March!

The first week of March was an adventure, to say the least. Alex had a work trip that took him to Seattle for at least 2 days, but could extend depending on the outcome of each game. Here we are the morning that he left...super happy and ready for the week :)

I try to have big kid activities every once in a while, and since Carter was learning about the letter 'D' at mommy preschool, I made some frozen dinosaur eggs! It was such a simple activity to prep (with a little forethought to get them frozen) and the kids played with them for hours. They each did a few while they were inside, then when they got bored we took them outside and showed how the sun would do the melting for them!

Just helping sister blow a dandelion :)

Kids playing piano is one of my favorite things to see. Cute little feet sitting so nicely just brought it over the top in cuteness, and when he saw me taking pictures of Makenzie, Carter climbed up and sat exactly the same way :)

It was a great first day of the no-dad week. Alex actually spent this day at work, but went straight from work to the airport so we didn't see him.

Here are a few pictures from his trip. His dad and Uncle Gene joined him for the weekend to watch the Oregon State WBB team, so he had a lot of fun exploring Seattle during his down time.

This is some weird whale statue in front of his hotel...modern art at its finest!

OSU fans...Alex assured me this was half time of the game before, and we actually traveled quite well to these Pac-12 Championships. Even though I didn't see a single game, I'm proud of these Beavers and how well they did this year.

Pike's Peak Fish Market! Seattle is one of those places that I have been as a kid and can't wait to go back and explore as an adult. My list of things I want to do gets longer every day. Eating either of these things on display, however, will never make the list :)

This is perhaps my favorite picture from the trip...him flying home :). I'm really happy that he got a break and had fun, but the kids and I really miss Dad when he's gone. This was the second time in 2 weeks that he was gone for 4 days, so we were ready to have some 'daddy days'.

As a little timeline of that first week in March, Alex flew to Seattle from work on Wednesday afternoon. That night was the beginning of the worst weekend of mothering that I have had yet. It's really easy to take our teamwork parenting for granted, and I know I fall short giving Alex credit for how involved he is in our kids lives. He rushes home from work every day to see them for a bit before bedtime, and especially when I'm pregnant he takes over a fair share of the bathing/cleaning/other daily activites that pile up with 3 kids under 6.

All of that said, Thursday night around the time that I was headed to bed, Olivia woke up throwing up. Usually in this case, I do all of the kid cuddling/washing/changing and Alex takes care of the bedding. It's an unspoken agreement, and since I've been pregnant he's even done the nasty job of chunk washing and spraying before it goes into the washer (TMI I'm sure for anyone without kids...). It's been a long time since I took care of a sick kid solo. I tried to keep the priorities straight (and keep Carter sleeping 3 feet away, so I took O, got her cleaned up and changed, then put her to sleep in our bed (on towels of course) so I could get to the bedding. I hadn't finished cleaning that before Makenzie woke up...puke for her as well. She doesn't have the reasoning skills that O has, so it took quite a bit more cleaning of the hair and way more cuddling before she was calm enough for me to tackle the bedding again. I settled for getting everything stripped and changed, knowing that I'd have a disastrous mess waiting for me in the bathtub whether I did it at 1 or 7.

About 1:30, both girls back in bed, I tried to get to sleep. That lasted about half an hour before we started round 2. At this point I wasn't feeling great but attributed it to 6 months pregnant and lots of nasty smells. I was just hoping that Cal (a 10 seed in the tournament of 12) would lose so Alex would be home in less than 24 hours.

It was an adventurous evening, and the following day was one to forget. As in I really want to forget it. I spent the majority of the day laying on a towel on the bathroom floor (I have never been this sick before that I can remember) unable to move and the kids fed themselves toast - one of the few things they can make for themselves...we went through an entire loaf of bread that day - and watched movie after movie. The girls were feeling much better, but I don't mess around with new foods until at least a day post illness, so the toast would have to do.

If I remember correctly, the Cal game was in the afternoon. I remember getting up for a second to figure out something semi-nutritious that the kids could eat for dinner (does a chewable Vitamin C count as a fruit?) and seeing that the women had pulled out the upset win and would be playing the next day (GO Bears!). I cried. 

For the next 2 days I was extremely weak, but able to function better. We tried to do a few get-through-the weekend activities, and the Bears kept winning. I'm much happier looking back at the time now that I was when I lived it, but here are a few pictures from the week without Dad.

Kenzie has been carrying around her 'woof woof' all the time, and insists on him coming to meals quite often. I usually make him sit on the counter or table and watch her, but I was apparently feeling nice this morning, and she ate her entire breakfast with him in one hand.

Carter gets WAY excited about rain, and is always quick to remind you that he mostly loves puddles :). This particular day we were headed to get Olivia from school when he saw a slight sprinkle. He ran to get a hat and his boots...and came back with his 'Go Beavers no rain on me' pants as well. Funny kid.

Olivia had a birthday party on Saturday afternoon, so she spent some time working on a birthday card for her friend. Craft time is always fun, and I am figuring out how to manage a toddler and help 2 preschoolers get their desired product. Most of the time that means Makenzie sits on the table and I try to contain the number of things that are falling to the ground. This time I was too sick to help much, so I just let them all do their thing. I should just let them do their thing more often, it went off without a hitch, and with only a slightly larger mess.

I always say that our best investment with kids has been the trampoline. I stand by that, as they still love it and jump almost daily. However, this Christmas Alex got me a handheld vacuum (I know, exciting right?! Don't worry, I asked for it) and it has been a miracle worker as well! The kids love vacuuming up their messes - and only occasionally do I catch them making a mess for the sake of cleaning it up. Definitely a life saver in our current stage of life.

Hey look! Daddy's home! I barely got a kiss in before the kids were climbing all over him, and it lasted the entire evening. We are so glad to have him home, and that he doesn't have any more trips on the schedule until fall :).

The next day, to celebrate making it through and the fact that everyone was feeling great, we went to a movie and dinner. Zootopia surprised me and was a cute movie, the kids loved it. They really love animal characters now, and I was shocked at how much they remembered and quoted for weeks afterward.

The next week was slower, back to the normal pace of life. We had a fun playdate, with fun playdate pictures of course :)

O has really been coming into her own with art and reading/writing lately. She has a lot of free art time at school, and I think it's helping her learn to express the crazy things she thinks of. This painting, which she did as part of her Happy Trunk box (the subscription box from Gma and Gpa that she LOVES) is a picture of a garden with a huge swirl that picks up all the dead leaves and sticks and dead squirrel heads to keep it clean.

The next picture is from the first sentence that she wrote by herself! She drew a picture of herself helping a girl crying at the park, which she completely covered with hearts and princesses and stars. I helped her come up with a sentence to describe her picture, then I helped by talking through each word individually, but didn't help at all with determining the letter sound or writing the letter. This was the first time we did something like this, and I was surprised by how well it went. O got a little frustrated with how long it takes to write one sentence, but when we talked about doing many of these and making a book that she made all by herself, she was able to persevere. We ended up with this sentence 'I help at the park.'

The next weekend we had Alex all to ourselves with no events, so we hit up the toy store as a treat for the kids. This is never my favorite activity, but I know that Alex secretly loves checking out the new Lego and Star Wars toys each time. He took these cute pictures of Makenzie with her current obsession...stuffed animals. She prefers dogs and bears, but was totally content to hang out in this aisle forever.

On March 15th Alex and I went on our first date since November...to go see Wicked! I love Broadway musicals, and had never seen it. It was a great date night, and our new babysitter worked out wonderfully. We went to a cute little burger place where I had an amazing steak salad, then headed into the city for the show. Definitely worth going to see, and Alex got great seats for us. We came home and immediately started planning our next show, which may be next year (we need baby to be big enough to leave and football season to be over) but I'm excited that I won't have to drag Alex along unwillingly anytime I want to see something. Best date in a long time!