Taycee's Birthday Part 2

Taycee Lynn... oh what a pill she is

When I think about how to describe Taycee at this age so many conflicting words come to mind. Darling/Stubborn, Sassy/Sweet, Funny/Frustrating... and oh so smart. Maybe too smart for her own good and definitely too smart for mine! People are always commenting on how well she speaks for only being 2.

She never stops, she is going from sun up til way past sun down. She can not sit still for anything, she can't even make it through an entire Dora show without getting up and running around a bit.

She LOVES her daddy. She has figured out that he is a very heavy sleeper and waits for him to start snoring then sneaks in under his arm and snuggles him the rest of the night.

Her favorite show by far is Dora, she begs for it daily. Anytime I let her watch a show Dora is always her first pick. When she is playing pretend with Kaden most often her name is Dora.

She loves her baby sister. She loves to look at her and kiss her, and give her blankies and binkies. She wants to be a part of everything that is going on. If Addison is on the floor for any length of time Taycee is right next to her the entire time talking to her and trying to make her smile. She also loves to take care of her own babies, and can turn any object into a baby doll. The other night she was carrying around Chris shoe rocking it and putting it to sleep.

She has started making up songs. It is adorable. It doesn't matter the subject, she can come up with a song about it. Usually the songs all have the same sing song tune. When we were in the car one day she was singing about how daddy was her heart.

We gave her a talk about turning 3 for a few weeks before she turned 3. We told her that once she was 3 there were things that she couldn't do anymore ( like sleep in our room) About a week before she turned 3 she came sneaking into our room after we had put her to bed and said with a hesitant smile, "daddy I am not 3 yet, I am still 2 see..." and she held up 2 finger "so I can sleep on your floor cause I am still 2!"

One night I was doing "magic tricks" for the kids. I had medicine dropper that I was making disappear from my hands and reappear in another place in the room. The kids were riveted. They thought it was the greatest thing ever. When i was making the dropper disappear I would have all the kids blow on it and then I would cover it with my hands and throw it up or at a wall and it would disappear. Taycee kept saying "mom I want to do magic let me try!" Finally I gave her a chance, she put the dropper in her hands, had everyone blow on it and then chucked it as hard as she could at the wall. I have never seen a more dejected little girl. She let out a great big "oooohhh" and slumped her shoulders. Then she said " I can't do magic!" hahahaha, Chris and I were laughing so hard. She was just so sure that dropper was going to disappear.

When she is excited or happy about something she uses lots of exclamatory words. The other night I made dinner and she was in a particulary good mood. When i put it on the table she said "WOW mom! This is the super goodest dinner I have ever seen."

When I ask her if she is hungry she stop and acts like hears something and then she will say "Yep! my tummy is growling!" or "no, my tummy is not growling."

On her actual birthday we tired to do little special things for her. We did cake and presents before Chris went to work because the kids were going down to St George that night with Aunt Kathy for Thanksgiving. ( Chris and I had to stay home because of Addison being sick)

Cake for breakfast... now that is a happy birthday.

her only request for her birthday was that she could ride a merry go round. So on our way to Aunt Kathy's we stopped at the south town mall and she got her ride. She was one happy girl.

We let her choose anything she wanted for dinner... her choice?

Chicken nuggets.

Happy Birthday Taycee girl, we sure do love you!

This is a little video of Taycee singing her made up songs. They are quite entertaining.

Taycee's Birthday Part 1

When did this tiny babe...

turn into this sassy 3 year old???

Where oh where does the time go?

I just can not believe that she is 3. The words 3 going on 16 were never so true.

She requested a princess cake again for her birthday. Actually first she told me she just wanted a banana cake. I asked her if she meant a cake that tasted like bananas because I know she loves bananas. But she shook her head and said "no mom, a cake that LOOKS like a banana" Then a few days later she changed her mind to a princess.

Her birthday was on a Tuesday and I knew we would not have time to have a party for her that day so we decided to let her choose somewhere fun to go the Saturday before hand. She decided to go to Jungle Jims in Salt Lake.

We couldn't take Addison out because of her cough so my mom came and stayed with her while we took the birthday girl out.

Taycee was pretty excited to eat her cupcakes. She had been asking me since the night before when I started making them when she could eat one. I think she was more excited about the cupcakes with sprinkles than the princess cake.

All of the kids ate their cupcakes before their pizza. Now that is a party!

Such fun friends.

Aunt Lisa and Baby Kara were nice enough to come and join the party. Isn't she a doll?

Taycee loves the ride that goes around really fast in a big circle. She screams the entire time.

After the ride guy spun their saucer around a few times I heard Kaden yell to him, "stop you are making me throw up." ...the guy didn't spin them anymore.

Taycee and Mason were checking out a few arcade games.

When we left Taycee and Kaden both immediately fell asleep in the car. It was such a fun time and Taycee loved spending the day with her friends.

Videos for grandparents

Just wanted to share the kids videos they made for grandma and grandpa Clayton this year.

First Snow

The first snow is always a favorite time of year for me. I think it is beautiful. There is something so peaceful about seeing the world with the first coat of untouched white snow.

We have to very dead trees in our front yard. They need to be pulled out, badly. They are so dead that the branches on them are curling. I think they are ugly, however on the night of the first snow I gained a new appreciation for them,

They looked like a piece from an art museum with all their curled snow covered branches.

The view from and upstairs bedroom window

Cough, Cough, Cough.... WHOOP!

SICK. That has been the word of the day around our house for the last few weeks. It all started about 3 1/2 weeks ago when I noticed Addison getting a really bad cough. At first I was worried about RSV. With her being a preemie I knew she was at high risk for it. I called the doctor to ask if I should bring her in and the nurse said that they wouldn't really do anything for her if she had it except to watch her closely to make sure her breathing was ok.

Taking 3 kids to the doctor is quite the chore, and I didn't want to do that if they were just going to tell me to go home and watch her closely. So I decided to just keep a close eye on her at home. A few days later her cough was worse. Especially at night when she would sleep. It was an awful hacking that sometimes ended with her vomiting. One night she was coughing so hard she choked and stopped breathing. Luckily I still keep her right next to my bed, I flew out of bed and yelled at Chris to get up and grab the sucker. We sucked all the junk out of her throat and she was ok. Our nights were long. I wasn't sleeping. She would have a coughing fit about every 20 minutes and I would immediately wake up and be on full alert in case she had more troubles. On top of all of this I noticed her thrush was back. We had had enough. I called the doctor, packed up the kids and in we went.

While we were at the doctor Addison wasn't coughing much. I was trying to describe the cough to the doctor but was doing a poor job. It was hard to describe just how awful her cough really was. He listened to her lungs and said they sounded clear... (thank goodness). He was just about to send me home with some thrush medicine thinking Addison just had the common cold with a bad cough. I had her lying on the table getting her dressed when she went into a coughing fit. The doctor immediately turned around and said "OH, that is a scary kind of cough".

Addison has whooping cough. When the doctor told me, all my mommy panic sensors went off. They had warned us about whooping cough in the hospital, wouldn't let me leave til I had the vaccination. The nurse who came to our home told us to have ALL adults who would be around her vaccinated. She told me it had already killed 5 babies this year. She warned it would be very dangerous for Addison to have. She explained that adults can have whooping cough but show no symptoms at all (except for ins some cases a persistent mild cough) they then pass on that cough to infants, who it is deadly to. Her awful Acid Reflux was making it worse, because she had so much junk already in the back of her throat. The doctor tried to be reassuring but it didn't do much good.

We left the doctor with 4 prescriptions, quarantine orders, and a teary eyed mom.

We are blessed to have such amazing friends and family. The day after we found out there was a huge fast in Addison's behalf. How grateful I am for the power of fasting and prayer. It is real. I know it.

It has been a long three weeks. The quarantine orders were for Addison's sake. ( She was not contagious after the first prescription was finished) but the doctor warned if she got any other sickness on top of this cough we would be in a bad situation. Whooping Cough has about a 6 week recovery time. So we are on the backside of it and hoping to kick it completely before Jenny come home from her mission on the 15th of December.

Addison coughs less now. The nights are getting easier and a little less interrupted. We feel blessed she is pulling through this without any of the major side effect that can come with it.

And sick or not, she is still one of the cutest babies I know.

The kids have been such great helpers. Addison had needed lots of attention from me. And since we can't leave the house the kids have been left to entertain themselves at home. It is times like these that I am SO GLAD we had them 18 mo. apart. They are such great friends and play together so well. I have come downstairs several times to find them played a new made up game. They have built houses out of couch cushions and played school with all the stuffed animals. They have just been so great and such good helpers.

Kaden was helping with Addison while I folded the mounds of laundry that had piled up.

PRIVATE!!

I've been back and forth on taking our blog private, but after seeing some of the search terms used to find our blog it has been decided.

We were private once before so if you sent us your email back then I still have it saved on here.

If not and you would still like to view our blog just leave your email here or send it to me @ jillwclayton@yahoo.com

Thanks all!

Baby Eats Cereal

At Addisons 4 month appointment the doctor recommended giving her a little cereal at night to weigh down her belly. He thought this might help with the awful acid reflux she has. The medicine doesn't seem to be helping and we are willing to try most anything to help the poor girl. So at 4 months and 4 days Addison had her first taste of anything other than mommies milk and medicine. I pumped a small bottle and we added a bit of cereal to it.

She wasn't so sure what to think of the new taste and texture, but she handled it pretty well and let us give her about 6 bites.

Not so sure about that stuff dad....

regardless of what he is feeding her... she is always all smiles for her daddy.

Halloween

Halloween this year at the Clayton home was a great success. I think I can say that by far this year was the funnest yet. We kicked off the holiday on Friday night with a Halloween party at our house. The adults were inside and the kids were in the garage watching a movie projected onto the garage door. Games were played, food was consumed, prizes were won, fun was had by all. It took a few days to recover after but it was a good time.

Monday the kids woke up at the crack of dawn begging to get dressed and go trick-or treating. I told them they had to wait til it got dark. They waited another 15 minutes before asking me again. :) It was a long day. But 5:00 eventually rolled around and we got dressed from head to toe in Halloween attire.

*Picture overload*

Spiderman

My little witch

We dressed her up on Thursday when Kaden had his pre-school Halloween party so I could take pictures of both of them during the day. When we got home that afternoon I washed both of their make-up off and put them down for a nap. When she woke up her right eye was almost swollen shut. We think that she must have had an allergic reaction to the make-up. So we couldn't re-paint her face for Halloween. She was pretty bummed about it so instead I let her put some of mommies make-up on and be a pretty witch. She cheered up pretty quickly. :D

Spiderman on Halloween night.

My precious little pumpkin. (who actually spent the entire night wrapped up in a blanket asleep in her car seat.)

My handsome Waldo

Waldo and Wenda on Halloween night

Taycee out trick or treating

They were SO excited at each house to say "Trick-or-treat!"

Kaden's scary face

This is what happens when I say "ok, we are done with pictures"

Such attitude

My 3 cuties on Halloween before trick or treating

right before we headed out the door to trick or treat

Totally Wenda... right?

getting ready to go to his pre-school Halloween party.

My little witchie poo

It's going to be a long year. I have been asked twice already when it will be time to go trick-or-treating again.

Hope everyone had a very HAPPY HALLOWEEN!