Category: Family - The Bartlett Family Blog

July recap (part 1)

8/11/2013

My poor neglected little blog. Seriously I need two more hours in every day to get all the things done I need to get done! Or to figure out how to function on less sleep, but I seriously don't think that is possible!!

So we will take few steps back and re-cap. I hate re-cap posts, but I also hate totally skipping over photos, and my sister wants a blog update NOW, so this is what we get. :)

Riley got a balance bike for her birthday, and we've slowly been practicing! She looks all big and grown up riding that thing, I can hardly believe it!

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Jackson has become a WILD child. He climbs on everything. He is feisty! He knows what he wants and gets MAD when he doesn't get it. He bites! But, he's also super fun and cute and definitely keeps me on my toes all day long!!

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And Jacky is definitely a daddy's boy, no question. He LOVES his daddy, and always has so much fun with him!

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Gosh I need to blog more, I can hardly even remember what we did in July!! Jacky dd get pretty sick, poor little thing, he just wanted to be held at all times, with a fever of 104! I hate when the babies are sick :(

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The second half of July was pretty fun, but of course, it's almost midnight, so those pictures will have to wait for another day. Hopefully another day this week, if I can squeeze it in!! And then maybe we will get to August and be all caught up!

Also... I want to be able to look back at these posts some day down the road and not have to calculate how old my children were... so for when that time comes, I'm going to start putting my kids' ages at the bottom of the posts. Just sittin' there, by themselves, like this:

Riley is 3 years old! Jackson is 17 months!

Riley Bug turns three!! (1 of 3)

7/9/2013

We'll start with her actual birthday... As per tradition, she woke up to a room full of balloons! Well... sort of... she actually came in our room in the middle of the night (not noticing her balloons) so I had to bring her BACK into her own room to see the balloons. Still a big hit!

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We had pancakes for breakfast, played and played and played, and then opened up presents with Grandma and Nana. You got some amazing dress up accessories, lots of games and books, a farm set to share with Jacky, and a few other things!

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We spent the afternoon at swim lessons, and then home for birthday cake!!!

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It was a simple day. Just spent hanging out and doing the things that miss Riley loves. And it was perfect! Next up... proper 3 year update, and party pictures!!!

Oh yeah and? We ended the day with extra stories, tickles, and snuggles in bed. Nothing better.

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A little March re-cap.

4/5/2013

I get overwhelmed when I don't post for a while, and then I have so many photos to share, and I end up not sharing any of them. So I'm going to do a quick photo share from the last month, and then move on. Pretend I'm all caught up. :)

We started off the month with a little trip to Tahoe!! Kids loved it, although Jackson was a little bit too cold, but he sure looked cute!

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We had to stop at this ice cream shop where we took pictures of Riley almost 2 years ago!

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We have spent a LOT of time outside these days. It is where Jackson is happiest. Both kids are happiest outside, but Jackson especially.

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And when he's not outside? He staring longingly...

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Jackson has had a bit of a rough month... sickness, itchy skin, just overall irritable... he's not one to sit and play for more than a few minutes, and he's been super clingy and whiny. But I did have one day where he played in this huge cardboard box full of balls for a solid 20 minutes. It was awesome.

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But if all else fails, and cranky baby is super cranky, we go outside...

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Riley and Jackson sometimes play really well together. They play with the same toys, share, make each other laugh... it's super cute... Other times... well, there are tears, we'll put it that way.

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Little Mister has been practicing his walking... he's getting there! He's taken about 6 or 7 steps, but still prefers crawling to get places FAST.

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We did the whole Easter egg thing late at night after Jack was in bed. Riley loved it, of course. She loves any sort of art project, so dying eggs was no different. She made some FAB eggs!!

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And then there was Easter! It was pretty lame since our whole house was bogged down with the flu, but Ri still wore her "princess dress" and loved every minute of the Easter egg hunt, so it was a success as far as she's concerned!

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Riley picked out the pink bunny basket for Jack, and he froggy basket for herself. Love it. And no, Jackson never ever has matching socks on. We are lucky if he even has two socks on at all!!

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December fun!

12/25/2012

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This month FLEW by. Hard to believe Christmas has already come and gone!!! December is definitely one of my favorite months of the year, and this year was no different. We do lots of fun holiday things, lots of holiday traditions. We hung all the ornaments on the trees, with "help" from the little ones. Riley was really into it this year, and Jackson just wanted to eat the ornaments and pull them OFF the tree.

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December is the season for holiday cards, and I wasn't organized enough to book family portraits for ourselves this fall, so I attempted to do them myself. I swear it must be the photographer's curse, to have children that just do not want to cooperate for family photos. And of course, despite finally getting a photo and ordering my cards on time... I still haven't sent them out. So you may get one in January or so.

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But hey, at least my kids looked cute, right? Riley put that headband on herself and refused to take it off, which is why it's practically backwards, but that's alright. Gives her outfit a little character.

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We made sugar cookies and decorated gingerbread houses, which really mean Riley ate all the sprinkles and candies while I tried to make things look pretty. But it was still fun, and very very messy!!

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We had Christmas-themed movie nights and read stories in front of the Christmas tree. We read all kinds of Christmas books and talked about Santa and reindeer and elves, and all things Christmas-related.

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Christmas trees are magical things to babies. The lights, the texture, the ornaments... and Christmas trees with trains around them? Even better.

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I really really wanted ONE picture of my two little ones sitting next to each other in front of the tree. Oh man I had to work so hard for it, now that Jackson doesn't sit still for a minute, and Riley is just a wild woman! This might have been the best one I got!!

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Since Riley loved Christmas lights so much, we decided to take her and Jackson to this special street in Alameda with tons and tons of amazing Christmas lights. I thought it would be better to get out and walk so we could see them all up close and personal, but it was a little cold and I think Riley probably would have liked it better being in the car. But it was still pretty awesome!

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A few other highlights leading up to Christmas (actual Christmas photos have yet to be uploaded and edited...)
Jackson trying to attack the trains around the Christmas tree... kid can move at lightning speeds!

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Riley's very first present she got to open from her Aunt Jennie. Her very own Minnie Mouse power wheels.

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And? Her very first haircut. She didn't even flinch, probably because Elmo was on and she got to sit in a cool car chair. Mark practically forced me to take her to get her haircut, but I must say it looks pretty darn cute, and it's even MORE curly now!

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We had a fabulous Christmas, full of lots of family, presents, food, and pictures!!! Coming soon, I hope! Happy Holidays, friends and family!!!

Halloween (part 1)

11/3/2012

It's no secret, I absolutely love holidays. Halloween is no exception. And every year, the street that I grew up on throws a little pumpkin carving party up at the top of the court. We were able to go last year, and this time we introduced Jackson to the neighbors of the court!

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Riley was obsessed with these steps. She wanted to jump up and down them, and just hang out up there rather than join the party. We thought we'd get a cute picture of Riley and Jackson together up there... well, let's just say it wasn't our finest parenting moment, and Jackson had his first "face meets pavement" moment. The crazy thing is, Mark was RIGHT there, like practically holding him, but got distracted for half a second and Jack lunged forward. Mark caught him juuuuust as his nose hit the ground, so he didn't get hit hard, but he definitely got scared and was bleeding. He only cried for a few minutes, and yep, we both felt awful.

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Baby in recovery mode. Owie.

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Riley was decked out in her Halloween attire, complete with skull necklaces. Oh yes, we love to be festive during the holidays.

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Annnnnnd back to the steps. Over. And over. And over again.

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Her Grandpa told her to jump down the step and yell "TA DA!!!!"... and so she did.

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We finally convinced her to come and help with the pumpkin carving, which she sort of enjoyed. And yes, that is my 2 year old with a knife. :/ Mark is a trusting man, having his fingers so close to that little carving knife...

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She wasn't totally thrilled about having her hands actually touching the pumpkin. But she liked helping to push out the pieces that Mark cut out for her, she's holding the nose below...

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Then of course we had to get a picture of the final product. This time on a softer surface for poor Jacky Boy. TA DA!

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By the way, in case you were wondering, it took like 20 minutes to corral Riley and get her to JUST. SIT. STILL. for a photo with her pumpkin and her brother. And then she was off. And Jack was shoving grass in his mouth. Fairly typical.

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I was able to get her back by bribing her with candy corn I think...but of course, Jackson discovered her necklaces, and an hope of getting two munchkins looking at the camera was lost.

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Next up... Halloween costume pictures!! Coming... eventually?

Pumpkins and trampolines

10/23/2012

My parents got Riley a trampoline. A BIG one. And it is by far her most favorite thing at the moment.

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And she knows that if she wants to go out and jump, she needs clothes, shoes, and sunscreen. So she goes and rounds up something to wear, puts her shoes on, and asks us to put sunblock on her, and she's outside and jumping around in no time flat. Jackson thinks the trampoline is pretty cool too.

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I have many many photo shoots lined up in the next few weeks, so Riley and my mom were my test subjects at a few new spots I was looking into...

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Isn't she just the best most cooperative little model ever??

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And of course, like every other person with kids in the month of October, we visited the pumpkin patch. Now, I will say, I didn't plan the visit very well. We went midday- right when Riley was probably going to be getting very tired. Of course she perked up right as soon as we got there and the man asked her if she wanted to get IN the cage with the baby chickens. Ummm, yes, yes she did.

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From the chickens, we moved on to the pigs, goats, and rabbits. Big fan...

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Jackson, on the other hand, was more interested in trying to eat the hay.

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Look at my big little boy in his blue hat. And he looooves his Aunt Jennie too.

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I had to put a blanket down on the ground to take pictures of Jack because he was frantically trying to get everything he could into his mouth.

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Including the pumpkins...

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I wanted ONE, just ONE picture of my two kids together, sitting nicely, at the pumpkin patch. This was the best I got. And that photo required a LOT of effort.

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But I consider the trip a success... not TOO many tears, and we left with one HUGE pumpkin!

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Some Moraga fun...

10/13/2012

Riley hadn't seen her Aunt Jennie for almost a year. But now that they have been reunited, it was like no time had past at all. Riley got to experience her very first Aunt Jennie mani-pedi... and loved every single second of it.

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Girlfriend is a natural. She knew exactly what to do. Until the end, when she asked "which color should we do next?" She just wanted the fun to keep going and going!

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To be honest, I'm not actually sure who was more excited, Riley, or Jennie! Jennie was thrilled that Ri was totally in to painting nails with her.

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And since clearly Jackson would just try an eat the nail polish, he did not get to join in on the fun. But he has been doted on plenty since we've been in the US, don't worry. Both my kids have received lots and lots of love and attention and special gifts since we've arrived... things like, these matching mickey and minnie PJs.

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I think it's funny that Riley is sitting there giving me such a big smile, she has become soooo hard to get good pictures of her staying in one spot, she makes me pull out all the stops, that's for sure!

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But it's totally worth it to get a picture like this of my two little monkeys. And want to know a secret? Pretty sure these pajama photos were taken at like 4pm... same pajamas they had worn the night before... oops!!!

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So many more pictures and more meaningful posts to come!

Moving, hotels, and chaos.

9/16/2012

Well, we moved out of our house over a week ago. It was bittersweet, that's for sure. That was the house where both our babies have grown up. Our first house we bought together. We put a lot of work into it, and it was a perfect little house for our family, so we were a little sad to be moving out. But, although we were sad to move out, we are ecstatic to be moving on to the next chapter of our lives.... Mark being finished with his PhD (soon, YAY) and moving back to the US (close to my family, YAY). So. so. excited.

Now, the last few days in our house we had hardly any furniture. Or toys. Or fun stuff. Riley was perfectly happy to run around, playing with the broom, and yelling and enjoying the echo that happens when you have hardwood floors and no furniture at all.

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But mostly she loved putting every last remaining toy into the TV cabinet. She was "helping" me clean, I guess. Also found in there... packing tape, ear thermometer covers, fruit snacks, Jackson's pajamas, and a few screwdrivers. As I said, she was helping.

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After we moved out of our house, we stayed with Mark's parents for about 5 days. Riley was in heaven. New place, different toys, a DOG to play with, and of course, Nana and Grandad to entertain her.

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They live pretty close to the beach, but unfortunately the weather was pretty awful while we were there so we didn't get a chance to go. In fact, we did the opposite. Convinced Riley it was a good idea to go puddle jumping. That is, until we realized her gum boots had already been packed away and shipped to the US, so I tried to improvise with plastic bags. Needless to say her feet got very wet and she was not impressed.

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I personally have never really been an animal lover. It's just not my thing. But Riley is just absolutely obsessed with dogs. She loves Nana and Grandad's dog Harvey. He is pretty unamused by her, but she thinks he is just the greatest thing ever. Especially when he hops up on the couch, she yells "Hey! What's he doing up there!" and then hops up right next to him.

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It has definitely been interesting, these past 10 days. It's a really big change for these two kids... several moves, getting rid of their toys and books, watching their things get sold or packed up, schedules and routines totally messed up. Jackson had a bit of a rough time sleep-wise at first, waking up a TON and needing to be rocked to sleep every single time, although he was pretty happy during the day so you might not have known how shocking he was at night...

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And Riley? Well, while we were at Mark's parents house she went to bed later than she's ever gone to bed, she was just absolutely wired!! It hit like 5pm and she just got all kinds of energy, running around, yelling, having fun, just crazy!! And of course, not sleeping in any later. And it seems that we've been paying for that lack of sleep ever since, our little two year old has been TOUGH work these past few days... Cute, but tough work.

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On Monday we moved in to the hotel we are going to be living in for almost 3 weeks. It's... okay. It's a 1.5 bedroom apartment-style room, which means Mark, Riley and I share a room and Jackson gets the 1/2 bedroom, which is really just a glorified closet, separated from the loudest toddler ever by just a sliding door. Jackson has actually been doing remarkably well with his sleeping, all things considered. Riley does well at night, but it's a bit of a mission to get her to sleep during the day since she basically has to sleep in broad daylight.

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We have just under 2 more weeks here. It's going to be a long two weeks, most likely. See, we are on the 4th floor, and yes there is an elevator, but there are a few sets of stairs before and efter the elevator, which makes getting up and down on my own with two babies rather tricky. Also, we are in the city, which means parking is never guaranteed. Soooo loading and unloading babies could potentially be quite a mission. But, it's only 2 more weeks, then we're back at Mark's parents' house for a few days, and then WE FLY TO THE USA!!!

We're trying to take advantage of our last days in New Zealand, which is a bit tricky since Mark is also frantically trying to write his thesis. But we did manage to take a quick trip to the zoo today, which was pretty fun. Exhausting, but fun. And of course, we asked Riley what her favorite part of the zoo was, and her answer? The playground. (There was an animal shaped slide at the zoo). Sigh. I was quite a fan of the monkeys, I must say. Look at the mama and baby monkey (bottom right mama is nursing her little baby monkey!).

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Also, you might be wondering why some of the pictures look a bit... odd. We have really crappy internet, which means uploading photos like I normally would is not an option, so I had to resize these photos, and long story short, they are very small files and overly sharpened, so they look a little weird and different than the original photo. But oh well, you get the idea. This is longest my internet has worked in ages so I'm just going to go with it.

USA... 17 days and counting!!!

Proof we did actually have fun in Auckland

7/17/2012

My last post was a little bit of a downer, but our trip wasn't all bad! It started a little rough, but once we got into the hotel and got all settled down, we packed up and headed off to the local aquarium. But not before stopping to feed the little guy in the parking lot while Riley needed to urgently use the potty RIGHT THIS SECOND.

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Do you know how hard it is to take a half decent photo in a super dark aquarium while chasing a toddler and trying to also look after a baby? Yeah.

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At this stage Riley wasn't too sick/feverish, BUT it was about 3pm and she hadn't had a nap, so she was a little... fragile, let's say. But she sure had fun! She loved seeing all the fish, pointing out the different colored ones, and would say "wow that's a really really big one!" over and over again. She got to hold a starfish (she was stoked about that one), and was super excited to get to see all these animals from her "sea animals puzzle" in real life! Seahorse, octupus, stingray, shark, etc... Although she was disappointed there was no dolphin. :)

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Jackson started out in the stroller, but was absolutely fascinated with every single thing around him. He was the happiest little guy, just looking around, taking it all in. Overall it was a really fun, totally successful trip. We probably could have stayed a lot longer but I didn't want to push our luck with a napless toddler and overstimulated little baby!

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The following day we stopped at a butterfly farm right near the airport. The place was actually really awesome, and I think Riley WOULD have enjoyed it if she was not feeling absolutely miserable. Literally right as we arrived there was the beginning of her miserable-ness. She spiked a fever, only wanted me to carry her, and just was not doing so hot. Needless to stay, we didn't stay very long. We did stay long enough for her to get scared by a HUGE butterfly flying right at her, and she thought it was going to bite her. I finally convinced her that he wasn't going to bite her, it just wanted to look at her, so for the next 30 minutes she went around chanting "he's not trying to bite you, he's just looking at you!"

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There were also baby alligators, HUGE crocodiles, and a bunch of different tarantulas. But at that point Riley was in a total feverish trance, so we had to go. But they clearly made an impression on her as she mentioned the crocodiles multiple times today!

Speaking of today... Riley was feeling slightly better, although at one point her fever was up over 103 again, but mostly hovered around 101.5. She went through waves of feeling pretty good and being in good spirits, followed by being miserable and clinging to me like a little koala. Around 9:30am she basically climbed into my lap and fell asleep, so I transferred her into our bed and she slept there for about 3 hours. Poor little bug.

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I hate it when she's so sick. Although I must admit, the extra snuggles are always welcome. And always love an excuse to stay in pajamas all day long!

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Thank goodness Jackson seems to be feeling alright. He was a trooper today, just hanging out, trying to roll over, trying to eat everything in sight, drooling up a storm, and about to sprout his two bottom teeth.

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His eczema also seems to be improving, although sometimes it's hard to tell. We saw a naturopath the other week, and I got some good insight from her, started taking some probiotics and some fish oil supplements, and I've changed to a completely dairy free diet. Next step is going wheat free as well, so I've slowly started phasing out wheat from my diet as I didn't want to do such drastic changes cold turkey. It's pretty tricky making sure I'm eating the right stuff since I'm not used to this kind of diet, but hey, for this little face, I think I can manage.

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Sometimes I still can't believe how much Jackson is turning into a real little person. Manipulating toys, looking at everything, grabbing everything in sight, yelling out when he's frustrated or wants attention, staring at me with his gorgeous blue eyes, bouncing like a crazy person in his bouncer....

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Oh yeah, and? The big news of the day? We sold our house!!! Hooraaaaaaay! That's a huge stressor we can check off the list, thank goodness. One step closer to being back to the US! Now on to the next task... selling our stuff, and deciding what to pack up and ship back to the US! Oh yeah, and crazy thesis writing for my oh so over-worked and over-tired husband. October can't come soon enough!

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The most non-relaxing "vacation" ever.

7/16/2012

Well, we had our first "vacation" with the two little ones this weekend. And I use the word "vacation" very, very loosely. Basically we had to report Jackson's birth to the US consulate up in Auckland (45 min plane ride up north), and also apply for a US passport and social security number, and we had to actually do it in person rather than by mail. I could've just gone up by myself (with Jackson), but we decided to make a mini vacation of it and go as a family. We had plans to go to the zoo, the aquarium, do some swimming, stay up late and watch movies in bed in our hotel room, etc.. Well, I won't give you the play-by-play of our trip, but all the following things happened:

-Riley had her first day EVER without a nap
-it rained, canceling zoo plans
-we forgot Riley's beloved "gray gray" (pink blankie) at home
-Jackson screamed bloody murder for what seemed like forever in the car as we couldn't find our freaking hotel and i just about lost my mind
-we lost one of riley's minnie mouse toys somewhere along the way
-jackson had his worst night of sleep so far
-i forgot some forms/evidence for our appointment at the consulate- luckily it was no big deal
-had the wrong size passport photos- had to get them re-printed the morning of our appointment
-we heard multiple times in the car "hurry hurry daddy i need to do a poo poo on the potty!" Number of poops? ZERO. But we sure got some smiles as we stopped at a McDonald's, a cafe, and a random gas station and sprinted in with our toddler demanding the nearest toilet!
-I left all the swim stuff in the hotel dryer. Including Riley's brand new cloth swim diaper.
-Riley spiked a massive fever at the airport/on the plane, and was absolutely miserable. Right at the same time Jackson was super tired and hungry. Two sad babies on the plane. Riley only wanted mama, Jackson could only be fed by mama... which baby do you let cry? The sick or hungry one? Riley was so sick that she basically passed out in misery while laying on me.
-Took Riley's temp when we got home, thought her fever had gone since she was feeling much cooler than on the plane... 103. Shudder to think what her temp was on the plane.
-Riley's cough takes a turn for the worse, we say a little prayer it's not croup, and snuggle her to sleep for the night.
-Crawl into bed to get some sleep. Cue Jackson waking up. Write this blog post while nursing/snuggling with him.

There were good parts too. I even took a few pictures. But for now.... sleep. At least for some.