4/30 - Medical update, Pratt Park, & boys day

So let's catch up. I had a sleep study done about 1.5 weeks ago. Wow. It was horrible. Here is a picture that I sent Brad to say "goodnight" to the boys. This was before I got the second round of stuff hooked up to my face and nose. It was almost impossible to sleep.  I had to get there at 7:30pm and then I went to bed around 10:30pm. I slept a little worse than normal. They then woke me up at 5:50am and then I had to stay awake until 8am and then I got to take naps every two hours. That doesn't sound so bad huh? Well, let me tell you. It was horrible. I would just fall alseep and then they would come wake me up (you can't sleep longer than 15 minutes). After not sleeping all night and just my usual amount of tiredness, I was beyond exhausted.

I do not have sleep apnea which is good. However, I was right on the borderline for something called Idiopathic Hypersomnia. This means I'm sleepy all the time and my body actually needs the sleep but there is no explanation for it. Awesome huh? While I did fall alseep for all 5 naps, I did not reach REM sleep which is necessary to be classified as narcoleptic. I also just found at the end of last week that I have to do the study again. Blah. I was the only one there last time for the day study because 95% of people only need to be monitored at night. Anyway, I have to do the test next week and we are doing it without me taking my ADHD medicine. I only had one period of REM sleep before and it lasted for just 30 min which equalled about 9% of my sleep time. The average person gets about 20-25% of REM sleep. Well see what happens. I have had horrible migraines for the past month
 and it got really bad this past weekend. Even my prescription medication does not even make a dent in the pain/pressure that I feel in my head.

Here is Aiden below making bracelets for 2 little girls. He was so cute making them.

Both of the boys recently got gardening gloves. Here is Brad helping Aiden put on his gloves. I helped Eli put on his and then they went out and played in the dirt at the end of the driveway for a bit.



On Friday, Brad had the idea to pack-up dinner in the form of a picnic and go to Pratt Park. I wasn't so excited about it but that's because my head has been killing me and my ulcerative colitis has hampering me quite a bit. It was fun. I was gone taking Aiden to the bathroom and when I come back, I see Eli chasing something around a tree. I ask Brad about it and he then informs me that he told Eli he could pet a squirrel if he could catch one. Seriously!! I couldn't help laughing. Eli so wanted to catch a squirrel. He eventually asked me if he could pet the ducks and I advised him that was a bad idea.

While Eli was off chasing squirrels, Aiden asked Brad what Eli was doing. Brad then told Aiden that he could pet a squirrel if he caught one. Needless to say, it wasn't long before Eli and I heard Aiden yelling that he almost caught a squirrel.  In the picture below you can see Aiden in the far left and a squirrel in the far right.

The squirrel got smart and ran up a phone poll. Aiden waited for the squirrel to come down but that didn't happen so he and Eli went off exploring with daddy for a while.

On Saturday, Brad took the boys to the zoo in the morning. They have really been wanting to go and that is not a trip that I can do at this moment because of medical stuff. They had fun it looked like. This is the first time I haven't gone to the zoo with the boys. It was so odd. There are new white tigers at the zoo and Brad took a picture for me. You can see the white tiger laying in the background between the boys.



 The chick-fil-a cow was also at the zoo and Aiden actually stood by him. This is a first. Aiden does not like the big characters like this so I was glad to see that progress made.

Brad fed the boys lunch and then put them down for short naps. He then got them up and took them to a birthday party. It was just Aiden that was supposed to go but I thought I would be back from the dr by then and I wasn't so Brad had to take Eli with him too. It was a Lego Stars Wars themed party. Aiden is too scared to watch any kind of Star Wars stuff but he likes to look at the comic books and beginning reader books of Star Wars. All the boys had fun it seemed. Brad really got in to it (he's even wearing a mask in one of the pictures below) and was teaching the kids how to fight with their light sabers. He did a great job because in the very last picture on the bottom right, everyone is beating him up with their light sabers. It looked like a very cool party and the boys certainly had fun. 

After such a long day with the boys, Brad was a great sport and even gave them baths. He gave Eli a bath in perfect Eli fashion ... outside at the water spicket. Eli loved every second of it. Aiden wanted to come in for a more traditional bath but that's not surprising. He's starting to be able to make it through a bath without crying which is awesome. He still won't soap himself or anything but ..... baby steps forward it what our goal is and we are achieving that.

I was recuperating on Sunday from the massive amount of drugs given to me on Saturday. After the boys got home from church and had a nap, they played outside. It started to rain and Eli obviously doesn't care about that. Aiden ran inside on got his jacket and a hat (he already had boxers on) so he could still play a little. It was barely sprinkling but I'm so glad Aiden has the influence of care-free Eli in this situation. 

3/31 - Park & fake snow

Brad took the boys in the morning last Saturday to Bass Pro Shop. I took them in the afternoon to Pratt Park (aka Castle Park) for the first time in a few weeks. They had a ton of fun running around. We explored a new area and found a cool new path that the boys really enjoyed. They were running around and finding rocks and then throwing them into the water and watching them sink. It was fun to just watch them play for a bit and I was super excited that Aiden actually picked up dirty rocks to throw. :)

The boys thought it was fun to take pictures of each other at the park too. The one below is cute because you can see them looking in to the screen so they can see themselves while Eli is taking a picture.

Little Eli is so fun. He lost one of tubes last week and is no longer pulling on his right ear all the time. 

After lots of running around in the afternoon, we decided to let the boys have a movie night. Here is the plate I made for them: carrot stick, 2 vanilla wafers, strawberry for the nose, and chicken nuggets for the mouth. They both thought it was pretty fun.

Here are Aiden and daddy doing a craft (therapy project) before Cubbies last week. 

I decided to take Aiden to the dr on Monday because his arm started to get much worse where we thought he had a spider bite. It turns out the dr thinks that it is ring worm although it did not present like typical ring worm at the beginning. They took a skin scraping sample to make sure it's nothing crazy but it's already starting to look a ton better.

Aiden had therapy on Monday this week. Here he is playing a game with me while we were waiting. It's a subtraction game where you take eggs away from the hen house. He thought it was pretty cool and had fun doing it. I'm still trying to decide what to do with him next year about school. A lot of it depends on where we end up living at and if I can teach any classes at UF. I just need to be patient and know that God is in control. The thought of home-schooling terrifies me because I'm the kind of mom that needs a break but ... we'll see what God has in store for me. Last week was very frustrating at daycare for me and Aiden. On Monday, after we returned from Aiden's dr appointment, the Big Green Bus was there in the morning. It threw Aiden all off because it normally comes in the afternoon. I was frustrated because I pay for that service so I would have rearranged things if I knew they were coming in the morning. All the classes had already gone and the babies were in there when we showed up. The man offered for Aiden to come in for the last 10 min but Aiden didn't want to because he was so freaked out with the timing and that it wasn't "his class." I finally got him calmed down and then walked him to his classroom to find out his class was actually in the classroom next door and they were eating lunch at 10:40am. His world was rocked again. Not his classroom. Not lunch time. Not his normal seat..... Poor kid. He was about in tears when I left. I felt horrible that he was so upset and was frustrated that they were eating lunch at 10:40am. It was spring break week around here last week but I felt like they were just putting all the kids down early for nap which frustrates me. Nap is supposed to be from 12-2 but they get down there at like 11:30am and don't get up until 2:15/2:30pm usually. That's a long time when starting at 11:30am you already begin yelling at kids to lay down and be still and do not move. Anyway, my stomach was unsettled and I felt like I needed to go talk with Aiden. I went there at 11:40 and all the kids were already down for nap and most were already asleep. I said, "you got them down here a little early today" and was told, "no we didn't. This is normal." I got even more frustrated. I brushed Aiden to help him calm down and he said he wanted to go home with me. I'm a sucker so I let him. He had to go to a neurologist appointment with me and Brad but was very good. It was the first time at the neurologist and he wants me to have a sleep study done. I go in at 7:30pm on a Monday and then will get to leave mid/later afternoon on the following day. I drop Aiden off at 2:20pm (normally I get there at 2:00 or 2:15pm and they are still sleeping and the lights are off and Aiden gets so upset because he thinks he is going to have to nap). Even though his teacher will tell him he can sit by her because everyone is about to get up, he won't. He goes to his cot, lays down, and cries. So, I was SHOCKED when we got there at 2:20pm and everyone was upstairs. That was awesome and has NEVER happened before. This made going back to daycare much easier for Aiden thankfully. Brad picked up the boys at 4:30pm and Aiden tells him he has had 3 lollipops (in just 2 hours). I was not happy to hear that! I understand a treat now and then put 3 lollipops in 2 hours - seriously. If you have having to bribe kids to behave that much in that short amount of time, you have some serious issues. 

I made some fake snow on Sunday night and brought it with me to therapy. Mrs. Rusty actually got Aiden to touch it which I was shocked about it. He didn't like it all but he eventually made a snow ball for Nana. :)

I got Eli a little interested in the snow that I made. I added some more shaving cream to it because it was a little too powdery. Eli did not like the texture of it at first but he didn't mind playing in it as long as he had something to wipe his hands on. Aiden came over and poked at things a very times. I then gave Eli a syringe with vinegar in it and he added it so some snow and we watched it erupt and bubble. He thought that was pretty cool. 

Tuesday was another frustrating day at daycare. I go to pick up the boys in the afternoon to see that Aiden didn't eat his lunch (almond milk and yogurt). He had a different teacher for lunch and she didn't know that he was supposed to get his lunch box. He said he told his teacher that he has a lunch bag but I'm sure he was shy about it and/or only said something once rather than insisting he get his lunch bag. That teacher apologized but it was just the wrong day for that to happen after such a frustrating day at daycare the day before. Needless to say, I'm praying what to do about daycare. Switch to a mother's day out program? Pull them out of daycare? Just get Aiden during nap time? That would be fine if it was just 2 hours or so but as I have found out, nap time is more like 2.75 hours, not 2. I'm praying for guidance on this one. He is learning and the social interaction is good for him. Eli is doing pretty well at daycare but the other kids are a pretty bad influence. Many of them are non-verbal and like to hit and throw and most of them LOVE picking their nose and eating it. GROSS. Those are things I prefer Eli not pick up but when you are surrounded by them all the time, you will pick them up.

Grandma Jo and Grandpa Dave sent a box for the boys for Easter. They opened it on Tuesday evening and had fun doing that. They both got bath soap/shampoo and Aiden hands his to me and says, "here mom, you can have it." I started laughing. I asked why he didn't want it and he said, "it's a present for you." After some more probing he says, "I don't like to use soap." He cracks me up. They both got giant stuffed animals too.

Oh yeah. And they also got some peeps. Last year neither of them would eat peeps but this year they both ate it.

Now on to the posts about our vacation to TN.

3/22 - Playground and Brush Buddies

We came back from Atlanta and enjoyed just hanging out and lounging in the backyard one night. Below is a picture of daddy and Eli in the hammock and Aiden crawling up top.

I just love this picture below of Brad and Eli. Daddy is giving Eli is a kiss and Eli is as happy as can be in his daddy's loving arms. Love it!!

I even got a chance to get in the hammock and get a little snuggle time with my boys.  It was starting to get chilly so it was easy to get them up there with me.

Of course we couldn't get through the week without someone getting sick. Eli probably had the flu. Now that Aiden has had it twice and Eli has had it at least once, we are becoming experts. Eli did get a really high fever and I tried to take him to the ER but we sat there for 2 hours and had not even been triaged yet so I left. We knew what to do but were hoping to get him some tamiflu. I got him home and and to bed and we just let him have the next few days to heal.

Eli had to take a trip to Target with me one day and I tried putting bunny ears on him but he wasn't quite in the mood for that. I still think he looks cute. :)

Eli really missed having his friends and Aiden to play with during the day while he was sick.

After having the thermometer used so much on him, Eli said he was going to see if daddy was sick. Eli really does pick up on the things we say and do. He would tell Brad that he was sick and needed to stay and bed and drink lots of water. 

On Saturday morning, Brad decided to take the boys out so I could get my mid-term grades submitted. He took them to the commissary and exchange and they had fun. Aiden decided he doesn't like the new drink cups because "they make him use too many finger muscles." Brad and I started laughing and I said Mrs. Rusty (his OT therapist) would be so excited to hear that. We love these cups because they truly do not leak at all AND there are no dumb valves to clean or anything.

Saturday afternoon we played around the house but it was so nice out that the little boys and I decided to go to the playground at the elementary school down the street from us. We walked over there and played for a little over an hour. Here is Aiden on the top of the climbing dome thing.

Eli enjoyed riding on the 4-way teeter totter.

Here they are both climbing the dinosaur rock wall. Aiden (on he right) is doing the hard side and made it all the way up. Eli (on the left) had just decided he didn't want to do it by himself and started climbing down.

Eli and I had a battle of the wills the other morning. To make a long story short, he didn't get his way. It was a really tough morning for both of us. He has to learn that there are consequences to his decisions and crying will not reward him for the things that he wants. We just pulled in to daycare when I took this picture. He has no shirt on ... or socks ... or shoes. It was pretty chilly out too. Needless to day, once he got to his classroom he calmed down and put his shirt on and socks. He then had to eat breakfast at daycare for the first time because he chose not to eat at home. He settled down and started using his words and his world became much better. I must say, it would have been so much easier to give in and just let him get what he wanted (eat breakfast in his pajamas) but thought would have taught him that when he cries, he gets what he wants. No Buena.

Aiden had therapy on Tuesday. He got to practice hitting a ball while on a scooter board, catching and throwing bean bags while on a trampoline, and climbing up a rope into the spandex swing and then having to put on his socks once he was in the swing. The person that sees Mrs. Rusty after Aiden was going to do feeding therapy so Aiden asked, "when do I do feeding therapy again?" I said we could do it anytime and asked if next week was ok. He said, "no, I like playing better than eating." Haha.

There is this bridge on our way to therapy that Aiden has always wanted to stop at and walk on (it's a pedestrian walkway) and we stopped after therapy on Tuesday. He was so excited and had a blast just walking around. I felt like one of the semi-trucks was going to whack into the bridge but Aiden was not nervous at all. 

He said he wanted to bring Eli back with us and go on the bridge again. what a sweet heart this little boy has.

After therapy we came home for rest time. After an hour of no sleeping for Aiden, I let him up and he helped me paint a paper towel roll. I'm not sure what exactly we are going to do with it but it worked out perfected to paint on the paper towel holder in the cabinet.

So I apologize if the post below is gross. I've even made the picture smaller so it's not too gross. Below is a series of pictures from Aiden's arm. You can actually see it in the picture above (it's his right forearm). We took him to the dr on Monday and they are not sure if it's a brown recluse spider bite or this weird childhood rash/skin thing. It started off as a tiny little mark like he was bitten by a mosquito or something and then started growing. I meant to take a picture of it today because even though it has grown in size (it's about a quarter-size now versus starting off about a dime-size), it is actually looking better.

Yesterday the boys got a special treat - it was Brush Buddies day at daycare. It happens once a month and costs $12-15. They did it a few months ago for Christmas but they have been doing Big Green Bus rather than painting. They both asked to paint this month so Brad and I let them. Eli was in the 2nd group of kids. This poor child isn't sure if he's a righty or lefty but primarily used his left hand to paint on this day. He holds the brush all funny but he gets the job done. He was having a blast. He did a great job of following instructions. 

Aiden went in the third group. I wasn't planning on staying at daycare this long but both boys wanted me to see them paint and take some pictures. Aiden did a very good job as well. He used the correct grip only about 50% of the time but managed to do a pretty good job of staying within the boundaries of the cross. I was asked to take Aiden's group downstairs to the nap room after they were done. I didn't realize how long it would take all of them to go potty and wash their hands. Actually, going potty was pretty fast but for some reason, they only have one stool for the kids to use in the bathroom to wash their hands to when you have multiple potties but only one stool, there is going to be a long wait to wash hands or some nasty kids with dirty hands. I'm not sure why they don't bring in another stool because I think that would significantly speed things up. Either way, they all went potty and made it down to the nap room. 

The boys had fun this week at daycare. Next week will be a short week because they only go to daycare on Monday and Tuesday and then we head to TN to go to Chattanooga. Fun times.

9/7 - Bamboo Forest & Science Museum

We decided to go check out a local bamboo forest last weekend. Yeah. That seemed odd to me too that Alabama has a natural bamboo forest. It was really neat and reminded me of Maryland. The downside of the forest was that it was very small. We planned to be there hunting around the entire morning and it took about 20 min so we had to come up with another plan.

I did give the boys index cards with pictures on them of some things they had to find during our walk. They had fun doing it. Eli collected everything (that leaf he is holding is about as big as his head) in a little pencil box he carried around and showed it all to Nana later in the day when we skyped.

We decided to check out a new playground in Millbrook which is a neighboring small community. It was pretty cool and very similar to the castle park (aka Pratt Park) here in town. They had a blast running around and playing hide and go seek.

Here is Aiden walking the moving balance beam. He's getting pretty good at it. Saturday was the first day of college football so we were all decked out as a family. Needless to say, we got many weird looks at the park with people everywhere wearing Alabama and Auburn clothes.

We had a great time at the park and shockingly, the kids didn't wear themselves out enough because neither napped. Little stinkers. The boys had fun setting out all their Matchbox cars fold ups and playing for a few hours this week.

When eventually resorted to half naked jumping ... it's their new hobby and they are getting pretty good at it. Here are both boys taking their turn and getting some air. This was in the evening - check out Eli's huge belly from all the food he just ate!

Now that we finally got clothes on the boys and are getting ready for bed, Eli decided to play monster trucks by himself. That seems relatively harmless unless you have a crazy little boy name Eli in your house. This child eventually falls onto the corner of an end table and bonks himself square in the forehead.

After about 30 seconds of crying, he moved on and was fine. I felt horrible that I told him to brush it off seeing how immediately this huge bruise showed up on his forehead. Such a little trooper!

Brad has been very busy with schoolwork for the past few weeks. This is what he looks like for a good portion of most nights although sometimes he actually has to read textbooks rather than computer articles. You can see Twix in the background keeping his daddy company.

On Sunday, we decided to take the boys to the Science Museum in Birmingham on Monday. It was the last day of the Diego/Dora exhibit and they were even going to be there!! After getting stuck in a few accidents and some rain, we safely got there at about 10:30am. The line to see Dora and Deigo was huge!!! Thankfully, our boys really don't care. They were having so much fun wondering around on the 3rd floor which is where the exhibit was at.

Brad and I had a hard time keeping up with these boys. The place was crazy busy and the boys stayed together for about 30 minutes. We all stayed together and saw everything together and then the boys were too excited to wait for each other so Brad and I split up and each took a kid. These first couple pictures are of the boys in Pirate Ship. Aiden was putting coins in, they both played with the telescopes, and then Eli played with the coins for a bit.

After we spent a solid 20 minutes at the boat, we moved on to the spaceship. They boys both had a ton of fun "flying" the spaceship and pressing the buttons and moving the levers.

They had this huge section of hard foam blocks. It was so cool. The boys played on those for a while and Brad helped them build a cool little area. Because there were so many kids, the structure didn't stay up for long until kids knocked it down and started stealing pieces. Here is Eli rolling a cheese wedge thing in a canal he made.

Aiden had fun walking on the canal pieces for a while.

On the first floor, they have a really cool kids play area. They also have hands-on stuff for the kids to play with. Here are the boys in the house that is created for an illusion. The floor is slanted and the painted floor changes to make you appear like a giant towards the back of the room and tiny towards the front of the room. The boys are both looking up at the tv screen that has their picture on it.

Aiden moved on to the play area (and Brad went with him) but Eli was fascinated  watching himself in the tv. He was hysterical. I almost videotaped him. He was entertaining many people by dancing all around and laughing at himself on the tv screen. We stayed there for a while so he could dance around and laugh. I was smiling and laughing the whole time ... it was great.

The only way I got Eli away from watching himself on the tv screen was to mention bubbles. They had a whole section with huge bubble blowers. This particular blower that Eli has, was one of the smaller ones and he could fit his entire head in it. He thought popping the bubbles with his face was great. He's such an odd but adorable kid.

We finally got reunited with Aiden and daddy over in the kids area on the first floor. Here are the boys at the water table. Aiden lasted here about 2 minutes and of course, Eli could have stayed all day.

Aiden found a water toy that was less wet .... a water gun encased! He liked that for a bit.

Aiden got bored from the water stuff and wondered over to a different area and asked me if he could play with the sand. I got so excited. My OCD scared of dirt and sand child asked to play in the sand. It was awesome. The only thing Eli perhaps likes better than water is ... sand. Needless to say, we could have stayed in this area all day.

We finally got some lunch and Eli had a small breakdown. We were skipping naps so we weren't sure how Eli would respond so a breakdown was not really a surprise except that it happened at meal time and Eli normally loves food. Aiden wanted to take the steps back up to the Dora/Diego floor and Eli didn't so I took the elevator with him. Eli parked himself by this stack of cones and rings and played for about 10-15 minutes. He was having a great time. Such randomness.

We went to go find Aiden and daddy. We had to stop and trying and pump up the car tires. You actually had to be pretty strong to work the pump. Eli was doing his best to pull it up but couldn't budge it without help.

While still looking for the other half of our family, we went by Diego's wildlife hospital and took care of a tree frog. We x-rayed him, washed him, and here Eli is drying him off (the dryer worked via a pedal on the ground). He then took the tree frog over to his cubbie to feed him. It was a cute little area they had set up with all different kinds on animals. 

I eventually got Eli to go this giant screen that was pretty cool. Eli is the kid in the yellow shirt on the right. The bugs fall down and the computer program or whatever runs the bugs on the screen, can sense images and the bugs go around. As you can see, the bugs are stopping at Eli's head and falling off to his right. It was so cool.

We finally found Aiden and daddy so Aiden decided to try the bug screen too. His image is pretty cool. That's him below with his arms wide open and the bugs falling into a pile and then trickling off his left arm.  

We went back to the area with the big blocks and the boys built stuff for a while. The boys had no interest in actually meeting Dora or Diego so we didn't pursue that given the outcome of seeing those types of characters at Disney. :)  The boys built quite a few masterpieces but it was getting too stressful for both of them because their stuff would get knocked down by other kids. Aiden finally found a group of girls to play with. Eli continued to just roll over blocks and squares. I eventually gave a stern talking to main older boy who kept knocking down everyone's stuff. Thankfully he responded  well. Seriously though, shouldn't a parent be watching him and have to tell him to stop knocking down everyone's stuff. I told him "a good general rule of thumb is that if he didn't build it, then he can't knock it down."

Brad had to distract Eli from getting upset a few times with some tickles. He also finally found a way that Eli was content .... to build some Eli-size dominoes.

I'm not sure who was worn out more, Brad and I or the boys. We had an uneventful and rainy trip home. It took about 75 minutes to get home which wasn't too bad. We all had a blast and I'm thankful we could spend the day together as a family since Brad was home. We ended up buying a year membership at the museum because it would pay for itself it we go back one more time this year which I'm sure we will do. The kids had such a blast and we didn't even take that much time to look at the fishes downstairs and at the dinosaurs on the 2nd floor.

My college class has started and I don't have that many students to far this semester which would be nice. We'll see how enrollment looks as the end of next week though. I'm exhausted and need to get to bed since I have to wake up early and go to Awana training tomorrow morning. It starts on Sunday night but the Cubbies part of the club is no where ready to begin. We'll see how it goes.