Spring

Spring is here, spring is here, spring is....well, I think it's here!  This has been one, long, hard, dark, winter.  It has been insane.  It's been cold, so, so very cold, for so, so, very long.  And then April came, and it was supposed to be warmer, but it wasn't.  Now, we've finally gotten some spring temps and the snow is melting!  Yea!  Except for, it snowed in Anchorage today, and we're supposed to get snow tomorrow, and Monday they are predicting a high of below freezing, 28F.  What the heck? 

This winter there were so many times I looked outside, seeing the dark, did I mention the cold? and wondering what in the world the pioneers of this place were thinking.  They would have arrived in the summer and then worked their a$$es off to cut enough wood and to build a house to survive the winter.  And then they did the strangest thing, they stayed.  Maybe it was to difficult to think about doing the trek back home, it couldn't have been easy getting here in the first place.  These first people, especially the women, rocked, and were super strong. 

So, back to spring.  Sunday we unpacked the bikes and did our first family bike ride!  Husband pulled #2 and #3 in the bike trailer, #1 rode his own bike!!!  And I rode my own as well.  #1 did AWESOME!  He followed all of our rules and did an amazing job.  The next day he wanted to go again and it was just me with all three kiddos because Husband was working.  And again, he did great!  He rode 1.3 miles, which doesn't seem like much, but it was just his second ride of the season and he is just 4, pretty good huh?! 

It's been wonderful getting everyone outside once, maybe twice a day, and they are really enjoying it.  They've been coming in wet from all the puddle jumping.  Let's hope this weather continues and that the forecasters are wrong (once again!).

No Way

I can't believe that my baby is nearly 1.  It seems impossible that an entire year has already come and gone.  On the bright side, #3 is still a fabulous boy and has been a wonderful addition to our family.  He was truly meant to be with us.  I'd tell you how much he weighs, but I really don't quite know, it's somewhere in the 25lb range; he has been in size 18 month clothes now since he turned 9 months old.  He is pretty close to walking, he prefers to cruise furniture whenever the option is available, has let go of the couch a couple times to lunge towards me, and has practiced balancing.  Not sure when he'll walk though, he has two crazy brothers that will surely knock him over, so his timidness is well warranted.  #3 now has four teeth, with four more breaking through, it makes him a tad bit cranky, but we're all surviving; he's a super happy kid otherwise, so we'll take the little bit of ugly.  Doesn't sleep at all like the others kids, what is up with that?  He loves his brothers, and is totally enamored with #1.  #3 already wants to wrestle and get in the thick of things so he's had a few bumps.  Usually though he just laughs it off and goes back into attacking #1.  Their favorite game is #1 laying on the ground, #3 crawls on top of him, and #1 bucks him off.  It's pretty funny!  He has shaking his head no down, can now wave goodbye, and "talks" constantly.  Look at my ham :)

Vacation Pt 2

After Indio we went down to San Diego to spend a week at Husband's sisters house.  It's about a 2 hour drive, which was for the most part a piece of cake.  The van we rented was equipped with a GPS, which kept recalculating our route, "based on updated traffic info," so we took the scenic route down, through several towns (pretty sure the stop lights made our trip longer) and through some "mountains."

 

Family story time the first night.  Husband had another sister come back to the house as well so we got to hang with her and her kids as well.

The train at the zoo.  We didn't go to the San Diego Zoo, we did that just two years ago.  But the train was fun.  The train runs at night during the Christmas season and has bunches of lights.  We went back the last night it was running, to wait for 30 minutes because it had rained, and half the lights had shorted out.  Oh well, it was fun.  And the boys love trains, so two train rides = awesome for them!

We went to the beach twice.  The first time was to the awesome park to watch the sunset.  #1 LOVED this.  The sand goes through the holes and comes out of a spout at the back.

It's coming.  The water is coming!

Yum yum, have fun changing my diaper!

Fresh squeezed lemon juice.  I guess when you live in Southern California and your friend has a lemon tree, you can afford to do cool things with your kids like squeeze lemonade.

Sleep mom with sleep baby on the red eye.  We drove back to Palm Springs to fly home.  While waiting the three hours until check-in, we killed time going to the local air museum in Palm Springs, which was actually pretty cool.  Did you know that Bob Hope was from England?  And I'm pretty sure I read that he tried to join the military during WW2 and was turned down so that he could tour for the USO instead?  Who knew!

 

We had a great time and it was a nice break from the cold we had been having back home.  The beach was really nice, even in the middle of "winter."  If we lived there I'd be taking the boys everyday it wasn't raining.  They had such a great time.  We brought some small trucks so they dug trenches and made mud sinkholes.  It sort of sucked leaving.  If there was a downside to coming back to NP, it was the realization that life could be enjoyed EVERYDAY outdoors if we didn't live here.  :(

An Eye Update

 

So the patch is actually not going too bad.  Scratch that, I should say it's going fabulous.  We got back from vacation the middle of January and started the patch from the get go.  #2 wakes up in the morning and the patch is put on within 30 minutes of waking up.  It's off at nap time, and then back on again when he wakes up until bed.  It's worn between 7 and 8 hours a day.  There are days that are a little less, but I feel we are avoiding something that does have the potential to blow his pupil, and that's all I care about.  The first couple of weeks were a little rough.  I took a page from my Mom's playbook and very matter-of-factly stated that it's something that has to be done and there's no room for arguing or negotiating.  The only time he takes the patch off during waking hours is when he's sitting in the car bored; and really even that's stopped since I got smart and put a box of reserve patches in the van.  I do let him take the patch off when we are at someone else's house and there are a lot of people/commotion around.  Because he doesn't have peripheral vision in the patched eye, he has a tendency to run into walls and such.  Poor guy :( 

 

I was hopeful this would only take a month or so, but now I'm not so sure.  I spoke with a father whose daughter had a severe farsighted eye and they did the atropine drops for an ENTIRE YEAR.  So the last time I bought patches I bought the place out, cause I think we're in it for the long haul.  At the very least, if this doesn't work, we can tell him when he is grown that we, he, did all the necessary things and that it's something that just wasn't going to be correctable.  But, let's hope it doesn't come to that.  Please think happy well wishes for this little guy.  I hope he doesn't have any memories of everybody constantly asking what's wrong with his eye.  I think we've pretty much explained it to just about every body we know and now all that's left are strangers.  And really that's not a bad thing because it has given us the opportunity to educate other parents the importance of paying attention to their child's eyes and to get them in early for a vision check.

 

And just because I can, here they all are enjoying each other's company.  I'd say this never happens but in a blue moon, but that wouldn't be true.  We have one or two of these moments a day :)

Vacation Pt.1 Indio



The McGilvary family flew to Indio, California over Christmas vacation to celebrate Husband's parents 50th wedding anniversary.  The only flight leaving around the time we needed to get there left at 1:30am Christmas Day.  For those who don't know me, I HATE traveling overnight.  It's been my experience that it's much better for your kids to miss naps then to miss a whole night of sleep due to traveling.  We arrived in Indio at 11am on Christmas day, starving.  Luckily there was an "In and Out Burger" open.  I figured we were going to California so there should be at least one place open for business.  We stayed the night at Embassy Suites (best place ever in my experience) and checked into the WorldMark Resort on the 26th.  While we stayed we had our own two bedroom suite with full kitchen, two baths, and laundry.  A lot of family traveled down so it was wonderful to have our own space to retreat to for naps, bedtime, meal time, etc.  I think at final count there were around 60 people that had come through during the week stay.

 



ALL the immediate family.  Six children plus spouses, and 18 total grandchildren.  Ours are numbers 13, 17, 18.

 

A bunch of the younger cousins hanging out watching a movie.  There are probably a dozen or so missing.  Also, this peacefulness lasted about 10 minutes.  Then the boys decided to play pillow fight on the bed and the girls got all bossy.

 

 Our family portrait.

#1 LOVED the kiddy wading pool.  He won't put his face in the water so this was perfect.  There was also a "lazy river" that he went on everyday.  The pool was heated so it was awesome.  Totally should have gone in much more then we did.

This was really cool, it's a sky tram that goes up a mountain. On top there is a national park with trails.

On one of the trails (the only short one we did).  There was about 7 inches of snow and well, this was last minute and we of course didn't bring our winter gear to California, so it was a short walk.  Down below there are hundred of windmills, pretty amazing to see them all.

 

We stayed in Indio for a week.  It was a bit chilly (yeah yeah I know, it doesn't compare to here) but it was windy.  The resort was really nice.  They had two small parks that the cousins would meet at and play.  There was a welcome bbq and then a 50th celebration.  There was tie-dying shirts, a big family breakfast, and a boys day out.  (The women tried, but they couldn't come to a consensus what to do.)

 

After Indio we drove to San Diego to spend a week with one of Husband's sisters for a week at her house.  That will be pt 2!



Merry Christmas (albeit a little late)

Trying to get a decent picture in front of the tree.  Yeah right!

This year we celebrated Christmas a day early due to a family vacation, in which we were flying over Christmas Eve, into Christmas Day.  Luckily our kiddos are still young enough they don't know the details and don't mind!  They had a great time opening presents and playing with all their new toys.  #3 liked chewing and playing with the boxes, of course, don't all babies!

The small trucks.  These went on our trip with us (and to the beach!)

Professional unwrappers.

 

My First Born is 4!!!

Yes, I understand this is (several, whoops) months late...but better late then never they say. 

Happy Birthday #1, you are now 4!  Wowza!  It has been quite the ride.  It's been amazing to watch him grow into the person he will become.  This past year #3 has proven to be quite the big brother.  He has become quite the helper with both his brothers.  He wants to play with them.  He encourages them; whether it be learning to crawl, or building a tower, #1 is always there with cheers and claps for his brothers success. 

Also, can I just say that 4 is an awesome age?!?!  I guess growing up is like a fine wine, it gets better with age.  Each new milestone is incredible.  He has all of a sudden put so much together on his own; he can spell his name, count to 15, has number recognition to 10, and recognizes all of the letters of the alphabet.  Best thing, I had do hardly anything!  I mean, I'm sure that the books, and the conversations, and the play, and all that contributed, but it's crazy how kids pick up on all these things without having to sit down and do rote memorization!!!

So happy birthday to my first born!  While I'm saddened that I can't freeze our family in time, I can't wait to see what else this year has in store for you, and what you'll teach me.

Do What?

You want me to do what?  This was my response to the optometrist at #2's recheck last week.  Let's just say the doc did not tell me what I wanted to hear.  I had actually thought I'd walk in there with #2, he'd check his eye, then promptly tell me what a great job I was doing and that #2 didn't need to wear his patch any more!  However, what ended up happened couldn't be farther from the above scenario.

The doctor said there wasn't any change in the farsighted eye and so we have two options:
1) #2 can wear a patch all day long.  Unlikely, he fights putting it on and keeping it on all day would be nearly impossible.
2) Put atropine in his good eye to blur the vision so the bad eye as to do all the work. 

Ahhhhhhhhh, I can't believe we have to do this.  I suppose the alternative isn't ideal, he would never see well, if at all with the bad eye.  We haven't started the drops yet, we're heading to Cali over Christmas for a McGilvary family reunion and I don't have the heart to start this terrible routine while we're having fun.  We're going to get the drops because one, they are easier, and two, once he realizes how awful they are, maybe, just maybe, he'll understand that the patch isn't quite so bad after all.  In a perfect world that's how it would work.  Right now he'll wear his patch for a long time once it's on (two-three hours).  Maybe we'll be able to get him to (reluctantly) put a patch on in the morning when he wakes up, off for nap, and then on again after nap.  I sure hope so. 

Most of the information out there on the world wide web makes it sound like this is relatively quick.  It doesn't give a time frame, but I'm hoping it's a month or so.  The doctor was positive and reiterated that because we caught it early we have time to try different treatments.

But really, ugh.  I hope this doesn't last long.

Beating the Cold Snap Blues

For those who read this blog that don't live in the interior of Alaska it has been really cold up here; not just cold, but cold for a really long time. It has been three weeks since I've had the boys out to play, and the last time we did that was when we flew down to ER to visit with Ahma and Grandpa. We haven't been outside because it's been below -20F for weeks, and a lot of that time the temperature was at -30 or lower. I have a personal cutoff for going outside at -20. It's really hard to keep cheeks warm at those temperatures, and #1 has the lingering frostbite to prove it.

So, we've been cooped up inside all this time and I've been challenged to find lots of things for the kiddos to do. Here are some of the activities to stave off cabin fever:

 

I pulled my van out of the garage and then "painted" tracks on the floor with water and let them ride their bikes.  #1 enjoyed pushing #3 in the stroller, and he enjoyed it right back!

 

 #3 watching, from a safe distance!, his brothers zoom around on their bikes.

The house was really cold this morning so I thought it best to play near the stove.  We rarely get these rugs out, so the boys were entertained for quite some time.

 

Yesterday I pulled out the large electric train and each kiddo took a turn using the controller.

I've been trying to get of my comfort zone and getting the paints out more.  Here the kids are making ornaments.  I cut out shapes from cardboard and they chose their colors.  

 

 Here they are finished.  I plan on stringing them and letting the kids put them on the tree.  It's been ages since we've had ornaments, and I figure no one will care if these break!  Headache free tree decorations.

 

 We bought a small magnetic dry erase board and hung it on the wall.  Something else for the boys to do when the lack of cooperation and cabin fever start to close in on us.  Here are a couple other painting projects. The apple and dinosaur are cheap wood cutouts from the craft store and after they were painted I glued on a magnet.  The snowflakes and tree are painted on cardboard with painters tape to make the shapes!

 

 Each of the boys playing with their computer.  #1 has a couple really cool games on his that uses the mouse to guide a spaceship through the air and a monkey through a maze!

A fort!  We don't have many boxes, so I made this with one box, the rocking chair, a play tent, and the babies JumperRoo.  Had to get creative!

How Do You Beat The Winter Blues?

How does one survive endless days of -20F (or lower, today was -35) with a (almost) 4 year old (yikes!), and 2.5 year old, and a six month old? You let them wreak havoc on your house and pray no one gets hurts or nothing gets broken! My kiddos love running in the house, especially around our pantry, it makes a great track. #1 has become really good at saying, "excuse me" to the little one instead of pushing him out of the way.  They do this at least once a day and somehow (yet thankfully) it never gets old.  Luckily I don't have to worry about #2 getting shoved down the stairs anymore!

#2 running around the pantry

 

We also take goofy pictures.  #1 has recently discovered he can make his face do funny things.  It sure does make for frustrating, uh, I mean interesting fun pictures!

 



Yes, I even let them jump off the couch.  For some reason a pile of pillows and blankets provides quite a bit of fun.  From jumping off the couch, to running and crashing onto them.  It burns a lot of the cabin fever off as well!

#1 in mid jump, and #2 just beginning his.  Lots of laughter!

 

The kiddos have also enjoyed playing "flashlight game" where they get flashlights and run around the house finding the items I say.  Lots of up/downstairs stuff.  Hallway bowling; although this doesn't last long.  #1 and #2 don't let the other actually bowl, they think it's funny to knock down the cups before any bowling can ensue.  And of course play dates with friends and story time at the library.

 

Here's a few extra pictures for the road!

 





 My big ham!  7 months in 2 days, 22lbs, 28inches!  And a happy pleasant boy!

 

Big brother helping to entertain the littlest one.  When he's not being to rough, he's been really helpful.  He is always telling me, "Mom, I love my baby brother!"  I'm glad he sees him as an asset!

 

Brothers getting along and posing for a sweet pic.  #3 really adores his brothers.  He watches them with an eagles eye.  He is both, soaking up everything they are doing, and at the same time watching out for danger!

What our winter looks like so far.  We have more snow then Anchorage.  However, with the cold temperatures we have an inversion, where cold air is trapped under a warm air pocket, so the valley (where we live) is super cold with really really really bad air quality.  So right now it's smelly and smokey outside with no end in sight.