Swimming Reward

When the ice storm hit, we were stuck inside without power for 2 days. During that time, we told Anniston that if she was a good girl and played quietly during Treyson's naps then she'd get a prize. Well, fortunately for us, Anniston still hasn't hit the terrible twos. She listens to us most of the time. If Treyson's sleeping, she whispers. In the car, Anniston sings herself from location to location. But if Treyson's sleeping, I'll ask her to stay quiet, and she does. So, we didn't figure asking her to be good would be a stretch. . .

. . . so we had to come up with a reward. Chuck E. Cheese? Dollar spot at Target? Nah, we decided to go swimming when it was 35 degrees outside!! (of course we were inside!!) We went to the Jones Center in Springdale, and it's free. We were practically the only ones there. The water was a little more chilly than we liked, but Anniston and Jerry didn't seem to mind. They went down the big slide about 5 or 6 times. We will definitely do it again. For those of you who don't know, our little Anniston is part fish. She LOVES the water. She does so well with her swim lessons in the summer, and LOVES all forms of water that she can get her little body into. So she was in heaven!

And terrible Mommy was holding Treyson while I took all of these pictures. Jerry was wet (obviously) so he couldn't take the pictures. About the time we were wrapping things up (and when I was planning on taking a picture of Treyson), there was a major poo-plosion. No pictures this time. But let me just tell you. . . he looked stinkin cute in his little swim trunks. His little milk gut stuck out, and the shorts were practically to his ankles. I PROMISE to take pictures when we first put his swimming suit next time so that the poo-plosion doesn't defeat me again!!!

Big Boy Bath

It's definitely time for Treyson to slow down growing! He loved his bath being in the "big boy seat". He splashed the entire time, and was quite entertained by his big sister (who's always singing or laughing about something--she tells us that she cracks herself up!).

Fun Friday

Fridays are usually set aside for Anniston and I to spend time together, and we sometimes go on lunch dates with Dadoo. This past Friday, we did some birthday present shopping for some upcoming birthday parties, ran a couple of errands, then came home to play. First, we made Anniston's Valentine's box to take to school next Friday for the party. She was SOOOO proud of it. She painted the outside of a wipey box pink. Then I used the hot glue gun to put some fun ribbon around the container. Anniston then added about 7 or 8 valentine's stickers. After that we glued on the pink rhinestone hearts. I bought a bag of 20 from Hobby Lobby, thinking we'd use 5-10 of them. Oh no, she wanted the WHOLE bag of hearts glued on. Her Valentine's box definitely looks "be-dazzled"!!

Then we worked on puzzles, played dress-up, made pretend snacks in her kitchen, played "Hungry,hungry hippos", and then she saw THE BOX. We had tucked it up on the top of her closet for a rainy day. . . but she recognized the princesses, so I had to get it down. It was a pop-up tent that our VERY SWEET UNCLE TODD picked out for us!!! We did some re-arranging in her room, and she loves the new addition. She has played in there, pretended to take a nap, made her dolls nap in there. . . she LOVES IT!!

Later that evening we had our monthly supper club gathering at Abuelos in Rogers (yummmm). Anniston and Treyson did great, and Anniston even finished the night off with some entertainment. She stood by our table and danced for us all, and sang several songs. I just love when she sings...her little voice is so cute!

Hope everybody has a great weekend!

5 months old

Our sweet angel is 5 months old today! So hard to believe. . . I keep telling him to stop growing so fast, and he's already ignoring me-ha!

Treyson has now started on veggies from a jar. So far so good. . . as long as the jar doesn't have anything "green" inside (sweet peas, green beans, etc.). The foods he does like: squash, sweet potatoes, carrots. He eats cereal 2 x day, mixed with apple/prune juice and water--yummmm! (Not my first choice, but definitely Treyson's favorite!!) We've also started to introduce his little Avent bottles with a sippy cup handle added to it in the afternoons. He's not doing too much drinking out of it yet. We're just getting him used to the idea. We put water in it, and he is playing with it for the most part.

Treyson can roll over from back to belly, and belly to back. He doesn't do it very often, so it's extremely exciting when he does!

He is a much happier camper in the car now. He jabbers and plays (especially towards Anniston--he loves staring at her in the car). We are so grateful that he got over his "I love to scream in the car" phase!

Treyson is a bubble blower. He is constantly doing this. And he's a drooler on top of that. He will blow bubbles during mealtimes, when he's sleepy, when he's playing. . . basically whenever--I think he thinks he's funny! You know, I've really found myself shopping for him alot at Gymboree. Really cute outfits, with mix and match options. They also have matching bibs. Before Treyson, I never really understood the point in matching bibs. With Anniston, we took the bib out to feed her then put it away. Since having Treyson, I totally understand the point of matching bibs. He really should wear one ALL DAY LONG. So, long story short--I buy outfits with coordinating bibs now!!

Treyson has really taken to reading. He especially likes the books where you can feel fur or texture. It's been alot of fun getting to read to both he and Anniston.

Note from the Mommy: This outfit was not picked out by me. This was Anniston's choice for the afternoon. I would have definitely steered her another direction. But this was a day that our Fancy Nanny (jerry's mom) drove up to watch the kids so that we could go to a Razorback game. Long story short, Fancy Nanny didn't have the heart to tell Anniston she didn't match, and we didn't care because we were just grateful that she came up to babysit!!ha

.

Treyson is an exersaucer champ! He can swirl and twirl in that thing like it's nobody's business. He pushes the buttons, grabs things to chew on, and dances too! He also sees some action in a jumparoo. It's upstairs with the Wii and Jerry's new shuffleboard table, so I'm going to assume that we'll head up there more often to play with our toys!

Treyson is napping without a swaddle. At the babysitters house, he lays down and clunks out without a fuss. When we're at home, he still fusses a bit. . . but I'm going to get a little toy to attach to the crib similar to the one at Ms. Ambers, and hopefully he'll do better here. He still sleeps at night in a swaddle. . .

. . . speaking of night time, he's still doing very well with his sleep. He sleeps for 11-13 hours. Usually more in the 11 range when it's a night that we've worked and he has to wake up early to go to the babysitters house. Because we wake him at 6:30, I just can't justify putting him to bed at 6:30 at night. That would mean I get a total of 1 hour with him, and Jerry might get 30 minutes. We try and hold him out until 7:30 (and he's very ready for bed by then).

Treyson is 90% formula baby now. I loved that I was able to nurse him for so long, yet I'm really enjoying my newfound freedom in bottle feeding with formula! He's taken to it very well, and we are thankful for that!

Treyson and Anniston are just the best of friends right now. She's such a helper when it comes to him. If he's crying in the car, she'll sing him a song and he immediately quits crying. Then she's so proud of herself for making her bubby happy. She's such a little mommy. When Treyson's eating, she helps spoon feed him, and if he starts spitting, she'll say, "Treyson, that's naughty. We don't spit our food. . . right Mommy?" It's kind of hard explaining how he can get away with it right now, and there's no way in heck she could (although we have definitely started saying "no-no" to the spitting while food is in his mouth...he doesn't care though. He just smiles and keeps on spitting--he knows he's too dang cute!)

Anniston's new thing is asking us daily if we are her friend (they must be discussing friends at school). So anyway, she told Treyson in the car yesterday that he was her baby friend. I thought that was so sweet. I hope she still thinks that in 5 more months when he's crawling into her room and touching her things!!

We are so blessed with the 2 wonderful children we have. I love my life! It still amazes me how much you can love your babies. Jerry and I were blessed to have eachother for so many years, and now we are in shock with how much more fulfilling our lives are with our kids. . . and definitely no dull moments these days!

Happy Birthday Dadoo

Happy Birthday to you,

Happy Birthday to you,

Happy Birthday dear Dadoo,

Happy Birthday to you!

We hope you enjoyed your breakfast in bed!!

Here's Anniston after we had made Dadoo's chocolate chip cookies (and before she licked the bowl!)

One of Dadoo's birthday presents was painting pottery with Anniston. He chose a trivet and put the kiddos footprints on them. So cute!

We love you Dadoo!

Love,

Mommy, Anniston, and Treyson

Gymback Meet

Here's a picture of our kiddos before the Razorback Gymnastics meet. Aren't they the cutest fans ever? Treyson even made the broadcast as Jerry was having him dance to a song (ESPN was covering the meet last night). They won. . . they're really good this year and are so fun to watch.

I think Treyson knows how cute he looks in a ballcap. He grabs at EVERYTHING right now, but didn't touch his ballcap once!

One quote from Anniston Friday: Mommy, it's cold outside; I better put my sunglasses on (and then wore her sunglasses until I made her take them off for her nap!) I feel like I need to record these things for Jerry and I because they just crack me up. And this is one of MANY!

Go away ice. . . Please stay electricity!

WOW! What a week it has been at our home. Sunday night the meteorologists were going on and on about what was to come on Monday afternoon. So I immediately decided that I was going to stay at home with the kiddos and would not venture out all day. So Jerry took my car (the 1 car in our driveway that has tread on the tires....that's another story) to work.

Well, they weren't kidding. It was so cold and starting to drizzle and slick up our back porch halfway through the day. I called my office (I work Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday) and asked if my patients had started cancelling for Tuesday morning. She said that I didn't have anybody coming in until 10. --no problem, I'll just go in late (better that than sit there for 2 hours twiddling my thumbs).

Here's Anniston Monday evening eating her "ice pop". It was her dessert, and she was SOOOOO excited!

Here's part of our fozen pond in the back yard (it's actually starting to melt now)

The plants out front (these are spirea) looked so weird:Here's a sprout off of our pompass grass plants (or "wheat plants" as I affectionately call them). I held my finger out there too so that you could tell the ice was about 1.5-2 inches in diameter.So the next morning we wake up and things were going fine. Jerry and Anniston were on the couch watching Good Morning America/local weather updates and I was feeding Treyson. Then the clock struck 7:45....and POOF, no TV, no lights, no heat, no NOTHING! Fortunately Jerry had already started a fire. So we reconfigured our living room furniture to get all of our furniture facing the fire and had alot of Anniston and Treyson's toys in the front of the couch so they wouldn't have to get into their rooms to play (we were planning on shutting those doors to help maintain heat in the living room area). For the most part, we did ok. I mean, it was light outside plus we had a fire inside...so technically we had heat and lights (technically).

We spent the morning/afternoon on our cell phones with friends and family trying to decide what to do about the situation and work. The kiddos did pretty good all considering. We kept a keen eye on the thermostat. . . it was slowly dropping. So the kids took their naps in their rooms because it still wasn't too bad back on their end of the house. Jerry and I are out in the living room and here this "beep, beep, beep" and had just enough time to look at eachother and say, "Huh?" before the RAYR,RAYR,RAYR,RAYR began. Oh yeah, the house alarm was going off VERY LOUDLY. . . and guess what, the indoor siren is in the hallway that the kids sleep in--PERFECT!! So Jerry and I scramble to get out to the box to unplug it...it's locked. He asks me where the key is. Now how the *beep* am I supposed to know. So my response, "Just break it open". Calm Jerry found the strategically hidden key and opened it and unplugged the alarm. We called Alert Alarm (shout-out to Pat), and they said it was our back-up battery that was low. And that's how they let you know. You have 3 sweet beeps notice before the blaring siren blows. So I know you're wondering about our kids throughout this ordeal. . . SOUND ASLEEP! Are you kidding me? So why do I tip-toe around their hall when they're sleeping. Well, I won't anymore!! haha

Then at 3:30. . . TA-DA! We have lights, heat, and a TV! We were so excited! We let Anniston watch a cartoon (after we checked the weather) and we decided to grill brats and cook french fries for dinner. AH, life is good--we love electricity! And then the clock struck 8:57 P.M. The kids were asleep, and we still had our cozy fire. We had set a bottle of Principato Rosato (a wine from Olive Garden that I LOVE!!--and btw got for my birthday from mom and dad last year right after we had surprised them with the news we were pregnant! haha) and were just about to pop the cork! WRONG!! There was a fireworks show outside our front door, and it was the power cable that came tumbling down due to the weight of the ice. We scrambled to get our flashlight and figure out what to do. We decided that we'd bring Anniston's matress into the living room (it's a crib matress since she sleeps on a toddler bed) and let Treyson sleep on it. Jerry and I would trade off sleeping out in the living room and keep the fire going. Meanwhile, we were going to have Anniston in our room and snuggle in our bed.

Here's a pic of the cable hanging down:

So Jerry got the kiddos all arranged and I went ahead and got into bed with Anniston. She was ecstatic! She sang me several songs (which I LOVE), but by this time it was 9:30 and she really just needed to close her eyes. I kept closing mine and ignoring her whispering, "Hey Mommy"'s. She doesn't give up though. She kept leaning over me and would kiss me on the lips if I ignored her (it's apparent we've been reading too many princess stories that end with a prince WAKING UP a princess with a kiss on the lips!!). She finally did get to sleep. Around 11:30, Treyson started to get restless. By 1:30, it woke me up and I went to check on Jerry. We tagged out so that Jerry could get some sleep.

I paced the floor with Treyson until about 2:45, then tried to lay him down. . .. WAHHHHH!! Nope, that wasn't going to work. So I paced again and then about 3:00, I sat down on the recliner oh so slowly and managed to keep him asleep. I was exhausted, and I didn't sleep b/c I was freezing cold. Our thermostat was down to 61 at this point. (On a side note: for those of you who don't know about my kiddos and their sleeping patterns, let me fill you in. . . because those of you who DO know how my kids sleep are probably laughing thinking, "finally, she's experiencing having to be awake during the middle of the night". We brought Anniston home from the hospital at 2 days old sleeping 7 hours through the night. She worked her way up to 9 hours in 4 weeks, and 10-12 hours by 6 weeks old. Treyson is similar. He was sleeeping 5 solid hours when we came home from the hospital, and it took him about 4 weeks to get to 8 solids hours, and now he does anywhere from 11-13 hours solid. So this "pacing in the middle of the night" thing is new to me. . . and I'm really not that crazy about the idea of it). Back to the story: Treyson slept in my arms until 4:45, until I got so cold that I couldn't stand it anymore and decided I had to get a pair of socks on and add a sweatshirt. He never did calm back down, so I decided to cave and let him nurse and did so in bed with Jerry and Anniston.

So about 10 minutes into being in bed (and somewhat warm) a beeping started to sound. It was a low battery on our smoke alarm. Are you kidding me? And it was annoying. So Jerry gets up on a ladder while I hold a flashlight, and he manages to rip it off the ceiling--for real, I think we have to get a new one. We get back into bed and sleep until 7:45. Then we hung out in our frigid home that morning (lowest point was 57). We left the house around 1 to just get out and eat lunch, then returned at 3:30 to electricity! YAY!!

Here are our 3 trees out front. The middle and right tree are goners. . . .I'm hoping today's sun will melt enough of the ice on the tree to the left so that the weight of the ice doesn't ruin it too.

Here's Anniston's playground area. The first pic is her little climber set, picnic table, and sand table. The second pic is of her "winterized" trampoline. I'm so glad Jerry decided to winterize it. Otherwise, I would have been very hesitant of Anniston jumping on a trampoline that had been left out in these conditions.

Here's the kiddos hanging out inside in their snow outfits/hat: (and it's hard to tell, but Anniston's lips were starting to turn purple...Jerry decided at that point to take both kids out to the car to thaw out!)
We celebrated by watching TV and cranking up the heat! We put the kids to bed at 7 P.M., yes 7. We watched an episode of House Hunters, then were in bed by 8:30. We were all cozy and getting tired eyes, then all of a sudden "Whoo, whoo". We kept hearing this, about every 14 seconds. ARE YOU KIDDING ME??? Oh yes, it was an owl, and it sounded like it was sitting on the deck attached to our room. Jerry asked me if he could throw our flashlight at it. Seeing as that was our only source of light if the electricity blows, I encouraged him not to (plus I don't know if it would scare it enough to leave)--sorry owl lovers!

Here's the back of our yard. There are lots of old, tall trees behind our fence. So far, our fence is still intact.

We did manage to fall asleep. We woke up the next morning and Jerry made us a big breakfast. He headed off to work around 9. The kids and I played all day. I went to Target last night to get a few things, and as I was standing in line to check out, the electricity went off. . . only for about 10 seconds--but I was so upset because one of my items was Orange Sunkist soda that I was craving. Oh yeah, there was also some milk for Anniston and food for Treyson, but did I mention Orange Soda for me? So anyway, all of the computers were re-booting at Target, so 1 lane was checking everybody out. Fortunately I was 7th in line (out of probably 20).

So I get in the car to tell Jerry about my traumatic 10 seconds in Target, and he answers the phone in a very somber voice. I asked him what was wrong. . . were the Hogs doing that bad? No, we lost electricity again. Oh, my goodness. I called my mom and told her I was heading home, had about 10 minutes worth of packing, and then I was driving with the kids to Ft. Smith. There was no way I was going to do another 57 degree night. I get home, get my stuff packed, Anniston packed, and was finishing up Treyson's bag when the electricity came back on. . . just in time to finish watching the Razorbacks beat Alabama!!!

I LOVE ELECTRICITY!!

By the way, we're buying a generator when they're back in stock to keep at home if this ever happens again.