Change

Look at these two little monsters? Brittany actually pooped in the potty so she was rewarded with a blue sucker. It sure has helped to motivate her into using the potty. Typically she will pee in there but NEVER poop. Her social worker said she sees that with kids her age all the time. Its like pooping is the only thing she has control over and she takes advantage of it.

I have been working part time at work since Kade came. I work Mondays, Thursdays and Fridays now. So today is my off day and I am at home... BORED. How do stay at home mom's do it? I just can't stand to sit at home all the time. Like okay the first few weeks were cool and quite frankly I am so busy with Dr appointments and CPS appointments that I rarely do get a day off. But TODAY is my second day off doing nothing... I am getting ready for Brittany's birthday party on Saturday but I am use to being on the go go go and when its time to slow down my body is like what the fat? I shouldn't complain.... I am grateful that I get to take off... Lord knows I would rather be bored a couple of days a month then overworked. It seems like woman get the short end of the deal.... they are the caretakers, emotional and physical providers, they play a handful of different roles as a mother, wife, daughter, employee, and still try to gain some self identity in the process.. sometimes even losing that. Its a real juggle. And at the same time we wouldn't have it any other way... we wouldn't know HOW to have it any other way. Its in our DNA.

So I don't mean to knock stay at home moms... I guess you can say I am a part time stay at home mom... LOL but I guess I am at that point where I think to myself... who else am I but a mom? I know that sounds horrible but I think all mothers reach that point.. or not really a point per say as much as a conclusion. And think about it... me... HEATHER... who took 4 years to actually have kids. I prayed, paid and begged and worked my butt off and then when they came it was like OMG! I was soooo not prepared for this. Who is? You sit and think how life is gonna be with kids. How you are going to do your Martha Stewart duties and sew kids clothes and make kids crafts and yada yada and when you and your husband come home you will all get together and hug and love and be happy. And then reality sets in and your kids are NEVER happy. She screams just to scream, she throws food and anything she can get her hands on... she is two and angry.... she hits, bites, and throws tantrums. You just want to sleep and smoke. HA HA HA, and its not like that everyday... not at all. But some days... it is exactly like that. But its like anything else... when the good totally outweighs the bad, you don't think of the bad as much. You think about how rewarding kids are and how much of a priveledge it is to have kids and mold their minds and futures.

The other day I started to pray with Brittany before she went to bed. My parents never prayed with me. I probably still don't know how to pray. I was never taught. If there is a correct way to pray, I am pretty sure I am lost at it. So I set my mind up that since Brittany is starting to grasp things now it would be a good time to teach her about God and Jesus and prayer. She just kinda watches me and repeats Amen but its a good start and I think one day she will just start doing it on her own and initiate prayer without even thinking anything other then this is what we do before we go to sleep. When she gets older I will mold it into other times of the day and show her that prayer is not on a time schedule or is limited to a certain part of the day. But you know.. start slow. She is only two. I want to find a church... but then again I don't want to hunt for a church. I am so back and forth. I am waiting to hear something really good about a particular church from more then one person... a sign if you will. I guess.

We are also starting to feed Kade more and more baby food. He loves it.

Getting Ready for the big TWO

So its about to be Ms Brittany's 2nd Birthday!!! She is pretty excited about it. Today Jeff actually sat down and thought out some birthday games and activities. I got excited, Brittany was excited...



And Kade was pretty thrilled. LOL



Of course there will be pin the flag on the mailbox. I printed out some Blues Clues characters and the actual game you can print online and Jeff took it to work and blew it up so it would be big enough for all the little ones to get a fair share at pinning the flag on the mailbox. There will be like around 17 kids and since there's five flags we will have to split it up by 5 people at a game and then we will have a pail and shovel filled with random party favors/ toys for the winner to stick his hand in and pick a prize. We will have it full so basically everyone will be able to pick a prize before they leave. Cool idea huh?




The ghoulie pack was not impressed.

Then there are my cookie cutters that I decided to just dye the cookie dough blue and then cut it out sparing me the trouble of icing them blue and making a mess. I will test this theory out this weekend. I have already made a couple of batches and they sure do look like dog treats! lol

Then we will use these washer boards that Jeff's mom made him for Christmas but instead of using the metal rings we will make a salt and pepper bean bag and let the kids have a contest of throwing them in the hole. Brittany did something similar at my Nanny's over the weekend and she got the hang of it pretty fast. I figure its will be a good little game all the kids could do. I need to just get some white and black fabric, draw cut and sew and fill with beans. We will also have the cotton candy machine and blues costume with Brittanys chair for photos. Face paintings and tons of food. WalMart makes a Blues Room cake we ordered the full sheet that feeds 100 people and will pick that up the night before. We have all the paper products Blues Room so it works out perfect. We are trying to figure out if we should actually do a game of "Blues Clues" but I really need a Steve.... so to speak. I can't necessarily be running around doing 50 things so I am gonna look for volunteers... lol

I got Brittany to try on her Birthday outfit Grandma, Jeff's Mom, made her. It fits good and she looks too cute. This is her cheese face. She doesn't quite understand that she will be TWO but she does have a vague idea about birthdays.

Princess cheese Birthday face!

Kade was so excited he had a small jump off to end the evening.

I got these hilarious shots of Brittany going down and up... LOL too funny.

Kade's Progress

So Kade always had a beautiful smile. The first time I saw him after surgery I almost cried because he will never smile as big again. But it didn't always stay so pretty.... days after surgery were horrible. I never had time to post until now. This is Kade on 3/19 just days before surgery.



This is him just post op, 3/22, just coming out of anesthesia. See how crusty and swollen he is?


It gets worse. 3/23 he was so so so swollen and miserable. I pretty much had him jacked up on meds and passed out. He bearly could eat and we had to position his bottle to the side. He wimpered and cried and had arm braces on unless I was holding him.

3/24 its not as swollen but still pretty painful. His nose would run and leak blood and crust. It was kinda scary but we knew it would happen. We had to keep his stitches wet with cream and he hated it to be touched but he is getting better every day eating without it hurting as bad.

3/27 his lip and nose are looking much better now and his glue is starting to come off. I try to keep it clean and let his arms breath as much as possible but he is still pretty angry about being restrained. He wants to put everything back in his mouth about this time and doesnt understand why it hurts to touch his mouth and nose. His lip gets scabby from rubbing on his arm braces trying to itch it and I can tell from the itching that its healing.

3/30 he looks soooo much better. I think most of his glue if not all is gone by now. Braces are being kept off for the most party because he seams to not be hurting himself and can sleep much better without them. Helping my sanity.

4/1 Glue is completely off. Just a stitch under his nose and some puss pocket that developed from there still being a gap and probably snot coming out his nose. He is awhole different baby compared to just days ago and is back jumping full time. lol

4/12 Puss pocket gone. Still has stitch under his nose and his notstril is closed partially from irritation and swelling but the Dr says it will go down with time and will eventually open back up fully. The stitch will desolve and to still keep cream on it. His lip will pull up slightly just from the scare but after a year it will go back down and you will hardly notice he had a cleft palate.

Today we went to his second follow up and the Dr was very pleased with his progress. Tomorrow his social worker comes for her first visit. She JUST called to set. I haven't really spoken to her since he came. I asked her how much he weighed at birth and she said 6.3 lbs and was 19 inches long. So that's good to know since his Dr's always ask and I don't know anything. She said nothing is new with the case and his birth mom keeps calling and saying she wants to work the plan but then doesn't do anything. She seams not to like the BM. I guess I will find out more tomorrow though.

Easter

So this year we actually had kids at Easter! YAY! Which made it 100 times better then usual. We made some easter eggs the night before. Kade could have cared less and was perfectly content jumping in the background, but Brittany enjoyed getting messy and making colored eggs.



We used the tye dye set and the glitter set but the glitter set was pretty messy so our hands were pretty busy making those vs taking pictures.



In the morning I set out both their Easter baskets the bunny rabbit brought them. Again Kade rolled his eyes and ate his rabbit and Brittany got a kick out of her bunny ears, candy and little chick that made noises. It was cute.

We dressed them both up before we went to my Nanny's for other Easter festivities.

But somehow Brittany still managed to get a time out before we left. She literally has turned into Ms Independent over night. Can you say beat down?

It did start raining around noon but we hunted easter eggs non the less, anticipating it would rain all day we figured what the hey?

Kade with my cousin Anna.

Brittany blew bubbles all day long with her Daddy. It took her awhile to figure out not to put the stick in her mouth and blow but she got it down fast.

My sister Brittany's baby Aiden threw up on my Dad. LOL I took the perfect picture.

Later in the day the weather did get super nice and I got some great picutres.

We had fun and it was great.