Summer. Has. Arrived!

The last week or two of May we had quite a bit of rainy weather.  We did good to entertain ourselves though.  As you can see, Caleb enjoyed himself immensely in the mud puddles.

A friend of mine posted on her blog that she had made crayons with her kids.  I checked out the directions & decided it might be a fun thing to do.  So, one very rainy day, we gave it a whirl.  I learned a few things that I'd for sure do the next time.  For example; if you soak your crayons in hot water, the wrappers slide right off.

#2 It makes it a lot easier for the kids to see how many crayons of each color they have if you sort them out after they take off the wrappers.  Once we got going & the kids knew what they were doing, I started chopping up the crayons into pea sized pieces & putting them back in the correct tin.

#3 The directions I read said to bake them at 250 degrees for 10-20 minutes.  Mine only took 10 minutes.  However, I made sure we only put in chunks of crayon to the half way mark of the tin.  I was worried they might overflow & I didn't want to clean that mess up!  You could easily fill the tins up more than half way but I'd suggest keeping a baking sheet underneath it (just in case).

#4 This project kept Caleb entertained for way, way longer than I had anticipated (which was great).  Little sister even liked watching them bake!

#5 The directions I read said to let the crayons cool overnight after they come out of the oven.  I only let my cool about 15 minutes (long enough to harden up).  The directions I read also said you could either put them in cupcake wrappers or just spray your muffin tin with cooking spray.  I lined my cupcake tins with wrappers & then sprayed them with cooking spray.  The wax still leaked through the wrapper though so both tins are now dedicated to crafts.  However, I think that of all the crayons we did only 1 had a little paper stick to it.  The rest slide right off easy as could be!

#6 By using wrappers in your tins, your crayons will look like Reese's Peanut Butter Cups or bottle caps.  I was ok with that.  The long pieces just brush off really easy & you can still color with them even though they have ridges.

Since I used a mini muffin tin, each kid got to do 8 (Brooke didn't do any).  We still had quite a few crayon pieces left over so I just put what was left into the regular size muffin tins & got a few more.

While Travis was home he ended up changing out the sensor for his oil (or something like that).  Yep.  He's sitting on the engine with a flashlight & a makeup mirror to do it.

The kids got to have their cousin Clayton sleep over this weekend.  They played in the water all day long on Sunday.  In fact, all 4 kids got sunburned!  I'm generally the sunblock queen.  However, first thing that morning we went down to my parent's house to pick up a fridge & drop it off.  While we did that the kids stayed with my mom & ended up getting in the pool.  I didn't think they were going to be doing that so I didn't sunscreen them before we left home.  They've been whining about their shoulders hurting all day (their sunburns aren't that bad, but I'm fairly certain this is the first sunburn in their life for all of them!)

Today the kids started swimming lessons at the Logan Aquatic Center.  We are taking my girlfriend's boys with us as well.  Turns out Sam, Nash & my friend's boys are in the same class with only one other girl (her name is Samantha too).  Caleb is in the 3 year old class.  Their classes are only 30 minutes for 9 days.  They were so excited about going they talked non stop all the way there!  Then I couldn't get them to quit all the way home either!  I told Laura we might have to sign them up for another session after summer school gets out!

After we got home from swimming lessons today I made the kids help clean the basement while Brooke took a nap.  After she woke up we went up to my "other mother's" house to play with her grandkids (same kiddos that went to Disney Land with Sam & I).  There is a couple across the street from Cindy that owns a bunch of miniature & fainting (yep, fainting) goats.  The kids love going to see them - especially when there are babies.  So, we loaded up & went to Cindy's house to play with the kids & feed the goats.  Cindy was awesome & prepared a bag of goat food for all of us (animal crackers - who knew?!).  

This was Brooke's view.

Little sister was so good.  She just sat in her stroller and watched all the goats clamor around us for their animal crackers.  There were a ton of little babies that were so cute!  She just sat & held onto her bag of animal crackers as tight as she could (until Sam got them away from her & shared her goat food!).

Since the big kids have dead flip flops & dead water shoes I decided we'd better make a trip to Walmart tonight to pick some up.  Now Sam & Nash are ready for summer with their flip flops:

And, I was lucky enough to find some adorable sandals for Brooke that actually fit on her chubby feet!

I was even able to get Sam to do the first day of her math challenge from her new fourth grade teacher.  We'll see how long that lasts!  She's also trying to do the governor's summer reading challenge.  Actually, we'll all try to do that.  At the end of this week we'll go sign up for the city library summer reading too!

I made a Hello Kitty cake for a girlfriend last week & she showed it to all the people she works with.  I now have an order for a character cake!  In the words of my mom "It sounds like you might be entering the cake business!"  I guess I might!  Tonight I'm making Elmo!  I'll take an extra $30 any time!  Bring on the cake!

Family PIctures

I was out looking for sponsors for Relay yesterday when I happened to find myself on the front steps of Whimsy Photography.  I've heard about this place on the radio & have wanted to give them a try.  So, what did I do?  I walked in and made an appointment for today.  I am thrilled with the results.  I will for sure be going back to this studio!  For $80 you get a 45 minutes session where they take as many pictures as they can. You can bring your own props or just use what they have there.  After your session, they edit your photos & you go back later to have a look at the cd.  With the $80 you get your own copy of the cd in addition to the copyright release.  You will also get a free 8 x 10 & 25% off anything you purchase for the next 7 days!  One thing I thought was cool was that on the sheets that have multiple prints on them (like 2 5x7's) the prints you choose don't have to be the same!  You never get that!  Sheets up to the size 8x10 are normally only $4 - seriously.  We got 105 photos at the end of our session today so I won't post all of them, just my favorites :)

 You have to look at Brooke's toes to notice a difference in these two pictures.

Has his dad's lop sided grin

What a cheese

Spittin' image of his daddy

All three of my boys are pretty bow legged!

You can see all her chubs in this one!

I love how all the guitar pictures turned out.

This one is his biggest fan.

Nash is in a full on belly laugh - look at his face.

Doctors, doctors, doctors!

We have seen multiple doctors over the last week or so.  Am I surprised by this?  Nope.  Not at all.

First of all, we took Brookelyn to her post op follow up appointment with Dr. Blotter.  I was really nervous he was going to tell me her tubes were clogged again.  If that was the case I was going to throw my hands in the air in exasperation because I had no idea what we were going to do.  Turns out, we finally had nothing to worry about!  After 2 sets of tubes, 3 months, 2 x a day ear drops for 3 months, and multiple trips to see Dr. Blotter, BOTH tubes are finally free & clear!  This is very, very good news!  We are continuing drops until tomorrow but only as a precaution.  Dr. Blotter wants to see her again about November to see if they are still working.  Cross your fingers for us!

We also took Brookelyn to Dr. Clarke (pediatrician) for her 1 year well check.  Little sister is a whopping 25.12 lbs and 30 3/4 inches long!  This puts her in the 95th percentile in both categories!  Yes, we do have big babies at this house!  He was asking if she talks, etc.  I was telling him about all the words she can say now -mama, dada, da-dog, boo-book, sissy - sam, no, uh oh, ba ba - bottle, na-nash, ta da - meaning cha da (Those that know my mother know exactly what this is.  For those that don't, it's a silly dance she does with the kids.)-  Dr. Clarke said that she's actually fairly advanced for her age linguistically because most kids only say about 5 words by the time they are 18 months old.  Guess this girl is going to be just like her big sister!  Some other things Brooke is doing include
Walks holding onto things (actually she's done this for several months now)
She took a single step by herself yesterday before plopping down and crawling across the room
Feeds herself with a spoon
Opens cabinets and drawers and pulls everything out of them
Likes to make "toilet soup" when her siblings leave the bathroom door open
Eats mostly table food (we still have some baby food we're trying to use up but she's not liking it too much)
Loves water in a sippy cup
Follows her older siblings around and wants to do exactly what they do (I think I posted pics of her trying to play XBOX with her brother)
Loves standing up in the tub when she thinks I'm not looking
Grabs the washcloth away from me & eats it every time it gets near her grasp
Follows the dog around and pets her gently on the head
Loves to look at pictures on the wall and point at the people in the picture
Loves to eat...everything...often

I finally heard back from the Rheumatologist I went and saw a few weeks back.  He did x rays on my hands and feet and did some blood work.  My x rays looked good.  My blood work tested for parvo (yes, like dogs get - but people get it too and in adults it manifests as arthritis symptoms for six months), a vitamin D level and the rheumatoid arthritis marker.  All the blood work came back normal.  He said my vitamin D levels were a bit low, just not low enough to cause my symptoms.  Basically he told me that other than pain in my joints he has no idea what's wrong with me.  He started me on a prescription of Plaquenil.  I guess this use to be used as an antibiotic but now it's used to treat arthritis.  Apparently it takes a good 4-5 months to get in your system really good and start working so I have a follow up appointment at the end of September.  He also wants to do an MRI on one of my joints.  He said that he wouldn't MRI all my joints, just the one that hurts the most the most often.  However, an MRI is at least $1500 and my share after insurance would be about $300.  So now I just have to decide if I have an extra $300 to throw at this pain expedition & whether or not I want to deal with this.  Right now I'm kind of thinking the MRI will have to wait.

On Monday Nash got bit by a big German Short-haired dog.  We were visiting my nephews at their place to drop off a birthday present.  Nash was riding my nephew's bike down the sidewalk and had stopped and turned around.  On his way back to us on the bike this big dog came out and grabbed him on his arm and bit him.  Nash screamed bloody murder and dropped the bike and started back to us.  Travis and I didn't see the dog coming or else the dog wouldn't have made it to Nash in the first place.  Amazingly, the dog didn't bit a hole in his long sleeved shirt.  When we pulled his shirt sleeve up however there was a nasty bite.  You can see the two top canines and all four top teeth between the canines.  Where the top teeth met the bottom teeth there was a big bloody/bruised bite mark.  The lady that owned the dog came out and was talking to us.  She said the dog has had all its shots, but who really knows.  She was like "He's usually pretty nice I don't know what got into him."  Then she tells us that her front door is broken and doesn't latch tight so the dog can just get out whenever.  She asked if there was something she could do and I asked her if she could get us a bandaid (Travis's brother & sister in law weren't home yet when this happened).  The lady told us that she didn't think she had any and wouldn't even go inside to check.  I was so extremely mad for several reasons 1-I didn't want to be at the place we were at in the first place, 2-Nash got bit, 3-The lady wouldn't get us a bandaid!  4-Travis was way too nice to this lady and told her that it wasn't that bad this time but she might want to consider getting rid of the dog because next time it might be worse.  When we were at the dr. for Brooke's well check I asked the dr. what we needed to watch for to make sure it doesn't get infected.  Now we're on infection watch.

I'm hoping that this isn't a sign of how our summer will go!  I'm crossing my fingers that we're getting things out of the way now so that our summer can continue on dr. free!

And speaking of summer, only 1/2 day of school left and our vacation begins!  Today the kids came home and told me they had found out who their teacher would be next year.  They are both very excited.  I'm a bit nervous about Nash's situation.  He had been assigned the teacher I wanted (the one Sam had when she was in 2nd grade) but apparently she's moving over to 5th grade & they have to hire a new teacher.  I'm crossing my fingers it isn't a first year teacher.  I can be sympathetic to a first year teacher but Nash has some issues going on at school and I'm afraid if he gets a first year teacher it will be disastrous for him.  Guess we'll hope for the best!

Relay 2012

Today I was able to get our Relay shirts & paint.  This year we are doing white shirts with orange paint.  The orange paint is in honor of my "other mother" Cindy who is a kidney cancer SURVIVOR!  We thought white shirts would be a bit cooler than the orange ones we did last year.  The name on the sleeve is kind of hard to see but that's because it's in GLOW IN THE DARK paint!  Yep, we're cool like that.

Right now our team fundraising total is at $1,029!  The first year I did Relay (four years ago) my team raised about $1,900.  Unfortunately every year since then I've had a smaller team and thus raised a smaller amount of money.  Don't get me wrong, any amount is great.  However, this year I'd like to hit at least the $1,500 mark.  

We are planning to do another yard sale/bake sale fundraiser next Saturday, June 2.  We are also hoping to put together a boutique at my place in mid-late June.  Hopefully we can get a bunch of the stuff my mom, Cindy & I have sewn in addition to Usborne books, Pampered Chef, Short Stuff Preschool, Avon, and more.  I think we will advertise it as a boutique but also send out invites - watch for yours! :)  If you or anyone you know would like to participate in the boutique, let me know!  It will be one weeknight & one weekend night (hopefully that will give us a better turn out).  I'm going to ask that participating sellers donate a percentage of their profits from the two nights to our fundraising efforts.  No specific set percentage, just whatever they would like to donate.

We also are currently doing an "opportunity drawing" for this quilt.  It measures 56 inches wide by 66 inches long.  It is machine quilted & the binding was done by hand.  No, my mom and I didn't make it.  It was donated.  Tickets for the drawing are $1 each or 6/$5.  Leave me a comment or email me if you're interested. We will have more opportunity drawings available at the Relay event itself.

It's not too late to join our team or register a team of your own if you're interested in participating in Relay.  Our overall fundraising goal this year is $150,000.  Last year we did about $97,000 so it's a big jump this year.  

And on a final note, just in case you don't know why I Relay:

I Relay in memory of my paternal grandmother who passed away from breast cancer 10 years ago this November 19th.  She passed away exactly 3 months & 41 minutes before Samantha was born.  It was her second fight with breast cancer - her first round was when I was in jr. high.  Samantha never knew my grandma but she reminds me of her every day.  She has so many of grandma's personality traits that it makes me miss grandma more every day.  I have told all my kids about Grandma Lea and they ask about her frequently.  She is not gone, she is certainly not forgotten.  She is temporarily out of our reach.  

I also Relay in honor of my maternal grandmother who is a  breast cancer survivor, my maternal grandfather who is a prostate & mouth cancer survivor, my paternal grandfather who is a prostate cancer survivor, Travis's grandpa Charlie who had throat cancer, Travis's grandma Myrle who is a cancer survivor, Travis's aunt Lori who is a thyroid cancer survivor, my childhood friend who is a breast cancer survivor, my "other mother" who is a kidney cancer survivor, and my good friend Mandy who was recently diagnosed with breast cancer.  

For me, it doesn't feel like it's a matter of if I get cancer, but rather it's a matter of when I get cancer.  I don't want my children to worry about hearing they have cancer & feeling like it's a death sentence.  I want to help "Celebrate a world with more birthdays." 

Caleb's Preschool Graduation

Today my baby boy graduated from Preschool!  I can't believe he's almost four and is graduating from his first year of preschool already!  Miss Shannon has been great with Caleb all year long - even when he's been a stinker.  We absolutely love Miss Shannon and are excited to go back for summer school in just a couple weeks.

The graduation was only 20 minutes long (perfect for wiggly four year olds.)  They sang several songs and told us what their favorite part of preschool was and what their favorite color was.  Then they got their certificates from Miss Shannon.  After everything was all done they got a prize (we still haven't opened Caleb's yet) and treats.  The kids were all super excited about the treats!

With his friend Davin:

Getting his diploma (I wanted to get a picture of him getting his diploma but he grabbed it and ran!)

This is a really cute picture but I had told him to hold his certificate up and he moved it right as I snapped the  camera!

A silly picture with Miss Shannon

A nice picture with Miss Shannon

Thank you Miss Shannon, We LOVE You!