Guess They Learned This Last Weekend

So I thought we had dodged a bullet when Steven's jeep didn't flip over last weekend in Moab.

And, of course, I was wrong.

Jason and I were sitting outside watching the kids play when I heard small amounts of whimpering. 

(I don't investigate unless I hear full on hysterics.)

Thankfully, Super Dad did because the next thing I heard was, "Oh no! They're upside down in the ditch!"

Here's what I found when I arrived on the scene.

Jason beat me there by a few seconds and found them both still underneath the jeep.

Before he could even help them, they both popped out from underneath without a care in the world.

Maybe a few scrapes on Reed, not that I could see them since the only real 'injury' was that he was covered in mud.

They thought the ditch jeep flip was awesome and were ready to ride again.  So with our amazing parenting wits about us, told them Kyle had to drive (since Reed was the flipper).

And off they went.

I Stapled Myself

Sadly, today is another in a series of non-witty titles ('A la: A Post about Soil) where I'm straight-up telling you what the post is about.

Yepers.  I stapled myself today.

I just assumed since I hadn't used the stapler in awhile, it must be out of staples.

But since a stapler isn't a cell phone, (and staples don't leave in the middle of the night like a cell phone charge) there were, in fact, staples already in the stapler.

And while trying to load a fully stocked stapler, I somehow stapled my thumb.

And it hurt.

And I was stapled deep enough I had to pull it out.

And it hurt.  Like made me get the chills hurt.

Sorry for the blurry picture...must have been the chills!

My mother-in-law (who's here visiting) actually volunteered to drive me to Urgent Care.

Bless her heart.

My mom would have said the same thing. 

Princesses Need OSHA Too

This past Friday night I was a greeter/princess/hostess at a Daddy/Daughter dance at church.

I had on a bright yellow dress (I was supposed to look like "happiness") and found some fun legging/tights that matched perfectly at Clarie's. 

Now, as great as Clarie's is for finding the perfect princess accessories, they're really meant for the tween and under crowd. 

Luckily, I'm the same height as a tween...I'm just not the same body type.

So while I could get a size small (the only size they had) on my body, they really didn't fit well.

At all.

In fact, after awhile, I found myself walking straddle-legged and decided it was time to intervene before I was in the middle of a serious wardrobe malfunction.

I headed out a back door where an area had been blocked off to do a quick readjustment.

As I was about to open the door to go back in the dance, a teenage couple was headed out the door at the same time.

I guess the girl was super excited to be going wherever it was they were headed, because she flung the door open with so much gusto that when the door handle hit me in the hip, I literally doubled over.

Now I know I'm dramatic, but this wasn't the time or place for that.  And I was really trying to keep it together.

But it hurt so bad, tears came to my eyes. 

And now, 3 days later, it's still sore and looks like this.

So my safety moment of the day is:

If you encounter a teenage girl wanting to spend some time with her "man"...

Get out of the way....FAST!

Another Facial

So I'm guessing I'm going to have to start a new weekly featurette entitled:
Look What Kyle and/or Reed Did to Their Face(s).

Before I start today's tale, let me first give you a back story in photographic form.

Here's what Kyle's bed looks like. (He's in it, with Buzz Lightyear, eating a piece of toast.) Toast aside, he's demonstrating what he and the bed are supposed to look like while sleeping.



After hearing a huge crash-bang-boom last night, I ran into their room to find his bed like this. (Picture taken this morning, staged for blog reenactment.)


I was so in shock that Kyle was able to move his bed, and so scared by the screams and blood I saw on the floor, that it was Jason who had to step into action and pick him up.

Kyle didn't just jump out of his bed, he jumped over (or from on top of) the railing side of his bed. He landed in between the drawers and the toy castle. Although he probably hit one or both on his way down


since he looks like this....


This picture was taken this morning, so you can imagine what last night looked like. (And don't worry about his teeth, he was still busy with his toast.)

I couldn't even look at Kyle last night, but thankfully while Jason was on doctor duty, I had some comic relief from the other two. When the fall happened Jason and I were watching Bachelor Pad (don't judge) and eating popcorn. Of course the popcorn was left unattended on the coffee table when we heard the crash. JR and Reed were quick to jump out of bed and give a few seconds of sympathy, but then I noticed they were gone and it was awfully quiet. That's when I found the two of them shoveling fist-fulls of popcorn in their mouths as fast as they could. So much for brotherly love!



In all seriousness, he's totally fine. (I had our pediatrician look at him in our driveway this morning.) But I'm really considering buying stock in Neosporin and Band-Aids.

With a House Full of Boys, I'll Count This One as Minor

Tuesday night during dinner Jason was telling me his dream from the night before. Then I said, "Oh, I dreamed Reed fell in a hole."

As I was putting Reed to bed he said, "Mommy, I don't want to fall in a hole." I laughed and told him that he wasn't going to fall in a hole, I had just dreamed that.

But poor thing did fall yesterday, not in a hole, but down the stairs. (We have wood stairs so it really does hurt to fall down them. I have first hand experience.) He fell face first, and it could have been a bad situation had Kyle not been sitting below him taking off his shoes. Kyle absorbed Reed's fall, and needless to say, both think they were hurt the worst.

Reed will tell me he hurt his face when he fell down the stairs, but then Kyle is quick to report that he was "hurt when Reed fell on me."

I'm not sure who hurts the most, but poor Reed did wake up from his nap yesterday with a bruise on face. What is it about Reed and injuring his face?!

But since there was no permanent scaring or trip to the emergency room, I'll call this one a success!

I'm Too Sexy For This Blog

Now that I'm in my 20's *cough, cough* I've found I need to do a little 'maintenance' every now again. So when I was in Houston I stopped by my old nail shop to get my eyebrows waxed. I admit I was a little nervous when the oldest lady working jumped up to help me. Living in Asia taught me quite a few lessons, one being: The older ladies are good at taking money and yelling at the younger girls, not so good at administering actual beauty treatments.
Against my better judgment I went ahead and let her do it. I relaxed when she didn't hurt me, and thought I was in the clear. As the waxing ended I thought, 'Oh, she DID know what she was doing. Whew.'
And then she swiped the 'after-wax refreshing lotion' across my lids.
*Dramatic pause*
I literally jumped off the table since I was quite certain I was, in fact, on fire!
I'm pretty sure I didn't have any brows in the middle of my eyelids (and if I did, that's something you, as friends, should have told me) but now I have no skin there either! Huge red scabs (where my skin once was) are now front and center above my eyeballs for everyone to see.
Needless to say, I look awe-some.

Reason #46 I Hate To Cook

I always get hurt.

Photo Evidence From Today:

And for an added flair of dramatics, I took the liberty of labeling my injury for you.

Thankfully I don't proclaim to be a good cook, so it makes the way this injury happened a little more bearable.

Ya know the old saying about not being able to boil water? Well, I was able to boil the water. And was even able to pour the boiling water in the sink...but then I somehow lost control of the stupid pot and the top of it (the pot) touched my arm.

Awesome.

Lookin' Good-er!

Can I get a doctorate in Neosporin application? Cause I'm thinking I would definitely be an expert in the field. I can see it now..."Have you seen Dr. Jan? She's the best! You can't even imagine the wonders she can work with that tube of Neosporin."

Here's Reed this morning, 2 weeks after the incident, and looking so much better! I've actually discontinued the Neosporin regimen and we've moved on to heavy applications of Scar Zone and Vitamin E. (Boy those Vitamin E capsules can squirt when you open them!)

Lookin' Good!

Well, it was just last Thursday Reed tore up his face front flipping off the couch. The Lord sure knew what He was doing when He gave babies such amazing skin. I've also been militant about following doctors orders and have been renamed the Neosporin Police. But look how good he's looking!

Yep, looks like we're on the mend!

What. A. Day.

Last night around 5:00 Reed came over to me and was trying to tell me something...then he threw up all over the couch. I picked him up and carried him in the kitchen, where he threw up all over me. At 3:00 AM JR came in our room to tell us he had just thrown up. (Twice.) As of this morning I didn't have anymore pukers, but let's just say I'd changed Kyle's diaper 4 times before he'd been up for an hour. I didn't even know 'green foam' was possible down there. About 11:00 JR started to feel better, and decided he needed to take the couch cushions off and use it as a trampoline. After threatening him with getting dressed and taking him immediately to school, the couch cushions were back on, but the babies now thought trampoline-couch was the neatest thing they'd ever seen...so of course they had to partake. The words, "sit down, quit jumping, you're going to hurt yourself" had just come out of my mouth as I watched Reed do a front flip and land head/face first into a box of Thomas the Train accessories. (I believe it was the roof and handle of the Coal Loader Playset that did the most damage.) I grabbed him up so fast he hadn't started to bleed yet, and thought we had gotten away with just some bad scrapes. I'm not so good at looking at injuries, so I just held him close to me...until I started to feel the blood on my cheek. I called our pediatrician, but they were booked and told me to go to the ER. I took off running down our street hoping one of the 4 doctors was home. I knew Pediatrician across the street was at work since I had just called her office, Hand Surgeon and OBGYN's house looked as if nobody was home, so I took off for Anesthesiologist house. All the while Reed was screaming at the top of lungs. (Did I mention JR, Kyle, and Hunter had all wandered (barefoot) into the middle of the street since I left the door wide open as I ran out it?) Anesthesiologist's wife, Radiologist, told me to take him to the hospital ER and not the clinic ER in case they needed to do a CT scan. I also left JR at their house, but took Kyle with me since I didn't want them having to change green foam diapers. I felt terrible strapping Reed in his car seat since he still hadn't stoped crying, and gave serious thought to pulling a Britney and driving with him in my lap so I could continue to hold him.
Jason was absurdly calm when I called him, so my next call was to the person I knew would have the exact reaction I was looking for: my mom. I can always count on my mom for just the right amount of dramatics, poor "whoever is hurt", and of course my favorite, poor Jan.
With Jason still calm as could be, and knowing he thinks I tend to overreact, I sent him a picture of the situation as we sat in the ER. Reed was lying on my chest as Kyle sat on my knee and we were both petting his back. (The picture is just too sad to post.) By the time we got to a room, Reed was feeling better, and Kyle tried to make him laugh by playing "Night!Night!" on the bed.


Which seemed to do the trick, because in no time at all they were trying to destroy the room and playing chase up and down the hall. Praise the Lord he's fine, and no stitches. I don't even want to think of what he could have done to himself.

So here are some pictures from the hospital. His face looks bad, but at least he's smiling.






As for the person in this house who's even more dramatic than me, he spent the rest of the day shielding his eyes and crying, "I can't even look at him! I can't even look at him!"

Chapstick-A Tale of Woe

So instead of dying of embarrassment, I'll just go ahead and put it out here:
When JR got home from school yesterday he casually mentioned, "Oh, by the way, Mommy, you don't need to put any Chapstick on me tonight. I got some at school." Knowing that JR doesn't take Chapstick to school I pressed further.
Me: What? Whatd'ya mean?
JR: I went to see the doctor at school, and he put some on me.
Me: The nurse put Chapstick on you? Did you ask him too?
JR: No, Mrs. (I forgot her name, but she's the music teacher) sent me. And then the doctor put it on, so you don't need to put any on me tonight. Okay?
Me: The teacher sent you to the nurse for Chapstick?! Oh my goodness! I'm so embarrassed!
JR: I know! Can you believe she would send me down for Chapstick?
Me: I'm not embarrassed for the teacher! I'm embarrassed for you...and me!
I can only imagine what this woman must think of my mothering skills. But as y'all know, I'm trying my hardest to get Chapstick, Blistex, lotion, I think I even tried to sneak some Neosporin on this child. You should see the dramatics during the "home doctoring" sessions. Squeals, jumps, flailing, and flinching don't even describe the half of it. And actually, I have no idea where he gets his hatred of moisturizing. Jason has Chapsticks strategically located in our house, car, and his office. And I'm so greased up that I usually have to de-grease before leaving the house. But now that I've shared my tale of embarrassment for all to hear, I think I'll go ahead and give the school a call. I need to find out what they put on his face...it actually does look better!

Ouch!

I was thinking about keeping this little story to myself, but with my addiction to oversharing and my need for sympathy, I just couldn't keep it in any longer. This is a picture of my knee. Nice bruise, right? I took this picture of my knee today, 3 days after I did this to myself while skiing. I guess I need to stop trying to ski; you'd think with all that soft snow around it would be next to impossible to inflict a bruise upon myself. But now that I think about it, it's really not the skiing I'm having so much trouble with...it's those pesky ski lifts! This time I had an incident getting off the lift. As I was getting off I never really stood up all the way. I was skiing, but I was still in a squat position (my butt was right over my skis). Thinking back it would seem that I should have just stood up, but for some reason I couldn't get myself to stand straight up. I actually skied for quite a distance in the squat position. (Guess I'm part Chinese too.) I finally gave up trying to get up and just kind of laid down/fell over to stop myself. Jason, still laughing and actually impressed at how far I was able to ski while in a squat, skied over and tried to help me up. But I never could get myself back up (I really need to work on my upper body strength). Resigned to the fact that I couldn't get up with my skis on, I started taking them off and threw the first one over to the side. Guess where I threw the next ski. Um-hum, right into my knee. As you can imagine, it felt really great. I was still so embarrassed about my "squat skiing" that I actually didn't make that much of a scene. But I'm making a scene now....Ow, Ow, Owee-Ow-Ow-Ouch!

Jason's Out of Town- We All Fall Apart

Look at these sweet little faces....


Do these look like the faces of babies who have cried all night and day? If you guessed "Yes" then
congratulations...You're Right! The nonstop crying started at the 3 AM feeding this morning. Reed actually went back to sleep for awhile, but Kyle never did. After I had watched the 3:30 and 4:00AM showing of The Andy Griffith Show with Kyle in my arms not asleep, I knew it was not a good sign. (On a side note, my mom's favorite TV show of all time is Andy Griffith, and the episodes I watched last night, were actually funny.) At 4:30 both babies went into the crib, and let's just say, it was not good. When their 6 AM feeding rolled around they both acted like they were just going to take 2 sips and fall asleep. I actually said out loud to them, "Oh No You Don't!" They did sleep this morning after 6, but have both been awake all day since 11. My mom and I are both just worn out from holding them.

On top of all that, right before JR was getting out of school I got a call from his teacher. Every time I see "Spring Branch ISD" on the Caller ID my heart races in fear of what JR has done to somebody. But poor JR had gotten his thumb slammed in the classroom door. He had gone to the nurse and was still crying when his teacher called me. He came off the bus so pitiful looking with his bag of ice on his thumb. His thumb does have a red mark on the nail where the door hit him. He wanted "medicine and a bandage" from me, and those seem to have made him feel better. (I wasn't sure what "medicine" I was supposed to put on it. My mom suggested just rubbing some lotion on it, but I grabbed the Neosporin out of habit.)

Then, to wrap it all up, I burned myself on the hot glue gun while trying to glue a decorative Easter bunny back together. I'm actually still hurting, and if Jason was here I would have probably thrown myself on the floor and screamed just to show off. He always says I'm like the professional basketball players who pretend their hurt when trying to foul somebody. What a day indeed!