You have heard of a stack of pancakes; but...

have you heard of a stack of kiddos? :)

May the Odds be Ever in Your Favor!

Anyone else get into the Hunger Game spirit? Ron's shirt says "Property of District 12 Athletic Department", Max's said "It's a Hunger Games thing. You wouldn't understand." and mine said "Love changes the game." Ok, we are official geeks! :) We just could not wait to see the movie!!!! We loved it and are excited about seeing the next one which unfortunately does not come out until November 22, 2012. :(

Our Twins

I call Veronica and Emerson our twins because they are almost exactly a year apart. Veronica was born on January 14, 2007 and Emerson's birthday is January 21, 2008. To see how close they are, look how they both fell asleep in the car last Tuesday (March 20, 2012) after a busy morning and afternoon. "Ouch"

Max is a Boy Scout!

Max moved from being a Webelo to being an official Boy Scout on Monday, March 19! We are so proud of him as he earned his Arrow of Light which is something that he can wear the rest of his life. Ron earned his and still wears his when he leads and/or helps out with Scouts. We started out with a short ceremony where Ron explained to the younger children the honors that Max had earned and encouraged them to stick with scouting. Ron's parents attended with us as we knew that it would be exciting for them to see Max advance just like his dad had. After the ceremony, we went for ice cream as a treat. :)

At the doctor's office

Which child is the sick one? This is when we were there due to a NASTY wet sounding cough Veronica was dealing with. (As I was doing this post and looking at the picture trying to remember when it was taken, I realized I had forgotten this illness in the last post. Too many "bugs" to remember.) The doctor was not too concerned and was hoping that she was at the peak of it. She did give us a prescription to hang onto just in case as the weekend was coming upon us. I thought that was very cool of her as we live about 45ish minutes from the office and that would save a ton of time. Thank God, we ended up not needing it. :)

health update

I am only blogging about the sickness and pains in our family again so that in the years to come we will see how rough this winter has been for our crew. I have even lost track as to which ones I have mentioned already and I am sure I have missed a sniffle or two. :) Trust me, we do count our blessings that we do not have more serious issues to deal with than these. We know these are just minor inconveniences for sure.

Emerson went to the dentist to have some cavities repaired. That was fun...not! We have to keep those little teeth as healthy as possible as he needs everything to be ready for his gum and teeth surgery (from the cleft) here in a few years. He had been complaining of pain prior to the visit; so, I had them take a look around at the appointment. They said he does have a tooth that is only partially through the gum and it is red and swollen. Poor kiddo. They gave me a small syringe to squirt water on the area. He has not really complained about that area too much now that I have a way to help him. Go figure. He says it is better and now is saying the other side hurts. Ugh!

I took Veronica to the doctor a while ago only to discover she had a double ear infection. We started treatment. A few days later, she woke up, seemed fine, and all of sudden she started screaming and crying. We were in the process of getting the other three ready for school. So, we got to the school, dropped off the oldest two and sat while we waited for Emerson's dropoff time. Unfortunately, Veronica was still crying and screaming, this was two hours later. As soon as the office opened, I called our nurse. She got us in to see a doctor. Poor Emerson had a hard time understanding why he could not go to school; but, I had to get Veronica in as soon as I could. It turned out that the meds were only working on one of the her ears and not the other. She had to get a stronger medication. Poor girl. She had a well visit scheduled to get her immunizations for kindergarten. We had to reschedule that since you cannot get the shots when on meds. When we did make it to the well visit, her ears were still not back to normal. The doctor said we could go ahead if we wanted; but, he would not if she were his child. We are scheduled to go back this week to have her ears checked before going on spring break. He will let us know if she needs to go on some meds before flying. Oh, I hope she does not have ear problems on the plane. I know how much that can hurt!!!!

Sydney ended up with strep recently. That is always fun. Plus, I got a call from the school nurse this past week. She said that Sydney had been in her office for about a half an hour with a stomachache. They called with only two hours left of school. This is such a terrible time because the littles and I are eating lunch and getting ready for nap/quiet time. Plus, by the time, I get the three of us out the door and to the school, there is no time to come home before it is time to pick up Max. (We do not live right in the vicinity of the school.) There was no convincing her to stay at the school for this last little bit. Thankfully, Ron was able to leave work in time to get Max. This meant I could pick her up and come home rather than sit in the parking lot. Thank you, Ron! She was miraculously better when it was time to go to Max's Boy Scout ceremony and out to get ice cream to celebrate (more on this later). I still cannot figure out what had caused her "stomachache". We had a talk about how I am more than happy to pick her up if she truly is sick; but, it is not fair to everyone else who has to rearrange their schedule if she is just not in the mood to be at school. The joys of parenting. :)

Not long after Sydney was diagnosed with Strep, Max started getting sick too. After taking him to the doctor for a Strep test, we were told he just had a virus. I never thought I would say I wanted one of our kids to have strep; but, I was really hoping for it in this case. At least if he did, he would have been able to get a prescription to feel better quickly.

We got a notification from the school that a child in the preschool/pre-k room had been diagnosed with bacterial pneumonia this past week. I am thinking of going ahead and scheduling appointments at the doctor's office now...

Behind the scenes of my party

Hi, I'm Max. I'm going to tell you about the most awesome party of the year. Ok so Justin and Gabe showed up first by about a second before Alex. Gabe kept telling me he and Justin showed up first. "Whatever Gabe." We didn't think Truman was going to show up. We decided if he did show up he would be put in the seat of shame(whoopee cushion under a chair). Well he did. We ate and did presents. Thanks guys for the presents! After many Nerf wars and Mario Galaxy 2, we watched Tron. Justin had to leave before we watched the movie. Truman didn't want to watch it, but we said tough luck. We found out in the morning he was the only one who watched all of it. Rest of us got some zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz's. After more wars and video games we ate then played prison break. Then we heard "Gabe, your mom is here!". Then Alex. Truman had 2 minutes left until time to leave. CUT!!!!!!!!! Party's over. Back to work. Told you it was awesome. It was definitely better than Sydney's. Don't you agree?