Preschool!

We made it through our first full week of preschool...it was a huge success!

The twins are reunited with several of their friends who had moved over to the preschool room already. They are now the pack again - Payton, Parker, Kierra W., Kierra A., Elaina, and Owen.

They have been totally worn out in the evenings. They have had a blast manning their way through an obstacle course on a few days, they are making special art for the big art sale in a couple weeks, they are helping take care of their class frog (yep, it's real!), computer time, bigger and better art time and thrown in regular school library time. It's amazing. No kidding, I can already tell a difference.

Their new teachers are amazing. Their old teachers are still making small appearances. It's the best possible situation. They are having a great time and I could not ask for anything else!

Also in big news from last week...I'm crowning Payton as completely potty trained. HOO-RAY! Not one accident since she decided she was ready to stop with the pull-ups. She's waking up from naps dry. We're still using a pull-up at night just in case, but at least half the time she's waking up completely dry. So proud of her! Now if we could just get the little brother to get on board.

And speaking of Parker...he had his surgery follow-up. All is good. Everything looks fine. But...he just finished a round of antibiotics for a sinus infection. We also did steroids since somehow between surgery and sinus infection, or some combination of all these factors, he was getting pretty stridorous (squeaking when he was breating) again. He had me checking him out all the time in a mini panic. Now that the meds are done, he's good as new.

A love letter of sorts

For Kate, Christy, Alex, Mallory & Katie… 


It’s been almost a year and a half since Payton and Parker started in the toddler room. They are rambunctious, giggling, playful preschoolers…not bad for a couple of runts who I was told weren’t supposed to make it. You’ve helped them grow, learn, play, and love. You helped expand on their strengths and hit knew goals, and pay special attention in other areas when they needed just a little more. You supported me, listened to concerns, brainstormed, and held me had at all the right moments, just when I needed it, and probably never knew how much that meant to me. You made the transition to the preschool room flawless and set them up to be nothing but successful. Just one more reason I will forever be grateful. 

I have loved Respite Care for a long time. You all have just made me love it more. 

I fiercely adore each of you. 


Thank you for taking amazing care for the dynamic duo. 

Milestones, Excitement and Plugs

Ok. There's just plain ol' LOTS of stuff happening around here. Lots. And there's a little bit of everything. So here's it all in a nutshell.

For the kiddos...
The awesome twosome will be starting the preschool room full time on Friday. Yikes! But yay!!! I will update more next week about the official transition over. :)

Also starting next week, Payton will be wearing big girly underwear all day long. Another yay!!! More to come on that too. Fingers crossed the transition to a new room and another big change won't cause any problems.

For the mama...
Life After NICU is a great place that helps support parents after their time spent in the NICU. They have honored the Quiet Light Foundation with choosing us as the Give Back group for January. Thrilled!!! Check it out here (and yes the pictures used in the little article are all really us) - Give Back

Up and Coming...
I won't gush about my love of Respite Care at the moment (I've done it enough and there's more coming soon). But, they have some really neat events coming up that support the center and are open for anyone. Check them out and go!

Mr. & Mrs. Burke Pageant

January 16th, 2013
7pm at Burke High School

Put on by the Burke High DECA club. Students from Burke will compete in 3 categories for the titles. School-age kids from Respite will be escorting the royalty at the contest. $5 at the door and ALL proceeds go back to respite care.

Friday February 1, 2013 Winemakers Dinner

4 Course Dinner & Wine Pairing
Scottish Rite Center
202 S 20th

Doors open at 6:30PM
Dinner at 7:00PM
Dinner is prepared by Hy-Vee Chefs

$75 per person
$500 for a table of 8
Seating is limited to 200.

For reservations contact Amber 402-895-4000
aburk@crccomaha.org

Children's Respite Care Center is thrilled to be one of the beneficiaries again this year!

Copy this link to view the events homepage.
http://events.constantcontact.com/register/event?llr=eplaqkgab&oeidk=a07e6vcdv6xbb015e80

Hy-Vee Food and Wine Experience: February 2nd

Join us at the DC Centre
11830 Stonegate Circle, Omaha
1pm - 6pm
Tickets: $35 in advance at CRCC or any Hy-Vee
$40 at the door

Enjoy a day of sampling wine, specialty foods, and cheeses from over 75 booths.

For more information contact Amber at 895-4000 or
aburk@crccomaha.org

CRCC is excited once again to be one of the beneficiaries of this event. Proceeds shared between CRCC and Children's Square.

Art and Bake Sale Extravaganza

Wednesday February 13th
CRCC is having an Art and Bake Sale!
Stop by and see the kid's art on display and buy some yummy treats for Valentine's Day!

You can also bid on classroom designed canvas art work with bidding ending at 530PM

Proceeds help support classroom projects and employee incentives.


Ok...everyone's calendars marked??? Fun ways to do something different, get out of the house, and support a great place.

More to come soon!!!

Out on the Town

We've had a couple super fun outings this past week. New things for us...hooray!!!

Last Sunday we had the chance to go to Sesame Street Live. A friend had tickets she couldn't use that were super a steal and gave me first crack at them. I took her up on it. Great seats and a great show. Parker did better than I expected. He pretty much needed his own person to talk him through the show, but we avoided all major meltdowns. And the whole show was about music so it easily kept both their attentions.
Thanks Bridget for the tickets!

Friday night, I had date night with the duo. I picked them up from respite care and we grabbed dinner at McDonald's (their favorite).

Then we headed downtown to meet up with Kristin to watch part of the Creighton women's basketball game and their friend Sydney dance during half time. It was great! Payton was ready to go by halftime - she was tired after a long full week of school. Parker was perfectly happy sitting on Aunt Kristin's lap, eating popcorn and cheering every time the girls scored a basket.

Thanks Kristin for letting us tag along with you. We had a great time!

Parker New Years Update

I had taken New Years Eve off work to do fun stuff going on around town with the dynamic duo.After an appointment with the ENT 6 weeks ago, I found out this wasn't going to happen. Parker needed to have another procedure. Not only did I know this wasn't going to happen ahead of time...I had no idea how crazy the day would be.

Payton woke up at 2am that morning and refused to go back to sleep. She was sick and nailed herself, me, my hair, blankets, pillow, etc. One moment caused a huge mess. After getting her cleaned up, I had to take a shower at 2:30 am. The fridge broke around 4am with the water line for it spraying water on the kitchen counter and floor. Both kids were up at 4:30 am wanting to watch Chuggington. I had to stall Payton's requests for cereal because Parker wasn't allowed to have anything. When Parker and I went out to the car to head to the hospital, I discovered my car had been egged along with several others that were parked on the street. And the cup of coffee the hospital brought me upon arrival tasted like it had been sitting for 2 days.

Parker and I checked into Boys Town at 5:30 am so that he could have semi-permanent tubes placed in both ears. His others had fallen out and he was already having  problems and losing hearing. The ENT has also been watching several cysts in his airway behind his vocal chords for a while. They're from being on a ventilator for so long. He's been having some issues with his reactive airway so the doctor decided it was time for them to come out - by laser.

 Surgery went fine. Because of what they were doing with the airway and his normal self, he was put under pretty deep anesthesia. HE was in recovery quite a while before coming back to the room. Once the haze cleared a little we sat on the bed and played with balls and cars, the nurses brought him popsicles and Dr. Lusk let him look at pictures of planes on one of his several trips in the room to check on us. With a promise that I would call or go to the ER on the very off chance something weird happened above what I could manage at home, we got our discharge orders and were able to go home. I grabbed myself a special load of caffeine on the way home which didn't make much difference since I'd been up since 2am.

 A quiet night at home, take out to celebrate New Years and my birthday and everyone here was out pretty early. I settled into the recliner with some champagne, a piece of my lemon cake and one of my Christmas gifts.

Parker is doing just fine. He's been a little rough in the throat  this past week post-op but nothing major and is sounding better. We check in next week with the doctor and then will just be every few months after that to monitor things. It's been 3 procedures in 9 months, and 4 in just over a year, for the little man. Praying for a new year with fewer procedures and more good coffee.

Adventures with the elf

Over the course of the month that Gary he aquired a last name - Snowball. He became Gary Snowball. The kids loved him. Since I didn't do the whole "don't touch him or he'll loose his magic" thing with him since it was our first year with him and I didn't know how they'd do, he spent a lot of time with them. I had several people ask about things our elf did. I was by no means anywhere near the most creative but we had lots of fun with him. So here are some highlights.

 Playing in sprinkles and colored sugar...

 Playing in their crayons and writing them notes...

 Apparently Gary is a fan of oreos...

 reading under the Christmas tree...

 taking a bath with a candle while reading Frosty...

 falling asleep under the Christmas tree...

 swinging from the kitchen lights...

 a late night game of Memory with Barbie, Pooh, a couple My Little Ponies and a few other friends...

 getting a little too excited in the bathroom with some toilet paper...

 man-up in a giant carton of Goldfish...

 going cruising with Tigger in the dump truck...

 building with their blocks...

 leaving notes written in Cheerios...

 hanging from their bedroom light...

 a little refreshment and web surfing with Payton's puppy, Penny...

 Gary and some of the friends he made here hanging out in the window...

 Gary, on his last night with us. He wrote them notes saying good-bye and he'd be back next year.

 They are still asking where Gary Snowball is but they know he went home with Santa and is at the North Pole. And now a whole other year to be coming up with elf ideas.

It's Christmas Time in the City

It's almost Christmas! We've been super busy hitting everything that's going on around town and some get togethers and a few parties...the month has flown by! So this is the dynamic duo's holiday month wrap-up!

This is the first time in 4 years that I've put up a Christmas tree. It's quite honestly a little Charlie Brown type tree so if the kids ruin it I won't be super upset. I bought a pack of plastic ornaments that they helped my put on the tree, along with some beads. They did really goo helping decorate and have done a good job for the most part in not playing with it too much.

We ran around town earlier this month we hung out in downtown for the afternoon with MaMaw going to the police barn to see the horses, riding on trollies, looking at the big tree and Santa at the Durham Museum. And goodies, crafts and snacks all for free. It was a beautiful day out, we sang carols on the trollies with people that carted us from one spot to the other. And getting to talk with the real police horses was a total hit.

We has our Christmas party with respite care which is always one of our favorites. We bowled, made gumdrop snowflakes, and wrote letters to Santa. We get one-on-one time to talk to Santa but that still doesn't go over well. No one was sitting on his lap or talking to him too much. The whole thing is so fun. They love seeing their friends and teachers there. It is truly a favorite thing. And besides mom and dad going with them, Aunt Bo and Uncle Dave were able to go too.

We went to the Immanuel Hospital campus last weekend to see Santa and Ms. Claus land in a helicopter. The Life Flight team cruised the city stopping to let off the Claus's for some pictures, cookies and juice. We had alot of fun watching the helicopter come in and getting some goodies at the party.

We visited with Sarah, Joe, Austin and Christian. They L-O-V-E to play with the boys. We exchanged gifts. The pajamas were an instant hit, especially with the diva. They also love their new toys. They are causing fights over them so I guess that's a good sign.

 This Thursday's storm gave us a snow day at home. This meant baking holiday confetti cupcakes and a little time playing in the snow outside once the wind died down. They are totally fascinated by the snow this year. Last year it was still a little scary and a little hard to move around in. 

Friday night, after work was over and the snow was mostly cleared, we went to play with Kristin, Sydney and Ava. The kids had a blast! Dinner, playing, crafty Christmas stuff, chocolate peppermint cookies and lots of glitter...sounds pretty much like the perfect evening.

We also had a few lunches out, went to visit the gingerbread houses, a few story times at the library, visited the UP museum, and had our annual Christmas get together with my friends and former co-workers. It's been so fun to be out and doing more stuff this year.

Merry Christmas!