Business as usual and I'm almost caught up on my blogging... and all the people said...
AMEN!!
Or I did! I said Amen! There is nothing more exciting that being caught up on anything... laundry, dishes, TV shows, blogging, in the moment... :)
(This is a very long post that is all about record keeping and not about entertainment, proceed with caution)
When we moved into our new home Kaki had lots of growing up to do all at once...
Immediately, we ripped the band-aid off and threw her from her crib into a big girl bed! Her room was transformed in an instant and she was pretty excited... well, mostly!
My kids take joy in mourning the loss of things... they need their time to say their goodbyes, which I totally get and may have encouraged a time or two in their lives. SO it should have been no surprise when she cried about not saying bye to her changing table and crib...
BUT...
Look at that big girl bed?
A trundle!
Who wouldn't want that??!!! :)
OH fine... I'll take it! And there she went...
Her first night in her new room, in her new bed!
Sweet dreams!
Easy schmeasy for Miss Kaki Pants! She has done SO well! Phew!
She is ALL nut... she has more personality than 10 people or maybe she has 10 personalities... either way she is full of it! :)
And this one... he shed some tears over leaving his old house, his old room, etc. But he found his new room to be quite appealing... especially once we got to "Baylor it up." Not to mention that he got to hang Daddy's deer head above his bed... which is oh.so.cool.
Life in our new hood is so fun! There are kids and young families EVERYWHERE, which is very different from our old hood. We bump into friends at the park all the time and enjoy walks to get there because we most always see some of our favorite people out playing in their front yards. It is a bit like living in Mayberry.
Kaki loves taking her stroller full of babies and/or puppies on walks with us. She isn't much of a scooter rider, but wants to be. Or a bike rider, but aspires to be, when "she gets bigger." So for now we take our stroller, which surprisingly helps her keep up a faster pace, although if we cross a path with a wildflower... we stop. Smell, pick it and put it in our stroller for mommy to find dead and wilted a few days later. :)
With a boy who is always READY to get to the next thing, walking with the two of them can be a challenge. It's a precarious balance of walking fast enough to keep up with Caden on his scooter and slow enough to not leave Kaki behind and constantly yelling ahead for Caden to WAIT and behind for Kaki to COME ON! :) But I do love the difference in the way the two of them approach life... they both beat to their own drums, just at different tempos!
One night Kaki let me attempt through the wiggles and giggles to braid her WET hair. Cute!
I am not a good braider... but I like to try anyway!
Which is why God made Kaki with AWESOME hair!
To compensate for her Mommy's lack of skills!
We have some super sweet Baylor buddies in town... we cheered our Bears on together during basketball season!! Kaki and her friend Sarah were HOOKED up!
One night when we got home from a friend's house Caden ran straight from the car to the position below and Kaki joined him. Then he remarked at the beauty of the stars and I'm so glad he did because I hadn't even noticed how gorgeous they were that night in particular! Stop and see the stars!
With all of our moving and selling hullabaloo, we hadn't let Caden play any sports yet this year... we were waiting until we moved and then we didn't move and then it was too late... but I called and happened to sneak him into soccer at the last minute. He was SO excited and SO big... he had outgrown all of his stuff so we had to go and get some new cleats!
He picked these out...
Neon is his signature hue.
And Kaki decided she wanted to do gymnastics...
Balance beam!! Everything is a balance beam!
So we signed her up!
We went once... it was HORRIBLE... she said it was SCARY! I thought it was scary, overwhelming, stinky, and too advanced... so we never went back! :) I know, I know... terrible mom example, but I'm the mom so I get to take on that risk of failure in teaching my child that sometimes it's okay to quit. And I'm absolutely comfortable with that!
Oh and that balance beam above is the edge of the running track that is LITERALLY behind our new house, because our house LITERALLY back up to the elementary school, so all day we watch the kids at PE and recess. Which means this mommy will have a ladder and a pair of binoculars come September. And am not taking a new job as band director. :)
One weekend KK and Albi came to visit... we took a Sunday morning to worship in the outdoors... on a hike... to one of our favorite spots! Best. selfie. ever!
And then it was time for potty training...
Just like that. Big girl bed, boom! Big girl panties, double BOOM!
So proud!
She had two accidents the first morning and none after that. We've had a few minor accidents since then but overall she has done SOOOOO awesome! If I'd have known it would have been that easy I would have started sooner. Now... it hasn't all been fun and games. She is a typical Cox child withhold-er when it comes to the poop. So she gets a Miralax cocktail every evening before dinner which helps us out, but she still only poops in a diaper and even then we have to make her! :) But, Caden who I was sure would NEVER poop in the potty is now doing it daily and doing it well... he in fact, will NOT enter kindergarten in diapers... and so I am confident that this too will be true for Kaki! Oh Lord, please let it be so! :)
KK was there for the first morning of potty training... it was fun! We played lots of games on TOWELS!!
In our new house we have a great backyard that gets the shade in the afternoons, so we spend lots of time out there. Kaki loves to see-saw and will take just about anyone for her partner... even her little dog, Maxie, belovedly named after our dog Max.
Red bud trees... we have two... they didn't look like this for long but oh did I enjoy them while they did!!
Barely escaping what turned into a MONTH LONG plague of all plagues in our house, KK and Albi went home from their weekend visit on a Monday... by the time Tuesday night rolled around, Kaki and I were in the ER.
Just as I was going to bed that night... which happened to be a bit later for me than normal, I heard her begin to cough on the monitor and then cough and cough and cough and cough again. It sounded worse than I've ever heard her so I went into her room and could see her struggling to sit up. So I flipped on the light and ran over there and her lips were blue and she continued to cough, not able to catching her breath. I immediately ran to my room to wake up Justin and started getting dressed. In the midst of all of it Justin managed to hear what I was saying and went to Kaki's aid while I threw on clothes. She still hadn't caught her breath and kept coughing. We thought she was going to vomit because she was gagging and re-gagging.
We put her in the car and when the A/C came on she took a HUGE gasp and stopped coughing... it was like it was all over. She finally caught her breath.
But needless to say, with blue lips and asthma in the family I wasn't taking any chances. So we still went to the ER where they diagnosed her with croup.
She was not a happy camper, obviously. She kept barking like a seal and was really lethargic. But she still insisted I take a picture of her bracelet... sweet girl!
And I was embarrassed that she looked like she did... mis-matched and mis-sized... if I had only known... :)
Her heart rate was really high when we got there and continued to be off the charts until they gave her a nebulizer. After that her heart rate dropped into normal range and stayed there for a few hours. They sent us home with steroids and hope for a rapidly improving little girl.
She did not rapidly improve although she did NOT ever bark again. But she was pretty darn pathetic for days... she just couldn't seem to kick the snots and coughs.
We played with ALL of our toys... and took pics!!
We created countless works of art!
Did our puzzles!
Managed to make it to Caden's first soccer game...
Where he scored his first goal!! This kid is one coordinated little dude! It's fun to watch him play!
And we started to get a bit better...
Or she did...
After a full 8 days she was just about done...
And then...
DUH DUH DUH
I started feeling the tickle... and then it hit...
Another one bites the dust...
But Kaki rebounded by day 10 and had minimal snot...
And I decided I did not have what ever evil cold virus spawned itself off on Kaki... instead it was just allergies... so I took on a painting project... because surely if my body was going to try and get sick it'd stop if it knew I had a project to finish...
So Kaki and I set off to paint her pink furniture Paris Gray....
And then we decided to play dress up in our new clothes from a sweet friend who passes down so many AWESOME outfits and shoes to us...
If a pair of boots can't energize a GIRL then I don't know what can!
She turned into a different little girl when she put those boots on... and I was wishing for a similar pair as the cold we later called the plague starting getting worse for me.
But by that Saturday I started to turn the long corner of cold recovery...
But the next morning... 5 days after the start of my version of the plague, Caden woke up barking!
His turn!
His was quick and painless...
But then Kaki started getting worse again... DARN IT!!
So back to the doctor we went... this time to the allergist... who is my favorite person in the whole world for the relief she has brought me over the last year! I knew she'd have the answers!! And she did!!
She so wisely diagnosed Kaki with allergies and asthma brought on by allergies and gave her all sorts of meds to try... it took several days for the meds to start working but she has been SO much better ever since. FINALLY able to kick the snots and coughs! And has so much more energy now that she can breathe!
Turns out my sweet Kaki is like her mama. The common cold for us is at least a week long adventure due to her allergies and asthma!
For Caden and Justin... two days... three max!
Which reminds me... this cold didn't discriminate...
Guess who was next...
Easter Sunday...
Justin's turn.
It took exactly 23 days for that cold to enter and exit our home! Is that not the craziest?! AND we were SO thankful when it was gone!! Peace out plague! See you NEVER again! :)
