Grammie's visit

I'm finally getting to his post. Grammie came for a short visit to meet Greyson and spend some time with the boys (and us). Everyone had a great time! She got to see our new house for the first time also so that was fun! This time she stayed at a hotel nearby in Delafield and one of the days we took everyone over for some pool fun. They had a blast!!! We ordered pizza and ate it in the lobby afterwards. It felt like we were on vacation! One other day we drove to Chicago to experience Legoland. The boys enjoyed that as well. They all liked playing with all of the Legos and we got to see some pretty cool professional creations like the life-sized Darth Vader, which Hunter thought was really cool. We also got to see how Legos are made in the factory and the boys left with three bitty Lego skeletons as souvenirs. Grammie's visit was so much fun!

Tee hee!

Greyson giggled for the first time tonight and he gave himself the hiccups! It was so cute!! He was crabby beforehand so I was carrying him around the house trying to get all of the boys in bed. Tyler and Brody were down for the night and it was Hunter's turn. He wanted me to read to him (as always) so Greyson came along for the ride. It's tough to hold him and lie on Hunter's bed to read so I was looking around for anything to put him in to keep him somewhat content and of course, safe. His little bathtub was the closest thing I could find without having to go downstairs so I plopped him in there (without water, of course) and rocked him in it manually to calm him down. It worked! He was giving me lots of smiles and then giggled. Hunter was upset that he missed it because he was busy trying to find a book to read.

Speaking of Hunter, he has been so so sick this past week. It started with a bad cough and turned into a high fever that lasted three days. He did not eat a single thing for two of those days. Today we managed to get him to eat one bite of a PBJ and half of a pancake. He missed school on Wed, Thur, and Friday and religious education on Wednesday night. Today he was crying on the couch complaining that his ear hurt so John ended up taking him to Urgent Care. His ear is pretty badly infected so he is on Amoxicillan now. He is like a different kid since taking the medicine. Smiling and everything! Tyler, Brody and Greyson are all sick as well. The twins have a fever but so far Greyson does not (knock on wood). Greyson has a congested chest and cough. John and I have escaped this one so far. I hope that lasts. Tonight at dinner Brody was telling us that his tooth hurt so I'm debating whether or not to bring everyone in to see the doctor tomorrow. John said that Hunter's Urgent Care Doctor said that it probably started as a sinus infection. The fact that Brody's teeth are hurting makes me think he might have one too. They have all been so sick so far this season. I just want it to end!

200!!

Wow! This is my 200th blog post! Pretty crazy. I haven't posted in a while so I have a lot to write about.

First of all, things around here are really great! I love all of my boys (including John of course)!!! And I love our new house, neighborhood & community! And of course I love all of you, my friends and family! Life couldn't be better over here!

Speaking of family, my mom came to visit recently to meet Greyson and spend some time with us. Stay tuned for a post dedicated to our time together...

Speaking of Greyson, he is cuter and cuter with each passing day! (I'm definitely not biased about this. Grammie and Nona agree!!!) He has started to sleep better at night. He is two months old and now sleeps a 5-6 hour stretch at night. I still get up with him around 4 a.m. to nurse but then he usually sleeps until 7 or 8 after that. I'm not complaining about that. He has always been in his little Moses basket right next to our bed except for a short stint in the crib before I decided to paint his room. I'm still airing it out before putting him back in there even though I bought the VOC-free paint. I still like to play it safe. He sleeps the majority of the day also. His most awake period is between 8 p.m. and midnight. I took him for his 2 month checkup today and he weighs 13 lbs. 9 oz. He's a chunk!! That is in the 83rd percentile. He is 24.25 inches long (86%) and his little peanut head is 15.5 inches circumferance (29%). I think he has my small head. That's okay because I'm pretty sure our other boys all have John's big head! They gave him three shots. Boo! And he was so happy and cooing right beforehand too. It was soooo sad. But he only cried for a minute. He has been pretty smiley lately and I'm eating that up! Hunter, Tyler and Brody continue to be great big brothers to him. Hunter really enjoys trying to get him to smile at him. Tyler and Brody both come over to him during the day and say, "Hi Greyson!"

We are all in the Christmas spirit over here. We've already decorated the inside and outside of the house and started a new tradition...roasting marshmallows over our fire pit for s'mores while Daddy hangs the lights on the house. The boys loved it! We are all very excited for Christmas. We are hosting this year in our new house!

Stitches

I got a phone call the other morning from John asking if I had talked to the school. Confused, I said, "no, why?" He proceded to tell me that the school nurse had been trying to reach me for the last half hour because Hunter had had an accident while walking into school. Apparently he wasn't paying attention to where he was going and had walked into the gym door and split his eyebrow open. I felt like the worst mother in the world for leaving him in the nurses office for that long with no response! We got new cell phones about a month ago and I never hear it ring. We hadn't had a land-line hooked up yet and were doing a trial run with just using our cells as our home phone. After this episode John called the phone company to hook one up. When I arrived at his school and saw the damage I didn't even think he'd need to be checked out but the nurse said it would be a good idea. She had put on two little butterfly bandages and the cut seemed to be holding together nicely. After calling the doctor's office from the car to see if they could put stitches in if needed they referred me to urgent care. So off we went! When the doctor took off his bandages I realized the cut was pretty deep. In the end Hunter needed two stitches and I learned that keeping four little boys entertained for several hours in the ER is tricky business.

Randomness at the Collins household

What I just heard happening in the basement while cleaning up the kitchen...

Brody half-way crying
Hunter: "Oh...you got an owie?"
Brody: In his sad voice..."yeah."
Hunter: "No...I'm not going to kiss your butt."
More crying from Brody
Hunter: "Okay, I'll kiss your butt."
Not sure what that was all about.

And another something I didn't want to forget...Brody has been stealing bites of food off of Tyler's plate and while he does it he says, "Yoink!" He definitely learned that from Daddy!

Lastly, Hunter's conferences were this week and Mrs. Nickel said Hunter is performing at above grade-level (second grade) in reading and spelling. She said he is so much fun in class and while he is very bright she loves having him in class because he still loves to learn and isn't "too cool for school" like some of her previous students who excel like Hunter. She showed us some of his journal entries called "small moments." They write these "stories" every day and then share their best work with the class occasionally. Hunter wrote one about the time he got "grounded" for going outside in his socks. Let me give some background info on this. Hunter has been struggling demonstrating his listening skills and while I have asked him numerous times not to go outside with his socks on he hasn't obeyed. So I finally broke down and told him that the next time he would be grounded from going outside for the rest of the day of the offense if he was outside with socks. His journal entry went something like this..."Yesterday I was grounded for wearing my socks outside. I just went to get the mail and didn't know Mom was in the garage. Suddenly, she caught me. Then there was drama." She thought that one was particularly entertaining.

During the first few weeks of school the parents were invited for an information night in the classroom with their child's teacher. This is to familiarize parents with procedures at school and such. While John and I were walking down the hallway we noticed a bulletin board with pictures drawn by Hunter and his classmates and sentences down below the drawings. These all started with "In first grade I hope to..." and most of his classmates wrote "learn to read" or "make friends." Hunter wrote "learn to drive a car."

Fall fun!

We have ventured out twice in the last week as a family of six and things have gone swimmingly! On Thursday night we went to the Halloween Haunts at the Wehr Nature Center and walked through the forest lit by hundreds of hand-carved pumpkins on either side of the path to meet the creatures of the night for their annual program. We love attending this event but were worried about how Tyler and Brody would handle being out at night in the forest. They handled it just fine! I had Greyson in the sleepy wrap and he slept the entire time and John and I held Tyler and Brody's hand to guide them through. They weren't scared at all and seemed to enjoy it. The people at Wehr recommend this program for ages 4 and up but we still don't have a babysitter in our new community so we braved it and thank goodness it worked out! We all had a great time!

Then this afternoon we hit up a new pumpkin patch closer to our new home and I'm a big fan! I got the recommendation from my boss, who lives out this way. If anyone is looking for a good one it's called Ebert's in Ixonia. The boys had a blast! They each picked out their own pumpkins, which was the highlight I would say, and Hunter played some games like pumpkin bowling, golf and a fishing game. Tyler and Brody didn't quite understand that they each got to pick ONE pumpkin and kept going back for more to put on our cart. On our way out we asked a stranger to take our first family picture since our new little addition joined us and amazingly everyone is looking at the camera (with the exception of Greyson who is sleeping in the wrap). Everyone was having so much fun that I had to go buy a bag of popcorn to lure them back to the van without a big fight. Whatever works!

Future daughter-in-law saved!

Today Hunter's friends were over as they have been almost every day since we've moved in. When I say Hunter's friends I mean Avril and Christopher. They live two doors down. Avril is in 1st grade like Hunter (different class though) and Christopher is in K5. Apparently Avril is a self-proclaimed monkey and loves climbing trees. We have some pine trees that are awesome for climbing in our yard. Their most recent activity of choice is to try and climb them. Avril climbs up SUPER high. Well, today they were out back climbing and John, Greyson and I were inside. Christopher came in and was telling us very animatedly, "Someone has to come and look at Avril! She is WAY high up and stuck up in a tree! We need help!" Well, Christopher is somewhat dramatic and so we didn't jump and run immediately, thinking that all was probably okay. But John did decide after a few minutes to go and check (I was nursing). After about 10 minutes John came inside panting and told me he had to climb up 30 feet into the tree (in his socks) and save Avril! She had been suspended with her hands on a branch but her legs dangling mid-air. On his way up to get her she was saying, "My hands are slipping!" YIKES!!! Thank goodness he reached her in time. She would've been seriously injured had she fallen. Later John told me that Hunter came up to him and said, "Dad, thanks for saving the life of the only girl I'm gonna marry."