Alana has been in a persnickety mood today, and arguing about every little thing. So, today when she and Anarosa were coloring with markers, she looks over at Anarosa’s drawing and asks her what it is. When Anarosa tells her it’s a pumpkin Alana says “that pumpkin is soooo unprofessional.” (Normally this is where Anarosa gets upset and tattles on Alana) But she just looked up from her picture and said “It’s not unprofessional it’s unique.”
They argued back and forth about it until Alana finally pulled me aside to ask me what “unique” meant. After that she let the matter drop!
Adventures in Motherhood
Monday, October 13, 2008
Saturday, October 11, 2008
The Emergency Room
It was our normal Thursday afternoon. I had just gotten back from work, and we were all trooping in the front door. Jacob had to sit in the naughty chair because he wouldn’t hold my hand in the parking lot. During all the commotion of getting everyone in the door and sitting down to do homework, Jacob was flailing around in his chair (mind you a child-sized chair) and fell off of it. He started to scream and I walked over with the intention of telling him to knock it off and just sit still, when I noticed the blood.
Well, he somehow managed to cut his ear while falling off the chair (I still can’t figure out exactly how, but there was nothing but him the chair and the wall). And now he is bleeding at a steady gush from the top of his left ear and I’m not quite certain but it may have cut through. Well I grabbed a kitchen towel and scooped up the screaming Jacob. Ran outside and stopped Mark from driving to work, jumped in with Jacob and drove to the emergency room.
(At this point please note what I did not do. I did not calmly pack a bag with snacks, crayons, books and other assorted distractions. This is important because it comes up later.)
It just so happens that this is a busy Thursday afternoon at my local Kaiser emergency room. It’s only a mile and a half away so we get there relatively quickly. Once Jacob calmed down enough to know where we were going, he emphatically declared he did NOT want to go to see the doctor (we’ve been to the emergency room before). Well, the parking lot was full so we had to go park in the parking garage and then walk through the other side of the hospital with a kitchen towel on his head to get to the emergency room. By this time he isn’t screaming, but he isn’t happy. We get to the front desk and they take his card and tell us to have a seat.
So then the waiting begins. The two and a half hours of waiting. Jacob tries whining. Surely I will feel sorry for him and take him home. Then he tries to reason with me. Then the fun begins.
He declares quite loudly that he has to go to the bathroom. We get up and go to the bathroom in the emergency room, but he doesn’t want that bathroom, he wants to go down the hall and find one “someplace else”. No. (We have to be here when they call his name or we go back to the bottom of the not-very-important list.)
Then he wants to go for a walk. No we can’t do that either.
Now, you have to understand that Jacob only has one volume setting and it’s loud. So all of the following conversations EVERYBODY in the crowded emergency room can hear.
“If you don’t take me home, I’m going to call the police and they will come and put you in jail.”
“hmm jail huh?, well if I’m in jail who is going go cook your food?”
“Daddy will. He can make ice cream and stuff”
“Oh, well, okay, but who will do the laundry?”
“Oh Anarosa can reach, she’ll do it.”
“Well you seem to have this all figured out.”
“Yes, so go to jail!”
When that didn’t work, he decided to very loudly discuss all of the private parts that he happens to know the correct names of, and everyone he knows who has one!
Next, we try the bathroom excuse again and again, until people in the “audience” actually start to giggle every time he declares he has to “go.”
We discuss me selling him to pirates and whether or not he would enjoy swabbing the decks or walking the planks.
He found a blond girl to talk to and actually broke down in tears when her mother returned and sat next to her.
My favorite person of the whole night was the fifty-something-year-old man, who actually got down on the floor and blew little pieces of paper with Jacob, across the floor in a race.
After about an hour and a half Jacob actually stood up on his chair, put his hands on his hips and yelled “I WANT TO GO HOME NOW!” to which several people in the waiting room answered back “me too”.
Once we finally get to see the triage nurse, she is totally unimpressed with his cut ear. She doesn’t really think he’ll need stitches, well maybe one, but if I really want to, she can get me an appointment in two hours at the minor injury clinic. By this time Jacob is as uncooperative as he can be and will not for love or money or stickers let her take his blood pressure and temperature.
So we drive back home, still covered in blood to wait an additional two hours to go back. I however, use this time to feed Mr. Grumpy and pack a diaper bag with about two hours worth of super hero toys, snacks, crayons and even considered taking the dvd player (just in case). We get back to the hospital and get in to see the minor injury doctor. Who was totally not impressed with the ER nurse, who didn’t think we would need stitches. He did need stitches, three of them to be exact. (not his personal record) But we had to wrap him up and hold him down to get the stitches in. He was in a much better mood for the second visit, but was not very pleased with getting the stitches in. And after all this we had to stop on the way out to get him an antibiotic, because that cough and cold he had was really an ear infection.
So we survived our latest trip to the ER. But I seriously think it’s Mark’s turn to do this next time one of the kids has to go!
Well, he somehow managed to cut his ear while falling off the chair (I still can’t figure out exactly how, but there was nothing but him the chair and the wall). And now he is bleeding at a steady gush from the top of his left ear and I’m not quite certain but it may have cut through. Well I grabbed a kitchen towel and scooped up the screaming Jacob. Ran outside and stopped Mark from driving to work, jumped in with Jacob and drove to the emergency room.
(At this point please note what I did not do. I did not calmly pack a bag with snacks, crayons, books and other assorted distractions. This is important because it comes up later.)
It just so happens that this is a busy Thursday afternoon at my local Kaiser emergency room. It’s only a mile and a half away so we get there relatively quickly. Once Jacob calmed down enough to know where we were going, he emphatically declared he did NOT want to go to see the doctor (we’ve been to the emergency room before). Well, the parking lot was full so we had to go park in the parking garage and then walk through the other side of the hospital with a kitchen towel on his head to get to the emergency room. By this time he isn’t screaming, but he isn’t happy. We get to the front desk and they take his card and tell us to have a seat.
So then the waiting begins. The two and a half hours of waiting. Jacob tries whining. Surely I will feel sorry for him and take him home. Then he tries to reason with me. Then the fun begins.
He declares quite loudly that he has to go to the bathroom. We get up and go to the bathroom in the emergency room, but he doesn’t want that bathroom, he wants to go down the hall and find one “someplace else”. No. (We have to be here when they call his name or we go back to the bottom of the not-very-important list.)
Then he wants to go for a walk. No we can’t do that either.
Now, you have to understand that Jacob only has one volume setting and it’s loud. So all of the following conversations EVERYBODY in the crowded emergency room can hear.
“If you don’t take me home, I’m going to call the police and they will come and put you in jail.”
“hmm jail huh?, well if I’m in jail who is going go cook your food?”
“Daddy will. He can make ice cream and stuff”
“Oh, well, okay, but who will do the laundry?”
“Oh Anarosa can reach, she’ll do it.”
“Well you seem to have this all figured out.”
“Yes, so go to jail!”
When that didn’t work, he decided to very loudly discuss all of the private parts that he happens to know the correct names of, and everyone he knows who has one!
Next, we try the bathroom excuse again and again, until people in the “audience” actually start to giggle every time he declares he has to “go.”
We discuss me selling him to pirates and whether or not he would enjoy swabbing the decks or walking the planks.
He found a blond girl to talk to and actually broke down in tears when her mother returned and sat next to her.
My favorite person of the whole night was the fifty-something-year-old man, who actually got down on the floor and blew little pieces of paper with Jacob, across the floor in a race.
After about an hour and a half Jacob actually stood up on his chair, put his hands on his hips and yelled “I WANT TO GO HOME NOW!” to which several people in the waiting room answered back “me too”.
Once we finally get to see the triage nurse, she is totally unimpressed with his cut ear. She doesn’t really think he’ll need stitches, well maybe one, but if I really want to, she can get me an appointment in two hours at the minor injury clinic. By this time Jacob is as uncooperative as he can be and will not for love or money or stickers let her take his blood pressure and temperature.
So we drive back home, still covered in blood to wait an additional two hours to go back. I however, use this time to feed Mr. Grumpy and pack a diaper bag with about two hours worth of super hero toys, snacks, crayons and even considered taking the dvd player (just in case). We get back to the hospital and get in to see the minor injury doctor. Who was totally not impressed with the ER nurse, who didn’t think we would need stitches. He did need stitches, three of them to be exact. (not his personal record) But we had to wrap him up and hold him down to get the stitches in. He was in a much better mood for the second visit, but was not very pleased with getting the stitches in. And after all this we had to stop on the way out to get him an antibiotic, because that cough and cold he had was really an ear infection.
So we survived our latest trip to the ER. But I seriously think it’s Mark’s turn to do this next time one of the kids has to go!
Wednesday, October 1, 2008
October 1st
Well, this week has been fun. I am having a crazy time at work. We are moving offices and September 30 is the end of our grant’s fiscal year. So all of the fiscal reports are due about this time. Mark has been called into court the next three Tuesdays (which is always a challenge for us since we have two school kids on different schedules, the court date, my work and only one car!!)
Jacob wasn’t feeling well yesterday. He’s usually a pretty accommodating little guy, but he gets grumpy when he’s not feeling well. Apparently he yelled at Danny (the guy who does the maintenance at the apartment complex) Luckily Danny has four kids of his own, so he understood sick little boys. By the time I picked him up to drop Daddy off at court he was warm and of course he threw up in the car on the way to pick up Anarosa from school!! When we got home I took his temperature and it was 103!! So he spent most of the rest of the day in bed (which was just fine with him!) I tried to give him something to take the edge off of his fever, but he wouldn’t have anything to do with it, so I just let him sleep it off. He woke up this morning feeling great!
Anarosa was cute this morning. She asked me what day it was, and I told her “Wednesday”
and she said “No, what DAY is it??”
“October 1st.”
“Oh, I knew it was something special”
So to everyone out there, Happy First Day of October!
Jacob wasn’t feeling well yesterday. He’s usually a pretty accommodating little guy, but he gets grumpy when he’s not feeling well. Apparently he yelled at Danny (the guy who does the maintenance at the apartment complex) Luckily Danny has four kids of his own, so he understood sick little boys. By the time I picked him up to drop Daddy off at court he was warm and of course he threw up in the car on the way to pick up Anarosa from school!! When we got home I took his temperature and it was 103!! So he spent most of the rest of the day in bed (which was just fine with him!) I tried to give him something to take the edge off of his fever, but he wouldn’t have anything to do with it, so I just let him sleep it off. He woke up this morning feeling great!
Anarosa was cute this morning. She asked me what day it was, and I told her “Wednesday”
and she said “No, what DAY is it??”
“October 1st.”
“Oh, I knew it was something special”
So to everyone out there, Happy First Day of October!
Monday, September 22, 2008
10 days for Alana!!
Since Alana had such a rought start to Kindergarten, we thought it would be wise to bribe her for good behavior. We made her a deal that if she got ten green days in a row that she could take her little best friend to Marine World!! (In her kindergarten class they all start the day with a green card and if they get in trouble it changes to yellow and then to red) And she worked hard for those!! We had to count a couple of yellow days as 1/2 days, but she kept with it and she earned her trip!! We were so proud of her!!
The dads took them this Saturday and apparently they had really great time. Alana and her friend held hands everywhere they went, and Mark said even the employees were laughing at how cute they were on the water ride. Apparently the couldn't stop giggling the whole time they were on the ride.
This kindergarden thing has been a wild ride, but I think she is finally starting to settle in. And so am I; thank goodness! For a while there my day revolved around finding out she had done at school. Luckily I have some great friends at work, who have heard all about my kids for forever. I even had a few who would ask for the "Alana Report" to see how she was doing at school that day! They were all cheering for her and they were happy to hear that she had finally earned her trip!
So rest assured everyone, Alana got through her first month of kindergarten!!
The dads took them this Saturday and apparently they had really great time. Alana and her friend held hands everywhere they went, and Mark said even the employees were laughing at how cute they were on the water ride. Apparently the couldn't stop giggling the whole time they were on the ride.
This kindergarden thing has been a wild ride, but I think she is finally starting to settle in. And so am I; thank goodness! For a while there my day revolved around finding out she had done at school. Luckily I have some great friends at work, who have heard all about my kids for forever. I even had a few who would ask for the "Alana Report" to see how she was doing at school that day! They were all cheering for her and they were happy to hear that she had finally earned her trip!
So rest assured everyone, Alana got through her first month of kindergarten!!
Sunday, September 21, 2008
This Saturday it was just me and Jacob at home. So we went to the farmer's market. I'm a big fan of farmers' markets and so are my children, but they always seem to find the only non-fruit & vegetable offerings in the market. Jacob wanted to get kettle corn, which he got. But then he decided that it was only for the "children to share"; which incidently worked out great for him, because he was the only child there! So he spent the rest of the day upset at me for trying to take taste's of his kettle corn!! I tried to get him to pose for a picture next to the flowers, but he wasn't having a bit of it.
Monday, September 1, 2008
Mom and Dad and Other Stuff
Well this has been quite an eventful week. It’s hard to know where to begin. Last Thursday my Mom and Dad came down from Utah to pick up Sarah. We had such a blast visiting with them and getting to spend time with Grandma and Grandpa! We got to go to church in the ward I grew up in and say Hi to everyone we hadn’t seen for years. Even though it was very sad to say goodbye to Sarah. For the next few days Jacob kept walking around looking at the ceiling and saying “Sarah, I said COME BACK!” It was very cute, he insisted that Sarah could hear him on the airplane! 
After my Mom and Dad left we had one day to get ready for school! So we went supply shopping and got our two big school girls new pencils and backpacks and stuff like that. We had a bit of drama when we went to register the girls at their school. We have them transferred to a different school district, and we received their transfer approvals at the beginning of the summer, but when we went to register them they only had Anarosa on their list not Alana. So we turned in all the paperwork and did everything we could to get Alana in. It came down to the day before school started and we finally got a slot for Alana! Talk about stress!
Well the first day of school came and we got up extra early and got our school girls fed. Then we packed everybody up and got them off to school. I took the morning off so that I could come too! Anarosa walked right into second grade. She is a pro at this by now. We dropped off Alana at her first day of kindergarten and said goodbye. Then Mark and Jacob and I went out to breakfast together.
Alana gets out at 11:40 for the first week, so Mark went to pick her up. Apparently the first day did NOT go well for her. The head kindergarten teacher was waiting for him when Mark arrived. Alana had gotten in trouble three times and had been sent to the principal’s office on THE FIRST DAY OF KINDERGARTEN! (we are still not exactly sure what she actually got in trouble for – the head teacher wasn’t actually in the classroom) But, by the time Mark got there, she was quite upset. And the school was actually talking about expelling her (which they can do very easily because she is a transfer) The head teacher actually asked Mark if we tolerate this kind of behavior at our house!! (Yes, of course we do, we give all of our children lots of candy whenever they have a tantrum) But then again, we also don’t expel them from the family the first time they have a hard time. At any rate, her next two days and kindergarten went by without a hitch. So we’re chalking this up to first day jitters! (admittedly a rather extreme case!).
So we managed to survive the first week of school. On Thursday however, Jacob managed to be standing behind the sliding door of our minivan when Anarosa swung it open. He has a nice long bruise right between his eyes.
Our other excitement was on Saturday night when Mark and I were going to bed. We heard a noise outside and upon further investigation found that half of the ancient pine tree in the front yard had fallen onto the fence! It hadn’t broken clean off but was also leaning over the car ports of the apartments so Mark and I spent about two hours taking off as much weight as we could. So that it wouldn’t snap completely off. That was fun! For those of you who have not recently deconstructed a pine tree they are full of spiderwebs and sap!
Well those are the highlights this week!
After my Mom and Dad left we had one day to get ready for school! So we went supply shopping and got our two big school girls new pencils and backpacks and stuff like that. We had a bit of drama when we went to register the girls at their school. We have them transferred to a different school district, and we received their transfer approvals at the beginning of the summer, but when we went to register them they only had Anarosa on their list not Alana. So we turned in all the paperwork and did everything we could to get Alana in. It came down to the day before school started and we finally got a slot for Alana! Talk about stress!
Well the first day of school came and we got up extra early and got our school girls fed. Then we packed everybody up and got them off to school. I took the morning off so that I could come too! Anarosa walked right into second grade. She is a pro at this by now. We dropped off Alana at her first day of kindergarten and said goodbye. Then Mark and Jacob and I went out to breakfast together.
Alana gets out at 11:40 for the first week, so Mark went to pick her up. Apparently the first day did NOT go well for her. The head kindergarten teacher was waiting for him when Mark arrived. Alana had gotten in trouble three times and had been sent to the principal’s office on THE FIRST DAY OF KINDERGARTEN! (we are still not exactly sure what she actually got in trouble for – the head teacher wasn’t actually in the classroom) But, by the time Mark got there, she was quite upset. And the school was actually talking about expelling her (which they can do very easily because she is a transfer) The head teacher actually asked Mark if we tolerate this kind of behavior at our house!! (Yes, of course we do, we give all of our children lots of candy whenever they have a tantrum) But then again, we also don’t expel them from the family the first time they have a hard time. At any rate, her next two days and kindergarten went by without a hitch. So we’re chalking this up to first day jitters! (admittedly a rather extreme case!).
So we managed to survive the first week of school. On Thursday however, Jacob managed to be standing behind the sliding door of our minivan when Anarosa swung it open. He has a nice long bruise right between his eyes.
Our other excitement was on Saturday night when Mark and I were going to bed. We heard a noise outside and upon further investigation found that half of the ancient pine tree in the front yard had fallen onto the fence! It hadn’t broken clean off but was also leaning over the car ports of the apartments so Mark and I spent about two hours taking off as much weight as we could. So that it wouldn’t snap completely off. That was fun! For those of you who have not recently deconstructed a pine tree they are full of spiderwebs and sap!
Well those are the highlights this week!
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