Happy Easter!

It was pure tragedy as we waited in line to see the Easter Bunny last Friday at the MOA.  Emmy had a meltdown in the stroller and Erin peered through the little fence that they had set up...watching his every move.

When it was our turn, Emmy ran and hid around the pillar and cried.  I was able to get Erin near the Easter Bunny, but she wouldn't sit next to him.  I had to sit with her during the photo.  She was not very happy and I couldn't get any smiles out of her.  Oh well. 

When I got the kids buckled back into the stroller, we saw Dora & Boots just around he corner!  Erin was so excited, but Emmy was still having no part of anything that was dressed up.  Erin went over to them and gave them a hug, a high five & then stopped for a picture.  I didn't get a photo of this...ugh!  They were charging $12/photo.

Brad is still recovering and a little sore from his surgery last week so we decided to just stay close to home for Easter.  I prepared a ham dinner on Sunday and we went to our normal church service.  It was packed and such a nice service. 

As soon as we were done with our meal, we went out to the back yard to look for Easter Eggs.  The girls really enjoyed it.  As we came back into the house, Emmy told Brad, "Daddy, that was really fun!  I liked that!"

Last night I colored Easter Eggs with the girls.  Emmy just wanted pink eggs.  Erin lost interest after a couple of minutes. 

Silhouettes

I had silhouettes done of the girls last weekend at Edelweiss Baby.  It's one of my favorite baby boutiques located at the Shoppes at Arbor Lakes.  They specialize in apparel, accessories and gifts for babies, age preemie to 24 months.  Sadly both the girls have outgrown the adorable clothes (some of which are handmade), but I still go there for other accessories, gifts, etc. 

The actual Silhouette experience wasn't what I remember when I was a kid, but they still turned out cute.  The artist just had the girls watch a quick movie on his iPad while he briefly studied their faces.  He only used a scissors and had these done in less than ten minutes.  I love how he captured the flip in the back of Emmy's hair & also Erin's lovely curls.

Emmy

Erin

 

I Can Count to Ten!

Erin has recently learned how to count!  One day Emmy was counting and then Erin started counting right along with her.  A few days ago I started to count...1...2 from the other room and then Erin finished and counted all the way to 11.  I heard what she was doing and pretended like I wasn't listening.  When she was done I got so excited for her.  She was so proud!  I gave her a hug & a high five!

Hospital - 3 Out of 4

In the past four months, three out of four of us have been hospitalized.  This is crazy!!  Is Palm Sunday considered an actual holiday?  Another one of us sick on another holiday!!  This is starting to become very comical.  Who's going to bet on us for the next holiday?

Brad was experiencing some stomach pains over the weekend.  He thought it was indigestion so he kept taking Pepto but wasn't seeing any relief. (sound familiar?)  We went about our daily activities throughout the weekend and even went to a hockey party in Shakopee on Saturday afternoon.  When we got home from the party, we both crashed on the couch for a little bit.  Brad put the girls to bed and then tried to do some work for his side business.  Around midnight he woke me up letting me know how uncomfortable he was.  He thought he was having the same problem I had last November (Gallbladder).  I asked him a bunch of questions...where does it hurt, what's the pain like, on a scale from 1-10 how would you rate your pain, etc.  He took his temperature, but no fever.  The pain seemed to be getting worse and when he said that his pain level was a 10, I told him he needed to go to the ER.  We didn't want to wake the kids so that I could drive him to the hospital...so he drove himself and ran a few red lights on the way.  The hospital is only a mile away.

He arrived around 12:30 am Sunday and by 2:00 am the doctors thought it was his appendix.  They scheduled a CT scan and it showed that it was inflamed.  By 3:30 he was scheduled to have surgery at 6:00 am. 

During the one hour surgery they removed his appendix and also repaired a hernia.  The surgeon said that his appendix was pretty bad...worse than what they had initially thought, but it hadn't ruptured which was good. 

I brought the girls up to see him after he got out of recovery.  The surgeon said that he could probably get discharged that same evening if he was able to keep food & water down, etc. 

Brad was discharged around 6:30 pm on Sunday.  He wasn't even in the hospital for 24 hours!  They sent him home with some pain medication and told him to do bed rest.  He can't lift anything for two weeks.

He is really bummed that he can't participate in the hockey playoffs that are coming up.  He was really looking forward to playing.  I might have to take Suevonne's advice and hide his skates!  He's determined to get better in the next two weeks so that he can play.  I keep telling him he's not going to.  Sorry Brad.

Brad's home resting this week and will be doing a little bit of work from home.  He's a little sore and sleeping was a challenge for him last night.  I had to show him how to "roll" out of bed. 

The next two weeks will be a bit challenging for me.  I will be Brad's nurse, the girls' full time chauffeur, mommy/daddy, etc.  

The girls love their daddy so much and they love to jump and hug on him.  I've already explained to them that daddy has some owies and we have to be very gentle with him.  So far they've been okay.

When Brad was getting discharged from the hospital, the nurse said "Don't you have any questions?"  Brad replied, "No, I'm pretty used to hospitals.  You have no idea how many times I've been in them in the last six years!"  

Brad always jokes that before he met me he never had any medical bills. 

I'm not glad that Brad had to go through this, but I am glad that it happened now and not when we are on vacation in a few weeks.  He has time to heal up for some fun in the sun! 

Now Brad & I have matching battle scars!

This Little Piggy

Brad's mom had arranged to take the kids to a pig farm on one of our recent visits up north.  Let me tell you...this just reconfirms why I don't eat bacon.  The stench took your breath away.  Once you got past the smell it wasn't so bad.  The place was pretty clean...but it was pig, after pig, after pig.  We came during feeding time.  Some piglets were squealing...They were really cute.  One of the piglets still had its umbilical cord attached.  The first set of piglets we saw were a few weeks old.  The other piglets were just a few days old.  The one with the umbilical cord was only a few hours old.  The girls all got a chance to hold a piglet.  It was really cute to see their faces.  They had fun!!!

After we left the farm, we got in the car to drive back to Hoffman.  We stunk pretty bad for only being there 15 minutes.  It's all we could smell all the way back to town.  One of the twins said, "Do I have poop on my face, because that's all I can smell." 

Deb also had a friend that had just gotten some baby goats.  They were fainting goats, but none of them fainted while we were there.  The kids had fun with them.  They were really cute!

After our farm adventures, we had to go home and take showers & wash our clothes.  

Preschool Screening

Emmy had Preschool Screening last week.  She did very well and wasn't shy one bit. 
They tested her vision, hearing and also checked her height & weight.  She is 38" and weighs 34 lbs.
The comments from the screener say, "Easily completed screening, cooperative, followed directions well."

Some of the development areas assessed:

• Cognitive - Basic concepts...counting, colors and completing sentences.
• Fine Motor - Small muscle & eye-hand coordination.  Block building, copying shapes, and drawing.
• Gross Motor - Large muscle activities (hopping/balancing).
• Speech/Language - Say sounds correctly and ability to use words and sentence patterns.

Emmy played a memory game with the screener and got them all right. 
Overall, she scored 23 out of 25 points.  One of the things she got stuck on was, "A table is made of wood and a window is made of ______."  Emmy looked up at the window and said, "Light."  The screener said it was so cute because she wasn't really wrong - that's what Emmy saw was the light shining from outside. 

She's all set for Preschool in the fall.  My baby is growing up so fast!  :)  She's very excited about going to school.  She tells me that she wants a pink backpack with a princess on it. 

Dance Pictures

Yesterday was picture day for Emmy's dance class.  I practiced with her hair and make-up on Saturday.  I'll just say, It's not easy putting make-up on a three year old.  Once she was all done, she looked in the mirror and said, "I look beautiful!" 

When I was doing her hair and make-up on Sunday it went a little better.  I skipped the eyeliner because she just hates it.  She doesn't need it anyway.  I'm really not a fan of make-up on children and wasn't on board with this for dance.  But, her teacher explained how washed out their faces would look on camera and on stage.  Plus, they want all the kids to look alike...brown eye shadow, red lip stick, reddish blush, black eyeliner & black mascara.  Ultimately it was up to us if we wanted make-up on our kids or not.  I caved. 

Emmy did really well for pictures...even without getting a nap yesterday.  I asked her if she smiled good. (parents weren't allowed in the studio)  She said "Yes, but Sophie didn't." 

After pictures were done, we stopped for ice cream!

Her recital is not until May.  So we have a couple more months to practice her dance moves. 

Her ballet song is "I Love Colors."

 Her tap song is "Fun 2 Be a Bee." 

State Swimming & Diving

The Amazing 200 Medley Relay team took 4th in the State Swimming competition and beat their own record breaking time twice this weekend. Way to go boys!!! Everyone had great personal victories in each of their State events! Congrats to all!!!

The state prelims were held on Friday at the UofM Aquatics Center.  Each of the Monte kids moved on to the Saturday events.  Tyler took 1st in his heat for the Beaststroke event.  He shaved two seconds off of his previous time.  However, he eventually was beaten out by the other heats after him.  He missed qualifying for the Saturday breaststroke event by one place.  He went from 33rd place to 17th place but they only take the top 16.  The 16th place person got 102.35...Tyler got 102.43.  He was very happy with his time though.

Tyler is pretty close to breaking the breaststroke school record.  He's currently 2.4 seconds away from the school record. He reached his goal of 1:02 this year so it's very possible that he will break the school record next year. Once he sets his mind to something, he stays focused and gets very determined to reach his goals!


The 200 Medley Relay team placed 5th in the top 8 on Friday, broke their previous school record, and finished with a 140.34 to move onto the Saturday events.  They took 4th place on Saturday and finished with a 139.43.
All the boys had determination to succeed and they dropped time all the way through.  It was exciting to see!  They represented Montevideo so well. 


As a team, Montevideo placed 10th out of 35 teams that scored.  Congratulations on a great season boys!

Tyler = Yellow Cap

 Fan Club

4th Place 200 Medley Relay

 Front Row: Tyler & Jack Spaeth.  Back Row:  Adam Peters & Tommy Payne