2015 - Week 22

Monday kicked off a nice, short week with a Holiday, Memorial Day! I started the day off doing some laundry, picking up the basement a little bit and cleaned the kitchen/did dishes. Christian cleaned the entry and fixed our leaking sink. Luckily, the girls played downstairs most of the morning, actually getting along, and Eliza was on her best behavior, Including taking a super long nap, so we were actually able to get a ton of stuff done. Finally, Christian and I showered and got ready for the day. I made a pasta salad, and his family and friend Lorenzo came over to have a BBQ. The weather ended up being amazing, the perfect day to spend outside. The girls’ BFF and her parents came over to hang out for a while, and I even indulged in a couple of margaritas. What a fun way to kick off the week! One by one, everybody started to head home. It was late, but the girls were dirty and gross and needed a quick bath before bed. I had a really hard time falling asleep, so I knew it was going to rough day, but at least it was a short week!

Flashback to last Memorial Day - she's grown, but she's still super clingy!

Some Memorial Day Fun!

Tuesday, as predicted, was a rough morning. Exhausted!!! As if the late night wasn’t enough, Eliza decided to wake up SUPER early this morning…she was upset, warm, crabby. I checked her temperature and it was normal, so we weren’t sure what was going on. Hopefully it’s just teething, which I hate. Ugh! We were finally off to work, school/daycare and I was ready for a nap by the time I got there! I had a pretty hectic day, including making a million appointments…I FINALLY made myself a hair appointment – treating myself for my birthday with my bi-annual haircut, made hair/nail appointments for the girls – they need some fresh new cuts, and I’m surprising them with some mani/pedi’s for the “end of the year” , my dentist appointment, the girls’ dentist appointments, Amelia’s 5-year check-up, Eliza’s 15 month check-up and Chuy’s check-up. Whew, who knew making appointments could be so tiring. Seriously, it’s too much to think about. Christian was pretty work out himself, and actually left work early to go home and rest. He NEVER does that, so you know he was beat. Rain hit shortly before I left for the day, so traffic home was terrible, TERRIBLE! Why doesn’t anybody move when it’s driving?! I tried to take some back roads out of the city, and construction was horrible, so I got all mixed up in that chaos. I was just a hot mess trying to get home. I FINALLY got to daycare, grabbed the girls, and we made our way home. Eliza was crabby…tired, she wouldn’t eat, I seriously hope she’s not getting sick. The big girls played downstairs for a while, while Christian made dinner and I cuddled baby…we ate, relaxed and everybody was off to bed. Hoping for a more peaceful night…and actually feeling like I’m awake tomorrow!

On Wednesday, we were all still pretty exhausted. Eliza slept much better, thankfully, but still had a rough morning. It didn’t help that Christian had to start work early today. She seemed to perk up quite a bit once we got to daycare though….she’s been crawling right over to her teacher at drop-off lately, getting in some extra cuddles before the day starts. I had a pretty low-key day at work, busy but quiet. Then a super chaotic evening. Traffic home was terrible again – it took forever to get home, and it’s so frustrating. I stopped home to get the dog out…and he proceeded to escape and run away while I was getting some snacks for the girls together. Pretty much the last thing I needed to deal with. Being a ball night, I did NOT have time to roam around town with him, so I was on my way to daycare to pick the girls up and get them changed, when I happened to drive by him, hanging out at somebody house down the road. UGH! So, back home to drop him off, then off to daycare. I gathered up the girls, and had them change in the bathroom. Christian met us there and left with Olivia, while Eliza and I were off to watch Amelia. Then, realized we had left Amelia’s hat at daycare. Ay, I’d forget my head most days if it wasn’t attached, that’s for sure. Finally, we settled in. Amelia did really well tonight. She got one really good hit and stopped a couple of grounders. She’s still letting the boys run the show, so she needs to toughen up a little bit. Olivia didn’t get any hits tonight, so we definitely need to work on that, but she got to play catcher and thought that was super cool. I’m so bummed that I missed it! The weather was amazing tonight…so, regardless of all other stresses and chaos, that was a silver lining. Christian grabbed some dinner on his way home and we all settled in. That is, until I realized we were out of bottle liners. We’re thisclose to being done with the bottle, but not quite there yet, so off to Walmart I went. So not what I needed. However…I did have a pretty cute encounter while there. I was cutting through the feminine hygiene section, when a confused looking man stopped me. He seemed to panicked and confused, and finally asked me if I happened to know where he could find nursing pads, and that the employee had sent him there. I wasn’t familiar with Walmart’s stuff, but I guided him over to the baby feeding section as a more likely option, and sure enough, we found him. He was so grateful – it was just cute! I don’t know that I could ever send Christian out for anything in that realm.

Thursday was all around a pretty quiet day, which was much welcomed. The office at work was pretty quiet, so that made for a low-key day.  I was able to get a ton of work done, which is extra great heading into the long weekend. I picked up the girls after work, and we settled in at home. Christian mowed the lawn quickly right when he got home, getting it all cleaned up before the rain hits tomorrow. Then, it was just dinner and some quiet time before bed. Not too shabby!

My Throwback this week - with Amelia graduating Pre-K tomorrow, and Olivia finishing up kindergarten next week, had to flashback to their first day last fall!

Friday was my day off! Little beats my Friday off, let me tell you that! Christian was off to work, I got up pretty early and showered myself. Then, finally, got the big girls up and ready to go. As soon as Eliza woke up, we were off to drop the big girls off at daycare. We made our way back home, had some breakfast, and finished getting ready for the day. Shortly after, we were on our way back to daycare for Amelia’s Pre-K graduation ceremony. Oh.My.Gosh – it’s official, she’s graduated Pre-K, and she’s ready for kindergarten!! How can this possibly be?! How can my little best friend be ready to hit kindergarten already?! This is just too crazy. I was pretty much an emotional mess, and had to work REAL hard to keep it in check. It didn’t help that her sweet teacher was crying before the ceremony even started. Seriously, we may pay an arm and a leg for daycare, but I KNOW they are being well cared for, by people who really, truly love and care about them. After the ceremony, we took some pictures, had some cake and hung out for a little while, before Eliza and I headed back home. She took a nice LONG nap, so I had plenty of time to edit pictures, catch up on some shows and relax the day away. It was a rainy gloomy day, so really the perfect day for it. I started cooking a turkey roast in the oven in the afternoon…later leaving to pick the big girls up, only to arrive home to the oven giving off some kind of alarm. The turkey container was burning and the oven was shooting off some kind of error. I looked it up in the manual, and nothing it was telling me to do was working…I couldn’t stop the alarm, turn the oven off, nothing. Finally, I pulled it out from the wall and unplugged it. SERIOUSLY, I cannot take anymore…the oven/stove, the dishwasher is falling apart, the dryer barely dries and breaks down all the time, we need a shed SO bad, the driveway needs some repair work done. It’s just neverending, and I seriously, honestly want to cry. I HATE, HATE, HATE owning a home. Every piece of it, I hate it. I wish so badly I could go back in time and stop us from ever doing it. I’ve been trying so hard to sell all of this stuff we don’t need anymore, mainly baby stuff, but people are so rude and frustrating. Ay!

It's Here - Pre-K Graduation Day! Wow, growing so fast!

Eliza, jamming out all night long! Love this girl.

Saturday was pretty busy, as usual. Christian was off to work for the day. The girls and I were off to swim class, bright and early. I can’t take much more of these 9:00AM classes! Unfortunately, I’ll have to, because I wanted too long to enroll them for the next session, and all that was left were the 9:00AM classes. Good Lord, nobody to blame but myself! Olivia got to practice some diving today, and Amelia is doing much better at listening and actually trying to swim, rather than just play around. So that’s great!! After class, we made a quick target run, made our way home for some lunch, and Eliza went down for a nap. After work, Christian and his friend Lorenzo came by with some new couches! My in-laws decided they needed to downgrade their (fairly new) furniture, so they gave us their current couches! Our couches were getting old, and one had a rip in the cushion…and we were going to need some new ones soon, so this was perfect timing. We’re going to try to sell ours – I mean, there has to be some college kid or newly moved out on their own person that just needs some temporary furniture out there! But, if we can’t sell it, I think Lorenzo is going to take them for his basement. For now, Christian has been kicked out of the garage. Some other exciting news, I caught somebody on the garage sale site looking for a glider/stool for their nursery, so we quick cleaned ours (that we never use) and sold it to them! YAY! I think I’ve talked about it before, but Christian gets all of these random things from work...from chairs, to music playing beach umbrella, to pool rafts, to folding bars. I mean, everything. They get all of this promotional gear from the different liquor companies, and it must just all go into some kind of freebie closet. Anyway, today he brought home this cool windmill for the garden…however, it took those two HOURS to put it together…so, they spent most of the evening doing that, while I played with the girls. We did bubbles, played in their jeep, rode bikes and just ran around having fun. Olivia actually rode her bike, all on her own too! We took her training wheels off to start working on it, and I couldn’t believe she actually did it after just a few minutes of working with her. She’s going to be full on riding on her own soon!!! So cool! On top of that, Eliza is walking better and better every day. So many exciting things! Finally, we all settled into the house, had some dinner, gave the girls bath, and were off to bed, one by one.

Keeping Baby Distracted at Swim Class

Sister Play Time

Sunday was a busy day around the house. We all actually slept in a tad…well, after Eliza woke up, and I brought her into bed with me anyway. I didn’t get a ton of sleep after that, because I was so nervous she’d fall out of the bed, but I at least got to rest. I spent most of the day doing laundry…lots and lots of laundry. But folding, oh folding, that’s always the challenge. I made our target run, loading up on groceries and household goods. The girls played really well together today, which isn’t usually the case. They spent most of the day in the basement, dressing up and actually playing with their toys for a change. Eliza has another tooth poking through, which might just explain her increased crabbiness lately! Teething, the worst! Christian grilled us a late dinner, and while busy around the house, we had a pretty quiet day. I’ve seen people searching for baby monitors lately on the garage sale sites, so we quick gathered up ours, and we’re going to get it ready to sell. We have a video monitor, and there’s a screw loose on the video piece, so it won’t rotate all the way around. If I can get that fixed, that will be one more good sale on tap! Slowly but surely, we’ll pay for all of this stuff we need!

Dress Up Fun!!

Trying to Do Laundry...she makes it very difficult!

Until Next Week! XOXO

2015 - Week 21

Monday showed up, and it was back to the grind.  Everybody was back to work and school/daycare. Some of us more exhausted than others, because some of us didn’t want to sleep. Oh Eliza, one day, you’ll sleep all night, every night and I may just miss these middle of the night cryfests. Maybe. This week, our main goal is to work on getting Eliza off the bottle/formula. So, today she only had two bottles at my mother in-laws, and one before bed. Hopefully we can keep decreasing that, and moving to the sippy cup and milk. So far, she doesn’t seem to be a big fan of milk, but we’ve been trying since her birthday, so we’ll keep on it. I left work early today for a Target run, picked the big girls up, and got them ready for ball. After Saturday’s heat wave, the temps have been dropping, and it was another freezing night of ball. Olivia just had practice, and only ½ her team showed up, so they cut it a little short. Luckily I remembered sweaters and blankets this week! Amelia had her first game, and I was so bummed that I missed it! Poor Eliza had to sit out and watch her game in the cold – but, I dug out some gloves and winter gear for her. Boo!!! We all survived the deep freeze, but I’m sure hoping this is the last of this cold weather! Finally, we all met up back at home, had some dinner and settled in for the night. Eliza took a spill today at my mother in-law’s house, and it makes me so sad. She hit her forehead right on the edge of a door, leaving a big cut on her head. I’m hoping it doesn’t leave too bad of a scar, otherwise she seems to be in pretty good spirits about it. My poor baby.

Poor Olivia, fell asleep on the way to softball. These long days get the best of them sometimes.

Ouch!!

Look at my big babies on their Timehops today! Can't believe they're getting so old!

Tuesday was a pretty good, much less chaotic day. Work, daycare, school…the usual. We’re working hard to start selling off the baby stuff, and other stuff that we don’t need, and it’s really been making me mad lately. I’ve been using craigslist and those garage sale sites on Apple Valley. We’ve sold a few things, but the number of cancelations and no-shows and people who just plain don’t follow through, is just ridiculous. It’s so frustrating. I choose to do this, vs. having a garage sale, because I want to actually make some money off of our stuff, but I just wish people weren’t so flaky! Ugh! Vent over. Eliza had a really great day at daycare – she was in a great mood, and she only had ONE bottle! Then, she was in the best mood all evening, such a relief! She had one more half milk, half formula bottle before dinner. We may just be able to wean her quicker than we were expecting! The big girls played in the toy room for quite a while tonight – AND, they have actually been cleaning up after themselves lately, which is really great news. Growing up, they’re all growing up!! The rest of the evening was pretty standard…dinner, baths, bed. Yippie!

Picked up some clearance dresses for the girls' pictures in a couple weeks. So cute!

Wednesday was a super busy day at work for me. The day seriously flew by. I had a couple long meetings, we had our annual health fair, where I got to stock up on some super fun freebies, and we had a plant sale, where I grabbed a few more things for our gardens. It was time to “punch out” before I even realized it. I rushed home to get the dog out, grab some snacks and the girls’ ball gear, and picked them up from daycare. The big girls changed in the van, and we were off to Olivia’s game, where Christian met us. Amelia had a late practice, so she and I left from there to meet up with her team. Thankfully it was a much nicer day out! FINALLY, we all met up back home, changed, had a late dinner and we were all off to bed. These late nights, they definitely take a toll on us.

I was missing my girls today. Blessed to be surrounded by their pictures and artwork all day though!

Another night at the fields!

Olivia in action.

Thursday was a much better day, more relaxed day. It was pretty quiet at work, so I was able to plow through a ton of things in my inbox. I barely made a dent, but it’s nice to actually feel productive. After work, I picked the girls up, and it turns out Amelia has been acting up a bit, and had a really rough day today. Ugh, so frustrating. I know kids will be kids, but man, I feel so bad for the teachers having to put up with it when she gets in her moods. Once home, the girls played outside for a while, while a couple people stopped by for some craigslist sales. Yes, actual sales, that people actually showed up for! We’re getting close to having our “buy a shed” money! After some play time, we had a pretty low key night…dinner, some TV and baths before bed.

My little monkey's enjoying some outside time.

Friday was a pretty big “entertainment news” day – the Duggar Family molestation news broke, and it was seriously disturbing. And disgusting. I’ve always had my own issues with the Duggars. I can’t stand them. I think they’re fake, I think they’re addicted to having babies, to the attention it brings, to the paycheck they started collecting and the lifestyle that came with it. I think it’s irresponsible to our world and the environment for one family to use up so many of its resources. I just don’t agree with it…no, it’s not REALLY my place to care, and I get that, but I do. Then the news today, that the eldest son had molested several young girls years ago, including his own sisters - and the family covered it up (with the help of a later jailed himself police officer), honestly did not surprise me one bit. And, I think it’s just going to open the floodgates to all of that families secrets. So horrible, just absolutely horrible. I think what was worse for me was seeing some of the response on facebook....watching people actually defend this man, almost like a “boys will be boys”, “kids will be kids” attitude. I mean, I couldn’t believe it. I mean, seriously, I don’t care how long ago it was, I don’t care how old he was, I don’t care how “sorry” he claims to be, it’s not OK. I was pretty excited to see TLC act quickly and take the show off the air (eventually canceling it all together, thank goodness)…at least one good thing will come out of that disaster. What a world we live in, what a world.

Back in our world, it was a pretty busy day. Work was pretty crazy for both of us. I left early for Olivia’s kindergarten “Celebrate Our Learning” program. Seriously, I can’t believe she’s almost done with kindergarten, it’s gone by so fast! At the celebration, there were four stations … she showed me their reading station, where she read a few books to me, their science station, where they had worms and baby chicks and she had a “report” on worms to read me, the listening station, where she showed me how they use the iPads to listened to different lessons, and their writing stations, where she read some of the class books they had written together. She was so proud to show me around, and so excited that I was there. It just warms my heart, I love that girl. After showing us parents around, the teachers showed us a little slideshow they put together of the class, and then handed out award Certificates. Olivia got an “Amazing Artist” award for her love of drawing. So fun! After the ceremony, she finished off her day at school and I was on my way back into town to pick up Eliza from my mom’s. We picked the big girls up from daycare, and made our way home. Eliza and I hung out inside, while the big girls played outside. When Christian arrived home, he set up a “sprinkler system” in the garden…he bought this set of 4 sprinklers last fall on clearance, and it actually works out perfectly for the garden. We had some dinner, and the big girls went across the street to their little BFF’s house for a movie night. It was nice to have a little bit of a break, that’s for sure. I cleaned up the kitchen with my downtime, and settled in with some Hulu for the night.

Celebrate Our Learning Day with Olivia

Saturday was a pretty quiet day. We didn’t have swim class this week, so it was nice not having to rush out the door right away. Christian was off to work for a while the girls and I hung out at home. Olivia slept in, Amelia watched some videos, and Eliza was all over the place. She’s walking more and more, every day which is pretty exciting. Exhausting, but exciting. She was a little cranky today, so after some breakfast and playing, she fell asleep on my chest for a little nap. Oh man, I love me some baby naps! My mom picked the big girls up around 1:30 for a sleepover, Christian went to his friends’ house after work to help him put up a fence, so Eliza and I had a pretty quiet evening at home. A day of rest and quiet is just what I needed!

Cuddles with my little love.

Sunday was a rainy, gloomy day. But, the quiet and atmosphere just have helped, because Eliza slept until 8:30! Sleeping in, I sure do miss doing that on a regular basis! I spent the day doing laundry and just hanging out around the house. I went through the clothes that Eliza has grown out of, getting ready to sell the first year. So crazy. It makes me sad to get rid of the kids’ stuff, but I’m pretty excited to see it all go…cleaning up space in the basement, and saving up for our shed. Slowly but surely, we’re getting there! My mom brought the big girls home around dinner time, and we had a quiet evening at home. Tomorrow is a holiday, and I’m off next Friday, so we’re heading into a 3-day week. Which, is basically the perfect week!

Until Next Week! XOXO