Outage

Our internet was down yesterday. I was all set to blog too. Oh well. These things happen. I watched an episode of "House" instead.

Let's see...so Jason is home now. Got back Friday afternoon as planned. He told me the wrong store to pick him up at but I'm a genius and realized there wasn't a bus stop there and was able to follow his bus to the proper store. Goob. And he had stuff for the boys:




Dalton got a cute new hat:


Easton got a cool "exploring" tool:


Saturday morning I had to take my mom to the airport to go get Lauren in California...she's coming home!!! Saturday evening we went out to dinner. I have to thank AJ for planting the hibachi idea in my head. It sounded delish and we hadn't taken the boys to a place like that yet. It was time! The boys loved it and the others at our table were entertained by Easton. When the chef first lit the table on fire Easton exclaimed, "I don't believe it!!!" Later he made an onion volcano and he went, "I don't believe it either!!!" He got lots of laughs. Jason was the only one of the 9 people at our table that was able to catch a piece of food in his mouth, flipped by the chef and Easton cheered loudly for him which was super cute. Then we tried flipping a piece of broccoli to Easton--he didn't catch it but did eat a few pieces of it. Other than his hibachi broccoli we brought the boys dinner from home.

Sunday we had church. Both boys did really well for drop off. I was happy. And in the late afternoon I headed down for a Mom's Night Out with a few friends: Max's mom, Rachel's mom, Wee Laddie's mom, Lily's mom, and one new-to-us mom who has older kids than ours:

Our new friend left before we took this picture.

We met for dinner and wine. Only I couldn't have any wine. And I soooooooo wanted some. Pregnancy really heightens one's sense of smell and their wines smelled delicious. Plus, it's strange but my only real craving this pregnancy has been for beer. Only 6 more months, only 6 more months. Good pal that she is, Susannah (Max's mom) offered to have a glass for me:

(Both those pictures were stolen from O-tay (Wee Laddie's mom))

It was a fun time and I got home nice and late. The boys stayed home and Jason took them to pick up a pizza for dinner. I guess Easton ate really well for him! And this picture was waiting on the camera from my time away:


Starting early Monday morning (5ish), Dalton started waking up crying about every 20 minutes. That was a little odd for him. Then once he was up he was pulling on his ear, crying, and saying, "Owie". I decided a visit to the doctor was in order. Even though we'd woken up to this once again:


The roads were fine and we went to get our doughnuts. I made D's appointment in the drive-through line. :) Multi-tasking at it's finest, people. We came home to eat and in the car Dalton started gagging a lot. I figured it was from all his post-nasal drip since we've all had colds. As soon as we walked into the house he started puking. He puked about 3 different times in maybe 6 minutes. Then he was done. Even ate breakfast.

I got the boys dressed after we ate and we headed up to our new doctor who confirmed Dalton's got an ear infection. You may remember he was treated for an EI before, but it was later confirmed he never really had one. So this is his first ear infection. As a matter of fact, Easton's never had one ever so it's my first ear infection as a mom. 4+ years, 2 kids, not too shabby. I'm actually shocked they don't have problems with their ears as I had horrible ears as a wee one. They still give me grief.

Anyway, the doctor recommends not necessarily treating the ear infection right away to see if it gets better on it's own, just managing the pain really. So I was perfectly happy with that and Dalton was fine the rest of the day. He had Motrin before his attempted nap and again before bed and we had zero issues. This morning he said "Ow" and yanked on his ear when we walked out in the cold to walk Bubba into school but other than that he hasn't mentioned it and I haven't given him anything. I hope it's getting better without antibiotics, sure seems like it is.

So you may have picked up on that "attempted" nap yesterday. He slept for maybe 15 minutes in the car on the way back from the doctor yesterday morning and I guess he was set for the rest of the day. I put him in his bed but he just talked and played and took his diaper off twice. When I walked in to get him up from trying for two hours Easton pointed out some poop on the floor. Dalton told me, "I spilled balls, diaper". So yeah, those were turds, son. Not balls. Ick. What were we thinking getting new carpet with soon-to-be three small kids and a cat who decided yesterday was a fun day to throw up since I was already cleaning up Dalton's yak?!?! Ugh!

Actually it wasn't too bad.

After we were done with quiet time we went to Wal-Mart. Easton had snack day today at school. That's about all that's going on here. Hope things are well with the rest of you.

Still Snowed In

Today I am 16 weeks 4 days...this is significant to me in this pregnancy and Dalton's because it was the halfway mark for my pregnancy with Easton. I feel fairly confident I'll make it further than that again. In fact, if I have my way, this will be the longest of all my pregnancies. Dalton's ended at 38 weeks and 6 days. I'm so strange I've got my fingers crossed to go to about 39 1/2 weeks this time. Who wants longer pregnancies, besides me and other mom's of preemies? :)

Anyway...sounds like Jason is coming home today. At first the airlines told them they wouldn't be able to get a flight until Sunday or Monday!!! But then they got creative and they left at 7 something this a.m. (meaning they woke up at 4:45!) to fly to San Fran first for a few hours. It looks like there's still a significant amount of delays and cancelled flights out at the airport so I'm nervous. And J's phone died so if he wants me to come pick him up at the bus stop (and I know he does) I'm not exactly sure when to meet him there. Eek!

I'm just hoping he'll be home for dinner. I've got his favorite chicken enchiladas ready to go when he gets here. And the house is all clean but who knows how long I can keep it that way? Actually it's easier to keep things clean with Jason gone.

So, for the second half of our snow day, we did make our Krispie treats. Easton was itching to get started and I told him, "Hold on, I have to finish this (something with Dalton) and then go potty and then we'll make 'em." A second later he informs me, "I got everything ready for you" and I see he's put the toilet lid up and the sink is already running with warm water for me to wash up afterwards. Cutie pie.

Finally!




We didn't eat them right away. We played in Easton's room for a long time then came back down to look out at the snow:


Then we had some dinner followed by our Rice Krispie treats:




Easton got to sleep in my bed again. Except this time he woke up coughing and coughing sometime before 6:00 a.m. Which means I was up too. He laid there fairly quietly but never did go back to sleep so that made me grumpy. And with his mood today it's fairly evident that he didn't get enough sleep either. Grrrr.

But he did figure out a new way to climb in the house today:


I know I see him do stuff like that all the time, but still it amazes me how strong my little guy is.

Seriously.

Snow Day!!!

First things first, though. My OB visit yesterday. It went just fine. Suprisingly a doctor was there. And the boys did really well. I brought a sucker for each of them to keep them quiet once the doctor came in the room. I've done that before and it works out well. It's rare that I have to bring both kids to the doctor with me but you do what you gotta do.

So, yeah, still haven't gained any weight. The doctor said they won't worry unless I get to 28 weeks without having gained. I've been getting a lot of headaches so I was worrying about my blood pressure a tad but it was just fine at 102/60. The doctor chatted with me a bit about my nausea. She said, "I'm sorry you're feeling so crappy...it'll get better--I don't know when, might not be till the baby is born. That's unfortunately what it's looking like." Oh nooooooooooooo!

My uterus is growing right on track and then we finally got to listen to the heartbeat. Easton hadn't heard it yet this go-round and he could hear all kinds of swishing noises before the doc could track down little Fin. Easton asked, "What's he doing in there?" and the doctor told him the baby was swimming all around. This struck Easton as very amusing and his giggles at that thought were so contagious that the doctor and I were laughing right along. But eventually we got Fin to hold still and the heart rate was "140s". Slowing down to boy territory again. If you believe that stuff...

And I don't.

Otherwise I should have two girls upstairs right now.

And I don't.

Anyway, Easton always refers to "Wabie" as a boy. Always. But when I flat out asked him yesterday whether he thought it was a boy or a girl he said, "I don't know. Maybe we should ask Jesus." :)

Being on our own again I picked up some Applebee's Curbside to Go for myself and the boys wanted PB&J. Bedtime went rather smoothly...Easton was in my bed again and Dalton took just a bit to calm down. Then I broke out my free Redbox: Rachel Getting Married. Meh.

The weathermen were forecasting piles of snow for us. 4-8 inches through the night with another 4-8 through the course of the day. Lovely. The boys and I were wanting to go to the Children's Museum and when I woke up and could still see the grass with nary a flake falling from the sky I thought it sounded quite do-able. However, after TV shows and my shower we came down to at least 3 inches on the ground with snow dumping from the skies. Yikes!

I told Easton we would "test" the roads by heading to the grocery store and if they didn't seem safe enough we'd have to do the museum another day. We got a few essentials from the grocery store: doughnuts and Rice Krispie treat fixin's among a few other things. And indeed we decided the museum would have to be a no-go for today.

Instead we prepared ourselves for a snow day at home. The boys first watched a movie while I did a little cleaning. Then I whipped up a little peanut butter play dough and we did that for awhile:




I didn't know we'd be doing edible playdoh so I didn't run our "tools" through the dishwasher or anything. Instead we had to improvise with forks and spoons:




We had fun:


And the best part is, it's tasty too!


Pudding painting and now this? Dalton will be so confused when he starts to do non-edible art. :)

Easton wanted to warm up with some hot chocolate after that. Dalton had a drinkable yogurt:


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Believe it or not, by then it was naptime so I got Diddlebug down and then Easton and I made a bunny puppet:


Now he's having his quiet time too.

I'm going to go sit down with my newly delivered Netflix: Twilight. Edward is calling my name. And I may have to tune into the news to see what's happening at the airport. Jason is supposed to be flying home tonight. Even if he lands, the really sad part is he took a bus to the airport, not his car. So he'll have to take a bus home and then supposedly walk from the stop to our house in all this snow!!! He doesn't even land till after 10 pm tonight...I'd go get him but with the weather and sleeping boys I'm just not sure what to do. Guess we'll first see if his plane is even expected to come in. What adventures!

Pray for him to stay safe, whatever ends up happening!

ETA: Oops, flight was cancelled. Oh no. I think he might be out of gamblin' money. :)

On My Own

Jason is in Vegas now doing his presentation for his Master's. It's today. So he got there yesterday and is staying through tomorrow, meaning the boys and I are on our own.

It's going just fine. Easton had a really rough afternoon starting with his misbehaving during quiet time and getting worse for a bit till he was screaming so much he puked. I was not feeling my most patient with him. And he's lucky he puked on his bed and not the new carpet. Rather, I'm lucky. After awhile spent calming down in his room he finally rejoined us and we had a much better afternoon and evening.

Although because he'd puked he decided he was sick and when I asked what he wanted for dinner he said, "I might throw up in my dinner." Then later when I said, "Shouldn't we do something special for dinner?" he said, "Yeah!!!" and I asked, "What!?!?" and he said, "Recycle!" Huh?

We had boxed mac and cheese instead.

Followed by pudding painting! Easton doesn't like pudding but still had fun getting plenty messy before bath time:






It's not so much about the 'art' as it is the mess:


Then it was off to baths and we read books in my bed for a bit. Easton got to join me in my bed for the night. Dalton, no way. He's not cut out for sleeping in a bed just yet. But Easton did great. I tucked him in and left him to fall asleep on his own like he's used to. When we try to stay with him to fall asleep (like J during their "camp outs") he's just too excited and won't go to sleep.

He's a little snorer and he woke up this morning at about 6:20 but he laid there pretty quietly till 7:00. However, he's now got a cold and was experimenting with trying to breathe through his nose the entire 40 minutes. But otherwise it was lovely and he'll be joining me again tonight.

When we all got up and ready for the day the boys watched Toy Story 2. Dalton's always asking to watch Woody shows. After it was over we headed to Sam's Club for a few things and then back home for lunch.

Later this afternoon I've got my 16 week OB visit. Hope it goes well!

Spring Break

Easton's school is on break so no school today. Instead we decided to do something fun: breakfast at Panera followed by Chuck E. Cheese!

We all got ready and drove up there. The Panera is in the same parking log with Chuck E's. But the boys wanted Pop Tarts so I brought that for them and got a baked egg souffle for myself. Yum! They both shared a booth seat on one side of the table, no high chair for D. My how they're growing up:





Dalton's arm(s) around E's neck were something he did all on his own when he saw the camera come out. Very cute.

Then it was off to play. I had some leftover tokens from previous trips and once those were gone we were done. The boys had a blast, we were there for maybe an hour. Normally when we show up at 9:30 in the morning we're the only ones there but as it's Spring Break, there was quite a few folks already there.

My boys:




We ended up with 40 tickets when we were done and each boy got a mini Tootsie Pop, Easton chose a small rubber spider and Dalton wanted "Cheese stickers". He decorated each hand and his head with them:


We stopped by the library briefly after that but couldn't stay long because Easton was testing me. Again, because of Spring Break, it was quite crowded and I'd asked him to stop throwing his stuffed frog into the air...but the second he did it again we left. Screaming. Good times.

He's giving me a hard time for his quiet time right now, the punk, so I'd best be going to deal with that.

Toodles!

Maternity Monday

Weekend's over. Darn. Weekend's are nice, and this last one especially was.

First I have a picture leftover from the boys' impromptu picnic on Thursday. They wanted to feed the birds but later plopped down in the grass with their bowlful of tortilla bits for a little snack...you can see the bagel crumbs on the log behind them, though:


And dinner Friday night to kick off the weekend. What better way than with your brother's feet in your face?

Saturday morning I got to sleep in a bit. With the solo kid duty earlier in the week at my mom's and then later this week Jason has to go away to present his Master's project and I'll be solo parenting again, I was asking for a little break to sleep in and some "me time" later. So I slept till about 8:30, sad that 8:30 is considered sleeping in for us anymore, but it is. And it was nice. I woke up to the boys playing "silly ball" in the finished basement. I'll share video another time.

After we all ate breakfast together, Easton and I headed off to the birthday party I thought was last weekend. We got there and all the other parents were gone. No one was staying. The birthday mom told me it was up to me, but that most parents couldn't wait to take off. Easton seemed like he was going to do okay so I told him to look around and notice there were no other parents and I'd be back to get him when the party was over. He was just fine with the idea so I left and came back home for a bit. His first birthday party without me there!

I guess it was a fun party, they had a clown that did face painting, balloon animals, and then a funny show. They served hot dogs for lunch and of course our vegetarian didn't eat any. He didn't eat his grapes either because they didn't take the "tims" off. Apparently, it was on the stem still, confusing our poor sheltered boy. He ate a bit of cupcake though and still managed to come away looking like he'd had a blast:


We came home to serve him his actual lunch then the boys went into their rooms and I went off for some "me time" which was really just spent doing Easter baskety things. I got bored and just wanted to come home and read in peace so that's what I did with the rest of my time till the boys started coming in to climb and jump and snuggle. So we went down to join Daddy in front of LSU's basketball game and I drew with marker on Diddles' face:


He didn't want to pose:


LSU lost so then we decided on a picnic since it was such a beautiful day. We made dinner for the boys and Jason and I got Subway (which I often don't like) and we headed to a nearby park:








Sunday morning was church, of course. Dalton woke up while I was in the shower and Jason went in to find him wearing his shirt like this:

Goof!

Dalton did great getting dropped off for church, he walked right in happily. Easton was another story but we're gonna keep making him go to Sunday School just like he has to keep going to regular preschool. He's always having a blast by the time we come get him from either place so we're fine with it.

Right after church we drove down to my mom's. A neighborhood school was doing a fundraiser involving a set-menu lunch at Outback and she treated us to that which was lovely! Then she watched the boys for about 3 hours for us so we could have a little date. We didn't have a plan. We keep going to movies because we can't ever come up with much else on our dates so this time we headed to the Container Store (basement stuff), the mall (J needs new sunglasses), and then since neither of us really likes to shop we went to Dave & Buster's for a bit. Jason did so well at "Chip Away" (typically my game) that he got 340 tickets from just one round!


Turns out we have 5000 tickets on that card and browsed the "shop" for something for the boys but, again, we don't like to shop and didn't walk away with anything. We headed over to get the boys after that and drove back home. Dalton fell asleep on the way, he'd refused to nap at Gramoo's. I looked back and found E holding his sleeping brother's hand:


Today is Monday now and I'm officially 16 weeks. I'm also wearing a maternity shirt for the first time:


I was hoping to hold out till April for such measures but really, I have a belly, might as well look pregnant now instead of just fat. I'm just afraid that now that I'm in maternity wear I'll start getting the "you look like you're about to pop" comments I dread. I'm not even halfway along yet, too early for the "but you're so big!" comments. And in my opinion, maternity clothes make you look bigger than you are. Here is my point. With maternity shirt:


Bare belly:


See, the shirt makes me look bigger, doesn't it? Please say it does. ;)

No one has yet asked me about my belly this pregnancy. That's good. But, I also haven't been anywhere in my (actually Kelli's!) maternity shirt yet. For doughnuts this morning we did the drive through and then I laid around on the couch feeling icky while the boys watched movies. I plan to go out later today. Fingers crossed that no one is rude about the size of my stomach. The thing that sucks is it's not the baby. I can feel where my uterus is and I guess it's just squishing everything up, making my belly pop out, but it's not baby. Plus I don't feel the baby move yet so walking around with my hand on my belly would feel dumb. I'd just be rubbing intestines which is quite sad, really.

Maybe I'll switch back to my regular shirts till I feel movement? :)

The Latest with Lauren

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So as most of you know by now, Lauren has been out in Hollywood since the beginning of the year at a professional make-up school. She went out all by her lonesome, not knowing anyone or even her way around. I knew that being away in California would help my baby sister grow up. I did not think it would turn her into someone I would no longer recognize...
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If it weren't for the nose ring and nail polish (and that fact that it's on her Facebook page) I would honestly have no idea this is our little Loé:


She really has grown up while she's out there and she's certainly made some new friends...

...like Lash Lady:


Ol' Penis Nose:


Gene Simmons:

(That was an homage to my KISS fan hubby, isn't she sweet?)

Some bearded gals: (Lauren is in the middle)


And Scary No Ears Head Wound Monster:

(How amazing is this above picture, by the way???? Holy crap!!!)

In all seriousness there are 7 or 8 girls in the program with her. I thought it was crazy when she told me one girl was named Georgette and another named Carol...the names of my mother-in-law and step-mother-in-law! Not to mention, those names aren't exactly common amongst the 20-something crowd. Fun!

One of her best pals is named Leslie. She's closer in age to me than she is to Lauren:




I believe Leslie is going to be staying out there when the program is over trying to find work. The girls are already certified as "Professional Make-Up Artists" as "beauty" was the first class they did. They finished that and got those "diplomas" on the Friday we were out there visiting, actually. After beauty they're now doing "special effects" and some of what she's doing and has learned just blows me away, obviously you saw some of the amazing work above...

But wait there's more...

They learned how to do bald caps:

Seriously, how good does that look??? I'm even more amazed by it when I heard that my sister whom I love dearly has such a big head that a "large" wouldn't fit...no, they had to glue two caps together for her noggin. :) Then, as an added bonus, the class did Lauren first and then broke for lunch so she went out to eat looking like that with all the rest of the girls looking normal. She said she'd put on her hoodie and thought maybe she could pass for a boy, but she forgot about her basoomas. Hee hee hee.

And they didn't just learn how to "remove" hair...they learned to add it too--this is a beard Lauren did:


They've made themselves into vampires:




Lauren made herself into her favorite animal:


She sculpted the nose herself (and Ol' Penis Nose made her own) but someone else would put your new nose on you:


They've done burns and flesh wounds:




Corpses:

(Her teacher remarked how inappropriate it was that she was wearing a Chris Benoit shirt that day--he's a dead wrestler for you normal people that might not know that.)

Lauren's pal made her into an "Ice Princess":




And with that same "ice" technique, Lauren made her pal look like she was freezing in the North Atlantic after going down on the Titanic:


How cool is all that?!?!?

I've got a couple more of my beautiful sister:






I'm so proud of her! She's almost done and will be moving home soon. I'm not sure what her plans are once she gets back and I'm pretty sure she plans to move back out to California someday. I think it's super cool to see all she's done but the boys and I will certainly be glad to have her back for a bit!!!

And Lauren, if you're reading feel free to set me straight on anything in my comments. Or via nasty email on our Blackberries. Love you!