In case you were wondering

Just in case you were wondering what your hair would like like if you hid under a blanket, cried for thirty minutes, got all sweaty and then fell asleep; well, here you go.

4 Months

Little Autumn is 4 months (well 4.5 months now).  At her 4 month visit she had these stats:

Height: 24 1/2 Inches = 59%

Weight: 12 pounds 4 ounces = 20%

Head: 16 1/4 = 59%

She is great (minus the fact that she always wants to be held and I get absolutely nothing done as a result).  She loves Owen and Ivy and is always happy to see them (minus when Ivy says “hello little one” while in her face).  She is sitting up and loves drinking from a cup.  She likes sucking on her thumb and her binky.   Like those she follows she HATES to be alone.   She started fake coughing this week.  She loves to be awake and part of the crew.  We are just to break out the 3-6 months clothes.  She LOVES to laugh with Owen and he carries her around much to her dismay.  She is obsessed with me and often cries if anyone else is holding her.  We are holding off feeding her “real” food and I am pretty sure she has a dairy /soy / egg allergy. 

Bottom line: I would take her any day over getting anything done.

Happy 4.5 months!

 

Two Fears

Owen is afraid of two things 1. Wolves and 2. Food

Wolves. His fear of wolves is odd in that the only place he is constantly afraid he may run into one is upstairs. For example: "Owen, please go get your pajamas on."
"Can someone go with me?"

"Possibly in a minute, but just run up quick and grab them."

"But what if I see a wolf in my room"

We have this conversation once a week and sometimes more. It has also been known to be on a much more dramatic level and even accompanied by tears.

Luckily I feel confident he will never find a wolf in his room so hopefully he outgrows this.

Food: He is the pickiest eater I have ever met (even beating out his cousin Evan but maybe right up there with my brother as a child). However, Owen goes beyond picky. He is afraid.

He has been known to pack up his lunch at school before he is done because the person next to him was eating something that smelled funny. He won't sit by Ivy when she is eating something like black beans or hummus. He won't eat canned peaches from the store anymore cause once he saw a little red thing on them (yep, the skin). He inspects every bite of something he is not used to to make sure a suspect food did not make its way in. And the time I put a piece of avocado on his neck you would have thought it was a bug. He turned all red and started crying and breathing hard yelling at me to get it off while completely frozen.

Owen eats sandwiches, noodles, cereal, apples, pancakes, and grapes. There is not one vegetable he eats and his list of approved foods gets smaller each month. He has been known to eat three or four peanut butter and jelly sandwiches throughout the day for all his meals. We try I swear.

And while he may never run into a wolf, he will run into a bean or two in his life so I certainly hope this is a passing phase.

We only buy things we have

So for Valentine's Day Greg and I exchanged Kindle cases. This is my third and his first. Why is it my third you wonder? One word IVY. That girl is trouble. In fact right now she is sitting here with me in the bed. She just took the lid of her sippy cup and spilled water all over the bed. Her side of the bed is soaking wet. She hopped in and said she would be ok. Before that she opened her own applesauce and spilled it all over the floor then purposefully stepped in it. She just yelled at me that she is getting one book to read for bed despite me telling her it was too late for books. I turned to find a stack close to twenty.

And back to the Kindle case. I am on my third because she keeps breaking it. Somehow she always finds it and gets her hands on it. I swear this will be the last. We were happy because this was Greg's first. It would not be so easy. He put his Kindle in it's new case only to discover the screen is cracked. So while he doesn't need a new case, he does need a new Kindle. Bonus gift I guess.

I have no proof but I put my money on MUFFY.

You Know...

You know you are tired when you almost fall asleep mid root canal.

You know you need to make some changes when you run in the grocery store and your son says, "Mom, you can run?"

You know you should not take your kids to the Verizon store when you walk out of there with an iphone and additional purchased accessories that total $150.00 in addition to the phone, only to realize once you get into the car and look at what you just bought, you don't need or want ANY of them.

You know when you are still writing the same blog 4 days after you started that you are busy (or have horrible time management)

and finally..

You know it is going to be a long night when you fall asleep with the kids at 9:30 and the baby cries and you wake up sure it is the middle of the night only to have the clock say 10:50. (and yes it was)

Snow and More Snow

It started snowing last weekend and it kept snowing until last night.  We had A LOT of snow and it was a crazy week. 

Let’s recap the highlights.

1. We had no school on Monday for the holiday and then no school the rest of the week due to snow – awesome.   This puts us in school until about June 22nd this year – not so awesome.

2. We drank a lot of hot chocolate.  How can you not with a week like this, there is that unwritten rule about playing in the snow and then coming in for hot chocolate.

3. The kids played in the snow more times than I can count.  By the end they were both professionals at putting on their snow gear.  Ivy could do the pants, coat, hat, socks and boots by herself and only needed help with her mittens and scarf.  Owen only needed help tucking his gloves in his coat.  This was all so joyous as you will recall they played in the snow more times than I can count. 

4. Other than to go to boot camp on Monday and Wednesday night, I did not leave this house one other time from Monday until Friday night.  There was no question we were going to dinner tonight.

5. I was reminded that I love when it snows for a week and then immediately warms up and starts to melt. 

6.  We are in need of all the snow to melt so that we can hopefully locate a missing spray bottle and a winter glove.

7. Spray bottles with water and food coloring make for a WONDERFUL snow activity, even if they need constant refills and new colors. 

8. I realized that I love to be able to go places when I want to and that homeschooling my children is not something I could ever do. 

9. Steve is the fastest snowman builder I have ever met.  He went outside for 3 minutes and instantly had a snowman.  One minute there was no snowman, I turned to talk to Angie and the next minute there was a snowman. 

10. It is impossible to keep a clean house with a baby, two snow kids and the worst snow storm in years.

11.  As it continues to warm up and rain this weekend, it will be only a memory by Monday, but it was fun while it lasted!

TUESDAY:

 

THURSDAY:

And this has nothing to do with the snow, but I like it (and I don’t have any snow pictures of her).

  

We Call her Muffy

There was a mouse on a show we used to watch, her name was Muffy.  She was a scruffy little thing and for some reason Ivy, in her scruffiness, reminds me of that mouse. 

And so we call her Muffy. 

I am not sure if it is the hair, her teeth, the clothes that she picks out for herself, the funny way she talks, or that she always seems to have a messy mouth that earns her that nickname. 

Maybe it is just the whole package. 

And a little bit about that little Muffy…

She loves her brother and loves teasing him about as much.  She snuggles up to me and says, “my mom” over and over.  She chewed a hole in her binky about 4 weeks ago and I resisted buying a new one.  She doesn’t seem to mind, as long as she can suck on the strap it used to be attached to.  She loves to eat everything, turkey dipped in hummus (as in the picture above, she is watching tv with the whole package of turkey and the entire tub of hummus), broccoli, asparagus, salad, salmon, cheese, cauliflower, carrots, peas, beans, and the list goes on and on, it is nothing short of a dream for Greg. She loves to repeat what just happened, ie.  Ivy: “Hi Baby”, Baby: Laughs.  Ivy: “Mama, Iya “Hi Baby”, Baby Ha Ha Ha.  She loves Evan.  She is the WORST at going to sleep, most nights include a ritual in which she will not stop talking and after threats that last too long, I take her down to Greg sobbing and crying while she says she will be nice.  I hear her crying, Greg talking, the crying stop, the noise of the stairs and then she comes back with Greg.  He lays her down, says she promises to be nice and keep her eyes closed.  She closes them tight and although I am sure she is dying inside, she keeps quiet.  We do this every night.  She likes to read but not the way you would think.  She tells me to read a book, I start to read and then she picks up another book indicating she will read that one.  We both read a separate book.  Whenever I get home from boot camp she always says, “baby cry AAAALLL night.”  When she says ‘what’ she puts her hand on her ear as if to help her hear better.  She has a slew of pants in her drawer that are 12 month pants that she wears all the time.  She told me today that she loves to wear tights under her pants.  She loves to beat Owen in getting dressed for the day and often gets in her pajamas around 4:00 or so to assure she is first.  It is usually accompanied with a little song called, “Iya beat Owie, la la la” and a little hip wiggle.  She loves the word WHY.  She potty trained herself when Owen told her she couldn’t go to school until she wore underwear.  Greg and I resisted and pleaded with her to wear a diaper.  She refused and has been accident free ever since.  She picks out clothes for the baby everyday and even occasionally for Owen.  She told me last night she was Mama’s baby, Daddy’s baby, Noni’s baby and Steve’s baby. 

I love that girl.

As I end, she is helping Owen clean the kitchen.  She is wearing a shirt, that is all, and chewing gum, singing a song with Owen about cleaning all night. 

just as Muffy as ever.