Picture Time!

American Greetings

So I'm officially employed now! The job pretty much found me since I didn't even know there was such a position as a "greeting card merchandiser". I had never actually thought about who was responsible for putting out and taken down greeting cards, now you know it is someone employed for the companies like Hallmark or American Greetings. The job is ideal for those wanting a flexible schedule and part time work and I am grateful for the friends I have who helped me get this position!

It's crazy to think I haven't worked outside the home in over four years! I was really rusty when it came to the interview questions and I am so shocked I actually got hired. I had one particular question that cracked me up, "How did you prepare yourself for this interview?" I wanted to say "I took a shower and got dressed"... I didn't actually say it but I couldn't help but think how funny it would have been if I did, so I started laughing and I was sure he thought I was out of my mind. The rest of the interview questions weren't any better than the first but I was at least able to answer them. Maybe next time I should prepare myself for an interview by practicing answers to stupid questions. Anyhow I start next week!

-C

Rainy days in SC

Yesterday went from hot and muggy to a frigid 68 and rainy, so loaded the kids up and headed to Columbia children's museum. Giant boy statue, fire station and water works made for a fun way to kill a rainy day.

Chrissy's mom called to let her know that she found a letter of admission into the nursing program at NCU Colorado from Nov 2003. So Chrissy spent a lot of time crying yesterday. Kind of like finding an 8 year old lottery ticket you can't cash. I guess some things happen in life that we are just incapable of understanding.

But hey, today is a new day. We have Easter eggs to dye, and nobody has ever had any luck trying to change the past so now we focus on the future:)

-Z

Jaxon's B-Day

Well, yesterday was little jack jack's real birthday. He started the terrible two's a couple weeks ago though and I don't know if we are ready for this or not:) Took the fam out to china buffet to celebrate and then came home to play in the sprinkler. It has started warming up here so even the sprinkler feels nice. It is raining today though so is a bit cooler. Still nice enough though that the kids are out rolling in mud puddles right now.

-Z

It was the terrible twos

This weekend we celebrated Jaxon's second birthday a little early, tomorrow he actually be two. We had two parties the same day, one was in the morning at Chuck-E-Cheese with just family including Uncle Chad :) and Jaxon's future girl friend Chloee and later on had a second party at our home with our "Air Force family".

Jaxon was such a turd that day, I don't know if he just didn't like being in the limelight or if it was the terrible two's starting a week early but holy cow he was unhappy. The whole day the lyrics "it's my party and I'll cry if I want to" rang through my head. He did NOT want to open gifts, he did NOT want to sit by his cake and blow out the candles, he did NOT want to be bothered. His sisters were more than happy to open his gifts for him. Mikayla even went as far as jumping up and down and screaming when she opened a movie he had gotten. At least someone was excited! He eventually warmed up to his gifts and at Chuck-E-Cheese refused to let go of his dino puzzle and at home refused to give up his cars laptop and ended up holding it while blowing out his candles. I just wish I hadn't gone through all the trouble to throw him two parties when he didn't want them. Maybe next year we will do a little less.

-C

belated

I am horrible about finding time to blog. I meant to blog right after the girls birthday party but that obviously didn't happen. Jaxon has his own birthday party coming up this weekend, I can't believe he is going to be two! I'll post pictures now and pretend that I haven't waited two months to post :)

Didn't see that coming

My children are fearless and a lot of times they end up doing stupid things that I can only imagine might require an emergency room visit but Monday night was like any typical boring evening so the fact that I ended up waiting 3 hours in the ER with Kaitlyn so they could staple her head took me by surprise.

I'm not positive how it for sure happened but when I looked over Kaitlyn had tripped and fallen backwards onto a little dollhouse. I thought maybe she had hurt her back and picked her up to give her a hug when I noticed blood running down her face and shoulder. Head wounds bleed a lot and since I couldn't see how bad it was I ran her to the shower to clean her up, after finding the wound I knew it would need stitches. While I ran to get stuff for the hospital Zach was doing his own doctoring he managed to stick a band-aid into her wet hair, not the brightest idea because it was extremely taxing and painful for her when I had to pull it out. He also came up with a brilliant idea to wrap her head but since we didn't have any medical tape he thought he would wrap her head with party streamers LOL really?! I put my foot down insisting that the streamer would turn to mush on wet hair and I really didn't want people to laugh at her when entering the ER.

After waiting hours she finally got a room and they determined that one staple would be enough to shut the wound. It looks really gruesome but at least now I know I don't have a weak stomach because I'm sure this wont be the last time one of my kids get hurt.

sick again

I believe the stomach bug should only be allowed to hit any household once a year if at all. This has been the second time in less than two months and with two down and three to go I know I'm going to be the next victim. I don't do well with lack of sleep but I'm going on three nights now and I'm not a ray of sunshine without my beauty rest! Hopefully Zach will be able to tolerate me the next few days. I almost feel sorry for him but he changed his schedule at work two weeks ago to work from midnight to 8 am and I believe this is his karma HA.

While on the topic of Zach he has me worried lately. He has not had feeling in the tops and sides of both feet going on four days now. He says its like your foot has fallen asleep but never wakes up. After 24 hours he went to see his doctor who is baffled and scheduled lab work which we find out the results tomorrow. If the results come back normal the next step will be to see a neurologist. The doctors biggest concern is either diabetes or nerve damage but it could be a number of things. Lets hope for the best!

Boycott Base Gym

The military is renowned for rules and I'm all about rules and following them but sometimes I really want to slap people!

Today Zach wanted to drop the kids off at the new daycare center in our base gym while he went to run 12 miles for his marathon training. I no longer live on base and with the one vehicle I didn't want to sit in the car for an hour so I thought I would just go in and sit with the kids. However, I was clearly mistaken that I would be allowed to sit and watch my own children, nope not allowed. Fine... I would go to the Library on base but as I was leaving I was told that since both Zach and I were not exercising I was not allowed to leave the children, um WHAT?! So the kids get kicked out and Zach still needing to exercise decides we should all go upstairs into this empty room that WE have all used together hundreds of times. The lady follows us and tells us that the room is not allowed for children and that the exercise balls could harm them, REALLY!!!!? So yes, we got kicked out of the base gym today. The boycott begins indefinitely! I knew I hated the gym for a reason.

Hello again

So you know it's been too long when you have forgotten your own blogs website and password :) I really envy those who are able to keep up with their lives online. My goal for the rest of this year is to continue updating my site, mostly for my own sake it seems days, months, years are passing by faster than I can keep up and I'm losing my most precious memories by not jotting them down.

The twins will be four next month and I'm already starting their Pre-K (preschool) applications for this fall. They are growing up way too fast and at times I'm shocked at the things that come out of their mouths. I want them to stay little but at the same time I am ready for more freedom. Yesterday they had their first sleep over, normally I wouldn't allow it but the family they stayed with are the closest thing we have to family around here and I knew they would be in good hands. We took Jaxon on our little date night and for the first time I got to see what life would have been like with only one child, it was too easy! Even though the three of them make life so chaotic at times I wouldn't change it for the world.

Sweet Grandma Rita

Happy April Fool's day!! So glad to see that Grandma is keeping up with the latest fashion trends! Accessories are a must!!! Love you Grandma!

more pics

The first picture is totally random but cracks me up everytime I see it. The other two are just too sweet not to share!

Jaxon

its been awhile

So I feel horrible that it has been two months since I last blogged about my family but so much has been going on! Jaxon was born April 21st and is an amazing baby!!! He sleeps really well at night and has a consistent schedule of getting up every 3 to 4 hours and only stays up for 30 minutes. I still feel exhausted but I think it's because it has been over a month since I've slept through the night. It amuses me that Zach wakes up looking just a tired as me but hasn't had to get up with the baby. I think it is because when he is awake he is going 100 mph and doesn't stop until his head hits the pillow. It seems his life goal is to make sure his family is happy and relaxed before he thinks about himself. I feel like since Jaxon was born he has taken on so much with working, the kids and the house that he really needs a vacation!

I'm sure people are wondering how the girls have been since the baby has come home and honestly they know there is a baby around but they pay little attention to him since they have each other to play with. Right now both girls are starting to potty train and it is so crazy because once one girl announces she has to go potty the other one does too! So of course both girls end up taking off their diaper and are running around bottomless as I frantically run after them trying to get them to the toilet before they pee on the floor! It's exhausting but I'm glad they are starting to figure it out. Along with potty training their new favorite thing to do is swim!!

The pool opened this weekend and we have gone there everyday so far! The girls love jumping off the side of the pool! They both wear life jackets which are great because Mikayla has already learned how to keep herself up right and can swim on her own! That little girl scares me to death, she is a dare devil!!! For some reason jumping off things has become her new favorite thing, I've seen her jump to her dad off tables, couches, bridges, swing sets you name it she will jump and I'm talking sometimes over 7 or 8 feet off the ground! Her jump isn't normal either its a straight free fall so it looks like she is skydiving off things. Well this weekend we were at a friends house and she decided she wanted to jump off their chaise, after doing it a few times she decides to free fall to the floor. Hello talk about a painful belly flop! All of us around her couldn't help but start laughing I mean what did she think was going to happen? Surprisingly she didn't even cry, she saw us laughing and wanted to do it again so we threw some pillows down to soften her fall. How do you stop a kid from being so daring?

weekend pics

We took the girls to the park this weekend and Zach was so proud of their floral outfits hahaha. I was the odd man out that is why I have no pics of me. The girls love their dad and I have so much fun just sitting back and watching them interact. Kaitlyn is wearing pink, Mikayla green. For some reason Kaitlyn wont wear her hat unless it is so far down she has to tilt her head back to see, silly girl.

Fishing

We took the girls fishing this weekend since the weather has been extremely nice! Everyday it has been somewhere in the 80's and the girls are constantly telling me "HOT". We didn't actually put a hook on the line we just let them cast it out and reel it back in. Both girls loved it and were surprisingly really good at reeling it back in. Zach and I helped with the casting but I'm not sure we were much help since Zach accidentally threw Kaitlyn's fishing pole into the water, I about peed my pants and poor Kaitlyn started crying not understanding why he did that. No worries we saved the pole, but the trip ended when Zach stepped in a fire ant mound and both of us started getting eaten alive. I swear those buggers are mean!

Bored

So I should be sleeping right now because I will be exhausted come morning but what is new? Zach has only been gone a week and I have three more weeks to go. This has probably been one of the most challenging times spent apart. Being 7 months pregnant I really have no energy right now and the girls want to be entertained every minute. I miss having Zach around because they are able to hang all over him :) I'm posting pictures of the girls from this week. I have been trying different activities and their favorite so far is playing with markers, thank goodness they are washable!!!! Wish me luck for the remaining 3 weeks I just hope I can keep them busy.

Mikayla top, Kaitlyn bottom. I swear I dont let them put it on their face they are just sneaky!

missing Zach

These pics were taken a couple weeks ago I thought they were cute. The girls have way too much fun with their dad. Don't think he is torturing them by picking them up by their overalls they LOVE it, they think they are flying :) We sure do miss having him around right now.

more pictures

The girls HATE getting there picture taken, they refuse to look at the camera because of the flash so I thought I would take them out to the park last night and try there. I wanted the pictures to look somewhat winterish so I put there heavy coats on even though it was still 70 degrees when the sun went down. Poor girls, at least they had fun!

Christmas lights

These were taken at Swan lake here in town. They are so pretty and the girls just love going there.