Week from hell (with a silver lining)

This last week has SUCKED.  I was sick for five full days with a super fun sinus infection/stomach virus combo.  I did not get out of bed AT ALL for two complete days.  One day, I did not even turn on my cell phone.  It was crazy.  Frankie has also been sick for this whole time, presumably with the same thing.  I tried to keep him home with me one day and Frank stayed home with him for one day, but otherwise we have had to send him to school (boo).  Lily is also now sick with another ear infection, although luckily hers does not seem to be bothering her too badly so far.  I hope both of them start feeling better soon.

Work continues to be absolutely horrendous.  I have a huge briefing assignment that is due on Monday next  week, and I am anticipating working late nights/early mornings/all weekend to get everything finalized.  I got to the office so early this morning that none of the escalators were working yet, and I had to go swipe my badge at a special counter to get access to the elevator (it was before 6:00 a.m.).  I am tired.  I also had my annual review on Monday, and it was not good.  I basically received confirmation that I am in a dead end position with "no hope" (those were my boss's exact words) of ever changing.  Not exactly the news I was hoping for.  I put so much into my job, and it is becoming harder and harder to stay motivated enough to care about it at all.

My silver lining is pictured above.  Every time I look at her picture or think about her, it makes my day sweeter.  And my sweet little boy is not too shabby either.  Happily, he seems to have returned today.

Night and Day

My two kids are like night and day right now.  It is like a light switch flipped and Lily has become a dream baby, and Frankie has become an absolute mess.  Lily is now sleeping through the night, every single night, without waking up and crying or even making a peep.  She will sleep until 8:00 a.m. on weekends before calling out for us to come get her.  She did not cry one time all weekend.  She took two super long naps both days, and happily sat up and played with her toys in between naps.  She is babbling, cooing, and just a complete pleasure to be around these days.  She is getting very excited about her toys, and she will sit and reach as far as she can to get something.   A couple of times she has gone from sitting to her tummy, but then she immediately rolls on to her back.  I am not sure if she will ever try to crawl!  She has learned how to clap, and she is SO PROUD of herself.  I am not going to lie, we are pretty proud of her too.  She has such a sweet and happy nature about her, and it is so hard for anyone to believe that she ever screams or acts like anything other than a sweet angel.

Frankie...on the other hand, has had a rough week.  He is sick with an ear infection, and he has been acting like a maniac.  He does not want to listen to anyone, and he had his most epic temper tantrum on Saturday night where he cried/screamed for literally more than an hour for no reason.  Frank went out of his way to take him to do stuff this weekend, and they went to the park a few times, to buy new art stuff at toys r us, and to see his first movie in the movie theater "Nut Job."  But, he continued to act out and misbehave all weekend.  Tonight he threw his soccer ball and hit Lily right in her head when we were all sitting outside.  He is pushing limits, testing boundaries, and acting totally defiant, after having several months of really good behavior.  I am not sure what is causing this change, but I hope I get my sweet little boy back soon!

Mommies are not supposed to get sick

I have spent most of this week lying in bed, sick as a dog.  I woke up on Wednesday morning feeling pretty sick, and I quickly decided I was not going in to work that day.  At first I thought maybe I could work from home and just kind-of relax and take it easy.  I quickly realized that was not going to happen   when simply standing up and washing bottles made me nauseous.  Frankie had a fever on and off since Monday, so I decided he must be pretty sick too and I kept him home with me on Wednesday.  That was a BIG mistake.  I could hardly function, so I pretty much just let him do whatever he wanted, which resulted in a very big mess and a not-too-happy Daddy.  But I was too sick to care.  I made myself get up and go to the doctor to see if I had the flu, which I did not.  The doctor gave me antibiotics and said I must have a sinus infection (and a stomach bug).  I did not even get the antibiotics until very late the next day (Thursday night), and thankfully, on Friday afternoon I finally started to feel better.  But I am still very weak and tired and just feel like resting.  We also finally took Frankie to the doctor on Friday (he had fever on and off Monday - Friday), and he has an ear infection, so I am glad we took him in.  Hopefully we are both on the mend!

I missed three days of work, and I hardly even worked from home.  I am really going to pay for that next week, but it felt nice not to worry about work for a few days.  We were supposed to go to Houston yesterday for our belated family Christmas celebration with my brother, but we decided not to go and risk everyone getting sick.  I am sad that we will miss seeing my brother!

On a little side note, Frank is NOT nice to me when I am sick.  I feel like when other family members are sick, I go out of my way to be nice to them, to make them comfortable, to give them special time, or to just go out of my way to try to make them feel better because I know that being sick sucks.  Well, when I am sick, Frank will pick up the slack with the kids and the house, but he basically makes me fend for myself and on top of that he blames me for getting sick.  It sucks, because (1) I am already sick and feeling like crap, and (2) now you have to make me feel worse because you are mad that I am sick and you think I somehow could have prevented it?!  Its like he thinks I enjoy getting sick, which I definitely do not.  I have gotten sick a lot since having kids, and I am not sure why.  I really don't understand why I get sick all the time and Frank doesn't.  He seems to think it is all preventable, but I think my weakened immune system is primarily due to stress, which I unfortunately have not been able to manage very well in the last couple of years.  Maybe also my lack of exercise.  I don't seem to get sick very much when I am working out regularly, which is just so hard to do with two little ones and a busy job.  I never used to get sick before I had kids!

Anyway, a couple of my friends put it best when they said "Mommies are not supposed to get sick!"  It is true. When Mommy is sick, everything else falls apart!  I don't ever remember my mom being sick when I was growing up, although I am sure she was.  I do remember her giving me seven up and chicken noodle soup and giving me lots of extra love when I was sick....because that is what Mommies do!

Baby boom!

We spent some time this weekend celebrating baby Walsh, who is set to make his debut in March.  Baby boy Walsh will be the 9th baby in this group of friends.  It is crazy to think that less than three years ago we all went out to the ranch and there were only two kids amongst us.  Now, getting together for dinner is mass chaos with two three-year-old boys and six kids under two.  This group of friends consists of five couples, and we pretty much all married off one couple per year starting 7 years ago with Frank and I.  Actually, when Frank and I got married, only one of these couples had even met yet!      It is so hard for me to believe that we have almost been married for seven years.   It was great to see everyone and to meet new babies Quinn and Laynie.

I am afraid to jinx it, but...

Someone is FINALLY sleeping through the night!  Once Lily finished her medicine (on Monday), we decided it was finally time to go ahead and start sleep training.  We had been very bad about using the sleep suit and the swing as sleep crutches, but we decided to take her out of the sleep suit, put her down awake, and let her cry.  Monday night she woke up around 1:30 a.m. and cried a lot.  I would guess she cried for between 20 and 30 minutes, and finally Frank went upstairs, held her hand for a minute, and then came back down and she quickly fell asleep for the rest of the night.  Tuesday night she woke up once around 8:45 p.m., cried for about 10 minutes, and then fell asleep for the rest of the night.  Wednesday night she woke up a few times before 10:00 p.m., but each time she cried for maybe 30 seconds and then went back to sleep.  I am AMAZED that this has been so easy.  We put this off for months because we feared we were going to be up all night for days.  I am afraid to declare it a success, because we have thought she was sleeping through the night before and it never stuck.  But I am very hopeful that she is going to be sleeping through the night from here on out...fingers crossed!

I had a great weekend with the kids while Frank was at reserves.  We had unseasonably warm weather, and we went to the park/playground on Saturday and the zoo on Sunday.  Lily got to ride in the swing for the first time on Saturday, and Frankie had a blast pushing her.  I think he really likes that she is getting bigger and more active and more fun.  Frankie loved seeing all the animals at the zoo, and he was such a good boy and a big help all weekend.  I loved spending so much quality time with the kids. I have been so busy with work the last couple of months, it has felt like I have not gotten much good time with them, and I missed it!

Here are a couple of pictures from this weekend:

Silly, singing Frankie

Frank loves to sing, and he will often be singing or humming random songs around the house.  The other night, he kept saying "bad advice, bad advice," and then he would crack up.  I wondered what on earth he was talking about, and then one day he said "bad advice, bad advice, see how they run, see how they run," and I realized he was singing three blind mice!  Haha.  His latest song he has been singing is "skip to my lou," except his version goes "skip, skip, skip to a MOO, skip, skip, skip to a MOO, skip, skip, skip to a MOO, skip to a MOO my darling."  I love hearing his sweet voice, and I love hearing what he comes up with.

Liliana - 7 months

This beautiful little girl is already seven months old!  I remember that it was nearly impossible to take a picture of Frankie at this age, but Lily seems much calmer and more easygoing than Frankie was/is.  She is perfectly content just sitting up and playing with her toys.  She still hates tummy time, and as a result she has not even started trying to crawl yet.  She has mastered sitting up, but so far no crawling or pulling up yet.  Frankie moved very fast from crawling to walking, but I think this little girl may take her sweet time.

At seven months, Lily is...

-eating fruits and veggies three times a day and still drinking four 6-ounce bottles during the day.  She is a pretty good eater, but she makes the funniest faces when she does not like a new food.

-taking antibiotics, a new allergy medicine, and doing breathing treatments to help with her second double ear infection and terrible congestion.  She has basically been congested for two months straight, so we are hoping that some combination of the meds is going to clear her up!

-still not sleeping good.  We had one night this week where she slept through the night, and it was the first time in months.  Last night she woke up twice and we had to put her in the swing.  As soon as she is healthy, we really need to start sleep training.  It has been easy for us to use sleep crutches to help, but she is almost too big for the swing and for her sleep suit, so we need to bite the bullet and just let her cry it out.  But we can't do it when she is sick!

-growing out of her 3-6 month clothes, and is now wearing 9 month or 6-12 months.  She seems so much heavier to me lately, and I am starting to have trouble carrying her in the car seat.

-such a sweet baby.  She loves to give kisses, and when someone picks her up, she usually puts her hands on their face, like she is trying to feel their energy and determine whether she likes them or not.  It is the cutest thing.  She smiles for anyone and does not mind strangers one bit.

-she still covers her face when she is drinking her milk.  We have no idea why she does this, but drinking bottles is clearly very comforting for her, and sometimes feeding her is the only way we can get her to go back to sleep in the middle of the night.

-babbling "dadada" and sometimes "gagaga."

-she likes taking baths, taking walks, and reading books.  She loves being near her brother, and she loves hearing her Daddy's voice.

Happy seven months sweet girl!  Time to start planning your 1st birthday, which will be here before we know it!

Everybody's talking

Baby girl has started babbling, and, of course, her first "word" is da-da.  She will look at you and have a conversation, but no matter how many times I say "ma-ma-ma," she just repeats "da-da-da."  Frank LOVES it.

Frankie also has a few really funny sayings lately.  One of his new things is to call foods gross.  He does this all the time now, and often with foods he actually likes.  It is like he heard it somewhere and just decided to run with it.  He usually says, "Ewwwww, gross!"  He also says "actually" all the time.  I think he gets that one from me.  He also says oopsie-da-daisy when he drops something, which is the cutest thing ever.

Christmas 2013, my birthday, and hello to 2014!

I am FINALLY getting around to posting about Christmas!  I have been so busy the last few weeks, it feels like Christmas came and went in a whirlwind.  We hosted my family for Christmas Eve, and we really enjoyed spending some good quality time with them.  We cooked a big turkey dinner on Christmas Eve, complete with an enormous, five-tiered red velvet and cheesecake layer cake with white chocolate frosting that I made from scratch.  It was AWESOME!  Christmas morning was super fun this year because Frankie really understands Santa.  He got a ton of cool gifts and he got to help his little sister open hers too.  I was very excited to get a new Kitchenaid mixer, which, I just realized as I am typing this, I still have not used!  Later on Christmas day, Frank's Mom and Grandpa Andy came over and some of Frank's cousins happened to be stopping by DFW airport, so we hosted another big dinner for all of them on Christmas day.  It was really nice to have so much family time, but it was also quite exhausting.

Frank surprised me the weekend before my birthday with a couples' massage at the Four Seasons and a fancy italian dinner.   On my actual birthday we went out for a pizza dinner with Frank's Mom and Andy, and then they watched the kids so that we could go see a movie.  We had not been to a movie together in probably at least three years!  It was really nice.  I was feeling a little down in the dumps on my birthday this year, and Frank really went all out to make it special, which I truly appreciate.  I can't believe that I am 32 years old!

2013 was a really hard year for me.  It has been the hardest year for my career and one of the hardest years on our family.  Having two kids and two professional careers is no joke!  We are constantly exhausted (will Lily EVER sleep through the night???), stressed, and busy.  I still have some Christmas gifts I need to give!  My office looks like a tornado hit.  It has just been nuts, and we are still trying to figure out how to balance everything.  Of course, we were also blessed with our beautiful baby girl in 2013, so it was not all hard and stressful.  I have really high hopes for 2014.  I see this year bringing great things for our family, and I am excited to see what the next chapter of our story will be.

Here are a few Christmas pictures:

School Christmas program

The Friday before Christmas was the kids' school Christmas program!  Frankie had been practicing his songs for weeks, and he was so excited to sing for us.  He literally stole the show, and we were SO PROUD of him!  His class sang "I'm getting nothing for Christmas" and "Hello, Reindeer."  Most of the kids did not sing at all, but Frankie was standing at the front on both songs, singing at the top of his lungs.  He loves to be the center of attention, that is for sure.  Lily and the other babies in her class "danced" too.