The mega teether (and snow)

The boys have been outside for about forty minutes now, shoveling our not-so-big driveway in blizzard conditions. This is the stuff Dylan lives for: purple cheeks, working hard, just like Daddy. Sean came home from work at 1PM and there was already anywhere from 5-9 inches of snow on the driveway depending on the height of the drifts.

Dylan and I had gone out to measure at about 12:30. His face was covered in Fun Dip, a Valentine's Day gift of glorious sugar from a classmate.











I was thrilled to see Sean pull in, not only because lunch was hot and ready for him and I was happy to spend the day with all three of my loves, but because my legs haven't been working well today and these poor kids were mostly entertaining themselves while I sat or laid down. I just don't understand how I can still have such crippling days a full year after having my thyroid removed. I was hoping to have this figured out by now.

Kate has been a horrible sleeper for the past few weeks, mostly because we've all been fighting a death cold and she kept croup coughing herself awake and we spent a lot of time sleeping while sitting up on the couch together. I knew she was teething, but I was beyond shocked when I looked in her mouth this morning. Look at this poor baby!

She is getting 4-6 teeth in all at once on top and possibly 2-4 on the bottom, although the bottom is half as bulgy as the top set. She spent a lot of the day on the couch with Sam, who is now barely limping from his partial torn ligament and strict bed rest.



It's 2:30 now and Kate is sleeping right through the incessant dog barking as the dogs pant and yelp at Sean and Dylan from the window. Jasmine and Sam have some pretty severe separation anxiety and don't handle the thirty feet separating them from their family very well. Sam is so sensitive that if you don't pet him long enough when you first come in the door he will find something--today it was one of Kate's Little People princesses--to chew until he feels better. Jasmine has been sticking her head in my lap all day because she is afraid of snow plows. Avery is our only normal dog. I sneaked out in my feetie pajamas to snap some photos of the boys.











Mr. Dylan boy just came in with Sean and said he needed a drink. A juice box? "No," he said, "muscle juice." Where does he get this stuff? He found a pudding Snack Pack instead and when I asked him if he was going to behave after having all of that sugar he replied, "Mommy, I'm gonna be wild and so crazy in this house. 'Cause, Mommy, I'm going to be running around and playing and eating and cooking and playing upstairs."

And look who is awake!




Ha. That face!



Dylan is now glued to the front window watching all of our neighbors snow blow their driveways. You know, I'm not even really sick of this snow right now. It's been pretty awesome today.

The end of football season!

I always think of my adorable niece and nephew on Groundhog's Day. They were about three and four-years-old and we were watching the Super Bowl together that night. This is their groundhog song.



I feel bad for Sean every year at Super Bowl time. This is his Christmas, his Holy Grail, and for me it signifies the glorious end of having to watch a torturously boring sport every Sunday for months. We took the kids to the park and for a hike at around noon and Sean joked that he was sacrificing the pregame show. I guess I don't understand football. There's a six-hour show before the game even starts? Anyway, we had a nice time at the park even if it was raining.




Today was the first day since Thursday that I'm feeling half alive again. I must've had the flu because I ran every symptom across the flu spectrum from fevers to chills to vomiting to coughing. This morning I coughed up blood--an effect of coughing so hard over the last four days--and I instantly felt better. It was as if I had coughed out my infection. I'm still coughing but nothing like I was before and I have enough strength to walk around and my appetite is back in time for all of this football junkfood. When we saw the kids' doctor last week he mentioned that they either had a touch of RSV or a lesser version of the flu since they both had their flu shots. I always get my flu shot. Every year. Well guess who didn't get her flu shot this year and came down with the flu? This girl. And not only did I get the flu but I got double pink eye. My eyes were sealed shut and my ears were clogged. Helluva few days. But I'm feeling fantastic in comparison now.

So the Super Bowl. Sean predicts 23-17 Seattle and I've got 17-14 Broncos although he knows what he's talking about and I'm just shooting in the dark. Our house is a Giants household so we've got nothing invested in this game. I asked Sean the other day if we were going to even bother watching it. He looked at me and said, "Are you kidding? When I was seventeen I decided that I was going to live as long as I could so that I can see as many Super Bowls as possible in my lifetime." Man, I wish I understood why people love football so much. I'm happy for Sean on his big game day and his happiness is all that matters.

I raided the closets and found orange "football" clothes for the kids so tonight they are rooting for the Broncos. They liked dressing up and will get to see about an hour of the game before bedtime. Although I'm not sure Dylan quite understands football either. He asked me when we were going in the "super ball". Close enough.






So for all of you football fans out there, I hope you enjoy your big day. May your bellies be full, your rides home be safe, and your teams win.

My hero

I started to get a sore throat last night before bed and by the middle of the night I was full-on flu bug. We were out of cold medicine and I had a terrible migraine. I crawled downstairs to the couch and flopped around in pain and fevery chills until Sean came downstairs at 6:30AM. By seven, he was on his way to the pharmacy to pick me up some DayQuil. He is at his busiest at work during the last few days of the month so I knew he couldn't stay home with me and so there I was, unable to move and having to tend to two little cuties all day. I barely got off the couch today and the kids were absolutely perfect. They played together and watched movies together and I drifted in and out of sleep.



I was counting the hours until Sean came home from work. And then he came home three hours early bringing me Reece's peanut butter cups and ginger ale. In my delirious state I thought maybe he was just home for lunch, but no. He was home for the day. Early. To take care of me. I could've cried I was so happy to see him. I so love that man.

My favorite present

Friday was our fifth anniversary. I'm sorry if I've mentioned that a hundred times. We semi-eloped for our wedding and planned it in a week and it was on the day of a big blizzard so we don't have too many photos of our big day because we were all freezing. But we made up for it on our first anniversary with my absolute favorite photos of us ice skating in our wedding gear in our backyard.


2011

After being in front of my camera for the last decade, it's hard to get Sean to happily pose for photo shoots these days so when he agreed to do another wedding clothes session with me for our anniversary I was overjoyed.

And not only did we dress up in the very cold windy weather, but he didn't complain once. And we laughed and skipped and ran around and climbed trees like teenagers. It was the best day.





I'm not going to post all of them, but you can see a few HERE on my flickr account. Including the outtakes of us trying to get in and out of a tree.

Happy 5th Anniversary, My Love.

I couldn't possibly explain my love for this man in a blog post. Or even fifty blog posts. So I threw together a simple video. I'm singing Calico Skies, one of my favorite love songs. It's not great quality, and most of these pictures are older, but I made it with love. For my Love.



Here's to fifty more years!

Laughy wife, happy life

There are plenty of secrets to a healthy marriage, laughter being one of them. Sean can make me laugh like no one else. He's quiet and keeps to himself a lot except here at home and to those who know him best, he only speaks when he has something important--or hilarious--to add to the conversation. I've got this line that I say to him a bunch, "And that's why I married you." I find myself saying that several times a week. He just makes my life better. I love his company. Always.



Here's a video from a bunch of years ago that makes me laugh. We do this thing...three seconds...where we have to try not to laugh for three seconds while the other person tickles us. It never fails, we end up cracking up.



Another thing that keeps our marriage laughing is mini marshmallows. We have a rule that if we're eating mini marshmallows we have to be throwing them at each other. We usually get one or two into our mouths and half the package ends up on the floor and we always laugh and laugh. Same goes for cheeseballs.

Although cheeseballs are way messier when we miss.

In the beginning

When Sean and I started dating eight years ago, I made a video for each month we were together. I would sit down on the 14th of every month and pair our collection of photos with the sappiest love songs I could find. I was smitten with him. At the end of our first year of dating his entire family gathered to watch our anniversary video. They sat through the first month's video and clapped and then realized that I had made twelve of these videos and that they had agreed to watch a movie that was nearly an hour long. They were good sports about it and I'm pretty sure I beamed with love for Sean as he held me on his lap and we watched our first year together.

There was this instant chemistry between us; we were electric.



And he didn't even have to open his mouth for me to know exactly how he felt about me, all he had to do was look at me.



But the thing is, all of these years later, we have grown even more in love with each other. We're still in this honeymoon phase of our marriage. Madly in love.



I no longer make monthly movies of our relationship, I'm busy documenting our kids' lives instead, but that doesn't mean that our love is any less special or exciting. Our life has changed over the years but our love hasn't dwindled.

Forever in love.

Those three words

Friday is our 5th wedding anniversary and so I thought that I would tell some Sean and me stories on the blog. Get ready for some sappy blog posts!

Sean and I met at a bar. The first time he told me he loved me was in that same bar two years later. We hadn't been dating for three months yet and I know this because being the planner that he is, Sean didn't want to say those three HUGE words to me before a certain point in our relationship. His rule: We must not say "I love you" until we've been dating for at least 3 months.

Okay, now the story of when I first knew I was in danger of drowning in the love pool:

Ten years ago Sean and I had a slumber party at a friend's house and stayed up all night talking about Ireland. No seriously, we talked about Ireland. And through Ireland we talked about dreams and ambitions, goals, pasts, futures...we just kept talking. I wanted to kiss him but his best friend had a crush on me and so he held my hand and slept on the floor next to the couch. The next day was a freezing cold Sunday in October and we spent it building a patio and shivering profusely. Sean's nose began to run. He had a huge pile of bricks in his arms and I reached over and wiped his nose on my sleeve. His snotty watery nose didn't phase me and that's when I first knew I loved him. I know that's weird and I had no idea then just how much I would grow to love him, but I remember feeling so instantly at home with him. He was someone I trusted with my secrets.


Building patios together in 2004

Fast forward two years later to May of 2006. We had been dating for a little over two months. We spent every possible second together and had never spent a night apart. Pertaining to the way I felt (and still feel), "Love" was an understatement and I was bursting at the seams to say those three special words. Sean was bursting too, but would only let on when he had had too much to drink. On a car ride home from Mystic, he whispered "I can't wait for three months". And we didn't wait.



It seemed unfair. I loved this man and yet I couldn't tell him because of his stupid rule. So I protested. I'd say "I hate your rule" and it really meant "I love you. Ha! I said it!". He'd smile and say, "3 months, Love, no sooner".

But that night at the Eagle, the bar where we first met, he let his guard down. I was on stage singing my traditional La Isla Bonita into the karaoke machine. Let me better set the scene:


This video isn't from the I Love You night, but it was taken at the bar and this was the song I was singing.

So here I was on stage when Sean stood up from our spot at the bar and walked over to me. He stood right in front of me as I sang and yelled, "FUCK IT! I DON'T CARE ABOUT MY STUPID RULE! I LOVE YOU! I LOVE YOU! SEE? I SAID IT! I LOVE YOU!" He was close enough to me for his proclamation to echo into my microphone and the entire bar heard him. Picture yourself at the bar, sitting there watching this man profess his love to his girl for the first time as she sings a Madonna song in Spanish. Now that, my friends, is romance.

Anyone want to share an "I love you story"?

Celebrating my loves

Katie turned seven months today and Sean turned forty! I love birthdays. Love love love love birthdays. The kids and I blew up a ton of balloons and hung streamers and made cards for Daddy while he was at work. We had Chinese food for dinner at Sean's request, ice cream cake for desert, and Octoberfest for after the kids went to sleep.



It was a long day for Dylan as he patiently waited for Sean to come home from work. I'm not sure who was more excited about our little family soiree, Dylan or Sean.








Here's Dylan singing Happy Birthday.



And a little family snapshot...



Happy birthday, handsome.

A heart full of love

Called Sean at work, he said he had a terrible headache.

Me: "Me, too! I was in a hurry because someone was pulling up next to me and I had left my door open and I slammed the trunk down ridiculously hard on my skull. Hard enough to check for blood."
Sean: "Oh! That must explain my headache then!"

Aw. Soulmates.

Do you know what makes a five month old baby happy? Everything. There's nothing like sitting down with her after a long day and pretending to sneeze, watching her light up with an ear-to-ear smile. Look that way! Look back at the baby! Where'd you go?! Laughs. All I have to do is get up to grab something in the other room and I come back to the happiest little girl who is just so glad to see me.



Do you know what makes a two-year-old happy? Dirt. And Home Depot. We are enjoying both today.

And do you know what makes a mama happy?





Two happy, healthy babies who adore each other.