yogalates

Right now: it's raining.
Ava and I are on the floor doing yogalates.
The boys are doing "push-ups".
It is so dark in here I had to use the flash to take this picture.
While I took the picture the boys dumped out the basket of
laundry that took TWO hours to fold last night.
Time for us all to get out of the house.

RAIN

RAIN RAIN GO AWAY!
My stir-crazy boys want to go out and play.

p.s. can you see my lovely oranges and lemons?
...only a few more weeks til we plant
a garden in this mud.

can i just say...

That I LOVE having a girl! It makes me so happy.

dinosaurs

Max goes through phases. For most of his life he has been in a car/truck phase. They were all he could think or talk about. During this phase could identify just about every vehicle, and would dialogue everything he saw on the road. "That blue big rig is a freightliner mommy...no, I think it's a peterbuilt." Usually I couldn't even confirm his assertions. He knows more about cars than I do.
He is currently going through a dinosaur phase. He crawls around all day long and roars, saying "I'm a corythosaurus!" Or, "I'm a triceratops, because I have three horns!" Thanks to books and t.v. shows he is becoming a dinosaur expert. Thanks to lucky thrifting expeditions, he has plenty of dinosaur books and toys to play with. I love to hear the dinosaur conversations he comes up while playing with his toys. I don't love it when he refuses to eat lunch and feeds it to his dinosaurs instead.

mischief

Having a two-year-old = lots of mischief + messes.
Once I was complaining to my wise friend about all the messes I clean up everyday. She explained to me that messes are EASY. You can clean up messes. She had just cleaned up a food coloring explosion in her kitchen created by her two-year-old. No big deal. Then, with a worried face she told me-- "My twelve-year-old has a girlfriend. You can't clean up a girlfriend."

I think about that conversation a lot. When Ian stormed into my bathroom this morning, unscrewed and dumped out the turtle food, and took all my clothes off the drying rack and threw them on the floor...it was no big deal. Very clean-up-able.

p.s. Max, who became extremely worried that our turtle would have nothing to eat, took it upon himself to clean the food up, pellet by pellet...only to have Ian dump it all out again when he was finished.

documenting our day

J-P gave me these flowers on Monday. He is not generally the type to surprise me with flowers, but he anticipated (for reasons I can't disclose on a public blog) that this would be a very difficult week for me. Yesterday, however, was perfectly pleasant. Today, not so much. Not quite as bad as this day, but pretty close.

The day started way before the sun came up (as always). I don't remember much after that but here is a rundown of what I can remember (majority of these pertain to ian):

ejections of stomach flu by-products (both varieties): 7
baths taken: 4
necessary wardrobe changes: 6
trips to the store (with all three in tow): 2
trips to the pediatrician:1
semi-severe allergic reactions: 1
screaming and crying : endless amounts
loads of laundry: lost count

Ian had a rough day. He has had three bouts with the stomach flu in the past couple of weeks, each 5-7 days apart. After today it occurred to me that it might not be the stomach flu. The pediatrician office agreed and requested I bring him in to be checked. They sent me home with supplies to take stool samples over the next few days (so excited about that) so we can start ruling things out. The doc also put Ian on a strict diet of watered-down gatorade, jello, popsicles, and saltines.

Since I never buy those sorts of things, we headed to the store on the way home. Things went downhill fast. Ava was screaming inconsolably (i forget her second dose of zantac). I jiggled her with one arm and used the other to maneuver the ginormous "car" cart. In my mad dash through the store I ran into a friend I used to teach with. In the 30 seconds it took to say hello and introduce her to ava, max climbed out of the car, swiped a box of chocolate chip cookies (thankfully not peanut butter), and the boys had stuffed about three each into their mouths before I realized what happened.

I knew an allergic reaction (max) and another vomiting episode (ian) were inevitable as a result of said cookie consumption, so I booked it through the store. By the time I got to the self check-out (shortest line) all three were screaming hysterically. EVERYONE was staring at me. After strapping everyone into their car seats, I went to start the car and the keys were gone. NOWHERE to be found. I searched frantically for about 10 minutes, the screaming intensifying all the while. Finally found them under the base of ava's car seat (seriously?). By the time we got home max's lips were swollen and he was itching and screaming. He wouldn't take benadryl willingly so I had to pin him down and shoot it down his throat with a syringe. Not an easy task. Meanwhile, Ava was still screaming in the background and Ian had begun spewing gatorade tinted vomit like a garden hose.

I could go on...but you get the picture. They are all sleeping peacefully now. I am catching my breath and willing myself to go take a shower. But mostly, I am marveling at the fact that even after a day like today, I love my children. Even more than I did yesterday.

documenting the afternoon

At this very moment:

Max is watching 'the dinosaur train' and playing with piles of matchbox cars.
Ian is sleeping peacefully.
Ava is rolling around on the floor (well, rolling from side to side).
I am making empanadas and snacking on green olives.
I am also up to my elbows in fabric yo-yos working on a project for Ava's room.

The windows are open and it is 77 degrees outside. A perfectly pleasant day. The whole stay-at-home-mom gig I have rocks. Best job ever.

talking & laughing

Newborn coos and laughter are my favorite sounds. There is nothing better.

p.s. for those that wanted to know how to make those headbands, i don't know what i'm doing well enough to make a tutorial. i just googled "fabric rosette tutorial" and read a bunch of tutorials. THIS one is probably the easiest. I sewed mine together instead of using glue.

evidence

Here is photo proof that we have a very busy two-year-old residing with us. He pulls off most of his shenanigans while I am nursing the baby. The other day I heard a jingling noise. I looked over to see Ian standing on the table and the chandelier swinging like a pendulum. It was swinging so high that it almost hit the ceiling. We are lucky it didn't knock him off.

My biggest goal of motherhood is to never buy a can of formula. So far it's been an easy goal to keep. I feel like it makes up for other areas I might lack in. If I don't read to my children enough, at least they will have better eyesight and the higher IQ that breastfeeding provides. If I don't provide meals that are as healthy as they should be, at least my children will have immune systems that are bolstered by extended breastfeeding (although the 17 months Ian got did not prevent the stomach flu this week). I'm just glad I set this goal with child number one. There is no turning back now. I just have lots of messes to clean after I'm finished. But it's all worth it. I hope.

two months

Our sweet little lady is two months old. She is sweeter than sugar thanks to a little thing called zantac. Miracle drug. I only wish I would have figured out what was ailing her sooner. I assumed that only babies that spit up a lot had reflux. And spit up she does not.

Proof:

weight- 13 lbs 5 oz (this is double the weight of her first well-check appt.)
height-24 1/4 inches
head- 15.5

She is in the 95th percentile for height, and the 90th for weight. She is wearing 9 and 12 month clothes, and I am sighing in disbelief at her growth rate. She is sleeping much better and has the sweetest smiles and cutest expressions. She sucks on her fist but will have NOTHING to do with a pacifier.
p.s. she did her first real hard belly laugh today. completely adorable.