12 Weeks

Had my 12 week check up yesterday and I got to see Tookie again! Every one keeps asking why I am getting so many ultrasounds and I say "I guess that's the one perk from having a 2 month premature delivery with my first pregnancy!" I get to see the baby again at my check up next month and then a few weeks after that we will find out just what this Tookie baby is gonna be! Even though it's most likely that having twins was my reason for such a premature delivery, my doctor just wants to keep checking on us and make sure that there wasn't another reason. Which is fine by me. Whatever it takes to keep this one hibernating for the appropriate amount time! And have I mentioned that I LOVE my new OB? Well, I do! He's great and makes me feel like he is seriously taking care of me and this precious little bun and that is worth more than all the gold in the world!! Tookie baby looks GREAT so far. Growing just right (and man has he/she grown!) with a good, strong heart beat and this time the hr was 153. I am done doing the hr guessing game and pulling the mother's intuition card. My sister-in-law Emily is expecting her 4th baby and we all (mother included) just knew it was going to be a girl. She found out last Thursday that it is indeed another boy!!! Anywho, my Tookie was just a moving and kicking and I even got to see him/her put his/her little hand up to his/her mouth. Such a change from the little blob we saw last time!!

I took Audrey to the Nutcracker Saturday night and will try to post about that later in the week. Right now she has a nasty old cold and we are having a Christmas party at our house Friday night for the church (I know, I know. I think I am Martha Stewart when it comes to Christmas. I am aware of my problem!!) so between those 2 things the Nutcracker post may not make it in till next week! We shall see.

Christmas Cookies

I am desperately trying to make sure James doesn't get sicker or have a relapse, especially since Christmas is right around the corner. What a bummer if a little boy is sick on Christmas!! So, I have banned the kids from going outside. Can't let Audrey go and not James. That would be cruel. Since we can't go outside, the kids are slightly bouncing off the walls and driving me crazy!!! So, in the attempt to keep my sanity and spread a little Christmas cheer, yesterday we colored Christmas pictures, decorated them with glitter and then we made Christmas cookies. I am not a clean cook by any means, but oh my word did we make a mess in my kitchen yesterday. I was still stepping on sprinkles this morning but it was all worth it to see how much fun they had. And especially when Audrey pipes up in her sweet little voice and says "Mama, tank you so much fo doin dis with us." Talk about a mother's heart melting into a big giant puddle.

Audrey's cookies

James' cookies (notice a difference?!)

Audrey's finished product

James' finished product

Waltzing Matilda

On Monday James woke up with a slight chesty cough like he gets when he is on the verge of an asthma induced upper respiratory infection that happens pretty much any time the weather changes. Sometimes we can avoid having to take him to the doctor and putting him on a round of steroids by giving breathing treatments every 3 hours for a couple days. But since I've done that twice already in the last month and a half, I wanted to go ahead and get him seen. We had to see the NP and she gave us our usual script and said it was good I brought him in. Usually with in a couple hours of getting those 'roids in him, his cough is knocked out. But this time was different. He had a pretty rough night coughing and nothing we gave him or did really helped. He coughed a lot during the day Tuesday and by Tuesday evening he was coughing non stop. He had another rough night and at 2:00 Wednesday morning I knew with out a doubt we were going back to the doctor as soon as they opened. Even though he acted like he felt okay, I knew that cough was not normal. Especially since the steroids and all the other stuff we usually do for him that has worked a million times before was doing absolutely nothing.

Glad I did and didn't wait it out another day and night. Little man has walking pneumonia. Air is still moving thru his lungs well so he's not close to being hospitalized or anything like that but he does have an infection. So we were instructed to keep with the prednislone till it's finished, continue with Pulmicort 2x a day and albuterol every 4-6 hours (even if it doesn't seem like it helps) and this time we got a script for azithromycin. Jon made him a comfy little nest in his bed so that he could sleep sitting up and hopefully rest better. It worked and he only needed a breathing treatment around 11 last night and after that he never coughed again so we all got a pretty good nights rest. (except it's a good thing that I went to bed at 9:30 since I woke up at 3 and couldn't go back to sleep till 4:30)

This morning his cough finally sounds looser and even though he is quite grumpy at the moment I think he's on the road to recovery. Now, if we can just keep his sister from coming down with anything.....she has been a little rough around the edges this week and has been whining a lot more than normal. When we got home from the doctor yesterday she was running a little fever but some ibuprofen got rid of that so I'm not sure whats going on with Peachy!

I know the pictures have nothing to do with the story but for some reason I can't get my camera to upload to the computer this morning so I stole borrowed the first and last pictures from Becky from Thanksgiving in the country. The middle one is one I took and I just think it's so pretty I wanted to share. Oh and the title of this post is even more random, I know, but every time I say or think 'Walking Pnemonia' Waltzing Matilda plays in my head! Go figure.

Where should I begin?

Lets start with how James and Audrey watered their FAKE, pre-light Christmas trees in their room the other night. It's a miracle they weren't shocked to death or that they didn't start a fire. Now lets talk about how blogger has changed and I can't get a Christmas background to load properly. I'm really frustrated about that right now and got tired of fooling with it so I figured a nice green background was as festive as I could get. Moving on to how I do not feel like myself these days and being 11 weeks pregnant while trying to stay one step ahead (or at least hot on their tails) of 2 little darlings, take care of a husband and try to run a household during the holiday's is H-A-R-D. I haven't seen the back of my refrigerator in more than a month. We've eaten out more times in the last few weeks than I'd like to admit. My poor husband had to actually ask me to wash some clothes for him the other day. I finally had some energy to clean up the living room on Saturday while the kids were napping and when they came out of their rooms they said "Mama, you cleaned up!" Now you have to admit that's bad. Not real sure where my broom is or when the last time was that I cleaned the bathrooms. I think I have decided that there is some sort of evil spirit following me around destroying everything that I attempt to clean or straighten.

James and Audrey now share a room. We moved James into Audrey's room about 2 months ago I guess because James got in the horrible habit of waking up in the middle of the night and climbing in the bed with us. Since he's moved, he hasn't gotten up once in the middle of the night and they absolutely love sharing a room!!!

I will be glad when the first trimester of this pregnancy is over so that hopefully some of my energy will return. And I am still wondering if it was a good idea to get ALL my Christmas stuff out, especially since most of it is still sitting on the table. We've been decorating for Christmas around here since the Saturday after Thanksgiving and I still don't have it all done. It's not that I have that much (okay, I just heard my husband snicker from his classroom) its just that it takes a lot of a certain something that I am lacking these days....ENERGY!! If it weren't for the joy that is in my children's hearts, voices and on their faces every time they see the tree or something new I've put out, I would say it's totally not worth it. But they are really enjoying the season this year and Audrey sings Frosty the Snowman all day long!! They enjoyed helping trim their first tree, make their first ginger bread house and really, really like singing Christmas songs with us. They know more songs and words than I thought!!

The Dentist

James and Audrey had their first visit with the dentist today and much to my surprise (and relief) it went GREAT!!! I love, love, love our dentist, hygienist's and receptionist's. They made our first trip to see them much better than I had expected. James had no reservations what so ever about letting the hygienist and then the dentist dig around in his mouth. Audrey was a little more cautious and it took some coaxing to get her to open up!!

Disney: Day 2, Part 2

Last Disney post, promise!!

On Saturday we opted out of going back to the rotel for naps since it was our last day and they were in much better moods after lunch. (I have to say though that by 8:30 that evening we started to re-think that idea!) After Winnie and Tigger, we went to Fantasy land and wow. Wow. I have never seen so many people in such a "small area." It was insane. But Audrey wanted to ride the carousel and James Dumbo, so we dug out our parent of the year awards and got in separate lines. We didn't have to wait too long for the carousel and when we got off and found the boys they were only about half way thru the Dumbo line. Audrey decided she wanted to ride too so to avoid starting a riot, Jon took both of them by himself. He's a trooper!

We left Fantasy Land as soon as we could and went to find Buz. We didn't find him though.

We decided to look for Buz later and went to stake out some seats for a parade. We got some really good ones and while we were waiting James looked in the store window that we were sitting in front of and saw some treats. Special treats as he referred to them and he begged ever so sweetly so I took him in to pick something out. He chose the $6 Mickey ear lollipops.

They really enjoyed that parade more than any of the others. Next time though, we will park ourselves across the street from where we were. The sun was right in our eyes the whole time. Okay, so after that the grownups needed to sit in some chairs and drink some coffee so we went to Main Street Bakery for a snack. I tried to get a picture out side the bakery but the side walk and street were just to crowded. Jon and I both got the best cup of coffee we'd had in a long time (well, since that morning at McDonald's!!!) and I just have to say that the chocolate croissant is out of this world! I wish I'd known how good it was going to be and I would have gotten 2 of them!!

After we were partially rejuvenated we headed out to look for Buz again. The character times kept saying he was in Frontier Land so we headed back there to look for him again. I stopped off in the Christmas Shoppe for some ornaments and Jon headed on with the kids. He texted me about 10 minutes later and said to come on, James was over it. Rut ro rorge. Who would of known that they would freak out that I left the group?? By this time the kids were in a nasty mood and we thought about leaving for a nap but it was too late. So, we went back to the help desk (which is where we should of gone all along but whatever) and I asked where we could find Buz and some other characters. I learned a valuable piece of info then, u can find characters where ever you see Mickey's hand. Geez. And Buz was NOT in Frontier Land, he was in Tomorrow Land. We trucked over there and got in line, again!
 You stand in line for what seems like hours with cranky, bouncing off the ropes kids. You're tired, they are tired. You're really tired of bumping into people and having people bump into you. Your daughter gets traumatized for the umpteenth time by grabbing hold of a tall persons legs thinking it's her daddy only to look up and see that it's some stranger. And you do all this for less than a minute with some character with a big, cheesy, kind of creepy grin on his face. It's worth it though. Always is. To see that look on their faces. That's why parents have been doing it for years and years. That look on their kids faces and in their eyes. And then to hear them talk about it to other people makes it even better!

I must give a little shout out to my husband. He was such a trooper on this trip. The trip was my idea. I did all the planning and purchasing and arranged the yard sale and collected and rolled the change that paid for this trip and I got him totally excited about going. Had I not saved and saved and planned and planned we wouldn't of gone when we did. So, one would expect that I would be the most excited, have the most patience and get the most out of the trip. Correct? Well, not so. My husband never got aggravated, always did what we wanted with a genuine smile on his face. He put himself in Mardi Gras mode to get us quickly thru the crowds which was a life saver, I have to say. He kept me laughing the whole time and he enjoyed every moment of our trip together. He got as much out of the joy on the kids faces as I did, if not more. We were talking about it the other night and he said that if we could go back tomorrow, he'd do it in a heart beat!! Aw, I love him so much!!! That being said though, I had to snag this picture of the one time he was "over it." We were waiting for Buz.

Are you tired yet of my minute by minute accounts? Sorry. My hope is that 40 years from now when Jon and I can barely remember our own names, we can read this account and remember what a glorious time we all had on our first trip to Disney!! So, after we left Mr. Lightyear, we went to find somewhere to eat for supper. Somewhere warm and comfortable and instead we found some ducks!

We were staying for the electrical parade and had a lot of time to kill. Almost too much. After we ate supper, we happened up on Pluto which again, was a huge hit. They LOVE them some Pluto!!

After Pluto, we staked out some seats for the parade and then found out we had another hour to wait. Ugh. So Jon let me do a little roaming around in the shops and he took the kids to get some popcorn. As I'm coming out of a store, I hear a very familiar cry and can hardly believe that I can hear my own child over the noise of that crowd, but I could. Their lips were very chapped and the salt from the popcorn was burning their mouths! Mom to the rescue of course and much to his father's horror, I put lipstick on both their mouths to coat it so they could eat their popcorn with out screaming. Because, even though it was burning the dog out of them, they were determined to eat their popcorn!!!

Jon then left and went to look around and by the time he got back, this is what he found

As soon as the parade was over, we bid farewell to the happiest, most magical place on earth. The place where little boys and girls dreams really do come true. We were more tired than we had ever been and the little bun that's growing in my oven certainly didn't help matters on that end! Audrey feel asleep as soon as she laid her head down on my shoulder so I got to tote dead weight around for what seemed like an eternity. James had taken him a little cat nap so he was good to go for the trek back to the van. Even though we were so tired we could hardly keep our eyes open, it was worth it all. And even though taking kids to Disney World with out the back up of other adult arms and legs is a lot of work, it was worth it. We made some memories that will last a life time and bonded in ways that we didn't know we could. It was great. It was wonderful. It was magical and we can't wait to go again!!!!! However, we wont be taking 3 children to Disney by ourselves. Just sayin!!!