Reunion

This weekend we drove to Houston with all the kids to attend a "Family" Reunion at Texas Children's with the fetal specialists that cared for the girls while I was pregnant. It was good to see all the walking miracles! We also got to spend some fun time with Melissa and her family. We hadn't seen everyone together for a few years! We also made a quick pit-stop to visit The "other" Rudds. A good time was had by all - and a special thank you to our host family for the weekend for allowing us to invade their space!

Eye update

I took both girls to the eye doctor yesterday (Thanks Shay). It was a whippin'! A total work-out. The results...Abby - the left eye is still deviating. He asked how the patch was going and I explained what life is like trying to keep a patch on a almost 2 year old. If she isn't pulling it off, Izzy is. We are now going to try drops. She gets one drop of Atropine on Monday and Thursday. This should keep the right eye dilated so that she will have to work to strengthen the left one. We will do this until October. The good news, her vision is still good, so no glasses. Izzy - we've discover that the "cute" way she looks at you out of the corner of her eye is due to strabismus. By looking off to the side, she can stop the movement of her eye to better see. If it worsens, they can do a surgical procedure to tighten up the muscle. She will follow up in April. Also, her vision is good, so no glasses for her either.

It will be a busy week as we prepare to go to Vegas for a combination "I have a conference, hey why don't you come with me and we'll call it our Anniversary" trip. The kids have all been farmed out, and if you are one of the recipients of my "bundles of joy" THANK YOU! If you are not, you don't know what you are missing!

My watermelon kids

We gave the kids watermelon for dessert tonight. Emily is away at camp, but everyone else enjoyed it. 

The girls are really starting to talk. Abby just said "Rocky" for whatever reason. Isabelle says more than Abby, and can say "Abby".  I guess Izzy is a little harder.

We are headed to the eye doctor next week. Hopefully we will get an all clear, but I fear that we will have to continue to patch Abby (or head to surgery), and start patching Izzy.

I hope everyone has a good evening!

Happy 4th of July!

Want some?

This is what happened in the bath tub tonight. Isabelle was feeding Abby bath water with a ladle from the play kitchen. Team work, right?

Sorry, It's been awhile -

It has been quite a while since my last post. Here are a few updates: Joshua - survived the 7th grade and has been promoted. He is away at Youth camp until Friday. He is striving hard daily to survive his teenage years!

Emily - received the honor of Student of the Year. She is busy helping us every day with whatever needs to be done.

Caleb - finished up wonderfully in 3rd grade, looking forward to 4th. He will be getting braces this week.

Matthew - Is busy learning how to play Wii. He stepped on a piece of glass the MINUTE I got to camp this year. He got 6 stitches on the bottom of his foot.

Olivia - Is enjoying her time with Mema, loves wearing everyone else's shoes (and leaving them all over the floor). And, evidently loves her Vampire teeth from Peter Piper.

Abigail and Isabelle - are just being BUSY. They are climbing on EVERYTHING - counter tops and tables included. They must be watched like a hawk at all times. They also love playing in the toilet.

Other news:

Emily cut her hair off and donated it to Locks of Love. This is the 3rd time she has done that.

Matthew has a good time playing on the playground!

As I said earlier, the girls are climbing on everything. Here is a picture of Abby climbing to the top of the play set at the playground.

And this picture is just a fun one!

I'll try to be better at posting, I promise. ECI is seeing both girls now three times a month to help work on verbal skills (obviously motor skills are not a problem). They are saying new words every day. Abby repeated about 10 words during therapy friday and Isabelle repeated about 20. Everyone is growing so quickly!

We're Back...

We are back from Sky Ranch. We had a wonderful time, walking, walking, walking some more! I think on Thursday I logged 8.5 miles on my pedometer. Seriously! Here is one picture that sums up the week..


Rocky and I both did the Zip Line.





Emily and Rocky rode a bull.





I rode a horse



We had a really good time, but we were ready to come home and see our other 6 babies.

This is the finger that mommy squished

Updated to add this photo after we took off the gauze for bathtime.This morning during the mass exodus of the car...aka...mommy taking the little 4 to daycare...Abby's finger got shut in the door. It was just the tip, so I thought no biggie. Well, it bled and bled. I stopped the bleeding and put on a bandaid and headed out for work. I checked in later in the day and they said they were having a hard time keeping a bandaid on it at daycare. I called the doctors office and the nurse told me that if the edges were jagged it would be best to go ahead and take her in. So, off of work I took, picked up grampa and headed for daycare. I picked up Abby and went back in to work to the ER. We were in and out in 1 1/2 hours - pretty good, I think. Xrays were fine, 4 stitches later...Ouch. Needless to say, she was not pleased with the care she received, but I was. 10 to 12 days later and the stitches come out. Just when we are back from Sky Ranch. The EMT wrapped it up for us so she couldn't get to it, but I don't think that will last long...

Our Busy Morning

Well, this morning we got up and went to find some Bluebonnets. My mom had actually scouted the spot last week, and I went by last night to make sure that it was still there. Mom went with us to help take pictures and contain kids. Overall, it wasn't that bad of a beating (Rocky says otherwise).

Make a Smilebox slideshow

Love at first bite

This happened the other day, and I am just now getting around to posting it. If you look really closely and look for the after-effects, you can see Isabelle biting Abigail.

First Bite from Suzette Burton on Vimeo.

Amblyopia

"A decrease in vision which is different from being nearsighted or farsighted. Patients with amblyopia do not see perfectly clearly with the affected eye, even with glasses or contacts. Amblyopia can be mild or severe. People with amblyopia have a problem with how the brain understands visual information the eye is sending it. Amblyopia will usually only affect one eye."

This is Abigail. We will have to patch her right eye every day for 2 hours until the end of July when we go back to see Dr. H again. Have you ever tried to keep an eye patch on a 16 month old? NOT really easy. She ended up wearing it for about 30 minutes tonight. I had to order her patches online. They come in many pretty cute prints. Who wants just plain white for their princess, because, you know, she can see it and all and might become offended if she knew that I ordered white and there was pink camo as an option - NOT. Anyway, they got me and I ordered the "girly" pack, the fun pack #1 and the fun pack #2. That should give us plenty to make it until the end of July. Hopefully this will fix the wandering problem, otherwise we are looking at glasses and maybe surgery. Let's hope that it does not come to that.

Number 958

Here I am after my 1st 5K. Phew. I must admit, I didn't run the entire time, but I finished. I wasn't first and I wasn't last. My time was 41 minutes. It was fun. I didn't feel like I was going to die. This evening I am a little sore, but not unbearable. I think I'll do it again. Who knows - maybe I'll run Cowtown next year!

I'm Back

Sorry for the Hiatus. Things have been so busy with soccer season starting up and just daily life. My main focus today is to let you know about the 5K I have been training for. Yes, me, training for a 5K. It has been actually fun, and I look forward to my runs. Wow, I didn't thin those words would ever come out of my mouth. Anyway, I am running in the MS 5K on March 28th. I run in honor of a good friend who battles this disease every day. My hope is that a cure will be found while he is still young so that he can walk his daughters down the isle on their wedding day! (We love you J.) You can click here to visit my fundraising page and donate if you feel led.

Emily and the Bee

On Friday the 13th of February, Emily entered her first Regional Spelling Bee. I will start out by saying she did get out in the 3rd round. However, I must also add that the event started out with about 60 kids, and by the 3rd round she was one of 12 or so. Her words were: 1st round - Polka, 2nd round - Rupee, 3rd round Poignant - out. We were so proud of her. I don't think she was near as nervous as we were.

The girls are doing well. They are both really happy just cruising around. They are getting more verbal. Abby has said "mama", Izzy has said "Ball". They will both give a high five now. They are starting to look around and try to interact with their brothers and sisters, and even each other. Although lately, interacting consists of Abby taking a toy away from Izzy and Izzy biting Abby. They are sleeping better, in their own beds, mostly all night. They started passing the GI bug around again last week. Abby, Izzy, Josh and I have had it. Olivia had a touch of it and everyone else so far has been safe. Hopefully it will stop there, as Mema can't afford to get it again - ok, WE can't afford for Mema to get it again. She is convinced that everytime she gets sick, it is the sickest she has ever been. I have to remind her that in her now 87 years (TODAY) of living, she HAS to have been sicker than this at least once!

Well, the word is out. I am training for a 5K. When I thought of it and roped and or persuaded some co-workers to do it with me, another co-worker laughed. She said that it was not that big of a deal. I would beg to differ! I have always wanted to run. I thought it would be the most perfect exercise - just walk out the door and go. However, I have never been able to get over the whole "I can't breathe" part. Well, I found a "couch to 5 K" training program and have been working at it. I am up to running 8 minutes at a time - about 2 1/2 miles. I actually find myself WANTING to go out and exercise. Wow - I didn't think those words would ever come out of my mouth. Well, when looking for an event to run, we had to time it out so that we would have time to train. The Cowtown was out - TOO COLD. We found the MS walk and 5K. We have a co-worker with MS and I have a dear friend who also suffers with MS. I do this in their honor. Here is the site to my fundraising page if you feel so moved.

We recently spent a night at the Great Wolf Lodge in Grapevine. It was fun, but I wouldn't do it again. Too much money and Too many people. I'll get some pictures up soon.

Ice Day

We knew last night that school wouldn't start until 10 am. We slept until 8 - well Rocky and I slept until 8. I think everyone else was up. At about 8:45 I sat down at the computer while talking to my co-worker to see if I needed to come in to help and I got an email that school was closed. Rocky was really happy and of course the kids were too. I was wondering how things were going to thaw out in time to go to school because the road in front of my house is SOLID ice. Here are some pictures from just now outside. Now - take note - no broken bones. This is how I broke my arm when I was in 3rd grade...

Make a Smilebox slideshow

Funny things in my dryer

Well, you would think with 7 children I had seen everything come through my dryer. We have had the markers, crayons, coins, rocks, legos and other toys, chapstick and I am sure many other things. I can remember the crayons. Someone had wrapped up crayons in a blanket or something I washed. It was the day of the garage sale. It was COLD and I was trying to do laundry too. I went to the dryer and everything was multicolor! The chapstick was the other day. I don't know who the culprit was but many things have oily stains on them now - don't tell Rocky....

Well, here is what I found just now!
Yes - that is a miniature rubber chicken.

Also, we just got notice that school will officially start at 10am - well, that is until they get up in the morning and realize it might not thaw out until after 12. Oh well, at least we can sleep late, right?

This week...

This week...Emily won the school spelling bee - the WHOLE thing. I guess the next step for her is the District Bee. She was so excited and embarrassed at the same time. I was at work and Rocky was texting me her place (final four, final two, etc) and then when she won, Emily said he cried like a girl. Here is a picture of her and the trophy - which is almost as big as she is!

This week...We had a baby reach 20 pounds. Anyone care to guess which one? Here are their growth charts...





You guessed it - Isabelle! Go Izzy!
Dad helped me take them to see the pulmonary clinic today. We have totally reached the stage that I cannot take them to the doctor by myself. If we were to use the stroller, they don't want to stay in it. I can't carry both car seats by myself very far - in to daycare is about to kill my back. They both got two shots to help protect them against RSV. So far, they are doing very well. They started back with runny noses, but no fevers, etc. One more round of shots at the end of February, and then they will not need them next year.

This has been a very emotional week, and we appreciate those of you who have been praying for us. We have (or at least I have) felt a real peace surrounding the "happenings". Thank You.

First Dates and First Words

This evening I went in to pick up Abby from Rocky who was having trouble getting her to sleep. She perked her head up from behind the couch, looked at me and said "mama". Clear as you please, loud and directly TO me! I think that is a first for either. They both babble, and will repeat sounds, but to associate the name with a person is a first. Wow, how big they are getting.

We won't talk about the other first that happened today.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year

I hope everyone had a wonderful Holiday. We did. It was busy, relaxing, tiring and restful all in one. Rocky is off until next Monday. I took off a few days around Christmas, and was off today, and maybe tomorrow. Today and tomorrow are cooking days. I am putting up meals for the next month. I found a collection of recipes that I have been making up and freezing so that dinner can be quicker and with less thought (that is if I remember to thaw it out the night before...). When I find the camera, I'll post some pictures of Christmas. It was really nice this year not to have to run out after lunch to see the girls at the hospital this year. It is also so strange to think of where we were this time last year. The girls have gotten so big and are doing so well. Olivia is such a sweet little girl. We were commenting just yesterday how sad it was that she never really got to be the "baby". Matthew is turning into a really great little man. He is still having some "toddler" issues, but overall, when he is well rested, he is a wonderful little boy. Caleb has turned into a really great big brother. We are trying the "buddy" system around here for trips out, bath help and putting laundry away. If it works well, it might be expanded. He is really bonding with the Girls, and is good at "babysitting" them so we can get something done and watches them in the bath for us while we get jammies out, etc. Emily is my mother hen. She is really good with Matthew and Olivia, and they really prefer her sometimes to Rocky and I. We have made Olivia her little buddy, mainly because they share a room. Joshua is working to define who he is as a teenager, and sometimes that means conflict with his siblings. He is working on developing a good relationship with Matthew, who is his buddy. Josh really enjoys being the big brother to the little ones.

I hope everyone has made their resolutions and a plan for sticking with it! There are a few of us at work who have decided to train for a 5K. We found a "couch to 5K" training program online and will be entering the MS 5K at the end of March. Who knows where this will go! I certainly don't see myself in a marathon, but maybe a half marathon? Who knows. Here's to a wonderful 2009!!!