Easter - Part II

Needing to update my virtual scrapbook, but oh so very behind.
Easter at my house (on Saturday - which was weird) was nice. We had about 30 relatives over for a little feast and an Easter Egg Hunt. My "DIVA hunter" got the hang of it this time around and actually picked up a few eggs, however she did not leave a three foot radius and once those eggs were all picked up - she was DONE!!!







and I love this picture of my brother holding CiCi. She does not go to men - at all. We have no idea what made her decide to cuddle in my brother's arms So very sweet!!!

Easter Eggstravaganza

While I prepared to have family members over to our house to celebrate Easter, DH took the crew to an amazing Easter Egg Hunt/Lunch/Fest. They had a ball. Hunted eggs, enjoyed the petting zoo, jumped on the contraption below???, ate, and STAYED OUT OF MOMMY'S WAY :)












Apparently CiCi was not so sure about the whole Easter Egg Hunting Game. She did understand that she was supposed to find the eggs. Once found, she would point and say "get it, get it". She absolutely would not get it herself. DH also said she had a small following. Her "following" made her pretty uneasy. They even realized they made her nervous and would say it out loud, but apparently could not pull themselves away from her. We are a bit conspicuous, I would say... at least so far it has all been in a very good, positive way.

Egg Decorating

Snow........ I'm playing catch up with my pictures!

So the snow day was two weeks ago.
I am just finding the time and energy to post...
but since this blog is my virtual scrapbook, I could not pass this one up.

I've heard of burying your brother in sand - which sounds perfectly miserable to me...
but to want him to bury you in snow - insanity!!!!

St. Patrick's Day

And I promise her sippy was not filled with green beer...

Bizarre 10 Minutes

So Kenz is zerberting Arby when all of the sudden he screams - I'm bleeding. I look over and blood is gushing from his nose. I yell at my DH to run and get some tissue while Kenz is holding his nose and I have my hands cupped to catch any extra. My DH runs to get the tissue and doesn't come back. As I scream for him to HURRY, I hear him say I'm hurt. Kenz and I run to the bathroom to find daddy lying flat on the bathroom floor. He slipped in a puddle of water left over from Kenz' shower. I see a pool of blood on the bathroom floor and can't figure out where it is coming from. Apparently, DH somehow busted his elbow although it was not hurting - his back was hurting quite a bit. He is fine now, but I think he'll be pretty sore in the morning. It took us about ten minutes to get Kenz' nose to stop bleeding and we ended up with some blood stains on the carpet from our run to the bathroom to help daddy. It feels pretty much like we just visited bizzaro world.

Remember When, She's at it Again....

Remember when CiCi was waking up in the middle of the night, happy as can be and having her own little party. Well she did it again. I am praying that it is daylights savings time that did it to her, but two nights ago she slept from 8:30 until 1:00 and then we could not get her back to sleep. We tried everything. DH even drove her around for a while, but he said she kept jabbering away completely oblivious to the fact that he was trying to lull her asleep. When he pulled back in the garage, he decided to turn on a movie for her and he sat (slept) in the car with her while she watched a movie. Still not falling asleep we just brought her inside and let her play until she finally crashed on the floor around 7:30 AM and slept until 10:00 AM. Not much of a crash in my opinion. So I just decided I would enjoy a great nap from her. NOPE. She took a 45 minute nap. Then last night while I was cooking dinner and she was sitting in her high chair eating pieces of cheese and crackers, she fell asleep.



I thought at this point she was out for the night, but again she woke up after 45 minutes. Fortunately she went to bed at her normal time, woke up at her normal time and is so far taking a good normal nap.

Pointing out a Cool Link

On the left side of my blog under Enrichment you will see a link for RV School. This link takes you on the adventures of a family that has decided to trade it all in for life on the road with their two boys for 18 months. They have spent much time mapping out their stops and making lesson plans to correspond. This is my dream. I have talked about doing this so many times (but my DH's job doesn't make this possible and you know that money thing is a factor)
So, instead, we will live vicariously through this family. We will check out the books they are reading and their lesson plans and we will read all about their adventures. How cool is this???

Nine Years Ago Today

my first child was born. Early. During Spring Break. I was a teacher and this was the week I had planned to do everything that I needed to do in order to prepare for my baby. Arby had different plans. On the Sunday night that was to begin my spring break, my water broke in the middle of the night. Let's just say that I was not really sure if my water had broken. I called the hospital and they said come on in -they could do a test that would let me know. We left the house without a single packed item. I didn't even bring my purse. We laughed and joked about "my situation" the entire way to the hospital. I assumed they would send me home. They did not. I was five weeks early.
My delivery was relatively easy, but we were completely unprepared for what would happen next.
As soon as Arby was born it seemed as if the entire nursing staff entered my room. We heard them say he was "singing". We didn't know this was bad. I put my hands on him for about two seconds and then he was whisked away to the NICU. I did not get to hold my sweet baby until he was seven days old. He was diagnosed with hyaline membrane disease. He was hooked up to every imaginable contraption. Between Tuesday night and Wednesday morning he crashed. He was jaundiced, he needed a blood transfusion, he needed more help breathing requiring a endotracheal tube, he needed a line that went into his stomach to feed him and they also discovered that he had contracted Group B strep from me. This can cause pneumonia or meningitis. They were treating him and hoping for the best(pneumonia).
My son was such a little fighter. At six pounds six ounces, he was the second biggest baby in the NICU, but he was in the worst shape (we did not realize how truly sick he was and how much he had to fight to live until days later - in our case I believe ignorance was bliss).
Needless to say this was not the spring break I had imagined. Nor the birth.
Every year his birthday coincides with spring break. We usually schedule his party a week or two later. A minor (yet annoying to Arby) detail in the whole scheme of things. To me his spring break birthday is now a reminder of that which is really important. Not all the stuff we buy and plans we make(like all that I had not done that I would have been so concerned about had Arby been born healthy) but the life itself - his life - and how very fortunate we are that he eventually left that hospital a healthy little boy.

It is amazing how much technology has changed since Arby was born!!! I do not know how to scan pictures and in the days before digital the first pictures I ever saved to a disk did not happen until Arby was almost one so I am unable to post any hospital pics of Arby, however I thought it would be fun to post a few pictures of my very obviously healthy Arby at age ONE.

Finally... A Snow Day

I took Arby home after snack and picked Kenz up as well since the snow was heading our way and they were closing schools early. We then headed to Target to pick out some essential winter wear. Not much of that to be found in March. But CiCi got some new little boots and the boys got some long underwear and we deemed ourselves ready for the snow!!! WooHoo!!! Our one day of snow a year is quite an exciting event.
The boys had a ball in the snow!!!!




They most enjoyed pounding each other with snowballs, which I really don't get.



They also had fun making snow angels.






CiCi wasn't so sure about it all. She definitely did not like all the layers of clothes I put on her. She was quite ticked before I ever even got her outside. And I forgot to buy her gloves so I put socks on her hands and she really did not appreciate that!!!






Once outside she was entertained by the snow for a little while.





It took me some time to convince CiCi to walk off of the driveway and on to the grass and she had trouble walking on the snow in her big boots.



Daddy got home in time to see her all bundled up.



And then, in no uncertain terms, she let us know she was done. DONE!!! I wish I would have taken a picture of her DONE tantrum, but I just scooped her up and took
her to the bathtub to get warm.
Once the boys finished playing they put on some PJ's to get warm. Kenz looked so sweet in his PJ's I just had to take a pic.