7/22

Well finally it happened. One of the boys did something that I'm sure every kid in the world does at some point in their lives. Honestly though if you'd have asked me which kid would be the first one to stick something in his ear and not be able to get it out I would have said Zachary. I would have been wrong. It was Noah.

I was in the kitchen doing the dishes and the kids were in the living room watching tv with their afternoon snack. All of a sudden Noah comes running into the kitchen screaming. He's screaming and crying so hard I can't figure out what he's saying. So after a few minutes he calms down enough that I can figure out he's saying something is stuck in his ear. I take a look and at first thought he'd somehow broke a piece of wood off in his ear. I figure its sticking out far enough that I can just grab it with my fingers. No I couldn't and I pushed it further back. Now Don always accuses me of overreacting so I decide I'm going to stay calm. I ask Noah what is in his ear so I can decide the next course of action. Noah doesn't answer because he's back to screaming again. I ask Nathan if he knows. 20 minutes later after a full recap of everything that Noah has done in the 5 minutes after I left the living room and the time Noah comes screaming into the kitchen I find out that Noah shoved a chow mein noodle in his ear.

I call Don calmly at work and tell him Noah shoved something in his ear. I ask him if he thinks we can get it out or if we need to take him to the doctor. He says he'll come home right now since its only 20 minutes before he's off anyway. It takes him about 15 minutes to get home and once he arrives he decides that we should flood the ear with water so the noodle will fall apart. So I make him a bowl with water and give him the syringe. Don then says to me, "Maybe you should call the doctor's office to be sure this is okay." So I call and talk to the nurse. She says he needs to come in because he's still young and we don't know how long the item is. So off we head to the doctor.

Noah falls asleep on the way over which is good because he's been screaming for about 45-60 minutes now. As we head into the office he's calmed down and all excited to go play in the play area. He heads right in and talks to the first person he sees. He calmly tells them, "Hi I'm Noah and I have a noodle in my ear." So now to end this extremely long recount of this story we wait 45 minutes to see the doctor who takes 30 seconds to pull the noodle out of his ear. And what does the doctor say? On something like that you could just flood the ear and let it dissolve.

7/21

I haven't updated this in awhile. I'll just give the run down on the boys.

Nathan is being typical Nathan. Somedays it seems his SID is going away and then there are days where it seems to be getting worse. I've convinced him at dinner time that he needs to take one bite of everything before deciding if he likes it or not. He's pretty funny because he sometimes says, "WOW I didn't even know I liked that." Nathan has also picked up a very annoying habit from the neighbor. Our dear neighbors behind us are a little "slow" and one doesn't really like to talk directly to Don or I. She'll say to her sister "Tell Norah, and she procedes with a story, and the repeats the tell Norah." Well Nathan has picked this up and its driving me nuts. I don't know how to get him to stop but if doesn't stop soon my head is going to pop of my neck.

Noah is king of the naked people. This kid would proudly go naked 24/7 if we allowed him. He is officially known in the neighborhood as the naked bike rider. He is also king of getting into trouble. He has this intense desire to play in water and to dump things. He constantly has the water on outside and if you can keep him from turning the outside water on you'll find him indoors in the bathroom playing in the bathtub or sink. Yesterday he dump all the hummingbird food out, my dad's mesquite wood chips, a bag of peanuts for the birds, and a bag of flour. Today he dumped a bag of sugar and a bag of quinoa. He is the biggest animal lover in the house and loves to call out the birds that visit.

Zachary is still the child who should have been an only child. He needs more attention than the others and is a very needy child. He worships Nathan though. I think it drives Nathan crazy when Zachary has to do everything Nathan does. He is going to be the sports star in the family. I don't think there's a sport out there that Zach isn't interested in. He is also the family dare devil. I honestly don't know how we've managed to avoid having major injuries so far. Nothing phases this kid. Zachary has also declared himself the protector of the "Wiggles" shirts. These are the shirts I bought the kids to wear to a wiggles concert 3 years ago. The shirts no longer fit anyone and are stained and not in good shape. However Mr. Zach finds it very important to know where the shirts are at all times, gives the said shirts to the correct person (each kid has a differnt color), and will go after anyone not wearing the said shirt. While I would love to rid the house of these shirts I think these are something I want to save as a reminder of my kids childhood. They do really love those shirts.

6/30

We took the boys to Eccles Dinosaur park in Ogden yesterday. This is a fun place to go if your kids like dinosaurs. The have a small indoor musuem and the majority is outside. The indoor part is okay if your kids don't spook. However my kids freaked out over the dinosuars upstairs that moved and made noise.

They have a policy of 2 maps per family. While this probably works well for some families it doesn't work well for us. Of course each kid wanted his own map so he would know were he was at all times. After trying to convince the kids that we only needed two and that not working I tried to beg another map from the front desk. I was told I had my two maps and couldn't get another. So I have two happy kids and one kid who is having a meltdown. Finally some nice person walked over and handed my child who was having a meltdown her map. I owe that person a dinner as for the rest of the day he was happy. I placed the maps someplace safe so the next time we go I'll have extra maps and won't have the meltdown again.

We spent almost 3 hours there with the kids. It was worth the money although I'm not sure I enjoyed the heat. If you have kids who love dinosaurs this is a worth while place to take your kids to see. At the end of our visit I bought the boys a gift from the gift shop. All three had to have a dinosaur hat. I'll have to get pictures and share because it is quite cute. Two kids fell asleep last night wearing their hats.

6/25

I've been a busy little critter. Between crafts, science projects, and our other typical daily stuff the boys and I have been a little busy. The boys have also been helping me grow a vegetable garden this year. We started several plants indoors and then moved them outside. We also planted carrots, which are a favorite of the boys. Yesterday we were rewarded with our first grown tomato of the season. Now granted it was tiny and a cherry tomato but the boys loved looking at the yellow tomato they grew. None wanted to try it so mom ate it and it was delicious. I can't wait for more.

The boys are getting even better at the bird watching in our yard. They can identify several species of birds and they help keep the bird feeders filled with each birds favorite type of food. Its so much fun watching them get excited over the birds.

Noah is pretty much potty trained now too. Again I have to say my approach to the potty training has saved me so much stress. He still forgets every once in awhile about pooping but otherwise he's doing great. It's going to seem weird not having to buy a huge box of diapers each month. We still use diapers at night although if they want to wear underwear to bed I let them. We haven't had an accident yet but I'm so scared of an accident happening.

Last night we went to the Syracuse Hertiage Days dinner and magic show. While the food wasn't too impressive, and how can it be when its massed produced, it was fun. The boys throughly enjoyed the magic show. Syracuse had a great turnout for the night. It makes me wonder why my city, Clearfield, can't do something like this. I was asked to join the 4th of July committee for Clearfield but after being told every idea I had wouldn't work I lost interest and dropped out. Honestly if Syracuse and do a week long celebration and have the turn out they did last night each night then I think Clearfield could draw the same amount if not more people. I hate the city I live in. They really don't do much to bring the city together like I see the other cities around us doing.

Frugal Tip Friday

My tip is to shop outside the grocery store for items. I'm always stopping at the nearest produce stand, ethnic food store, farmer's market and other such places to buy food. You never know what you may find and most of the time produce is so much cheaper at any of these places. Plus you can usually buy bulk spices from the produce stand or ethnic store for so much cheaper than the little bottles at the grocery store.

6/18 Part Two

Today I stared our daily science experiment and craft a day program. Basically this is to help me keep the kids entertained and to teach the kids something while they think they are playing. I used the book More Mudpie to Magnets and All Around the town craft book.

Today's Science experiment:
Floating Rainbows
The kids loved this. "More, more, more Mom," they hollered. The hardest part was the waiting for the food coloring to drop from the oil into the water. Overall this one was liked in our house.

Today's craft project:
Peek a Boo house
I should have prepped this one last night. The kids lost interest quickly as it took some time for me to get things ready for them to do. I think I may try this again tomorrow after I prep it some tonight.

6/18

The kids are enjoying the summer reading program at the local library this summer. Sadly I had the days mixed up so we missed the puppet show. I know they kids would have loved that. Last week they did a bug concert and after the concert they made puppet bugs. The kids really enjoyed that. Yesterday they had Doodlebug art. The boys really enjoyed the learn to draw bugs part of the program. They watched and studied and drew just like the artist. While they enjoyed the pop up book storytime the actual making of a pop up book lost their interest. They also made a clay bug but again they didn't seem to enjoy that as much as the learning to draw. This is a great program and I highly recomend taking your kids to this program.
Tonight is Army Ants and Miss Utah will be at the Clearfield Library. I'm not taking the kids to this one but I bet it will be fun.
http://www.daviscountyutah.gov/library/kids/summer_reading_program/2008/default.cfm