Update- A little Pneumonia with a side of Ear Infection

*Update: Paige had a better nights sleep last night as her coughing is getting much better, however, now it has moved on to Claire. Between the two of them Cory and I didn't get much sleep again last night. Paige would wake up crying for no apparent reason and Claire was calling for a tissue or would just wanted us to give her a hug. Paige's appetite is starting to return as she had a few oyster crackers and some grapes this morning, but Claire is the one not interested in food now. We were out running some errands this morning and while we were in Sam's Claire told me she was cold and asked for her jacket. Clue #1 that a fever was starting as it is absolutely beautiful here today with the temperature being in the mid 60's. Clue #2 as we ran into another store Claire again told me she was cold and wanted to go home, when I looked at her I noticed that she was pale as a ghost and was her body was actually shaking. Clue #3 and the topping to the cake as they say, we got home washed hands, took Tylenol and both the girls were in bed taking naps by 12:30pm. Can't remember the last time that happened as Claire doesn't really take naps anymore, fun times, guess I am next! When I was up with Claire around 5am I noticed that I was starting to get a sour throat and my left nostril was stuffy (or as Claire says snuffy), hopefully my body can shake it, who knows!


Last night Paige had a 102 degree fever and another bad night sleep, then this morning she woke up coughing her head off. When I tried to lay her down to change her diaper she got really upset and was saying "no, no, sit up, sit up". I sat her up and saw that her nose was covered in dried green snot so I wiped all that off and then grabbed the infamous nose sucker. She saw that coming and got even more upset causing herself to blow a lot of the snot out on her own. What worried me was that the mucus was all bloody. Now between both the girls and even myself I have had yellow and green mucus but never blood, so I grabbed the phone and made an appointment with the pediatrician. Come to find out she was a mild case of Pneumonia and a slight ear infection in her right ear. Poor thing no wonder she didn't want to lay down to change her diaper and is sleeping terribly at night. We have her on antibiotics for the next 5 days but, even after they are done they continue to stay in her system for another 5 days. The doctor said that she could her crackling in her lungs and the antibiotic that she prescribed will help with the bacteria that is in her lungs therefore, help the coughing subside some so hopefully she will start to be able sleep better at nap and nighttime. She looks so pathetic you should see her. You can tell that she is exhausted by just looking at her glazed over eyes that are no quite all the way open. Wish get well wishes for my little girl, please!

Darn Colds!!

My poor little baby has come down with a TERRIBLE cold. I have not seen her like this from a cold in a long time if not ever. She started coming down with it last night while we were at dinner with our friends and had a really bad night's sleep. She didn't wake up this morning until 9am and then fall back to sleep on her daddy (which neither Cory or I can remember when that happened last) at 11:30am. Both Cory and I feel horrible for her, as so many moms say throughout their motherhood especially with little ones "if I could have it for her I would". Here it is 3:45pm as I am typing this blog entry and she is still asleep. Feel better soon my little one!!

Playlist of my Life

My friend Kelli did this on her blog and it sounded fun so I had a go at it! Some of the songs fit perfectly while others, not so much! If you want to join in on the good times, leave me a comment and let me know you did so I can come on by and check out your life playlist!

So here’s how the game works…
1. Open your library (iTunes, Winamp, Media Player, iPod, MP3, etc)
2. Put it on shuffle
3. Press play
4. For the first question, type the song that’s playing
5. When you go to a new question, press the next button TWICE
6. Don’t lie and try to pretend you’re cool…just type it in man!
7. Tag anyone, and they have to do it too - I won’t do this, but play along if you’d like!

IF YOUR LIFE WAS A MOVIE WHAT WOULD THE SOUNDTRACK BE?
Opening Credits:
When I Get Where I'm Going (Brad Paisley & Dolly Parton)

Waking Up:
Amazing (Josh Kelley)

First Day at School:
Don't Matter (Akon)

Falling in Love:
This Love (Maroon 5)

Fight Song:
It's Not Over (Daughtry)

Breaking Up:
My, Oh My (The Wreckers)

Prom:
Oops... I Did It Again (Brittany Spears) what is this all about?

Life:
I Swear (John Michael Montgomery)well I do do this on a daily basis!

Mental Breakdown:
Goodbye Earl (Dixie Chicks)- fun song

Driving:
Surfin' U.S.A (Beach Boys)- oh yeah better get off the roads!!

Flashback:
Don't Stop til You Get Enough (Michael Jackson)

Getting Back Together:
Love Like This (Natasha Bedingfield feat. Sean Kingston)

Wedding:
My Prerogative (Brittany Spears, well I guess it is suppose to be the bride's day right??

Birth of Child:
Saving All My Love For You (Whitney Houston)

My Princesses

Cory took the minivan to work today to pick up Paige's big girl bedroom furniture so we are housebound for the day. I was trying to think of ways to keep the girls busy so we played dress up. We decided that since Sleeping Beauty has longer hair and usually wears it down that Claire should be her. Paige made a good Cinderella as she usually has her hair up and since Paige doesn't really have much hair it worked out perfectly! They had a good time for the whole 15 minutes that it lasted! Hope everyone is having a good hump day and isn't getting too much cabin fever with this yucky weather that we are having.

One of Those Nights

Last night was one of those nights that I hate. I was so tired and totally ready for bed so I headed upstairs, did my nightly routine and got all snuggled and comfy in bed. I laid down, my head hit the pillow and then "bam" I was wide awake. My mind started racing about all the things we did over the weekend and everything I need to do this week. I so badly just wanted to stop thinking and fall asleep but nothing I tried worked. Why can't I be like the typical male that as soon as my head hits the pillow I am asleep. They just don't realize how lucky they are to be able to turn the thinking switch off and just tune out for the night. Oh well that is one of the MANY differences between men and women. Hopefully tonight I will be able to just fall asleep with no thoughts getting in my way!

My Valentine's Day

This was mine and Cory's 11th Valentine's Day together, four while dating and seven since we have been married. I was impressed as Cory took it on himself to plan a night out for us and asked his mom to watch the girls. Originally we were going to go to dinner at The Cheesecake Factory and then to a movie. I got online and started looking to see what movies were out and what one I might want to see. Well we quickly decided that there aren't any movies out right now that we would really care to see. We were going to see Benjamin Button with Brad Pitt but there was only one showing and it was at 9:30pm. Since we were planning on going to a early dinner knowing that The Cheesecake Factory would be busy we didn't want to wait around until 9:30pm to see a show. So on with our night!

We pulled into the mall at 5pm and Cory immediately got overwhelmed with all the cars and people and starting yelling "I hate the mall." I have not seen the mall that busy since I don't know when, not even at Christmas. After driving around for 5 minutes or so we finally found a spot and went into the restaurant. As we were waiting to put our name on the waiting list I heard the two girls in front of us being told that the wait for a table for two was going to be 2.5 to 3 hours!! I thought for sure that I had heard wrong, don't get me wrong I knew that we would have to wait but I figured maybe an hour or so. When a different hostess came up to the front asking to help the next person in line I said to her, "did I just hear right, it is going to be a 2.5 to 3 hour wait for a table of two?" She replied, "No, more like 3 to 3.5 hours." I quickly replied "Oh we aren't going to wait that long" and we left. We could not believe that at 5pm there was already a 3 to 3.5 hour wait, that is ridiculous. So no cheesecake for me and we ended up eating at Houlihan's instead. We walked right in and got seated right away.
After dinner we walked around the mall taking our time and just enjoying simple things like being able to walk holding each others hand instead of one of the girls, being able to concentrate on each other 100% and not have to be watching out for or helping a little one, and the best part was just making each other laugh!! We also had a few returns to make a Target, Walmart and Barnes and Noble so we did those as well trying to make sure that we didn't get home until both the girls were in bed. Our finally stop at Barnes and Noble was nice and relaxing, except that my foot was not appreciating the tall boots that I was wearing, ever since I broke my foot it screams at me when it is in heals for too long. Anyway, we went over to the travel section and looked through some books on Sanibel Island for our trip this summer, Cory wandered over to the magazine section and I picked up and started reading "Marley and Me". When we got home Cory made me a smoothie since I didn't get my cheesecake. He did a great job and we all know that a smoothie is definitely better for us than a big ol piece of cheesecake!

SO our evening didn't turn out the way that we had planned and we probably could have gone and seen the Benjamin Button movie if we had waited 3 hours to eat. The important thing was that we were together having fun and concentrating on each other with no distractions.
How was your Valentine's Day???

My Saving Grace!

I had the WORST headache yesterday, it came on about 3:30pm. I don't usually get headaches but this one was turning into more of a migraine by the minute. I tried to take the girls into the family room and turn on a t.v. show while I laid on the couch with my eyes closed hoping that it would pass. Claire was doing great but Paige is not into t.v. at all and was quickly destroying the house. As 4pm approached I felt like my head was going to explode and then I started to feel like I might get sick. I quickly grabbed the phone and called Cory asking him if he could leave work early and head home, he said he would leave in about 15-20 minutes. I knew that I had to go lay down so I took Paige upstairs and put her in her crib as I did not know what else to do and I couldn't let her roam all over the house for the next hour until Cory was home. Man was she mad at me, she was crying and screaming for me to come get her out (which wasn't helping my head), but I just couldn't do it. There I was laying in the fetal position in bed when my sweet little Claire came upstairs telling me that she had to go potty but then she would take care of Paige. She was so quite, she told Paige that she would be right back that she had to go potty. Then the next thing I know Claire is asking me if I wanted her to close my bedroom door so I could rest better. Of course, I would have LOVED to be able to block everything out but I needed to have the door open so I could at least hear everything that was going on in Paige's room. I told her "no, thank you" and asked that she go play with Paige. To make a long story short Claire went into Paige's room and got more toys and books, (I had put two toys in the crib already) handed them to Paige and then climbed into the crib herself. She played in there with Paige for 40 minutes and actually got her quited down enough that I was able to dose off for about 15 minutes. Even though I wish I could have slept a little longer that 15 minutes helped my head a TON! Of course Cory didn't leave when he said he would making it so that he got home at his normal time, but I had my little Claire/helper as my saving grace yesterday and I don't know what I would have done without her!

Dance, Dance, Dance!

This past Friday was "Watch Week" at the dance studio where Claire takes dance. It was so fun to see what she does there every week, they have started working on the two dances for their recital in June. They all looked so cute in their leotards, tights, tap and ballet shoes. Claire did SO good, I can tell that she was really concentrating on her teacher and the correct moves. I have attached some pictures of her and then also a video from her tap routine to the song The Candy Man Can. She is in the first row all the way to your left. Enjoy!

My Gym

3 weeks ago Paige and I started a class at My Gym on Thursdays while Claire is at school. They do activities that are all age appropriate/fun along with activities that help with fine & gross motor. Paige absolutely LOVES going every week and is getting more and more comfortable with her teachers Ms. Claire and Ms. Amy. It is fun for me to watch her get all excited and run from one activity to the next. I would say that her favorites are the swings, bubbles and the trampoline. I took my camera with me today and got some cute shots.

This weeks swing was two police cars hooked together that they hung from the ceiling and the kids could swing.

Bubbles, she was too busy running around trying to clap them all that I couldn't get a picture of her from the front!



Ball Pit! I don't even want to think about how many germs are in there, but she loves it.

Something to look forward to....

Last night I booked our family vacation for this summer! I did a fair amount of research, was my own personal travel agent and found the PERFECT place for us. We are going to Sanibel Island for a week. I knew what requirements I wanted and just took my time until I found a place that met them all. For those of you who are wondering what kind of requirements I was looking for here they are:

1. A house or condo that had 3 bedrooms, one for my parents- Nana & Papa wanted to join us for a fun family vacation (with a king size bed), one for Cory and I (with a double or queen) and a room for the girls with two beds preferably but, one would have worked as Paige could sleep on the floor on the blow up mattress. Also needed to have at least 2 bathrooms.

2. Needed to be CLOSE to the beach! If not on the water then it needed to have a very short walk. I didn't want to have to worry about getting in the car everyday to go to the beach. So it needed to be close enough that the girls could walk and not be completely exhausted by the time we arrived.

3. Had to have a pool.

4. In a family friendly area with fun things for families with young kids.

So I did it, it took me about 2 days once I narrowed everything down. Want to know how I did?? Well anyone who knows me should already know that of course I got everything that I was looking for or else I won't have stopped looking. :)

We are staying in a 3 bedroom, 3 bath condo that is right on the beach all we have to do is walk out our front door, down the walkway and our toes will be buried in the beautiful white sand. The community of condos that we are staying in only has 10 other condos and we all share a nice pool. There is a lot of fun things to do with little ones from looking for shells (Sanibel is supposedly one of the best places to look for shells in the USA), parks, zoo, miniature golf etc. Since the girls are so young still I assume that we will only be either at the beach or in the pool, but it is nice to have things to do after dinner as well. It will be interesting to see if Paige will actually get tan while we are there. Poor thing, Cory and I both tan VERY easily as does Claire. However, from what I observed last summer Paige inherited her Grandma and Uncle Ryan's skin tone.

I remember going to Sanibel Island with my parents when I was younger and finding the coolest shells. We would wade out in the shallow waters around low tide and find beautiful sand dollars along with other big shells still all in tact. What little kids don't LOVE finding cool shells! I also remember the water being really clear and not being afraid of what I might step on because for the most part I could see where I was going to walk.

We are also going to take a day trip up to Venice Beach (Florida not Californa) which is about a hour drive to look for shark's teeth. When I was younger we also did a trip to Venice Beach and had a BLAST gathering sharks teeth. I actually wanted to stay in Venice Beach but they didn't have any condos or houses that were that close to the beach.

So all I can say is HURRY up summer we are more than ready to hit the beach and get some sun. Claire is so funny she doesn't understand that we are only going for a week. She keeps saying but what about my bed how will we get it there? Oh yes and one more thing we will be flying, both the girls first time on an airplane so if anyone has some good ideas of things to take on the plane to keep them entertained for 2 hours I am all ears!!