Getting In Some Gigi Time

As you may have noticed, this blog was on a hiatus last week.  My mom popped in starting a week ago Wednesday night (the 14th) to spend five days with us.  We hadn't seen her since Christmas so the anticipation was at an all time high when I picked her up at the airport.  The girls had just gotten home from Adventurers with Grandma when we arrived back.  The three of them would be roommates for the duration of her visit.

They fell asleep on Gigi's blow up mattress the first night.

We very much enjoyed her company, as usual.  Thursday morning she got to see Brady and the progress he's made in the last three months.  Not sure if he's much bigger but at least he's progressing with skills such as crawling and other milestones like two teeth (second bottom is now in).  That morning while she was with the kids, I zipped over to McAbee Vet to pick up Dewey's ashes which we will take to Nova Scotia like we did with Marlee's (I guess it was providential we were too lazy to do anything with Marlee's up there last year).  The girls are still very nonchalant about the whole thing and pretty much tell anyone who will listen that Dewey died (as they did to a random person at a yard sale today who had quite a befuddled look on her face).  Maybe this seems weird but I had taken a picture of him when I got to the vet that last time.  I wasn't sure if I would want it but I figured it was better to have it and then decide if I wanted it then to not have it at all.  In the end, I showed it to the girls just to show them that being dead was like sleeping.  It wasn't anything to be afraid of.  Then when Jesus comes, we would wake up and go to heaven.  After I got home, I put the bag with the ashes box on the stairs to take up with me (now I sound a little nonchalant!) on the next trip.  Some time later, Aubree passed it on her way up and announced, "There's Dewey, sleeping on the stairs."

Later that morning, we took a nice picnic lunch to Trotwood Park where Aunt Shirley met us with her new puppy, Casey.  I guess her name is Casey Casey.  Reminds me of those people who name their kids, Phillip Phillips (I think there was a guy named that on American Idol this year...not that I'm watching it).  Anyway, we had a nice visit with the both of them.  She did a little trivia game with Calleigh where she asked Calleigh questions like "Who are your mom's brothers?"  Every time she got one right, she got a dime.  At the end, she had a whole $1.10 and she seemed very pleased with herself.

A picture to show off his two teeth

Playing with Aunt Shirley's dog, Casey, as Shih Tzu.

Friday morning we went to a couple of yard sales before heading to the big Just Between Friends consignment sale in Altamonte.  I didn't find a whole lot at the yard sales but did have an "imagine that" experience.  I was browsing at one spot while my mom and the kids were in the van.  Two older ladies were standing in the garage talking.  I heard one of them say to the other "Where did you go to school?"  The other lady replied, "SLA."  I wasn't sure if I heard her right but then she said it again.  I went up to them and said "You aren't going to believe this but I went to SLA too."  Her maiden name was Blood and lived right across the street from the school.  They asked me my maiden name and when I told them, the first lady said, "I went to school with a Billy Brace and a Dick Brace."  Sure enough, she had gone to GBA with my dad.  She was Shirley Videon (sp?) at the time.  She said my dad was pretty quiet and she couldn't believe he had become a pastor.  I suppose there is a fairly good sized Adventist community around these parts but still, you sure don't expect to randomly run into people who went to school with your dad especially when you're 1200 miles away.

Trying out the toys at the consignment sale.  Brady is in the background.

Friday evening we had David, Yully, Aunt Wanda, Ron and Elaine over for supper.  Have I mentioned that one of the things that I most look forward to with having older kids is being able to sit down and have a peaceful meal?  As it was, the girls had to be excused half way through. Terrible, terrible. I swear people probably think these kids just run wild over here.  Once they were eventually in bed, we at least got to enjoy some quiet time and get caught up with David and Yully.

Yully brought fondue for dessert.

When my mom had gotten back from the groceries that afternoon, we made a discovery that someone had hit into the side of our van.  Duncan actually had noticed it.  My mom knew nothing about it from going to the market or Publix so we have no idea when it exactly had happened.  I figured it was probably karma that someone hit into it while she was in the market since that is where I had hit that lady.  It doesn't look too pretty but I don't know that I'm going to want to pay for it to be fixed.  We'll see.  So nice of people to hit you and just go.

Please ignore the bright light above the scratch.  That's what I get for taking a picture of it at night.

After naps on Sabbath, it was time for our big trip....to Kissimmee!!  We always like to go somewhere when my mother is here but we weren't up for going too far.  We were thinking the ocean/gulf wasn't quite warm enough yet to fully enjoy so we opted for a resort that had some heated pools.  We got a two-bedroom townhouse at a place called the Fantasy World Resort. I thought the accommodations were very nice and the pool, lazy river ride, and splash playground were great.  There were two big slides there but it turned out you had to be 48 inches to go on it so that didn't work out but Calleigh got over it quickly.  It was nice because the pool was one of those pools that gradually get deeper like a beach so Brady was able to play in the shallow part...which he very much enjoyed.  He kept contemplating crawling in deeper and we had to contain him a few times.  We stayed over Saturday and Sunday nights.  Most of the time was spent in the water which suited the girls (my mother included) just fine.  The girls had no nap on Sunday and by the time we got home on Monday around lunch time, I could tell they were getting pretty tired.  Don't you just love that...your kids have so much fun that they can barely stay awake?  In fact, Aubree had woken up from her nap after a good two hours and came to the top of the stairs to tell us she was awake.  Before I could go up there, I heard her feet patting around upstairs and then quiet.  A few minutes later and I went up to get her and found her lying in front of Brady's closet door, sound asleep again.  Now that's tired.  Monday evening Duncan took her to the airport and so ended our five great days with Gigi.  We can't wait until June to see her again!

Brady loved the water!

Forgetting the bib at home = costly.  What a mess!

Sleeping in front of Brady's closet door.

That has been the highlight of the last two weeks but of course, we've been up to a few other things here and there.  One of the big things was a little adventure down to I-Drive that Duncan and I took almost two Saturday nights ago.  I had gotten some Maggiano's gift cards for my birthday so I figured it would be a great time to redeem them by continuing Duncan's birthday celebration.  Allen & Tangie and Bruce & Jennifer met up with us down there so we had a nice couples only night out.  I was a major bonehead and didn't think to make reservations until late that afternoon and so we didn't get seated until around 9:00 (as opposed to the 8:15 I wanted).  The time just flies by when you're eating (and eating and eating and eating) and gossiping...err, discussing current events (and in the case of Duncan and Allen, making inappropriate jokes).  By the time we got out of there it was 11:30 and we were basically the last ones to go.  It's hard to end the evening when you're having such a good time.  But in our defense, things just don't move very quickly when you're having the family style, all you can eat, type meal.  I'm already looking forward to the next night out...

That night was the time change so it was a rather short night.  Although, if you really think about it, it's not.  We always say you'll lose an hour of sleep but unless you have somewhere you have to be at an early hour on Sunday morning, you still sleep to the same time you normally would, it's just an hour later on the clock when you wake up than it usually is.  So really, you're losing an hour of your day.  But I digress.  When we were on our way home Saturday night, we had scratched First Watch (almost unheard of!) so we could have a more leisurely start to the day.  Later in the morning, it was off to SeaWorld to celebrate Braelyn's fifth birthday.  Unfortunately, Mother Nature decided not to be kind and it rained pretty heavily for the duration of our time.  No matter, though!  The girls had on their raincoats and we had our umbrellas.  The beauty of it was that it wasn't cold and we know we could just go home and change afterwards if we were wet.  We did have a nice time watching a show and having pizza and birthday Oreo's.  I say we made a memory because we'll always say "Hey, remember that time we went to SeaWorld for Braelyn's birthday and it was pouring?"  Now that I think about it, last year for her birthday, we were doing crafts outside at her house and it was really windy.  My suggestion is that they do her birthday each year with a different weather theme.  I vote for snow next year.  Ha!

Note Brady tucked in his coat in the Bjorn

The girl table

The boy table.  Note the disparity.  Glad we're getting another girl to help even things out!

The birthday girl with her frosted birthday Oreo.

 

The time change did not affect her going to bed Sunday night.  Gotta love SeaWorld.

This week had been pretty ho-hum since getting back from "vacation" on Monday.  Both Wednesday morning and this morning, we went to the other semi-annual consignment sale, Boutique for a Week.  It was considerably smaller than the one back in September so I didn't find as much as I had hoped but it was still fairly good.  The yard sales have been a real drag so far this year. I don't know if people just aren't selling their kids' clothes at yard sales as much or what but they've been much fewer and further between.

One of the sales this morning was at least selling cupcakes much to Aubs' delight.

Yesterday morning we went to David's Bridal so I could try on and order my bridesmaid dress for Ricky's wedding.  I was hoping for a quick in and out and it started that way but then there was a little mix up on which was the correct dress and in the end, we were there for much longer than I had anticipated.  The kids were getting just a little wild with Calleigh trying on every headband and bracelet on display and fondling every booby bra (as she calls them) she came across.  Aubree spent the time trying to steal Brady's snacks which resemble cheese puffs.  I'm not saying she was getting violent over it but at one point, Brady was sporting a bloody lip.  The lady trying to help me with everything kept saying, "Wow, I really admire you coming in here with three kids."  But really, I think she thinking, "Man, you're pretty dumb to come in here with them and look at all these cracker crumbs I'm going to have to clean up after you're gone."  Finally, everything got squared away and that was that.

We did manage to get in a little fun at the playground afterwards.

In other news, this time change has actually been a real blessing.  It's worked out just as I had imagined it would.  Brady is going to bed at the same time, around 8:30, but waking up as if it's the old time which used to be 6:15 but is now 7:15.  He's doing that virtually every morning.  So much nicer!  Of course, I don't know if it's partly because he's just more tired from crawling around which he does with great gusto now.  Honestly, it's been so great now that he crawls.  It's funny how people will make comments like "Watch out" when they hear you talking about your kid crawling or walking as if you'll be sorry that he is now mobile.  But it expands their whole world and you don't have to worry about keeping them entertained in that little tiny sitting space.  Now they can just crawl to a broom on the floor and be engrossed in that for a good 10 minutes.  Sure, it has it's moments like when he yanks down a blind, but we can deal with it!

So, I did something last week that I have never done before.  I bought formula.  After a particularly short nursing session last week in which I couldn't fathom that he was possibly on there long enough, I came to the realization that I should just try and give him some formula to try and fatten him up a little.  As a proud nursing mother, you can't help but feel just slightly defeated when you have to bring in reinforcements.  I know that's really an unreasonable way to think of it but I can't help it.  But in reality, it was a lot easier to take this step with Brady than I'm sure it would have been with say, Calleigh.  Things just don't phase you as much now.  Anyway, one day last week found me in Walmart staring at the vast display of formulas.  I didn't have a clue.  I knew that I wanted to try a soy based one.  I eventually chose two different brands and bought the smallest containers I could find since I didn't know how positively it would be received.  It turns out, it wasn't positive at all.  I would say about 98% of it got dumped down the drain.  In my cluelessness, I didn't buy the powder but the ready made ones that can just go directly into the bottle.  Those kinds have to be dumped within 48 hours of opening.  A rookie mistake.  So yeah, Brady had virtually no interest in it.  I nursed him and then gave him the bottle.  He took maybe a tiny sip or two and then started chewing on the nipple.  I didn't get the impression that he didn't like it since he made no face.  He just didn't seem hungry. Maybe he's getting more than I think or just has a small appetite.  I don't know.  What I do know is that the great formula experiment of 2012 may be shelved before it even really started.

On the plus side, he is eating well at meals.  He's mostly eating regular food now although it's funny because he'll start eating and then sometimes he'll start screeching like he's unhappy and stop eating.  Then, if you start feeding him some baby food, he'll immediately start eating the regular food again and he's happy.  I'm not sure what the meaning of that is but I'm hoping we get past that pretty quickly.

On another front, we learned a costly lesson this week with our a/c.  Do you know that when they tell you to change your air filter periodically that it's actually a good idea to do that?  Umm yeah, so we apparently didn't really keep up with that suggestion.  Our a/c was blowing on Monday night but no cold air was really coming out.  Duncan got a referral for a guy from our church who came out Tuesday morning and showed me the nasty air filter that he removed.  It was so old and bad that gunk had gotten into the the a/c unit and caused it to stop blowing cold air.  The guy cleaned it out as best he could and $189 later, we have cold air again.  He says that we should really remove the whole unit so they can take it outside and pressure wash it to get every last bit cleaned up.  Until we do that, the unit is not working at it's most efficient.  We'll see when we want to spring for that though.  In the meantime, Duncan has instructed Siri to remind him to change it out.  I knew Siri would come in handy for something.

In closing, here are a couple of cute things.  The first was when we were in Publix recently and for the life of me I couldn't find some whole grain, long grain rice.  I stood there looking up and down from side to side.  Aubree must have seen my frustration because she asked what I was doing.  I told her that I couldn't find the rice so she says, "We should say a prayer to Jesus to help us find it." And right there, she proceeded to pray.  The lady standing next to me got a chuckle out of that one.  Incidentally, I never did find the rice. I  suppose that could have been a good opportunity to explain that the answer to our prayers isn't always the one we want.

With Calleigh, I've been noticing how sometimes she won't quite get the word she's looking for which results in some funny comments:

Calleigh:  "Remember when you ate that English muffin and your queen came out?"
Me: (completely befuddled for a moment): "Huh?"
Calleigh: "Remember, it popped out when you took a bite."
Me: "Ohhhhh, you mean my CROWN?"

Calleigh: "Does the word 'fair' mean something else?"
Me: "What do you mean"
Calleigh: "Well, you know how a word can be one thing and then it can be another thing.  You know, like...(thinks for a second) a bus of fish."  
Me: "A bus of fish?" Then I got it.  "Do you mean, a SCHOOL of fish?"
Calleigh: "Yeah, a school of fish."

Well, I think that catches everything up from the last few weeks.  I'll end with a few closing pictures.  Have a Happy Sabbath!

Finally got our new table.  Yup, the original one we looked at from Ikea.

Trying on my shoes.

I had gotten this animal book at a yard sale and was/is Calleigh obsessed with it.  She insisted on bringing it on a nature walk to see if they could find anything from the book on the walk.