Picture Wednesday

I have to start this post by saying how much I love blogging.  I love that I can journal in a quick and easy way that doesn't feel overwhelming to me.  I can document my little family life in as much detail as I want, with pictures!  And I can write about my thoughts, my hopes, my concerns, and my insanely frustrating moments, and having written them down, they feel better.  Lighter.  Dealt with somehow.  I'm able to package them up in my mind and not worry about having to remember the sweet moments I never want to forget because I've written them down.  I'm also able to laugh about the crazy moments because I get to take a step back as I record them and realize, they were pretty darn funny.

And one more thing I love about blogging: it helps me feel connected to all of my friends and family who read it.  It's an instant help line when I post something I'm struggling with.  And I absolutely love that.  I don't see many of my extended family members often and I love that through blogging I can keep up with what they're doing, and they can keep up with my family too.  And they can give me support and advice when I need it most because they know just what I'm going through by checking my blog once in a while.  Thanks so much for all the supportive comments.  Seriously, it's so great to hear, from several people, that my little guy is not losing his mind.  He's just 3 and a lot of other people have the same problems with their kiddos.  I really appreciated all the sweet comments and even a phone call from my mother-in-law today with some great tips of what she did to help Glenn through the same stuff.  Turns out Glenn used to be a super stress case, and now look at him.  There aren't many people more laid back than my honey.  So, odds are that Tate will not always be a total nutcase every time he has to decide anything.  That's great news.  I know he's going to be fine.  But it's sometimes hard to know that in the moment, when he's screaming at me, or peeing on me.  So many good stories in this phase and thanks to this here blog, I'll record them all.  Dear me.  Thanks everyone.  I sure love you.

Aaaaand without further ado, here's picture Wednesday.  The boys and I braved an outing to the children's museum tonight with some of our dear friends from Austin who just moved here.  (The evening deserves a post of its' own but that will have to wait.  I'm tired.)  I had Janelle take a picture of Finn and I.  I can probably count on one hand the number of pictures of me that have been taken since Finny was born so I figured we should make it happen this week.  Let it be known that I exist and love my boys.  Here is a bit of photographic evidence.

Little Finn at 27 weeks old.

We had his 6 month appointment today. He did great for his shots.  So many shots in those poor squishy thighs.  He beamed at the nurse as she came in with her tray of shots and she said, "Oh I wish he wouldn't be so happy to see me.  It makes my job much harder!"  Sorry, that's just the kind of kid he is.

Here are his 6 month stats:

Height: 26.5, 50th percentile

Weight: 18 lbs, 50th percentile

I was pretty surprised by his percentiles and decided, yet again, to put very little stock in them.  I love my chunky little baby.  It's going to be really sad when he starts crawling soon and starts to thin out.  I could squish his squishy parts all day long.

Wow

A tantrum morning for the record books.  Here are the highlights:

• Angry that I couldn't get him gold fish "right now, right now!" because I was feeding Finn.
• Angry that he was put on time out on the stairs instead of the chair.  "I want to go to time out on the chair!"
• Getting in the car to go to a swimming pool to meet my visiting teachers for our monthly visit.  I asked him to hurry and get in his car seat (he was moving very slowly).  Then I asked if he wanted me to help him and he said yes.  So I helped him.  Then he yelled and cried all the way to the pool because he changed his mind and didn't want help.  "I want to do it by myself.  Get me back down.  I do not want help."
• Swimming at the pool was fine...until it was time to go.  Lots of screaming because he didn't want to go yet.  Time out, followed by one of those amazing blood curdling screams.  I bopped his lips and told him not to make that awful noise.  Then he started screaming, "My mom hit my mouth!" over and over.  Lots of folks staring at this point.
• He calmed down after a while and we started to walk out then he changed his mind and started to run away from me around the pool.  I chased him down and put him back on time out.  
• My visiting teachers came over to help me get out to the car.  One of them pushed Finn in the stroller while I carried Tate.  Tate starts yelling, "She's stealing my baby!"  
• No, Tate.  She's not stealing him, she's helping me because you've lost your temper.  "I want my temper back!  Get me my temper back!"  
• I explained to Tate that losing your temper means that you're angry and frustrated.  Didn't matter.  He still wanted it back!  So do I, Tate.  So do I.  
• Aaaaand then he had an accident.  All down my side.  He was soaked and upset that his flip flops were wet.  "There's pee on my flip flops.  I want them to be clean!"  Seriously, when I started to feel warm down my side I just put him down and doubled over laughing thinking, "you must be kidding me."

Good times, this morning.  Good times.  Funny thing is, we got home and had lunch and stories without an incident.  He was fine again.  Of course, right now he's refusing his nap and yelling in his bed.  But there was a normal moment in there for a bit.  Please bless this is just a crazy crazy phase.  And also that it will pass very soon.  Glenn's gone for a few days and I'm not sure what he's going to come back to.  He really was pretty great for a three year old until 2 weeks ago.  Where did my little sweetheart boy go?  I want him back.

Picture Wednesday, a quick trip, and tantrums

Little Finn at 26 weeks old.

Glenn just started playing with a Summer Men's Lacrosse league and gets to play games every Wednesday night.  It's not as easy as it used to be to actually watch Glenn play.  There are two very distracting little boys along for the ride now, but we still have a great time.  It's good for the boys to watch Glenn play and they have a lot of fun too.  Finn was happy just rolling around and smiling at all the other kids, although he lost his pants to his second pooplosion of the day right after we arrived.

Tate had fun watching Toy Story on the DVD player another family brought.

Finn turns 6 months old this week.  How on earth did that happen?  It's entirely unfair that I should have such a sweet, happy baby who grows up so fast!  I don't think I'd mind near as much if he were ornery, mean, or really horribly ugly.  Maybe then I'd actually hope he'd grow up so those things would change, but alas, he's a little doll and he still insists on growing.
This past weekend we drove to Utah for the first of what I imagine will be many many times.  The drive was actually not as bad as I imagined.  I'm not terribly fond of long drives to begin with, throw in the two kids and I was sure it would be a nightmare.  But, in spite of poor Tate vomiting just once in the car each way, it was not a terrible experience.  I wonder if Tate gets car sick.  You'd think if he was car sick he'd throw up the entire time and not just once.  Poor kiddo.  He was very sad both times.  Huffing and sobbing in his car seat as we tried to pull the car over and saying over and over, "Please make me feel better!"  He's very sweet and sad when he's sick.
The reason for the quick weekend trip was that Glenn's little boy's lacrosse team was playing in a tournament in Park City and he wanted to go.  So the boys and I camped out at Nanna's and played with Kenzie,

swam with Nanna,

checked out a great new splash pad,

and of course enjoyed stories from Grampa.  We had a good time and are glad we went even though it was a fast trip.
It's been a rough week for Tate.  All I can do is hope that it's just a phase.  It was nice to have my mom around to witness some of the fits and laugh with me because sometimes it's hard to laugh when I'm facing several days of being patient and dealing with it alone because Glenn's out of town or busy with work and lacrosse.  It started a week and a half ago when the boys and I went to a farmer's market and I let Tate pick a cookie from a bakery stand.  He told the lady he wanted the pink cookie and as soon as he had the bag in hand he decided he wanted the green one.  I told him it was too late and that the pink cookie would be delicious.  All the way home, all through lunch and a few time out breaks he absolutely lost it.  Screamed, sobbed, and shouted for 45 minutes about how he made the wrong choice.    "I want the green cookie!  Mom, can we please go back and get it!"  He took a nap and woke up still fighting for control when he thought about the cookie that he might have had.  Seriously, kid?  You still got a cookie out of this deal.  What are you crying about?  And since then, about once a day he has an absolute melt down about some decision.  Chocolate milk or OJ?  Little Einsteins or Wild Kratts?  Peanut butter and honey or Mac and Cheese?  He goes back and forth over and over and completely loses it.  He has to sit on time out more than once while he tries to calm down and even then he never seems to reach a resolution.  I've tried through the 2 year old stage to let him have some choices.  It seemed to help him feel more in control but lately it's like he cannot handle the possibility of making a choice he might regret so he goes back and forth and completely wigs out.  Maybe I should just decide everything for him for a while. Today was particularly rough.  I sure hope it's just a phase because it is ridiculous.
I do want to write some cute things he's done lately, as much for my sanity as anything, because he usually is a very sweet kiddo.  We have this candy jar on a table.  Just sitting there all the time.  Only once has Tate ever taken a candy without asking...that we know of.  He knows he has to ask first.  It's hard to say no when he walks into the computer room carrying it like this, right in front of his face, and says, "Mom, may I please have one of these candies?"  So sweet.

 He's a very social boy.  We need to get going inviting some families in the ward over for dinner because we need some friends, for us, and for Tate.  He thinks every kid is his buddy.  Even kids he's never met before.  Yesterday I told him we were going to the pool and he said, "And will there be kids there?"  When we pulled up in our stoller he started yelling, "Hey guys!  Hey guys, I'm here!  I'm here now guys!  I just came!" to the kids in the pool...who we've never seen before.
We have some dear friends who just moved to the area from Austin.  They have two kids and Tate loves them to pieces.  Yesterday they came over to play for a little while and when they got here Tate was still sleeping.  I went up to get him and told him they were here.  He came down the stairs and said, "Hey Tori and Lizzy!  I woke up so happy because you were here!"
Thank heavens for all of the sweet moments.  They make the 3 year old emotional tantrums bearable.

Picture Wednesday and an update

We started feeing Finn rice cereal this week.  I wish that Glenn was here when I fed him the first time so I could have got it on film.  He just kept looking up at me while I was feeding him and absolutely beaming at me like he was saying, "Where has this been? This is amazing!"  He kept moaning "Mmmmm" and his shaking hands kept trying to grab the bowl and pull it in.  Once I let him get ahold of it to see what he'd do.  He pulled it in and bowed his head right into it like he was trying to dive into the stuff.  Hilarious.  A very different reaction that Tate when we first started to feed him baby food.  Tate kept gagging and heaving as soon as it touched his lips.  Good times.  I can't wait to see Finn's reaction when we get around to feeding him something that actually tastes good!

Here's our little babe at 25 weeks old.  Babies in bucket hats.  I love summer time.

Glenn's been out of town all week in North Dakota monitoring some coring.  He found it fascinating and enjoyed it quite a bit in spite of the very little sleep and bad food all week.  We're very glad he's home.  While he was there his rash kept getting worse.  He was in horrible pain that went down to his muscles and he said it felt like they were tearing every time he'd move.  So he finally went to a clinic up there and found out he has Shingles.  I've never in my life known anyone who had Shingles, so I had no idea what that meant.  Apparently it's the chicken pox virus and can live dormant in nerve cells until triggered by something and then manifests itself as shingles which causes an area of pain, muscle and skin sensitivity and blisters.  Sounds wonderful, eh?  The Dr. thinks the bed bug bites could have triggered it in some way, or more likely, stress.  He also said that given the area affected, it's likely that the radiation treatment Glenn had a few years ago weakened the immunities in that particular nerve cell and made it susceptible to the virus.  Glenn's on a bunch of antibiotics and is feeling much better.  The bad news is that once you have it, you have it for life and it could possibly flare up again and again.  Let's hope it never comes back, poor guy.

Luckily, we've had no more incidences with bedbugs.  No bites on the kids or I, no evidence that we brought them home at all which is beyond wonderful!  That would have been so horrible.  So thanks for those who added us to your prayers so that we might dodge that bullet.   My goodness, I'm so very glad we don't have to deal with that mess.

Babies, Bunnies, and Bugs

I wanted to do Picture Wednesday, on a Wednesday for once but forgot to take one all day...so here are my babies right before story time tonight.

Finn at 24 weeks old.

Finn is really loving his big brother lately.  Even more than usual.  He's more mobile now and cranes his neck and rolls over to see where Tate is and what he's up to when they're in the same room.  He loves Tate's voice, especially when he's talking to him.  All it takes is some silly nonsense words from Tate directed at Finn and he cracks up laughing.   Sometimes he'll be fussing and I ask Tate to cheer him up and Tate just walks over to him and starts talking and suddenly, everything is better and Finn is beaming.  Tate loves that.  He loves all this evidence that his baby, that's what he calls him, "my baby", loves him so much.  It's so fun to watch.
We were doing a bit of gardening on Saturday and found a burrow of brand new baby bunnies on the side of our house.  They were so tiny we just couldn't resist catching them and playing with them for a little bit before returning them to their little burrow.

 There were 4 little babies and they were so brand new they didn't have much fluff and they weren't very fast, which suited us just fine.  So precious.

And in other news, Glenn seems to have had an encounter with bed bugs while we were in New York City.  Several patches on his body look like this:

Yeah, it's gross.  He says it feels like a mix between mosquito bites and poison ivy.  Very pleasant.  They started showing up a few days after we got home and he was worried they were from bedbugs.  I didn't have any, and still don't, so I was determined to ignore those concerns, as acknowledging them would completely freak my freak.  But as the days went by and more bites turned up it didn't look good.  Glenn called the hotel, they searched the room and found one bedbug.  Seriously.  One?  At any rate, the guy from the hotel made it sound like since there wasn't a huge infestation in the room it's very unlikely that we brought anything home, especially since none of the rest of us have bites.  He told us that they'll pay for any medical bills or extermination bills if it turns out they came home with us.  Glenn's research said that bites usually show up 7-9 days after being bitten so the ones he has now could still be from our time there.  We've washed all our clothes and bedding, taken a blow dryer to our suitcases, and called our pest control guys who told us they'd check when they come next week but it's unlikely they'll find anything now even if they're here.  If they're here, they won't be noticeable for a few weeks.  Perfect.
I'm not super freaked out, which is strange for me, because I'm just determined that they didn't come home with us.  I REALLY don't want to deal with that.  It makes me itch all over just thinking about it...so I've decided that they're not here and I just won't have to deal.  However, if anyone reading this decides to put in a word for us in your prayers tonight, something like, "Please bless that the Makechnies are not covered in bugs eating their flesh as they sleep tonight", I certainly would appreciate it.