Christmas Par-tay!

Kristen had her little party today and it was so fun! My friend Kathleen stayed to help me out, so it wasn't too bad, besides being REALLY loud. LOL They made their little reindeer ornaments and although it was messy, they turned out pretty good! Something cool to show off on their trees for Christmas. :) Here are some highlights! Kristen's is a magnet, so that's why there's no ribbon on top.

Happy Birthday Mom!!

Christmas concert

Kristen had her first school Christmas concert on Wednesday. She was so cute singing Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer with her little paper antlers on. :) Here are some photos.



I got her class singing their song and the whole school singing the finale on DVD but I couldn't see Kristen for the finale because it was too crowded. This was the first time we really used our camcorder since we got it back in March. It really is a cool little thing.

Sunday Kristen is having a little Christmas party with 6 of her classmates. They are going to make a foam reindeer magnet and have some cookies and milk. It should be a fun time! I will definitely take pictures this time because I bought a 15 minute battery charger so even if my batteries go dead, it'll only take 15 minutes to get them going again!

In-service play date

Today Kristen didn't have school and since that means my niece Samantha doesn't have school either (they are 6 months apart) my MIL was babysitting her for the day and they wanted to come over. I then invited my new pal Kathleen and her kids over for a play date. Her son is in Kristen's class. Turns out Kathleen and her husband went to high school with Barry! Small world eh? Anyway, so as I was waking up this morning, I thought "Why not do some crafts while they're here? I have a bunch of new crafty stuff to use and Halloween is coming up, so why not?" I also had some Halloween candy & toys and some extra candy bags (they are about 8"x8" with a handle) so I made Samantha and Kaiden little loot bags. :) I then got everything ready for them to make 3 crafts and made samples of each. Took pictures of those, but then when the time came to take pics when they were actually making the things, my camera went dead and all my batteries were dead too, so no pics. :( Here's what I made for the kids to make! The hands on the pumpkin are Kristen's hands and then when the kids made them, they traced their hands and their feet :)

They had such a fun time and I'm glad they were able to take away something from their in-service play date. :)

Weekend Getaway

Barry and I went away to PEI for the weekend last week (late anniversary celebration) and even with the weather not being so nice, most of the stuff closed down for the season and him snoring, it was a pretty good weekend :) Here are some pics! *click to see it up close*

So there you have it...our weekend :) The girls had fun with my ILs too...they went to see some Pumpkin People in the Valley (a few hours away). :) Kristen even saw one of her classmates there!

She's a school girl now!

Kristen was so excited to go to school she woke us up at 2:30 in the morning. LOL No crying at all, which wasn't expected anyway since she's not that type of girl. She is outgoing and adapts to change very easily so she was raring to go! Here are some pictures I took this morning. What a view eh? Hence the name "Oceanview Elementary" LOL

A few things had to change with her going to school. I am going to take Kaylee for a walk every day (if it's not raining or snowing) after dropping Kristen off at school since we are ready and out anyway. I have to feed Kaylee lunch at 11:30 and put her down for her nap at 12 because I have to get her up at 2 to go pick Kristen up. For the last few weeks she's been sleeping until at least 4, sometimes 4:30, so this will be an adjustment. But, it'll work out and will be great for Kristen as she is getting bored at home with learning. She has already been teaching herself to read and is doing really well with that. Kaylee will be able to play on the school playground for a few minutes both before and after school starts so it'll be fun for her too!

My baby girl is 2!

Today Kaylee turned 2. After I got up this morning she was able to open her presents. Well, Barry & I did because she was scared of the tissue paper. LOL She loved everything! After that, Kristen & Barry left for the Fly-In at the Stanley Flying Club (they are staying overnight) and I got to sing Happy Birthday to Kaylee by myself when I gave her a mini-cake that Lynda bought. She ate it with her new Wiggles fork :)

Here are some photos taken too :) she always looks so serious! LOL

New do, new deck

The girls & I went out shopping with Lynda (my MIL) yesterday to Costco & WalMart. I picked out the new frames (glasses) I want to get but haven't been to the eye doctor to get a new Rx yet so I couldn't order them. Hopefully in the next few weeks I'll get them. When we went to WalMart we went to McD's for lunch then Kristen got her hair cut. I LOVE how it turned out! I'm going to show these pictures to my hairdresser the next time I get my hair cut because that is how I always want it, but no one ever does it right. Anyway, here are some pics of my grown up girl who is starting school in less than 2 weeks!

I never showed you a picture of our new front deck that Barry & his Dad made, so here it is! Nice and big...lots of room. The bench that's there right now probably won't stay there, we might get a little bistro table next year. Also, Kristen is learning to ride her bike without her training wheels, so I thought I'd show you a picture of that too :) She can go straight no problem, but needs to have a push off and can't turn too well yet. Hasn't had a good fall yet, so she's doing really well!

Next week the girls & I are going to Truro for a few days...Tuesday to Thursday I think. One last weekday trip before Kristen starts school.

I could SCREAM!

So yesterday I made the mistake of letting Kristen have 2 friends in (sisters) because it was raining out. I ended up yelling the whole time...the girls kept coming up and tattling on each other, made a HUGE mess, had the music up loud, got into Barry's stuff, etc.

So around 4:30 I asked them to start cleaning up because I wanted to start making supper soon and couldn't until I knew they were gone, and they weren't leaving until that mess was cleaned up.

Finally, at 6pm (!!) I hear silence...wondering what the heck they were doing. I went downstairs. No kids. I go into the back room (which should be locked and Kristen doesn't know how to pick the lock so obviously one of her friends did it)...no kids. I see the blinds askew so I go and look at what's up. The girls (including Kristen) had removed the screen, opened the window and escaped to their house just so they wouldn't have to clean up. UGH!

Now Kristen isn't allowed to play with them anymore. We have had to deal with them teaching her bad stuff all summer and we are just tired of it. This little stunt was the last straw. Obviously Kristen  isn't ready to have friends over. Oh, and she says that they told her she had to do it or else she wouldn't be their friend anymore. Yeah, you don't need friends like that. She's grounded until Friday because of that and because she left th cleaning up to Barry who took over an hour cleaning it up last night.

Good thing school is starting in a few weeks so I won't have to worry about her wanting to play outside during most of the day!

{Family Reunion}

My family reunion went great! Quite a few people showed up at my grandfathers old farm house. He grew up there, so it was built before 1926 I think. There were many people I didn't know, but it was still fun. :) Barry & Kaylee didn't come...Barry doesn't like those sort of things and Kaylee would be running around all the time and I wouldn't be able to sit and talk to people, so it was just Kristen & I that went. Here are some photos I took! (Click on it to see a larger view) I love the one of Kristen and her new Aunt Angela. :)

Kristen and I left at 11:30 in order to be there by 1. It was really windy out! Because it was windy, I wasn't hot, so I never even thought about getting sunburned. Didn't even feel it on the drive home either, but as soon as I got into the house...wham! Felt sunburned...darn it! I had a V-neck shirt on, so it's burned there on my chest and my arms and my nose is like Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer. LOL Okay, well not that bad, but still...it's burned. Kristen didn't get burned at all. She had a long sleeved shirt & jeans on the whole time and her face is pretty tanned from playing outside, so she didn't get burned. We left at about 5:45 and got home around 7:15! What a long day!

{I have a little sister!}

My brother Joey & his fiance finally got married on Saturday!
First, as most parents know, going anywhere with your children is chaos. Then add a wedding into the mix along with a bit of sickness, and all you get is fun fun fun I tell ya! LOL We went to Truro on Friday afternoon for the wedding rehearsal and just made it in time. Had to shop for something for Barry to wear and get something to eat first, so we were a bit rushed. Then on Saturday I had some sharp pains in my stomach all morning. I was thinking it was possibly nerves, but why would I be nervous? Because my girls were in the wedding? I dunno…anyway, right at the time I needed to start getting the girls and myself ready, I started feeling like I was going to throw up and I couldn’t stand up or I felt like I was going to faint. After a bit of laying down on the bed, I knew I just had to get up because no one was going to get any of us ready but myself. I was doing pretty well once we got going and up to Angelas parents house where the wedding/reception was. Still feeling a bit icky, but not too bad.

It was a wonderful wedding! I had to walk Kaylee down the aisle though. They couldn’t hold hands and throw the flower petals at the same time, and without Kristen’s hand, Kaylee just wouldn’t go. The ceremony was very quick. No solos or instrumentals. Just got down to the point and got ‘er done.

After the ceremony, my brother & SIL went for ice cream and photos, so the rest of us stayed at the house and chatted while eating some appetizers (aka cheese, fruit & veggies). Kaylee was a handful to take care of…wouldn’t sit still, and I wasn’t feeling well again. As soon as we weren't needed anymore for photos, we left. I hated doing it, but I just couldn’t stay there anymore. Here are some photos I took (except for the ones I am in) Click on it to go to a larger version.



So on the way home I slept. Kaylee had a bad night sleeping in Truro, as she usually does, so I didn’t get much sleep Friday night. I woke up when we were close to home and was feeling cold, even though it was warm out. I ended up with a fever and chills all night, but felt better in the morning. Just had that weird empty/dazed feeling you get when you are getting over a sickness. Took some Tylenol throughout the day and today I am much better! Good thing too as Barry is gone to PEI until Friday!

My little klutz

Well, she did it again...trip to the ER. Kristen was back-talking to me and I went to the living room window where she was and grabbed her arm to pull her away and she lost her footing, fell, and landed on the bottom corner of the entertainment stand, splitting her scalp open a little. I just figured her head hurt so I was hugging her, saying I was sorry and holding her head. Then I felt a warm sensation so I looked at my hand and it was covered in blood. Took her to the kitchen and saw she had a gash about an inch long and it was wide enough that right there I knew I needed to bring her to get stitches. I called Lynda, then all 4 of us went to the Dartmouth General so Kristen could be seen. Took a little while but we got in. (her head stopped bleeding before we even got to the hospital). So, instead of doing stitches, the doctor did this procedure where she takes strands of her hair and sort of knots them (twists them so the wound closes) then puts some Dermabond glue over top of it to seal it. In a few days the glue will start to dissolve and once that happens, the hair will unwind, going back to normal. Here's some pics:

The cute picture is afterward...notice the glow of Popsicle around her mouth? LOL This time though, because she's been to the ER more than once, Children's Aid had to get involved. Not a half an hour after we got home, a woman from CA came to the door. She talked stuff over with me then I had to wake Kristen up from her nap so the woman could talk with her by herself. She said it's just protocol for these things and everything seems okay. She just needs to talk to our doctor and see if she has any concerns about us then she'll be able to close the claim/report and be done with it. We can't help it if Kristen is accident prone...I do not abuse my children! It's good to know the system is working to help those children that are in need though.

Kristen's 5 year portrait

Picked them up yesterday. Doesn't she look so grown up?

Picnic at the beach

This morning while I was taking a shower I was thinking that since it was such a nice day out, I'd take the girls to the boardwalk and small beach that is only a minutes drive from our house and then have a picnic for lunch! These are some of the pictures I took while we were there.

Click here for a close-up

So yesterday I called the HRM Water Commission and they said they'd send someone over to check out our hole. They came today and told me that the valve came off while they were inspecting it (because it was so rusty) so the whole thing has to be replaced. Within a few weeks they said. Okay, so what do I do with the newly hazardous rusty "stick" you just produced for me until then? I couldn't just leave it like that with kids running around in the front yard, so I put a large rock in the hole and another one over top of the whole thing so no one can fall in or fall on the "stick". This thing is easily a foot deep, and it veers off to the side as it goes down (like maybe a rabbit burrowed down there or something) so who knows how far down it actually goes. I'm glad it's going to be fixed!

Ugh!

Barry came home a day early! They finished up what they were doing so decided to come on home and start a new project next week. I hope I start sleeping better when he goes away next week. I want to enjoy the snore-less time! Last night was a bust though...I'm not sure what I can do pillow-wise. I've tried 1 pillow, 2 pillows, foam pillows, feather pillows...right by my should blade near the middle of my back still feels like a nerve is being pinched or something. Maybe it has nothing to do with my posture while sleeping...I dunno.

I have to call the Water Commission today. I don't think it'll do any good for our problem though. We have a duplex and the water turn off thingy on our neighbors side (close to the middle between our yards, but still hers) sticks out of the ground and there is a huge hole right next to it like an animal dug it's home in there or something. Kristen fell in it last week and got stuck, luckily not spraining her ankle or anything, then yesterday she fell on it and banged up her shin. I think it would be the property owners problem to fill the hole, but the metal thingy would still be sticking out. She's the type that won't do anything anyway and she has 2 kids to think of. She just doesn't care. Barry says if something happens to Kristen because of her negligence, we'll be suing her. I'll see what the WC can do and then go talk to her today I guess. I don't think we are the ones that should be doing anything about it, but she is very irresponsible, so nothing would get done and kids could get hurt.

Check out this page I did about Kaylee squeezing her cheeks when I ask her to "say Cheese". :)

Update

Barry has been working in Bathurst NB for the past 2 weeks almost. He'll be working there from M-Th every week until the end of July. And for the past 2 weeks I've been feeling crappy...first with a strained neck/back for a week and now just feeling generally yucky...gurgly stomach a lot of the time. Yuck.

I've done a few pages in the past few days though. Just had to use some photos I took of the girls! Check them out!


A member of one of the forums I frequent wrote me a poem having to do with the last layout of the girls...brought me to tears.

"Life offers us some moments
With those whom we adore
That if we had waited a liftetime
They would have been worth waiting for.
I love the moments that I have
And cherish every day
Thanking God above who in His great love
Sent two little blessings my way."

Isn't that so sweet of her??

Nothing much else new really, so I guess I'll sign off for now! :)

Look at her go! LOL

Man, Kaylee just LOVES music and dancing! Check out her dancing...looks like she's doing the salsa or rumba or something like that. LOL Excuse the "no shirt" thing...she's in that stage where she wants to be as naked as she can be at all times. LOL

Kristen's party!

She had a blast and was hyper right up until bedtime. LOL She loved all her gifts and thanks everyone for coming! Here are some pictures taken yesterday!

What a way to wake up...

OMG, this morning we woke to this loud beeping sound. Took me a minute to figure out what it was since I just woke up...it was our security system going off! Barry ran downstairs to turn it off, but not in time...what we woke up to was the warning beeping...gives you a minute to disarm it before the wailing begins. Well, the wailing started. LOL Turns out Kristen opened the front door (lock & deadbolt) so she could get the flyers that were on our front step. We never told her she couldn't open the front door and the reason why not to, so it wasn't really her fault. Now she knows not to do that again. Good thing it's not hooked up to a company monitoring system or else they'd be calling to see if everything was okay!

I'm done...finished...fini!

I finally settled my claim for the car accident we had back in December of 2002! Took long enough eh? Last Wednesday I went down to the lawyers office, signed the paper and picked up my cheque! We paid Kev & Lynda the money we owed them for the car so now it is totally paid off, almost exactly 2 months to the day we bought it! Cool eh? Then we went to WalMart on Saturday...spent $260! Eek! So, we didn't spend the extra money on anything special, just some take-out suppers, clothes for the girls, DVD's, some groceries, etc. Oh well, hopefully when Barry settles (who knows when that'll be) we'll be able to pay most of our Visa off and maybe the laptop too.

We got our kitchen floor redone on the 5th! Looks really nice..I did take pictures, but there's no baseboard on it yet since we have to replace it all, so I'm not going to show you yet. :) The people before us (or before them) put quarter-round over top of it to hide the fact that they didn't take off the baseboard when they redid the floor however many years ago. This whole house is full of short-cuts like that. So annoying!

Mother's Day was nice. Barry let me sleep in on both Saturday and Sunday. We went over to Kev & Lynda's for supper and Paul, Dawn & Samantha were there too. The girls just love their cousin :) I made a layout about my morning. The font is my own handwriting! :)



So Kristen's birthday party is on Saturday. She is so excited! Didn't invite everyone this year because we weren't sure who'd want to drive down here for it. So if you're reading and want to come, let me know! ;) It's just family this year I guess. Fine really since I'm sure she'll have a lot of school friends coming next year. Wednesday, on her real birthday, she and I are going to go to Mic Mac Mall together and go to Build-a-Bear to build a Hello Kitty! Depending on how long we'll stay, we might go for lunch somewhere too. Lynda will be watching Kaylee, so hopefully she won't get too cranky. She seriously has her daddy's temperament. Uh oh...watch out! LOL

See some of you on Saturday! :)

It's open!

My site is officially open! Going pretty good too... not a huge amount of sales, but pretty good seeing as a big holiday is coming up on Saturday...National Scrapbooking Day and LOTS of people are saving their money to spend that day on all the sales there is going to be. I've only had 2 tiny problems so far that were fixed easily. Lots of people coming to the forum and congratulating me and stuff...it's fun!

Mom, we'll see you Saturday morning sometime! :) Can't wait to see the new kitchen floor when we get back!

Just for preservation...

I wanted to write this down and share it with y'all...it's too funny.

The other day Kristen was staying with Kev & Lynda and went to Home Depot where she got a free keychain...one with a Nascar #20 car on it, Tony Stewart's number. Lynda gave it to Kristen, she looked at it and being a true Dale Earnhardt Jr. fan, said "I hope no one sees me with this". LOL

LCD baybeee!!

Yep, we got ourselves a new TV with our tax money. It's a 32" HD ready LCD Insignia TV. I know it's not a brand you've probably heard of but I guess it's by Samsung. We needed a new TV and if we wanted to use the entertainment stand we have now, we either A) get a name brand LCD TV we can't afford, B) get a cheap brand LCD TV or C) get another 27" tube TV like we already have. So we opted for B. The only thing that bothers me about it is that Barry likes to watch regular TV in the wide screen mode, which makes everything stretched and distorted since they are two different proportions. He doesn't care that it looks funny. Drives me crazy!! So anyway, here it is:

Video!

Here's a video of Kaylee saying "yeah" :)

She can talk!!

Finally, at 19.5 months old, Kaylee has said her first word. Yeah. That is her first word...yeah. LOL I can't get enough of her saying it! I keep asking he questions she has to say yes to just so I can hear her say it. So cute!!

We brought the coffee table back up from downstairs, hoping the girls were past the pushing and climbing on top of it stage, but no such luck. So, I did what Barry didn't want me to do...brought the "oriental" carpet from downstairs and plunked that underneath so they can't move it. LOL AHA! So I AM smarter than they are! LOL

Here's a picture of the couch we bought last week! Love it! So cool to have the two ends recline! And it seems so much more solid than our old one, which is blocking the dining room entry right now because it has to go outside over the deck to get it downstairs. Pretty good though because I can just put a gate between the kitchen and the dining room and then Kaylee can't get into the dining room to climb on the table.

So yep, I'm getting my own site for my designs (www.jennilyndesigns.com). On May 1st I'll be having my grand opening. Be sure to stop by to check it out, even if you don't digital scrapbook. :) You can still chat in the forum (playroom)! :)

Here's a layout I just made to showcase my corner fold template that I'll be selling. It's Mark holding their wedding bands just a bit before their wedding last September. It's also made using 2 of my kits...Burning Desire and a new mini-kit called Crimson Sunset.

That's it for now! I hope to update more often once the site gets up and running smoothly!

xxxooo

{Ugh! Snow!}

So we're going to get a lot of snow today. Supposed to get 10-15cm. Fun fun! I want Barry to go to the DMV tomorrow so he can get plates for the car as our temporary permit is out Monday. So hopefully he'll be able to. I will be going out on Monday, to Kaylee's pediatrician app't and could go after that, but I don't want to sit in the DMV waiting for an hour with 2 kids. We haven't gotten one single call about our other car yet. I want that thing gone! Not just to make some money & stop paying insurance on 2 vehicles, but our driveway isn't big enough for 3 vehicles. Barry's company vehicle is a big van and our driveway is a small double wide, and not too long either, so it's kind of squished.

Tomorrow afternoon Kristen and I are going with Lynda to a wedding shower for someone I've never met. She's Barry's 2nd cousin or something like that. Hopefully we'll have a fun time.

xxxooo

Camcorder & bag

Just thought I'd show you the camcorder we got and the bag I ordered last night. The reason we got it was because Barry got the vacation pay Plexus owed him so we had extra. We really wanted to get a new one for when Kristen starts school and has her first Christmas concert, etc. and the one we have now, although it still works, it takes the tape, is large and isn't the greatest quality. It did it's job when we needed it though, so we are grateful for that. Anyone want to buy a used JVC camcorder? LOL

{Charms}

Here are all the charms I bought for Kristen yesterday! There's one more I'm going to try to get tonight on eBay, and it's one that I really want, so hopefully I get it! Guess she'll be getting this instead of the Hello Kitty stuff animal from Build-a-Bear since I spent over $30 on it. Unless my sales are pretty good before then and I have some extra money to spend on it. She is so spoiled :)

I have a bunch of plain ones from when I replaced them with my personalized charms, so there should be enough to fill it. Well, her wrist is so skinny I probably won't even need any plain ones. LOL

We went to WalMart today to exchange the camcorder I got on Thursday. (it had scratches on it and fingerprints on the lens! Pretty sure it was a floor model or something) Had to exchange the disks I got too as they weren't rewritable and after thinking about it, it seemed the best thing to get. After that we went to McDonald's for lunch. Not to the one inside WalMart because it was crazy busy in there and it's pretty small, so we went to a different one. Still busy, but at least we didn't have a cart to park and had seats to sit in.

Can I say again how much I LOVE our new car? I just love that keyless entry! No more waiting for the doors to unlock before we can get in! Also love those cupholders. LOL Sounds silly, but with our old car, especially since it was a standard, there was no room for any cupholders.

Ouchies

So yesterday the girls both had to go to the doctors for some needles- Kristen needed to get 2 booster shots before school in the fall and Kaylee had her 18 month check-up which meant she needed to get 2 needles too. She said that Kristen is perfect, besides her needing to drink 2% milk instead of 1%, but she's a bit worried about Kaylee. She has gained less than a pound since she was 9 months old. We've gone and done 3 weigh check-ups since then and have to go back next month for another one. She used to be in the 90th percentile back when she was 9 months old and now she's in the 40th. Also, she has yet to say one real word, which is a bit worrying. Not terribly, but still. So, the doctor is going to refer us to a pediatrician to get those 2 things looked at. I'm sure everything is fine with both her weight and her speech, but we want to make sure.

Just wanted to give a little prayer to my friend Melanie. I haven't heard from her since yesterday at lunchtime and she said if I didn't hear from her, it means she had to take her son Kayden (he's 3 weeks older than Kaylee, but a preemie that was supposed to be a month and a half younger than her) to the hospital for a bit of a stay because he probably has pneumonia. :( Hoping the little guy gets better real soon!

Kaylee got into Kristen's PB&J leftovers today...no reaction, so I'm wondering if that means it's okay to give it to her now.

xxxooo

It's Monday!

And there is nothing exciting going on! :) Found out Kristen chopped up 2 pages of her memory sticker book. It's a diary really, but we stick special stickers in it and write down when & why she got them. Why couldn't she chop up two of the empty pages?? I taped back together as much as I could but there is one small piece I'm missing. Gotta learn to put the little padlock on it so she doesn't do it again.

That's about it for me today. Tomorrow afternoon I have to take both the girls to the doctor. Kaylee is having her 18 month check-up and 2 or 3 needles, and Kristen is getting her booster shots for school. Yippee...that'll be a fun drive home.

Long hours

So Barry had a long day yesterday. He worked from 8am to about 7:30pm then went out again at 8:45 and came home at 5:40am. Lots of moolah this pay period! :) He's upstairs sleeping right now and has to go out again around 5pm to do another night job. Guess we'll be switching sleep-in days this weekend!

First trip to the new Walmart...

So today the girls and I trekked to the new WalMart. Was pretty easy to get to and there wasn't much traffic because it was a weekday morning. Didn't go for any particular reason except to go out for once. So I got these Backyardigan toys for Kaylee. The Pablo one she got for Christmas and we've been looking for the others ever since so I grabbed the other 2 when I saw them today. We also have been looking for a pink Power Ranger for Kristen since before Christmas and no one ever had one, but now with the new season coming out, there are new toys, so I was able to nab one today for her. She also got her Bratz boy she's been wanting. Not the one I linked to yesterday but one named Cameron instead.

So everything went smoothly except I needed to ask someone how to get out of the park. LOL Just wanted to make sure I knew before I left so I wouldn't be driving around aimlessly. It's a new business park with only a few businesses right now (Staples Business Depot, Home Depot & WalMart) and it was the first time I've driven there. It was really easy to get out, so I'm pretty sure we'll go again. :) The girls behaved pretty well too!

Kristen's room is finally done!

After three weeks and countless trips here, Kev & Lynda finally finished Kristen's room today! They worked so hard to make it so pretty! Look!

Kristen...

Is all registered for school in the fall!! She and I went yesterday since Lynda was here to watch Kaylee. So when we got there, no one was in the office and we could hear music and screaming coming from the gym. The secretary finally came in and asked if we wanted to go watch the entertainment (SQUID, a local percussion & bagpipe group of young guys). So we stayed for a half an hour and watched them. They were awesome! I just love bagpipes and percussion! I didn't want to stay the whole time because for one, Lynda was expecting us to only be gone for about 10 minutes and two, the show wasn't over until 2pm which is when school lets out and I didn't want to be caught in that rush. When we got home, Kaylee was taking her nap and Kev was done sanding and priming Kristen's room! Today they are coming over again. Kev to do the first coat of paint, and I'm not sure why Lynda is coming over.

Oh, and if you read this, please leave me a comment! I feel like I'm talking to nobody! :) I'm pretty sure you don't have to log in to anything to post one. Just make sure you sign your name so I know who posted it. :)

xxxooo

Just showing off...

A layout of Spencer I just did. :) Michele, if the month is wrong, let me know so I can fix it!

Oh yeah, and look at Kristen today... she got pink eye yesterday afternoon! What's freaky is that when we were over at Scot & Janine's while we were out showing off the car, we were talking about the kids getting sick and I told them about how Kaylee got pink eye in both eyes when she was 2 months old and that Kristen never got it. Well wouldn't ya know...when we got home, she had green gook in her eye and it got worse from there. Barry picked up some OTC Polysporin eye drops for pink eye this morning and even with just 2 drops so far her eye is much better!

My birthday present

Pretty isn't it? :)

Kristen's haircut

I told Mom I'd show her the before and after pics of Kristen's haircut, so here it is. :)


Also, Kaylee had her nap in her crib today!! It's been a week since she's slept in her crib...hopefully it keeps up.

xxxooo

Can I just say...

Thank God for Lynda! She came over yesterday to remove the border in Kristen's room to start getting it ready to paint. While she was here she swept & mopped the floor, did the dishes, vacuumed, cleaned up
Kristen's room and cleaned up the play room downstairs. Then today both Kev & Lynda came over to check out Kristen's room to see what had to be done to prep it for painting and she did the dishes again. :)

With me, Kristen & Kaylee having a cold (& Kaylee having a double ear infection -- see paragraph below) I really am not in the mood to do housework. Although, i am doing some laundry. :)

Okay, now on to Kaylee's ears...last night we figured we should all go see the doctor. Kristen has been coughing for 3 weeks now and DH and I are still coughing too, on top of us all having a cold now and Kaylee too. Tylenol wasn't working for her, her cold meds weren't working for her (nor for me) and she just seemed miserable so I called the clinic and got an app't for 8:10pm. Arrived there at 8pm and the girls played with another patient for almost 2 hours before we were called! Yep, we didn't get to see the doctor until almost 10pm! She listened to Kaylee's chest, which she cried at the whole time, and then looked in her ears...her ears are REALLY inflamed...both of them! I had no idea she'd have an ear infection! Kristen has never had one and she didn't show any of the symptoms I've heard kids have. So she wrote a Rx for some antibiotics, but because it was 10pm, nothing was open. Good thing the Motrin Barry bought before supper was working as she was actually not cranky since supper last night! Hallelujah! LOL So he'll pick the Rx up on his way home tonight and in a few days, we'll hopefully get the old Kaylee back. :)

xxxooo

So far...

2007 hasn't been the greatest of years. First, we all get food poisoning and now 3 of us get bronchitis. Fun fun! $50 worth of prescriptions and $63 for an air chamber to make it easier for Kristen to take her inhalers and we're all set to get better! Ugh!

xxxooo

Thursday

So last night was wonderful....Kaylee slept great, I slept great, she didn't wake up until 7:30am! Awesome! We then got up and went downstairs. I gave her breakfast and then went to do the dishes (yes, I wait until the next morning to do them :P). Turned on the tap and....no water! Frozen pipes! Ugh! So I called Barry and he told me what to do. Go downstairs in the playroom, turn up the heat, open up the electrical panel and box where the water pipes are and take a blow-dryer to them to unfreeze them. Before I did that I had to clean up the room though because Kaylee had to come down with me and there were too many little bits all over the place from Kristen playing down there. All in all it took about an hour to fix. At least they didn't burst!

PS. Mom, we got a pick-up notice in the mail yesterday and I'm sure it's the He-Man figures. Just have to wait until the weekend for Barry to go get them.

xxxooo

LONG post ahead! :)

Sunday was pretty much a "no Barry" day. It was his turn to sleep in and by the time he got up, ate and got ready to go to his parents, we had about a half an hour together before he left. He's still not home. He went to order some eyeglasses at Costco (hence the reason he was with his parents - they have the membership) because he got a new job that will start in a few weeks and there's no benefits for 3 months with it (yikes!) so he figured he'd get his glasses now while he can rather than waiting 3 months. He should have gotten them more than 6 months ago, but we're both procrastinators....Since his parents drove him, he had to go where they wanted to go after that. They wanted to go look at an airplane that a friend of theirs is building, then go to supper at Curly's in Stewiake. Not fair for me! He gets to be away from the cranky teether and the mischievous drama queen for the whole day and he gets to eat out! I think he owes me something there!

So yeah, he got a new job. Not that he needed a new job or it was really terrible at his current job, but he felt that there was no room for growth and this opportunity came up, so he took it. He's a Network Cabling Technician (runs all the data cables companies need to run their computer and other  Communications technology) and it's pretty hard on him. He works long hours to get jobs done so companies can open on time if they are new or don't have too much downtime if they are already up and running. Hopefully at this new place I will know when he's coming home each day. Right now I have no clue. Could be 4:30, could be 8:30 or later.

So yesterday he gave his boss his letter of resignation. He was afraid that they'd be mad at him because there really are only 2 head guys at his office and he's one of them, which might leave them short. Okay, it WILL leave them short...he works harder than any other guy in that place. I think he's going to be nice and give Neil 3 weeks notice instead of 2 to give him time to find someone else.

I have a Wiggles song stuck in my head and it won't leave! Actually, there's 2 of them, Taba Naba and 6 Months in a Leaky Boat...both from their Wiggly Wiggly World DVD. I actually really like their version of
the Split Enz song, but having it run in your head all day long is a bit much. Doesn't help that Kaylee is teething and cranky (confirmed yesterday that she has two new teeth poking through on the front bottom) and listening to the Wiggles soothes her a bit so we watch them all day long. Ugh. LOL



I just finished a sampler kit for The DigiShoppe (we do a sampler pack each month) and I named mine Aileen after Grammie. See the little word art in it? It's from the saying she always says... "Spring has sprung, the grass has riz, I wonder where the birdies is? The bird is on the wing they say, but that's absurd! The wing is on the bird!" :) I can remember her saying that from when I was a kid!

xxxooo

Food Poisoning

Well, it looks like we have/had a bout of food poisoning. It started Tuesday night after Barry & I had a fondue. We thought something must've been up since it wasn't just me who had the runs (I normally do after a fondue anyway) but Barry as well and we both started feeling nauseous. Barry got sick before we went to bed and I got sick around 11:30pm. At 12:30am Kaylee woke up crying, but not sick so she came into bed with us. At around 2am Kristen woke up yelling "Mommy! Daddy! I throwed up!" so Barry got up to tend to her. We started figuring that maybe it was the meatloaf I made for the girls supper at this point. At around 3:30am Kaylee started throwing up all over our bed and Kristen was awake too so we decided to go downstairs and watch TV. Now we knew it was the meatloaf, as all of us had some. Not much, but some. By 7:30am Kaylee was feeling pretty good and getting into everything. Barry nor I had the energy to watch her so I called Lynda and she came over to watch the girls (Kristen just laid on the couch the whole time, not getting sick) while Barry and I went up to our room to sleep some. We got up around 1pm and came downstairs feeling better so Lynda went home to clean up her own home since she did the floors, dishes and laundry at ours. :)

Not exactly sure what happened with the meatloaf...either it was because I didn't cook it long enough (although I did what the recipe said and I've made it before with success) or the hamburger went bad because it was left on the counter to defrost all day (which I do all the time and we've never gotten sick before). So, from now on, meat will be defrosted the day before, in the fridge.

Today was much better, although Kristen was still throwing up until this morning. She couldn't keep anything down yesterday. On his way home tonight Barry is going to pick up some Tylenol/Advil since we're down to nothing due to the huge headache I had, and some Pedialyte for the girls. I'm glad it didn't last long but I don't want it to happen again!