Giveaway Winner!!!

I am giddy with excitement.
I am not the luckiest of individuals when it comes to things such as winning raffles, drawings, contests, gambling, etc ... but this week, luck was on MY side!
I won not one, but TWO giveaways! WOOT!
First, I won a family four pack of tickets to the Midwest Kids Fest which includes admission and a goody bag valued at $175. It is coming up July 30 - 31st at the Overland Park International Trade Center. You can read more about it here. If that wasn't enough I just sat down to check my google reader only to find out I won a set of Simple Chic Personal Note Cards from thee one and only Janna Wilson (a lot of her works can be found in Scrapbooks, Etc.). I am looking forward to enjoying a family fun day at the Festival and super excited to receive Janna's design when my happy mail package arrives.

Mr. Postman, I will be stalking you this next week :)

Birthday Abundance

This past Thursday marked my 36th birthday as well as Travis' and my 11th wedding anniversary. I was celebrated throughout the day by family and friends. A girlfriend treated me and the kiddos to lunch followed by a sweet treat at Cherry on Top.
She also spoiled me in a big way with

this fun new clasp wallet

my first pair of flirty peep toed sandals

and these fun strappy sandals.

We returned home from lunch to find this amazing gift that had been delivered by another dear friend. I love it!

Moments later I had a girlfriend from church pop in to deliver this yummy cookie cake

and this pad of sticky notes with 100 ways to say "I care"
Today's way to say I care -
Practice Random acts of praise!

And a favorite
A Blue Swirl hand stamped necklace with each of my family members initials.
Swoon!
My parents so graciously gifted us their time to keep the littles so we could have an evening out. They gave us cash to enjoy a nice supper & drinks. We followed that up with a little live music, shopping and dessert at Cold Stone Creamery. Yep, ice cream twice in one day!
My mother in law sent money as well that I used to treat myself to some much needed new clothes. In true bargain fashion I was able to get two pair of pants at the GAP, a pair of jeans & two short sleeve shirts at JCP.
Yeah for happy birthdays and for 11 years of wedded life with my man.
(My apology for the poor photo quality.
One of these days I will learn how to use this camera of mine.
For now I will just keep trying.)

And the Misfortunes Continue

Sunday and Monday were relatively easy on me/us with the exception of one large batch of over baked cookies - darn me for walking away after turning off the timer. Tuesday, well not so much! The misfortunes decided to make another visit. I prepared a bowl of organic rice cereal for McKenna that Travis fed her while we sat down for our supper meal. After supper I left to run up the street to send a fax and drop a prescription at the pharmacy. I phoned home after being gone about 30 minutes and T said McKenna had been pretty fussy so I headed home. I wasn't home five minutes snuggling MJ when the sonic flood gates of vomit came from the very pits of her stomach. It.was.frightening! No joke when I say it was like a fountain out of her mouth AND nose. I was covered in vomit, she was covered in vomit & our couch ... well, let's just say I am thankful for microfiber pretreated fabric that is easily washable. After this initial episode I stripped the baby and bathed her, then placed her in the bouncy seat while I proceeded to take a shower. I was drying off when the 2nd round of emesis hit her like a freight train. She was covered in her own vomit and was lying in a pool of it in her bouncy. Travis rushed in to my side to help. Bath #2, lots of snuggle time mixed with some strained smiles and we thought things had settled down. I had said several times that I wasn't comfortable with the way she sounded. There was an audible rattle coming from her lungs. I headed downstairs to get her pacifier to calm her when she started to spew thick mucus. My heart dropped to the floor as her little body just gave way and she collapsed in my arms. It is now 10:40am and she is STILL fast asleep. She woke at 7:15 this morning, nursed and fell back asleep. I am praying that her tiny body is recovering and she will awake her happy little self. Food allergy to organic rice cereal? Just a fluke stomach bug? We will probably never know. Just know we will not be too eager to reintroduce organic in the future. She was doing great with the Gerber brand.
I had gone to bed about 10:15 in hopes of getting a good night sleep. That was quickly interrupted with periods of Dawson crying out in his sleep. Please bare with a little honesty here. I didn't go in to check on him for over an hour as this is highly unlike him to wake. About midnight or so he began whimpering and I finally drug my laziness out of bed to see what was troubling him. Holy smokes did I wait too long! The poor child was drenched in urine. Picture him standing next to his bed with pee dripping off/out of his pull-up and him pointing to his bed repeating himself saying "wet, wet, wet." I was in complete disbelief when I turned on the light and saw just how "wet, wet, wet" his bed was. I knew he had taken a lot of fluids over the course of the night, but my gracious. So my morning has been consumed with laundry and more laundry. Update, it is now 10:50 and little miss just stirred herself from her sweet slumber. I am off to get my baby love!

Misfortunes

It was a busy week for us with company. Travis's mom and sister arrived in town for a brief visit early Tuesday afternoon. We spent the afternoon at the n'hood pool & then indulged in a delic' dinner & margaritas at Salty Iguana followed by a little shopping at the red bullet. We started the day Wednesday with an early morning visit to the pediatrician. This is where the string of misfortunes began. We had noticed a rather small bald patch develop on the crown of Dawson's head several days prior and felt it had more than doubled in size over the course of a day or two so the nurse we suggested we have him evaluated. The short end of this is, he is being treated for ring worm (which I am still not convinced it is) and we were told to not expect new hair growth for a period of up to two months. Boo! Thursday we headed to BlackBob Bay in south Olathe with my brother Derek and his family who were in town for the week from Alabama. We had a great time with the older kids going down the water slides, jumping off the diving boards, floating down the lazy river and such. We were so careful to apply and reapply sunscreen, but man oh man was it apparent where my hands could and could not reach on MY OWN back come evening time. I was burned to say the least! Somehow Derek convinced my Dad to go down the water slides so we awaited our turn. Dad went down directly in front of Gabi and I. This is when shear panic set in. My Dad isn't much of a swimmer and as he entered the water the tube capsized and my Dad went under. What I didn't know at the time was he hit his head pretty hard at the bottom of the pool. He came up and immediately went back under unable to get his footing. There were two lifeguards at the base of the water slides and neither saw my Dad or came to his immediate rescue. I started screaming at the lifeguard at the top of the slides that my Dad was in need of help. He blew his whistle and finally the female lifeguard pulled my Dad up. It really shook us up. Friday morning I was up early so I checked voice messages (something I do rarely as of lately) and retrieved a message that seemed somewhat suspicious to me. It was a prerecorded message from Frog Service Center stating we needed to return a call to a toll free number & reference a case number in regards to our bank account. I immediately phoned the local branch and low and behold it was a valid call notifying us that our bank account had been compromised. Somehow someone attempted to make a VERY sizable purchase on Travis's card and the transaction was flagged as it didn't coincide with our spending trends. Praise the Lord that it was caught! After verifying that the transaction was indeed fraudulent they reported T's card as "hot" stopping any further activity from occurring. Saturday morning I woke after a fitful night of sleep and was changing McKenna's diaper as Travis entered the room to announce the air conditioner wasn't working at all (which we had suspected late Friday night). I was distracted by our discussion for all of ten seconds and when I refocused on the task at hand discovered she had emptied her bladder all over the bed. No AC on what would be one of the hottest days of the summer thus far paired with the necessity to strip the bed and create further heat by running the washer and dryer = much frustration. After spending the entire morning making calls, I finally secured a repairman to come out in the late afternoon. Again, praises that it ended up being a quick, fairly affordable repair and we were able to reenter a cool home by bed time that same evening. The day ended with me hugging the toilet regurgitating every bite of Oklahoma Joe's BBQ I had devoured just hours before with my family.
Here is to hoping and praying that these little misfortunes are behind me and that I can have a great week ahead!