Tales from my life as a mom of 2 sons and 2 daughters

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Cheli On Friday, August 29, 2008
It's Friday again and I'm actually updating, on a Friday. Go me.

Weigh in day has me a pound less than last week at 169 even. 48 lbs loss so far. I also did my measurements and lost another inch of my waist and 1 1/2 inches off my hips. WOOT. 12 lbs to go until I am out of the obese BMI range.. Slowly but surely I'm getting there.

I went down to Concorde this week and talked with the DON about when the IV certification class is offered. That's when she informed me that hey got the LPN to RN bridge program and I HAD to be in it. LOL They still don't know much information other than they will start officially advertising for it September 2nd and the classes will start November something. I came home and talked with Doug about it and he is all for looking into it so there is a possiblity I will be back in school in November. WOOOOOT.

Doug's first payday is today... YAY!!! We know the next 2 checks are going to be smaller than normal due to missed days from Fay and what not. But at least it's money coming in. He LOVES his job still and I love being able to pay the bills. LOL We managed to get a few of them paid today and we'll pay a few more on Monday or Tuesday.

Journey went to the doctor this week for his WBV.. yes he went a few weeks ago and got measured but this was for his shots etc. The re-measured him. He is 16 lbs 14 oz and 26.25 inches now :) He has really grown in the last month or so :) I love it. He has a very bad case of acid reflux apparently so they upped the dosage of his Zantac to 3 times a day and changed the formula that we supplement with to Nutrimagen (the insanely expensive stuff River was on). He also was put on an antibiotic to combat an ear infection he has. Poor kid. But after all of the changes.. he slept all night *knocks on wood*. She said that he is slightly behind in communication skills which seems to be the status quo for my kids so I'm not worried. He amazes me every day. I can't believe how fast he's growing. We are in the process of cleaning out the spare bedroom to make it a bedroom for Journey so we can move him out of our room before I start school because it will wake him up and we don't want that.

River is sick as well. A cold of some sort. Snot, lots of it and coughing. Doesn't seem to be slowing him down at all. We measured him when we took Journey to the doctor the other day and he was 40 inches. He is insanely tall. Takes after his daddy. LOL He sings all the time now, to all the nursery rhymes. I love it. He loves to go out to the park and take baths and if he hears either word he MUST go right now so we've taken to spelling certain words around him. He still won't sleep in his room, we're not pushing the issue.. we figure he will go back to sleeping in his room at night when he's ready. He does sleep in there for naps.

All in all a good week ont his side of the world..
Cheli On Saturday, August 23, 2008
OK I told myself that my goal today was to sit down and finally write an update.. sorry it's been so long.

I weighed in yesterday at 170 exactly. Which brings my total to 47 lbs. WOOT. I lost 1.6 lbs this week. YAY!. I went this week to an orientation for the flu clinics I did last year. I'm going to do them again this year for some extra money during the times that Doug isn't scheduled to work. I have to go sometime in September to get my CPR card recertified (I can't believe it's been 2 years since I got my card already). Then the clinics will start October 1st.

Doug started work last Wednesday. He loves it. He gets tips of about 40 dollars a day and we have been putting them in an old jar and saving them for gas and what not. He gets paid every 2 weeks for the actual massages. Next Friday will be payday. It won't be as good as it usually will be due to the fact that one day was really just orientation and then this week he's missed 3 days because of Fay.

Speaking of Fay... we're okay. It got pretty nasty here for a few days. Yesterday was the worst. We had 2 tornados touch down about 5 miles from here. We got 9 inches of rain. Winds of 65 miles an hour. It was nasty. But it seems as if she has moved away now so thank goodness the sun is almost shining and everything can start to dry out.

As I said in my last real post, we pulled River out of daycare. He's been out of daycare for 2 weeks now. It's going okay. He has hit the terrible 2's full force. He back talks ALOT more than I would like but we are nipping it in the butt. We have also been having some bedtime issues with him. A few weeks ago he started crying when we put him to bed, we figured he just didn't want to go to bed. A few days went by and his crying esclated to terror. So we thought it was because he was seeing stuff outside of his window so we spray painted his windows so barely any light gets in and he can't see out and it got even worse. So then we figured it was because he was afraid of the dark so now his door stays open at night but he's still waking up multiple (think 5 or 6 times a night) crying and asking for us or coming into our room or Linda's *my mother in law* room. I'm not really sure what to do for him but we are all pretty sleep deprived. He has gotten taller over the last few weeks I'm convinced. He can open the fridge AND freezer doors by himself now and has taken to bringing the Orange Juice out and asking for more. He can count up to 16 now in English. Is beginning to recognize some of his letters, and sings all sorts of songs. He really misses the interaction with other kids at school though. I tried to go on a play date with a mom's meet up group and although 7 people RSVPed for the park no one showed up.. I was rather turned off by it. We did however discover that someone we've been talking with on line for a year now lives about 10 minutes from here so we decided to meet up. She has a 3 year old daughter and a 6 month old daughter (among 4 other children) LOL so we got together with the kids and went to the park. It was most fun.

Journey is a little less than 6 1/2 months old now. He is getting more mobile every day. He can roll both ways and has taken to rolling across the room to get to where he wants to go. He can sit up for longer periods of time now as well but can't figure out how to get to a sitting position. He is soooo close to the belly laughing now I can taste it. I can't wait to hear his sweet little laugh. His eyes are still blue, I'm wondering when they will change? River's are brown now. He is still waking up once or twice a night most nights to nurse but as soon as he nurses and gets a diaper change he goes right back to sleep and last night he slept straight through from 8 until 7am. It was wonderful. He is such a smiley and happy baby most of the time and getting SO BIG!!! I'm so ready for the boys to be able to play together.. they have slowly been interacting more and more with each other and Journey is over the moon about his brother.. it's awesome :)

Here are some pictures....

River after passing out on the couch.. the only way we can get him to fall asleep with out confrontation.. I don't mind it as long as he actually goes to sleep. And he seems to have learned that lesson too it's rare we have to tell him not to talk and go to sleep now... but a few times we had to put in his room before he was asleep because he was too wild.

Tell me this is not the cutest truckload you've ever seen ;)

River is his friend Ella at the park last week.

Journey and his friend Lauren (she's exactly 2 months younger)

My sweet boy on my lap after nursing himself to sleep.. is there anything sweeter than a sleeping baby???

Journey showing off his wool shorties/longies and amber teething necklace.
Cheli On Tuesday, August 12, 2008
Took Journey to the doctors today because of his acid reflux. Got his height and weight.
Weight: 15 lbs 4 oz (8%)
Height: 25 inches (3%)
Head: 17 inches (25%)
He has been put on Zantac for the reflux. We'll go back in a few weeks for his shots and a follow up for the Zantac to see how it works. She thinks he might have an intolerance to wheat but I didn't want him to be stuck for allergy testing this young so she said treat him like he has the wheat allergy (along with no dairy or milk protein) and see how it goes... So now I have NO idea what to eat.
We took Journey to get his pictures taken on Thursday for his 6 month shots. As soon as they come in I'll post them for you all to see :)
Cheli On Sunday, August 10, 2008
OK I'm finally getting around to writing an entry.. I know it's a few days late but considering I had 6 teeth pulled on Thursday... a few days late is fine. LOL
I weighed in on Friday even though I didn't figure on losing anything. I was 171.6 which is down 1.4 lbs from last week. WOOOO HOOOOO I'm beginning to think that the scale is a piece of crap. Oh well.
I went in on Thursday and got 6 teeth removed. I don't remember much of Thursday. I remember him giving me the IV and saying that's the only pain I'd feel while I was there. Then I made a comment about liking his shirt and I was out. Don't remember getting home or anything else until late Thursday evening. I've been in quite a bit of pain the last few days but it's slowly getting better. I kept ice on it 24/7 for the first 2 days and kept heat on it all day and night last night and today. So the swelling is almost non existant as well. Here's a picture of me at 2 days after surgery (don't mind the date on the camera, we were testing out a camera that we're sending to a friend of mine since hers broke)... see how swollen I was??




I'm going tomorrow to see the midwife for my annual exam and to get my IUD removed.. we've decided that if we're going to have another child we need to do it sooner rather than later as Doug isn't a spring chicken anymore.. so we will start actively trying as soon as my cycle returns.
Doug starts work on Wednesday. He's excited and nervous. I know he'll do great and I know he'll love it. He also interviewed at another massage/spa place. The lady owns her own spa and wants to start offering massage therapy as a service. Doug would be the one to do it. It is a 70/30 split so Doug would get 42 dollars plus tip on an hour long massage. It would also give him experience in different parts of the massage therapy business (booking, client networking, etc).
River had his last day of daycare on Friday. We decided it was time to pull him out since I'm staying home with Journey it didn't make much sense for us to be paying to send River. It should be interesting having both boys home all the time. I've joined up with a moms meet up group on line that gets together a few times a week to do activities etc.. should be nice to interact with other moms and for River to get the socialization he needs. He is fighting bedtime again... we put him to bed and he knocks on the door to be let out of his room. We put him back in his bed and he knocks again... 15 times a night.. before he finally caves and goes to sleep. We think there might be something that he's seeing out his window that's scaring him so we're going to paint over his windows to try and prevent that from happening.
Journey turns 6 months old on Friday. It's flying by. I can't believe it's been 6 months old already. We took dairy out of my diet and it has made a world of difference with his sleeping and his behavior so I guess he has the same allergies going on that River does. *sigh* He's still not really interested in doing much of anything. He wants to be held the majority of the time and is very vocal when he's not. We are doing solids every other day or so now and he seems to be tolerating them well.
Cheli On Friday, August 1, 2008
It's that time again...

I weighed in today and for the first time since I started actively trying to lose weight back in March.. I gained weight :( I am up 1 lb over last weeks weight. But I also did my measurements this week for the month and I lost 3 inches off my waist which is awesome. Honestly I can't be all that disappointed in not losing weight this past week I have really really slacked off on my exercising and eating right and drinking water so my goal for August is to get back with it. Get back to drinking my recommened water, eating better, and getting exercise in more often. We shall see. I'd like to lose 8 lbs this month. Last month I lost 5.8 lbs..

I go in on Thursday for my tooth/teeth extraction. I'm getting 6 teeth removed. I'm scared to death. It's weird. I'm more scared about getting 6 teeth pulled than I was about a damn c-section. I don't figure that getting wisdom teeth pulled can any way get close to the pain after a c-section, right? I should be fine... right? LOL

I got a call this week from Maxim about doing the flu clinics again this year. It's easy money although not much of it but money is money. I go in on August 19th for orientation and we'll go from there. I need to find out where to go to get my CPR recertifiied. It expires on September 1st. I can't believe it's been 2 years already. Crazy.

Doug finally get his insurance this week and called his work. Who miracles of all miracles still wants him to work there. He did however tell her that he wouldnt' be able to work the weekend of my surgery because I won't be able to care for the boys on my own the weekend so she said to just wait until August 13th to start working there. He goes in 3-10 on Wednesday, Thursday and Friday evenings and Saturday he work 10 to 6 and Sunday 8 to 1. I'm excited. I know he's excited. He just ordered his cards today to have cards to start trying to bring clients in on the side for more money. Doug has been to the dentist twice in the last week. He has now had all of his fillings. He found out that he will also need to get his wisdom teeth removed and 2 other teeth pulled as well but he was told that there is hope for saving the other 2 teeth so he is going to wait until we have dental insurance from his work and see if they'll cover what he needs to fix them so that he doesn't lose them.

River went to the doctor this week because somehow got pink eye again. No idea how. So he's been on an antibiotic for that for the last few days, he doesn't like the drops at all. We found out that he is 33 lbs even and 39 inches tall. He super tall. 97th percentile for height and 84th for weight. Such a big boy he is. He is such a smart boy too. He will be 2 1/2 next week. Where is the time going?

Journey is doing great. He went to the cardiologist last week a previously updated on and went to the pediatrician the same day we took River for a rash and a weight check. He is up to 13 lbs 11 oz and 25 inches in length. He's tiny but he's growing so there is nothing to worry about. We aren't giving him solids. The last few times we've tried he's wound up with a ton of tummy issues all night so we're going to hold off for a while yet. He's still nursing but I'm not sure for how much longer. He's just not getting full off the breast anymore and he's also having tummy issues with something I'm eating. I think it's just going to be easier on the both of us after the 6 month mark to call it done or at least not fight so hard for it and I'm okay with that.. I made it to the 6 month mark and that was my goal.