WATER FUN

While on vacation it is the water that we seem to love and enjoy so much. My husband and I both would love to relax in on the sand in the sun with a good book but we have come to the reality that this is not going to be an option for many years, unless we take a vacation with out the boys.

My boys truly love the water. Last summer by the end of summer Luke was just getting a little comfortable with putting his head in the water. He went to Latchkey all summer and once a week he got to go swimming. It literally took all summer for him to get comfortable in the water.

This summer our vacation was the second time he was in a pool. This child blew us away. First with going under water, second taking a little instruction from us and he was swimming around the pool by day 2. AMAZING!!!!

Here is a little video clip of him enjoying the pool.



Now it is time for swimming lessons. No more waiting around....

The bad part about his new found love for swimming is he doesn't want to go to the sitters with his little brother for the summer. He wants to go to latchkey so he can go to the pool all summer. I don't blame him but it will cost me more money. I told him he had to give the sitter a try for 3 weeks and then if he doesn't like it I will consider switching him back. Now all I am hearing is "has it been three weeks yet", throw in a little 7 year old attitude with that and you get the idea.

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Now my little guy was all about the ocean. Forget the pool, lets go to the ocean. You couldn't call it the beach either, it was the ocean and had dolphins and whales.

Anyway here is a little clip of him enjoying the waves with his daddy.




He would crack us up when he would say in Spanish "salto" as the waves would come. This word means jump, thank you Dora the Explorer for teaching my two year old a little Spanish. The funny part is I always have to ask my seven year old what that meant. I don't think he say's "salto" here on this video.

The North vrs South

Remember my extra busy week last week?

Yep, it was really busy sitting on the beach in South Carolina.

We went to the same vacation destination again this year that we did last year. I have lots of pictures to share and hopefully will do that tomorrow but for now I am just going to share a fun little observation that I picked up on as we traveled. Remember I live in the North and we travel to the South for vacation and as we did I observed some very big differences between the North and South.

1. Personality

• Southerners are so friendly, so nice. People walk around saying hello, smiles on their faces and it is so refreshing.
• Northerners are not friendly, people don't make eye contact, rarely say hello and most the time are walking around with frowns on their faces. Makes me sad!

2. Traveling by Car

• Southerners are very slow, not in a hurry however they drive with a lot more curtisy. Overall it seems to take a lot longer to get to where you want to go but traveling seems to be much safer.
• Northerners in a hurry, a big, big hurry. Seriously we enter the North and cars start cutting you off, driving like crazy and moving very fast down the interstate. Now I must say we traveled much quicker in the North but I am not sure it was the safest of travels as I watched many drivers go and cut off others almost to the point of an accident.

3. Public Places (Bathrooms Specifically)

• In the South, I don't care where we stopped to use the restroom, they were clean. With little kids who potty a lot this is truly a nice thing.
• In the North, well my best advice is stay away from any and all gas station restrooms. I don't know if they just don't clean them or if people in the North are just that gross. Either way, people should know better and be more respectful.

4. Slow & Quick

• In the South, everything takes forever because they are not in a hurry. Going through a McDonald's drive through takes an hour. They most march at their very own pace and their is no speeding them up.
• In the North, everything is much faster. It seems the idea is to get them in and out as quick as possible. Of course this might be why the personality and friendliness is lost in the North.
  

Have you traveled and picked up on these types of things before?

A STORY FROM THE PAST

June 13, 1998 was the date that we set sail on our Caribbean cruise. It was the beginning of a whole new chapter to our lives. See this cruise wasn't just an ordinary cruise or vacation. This was our wedding. Yes, I got married on a cruise ship. We set sail from Miami on the 13th and three day's later on the 16th we got married on the Island of Saint Thomas.

We did not do this alone either. We took our parents, grandparents, siblings and some friends with us. 15 people in total went on our journey with us which made it all that much more memorable.

I remember that day so well. We ported in Saint Thomas where we had to go sign our marriage license, we then went to the beach for about and hour. Here we are getting off the ship that morning. Who would have thought we were getting married in just a couple hours.

After that we headed back to the ship where I had 45 minutes to get ready before I got married.

Nothing fancy for me.... I am a very simple gal and I just had a sun dress (custom made by my aunt) and sandles, fixed my own hair, painted my own nails... you get the idea.

Look how young we look.

We all then met in this beautiful little room on the ship set up for our wedding ceremony. We were married to wedding voes set to the sea (if I can find them I will post them sometime), very beautiful.

This was the room we married in and these are our friends that went with us. Everyone else was family.

After the ceremony we went to another room just for our reception.

I really wanted to get married on the beach and this was an option however my grandfather went with us and he was in a wheel chair so this really wasn't an option for him so we married on the ship instead.

I never had those little girl dreams of a big wedding one day. I am just not a girly, girl. I was not a Christian at this time in my life (sad to say) and I had no desire to get married in a church. I do not like lots of attention and the idea of walking down an isle with a room full of people watching me was terrifying so I opted to get married on a cruise ship. It was this or Vegas. I really didn't want to say I got married in Vegas, seems a bit cheesy to me.

It was simple, very little planning, we pretty much just had to show up. We got a full weeks vacation out of it. The cruise line upgraded our room to a fancy cabin with a balcony while all our traveling friends were down in the lower parts of the ship. It truly was a wonderful event in my life.

Hard for me to believe we will be celebrating 12 years of marriage. Where does the time go...

Funniest part was our friends that went with us said the four of us will go back on our 5 year anniversary. LOL.... we were both pregnant that year so that was out.

Then we said how about on the 10 year anniversary? LOL... again, she had just had a baby and I was pregnant again.

I am almost afraid to declare a 15 year return because a baby could magically appear. Seems to be a pattern anyway.

I know I posted this early but I have such a busy week ahead of me that I am afraid I will not get around to posting it. I didn't post it last year when I wanted to so I wasn't missing it this year.

A little laugh

There is nothing I enjoy more than a good laugh from my children.

The other day for the first time Thomas (2 year old) walks up to his little potty and says I have to go pee. So I say, go potty. He walks up to the potty but instead of sitting down he bends his little legs in a bow shape and starts peeing. I laughed so hard because this is the first time he has peed standing up. I will give him lots of credit because he hit the little hole better than when his brother uses the real potty and misses his target 75% of the time.

This all took me back because Luke was 2 when he first learned to pee standing up. I will never forget him coming home from preschool and standing in front of the potty. I freaked out thinking he has no clue what he is doing but his friend Cameron taught him.

This leads me to believe that Thomas has learned from another little boy at the preschool as well.

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On a side note Thomas had another fever (103)over the weekend. We went back to the doctors on Monday and I was a mom on a mission and wasn't taking no for an answer. The doctor issued the C-diff. test along with a few other tests. They also did another strep test (4th one in a month) and it was negative but his throat was still a little red. I delivered his stool sample to the lab yesterday morning so hopefully we will hear something very soon.

I also gave my notice to the preschool this week. I agonized over this decision. I want Thomas to have everything Luke had and Luke's experiences at the preschool were so good. I just don't think Thomas is getting the same so I have decided to part ways. I was also having a lot of trouble with how much it costs especially with having to pay for child care for Luke for the summer months. I tallied it all up and it is costing me almost $300 a week for the two of them and this is for part time child care. That is crazy!!!

I did not go with the first lady I interviewed but some friends of ours use a lady who has set up a house (not her home) just for a preschool/daycare. She runs it with the help of her daughter and another lady. She is going to charge me $35 a day for both my boys. This is fantastic!!! At the end of the day I said this was not about the money but I was having a real hard time with spending $300 a week in child care when that money really could be used for other things. I also love that Luke will be going with Thomas because this will make the change for Thomas so much easier.

Luke is excited because our friends son goes their and they are the same age and play together really well.

Lots to do so everyone have a wonderful week.

It continues...

Last week was truly a nightmare.

Last week my little guy went for 4 days and did not eat anything. I mean nothing... the only thing we could get in him was popsicles. The child ate a lot of them as I was so stressed that he was not eating.

Finally on Thursday we made a trip to the children's hospital because I couldn't take it anymore. Not a lot of resolve from the hospital but they pinpointed that his mouth was riddled with sores. I am guessing it was a side effect of the antibiotics. So on top of a sore throat we also had a mouth that was just covered in open sores. Finally, after applying some orajel to his mouth we were able to get a little food in him.

The hospital assured me he can go a long time with out food and he was hydrated so he was OK.

Can I just say it is very scary when you see your child not eating and they can't tell you anything and they don't understand how much you want them to eat.

Yesterday he went back to the preschool only to have a lot of loose stool all day. At this point they inform me that they recently had a positive case of C-diff. in the preschool. Looking this up really causes me worry. I have taken all the loose stool as antibiotic side effects. However he has had random days of throwing up. For no reason he will cry about his tummy and then throw up. After that he seems fine until the next incident. This part really concerns me.

I was also really mad that the preschool only told me because he had so much loose stool yesterday. They have not informed or notified parents that this was in the school.

Today I called the doctors office because I wasn't making another trip with out being told they should see him. I argued on the phone for 10 minutes as it is all just antibiotic side effects. This very well may be but how can they be 100% sure with out testing him? So again I am angry...

My baby has been way to sick in the month of May. This goes back to May 5th as the start date to all this. My baby has literally lost all of his baby fat as he has lost way to much weight. First from the 10 days of stomach virus and now this. I cried last week when I gave him his bath because he has sagging skin on his little butt cheeks that use to be full of baby fat. I cried again last night when I could see his ribs on his back. He is just way to thin right now.

First Photo, two months ago, second photo I took today.

With my frustrations up I looked into another option and considered taking him out of the preschool daycare. I interviewed someone today who has started a daycare in her home. She use to be the director at the preschool where my little guy goes right now. She has all the background, I know her but when I went it feels like a home environment, not a school environment. She says they have learning time, TV is very limited (less than an hour early in the morning) and she has a structured day. Along with all of this she has hired an assistant. Cost would go from paying $50 a day to $25 a day and I really like that part but I don't want to make this about the money.

I am just afraid to take him from this wonderful learning environment that did so much for Luke and I am already seeing some great things in Thomas, just from the two months he has been in the school. However how much more sickness can we really handle? He can't loose anymore weight and the risk of illness is way up if we stay where we are at.

I really must apologize as I seem to be talking about nothing but sick people these days.