and then there were four…

So, I’m back. I feel kind of ominous posting that as a title, because I don’t want to jinx myself, but after two weeks of feeling like utter crap, it’s nice to announce that I’m feeling much better.

Unfortunately Sophia seems to have caught the cold (luckily it doesn’t seem as severe as mine was), and Olivia may have a UTI. She has been crying every time she goes to the bathroom since late this afternoon, so we are taking her to the doctor bright and early tomorrow morning.

I know that UTIs are super common in little girls, but it still makes me sad that she has to have that kind of pain so young. It is such a cliche, but I wish there was a pain transference machine where you could just take someone’s pain away.

I’d let them feel the pain when they did something stupid, just not when they were sick. Unless of course they got sick by doing something stupid (like puking because they drink too much when they go to a party and indulge in underage drinking) Sure, I’ll rub their back and hold their hair, but I’m definitely gonna be laughing and telling them this is what they get. THEN they’ll have to research the effects of alcohol poisoning and write me a report. At least if they are stupid a second time I’ve given them the information, right?

But, as they are (almost) four and two, I do not have to worry about that. One would hope I would NEVER have to worry, but I’ll try not to be that naive.

I have tried to make Olivia feel slightly better about the whole situation and told her that the doctor may give her medicine to make her pee look neon orange. Unless they don’t give that to little kids, then I’ll be forced to admit that I was wrong.

I really hope they give her that medicine. I hate admitting I was wrong, plus the neon pee is kind of cool.

I guess we’ll find out tomorrow.

I don’t think I have been this sick in a long time.

I felt flutters last week, but, in true Natalie fashion, I ignored it. “Oh, it’s just allergies, the weather is being funny, my body is reacting…I’ll be FINE.”

I went to the beach with my family last Friday and was able to keep it together, but as soon as we got home and decompressed I realized that it wasn’t just allergies.

Still…I shrugged it off and went to Bill’s cousin’s going-away party on Saturday (it was so worth it…the best homemade pizza I’ve ever had!)

I woke up on Sunday and sounded like Marge Simpson.

Absolutely no voice. Please understand there was no yelling or crazy partying that happened on Saturday, I didn’t have one drink, but I still had no voice.

This has never happened to me before. It was (and is) weird.

Bill kept asking me to call one of the girls my “special little guy” but instead I just “hmmmmm”ed at him, which amused him to no end.

I stayed in bed all day Sunday, and was forced back to my real world of being primary caregiver on Monday. I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again: stay-at-home mama’s do NOT get sick days. I can’t speak for working moms, but I would assume MOST moms don’t get sick days. Sucks, but along with the pros I guess I have to take the cons.

I was still unable to talk above a whisper on Monday, and Olivia and Sophia kept asking me why I was “talking like that”? I couldn’t yell at them for misbehaving (not that I EVER do that or anything. *smirk*) which led to some very creative parenting. “I’m going to swat your legs with this flyswatter if you keep acting like a fly and bugging me!”  Since we don’t spank in our house they both called my bluff and I actually looked at them and said “man, I’m gonna have to come up with some better threats since we don’t hit in our house, right?” Olivia looked at me thoughtfully and said “Mama, why is your voice so funny?”

By Tuesday, Bill said my raspy, deep voice had gone from “Maude”-era Bea Arthur to “Golden Girls” Bea Arthur, which, I suppose is progress.

Yesterday and today has been much better, I have faded in and out from being able to speak, to losing my voice and sounding like a boy entering manhood. However, the coughing has taken over and for the past three days and nights I feel like my lungs are going to come up out of my throat.

Unfortunately it hasn’t affected my appetite and when I’m sick I’m less likely to eat healthy and more likely to eat for comfort. So much for the appendix diet. But, seeing as how starting next week I’m going to have to walk a few miles a day to get Olivia to and from preschool (I’ll be so glad when we finally get that second car), maybe I’ll be able to tackle the extra (and then some).

Other than that, I must say I am a lucky girl to have such a great husband. He brought me my favorite soup when I feel like crap (Chinese WonTon soup) and went out and bought breakfast items since I have not felt like baking for the girls. Plus he hasn’t complained about eating sandwiches or random meals since I’m in no mood to cook. I did get a burst of energy on Tuesday and made Waffles & Bacon (it was National Waffle Day, Ya’ll) but other than that I’ve been MIA from the kitchen (okay, I do get the girls’ meals together, but sandwiches, leftovers and quesadillas are not exactly heavy-duty cooking).

I’m hoping that I am better by Monday. This can’t last forever, can it? Plus, my baby girl starts preschool and I have to meet all the other parents. I don’t want to be the weird mom (with the frog voice and glazed over eyes) from the very beginning…gotta let them warm up to the weird, right?

The Yo Party Party I threw for Sophia’s 2nd birthday was featured on the Gabba Friends website. Many thanks to them for helping me plan and execute the most amazing party for my sweet girl!

And just in case you missed it earlier, here is the lowdown on her Yo Party Party.

So, three weeks ago we had Sophia’s second birthday party and celebrated Yo Gabba Gabba style. She had a blast and everyone seemed to enjoy themselves.

Here is our Yo Gabba Gabba decorated patio. All of my decorations were printed from my computer, and handmade. Nothing fancy, but helped saved a lot of money. The balloons really helped give it lots of color. I also used all of the Yo Gabba Gabba toys that the girls had for decorations.

I really liked how the birthday banner turned out. Blue construction paper and sticker paper with Yo Gabba Gabba-esque font printed on it. I made the party hats (printed Yo Gabba Gabba printables from Nick Jr. on sticker paper and hats in Yo Gabba Gabba character colors). I printed the Yo Gabba Gabba paper dolls and glued them to ribbon and hung them from the patio roof.

The kiddie table (also decorated with printables from Nick Jr.)

The food table: All Sophia approved. We had Peanut Butter and Jelly Sushi AND for a fun variation, Nutella and Marshmallow Fluff Sushi. I also made chicken and plain cheese quesadillas, Bacon Wrapped Pineapple Bites! and little smokies in a blanket. There were various dips and salsas and Bill’s mom brought a great fruit platter with this delicious cream cheese/marshmallow fluff dip. I also made pink lemonade but re-christened it “Razzle Berry Lemonade” which is what Muno’s mother makes for the gang in the “Family” episode.

Excuse the graininess of this photo, it was taken with my cell phone at 1 in the morning the day of the party as soon as I finished it. But this is the cake I constructed for my baby’s 2nd birthday. I was quite proud of it–it isn’t as fancy as a store-made cake, but it was EXACTLY what Sophia wanted, a green and pink cake. The inside was pink with chocolate chips. It was a Apple-Chip recipe my friend gave me. It was pretty tasty. Between each layer was a chocolate ganache I made from scratch. I iced it with homemade buttercream (any generic recipe will do). I forgot to take a solo picture of the inside of the cake, but it looked like a watermelon. I also made her the Ben & Jerry’s French Vanilla ice cream that I made for Olivia’s birthday, and like her sister, she wanted it BRIGHT yellow.

My icing skills need a little work, but I’m still quite proud. (Toodee fell off somewhere between the kitchen and the table).

Our Muno Pinata that was bigger than the kids! And yes…there was beer at a 2 year old’s party. But I didn’t provide it (if that makes it ANY better–apparently on really hot days, beer is a necessity for some folk).

Yummy candy.

The ring pops were a hit.

All-in-all we had an amazing day!

Since the day she was born, Olivia has had a head full of curls, losing some of it when she was about four months old, and finally growing those curls back.

They are GORGEOUS.

Not tight curls, but big loose curls that are usually curlier right after her hair air dries. Her hair is also long. When wet, it stretches almost to her butt, when dry it is halfway down her back.

Some days it is a struggle to get her to cooperate with me when it comes to combing and fixing her hair, lots of days she’ll say “You’re just going to pull it back, no combing it, right?” Which I have to inform her that yes, indeed, I will be combing her hair, because when you have long hair you HAVE to take care of it. When she protests I tell her “well, if you want to get your hair cut, then we won’t have to comb as much!”

Then the tears start “I don’t WANNNNTTTT to cut my hair, no mama, please don’t cut my hair!” Of course I have no defense: “OK baby, we won’t cut your hair right now, but we have to keep combing it and taking care of it so you don’t get any bugs or big tangles in it.”

“Okay mama.” Usually after that we have no problems (until a day or two later when we have the same conversation).

We’ve tried to explain that cutting your hair is painless, and it is a lot like cutting your fingernails or toenails. Nothing seems to help, she is still terrified of the idea of cutting her hair. I couldn’t put my finger on it until one day when we had the conversation about hair and she said “But I don’t want short hair like daddy!”

No amount of explaining how a haircut works would persuade her that it didn’t mean getting a number 3 shave on the back and sides and a trim on top. So for now, long hair rules.

I need to buy stock in detangler.

For the past few days, I have been having to tell both girls to stop pushing each other down. They think it is hilarious to push each other onto their butts and every single time they laugh hysterically. However, being the parent that I now am I know that it will only end in disaster.

“Keep your hands to yourself, and DO NOT push each other down!”  Both Bill and I have repeated some variation of this mantra to the girls at least once a day.

After telling them this again today, I hear Olivia say to Sophia, “No Sophia! You have to do it with your tummy.” And witness them tummy bump each other to the ground, laughing hysterically the whole way down.

While this can’t end well, what do I say to that?

Today Olivia was looking at my face and she said “I’m getting those” and started swirling her finger around near my face.

“You’re getting what, baby?” I asked her.

“Those” (more finger swirling in the general direction of my chin).

Then it hit me. I’m in the midst of a PMS breakout and my chin has gotten the zitty end of the deal.

“My bumps?” I asked her.

“Yeah, I’m getting those!”

“No baby, you’re not getting bumps, your face is smooth and you have a long time before you need to worry about bumps.”

“But I’m getting them! SEE?” And she proceeds to lift her nightgown and show me her kneecaps, which had a few bumps and bug bites on them.

Later today I took the girls outside to play and while they were occupied in the sandbox I took the opportunity to stalk bugs to photograph (For Pioneer Woman’s current Photography Assignment) and I suddenly hear Sophia saying “NOOOOOO NOOOO NOOO” so of course I practically drop my camera to run over and see what the heck is going on. I see her, covered, in sand. In her hair, her clothes, she’s spitting it out of her mouth, it’s mixed in with her (still) snotty nose.

“WHAT IN THE WORLD?” I asked. “Olivia did you throw sand on your sister?”

Of course, she did not want to admit to it, but I finally said “Olivia, I want you to always tell the truth, because if you tell a lie and I figure it out, I’m going to be more upset than if you tell me the truth right away.”

“Okay, I did. I threw sand on Sophia.”

I cleaned poor Sophia off, and as I am doing it I look at Olivia and sternly say “This is MEAN. You are not a mean girl, but you did a mean thing that I do not like.” Then I went on to tell her we were going to go inside since she didn’t know how to behave and she was not allowed to watch any television for the rest of the day.

Of course, this made her cry and get upset. I explained that one of the biggest rules we have is that we never throw sand, because it could hurt and it is not nice. I told her if she did something like that at preschool to one of her friends, she would get into trouble and probably have to come home. I have no idea what would happen, but we’ve started trying to put her misdeeds into “when you start preschool” terms, so she knows what will be expected of her. This made her cry, which made my heart ache, (yes, I am an emotional pushover sometimes), so I told her how much I loved her and knew she was a sweet girl, but she had to apologize to Sophia and never ever do it again. She apologized and I told her if she did it again we were going to throw the sandbox away.

“But…the sandbox won’t fit in the trashcan!” She said very concerned.

Biting my lip, I looked at her and said “I’ll throw the sand away and then give the sandbox to someone else who can use it properly and not throw sand!”

That seemed to satisfy her.

• Yesterday, I was working out with my Wii fit plus “trainer” and the girls were working out with me (they really enjoy ‘exercises’). The trainer likes to shout out words of encouragement throughout your workout. Suddenly I hear Sophia’s little voice shout out (a little congested one, I might add, since she has been sick recently and her nose is still runny) “I’m toning my body! I’m doing it!”
• Last night, Olivia came out of her room, dragging her monkey, Sandwich, behind her. “Um, Daddy…I need to tell you something.” Seeing as how it was nearing 10 p.m., we were growing weary of her stall tactics, but ever the good daddy, Bill asked her what was wrong. “I have a problem. Sandwich is allergic to beds!” Bill stifled his laughter and said “No, he isn’t! Sandwich LOVES your bed.” And then Olivia said “No, he really is allergic, see? And proceeded to “sneeze” for Sandwich, proving that he, indeed, was allergic to beds.
• Sophia had a cold last week and she is still very congested and has a runny nose…Yesterday I said “Oh, you’re Miss PrissPot, aren’t you?” She looked at me, indignantly and said “I NOT PISS-POT! I SO-FEE-UH!”
• Olivia has taken to making a “pfft” sound whenever we say or do something that she thinks is wrong or silly. Ex: Last night I made pancakes and bacon for dinner. We also had yogurt and bananas. I told the girls I was going to have yogurt on top of my pancakes instead of syrup. (BTW: YUM) Olivia looked at me, “Pfft”ed and said “That’s not right” and shook her head at me. We’ve had to enact a “no Pffting rule at the table.” We are attempting to eradicate the pffting altogether. Wish us luck.
• Sophia, on the other hand, has taken to saying “Ummm-hmmm” and “Uh-uh” instead of “yes and no”. We have been responding with “use words, I do not understand these sounds” or something similar. The other morning, during breakfast, Olivia asked Sophia a question and got the standard “Ummm-hmmm” from Sophia. Suddenly I heard Olivia say, “Don’t you UMMM-HMMM ME!” Bill and I had to hold each other up to prevent us from falling over with laughter. Then I had to wonder where she heard that from, because we do try to be good parents and use constructive ways to correct them when they say things they shouldn’t. I am assuming I said it to Bill jokingly, or have, indeed slipped up and said it to her in the past.
• For the past month, both girls have been obsessed with Wall-E and walk around the house saying “Waaaaaaahhhh-Leeeeee” and “Eeee–Vhuuuuu” in similar voices to those the robots use. It never fails to amuse.

Last weekend Bill and I were invited out to dinner and drinks to help celebrate his younger brother’s 29th birthday. We were fortunate enough that Bill’s mom was able to drive down and take care of the girls for the evening.

As we were going to a fancier locale for drinks after dinner, Bill wore a nice pair of dress pants and a button down fancy dress shirt and nice shiny dress shoes. I wore a maxi dress (are those still “in”?) and a wedge sandals with a cute little cardigan.

We looked nice.

Bill finished dressing before I did and walked out to the dining room where the girls were eating dinner. I suddenly hear Olivia burst into hilarious laughter.

“Daddy, you’re wearing funny clothes!” She giggled.

“No Olivia, Daddy looks handsome!” My mother-in-law encouraged.

Olivia, still giggling, states: “Daddy, you’re handsome, but you’ve got funny clothes on!”

I think we need to get out more.

After Bill read THIS post this morning, he said “Uh…I’ve got a slight correction for you.”

I had a feeling he was going to school me on some Nintendo fact I didn’t know (seeing as that was the only thing I could think would possibly be wrong with my post), and I was right.

“Miyamoto didn’t create Nintendo. Nintendo is a 120 year old company (give or take).” Miyamoto is a video game designer and he created Mario (among other things).”

So, I stand corrected.

It’s been known to happen.