one rough night

As I am typing this it is not even 7pm and both of my girls are sound asleep in bed. We're hoping we won't have another everlasting night again....

We thought Mace was in the clear, boy were we wrong.

Between cleaning up Macey's many messes in the hallway, on her carpet, comforter, her hair, and pj's, we were running to Kelsey's room. She did not want to sleep and now we know why. At 6am, Jason found her with dried vomit crusted in her hair as she was onto puking up green bile. Fun fun times. Both girls were past the bile and onto dry heaving. The worst. I was a bit scared as I saw my sleepy eyed husband head off to work in the morning, leaving me with two sick innocent children behind.

I have realized drama usually happens at night in our household. Things are a lot better during daylight hours. The girls have not gotten sick while the sun has been up. They get sick at night and then are for the most part pretty low key and easy during the day, besides some extra tears from being overly sensitive. Overall, kids amaze me. How can they handle being sick so much better than myself? Kelsey would throw up and then a second later as if nothing happened, she'd start pointing and yelling, "Dora! Dora!" at a magnet we have.

I am praying this stomach bug is all behind us now and it's not me and Jason up tonight by the toilet.

it's alway something..

First of all, our poor little Mace has gotten the stomach flu. This is her first time ever throwing up and she keeps telling me, "I don't like throwing up!" She questions why she throws up and asks me to give her something to make her tummy feel better. She acted fine all day besides not wanting to eat much, but it hit her again late tonight. We're crossing our fingers this is the last of it and Kelsey can make it to almost age 3 before it's her turn. It's not fun!

Tonight I cleaned this pear up from her bedroom floor.

As for Kelsey, she's been acting fine besides a crazy night of not wanting to sleep the other night, who knows? teething? She makes me laugh all day long. She is my stinker. Her new thing is to pick on her older sister. She hands Macey a toy and as Macey reaches for it, she brings it back to herself and laughs hysterically. She will do it over and over and Macey keeps falling for it. Macey does not think this is funny. Kels is obsessed with Dora undies and tries to put them on everyday so today I put some on her over her pants. She was quite proud. Whenever I look at her she has a new piece of clothing, blanket, hat or other piece of fabric draped around her neck or on her head. She really thinks she's dressing herself. Again, she carries around a proud smile thinking she's "wearing" it.

Who knew laying under the kitchen table was so fun?

Jackpot!

Getting dressed is tiring.

Is this right?

Got my coat on, ready to go!

(after taking this picture I realized she

had something in her mouth so I went to check,

sure enough, an old food crumb from the floor,

alway good to suck on :)

A new do for Roo!

Doesn't she look proud of her ponytail?

masterpieces and more

Brenda, the girls and I left Tuesday morning to visit our friend Erin in Saginaw. It was a 3 hour trip so we decided to stay overnight until Wednesday. We had a really good time, the kids played good, we went shopping to Birch Run Outlets, and played Nintendo Wii. My girls decided to wake up around 3am and didn't want to go back to sleep until 5:30am. So besides a long night, it was a good trip! The girls were sleeping by 6:30 last night and I was in bed soon after so we're all caught up now :)

Jacob helping Kelsey along.

Look at these great bowling forms!

Naptime?

Loving her Aunt Brenda

I took some pictures today of the girls coloring. Macey loves to color and cut paper. It may only keep her busy for 10 minutes but it's always fun to watch and to see her finished products. Kelsey is always wanting to do whatever sister is doing so I decided to let her color today for the first time with washable markers. She seemed pretty proud and did better than I thought she would.

Taking the top off the marker and handing

it to me was the highlight of coloring.



Making a masterpiece!

Done coloring and attacking the camera.

Don't let that cute smile fool ya!

She's been quite the stinker lately :)

Cutting strips and strips of paper

for Kelsey to throw on the floor.

Hard at work.

One of Macey's finished pieces of the day.

after naptime

I enjoy the after nap look. Macey's hair is

usually a mess and she'susually full of stories or

questions the second I open the door.

Kelsey usually has rosey cheeks, one or two

socks off, hood on, and poopy diaper.

guess again....

Today we got Kelsey's throat culture results and she did not have strep throat. Her doctor thinks she must have had some type of viral infection. I'm not a doctor by any means, but my motherly instinct is still saying that it was all due to teething. I know how my girls both run such high fevers so easily, even with teething. She has no cold symptoms what so ever and her other top tooth popped through last night. I will be glad when she's old enough to tell me some sort of clue as to what's bothering her. This morning she was still quite fussy and wasn't eating much, but this afternoon she ate a little bit of oatmeal and was content not being held for about 2 hours. (which is really good considering these past few days) During that time I got a few pictures of my girl. It was nice to see her playing and not attached at my hip for a few hours :) I guess we'll never know what she had, if anything at all.

I've been seeing a lot of this lately ("all done")

when I try to feed her along with her shaking her head no.

She was determined to wear both of these.

Still no interest in trying to walk.
It's more fun to fall and have mom catch you.


Taking good care of her babies.

playing in the snow = good nap

Macey had fun with her daddy this morning in all the fresh snow. It was the first time she used her new purple sled from Aunt Brenda. Last time she played in the snow she napped 4 hours, and we're going on 3 hours today and she's still sleeping. Also, an update on Kelsey. She was up twice last night and still isn't eating much. She popped a new tooth on the top last night! Her fever isn't as high today and acting a little more like herself this afternoon, which is good to see.

Strep throat?

So my little Kelseroo has been running a fever around 102.5 and last evening it started to go up and Tylenol was doing nothing for it. Jason had basketball practice so I am very thankful to Elizabeth for taking Macey for a few hours while I took Kels to the ER. There they examined her and found NOTHING wrong with her, just a temp around 104. They wouldn't let us go until they found something for causing the temp so they did chest x-rays, cathed her for a urine sample, drew blood, and did a throat swab. Everything came back normal. They had to bring in another doctor to examine her again and she found her throat to be red with white dots, she feels positive that the culture will come back positive in two days. So she got a shot of antibiotic there last night and is on amoxocillin starting today. Part of me still wonder if the fever is not from her two top teeth which are trying so hard to come down. Her gums are swollen and red and I can see the white about to pop through. I will call in two days to see if the throat culture came back positive.

I set her down yesterday for a second to take a picture of her so I could email it to Jason to show him how sickly she looked and here's what I got. Poor thing :(

bad haircut and teething

So I decided to *trim* Macey's hair the other night and she ended up with a lot unevenly chopped off. I have been fixing it up a little here and there so it's improving but also getting shorter. Jason has told me I am not allowed to cut it anymore. She is not thrilled about the idea of going to the salon, but I think it's time :) I will try to get some better pictures up of the end result here soon.
Kelsey woke up last night with a 102 temp with no other symptoms besides some top swollen gums and two teeth about to pop through so we're hoping that's all it is. I hear her on the monitor now so I better go and snuggle her since that's all she wants today.

Aunt Carol, I think she likes her presents (notice the dress is on backwards)

My snuggler

Yes, she'll have bad knees like me.

Trying to feed Merek

Boy he is fun!

He's growing!!

favorites vs not-so-favorites

As the girls were settling down before bedtime tonight, I was watching both girls and what they were doing. They definitely have their favorite things to do, play with, and say right now. Along comes some of their least favorite things to do. I enjoy looking back at my old blogs and seeing how the girls have grown so I thought it would be a fun post to describe these things as they are today. (since they may change tomorrow)


Macey's favorite things:

*movies- Milo and Otis, of course anything Dora, Wizard of Oz, and Winn Dixie

*books!!!!!! The girl could read or be read to all day long if possible, which I love. Her favorites
lately are a search book called Christmas Fun, Snow Day, and Little Critter books.

*taking a bath

*changing her baby doll's diapers and clothes. Today I found a pair of her own leggings on her
doll.

*eating "nacks" - suckers, yogurt, and chocolate are her favorites

*bossing her little sister around and telling her what she is "allowed" to play with.

*asking questions- Today on the way back from getting groceries we decided to get fast food. We asked Macey if she wanted McDonalds. She then had to question it, "Dad you said you wanted Taco Bell at home today, rememeber that? Why you not want that anymore? Don't you want a taco anymore? I like tacos, do you like tacos? She will go on and on and on.......

*sleep- we are blessed that she enjoys her sleep. Last night she asked me to put her to bed.


Macey's not-so-favorite things:

*sharing her toys

*brushing her teeth

*eating- unless it's a "nack"

*when we tell her she can't watch a movie




Kelsey's favorite things:

*hiding bottles or sippy cups under the couch
*eating finger foods or anything someone else is eating
*pointing her finger at anything she thinks is exciting
*her big sister
*taking baths
*babies
*Macey's *clean* underwear- she gets so excited if she finds a pair and is determined to put
them on either her head or feet
*getting into cupboards, fridge, or anywhere else she shouldn't be
*giving kisses
*music- the girl's a dancing queen!


Kelsey's not-so-favorite things:

*getting her pajamas on
*when we tell her "no" -we get a whine OR a big smile while she attempts again
*when her sister takes something away from her
*when I'm talking on the phone because she wants it
*taking naps- talking and playing is much more fun
*ceiling fans- on or off
*when her sister goes to the naughty spot

I have to leave you with a picture of my mischievious little one discovering fun in one of the many cupboards this house has that is not yet child proofed.

Looking back....

Jason and I just got done looking at some pictures from the past year on the computer. It's amazing that going into a new year, you have no idea what's going to come your way. We would have never guessed how busy and crazy 2008 was going to be for us. I asked Macey tonight, "Where do you live?" She answered, "In Colon on Elm Street!" Just hearing her say the words make it more real to me of what has happened this past year. We are still unsure of how long we'll live here, but for now we're very happy and enjoying our cozy house on Elm Street :)

Here's a list of what 2008 was like for us:

-Kelsey was born on March 1st

-Macey became a big sister!

-I went on maternity leave not knowing I'd never return

-Jason received a high school math teaching position down in Colon, MI.

-We sold our house within a month in a terrible market

-I called and quit my job and officially became a "stay at home mom"

-Jason started graduate classes at Western Michigan

-Jason ended his job doing concrete

-We moved to Colon and lived in a cottage then a rental before buying our house on October 30

-Kelsey lived in 4 different houses within her first year of life

-Started lots of painting and remodeling in our new house

-Jason started coaching JV boy basketball

Who knows what our 2009 list will end up looking like??