3rd Place

March is reading month at many schools, includung Victoria's school. We were to record how much reading she did every week and on the last Friday of the month (a few days ago) they gave out medals for the students with the most reading minutes in each class. Victoria ended up winning the bronze, placing her in third place for her class! I was very surprised and excited. Of course, we did have an advantage since we live so far from the school. We had the kids read in the car going to and from school, giving them, at the most, an extra 60 minutes each day. The boy in our car pool got the silver medal and he lives 20 minutes north of us, so the long drive is good for something!

Ear Irk

Victoria woke up last night saying her ear hurt, so I told her I would take her to the doctor today. We went this morning and when asked which ear bothered her, she pointed to her left ear. The doctor checked it and said she couldn't see in it with all the wax build-up. So she looked in the right ear and saw it was infected. She then said they were going to clean out the ear so they could see it, which was a big mistake! Now that I've replayed it a few times, I realize the difference from when I have gone to the doctor for my ear, but at the time, I didn't think twice about it. As the nurse was squirting the water in her ear, her eardrum ruptured. Needless to say, Victoria was screaming her head off. The worst part is, they told her it wouldn't hurt! Now, my eardrum has ruptured a few times, and let me tell you, it hurts!! So. she's not likely to believe what the doctor says anymore.

They gave her and Karissa popcicles and she now gets to take antibiotics and ear drops. They say to go back in ten days to make sure it has healed. This is what worries me. I've had a hole in my eardrum for 23 years! The only time there wasn't one was when it was surgically patched up, which didn't work, leading to the other two times my eardrum ruptured.

Here's the part where I kick myself. A few people have told me that the doctor should not clean out an infected ear because the eardrum is more likely to rupture from the pressure in that case. They should have just noticed that since the right ear was infected, and that wasn't the one that was bothering her, the left one probably was, given her some antibiotics, and had us come back in a week. That is what usually occured when I was younger, now that I remember.

Oh well! Hopefully she doesn't have an abnormal eardrum, like I do, and it heals on it's own!

Old Friends

We enjoyed a fun visit with our best friends from Maryland, Andrea and Tyler and their daughter, on Monday night. They are moving from Alabama to Montana with the Air Force and decided to come by way of Michigan. We had a great time catching up, and especially watching our daughters play. Kalli is exactly in between Victoria and Karissa in age, so they all had a blast dressing up together.

Of course Austin couldn't resist helping Andrea vacuum!

Crazy!

We have been on a crazy schedule this week. Normally, the time change does not affect us much, but this time it has. Instead of just being on the old time, Victoria and Karissa have been on the old time for going to bed and the new time for waking up, which means they are going to bed very late and waking up way too early-- not fun! Each day they wake up early, I keep thinking that night they would be extra tired and go to bed on time. Not so! I put them to bed and go up to find them climbing all over the bunk bed night after night. So we have had some cranky girls around here. Luckily, Austin wasn't really affected.

Isn't he sweet in this picture?!

Along with the cranky girls to keep me on my toes, I watched two kids on Tuesday and two kids on Wednesday and we had an impromptu neighborhood kids' bike and motorized car playgroup in our cul-de-sac, including the kids in Victoria's car pool, 4 of the 5 school days this week. Add the girl's-night-out I went to on Friday night (and came back way too late), my early-morning work-outs, and I am beat!

Speaking of crazy, Victoria decided to drive her motorized car we got from some friends a couple of years ago and she finally got the steering down, after many screams of fear from her and me. Once she figured out that steering the wheel left, away from the tree she's about to crash into, will actually turn her left, away from the tree (and the fire hydrant, light poll, curb, etc.), she decided that she could drive around the cul-de-sac like a crazy person and purposely steer from side to side to make the ride more fun. At least she doesn't drive a real car for another 10 years!

If you can see, her head is off to the side and her mouth is wide open, singing, as she turns from side-to-side.

Also crazy is our cat, Yoda. Lately, he's been thinking he's a dog and will lick up any crumbs from the floor, especially bread crumbs, cake crumbs, and tortilla chip crumbs. He also was caught, numerous times, eating the dying flowers from Valentine's Day, though he puked those up. I don't know if he's lacking some nutrients suddenly in his old 7 1/2 years or if he's just discovered how tasty those crumbs the kids always drop really are.

Here he is eating cupcake crumbs. He's so weird!

A Perfect Day

My sister and I agree on what makes a perfect birthday and that is just what I had on Friday.

-I started out the day with a great work-out, X style

-Had a yummy pancake breakfast

-Shopped at three different stores with only one child

-Pizza and cake with the family

-Happy helpers to set the table and put the candles in

-A rip-roaring game of Chutes and Ladders

-A great movie with the hubby (Australia)

Of course it's always nice to receive phone calls, emails, and cards from friends and family from far away. Thanks everyone!

We had some nice warm days during the week of my birthday. (55 degrees is warm to us right now!)

Victoria's view of us.

These were hats from the Relief Society b-day celebration the night before. Aren't they lovely?

9 Months

At his 9 months check-up Austin was 19.4 pounds (25th percentile), 28 3/4 inches (50-75th) and in the 50th percentile for his head. So he's going down in weight, though he still seems huge to me, but I guess that's mostly because he's a boy and Victoria was in the 5-10th percentile at this time and Karissa was in the 15th.

It's also strange to me that he's not crawling yet, since his sisters both were by this time. First I was thinking that he's not strong enough yet in his upper body since he never liked being on his tummy, but I have seen him go into a plank position many times lately. (He was in the plank position in order to avoid being on his tummy, so he just lifted up his whole body with his arms.) His preferred position now is standing. I have to actually bend his legs so that he will sit now, but he his happiest when standing, with support, of course. I'm beginning to think he will walk before he crawls, but I don't know how I feel about that. They say it's best for babies to crawl first. I guess he'll just do what's best for him, since I have given him plenty of opportunities to crawl, or at least he hasn't been stuck in some toy, since he could sit on his own. So we will see what happens!

He currently loves anything that makes "white" noise. We have three vacuums and he loves all of them and cries when I turn them off. He actually tries to help vacuum with the smaller one. Today he tried to mop, too. Last week I made curtains for our slider-door and he loved the sound of the sewing machine, which made making them easy for me since he just sat there laughing and bouncing every time I pressed the pedal.

The past few days he's been saying "Ahth, ahth, ahth!" He was doing that at the end of Primary today when he was with me and all the kids watched him instead of the Bishop.

He loves to go into the basement where all the toys are. Whenever we start going down the stairs, he'll kick his legs in anticipation of the wonders in "toyland".

Here are his teeth. BTW, he is the most ticklish baby ever, especially on his ribs!

Here he is helping me vacuum.

Yesterday, we went ice skating as a family at the ice skating rink where the gold and silver medalists for ice dancing practice. Victoria has been wanting to go ice skating since before the Olympics started. We decided to go yesterday since Jason has off class for mid-winter break. It turned out to be the perfect day to go. It was free, minus skate rentals, in honor of the Olympians, and they gave out little medals! Victoria did very well, considering she went one other time when she was 3. Karissa did okay, but she'll do better when she's older. Victoria definitely wants to go again!