Mommy Time: Good and Bad and Another Busy Weekend

Well, I think that it is just the beginning of a very busy summer.  This weekend we were very busy and traveling all over.  Any of you that know me well, know that I am not good at just staying home.  Some people may think I am crazy for taking the twins and Karter places by myself, but I don't really think much of it.  I love social activities and I think Karter does too.  She loves going to parties, which we did a lot of this weekend.

I did get to take a little break Friday night before it all began for a little "Mommy time."  I felt like I had been doing pretty good with getting no sleep, but I hit a little wall last week and told John I just needed a small break from changing diapers and feeding bottles.  A friend had given me a gift certificate for a nail place, so I decided I was going to pamper myself and think about nothing for an hour during a peidcure.  I stopped at the nail place and there was a little wait, so I decided to return something to Wal-Mart.  When you think you are just returning something, you think that it will just be a quick trip in and out of the store.  Not so much on a Friday at 5:00.  So my "Mommy time" started with me dreaming about the pedicure chair even more.  First the line at customer service was about 20 people deep.  I'm thinking about what color of polish I'm going to get and up walks two screaming kids behind me....I thought that was what I was getting away from for awhile.  I try to ignore it, but the 30 something year old couple and their young toddler in front of me, made that impossible.  The mom thought that it was hilarious to tickle her son so that he screamed so the people could hear him across the street at the nail salon.  It may have been cute if it just happened once, but no.  She decided to do it the over and over and over again.  I thought to myself, "Really Kari.  Just let it go.  It isn't something to get worked up over."  That thought helped for a couple seconds until I glanced at the mom and she is giving her son a "wet willy."  She seriously put spit on her fingers and put it into her less that 2 year old son's ear.  Are you kidding me?  I took a deep breath and just tried to remind myself not to get worked up over the woman that has a lower IQ than my 2 year old daughter.  So to sum it up...this Mommy was very ready for her hour of pampering to enjoy herself.  I even got my brows waxed too.  It has been months since that has happened.

So the pampering was nice, but then it was back to "Mommyville", which I love a lot.  John helped his mom tile her kitchen last weekend, so as soon as I was home, he was off to make sure everything was ready to start on Saturday morning.  The kids and I headed to Indianola on Saturday to Ryan McCoy's graduation party.  I remember when he was playing in the dirt at our high school softball games, so it made me feel a little old.  After the party, we went to Grandma Connie and Papa Bob's for the boys' 1st overnighter.  Karter was very excited to stay since we hadn't been to my mom and dad's for months.  I think Karter stayed there once while I was on bedrest, but I hadn't been there since December.  It was nice to be there, because there is nothing like going home.  We got a visit from the Diehl's that night and then had 2 baby showers the next day.  Then I got to finish up the weekend with some more pampering by getting my hair colored and cut (which had also not been done since November)  by Lance while Lindsay played with Karter and watched the boys.  She is an awesome friend.  Karter loves going to the Diehl's farm, so it was to good to end a great weekend there.

I am still taking Karter to daycare, and I will until the 1st week of June.  It has been good to be able to spend the time with the boys and to have the time to rest myself, because there is no rest when our wild child is home.  She wears me out!  The boys are still waking up every 3 hours to eat and I have gotten the night time feedings down to about 30 minutes. This is especially helpful when 1 of the boys decides to only sleep for an hour and a half before waking up to get me out of bed. 

So we will try to rest up before another busy weekend of graduation parties, a birthday party, and a wedding.  The boys are having fun meeting so many people!

Here are some pictures from the week.

Karter with her new water toy for her birthday. 

Max snoozing before getting his clothes changed.

Sweet Kane

Busy Weekend and Dr.'s Appointments

Snuggling brothers.

Karter cheesing on her birhthday.

We  started off our busy weekend on Friday celebrating Karter's 2nd birthday.  Where in the world did the last 2 years go?  Our sweet little baby is now a wild, rambunctious, but still very sweet little toddler.  She is so loving and has made the transition of bringing 2 more babies into our home much easier.  Karter loves her brothers so much and has done extremely well adjusting to Mommy and Daddy giving attention to others besides her.  I can't imagine what it would be like if she was jealous or had a hard time being around them.  We had to quickly plan a little party for her because we hadn't made many plans with not knowing what was going to happen with the boys.  Karter was able to have her grandma's, papa, aunts, uncles, and cousins at our house to help her celebrate.  She did a good job opening her presents and we were lucky that it was nice out so we could all be outside so she could play with some of her new presents, like her bubble mower and her new trike. 

Saturday was another busy day as I took all 3 kids to John's cousin, Megan's, baby shower.  We picked up John's sister and our niece and headed to Ames for a nice shower.  A lot of John's family were  able to meet the boys for the 1st time, so they got a lot of love.  When we got home, we were very excited to have some good friends, The Otto's and The Steinfeldt's, over to also see the boys....and of course they wanted to see all of us too.  We tried to get a good night's sleep Saturday because we knew Sunday was going to bring yet another busy day.

Mother's Day this year was all about my Grandma Barb.  Almost all of my 1st cousins and their kids made it to see Grandma at the farm at some point this weekend, which was pretty awesome.  Grandma has taken a little turn for the worse.  This doesn't seem to very easy for any of us.  For any of you that know my Grandma Barb, you know that she is one of the most amazing women in the world.  It isn't easy seeing her sick because she has lives such an active, healthy life.  Grandma was able to go to church, so a lof of us joined her.  Our family filled 1 whole side of the church and part of the other side.  Someone asked Grandma at the end of church if she was tired from sitting up that long.   With a big smile, she said "I didn't really think about it with all of these faces around me."  I'm so glad that we could all be there to spend some time with her.  We are hoping she gets to feeling better and can get some of her pain relieved.  Our day ended by stopping to see John's mom's for awhile.  Karter had a fun time playing oustide and screaming with her "Moo Moo." 

After a busy weekend, it was time for all of the kids to visit the Dr.  Monday I took Karter to her 2 year appointment, and it was by far the worst appointment that I have ever taken her to.  Her dad is definately taking her next time.  If any of you out there have kids that scream bloody murder the whole time a nurse or dr. is in the room, I would love advice on how you got your child to get over their fear.  I'm not sure why Karter acts like this, but it is not fun.  Although, she was not happy the whole time, everything looked very good with her.  She weighed in at 27 lbs and is 34 inches tall, and developmentally right on track!  Today it was time for the boys to go in for their 1 month visit.  You would think that taking 1 month old twins by yourself to the dr. would be a little stressful, but today was a piece of cake compared to yesterday.  The boys are also doing awesome!  Kane weighed 7 lbs 7 ozs and Max weighed 6 lbs 15 ozs, and they were both 20 inches long.  The dr. said that they should gain a 1/2 oz to 1 oz everyday, so they are right on track.  The boys have to be on special formula that has more calories and extra iron.  The iron is very important since they missed out on a lot of that being born early.  This formula has seemed to make Max a little bound up, so he is supposed to get Karo syrup in every bottle.  I would think that would make things taste a lot better!  The only other thing she said we need to watch out for is if Kane gets a fever.  If that happens, we will probably have to get a urine sample.  He is more apt to have UTI's because of his kidney disorder, so we want to make sure we take care of it soon so he doesn't get any other kind of infection. 

So after a very busy, but fun weekend and knowing that all of our kiddos are doing well, we are hoping to relax a little before another busy weekend.  John will be helping tile his mom's kitchen and the kids and I have some graduation parties and baby showers to go to.  People ask if I take all 3 kids, and yes, I do.  I'm not scared.  :)  Four years ago I watched 5 kids all summer long, and I think that prepped me a little for this!

Our 1st Post!






 So here we go with our 1st post on our 1st blog!  I thought about starting a blog during one of the many days of my 12 weeks of bedrest, but wasn't for sure if many people would check it out.  After having the Carepages blog, I found a lot of people probably would check up on how the twins are doing and probably like to know what our sweet, but very ornery, toddler is up to.  So hopefully I will be able to keep everyone up with what is going on in our world on a weekly basis, and post pictures of the always changing looks of our kiddos.  I can't believe how different the boys look everyday and I really do not know when our baby girl got so big.  People always told me that she would seem so big once the boys came, and man they were right.  Makes a me a little sad that she is going to be 2 in just 4 days. 

The boys were 3 weeks old on Saturday, and they are are doing well.  We are beginning to get on somewhat of a schedule.  The boys like to eat every 3 hours.  Sometimes they will stretch it out to about 4 hours, but not very often.  Last Monday at their appointment, Max was weighing in at 6 lbs 1 oz and Kane was 6 lbs 7 ozs, so they are definately growing.  We go back next week for their 1 month appointment and Karter will have her 2 year appointment.  We took Kane to the cardiologist on Thursday and everything went good.  Nothing seemed abnormal and the cardiologist doesn't need to see him again, unless the pediatrician would find a need for it down the road.   My mom stayed a few nights last week, which was great at night because John and I could each sleep through a feeding.  I'm sure she was exhausted, but I think I slept for 4 or 5 hours straight one of the nights.  I was a little freaked out when I woke up, but it was some much needed rest.  And, we mom and I got to see much of the Royal Wedding.  Sometimes I think all that rest that I was sick of during my bedrest sounds pretty good at 3:00 in the morning.

We don't have any Dr.'s appointments this week, which will be a change for us...but a good change.  We have a busy weekend ahead with Karter's b-day party, John's cousin's baby shower, and the boys' 1st trip down south (or as John says to "God's Country") to Mom and Dad's for Mother's Day.  Can't wait to see a lot of family and starting making memories as our family of 5!