The First Day of Kindergarten

My sweet baby girl Reagan Marie is all grown up!  It seems like it was just yesterday that I was holding her in my arms for the first time.  But actually, yesterday was her first day of Kindergarten!

She's been preparing for and counting down the sleeps until the big day for weeks.  We had a day at the spa for mani's and pedi's, a day of pampering at the salon for a new hairdo, and she chose the dress that she would wear for her first day of school back in July!  

I wasn't sure that I was ever going to get her to go to bed on Tuesday night. We spent a long time cuddled up together, talking about school, and reading a few bedtime stories to settle her down.  We ended our reading with Dr. Suess's Oh, The Places You'll Go!, and it was the PERFECT story for the night before her first day of school!  I have big plans for this book for Reagan, so I was excited to share it with her for the first time for this occasion.  Over the next 13 years, I plan to secretly give this book to all of her teachers from Kindergarten through high school, and have them write a message to Reagan at the end of each school year.  Ryan and I will then give the personalized book to her at her high school graduation!  

She started off the morning of her big day with a phone call to her Daddy at work to sing Happy Birthday to him!  Yes, September 7th was a double duty celebration day for us this year!

Because the school that she attends chooses to do a "gradual entry" for the Kindergarten kids, Reagan didn't have to go to school until after lunch on her first day.  This was great news for us because it meant that Ryan would be able to make it home from work in time to walk with us to school.

You read correctly, we are able to walk to school.  We live one block away from the front doors of the school, so Reagan is already very familiar and comfortable with the school playground as she has already been playing on it for years!

One o'clock finally arrived, and Reagan was about to jump out of her skin because she was so excited.  I was able to slow her down just long enough for a couple of pictures before we left for school.

Of the twenty children in Reagan's kindergarten class, Reagan and 5 others all attended preschool together.  There is also another little girl in class that used to take gymnastics with Reagan, so it was an end-of-summer reunion of sorts for many of the kids!  I think Reagan was just as happy to see her teachers as she was her friends, as we were lucky enough to have already met her teachers before the start of school.

 

I must admit, as Ryan and I walked back home yesterday afternoon with Myers, I was missing my baby girl VERY much.  But I was also very happy and extremely proud of her, as she truly loves school and is so excited for this new adventure in her life.

Because of the gradual entry, less than 2 hours later we were on our way back to school to get our girl.  As luck would have it, and because we arrived a few minutes early, the kids were heading back into class from a playground recess, so I was able to sneak a quick picture of the big Kindergarten girl with a few of her classmates.

Today was a slightly longer day of school, and Reagan was thrilled.  That meant that she could use her new back pack and lunch box!  Trust me when I tell you that she thinks that she is some serious tough stuff with that backpack!

I had a little surprise for Reagan when Myers and I went to pick her up this afternoon... DIXIE!  Of course Reagan was excited to see her puppy dog, (although I don't know why we still call her a puppy when she just had her EIGTH birthday last month) and all of the other kids in her class were excited as well.  I think my surprise earned Reagan serious rockstar status among her classmates!

So, we have one more day of Kindergarten this week, and then we're heading off to Seattle for the weekend to do some serious back-to-school shopping and to celebrate Ryan's birthday.  I must say, I have a feeling that this is going to be a GREAT school year!

My dear Reagan, I am so very proud of you.  You are such a smart, talented, loving, and beautiful young girl, and I know that you are going to excel not only in school, but at everything in life.  Always follow your dreams, and never give up on those dreams.  You are a superstar!  And, as Dr. Seuss once said...

Congratulations!  

Today is your day.

You're off to Great Places!

You're off and away!

OH!  THE PLACES YOU'LL GO!

You'll be on your way up!

You'll be seeing great sights!

You'll join the high fliers

who soar to high heights.

And will you succeed?

Yes!  You will, indeed!

(98 and 3/4 percent guaranteed.)

KID, YOU'LL MOVE MOUNTAINS!

You're off to Great Places!

Today is your day!

Your mountain is waiting.

So... get on your way!

OH!  THE PLACES YOU'LL GO!

Sibling Love

Every single day, I am amazed at how much Reagan and Myers truly love each other.  I know the day will come when I have to deal with sibling rivalry... But for now, it's nothing but sibling love around here!

Today was the first day that they shared a ride in the chariot together, and something tells me that this is how many of my afternoons are going to be spent over the next little while!

Infant Sleep Training

As you may recall, I have been on the brink of insanity for months now.  Being a sleep deprived mother has truly taken a toll on me.

Over the past few months, one thing has remained a constant.  Everyone I know has been recommending the same book for me to use as my survival guide...

Seriously!   Preschool moms, gymnastic moms, my own mother, my cousin, a friend from high school, a sorority sister... all spread out across the world, coming together, united in their allegiance to Dr. Marc Weissbluth.

I borrowed a copy from a friend, and started reading it while we were on vacation.  I opened it up to a random page, and was instantly struck by the words that I read...

"WARNING!  Sleep problems in children may cause maternal depression."

Having battled with clinical depression in my life before, I knew that I was very quickly heading in this direction again.  I also knew that it was purely situational, based completely on my lack of sleep.  But I began to worry that if I didn't regain control of the situation, I would end up back on the meds again.

We had been home from vacation a little over 2 weeks when the opportunity presented itself to give sleep training a try.

It was August 1, and we were ready for bed.  Reagan was already asleep in her own bedroom, and Ryan and I were getting ready to settle into bed WITH Myers, as this sleep habit has continued since it started while we are on vacation.  We had only been in bed for a couple of minutes when I heard Reagan's bedroom door open, and then I saw/heard her come running down the hallway to our bedroom in tears from a nightmare.

Can you say FAMILY BED?!

Yes, we have a King sized bed that can accommodate all 4 members of our family.  But can all 4 members of our family get a good night sleep this way?


Ummmmmm, NO!

I encouraged Ryan to go sleep in the guest bedroom so that at least one of us would get a good night's rest.  He is, after all, the one that gets up at 4:20 every morning to go to work.  I may be a zombie all day, every day, from my lack of sleep, but at least I get to be a zombie in the comfort of my own home.  And I can choose to just stay in my pyjamas all day and forget to brush my hair or teeth without anyone else ever knowing that it happened!  Ryan has a crew of guys that he is responsible for, so he needs to be as awake and alert as possible!

Ryan moved to the guest bedroom;  Reagan, Myers and I tried to fall asleep. But Myers was being his normal non-sleeping, cranky baby self.  Reagan then started to complain that she couldn't sleep because her brother was keeping her awake.  I told her to go back to her own room so that she could sleep in peace.  She refused because she was scared that she was going to have another nightmare.

This is the point that I decided I needed to take action.  I was already at my wits ends, and I now had TWO children in my bed that seemed incapable of sleeping on their own...

Option One... Wake up Ryan and convince him to quickly put me out of my misery.  Only problem, we don't have a gun.
Option Two... Figure out a way to sneak quietly out of the house on my own, and then go check into a hotel under an alias.  VERY tempting, but not completely realistic.  Who would be home to listen to the children cry once Ryan was at work?
Option Three... Put Myers in his crib, put Reagan in her bed, and put in some ear plugs!  DONE!

I told Reagan that I was going to go to the nursery to feed her brother and that I was going to put him to bed in his crib.  I then told her that she could rest in my bed and try to fall asleep until I came back, but that I would take her to her own bed and help her fall asleep in her own room once I had Myers settled down.

I took a pair of ear plugs to Ryan in the guest bedroom and filled him in on what was getting ready to go down.  I gave him strict instructions that NO MATTER WHAT, he was not to enter the nursery at any point during the night!

Yep, I was going cold-turkey for extinction.  Extinction is Dr. Weissbluth's method of allowing the child to cry indefinitely at bedtime and for up to an hour at nap time.

I let Myers nurse until he was done, and then I put him in his crib.

And then I walked out of the room.

During the time that I was nursing Myers, Reagan had fallen completely asleep in my and Ryan's bed.  Since she only ends up in our bed about once a month, I decided to just let her stay there.  Plus, by not moving her back to her own room, I was able to shut our bedroom door completely, thus further muffling the sounds of the screaming that was coming from the nursery.  (Ryan and I normally sleep with our bedroom door open so that we can hear Reagan if she gets up since she has been known to sleep walk a time or two!)

I watched the baby monitor intently as the screaming continued for 8 minutes. He wasn't moving around or making a big commotion in his crib... he was just laying there, screaming his head off.

And then, just like that, after only 8 minutes, he stopped crying and went to sleep.

AND HE SLEPT ALL NIGHT LONG!

Why in the world hadn't I tried this sooner?  I still didn't get much more than a wink of sleep throughout the night as I kept waiting to hear him cry, and I would still wake up every 30 minutes or so to look over at the screen on the baby monitor.  But each and every time that I would look, all I saw was a peacefully sleeping baby.

The next night of sleep training wasn't much different than the first.  I nursed Myers, put him in his crib, and walked out the room.  After 20 minutes of crying, he gave up the fight and then proceeded to sleep for ELEVEN HOURS!

It has now been 18 nights since our first night of uninterrupted sleep.  No, all of the last 18 nights have not gone as smoothly as the first two.  By the fifth night, Myers had figured out that his cuddle partner had left him and that the "all night boob buffet" had closed it's kitchen door.  We went through several nights of having to listen to him scream for over an hour, but we stuck to the plan.  I'm willing now to say that we have successfully completed sleep training, and we are ALL much happier because of it.  I still get up once a night, usually around the same time that Ryan is getting up to go to work, to nurse Myers.  But he then goes right back to sleep and sleeps until 6:30.  He is actually even napping on regular basis, and that had also never happened before!

Our current schedule looks something like this:

6:30 am - Wake up
9:00 am - Morning Nap
10:30 am - Awake from nap
12:30 pm - Afternoon nap
2:30 pm - Awake from nap
6:00 pm - Bedtime

That schedule is working very well so far!  I'm sure we will have the occasional hiccup... like I said, Reagan is five and she still ends up in our bed about once a month.  But I have to tell you, it is a very very good feeling to know that the months and months of hellish nights are officially over!

Moving On?

We've now been home from our summer vacation for a little over two weeks. And in that time, we have not been able to do much of anything other than think about and talk about packing up our life and moving back to my home of South Carolina.

We go through this pattern for a few days every single time that we head down South for a visit.  But the conversations usually only last a day or so, and they never move past the "dream" state.

Not this time.

This time, we are seriously talking about it.  We're doing the necessary research. We're weighing our options and trying to make the best decision for our family.

But this is no easy decision to make.  This would be life changing for us.  We're talking about a move into and then across another country.  Trust me, I would know... I made the exact opposite move of what we are now considering just over 9 years ago.

We've spoken to an immigration lawyer and with several Canada/US Border agents, and it appears that we have plenty of time to make a decision about what we want to do.  Ideally, we would prefer to move next summer as soon as Reagan is done with Kindergarten, but due to new immigration processes between the US and Canada, that is not possible.  Well, it's possible that we could move tomorrow, but it wouldn't be the completely LEGAL route to take!!! Because we don't want to move in the middle of a school year, the soonest we are looking at would be July 2013.  That is a long time away.  The good news with that timeframe is that, by then, I will have become a Canadian citizen, meaning that I could move between the two countries back and forth as much as I want to.  (I am currently a permanent resident of Canada, not yet a citizen.)  The bad news with that timeframe is that our children will be even more established and settled in our current life here, making it harder to uproot them.  So we are extremely confused about what to do.

Because of our confusion, Ryan and I sat down separately and created individual lists as to the pros & cons of moving and the pros & cons of staying. Our lists were almost identical when we later compared them!  The reasons to move outnumbered the reasons to stay, but not by much.

But there is a problem that is holding us back...  And this problem is big enough to cause us to stop the planning process completely.  Neither Ryan nor I have any form of employment in the States, and with the current state of the economy and the current unemployment rate, there is no guarantee that either of us would be able to get a job.  Even though we could be mortgage-free and have only half of the monthly bills down there that we have here, it wouldn't make a hill of beans of difference if neither of us was making an income to pay those bills! And truthfully, we only want Ryan to have to get a job there because we both love the fact that I am able to stay home with our kids here while they are young.  Based on the conversations that we have had with people in the same industry as Ryan, we have learned that he would probably only be making a THIRD of what he gets paid here, as he would be starting his career over.

And Ryan has a REALLY REALLY good job here!  That is the #1 reason on his list for staying.  He nor I see the benefit in giving up a position that he has been in now for over 17 years.  He loves his job.  He claims that he doesn't love all of the headaches that come with it, but I think he is full of bologna when he says that. He literally walks around our house on the weekends like he is going to go insane if he doesn't find something to do to keep himself busy!  So I'm not so sure that the slower style of Southern life would necessarily suit my husband.

We have decided to complete the necessary paperwork to claim the right to US citizenship that is owed to both of our kids.  Technically, they are automatically US citizens since I gave birth to them, and I am a US Citizen.  But there is a lot of legal mess that we have to do to make it official for the two of them.

However, we just can't seem to bring ourselves to start the paperwork for Ryan. Sure, we could submit all the paperwork and then change our minds, but what would be the point in that?  It would be a waste of a LOT of money, as the immigration process for him would be expensive.  So, we are waiting until we know 100% for sure what we want to do.

Lord only knows if and when that will ever happen...

UPDATE:  It is now February 2012, and we still have not submitted any paperwork for Ryan.   We realize that this makes our dream of moving to South Carolina about as realistic as our dream of winning the lottery... pretty tough to accomplish when we don't buy any lottery tickets!  But it is just such a big decision to make that we know we can't rush it...

8 Month Update

It's time for another monthly baby update for Myers!

In the last month, he has...

• Started crawling
• Figured out how to feed himself items such as puffs or cheerios
• Flown on an airplane for the first time in his life
• Gone on his first boat ride
• Swam in the warm waters of the Atlantic for the first time
• Had his first trip to an Emergency Room
• Started waving to people, but mostly to himself
• Met lots of cousins, aunts, uncles, and his Great Gran
• Started to grind his teeth
• Developed more of the reddish tint in his hair
• Acquired the signature gap between his top front teeth, just like his Pops
• Started saying "Dixie" whenever he sees our dog (named Dixie!)
• Remained sick with respiratory infections
• Refused to sleep 
• Become very clingy and needy with Mommy

Family Reunions

Anytime that we visit the family beach house in North Carolina is like a family reunion of sorts.  The only difference this summer is that we were able to spend time with more family than ever!

From sun up to sun down, Reagan was busy playing with her cousins each and every day.  She was the little social butterfly this year, floating from house to house visiting with family.  Of course, it is hard to stay inside any of the houses for long when we're at the beach.  There is just too much fun to be had outside and on the water...

We were also lucky enough this trip to be able to spend some time with my Grandmother.  I can not begin to explain how grateful I am to my Uncle Wayne and Aunt Evelyn (my mom's older brother and his wife) for bringing my Grandmother to the waterway to visit with us.  I was determined to see her this trip, but I couldn't imagine how we were going to make the 5+ hour car trip to Grandmother's house when Captain Cranky Pants can't stand to be in his car seat for 5+ minutes!

They arrived on Wednesday afternoon, and we immediately started having a beaching good time with them...  soaking up the sun, splashing in the baby pool at the beach house, swimming in their hotel pool, and eating up some delicious Southern seafood treats!  Reagan and Myers both loved all of the extra attention that they received (as if they hadn't been spoiled enough already by the dozens of other family members at the beach).  I'm pretty sure that my Grandmother (or Great Gran as my kids call her) was happy to see us all, but she was especially excited to meet her first great-grandSON for the first time!

It really was a special visit... THANK YOU AGAIN WAYNE & EVELYN!

Being with ALL of my family makes it even harder to say goodbye and return home to Canada, but that is what will happen tomorrow.  As the saying goes, "All good things must come to an end."

Until next summer...

It's NOT All Good

Like many moms who blog, I enjoy posting about all of my kids' accomplishments, milestones and achievements.  And I love to post about all the fun and exciting activities we do and trips we make.

But I also want to be a blogger who keeps it real, so that means that I have to make this post... 

This vacation back home to Carolina hasn't been all "rainbows and butterflies" of happiness.  There have been parts of it that have been pure hell.  And it's not because we are away from our Canadian home... the weeks (and months) leading up to this trip were much of the same.

You may recall from this post that our entire family had been sick with a crazy respiratory infection a few weeks before we left for vacation.  Well, only a few days after I had published that post, Myers was also diagnosed with double ear infections.  Reagan was then diagnosed with yet another ear infection a few days after Myers.  JUST GREAT!  Thankfully, one week before we left to come to the waterway, both Myers and Reagan were given a clean bill of health to travel.  No colds and no ear infections!  Our doctor did warn me that it was possible that a flare up could occur in either of our children, and that I would need to get them to a doctor at the first signs of any illness to make sure that we weren't dealing with additional ear infections.  I filed that piece of information away in my brain with the hope that I wouldn't need it.  Yeah, right...

You may also remember that I posted in both his six month update and seven month update that Myers isn't the world's greatest sleeper.  That hasn't gotten any better either.  His sleeping habits worsened with all of his illnesses, and then the pattern just seemed to stick for him even after he was well.  He was waking up almost every hour on the hour before we left for Carolina, so needless to say this Mommy was hoping to get some much needed rest while on vacation. Yeah, right...

The first night that we were at the beach house, Myers had an absolute freak-out meltdown when I put him in the playpen to sleep in.  It was like something out of a horror movie!  Sound travels VERY freely throughout our beach house, and I didn't want to keep the entire household awake with his screaming.  (Of course, at the sound level he was reaching, he was probably keeping people awake even 4 houses away!)  After only a few seconds, I went back in the room to him and took him out of the playpen.  I then put him in my and Ryan's bed, nursed him until he fell asleep, and then crept out of the room.  Within 40 minutes he was screaming again.  This continued ALL NIGHT LONG, even after Ryan and I had crawled into bed to snuggle with him.  The same pattern continued the next day for all of his naps, and then again the next night.  And then again the next day.  And then again the next night.  You get the picture...

Ryan decided to sleep on the couch in the living room in the hope that maybe Myers needed a little more room in the bed to sleep comfortably.  At least that is the reason he gave me... truthfully I'm sure it was because he was thankful for the opportunity to leave the "bed of no-sleep"!  It didn't help Myers any, but at least Ryan was able to get some sleep.  I continued to keep Myers in the bed with me so that I could immediately nurse him when he would wake up every 30-40 minutes so that he wouldn't wake up everyone else.  We have now been here for 16 days, and nothing has changed.

No, wait.  That isn't true.

On day 6, things went from bad to worse as both Reagan and Myers suddenly had thick green snot pouring from their noses again, and both of them sounded raspy and wheezy.  I waited a full 48 hours to see if they would show any signs of improvement before I started making phone calls to our Canadian Insurance company to see what clinic in North Carolina would accept our insurance.  It turned out that no clinic or office physician would... our only option was to go to the local hospital's Emergency Room to be seen.

Seriously!?!

Neither kid was sick enough in my opinion to warrant a trip to the hospital.  But I didn't want to mess around with any more ear infections either, so I knew that they had to both see a doctor.  I am pretty sure that I muttered the words, "Can you just go ahead and shoot me now?" to Ryan as we walked into the waiting room at the Brunswick County Hospital ER.  Thankfully, it was a slow day in the ER, and we were in and out within only a couple of hours.  And thankfully, neither Reagan or Myers had an ear infection... but they did both have another upper respiratory infection.  But most thankfully, our Canadian insurance company footed the bill for the visit that otherwise would have cost us $1728.

Reagan got over her cold pretty quickly, which was a really good thing considering all of the cousins that are here at the waterway that she has to play with!  Myers on the other hand is still a very sick little boy to this day.  We are now having to do up to six breathing treatments a day (Hooray for Mommy planning ahead for all possibilities and I packed the nebulizer machine to bring with us!) and he no longer likes doing them at all.  My only comfort is that I know he is getting lots of medicine into his lungs with all of the screaming that is taking place during the treatments!

He also still HATES to ride in his car seat.  Without fail, within 10 minutes of being in the car, the screaming begins.  We've tried singing, clapping, nursing, comforting and ignoring.  None of it works.  This baby is just miserable.

Except for when he's not, because then he is the happiest baby on the planet! As long as he is not riding in his car seat or trying to sleep or having to do a nebulizer mask to help with his breathing, he is a VERY happy boy.   Thank God for that small miracle... I seriously think that I would have lost my mind completely if it weren't for that.

Prime example for you of my current state of mind... the night of our anniversary dinner boat ride, Reagan and Pops decided to have a dance-a-thon on the end of the pier as soon as we got home.  It was quickly becoming dark out as it was already past Myers's bedtime and would soon be Reagan's bedtime as well.  I went inside to attempt to put Myers to bed while everyone else stayed out on the pier to enjoy the shagging performance that was taking place.  Pops had the beach music blaring from the boat as he and Reagan danced the night away.  By the time I finally got Myers to sleep, it was well past Reagan's bedtime.  Being overly tired has also made me overly grumpy, so I was the party pooper that stomped out onto the end of the pier and forced Reagan to come inside to put on her nightgown and get ready for bed.  It wasn't pretty, but I finally managed to get her to go to sleep.  Of course, this whole process took about 40 minutes, which meant that it was time for Myers to wake up for his first screaming-fest of the night.

I think Ryan could tell that I was on the verge of a meltdown myself, and he didn't want to witness it.  He took Myers outside to scream on the end of the pier, while I sat on the couch and tried my best not to cry. I was doing pretty good at my attempt until my parents began to tell me that I ruined the perfectly fun night that everyone was having watching Reagan dance with her Pops by making her come inside to go to bed.

(And the poor camel's back was broken by just a tiny little straw.)

That was it.  I started crying.  My dad looked at me and asked what was I crying for.  In a voice just above a whisper, I said, "Because I can't stand it that I both love and hate my child with every fiber of my body right now."  I was referring to Myers.

Seriously, what mother in her right mind would even think that, much less say it out loud?

I know, I know... I am tired.  It has now been almost 4 months since Myers slept for more than a few hours at a time, if even that much.  And it is only getting worse.  But what kind of an excuse is that?  Don't get me wrong, I do love my son.  I love him and Reagan both with all that I've got.  There is no question about it.  But I don't know how much more I can take!  At least here at the beach house, I've got lots of extra hands to help me bounce this baby boy that is struggling to figure it all out himself.  I guess I am just scared that things won't even get better once we head back home to Canada in a few more days. Or, what if they just continue to get worse?

Plus, I NEVER EVER EVER do well when it comes to saying goodbye to my family, leaving the beach, and returning to Canada.  And like I just said... that day is fast approaching.

But again, it's no excuse.

So, there you have it.  A no-holds-barred honest post about the struggles of being a sleep deprived mother with sick kids.  I've talked to lots of friends recently who have been through the same struggles, so at least I know that I am not alone.

And at least I know that they lived through it to share their stories with me!

Update:  Seeing as how it is now February 2012 when I am finally publishing this post, I can tell you that it does eventually all get better!  And now you all have a better understanding as to why I have been missing from the bloggy-world for so so long!

Teach Me How To Kayak

My parents have been kayaking since they first started spending their winters in Florida back in January of 2009.  After a few months of lessons and guided adventures, they decided that they were hooked and bought kayaks of their own.  They have been kayaking like pros ever since.  

Ryan and I on the other hand have never even thought about taking up the sport.  Or at least I hadn't given it any thought... apparently my husband had been considering it because this is what I discovered when I walked out onto the deck of our beach house this morning...

Yep, Pops was giving Ryan his first dry-land lesson in kayaking.  Too a novice such as myself, this looked quite ridiculous to see.  But apparently this is step one in the learning process!

It wasn't too long after that they moved the lesson to the water...

 

I nervously held my breath as they paddled out into the middle of the Intracoastal Waterway, thankful that Ryan and I have really good life insurance coverage on each other as I could envision him falling out of the thing while still somehow being attached/trapped/stuck in it and drowning to death!

I never should have doubted the skills of the instructor or the student, as Ryan had a fabulous time out on the water with my Dad.  They did "the loop" around the waterway... up to the backside of Long Beach and back around to Blue Water Point, and then back home.  Ryan said that it was no easy task to accomplish, but that he absolutely loved doing it and being out on the water that way.  He was DRENCHED in sweat by the time that they made it home, and he said it wasn't because it was hot out... it was because he was working every muscle in his body!

Hrmph... maybe I should consider taking up kayaking to lose the last of my Myers baby weight!

Myers Chillaxin' in the Pool

While his sister enjoys life in the fast lane at the waterway, Myers is more inclined to just chill out and relax the day away.  (This may have something to do with the fact that he spends his nights screaming his bloody head off instead of sleeping, but that is a discussion for another post...)

We set up the perfect little baby pool for him to enjoy, and that is exactly what he has been doing!  

On a hot summer day, there really is no better way than to cool off than by splashing around in the pool.  Of course, running through the sprinklers is a pretty good idea as well!

Isn't he just the most adorable little man you've ever seen?!?!

Let's Ride the Jet Ski Daddy!

Reagan is such a little dare devil on the water!  She absolutely LOVES jet skiing with her Daddy.  And she only has one speed that she wants to use... SUPER FAST!

You may want to click on each of these pictures so that you can get a closer look of the pure joy and excitement that is on her face.  Like I said... she LOVES it!

   

Let's Go For a Boat Ride Pops!

My children LOVE going for boat rides!  

Reagan, of course, had been boating with Pops numerous times before.  But this was a new experience for Myers.  When we first put him in his life jacket, he was a little unsure as to what we were planning to do with him.  However once he discovered the fun of licking the salt off of his life jacket, he was all smiles! Speaking of life jackets... Reagan is sporting the exact same jacket that I wore when I was her age!

Once we were moving, Myers was in love and was all smiles.  Again just like her Mommy used to do, Reagan perched herself at the very front of the boat for the best view and most fun ride of all.

Myers enjoyed just relaxing and taking in the views of the waterway.  Reagan loved going over the waves, and then she loved getting up and dancing around the boat when we would enter into any of the no-wake zones.  (Again, she is her mother made over as I used to do the EXACT same things!)

Tonight, Ryan and I celebrated our 8 year wedding anniversary, and we did so with a boat ride to a fabulous restaurant called The Inlet View.  Pops and Momsey had been to this restaurant before and encouraged us that we would enjoy not only our dinner, but also the fabulous views of the Intracoastal Waterway and the Atlantic Ocean from the upper deck.  I think they were expecting us to go on our own to enjoy a romantic dinner, but we had a different plan!  We wanted to spend our anniversary with the whole family, so we ALL loaded up into the boat.  My parents were correct... the dinner and the views were both amazing.  But it was the fact that we were able to enjoy it with them and our kids all together that made it even better... especially the boat ride!

Pier Jumping

Not only do my kids like to fish, I am beginning to think that they are turning into fish!  

You may remember from last year, that Reagan loves the game of pier jumping.  She must have jumped off the end of the pier over 50 times the other night just as the sun was starting to set, and I think that she would have done it 50 more times if Daddy hadn't started to get tired from treading water the entire time.  Of course, Mommy screaming that she had just seen a jelly fish in the waterway probably didn't help matters much either!  

  

Even Myers jumped in on the fun for his first official dip in the warm waters of the Atlantic!  He was instantly in love with this gigantic new bathtub to splash around in.  

Needless to say, I've got two little beach bums on my hands!

"Here, Fishy Fishy"

Both of my kids have turned into little fishers! 

Myers went fishing for the first time ever, and he absolutely loved it from the very first moment.  It's obvious even in pictures that he is having tons of fun. He's so curious and excited by the process, and he is simply AMAZED when Daddy reels in the line and there is a fish on his hook!

Reagan decided that this is the summer that she turns into a pro. She's caught more fish off of the pier than the rest of all of us combined I think!  We used to joke and say that it was something about her purple fishing rod, but this year she is catching them left and right no matter what pole she uses.  Everyday, without fail, she heads out onto the end of the pier to see what her catch of the day will be.  And everyday, she succeeds!

She's one tough and determined little fishing lady!  Can't you tell?

I'm BACK! Or at least I plan to be...

Don't fall out of your chairs!  Yes, you are seeing correctly... I'm finally making a new post after over a 6 months hiatus from this blog!

I have been debating on how to make my return to the bloggy world... should I back-track to create and date posts from 6 months ago, or should I just pick up with current time and start anew?  I finally decided to back-date the posts because there has just been TOO much going on to skip right over it!  How could I not go back and post about Reagan starting Kindergarten, Myers turning one, Myers starting to walk, and of course all of our holiday activities like Halloween and Christmas!?!?

So, even though today is really January 23, 2012, this post and my next few posts will be posted as if it is still July of 2011!  Thankfully, I had already created a few "draft" posts from back in July and August, so it shouldn't be too hard to catch up on the long ago months.  And thankfully, even though I haven't been blogging, I've done a great job of taking pictures and keeping the kid's calendars up to date so that I can refer back to them!

Give me some time, but I hope to back up to date and posting on current life within the next couple of weeks!

STAY TUNED!

Summertime Sprinkler Fun

What could be more fun than running though the sprinkler on a hot summer day?  Why, running through the sprinkler on a hot summer day AT THE BEACH of course!

Declaration Dash

We are AT THE BEACH! We left the June-uary temps of Canada the day after Reagan finished with preschool to head back to our favorite place in the world... the family beach house at Sunset Harbor in North Carolina where the sun seems to be always shining!  We arrived early in the morning on June 29th after flying through the night.  Thankfully both children slept on the plane... Myers slept better on the plane than he does at home.  Maybe we just need to be international jet-setters all the time!

After a few days of adjusting to the jet lag, time change, heat and humidity, it was time to head to Wilmington, NC for the Declaration Dash race.  Reagan ran in this same 2K race last year with her Daddy and her Pops.  This year, she decided that she wanted me to run the 2K with her so her Daddy could run the 10K race by himself.

Ryan trained for his race... I, on the other hand, decided to just suck it up and run the day of the race with no training at all.  Reagan probably wishes that I had put forth a little more effort because I'm pretty sure that I slowed her down tremendously while we were running.  I even asked her to slow down a couple of times early on.  She only stopped to walk one time... at the water station right at the midway point.

Once we had made the turn to return to the Start/Finish line, I told Reagan to feel free to run ahead and to leave me if she thought that I was going too slow.  She stayed with me for a short while longer, but once she realized that the Finish line was in sight, she took off sprinting on her own and left me in her dust!

 

The crowd went wild cheering once they saw her coming.  She, of course, was eating it up and running faster and faster!

After the race, the only thing left to do was to cool off with a fresh fruit smoothie and a slice of watermelon.  Oh, and of course she had to tease mommy for getting beat by a 5 year old!  I was just relieved to have finished the race and to still be able to stand on my own after it was over since it had been more than 18 months since I had done ANY form of running!

She finished the 2K with at a time of 12:58, and she placed second in her age group.  She was the youngest runner in the entire race, thus also the youngest runner in her age group of over a dozen 5-8 year olds.  All of the children that participated received a medal and an opportunity to stand on the podium!

Ryan finished the 10K with a time of 42:49!  That's a pace of 6:54 per mile!  Way to go, honey!  I think he's got the running bug now and I'm going to need to find a few races for him to run in once we get back home!  And who knows, maybe I'll get back into the running groove myself...

Graduation Day

The day before Reagan's preschool graduation, as I was ironing her favorite dress for her to wear, she was humming a song that I couldn't quite place.  Every once in a while, I would hear a note or two strung together that I knew I knew from somewhere, but then she would go on and hum a little more and I would be clueless once again.  I finally asked her what she was humming, and she told me that it was the song that would be playing the next day when she walked into the auditorium while she wore her graduation hat.  Of course!  Pomp and Circumstance!  And of course, I had to fight back the tears as I realized that my little girl was suddenly all grown up!

All of the kids in her preschool class had been working hard to learn their parts for a series of short plays that they performed for us on Graduation Day.  Reagan was the littlest billy goat from the fable The Three Billy Goats Gruff.  She was the cutest littlest billy goat I had ever seen!

After the plays were completed, it was time for graduation.  Just as Reagan had informed me the day before, they all marched into the auditorium to Pomp and Circumstance wearing their graduation caps.  Just as I had expected, I was quite choked up!

Teachers Bev and Anne presented each child with their diploma and shared with all of the parents what each child wants to be when they grow up.  It was no surprise to us to hear that Reagan wants to be a veterinarian!

I'm not sure who was the most proud of the diplomas... the kids or the parents!

The kids ended the day with a farewell to preschool song:

Kindergarten here we come!
Kindergarten here we come!
So long preschool, it's been fun!
Kindergarten here we come!

Reagan is now counting down the sleeps until summer is over and the first day of kindergarten arrives.  Me, I'm trying to hold on to the last lingering moments of my pre-kindergarten girl as long as I can!

7 Month Old Chatterbox

Myers is SEVEN MONTHS OLD today!

He has always been a very vocal baby, but lately he has been chatting up a storm. Of course, everything is still in his own little jibberish language, but it is adorable to listen to even without having a clue of what he is saying.

He has also turned into a little lover boy!  He loves to cuddle and snuggle, and has recently started to truly reach out to be picked up, to be held, and to give hugs.  And he is a FLIRT!  One second he'll pour on the charm, all smiles and laughing, then he'll turn his head and play coy and shy.  It's adorable, and I eat it up every single time.

You probably remember from this post that we had to lower the crib and remove the bassinet from the playpen since he has started pulling himself up whenever he can reach onto something. He is such an active little boy! He still isn't officially crawling, but he can get where he wants to go by either rolling, scooting, or sliding across the floor.

Two more teeth have FINALLY popped through... his top two front and center teeth are now gleaming, giving him a total of 4 teeth!  His top teeth have been giving him a horrible time, so we are very relieved to finally have them completely in.

Speaking of a horrible time, Myers has been sick for over 3 weeks now.  At first we (we meaning me and our family physician) just thought that it was from teething; then we thought maybe it was allergies; then we decided it was a mild cold;  then we were worried that he possibly had pneumonia.  Thankfully the chest x-rays came back with no signs of pneumonia, so we began the process of treating him for croup and bronchitis with a sinus infection.  Three days later we discovered that he had an ear infection in BOTH ears.  Antibiotics were added to the regimen, and I'm hoping that the end is in sight!

Needless to say,  Myers' sleeping habits have NOT improved from waking up every 1-2 hours during all of his teething and illnesses.  Truth be told, his sleeping habits have gotten even worse!  I'm still holding out hope that once he is completely well, and now that he has finished with this current round of teething, that maybe just maybe, he and I both will be able to get a full night's sleep!  Hopefully I will be able to report that fabulous accomplishment in a post with all of his 8 month updates!

Sick, Sick, Sick and Sick

That describes my family right now.  Every last one of us is sick, and it sucks!

Ryan started with a nasty cough on my birthday... that was over a month ago on May 4th, and he is still coughing today!  Thankfully, we think that his "cold" is almost over.  Our family physician warned us that this cough/cold that is going around lasts for over a month, so at least we know that Ryan is par for the course!

Myers started coughing on May 27th, and he has progressively gotten worse since then.  Our doctor ordered a chest x-ray for him just a couple of days ago to rule out pneumonia, and thankfully it came back negative.  So we are currently treating Myers for croup/bronchitis.  He is doing GREAT with the breathing masks/nebulizer treatments, so that makes the healing process at least a little easier on Mommy!  We had purchased a nebulizer for Reagan back during her early days with RSV... that little machine has definitely been put to good use over the last few years!  The hardest part for Myers, and it really ended up not being that bad at all, was getting him to take the concentrated steroid syrup.  Getting a 6 month old baby to "chug" down 80 mls/3 ounces of medicine all at once is no easy task.  But with Reagan and Ryan dancing around in the background to keep him distracted, drop by drop he drank it all in about 25 minutes time. 

Reagan and I started coughing on May 29th.  The medicines and inhalers have at least prevented she and I from becoming too terribly sick, although you wouldn't believe me if you heard us coughing.  I swear our neighbors must think that our house is infected with tuberculosis or something!

The main problem with Reagan's health right now is her ears.  She is battling recurrent severe ear infections... she had just gotten over an ear infection in her right ear when it suddenly came back stronger than ever, accompanied by a matching infection in her left ear.  

These ear infections are only making our current worry of partial hearing loss for Reagan that much worse.  Our family doctor has confirmed that she has significant scar tissue damage on her right ear drum, and that the scar tissue is probably the cause of her hearing loss.  At first we just thought that she had "selective" hearing like most 5 year olds, and we were constantly telling her that she needed to listen more.  When we realized that she was actually missing entire sentences that we were saying, we discovered that we had a HEARING problem on our hands... not a LISTENING problem.  Once Ryan and I sat down together and really started analyzing the situation, we realized that it had been going on for quite some time and had been progressively getting worse.  Her hearing issues have also started to take a toll on her speech, to the point that people who aren't around her on a daily basis to "know her language" can't always understand anymore.   We have an appointment with an audiologist on August 15th to decide what our next steps need to be, so for now we wait and hope for no more ear infections!  (August 15th is considered an urgent appointment time... otherwise we would have to wait until November or December to see the audiologist.  Government Health Care isn't always the greatest...)

The good news about all of this... Apparently, stress combined with lack of sleep mixed in with a nasty cough is the latest diet trend!  I had just about decided that I was not going to lose the last 6 pounds of baby weight without doing some form of serious exercise.  No need to worry... I have finally broken the barrier and now only have 1 pound left of "Myers weight" to lose.  So, once we are all healthy, hopefully I will be able to do that serious exercising to lose 15 extra pounds as well!

I Think It's Time...

I think it's time to lower the crib and remove the bassinet from the playpen!  What do you think?