Wednesday, March 1, 2017
Allergies
This right here is exactly why I love using essential oils in our home. I wish I had a better photo to share of Finn while he was at his worst, but I don’t. Last Friday Finn woke up with green gunk collecting in his left eye. I immediately thought it was a symptom of an ear infection as Kensi just had one with similar symptoms. Saturday morning came and I decided to take Finn in to our pediatrician’s office. Of course it being Saturday meant I had to do a walk in appointment and sat in the “sick section” with several kids wearing masks because they were running fevers and coughing up who knows what. I was cringing with every cough, sneeze and wipe. As any mother knows it’s the perfect brew as your toddler decides now in this moment, in this situation that he would really like to be wiggling, try to get down and nearly scream as he doesn’t get his way. All I could think about was what in the world am I doing here exposing him to all of this.
When we were finally called back the nurse practitioner checked him out and declared there was no ear infection. She diagnosed Finn with pink eye and I immediately sunk thinking 'crap, here we go with this stinkin' pink eye.' However, she informed me Finn didn’t have bacterial pink eye which is the always dreaded one that terrifies every parent and teacher. He was reacting to our pollen pop here in North Carolina. The poor kid inherited Mike’s awful allergies and just like his daddy it was affecting his eyes. So not only was I relieved it wasn’t contagious in the sense of THE pink eye, but I also learned there are three forms: bacterial, viral and allergic. Which now makes sense as I grew up I often would have a cold in my eye....viral pink eye. Finn had a combination of viral and allergic and the only medicine offered for him was an eye drop that's meant for bacterial pink eye, it wouldn’t do much for him according to the NP since his was not bacterial, but it would help with the redness. So now I was faced with another decision. Do I give him the antibiotic? I know so many people are probably rolling their eyes as they read this and saying duh! yes you take the antibiotic, but in my parents’ house we were taught to try a natural remedy first, then go to an antibiotc.
Wednesday, February 22, 2017
Date 7: Downtown Hop
If you follow me on Instagram then you may have caught our date night last Friday. To celebrate Valentine’s Day and our seventh date we finally got out of the house and pseudo planned a night for a progressive dinner. This is probably our favorite date night idea, but it needs some planning because it's more costly leaving several different tips for each restaurant.
We drove downtown to our river front where it’s always bustling on Friday and Saturday night. We had no idea where we would start, but started walking and stepped into the first place that caught our interest. The Fortunate Glass. I’ve been excited to try this quaint little wine bar for some time after I opted out of my last girls night being nine months pregnant. Inside we grabbed a seat in the tiny cozy booth perfect for two. This is a great little spot for trying small portions of wine, beer and good food. We each ordered our drinks; a crisp Chenin Blanc wine for me and Bells Amber Ale for Mike. We sipped and nibbled on a little antipasto plate and vowed to come back to share a bottle of wine in celebration of a big milestone in the near future.
Our next top was for our main entree. We decided we wanted to go somewhere that was casual and friendly, where we could eat at the bar and just enjoy. We walked to Docks Oyster Bar which reminded us of Faidely’s in the Lexington Market in Baltimore. We found a couple chairs open at the bar and ordered a couple beers and put in our dinner order. By hoping around to different restaurants, it allows us to try several different foods and try different places all in one night. We split everything we ordered so we didn’t order too much food, preventing us from being able to make our next stop. At Dock’s we enjoyed oysters rockafellar and a steamed plate of crab, shrimp, oysters, mussels and clams. Since we live in a beach town it just felt so right to have seafood. This is the type of place where it’s perfectly normal and encouraged to get a little messy. The food was delicious and it definitely hit the spot as we’ve been needing a fix of seafood for a while.
After a couple drinks and laughing hysterically, we ventured off to find dessert.
Mike was feeling cheesecake and YoSake was about to start happy hour so we climbed the beautiful staircase to dine on a little sushi and caramelized banana fried cheesecake. By the time we were done with dessert and walking the streets of the river front, the bars were spilling with college students and twenty-somethings. We’ve always found it interesting to people watch and Friday did not let us down. While leaving one of the restaurants we over heard one girl complaining to another guy about how she deserves to be treated, she was venting about an ex boyfriend. When the girl finally took a long enough breath for the guy to get a word in, he desperately spits out “You know what I say? Every pretty girl deserves to go to a ball.” Mike and I were absolutely dying with laughter. We so badly wanted to shout YES MAN! as it’s clearly a line from the movie. And that’s how we knew that moment was our cue to leave. We no longer fit into the downtown scene as we are clearly parents who stay in on the weekends watching the latest flick that’s finally available at Redbox. We were aching to go home, hold our babies and go to bed. I think that’s the beauty of thirties, we are too old to do the whole clubbing thing anymore, but I’m so grateful for that...it’s exhausting. Plus it’s more fun to bounce around restaurants for food and drinks rather than bars for drinks and lame pick up lines.
Thursday, February 16, 2017
be mine forever valentine
Valentine’s day sorta snuck up on us this year. I was planning and planning fun things for the kids to do all month and I felt like I still had so much time until it was here and I spent all my time planning and not doing. Luckily, our day of love was still everything it should have been and the kids didn’t even skip a beat.
The night before Mike picked up balloons and cards for the babes and I was busy putting together an easy make ahead french toast bake, which leftovers are still in the fridge for the morning. We kept things very simple and surprised Kensi and Finn with a box of cake pops instead of the usual heart day candy and stuffed animals. When the kids finally woke up Kensi’s eye was red, tearing and all sorts of yuck. My immediate fear was pink eye. Ugh! Not what anyone really wants to wake up to especially on a fun little festive holiday. Luckily, my fears were put to ease and instead of pink eye she got her first ear infection. Not bad for almost being five. I was happy to take an ear infection as it meant we could go on with our day as usual.
Kensi and Finn handed out little Valentines to their sweet little friends and played for hours with balloons in the playroom. It amazes me how each year and each holiday how much they grow, but so does their excitement. I adore how much they love to celebrate and decorate for each upcoming holiday. They’re the most festive little bunch of kiddos and I could just eat them up! Here’s to making so many more memories filled with so much love for years to come with my forever little valentines. We hope your day was filled with just as much love!
xo
Monday, February 13, 2017
Date 6: Unplanned Illness
We were excited to mix up our date nights and try to plan something out of the house, but all hope was lost after Friday’s nap time. Friday delivered cold temps and our entire house had a slight chill. Kensi mentioned she was 'so cold' and decided to snuggle up on the couch with a cozy blanket. We knew something was up when she fell asleep because for her to actually nap is rare. Chills, napping...we knew she must have a fever and sure enough we were right. We were suppose to join some friends for dinner and had to cancel, which also cancelled any hope of leaving the house for date night. We were stuck homebound another week.
Mike decided to make the most of it and planned a steakhouse dinner in. We’re always trying new recipes and he stumbled across this filet +mustard cream with mushrooms. (Ours does not look like the photo at all...food photo fail?!?) Better plating for next time! He paired it with roasted cauliflower, one of our favorite sides, and our go to red wine blend Carnivore. Dinner was absolutely declious and what Mike thought would a great night to watch It Follows on Netflix. Oh my gosh, so terrible! The movie was legit creepy, but the premise of the movie was just bad. So bad! So we started to binge watch a new Netflix series, Santa Clarita Diet. However, after a couple episodes we both fell asleep on the couch and woke up in a complete daze not sure where we were or what was going on. The absolute worst way to way up! We slowly made our way upstairs and called it a night. Not exactly the date we had in mind for this week.
So here’s to those unplanned dates, that go arye. The ones that are so casual that it becomes increbily evident how much you truly love the crazy person snoring on the couch next to you. The ones that include a happily sleeping infant in your arms. The ones where the kids get sick and the plans unexpectedly change. The ones were where the expectation for the date are so much and someone just can’t quite make it to bed. Everyone needs these dates just to remember that hey this is real life, this is our life, this is our family, our circus and our love. These dates are sometimes my most favorite of all.
But we’re totally getting out of the house this next week!
xo
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
