Weekend Report

Saturday afternoon was beautiful, thankfully! The girls enjoyed some outside playing before the ROUGH weather rolled in about dinner time! As promised a while back - here are pictures of Beth riding her new bike with no training wheels! And Sarah played on her bike, too, and in her beloved Cozy Coupe and on her favorite jungle gym...out Dogwood tree. One of these days,that branch is going to snap right off!

About 5:00, the storm hit and it hailed for a good 15 minutes straight! We were lucky that none of the tornadoes touched down near us and that Bob's truck was not damaged by the hail. I read somewhere on a weather website that Western KY is now part of the "new" tornado alley. Oh fabulous.....

This is what was left of the hail after the storm. It was about penny/nickel size.

And another big event at our house this weekend - Beth lost her first TOP TOOTH! I was in the 1st Grade when I lost my first top tooth - I remember it! She looks so old! (and snaggletoothed!)

Retraction....

Oh boy...do I feel like the worlds worst mommy after writing yesterday that Beth had basically been acting like a demon! There was a reason....
Beth was admitted to the hospital yesterday afternoon for dehydration. I was shocked. We went for a 10-day recheck to make sure her bladder infection was gone and ended up in the hospital for DEHYDRATION? HUH??? The doctor said she was on the verge of being "severely" dehydrated and wanted her on I-V fluid all night. So, we spent the night there. Beth watched more cartoons than should be humanly allowed, played with her bed and was a great little trooper. Hated getting the I-V in and out, though, but who does?

Honestly, she never seemed dehydrated at all. She seemed to be drinking just fine. Eating was another story alltogether, but she had been drinking! She didn't LOOK dehydrated. Her skin looked healthy, she was crying "real" tears.....she was peeing ALL the time. She hadn't had a stomach virus at all...its all still a mystery to me.

But nonetheless...all is well now. She's home. We are tired. Maybe now she'll return to NORMAL!

Angels and Demons

And no, I'm not talking about the new movie coming out soon! I'm talking about my kids.

I've been through the terrible two's...but are there "terrible six's" too??

Beth has been down right terrible these last 3-4 weeks. She's really testing boundaries. She's talking back with a very smart mouth. She is completely NOT listening to us any more or doing much of anything asked of her - just basically uncooperative. Her "drama-queenness" has escalated, too! She's been awful to Sarah. I could go on. Maybe it was the bladder infection? Maybe it was the lack of sleep due to the bladder infection? Maybe its the antibiotic? Maybe its spring fever? I have no idea what it is and I'm exhausted at trying to figure it out. My patience grows EXTERMELY thin......

Sarah on the other hand has been a dream child lately! Maybe that is God's way of keeping me sane. When one child is about to put me over the top, the other one's good behavior compensates for that and makes me realize that I DO love my kids! :-) This morning, upon waking up, she snuggled up to me and after being very quiet and just "being" there...she looked up at me and said "good morning momma! I love you!" Aahhhh....... She then chatted on about how it rained and the flowers were happy that they had a drink of water and oh, wow...look at all the puddles...and look mommy at the squirrel! Upon picking out her clothes, she was so excited to wear a certian butterfly shirt that she hugged the shirt, then hugged me and told me she "I love it!" and then said "I love you, too, mommy!" Two "I love you's" before Breakfast...wow! She got her hair down nicely....ate breakfast nicely....she was a little angel this morning....


I remember my mom saying that "three" was one of her favorite ages when I was little. Well...with Beth...3 was ANYTHING BUT great. Three was Beth's terrible two's. She skipped the terrible two's. She had TERRIBLE THREE'S! Sarah, however, did have the terrible two's...but more at the beginning of two. She will be 3 in less than a month. I'm kinda looking forward to it!

We've been busy around here- sorry for the lack of posting lately! Meetings....late nights.....the gym....spring's arrival.....

WELCOME SPRING!

Its the first day of spring! YEAH! We welcome you whole-heartedly!!

I know its still March...and it IS Kentucky...and we've been known to have hard freezes as late as mid April, so we are by no means "in the clear" for nice warm weather. However, its been a great week! The girls have been outside everyday after school until at least 6:30 p.m., with short breaks for dinner. Riding bikes & scooters, helping Bob clean the boat, jumping on the trampoline, collecting things from the yard in their buckets....I've not had to listen to Wow! Wow! Wuzbie! or any other Noggin TV show, for that matter, ALL WEEK! They SHOULD be completely worn out....They SHOULD go to sleep as soon as their heads hit the pillow -right? Ugh...Beth has only fallen asleep before 9:30 p.m. one time this week. The other nights have been extreme battles...the first few nights because of her bladder infection...and that was understandable...but now she's been on antibiotics since Monday, so that shouldn't be an issue anymore, yet she is milking it to death...and in the meantime, she's killed every bit of patience that Bob and I have left!!

Anybody have any ideas of helping her go to sleep? Besides medicating...we've tried...didn't really help a lot! Yes - I'm one of THOSE moms! I'm not at all above medicating to help them get the sleep they NEED if they are flat-out refusing to sleep.

We're looking forward to another pretty weekend! I'm hoping to get the yard cleaned up - all the yucky dead stuff leftover from fall/winter needs to be gone! A lot of yard toys didn't survive the winter and they need to be gone too, so I can assess what new things we "need" for outside...which are always great Easter basket things! (buckets, shovels, sidewalk chalk, bug houses, etc.) I'd LIKE to head over to Target, too. I need Easter basket stuff....and I need to look for clothes for Beth - shorts and capris only. She has like 35 short-sleeve shirts in her closet, yet no bottoms! She needs at least 1 more swimsuit, too.

I'm starting to try to make some hard decisions about this summer. I'm thinking about taking the girls out of daycare this summer completely, or part-time. I'm considering a teenager or young adult that could keep them about 3 1/2 days a week because I'm thinking of letting them go to their daycare 2 mornings a week for socialization purposes only. I think they need some sort of social interaction with their long-time friends. I'm considering taking Friday afternoons off this summer, too....not sure yet...I'm still trying to figure it all out. Money-wise, this route isn't going to be any cheaper, just something different for the girls, plus Beth HAS to give up her nap prior to First Grade...a habit they DO NOT break at daycare. They are made to rest from 1-3p each afternoon....which is completley ridiculous for the kids getting ready to start First Grade.

It will all work out!

Happy 6th Birthday Beth!

Yesterday was a little nutso with all the different appointments Beth had and then her family dinner party. I didn't get a chance to blog her birthday!

At 6:36 p.m. on Sunday, March 16, 2003, Beth was born via C-section because she was as breach as breach can be! I remember the SEC tounament was in New Orleans that year...and Kentucky DID win!! I remember timing my contractions during the first half of the championship game...and finally making the call around halftime that it was time to head to the hospital! 5 1/2 hours later...

And before we knew it...she was sitting up and crawling, which she was more than content to do until she was 14 1/2 months old.

Then, after a week at the beach of persistence, she walked! (I've always loved this picture for some reason!)

At 2 1/2 we moved to Kentucky and lived with mom & dad for a while. She LOVED playing dress-up with Grammie's things...

At 3 she started Nursery School.....

At 4 she got her first "bike" with training wells...

At 5 she thought she was hot stuff cause I let her have her first Barbie!

And now she's 6!

And she finally got to get her "big girl" bed! She is the 7th generation to sleep in this bed- SEVENTH! The first person who slept in it was born in 1789!! She'll get to pass it down to her daughter (hopefully) someday! I still need to order new bedding for it. And that would be Beth & Sarah playing under the bed...

She got an even bigger bike for her birthday...with no training wheels (which I've still not gotten a picture of!). And she's doing great on it! We have Kindergarten graduation to look forward to, the start of First grade and making new friends...and "officially" giving up her nap (which I'm not looking to!).

Six years have FLOWN by! Happy Birthday Elizabeth Lynne!

A few pictures from Beth's Fancy Nancy 6th Birthday Party

Beth's "Fancy Nancy" 6th Birthday party was yesterday - whew! 6 little girls is always fun, but exhausting! I think everyone had fun! Here are a few pictures from the party - Fancy mom with the Birthday girl, Parfait with a candle on top, Birthday girl, Party Girls, and a picture of Fancy Nancy, just in case you have no clue what I'm talking about!

Spring Snow

I know, its not "technically" spring until next Friday, but once it hits at least 75 degrees multiple days in a row, its spring in my mind! And the tulip trees and Bradford Pear trees are all in big beautiful pink and white bloom and the daffodils are popping open everywhere...its spring!

Or at least it WAS until yesterday.

We got about 2 inches of snow last night...about half of which had already melted by this morning. I'm not a fan of snow. Its messy, its cold, its inconvenient.....BUT the girls love it, so as we were rushing off to school, they noticed all the icecycles hanging off Bob's boat and decided to taste test (ick!).

Neither had gloves on, so after about 5 seconds, each of them let go of their beloved ice as they screamed "ITS COLD!". Well, duh!

Its ICE you silly girls!! I hope its all gone by this afternoon. Bring back the 70 degree weather!!!

Back to "Normal"

I'm not even sure what "Normal" is anymore!

Anyway -Kids Closet is over...for the most part. I know I will have at least 2 more meetings....a final wrap meeting and a tag sorting/check signing meeting. But other than that...we are relatively DONE until August when preparations begin for the Fall/Winter Sale September 18/19. We grossed approximately $45,000...and about $14-15,000 of that will go to the Kindergarten/Nursery School program. Not a bad fundraiser, huh!?! And we do it twice per school year, too! (The Fall/Sale grossed over $50K last October).

This week should be NORMAL! I should be home every night to cook dinner! I should be home almost every night for bath/bedtime! I don't have to get up at 6:15 on Saturday! YEAH! But, I do confess that Kids Closet is kinda fun and I will miss the social aspect of it, but we are all so worn out right now.

Also- my kids never got sick last week!! Thats a Kids Closet week FIRST!!! Everyone else's kids got sick...but luckily, mine escaped the funk!

Its been beautiful weather here since last Friday! Beth got her birthday present a week early - a new "big girl" bike - blue with pink polka dots...and NO training wheels...and she's getting pretty good at riding it, too!! I'm excited for her, too, but a little part of me was sad that she's already that big! I didn't even think about capturing the moment on camera when she was learning on Saturday. Bad mommy! I'll try to snap some pictures today of her on it. Sarah is THRILLED that Beth's old bike (with training" wheels) is now her bike, even though she's been riding it since last fall! But...she can now call it her own! I'm guessing she'll be riding without training wheels by the time she's 4 or 4 1/2 (or maybe even sooner- we'll have to see!).

I can't believe Beth will be 6 in one week....ugh!!!

Kids Closet Bargains

As always, I post pictures of my good deals from Kids Closet! And as I mentioned in the last post, both my girls are obsessed with butterflies, so that is why you will see so many! I figure why fight it! I spent a total of $169 on everything (so far.)

EDITED TO ADD: I went back and read the post last fall where I posted pictures of the stuff I got during the Fall/Winter Sale. I thought this was quite interesting...and I quote:
"So, I did all my Kids Closet shopping tonight. My total (to date) is $169."
I couldn't do that again if I TRIED! $169 is such an ODD NUMBER to hit two sales in a row! WEIRD!!!

I spent $63 on Beth, $78 if you include the 3 Leapster Games I got to go in her Easter basket. I also saw a UK cheerleader outfit in a size 8, so I went ahead and got that for her, too....for only $5. I also bought her a white dress for Kindy graduation, and another pink dressy-dress, too. But, honestly, I didn't do so well with her on clothing. As she gets bigger, the clothes get less and less cute! I didn't have a lot of choices! I got a few Gymboree things, but most of the shirts/shorts are just play clothes. Thankfully, I hit an awesome Osh Kosh sale and Gymboree Sale in January, so she DOES have spring/summer clothes in her closet that are new. Here's Beth's haul:

I spent $91 on Sarah...probably way more than I needed to. MOST of that was spent on 11 little sundresses- play dresses...and 1 for 4th of July at the beach. Based on her recent behavior, I think the only thing she is going to want to wear this summer will be dresses, so I'm getting prepared! MOST of them are size 3T, which I'm hoping she'll be able to wear by summer. The pants and shorts I stuck with a size 2T. I also got her 4 pairs of shoes, an adorable Florence Eiseman swimsuit and a Disney Princess nightgown, so I'm happy with those purchases, too. I also got two VERY CUTE LeTop outfits that I'm very excited about! One is brand new and the other looks practically unworn. I was lucky that I also found 3-4 Gymboree outfits/dresses still in excellent shape! (Hey Teresa - I think I bought one of Riley's dresses!) So, here is Sarah's haul:

Updates

As of Today - Wednesday-no one has been sick yet! WOW! Everyone else's kids are getting it, though....maybe the curse of Kids Closet will miss my kids this time?

I shopped this morning -I'll post pictures of my scores tomorrow! I did well with Sarah -I got her approximately 10 dresses...I figure that will be all she will want to wear this summer. I got a few 2-piece LeTop outfits and some shoes....and some adorable purple maryjane Crocs.
Beth...not so great. She's just getting into the big girls sizes and there is less and less cute stuff! She's obsessed with butterflies, so about 75% of the things she got have butterflies on them (and honestly, so do Sarah's!) I also got Beth some new Leapster games that will fit beautifully into Easter eggs! The only toy she picked out was a hot pink boa! YEAH! NO junky toys this time! I had hoped to find some bedding for her...but there was NO full-sized bedding for girls. bummer.....

On a completely unrelated note - after all the terrible ice/wind storms we have had these last few weeks- our roof didn't fare well.....well...after filing an insurance claim, we found out today that the insurance company will pay our claim and we are getting a new roof! YEAAH!!