Chaos and Cupcakes

…come to Zion!

My sister Brianne and her husband left today after a 6 day visit. It was so great having them here. I wish that they would move here soon. I wish that all my family would move here soon! It would be such a blast to have them all here. I really do like living in Utah. It is so beautiful and there is so much to do.

We had a fun-filled visit with Bri and Brian. We went to Temple Square, Park City, had a picnic at Timpanogos Park, went to see X-Men 3 at the movie theater, visited family, etc. The kids are going to be so bored now after all that excitement.
We took the kids to Day Out with Thomas yesterday. They love going to that. I guess it is a yearly tradition for us now.

Sawyer has gained 2 ounces; he is 7 pounds even. He is such a smiley little guy. His smile is so huge and adorable. We were at Costco the other day and 2 old ladies almost made me cry. The first went up to Olivia and said, “You are just so adorable! Do you want to come home with me?” Olivia replied, “No!” So the lady turned to Sawyer and said, “I bet your mommy hasn’t ruined you, yet. Do you want to come home with me? My, but you are a skinny baby! Doesn’t your mommy ever feed you?!” Then she looked at me like I must be starving my child. The next lady came up and started petting Sawyer’s head (without permission). Then she asks me, “How many days old is he?” I said that he is 2 1/2 months old. She said, “Oh! Oh my goodness! But he is so tiny!” And I told her that he was a preemie. And she said in this voice dripping with self-righteousness, “Well, I should hope so!” We get this all the time from total strangers. Haven’t they ever seen a small baby before? Why do they think it is their job to make me feel like I must be a horrible mother because I have a small baby?

At his doctor’s appointment yesterday, Sawyer got 4 shots. The nurse said he would have very sore legs for a couple of days after because he has no body fat to insulate his legs and the muscles in his skinny legs are so small. We gave him Tylenol last night to help with the pain because everytime we picked him up or changed his diaper he screamed in pain. Either the shots or the Tylenol just knocked him out. He slept from 9:30pm straight through to 6:30am this morning- 9 hours! Usually I would be thanking my lucky stars for that but not right now. The doctor wants Sawyer to eat at least every 2 hours during the day and every 3 hours at night until he gains a significant amount of weight. However, I was so exhausted that I didn’t wake up last night either. I’ll have to add in some extra feedings today to make up for it.

The boys keep me in stitches. Yesterday I was on the computer when Cameron came up to me and said, “You have to ask before you can play on the computer, Mommy!” Taylor wanted to make muffins by himself yesterday and I told him no. He responded, “I am 100% mad right now!” Whenever I ask Andrew to do something he tells me with a voice full of exasperation, “I am too busy transforming!” Translation: he is busy making Lego replicas of all of his Transformers.

Olivia is completely, utterly spoiled. Her new thing is that when the boys have something that she wants, she will yell “Owie, Owie, Ooowwwiiiieee” until we come running and chastise the boys for picking on her. We are on to her game now, though! It actually is kind-of cute though that she has learned to play us for sympathy this early on. She likes to pick out her own hair accessories now. When she gets dressed she says, “I need bows.” Then she goes and picks out a bow to wear. As Tristan put it in his last e-mail, she is the “girliest girl in all of creation.”

I swear I really do feed my kids. I let them eat as much as they want. I encourage them to eat and drink. I nurse Sawyer all the time. But right now I feel like a horrible mother. Taylor had his 5 year check-up today and Sawyer had his 2 month check-up. Taylor has lost over a pound since his 4 year appointment. He is in the 7th percentile for weight and 70th percentile for height. He is a beanpole. His urine check also showed that he is dehydrated. I can understand the dehydration and weight loss with Taylor. He spends his days out in the heat riding his bike, playing soccer, running around, and doing karate. He has a water bottle that he takes on his bike with him but I need to encourage him to drink even more. Sawyer has not gained a single ounce since his last weight check 2 weeks ago. He only weighs 6 pounds 14 ounces at 2 months.  He is nowhere close to being on the charts for weight or head circumference. He is in the 4th percentile for height. He is so, so tiny. He has one week to gain a significant amount of weight. If he doesn’t, then we have to do all the tests that the doctor had run on Olivia when she wasn’t gaining weight- leukemia, cystic fibrosis, malabsorption, etc. Olivia turned out to have a malabsorption problem and once we were able to get that figured out and taken care of she started gaining weight well. Hopefully that will be the only problem with Sawyer and we can get it taken care of as well. Being a parent is so stressful and heart-breaking sometimes!

It is an absolutely harrowing experience to watch your child suffer. 2 days ago, on his 5th birthday, Taylor was at a friend’s bowling party. He tripped with his fingers in the ball and tore away the tip of his right middle finger from the last knuckle down. He completely crushed the knuckle bone, tore the whole fingernail away, and the rest of the tip was totally mangled. He had to have surgery to repair everything. The plastic surgeon constructed a new nailbed but the nail will grow in wavy. He has a splint on to help the bone heal. He has to go back to the surgeon next week to see if the tissue and nerves that were severed have died. If so, they will have to be removed. Then yesterday blood started seeping through the bandages. I took him back to the ER and they unwrapped his finger. A blood clot had formed at the end of some severed nerves and when he moved his hand around the clot would bleed. They didn’t want to do anything to it for fear of damaging the nerves more so we just have to keep his hand elevated, on ice, tightly wrapped, and put pressure on it as we see blood seep through the wrapping. Poor Taylor!! He has been such a trooper, though. He didn’t even flinch when they put his IV in for the anesthesia before the surgery. They let me stay with him through the surgery. It was very interesting and quite gruesome to watch. The weirdest thing was watching Taylor’s eyes. He kept his eyes open even though he was completely under. His eyeballs flicked back and forth so rapidly. I was proud of myself for not being hysterical with this accident like I was with Andrew’s forehead stitches. I guess I am getting used to the gore that comes with raising all these active little boys! Here is the link to a picture of his finger before the surgery: http://gallery.ottleys.net/gallery/v/current/taylorsfinger.jpg.html .