Guess what I found on Friday night?

Two more teeth in Miss Emmi's mouth! Wow! They are coming in like popcorn now! Even after cutting that tooth on the bottom, Miss Emmi continued to chew and put stuff in her mouth this whole past week. I decided that an inspection was in order on Friday night, and that is when I realized that the front top teeth had cut their way through her gums. You can't see them much, but if you run your finger over her gums you can sure feel those sharp little toofers!

The Cruise – Part Three – Time to get WET!

Since we missed our first port, San Juan, due to the storm, we gained another day at sea. What do kids want to do on days at sea on a cruise ship? SWIM, of course! Nikki pretty much spent all of her waking hours in some form of water or another. Noah, our nephew, was right there with her most of the time as well. Here are some photos of the us enjoying the pool, hot tub, and other fun water features of the ship. Yup, I even included some fun shower shots, as the kids made the best of every bit of water on the ship!

A good cook always...

tastes the soup!

Just a couple of quick snap shots of Miss Emmi “cooking” in the kitchen with her pot and wooden spoon. She loves to pretend to do lots of things like Mommy, Daddy, and her sister, Nikki. She can often be seen trying to brush her hair, write with a pen, brush her teeth, put socks and shoes on, as well as blow her nose (check out the video below in a previous post). She has been saying “bub bye”(bye bye) for awhile, but her new phrase is “aw gawn”(all gone). Just love her baby talk…it sounds so cute!

See this rash...

It's got a tooth written all over it! Miss Emmi got her second tooth yesterday on the bottom next to the one she has had for several months. I was pretty sure she was teething the past few days, but the rash and drool really gave it away on Sunday! Kenny tried real hard to get a photo of the new addition, but all he got was this funny picture of her tongue!

My New Niece

Presenting my new little niece, Zoey Marie Parish. She was born on January 4th, but since we have been so sick at our house we weren’t able to go visit until yesterday. She was born a whopping 10 lbs. 4 oz. and 21 inches long. She is seen here with her Daddy, Brandon, and her Mommy, Sara.





Congratulations to Sara and Brandon on their beautiful new addition!

The Cruise – Part Two – The Storm

When most people plan a cruise they avoid the hurricane season. We, like most people did the same, but unlike most people, the seas did not look on us with favor. Around midnight the first night at sea, we hit rough waters and spent the next 36 hours in barf bag worthy seas. Yup, you read it right! The seas were so rough that they taped barf bags by the elevators on each floor of the ship.



People were not allowed on the upper couple of decks and if you watch the video below, you will understand why. Be sure to watch the horizon to get the full effect. And remember, we are on a 1,000 foot ship, so all that bobbing is pretty drastic!

Click here to watch "Watch-the-Horizon-in-this-video"

Overall, we did well as a family and left the barf bags for others. Ken and Emmi didn't seem at all effected by the rough seas. Nikki was queasy the entire trip, though she didn't want to admit it, and didn't even complain about until we got home. I was queasy at this point during the trip, but it wasn't nothing that a dose of Dramamine couldn't fix. After the stormy seas started to calm, we were told that we had just weathered a subtropical storm named Olga, one of only a handful of such storms in December on record.

Want to see something funny?

Click here to watch "Emmi-Blowing-Her-Nose"

Did you watch it? It had me cracking up...Miss Emmi blowing her nose. I guess she has seem me do that a lot over the past week while I am trying to kick this sinus crap. She just loves to mimic us!

The Cruise – Part One – The Hotel

We left a day early (December 8th) for our cruise so that we wouldn’t miss the boat because of weather or other unforeseen events. This is the story of our overnight accommodations in Miami and Part One in the Cruise Saga. Check back for more tales in the coming days…



See this place…you don’t ever want to stay here!

You know the term “roach motel”? Well, that sums this place up perfectly! Never saw an actual roach, but we saw pretty much everything else!



The carpets were torn up and had mysterious stains on them.



Look close at the photo, the lamp shade had a dirty ring around it. Personally, it reminded me of a sweat stain.



The walls were filthy, dinged up, and had holes in them.



There were electrical connections hanging out of the wall in the hall.



Look at the dirt in the corners of the hallway.



Check out the tiles by the ice machine…don’t you want to get yourself some ice?



What about this “Maid Closet”.



Of course my favorite was the metal plate between the hall and the elevator door. I wonder when the last time that was cleaned?

Definitely one of those places you see on TV where they are using a black light to check for mysterious secretions on the bed!

So I am sure you are wondering why we didn’t stay someplace else, unfortunately there wasn’t anyplace that had a vacancy available. We talked to quite a few people in the lobby and outside who had tried to book someplace else without any luck, so we sucked it up for one night and walked away unharmed the next day! At least we have something to talk and laugh about! Could have been worse…well maybe not!

A trip to a hospital or two - 3 strikes your out!

So this nasty flu bug hit our house over the past few days, which is why I haven't been on here posting any updates, and I was doing so well getting caught up.

Anyway, it was pretty scary for a bit. Emmi came down with it first on Thursday evening. I wasn't home 30 minutes or so from picking her up from daycare when she started throwing up. Poor baby threw up like 7 times in 2 1/2 hours. I contacted her dr. and he recommended that I take her to Wyandotte Hospital, because he thought that was a lot in such a short period of time and he was concerned about dehydration. We packed up and headed over there. She was evaluated by the pediatric dr. in the Emergency room, Dr. Bloch. They took all sorts of samples; urine, blood, etc... In the meantime she got an IV. The Dr. became concerned when Emmi continued to throw up even after receiving a whole bag of fluids and recommended that we be transported to Children's Hospital for observation incase something more was wrong than just a nasty bug. I was scared at this point that they really thought something more was wrong but didn't want to say anything until more test results came back, especially with the number of vials of blood and the rsv test they came and did.

Off we went via ambulance; I went in the ambulance with Emmi and Ken followed in the car after he had taken Nikki to his parent's house. She received additional fluids at Children's via IV and slept on and off for most of the night. Thankfully she had quit throwing up. In the morning she showed interest and was able to keep down some food. They released us to go home early in the afternoon. The dr's (Raffee and Kumar) as well as the nurse's were very good to us at Children's and I can see why that hospital is so well rated!

No sooner did Emmi start to feel better and then Nikki came down with the bug on Saturday evening. Ken and I followed suit with it early Sunday morning. Needless to say we spent all day Sunday laying around; sleeping on and off. I would say this was the second worst flu type bug I have ever had. We had one in the house when Nikki was 2 or 3 years old that put us out of commission for 3 days that was the worst, but this one was pretty violent, although short lived.

So this little trip to the hospital is our 3rd strike financially since we came home from vacation...you know they say things happen in 3's. First, we had to take the cat to the vet for a bladder infection, then the garage door collapsed on Christmas day while we were taking out the trash, and now this trip to the hospitals with an ambulance ride in between. I can only imagine how much that is going to cost me! However, Emmi seems to have completely recovered, everyone else is on the mend, and I am thankful for that!

Singing Happy Birthday to Miss Emmi

Ken edited the video of us singing Happy Birthday to Miss Emmi so that I could add that to my blog. She was kind of funny when we sang; she wasn't quite sure where to look or what to think. It was cute! Enjoy! We are now officially a blog team, at least when it comes to videos. :)

Emmi's 1st Birthday

I really think the princess theme was fitting for Miss Emmi. She is a bit of a drama queen already. She can easily be brought to tears with a stern no, and often sits down and puts her head to the ground crying when you take something away from her. So very different from her big sister Nikki.

Honestly, this birthday was a bit sad for me. It is hard to believe that she is already a year old...almost 13 months by the time I get around to posting this message(her birthday party was December 1st.). I guess I am sad because she is my last and she is no longer a baby. Not that I want another baby...no, no, no, but it is sad to think that my kids will never be this little again. Sorry for getting sappy on you.

Despite Mommy being a bit sad, Miss Emmi was in all her glory on her big day. We weren't sure how she was going to do with a house full of people, but she was really into it and did great! She seems to be such a people person.











With a little help, she opened her own presents. She was more interested in the paper that she was ripping off than the present itself, except when she got to the Chicken Elmo. One of the kids made it sing and dance, then her little face lit up with the biggest grin.





Then there was the cute little cake that her Daddy made for her. Once she figured out that it was sweet she busily got to work on it. We also got an ice cream cake to share with everyone else who came to share her special day.













After everything was said and done, Miss Emmi got a bath to remove the cake and spent the rest of the evening hanging out in her jammies! It was a birthday to remember!