The Most Embarrassing Moment of My Adult Life

I know I haven't been updating this blog lately, but this needed to be documented. You're welcome in advance.



I wanted to print out this really cute Easter print from pinterest. I saved it on a flash drive we had and while I was saving it I noticed it had some files on it called Teaching and Nursing Resources, Community Health, Fall 2010 Semester, etc. Neither Phil nor I took nursing classes so I just assumed he found it laying around and tossed it in our "all things technology" basket.

So I get to Sam's and I ask the guy if they can print photos 16x20 size from a thumb drive. He says, sure... I'll help.

So we insert the thumb drive as I'm telling him I have no idea what's on there and it might take a minute to find the picture. WELL, what I DIDN'T know was how many pictures of straight up penis and vaginas covered in genital warts we'd get flashed with trying to find the picture that I wanted to print.

I DIED.

I mumbled something about "I'm so sorry, there are a lot of nursing files on here and I had no idea those pictures were in them".

And then I died again.

And of course the photo I actually wanted to print wasn't a freaking jpeg, so it didn't even show up. My innocent little Easter photo.

He suggested that I go home and upload the photo I want printed to Sam's Club online. He was really nice and said he was a surgical tech before he retired (did I mention this was a sweet old man?) and photos of genital warts were nothing for him.

And then I took my cart with my sweet precious innocent little children sitting in the front and got as far away from the photo department as possible.

And that, my friends, is going in the "things I'll never forget" file.

For the new family receiving a Prader Willi Syndrome diagnosis

If you have a baby and have received a Prader-Willi Syndrome diagnosis, please know you are not alone! Here is a wonderful video put together by some fellow PWS families...

This is the Day

Have you all seen this 2012 Declutter Calendar from My Simpler Life?  It's pretty neat.  A great way to reorganize, clean, and declutter your house in one year, just by doing one task a day. I love that it's totally achievable, and even when we leave the house for vacation I'm pretty confident we can knock out a weeks worth of tasks in just a short weekend or two.  Maybe pick half of the days of work to do before the vacation and the other half of the days of when we get back.  Today we took our donation pile to the Goodwill to start fresh!

I'm so excited to be doing this.  Surely it will help us get the house ready to sell!

Day 2 of the 366 Project:

Sarah

New Year and New Resolutions

Happy New Year!

I know I said I'd update about Eric and how things have gone over the last 5 months.  But basically it was a combination of crying, rocking, nursing, tickles, giggles, kisses, and coos.  That sums up most of our 5 months. 

Eric, if you're reading this when you're older, you have been one of the biggest joys in my life.  Yes, you cry a lot as an infant, but your eyes tell me you love me and it makes it all worth it.  You are mostly crying because you don't ever want to be put down or have the attention on anything but yourself.  Hopefully over the years you'll learn to turn that into something positive.  Even at 3am when I'm tired and know you're not really hungry, I still rush in to hold you because I know it's not always going to be like this.  You have me wrapped around your little finger and that's OK.  Even when you're fussy, I know I can pick you up and toss you in the air and you'll instantly be happy again.  You love to be tossed, swung around, and smothered in kisses!  Everyone else is scared to death to throw you around, but I got you babe.  One day it's going to be you and me riding the roller coasters and jumping out of airplanes, snowboarding and wake boarding, white water rafting and rock climbing.  Your dad can teach you hunting and fishing and how to change a tire.  I'm sorry I haven't been keeping up with this blog during your newborn stage, but I was too busy holding you and trying to catch up on sleep.

Here are some pictures to make up for lost time:

Now, back to the new year and resolutions...

I'm jumping on the 366 project bandwagon.  Basically you take a photo every day of the year. Here's a little blurb about why it's awesome and why you should do it too - http://content.photojojo.com/tutorials/project-365-take-a-photo-a-day/.  Since this year is a leap year, it's 366 (duh) days instead of 365.  To make this a realistic goal, I'll probably use my phone a lot for the photos and will likely update the blog every few days if I'm not able to do it every day.

Another resolution I have is to run a half marathon.  Let me preface this by saying I. am. not. a. runner.  I don't even like jogging.  But we'll be having another Running for Lillian Fundraiser in October and I really want to run the half marathon.  All the money raised will go towards the Foundation for Prader-Willi Research.  More info to come. (if anyone is interested in running, shoot me an email and I'll give you details on where the race is.)

If anyone else is doing the 366 project this year, please leave a comment and let me know! I'd love to follow along and keep each other motivated to keep it up!

Forget the baby food, bring on the Twix!

First night of the year

Big sister

Birthdays, Beaches, and Blogging

Things have been a bit crazy here with learning to navigate life with a toddler and a newborn!  Eric is now 4 months old (gasp) and finally not so colicky.  We're still having some struggles with waking up anywhere from three to four times a night (two on a good night).  So, I'm still pretty darn sleep deprived and 4 months of sleep deprivation can lead to neglecting a blog, clearly.  I probably would have just complained the last four months anyway.  But I'm going to try to get back to this because I really want to keep documenting these times so one day I can look back and and REMEMBER things that my sleep deprived memory might rob me of :).

This fall was beautiful and the weather has been really mild.  Lillian's birthday was a big hit.  She had an apple themed birthday party with LOTS of friends, family, and babies.

Just a few decorations

Pie in a jar for our guests to take home (we didn't serve dessert at the party)

She was running around so much, this is the best photo I got that day!

My little colic monster would only rest with mommy

Lillian is growing up so fast.  She picks up on so much going on in the house too.  Ever since we brought Eric home, she has been ALL about her baby dolls!  She puts them in his swing, on his play mat, in his jumperoo, in his bumbo seat, she lays them on the bed and puts diapers on top of them, puts the swaddle on them, etc.  She burps them and rocks them too.  I just love watching her and if she's playing with her dolls, then she's staying out of trouble...

Speaking of trouble, turning two has been interesting.  She has learned how to get my attention by getting into anything and everything she's not supposed.  Drives me absolutely batty!  It's especially hard with a newborn who cries and nurses all day and I'm trying to soothe him while keeping my eye on her. Oy. And all while sleep deprived. 

It's been really hard to not loose my mind the last 4 months.  I was so desperate for a break, and felt horrible that Lillian wasn't getting the attention she was used to.  Finally out of desperation I called the local PDO program (parents day out) and asked if they had any openings, and thank God they had one opening in her age group. We went in and toured the facility and I talked with the teachers in her classroom for a while.  It took a few visits before I was comfortable leaving her there for the whole day (9-3), but I'm thankful they are willing to make a few adjustments for her and were more than willing to learn about her syndrome.  The kids eat snacks and lunch at "school" and I'm able to provide Lillian with all her own food, so that makes everything much less stressfull.  I found a great PDF file written for preschool educators of children with PWS.  The link to that file is here.  I also printed this out for all of her therapists because it's really great information on how they learn best.  She absolutely loves going to "school" and usually doesn't want to leave when I go to pick her up.

So now Lillian's schedule for the week consists of 2 days at PDO, 4 therapies (PT, ST, OT, DT), and church 2 mornings a week (once during a mom's group and once on Sunday).  She's a busy girl!

We also recently went to the national PWSA conference in Florida and met some really great people.  Lillian enjoyed swimming and we spent some time at the beach. 

Eric deserves (more like demands) a whole post to himself, so I'll update on him later. He's an absolute joy and I'm really enjoying this age with him!  Lillian loves her brother too and luckily has shown no jealousy of him whatsoever.  Hopefully it stays that way.

Any sleep advice for a 4 month old is welcome :).  I'm sure many of you have experience in this department!  Since he was a colicky newborn, up until this point I've basically done anything to get him to sleep.  Rocking, nursing, singing, etc.   Now that he's not crying all the time, I'd like to get him out of the habit of needing to nurse to sleep because i'm really not getting enough sleep to be a good mom.  I'm just so tired. 


Sarah