Sisterly love

1st of all, let me be clear - Carolyn LOVES Anna and she is very good to her. She reads to her and plays with her. She sometimes let's Anna come in bed with her. You get the point.

Well today while playing together Carolyn tried to pick Anna up. (I am forever saying, "don't pick her up", since Carolyn is only 25lb heavier than Anna.) Anyway, I guess Anna was slipping and Carolyn grabbed her by the arm. Anna started crying and I went to investigate. At first Carolyn "didn't know" why Anna was crying, but when it was clear that Anna's arm was hurt and she wouldn't move it and she wouldn't let me do anything but hold her, Carolyn did say that she tried to keep Anna from falling by grabbing her arm.

Fast forward 30 minutes - I realize that Anna's pain wasn't getting better. I did have the issue of no nap, to make me wonder if she was just tired, but decided to call the doctor's office to be safe. They had me bring Anna in, who still was not moving her arm and crying if I moved it even a little. The doctor speculated immediately that she had "Nurse-maid's arm" (aka dislocated elbow), which happens when a young child's arm is pulled, especially when falling. She checked out Anna's arm and ruled out fracture and then "reduced" it back in place. The dr. said she could feel it pop back into position. The dr. left the room, so that Anna wouldn't be nervous with her around and perhaps would start using her right arm again. Within seconds, Anna was moving her arm and seemed to be extremely comfortable.

Praise the Lord that nothing was broken and that Anna can be pain free tonight.

Now Anna can always say to Carolyn, "yeah...like the time you pulled my arm out of its socket"....just like how I tease my older brother, "yeah, just imagine how smart I would be if you hadn't dropped me on my head when I was a baby".....(that explains a lot doesn't it)

LOVE MONDAYS

• I love Mondays....don't get me wrong, I love Fridays just as much. There is something about Monday that feels like starting fresh....new goals for the week, recharged batteries from the weekend.
  I love that Anna had a "quiet time" since a nap wasn't happening today. She wasn't really that quiet though, but she was talking happy, which is acceptable in my world. Of course, when I went to "grab her quick" so we could run to get the kids she was standing w/ only blue and white bloomers over her diaper. Gone were her shirt, socks and pants....guess I was glad that she still had her diaper on. She can reach in her top drawer and she pulled out the bloomers (which are under the striped pants as she didn't want to give them up) and the lovely tank top, which she insisted on wearing.

• I love that Carolyn still loves to wear what I love for her to wear. Rumor has it that this will not always be the case. (above she is wearing J.C.'s former sweater and new pants from Grandma) I also love that she and I both love her new haircut!

• I love that all the kids love nature! Here Matthew is holding a Praying Mantis that was on the ceiling of our garage.
• I love that Joel wanted to look just like Daddy this Sunday. First he wet his hair and then added copious amounts of hair gel (or jello as he called it). I convinced him that from now on Mom or Dad apply the gel.
• I love that for the first time since Carolyn was a baby, we will have a family picture for our Christmas card photo. I love even more that it already has been taken and we don't have to do that again anytime soon.

LOVE HOPE AND TRUST SUNDAY

2nd edition

LOVE: I love that I started back on a walking schedule with my walking buddy. We have a bit more flexibility in the day, with our big kids back at school. She was a foster parent for 2 toddlers for the last year, so her life has freed up a great deal now that they have found a forever home. Say a prayer for R. and E. and their new family!

HOPE: I hope that Anna can finish her transition away from her binky. Unfortunately she developed a cold and now has a stuffy nose to add to her sleep-challenged nights. She went to sleep (in her sister's bed) after just a bit of fussing for her nap today (sometimes she just likes a change of scenery). I do think she is on her way, she hasn't asked for the binky since Thursday, which is nice.

TRUST: I trust that life is settling down a bit now that we are passed the "start of school hustle". I hope to have more time to get the house picked up and maybe start back working on the scrapbooks! This may have to wait until the middle of October, since we have some plans for the 1st 2 weekends of that month - including guests!!!! (my college room-mate's family ;0)

What do you LOVE, HOPE and TRUST?

without a peep

binkies are for babies

(tried to find a good picture, but realized that she rarely had her binky in a picture, even when she was a baby - here she is at 10 mo)

Just an update that Anna went to bed tonight without a peep. During "book time" we talked about her broken binky and the fact that many of the "big" characters in her books didn't have binkies, since babies needed them most. Of course the real reason for the quick sleep was probably that she was exhausted from having a shortened nap after fussing about the loss of her binky earlier today. (We also went to the park while Carolyn was at church choir practice, in hopes of making her really tired!) I hope I don't hear from Miss Anna tonight, but she woke up several times last night, when she did have her binky, so I am not going to worry about it. (yes...she does seem to know the nights Ken is out of town, because she doesn't seem to get up as much when he is home, which is just wrong! I would say 6 out of 7 nights we don't hear anything from night until morning, which is great. Now I am going to bed, since last night wasn't one of them.)

Toddler-training camp

Bye-bye binky!

You have all heard of baby-boot camp where little ones are encouraged to sleep better by their parent, even if it requires some sad moments.

We, at the McCleary house, are going through "Toddler-training camp" to get rid of our beloved binky.

1. Matthew had to give up his binky at age 2, Carolyn at age 1 (when we couldn't get rid of a rash below her lip, because of the moisture caused from the binky) and Joel hated binkies.


2. I let Anna keep hers longer because I didn't want to jeopardize nap time.


3. Well nap time hasn't been going that great anyway. She normally still takes a nap, but not without fussing at me first on several days of the week. I decided if she was going to fuss anyway, she may as well fuss without the binky.


4. Anna is prone to catching germs. I decided that binkies weren't doing us any favors even if they stayed in her bed, since it isn't like we boil them each day! Plus sometimes she doesn't want to give it up when she gets out of bed, especially if she isn't choosing to get up.


5. One of Anna's binkies was getting a tear, so it needed to be thrown away anyway. So we talked about it being broken and we cut off the suckie part. She was sad that her binky was broken, but I decided that if I waited until she was three, then I had no prayers that naps would continue once the binky was gone. Now, at least, she still needs a nap, so I think exhaustion will win out.

Wish us luck and say a prayer. I think Anna is about asleep for her nap. This may not be easy, but it has to happen some day and it just feels like now is a good time....I don't think Anna agrees, but I do think she would be willing to suck on her binky on the way to kindergarten...she likes it that much!

LOVE HOPE AND TRUST SUNDAY!

I know a few people who have blog entries called: "love Thursday" or "trust gratitude inspiration Friday", where they try to remember great things about the week. I decided that it is always a good idea to ponder the wonderful! The more we think about the good, the less we can dwell on the bad - right?

So, this may or may not become a regular event, but today I will start (and encourage you to join along in the comments section, even if you have never commented before - it is easy!)....

LOVE
I LOVE a good church social. Today we had Our Lady's Immaculate Heart's Church picnic and it was LOVEly. We had a BBQ meal and there were kid's games, a bounce house, a paint tattoo artist, cotton candy and root-beer floats. I am not sure what the kids liked the most, but I enjoyed the fact that there WERE many people that I knew and recognized at the picnic (including my cousin's family), so I had a fun time chatting and watching the kid's pleasure. Unfortunately (or fortunately) everything was free, so the kids had cotton-candy AND ice-cream and won tons of candy prizes. Joel probably had more sugar today than in one normal week! I LOVED that I was able to eat reasonable food (a burger and watermelon) rather than regretting all the "fair food" that was available, which I could have consumed!

HOPE
I hope that my kids can have a healthy year. I especially think of Anna and her frequent bouts with viruses last year. This year I am teaching religious ed., so she will be in the nursery during that hour as well as the occasions that I am able to attend my Faith and Friendship gathering that meets on Thursdays. I don't want her to suffer so that I can volunteer and have a social life!

TRUST

I trust that I can make each day better, if I try to remember the truly important. Especially reminding myself that God is the center and to make decisions accordingly.

What do you love, hope and trust this week? Click on comments....you can do it!

The bright-side is very bright!

It was a challenge for everyone (except maybe Anna) to move away from our friends in Newburgh Indiana. Hopefully it won't take 6 years (that's how long we lived there) for us to have the quality of friendships here in Iowa that we left in S. Indiana.

Of course you have to look at the bright-side and luckily our bright side is sparkling!

We get to go see Grandpa and Grandma frequently. (to the Schilling's twice in the last month and to the McCleary's twice in October) The car trips don't even require a stop!
My brother Joe and his family live in Burlington and we LOVE seeing them. (I thought this was a better picture than the one w/ Joe's glasses knocked off his face by his beloved niece.) My brother Paul's family lives in Iowa City, but I forgot to take a picture the day we visited in August!

Cousin Erin and Aunt Sue (Anna' Godmother) will come and visit us tomorrow on their way to Ames! We can't wait!

Ken's parents were able to visit us many times this summer because they were "in the area" or "driving through". It is so wonderful to have many visits.

quilt square of the month - don't look Miss September

My friend SS asked that she be warned before I posted my quilt square that I made for our virtual quilting bee. (she wants to finish hers before seeing the others) SS suplied all the fabrics for the quilt and made no other stipulations.

I really like the end result. I modified the individual squares from my original "sketch" to make it work together a bit more. It isn't perfect, but this is the first "corner matching" thing I have done since Joel was a baby. Poor Anna's baby quilt did not require matching corners, because I knew w/ all my helpers running around, it just wouldn't happen. B.T.W. the "flags" in the middle of each outside wall will not have the little notch in the final product as they will be in the seam allowance. These are made with 1/2 square triangles, so they look like that until they are sewed to the next block.

Goals of the day....I mean week

If you remember, last Monday, I actually had the nerve to post my goals for the day. Clearly, I won't do that again, because the only thing I accomplished was the potty training goal with Anna! She is doing pretty well, dry most mornings and only a few accidents this week.

It was soon evident that the other goals needed to become "goals of the week". I can proudly say both were finished today. Ken helped rally the troops to put away laundry yesterday and helped watch them so I could finish up both goals today.

Am I shallow if I say that a lot of my motivation was that I just didn't want to be beaten by the list? Well the goals are done now (actually, they were expanded to include getting all of October's obligations on the calendar as well - DONE, and putting away the additional 10 loads of laundry that were washed SINCE Monday - DONE). Plus I got the kids packed to go visit Grandma and Grandpa tomorrow (they have off Monday and Tuesday)!

I do love project completion, even if it takes almost a week.

Always a bridesmaid, never a.......

Have you ever read.....
Well we have....when Carolyn was in kindergarten, right about the time her brother was asked to be the Ring Bearer in his cousin's wedding. Let's just say, we were a little envious. Carolyn wanted to know if she would ever be a flower girl. I said that I didn't think so, but that it was ok, blah blah blah. Add insult to injury....at the wedding, where Joel was the Ring Bearer, Anna was asked to be the flower girl at a different cousin's wedding. (Yes I did point out that Anna would barely be 3 at the time, but they still wanted her.) Again, Carolyn was happy for her sibling, but you tell that she really LOVED weddings and all the hoopla and couldn't wait to play a part some day! Plus Joel got Legos as a thank-you gift and I could just see Carolyn's mind working, (she never actually said this) "You GET to be in the wedding AND they give you gifts....I would do it for free......I would pay someone so I could be in a wedding."

Well, Carolyn's day will arrive Memorial Day weekend. The same cousin who is having Anna as a flower-girl has asked Carolyn to be a Jr. Bridesmaid. I have never seen such a smile on Carolyn's mouth. She was estatic. Before I let her cousin asked her, I told this cousin to make sure that Carolyn knew that Jr. Bridesmaids must always be honest. (We have had some fibbing issues of late that are driving me crazy.) When we talked about it, Carolyn said that her cousin said "she had to be honest, trustworthy, respectful and some word I didn't know and can't remember". Every little bit helps -right? I loved it when Carolyn was talking to her cousin and had been popped the questions, she said, "Can I ask my mom?" So sometimes they do remember me! I am so happy for Carolyn and I know she will love every minute of it!