Raindeer boots

Sorry it's been a while since the last update. We have been busy, yet lazy at times, so I have a lot to catch you up on. We were able to go to my parents for an early Christmas weekend and were met with a lot of rain. Mom had warned us about the previous amount of rainfall and suggested we bring some rain boots. I had so much fun just shopping for Reese some rain boots. Mom picked some up for Mason, boys are so easy. Mason was a bit confused though and kept calling them "rain deer" boots.

So, if you give kids rain boots, they must use them to their maximum potential. My mom was thrilled to be able to get these city kids dirty, not just dirty, but wet and dirty. Love ya mom!

I did it!

I did it! I walked my half-marathon over the Thanksgiving break. It was awesome! You wouldn't think that one would need to train for "just walking" 13.1 miles, but let me be the first to say it wasn't as easy as one would think. Miles 7 and 12 were the hardest, by far. My mom did the majority of it with me with a combination of running and walking (thanks mom!). She also acted as my gopher, refilling my water bottle and bringing me a phone every once in a while. Extremely helpful! Gary and the kids came for the last 2 miles or so to help encourage me. Mason ran the last 1/2 mile or so and kept telling me to slow down and walk. I would have to keep telling him I already WAS walking. It was hilarious when he first started running with me and said...while laughimg and sounding surprised, 'Mommy, I didn't know you could run!?!?"

I walked all 13.1 miles on a really nice wooded, hard sand packed 1 mile track near my hometown. It's one of those little jewels that you take for granted until you move away and realize how lucky you were to have it.

My goal was to finish in 3:30, but instead I finished in 3:13 averaging 14:44 minute miles. I know I may look funny walking fast sometimes, but I am just thankful that I can.

So, thanks to everyone that helped along the way and to Gary and my mom for watching the kids and keeping me going the day of the race.

My next adventure will be in March walking the half at the Dallas Rock-n-Roll half-marathon. I'd love to have some company!

A little laugh for your morning

Mason has cracked me up lately with some of his sayings...

Whenever we playfully get onto the kids we sometimes say their full names in addition to adding "burger" to the end of Kearns. Grandpa started it. So we'll say "Mason Kearnsburger!" and they think it's funny. Well recently I have heard Mason get mad at Reese and would yell "Reese Kearnsburger" at her, which cracked me up because he was so serious. Apparently yesterday he was really mad at me and looked me straight in the face and yelled "Mommy Kearnsburger!". I know I was supposed to get onto him for yelling at me but I couldn't stop laughing instead. I will probably pay for that mistake later.

We put the Christmas tree up last night with just the lights for the kids. This morning Mason kept turning the lights off on the tree and I asked him why...he said he didn't want to waste power, in the most "duh" kind of tone. He did say his w's correctly though :)

Have a Blessed day!

Update a little late

So it seems that I have fallen behind on updating the goings on around here. We went to the Heard Museum a few weeks back and as usual Mason loved it. Reese wasn't too sure about it and preferred to be held as we walked throughout the exhibit. Makes for a long walk, but I didn't mind the extra cuddling.Despite having been sick a couple of weeks in October and not having much of an appetite during that time, this little girl has managed to gain 8 ounces and grow 1.25 inches taller. That puts her in the 3rd percentile for weight and the 50th for height. That's right...the 50th! Her pants have turned into capris almost overnight it seems.
This week we decided to take a mini-vacation and go to the Great Wolf Lodge in Grapevine. The kids absolutely loved it. Mason probably went up and down the slides at least 50-60 times in the less than 24 hours that we were there. Reese enjoyed it too but she was shivering most of the time and a little scared of some of the water features, but when we tried to take her life jacket off and go back to the room she would throw a fit. The best part of the trip for me was seeing them sleep in the bunk beds in the kid den suite. Reese slept all night on the bottom bunk and she looked so tiny. I kept sneaking in just to watch her sleep because she looked so adorable. Mason loved the top bunk and was very proud of himself for being a big enough boy to climb up himself. Gary was absolutely exhausted and was asleep before 9. We will definitely be going back but maybe when Mason is tall enough to ride the big rides. My other favorite part of our stay was when the boys were at the water park and Reese and I were getting ready for bed. She loves all things girly related and wanted to blow dry her own hair. How cute is she???

Have a Blessed day!

Ladybugs and spiders

This year was Reese's first trick-or-treating experience, which was helped by having a professional standing by in Mason. I have to say that Reese made the cutest little ladybug ever.

Mason and his little friends, Caden, Cohen and Zander.
Mason leading the way showing Reese how it's done.
What cracks me up is that Mason is usually very shy even around people he knows. But, if there is candy involved, he apparently knows no strangers. He was out ahead of everyone, the first at each door, the first to ring the doorbell and the usually the first to say "happy halloween!". He even went another hour after our group was finished trick-or-treating and he and Gary walked the majority of our neighborhood. Reese threw a fit when I took her ladybug outfit off. Poor little girl was tired after all that walking. Can't wait for next year!

My favorite walk

I look forward to my long walks on the weekend because I usually follow the same route. Today was no exception as I did my 8 mile trek. A little more than a mile into the course (and again at mile 7.5 today), I round this one particular curve in the path and come across this...and every time I think what a beautiful place for pictures and I would imagine the kids running around under the canopy of the trees on the incredible green grass. Well, today I had Gary meet me with the kids at the end of my walk and we did just that.
And if I do say so myself, today's photos didn't disappoint. They turned out exactly like I pictured in my mind.
They didn't stay still for very long at all, but it was long enough to get this picture, which happens to be one of my new favorites.

Mason took the time to teach Reese how to blow on a dandelion, but doesn't quite understand about the making a wish part first.
So now when I walk past this particular spot I won't have to imagine the kids running around under the trees anymore.

It was such a beautiful day!

Kleenex alert

I don't know this lady, but as a mother, I couldn't help but want to share her story. Warning: you'll need some Kleenex.

Random updates

Ignore the fact that he colored a Hello Kitty page (Reese's girly stuff of course), just look at how well Mason stayed in the lines. Seriously, he went from coloring all over the page last week to all of a sudden coloring in the lines with different colors.
Halloween preview: Spiderman
Ladybug (the cutest ladybug ever I might add)
This was Mason's first ever drawing. It's a picture of me, can't you tell?
They love Candyland right now. Reese got it all out by herself.

So they tried to play it together, but they didn't get too far by themselves.

As of today, Mason, Reese and I all have strep throat so we are just hanging around the house trying not to go stir crazy. It's only day one so I think it may get worse before it gets better. Like I keep saying, it could be much worse. We are so thankful!

Full fat yogurt

So most of you know we have been trying to add some calories (good calories, not empty calories) to Reese's diet to help with some weight gain. I recently found some awesome yogurt for her, Liberte Mediterranee, that has 250 calories in each 6 ounce serving. We previously used Yobaby Yogurt, but it only had 110 calories in each 4 ounce serving. I was excited when I found it because there is no high fructose corn syrup or artificial flavoring added at all. I will have to say that it is not the cheapest thing out there, but it's manageable at $1.19 each, especially when I usually give it to her every other day. This girl loves all thing dairy and would live off of yogurt ("ya-ya" as she says) and string cheese if she could.

Warning: do not eat what she doesn't eat, afterall it's full fat yogurt.

These two...

...are loving playing together now. Their current favorites are hide and seek, reading books, and making tents. I came home today to find that Gary had rearranged our couches just to make an amazing tent for the kiddos. They love picnics in the living room, helping me clean anything they can reach with wipes, and putting stickers on the floor.

He...has mastered some new speech sounds. He can say 'w', 'f', and 'l' sounds now which has made a huge difference with his intelligibility. Unfortunately, we had to stop his speech therapy after learning our insurance didn't cover it, but we seem to be making great strides even after stopping therapy. He has alsolearned how to manipulate us (mainly daddy and grandma & grandpa because it doesn't work on me) by using Reese. A typical conversation may look like this:

Mason: "Let's play duck, duck, goose!"

Us: "No, not right now bud, maybe later."

Mason: "Reese, do you want to play duck, duck, goose?"

Reese: head nod here with "eh uh"

Mason: "Reese, you do? Yeah!"

Mason to us: "Reese wants to play duck, duck goose".

She...has gained a pound. Yeah! We have been fattening her up with lots of butter, cheese, and some Kid Essential Boost to her milk. Her shoe fascination has grown to include my heels. Surprisingly enough, she can actually walk in them. Too cute! She is scared of the play-do spaghetti maker. For some reason, it freaks her out when Mason pushes the play-do through it.

Celina pumpkin farm pictures (warning: picture overload)

Wow, it was a beautiful day! We took the opportunity to get out and head to the pumpkin patch in Celina. Mason had been to one 2 years ago, but this was Reese's first time. She loved it! They both loved it! Even when the hayride we were on got stuck in the close to 2 feet deep mud ruts and it took about 15 minutes for us to be rescued by another tractor. Even when the hayride had to be cut short after getting unstuck when one of the tires came off. Even when the lady next to us threw a temper tantrum about her kids getting yelled at so she in turn yelled at the pumpkin patch owners. We had a great time!












Hope everyone had a wonderful day too!

Head start on Halloween

Looking back over the last several posts, Mason seems to have been neglected. We really do take pictures of him too. For instance, he has gotten an early start on some Halloween antics. Got to love it!

new page & old purse

The kids and I are just getting over some colds and an ear infection. Somehow, Gary managed to miss out on all the fun this time around. Reese ended up with a bad ear infection so we had one miserable night where she couldn't sleep. Only later did I find out that there are numbing drops the doctor can prescribe for a bad ear infection. Would have been nice.

I've said it before, Reese is quite the girly girl. Her love for shoes, dresses and purses cracks us up. Although, she also likes to put on Mason's underwear too. She can actually put them on by herself and pulls them up to her knees.

I haven't been up to much lately, but I did finish a page today while Mason managed to put stickers all over my closet door. We did practice his sounds and letters while I was scrapbooking though. In my defense, he asked if we could go to my scrapbooking closet to watch trash trucks on the computer. Of course I said yes, but at least made it educational and did letters and sounds instead of trash trucks on the computer.

Hope you have a Blessed day too!

Reese's 18 month check up

First of all, I can't believe she is already 18 months old. Nothing could have prepared us for life with a little girl in the house. It's amazing to me how early some of the girly things start, like her love for shoes, purses and dresses. I am fairly certain it's nature and not nurture in that area. Her love for all things trash related though definitely comes for nurture since Mason was the original trash lover in our house. She had her 18 month check-up today and her were her stats for anyone interested...

Height: 31 inches (27th %ile)

Head: 18.75 inches (78th %ile)

Weight: 19 lbs, 7.9 ounces (1st %ile)

At her 15 month check-up she weighed 20 lbs, 2.1 ounces. So she is still on her downward trend of losing a few ounces here and there instead of gaining weight. Right now honestly we don't know what to do. Allergy testing has been put on the back burner since she doesn't really show any other signs of food sensitivity (vomiting). The pediatrician suggested sending her to an endocrinologist if she continued with this trend even though the previous two thyroid blood panels have come back normal. So for now, I am re-referring her to ECI for another dietician evaluation to see if we can up her calorie take anywhere and will weigh her again in 2 months. If she continues with this trend then it's on to the endocrinologist unless our team comes up with another suggestion.

I have to keep reminding myself that she looks healthy, she's happy, and so much fun. But still my instinct tells me this is more than her just being petite.

On a side note, Mason apparently decided he needed to read books at 3 am this morning. Gary thought he heard something so went to check on him and found him sitting in his bed with his lamp on reading books. So we were surprised again when he came downstairs into our room at 5 am. This time he told us there was a spider behind his door in his room and it scared him. So we let him get in bed with us and asked him how he saw it if his light was off and he would just say " I don't know, but it's there". We asked if it was big or little and he said "little", and of course we just humored him and said he could sleep with us. Daddy even told him he killed it earlier but that didn't work. So later that morning, Mason, Reese and I went upstairs to get everyone dressed and what did I find? A little spider on the baseboard behind the door in his room. I totally had to laugh out loud. He was telling the truth.

What a beautiful day!

I haven't done this in a while, but a friend reminded me that I needed to do it again. A while back I did a post on things that I love...so here's some of my new loves.

I love this picture. I love that Reese and Mason both love to play outside and a simple bottle of bubbles makes their day.

I love that my mom came all the way up to Dallas just because I said I wanted my mom and she didn't even think twice about it.

I love that Mason says thank you to things that don't even require a thank you, but I'm not going to tell him otherwise.

I love Braum's chocolate mix with Reese's Peanut Butter cups, the new Reese's dark chocolate peanut butter cups, and Kashi's raspberry chocolate granola bars. I should probably stop there in my favorite food lists because I could go on and on, and on....

I love the Watters Creek commons area with the bronze ducks and buffalo statues. The kids are so excited just to go there and run around to play tag and sit on the buffalo. Did I mention it's free?

I love that Mason has a sticker collection on the inside of his passenger window in my car. It's a great conversation starter and I will never mistake someone else's car for mine (yes, that has happened before prior to the stickers).

I've said it before...I love our quesadilla maker. It makes the best grilled cheese sandwiches and it's so much faster and easier than the old fashioned stove top way. Exciting information, I know.

I love Mason's imagination and the ease at which he can entertain himself sometimes, I said sometimes, not all the time...

Most of all, I love that I have so much to be thankful for. Have a Blessed day!