Update on the kids!

Kaleb has been really into Transformers lately. Tim finally talked me into watching the new Transformers Movie and it was to my delight a VERY good movie. So now Kaleb watches the movie all the time. Tim is especially thrilled with this new passion of Kaleb's because Transformers have been around since Tim was a kid. So he gets to relive his childhood through Kaleb. There for a while Tim was coming home with a new Transformer action figure every couple days. I finally had to tell Tim to quit buying himself new toys, because clearly he was enjoying them as much or more than Kaleb was! So my world is now a hodge bodge of transformer parts. Autobot (good guys) and Decepticon (bad guys) pieces and parts for me to find and try not to suck up into the vacuum! Kaleb also has recently become a fan of my Zucinni bread. My recipe isn't anything special, just straight outta the Betty crocker cook book, but Kaleb loves it! I love that he will eat a green veggie, however it is prepared. LOL!

Jasmyn is in Preschool this year. Last year she was in the same class but Future was in their with her. I really thought that she would be the queen of the classroom as a returning student. And for the most part her teacher says she is. But she is sometimes having a difficult time when we drop her off. SO we have been working hard on trying to make her comfortable in the mornings. We read a book called "The Kissing Hand" about a Raccoon that is afraid to go to school. His mother kisses the palm of his hand and he carries the kissing hand with him all day long. When he is feeling sad he presses his kissing hand to his cheek and it is like his Momma is there kissing him and telling him he is loved. So our tradition in the mornings when I drop her off is to give each other a kissing hand. It usually works, although sometimes she still is a bit clingy. It will get better as she gets more confident in her place in her classroom.

Mason is just talking up a storm. When Mason was born Jasmyn was 2, the same age Mason is now. After Mason was born it just seemed like overnight that Jasmyn's vocabulary boomed and she was speaking so much more clearly. I always assumed she did that out of survival since Mason had essentially taken her place. But now that Mason is the same age, his speech is so much better and gets more advanced everyday. I have to admit that it really does ease my mind about Jasmyn when Mason was born. She was just ready to speak, kinda like Mason is now. The coolest thing is now Mason is saying our names. He has always said Momma and Daddy, but it is so cool to hear him say Taybub (Kaleb) and Ja man (Jasmyn)and Utchur (Future) and Davit (David) and Gamma (grandma). I also love to hear Peez (please) Tank ou (thank you) Er Elcome (your Welcome). And when he is upset at you he also has been know to say "awp awuking" (stop talking). LOL! It took him saying "Awp Awuking" a few times before I finally understood what he was saying. I had to laugh, but then realized he was basically telling me to "shut up"! LOL!

Now I have 2 little stories to tell......

Kaleb & I were sitting next to each other at dinner. I held up a piece of zucinni on his fork and tried to feed it to him. "See Kaleb, this zuccinni is just like the stuff I put in the zucinni bread yo love so much." He looked at me and shook his head. "No Mom that is Decepticon Zuccini" LOL!!! He didn't eat it.

Jasmyn and I were on our way to her school. Parking around the school is a nightmare, so I was circling the block trying to find a place to park. Jasmyn asked me if we were going to the school. I said, " Yes Honey, we are just trying to find a parking spot and then I will drop you off. Are you ready for school?" "yes Mom, and I won't even cry or Nuthin' " I say " Oh good Jasmyn. You will have a good day and you will be with your teachers. They are very nice teachers, right?" Jasmyn says, " Yes Mom they are very nice teachers, and they WON'T even KILL me" LOL! Yes Jasmyn they won't even kill you!

Kids say the darnedest things!

Bad Bad Day!

I thought my day was going well. I dropped the kids off to school, had breakfast with some friends and the sun was shinning. Perfect. Beautiful. I was thrilled with my day. I picked up my kids from school and we had lunch. After lunch was when the day started going downhill and FAST.....

Kaleb lost his 1st tooth. I was NOT prepared or ready for this particular milestone. For some reason it really hit me that my "baby" was growing up. I think I would have been ok with it if it would have been in it's own time. Let me explain. Last week Future and Kaleb were playing and Future kicked Kaleb in the mouth. It loosened his tooth. Actually it BROKE his tooth. It broke one of the sides of the root off. So it was loose and of course Kaleb kept playing with it with his finger and tongue. So today while Kaleb was eating Mac & Cheese for lunch his tooth just fell out. He luckily didn't swallow it. LOL! Anyway, I just was not ready for Kaleb to loose his tooth before he was developmentally ready. There is no permanent tooth peeking through yet and the other root is still inside the hole. I am guessing that it will be a few months before his permanent tooth grows in. :( Oh well, the tooth fairy still pays the same for broken teeth as whole teeth.

After Lunch I picked up Mason from his high chair and realized that he had poop running out of his diaper down his leg. YUCK! So I picked him up and carried him into his room. I cleaned him up the best I could and got the yucky diaper and clothes taken care of. I put Mason into the tub to finish cleaning him up. I was kneeling by the tub when I heard a loud "thud" and then a child crying. Oh No, I thought. Next thing I saw was Kaleb running into the bath room crying and his side of his face covered in blood. I wiped the blood away to see a hole in the side of his head by his temple. I asked what happened and Future relayed that Kaleb was running in the house, tripped and smacked his head on one of our hardwood kitchen chairs. I look at the wound again and I can see the layer of fat hanging out of the open gaping 1 inch gash. I call Tim. I don't know why other than it is a gut reaction. He is in Portland, OR and will be for a few more days. He says to take him to the ER and have them stitch it back together. Ugh. So I press a washcloth onto Kaleb's head and tell him to hold it there. I finish washing Mason and get him redressed (remember he was in the bath after the poopy diaper issue). I text a few friends to see if anyone can help me with the other 3 kiddos. Nope. Nada. No way No how. Nobody would/could help me. So I pile all 4 kids into the car and head to the Emergency Room!

Once at the ER they got us back into a room fairly quickly. Kaleb was very scared. He kept asking over and over what they were going to do to him. I didn't really have a solid answer so I told him they were going to look at the boo boo, put some medicine on it, close the hole somehow, put a band aid on it and we would get to go home. He accepted than answer for a while. LOL! Here is a picture of what it looked like when we arrived, except it was more bloody (this is right after I wiped the blood off.

So the Dr came in and looked at his boo boo. They put some topical numbing stuff on a cotton ball and wrapped his head up in some gauze. Next they gave him some pain medicine/sedation in some oral syrup stuff. Kaleb drank it like a champ! Then they let us sit for like an hour while the medicine worked to numb the area. Here is a pic of him wrapped in gauze:



Future, Jasmyn & Mason at this point are hiding under the bed, crawling around on the chair, laying on the floor (eeewwww, in a hospital who KNOWS what germs are lurking there), getting into the drawers and playing with the stacks of linens. Oy Vey. The nurse asked me "Is there someone I can call to come and get your kids?" Nice Huh? Doesn't she know that I had already called everyone I could? Doesn't she think I would have LOVED some help with them? No instead she had to state the obvious that yes I was alone with 4 kids and they were running a muck! I will still trying to text Roselyn to come and give me a hand, but she was unable to help me. She was my last option. We pressed onward.

After what seemed like a lifetime, but was probably only 1 1/2 hrs the Dr comes back in to check on Kaleb's numbness. He is numb enough. He is Kaleb, right before the Dr started messing with him.

:( He looks scared. :( I get Mason strapped back into his stroller, even though he screamed the whole time. I get Jasmyn & Future sitting in a chair together holding their teddy bears. Dr comes in and has Kaleb put his hands behind his back and puts them into a pillow case and pulled it up to his armpits with his arms pinned inside it. He called it a "cape" but we all know it was really a "straight jacket". LOL! Then they wrapped Kaleb tightly in a warm blanket with his arms still in the pillow case. He looked like a burrito. Next they cleaned the wound with Iodine. Then they had a big male nurse hold his face while I held his body and used a needle with litocaine to finish numbing it. As I was holding him down I could clearly see him injecting the wound. Yucky. I saw at the bottom of the hole was white. I asked the Dr. "ummmm is that his skull?" the Dr. laughed and said, "yup". Kaleb cried and was upset because that part hurt. Next they wiped the blood away and put the white drapes over his face. At this point Kaleb said he wanted to "look at Mommy" So I went to the other side of the bed to help comfort him. I sang to him while the Dr stitched him up. I probably sang Twinkle Twinkle Little Star about 6 times. Future and Jasmyn were hiding their faces behind their teddy bears and Jasmyn was crying. Mason cried when they pinned Kaleb down and he was crying. I felt really bad that they had to witness all of this. All in all Kaleb has 6 stitches. 1 inside the wound. And 5 outside. Then the Nurse cleaned the blood off his face, put some ointment on the boo boo and applied a band aid. They gave us our discharge instructions and we were outta there. Kaleb wanted a dilly bar from Dairy Queen so we swung by DQ on our way home. Kaleb was so very brave. He really was awesome. I was so very proud of Kaleb. I was also proud of Jasmyn Future and Mason. They handled the whole thing pretty well, considering. I still wish I could have spared them the experience, but we all survived.

Here is a picture of the stitches and the wound right after the Dr was done sewing.

Here is the Nurse cleaning up the wound and putting ointment in it.

And this is a picture of him at home. All relaxed and better. I put a spider man band aid on it after I took this picture.

And then here is a smile!

I have to say that today felt LONELY. It sucks to be a "single-parent" 5/7 of the week. I know that Tim can't help but work out of town and I am thankful he has a good job that pays our way. But days like today remind me how much I need him with me and how NO ONE can fill his shoes. And apparently nobody else wanted to try! LOL!