mini fall photos + mosquitoes

As you all know, I am the worst at lining up family pictures. We've done it once. Three years ago.

And here it is the middle of October and yet again, I didn't get around to or even think of scheduling family pictures. 

(Maybe every 4th year is the ticket?)

Recently I helped a friend take some impromptu newborn photos. She literally texted me one day and said, "You have an expensive camera, can you take some pictures?"  I said yes, and then quickly tried to learn all there was to learn about our camera in the course of two hours. 

Long story short, I took the photos, Jared did some hefty editing to make up for my lack of eye/knowledge-of-anything-camera-related and they turned out much better than I ever expected.

So I've been suggesting we take a few of our kids. And by "we" I mean Jared.

There was beautiful weather out one evening, so we fancied up the kids and took them to a local walk park with lots of trees and fields in the background.

They were pretty decent sports for about 30 seconds.

Because while we had accounted for the sunset and their clothes and all that, we didn't really think of bugs, specifically mosquitoes. And they were out in full force.

In almost every photo, one child or another is swatting one or scratching somewhere.  We were able to get one or two acceptable ones, but we will definitely need to retry another time.

And the biggest mistake on our part was that school photos were the next day. And the poor things already had bites on their cheeks and foreheads showing up that night. So I had the pleasure of shelling out an extra $6 a piece for "touch-ups" so their school pictures wouldn't showcase the massive welts on their faces.

Lesson learned.

May photo randoms

Birthday Breakfast: Daddy's Famous Cinnamon Roll + 5 candles

Grandma Snuggles

Grandpa Wheelbarrow Rides

New in the Solko household
It's like that weird extra room was just waiting for this piano to show up and complete it.

Ladies' Tea at church

I thought digital cameras made it fool-proof and virtually impossible to cut off someone's head. 
Guess not. 
Boo.

Tiny bowls for tiny chefs

The hat and pink aviators. 
Be still my heart.

Planting with Daddy

A scolding from Daddy

 Back yard chillin' and cupcakes with Papa Alan

Always Fighting/Kicking/Pinching/Hitting/Arguing

"Push me, Papa!"

 Painting

Photography by Bailey

 Photography by Graham

Photography by Avery

Workshoppin'!

Avery's 5th Birthday Weekend

Avery is five years old.
That seems way too old and not quite old enough at the same time. This child has been acting five for at least two years.

It was a full weekend, let me tell ya. 
For the first time ever, we had every grandparent present at the same time for a birthday party. (With the exception of my grandpa Lyle who was at home being a sick party pooper.)

And since everyone was present and this might never happen again, I made everyone pose for a picture. Cathy and I planned the spot in advance, I put it on rapid-fire-self-timer mode, and even Tucker was nice enough to hop in and humor me. 

There wasn't really a theme. Since Avery loves anything art, we took all her drawings and paintings and threw them up on the wall. Add in balloons, and other randomness and there ya have it. She requested a strawberry cake and I made chocolate cupcakes for the chocolate addicts on the Ellis side, along with a big supper for everyone.

Happy 5th Birthday, Avery Josephine!

More weekend photos coming soon.

found on my phone

I don't take photos with my phone much. If it's handy, sure. But if the photo is even somewhat important, I try to get out the good camera. 
So that means that lots of the photos on my phone are slightly blurry or downloaded from a Snap I took and sent to family.

And what usually happens is that I forgot I ever took them, and I am surprised to randomly find them months later.

Like this one last month before Boo's first concert.

Easter morning, anxiously awaiting the egg hunting

Have I mentioned this guy is obsessed with stealing my coffee?
Some days I will take one or two drinks, leave to do something for a few minutes and come back to find the entire mug empty.
And then I find him, and he is smiling really, really big.

This lady taking a nap on me in the doctor's office (Hour #2).

It seems there are seasons in parenting: all-night feeding season, diapers, constant activities, the teen years... 

But is there supposed to be a UTI season?

We're still trying to get to the bottom of all the issues, and we're trying whatever we can think of.

Currently: chiropractic. 

Photography by Avery Jo.

She really captured his essence, don't you think?

And just like that, it's December

I started to write that I'm sorry for my lack of posting, but honestly, I haven't given it much thought. Life has been hectic and borderline crazed. And I'm not talking the "oh I have so many presents to buy and parties to attend" type of crazy.

All the presents have been bought for weeks - most of them are even wrapped - and we have a total of two Christmas get-togethers to attend.

But since I last posted - in October mind you - big, mind-occupying stuff has been going on.

We wrapped up October with a life flight and hospitalization for Avery. She was off-and-on delusional with a 105º fever which prompted an ER visit. (Because this stuff always occurs on a weekend.) Children's in Omaha feared meningitis based on her symptoms so they opted for a helicopter ride over an ambulance transfer. She handled it well and with minimal drama.

Wait, I'm kidding.

She had to ride alone since the double-occupancy chopper was already out in use elsewhere. Jared and I were worried, but we tend to stay cool in these types of circumstances. After all, we have had our few share of medical issues with kids so far. I held off tears until they were wheeling her away, strapped down, only able to move her head. She looked at me and simply said, "I'm going to be sick and all alone."

She knows how to twist that knife for maximum effectiveness.

Everything turned out okay, but the next two days were tough. X-rays, ultrasound scans, straight caths, plenty of lab tests, and IV medication is a lot for an already over-the-top dramatic 4 year-old. It turned out she had a bad kidney infection. With 3 days of IV antibiotics and 10 more days of oral ones at home, she recovered easily. But really, she sure brought the drama. I am not surprised that Avery was the one to require a life flight.

Some other stuff happened too. 

Halloween. (Yes, I'm that far behind.)

A family wedding. 

An overnight getaway for Jared and me.

Etsy business on steroids. Seriously, we're both so over Etsy right now.

The death of our computer.

The purchase of a new computer.

Graham's 3rd birthday.

Thanksgiving.

A spare bedroom/office/play room remodel.
The kids' church Christmas program.

Christmas decorating, baking, and eating. And eating.

Which brings me to our next time-filler lately...

Graham has been sick and just kinda "off" for about 9 weeks now. It started with a rash that lasted for 11 days that doctors couldn't explain, a change in appetite, mood swings, itching like crazy, and bowel changes. Some lab showed elevated liver enzymes - which aren't uncommon with an infection, and a week later they had decreased back to normal levels. 

But his symptoms didn't go away, they hung on. And a few weeks later we took him back to the doctor since he felt worse, and it turns out his labs were elevated again - this time triple normal. 

So off to Omaha to a GI specialist we went. 

An ultrasound revealed an enlarged liver, pancreas, and gall bladder. Further testing showed elevated levels of many different labs related to the liver and gall bladder. Doctors weren't exactly sure what any of this meant. While waiting for some labs to get back, they sent us home with medication for his itching and a general feeling of uneasiness. By the next week, his symptoms were still the same and his bowels changed even further. 

The specialists decided it was time for an MRCP, a specialized MRI to look at the specific structures like the ducts connecting the organs in his stomach. We just completed that this past Tuesday. 

He had to be NPO for about 18 hours, and what should have been a 45 minutes procedure turned into 2 hours. Knowledge is not power in this situation as I was nearing panic mode, knowing something was amiss for the procedure time to more than double. Turns out he had a really hard time coming out of the anesthesia. Thanks, Graham, for aging me years during those few hours!

The results were what we expected. Both his liver and pancreas are enlarged. The pancreas is so enlarged that it is causing narrowing of the pancreatic duct and common bile duct. That is contributing to his bowel changes and the elevated labs. We've ruled out every common infectious cause of organ enlargement (hepatitis, mono, etc) and now not even the doctors are sure what is causing it. We repeated more lab yesterday (Friday) and should hear back about the results on Monday. Those results will dictate what course we take next. If they are decreased we will continue to monitor, hoping it is some unknown infection that his body is fighting off. If they are the same or elevated, we will continue down the road of more testing/procedures. Even our specialist couldn't tell us what these would be because Graham is an atypical case.

So it goes without saying, we've been worried. 

I don't do well when things are out of my control; I know this about myself. And if there was a lesson to be learned from this past year, "you're not in control" just might be it. I've been working really hard to turn worry into prayer. It's helped me more than I can put into words. I'm not in control, and my worry does nothing but drive me (and others) nuts. So maybe I am actually learning my lesson a little every day.

On that note, I think I will end my way-too-much-medical-happenings update on a positive with a few pictures of our little dude on his 3rd birthday last month. 

On his birthday I baked some brownies (covered in fresh whipped cream) and he opened a couple of gifts at our house. His real party was the next day on Thanksgiving night. The unofficial theme of his 3rd birthday was apparently "anything with an engine."

Happy 4th Avery Jo!

Today marks four years since a mischievous, sweet yet uber-dramatic girl entered our lives. Since we've been up to our ears (pun intended) in pink for years, a pink and black Minnie Mouse party seemed appropriate.

We went cheap this year. 
I bought mostly plain black and pink items for the party - tablecloth, plates, napkins, utensils, crepe paper, balloons, etc - and supplemented with a few Minnie Mouse themed items. There was a Happy Birthday banner with Minnie on it, and I purchased some balloons from Amazon along with mouse-eared cupcake picks. 
Jared helped out greatly by using his Silhouette tool (which he uses for words/graphics for Etsy projects) to cut out Minnie Mouse shapes on different colored papers. We used string to make our own birthday garland and decorations for the table. 

{I was skeptical of how much he would use the Silhouette when he first bought it, but it has proved its worth in tons of ways - many of which aren't even for Etsy projects. We will definitely use it in the future to decorate for more kids' parties.}

Anyway, the party didn't break the bank and Avery still loved it. 
In fact she later called it "the best day ever." 
Well worth it.

Can't waste a drop of that frosting!

Then the next item of business was the long-awaited and begged for bike. 
We led her around the house looking for the present we "misplaced." When she finally opened the front door to look outside, she saw her bike sitting there, brand-new and ready to go. Instead of jumping with excitement, she yelled, "Hey, who parked their bike here?!" and slammed the door shut to continue looking for her gift. It took a few seconds for it to register that it was her bike, but within seconds she was on it and took off.

And she's been in constant hey-let's-go-biking! mode ever since.

Today we've invited a few friends over for a play date (hey, Mom wins too!) to make it feel more special. We're going to have a few more cupcakes and continue to celebrate Miss Avery Josephine. 

The ladies' room

Bailey and Avery share a room. Most days it is all fine and dandy. And some nights it is an absolute disaster, but that is a bitch sesh for another day.

Their room isn't large. Up until recently all the available floor space was basically eaten up by two twin beds and one bookcase. There was no room to actually play or do anything other than sleep. Now that they are older and playing more and more independently, I wanted their room to be a place where they could actually spend time. 

Of course the peace and quiet I experience from that is a pleasant outcome as well.

So we decided to buy a set of bunk beds. And because their existing carpet was nasty blue office carpet dotted with paint stains and hastily installed by the previous owners, we opted to install new carpet while we were re-doing everything else in the room. One trip to Menard's and $250 later, Jared and I got the privilege of installing a remnant piece of carpet all on our own. 

It is safe to say that carpet removal and installation is a workout all on its own. 

But I am glad we took that extra step because both of us had forgotten what nice, new carpet feels like because God knows it is no where else in this house. "This is why we don't have nice things" rings more true each and every day. I know you are hearing me on this one, fellow parents.

Anyway, new carpet - totally worth the hassle.

The girls thought it was great fun to spend one night sleeping on the floor in their empty room.

Bunk bed installation was less painful than I imagined. Granted we bought them from Walmart so we were expecting vague directions and not top-of-the-line quality, but I am pleased with how they turned out, especially for the money. We already had the mattresses and matching bedding, so there wasn't much expense in this room re-do. 

I had only a couple honey-do projects for Jared to complete to finish off the room. 

Jared scored an old dresser for $35 at a local household auction two months ago. It is in great shape and with a quick coat of paint, it very quickly became a fun piece of furniture for their room.

If you are wondering about the rug under the bed, well that is the kids' favorite place to "hide" from me each night after their bath. They have pillows under there too, and they think it is just the coolest place to hang out.

The other area of their room is open and easily facilities a pillow and blanket cuddle-up session for reading books, which happens nightly before bed. 

Jared built the white crate for the corner of the room to hold all their blankets. They have so many baby blankets, many lovingly knitted and quilted by friends, and they are beautiful. They have been sitting in a closet for years since I had no where to put them. The crate works perfectly because it is easy for the kids to access the blankets and put them away at night. Plus every time they get used, I remember all the time and love put into making those blankets for each of my three newborn babies.

The dollhouse bookshelf is originally from Pottery Barn and we found it on Omaha Craigslist a few years ago for a hundred bucks. The rocking chair we bought at a garage sale for $10 and a coat of white paint freshened it right up.

The girls love their new room and Bailey was excited to achieve Big Sister Top Bunk status. And while it is technically Bailey's bed, Graham is up there so often you would think he had claimed it as his own.

Are you spying that bookshelf? 

Yep, another honey-do right there. I love that it holds so many books and Bailey has a variety at her fingertips at night without having to climb up and down the ladder.

We still need some decor for the walls, but I want to wait and find something that we really like and that will grow a little with the girls. Oh, and I don't want to spend much money. Are you noticing a trend here?  :)

So we will take our time and add things as we feel like it. Right now I most happy about the missing blue office carpet. 

My only complaint: changing linens on a bunk bed. Ugh.

It's. The. Worst.

because this is all the effort I can give today

This week has been full of NyQuil, DayQuil, children's ibuprofen, and grumpy moods.
Damn you, start-of-school sickness.

So in place of real content, check out some pictures my kids (and dog) instead.

Happy Friday!