Key West

This past week we took a little trip down to Key West, FL! I must admit, a few days before we left I really got to thinking: Why are we doing this? Are we crazy? However, the kids were absolutely AMAZING! The boys only fussed for a few minutes on the way down there. It did take us 8 hours, but we stopped for lunch for a while and made another stop so everyone could get out and stretch for a bit. Elliot was awesome. She totally entertained herself, played with her leapster (a Godsend), watched a movie, colored, etc. Even after the drive, I was still wondering how it would go with bed time. Thankfully we had a 3 bedroom townhouse so everyone had their own space. The boys went to sleep just fine in their pack and plays! Ezra even did 12 hours straight (and since we've been home Levi did too! MIRACLE!! Only problem is I wake up with 2 bricks on my chest! haha) Elliot had fun setting up her room and sleeping in it. YEA!!

I've been to Key West but never for more than a few hours. I was surprised at how family-friendly it could be and all the nice things we found to do. We ate breakfast at the house, did a morning activity, ate lunch out, drove around for nap time, did an afternoon activity, then went home for a sandwich/easy dinner and bed time. It worked perfectly for us.

I'm no good at picking just one picture, so below I have some headings with collages beneath. Remember, you can click on the images if you want to enlarge them. Enjoy!

The first day we headed to the aquarium and a beach. The aquarium was kinda small, but Elliot had a good time-and that's what's most important :-) The beach was a bit rocky, but still beautiful. It's always fun entertaining El (which Wes did with a dead lobster!) and trying to keep Levi from eating every small thing he see's:We also ventured up a lighthouse (good workout with a babe strapped on you!) and to the Hemmingway house:Found a fun little playground and walked along a pier. Elliot took the picture of Wes, I think it's kinda cool:
Had WAY TOO MUCH FUN taking pictures of this silly pelican and then all the seagulls that came to eat up all the kids goldfish we spilled:

We also ventured to the beach again. This one was super nice with beautiful clear water and soft sand. But, there really is NO relaxing! Ezra tries to see how far he can crawl away, Levi tries to climb everything in sight (chairs, stroller, etc.) or eat very small objects, and of course we need to spend special time doing thing with Elliot. We usually divide and conquer and each take a turn doing something one-on-one with the kids.
On the last evening we enjoyed a catamaran cruise to watch the sunset. It was beautiful, we all had fun doing a little dancing, and Elliot just loved when the seas got a little rough and water splashed on the boat. (Yah, I was scared...she loves adventure!) Oh, and she had her first soda (A Sprite) as a special treat on the boat.

WHAT A WONDERFUL VACATION! SUCCESS!!

Sippy Cups

Does anyone out there have any ideas on how to get babies to take a sippy cup? My boys are starting to self-wean and will take nothing but the boob. I really don't mind this, I just do not want them to get dehydrated when they go for 6 hours or so with nothing to drink. Maybe this is fine, I honestly haven't researched it much. El was drinking from a cup by 7 months, so I never had to deal with this! I even attempted giving Levi a bottle of water and he refused it. They just like to chew on the nipples. So....any ideas?????

*note: I have not and probably will not give them any sugary juices. Water is all I've tried. Did put a little lemon in it one time...but no juice!

Artist of the Week

Elliot is the "Artist of the Week" this week at school. Here's the proud artist and her work (A snowman and snow!)

Zoo...

Visited the zoo the other day. Stayed for a long time 'cause all the kids were being super! We had a little too much fun in the "dress up like a sea turtle and/or turtle researcher" play area....

Pizza, Pizza

We took a nice little field trip with a few people from our MoMs group to Papa Johns. They gave the kids a tour, did a safety scavenger hunt, then let them make pizza's! It was so nice! We made 3 pizza's, bread sticks, a dessert pizza, and they gave us plates, drinks, etc. to take it all to the park. FUN DAY!

....add a little sauce
and then some cheese!
"Mr. Slice" and the gang
Eating at the park (on one of the few days it was a little chilly!)

Haiti

A doctor from our church just went to Haiti on a medical mission trip. I do not know him, but I found his writing on his experience worth posting. I found it quite eye-opening, possibly because I do not watch the news. Enjoy....

"My Experience in Haiti

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Thu at 10:35pm

Dear Friends, I just wanted to let everyone know that I am home, safe and sound. However, I have never been so emotionally drained in my life. The situation in Haiti is unbelievable! It is a war zone at best. Picture the scene of 9/11 but make it eight miles in diameter! They had a 7.0 quake for 18 seconds that did all of the damage. The population of Haiti is 12.5 million. The Population of Port-au-Prince is 3.5 million. So far, the estimated death is in excess of 250,000! I have never experience that much death and it was incredibly overwhelming. I was part of a medical group from Melbourne, FL that consisted of three Ortho surgeons, one general surgeon, two anesthesiologists, two PA's, and two nurses. We flew into Haiti with Missionary Flights International and planes donated by Hendrick motorsports (Nascar).

We had a local affiliation with the owner of CDTI hospital. It was a privately owned hosp. with little damage. It is the hospital which is used by the US embassy (oddly enough, our military at the airport didn't know it existed). We went right to the hospital and began work immediately. We performed over 100 amputations on severe crushing injuries that had become gangrenous or infected. The procedures were performed with Ketamine an anesthetic used in veterinary medicine, and just a little or no fentynal narcotic to keep the person still and calm. After the procedures, the patient was taken out the front door the parking lot and helped off of the stretcher because the stretcher was needed for the next patient. The patient was placed on the concrete or a piece of cardboard and the next one in line was taken. Most often, the new post-op patient was given no antibiotics, no IV fluid, and no pain medication beyond a couple of Advil. If they had family, they were sent home, or out into the street so room could be made. For every one patient we tried to help, 20 more would come in. One older orthopedic surgeon said that he had seen as many orthopedic injuries in his entire career as he had seen in the last few days! Fortunately, we were able to do many other procedures with better outcomes such as reductions and casts, as well as open reductions with internal fixation. We worked long hours and yet did not even touch the tip of the iceberg! It was very disheartening to not be able to help everyone.

I am reminded about the analogy of the starfish: A man was walking along the beach where 100's of thousands of starfish had washed up on the shore. He saw a little boy picking up the starfish and throwing them back into the ocean. The man said, "What are you doing, you can't save all of these starfish." Then the little boy said, "I just saved that one!" That was the mentality you had to have. I would feel so guilty to take a drink or eat a meal bar when those patient's had not eaten or drank much if anything since the quake. It was frustrating to not have the supplies to help everyone. Many times we would run out of basic staple materials that would keep us from doing another case. We had no sterility to speak of and would often not have a basic piece of orthopedic hardware keeping us from fixing another fracture. We did have a Black and Decker drill from the garage that was a life saver when wrapped with an ACE wrap. I can not begin to tell you all of the instances.

The worse part was to see all of the supplies to help us sitting on pallets at the airport and not being able to get to them due to the United Nations control of them and their distribution. I did make headway with our military to get a secure parameter set up and food and water to the patients. They may be able to bring in a mobile hospital unit to help with the logistics of sterilization of instruments and just decompression the magnitude of casualties! The city was a nightmare! Front end loaders picking up stacks of bodies and putting them in dump trucks to be dumped in a mass grave.

We had numerous aftershocks at 4.0-4.5. The scariest thing was the second quake on Wed. morning at 6:01am. It was a 6.1 that lasted 10 second. We were on the third floor of a concrete building that already had damage from the first quake. I was awakened by screams of, "get out it is falling". We did get out without damage; however, homes next to us did fall. It sounded like a helicopter landing on your head, with a train passing next to you, while you were trying to stand on a moving roller coaster. I have never been so scared. That is what made our decision to leave since there was a stand down for flights leaving Haiti. We made it out, but I feel so guilty to have left early when there was still so much to do.

One of our doctors stayed and will still be there for another week. I already have another team ready to go back possibly within the week. This time we have a big check list of needed supplies that were lacking the first time. It was such a joy to help these wonderful people in this way! I wish everyone could have had the experience I have had. Thank you all so much for your prayers and concerns! Please don't stop praying for these people as they still have such need! I will try to keep you all posted. Thanks, and God bless, G"

Climber

Levi LOVES climbing! He can climb all the way up the stairs at my parents house (of course, we follow right behind).

The other day, I glanced over and found him inside the toy cabinet at Mimi and Papa's:
Today, he was not only in the cabinet, but up on the second shelf! He also decided to open the fireplace up and climb up on the hearth (It is pretty tall! Once again, I was right by him)

When we got home today he was playing on the porch with El. I hear her say, "Hey, how did you get up there?" I look and he found a way to climb up his little play climber. There are no stairs, he just hoisted his leg up and pulled.Since he's gotten so brave (as I've also caught him climbing the picnic table on the porch and sitting on top of it) I decided to stay out. Dinner can wait. Next thing I know, he's standing in the rocking chair:

GOOD THING Ezra is more interested in talking (his vocabulary has expanded even more. Levi says no words!), opening/closing doors, and playing fetch with himself. I'm not sure I could handle TWO climbers! :-)

School Party

Elliot got to celebrate her birthday with her classmates the other day. I did as instructed and made a square chocolate cake with Princess candy on top. I felt bad about just bringing in junk, so I cut up some apples too. I put some lemon on them to keep them from turning brown. Well, apparently I put too much lemon 'cause one kid was almost in tears SCREAMING, "It's TOO sour, I don't want it!" (he thought the cake was sour). Other kids were cringing. OOPS! We rinsed them all off and it was much better. HAHA.

Apparently something happens to little girls when they turn 4 and they no longer know how to look "normal" in a picture. She insist on making ridiculous faces all the time. So...here's the shots I ended up with (click to enlarge): I'm taking her to get her pic's done on Saturday so it should be interesting!

Love FLORIDA!

A few weeks ago we took a little family walk over the causeway, just a few miles from our house. Ahh, it's just soo beautiful! I love knowing that there is water everywhere around here. I had to share a few photos:

Me and the boys near the top of the bridge:

a lovely little sailboat cruising down the river:

Just the view...the ocean is at the horizon:

I thought this was a cozy little place at the bottom of the causeway:On our way back to the car, Mr. Pelican met us. He NEVER moved. I was kinda afraid he would attack us or something. haha

...and here is W on another day taking the boys out for walk in the neighborhood (Elliot stayed home, but joined in for the photo op)....pardon the red-eyes, I was having editing issues ;-)

levi's 6th tooth and sleep

Levi got his 2nd top tooth making his total 6!

And...both boys slept 9.5 hours last night.  Amazing.  630 to 4...then back to sleep till 730.  Yea for sleep!!