With our new daycare comes new adventures in performing for Ellie. This year was the first time she had a program to perform and while she knew all the words and practiced them for weeks and weeks and would even sing them at home...it was difficult to see that in the program. You'll see what I mean as you watch.
Also, a huge shout out to Tino who does music at the daycare a couple times a week. He worked really hard with the kids on all these songs. Ellie (and I am sure all the little kids) love him.
Fair warning that the second video is really long, but has the majority of the Christmas songs on it.
Monday, December 30, 2013
Sunday, December 29, 2013
Christmas in Photos
Christmas this year brought lots of fun memories as you might imagine with a 4 year old and nearly 2 year old.
Ellie has been asking for "her very own tree stump" since September. Well PopPop spent a lot of time cutting down some trees in the back and made this extra special for her. Nana added her name.
Doc McStuffins
Ryan is in love with his new train set from Auntie Ashley and Uncle Kyle.
Ellie, Case, Ryan and Jackson were all huddled up after opening gifts in PopPop and Nana's room watching movies together...
and being silly.
Christmas morning opening stockings.
Singing Christmas carols and playing the piano
So excited by her Lambie doll from Santa
A noisy fire truck
Ryan loves his new trike from Uncle John John
Family photo
Sickies
Man, we have had a rough month for illness around our house. In fact its really been since September! Such is life with two kids at ages 4 and 1.5 who put everything in their mouth - the cleanliness factor is not so high. We also switched daycares in July from a home based provider who had her 3 kids and 1 other kid to a center that has probably 80 kids. The amount of exposure to different germs is much higher now. Our immune systems are weak after fighting one cold after another.
This past few weeks was really bad though. After returning from a work trip to SF (flying with a head cold) I ended up in Urgent Care on a Sunday morning due to having been in tears the night before with so much sinus pressure. She told me I had major inflammation in my sinus and that I didn't have an infection. She prescribed 3 days of Prednisone (40 mg) and a referral to an ENT. On Wednesday I saw the ENT who confirmed the inflammation, but also said I had a major sinus infection which was causing pressure on my ear drum and causing me to feel like I couldn't hear. He continued the Prednisone for an additional 12 days on a taper, added 30 days of an antibiotic 2x a day, 30 days of Mucinex 2x a day, a nasal steroid, a nasal rinse 2x a day, and a moisturizer gel for my sinuses since all this was pretty much going to dry me out. I have a follow up with him early January.
Meanwhile both kids seemed to have a similar head cold. Friday that week, Ryan was sent home from daycare because he had these horrible blisters in his mouth inside his cheek. The nurse said that hand, foot and mouth (oral only) was going around and what to expect and how to keep him comfortable. Ironically, I also ended up with the same blisters inside my mouth. Fortunately, neither him or I got the high fever commonly associated with this.
On Monday, Ellie got sick at daycare - she continued to puke through the evening. She couldn't go to school the next day, but we felt it best to keep her home anyways since she was so dehydrated and Ryan stayed home too. We tried to send the kids back to school on Wednesday, key word is tried. Ellie was sent home with a 102 degree fever and Ryan had green goop coming out of his eyes. A trip to the doctor and Ellie was diagnosed with the hand, foot and mouth virus that Ryan and I had although limited blisters, but the high fever and Ryan was given drops to help his eyes. We kept the kids home on Thursday again just to be safe and they returned on Friday to school.
With the holidays and Jared trying to use his PTO we determined to keep the kids home for 2 weeks from school to hopefully build up their immune system so that when they return to school that they have some antibodies to fight off these colds. Jared worked Monday before Christmas eve and we were all off the rest of the week. Monday and Tuesday I'll be at home with the kids, Wednesday were all off for the New Year holiday and Thursday and Friday Jared will be at home.
Hopefully we can make it past the first week before we see signs of the next cold.
This past few weeks was really bad though. After returning from a work trip to SF (flying with a head cold) I ended up in Urgent Care on a Sunday morning due to having been in tears the night before with so much sinus pressure. She told me I had major inflammation in my sinus and that I didn't have an infection. She prescribed 3 days of Prednisone (40 mg) and a referral to an ENT. On Wednesday I saw the ENT who confirmed the inflammation, but also said I had a major sinus infection which was causing pressure on my ear drum and causing me to feel like I couldn't hear. He continued the Prednisone for an additional 12 days on a taper, added 30 days of an antibiotic 2x a day, 30 days of Mucinex 2x a day, a nasal steroid, a nasal rinse 2x a day, and a moisturizer gel for my sinuses since all this was pretty much going to dry me out. I have a follow up with him early January.
Meanwhile both kids seemed to have a similar head cold. Friday that week, Ryan was sent home from daycare because he had these horrible blisters in his mouth inside his cheek. The nurse said that hand, foot and mouth (oral only) was going around and what to expect and how to keep him comfortable. Ironically, I also ended up with the same blisters inside my mouth. Fortunately, neither him or I got the high fever commonly associated with this.
On Monday, Ellie got sick at daycare - she continued to puke through the evening. She couldn't go to school the next day, but we felt it best to keep her home anyways since she was so dehydrated and Ryan stayed home too. We tried to send the kids back to school on Wednesday, key word is tried. Ellie was sent home with a 102 degree fever and Ryan had green goop coming out of his eyes. A trip to the doctor and Ellie was diagnosed with the hand, foot and mouth virus that Ryan and I had although limited blisters, but the high fever and Ryan was given drops to help his eyes. We kept the kids home on Thursday again just to be safe and they returned on Friday to school.
With the holidays and Jared trying to use his PTO we determined to keep the kids home for 2 weeks from school to hopefully build up their immune system so that when they return to school that they have some antibodies to fight off these colds. Jared worked Monday before Christmas eve and we were all off the rest of the week. Monday and Tuesday I'll be at home with the kids, Wednesday were all off for the New Year holiday and Thursday and Friday Jared will be at home.
Hopefully we can make it past the first week before we see signs of the next cold.
Its Christmas Time
After having kids of my own, I've especially come to love Christmas! The excitement for them and all the festivities just seem that much better!
Last year we started a few new traditions - cut our own Christmas tree, activity based advent calendar and I am sure a few others. This year we continued the advent calendar and for the most part successfully completed an activity a day.
December 1: Cut a Christmas Tree
December 2: Decorate the Christmas Tree
December 3: Write a letter to Santa Claus. Ellie wrote hers with help from Daddy. Ryan actually communicated some of these things to Jared and Ellie as they peppered him with questions. Ellie asked for a Lambie (lamb from a cartoon Doc McStuffins) and a potty for her babies. Ryan asked for candy. He's in his "no" phase now, so it took some thoughtful questioning to get him to say yes to anything, but he was pretty excited about candy.
December 4: Decorate Pinecones - Daddy was on duty since I was out of town - there was one giant mess, but they are cute!
December 5: Ellie had her Christmas program/concert for daycare.
December 6: Christmas Sticker Activity - used more stickers that Nana brought last year!
December 7: We cheated and used Carter's Birthday party as part of the calendar! Too hard to travel and do activities that don't already go together.
December 8: Make a snowman - pretty hard to do when there is no snow, unless you do this!
December 9: Make a Christmas Tree - we cut strips of colored paper and glued them to a blank page in the shape of a tree with a star at the top
December 10: Make a snowflake - we used the Borax recipe with pipe cleaners. What a beautie!
December 11: Watch Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer
December 12: Make a snow globe - this was fun, but wasn't as successful as I had hoped. Our tree left debris in the water and the glitter wasn't fine enough to float gently down to the bottom. But the good news is I have enough glycerin to do this next year and probably several more years.
December 13: No formal activity - at least that I can remember!
December 14: Have a Christmas Party - this year we held an ugly sweater party for all of our friends. We served up a nice ham dinner with twice baked potatoes and pumpkin pie. Everyone brought a side dish. We even had yummy festive drinks like cranberry martinis and spiked eggnog. It was super cute that our friends the Simmons kids had very similar sweaters to Ellie and Ryan.
December 15: Make Christmas Cookies - we kept it simple and did one kind of cookie this year. Sugar cookies with sprinkles some cut out and some circle cut from a log.
December 16: Watch a Christmas video - Ellie and Ryan were both pretty sick this week and spent most of it at home instead of at school. We watched a random Christmas movie that was free on Amazon Prime.
December 17: Make a gingerbread house. Our friends Joel and Cailin gave us a cute gingerbread village of small houses which was perfect. There was one for each of us to decorate. Initially Ryan was good about putting candy on the house and not eating, but quickly that changed. 2-3 for the house and 1 for Ryan and by the end it was 1 for the house and 1 for Ryan and even taking candy off the house to eat.
December 18: Make chocolate covered pretzels.
December 19: Wrap gifts. Ellie loves to wrap the presents for her cousins, grandparents and uncles/aunts. Ryan was helpful too handing us tape and scissors.
December 20: No formal activity - mom and dad were pooped after such a long week.
December 21: Look at Christmas lights - Nana came up from Moses Lake to drive around with us.
December 22: Ellie got to go to Moses Lake with Daddy. Jared played ice hockey on the lake with his buddies for 4 hours and Ellie got to hang out with her cousins all day!
December 23: Travel to Moses Lake
December 24: Christmas eve with the Haight family.
December 25: Christmas day with the Fisher family
Last year we started a few new traditions - cut our own Christmas tree, activity based advent calendar and I am sure a few others. This year we continued the advent calendar and for the most part successfully completed an activity a day.
December 1: Cut a Christmas Tree
December 2: Decorate the Christmas Tree
December 3: Write a letter to Santa Claus. Ellie wrote hers with help from Daddy. Ryan actually communicated some of these things to Jared and Ellie as they peppered him with questions. Ellie asked for a Lambie (lamb from a cartoon Doc McStuffins) and a potty for her babies. Ryan asked for candy. He's in his "no" phase now, so it took some thoughtful questioning to get him to say yes to anything, but he was pretty excited about candy.
December 4: Decorate Pinecones - Daddy was on duty since I was out of town - there was one giant mess, but they are cute!
December 5: Ellie had her Christmas program/concert for daycare.
December 6: Christmas Sticker Activity - used more stickers that Nana brought last year!
December 7: We cheated and used Carter's Birthday party as part of the calendar! Too hard to travel and do activities that don't already go together.
December 8: Make a snowman - pretty hard to do when there is no snow, unless you do this!
December 9: Make a Christmas Tree - we cut strips of colored paper and glued them to a blank page in the shape of a tree with a star at the top
December 10: Make a snowflake - we used the Borax recipe with pipe cleaners. What a beautie!
December 11: Watch Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer
December 12: Make a snow globe - this was fun, but wasn't as successful as I had hoped. Our tree left debris in the water and the glitter wasn't fine enough to float gently down to the bottom. But the good news is I have enough glycerin to do this next year and probably several more years.
December 13: No formal activity - at least that I can remember!
December 14: Have a Christmas Party - this year we held an ugly sweater party for all of our friends. We served up a nice ham dinner with twice baked potatoes and pumpkin pie. Everyone brought a side dish. We even had yummy festive drinks like cranberry martinis and spiked eggnog. It was super cute that our friends the Simmons kids had very similar sweaters to Ellie and Ryan.
December 15: Make Christmas Cookies - we kept it simple and did one kind of cookie this year. Sugar cookies with sprinkles some cut out and some circle cut from a log.
December 16: Watch a Christmas video - Ellie and Ryan were both pretty sick this week and spent most of it at home instead of at school. We watched a random Christmas movie that was free on Amazon Prime.
December 17: Make a gingerbread house. Our friends Joel and Cailin gave us a cute gingerbread village of small houses which was perfect. There was one for each of us to decorate. Initially Ryan was good about putting candy on the house and not eating, but quickly that changed. 2-3 for the house and 1 for Ryan and by the end it was 1 for the house and 1 for Ryan and even taking candy off the house to eat.
December 18: Make chocolate covered pretzels.
December 19: Wrap gifts. Ellie loves to wrap the presents for her cousins, grandparents and uncles/aunts. Ryan was helpful too handing us tape and scissors.
December 20: No formal activity - mom and dad were pooped after such a long week.
December 21: Look at Christmas lights - Nana came up from Moses Lake to drive around with us.
December 22: Ellie got to go to Moses Lake with Daddy. Jared played ice hockey on the lake with his buddies for 4 hours and Ellie got to hang out with her cousins all day!
December 23: Travel to Moses Lake
December 24: Christmas eve with the Haight family.
December 25: Christmas day with the Fisher family
Wednesday, December 11, 2013
Kids Check-ups
A few weeks back the kids both had some well child checkups. Ellie had her 4 year and Ryan was about 20 months (a little late for his 18 month). Here's their stats.
Ellie finally hit the 30 lb. mark putting her about 12%ile for her age. She's right about 40 inches tall (40%ile). Ultimately in the past year she gained just under 4 lbs and grew about 3 inches!
Ryan on the other hand is just under 30 lbs. (28 lbs; 65%ile) and 35 inches tall (90%ile). At this age they still measure his head circumference which is still nice and large 19.3 in. (68%ile). From the same appointment this time last year he gained 7 lbs and grew 5 inches. Beast baby.
Both kids had to have shots and not just 1 or 2. If I remember right Ellie had 4 shots and also got a flu mist. Ryan had 3 shots which included his flu shot. Even mom got in on the action and had the pediatrician's office give me my flu shot. Ellie was doing well up until the last shot when she completely lost it and broke down crying uncontrollably FOVEVER. Meanwhile, Ryan got his shots freaked out and the nurse left me saying "take as much time as you need" as both kids cried. Ryan pulled it together quickly and Ellie cried all the way out to the car, even with me making promises of cookies, treats, etc. Quick trip to Starbucks and cake pops (which she always wants and I tell her no) solved all those tears.
Ellie finally hit the 30 lb. mark putting her about 12%ile for her age. She's right about 40 inches tall (40%ile). Ultimately in the past year she gained just under 4 lbs and grew about 3 inches!
Ryan on the other hand is just under 30 lbs. (28 lbs; 65%ile) and 35 inches tall (90%ile). At this age they still measure his head circumference which is still nice and large 19.3 in. (68%ile). From the same appointment this time last year he gained 7 lbs and grew 5 inches. Beast baby.
Both kids had to have shots and not just 1 or 2. If I remember right Ellie had 4 shots and also got a flu mist. Ryan had 3 shots which included his flu shot. Even mom got in on the action and had the pediatrician's office give me my flu shot. Ellie was doing well up until the last shot when she completely lost it and broke down crying uncontrollably FOVEVER. Meanwhile, Ryan got his shots freaked out and the nurse left me saying "take as much time as you need" as both kids cried. Ryan pulled it together quickly and Ellie cried all the way out to the car, even with me making promises of cookies, treats, etc. Quick trip to Starbucks and cake pops (which she always wants and I tell her no) solved all those tears.
Sunday, November 17, 2013
Ellie's 4th Birthday
Although her birthday isn't until Tuesday, we celebrated a little early with a party yesterday! This was the first party that Ellie has invited multiple little girls from daycare. We've invited our daycare providers previously, but it was just their little family as opposed to the class room setting of her current daycare. Obviously, I was overwhelmed thinking about inviting the entire class considering I am unwilling to have a party outside of our house, but we managed to just pick 4 friends. Ironically 3 of the 4 girls actually have parents that work with Jared or I, so we know them a little bit.
Ellie's request for her party this year was Princess Sofia. It's a very cute Disney cartoon about a little girl who becomes a princess overnight (mom marries the King). So we had activities to decorate crowns with jewels and coloring pages with Princess Sofia for the girls and Prince James for the boys.
Additionally, I tasked my mom with making the cake again this year. I'm sure I've mentioned before but she made all my cakes growing up so it has a lot of meaning to have my kids cakes made by her too. As usual it looked amazing!
Ellie and Ryan have their check up at the doctor on Friday so 4 year stats to come....
Ellie's request for her party this year was Princess Sofia. It's a very cute Disney cartoon about a little girl who becomes a princess overnight (mom marries the King). So we had activities to decorate crowns with jewels and coloring pages with Princess Sofia for the girls and Prince James for the boys.
Decorating her crown.
The finished product.
\Helping Ryan with his crown.
Although this picture was taken the day after the party, I thought it was hilarious how he put her crown on upside down.
Additionally, I tasked my mom with making the cake again this year. I'm sure I've mentioned before but she made all my cakes growing up so it has a lot of meaning to have my kids cakes made by her too. As usual it looked amazing!
I posted this pic to Facebook too and got a good laugh when a friend from college commented that "I can't lie that it looks like Princess Sofia is doing the gator chomp. Go Cougs!" She's right though and with the victory we had that day it was so appropriate.
Ellie and Ryan have their check up at the doctor on Friday so 4 year stats to come....
Sunday, November 3, 2013
Halloween
October seems to have flown by! Hard to believe that we are pushing up against the end of the year. We had a good Halloween run this year. It started with a trip to Green Bluff to pick pumpkins, one of our annual traditions now. Knapps on the bluff is by far our favorite place to get pumpkins. The kids love the animals (goats, ponies, chickens, geese), they have a pumpkin cannon, and tons of pumpkins! We also managed to get Honeycrisp apples for dirt cheap - $1.20 a pound. I should also mention that it must have been the nicest weekend on record for October in Spokane. I think it was like 75 degrees this weekend and thus the entire bluff was packed!
We waited until nearly the last minute to carve our pumpkins. Between Jared hunting one weekend and in Moses Lake the next, it didn't leave many opportunities. We settled in Tuesday night before Halloween. As usual, Ellie was over it within a few minutes and Ry was never into it. Good thing we went simple with at least one of the two pumpkins. Ellie shows us how its done using a drill!
On Halloween, Jared was in Pullman watching the Cougs play - well for as much of that awful game as he could handle. The boys had taken Pat & Cindy's camper up with them so they were able to go and at least have a good time without needing to drive home that night.
Meanwhile, the I got the kids dressed up in their costumes for their party at daycare! They were so excited and game home with loads of goodies - stickers, cookies, candy, pencils, spider rings and more! Then we headed out to my office for trick or treating there - this has proven to be the best way to trick or treat ever! Its warm and light and you know exactly who that candy is coming from, not to mention that not all of its candy. Some co-workers give play-doh, fruit snacks, and this year I gave chocolate graham cracker "goldfish". The kids get more than their fill of candy and then we don't have to go out in the evening and they enjoy handing out candy at our house.
Because some of the other guys went to the game with Jared, I invited the ladies over for dinner and drinks. It was nice to hang out - although the door interrupted us every few minutes and Ellie and Ryan wanted my attention, but still a nice opportunity to chat. I made stuffed pumpkins (ground turkey, wild/brown rice mix, dried cranberries, pecans, and apples) and some spiced cider martini drinks and the girls brought some yummy treats.
We sure hope you had a good Halloweeen too! November has already brought us our first snow this morning! Sure glad it didn't stick around too long.
Dad workin' hard pulling these pumpkins.
Ellie went for a short and squatty pumpkin this year.
While Ryan went for taller and slightly thinner....hmmmm.
Ryan started the ride your pumpkin trend.
Now Dad was really workin' hard.
We waited until nearly the last minute to carve our pumpkins. Between Jared hunting one weekend and in Moses Lake the next, it didn't leave many opportunities. We settled in Tuesday night before Halloween. As usual, Ellie was over it within a few minutes and Ry was never into it. Good thing we went simple with at least one of the two pumpkins. Ellie shows us how its done using a drill!
On Halloween, Jared was in Pullman watching the Cougs play - well for as much of that awful game as he could handle. The boys had taken Pat & Cindy's camper up with them so they were able to go and at least have a good time without needing to drive home that night.
Meanwhile, the I got the kids dressed up in their costumes for their party at daycare! They were so excited and game home with loads of goodies - stickers, cookies, candy, pencils, spider rings and more! Then we headed out to my office for trick or treating there - this has proven to be the best way to trick or treat ever! Its warm and light and you know exactly who that candy is coming from, not to mention that not all of its candy. Some co-workers give play-doh, fruit snacks, and this year I gave chocolate graham cracker "goldfish". The kids get more than their fill of candy and then we don't have to go out in the evening and they enjoy handing out candy at our house.
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