That Darn Yogurt

Ok, so I guess I'll have to admit I am a slow learner. Some of you may recall the last time Seth got to feed himself yogurt. It was a messy experience to say the least. Well, I let him try again today. Not that it matters much but he took a really long nap and was eating lunch at like 1:00. I had already eaten so I grabbed a magazine to read while he ate. He took a few spoonfuls of the yogurt and then moved on to the bagel with cream cheese and the blueberries. He was doing a great job. I was reading along and then I glanced up to discover him putting the yogurt in his hair like it was shampoo or something! He smiled at the look of shock on my face and dipped his hand in the cup for more!

I removed the tray and went to get a towel. Although I knew it would take more than a towel to get the yogurt out of his hair. Might as well grab the camera while I'm at it, eh?














Don't worry, he cleans up nicely after you run his head under the sink faucet. He will need a bath again tonight though.

The one good thing about his extraordinarily long nap was it allowed me to get a bit of work done on my latest quilt project. I got all the cutting done today and even began doing some piecing! I do love it when I make progress. Oh, and I talked to the lady who is going to be machine quilting Ben ad Susan's quilt today. She said she thinks she'll get it done this week! I am so excited to see it all quilted with the pretty pattern I picked out.

4 Day Weekend

We had an eventful weekend. Seth was sick pretty much the whole time. I took him in on Friday and the doctor said he had an ear infection. We talked about antibiotics and decided to wait and see if the fever broke. Not all ear infections are bacterial. Well, Friday night the little guy's fever went over 103 and I wasn't comfortable with my previous decision anymore! I called the doctors office Saturday morning and they called in a prescription for me. Seth's fever finally went away on Sunday night. I alway worry about my kids when they get crazy fevers like that. Anyway, no one else in the house seems to be sick.... yet. We spent most of the weekend in the house trying to relax even though it was HOT!

We went ahead and had our BBQ today and it went off smashingly. I had intended to procure a table and chairs but with the little guy being sick it was hard for us to go out together and look. This morning Dan and Becker (one of the guys from Dan's work) went to Target to see if they could get one and they were all out. Surprised? I think not. Instead of searching the city for patio furniture Becker went back to his house and kindly brought over his table and a few assorted chairs. No one seemed to care or even notice the fresh out of college assortment we had going on. The food was good but the company was better!

Oh, I need to add.... Hannah's troop was in the Memorial Day parade this morning too. I walked over and dropped her off with her girl scout troop at 9:30 because the parade started at 10 and everyone had to be in their places. I ran back to the house put my pound cake in the oven (Oh yeah, strawberry shortcake. Yummy!), got Seth and Simon all sun screened up, grabbed water and snacks, and then headed to where the end of the parade route was. I swear there was every single fire truck in the 3 towns around us and our own in the parade. Now, I think fire trucks are cool and all but dang there were a lot! Simon was so bored. Once Hannah was done we just headed home to get ready for the aforementioned BBQ!

Class Pictures

I can't believe it's Memorial Day weekend already. The end of the school year is rapidly approaching for my kids! Their school does a second round of school photos in the spring that of course surpass the fall pictures so you just have to buy them! I figured I'd scan them in and share with all of my lovely readers. The kids are growing by leaps and bounds. Now don't fret this summer we are getting family portraits taken (I have been grumbled at for not having any family pictures to speak of).


I am taking Seth into the doctors this afternoon. He was running a pretty good fever today, 102.3! Yikes. So the doctor would like to see him. I gave him some Tylenol and that seemed to bring the temp down quite a bit. It is really hot today, I think they were calling for about 90, so I am really hot! Holding a hot baby in a hot house... god we need AC! Thankfully it doesn't feel like the humidity is very high or maybe I've gotten used to the humidity.

Oh, and lucky me, I got to meet my new neighbor this morning.... in my pajamas. He came over to ask if my little hoodlums (my word not his) could stop riding their bikes in his drive way for fear they could get hurt and he'd be liable. Gee, nice to meet you too sir. He was actually very polite about it. The kids make a loop from our driveway around the corner and then turn around in his driveway to come back. It keeps them entertained and seemed harmless to me. Oh, well. Now I let them ride all the way to the corner of the block which is way cooler.

Enjoy your holiday weekend everyone! We will be BBQing on Monday. Maybe we should go get a table and chairs for people to use. :)

Park and Pictures

Sunday afternoon we went to a birthday party for a little boy in Simon's grade. Mason is in a different class than Simon but they get along well and so do Michelle (Mason's mom) and I. The park was huge! There was a lake and your typical playground areas. The cool part is there's an area where you can feed animals. There's apparently a herd of deer. I didn't walk over with Hannah and Simon when they did the feeding so I don't have any pictures of that. I did snap a few others...
Hannah brought home a caterpillar for their new insect cage. Ya, I am excited. Not! I turns out she found a Gypsy Moth caterpillar. They are terrible and can destroy trees. I told her under no circumstances was it allowed out of the cage! It will live and die in there. Although, I wouldn't be surprised if it dies quickly. I think we'll have a lot of captive and tortured bugs throughout the summer. She wanted me to take a picture of her with her new fuzzy, creepy, crawly friend.
Simon was dumping sand out of his shoes in this shot. I think the picture looks like I made him posed even though I didn't.
Ben put up a couple new pictures yesterday. I think this one shows how much nicer everything is looking in our house. Oh, someone looked at the house a few days ago and really like it so they are going to go back again! Cross those fingers!
That's about it for now. I have to leave in a few minutes to go get the big kids. Seth and I already went to the park, had lunch with Tiff and Chloe, and went grocery shopping. Somehow I'll get laundry done today also... somehow. My question is, what is "free time" and what does one do with it?

Finished! YEAH!

I finished another quilt top! I totally rock. I hope to get one more done as quickly as I can manage. Anyway, the one I just finished is designed by Kari Nichols (my old manager at Quilt in the Attic, now Holly's Quilt Cabin) and it's called County Lines. There are tons of great Mountainpeek patterns here.
Isn't it pretty? I like it. If, and I mean IF I can get it quilted and bound in time this is for Brain and Rhea as a wedding present. I'd like to put a request out there to all my friends and family... Could you please stop getting married and having kids for a while so I can catch up and maybe make a few things for myself! (Selfish aren't I?)

The best news on the "finished" front is our house in Denver! It is finally all done! YES!!!! Ben has a few good pictures of the house but some of the pictures are from right before they finished painting and putting up molding. We are going to give it at shot at selling it, again, but we have little faith (sorry Ben) that the house will actually sell given the current market. I would think that it'd be very desirable. The interior of the home is almost all brand new and it comes with a 5 year warranty on all the work that was done. There are things that people want in our house that we can't give them. There is no big back yard (I think that means less yard work!) and there's no garage but there is off street parking. Oh well. We'll give it a few months listed and then we'll rent it. I'd just like to not have to deal with it anymore. We moved out of the house 10 months ago after all.

"Woof, woof!"

I had a wonderful Mother's Day and it sounds like most of you did too! I got a hot cup of Chai Tea handed to me upon waking and the kids gave me all of their wonderful hand made gifts. I especially like the nice things Hannah said about me. I got to do things I wanted to do.... like quilt. I know, shock and surprise! I actually made quite a bit of progress on the quilt top. I am working with batiks. I love batiks. They are just fantastic fabrics that are rich in color. I digress, where was I... ah yes... We then spent the evening with some of our friends having a little Mother's Day BBQ. It was a very nice evening minus the car ride home where Seth cried almost the whole way.

A Simon update- Everything looks good right now. We saw the orthopedic doctor today and he said everything looks okay. Simon's curve is at 18% (it was 20% last time). Getting better? Maybe. His flexibility is worse but he did spend two weeks moving as little as possible. I think my muscles would suffer too. I am going to work with him on stretching. Heck, it'd be good for me too! We also saw Dr. Storm's Nurse Practitioner today. She said things look good. They want an MRI within 4-6 months after surgery to see how the syrinx is responding. Everyone cross your fingers that it shrinks up on its own. I don't want him to have any more surgeries! I need to get a little more clarification from the doctor about what activities are okay and when. The nurse said he shouldn't be in gym for 3 months but Dr. Storm told us he could go back to normal activity... hum, very conflicting. I do think the doctor was right when he said we wouldn't be able to stop him from doing much anyway.

On to the title of the blog-

Ah, our little Seth is such a smart boy. When he sees a dog he says, "Woof, woof." I was so excited to hear him using sounds to help express himself. I've told everyone about how he says this when he sees a dog. Then the other day in my office he said "woof, woof" again. I asked him if he saw a doggie and I looked to where he was pointing..... It was a goose. It turns out all animals say woof, woof. :) Yes indeed all of them- sheep, pigs, cows, cats and even fish say, "woof, woof!".

Mom

It is quite the title. After 8 years I am still amazed at the magnitude of the job that comes along with the title of "mom". It is hard yet so very rewarding.

With that in mind may I wish all of you wonderful women in my life a very heartfelt-

Happy Mother's Day!

New Baby!!!!

My dear sweet friend Cynthia had her baby last night! Yeah!!! They have a beautiful healthy boy. They named him Kenyon. He was 8 lbs 8 oz. She got to labor mostly at home (she even went bowling with friends during early labor!) and by the time they showed up at the hospital she was ready to push. Go Cynthia. They are both doing very well.

I guess it doesn't matter that the quilt was a little on the boy side and I apparently have rather good timing since I shipped off the quilt yesterday! I need to check on flights so I can go visit them. I am so excited!

LLL

I went to a La Leche League meeting tonight. (For those of you saying, "La what...?" It's a organization that provides breastfeeding support, information, etc.) I do so enjoy the meetings. I love being surrounded by like minded women. All of us are different in how we parent and the length of our nursing relationships with our babies but we all believe breast milk is the best food for the baby. I also understand that nursing doesn't always work out for everyone so I don't want to upset anyone but if you can nurse, you should.

Earlier today I finally took the quilt top I made for Sheri in to get it quilted. Seth charmed all the ladies at the quilt store with his little smile. Now I am working on a new quilt! I love to start new quilts. I just finished my least favorite part of quilting.... ironing. Bleck. Ironing is boring but rather necessary unless you like lumpy messed up quilts.

Simon is doing very well. He is healing up nicely. He runs around, rides his bike, and in general doesn't act like he had major surgery a month ago! We see his orthopedic doctor and the neurologist next Tuesday. Hopefully everyone will agree that things look great. If his scoliosis hasn't worsened I think that means we might be able to keep him out of a brace. I am sure I've mentioned this before but if the surgery worked the way it is supposed too than the syrinx should shrink on its own, releasing the pressure on the spine, allowing the curve to self correct!

Taking it Easy

I like it when we can take it easy.... It's a nice day outside... I got to hang out with Misty and Tiff today... I walked to get the kids from school.... nice and easy.

Of course, I have neglected a few things today like we forgot Hannah had Band this morning, I haven't done the dishes, we are out of milk..... but who's asking, right.

I finished up Cynthia's little quilt. Hurray for me! It has minky on the back which is the softest stuff in the world. I made a cute little elephant out of the minky to go with it too. So, is it too boy or is it gender neutral enough? On to the next project!

So, since I have been negligent as far as Hannah updates go... I thought I'd brag a little. She gets spelling words every week and she has to make up sentences that the words go in. She thinks it's fun to use as many words as she can in one sentence. Actually these are the challenge words. She takes the spelling test at the beginning of the week and if she (or any other student) gets them right then they only have to use the challenge words.

Her words were:

permissible
flabbergasted
commas
bundled
chugged

Her sentence was:

It is permissible to be flabbergasted that you forgot to put commas on a bundled package that was chugged away on a train!

I think she is a smart little girl to come up with sentences like these.

Crazy

Things are crazy around here as usual. I am not sure what to make of how Simon has been feeling. He was home Wednesday and felt yucky all day. He even ran a low grade fever for a while. He does have a cold now. Thursday he felt better but I had him stay home one more day. No sense rushing things. By the end of the day on Thursday he seemed all better so he went to school on Friday. He had a good day. Things seemed fine again. We even went to the mall to get all the kids hair cut. They played outside with friends and had fun. Then about 7:30 last night he started to get a headache. I figured he was tired ad we tried to get him to bed early. He woke up soooo many times last night crying because things hurt. His head and his butt again. I just don't get it. We aren't pushing him. We are letting him decide what he can handle like the doctor told us too. Besides, if you know Simon you know the kid is usually a ball of energy. He is still feeling yucky this morning. I can't give him more Tylenol for another hour. I really, really hope this all goes away. He is so whinny when he doesn't feel good. I can't blame him either.

While they were playing around yesterday I took the opportunity to snap a few pictures of the kids. Of course the one I like is blurry. They were swinging and I knew it was a possibility that the picture would be blurred... sometimes I don't want to be right.... Here it is anyway and a few others.
I like the last one because it makes the house look so big and Seth look so small. I can't wait until we are able to paint the house. It'll look so nice! I think I lost a few of my Hydrangea's because they tried to bloom in February when the weather was so nice. You can't just tell a plant not to bloom... I tried. Anyway, I am sure I'll have tons of photos from outside this summer since Seth loves to be out so much. We should get a sand box for him.
Other than Simon not feeling well we are doing pretty good. I've been trying to make progress (Slow and steady wins the race, right?) on Cynthia's quilt. She is due so soon!

Home Again....

Well, Simon is home again today. He is having a lot of hip and leg pain. Poor kid. He mentioned again to me this morning how he wished he never had to have the surgery. It just breaks your heart to hear it. He woke up in the middle of the night with real bad hip pain. He actually told me his butt hurt. I had a hard time figuring out what that meant. I asked a lot of questions but didn't get much more out of him. Is it new sensations that his body is interpreting as pain? Almost like when your foot fell asleep and it begins to wake up. Is it going to happen his whole life? I just hope it subsides over time. This morning he was still hurting so I decided to keep him home. It's not like he is behind at school or anything. The kid can read really well and do math like mad, basically the only he can't do at school is sit quietly. He is my child after all. They didn't call me "Little Yellin' Ellen" for nothing! Anyway, I emailed his neurosurgeon to ask him about the severe leg pain so hopefully he'll be able to get back to me today with some insight.

When I got home from walking Hannah to school I started a pot of coffee for Dan and I. I could hear Seth is the living room or dining room while I quickly did it. As soon as I finished I went out to see what the little trouble maker was up too, because let's face it he's usually into something, and I found him sitting at the dining room table helping himself to Simon's breakfast. He was very proud of himself and even offered some to me. The little stinker can actually climb onto the table now that he has figured out how to get up on the chairs. I think he is part monkey!

We will just hang out today and let Simon rest. He has been pretty exhausted and getting headaches by the end of the day since he went back to school. I think kids have a hard time taking it easy because they can usually do so much. What am I saying, adults do the same thing.