3 Years?? You can't be serious....

Last week the littlest one in our family had a birthday to mark his third year on this earth.  I know that I say this every year when one of the kids has a birthday, and my best friend Becky and I say it to each other all the time, but where did the 3 years go????  I have to admit that the first six months of Jack's life are a blur, thankful there are pictures and videos (because I am that obnoxious mother), but I still feel like his first six months went by faster than the other kids.

One of my favorite stories to tell over and over to again to illustrate how crazy that time in our life was, goes a little something like this.."One night we had both of the boys in their cribs in their room, and we had managed to get everyone asleep, including Bryan and I, until we heard the cry.  I asked Bryan to go and get the crying child and bring him to me.  Bryan dragged himself out of bed and returned with the baby, only problem was that it wasn't the crying baby!  All Bryan could say was 'I picked up the first one that I found, I had a 50/50 chance of getting it right!"

Jack had no choice but to go with the flow in this family, and thankfully he did.  It seemed to have his moments where he needed a little more time and attention, like from birth when he needed to be in NICU for 2 weeks, but he was such an incredible baby, and Rory and Brendan were so great with him.

It's been a fun journey for the past 3 years so far...

6 months and dimples galore!

1st Birthday!

1 1/2 and not afraid to be fashionable!

The 2 year old birthday boy

2 1/2

Our 3 year old!

We can't wait to see what else you have in store for us little man!  Love you!

My new favorite thing of the New Year

Being a mom of 3 kids is great, but it’s also challenging because I always seem to feel that one kid is getting slighted on something, mainly my time and attention, and I mean one on one good attention.  I have made a promise to myself that I am going to make special dates with the kids, so Wednesday is the day!  I am doing my best not to have anything to do on those days, just spend time with the kids!

Our “date days” start with Jack in the morning.  After Brendan and Rory are at school, Jack and I head off to the local donut store to have a coffee and a donut….bet you can’t guess who gets the coffee!  

The few times that we have done it so far Jack has talked for he entire time non stop!  I mean this kid talks a lot anyway, but he had all of my attention and boy did he keep it!  He’s also very good at winning over the ladies who work there!  They love seeing him!

Brendan is next up!  It’s been a little hard trying to find that one special thing for us to do every Wednesday, but lately he’s been enjoying just going out in the backyard and having the whole place to himself!  He’s been perfecting climbing over the wall of the playhouse.  

I want to stop him, but it’s all about the developing those gross motor skills!

Besides, he hasn’t tried this trick when anyone else is around, at least not yet!  So I think it’s just a little something that we do together…scaling walls!

Rory has CCE class on Wednesday nights, which always makes it a crazy time after school!  We have homework to get done and dinner to make and eat so we can be out the door by 5:35.  We have now made a ritual of having some “Mommy-Rory” time, as she calls it, after CCE class.  I normally pick her up myself and we head off to Dairy Queen for a small dish of vanilla ice cream with rainbow sprinkles.  I love how her eyes light up when I pick  her up from class and the first thing she always asks is “Is it Mommy-Rory time now?"

 I also manage to get a little homework time in while we’re there too!

Hopefully I can make this stick because they aren’t going to be these ages for this long, and I know that this alone Mommy time is going to be something that becomes more annoying than fun…so we take it one Wednesday at a time!

Welcome to the New Year

We started off this year with big to do’s!  First, the kids went back to school on January 2!  I love being with my kids, I love playing with them, I love seeing them play with each other and hang out and I especially love when all 5 of us are together doing fun, even boring, family things.  That being said, I was more than ready for them to be back to school and back on a routine!

The routine didn’t last that long,  Brendan had his third, yes that would be the #3, set of ear tubes put in on Tuesday January 3.  Poor kid, he was all excited walking into the hospital, the ride up on the elevator to the day surgery floor, even checking in and chatting at the nurses station.  I started to think, my goodness he is doing really well with this, he’s not that freaked out.  Well, as soon as they lead us into his room, he caught sight of that hospital bed and the death grip on the door jam was applied.  The cucumber coolness was gone, and it was panic mode now.  I had too physical remove his tiny hand pick him up and start comforting him.  The poor nurse was trying to get vitals and listen to his chest…good luck lady! 

He was able to settle down and collect himself, and then the team came in to collect him, and just at that moment the panic was about to spring out of him again…in walked the white knight (that would be Bryan.)  Brendan got a good snuggle for Daddy as we walked down the hall to the “drop off” area.  We hugged and kissed up and handed him over to his nurse and off they went as the big clunky metal doors shut behind them.  Now this is obviously not his first surgery, and it wasn’t that major either, but I started to tear up.  You never get used to that feeling of handing over your child to be put under anesthesia, and Lord knows that Brendan has done it one too many times. 

Normally a set of ear tubes takes all of about 10 minutes to put in, but this time Brendan was also going to undergo an ABR, Automated Brain Response test.  It is a very thorough hearing test that gets the best picture of what, if any, hearing loss he has.  The test takes about an hour, and it was a long hour. 

Just when I was starting to think that it was taking too long, here comes our little guy in the arms of his nurse, right back to us.  He was oh so drugged and sleepy, but everything went very well!  His hearing is in the normal range, which was a HUGE relief to us especially after so many ear infections!

Poor kid…

Brendan had his best bounce back out of anesthesia that he has ever had!  He was eating and drinking and then when we were discharged that kid walked himself right out of that place!

Hopefully now with the ear tubes in his speech will improve at light speed, and his head dunking in the tub will slow down!

Clean slate

The Christmas holiday has come and gone, the kids are back to school so that meant it was time to take down the Christmas decorations..boo.  The house feels bare and a little empty now, but as I was packing up all of the ornaments and the decoration it brought back lots of happy memories...

For example..

These were the favors from our wedding that a friend of mine surprised us with the day of the wedding.

and..

We bought this one at Faneuil Hall while we were on our "honeymoon"

Then there are these..

A friend of my mom's Louise would make us ornaments every year...they make me smile.

These hung of Bryan's grandparents tree.

I'm not the type of person who strives to have the perfect Christmas tree that Martha Stewart inspired, not yet anyway.  I love it when the kids decorate the tree and find their ornaments from the past years that I remember and they love.  I love showing them the ornaments from when Bryan and I were growing up and telling them about our Christmas memories when we were little.  So maybe when the kids are grown we'll do more of the fancy picture perfect Christmas decorating, but until then, I think we decorate the most perfect tree of memories that anyone could ask for.