Blessings even in less than desireable situations

I know I've been whiny about my sick baby... perhaps overbearing for some (sorry about that).  It's just been frustrating and... scary.  I sort of feel like I am fighting a losing battle. She has a horrible diaper rash that I can't do a lot about until her diarrhea slows down, she is losing fluids faster than she is taking them in, the only thing she'll drink is something you really should avoid when sick.

I am aware  that whining about it won't really get me anywhere so, I started thinking and have noticed some pretty nice blessings we've received in this whole mess.

First: I usually do my shopping Wednesdays or Thursdays but I decided to go on Monday (when Kylee was just starting to get sick, but not bad enough to give me much concern), so when it got really bad  I was able to stay home and take care of her.

 She happened to get sick while my husband is in between semesters, so I am not doing this alone.

My husband was able to give her a priesthood blessing, I love having that in my home.

She is drinking something, even though it's milk... and not ideal for tummy troubles she is drinking enough to prevent herself from getting dehydrated.

I have a GREAT pediatrician but today he wasn't in the office, so I went with another pediatrician in the office.  I loved him too.  In fact a had a moment of debate, deciding if I wanted to start making appointments with him, rather than my regular pediatrician, but... I still know our other one better and he is already familiar with my kids (and no I am not one of those moms who takes her kids in for everything) It's nice to have some peace of mind after talking with him, getting advice and... I just love that we have modern medicine available to us.  He knows the struggle I have had to push fluids and told me to call him if I want her admitted to the hospital so they can help me get fluids in her.

Another blessing--and this might sound kind of selfish--but Kylee has been SO CUDDLY.  She is not normally cuddly at all.  Katie would (and still does) give me bedtime snuggles, but as soon as Kylee is done with her milk, she is ready for me to put her down in her bed... usually.  While she's been sick, she's been snuggling with me for hours.  If she is awake, she is more than likely in my arms.  If Jeff weren't here that might be overbearing, but with him here to help it's just kind of nice to be able to just hold my baby and try to make her feel better.

It has been SO nice to actually have Jeff home. The last few weeks of his semester were so filled with tests that I feel like we never saw him so these two weeks (sadly this is the last one before it begins yet again) we have tried to do as much together as possible.

We kicked off our time together with a trip to the zoo, a little more expensive than we would like but... the kids loved it so, it was worth it. The polar bear exhibit was my personal favorite. Pretty cool, eh?

You pay good money for a zoo and what do the kids want to do? Play at the playground. Ha ha ha :)

Katie suckered her dad into taking her on the carousel (yes, extra money but she enjoyed it). I love her little smile

Poor Kylee, worn out before Kate was ready to go

Even though this is Jeff's break, he sent me off to get my hair done, sweet right? (But it had been a long time, so perhaps it was more win-win for me to get it done than one would think ;) ). Went with a dark color, and I like it better.

For this break, I was intending on making it all about Jeff, but he is just so good at making sure I'm getting my way. He knew that I had been struggling with teaching Katie basic modesty-- you know, don't show your underwear-- but she's getting too tall for her her old dresses, so it was making an already difficult concept virtually impossible. Jeff took us girls to Savers and we found some good ones (that's right, my husband willingly took his wife and daughters clothes shopping).

Later, we were given more clothes by the Meltons in our ward, so now Katie is doing pretty well with fall clothes and dresses that fit, and Kylee gets Katie's hand-me-downs, which were also given to us by the Meltons. It has been a HUGE HUGE HUGE blessing to not have to purchase many clothes for our kids. I can not thank them enough, seriously HUGE blessing.

Katie taking care of her sister who wasn't feeling too well and still isn't... making me sad and frustrated on this day 5 of her being sick :(

I love that Kylee plays with baby dolls. It's cute to see her putting it to bed :) (FYI this pic is out of order, she isn't back to playing just yet... maybe tomorrow)

Ok, so I know I posted this sweet little story on facebook (as is the case with many things) but this is where I get everything I put in our actual journals so... deal with it ;)

I was super super frazzled, it was a crazy, exhausting, disappointing day and I was trying to get Kylee to sleep who clearly wasn't feeling well and Katie was bouncing off the walls. I was starting to get snappy and ornery with her, she ignored me (THANK GOODNESS!).

She climbed up on the back of the couch and looked out the window and squealed in her sweet little excited voice, "Mommy! Look! Look what Heavenly Father gave us!" and she was pointing to the rainbow.

Instantly I melted, my bad mood went away, and I wanted to cry. How wonderful it is to have a child who constantly reminds me of all the wonderful things I take for granted.

Finally, not to get mushy but I am feeling so LUCKY to be married to the sweet man that is my husband. We've been busy moving furniture around like crazy and cleaning. We had an unfortunate situation where we were thinking we could finally get a sectional (free) that was left behind at a rental house. We took our couch and recliner to the DI and went to get the sectional (we wanted it because we can't really snuggle up together on our loveseat so we often sit apart unless we decide to sit together on the floor... carpet over concrete still isn't very comfy so we don't do it often, or for very long)

Lesson learned: It is a BAD idea to get rid of furniture before you're sure that you can get new furniture in your house. Sure, it would fit in the space we cleared but we couldn't get it into our house with the awkward layout our house has.

Anyway today we bought a new recliner for 15 bucks and now we do have something, we're just waiting on a super cheap loveseat. After the kids are in bed, Jeff and I sit in the TV room (inconveniently the place we no longer have adequate seating is where we spend our kids-free time) Jeff insists I sit in the comfy seat while he either sits on the floor or our fold-out camping chair.

He always does little things like that... gives me the biggest piece of dessert (maybe it's cheesy that I notice these things, but I think it's sweet), serves me first, makes sure I'm happy and I'm comfortable before he even starts worrying about himself. Just the most selfless person I have ever met.

Right now he's sick, right along with Kylee (though he seems to be on the mend today, YAY!) but he has still helped me tremendously. Even though he's been sick, exhausted and should be resting in bed, he has been keeping Katie completely occupied so I can take care of Kylee. Let me tell you, Kate is a BUSY girl and keeping her occupied is not easy and is quite exhausting.

I feel so lucky, and so undeserving. I hope I do enough to return all the sweet favors he does me. I love that man, sorry to get all mushy but... I do.

Obviously no one is perfect, but I'm pretty happy and feel very blessed to have married a man who treats me so well and is a wonderful father to our two sweet girls.

Kids, Birthdays, and more

Wow, I've been horrible about updating.  Here it goes...

 

My parents' dog Champ is the most patient dog you will ever meet.  She lets Kylee climb all over her without so much as a complaint (don't worry I interfere if Kylee starts pulling hair, but Champ still wouldn't do anything)  Good doggy :)

 

Helping mommy make brownies for dad who has had to study for 11 big exams within ONE week.  InSaNe, right?  Grad school is rough.  I suppose I'll just have to expect the last 3 weeks of each semester we will basically not see Jeff

 

More pictures of just how patient dear champy is.  Love that dog (love ours too, but Beanie won't sit and take it, she'll eventually run away).

(two weeks ago) I was making breakfast for my girls when Katie asked if I'd help her with a puzzle. I told her I could help her after breakfast but that she could work on it at the table until I brought her food to her.
Ten minutes later (or less) she had it completely finished! All by herself. I was impressed, she usually needs me to be right with her helping her figure out where they go.

 Watching firewords on the 24th :)  She had to clap and jump the ENTIRE time aerials were going off. It was so cute to see the excitement on her sweet little face

 trying to escape ;)

 snuggling with daddy, these are those moments that can never be replaced.  I'm grateful to have such a loving devoted father to my children

 Random picnic in our backyard :)

 This is how our mornings go :) the girls wake up, climb into my bed and play under the covers.

 Kylee's first birthday :)  She didn't quite know what to think about the gifts, Katie opened them all and Kylee watched, playing with each thing as Kate opened it.  It actually worked out well, both kids were pretty happy

 This was an early gift from her aunt Sheralyn and uncle Chris.  Kylee LOVES it and has to sleep with it every night.  In fact, how I know she's awake is I hear "Hi Kylee... I love you, Kylee."  Yep it says her name and is just ADORABLE!

 Music toy from Grandma Geslison :) another favorite

Also not shown is a baby doll from Grandma Bennett, it is SO cute to see her play with it. Sister Peery, a sweet woman in our ward (and my former 5th grade teacher) gave us a doll bed and it is the sweetest thing to see Kylee put her baby to bed

 Grandpa Geslison loves his granddaughters.  He can't wear his glasses around Kylee though, she takes them off and tosses them aside.  Silly girl

 Kylee's birthday cake.  We gave her lava cake once and she freaked, so that's what we wanted to make and it was a SUCCESS!

 Swimming in Hurricane

 

Does it look like I'm having fun? 

Ok so, in honor of my two girls birthday's I'd like to list some or their favorites/accomplishments

KYLEE

Favorite Blankey:  A purple fleece blanket with her name and Tinkerbell on a corner.  I bought it online for super cheap and gave them as gifts to my girls for Christmas.  Kylee LOVES hers, and after many washes, since it's such a low quality fabric, it's not even soft anymore.  Katie's is more gently used and I made the mistake of trying to let Kylee use that while I washed hers and she was not fooled, not even for a second.  "wait, this isn't right... it's soft" I'm sure that's was she was thinking :)

Favorite book: actually it's very recently changed, it's a cute baby animals book given to her by Tenika (THANK YOU!) it's cute to see her pointing to all the animals, and she'll of course take my finger and "help" me point to them as well.

Favorite toy: a ball popper (actually Katies, but she loves it), her My Pal puppy, and most things that make noise

Favorite Food:  Spaghetti and Pizza.  She will gobble those up and are quite literally the only two foods she will consistently eat... that and toast.

I wish I had all the first dates like I do with Katie but I can give the month.

First rolled over: 4 months

Sat unsupported: 6 months

First tooth: ALMOST six months and she had SEVEN teeth before she hit eight months

crawled: 8 months, almost nine months

First steps: 11 months, now at 12 months she's walking a lot.  Not incredibly well but she does it.

KATIE

Favorite Books: Pinkalicious, Lady Bug Girl, and the Elephant and Piggie book "Can I Play Too," she laughs and laughs, it's the cutest thing.

Favortie "lovie": her white fleece blanket which, three years later, is STILL soft and her "scrumbly kitty"

Favorite food: Pizza

Favorite color:  PINK, PINK, PINK!!!  If you are giving her ANY option, ice cream, toy, shirt, etc and pink is an option, whatever is pink will be her choice

Favorite TV show: Dino Dan (super annoying but she'll choose that above anything else) and Team Umizoomi

Favorite Movies: Tangled, Beauty and the Beast, and the Little Mermaid

Favorite Toys: Her little people toys, and some finger puppets she got from completing a reading program at the library AND a pretend cash register. 

Favorite Pass-time: All things art... play dough, finger paint, water color, markers, side-walk chalk, and WATER, my kid LOVES water :)