TTT: Season 2, Episode 32

1. Another week. Man, they're flying by. In fact, I texted my mom a picture of Grant earlier this week and she responded by saying that he now looks more like a baby and less like an infant. It made me sad. Can time really be moving that fast? He'll be two months old in a few days. I guess life just happens right before your eyes. And speaking of this life we know, Mark and I are celebrating our fifth wedding anniversary tomorrow. Five years! (I know...you're probably thinking three kids in under five years...yikes!) We had a chance to slip out last night and go to a super fancy restaurant here in The Woodlands for a good steak and time together. Alone. Even Grant stayed behind with my parents! It was so nice to spend some time with my wonderful husband, just the two of us and reflect back upon the past five years. As an anniversary gift, I gave him a framed picture of us taken just minutes after we got engaged. Boy, do we look young! Completely naive to all we'd encounter throughout the following years. We certainly have experienced a lot, but we're so glad that we're able to see the beauty in all of it when we realize that it was all led by the hand of God. Of course, we can't help but sit and wonder...if all of that happened in the first five years, just what is going to happen in the next five!?! Thank God I have my Mark to share the journey with.

2. I'm back on the sick list.
Again.
Man, this postpartum time period has been a hot mess for me this go round. First of all, one thing I don't think I ever wrote about on here was the thrush that both Grant and I developed from me taking so many antibiotics. Flashing back--I was treated with heavy IV antibiotics in the hospital for both possible infections due to the C-section as well as a positive Strep B test prior to Grant's birth. Then there was the first ten day round of antibiotics for the first case of mastitis. And then another ten day round for the second case of mastitis. After that, when the mastitis finally cleared up and I was still having lots of burning during and after nursing, I wrote some about possibly having issues with my Raynaud's while nursing. Beyond that, Grant suddenly showed up with thrush (a form of a yeast infection that grows in the mouth) a few days later. And his was caused by the same type of infection in the tatas. (I'll try not to get too "wordy" for you guy readers!) Unfortunately, taking lots of antibiotics can kill more than just the bad bacteria in your body. It kills the good bacteria too which often leads to fungal/yeast infections. So I got on another prescription for seven days to help clear that up. It's helped some with the burning sensation while nursing but not completely. Anyways, flashing back...during the second round of mastitis, we discovered a small lesion on my C-section incision that tested positive for a staph infection. Knowing that staph commonly lives on the skin and that I was currently taking the antibiotics for mastitis, my doctor felt confident that the meds would clear up both infections. Which it did.  But as soon as I got off of those antibiotics, the incision infection came right back. At my six week check last week the doctor did another culture of the fluid coming out of it and called me back a few days ago to tell me I still have a staph infection. So I'm back on antibiotics. Again. And just waiting for the thrush to return. Based on my track record here, I find it highly unlikely that it won't. I'm doing my best to prevent it though. Anyway, this round of antibiotics is my seventh prescription to fill for myself since Grant's birth just seven weeks ago. And the most annoying part? There's not a dang thing I can do about it that I'm not already doing. Grrr.

3. Let me go on and talk about something I like before I get too bitter.
Have y'all all heard of Pinterest? I had seen it mentioned on several blogs that I frequent a while back but never looked in to it because I was just too tired there at the end of my pregnancy to sit and surf the web. A month or so ago I finally set up an account while nursing Grant one day and it's kind of become my newest little go-to activity when I'm feeding the babe and not trying to entertain the other two boys at the same time. For those of you who don't know, it's basically a system of bulletin boards for the internet. You install a little "tool" on your computer and then while you're surfing the web, if you see something you like...a product, a picture, a book, an article...you can "pin" it to one of your bulletin boards. Then, all you have to do is log back in to your pinterest account to access all of your boards. Beyond that, you can also look at your friends' boards as well as other "most popular" items members of pinterest are pinning. For example, I have a fabric board where I pin pics of fabrics I like. And a home decor board where I pin pictures of rooms and decorating ideas I'd like to try out in our new house. And a kiddie board with fun ideas of activities to do with the boys. And several other boards too...quotes, recipes, DIY projects... there's really tons and tons of options and it's just a cool, creative way to store all of your ideas that you find online in one place. And share them with others too. I'm pretty sure that if I didn't have the app for it on my phone, I would fall asleep while nursing nine times out of ten.

My daily companions. Aren't the beautiful?

I so wish that this was not a iPhone pic and was higher resolution. It would definitely be in a frame on my wall. Kolbe will always be the brother the younger two look up to. And it's started already.

Did you have any "burnt cookie" moments this week? We sure did. Figuratively and literally.

Kolbs at the dentist. Poor guy...we are fixing to enter the dental phase of his cleft care. He'll have his first tooth pulled in November...the extra one that has grown through his palate.

Haircuts by Mama. I got brave this weekend and cut the boys' hair myself instead of coughing up $30 to have it done elsewhere. Kolbe is a piece of cake. He's mature enough to sit there and cooperate. Rudy on the other hand...let's just say he still has a few stray long hairs mixed in there from not holding still.

Summer shows no signs of going away down here so we've been busy grilling out nearly every weekend. On Sunday we tried some marinaded steak kabobs. (this was prior to hitting the grill) They were phenomenal.

Mark had to make reservations for the fancy-shmancy restaurant that we went to last night. They asked if it was for a special occasion. Sure enough, when we showed up they had a little corner table set up for us with rose petals everywhere and this cute little dessert platter after we ate our steaks. That truffle on the left was too strong, but the other two were awesome!

Obligatory picture of Sir Grant-ness. See. Less infant. More baby. He's trying so hard to figure out the whole smiling thing! Every now and then he makes it happen but usually we just get this really concerned face and crinkled eyebrows.