Mama needs a nite out!

Thursday night the Studio Movie Grill in Addison hosted a Mom's night out to celebrate moms just before Mother's Day. A bunch of my PAMOM friends were going to be there but I didn't register so I wasn't able to come and was so bummed. We had started letting Craig practice with the babies and see if he could handle them. He was doing pretty good with them so I decided I needed a break from them. My first break from them (excluding church and school) since Craig's surgery. I called my friend Jennifer and she and a couple of other girls were at the movie grill. The movie hadn't started yet and she said they had a much lower turn out than expected and there was an empty seat next to her. So, I jumped in the car and headed over and got there just in time for the movie to start. Oh and Jennifer won like $800 worth of gift certificates! Lucky girl! Her company - Bounce U - was one of the sponsors for the event so I guess she deserved it but I still think she should have shared with us! ;) ;) Everybody received a goody bag of stuff with coupons, books, t-shirts, sweets and other fun stuff. Oh and we saw Ghosts of Girlfriends Past.

After the movie, we headed over to Fridays to have dessert and good conversation. It was a lot of fun and such a nice break for Mama!

Seeing triple?

We decided it had been a while since we had a playdate of multiples, so Jessica, Candice and I got all got together with our three sets of three. We went over to Jessica's for a little whip cream and pool party. My three weren't into the whole whip cream idea... not sure why - they love sweets. I think they were just extra clingy and nervous because we were in a different environment. Gotta get those kids out with other kids more! They may have also been a little over-stimulated... after all, there were 9 kids there!
How many kids can we fit into the pool????????



I am trying to get Whitney to sit at the table with the other kids and play with the redi whip.

April part 2 - 15 months

To finish off our month of April... Craig wasn't up to having our friends over last Friday due to his stomach bug thing. But, by the next day, he felt better so we had Craig's sister, Lisa over and her family. I don't think we've ever had them over as a family - hanging out and having dinner together as two couples. We cooked out and all 7 of the kids played and had a great time. Lisa's two older kids loved playing with Lacy (our dog) but the two younger kids warmed up to her eventually. Craig and Byron (Lisa's husband) took B & L's oldest son, Austin for a ride in Craig's hot rod and they had a great time. We had a delicious meal and really enjoyed ourselves.

The next day we were able to go to Craig's parent's church for baby day. This was the first time we've been to their church since we had the babies so that was fun to let all of their friends see the kiddos. We got their picture made and some of it was successful and some of it was not. The babies did fine in the nursery and I got a break! Yeah!! We finished off the service with a baby parade - the parents take all the kids across the stage and announce their kids names and ages. Then, all 18 of us went to Spring Creek Barbecue and had lunch - it was a lot of fun.

I had a couple of play dates scheduled this week but had to cancel them due to the rain and sick kids (not mine but my friends). Hopefully one of these days I can make it to my playgroup with my church.

This weekend we had one of my very good friends from high school over for dinner - Kelli, Jesse and their son Andy. I am so glad they moved back to Texas. We've gotten together a couple of times now since they moved back a year ago and I truly cherish her friendship. We didn't always keep in touch real often while she lived out of state for many years but we have kept in better touch now that they are back and living so close. Kelli and I have been friends since the 4th grade so we've been friends now for probably 23 years and I think that is just awesome! She is my oldest friend by far!

We are becoming quite the little entertainers these days - as we are having more friends over tonight. Some of Craig's friends this time. Well... they are my friends too but you know what I mean... We are looking forward to having them over and having another BBQ if it doesn't rain. Things have been so tough around here with Craig not being able to help much with the kids and it is hard to manage 3 babies out and about so we've been really living it up by having people over. We've never been big entertainers but we've enjoyed the entertaining we've recently been doing.

We already have several exciting things planned for May - play dates, adult socials, birthday parties, mother's day celebrations, church socials, school finals, book club outings, college graduation parties among other exciting things! Stay tuned... :)

Hannah is still our little "Riblet" - she is so tiny, it isn't even funny. She loves loves loves her fingers. This girl used to only suck her fingers when she slept or if she was upset but now she is beginning to suck her fingers a lot more frequently. Guess we'll have to cut those two fingers off! ;) She kind of slowed in the walking department but still walks some - I'd say probably 30% of the time. Hannah has 6 teeth now (4 on top and 2 on bottom) and her hair is growing like a weed. Yay! She took a break in the biting department and has recently picked the bad habit back up! Ugh! Hannah is loving stuffed animals now! Hannah's new best friend is her daddy - she loves to sit in his lap. With Craig being around so much more, any time he is in his chair, she wants to sit in his lap. She is melting her daddy's heart that's for sure. Hannah still wants to chew on everything - I figured she would be past this stage by now but not so much. Hannah is not really talking much - still just mostly baby babble.

These are pictures from the mall when we went a couple of weeks back. This girl will not sit up in her seat.

This was at home - having lasagna for dinner. Notice how the orange brings out the blue in her eyes??? Ha!We didn't even attempt to wash hands and face with a wash cloth this night - they all went straight to a bath.
This was a casual day around the house. Mommy was being silly dressing the girls.
Whitney is definitely filling out and getting a few little "baby fat roles" and "baby love handles". It is so cute! She has two new teeth - she now has 8 (4 on top and 4 on bottom). Whitney is learning how to use a regular sippy cup rather than the straw sippies. And I will be so glad when she gives them up all together - those things leak so bad (every kind I have). Whitney is developing a little stranger/separation anxiety again. Whitney's primary mode of transportation these days is walking on her knees. She still will not pull up or walk but at least she is moving past the crawling stage. She knows how to climb up on her push toy/riding car and is very close to being able to move herself while sitting on it. Isn't it strange that Whitney is the only one that can do this and she is also the only one that doesn't walk??? Oh and Tyler likes to push Whitney while she rides on the car. It is so cute. She is really starting to like dolls and stuffed animals. Whitney is not really talking much but she babbles in baby jargon a lot more than she used to.

Again at the mall...
The lasagna...


Being silly around the house...
Whitney is growing a mustache and beard. J/K - They had blueberries for breakfast.

Tyler is staying about the same weight-wise. He is still a nice little chunk! He has 8 teeth now too (4 on top and 4 on bottom). Tyler is going through stranger/separation anxiety the worst right now but he gets over it pretty quickly. Tyler slowed in the hitting department but has now picked up a new fun habit... whining, crying and squealing (at pitches so high only dogs can hear :)) almost all the time. It's making for some fun and loud times around our house! Ha! Tyler's primary mode of transportation is walking! That's right - he is walking probably 80% of the time or more. He is really good and rarely has bad falls. He can also walk really fast. He tries to put his shoes and socks on and it is so funny to watch! He is starting to associate shoes with going bye-bye. He brought me his shoes yesterday and wanted me to put him on him - I guess he wanted to go bye-bye! Tyler talks the most although, he doesn't say much either. He says mama and dada a lot more frequently than the girls and has occasionally said a few other words like buckle, yummy, tree, and dog.

The mall... getting ready to go.

He and Hannah wanted to see how messy they could get! Fun times!Casual days around the house...

Ready for bed with his paci and tiger!
All three are into the toddler tantrums - some more than others (Tyler & Hannah mostly). We tried switching to one nap a day a few weeks back but I could tell they just weren't ready. So, we'll try it again in another month probably and if they are closer to being ready, I'll push them to get them transitioned. I'm ready for the one nap so I can have more time to get out and do stuff in the morning (errands or play dates) and have a longer period to do chores etc. during a longer nap.

April...... Oh! April........

What an eventful month we've had! Where to begin....

We started the month off on a good note with our first Easter egg hunt/party as I previously mentioned in another post.

Just before Easter, we had a rather interesting "65th Birthday Party" for my mother. Not sure if it would actually be considered a birthday party without the birthday girl, but nonetheless, we had pizza and cake and celebrated..... my nephew's one month birthday instead!

As I also mentioned in the previous Easter post, we made it to church for Easter Sunday. The first we've been since Craig's surgery and the first time the babies have been in probably 6 months.

We had a couple of outings to the mall and are making an effort to get out more and be "normal". We were going to let the babies play in the kid's play area at the mall but it was closed for cleaning and didn't have time to wait for them to finish so we left. But we had a good time anyway getting out of the house and strolling around the mall.

Last weekend, we had our first official roadtrip with the babies. We went to East Texas to visit with some of Craig's family. It was a rather exhausting and short trip. The babies are still so small, it just isn't easy trying to travel especially without the help of Craig. We left the house early Saturday morning and headed to Longview. It rained pretty much the whole way there. I changed poopy diapers in the car while we stopped for a potty break because I didn't want to venture out in the rain. The babies cried and screamed almost the entire time and didn't nap a wink except the 15 minutes before we arrived. At some point on the road, I literally crawled all the way to the back of the car, climbing over the middle baby, to fetch the paci's. W & T don't ever use paci's unless they are sleeping in their beds so I didn't feel the need to have them up front with me. So, anyway, once we got there, I unloaded the babies and our stuff in the rain. Then, once I got their seats set up and got the babies fed, we sat down and had a nice lunch and I put the babies down to nap immediately after. They napped almost the entire time we were there which was a bummer since that was the sole reason we went was to allow Craig's relatives love on Jami's (Craig's mom) grandkids. They were just so tired and I knew they needed to nap but they got a little bit of time to hold them etc. before we had to leave. We left there about 4:30 and headed to Gladewater to go visit with Craig's uncle for a very short bit. Craig's uncle lives in a log cabin that Craig helped build and he has been wanting to show it to me for a long time as well as let Ben (Craig's uncle) see all the grandkids. We left there and the babies were fussy and hungry. We went to the local Dairy Queen and they didn't have enough high chairs to accomodate us so we drove on to the next town. That town didn't have any place to eat so we drove on... We passed several more towns before we found a Golden Chick with 2 high chairs so we unloaded the babies and brought in one of our own booster seats. We ate dinner and after that, we went to the car so I could change everybody's diaper and put pajamas on. By this time it was 8pm. We got on the road and Tyler fussed and screamed half the way home - they were awake the whole way home except for 30 minutes prior to arriving home at 10 or 10:30. It was good to meet his family and visit and see his uncle's cabin, I just think my kids were still too young for so much driving in one day.

This week, we took the babies to the gym for the first time and left them in the gym "kid's club". I've never been too comfortable with this but since the babies are getting older, I figured I would give it a shot - besides, I am getting desperate for some "me time". Craig's surgery was 4 weeks ago and my "me time" consists of me occasionally going into my bedroom to get away while Craig hangs out with the babies in the living room with nothing but one wall separating us. This is about the best we can do since he can't really watch them. This way, if something happens, he can just holler and I can come in and put out the fire. So, other than this "me time", I had one hour break Easter Sunday when we put the babies in the nursery and two nights a week when I go to school, which I don't really consider "me time". Anyway... back to the gym. The babies didn't do very well - they cried off and on the entire 30 minutes I exercised. There were probably 20 other kids in there too with only 3 adults so I am sure the babies were very overwhelmed. I wasn't a big fan of the "kid's club" because the baby section was tiny; the section for older kids was huge but the baby section was itty bitty. AND none of their toys worked because they don't keep up with the batteries! What the heck is that about? We probably won't be back until they are walking all the time and are able to play in the big area.

Then yesterday, we had a fun day of playdates at the mall and ER visits. Not the babies... it was Craig. I know.... you are really surprised right? Craig woke up yesterday early in the morning with diarrhea (I know... TMI) and it just progressively got worse. He started vomitting as well. It was getting close to time for me to go meet my friend at the mall and I asked Craig over and over if he wanted me to stay. He said no and told me to go. I think he wanted peace and quiet without 3 loud babies around more than he wanted me to take care of him. I called to check on him while I was gone and he said he was taking himself to the ER but he really wanted me to drive him but I couldn't get here quick enough for him and then what to do with the kids? I left the mall and began making phone calls trying to find somebody who could help me out with the kids. My SIL, Lisa came over and watched them for me so I could get up there and see what the heck was going on. THANK YOU SO MUCH, LISA! You were a life saver! When I got there, Craig told me his heart rate was well into the 200's, he had the chills and was dizzy. They started an IV and drew some blood and ran some tests. His white blood cell count was high so they said he probably had some type of infection but they wanted to do a cat scan just to make sure it wasn't something else. They checked abdomen, intestines and appendix. His intestines were inflamed but everything else looked good. They diagnosed him with a severe GI infection, gave him some meds and sent him home. He is feeling a little better but still not feeling very well at all.

We had a doctor's appointment this morning we had to cancel and we have some friends coming over tonight and we were going to BBQ on our new grill but we will probably have to cancel that too. We were also planning to go to church with his family for baby day this Sunday because whoever has the most visitors will be crowned baby king and baby queen and will get a pizza party afterwards. Plus, one of the church members is a photographer and is taking pictures of all the babies and we get a free group pic and one individual copy as a gift for mother's day. We were looking forward to all this but we may not be able to make it to that either.

I'll let you know how the rest of our weekend and month goes and I will do a post with more baby updates and pictures soon.

Happy April everybody!

Easter Weekend

The babies had their first Easter Egg hunt this year. We got together with some friends the weekend before Easter which turned out perfectly since the weather was so yukky on Easter weekend. The babies were still not sure about grass so they didn't do much in the way of picking up Easter eggs so I had to carry them around and put them in their baskets for them. They still enjoyed the experience and we had a great time!

Playing on the blanket
Let the egg hunt begin!
Hannah and I were twinkies.




We braved the weather and managed to make it to church Easter Sunday - the first time since Craig's surgery and the first time the babies have been since last Fall. They did great in the nursery for an hour, not sure how they will do for 2 hours. I was so busy getting everybody fed, dressed, loaded, unloaded, loaded and unloaded in and out of the car, undressed, fed and put down - I forgot to take our picture for Easter. We enjoyed being able to get back to church.

Ready, Set, Take off!

Just a couple of weeks ago, I blogged about Hannah taking her first steps. Since then, she has pretty much been taking only one step before falling... Until yesterday... Yesterday, she started taking 5 or 6 and sometimes more steps at a time. She is constantly getting up to walk - much to my surprise, she is walking more than Tyler. Tyler can take 8 or so steps at one time but he doesn't do it as often as Hannah does. Tyler would rather push his walker - he is really into that right now. Whitney is still not interested at all in standing, pulling up or walking. :) She'll get there, in her own time. We are just as proud of her for her accomplishments. She definitely is the best mimicker ever!

Midnight drama!

Last night I finally headed for bed around 11:45 and not but maybe 5 minutes after I got in bed, I heard this helicopter flying around. I could tell he was circling and I thought there had to be either a car accident of some sort or the police were searching for someone. We got up because we could see red and blue police lights shining in through our windows. We started looking out the windows and the police had stopped this big van directly in front of our house. They put the guy in handcuffs and into the back of the police car.

We kept watching and watching as more and more police showed up. The helicopter kept circling with his spotlight shining down on our neighborhood. We see police cars going up and down the next street over and we saw policemen on foot running up and down the streets. By this point, I was pretty nervous. We continued to watch as the police officers began walking up the street with the drug dog. More and more police continued showing up and they continued to go through the van and pulling out various things - drug paraphernalia no doubt.

Finally Craig went out there to see what was going on because it was evident that they were still searching for somebody. The police man told Craig they chased this van down because they were busted in the middle of a drug deal. When the van stopped, 4 guys took off running. At that point the police man said they had 3 of the guys in custody but one was still on foot. Craig came back in and we continued to watch out the window.

Finally the helicopter left and that was a huge relief because we knew they must have caught the guy. Then a few other police officers showed up again and they stood out there talking discussing the whole fiasco for a few minutes before leaving. The wrecker showed up and hauled off the van and it was finally quiet again around our house. I was still so nervous, I decided to sleep on the couch for a while next to Craig in his recliner (his new bed, post-surgery). It was probably 2 a.m. before I finally fell asleep. So, needless to say, I am exhausted today!

Our neighborhood has had a few incidents involving the police in the 5 years we've lived here but never anything close to this level. I'm just glad they caught the guys and hopefully nobody was hurt. So, for my friends who live close by me, if you saw any of this, now you know what happened if you didn't already.