Not the plan

Drew and I had planned on celebrating our anniversary on Saturday by going to the Cardinal game. Unfortunately Andrew got sick in the middle of the night on Friday and we had to cancel our "date". I have to say Drew was more helpful and caring than ever before. Considering I could not think of a worse way to spend our anniversary, I realized what a great husband and father Drew is. He knows my weaknesses and is able to step up when I can't pull my weight. (Explanation of weakness: my biggest phobia in life is people throwing up). So hopefully one of these days we'll be able to celebrate our 6th anniversary but if not I can hold off until lucky #7.

Baby girl update: Don't worry, she'll get much more attention when she's here. Poor thing, during my pregnancy with Andrew I had a daily journal:) Anyway, I'm halfway there! She seems to be doing well, giving me some more frequent kicks...my favorite part of being pregnant. She is the size of a banana:) I had an appointment with a surgeon last week because I have had an umbilical hernia since I was pregnant with Matthew. My OB decided it was best to have it looked at since it wasn't getting better. The surgeon said I should be okay until after delivery but if not, even though it's not ideal, he could operate while I'm pregnant. So we're going with nothing is going to happen and I'll have surgery a few months after our baby girl comes, because that'll be easy:) We're still thinking about names...we'll keep you updated.

Andrewism of the day: I was telling Andrew that I had to set up the pack n play for Matthew's nap. (Matthew naps in our room but every time we have a showing we have to take the pack n play to the basement.) So I was getting naps set up and Andrew wanted to play in the basement with Matthew.
Andrew: Mom I'll be in charge of Matthew
Me: Ok
Andrew: If he pinches me or something I'll say "TIME OUT!"
Me: No you won't
Andrew: Why? Because he doesn't know what time out is?
Me: Right
Andrew: Well Matthew, time out is when you sit around and be really mad.

6 Wonderful Years

Drew and I have been married for 6 years! Wow time flies. In my opinion our weekend started on Thursday. I took Andrew to swim class, then we met my mom at the pool. The boys had such a great time and my mom and I were able to chat while making sure they stayed afloat. We stayed longer than I expected so I was hopeful everyone would take a great nap. Naps ended up being pretty good. Then I took the boys to Drew's softball game. They were winning big before we got there and Drew hit an inside the park home run. We weren't exactly good luck but they boys had fun. Then we ran to Boarders to get some Father's Day gifts and it was one of those errands that everyone was cooperating and in a great mood, RARE! Matthew was looking at a Cardinals (baseball team) board book. There was a picture of Jack Buck (when he was younger) and Matthew pointed to it and said "Poppa"(that's what he calls my dad). Matthew is not a big talker at all so this was HUGE for him, and quite funny. So of course we had to buy the book. Then Andrew had a big break through. He's been telling us that he wants a garbage truck theme for his 4th birthday (July 27) and I've been racking my brain trying to figure out how I can make that work. Well while we were at the book store, he found a book on Wall-E and decided Wall-E is like a garbage truck so he wants a Wall-E party...much easier!

Since we are in the process of selling our house and not real sure what the future is going to bring, I told Drew that this year for our anniversary I just wanted to get my hair highlighted and trimmed. So Friday, my mom came over and watched the boys while I relaxed and got my hair done. I never thought I'd say this but I love sitting around just reading a magazine. They boys had a blast with grandma and were ready for naps when I got home, what a treat! After naps we went and got Drew a card and some little things for our anniversary and Father's Day. Then we did our weekly tradition of Friday night dinner at Racenelli's (but too hot to eat outside).

We had a great Anniversary morning. We went to Starbucks for coffee then walked to the Kirkwood Farmer's Market for breakfast burritos. Drew came home and mowed, I did some gardening, Andrew played and Matthew napped. Then we went to the mall for a Chick fil A lunch and Drew got some watch batteries replaced. That's what he wanted for his anniversary gift. While we were waiting I found some great deals at Children's Place and Gymboree for the boys. Then everyone napped and we had a low key evening at home. Drew and I are going out next weekend to celebrate as adults.

Today Drew is playing golf with my dad and brothers for Father's Day and then we're headed to dinner at my parents. Hope all the dads have a great day!

It's a GIRL!!!!

Well my week just turned around and I think I'm still in shock.I had my ultrasound appointment this morning and found out the sex of our little baby! I'm so excited. Drew came to the appointment with me and the boys stayed with my mom. Everything looks great with our little girl. I think Drew was excited but I know he saw lots of dollar signs when we heard the big news. He had to leave the appointment pretty quickly to get Andrew to swim class so we haven't had time to talk about it but of course I'm on top of the world and I know Drew will be the first time she looks into his eyes. Now we need to think of a name! Suggestions? I'll post a picture of the ultrasound when I have time to scan it and get it on the computer. My sick one is waking up (he's much better today).

Addendum

In response to my confident title of yesterdays blog, my title today should be, "Not So Sure" we're going to survive. To explain, Matthew woke up at 3am like a furnace. Took his temp 103...HOT! We brought him into our bed and he could not get comfortable. I sat up with him in the chair. The he started acting like he was going to throw up. A little background on me...I know it sounds crazy, strange, weird, etc, but that is my biggest fear in the whole world. Yes, like some people have a phobia of snakes, heights, mine is vomit. It hurts to even write the words. So anyway, Drew knows this crazy fear of mine. So he took Matthew from me and took him into the bathroom. Thankfully he didn't get sick and Drew calmed him down and brought him back into bed. I of course grabbed a towel and covered our bed. Over the top, I know. So needless to say, crazy Liz didn't sleep the rest of the night. Andrew of course got up at normal time, Matthew never stopped burning up, and Drew had a meeting to get to, this is all before 7am. Needless to say, I had a breakdown. Let's just blame it on the pregnancy hormones. So when Liz has a breakdown, she calls mom! Mom, I love you. My mom cancelled the meeting she had, hopped out of the shower and rushed over here.

Of course, by the time she got here Matthew's fever had gone down to 101 and he actually started to look like himself. Then I felt really stupid and bad for having my mom miss a meeting. Well it ended up working out b/c she took Andrew to swim class and Matthew was able to nap. He woke up once again on fire. I decided to go ahead and take him to the doc. I was pretty sure he had what Andrew had but didn't want to risk it with as high as he fever was. So we got right in and my mom stayed with Andrew while I took him. And indeed, he had the sores in the throat, everything Andrew did...same thing. At least now I didn't have to second guess myself and knew the issue.

I got both of the boys down at the same time and was able to get a 45 minute, much needed nap in for myself. Thank you God! Matthew woke up feeling pretty bad. I just held him until Drew got home and then rushed to get on germ free clothes, clean hands, and a little bit of make up for my mom's birthday party at Pete and Jill's.

Side note: A few weeks ago we were watching Ace of Cakes with Andrew and the we came up with the idea of making a pyramid birthday cake for my mom. I knew this was a bit over my head but Drew is much more artistic and can always pull something like this off. So last night after dinner I started baking cakes, we put the boys to bed, baked some more cakes and then once everything had cooled, Drew began the hard work. Drew would probably be upset about this side note b/c he thinks it makes him sound feminine but I think it's cool and the main guy on the Ace of Cakes is a guy. Anyway, he pulled it off at about 11:30 last night and it turned out awesome.

So Andrew and I headed to the party and wonderful Drew stayed with poor little Matthew. My mom ended up seeing the cake when she was over earlier in the day (it's not easy to hide a pyramid) and had the best reaction. So even though it wasn't the right timing of seeing the cake, the reaction was priceless. We had a great time at the party and I think everyone enjoyed the cake.

Now I'm sitting up trying to decide what to do. Matthew woke up a few hours after Drew laid him down and they are asleep in our room. Should I walk in on the creaky floors and risk waking up a sleeping baby or should I sleep on the couch? Maybe I'll go in in a few minutes since he can have more medicine then anyway. Okay, I'm starting to sound crazy, I better go.

Oh, the contract on our house didn't go through. Back to square 1.

We will survive!

Well Thursday Andrew woke up from his nap feeling a little warm. Sure enough he had a fever. I gave him some Tylenol and prayed it would go away quickly. Drew had a softball game that night and by the time he got home, Andrew looked awful. I took his temp again (a few hours after the medicine) and it had gone up! That never happens. I was a little worried but knew if I called the doc they would say to just keep and eye on him and call if it got too high. So we got Matthew to bed. Andrew laid around and we finally got him to take a bath. I think he felt a little better. We let him watch TV in our room and he eventually fell asleep so we took him to his bed. About 3am he came in and said he wanted to sleep with us. Of course he was burning up so I got more Tylenol in him and brought him into our bed. Finally about 5:30 he fell back back to sleep and got up again about 7. He didn't seem much better so I planned on calling the doc as soon as they opened. In the mean time he started telling me his head hurt and was pointing to the back of his neck. That's when I really started to freak out, I thought for sure he had meningitis!

Once I talked to the nurse she agreed that they needed to see him. So they got him right in. Thankfully, it ended up the problem was his throat. The doctor said it was REALLY red, pussy, and his glands were REALLY swollen. Poor guy. They did a strep test, which he loved ;) but it came back negative. So it ended up being a virus that would have to run it's course. The doctor recommended switching to Motrin to see if that would help with the fever. So after the doctor we went to Walgreens and got that and a RedBox DVD. He was so pathetic all day. I felt so bad for him. I think this is the sickest I have seen him because he never got a burst of energy to play or even really sit up. Thankfully about 11PM he woke up soaking wet. HIS FEVER BROKE!

Saturday, he was still not himself but MUCH better. We were finally able to get him to eat a few bites for breakfast. Then it was back to our Saturday routine. We had to mow and deep clean the house for a showing Saturday. We left the house, grabbed lunch, napped at my parents then did the torturous task of driving around looking at different areas and neighborhoods. Thankfully, my friend Maureen let us borrow her portable DVD players for the boys which made the excursion much more doable than last time. As we were getting frustrated about one area not meeting our expectations we got a call saying our house was going to be shown Sunday as well. That's always good news. We decided the boys needed to get out and have some dinner. So we sat outside at a fun Mexican restaurant and tried to collect our thoughts but that didn't really happen with our two crazies:) Then as we were finishing up dinner we got a call from Kathy saying the people that looked at our house wrote up a contract! Drew talked to her and couldn't really hear so I took the boys out of the restaurant to let them run around and let Drew do the talking. He came out and informed me that the offer was REALLY low and they said it was their final offer. MAN!

Now the stress begins. We decided to counter anyway in case they are just playing the game. So we got their contract, look it over and discussed what to do. We decided to sleep on it since we had until 5 on Sunday to counter. I didn't realize how stressful this would be. But it was, we finally decided on a price and got the paper work in at 5 on the dot! Then we just had to wait.

Today, Andrew had his first swim lesson. I was way more nervous than he was because I knew the possible freak outs he could have. He was really excited and had no worries going in which was great. His teacher was young and nice and great with the kids. Once she taught them how to hold on to the wall and let them hang out he freaked out, got out of the pool and started to walk away like he was done. Thankfully she got him back in and made him laugh and even though he was pretty unsure, he stuck it out. The lessons are everyday for 2 weeks for 30 minutes so I think he'll get used to it. I hope! I promised him a big cookie if he did well, so we got that after class and headed home as he was falling asleep. I quickly gave the boys lunch and got them down for naps. The couple that put offer in on our house countered back (they said they wouldn't) but it is still too low. So we countered back again, as low as we can go and haven't heard back yet. We'll keep you updated. It sure would be nice to have our house off the market and move on.

6 Puppies

You may be wondering why the title of this blog is "6 Puppies". Well let me explain. Drew and I are beginning to go delirious with all of the houses we have been looking at on the interent. Usually after the boys go to bed we go through the new listings and either save it or reject it. Well Saturday night we were catching up. I was reading the description of one of the houses to Drew and I kid you not, the description said: "Backyard big enough for 6 puppies." I seriously could not control my laughter. I was in tears. I mean seriously, 6 puppies could fit in a play pen! You would not believe some of the pictures people take of their houses or the descriptions they give. It takes all kinds...and it's great entertainment.

Friday, my mom and I took the boys to the zoo. Once we were all loaded and in the car, I got a call confirming a showing of our house from 12-1. WHAT?! We never got the first call. Now keep in mind, my focus all morning was on getting ready for the zoo, not on making sure the house was perfect. I called Drew in my panic and be the wonderful husband that he is, said he would take a LONG lunch and go home to get the house ready and we could enjoy the zoo. Well we enjoyed the zoo with about 5 million other people. It was the first day it hadn't rained all week and it was the first day of summer for a lot of schools. So after a couple of hours we had enough and decided to call it a day. It was the best feeling walking into our house. It was immaculate! My mom was in complete shock at the transformation, she saw the before and after. Way to go Drew!


We had another showing on Saturday, our first repeat! So we tried to stay out of the house as much as possible considering we were having an open house Sunday as well. Besides naps we were gone most of the day. We went back to the zoo in the evening. The crowds were much more manageable and we were able to get into the new stingray exhibit and touch the stingrays. Matthew thought it was pretty cool and Andrew wasn't so sure. We told him over and over again that they had the stingers trimmed but he wasn't convinced. Drew and I thought it was really cool. The melt downs happened right as the zoo was closing so we rushed home and got everyone in bed.

Sunday, we stayed out of the house again. We went to church and the park. Then we brought Matthew home for nap. Then went to lunch and drive by a few houses. Then to my parents for naps. Then to drive by MORE houses. Oh boy was that an experience. We like these houses on the internet but knew we need to drive by to see the exact area. We saw some good, bad and ugly and the boys were pretty much the same:) They were troopers though. We decided buying and selling a house is not for the weak, or maybe just not for parents with 2 small kids. Oh and Max had to join us on all of our adventures. I'm sure he appreciated it. After all our driving around we grabbed some stuff to grill and came home to enjoy a beautiful evening.

Anything to keep him happy
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Monday, at the pool with our neighbors, the Fitzpatricks