What's new?

A LOT has been going on over the past couple of weeks.

Xander and Amelia Jayne had dentist appointments.
Both of them did amazingly well. Xander has been multiple times now, but this was a first for Amelia Jayne. I was so proud of her! The hygienist took her hand and that sweet girl never looked back. They showed her all the instruments, cleaned and flossed her teeth, the dentist checked and counted her teeth, Amelia Jayne said thank you and please each time she was given something. Oh.my.goodness. What an amazing little girl. The only concern Dr. Matt has is that she has a slight cross-bite. He says it may be caused from her sucking on her blanket. I'm no professional, but I do know that her daddy has a pretty severe cross-bite, so I'm not that concerned. However, we are going to limit her time with nonny even more than we have been. She's gone several days without it over the past couple of weeks...but she still needs it at naptime and bedtime. We're getting there.
Dr. Matt recommended the "blanket fairy" come. Oh, Dr. Matt, how little you know about the relationship my daughter has with her nonny. Not only did she name it, it has nicknames - nonny nonster, the nonster, nonny nonny. "My nonny," as Amelia Jayne often refers to it, will never leave us...I just hope it leaves her mouth sooner rather than later. :)
I worry about Xander's teeth sometimes. They're extremely close together, so he doesn't have much room for permanent teeth. Dr. Matt told us that braces are in our future. $$ Cha-ching $$
Because of the closeness of his teeth, I always feel like he's going to have a cavity, but thankfully we haven't had to deal with that up to this point.
I am definitely thankful I started my kids at the dentist early. Xander told me yesterday that he wants to go back really soon AND that he thinks he should brush 3 times a day instead of just two! I told him to go for it. :)

Xander had his 5 year well-visit at the doctor...and is ready for kindergarten!
Oh yes. The words have been spoken and will continue to ring in my ears for the next few months.
Xander's doing very well. He is healthy in every way the doctor could determine. He had his first vision test and his first hearing test. Despite a slight struggle with the eye test (the nurse was evidently used to doing the test with children who aren't as logical as my child so he would question everything she asked him to look at...it was pretty funny. I finally just told her he knows his letters so she changed it up.) He did fine.
He's still a big boy - solid as a rock. He's slowed down on his height, now only reaching the 69th percentile. You know they're growing up when most of the doctor's questions are directed at your child and not at you, the parent. Oh my.

I've been sick...again.
We are a fairly healthy family overall. 2014 has kicked our butts when it comes to health. I'm willing spring to come and with it, better health. I've had a pretty severe cold which I'm concerned might be turning into an ear infection. I've been fighting this cold for almost 2 weeks, so I'm considering going to the doctor if it doesn't improve in a couple of days.
And well, if you've been reading any of my more recent posts, you can see all the other illnesses that have kept our family down this year.

Work has been so busy!
I love what I do. And I'm grateful. It's been very busy, though, lately. I can only attribute that to the time of year and the fact that I've been out a lot due to sickness and snow. I'm also dragging a little bit, which makes everything feel a bit more difficult.

Schedules suck.
Oh, for my brain to work right! I'm working on our summer schedule right now and have intermittently been working on our fall schedule, too. My brain is a jumbled mess.
Our babysitter, Erin (whom we LOVE) is going to watch the kids this summer, so I'm extremely thrilled with that.
Here's a little conversation I had with Xander about Erin:
X: I love everyone in the world!
Me: Really? Everyone?
X: Well, everyone in our family.
Me: You can love other people outside of our family.
X: I know. I love Erin..but she's part of our family.
Me: No, sweetie. She's not in our family.
X: Well, I think she is and I love her.
(I guess he wants to adopt her - they do both love One Direction.) :)

I've visited four preschools in our area over the past few weeks to determine if we should move Amelia Jayne in the fall or not. I LOVE our current preschool, but logistics and timing are going to be difficult to coincide with Xander's kindergarten schedule in the fall. Finding a preschool that I love, that's close to our home (and Xander's school), and that's affordable seems to be the impossible trifecta. I want what's best for Amelia Jayne, but I also want what's going to work best in our family. I'm praying that something comes up that will be perfect for everyone.

Family does not suck.
We've been able to spend a lot of time with family lately. My mom and Ame came down one Saturday and we enjoyed shopping and eating and spending time together. Another Saturday David's mom, dad and sister came down and hung out at the house. Becky's coming down this weekend to hang out, too, so we'll enjoy another weekend of fun family time. I'm so thankful for family and having the opportunities to spend time together.

Xander finally had his birthday party!
I'll probably dedicate a whole post to this topic, but we had an excellent time. Poor boy had to wait a whole month after his birthday to get to celebrate with his friends, but nobody seemed to mind. Fun was had by all. :)