Suitcases

2 innocent little suitcases.  One for me to pack for my quick trip to Washington.  The other for the kids to pack because they can't help but do what I'm doing.

And they did get packed!  With 2 little kids who REALLY want to come with me!

Planting Seeds

Jayden and I spent a little time yesterday getting our seeds going.  We are a little behind schedule, but I figure better late than never! 

Jayden got a little excited about writing on our tags and wrote on his face.  With a permanent marker.  That won't come off.  Jayden said, "Well at least it's purple.  Go Huskies!" Good point!

We are soooo excited for our garden this year!

Willow also decided that she was ready to ride her bike on 2 wheels.  She doesn't spend a lot of time riding her bike, but she's been getting sick of riding in the stroller when we go for a run and my rule is you can't ride your bike while I'm running unless you have your training wheels off, you're just too gosh darn slow and you can't corner very well.  So, yesterday, with Jayden cheering her on the whole time, she tried it.

And after one attempt, she gave up.
This may look like she's happy and having a good time, but this is actually a panic face of "stop this bike and let me off.  i'm not doing this anymore." and then some screaming because Royal kept pushing her towards the house.

Next time......next time.....:)

Kid Quote :: 21

Thanks to Death Cold 2012 (see previous post :) ), there were lots of snuggling and movies happening at our house.  The kids would watch one out in the living room and then come into my room and snuggle in bed with me and we'd watch one on the computer.  During one of these times, Jayden says to me....

Jayden : Hey Mom.  I have figured out when I could lie and it would be ok.

Me :  Oh, you have?  (cough cough, sniff sniff, blow my nose in a kleenex, collapse back onto my pillow)

Jayden : Yes!  If pirates were trying to find and take Willow, I would lie and not tell them the truth about where she was!

Me : Um......yes.....I suppose that would be a good time to lie.

And then tonight while I was making dinner, Jayden and Willow were being rough with each other in the chairs at the counter and I look over and see Willow coming at Jayden with her teeth bared, ready to chomp into his arm.  I quickly tell her to close her mouth and get out of the chair and walk away or she was going to have a bigger consequence.  She slinks out of the chair but not before getting one last swat in at Jayden.  Jayden looks at me and says....

Jayden : Man, Mom.  Sometimes Willow can be so mean........and she can smell fear!

Death Cold 2012

We have been sick in this house with what I'm naming the Death Cold 2012.  It started with Willow almost 2 weeks ago, she had a runnynose, cough, and a 103 fever for a couple days.  She got over it though and had a bit of a cough and a clear runny nose.  Then Jayden started getting it in his chest, no fever, and a slight runny nose.  Meanwhile, Royal caught it.  He wouldn't admit it, but his voice had dropped like 2 octaves and he was a tad crankier than normal.  Then I started getting a sore throat.  No big deal, but I seemed to go downhill fast after that.  2 days later and I was in bed and I wasn't getting out if I didn't have to.  One night I was desperate enough to take some Codeine cough syrup I had - now this is a big deal because I hardly will take ibuprofen if I don't absolutely have to.  Too bad I didn't sleep all night due to drug induced anxiety filled dreams that woke me up, made me feel all panicked, and then had coughing attacks that the medicine was suppose to be suppressing!  So the next day I didn't get out of bed. 

On Monday the only reason I got out of bed was because Royal had to go to work.  And then I tried to make some breakfast, but since I hadn't gone to the store during the weekend there was only 1 egg for Jayden (sometimes he eats 4!) and I scrambled it up.  Jayden ate it, but said he was still hungry.  I wasn't feeling too hot, so I told him to go into the pantry and whatever he could find he could eat, but I was going back to bed.  Poor Jayden walked around with a bag of pretzels for the rest of the morning.  Now, I really don't like to take antibiotics or giving antibiotics to my kids unless we absolutely need them.  I believe in our bodies ability to heal themselves, and I believe in giving our poor bodies a chance to do it, and gosh darn it, I want those antibiotics to work when we need them and not develop resistances to them because I've given them to my kids every time they've had a runny nose.  However, on my behalf, the kids were feeling better, but were still congested and Willow was complaining a little about one of her ears hurting, and since it had been going on a week, I tried to get us into our doctor on Monday, but they didn't have any open appointments all day.  I'm guessing more people were suffering from the Death Cold 2012.  I did however, manage to get out of bed and we went to our chiropractor to see if she could help drain our colds out of our heads and check the kid's ears.  Their ears looked good, one of Willow's a little pink, but pretty good. 

We carried on as normal, I tried to force myself to get out of bed and do things because sometimes it takes moving around to get to feeling better.  However, I just kept feeling worse and worse.  My sinuses were completely plugged, my ears were ringing and hurting, my chest hurt from coughing so much, and one of my eyes started to catch a cold as well.  So, on Thursday, I gave in and called the doctor, I figured walking around and crying for a half an hour in the morning because I felt so terrible just wasn't going to cut it anymore.  I'm also pretty sure I saw Royal dance a jig at the end of the bed when I said I was calling.  He'd been feeling better for days now and had to start bringing dinner home with him because he knew I wasn't cooking.  And the poor kids were hungry and were eating things like french fries and peaches for dinner.  One day, Jayden went to school with nothing but these horrible cheese puffs for lunch because I hadn't been to the store in over a week and had no fresh fruit or veggies and no bread to make a sandwich and he didn't like my peanut butter tortilla idea, and I didn't feel well enough to come up with anything else.  So I called and they got me in right away.

I LOVE our family doctor, however sometimes her wait times are sooooo long.  So, I always have to come prepared with things to do with the kids, things like snacks, games, coloring, music for a dance party.  Eventually they get bored of those things and start tearing apart the room, but I just figure that's motivation for the doctor to hurry up and get in there.  The nurse came in to take my vitals, took one look at me and and said (she's a big black woman named Thelma), "oooooo, girl, the doctor's gonna give you a shot!"  I just laughed and said, "No, she's not!"   Jayden panicked and said, 'Just for mom, right?  I'm not getting a shot!"  And Thelma took one look at my kids with their slightly runny noses and said, "I'm taking these kids with me and weighing them in, just in case the doctor decides to give them medicine too"  And now you know why the wait times can get long.  Our doctor spends lots of time talking with her patients and sometimes, like in my case, 1 patient turns into 3.  So the doctor finally comes in, and my kids love her, so they hop right up on the exam table and have her check them out just for fun.  Turns out Willow has an ear infection in one of her ears.  It also turns out Jayden had some wheezing in his lungs that needed to be taken care of (he has cold induced asthma, so wheezing can become bad).  It also turned out that Thelma was right and I had to get 2 shots, right in the rear.  One an antibiotic and one a steroid to help get my ears to heal up before I bored my plane for Washington in less than a week.  The kids were SO excited to see me have to get a shot.  Willow had to come over and remove my band aid make sure there was a hole there from the needle and put my band aid back on.  Jayden told me I was really brave and gave me a Diego sticker from the basket.

The kids and I are feeling much better.  Sometimes it takes feeling much better to realize just how bad you really felt!  I have a 2nd oral antibiotic that I have to take too and every time I take it, Royal looks at me and says, "Now, Rachel.  What have you learned from this experience?"  I pretend that I can't understand what he's talking about.  :)

A Bigger Garden

We have lucked out I tell ya!  We have some friend's whose parents live just a few miles north of us who decided this year they weren't going to really do anything with their garden, and if we wanted, we could use it!  So, the 4 families in our small group have decided we are going to take it over and see what we can grow.

We met out there is morning to clean up and till the garden.  Jayden was really excited to get to do some garden work and was even more excited when we showed up and they had a little fire going, burning up the remnants of last year's garden.

The kids were real interested in the tiller.  So much cooler than turning your garden over by hand, like we do with our garden boxes.  :)

Then it was onto digging out the walkway trenches in between the raised beds.  Jayden and Willow both liked this the best.  :)

Now to get the garden boxes in the backyard turned over and those spring veggies put in the ground!

Musical Beds

Jayden and Willow both started out the night in mine and Royal's bed for a "special night".  Special nights in our house pretty much mean they can sleep in our bed until Royal and I go to bed and then they get moved to their own bed.  I'm all for co-sleeping and attachment parenting, but the truth is I need my own space at night and Royal is big enough to have to share a bed with, much less kids who flip and turn and sleep sideways!

Jayden has been thinking it's funny to play Hide-And-Seek Night Edition lately with Royal.  Only he tells me where he's going to "sleep-hide" but I'm not to tell Royal, and really Royal doesn't even know that he's playing.  Guess that's part of the game?  I'm pretty sure that's what led to the sleeping between the bed and the wall earlier this week.  Anywhoooo, we'd put the kids to bed and told them they'd need to stay quiet or they'd get separated, however I slept with my sister pretty much my entire life and I know that staying quiet really isn't all that realistic or possible.  :)

Royal and I were downstairs watching a movie and we'd hear the pitter patter of feet upstairs signaling they were out of bed, so Royal went to check on them.  He stood in the dark at the top of the stairs and watched Jayden and Willow sneak out of our room, sneak across the living room, walk right past Royal, and into Jayden's room.  Then, there was a conversation about Jayden going and getting Willow a drink of water because she was thirsty.  So, Jayden snuck out, walked right past Royal, and got Willow some water and brought it back to his room.  Then, there was a conversation about Willow needing her pillow.  So, Jayden snuck out and into Willow's room, grabbed her pillow and brought it back to his room.  Then, there was a conversation about Willow wanting them to sleep in her bed and Jayden wanting them to sleep in his bed, and they compromised and said that they'd sleep in Jayden's bed tonight and Willow's bed tomorrow.  All went mostly quiet and Royal came back downstairs.  We heard some more pitter-patter of feet, but they stopped quickly and then everything was quiet and Royal and I were too lazy to go upstairs one more time and make sure they were in bed.

So, on our nightly rounds of making sure animals and children were tucked in, I walked into Willow's room and found the monkeys like this!

Guess Willow finally won out on where they were going to sleep and poor Jayden can't even stretch his legs out all the way.  :)  It's probably time to upgrade Willow to a real bed and get rid of this crib/toddler bed once and for all!  At least Jayden would fit then!  :)

Comfy?

Check out how Royal and I found Jayden when we checked on the kids one last time before we went to bed.

And it was totally intentional.  He had pillows all shoved down there for him to sleep on.  :)  Nice. And. Comfy.  :)