Christmas Eve

First, an update since the last blog...although I thought my kidney stone had already passed, it actually didn't pass until yesterday at about noon, over 48 hours after the pain had begun. PLEASE, PLEASE don't ever let me have one of those again! I did NOT get the stomach bug (at least not so far), but Ethan did on Wednesday afternoon. After puking 4 times, I gave him a bath to feel better. He slipped trying to get out of the bath tub and hit his chin on the side of the tub, causing it to open up and bleed everywhere. Appears to be healing nicely, but my goodness...what a week!

Anyway, I do promise a blog on Christmas, but before Christmas came Christmas Eve. As has been our tradition, we dressed the kids in their Christmas clothes (picked out and purchased every year by Grams...she has much better fashion sense than I for these things!). Then we took some pics of us all gussied up. Some favorites:







You could wonder how such beautiful kids could be anything less than perfect at church, right? Well, well, well....

Church was not so much fun. Blythe had been coming down with a cold, but apparently during church service was when her ears decided to hurt so bad she needed to cry and curl up in a little ball. Although I had given Ethan a snack earlier in the service, he decided he wanted more and wanted to dig through my purse. Braden wasn't having that and so Ethan had a melt down. And then Ethan tried to burn down the church during "Silent Night". And why was Braden guarding my purse and not me? Because I was in the lobby for half of the service carrying around a hungry and tired 7 month old baby (oh yeah, guess I forgot to do a 7 month old post as well). After the service was over Brynn and I went back in to connect with Ethan, Braden, and Blythe and then Ethan decided to take his tantrum to the next level. So we literally had to drag him down the aisle while he kicked and screamed.

But at least they all looked nice while they were crying.

Worst 18 hours ever

Don't worry - I will blog about Christmas, but I will do so after I get home and can upload our pics and videos. For now, a blog you probably don't want to see any pictures for. Pretty sure it was the worst 18 hours of my life.

We are visiting my parents and have had a great visit so far. Braden had to leave yesterday to go back to work and I'm hanging here with the kids so Gommy, Poppa, and Laura can babysit while I do some work.

It was about 10:45 last night when I was about ready to go upstairs and go to bed. But I heard my sister yell down, "Mary! Blythe threw up!". Uh oh. My mom had been feeling bad that night, so maybe it was a bug. I went upstairs and Blythe was covered head to toe in puke. It took all I had to keep my dinner inside of me. It was also all in her bed. She's sharing a room with Ethan, but fortunately she did not get any on him. So I put her in the tub and got her all cleaned up and hair washed (which meant blowdrying her hair at 11 at night). My sister and dad changed out her sheets, not very quietly, but amazingly Ethan never woke up.

I got Blythe back in bed (and showed her the trashcan next to her bed in case she had future "incidents"). Scratched her back for a while and she fell asleep. I went downstairs and started a load of wash (oh, after I had to rinse out the chunks from the sheets and rinse off of the new pillow pet she got). Went back upstairs, got my jammies on and brushed my teeth and FINALLY could go to bed.

Except just as I was about to get in bed, I heard Brynn throw up. Sigh.

Got her out of bed, started a bath for her and got some new jammies. After her bath, I took more stuff down to the laundry room, which was getting a nice big pile going. After all that, it took her quite some time to go back to sleep. Finally she fell asleep and then I did too. But within minutes of falling asleep, Blythe came into my room. She had thrown up again. Change of sheets and change of jammies, this time ignoring the small amount of puke in her hair. And another pile of sheets and clothes to take down to the laundry.

Finally time to go to sleep.

Then Blythe came in again. More puke.

Change of sheets (which were running out at this point). Change of clothes...no more jammies, now just regular clothes. And another pile of laundry.

Seriously, will I ever be able to sleep? Apparently not, as 30 minutes later I heard Brynn starting to puke, so I grabbed her out of her pack n play and rushed her to the toilet. After that, I put her back down. An hour and a half later, the same thing again. Poor Brynn may have slept even less than I did. I was finally able to go to sleep sometime after 5:00am. Then up at 7:30 for the day.

Worst day ever, right? It had only just begun.

I pretty much expected to get the bug with the amount of puke I came into contact with over the night. Instead, at about 11 this morning I got back pain. REALLY, REALLY bad back pain. Right where my left kidney is. I couldn't stand it, the pain was intolerable and nothing I could do would make it subside. I didn't know what was wrong. I didn't think I was pregnant, but the chance I could have an ectopic pregnancy was enough to scare me into going to the Emergency Room. That and I needed pain relief SO SO bad.

Finally after 2 hours at the ER, I was given a shot in my butt for pain relief and FINALLY I felt almost normal. As for the prognosis? Inconclusive. I'm not pregnant (phew!) and not a bladder infection or UTI. Could be a kidney stone, but the doctor thought more muscular strain. I know what muscular strain feels like, and this wasn't it, so I'm still leaning toward kidney stone. Fortunately the pain relief shot is still working. I'm dreading when it wears off, but hoping that when it does, the pain is nowhere near what it was (plus now I have better drugs to take). So there you have it...worst 18 hours ever. The good news for me was that Braden came back and met us at the hospital, so we all get to be with him for an extra day...yay!

All ready for Santa....or not

Took the kids to see Santa yesterday. Amazingly we got a picture where all 3 kids look normal and Ethan is NOT freaking out about being on Santa's lap. He started to freak out, but when I put Brynn on Santa's lap, I guess he figured it was safe.


We had to go see Santa to be SURE he knew what the kids wanted and would bring the right things. Ethan told him very quickly, but clearly that he wants a "really big green tractor". Check.

Blythe told him she wants "a Sleeping Beauty costume and a Little Mermaid bath toy". Crap.

Usually we are pretty good at convincing the kids what they want Santa to bring them. This year with Blythe has been a struggle. I started making a list a couple of months ago of things I thought the kids might want. I was at my parents house when we started it. My mom had said, "Does she want a pillow pet?" And I said, "Yes! She actually does!". So my sister locked in that gift. Next we tried actually asking Blythe what she wants. My mom asked her and she told her she wanted a Jasmine costume. So my mom locked in on that one. Later my mom also got her a Rapunzel Barbie because Target had them on sale.

So when it came time for Blythe to make her list for Santa, what does she put on her list? A Rapunzel Barbie and a Unicorn Pillow Pet. Well great, Santa's not bringing either of those. So we had to convince her of something else. We searched the Target toy ad and convinced Blythe she wanted a camera. So she added the camera to her list and we made sure to tell her Santa doesn't always bring EVERYTHING on the list.

Ever since then, her "list" for Santa has been different everytime you ask her. And it practically never includes a camera.

My mom also got Blythe a Rapunzel costume. So now she'll have Cinderella, Belle, Ariel, Tiana, Jasmine, and Rapunzel. So what does she tell Santa she wants? Freaking Sleeping Beauty.

As for the Little Mermaid bath toy, that was also in the Target ad. We have it, but it's wrapped up as a gift from Mom and Dad.

So tomorrow morning should be interesting!

Fun Things With Daddy

Because Blythe and Ethan are switching daycares as of January 3, we had the luxury of pulling them out 2 weeks early, so we didn't have to pay! Merry Christmas to us! Braden is off this week (I'm not...boo), so we told them last week they had no school this week because they were going to do "fun things with Daddy". And fun things they have done!

Monday Braden did have to work a bit, but he took Blythe and Ethan to work with him where they got to color and explore. Later, they hit up Red Robin for lunch and the stores for some errands (including the Dollar Tree....what could be more fun!?)

Tuesday we all went to breakfast at Panera Bread (or "Banana Bread" as Ethan calls it), then we took Ethan (and Blythe) to visit their new school. Ethan loved it and it took him no time at all to start playing with the other kids, so I feel good he'll be just fine come January. After nap that day, Braden took the kids to the movies to see Yogi Bear in 3D. Although Ethan kept taking off his glasses, he actually made it through the whole movie, which is quite a feat for him.

The "Fun Thing with Daddy" on Wednesday was a day at the indoor pool! Then Taco Bell for lunch...the kids were in heaven!

Although the cleaners came Tuesday morning and our house was immaculate for all of 0.3 seconds, now our basement looks like a toy bomb exploded. Brynn was at daycare all week, but she's home today too. No real plans today and most of tomorrow (just church tomorrow), so we may be tempted to let the kids open a few gifts early so we don't go stir crazy playing with the same toys we've been playing with all year. Who knows, maybe we'll even attempt to go see Santa today at the mall (just to make SURE he knows what the kids want for Christmas).

The end of an era

About a month ago I got an emailed letter that stated that the day care where all 3 of my kids go will close as of December 31. As you can imagine, that sent me into utter panic mode. There are waiting lists at all of the daycares here in Blacksburg, so it's hard to get 1 child into a center, let alone 3. Especially with only 3 weeks notice. And especially an infant. We've stayed relatively current on other waiting lists because, although we were very happy at our current daycare, you just never know what might happen. Well, I guess that paid off kind of. I was able to get spots at another good school for Blythe and Ethan to start January 3rd and for Brynn to start sometime in late February. Although I'd have to find something for Brynn for a short while, I was so relieved!

I was prepared for the stress of uprooting my kids from their current well-known, safe environment because there was no other option.

Well, then we got word that there was a potential buyer for the current daycare, but there were so many unknowns - would she buy it? what changes would she make? what would it be like? what would the transition be like? As these answers unfolded over the past few weeks, the stress and difficulty of making a decision of whether to stay or go to the new school got greater and greater. I don't think we've ever before had to make a decision like this that we knew would greatly affect the lives of everyone in our family.

I'm not going to go into the details of why we made our decision, but the decision we made was to start the kids at the new school. So today was Blythe and Ethan's last day at their current school. Brynn will stay until her spot at the new school opens up.

Making that decision gets complicated with friends our kids have made, friends we have made, a staff that is like family to us, Brynn's primary care giver who she likes just as much as me (or maybe even more). It's hard. It's really hard.

Blythe started at that school in August of 2007, when she was 19 months old. Ethan started at 12 weeks old and Brynn at 12 weeks old also. I'm trying to get excited about the possibilities at the new school - new friends, new teachers, new experiences, but it's hard because what we've had is so safe and comfortable and my kids have had wonderful experiences there.

So today is a sad day. But we'll cherish the memories we've had and continue to stay in touch with our old friends.

Snow Day

Yesterday was the first snow day of the season. We got 5 inches of snow, which probably would have been more, but it changed over to sleet and then freezing rain a few hours before the weather people had anticipated. The 5 inches of snow was powder though, so the sleet and freezing rain on top improved the sledding conditions.

Fortunately, I had just bought a sled. Nope - we never had one before now. The first 5 years we lived here it hardly snowed. Then last year hit and we didn't have a sled, but you couldn't find one anywhere. It's certainly seeming like this year will be a lot like last year. Cold and snowy. In fact, the other morning it was colder here than it was all last winter. And it's not even winter yet. And last winter was one of the coldest on record. I don't really like cold and snowy, but when you can sled, it makes it a little better.

By the time I broke out the camera, Ethan had had enough of the cold weather. He had sledded earlier in the day, so he was cozy inside watching Dora.

First Tooth

Last Friday Brynn cut her first tooth (one of the lower middle ones). The second one should be not too far behind. She's been taking it pretty well, like the laid back baby she is. Really not much to report on that, but since this blog has taken the place of a baby book, wanted to make sure it was recorded.

"Blythe" toy

Good thing my kids can't read yet or type in web addresses to look at my blog. That means I can post pictures of Christmas presents online.

Actually, there's only one I want to post. This one is way cooler in the box, so I decided to take a picture. I love it because "Blythe" is not in the top 1000 most popular names for a girl. And then this toy even looks a little like Blythe. It's almost like I designed this toy just for her.



No one else probably thinks it's as cool as I do, but whatever.

Christmas decorating

Blythe and Ethan decorated the Christmas tree this year. Can you tell by the placement of ornaments?


We're struggling with Christmas decorating this year. No one is visiting, so I don't really want to put up a lot (because that means having to take down a lot). The kids keep asking when we are going to put up lights outside, but it hasn't been above 20 degrees here in 4 days and every single time I look out the window, I see blowing snow.

I also have yet to buy a single Christmas present from the store. I have bought some stuff online, but I really need to make a trip to Target and it just hasn't happened yet. Christmas is coming up WAY too fast!

A Beary Good Thanksgiving

Okay, so my title is cheesy, but we saw a BEAR...a real, live, giant 500 pound black bear. We headed out to Cashiers to spend Thanksgiving with Grams and Peep and after a delicious Thanksgiving meal, I thought I'd walk off a bit of it by pushing Brynn in the stroller and telling Blythe to "hurry up" as she walked slowly behind me. We were all suited up and Brynn was in the stroller, when a car drove by and said, "We just saw a big bear walk across the street". This is broad daylight, mind you. So I said, "hmmm...probably a walk with my 2 daughters is not such a good idea". So we went back in and told the others about the bear. The other fearless adults all ran out to go get a look at him. His name is Wheeler and he's been in the area for years rummaging through trash most nights. Grams and Peep had seen him at night but never during the day.

They found him settled down a hill, about 100 feet from the road. So a small crowd formed on the road just watching him down there. They came back to the house to get cameras, and then Dan, a family friend, took my camera and got within probably 15 feet of the bear. The bear clearly preferred the peanut butter jar over Dan.



Beautiful creature.



Anyway, we also had our Christmas with Grams and Peep while we were there. Kind of nice to have such an early Christmas because the kids can really enjoy the stuff they got. Ethan is loving his Thomas the Train matching game (I think we've played it almost every night) and his Automoblox cars.


Blythe loves her Leapster game and her fairy outfit.


And Brynn loves, well she loves her mommy, but she doesn't mind being a fairy either.


On Saturday, Blythe and Ethan went out with Grams, Peep, and Braden to find a Christmas tree they could bring back to Louisiana. It was a little on the cold side!


Anyway, it was a fun trip filled with some DELICIOUS food! Trying to work some of it off, which is hard because it's SNOWING here. I used to like snow until last winter. Now I don't like it so much!

We're famous

For the past few weeks I've been dealing with a day care situation that I'm still not quite ready to blog about yet, however it's been a huge stressor and time suck for me (thus the measly 8 blogs in November). But anyway, yesterday the news cameras were there and now our family is famous (and Ethan's boogers are famous too).

6 months

I missed Brynn's 6 month update last week since we were travelling to Cashiers, NC for Thanksgiving. She decided to celebrate her half birthday by being sick with a fever. Lovely. Anyway, Braden took her to the doctor the day before for her measurements and shots, but that's when her fever started, so no shots for her (will have to go this week sometime).

She was 16 pounds 10 ounces and 26.5 inches tall. I looked it up and all 3 of my kids were 26.5 inches tall at 6 months. Weird, huh?

Anyway, it appears she is entering into a new phase of her life. She really seems a lot different now than she did just a few weeks ago. She's starting to teeth (those bottom 2 should break through any day now). That and that darned fever she had have been making her a much fussier baby than normal. But the other thing is that she's starting to want to be awake more. Appears the days of catnapping in mom's arms while her siblings are loud as can be are over. I tried it tonight and she wouldn't go to sleep. Finally I took her to her room where it was quiet and she fell asleep. I laid her down in her crib and whoops! awake again! I think she's afraid she's missing out. Used to be she had no schedule on weekends because she would just sleep when she's tired. But now....we might have to try a schedule (which is a pain when that schedule involves 2 naps and you have 2 other kids you need to get out of the house).

Brynn is sitting by herself quite nicely these days. If she's on a soft carpeted area, I'll let her hang out by herself with toys and no pillow. It the floor is hard, she still needs a pillow or someone to sit behind her because she does get distracted and fall backwards sometimes.

It's funny though that she can sit so well, yet I still have NEVER seen her roll over. I know she has done it at daycare, but at home NOTHING. I'm kind of thinking she'll be a late crawler. But who knows. Like I said, she's acting like a different baby recently so it's possible.

As for eating, she's tried lots of foods. All fruits, veggies, and cereal. Such a shocker, but she is not a fan of vegetables. Except sweet potatoes. She USED to like carrots and peas, but now she makes faces (because she'd rather have fruit).

She's saying some sounds like "Ba" and "Da", but mostly she's really quiet around her siblings (because they are so loud and she knows she can't compete). I let her lay in her bed in the mornings for a good while so she can practice talking before the wild ones invade her room. Recently they've been going into her room (after she's awake) and they climb in bed with her and jump and do seat drops to shake the whole bed and then Brynn laughs (kind of a nervous laugh I think...like "please don't jump on my head").

She does lots of big girl things now like sit in the grocery cart and sit in a high chair at restaurants. She's even taken baths in the big bath tub with no bath seat.

She wears size 3 diapers now and is wearing 6-9 or 6-12 month clothes.

Anyway, happy half birthday Brynn! May the next 6 months not go by as quickly as your first 6 months.

There's nothing better

than a baby laughing....

Flu shots

Took the kids to get flu shots today (well, not Brynn...she has to be 6 months so will get hers next week).

Braden had already gotten his, but I had not, so I got one too. It had been a LONG time since Blythe has had a shot. Last year she just got the H1N1 nasal mist thing, so I guess it was 2 years ago, when she was 2 that she got a flu shot. Ethan got an H1N1 shot last year, but he didn't remember. So when I asked them this morning, "Who wants to get a shot this morning!?!?!', they both said, "ME!". Ha! Maybe Ethan remembered a little because then he said, "It's just a little tiny shot, right?". Right. Here was my plan:

Mommy goes first (and acts like I can hardly feel anything)
Blythe goes second (and I make sure to tell her to be brave and not cry so Ethan doesn't get freaked out)
Ethan goes last (because he's definitely going to cry)

This plan did not work out as nicely as it had played out in my head.

Blythe completely lost it when she got a shot. She just kept crying and making sad faces and just couldn't believe we had let those nurses do that to her. This did little to calm any fears Ethan had. So he started crying when they wiped the area with an alcohol swab. And then of course screamed when they gave him the shot.

But he got over it quickly. Blythe did not.

Prior to the shot I had told her about getting shots when she turns 5. So at the doctors office after the shot she said, "I don't want any more shots until I'm 5". So I agreed. No more shots until she's 5. Later in the car she said, "Mom, I thought about it and I decided I don't want any more shots until I'm 6". Unfortunately I had to inform her of the horrific news that shots are required before she goes to kindergarten.

I also found out at the doctors office that Ethan never had his flu shot booster. I now remember forgetting to bring him back when he was a baby. Then last year because of the H1N1 crap, the kids didn't get regular flu shots because no one had them. So great, now I get to bring him back to the doctor in a month for a shot again. And now that he's almost 3, he's going to remember and it's not going to be fun.

Deep Thoughts....

My mother had 3 kids. Growing up I thought for sure she couldn't love me, my brother, and my sister all equally. She clearly loved me the most. No, actually Doug because he was the baby. Okay, actually Laura because she was the oldest (why else would she have gotten to do all the stuff I wanted to do..."because she's the oldest"...that's lame). Okay, so clearly she did a pretty good job of hiding who her favorite was. But I always knew she had a favorite (even if I didn't know who that person was).

But now that I have 3 kids I know that she didn't have a favorite. And she loved us all equally. Before Ethan was born I was so worried because I couldn't imagine splitting the love I had for Blythe in 2. That's not how it works though. And I loved Ethan just as much as I loved Blythe. Yet I still worried again before I had Brynn. But again I see how love is complicated and unexplainable. All I know is there is NOTHING I wouldn't do for any of my children.

But just because I love Blythe and Ethan a lot doesn't mean I don't feel guilty for spending the time I need to spend with Brynn. I need to feed Brynn and hold her and nurture her. And I LOVE doing it. But I wish I could also spend more time with Blythe and Ethan. And I know that time will come. In the meantime I wish things would slow down. I wish life wasn't so stressful and things were just simpler.

But things aren't going to slow down and life won't get any simpler. So I will settle on enjoying the little things and taking a few moments each day to feel grateful for all that I have. Happy Friday!

Family Room Before and After

Yahoo! We FINALLY finished our cabinet projects. Yes, I know people build houses in less time than it took us to finish this project, but whatever.

Here are the before and after pics of our family room. I may have left in the "clutter" (dog beds, baby swing, etc) in the before pic and removed it in the after pic for an extra dramatic effect. But still, look how much bigger and neater our family room looks now.

I need to hang a picture before I take the "after" picture of the basement, so I know the suspense is killing you, but you'll just have to wait longer for those pictures.

My baby got baptized

First of all - a refrigerator update. The repairman FINALLY came at 7:15 on Friday night. Holy crap, I was in panic mode. As I suspected, it was the motherboard, which is normally a $285 part. But since it was so late, he only charged me $100 and now my refrigerator is as good as new. Phew!

Braden's parents came in town on Friday early evening and then my parents, sister, brother, sister-in-law, and niece came on Saturday morning. It was really cold here (but fortunately the chance of snow didn't produce), so we headed to the new indoor pool. Blythe went down the slide "like a hundred times" and even yours truly went down the slide (it really was a lot of fun). Brynn liked the pool until she started getting splashed (and tired), so then she liked sleeping at the pool.

Blythe and Ethan could have swum for hours probably (and Ada too), but we didn't want to push nap time TOO much.

Then on Sunday, my baby was baptized. Isn't she beautiful in her christening dress?

The rest of us didn't look too bad either.

And here's the star with her godparents (and aunt and uncle) Doug and Lynette:

Brynn did great with the baptism even though she was SO tired (and fell asleep not 5 minutes later). Ethan TRIED to steal her thunder by making faces at the crowd during the baptism. He's always trying to make people laugh, that silly boy.

Anyway, it was a very, very nice weekend and we all had a good time. Here's a few more pics from the weekend.

Save the milk!

Our refrigerator has been making a clicking noise off and on for the past week. Kind of annoying, but it stops after a few minutes, so whatever. Then last night it wouldn't stop. Just kept clicking. And clicking. And clicking. And clicking. I couldn't take it anymore! It sounds like someone left their turn signal on. Forever.

So I got online to research. Bad news. This means that we are going to need a new motherboard. And that the refrigerator and freezer will likely stop working very soon. Wow, great timing. Brynn's getting baptized this weekend so we have all our family coming into town and I had just bought craploads of food from Walmart yesterday. Fortunately, there is an online repairman scheduling tool so I was able to schedule someone to come out this afternoon (sometime in a 5 hour block of time).

UNFORTUNATELY - the refrigerator and freezer stopped working sometime over night. Yes, I have a crapload of food in there that I don't want to go bad. But I have frozen breast milk in the freezer people! I.must.save.the.breast.milk. Got me a cooler out this morning and filled it with the already-melting ice and the breast milk. So we should be safe there. I likely let out all traces of cold air left while I was doing that though (because bad motherboard also took down my ice dispenser).

Please get here soon refrigerator repairman! What if he doesn't have a new motherboard? What if I have to wait longer? Supposed to be 23 degrees tonight, so I guess I could put all the frozen stuff outside. And tomorrow's high is 41, so we'll be good for a day or so.

In the meantime, the damn clicking noise continues. And it's driving me CRRAAAAAZZZYYY!

Halloween

Despite Braden's goal to make at least 10 kids cry in terror on Halloween, I think he only made 1 kid cry. Ethan. Poor kid is just scared of everything. Even though he would watch Braden put his mask on, he still was petrified of Braden in costume. And the fog. Screetching like a little girl every time our fog machine came on.

That's right - we have a fog machine. Definitely added to the spooky atmosphere.

That's Braden in costume and Blythe dressed up as Ariel. Nice hair, huh? I was a little worried she'd have pink hair for a week (and Blythe was hoping she would), but it came out after just 2 shampoos. Braden was pretty scary looking. Notice his Freddy Krueger hand with the knives. Yikes!

Although Ethan was scared at our house, he did enjoy trick or treating around the neighborhood. He was slow compared to his sister RUNNING from house to house. Good thing his friend Luke went slow with him.

Blythe was really into the whole Halloween experience. After she finished trick or treating around the neighborhood, she wanted to sit on our porch and hand out the candy. Later we found out she liked doing that because she was eating the candy she was supposed to be passing out. Oh well. We ran out at one point and then just started using hers anyway.

Brynn made it through a short bit of trick or treating. She didn't get any candy, but looked cute in her ladybug costume.

Overall, it was a really good and really fun Halloween. How about one more pic of the 3 kiddos in costume.

Tombstone Wars

Here are the 2 tombstones Braden had originally created for our awesome Halloween decorations.

We came home from church today and found someone had added to our collection.

Since that someone went to Davidson College, we've now expanded our graveyard by another.

Ah, how we love Halloween.

Otherwise today has been a pretty typical Halloween. "If you don't eat all your lunch, then you must be too full for candy." "If you don't take a nap, you can't go trick or treating." "If you guys fight, there's no trick or treating."

Everyone ate their lunches, and now all 3 kids are napping. Ah, how I love Halloween.

Bubble Time!

Blythe and Ethan probably won't be bathing together much longer. Once Brynn moves into the bath seat and into the big bath tub, they'll probably alternate who bathes with her (but 3 would be a crowd!).

So might as well make the most of these last times with some bubbles!

Dan Nicholas Park

Last weekend Braden headed to State College, PA for a meet against Penn State. So while he was there, I packed up the 3 kids and 2 dogs and headed to Gommy and Poppa's house. My godparents, Mike and Marcia, were there visiting as well. So as usual, a packed house!

I had thought about going to the Carolina BalloonFest, which is an annual hot air balloon festival in Statesville, NC. However, in reading about it, the balloons are only in the air 8am-9am and 4:30pm-5:30pm. Seeing as how it's an hour drive to get there, 8am was WAY too early. And 4:30 would mean we'd need to leave by 3:30 and that just wasn't meshing well with our schedules (esp. Ethan's nap schedule). So instead we opted to hit up Dan Nicholas Park in Salisbury. It was a BEAUTIFUL Fall day, and there was no way we were spending it inside!

So we did the playgrounds, rode the carousel, rode the train (which was temporarily the "spooky" train), mined for gems, and had a picnic. The gem mining was fun and a good activity for everyone to participate in. Blythe got some amethyst, onyx, fool's gold, quartz, and a bunch of other gems I don't know anything about. So it was a fun, fun day! Gommy took a bunch of pics, and I took none.

I think Ethan was little bummed about not seeing any hot air balloons, but he still had a good time. I had some TIRED kiddos on the drive home on Sunday, so the drive was pretty easy. Yay!

5 months!

Brynn was 5 months old yesterday! She's still a super GREAT baby, very chill and

go-with-the-flow. She can be happy just sitting on someone's lap (usually mine) for a long, long, time. Here's what she's up to:

• I weighed her on our super-unreliable bathroom scale and she is approx. 16 pounds. Length - have no idea
• Wearing size 2 diapers and officially out of anything 3-6 month or 6 month sized. Now into the 6-9 month and 6-12 month (though these are usually a little big).
• She started with rice cereal this month. Went okay for about a week and then it was yucky. So she has also tried banana, applesauce, and peaches baby food mixed in with the cereal. She's also tried oatmeal baby cereal. She may also have tried a bite of my chocolate frosty from Wendy's (bad mom!). Yesterday she tried applesauce by itself. Overall, I'd say she's not the biggest fan of food.
• This month she rolled over! Only once as far as I can tell (unless she did it again at day care late last week).
• Loves her feet and trying to eat her toes
• I think she might be working on a tooth. She makes a fish face all the time now like she's trying to feel her bottom gum. That and she has her fingers in her mouth all the time.
• I thought she'd be out of her baby bathtub by now, but she's not. I tried it once in the big bathtub with the bath seat and had Blythe in there too. She screamed the whole time. I think she was cold because I fill up her baby bathtub so even her shoulders are under water. Hmm.
• She's probably ready to sit in a high chair at a restaurant, but these days we only do drive-thrus. Usually Brynn is too tired at dinner time to even attempt sitting in an establishment (even if it is Taco Bell usually).
• Speaking of that, the past few days she's been so tired at about 6 o'clock in the evening, that she has to take a 30 minute nap (while someone is holding her). Then I bathe her and feed her and then she hangs out for about 45 minutes before going to bed. This helps avoid a 6am wake up, but kind of makes fixing dinner difficult.
• She can sit without support for a few seconds before falling over. She's good with a boppy around her.
• If I put her on her tummy with my leg under her or a small pillow under her, she tries to crawl, but I don't think she's all that close to actually crawling.

So anyway, that's about it. Another month went by way too fast!

Talon comes to visit

This past weekend we had some visitors from across the state. Tommy and Angie and their new baby Talon came to visit from Newport News, VA. Talon was born July 3, so he's not too much younger than Brynn. Big boy though! He seems to weigh just about the same as what Brynn weighs.

I think they had fun laying on their backs on the floor together. Brynn was trying so hard over the weekend to roll over and she seemed to try even harder if she had no diaper on, so there was one time when she showed Talon her lady parts in kind of an inappropriate way, but I'm pretty sure he won't remember.

Anyhoo, we jam packed our Saturday with as much as could fit in a day as possible. VT had their first swim meet of the season and the first one at the new pool at 9 in the morning that day, so I took the 3 kids to the meet where we watched for a couple of hours. Oh how nice it was to be at the new pool with plenty of seating (NOT on deck) so they could run around as much as they wanted. From there, I took the 3 of them to the parade on Main St. for VT homecoming. We got there late and Ethan had to potty, so we didn't see much of it, but the kids got a few pieces of candy and Ethan got freaked out by the weird-hokie bird-on-stilts-people, so that's pretty much what I had expected to get out of the parade.

Home for about an hour and then it was off to the tailgate for the football game. And we took ALL the kids to the game (and the tailgate). We went to the game about an hour early to meet up with the swim recruits and take them on the field to watch warmups, then we stayed until halftime (score was 49 to 21 at that point). All the kids did really well considering we had basically no naps that day (Brynn napped some in my arms).

As a side note - Brynn FINALLY did roll over for the first time yesterday afternoon at daycare. Tried to get her to do it again when we got home and she got real close, but she seems quite pleased with herself on her newly developed skill.

Disney on Ice

Last Thursday Blythe and I went to Disney on Ice: Princess Wishes with her friend Ashley and her mom and grandmother. It was a mother/daughter date long overdue! Ashley and Blythe are at the perfect age for something like this and they both dressed up in princess costumes (as did almost every little girl there). Ashley was Belle and Blythe was Ariel.




The show was good - basically had a little "clip" from each of the Disney princess movies (except Princess and the Frog and Pocohontas, which Blythe was a little unnerved about).

Here is a little movie of the dragon scene from the Sleeping Beauty part.

When I showed the clip to Ethan later, he said he wanted the dragon to eat the Fairy Godmothers (or whoever those women with the funny hats are). Nice.

So it was a fun show. I spent money only on the tickets, though Blythe tried to flag down the guy selling cotton candy (for 10 dollars!) and the snow cone guy and she begged for popcorn and for this light-up-spinny-thing (that was 25 dollars). So lucky for us the people sitting in front of us bought ALL of those things so that Blythe could keep on wishing she had just one of them.

As a side note, it was the first night I was not here to put Brynn down for bed. Things went splendid. Okay, so she screamed bloody murder until she was too tired to scream anymore and fell asleep. What can I say? She missed her mommy.

Beware the Holloway home on Halloween!

We're all decorated for Halloween now. Our neighborhood is pretty much the perfect Trick-or-Treating neighborhood. 42 houses, all fairly close together on one well-lit street that is one big circle that's all a one-way street. Takes about an hour and half for little kids to finish our neighborhood. Big kids could probably run through it in under an hour. So we get a lot of trick-or-treaters and we take our Halloween decorating seriously.

We had some left over plywood from our still-not-yet-complete basement cabinet project, so Braden used it to make a coffin. And some more of it to make a tombstone. Then Blythe and Ethan helped him paint blood marks on them with red paint. Actually there are 2 tombstones - one says "Cavaliers" and one says "Heels". He made the coffin big enough so he could fit in it (one of his many ways to scare the prospective trick-or-treaters).

And then there are the lights. Oh the lights. We've been adding to our collection each year (actually I'm pretty sure my mother-in-law has purchased all of them for us). We have: skeletons, candy corn, pumpkins, and now bats. Oh, actually Braden did buy some orange ones that come in a net to put up as well. Throw in a few decorative bats and we're all set.

Ha! Yeah, right...that's not it! On Halloween, we'll add some dry ice inside the coffin so the smoke filters out through the slits Braden left in it. And Braden will dress up in his scary Freddy Krueger costume and sit perfectly still holding the candy (until someone tries to take a piece!). And we'll add the scary Halloween music from the CD Braden already made.

Oh and duh - by Halloween I'm sure we'll have at least 5 pumpkins to carve. For now we just have the one seen in the picture. In exploring the neighborhood the other day, Braden, Ethan, and Blythe found that someone had planted a pumpkin patch in one of the common area flower beds by the front entrance. The nerve! Since they were in the common area, we picked one.