Finished!!

This morning Matt and I placed the last pieces on our 2000 piece Van Gogh.  Next step is to glue it together and then find a frame (we may have to get a custom one?) so we can put it on the wall!

Savoring the little moments

Recently I've been feeling kind of depressed because I realized that we have nothing big happening this year.  Since we got engaged, we always have had something big to plan for: our wedding in 2005, Cora's birth in 2006, Erin's birth in 2007, Matt's internship and graduation in 2008, moving to Denver and Patrick's birth in 2009.  But this year looks to be exactly the same.  I was really frustrated, and a little depressed, and I started praying for help.  In thinking about it, I realized that I as falling into old patterns again.  A bad habit I thought I conqured was resurfacing: living in the future.  In high school, I told myself life would be better once I graduated.  While single I told myself life would be better once I got married.  While pregnant with Cora I told myself life would be better once the baby was born.

And of course with that last one, the future that I was anticipating never came.

I realized that when we're done having babies and we've bought a house, what comes next?  Once we've done all the big life events, what is there left other than just living every day?  So I need to learn to do that now.

So that's my main goal for this year: truly learn to live each day and savor it.  As Master Oogway says on Kung Fu Panda: "You are too concerned with what was and what will be.  As they say, the past is history, the future a mystery, but today is a gift.  That's why it's called the present."

I love how Erin has started to pose for the camera. She always wants to be involved in pictures.  When I take a picture of Patrick she'll say "Ewwin in pitoh too?  Pitoh of Ewwin!  Smayoh!"

And Patrick just does goofy things and is always smiling.  He always seems to know when I need his grins the most.

I have no idea how Erin really compares with kids her age, but she's always surprising me with just how smart she is.

The joy of blocks

Patrick was playing with blocks (and actually getting them stuck together!) and then Erin had to join in the fun.

When two turns into four...

...massacred teeth that is.

I went in to the dentist this morning expecting to have a filling done and a crown put on, with another crown to be scheduled in the near future, since it was on the other side of my mouth and they don't generally like to numb your entire mouth in one visit.

When I got there, they informed me that the tooth adjacent to the first crown also needed a crown.  It was just a filling last summer on our initial consult, but since then the tooth had lost enough integrity that a filling was no longer a viable option.  Oh...and it was getting close to root pulp too.  So, after talking it through and talking about insurance benefits, we decided that we would do the filling and 2 crowns today (the original 2 teeth that needed them, because the second crown was decayed enough he didn't want to wait really at all), and on the 3rd tooth (the "surprise" crown) he just drilled it out and built it up and put a temporary crown on it.  I went in expecting 2 teeth to be massacred, and came out with four of them having been.  In reality, I have 3 temporary crowns at the moment, since they have to send the molds out to have a 3rd party make the porcelain permanents.  But they're only making 2.  I go in in 2 weeks to get those put on, and we'll try to schedule a time then for the 3rd permanent crown and to fill the remaining cavities in that quadrant of the mouth.

I think we'll also be able to do the fillings on yet another quadrant sometime this year.  Man my mouth is a piece of work.  I'm betting I'm one of my dentist's favorite patients.

Pictures that I didn't post for some reason...and a video

Erin and Patrick love the art table and markers

11 months....and a tooth update

Seriously? He's really 11 months old?  Where has the time gone?  I can't believe my baby boy will be a year old in another month.

I'd post a picture, but I forgot to charge the camera battery overnight...so my camera's dead.

As for the teeth...it's my teeth not Patrick's, lol.  Wednesday I'm going to get another crown and a filling. Soon after I'm going to get another crown hopefully.  Then we have to work on my plethora of fillings.  Man my mouth is so expensive!

Sunday Sunday

Just some cute random pictures ((Just so you know, I posted 3 different entries today, catching up on Friday and Saturday because I didn't a chance to post them on those days.))

A day at the museum

Yesterday Matt and our friend Dave and some other guys got together to play games, so his wife Danica and I took all our kids to the Denver Museum of Nature and Science.  We've been there on multiple occasions, but it's always fun to take the kids.  We were planning on the zoo, but decided that it was just too cold to be outside (39 degrees or so by the time we got there) and the museum is right next to the zoo.  The boys put the carseats in the van for us, so I didn't have the right to tell them that Patrick was supposed to be rear facing (we usually move Lilly's carseat to the back with Erin and Jensen and put Patrick rear facing where Lilly is.  But we forgot to tell them that).  I figured one trip wouldn't hurt, as he's nearly a year old and over the weight limit now anyway.  Don't worry, I put his seat back rearfacing into our car where the vast majority of his car riding gets done anyway.

We went to the wildlife halls first, figuring that while it wasn't as good as a zoo full of living animals, it was still cool.  Though when Jensen asked if they were real we told him they weren't.  We didn't think a 4 year old would understand taxidermy.  They liked riding on the fake llamas.

Then we went to the Discovery Health exhibit, which is all about the body and such things.  There's this light panel that plays video of rushing water, and has a balance beam across. Erin did amazingly well (when that older boy wasn't tailgating her!). 

I didn't get a picture, but she, Jensen, and Lily decided they needed to "go swimming."  Danica and I (and everyone around us) were laughing, it was very cute.  But of course, once the camera came out, they stopped.


There was a children's play area in that exhibit called "Tyke's Peak" in which Patrick practiced his climbing skills.

Then we went to the Children's Discovery Center.  Seperate exhibit, same sort of thing.  Erin and Lily were excited to go in.

They always have a different set of toys when we go and this time it was these magnetic rods. 

I don't know what it is about magnets but even Danica and I had a lot of fun playing with them!

All in all, a very good day.  Hopefully soon it'll warm up enough to go to the zoo!

Cognitive development

Patrick likes to play with the tupperware bowls in the cabinet in the kitchen while I'm cooking dinner.  It's fun to watch him stack the bowls into each other and try to put the lids on them.  Oh, and climb inside the cabinet.

Recently Matt and I decided we need to have something we can do together and interact, so we bought ourselves a 2000 piece puzzle of Van Gogh's "Cafe Terrace at Night."  It's going pretty well even though I've never done a puzzle this big before.

But Erin got jealous, so we had to buy her one, and she LOVES it.

She got the idea of matching dips to bumps pretty easily.  It took her a couple days to understand matching the colors too.  But now she has it memorized.

It's so fun to watch my kids try to figure out the way things work!

It's official!

I had enough time to stand up, get the camera from the desk, turn it on and take both these pictures.

The drama of the $10k mouth

Okay, so my teeth are terrible, right?  3 close, very sick pregnancies have left my teeth riddled with holes and decaying.  Last summer the doctor's estimate added up to about $10,000.  (that was not including the 2 actual root canal procedures since he referred me out for them, not including the insurance discount either). 

So with the 2 root canals and crowns, it added up altogether to about $4,000, only half of which was paid for by my insurance.  And now we get to go for round two.

I had a checkup/cleaning on Monday.  In addition to the other two crowns, I have a cavity that is getting close to needing an root canal, so it needs to be filled ASAP.  They were supposed to call me this afternoon to set up and appointment for the filling and crown on that same side, but it's now after 5pm and no call. grrr.


Oh, and to add to all that....a piece of that tooth that they were supposed to be scheduling a crown for today fell off.

*sigh*

Sometimes I accidentally take a really great picture.

I'm not really a great photographer, I admit it.  Sometimes it really bothers me.  Other times I figure it's better to have mediocre pictures than no pictures at all.

Sometimes though, I manage to get a really great shot.  Usually, like today, it's when I stop TRYING to take a good picture.  I'm really proud of these two

Erin was playing on the slide with her bunny, wiping the gravel off, and then putting Bunny on the slide and helping him slide down.  And then she tried to climb up

And Patrick wanted to play too (he was throwing gravel on the slide)

More of Patrick

Trying to eat like a grownup.

I couldn't help but take pictures yesterday of Patrick trying to use a spoon...

and giving up...

And I love it when he makes this face...

Erin started saying "Ewwin! Pitoh! Smayoh!"  So I took a couple of her too.  She didn't like the idea of stopping eating long enough to actually smile though.

Haircut!

I've been growing out my hair for Locks of Love and yesterday I got it cut!

Before

After
((these were taken on Matt's phone, sorry they're not so great))