Ear Infections X3!

Maya and Camille had a well child doctor's appointment today. Gavin has been coughing and crying at night and decided to take him in as well. I was by myself...no biggie right? I take care of four kids all day long. I can handle 10 month old twins and an active 3 year old in a doctor's office by myself....ummm....never again! I learned my lesson. I'm good, but not that good.

The girls were in rare form. They cried the entire visit! (Turns out, they both have an ear infection. I felt so bad, I thought they were just fussy because they were teething.) Gavin, knowing that I am busy with the babies, takes advantage of the situation and decides to rearrange all the waiting room furniture. After 15 minutes of screaming and numerous dirty looks thrown my way, a little old lady came over and asked if she could help. I quickly said "Yes!" and handed her a crying baby. Another lady took the old woman's cue and stepped in and navigated Gavin back toward his coloring book. This gave me the opportunity to nurse one of the twins to calm her down. Switch babies with the older lady. She then rocked Camille to sleep while I nursed Maya. Whew. I'm exhausted just typing it all! So a big THANK YOU to the angels in the doctor's office that helped me keep my sanity today.

By the way, the pediatrician suggested I put butter on the girls veggies to fatten them up! BUTTER!? It just seems wrong. I'm going to have to research that advice before I try it.

Happy Birthday Gavin!

"Ok Mom, stop taking pictures and let us EAT!"

My baby turned 3 today! Wow. He's growing so fast. Now if I could only get him potty trained! In all fairness to him I haven't made the time to teach him. I've been a little preoccupied with the twins. Honestly, who has time to sit in the bathroom and read for an hour with two babies crawling around?! I've embraced the saying, "He'll go when he's ready." But no more...it's time...buying diapers for three is EXPENSIVE! (not to mention it's just gross changing a 3 year old's diaper!)

Zander has been sick this week. Poor little guy has croup. Rebekkah (my sister) took Gavin for a couple of days hoping he wouldn't get it. Hopefully our plan worked.

Because Zander was sick we had to cancel Gavin's birthday party. At this age he didn't even notice. We just made a train birthday cake...it turned out REALLY CUTE and was SUPER EASY! Not to mention the boys had a blast helping. If you click on this link you can see what it was suppose to look like. And this was a picture of mine. http://www.parenting.com/recipes-article/Recipes/Birthday_Parties/How-to-make-a-train-cake

Thanks "or so she says" for the cake idea...it was a BIG HIT!

Perfect Rose of the Gardens

The last two posts have been about Maya, so I felt obligated to write a little something about Camille. Funny how that works. I can be playing with one twin, tickling and blowing raspberries, and I have to do it to the other. Can't have one feeling left out.

Camille Rose DesJardins. Our last name is French meaning "of the gardens." Camille means "perfect" in french...so she is our Perfect Rose of the Gardens.

From day one she has had an adventurer spirit. She's always been smaller then her identical twin sister...but you can't tell her that! She has hit every "milestone" first. Sitting up, crawling, pulling up...and the latest, standing unassisted. She is only 9 months old but is passing from the coffee table to couch like a pro.

Camille is super picky already! Unlike her sister, who will eat anything on a spoon, Camille has a flair for the dramatics and will gag, refuse to open her mouth, or spit food all over you if she doesn't want to eat it. It can be quite frustrating, but she knows what she wants...and usually gets it!

I'm excited to watch her grow up. With her determination, aggressiveness and beautiful spirit I am certain she will succeed at anything she wants to do.

Screaming

Don't let that sweet innocent face fool you.

Anyone who has been to my house knows it's loud! You can imagine with four little ones. But the past few days the decibels have raised! Maya has discovered that high pitched scream...and uses it often. When she happy and playing she's screaming. In fact, her brothers think it's funny and egg her on. When she's in the highchair, between bites, she's screeching. But she gets to the highest pitch squeal when she's mad and wants me to be there...pronto. It's 7:30 AM and I've about had my days fill. I don't remember my boys doing this. Is it a girl thing? What ever it is, I've got to figure out how to stop it...or invest in some earplugs.

The mystery tube of lipstick

I was on the couch watching cartoons with the boys yesterday morning. The babies were crawling around getting into everything...like usual. The living room is pretty much baby proof so I wasn't watching them to close. Maya had her back towards me and was playing with something. After a minute or two of extra quiet play, I got up to see what she was playing with...LIPSTICK! I have no idea where this lipstick came from. It's not mine. The only thing I can think of is my mom and grandmother were here a few days ago...maybe it fell out of their purse? But I've cleaned since then and never noticed it. Who knows.

Where's Gavin?!

SIGH...that was a big sigh. My soon to be three year old, Gavin, is CRAZY! I hate to compare my children...but he is SO different than his older brother, Zander. Zander has followed the rules and doesn't test the boundaries...much. But Gavin is a different story...

The other day it was to quiet in the house. Where was Gavin? After several minutes of searching (not to worried, his favorite thing to do is hide) I hear something in the garage. I go out to see if it is him, yup. He was "fixing something" with his daddy's tools. I told him that was BIG no-no and the garage was off limits.

A couple days ago the weather was beautiful. The boys were in the back yard playing. I had the back door open, so I could hear the boys while I was in the living room with the girls. Ely came into the room asking, "Why's Gavin in the van?"

He had opened the gate in the back yard, walked around the house, opened the back of the van and crawled in the drivers seat. He had a set of keys in the ignition and said he was going to go somewhere. Thanks Aunt Duque for letting him sit on your lap to back out of the driveway...now he thinks he can drive!

Questions for your kids

A friend of mine asked her son these questions and posted them to her facebook page...I took that lead and asked Zander (age 4 1/2) the same questions. The answers were funny and eye opening.

1. What is something mom always says to you? "Don't hurt your brother"


2. What makes mom happy? "Not doing bad things"


3. What makes mom sad? "Daddy yelling"


4. How does your mom make you laugh? "Doing funny stuff"


5. What was your mom like as a child? "I don't remember..."


6. How old is your mom? "40? 30?"


7. How tall is your mom? "Like a million or 100"


8. What is your mom's favorite thing to do? "Clean the house."


9. What does your mom do when you're not around? "You miss me!"


10. If your mom becomes famous, what will it be for? With a confused look he said, "I don't know."


11. What is your mom really good at? "Cleaning the house. You always make it clean."


12. What is your mom not very good at? "Feeding my fish"


13. What does your mom do for a job? "Clean the house"


14. What is your mom's favorite food? "Everything...like spicy food."


15. What makes you proud of your mom? "Like going somewhere special or my birthday."


16. If your mom were a cartoon character, who would she be? "Nina (on Imagination Movers). But that's not really a cartoon...I don't know any girl cartoons."


17. What do you and your mom do together? "Clean the house. Sometimes we go outside together."


18. How are you and your mom the same? We're both skinny. (have I mentioned how much I love my son? lol)


19. How are you and your mom different? "You have a lot of nipples on you, and I have only one." HUH? I asked him what he was talking about. "You have little brown nipples all over...like your arms...(he points to my freckles)...and I only have one (points to his freckle on his ankle)...see? We're different."


20. How do you know your mom loves you? "Because I love you."


21. What does your mom like most about your dad? "He works for money."


22. Where is your mom's favorite place to go? "Like...out to eat...or to the mall."

Priceless. In his eyes I sure clean a lot...why is my house such a mess then?