Confessions of a Take Care of it Fairy!

• Sometimes I look at the mounds of laundry that I have to do and have come to the same conclusion as those of a nudist colony........clothes are way over-rated!!




• There are moments that I can totally understand why there are some insects that eat there young!



• Forget about the 2 second rule......we totally have the five or more day rule at our house or car seat (where James just ate fish crackers and chicken nuggets from.....ummmm....I don't know when!




• I sweep up enough food off my kitchen floor......... everyday......... to probably sustain a 3rd world country!




• Even the best of men are still..........MEN!!




• Sometimes when I hear the kids cry during the night, I sometimes pretend I'm asleep and can't hear them so Kirk will get up with them. (It's a good thing he doesn't read my blog!!)



• Sometimes I feed my kids cookies for breakfast, cereal for lunch and then cookies and cereal for dinner when Kirk's not home. (Again, glad he doesn't read my blog :)




• I confess that before I had kids I couldn't believe that there were moms that could not keep there kids noses clean or at least comb their kids hair when they went out in public. I am SO now one of those moms who have kids with hair looking like rats nests and snotty noses............ IN PUBLIC!!




• I totally believe in aliens! It is the only logical reason why I have a laundry basket full of mis-matched socks!!



• There have been times when getting ready for company to stop by for a short time that I have totally shoved dirty dishes in the oven so my house looks cleaner than it really is!
  

Pumpkin Pancakes

Last week I had a major pumpkin craving. I bought some canned pumpkin and I was going to make.......... something! I needed to make dinner and when I don't really want to make dinner I resort to pancakes. Since we have pancakes a lot for dinner I decided to mix it up a little and make pumpkin pancakes. I got online and googled it ( cause let's face it.........you can google anything!) and the recipes I found either had pancake mix or whipped egg whites in it. I'm kind of a pancake snob and like mine from scratch and I am WAY too lazy to whip egg whites, so I made up my own and they were actually quite tasty. Here is the recipe for all you non egg white whippers!


Pumpkin Pancakes:

In a large bowl combine:

• 2 1/2 c. flour
• 1 TBS. baking powder
• 1/2 tsp. salt
• 1 tsp. cinnamon

In another bowl combine:

• 2 c. milk
• 2 eggs
• 5 TBS. melted butter
• 1/3 c. brown sugar
• 1 c. canned pumpkin
• 1 tsp. vanilla

Add milk mixture to flour mixture. Mix well. Pour 1/4 c. of batter on a greased griddle. Makes enough to feed my family of 7!

Tasty add in's/on's:

• semi-sweet chocolate chips
• whip cream
• vanilla ice cream

(Really can't go wrong with ANY of these!!!)

SUPER SCRUMPTIOUS!!! Even my 2 year old and my picky-eater 4 year old went back for seconds!!

Note to the Teacher

Dear Mrs. Knapke-

Maddie has misplaced her "how-to" paper that she needed to turn in today. She is trying to blame the misplacement on everybody but herself. We have discussed that there are consequences to every choice whether it be on purpose or on accident. She is not happy about the misplacement, thus wanting me to write you a note to excuse her. So, I am writing you a note to tell you that there is no excuse for her losing it, she just simply lost it. She is prepared for the consequence that she might get on yellow. Thank you. Melanie

Maddie after she asked me to read the note to her: "Throw it away"!

Me: "Throw what a way"?

Maddie: "The note".

Me: "Why"?

Maddie: "Because it is a stupid note!"

AHHHHH.......Mission accomplished!!!!

Sometimes, I really do like being The Take Care of it Fairy!! (Said with my evil mom voice:)

Elise

Thursday the 7th, I took our little 4 month old Elise to her baby well check. I stripped her down to her birthday suit to get her weight, and the scale said 11 lbs. 5 oz. OK, no problemo I thought. I am not the kind of mom that keeps track of the cute little pieces of paper that you get at each well check with the growth stats, so I had no idea that Elise weighed 11 pound 6 oz at her 2 month well check. The Dr. came in and expressed major concern because she had not gained ANY weight in 2 months. Even though I am not a math whiz I knew that in 2 months she should have gained something. The Dr. wanted to put her into the hospital right then and there and I was like....."Holy crap, I can't do it this weekend. I have a commitment on Saturday and I can't bale out!" Now you know where my priorities are! The thing is, is I would have been more concerned if she wasn't......THE BEST BABY EVER!!!!! She is so happy. Well except when she is poopy, hungry, or her brother steps on her or polks her in the eye. I would be grumpy too! I have been nursing her so I was able to convince the Dr. to give me more time so I could up the amount of times I feed her to see if she would gain weight that way. We did try to give her a bottle but she was way not into it. In fact she just got super mad when we tried. Hey, at least I was able to make my commitment....right?

Monday we went back in to the Dr's. I thought since it was going to be a weigh in that it wouldn't take long. I took James and Claira with me and we waited for an hour and a half in a little room. I really thought that they were not going to survive. Come on, how in the heck do you entertain 3 children in a small room for over an hour? STARBURSTS! I was desperately going through my purse trying to find something, anything, and there they were. Totally saved my life and theirs! We did find out that she gained another ounce which I was then allowed 4 more days to see if she could gain any more weight.

I tried all kinds of stuff to help my milk come in better.

All kinds of stuff =

Non alcoholic beverage - Way dang super gross!!

Brewers yeast - Way dang super gross too. Even in a fruit drink.

Marshmallow Root - This is actually a capsule and doesn't make me want to barf!

I felt that I at least needed to do what I could do to help her out.

Thursday was another weight check and this time I did NOT take Claira and James. I was out of Starbursts! Elise had only gained an ounce and so the Dr. wanted to admit her into the hospital to find out what was going on. Answers to questions like, is she not getting enough calories, is she not eating well, is she just content with a small amount of what milk she is getting, or is she getting enough and not absorbing the nutrients.

They put an NG tube up her nose to feed her through. They wanted to do this so they could monitor how much fluid she was taking. I pumped as much as I could and the rest we had to supplement with formula. They also had to put little boards on her arms so she wouldn't pull the tube out. The first day we fed her an ounce every hour for 3 hours. After that it was 2 ounces every other hour. 24 hours of being in the hospital she gained 2 ounces. The Dr. was pleased and upped the amount to 3 ounces every 3 hours.

Friday night she decided to take a bottle!!! This was super exciting because that meant one step closer to getting the NG tube out. She took the bottle so well that we didn't need to use the NG tube the rest of the time that we were in the hospital.

She was great at the hospital and all the nurses just loved her! She is way super cute and still the best baby, even with a tube up her nose. We had lots of quality bonding time during the 48 hour stay as well as bonding time with the Food Network and HGTV. So super addicting. Oh ya, I also had 3 fantastic meals a day that I didn't have to cook! :)

Although Elise hadn't gained weight in the 2nd 24 hours, she was taking a bottle and eating consistently, so the Dr. gave us the OK to go home. The NG tube was still in just in case she decided not to eat well at home. With every feeding I am nursing and then giving 2 oz or more of formula. I talked to the Dr. yesterday and because she was doing so well, she said we could go ahead and take the tube out. I did feel pretty confident in taking it out but called my neighbor who is an RN for support. It came out just fine and she is doing SO good!!! The conclusion is that she was satisfied on what she was getting which was probably only 12-15 oz a day. She should have been getting anywhere from 24-36 oz a day. She is up to 24 ounces and we go back for a weight check on Thursday.

All of the other kiddos went up to my parentals over the weekend and had a great time. We picked them up last night and now life is back to as we know it! Thanks to all who helped out and for all your thoughts and prayers!