Tuesday, January 23, 2007

Miss Jennica Potato-Head

Today didn't start out on such a great note. Let me explain...



The girls were playing in their room while the boys were getting breakfast for themselves and I was picking up the random morning disarray around the house. Out of the blue, I suddenly heard Jennica give a blood-curdling scream. Not the "I'm-angry" type of scream, but a "I'm in serious pain" type of scream. Dane and I both headed for the girls room at a dead sprint.



As we dashed into their room, Jennica had her hands clasped to her head and was still wailing. Tiersten was standing quietly to one side with her hands behind her back. (Didn't take a genius to figure out that perhaps Tiersten had inflicted the obvious pain.) When I asked Tiersten what had happened, as Jennica was obviously too upset to tell me, she held up a Mr. Potato Head ear and told me that she had put it in Jennica's ear!!! Now......the peg on the Mr. Potato Head is quite long as it is meant to held the ear into the head of a plastic object!! As I pryed Jen's hand away from her ear, it was obvious that there was blood in the ear canal. She was still screaming, and promptly started throwing up, as we all know about the human gag reflex that we get when we cram something too far into our ear canal. (If you don't know about that, try it with a Q-tip!)



Long story short...Jennica will be fine. Her doctor confirmed that her ear tube is still firmly in place, the ear drum is intact, and the bleeding was caused by the plastic stem of the toy where it scraped the inner wall of her ear canal. A few days of antibiotic ear drops and she will be back to normal.



But I still felt like an idiot explaining that Tiersten tried to turn Jennica into Mr. Potato Head. When does this parenting thing get easier? ...........Sigh...........

Sunday, January 07, 2007

The Dynamic Duo


Not sisters by birth, but we knew from the start, God placed them together, to be sisters at heart.

Friday, January 05, 2007

Loads of laughter...

I've had an interesting week with the kids. All four of them have made me laugh, in one way or another. Let me share my stories...

First, everyone went back to school on Tuesday (HURRAY!). As I was escorting Tiersten down the hallway to her preschool classroom that morning, an older elementary student that I vaguely know said, "Hi, Tiersten!!" As we passed her, I heard this same girl turn to a friend that was with her and say, "That's my brother's girlfriend." HELLO??? Tiersten is WHAT???!!!??? For pete's sake, she is three years old, so I'm not about it get my panties in a wad over the romantic imaginings of a 5th grader, but STILL its a little shocking the first time you hear one of your children identified as someone's romantic interest, and even more shocking still when it is your THREE YEAR OLD. Mike and I are still shaking our heads over this one.

Second, Grant is a math whiz and always has been. But this week, one day after school he was quietly working on some homework, and started mumbling and muttering. Within about five minutes, it deteriorated from muttering and mumbling to a full-blown crying fit and temper tantrum. This is WAY out of character for Grant. I finally got him settled down enough to talk to me. He had been assigned a Sudoku as math homework and it was sending him "over the edge". For a whiz kid that is used to flying through schoolwork like lightning, the methodical challenge of a Sudoku was almost too much. I got him calmed down and working on a system to get through it, went to pick up Dane at basketball practice and girls at Day Care, and by the time I got home, he was madder than a hornet again. He had started trying to skip steps again and messed it all up again. Finally, about 8:30 that evening, he and I had worked through the entire puzzle together. I think Grant needs more challenges that he has to take one step at a time. WOW...What a temper!!! Didn't know that side of him existed. LOLOL.

Yesterday, I received a new bathrobe by UPS that I had ordered. I haven't had a bathrobe in years, but I saw this online at an After-Christmas Clearance Sale, thought it might come in handy for those late nights and early mornings at my computer, so I ordered it. The funny part is that Dane thought it was HYSTERICAL. He immediately started humming the theme from "Rocky" and even went in is room to get his wrestling shoes and tried to get me to put them on. He said I looked just like a BOXER and thought that his wrestling shoes were going to be the perfect accessory. He griped a little because my new bathrobe doesn't have a hood, and every time I passed him moving around the house last night, he started cracking up and trying to fake-punch me. ??????? Who would have thought that a stupid BATHROBE would get him so excited??? Even more, the thing is lime green!! Who has ever seen a boxer in a lime green, fuzzy bathrobe with a zipper up the front?? Too funny!!

Lastly, I saw a purple sweater in the same clearance sale that I saw the bathrobe and ordered it. It arrived yesterday, in the same package with the bathrobe. So this morning, I'm standing in the bathroom putting on my makeup and Jennica walks in. She instantly said, "New shirt?" I was pretty impressed that she noticed! So, of course, I said, "Yes! Do you like it?" She got this very intent look on her face and I could see that she was REALLY looking at my purple sweater. Finally, she wrinkled up her nose in the way that she does when something stinks and shook her head and said, "No." I cracked up!! In absolute honesty, I'm not sure that I like it either!! Its a lot of PURPLE for me. I'm not sure what possessed me to order it, other than that it was something other than a dark winter color, and it was the right price. Its basically the color of Barney the Dinosaur, as Mike coined it. LOTS of purple!!! But the fact that Jen noticed it was new, and that she was honest when asked if she liked it, really cracked me up.

So I've had some laughter with day-t0-day adventures this week. Every day is a good day to laugh!! Hope all of you have had some laughter, too!!!

Monday, January 01, 2007

I'm baa-aaack........

December got away from me BIG TIME!!! Where did the time go?

In any case, we had a wonderful Christmas and New Year here. Visited a lot of family and friends, the kids have enjoyed their long time away from school (they go back tomorrow), and I have enjoyed a self-imposed sabbatical in which I worked long hours organizing/cleaning/purging/etc. in hopes that it will improve my turn-around times on my appraisal orders, relieve some congestion, and all that jazz. I actually wish that I had another full week of time to organize as I still have a few remaining things on my list , but I'm just going to have to accomplish them in the middle of grinding out reports. Like it or not, I've got reports due on Friday.

Dane starts basketball practice this next week, which means we have a couple more weeks before the games start. (YES!!!) Grant should be starting his practices next weekend, but we'll see......As much as we encourage our sons to play, and love to be there to cheer them on, the day to day challenge of meals, laundry, juggling girls, etc. when we are in full swing of one sport or another is sometimes exhausting. But, with that said, I'm also very proud of both of the boys and grateful for having healthy children that can and want to participate in EVERYTHING.

The girls seem to be maturing in a big spurt again. Jennica's speech development has taken another big leap and we've gone from 2-3 word phrases to full paragraphs in a very short time. She is so strong-willed and continues to stand toe-to-toe with us on so many occasions. Today, she absolutely REFUSED to come out of the jungle gym thingy at Burger King, so Mike got to climb up there and drag her out. :) Tiersten is also taking a big jump developmentally and wrote Mike's name on her Doodle Pad today with him just telling her M-I-K-E. (She can already write "Dad" so he had to come up with a new challenge.) Not bad for being 3!!

As a final farewell to the holidays, Mike and I spent New Year's Eve last night playing poker with a group of friends. We had a great time, but I have to admit that I have chuckled silently to myself today, as the biggest pleasure that came out of the evening for me was that I was incredibly glad to go home with MY husband. It is so enlightening to spend time with other couples, watch their interactions, and such a nice place to be in life when you can't imagine going home with anyone else. I love you, Michael!!!

My hope for January is to get back to blogging more. I have missed this venue to express myself, as its rather therapeutic for me. LOLOL.

Happy New Year!!!