The Aftermath and Favorite Toys

The house was a mess for several days after x-mas until I could find a place for everything. I am having to get really creative in keeping things organized around here with so many toys! With our basement not really finished, it is too dungeon like for it to be the playroom so until we do something about that, our living room will continue to be the multi purpose (crowded!) room.
I think this year Logan's favorite santa gifts turned out to be some of the little things he got in his stocking. Things I thought would not be a big deal. Such as the small toy airplanes and the Alladin figurines. He loves to play with both of these. He also likes his 2 headed dragon and big dinosaurs alot. And he likes the geotrax trian and airport sets but doesn't play with them as much as I thought he would :(

A Day of MANY "Changes" and "Sun Up to Sun Down"

Changes of clothes that is. Logan changed his outfit 6 times throughout the day! I felt this blog needed two titles since it was such a fun day

Our tree AFTER my parents came over and doubled the amount of gifts!

Logan's first glimpse of the presents and outfit #1, his dinosaur pjs.

Logan was so cute x-mas morning. He was excited but he was very specific about how he wanted presents opened. He wanted to take his time and someone else could only have a gift when HE said so. Too funny. In a way it was nice he wasen't tearing through all the gifts but to get to my 2nd blog title it took us "SUN UP TO SUN DOWN" to open all the presents. First one started around 8am and last one was opened at 11pm! With a break for dinner at my parents house.

My Dad and Melody with her new pony

Outfit #2, his Pirate costume from Halloween.

He wanted to put it on as soon as he opened his pirate ship. He played with this for a good half hour before another gift was even thought of.

Outfit #3.

He ran around in his underwear for awhile while I convinced him to put on some clothes! My mom had a good idea and had him open his new outfit for his "Build A Bear" monkey named "Dr. Bananas" (Joe and I bought him the monkey with scrubs on originally) Anyway, this brought us to our 4th outfit......

Eagles Football attire

My mom and Melody with her "Dolly Llama

This was my dad's idea. My mom told him she was looking for a doll for Melody and he said "Why don't we give her a "Dolly" Llama? So my mom got the stuffed Llama and a tag around its neck that says "Dolly". It will be funny one day when she learns who the "real" Dalai Lama is

Outfit #5. One of his new ones from Joe's parents.

He finally kept this one on for awhile.

Logan's new geotrax train. We also got him the geotrax airport but it had the wrong pieces, so back to the store I go to exchange it..

Our cookie cake for Jesus.

Logan sang Happy Birthday and here is the video.

Melody had a bath in my parents sink

Logan wrote his name all by himself

And outfit #6....some more dinosaur pjs.

Holding his two headed dragon that "breaths fire"

What a great day we had!!! Logan was exhausted by the end of it and fell asleep in the middle of eating a chicken nugget. Wish I had a picture of that!

5 Days Off!

Finally this year Joe and I are NOT on call for Christmas! In fact, we have 5 days off. Yeah! The past two years one of us has had to go into work over the holiday. It is nice being a 3rd year!

Christmas Eve we went to mass at 4:00. It was...well...difficult. We didn't have the best seats for Logan to see and I forgot to bring him a drink. So the whole time we just tried to keep his mind off of wanting a drink and tried to keep him quiet. Forget about him sitting down....that was a lost cause. He sat and climbed everywhere BUT the pew we were in. At one point when it was quiet he said "I don't think I like church!" really loud. *SIGH* Joe took Melody out cause she was crying...Anyway, not sure we got much out of it but we were there!

Logan ready for church

Silly girl!

I didn't get a pic of Melody in her x-mas dress b/c we were so rushed and she was asleep but this is her santa dress.

Christmas Eve Pajamas

When I was growing up my mom always let us open one present on x-mas eve. It was almost always pajamas. I think this was a ploy for her to get us excited to go to bed but nevertheless it worked well! So I will continue this w/ my kids. Joe and I had a box with new PJ's too and Logan just thought it was great we all had new pj's. I think the pj plan backfired for me cause it only made Logan more excited! Oh well

Joe and I were up to about 1 am setting up everything and cleaning up. Here is the tree and gifts before we went to bed:

Christmas Poses

Since our JC Penny pictures were a disater, I decided to take some pictures at home instead, save money, and do it on my own time! Most of the pics were taken with my parent's camera but I captured a few.

Handsome little guy

What a boy

Little Santa outfits

We have scrubs just like Mommy & Daddy!

Hospital Santa

Instead of the mall Santa (which I'm not a big fan of anyway) we went to a Santa event for the employees at one of the hospitals we work at. There was a very authentic Santa who gave each child a small gift and the parents got a polaroid. They also had a magic show which Logan LOVED... he was laughing louder than any of the other kids. It was a fun time.

Logan told Santa he wanted a lamp, a horse, a new house, and trains. Ummmm...okay, not sure where all that came from.

She seemed to really like Santa!

The magic show

A cute Daddy and Son moment

Waiting patiently in line to get his balloon from the Magician

This was a busy Saturday for us...After the Hospital Santa event we ran home and got the kids ready for their x-mas pictures at JC Penny which turned out to be a disaster. We waited over an hour and none of the pics really came out that good. Then that night we went to over to our previous neighbor's new house a few miles away. Logan had fun playing with his good friend Alex who is 4 and their daughter Kira who is a year older than Melody. Logan slipped on their kitchen floor and got his first bloody nose and mouth. He had a swollen lip for a few days but he was fine! Scared mommy though. When it comes to my kids getting hurt all of my "doctor sense" goes right out the window and I don't think very clearly!

A Month of "Firsts"

Melody of course will be having a lot of "firsts" this year and here is what she did this month!

First time in the high chair.

She did the EXACT same thing Logan did which was bite the edge of it. I will have to scan in he picture of Logan doing this, they look the so alike.

First time in the Einstein Exersaucer.

She loves it! Her goal seems to be either to get each toy in her mouth or to pull the toy out of its "socket". One day she somehow pulled the star toy completely out and was waving it around in the air and she also broke the plastic hinge on the mirror book. What a little brute!

First Rice Cereal! 4 1/2 months

It took her a couple of times to get used to it, but now she LOVES it and has come to expect in in the morning and evening.

First Vegetable! (Carrots)

Christmas Day dinner I decided she was ready to try a veggie. She only ate about half the little jar but she seemed to like it. Notice the sleeve of my "protective" flannel shirt so she wouldn't spit carrots on my sweater.

I look forward to many more "firsts"!

Oh Christmas Tree

Well we started off the holiday season by putting up the christmas tree the day after Thanksgiving. This year Logan wanted to help with every step so it took a little longer than usual but he was so proud of himself! I love putting all the ornaments on from when I was growing up. Each one has its own meaning and memories. Unfortunately we never got around to putting up our outside lights this year. We are just too busy and tired!

Little Santa Logan

Melody's first ornament

The whole thing wore her out!

Melody's Stats

Melody is 4 months old already! Here are her measurements:

Head Circumference: 40 cm 25th percentile

Weight: 14 lbs 2 oz 50th-75th percentile

Height: 25 1/2 in. 90th percentile


How I had a baby girl this big, I have no idea!! For some reason both of my kids have small heads though! :) Not like you can really tell this by looking at them, I just think its kind of funny. Do these growth charts really mean anything and are they really accurate?? Logan was 15 lbs 8 oz and 26 in. at 4 months and was only 25th-50th percentile. I guess girls are measured on a smaller scale. She seems to be doing things early...She first rolled over at 10 weeks! Then she really started rolling over all the time aroud 12-13 weeks. She is starting to be able to sit up in the "tripod" position, but still falls over after a minute or so. She also seems to want to crawl already! Yikes! And I really feel she is ready for solids but I hope to put it off unitl 5 1/2 months.

Where did the weekend go??

Why does the weekend go by so fast?? I think most people feel this way, especially when you have to go to work monday. Sunday evenings are the busiest night of the week for me as I try to run around doing everything that I put off over the weekend to get ready for the week. Inevitably I am doing laundry, dishes, emails, baths, bottles, books, cleaning, packing daycare bags.... all at the same time after 7 pm on sunday night. Regardless, we had a pretty fun weekend

Friday evening play time

Getting ready for Saturday's Iowa game.

They won 55-0 against Minnesota, yeah! And my awsome wolfpack had an amazing win over the Tar Heels!!

Awwwww...

Logan helping Daddy fix my headlight

Joe and I went to a penthouse party in downtown Philly thrown by someone we know through work. It was nice to get dressed up and have a night out! One of Logan's teachers from daycare came and babysat.

She LOVES getting ready for bathtime!!

Well off to another week of surgery and clinic...but wait, at least its only a 3 day week!!! :)

A VERY cool website!

Make a Smilebox scrapbook

I LOVE this website! It makes scrapbooking so easy! Its free to make designs and a reasonable price to print the pages!! This is GREAT!!

Surgery and Surviving Daycare

In some ways it is nice being back in the OR after being on maternity leave for 10 weeks. I've been back at work for about 5 weeks now and I was worried I would be rusty but so far everything is going fine. I like having the knife again! We still don't really have any kind of rountine established but do you ever have a routine as a resident?? Probably not. At least this year is MUCH better than the past two years of residency. Fortuately in my field and in my residency program the 3rd year is much more laid back. We get to pick and choose cases and hospital rounds are less than they were. Also, no weekend call!!! I can't even begin to tell people how much I value the weekends now after having to work them for two years. With both Joe and I in the same boat we maybe got one weekend off a month where we both were NOT on call. Still with the job searching and extra studying that I should be doing for boards in May on top of a new baby thrown into the mix I stll feel extremely busy! Stay tuned for some recent surgery pictures....



I think Melody is getting used to daycare for the most part. It sounds horrible but the way I make it through the day is I force myself NOT to think about the little things like: Is she crying? Are they paying enough attention to her? Is she uncomfortable? Is she tired? Is she lonely? Does she miss me? What is she doing right this second? Don't get me wrong, I think about both of my kids ALL day but I force myself not to stress about the activities of their day, instead I focus on how many hours I have until I can pick them up!! That is by far my favorite time of the day! To see Logan run for me screaming "Mommy!" w/ a big smile on his face and to see Melody's drooly grin when she realizes mommy is holding her again is priceless.... I hope and pray that I will be able to work part time next year! I think it is an attainable goal since I know Joe will get a great job since he already has some great offers. Having my kiddos in daycare has made me a stronger person since it has been the hardest thing ever to leave them in the hands of someone else. I like to be in control of their care in a BIG way and having to take them to daycare is very hard for me. But in a way I think it has chilled me out a lot and I have much more of a "whatever, everything will be okay" attitude than I used to have!

Melody enjoying a fall day


And Logan enjoying the leaves!

These are from last week and today it is snowing so we will have to get some snow pics!

Crafty Kristin

Okay, so I LOVE doing any kind of craft project, crocheting being my favorite, and I think if I was a stay at home mom I would be going to Michael's several times a week! I can't draw or paint at all but things having to do with spatial organization or color schemes or yarn/thread are my cup of tea! I recently made both of my wonderful grandmothers prayer shawls for their birthdays and baby blankets for my cousin's baby and for Melody. I don't have pictures of all those but here is an afghan I made for my sister-in-law when her daughter was born a few years ago. She loves frogs so here is what I made:




And here is the blanket I made for my cousin's baby:



Today I have "crafts on the brain" b/c it is so therapuetic for me..... which I could use after my not so wonderful day today! I have several projects in the making that will hopefully get done one day.