so about last week

last week got a bit busy.

on monday, it was my birthday.

another year under my belt and

another number added to my count.

t h i r t y - t h r e e

ugh.

i do not like getting older.

but i had a nice day at work full

of treats, including my bff, kassie, stopping by

with an added dessert. 

then a normal monday night dinner with

the fam, including my favortie foods:

chicken pot pie with reese's peanut butter

cup cookie pie.

yes, it was amazing.

here are the girls baking for me.

tuesday, my parents watched the girls all

morning while i went to get my hair

cut and colored. 

it was a nice, relaxing few hours to myself.

they also finished painting the back door

in my family room, which is now FINISHED!

(i'll do a complete recap on our finished room later.)

my hair length before.

and after.

wednesday and thursday, i actually got to watch 

baby elle, kassie's little 11 week old.

it's the first time i've been around her on my own and

i loved getting to know this little peanut,

which i lovingly started calling "butter."

it fits her. 

wednesday, we went to kassie's.

brette was in school, so it was me, reid and elle.

at one point i actually had elle in my left arm, while

reid was in my right arm, both asleep.

i really wish i had gotten a picture.

it was so sweet. 

thursday, elle came to our house.

she basically slept the whole time because

she took a three hour nap.

it was killing brette because she just wanted

to hold, feed, play, watch baby elle.

obsessed.

and reid was so sweet with her, just giving her kisses.

(open mouthed, licking kisses, but still.)

             

friday, it was back to work and that

evening i worked the octoberfest in town,

then woke up and worked saturday morning.

busy. busy. busy.

and here we are on a new week.

let's get started.

elbow grease

there is something about being around a year old,

that my kids get injured.

remember when i had to take brette to the 

emergency room for her mouth?

well, a few days ago i had to run 

reid to children's mercy for a dislocated elbow.

i had actually heard of kids getting their elbow

dislocated (nursemaid elbow) because kassie is an OT and we had

talked about her having to calm down a crying

mother when kass had given her the news about her son.

i distinctly remember picturing this poor boy's

arms hanging awkwardly, while he screamed in pain.

in actuality, it's not like that at all.

in fact, i didn't notice it for a few hours.

(which i feel horrible about, ps)

i think i have a memory of pulling her up by her arms 

while we were playing in the playroom.

that's the only thing i can think of that would have caused it,

unless brette did something that i don't know about.

i guess it's pretty common and it CAN happen from 

something as simple as lifting them wrong.

(you should pick up kids by their trunk, 

never by their arms or legs.)

and i KNOW that.

i guess i just assumed that it would be ok and 

she would have had to be yanked on in order for it to do any harm.

not the case.

she was being fussy, but her front teeth are coming in,

so i blamed that.

i decided to give her a popsicle to snack on.

still fussy.

hmmm...

it was time for her morning nap, so 

i chalked it up to teeth + sleepy.

i gave her some ib profin and laid her down.

she tossed and turned and fussed in her crib, but

never actually fell asleep.

that is super odd for reid.

she takes a morning nap like a champ.

so i'm a little flustered because i don't know 

what's bothering her so much.

i go ahead and get her back up and it was

going on lunch time, so i decide she must be hungry.

(i mean really, what else is there?!)

THAT is when i finally noticed she was favoring her right arm.

not just favoring it, but would not move her left arm at all.

she was trying to eat everything one handed and 

lift her sippy cup with one hand.

her left arm stayed straight against her body.

so literally two and half hours later, i finally catch on.

i call kassie first, because hello, she's an expert.

if she lived closer i would have just had her come

over and fix it herself, but she told me to take her into the pediatrician.

i call them, but of course, everyone is at lunch.

the lady at the front desk can't get me in until 2:00.

um no.

she suggested i take her into a pediatric urgent care, 

which is located in children's mercy hospital.

i load up both girls, cussing that i had cleaned the 

house that morning and i look like trash.

i feel like if i'm going to take my child in for

an injury i (may or may not) have caused, i should at least look like a

person that would never purposely hurt their kid.

not, lets say, like someone that forgot to shower this week.

we get there and everyone is super nice.

can i just say how impressed i am with children's mercy?

their facility and staff were on point.

once we see the doctor, 

her little elbow is fixed in literally less than 10 seconds.

she immediately bends it which is a huge relief and

isn't crying or anything.

yay!

and then i'm pretty sure i side-stepped getting social 

services called on me by hair.

the doctor steps out of the room to print off our paperwork and

brette is "reading" a book next to me.

out of nowhere, she looks up and

says, and i kid you not, 

"why are you so angry?"

um? whaaa?

can you imagine if she had said that in front of the doctor

as i hold my baby that i (may or may not) have injured?

i would have died. 

DIED.

i wasn't mad or scolding her or anything.

she just said something random.

i'm telling you, my three year old is trying to get me.

be on the lookout.

all in all, it wasn't as bad as it could have been.

i would feel better about it if:

A- i could blame this on brette.

B- realized she was hurt within the first five minutes.

but it's a good lesson and reminder

that even though kids are resilient,

they're little bodies are still growing and 

we have to be careful.

here's children's mercy-east.

it was seriously so perfect for kids.

(but i'm hoping i never have to go back. ever.)

apples to apples

we found an adorable little 

apple orchard up north by a

recommendation from a friend.

last year was our first year to explore it -

brette was only two and reid, just a few months.

and although it was cute and brette had

a good time, this year was even better.

we brought madeline and eden along

for the day and the three girls had a ball

running around the whole farm together.

i am already excited for next year, when

reid will be able to keep up and really

enjoy herself too.

(i actually think she could have done more this year,

but wasn't feeling very well, so she sat on me a lot.)

the girls were most excited about picking apples

to fill their very own baskets

and going for a hay ride.

eden decided she was going to make an apple pie,

while brette and madeline just wanted me to

let them eat them right off the tree.

(i did a little washing first)

we had a picnic lunch,

shopped around their little store,

played pretend in the playhouses,

fed the chickens, and 

had a special treat from the cafe on site.

(the girls chose a rice crispy treat instead of the 

apple fritter i was pushing. its disappointing i didn't raise my girls better.)

it was a good day and i'm glad these 

girls are so close.

i didn't have any cousins my age growing up

so this feels like a such a bonus for our girls.

ronnie took turns lifting the girls up to the 

top of the trees so we could find some better apples.

and then of course, we had to eat some.

the girls were so funny while feeding the chickens.

brette and eden had no fears and went at them,

meanwhile, madeline and i tried to be brave but decided

we're not huge fans.

and ronnie thought it was pretty cool you could hand-feed

a turkey, so he stayed busy doing that.

its was the perfect day and a

great way to start off the fall season.

more teeth, more sleep

reid's been sick since sunday.

we took the kids to the apple orchard

and i thought she felt hot after.

she slept the whole way home, but even

after we made it home she

was so tired she couldn't get her head up.

she fell asleep in my arms at 5:45.

we had dinner without her and made

it all the way until 7:45 when she woke back up.

i did a quick diaper change, threw on her pj's, 

gave her some medicine and laid her back down.

she was up for maybe 10 minutes.

she woke up at 5:30am, so i gave her more medicine 

and popped that pacifier back in and

she didn't get up until almost NINE.

holy cow.

that little one slept almost 15 hours.

and then last night i laid her down about

7:45 and she didn't get up this morning until 9:30.

another 14 hours night.

it's teeth.

she's not throwing up, she doesn't have a cough

or a snot nose, no diarrhea - just a fever at night

with lots of sleep.

i checked her mouth this morning and i can feel

her one of her top teeth coming in. 

i don't remember brette being so affected by teeth,

but it's really taking it out of poor reid.

i am excited though.

i've been dying to see what she'll look like 

with an actual mouthful of teeth.

hopefully, all this sleep means

she's getting more than just one.

it's cooling off

september.

a good month.

my birthday month.

it starts feeling like fall.

the holidays start rapidly approaching.

my calendar starts filling up with 

family fall day,

an afternoon at the apple orchard and 

a field trip to the pumpkin patch.

i just love this time of year.

in fact, yesterday was my first day 

home after a weekend away, so 

once all my laundry was done, i

immediately started decorating the house.

i needed some pretty leaves and pumpkin

spiced candles in my life.

AND now that summer is over, it 

also means ronnie has to get back 

to working on the house.

i think he enjoyed his three months of summer off,

but i am ready to get a few things done around here.

don't worry, i already made him a list.

top priority and first on my list:

get the family room painted.

i am ready to cover our wood paneling and

hang some pictures.

i'm really excited to have all our trim finally match.

after the family room, then comes the entry way.

i'm excited. 

i left a few weekends open on our calendar, so

hopefully this can get done sometime SOON.

i'll keep you posted on our progress. 

summer sets

we went campering this weekend.

monday was labor day and since no

one had to work, it was a nice time to go.

unfortunately, i drew the short straw and had

to work on saturday.

ronnie went ahead and left friday.

he took reid to my parent's and

he and brette went down to set everything up.

i picked up reid saturday after work and met

them down there in time for a boat ride.

we had a nice afternoon swimming it just sucks because 

the girls never nap.

no nap is normally a recipe for disaster.

it's nice because we do community dinners

with everyone else down there so it takes

the stress out of mealtime when the girls hit a wall.

fortunately, there are so many other kids to play

with that brette never really gets awful and

they're both so tired after a long day in

the sun they go to bed after dinner with no fuss.

yessssss.

we spent the next day relaxing and

spent another afternoon out on the boat.

i took reid in the water for the first time.

jason and amy have a little intertube with a mesh 

bottom so i can sit in it and hold her.

she loved it and she 

would have stayed out a lot longer but

i got nervous about having her in the sun.

for real, i don't know how fast red-heads burn.

it freaks me out. 

brette pretty much stays in the water the whole time.

she is a little fish. 

oh, except for when she came on the boat to tell me she had to poop.

perfect.

i swam her to the ROCK shore,

where i killed my feet.

 i stripped her down,

let her sit on my arm and she took a huge shit in

front of the whole boat.

that's my girl.

next time, i'm sending ronnie.

it was a nice weekend away.

perfect weather.

fun company.

and a great end to the summer.

we had a similar day last year...

maybe next labor day reid will 

actually be awake for the family photo.

my so-called life

every once in awhile my old

calendar comes back and i actually have

a social life.

not that i don't see people.

it's just normally i have reid on one hip

while trying to make sure brette is playing nicely.

and most play dates involve at least five other kids.

those are fun too, but

a couple nights without the kiddos is surely appreciated.

we bought tickets LAST NOVEMBER

for a dixie chicks concert in august.

then in april, lindsay and i bought tickets

to a vintage market with guest speaker ree drummond.

hello pioneer woman.

i. am. in.

and finally last month i received an invite

to a bridal shower.

once i wrote everything down,

it ended up that these things were all within

four days of each other.

nothing like over-booking yourself.

so friday, i took off work and headed

downtown kansas city to the west bottoms.

this part of town is known for their antiques.

they have taken all the old warehouses and

turned them into huge shops.

it's amazing.

this event, called the vintage whites market,

 actually brought in shops and vendors who

set up booths for a lot of compact shopping.

plus, you were able to venture out to the warehouses as well.

and the best part, they had ree come in as their guest speaker.

linds and i bought the tickets that included the meet and greet,

so ree is now my new best friend.

that's why i call her ree and not the pioneer woman.

best friends do that.

you longtime readers know how 

obsessed i am with her show and her recipes.

it was a fun day and ronnie was able to spend 

some quality time with the girls after work.

sunday afternoon while the girls were napping,

i made my exit once again to go to 

adrienne's bridal shower.

i really wanted to go because we don't work

together anymore and i don't get to see her very often.

she's getting married in florida so we obviously

aren't going to the wedding, so i was happy to 

spend the afternoon with my old work buddies and catch up.

they also had the best "lemonade" ever.

for real, try this recipe.

and then two days later... DIXIE CHICKS!

anyone that knows me, knows i freak out 

over garth brooks and the dixie chicks.

they are my jam.

i was obviously crushed when DCX broke up

and i had never gotten to see them live. 

my college roomie, marge, is just like me.

we. heart. the chicks.

so last november her and i were going crazy,

buying tickets right when they went on sale. 

i've been, for real, counting down the months.

we had the most fun group of girls that all went.

of course, being a sorority girl, we don't do

anything without getting t-shirts made.

i came up with this little number,

and i think it's pretty great.

know the quote?

a little pre-party at dana's and then an uber ride later,

i had my singing voice ready.

i also managed to buy a beer in 

record time during a prince cover that

impressed even me.

i literally ran to the concessions, no line, 

and ran back within a minute.

i didn't want to miss a thing.

i was hoarse, but totally happy by the end of the night.

so the girls have had a few evenings with daddy.

but sometimes, my social life comes a calling and

i just have to answer.