Is It Naptime Yet

Today’s been pretty normal.
Eden woke up very early. Jon got her for me. later when Jon was up I tried to see of she would sleep a little in bed with me and of course all she did was play roughly with my hair. Jon at one point took her back to the living room. She was having a bad cough, which she caught from Lilah, and we decided she should stay home with him. We discussed shortly having Lilah stay home since she’s still coughing but we decided she probably was not contagious and I decided since it was my first mothers day with her in primary she must go because I wanted to see her sing the traditional mother’s day song by the Primary kids. (The song changes each year between a few but they always sing in sacrament, this year was “Mother I Love You”. I think it’s in the church handbook. J/K)
Anyways since it would be just me and Lilah needing to go to church I turned my alarm back to 7:30 and tried to sleep in a little more. It turns out Jon fell asleep on the couch and I turned my alarm off so at 8:06 I started getting ready for our 9:00 church. Some how I got ready while Jon took care of the girls. We actually got there at 9:07.
When they announced for the Primary kids to go up Lilah timidly got up and wandered slightly to the front. We were on the very last row. Emily Bartholomew got her and another Sunbeam and brought them up to the stand. Lilah stood in the front and her head was the only thing over the hand rail. She had her hands on it and she rested her head on her hands. She was so cute and I could tell she was nervous. She sang some words but mostly watched the congregation. I teared up a little as I watched my baby sing.
I still can’t believe she’s so big.

Well I had planned on making the girls hooded towels for Easter but my mom wasn’t able to embroider their names on them and I was too tired to make them. 🙁
Instead I got them each a bag of goldfish colorful crackers one mini cadbury egg , some robin eggs and green pear applesauce. (Lilah didn’t like the applesauce. I actually think it’s too sweet for her taste.)

Church was early for us so we had breakfast and got dress to go. Lilah wanted to just stay home to eat candy and hunt for eggs but I said she had to go to church or there would be no more Easter. (She kept asking to stay home so that’s when I gave her the ultimatum.) She went to church but apparently was noticeably grumpy to a primary counselor and her teacher during singing and sharing time. I’m sure waking up at 5:30 am didn’t help either. (Our power went out about 4 times on Sunday. Lilah woke up because the door wasn’t lite by the hall night light, or rather she started crying for that reason.)

They girls got tons of stuff at church, really Eden got tons of stuff at church, play dough, M&M’s, a goody bag. It was more than we had given her! Jon got a picture of the girls and all their loot.

The girls and their loot. This is also the only picture I have of them together, so I had to post it.

Sleepy Eden

Eden also woke up early that morning. As you see she feel asleep in her high chair at lunch. Jon had seen the signs of sleepiness and warned that we’d have to hold off on the egg hunt until after Eden’s nap since she was so tired. I didn’t believe that she was that tired until I saw her eyelids close and her head bob. Lilah was too psyched for the egg hunt so we decided we’d do two that day. She got hers that afternoon and Eden got hers after we got home from my parents.

Lilah’s egg hunt

Her reapings

We all took afternoon naps and then headed to my parents for dinner. It was delicious and the kids couldn’t wait until they went egg hunting.

Howie, Kaitlynn, Eden and Lilah

Eden finds egg!

Lilah goes right by the egg!

Howie was a real trooper and aloud Eden to get some eggs that he spotted at the same time as she. Poor kid, they’d both see it and he was obviously faster than Eden but we’d always ask him to let her get the eggs.(She got 5 and he got 8. ) He’s a great cousin.

Their was tons of candy in each egg. I mean this is a picture of what we got in the one basket my mom gave us and then the 15 eggs the girls found.

Jon wants the candy to be gone within a week, either we eat it or it gets tossed, though I’m sure I can’t do that I love chocolate too much and I’m trying to be good, so I want it to last, we just don’t like the asking of candy each morning by the girls.
Anyways between the candy filled eggs and the best Easter basket ever we’re going to have a lot of candy to eat or give away. Anyone want candy?

Oh here is a picture from Eden’s egg hunt that night.

It actually worked out well to do two. This way she could just look and find rather than us hurriedly point so she could have a chance against her sister. Lilah wanted to help find eggs but we kept her on the couch and Eden laughed with delight each time she spotted an egg on her own. Lilah did help me hide them for Eden. She wants to do more egg hunts, but I can only take so many and three’s enough for me.

Happy Easter Everyone!

My sister Carolyn works at a real estate office. For an Easter gift she asked the women who does their house baskets to make each family, that was here for Easter, a basket. Here’s ours. It has tons of stuff in it. Peeps, cotton candy, chocolate bunnies, crayons, coloring books, Orange slices, m&m’s and candy kisses to name some of it. I almost don’t want to open it because it’s so pretty. It’s was from her and Derek.

Carolyn also bought the dresses that the girls wore for Easter. She just liked them and I just kept them for Easter.

She’s taken nicely to the position of “Aunt with no kids who spoils her nieces”. Andrea use to do this, along with Carolyn, but now we only have Carolyn. Andrea still spoils them when she has a chance, it’s just that she’s hundred of miles away.
On Sunday I joked with Carolyn that she didn’t need to have kids, we’d just share custody with her and Derek. We’d have the girls during the week and they could have them on the weekends, that way we could go on dates. 🙂
She wasn’t up for joint custody but she did say she’d babysit once a month since she’d be babysitting Nia, he friend Julie’s daughter, once a month. Derek would just have to have his boys night out on her babysitting night. 😉
Well see if it happens. Their house will be on the other side of the universe from us, but heck if it’s free $6 in gas ain’t bad for a babysitter. 😉

So I went on the trip.
Eden had a small fever on Wednesday night, but she only puked once that day. Thursday morning she was her normal happy singing self in bed so I decided to go. I had folded all the clothes I washed for the trip so it would be fairly easy packing. We were all set and then at 10 am when I started to think about getting everything in my mom’s car I realized we’d left the car seats in our car. Jon was a doll and dropped them off for us so we left about 11:15.
Both girls seemed normal on Thursday. It was very happy traveling and we didn’t use the DVD player my mom brought because they were quiet the whole time, napping or reading books.
They didn’t eat very much Thursday night, though they ate well at lunch. (We went to Chuck -a-Rama’s in St. George, one of the reason’s I so badly wanted to go on the trip in the first place.)

Friday morning Lilah was great, Eden ate hardly anything but drank a lot of orange juice. We stayed at the hotel while my mom went and decorated the cake for my cousin’s reception.
Eden threw up about 10:30 am. I was able to clean it up easily, luckily the carpet was hunter green. She seemed fine after that so we took a walk across the street and played at a little play ground that we found. The maid came while we were gone, I warned her about the throw up, and our room smelled like cinnamon when we returned.
We walked to a diner for lunch and just had it to go since I was alone and Eden was sick. I felt like a single mom. Why you ask? Well I was there with my girls alone and two Jon had my rings so he could get them checked for our extended warranty plan. So I was without my wedding ring. I felt like everyone saw that I had kids, and saw that I was not married because I had no rings.
Lilah had her drink while we waited for our food and she spilled it. 16 oz of soda and ice on the bench. Her and Eden thought they were helping by running their hands in the soda and wiping the bench but without any napkins. I got mad at Lilah because she continued to do this and she started to cry. Luckily we had our food so I was able to usher them out as she cried and Eden tried to give her a hug. I felt like people were thinking, “Oh the poor single mother can’t keep her temper when her child spills her drink”.
I just felt single the whole time. Anywhere we went really. I was there with my mom, two girls and without a wedding ring. Of course I know I was more self conscious then others really noticed, but being in Utah I felt more judged for some reason.
We all went to the reception. Eden seemed to be doing better, even though she had a diaper blowout, and Lilah was still fine.
My cousins, Brittany (16) and Celeste (14) kept holding Lilah and Eden. I had to remind them that Lilah had legs and she could walk. Eden was very cuddly and she liked just being with me that night.
Here’s another reason I felt like people thought I was a single mom. At the reception people noticed I had kids, but never asked about my husband. (The the groom’s family.) So I felt like they thought I was single or maybe thy didn’t want to ask in case I was single.

Saturday neither girls ate much of anything at breakfast. Eden had a pretty good day, but Lilah did not.
We stopped at Beaver for lunch and right after we ordered Lilah started coughing, which has been pretty normal for the last two weeks. Then she threw up right there by the registers at Wendy’s. Luckily she hadn’t eaten much so it was just watery, not chunky. She threw up a little and I thought it would stop but then she threw up a little more and I tried to rush her to the bathroom where she threw up on the way and just a little in the toilet. The girls shared a banana and we ate lunch.
They both slept a lot on the way to St. George.
We stopped in St. George and Lilah went into a store with my mom for some knitting needles. Once inside the store she threw up again. ( I asked her if she felt okay and she said she did, but we think the walking made her sick.)
The rest of the trip was fine, but neither of the girls ate or drank much.
Saturday night Lilah coughed and threw up once,and then throughout the night felt like she was going to threw up anytime she coughed.

They stayed home Sunday and slept all day.
Eden threw up on Jon Sunday night right after I canceled dinner with Carolyn for tonight, Monday.
Today has been more sleep and slightly lethargic girls.
I hate having sick girls. Luckily today is a holiday and Jon has it off. I may make him stay home tomorrow, but well see.
Eden seems to want food, bit she won’t eat the applesauce I give her. I think she’s sick of applesauce.
Lilah just wants cuddles and she eats a little.
I hope they get better soon. They did have a good time on the trip though. Lilah didn’t want to leave the hotel. I think she liked all the soda’s and restaurants we were visiting.

So we don’t do Valentine’s Day very much. Mostly because our anniversary is later this month, so to do two romantic nights in one month is hard. Really it’s over doing it because we don’t even do one romantic night a month. I also prefer doing something extra special on a day that actually means something to me.

Today has been a bad day though. Eden is sick. I mean diarrhea and puke sick. (She’s only puked once, but the night is still young.) This makes me extra sad because we were suppose to go to Utah tomorrow with my mom. Even if she has a good night and doesn’t puke again there’s no guarantee that she won’t tomorrow while on the trip. I’m still tempted to go if she has a good night, but I would feel soo bad if she did  end up puking in my mom’s car.
Most times these things are just one day, but will it only be one day is the question. We’d be leaving around 10 am….which is just too early to tell.
I really wanted to go. It was for a cousin’s reception. I’m not close to this cousin or even this aunt and uncle. I just wanted to get away. I also wanted to show support because they’ve come down for weddings and blessings, and we haven’t been able to go up for the two weddings they’ve have since I’ve been married.
Really I just wanted to get away and change my routine.
I’m so very disappointed.

(Jon’s coworker has been gone and if it were just Friday he could take the time off, but it’s Thursday and Friday, which makes it hard for us.)

Jon has the week between Christmas and New Years off. UNLV does this shutdown of the campus and you can work, but it’s recommended to take the time off. Since we had the week off Jon studied for the G.R.E. which he took on Friday. So even though my husband didn’t work he was still at his office two days last week and then he took the G.R.E. on Friday. The time flew by and it seemed I didn’t have time for much of anything. So here is my week in review.

Monday: Christmas….why would I blog on Christmas.
Tuesday: Relaxed in the morning and watched movies. Andrea and Brien came to town so I took the girls with me to see them while Jon stayed behind and studied. We saw them for about an hour in the afternoon before they left to do some shopping. Then I went to my sister Carolyn’s house in Boulder City. The girls caused mischief and I sorted through some clothes she hasn’t worn. I found one sweater, two long sleeve shirts and a couple short sleeve ones that I could add to my wardrobe.
Wednesday: Jon went to study for the G.R.E. at his office. I’m not sure what I did this day. Probably the normal dishes and cleaning. This week was hard though because Lilah started saying the phrase “I just can’t do anything right.” in which she would not try to do anything. She seemed very whiny and it drove me nuts all this week until today, Tuesday, where she’s been her normal self and not overly whiny.
Thursday: Jon went to campus to study in the morning and I stayed home with the girls. Around 2:30 Jon’s mom called about the plans of seeing Kumen and his family. At 3:30 or so it was confirmed that we would have the gathering at our house the next day at 4. Andrea and Brien came by on their way home to Ely. Probably because I was sad that I hadn’t seen them more and because we had some things of theirs. I gave them their pick of family pictures to compensate for them stopping by to see my little family. After Andrea and Brien left, about 3:45 and I started cleaning the house. Well not so much cleaning but organizing the chaos that had taken over. I got my room organized and the Christmas tree taken down so there would be more room for everyone. My room was quite a feet because we’ve had lots of little things floating around there and it has never looked as nice as it did Friday, when I completely finished, since we’ve moved in. I should take a picture so I can remember this moment. ( I hope to make it look nicer once I get drapes and get even more organized.)
Friday: Jon took the G.R.E. I ignored my two little girls and organized the front room. ( My house is normally okay but we just have so much stuff. Books or filing overtakes our living room and computer desk regularly.) We ate lunch and Jon got a few things from the store. I cleaned my bathroom and took a shower. After getting dressed and presentable I loaded up the things we’d decided to take to DI and made a big trip. I went to DI, then to my parents house in Henderson for chairs. Then I stopped off at Costco for food and came home. I left at 2:40 and got home at 4:15. Then we had a family gathering.
Saturday: I’m not sure what we did. I think I tried writing a draft for stuff but I just relaxed because of all the hard work the previous two days.
Sunday: Went to church and celebrated New Years Eve. Jon fell asleep around 10. I didn’t want to watch anything that was on TV so I watched Star Wars III because I fell asleep the day before when Jon was watching it. Jon woke up at 11:55 pm and we paused the movie at 11:59. We enjoyed a New Years kiss, the fireworks on TV, and ice cream floats. I had a the regular root beer float Jon had a Kiwi Lime Soda float. We stayed up until 2 or so.
Monday: I slept in. Enjoyed the morning. Jon tried putting up the dry wall in the girls bathroom. It turned out to be just a little to thick for the patch job so we need to buy more. I went shopping with my sister Carolyn at 2. It was so fruitless until we reached the Target Greatland. The stores either didn’t have what I was looking for (a black dress or a least a cute but simple black skirt.) , or they were to expensive. (I just can’t spend $50 on a skirt even if it is Ann Taylor and on sale/ clearance.) We ate at Buffalo Wild Wings where Carolyn’s boyfriend was watching a game with some friends. I got home around 7:30 pm. It was a fun day out and I’m glad that Target at least had what I was looking for. ( I got a black skirt, black yoga pants, and then two t-shirts on clearance at $1.98 and a v-neck at $3.98. I’m totally going to visit ours to see if they have the same clearance because they’re cute and I can wear them at home without worrying about ruining a $2 shirt.)

I’m trying to keep my house organized now that my life is back to normal.Today I feel yucky, I’m not sure why, so I’ve slept and played all day with a little blogging.

Our little tree on Christmas Eve.

The stockings. ( Filled with some homemade truffles and other goodies.)

Lilah finding what she wants in the stocking.
Chocolate covered pretzels before breakfast!

The first gift Lilah opened. (We don’t have Eden’s because our memory card got full.)
Lilah’s accordion that Eden liked.

One of Jon’s gifts. (A book on Escher.)

Mommy’s gift…..The pearls around her neck and on her ears.

Eden enjoying watching Tarzan on the couch. See collected all these bows and then sat in the middle of them.

Lilah with a bow on her head. She never noticed I put it there.

A little bit of our Christmas 2006.

So it’s been a little nutty at the Blake house. But this is a written recap of Christmas.
Lilah was so excited for Christmas. All day long on Monday she was asking “Is it Christmas?” She had tons of fun opening gifts. Eden on the other hand opened two gifts and just wanted to play once they were opened. One was a xylophone type chime toy, but she also liked playing with her sisters accordion. Jon got it out right away to play with it and Eden wanted to only play with that until we finally got her to open another toy, a little bath toy with soap crayons. Since Eden LOVES crayons she just played with them the rest of the morning. Lilah didn’t mind opening the rest, though I think Eden had decided to help her open the blocks once we got them out.
Jon received books and a cd. That’s all he ever gets because clothing is one thing we don’t buy for one another. Our tastes are just different enough that we’re okay with what the other person buys but we don’t always understand each others tastes. I received “one gift”. This made me sad Christmas Eve. I suppose I didn’t expect a lot but when Jon mentioned that he was sorry that I had only one gift I did get a little sad. All I get to open on Christmas is one gift when our girls have nine and he has like five! I will admit I am a little spoiled but I really love surprises so one gift just wasn’t cutting it on Christmas Eve. I also had asked Lilah what she wrapped for me with daddy and she said it was a DVD. So if I was getting one gift I didn’t want it to be a DVD set of some show I liked. I would just like to say also that we set a limit on what to spend for one another. We try to keep it small so we don’t use our savings for Christmas, except what we saved for Christmas, or go into debt. So it was only one gift because that was what our limit was set at. Jon blamed it on my expensive taste. Anyways my one gift ended up being two gifts in one package. He said he wanted to shake things up a bit and surprise me because I always know whats coming. In the one package was a cd I wanted and a fresh water pearl necklace with matching earrings. It was a bit of a surprise though not completely.
You see Jon had hidden the pearl necklace box in his drawer under this shoebox he keeps his pocket stuff in. I had removed it a week or so before Christmas to get receipts from it to file and when I put it back I noticed the blue box. It was just like the blue box a necklace I received  at a previous Christmas came in so I figured he had gotten me some jewelry off of amazon. I had will power and I did not look in the box and I even told him that I had accidentally found the box. So I started thinking about what would be in this blue box and I figured it was probably a pearl necklace and earrings. Mostly because  the jewelry I have on amazon is silver stuff and then I have a few diamonds just to give an idea and then pearls. So he was right that I end up figuring things out. ( I felt my one present Christmas morning and figured out it was the blue box I saw and not a DVD set.)
Back to the story. The twist of one present and me asking Lilah what it was made me a little disappointed only to be pleasantly surprised when I finally opened it Christmas day. Now I need to go find a cute Church outfit to go with the pearls. Sure I have one that will work and I can wear them with jeans and a nice shirts, but what’s the fun in that.

Things we got the girls:  cd player for their bedroom (really a clock radio with cd player), more blocks (hopefully they won’t fight over them as much), Tarzan (my favorite Disney movie), Monster’s Inc., Accordion (why I’m not sure. Jon bought this), toy chimes (another Jon), bubble bath, Candyland. Lilah got Eden a bath time Pablo, form the Backyardagains and it came with soap crayons. Eden got Lilah a Sequence game.
(remember this is for posterity and for the sake of recording it.)

We hung out all morning and then went to my parents around 1. The girls got lots and we got some things.  We had the traditional ham dinner with my family and just talked for the evening and came home around 6.

Jon’s parents are older and they have a hard time getting things done for Christmas sometimes. I remember our first married Christmas we came over and helped set up the tree and decorate it. Other years they’ve been able to pull it off. This year they had a hard time.  This past month their health as been ailing them and they had their one and only car in the shop for a week before the mechanic told them to take it to the dealership, in which the dealership diagnosed and fixed it in about 3 1/2 hours. Since we were in the middle of finals she didn’t tell me anything until this Wednesday, the first day we were able to make contact this week. I found out about all the craziness and that they had no tree up and had bought no gifts. They declined my help for Thursday. (Lilah had a little book reading holiday party with a nursery friend.) This morning I called them and nothing had been done for Christmas. Mom was planning on getting the tree out, but she was still having some difficulty. The reason Christmas is so important is Dara and Jason, my two down syndrome  siblings in-law. Since they still are quiet child like in their thinking I knew it would be important for them, and my in laws to have the Christmas tree up and some gifts. Mom said she had some videos from previous years that hadn’t been given and some pants for Jason that she had hemmed. I decided I would go and get her two items for each child and then we would go over as a family and help set up and decorate the tree, which Lilah was all for. Mom didn’t know what to get Dara and Jason. I suggested shirts and she suggested a photo album for Jason. Jason loves taking pictures. I went to Mervyn’s and Eden tagged along with me this morning. It was surprisingly not that busy and we got in and out quickly with no long line since I was in the linens department. I got Dara a shirt and a medium sized lava lamp and Jason a shirt and a photo album set. Since I got home at 10:45 am we packed up and went to the parents to set up the tree. I also wrapped the gifts while I was there so I knew that they would be wrapped.
We never know what to get his parents. They already have a lot of stuff, so this was our gift to them. Mom suggested we make it a tradition to have us over to help with the tree. She loved watching Lilah decorate, and just having company was a nice change. I suggested I could also be her elf and by this time next year because we should have a second car which would allow me more freedom to come help them. It may sound cheesy, but I love that I was able to help them for Christmas. I was a little pushy, but that was so Mom would accept the help. I know our help helped them and that makes my holiday feel a little bit more like Christmas.

We put our Christmas tree up the weekend before finals. Why the weekend before finals? I’m not sure, especially when I told Jon as he was in the shed doing things we should wait until after finals. He was taking the shades down for the garden and since the shed was open he decided to get the tree out and check it for spiders. At least when I saw him with the tree out in the backyard he raised it and said “Look no spiders!” I sighed and said “What on earth are you doing with that? We’re supposed to wait until finals are over.”
Lilah has been so excited for Christmas since our concert on the 25 of November. The couple who babysat them had their Christmas tree up and she couldn’t wait until Christmas. Her excitement along with Jon being in the shed fueled the setting up of the tree. ( I also think me stating that we should wait made him want to do it also. ) So while Jon finished checking for spiders I got things in a little more in order for the tree. Another reason I wanted to wait. Our house was a little more chaotic because of the neglect during the finals pre-week. He came in and helped me get the leaf out of the table so we could have more room by the front door…the only place to put a tree in our small living room. Well I swept and wiped the floor down and we set it up on Saturday. (The 8th I believe.) Since we had no plans on Sunday we decorated it. The girls had a blast. Lilah was so excited for Christmas to be coming.
So here is adventure of our tree decorating.

Eden loved the plastic hooks.
They were attached to a circle and looked like a flower. At one point Lilah put them on the tree.

Lilah loved the stockings
What else do you do with a stockings besides put them on your foot?…..

…apparently you also put them on your arms.

Here’s them decorating or looking at ornaments.

Eden putting our angle on.

(It’s an ornament from the year we become engaged. My mom gave it to me and we’ve use it as our tree topper since we’ve been married. I don’t know what we’ll do when we start using the bottom layer of the tree and make it seven feet tall instead of just five. )

The finished product.

The last thing I want to mention is why Jon was checking for spiders. We had a fake Christmas tree for many years growing up. The second or third Christmas while at the Edison house we got the tree out and began bringing it into the house. (It was stored in a wooden box on the back patio.) Well one of us noticed small black things on the branches and we realized it had been infested with a black widows nest and they were now running around on our couches! it was terrible. Scott, one of my older brothers, would have been the only boy because we were doing this without my father. I’m pretty sure we were all screeching a little bit as we tossed them onto the front patio…the closet door. So now since we store our tree in the outside shed…I’m a little worried of spiders getting in it. It seems pretty empty of crazy bugs and what not for now.