Well, as predicted,
the week, Monday, started off with a nice big snow storm. Seriously, this is
WAAAAY too early for all of this to be starting. And, was super nervous for my first snowy drive in
the van. It took me 2 hours to get to work. TWO HOURS (vs. my 25-30 minute
commute). So gross. I just hate sitting in the car, in traffic, for that long.
And even more, I HATE taking leave time, which I have so little of, for it. Oh
winter, you can’t come this early! I also had to leave a little early, because
you never know how traffic going home will be. My van was totally iced over
when I got off work – just over a month and we’ll be parking in the ramp at
work, and I seriously cannot wait. Luckily, traffic wasn’t too horrible going
home, so I was able to stop at Walmart for a few things before I picked the
girls up. As I was walking by the clothes (which, I don’t typically like from Walmart)
I noticed fill racks of Christmas dresses. I fell IN LOVE with one dress, and
they happened to have it in all 3 sizes we would need for the girls, so I
jumped on it and bought them. I’m so excited – we’ve never really don’t the
matching thing. The girls usually coordinate for Holiday’s, but they don’t
actually match. I figured this will probably be the only time I can get
something in all 3 sizes, so I couldn’t resist. I can’t wait to see them in it!
After that excitement, I picked the girls up, we met Christian and baby at home…had
some dinner and settled in for the night. Winter is here, it’s cold and snowy,
but it’s a short week, so let’s go!
Tuesday was Veteran’s
Day. Working for the government, I get the day off…YES! Christian was off to
work, the girls were off to daycare, and I got the house to myself. TO MYSELF.
ALL DAY LONG. I can’t even tell you how amazing that feels. If you haven’t gathered
over the years, I adore my alone time. I love my family, but I ADORE my alone
time. I think it mostly stems from being an only child, and never having an
issue finding peace and quiet growing up. It became my calm…just being alone.
While I’ve grown to appreciate (kind of) the chaos of our lives, I still long
for my alone time. Days like this, I just relish in it. I decided to take
myself completely off duty – no cleaning, no chores, no shopping, no kids,
NOTHING, and I had myself a little Sons of Anarchy Season 6 marathon. One more
mini-marathon and I’ll be done. Seriously, Netflix binge watching is the best
thing ever. I was in a little bit of a rage over “Black Friday” today…Target
and Walmart released their opening times, 6:00 and 5:00OPM THURSDAY. I mean,
seriously, COME ON. While I do think it’s ridiculous to make retail workers
give up their time with family (yes, I know police officers, nurses, doctors,
etc. work – but to me, those professions are MUCH different than somebody
working at Target likely to make ends meet), it bugs me mostly because Black
Friday has just been ruined. Absolutely ruined. Years ago, Christian and I would
get up early on Friday, get ready, stop somewhere for some breakfast, then hit
up the mall and Target to do some shopping (some Christmas, a lot just for ourselves
– ah, to be young and carefree again). It was busy and hectic everywhere, but
it was a great day, something we really looked forward to. And now, as an adult
with 3 kids and limited funds, I’d LOOOOOOVE to be able to take advantage of
some of the deals. But, I can’t. I’m not giving up my Thanksgiving with my
kids, my family, to go shopping (especially with how greedy and out of control
it’s become over the last couple of years). Yes, in the end, I usually get better
than Black Friday deals shopping online, or shopping closer to Christmas, but
still – I miss the essence of our fun day out together. Ugh – rant over.
Outside of my annoyance and my SOA marathon, I picked the girls up, and our
evening was pretty standard…dinner, baths, bed. Back to reality tomorrow.
She's so funny - she tries to eat all of the little pictures on the pillow.
On Wednesday, it is
was beyond cold – it was like mid-January cold. I mean, I know I live in
Minnesota and you just have to suck it up – it is what it is, but being this
cold, this early, makes me really fearful for what’s in store this year. I was
hoping for a winter we could actually leave our house during, but that doesn’t
seem likely at this rate. Luckily, being Wednesday, it was work at home day, so
no trekking to and from work! Between Monday’s drive, yesterday’s holiday,
today’s working from home, and my flex day Friday, this is shaping up to be a
pretty ideal week! I mean, the shorter the better! I seriously love my new
schedule, as if I don’t say that every week. Outside of working and the cold,
it was a pretty normal evening – picked the girls up, had some dinner and
family time. The usual.
Trying to get a picture of Eliza is tough, Chuy always photobombs. She thinks he's hilarious. I never would've let him near the other girls, LOL - she's free game - joys of being baby #3!
Olivia drew this picture today. It took me a while to notice little Eliza clinging to me. Daddy is still pretty jealous that he doesn't make it into her pictures too often yet...
Well, I spoke too
soon. Maybe the shorter the better is not so true. On Thursday, we were all off
to work and school, as usual. In the late morning I got a call from the school
nurse, and my heart always sinks when that happens. She said Olivia was in her
office complaining of a headache, she had a slight fever, her eyes and ears
were really red and she was complaining that her stomach hurt (OK, is there
anything NOT wrong with her?!). I felt so bad for her; thinking of my poor baby
stuck at school sick is just the worst. I finished up some tasks and made my
way to school…I signed her out, went to her classroom to pick her up and she
looked just miserable. Until we started heading down the hallway, to the
parking lot, and she was just skipping along, happy as a clam. Oh man, I was so
mad. I made her take a nap when we got home, and she did rest most of the day…randomly
complaining that she still wasn’t feeling well, but, I did have a conversation
with her. Reminded her that she only goes to the nurse when she REALLY doesn’t
feel well…when she has a headache, when she feels like she’s going to throw up,
when she’s really in pain. NOT because she thinks it’s cool, NOT because she’s
tired, NOT because she just wants to be at home. I had to explain that Mommy
and Daddy have to work, and we have very important things to do, so she can’t
be at home unless she really needs to be. So, in the end, it’s really a mystery
if she was actually sick or not. Hopefully tomorrow she’s feeling better,
whatever was bothering her. Luckily, I was able to do a little work from home
while she rested – so the afternoon wasn’t a complete loss. Christian picked up
the other girls from daycare on his way home and we settled in for the night. We
ended up bringing out the highchair tonight – we’ve been using the bebe pod
chair – and I actually had hoped to just use that until she was big enough to
sit in the booster chair, but her delicious leg rolls had other ideas, and she
acted like the chair was trying to kill her, so highchair it is. My big girl,
growing fast!
I finally hung up some new artwork at work today. I love being surrounded by reminders of the kids all day.
Trying out the highchair - big girl!
This weeks throwback - a comparison of me and my dopplegangers. Crazy!
Friday was my Friday off – YES! Eliza had her 6 month check up to start the day. Again, not
with her actual pediatrician because LONG after I had scheduled her appointment
he decided to take some vacation time. Ugh. So, we saw a new doctor. She was
really nice though. I think I’m going to switch the other two to her – she’s at
the clinic near our house, vs. way in the city for our usual doctor. I want Eliza
to see him though for a couple years because we really like him. She is
currently 87% for height and 73% for weight – so, she’s staying pretty steady
in her growth. She did end up getting 4 shots today – which is just cruel. Poor
baby! She got 3 vaccinations and her first dose of the flu shot. I thought she
was going to be pretty crabby all night, but she actually slept for quite some
time once we got home. While she slept, I got lots of little chores done. I
broke my glasses last night…I have a tendency to climb into bed at night with
my glasses on, then I’m too exhausted to turn over and put them on my
nightstand, so I just lay them on the bed. Well, in Eliza’s refusal to sleep
last night, I put my elbow right through my glasses when I went to support
myself to sit up. UGH! Well, I wasn’t going go years wearing broken glasses
again, so I right away hopped on zenni this morning and ordered a new pair. I
also ordered some new contacts as my trial pair is getting pretty old now. I
paid some bills, balanced our budget, watched some shows – finishing up Sons of
Anarchy (now the painful wait for the final season to show up on Netflix). The usual.
While Eliza did take a nice long nap, she was pretty cranky the rest of the
day. Poor baby. So, other than picking up the big girls in the evening, we had
a pretty quiet afternoon/night.
Ready for her checkup!
Bestfriends!
On Saturday, Christian
had to work most of the day. Eliza was SUPER crabby today, the big girts were
at eachothers’ throats all day long – just driving each other insane and
fighting about everything. I had a pounding headache. It was just a rough,
miserable day. After a long battle, I finally got Eliza down for a nap…and she
ended up napping for SIX HOURS! Whoa, I’ve never heard of such a thing. My
headache sure thanked her, but I did have to keep checking in on her, I couldn’t
believe it. Amelia also took a nice nap, while I let Olivia skip hers and relax
on the couch. I showered, took some medicine and rested as much as I could.
Christian arrived home from work, showered himself, and when the girls woke up
I was feeling much better – so, we were all off to the Sprint store. We have
been needing new phones for quite some time, and had decided to leave T-mobile.
After researching AT&T, Verizon and Sprint, we decided Sprint was right for
us (for what we want)…so, even though we had a horrible experience with them
years ago, we took a chance and switched to them. We remain rivals, as
Christian went with the iPhone 6 and I went with the Galaxy S5. Oh my gosh, we
LOVE them! There’s just something so exciting about getting new phones, I don’t
know what it is. Christian’s friend Lorenzo ended up meetings us for dinner at
Applebee’s afterwards, so we ate and chatted and hung out before heading home
for the night. The girls were off to bed and we watched a little TV before
passing out. What a day!
Sunday did not
start off well…it actually started off with Eliza throwing up ALL over me. So
gross. It was early, and still dark out, and I was getting a very early start
on laundry as our bedding was just covered. ICK!! I got her back to sleep and
rested on the couch while laundry was going, until the other two woke up. Throughout
the day, we noticed Eliza was breaking out in a strange, mysterious rash. Between
feedings and dealing with her crankiness, I tried to get the basement cleaned
up. It wasn’t going well though – so I again succumb to the decision to just
leave it a mess for now. I made a quick run to the grocery store, and Eliza
continued breaking out and acting very unlike herself. We’d never seen anything
like it before – it almost looked like chicken pox (though we knew it wasn’t).
We were starting to worry it might be a vaccine reaction, so we decided it
would be best to have Christian take the girls to swim class while I take her
to urgent care to be checked out. I’m not a fan of urgent care for the kids –
it just seems like they never know what they’re doing. The doctor checked her
out…all of her vitals were normal, she had only a slight fever and she had
never seen a rash quite like it before. She did some research on the vaccines
she had gotten on Friday and a rash, like this, was not a known side effect of
any of them. She was pretty sure it was just viral, but said to keep an eye on
it and if it wasn’t starting to get better by Tuesday or Wednesday to have her
seen again. Seriously – leaving the doctor, with a sick baby, with a crazy
mysterious rash and no answers was really frustrating. But, it was slightly
comforting to know it wasn’t anything serious. I got home before the rest of
the house, so I started dinner. We ate, I finished some laundry and man I was
exhausted. Another week down!
The rash Eliza was breaking out in, kind of hard to see though.
Until Next Week!
XOXO
