Note to self...

I should not tear open a hole in the bag of Baking Coco while shopping with Mommy...



Its Icky!!

Bradley's MRI

In November Bradley had an MRI to tell how big and what is inside of his bump on his forehead. They had an emergency MRI that morning so our appt was pushed back an hour. I am so glad Bradley didn't care that he couldn't eat.

I packed a travel lunch pail full of toys and activities for Bradley to do while waiting. He mostly just wanted to run up and down the hall just outside the waiting room.



The MRI took twice as long as they thought because they had to redo the images to make sure they were perfect. I was a nervous wreck waiting! Here is in in recovery:

And leaving the hospital with a pop sickle.

He was really out of it but was back to his normal self within the hour.

So the final results are that it is a benign cyst that is not attached to brain tissue- Awesome news! He will still need surgery to have it removed and we scheduled our next appointment with a children's plastic surgeon of the eye area for January 26th.

Halloween!

I forgot to post about our Halloween!!

The four of us dressed up as the Skywalker family for our trunk or treat at church. I unfortunately left my camera at home that night so I didnt get a picture of all of us. The kids loved going around to all of the cars and after we made our loop the kids kept going back and forth to the cars on both sides of us. At one point, I caught Bradley stealing a handful of candy from a child next to us in line. I took a my size handful of candy from Bradley and gave it back to the kid.

On Monday the 31st the kids and I went to the Treat Street downtown. Everyone thought we were Luke and 2 Lieas. Haha I am Padme from the 2nd movie!

I love this picture!


The kids ate/ took a bite out of almost every candy they got. They were SO sticky by the time we were done!!

Here is Kiersten trying to rip open a sucker.

That night we went to our friends house and passed out candy. We definitely did not go trick or treating that night! They didn't need anymore candy!!

Thanksgiving Dinner

We went to Adam's parents for Thanksgiving dinner. The kids LOVE playing with their dogs Liea and Allegra and poor Bradley tuckered himself out. He fell asleep during dinner but was still trying to feed himself.


Meanwhile, Kiersten couldn't get enough of Poppy's Fruit Salad.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Letters to Santa.

We went down to Modesto for Thanksgiving and visited the Macy's while we were there to write Santa a letter.

Pumpkin Patch

On Friday Oct 21st Bradley, Kiersten and I went to Modesto to go to the Pumpkin patch with My Sister Shannon and her two boys Eli and Jackson. My Mom Patti also met us there.


We went on hay rides,Hopped on the "Hay Bales" which were mattresses under the tarps. The kids loved this the most! Fed the farm animals, rode tricycles around a track, etc!

After the Pumpkin Patch we went to my sisters to paint the pumpkins we bought for the kids. Kiersten was okay wearing an apron but Bradley refused and ultimately got covered with paint.
Blogger is not letting me upload more photos. They are all downloaded on Facebook if you want to go see them.

Goofin' off during naptime.

Even thought Kiersten refuses to nap, she still has to go in the toy room/extra bedroom and have quiet time to her self with all her books and toys. Very rarely she will lie on the bed and actually sleep. She is notorious for taking her diaper off so I go in a check on her every so often. This is how I found her today. Singing her self to sleep in the toy box with her lullaby bear and blanket. And yes of course, she had her diaper off. When I was done re-dressing her she asked for me to put her back in the toy box.

Applesauce!

I keep reading posts on face book about making home made applesauce so I decided to make some! I thought Psh it'll be easy with my apple/peeler/corer/slicer thingy-ma-jig. Two apples in and the thingy-ma-jig broke. Darn it! So I had to do it all by hand.


MMM Can't you just smell them? I am so excited to eat them tonight!



Its such hard work makin' applesauce!
Bradley took all the couch cushions off so he could cuddle and watch Despicable Me while I was working away.

The Death of Naptime

One of my best friends in the whole world died- Naptime. I will be mourning the loss of this dear friend for quite a while.

I heard some giggling and "again! Again!" coming from the kids bedroom. I went in to check on them and found this.



They were standing on top of the dresser with a disaster zone below them. At least they weren't by the window this time.
Bradley has been trying to reach for the light switch for quite some time. Today he figured that if they took Kiersten's mattress and dragged it next to the dresser, emptied out every single drawer, then used the drawers for a ladder they could stand on top.

I normally nap them separately but lately they just play in their room by themselves for an hour then ask to come out. I was thinking if I put them together then they will play for more than an hour so I can get more tasks done....not.
I moved them into the toy room while I cleaned the mess up. They are still playing nicely...and of course my neighbor is banging around upstairs like normal due to the noise.

Cooking Lessons

Kiersten loves playing in the kitchen with me and so I started "teaching" her how to cook. Our first lesson was making a cake.

First: rip open the box and add all the ingredients. She loved putting in applesauce instead of oil and kept talking about the applesauce the entire time.


Second: turn on the mixer.
She loves turning the kitchen aid on and watching it spin. More than anything, she loves squeezing the poor eggs to death and making it splatter everywhere. If I can get to the eggs before her, I crack it and then have her help me open the shell into a separate bowl.


Third: Pour batter into the pans....or spoon everything in very slowly haha.



Fourth and most important to a toddler: Lick the bowl clean. She even got some in her hair because she stuck her head all the way in the bowl.


Tonight I had her help me make German Pancakes for dinner- her favorite because it required SIX eggs! Yahoo she was in heaven!



She practically did everything too!! She unwrapped the butter all by her self, had some assistance cracking the eggs but she poured them into the kitchen aid bowl, then poured the flour and milk in by herself.

Yay my little Betty Crocker is growing up so fast!

What a pretty girl!

Kiersten was watching me while I was putting on my make up. When I was done I put it in the drawer and then left the bathroom to see what Bradley was getting in to. When I came back in Kiersten was crouched in the corner. Hmmmm.... she turns and said "Hi!" She put eye shadow on her right eye.

So pretty haha.
She scratched out all three of shadows. I guess its time for new makeup!

One little Monkey jumpin on the bed

You most likely know this by now, but Bradley and Kiersten have different rooms for naps and share a room for night time.
I heard some noise coming from Bradley's room so I went in to check on him. He greeted me at the door with a sticker that is a wall decoration. While I was sticking it back on the wall he pointed to the bird and started to climb his bed again to reach the other sticker. My kids are monkeys!!

Cousins

We went and saw my sisters, a bro in law, and two nephews this weekend. It was hot so the kids played in a kiddie pool were given water balloons to play with. The kids were not allowed to throw them at us but I still got SOAKED because they kept popping while I was tying knots in them.



Ruben tried to throw a bucket of water at Bradley but he was smart and ran toward the parents.




Kiersten wasn't so lucky.

The Pacifier Fairy

We decided that when the kids turned two the pacifiers had to go!

I started weaning them a month ago and they were only allowed to use them at night time and not throughout the day. I put two nails in the wall above the light switch in their room. Before they were allowed to leave the room after nap or bedtime they had to hang their pacifiers up. They hated it at first but began to love it after a while. They would ask to put it up and visit it through out the day and said Bye pat pat Nigh nigh! And they would wave to it.

Today we sat the kids down and explained they were big boy/girl now and don't need them anymore. I set two bowls out on the couch and had them put it in the bowls by themselves. They said their goodbyes and we left for breakfast.

When they came back The Pacifier fairy has visited us and put MM's in the bowl where the pacifiers had been. The fairy had left the kids birthday presents on the couch too.


Kiersten got a chalk board and a white board easel and a bucket of chalk for his birthday. I hate chalk and my handwriting is terrible lol.


Bradley got a remote control Thomas the Train set with 6 cars total and a bunch of tracks.

Nap time was ok. They fussed for a while and but fell asleep ok. Tonight was torture!!! They pulled out all their drawers, through clothes everywhere, screamed, pushed the beds around- my goodness!! I eventually went back to the first toddler bed night routine of standing in the corner. The screamed hysterically for about an hour and then gave up through exhaustion.
I am SO grateful I took the pacifiers with us in my pocket to the restaurant. I threw them away there so I wouldn't be tempted to find them, clean them off, and give them back. Adam of course gets home from school about half hour later haha.

First Day of School Cookies

A tradition that I had growing up was Cinnamon Rolls and Cookies on the first Day of School!
My Dad would take the day off of work and make up cinnamon rolls when we woke up the first day of school and he would have warm cookies waiting for us when we got home.
I wanted to carry this on with family and so Bradley, Kiersten, and I made Adam monster cookies on his first day of school.

Kiertsen liked putting the MM's in the best. One for me, one for the bowl, one for me, etc.



Bradley "stirring" the bowl


Kiersten mimicking me scooping the cookies on the sheet.


I love my family : )

Date Night

Adam and I went on a fun date night about two weeks ago. I mostly wanted to blog about it because it was the STRANGEST mini golf course I had ever been on! There were about 5 out of the 18 holes that had WATER HAZARDS- really?! My first ball i hit- plunk! Straight into the first pond.

Although the 2nd to the last whole was the weirdest!!! In the back of the picture there is a foot wide beam you have to putt across to get the ball to the other side. I got it across and Adam hit the water hazard- I have to admit I had to laugh at him because He finally lost a ball. So we dig around in the creek, poke at the rocks looking for the ball, can't find it anywhere.... Ok lets go ask for a new ball. I go to putt mine in and then ask for a new one for Adam. We walk to the bottom and Lo and Behold- there's his ball less than a foot from the hole!!! WHAT?!? That was closer than what mine was! Apparently the ball floats and drains out.

Adam won by 15 or so strokes- so sad.

After putt putt we played air hockey ( one of my favorite games of all times!) We each won a game and stopped at that. We went to Baskin Robins and redeemed our pint for a pint coupons. Yes I gave blood- So proud of myself! I am a total needle-phobe!

Bradley used the potty!

I don't like to write in my journal so I write in my blog instead. So this is another blog about bodily fluids- be prepared if you don't want to hear it!
So a little back up first- The four of us went out to Chili's on Monday. Kiersten and I shared a plate because she sat on my side of the booth. I woke up the next morning extremely sick! About noon yesterday Kiersten joined me in the misery so the both of us were sick. I started to feel better this morning so I began to tackle my to do list of phone calls, mailing, and cleaning.
I called SallieMae and was soo surprised because I talked to a representative right away- SHOCKING! The whole phone call was under 5 minutes. I've been put on hold for half an hour or more at the beginning of a school year. I was seriously thinking- this is a miracle! And right when I was telling the guy at the end of our conversation that I was really pleased it was so fast, Kiersten walks up to me and gives me the moan of- Mom I don't feel so good...
To spare details, Kiersten ended up in the bath tub about a minute later. Bradley comes in and wants a bath too so I clean Kiersten down real quick and let Bradley in.
Now we are done with the back story and tangents- sorry I love tangents.
A few minutes later Bradley tries to climb out of the tub and kept saying poo poo. I say No because they just love to sit on the Elmo chair for 10 seconds and hop off which gets me covered in water in the process and no one goes in the potty.
SO this time Bradley starts to pee in the tub and I felt bad so I put him on the toilet. And then he did his business. I'm so proud! And I hope his future girlfriend or wife never finds this blog entry haha.

Bedtime adventures.

The kid's bedtime is anywhere from 7-8pm. My bedtime is like 10-11. The kids have always been good sleepers so I go in to check in on them and give them a last kiss before I head to bed. They sometimes stir but never wake up. This last week we had three very eventful bedtimes!
First event I went to check on them and the kids had taken off Kiersten's sheet on the bed and she was sleeping on the floor. I picked her up and put her in Bradley's bed while I fixed her sheets. I left the room to get something and came back to them cuddling like this.


They were so cute I left them like that and they stayed that way all night until they woke up the next morning.

Second event: They had taken the sheet off the bed again so Kiersten was on the floor. They love to lay under the fitted sheet and play peek a boo. Its pretty funny to watch actually. They did it one day while I was in their room putting laundry away. Anyways! So Kiersten is also in this phase of I want to wear big girl panties and not diapers. She takes off her diapers and tries to put any clothes on her bum instead- pants with both legs in one hole, a shirt through the neck, big girl panties, etc. So I come in her room and she has one of bradley's shirts on her bum and the diaper next to her. I'm glad I cam in to check on them! She would have peed all over the carpet the whole night.


And third, I dont have a picture of. On our one day trip to Modesto we stayed with our good friends Tom and Laurie. We have pack and plays for the kids but they have outgrown them. So K climbed out of her cage and into Bradley's. Adam caught her and separated them again. Then she got out again and taught Bradley how to get out. They trashed our friends spare room together before K climbed back in hers and left Bradley to fall asleep on the floor. I was at the movies with my friend Tara so I didnt see anything happen. I did see the aftermath though. lol I just hope they invite us to come stay with again!!

Otter Pop Thief

Bradley has figured out how to open the deep freeze and he started taking out otter pops. I moved them from the top basket to all the way on the bottom in a box. Still didn't work. If they were regular pop-sickles I would worry about them a little more (because of the sugar) but otter pops to me are just flavored water and seem more justifiable.
Here are some pictures that I took while catching the thief cold handed!

First, drag a chair to the freezer and look around to make sure no one is watching...


Second, use your head to prop the door open so he can use two hands to dig.


If you can see in this picture- Bradley has two otter pops in his hands- a blue and a green. He always steals two so he can reward Kiersten for distracting Mommy long enough to take them.

Party Time!!

Bradley and Kiersten are turning two next month!
We are having a Birthday Party at one of our favorite parks, Caper Acres, to celebrate their birthday.

Since the blog is public, if you would like to come and play with us please comment or email me. I don't want to tell the whole world wide web the time and day.

Anyways- we LOVE this park!

They have a humpty dumpty on a wall, a pirate ship, a dragon tunnel you can crawl through, swings, swiss cheese to climb through thats like one at Fairy tale town, a teeter totter, etc!

Can't wait for our party!!

Ugh..Stupid Potty training...

This whole post is about potty training. If you don't want to hear about pee then sorry my friends, this wont be fun!
So yea it didn't work. I did my best to do it though! I was so excited to start in the morning- I pep talked myself to get ready for it and hype myself up for the misery that would soon follow. One major problem was trying to attack it by myself with two kiddos. Adam worked from 2-7 that morning and had to sleep for a few hours. After going crazy around 9 I woke him up to join me. With two of us we got about 5 successes in their potties.
During nap time Adam left and was gone for longer than I thought. About two hours after nap times the twins and I were hanging out in the kitchen/ dining area. My moment of "I am so done hand me those blasted diapers!!" was when Bradley decided to deliberately pee on my cabinets. I grabbed him and put him on his potty and he got some in the bowl. We did our celebration because at least SOME got in the bowl. When I went to go clean the cabinets Bradley was still sitting down. He jumped up and Kiersten grabbed the bowl and flung the pee all over the room. OMG I AM DONE!
Of course Adam came home about a minute after that.
I really liked the concept of this method and we will try it all again in a few months. Oh and the funny thing was that even though the deal breaker was with Bradley peeing, he was the one who grasped the concept much better than Kiersten. So I kind of debunked the girls are better and faster at potty training. It's all an individual thing.
We'll see in a few months...

Potty Training time?

So I got this email from baby center with a suggestion with a potty training method that works best before 28 months. I read about it and it interested me. Adam and I talked about possibly giving it a shot and I think we are going to go for it!
The method says it takes three days for them to get it down and then they should be good. The first day is obviously the hardest.
Today we prepared for our big day. We got two potty seats and we took them to target and let them pick out their own panties that they would love. I cleared out the dining area so we would be on linoleum for easy cleaning. I moved the TV across the room in case they get board and I need help distracting. The TV is actually further away then it looks and they can't touch it.
Here is what it looks like :



We are starting this weekend because we want them to be potty trained before school starts for Adam in a little over 3 weeks. What we normally do is buy about ten boxes of diapers at the start of every semester and it lasts us. Our last diaper purchase we got 25% off plus free shipping of and a coupon to.... gotta love target! So if it fails and we need diapers still we want to know before Adam leaves target and wont get his employee discount.

Anywho- wish us luck!

Bradley's First Appt

Bradley had his first appointment today for his surgery. This wasn't the actual surgery. We met with the dr and she looked at his bump and tested his eyesight to make sure the bump hadn't affected anything.

The bump is called a dermoid cyst and is just a bunch of cells that form a sack of "junk". Its not liquid filled so they can't just drain it and it has to be surgically removed. If the cyst is ruptured it will cause significant inflammation and cause the cyst to multiply in the area it was spread and get just as big as the original one.

Sometimes with these cysts so close to the eye they form a dumbbell cyst. This is where its a sac on the outside that connects to another sac on the other side of the skull. So the visual would be weight on one side connected to a weight on the other side like a dumb bell.
Bradley has to get an MRI to make sure that this didn't happen. If it did then they have to remove part of his skull to get the sac because they can't rupture it.

We have to schedule an MRI with UC Davis because our imaging center up here in Chico isn't connected with the hospital so they can't anesthetize him here.
Hopefully I can talk with our pediatrician to see if there is anything he can prescribe him so we can get it done up here. Otherwise that means at least four trips to Sacramento- One pre-surgical consultation, MRI, Surgery, and post-op. I know they are specialized with children because they do it all day long. It would just be nice to cut an appointment and traveling out.

I was very nervous for today's appointment. I thought they were going to run a lot of tests, bloodwork, hours of poking and prodding etc.. The only test the really did was dilate his eyes to see the back of the eye ball if there is any damage or it didn't grow correctly. She said everything looks fine and his eyes are perfect. The want to do bloodwork closer to the surgery date so we didn't have to do that today.

I was completely expecting surgery to just remove the cyst off of his eyebrow. But to know that it could be much worse and they have to remove part of his skull it just terrifying.
We will be fasting for Bradley that his test results come back showing the cyst is just on the outside. We would appreciate any fasting or prayers on his behalf. I will keep everyone updated for when we can schedule his MRI.

Potato Harvest

From what I read, potatoes are ready to harvest when the stalks fall over and die. So the time came for my tiny garden to harvest the potatoes. The stalks grew to be about 3 feet in height. The fell over fast so I didn't get a good picture of them all standing up. Here is what is looks like while laying down:



So I dug them up and found nothing! I was so bummed! Well, that's not true- I found another 5 pennies, a button, some glass from a car, and a soda can top.


I tried to loosen the dirt as much as possible before I planted but I probably didn't do good enough. The roots only grew out and not down.


My zucchini only has to sprouts left and both were dying. I wanted to transplant them to two clay pots on the fence so they get more sun. I tried to dig up one and a bunch of ants came out and the sprout looked like it had no roots left so thats why it was dying. The second and biggest sprout looked okay and I was able to move it. but now it looks like its dying too.

The one thing that is working is my tomato topsy turvy. I had to replace it once and it broke in half about a week after that. This is what it looks like now:

There are a few buds on it and we might actually get tomatoes! I'm excited!

Bradley's Bump

Bradley has a big bump on his left eyebrow that is about the size of a nickel. It goes back and forth on how big it is and it worries the doctors up here in the Chico area.
We have an appointment scheduled this week at UC Davis to see a Pediatric Plastic Surgeon for a pre- op appointment. This could last anywhere from 2-4 hours. They fear that the bump might keep growing and either push his eye or cover it. He has to be under general anesthesia to get it removed and we will schedule that after we talk to the dr this week.

He already has really pronounced brow bone so it looks like its on both sides almost. We don't know what caused it and he didn't bump his head. We were asked that at every dr appointment for about 6 months until we moved to a new DR. It first appeared around 9 months.


This picture was taken on the 4th of July before we cut his hair. Its even more noticeable now that he has a buzz cut.


Michelle McConkey, a friend from our ward, is going to watch Kiersten for us so we don't have to bring her with us for the very long appointment. Please keep us in your thoughts and prayers. I will update everyone after our appointment this week.

Naptime Nightmares!

Naptimes don't always work out too well. I am almost at my wits end!!
Friday I took a shower after putting them down for a nap. When I was done I heard high pitch screaming coming from Kiersten. I get dressed and go in their room to investigate. Bradley had pinned Kiersten down into a tiny ball in the corner and was bouncing up and down on her.

Yesterday we put them down for a nap and found this


They had pulled the drawers out of the dresser to use it like a ladder and climbed up. Then pulled the blanket off that I had on a curtain rod as a black out curtain and were playing with the blinds.
They were quiet about it to and we were across the house so when we heard the blinds being played with we knew something was wrong.
We let them out of their nap time and re arranged to room so the dresser in on the opposite wall and nothing in under the window now.

Maybe I should push nap times back further so they are more tired and will actually sleep.
All I know is that the kids love climbing the dresser, stealing pacifiers, and even the socks off the other ones feet.
Sometimes I will stand in the corner and be silent and wont look at them and when they climb out of bed I quietly put them back in bed. But it gets frustrating really fast. This was also how I found out about the sock thief Bradley.
Oh and now Bradley is throwing huge temper tantrums because he's tired all the time. I mean like monumentally huge and screaming and thrashing on the floor bad.
Ugh... help??

Our 4th of July

We went to the big city celebration at 10:30 in the morning at Bidwell park. It was so hot we went home after about an hour of being there.


We let them take really long naps and then we went to our friends Megan and Mike Meyer for a BBQ. They live in Oroville and are allowed to have personal fireworks there. I was SOO excited!! This is our 4th year being in Chico and we haven't been able to bang a piccolo pete, blow stuff up, or burn ourselves- needles to say I was over joyed with a chance to do so. The Meyers had another family come over for the BBQ so there were 7 kids under 7 and 5 of them were under 3.


We got this great idea to take the car seats out of t he car and strap the kids in so they wouldn't jump up and run for the fireworks. I thought it was brilliant! So the three girls helped the kids cover their ears or hold sparklers and the men blew the stuff up.

Here is a picture of Adam and I... and a little bit of Mike too, while we lit the fireworks off.



I have never in my life made jell-o. I don't really like it all that much. I got a wild hair this year to make a layered jell-o flag mold for the BBQ. Because I had no clue what I was doing, I thought an hour would be completely fine to make a jell-o and let it set. Haha not so my friends!! I went to take it out of the fridge and I spilled it all down my white shirt so I had to borrow a shirt from Megan.

Here's how my horrible mold turned out. I am never doing this again....