Back from the dead…again

3/26/2008 Category :General 1

Three times we’ve taken Brenden to this playcare place, and three times he’s come home sick. On the 15th we went to another hockey game and sure enough, two days later Brenden was sick. AGAIN. This time with pink eye and a cold. The cold turned into a horrible ear infection. He was absolutely miserable. I wonder what a nearly two year old must think about not being able to open his eye? The doctor said on Monday there is a still a lot of fluid and pus in his ear and that it is actually bulging a little. This was the worst he’s ever been. He would just sit on my lap with his head flopped over to one side Sean Preston (Spears) style and moan. He wouldn’t eat anything for over a week and he had a really hard time sleeping. Poor little guy.

Two trips to the doctor and one to the urgent care place—plus two different antibiotics, lots of tylenol, ear drops and eye drops later—he finally started feeling better yesterday. Today I would say he’s back to actually acting like Brenden. He played, laughed and ate. Plus he took a 3 hour nap. He still has a bad cough and a runny nose, but he is on the road to recovery.

Patrick and I have been trying this whole time to fight off the cold. I think the only think that has helped me from completely giving in is that I just had a round of antibiotics when I got my wisdom teeth pulled on the 13th. Which is another whole story about an arrogant doctor who did not want to believe me when I said no one could find my veins in my right arm so he attempted to prove me wrong 4 times all over my arm and wrist before finally going into my hand. That is something I would never have allowed if I hadn’t been under the influence of laughing gas at the time. I wish I had taken a picture of my poor bruised arm, but it is finally starting to look better. Mostly.

Patrick took three days off of work starting today and we had a nice day together as a family. And that’s my update for now. I’ll try to add some pictures in the next couple of days now that Brenden is back to smiling.

Back from the dead

3/3/2008 Category :General 3

So Brenden and I were sick since the time I posted 2 and 1/2 weeks ago up until this past Friday evening. We were just getting over our colds. My voice had just come back to a point where I no longer sounded like Marge Simpson. We took Brenden back to the kids play place so we could go to another hockey game. And then we got hit with the flu.

We were all in the car in Plano getting drive thru Krispy Kreme’s on our way to view several houses with realtor in Richardson and Dallas. Our food had just been handed to us and we heard the horrible sounds coming from the back seat. I won’t gross you out with details but I’ll just say that we to this day haven’t gotten everything off the car seat despite a seriously large effort. We had to strip Brenden down, wrap him up in my coat and hit the nearest Target for a new outfit. We decided to see if he could make it through the house tours we were now running late for, but we cut out one or two that were at the bottom of the list. He threw up several more times later in the day and we ended up taking him to the doctor where he tested negative for the flu. But I’m not buying it because by Tuesday I was hit with it so badly that I could not move and I had to call my Mommy to come help us out. Even Patrick who just never gets sick came home from work. Of course he slept for a few hours and bounced right back by the next day. I even missed my GRE and a hockey game 🙁

So it’s been a yucky couple of weeks and we were so happy to start feeling better on Friday. We had a playdate on Saturday because we thought we were having an open houses. The open house didn’t actually happen until Sunday, but we were glad for the mixup because it allowed us to have a truly relaxing day on Saturday which we probably wouldn’t have done otherwise. We took the kids to the park and enjoyed a beautiful day and good conversation. We haven’t gotten to relax or enjoy outside in so long that it was really blissful. And Sunday during the acutal open house we went and played with more friends. So all in all it was a nice weekend.

We are got a little discouraged on the whole house selling over the course of last week so here’s to hoping for a better week. After getting so close to having a deal go through in our second week, it’s just disappointing to not really be any further along yet, but we are trying to stay positive.

Here are a couple of picts from the sick days:

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He insisted that he wanted to go somewhere. So we put his hat and shoes on with his pjs because he couldn’t be patient enough to get dressed.

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All of his hats hang on a peg that he has discovered he can reach if he stands up in his chair. He flings the stuffed animals off the chair, climbs up and gets all the hats. Then he picks one to wear and I have to wear the rest.

A real update

2/13/2008 Category :General 1

Life has been a little crazy around our house since the new year. Patrick is in his busy season at work plus taking a night class every Tuesday and Thursday. He often gets home after Brenden goes to bed. Meanwhile I’m trying to take care of Brenden and get the house ready. So we’ve both had our stresses and pretty much just want to rest, which is why there hasn’t been much writing lately. But I think things are slowing down a bit now. I think.

Brenden is a handful. A sweet, wonderful, adorable handful. He climbs on chairs to cook in the microwave, make pop (toast), eat his father’s breakfast and pretty much do anything that would otherwise be out of his reach for good reason.
Today he wanted to go for a ride in the car so he brought me his shoes and I put them on him. I guess I didn’t get it though because then he went and got my shoes out of my closet. Exactly the pair I would have picked to wear. Then he got my coat out of the coat closet. So we went out. And when we got home he didn’t want to take his hat, coat or shoes off. The part with his shoes started on Friday but the coat and hat were new for me. The only time I was allowed to take his shoes off today was when I was changing his diaper.

We went to a hockey game with some friends of ours on Sat. night (thanks again guys!) and left Brenden at a daycare type place so he could play with other kids. And those darn kids got him sick! Again. Yesterday he threw up once and then sneezed a lot. Today he has an out and out cold with lots of coughing and very productive/projectile sneezing. He was very pink checked and glassy eyed most of the day but still wanted to run and play.

He has decided for some reason that all dogs are Sam now. Only it’s pronounced shamy. Sam is Shamy. Bailey is Shamy. The target dog is Shamy. The dogs on his dog pjs are Shamy.  You get the idea. And no matter how many times I try to correct him, he is determined that Shamy means dog.

So he’s been keeping me busy trying to keep him safe though I am fairly certain he has a death wish. Or at least a break every bone in his body wish. But he has also been very entertaining blended with lots of hugs and kisses and “mommy. mommy. mommy”.

Here are a few pictures from after his bath last night:

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And a bonus.

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Happy Belated 21…months that is

2/9/2008 Category :General 1

Here are a few recent pictures. He’s been a lot of fun and a lot to keep up with lately. Getting more independent and willful every day. Learning new words and being funny every day too.

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sleeping in the car.

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riding the choo choo train at the mall.

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courtesy of my parents.

It’s official!

2/9/2008 Category :General 1

Our house is officially for sale! After several weeks of working hard, we listed our house this morning. There’s a sign up and everything. Now I just have to go crazy trying to keep it clean!

The difference is, I’m in the mood to kick a little a**

1/31/2008 Category :General 2

* I should note that the title is a quote from a movie since only about 2 of you will get it. *

So the premiere of Lost season 4 was tonight. It was awesomely good in a way it hasn’t been since season 1. I’m not one of those people who complained through seasons 2 or 3 either. I thought both season were just fine until I watched tonight. I can not believe we only get 7 more episodes before they run out of stuff that was finished before the writer’s strike. 16 episodes each season was already going to be too few. Come on already, just give the writer’s their money so we can get back to “keep you on the edge of your seat” or “huddled up next to your husband” good tv!

Moving on up?

1/25/2008 Category :General 1

In December, as the idea of Patrick’s impending busy season loomed, we started to look into moving closer to downtown Dallas. I quickly found a house that I absolutely love the outside of and could love the inside with some work. We went and saw it and several others. It came down to two houses that we really liked, but we decided on the first one we saw after a lot of discussions. We thought of making an offer on it contingent on selling our house, but after some great advice decided that wasn’t the smart way to go. Even though we’ve owned this house the whole time we’ve been married, neither of us have ever actually bought a preexisting house before, so it all seems a little complicated to us. Plus, this will be the first place we’ve actually picked out together and we are hoping to stay for a long time so we want to make the right choice.

So now we are spending some time getting things fixed up and packed up in our house so that we can put it on the market. The hope is that we can get our’s sold while the one we want is still available. We also know more about what we are looking for now so we know we can find something else if we have to. It’s meant a lot of juggling trying to get things done while Brenden naps and on the weekends. This weekend, should the weather cooperate, we are having a big work day on Sunday. Then, whatever doesn’t get done, we’ll have a professional do. Then time for cleaning. Our house should be ready and on the market starting the 9th of next month. Touching up all the paint is proving a little maddening for my perfectionist side. Everyone keeps pointing out though that I’m going to see it more because I did it though. So if you know anyone who needs a 4 bedroom 2 bath home in McKinney, send them our way!

Update: Here is a link to our house listing:
http://www.cbdfw.com/property/property.asp?PRM_MLSNumber=10943499&PRM_MlsName=NTREIS&VAR_AgentCode=&VAR_OfficeCode=#

Sick Baby

1/25/2008 Category :General 1

I took Brenden to the play area at the Collin Creek Mall on Tuesday. He loves to go play with the kids and go up and down the slides. Poor kid doesn’t get to spend a whole lot of time around other kids. He had a great morning playing and then came home for a nap. When he work up he had a surprise visit from Grandma and Grandpa and wore himself out again. He was one tired little guy by the end of the day.

When he woke up Wed morning, he had thrown up in his bed. I gave him milk. He threw up. I gave him more milk because he begged for it. He threw up more milk. Any time I gave him milk or crackers he would throw up. He also had a slight temp of 99.4 so I knew I had to keep fluids in him. The nurses line at his doctor suggested giving it to him in spoonfuls but Brenden was having none of that. So I kept giving him electrolite water mixed with juice in little sips in his cup. Anyway it was a long day of cleaning up the carpet and the kitchen floor and the chairs and his clothes.

Thursday he didn’t throw up once, but any time I picked him up he was cuddle and warm. Brenden is not generally one to sit still long enough to cuddle, so I knew he still didn’t feel good.

Today I gave him milk for breakfast as usual because he had successful kept some down last night, but today it quickly came back up. It’s been a long week, but the good news is that he’s been taking 2 1/2-3 hour naps all week! Darn carrier monkeys at the mall!

Diabetes News

1/23/2008 Category :General 0

Great, now I just need to become obese and I too can have my diabetes cured.

Overheard at the mall…

1/15/2008 Category :General 0

Little boy: Mom can I have a gumball?

Mom: Sorry, I don’t have any money and gum is yucky.

Little boy: Moms don’t have any money. Only daddies have money!

Two cute Pictures

1/12/2008 Category :General 0

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His shirt says ” I still live with my parents”

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I used this photo to enter him in the Regis and Kelley/Parents magazine Beautiful baby contest. That’s right, I pimped out my baby.

I think they’ve started my CPS file now…

1/12/2008 Category :General 5

Everyone knows that I hate shots and needles. Since I am diabetic however, I have to go in to my endocrinologist every 3 months to make sure all my numbers are ok. That means that I have to have blood drawn every 3 months. And even though I’m see-through and you would think my veins would be easy to locate, they are deep and they roll. Unless the person is really good, they have a hard time. Anyway, I got lucky the last time I went and the doctor said since nothing was changing I could wait 5-6 months before coming back. So I scheduled my appointment for 5 months out and Wednesday was the day. I always get really nervous as my appointment date gets near, and this time was no different. Especially since I’ve had some trouble with my medicine supply and it’s been the holidays so I knew that my numbers probably weren’t going to be as good as they normally are.

So Brenden and I made the drive into Dallas for my appointment with all this going on in my head. It’s a colder day than I thought and I’m realizing I probably should have put a coat on Brenden. I went to the back seat to get him out, but then realized I needed to get the stroller out first. He has lately become completely obsessed with anything related to his beloved beep beeps so he really wanted my car keys. I gave them to him to play with which I do sometimes and then went to get the stroller out of the trunk. When I went back to the car door to open it, it was locked. Brenden had locked himself into the car. With the keys. With my phone. With everything but me and the stroller. And it all came to me at once that I’d shut the car door to keep him warm and that I normally leave it open when I give him the keys. That he’s been pressing the buttons on my Mom and Dad’s keys so that he can hear the panic alarm and all the beeps. Oh my goodness why on earth did I give him my keys?

I tried for a good 5 minutes to get him to press the right button. He thought it was very amusing when I told him beep. He beeped back every time. And then he grew bored of that game and dropped the keys out of reach. Freaking out, my only choice was to go in to the doctor’s office, tell them I wouldn’t be making my appointment and ask to use the phone.

I had plans of remaining calm. Instead, I walked in, the receptionist said hi and asked how I was doing. Tears spring to my eyes as  I say, “Not good. I’ve just locked my toddler in the car and I don’t think I’ll be making my appointment.” She gives me a phone book, the phone and a business card with the buildings address on it and I proceed to call Patrick, who doesn’t answer and leave him a rambling message about how he can’t call me back.  I then call a locksmith who tells me that since there is a baby in the car, the police department will come out fast and free so I call them.

It’s the fire department who comes, with 4 men. Nothing to make you feel more like a stupid woman than to have 4 fire fighters all there dying to hear the explaination of how this happened. All bearing a slight smile on their face.
Anyway, they got him out. He was freaked out by the 4 men breaking into the car. But he handled it pretty well. And after verifying that I had my keys in my hand, they were on their way.

The doctor’s office fit me in. The whole office knew that I’d locked the baby in the car but didn’t know how it happened, so I got to explain it. Many times. And then I got my blood drawn and a bonus flu shot too. The one good thing is that without the focus on my arm being pierced by needles, it wasn’t as bad to have two attempts at drawing blood followed by that darn flu shot. And I did learn that there are a lot of people out there willing to help. Like the fireman and all the people in the doctor’s office. And the fine gentlemen that took the hanger already straightened out for just such an event out of their trunk to come help me before I told them the firemen were already coming.

Belated Christmas

1/12/2008 Category :General 0

It was an usual but great Christmas this year. I think I’ve mentioned in previous years that we are fortunate enough to have three families to celebrate Christmas with. We celebrate with Andy’s family (Patrick’s best friend since forever), Patrick’s Dad and Stepmom’s family and my family. We always celebrate with Andy’s family on Christmas Eve and then our families it seems to change from year to year, but for the past several years it has been my family here for Christmas day. This year with celebrated with the Burleson’s on Christmas Eve day, then headed to Oklahoma. Brenden enjoyed both celebrations very much. Especially climbing up and down the one step that each of the houses had. Up. Down. Up. Down. He seemed to really get into other kids that day.

On Christmas we got up to prepare our feast. We had a hookup on our meet from our connections and Patrick was very nervous that he would mess up. But he did great (thanks to all the help from our hookup) and we feasted on Prime Rib. None of my siblings or my two cousins who normally come were able to make it this year. My sister had just been in for my graduation for the week before and we were going to see my brother and his family the next weekend. So it was a smaller crowd, but that just made it nice and relaxing. Brenden was happy that without the distraction of too many people everyone could fix their full attention towards him!
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In Oklahoma

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Christmas Day out our house

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My Mom, Me and my Aunt Jane

As Promised-Graduation and Vegas

1/11/2008 Category :General 0

Ok, so on Dec. 15th I FINALLY graduated from college. Or so they say, but I haven’t gotten my diploma yet! The few people that I got to invite to the actual ceremony (we had a ticket limit) braved the wind and freezing cold to come watch. Despite the weather, I had a great day and really appreciated everything my friends and family did for me!

The next day it was off to Vegas. We hadn’t been since right before we moved to NY. We really have a great time in Vegas and had been missing it. If you read Patrick’s blog, you already know that we refer to this as the upgrade trip. If you don’t read his, I’ll give you the jist of it. We got offered an upgrade to a suite and though I thought Patrick was crazy to agree to it, as soon as I saw the room, I got over him blowing our carefully laid out budget in the first 5 minutes of being there. It was an amazing room, or shall I say rooms. He’s got all the pictures posted on his site, because yes, we are that easily impressed that we took pictures of every inch of the room. So take the link to his site to check them out. We loved the increase of the penny slots everywhere and had an especially great time with a few versions of Monopoly. On our flight home we got offered an upgrade to first class seats and took that to complete our 2-day trip in luxury. It was the perfect way to reward myself. Brenden seemed less than thrilled that we went away and did not seem to think his new M&M World loot made up for it.

I’ll catch up soon-Promise

1/10/2008 Category :General 2

I haven’t forgotten about blogging. I have a lot I want to post about, just haven’t had the time and energy to get there yet. Here are some upcoming topics: 1) graduation 2) vegas trip 3) christmas 4) My run in with the Dallas Fire department. I’ll try to get these posted over the next few days.

Quick Pictures

12/8/2007 Category :Brenden 1

I’m studying for my final finals this weekend, but wanted to take a second to post a few quick pictures I took of Brenden around the house this past Friday morning.

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He is absolutely in love with cars and trains all of the sudden.

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Honest,  he climbed in by himself! He does it every once in a while and I’ve been trying to catch it on camera, but he usually sees the camera and jumps out to grab it. I told Patrick we should use this one on our Christmas cards this year!

Brenden is James Blunt-Sorry for my unsteady hand

11/28/2007 Category :Brenden 2

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Thanksgiving Week

11/25/2007 Category :General 1

It’s been another busy, but great week. My sister and her husband came in for the holiday and brought along two of my nephews. They stayed the week with us and then we hosted Thanksgiving at our house. One night my parents even kept all the boys so we “young people” could have an adult night which we used to have a nice meal out and play trivial pursuit. Did I mention yet that I won? Rachel was ahead most of the game. She expected to do the worst, so it was nice for her to do well. It was the two trivia kings Patrick and Frank who I was happy to beat! Sorry guys—but how do you know all that stuff anyway? We also had a never ending game of Monopoly Vegas edition a few nights later that my oldest nephew got in on despite it dragging out until 1 in the morning. A pretty enjoyable week.

Friday after our guests were gone the three of us decide to see just how crazy Black Friday really is. And it turns out it isn’t that bad. Or at least from 10-12 on a cold and drizzly day it isn’t that bad. We stocked up on some plate in our china pattern, some sheets and badly needed new jeans for me. Saturday we did some more running around then came home to a cozy fire.

Today I got the idea that after years of not having a real christmas tree, it was time to get one. I have always preferred the real ones, but the last time I had one was in ’99 or 2000 when I lived with Kelli and Eve. I hate the way artificial trees scrape my arms when I try to put them up. The year I was pregnant with Brenden and we’d just moved home, I put up two artificial trees by myself and swore I’d never put one up again. Somehow, I forgot that last year though.

Anyway, we went out to buy a tree this afternoon when it was again cold and drizzly. We had fun picking out our tree and getting it home. I just hope being out in the cold so much has not hurt Brenden who has been sick for over a week now. We’ve got him on an antibiotic that gave him a great initial improvement, but now I haven’t seen anything for a few days. We’ve been keeping him bundled up. We even bought him a new winter hat this weekend—man that was hard. Even though I knew his head was in the 90+% for size, I never thought it looked disproportionate to his body. But we actually had to go to regular kids sizes to find a hat to fit his head because those wimpy 2t’s just weren’t cutting it.

He’s gotten both his upper and bottom molars in now. I thought those uppers were going to kill us all. He kept waking up in the middle of the night and not going back to sleep. Actually, the night my parents took all the boys was wonderful because the two nights before I’d only had 10 hours sleep between them. And my parents were up with him from 2:30-6:30 when they had him. That seems to have passed for now, but I’m probably jinxing myself.

Here are a few pictures.

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Modeling his new puppy pjs.

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Being cold while hunting for our christmas tree where he learned the word short.

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While waiting for Patrick to pay for the tree I took the above photo of Brenden. A man who just happened to be a photographer saw me and offered to get both our pictures. It was so nice of him, I didn’t feel like I could tell him “No, I’m sorry, I look like a bum, just get the kid.”

November 16, 1994

11/18/2007 Category :General 4

It was 13 years ago on this day that Patrick and I went on our first date. We went to see The Road to Wellville which was a horrible movie. Patrick let me pick what I wanted to see and I picked that movie because it had John Cusack and Matthew Brodderick in it. Afterwards we went and had ice cream at Braums. Ahhhh.

A wedding, 2 birthdays (sorta) and trick or treating

11/2/2007 Category :General 1

It has been a crazy busy couple of weeks around here and we are looking forward to settling down a little bit this weekend.
Two weeks ago we went to my sisters wedding in CA. It was absolutely beautiful. Brenden loved being around all his cousins and aunts and uncles, etc , being out in the nice sunshine and going up and down the stairs in the big rent house we stayed at.
I celebrated another birthday just days after being asked if I had given birth to Brenden between first and second period, because I looked like I was still in high school. It was quiet but nice. Had dinner made for me out at Patrick’s Dad’s and happy birthday sung on my voicemail by my parents and sister. Then later in the week Kelli came and spent the night with me and we hung out.
Then Brenden turned 18 months old on the 30 and went to the doctor and celebrated Halloween on the 31st. His doctor’s appointment went well. The doctor didn’t hear the heart mumur this time. Brenden got two shots, one of them the flu shot, and was not very happy about it, but quickly got over it. Much more quickly than some of the older kids in line behind us did!
The stats:

24 lbs 8.7 oz      30%
34 1/4 in            92%
Head 19 1/2 in   90%

He’s tall and skinny with a big head! No idea where he is getting the tall and skinny part but hope he keeps it up! But judging by the fact that his favorite foods seem to be pizza and french fries, I just don’t know.

Halloween was fun for us, but it took Brenden a long time to get into it. As you saw from the pictures in the previous post, we dressed him as  dragon because favorite book is That’s Not my Dragon. We had planned to go to a few houses on our block, hand out a little candy at our house and then head over to Jim and Mary’s because they had asked to see Brenden dressed up. Luckily we didn’t kid ourselves about Brenden marching all over the neighboorhood, because he only went to 4 houses and then he was done. We had thought of going to the downtown area where they have trick or treating on the square, or even the Allen outlet mall but those events ended before Patrick could get home from work and he really wanted to be a part of the first trick or treating. So after that pitful attempt at trick or treating in our neighborhood we returned home to hand out a little candy. Brenden did like seeing the kids come to the door. Then we headed over to the grandparents who had a nice big bowl of candy waiting. It took Jim putting a few pieces of candy into Brenden’s bag for him to catch on, but finally he got it. Got it so well he emptied most of the contents of the bowl into the bag one piece at a time.