On the Road Again

This past week we were able to leave the unpredictable weather of Illinois  for the predictably steamy weather of North Carolina.  Our trip started last Sunday night around 8 PM.  In the car.  With 2 kids.  And all the crap necessities.  From Champaign to Greensboro is about an 11 hour drive.  We figured we could drive straight through if we did the trip overnight, when the girls would be asleep.  It was a beautiful plan that actually worked fairly well.  I did have to sit in the back with Lucy to give her a final bottle for the night but I was able to move back up front when we stopped for gas.  I also had to pump several times but pumping while riding in the car is no big feat for me anymore.  It's just nerve-wracking trying to transfer the "goods" from the pump bottle to a storage container without spilling any precious drops.  Really the worst part of the drive was when I had to drive through the mountains, on a 2 lane highway (as in one lane for each direction), in the dark, on a very twisty elevation-changing road, filled with rampant deer.  Oh and fog.  It really wasn't terrible but I also didn't go more than 45 mph the entire time.

Around 6:30 we were getting hungry for breakfast and the girls were starting to wake up so we decided to find some place to stop and eat.  By this point I'm pretty sure we were somewhere in North Carolina or at least very close to it.  All I wanted was a donut from Krispy Kreme.  There was not one in sight.  Really?  In the state where Krispy Kremes originated from?!  Anyway, we settled for a Shoney's which was pretty decent.  Then again I had been up for about 24 hours (minus a few naps in the car) by this point so pretty much anything would have been good!  We were definitely a sight: the girls and I were all in our PJ's, Walker and I were wearing our glasses, Taylor's hair had big snarls in it and was sticking out in every direction.  And then at some point during breakfast, Taylor peed right through her diaper (and onto the highchair- don't worry we cleaned it up) so she got stripped down to just her (fresh) diaper right before we left. 

We pulled into Greensboro shortly before 9.  And after we all got freshened up we went to the toy store!  Our niece Courtney is officially potty-trained; she filled up her potty chart which meant she got to pick a new toy out.  But being the little ballerina she is, she opted instead for a new leotard, tutu, and ballet slippers.  Here she is in all her adorableness:

And Taylor got one too (thank you Auntie Jennifer!)

(by the way, that is just a regular onesie- there were no leotards in Taylor's size).
Then, that afternoon, Walker and I both got to take much needed naps!

The next morning started off with a bang....literally.   Walker (or maybe it was my sister) had taken Taylor downstairs to start her breakfast.  Then Lucy was fussing so Walker came back up and was getting her.  I was desperately trying to sleep in.  All of a sudden I hear a loud crash, Taylor's cries and my sister shouting up the staircase "guys, guys!"  Walker went down there right away.  In my sleepy haze I assumed it wasn't a big deal and stayed in bed but after a minute I decided I really should go see what happened.  I get downstairs and I see Walker holding Taylor and blood dripping down the back of her shirt.  I didn't really know what to think or say- I was a little shocked honestly.  But I guess Taylor had been sitting in the booster chair and pushed her legs against the table (something she's been doing lately) and this time pushed too hard and her chair tipped right over.  The result of the crash was splitting the back of her head open.  Thankfully, Jen's neighbor is a doctor and so Jen called her right away and she came over to check Taylor out.  Would you believe that Taylor had already stopped crying by the time the neighbor arrived?  The neighbor said we should take her to the ER because she'll probably have to get a staple put in to close the wound.  But she said that the wound didn't look too serious.  So Walker and my sister took Taylor to the ER and I stayed behind with Lucy.  Turns out Taylor needed 2 staples.  And apparently she took them like a champ!  The doctor didn't  use anything to numb the area and Taylor didn't even cry. 
So after that whole ordeal, it was decided Krispy Kreme donuts were in order (YESSS!).  Taylor very much enjoyed her first Krispy Kreme.

The spot on her forehead is chocolate, not an injury.  And notice how her chair is now against the window?  So she couldn't push on it anymore.  We did the same thing at home; moved her chair in between the wall and the table.  And when we go back to Miss Monica's in the fall, I'll ask if we can make sure Taylor sits against the wall.  I mean hopefully she's learned not to push back from the table but you never know.....
Anyway, that afternoon we went to the pool that my sister's family belongs to.  Taylor had clearance to go swimming as long as she didn't go under the water.   So we stayed in the baby pool.

The next day we went back to the pool and this time Lucy got to try swimming too!  She didn't seem all that impressed with it honestly. 

 Taylor tried to show her how to have a good time.  Oh yes, remember how Taylor wasn't supposed to get her head wet?  Well she went under the water...twice.  The first time I saw it happen and I couldn't do anything b/c I was standing on the pool deck holding Lucy.  All I could do was shout something (I can't even remember what I shouted) to Walker.  Taylor was fine but it definitely got my heart racing. 
That evening, we went to my sister's in-laws' house since they had just moved to the neighborhood.  They had their other 2 grandchildren staying with them.  The older kids had a great time goofing around and Taylor had a good time just watching them. 

I think in this picture Will and Wren are trying to play the piano with their noses.  Silly kids =)

The next morning my sister arranged a playdate with a friend of hers who has a little girl a few months younger than Taylor.  The girls did some nice parallel playing.  We played up in Courtney's room reading books for a bit.  Then my sister took Zoe (Zoe's mom had some errands to run- can't say I blame her!) to do something so I was watching Taylor and holding Lucy.  Taylor wandered out of Courtney's room over to one of the staircases.  I could see her shadow and I thought she was on the otherside of the railing.  Then I hear THUMP, thump thumpthumpthumpthump   thump.    And Taylor starts wailing.  All I could do was yell "Sh*t!! JENNN!"  Taylor suffered her 4th (yep count 'em, 4!) accident.  She had rolled halfway down the stairs.  But as always she was just fine.  I think it scared her more than anything.  I will say that I am SO glad we don't have any stairs at our house!!

That night I decided to do my middle-of-the-night pumps in the family room so I could sit on a couch (I had been doing them in the bonus room where there are only bean bag chairs) and watch TV.  Too bad I forgot to tell my sister that and so the minute I put one pinkie toe over the threshold into the family room, this loud siren filled the house.  Ho.ly. crap!  It scared the living daylights out of me.  I felt so bad I woke everyone up but I never heard any of the kids cry.  Anyway, Dan turned off the alarm and I got settled on the couch for pumping.  I was maybe 30 min. into pumping and I hear a WHAM! WHAM! WHAM! on their front window.  Okay if my heart was beating fast before, it was NOTHING compared to this!  And of course I couldn't jump up and hide; I was hooked up to the pump!  So all I could do was get a couch pillow and kind of cower behind it.  I sat there praying for someone else to wake up and come investigate it for me.  Dan to the rescue again!  He looked around downstairs and concluded that their house had been egged.  I was kinda surprised that people still did that on nights other than Halloween.  The next morning my sister reached the (probably accurate) conclusion that the eggers probably didn't see me on the couch (it's hard to see in their windows) but rather the flickering of the TV so they threw the eggs to scare whoever might be in the house awake.  Well it worked.  I was definitely freaked out!  
Definitely not a relaxing night in terms of pumping goes but after that we made sure the alarm was turned off at night and the doors connecting the family room to the front room were closed so no one would be able to see me or the TV and get tempted.

On Friday we traveled to Raleigh to two museums.  We went to the Natural History Museum and Marbles- a FABULOUS children's museum.  The girls didn't get much out of the first museum although Taylor did like pushing her stroller around:

Marbles was better: Taylor very much enjoyed the water table and the soft play area for babies.

 

And Lucy just hung out- something she's very good at

On Saturday we went back to the pool and Taylor took a nice long nap on the pool deck.  And of course I didn't have the camera.  Oh well.  You can just picture it.  That evening the guys took the older kids to a minor league baseball game.  Jen and I hung back with Taylor and Lucy and we watched The Adjustment Bureau, which was actually pretty good.

Sunday was our last day there and we drove about an hour and a half to Fairy Stone State Park.  It had a nice beach with a very cool roped off kid's area that had floating structures for kids to play on.  Taylor enjoyed more wandering around the beach. 
 

And Lucy again just kinda hung out in her carseat.  I guess that bottle was pretty good.  ;)

 

Unfortunately for us, some rain clouds rolled in pretty quickly and it went from lightly sprinkling to heavy downpour within five minutes.  We had to say our goodbyes through the car windows as we were leaving to get on the road.  We thought we were saving time on our trip by leaving from the park since we were in Virginia.  Turns out we didn't save that much time.  We had to get out of the mountains first so we were on a lot of little country roads.  I'm SO glad we weren't driving them at night because they made me nervous just being on them in broad daylight!  Since we left in the middle of the afternoon, we had to stop a lot more, including when that nice West Virginia trooper pulled us over for going 56 in a 40.  I don't know why he gave us a court summons; clearly we're not going back to WV!!  We'll just have to pay the ticket but I guarantee if I had been driving, I would have gotten off with a warning.  Well actually we wouldn't have gotten pulled over in the first place because I wouldn't have been going that fast ;).  

We finally pulled into Champaign around 2:30 AM amidst a pretty good storm.  We left everything out in the car except the bottles, breastmilk, and my pump.  Oh and the girls!  hahaha!  We figured everything else could wait until morning.  And then we all collapsed into bed.  

We had a great time in NC and I'm so glad we went but I mean it this time: we are NOT traveling anywhere far with the girls for the next year!

Scratching the 7 Year Itch

"7 Year Itch" is usually a term used in marriage.  However, in this case, I've got the 7 year itch with my job.  For the past 7 years I've been teaching 1st grade in the same district, same building, same hallway even.  It did help I got to move classrooms this past year.  But I knew I needed a bigger change.  So when our reading specialist announced she was changing positions in the district I leaped at the chance to replace her.  And after waiting on pins and needles for a week after my interview, I learned yesterday that I would be the reading specialist at my building next year!
So what does a reading specialist do?  Well that depends on where you work.  In my district it means working with the neediest of needy kids on their reading skills in small groups of 1-3 every day.  These kids are receiving the most intensive interventions we have.  The nice part about it is all the interventions are scripted (which can be monotonous I know) so lesson planning will be a snap!  And there will be oodles of paperwork involved (data, data, data!) but I don't see how that's any different than the oodles and oodles of papers I've had to grade over the years.   Oh and scheduling could be a big challenge but I'm very creative when it comes to that.  But overall I'm really looking forward to this position.  I'm really excited about using Teacher Web to create a reading resource website.  I'm also looking forward to planning reading night(s).  I'm really really looking forward to never having to sing the "Days of the Week" song....haha. 
I wish I could say this position involves more money but it doesn't.  That's okay; I always say I never got into teaching for the money!

Lucy's 3 Month Pictures

Well I don't think I got any smiles out of Lucy but I can only blame myself for that.  1. She had just eaten and usually after her first morning bottle she takes a nap.  2. I was making her wear a sundress outside when it was a little chilly.  3. Since she was laying on her back, the outside light was probably hurting her eyes (even though it wasn't that sunny).  Oh well, I wanted to get the pictures done.  We'll get more smiles next month.

Lucy is 3 Months!

Stats:
Weight- 11 lbs .5 oz
Length- 23.25 inches

So growth slowed down a little bit this past month.  I think it would have been more of a difference had her 2 month appointment been closer to when she actually turned 2 months but it was actually 10 days after.  So maybe I should have waited 10 more days to have her weighed and measured but oh well.  I have to say I did think it was strange she was only eating 21 oz per day.  She didn't seem like she was starving or anything but there were times she'd finish eating and fuss but we just figured she was sleepy or had reflux.  But now we give her 4 oz at each feeding and we've started waking her up in the middle of the night again to eat.

New skills: going days without pooping!  I was starting to get worried she doesn't poop as frequently anymore but I was told by many people that it's normal, especially since she's on 100% breastmilk now.  Hey I'm not going to argue with less poopy diapers to change!  Other than that, nothing really new with skills.  Still getting lots of smiles and we've gotten quite a few half laughs.  I'm still waiting for that first full out belly laugh.  She doesn't seem really interested in using her hands yet and definitely has not lost that grasping reflex. 

And another new development is the most awful eczema I have ever seen.  She's got it all over her elbows and on the back of her head.  And recently she's started getting patches on her legs.  I seriously have tried just about everything on it.  All the lotions do is make her greasy and reduce the red color.  I want something that will REMOVE the crusty scaly stuff and make her skin smooth again.  Am I allowed to use my Mary Kay midrodermabrasion stuff on her?  haha probably not.  =)

I feel bad that I'm not focusing on her development as much as I did with Taylor but you know life with 2 under two is super chaotic fun.

ETA: oh yeah, pictures are coming soon.  See above comment......=)

2 Great Websites

Yesterday I signed up for 2 different websites and I just have to share them.

The first one is onetsp.com.  This is a website my sister mentioned to me and I finally got around to checking it out.  Basically it's a place to store all your recipes.  That may not sound very exciting but so far I love it.  It's very easy to enter in recipes and you tag them making it easy to find them later on.  You can also upload a picture for each recipe.  The great thing is, I finally can get rid of the crappy 3 ring binder of recipes that I've written out on notebook paper or torn out of magazines.  Also, I can keep recipes that I find in cookbooks I've checked out of the library (like "Deceptively Delicious"- more on this later).  I may never have to buy a cookbook again!  The only thing that would make this site better?  If they had an app for the iPhone.  Oh well....someday I'm sure. ;)

And the other site is mperks through the Meijer website.  So how many times have you been at the grocery store only to realize you left all your coupons at home?  Or even worse, you brought them with you but you forgot to use them until after you've already checked out?  Yeah, I've done that so many times!  But no longer!  I don't know who came up with this but it's truly brilliant.  You sign up on the site using your phone number.  Then you look through their online coupons and "clip" the ones you want.  Then when you get to the store, before you pay, hit the mperks button on the screen, enter in your phone number and voila!  All the coupons you "clipped" are applied to your total.  How amazing is that?  No more cutting coupons out, printing them out, or remembering to stick them in your wallet.  Finally, a way to save money for those of us with "mommy fog!" 

Happy Hundred's Day!

No, not the hundredth day of school- thankfully that happened months ago (no, I'm not ready for summer to start at ALL).  This is my own hundreds day.  As in, I now have over 100 oz of my OWN breastmilk stashed in our deep freezer!

Pardon the crappy quality of the iPhone camera (didn't feel like busting out the Nikon for this one =P).
I'm honestly amazed at this.  I definitely have to give credit to Carissa for donating some of her freezer stash.  I've gotten to the point where every time I take out one of her containers to thaw, I'm able to put a container (or more!) of my own back in to replace it.
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            <---------------------------I step away from the computer for 1 minute and Taylor decides to add her own 2 cents
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And of course, this shows that God DOES answer our prayers.  I'm sure you remember I wrote about praying to God every day to make me an overproducer.  An overproducer is someone who outproduces what her baby needs.  Well, I'm now consistently making between 24-26 oz a day and Lucy only takes in between 21-24 oz per day.
I cannot begin to write how good this makes me feel.  Finally, after over a year of feeling like I had failed and that something was wrong with me, I can put all of that behind me and confidently know that there is nothing wrong with my body and that it is working the way God intended.
So now I'm praying a new prayer.  I would LOVE to be able to make enough to donate to either a breastmilk bank or a mom in need.  Being able to bless another mom the way I was blessed would be such a wonderful gift.