2 Birthday Parties in 2 days!

My mom and grandmom came to visit us for a week! We had a great time. Since it was so close to Bianca and Gwen's birthdays I decided to do both parties while they were here. It was a crazy idea! I think next time I will just let us visit with family instead of doing the parties while they are here. I'll just have to take better pictures of the parties, which we all know I seem to be very very bad at doing!

So first off we did Gwen's party with her preschool friends on Friday. She had a great turn out! We did an ice cream party in lots of pink. Gwen is such a cutie girl! I always find it funny that she wants to have kids around all of the time, but she spent most of the party downstairs with the grown-ups cuddling with someone. She loves friends, but has a very limited amount of time she can be with them. I also notice that she would rather dig in the sand by herself at the park rather than run around with everyone. I am also always amazed at how generous people are at parties. I always put on my invitation, "no presents needed" because I don't want people to feel obligated or stressed about another birthday party kid present/money wasted/whatever, but Gwen got tons of stuff! I did not have the presence of mind to take a before picture of her ice cream parlor set up. Here are the pics for her party:

From New Album 5/14/11 10:15 AM

Clearly, I have lighting issues!

From New Album 5/14/11 10:15 AM

Oh big 4 year old!
This one is a little bit more clear:

From New Album 5/14/11 10:15 AM

From New Album 5/14/11 10:15 AM

From New Album 5/14/11 10:15 AM

From New Album 5/14/11 10:15 AM

From New Album 5/14/11 10:15 AM

From New Album 5/14/11 10:15 AM

From New Album 5/14/11 10:15 AM

From New Album 5/14/11 10:15 AM

From New Album 5/14/11 10:15 AM

On Saturday, yes the very next day, I took on Bianca's bee party! For this one we invited our friends. I think that until the 4 year birthday party, the parties are still for me! Age 4 is when they suddenly want all their friends there. The plan was to just do cupcakes, but I had so much left over from Gwen's ice cream party, I put out the ice cream bar again! I actually got pictures of the decorations this time, but the sun was shining in through the curtains so they look all glowy and weird. I bought a better camera to do this stuff with, but the first time I used it, it broke. Gotta get that figured out still. So here are the pics:

From New Album 5/14/11 10:15 AM

From New Album 5/14/11 10:15 AM

From New Album 5/14/11 10:15 AM

I didn't even get a picture of Bee on this day! I think Brian has some on his phone though - so I will have to check.

Quick Look for less Bathroom Redo

I was feeling like our upstairs was a bit too pink. Pink, pink, pink. Perhaps we could call it pinkalicious! It was pink and grey with princess stuff everywhere. I was tired of it. So I found a color combo I liked on CB2's website.



Only problem was that one towel cost $24.95!!! Not going to pay that. So I went to HomeGoods and Target. I definitely found the Look for Less!!

From New Album 5/14/11 10:15 AM

From New Album 5/14/11 10:15 AM

I want to put up a shelf above the toilet to put the rolled towels on. The awesome bath mat is perhaps the softest thing I've ever touched! So glad I got it! And looks just like the inspiration rug.

Have you ever purchased a tumbler rinse cup for your bathroom from the bath section? Did you notice that they cost like $10 sometimes?? I did not want a $10 tumbler! So I found my adorable cups in the summer section for $1.50 each!

This is my favorite find from HomeGoods:

From New Album 5/14/11 10:15 AM

Some happy girls!

From New Album 5/14/11 10:15 AM

The best and surprise benefit to this redo is that the girls will finally use the bathroom again. They have been terrified of it since our electricity went out when they were in there with the door closed awhile ago. This morning I wake up to, "Can you please put toothpaste on my toothbrush, and Gwen is in the potty." Woohoo! Finally I don't have to hold their hands to get them in there!!

Bad Dreams

I have certain things that I still have bad dreams about! Often they involve vampires, people breaking into our house, ghosts, something bad happening to people I love, sometimes high school stuff that haunts me. There are more things I have bad dreams about, but that is a fairly good list of things to be afraid of when it happens in your dream, I think.

This one, I don't think you should be afraid of.

Naomi came to me last night at 5am. Her eyes were wider than I have ever seen. So much so that I instantly got scared she was sick (or it was one of my bad dreams where my kids are possessed!). When I asked her what was wrong, she told me she had a bad dream.

Here is the dream: I was in the bathroom. I washed my hands 4 times, and then I used sanitzer one them so I knew they were clean. But then I left my water bottle in the bathroom.

Say WHAT? This is what traumatizes the poor kid? I told her to go back to bread and do some deep breathing. Normally when she has a bad dream I let her sleep the rest of the night on our floor. I understand the fear of a bad dream, but I tell ya, that one really threw me for a loop!

I dream of having a garden with all white flowers! Imagine that at night? I think it'd be gorgeous! Brian and the girls, however, want all the possible colors in it. I think I should win, but I doubt I will...

My living room needs an office.

Lately I have been realizing that I need an office space of some sort. I want a place where I can do the occasional craft, allow the girls to color whenever they want, do homework, house the computer, bills, printer etc. Currently we have the computer in the living room and all of the coloring craftings in the dining room. Having the girls use the dining room for crafts is quite inconvenient. They are never finished for dinner time so the table always has to be cleared. Additionally I tend to set them up to color and do homework while I make dinner. Then when dinner is done I have to clear off the table and THEN set it. So I have been dreaming up a solution to have a bigger office space in the living room.

I want to have at least two work spaces. I need quite a bit of storage for the craft stuff and coloring books and office supplies. I have it all dreamed up from the pottery barn catalog, but obviously I cannot afford a pottery barn office. I want something that is able to be out in our living room though; it can't look too officey. It has to have a little class and be totally organized. So I am asking for some tips or advice on what might work.

Here is the location for the future office set up:

From Drop Box

Here are my dream offices:

From New Album 5/14/11 10:15 AM

From New Album 5/14/11 10:15 AM

From New Album 5/14/11 10:15 AM

From New Album 5/14/11 10:15 AM

One of my dilemma's is that I am always drawn to a white office. Every one of my dream offices is white desk and storage etc. However, we don't have any white furniture in our living area. I don't know if I can mix it properly to get a good look or if it will totally stand out against the rest of the room and look awkward or worse, cheap! We plan to paint the walls a blue grey. And we are keeping this tv stand:

From Drop Box

Because of the price point I am turning to Ikea as my most possible solution. They have a corner desk that will fit right in there. Any ideas? I am worried that I am looking at this from just my view point and not seeing the whole picture.

I am planning on these to use as legs for the desk:http://www.walmart.com/ip/Bush-Stockport-Collection-3-Drawer-File-Pedestal/13062139

Any ideas??

Mawwiage, Mawwiage is what brings us togewer today.

QUICK UPDATE: Naomi went to the doctor and had an xray. We'll get the results tomorrow. However, the doc is pretty sure its constipation and we will be starting a whole regime to take care of that.

Onto the topic:

I find it hilarious how different kids are. Both Gwen and Naomi were raised in the same house by the same people and yet, at this very early age, they are so so different. I don't think that Naomi has once brought up marriage until just this year. And she might have only brought it up because because Gwen talks about it constantly! Many months ago Gwen brought up being married and having 2 sweethearts (sweethearts are what she calls children). This dream of hers also included her pink house and 2 pink dogs. I feel sorry for her future husband. I just find it so interesting that its not something Naomi obsesses about. I guess I never thought it was something girls did until now that Gwen is obsessed with it. This evening, in quite the urgent voice, she told me that I need to get the decorations ready for preschool. Worried, I asked her what was happening at preschool that I needed decorations. Well, her wedding of course! She is going to marry one of the little boys in her class. I need to provided the decorations. I asked her when this was happening, again. She said this week. I told her it couldn't happen yet, I wasn't ready, and she was too young! She agreed that that was true because she does not yet have a "big purse". I laughed, and asked her if she thought it'd be ok to get married and then get the big purse. That would be just silly! So we've got time. She needs to get the big purse first. Oh and "boobs, big boobs." Right Ian?

Constant sickness, no sleep, ugh!

Naomi lately has been more vomity than usual. She has always been vomity but in small doses. For a while now she will start to vomit and then vomit through the entire night. As she has no ability to say out loud, "I am going to throw up" I have to stay awake the entire night in case she starts to throw up which will happen every 15-30 minutes through the night. So I'm not doing nothing all night. We all camp out in the living room. Naomi and I on the couch. Bianca and Brian on the floor. The reason we do this is because Brian cannot stay awake all night and then go to work all day, but he also won't wake up if Naomi starts throwing up because as I mentioned no warning. It would be just me, but Bia is still nursing so if I am nursing when Naomi starts I have to yell out to wake Brian to help her. This has happened 3 times in the last month. One of those we do think was a virus because Gwen got it.

We have an appointment with the doctor today. I am not feeling hopeful of anything coming of it. We have noticed that Naomi is a very anxious little girl. We wonder if maybe it is tied to anxiety, but like today there seems to be nothing that would be making her anxious. She gets mad when she can't go to school so I don't think that just school is the culprit. Our other wonder if that maybe its constipation that is hurting her tummy and causing her to throw up. We know this is possible, we just don't know how to tell if that is what is happening. It is really annoying! I recently read about Cyclic Vomiting Syndrome. I sure hope its not that because it seems like basically patterned vomiting for long periods of time for no real reason. Back to the anxiety, we have noted that any time we are on a trip or vacation of any sort she gets sick. (One reason we tend to not travel often) This may be because she is anxious about the change in environment or just the stress of traveling or plain excitement about it. Either way its NEVER fun for me! Oddly Brian can look back on these trips and still think of them fondly and remember fun things. I don't have that ability, if she vomits for half of a trip, I only remember that I was miserable being covered in puke or being trapped in a room or wherever with her, and being very worried it might be something spreadable.

We miss out on so much because I can't spread something. Even if its not spreadable I don't take the risk, ever! Its times like these, especially, that I wish we had any sort of family near by. 1 full hour of sleep and the occasional 10 minute snooze just does not cut it to be able to function through a normal day. It'd be great to have some sort of socialization during these times of seclusion. And at the same time I just want to lock myself away for the next week or two to recover!

We also noticed that once this child decides she is going to throw up there is not stopping her. Its almost like she wants to throw up, but I have no idea WHY anyone would want that. She came home last night with a tummy ache. In just trying to determine if she just has a little gas or is going to throw up, just the suggestion makes her do it. Then I often wonder how much of the continued vomited is just from being set off by that one time and then she thinks she needs to keep throwing up, ya know? Its frustrating, and I am very tired!