Our friend Katie from Florida

My old college RA Renee sent us Katie to keep for 2 weeks. Katie is a teddy bear that is a travel buddy for Roni Alima, a second grader in southern Florida. They are learning geography from their travel buddies. We take her with us and document her time with us before we send her off to a new family after two weeks time. She'll be going to Iowa next to visit with the Missaoui family before going to visit the Kelson's in New York. So here is what Katie has done with us:

On Wednesday Katie went to gymnastics and dance class with Taylor.

On Saturday we went to the Liberty winter BBQ where she tried some traditional Kansas City BBQ and ice cream for dessert.

Katie when to church with us (Sunday) at Desperation Church.

On Monday she went to story time with Taylor.

At story time Katie participated in craft time.

On Tuesday Katie went to Red Robin and enoyed a burger and a water with the family.

Today, Katie went with Jay to Overland Park and Jay took Katie to Arrowhead stadium.

MATCHBOX 20!!!!

Jay got us some tickets on the floor at the Sprint Center to see Matchbox 20. We went to that concert tonight while Jay's cousin Christine watched the kiddos for us. We got some serious rock star parking right outside of the doors at the Sprint center and didn't have to wait long to get into the arena. We got ourselves a $5 soda and sat down in our seats to enjoy some adult conversation before the concert started. Unfortunately we were surrounded by some serious winos on both sides of us that ended up squeezing us tighter together than we've been in public in a long time!

The opening act was MuteMouth and they were actually pretty entertaining. They have one famous song that neither Jay nor I can remember the name of. They were doing back flips over their keyboards, standing on the drums, and at one point in time every member of the band was standing around the drums playing them.

The next opening act was Alanis Morisette (sp?). I thought that she would be pretty good since she has like 4 or 5 really good songs...unfortunately she played a lot of junk that no one knew. Our running joke of the evening was that at one point in time I told Jay "I just want to go push her off of the stage and say 'Isn't it Ironic?' as I see her falling off." I just really wanted to get to the main event.

When Matchbox 20 was getting ready to come out they had this big barred screen that they had a little space man roaming around to a Johnny Cash song while a countdown was going on above the screen. Then they came out and completely rocked it out. I think Jay enjoyed the concert just as much if not more than I did. Truthfully I think that Rob Thomas is one of Jay's man crushes. I cannot blame him. They put on an AWESOME show and it was worth every single penny!







They played one encore set and they played a three song set during that set. I could've stayed there all night listening to them play. What was cool was once they were done playing Rob Thomas jumped down off of the stage and was shaking hands with the fans. He's just a really cool guy. He didn't really talk much because he said he wanted to cram as many songs into the couple of hours that we had as possible. AWESOME SHOW!!! I hope y'all enjoy the photos!

Bella and the baby within...

Today Bella was in her little walker making her rounds when she looked down and got suddenly very interested in the tray. Jay was reading the story about Amanda Pig to Taylor so I didn't get up immediately to investigate. When I did get up I discovered that Bella was seeing her reflection in the tray and was giving her reflection multiple kisses. She's so funny!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY JAY!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOU
HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOU
HAPPY BIRTHDAY DEAR JAY
HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOU!

We are celebrating Jay's birthday in the middle of a snow storm in what I deam the "Den of Disease". Taylor is still recovering from tonsilitis, Bella is working on getting rid of conjunctivitis, and I have mastitis. We are the "itis" family. Jay had to come home early from work today to give me my car back and watch the kids while I went to the doctor. We now have a roaring fire and Jay is cooking his own birthday dinner. We've officially rescheduled his birthday for next week so I can treat him as a birthday boy should be treated. He has gotten some good quality time with his children today.

Eachy goes to the Hospital

First of all, "Eachy" is the nickname I have given Bella because I'm alway telling her that she's so cute that I want to "eat ya" and it sounds like "eacha" when it comes out. Now...onto the story!

Bella had an eye infection and the pediatrician said that they couldn't see her that day or probably for the next couple of days but that she did need treated. They told me to take her to the ER. I thought that it was dumb that they wouldn't see her but what could I do? We trudged out to the ER.

Bella was SUCH A GOOD GIRL during the obnoxiously long wait to be called back into a room. Once we got into a room they had a bed for her to lay in and she thought that was great. She laid down in her little bed and kicked and played. She kept the lady across the hall amused which was good because I think she was in there with a broken leg. Eachy ended up getting bored with laying down and playing so I sat her up and gave her my scarf that Renu gave me and she played with the fringe.

When the doctor came in she said that Bella has pink eye and it will probably spread to the other eye as well. She prescribed her some eye drops and said that no one wanted her to discharge Bella because they were all having so much fun coming by and playing with her. She's a cutey! Even when she looks like Rocky Balboa.

Well aren't we the bad luck buddies...

Story #1 We invite Tori, Kennedy, and Lola (Taylor's friends from school) on a playdate at Taylor's gymnastics gym. They have a wonderful time and about 20 minutes before open gym is over Tori takes a tumble on the trampoline and starts to cry and is clutching her knee. Now Tori is about as tough as they come so for her to cry it must be REALLY bad. When she calmed down and tried to stand on it she couldn't put any weight on it and she started to tremble. Her mom called the doc and the doc said that he thought that she'd hyperextended her knee and to call him if it didn't get any better. That was Friday, it is now Monday and poor little Tori still can't walk on her leg and they are going to get it x-rayed. YIKES! Tori and her mom may never call us again!

Story #2 Yesterday (Sunday) we notice at lunch that Taylor is out of sorts. She doesn't want to eat her pancakes and all she wants to do is take a nap. We come home to take a nap (she does this very well) and when she wakes up she has a fever of 102. I giver her some ibuprofen and she sort of meanders through the evening. When we put her to bed all is well until 4AM this morning. She is hysterical. I go in and she says that the wind is scaring her. When I touch her she is burning up with a fever. So I crawl into bed with her to snuggle her and comfort her until her fever starts to come down. At 5AM motor mouth still hasn't stopped talking so I take her into our bedroom thinking maybe she's still not warm enough. Nope...motor mouth then keeps Daddy awake too. Bella wakes up at 6AM wanting to nurse...she nurses and motor mouth insists on waking Bella up too. We had an early start to this morning. Taylor had a checkup with the ENT this morning and she has tonsilitis. Tonsils will be coming out this summer.

Story #3 Have I told you yet that I washed & dried Jay's cell phone?

Story #4 My furnace is dying a slow and painful death.

Yep...I'm done.

The Tooth and Nothing but the Tooth

FINALLY!!! Bella got her first tooth today on Savannah's 14th birthday! Happy Birthday Savannah! I was playing with her on the couch when I noticed that her gums looked a little funny and after I inspected I saw the little white nubbin' poking through her gums. It is her upper right front tooth that came through. Yay Bella!