Cake and presents

We had our friends over today to have cake and presents for Patrick.  We had homemade personal sized pizzas for dinner, and then cake and ice cream for dessert.

I got this cute little mini cake for Patrick.  We found the candles a month or so ago at the store we got our big puzzle at, and I couldn't resist.

Patrick was pretty tired, and had been crying through dinner (thus the tears on his face) but cheered up once we gave him the cake.  But he didn't get as into it as I thought he would.

Then we moved on to presents.  After opening the one from Jensen and Lilly, he wasn't interested in the two I wrapped from us (I mostly bought him clothes and didn't bother to wrap those).  So I let Jensen and Lilly open them.

Even though the kids were all really tired, it was still really fun to have them over to celebrate our little guy!

The post I should have posted yesterday.

We took some pictures of things on Patrick's birthday, and I meant to post them yesterday, but didn't get around to it.

Here's his birthday outfit.

Even though we're having Patrick's party today, we let him open Grandma and Grandpa Hill's gift so he could have something to open on his actual birthday.

Erin has decided it's now her favorite toy (of course)

And then yesterday, in one of the outfits Grandma and Grandpa sent, playing while Erin was napping.

And a video

Happy Birthday Patrick!!!

Dear Patrick,

One year ago today at this time, I was on my way to the hospital so that you could be born.  That was a very long day, and by the end we were both very exhausted and very ready for you to just be born.  It was one of the happiest moments of my life to be able to hold you in my arms after all of that.

You have been such a joy in my life.  You are so easy to smile and laugh, and that has helped me make it through many a hard and frustrating day.

I hope you know how much we love you and how happy we are to have been able to share the last year with you.  I am excited to be able to share many more to come!

Love you always,
Your Mommy.

Why I love that Erin loves the Princess and the Frog

Disney's The Princess and the Frog has to be Erin's favorite movie now.  She asks for it multiple times a day.  She even knows and repeats the lines.

It's funny now, I like movies that have a good message for her to take away from it.  As a kid, you just watch to be entertained.  lol.  Luckily this movie has both.

The main conflict is less about outright good vs outright evil.  It's actually about the difference between getting what you want the "easy" way and working hard for it.  In this culture of getting what you want NOW with as little effort as possible, I think it's a great message.

Our protagonist is Tiana.

Her dream is to open her own restaurant.  It had actually been a dream of her father's be he died without the money to be able to buy a place.  So Tiana is working two jobs, with double shifts sometimes, to save the money for the old sugar mill her dad had had his eye on.  In the prologue though (10 years prior), when Tiana is wishing on the evening star for her daddy to get his restaurant, he says to her "Remember that star can only take you part of the way.  You have to help it along with a little hard work of your own."

Enter Prince Naveen.

His parents have cut him off for being a "leach" and now he is penniless but wanting to live the high life.  He doesn't want to get a job, though, so he's decided he's going to marry the daughter of the richest man in town.  While he and his manservant Lawrence are discussing this, they are overheard by Dr. Facilier, who is also called the Shadow Man because of his voodoo talents.

Dr. Facilier is described by the makers of the move as the love child of Captain Hook and Cruella DeVille.  Unlike Maleficent though, there's no "ruler of evil!" bit here. No, he describes himself as someone who "just wants to help" and Naveen and Lawrence are taken in.  What Naveen doesn't know is that Facilier is planning on turning him into a frog and using his blood to make Lawrence look like Naveen.  Lawrence will then marry Charlotte and split the LeBouff fortune with Facilier.  Knowing that, you can see all the frog references in what he's saying to Naveen.He tells Naveen everything he wants to hear, but means something completely different while saying it.  He talks about how Naveen wants to be free to "hop" from place to place, but freedom requires "green."  The tarot card for Naveen's future even shows him surrounded by money, playing his banjo while lazily laying back on a lilypad.

Isn't this really how it works?  Whenever we are offered the "easy way" to what we want, it never turns out like we expect it to, and many times it's unpleasant.


But Erin doesn't realize all this.  She just thinks that the frogs are funny.

Differences

It's amazing how different my children are.  And the difference is usually more than gender.

Erin hates to be dirty.  If she gets food or drink on her clothes at all, she must change (although, I must admit, if it's not bad I try to distract her so she won't think about it and will leave that shirt on).  And she hates to be naked.  If I don't get her dressed quickly enough she'll demand "Cwoze on!"

Patrick, however, will dive head first into any mess (we'll see if this holds true with his birthday cake this weekend).  And as if having it on his face and hands isn't good enough, he'll spread it on his head too.  And he loves to be naked.  If I'm not ready with a clean diaper to go on immediately when changing him, he'll take off diaperless and giggle the whole time.

As an illustration:  Earlier today Patrick took off before I could get pants on him, so instead of chasing him down I let him go.

And Erin is sitting on the couch asking "Where Paquackses pants?"

french braids

I french braided Erin's hair for the first time today.  Her hair is SO thin!  It was actually fairly difficult, especially since she wouldn't sit still.  I really doubt it'll stay in for very long!

I also found a large patch of very flaky dry skin on her scalp.  Anybody know what I can do to help that?

In other news, Erin's sick.  She's been coughing for the past two days.  It now sounds like she's coughing stuff up instead of it just being a dry hacking cough, but she's telling me it hurts after every one.  It's so sad!  And Patrick is starting to cough a little too.  *sigh*  Hopefully they get over it quickly!

Always growing

Patrick just took 3 steps from his daddy to me.  I knew he could if he really wanted to, and he proved it today.  I need a pause button!

And edited to add a video from yesterday.

Mom, look!!

After Patrick's nap today, I was holding him on my lap and he looked out the window.  It's snowing.  He said "Mama! Unh!" and I looked at him and he was pointing out the window.

So I put him on the floor and opened the blinds to the sliding door...and he's still fascinated with the snow falling in the window...lol

Just another day

I haven't taken pictures in a few days, so I decided to dust off the camera today.

Erin and Patrick were playing so nicely.

Erinisms

I'm going to be updating today with the silly things that Erin says to me.

~"PWEEEZE Mom!"  "Please what?  What do you want?" "Munny mik."  "Bunny milk?  Bunny wants milk?" "NO.  Cockitt munny mik."  OH!  ((The nesquick chocolate milk mix package has a bunny on it))

~ (She brought her Christmas hippo out to me) "Mom, is habbo!  Is Mismis!!  Where pessants??"

~"Watch fwoggy moomie.  An' pwincess! An' ah-ee-gadow, an' fy-fwy.  You sing Mommy."  ((She's talking about The Princess and the Frog.  And yes, I sing along.  lol))

~ (I asked her what she wanted for lunch) "Kicken!  Kicken nuggets an' sauce! TWO sauce!"

~"Do see fish?  Paquack! See fish?  Commere!  I saw you!"

~"Pan-cake a pan-cake, yeah, yeah, a Paquack an' me! YUM!" (playing pat-a-cake with Patrick's feet and then eating the "cake" after, lol)

~ "Ah-ah-ah-chyoo! Byess you!  heeee hee! Funny sneeze!"  (pretend sneeze)

Well, Patrick lost that race

Erin got her first tooth 16 days before her birthday.  Patrick is still toothless and his birthday is in (for all intents and purposes, since it's 10:22pm) 10 days.  He's been fairly cranky (for him anyway, I'm sure Adrienne would laugh at me) lately, and has 4 lumps on his bottom gum, so I wish he would just CUT one already!

Anyway, sorry about the blog silence, I'll try to get some pictures tomorrow.

Sometimes he surprises me.

I don't know why I find it so surprising that Patrick's developing like he is.  Maybe because I think everything is a miracle.  Probably more so that I see him compared to Erin, who has 21 months of development on him.  When Erin was learning to talk, she babbled ALL the time but didn't mimic.  She wouldn't for the life of me repeat anything I was trying to get her to say...until later.

Patrick is a parrot.  He doesn't get it perfect, of course, but when you say words at him he says something that kind of sounds like it back.  And I love it.

This morning I was changing Erin's diaper.  I pulled off her pants, and put them on her face and said "Peekaboo!"  So she started playing.  "Keekaboo! Keekaboo! Keekaboo Paquack!"  And Patrick in response put his hands on his face, pulled them off and said "Buh-boo!" with a huge grin.

SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO cute!!

Bunny jumps

Poor Lonely Bunny

So Erin's gotten to the point where she no longer needs to take Bunny with her everywhere she goes.  When we go out, 9 times out of 10 Bunny gets left here.  This is where he got left when Matt and Erin left for church this morning.

Yes, you read that correctly, just Matt and Erin.  Patrick and I stayed home.  Why?  Because I woke up with a migraine this morning.  I've had a persistent sinus headache for the past several weeks.  Even the Tylenol Severe Cold and Sinus (that I'm not actually supposed to take because of reactions with the thyroid meds) does nothing to relieve the pressure.  I took 2 excedrin and 2 ibuprofin this morning, and I still have a headache.  I don't feel like my head is breaking open anymore though, so that's good. But the caffeine in the excedrin made me dizzy (a dose is 2 pills, I normally only take one).

I've been on zyrtec for the past week as my dr suggested so we could make sure it wasn't allergies.  It hasn't helped.  I have another dentist appointment on the 23rd (for the permanent crowns), and if that doesn't help (it got worse after the dental work) then I'll talk to my doctor again.

One of Matt's "assignments" while at church today was to track down someone to help give me a blessing (we have new home teachers and don't know who they are).

In the mean time, any spare prayers you have that you could point in my direction would be wonderful.

Tub Crayons

The other day we got a Valentine's package from Grandma Linda.  For Erin there was a Color Wonder set, which she was SO EXCITED for (thanks Grandma Linda!)  For Patrick there were these adorable Tadoodles markers

I pulled them out to give them a try and they BLED everywhere.  There were puddles of ink all over the paper.  Needless to say, I wasn't going to give them to a 1-year-old and a 2.5-year-old.  I really hope that they're not all like that because if they are the designer was kind of dumb.  So...I went to the store and got these instead (I wanted to get something similar but not the markers again just in case)

And we tried them out today in the bathtub.  How'd they like them?  Well...you decide

A day in the life

(I'm going to be updating this throughout the day)

5am: Patrick's crying.  I go get him and bring him to bed with me, hoping he'll fall back to sleep.  He does.
5:30: Matt's alarm goes off.
5:31: after a little prodding, Matt gets up and hits snooze
5:39: alarm goes off again, Matt gets up and hits snooze
5:48: Matt gets up and gets in the shower.  Patrick wakes up when he turns on the light but after snuggling into my shoulder he's fast asleep again and surprisingly I'm not far behind.
somewhere around 6:30:  Erin gets up and Matt puts her in bed with me and Patrick, tucks her in, and tells her to sleep with mommy and baby.  He gives me a kiss and leaves for work.  Erin starts crying.
6:35ish: Erin's quiet.  Not sure she's asleep, but Patrick still is so I can close my eyes and pretend I am.
7ish: Erin starts poking Patrick saying "tickoh!"  He starts to stir and is soon kicking her and laughing as she tries to tickle him.  Such antics contine.
7:30: Erin is bouncing on the end of the bed calling "Geh-yup Mommy! Way-cup! Way-cup! Geh-yup Paquack! Cummon!"  Patrick is trying to climb over me off the bed.  "Okay fine!" I say and start trying to detangle myself from the bed covers.
7:34-7:38: change diapers.  Erin is talking about everything from bouncy balls to Cookie Monster.  I explain it's not time for Cookie Monster yet.  She asks for fruit snacks and cookies.  I say "How about breakfast?"  She yells "NO!" and starts running around the apartment.
7:43: I've turned up the heat a tad, wrapped myself in a blanket and started this post.  Erin is still running around yelling "eeeeeyoh-eeyoh-eeyoh!"  Patrick's sucking on and empty bottle and giggling.
7:58 post is done for now, am contemplating breakfast.
8am: walk into the kitchen.  I mix up some pancakes, using what's left of the mix.  It's a little more than I wanted to use, but I'll have prepared pancakes for the next couple days for Patrick. Erin won't eat pancakes.  I stick some water in the microwave to heat.  Erin sees the cookies in the pantry, and I tell her if she eats all her oatmeal she can have a cookie after breakfast.
8:18: babies are both eating, I'm sitting at the computer with a mug of hot chocolate catching up on facebook.  My mug was hand made by a friend in Rexburg.  I think it's probably perfect in every way (when I told him how much I liked it while having dinner at his place once, he gave it to me.)
8:27: Erin announces that she's done, and gets down from the table.  As Patrick is still eating, I let her play while continuing with my hot chocolate.
8:36: Patrick is done, and is banging on his high chair tray.  Before I can get up to get him, though, a very noticeably stinky Erin announces to me that she did a "bubble sneeze."  I wipe her nose and then change her diaper (wishing she'd cooperate with the whole potty training idea).  She then asks "Cwose on?" So I put yesterday's pants on her but tell her I need to get Patrick (who is calling MA! MA! MA! and emphasizing each syllable with a bang), and then we'll change her shirt.  As I'm getting Patrick down, Erin goes into her room and gets a shirt from her dresser.  I take of Patrick's pjs and check his diaper (all good there), change Erin's shirt, and then grab clothes for Patrick and dress him (with Erin's help).
8:47: The now-dressed babies are playing with blocks while I try to finish my not-so-hot chocolate.
8:57: Erin reminds me I told her she could have a cookie if she finished her oatmeal.  She didn't completely finish it, but she ate most of it, so I give her a cookie.
9:24: realized Erin had pulled my box of chalk from my Sunday School bag and had given it to Patrick.  Good thing the stuff is non toxic!  Erin has moved to her art table and is counting while coloring "nine, two, four, fife, siss, eight," over and over again.
9:34: Tried to catch a vid of Erin singing.  Even though she didn't see the camera, she stopped the moment the vid started recording! GAH!
9:35: Erin asks for Dinosaur Train.  How she knew it was time for Dinosaur Train I'll never know.
9:36: Oh my goodness! Hulu.com has the Phantom of the Opera online!! So watching it today!!
9: 53 refilled Patrick's bottle of milk and put him down for a nap in his crib.
10:04 Sesame Street is on, Erin is "peeping" with Elmo and Rosita trying to help a baby bird call its mom.  And I'm off to take a shower.
10:15ish  While singing bits of the Phantom of the Opera in the shower, I decide I need to get the complete Phantom, as I've only got Highlights from the Phantom and my favorite song isn't on Highlights.  Nor is it in the movie.
10:32: Emerge from my room fully dressed and carrying a load of laundry to be washed.
10:35: bring what needs folding out to the front room, but am avoiding actually folding it.
11:01 posted on my friends blog, thinking about folding laundry, and still avoiding it.
11:08: Erin's telling me she wants to go outside.  I do need to take a couple things down to the mailbox.  But Patrick is still sleeping.
11:17: started the Phantom of the Opera, only to realize it's not Andrew Lloyd Weber's Phantom.  So watching Mercy instead.  And folding laundry.
11:51 done with folding, then getting ready to change a diaper.
12:12 Patrick's still asleep. Makes me a little nervous when he does this.  Checked on him and he's okay. Time to make some lunch.
12:23 Erin's at the table with chicken nuggets and ketchup, and she asks for cheese.  I go slice some cheese and when I come back I realize that she's eating her ketchup with her breakfast spoon that didn't get put in the sink.  *rolls eyes*
12:41 Patrick's awake!  I missed him.
12:50  Erin's trying to tickle Patrick and it is SO CUTE!
1pm: Put Patrick in the high chair with another pancake and the cheese Erin didn't eat.
1:13 Erin asks for more juice, I get her some, and then finish putting away the folded clothes (after switching laundry over)
1:43 All the clean laundry that is not currently in the dryer is folded and put away.  Getting on shoes to go on a walk and take the mail down to the mailbox.
2:03 Finally getting out the door!
2:36 Get home and put Erin to bed.  Then started to un/loaded the dishwasher.
2:42 decided to put Patrick down for a nap too, not thinking he'd want to because of his late morning nap.
3:08 dishwasher loaded and started, laundry switched over, babies asleep.  Ahhhh, mom time.
4:45  Patrick wakes up and we slow dance in the front room for a couple songs.  I love my after-nap cuddle time with him when Erin's still asleep.
4:57 Erin wakes up.  First thing she does is give me a hug and I can't help but tell her how much I missed her.
5:03 Take the trash out.  It was getting too full to lock, and I MUST have it locked now that Patrick has figured out that the lid opens.
5:16 thinking about starting supper.  Matt's going to be home later than usual today, which is why I haven't started already.
5:31 Decided it's definitely time to start dinner.  Babies will be hungry enough already when dinner's ready.
6:10 Matt gets home and dinner's ready so we eat.
6:46 dinner's over, kids playing on the floor with Daddy.
6:55 Matt has to run to the scout roundtable meeting (he's some scout person in the ward).  Have to turn on Winnie the Pooh, Piglet's Big Movie for Erin because she's so upset Daddy's leaving.

"push it" and chocolate chip pancakes

Edited to add: Erin always says "hi baby!" to Patrick when she gets up from her nap. So she just opened her door and Patrick turned and grinned and said "Haaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa bee bee!"

When Erin gets ahold of the camera and some random shots