The Story of a Lifetime: Parenting - The Good, The Bad and The Just Plain Gross

Finally...more pics!!!! We were able to get them from the camera to the computer but I'm not exactly sure what the prognosis is on the camera itself. But, for now, we have more pics!

Let's just say last night was seemingly infinite. In fact, I'm not quite sure it's ended yet. After almost a year of none of the children being sick we seem to have gotten into allergy season and all of them have some sort of runny nose, red bloodshot eyes that look like they've had one too many to drink, as Brad says, and a couple have run fever here and there. But, other than me, everybody else has seemed to avoid everything.

Making Cookies

So, last night Brad and I went out on a date for the 1st time in awhile. It felt good to be out. It felt good to have a little to splurge just to be able to sit and eat a meal that was served to me without having to face the kitchen afterwards. It felt good just to look at each other and say whatever was on our minds without pausing to give instructions every 5 sentences. Gavin is a social little butterfly these days and is just now getting to the age where all of life holds a vast amount of unending interest for him. So, he sat perched in my lap just loving being held and taking all of his surroundings in. He is so sweet and so much fun. The older he gets the more fun he becomes and the absolute cuter he is. He caught everybody's attention by his smiles and coos and not one person found themselves immune to his contagious little grin. We were interrupted all evening by compliments showered upon him....interruptions that I somehow didn't mind.

Pretty red head boy

2 stupid dogs

So, we did our usual grocery trip date night and then headed home. Grayson and Evye took off with Mother to spend the night with her and Brad and I shut down the house and headed for bed around midnight. Somewhere around the 3am time frame I was jolted awake by the disgusting, notorious splat of some form of bodily fluid hitting the hallway floor. Assuming Garrison hadn't quite made it to the bathroom I was prepared to clean up pee and change his pj's. But.......no. I was greeted by the dim hallway light casting shadows of a 4 year old breathing in just enough to take another heave and puke all over the floor once again. In my nighttime stupor I begin trying to find a trash can........all the while as she breathes in and pukes out no less than 104 times. Finally I give up and watch in horror as she holds her head down and her hair hangs around her face and she continues in her efforts of ridding herself of whatever it is she ate hours before. So, I figure she's on a hard, carpetless floor and so far it's been contained in one spot. So, better to leave her there and let her finish than to drag a trail of it down the hallway or across bedroom carpet trying to get to a toilet. So, she pukes again and again and I wake Brad. I'd already been awakened by Grant twice and finally gave up and figured getting to sleep beat putting him back in his bed 15 freakin times. So he had been asleep in the middle of us and was now waking too in the activity. Brad got out of bed just in time to see the vast, limitless amount of contents her stomach was capable of holding so I figured at least he could be grossed out with me. I asked him to take care of the floor while I dealt with her. So it was that at 3 am I begin running bathwater, bathing a little body and washing long strands of hair. Clean and in a fresh warm gown she was put back to bed along with Grant being redeposited back in his bed. That ordeal was over somewhere around the 3:45 mark and I climbed sleepily back into bed.

Cold movie nights

4:14am. Here comes Grant. Ok. So, like the loving mother I know I am I gently get up, lead him back to his bed yet again and threaten him within an inch of his life, after tucking him under warm covers and handing him all 78 things he sleeps with.

4:48am. Here he comes with underwear in hand. Alright, so he had to pee. Put back on underwear and send him back to his bed. He obstinately stands in the hallway and I remember thinking something about how I hoped Brad had cleaned it up really well since he was standing exactly where puke had splattered only an hour before. Tired and wanting sleep I just ignored him and hoped he would find his way back to bed. But, being Grant, of course not. So, he starts sniffing....enough to be obnoxious and annoying but not a cry and not quiet. Just a fake sniff to assure you he is displeased with the situation but can't really work up a good cry over it either. So, giving up trying to be mindful of Brad sleeping peacefully next to me I finally just told Grant to go get back in his bed quite loudly and in total exasperation. So, he then finds it somewhere deep within himself to work up a wail. A siren worthy wail. Just plain mad at this point I throw the covers back and have a little fit myself. I march him back to his bed, which, of course, does nothing for the situation but make it worse, and non too gently deposit him in it. In my little tantrum of taking a screaming kid back to bed he then wakes Garrison and Aubrey with his fit. So, once I got that under control I left them all very awake in their beds. The other 2 drifted off.

5:12am. Here he comes again. He lost his freakin lion. At the moment I had mental images of hot licking flames eating little stuffed lions. Spoon in hand we have a character building lesson, for both of us at that point, right there in the pitch black dark. Back to bed he goes and I make a mental note to burn everything he sleeps with when I wake up....if I wake up.

5:30am. Baby crying from far away needing a boob. Oh my freakin gosh. I swear the night has no end. I get up and am greeted by volatile little laughs and tiny kicking feet when I appear. I pick him up and take him back to bed with me. He nurses contentedly as I doze off and on. At some point an hour or so into it he whimpers to be nursed on the other side. I roll us over and doze back off.

6:30am. Tiny baby pukes all over me in large quantities. So, I rise and clean us both up, lay a towel on the sheets and get back in bed.

7:30am. The house is awake and ready for breakfast, minus Aubrey of course. I roll over 1/2 way mad at Brad that he can sleep so soundly when I have had maybe 2 hours total worth of sleep. How in the world can he work at a station and wake at every noise and beep but come home and sleep like the dead????? I think it goes about like selective hearing. He selectively sleeps through it all. I nudge him and ask him to give everybody a Nutrigrain bar, some yogurt and put on a movie since I'm nursing yet again seeing as how he had puked it all up only an hour before. He gets up cranky and sets off to get everybody situated and I fall back into a deep sleep.

9am. Phone rings and for the 3rd time in 24 hours they ask him to come in for overtime. With his mom and sister on their way I roll over and give up trying to sleep. At some point between 8 and 9 I was able to sleep uninterrupted so I figure that's enough. His mom calls seconds after hanging up with the station and says they're on their way. After explaining that Aubrey's sick, Grayson and Evye are not even here and he's headed in for OT he figures it's not such a good idea to bring Abby's new baby by. Stomach virus while trying to care for a newborn....not sounding too good. So, they decide to head to the station to meet him there and the children and I camp out here.

Best friends...yes, she's kissing him

With Gavin back in the swing and me trying to get my day started I eat a bagel, drink some hot tea and call Mother to make sure nobody else has had stomach aches. Nope. Safe there. Then Gavin begins to cry again. Finishing up my quick breakfast I go to pick him up and apparently everything he has not seen fit to poop out for the last 3 days suddenly manifested itself in 1 diaper...successfully setting off a poop bomb. The higher I lift him the more reality takes hold of what exactly the terrain looks like. At arms' length I take him to the same bathtub that only hours ago I had washed a puke laden kid in. I strip him down and try to clean him up as best as I can before powerwashing him with something akin to a water jet that would sandblast most any surface. But.......he's smiley and happy and filled with laughs and coos. After doing something of that magnitude I'm sure most anyone would be smiley and happy and feel better. I could only lean over the bathtub and hope that the last 8 hours worth of work are by no means an indicator of the rest of the day.

Filthy Daddy home from welding but happy baby

After being nursed yet again he was put back to bed and now sleeps peacefully. I have since changed 2 crapped out diapers on Garrett and am hoping that no one else pukes at this point. It's a 24 OT shift for Brad, he's on again tomorrow and will probably be called again on Monday for another 24 OT shift. It is, afterall, the 1st weekend of deer season and every firefighter in the city of San Angelo seems to have gone missing. I am so thankful for it though and his checks are very family friendly during deer season.

pretty days on the trampoline

a perfect 3 year old flip

So it is that my day has started many, many hours ago. I think I probably should've given up on the idea of sleep when the 3 am episode rolled around and it probably would've made for a lot less frustration on my part. Despite the fact I sit here still looking exactly like I did at 9 am, it's a beautiful day, no one else shows any signs of puking, I think everybody's pooped out....literally...so that's over, Grayson and Evye are on their way home along with Mother who's spending the night and I cannot wait for church tomorrow.

Early football lessons

Deep thoughts

You know, on a side note of everything gross that I have done in the last 8 hours, I keep trying to work myself up to cloth diapering and really getting geared up for it. But after the amount of disgustingness I have just lived through and the 2 diapers I have just changed on Garrett I can't help but be a little bit thankful that it is not going into the washing machine....or that I even have to remotely deal with it. At some point I am quite sure and have every faith that my gross tolerance level will work it's way up and I will indeed be diapering cloth butts.

I think he has my ears

.........and Grant's baby pucker

My homemade croissant rolls....more plain roll than croissant..but impressive none the less

Cotton harvesting season. After pulling over to watch the activity of the combines, pressers and haulers we collected a few scattered ones laying around to take home and study. These things grow into trees. You can see the root system and braches on it. We decided to plant some seeds and let them grow to see the finished tree result in a few years.