Change and Adaptation

Change is good. Change is hard. These are both phrases I have heard many times in my life. And I agree... with both of them. Some change is relatively simple and even fun. For example I recently asked my sister Heather to design a new blog background for me. She is very talented at creating things and jumped right on the task I now have this fun new background that is very symbolic of our life. For instance, the scribbling you see in the background is the same scribbling that is currently found in permanent marker on my front door. Like I said she is good at what she does. If any of you are interested in a blog make-over I can put you in touch with her.

-- back to change--

This fresh new look to my blog is a good change. A much needed change. However there are other changes going on right now that are not so fun. To sum it up in one word... school.

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I started a full semester of school at the U on January 11th. It has been a MAJOR change to our families normal routine. Being a mom of 2 children under the age of 3 is a feat in and of itself. Adding homework and classes and tests and projects and research on top of it all has made life... well... crazy. I spend every spare second listening to online lectures or reading textbooks or studying for tests. This week I have around 200 text book pages to read 4 hours of lectures to listen to and 2 tests to study for not to mention the lab work required. I am afraid my children feel slightly neglected and I know Kaden has watched way too much Super Why in the last few days. More than once I have asked myself if it is really worth it. To be honest with you I still haven't decided that it is. But I am not the type to quit once I have started so we are working on adapting.

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Last week I was really not feeling well and had a lot of school work to get done. Chris was an angel and volunteered to stay home on Wednesday and Thursday. He planned to just do his school work from home. I do that every day... not too hard.. right??? Ha. The days went something like this...

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Wednesday morning Kaden brought me his diaper. It was very wet and had a few brown marks on it. Kaden is always taking his diaper off these days so I didn't think much of it and got a new dry diaper to put on him. About 20 minutes later I found big brown lump of poop sitting on top of Kadens toys. We are working on potty training, apparently he understood the "don't go in your diaper" thing we just need to work on the "go in the potty" part. Chris swooped in and took care of cleaning the toys while I headed back to my school work in bed. A few hours later I got up to find one of my diamond earrings laying on the floor. Notice I said ONE not two, not one pair, just one single earring. My heart dropped, those were an anniversary present.. a VERY expensive anniversary present. I started the search, Chris joined me and about 20 minutes later we recovered the missing earring in the play pen. Crisis #2 averted. Chris decided to put the kids in the tub and let them play for awhile. He went to check on some of his work and came back to find the kids in the tub joined with about 100 Q-tips. Kaden had found the box and decided they all needed to go in the tub. We cleaned up that mess had lunch and tried to move on with the mounds of homework we both needed to do. Kaden came to get me about 15 minutes later saying "show me mom" which translated to "I want to show you something mom" He led me by the hand into the other bathroom where he had dumped a bag of fish rocks into the tub, little tiny blue fish rocks. Luckily he hadn't dumped them near the drain so we didn't have to worry about our drain being clogged. That night I had a class to go to but it got cancelled last minute so instead I headed to our young womens new beginnings. When I arrived home I could smell rubbing alcohol strongly as I walked in the door. It took less than 30 seconds for me to find orange and brown marker all over my bedroom wall. Then I found my closet torn apart, literally. My drawers were dumped out, shoes were all over the place, hangers were scattered anything that had a place was not in it. This ended Wednesday.

Thursday went better, and by better I mean that nothing expensive was lost, nothing white was colored, and no tub incidents occurred. However the house did get turned upside down in an attempt to keep the children happy and occupied so mom and dad could try to get some school work done. I don't know that my house has ever been that out of order. I had a class Thursday night from 6-9 when I got home once again I was greeted my a strong smell as I walked in the door however this time it was baby lotion. I asked Chris about it and he simply handed me the camera with this picture on it.

Kaden had found anew bottle of baby lotion and decided Taycee needed to bathe in it. The good news it that she liked it. They were laughing and having a good ole' time. No harm no foul I guess.

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After reliving these days I realize maybe coping is a better word than adapting. There have never been more "messes" at our house than there are now. They occur on an hourly basis. I put a baby gate up to block the front of the house so I can localize the destruction to the back few rooms. The bathroom doors are all locked so if you ever need to pee really bad at our house you will be doing a potty dance outside the door for a few seconds while you use the safety pin on above the door frame to unlock the door. Kaden sees me with my laptop and says "mommy work" regardless of what I am doing or what time of day it is. However Taycee and Kaden have found a new formed friendship because of their lack of attention from mom. Kaden will whisper for Taycee to come with him, I don't think he has discovered that we know that means there is trouble afoot. When I jail Taycee to the playpen so I can get 20 minutes of uninterrupted homework done Kaden climbs in with her to keep her company. Chris comes home from work and makes a special effort to entertain the kids so I can get a couple hours of real studying done. He walked in 20 minutes ago with a chocolate marshmellow shake and fries from iceburg and insited I take a break. So I blogged. A lot of change and adaptation is happening at our house right now and although it seems hard I think it is good. Only 98 more days to go.... but who is counting?

Ketchup Mom

Today I made Kaden a ham and cheese sandwich for lunch. He ate about half of it and then said ketchup please mom. I must admit I thought that ketchup with a ham and cheese sandwich would be disgusting and ignored his request and kept on with whatever I was doing at the time. After he made this same request about 4 times, each with increasing urgency I decided to comply. I got out a small plate and squirted a small pile of ketchup on it. After I put the plate down in front of him he looked at me with the most annoyed look and said "MOM... hot dog???" oh of course silly me I should have known that when he was demanding ketchup with his sandwich he was really asking for a hot dog instead. Now I will know for next time. A few nights ago Chris and I were laying in bed with Kaden, I leaned over and gave him a kiss which he wiped off with the back of his hand and said "GROSS MOM" I almost cried. He is 2 for crying out loud.

Dear Kaden,
You are 2 years old. I am your mom. I am allowed to cover you in kisses all I want right now and you are not allowed to wipe them off or call them gross. When you are 20 we can discuss this matter again but for now this is the law.

Love,
Mom

Apparently kisses for Taycee aren't so gross

This is how they look at each other most of the day. This look usually comes before they are about to do something really nice like give a kiss or a hug or do something really naughty like steal a toy and tackle the other one to the ground.

My babies that aren't babies anymore.

Dear Taycee,

You slept in your own bed last night for the first time in a month. You didn't wake up once from 8 pm til 7 am. Thank You. Now if you will please do me one more favor and stop growing up. I am not going to have a baby for a long while sill so I need you to stay little and sweet and cute for a few more years.

Thanks!

Mom

This is the newest Taycee expression. She will throw her binki or her cup and then look at you with her hands up and say "where go?"

Love em'

This is Kaden sending me off to my first day of school. He really is a crack up these days. When he is suppose to be asleep but he wants to get up and play he will sneak to the outside of the door of whatever room we are in and throw things in to the room. I have no idea why he does this or what he is trying to accomplish but it is pretty funny. All of the sudden small puzzle pieces or binkies or toys will come sailing into our room from out of no where.

He has also started to quote movies. His new favorite is Happy Feet. One of the penguins says "I knew it" all excited with his finger in the air and then hangs his head and says " it was all a lie" Kaden does this several times a day. He finds himself quite amusing.

Kaden has also taken a liking to a small electronic cat. It is the kind that walks and makes noise. It hasn't had batteries for a very long time but Kaden carries it around and hugs it. He pets its fur and asks it if it is ok. Sometimes he will set it on the ground and say "come here kitty kitty" it is pretty cute.

First day of school... it is true, I am a student again. Full time. After one week I have decided it is do-able. Hard but do-able. My two energetic children take most of my day as it is.. adding in classes and homework make each day a juggling act. BUT I am doing it and I am enjoying my classes so that's something.

Sunday I decided to make Can't Leave em Alone Bars which are fabulous. I got out the white cake mix added in my eggs and oil and started stirring. As always I took a taste of the batter and immediately stopped stirring. The cake mix was not white... it was lemon. How in the world did a lemon cake mix get in a white cake box? Well I couldn't continue with my recipe because lemon cake definitly would not go well with my chocolate fudge center so I started to contemplate what I would do next. I couldn't make a cake because I had already ruined it with the eggs and oil I had put it. I decided I would invent something new. I opened my cooking cupboard and pulled out some flour and powdered sugar. Then I looked in the fridge and saw a can of whipped cream, this peaked my interest so I pulled it out as well. Chris was watching all of this with some curiosity wondering what I was going to make. What I did next about made his eyes bug. I shook the can of whipping cream and then squirted about a 6 inch pile on top of my cake batter. I really really wish I had had a camera at this time Chris literally about fell over. "What are you going to do with that" "You can't bake that now that you squirted all that whip cream in it" "What were you thinking" He thought the situation was quite comical. I told him not to worry that I had it under control. He said " what are you going to call them? Who in the heck thought that would work bars" he thinks he is really funny. I added some flour and sugar to my batter and decided to make them cookies. the problem was I couldn't get the batter as firm as I would have liked it so I decided to roll them in powdered sugar before I put them in the over. I slid a tray of 24 cookies into the over at 350 for 13 minutes and this is what came out....

In Chris's words " THESE ARE AMAZING" He loved them. He ate about 15 of them before the night was over. I have decided to name them lemon puffs. So if any of you ever end up with a white cake box with lemon cake inside... give these a try. :) And have people around when you squirt the whip cream in... it makes for a great reaction.

January Blues

January seems to be a slow month for us. The rush of the Holidays is over, school starts and brings with it schedules and homework and stress. I lose my umph to do much of anything. If you think about it that is rather ironic considering that January is suppose to be the month of new resolutions and goals. I do have my new years resolutions... I just don't have the energy to do them.
I am suppose to be starting school this week again however I have been back and forth in limbo about it for a long time. We have been waiting on my financial aid to come through and today it did. A whoppin 787 dollars. Unfortunately that doesn't even come close to to covering the 2300 dollars tuition costs not to mention the cost of books. I do have the option of taking out student loans to help cover the cost, unfortunately I will also have to start paying those loans back in a year when I finish school. I am pretty sure in a year from now I will still be home with my kids and Chris will still be in the middle of his Chem E PHD which means we will be in no situation to be paying back loans. What to do.... what to do...?? I am not sure. So for now I am going to classes until I decide.
The kids are feeling my lack of energy and are trying to compensate by being overly energetic. Kaden spends most mornings running circles around me... literally... he puts his arms out like he is a plane and runs circles around me saying "run run run" as I am carrying Taycee trying to get breakfast ready. Kaden has started saying his own prayers... unfortunately they are completely garbled and I can't understand most of what he says. Every once in awhile I catch a Heavenly Father, grandma, Taycee Lynn, and Amen. It is pretty cute. He has also picked up on little things like saying "sure" when you ask him something or "of course". Yesterday when we were in the doctors office for Taycees check-up she ripped the paper lining on the table and Kaden let out a very exasperated "OH MY GOSH"
Taycee is still not 100% back to normal. She isn't sleeping well at night which means Chris and I spend most of the night trying to rock her back to sleep. She is also very very needy. She wants to be held all the time and cries over everything. That doesn't help with the no energy thing. I think the hospital must have traumatized her because she refuses to let anyone hold her or get close to her. Every once in awhile she perks up... it is usually over food. :) I made apple crisp the other night and Chris and I both had a bowl of it while sitting in the living room. She would walk back and forth in between us to make sure we were both sharing with her. Chris didn't want to share anymore so while she was turned walking toward me he tried to hide. She is one smart cookie, she wasn't fooled for a second. He tried this several times hiding behind couches jumping over counters... no matter where he went Taycee found him in seconds. She made him share with her til every last bite was gone.
This is what I came home to Saturday night after teaching dance..... Not exactly the welcome home present I was hoping for. This is a black sharpie marker all over my front door. If anyone has any great suggestions for taking marker off doors let me know. :D So far we have tried hand sanitizer, fingernail polish remover, WD40, and MR Clean Magic eraser ( All Internet recommendations). The hand sanitizer worked the best but also took the paint off.

Who could be in Kadens tunnel with their feet sticking out one end and their hands the other....

Oh its our 6'7" daddy.


The girl cousins at Mckells baby shower

Taycee was excited about something

She loves to cover her face/head with things and play peek-a-boo

This is Kadens new trick he goes to do a somersault and then lifts his arms in the air


Please tell me he will never be big enough to fit in this coat.

This is what happens when we have spaghetti

Taycee has recently decided she is big enough to feed herself... I am pretty sure I never gave her permission to get this old.

Here are some fun pics from Mckells baby shower. She is expecting a boy in February.

Latest Photo Shoot

Thursday I was able to take pictures of this cute girl for her Fourth Birthday. It was a crazy blizzard outside so we had to make do with a sheet as a background. There were so many cute pictures it was hard to pic just a few to post.

Taycee in the Hospital

This is the morning that Taycee woke up and was responsive to us!Just waiting to be dischargedSo happy to be going home
This was taken this morning. As you can see she is back to her crazy silly self.

Major Bed Head

Christmas 2009

The annual Christmas Eve Nativity Reenactment
Our matching Christmas Jammies!!

Hunter didnt want to be left out so I made him some tooSisters
Hugs... love Hunters face

My family

Christmas Morning

Kaden LOVED opening presents

Best Buddies

Getting pretty snug in the snuggie

Santa Baby

Loving Grandma Clayton

Snuggle

Kaden was so proud of this tower he built

We are home!

We are home and Taycee is doing well. There was no final consensus on what was wrong. They were going to do a spinal tap but since she was awake and happy they decided not to. We are keeping a super close watch on her to make sure her symptoms don't return and as long as they don't we can keep her at home. I have to take her in for a follow up appointment next week just to make sure everything still looks normal.
Thanks to everyone for you prayers and support. I have had so many calls and texts of concern and love I haven't been able to return them all. Please don't think I am ignoring you, I just lost track of who I did and didn't call back.

I do have lots of pictures from Christmas... I am hoping to get them posted in the next few days.

Thats all for now