THIS is a good story

One day at preschool last May, was "Teacher Appreciation Day".  We were asked to bring one flower per teacher in order to add to a vase to make a bouquet.  My yard doesn't have any annuals at this time of the year, and I was super tempted to borrow steal my next door neighbor's Irises (it was only 2 after all!), but instead I went to the local grocery store at 8:30 the night before.  You might think that is procrastination, but I was putting it off as long as I could as fresh flowers just don't last in our house.  Well, the local grocery store sucks, I'm sorry to be crude, but it does.  The floral section is tiny and you could tell that it hadn't been tended to for the last 12 hours.  So my pickings were slim... not to mention, there was probably 20 other Moms picking through that same section on the same day!  So I finally settled on a bouquet of 2 hydrangeas.  I took them home and put them straight in the water with the food packet.  I jokingly told Brad, "They only have to stay alive for 12 hours.".  Well, the next morning Brad said, "Deanna, I'm really sorry, but the flowers are dead."  Of course he HAD to be joking, there's no way the flowers were dead..... But, oh yes, they were DEAD - well, one of them.  Which just proved to me that the grocery store SUCKS and it was nothing that I could have done wrong.

How could I take these 2 flowers to the class?  How could I take just one flower to the class?  I couldn't run past the store on the way to school - the baby still took a morning nap and it was just too much trouble. So I call to my friend down the street - great friend - former Texan, former Aggie - so much in common - she's my rock. She sends 2 of her 3 kids to the same school so I knew she must have bought an actual bouquet and might have flowers to spare.  So, of course, she doesn't just lend me a flower, she drops it off on her way to school.  She brought us a pink carnation.  Now, I will admit that the flowers were not quite equal in the garden status of life, but we had 2 LIVE, beautiful flowers, so I was fine with it.  I let Caden get the flower from Kiandra as she dropped the flower off.  He was carrying it around as we were loading in the car.  I tried my best to explain to him the delicateness of the flower, but he is a little B-O-Y and soon enough he started swinging it around like a nun-chuck.  SNAP!  Went the carnation stem.  Now the inequality of the flowers has been intensified.  We have one HUGE 4 inch round full hydrangea with a 12 inch stem and one tiny pink carnation with a 4 inch stem.  And it is time for school, so off we go!

Here are the flowers!

Mrs. Kelly and Mrs. Leak are simply the best!

15 Months!

My love bug, snuggler, tickle-bug, giggle-monster, and jokester.  It is so fun to see the difference in personalities between both boys.  Carsten is much more play than work and he always makes us laugh.  I laugh even harder when he cracks himself up - which is fairly frequent.  He is just SILLY.  He does things that crack you up.  And that worries me for his future - I think he might turn out to be a class-clown.  He is great at independent play.  He enjoys company playing, but has no problem going off to play on his own.

He is NOT a big talker.  He is more into grunting and pointing - squealing on occasion.  He had so many ear infections, especially for that month and a half where we couldn't kick it, he went a while without hearing - which in turn has delayed his speech development.  We decided to go ahead and have him evaluated by the State Plan just to see if he was eligible for speech therapy. Their plan is a total body evaluation - physical, mental, social.  He did show that he is delayed in speech, BUT, his overall score was high enough that he didn't qualify for the state plan.  So for now, I am just working with him the best I can and we'll see if we need to seek out a speech therapist at the 18 month appointment.  His first word was Moma, but he wouldn't even use that on a daily basis, more just when he was in distress.  His favorite two words were Kitty (because they are in the house) and Shoe (because that means he gets to go play outside).  Speaking of, he LOVES to play outside!  Thank God for good weather and that we can finally get out!!!  He likes to play in our driveway, riding in a push car and pushing a lawn mower, he really enjoys swinging and digging in the sand box.  Around the house, he enjoys playing with cars and balls.  He likes to get into whatever big brother is doing. He LOVES books.  He seriously can't get enough reading.  Before bedtime and naps, he will throw a little fit when it is time to stop reading and starting sleeping.  He also reads all throughout the day as he comes across a book.  Minus the fit he throws after books have stopped, he has turned into a good sleeper.  He gives us 11 hours a night, sleeping from 7:30 - 6:30. And he also has a nap everyday for about 2 hours.  He has a little brown bear blanket that he takes to sleep with him - he calls him Brrrrrr.

He is a pretty good eater - fruits are his favorite by far.  He can eat a whole banana in one mouth full like a monkey, if not monitored closely.  He loves berries, especially blackberries.  Still not big on some textures like rice.  We eat lots of crackers, grilled cheeses and fruit.

I just LOVE him in that hat!!!

One of his hang-outs.

Maybe he's not TRYING to be funny with his plastic upside down ice cream cone, but it turned out that way!!!  I said he was too young to eat an ice cream cone on his own, but I had this lovely plastic one for him to hold!!!  ;)

Well, he is definitely trying to be funny here!  This is how he spent the whole month of April, while we had the Easter Buckets out!!!

This is my absolute favorite, my child is a jokester picture.  There is no way this was unintentional - and no, nobody was asking him, where is your belly button?

This GUY!

My 3 year old.  My BIG BOY!  We've been gradually (you know how we do!) potty training since last summer.  He got the hang of it quickly and would potty before bath every night.  He knew the feeling of what it meant to need to go, but he wasn't quite ready to commit to quit playing and start pottying.  After we returned from Christmas travel, we started potty training seriously and it took all of, no time.  He had it from the start.  No accidents, no clean up.  He's a quick kid!  It also helps to do things on his terms, less battles.  Yay for no diapers!!!!

Right now he is REALLY into pretend play.  His favorite thing at the time is to pretend that he is packing to go to Texas.  He does it very realistically.  We pack some stuff.  We all go to pretend sleep and wake up really early in the morning, it's still dark outside as he puts it. We then have a few last things to pack.  He toasts us some bagels and makes us some apple juice and we eat in the car on the way to the airport. I LOVE THIS KID!  He is so in-tune to what is going on around him.  Nothing slips him, NOTHING.  Today during pretend travel, he arrived at Nona's house, pulling his suitcase behind him.  He told the dogs to get down, then went on to air pet Willa for a few minutes.  It cracks me up!!!!

He much prefers pretend play over structured play.  For Christmas, Santa brought him this really cool 5-1 sports center that we have in our basement.  It has a soccer net and foam soccer ball.  Well, the other day he wanted to play soccer in the basement, he sat up this hard plastic ball for me to kick into this other random toy that was our goal.  I told him that we had a net and soccer ball right over there, he said no, we are playing with this. :)

We also pretend fix things a lot.  He is really into Bob the Builder right now, but unfortunately Bob isn't big anymore.  We get books from the library and have a few hand me down toys.  He has plenty of tools though, and he just picks them up and tells me, Wendy, what we are going to fix.

He still loves school (he goes one day a week, from 9-3).  And is learning a lot.  I like that they have chapel, since we find it hard to get to church with the baby taking morning naps.  He learns about Jesus and will ask me questions about where Jesus lives.  The other day at the lunch table we were talking about body parts.  I would point at a part, and have him tell me what it was.  We were almost completely through the body and I was running out of parts to ask him, so I pointed at his chest, where his heart is.  I was going for the word heart.  But when I asked him what was in there, he said Jesus.  I just about melted out of my chair,  How Sweet!  Interesting I say that, he has his sweet moments, but more often than not, they are devilish.  Especially with the easy target of Carsten toddling around these days.  Being the baby of the family I tend to side with Carsten and think that Caden is the instigator/bully of the two.  But good thing for Caden, Brad was the older sibling, so he sides with Caden.  Caden is not great at sharing his toys, but he has no problem taking a toy out of Carsten's hand and says, "he shared it with me!".  Uh - not so much!

He is still such a great eater!!!  He eats just about anything we put in front of him. His favorite is cheese, and sweets.  He also likes bar b q flavored chips a lot.  He is completely off of cheese for now, as we are trying to figure out some stomach stuff.  And so far, it has done the trick.  The first couple of weeks of no cheese was hard for him, being that he loves it so much, but now he knows the benefit and will more often than not say he is not interested in it.

He is still a napper and is sleeping great at night.  He gives me a good 2 hour nap in the afternoon.  Which he needs, you can tell.  He is a much happier, more enjoyable guy when he gets his sleep!  He goes to bed around 7:30, and tries to stay quiet until his "OK TO WAKE" alarm lights up at 6:30, but there are many days where we hear him calling out around 6:15.

Just the other day he had a note sent home from school saying that they were so impressed with Caden because every time before he interrupted them, he would say Excuse Me Mrs. Kelly/Mrs. Leak.  I am really enjoying seeing his personality develop and see him grow into a BIG BOY.

Mental Exhaustion

A light bulb went off this morning.... I know Caden wears me out, and we all know that being a stay at home mom is mentally, physically, spiritually exhausting ;) but this morning I finally made the comparison that makes the most sense to me.  The mental exhaustion that I experience is like that after being at a 2 day interview.  I still remember some of these interviewing trips that I went on straight out of college, and for 2 days we were put in a glass box and intensely judged!

Today Brad's truck was in the shop, so the boys and I dropped him off at work.  So the conversation on the way home went like this - and this was all within 5 minutes.

Caden: "Mommy, are you going to drive us home?" (Seems like an innocent opening question.)

Me: "Yes, Caden, I am going to drive us home.  We just dropped Daddy off at work, so he can't drive us home." (Good enough answer??? Tried not to get too technical, just stated the obvious.)

Caden: "Maybe Mike can drive us home?" (Well, that came out of left field... hmmm... wonder what he is fishing for with this question... how do I respond)

Me: "Mike?  Mike doesn't work here, he works at Lily, that is at a different building." (Short, sweet, to the point.  Did I nail it?)

A little stammering and confusion. (Uh Oh, I caught him off guard with my answer, maybe that wasn't what he was looking for???)

Me: "Are you talking about Catherine's Daddy - Mike?" (Let me try to save myself... quick! another question!)

Caden: "No, the regular Mike.  The Mike we see at Gramma and Grampa's house." (OK,phew, now we are on the same page!  Relief!)

Me: "Ohhhh, OK!  That Mike doesn't work here either."

Caden: "I like that Mike!" (Wondering if we are through with this conversation now.)

Caden: "Mommy, where is Uncle Jesse's moma?" (Yep!  On to a new topic and this is one we've discussed a million times before and I know where this is going and this is not fun/easy for me to discuss with a 3 year old!!!)

Me: "Uncle Jesse's moma is in Heaven." (What question is coming next... WHY???)

Caden: "Why is she in Heaven?" (YEP!)

Me: "Well, God calls people to come to Heaven with him sometimes.  And he called her."

Caden: "Why?" (There it is again!)

Me: "Well, she was really, really sick, and God knew that she would be better off living in Heaven." (How many more rounds of whys can we squeeze in???)

Caden: "Why would she be better in Heaven?" (Exhaustion is setting in!)

Me: "In Heaven you don't feel any pain." (My answers are beginning to get weak.)

Caden: "Mommy, I want to drive the car from the front."

Me: "OK baby, you can help me drive when we get to the driveway."

Caden: "No, I want to drive on the road."

Me: "Oh baby, I can't let you do that until you turn 16."

Caden: "Why?"

Me: "Well, if the police saw me let you drive, they would give me a ticket or take me to jail."

Caden: "Ok, I want to drive when we get to the driveway."

Phew.... and I am spent AGAIN, just reliving that whole conversation, but it was a good one and I wanted to capture it, so I tried my best!

We get to the driveway and I say, do you want to help me drive?

Caden: "No, I want to drive on my own."

Me: "Well, you can't do that."

Caden: "I couldn't reach the pedals!!!"

Me:  "That's right!"

Caden: "I want to pretend drive."

Me: "Ok, when I park in the garage, you can come up here."

Caden: "NO! No, Nnnn, NO.  I want to do it in the driveway."

Me: "Caden, it is 18 degrees.  I need to put the car in the garage.  The baby is tired of sitting in his carseat.  I've got to get the baby in the house.  You cannot drive in the driveway."

I park the car, unbuckle Caden and let him crawl into the front seat to pretend drive.

Caden: "It's too dark in here!!!"

So I turn on the overhead lights for him - OH CRAP!  I turned on the overhead lights!!! Are they still on????

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 I just ran out to my garage and the overhead lights were indeed still on.  That would NOT have made for a good afternoon when we left to get Brad from work.  THANK YOU BLOG!!! :)

Happy First Birthday Carsten!!!

We had a wonderful celebration for Carsten's First Birthday.  I really enjoyed getting to plan and execute a party in my own house!!!! (Something that I never get to do with a child having a birthday on Dec 28.)  We had a circus theme, Come One, Come All, Big Top Birthday.  I thought it was pretty appropriate being that Carsten is my little clown/world's strongest man/acrobat.  My mom was able to come up to help partake in the festivities, which of course I loved! We started the festivities on Monday with a road trip to an indoor water park.  I really thought that Carsten would be into it, being that he LOVES bath time so much and has no problem with water in his face/on his head.  He was a little reserved at the park, but took a huge liking to the swings they had in the baby pool, and also enjoyed watching Moma, Daddy and Big Bro splash around like crazy fools.  Caden had a BLAST and wanted to do everything, even the slides that he wasn't quite tall enough for.  He is a DUCK!  He LOVES the water too.  I'm blessed to have 2 water babies, since I am a fish myself. Even us adults had a blast at the park.  Carsten's Birthday was on a Tuesday, which is school day around here.  We started the day off with homemade donuts.  Huge hit with both boys, and myself.  Then Caden went off to school and Carsten got some special time on his special day.  A trip to Olive Garden for lunch - he loves the minestrone soup there! and lots of play with toys that he sometimes can't otherwise play with.  We had our party after Caden returned from school.  Carsten was a trooper wearing his hat, and blowing at (not out) his candle.  He didn't get overly messy with the cake.  I'd say that he had 4 or 5 huge mouthfuls, but then was ready to have something a little more savory - back to the goldfish crackers.  He enjoyed unwrapping a few gifts.  We gave him a table and chair set that he has really enjoyed!

Blowing at his candle

Big Brother warning him not to touch the candle, it is hot.  So Sweet!  Although blurry, look at those puffed cheeks, he's trying to blow!

Trying to get a pic of some of the circus decor in the background.

The cake - yellow cake with buttercream frosting.

I made this banner from the monthly pictures that I have been taking.  So fun to see how much he has grown in a year!  Caden and I painted the number one to help add to the decor.

Messym Messy

Say Cheese Cake

Big Brother enjoying the cake too!!!

Birthday Breakfast!

Ohhh, I'll take that one!

Big Bro LOVES him some donuts!!!

Sugar smile!

Sitting at his new table and chairs

Unwrapping a present

Caden never opened a gift from us on his birthday, it is serious present overload for this Dec 28th baby, so we had a 1 year anniversary of being a Big Brother gift for him.

A new suitcase, OMG, he LOVES to play packing/airport!!!

Tubes-Day

We HAD to get this guy tubes, it just wasn't even an option.  He had been on antibiotic for 30 out of the first 45 days of the year.  We were seriously close to having to do an antibiotic injection, which the doctor warned me was a painful process, but thankfully, we kicked it with the 2nd round of the 2nd antibiotic.  Phew... It was a crazy ending to 2014 and a rough start to 2015, but I think these tubes were "just what the doctor ordered".  ;)  The roughest part of the whole process was him waking up at 4 am for a bottle on tubes-day, and us not being able to give him anything but love.  He was NOT happy!  He didn't understand what we were telling him about having to wait due to fear of aspiration!  So, we had about 4 hours pre-surgery where he was an ANGRY baby.  They brought him a few fun toys to play with while we waited, and that worked for about 10 minutes before he turned back into ANGRY baby.  I was finally able to get him to sleep, with about 15 minutes til surgery.  We were hoping that he would stay asleep when we made the transition from me to the nurse taking him back to the OR, but he didn't.  So they had this fun little car for him to ride in, but he didn't want ANYTHING to do with that.  There was a parade of nurses and bubbles leading him back to the OR, you would think he might have been distracted, but he wasn't... poor baby.  And then 15 minutes later, when he was out of recovery, we heard that same screaming baby coming back down the hall.  Yes, I can recognize that scream/cry.  I feel bad for the nurse who had to bring him back to us, he was thrashing, screaming, very unhappy.  Even the comfort of his Moma's arms didn't put him at ease (they warned us that he might be inconsolable for a while, and he was).  It took a good 20 minutes for him to settle down, even after feeding him a bottle.  Again, I finally got him back to sleep, and then we were released to go home.  Caden had been staying with some very kind/helpful Aggie neighbors that we have become friends with up here.  He loves playing with their kids, so he didn't hesitate going to stay with them (well, not too much!).  I owe them, because it was an EARLY drop-off on a non-school day!!!  And of course, here are a few pics from the event...

One of his very, very sick days... ended up as a respiratory virus and ear infections

Getting breathing treatment at the doc 

Given toys to play with while waiting on tubes, check out those baby hospital clothes!

NOT so happy about the car

Pre-School

We are a big fan of GRADUAL change in this household.  It's definitely the theme in introducing my children to new things and just makes ME more comfortable with the transition.  It is not for everyone, some people, like my friend J Lar, much prefers to rip off the band-aid, and get the experience over with.  I can see that perspective, but I am sure that some counselor could tell me something about my past that makes me prefer the slow but steady approach.  Last fall when we moved to Zionsville I started researching preschool.  I knew that I needed to enroll Caden in order for him to learn a few things that couldn't be taught at home, sharing, listening to instruction, learning to follow directions, interacting with kids of his own age for a good amount of time...

So, rather than enroll Caden in a all day program, I really wanted to enroll him in a half day only.  The only problem was that there weren't any good half day options around here.  My first choice preschool, the one at our church, had a 9-3 program, which seemed rather lengthy, especially since from 12:30 - 3:00 they were just preparing for and napping.  After talking with the teacher, she agreed to allowing Caden to attend half day only, until we were comfortable enough in the school that he was ready to go full day.  We did lots of preparation for this 9 -12:30 day away from home.  Our teacher even did a in-home visit, which I thought was spectacular!!!  Caden seemed ready.  We went to our orientation, which was a 2 hour play session in his classroom, where Carsten and I could stay and play with him.  Now, his school room is actually the room that is our nursey at our church.  And aside from Sunday mornings, he goes to childcare there during MOPS meetings and bible studies.  He's definitely familiar with the environment!!!  It took him 1 of the 2 hours just to warm up to the idea, before we could even start playing during orientation.  I was fearing the worst for the first day of school.  The next Tuesday came, we packed his lunchbox and talked about how much fun he was going to have at school.  I dropped him off, and he didn't even cry.  Not one tear.  PHEW!  HUGE sigh of relief!!!  Carsten and I went back up at 12:30 to get him from school and he was still eating.  All the other kids were preparing their beds and getting ready for nap, and he was still chowing down.  I gave him some time, but finally ended up persuading him to finish at home.  He said, "Mommy, why can't I stay here to nap???"  OK, point taken!  You're ready for school!  Again, another huge sigh of relief, he really must like school!  He LOVES his teacher Mrs. Kelly and Mrs. Leak is OK.  He tells me that he wants to go play with Mrs. Kelly all the time and he also tells me that Mrs. Kelly makes him happy!  What a joy!  I am so glad that something I dreaded so much turned out to be SO FUN!

11 Months!

Oh My!  The time has really flow by with this precious baby boy!  I hate switching out his clothes as he out grows them and I certainly can't come to terms with cutting his messy, messy mop of hair yet.  He's definitely still got a lot of baby left in him, as he doesn't sleep through the night and is not the biggest fan of solid foods.  I say that because it is hard to find solids that he actually wants to eat.  I don't want to say that he is "picky" and I certainly don't want to cater to that, but he is!  I can go through 5 different types of foods in one setting, he will take one bite and then lose interest in it, throwing it on the ground.  He will then sit there and grunt and look at my stash of baby junk food (gerber finger foods) in the kitchen.  Oy Ve.  I was telling the doctor this story, and she commented that it was a little early for him to be so particular... What can I say...

And, the sleep thing is probably attributed to his constant sickness.  Poor Baby!  He has had a rough go of it.  Starting last fall, it's just been one ear infection after the other.  Going into our Christmas travels he had his 4th one.  The doctor said if he gets another one within a month then we are a candidate for tubes, and she would HIGHLY recommend them.  Well, sure enough, he got one before we could even get back to Indiana from Texas.  It was a miserable last 2 days there with him.  We saw the ENT and have tubes scheduled for February 16.  In the mean time, he has come down with at least 2 more infections.  And this time around the antibiotics weren't working, so after a few days we had to go back and get a different variety.  AND, to top it off, this time his lungs weren't clear either.  He was wheezing, so they put us on a nebulizer.  Breathing treatments, 4-6 times a day for 5-10 minutes each.  Oh MY!  There is seriously no greater physical struggle that I have experienced as a Mom, than holding this mask on his little face for 5 minutes straight.  It is a struggle every time.  The TV treat worked the first several times, then the novelty wore off.  However, we have to power through, because we have got to get these lungs clear before he can go for surgery on the 16th!!!  Oh yeah, and one of the worst side effects of his breathing treatment is that it makes him restless, so he has been skipping his morning nap, although he really is tired and grumpy, he just can't sleep with all that medicine in him.  Which is why I give him that treatment first thing in the morning, so he can still get an afternoon nap and sleep at night!

Even with all that has been going on with my sick baby, he has been able to develop and hit milestones.  He took his first steps at 10 months and really began walking this past month.  At this time, he definitely prefers walking to crawling and will walk from one end of the house to the other.  He currently has this large inflatable cylinder that has balls in it and he likes to pick up and carry around with him, even though it is just as big as he is!  We are hearing some babbles, but believe that his hearing is quite muffled and we should hear quite a bit more after his ears are cleared on the 16th.

Bath time is his favorite time of the day, and don't even think about sticking that mean 'ol big brother in the tub with him to cramp his style, oh no, he will throw a FIT!

Brain Dump

My mind is a junk yard of thoughts and memories.  Maybe someday I'll combine enough pieces to write a luxury suv of a blog.  ;)  In the meantime, I realized how helpful it is to me to document these times, when I can.  So, even though I have taken a nice break from it, I have to just pick up from here for now!  Maybe, just maybe, someday I'll be able to fill in the gaps.  For now, I need to accept that catching up on sleep is my hobby!  :)

Here's a quick up to date picture of the 2 boys that make my world go round, well 3 really!

Yep, the baby is walking and the big boy is brewing.  Man!  They grow up fast!!!