Friday, February 29, 2008

Girl's Night Out

I got out of the house last night! Jason stayed home with all 3 kids, and I don't know what he did to them, but it worked...Reed and Kyle slept from 9:00 PM-2 AM! JR told me this morning, "Don't worry, Mommy, Daddy took good care of me." We had our monthly KD dinner last night, I don't know if it was just being out of the house, or maybe it was the margaritas ;-) but I had a great time. It was a small crowd last night (just Laurie, Lisa, Amy, and me) but we sure had lots of laughs. Jason is leaving tonight for Argentina for work and he'll be gone a little over a week. I know he will miss us, but I think he is secretly looking forward to full nights of sleep!

Wednesday, February 27, 2008

Jason and Jan Plus 3

How many of you out there watch Jon and Kate Plus 8 ? If you don't you must check it out on TLC on Monday nights or on Discovery Health. (Quick overview, a couple has twins then 4 years later they have sextuplets and it's a "reality" show of their lives) Jason and I love watching it just to make fun of Jon and Kate and JR even watches it. He says, "Mommy I want to watch The Bad Kid Show." I use this show to teach JR how not to behave. The kids scream, cry, and hit constantly. I can handle the 3-year olds crying, but one of the 7-year-old twins cries nonstop and she drives me crazy. Kate is totally controlling and tells Jon what to do, how to do it, and how it should be done. Poor Jon is just a beat down shell of a man who looks miserable at all times. Kate complains all the time about how exhausted she is (even though she has a maid, babysitter, and people who fold and put away her laundry, not to mention a TV show that gives them toys, clothes, and trips as product placements) Anyway, all that to say that Kate once said something to the effect that everyday was excruciatingly the same, yet completely different. It hit me last night that I know exactly what she meant. With the little boys eating every 3 hours our schedule is pretty rigid. I know each day we'll go through 16 bottles, at least 16 diapers, Kyle will scream part of the night, and I'll have laundry to wash and fold. Yet, seems like something new pops up each day too. Like right now, I'm typing this with Reed lying across my lap asleep. He has decided that he has not been getting enough Mommy Time...If I haven't been holding him today, he's been crying. Also this morning, JR and I were waiting for the bus on the porch when he started doing the bathroom dance. Thank goodness for boys...he went right there off the porch, but as he was going, the bus pulled up. Poor thing, he was jumping and flailing and trying to get his pants pulled up and run to the bus at the same time. It was hilarious! So, sure things can get monotonous around here, but there's always something new and exciting just around the corner!

Monday, February 25, 2008

I did it!

Today was my first day with the babies without any help, and I did it! I even had a lot going on today, so I wasn't just sitting here feeding and holding. Jason and I both got JR ready for school (it's so hard getting up in the morning, especially since the boys thought they needed me to hold them til 4 after their 2AM feeding). I wasn't sure how I was going to manage getting JR out to the bus, and when I saw how good the boys were sleeping this morning, I knew I had to figure something out that didn't involve waking them up. Usually we meet the bus at the end of the driveway, but that would mean I would have to get the boys up and in their stroller. So JR and I sat on the front porch and I left the door open so I could hear what was going on inside. Luckily we can hear the bus coming, so JR took off running down the sidewalk and made it to the driveway as the bus was pulling up. They have a bus monitor that helps them get on the bus, so I'm able to just stand on the porch and wave. The little ones were still sleeping when I came back in, and they let me catch about a 45 minute nap with them before they were ready to eat. After feeding the guys their mid morning meal, I even managed to take a shower. Jason's former boss from our China days and his wife came over to bring us lunch and see the babies, so I had to be presentable. They brought Chinese food from Chinatown...it tasted just like our Ayi used to make. Yum! Then I had to be at JR's school by 2:30 for a conference. I got the babies ready and we made it to school on time. Thank goodness they were on their best behavior, they slept through the whole thing. All in all, I'm just happy to have done it on my own. I was able to get out of the house and make it through the day without any of us having a meltdown!

Friday, February 22, 2008

Big Busy Day

We had a big busy day today. JR went for his “interview” at Second Baptist today. (We’re hoping to send him to school there next year.) They call it an interview, but JR said they played centers, made a craft, had story time, and had a snack. I talked to the head of admissions and she told me they really enjoyed JR today. And why would I be talking to the head of admissions you ask? Well, JR came home with a huge bite mark on his arm…Can you believe it? A kid bit him! JR hasn’t bit anybody since he was 2. What kind of kid is still biting at 4? We grilled JR about what he had done to get bit…”Did you hit him? Did you take a toy away from him?” But he kept insisting that he hadn’t done anything and that he didn’t hit the kid back, and that he went and told the teacher. Jason and I believed him because JR is really good about telling us what he has done wrong, and since he has been in PreK, JR has found his love of tattel-telling, so his story sounded about right. And it was. The admissions lady told me that JR had been standing there and the kid wanted the toy JR had, so he bit him. After I picked JR up from Second and got him to his PreK, I had to go get Reed and take him to Texas Children’s. Let me just say I feel like such “country come to town” when I go to the Medical Center. I drove down there without any problems, and I only had to circle around twice to get to the parking garage…so I was pretty proud of myself. Then it got a little tricky, there were no parking spots in the parking garage so I asked the parking attendant what I should do, she told me to valet. Who knew you could valet at a hospital?! So that’s what I did. (BTW, it’s $15) Of course now came the hard part of actually finding where I was supposed to take him. Texas Children’s is huge! I literally went to 3 different buildings before I found the right place. Reed had his ultrasound on his hips to make sure they were okay. He was so cute laying up there having his ultrasound. The bed was so big and he is so little! He slept through most of it and was very cooperative. They said his hips looked good and his legs should continue to straighten out. I was super proud of myself for being able to find the freeway without getting lost, and I didn’t get hit by the metro tram either….Yeah me!

Tuesday, February 19, 2008

The Mistreated Ones

Poor JR and Hunter just don't get the attention that they are used to (especially Hunter). Hunter has never heard, "No!","Get off!" and "Get down!" so much in his life. Jason even accuses me of "being mean" to him. And poor JR has never heard "Shhh! Be quiet!", "You'll have to wait." and "Don't cough on them!" as much as he has. And although they both get told "no" a lot, they are both so eager to help with the babies. Like I have said before, Hunter thinks the babies are his to guard...so here he is, guarding Reed

JR, on the other hand, really just wants them to be big enough to play with him. Since they aren't big enough to play, he wants to hold them and have them watch TV with him. So, here's JR holding Kyle...I'm not sure what Kyle thinks of the situation, but JR is loving it!

Monday, February 18, 2008

Sunday, Sunday

We had a super busy Sunday, and I totally forgot to take any pictures. My cousins, Lu, Sarah, Kristi, and Kristi's two boys Caleb and Cole, came by to meet the little boys. As you will remember, Caleb is one of JR's favorite people in the world, so he was thrilled. It was such a beautiful day yesterday that we tried to get the boys to play outside, but JR was having no such thing. After being outside for about a millasecond JR came INSIDE because he "needed some fresh air"! Last night Jason and I went out to celebrate Valentine's Day. We had MawMaw and Granny Sherry here to babysit all 3 kids. Jason and I went to the Melting Pot and had super yummy fondue. That was our first time out without the kids and we had a great time!

Saturday, February 16, 2008

"JR's" First School Project

Some of you might be wondering why I have JR in quotation marks in the title. Well, JR brought home a big letter J this weekend, because he is the Super Star of the class next week at school. We were supposed to decorate the J with things that tell about JR. Now, as the teachers out there know, this is not a kid project, it's a mom project. I was just telling my cousin, Lu, how I had just finished JR's project, and she summed it up perfectly when she said, "if the teacher had wanted a kid project they would have done it at school." So, JR's name is in quotes since it's really my first school project for JR. JR did help; he didn't even notice how I made sure he picked the pictures I wanted him to pick, or had me write down what I wanted him to say. JR told me that none of the other kids had pictures on the front AND back, so of course, we did. I think the other kids must have talked about really "exciting" things like their favorite color and favorite food, because JR kept asking me, "When are we going to do my favorite color?" Anyway, I think we did a really good job on the J project...and without further ado....here it is!

At the top of the J we have his favorite place in the world is Hong Kong Disneyland. Then we have pictures of JR doing karate, at hockey lessons, and on his hunting trip. The Buzz Lightyear picture is for his favorite movie, Toy Story. Coming around the hook of the J, is his first hunt in Australia, his baby pictures from China with us, and Ayi, and then a picture of his brothers. Finishing it off, is JR's love of animals as he feeds an elephant in Thailand and pets a pink dolphin in Singapore.


The top back of the J shows JR's love of swimming with a picture from The Philippines. Then, JR on the computer playing computer games. The next section is all JR without my assistance- he tells about his favorite colors, food, and how he likes to trace letters after you make the outline of them with dots (didn't know that one myself). At the bottom is JR with Jason's motorcycle and Hunter and Harley, and then we finish it off with some of his favorite superheroes.

Thursday, February 14, 2008

Got Chocolate?

Okay, So I guess JR had a right to be excited about Valentine's Day, as Cupid seemed to rival Santa this year. I have never seen so much chocolate, candy, and sweets. If you are lacking in the sweets department, just swing on by the house...we gotcha covered. JR scored Valentine's presents from us, the kids and teachers at school, and all the grandparents. It’s quite a loot. Here he is, first thing this morning, checking out what he got from us.

My husband did a fabulous job in the Valentine's Day present department (especially since he told me we weren't doing gifts this year). After JR had finished going through his swag, Jason told me that the babies had gotten me a present and to go look in their crib. Here's what I found...Too cute!

And inside the box was also too cute, new earrings! Each earring is made up of 3 individual diamonds, one for each boy. It's my Valentine's present plus my "I had twin boys" present. I must thank my fabulous cousin, Dan, who replied to the birth announcement email Jason sent out by asking him if he was getting me diamonds...Way to drop a hint, Woo-Hoo!

Wednesday, February 13, 2008

Almost Valentine's Day

JR has asked us a million times in the last week if it is Valentine's Day yet. He is super excited about it...I think he might be thinking that Cupid is the equivalent of Santa (let's hope not)! Last year I made cupcakes for V-Day; of course JR remembered and wanted to make them again. I took the somewhat easy way out and we made a cake together...I still did the "cooking" part with him, but the making them into cupcakes part is just too time consuming these days. As you can see JR was in complete control of the sprinkles...
I figured I'd get in trouble with Granny Sherry if I didn't put any pictures of the other boys on the blog this week. They are both really finding their voices. The days of them eating and sleeping seem to be gone, and there is a lot more crying and fussing going on. My mom and I have tried just about everything to soothe them, so here they are being soothed in their bouncy chairs. JR loved his, and loving the bouncy chair seems to be hereditary...Thank goodness!

Monday, February 11, 2008

Calm Days/Crazy Night

We got the boys out "a bunch" this weekend. I say "a bunch" since they weren't really out that much, but it was a lot of going out for twin preemies! We celebrated Chinese New Year on Friday night by going to eat Chinese. Shelley met us out, which was fun since we hadn't seen her in awhile. On Saturday we let JR pick where he wanted to each lunch. JR has a couple of standard favorite restaurants, which cracks people up because none of them are traditional restaurants that a four year old would pick. He picked Cafe Express, which he loves because of the breadsticks and that they put swords in your sandwich to hold it together. His other 2 standards are The Empress (The Chinese restaurant down the road, which Jason and his dad have been going to since 1976. Yes, they know the Ingersolls very well in there) and James Coney Island. Anyway, after Cafe Express we went to get JR's haircut and then let him go to Toys R Us (which JR calls "Toys FOR Us"). We got up Sunday and took the whole clan to the grocery store. (We still haven't gone to church with them because the doctor says not to put them in the nursery until they are about 4 months old. Their immune systems just can't handle being around kids in a confined space.) Then we met my mom and dad at Olive Garden in the Woodlands for lunch so we could pick up my mom and bring her back here to stay the week. All in all, a very calm weekend...but last night, not so much. I hate to say it, but Kyle, as cute as he is, is already spoiled. He thinks that I need to hold him at night if he is going to sleep. He sleeps great during the day in his boppy...but nighttime rolls around and he definitely wants my full attention. Now some of you are saying, "Well, just let him cry." I know that's what I should do, but I don't want to just let him cry for many reasons:
1. I'm not having any more babies so I just want to enjoy them both.
2. The babies are still in our room, and poor Jason has to get up and go to work, so I'm trying to let him get as much sleep as possible (which isn't much).
3. If he cries too much, he gets his heart rate up and his monitor will go off if his heart rate is over 200 BPM.
4. I don't want him to wake up Reed, who is an awesome sleeper, because then I would have two crying babies instead of one.
So, needless to say, I do a lot of holding Kyle at night. I'll hold him and hold him until I'm quite certain that he is sound asleep and as soon as I lay him in the crib, and get in our bed with my head on my pillow, he starts crying again. This happens every night, especially between 8PM-2AM. He actually does pretty good in his crib after 2AM, I guess he can only stay awake for so long.
But, last night was our really crazy night. It was about 12:30 and he was in the middle of his standard routine of crying in his crib, so I had him out of the crib in my lap. I laid him on our bed (of course he doesn't cry if you lay him on our bed) to go get something, and as I was on my way, I tripped over the wires to his monitor. Of course this set off the chain reaction of the monitor falling from the dresser to the floor, and then the wires being pulled off of Kyle, which sets off the most ear piercing alarm you can imagine. (Just think of your fire alarm going off in your house; it's the same sound). Now normally if he comes unattached, Jason or I can get him reattached and the alarm stops. This time it wasn't happening. Not only could we not get it to stop once we got him reattached, we couldn't get it to stop at all. Jason and I both tried turning it off, we unplugged it, we did everything. Finally, I ran and got the instruction booklet and called the 24-hour help line. Of course, the person on the other end can't help you make the alarm stop...she's just the answering service! She told me that a tech would call me back within the hour. An hour! An hour! I can hardly stand this alarm for 1 second much less for an hour. Jason took the alarm, buried it in my closet under a pile of clothes, shut the closet door, shut the bathroom door, and we could still hear it going off. Of course, we know that my mom, who is upstairs, is hearing all of this going on. Jason said, "What do you think your mom is doing?" I said, "freaking out and praying"...Sure enough this morning she said, "Oh, I was just praying last night when I heard that alarm going off...I just knew y'all were going to call for me any minute to come watch the other baby while y'all went to the hospital." While all of this is going on, I hear JR coming down the stairs. At this point I'm thinking every person in the house is going to be up all night long. JR walked in and said, "I have to go to the bathroom and my mine is too bright” so he walked in our bathroom, went, came back out and said "Night, Mommy" and off he went back upstairs to bed. Then, more good news, the tech called us back in about 10 minutes. She gave Jason some quick instructions and he had the machine turned off and Kyle hooked back up in no time. And the best part of the story...our perfect little sleeper, Reed, slept through the whole thing.

Saturday, February 9, 2008

New Photo

As you can see I posted the one and only picture we have of all of us together. To clarify a few things:

-I'm holding Reed and Jason is holding Kyle-each of us holding the baby that looks like we do.
-The wires that look like they are coming out of Jason's hands are actually Kyle's monitor. He is still on it, but the doctor seems to think it won't be much longer.
-Hunter put himself in the picture; we didn't even call for him. He ran up and positioned himself right in the middle...He thinks the babies are his and spends his days guarding them.
-JR isn't smiling, but he wasn't in a bad mood. I think he was just distracted as the picture was being taken. He was excited because we were about to go eat the food of his ancestors...yep, Chinese.

So there we are, the entire Ingy Family

Thursday, February 7, 2008

Happy Chinese New Year- Year of the Rat!

Happy Chinese New Year! It's the Year of the Rat. Luckily, the twins were born before today so they are the Year of the Pig (which is a very good year). Poor JR is the year of the sheep, which is a terrible year. The Chinese were always upset that JR was a sheep. My doctor that delivered the twins is American-Chinese, and she was telling me that if you have two people that are Year of the Pig in the same family and that are 60 years apart, it is called a "Golden Pig" and that is supposed to be really special.
Jason and I miss China more on Chinese New Year than any other time of the year. It’s the equivalent of our Christmas, Thanksgiving, 4th of July, and Easter all rolled into one. We really miss all the fun we had (and the week vacation)! Here's a little trip down memory lane of our last Chinese NY, I believe it was the Year of the Dog...


Here's JR and Madeline and Katie and me in our Chinese NY costumes for our clubhouse NY party. The clubhouse management asked us to dress up and be part of their show. I'm still upset that Katie got the pretty yellow dress and I got the red tent with a wine glass stuck on my head. Look how much cuter her outfit is than mine! My costume is from the Yuan dynasty, which must be Chinese for "ugly outfit that make you look fat"!

Gary and Anita had a super fun Chinese NY "blow out" at their house. Here's JR modeling a few of the fireworks that the husbands had purchased. You can see that they are the "professional" kind you would see at a fireworks show here in the US. In China, you just buy them on the street corner. And there's Jason and Andy so proud of the extra fire extinguishers the guards brought to us. Why the extra fire extinguishers? Well.....


Because the guys had already set one of Gary and Anita's trees on fire earlier in the night! Not to worry, the guards rushed in and put it out fairly quickly.

Since Chinese NY is always in January or February it's always cold. You can see how bundled up we are. That's me, Katie, Melissa, and Anita sporting our warmest winter wear. Much better than the costumes, don't ya think? JR wanted to make sure I posted a picture of him with all his older blonde "M" women...That's Madeline, Madison, and Meredith. I think they were all about to go ice skating in this picture. It's really hard to travel during New Year because all the Chinese go home to see their families, so planes and trains are really booked up. Since we got a week holiday and there was no work or school, we were always looking for fun things to do that week in Beijing.

Happy Year of the Rat!

Wednesday, February 6, 2008

Doctor Visit

We went to the doctor today, which was an event in itself. I started feeding babies at 7:30 this morning so we could get to the doctor by 9:00 (and the doctor is at Memorial City which is only 1 mile from our house). Not only did I get an early start, but Granny Sherry is here to help too. Getting out of the house just takes a lot of planning and effort. The boys both had great check ups. Kyle is 7 lbs 13 oz and Reed is 7 lbs 2 oz. The doctor was very proud of their weight gain. She even told me I can stop waking them up at night to feed them....halleluiah! Although Kyle woke up 30 minutes before every feeding last night, so I'm not sure that will actually get me anymore sleep. Anyway, Reed was quite the showman today, while the doctor was checking him out sans diaper, he sprayed down the doctor and the wall! She was so funny she said, "Oh, that's great, I love to see a good stream from preemies!"

Monday, February 4, 2008

Mirror Image

The little boys cracked me up today when I saw this...

mirror image of each other!

Granny Sherry is here helping me out this week. I told her after spending a week here with me she will be thrilled to go back to work! Nothing out of the ordinary to report (which is a good thing). JR is going to school, Jason is going to work, and the little ones are eating every 3 hours.

Sunday, February 3, 2008

Out and About

We took the whole family out on Friday night. We loaded everybody up in the car, which will take some getting used to, and we went to eat at an Italian restaurant by our house that we like. The little boys were very good; they slept through the whole thing. Since we got out of the house on Friday without incident, we decided to try again on Saturday. We ate at Sonic for lunch (that was in honor of JR, because Sonic was the first place we took him when he was a baby...we were too scared to try an actual "go inside" restaurant back then) and then we went shopping at Costco. I broke out the double stroller and pushed the little guys around. I felt like I was back in China, as everybody was stopping me and commenting on how little they were and asking how old they were. Again, they did a really good job, and slept through the whole thing. We didn't do anything exciting, and getting out sure isn't as easy as it used to be, but at least we're doing it!

We all fit in the car!

The boys go out to eat!

Friday, February 1, 2008

Gearing Up For Valentine's Day

JR and I worked on getting all his Valentine cards addressed for his classmates yesterday. I have a question for all the moms that have elementary aged kids...Do Valentines not come with envelopes anymore? When we were kids I remember addressing envelopes. We picked out a box of Transformer Valentines (of course) but they don't have envelopes with them...Is this the new thing? I would hate for JR to be the only kid in class envelope-less. JR was pretty excited about the whole Valentine process. He wanted to do all the boys in the class first, and he knew exactly which Transformer each person would want..."Timothy likes Bumblebee, Logan likes Deceptacon” I have no idea how he knows every Transformer's name. JR would write the kid's name on it and then his own...You should see a 4 year old try to fit "Samantha" and "Talmadge" in the tiny space provided for their name. Of course he ran out of room after the first 5 letters or so. After he had finished his part, I would ask him if he wanted me to write a message on it. For every boy in his class he wanted me to write, "I like you, you are my best friend." Now, when it came to the girls it was a little bit different. First he told me, "Mommy, the girls don't like Transformers, they like Barbies." So we put some Dora the Explorer stickers on the girl Valentines so the girls would like them better. He had a different message for all the girls. He wanted to tell Samantha, "You eat a jelly sandwich everyday, and you sit at the round table which is close to my square table." For Cadence he wanted to say, "I like sitting by you most of the time." And we can't forget about Miracle.... he wanted to tell her, "You like me!" Needless to say, I just wrote, "I like being your friend." for all the girls. He is so excited about giving out his Valentines; he already started asking this morning if it was Valentine's Day yet.