Saturday, October 31, 2009

Happy Halloween!!!

 Hope you have fun wherever you may be!!!

Mother-In Laws

You hear that mother-in laws are horrible. You hear all the jokes out there about the bride fighting with her, or the groom detesting her...you know how it goes.

But....I am so lucky. I have probably one of the best Mother-In laws there is. She is always offering her help, but never forcing it. She always lets us know that she loves us. She includes me in the family. She leaves comments on my blog. What can I say, she's amazing.

Thank you, Kim for raising a great son like Court. Thanks for teaching him that meeting is important. Thank you for being so great! :)

Oh, and my wonderful in-laws don't stop with Kim!  There is also my wonderful father-in-law. He is a pretty good in-law as well (even though he doesn't comment on my blog. ;) hehe). Thank you for all that you do for us. Thanks for being loving, supportive, and just so amazing. :) I love you guys. I am so thankful that God gave me such a great set of In-laws!! Thanks Mom and Dad Barndt!!!



Thursday, October 29, 2009

Two year-olds are a struggle...but so much fun!!

I thought I would share some little things about the two year-olds that I take care of. So here goes...

As many of you know I am a nanny to two year-old twins. Jack and Sam. I've been with them since they were 4 months-old so I have become a main part of their life. For example, when I was sick earlier this year and unable to work for a couple of days their mom said that everytime they heard a key in the lock, they would cry my name and run to the foyer.

They love me and I love them.


 These are some second birthday pictures that I took. What fun!! :)


Ok, so I wanted to tell you some of the struggles that make up my workdays and some of the joys that make those struggles well worth it!!

I think our main struggle of the moment is sibling rivalry. One has a toy, all of a sudden the other needs it. When mom's home the one crying and demanding that "not Sam have it, Jack have it" (or the other way around) often gets a treat or something to make them stop crying and not want whatever their brother has...but with me things go a little differently. :)

One thing that I have really appreciated about this age is their honesty. When I will be in the other room and hear a fight break out over a toy I often just need to go ask who had it first and the answer is supplied. I hope that doesn't end soon! :)

And then if Sam says 'it's raining.' Jack will say, 'no it's not raining.' ALWAYS ALWAYS contradicting. Even when Sam is speaking the truth. It's really starting to get on my nerves.

But then there are Jack's funny phrases. The way he has just recently learned to tack the word anyway onto a sentance, 'cow says moo, anyways.' 'I have a train, anyways.' Haha. It's really funny and I have no idea why he has decided it should end all of his sentances. :)

And then there is the way they will say excuse me. SOOO cute. :) Once asked what they need to say, they are always prompt to say it. :)

About a month ago they spent a whole day answering questions like this...'uh, no please.' 'uh, yes please.' haha. Now they will still answer 'uh, no please.' every now and then but not nearly as much as that one day.

Haha, and then there was the day I took them to play in puddles. Hahaha, I outfitted them in boots and raincoats and we headed out in the pouring rain for the park at the end of the street. As luck would have it the baseball daimond had HUGE puddles on it and they spent about a half hour stomping, jumping, and walking in the puddles. Sam fell down at one point but quickly got himself up and continued playing, but when Jack fell down (in the middle of a puddle) you would think his world had just ended. So, not wanting to get myself wet I reassured him that he was okay and if he got up and came over to me I would make sure. But I guess it was a tad to traumatic so he stayed sitting the puddle crying. So I asked Sam to go help him up...so Sam goes over and places a hand on each side of Jack's head and begins to try lifting him up by his head. :) hahahahahaha... I quickly prompted him to try taking his hand instead and so Sam held Jack's hand so that his brother could get up. It was so cute and so funny. :) And then Jack insisted on trying to clean his hands off in the puddle because they were dirty from falling. :) He is so funny.

And then yesterday I asked them if they wanted to go somewhere, to which Jack replies, "THE FAIR! See elephants!!"( I have no idea where he got the idea there where elephants at the fair...but okay!) So Sam, hearing
Jack came rushing towards us crying "THE FAIR! THE FAIR! Go to the FAIR!"I then had to inform them that the fair wasn't here anymore but we had some other choices. So I said, "We can go to the Zoo, the Aquarium, or the park." Before I had even finished saying zoo Sam is chanting "Zoo, Zoo, Zoo, Zoo..." So I quickly packed a  lunch and we got ready to go...as I was getting us ready Sam tried to convince me he should wear his crocs (with a devilish grin and the funniest tone of voice) he proclaimed "Not sneakers, wear crocs.". To which I reminded him that he could either wear sneakers or rain boots. Then he got all excited about rain boots and forgot all about his crocs. :)

I know I have some more funny stories but I cannot remember them right now so this will have to be all. :)
Hope you enjoyed yourself!!
Hey all!

I know I haven't updated in a while, and I am really sorry! :)

So, I am not really sure how to tell you this, but Tuesday Court got laid off. So, now we are without medical insurance, and a second income. We had been in the process of looking for a home, but that has been put on the back burner for now. Luckily we have savings to tide us over until he gets something else, unfortunately those savings were meant as a down payment. But oh well. It will all work out in the end.

I will admit to being very stressed out about this because it felt like our dreams had been taking away from us, but then I arrived at work Wednesday and two smiling little boys were waiting for me. One who eagerly told me he loved me...many times throughout the day. And I realized life is still good. :)

Sunday, October 18, 2009

comments............

Hey, just wanted to let you all know that I just changed the comments area so that you can comment even if you don't have a gmail account, or anything like that. :)

So, feel free!

Saturday, October 17, 2009

October 17th...

     Eight years ago a precious little girl was born. A little girl whose smile brought joy, whose attitude was amazing, and who loved meeting, and her family and friends. A little girl whose situation sometimes seemed hopeless and sad to those close to her, but when you saw her in action, you saw hope.


     Kasaundra Rose Corcoran was her name, and she is the oldest child of Sandra and Bradley Corcoran. Many mistakes took place during her birth, resulting in a prolonged hospital stay and a departure with seizure meds in hand and the knowledge that little Kasaundra had cerebral palsy. She managed to battle her seizures and cerebral palsy, learning how to crawl, sit, walk with a walker. She was so smart. She was amazing!! She was my best buddy.


    I can't remember when it started getting really bad. But eventually the seizures became almost constant. If it wasn't a physical seizure that you could see, it was a mental one. She often couldn't remember my name when I stayed with them for 6 weeks after Brayden's birth. And took to calling me "this one." *Grin* I still remember the sound of that sweet little voice saying, "This one's turn." :) And although she knew her colors she sometimes couldn't remember them and would guess which was which.


     I remember the last time I saw her. They had come to my parents house for a gtg and I remember Sandra brought her in and she was having one of the weird siezures where her eyes would stay glued to some spot on the ceiling and she would be unresponsive. and I had taken her and held her on my lap and talked to her hoping that something would get through. I remembered the first time I had seen one of these types. I had been so afraid, I had wanted her back, and in an effort to do so I had began to play peekaboo with her. Laying her cloth on her face and then pulling it off until finally I had gotten a twitch that looked like a smile, with hope I had done it again and again until a little hand, slowly, slowly reached up and pulled it off. And so that day I sang to her, I played with her until finally she broke through. I remember Megan asking if I wanted to go outside with her, and saying that no I wanted to stay with Kasaundra. I remember wondering why I didn't just go outside, but for some reason I just felt this need to hold her and try to get through to her.

    I hope that she considered me a best bud, because she definitely was one of mine.

   I remember the phone call early on a Sunday morning that woke me in a sleeping bag on Tia's bedroom floor. I remember that sunday meeting, crying during hymns and prayer, barely getting my testimony out. I remember going to Sandra parents after meeting and just holding each other. I remember taking baby Brayden to meeting with me so that Sandra could get some sleep. I remember the Barndts sat in front of me (a silly detail), and when Brayden woke crying I remember feeling thankful for something to do that would help me not cry.


   And then when I got home I remembered a poem that I had started writing one day in my room about Kasaundra and had then stored away with the thought that I would probably never need to finish it. And so I opened it and finished a poem. A tribute to a loving daughter and sister, a real princess, a real sweetheart, and a very precious friend to many.

and here it is.

A poem about my Kasaundra

My sweet little Kasaundra Rose,
I remember little things
like her blowing her nose,
silly things like her not so little shouts,
and even her stubborn lil' pouts.

And how she loved to hear
about the monkeys jumping on the bed
and how they fell and bonked their heads.
She would be the doctore,
shake her finger and tell them "No!"
Her voice was strict and sometimes
quiet and kind of low.

She was definitely cute as a bug,
and gave some of the most awesome hugs.
Her kisses were usually big and wet,
but that didn't keep them from
 being the best you met.

I'll always cherish the memory
of her shouting out, "BOO!"
and how her sweet voice said "I wuv you."
I'll always remember her "pat-pat" hugs,
and how she "hopped" across the rug.

She was really sweet
to everyone she did meet,
and we all thought
she was pretty neat.

We'll remember and miss Kasaundra for many years,
and we'll probably always shed a few tears.
But we are thankful for our time with her until to God she did return
And for the many lessons that through her we did learn

Saturday, October 10, 2009

More Ellia photos!!

   I was having fun this morning finishing up with Ellia's pictures so I thought that I would share a few of them with you!! :)  I photoshopped these ones and had a lot of fun with it!! :) I am not sure if Megan will enjoy the pictures but I sure hope so! :)

And make sure to click the view on black!! It looks amazing!!



Tuesday, October 6, 2009

:) look into the eyes... you can see...who?


ME!!! in Zack's eyes!! Hahaha, i just noticed so I thought I would point myself out. :)

Saturday, October 3, 2009

Photo op with Ellia

This little picture is my favourite...I cannot believe it is already fall!!


Now, that's what I call a silly face!...







Isn't she just so cute!! There are more....so maybe later I will do another post with a couple more pictures of my little princess. :)

Thursday, October 1, 2009

And then his saturday celebration...

So, on Saturday I decided to make a cherry cobbler for Court's birthday because it was a recipe I had been wanting to try out for a while and it sounded like something he might like. So, I headed to Trader Joe's for the canned cherries (let me tell you those baby's are good! Even just straight from the jar! YUM) and for some dry red wine. Now never having purchased wine before it was a little hard to figure out which one I should buy but I finally settled on a cheap one that looked like it was supposed to be a dry red wine.

After dinner we got to work making it (so that it would still be warm when we added the ice cream and ate it!) and wouldn't you know I had forgotten that to open a bottle of wine you have to have a corkscrew...and we didn't have one anywhere! So, after using a pocket knife, a corn on the cob holder, and a real knife (which resulted in it almost being pushed down into the bottle...and spraying wine all over Richard (my brother) and the kitchen ) we finally just used a knife sharpener (you know the long skinny thing that came with your knife set) and pushed it all the way down in the bottle.


It was an interesting recipe that had you cook the topping as biscuits first so that they wouldn't get soggy on the top of the cobbler.

Not soggy!!

Anyways, it tasted a little bit odd...and I think that if we make it again we'll either find something else to replace the wine or maybe buy a better wine. :) Because maybe 6.99 Trader Joe wine wasn't what the Cooking Illustrated magazine meant when it said dry red wine.:)

Courts brithday evening

     I just thought I would throw out some pictures of Court's birthday gatherings. Here us 'youngsters' are at his parents house right before Court blows out his candles.

Here is the peach pie Kim made Court.... :p Delicious!

Here is the YUMMY apple pie!!!

and here is the candy..Taylor picked out Army Men and Fighter Jets :) and
then Kim picked out Sour Patch Fruit salad... :) Now that stuff is good!

Look at how yummy that is!!


All in all the evening at his folks was a smash!!

Even though Joey (their dog) kept escaping the camera