Fun in the Sun

Charlotte trying out the slip and slide

We had a fun day today. We bought a new slip and slide and decided to try it out. The girls (especially Charlotte) are a little young, but they had a great time. I think it was the best money I ever spent. My sister and her three boys came over in the afternoon and they had a great time too. I'm still thinking about buying a little kiddie pool. I saw an ad somewhere for one that has a slide. I was a bad mom though and didn't put sunscreen on the girls and Brooke got burnt on her shoulders. She didn't complain about it before bed though. Hopefully it's not as bad as I think.

In other news, Nathan is working like crazy this week. Monday he worked until 8 P.M. and yesterday he didn't get home until 12:15 a.m.!! And he went in at 7 a.m. He called me around 8:30 to say they were going to install a heat pump in someone's house. I thought he must be crazy!! Who wants someone working in their house until midnight!! I sure don't. I found out later though that the house is vacant but the owner was there for a little while. Tonight his boss made sure he was home by a more decent hour: 6 P.M. He got to play in the slip and slide with the girls. I think they all had fun.

Indiana Storms

This Indiana weather is crazy!! If you haven't heard on the national news by now, much of Indiana is under a state of emergency because of all the rain and tornadoes that we have had. Thankfully we have not had any major damage. We woke up this morning to no power which stayed that way for 3 hours. Dad, Nathan, and the neighbor Pat were working furiously to get the generator working so the basement wouldn't flood. Our backyard is pretty much a lake. Nathan and I tried to go to several different places today, but kept having to turn around because of high water. We finally just decided to go home. I've lived here all my life and have never seen anything like this! Click here to read about the storm and see some crazy pictures.

ATrip to the E.R.

As you can probably guess from the title of this post, we had a pretty exciting day. It all started when we went to the park with some friends at church. Brooke was playing with some girls and they found some rocks and were pretending they were earrings. For some reason she wanted to bring the "earrings" home. Ok fine. I gave her a baggy when we got home to put the rocks in. After lunch I decided to take a shower. Lauren was home and halfway through washing my hair I hear someone crying. Lauren is yelling through the door that Brooke put a rock in her ear. I quickly rinse my hair and get dressed and run to Brooke to look in her ear. I have Lauren call the pediatrician and they are at lunch. This was approximately 12:50. I decide to go on over there and see if they are there by the time I get there. I dialed their number again and find out they aren't back from lunch until 1:30. So I decide to go to prompt care. We get there and she tells me if they can get the rock out it will cost $265. Well we can't leave it there so let's try it. Fortunately we didn't have to wait too long, less than 5 minutes. The doctor tried a couple times to get it out with this long skinny tool that they use at the pediatrician to get ear wax. But she couldn't get it and she didn't want to bust her ear drum. She tells me to go on the E.R. No bill? I say. She acted like she would try to waive my fee, we'll see about that. We arrive at the E.R. at about 1:45. They take Brooke's vitals and then she starts crying. I didn't know if she was in pain or scared. She was in pain but now she was scared. We met a nice nurse though that hooked her up with a ton of stickers, a sucker, and some bubbles. She also found a friend to play with that made the 2 hour wait in the waiting room go a little easier. By 4:00 we finally got a room. A physician's assistant came in and took a look in her ear, tried getting it out with one of those long skinny tools again with no luck. She came back with the doctor who decided we needed to numb it with lidocane (sp?). She had to have that in her ear for twenty minutes before they would come back. A little after 5:00 they came back in with a tech as well and used the tool again and we all held Brooke down. Finally it came out. All during this time Brooke had been crying off and on because mostly she was scared, she wanted to go home, etc. Not exactly how I wanted to spend my afternoon. Brooke is fine now but she does have a little bit of blood in her ear. Hopefully she had learned her lesson and won't put anything in her ear again.


The rock: The arm bracelet (Charlotte is wearing it)
All of her goodies
Brooke being silly after we got home

Little Mommies

My girls are going to make great mommies someday. These are pictures of Charlotte putting her baby to bed. She puts her in the little crib that we have for dolls and puts blankets on her. She says "night night baby". She gives hugs and kisses. It is so cute. She even tries to put diapers on them. Speaking of diapers....Brooke changed Charlotte's diaper today. And it was poopy!! I left them downstairs to play and watch a movie to come upstairs to take a shower. My dad was upstairs in his office. I just asked him to listen for them to fight or cry or anything. I got out of the shower and Brooke comes running in telling me to come get Charlotte's poopy diaper. I asked her if I needed to change her and she said she already did, I just need to come get it. What?!?! Please tell me you're kidding. I run downstairs and find Charlotte laying on her changing table with diaper off and wipes all over. Brooke had actually done a pretty good job. Good thing it wasn't such a bad diaper. She didn't have the new diaper on yet, but wanted to do that too, so I helped a little. So those are my mommies in training. Not that I always want my 5 year old changing poopy diapers. My 22 year old sister and dad don't even like to change poopy diapers, why does my 5 year old? Pretty crazy. Anyway, no pictures for the diaper incident. I was in too much of a hurry to grab my camera.

Charlotte's Birthday party

We had a great day today. Not only was it Memorial Day, but it was also Charlotte's 2nd birthday. So we celebrated with a cookout and birthday party. Charlotte has been singing "Happy Birthday to me" all week. She really seemed to understand what was going on. But we have had a lot of birthdays this month to get ready for hers.

She had a great time "tearing" into her presents. Look at all those clothes! She had to put the swimsuit on over her clothes and her new Dora sandals.
This is Brooke trying on the hair piece she got for Charlotte. Charlotte wasn't very interested in it, but Brooke was! I think she really got it for herself.

Here are a couple more pictures of playing in the yard. It's a big yard great for running!

Brooke's Preschool Olympics

Brooke goes to a preschool for special needs kids. They select a few "normal" kids every year to be "Peer Models". They help with the special needs kids and are good examples. They do the same things that they do at a regular preschool, like learning the alphabet, numbers, days of the week, etc. Well, last week they had a Special Olympics. Brooke had lots of fun. They walked on balance beams, threw balls, jumped over hurdles, etc. I wanted to share some of the pics for everyone to see. Only 3 more days of school and then it's home for the summer!

Here is a picture of her whole class in front of the sign:

Brooke and classmates running

Jumping over hurdles

Walking across the balance beam

two of Brooke's friends, Emma and Sarah

This is Giancarlo, isn't he cute?

Brooke showing off her "badge"

Here is a picture from Brooke's 5th birthday party that was on Mother's Day. She was even born on Mother's Day so it has always been a special day. Lauren got her a Hannah Montana wig so that is what she is wearing.

We are currently living in my parents basement so that we can get our house sold to move to Michigan. Nathan is finally going to finish school!! He has pretty much a full ride so we really feel like we need to go. This is the third time we have tried to go. Let's hope that the third times a charm!!

Charlotte's birthday is on Memorial Day. I will post more pics soon!