the fever

what is wrong with me? I have 2 little boys and have no business thinking about having another baby right now. Dash is almost 3 and Macks just turned 1. I DO NOT need a baby - i have 2 already. But Dash is getting so big - he started school, he is talking so much better and he is pretty much just an awesome kid. Mackey is a toddler and being his adventurous self and I cannot imagine not going through all those exciting first things again - the first smile, laugh, rolling over, crawling and walking. I like that they are close together. I don't want to start back with baby stuff after the boys are older. I don't want to be done with diapers only to start them again. I don't want to have to give all these baby toys away only to buy them again 3 years later and my house is way too small to store them for any length of time. I hate that the main reason I feel like I need to wait to start trying is because my pregnancy are high risk and I most definitely will end up on bed rest at some point. Mack still needs to me to be active and he hasn't yet figured out how to sit still to watch even 10 minutes of TV. It wasn't fair to Dash for me to be stuck in bed for months and then in the NICU when he was still so little. I have to wait - I know I do and I will but some days when I see newborn babies I can't help but want my own or when I go to Target and every single person is pregnant but me. or when I see my OB at the mall and she asks when I am having my next? I have stuff I want to do this year ... I am planning a trip to the UK to visit my little sister in the early spring and if I was pregnant it would mess everything up. Logically I know I have to wait - at least another year but some days I wish it would just happen and we would all be surprised and say it was meant to be. But unless I am the .01% that get pregnant with an IUD than I am just going to have to wait. In the meantime I will just live vicariously through my pregnant friends and enjoy drinking a beer after a stressful day.

what i hope to teach them

dash is starting preschool next week. up until now his education has been mainly something that we are responsible for but next week teachers and other students will start to shape him into the man he will be. i am hopeful that preschool and his early learning experiences will be positive and help him develop a life long love of learning. but there are some things that i want to teach this kids that they probably won't learn in school.


1. laugh. laugh loud and long. sometimes laugh when you feel like you are going to cry. humor can get you through some of the hardest things. I want them to be able to see the hilarity in some of the mundane everyday life things. life is funny.

2. good friends do not judge or try to change you. good friends will tell you that you look ridiculous wearing a fedora but won't care if you continue to wear it. good friends will spend hours just hanging out doing nothing at all. best friends are like family and some last forever. 

3. they won't win everything. sometimes you just fail. you won't make the baseball team, you don't get the promotion, you lose your job, your girlfriend dumps you right before the 7th grade dance. it can't always go your way and it might suck for a little bit but then it is done and there will be something bigger and better waiting for them. maybe they will suck at baseball and instead be really good at writing short stories or singing in glee club. (doubtful given their genes) who knows but i am going to give them the chance to find out what it is!


5. I have a fortune framed in my kitchen from a fortune cookie I opened 10 years ago as a sophomore in college. It says "Stay True to the Dreams of Your Youth". I want them to always live with their hearts ... be happy in their own shoes. I don't want them to make choices just to please me - I want them to be truly happy in every thing they do. I want them to think that if they want to be the freakin' president of the United States than they will be the President!


6. I want them to know that right now they are our entire world. they are so young and precious and innocent and they deserve to be loved like crazy. They deserve our attention and our hugs and our kisses and everytime I say "yes" to one more time when I really really really want to be saying "no". they are babies and pretty soon they won't be so if one more time down the slide or one more really long walk around the block or one more really yummy cookie puts a smile on their faces - where's the harm in that!

you're one ... a happy birthday post!

my little mackman,

you started out so small and for so long we were so worried about you. we had to record every singled mL you ate and at first it was so little that we had to measure it is cc's. But that was then and obviously you are making up for those first few months when you wanted nothing to do with food because you can eat. a lot.  I don't know of a baby that eats more than you and you are still so so skinny. You weigh 20lbs which is the 20th percentile and are 31 inches long which is the 80th percentile. You would be happy if I let you eat black beans for every single meal, and I probably would if only they weren't so messy!

You have been walking for a couple of months now and have kind of progressed to running. You are fast already. You have walked right out of the baby stage and into the toddler. You are a dare devil and are injury prone. I have never cleaned up so much blood in my life - every single day you cut something open. and sometimes I just happens when you are standing doing nothing ... i think you are just trying to make me have grey hair or something. You are so so happy - some days you don't cry at all, even if you have decided you are too big for a nap. You go about wandering around the house like you are on a mission, a mission to wander!



You have started dancing to music and it is pretty funny! You love the Hot Dog song from Mickey Mouse ... you get the biggest smile on your face and then start grooving! I don't think you really have a favorite toy ... you like to pick little things up and carry them around the house. You and your brother have started to play more together ... he still gets mad at you when you steal his toy but you don't ever seem to mind when he grabs it back from you.

Pretty soon you will be a full fledged toddler - telling me "no" and loving Elmo but I am going to try to enjoy these last few months of babyhood! I am going to enjoy the bedtime snuggles and your crazy kisses. I'm going to keep feeding you all the variety of foods you like because I am pretty sure once you turn 2 1/2 all you will want to eat will be chicken nuggets even though you have never eaten them in your life...it's just going to happen! I'm going to cherish our slowest walks around the block ... a 1 year old and a 3 year old can make a 1/3 mile walk take over an hour but it does let me slow down and see all the beauty that does exist on our street. Dash is teaching you to take the time to smell the weeds and to eat mulch (just ignore that lesson)!


A year ago - it was so hard for me to picture you as a toddler. You were so miniature and fragile and now you are so rough and tumble and crazy! I am so excited to see you grow up and become your own little man!

Love- mama. 

help.

We have been struggling with Dash's speech delay for almost a year now. Two Early Steps evaluations told us nothing except that he didn't qualify for their therapy. It didn't appear his speech issue was caused by another disorder so they couldn't help him. A week ago we had a speech evaluation at the Children's Hospital - the therapists agreed that he needed therapy, We start in July - 2 days a week until he doesn't need it anymore. There really is no timeframe. I am glad that he will finally be getting the help that he needs. I will be glad when I can understand him without having to guess what he is trying to tell me. I will be happy when the tantrums out of pure frustration taper off. I am glad that he doesn't have another disorder but I really wish the state funded program would have been able to help him. I know kids that recieve speech therapy through Early Steps who speak so much better than Dash - 2 of them even speak both English and Spanish and can be understood pretty easily in either language. I understand Dash maybe 20% of the time - other people probably understand maybe 5%. I guess I don't understand thier criteria or testing methods - he clearly needs help and other people that need help less than him in the area are getting it instead of him. It is frustrating. I am lucky we have good health insurance that will cover his therapy in the most part - but still wish I hadn't wait so long to get a second opinion. I knew he needed therapy - I should have trusted what I was feeling.

chaos

I posted a week ago about macks first steps and everyday he is getting better and taking more steps and a lot of those on his own with prompt from me but some how almost overnight a new chaos has taken over this house. when he is not slowly, caustiously walking - he is crawling at the speed of light or climbing like he is Sir Edmund Hillary (jeopardy fact for you - he was the first to climb mt. everest). seriously - the kid is going to be trouble. Nothing is safe from the Mackster - he will climb couches, coffee tables, pack-n-plays and a whole long list of dangerous things to get what he is after. i thought dash was "high energy" but this little skinny 10 month old is giving him a run for his money. I am kind of getting nervous that he is going to be climbing out of his crib soon - he is pretty close and he gets the most determined look on his face when he is trying. basically it is chaotic in this house - i am constantly chasing after him while he is chasing after dash and trying to imitate things he sees his big brother doing. im tired - part of me will be so glad when this phase is over but the other part of me loves his adventurous, no fear spirit and will miss it a little when he will lay on the couch and watch a movie without doign something that could break his neck. i haev a feeling i will have a while until i have to worry about  that.



trouble.



first steps

Mack took his first steps the other day, 2 days before he turned 10 months old and I was so proud and amazed and kind of nervous about the impending future. That night as I showed my friends and family the video and replayed it like 20 times, i really started to think about what has happening one year ago. I remember all those weeks on bedrest and meetings with doctors and specialists. The one that sticks in my mind the most is when I was 28 weeks and was admitted to the hospital in labor and they didn't know if they could stop it and a neonatologist from the All Children's NICU came over to talk to us about to expect. He went through a list of issues premature babies can have, he went through common procedures and what our stay in the NICU would possibly be like. we were scared. we wanted a healthy baby. we wanted a baby we could take home with us. luckily they got my labor stopped that night and mack waited almost 4 more weeks before he was welcomed into this world. After about a month in the NICU, Mack joined us at home, all 4lbs of him. I was told to use his adjusted birthdate when looking at his milestones he was or wasn't meeting and to expect delays. Mackey must not have gotten that memo : )

It just amazes me to think about how far he has come in such a short period of time. I feel so blessed to have such a healthy and happy little man especially when I think back to that hospital stay in July. Things could have been so different. While first steps are always a huge milestone for all babies - it seems even bigger for a baby that has surpassed such odds. i just love that little man.

what its worth.

I am a pretty cheap person. I only shop the clearance racks. I live for an awesome deal. I will always attempt to fix my plumbing issue or basic home repair by myself before calling in a professional. I research major purchases TO DEATH and always end up making my decision when the perfect deal comes around. That being said - I shop, a lot. If a sale is too good to be true, I buy it - even if I don't really need a 3rd car seat or a new set of china.

My husband is the total opposite. His thinking goes like this - "dash really likes bubbles, maybe i should buy him a bubble machine...hmmm....well there are 15 choices on Amazon, I guess I should be the most expensive one because that means it is the best." I mean every 2 year old really needs a "DJ quality" $150 bubble machine along with a $20 gallon of bubbles. (seriously, who buys $20 bubbles ... I about had a heart attack when I saw that invoice. I could have bought those for $1 at Big Lots.)

There are a few "luxuries" that we allow ourselves and I don't feel one bit guilty and I can rattle off a 10 minute justification of each.

1. Lawn Care - after 5 years in this house, we finally hired a lawn service. I don't know why we didn't do it before. Our weekends no longer have to be spent mowing and trimming and fertilizing. I don't have to worry about the dogs getting chopped up by the mower, as it is their mortal enemy and they attack it and if they aren't participating in the yard work with Brent then they sit by the window and bark - for HOURS.

i'm ferocious .... watch out lawn mower

2. Pool Guy - we did the chemicals and cleaning in our pool for 3 1/2 years and our pool was probably breeding bacteria for that entire time frame. For about $30 less than we were spending every month on chemicals trying to make it usable, a guy comes once a week and cleans it and does the chemicals and it has been usable every day since we hired them. if you have a pool - hire a pool man. seriously.

3. Good Hair Cuts - I don't get my haircut all that often but it is important to me that when I do the person cutting it isn't going to fuck it up. I found my hairstylist right when I moved here and haven't been to anyone else in 5 years. Every year her prices go up and I will just keep paying more because I love her and trust her. She cuts Dash's hair too - for free, so I probably save $20 a month just by knowing her.
                                                  

look how cute he is after his haircut

 

 

 

4. Vacations - I like to travel. I think everyone needs a break from the routine. We are going on our first annual family/friend trip to Tennessee in a couple weeks. One house, 7 bedrooms, 6 families, 5 kids under the age of 4 and apparently my brother is bringing a case of vodka. so it should be an interesting trip. i am excited to see what this trip has in store for us!