Long Family Vacay 2010

This past weekend we went to Milford lake for the 3rd annual Long family fishin/campin trip (how country do I sound? I am SO not country). Like I said in my earlier post, it's the farthest thing from camping since we stay in fully furnished, air conditioned, lovely cabins. However, that being said, you can try as hard as you want, but nature will find you!!! I had a run-in with a snake right outside my cabin and a spider crawl on my bed (yes I want to cry just thinking about it again). Dangerous, killer creatures aside, it was a great time! We arrived Sunday afternoon and changed the kiddos and headed straight to the beach. The water was freezing but the sun was hot so it felt pretty good, not that I went swimming, heck no...I just dipped my feet. My son, however, was completely unphased by the frigid temps and loved being in the water. Harper fell asleep right away, baby girl already knows how to relax and soak up some rays :) That night we grilled out and then enjoyed some adult beverages by the fire after the kiddos went to sleep. Monday was hot and sunny again, half of the group went golfing, and the rest of us hung around the cabins and beach again. Pax got some more fishing in, and then that afternoon we just relaxed outside and let the kids enjoy some fresh air. Harper LOVED being outside, we tried to put her down for a nap inside but she wasn't havin it, Sarah finally laid her on a blanket outside and she fell right to sleep!! We grilled out again that night, and did s'mores by the fire....yummo!!! We left pretty early Tuesday because it was cloudy and cool so there wasn't much for us to do. All in all it was a fabulous time. I was so grateful that my kids did so well, Harper was completely ok with being totally out of routine and Paxton....hell who are we kidding the kid was in fishing, dirt, sand, food, stayin up late heaven!!! We are already looking forward to the 4th annual Milford trip!! Beware of picture overload below....don't say I didn't warn you!!!

He was so upset to leave!!

Harper 5 months

Harper was 5 months on Sunday!! She is so fun these days, she is really jabbering and smiling so much now. She had her first ear infection last week, she had been up all night SCREAMING which is so unlike her. I knew something was wrong so I called the doctor first thing in the morning and sure enough her left ear was infected. Poor baby girl, but the medicine and ear drops have seemed to help. She is also trying to eat twice a night again....what in the h-e-double hockey sticks is this about?!?!? I am pretty convinced it's because of all my bragging on what a GREAT sleeper she was and how she sleeps SO MUCH and only gets up ONCE a night, blah blah blah. Should've known I was just setting myself up for disaster and totally jinxing myself!! I am thinking about trying baby food a month early to see if maybe it will fill her up more and make her sleep longer.

I have also decided to start weaning her from nursing. My goal was to make it to 6 months and I figure by the time she is completely weaned it will be about 6 months exactly. I am a little sad about losing that special time with her but she is starting to lose interest in it anway and drinks so much faster from a bottle. Also pumping is so time consuming! I have to get up a whole 30-45 min early in the morning to nurse and pump and honestly I just want to SLEEP!!! I am scared and hope it goes well and is as painless as can be :) I am just happy I made it this long with her, it really feels like an accomplishment that I stuck to it even when it would have been so easy to throw in the towel.

At the doctor last week she got weighed again and was a little over 13 lbs. She seems so big to me but I know that 13 lbs is still pretty small for 5 months. I chalk it up to her being so little when she was born, she is still just tryin to catch up.

Here are a few other things that baby girl has been doing lately:

-rolling all over the place: today she rolled from one end of the room to the other!!!!

-holding herself up on her arms and trying really hard to scoot, I think it will happen soon...AAAHHH!! Time to start babyproofing again!

-Drooling and gumming things like crazy, which makes me think that teeth are in the near future.

-Still puts herself to sleep. This kind of makes me sad because I would like to snuggle with her sometimes, but she wants to be left alone when she is tired. I will try to rock her and she wiggles and fusses and so I put her in her crib, she puts her hand up by her face (always) and goes right to sleep.

-She is still so happy all the time!! She is just smiles, smiles, smiles. She sat through 2 weddings the past 2 weekends and did so good, didn't make a peep. We can set her on the floor or in her bouncer and she just entertains herself, and as soon as you look at her or talk to her she grins ear to ear.

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I am enjoying her so much, and love watching her grow and especially love seeing the special bond between her and Pax. He is so great with her and is my big helper. He will put her binkie in for me if I am busy and she is fussing, he throws her dirty diapers away, helps me with her bath. He is such a great little man, and he truly makes me proud. Ok I will stop bragging now, believe me my kids are far from perfect and definately have their moments, but that's a whole separate blog post :)

Oh yeah and I survived the bad weather yesterday, by the time the storm reached us it had lost intensity. Thank goodness cause that sucker was nasty and had been producing tornados all day.

Busy weekend!!!

This weekend was Josh's 30th birthday, Mom's day AND Harper turned 5 months!!! It is actually the second out of FOUR weekends that we have stuff crammed into. Last weekend was Cowboy and Kelsey's wedding and we had the Stein's stay with us from Colorado. This weekend was all that jazz I previously mentioned, next weekend is my sisters boyfriends graduation from K-State (masters in accounting, big smarty pants), and the weekend after THAT is our family reunion/camping at Milford Lake. Now when I say camping, I mean staying in these huge cabins that are brand new with air conditioning, full kitchens, bathrooms with showers, beds, flat screen tvs (with cable of course) and huge decks with awesome views of the lake. Obviously that is the epitome of "roughing it" (insert sarcasm here).

Anyway this weekend my Mama and Sisters came to El Do to help celebrate the big 3-0 with Josh. We went to eat at Sumos Japanese Steakhouse in Wichita and a few of his friends met us there also. Mom stayed home with the 3 kids (bless her) and somehow managed to get them all to sleep with NO FIGHTS!! The dinner was amazing, great sushi, great drinks, great food, great times!! After we finished eating we went to the bar in the restaraunt for a couple drinks. Josh ended up having a few more than a couple as well as some shots so he was definately feeling no pain when we finally got home. He ended up "going to bed" pretty early and our plans to hang out on our patio with our chimnea (sp) were kinda ruined. Can't really be mad at the guy, guess you only turn 30 once, but I was sure looking forward to enjoying our new patio.

The birthday boy and I

Me and My Sissies

Family!!

Family AND Friends!!

Bubba trying sushi for the first time...he didn't like it.

the fellas

the ladies

Love this picture, who knows what they are all doing.

It was so nice for our family and friends to get together to celebrate his birthday, I know it meant a lot to him that they were all there. We had a great time, and LOTS of laughs (you know what I am talking about sisters).

Today was Mothers Day and it was a great day as well. I actually let JOSH sleep in because I am pretty sure he needed the sleep more than I did after his night the night before :) Harper got up pretty early but Amber and my Mom took her because they were already up with Aiden (pretty sure I forgot to thank you guys for that so THANK YOU!!) Pax and I slept for another hour or so and then we got up as well. We spent the morning hanging out and helping Mom cook breakfast and then after we stuffed ourselves with that breakfast we all lounged around some more. I ended up curling up in a chair and sleeping and it was amazing. I cannot remember the last time I took a nap mid-morning for no reason at all!! Josh was taking care of the kids so I just said screw it, nappy time for Mama! I have a hard time napping because I feel like it's such a waste of time and I could be getting housework done, but not today, no siree I was a free woman today. Josh and I took the kiddos to the Butler baseball game today, they are playing in regionals and they were actually playing a team that a good friend of mine from high school coaches (Andy Morgan for all you MHS'ers). We ended up run ruling them with a final score of 13 to 3 but it was a fun game to watch. Pax loves watching baseball and will sit through the whole game!! It was pretty chilly but still a great day for baseball! We went to Josh's grandparents farm for dinner and it was nice to see his family and spend some time together. All in all it was a wonderful day with lots of family time.

Here is our breakfast FEAST!!

It was a great weekend, I am exhausted, I need one more day off but don't think that's going to happen..........oh yeah and has anyone heard the forecast for tomorrow? TORNADOS!! And anyone who knows me knows I. DON'T. DO. TORNADOS, so I am already stressing out and will just have to warn my boss if it gets bad my butt is runnin out of the Y and driving to get my kids and going straight to my basement where I will probably be crying my eyes out. So good luck to all tomorrow, lets hope there are no twisters and I don't have to get fired for running out of my job :)

My kiddos on Mom's Day, don't ya love their smiles?