Ralph

I was going to title this post "Ookie Pukie" but it seemed a little too gross.  I'm going to have to be honest and say that's exactly how this last week was.  Gross.  Our house was hit with the dreaded stomach flu.

It started with Zach on Sunday.  He left church after sacrament meeting, came home and crashed in bed.  He stayed there for the majority of the week.  He even had to miss his mock trial (KITA) that his firm puts on in DC because the morning he was supposed to fly out he couldn't walk from the bedroom to the front room without getting light headed.  On Friday he finally felt well enough to go into work.

Austin got the stomach flu around midnight, Sunday night.  He came in my room, woke me up and told me he didn't feel well.  He didn't bother to mention that he had thrown up in his bed and that it was all over him.  That was the beginning of the laundry marathon.  Sheets, bedspreads, towels, clothes, so many things needed to be washed.  Austin did fine Monday, no throwing up.  Early Tuesday morning we began round two.  Again, he threw up while he was asleep so I had more laundry.  Then Austin was fine the rest of Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday.  He even went to school and a birthday party on Friday.  Saturday morning I woke up at 5:30 to Carter running into my room saying, "Austin's throwing up in his bed!"  Sweet.  This time was the biggest clean-up.  It had dripped down the wall by his headboard and puddled under his bed.  He was fine the rest of Saturday.  I'm sure you can understand why I came to dread the night last week.

Carter got in on the action too.  He woke up Thursday morning but he made it in the toilet. Hallelujah!  That's the only time Carter threw up.

Tessa had a mild fever Sunday night and was fussy and grumpy for a few days.  Thank goodness that's all she got. 

Last week was exhausting!  Caring for four sick individuals and all the demands/requests that come with it had me feeling pulled every direction and quite grumpy at times.  My "To Do" list for the week stared at me from the fridge with nothing crossed off it for the majority of the week.  Unfortunately I let that make me grumpy too.  Does anyone else feel like no matter how carefully you plan or schedule, things never go anywhere close to what you plan?  It seems like my schedule is regularly canceled out or trumped by someone/something else.  Anyway, I'll stop my wining now. 

I tell you what, I am very grateful for a washer and dryer in my apartment and the fact that I never caught the bug.  I'm also glad that everyone seems to finally be over the stomach flu.  We'll see what this week brings.  Over and out!

Ready. Set......

I just put Tessa down for her nap.  Something funny happened that I wanted to write down.  Normally I would write it on the note pad I have on my fridge.  The one that only Zach, myself and the occasional dinner guest get to see.  Today I decided to quickly post it here on the blog, because Zach made a New Years Resolution for me to blog more.  Anyway, short story made long, I was following the usual sleep routine where Tessa & I rock and snuggle in here room for a minute before I put her in bed.  I sat down in the chair and said, "Here's your fuzzy, and your binki, and now your blanket and you are set."  She quickly pulled her binki out of her mouth and shouted "GOOOOO!", because in our house that is almost always what follows "set".  The boys do a lot of racing, be it cars or themselves, and Tessa has caught on to their "Ready. Set. Go." phrase that starts them all.  She's a quick one! (pun intended)

Tessa

I was going to do a big update post.  I even started it two weeks ago.  I just never felt like I had enough time to put it all together so I'm scrapping it.  I've decided to do a bunch of little posts instead.  It will help me feel like I'm accomplishing more.  I figure I should start with Tessa because she's changed the most.  Ready?  Here we go....

This is the most current picture I can find on our computer.  It's from early December and her hair's a mess.

She is all girl.  Anything can become a bracelet or a ring.  She loves stuffed animals and soft fuzzy blankets.  She got a tea set for Christmas and is always ready to have a tea party.  When I'm eating breakfast and can't come to the other room for a tea party she brings me all the cups and saucers demanding we have a tea party.

She started walking around eleven months and talking around one year old.  She will now mimic anything we say whether it's in Russian or English and says a lot of words on her own.  Some of my favorite words she says are applesauce, sweet potatoes, and avocado.  She uses "bla-bla" to make the ending sounds and it's adorable.  She has also recently started saying yes instead of yeah.  It comes out "yesh" with an emphasis on the "sh".  She is saying or understanding something new every day.  It's always amazing how quickly these little ones pick up on everything.

Tessa loves to eat.  Whatever anyone else is eating she wants some.  If she sees someone eating something she starts saying, "bite, bite, bite" until she gets a bite.  She sounds like the seagulls on Finding Nemo.  On Friday night we were out running errands and stopped somewhere for dinner.  As we walked past the restaurants windows heading toward the front entrance she started saying "bite!" and pointing to everyone's plates.

She's also a great big tease.  Her brothers will be folding their clothes and she'll walk over and squat down by the folded clothes to look them in the eye.  Then she grabs the folded clothes and runs or shakes them and throws them back on the floor.  Lately she'll look at us, lean forward at the waist, and then start slowly stomping toward us, like we do when we're going to chase her.  When we act scared she giggles like she's the funniest girl around.  Then she waits for us to do it to her so she can run away.  She has been such an fun addition to our family.  She makes me laugh every day.

Here are a few more pictures of Tessa growing up.

1st air and water show

Morph Suit

This morning I was getting Tessa dressed for church and I put a pair of hot pink tights on her.  Carter came in to ask for help with something and was instantly distracted by her tights.  He scooted as close as he could get and touched them.  Then he said,"What are these?  Are these part of a morph suit?"  I wasn't sure I'd heard him correctly but he repeated it a second time.  I chuckled and informed him they were just tights to match her dress.  "Oh." he said.

When Tessa was all dressed I set her down and she walked out of her room.  Austin saw her and asked/yelled (he's a loud talker) "What are those things on Tessa's legs?"

Mind you, this is not the first time Tessa has worn tights.  They've even seen me wear tights, but they were a boring black color.  For some reason hot pink tights seemed cooler I guess.  Like a morph suit.

Duck Bump

Yesterday Austin was goofing around and fell. He hit his head on his chair which resulted in a big goose egg on the back of his head. Today he was goofing around again and I asked him what happened yesterday when he was engaging in such monkey business. He said he slipped and hit his head. At this point Carter chimed in saying, "Yeah, and you got a duck bump."

And now please enjoy a totally unrelated picture taken of them back in July after hair cuts and a long bath.

Stuff (May-July)

Wow, this is my fourth blog post in 2011. What can I say, I'm really good a blogging. Not really, but I'm going to try to do better.

This post is going to be mostly pictures. I finally downloaded our memory card so I'll probably cover a pretty big chunk of time. Here we go.....

This summer we spent some time at the beach. The boys love going to the beach. Here are some shots we took on Memorial Day.
Austin is our little "dude". It always makes me chuckle when he puts on his hat and sun glasses. He typically walks with a little swagger and has crazy hair but you add the shades and hat and it's a riot. (If you look closely you can see my big pregnant reflection in his glasses.)
Zach was very sweet to play life guard with the boys down by the water while I sat in the shade. For almost two hours Austin filled that bottle up with water and then would walk over to some hole Carter had dug and dump it in. Back and forth for two hours at least.

Carter is a ham for the camera. Almost every picture of him is goofy.

As a reward this summer the boys got to make oobleck (corn starch and water). They loved it. I would recommend making it but play with it outside to save yourself hours of clean-up.

We took our yearly trip to Six Flags. Zach's mom was a trooper to come along. I couldn't go on any of the rides so she got to go with one of the boys. It was great!

While Zach's mom was here we tried to get some updated pictures taken. This is the best we got.

We went to a Cubs Game.

Thanks to one of the partners at Zach's firm they were great seats.

The boys favorite parts were the foam finger/claw and the ice cream they got.

In July we went on a little trip to Milwaukee. It was a nice little escape.

While we were there we went to the Harley Davidson Museum. It was really cool, but hard to get a descent photo in there because of the lighting. This is one of the very few pregnancy pictures we've got of me.

We also went to the Jelly Belly factory. The boys loved it.

Popsicles on the porch are a summertime must.

I think I'm going to have to do this in two different posts to avoid technical difficulties. Watch for more to come soon.

Baking

Long time no update. Sorry. Get ready, here comes an update.

There's been some baking going on at our house. Aside from the kind that results in bread, pumpkin chocolate chip cookies and rice krispie treats (yes, I consider making rice krispie treats baking) I've been working on this little bun for the last 9 months.






Yes, we now have a baby sister at our house. The boys love her and constantly ask me how she's doing. We're all excited to have her here.

Here are the numbers for those of you who are into that ;)

Tessa Anne Holmstead
Born 8:42 a.m. on September 26th
7 lb 11 oz
20.5 inches long