Cameron 3 Months

Cameron is 3 months old. She is doing so well. When she went to the doctor a few weeks ago she was just shy of 8lbs and gaining weight quickly, (about 20% faster than most babies her age,)finally! After that I was able to ween her off of the breast milk/formula mixture. Now we guess she's about 9lbs. She goes back to the doctor for her next round of shots next month.

She is doing all the things a baby her age should. She smiles all the time and talks and giggles. She has started to grab for things a little bit too. She sleeps through the night almost every night now, from about 9pm - 6:30am. It's great!

She has excellent head control. She likes to sit in the "Bumbo" seat and watch the boys play or look at the t.v. Most of the time I carry her around with her facing outward. I sit her little tush on my hip and support her torso with my hand on her belly. She looks around and talks to the boys and watches everything everyone is doing.

She has lots of nicknames; Cammie, Cam Cam, Camster, Cammie Lou, Little Miss, Little Peanut, and Baby Sissy. Believe it or not those are all commonly heard in our house. We talk to her and about her all the time so their are lots of opportunities to use different nicknames. :-)

She is so so so sweet. We just can't get enough of her!

Carters Broken Arm

Well unfortunately Carter broke his arm last night. He was playing with his brother, (when they should have been going to sleep) and fell off the top bunk. It was about 8:30 and they had only been in bed for about 5 minutes. We heard him start to cry and ran in to see what had happened. He was holding his wrist and when I checked it out it was very obviously broken. Gregg took him to Children's Hospital right away. They were gone until about 11:30. Carter was SO good! Gregg said he only had one little melt down and started asking for me, but other than that he was an angel. He didn't complain about the pain or anything. They took and xray, gave him a temporary cast, and sent him home for the night. He told me later that he didn't like the "squeeze" (the blood pressure cuff,) but didn't have anything else negative to say about going to the "hostipal" as he called it. We had to go back today to see the orthopedist and get his permanent cast. I took him today. He was fine about going as long as I didn't make him see the "poke doctor". (The last time he saw the pediatrician he got shots.) Again he was an angel. He didn't complain about anything. They gave him some Tylenol with Codeine before they did the cast and it made him kind of loopy. It was funny. He cried when the doctor squeezed the cast tight to his arm but was fine once that was over. He wasn't allowed to eat until after he got his cast in case he needed surgery, so we went to McDonald's after we left the hospital at 4pm. He was very excited about that. Now it's just going to take him a little bit of learning how to do things left handed, but I think he'll be fine!

This is what his arm looked like after we took the splint off this morning. Last night it looked even worse before it started to swell. I literally couldn't even look at it without starting to cry.

This is a picture of a photocopy of the xray so it's not so great, but you get the idea. He broke both bones. The top bone broke 3 or so inches from the wrist. The lower bone broke about an inch back from the wrist.


Here we are waiting for the cast. This was about the time the Codeine was starting to kick in. He was so giggly.


Here he is all casted up. He chose the color. He didn't like the sling and made me take it off as soon as we got outside.
Gregg and I are still amazed at how good he has been about the whole thing. My poor baby is broken, but it could be worse. A few weeks and it will all be a memory.

Kyle

Two weeks ago Kyle turned two. I can't believe it. In some ways I can't believe it's only been two years since he was born. On the other hand I can't believe he is growing so fast.

Kyle was born two weeks early on April 29th, 2008. He was a difficult infant because he had colic and reflux for almost 5 months. Once he got passed that, he was a healthy, happy, wonderful little baby.

He earned the nickname "Beaker" because of the way he cried as a baby. Gregg always said he sounded like a bird beaking, (whatever that means.) We would say thing to each other like, "the beaker is beaking again." After that it just stuck. He also goes by; Beak-man Beak-tastic, and simply Beak. It's a strange nickname I know, but it suits him.

Kyle has always been our snuggler. Even now one of his favorite things to do is sit on either Gregg's or My lap wrapped in a blanket. (The only time he gets jealous of Cameron is when she is on a lap that he thinks should be his.) He loves to crawl in bed with us and have us crawl in bed with him. At bed time he often asks me to "lay down and snuggle Mommy, right here" pointing to his pillow. He has always loved kisses and hugs. I LOVE to snuggle with him.

Kyle wants to run with the big boys so bad. He would get very frustrated even as an infant and I could see in his eyes that he just wanted to do so much more than his little body would let him. He learned how to pedal his bike on his own about a month ago. That was a very proud day for him. Now he can keep up with Carter and ride up and down the driveway and sidewalk in front of our house. As he gets bigger and more capable his frustration level goes down. That has been nice for Mom and Dad. He is still very stubborn and wants things done his way, but now that he can speak so well we finally know what his way is and can try to help.


Here are some things about Kyle:

He hates it when he spills anything, even a drop of milk. He is very protective of his pillow. He's a very good helper and like to get things for me, (like diapers or Kleenex,) and can feed the dogs and the cat with very little assistance. He is very inquisitive and wants to know what everything is, especially noises.

Some of his favorite things are; motorcycles, wrestling on the floor with dad, trains, bubbles, anything outdoors, and his rain boots.

Some of his favorite foods are; peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, fruit snacks, french fries, pretzels, mac and cheese, and green beans.

We just love him so much! I can't imagine life without Kyle. He is a wonderful part of our family and we just wouldn't be complete without him!

My Happy Mother's Day

Today is Mother's Day. It's my 4th year as an actual Mom. I LOVE being a Mom, so for me this is always a day of refection on my beautiful children. My kids are to young to know what today is but somehow every year I get a special little gift from each of them. This year it was that all of my kids, including my 2 1/2 month old baby, slept until 8:00 AM. I can't remember the last time I slept in that late, it was awesome. The kids were all really good today. Kyle was very snugly, (he and I both have a bit of a cold,) which was nice. He kept whispering "love you Mommy," to me periodically all day. Cameron gave me lots of smiles and little baby loves. Carter brought me flowers from his grocery store trip with Daddy.

Gregg did a pool job yesterday and used a little of the money from that to get me beautiful flowers, and a very nice dinner; petite fillet minion and lobster tail with a slice of cheese cake for dessert. (Lobster tails were on sale for $5 a piece! otherwise it would have just been the steak.) For those of you who don't know my husband is practically a gourmet cook, so this really was a treat. He even cleared the table and bathed the kids after dinner. It was so nice. :-)
Other than that we just hung out together today. It was very nice and laid back, my favorite kind of day. I hope all of the Mother's out there were able to have their own great Mother's Day.
To my Mother, Step-Mother, and Mother-in-law: I love each of you very much! Thank you for all that you do for me and my family and for being such shining examples to me of what Mothers should be!

Me and my kiddo's, (obviously). SO hard to get a picture of all of us together. I had to bribe Kyle with a jellybean just to get him to take the picture. Carter wouldn't stop picking his nose, (typical), and Cammie wouldn't stop crying until Gregg took her after the picture was taken. Oh well, Happy Mother's Day 2010!

More Party Pictures

Well for some reason Blogger didn't like that I was trying to put these pictures in my last post. It kept removing them. I got sick of fighting with it and decided to give them their own little post. :-)

Here is Kyle taking his turn with the Pinata!

Kyle is giving the Pirate the "Evil Eye" in hopes of cracking him!

The Birthday boy playing with Courtney and Uncle Chris on one of the Big Kid toys.
Here is Cameron just hanging out before the party. She slept through most of the action! Keep scrolling down to see thr rest of the party!

Kyle's Birthday Party

This year for Kyle's Birthday we had a Pirate themed party at a park near our house. It's the boys favorite park to go to because the play ground is huge. It has 5 or 6 slides, a rock climbing area, swings, and all kinds of other things to keep them busy.

I went to the park with Cameron at 8:30 to set up. The party wasn't starting until 10:00 so I thought that would be plenty of time to get a good table and get all set up. When I got there, the parking lot was full, (I had to park in a handicapped space to unload my stuff,) and all of the shaded tables had been reserved by some bicycle marathon group. I quickly unloaded all of my stuff onto the last two tables at the park and called Gregg to get the Easy-Up out of storage on his way so that we would have some shade.

In the end it worked out just fine, it was a beautiful day and we ended up closer to the playground.
The kids who came to the party ranged in age from 13 down to infant. The park had something for everyone to do. Carter and Kyle were thrilled to have so many of their friends and cousins to play with. They were practically buzzing.

It was nice to be able to hang out and catch up with our friends and family while the kids were off playing with each other.
Some of our friends that came to the party were people we only get a chance to see a few times a year on a special occasion like a birthday so it was fun to have everyone together and relax.


In years past I have been busy "hosting" the birthday parties. This year I was able to really just


enjoy my kids, friends, and family. We may never have another birthday party at our house ever again. (Thank you Brad and Carroll for the great idea!) Clean up was a breeze too. Roll up the disposable table clothes, take down the Easy-Up, throw the cooler and gifts in the Suburban, and go!

After lots of swinging, sliding, and running around, we did a Pinata. The youngest kids went first for obvious reasons. The all did well hitting it, but none of them got close to breaking it open. Even the "big boys" couldn't break it. Gregg finally had to step in and give it a few good whacks to get the candy out. When I asked Carter later what his favorite part of the day was, he said, "when Daddy killed the pinata and got my candy for me!" Apparently it was a hit, no pun intended. ;-)

We sang Happy Birthday and Kyle tried to blow out his candle, but he was pretty tired and couldn't quite get it so Carter stepped in and took care of it for him. Kyle didn't care at all. He was just happy to have a long awaited cupcake.
He even helped himself to a second one while I was taking pictures. When I asked him what his favorite part of the day was he said, "Cupcakes!!" It was a fun party and a great day. Thank you to all of our friends and family who came to our little shindig and for everyone who brought or sent gifts to Kyle. He LOVES ALL of them and so does his older brother!