Happy Yoyo

Last Thursday Lily turned 2! We made a quick trip to Houston to pick up Jhonny and went to Olive Garden to celebrate her birthday (April 10) and our anniversary (April 11 & 12).

Friday we got ready for Lily's birthday party. I tried my hand at cake decorating. It turned out better than I expected! Jessica was jealous that I haven't done something like that for her, but I promised to try again for her party. Then Jhonny and I went out for a date. Saturday we finished the final touches and waited for our guests.

Friends and cousins came. We played in the backyard. We sat and talked. We ate cupcakes and rootbeer floats. We pulled strings on a piñata. We opened lots of Dora gifts. We played some more and then our guests left. We cleaned up. We went to another birthday party for our neighbor's daughter. We came home. The girls went to bed. Jhonny cleaned up more. I worked on sharing time for Primary. We went to bed late. What a great day.

All week Lily was singing a song, "Happy yoyo." It wasn't until I turned the volume up on the strawberry shortcake movie in the car that I realized the song was "Happy Birthday to you." She loved getting phone calls from her aunts, grandma and friends to sing Happy Birthday to her over the phone.

From what I am discovering, Dora is sort of losing popularity in the birthday party department, but not for Lily. She is obsessed. I don't really know where she discovered Dora. One day she asked to watch it (I didn't know she knew it existed) and now her first words to me in the morning are, "I want Dora and Boots!" Last night at the neighbor's house, she found the remote control for their TV and came up to me with it and said, "Dora, mom. Gimme Dora!"

Needless to say, she had a great birthday party.

Allergies Part II

The good news is Lily is not allergic. So the doctor who told me last summer that she was merely suffering from allergies when her nose would not stop draining and I feared an ear infection which she did develop within days was sadly mistaken. She has little to no allergies at all. No wonder the very expensive Clariton that he prescribed did NOTHING for her. I'm pretty sure the poor girl was suffering from a sinus or upper respitory infection. Definitely NOT allergies. Now at least for the future I can say - she was tested. This is not an allergic reaction.
Jhonny, on the other hand, has a problem. He tested severely or stongly allergic to just about everything they pricked him with. All oak trees, ragweed, cedar, dustmites, cats, etc. Everything but food and mold. He will be starting a series of shots because as the doctor said - it's impossible to avoid the things he is allergic to. His allergies are so bad right now that he can scratch his skin and it turns into a welt.
His comment to the doctor, "But I never had allergies until I moved here from Venezuela." Naturally, I thought. What vegetation is there on a beach, but palm trees, the one tree he is NOT allergic to? My thoughts - he was just never exposed before he moved here to the land of vegetation.

Men and Medicine

Tomorrow we head to the allergist to find out what Jhonny and Lily are allergic to and hopefully clear up this constant sinus problem that is keeping both Jhonny and I awake at night.
I'm sure other wives can relate to the fact that if it weren't for me he would never go to the doctor. I've bugged him over the years to go, but he never gets around to calling and making the appointment. I didn't bother this time. I called myself.
Do single men ever go to the doctor? Or is it just my husband who doesn't know how to pick up the phone and admit that he has a medical problem?

Conference Bingo

This weekend when we explained to Jessica that it was General Conference, she eagerly asked if we were going to do our Conference Bingo again like last time. It's amazing how quickly 6 months passes. It seems like yesterday that we were trying out this new gimmick to get Jessica (and some others) to stay awake and pay attention to conference. I assured her we would and stocked up on the M&M's and Jellybeans for the game. I think we have started a new tradition that hopefully will make pleasant and positive memories for our kids during Conference.

We set up conference on the TV in our living room thanks to a nifty cable Jhonny bought to hook up the computer to the TV screen. The Bingo works pretty well for 5 year olds who might not otherwise listen to a word going on. She actually looked forward to all four sessions and never complained that we didn't do much else all weekend! Wow. I don't think I ever sat through two days of conference at her age.

It didn't work so well for our almost 2 year old however. She ate all her pieces within the first fifteen minutes and tried to steal everyone else's. She pretended to play along for a little while, but ended up in a nap before the first session was over.

Overall, I enjoyed watching conference and sustaining our new Prophet. My favorite talk however came at the very end by Elder Ballard. He spoke to mothers. How appropriate! I loved his advise to maintain sanity by finding time for ourselves and enriching our lives so that our buckets will get replenished to give to everyone else. Enjoy the fleeting moments, and don't overschedule yourself.

The best advise had to be when he spoke to husbands and children about what they could do for mothers - give her appreciation, validation and a break once in a while, do your chores without being asked, say THANK YOU more often, and give her hugs and tell her you love her! Amen and Amen!

His words reinforced exactly what I have been feeling in the past few months as I've eased into this stay at home full time mom routine. It was very validating. My only regret was that I didn't have more room in my journal to get it all down. I will be reading this one for sure!

April Fools

It occured to me this morning that it's April Fools Day. It's not really a frequent holiday celebrated around here. I only remembered because Jessica said something about it yesterday.

Jessica: Mom, can we have Lily's birthday party tomorrow for April Fools Day?
Me with a confused look on my face: No.

I tried to think of some brilliant joke to play, but I think I was already played by the Insomnia Fairy and my brain wouldn't work.

Nose Bleeds

Jess had her first nose bleed at school yesterday. Cause? No idea. This morning I found some evidence of another one last night. Later I found even more evidence on her bed. I still don't know the cause.
I tried to think back to my own nose bleeds. I don't remember mom ever taking them too seriously, but they usually occured from hitting my nose or something. She didn't seem to even think she had had one. If she didn't hit her nose, where is it coming from?
It's a mother mystery to solve. I'm waiting to see if there are reports of another one today.

Insomnia

I woke up last night at 2 am. I do almost every night, but last night, I couldn't go back to sleep. My mind was busy keeping me awake as I planned two upcoming birthday parties and wondered if I should maybe write the ideas down somewhere since inevitably I will forget my brilliance. Then my mind moved on to other things.
I am currently writing my life history while I still remember it. I was up to preparing to go on my mission and stopped to take a break. So I was thinking about my progress and if there was anything I had left out and writing and rewriting the whole thing in my head. I wondered if I wasn't in too much of a hurry to get to the present. Maybe I should slow down and put in more details. . .or maybe I should erase some parts??
I'm tempted, but as difficult as it may be to write - my grandmother has inspired me. I just finished her story and she left in the parts she probably would rather have erased. I was grateful. As difficult as it must have been to write, I know that without conflict, there isn't a story. Her justification of trucking through the mud? "If I don't tell the whole truth, what's the point of writing it?" I have to agree. It's a painful process at times to relive the embarrasing naive choices and mistakes of my youth, but if I leave them out who will benefit and who will want to read it?
I hope that someday when my grand daughter is feeling rather dumb at making a silly mistake and wonders if she is the only one, she will find hope in my story that she is not and there is redemption. Maybe she will even gain something from my mistakes. I do plan on being a miraculously perfect human being by the time I die by the way.
Anyway, after lying there for over an hour, I finally got up and went into the other room as to not disturb my sleeping, snoring husband (perhaps that was part of the cause?) who is suffering from rhinitus of Spring Allergy Season, and opened my story. I wrote until 6 am before I quit and decided I might finally fall asleep for an hour before having to get up. I tiptoed into my bedroom to find my husband now up studying for his big presentation tomorrow.
He wanted to talk. I wanted to sleep. After twenty minutes of mm-hmms, I finally informed him that I intended to get some shut eye before I had to be up in 40 minutes. He left me alone and I finally slept. That is until 7am when I woke up to help get Jessica on her way to school. Fortunately Jhonny was home this morning to take her. He does when he doesn't have to take off for work at 3am.
Lily of course wouldn't let me go back to bed. Now I'm up and I can't sleep again. It's 1:30pm and I'm still in PJ's as is Lily who is taking her nap. Some days are like that I guess. If only I didn't have to go get dressed so I won't be entirely embarrassed as I pick up Jessica from school. I envy those who get to wait for a school bus to bring home their precious children. 1/2 mile more and I could have enjoyed that luxury myself. Sigh.