It's Flying

This summer is flying by

I'm not taking the time to blog so I'll recap
 and will hopefully find time to go in a little more detail later

I've been reminded that school registration online is already open
I'm putting if off until the very last minute because I'm not ready to go bankrupt

I'm also not ready to have my baby start his last year at elementary school

and my oldest start his last year in middle school
Say what!?!?
I'm just not ready for all that stuff
When I became a mom, people told me time would fly but as Junie B. Jones would say,
woweee wow wow
Can't they just stay little so I can read them Junie B. Jones books again?

I saw this picture last week and got teary
This was taken a year ago

This was taken last week

Not the best picture but someone please put a brick on that boys head

I know there will come a day when he won't take a selfie with me so I'm treasuring every picture I get
My heart bursts with love for this boy


TRIP

We took a trip!
I'd like to call it a vacation but I read this and decided it wasn't a vacation, it was a trip
Yes, I finally took a day off work so we could go away over the 4th of July
We went to Wisconsin to spend some time with my brother and his family
My parents were also there at the same time
Great memories made in a few short days

Lake Michigan was COLD but it didn't stop these kids

Our trip wouldn't be complete with out this
Ice cream from Cedar Crest Dairy

Fire works on the 4th

Bro and Sis Coke cans
Oh and I love the seagull photo bombing us 

The Belmont cow
We stop at the cow every time we go to Wisconsin

BASEBALL
The summer ball season is over and it was an exciting year

 Parker's team took 1st place in the championship
This kid struggled to hit all year, he was the youngest and smallest on the team and just didn't have it
Then tournaments started and the switch flipped; the boy hit an in the park homeroom
Where was that all season?
Dad got to help coach the Bridgestone team
I was so proud of him for building the kids back up after the other coach would tear them down
Yes, it was one of those years and we're glad it's behind us

Spencer's team took 2nd place in the championship for their age bracket
Spencer's coach (back left) was fa-nominal and so positive
He wasn't all about winning like a lot of the coaches
Spencer did some catching and pitching and has decided to play fall ball this year

AMELIA

Our princess turned 4 and I forgot her birthday

Oh my goodness, we love this girl and she knows it


WORK
Work has been weird
 I'm so ready for normal what ever that might be
My coworker took a job in a different department July 1st
I've been working extra hours and spent the last week and a half training my new coworker
Later this week I start my new hours of 8-2
Life will be grand!


BIG NEWS
I started making time for ME
Yep, that's the BIG NEWS
My kids are in a million activities,
the hubby bowls
and
I do nothing
So I got frustrated, basically blew a fuse and told them that it was time I took some time out for ME
I signed up for 4, 5k's and 1, 10k
Yes, this is what I consider fun!
The night before a race, we pick up our race packets, have supper and shop for cute race clothing
How much more fun does life get?
We walk/run the race and then treat ourselves to Starbucks or a donut
I have some pretty amazing friends who are weird like me and love doing 5k's so it's great
When mama gets some "me" time, I'm much more enjoyable to be around


Well, that's a recap
We're planning one more trip before school starts
and the boys have a summer bucket list we haven't even got to
I hope the month of August creeps by

Our plans for SUMMER break

Dang it, it's hard being a working mama

I wish I would have treasured those summer days more when I was home with the kids

We're just going to make the most of it this year

I found out last week that my work schedule will be changing

For the last 10 months, I've worked 11-5

Starting July 1st, my hours will be 8-2

I'm not sure what to think 

The boys will be home longer by themselves

I kind of liked having the mornings to myself to run errands and get things done

but 

getting the kids supper and to ball practices and games by 5:00 is tough

I'm a morning person so it will be nice to get my day started early and get it over with

It's going to take some adjusting but I think it will be great

As for our summer plans:

We will be playing ball until the second week in July

We have a trip to Wisconsin planed

We will be taking the boys to the Iowa State Fair for the first time

I'm sure we'll be spending time at the Aquatic Center

We plan to do lots of reading

We'll be making a lot of smores in our new outdoor fire pit

Yesterday was the boys first day of SUMMER break

I left them a list of jobs to get done

One of the jobs was to write 10 things they would like to do this summer

Here are their lists:

Spencer

Go to Sky Zone

     Go  fishing

Go to the Aquatic Center

Stay up late

Be AWESOME

Go to Wisconsin and do fun things

Have a fire in the fire pit

Learn to play the piano

Go for a long bike ride

Go to Grandma's a lot

Parker

Go to Sky Zone

Make hot dogs on the fire

Have steak

Have smores

Go to Happy Joe's

Buy 5 things at the Dollar Tree

Stay up late

Play baseball with the family

Eat 2 pies 

Library stuff (The summer reading program)

Do you think Parker was hungry when he made his list?

I laughed reading them because for one,
I was impressed that the things they want to do are not over the top like I thought they would be
and because the lists have their names written all over them

Spencer is all about being awesome and Parker only thinks about food

The boys are enjoying sleeping in and today they'll be hanging out with Grandma

How much better can it get?

Summer Break 2015

The boys are officially on SUMMER break

I can't believe we have another school year under our belts

On our way to school Friday, Spencer reminded me that he'll be an 8th grader next year

What that heck!?!? 

Excuse me, I'm feeling a little nauseous

We celebrated the last day of school with Dunkin Donuts for breakfast

Parker got to go to the Aquatic Center with his school

Spencer had field day

and we got Tees ice cream and closed the place down

Hello SUMMER! 

31 days until our family vacation but who's counting

Life Lately

Life lately has been keeping us on our toes and making us feel incredibly blessed

We are in the home stretch of the last month of school

with a million activities to fill the last 2 weeks

Spencer was given the Best Attitude award at his orchestra concert last week

and also got an award for getting a 1- on a solo and ensemble piece

We have a choir concert Thursday and movie night at school this Friday

Baseball practices have started and oh my goodness how we missed being at the ball field

The boys LOVE playing ball and we LOVE watching them

Opening ceremonies was Saturday and we had gorgeous weather
Whats not to LOVE about ball park food, sunshine and great friends 

 While there is no place we'd rather be, practices 3-4 nights a week take time from other things

Two months ago, I was asked by the PTO to treat our teachers for Teacher App. Week

Last week was THE WEEK and we delivered 52 gifts every day

with an added bonus of breakfast on Friday for all of the staff

It was fun but I've never been so happy to put all my craft stuff away
Maybe this is why I don't get any of my own projects done

I'm not sure why I thought it would be a good idea to add a little more work to our lives but we did

After wanting to remodel one of our bathrooms since the day we looked at our house (15 years ago),

things are finally starting to come together

The corner shower leaked after multiple caulk jobs so I finally said, THIS IS IT!

I should say that more often because things happen when I say that

I spent a month picking out a shower (I could never build a home- there are too many decisions)

In my mind, I knew I wanted this particular corner tub we had seen at Menards

but kept thinking it would be too big

I didn't want to have my knees shoved in the side of the tub when I was on the toilet

We measured and measured and drew lines - I'm a visual person

In the end, we decided to GO BIG

Here's a  photo of the work in progress:

The old leaky corner shower
 

We had to do some floor repair due to the leak

I'll post more pictures of the bathroom when it's done

While all of our projects were in full swing, 

I fit in a few Dr appointments for myself  that I had been putting off

I've had a sore on my foot since December that I tried to treat myself but it didn't work

It was a deep plantars wart that's going to need some more attention

Bummer!

Two days later I had an appointment for a yearly lady exam and some blood work

What should have been a quick exam ended up being a 2 hour appointment

My Dr. found a lump in my right breast

4 days later (the longest 4 days of my life) I had a mammogram and ultrasound

So far everything looks good but I'll be seeing a surgeon later this month

Mother's Day was a little more sentimental than it has been in the past

A week prior, I wasn't sure what my future would look like

Life can change in the blink of an eye

I'm so thankful that I'm on the other side of this and blessed

The boys made me breakfast and cards on Sunday and we spent the evening with my parents

Our jobs are going well

The hubby is working a lot of over time
 and I'm thrilled to be working in a t-shirt rather than my parka

I had my 9 month review last week that went fabulous

My boss is kind of a negative nancy so I was dreading my first review

A great review and a raise can turn anyone's day around

Our vacation plans are in the works

I've worked 9 months with NO vacation
This was quite a change from the flexible schedule I had before

Come the end of July I will FINALLY have vacation time and I'm going to CELEBRATE
So far we have 2 trips planned

Well, that's a wrap up
I'm hoping to write more blog posts this summer

Vacation

Spring break

The boys just finishing up Spring break 

I could really do without Spring break

It's usually too cold for the kids to do much outside

In my opinion, ten and a half days off is a bit much for a Spring break

I think it's basically for the teachers to take one last breath so they can get through the year

The boys enjoyed it though

We started the week off by meeting our new cousin John Hadley

We let the boys stay out later in the evenings playing with friends

My mom was AMAZING like we know she is and took the boys several afternoons

and

we did some grilling and had strawberry floats



Welcome Spring 

Today the boys went back to reality
School and Iowa Tests of Basic Skills
What a way to break them back in

Playing catch up

Where did February go?

Seriously wasn't it just Christmas?

 I'm playing catch up on the blog today

February was a fast but incredible month

We had beautiful snow with lots of cold days but my oh my were the snowflakes pretty

We had a lot of important doctor appointments

Parker was backed off on his allergy meds because of  the bad reaction he had in January

His Dr. decided to go back to the blue serum

He got 1 dose in IC and 2 doses here in town

When it was time to get back up to the dose he had the reaction to, we went back to IC

The doctors and nurses at Town Square Allergy and Asthma Clinic are fa-nominal

Parker did AMAZING and we are back on track with the yellow vile

He has been a champ through this entire thing 

and we hope to get to the maintenance phase by the end of March

Can I get a whoop whoop?!?!

That will mean 2 shots a month instead of once a week

Spencer saw a new neurologist this month

We decided to switch his care from the University 

when his doctor wanted to take him off of his migraine medicine last Spring

He has done so well on it, I hated to take him off if we didn't have to

Why ruin a good thing?

Dr. Stern agreed and he's staying on his medicine

Spencer doesn't go to the Dr. very often {He's the healthier child}

and we got to get a true weight and height check while we were there

5'0 and 104 lbs 

I hosted a baby shower for my sweet cousin last weekend

She will be blessing us with a bouncing boy any day

That growing boy of ours turned 13 last Sunday

Where does the time go

Spencer had a choir concert Tuesday and an orchestra concert Thursday this last week

These kids keep us on our toes

He'll be participating in the solo and ensemble again this month so lots of practice happening here

We can't believe Spring break is in 2 weeks 

Time flies when Life happens

Allergy shot update

Last week I wrote a post about Parker's scary reaction to an allergy shot 

Here's that post 

Here's the update:

After talking to his Dr. and nurse in IC, we all decided it would be good for him to be seen up there

before we continued any more shots here in Muscatine

Parker and I made the trip last Thursday 

We saw his doctor, we explained everything that happened and

 we showed pictures of his swollen arm and the hives that covered his back, chest and neck

I took the bottle of serum that they had taken the shot from with us

The nurse was going to measure out each dose to see if he was given more than he should have been

They were short staffed due to two nurses having babies the same week  so that didn't happen

Parker's doctor held up a bottle that was missing one dose (.05) and Parker's bottle

There was a noticeable difference in the amounts

Our guess is that Parker was given .5 instead of .05

When we're putting an allergen in a body, this is serious stuff

I've gone through the emotions

I understand mistakes happen but when I'm putting the health

 and well being of my child in their hands,

I expect the right dose of medicine to be given!

Parker's doctor is fabulous and always asks Parker how he's doing

She faced him and asked him if the reaction was scary

I never in a million years would have expected him to say yes

but he did and my heart broke

She asked him if he wanted to continue to do shots 

and explained that the reaction he had wasn't normal

I didn't want him to feel pressured in any way to keep going with the shots

I was having seconds thoughts myself

Parker decided to continue getting allergy shots

They backed him up a little so we are back to the blue bottle of serum

He got a shot the day we were in IC and had NO reaction

He will get 2 more shots from the blue serum in Muscatine 

( I will be watching the dosage like a hawk)

and then we will be going back up to Iowa City to get the dose that gave him the reaction

His doctor wants to be the one giving that shot in case he has another reaction

There's a small chance that it could be the way that bottle of serum was mixed

or it could be that his body just isn't ready for that dose

but they're guessing he was given too much

I'll be updating again in a few weeks

We couldn't be more proud of Parker, he's such a trooper!