New Years Eve

I can't believe that it's almost time for a new year to start already. This year has just been crazy...between work being nuts, all the kids sports/activities and having Adam the year has just flown by. I wonder what the new year has in store for us?

I hope everyone has a safe and happy new year!

Merry Christmas!

May everyone remember the reason for the Christmas. God Bless!

New Glasses

Keari has decided to follow in her siblings footsteps by being the latest one identified as needing glasses. So far, 5 of the 8 need them. Here's a picture that was taken of her in the drs office. Soon after the picture was taken, she broke the sample glasses by snapping off one of the arms. I don't think this is a good beginning to her glasses experience.

Happy Thanksgiving

Last Week

This is my last week off from work. Hard to believe it's been almost 12 wks already. I'm not looking forward to going back into the office. While I do miss the interaction with some of my coworkers, I really hate the travel but what are you going to do...it pays the bills. Of course, my hubby would say that I can do my job from home so there's no reason to go into the office at all. This is mostly true but the VP, while a very nice guy and would do just about anything for me, is still of the old school that thinks you need to be physically in the office to do your work. I was able to get another day at home out of him so I'm up to 2 at home and 3 in the office so I can't complain too much. That's more than most people in my department get. But I sure will miss being able to get up at a reasonable hour, roll out of bed and walk to my computer to go to work. Next week, I'll be up at the crack of dawn trying to stay awake while driving in the dark again. Blech!

Tag...I'm it...

Martha so kindly tagged me...

The rules…
Find the 6th folder in your pictures directory and post the 6th photo in it.

So here are the instructions:

* Go to your sixth picture folder then pick your sixth picture
* Pray that you remember the details ;)
* Post it on your blog
* Tag 5 others, leave a comment to let them know they’ve been tagged


This is a picture of some of our chickens playing around in the leaves. They are silly creatures.

I'm tagging Bre, Margaret, Meari, Tammy & Velda.

Ferris Wheel

One of the gifts that Tyler got for his b'day yesterday was a Kinex Ferris Wheel kit. He spent most of last night and this morning putting it together. He loves these kinds of things. The only problem with them is that he tends to obsess over them and wants to put them together all in one sitting. He does are really great job with following the directions and only needed minimal help with this one. He was especially excited when he put the batteries in, turned it on and it started spinning.

9 Yrs Ago

Hard to believe that 9 years ago, I walked into the hospital as a mom of 3 and within the span of 7 minutes later that afternoon I became a mom of 5. We like to tease Tyler that he kicked his brother out so that the could have all the room for himself...he turned breach and didn't want to come out once his brother was delivered, hence the reason for the 7 minute delay. He really hates that story!

They started out like this...


And are now this...


Happy 9th Birthday Taylor & Tyler!

Dreary Day

Just a grey, blecky day here. And of course I had to go out in it today because I had an eye appt this afternoon. The good news there is that I didn't need new glasses. My prescription barely changed in the last two years. Yay!

I've been working from home one day a week for about a year now and my boss just approved me to work another one from home. I guess her boss wasn't too thrilled about it but was willing to give it a try. He's from the old school where he thinks everyone should be in the office all the time. I can do just about everything I need to from home and most meetings I attend are by conference call so the need to be physically in the office is minimal. Maybe one of these days he'll get more telecommuting friendly but for now I'll be happy with the two days.

Veteran's Day

Drs Appt

Adam had his 2 month checkup this morning. He's doing great...now weighs 13 lbs 12 oz and is 23 1/4 inches long. He ended up getting 4 shots and an oral vaccine today. Poor munchkin is a little cranky now. And it didn't help that one of the needles came off the syringe and got stuck in his leg. With all the vaccines that our kids have gotten, I have never seen that happen before. He sleeps 7-8 hrs a night...such a good baby which is such a switch from Keari who was up every couple of hours til she was almost a year old. He still has the hematoma on his head which the dr says has now calcified and will eventually smooth itself out...in about a years time. Guess he's going to be lopsided for awhile. And now he has a couple of hemangiomas on his head too. Those will eventually go away too but right now the poor guy is just a mess up there. LOL

Fall at the Mall

Connor, Kenzie and Taylor had a piano recital at the Annapolis Mall on Saturday. When that was finished, we then had to run to the soccer field for Connor & Kenzie's soccer games. At least the schedules allowed them to do both events...I hate when they have to chose between the two.

If you are interested in hearing them play, click here...Andy has clips posted on his blog although I took the video as he so kindly pointed out. ;)

Our Day Off

A few pics from our day at Terrapin Beach yesterday.

A Day Off

Since it was such a beautiful day today, Andy decided to let the kids have a day off of school. This picture shows how Connor spent some of his morning. LOL Actually, he was helping me out while I did a little work. After lunch, we all headed to Terrapin Beach and spent some time playing in the sand. What a gorgeous day to be outside! Hard to believe it's November and the temps are near 70 degrees.

We received Alex's first quarter report today. He did great...made 2nd Honors with 4 A's & 3 B's. It was touch and go for a while there with his Chemistry grade but he was able to squeak out a B. ;) Way to go Alex!

Last Lesson

Alex is off with his driving instructor getting his last lesson which, among other things, is teaching him parallel parking. That should be fun as most people don't enjoy parallel parking. I haven't done real parallel parking since I took my driving test umpteen years ago with a spot that was big enough to parallel park a limo in. LOL If I can't pull into a parallel parking spot, I don't park there. ;)

Alex had a pretty easy day schoolwise today. His class had a field trip to the National Gallery of Art in Washington, DC. On display there now is Jan Lievens: A Dutch Master Rediscovered. I'm sure he had a good time although I haven't heard about it yet since is instructor picked him almost as soon as he got home from school.

Election Day

I hope everyone that is able to vote did vote. I went in the afternoon and the polling place was pretty empty which was nice because then I could just run in, vote and still be home in time for Andy to leave to get Alex from school. This is definitely going to be a history making election, regardless of which party wins. Will be interesting to see the outcome.

Trick or Treat

The weather was beautiful for this years trick or treating. The kids had a wonderful time. We certainly had no need to worried about Keari going up to the doors to get her treats...she pushed people out of the way to get there. LOL Everyone thought she was the cutest thing in her bat costume. Of course there were a few times that we had to call the older ones back because the baby bat was trying to fly solo but for the most part we were able to keep track of all 11 kids (had 3 neighbor kids with us) without too much trouble. Here's a few pics of them...



And this is the mountain of candy that the kids came home with. What in the world are we supposed to do with it all??

Happy Halloween!

Birthday Gifts

I received a number of my b'day gifts early this. Since everyone was together for Adam's baptism, my parents and my in laws gave me my gifts then along with a small cake. I had to wait to get my gift from my family until my actual b'day, though...they weren't into the early gift giving. ;-) Besides money from my in laws and a pretty silver chain from my family, I also received these gifts...

Happy Birthday to me! =)

Kenzie and Bekah made this picture for me and taped it to my bedroom door.

Snow Clouds?

or just normal rain clouds? Either way, it looks pretty ominous outside. I think it's going to be one chilly night to be playing soccer. Connor has a makeup game tonight for the game that got rained out on Saturday. Glad it's Andy taking him and not me. I really hate cold weather.

Brr

What a difference a day makes. Yesterday we were outside in shorts enjoying a gorgeous day and today it's 42 degrees, cloudy, gray & drizzly. Glad we took advantage of the nice weather yesterday while we could.

Beautiful Day

Today was an absolutely gorgeous day. After oversleeping and missing getting the kids to Sunday school, I decided that there was no way I was letting them stay inside all day in front of the tv playing games. Alex, Connor, Bekah, Keari, Adam and I all headed to Terrapin Beach for a nice walk...the rest of the kids went with Andy to Virginia for Kenzie's softball tournament (her team ended up losing the first game 3-1 so they were done for the day but decided to stay to watch her old team play). Here's a few pics from our walk today. Pictures aren't the best because they are from my cell phone. I had my camera with me but the batteries decided to die just as I took the first picture.

Spirit Week

This past week was Spirit Week at Alex's school. They had a different dressup days planned for each day. What's nice about Alex going to such a small school is that just about everyone participates when they have events like this. Monday was Las Vegas Day and Alex dressed up as a Black Jack dealer. Tuesday was Color Day. Sophomores are yellow so the class all bought yellow sweatpants that have 2011 down the side. Alex also wore a yellow sweatshirt so he was very yellow that day. LOL Wednesday was Cowboy Day. Can you believe that not a single store around here had a cowboy hat as part of a halloween costume? I finally was able to find a kids foam cowboy hat that looked like the one in Toy Story. Alex was a good sport and wore it anyway.
Thursday was 70's Day. I dug out a green and yellow paisley shirt for him to wear with his jeans and bandana. I had a pink paisley shirt but he wouldn't go for that one. His spanish teacher really like the one that he wore which is the one I remembered to take a picture of. Friday was Blue & White Day which are the school colors. In addition to dressing up the also had events like tug of war, pep rally etc.
Friday night ended with a huge bonfire and Saturday was the Homecoming Dance. Alex didn't take anyone this year and it turns out he didn't even dance...he sat around and played black jack all night with a bunch of other kids. Too bad they were only playing with play money as it sounds like he was doing pretty well. ;)

A New Driver

Uh oh, Alex got his Learner's Permit today so he's the first of many new drivers in our family. I sure hope my nerves can take it. I think he looks entirely too happy about that little card he's holding. ;-)

Congested

I have been so congested these last few days. My head hurts, my eyes are scratchy and I just don't feel well in general. I think it's weather related...it's finally gotten cold here and every time there is a change in weather it totally screws up my head.

I went to an IEP meeting for Bekah's speak. It was with the school principle, speech teacher and head of the special ed department. They didn't discuss anything in the meeting that I didn't already know. Basically Bekah has articulation problems with certain letters and while she can say the letters by themselves, when they are in words, she substitutes other sounds for them. She's making improvement but it's slow going at the moment so her teacher is recommending that she continue with her twice a week independent sessions. We tried a couple of sessions with her in with a group of kids but it didn't go well. Her teacher thinks it's because the other kids were older than her and that she was intimidated. She's doing much better now that she's back to individual lessons.

They can make some stupid designs for humidifiers. I bought a new one last night because Adam is starting to sound congested. I set it up in our room and didn't think about it again until Andy came home from softball practice with Kenzie at which point they say that water has leaked out all over the floor. Now that's bad news since our room is carpeted and it was soaked. Talk about being pissed...and I was already feeling crappy so the last thing I wanted to do was to clean up a waterlogged carpet. An hour later, I finally get it dried out. I haven't a clue what happened to cause the humidifier to leak all over the place but this particular humidifier has slits all around the base with just a tiny reservoir to hold the water. If any water comes out of the reservoir it will immediately flow out the holes in the base. I didn't notice this design when I bought the humidifier otherwise I wouldn't have bought it. You can't even touch the thing without having water spill out. Stupid, stupid, stupid. Andy tried testing it to see if he could figure out why it leaked and the container that holds the water ended up breaking so needless to say it got returned this morning as a worthless piece of junk.

Interesting

I've seen many different types of alerts come through weatherbug for our area but I can't say that I've ever seen this alert before...

Baptism

Today was a beautiful day for Adam to be baptized. Weather was gorgeous even if it was a bit on the nippy side. Our whole family came over to witness his special day. He was so good during the ceremony...slept through most of it although he did open his eyes to check things out when the water was poured over his head. He decided that was okay and promptly went back to sleep. LOL
Alex and Kenzie are Adam's godparents and they were so excited. This is a picture of them laying their hands on his white garment. Click here to see more pics of the entire family on Andy's blog.

Cold

We have a service contract on our furnace that enables us to get it inspected each year and have any problems with the furnace itself fixed for just the cost of the contract...of course how many times is the problem with just the furnace?? We always schedule the service prior to it getting cold so that we know the furnace is in working order when we need it. We started this process last week when during that inspection it was discovered that the exhaust vent motor had burned out and needed to be replaced (one of those instances where the problem isn't with the furnace unit therefore not covered by the contract). This also meant that the inspection couldn't be totally completed because of the burned out motor. The part was ordered and they came on Tuesday to install it. As the guy was leaving after doing the repair, he commented on us being ready for the cold weather that was supposed to hit the end of this week. So I'm thinking everything is good but I should have known better. Andy turns on the furnace, or I should say, tries to turn on the furnace last night but nothing happens other than the vent coming on. So needless to say it was a chilly night with no heat here. Andy calls this morning for an emergency appt to get things fixed and after the furnace perplexes the workman for awhile, he is finally able to figure out that the problem is due to some broken wires in the furnace. So, I'm concluding that the last workman never actually tested the furnace after he installed the vent motor 3 days ago because there no way it would have worked with those broken wires. We always, always have problems with this furnace...no matter what we do, it just seems to want to work correctly and always takes multiple phone calls to the servicing company, almost always on an emergency basis, to get them to come out and fix it. The good news is that, for now at least, the furnance is working and we should all set for the 35 degree night we are expecting tonight.

And now I'm off to bed...it's been a long day of cleaning the house to get ready for Adam's baptism tomorrow and the houseful of people we will have. Still have a few odds and ends to do in the morning but the majority of stuff is done. Thank goodness.

Last Day

Today is my last day of paid maternity leave that my company offers. It's hard to believe that on Monday Adam will be 6 weeks old. This time went by so fast. Thankfully, I have leave of my own so I won't have to go back into the office until December 1 so I still have some time at home. It's sad to think that it's half over already though. Adam's doing great. He sleeps about 5-6 hrs at night now and he's starting to coo...that's always fun. I think he scares himself when he starts cooing because he'll jump sometimes. LOL

We might get lucky with Adam's baptism pictures...his acne is going away so maybe, just maybe, he won't be completely spotty come Sunday. He'll still have his nice lump on his head, though, but that will be hidden under his hat. ;) And let's hope that he'll fit into the baptism outfit...he'll be wearing one of the twins outfits but they were a few pounds lighter at their baptism than he is. I'm sure he'll be fine (she says with fingers crossed LOL).

Looks like the weather has finally decided to get with the right season here. The last few days have been absolutely gorgeous here with temps in the upper 70's/low 80's but that's definitely not fall weather. Today it's in the upper 50's so much more in line with what it should be. Still a beautiful day though.

Wave of Light

Light a candle at 7 pm and please join in. We are all in this together. Whether your loss was early in pregnancy or you lost a newborn, we all grieve for our lost babies. My thoughts and prayers are with all of you today and always.

Lighting in memory of my two losses.

Long Night

Sheeze, we went from one extreme to the other. Last night Adam was up every 1 1/2 hrs. I'm glad I didn't go to bed last night with the expectation of him sleeping the entire night because I would have been sorely disappointed. The one bright spot was that I wasn't in pain last night. LOL

Adam had his one month check up today and he weighed in at 11 lbs 14 oz and 21 7/8 inches. He's just growing up a storm. Still have his hemotoma which the dr is still claiming will go away...we'll see...and he still has his acne but that's starting to improve. Won't be gone by this weekend though but nothing can be done about that.

Keari also had a drs appt for here two year check up. She weighs 25 lbs 6 oz and is 31 1/2 inches tall. I made this appt for her today because she was supposed to get a second shot but the drs office counted wrong and she wasn't able to get it...the two shots need to be done 6 months apart and it's only been 5 months. If I'd known that, I would have waited another month to take her in. And combined with having to argue with the office about the filing of one of Adam's claims totally put me in the wrong mood for the visit today. I totally love the pediatrician but the lady that handles the claims submissions leaves a lot to be desired. I get so sick of hear "you need to get me someone to talk to" or "you need to call and get it straightened out". Just because I work at the company where I have my insurance doesn't mean that I have anything to do with the way claims are paid and it shouldn't be my responsibility to have to straighten things out. I'd already made a call to company to find out why the claim paid incorrectly but there drs office didn't think that was good enough. Grr!

All Nighter

Adam slept from 9pm to 5am last night. That's wonderful for him but terrible for me since I'm nursing him. I woke up about 1am in a severe amount of pain and finally had to get up at 1:30am to pump out some of the excess milk as I couldn't stand it anymore. Boy did I feel much better once I'd done that...could actually go back to sleep after that. The night before he slept 6 hrs...wonder if he's starting a new pattern. We'll see how he does tonight.

Family Pictures

We picked up our family pictures that we have done at our local firehouse each year. They turned out much better than last years. I only have the group shots right now as they did something different with the packages this year (which totally pissed Andy off)...they decided to give other styles of prints besides just color, so some of the pics were in black & white and some were in sephia. They looked great that way except we didn't have all the kids pics in any one style...a couple were color, a couple more were in b&w and the rest in sephia...makes for an odd looking collection when you put them all together. So we ended up having to order the kids that weren't in color but here is our full family pic and one of all the kids together. Poor Adam looks likes he breaking his neck in the all kids one. Luckily he was asleep and really didn't care. LOL

Happy Birthday, Keari!

Today is Keari's 2nd birthday. What a big girl she is. Well, actually she's a little girl...a petite little girl which I never realized until my dad said something about how little she was last weekend. When I added her height to our growth chart today I realized she's a good 1 1/2 inches shorter than all her other siblings at this same age. My nephew had his 1 yr checkup today and he is the exact same height as Keari except he's a year ypunger. They are both 31 1/2inches.


Here's picture of her with her birthday cake. I think she's pretty excited about it.

This Day in History

Not often that you see your last name in a Day in History (from The Free Dictionary)... ;)

The Spiegel scandal of 1962 (German: Spiegel-Affäre) was one of the major political scandals in Germany in the era following World War II.

Essentially, the scandal boiled down to a conflict between Franz Josef Strauß, then Federal Minister of Defense, and Rudolf Augstein, owner and editor-in-chief of Der Spiegel magazine, Germany's leading weekly political magazine. The affair would cost Strauß his office and put the young German democracy to its first major test.

The two had clashed already a year earlier, when, in 1961, Spiegel raised accusations of bribery in favor of the FIBAG construction company, which had received a contract for building military facilities. However, a parliamentary enquiry then found no evidence against Strauß.

Der Spiegel No. 41/1962, which triggered the scandal

The quarrel then escalated when Der Spiegel, in its October 8, 1962 issue, published an article called "Bedingt abwehrbereit" ("partly prepared for defense"), about a NATO manoeuver called "Fallex 62". The piece uncovered the sorry state of the Bundeswehr (Germany's army) facing the communist threat from the east. At that time, the army had been given the grade "prepared for defense to only a limited extent", the lowest possible NATO-grade.

The magazine was accused of treason. At 9 p.m. on October 26, 1962, the magazine's offices in Hamburg were seized and (together with the houses of several journalists) searched by 36 policemen, and thousands of documents were confiscated. The offices would remain shut down for weeks. Augstein and the then-editors-in-chief Claus Jacobi and Johannes Engel were arrested. The author of the article, Conrad Ahlers, who was vacationing in Spain, was seized in his hotel during the night. Augstein would be jailed for 103 days.

Bundeskanzler (Federal Chancellor) Konrad Adenauer was informed of Strauß's actions. However, the Minister of Justice, belonging to the smaller coalition party FDP, was deliberately left out of all decisions. The injustice of the arrest caused riots and protest throughout Germany. Strauß initially denied all involvement, even before the Bundestag: Adenauer, in another speech, famously complained about an "abyss of treason" ("Abgrund von Landesverrat").

Strauß was finally forced to admit that he had phoned the German military attaché in Madrid and urged him to arrest Ahlers. This was clearly illegal — as Minister of the Interior Hermann Höcherl famously paraphrased, "etwas außerhalb der Legalität" ("somewhat outside of legality"). Since Strauß had lied to the parliament, on November 19, the five FDP ministers of the cabinet resigned, demanding that Strauß and Volkmar Hopf be fired. This put Adenauer himself at risk. He found himself publicly accused of backing the suppression of a critical press with the resources of the state.

On November 26, the police ended its occupation of the Spiegel offices, while Augstein, Ahlers and three others remained under arrest — Augstein until February 7, 1963. In December 1962 Adenauer formed a new cabinet without Strauß.

On May 13, 1965 the Bundesgerichtshof (highest German court of appeals) refused to open trial against Augstein and Ahlers, ruling that during the affair Strauß had violated the boundaries and committed Freiheitsberaubung (deprivation of personal freedom); however, because of his belief of acting lawfully (Verbotsirrtum), he was exempt from punishment. The case also came before the Federal Constitutional Court of Germany, which issued a groundbreaking ruling that laid down the basics of the freedom of the press for decades to come.

The scandal temporarily halted Strauß's political career and was remembered by many when Strauß ran for Bundeskanzler in 1980, clearly losing against his SPD opponent (and incumbent) Helmut Schmidt. However, it is mostly remembered for altering the political culture of post-war Germany and — with the first mass demonstrations and public protests — being a turning point from the old Obrigkeitsstaat (authoritarian state) to a modern democracy.

One Month

Adam is one month old today. Hard to believe that he's already been here that long. He sleeps pretty good at night although he seems to thing that when he wakes up around 4-5am that it's time to be up and play for awhile. I try to discourage him as best I can. LOL He has a serious case of baby acne...covers the top of his head, face, and top half of his chest and back. I'm hoping that most of it will be done by the 19th as that's the day he gets baptized. If not, he'll just have some blotchy pictures. LOL Anyone that's in our neighborhood that day feel free to stop by, we'd love to see you.




Here's a picture of Kenzie making Adam smile.











And one where Connor wrapped him up like a cocoon.

Nests

Two nests were found today and they weren't the kind that hold cute little baby birds. These two wasps nests were discovered in our furnace's exhaust vent while the annual maintenance on the furnace was being done. Guess it's a good thing for him that we scheduled our maintenance now and not in the middle of the summer. So the good news is that we got our vent cleaned out...the bad news is that the motor to the exhaust fan is burned out and will cost us $600+ to replace. When it rains, it pours. :(

Proud Big Sister

I think Keari loves her little brother...what do you think?

Happy Birthday, Bekah!

Today is Bekah's 4th birthday. We started out with cake and presents at home in the morning. Then we set out to go to my sister's house for my nephew's birthday party. We didn't make it very far before discovering that there was an accident on the other side of the bridge that had traffic on our side virtually at a standstill. So back home we went go to wait it out. After waiting 1 1/2hrs, we set out again with better results and we are able to make it to my sister's albiet a little late. It was a beautiful day for an outside party. There's was tons of food of which I ate way to much of.



A cute pooh bear cake for Josh...here's a pic of him enjoying his cake.






My sister made sure that Bekah wouldn't be left out on her big day by getting her a little cake all for herself. She was thrilled. Here's a picture of her enjoying her cake.






And a pic of her sporting her brand new b'day outfit that her aunt and uncle gave her...she loves it!

Afterwards, we ran by Andy's parents for a bit...did presents for Bekah and Keari (Keari's b'day is Friday) and then headed home. All in all, it was a good day.

More Eye Appts

Today it was Andy, Kenzie and Connor's turn to go for their eye appts. This visit only cost us $350+. Guess it could have been worse...we only got new lenses for Andy and Connor so that saved us the expense of new frames. And thankfully, Kenzie still doesn't need glasses...let's hope that continues for a long while. After all this, I don't think I want to make and appt to get my eyes checked...can't afford it...although I did skip last years appt. I'm not having any trouble with my current prescription so I might just put it off for awhile. I think next time we'll have to check on Kristin's Zinni's website.

Taylor and Tyler's glasses were in so they came home sporting a brand new look. Taylor has had the same oval style glasses since he started wearing them when he was 3. This time he went with rectangular glasses...gives him a different look but I like them on him. He's having a little trouble adjusting to them because they are shaped different from what he's used to. Hopefully it won't take him too long to get used to them. Tyler absolutely hate his new glasses...and it doesn't help any that his siblings keep making comments to him about them. He also got a rectangular shaped pair which look good on him although I think they are a tad wide...or maybe it's just that I'm not used to seeing him in glasses. I'll take some pictures of the new looks whenever I can catch them staying still long enough.

Happy Birthday

Happy 1st birthday to my nephew, Joshua. He's come a long way from the babe that started out in the NICU. Hope you enjoyed your big day, sweetie. Here's a picture of him enjoying his birthday cake. We'll be heading to my sisters on Sunday for his birthday party...which just happens to be Bekah's birthday. October is a busy month in this family with 6 birthdays starting with Josh's, then Bekah, my neice Lauren, Keari, my sister and last but not least mine! Whew, that's a lot of birthday cake. =)

Wicked Headache/Interim Grades

And no, my headache wasn't brought on by the grades. LOL Alex's first semester interim grades came out yesterday and so far he's doing great with 4 A's and 3 B's. Two of the are 89 & 88 so very close to being A's. He's having the hardest time in Honors Chemistry right now but I think that's mainly because he hasn't been putting the effort into studying for it. Hopefully getting two failing grades on quizzes will have opened Alex's eyes to the fact that he needs to study more and his grade will improve in that class. Luckily, his teacher decided to throw out the lowest quiz grade so that brought Alex's average from a 65 to and 80.

I think my headache was brought on by the change in weather we've been having. We had a thunderstorm come through last night. I'm guessing it wasn't too severe as none of the kids woke up. My headache is better today...I can at least move my head without it hurting...but I can still feel the ache behind my eyes. Hopefully it doesn't get any worse.

Eye Appts

Andy took Taylor and Tyler for their annual eye exams yesterday. We knew that Taylor was going to need new glasses...there's only so many times that frames can be twisted back into shape before needing to be replaced. What we didn't know was that Tyler was going to need glasses...turns out he needs them for distance. So, an hour later and $600+ poorer, Andy and the boys returned home. Andy, Kenzie and Connor have their eye exams on Friday. I hate to even think what the bill is going to be for them.

Growth Spurts

Adam seems to be right on track with his growth spurts so far. The first growth spurt is supposed to hit between 7 - 10 days and on day 10 he started eating like crazy. The second spurt hits about 3 weeks. He's 3 weeks today and yesterday all he wanted to do was eat, eat, eat...and that's saying something for a baby that already eats every 2 hours round the clock. Poor mom is definitely feeling like a cow now. LOL

I want to know how babies can sleep like this. Now matter how many times I straighten him, he always ends up back in this same position. I'm glad he likes it. Can you imagine how we'd feel when we woke up after having our necks crinked over like that? I don't even want to think about it.

Rain, rain

and more rain. What a terrible day to take a drive. The day started out with just enough rain to cancel all the sports activities for the day so we took advantage of the free day by going to have our family portrait done. We were done with that by lunchtime, so decided to head over to Andy's parents so they could see Adam. Well, if we had known it was going to be raining cats and dogs on the other side of the bridge, we would have just stayed home. And it continued to rain cats and dogs the entire way over to their house. We got soaked running from the van to their house...it was crazy. The rain was coming down so fast that it couldn't drain off the roads fast enough so there were rivers running down the streets. Ugh! No fun! But it was a nice visit and the rain finally decided to let up about the time we were leaving so at least we didn't have to face the deluge on the way home too.

Brr!

It's definitely not summer anymore. It's downright cold today...and very blustery. Makes me feel like Winnie the Pooh in the Blustery Day story. I think we've skipped driectly from summer to winter which for us is pretty typical. It's a shame though cause I love fall. Temps through the end of the weekend look like they will be in the mid 70's which is nice but they are calling for rain everyday so that's no fun. With put a crimp into the scheduled softball tournament and soccer games that were scheduled. Guess we'll just have to wait and see if it rains the way they say it's supposed to. I'm a little skeptical about weather forecasters because they are typical wrong. It's grey, dreary and rainy right now so they might actually be right this time.

Drs Appt

Adam had his 2 week checkup today and he's doing great. His weight is now 9 lbs 10 oz. The dr just laughed when he saw his weight and said whatever I'm doing is working and to keep it up. Unfortunately, I think it's really all Adam's doing and his 2 hr around the clock feeding schedule. He'd make a great alarm clock, if you were so inclined to want to get up every 2 hrs throughout the night. He's very punctual. LOL He's still slightly jaundiced but nothing to worry about and is most likely due to the combination of breastfeeding and the cephalohematoma...which has gotten a little bigger and will still takes weeks to resolve itself. Poor little guy. I'll be very glad when he no longer has a lopsided head.

Last Day of Summer

And what a beautiful day it was. Too bad I was in such a crabby mood. I think the late nights and running around has finally caught up to me. But it was nice to get out for a little while in the gorgeous weather and watch Tyler play football. I found a nice tree so Adam was in the shade and hung out with Taylor during the game. Andy and the rest of the crew came by for a little while before they had to head to Chestertown for Connor's soccer scrimmage.

Busy Day

Whew, nothing like running around all day. I know Andy is going to say that he had the roughest day because he had to be out of the house by 7am to get Kenzie to her softball tournament...she had 4 games today...but at least once he got to the field, he was there to stay for the day. I, on the other hand, spent the day running back and forth to the fields to get Taylor and Alex to their soccer games, running to the shopping plaza to meet Connor's coach so he could get a ride to his soccer game, then running the boys back and forth to church to serve tonight. Talk about totally disrupting Adam's eating/sleeping schedule, not to mention Keari's naptime. And I still need to get the girls to bed without disrupting Adam too much since Andy won't be home til late.

So far, Tay and Alex's teams lost their games today, Connor's team won and Kenzie's team tied their first game and won their next two. Haven't heard about the last one yet.

Well, they won their last game so the got their first 1st place trophy of the new season. Way to go Riviera Beach girls!

Back to School Dance

Alex attended his first after school function for the year in the form of the Back to School Dance. It's more of a get together rather than a dance as they play video games and other stuff while there but there is some dancing that goes on as well. And it's quite loud...you can hear the music as you turn off the highway to go down the road to the school. Seems like he had a good time even if he did go dateless...hung out with a few guys and a ton of girls. The girl he was seeing last year transferred to another school so they are no longer together...although I'm not quite sure either one truly understands the concept of boyfriend/girlfriend since they both seem to think they are still together yet they haven't seen each other since early summer.

Getting Alex to school functions is always a challenge since his school is so far away and there aren't many kids from our area that go there making carpooling a challenge. Andy did drop off duty last night after running by the soccer field to drop Kenzie and Connor off for their soccer practices. That left me with pick up duty. It was my first trip out of the house without Adam and he was a little angel. I was able to feed him and put him to bed before I left and he slept the entire 1 1/2hrs that I was gone. What a sweetie! But I don't want to be doing too many late night trips right now as I'm not getting much sleep yet.

Drs Appt

Adam had a drs appt today as a follow up from his hospital stay over the weekend. He is looking so much better than the orange pumpkin he looked like on Friday. His coloring is much much better...still slightly yellow around his chest area and his eyes are a little yellow but the dr says it's nothing to worry about as long as he continues to eat & poop the way he has been. He also has a nice bump on the one side of his head from where the vaccum was used on him. Every dr that's seen him...his pediatrician right after birth and the drs that examined over the weekend...have said that it's nothing to worry about and that it will eventually go away. Because its blood that's caused the swelling, that's also contributing to his jaundice as his liver is having to work harder to break down the unwanted blood cells. I'm glad that it's nothing to worry about but I'll be glad when it's gone because it constantly reminds me that I did that to him. =(

On a good note, his weight has gone from 8lbs 14oz at discharge last Wednesday to 9lbs 2oz at his weigh-in today so the little munchkin is growing. =)

Back in the Hospital

Adam had a drs appt today to check on his jaundice. Based on his coloring...a nice yellow/orange color, his pediatrician recommended that we get his bili #'s checked so off to the hospital lab we went. We were in and out pretty quickly and after a couple of hours wait at home, we get a call from the drs office saying that his numbers are pretty high (23) and that he thinks it's best that he gets admitted for treatment. So back to the hospital Adam and I go. The nurses we expecting us when we got there and ushered us right into a room. He had his vitals checked and then was put under the bili lights....which he absolutely hated! He cried and cried and cried. Poor thing. And when he would finally stop crying and fall asleep, he would have knocked his glasses off which meant that I needed to readjust them to cover his eyes, which would wake him up and the whole crying process would start again. The nurses finally got him a different set of glasses that stayed on his head a little better so he did better after that. It's funny though, cause most babies love being under the lights...it's nice and toasty under there. Here's a couple of pics of him under the lights and one on the day we left.
They tested his numbers every 6 hours and about about 12 hrs under the lights, we could start to see a drop in the numbers. They ended up keeping him til Sunday although they did take him off the lights at midnight Sunday morning and tested him at 6 am to make sure that his numbers wouldn't go back up once he was off the lights. Thankfully they didn't and we were able to come home.