Social interaction/Out and about

Winter is the worst.

When it's stinking cold out, germs are running rampant, and there's not snow to play in, cabin fever gets the worst of you and all I want to do is scream.

I WANT MY FRIENDS BACK! I WANT TO GET OUT OF THE HOUSE! I WANT TO BE HOT AND SWEATY AGAIN. And lots of internal yelling like that. It doesn't help that somehow the dads always get to get out of the house with basketball, bowling, school, callings, etc. Not complaining or anything...

Well in the past week or so I've finally gotten to get out a little more (lots of help because my mom is here to relieve some of the pressure of child watching)

I invited a bunch of friends over for craft night last week. That night was so rejuvenating: talking and laughing with friends, doing a fun activity with your hands, it was just what was needed. I made mini cookies for it and poor Max had to exercise his self control to the core to stop from eating those cookies, poor guy. (I did let him have a couple).

Crafting. Most of us made these easy banners.

Mid banner sewing.

Mini cookies. The perfect bite size (and child size serving amount)

From left to right: Renetta, myself, Katie, Suzanne, Tasha, Sarah.

Thanks girls for coming!

Another night I got to go to bowling with Casey! The babies stayed home with my mom and we took Max, holy cow Max was a HANDFUL (as seen from this first picture) but he had a lot of fun there too.

There was some high energy going on there (I'm talking about your hubby, Jessie! Ha, he was a hoot) and it was actually really fun. So many strikes and spares, ridiculous. I talked with a couple of the wives in the back and it felt like a vacation.

This is (to Max) Maxson's best friend Zack. Literally, he's one of the two adults Max is most obsessed with because he has the coolest toys: remote control helicopters and cars, Max loves Zack. Zack brought his helicopter to the bowling place to fly around a little and Max was thoroughly happy about it.

a. Random picture Max took: normal life is changing baby's diapers.
b. Casey and I got to go out for a quick lunch date (thanks mom!) to our favorite Honest Abe's Burger. We always split the fries and both burgers. This time we got their classic burger and another one with chili, cream cheese sauce, and jalepenos and it was superb. Our lunch date gave us a great time to regroup as parenting. (Max has entered this new REALLY awful stage of these really awful terrible screaming yelling tantrums and throwing stuff and it's really hard on all of us. We've no idea how to help him.) We also just laughed at silly things and it felt good to be childless for an hour.

My good looking guy even without a beard.

Lastly we took a trip to Target with my mom while she was here and Max was, surprise, awful. He has become *that* screaming, yelling, fighting, limp noodle, unconsolable child you see/hear about at the store, it's real fun. While we all had previously planned on going to the dollar store next, Max and I waited in the car for my mom because I was not about to deal with him again in public. You guys, it literally gives me anxiety now thinking about taking him places. HELP!

My 3 cute sons, melt my heart.

And my last part of social interaction: my mummy!!!!!! She was such an angel to come to town and rescue us for a week. The Lord was so very kind and knew to send her that week when we'd be needing the most amount of extra sleep since we were getting little to none at night. She cuddled and fed babies, cooked and cleaned constantly, tried helping with the terrible two year old, and gave me someone to talk and laugh to. Oh how I owe that woman so much of my time and energy.

And that there is the end (and height) of my social interaction and out and about happenings in pretty much the whole last month it seems like. Now come back spring/summer, I'm rooting for ya!

Even sicker day

**Written last Saturday**

OH. MY. GOSH.

Remember how Max had a fever and was sick? As awful as it sounds I will take Max sick over the babies being sick any day because he is so much easier to deal with when sick. The babies spiked fevers last night (friday night) and it was one of the longest nights ever. I kid you not. They awoke at 11:15 and I couldn't get them back settled until 12:30 am until Casey was home picking my mom up from the airport and I had more hands to get the poor kids off my chest. They were oh so hot even after their tylenol, they were so sad, and their noses so runny. Starting at 3:30 we were up every half hour with the babies for some reason or another. It is/was so sad. My poor sick little babies. They can't sleep for a very long and they can't stay awake for very long either. It was a long night and has been a long day thus far. I just want my babies to be happy again.

All day long they couldn't sleep or stay awake for more than 30-40 min at a time and they were so cranky and sad and congested, it was just the saddest thing ever and super exhausting as parents.

By the way I am sick too. Starting in the evening I started a yucky not feeling cough, then a headache, then achey joints, and then during the night I probably had a fever go on and off with getting chilly. At one point I was in sweat pants, thick socks, and a sweatshirt with the hood up and still freezing under the covers. I don't know what my poor little babies are/were feeling either which stunk. Were they hot? Were they cold? It just makes me so sad.

GO AWAY GERMS! LET US BE HEALTHY!

COME BACK SUMMER, I MISS YOU DEARLY!

But my wonderful mom is here now to help. How great is that? I was able to take a nap when all the kids were awake and my house isn't falling apart with all these sick kids and sick momma. How indebted I am to her.

**Written Tuesday**

We had 2 nights of very sick babies and those may have been the hardest nights we have thus experienced as parents. Imagine 1 sick baby: I don't know what your sick babies are like but maybe they wake up every couple of hours, you have to suck out their noses so they can breathe, it's sad, you may have to hold them more, etc. It's a hard night but doable, you get through it

Now imagine 2 sick babies in the same room and then a toddler in the next room that wakes up to all the crying. Going through the chain of events that night would take way too long but let me right a few bullet points.

(I'm going to call Quinn and Bryson one and two just for fun because it doesn't really matter which woke up when, actually I have no idea who was who all night it seemed like because they were both equally awful and sad)

-One wakes up to eat and then won't go back down easily for a good half hour+ because it's s hard to fall asleep with a stuffy nose and high temperature. A half hour after you get one down two wakes up to eat, you have to suck out his nose because he can't breathe causing him to cry very loud then waking up one then you tried so hard to get to sleep. You then play this dance every half hour with both: feeding them, sucking out noses and screaming causing the other to wake up, and then finally falling asleep in your arms only to wake up nearly immediately and bounce/cuddle the baby back to sleep.I kid you not be I was out of bed every half and hour and there was a 2 hour stint I didn't sleep even a blink.

-Max woke up I think 3 times beginning at 1:30 and pretended he'd go back to sleep but end up screaming and not going back to sleep. He ended up sleeping in our bed from about 2:30-5 (first time he's slept in our bed in a year I think, it was so weird!) After a couple hours he must have gotten woken up too much by the baby's crying and decided to wake up for good. That was not cool and not going to go on. After 15-20 minutes with him downstairs arguing that he needed to go back to bed and it was still night time while he yelled back that he wanted the iPad, I somehow bartered with him that I would give him strawberry milk and he'd go back to sleep. He (shockingly) immediately agreed and went back to sleep, so weird and so exhausting.

The rest of the night was a blur, I think the day started at 6:30 or something, so early, I'm pretty sure I got a MAXIMUM of 3 hours of sleep. So flipping exhausting, I felt so bad for my babies too though, they were probably feeling terrible. The rest of the day they could barely sleep 30-45 minutes at a time and were only able to stay awake for 30-45 minutes at a time (usually they stay awake 1.5 hours and sleep 45 min-3 hours). It was rough.

We took the babies to the doctor on Saturday to make sure there was nothing seriously wrong with them, they test them for RSV and nothing showed up, just really bad yucky virus I guess.

Their fevers broke after about 36 hours, it was so long. And now their sleep habits have turned for the worse with all that sickness. Rmemeber how they used to sleep a ton at night? Not anymore :( They're now up 4-5 times a night, insist on formula after being nursed, wake up to each other's cries and just are not good sleepers anymore! Ugh, please change for the better babies! I told Casey that even though they were/are crappy day time sleepers, at least they slept fabulous at night. WEll the their redeeming quality has disappeared…they need a new redeeming (sleep) quality from somewhere, mmeh.

This picture was the day it started, I should have seen the signs in Quinn there on the right.

The first time they woke up with fevers I rocked their hot little bodies for a couple hours while they went in and out of sleep. Casey was gone getting my mom from the airport and I had to wait for them to return to move them, it was oh so sad.

The death days of 4 out of 5 people not feeling great and everyone not getting any sleep.

a. Quinn's stank face of how he was feeling, poor guy

b. Max was cuddling with Casey in the middle of the night and it was the stinking cutest thing ever.

Entertaining our tired sick selves during church.

Any tips on getting babies back to sleeping through the night is GREATLY APPRECIATED! Sadly, we have a tiny house and they have to sleep in our room, we don't have another room for them with Maxson being in our 2nd bedroom. We've thought about sleeping in the family room for a week or so while they learn to sleep through their night wakenings and each other's cries (read let them cry for longer times at night. With them in our room we come to their rescue immediately so we can get the most sleep possible). Also, why are they not satisfied just by breastfeeding anymore?!? It takes so much longer to bottle feed them too and it's so frustrating!

Funny thing, after the third awful night of helping the babies I was sitting on my bed with one of them at 4 am feeding them a bottle or just hushing their cries and I remember thinking "As crappy as this is, I'm so glad it's me taking care of these boys. I love them so much and want to be the one nursing them back to health, cuddling them through the night, and holding them tight" Funny how motherhood works, huh?

Rant over.

Germs: go away.

Health: come back.

Babies: be better sleepers.

A birthday fit for a 28 year old

Mr Casey turned a whopping 28 years old this year. He said he didn't feel any different, ha.

He had a a dang busy day, he wasn't home much at all, all day long. Lots of school and lab work. The 30 minutes between when he got home from school and ran off to his bowling league games we invited friends over at the last minute to sing happy birthday and eat all that yummy cake.

For the 2 hours leading up to when I knew we'd be eating cake I told Max he had to eat his dinner if he wanted any cake. He kept yelling at me no no and more no's that he didn't want dinner or cake. Yeah, uh huh. We were literally getting ready to sing happy birthday and Max was FINALLY shoving dinner down his throat at the last minute. That child… It was a fun quick evening to have friends over.

 Of course I made our delicious traditional oreo cake always, that things NEVER disappoints.

28 candles exactly!

 (isn't this an awesome really awful quality picture of our friends?)

 Bryson be like "Cake? What I'm on that"

 random picture of cute babies

Casey went to bowling that night and one of the other wives were sweet enough to make this awesome cake!

 Casey wanted pedicures for his birthday, he had to drag me screaming and kicking to go with him… ;)
We thoroughly enjoyed ourselves.

 I texted Casey this picture the day after his birthday and said "happy birthday, I did the dishes"

 Back to Casey's birthday, Max helped make the cake and as much fun as it was and as helpful as he was, it was at the same time and absolutely awful battle of wills… enough said.
Also, Casey's new birthday banner, awesome right?

 And unrelated to the birthday post I was SHOCKED when Max fell asleep watching the iPad, it has never ever happened before, ha. It was after the day I took all 3 kids to the doctor by myself during nap time.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY LOVER BUNS!

Friiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiday

The end of a week.

Friday.

I love Fridays since that means Casey has less than a half day at school and then he's home for pretty much all day Friday, Saturday, Sunday, yipeeeeeee!

It feels as if we are an all hands on deck house right now. If you're home, you're helping, no rest for the weary.

Poor little Max was/is one sick puppy. He's had a pretty runny nose for the past 4-5 days and then yesterday he came down with a fever and was just wanting to sit and not do much. My poor baby boy. And his eyes were watery all day long and he napped for 4 hours I think and then went back to sleep for the night just 2 1/2 hours later. Today he continued the fever on and off while we gave him tylenol here and there. Still an awful runny nose today (can't seem to get him to blow through his nose, it's killing me!) but eyes a little less watery, he's been eating less today too.

But remember how I said he went to bed pretty soon after his nap the day before? WELL, that was not a wise choice to allow him to do because at 4 am we here Max awake, Casey goes in (Casey always deals with Max in the middle of the night because a) he's nice b) I pretty much always deal with the babies c) Max is overall more used to Casey when it comes to going to sleep or back to sleep because he pretty much always puts him to bed). Well after talking to him and trying his best to coax him back to sleep, Max insisted "ALL DONE! AWAKE!" Ha, oh man. I asked Casey to stay up with him (stay up=let Maxson watch a movie on the iPad downstairs while he slept next to him, ha) and I told him I'd switch him when the babies woke up. Did I mention the babies woke up FOUR times to eat that night? What in the heck happened to them that night? No clue. Bryson decided to start the day at 6 am (usually the absolute earliest is 7:30, but more like 8/8:30). So I forced Quinn to wake up too and we switched Casey.

Babies went back to sleep 1-1 1/2 hours later and I was able to convince Maxson back to sleep at 7:30/8 too. The whole family slept until a glorious 9:30. I fed the babies and went back to sleep while Casey got up with the children (he didn't have school today because of boards for the 4th years, TENDER MERCY). When he came back in to put the babies to sleep at 11 I decided it was finally the right hour to wake up.

Oh my goodness, what a morning, right? Do you see why my last post was surrounded by exhaustion?

But my glorious, heavenly, wonderful MOTHER is coming tonight to my rescue!!!!!!!! I told her at the beginning of the month that I would be needing a break soon, ha, and was hoping she'd come help me out again.

This stage of my kids is just so overwhelming and intense, I'm so grateful she's so willing to come help and join me in the ranks of mothering small children again for a week to relieve me for just a bit, how I love her so much (if anyone else wants to come slave labor visit me for a week you're more than welcome! Wink, wink)

Onto something more exciting than me being exhausted and our household's sleeping status.

I'm working on my 2014 photo book again!!!!! GO KIMBER!

You guys, it's seriously a huge accomplishment to start it again. I got out 2013 the other day and Max and I loved looking through it. I decided I needed to hurry and pump out 2014 so we could hurry and enjoy last year too, especially since Max will still remember those later months! It's really not that hard to do, I got half of July, August, Sept, and half of Oct done in like 2 nights. It just take effort and remember how I said that at night I want to sit and nothing? Yiiiiiiisssssss.

I got up to the part of where the babies are born. I imagine the next 3 months of the book are going to take longer than just 2 nights though…

Also I took all 3 kids into the doctor this week BY MYSELF! This was the first time I've ever gone anywhere with all 3 by myself!!!!!! (Ok one time we went to the park but I'm not really counting that, it was 15 minutes maximum and I didn't even get the babies out). Well our ward is FULL of sickness, my family included. So we went in to check that they didn't have anything serious and just little colds. Moral of the story, I went somewhere with all 3 kids by myself and I did it!

I'm not sure why I've gotten all chatty lately on my posts recently. Maybe it's because it feels good to examine my feelings and my days, to step back and see where I am/where the kids are/where I want to be and that happens because I can write it out, now that I think of it, blogging is very therapeutic.

Pictures another time, I'm too tired and headed to bed.

Snow days

Snowwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww. 

I am not a fan of winter. Well winter is ok for just 3 months, at the maximum. After that it's just not welcome in my books, BUUUUUUUT, if you add in some snow, honestly, winter could last a lot longer if that snow happened more often and stayed white and fluffy and pretty. Snow makes the cold so much more fun and pretty and wonderful! A week or so ago we got 2 pretty good snowstorms back to back and it made for a beautiful outside snowy wonderland.

 It snow/rained half of Saturday and didn't stop until Sunday afternoon. It was so beautiful outside. Church was cancelled and we stayed home and just watched the beauty of this earth. And then Monday school was cancelled too, yippee!

Max loved watching the tractors plow the snow

 We walked Max around in the sled and went down the tiny hill next to the driveway over and over. The snow was so deep he just crawled on his hands and knees up the hill, it was so funny to watch.

The next day we graffitied the snow with some colored water and built a beautifully rough snowman.

And that was our fun with the snow.

A post about being exhausted and children's sleep habits.

I  can feel my beloved/ sacred time of everyone take a nap beginning to fade. Max is starting to fight me on every afternoon nap.

I don't know why. He used to be such an angel to go down for naps. Wouldn't say 2 words about going down for a nap, he would just go into his bed and be completely fine with it and I'd just leave the room and he'd just go do his nap thing for 2-3 hours.

Lately his angelic like sleeping habits have changed. He scream-cries bloody murder when I mention it's time to go night-night. We haven't even begun anything to get ready for his nap and he's already crying/screaming at the thought of going to take a nap. I don't get it. And lately he wakes up crying and sad fem all episodes of sleeping be that night time or day time. What has changed in this kid? How am I supposed to nap with a screaming child upstairs? Ugggggggggggggg. Suggestions anyone?

I've gotten a little behind on blogging because I've been (trying/wanting) to take naps everyday at some point. So during the only 15 min-1 hour time slot I have completely alone time during the day I sleep, thus no daytime bloggging. I'm downright exhausted all day everyday. I do believe it has something to do with finally getting in a religious exercise routine, exercising sure feels great but I'm stinking tired all the day long. And then at night times Casey and I have been extra awesome as of recently to clean up the house super duper well each and every night. It's really only been getting done thanks to Casey's help. When I'm bum tired at the end of the night all I want to do is sit and do nothing but if I see Casey going I might as well get up too and get twice as much done with him around. So, thanks, lover.

And then after we clean I'm again still exhausted and add that to the fact that we've found a new show to binge watch together called The Unit (free with Amazon Prime membership!) I've really done nothing in my evenings.

Moms of 3+ kids, are you dog gone exhausted at the end of every night or is this just a phase?

Oh and the babies? We'll they're just exhausting, love them to pieces, but I wish so bad they would just take TWO 2 hour naps during the day with maybe another 45 minute one instead of 4 naps all lasting less than an hour. It just gives me no break when they only sleep for 45 minutes! They're hit and miss…

Ok, let's get onto something more interesting than Kimber complaining about children's sleep habits and being exhausted.

Actually, that's all I can think about right now is different things to do with sleep and me being exhausted so I'll just continue forward with that theme.

-I feel like I constantly can hear a baby crying even if there's no baby crying. At night trying to fall asleep for example, they're in my room, and my ears will still suddenly perk up and I will be fully awake thinking I can hear a baby crying downstairs. I look forward to that far distant background noise ending.

-I believe that since the babies were born I have not had one episode of sleep that wasn't ended by the sound of a child crying. When you think about it, what an awful way to wake up from sleeping, to the sounds of someone crying, ALWAYS. Truly not the most pleasant way to end a pleasant sleep.

-Today I was thinking how I've truly been blessed with babies who actually do sleep really really well in the big picture. Going down for naps is usually the easiest thing 99% of the time (except for the night I have to put all 3 down by myself, then they're all just awful). They just know it means sleep time and they go with little to no crying and little to no help from us. I'm so grateful that already at an early age they are like this (though it is because we pushed/trained/guided them to fall asleep by themselves a few weeks ago). They sleep really awesome throughout the night. Sometimes I only wake up once and if it's a bad night 3 separate times between the two of them. More often than not through I wake up 1-2 times a night with them, nurse them each laying down and go back to sleep myself. It truly could be worse.

- I told my mom and SIL the other day that at the end of everyday I feel completely exhausted and run down and wondered how long that was going to last/if it ever ends/if my SIL feels like that too. I kinda came to the conclusion that I am especially exhausted right now because of my circumstances but yes, I will feel exhausted for quite some time. And then I read this article (thanks, Katie!) that night and it brightened my spirits. This too shall pass for good and bad reasons.

 I'm so very grateful I'm exhausted because that means I'm blessed with so much. I would so rather be exhausted and worked hard like I am every single day like so rather than hoping and waiting everyday that I had a child to be exhausted with. I know my complaints are small in the big scheme and I'm grateful what problems I do have, like they say, if we all laid our troubles on the table you'd take yours and I'd take mine.

I HIGHLY look forward to the day that it will be possible to sleep 8 hours straight with no interruptions and waking up to the sounds of a quiet room/house. Trust me, when that day comes I WILL BLOG ABOUT IT.

And onto some incredibly random pictures about our life since I over-share just abut everything it seems like.

a. While I slowly woke up one morning and nursed the babies upstairs, Max was happily downstairs climbing on all the counters helping himself to a bowl of fruit loops (fruit loops are church snack only usually, naughty boy, but whatever…)
b. Putting up new pictures...

Making Texas Caviar by the butt loads for a few wonderful friends. Maxson taste tested every batch.

a. Quinny the little gangsta
b. A cold day activity: spray bottle, foam patters, and a window

a. Just cracking out some work before lunch.

a. Bryson smiles, baby's smiling is heart stopping.

Bryson

a. An everyday sight: babies in bumbos and Max sharing his toys.

a. Sometimes when I hold the babies on the rocking chair, Max decides he needs to site with me too, it gets  little squished ha. As I'm writing this I'm remembering when I was hugely pregnant with these babies and there would be next to no room for Max on the rocking chair ha

 We took a walk on a warm day. We didn't make it to the park yet (we have made it further each trip!) but I'm pretty certain there was at least 1 child crying at all points of our walk, ha, at one point I remember all 3 crying. Casey and I had fun to say the least. Max needs more practice on staying on his little kick board though. The whole way back he made Casey carry him, haha.

 Bryson's eyebrows kill me in this.

 a. Look at those little baby arms rolls, I just want to take a bite right there!
b. Sunday means train day!!! And by golly were we so wise to set aside Sunday as the designated only day the trains cmd out because then they're that much more special and he plays with them so much longer, it's great.

 a. Sly guy Bryson
b. Probably some love Bryson gave me in exchange. Pure motherly love right there.

 a. Walked in on max sleeping and lugged hard at the plethora of stuffed animals he hoarded from various places (the 2 baby's BYU animals and a duck that once covered the head of a golf club). There's also a tiny stuffed monkey squeezed below his chin.
b. Didn't quite muster up the time or energy to make sugar cookies for Valentines but cutting hearts out of play dough seemed to work even better for Max!

 a. "mmooo-eeee" smoothie
b. Still balancing even at (I'm guessing) 35 lbs ha

 a. Finally I was being the funny/fun parent and making Maxson uncontrollably laugh. Proud moment.

Bryson

 Watching Casey play with Max makes even me laugh so very much.

 Cute duo

 Maxson plopped himself purposely next to Quinn and began showing him what he was playing on the phone one day. Although it involved technology, it still made my heart happy to see Max trying to share his experiences with the babies.

 a. Probably one of my favorite pictures of Quinny: all bundles up like a babushka
b. Bryson

 Caught Max red handed in the tunnel with my telefono.

 The babies were arching their heads back and sideways trying to watch the TV with Max, little stinkers. It was a funny sight to see their eyeballs and heads looking so far backwards.

THE END ;)