Vomit, birthdays, and other fun stuff...

I'm the worst mother in the world I need a really good long nap. I have had 2 little ones have birthdays since my last blog post, but haven't added birthday posts. Partly because when Mark turned 3 on the 13th, just about everyone was getting over a trip to Vomit City, USA....a mother of many's worst nightmare. OK, I suppose there could be worse things than 4 kids vomiting at literally the same time, all night long. But at the time, it just didn't seem possible.

It all started on Thursday March 12th. First ,Anna started vomiting around 8 pm. She made it to the toilet, thank God. She felt better, so we put her to bed. Since I was planning on a solo trip to Texas for a week long getaway all my self the following Monday, I said a little prayer that anyone here who is going to get it, gets it before I leave, so that my husband, who gets psychosematic nausea doesn't do well with vomit, wouldn't have to deal with it. Well, all I can say is be careful what you ask for.

By 10 pm, Mark was vomiting....all over his crib. Blech. While I was cleaning him up, Jonathan came out to inform me that he threw up....all over his bed. Joy. More throw up to clean up. But before I could clean up Jonathan's bed, I had to catch more Anna throw up in a bucket. So, after getting everyone cleaned up, I set up the infirmery in the living room with Jonathan, and Mark, caught a few more bucket fulls, than had to run up and clean up the next patient, Erika, who....yes, you guessed it....threw up all over her bed.

While I was up there cleaning HER up, Mark vomited on the sofa (which was thankfully covered with a blanket). So, I moved Erika down to the infirmery thinking that the three would have to be together so I wouldn't have to run up and down the stairs nursing everyone back to health.
Nope. I was wrong.

Anna continued to throw up through the night, plus I had to dump and rinse buckets, so I was up and down the stairs no less than 20-30 times before I gave up and left everything in the buckets.

Have you ever seen vomit ballet? No? Let me paint a picture...I'm sitting on the floor holding a bucket for one vomiter while holding one leg up to keep another, (who is flailing his body around in his sleep because he's about to vomit, too) in order to keep him from falling off of the sofa. This position felt quite unnatural, but what I did next seemed so graceful, I think it could be considered ballet. I set the barf bucket down, and gracefully leaned over to grab the bucket for the flailing, falling off the sofa child and caugh his barf just in time. It was quite a lovely, perhaps poetic movement, I'm sure.

NOT.

Anyway, when the sun finally did rise, I found out that my poor husband was sick upstairs, too. He's lucky, though. He has a great prescription for anti-nausea meds that keeps his vaso-vagal syncope under control.
So, on Friday the 13th, which happend to be Mark's birthday, everyone was just laying around looking zombie like, and drinking gatorade and eating jello. Not a fun birthday for Mark, but he really didn't know the difference. Here' are a couple of pictures taken the day after his birthday when he got to open some presents.






He wouldn't look into the camera, but no matter....he has the most scrumptious eyelashes!

After my trip to Texas we celebrated Erika's 5th birthday! Here she is!

*crickets chirping*

Well, apparently Blogger won't let me add any more pictures for some reason. The add photo button all of the sudden won't work, so I'll have to add the photo in another post. Sorry.

Love,
Lisa

Another Photoshop Editing Job

Here is a picture of Elyse and Mark we took last week at Grandma's house.

Notice how dark the foreground is. The background is very light so the flash didn't go off. But that's ok when you have photoshop. *smile*

So, I cropped it and made some adjustments to the lighting and color, sharpened Elyses face, took some of the redness out of her complection (it was very cold and they were out sledding), and voila!

What a difference! Photoshop allowed me to take a photo that wasn't all that great, and turn it into something worth framing!

Before...

After!

I'm having so much fun!

Lisa

King of ALL Chicken Wing Eaters...

We love wings at our house. Especially hot wings! Especially these wings! But, because we have several little rugrats a few small children in the house, I always make some without the spicy sauce.

Who do you think stripped these bones clean?

Would you believe MARK did??? This child loves wings! He'll even eat them spicy. But I don't give him much more than a little bite of the spicy ones because I know it may upset his tummy.

It wasn't long ago I had to peel all the meat off for him so that he could eat them. Not any more.

This kid goes to town while eating wings! He would eat the bones if I let him. He often eats all the gristle off the ends. He's like his mama. I love gristle.

One for each hand.

Yummy, aren't they, baby boy??

I love watching him eat. He thoroughly enjoys his food. But ya know what the best part about Mark and this particular wing meal was?

OK, Besides his BIG brown eyes....

His dinner attire.

But his yummy plump baby thighs will have to be a totally different post altogether! It would be completely wrong to write anything about his BEEFY thighs in a CHICKEN WING post!

Wouldn't you agree?

Love,

Lisa

A Shiner!

It was a close fight, my tough little man!

When I walked in Mark was winning. He was almost up on his opponenet, trying to climb the guy. What a grip! Then without warning, the enemy threw his tall frame forward knocking Mark to the ground face up. All I could hear was the "thunk" of his little head hitting that hard floor. The mother in me could hold back no longer, so I ran to my baby's son's rescue, but before I could get to him, this rival lunged forward and landed his seat right on Mark's eye!

I had half a mind to grab the rival and sit on him... but I refrained, and tended to my son baby, as any mother with a heart would.

And this rival.... You might be wondering what who it is, huh? Well, I got his picture before I personally grabbed him and shoved him under the breakfast bar.

Don't try to look innocent, Mr. Bar Stool! You're no friend of mine!

Toilets, Toothbrushes, and Toddlers

Need I say more?

We knew something was in that toilet. It kept overflowing after one of Mark's attempts to flush something down it. I caught him red handed! I just didn't catch what he put in the toilet before he flushed.

Well, after using the plunger on this toilet for about a month, we decided to pull it and try to get what was in it.

We tried.

Really, we did.

We used a hose, springy things my husband has in the garage, wires, our hands...but with no luck. We just didn't need the expense of purchasing another toilet, but couldn't keep this toilet out of commission on a permanent basis (or could we.....no wait, it's too late).

So, we couldn't resist....

Go for it, Babe!

The culprit....a toothbrush.

We have no idea whose toothbrush it is or where it came from. All downstairs toothbrushes are accounted for. We suspect it's a toothbrush that belongs to our neice, who came for a visit a few months ago and left it here. We're just not sure. But we are definitely sure we won't be returning it to her.

Now Mark, what do you have to say for yourself????

Oh, never mind.

Meet The Shoe Dwellers ~ Mark

Awwww.....don't you just love babies? This one just melts my heart into a big pile of mushy nothingness. Mark is our 3rd born son and 6th child. He weighed 8 lbs. 12 oz. and was not born at home as we had hoped. My 20 week ultrasound found a complete previa, so we decided to discontinue seeing our homebirth midwife and go to a local Nurse Midwife who would deliver us in the hospital's birthing center. The previa migrated, praise God, and Mark's hospital delivery was wonderful.
Mark was 7 months old yesterday!!! He has 3 teeth, can crawl and sit up, says mama and dada, and thinks my boobs are balloons that need blowing up. Either that, or he'll be a trumpet player when he is grown. Ugh! Mark is generally happy most of the time, except for when he's not. ;o) We call him our high needs child, as he seems to need more of everything......except for sleep. Ok, I take that back. He is doing much better than he had been. But he can still sometimes manage to keep the rocking chair warm and rocking in the bedroom during the wee hours of the night some nights! But oh is he scrumptious! He weighs about 22-23 lbs. now. Still exclusively breastfed. I've become one of those mamas that chooses to wait longer before introducing solids. My experience has shown me that babies who eat solids tend to drink less breastmilk. They also can get constipated if their digestive system is not completely matured enough to tolerate solids. Plus, feeding solids means another thing to do during the day and a small, but nonetheless added expense to the grocery bill. So, I usually wait till around the 8th or 9th month.
Mark has killer brown eyes like both of his brothers. Not sure what his hair color will be yet, but it looks to be a medium to dark brown color.....what little he has.
I just love the first year of a baby's life. I love the look in his eyes when he sees something for the first time, or experiences something for the first time, or hears something......I just can't get enough. I'm so thankful the Lord has chosen to trust us with this precious little boy.