Tubes

Andy, Hannah and I met with the ENT today to review Hannah's recurring ear infections.  Since January, it seems as though she had had one long ear infection that just won't completely go away.  It was a quick appointment.  They did a quick pressure test in her ear.  We learned that even after 4 days of strong antibiotic fluid remained in her middle ear.  Dr. said she would be a great candidate for tubes.  We signed right up. 

We have only heard great things from friends and family about tube experiences.  Once your child gets them in, the ear infections go away and they can live pain free finally.  No more pressure build up in their little ears.  April 12th is the surgery.  It is painless and Hannah can go back to the sitter that day if we want her to.  The day can not come soon enough. 

Moving Day

Moving day has come and gone.  We have been in our new place for one week.  With all of our families help,  we pretty much got every single box unpacked by the end of last weekend.  We made the decision to hire movers this time around, which paid off as well.  My dad said it was very nice to watch someone else move the very heavy items up the stairs this time!

This weekend with Andy's help we got stuff hung on the walls, and many finishing touches completed.  I organized many cupboards, drawers, closets, and dressers.  There is still work to do, but we are almost there.  It is so nice for the kids to have their own rooms, have a guest room, a three car garage for all our junk, and more space. 

Andy relaxing after a hard days work.  

Living room 

Formal dining.  

Playroom/Office  

Kitchen 

Master 

My favorite - 2nd floor laundry with a sink!!  (I now have a place to soak my babies clothes from the nasty stains they produce!!)

Dancing Queen

Earlier this week Hannah and I were inside playing while Andy and Henry took a trip to the store.  With the big move on Friday we have packed up most of the kids toys.  Mr. Leap Frog was left out so I played him a few times.  I then noticed that each time I would start up the ABC's Hannah would start dancing.  It is quite possibly one of the cutest things I have ever seen. 

I had to tape most of it from behind her because she now comes after the camera each time she sees me get it out and will stop what she is doing.  Part of their every growing curiosity. 

I play the song every night we get home now and get the same cute little wiggle.  It was no accident - this girl is a dancing queen and has quite the rhythm. 

Sibling Love

Henry and Hannah sitting on Henry's couch.  Henry was tickling Hannah's tummy making her laugh so hard.  It was too cute!

Kisses!!

Hannah 8 1/2 Months Old

Hannah is 8 1/2 months old.  She has big beautiful eyes, she never sits still, and is learning so many new things every day. 

New things that Hannah has learned since she was 7 months old are:

• She crawls, very fast, and gets into everything!
• She is sleeping much better ever since her ear infection has healed up.  She slept from 7:30pm - 6am last night!
• As of today, she is completely on formula.  No more nursing.
• She eats like a champ.  She easily finishes a container of stage 3 baby food each meal. 
• Other food she loves is avocados, peas, graham crackers, pancakes (1st time this morning), muffins, toast, and Cheerios.

 Hannah weighs a little over 17 pounds.

She loves playing with her brother's toys.  And of course Henry is at the stage where sharing is very difficult.

Here is Henry at 81/2 months:

It is crazy to think that this little boy has now turned into this:

Happy Saturday!

 

Sisters Lunch

I manage 801 Grand, the tallest, most beautiful building in all of Iowa.  I am proud to be the property manager and consider myself very lucky. 

You want to know what is even cooler?  My sister Danielle works on the 20th floor of the building.  At anytime of the day I can stop in and see her.  We often take walks through the skywalk, run errands together, get coffee, and just stop by and chat.  How many people can say the work in the same building as their sister?  Yesterday morning I got to work and realized I forgot to put on deodorant!  How awful!!  The best part is I emailed Danielle, found out she had deodorant in her gym bag and just had to take the elevator up and see her.  She saved my day as she has many times before!   

Brianna, aka 'little sister', works just two blocks south of us.  She just got a well deserved promotion which has given her the flexibility to take lunch anytime she wants.  We all three met for lunch last week and it was so fun to catch up, without the crazy kiddos interrupting us.  We now have a reoccurring 'sisters' lunch on the calendar that I will look forward to each month. 

Have I mentioned before how lucky I am to have family so close??

Video Follow Up - Hannah Playing with Henry's Legos

Hannah's new favorite task is to remove every single block from Henry's Lego car.  I can put them all back in over and over again and it never gets old for her!  So funny.

Round 3 - Antibiotic Shots

We visited the Dr. again this morning to take a peek inside Hannah's little ears.  The Dr. said the infection is gone, but the drums are still a little red.  To make sure we totally kick all the strong bacteria that is causing the ear infection the Dr. recommended the third, and final, shot of Rocephin.  Hannah did not take it well at all.  She screamed, and screamed, and then fussed for the entire 20 minute waiting period.  There is nothing worse than watching your child in pain.  I stood there the entire time wishing it was me they were giving the shots to.   Hopefully this does the trick. 

In other news - remember my baby girl that just started crawling a week ago?  Well, she is already pulling herself up on everything.  Her new favorite trick is to pull herself up on Henry's Lego car and pick up and throw out every single one of his Lego's.  It is pretty funny. 

We have her 9 month check in three weeks when they will check her ears again and hopefully find them to be perfect, just like her.

**For my stats - today she weighed in at 17 lbs on the dot**

Bieber Fever

Wednesday night was girls night.  Kelly, Erin and I all secretly wanted to see the Bieber movie.  We all have young girls, but not old enough that we can take them to a teeny bopper movie quite yet.  So we decided to go to the movie together.  Luckily we were the only ones in the theatre, and bonus - it was 3D!

The movie was great, and since Wednesday I have had the song 'Baby' in my head, singing out loud at times.  I didn't realize just how often I was singing it until Henry asked to sing 'Baby' tonight.  Hilarious.  I downloaded the song and we have been playing it over and over tonight at Henry's request.  He even has the killer dance moves to go with it.  Possibly our next Justin Bieber????

Mother's Instinct

Hannah has been on antibiotics for her ear infection since last Wednesday.  She has been eating fine, but a little more fussy, and has not been sleeping well (which isn't out of the norm).  My mother's instinct has been telling me that something has still been bothering her.  Since the kids were scheduled to go to my parents this weekend I decided to take her to the Dr. to peek in her little ears yesterday afternoon.

Sure enough, her ears are still infected.  Both of them.  Poor little girl.  The Dr. recommended a shot of strong antibiotic called Rocephin, which should clear the ears up.  The only bad thing is that it is three sets of shots.  I had the choice between the stronger oral antibiotic augmentin, or the shots.  I panicked on what to do so called my mom, who recommended the shots as well.  The chances are the augmentin wouldn't work either so I would be back here next week doing the shots anyway, prolonging the healing of the infection.  So I had to hold my princess while they gave her the shots.  The antibiotic is pretty thick so they split it into two doses, one in each thigh.  She screamed.  It was awful.  Henry was watching, playing commentary on how Hannah has an owie.  A little comic relief for me.

One set of shots down, two to go.  I really hope this works and I get my little Hannah back.  I really think this explains why she hasn't been sleeping either.  Her poor ears have been plugged up. 

We still sent the kids to my parents house since Hannah has been acting ok.  The good news is that she was so worn out from the shots that she only woke up for my mom once last night! 

Let's hope these shots work and it is the last of these horrible ear infections.

We've got a crawler!

Guess what Hannah decided to start doing yesterday on her 8 month birthday??!!  She starting crawling!  Yesterday it was more of a shuffle of the knees, but today it is a full out crawl.  There is no stopping this girl now.

Kittycat's House

Thursday morning we received a call from Dale reporting that Deb was in the hospital again with diverticulitis (a swelling of the abdomen due to consumption of certain types of foods).  Deb had surgery years ago to fix the problem, but for some reason it has come back.  The first few days she was in pain, but the antibiotics and pain medicine has made her feel much better.  She will check in with the Dr. again in a few weeks to see what the next steps are. 

Sunday she was still in the hospital, but feeling much better, so we made the drive over for a visit.  Henry was very excited to go and see Grandma and Grandpa Schmidt and their kittycat Fred.  We got to St. Anthony's in time to visit with Deb right before she was discharged.  When we got to Deb's hospital room Henry told her 'your room is very nice'.  It was so funny!

Deb was discharged before noon so we got to go to 'the kittycat's house', as Henry calls it.  Fred is Deb and Dale's cat who, over years of tourture from her three grandson's, has learned to hide the second he hears any little children's voices.  Fred made an appearance for about five minutes when we got to the house, then went and hid never to be seen again.  Henry got his kittycat fix though. 

Bennett and Camron came over to play with Henry yesterday afternoon at the kittycat's house.  They played basketball in the basement.  It was so fun watching Henry try and keep up with his cousins.  Henry still calls them both Bennett, which Camron just shakes his head at and smiles.  He was so exhausted that he fell asleep one minute into the drive home.  He didn't even finish the granola bar in his hand before passing out! 

It was a nice, quiet drive back to Des Moines for us last night.  I even got a nap in!  Thank you Andy for driving us back safe and sound. 

Formula Poop - How I have {not} missed you

Now that Hannah is almost 8 months old her vision is as clear as it will get.  She can now see as far as we can, where as compared to the first few months of her life her vision span started at only 8".  What does this mean for us??  She pays attention to everything!!  It has become nearly impossible for me to get in a full feeding with her lately.  Actually, it has been impossible.  So a few weeks ago I decided to start the weaning process. 

Hannah still wakes up twice at night (I know...crazy), so I feed her one side each time she wakes up to put her back to sleep.  This has kept my milk supply up enough during the day that I still have to pump once at work.  So Hannah has been taking her bottles with half formula and half breast milk. 

There are great things with bottle feeding.  It makes getting ready in the morning much easier (Andy gets to feed her so I can spend more time getting ready), we know how many ounces she is eating, and she can watch everything she wants and still eat at the same time.  But one of the downsides to feeding her formula is the stinky diapers!  No more throwing away Hannah's poopy diapers in the kitchen garbage - these stinkers will be going in the diaper genie from now on. 

So the bitter sweet process of weaning has begun.  I know Hannah is ready...but am I??  I am very ready to have my freedom back.  No more pumping at work, remembering everything that goes with the pump, figuring out how to keep the milk cold, no more nursing tanks, no more breast pads, and no more exploding breasts when I am in meetings all day.  But that also means Hannah is growing up.  She doesn't need me as much as she used to.  It is all part of life I know...but are we really already to this point??  I remember this happened with Henry as well.  I was sad at first...but give me a few weeks and it will be a distant memory once that pump gets packed far far away, and my body returns to (some sort) of normalacy...

Tractors

Henry loves any and all tractors.  He currently owns more tractors than I can count.  Yesterday my mom came to watch the kids and she brought a new tractor for Henry with her that my dad bought for him.  Just what Henry needed - one more tractor!  I guess I have to give my dad a break...he has spent the past 28 years buying dolls and all things girly. 

Here is Henry showing off his new tractor that Papa got for him.  He slept with it last night and took it to the sitter with him today.  Hopefully my sisters have boys...because we have enough tractors to go around for everyone!

Count to Ten

We caught Henry on tape counting to ten last night.  Every day he amazes me more and more with everything he is learning.  Love this boy!

Sharing

Henry is learning to share his toys with Hannah.  He knows that if he takes a toy away from her, he needs to give her one in return.  It was so fun to watch Hannah crawl over top of Henry this morning to try and get the toy he was playing with.  Of course, his toys are the only thing she wants to play with.  Hannah is becoming more and more mobile every day.  She can crawl backwards now, so I know any day away she will go!!

I have quickly learned that toys are not the only thing these kids share.  On Friday Hannah woke up covered in poop.  She unfortunately has come down with the same thing Henry had last week.  So all weekend Hannah was fussy, pooping every 2 hours, and not sleeping well.  It continued yesterday, so I called my mom and asked her to come over today to stay home with the kids.  So she is at home with both kids today.  We are so lucky to have our family so close. 

I have a call into the pediatrician since when kids have diarrhea you are supposed to take them off milk.  But what do you do when all your baby drinks is milk??  My mom tried a few ounces of Pedialyte this morning which she took down fine.  She is on day four of this GI bug, so hopefully on the mends.  Poor little girl.

Henry is completely better and treated mommy and daddy to sleeping in until 7:15 this morning!  Only if that would continue!!

And P.S. - Mommy has a sinus infection...nothing more fun that a sick mommy and sick kids!  Luckily my Dr. called in a script for me that I am headed to pick up over noon.  There is no time for this mom to be sick!

Happy Monday everyone!

Cheerios

Our sitter called in sick today, so I am at home this morning with the kids.  Henry was eating his normal 4 bowls of cereal, which is the only meal of the day we can get him to eat well for us.  Hannah was being a little fussy, so I decided to entertain her with some Cheerios.  Her first time gumming any type of finger food and she did great!!  Pretty hilarious watching her try this new adventure of eating Cheerios. 

Kids Company

Our search began for a new babysitter.  The question is - do we switch to a center now that Henry is older?  What do we do with Hannah?  Do we bring her to an in-home provider and Henry to the center and deal with two drop offs for a year?  Or do we bring Hannah to the center as well?  Those questions and more have been on my mind over the past few months.

Now that Henry is almost half way to his third birthday, structure in his day is becoming more and more important.  Free play is still a very important piece of his day, but a few short lessons here and there are good for him.  And playing in groups of children his own age wouldn't hurt either.

Andy and I interviewed with three centers and three in-home providers.  My coworker highly referred the center she brings her children to called Kids Company.  Of the three centers I toured I liked this one the best by far.  It is much smaller than the other centers, and is family run.  The only problem is, like with most centers around here, the wait list!  Emily (the director) thought she could get Henry enrolled in June, and Hannah in August, so a little bit of a wait.  So we had been dealing with what to do with the kids until they had an opening.  Then last week Emily called and said an opening came available and she can get Henry in starting March 21st!  That is the first day we will be in the new house - so perfect timing. 

She still doesn't have a date for when Hannah can start.  Once Henry starts we get priority over any other families that aren't currently enrolled, so she is hopeful for a June start.  We interviewed with an in-home provider a few weeks ago that we really liked and are working through details with her now.  She may be ok with us bringing Hannah for a few months until they can get her in the center.  Or we may decide to keep Hannah with her for awhile until she is ready for a center, as long as the two drop offs isn't a huge inconvenience. 

I dropped by our deposit check for Henry on Tuesday and peeked in his room again.  One of the things I love about Kids Company is that they split out their two year olds into 'Little 2's' and 'Big 2's'.  There is such a difference in development between a 24 month old compared to a 36 month old.  So I really like that they split them up.  Henry will have 11 other little playmates in his class.  I also like that during educational time they break out into two small groups of 6 each.  They also go outside at least once a day.  He is going to love it so much!

So we have one of the kids taken care of, which is a relief!  Still trying to figure out what to do with Hannah.  Luckily we still have five weeks.  And if I don't find anything that is better than where she is at now I can always leave her with Teri. 

Hard to believe that Henry will be starting at more of a 'preschool' now.  He is growing too fast!!

My Valentine's

Last night Henry was feeling a little better and helped me make his Valentine's.  He helped me write each of the daycare kids names on each Valentine, and put the stickers on.  We then attached a piece of candy to each one.

When is the last time you made Valentine's?  Well, it had been quite awhile for Andy and me.  We couldn't remember how they worked.  Does Henry give everyone Spiderman Valentines since he is a boy?  Or does he give the girls the Princess ones and the boys the Spiderman ones?  There were no directions on the box to help us out! 

Henry helping with the heart stickers. 

Spiderman and Princesses.  We decided to give the girls the Princess Valentine's and the boys the Spiderman Valentine's.  That makes the most sense - right??

This Valentine's Day I find myself the luckiest girl around.  I have the most wonderful husband, and two beautiful babies.  I am lucky to be so loved. 

Happy Valentine's Day!!

Not Feeling so Well

Henry is constantly on the move.  Literally.  He never sits still for even a second.  So I knew this morning right after he woke up when he wanted to cuddle on the couch that he wasn't feeling well.  We have been super lucky with such healthy children.  Henry didn't get his first ear infection until he was 2 years old.  Sure, he has had the normal colds here and there, but hardly is he sick enough that it slows him down.  Well today is a different story. 

Poor little guy.  This was after he laid in bed with us until 7:30am, and took a 2 hour morning nap. 

Don't worry, he didn't forget about his Spider Man swim trunks (two sizes too big).  He has not taken these off since we accidentally stumbled upon them while packing yesterday. 

He is down for his second nap of the day now.  Hopefully he wakes up feeling much better.  Valentines Day is tomorrow and we have a list of his daycare buddies to make Valentines Day cards for!