Weekend Wrap-up

This weekend was rather dull - spent the weekend inside with sick kids still. Anna just seems to be progressing from one thing to the next. She now has the cough that Ethan has had and a fever. Ethan is finally over his fever (I think) but still has a cough. Ugh

My husband is back fully partaking in both of his jobs...he worked 60 at the fire department this past weekend starting Friday morning.

Even though we did spend the weekend inside, I'm still not complaining - I really like to hibernate when it comes to cold weather. I just feel bad for the kids not feeling good.

So I am in Illinois and we are supposed to get the mother load of snow dumped on us starting tomorrow afternoon. Between tomorrow afternoon (Tuesday) and Wednesday afternoon they are calling for ~18 feet. I think I'm done with the snow thing now. :-) Hopefully the kids will feel better and get to go play in it though!

I am very excited that I have finally gotten two sponsored posts and I have some upcoming giveaways. I am starting one tomorrow, February 1st. Do you believe it's already February tomorrow??

Have a great night!

Love,
Jodi

Weekend Wrap-Up

This weekend was spent mostly caring for the sick...children.  'Tis the season, right?  This year actually hasn't been so bad with colds as in years past.  The year Anna and Ethan were born they were given shots to immunize against RSV, since they were born 8 weeks premature they needed the extra protection.  That shot also really built up their immunity for that flu season and, amazingly, they did not get any colds at all!  Since then, every year they've been making up for lost time with all they colds they've gotten.  Last year I counted 9 colds!  At least they are building up their immunity, right?  This is only the second cold so far this year.

Anna had a fever through Friday.  Yesterday (Saturday) she didn't have a fever but she (and Megan) started getting a really bad cold  What makes it worse is, I still can't get Anna to blow her nose.  She keeps blowing air out through her mouth instead of her nose.  For some reason I get the feeling she's playing me.  But it gets so messy and I think it tends to settle more in the chest.

So this morning Anna woke up with a bloody nose.  It's really not too unusual for her.  She and Megan seem to be the one's to have more of a tendency to get those.  But this one really made me a bit nervous.  It seemed to finally slow down after about 15 minutes only to all of a sudden start gushing...I couldn't get it to stop.  I was starting to get a little panicky - you know those thoughts going through my head - so I was able to talk Anna in to letting dad take over by telling her he is really good at making these stop.  I didn't want her to see me getting nervous so I thought it best to let him take over and I could go get her bedding washed.  Besides, he's the paramedic!  Of course he was able to get it to stop.  Thank you God!

I then went to church and left the kids home with my husband.  Since Anna and Megan both have colds and were coughing I figured they may as well stay home.  And if I was leaving Megan, and especially Anna, then I really needed to leave Ethan too.  Church was great - I love my church.  It has cultivated such an amazing community of people.

After church I went home and all the kids were dressed and playing very nicely and ... no coughing.  Yay!  Mornings and nighttime seem to be the hardest time's with the coughing.  We hung out at home for a bit and then watched The Bears get their butts handed to them with some friends for the afternoon.

As we were taking the kids up to bed, Anna said she wanted her temperature taken.  Temperature...100.2.  Low, but it is a temperature.  Ethan then wanted his taken, I was shocked to see it was at 101.7!  Poor little guy was coughing like crazy in his bed too.  I put a really flat pillow under his pillow just to elevate him a little, it seemed to have helped in the past - but wasn't helping so much this time.  It's so hard when they get those coughs, there isn't really anything you can do except humidity and lots of water.

Even though the kids were sick and we didn't really do anything very exciting, I really didn't mind not going anywhere.  It has been so cold that I've really had no desire to go out and do anything anyway!  It was actually nice to just spend the day in our jammies!

Also, I am very excited about starting a fabulous giveaway this week from doozycards.com.  Watch for that to start!

Monday Blog Hops

Weekend Wrap-Up

We will see how this goes - I am typing this from my Cell. Since tomorrow is Martin Luther King Day, that means no school for Megan so she is up later tonight. Actually, we are laying in bed watching TV! My husband is finally back at work after his extended stay at home with his broken toe. I must admit that as nice as it was having him home for 4 weeks - it is nice having the routine back too. Although, I think I had more withdrawals with him being gone then the kids did!

It was actually a quiet weekend. Friday evening after my daughter's Brownie meeting we went to Portillo's. Her teacher gave us a gift card for Christmas as a thank you for helping out with class parties. We all love dinning out, but don't much any more. On Saturday morning Rob got a call from the Fire Department that they needed him, so off he went. While there, someone needed Sunday evening off so it worked out great since he had already picked up Sunday Day. (Back on normal computer now, whew!) Saturday I just spent the day with the kids inside. It is really hard though for our kids to function together at times though with there being 3 of them. Saturday was one of them - it seems every few minutes I was refereeing some fight for them. Since they were upstairs, I decided to bring a book up there and read in my bedroom. I figured my presence up there may be enough to cut down on the arguing.

It did help, and eventually Ethan wanted to stay in the room with me to watch one of his Thomas VHS's from the library. So while reading and watching Thomas I kept dozing off! Megan and Anna ended up coming in the room too and coloring on the floor next to the bed. Everyone was behaving so perfectly too. At one point, after I was done dozing, I looked over at Ethan and he actually fell asleep right next time me! First time he's ever done that. :-) I enjoyed the moment and then I really needed to wake up him since now they are both at the stage when if they nap at all it effects their bedtime big time.

Rob came home from the Fire Department for the evening and night and then was back there early this morning.

Today was a very nice day with the kids - church this morning. We then came home, ate lunch and hung our at home for just a bit. I then took the kids to the library for a couple of hours. The kids love going to the library which thrills me since I am such an avid reader. By the time we got home it was just about time for dinner and then the night time routine.

Overall - a really good weekend for the first weekend with dad back at work. :-)

Keep watching for a review and a giveaway that I will be posting! I will be posting a review of Overstock.com which will include a 10% off coupon for all readers! The other will be a review/giveaway for doozycards.com. The post for Overstock.com will be up this week, so make sure you watch for it!

Lastly, make sure you check out my giveaway at my other blog - Helping Moms Work From Home! The giveaway is for an awesome assortment of hair products from Regis with a zipper carrying case :-)

Monday Blog Hops - And Mailbox Hops!

Weekend Wrap-Up

We had a wonderful weekend, can't say we did very much...which is probably why it was so wonderful!  :-)  The last few weeks have been so busy, that it was nice to just do nothing.

Saturday was a very "couch potato" day.  It was really probably one of the most relaxing New Year's days I've had in a long time.  The two youngest kids are at a much better age then they've ever been at, and they played very nicely with our oldest daughter.  Everyone stayed in PJ's all day long!

Today went to church in the morning and then did a little shopping for our oldest.  She has never liked jeans that are too tight fitting and the jeans I ordered for her in the beginning of the school year from Gymboree - which are adorable - have gotten a little tighter then she likes.  They fit, but she's just not comfortable in the "skinny" jean type.  Hopefully that feeling will remain in place through high school!  Anyway, after church we took a ride to Justice and got a great deal on a very cute pair of Boot-Cut jeans.  Originally they were $29.99, marked down to 16.99 and then an additional 40% off.  They only cost just over $10!

Once we got home I decided to take down the Christmas Tree.  It is much earlier then I usually take it down, but we do have a small house and just the clutter of everything was starting to get to me.  Plus, my husband will be going back to work this week after 4 weeks off because of his broken toe.  So basically we won't see him for awhile after Tuesday (when he'll get the doctor's note releasing him to work) since I know they are going to slam him with a ton of work.  I didn't want to get stuck in the situation of having to get the tree down for Christmas tree pick-up and him not being around to help at all.

I can't believe my daughter's 2 weeks off for Winter Break is already over.  We had such an awesome time the last 2 weeks...it made it go by so fast!  Back to getting up early to get her ready and off to school.  The twins just finally started getting back to a good wake-up time of about 7:30 am - so it's been nice to "sleep in"!  It's going to be a rough morning for all of us.

That's funny, to even be hinting at a rough time getting up at 7 am.  Okay, I guess I'm a little spoiled with be a WAHM!

Happy (early) Monday!  :-)

Weekend Wrap-Up

First, I want to say I hope everyone had a wonderful holiday!  :-)  We had a great weekend, jammed packed with lots of fun family time.

Our Christmas started out on a not so good note on Thursday when my sister slipped on ice and broke her arm.  When my mom called to tell me my brother-in-law was taking my sister to the hospital I knew it wasn't good. But then when I told the ambulance was taking her I knew for sure it was bad.  My sister has a very high pain tolerance and would not got to even a doctor unless she had to or if she just had a regular appointment.  Shoot she suffered from what she thought  was heartburn her last 3 months of pregnancy with her oldest son - come to find out it was gallbladder attacks.  From what I've been told, they are extremely painful.  A week after my nephew was born she had to have emergency surgery to have her gallbladder removed.

It turns out she has a compression fracture in her upper arm of her humerus bone.  The bone is compressed so much that it actually has her shoulder dropped about 1 - 2 inches than the other shoulder.  She will have to have surgery on it, hopefully soon.  She would have surgery on it right now if she could so she could just get it over with.

We went to their house for Christmas - I am just in awe of her.  Even with a broken arm she is still hustling and bustling around.  Grant it, you can tell she is not herself and obviously has major limitations but she is not, in any way, just sitting around either.

For Christmas Eve we spent the day at my In-Laws.  Had a wonderful time there and had a lot of fun playing games with the adults.  My mother-in-laws sister brought this newer version of Uno so we had a blast playing that and then play Yahtzee.  I got Yahtzee two times!  :-)

The snow started coming down pretty hard early evening so we headed home.  I had all the kids open one gift that evening - Christmas PJ's.  They all got jammies with monkey's on them.



Christmas morning was a blast.  The kids had an awesome time opening their gifts. In the afternoon we headed over to my sister's and spent the rest of the day their.  We had a great meal and totally wore the kids out.

  

Today we went to church and then spent the afternoon sledding with our kids and my brother-in-law and their 3 kids.  My sister stayed home.  :-(



I am totally exhausted but filled with a lot of joy.

Weekend Roundup

I can't believe another weekend has gone by - this year is coming to a quick close.  Pretty soon we will be bringing in the New Year.  Actually I will wake up the morning of and think hmmm, 2011.  :-)  Don't you wish time could just stand still for just a little bit?  My In-Laws came by today after church to use our Deep Fryer for a chicken they bought.  I sat down on the couch with my father-in-law and I thought wow, this is the first time I just sat down and relaxed in a LONG time.  It felt so good to just sit and do nothing.  That seems like an impossibility these days.

I got some more Christmas shopping done this weekend (yay).  Not too much more to get.  I'd like to have it all done within the next couple of days.  Otherwise, we had a really nice weekend.


On Saturday we went to a friends for a Christmas party.  I have gotten together with this same group of friends for this Christmas party for over 10 years - it is such a treat to see them and spend time with all of them.  Everyone has children and it's really hard to coordinate time with everyone's schedule and children's activities.  There were 12 kids and 13 adults - kids range in age from 3 all the way up to a sophomore in high school.  We had a gift exchange for the kids and then the adults did a $10 grab bag.  We did have a rather late night so thankfully the kids (except Ethan) fell asleep on he way home.


On Sunday (today) we had church in the morning in which my 7 year olds second grade Sunday school class were singing.  There were actually several different groups singing today...for Christmas.  My In-Laws and my mom joined us for  Christmas and then we came home.  Okay, I think I should go to bed for the night – I actually just fell asleep while writing this post.  I think I am a little tired!

Weekend Round Up

We had an excellent weekend...and actually had some time to relax.  :-)

On Friday, my husband and I had his Christmas party from his work to attend for the Fire Department.  We had a really nice time, the food was excellent...a restaurant owned by one of the firemen he works with, and it was great seeing all the "guys" Rob works with.  A few hours before the event I remembered we had to bring a $10 gift for a toy collection they take at the party so I had to run off to Target.  Just before leaving the house I found that my Blackberry roller ball no longer allowed me to roll down, which I quickly realized is a major hindrance, especially when trying to use the Address Book.  So I multi-tasked...on the way to Target I called T-Mobile and, since I qualified for the full discount, I ordered a new phone!  I am soooo excited!  My first Android - a T-Mobile G-2 that has the Google applications.  I should be getting it in the next couple days.

Saturday was a fairly quiet day, we ran a few errands with Anna and Ethan while Megan stayed behind at a friends house to play.  It was funny though because before we left Rob told the kids we were stopping at Home Depot (his favorite store) and Anna said "Yay, Home Depot" and Ethan said "I don't like Home Depot".  This is the kid who last weekend wanted nothing to do with getting a Christmas tree either.  So on the way home from Home Depot Rob said something to the effect about having fun at Home Depot and Anna said "YES" and Ethan said "I did not have fun at Home Depot and I did not have fun at Pet Smart (the other errand) - I do not like Home Depot".  He has gotten so funny in the way he expresses adamantly his like and dislikes.

On Saturday I was also able to spend a lot of time on my business.  I have not been doing a whole lot with that lately...I've truly been letting excuses get in my way and, well, let's just say that no one wants to hear excuses.  You either do what you say you are going to or you decide if it's truly what you want.  My mentor, who I love dearly and my husband both got pretty tough with me on Friday.  Although what came out of that was not only my husband actually taking "over" the kids so mom could go work (which he's never done) and me truly loving what I am doing again!

Sunday...another good day - we had church, ran to Trader Joe's and then went to a local scrapbooking store for the kids to have their Silhouettes done.  The artist who cuts out the silhouettes by hand was at this location for two days...one of the last of these   
artists around.  He did amazing work with just a pair of scissors and paper.  It's the classic black silhouette on the white background.  Each silhouette looks exactly like the child, unbelievable.  We then went out to lunch, came home and I got some more work done.  When we were a Trader Joe's we bought a Ginger Bread Cookie making kit so after dinner all the kids took part in decorating (and eating) the ginger bread cookie.



We are now in the bitter cold weather of Illinois.  We will be having wind chills of 10 - 20 degrees below 0 for the next two days.  It really does make it difficult to even want to step foot outside.  This type of cold weather is really odd this early in the season.  Usually our coldest time is in January/February - really worries me how bad it will get during the "bad" time.

Don’t forget – if you haven’t already – Join my giveaway for Old El Paso Family Taco Night.

Hops I am participating in:

Question of the Week: What material thing is on top of your holiday wish list?

I honestly can't think of anything truly "material" I want this year...everything I really want is just practical. I really want a good electric hand mixer and I'd really like some nice rimmed baking sheets. I suppose the only material thing I'd like is a pedicure! I do love remote starters too though...I had that on an old car and I do miss that. Although, it helps now that I'm home with the kids and the car is in the garage. :-)

Weekend Round Up

What a crazy, fast, wonderful, bummer of a weekend...all rolled up into one.

Friday started with my husband working 24 hours at the Fire Department, which is not unusual - but Anna has been fighting naps all week and was once again dreadfully overtired but refused to nap. I describe Friday morning and afternoon as my time thing that putting bamboo shoots up my nails would've been more fun. :-)

But Friday evening was wonderful! Once Anna and Ethan went to bed, Megan and I had a "girls" night. We played the WII and then we laid in bed and watched a movie. Both of us feel asleep and it was perfectly relaxing evening.

Overnight Friday into Saturday we got quite a bit of snow. I was supposed to go to a friends house who I am with on the MOPS Leadership Steering Committee for a meeting (she lives ~ 30 minutes away in good weather) but the roads were too bad early morning. Plus I would only be able to stay for a short time since I then had to come back to right around my house for a Christmas luncheon with the home daycare owner and moms of the preschool Anna and Ethan go to. Megan also went to this home daycare for daycare for 4 years so I've been going for years now.

Megan and Anna knocking off snow

I had a wonderful time at the luncheon, great food, great conversation and a gift exchange! Yay, got a lovely wicker basket with a red cloth insert, homemade cookies and jam, a candle and a little snowman knick knack.

After I go home from the luncheon it was then time for us to get our Christmas tree at a local tree farm. My husband has been wanting to go to this tree farm very close to our house for years and we decided this was the year to finally go. We were all very excited to go except for Ethan - he was not buying it and could care less if we had a tree! Anna and Ethan fell asleep on the way there, and once we were there we had to wake them up. On top of Ethan not wanting to be there in the first place - was really not pleased about being woken up, so I was carrying him while Anna and Megan were knocking snow from the trees.

We ended up getting  huge, beautiful tree ... which looks awesome in our living room with a cathedral ceiling. Nice thing too is the trees are $60 flat fee, so it pays if you are planning on getting a big tree to go their since normally lots charge a lot more for the taller trees.

Anna and Ethan sat in the car while we tied up the tree.  On the way home, Rob (my husband) exclaimed "wasn't that awesome, I had so much fun - did you?" everyone said yes, except Ethan - "no, I did not have fun - I did not want to go get a Christmas tree".  Bah hum bug - got to love kids!  But he normally has such a wonderful disposition that it is rather funny to hear him irritated.  

We then came home, a neighbor helped Rob bring the tree into the garage while I ordered pizza for dinner.  We then wanted to make room for the tree, since Rob was once again going to be at the fire department all day Sunday (today) and I wanted to have the tree in the house to start decorating it.  Where the tree was going is a train table that we had to find a place for - Rob decided in their bedroom was actually a great idea.  When we were going to move it we had to turn it over on it's side and didn't remember that the boards in the table were not connected to anything.  They fell out and landed right on my husband's big toe.  I have never seen anyone in so much pain.  He was stuck on the floor for about an hour.  His toe was not a pretty site at all.  He ended up sleeping on the coach downstairs because it was too painful for him to go up the stairs and could not get comfortable in bed anyway.

This morning rolled along, Sunday, and he was already up and gone at the fire department when I got up.  I had a busy day planned with the kids so I started getting everyone moving right away this morning.  Emailed my husband said he was in unbelievable amount of pain and that he was going to see how the day progressed.  In the meantime, I got the kids dressed and we went to church.  After church we picked up my mom and went to Bass Pro Shop for lunch and picture's with Santa.  We ended up being there for a few hours - it was a long wait for Santa.  When we were leaving my husband had emailed me and said he left work early and was on his way to urgent care.  Ethan exclaimed he was going to sleep in the car and was to not be woken up!  I told him it is too cold to stay sleeping in the car so I would carry him up to his room...luckily he agreed.  :-)

I got everyone home and then we started putting lights on the Christmas tree.  My husband, came home shortly afterwords on crutches with a compound fracture (multiple breaks) to his big toe and a prescription for Vicoden.  It's going to be a long holiday season with an out of commission husband.  Poor guy.  I just can't imagine how bad that must have hurt last night when it broke.  I don't know how he didn't cry, pass out or throw up...I'm sure I would have done all three.

We did manage to get the angel and all the lights up on the tree. 

Faa, laa, laa, laa, laa,
laa, laa, laa, laa