February Weather

Here's my monthly weather update post Laura!

Here's the breakdown of the February sun.

Sunny: 12 days
Some Sun/Some Clouds: 12 days
Cloudy: 5 days

Conclusion: We saw a lot of sun on 24/29 days so that's pretty good! We just wish the weather was warmer so we could actually feel the warmth of the sun.


We had 0 snowy days.
We had 0 foggy days.
We had 5 days with some rain.
We had 1 day with crazy wind (yesterday).



For our yearly total through February 2016, we have:

Sunny: 21 days
Some Sun/Some Clouds: 19 days
Cloudy: 20 days

Snow: 3 days
Fog: 9 days
Rain: 12 days
Crazy Wind: 1 day

I predict the "Crazy wind" days will increase in March. I think the definition of "Crazy Wind" is when it's very uncomfortable to be outside.  Also, often times, dust is blowing. The weather forecasters tend to say the wind is over 20 mph during the "crazy wind." However, in March, "crazy wind" days are often sunny at least!

Winter Videos

 

Rollerskates

Since Auntie Laura was sick for Elizabeth's birthday party, Elizabeth did not get to open her present. So she got to open the present on her actual birthday! New skates! She's been skating all over the house the last few days. Very fun Auntie L!

New books!

A package of awesome Scholastic books arrived in the mail a few days ago! It was a big surprise for the kids and they love them! We have read them all. Thanks Karen and Ilene! 

A Typical Valentine's Day

Valentine's Day is my least favorite holiday. Something bad always happens this day and I dread it every year. What is it about this day? Seriously! I wish I could somehow skip it every year. 

This morning about 7:30 Elizabeth comes out of her room crying and screaming that her ear hurts. She's grabbing at her right ear. She's had a cold and occasionally one will go to her ears. It's been a while though! So she obviously had an ear infection. 

I managed to get her to eat a little bit of cereal and we (me and the kids)  were all out the door by 8:00 on a Sunday morning to head to Urgent Care. Luckily, they got us in pretty quickly for Urgent Care. And luckily, it wasn't my morning to teach Sunday School! 

Diagnosis: Double ear infection. 

The assistant tells me the pharmacies don't open until 10:00. At this point, it's about 8:45 and Elizabeth is screaming and crying. I searched my phone and found one Rite Aid in Kennewick that opens at 9. Elizabeth doesn't understand why she can't have her medicine NOW. 

We drive to Kennewick, find the Rite Aid and get to the pharmacy just as they are opening. They said they just got the prescription and they would get it done first thing. We wait for only about 10 minutes and then I go up to pay. Nathan is off looking at stuffed animals so he misses the next part. 

At this point, Elizabeth starts projectile VOMITING all over the place. I got her turned so her vomit was no longer hitting the items on the shelves so at least it would all hit the floor. I didn't think she was ever going to stop. 

Her coat was covered, her shoes were covered. It was unbelieveable. The two women there were absolutely wonderful about it though. They went and got the mop and a bunch of paper towels. I paper toweled everything and then one lady mopped. Another lady sprayed alcohol spray on everything that got hit and I wiped everything off. We probably cleaned for like 20-25 minutes. 

Elizabeth is still screaming and crying at this point because her ears hurt. I didn't want to give her the medicine right then though. What if she just threw it right up and we lost a dose? 

We finally get in the car. Her coat, pants, and shoes are in a plastic bag. She walked out of that store cold. At least it wasn't raining! 

She falls asleep immediately even without the medicine. We get home 15 minutes later around 10:00. I give her the medicine and she sleeps on the couch until around 12:30. This kid NEVER slows down or naps so I knew she was pretty sick. When she wakes up, she says her ears are much better but she still wouldn't eat much. 

They opened up Papa Ray and Kim's Valentine Baskets and got cards in the mail so that helped cheer her up a bit. 

It's been a rough day. Jeremy's at work and will be home hopefully by bedtime. 

We'll see how we can top this fun next Valentine's Day! 

Valentine's Party Day

Today at school are all the Valentine's parties. Elizabeth decided she was going to wear pink from head to toe. Nathan said he was totally blinded from all the pink and his eyes were on fire. 

Then, she went and put on her pink coat and he passed out from all the pink. 

Elizabeth at 6

Elizabeth is 6 today!

Every year, I will probably write about how I can't believe how big my baby is getting!

She's 40.4 pounds now! She's finally big enough to sit in a booster but since she still fits in her carseat, I'll try to keep her in there a little bit longer just for the safety factor.

As far as sleep, I'd say she sleeps about 10 hours a night. She is usually asleep by 8:30 and wakes up about 7:30. She's dry every night too! She finally used her last pullup somewhere in mid-December. No more diapers or pullups in this house!

Healthwise, she's very healthy. She gets colds but has had no other major issues lately. Her eczema is greatly improved this year. Last year, her hands in the winter were just completely scratched and bleeding. This year, they are almost perfectly normal! I'm not sure what changed. It has been a wetter winter and that might be why. She's also just growing. She still scratches at her feet a lot but still not to the point where they are bleeding like she used to.

We have not discovered any new allergies. Still just the peanuts and sunflower seeds and possibly hazelnuts. I'll take her in in June to re-evaluate. She's very good about wearing her epi-pens whenever she's out of my care.

She's still not a great eater however. She goes to bed hungry quite often because she refuses to eat what I cook. If it doesn't involve bread (breads, crackers, noodles, rolls, cereal) or cheese or some kind of processed food, she won't eat. I refuse to cook another special meal for her. She eats huge breakfasts though. I guess that's why.

She's in kindergarten all day this year. It's the first year the district offered all day kindergarten all year. At first, it was a rough adjustment. She couldn't get up in the morning and would be super fussy in the evenings. She's much better now though.

She's doing really well in school. The teacher has no complaints or worries. Mrs. M says Elizabeth has a fantastic attention span for a kindergartner, listens well and works really well with the other kids. She's doing really well learning all her sight words as they come and can read short easy books. She's good at sounding out words too. She can read books like "Gerald and Piggy." I think she's read them all! She's picking up her addition and subtraction facts quicker than I thought too! I love to watch her write little stories and draw little pictures to go with them. Socially she does pretty well too. She seems to play with all the little girls in her class and plays with different girls at recess. She says she does not like to play with the boys as they push and shove.

Playing imaginative games with Nathan is her favorite activity. They'll get home from school, have a snack, and then head outside (if it's decent) or play inside with their games. Their current favorite are Harry Potter games where they pretend they are the characters doing silly thing. They get along so much better than they used to. Often, I will hear Nathan say Elizabeth is his best friend. They still get into fights (especially when things don't go Nathan's way) but they play together really well without reffing most of the time!

Her funny little obsession right now is mustard. She wants to eat it on everything! I even bought her mustard for her birthday. Another little girl did too! She must talk about mustard at school!

I don't have her in any sports right now. Neither she nor Nathan seem to be too interested. They just want to come home and play all afternoon so I'm ok with that! Cheaper and I don't have to haul them around anywhere!

She likes to play with all of her jewelry and dresses up as different characters from the games they play.

We sure love Elizabeth! She's very good and fun to be around. Cute too!

Elizabeth's 6th birthday party

Elizabeth had her 6th birthday party yesterday! I can't believe she will be SIX this week! 

She wanted her cupcakes to look like mustard so we used yellow cake and yellow frosting. She wanted to use mustard as frosting but that was not happening. 

We invited the girls from her class. There were 7 other little girls that came plus herself and Nathan. 

It got very noisy when they were playing balloon bonking games!

They played Pin the Tail on the Donkey

We made some Valentine's. 

We sang Happy Birthday!

Everyone ate cupcakes!

Birthday girl! 

She opened up her presents and got a lot of really fun stuff!

She loves beads!

She got a big panda. 

One of the little girls actually got her mustard! I also bought her mustard so she got 3 mustards! 

A barbie

A great art kit!

A new umbrella

Nathan got Elizabeth the little panda and Charlotte got her the big panda. Isn't it funny that she got 2 stuffed animals and they were both pandas? 

Opening some of her jewelry. 

I got her an entire package of tape just for herself. 

They had some outside play time. 

I guess you swing standing up now. 

A birthday party snuggle with Mom. 

Wearing all her birthday jewelry! Thank you Grandmas! 

We were very sad Auntie Laura could not come because she was sick. Hopefully, she will enjoy the pictures! 

Hills between Ellensburg and Yakima

It's usually pretty brown and desolate driving between Yakima and Ellensburg. But in the winter when it's covered with snow, it's very pretty and looks so different! These pictures are from a few weeks ago so it might look quite different now. 

I was glad Jeremy was driving so I could see the unusual view. Not every day it looks like this! 

The white on this hill was so bright and perfect! 

The Kittitas Valley looked so strange just covered in white. Usually you can see the various shades of greens/browns/yellows as you drive down. Just white today! 

February 2, 2009

Here's a picture from February 2. However, it is February 2, 2009! That was one small little 18 month old boy. He was thrilled to see 3 of himself.

Rainbow

I forgot to post these photos from a few weeks ago! 

We had a rainstorm with a really beautiful rainbow! It was freezing cold so we didn't spend much time looking at it, but it was sure pretty! It doesn't look nearly as pretty in the pictures.