Happy 35th birthday, my dear Jude!

Jude turns thirty five tomorrow, so we went out to dinner tonight with his parents, Cullen, and Aiden. Roman was a little too young to dine where they cook your food right in front of you, so Amy was gracious enough to babysit him for us. Jude has been wanting to take the boys to eat here forever, as it is one of his most favorite restaurants and it is really entertaining. The problem is, it is a tad expensive($255 tonight, nothing fancy), so we usually only go on Jude's birthday. Well, the boys absolutely LOVED it! They were in awe. Aiden used chopsticks (he stabbed his meat, but hey) and he even tried to catch the food that was thrown at him with his mouth. Cullen, too. Had I known they would have been that happy and excited to dine there, we would have taken them there a lot sooner. They were both so well behaved and Jude's birthday dinner was a success.

Our day, child vs. mom

My child's view of our Tuesday

• Awoke
• Breakfast served to me with my favorite chocolate milk
• Went to the gym and played with my BFF for an hour
• My BFF came to my house and played for a couple more hours
• Had lunch with my BFF from Cane's
• Took a nap
• Woke up and played Lego's
• Went swimming in the pool and the "water slide" for an hour or two
• Got dressed, had dinner, played more
• Went to the movies with mommy and daddy to see Toy Story 3...It was great!
• Came home and went to bed

Mom's view of our Tuesday

• Awoke
• Made breakfast for everyone and had a cup of coffee to get some energy, cleaned up
• Went to the gym in the rain and worked out for an hour, even though I didn't feel like it
• Watched four kids and tried to wash clothes for a couple hours
• Had lunch with my BFF from Cane's, while arguing with Aiden the entire time because it was past nap time and he was a big crank ball
• Took a nap
• Woke up to referee arguments over Lego's and prepared dinner
• Cooked dinner and watched the children play in the little pool for some time, making sure no one drowned the other one
• Dressed the kids and served everyone dinner, ate, cleaned up
• Went to the movies to see Toy Story 3...It was great! Spent $35.
• Came home, blogged, and went to bed

Our days are so similar, yet so different. Oh, to be a child again!!

Monday, starting the week off right

The boys and I went to the gym this morning, the grocery, then home. Jude had come home on his lunch break to my surprise and had flowers, a sweet card, and some chocolate waiting for me.

He entered the dog house on Saturday evening, got a free pass on Father's Day, and quickly returned there last night while I was trying to fall asleep. Men do stupid things, and that is all I will say about that. The boys played/fought while I washed clothes and attempted to clean the house a bit.
Once Jude got off work, he brought the boys to the library, mowed the yard while the boys played in the baby pool, and I grilled some delicious steak and corn on the cob.

After, we all watched Charlotte's Web in Spanish. Aiden is very interested in the Spanish language since starting the Spanish Immersion program at school this past year. He was even excited to see the commercials in Spanish. (We DVR'ed it off the local Spanish channel.) I know Roman is going to know quite a few Spanish words by the time he enters into the program next year. I hope to learn it too one day so there will be no secret language in this house as they get older.

Happy Father's Day, Jude!

I may not say it to Jude often, and it's not that I take him for granted, but he is an amazing father who has more patience in the world than any man I know. I sometimes find the chaos in our home overwhelming, but Jude takes it as almost music to his ears. He loves the noise! He loves our children and provides so much for us so we can have a comfortable life. The fact that I get to stay home with our children and create many special memories is something I only dreamed of until marrying him. I love that I can take many photos of the children's daily activities and email a few pics to him and blog about it when the day is done. It wouldn't be possible without Jude. He works very hard and takes a lot of crap from his job of fifteen years, that I am sure if we didn't exist, he wouldn't do. He tries so hard to balance work and family, and I know that's a job in itself. He is some one's favorite in this house at ALL times. He sometimes plays board games with the kids in the evenings, or takes them to the library, he always reads them books at night, bathes them ninety five percent of the time, and loves watching kid movies with them. He likes to take them swimming at the gym, fixes them breakfast on most of his days off, and will build Lego's with them until they all are used up. He comforts them when they are hurt, settles disputes between them, and can fix just about anything they need fixed. Every day when Jude walks in the door from work, he is welcomed home with a kiss from each of us. (At the moment, that is three or four kisses guaranteed every day.) At times, there is even fighting on who will open the door for him. He is a hero in our home and I am a very lucky girl to call him my husband. He may not be perfect, but he has few imperfections in my book. I married the right man for me, and in good times and in bad, he never changes the way he fathers our children and I am most thankful for that. I know at times I feel like I could be a better parent, and he goes through that too, but from my personal view, he is doing a wonderful job and we are all blessed to call him our daddy here. Thank you, God, for this man!

Congrats to Jeff and Julie

Tonight Jude and I attended an engagement party for Jeff and Julie across the lake. Jude and Jeff were very good friends in college. Jeff was the best man at our wedding, and the godfather to our last two children, Aiden and Roman. As Jude works like a mad man, has been married for six years now, and has three kids going on four, we really don't see them much. (Jude doesn't see anyone much, besides us.) I honestly didn't think Jeff would ever settle down; but he has, and Julie seems like a great girl for him, so I am happy for them both. The ring is beautiful and the wedding is planned for January 2011. Here is the only pic I snapped from the evening.

Jeff's in the middle, Brad (was also in our wedding) is to the left of Jeff, and Jude is to the right

Taste and See

Cullen and Aiden have been attending vacation bible school together this week at the church we attend and the theme is Taste and See. It has like a Candyland theme. Every day they give a fun report of what they did. Here are a few photos from my phone...

It's a date!

Roman, my three year old son, and Delaney, Amy's almost two year old daughter, are close in age and I have been waiting for them to get along and start noticing each other/playing together. The most Roman says to Delaney is "Stop looking at me!!", which I know he means lovingly. Well yesterday we hung out together and Roman gave Delaney her first compliment. I told Roman he was pretty (he'd just got a haircut), which in turn he usually yells "I'm NOT pretty!". But this time he said "I not pretty, Laney pretty." Whoa! I don't know where that came from but he is right. So today, all the kids ran outside to play, then after a little while, everyone came in except Delaney and Roman. When Amy and I noticed that, we went quickly to see what they were up to. We found them at the little picnic table together...playing.

Finally, they play! Delaney even hugged Roman today when he walked in the door. It must have been the pretty compliment from the day before that got her:) Just look at his smile...

Our last zoo trip of 2010

Today we needed to get out of the house, and since there was mad rain throughout the city in patchy areas, Amy and I decided to hit the zoo with the overcast. Fortunately, it wasn't that hot, except for one ten minute time span when the sun contemplated coming out, but it chose to go hide some more. The five children had a blast and burned tons of energy. Sadly, since summer is here already, it will probably be our last trip there until the fall when the weather cools off.






Delaney tried to run...

...but she was caught

I'm not the only one gaining weight around here

Cullen, who's ten, has been off his ADD medicine for almost three weeks now and is steady gaining weight. I am so happy! He has also calmed down from that first week of getting off of the them. Although he still has problems processing stuff like directions, he is not all over the place like he was that first week. Here is a side by side of the past three weeks. The first picture is from the end of May and the second one is today, mid June. His cheeks are chubbier and his shoulders are a little broader. It amazes me. I want to take him back to the doctor to weigh him again on their scale and see what the difference is.

May 2010

June 2010

And there's the weight!

Pregnancy #4:
The first 18 weeks, 5 pounds. Doing good!
The last 7 weeks, add 17 pounds. Not so good! (FYI-That's about 2.5 lbs a week.)
Total: 25 weeks, 22 pounds on so far.
14 weeks left...you do the math.
Looks like this fourth pregnancy will be no different than the rest. I have always gained between 50-60 pounds for each boy, losing pretty much all of it after Cullen and Aiden with the exception of this last little rug rat, Roman. I am miserable and cannot afford to put on that much more weight!! I thought it wouldn't happen this time:(

Did I ever tell you how much I HATE being pregnant?! Oh, I said it. HATE!! I do! I just like having the newborn in my arms on it's birthday. I am not a fan of alllllll the other stuff that goes along with it. I'd give you a list, but it would probably gross a lot of people out. To all the women who say they just LOVE being pregnant, screw that. That's just crazy talk! I thought this time would be different, but it's not. I'm going to cry now...

My horrible day

Jude was off today and I woke up at 9 a.m. to the phone ringing. It was our home alarm company stating that our side door wireless sensory battery was dying and they just wanted to let us know. Well, this is the second time in the past six months that they will need to come out and "fix" it. I then realized I was sweating something bad. The air conditioner must be broke, too. It was!! I had a hair appointment I ran off to and when I got home, I pulled in the driveway, turned the car off, got out, and closed the door. All of a sudden I felt stuff hitting me. I thought our hanging fern had broke through the bottom. Nope. I looked around to see my back quarter driver side window shattered.

The heat apparently made it explode out, and onto me. Nice. Real nice. I get in the hot house, have a seat on the recliner and try to use my Iphone to look up the glass company and I discover IT isn't working. Talk about being in a bad mood!!
Jude's uncle then came out to repair the A/C, which only needed freon, thank God. I found a glass company that can repair my car tomorrow morning, and I realized that every one's AT&T service was screwed, not just mine. Things started looking up. But, to finish the day off, our little blow up pool that gives the children hours and hours of fun (and me peace and quiet), POPPED. No more pool time fun until we buy new one. I just want to go to sleep and start the day over tomorrow. My Saturday is supposed to be a girl day by the pool on the coast. Let's hope tomorrow is better!

This week, so far

Let me just start this blog post by saying IT IS SO FREAKING HOT down here. OMG! We are in June and my pregnant butt has three more months of this? WTH was I thinking? When I got pregnant for Cullen, he was my first and I had no idea about the summer heat and pregnancy. I learned a valuable lesson with him and swore I would never do that to myself again. The next two children, I planned so I would not be pregnant in the summer. Well, I must have forgotten just how HOT it is from eleven years ago. I wanted us to hurry this round once we decided to have another, as neither one of us are getting any younger. Boy, should we have waited. I am miserable! Just wanted to record this for my future blog book, in case we decide to have another, it will NOT be during the summer for sure!
Monday and Tuesday morning I had to babysit the Kreemer kids so the boys had friends to play with both mornings. By Monday afternoon, Aiden had such an attitude that I decided to go grocery shopping alone and enjoy not being yelled at for an hour. See, Aiden is a gamer. He is addicted to the Wii and all video games in general. Yes, he's five. I try to let him have some time on the weekends to play, but come Monday morning, he goes through detox when the Wii is put away. It's crazy, and oh so scary. I don't even see how he enjoys playing as he gets so mad at the Lego games that he throws and pounds the remotes, which of course gets him in trouble. That doesn't seem fun or relaxing to me. Let's remember, his name does means FIERY.
Anywho, Tuesday came and went with little to no problems. We went to the Castillo's to play for a little while and let the older kids swim for a couple hours in the kiddie pool.
Aiden

Xan

Laney

Eli

Hannah

Roman

Everyone was worn out once we got home and naps followed quickly. Cullen has been at his dad's. Tuesday night we went to get (sugar free) snoballs after dinner.
Today, Jude and I slept in, as he works really late tonight. Then the boys played in the backyard and burned some energy while I booked my hotel room for the trial in Hattiesburg.




The trial for Brandi is sooooo close!
Tonight, we have church group and Cullen comes home. I wonder what tomorrow has in store for us. At least Roman is feeling better and Aiden is all well. Next week, vacation bible school! I learned from a few parents at a recent birthday party that the key to sanity for any stay at home parent during the summer is multiple vacation bible school camps on different weeks. We are signed up for two and are debating a third:)

Dinner with a three year old tyrant

Roman does not eat dinner. Ever! He barely eats lunch. He just pushes his plate away and snubs his nose. We have tried many different routes, but so far, none have worked. We have plenty of issues trying to feed this child and have limited snacks to bread, crackers, fruit snacks, fruit, granola bars, etc. Meaning, he doesn't walk around eating Ding Dong's, cookies, and chocolate all day. He is stubborn times a hundred. Tonight, I tried to get him to taste a green bean and although I know I shouldn't have used bribery, I wanted to see how far this would go and took out my iphone to record it. We were all done eating dinner.



Some of the things he says in the video (I had to cut the first few seconds to be able to download it to here):
"Daddy gonna eat the bean, Daddy eat the bean!"
"I don't want to get a snoball."
"I not getting snoball."
"I can't...I going in the corner."
That's Aiden laughing at the end.

It does not matter if it is a green bean, mac and cheese, or a cracker he does not want. This is the response to food put in front of him.
Now, let me just state for the record, besides putting him in his room at dinner when he refuses to eat with us, we have NEVER put him in the corner. He punishes himself these days.
I love him so much, bad attitude and all. This is an every night occurrence. No need to wonder why I read all the parenting books!

Our Sixth Anniversary Weekend

Jude was off Friday, Saturday and Sunday, so we made sure to spend some quality time together. After all, we were celebrating six wonderful years of marriage.

Friday:
We woke up and it was funky outside with rain (again). We got all three boys dressed and went to eat donuts. One of their favorite breakfasts...

Then, we headed over to the insectarium and the boys were in little boy heaven. To be honest, it truly grossed me out, but it was a very neat place to visit. All three really enjoyed it; it fit all their age groups apparently.





For dinner, we all went to Chili's to eat. The boys LOVE molten chocolate lava cake and it was gone in two minutes.



Saturday:
Jude and I slept late and stayed in bed pretty much all afternoon, just relaxing. Then, it was time for the boys to go sleep at Nanny and Paw Paw's so Jude and I could have a nice adult dinner at Dickie Brennan's Steakhouse.
*Six years ago, Jude and I had our daytime wedding reception in the FQ and got a hotel room to stay in down there overnight, before we caught a flight in the morning to Hawaii. In all the madness, we left our bags at his parents house and only had our wedding clothes to wear till the next day. Silly, I know. It was raining and we were starving come night time, so we got dressed in our wedding attire and walked a few blocks to Dickies. The wait for a table was outrageous and we decided we would leave and try somewhere else. As we were walking out the restaurant door, a staff member grabbed us and asked if we had just gotten married. Of course, yes. We were seated immediately, the staff was great, and the food was oh so yummy. We try to go back there once a year and we are never disappointed. Great memories!*

After dinner, we came home to cuddle and watch a movie, left to get snoballs at 10:30 at night, and went to bed soon after.


Sunday:
Since we were still child free come morning time, we decided to sleep in late and go have a jazz brunch at a local favorite restaurant. It was wonderful! After, we picked up our two little monkeys and headed home for naps. Yes, we slept some more. Then it was off to Richelle's 30th birthday surprise party with tons of family. (HAPPY BIRTHDAY, RICHELLE!!) It was an amazing, relaxing weekend and it couldn't have been better. Jude sure knows how to treat me, even after all these years. I am one lucky girl and there aren't many days that go by that I do not count my blessings. He is an answered prayer:)


Six years of marriage and we've added two (and a half) kids. I wonder what ten years will look like...

Pregnancy brain

Tonight, I didn't feel like cooking dinner, but I had already defrosted crawfish tails to make an etouffee. I forced myself in the kitchen and made sweet tea, cooked some rice, and almost finished the crawfish etouffee when I noticed it was very foamy and bubbly. I kept thinking it just didn't look right. Then it hit me! I used baking soda instead of corn starch in it. OMG! I blame it on pregnancy brain. For the rice, well there was one little itty bitty rice bug hanging out on top of the four cups of rice that I had just cooked. I should have went with my instincts of NOT COOKING. Looks like Jude will have leftovers from last night and the boys will have pizza. What a waste of time (and food)!

Two thirds of a break

This morning I woke hoping to send all three boys to their Aunt Dawn's house. She wanted to take them to see a movie today. Well things do not always go as planned and Aiden woke up with 103 fever. I had a baby doctor appointment to go to, also. I dropped Aiden off at my m-i-l's and then the other two at Aunt Dawn's so I could go sit in the doctor's office waiting room for two hours. (Oh, it was busy there.) So my free day didn't turn out the way I had hoped. We did get to do another ultrasound and see our handsome little man,

whom I say looks like Roman after today's viewing. He is an active little child, moving way more than I ever remember his brothers moving. We have a VHS tape of today's show, but no VCR in the house to play it on. Hmmmm. After the doctors visit, I picked Aiden up and I was going to take him to McDonald's for some mommy and son alone time lunch. I felt bad that his brothers were out enjoying a movie while he was not. We pulled in the parking lot and the skies opened up, loud thunder, and lightning you could see in the car. Scared me half to death. I kindly asked him (looking all petrified) if we could get our lunch to go and hang out at home. He was supportive and agreed. We got home, ate, and have hung out all day on the recliner. He still has a high fever of 103 this afternoon.

This is day five of his illness and the highest the fever has been this week. (He even let mommy take a picture for the blog. What a sport!) What could have been a day all about me turned into a day all about him. Isn't that the way it always goes though? But, I wouldn't trade him/them for the world!
A break from two out of three ain't bad:)
Thank you Aunt Dawn and Megan!