Easter Weekend 2016

So we were looking for Egg hunts to participate in this year.  We read about one online that would happen at Redmond Town Center.  They were going to have a lot going on, so we decided to hit it.  BOY WAS IT CROWDED...trying to find a parking spot was our first clue... lol  We got there about an hour into the 4 hour activity,  They had already given out the Scavenger Hunt maps for the Easter eggs--to 2,000 children that got there before we did.  So instead of trying to stand in line to participate in the activities, we walked around the perimeter of the swarm of happy participants.  We ran into this bear, that had no line!  So we got our picture with her.

 The highlight for our boys of our excursion was riding the escalators up and down.  LOL

 

 We took some pictures of the princesses--long line, so our boys just stood by them...

 

 no, we don't know these adorable girls getting their pictures with the princesses.  ;)

 

 

 Then there was SPIDEY....again, long line for a pic...so we took our own...

 

 Then the petting zoo, where they had several cute and cuddly EASTER Bunnies, though we would never know, because the line was way too long to pet them...

 The boys really wanted to jump in the BOUNCY HOUSE, but again the line was way too long...hence some of the long faces in the pictures...

 Fun water fountains too...

 We finally left the Redmond Town Center activity and joined Auntie K at her wards Egg Hunt.

 On your mark, Get Set, GO!

 Auntie K was helping direct them to the hidden treasures...

 Then the boys shared some eggs with their sister.

 This is a common facial expression as she has been cutting teeth.  She is probably grinding them right now.

 Decker is such a loving big brother and Kaylie loves him.

 

 

 

 Then we went into the backyard and played on their BIG TOY for a bit.  It's a train!

 And to top off the day, we painted some eggs that night for the EASTER Bunny to hide.

 It's Easter morning.  Decker was surprised with Magic Treehouse books for his collection.  He is currently reading #45 of 54 in the series!  He loves these books!  Cody got an Audio Harry Potter book on CD which he is thrilled about and Kaylie got a few new onesies that she can grow into.

 

 

 Kaylie found a BLUE EASTER EGG....Got it all over her face and white sweater.  She likes Hard boiled eggs.  ;)

 Her teething this weekend was so painful that she couldn't nurse without crying...so she decided to go on a nursing strike...no pacifier, no nursing, no nothing.  I could hardly put her down as she wanted to be held all the time.  I got some teething tablets for her in hopes that it would take some of the pain away.  Poor baby.  Her Nursing strike went on for a week.  Finally on April 2nd, Mike got the idea to put some syrup on her pacifier in hopes that it would coax her to suck on it.  It worked.  She took a two hour nap happily sucking.  Then I decided to try the same on my nipple...it worked!  She contentedly nursed for 45 minutes with her eyes rolled back and almost back to normal.  I can still feel that she's a little hesitant and worried that it will be painful for her....but it's so good to have her back to nursing.  I was not ready to give that up yet.  I really want to get to a year.

 

 We've got a few blossoms on our Cherry Tree.  Yay!

 I'm loving this picture of Cody with his hands in his pocket and his new frisbee around his angelic head.  And then Decker who is so excited about his Magic Treehouse book that he got for Easter.  Ad missing Dad's head in the timer taken photo.  Never a dull moment!

Happy Easter!!

April 2nd It's a Sunny Day!

Today was a beautiful Saturday.  The boys played out on the trampoline with our neighbor, Roarke.  Kaylie even made an appearance on the trampoline.  Everyone wanted to hold her and go down the slide with her.  Poor Cody, It's been a rough week for him.  He first face planted at his school causing the sores around his nose and mouth.  He said he was trying to flip off the swing.  Then today, he tripped in the yard and fell on some wood, giving him a black eye and this gash on his eyelid.  Then, he accidentally got kicked in the nose by Decker.  Rough day...he came in the house and said he wanted to lay down in his bed...took a little nap.  :)

 

Tulips and dandelions are out in bloom, along with all the pollen....Hello Hay fever!

  She's not so sure about all this grass...doesn't really like the feel of it.

Mike worked on fixing the fence that blew down in the storm.  Dad is going on a weekend trip to the Bay Area in San Francisco.  He's picking up a bunk bed that will be Kaylies in a couple of years.  Gordon Hunt made it in our shop several Christmas's ago for their daughter, who has now grown out of it and said they would love it for this little girl to have it.
After he left, the boys and I played a game of LIFE.  Cody was hoping for a little girl to add to his car so bad and when he had a boy, actual tears....He really wanted a girl...Reminds me of when I learned the gender of our first baby and it was a BOY.  So funny!
We had a fun time playing it and Cody ended up winning the most as the Lawyer...now he always wants to be the lawyer.  ;)

Friday morning woke up to hearing Cody say, "What are you doing Decker?  Are you throwing up on me?  This was at 5:00 a.m.  Decker sleeps on the top bunk and Cody had made his way off his bed to the floor.  Decker had just bent over the top bunk and threw up all over Cody.  I got up and put Cody in the shower and changed the sheets on their beds.  Got Decker a bucket.  I didn't want to take Cody to school, because that meant getting Kaylie up and taking sick Decker for a car ride. I asked Cody if he wanted to go to school today, hoping he would want to stay home.  He said he wanted to go because he didn't want to miss recess.  dang... at about 5 minutes to 9:00 I got the idea to ask for help, so I texted Candice Parker and Rachna. 
Scott Parker could swing by and get Cody and then Danielle Wheeler could pick him up at the end of the day.  A few minutes before Danielle was to drop Cody off at home, I was hurriedly cleaning up the living room,  Kaylie was in the kitchen.  As I was putting something away in the back room, I heard a cry and thought maybe Kaylie got her finger stuck in a drawer or bonked her head on the table....WORSE....she had tumbled down the stairs....7 steps....She was down on the landing bawling.  Awful mom for not putting up the gate and being prepared for something like this.  Danielle came in the midst of it.  and gave me some good advice...check the dilation of her eyes to see if they match when a light is shined in them. 

I called Pediatrix and they couldn't get her in until 3:30...it was now 12:45.  I nursed her with an ice pack between her face and me.  She fell asleep.  Then let her sleep in her crib for another hour or so. 
So we got all piled into the car to go to the Dr.  Decker with his bucket, Kaylie with her bruised forehead and Cody happy to go along for the ride.  The Dr that checked her out said she looked fine.  And reassured me that babies are very resilient and proceeded to tell me about her experiences in Hawaii. She worked on a military base and saw 3 cases of children falling out of windows because the screens weren't secured.  One of them was a 2nd story window and the babysitter didn't even notice until a passerby walking her dog knocked on her door with the baby in her arms. 
While we were at the Drs. office I thought since we were there and Kaylie needed her booster flu shot, could she get that right now?  Nurse came back in and Decker proceeded to put his hands over his ears.  He is very sensitive and doesn't like to hear Kaylie cry, or see the shots. 
Well as soon as the nurse gave her the shot and left the room, Decker threw up in his bucket.  Good thing we brought it.  There was a bathroom across the hallway, so he went and emptied it into the toilet and I rinsed it out.  Then we went on our way back home.
Mike and I had decided to have a little staycation the night before.  We reserved a hotel up in Lynnwood with our hotel points.  There was an Old Spaghetti Factory in the hotel's parking lot.  Everyone fell asleep in the 25 minute ride up to the hotel.  We put our name on the list at the restaurant and then proceeded to check ourselves in at the hotel....unbeknownst to the boys who still didn't know what we were doing.  We were seated in the trolley...best seat in the house...how lucky was that?!   You could tell Decker wasn't feeling the best at the Spaghetti Factory. as he was laying on dad's lap or on the bench.

  Decker ordered Alfredo which he loves, but he wasn't feeling very hungry...again bucket was by his side just in case.  We had a great dinner, but I was anxious that Decker might get sick and throw up again.  So we quickly ate and then made it back to the hotel.  When we walked in,  I showed the boys the POOL.  They then realized what we were doing...they were so excited.  So we ran up to our room and got our suits on.  Even Kaylie has a swimming suit.  ;) 

We sat in the sauna and the boys alternated back and forth from the pool to the hot tub. Kaylie had a nice little booty, since we couldn't find any swimming diapers.

After about an hour we went back up to the room for a cleansing bath.
We cooked up some popcorn in the microwave and watched some Harry Potter on the TV and some other high school musical type show.  

We had also brought  orange swirl vanilla ice cream and root beer to make rootbeer floats  which we did in the morning while watching the Good Dinosaur on my ipad.  We had breakfast downstairs in the lobby where pancakes were made at the push of a button.  I had my favorite cinnamon roll and sausage gravy over eggs, which Kaylie liked too.  We went swimming again

and enjoyed our melted ice cream milk shakes with a touch of rootbeer and Decker ate his alfredo leftovers.    So far no throw up on our staycation.  Yay!!  We checked out at noon and went home.  Cody had a birthday party to attend at Pump it UP in Kirkland and Decker hung out with dad .

 It was such a memorable weekend with the good and the bad.  

7 months old

Kaylie can sit up for a bit.  She can almost put herself up to sitting position.   When we put her in a sitting position, she sits up for awhile before toppling over.
She can scoot and sometimes goes backwards.  She can also do a little bit of an army crawl.  She started rocking on her knees this month.  Around the 27th, she would take 3 or 4 crawls and then falls to her tummy.
Naps: We finally got her on a schedule....we gave away the swing.  She takes a nap around 9:30, 1:30 and 6:00.  She takes short naps though.  Usually less than an hour.  I guess, since she sleeps 11 - 12 hours every night that she doesn't need as much day-time sleep.
Her favorite stuffed animal is a colorful caterpillar.
She is getting her 2 bottom teeth in. They came in mid January. She was fussy for a couple of days and then we could feel them with our fingers.
Her laugh reminds me of my short chuckles.
 When we went to Kaylie's 6 month check up, the Dr said to feed her everything and anything except honey and chunks that she can choke on.  I learned the hard way when she accidentally bit off a chunk of the pineapple that I was having her suck on.
She likes the Sweet potatoes.  We went to the Olive Garden and I shared my chicken gnocci soup with her.  She loved it.
We found out she likes Pizza sauce.  When we were over at Auntie K's, we dipped our fingers in the sauce and let her suck it off.  She is loving it!
We also made some broccoli soup at Cody's request.  Kaylie and I were the ones who ate it the most.
She likes spaghetti.
Cody discovered that now that Kaylie's neck is fairly stable, he likes to pick her up while he is standing and rock her back and forth.  He feels like such a big kid doing this with her and is very proud and asks me to watch him do it every time.  She does get a little heavy for him, so he can only do it for so long.  But it is really sweet.
The boys fight over how they make her laugh and are very possessive of "their ways and tricks" to make Kaylie belly laugh.  They don't like the other doing "their tricks".
Kaylie went to a movie with the girls.  We went and saw Brooklyn.  a well done movie about an Irish girl who sails to America and ends up in Brooklyn and falls in love with an Italian.
I didn't take pictures with her pink teddy bear this month. --didn't get around to it... But I took this picture on January 31st.  I love this little dress...we got it from a friend, and even though it is a 3 month dress, she wore it on Sunday....so cute with her headband.



 She's being reverent here saying the prayer.

Love this little ball of SUNSHINE!