Valentine's Day Prep

Candle, Valentine's Day Card, King of Hearts Shirt, The Day it Rained Hearts, Dress

Well, it's day three of Liam's fever and the doctor confirmed it is RSV.  Wah.  Poor little guy has been sleeping for three days straight and has barely eaten.  We're snuggled up in bed right now while he watches Ice Age on the IPad and I "window shop" for Valentine's Day items.  

Valentine's Day is one of my favorite holidays.  First of all, there are the cutest books that go along with Valentine's day.  The Day it Rained Hearts would be a great one to read before making your own Valentine's Day cards with your kids.  Such a cute story!  I'm not going to lie, looking at all the Pinterest homemade Valentine cards to get ideas for Liam's classmates gives me a certain level of anxiety.  A robot made out of a fruit cup and juice box...seriously?  I do not have the time nor the skills.  I lied.  I have the time, but I'd rather be watching Making a Murderer.  The skills part is true, though.

Greg and I don't typically do anything romantic, but I'm swooning over that card pictured above.  I'm pretty sure I have to get that.  We will most likely make some sort of dessert with the kids and make heart shaped pancakes for breakfast (or a heart shaped pizza for dinner...just know that some heart shaped food will be happening this day).  

The Never Ending Saga

I hope everyone had a healthy start to the new year, because we certainly have not.  For the past two months one of us has been sick with something, with maybe a gift of a day of two in between of everyone being healthy.  We had a streak of about five days where we were all good and I thought the germs were all behind us, until Friday night, when Liam woke up with a fever around midnight.  Now it's Sunday night and he's worse than he was Friday night. I hate seeing him this ill.  He's a kid who can be sick, but will still run around and play, but this round, he's pretty much couch bound and cries every time he coughs.  We took him to urgent care, but they said it's viral and we'd have to wait it out.  So, here I am, waiting it out with him, at 7:00pm in my bed (yup, writing from my bed).  I'm just hoping the rest of our family doesn't catch anything.  Being a stay-at-home mom is always in the back of my mind, but these times especially are the times I wish I could just devote 100% of my time to caring for my family.  

In happier news, Eva Las Vegas is a whole 6 months old!  I can hardly believe it.  I felt with Liam time passed so slow that first year as we were anxious for him to meet his first milestones.  I feel with Eva, if we blink, we'll miss everything and she'll be talking and walking before we know it.  She continues to be fairly easy going.  She loves hearing herself  "talk," rolling on her belly (and sleeping on her belly), watching Liam, looking in the mirror, and has recently discovered pulling the kitty's hair.  It's so fun to see how much more Liam attends to her now that she is getting her own personality and can respond with giggles and smiles to him.  She is working on sitting up by herself and can hold it together for about 10 seconds before she topples over (which Liam loves).

In unrelated news, after eating three meals of pizza this weekend, Greg and I decided we really need to eat healthier and actually took some action and wrote down some meal ideas, which is about one step further than we usually take when we mention we need to eat healthier.  I even prepped some over night oats for tomorrow.  Props to me.  Hopefully we can keep this health kick going...although I will admit, the idea of giving up pasta gives me a slight panic attack.  I think I'll compromise with that one by just adding spinach to the lasagna.  It's all about balance, right?

2016

I almost didn't want to write a "New Year, New Me" post, but after giving it a days thought, and with some inspiration from Instagram (seriously, have you followed natgeo or intherivervalley...if not, you need to!) , I have thought of one change I want to make for the new year: adventure.

I'll just start out by admitting I am not a risk taker.  I am happiest when I am safe, at home, and with the people I love.  However, for my kids' sake, I want to add a little adventure in our lives.  Specifically, adventure through nature.  I'd say as parents, we do a good job of exposing our kids to different activities and keeping them away from TV, but when I told Liam we were going to Target and his response was an overzealous, "Yay!," I knew it was time to add a little more excitement into our lives (although the mention of going to Target makes my heart beat a little faster, too).  Liam loves being outside and that's something I want to continue to foster within him.  Even when we're tired, busy, or unmotivated, I want to try to get the kids in nature as often as we can.  Here's to a more adventurous 2016!