What a bond...

What a bond twins have.  These two have never known what it is like to not have each other by their side.  (except for that 2 night stint in the hospital) They have such a cute relationship.  I love this series of pictures.  All i wanted was a cute picture and they (as usual) teamed up against me and were complete goofballs.  That is better than fighting!  I think you can see how close they are and the love they have for each other.

Zoe dog photo bomb!

Claire is saying "say cheese Connuh"

He listened and is saying cheese! (the yellow thing is Laney's night time potty pager.  I thought I'd give it shot with potty training Claire.  It didn't work!

The just adore each other.  They finish each other sentences and always know what the other one is up to.  Not sure how I got so lucky as to be their mom!

Summer so far...

So, now that summer is here these kids of mine like to spend as much time in the water as they can!  Just like their me when I was little.  

Here they are with their cousin in the baby pool at Meme and Papa's.

Claire at the local wading pool.

Connor is the only one brave enough to dump water on his head.

Laney used the bucket to protect herself from the waterfall.

Each morning our routine is to eat breakfast, get dressed and go for a walk.  Sometimes going for a walk takes a LONG time because to 2 year olds there are A LOT of interesting things to find!

The twins have been very good at Laney's softball games.  They mainly play in the dirt and rocks.  Sometimes they cheer for their big sister!

After softball treat.  Note to self ice cream may be a kid reward but it is a parent disaster.  Ugh...thank goodness they needed baths anyhow.

Claire is such a little princess.  On one of our morning walks she had to have her baby.  She is such a good little mama to her babies.  Also very important to Claire are her shoes.  Most times she wears Laney's flip flops that are 2 sizes too big.  This time she HAD to have her sparkle Dorothy shoes.  That girl is a cutie.  I'm kind partial!

Father's Day

So these kids pretty much hit the daddy and grandpa lottery!  This guy adores his kids and is an awesome daddy!

Papa Dave is such a great Grandpa.  Not only did these 3 kids of mine get lucky with their daddy they have the two best grandpas that any kid could ask for.

Riding the mower with daddy is one of Conman's favorite things!

Look at this guy.  This was his first hold of both twins shortly after they were born.  Can't you just see how much he adores them?

I was a lucky lucky girl to grow up with guy as my Dad.  He is onrey and stubborn but man, he is the best!! He taught me to golf, run and throw like the boys, be helpful and kind and most importantly he raised my sister and I always telling us we could do anything any boy could do.  Claire says she is Papa Roger's girlfriend and will not let anyone else have that title!  Here he is when he first met Connor.

Flashback post...

So at the beginning of May we paid off ALL our outstanding medical bills.  Twelve hours later Claire was admitted to the hospital.  

Here she is ready for her skin biopsy.

She was a very brave girl and got 2 stitches.

See those red spots ALL over.  They just kept growing and growing.  She had a VERY high fever of 104 and we could not get it down and keep it down.  As her fever would spike then the spots would get worse.  

Finally, she was admitted to the hospital.  She was dehydrated and we needed to figure out what was going on.

Just look at those.  They were painful and very warm to the touch.

The good part about being in the hospital was popsicles anytime you wanted them.  Claire also found individual attention she never knew was a possibility.  This caused a few problems after our 3 days in the hospital.  She became a growth to her mama.

She was super brave when they took 4 pokes to get her IV in.  Poor girl!  This mama couldn't have taken it if they didn't get the IV in that last time.  Thankfully the doctor came in and got it right where the nurse was unable to.  Whew!

You can see how swollen her face was.

Holding onto her sucker while she has her back scratched!

She was very happy when her sister came to visit after school.  Laney was so good about taking care of her and getting things for her.

Connor was very worried about his "Pear Bear" as he calls her.  He was not happy about not having her in their room to sleep.  He just wanted to snuggle up with her.  Claire on the other hand had some individual attention from mama and wasn't so into Connor.

Thank heavens for the ipad.  Dora was always playing on one while a game was on the other or it was charging!  This girl watched more episodes of Dora than I knew were available.  Thank you Amazon Prime!!

Well, by Day 3 (actually at 1AM in the morning) the nurse came in to tell me that she had parainfluenza 3 (she had a viral screen where they swab her nose when we first got to the hospital) and would be in isolation.  We could not go for rides in the wagon or hang out in the hallway like we had done before.  She also said anytime anyone came in contact with her they would be fully gown, masked and gloved.  We also had a sign posted on the door with all of these items on a cart outside of the room.  Being that it was 1 in the morning when the nurse told me this.  She told me nothing about what the virus was but made it sound HORRIBLE!

I.freaked.out.  Of course what did I do?  Googled it.  Bad.Bad idea.  The first website was about a little boy who passed away from it and a response from someone else who had a child die from it.  The next website was the mortality rate.  ARE YOU KIDDING ME!  So, I spent the ENTIRE night worried to DEATH attempting to sleep.  Thankfully I have this wonderful friend who has been my bestie since I was 3.  She was up at 1 and talked me down for a good 45 minutes.  Love that girl!  

Finally, when the doctor did round the next morning (an hour later than he usually comes, of course!) he assured me she would be fine.  Still not treating the red spots with steroids like the derm doctor wanted to but if we could keep her fever down I told him we wanted out!  The peds doctor wanted to wait for the biospy to come back before steroids.  Which later it did and showed that it was a terrible reaction to her virus and was only hives.  Which we needed to treat with steroids...2 doses and she was cleared up. Ugh!  

So, what does one do when isolated to a hospital room with a 2 year old?  Well, first grandma and grandpa who are worried sick about her drive 3 hours at 5am to get to the hospital and help keep mama sane.  The other thing is ride around on the IV machine for fun!

After we found out it was just hives we begged and insisted (having a doctor for a sister helps a lot!) to go home.  All 3 kids had it Claire just reacted this way.  Turns out this virus the nurse made out to sound deadly is the common cold virus that 100% of 5 years olds have had.  Cough, congestion, runny nose...yep freaked out over that!

In the end I had some great cuddle time with my Claire bear.  Two days after leaving the hospital she was putting on her coat.  When I asked her where she was going she replied, "To da hospital."  She had a little hospital detox time upon arriving home.  Having to share with her brother and sister again was not near as much fun as the hospital!

So, that was the flashback to the beginning of May.  I had so many other ways I would have liked to spend May Day! :)  Still, very thankful this little girl is healthy.  The entire time we were there I kept thinking of the babies who have illnesses and have to spend so much time in the hospital.  I'm glad our Claire was healthy after all.

SUMMER!!!!!

So far we have survived the first 3 weeks of summer.  These two little two year old I absolutely adore but me oh my can they be little terrors!  They sure keep me on my toes!

Who stole the cookie from the cookie jar? (Then hid in his sister's room so he couldn't be found?)

How cute is this face?  You can't be mad he is so darn cute!  He is wearing his dad's old football jersey (it was Jeff's first football team he was on)  Connor likes to dress up with his sisters BUT Jeff HATES that he puts on their tutus.  So, this is his new dress up outfit!  Yep, it is quite possible that Claire is in the buff right there.  Ugh...potty training.  That's an entire different post!

Claire wore piggies in her hair for the first time.  This is her look at me I'm REALLY cute pose!  Stinkin' cute I tell you!

My attempt at a twinkle picture.  

One with sissy.  Can I tell you the awesome big sister this girl is?  Man, she is good, sweet, gentle and loving 99% of the time with these two.  Just last night Claire decided (and when Claire decides there is NO changing her mind!) that she was sleeping in Laney's bed.  So, I put her to sleep in there planning to move her after she was sleeping.  When Laney saw her sleeping in her bed she ohhed and ahhhed at how cute she was.  Laney crawled into bed, snuggled up to her and went to sleep.  I checked in on them at 2:30 am and man, I should have had my camera.  They were cuddled up so sweet.  They stayed that way until morning.

Thank goodness for our little wading pools in town.  We can go just for an hour and cool off. Connor is our little adventurer.  He loves to play and dump water on himself.  He is the one to wonder off and make friends. 

This is his idea of jumping in.  Nice try buddy!  One inch jump that is more like a step into 2 inches of water!  He was SO proud because we were on the other side of the pool and he was doing it "by myself"!

How cute is that face?  She loves wearing her sunglasses any chance she gets!

Claire decided to share her sunglasses and let Laney wear them during her softball game because Laney had forgotten hers.  Claire was so proud to run out and give them to Laney.  Of course Connor doesn't turn down a chance to run out onto the field.  See him eyeing the field.  He'd join that pink team if we would let him!  He can also hit off the pitcher.  He loves to practice hitting and catching!  

Laney giving the ball a big smack!

Fielding the ball at 1st base!  Laney has an awesome group of girls on her softball team.  For 5 year olds they have really improved this year.  She has a lot of fun playing.  Softball is her and daddy's thing.  You can tell she loves that!