The Nelson Narrative

Today is the girls' 5th birthday.  It's been a full week of celebrating, commencing with their party last Saturday, then their school party yesterday, some fun things today and finally dinner and cake with grandma and grandpa tomorrow!  Wow.  Maybe one day soon my house will be clean again.  Not that it's ever clean for long, anyway. So since today is their actual birthday, Paul took the day off so we could do some things as a family.  First they opened their presents from us and from my dad and stepmom.  They snowbird in Arizona (live there in a motorhome from September through May) so they just send money and we buy the girls presents from them.  Winx Club doll Breyer pony w/rider and accessories Breyer horse Merida dress, bow and arrow Then a friend that couldn't make it to the party last weekend came by to give them their presents (another Merida dress, so now we have 2, and a Me...

Olivia and Kayley, 5 years ago today you were born, and it was by far the happiest day of my life (I think.  The day I found out I was pregnant with you was right up there). I had waited SO long to have you. For many, many years before your Dad and I ever met I longed for you and worried I may never have you, or any child. But we were finally blessed with you and you were SO worth the wait! The last five years have been so much fun.  I've SO enjoyed being your mom. I've loved taking you to storytime at the library, all the different parks we've been to, playdates with the mom's group, and McDonald's or the mall to play on the playground. I've loved playing with you at home, coloring, doing puzzles, playing with play-doh or doing crafts.  I'm SO thankful I got to stay home with you and enjoy all of that.  It means the world to me. Olivia, you are so funny.  You say the cutest/weirdest/funniest/totally off-the-wall things.  You love ...

Last June was the 5th anniversary of my becoming pregnant with the girls and I have since been documenting here various highlights and milestones of that pregnancy since I was not yet blogging at the time.  This week is the anniversary of my last week being pregnant.  5 years ago this week: Sunday the 24th - My mom came to stay with us until they were born.  I assume we watched the 2008 Oscars that night. Monday the 25th - I had my last OB appointment.  First with my regular OB and then with the MFM (maternal/fetal medicine) specialist after that.  I had my last NST and the girls were doing great.  I just remember thinking how weird it was that that would be my last time in that office (the MFM office, that is.  I sure didn't plan on having twins again but hadn't ruled out a singleton (and I'm pretty sure we could have prevented twins or more by only transfering one embryo had we ever done an FET {frozen embryo transfer})....

The girls turn 5 on Thursday and we had their party yesterday.  This was their first party that was for just their friends and their parents and not just mostly family.  We had 11 kids here (including the girls) and about 10 grown-ups (including us), so it was a houseful but still managable. We had a cat theme, so we played Pin the Tail on the Cat and hat a cat pinata.  The girls were so excited to be having a party with all their friends. They had been counting down the days and on the day of kept asking when everyone was coming over.  It went well and they had so much fun. Cat decor, including a real cat     Happy Birthday Banner Cat Cake Pops The Cake (from Costco) Goofy birthday girls Decapitated pinata Taking turns beating on the pinata Opening presents Duck shaped watering can Olivia ready to Pin the Tail on the Cat My crude drawing of a cat ...

I've never been real big on Valentine's Day.  I was single forever, and when I did have a boyfriend there was all this pressure to get something romantic and meaningful and it was always so hard to figure out what to get.  I mean, what else is there besides chocolate, really?  Most guys aren't big into jewelry and even if they do wear chains or whatever a guy can only have so many. Now that I'm married, I'm just kind of eh about the whole thing.  We haven't gone out the last few years because we can't afford to go out AND pay a babysitter, and I imagine it's hard to even find a babysitter on V-Day.  I usually try to fix a special dinner, but it's hard to make it all romantic when the girls are here with us.  Sure, we could wait until they go to bed and then light candles and have a romantic late dinner or just dessert if we've already eaten, but Paul gets up so early that he usually goes to bed the same time the girls do, although they...

I had one of those weekends that I hate, where there's lots going on and there's no time to do any of the "fun" stuff that I usually like to do on weekends, like research new music/download from iTunes/make new playlists, organize photos (maybe even scrapbook one day), read, blog/read blogs, etc.  Not that I do any of those every weekend, but that's just an example of some things I like to do. Saturday we headed up to Mount Vernon to visit my mom and help my brothers and sisters-in-law pack up mom's things (they weren't there at the time but we're all just going over there when we can and packing stuff).  She had a stroke a month and a half ago and is currently in a nursing facility and from there will probably go to assisted living or something and not back to her former retirement community.  We had lunch at Five Guys while we were up there.  I have been wanting to try that place for a long time and finally got to.  It was really good and even the ...