Look at those chunky thighs!!! You'd never know he's sick either! 

Olivia testing out her new nap mat w/cover from MiMaw for school (she starts in feb). 

Smiling through the fever:) 

No Olivia he is not your doll, and yes I caught you trying to feed him! 

we did a lot of sleeping this weekend 

She's always loved music and already she can do more on the guitar than I can. 

Jeff teaching Olivia to play the guitar- SHE LOVES IT! 

Weekend in review

A little bit of a song for your amusement (not necessarily mine)- about our lovely weekend stuck in this cracker jack box house w/ everyone (except Jeff) sick!

one nonsick person
two high fevers
three stuffy noses
four loads of laundry
FIVE MINUTES OF SANITY
six trips to walmart
seven hours of broken sleep
eight if you're Olivia
nine times a day yelling "Use your manners!" and "Leave your brother alone!"
TEN minutes it'd take me to back my bags (for Hawaii that is)
eleven doses of medicine
twelve times we'll do it again this year!

Hope you had a good weekend:) ...maybe next weekend will be for us!

Still Sick

Well it's been a week and Deagan is still sick, so I took him in again for a check up. She was amazed that after three rounds of antibiotics he's still resilient and not responding. He still has a double ear infection (going on 20 days now) and still bronchitis. BUT now we get to add sinusitis to the list. He has an endless supply of green goo in his nose at all times. Poor little man can't suck his bottles cuz he has to come up for air all the time. He's hilarious and laughs when I suck his nose out with the hospital ball aspirator- it must tickle or something!

Anyway, she was afraid that he had pneumonia, so we went in for another chest xray...but that was negative. (Olivia got to watch behind the 'special glass' as the "tv took a picture of brother's tummy" so she said very excitedly).
So we went home and waited anxiously to know if we were going to get an all expenses paid weekend at the hospital, but we didn't;)

Now he's on yet another new antibiotic, an oral steroid, and another med added to his breathing treatments.

Ok, he can get better any time now!!!!!!!

Olivia's quote of the week

This one I am not proud of, at all, yet it is pretty hilarious...

"Do it and die Maverick!" says my two year old angel while attempting to prevent the dog from attacking the cat.

! TrAfFiC !

At the moment I cannot think of anything that frustrates me more than traffic. Traffic filled with terrible drivers who rear-end each other and cause major back ups. Traffic due to the gazers that stare at those drivers. Traffic due to semi trucks that cannot seem to keep their trucks on the straight as an arrow highway, thus veering into the middle and causing yet another back up. And finally traffic due to the 100,000 post-Katrina population of my little 25,000 pre-Katrina Slidell. IT FRUSTRATES ME MORE THAN ANYTHING that it takes seriously three to four times as long to make a trip that never, ever took more than 15 minutes across town! There, I said it and now I feel better:) Thank you for reading and no I will not pay you for being my shrink;)

CONGRATULATIONS

CONGRATS to Nicole and Mark Downer (nicole and I graduated high school together and go way back) on the birth of their baby boy! Little Dominic arrived at 11:07 last night via a late C section. Everyone is healthy and resting! We love you guys so much:)

p.s.- Congrats to Jason and Lindsay Pociask who just found out that they are pregnant and due late august! It's just babies, babies, babies!!!!!!! Seems like all of our close friends are having babies, and I just love it!

I totally forgot to post a picture of her new shorter hair cut...so here it is 

See my dragon mask, I like to bite it and take it all out on him! 

Two seconds after he was done- this is the face I got:) So adorable! 

She kisses on him and makes him laugh, so he forgets what's going on 

Sissy helps to make it go a little easier 

I swear he never stops smiling:) 

The Princess on her throne 

She's a cheese ball and REFUSES to wear clothing!!!! 

Sleepy head 

Oh Deagan...

Long Story Short-
I took Deagan in today for his four month check up and shots. Well it turns out his bronchitis hasn't gotten much better. And, his double ear infection didn't respond to the antibiotics and is worse. Poor little guy! They gave him a huge shot of strong antibiotics (in which he screamed for about half an hour) and then prescribed another oral one that is stronger than before. She set us up to have a nebulizer (breathing treatment machine) at home. They delivered it this afternoon and showed me how to use it. He gets a treatment twice a day for now, more if it's a bad day, less if he gets better. And he'll probably have wheezing and lung congestion every time he gets sick from now on. I guess if you get bronchitis before you're 1 year old, you have a tendency towards it for a very long time.
I gave him his first treatment tonight and he screamed bloody murder the whole time. They gave us a tiney tiny little mask in the shape of a purple crazy dinosaur- and I tried telling him how adorable he was, but he didn't seem to care;)

Our Family Photo Session

The following are pictures that we had taken professionally in Sutton's Bay, right when we first got to Michigan in September. Sorry it's taken so long for me to post them...it's not really legal...shhh! Anyway, here's a few of them, hope you like them:)

The Carter Family, no, no one is holding Deagan, they just set him up there and he didn't move at all! 

(No words needed) 

Their hero 

Daddy w/ his little man.

Three week old baby Deagan...aka my sweet prince! 

I just love how she holds the book up with her feet! 

She's such a sweet big sister:) 

Me and my babies! 

The Garthe Family- I just love Olivia's smile. (Be kind, I had a baby three weeks before this was taken)! 

Turn the heater off!

Just wanted to let ya'll know that it's going to be in the 70's all week:)~

The LOoooooooooong Road Home

Well we started out Wednesday on our 20+ hour drive home. We got about 30 mins from home and had to make a small diversion to the ER. On Monday we ended up taking Deagan and Olivia to the doctor for their icky yucky coughs. Well it turns out they both had double ear infections (would you call it a quadruple ear infection then?) . Anyway, she assured us they would be fine and sent us home with scripts for antibiotics. Olivia got better, Deagan didn't! His cough got worse and developed into a bark of sorts, and then came the wheezing. He sounded like an 80year old man with emphysema! Pour little guy just couldn't breathe, so we called the doc and she said to head to the ER.
This brings me back to the beginning of our story, we stopped for coffee in Traverse and realized we were fooling ourselves thinking we should be driving anywhere. We got right in at the ER, it's amazing what a sick four month old will get you....yet, when I was four months pregnant and he was in me it took FOUR hours to be seen in the ER when we almost lost him. ANYWAY, he was given the abuterol breathing treatment (in which he screamed bloody murder), chest Xrays, RSV nose swab and a big old shot of steroids in the chubby little thigh. It turns out he has bronchitis!!!!! Pour little man. He was already on antibiotics for his ears and bronchitis is viral, so there really isn't much they could do for him but let it run it's course.
So here we are on the road for two days with two sick kids. Deagan did remarkably well and slept 90% of the time. Olivia on the olther hand turned into a demon and whined and cried about 50% of the time (basically when she wasn't sleeping or when she was bored with her inflight film).
Then us smart parents got one hotel room for a dog, a cat, a four month old, a two year old and us. It was like a zoo! We had to smuggle the animals in and then try to keep them off each other. Then try to keep Deagan asleep when Olivia woke up at 2:30 freaking out cuz she didn't know where she was, and then keep her quiet at 5am when he was up to drink his bottle!!!!! Needless to say, Jeff and I are now coming down with colds...or is it stress? UGH!

We're home now though and that's the best part. Olivia was so excited she started crying and trembling when she walked into her room. She picked up each and every toy in sight and said, "remember this momma?" It was so cute. And she was so excited to go to sleep in her own bed for the first time in FOUR months.

And that sweet little boy FINALLY got to see his house and his bedroom for the first time. He gave the classic response of looking all over and smiling like crazy and even cooing at the fish on the walls, seriously it was great! And now he's sleeping ever so soundly in his crib.

The house is done, but it still needs a lot of work. You can tell it has been under construction, there is dust all over everything...it's driving me crazy. And the trailer is still full and there is so much to be put away! But for now, I'll just go to bed happy knowing that my family is finally all back together again:)

HaPpY nEw YeAr!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

What a year it has been! Full of ups and downs, way ups and waaaay downs. First thing in '05 we finally found out we were pregnant with Deagan. Next thing you know we're being told that we might lose him and I'm put on bedrest. Very long, very agonizing few months. Then it seemed things got better. Because of the bedrest and troubling pregnancy, Jeff was able to stay home most of the year and not go on any trips. We finally had things all together and were feeling confident with our lives and the new little life we were bringing into the world...then WHAMMO! Hurricane Katrina rolls in and turns our lives upside down. Here we are in a town we've never been in before having a baby with a doctor I'd just met, and bringing the little guy home to someone elses house. Poor Deagan and Olivia haven't had a place that they could really call their own since summer, and heck he's never even seen his house or own bedroom! And yet again, we were forced to be seperated from Jeff:( Oh boy, oh boy!

But it all ended up working itself out, as it always does. And now this year will bring it's own set of hurdles for us to overcome. We're just happy to be healthy and have such great family. 2005 was a memorable year that sure will go into the record books and after all we've been through together, all I can say is BRING IT ON BABY!!!!!!!! We'll be just fine;)

p.s.-The kids woke up this New Years Day with terrible coughs and I'm sure colds to come...great start to 2006:)