another day, another lesson learned

well, today Ally Claire turned 6 weeks!! that is a great milestone (and no, i'm not gonna tell you how old she is every week) b/c the docs always talk about how important it is that babies not get sick especially within the first 6 weeks. and we MADE IT!! also, when we were discharged home, they said to limit things with AC for 6-8 weeks b/c since she had been in the NICU, she was even more capable of picking up bugs (her immunity would be even lower than a typical baby since she had tubes, IVs, drugs, etc.). well, i will admit that last sunday we busted out of our shell when we went to church.

(in this pic, she is wearing my daygown and her newly acquired headband. that will come in another post.)

she obviously stayed with us the whole time. however i did have a complete stranger ask to hold her. i have never, in my whole almost 5 years of being a parent, had a complete stranger ask to hold my very new child. i just politely said "no." she was a little shocked, i think. but i also didn't feel i owed her any explanation. i mean, i know we were in church, but there is a such thing an amber alert these days. (that only has a little bit of sarcasm in it.) also, for the last 2 weeks, i already have the ladies asking me if we are coming to mommy and me class. um...can i get in the door first? no. thanks, but no. we are good for now. she's not missing anything yet and i'd still like to enjoy my Bible class time. i mean, i have needs for the Word too!

today, i met micah in town for lunch at mcalisters. we love that place and it is one of the few places we can go and we all like something there. (super super picky eaters doesn't even BEGIN to describe it.) but i got AC fed, a bag packed, 2 boys pottied and dressed, and off to huntsville we went. (takes us about 25 minutes to get there.) we ate, the boys didn't get any public spankings, the building was still standing, and i didn't get anything on my shirt since i had to hold sister while i ate....which leads me to this...



ally claire HATES, hates, hates to be in her car seat. now when she had to pass her car seat test to come home from the hospital (standard NICU thing), the nurse told me she had to hear about her not liking it for just about the entire 40 minutes she had to sit in it (time it takes to get from the hospital to our house.) i didn't think much of it. oh.my.word. she screams at the top of her little lungs. sounds like someone rocking on a cat's tail. i know for a fact that she will be a good cheerleader one day b/c she doesn't even get hoarse (atta girl...holler from your gut, not your throat!). now, i will say that she prefers to be on roads that are a little more "gravely" than the newly paved ones (sorry Pop!) and she is better when the rpms stay above 2000. so stopping...that is dreaded because good Lord help us if she ever gets going. when she does, like today, she will cry for at least 20 of the 25 minutes it takes us to get home.



and did i mention that we are going to dothan next month...and that's a 6 hour drive? if she were old enough, i'd sock her with benedryl. however...luke is gonna move up to the middle seats with seth and i'm gonna sit in the very back with sister. (God, i am asking this far in advance for no wrecks on the interstate and no hour long stops because of construction around b'ham!!)



let's see...i did mention that last week i found crayons in the boys toilet. luke couldn't give me any reason as to why he was putting them in there. but he is in a super fun stage where he will automatically say "i didn't do anyphing." or automatically say that "sef did it." which leads us to last night's little incident. (mimi...warning...and don't tell pop until you get home. and the following photos are not for the squeamish.) the boys were supposed to be cleaning up their room before supper. i was finishing eating while on the phone with my brother. micah had ally claire in one hand, his bowl in the other b/c she was getting ready for a bottle. the boys were already whining about having to clean up (like it was a new order...i had only been after them for about 2 hours) and we hear some kind of commotion (which in our house, that happens allll the time and it is easy to over look...especially if seth is whining in the course of it.) well, luke came around the corner and said "sef has blood" and luke had blood on his hand. i throw my bowl down, walk around the corner to see my child covered in blood and it looks like it is dripping from his head.



i hang up on scott and rush seth into the bathroom. i strip him down and put him in the tub b/c i have to find out where the bleeding is coming from and get it to stop b/c it was alllll over their floor and his clothes and DRIPPING from his hair and b/c he is a curious child, looks like he has bathed in it from rubbing it. i finally get him all rinsed off, all the while he is saying "i bleeding and i hurt". (this might be a good time to tell you that when it comes to my kids, i am NOT a nurse. i'm a mama and i only have a certain level of calm.) so i get him clean to find that all that blood came from this tiny little nick on his head.


we asked luke over and over what happened and told him if he told us, he wouldn't get in trouble, but if he lied or didn't tell us, he would get a spanking. seth kept telling us luke hit him with a block. finally we got luke to apologize and when he did (thanks to my genius parenting skills of making them tell the other what they are sorry for when they apologize) we found out what happened. luke said "seth i'm sorry i hit you in the head" and i said "hit him in the head with...." and he said "sef, i'm sorry i hit you in the head with a block." siblings. i have figured out what it means to be a good mom, though. if they make it out of your house, and you haven't killed them, they haven't killed each other or caused them to need major therapy, you are a success as a parent. everything else we do is just icing on the cake.

i finished this blog to go get my camera to download the pics to go with it. i had told luke about 5 minutes earlier to come out of his room and sit in his corner until i was done b/c i didn't want him waking up seth and i had already gotten on to him about kicking the wall about 4 times. and this is what i found...





mischief making can really wear a little boy out! coming soon, pictures from "Lukaso" from last week when our cable was out. boredom can really bring out the artist in a kid! also, my new talent, also learned while internetless...hairbows.