FOUR little FULTONS: candy

Saturday, October 31, 2009

rid the neighborhood of their candy addictions...

We decided this year we would dress the tribe up as our own "medical team". Brendan was a Doctor {We told him he could be a neonatologist since he is a NICU brat!}, Camryn was a surgeon {scrubs & all} & the "twins" were patients. St Mary's was kind enough to lend us some hospital gowns so we had the full effect. They looked ADORABLE! We made it to THREE Halloween parties in these costumes & each time they looked even cuter! I must say after the first party they did not need a tutorial on what to do come Halloween night! Candy has become their new favorite five letter word. They talk about it ALL the time! With all this talk you would think that we give them candy all the time. Well that is partly true, it's not us, but their GRANDMA! Yes I have one of those mothers that keeps candy dishes ALL over her house! I think the tribe stumbled upon her stash one day & the rest was history!She has jelly beans, butterscotch & most of all various forms of C-H-O-C-O-L-A-T-E everywhere! Their sweet tooth has to come from their Dad because my only vice is DARK chocolate & he loves ALL sweets! Give me DARK chocolate & I'm happy! (= Now that the tribe has found out Grandma keeps a HUGE stash they ask her for it ALL the time! We constantly hear "Candy?", "Candy?". Remember they like repeating things! arghh! Sad thing is that she gives it to them! And before anyone says a word, Yes we brush their teeth, floss too! This is one of those instances where Grandma's can get away with about anything! She says she cannot deny them a piece when she herself is having one. What a line! Oh am I in trouble! (= Tonight of all nights, Halloween, candy played a HUGE role with us. The tribe now knows ALL about "trick or treating"!They know if they carry their pumpkins around & say those three words they will get the motherload! Little do they know they will NOT be eating it anytime soon! {Daddy & Grandma will! LOL!} In order to get the kids dressed & out the door all we had to do was ask them if they wanted to get "CANDY". There they were lined up at the door with their shoes on waiting for us! CRAZY! Then when we were sitting down for dinner & they about refused to eat another bite so all we had to say was if they wanted to get more candy they needed to eat their food & their mouths opened & food was consumed. It truly was amazing! It was the BEST bribe! There we were "Trick or Treating" at my cousin Lori's house. It has become sort of a tradition that we hope to continue. She lives in a safe neighborhood where we do not have to worry about people or cars. I have to add that the tribe did NOT get a nap today.They were champs! Remember they had "CANDY" in their minds so as long as they kept their eyes on the prize {candy} they were good! haha! It truly was the BEST time had by all! This was the first year that we actually went to a ton of houses! It was a LOT of walking but the tribe persevered! One funny moment was when Brendan plopped himself down in the middle of the sidewalk to consume some of his treasures! TOO funny! Candy, it does a body good! haha! I must say hearing "Trick or Treat" out of their mouths made me almost want to cry! I cannot believe how grown up they are getting! Time sure does fly by! Everyone loved their costumes & I felt like we did our part in trying to...

rid the neighborhood of their candy addictions...

Sunday, July 12, 2009

won't you be my neighbor?...

My mom has THEE greatest neighbors! Whenever we visit her, which is a lot, we always have one or two of her neighbors gather on her porch. I wish I could say they were coming to see me but we know the REAL draw, the tribe. The feeling is mutual!

Just the other night we attended the 6th Birthday party for my mom's neighbors daughter. Jennifer & Boris are such a great family, they have 3 daughters in fact they give us MANY hand me downs! You know how I love hand me downs! The birthday girl is Ashley & she was turning 6! She is SO cute. For months she has walked over to see the babies & would tell us that her birthday was "tomorrow". Her big sister Emily would say nooo it's not tomorrow & laugh! I never knew when the real day was! So when Ashley came over on Thu asking us to come to her party I was perplexed. I checked with her mom & yes it was in fact her big day! They celebrated with a pool party! I was excited because the tribe has been swimming a lot lately & LOVES the pool! The bad part was that we had NO swim diapers! We were given a bunch awhile back & we finally ran out!
That's partially due to the fact that we do NOT use them in our pool. So far I have only had to clean up 2 pooptastrophe's! Yes we had poop in the pool! It was Cam Cam who did the deed! Never in my wildest dreams did I ever think I'd pick someone's poop out of the pool! There I was making sure I got all of her terds! YUK YUK YUK! It was disgusting but cleaning up floating ones is SO much easier than what it could have been! PLUS it's SO much cheaper than having to buy swim diapers each & every time they go for a swim! Now when we are going to be in someone else's pool I will splurge. Mommy did not plan well & there were no swim diapers to be found, so NO swimming. Tell this to 4 two year olds! They were NOT happy! We dressed them nice since they would not be swimming & walked over to the party. Instead of being in the pool we had 4 FULLY clothed two year olds walking around the pool! We had a lot to watch out for! The pool was full of six & above aged girls. They SO wanted them to come in & go swimming!

Only one "accident" where Cam tried to sit on the steps of the pool & got her dress soaked. So then she was just in her diaper! I am going to plan better from now on! We had such a fun time hanging out with the adults, eating all the tummy munchies & then it was time for the pinata! Yep a pinata! It was SO cute how Vinny, Ashley's older brother, sat on the roof holding the pinata rope. What a brother! Needless to say it took awhile to get that puppy open! The kids went crazy when they finally broke it open & all the candy flew out! Our kids now LOVE candy! Thank you Jennifer! LOL! A fun time was had by all! I wish our neighborhood was like that!

won't you be my neighbor?...

Our Story...

Ok I am now over 8 years into this "job" of mine, being a mommy to multiples, high order multiples to boot! They say that if you try to conceive without protection for one year with no success then you are infertile. Those words were a lot to take in. I sought answers from everyone. We started out with our 1st OB/GYN Dr William Casale doing the normal testing that they were equipped to do. We did it all, IUI's, spermwashing, etc. I then contacted RESOLVE, a wonderful organization for people like me (could not get pregnant). I started making mental notes of what I needed to achieve my dream, to be a mom! The next step was to go see a Fertility Doctor. We chose to see Dr Mark Denker. After checking me out he then referred Michael to see a Urologist who ended up putting him on clomid. Yes, men can take this RX too! It helps make more sperm just like it helps a woman create more follicles. It is AMAZING the things you learn when you are trying to conceive! After further testing we were both told we had fertility issues, I had fewer eggs than a woman my age & they were "tough", Michael had double vericasils so that in order for us to have the "best odds" we needed to go the IVF route. I had this feeling that it was not going to work right away, call it my intuition. So we bought a package, can you even believe that they sell "packages" like a travel agency? Our "package" included 3 rounds of IVF with ICSI, minus all the meds I would need. The drugs are an expense we did not even think of but had to purchase for this entire thing to work. Well, it ended up taking all 3 rounds of IVF & accupuncture courtesy of Dr Susan Schiff for me to get pregnant & boy did I get pregnant! (Trust your intuition!) We started out with very few follicles, only 3 fertilized into embryo's and all three took. I was finally pregnant! 8 weeks into my pregnancy one of the embryo's split & became identical. Can you believe that!? What are the odds? No one told me that could happen! AMAZING! We had a lot of decisions to make. No one thought that we should keep all four. In the medical world it is called a "selective reduction". Only a few doctors even do this procedure. We did not know what our future would hold just that we could not reduce anything! In the beginning we had a hard time finding a doctor that felt like we did & wanted our four babies to thrive! We finally found Dr Moises Virelles, a fellow Christian & my now OB/GYN. He then referred us to an AWESOME Perinatologist, Dr Gary Cohen. Having the two of them on our side we knew ANYTHING was possible! My pregnancy was really uneventful. I was put on "bed rest" at 22 weeks. I later found out my "bed rest" was unlike other women's bed rest. I was just not allowed to work. I continued to do things, just stayed off my feet as much as possible. If I went shopping I would ride a motorized scooter. If I went to a party I sat pretty much the entire time. I had no issues, my cervix was long & rock solid. I really feel that God wanted me to be a mommy! The babies were great! They kicked each other more than they kicked me! People would look at me & could not believe that I had four babies inside me, I tell you I was meant to carry quads! Now don't get me wrong, it was not a joy ride, I was miserable towards the end & felt it very difficult to breathe. I never even went into the hospital prior to January 15th. Even though I asked them to admit me MANY times!! On January 17, 2007 we welcomed our GBGG quads; Camryn, Brendan, Avery & Lindsey into this world. 1 set is fraternal & 1 set is identical. They weighed 4 lb 7 oz, 4 lb 4 oz, 3 lb 6 oz & 3 lb 3 oz. I made it 32 weeks 5 days when I delivered them at St Mary's Medical Center. They were all HEALTHY and they did not need to be intubated! WOO HOO! They were little miracles destined to be here! I had nurses come up to me & tell me how wonderful it was that I carried them so long, that it was a better gift holding onto them as long as I did than a Harvard education! WOW! We were SO happy, excited & most of all unprepared for how much our life was about to change. I will say it was a GOOD change! I cannot imagine my life without them! Everyone watches our little ones in amazement & they still do. This is their story....

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