Good Things Come: March 2016

Tuesday, March 29, 2016

Quarantined

To say that I'm missing my family would be an understatement. We're under the same roof and from the confines of my room, I can still hear the laughter of play and cries for mommy. Thankfully I hear more laughter than tears. I have a terrible stomach bug, and even though I'm feeling much better, I still can't risk any of the kids catching it. Brian has stepped up to full Daddy Duty, and he is beyond thankful for nurse Lisa who stepped in to help him out! I'll be jumping back into mommy mode tomorrow; however, I will be taking extreme precautions wearing gloves and a mask. Not exactly how I had anticipated spending my birthday, but at least I will be with my family.

Prior to getting sick, we did have a wonderful Easter filled with family from both sides! Brian did a delicious crawfish boil for everyone, and our kiddos participated in a fun filled Easter Egg Hunt put together by our dear friends, Eleni, Joe & Jamie! It was so much fun watching Kennedy, Harper, Elizabeth, and Jacob interact as they were collecting eggs. They were all so sweet with one another!

We will hope and pray that this is the end of the stomach bug in our household, and continue to take precautions to protect the kids. I'm ready to be back to full health and sharing in more adventures with my sweet family!

Pre-hunt group photo!

One of my favorites!

Enjoying the outdoors!

Spending some time with Poppy!

Serious egg hunting!

Pure joy!

A little help from daddy

I'm so glad these cousins get to grow up together!

More Easter surprises with Harper!

Rehydrating!

Mimi & Poppy with all of their grandkids!

I love Drake & Hayes looking at each other!

Busting a confetti egg on Mommy's head!

A special handmade rattle from Yea-Yea!

Everyone getting some upright exercise!

Sweet baby helping daddy work!

Daddy took these two sweeties down to feed the ducks!

Oh, this boy!

Mommy did some sharing and caring!

Daddy held down the homefront with our sweet babies!

Wednesday, March 23, 2016

Progress & Hurdles

Drake has begun tasting trials with his speech therapist! She said he is doing really well! She was even bragging about how well he is doing with her colleagues! His body is beginning to elongate which is therapists are extremely excited about! This helps with everything...including breathing! He is grasping objects for extended periods of time and bringing objects to his mouth! He is very aware of everything around him, especially his brother and sister! Kennedy likes to be involved in moving him with his stander when he pushes his button. He likes it, too! In fact, he even waits for her to walk out of the room and then immediately pushes his button to make her run back in. Lisa and I laughed and laughed as we watched this occur at least 20+ times!

I honestly believe potty training is the most difficult thing in the entire world! Kennedy has been potty trained with #1 for over a year, but our girl refuses to #2 in the potty. I have read book after book, seeked advice from friends, googled, bribed, rewarded, ect...at this point, I really don't know where to go from here. I do think we have a couple of contributing factors: 1) having a new baby brother and 2) she sees that Drake goes in his diaper. Any new advice and/or suggestions are greatly appreciated.

To say that I was not prepared for this 1/2 marathon would be an understatement. The farthest I had run in the past 15 months was 4 miles until the race this weekend. The jump from 4 miles to 13.1 is not something I would recommend for anyone. However, I committed to doing something and I was determined to see it through until the end. Finishing this race was more emotional for me than my previous 1/2 marathons. With the others, I knew that I was prepared and finishing was never in question. This race ranked up there with my full marathon mentally and emotionally. I was extremely sore on Sunday following the race! Any and all movements were difficult and hurt. Even with my pain, I chose to go the all natural path and took my usual sunset before bed along with one extra to help fight inflammation. Not only was I surprised at how well I felt the next day, but Brian was absolutely blown away!

Thank goodness I was back to myself, because I had to add another person to care for...Brian. Yes, he is injured again. This time the culprit was racquetball. He called me Monday evening from the Express ER. His ankle is severely sprained. The doctor actually said it would heal faster if he had broken it. He is currently in an air-cast and moving to a full boot tomorrow. Regardless he is already having trouble "taking it easy."

I am praying for a smooth recovery time that goes much faster than anticipated.

I cannot even express the joy this laugh brings me!

A strong grip and bringing his toy to his mouth!

Making Easter cookies!

Sweet Hayes in his Easter basket! He's getting SO big!

Hanging out at the running expo!

Movie snuggles with Poppy & his dog River!

Catching a shoulder ride with Uncle Aaron at the expo!

Love my girl!

Enjoying the exersaucer at Mimi & Poppy's!

Feeling determined!

Can't stop, won't stop!

We did it! 13.1

Celebration time!

Poor Brian!

Tuesday, March 15, 2016

Spring Break

I've really enjoyed seeing pictures from everyone's latest spring break trips online! Technically, now that Drake is receiving homebound services from the school district, he is on spring break, too. However, that did not effect any of his other therapies, so his week was still quite busy. Our spring break was also very stormy! I'm still in disbelief about the flooding in and around our neighborhood. This is the highest we have ever seen the water level on our lake. Our power went out one day and we relied, yet again, on our backup generator to power Drake's equipment. I honestly don't know what we would do without it!

Kennedy and I took Hayes to Dallas today for an evaluation at Cranial Technologies. As we suspected, he would benefit from a helmet. Now I'm waiting on a call letting us know if insurance will help cover any of the cost. We did squeeze in a little fun during this day trip...lunch with Mimi, Aunt Mere, Jacob, Elizabeth, and my wonderful friends Heather and Angie (and little Trafford)!

I guess there could be a highlight to getting this helmet...being able to see more of our family & friends!

The man fishing is standing in the parkinglot & the road I generally run is underwater!

Nurse Lindsey did a makeover on Drake's activity board!

We try to tweak and improve his toys to make them as interactive as possible!

Nurse Lisa sent me this picture while we were in Dallas today. Made me smile from ear to ear!

Guess who turned 5 months old on the 5th!

Our little artist!

"Mommy, I drew a picture of Hayes!" I know I am bias, but I think she did pretty darn good!

Tuesday, March 8, 2016

Mommy & Daddy's Night Out

Brian and I had the wonderful opportunity to travel out of town overnight together. As you know, this is a rare occurrence for us. Aunt Gigi, Brian's sister, invited us to New Braunfels for Wurstfest Craft Beer Festival. We had so much fun and we wish that Tyler and New Braunfels were closer together! We were even able to spend some time at Angie's No-Kill animal shelter, CLASS Canyon Lake Animal Shelter. Yes, we met plenty of dogs and cats that we wanted to bring home, but I had to remind Brian that our house is currently at capacity. Thankfully for us, we have a solid set of nurses in place whom we feel very comfortable with, and Mimi & Poppy traveled in town to care for Kennedy & Hayes! There was no containing Kennedy's excitement on Friday night when Mimi & Poppy arrived! We are very schedule oriented around here; however, we are not against making exceptions...especially for grandparents!

You would think that my parents would get limited sleep because of our kiddos, but that was not the case. Our kids all slept soundly through the night, but our dogs woke them up at 3am to go outside. We're so sorry about that! Silly dogs! They know better than that.

Hayes was scheduled for an evaluation at Cranial Technologies in Dallas today, but I rescheduled due to the weather. There is no sense in traveling in inclement weather for an appointment we were able to easily reschedule. The crackle of thunder and pounding of rain throughout the day were a constant reminder of a good decision.

It's obviously not easy for us to travel out of town and overnight together; however, it was good for us to get away and good for our kids to be with their grandparents.

Our 3 sweet kiddos!