Eight Months and One Tooth Older

This weekend, the boys turned Eight Months Old. I guess there really isn't a way that I can stop time and keep them like this forever, is there? Darn it!
Here's Bryan. He's doing great despite a little bit of discomfort from cutting his first tooth! We're going to call it officially cut on the 17th. He Loves to rub his tongue over it and now he's obsessed with holding onto his tongue for whatever reason.

Last night he tossed and turned. I got up two times for him and one time for Jonathan where all he needed was a consoling pat on the back to go back to sleep. Bryan ended up waking up again a third time where he earned himself a trip downstairs to sleep on Daddy. I hope this is just because of the teething. I feel really bad for them. I hear it's not painful for them, but how do we know? Has anyone used Baby Orajel? Despite the restless nights, they both wake up happy and ready to play. I wish I could bottle that energy and sell it as a drug!

So here are the boys on Saturday, their 8-month b-day. I can tell how it's going to get harder and harder to get them to sit still for just a minute.

Here's Jonathan. When Matt was little, his father used to tell him to "get excited" and he would clench his fists get a big grin on his face and shake. I wonder if this is similar to how he looked.



I don't know if it's the kick from finally being over with busy season, or just that I'm coming to my senses, but I'm missing the boys almost every minute of the day now. It's exhausting to think about it too. I feel terrible for working while someone else is having all the fun with them and I think I'd feel terrible if I'd stay at home and worry about our financial future. Anyone else grappling with this dilemma?

Bryan's Surgery

Well, everything went great! If you want more details, read on. If not, there are two other posts below this one. Yep, it's after busy season baby!
Bryan woke up the night before at 12:15. The rule was to not eat after midnight, so all I could do for him was stick in a pacifier and soothe him back to sleep. Luckily that worked and he fell asleep about a half hour later. We arrived at the Surgical Center at 6:30am. Bryan was in good spirits and he smiled at all the nurses - such a schmoozer! They opened up a toy drawer and gave him a stuffed dog-like thing. They were really surprised with how much he was smiling. Aren't all babies like that? Then Matt started to do the "boo" thing and got Bryan to laugh, then the nurses were really all over him.

Just like everyone told me, the surgery lasted maybe 20 minutes including their prep and recovery. Matt and I were in the waiting room when we heard him waking up. We had to wait until they let us in, so we got the bottle ready and waited. That was the hardest part, honestly. Knowing that he's in there upset and I couldn't hold him. When they gave the OK, I ran inside and fed him immediately. He only took about 4oz when he became agitated and started to cry again. I could only imagine what was going through that little head of his. Hearing his Mom and Dad talking and not recognizing the sounds coming from us. The Dr. said he scraped away a lot of gunk before making his incisions. There will be some more drainage before he's completely better, but it's a ton better than what it was before. After about an hour in the recovery room with Matt and I taking turns pacing the room with Bryan in our arms, we left to go home and rest. Matt went to get my car's oil changed and to get some food while I stayed at home with Bryan. I thought he'd be cranky and sleepy, but he was back to normal in just a few short hours. They used gas instead of an IV, so I think that made a huge difference. The Dr. told us that he shouldn't get behind a wheel, but I figured this one might be OK...

Accountant's Gone Wild

There's only one day (normally) that Accountant's will let loose and go wild - really wild! For those of us at McGladrey & Pullen, "going wild" includes various coctails and playing pool. Don't laugh! Ok, you can laugh. Here's the scene at the local bar/restaurant. Trust me, it didn't look as cool in person. The camera was doing someting cool with the lights. Not sure why.



A group of us played a couple of rounds of pool.

Here's Gina and Lisa on Team 1:

Here I am with Rahim on Team 2:

Here's the table with NO balls hit in after everyone had at least one chance to go. This wasn't the first game either, so you can't blame it on warming up(not that you would).

Rahim was clearly the best player, so we won the first game, but on the second game, Lisa took control and sunk four in a row, then Gina whipped up some raw talent and sunk a few of her own. The score was even at the end of the night. Good times.

Here I am trying my best not to laugh too hard at myself being pathetic.

Just 364 more days 'till we go wild again! Look out Paris Hilton!

My Little Models

I decided at the beginning of the year to submit a couple of photos for the cutekid.com competition. Each month, they choose a "cute kid" among thousands of applicants (in different categories) to be a semifinalist for a yearly competition. The prizes are awesome and include lots of money to go towards their college tuition. The cost to enter a photo is $20. I tried all winter to get a good picture that I felt could "win it all". I wasn't coming up with anything spectacular, just your average ma-ma pics, so I submitted two that I liked a lot. Remember these...


The first picture got picked as a April preview picture! The prize is a free entry into the following month's contest. Now the pressure's on!

Week of 4/7/08

This week was great! The boys are well and Matt and I are on the very tail end of our colds. You'd hardly believe it, but the little angels are quickly becoming little devils. It's becoming impossible to leave them in a room to play. I'm sure you other moms know exactly what I'm saying. As a temporary fix until we can get some gates that will fit our doorways, we've been using our pack-n-play as a holding pen for the boys when we need to get around to do things. They absolutely LOVE to crawl around and observe everything that's around them. They've been pulling themselves up to standing on a few things in the living room and Bryan's even started to shift from standing in front of a game to standing in front of the rocking ottoman to the rocker. It's scary, but really exciting. Of course where there's such bravery, there's also some bumps and bruises. Both boys have fallen back right on their heads or on to their sides. Mostly onto their sides because they'll hold onto whatever they can, but later realize that it's not going to hold them up. We've learned to say "Yeah!!!" and clap when they fall so they don't cry too much. Bryan has learned to climb into the kitchen this week. I grabbed a few pictures so you can see how he's doing it. He's pulled himself up to the step before, but never over the ledge until just this weekend. Love the one-sock look, right? Yes, it's our favorite around here.
He normally gets upset at this point and wants to be picked up, but instead... He started to lift that little leg and he wouldn't give up. It would be up then down, then up then down.. until...
He pulled his other leg up and found a whole new room to explore! He didn't even realize that he did it at first, so he was still a little frustrated, but then it clicked and he took off.

The more he crawled the more upset he got. I think he was worried he was lost. So once he reached the dining room, I picked him up and brought him back to the living room. Back up he went. *I can't wait till we find a gate!!*

Here's a spooky pic. There was a little white orb floating to the left of Bryan and he's looking at it. It's not in any of the other pictures. Maybe Great-Grandma Bryan was helping Bryan up that step!?

The next day, Bryan showed Jonathan how it's done. It was a rotten snowy day, so we were all in sweats, that is until Jonathan decided to go shirtless for awhile. Did you see that drool coming from Bryan's mouth! So when are those teeth coming already!?

Here's just a picture of the twins playing together. They were really good with each other on Sunday. They still don't share and get upset when the other one gets a toy (or person) that they want, but they'll learn eventually, right? Grandma Jean made a discovery this weekend. Any time we want a picture of the boys, we just need to clap and say "yay!" and they look up and smile. This will come in handy! I tried it with this pic.

On Saturday, Grandma Jean was feeding the boys their last stage one food, prunes. I have to say, I was really nervous. What is that going to do to them? Will Matt and I be up all night changing poopy diapers? Oh silly first-time-mom!! They really liked their prunes and we didn't have any accidents that night. Phew! Here's Bryan stylin' a stash-o-prunes. (yes, he's wearing not one, but two bibs. Some foods are messier than others and this was definitely a messy food.)

I'll be sure to update everyone on Thursday for the results of Bryan's ear-tube surgery. Hope it goes well!

First week of April '08

So this week went by without too much going on. It was the first really nice weekend, so we decided to go on a walk to pick up dinner. We tried to get the boys to put on their sunglasses, but they weren't having it. I did get a quick pic of them before they came off and became choking hazards. The walk was great. It felt good to get out of the house and enjoy the fresh air. This weekend we were extremely productive and we cleaned the whole house. Well, most of it at least. I'm still working on making a "spring cleaning" list which should take me 'till at least the fall to complete. Here's Matt, Grandma and Grandpa Bevevino, and Jonathan (left) and Bryan (right) before our walk. Here's Bryan(left) and Jonathan in their sunglasses. Bryan was hamming it up while Jonathan was stealth.
Next weekend, we're hoping to make it to Purdue University in IN to watch Matt's cousin, Paul pitch with the Penn State baseball team. Unfortunately, the weather is calling for rain and snow, so we might not be going. The good weather is trying so hard to come out!

Update w/ Easter and Mommy's B-day

Ok, so it's been another two weeks, sorry! I have to be relatively short this week too cause I need to order some child-proofing items online. That's right, the boys are crawling!!! It all started about around Easter weekend. Both boys have been doing the whole bouncing on their knees thing for awhile and finally, Jonathan decided to move forward. He's a bit slow, but steady..just the way to keep me calm. Bryan really wasn't interested until just last week. Just yesterday, we had a race between the two of them and Bryan took off while Jonathan stood still. Fast learner! Either that, or Jonathan wasn't interested in moving at that particular moment. So, it's just a matter of time before the boys move up to the waddler room at day care. I can't believe they've grown so much! I can remember when they were so tiny and we were hoping that they would eat one ounce of formula. Now, they're downing 8oz at every sitting plus whatever baby food we give them. *sigh* Where has the time gone?
As far as everyone's health goes, Matt and the boys just got over whatever virus it was that they had. I've got a dry cough that I think broke this morning. It looks like Bryan has another ear infection, but we can't do anything about it because he can't have medicine two weeks before or after surgery. Hopefully that will heal on it's own really soon. Other than that, we're all very happy.
So, here's a suggestion to any new mother. Get an activity center - one of those things that's stationary, you sit the baby in it and they play with all sorts of toys around them. It's the boys' favorite toy by far and Grandma Jean got it for them a little while ago. Here they are tearing at it from every angle. They both love to chew on that mirror-like thing then they get excited and bounce like crazy. It's hard not to watch them when they're in it cause you just can't stop laughing.
One day we put the boys in their Penn State Altoona onesies. Great Grandma and Great Grandpap Miller arranged to have these sent to the boys. Thanks! They weren't really in the mood to pose for a picture that afternoon, so I'll have to try again sometime. One day I dressed the boys in their "West Elementary School" sweatshirts. These were made especially for the boys from a friend of Grandma Jean's. She is the principal at West.
It was my 30th Birthday on March 29th. Ugh! Well, all my coworkers took me out to lunch and this was what my cube looked like when we came back. The culprit still hasn't fessed up.

To celebrate my big b-day, Matt and I went downtown to visit some museums in Chicago. Grandma Jean and Grandpa Mark were nice enough to take the boys for a sleepover at their house. They had a blast! Bryan slept in a crib upstairs and Jonathan slept in a pack-n-play downstairs. According to the 'rents, they ate, played, and slept well the whole day. They even went out to lunch and had a bath that night. Bryan slept through the night and Jonathan woke up once wanting a bottle (the usual).
The only eventful thing that happened to them happened at lunch. They went to Red Robin and Jonathan had a toot that didn't fade (if you catch my drift). Jean took him into the ladies room, but they didn't have a changing table, so she had to wash off the sink and change him there. He's started to really squirm during changes and even roll over, so this is no easy task. Luckily, he didn't move all that much and Jean was able to change him with out incident.
So, Matt and I had a great time downtown. We stayed at a really cool/modern hotel named the Amalfi. It was right across the street from Harry Caray's (spelling?) . We didn't go there because we only had jeans and the picture in a restaurant book made it look like a no-jeans kind of a place. I just learned today that that's not the case, but we know now for next time. Here I am with a Moose sculpture that was in front of the WGN building. I actually cropped this picture to what's showing because the original has a big chunk of the building and a bunch of people in it that we don't know. Matt's picture skills are not that desirable. Hence, me not being in too many pics, 'cause I'm taking them all. At least he got the sculpture in the picture. He took another picture of me in front of one of the lions that sits in front of the Art Institute of Chicago, but he didn't bother getting the lion in the picture. Ugh! So anyway, we only got to the art gallery because we ran out of time there. There was so much to see! A lot of very famous paintings that I've only seen on tv or in print. breathtaking! If anyone is interested coming to visit Chicago, I highly recommend a trip to the Art Institute! For dinner, we tried to go to Ed Debevik's, but it was way too busy and there was a huge line at Gino's East, so we went to Carson's. This is a legendary BBQ rib place, which is right in line with my taste. We loved it! Here's a picture of Matt, annoyed that he had his picture taken, but sucking it up because it's my birthday. Good husband.

Here's a picture that Matt took of me. I was in mid-sentence and a bit goofy, but it's not a terrible picture I guess.

Ok, that's a little bit longer than it should have been. I guess I'll be looking for childproofing stuff tomorrow. :)