Chrisamas day

Merry Christmas to everyone. I cant believe that I am still alive. After staying up late to finish Christmas, being up in the night with Zachery, and waking up early with the kids, I feel half dead. I’m sure I look mostly dead. I’m to tired to take pictures, but the kids are having a blast. The kids received lots of toys, I keep thinking each year that they get to much, but they were such good kids this year that coal was out of the question. I walked around like a zombie all day until Chris made a healthy dinner. I felt much better after that. We all went to bed early, and I am feeling better today. The day after Christmas is the start of my recovery. We will try to get all of this Christmas clutter cleaned up over the week and get the house cleaned and ready for the new year. I will try to take pictures of the kids having fun with their new things, and will post them soon.

Christmas Eve

Well we finally made it. The kids are so excited to see what Santa will bring. Chris and I decided to not make a big Christmas Eve dinner , and do minni pizzas instead. The kids were OK with that. After a while I started feeling bad. Minni pizzas are not very Christmas like. So I took out my cookie cutter and started turning the dough in stars. It didn’t take me long to realize that they were going to be to small, so I only made one batch. It was fun though to see Adams reaction. He was so excited to eat pizza stars.

After dinner we watched Joy to the world. We needed to make time for Christ this Christmas. Then we tried to put the little ones to bed. That did not last. They were to excited. We watched more Christmas movies on T.V. and put Adam and the older kids to bed. Zach would not go to sleep until around midnight. What A night owl. They say what doesn’t kill you just makes you stronger. I am starting to wonder.

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas

Yea! Our first real snow of the year. I’m sure my friends in Utah are laughing, and my friends in Florida are jealous, but it was enough for the schools to call a snow day. Sorry I have no pictures of the kids enjoying the day, but I was busy getting in some exercise. I was pulling Adam around the neighborhood on a sled. We had a lot of fun. By midday, the snow was already melting. I’m glad we got out in it when we did. My advice for the day, LIVE IN THE MOMENT!

Amoxicillin rash

Wow what a week. on Friday morning Zachary broke out with red spots. Some on his face, back of his legs, and some on his trunk. It did not seem to bad, but I did put a call into his primary doctor, and his Neurologist. His primary Doc. was out for the week, but the Doctor on call said that it was probably just a virus and not to worry. The Neurologist called back, and thought that it might be a reaction from the Amoxicillin that he had been taking for an ear infection and to stop it right away. He had already been on Amoxicillin for 8 1/2 days, out of a 10 day dose. It seemed strange to me, but we stopped it just in case. On Saturday the rash started changing it was spreading out into large blotches, and was hot to the touch. Another call into the Doctors. They said as long as he was acting normal we shouldn’t worry. Just keep taking Benadryl. Saturday night we researched on the internet, and found a picture of a little girl with Amoxicillin rash that looked a lot like what he had. Then he started with a fever of 101. We gave him Tylenol and he fell asleep. On day three (Sunday) He wasn’t looking any better. His hands and feet looked very swollen and his fever was back to 102.7 We took him to the E.R. They said that he had Erythema Multiforme. It’s a bad rash that can be caused by an allergic reaction to a medicine, or it can be from a virus. No treatment needed other then Benadryl, and Tylenol. It could last for a few weeks. We researched it on the computer when we got home, but none of the pictures looked quite like Zach. And none of them mentioned swollen hands and feet. At this point I am still not sure, but the rash seems to be getting better, and his fever is going down. We will just have to keep our eyes on him and see what happens!

Day 2

Day 3

Day 4

GRANDMAS

Grandma and Grandpa Hart came out the day after Thanksgiving and gave Kayla a new reason to be thankful this year. A NEW CAR! Well, it’s not really new, actually it’s older then Kayla herself, but it’s in near perfect condition, and she loves it. Thanks to Grandma Scott for the great price on the car. And Thanks to Grandma and Grandpa Hart for bringing it out for us.

(Picture of Kayla and her car coming soon.)

While Grandma and Grandpa were here, we had GRANDMAS! Grandmas is where grandma buys her grand kids Christmas, and wants to see them enjoying the gifts before she leaves. We won’t be able to travel to see our family this year, so grandmas is the next best thing! Chris, Kayla, and I received cloths. The older boys received air soft guns. Adam received his favorite gift yet, a Nintendog, who he named four and plays with every day. And Zachary received a musical mobile which lights up the ceiling above. They were all such wonderful gifts. THANK YOU GRANDMA AND GRANDPA!

Are we thankful?

I did not want Thanksgiving to pass without posting a list of what all of my little turkeys (kids) were thankful for. Well, my intentions were good, but life seems to just keep getting in the way. I know that If I asked my kids today what they were thankful for it would be different then what It was on Thanksgiving. Its the second week of December, and Grandma, and Grandpa Hart were just here. Now the kids have all new things to be thankful for. If you want to learn more about that, you'll have to read about "Grandmas". Back to Thanksgiving. I want to thank our friends for inviting us over for dinner. It is so nice to eat with another family when you can't be with your extended family. I hate making a huge dinner when it's just us. All you do is cook, eat, clean, rest, and clean some more. This year, I only had to make half the dinner. Somehow, I used every dish in the house and made a huge mess. Oh well. It was nice to show up at our friends and find everything neat and clean. We had a wonderful dinner. We ate and talked and played games. Then we came home and cleaned up our dishes. It was worth all of the mess, we had a fantastic time thanks to our friends!

Yummy Pumpkin Cake

I made this recipe I found called Yummy Pumpkin Bars (Jill McKenzie, 52 weeks of proven recipes for picky kids.) It was so good that I decided to make it as part of our Thanksgiving dinner. However, I think that It should be called Yummy Pumpkin cake! I think that it tastes much more like a cake then a bar. This time I am going to frost the pieces individually as I serve them. Last time Adam found the cake and ate all of the frosting off. Here is the recipe if you want it.

Yummy Pumpkin Cake

4 eggs
2 cups sugar
1 cup oil
1 15-ounce can of pumpkin
2 tea. Cinnamon
2 cups flour
2 tea. Baking soda
½ tea. Salt

Frosting

1 3-ounce package of cream cheese
1 tea. Vanilla
1 Tab. Milk or cream
6 Tab. Butter, softened
3 cups powdered sugar
Dash of salt

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Spray a baking dish with nonstick cooking spray; set aside. In large bowl, beat eggs with mixer until frothy. Add sugar, oil, and pumpkin mix; and mix until smooth. Add cinnamon, flour, baking soda ,and salt. Spread evenly in prepared pan and bake 25 to 30 min. until toothpick inserted in center comes out clean. Cool completely on a wire rack.
Prepare frosting by mixing cream cheese, vanilla, milk or cream, butter, powered sugar, and a dash of salt in medium bowl until smooth.

I need a blogging break!

Wow what a day, I had to wake up early today to take Adam to preschool. It's sooo early(7:30) but I am grateful he has school today because I have to go to a meeting a Aaron's school today. Chris was not able to stay home and help out today, so I have to plan on taking the bay with me. Oh well at least it's just one baby, and not the baby plus a 3 year old. As you may know Zack, the baby is sick with a terminal Illness that effects the brain and the body. It's an unknown type of leukodystrophy. Anyway, back to my day.... 7:30 Adam is off to school. I go into Zachary's room, and he is just waking up. It is so cute to see him stretching and he beautiful eyes looking around the room. I pick him up for a love and a cuddle before I have to get going on my day, and what do you know, he starts into one of his seizure fits. I should have known better, he needs to wake up slowly. To much stimulation to soon often sends him into seizures. It's Ok, I know what to do, he just needs his meds. I get his Dad out of bed to watch him so I can take a shower. I shower as fast as I can and run downstairs to get a quick bit to eat. Zachary is resting nicely in bed so I have time for a quick Hot Coco and toast. My version of Coffey. I am a coco addict. Then I rush to get Zach's food and 9:00 meds. He needs to get them early because my meeting is at 9:00. I plug Zach into he feeding machine and off we go. We make it just in time, and sit down for the meeting to start. OOPS! What’s that smell? Zack needs a diaper change. Out to the nurses office, a quick change, and we are back in the meeting. The meeting is going well then about 9:45 Zach starts into one of his fits. I pull out the Valium in the middle of the meeting and put it into the G.I. tube like its no big deal. The tone of the meeting has now changed as all eyes are on Zach and things start moving much faster. They wrap things up, and Zack is glad that we are finally leaving. He falls a sleep in the car. As soon as I get home, I see that I have about three messages on my caller ID from public schools. This time it's Kayla she has been trying to call me for the past hour and has already thrown up twice. Thank goodness I haven't gotten Zack out of his car seat. We get back in the car and go get Kayla. After we pick her up, we hurry to a drive-thru to get kayla a quick snack. She is starving. On the way home I realize that Christian might miss his bus. His bus comes at 11:00. (He only goes half day.) So I call him on the cell phone. No answer. WOW! Did he actually remember to get out to the bus stop on his own? On the way home I see his bus driver waiting. Christian is not there. I send kayla into the house, to tell him to hurry, and he is still in the shower. I bring the baby inside and yell at him to hurry. He gets dressed and runs out the door just in time to see the bus driving away. I guess it's back into the car again. I ask Kayla to watch the baby, something I have never done before, and run Christian to school. On the way home is realize that I am going to miss Adams preschool bus. I call Kayla, (what would I do with out my cell phone?) and tell her to watch for Adams bus. When I get home the baby is happy in bed, and Adam is home from school. The first thing I hear is a very happy "Mommy your home, I'M HUNGRY!" OK, it's time to slow down. I feed Adam and give the baby his 11:00 meds which are by this time a little late. Soon Adam is eating and the baby is falling asleep. It's 1:00 now and I'm trying to convince Adam to take a nap. He is not quite ready, so he sits on my lap while I check my e-mail. He asks me to see the puppies on the computer. Can this 3 year old be talking about the puppy cam that all of the adults are talking about. I have heard it's an Internet sensation. How does a three year old know about these things? So we search for "puppy cam" and easily find it. Everyone says that It is so cute and people cant stop watching it. Adam is loving it. We see 4 sleeping puppies and 2 restless puppies that are crawling all over the sleeping ones and ripping up a plastic sheet. OK, the puppies are cute, but all I can look at is the poop in the corner and the ripped of stuff all over. Just looking is making me stressed, and I am already stressed enough. I tell Adam he has 5 more minuets and it's time for a nap. I get him down and the baby is still asleep. I know this time is precious. What should I do? I have loads of laundry waiting to be done, dishes in the sink, and a not so clean house. Hmmmm maybe I should clean, or maybe I should eat a bowl of ice cream. Nah!! I just write this blog.....

Getting started

hello from the "New Mexico" Harts!
We have had such a wild a crazy ride over the past 17 years, and I have done such a poor job of documenting it that I thought I should get started blogging and start giving this family a written history. We have lived all over: Utah, Florida, Michigan,and now New Mexico. I hope that we will get to live in other fun and interesting places, but we are here for now. (I should list moving as my hobby. I am always excited to move.) When we first moved to New Mexico I thought that it was windy, dry, and boring. Now that I have lived here for a few years I am really starting to see how beautiful it is. I'm not sure what has taken me so long, but I am starting to see beauty all around me. I wish that I could travel around the United States and just enjoy it all. Maybe I'll do that some day, but for now I'll just have to be happy with where I am and enjoy the family that I have.