Breakin' 2013

First, the good news.  Lucy's VCUG went well and there is no sign of reflux.  And her blood tests came back from the GI completely normal.  So, no info on why she was having issues, but that is better than finding out she had something wrong.

It worked out pretty well that I was on maternity leave for Shelby's first official Spring Break.  Jeremy had some business scheduled in Houston so we decided to make a trip out of it and join him.  Tristan and Jordan and their families met up with us there and we had ourselves a 1/3 McGrath clan reunion. 

No lie, the first day in Houston sucked.  Jeremy had appointments all day, and Roy was not with Jordan, so we wanted to pick a place to go where if a child ran off they wouldn't be running into a street or anything.  We THOUGHT the Children's Museum was going to be a good choice.  Unfortunately, so did about 5,000 other families.  It was so crowded in there that I couldn't really let Joey out of the stroller because if she had run off she would have been swallowed by a sea of people.  The kids had a hard time seeing/touching any of the exhibits.  We probably only stayed there for about 2 hours.  We looked at a map and saw that there is a huge park close by and decided to just go there so the kids could play.  Well, some not-so-smart people decided to place all the museums, and the zoo, and a huge hospital all within a few blocks of each other.  Traffic was ridiculous.  We drove 2 and a half hours (keep in mind this was all in like a 5 block radius) and never made it to the park.  The saving grace that day was Fudruckers, where the kids were able to play in the arcade while the adults visited for a while.

The next morning we went to leave the hotel and found a note on Jeremy's rental car.  Yep, somebody hit it.  Awesome.  At least they hit the rental car and not the van.  Jeremy left for his appointments for the day while the rest of us headed over to The Woodlands.  I wish that we had just gone there the day before.  We had a great time playing at the park, taking the water taxi, playing at the splash pad, and then at the mall playground.  The girls were wiped by the end of the day.  I am so glad Jordan and Tristan were able to meet up with us and the cousins all got to play together.  We sure had a rocky start to the trip, but at least it ended great!

We spent the rest of the week playing at the park, eating snoballs (not as good as New Orleans, but we'll settle for what we can get), playing with makeup, and of course, celebrating St. Patrick's Day.

The girls had dentist appointments before we left for Houston.  They were particularly impressed with how well Joey did!

Divas relaxing at the hotel.

Lucy was not happy with having her picture taken.

 

Pretty much how you will find Joey if Liam is around.

You can always count on Uncle Tristan for a ride.

Leighton (3 1/2 months), Owen (12 days old), Lucy (2 months)

 

Third Child

Friday was Jeremy's 31st birthday.  Since I haven't slept for more than 3 hours at a time in over 6 weeks I chose not to plan some big party for him and hoped he would get over it. :)  We had a nice little dinner at Cheesecake Factory on Friday night, followed by his requested ice cream cake from Beth Marie's.  We also got together with some friends on Saturday night.  We were supposed to go to Top Golf and then dinner, but when we got to Top Golf there was a THREE HOUR wait.  Really?  Three hours?  Sorry, Top Golf is fun, but not THAT fun.  So we all went to dinner and ended up having a great time and ticked off the waitress because we stayed there talking so long.

I love that I captured this.  This is his "vampire hiss" face that he does when he is trying to tell the girls to back off.

Sunday was a special day because we blessed Lucy in church.  We had kind of put off planning it because we were hoping to somehow figure out a way to do it with family present, but we finally realized that just wasn't a possibility.  But we have a great church family that participated and the blessing was beautiful.  I do feel bad that we didn't have some sort of brunch or lunch afterward.  Not that that is a requirement, but it is nice to have and we did something for both Shelby and Joey, so I just don't want Lucy to grow up and feel slighted.  Not that she will.  She will probably not care at all and Jeremy can rub it in my face that I worry about silly things.  I just don't want her to feel like such a "third child". 

Jeremy said, "1850 called.  It wants its bonnet back."

 

Her "staring at the fan" face.

Today was such a nice day so we took the girls to the park.  We ended up running into two friends from church there and then two more at Walmart afterwards.  Those are the things I love about living in smaller towns!

Juicy

The past two weeks have been so busy.  It's a good thing Lucy has me trained to function (somewhat) on minimal sleep because between our YW fundraiser, Valentine's Day, buying a car, a trip to the ER, and New Beginnings there wasn't much time for sleeping.

So, yep, we bought a new car.  I AM SO RELIEVED.  I know it sounds dumb that a car can bring such happiness, but seriously, we have been a much happier family since buying it.  I never thought I could love a minivan so much.  No more kids touching each other or kicking our seats, no more stroller crushing Shelby at every turn, and no more fighting with opening doors while trying to get Joey in while holding a car seat.  It is amazing.  Plus, we can watch Princess and the Popstar in the front right along with Joey in the back while we wait in the car line to get Shelby.  Haha!

So Lucy, or "Juicy" as Joey likes to call her, had some...intestinal issues last week.  Not to get too much into it but we basically had to check her diapers all week.  That's always fun.  Then Sunday morning she was running a low fever and she was very lethargic all day.  I could barely wake her up to nurse her and when she did it was only about 5 minutes before she was out again.  Around 9 pm I took her temp again and it was at 101.4.  I called the pediatrician and he told me to bring her in to the ER.  They ran all kinds of tests - urine sample (via catheter), blood tests (via IV), and a spinal tap.  They had to hold her in the same crouching position you have to get in when you have an epidural.  It was so hard to watch but I knew it was necessary to find out what was going on.  It ended up that she has a UTI.  So now she has to have a Voiding Cystourethrogram (VCUG) in a couple weeks.  Basically it is when they insert dye and do an x-ray to make sure all the parts are connected and functioning properly.  I am worried that the tech that did Lucy's ultrasound after she was born missed something and that there actually is something wrong with her kidneys.  So we are doing lots of praying that she is ok.

Sick baby snuggles

Knocked out after being poked and prodded

5 weeks old today and starting to feel better

Aside from all that we are trying to take advantage of my time off and are trying to spend some QT with Joey during the day.  Jeremy had a few lunches reschedule on him this week, so we hopped in the car and had lunch with him those days.  I think Joey felt special since Lucy was asleep, Shelby was at school, and all the attention was on her.

Speaking of Shelby, I love that she is learning how to write.  She spends most of her free time at home writing songs or notes to us.  Here is a song Jeremy found in her room:

 

"I love you and you love me.

We were in love, but now we are not,

so we don't know where this is going."

 



 

And here is a note she wrote to me the other day:

 

 

"I love you but you are my best mom ever.  Best.

You smell like a blossom and you are my mom.

I love you."

 



Lovey

We had a great Valentine's Day this year.  I have been slightly busy and didn't make any super cute Valentine's for Shelby to take to school like I wanted.  In fact, we didn't even make it to the store to buy Valentine's until Wednesday.  No worries, though.  There were still plenty of generic cartoon themed Valentine's to choose from.  Shelby scoured the isle and chose a Brave themed card.  When we got home she excitedly wrote the names of her classmates on each of the cards. 

At midnight Shelby came down from bed.  I was sitting on the couch and felt someone standing behind me.  I looked back to find Shelby standing there with a goofy grin.  I asked her what she was doing and she exclaimed, "I'm just so excited!  I want to go to school right now!".  Hahaha!  She is too funny.

I was able to make it to Shelby's school for her party.  I love kindergartners.  They are all so funny and random.  The little boys in her class were cracking me up.  They would say things like, "You look pretty, Shelby's mom", or "Shelby's mom, did you have a baby?".  I loved getting to help out and to be there to see the kids open each of their Valentine's and read them. 

 

When Shelby got home from school we let the girls open their presents.  We actually only got them some activity books and some cake pops that we ordered from the YW.  Aunt Alex got them the Ken doll and Barbie car for Christmas.  But since she had already bought them the Barbie dream house for Christmas we just hid the other stuff in the closet and waited til now to give it to them.  So thank you for the Christmas AND Valentine's Day presents, Alex!  Lol.

 

 



For dinner we had our traditional Valentine's Day fondue.  Not quite the melting pot, but it was good.  The girls liked their "love potion" (strawberry milk) until I told Shelby it was Cupid's pee.  She did not think that was funny at all.

 

 



AND, yesterday Lucy turned FOUR weeks old!  Isn't it funny how time flies so fast yet it still feels like I JUST came home from the hospital with her?  I tried to get some pictures of her but I am terrible at trying to get any decent newborn/infant shots.  Oh well.