Insomniac

I'm just going to come right out and say it.  I have never had a child with such atrocious sleeping habits as Preston.  I keep thinking that any day now, he is going to start sleeping through the night, and finally let Trent and I get a good nights rest.  So far, nothin'.  Ever since he learned to climb out of his crib, it has been one sleepless night after another.

We've found that the days he doesn't have a nap, he won't necessarily sleep through the night, but he sleeps a lot better and will only come into our room once or twice instead 4 or 5 times.  The problem though, is that he still could really use a nap.  To be honest, by the time 4 'o' clock comes rolling around, he is an absolute bear.  And sometimes it is just impossible to keep him awake.  Almost every day I find him somewhere in the house, zonked.

He was sitting in the chair in the living room the other day, eating an apple, and before I knew it, he was out.

He has been known to fall asleep on the stairs a time or two.

He has even fallen asleep on the hard wood floors.  When the kid is tired, he's tired.  Somehow, I've got to keep him up until bedtime and hopefully get this kid to sleep through the night soon, or I might start dropping off to sleep at random places throughout the house myself.

Loose Tooth

Trenton had a really loose tooth a couple of weeks ago.  I mean really loose.  He was able to bend it all the way in to the roof of his mouth.  So naturally, I thought it was time to pull it.  After he ran and grabbed the floss, I made a loop and tied it around the tooth, nice and tight, and gave it a good yank.

It was still a little too attached.

Poor Trenton.  I tied such a tight loop around the tooth, we couldn't get the floss off.  And the tooth was not about to come out.  We did finally get the floss off with scissors... very carefully.  I had to laugh my head off for a while first though.  I know, nice mom, huh?  The tooth ended up coming out all on it's own a couple of days later.  I think Trenton was pretty happy we didn't have to pull the floss out again.

My New/Old Ottoman

It has been almost a year since I took apart one of my ottomans with the intent to recover it.  I've had all the supplies to recover it, it's just another one of those things I haven't gotten to that has been taking up space in my sewing room.  Trent's mom took the kids for me for about 6 hours the other day, so I figured it would be a good time to tackle this project.

This is the before picture I took, almost a year ago.  These ottomans used to have buttons on them at one time.  I think it took all of two weeks after buying them that the buttons started popping off.  And the fabric is horrible!  Everything snags it.  And since we repainted the inside of our house last spring, they don't match so well anymore.  We have three of these ottomans btw.  And a chair to match.  I eventually want to recover the chair, but since I am new to the whole recovering thing, I figured I better start with something... smaller.

So here goes.

This is what it looked like all torn apart.

I decided to beef up the padding a little bit.

This part was a PAIN IN THE BUTT!  Trying to get the straight line around the bottom of the ottoman was a bit tricky, but after removing staples and restapling a couple of times, I finally got it pretty even.

And here it is, all done, sans buttons.  Don't look too closely.  There are a couple of areas that could have turned out better, but I figure it's not too bad for a first try.

One down, one to go.  Well... two and a chair, that is.  But just one more in this fabric.  Hopefully the next one will go a little smoother now that I've done one!

Update

I took Cal back to the Vet yesterday to get his staples out.  Good thing too.  I don't know if the cone would have lasted much longer.

Cal put several cracks in the cone by running in to things, hence the duct tape.  Then he started chewing on it.  Thank heavens we got to take it off, or we would have probably ended up back at the Vet... this time for a bowel obstruction.

  Our pup is so much happier now.  He can finally scratch his ears again!

Derby Time

The boys had their Pinewood derby this past week.  This was Colson's first year, and it didn't dawn on me until a few days after the derby, but it was Trenton's last.  The boys did good this year.  They both came in second in their classes.  (Thanks go out to Mitch for all of his help and the use of his tools.  Thanks tons!) The boys were pretty thrilled!

ZOOM!

What fun!

Sneaky, Sneaky!

I was downloading pictures the other day, and to my surprise, I found these...

Is that a bellybutton?  Not sure.

And one of the bathroom floor, just for good measure.

At least his nose was clean.

This Week's Project/Ode to Bright Blanky

My kids have all been blanky kids.  None of them would ever take a pacifier, but they loved their blankets.  They all have a favorite that they latched onto at a very early age.  Vivi's blanket of choice happened to be one that Great Grandma Chapman had made for Trenton when he was born.  Vivi had tons of cute, pink ones that her grandmas had made specially for her when she was a baby, but for some reason she liked the hand-me-down one the best.  It was made out of flannel fabric, in a pastel blue with pastel yellow, green, and pink wavy stripes, and the back was a solid pastel blue.  The edges had been crocheted in white, in a shell pattern.  Trenton had chosen his favorite blanket early on, so this blanket was rarely used.  It was pretty much brand new when Vivi latched onto it.

From the moment she could speak, the blanket was dubbed 'Bright Blanky'.  Well, after many years of being dragged here and there, and being loved to death, it wasn't so bright anymore.  About a year and a half ago, it started to lose it's crocheted edge too.  Some time last year, I asked Vivi if she would like me to make her a new blanket in place of Bright Blanky.  She said, "Sure mom!  But can I still keep Bright Blanky?"  So I said, "Never mind".  I didn't need to be dragging two blankets around with us everywhere.

Slowly, but surely, Bright Blanky started falling apart.  Trent's mom did a pretty good patch job on it once, but even still, it only lasted a few months.

 (Bright Blanky in better looking days)

 And that was when Vivi decided, all on her own, that Bright Blanky had seen it's day, and that it was time for a new one.  So we went and did some fabric shopping.  Together, we picked out some really cute fabrics.  And they have been sitting in my sewing room for months.  I had even started cutting the blocks out, but as I mentioned in an earlier post, I had some issues with finishing a project once I had started it.  This week's project was to finish the new blanket.

Just a few stories to give you an idea of the attachment that Viv has had to Bright Blanky:

This has been Vivi's first year of Preschool that she didn't take Bright Blanky to school in her book bag every day.  I had told her at the beginning of the year, that since she was going to be going into Kindergarten soon, she had to start practicing by not taking her blanket to school.  Oh the TORTURE!  The first little bit was a struggle, but slowly, she just got used to it.  And every now again we would have a major meltdown day, and there was no getting her to school without it.  Not too often though, thank heavens.  She had to take Bright Blanky with her almost every day the last two weeks though.  I think subconsciously, she knew her time with Bright Blanky was coming to an end, and she wanted to make every last moment count. ;)

Every time Vivi was upset about something, whether she got hurt, or someone hurt her feelings, the first thing she would do was run and get Bright Blanky.  If you tried to hug her, or comfort her before she had her blanket, forget it... She would push and squirm and cry harder until she could get to it, then she would come back for hugs and comfort afterward.

There were a few times that Bright Blanky had gotten left at one of the Grandma's, and when bedtime came around, where do you think either Trent or I were?  In the car to go get Bright Blanky.  (Thank heavens neither of our parents live very far away!)  

Bright Blanky was always with Vivi, wherever she was.  It has seen many shopping excursions, traveled to several different places,  and was never very far from Vivi's grasp.  She loved that thing to death, and as you can see by the picture, I really mean to death.

 When I got thinking about what we were going to do to dispose of Bright Blanky, several ideas came to mind.  I asked Vivi if we should put it in the fire pit and light it on fire.  She asked me what it would look like after, and when I told her it wouldn't be anything but a pile of ashes, a look of horror came into her eyes, and she firmly shook her head and said, "NO!"  Okay, so maybe not the best idea.  Then she asked if we could bury it in a box.  I asked her if we would just put the box in the trash after we put the blanket in it.  Low and behold, she wanted to keep the box.  "Ummmmmm... No.  Not an option." I told her.  Well, we left things unsaid for the time being, and last night Vivi told me, as she snuggled into her bed with her new blanket, "Mom, you can find Bright Blanky and throw it in the trash."  I asked her if she would rather throw it away herself, and her reply was, "You can have dad help you find it and throw it in the trash."  So we did.  After she went to sleep, we went and got the blanket and threw it in the garbage.  Funny, but after all the years of comfort and peace that blanket brought to Vivi, it seemed so unceremonious to just throw it in the garbage.  But what else were we going to do with it?  It was so threadbare, I couldn't even use it as a rag.

Bright Blanky, thank you for your many years of service.  Thank you for all the times you helped to comfort our sweet Vivi when she was upset.  You have dried many a tear.  Thank you for your willingness to be drug everywhere, and for not complaining once about it.  Thank you for suffering through the many spills, nights of illness, and just for always being there.  I don't know what we would have done without you.

And now, we would like to welcome Pinky Winky (do you love the new blanket's name?) into the family.  We hope that you will serve your purpose as well as Bright Blanky has.

Side Effects of Summer

You want to know one of the things I love about Summer?  I don't have to fold socks.  Come on Summer, anytime now.

Yet Another Fabulous Outfit...

Put together by none other than Preston himself.   I know you wish he could be your fashion designer.  He's got talent, don't you think? ;)

He Wears the Cone of Shame!

Poor, poor Caliber-ber (as Preston calls him).  He had a little accident last week.  We usually take him every day to some fields near our home and let him run around for 30-45 minutes.  He loves it.

See?  Doesn't he look so happy?  Just to give you an idea of how much energy Cal has, the whole 45 minutes he is out in the field, he is running.  And I'm not talking jogging around, he is RUNNING.  And the only reason we leave after 45 minutes is because I am completely exhausted from just watching him exert so much energy.  I'm sure he could keeping going, and going, and going, and going... 

Anyway, Trent took Cal to the field last week so they could both get some exercise.  Unfortunately, there were tractors plowing the fields, so to avoid having the dog get ran over by the tractors, Trent opted to go run on some of the dirt trails down from the fields.  About 1 1/2 miles into their run, Cal decided to jump over a barbed wire fence.  I won't post the pictures of the aftereffects of his encounter with the fence.  Its nasty.  Needless to say, he cut his chest up pretty bad.  It didn't seem to faze him though.  He didn't make a peep when it happened, and he ran the entire 1 1/2 miles back to the car.  After his trip to the vet, he came home with 15+ staples and a cone.

The first thing I thought when I saw him was the line, "He wears the cone of shame!" from the movie UP.  Well, because of where the wound is, Cal is not allowed to run, jump, or exert himself in any way.  It's killing him!  He snuck out to the garage earlier and went and stood at the back of my car, just waiting for all of us to hop in and head to the field.  I think he was really disgusted when I brought him back in the house.  Only 10 more days Cal, then I promise we'll go back to the field and you can chase rabbits and birds to your heart's content!