This is a Happenin' Place!

I have realized that lately I have really only blogged about the challenging side of the kiddos, especially Miss Ailey.  Shame on me!  There are so many sweet things that she does!  This past week has been a challenge because Ailey had a fever starting Tuesday night and it escalated to 103+ with us going in to see the doctor Thursday night.  He confirmed what I thought it was - croup.  Yuck!  I had noticed her breathing becoming labored in the early morning hours on Thursday and researched it online and it was the most fitting explanation.  She is the first of the kids to get that.  Poor baby, I took her to co-op and just kept her with me the whole time because I didn't want her sharing whatever it was and she was a trooper!  (I honestly thought at first that is was due to the vaccinations she had gotten last week.  All the kids have a delayed reaction in one way or another to them, so I just concluded that is what the fever was due to.)  One of the other moms held her and let her go and watch sharks being dissected in the older kids' biology class and she was apparently very interested in all of that.  She's curious about most things, which I think is where the challenge for now comes in.  I think as she gets older it will definitely turn into a gift!  Anyway, I believe it was Thursday, early evening, I found her in her room playing with all the cook stuff while she was supposed to be taking a nap and she looked up at me and said in her sweet little girl voice, "I'm cooking, do you want to come and play with me?"  Well, I couldn't pass up that invitation!  I love it!  We sat and fixed quite a feast!  She's also super cuddly when she doesn't feel good and lots of times when she does and she's been so very cuddly and sweet.  She keeps coming and asking to hold me or Sam.  We've also found that a lot of the trouble we've had lately of getting her to go to sleep at night is her just not wanting to feel alone.  We did have her sleeping in the boys' room, but she and Zekey and many times Braden kept each other awake for HOURS and that was just NOT working.  We put her back in her room and now laying down with her until she gets settled and then leaving the door open a crack so she's not all the way shut off seems to be just what she needs.  Yay!  Sam keeps commenting how different girls are from boys. :)  Its so true, though!  The boys actually prefer the dark and the door closed all the way.  When my sister and I were little, we liked the door open and I remember when we would go stay with my granny that she would lay down on the pallet on the floor with us until we were asleep or nearly so, so that we wouldn't be scared.  Anyway, she's responding better.  Yay! She's also been super helpful and willing to assist me.  She especially loves to do the dishes.  Well, she likes to make a huge watery mess, while I do the dishes, but she has been wanting to do everything I do.  So sweet!

Yesterday, we had a Toby Mac cleaning day.  I put on Toby Mac songs and we cleaned up some of the house.  We had an impromptu dance party and at one point I was in the kitchen at the counter doing something and Braden came up beside me gyrating all funny and said, "C'mon, Mom!"  So, we had some dancin' to do!  It was so funny!  He's always doing something like that and sadly, my sorry memory forgets before I can get it written down on here!  Hoping to do better with that.

Poor Zekey had a horrible earache last night.  I really, really hate it when Zekey doesn't feel good.  Most of the time he suffers in silence and it takes a while to even figure out that he's not doing okay.  He's not usually vocal about it.  BUT, there are times when he feels absolutely rotten and then he does vocalize it and it just breaks my heart and I start crying with him!  Last night was one of those times.  He deals with majorly bad allergies and it goes from normally yuck to terribly yuck in a matter of hours for him.  He was sort of congested yesterday and then it got upped to the next level and he started talking about his ear hurting.  He started crying and pacing all over the house and telling his ear that it was a bad ear.  He couldn't get any sort of relief.  I tried to give him a warm compress, which helped a little, but not for any length of time. :(  I also gave him motrin, which didn't seem to do diddley-squat!  I got him into the shower which helped all the while he was in there, but the minute he was out, he was in pain again!  So, I got online and looked up what else I could do!  I knew about the onion and garlic oil drops because I'd tried that with him when he had an ear infection before, but it didn't seem to do much for him at the time.  This time, however, we weren't dealing with an infection, but an ache because of sudden pressure build-up, so I fixed up some oil, dropped it in and then massaged down his lymph nodes in his neck.  I gave him a warm compress again, this time putting a baggie of hot water and wrapped it in a warm, wet wash cloth.  It stayed warm longer.  Progress!  I also added some claritin in the mix.  He was still feeling yuck up to bed time and it had been a while since the motrin, so I gave him Tylenol to help with the pain and inflammation.  He went to sleep pretty quickly and only woke up once during the night.  It seemed that his ear was already better when he woke up, so he went back to sleep and had been his normal chipper self since he got up this morning!  I was praying LOTS concerning healing this week and know that the Lord was with us every step of the way and totally had his healing hand on this family!  Thank you, Healer!  In case anyone wants it, here is the website I got some really good earache info from.

Brea is definitely crawling now, although she does revert back to the belly flop and scootch on occasion.  She also sat up all by herself last night for several seconds before returning to crawling.  She's be in crawl position and then stopping and plopping to one side propped up by one arm plenty lately.  It was just a matter of time before she sat all the way up by herself. :)

Today is shaping up to be a very good day.  Praise the Lord from whom all blessing flow!  Love you, God!

Family Reunion

This past weekend we went to Abilene to visit with family that we haven't seen in a while. Some for nearly 10 years and others in lesser increments than that.  We had a good time and it was really great being able to see so many loved ones.  It was a short visit and I, for one, didn't get to visit nearly enough with several people.  I think some road trips are in order in the future. :)  We got some good pics and well, some not so good ones, too.  Here we go:

Ailey and her cousin Lauren.  We had some who thought they were twins at first.

Lauren and her cousin Elijah

Ailey trying to get in on the pummeling-Elijah's-head-with-favored-stuffed-animal action.

Aunt Dianne - isn't she lovely?

Billy Gene - super fun cousin!

Aunt Mary Alice and sis Jennifer

We took up a whole room at the bbq joint.

Uncle Enslie and Aunt Linda there in the middle

Memaw and Pepaw -  wasn't trying to be artsy, just didn't have my flash on. ;p

Don't you just love it when you are trying to eat and someone is taking pics?!  Mwwahahahaha!  Brother and sister comedic duo Winell (I'm sure I completely botched the spelling!) and Billy Gene.  I seriously love being around them!  And Aunt June is on the right.  We were celebrating Billy Gene's and Aunt June's birthdays.

Uncle Nelson on the right.

Uncle Nelson and Aunt Mary Alice's crew.

The Dyess siblings.

The Dyess and Towels siblings = cousins.

They are such fun!

The Towels siblings.

The kids of the siblings - crazy-fun cousin stuff here!

Aunt June's crew.

Uncle Nelson's crew.

Lonnie and Winnell's reps.

Billy Gene and Patsy a.k.a Pantsy as Braden calls her. :)

Sharon's crew.

Linda and Enslie's crew.

Our crew.  (totally scary pic of me, but I'm sure that's exactly what I looked like that day).  Next time, I think pics outside are called for!  The following is yet more evidence of the impossibility of getting a normal pic with our family.  Pay special attention to Ailey there at the bottom:

Uncle Jim and Aunt Dianne's crew.

Jennifer alerted me to the arm wrestling match in the back, so I had to get some footage...

They were so funny talking it out and trying to get the rules straight. :)

We had such a good time and hope that we'll get to spend more time later with some of the peeps we didn't get much time with this time around.  If you didn't notice, time was the star of that last sentence.

After all the food consumed over the weekend, I go up Monday morning and started my fiber attack!  There's no rule that says it can't be hidden in cookies!

Oh, yeah!

Go, Baby, Go!

I didn't get a pic, but Brea crawled last night before bed!!!  She got the opposite hands and knees going three times in a row.  Its inevitable now!  I'll try and get a pic when she does a repeat performance. :)

Braden vs. Big Honkin' Tree/ Picnic Table Team

Braden came in screaming his head off, holding his ear and his knee.  After he calmed down enough to talk, he explained that he was swinging on the rope hanging from our ginormous backyard tree and he swung into the tree, exfoliating his knee and then slammed his ear into the picnic table on his return swing.  So far:  Big Honkin' Tree/ Picnic Table Team - 1, Braden - 0.  I'm sure he'll try for a rematch later. :)

Brea's and Ailey's Stats

I finally got Brea in to see the doctor for her first well baby check up.  I know.  Its not because I'm all into the not vaccinating thing or whatnot.  I do like to wait until at least two months before we start vaccines because I think its just too much drama for both me and the baby.  Some of the drama can be saved for later. ;p  Anyway, there was an insurance mix up and necessary appointment cancellations and well, it just ended up taking this long.  BUT, I did get her in at the 6 mos point.  Usually its on some off month, so yay!  Anyway, she was weighed and measured and after we got into the room, the nurse was looking at her weight and she said...."Um, let's go weigh her again.  That doesn't seem right."  She was a little over 12 lbs.  I agreed that seemed light, so off we went to re-weigh her.  The result was the same, though.  I looked up Ailey's 6 mos stats and she was 15.2.  They aren't too far off.  I think they are just petite girls.  They come by it honestly, though you wouldn't know it to look at me or Sam. ;)  My grandpa on my mom's side is from a very petite family.  Ailey actually reminds me a lot of my sister, who got the petite gene.  On Sam's side, there are petites from both of his parent's lines.  I think the boys are gonna be tall and the girls, um, not so much. :)  I could totally be wrong, though.  Wouldn't be the first time nor the last. ;)

Both girls had to get shots.  Ailey only had to get one and she took it well....especially after receiving a lollipop as a consolation prize. :)  Brea was doing the whole shocked expression/ delayed reaction cry for each shot.  Ending with the full-on cry finale.  Poor baby, this is just the first of many to come!  They both did a really great job handling the shots well.  AND instead of giving the nurse death stares and trying to stay as far away from her as possible, there was a congeniality and peace in our goodbyes with her. :)



Anyway, here are the girls' stats:

Ailey - 35" and 26 lbs 8 oz

Brea - 25 1/4" and 12 lbs 3 oz

Two-Headed Alien Monster

This came clomping into the living room this morning.

LOVE their silliness!

Goin' a Little Crazy....

  Paper doll crazy, that is!  It all started out with me trying to find felt "paper" dolls and I did come across a couple of websites that sell them in sets.  They are not overly expensive, either.  I just was really wanting something a little different.  I found these on Etsy:



Little Pink House



maureencracknell

Totally loving these!!!  Alas, its not exactly what I am looking for, but close.  These both gave me a jumpstart on an idea formulating in my head.  I will ponder more and experiment and then post my result when I finally get around to it.

In the meantime, I am finding all these super cute paper doll templates online and printing them out.  I want to see what Ailey thinks about them.  Here are the ones that I really like and they are free! :



Savvy Projects Blog - by guest designer

Melanie Montes de Oca

She did such an amazing job!  You really need to see all the little outfits she made for the dolls.  So fun!  Gonna try it out.

Wee Wonderfuls by Hillary Lang

I love that this is a really simple one and all the outfits are ready and you just have to cut them out.  I'm thinking about attaching magnet tape to the back of the doll and the backs of the outfits for them to stick.  We'll see how that works out.  OR, just had a thought, I could get that magnetic paper....I wonder if I still have some of that stuff... NOPE!!!  Bummer!  Gotta put that on my list...

Zoe Paper Doll at Play Powerhouse

This one gives you the option of printing the outfits out in color or in black and white.  I'm not super crazy about the color combo of the first two outfits so, I am going to color in my own. :)

I think I might have more fun prepping these than Ailey will have playing with them. :)  I'll report on my findings. 


Since writing the above and printing out the wee wonderfuls one, the boys thought it was neat and said they would like boy ones.  This is what I came across:





True Town

There are three different boys to choose from and three pages of outfits.  Braden requested an alien one and so I just made up my own and also added an astronaut costume.  My scanner is not cooperating so here is a pic I took of my templates:

The boys had a great time coloring all of the clothes and costumes for their little guys and will soon be playing with them...as soon as I cut them out and put magnets on them. :)

I did end up putting magnets on the wee wonderful doll and clothes by putting a blank piece of cardstock behind the printout as I cut it all out.  I then stuck the magnet tape to the printout making sure to keep the poles on the magnets correct so they wouldn't repel and then using a glue stick, I glued the blank template to the back of the printed cutout over the magnet.  Now they just stick right on the doll!  Nice.  Here's what it looks like:

*Sigh* Since writing that last bit and making the boys' sets, Ailey has rebelled against the wee wonderfuls one.  I think she likes all the different kinds of clothes as opposed to the wee wonderfuls one that is all dresses.  She keeps trying to take off with Braden's!  Braden is not coping well with that.  Weeee!  Okay, so I went back to the site where I found the boys and printed out the girls counterpart.  It also has three different dolls.  It does crack me up that there is a dark skin tone, a medium skin tone and a light skin tone for the girls, but for the boys, there's a blonde, a brunette and a redhead.  The brunette has a medium skin tone.  Its just funny.  Here's that one:

True Town

Another neat thing about making them magnetic is that they will also stick to the fridge or a filing cabinet or other metal objects.....I'm thinking about getting a plain lunchbox type container from Hobby Lobby and spiffying it up for each kiddo's dolls. :)

Here are all the ones we now have in this house:

This is Braden's.  He likes to embellish stuff.  Notice the fire coming off of the feet of the outfit top left.  They are rocket shoes. :)

This is Zekey's.  Zekey is a one color for the whole picture type of boy, for the most part. ;)  He doesn't believe lines mean a whole lot, yet, and there is no time for details, for now.

This, of course, is Ailey's.  I colored hers because usually not only the paper gets colored, but whatever the paper is on and then she gets distracted, travels with the colors and walls and other furniture get art treatment. :)