Splashin' in the Puddles

Manny, Makenzie and I took advantage of the "okay" weather on Tuesday and headed outside to play. We drew with chalk on the driveway, Manny rode his bike and we stomped in some puddles. It was great and a preview for the nice weather that is to come.





Do you like our rain boots?

Makenzie didn't really like the whole sitting still thing, so this is the only picture I have of her that doesn't involve screaming.

Not that one Mama

We were at Target today and I was looking at the wallets. I have a hard time finding a wallet that I like so I usually look at them for about a year until mine finally falls apart completely and then buy one. I think I have had my current wallet for 5 years and it is time to part ways.

Manny was looking at the wallet with me and said,

"Mama you don't want that wallet, it has no money in it".

Ring Around the Rosie

Here is a video of Manny and McKayla doing Ring Around the Rosie. At the end, Manny does the second verse all by himself (part of his slight OCD, he has to do everything completely).

"French Fries Make Me Happy"

Manny continues to remind me that "french fries make me happy" everytime we go by a McDonald's, or for that matter any time I offer him a snack. So, he was very excited when I told him that we were going to meet his friends McKayla and Kristian at McDonald's for dinner.

The kids (Makenzie was there too, but I didn't get any pictures, don't worry, I didn't leave her at home) all had a great time and before we knew it, we had been there for 2 hours and it was time to go home to bed! As soon as we got home Manny asked what he could have for a snack.

It was nice to get to chat with Christine while the kids were occupied.

"Mine contacts are red Mama, not blue like yours". He is too funny sometimes (you might have to click on the picture to enlarge it to it, but I forgot to push reduce the red-eye button).

P.S. This is a picture of Manny and Uncle in "Uncle's Gym" (yes, Manny thinks it is just Uncle's gym and yes Manny thought he was going to be sleeping here with Uncle when he spent the night in Dexter....to be two again...)

The Budding Photographer

Manny loves to take pictures and he wanted me to post them on the blog.

Please don't tell me this is ANOTHER growth spurt

Manny has eaten just about all the food in the house (ok, not really, but that is what it feels like). Every other sentence out of his mouth today has been, "Mine has an empty belly".

What he has eaten today:
*bowl of oatmeal with raisins
* 1/2 of a pear
*bag of cheese popcorn
*2 pieces of turkey
*1 cup of grapes
*1/2 cup of dried cranberries
*1 mozzarella cheese stick
*1 banana
*4 sippy cups of milk
*veggie burger

and it is only 2:30pm!

It's not that I don't want Manny to grow, it is the fact that he is growing out of his winter clothes. He has like 4 pairs of pants and 5 shirts left that sort-of fit. I need spring to get here so that he can wear some clothes that fit!

Makenzie's 8-week well-baby visit

Makenzie had her 8-week Dr's visit today.

She weighed 12 pounds (up 1.5 in two weeks, yikes!)
She was 23 inches long (up 2 inches in two weeks, yikes again!)

However, the Doctor said that was normal, she just had a bigger growth spurt in those two weeks.

She is developing at the rate of a 3-4 month old (what a little smarty-pants, haha).

"Ready to go"

At 8:00 Friday morning, I got out of the shower to see that Manny had finished dressing himself, had put his rainboots on, and has somehow gotten his sweatshirt down (I do not dare to ask how) and said to me,

"Mine ready to go to Grampa's"

I had to explain to Manny that we had to wait for Daddy to come home and then we would go to Dexter to Grampa's.

Manny seemed to accept this answer, however, about every 20 minutes or so, he would remind me that he was ready to go.






I don't have any pictures from Manny's stay with Grampa or Makenzie's stay with Grammy, but they both seem to have had fun time.

Manny was very excited because he got to eat red hotdogs for supper and he went to the "dempshun" (redemption center) with Grampa and got cash.

As for Joe and I, we had a really good time on our night away.

Manny Says....

Tonight Joe was on the phone with a co-worker from the mill and Manny was trying to return a pen to Joe's desk so the pen could "be with his family"

Joe put his hand to Manny's mouth to let him know he had to be quite. No one has ever done this to Manny before, so I don't really think Manny knew what Joe was trying to do. Manny continued to say, "have to get back with the family" and Joe kept trying to cover his mouth. (I know you are thinking, why didn't I jump in and do anything, but hey, I deal with this stuff all day, plus I knew it would be easier just to let Manny continue what he was doing and then he would move on).

Anyway, after putting his hand over Manny's mouth three times, Manny finally said,

"Hey, stop that Daddy, that not very nice."

Over the river and through the woods....

To Grampa's house Manny goes....

Hooray! Manny is going to spend the night at Grampa's house tomorrow night, Makenzie is going to Grammy's house and Joe and I are going to a hotel.

Hooray!

Manny is actually very excited. These are the things Manny thinks he is going to do at Grampa's:

*eat pizza
*eat popcorn
*sleep in Uncle's bed
*watch Scooby Doo
*go to Uncle's School
*play with Casey's eggs (Casey is their parrot)

and he is very "cited" as he says.

Mama and Daddy are very 'cited' too!

Batteries and No Screwdriver

This morning I was trying to put the batteries in Makenzie's new baby monitor. Manny was very excited to have something else that ran on batteries in the house. He sat next to me and said, "Mine want to see how it works". He is quite the little engineer.



Then, which is the case with ALL baby things now, we needed a screwdriver to put the batteries in. Of course, I couldn't find one so Manny said, "You need screwdriver Mama? Mine have one on my tool bench." He ran in to get his plastic Fisher-Price screwdriver.



I tried to explain to him that I needed a tiny screw driver to pit into the tiny screws. Manny looked at me and said,



"Mine sorry, this is all mine have."

The Start of Potty-Training?

Last night, I heard Manny go into the bathroom, but didn't think anything of it because I was feeding Makenzie and Manny often wanders into the bathroom.

I heard him move his stool, I still wasn't worried because he often moves it closer to the sink to wash his hands or moves it under the light switch to turn it on.

A few seconds later I see him run out of the bathroom, but stop in the living room and then run into the kitchen. I could hear Joe talking to Manny and began to get curious.

Manny had taken his diaper off, moved his stool near the toilet and attempted to pee. He told Joe, "Mine no pee, too dark". Then he had run into the living room and found an empty play cup and peed in that. (He missed a little bit, but I thought that was a pretty good try).

Hopefully we are on our way to no more diapers...we will see.

Manny Says...

Manny woke up this morning and the first thing he said to me was,

"Mama, we have no hotdogs"

My Dad would be proud that the first words out of Manny's mouth were about hotdogs.

The Lunar Eclipse

So, Joe stood outside for HOURS on Wednesday night to capture the eclipse with his camera. I enjoyed looking at the pictures the next day from our nice warm office rather than watch the "live event" outside in the freezing cold.

I took Manny and Makenzie to get their pictures taken this week at JCPenney. They came out so cute! They were playing on the floor and I decided to take some of my own pictures. I wish Joe was home so that the pictures would have been really good (he is a much better photographer than me).

Political Affiliation for a toddler

Today, Joe and I were talking about the election and I asked Manny if he was going to be a Democrat or a Republican? He said, "Pub-ah-lick-in". Hmmm, I thought, so I asked Manny again, Are you going to be a Republican or a Democrat? He said, "Dem-crat".

Joe said to Manny, "Manny, Daddy is a Republican and Mama is a Democrat, which do you want to be, a Republican or a Democrat?" Manny said, "Manny want be a butterfly."

There you have it.

Manny Says...

Manny says, "Macky-Roni" for Macoroni and Cheese.

How to Quiet a Screaming Makenzie

One day last week (I know, I am a little behind), I apparently was taking too long to make Makenzie's bottle and she was screaming louder than anything you can imagine.

Manny did his usual, "Oh, Kenzie, it's okay. Honey, it's okay, let me kiss you". He was doing all the tricks that he could think of All of a sudden from the kitchen where I was trying to figure out why I was taking so long to make a bottle, I heard silence.

I listened for a minute and when I still didn't hear anything I quickly went into the living room (of course I was thinking the worst). But, what did I see? Manny was laying on the floor next to Makenzie and he had put her pacifier in her mouth. He looks up at me and says, "See Mama, she's happy now."

Manny Says....

Manny doesn't like when Makenzie cries and always says, "Mama (or Daddy) pick her up".

I didn't think it was because he was annoyed that she was crying, but I wanted to find out for sure.

I asked him why I have to pick her up? He answered, "because it makes her happy".


What a sweet boy.

Manny says...

We recently purchased the movie Annie (which I LOVE and thought Manny would too, turns out Joe is a bit of a fan as well).

Anyway, Manny has an Auntie Annie and a cousin Gracie who just came to visit after Makenzie was born.

Yesterday Manny was trying to tell me that he wanted to watch the movie "Gracie". It took me several requests to figure out that he wanted to watch Annie, but he was mixing up their names.

When I finally figured it out and asked him if he meant Annie, he said, "Oh yes, yes, yes, Manny watch Annie, not Gracie, mine forgot."

Chocolate Fondue

Need I say more? Not if I am speaking to Manny.


Manny has such a love of chocolate that when he even says the word, he uses a different voice and his facial expression changes to one of adoration.


For Christmas I received a chocolate fondue pot for my yankee swap gift....yay.

Manny's curiosity finally got the better of him and he asked me what was in the box and when we could make the chocolate things that were pictured on the box. So I told him that after dinner we could make chocolate.


His head almost started spinning he was so excited. All day he continued to remind me that we were going to "make chocolate".

Our first visit to GG's

Last Tuesday Manny, Makenzie and I decided to go visit GG (plus GG was quite anxious to see her great-grandchildren :).

Manny Says...

The other day, Joe called from work and wanted me to record the Presidental debates on his computer...on MSNBC. First, I don't even know what channel MSNBC is, so I had to look for that and then I couldn't find where it said, debate or anything Presedential.

I was getting frustrated and said, "Grrr, Joe, I can't even find this". Manny looked at me, laughed and said, "Joe not at home, Joe at work Mama"

Manny says...

We were driving to the mall yesterday and Joe said something to Manny that we almost got hit by a car. Manny replied in a very concerned voice, "no Daddy, don't crash car, there people in there you hurt them"

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When we drove by the hospital, Manny pointed up to the red lights and said, "Mama see those red lights? Those just lights, not Rudolph"
(See http://mannyjenandjoe.blogspot.com/2007/12/whos-two-year-old.html)


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2-week Doctor's Appointment

Makenzie had her 2-week appointment yesterday. Here are her stats:
Weight: 8 lbs 4 oz (50th percentile)
Height: 21.5 inches (95th percentile)

Her jaundice is apparently all gone and the Doctor was very happy with her and was pleased with her weight gain (she was born at 8 lbs 5 oz, but in the hospital went down to 7 lbs 4 oz).

Nothing is as comforting...

....as a pacifier to a Ramos child (apparently). Makenzie is not quite as sold on the idea of a constant pacifier as Manny was (she only likes one in the middle of the night, Manny wanted his constantly).

They both, however, figured out very early on how to keep the pacifier in their mouth's so that they would not fall out. Here is the proper technique:

Makenzie or Madonna?

Madonna circa 1988, of course, not the respectable, calm, British citizen that she is now:

Strike a pose

Strike a pose

Vogue, vogue, vogue

Vogue, vogue, vogue

Pictures from the Hospital

A personal yay for me!

I am just going to take a selfish blogging moment to announce that as of Tuesday, I have officially lost all of my "baby weight" (22 pounds) that I gained while pregnant with Makenzie...

...now onto the remaining 20 pounds that I never lost after being pregnant with Manny (I gained 50+ pounds with him).

Visitors in the Hospital

What else has happened in the last week?

So probably the most exciting thing that has happened in the last week, is of course, the birth of Makenzie Elizabeth. However, many of you are aware of the saying, "when it rains, it pours", well, it literally poured in our house last Thursday.

Apparently there was a leak in the pipes on the third floor that flooded the second floor bathroom (which has been vacant all month as the tenant moves out) and then to our BEDROOM!!!....more specifically our closet.

Joe came home after visiting me in the hospital to find a waterfall in our bedroom. I came home the next day to see parts of the ceiling that I have never wanted to see exposed...pipes, insulation etc....gross.


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I also had a very rough time during the c-section. I won't go into complete details, but they had trouble with the spinal block and I was poked several times in the spine in order to obtain the block, oh yeah, and then the spinal block stopped working early, instead of lasting 90 minutes, the spinal block only lasted about 30 minutes. It was quite uncomfortable to say the least.

I also began having severe headaches right after the procedure. The percocet would not take care of the pain, so they were giving me 800 mg of Motrin, didn't work either. Every time I stood up, I would double over in pain and have to lay back down.

Jessica took me to the ER (THANK YOU SO MUCH!!!!) on Saturday night and they gave me an IV of caffeine, not as fulfilling as one would think. This treatment did not work, so they said I could come back the next day for a "blood patch". I thought it sounded pretty scary, but anything to be able to stand up like a human instead of at a 90 degree angle.

So I called the next morning to make sure an Anesthesiologist would be there and I wouldn't have to wait, the nurse called me back and said,

"anesthesiologywould prefer if you could come in Monday morning for the procedure because they are under-staffed."

I almost keeled over. Are you kidding? I described my pain once again to the nurse and reminded him that on their scale of 0-10 for pain, I was at about an 8 or 9 with 10 being unbearable pain. He called back 10 minutes later and said they had a doctor to perform the procedure.

I had called Mom and she came down to help out with Manny and Makenzie/take me to the hospital...THANK YOU VERY MUCH. So, I had ANOTHER spinal (not exactly a fun way to start the day, but guess what? A couple of hours later I was able to stand....YAY!!!

Names can be so confusing.

Lately whenever you ask Manny what his name is, he will reply, "Manuel Philip Ramos".

Today he was sitting with me on the couch and asked me what my name was. I told him that my name was "Mama". He looked at me and said, "Your name Mama Philip Ramos".

I tried to explain to him that everyone has a different name etc, but he was not having any of it. Apparently the only person who has their own identity is Makenzie Elizabeth (or Kenzie Wizabef as Manny says), but even she does not have a last name.

He is doing very well adjusting to having Makenzie in our house. I promise I will start blogging about our adventures soon!

Wedging myself into a booth

Last night Joe, Manny and I went to eat dinner at Texas Roadhouse. We were given a booth. Those of you that have been pregnant may remember that being 9 months pregnant and being escorted to a booth can be trouble, especially if the table is welded to the wall.

Well, I wedged myself into the booth, managed to spill my whole glass of diet coke and drop salad on the front of my shirt. *

*as a side note, Manny did not spill anything.

Manny's First Slumber Party

On December 15th Manny, McKayla and Roman had a slumber party. This was a lot of fun, I think the parents were very excited to have an evening "off" and the kids had a lot of fun. The evening started out with McKayla and Manny helping Joe with the fish tank:

Here are all three kids playing with puzzles and toys in Manny's room after we ate pizza for dinner.
Of course, we had to play with the train set. That is the only toy Roman wants to play with when he comes over. I think if we would have let Roman stay up all night, he would have played with the train non-stop.
More legos and trains. I don't know who was having more fun, Joe or the kids.

All in their jammies watching Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer and eating a "special treat" as McKayla called it...popcorn.

Okay, so the slumber party didn't last all night, it ended at about 10:30pm after we called the parents to come get some nervous kids. I think they did a great job lasting THAT long. It was a lot of fun, can't wait to do it again.

"It's landed"

Last weekend Joe and Manny went to Petco and bought some new fish. They bought four angel fish to try to combat the excessive breeding patterns of the guppies and the platies (ie: angel fish are supposedly aggressive and will "take care" (yes, in the mafia sense of the word) the baby fish.

Last night Joe and Manny were looking for the angel fish. They looked and looked and finally

Manny said, "Right there Daddy, the angel fish it's landed, he's broken."

Joe and I looked and there was the fish, lying belly-up on the bottom of the tank.

We wish you a Merry Christmas....

more than a week late. I haven't had time to post any pictures, so here they are:

Our Christmas Tree:

Daddy and Manny opening a present:

Look, we have matching jammies!

Manny says....

Sometimes Manny will shorten our names to "Mom" or "Dad" and we will tease him and call him "Man".

He will reply, "Manny not a man, Manny a kid". No matter how many times you do this, he replies with the same answer. It is really cute.

Today Joe and Manny were heading out the door to go to Best Buy and I said, "Bye boys, have fun". Manny looks at me and says, "We not boys. That Joe and I Manny."

Who's the two year old?

Our Christmas Eve was very busy and hectic. Joe had a chiropractor appointment at 7:30am, we were on the road to Fort Fairfield by 9am and then driving home from Presque Isle by 7pm.


Manny had a 10 minute nap in the car, so needless to say by the time we had started for home, he was quite cranky.

He fell asleep before we stopped at the Houlton gas station and then woke up and started crying. It was that cry that could not be consoled, just a miserable unhappy cry from being over-stimulated, over-fed sugar and over-tired.

As we got back on the interstate Joe and I saw some red tower lights on top of a mountain by the side of the road and we tried to convince Manny that it was Santa's sleigh.

This is how the conversation went:

"Manny, look, it's Santa's sleigh. Do you see Rudolph's nose?"

Manny quieted down and looked, you could almost hear his thought process and he said, "That not Rudolph's nose, that just a light".

Yes Virginia, there is a Santa Clause.

Christmas Eve

On our way home from Christmas Eve, I was driving home on the interstate, trying to stay awake for the 3 hour trip home. All of a sudden I looked in the left lane and about 4 feet from our car was a huge deer with huge antlers.

(*note: it might not have been huge, but when it is that close to your car, it looks enormous)


I hear Manny suck in his breath and start laughing, "Santa's reindeer, Mama. Manny saw Santa's reindeer".

When my stomach finally dropped back out of my throat, I said, "Ya, Manny did you see Santa's reindeer". He was so excited.