Our Kids

Jason has been asking the girls lately what they want to be when they grow up. Piper likes to answer and so far Lela likes to be whatever Piper says she is going to be. So when Jason asks her what she wants to be she says she wants to be a babyholder just like mommy. She was also wearing her “I want to be a skateboarder when I grow up” tshirt from cousin Ava so she said she wanted to be a babyholder AND a skateboarder. Lela will settle for just being a skateboarder.

Another thing that has happened is that the girls are already playing us off each other even though they are not sneaky about it. If I tell them they can’t do something they go to Jason in tears and say, “Mommy said no.” I find this hilarious because they ask him to see if he will say yes, it is too funny because they are only 3, it must come naturally.

The girls favorite game lately is hide n seek. They love it. They don’t really seem to get the concept of it though. The other day I was nursing Landis and they wanted to play so they got into my bed which was right where I was feeding Landis and they said, “count and we will hide.” So I counted and they hid under the covers right in front of me and then they proceeded to giggle giggle giggle because I could not find them, Piper even shouted out “we are in the garage.” Of course I finally found them to squeals of delight. They want to play hide n seek every night when Jason gets home, not that it is a difficult game to play with them but it never seems to get old to them either so you could be playing FOREVER.

I worked in a daycare/preschool when I lived in Germany. I remember getting so sick that I was at the hospital several times a year, stomach bugs that left me dehydrated, skin rashes and the like. Well seems I am getting into the same boat here. I have finally kicked that cold to the curb with just a little lingering mucus only to wake up with a nice case of pink eye and an ear infection! LOL! I blame science class, we learned how to use our five senses yesterday and apparently some got in my eyes and ears! More likely it is the cold moving its way around my head but still I always like to have something or someone to blame.

Today we are off to the Riparian Preserve for some communing with nature. I bought the girls some kiddie sized binoculars so they can do some bird spotting. Funny thing is that they insist on using them backwards. Now when you use binos backwards you see things perfectly normal in normal size, I sure hope those birds are up close. LOL!

Okay so after my horrible rant on breastfeeding I should say that due to breastfeeding Landis made a quick recovery from something that could have been really nasty. Her smiles are back and you can see her mug on our flickr site smiling away. She still slumbers a lot throughout the day but that is her nature more than her RSV.

The girls had their last day of ABC’s N More with Ms. Mae today, they were very excited to get their certificates and go right to the park. I think they enjoyed the class so we will take another session in about a month or so. I am not sure they are learning much but that is okay it is more the experience that I am after at this point.

I think Jason and I are on the mend as well. This cold definitely ran through the whole family although it affected us all in different ways. So many funny things have happened but the last three weeks have all blurred together.

Well Landis still had a temp on Friday so I decided to take her to the doctor. We got an afternoon appt and while the girls were playing at the neighbors I took Landis in to see the doc. Turns out that she had RSV, which totally sucks. There is not much we can do to get rid of RSV so all we can do is make her comfortable, use a breathing machine, suction her nose and keep her hydrated. Landis is a lot like her sisters, very mellow, so if she gets the opportunity to sleep all day she will take it and she does. That means that she doesn’t do much else like eat. She is not really into eating so I am paranoid about her getting dehydrated and losing my milk supply. I am going to start pumping for the milk supply issue and waking her up to feed her every hour or so as well. All in all it should work out for me and for her. We go back to the doctor on Monday and hopefully she will be showing signs of recovery. It is typically a 8 to 15 day illness and can have long term effects on lung capacity. With my families tendencies toward respiratory ailments it really is a bummer. Oh yeah and on top of all that she has a double ear infection, another familly tendency:-p At least we know that she is really ours, warts and all!

Piper has started to say “thank you mom” when I least expect it. Now she doesn’t say it all the time but usually when she does say it I need to hear it, it is like she knows when I get run down and she kicks in her “I love mommy” attitude. This morning Lela was being her usual self centered toddler self (they both are, it is the nature of the age) and neither Jason nor I slept a wink last night so it was all we could do to get up and get moving. She wanted an english muffin and I was making said muffin, so when she asked again I looked at her and I wanted to say, “can’t you see I am making your freakin’ muffin” but instead I said “I love you Lela” and she looked up and me and said “I love you too Mom.” So even though we are all tired, cranky, croupy, coughy, gunky, junky there is a lot of love around here:)

Landis has discovered that her hands actually belong to her and that she can move them. She has been getting to that place for a while but on Monday she actually really looked at them and moved them around purposefully. She is such a cutie always sitting with her hands clasped but now she can clasp them with purpose. She can also reach for an object that you hold in front of her. I got a video of her doing it and will post it later (I say “I” but we know it will be “he” that posts it). She is talking up a storm and even now that she is sick she is still letting us know she is there with her babble (only the sick babble breaks your heart).

I know my expectations are so high for breastfeeding and healthy eating and probably if I looked at all the info I would get a reality check BUT today I feel like venting. I feel like I go above and beyond making sure the kids eat healthy and that I breastfeed, in return I would like for my kids to NEVER get sick. Okay, I said it, I want them to never get sick, I know that is not reality but if I am going through all this trouble I expect big returns. Probably why I am no longer in corporate america, LOL!

On the flip side of my coin I know that my girls don’t sick as much as other kids and for that I am grateful. But like Jason said when an itty bitty gets sick it just pisses me off. The girls were never sick so I am not used to having an itty bitty sick, I am so helpless. Thank goodness for the moby, she can sleep skin to skin and hopefully I am passing all my good virus butt kicking to her. The other thing that really sucks is that the cough lingers long after the fever has left. So the poor thing will have that rattly cough for a while.

I am grateful that I can still breastfeed her so I know she is being nourished and is not dehydrated but it still really ticks me off. I mean hell we might as well sit around eating fritos (not really). On another note I do see the “gift” in this challenge. I have been struggling with vaccines and such and this might just be my wake up call that I can’t handle it if one of the girls gets a scary, bad disease that could be prevented by vaccines. I know kids will get sick and I need to just “man up” but I will do that later today, for now I am just PO’d.

PS. I know breastfeeding is best, I know I am fortunate to be able to breastfeed, I know that it is a lot easier than bottles/formula (from first hand experience), I guess I just wanted it to be the magic bullet everyone says it is.

Well, it started with Lela… seems to have landed a glancing blow on Piper (so far) but then landed completely on Landis. What is it? The nasty-cough-runny-nose-makem-feel-puny bug. Wheee… it provides loads of entertainment, especially for parents!

It’s certainly painful for a parent when their child is sick… there’s only so much you can do and at times you just feel completely helpless. But with Piper and Lela at least you can sit down and explain things with comforting words… they can even have some relief purely by distraction (Leap pad, Doodle pad, Cat in the Hat, etc…)

But when it hits Landis… ouch. It’s terrible hearing her cough then cry because the cough just hurt her throat. And then her cry is so hoarse it makes things even worse. Poor thing.

Uber-kudos to Mystique, though, for taking care of not just Landis, but a sick Lela, a somewhat-sick (but certainly grumpy) Piper, while still managing to make wonderful meals for her goofy husband. All the while surviving on just decaf, too!

So that’s what is going on around here… a couple of sick kids. Who knows how we got sick but we like to blame it on a nearby park that we’ve nicknamed, “get-sick-quick park.” That nickname has stuck so well that Piper was even referring to it by that name when she was talking with my parents over video-Skype. I’m not sure my parents caught it, but when they asked her what she did that day she replied in a cheerful voice, “get-sick-quick park!” Cracked me up.