Being Shushed by My 3 Year old..

...I love it. HAHA right. My 3 year old has many important phone calls throughout the day and insists on shushing me when they come in. For example today her "best friend daddy" called, just before going into a meeting so I needed to be quite so they could talk. (He really didn't but this is her use of her toy phone, and the scenarios she makes up.) Um Mickey Mouse called today and so did grandma, all times I needed to be quite so she could hear. I am also being shushed when she puts her babies to bed. Did I mention she has the loudest voice ever? So it is more of a yelling to tell me to be quite. She is so dang goofy, she keeps me entertained to say the least.

Success!

I know I have written about South Beach before with very little success but I am writing again because I have had success. Let me start at the beginning. I have had a major struggle with my weight since my early 20's so about 10 years. As I wrote in a previous post, my struggle really concerns me because I have three daughters. One in particular that is 13 and watches my every move. I feel I am teaching her bad habits and an unhealthy cycle. My goal during my pregnancy was to finally get in control of things. In the past (after my pregnancy with my 3 year old) I only had success with South Beach. I began South Beach 3 times total since I gave birth in May and did not have success the first two attempts. I was not having any success because I was working out and keeping up with 3 busy kids, all of which you need carbs to do. So what I decided after vacation was that I was going to take a break from the gym to get through the two weeks of phase 1. I discussed this with my doctor and she thought it was a great idea. She feels that after the first phase the diet is a very healthy way of living. So here I am in phase 2! I have been South Beaching for 3 weeks now and I have lost a total of 13 pounds! I am really excited and I feel really good. Next week I will begin back to the gym. I plan to hit my goal weight by January. (I have a lot more than just baby weight to take off.) While this time I have set a number goal my true goal is to wear a bathing suit and to feel good.

Wisdom Wednesday

Responsibility. As my 13 year old has gotten older I have worried about how much she appreciates what we do for her. So I have tried a few different strategies. This years strategy I am having her babysit for me for a couple of hours a few days a week. The money she earns will be used for school clothes. AM is very into clothes and usually likes to shop at stores that are higher end. I want her to understand the value of a dollar. So I feel if she works for the money she will value it more. It seems to be going well. There are certain situations that come up as a parent that I know what I want the outcome to be but I don't know how to achieve it. Like this situation I know I want AM to be appreciative and to not expect everything when she has not earned it. I think the best way to avoid this would be starting a rewards system at a young age. There are some behaviors that you don't realize are being created until they get out of hand or become obnoxious. How do you teach your kids about money and responsibility. Is this something you and your spouse discussed before you had kids?

What Matters Most?

I am currently reading a book called, "What Matters Most". In short it is about being the best you. A little more detail is, the book goes through exercises to help the reader pare down what truly matters most to them and living a life based on their beliefs. I have read the book before, a long time ago but my life is radically different from that time. I decided to reread the book because of how disorganized I am feeling and how many mixed emotions I have.

So what matters most to you? How does your list of what matters most reflect in your daily priorities/activities list? Do you feel you are living your life through your beliefs?

Baby Shower Gift

My hubby has decided any time I go to a baby shower I need to give the father a cup in addition to the baby gift, with a note stating "trust me you will need this". Ever since LD has been able to crawl she inevitably racks my hubby at least twice a day. Right now she is exactly the right height to do it standing up. She LOVES to run to her daddy and if he isn't paying attention it means big trouble for him. He used to turn green when it would happen but now it just takes his breath away for a minute. Poor guy maybe he is hinting that is what he is wanting? My question is do I attach the cup to the ribbon on the outside of the gift next to the rattle?

Friends Yet to Meet

Growing up our church had a sign above the sanctuary door that read; "No Strangers Just Friends Yet To Meet". I always loved that sign and read it every time I walked into the sanctuary. The sign is exactly how I interact with people. Everyone I meet I assume are my friends. I know this may sound silly but it is just how I am. What strikes me as funny is that my 3 year old is like this too. I assume that all children are like this. I just think it is so funny when we go to the park and she has not talked to any of the other kids but when it is time to leave she cries and says she will miss her friends. Maybe I have a 3 year olds state of mind when it comes to social interaction, but I am just friendly and I am okay with that.

New Cards

My dear friend Margie came over today and played with the kids while I spent a little time stamping. I have not been able to stamp in awhile so it was a great break! I am so thankful for my friend. Here are some of the cards I made. I needed some thank you notes. I am not in love with all of them but I had fun and now I have some thank yous made. I focused on using one stamp set. It was the first time I used it and I really liked it. If you enlarge the cards with the green background you can see the different textures on the green.

White Teeth and Death

Not really but I thought it was funny and had a little to do with my story.

I was at the dentist the other day and they were running a teeth whitening special. When I was paying on my way out I asked about it. She gave me some info and I mentioned that my teeth were whiter when I smoked. The check out lady said well it could be from tea or coffee and I said yes I started drinking coffee two years ago. I jokingly said maybe I should give up the coffee and start smoking again. She thought the coffee was a better idea it wouldn't kill me, although they are saying caffeine is not good for you. My reply was "I have 3 kids, it isn't the coffee that will kill me". She agreed with me.

Wisdom Wednesday

Today I wanted to talk about Night Terrors. Now I am not an expert on this subject but I have been doing some research. LD started having Night Terrors a few months ago. It does not happen every night but it was happening quite often. Here is how they usually play out. We finally get LD to bed, hubby and I will watch a show or two in bed before we call it a night and LD will start screaming and come into our room. She screams sometimes up to 20 minutes. I pick her up and try to console her, I can tell by her eyes she is not actually awake, they are glazed over. She continues to kick and scream and I continue to try to console her or wake her up. Nothing ever actually calms her down so we just have to ride it out. I assumed she was having nightmares and was not fully awake, when I ask her about what she was dreaming about she can never tell me. I remembered my nephews having similar episodes to these and my sisters calling them Night Terrors. Here is what I found out.

• Night Terrors can be more common in families - so I don't want to say genetic but if a family member has them it is more likely for a sibling or relative to experience them.
• Do not try to wake the child up.
• Night Terrors occur during the transition into REM sleep. They are a sudden feeling of fear.
• There is no visual imagery produced during the night terror so the child will have no recollection of what scared them.
• There is not much a parent can do except sit with child to make sure they do not hurt themselves.
• It is believed they can be caused by stress and being over tired so making sure the child has a low stress environment and naps will help prevent them.
• Night terrors usually happen 2 to 3 hours into sleep.

LD usually kicks and screams during her episodes. She actually looks like she is trying to fight somebody off. I have heard of children getting up and running around the house. The episodes are very scary even for the parent. It just has to run its course we have only been successful twice at calming LD down. The first time she suddenly realized she had to go potty and as soon as she went she was awake. The second time hubby waved her blankie in front of her face and she became aware of the familiar "safe" scent and latched onto it and went back to sleep. Since I did my research I have made sure that she has a nap everyday (even if I am not up for the fight) and I am trying to be more calm about her accidents. I believe it has significantly reduced the number of episodes.

I would like to point out that I am not an expert, I am just a mom that did some research and has tried a few things out. Again they are scary for the parents and they are also frustrating because there is nothing you can do. I would also like to mention the Night Terror Tablets or Calming Tablets - the homeopathic ones, did not work for us. Have you dealt with this? How did you handle it?

As I said I did a lot of research and this is the site I found to have really good information that lined up with what we are experiencing.

Newborn Pictures of AL

With all of the craziness swirling around our home I have failed to post these gorgeous pictures of AL. Our neighbors our amazing photographers, they own Trystan Photography, you can check them out here. Kim took these pictures and she did an amazing job.

 

Snow Patrol and Other Band Tickets $5!!

This is just a quick post just in case anyone is interested. I went online to see if there were anymore Snow Patrol tickets for the Denver show. I was mostly dreaming because we are trying to cut back. The hubby and I fell in love with Snow Patrol on our first trip to England together, we even used one of their songs for our walk as husband and wife down the aisle. Anyhow, when I went to the website they had a Citicard holder special. I got our concert tickets for $5 each!! I was so excited. I am not sure when the promotion ends but there were several other bands for the same $5 special. Check it out at Livenation.com

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Baby Feet and the Tired Meter

AL has found her feet! It is these milestones that I find adorable! I love to see kids learn new things and how exciting each new thing is to them.

This picture was actually taken before we left for Mexico I just did not have a chance to post. This is actually her first "Foot encounter". She wiggled it and wiggled it and was truly amazed.

My husband calls this the tired meter. In this picture AL is definetly not tired. He used to use this technique with LD too. Look how straight her body is! When the kids are tired they can not hold themselves like that they just kind of go limp. (We actually use their schedule but my husband swears this works. It makes me laugh.)

Speaking of tired, it has been a long weekend. All of the kids are in bed so I am heading the same way. Hope everyone has a great week!

Summer Fun

Just wanted to post a few new photos. I have been trying to get LD to the park during the day. We have fallen into the trap of letting her watch too much TV.

Here is LD at the park. She insisted on wearing her rain boots and she always has a watch on. I found a real analog watch her size at Gymboree. (This is not it.)

Here is AL with her cute sun hat. I was happy to have found the hat in the diaper bag when we got to the park.

In another effort to do some summer stuff before it is over we are going to the lake. It was in the 50's this evening, actually chilly enough for a sweatshirt. I think the lack of hot summer days this year is making me panic about summer being over. Hope everyone has a great, warm weekend!

Wisdom Wednesday

I am starting a new feature called "Wisdom Wednesday". If you have read my blog before you know I have been a mom for a long time, 13 years. Yet I am still learning as I go. All kids are different and different tactics work for each child. What I plan to do with Wisdom Wednesday is just that, write about the new things I am learning.

My wisdom for todays Wisdom Wednesday is this: Arguing with your children is bad business. Both of the older girls love to argue with me - on EVERYTHING. Even at 3 LD is just as bad as AM at 13. It is exhausting. I have learned to tell them "it isn't up for discussion, I gave you the answer that is that" and I have to walk off. I am sure many people think I am a mean mom but as your kids get older you have to have boundaries for them and you. What do you think is acceptable to be doing at what age? If you don't stand strong while they are young than it will be a big battle when they are tweens and teens. Trust me on this, there was a time that I let AM have her way all of the time. There are many times I have to remind her that I am the mother and I am okay with her not liking me. (All teenagers will dislike you on certain days.) When you stand and argue with your kids on any topic this is how every topic will be handled.(Unless they like your first answer) I have also found that standing around arguing with them just makes the mood in the house negative. Like I said this process of arguing about everything is exhausting and this has not always been the way I operate. I am not perfect at it but I am getting better and there are definetly days that I just don't have the energy to deal with it. Stay strong!

How do you handle the situation of your children arguing with you? If your children are not old enough have you thought about your boundaries for when they get older?

Back with Baby

As you know we are back from our Mexican vacation. Back to reality. We came back to a 2 month old little girl. Yes AL turned 2 months the day before we got home. Thanks to my awesome in-laws we have photo's.

AL 2 Months


Hope you enjoy the photo as much as I am enjoying her!

Also I am proud to say she is sleeping through the night! She has been doing this for about 4 weeks now and I couldn't be happier. I know many of us need our sleep but for me if I don't have sleep I become a BEAR. I know, I know, real mature right? It is just one of those things that I have never been able to fight.

This is my secret to getting the kids to sleep through the night so young. I would like to start by saying, sadly I do not breast, I tried, it did not work. So for you nursing mom's it will probably not be the 10 - 12 hour span I get. But any long stretch is nice right? Anyhow the secret is what I call reverse "napping". So although during feedings and a little after each feeding AL is awake, I also keep AL up for 2 - 2 hour periods. Sometimes I do not get the full 2 hours but 2 hours is my goal. I know this is not the only way but this is what has worked for us. What works for you? Did I mention Schedule, Schedule, Schedule? This is also a necessity.

Mexico: Part Two

Here are some more pictures from Mexico. As I said in my last post this was a much needed getaway for the hubby and I. It was wonderful to see oh easy it was to reconnect. Just relax enjoy each other and the environment.

Our First Night


My Bestie and I



Our first dinner and the hubby falls victim to another sea creature. (Last year it was a shoark at MOA).



Me on our way to dinner.



The Hubby Got Me a Floaty


The resort had a lazy river and the tubes were tiny!

It is back to reality now. We are very fortunate to have had the opportunity to go to such an amazing place and recharge!

MEXICO!!

We had an amazing trip to Mexico! It served its purpose for sure. We had a great time with my bestie, her family and friends. What a great group of people. The hubby and I were able to unwind and reconnect which was much needed. Here is a little peek at our vacation. We stayed in the Riveria Maya area, which is on the Caribbean Sea side and the water was like nothing I have seen. I LOVE the beach but this was beyond amazing! We stayed in an Iberostar Resort that was very nice. The service was great the rooms and grounds were immaculately kept. The comforters were a little typical but everything else was beautiful! So here we go

Coming into Cancun



Finally Arrived at the Hotel and Finished Check In



Our Hotel











Ahh the Pool





And the Beach!!





There were a lot of weddings on the beach. This is not BB's wedding, her wedding was much prettier with flowers and colored ribbons on the backs of the chair.

These are the photo's of the things we saw. I will post the pictures of people tomorrow. The funniest thing to me was that they called me "lady". The first time I was completley offended but than it just made me laugh. Even during my AMAZING massage the girl said "lady, roll over now." haha It makes me laugh even now. Two more things. The first is the soda.



Second are the towel animals. The first was a bunny the second was a lump as far as I could tell. I think they skipped a night and than this is the one that is making the blog cut.


Sorry for the long post but there are so many pictures to post! I will do phase 2 tomorrow.

Also I am having a lot of trouble with Blogger this morning, to end the post I can not spell check. So sorry about the spelling I am a horrible speller.

Pregnancy....The After Effects

Before I begin I want to say that I am making a quick post but promise to post about my fabulous Mexican vacation soon (like tonight or tomorrow).

I just have a small rant about some effects on my body after pregnancy. Obviously there is the weight gain and trouble with weight loss. My biggest annoyance are my feet. Before I had my first I wore a size 6 - cute. Now after my 3rd I am still waiting for my feet to go back down to a size 7. If they don't that means my feet have grown a 1/2 size with each pregnancy. I know it sounds vain but I would much rather have sagging that I can cure with a new bra than big feet. It may be decided that I have no more children because that will push me to a size 8. Now please don't be offended if you wear a size 8 or bigger. It is just one of my issues. I used to have a small foot and now, not so much.

I would also like to point out that I wanted to use quotations on some words. But after being directed, by one of my favorite blog to The "Blog" of "Unnecessary" Quotation Marks I am severely paranoid to use quotations.