what's going on??....

Being that it has been almost a month since I last posted, I thought I would give you all some updates.

Where do I start.....

I turned 30 !!! I have spent the month celebrating.
Celebration #1 - The weekend of 2/29, we went up north to celebrate with my cousin Danielle and our families. Dani turned 30 on 2/27 and I turned 30 on 3/8. It was so good to get the kids together. On Saturday, we left the kids with their dads and Dani and I, and our moms went wine tasting. We had such a great time!! I miss them all so much and wish we lived closer.
Celebration #2 - My mom and my husband pulled one over on me and threw me a surprise birthday party at my moms house. It was a great time. So many good friends there and I really did not expect it. I expected a family dinner, but not the turnout that we had. I felt so important.
Celebration #3 - Today at work we celebrated my birthday. Birthdays here are big and always have a theme. My theme is a clean room. There is saran wrap enclosing my space and cleaning products all over. I am not OCD, I swear.
All in all it has been a wonderful birthday with lots of pampering to come!! (I got 2 gift certificates to Spa's... the only problem is... deciding what services to get!!)

Zachary's turn....
Zach was supposed to have eye surgery yesterday but it got cancelled due to him being sick. We were really ready for it to be done with so our anxiety about the whole thing can be gone, but what can you do? Now we are just waiting to find out when it will be rescheduled to. Other than that he is great. He comes out with new words everyday and he is just a little pistol. He gets pretty defiant from time to time, but what kid doesn't, right?

Hannah's turn....
Her Royal Highness is 6 months old today. (6 month old pics to come soon) It is so hard to believe she can be this old already. Yesterday she cut her first tooth. It excites me to see everything she is learning to do and see her beautiful smile everyday, but it also makes me sad that my tiny newborn is so big already. She loves to play on the floor and in her jumper. She can sit up unassisted (for the most part, she will fall to the side or back when she gets tired of doing it) and she loves rice cereal and the few fruits and veges she has tried. She is already in 9 (and some 12) month clothing!!

Chris is doing well. Loves his job (how can you not love a job where you play soccer twice a week for lunch and get free energy drinks)

And of course... here are some pictures...

At the first wine stop...


Zach hanging out at his cousin's house...


Love this picture of Hannah...


Happy Zach at mom's birthday party...


This picture just makes me warm and fuzzy...

Hannah is 5 months old!!!

Where has the time gone? Hannah is getting too big too fast. She loves to eat her rice cereal and has tried a couple vegetables which she has taken to also. She is pretty mobile now. She will roll all over the house. She gets up on her hands, and up on her knees, just not at the same time.
Here are a couple of new pictures:

I am 5 months old :




And she's off:


Me and mom at the beach:


My big brother at the beach:


My big brother and I all dressed up and ready to go out for Nana's birthday:


Give me food NOW:

more pictures...

Now it's Zach's turn. Zach is doing great. Not too much new. Here are some pictures from the new Paso Childrens Museum. They have a special needs day once a month and we had a blast!!

new pictures of Hannah

Thought I would post some new pictures of the kids. We bought Hannah's big girl carseat since she is already at the height limit for the infant carrier, and because of the little car bump (I can't even call it an accident), the insurance company has to replace our carseats. So, we had the store ring up an infant carrier and an extra base and we bought her her new one. I have been researching this seat for awhile and it is purple!!! Anyone that knows me knows that I am somewhat of a fan of purple. :)



We have also started Hannah on rice cereal, so I got a couple shots of her in her highchair





Here is Hannah on her 4 month birthday

what's going on??....

Chris so kindly reminded me I needed to update the blog. I think about the blog often, but haven't taken the time to post anything.

Biggest news... I am back to work. Full Time. The transition went better than I expected, but I still miss my kiddos SO much. Hannah is doing wonderfully at Cindy's house and they have got each other figured out. For now.

Yesterday I was off work and we took her for her 4 month appointment and shots. She now weighs a whopping 16 lbs 8 oz and is 25 3/4" long. She got 4 shots in her little legs and she was not happy about it. The first shot she was ok with. Didn't make a peep. Second shot, she whined a little bit to let us know she was a little pissed. The third and forth shots were a blur as all we heard was screaming. I instantly tried to nurse her which she wanted nothing to do with, so we packed her up and took her home. She cried the whole way home (all 4 blocks of it) and once we got home and she cuddled with me she was much happier.

Yesterday morning Zach also had an eye doctor appointment. We (meaning the doctor who went to school way longer than I did) decided that Zach needs surgery. For the past 2'ish years we have been trying to fix his lazy eye with patches, eye drops, glasses, prayer, threats, and nothing worked. It improved it some, but not totally. See, the way that a little ones eye works is that when their eye crosses, the brain shuts it off and only the "good" eye works. And what will end up happening is that he will lose all vision in his "bad" or crossed eye. The surgery will go in and straighten out his muscle. I am a little scared about this. Mainly because I am afraid it won't work and the whole surgery was for nothing. The good side of it though, is that if it does work, hopefully we don't have to hold him down every morning and pry his eye open and put a drop of Atropine in his good eye. Another bad thing about this is that he cannot be active for a lot of days. Anyone that knows Zach understands, that will be a huge challenge. The surgery will be on a Tuesday, he will be down all week (he will probably feel ok, but can't go to school or daycare). The next week, he can go if there is not a chance of him being rambunctious. Right. So, we are hoping that he can at least go to school, if we can work it out with the teachers that they will keep him inside during recess. Daycare is out of the question though.

Other than that things are normal around our camp. We are finally getting some rain in this area which is much needed after the dry winter we had last year. We had a huge storm a couple weeks ago and there is now a huge oak tree lodged in the creek behind our house. It looks kinda cool. All the garbage that the storm brought to the creek doesn't look nearly as cool.

New pictures coming soon....

Christmas

We're ready:




this paper tastes good:


still eating paper!! (notice Zach signing "more" in the background)


Wow!!:


look at all those animals:


I love my barn:


Look at MY new stuff!!! :


4 generations of women:

Hannah update

Hannah is getting so big!! When I took Zach to the doctor last week for his tongue, I put her on the scale and she now weighs 15 lbs. She is getting so active and has started rolling over! She loves to try and sit up when she is in her swing or in her bouncy seat and when she is on her belly (which she loves) she tries to scoot. I think she will be a pretty early crawler.

Here are a few new pics:

Her first roll over!!:


Daddy calls this her Popeye face:


You talkin to me???:


Happy girl:


She loves to suck her thumb:

out of the mouths of the ignorant....

Last week when I took Zach to the doctor to have his tongue looked at, the nurse that was checking us in the room said:

"I bet that happens to a lot of Down syndrome's since they always have their tongues hanging out"

Now let's pick apart this statement. First of all, my son is a person, he is not a "Down syndrome". Second of all, that is pretty stereotypical to state that 'they all' have their tongues hanging out.

I just didn't know what to say, so I said nothing. Sometimes I feel like I don't always want to be the over sensitive mom who has to educate everyone. And in that moment, I was at a loss for words. I should have educated her, and advocated for my son and for all other special kids she may come across in her field, but I was just floored by the statement.

I hope one day this world is educated enough to not stereotype a person based on a diagnosis, or a difference. Seems like a long shot, but I can always hope and dream, right?

Just not his week....

This is really not Zach's week. I wanted to post some more details about his initial fall, just so we have them in the future....

Tuesday night, after a nice bath Zach was quietly playing in his room before bed and he was coming out to the living room with his toy school bus. I think he tripped over his own feet and right when I turned and looked he was on the floor at the door of his room, crying. From what I could tell he smacked his face on the bus and bit his tongue.
I went and scooped him up to cuddle him when I saw the blood gushing in his mouth. I think he actually went into shock somewhat and I know he swallowed a ton of blood. Chris grabs a cold wet washcloth. There was so much blood and once I cleared some of it out to see what was bleeding, I saw it. We panicked and rushed him to French ER. On the way over the hill I knew there wasn't much they could do for a tongue, but thought we should go anyway.

We got there and I asked the lady "before I waste our money and your time, are you going to do anything" ... she said no, not really. Just watch for infection and gave us a couple other tips (pain meds). The bleeding had finally stopped on the way home and then he started messing with it and the bleeding started back up. He couldn't really eat a whole lot at first, but I think he enjoyed living on Popsicles. The following night for dinner he had a Popsicle and some soggy rice krispies. I tried to make him a few other soft things, he wanted nothing to do with it. I can tell it hurts him, but as long as he stays busy it doesn't seem to bother him too much.

Fast forward to last night (Thursday). We had a long day and Zach only napped about 10-15 minutes. Anyone that knows toddlers, know that no nap = clumsy and tired kid. Zach had his Mega Blocks Wagon in the kitchen and attempted to sit in it and it tipped over and he took a face plant into the floor. The blood started again. Luckily it wasn't coming from his tongue this time, but he split open his top lip. This time he actually would suck on a washcloth full of crushed ice, so the swelling went down relatively quick. He actually ate some dinner after all that, which was probably more than he ate the last few days.

I just want to put him in a padded room for a few days so he can heal.

OUCH!!!!!

Zach took a little tumble last night and this was the result (WARNING: Not for those with weak stomachs)