Poor Poor Tessie Bessie

I'm such a bad mom.

No, really.

I took Tess in for her 15 month check-up today and the doctor discovered that she had a pretty ragin' ear infection.

"Has she been congested and fussier than normal?" Dr. Jonkman asked?

*face palm*

Yes.  Yes YES!  This girl has been congested and very much fussier than normal!!! 

Dang.

I would like to say that this is the first time this has ever happened, but no.  It also happened when Josh was a baby.  And Cole.  (Well, Cole pretty much had an ear infection all the time, so whatever.)  And let's be honest, probably Spencer as well, but we just never found out.

Tess was not happy with this examination.  She wanted her milk.

But I had forgotten it.

Because I'm a bad mom.

Then Tess had to have a quick blood draw to check for lead and iron levels.  And two immunizations.

So, not only did her ear hurt, but she got poked three times and still didn't have her precious milk!

Then it got better.  And by better I mean worse.  The doctor was a bit concerned about Tess still not walking.  She moved Tess's hips and legs and checked her all over.  We talked about how I've always had late walkers, but Tess is exceptionally late.  Right now she's about 8 months behind her peers as far as moving goes.

"I think you're right," Dr. Jonkman said.  "I think she's just being lazy and doesn't have the incentive to walk yet.  However, her hips keep popping, and her legs are not symmetrical.  I couldn't tell this last time because she was so fat.  But this concerns me."

(Side note: I love the fact that Tess was too fat during her last exam, especially because of all the issues she had with being underweight after she was born.  I might not be able to get my kids to walk, but I sure can fatten them up properly!)

So, off we went to Innervision (where Lance works) for a couple of x-rays of Tess's hips. 

We got the royal treatment, with lots of love and attention and the best techs who let Tess chew on yummy stickers and really just did a great job with her.  Despite all she had been through that morning - and the fact that she still did not have her milk (!) - Tess got through it all like a champ.

Sure, she fell apart on the way home after we had to get gas and pick up her prescription and get her brothers from their friends' house. (Hey, these things had to be done!)  But I completely forgave her for it, which I guess makes me not the most terrible mom in the world.

Lance called with good news - the radiologist looked at Tess's x-rays (we got bumped to the front of the queue because it's all about who you know, right?) and everything looked fine.

Which means, physically, she's perfect.

*whew!*

It also means that we have a very, very lazy baby on our hands.

A very fat, lazy baby.

Man, I love her.

Stuck!

When you get your little fingers stuck in the vent three times in as many minutes

then you don't get sympathy.  You get a momma with a camera.

Then you get sympathy.

But no sympathy for the fourth time.  There are limits.

Irrational Baby Fears

Do you remember when we discovered that baby Josh was irrationally afraid of fish?

Yesterday I discovered what Tess is irrationally afraid of.  And like any good mother, I exploited this fear for blogging entertainment purposes.

She wasn't freaking out about it today like she was yesterday.  (She shrieked and hollered when I first put the toy in her lap.)  Be she is certainly very wary of this thing.

"Black magic!  Black magic, I tell you!"

No need to tell us - we're such awesome parents.

Summer Slow Down

Summer seems to have slowed down a bit, which is nice.  I think the heat wave we had last week had something to do with it.  I had all of these big plans for the summer, and once again I haven't even gotten around to half of them.  We've kind of been home bodies and we've really enjoyed it.  Not that we don't go anywhere - just not many big outings and such.  I rarely even take the kids on errands, because four kids on errands?  Not so fun for anyone.  We tend to stick around the neighborhood, swimming at the pool and playing at the park.  The boys have lots of neighborhood friends to play with.  Yesterday we ventured out to Sonic for happy hour drinks, which is pretty much the most ambitious thing we've done in a while.  (Get the Coke Zero with vanilla and cherry.  Heaven.)

It's great.  Idyllic, really.

But it doesn't make for much blog fodder.  The kids haven't done much of interest or humor lately.

Well, Josh walked through the living room yesterday singing "It's Raining Men" at the top of his lungs.  And Cole has taken to calling Spencer "Spence", which is super, super cute.  Oh, and Tess has throw-your-body-on-the-floor tantrums over every little thing now, which isn't very cute but is fairly entertaining.


I took these pictures last Friday at breakfast.  You know it's hot and HUMID when the windows look like this at 7am.

Miserable.

My cherry tomatoes are taking off.  I made a caprese salad for myself the other day with tomatoes and basil from my garden.  I think I could like on this and never get tired of it.

Cole and Tess get really grouchy right around the time I need to make dinner.  The other day I let them play in the sink so they'd leave me alone.  (Tess's tray is full of water.)  It gave me a good 20 minutes of peace and only took about 5 minutes to clean up, so I consider that a success.

I pick from the garden about every other day now.  I should probably do it every day, but I'm lazy.  Big news: the cucumbers aren't bitter anymore!  Yay!  And there should be a good-sized crop of green beans in the next day or so!  Double yay!  I just watched a news story where all the farmers were talking about how produce isn't growing as well this summer because of the drought.  My garden seems to be doing pretty well, although I do think my beans have been suffering.

I have to hide the cherry tomatoes so the kids won't eat them all.  (I'm planning on using them for dinner tomorrow.)  I can't get them to eat grapes anymore, but they will eat the cherry tomatoes.  Smart kids.

That zucchini had been hiding and kinda snuck up on me.  It's humongous! I usually like them a bit smaller, but I'll find something to do with it.

So there you go.  We leave for Utah in a few weeks, so things are bound to get more interesting.  Until then, let's hope life keeps a slow and steady pace.

Strawberry Balsamic Bacon Pizza

I like to try new recipes.  Especially unusual ones.  I would say that 30% of my experiments turn into recipes I use often, 50% are good but nothing all that special, 19% aren't that great, and 1% are just gross.

The recipe I tested the other night?  Totally part of the 30%.

Behold: Strawberry Balsamic Bacon Pizza!

Soooo good.  So very good. Pretty and tasty. And easy.  So good that I'm dedicating a blog post to it.  Yes, it's a bit unusual to have strawberries on a pizza.  But trust me - it's worth trying.

Today I...

• spent more time than planned making jam
• fumed and/or swore* over the jam because it did not jell  (%&*@#%X!!!)
• bought a water bath canner that I did not realize would not work on my ceramic stove top
• returned a water bath canner
• bought a pressure cooker that did not work
• returned a pressure cooker
• forgot to turn off the hose and accidentally watered my garden for 2 hours (dang it)
• ate dinner at McDonald's even though I didn't really want to
• scored a free milkshake at McDonald's, which tasted better than any other milkshake at McDonald's because it was free
• watched Tess come sooooo close to figuring out how to use a straw 
• chased THREE rabbits out of my garden
• barked and/or swore* at the rabbits for eating my green beans 
• yelled and/or swore* at the bugs for eating my green beans
• picked a lot of squash and zucchini
• sprayed a rather large amount of insecticide on my garden
• sprayed a rather large amount of fungicide on my garden
• chipped/scraped/cleaned most of the burnt jam off of my ceramic stovetop
• made homemade laundry detergent**
• was pleasantly surprised that the laundry detergent seemed to do a pretty good job!
• got after naughty little boys for getting out of bed
• put Tess back to bed after previously mentioned little boys woke her up
• gave un-jelled jam the evil eye as I cleaned the kitchen one more time
• collapsed into a chair to blog

Not exactly what I had planned for a laid-back Saturday.

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*Hopefully this doesn't need to be said, but just in case: I'm not a swearin' kind of gal.  Never have been, never will be.  But perhaps after today I will be...

**I never thought I would become so frugal that I would make my own laundry detergent, but my usual brand (which is pretty cheap to begin with) just nearly doubled in price.  Since I am CONSTANTLY doing laundry I figured that experimenting with making my own would probably be worth it.  We'll see.  (In case you're interested, here's the site I used.)

Tess's Summer Dress Code

Tess, following in the footsteps of her brothers, has adopted a clothing optional dress code for the summer.  Especially on days when we go swimming.  (Which is almost every day now during this ridonkulous heat wave.)  Because why get dressed when you're just gonna get changed into your bathing suit later? 

Tess prefers wild, uncombed hair.  I think she's going for the "beach" hair look.  The food she keeps sticking in it kinda takes away from the glamour of it, though.

She has recently started accessorizing with one of the 4th of July necklaces we had at our Back Yard of Fire party.  (Red, silver, and blue necklaces, of course.)  During the course of the day Tess will take a necklace and put it back on approximately 397 times. 

It's a sophisticated look, but Tess pulls it off smashingly.