Exhausted

I think this picture sums up perfectly how we felt at the end of the day!!

Mom

Lots of pictures of the boys... yes, I was on the boat, too!

Twenty-Ten:

The number that follows twenty-nine...

(Don't you think he should be the next face on the Life cereal box??? Again, notice Curious George...)

Harris Games

Another new Harris game... he will crawl to Jason with the harmonica in his hand, sit up on his knees, and put the harmonica to Jason's mouth, hoping Jason will play. Harris giggles and giggles when Jason plays! This little boy is a trip!

We Did It!

Caroline and I did it... we made our goal over a month before we had planned! We ran 32 minutes today, probably a little over 3 miles. The double stroller is a killer (imagine running and pushing a wheelbarrow with 50 pounds of bricks!), but it is added resistance, so we are just that much stronger! Yay us!

We are going to bypass the Grits Festival (unfortunately, it is a weekend neither of us will be able to do... I was so looking forward to the T-shirt!), and we are going to shoot higher... the Cooper River Bridge Run. Not sure if we will make the entire run as it is a 10K (6.4 miles), and one of those miles is straight up, but we are going to try. How exciting! Anyone want to join us?

Trouble

Jackson got in trouble at school today because he kept pulling his pants down on the playground. What is that about???

(Not So) Good Morning part 2

Harris actually slept this morning until 6:15!! What was the difference yesterday? He cried for about an hour of his 1 1/2 nap (Mean Mommy, I know...). He must have just been exhausted. I don't know what is worse right now, though, giving up a nap or waking up at 5:30... I'll have to think about that!

Why was it a not so great morning? JACKSON! I usually have to wake him up at 7:00, but this morning, he was up talking to his trains at 5:30. Ugh. If it is not one, it is the other. I guess that is how it goes with two, hmmm?

(Not So) Good Morning

Harris has decided that his day starts at 5:30am... I have decided that this is crazy. Almost every morning since November, he has woken up at 5:30 (at the latest!). I refuse to get up and get him, though, until 6:00, so we end up lying in bed, listening to him cry for at least 30 minutes. We have tried everything... later bedtimes, earlier bedtimes, toys in the crib, nothing in the crib, etc. I just don't know what to do to change this. In November, we joked about being excited for daylight savings time to end, but I am no longer thinking this is a joke! If you have any new ideas, please let us know... the time change is still a month away!!

Ring Update

No luck recovering it. Some friends lent us a metal detector, and Jason has gone out twice to try to find it, to no avail. Last night, our cell group met here, and they were all excited to go on a treasure hunt, even threatening to come in the middle of the night and dig up the shrubs that Jason was planting when he lost the ring! I think he has given up, though, and is headed to the jeweler later this week. Oh well... maybe it will show up someday...

"Wiggle on over to..."

"Ava's Birthday Party!". This was the headline to one of Jackson's girlfriend's birthday invitation. That boy was so excited to go that he memorized the invite, down to the location, date, and time! The party was at the Children's Museum, and many of his classmates were there... he had a blast playing with them outside of school. Of course, he bypassed lunch for the cake, going back to the cake table two or three times to try to swipe another piece. The best part was watching him play Ring Around the Rosy with the girls... they were loving him!
Jackson with the birthday girl.

Funnies

Harris has a new game: he will kneel, put his hands in the air, throw them down on the floor, and crawl as fast as he can towards me. When he gets there, he will bury his head in my lap and wait for me to pat his bottom or scratch his back! Little stinker knows how to get what he wants!

Jackson has become a rapper... Vanilla Ice, to be exact. When we get him a sippy cup, we will fill it with ice first. As we do that, he starts singing, "Ice, ice baby, doo doo doo... doo doo... doo doo... doo doo doo... doo doo... doo doo...".

Sarah

My great friend, Sarah, stopped by for a bit yesterday with her parents... it was such a nice visit. Sarah and I have been friends since grad school, and she has been an awesome friend... always there to listen or lend a hand. She and her husband, Jeff, moved back to West Virginia in May, and we have missed them terribly! Obviously, she is expecting her first baby... it makes me sad that I won't be there to help her and cook for her like she did when I had Harris. She and Jeff are going to be awesome parents, and I am so looking forward to meeting Baby Dodson!!

We love you, Sarah!!!

Curious George Part II

Jackson is in LOVE with Curious George!! We went to a children's store to buy a gift for a friend of his, and there was Curious George, waiting for Jackson to take him home. Of course, I indulged, and Curious George has now joined the family. He does puzzles with Jackson, he sleeps with Jackson, he reads with Jackson... it is too sweet.
One of his favorite things to do is to go to the Curious George Movie website. The website plays the music from the movie, and you can even watch the video... very cute. The theme song is great (I am loving Jack Johnson right now!), and Jackson loves to play it and dance... and dance and dance and dance. If you have a free minute, check it out and think of Jackson!

Running

Fordham and Harris are just chillin' in the stroller.
Caroline and I are on a mission... we are 5K bound. We have set a goal to run the St. George World Grits Festival 5K on April 15 (we are looking forward to the cool t-shirts!)! We started a "Couch to 5K" training program a couple of weeks ago, but we were both beyond the "couch" part, so we started about midway through and have been kicking tail ever since. We have committed to running together at least twice a week and at least once more by ourselves. We are not far from our goal now... it has been great to have Caroline's motivation and the beautiful weather! It won't be long until we are blogging about our Half Marathon and sprint triathalon goals!

Visitors

Over the weekend, we had a house full of visitors! The Blacks came and brought Matthew, and the Gandys came with Katherine. The SE Wildlife Expo was this weekend, and this seems to be a reunion weekend for all of us... for the most part, we have all gathered this weekend since Jason and I moved to Charleston. We also usually have an oyster roast. While it wasn't huge this weekend, we did eat lots of yummy oysters out in the cold. It was great to see everyone and to see how much the kids have all grown (and to meet Katherine!!). Hopefully, we won't wait so long to all get together again!

Sweet Dreams

This morning, at 5:00, Jackson woke us up laughing in his sleep. I wonder what on earth was so funny that he laughed hard enough to wake us up???

Curious George

Jason took Jackson to see his first movie today... Curious George. Lately, Jackson has been seeing George everywhere and has really taken an interest in him. So, when the movie came out, Jason decided to take him to see it. We were doubtful that he would make it through the whole thing, but he suprised us and loved the whole experience.

Jason said that Jackson ate an entire bag of popcorn, sat on Jason's lap for the whole movie, and even participated in parts of the movie... when the man in the yellow hat grabbed George and said "I gotcha!", so did Jackson, as loud as possible... Jason said that you don't realize how loud Jackson's voice is until you hear it in a silent movie theater!

I tried to get Jason to write this blog entry, but no luck. He described it so well. He talked about how awesome it was to watch Jackson, wide-eyed, watching the movie with a huge smile on his face... how amazing it was to see the movie through a child's eyes. Jackson loved every minute of it... he even came home and told me little bits about it. I'm thrilled that it was such a good experience, and I am looking forward to taking him to the next one!

Hooked

We were eating dinner tonight and forgot to turn off the TV. Harris just about fell out of his chair to see what was going on!

Playgroup

On Wednesday morning, playgroup was at our house. I had an appointment to get my hair cut, so everyone came here, played, and watched Harris (what great friends I have!!). The little ones had a blast, and Harris did well with all of the mommies around (or so they tell me!). Hopefully the weather will warm up and stay warm soon so we can play outside again!
DuBose, Fordham, and Mary Kathryn showed off their musical talents.


Look at those blue eyes!

Sad

Today at lunch time, Jackson was sitting at the counter in the kitchen. Out of nowhere, his little eyes filled to the brim with huge crocodile tears, and he started to cry. Hard. He never does this, so I was immediately alarmed. Of course I asked him what was wrong, what hurt, was it his tummy, was it his teeth, etc. No answer. The only response I got was "Sad". This broke my heart. Poor Jackson was sad enough about something to sob, and he couldn't verbalize what it was.

Eventually, after 5 minutes and lots of hugs and kisses, Jackson calmed down and ate his lunch. But, I was shaken. I can't believe I still don't know what was wrong. This has made me even more confident in our decision to move forward with his speech therapy. I know that all children move at their own pace when it comes to skills, verbal and motor, but I am tired of watching him grow frustrated when he can't say something or tell me what he wants or needs. It is one of the worst feelings. I am looking forward to the day that he can tell me exactly what it is that made him so sad.

Happy Birthday, Jason!!

You are an amazing daddy and husband... the best Valentine we could ask for!! Thank you for all you do.

We love you!!
Amanda, Jackson & Harris Bug

Dr. Jackson

Dr. Jan, the dentist, visited Jackson's class at school today. We haven't had much chance to talk about it yet, but I got this picture from the director of Little School today! I love it! Maybe there will be a dentist in the family someday...

Baby Harris

Such a cutie!!
Look at that hair!!! Will I ever be able to contain it?

Congratulations, Eglestons!!

Welcome to the world, Baby Mills!!

We are so happy that everything went well and that Mills arrived safely. Great job, Nancy!! He is a beautiful little boy, and we look forward to watching him grow up. Please let us know if we can do anything to help!

Love,
Jason, Amanda, Jackson and Harris

(I forgot my camera or I would have posted a picture. I will try to get one soon. Check out Nancy's blog to see some now!)

Lost

Jason was doing yardwork today and lost his wedding band. We searched and searched, but to no avail. We even tried to use a children's metal detector, but again, no luck. Poor guy feels terrible and is bothered by his naked hand (or so he tells me!!). I guess he is off to the jeweler this week to buy himself a new one. Ha... maybe he will pick up a new sparkly something for me, too!

Sunday Night Pictures

Just took some pictures as we were getting the boys ready for bed tonight... very cute!

Sad, Sad Day

Jackson has needed a haircut desperately for a couple of weeks now, and I just hadn't had a chance to get it done. Well, Saturday afternoon, I decided I would try to get him to HairBears before it closed. No luck, but down the way was "Oskars, A Family Barber". I figured a "family barber" would be able to cut a fussy three-year old's hair just fine... was I wrong. Not only is the haircut bad... it is really bad. I cringe every time I look at it. My little boy is gone, and I don't recognize the Jackson that is in front of me. It is not even close to even, anywhere. There are chunks missing here and there. There are still long strands that hang over in certain places, and from some angles, he looks like a little girl. I am so sad... I even teared up on the way home. I know it will grow out, and hopefully it will be soon. I miss my little boy!!

This is how we like it cut.
This is Saturday's "before" picture.
Saturdays "after" picture. Can you see how uneven it is?
Even worse in the back!!

Results

I have been busy, so I haven't gotten a chance to update you on all of the doctors' results we have gotten:

Harris -- the pediatrician called me on Friday evening to give me the Harris latest. He said that things are looking good, as good as they can be without him being perfectly well. His iron levels were up from 10.8 to 11.1 (normal is 12.0). What this means is that Harris' iron "storehouse" is growing and on its way back to where it should be. He looked at some other things (bone marrow, cell morphology, etc) and said it all looked normal. So, the end result is that we continue the iron supplements at the same dosage for at least another two months, and at Harris' 12-month appointment, we will have to go back and have another blood draw (ick) to recheck again. Hopefully by then he will have normal iron levels. I can't tell you how glad I am that we changed pediatricians... he is so much more proactive and confident about what he is doing. Why didn't I change earlier???

Jackson -- the speech evaluation went really well. What the therapist said was that he was doing well, but he had three issues to work on.

1. He doesn't initiate conversations.
2. He doesn't use many verbs or -ing words.
3. He rarely answers questions.

She gave us some tips to get started on working on some of this, and we have already seen some changes. We have two therapy sessions for March, when she will work with him and with me, teaching us both what we can do to address his issues. Jason and I are both really glad that we went... now maybe we can help him so he doesn't get so frustrated when we don't understand.

So, that is it for now... no more medical posts for at least another month!!

Bedtime Snack

Tonight, our babysitter gave Jackson pancakes with chocolate syrup for a bedtime snack. When we got home at 10:00, she couldn't understand why he was still awake...

Another Harris Update

We went to the ped. this morning to recheck Harris' ear infection and to discuss his anemia situation.

Good news... ear infection is gone.

Bad news... the old ped. hasn't sent the boys' records over yet, so the anemia discussion was difficult without his old results. The solution: to get more lab work and thus new results. I guess this is a good thing, as the new ped. wants to get a good picture of what is going on. Hopefully he will have Harris' old records soon, so then he can compare both sets of results and see if Harris is getting better.

So, we were off to the lab to have more blood drawn... ugh... I hate that part. Poor guy just screams and screams. He quieted down a bit when I sang to him, but he was so upset. To make it worse, his vein just kind of shut down, and there was very little blood coming out. We thought they were going to have to switch arms and try again, but the woman doing the labs said that she had just enough to do what she needed.

We should have results by Friday. Hopefully they will be good, as I am monitoring the iron in his diet like a hawk. I will let you know as soon as I hear something!

Emergency

On Friday morning, I got a call from Nancy. Her voice was a little shaky, and as she is due to have a baby any day, I thought she was in labor. No luck. She said that little DuBose had fallen, cut his head open and needed stiches. Knowing that I would be in a state of panic had it been one of my children, I grabbed Harris (Jackson was in school), jumped in the car, and was at Nancy's in 60 seconds flat (she lives about 5 doors down).

She answered the door with poor little DuBose in her arms, both of them covered in blood. I immediately took DuBose from her so she could get dressed and ready to go to the ER... that little boy was amazing. After all of that trauma, he just lay in my arms, calm as could be. Once Nancy was dressed, we hopped into my car (thank goodness Jackson was at school... there was an extra car seat!), and headed to the ER.

You may be asking where DuBose's daddy was... we were all asking that question at that moment!! Nancy is due any day, and her husband wasn't answering his cell phone and couldn't be found at work. Nancy, if you didn't give him a nice long lecture, there are at least 4 of us that would be willing to do it for you!!

Needless to say, we got to the hospital safe and sound, and DuBose received 6 stitches. Nancy's blog has pictures and the full story. She was way too nice to me... I only did what any mom or friend would have done, and I know that she will be there to help me when it is my turn to go to the ER!!

We are so glad you are feeling better, DuBose... you are going to be a lady killer!

Can You Hear Me Now?

We are back from the audiologist... Jackson's hearing is just fine. He did well there... much better than I had thought. They do a great job of keeping the kids occupied by playing games with them to test the hearing. What a relief that is over... on to the next appointment!

Happy Birthday, Tracey!!

You are the greatest friend, best swimming teacher, and our favorite babysitter!!! Thank you for all that you do for us! We hope you have the best birthday... eat lots of cake (we can run it off tomorrow)!!


We love you, Miss T!!


Amanda, Jason, Jackson and Harris Monster

Come On, Baby Mills!!

We are waiting for you! Your mommy (Nancy) got a freezer full of dinner, monogrammed crib sheets, and lots of other goodies at our shower for her last week... we are all ready for you to make your appearance! I will be sure to drag her out of the house to go walking every day this week... will that help to get you out of there???

Jackson

I am just showing off the cutest three-year old around! He loves play-dough now... his favorite game is to make a bunch of trains with the train cookie cutter we have, name them, and have them "puff along" his tray. I love it!

We are off to the audiologist today... just the first appointment in a line of them to get his speech stuff going. Next week we have an appointment with the speech people. Hopefully they will get us on the right track soon!

A Day at the Park

We spent Saturday morning at the James Island County Park... it was a beautiful day, and I am so glad we spent it outside! The boys loved the playground... what a great way to burn off energy and to plan for longs naps!! Hopefully the weather will stay this nice and we can start running out there again...

Harris Update

At the end of last week, Harris was extremely fussy and has a fever on Friday. So, we headed to the new pediatrician (I have officially switched now). Poor guy had another ear infection.

I am so glad that we went... I love the new doctor! Our wait was next to nothing, and he was very thorough. We spent 30 minutes with him while he took Harris' history, Jackon's history, and a brief history from Jason and me. He said that he couldn't do too much without Harris' test results (which are on the way to his office), but he gave me some comfort on the whole anemia thing. The old pediatrician prescribed quadrupling the amount of iron he was getting (1/2 tsp twice a day). The new pediatrician prescribed the recommended amount (1/4 tsp once a day). I am glad, as there is a warning on the side of the bottle saying "Iron poisoning is one of the leading killers of children under 6...". I'm sure the old ped.'s prescription wouldn't kill him, but I really wasn't comfortable giving him that much!!!!!

Anyway, as we were leaving the new ped. told me, as Harris flirted with him over my shoulder, that Harris was "awesome"... what a great way to end the appointment!!