Crazy Crescitelli

Family Pictures

2010-10-04T05:27:00.001-07:00

Boy, this was FUN! HA! 2 hours later and here are some of the many photos we got. I can see WHY it's been 2 years since we've done this. What a crazy time!

The Summer Days

2010-08-13T05:07:00.001-07:00

Have been filled to the rim with lots and lots going on. I'm TERRIBLE about posting on the blog. I keep thinking I want to and try and then something always comes up. I'm missing the little things in life though that I always want to remember. Like Nico, who is still not talking, whispers flaaa, laabaaaaa, in your ear like his sister does to tell you a secret. How Nico raises his arms up and says with a over piched Y--EEAAAAHHHHH when he wants something and you guess what it is he wants, like a cookie. How he does this little happy dance shaking his arms side to side when you're getting the cookie for him. How Mina has learned sarcasm. The other day I gave her two choices, none of which she wanted and then when she picked one I said HI FIVE and I brought my hand over to her to smack a high five and what does she do? She gets this look on her face of disappointment, puts her hand out in a fist form all closed up and does this very sorry, yeaaahhhh mom! I thought Carlos would pee in his pants seeing this. How every doll Mina has she has named Rainbow, Princess, Sparkles, Flower, Pony and in this order. How she wishes on a star and when you ask what she wished for, she says the above, A beautiful Rainbow, Princess, Sparkles, Flower Pony mommy, and the light shimmers off her eye like you would see in a movie.

The kids are growing up too fast for me though. Mina is everyday turning into more and more of a kid, not my baby. She's always been gun ho and ready to MOVE since she was born though. She was walking 4 days after turning 7 months old, yes, you read right, she was barley 7 months old and girlfriend was walking. I think I have a video, I need to insert it. Mina has taken to this World running and is always up for a new adventure. It KILLS me that she says to me "mommy, when I turn 7 like blah, blah," I cut in "Mina, STOP trying to be older than you are.....ENJOY being 4, stop with the non-sense of being as old as Taylor(9, her cousin) and just be YOU at 4!!!" That answer is never good enough for her and she's ready to grow up.....I fear and hate this, but also know our Mina doesn't like to wait! She's swimming like a fish, pretty much self taught. I worked with her some, but she just got it and this summer we started out by putting her life vest on and two days later, she ripped it off and was off doing "CANNON BALL!" as she rolls over the edge of the pool swimming the length down it! She has enough energy for 5 kids and never stops. She has gotten more girly though and this is cute to see. She's SUCH a tom boy, but her best friend Madison is ALL girl and I think it's rubbing off on her. Mina will strut her stuff around the house in some crazy ass outfit she has put on like she's on a cat walk. Hands on her hips, swaying side to side and then she stops and poses like she's a Vogue model! I crack up, but it's cute! I'm still allowed to pick her clothes out for her and do her hair and I guess this is good because I see most girls her age HAVE to pick their own stuff out to wear! Mina starts pre-k at the end of the month and is excited. Guys, she's smart as a darn whip too. That hamster in her head is turning, turning, turning that wheel and she is just soaking it ALL up! 3 year old school has does wonders for her. She just turned 4 and she can count to 30, does her ABC's, can pick out letters, can write any word you ask as long as you spell it and we have just started working on money and sight words. I'm so proud that she's so excited to learn and loves "knowing" so much. She's the star of my world and I love to pieces! This of course on the days I'm not trying to strangle her from SO much energy.....LOL, when does school start again just keeps playing over and over in my head! HA!

Nico, geez, could he get ANY sweeter? I don't think so. He's our little snuggle buddy. He wants to be held and picked up and not have mom OR dad more than a couple feet away from him. He wants to sleep in the middle of us in our bed and I KNOW this is not good, but SO WHAT! There will be a time when he won't want us around and if he wants to snuggle after 2-3am, so be it. Carlos doesn't admit it, but his face lights up even at 3 when Nico joins us in bed. He loves to snuggle with daddy and it's so cute to see. The best is waking up to Nico giving you kisses. he kisses like a fish too, he will pucker his lips and suck his cheeks and give you a kiss. Mina on the other hand pushes her lips WAY out like she's a super model and wants to give you a kiss, it's scary, it's wet and we tell her ALL the time, please just keep your lips normal, no one wants to kiss big juicy lips! They are so funny in the morning. Mina comes running in the bedroom with this chipper voice "Good Morning mommy and daddy, the sun is UP, the day is Beautiful, the birds are singing, it's going to be GREAT day and I want WAFFLES!" I turn and look at her and see this over excited little face and I look at the clock and say, "but Mina, it's 5 till 6.....OMG, it's TOO EARLY!" "No mommy, it's not too early, today, TODAY is waking up and so should you and it's going to be GREAT day.....the BEST day EVER!" Now you tell me how that would not put a smile on your face and get you out of bed? Nico takes a while to wake up. He's grumpy for an hour or two once he wakes. He's such a man! He wants his milk, he wants to sit in front of the tv and watch cartoons, please don't talk to him, please don't look at him, please don't offer him food, don't smile at him, don't ask him stuff, don't pick him up, he needs TIME to sit and soak up being awake! MEN! He is getting better about eating though. We are managing to get about 700 calories in him a day and he's willing to take a bite of something now. He's had a two pound weight lose over 1-2 years, but he's gained 2 kilos in the last month and we just hope this continues. We are seeing a SLEW of doctor's on his fever issue, he runs 104-106 temps for days on end with no rhyme or reason and we can't seem to pinpoint why. He sees 4 dr's, infectious disease dr at Nemour's Mayo clinic, a Ped GI here in Orlando, A Ped Rhemuatologist at Shand's in Gainesville and his normal Ped here in Orlando. Needless to say we are always at a Dr visit. They are going genetic testing on him when he has his next fever and we should get more answers then. He normally runs these fevers every 2-4 weeks. I have to now keep a log and looking back over the last few months, it's scary to read. He has had fevers up to 107 and ran them for 5 days with nothing wrong with him. They are calling it Periodic Pediatric Fever Syndrome, but until the genetic testing comes back, it's a blind as saying he has high blood pressure. We shall see WHY his little thermostat is set so flipping high here soon!

I've been doing well since the heart scare and the week stay in the hospital. They are monitoring my heart and just keeping tabs on me. I have something that is pretty common, a MVP which is a valve prolasp, but it leaks blood back into the heart at times and causes me to go light headed and dizzy. I can feel it coming on though and just have now learned to sit and take it easy for about an hour. My cardiologist just said I could get back to running and just to stop when I feel my heart skip and no, it's not your asthma Melissa, it's your heart, so stop and just to take it easy. He pretty much said I will have to have an EKG done a few times a year to make sure it's not getting worse pretty much for the rest of my life....Lovely! They just did a "at home" heart monitor on me and I go in Oct 8th to see if they are putting me on meds for it, hopefully not though.

All in all, it's been yet another crazy time here in this house, but what else can you expect from the Crescitelli's? We've had a wonderful summer, full of days packed with something, two house guest moving in, my cousin Wesley and our FIL and it just never seems to slow down. My business partner and I are looking pretty good to signing with Sam's here in Florida. We FINALLY got the buyer to say YES and now we just need to work out the logistics and present to the big boss at the end of the month. If all goes well we will be starting shows with Sam's here in Florida at the beginning of the year. They are testing us out in a 5 club market, but we will NAIL it I know and then they will open us up to more stores. It's been a lot of work getting this business of ours off the ground, but Lisa and I haven't stopped and haven't given up and it looks like because we push so hard, it will pay off!

Here is a video of some of the summer days around here. Hope you enjoy it!

One Crazy Summer for the Crazy Crescitelli's!

It's a been a while

2010-06-15T05:14:00.001-07:00

WOW, I have not updated my blog in SO long. I need to get better about this, but it seems like I have SO much going on these days. I seem to never stop and it's ok, but I miss blogging and writing about funny moments that happen with us and just life in general.

Mina turned 4. My sweet baby girl is growing up. She keeps telling me she's turning 5 on Thursday, you know, everything with Mina is on Thursday! Her birthday this year was on Mother's Day and every 4 years we will celebrate the day together, how special? This year since I've not had my normal time to plan for a huge party or the funds to do it, we took Mina to Disney World for her birthday. We had a friend come and visit, Belinda and her son Colby and they were here her birthday weekend too. Belinda and I met on-line through a baby sight and have been talking for years. She was so much fun and just a wonderful person inside and out and I no longer call her a friend, she's family to us now! We spent the weekend at the Beach and then Mother's Day and Mina's Birthday at Disney. Mina was all dressed up in a fairy outfit I put together for her and looked so adorable. I know she will remember her birthday for a while as she still talks about it. My little girl.....WOW, 4! She's growing up SO fast.....too fast really! I'm just amazed at what she says and how smart she is. She's growing into her own person (which is a lot like me) and she's full of life, full of energy, with a stellar personality that can't be beat! I love my Mina as she reminds me just how wonderful this world is!

Nico has finally gained a little weight. He's up to 22 pounds now! His "unexplained" fevers are still coming, although the last time he had strep, so I'm hoping they don't come back. The Dr called it periodic pediatric syndrome. An unknown cause for his fevers that come about every 5 weeks spiking 104-106 for 5 or so days. High fevers no longer scare me and we are use to dealing with them now. We are seeing a rheumatologist up at Shands and she's running test on his blood. He has a few things off in his bloodwork and so they started genetic testing on him. I had an auto-immune disorder growing up and although they are not "supposed" to be passed down, etc, they want to look for this in him. She said what we will shoot and hope for is that his body is not taking to the shots they get every few months as a baby and we will need to give him more, like every 3 months to build it up in him. We started the bloodwork 2 weeks ago and they've taken almost 20 viles of blood from his little body. They want us to see a Infectious Disease Dr too, but I'm DONE poking him and unless his test come back saying something I want to skip this! In my heart I know he's ok, but I guess it's better to get the testing done and just make sure. He is FINALLY off the bottle! We kept him on it because I was putting rice cereal in it at night to give him something in his belly as he just won't eat. He has started to eat a little, not much, a few crackers a day and he seems happy. He's still not talking yet which I was told he's delayed, but he's trying and the gibberish makes sense to him. He understand what we tell him and follows directions so I'm not too worried about him not talking, he will here soon I know it.

Our house we are renting is back on the market. After a few months the HUD fell through for the buyers and so the process started again. I'm not packing yet until they tell me it's sold. I just can't stress about that right now. I'm not too keen on having strangers walk through this house a few times a day, but it is what it is. At least we have a roof over our heads, and we can be lucky for that. I have NO idea where we will go or when, but we will cross that bridge when we do.

My business is going well. We are about done with the main line and have started a second line. We are hoping to present to Sam's with in the next couple weeks with the second line. I actually get the privilege of meeting with a buyer from Sam's this week! She lives here in the Orlando area and I've invited her over to see the work, see the printer and talk to me about our line. I'm pretty excited about this and hope they pick it up. We have not been picked up yet, but I know it's only time before someone does! Lisa and I just keep working and working and plugging away and we both know soon our hard work will pay off!

This update on us is long enough, but it was well over do. My kids are fighting over a pillow pet and thus I must go and be COP MOM! Life overall for us is STILL crazy, but we are loving and living every moment of it!

"Yesterday is History, Tomorrow is a Mystery, but Today is a Gift and this is why we call it the Present!"

Let me see if I can wrangle up some pics sometime today to post as well!

Update

2010-03-20T13:12:00.000-07:00

Ok, I know, its been FOREVER since I posted an update on us, but I have a free moment so I will TRY! Right now I'm sitting under a shade tree in the parking lot at Disney. We all came as a family & took a break in the RV for lunch and naps. Since everyone is sleeping, and I don't have my computer to work, then I MUST update my blog while I have a free moment.

Free moments, ahhhhh, I don't get too many of those anymore & I almost feel "lost" not having something to, ie, work, cleaning, laundry, cooking and the list goes on. Work takes up a lot of my time and I guess its time to spill the beans on what I'm doing.

I've been working with a client for about 3 years & she's one of my best clients. She feeds me if you know what I mean? Lisa and her family send me order after order from Baby Duck Boutique. In Dec as she was getting her Christmas orders, she called me trilled saying I always impress her & my work is so great. I thanked her but told her, I will most likely close next year. As much as my work feeds my passion, it doesn't feed my wallet & times are tough now & I have to bring more income in. She sent me an email back asking if I ever thought of mass-producing my work and then within a week, a new business started. I have a new business called Mona MELisa Designs and a new partner, Lisa. Working with her is better than anything I could have imagined, and this business I feel is why God put me where I am, to do it! I'm not sure what brought Lisa and I together, but I know in my heart it was for this. We are an amazing team together and it's almost like we share a brain most of the times. She gets me, I get her and I'll spit out rough art designs and together making changes, we come up with AMAZING stuff. She is by far one of the coolest people I've had the chance to meet and funny thing is, we've NEVER met face to face! She lives in AZ and I live here! I feel like I've known her my whole life and we have a great connection and share the same dreams and goals. This is WHY I said God put me here, it just feels SO right, down to my core and into my toes about this business and my partner. I can't tell you HOW excited I am about it. I LOVE working on it, I love working with her, and don't mind working all night either! ;)

My new business with Lisa is similar to BDB. I am designing growth charts, murals, and name signs with the help from her so we can sell on a national level.Lisa is not doing the artwork, I am, but it is both our ideas & brainstorming that is generating the pieces. The art that is being created is one of a kind & never been done before. We have developed a line of art, charts, murals, name signs that are customized to the clients choosing. Its really neat and I'm excited to share the line once we are up and running.

Lisa has an "in" with Costco & we have already presented to them and they are excited. When we presented, we had the murals & signs as coming soon & Costco said they wanted to see the rest of the line. This was GREAT news for us, but more work, and so here we are. I've been working 12-16 hour days since Dec & we are almost done w the artwork. Once done, we will send the rest of the line to Costco & hopefully get picked up. I'm so excited I pinch myself all the time.

So this is where I have been. Starting a new business & trying to get picked up by Costco has been my life the last 4 months! My kids miss mommy, my husband misses his wife & my friends think I dropped off the Earth! Everyone understands though & we are all pulling together to make it work.

The kids, well, they are doing well. Mina just amazes me with what she says, and how she acts. She's such a little girl now. She's so darn cute & makes me smile all the time. She has a way to lift your heart and world with her cute smile. She's high energy, personality plus, and just loves life! She's in 3 year old school and doing SO well. She goes 3 days a week, part time, 9am-2pm. It is worth EVERY penny to send her. Times are tight and we thought about pulling her out, but we didn't and I'm so happy we are making adjustments in other places to keep her there. She busted out with God Bless America the other day. So FUNNY! She has the cutest voice too. Like this:
"Gwad Bwess Ahhmer-i-ka, wand twat i wove...stand beside hwer and gwide her.....

LOL, too cute! The other day she told us about her ice cream swam-minch. Mommy and daddy she says, it has chocolate on the top, chocolate on the bottom and niilllll (villlllaaaaaaaaaa from her tongue popping in and out on her lips super fast) in the middle. Ii thought Carlos and I would FALL out of the chairs laughing. She reminded us it's not nice to laugh at people and we just held it in, and asked again, what was in the middle? Again with the tounge blaaahvillllaaaaaaaa in the middle daddy! I HAVE to record this! HA!

-----stopped on my phone to return to Disney.......4 days later....I'll finish.....

Nico, ahh, my sweet boy! He's still not gaining weight, but all his test came back negative for allergies and so we are just doing what we can to get him to gain a bit, but that is that. No more special diet, no more soy, we are feeding him normal food and just dealing. He refuses to eat most days and still does not sleep through the night, but it is what it is and we just deal with it. He is starting to come into his own and it's cute to see his personality come out. He doesn't like to be dirty, he's shy and clings to his momma and daddy and doesn't want to be left alone with anyone! So funny that we have a daughter who is super spot light look at me now, never met a stranger, chatter box and then a son who still at 19 months is NOT talking, just grunts and points, who is super shy, who only wants mommy or daddy and does not like social situations. It's neat to see both sides and honestly, not sure if we could handle another wild one like our Mina. I would not change either of my kids.....I love them to pieces!

Carlos has been battling BAD allergies and is seeing an ENT dr now. Hopefully they can get him to stop sneezing and using a box of Kleenex a day soon. He's been pretty miserable because he's so congested. The pollen on the East side of Orlando is HIGH and I thin it just triggers him so bad.

We will be moving soon from our house here in Orlando. We have been renting since selling the home in Clermont and the house is now being sold. It's actually being fore closed on. I think we will be out by June or July. Not sure where we are going. We are still going to rent because we are trying to get to Gainesville and hopefully AT&T gives us our transfer request soon. It's only been 3 years we've been asking for a transfer and Carlos has worked with them for like 12 or 13 years now, so they SHOULD move us, but with jobs the way they are, AT&T is not moving people, they are actually laying people off. Carlos is good though, with as many years as he has, he should not get laid off. People with less than 5 years are the ones in trouble. So on top of a new business and busy being mom, wife and ashwanda the cleaning lady....LOL, we have to pack up soon and move. Life is SUCH a roller coaster these days and it seems we are on the warp speed part of the track. Each day at a time is all we can do and just make the best of the situations.

I know this was a LONG post and if you read it......WOW, LOL, it feels good to update on what's been going on. I know at one point it's going to be nice to come back and read these post.

Mina's turning 4 in May, WO, 4.........???????? This year instead of having one of my CRAZY all out parties, we are just taking her back to Disney World and let her get dressed up like a princess in the castle. We made reservations to eat with the characters too. It should be a nice day. Mina's birthday is on Mother's Day this year. Awww, she was due on Mother's Day and she was born 4 days before. It's great to share this day with her......after all, she's why I'm a mother!

Easter is coming up, and HOPEFULLY we can get some new family pics taken! It's been TOO long since we did pics!

Ok, I can keep going on an on as you can see and so I'll end it.......

Just another crazy time in the Crescitelli house!

One Smart Cookie!

2010-03-06T05:27:00.000-08:00

OK, it has been MONTHS since my last update and with good reason! I have started a new business with an amazing partner and we are working so hard to get it up and running. I started working on it a week or so before Christmas and almost everyday since then (if no sick kid or sick me) I have been working 12-16 hour days 7 days a week! I love what I am doing though and believe in our product and my partner and I have this inside feeling something BIG is going to come from this! I'll update soon, HAVE lots to catch up on w the kids, etc.

I decided to write about my smart cookie Mina this morning. Here is the dialogue:

Me - "Mina you are ONE smart Cookie!"
Mina - Eyes wide, mouth open and deep breath "ahhh, I want a COOKIE!"
Me - "No, no, Mina, I said YOU were one smart cookie."
Mina - still with excited face "I want a smart cookie!" her little head is shaking yes.
Me- "No Mina, it's 8am, (I'm laughing) I don't have cookies, I'm calling YOU a smart cookie!"
Mina - "Can I see what a smart cookie looks like?"

I was laughing by this point, grabbed Mina, took her to my mirror and said "There Mina, YOU are the smart cookie!

Mina - "Moooommmmmmmmm, you are sooooo silly, I'm not a cookie, but can I have one?"

I gave up at that point.

It's times like this that really make you smile. Kids are so funny, especially when they think they are getting cookies!

Just another crazy morning in the Crescitelli house!

Update on Nico

2009-12-08T05:39:00.000-08:00

I just have a bit to type and give the update on Nico. He seems to be doing better off of the gluten/wheat/dairy/eggs, but something somewhere is STILL wrong with him. He continued to scream all night for many, many nights and I finally took him in to see the Dr. Our Dr, weighed him and said Nico hasn't had any growth since his year check up, 5 months. He sat down with me and with a smile on his face said we would get to the bottom of this. He told me for some reason Nico has malabsorbtion and isn't keeping much of the food he eats in his body. He told me it could be LOTS of things like IBS, Crone's, Celiac or something as simple as a Parasite. He scheduled a test this Thursday to rule out Cystic Fibrosis in him. He shows a lot of the signs, but we are certain he doesn't have this, we just need to rule it out. Mom said he's just covering his ass as a Dr! He has sent us for a slew of bloodwork to be done on him and we had to give poop samples. Now you KNOW your a mother when you can dig through a diaper and fill 3 large containers of pooh for the Dr......YUCK! He let us know that if we can't find anything from the stool or blood that they admit Nico and scope him to take a sample from his intestines and test it under a microscope. All in all, the Dr is doing what seems like a lot, but we need to know what is going on with him and why he's not gaining and afraid to eat food.

Over the last couple days Nico has really improved though. He slept last night from 8 until 4 and the night before until 6! This is the most he has slept in a month's time in one shot! Too bad I am sick and didn't rest while he did. Seems like forever since I've gotten a full nights sleep! Nico is eating again, this is GOOD! He seems to be doing much better gluten free. Maybe he screamed night after night for 5 days while the bad stuff cleared his body? I'm not sure, but he screamed and screamed and had the foulest smelling diarrhea diapers I've ever encountered. It almost seems like a light switch though and for the past 48 hours, he seems to be getting back on the normal track. We SO need this for him!

I have to say it was a bit overwhelming to adjust our diets to be gluten free, but we are getting better at it. Never thought I would be a Nazi mom who reads into every label and every ingredient with a fine tooth comb, but here I am. I'm really trying to just make the adjustment for the entire family. If this is really his problem, I don't want him growing up thinking he is "spacial" or has to eat different than everyone else. Plus, it's VERY hard to cook 2 completely separate meals 3 times a day! I felt like I was washing dishes and cooking non stop and having to meal plan that much will make anyone go crazy. I'm crazy enough as we ALL know, so I don't need any more help! ;)

I will post after the CF test and after we get the blood work back. Hopefully we get our answers and in the mean time, I just PRAY we continue the way we have the last 48 hours.......ahhhhhhhh, it's nice in this house again!

More crazy times here at the Crescitelli's!

Celiac in our 1 year old?

2009-11-27T05:46:00.000-08:00

Well yesterday was Thanksgiving. Yet anther year since I last saw some of my family at my moms and again it was so wonderful to see them and have lunch. Moms is always so special on Thanksgiving and really makes me thankful for the wonderful family I have. We were driving to moms house and were coming through a small town, Melrose, where our lake house is and I was moved so much I was brought to tears. Right next to a church in the middle of the street stood people holding signs that read FREE FOOD, PLEASE COME EAT! Across the street they were feeding the town's people who could not afford food and they were passing out clothes and other donations to them. Just thinking about now makes me emotional again. It is in the heart of these small towns that you find the true meaning of living and giving. How wonderful it was to see so many people giving up spending the Holiday with their families to put a huge lunch on for those who didn't have one. I have to say from the bottom of my heart, I am VERY THANKFUL to know there are people out there that still care about one anther and love thy neighbor. It means a lot to me when I see people lending a helping hand, even when the hand they have holds little. This is what life is about, giving, sharing, and loving one anther good, bad or indifferent! We might have wars going on over sea's, but back at home in the heart of this country and in the towns, we have people helping people and I could not be prouder OR more thankful for that!

So now on to my sweet baby boy Nico. UGH, we have HIT a crossroad AGAIN! When we stripped everything out of his diet he was eating, eating, eating. Nico was eating so much I didn't know when he would stop. Well, he stopped. He has all but quit eating once again. The only thing I can get him to eat is watermelon, banana's or his much loved grapes. He will eat a "cookie" this is what we call his crackers, here and there, but won't eat them like he use to. He has not gained any weight in 3 months and looks as if he is not "growing." Carlos and I are not big people and thus our children will not be big, but it worries me that he won't eat and that he's not gaining weight at this age. He is 15 months old and I know that babies this age need to gain a few pounds a month. We just can't get him to eat though. The only reason he's not losing weight is because we spend an astronomical amount of money on goat's milk. Yes, you read right, astronomical! A pint of goat's milk is 4 dollars, this makes a gallon of goat's milk 16 dollars! WO! We spend 20 dollars every week JUST on Nico's milk! Goat milk is soooooo good for him though. It has fats in it, proteins in it and is easy to digest on his tummy. We are poor though and so for the sake of money we mix his milk 1/2 and 1/2 with organic soy milk. Why not just soy milk? We don't just do soy milk because it doesn't contain much fat at all and just doesn't have the "good stuff" that babies need. All babies and toddler's need milk and need milk fat, hence the Dr's saying "whole milk" for the first year of life. It is VERY important for brain development to get the "fat's" that whole milk has when the baby is 1 for the next year until at least 2. At 2, Dr's say it is ok to go to 2% so the kid doesn't get too much "fat" in their diet. So we do goat milk for the fat and the proteins that soy just doesn't have.

I am thankful that we are giving him goat's milk. I think if we pulled the goat milk from his diet he would be losing weight. He has all but refused eating foods, is back to clingy and being cranky and just unhappy again. I am racking my brain so to speak on "why?" He was doing so well, what changed? Ah-hah, we have put wheat back in his diet. Could Nico have Celiac? Could he be sensitive to gluten? I know that when Nico was doing well, eating plates of food, we had cut dairy out, egg out, gluten out among the other things that were making him react. I didn't really think "wheat" was the culprit, leaning more towards egg and dairy so we have re-introduced wheat and gluten. It seems that it took just a week of bringing this food back into his diet that he started his old ways again. A few weeks later and he has all but stopped eating unless it's grapes. I have spoken to my mother about this a few times trying to decide what to do. Once he started boycotting food again I assumed it was because he was getting too much milk. I was giving him about 22 ounces of half soy, half goat milk a day. I thought he wasn't hungry and eating because he was getting too much milk and full and didn't want and or need food. I then cut his milk intake to 14 ounces a day, which is not a lot and yet still he would not eat. After a week of 14 ounces of milk he was irritable, and screaming all the time. He was hungry, but refused foods unless it was a banana or grapes in the morning. What was I to do? Of course as a mother I upped his milk intake back to 22 ounces and here we sit. Nico is not loosing weight, however he's not gaining. Nico will drink his milk, but won't eat food. Of course he will have a few grapes, but has pretty much stopped even eating banana's. If I put him in his high chair, he just screams at me and screams at the food throwing it on the floor. I have tried putting him in my lap to feed him, NO, he refuses to eat. WHY? WHY? WHY? I have come to a conclusion of sort, maybe Nico has Celiac, a gluten intolerance.

Starting today I will now cut gluten out of his diet again. We will go back to basics yet again. He has been egg/dairy free for some time now, but gluten will now join this group. I know it was take a few days to a week to "clear" the foods from him and make him feel better, and so in a week I will blog again to share how he is doing. I am also calling his Ped to see Dr Erheart, a ped GI that Mina use to see. Something somewhere is causing him to be unhappy and not eat and as his parents it is our responsibility to find out why and get him happy and healthy.

It has me wondering though, WHY have Carlos and I had 2, not 1, but 2 kids with terrible food allergies? Neither one of us have food allergies. I know that genetics has lots to do with allergies along with family history, but it still has me wondering "why" both of our kids have had such problems with food. It has caused me to dig and research a bit on the foods we eat here in this country, what's put in it and why all of a sudden things like allergies and celiac are on the rise among our children.

I'm not going to preach, or tell anyone this or that, but I URGE all of you to READ, READ, and READ about our food in this country, (GMO's), and find out what's really in stuff and what the US government is telling us is safe. None, and I mean NO clinical trials have been done on GMO's in humans and yet we have been eating them in this country since the early 90's. HUM, and now we have a slue of problems with our off-spring and allergies, amongst other things. Are we changing our DNA structure with unsafe foods? Knowledge is a powerful thing, and just because someone, somewhere has told you something is "safe," shouldn't you find out if it really is for yourself? I'm just not sure why Americans are ok with not "knowing" about our food and not demeaning a better product. Europeans won't eat our GM products because they demand as people to eat safe, healthy and natural, the way God intended it. Hum?

Food for thought in the Crescitelli house. Update in a week on Nico egg/dairy/gluten free!

Dreams

2009-11-17T05:16:00.000-08:00

I have not blogged in a while, I know BAD, BAD, but I feel like I have not had a moments peace to stop and do much these days. Carlos is home.....YIPPIE, but it seems like I am +even busier now than when he was gone. It's good though and feels good to have my partner and best friend back by my side. I know how much he means to me as it was torture to have him gone, almost like part of my soul was missing. Tomorrow is my birthday....WO, no more after this year and we are planning a cocktail party Sunday and I'm excited about it. Finally after 4 years a birthday that I'm not pregnant on OR breastfeeding!

I wanted to blog this morning about my dream last night. I'm a CRAZY dreamer and laugh all the time saying I missed my calling as a movie director because I dream these vivid wild dreams that play out like movies. I often wake Carlos up rattling off all the adventures I was on, flying through the air, and just doing off the wall stuff like butchering a horse and getting the meat out which was in packages to feed the town's people! Crazy right? I even had series of dreams helping to free the slaves. I be-friended the mean cowboy so I could sneak the slaves past him and his gang in the middle of the night. Old soul? Maybe. Just strange none the less the things that pop in my mind while I sleep.

Last night, or early morning rather I was dreaming about saving lives. Carlos and I were in a car in driving on the east coast, somewhere up north, like Main or something. My mom and dad were driving behind us. The kids were not in the car with us. We were driving pretty fast through this small town which sits on a major waterway of some sort. There was this "working bridge" that you had to take to get off the island or out of the town we were in. The main street in the town was closing down as the "working bridge" was getting ready to close for the day. We were racing through the little town up and down alleys and streets to get to the bridge before it closed. We saw the bridge and honestly it looked like a tonka train plastic bridge that butted up to a big circle port area where the end of the town and road was. We put our foot down on the gas to get to the bridge and just as we were getting ready to get on the bridge it collapsed into the water and started moving away from the end of the road/port area we were at. Carlos and I could not stop in time and we ended up falling off the road area and into the water. We landed on a big floating sheet of metal or something and so our car didn't sink in the water. We both took our breath and said WHEW, we are ok. Just then a car comes off the road and goes into the water, followed by anther, and a anther. 3 vehicles came crashing into the water and they all had people and kids in them. I looked at Carlos and said "we have to help them!" Carlos said the water is freezing and we could die ourselves! I didn't care. I took off my shoes and jumped into the water to get these people out of the cars and try to save them before the vehicles sank. My mom and dad were out of their car and my dad took his shoes off and jumped in the freezing water to help me. My mom came in a few minutes later after she called for help. The first vehicle I came too had these kids in them. I was looking at the glass and could see the kids screaming to get out and could see them drowning. I was treading water and somehow managed to break the glass and pull the smallest of the kids out who looked dead already. It was a boy, maybe about 2. I held him over my head, treading water, screaming to the crowd for help thinking he was dead. He gasped for air while in my hands as I passed him to the people and I knew he would be ok. I went back to the car to pull more people out. I don't remember how many people I pulled out, but they were all kids and all half dead. I was fighting with seat belts and car seats in the cars to get them out. My mom and dad were getting people out and I just remember my mom telling me "keep treading water Mel, you can do this, you're a strong swimmer!" They were pulling people out and taking them to the edge of the road with me. The last car that fell in look hopeless and the people looked dead already, past the point of trying to save. We had gotten everyone out of the first 2 vehicles and they were all alive laying in the street with the town's people. We didn't have time to get to the last one before it filled with water drowning the people inside. We rushed over anyway and my dad and I flipped it over.....yeah, super human strength I have in my dreams! They all looked dead still strapped into the seats. Dad and I were STILL trying to get belts off and get them out. Just then one of the kids, maybe 10 or so started vomiting water all over me. I was screaming "he's alive, he's alive, help me, help me!" He threw up on me 3 times and it was so horrible that I was dry heaving while fighting with his belt to get him out. The little pocket of air he had when we shifted the car was filling and time was running out to save him. As it filled with water and his head went down, I dug deep and was able to unbuckle him and bring him out of the car where my dad was and grabbed him from me and swam him to the road. The car then sank. There were 3 other people in that car that went down with it. I was sad, deep pain of sadness because we couldn't save them all. I swam over to the edge where the road was and the crowd pulled me up. I laid on the concrete gasping for air and completely exhausted. I could hear the crowd talking about us as hero's and thinking no way, 3 people just died and we could not save them all. Just then I awoke from the sounds of Nico crying in his crib at 6:30am.

What a crazy dream. I spoke to my mom this morning and told her about it and she said, start writing these dreams down hun, you never know where they will lead or you'll end up doing with these stories. I agreed and thus shared it on my blog. Not sure when the next big story of mine will play out in my dreams, but I'll be sure to keep writing them down. I dream like a movie being played and I have to say they are pretty neat.

On to Dr's apts and working!

Just anther crazy time in the Crescitelli house!

Values

2009-10-22T18:06:00.001-07:00

I have to stop for a minute, and I don't have much time these days to do this, and take the time to thank my parents for the values they instilled in me.

Growing up was crazy it seemed. Times were good, times were bad, times money flowed, times money didn't, but all in all, my parents held true to themselves and instilled values in me and my brothers about how one should act, care, do and live. I want to thank them from the bottom of my heart for doing that for me.

I remember when I was growing up that we always had LOTS of kids to feed. There were four of us and we ALWAYS had one, two or many, many more over at the house and we always ate and we always ate well. I remember at times growing up that my mom and dad would take in a kid, usually one who didn't have a home and would care for that child, feed him/her, put them in activities and showed them that they were loved. I use to think they were just "crazy" but now looking back, I know they were saints and I'm sure the kids growing up with us would say the same thing. We never had much growing up. By that I mean not the latest and greatest of this and that, but we were always cared for, shown love and taught how to care and love one anther, no matter what.

My parents would feed us all, 7 extra friends included at Pizza Hut after a ball game and the next week count change to buy milk and bread. We never went without. They provided a wonderful life for us, giving us what we "needed" always and not always giving us what we "wanted." I still have the phrase fresh in my mind that my mother would say when I wanted the extra frills in life...."too bad your wants won't hurt cha!" It's a phrase that has stuck with me since the very first time she said it.

Life here in America is all about "what" you have, "how much" you have and how "BIG" what you have is. My parents raised us with the values that it's not about what you have, but it's about "WHO" you are and what you "DO" with what you have that matters!

Times are tough for LOTS of us right now, including me and our family. My parents have always been a constant support as well as great friends along the way that have extended their hands. While we might not have much, we are STILL willing to share the little we have to make someone's day a little better.

I have recently shared good fortune on a great friend of mine. It wasn't much in the eyes of many, but to her, it made her day, it made her kids day and it made her not stress so much if even for a short week or two. Other's have done this for me in the past. Allowing me to actually have Christmas when we were not in a situation to have one and I remember how good it felt knowing they were there and willing to "share" what they did have with us and make our times seem not as tough! Now I don't have much to share, but what I do, I'm willing and it felt great to help someone who needed it. I cried as she called me crying the day she found my "surprise" in her house. It felt good to me and at the bottom of my heart, I LOVED extending a hand that's been extended to me so many times before.

I have to thank my parents though. I have to thank them for raising me with values. I have to thank them for teaching me to think about others before thinking about myself. I have to thank them for teaching me that that's better to give, no matter how little you have or how little you give, to someone who really needs it. You might be rolling quarters in the other room for milk, but you SHARE what you have and you lend people a helping hand, NO MATTER WHAT!

From the bottom of my heart mom and dad, thank you for making me the strong, passionate, caring, giving woman I am today. I thank you for the values you instilled in me and I thank you for making me who I am today. You are the reason I am WHO I am and I love you for it!

Just remember, it feels TEN times grater to do something for others than for yourself. If we could ALL learn to live this way.......oh what a World it would be! We should ALL take the time to slow down, downsize and help thy neighbor. I heard a quote on Oprah the other day from a couple in Denmark (the happiest place on Earth.) The average size house is 800 square feet and when Oprah walked in and said "this is it, this is REALLY it???" The man replied with this simple saying......."Less house means Less things, Less things means MORE life!" That has stuck with me since I heard it. Family, friends and caring for one anther is what matters in this world......take a step back and think about your values!

Not so crazy thoughts from the Crescitelli house!

M

One Sweet Little Girl!

2009-10-06T18:11:00.000-07:00

Tonight was anther crazy time in this house. We are getting use to a routine here without Carlos and it's getting easier, but MAN do I miss him and MAN do I feel like I need a break. I have a new found respect for single parents and for military families. It's HARD having a 3 year old and 1 year old by myself. I wish we lived close to home, but we don't, so for now, it's just me.

I made yummy chicken nuggets tonight. Wheat free, Gluten free, Dairy free, Egg free. HOW do you ask, um, I'm getting use to cooking like this and just DID it with rice flour. I cut up organic chicken breast and needed something to coat them in. I put together a mixture of Soy milk, Vegan Mayo, Vegan butter, Nutritional Yeast(it's good and 9gms of protein per serving), red sea salt and paprika. I then put the rice flour with Emerald's Essence seasoning, red sea salt and yup, rice crispy cereal. I coated in the batter and then in the flour mixture and pan fried them in organic canola oil, just a tad that I put 3 smashed garlic cloves into. They turned out pretty good. Next time I think I will bake them, but with a little homemade honey mustard, and I make THE BEST, it was fantastic and you would NEVER know it was Wheat/Egg/Dairy/Gluten free. Cooking is a work of art and you only get better by doing. I have LOTS to learn on how to make yummy food for a toddler who can't eat much!

After dinner and a bath, it was time for bed. I put Nico down while Mina had downtime watching cartoons and drinking some milk. I put Mina to bed and up arose my sweet girl.

I don't think I've EVER talked about JUST how sweet Mina is and can be. She ALWAYS seems to be on the other end, wild/crazy/uncontrollable, etc, but she has SUCH a sweet side. Even her teacher said to me, WOW, she's ALOT to handle, but she's the only one who will stop what she is doing to come up and hug and kiss me, like 3 times a day. Mina is affectionate and I LIVE for these moments.

Since Carlos left, it's me putting her to bed at night and we are not use to this as it's what Carlos does with her. Tonight she climbs into bed and wraps her arms me and squeezes me while giving me a kiss.

Me: "Ummmm, you're SO sweet Mina and I love you!"
Mina: "I love you too Mommy, you're my very best friend in the whole wide world!"

She rolled over towards me and ask "will you sleep with me tonight?" "no baby, but I'll lay with you for a bit." A smile went across her face and she snuggled right up to me, forehead on forehead and grabbed my head and squeezed it tight loving me and these words were to follow......

Mina: "don't worry mommy, daddy ALWAYS comes back for me......(a faint whisper voice) he HAS to, he loves us."
Me: "Please never forget just how much your daddy loves us and remember he will ALWAYS come back for us.....goodnight and sleep tight my love!" I kiss her.
Mina: "my heart loves you too mommy.......I LOVE my best friend!"

She gave my hand a squeeze and drifted to sleep.

I almost started crying. She loves me now and I love that about her. I'm not so easy on her, especially being the ONLY one all day and yet she still knows I love her. I HAD to blog about this because I FEAR in 10 years she will hate me and not remember this love for me. It seems that daughter's FORGET about loving mom during those tough teenage years to later realize how much mom really knows and was right when they "grow" up a bit and become close friends again. For now, I will SOAK UP every ounce of caring and "I love you" from her I get. What a wonderful feeling to have.

Mother's and Daughter's.......what a special bond we have. In case my mom is reading........I've loved you this way for as long as I can remember.....you were my FIRST best friend and remained that to me.....and if I forgot to tell you today......"I LOVE YOU!"

Re-dick-er-us!

2009-10-02T16:12:00.000-07:00

Friday is school day and since Carlos is gone, I'm getting Mina to help more and more around here.....hum, maybe NOT such a good idea!

Here was our morning.....

Mel "Mina, today is school day, please go in your room and pick out an outfit." Mina is BIG on wearing clothes she picks out. 10 minutes later I think, hum, where IS she? This is what I found in her room!

Mel: "OMGosh MINA, this is a MESS, UGH......it's ridiculous to pull ALL your clothes out!!! Look at the MESS you made!"

Mina "Mommy, it's not re-dick-er-us!" she starts laughing at me "it's my CLOTHES silly mommmy!"

I just looked at her and shook my head and she started laughing again.

Mina "my silly mommy called my clothes re-dick-er-us!" hahahahahahaha!

At this point I had to smile too. Man, what a mess to clean up!

Crazy times indeed at the Crescitelli house!

Wheat?

2009-10-01T17:52:00.000-07:00

Oh boy, oh boy, what is going on??? My sweet baby Nico has been doing WONDERFUL, and I mean a new baby. He's soooo super happy these days, he plays, he sleeps, he doesn't scream and then today it ALL comes crashing down!

Since he was doing SO well, I decided to make pizza crust and pizza for him. I sauteed organic spinach, mushrooms, red onions and red peppers for lunch. I decided to make a "quick" crust using all purpose flour and yeast and it's ready in 5 mins, no proofing, etc.

With in an hour after eating this Nico screamed BLOODY murder for one and a half hours! He was inconsolable. He would not let me rock him, he would not let me hold him without kicking and screaming at me, he would not let me put him down. It was HELL on Earth for a bit around here until he managed to fall asleep from the exhaustion.

When he woke an hour later he was back to crying, and yanking on his skin. I decided to cut the wheat out and see for dinner. I had these rice veggie noodles, which are great and made those for us tonight. I then took the frozen tomato sauce I made a few nights back and heated it up over the noodles. The last time I gave him this sauce he had hives on both arms. He was also eating wheat pasta that time. I wanted to see if it was the tomatoes or the pasta that made him react tonight.

Within 20 mins of eating the organic tomato sauce from scratch, hives appeared. UGH, was it the tomatoes from dinner or the flour from lunch? He screamed at me after lunch so.....? He has hives again and has scratched himself so bad since he woke up that he is bleeding on his sides like before. Nico just trys to deal with it, but you see him fussy, yanking and pulling on his skin until he bleeds. Tonight, he didn't have all the screaming like he did today after lunch and it makes me wonder?

Wheat/gluten intolerance? Could THIS be the reason he's not been ok with food? I understand he may have reactions to things like tomatoes, mango's, peaches, pears, etc, but he straight up screamed at me today for an hour and a half like someone cut his foot off. I have NOT heard this screaming from him in about 2 weeks. We were doing SO great.

HUM?

Oh what FUN and CRAZY days around this Crescitelli house.......NOT!

5 weeks away.......

2009-09-29T08:59:00.000-07:00

Carlos called me last week and said he had an offer to go to Alabama and work and should he go. We tossed the idea around and then decided that he MUST go because of the money he could make up there. He will be working A LOT....12 hour days, 13 days on, 1 day off for 5 weeks. He will bring home over double his normal paycheck and this family could use the extra money right now!

He left yesterday and it was sad, but we both know that 5 weeks is not that long in the grand scheme of things and we can pull through this. Mina is having a hard time adjusting without her daddy and just doesn't understand why he's not coming home yet. Carlos left yesterday and while I was cooking dinner, she told me "no mommy, don't cook yet!" "why Mina, it's time for dinner" "because my daddy is not home from work yet and he needs to eat dinner too!" Awww, it was cute and sad all the same time. She has an incredible bond with her daddy and he just lights her world up.

It was a bit of an adjustment cooking dinner, feeding the kids, getting baths, pj's, kitchen cleaned, bed times and getting lunch packed for school all by myself, but I did it and managed just fine. I learned that I had to just let the kitchen go until after I put the kids down. It was 9pm before dishes from dinner were cleaned and it KILLED me to see the mess for 2.5 hours, but I needed to do bedtime routine and that was more important. The kitchen will get cleaned, it just might take me a while to do this.

I woke up a few times last night feeling cold in our big bed and just sensing something was missing....ah yeah, Carlos, but I slept ok and I know it will get better. We miss him, I won't lie, but he is doing what he needs to for his family and we love him for it! Life around here will be harder without my partner, but I know I'm stronger than I think and can do this. Now if I can just make Mina understand 5 weeks is not long! She said to me last night in bed "Mommy....daddy will come back...he ALWAYS comes back for me!" I said yes he does honey and I gave her a kiss. She rolled over, smiled thinking about him and went to sleep.

My family is doing SO MUCH better with our new diet too. I can't even tell you just HOW happy Nico is. He is a complete JOY to be around. He laughs, plays, runs around this house with a huge smile on and it just melts my heart. He has not been this happy in SO long and it's just wonderful to see him this way! He is sleeping through the night now, sleeping at nap times, no screaming, no fussing, no clinging on to me and wanting to be held night and day, he's eating food....lots of food and is just overall a different baby. He's on a pretty tight diet, but I'm making it fun for him. He LOVES rice, peas and carrots and so he eats this a lot. He's on Goat milk and getting chubby legs!

Mina was in SHOCK running to the pantry and not seeing all the crap she use to eat. She is getting use to not eating junk food, and by this I mean no Cheezit's, cookies, chips, teddy grams, etc. All we have in this house is real food with ingredients that we can read, no GMO's, and no dyes and I've pretty much cut out the sugar. I have to say, WOWEE, she is also a different child. For the first time last week since school started she had a straight green week. This means she was good all 3 days. Mina was doing terrible in school, yellow days, red days and this is VERY BAD and she was having them more and more. Once I cut the dyes out of her food and went natural, it was almost an instant change in her behavior. I had the director of her school stop and ask me "what changed with her?" I told her what I did with her diet and she said "wow, she will listen now and follow the rules!" I am also seeing the change in her at home and I'm not stark raving MAD by 5pm these days from dealing with them. I had Mina bouncing off the walls in every direction and Nico screaming covered in hives vomiting! Carlos would come home and I would throw the kids at him and want to run and hide! Yesterday was nice here at home with my happy baby and our 3 year old in a normal mode. I have never connected the artificial dyes to her being hyper, but I'm here to tell you, it has changed her!

We are eating well, feeling great and taking charge of our bodies and life. I like this way of living, it's so much less stressful on me! I miss my best friend, but I know he will be back soon and until then, I'm keeping this house and our kids happy and healthy.

Organic and Dye Free......Can we do this???

2009-09-22T12:27:00.000-07:00

Well, my sweet Nico is so much better today! He still has hives, but they are going down and not blistering red. He seems happier and actually slept through the night for me. I think all his troubles sleeping were due to the fact that I was feeding him stuff he was allergic to. He would SCREAM like someone was cutting his foot off for HOURS on end during the night. Low and behold, he has LOTS of allergies and we are JUST now finding out.

I'm not sure what is clearing the hives up. We took him off Amoxicillin which had red dye #40 in it. The Dr said it could be the dye OR the Amox that he was reacting to. After doing some research, and I'm doing TONS, I'm finding out more and more about the foods we eat, what we put into our bodies and is "approved" for sale by the FDA. The dyes in our foods are linked to behavior problems and hyper-activity...ahum, Mina, and that we as Americans just eat it up because we are told it's safe. I am just blown away at the genetic engineered foods that this country has been making since 1994 (GMO's) and the fact that they are NOT governed and have NOT been tested on human consumption. Europe won't even sell our GMO foods (corn) because it has been found to give rats problems and they won't sell food that is not safe. So why might I ask is this government allowing foods that are considered "not safe" by Europe and other parts of the world safe for us? It's because we as Americans are a mass producing country and feel the need to have lots of stuff and have it fast.....even our food! What is to come from all this? No one really knows because it's NEVER been tested on humans, but it's been on the market since 1994 and celiac disease as well as lots and lots of allergies are growing by leaps and bounds in this country. Soy beans that this country produces have been GM to be able to handle Roundup spray. You know Roundup, it's the stuff you spray on your sidewalk to KILL all plants from coming up. This soybean can handle the Roundup, but it kills all the weeds around it, but at the end of the day.....who's eating the soybean???? That would be you and me my friend! We have now engineered a pig to have Omega 3's in it's meat....WTF people, EAT FISH! The more I read, the more I want to PUKE about what I am putting into my body as well as my families body. It's gross and something needs to be done! They are now making cloned animals and we are eating the meat from the super market and there is NO label required to tell you that what you are eating is a clone! I for ONE do NOT want to eat a clone, I want a REAL animal, and one NOT fed the GMO corn we grow in this country....ewww! Use that corn for Ethanol, not to screw up our bodies and animals! President Obama wants to change the health care reform in this country, but if you don't change the foods we eat, we will NEVER get healthy. We will continue to depend on new Dr's, new medicines and keep having people die from heart disease, obesity and diabetes! I for one NEED to make a change. Maybe not for the world, maybe not for my extended family, but for OUR family, the 4 of us. I just want us eating REAL foods and I want us healthy. What started as research for Nico and his allergies is leading our family down a new path for food. I have to wonder if my high strung 3 year old is the way she is because of all the dyes in her food. We shall see as I'm getting rid of the "fake" stuff in our house and we are going back to basics!

A trip to Whole Foods Market (no artificial dyes allowed in ANY foods they sell) today was the start of a new found way to eat for us. I know you don't need EVERYTHING to be organic, but stuff that is sprayed A LOT needs to be, ie, apples, peaches, strawberries, potatoes, bell peppers, celery, cherries, grapes and a few more. Avocado, broccoli, pineapple, mango, asparagus, sweet peas, cabbage, eggplant are some things that don't need to be organic. Our meats and dairy need to be organic because of the hormones, antibiotics and "other" fillers injected into the animals to produce the foods at a fast rate. It's expensive, I KNOW, my goodness, two bags of food from Whole Foods today was 75 bucks, but it's something I HAVE to get good at buying and something I HAVE to do for my family. I'm hoping picking things with mom next summer, strawberries, corn, peaches, tomatoes, etc will help keep my cost down. My mom is pretty good at canning and freezing and thus I will learn her secrets. I told Carlos that we need to start a garden and grow our own stuff, bell peppers, tomatoes, when we can and he agreed. I want to get back to real food and eat the way my grandmother did. You didn't have ALL the health problems, and all the allergies that's sweeping this nation today back then. People ate what they grew, people didn't have GMO corn fed to cows that they ate, people KNEW where there food was from, how it was harvested and there were NO fillers in it! Amazing how we have shaped Americans today ey?

I'm having a HARD time trying to think about how we will afford this new change. It's hard enough to just buy regular food to put on the table these days! I really don't want to go back to our old way of eating after the reading I've done and I'm willing to cut back on the "extras" if need be. So we might not have chips and crackers on every shelf in the pantry, but our family will be fed at every meal with food that is real, that is dye free(red #40, yellow, blue) and healthy for us. I have to do this for us. Nico and his LONG list of allergies that is growing, Mina and her hyperness, and the need to feel "healthy" on a "real food" level has hit us and change HAS to be made. I wish we had land to grow our own food and raise our own cows and chickens, I'm SERIOUS too! This is how my grandmother lived and so it's back to the basics for the Crescitelli gang.

Nico has started Goat's milk and I HOPE he can have this without a reaction. It's SUPER expensive, 6 dollars for half a gallon, but I want him drinking milk with fats as it's important to brain development in babies and kids. Soy has LOTS of estrogen in it......tee hee, Mina was on Soy for a while and she had breast buds within 6 months! She had more of a chest at 15 months old then I did when I was 13! 4 weeks off the Soy and they returned to normal. Soy's not bad, but I shouldn't just give Nico this in every form it comes in! Next we will try Rice milk for him. It won't have the good stuff like Goat's milk, but it should help with the expense. Maybe we will go half and half? Who knows? I just want him healthy and happy and to get his allergies under control!

I know I've vented about the GMO's and food in this country, but it's SICK to read and I felt the urge to share.

On to healthy Crazy Crescitelli days around here! :)

Allergies????

2009-09-21T10:52:00.001-07:00

Ok, well we are having major issues with allergies in this house! Mina, ahum, was allergic to EVERYTHING under the freaking sun as a baby. She was allergic to all dairy, all soy, my milk, yes in the 3rd percentile, processed foods, detergents and the list went on and on. At 5 months old she was only 10 pounds and "failure to thrive." She also had severe reflux, so it was a bad mix all the way around. Mina was even allergic to the non-allergenic formula sold in the states....what are the odds right? At 5 months old faced with a nasty surgery to fix the reflux issues and help keep food down, we tried one last option. I was given a can of Neocate, an elemental formula with NO hydrolyzed proteins in it AT ALL! I was given 3 days to "try" this last ditch effort to put weight on her. Low and behold, IT WORKED! She kept it down and started gaining weight....1 pound in the 3 days we "tried" it. She only had 1 more bout of bad reflux a month later and from there, just grew and flourished. Mina out-grew most of her allergies by the time she was one. We have some issues still with processed stuff like jams and jelly's, etc, but for the most part, she eats everything now and has no problems with it.

When Nico was born I asked God, please let him be "normal" whatever that means, but I asked to please let him not have it so rough as a baby and my prayers were answered. Nico was breastfed until I dried up when he was 6 months old. At this point he took Similac formula and did fine on it. I liked having a baby that could drink milk, even though it's not real milk that he was drinking, it's still milk based. Nico was also eating table food and eating well.

5 weeks before his first birthday I started mixing whole milk in his formula to get him use to milk. I started with about 10-15% milk and the rest formula. The next week I went to 25/75 percent spilt. The following week I went 50/50 milk to formula and at this point he was screaming at me, mad all the time and vomiting. I thought, ok, back off the milk and go back to 25/75 for anther week. I did this and just kept adding milk into his formula until he was 100 percent whole milk a week after his first birthday. Ever since we started him on milk, he was not a happy baby. He was constipated, gassy, fussy, screamed at us night and day, refused to eat table food and just all around crabby. At one point I said to Carlos, do you think he will EVER eat table food again or is this little guy going to drink forever? He would simply push food away from his face, close his lips and just not eat after 1 or so bite. I thought was strange because he use to be such a good eater and didn't know why he stopped.

2 weeks after his birthday Nico started getting hives. Not just hives, but big red blistering hives that were bleeding because he scracthed them so much.
He walked around this house constantly itching and crying like he had a burning itch from inside his body. He was miserable, looked miserable and just cried all the time. I thought his hives were from his Pampers because it was on the sides of where his diapers started, but within a couple days, the hives spread all over his body, on his arms, his face, lips, mouth and left eye swollen shut with hives on it. I knew at this point we had a problem and it wasn't the Pampers! Poor Pampers people too, they got an EAR full from me on the perfume in their products, tee hee!

I call the Dr and make an apt to get him seen and in the meantime, STOPPED all milk. I said to Carlos, I'm not sure what he is allergic to so why don't we go back to no food, put him back on Similac formula and just give him that until we see the Dr. it was Labor day weekend so we had 3 days before we saw the Dr. We bought a can of Similac and gave him a bottle. He drank it right up and 10 mins later, puked everything up all over the place, projectile vomit from one end of his room to the other! Ok, I said, NO more formula and we went back to the store to get Soy milk.

The soy milk seemed to sit MUCH better with him. No vomiting, no hives on his face and lips and we thought ok, he can't have milk. We were still giving him crackers however with dairy in them and thus his hives were not clearing up. We then stopped feeding him ALL dairy products, and eggs. OMG, what a different baby within a day on this diet! We gave him simple juice, apple and just basic food like potatoes and white rice and soy milk to drink. He was drinking the soy milk UP, I mean like half a gallon a day, but he wasn't eating much table food, so we gave it to him, I didn't care, I wanted him to at least drink some milk, even if it was soy!

We saw the Dr and she looked at his skin was like WO, look at these hives! I said, yes, but they look GOOD compared to what they did and he's feeling better. I spoke to her about him boycotting food, not sleeping through the night, screaming and crying, fussy, not pooping everyday, etc, etc and she said he's probably allergic to foods and that we needed a blood test called a RAST test done on him. They took 4 viles of blood from him and while we waited on the results he was to eat no dairy, duh, and no eggs. She would not even give the flu shot because it has eggs in it....go figure?

Within a 4 days of being on this diet, Nico was coming back to his old self. I didn't realize just how unhappy he was for a couple months until he started "feeling" better and returned to the lovable little guy he is and was. Carlos and I went shopping at Whole Foods and we shopped like vegans do and only bought foods with no dairy and no egg and even no gluten. We were not sure about gluten, but hey, why not take it out too and get him healthy and then try again.

Nico did wonderful for about a week on this "special" diet. We then ran out of his all natural apple juice and started giving him Juicy Juice of his sisters. The flavor was apple banana and like his sister, he got half juice and half water. Nico's hives started again and it left Carlos and I stumped as to "what" it was from. I rewashed ALL of his bedding and laundry in dye free, perfume free soap and started really looking at labels. Nico then came down with a 102-103 fever and I was giving him Tylenol for it before taking him to the Dr 3 days later. Nico had strep throat and needed antibiotics. Carlos gave Nico a Pydialyte freezer pop thinking it would make his sore throat feel better. The pops were Parve, a word we've come to trust and know in this house meaning vegan, no dairy, no eggs in it and we assumed it was safe for him. Almost immediately after having the freezer pop, his face blew up in bright red swelling hives all over his lips, chin, cheeks, throat and chest. OH NO, OH NO I screamed and reached for the Benadryl dosing him up. I sat and watched him in my lap scared his throat would close and he would stop breathing. This had happened to Mina, quite a few times, so I was not too panicky, but it scared me none the less.

After he got better, a few hours later, I started going through everything he had eaten and drank that day and went on a frenzy reading labels. Clearly whatever was in the freezer pops set him off, but we were battling hives for days now and something was the culprit! The more I read labels, the more I started seeing one ingredient in all of his foods and drink, pears and pear juice. There is pear juice in the apple banana juice from Juicy Juice. There is pear juice in Juicy Juice grape juice, there is pear juice in Gerber's Vegetable and Chicken 3rd stage food that he ate for lunch that day, he had eaten Gerber's pears for breakfast in the tub and yes, you guessed it, pear juice in the pops! Ok, he's allergic to pears and thus we have eliminated pears from his diet. You have NO idea how often pears and pear juice is used these days in foods, it's in A LOT of stuff!

Nico was getting better off the pears, the hives on his body were clearing and then once again, hives were emerging back again on his face! UGH, this is SO frustrating not knowing what he "allergic" to! The only thing he has had other than basic stuff, is the amoxicillin used to treat his strep. He's been on that for 3 days now and his hives are getting bad again. This morning his eye was swelling and he has hives all around both eyes, nose, lips and cheeks! I went to give him his morning dose of amox and noticed the antibiotic was pink. I said to myself, hum, could this have red dye #40 in it? I called my pharmacist and asked and was surprised to hear that yes, it does have red dye #40 in it and she's NEVER seen an antibiotic for kids that were dye free! I asked WHY, after all Tylenol makes a dye free product, Motrin makes a dye free product, why not antibiotic's???? She was just as baffled as I was and she said she would research for me and call me back. Meanwhile I called his Dr and the nurse said he's probably allergic to Amoxicillin and to STOP the use of it. She had also not known of ANY dye free antibiotics for kids and had never heard of one. The nurse called in a new script for us, and this one does have flavors and dye in it, but does not have red dye #40, so we shall see how he reacts to it!

We are NOT sure what Nico is allergic to. His RAST test came back all negative! This blew my mind too, but after speaking with the nurse and Dr I was told that at this age, this happens. Since Nico had patches of hives on him when they took the blood, he can have what is called "false positives" on his test. Also, at this age you have to go on reactions more than testing. I can say that Nico is MUCH happier now off of dairy and eggs and eating like a champ! He is eating 2-3 plate fulls of food now....yes, plate fulls! For the past couple months I just thought he didn't like table food anymore and it's wasn't that AT ALL! The table food I was giving him made him feel bad and thus he refused to eat it. He's still cautious on what he will eat, testing it a few times, almost like he's scared of it or something and then after a few tries will gobble it up. I've never seen a baby eat as much as he is right now and I can't be happier about it. Nico went from having a BM every 3-4 days, gassy, fussy, and refusing to eat to having 3 a day to now normal at one a day. I can't tell you HOW much better he feels, you can see it in his face and his actions now. He's also starting to sleep better at night, through the night in most cases. No more screaming bloody murder for an hour at 2am and this is a breath of fresh air. Momma NEEDS some sleep! ;)

We are setting up an appointment with a specialist here in Orlando to take him to. I just can't wrap my head around "what" and "all" the things he is allergic to and we could use some help with his diet. Right now he is on white potatoes, organic that I bought and made with vegan butter and soy milk, gluten/dairy/egg free cereal from Whole Foods, organic broccoli, vegan crackers(look like Ritz) and fresh fruit....NO PEARS! We have pasta for him too, but he doesn't really like it. I guess I'll be posting a lot about recipes and things we "make up" to feed him.

Foods we are avoiding:
Dairy
Eggs
Gluten
Pears and Pear Juice(in everything for babies and kids...look and see!)
Squash -until we clear up the hives and then we will try this again, homemade/organic of course!
Red Dye #40
Amoxicillin and other "cillins"

We won't even DARE try strawberries OR peanut butter....GEEZ, this poor kid huh?

Hopefully we get answers soon, clear up his hives and try to give him somewhat a "normal" kid diet. I just hope the allergist can help, which I'm sure he/she will! In the meantime, we are SO careful about what he is eating and drinking. Mina can only eat/drink at the table and she know that Nico has "special" foods and can NOT eat or drink her stuff. She's cute and tells me, mommy, he throw up from my food....no no no Nico, you no have my food, you have special food! LOL, but she gets it!

Ahhhhh, here we go again with these darn allergies! I have to say it was a bit easier for Mina because she was young and did fine on the Neocate formula and sweet potatoes and outgrew this by a year. Nico at a year is just getting his allergies and it STINKS! I hope he out grows this soon!

Just anther CRAZY time in the Crescitelli house!

5 Wonderful Years of Marriage!

2009-09-04T12:17:00.000-07:00

Well, Carlos and I are celebrating 5 years of marriage today! It's been a wonderful, challenging, adventuress time and we would not change a thing! Carlos and I met not in a typical fashion. I had moved into a new apartment and my phones did not work. This was pre everyone in the World having a cell phone and so I needed my apartment phone working. I called Bellsouth and plugged quarters into the pay phone for 45mins before someone helped me. I was told to go back home unplug my phone for 45 mins and plug it back in. Well as you can guess, it didn't work after 45mins and back to the pay phone I went, but I was MAD! As I sat there stewing for half an hour on hold, the poor operator picked up the line and I WENT OFF on her and she promised to send a tech out to my place ASAP! Meanwhile sleeping in his bed on his day off, Carlos got woken with a phone call from work. Seems there was a irate customer in his area and they needed him to go deal with her and fix her line. Me, IRATE, hum, must have been anther woman @ my address...tee hee! The Bellsouth van showed up outside and I could see it from the window in my apartment. I was NOT allowing the van to leave w/out my phone working! I was busy unpacking and hours went by with no phone working, no tech, but the van was still there. Little did I know Carlos was in the meter room frustrated because he could not get the line working. After 3 hours he gave up. He knew his job description said to go to customer's door, but it was his day off and he didn't feel like dealing w an irate person and no phone service. He skips over my apt door and heads to his van. He gets there and said ugh, I gotta go inside or I will be written up. He walks back to my door and goes to knock and then said NOPE I'm going home. He goes back to his van and gets in and starts it up. At this point he knew he would get in trouble so he gets back out and comes to my door for the third time. He knocks this time and I opened the door. There in front of me stood the most adorable man in a Addia's bucket hat and his uniform! YUMMY! He comes in and goes to my bedroom where the main jack was and started working on it. I hovered over him looking over his shoulder seeing what he was doing doing and after a couple minutes he turns and looks at me and says "MAM, I'm going to need to you back up and let me work!" I replied with "OHHHHH, Big BAD Phone Man needs some space!" and I laughed as I walked away back into the living room where I was unpacking and trying my HARDEST to find the Gator game on the radio! After a bit he comes out of the room and asked me what I was doing. I turned and looked at him and said, I can't for the LIFE of me get the Gator game on the radio and I NEED to know the score and hear the game!!! I then looked up at him and thought again, oh, he is so cute and so I decided to ask him out. I said to him, "hey, I'm new to the area, wanna grab a drink sometime?" "I don't drink!" he returned. "Ok, well that's cool, maybe we can get together to just hang sometime then?" "I don't think so, your phone is fixed and working and have a great day Mam." I was turned down......not just once, but TWICE! Ugh, the NERVE of him! Carlos then walks out to his van, cranks it up and as he says, turned seek on his radio station. The first three channels that it stopped on, they had the score of the Gator game and were talking about the game. He thought it was strange to hear on 3 stations in south Florida, let alone the first three in seek mode. At this moment he said destiny and the world were trying to talk to him and tell him he needed to ask me out. I received a phone call and a voice saying "Am I the first person to call you?" "Um yes, who is this please?" "Carlos the phone guy, the score to the Gator game is 32/16Gators. I'll be there at 8 to pick you up!" He showed up at my door right on time, 8pm and we went to TGIFriday's and the rest is history. I knew within two weeks of being with him that I loved him. 2 years after being together we got engaged and planned an amazing wedding 1 year later. We were married Sept 4, 2004 during a hurricane, Francis. We took our honeymoon to Jamaica and were hit by a Cat 5 Hurricane, Ivan while on the island in the resort and riding out the storm....SCARY! We came home to our townhouse in Boca Raton and were hit by anther storm and had no power for 15 days! We moved to Clermont, Fl and bought our first house and worked our tails off making it a home! We were pregnant with a girl a year after being married. Mina Marie was born May 9th, 2005 Struggled with a VERY sick baby for 6 months, but pulled together and pulled through it. Pregnant again Dec 07 with a boy. Sold Clermont home Summer of 08. Nicolas Antonio "Nico" born Aug 21, 2008 Moved to east side of Orlando close to Carlos's job Mina turned 3, Nico turned 1 and the rest is waiting to be written. Here is a video I made for Carlos. A small glimpse into our life for the past 5 years. Our wedding song plays in the background. Come what May! I love you honey, today, yesterday, tomorrow and for the rest of my life.....until my dying day!

August in Review and Nico turns 1!

2009-08-26T13:36:00.000-07:00

Ok, it's been a bit AGAIN since I have updated the blog. I just can't seem to find the time and it's hard to do. I think about it ALL the time and then I forget and get busy with something else. Seems like life never seems to slow, which is good, but my goodness, where is the time going? This year is getting close to being over. It's true what my parents use to tell me when I was young, "have fun being BORED, because life goes by in the blink of an eye when you get older!" I remember sitting as a 10 year old playing during the summer thinking the days would never end and the world was almost at a stand still. Now if I could only find SOME time to stand still....HA! August came so quick and now it's about to end. It started the usual way, busy with me working on some rush orders and working part time at Publix during the evenings as a deli clerk. I had to stop working at Publix because I have toren my rotator cuff and it looks like I will be heading in for surgery #3 here soon on my right shoulder. It's just never been right since the accident and it hurts to live with pain all the time, but at least I have my arm right? Things could have been worse, so I just go with the flow and deal the best I can. I see the Dr next month to discuss surgery on it. Hopefully I can hold off a bit longer. We took a family trip to the beach on a Sunday and Mina finally learned to swim without her floats on. It's scary to see your 3 year old going from one end of the pool to the other under water with no floats on. She's getting so big, when did this happen? The visit was nice with my grandmother's sister, Laragene. She has a condo on the beach and it's about an hour drive from where we are and we like to visit when we can. I drop Nico off inside for a nap in the pack and play and Carlos, Mina and I head out for fun in the sand and water. Once Nico wakes, we head up for lunch and then pool time. This is when Mina decided that she NO longer needed her floats on and started swimming. It was a great feat for her. The very same day back home, Nico took his first steps! All in one day, swimming and walking for our kids...WHEW, what an afternoon! Carlos and I decided to put Mina in a new school. She was attending a Montesorri school here in Orlando, but the price was VERY expensive and I wanted more of a routine for her. We found a wonderful school that has been around for 32 years and it's Christian based at a church just around the corner. I have to say it's a wonderful school and I've never been so excited for Mina to attend. She will attend 3 days a week from 9am to 2pm. She has a music classroom, an art classroom, a computer lab, and all sorts of things. It's set up more like public school and gettinf her ready for her first year! I think this is a change we needed with her and school. Mina had one more week of Montesorri left before break and we decided to keep her out that week because we had to pay for start up at the new school. We were very thankful we kept her out the last week too. Monday morning, the day Carlos takes Mina to school, he was in an accident. Mina was not in the car with him, thank God and was home safe with me. Carlos was leaving for work and out of our development a deer ran across the road. He swerved to miss the deer and said the steering wheel was jerked out of his hands and less than 5 feet away he ended up in the retention pond! What he didn't know what that this was a DEEP pond and within 60 seconds his car sank and filled with water. This still gives me chills. He could not open the door as his car is newer and automatic and once the engine was wet, it would not allow him to unlock it. He was able to get his belt off and go out the window because he smokes. If Mina had been in the car, he would not have been smoking and the window would have been rolled up. I would have lost my husband and my daughter this day had things not been the way they were. SCARY! Carlos told me it was very hard to get out of the car and there would have been no way to get the window down in his car had it been closed because it was all electric and we all know, electricity doesn't mix with water. I was very happy Carlos was a smoker that day and I told him he could smoke ALL day and I would say nothing to him, but that the next day was anther story! It took Orlando dive team 6 hours to get the car out of the water. Thankfully it was just a car that was lost that day!

Nico started walking all over the place and doing the duck shuffle. It's so funny to see babies shuffle and waddle around like a little duck! He's getting the hang of it for sure! Mina started gearing up for her first day at her new school and I was busy working on Nico's first party.

Friday, Aug 21 and our baby boy turned 1! WOW, where has a year gone? Now you moms know, this is bittersweet. It's hard to see your baby grow up, but you love them learning and growing. He will always be my baby though and I told him, I can hug, love and rock you whenever I wanted! We had a family party for him here on Sat the 22nd. It was SO nice because my entire family drove the 2 plus hours down to come and we had a great time. Carlos and I made the cake and the house was decorated and things were done like I like to do them......great! ;) We had so much fun playing in the pool and playing with everyone. Nico eating his first ever cake I made and it was awesome to see! He got lots of toys and clothes and overall just had an awesome first birthday. Hard to believe that my baby was just born a year ago!

Mina started school this week and really likes it. Her teacher Mrs Lisa is wonderful with the 3 year olds and has lots planned for them. I know that this is just what she needed to thrive and harness some of that Mina energy she has in a good way! At least 3 days a week right? Here is a look at a video I made with all that has gone on this month. Next month, well, our 5 year wedding anniversary on the 4th....should be FUN! Just anther crazy time in the Crescitelli house!

Mina's First Haircut!

2009-08-04T08:10:00.000-07:00

Ok, my baby girl is 3 and we have NEVER cut her hair before. Not sure why, but we just let it get long and we pulled it up in pig tails or a pony. Well, it was TIME for a hair cut so I sat her down and started it. Of course I have NO idea how to cut hair, but how hard can it be....really?

LOL, I soon found out that my "little" trim turned into a bob that was uneaven. Upset, I called my neighbor who once cut hair to the rescue. I walked Mina over to his house and he wanted to KILL me at first sight. I told him, every little girl gets a bob at one time or anther and he responded, yeah, when their mother's cut their hair! Hardee, Har, Har!

So he fixes the uneven cuts I had made and then it was done. I was worried about the cut being so short, but thought, it's summer and it will grow. After a shower to get the hair off her and a blow out, I LOVED her new do! It is so darn cute on her. She doesn't look like a little baby anymore....she looks like a kid. Bitter sweet right? She's very happy with the hair cut. We normally pull the front part back in a pretty clip and she loves to wear the clips of different colors, etc. My mom came down and said I love her hair Mel! This made me feel good about cutting it. My little baby, turning into a little girl now!

Shower Time?

2009-07-23T07:13:00.000-07:00

So I want to know when MY morning HOT shower became a circus and I became the 3rd wheel? It's lifes little pleasures that we all enjoy and all that gets tossed out the window as soon as you have kids! It's bad enough when you can't sit on the potty for more than 5 seconds before someone is screaming for you, someone fell and hit their head and is crying OR your kids just walk right on in where you are and ask "what cha doing mommy?" But now my hot morning showers have been taken over as well and I wonder where I lost it?

I like my morning showers. It gets me up and gets me moving to start the crazy day around this house. After I feed Nico his breakfast this morning I realize that he has banana's all mushed in his hair and all over him. I normally give him what I call a monkey bath after every meal. This means I put him in the sink straight from the high chair and wash him down and let the food go down the disposal. I know, probably not the best, but hey, it works for us and the kid gets a bath in the tub with his sister everynight. I'm not one to wipe a baby with 10 million wet wipes to get them clean after they eat.

So I look in the sink and realize there are dishes in it.....ugh, I hate that, but life is busy and sometimes we have some in the sink until we have a few to do them in the morning. Ok I thought, I need to shower, so just put him in with me. Of course Mina will NOT let you shower without her these days, so I decide to make my nice hot morning shower not be so hot and be joined by the kids.

After we get in, I then realize that not only will I NOT be getting a hot shower, I will also NOT be getting wet. Mina takes over the water coming down and Nico plays on the floor, but wants to be under the water too. Mina is fighting with Nico about NO, it's MY turn meanwhile I stand to the side cold as all get out, not wet and looking at my two kids fighting over who gets the water! Finally I bust out with MOMMY'S TURN and as I scoot Nico back and move Mina, I dip my head under for point 3 seconds before I get a shove, MY TURN MOMMY from Mina! I look down and Nico has also found his way back under the water. Once again I left to the side, now really, really cold because my head is half wet and I didn't even get to warm up. Ok I think, soon this big walk in shower will get warm from the steam in the hot water adn warm you up.....oh, right, it's not really hot water is it Mel? NOPE, it's warm and warm water takes FOREVER to steam up. I deciede to bear it, the cold that is, and do the best I can with washing myself. The problem with this comes when my body is only partly wet because I didn't really have but about 3 nano seconds under the water and soap doesn't apply well to a half wet body. Mind you I'm still cold, but at this point I have half dry soap rubbed on me and I'm still fighitng to get wet and or even get some more water on the soap. Do I even BRAVE to try and wash my hair? Shaving is WAY out of the question, this is why moms have stubble everywhere, but my hair? Could I, Should I....hum, how dirty is it really and what am I doing today? Seems like a ponytail day for me and I skip washing my half wet hair.

Wait.....after 10 minutes in our warm shower, we have some steam and Mina can now write letters on the glass door! I tell her, look, steam, go write mommy some letters, "OK" she screams with excitement and goes to the door. Ahhhhh, MY chance to get wet FINALLY! I get my head back under the water and think, oh, let me at least wash my face. Nico at this point is under my feet, but I wash my face anyway. As the cleaner comes off my face, it comes down on Nico who was of course looking straight up at me with his eyes WIDE open, under the water so that some of the cleanser would fall directly into his eyeball and burning it and now he's screaming bloody murder! Mina then walks over, moves me out of the way to procliam "I cold mommy, MY TURN!" As I get shoved to the side with the baby in my arms trying to calm him down and flush his face, Mina walks over the knob and turns the shower off. She says, "we are done, no more shower" and she walks out of the shower. I then say, I guess that's it then because I can't have Mina running around the house soaking wet naked and all. I dry her off with a towel and the baby on my hip and then I towel him up. Everyone is dry but me, but it's ok, I've been cold now for 15 minutes and why not a few more right? I decide that I just need a towel around me, get the kids dry and dressed and then I can worry about me. Of course the towel falls off of me after my second step, but again, I've been cold, why not a few more minutes right? I get Mina dry and dressed and then take Nico to his room to get him dressed. As I have him on the changing table I look and say, what's that in your hair buddy????? AHHHHHHHH, I scream, F'ing BANANA'S! This was the ENTIRE reason I started this circus act of a shower with both of them in the first place! Oh well, I hope it brushes out as I run a comb through his hair. I then put him on the floor where he screams at me to pick him back up, but I remember, I'm still not dressed and some clothes and panties for mommy sound oh so nice! As I'm getting dressed, I see the dry soap still on my body and I think......WHY DO I EVEN BOTHER TO SHOWER AT ALL ANYMORE?????

To all of you with kids, you know just what I mean and for all of you without kids, ENJOY life's little pleasures still by taking LONG, HOT, MORNING SHOWERS while the rest of us have dirty hair, and have dried soap still on our skin!

Just anther crazy day in the Crescitelli house!

A Sickly Chicky & Family Update

2009-06-29T07:11:00.000-07:00

Ok, it's been over a month since the last update and man do I feel bad about it! Seems that life never slows enough these days and there aren't enough hours in the day to do all that needs to be done. With that being said, there is LOTS to catch up on!

First, our Mina Beana has been one sickly chicky these past few days. Last Weds I was called from her school because she was running a fever. I went and picked her up and she felt a little warm, 99.4 and said her tummy hurt. I brushed it off and we just went about our normal routine. Mina was not eating and still running a low grade fever Thursday. Again, I just brushed it off and let her be. Thursday night at 10:30 she woke screaming with tummy pain, rocking on all fours, curled in a fetal position crying in pain. I went and picked her up and at this point she threw up all over me. After a few rounds of vomiting, I gave her some meds (via not the fun way) and within an hour she was out. I went to my Dr's apt on Friday and left her home with Carlos who was also sick with the flu. I was home by 12pm and was told she felt a little warm, was complaining of tunny pain again and he gave her motrin at 11:30. I laid my head on the couch because I was exhausted from the night before and at 12:15 I was told, get up, she's in pain and running a fever. Carlos knows the fever drill, start a bath and get her undressed. He had given her motrin less than an hour before, so we needed to get the fever under control until the motrin kicked in. Mina went from a 101 fever at 12:15 to 103.2 by 12:30 to 104.8 by 12:45. The bath was not working, the motrin was not working. Mina was screaming with tummy pain. We decided to take her to the hospital. By the time we got to Arnold Palmer, her fever was 105.4. They sent us back and gave her tylenol (via not the fun way) and zolfran to stop the vomiting and nausea. They started taking xrays thinking she had a blockage somewhere. I remembered Mina telling me "a penny went in my mouth and my tummy ate it" on Tuesday or Weds and I let the Dr's know. After the xrays showed nothing, they asked her to pee in a cup. Um, i said, Mina doesn't use the potty and you want her to pee in a cup????? She knows how to use the potty, she just refuses and I knew this. So after some talking to, 3 trips later to the bathroom, we got her to pee in the cup! About an hour later the Dr came in and told me she had one of the worst UTI's he had seen in years and one of the worst the hospital has seen in a very long time. They gave her a shot of rosefrin, more motrin and we left the hospital with a 103.2 fever after 7 or 8 hours. We went and filled the antibiotic and came home, started her on it and she seemed to feel better. GREAT I thought, we are over this! Little to my surprise at midnight she woke up throwing up everywhere and feeling a little warm. The freaking ER forgot to give me zolfran, the vomiting meds and Mina was throwing up and we could not stop it. I checked her fever, 100.2. Carlos starts the drill of running a bath for her while I called the ER demanding they call in a script for zolfran to stop the vomiting. It was around 12:30am and the triage nurse was on the phone with me explaining they could not call in scripts, etc, etc and she asked me what temp Mina had. I walked into the bathroom where her and Carlos were, took her temp via the ear and it said 106.3. I told the nurse, she said check it again, 106.5 now. The nurse said how are you checking it, I said ear and she said, I need rectal temp. We take Mina out of the bath, lay her on a towel on the floor. At this point she's burning up, eyes rolling a bit, she's moaning and she was bright red and looked swollen. I take the rect temp and it says 107.2!!!!! I tell the nurse, ok we both say, it's wrong, take it again, 107.2 it read again! I take it one more time and again 107.2. My thing was not broken, Mina was BURNING up! The nurse screams to get her in ASAP and although I should have called 911, I called my mother, who I was talking to earlier and was a wreck on the phone w her. My mom, a nurse tried to calm me down and told me to put vinegar and cool water in a bowl, puts rags in it and place the rags under her arms, around her neck and on her head. Carlos and I did this, wrapped her up and threw her in the car and off to the hospital I went with hazards on doing about 95 the whole way, running lights and all!

We arrive in the ER AGAIN where I am running through through the door in complete panic mode, shaking and screaming at the front desk lady to get her in. The lady ask, what's her fever, I'm screaming 107, 107, 107!!!!! The dumb woman looks at all calm and says, "huh, you mean 100 point 7!" I yell NO, ARE YOU KIDDING ME, I MEAN 107.2!!!! The lady looks confused and at this point the triage nurse comes running out and says, Mina? I said yeah and they rush us straight back. Mina had 106.8 by the time we got to the back, and she was covered in wet soaking towels. They give her tylenol (via not the fun place) and she was so hot the lady had to use her finger to push it all the way in because it was melting before she could stick it in all the way. Mina was burning up! They sent us straight back to a room where the Dr's come straight in with some nurses and they start IV's, start taking blood and doing what they could to bring her fever down. I was told that a high fever will not fry the brain, like we have been told, but they have to make sure she won't have a seizure from it being that high. By 3:30am Mina was coming around and looking at me like hi mom. Her fever was better, down to the 104's and by 4am she feel asleep and I tried to close my eyes as well.

We were able to take her back home Sat morning after anther round of rosefrin (major antibiotic shot) and she seemed to be in good spirits. We had to bring her back if her fever went over 106 and we had to bring her back Sunday for a thrid round of rosefrin shot.

Mina ran a pretty high fever most of the day Sa, 105 plus most of the day, but she seemed to be feeling a little better. She woke up a new girl on Sunday and asked for waffles! The first food she had asked for since Tuesday! We had to take her back to the ER of course for anther round of shots and she cried the whole way. Once there she proved to the Dr's that she no longer needs to wear diapers and pull-ups and went pee pee and pooh pooh in the potty and asked them to go see, she was a big girl now and didn't need anther shot. As good as an atemp that this was, it was a no go and she HAD to get anther shot. They gave it to her in her leg and she screamed in pain. I was told this shot makes some adults cry it hurts so bad. This was her 3rd one! They put this one in her leg and we were able to go home about an hour later. We then took her to Target to buy "big girl panties" and then to the pet store where she was able to get a fish tank. Her daddy had promised her about 6 months ago that when she started wearing panties and going pee pee on the potty he would get her a fish tank with fishey's in it. She was very excited that this day was finally here!

We are home now and Mina hurts so bad from the shots she won't walk or stand on leg, but she is going pee on the potty and scared to DEATH to go in a diaper again. She doesn't want anther shot, no way, no how and we have told her the only way to not get anther shot is to go on the potty. I guess some good HAS come of this. It's been a scary ride to get here though! I hope and pray I never again in my life see anther 107.2 fever.....it was awful to see and experience!

I now have NO time to update about the family, ahhhhhhh, can't we just rewind the clock back some???? No, time just seems to speed by these days. Hopefully I can get back on soon!

MIna's 3 year Dr Apt

2009-05-19T05:28:00.000-07:00

Mina had her 3 year Dr apt and it went well. She was weighed, of course with a VERY wet and to my surprise, poop filled diaper, but she was 30 pounds and me and the Dr wanted to do a back flip. Mina is between the 25th and 50th percentile and the Dr looked at me and said, can you believe this? Was there ever a time when you thought your child would be between the 25th and 50th percentile? I just shook my head and said no and then smiled. Mina for the first year of her life struggled with weight because she was so sick from reflux, allergic to my milk, all dairy and soy proteins as well as all hypo-allergenic formula sold here in the states. She weighed a whopping 10 pounds at 5 months old was classified as "failure to thrive." At this point her pediatric GI said she needed surgery and I BEGGED for one last option before I set her up with surgery that would affect her the rest of her life. I was then given an elemental formula called Neocate and I had 4 days to see if Mina would respond to it. If she did not gain weight in those 4 days, we were to meet with the surgeon and have the surgery the next week. I remember this like yesterday. It was a Friday morning when we saw the Dr. After the apt, I took her, the can of Neocate and headed to my moms for the weekend in tears and determined to get her to gain weight. My mom and I mixed the nasty, freakishly white formula and started giving it to her. Mina took the formula and started vomiting less. I took her back tot he Dr on Monday morning and low and behold, she had gained 1 pound since Friday. I cried and believe Dr Erheart cried too. I was told we needed a weight check every other day, but as long as Mina would keep gaining, we could hold off surgery. Well, it worked. Day by day and week by week, Mina was gaining weight and starting to get healthy again. She had one more episode at 6 months for 2 weeks and after that, we had no more. She only weighed 16 pounds at a year and for the first year of her life, she was either in the 5th or 3rd percentile for weight, or not even on the charts at all. To see our baby girl weigh 30 pounds at 3 years old gave me the biggest smile and I could not be happier. She's happy, she's healthy and you would NEVER know that during the first year of her life she was so sick and was "failure to thrive." It's still hard to wrap my head around the fact she's 3 now. I just don't know where the time has gone? I'm very thankful however that we stuck out the screaming, the vomiting, the weight problems and all the other issues she had and we didn't do the surgery. She is a bouncing 3 year old and has no problems other than slight allergies to processed foods. 25th and 50th percentile.......WHEW, thank you God for seeing us through the rough start and getting her healthy again!

Mina weight - 30 pounds (25th and 50th percentile)
Mina height - 37.25 inches (25th and 50 percentile)

Mina's turns 3! Minnie Mouse Party!

2009-05-11T05:58:00.000-07:00

Well, it was that time again, May 9th and our baby girl turned 3. Where has the time gone? I'm sad and excited at the same time. My baby is growing up and she is becoming more and more of a kid, but she will always be my baby!

We had her party here at the house on Sat. We went with the Minnie Mouse theme and we had lots of fun with it. Mina is having 2 party's this year. I know, who gets 2 party's? She plays everyday on the col-da-sac with the neighbor kids and since her birthday was a day before Mother's Day this year, it was just too much to go to my moms to have her party as well as have all of my family drive the 2 plus hours down to come. So we decided to have a small pool party here for her Sat with the neighbor kids and then this weekend we are heading up to my moms where we will have anther party for her at the splash park with family and friends up there.

So the theme like I said was Minnie Mouse. I went a little nuts making everything Minnie Mouse, but it sure did turn out cute. I made all of us shirts, with Mina and I in Minnie and Carlos and Nico in Mickey. It was adorable to all be festive for her on her big day. We had Minnie Mouse cutouts of PB&J sammy's, turkey and cheese sammy's, rice crispy treats, cookies, hamburgers with Minnie Mouse cheese heads on them and I even made a Minnie Mouse cake, which turned out ADORABLE! It was actually an easy cake to make. I then made a Minnie head and printed it up and put it on cardboard and cut out her smile for a bean bag toss. I also had pin the bow on Minnie's head and we cut out cheese wedges from Styrofoam, painted them yellow and hid them around the yard for the kids to find. The neighbor brought over his bounce House and the kids played their hearts out in the pool, bounce house and all the activities. It was indeed a fun day for us and although I'm not sure she "really" gets a birthday, but I know she got that the day was about her and she had FUN!

I just don't know where the last 3 years have gone? Carlos and I sat up in bed the night before her birthday shaking our heads as to where the time had gone. Life is always moving forward, but it sure does seem to FLY by when you have kids. We are just so happy she's healthy now and a thriving child. Her first year of life was so super tough with her being so sick, but you would never know it now. She keeps us on our toes everyday and I wouldn't change a thing about her. She has more personality, sparkle and shine than we could have every imagined and although we have our hard moments with her, we love every bit of her!

Here are some pics of Mina growing up and some pics from her big 3 Minnie Mouse party!

Mina's 3rd Party Pics!

I made this cake

Update

2009-04-24T11:18:00.001-07:00

Well, it's been 3 weeks since my last update and it just feels like forever. Of course time never seems to slow down and there just aren't enough hours in the day to do all I need to do, but we try to manage and we never seem to stop. We had quite a few over here for spring break. My high school best friend Nancy came down with her two kids for the week and my cousins were here as well. My cousins who are 17 and 14 were a HUGE help with all the kids and keeping this place somewhat sane. We had 8 people here as well as the neighbor kid and it seemed like a very crazy week with everyone all over the place. It sure was fun though and we did a lot, like Seaworld, shopping and Chuck E Cheese with them all. I look forward to the next time they come.

The kids are doing well. Mina is almost 3 and we are starting to plan her party. She's still not potty trained and I'm about to give up on it. I put her in panties for 2 weeks and she just didn't care about peeing in them and sitting in wet pants. I have since put her back in pull ups and just hope she will wake up soon and want to be a big girl. I really just think she's just too busy to want to go. She is doing very well in school and is just so cute when she sings and dances. Her favorite song right now is Rock Star. She sings it over and over again and dances around and shakes her butt. I just love how she's getting older and getting more of a personality. She displays her love more and more for us and it's just so nice to hear "mommy, I love you, you are my best friend EVER!" All the while her little head is tilted to the side and she looks so sweet while she is saying it. Of course it's not 2 minutes later that she's into something and needs a time out, LOL!

Nico is sweet, sweet boy. He just started to sit up a few weeks ago and has really gotten the hang of it. Mina was running by this age, so I welcome the slower pace and I'm not encouraging him to crawl, stand or walk. I know mean, but it's nice to put him on the floor and leave him. He is still up once or twice a night, but after a quick bottle, he's back to sleep. I am finally getting some sleep after 8 months and I'm feeling human again. He has just cut his first two teeth. They were a bear to come in, but they have popped through and although very little and on the gum, they will be out and proud here pretty soon. Nico is always so happy, lovable and sweet. He likes to eat solids 3 times a day now and will clear a container of baby food in no time. It's great to be able to watch him grow and it's nice to see how happy he is. He just brightens my day with his warm smile and dimple. He just started saying daaadddaaaa today and I think Carlos and him have been working on this together, because mommmaaa was NO where in the picture. I'm soon I'll be updating that he's crawling, so keep checking back on him!

Carlos and I are doing well. Carlos has been busy trying to work as much as he could and I'm staying busy with orders for my store. I have been working pretty much non stop until about 2-3 in the morning, but I welcome the work and I'm just doing what I can to keep it coming in and going out!

Easter was nice and it was wonderful to spend time at my moms with the family. We had the usual bunch over and then after lunch we did an Easter egg hunt with the kids. It's so great that all the kids are so close in age and it's times like these that makes me so happy we are the kind of family we are. I hope that we will always be together because these are some of the best times with my brothers and their families!

Here are some pics of us in action.

Strawberry Fields Forever

2009-04-03T07:29:00.000-07:00

So it's spring time here in Florida and this means things are just right for picking. I took the kids up to my moms this week to visit and go strawberry picking. This is something that is so much fun for the kids and something I remember doing every year while growing up. Of course true to my past, the kids ate more than they picked. We picked up my niece Taylor from school and my sister in law Mary met us out there with her daughter Kaitlyn. We had all 4 girls picking with myself, Mary and my mom. Grammie and Nico sat under a pavilion in the shade. We picked buckets of strawberry's. The girls were so cute wiping off the dirt and biting right into them. If you've never had fresh berries from the field, boy are you missing out. They burst with so much flavor in your mouth and juice runs all down your face and you can't wait to get anther bite in!

We paid for our buckets at a dollar a pound and we picked 60 pounds worth! Mary, mom and I wanted to make strawberry jam with the berries and so we got all of our stuff together and started making it.

My moms house had strawberries from one end of the kitchen to the other as shop was set up for the canning and jamming process. We worked as a team doing things to get all of the jamming down and it was a BIG undertaking. We had to call my cousins to come watch the kids because we were non stop in the kitchen and could not do anything else. We canned jam from 9am until 1pm! We went through almost 50 pounds of sugar and ended up with over 50 pint sized jars of homemade strawberry jam. Strawberries that we picked from the field. If you have never had homemade jam before, OMG, you are missing out. This stuff taste so good and you will sware off store brand stuff. We canned a lot because I wanted enough to last me the year as well as have gifts for my neighbors and friends. We were so excited to end up with so many jars. It all needs to set up for a week or so and then we are all good to eat away!

I loved doing this with my family and we can't wait to pick and can tomatoes, peaches and blueberries. It's a big undertaking like I said, but it's so very well worth it. I just can't get over how delicious this stuff is.

Here are pics from the field and the canning and jamming process.

The kids in the pictures are Kaitlyn, the smallest who is almost 2. Mina who is almost 3. Ashley who is 3 and a half, and Taylor who is 8. Of course my sister in law Mary and my mom.

I Cooking Eggy's

2009-03-23T17:01:00.000-07:00

I have to share a funny story about Mina. She's always into something and this morning at 6:45am, she was starting early! I walked into her playroom where I saw her light on and just had that "feeling" that she was doing something wrong. Normally when she's up to no good in the morning, she will close our door tip toeing not to wake us up. We will wake up later and find a big mess on our hands. She has usually gotten into the freezer and fed herself a frozen waffle or pot pie, LOL! This morning however, our door was open and what did I find? Mina in her playroom cooking in her kitchen and a dozen eggs on the floor cracked open and all over the place. Mina had about 5 eggs cracked open into one of her cooking pots and was stiring the eggs over and over again like we do for scrambled eggs. I looked at the mess of eggs, I looked at her and said, "WHAT ARE YOU DOING?????" I got back a smile and a little voice saying "Mommy, I cooking eggy's, I hungry!" She was so darn proud of herself that she cracked all those eggs and got them in the pot and was cooking them. I was mad, but didn't have the heart to punish her. I gave her a stern talking to about going in the fridge and that mommy and daddy have to cook with her, and to not do it again. I cleaned up the mess on the floor and Carlos came to the door to see what was up. He sees the mess and throws his arms up, "OH MAN, what are we going to do now???" I looked up at him and said turn the burner on, put a pan on it, we're having scrambled eggs for breakfast. After picking out a few shell pieces, we all sat down to enjoy Mina's eggy's.

An Amazing Day

2009-03-16T05:07:00.000-07:00

Well it's been a while since this family has had an amazing day. We were sick for almost 6 weeks in this house, in and out of the hospital, ER and the Dr's office. I thought we would never get the bug out of here and contemplated bombing this house to get rid of the bug. Nico is still congested, but I'm hoping it will end soon with him. Enough about the last 6 weeks, let me tell you about our awesome family day yesterday.

Since we've been been pretty much cooped up in this house for over a month, we got out yesterday as a family and went to Seaworld. If you buy a ticket to Seaworld for the day, you can come back all year for free as a Florida resident. Carlos and I thought this would be great family fun for the year. Of course Seawolrd went up in price from last year to this year by 11 dollars. An adult ticket is now 75 bucks......WO, but at least we will get our money's worth because we will be heading back all year for free.

We got into the park and decided not to see any shows. Carlos wanted to take reigns of the map and just do simple things. Since we can come back and we ALWAYS see shows when we go, we were doing something different this time. It started with Mina and Carlos feeding and petting the stingrays. She was in such delight to give them fish.

We then walked over to see the manatee and Mina was shouting SEA COW at the top of her lungs while everyone laughed at her. We saw the penguins, the seals and then we walked over the Clydesdale horses and Mina got to pet one.

After the horses, we decided to hit the hospitality center and get our free beer. Since Seaworld is owned by Anheuser-Busch, you are allowed to get 2 free beers in the park. Well, wouldn't we know that Seaworld is being hit by hard times too and now you have to pay for your once free beer! We got us a couple cold beers and sat down to unpack our lunch box and eat and have a beer.

After this, we took Mina on a HUGE play area to climb the nets and play on the slides. We then took her to the splash park and let her play in the water. I dried her up, put on her dry clothes and off we went home. We were only there for 4 hours and it felt nice to leave. We didn't rush the day, we took our time seeing the little things at the park and just having fun. We were even able to keep Mina awake in the van on the way home so she took her nap when she got here! I know we are going to enjoy Seaworld this year!

When Mina woke up, we got dinner ready and baths and started to get ready to watch the space shuttle go off at Nasa, about 40 miles from our house. We all stood outside and joined the neighbors watching and listening to the countdown. 5, 4, 3, 2, 1 and blastoff we heard from the tv. We all looked in amazement out to the East and saw this massive ball of fire heading into space. Looking at the fire ball I said....oohhhh, we need a pic of this to share w everyone. I of course grabbed the camera a bit late, but was able to take pics of the smoke it was leaving behind. The smoke is really pretty after the fireball, it's pink, purple and then white. You can actually see the shuttle hit space and drop the rocket boosters and watch the light go further, further and turn into what looks like a star. Mina was in complete aww over it and I'm so happy we are this close to see it. Next we will head to Cocoa and watch it live and feel the ground shake and tremble. I know Mina will get a kick out of that!

We cleaned up after dinner, made some brownies and popcorn and sat down to watch Journey to the center of the Earth. We all crashed out about 10 and we all went to bed with smiles on our faces because we had An Amazing Day!

Here are some pics of the day. Enjoy!

Mina feeding fish to the stingrays.....

The Shuttle:

Pneumonia

2009-02-16T12:40:00.000-08:00

Seems our house has the plague....well really, pneumonia and it's not been fun. Carlos started complaining of being sick a couple weeks ago and called his Dr. He was called in some meds and after a few days wasn't responding to the meds and called his Dr back. The Dr's office then called in more meds for him as well as a steroid to help him breath. 4 days on this new treatment he was still not responding and getting worse. At this point I called the Dr's office and said, no more calling in scripts for my husband, you will see him and you will see him tomorrow morning, period! We loaded up the kids and headed 45 mins into Clermont to see the Dr. Once there he did a chest x-ray and by the next day we got a call he had pneumonia.....GREAT, but I knew he had it a week earlier! As soon as he gets better and returns to work, after taking 2 weeks off, I start getting a runny nose. No big deal though, it's just snot, I'm a mom after all, and we don't get sick.....EVER. We don't get to take 2 weeks off from work, we have kids to feed and a house to run and nothing is slowin us down! HA did I eat my words. On Wednesday of last week after returning home from my moms something hit me like a Mac Truck. My body was aching and I felt a little funny. Within an hours time my body went from aching to every inch of it screaming in pain, a fever spiked of over 102, my head starting spinning and all I could do is lay on the couch and moan because I felt so ill. I called Carlos home from work as there was NO way I could take care of the kids feeling the way I was. Now you moms out there know......hell has to be about frozen over for us to not be able to care for our kids! I couldn't do it though and Carlos came home for me. I made an apt to see the Dr the very next morning and off I went to Clermont. Carlos took Thursday and Friday off from work to care for the kids so they stayed home with him as I drove myself to the Dr.

I was told I had the flu, but he sent me for chest x-ray just to be safe. I was told since I was breastfeeding that I would have to ride out the flu as I could not take meds. I was sad because I felt so bad and I knew how long the flu lasted. I toughed it up though and got my x-ray done. On Friday, feeling much worse and not being able to get out of bed, the Dr called. He says to Carlos, your wife has pneumonia too. The good thing is we can give her meds and I will call something in for her.

Carlos went and picked up the meds and I started on the right away. 4 days I ran a fever of up over 102 and was not able to move as my body just ached all over. Not to mention to the severe shakes I was having along with coughing, nausea and body pain. I felt awful. You know a mom feels bad when she can't get out of bed for 4 days and when she can, she only makes it to the couch to lay down. It had been 10 years since my last episode with pneumonia and that's because I was young in college, got the flu, tried to fight it off with drinking and more drinking and then BAM, pneumonia. Not to mention I smoked at the time so I'm sure that had nothing to do with it.....RIGHT! Either way, I'm mom now, not some young wild party girl and moms aren't allowed to get sick. O cointreau miss mommy, we do get sick and when we do, the house falls apart! ;)

Carlos was a gem taking care of me and the kids. He made sure I rested and cooked and did a wonderful job of trying to keep this place sane while mommy was in anther world. I give him two very big thumbs up for all he did. However, I feel 80% better today and upon waking up and getting the haze off my eyes, I saw my house..................eek, eek, eek, eek like the sound in the horror movies, a bomb had gone off in my home. There was stuff everywhere and everything was out of place. I sent Carlos off to work and found some strength to get my house back together again. I have to keep stopping because I can only do so much before my body screams STOP at me, but ahhhhhhh, I smell the wonderful aroma of bleach and can actually see my countertops!

Although my ribs feel like they have been kicked in by someone in steal toe boots, and I have a terrible cough, my house is back under control......the moms control and it feels good! Now if I can get the hand shaking under control I'll be set, but I know it's just my body fighting this sickness to the fullest. At least I will sleep better knowing the dishes are in the dishwasher, food crumbs are off the floor, 6 loads of laundry done and my potty is clean! Ahhhh, the simple things in life! Hope I NEVER get pneumonia again!!!!!!!!!

And in this corner a 5 pound weight

2009-01-31T17:34:00.001-08:00

and in the other, Mina. While I was blow drying my hair this morning, I hear this loud SCREAM of death from Mina. Soon after Carlos was shouting my name and running I went to them. Mina had smashed her toe with one of my weights. It's a hand weight, 5 pounds and Mina was walking with it around the house. Carlos saw her and told her, NO, it will hurt you if you drop it and sure enough just as he said it, she dropped it....on her big toe. We looked at it and cleaned it up a bit and after a couple of hours, it was still bleeding. We then decided to take her to the ER. They were nice to her there and she was a BIG girl, letting the Dr's look at her foot, getting x-rays and letting them clean her up. She has no broken bones in her toe, whew and they just wrapped it up and told us to see her Ped in 2-3 days to have them look at it again. I know she was hurting because she came home and slept 3 hours....um, unheard of for Mina and she won't walk on it....um, again, unheard of for Mina. So here's a look at her toe. I feel bad for her. Poor baby!

"Cry It Out"

2009-01-30T10:02:00.001-08:00

Is not really working for us. I let Nico scream his head off the first couple of nights, up to 58 minutes one evening at 2am. He stopped crying after the 58 minutes for just 15 minutes to start again. I then walked in his room and rocked and nursed him back to sleep. Poor baby was hungry after all that screaming! After 2 days of letting him cry it out, we all got sick in this house. Green snotty nose, sore throat and a cough made all feel pretty bad for a few days. I stopped the cry it out thing for a bit because I knew I my throat was sore, the baby's was and I didn't want him screaming all night again. I was back to old routine a few nights, being up every 3 hours, back to 2 hours and then hit rock bottom again getting up every hour to hour and a half. Just when I did not think it would get better, Nico slept for me the night before last for 6 hours in a row! OMG, 6 hours has NEVER felt so good! He woke up to feed at 11:45am and didn't wake again until 5:45 in the morning. Ohhhh, I am feeling like a human again with some much needed sleep! This is the most I have slept in a row in over 5 months.....that's a long time to go w/out this kind of sleep, to long if you ask me. Last night again was better. Not as good as the night before and the 6 hours, but he gave me 4 hour blocks and only woke twice to feed, 12:30 and then at 4:30. I am waiting for this cold to pass before I let him cry it out again. He still has green snot in his nose and I just don't want to make him sicker.

So that's the update with letting him cry it out. It's been a week and so far I've rested more than I have since before he was born and that's good news to me. I've had a hard time this week not feeling good myself and about breaking down over not sleeping, but I'm hanging in there now. I almost gave up brestfeeding from it too and I'm happy to say I didn't and I'm still sticking with it. My thoughts were that maybe if I gave him formula he would sleep longer, and yes, he may, BUT I think he wakes more at night from being restless and can't sooth himself back to sleep. I would hate it if I stopped breastfeeding and then he was still up all night. I am considering giving him 1 night time bottle here soon to see where that takes us. I just can't seem to part from breastfeeding yet, even though I have no sleep. Hopefully we get this sleep through the night thing down soon and until then, I guess I just have to take good days and bad ones and rest when I can.

Nico's 4 month Apointment

2009-01-21T10:44:00.000-08:00

was a month late, but it went well. He's on the tiny side, weighing just 13 pounds and not even 5 ounces, but we took the 5 because he was so close. The chart in the Dr's office said he was close to the 10th percetile, but on-line it says below the 5th! Either way, he's on the small side for his weight, but his Dr is not worried. She said he was a very happy little boy and he looks very healthy. She said it's probably more to do with genetics than anything else because Carlos and I are not very big. He's 25.5 in length and about 50 percentile for this. Long and lean....nothing wrong with that right? LOL! She told me because he is 5 months old, as of today, that it was time for me to "ferburize" him. Meaning to let him cry it out at night and learn to self sooth. She said there was not reason for him to wake as often as he does and he needs to learn to sleep w/out me by his side or my boob in his mouth at night! I agree with her, 5 months is a long time w/out sleep and I know it's "time" to get him sleeping more. It just makes me sad because he's gonna be heartbroken tonight crying out and screaming for me and I'm just going to let him go...well, within reason. I do need to feed him every 6-8 hours at night, so after 6 hours if he wakes and wants food, I will feed him. I hope I can do this. I hope I hear my sweet baby crying and not go get him. My heart hurts already just thinking about it, but I know it is what needs to be done so we can ALL get some more sleep in this house.

He took his shots like a champ and let out a little cry and that was that. My baby is 5 months old today and it just seems like the time is going by too fast. I look forward to the new things he will be doing soon in life, but want to hold on so tight to the sweet little baby I have. Maybe it's a good thing he's small.....I can pretend he's my little baby for much longer!

I'll update on the crying it out method. Let's see what goes down tonight.......

2009

2009-01-15T11:35:00.000-08:00

Well it's been a while since I've written in my blog. It's a new year, 2009 and things are rolling out nicely. We have a new President that is getting ready to go in office, the economy is hurting, but my family is alive, happy and healthy and I can't ask for much more than that!

Since it's a new year I have decided to get myself healthy from the inside out. I have started to eat better, and by that I mean adding salads and good protein to my diet and trying to cut back on the grease and fast food. I have also stated jogging. It was super tough on me the first few days to get going, but after a week of running, it is becoming easier on me to do and I am finding that it helps me to get stress out of my system and let's me find a good sense of peace while I am doing it. I of course have both kids in tow in the double jogger and if nothing else, my arms are getting a good workout! I am up to about 2-3 miles per day and I am stopping less and less and I feel wonderful. For the past couple days, I have jogged 2 miles without stopping once. It feels incredible for me to do this and I'm very proud of myself. I would like to start training for a half marathon, 13.1 miles! It's a start to a new me, a healthy me, inside and out.

This is also the year that I want to get my business off the ground. I know that with the help of Tammy and the site re-design and some hard work that I can get my business going and bringing in some money for us. I just love what I do and would like nothing more than to continue it and stay home with my kids. I just know that 2009 will be the start of something great for Baby Duck Boutique!

The Gators have won the national championship and as a Gator fan, I could not be prouder. Tim Tebow holds our team together and makes things happen and has a fire unlike any player I have ever seen. It's a great time to be a Gator!!!!!!

Nico is such a sweet boy. I am falling more and more in love with him everyday. He is still not sleeping through the night, waking every 2-3 hours to nurse, but other than this, he is such a good baby. Sleep is overrated anyway right? I told Carlos that I'll sleep when I'm dead...LOL! It's exhausting to be up after almost 5 months and not sleeping more, but he's a happy healthy baby and I could not ask for more. He has started to roll over from front to back and back to font and gets his little legs under himself. I fear he will be crawling soon. Mina was crawling by 6 months and walking by 7. I said if he tries I will tie bricks to his feet. It was nuts chasing Mina at this age, so I don't want it again. I'm sure it will just be my luck though! He is also eating rice cereal and gets VERY upset if he has not had his dinner by 7:30! It's cute to see him eating. Soon I'll be in the kitchen making his food like I did for Mina. My baby is growing up so fast. It's great to see the changes in him, even though I want him to stay a baby forever, LOL!

Mina is Mina, busy as always and getting so much more of a personality. When you tell her no for something or if she doesn't like what you are saying, she will put her hands on her hips, turn her head to the side, pucker out those lips, close her eyes and say "hum!!!" all with this little attitude. She will even stomp a foot here and there with this too. Of course Carlos and I don't let her get away with it, but it's funny to see her reactions now. She does sweet things too. If she gives you a kiss or a hug, which she does to just about anyone, she will cock her head to the side on her shoulder, her eyes light up and she grins ear to ear. This has to be my favorite expression of hers right now. It is the sweetest thing I have ever seen. Of course she is still our little ball of fire, always pushing the limits, pushing her boundaries and exploring her world with her eyes and brain WIDE open. She's a smarty this one and I can't get away with just telling her something is gone, she insist to see it just to make sure. She has a memory like nothing else I've ever seen. She recalls things from a year ago right down to the T. It just amazes me when she does this. We have started potty training, but she's not really interested right now. She is too busy doing other things to take the time to go pee pee on the potty. She will go if I tell her every 15 mins, but other than that, she will only once or twice a day when she is ready at her own will. This child does things when she wants to, so I can't even win this potty battle right now. I'm hoping one day soon she will wake up and say no more diapers mom! My parents and Carlos parents are helping us to put her back in school. She does well in school and it's a good structure/routine for her. She will start in the next couple of weeks. I am very thankful to have family that cares so much and are willing to help us out with this.

Carlos and I are doing great. Our love for one anther is growing stronger everyday. We are back in our routine of doing things together. Living apart for 5 months was hard and it took us a bit to get back in the swing of things, but we have it down again. Never thought life could be so fulfilling, but it is, each and everyday. We are learning to budget ourselves and live on a tight dollar, but we are living the richest we have ever lived through our spirits and with our love.

The Holidays were wonderful and once again I had my entire family at my moms house. We decided to get together this year and take a group picture. You can now see all of us. This is the group that gets together all year. My aunts and uncles drive from all over the place and it just great that we continue to do this year round.

I am posting some pictures of recent things. Enjoy!

Mina eating her cake from her Easybake oven. She loved making this!

Mina holding Nico, too sweet!

Nico passed out playing on his mat...awwwwww!

My Gator baby on game night!

Mina and daddy on the mower!

Grammie with the grandkids!

My family all together.....lots of us huh?

Grandma with her great grankids!

Christmas 2008

2008-12-29T11:03:00.001-08:00

Well it's Christmas time with the Crescitelli's in 08. What a wonderful Christmas we had too. My brother Rob and his wife Liz flew in from Denver on the 23rd to Orlando. Since we are about 15 mins away from the airport, we went and picked them up. We woke up Christmas eve and I took them shopping. Since you have to pay for baggage these days on planes, they wanted to wait and get gifts here so they didn't have extra bags on the flight. We were on a whirlwind trying to find everyone things, but we did it.

Carlos worked on the Christmas Eve, but as soon as her got off, we were on our way up to Gainesville to moms house for celebration. In my family we have a BIG Christmas Eve celebration. We have a traditional dinner and then it is followed by gifts getting passed out from under the tree and us starting from youngest to oldest opening gifts and everyone watching each other while we waited on our turn. We have such a big family, about 37 of us, so this takes all night while each person goes and opens gifts. With all the grandkids in matching pj's we were off, starting to open the gifts! Of course Nico was first this year and until a new baby is born, will be first, HA HA! Both Mina and Nico were showered with things from their aunts and uncles and great aunts and uncles and grandma and great grandma! I thought the gifts would never end. Nico still has no clue, but Mina is starting to understand a bit and just had a hay day unwrapping her stuff. She had BIG help from her cousin Ashley to make sure they were ALL unwrapped! It was about midnight when we got done and then of course we hit the bed and waited on Santa to come.

The morning was delightful with all that Santa brought the kids. Mina didn't understand much about Santa, but she understood she had gifts that needed to be unwrapped....yet again! She smiled and smiled opening each one and then helping baby brother to open his. She played and played while we made strong coffee and had some breakfast. Carlos and I decided to come home early, he had to work the 26th and have Christmas with just our family. We were home by 2 and piled all the gifts in the living room and just let Mina and Nico play until their hearts content. I wanted to cook us a Christmas dinner, but didn't know we were coming home, so I had no turkey or ham. However, I had just bought a standing rib roast, it was on sale and thought, hum, this will be perfect! We all sat down to a great dinner and gobbled it up. I started putting the toys away on Friday and then we were back up to Gainesville by Saturday.

On Saturday we did the adult gift exchange. Since we have about o....20 something adults, we decided to do a fun gift exchange instead of trying to buy gifts for everyone. We play the white elephant game and boy is it fun. Each adult brings one 25 dollar unisex gift wrapped up and unmarked. We draw numbers and you can either pick a gift from the pile OR pick a gift someone else has. Now let me tell you just how fun this is. My family starts to hide gifts they get and don't want people to take, everyone fights over the bottle of vodka and the Gator blanket and everyone has had just about 1 or 2 drinks too many! It is a slap in your face, pee in your pants, jump up and down kind of fun and funny to boot seeing everyone play this game. I just love it and crack up even now thinking about the good time we have doing it. This year Carlos and I ended up with a George Foreman, which we fought for and a digital picture key chain. Even if you end up with not what you wanted, everyone leaves with a huge smile on their face because we have a BLAST playing.

Christmas was good to us this year. I am so very lucky to have such a big caring family. I am reminded that with family it's not about how much you have it's that you have each other. With things being as tight as they are for everyone, my heart was filled to the top with more than any gift could have ever bought, it was filled with the love from my family. It makes you realize just how special togetherness really is and boy am I glad I have a family that still believes in togetherness. It was a wonderful Christmas indeed!

Disney Dreamland

2008-12-21T10:04:00.000-08:00

So Carlos calls me at my moms and tells me his friend at work had just given him 5 free tickets to Disney World here in Orlando and wanted to know if I wanted them....um YES! So we decided to ask my parents if they wanted to come and they both said SURE! We had to use the tickets by the 31st or they were bad, so we decided to go on Sat and see the park during Christmas time.

My parents have not been to the park in about 20 years, so they were VERY excited to go. I packed us up a wonderful lunch, juice boxes, water and snacks and off we went to the Magic Kingdom. I have to tell you that living in Florida my entire life, I've never seen Disney at Christmas time and man I have missed out. It was so amazing and decorated to the nines with lights and bows on everything. I looked at everyone and we all had a smile on from ear to ear.

My mom took over the map and we let her lead us in what we were doing and seeing. We walked from one to the other looking at things and riding rides. Mina got a kick out of the dancing bears and the singing birds in the Tiki Room. We even managed to ride Space Mountain. Carlos, my mom and I went and left dad to sit and wait with the kids.

Dinner time started to roll around and we thought about what we wanted to eat. Mom suggested the Crystal Palace for dinner. It was a bit on the pricey side, but we had brought our lunch and snacks and so we went for it. I have to say it was the highlight of our trip. Mina was DEAD tired and poor Nico rode in the sling all day and so by 7pm the kids had enough of Disney. However, we walked inside the Crystal Palace and were greeted by Tigger, Pooh, Eyore, and Piglet and Mina's eyes popped WIDE open and she just started squealing with delight. We sat and ate and each character came by to the table one by one to great us. Mina just hugged and kissed them all and Nico was just all bright eyed looking at them. After they all came to the table they took all the kids around the room in a parade march. Carlos was holding Mina's hand during the parade, but she was kicking her feet way out in front of her marching, marching, marching across the room. The look on Mina's face seeing all the characters made my day as well as my parents. While we ate we got to see the castle change colors in a beautiful display of lights as well as see a show that was going on with Mickey and the gang.

After dinner we walked out and the light parade had started. It was hard to find a spot to see the parade, but we managed and were in aww of it. Mina was half way asleep and by the end, was OUT. Carlos and my dad decided to take her and go back to the car and wait on us. Mom wanted to see more so I decided to keep Nico in the sling and go with her. About 2 mins later fighting a crowd to go to the other end of the park, we decided that we had seen enough and that we needed to just turn around, shop for a few and leave. Of course the second we turned around we got engulfed in a mob of people. I mean about a thousand people all around main street pushing and shoving and trying to walk. I started to panic a bit because Nico was in my sling asleep and people were knocking into him and pushing me into people and his head was getting hit. I kept yelling, STOP, I have a baby in my arms, but people didn't care. About 10 or so minutes of this I started to freak out. We weren't moving, people were hitting Nico's head and we were getting shoved from every direction. I looked at my mom and she could see I was breaking down. Somehow she managed to get me out of the crowd and into a store where I lost it. I had my first ever panic attack and let me tell you it was scary. I could not breath, I was dizzy seeing spots, my heart was racing out of my chest and I felt so out of control of my body. I just sat there holding my baby crying and trying to get a grip on things and calm myself down. After a bit I was able to. I am so lucky to have had my mom with me. She just sat next to me reassuring me things were ok. Mothers have a way of telling you everything will be ok and you trust them with all your heart and soul to know it will be. I sure am happy to have a mother like her, not sure what I would have done without her by my side this night!

As a parent all you want to do is protect your children and you will go to any lengths to make sure they are safe. In the middle of the crowd we were in, I could not keep my baby safe. People were hitting him and shoving me into other people with him on my chest and I could not protect him. It was such an awful feeling, one I hope to never have again!

Once I was calmed down we walked through the shops only to stop at the end and see the fireworks over the castle. We then quickly walked to the monorail and went to the car where the men where.

It was an AMAZING time at the park, one that I will never forget. I am super happy we got to go, and go for free and that my parents joined us. My parents helped make this trip a memorable one by buying dinner for everyone and letting Mina meet the characters. That was simply priceless I tell you.

What a wonderful day for the Crescitelli Gang!

Mina's new MUST HAVE

2008-12-16T05:13:00.000-08:00

Ok, for the past few days Mina has been going nuts in the pantry for one item. Now it's something that you would normally not eat, well I don't eat it. Carlos bought them for pasta sauce, which I still won't eat them in the pasta sauce. Anyway, Mina has been sneaking into the pantry when no is looking and then she runs off to her play room and closes the door SHUT really loud so that no can see what she is doing. I know she's up to something if she closes the door and I have a rule of no closed doors in this house. Well, for the past few days she's been in her room with a package of clams.....YUCK! I go in and take them from her and she screams and cries and snots at the nose wanting them so bad. I finally got down to her level and told her, Mina, these are daddy's and he uses them for cooking, we DON'T eat these like this. She keeps crying to the point of hysterics and when I ask why she wants them so bad she looks up at me with a snotty face and says..............................
BECAUSE ARIEL IS ON THEM.....sniff, sniff, sniff. Sure enough, I look at the package and there is a mermaid, right in the logo. My poor child is about ingest clams......ewwwwww because there is a mermaid whom she thinks is Ariel in the logo. Nice going Chicken of the Sea. Do you think they knew what they were doing?????? I have to wonder! I now have a 2 year old ready to eat clams because of packaging! I have since put the clams way up high in the pantry so she can't see them or reach them and get upset she can't eat Ariel.

Decorating Time

2008-12-10T05:24:00.001-08:00

Well it's the time again during the year where we decorate our tree and get ready for Christmas. This year was so wonderful because Mina is actually at an age where she can help to put ornaments on the tree and she just had a BLAST doing it. Carlos and I normally have a big tree, but last year we decided that since Mina was such a terror that we would get a small tree and put it on the pool table with the village. This year was no different. We pulled out the 3 foot tree and put it on the dining room table with the village. It's a little Charlie Brown looking, but it makes me smile none the less.

Once we pulled the tree out, Mina's face just got huge smile on it and she was super happy. It was great to see her into this. She started putting ornaments on the tree from the chair, which are in the garage now, and she could not have been happier doing it. Of course I had to back behind her and ungroup the 5 ornaments she put in the same spot, but it gave me pleasure to watch her so excited to put stuff on the tree.

What an amazing time for the little ones this year. Mina is two and a half and she's so cute because she is starting to follow directions and do things like decorate the tree, decorate a gingerbread house and just get excited about Christmas. She still has no clue and I've tried to explain about baby Jesus and it being his birthday and all, but all she keeps saying is birthday.....gifts, it's Jesus birthday mommy???? I can see her little brain trying to search for her friend Jesus, LOL! She will understand one of these days, I just have to keep explaining it to her. In the meantime, what a wonderful time to be a mother of a two year old and see her face light up from the simple things like lights on a tree and fake snow in a village.

I know this Christmas is going to be a wonderful one, homemade gifts and all because of the love that surrounds us.

Thanksgiving

2008-11-29T04:52:00.000-08:00

First let me say, that this year was AMAZING at my moms for Thanksgiving. Now growing up, I am use to BIG Thanksgiving lunches at my moms and grammies house. When I say BIG, I mean about 60-70 people showing up and everyone bringing dishes and us having to get tables from the church to set outside just to seat everyone. Over the years, the numbers have gone down and a lot of our family has had their own Thanksgiving. My mom and grammie still pull a BIG crowd of family, but this year was the first in years that I saw not only just a big family gathering, but people really happy to be there. Don't get me wrong, everyone always LOVES coming to lunch at moms and grammies, but maybe it just hit me different this year because of the times. I looked at the faces of all my family that I only get to see once a year at this time and I saw the happy smiling faces and people just having a good time being together. In this day and time with everything going on family is the one and only thing you can turn and count on. Boy did I see a special bond between us all on Thursday. No one was talking about how bad things are in the economy, everyone was just smiling and cheerful and happy to see one anther.

We had about 50 people there this year. I would say the biggest crowd we have had in some time. I'm happy the gas prices are down which allowed family to come this year. Mom and grammie cooked a few turkeys and some ham along with other dishes and everyone brought a dish to share. I sure to do like pot luck and getting to eat everyone's food! Right before we ate we all stood in a circle holding hands, mind you we were 50 deep, but we all held hands and stood there. We took turns person by person saying out loud what we were thankful for. I of course said I was thankful to have my family back under one roof and thankful that I had a terrific family and friends that has helped us out so much this past year. My aunts and uncles, great aunts and uncles, nieces, in laws and everyone in between took turns saying what they were thankful for and it just brought chills to my body. We even had a few tears and it was just touching that we were all there for each other holding hands feeling the love and strength that only a family this big could bring.

Of course after which a prayer was said by my dad and we started the line to eat. I am sooooo lucky I have kids too, as I got to get in the front of the line. Being a kid I always was in the front, but as you got older, the families with the small kids always went first and you got booted back to the back! This year I was up front and loving that there was LOTS of food to choose from. When you are in the back you might not get aunt Nancy's famous squash casserole or mom's 7 layer salad! I loaded up my plate, Mina's plate and Carlos was behind me filling his up too. We all sat down where we could and ate lots of food and had a good time being together stuffing our faces! After we were so full from eating lunch, we of course hit the dessert table. I made Tammy's pumpkin roll and boy was it yummy and a hit amoung everyone....thanks Tammy for sharing the recipe.

After lunch it is tradition that the men go off bird hunting, or watch football and all the women get together and make crafts. You see our Christmas tree is filled with handmade ornaments and every year we make new ones. The only thing that is bought on our tree are the lights. My mom still hangs ornaments that we made when I was a small child. I justt LOVE my moms tree. It holds so many special memories of making ornaments together as a family for all the years of my life. Anyway, mom decided to make ornaments this year that were favorites from the past. Reindeer's were made, stars were made and little Santa balls were made. It's funny to see the group of women doing this too. They all have gotten smart over the years and have learned to bring their own glue guns so they don't have to wait behind 10 people to use the hot glue, LOL! They all sit together laughing and gabbing and being mad that their Santa head got glued on backwards, etc. I always use to get paid 20 bucks by my aunt Jackie to make her ornaments. She said she was never skilled enough to do them, and thought mine were always so wonderful. This year however I didn't join the ladies with the crafts. Instead I took over the kids table and helped the girls do crafts of their very own. Mina was interested for about 10 mintues and then moved on. 2 year olds just can't sit still for more than 10 minutes at a time. I had about 7 little girls that I helped and it was great to see them all enjoying the time and making little crafts for their trees at home.

As we were packing up to leave and take the 2 hour drive back home, my mom handed me a baggy. Inside it had all the ornaments the ladies made. My mom made her set, about 5 of them and gave them all to me. What a wonderful mother. I tell you, she has always put her kids and family first before herself. She knew I wanted to make ornaments and w/out even asking me or having me to ask her, she just made them and gave them to me. Thanks mom. My tree at home is starting to be filled with the love of homemade ornaments, just like yours. It brings a smile to my face to see a tree getting filled with love like this.

So this was our day. A wonderful day indeed. I am so very thankful for all that I have and all the wonderful people that surround my life, day in and day out. I'm not sure where I would be today without my family and friends. What a great day to remember all of that and what a great day to soak all it up and be so VERY proud!

Kidnapped a couple kids today......

2008-11-22T16:44:00.000-08:00

Well Katie called me this afternoon to tell me she was in the car heading down to Orlando with a Uhal and were going to unpack Phil. I said, PLEASE let me come and pick up the kiddos from you and bring them here to play with Mina! She was a bit hesitant because of all the work they needed to do and they needed to pick Phil's mom up from the airport, but I told her I lived on the way to the airport and that I MUST have the kids and I WAS coming to get them, end of story. She had not other choice but to say ok and so off we went on the 30 minute drive up to get the kids.

Once we got there Mina got excited because she saw Cooper and Samantha. We parked and Mina hopped out of the van, ran over to Sammy and just started giving her a giant bear hug and a kiss. Mina has missed her friend. She then gave Cooper a hug and a kiss. She's so sweet and she just loves her friends and I could tell she has missed them. She knew JUST who they were too and was ready to play from the get go. I packed the girls up in the back of the van and Cooper in the the middle next to Nico. We were heading back to my house and we had Brother Bear on the dvd player. I said to Mina, where's Shamu? (there is a part where a killer whale is in the movie and Mina shouts Shamu) Anyway, Cooper interrupts and says, Mrs Mel, it's not Shamu, it's an Orca!!! Oh my Mr Cooper......how smart are we these days is what I responded with. I drove home with a huge smile on my face thinking about how wonderful kids minds are.....like little sponges, you can fill them with all kinds of information. I mean here was a almost 4 year old telling me what kind of whale he saw on the dvd!

We got home and they started playing in the playroom. The kids were having fun and I thought, hum, what would be fun? I looked at my new stand mixer.....just got it as a gift from a company and thought, do I have stuff to make cookies? Low and behold I did! I got everything out to make peanut butter cookies, called the kids in and sat them on the counter. Each kid sat there on the counter helping me one at a time put stuff in the mixer and taking turns licking the edges....lol! We really had a good time for about an hour making cookies on the counter. We baked them and then they each ate two. After which they were pretty wound up and played chase for a bit.

They slowed down and around 6:15 all three of them layed on the floor and the couch and just crashed out. I could tell the sugar high was gone. Katie came soon after to get them and pick up her mother in law at the airport.

What a great day I had with the kids. I have never made cookies like that before and I had sooo much fun making them with 3 kids. I can't stop smiling now just thinking about the good time we had.

I am happy my friend is moving closer to me. I am happy I get to see Samantha and Cooper some more and I am happy for days like this. It helps to remind me that it's the little things in life that make me really happy. Who knew cookies could make me smile this much? Boy I love life and boy do I love seeing kids soaking it all up.....every ounce of it, minute by minute!

The 30 something crowd......

2008-11-18T12:06:00.000-08:00

well, I guess I can officially join the 30 something crowd. Today is my 30th birthday. It was a feat coming into this world born at 60mph in the back of a Mercury Cougar, 2 blocks from the hospital and delivered by my dad and all I did was smile spit bubbles at him!

I am still smiling today and have enjoyed life thus far. It's not been an easy road I've been on at times, but I've made it through the journey this far and happy to say it's been an exciting one!

I am the mother of two wonderful children, one is only 2 months old and a very proud wife. I never dreamed I would EVER be 30, and now that it is here, I can say I'm excited to take anther journey of life hopefully for anther decade. 30 seems VERY young to me now, LOL and I smile remembering when I thought it was sooooo old!

I'm going to celebrate today with the family and some dinner and smile when I think where I have been and where I want to go in life. 30 IS young and I know I have many more adventures ahead of me and it makes me excited.

So I'm strapped in and ready to go and enjoy life now as a 30 something.....well at least for the next 10 years! Once the over the hill 40 age hits me, I'm sure I won't be so eager to start a new decade......LOL!

I'm happy for today, I'm happy it's my birthday and I'm happy that no matter what life has given me, I'm still here, kicken hard and strong. And didn't you know......30 is the new 20 anyway! :)

My Early Riser

2008-11-13T04:48:00.000-08:00

So at 4:30 this morning as I was sitting in the bed nursing Nico and I hear these strange sounds coming from the kitchen in our new place. I shake Carlos awake and told him, honey, I hear noises from the kitchen.....did someone break in? I was told from the neighbor a week ago that this area is prone to car breakin's, etc and make sure to lock up my stuff. I reminded the neighbor that I drove a Dodge minivan, not some fancy car like everyone else here. Anyway, Carlos gets up and just then I hear little feet. Ahhhhh, not a burgler, but Mina! Carlos comes back in the room after a few minutes and I asked, what is she doing up? He tells me, cooking waffles! Oh Gosh is all that comes out of my mouth. Apparently Mina woke up and was hungry so she decided that a blueberry Eggo was what she wanted. She came to the kitchen, opened the freezer with all her might, got the Eggo's out and put one in the toaster oven and hit hit toast. Sure enough, it was cooking when Carlos got to her in the kitchen. Mind you there were no lights on either. I tell you, we have one smart child on our hands.

After Carlos came to bed about 5, she was back in our room just 10 minutes later. I decided to get up this time with her and tried my hardest to coax her back to sleep. It wasn't happening this morning. So I set her up in her playroom, gave her froks in a cup (Frosted Flakes) and some juice in her sippy. I then babygated the door off from her so she was locked in the playroom and I proceeded back to bed at 5:30. As I would know, as soon as I laid my head down Nico started to stir and fuss in his bassinet. GREAT......now he was awake! Just as I got him settled down, about 15 minutes later, I hear more noise in the kitchen and little feet running. I drag myself out of bed....AGAIN to find the freezer door open and the Eggo's missing. I go on a search for my dear child and there she was, in her playroom sitting on her princess couch eating a frozen waffle. When I approached her she said, look mommy, I eat waffle.....yummy! I said Mina, they are frozen and I got a reply back....no mommy, waffles are yummy! I rolled my eyes, took the waffles away and decided to make a STRONG pot of coffee and start my day.

Boy, I knew the time changed, but 4:30 is a bit early for little ones to be waking up wanting waffles!

Yet anther crazy day here in the life of the Crescitelli's!

A week into the new place

2008-11-11T04:33:00.001-08:00

And it's starting to feel like home to me. I have unpacked so many boxes and I have forgotten how much stuff we actually have! I actually left about 25-30 boxes unpacked and put them in the garage. I really don't need everything out if we will be moving again here soon. Oh I dread packing all this up again, but it's what we will be doing. I'm trying to now think about as I unpack it.

Family life with us is getting back to normal and boy have I missed it. Just cooking dinner and sitting together brings tears to my eyes because I'm so happy. The bond between Mina and Carlos is so precious it just puts a smile on my heart watching them together. She is so attached to her daddy that she follows him into every room and won't leave his side. It's great seeing them play together and of course it's great when he raises his voice to a certain tone and she stops dead in her tracks doing whatever it was that made him have that tone! I for the life of can't get her to do that, but one quick word and tone from her daddy and she KNOWS he means business!

We celebrated a week here last night with a family bubble bath. We have a HUGE tub with jets in the master bedroom and so we took some bubble bath and piled in. Yes, even the baby. It was the most fun we have had in a long time together. Something so simple as a bubble bath bringing laughter and delight to each one of us. Nico's poor head was surrounded by bubbles and all he could do was giggle. After the baby and I got out, Carlos was true to himself and played with Mina anther 15 minutes. As I got the baby dressed in his pj's, all I heard was squeals and screams of pure excitement from Mina. I thought, ahhhhhhhh, my family back together again.....these are the sounds I have most missed!

Election Day!

2008-11-04T09:27:00.000-08:00

Well today is Nov 4th and it is Election Day. I was VERY worried about not being able to vote. Carlos and I moved from our home in Clermont in May, moved to Alachua with my mom and then just moved back to Orlando Sunday. We are both STILL registered in Lake County (Clermont.) I call Lake County and they told me just to go today and fill out a new change of address and vote. Well all the voting here in Orlando has been on a 3-4 hour wait line and I was SO scared to take 2 kids to do this.

However this morning, and it was a challenging one at that, I packed them up and off we went. I go to what I thought was the right place and unload the kids. Those of you w/out kids have NO idea what it is like to unload a newborn and a toddler. It's not easy or fun. So I get them unloaded and go inside. There was a HUGE line outside, but I knew i needed to speak to someone. After 20 minutes, we find out I'm at the wrong place! GREAT! I then go and re-load the kids in the car and drive to the next loactaion.

O boy is all I said driving up to the new place. There was so many cars, they were parked down about 5 blocks from the place! I just kept driving and got lucky to find a parking spot right up front. I see this HUGE line and it started to sprinkle and I just took a deep breath and told myself I was going in and doing this!

After unloading the kids, AGIAN, I walked up and was told that the area I needed to vote for had NO line! YIPPIE, something right today! They had 2 places combined together and the line was for anther area, not the one I needed. YIPPIE again!

Mina was in the sling, Nico in the carseat in the stroller and people looked at me like I was one heck of a crazy momma! I strolled them through the line next to people waiting and went to my area. Once there I changed my address and 20 minutes later was able to cast my vote!

AHHHHHHHHH, I feel SO much better now. I am excited about this election and I'm excited to see who wins. Either way, I did my job as an American and cast my vote and felt proud that we live in a place that allows me to do this. There is something GREAT about this country and I'm so happy I'm part of it!

Back home now with one sleeping toddler and one not happy infant today! lots to unpack in the new home and need to find out how to get blue paint off the carpet.......thanks to Mina this morning! Ahhh, how life is GRAND! At least Carlos and I are back together again and boy it feels GREAT!

Mina's RED lipstick

2008-11-01T07:52:00.001-07:00

Does anyone know how to get RED color stay lipstick off? My child has it in her EYES!

What a mess I tell you! LMAO!

A CRAZY week and Halloween to boot!

2008-11-01T07:13:00.000-07:00

Well it's been a week since I have written in my blog. Of course it's been a nutty and crazy one! Tuesday night after grammie not feeling well for a few days, we had the ambulance here and had her taken to ICU. It was something more real than I could have ever imagined. My mom yelled down to me around 11:30 or so and when I came downstairs grammie was laid out on the floor and mom said she just had a stroke. Now this is my ONLY grandparent and I love her dealry. I started to cry, but sucked it up and helped until the EMT's got here. I laid next to her, stroked her hair and sang you are my sunshine. Grammie was not doing well on the floor. The EMT's came barging through the door, 5 or 6 of them and started to hook her up to machines, etc. At this point I cried. I didn't know what was going on with grammie and my heart just fell to pieces.

She was admitted to ICU and after a day there they found LOTS of blood in her belly. After an endo, they fixed it and she started to stablize. I have to say she's a fighter and not ready to give up just yet, because she is pulling through just FINE! We dressed up all the great grandkids yesterday and took them to see her in the ICU unit. She smiled the entire time taking turns with each one in her bed. It was sweet!

Halloween was last night and boy was it fun. I told Carlos that I don't think I EVER had a more wonderful Halloween. Something about having kids and seeing their face light up that just took my breath away.
We went trick or treating down Main Street in Alachua. It was an AMAZING time, with lots of peolpe down there and all the stores giving out candy. I took Mina's wagon and turned it into a bubble bath. No bubble bath is complete with out a rubber duck and that's what she went as. It was simply adorable to see her riding in the wagon as a rubber duck. People stopped and just said it was such a cute idea and they took her picture all night. Of course Carlos had the previlage of pulling that wagon through the crowded streets with tons of people, but at least we knew where she was. It was funny, she was kept busy by trying to open the candy. She managed to get a few open, but it took her the 2 hours to do it in! LOL!

My entire family went, Jason, Jen, their 3 kids and BK and Mary with their child. My mom also left the ICU with grammie to come with us. It was something she didn't want to miss. We all walked down to Main Street from my moms and just had a blast being together. This is why Carlos and I want to move back here......to have fun family time like this! After trick or treating we all came home to BIG pot of chilli dad cooked for us all. It was yummy and we chowed down!

Today is my last day at my moms. I am starting to pack and we move tomorrow morning at 8am. I am sad to leave, but very HAPPY to be back together again with Carlos. 5 months is a LONG time to be apart. Hopefully his transfer comes soon and we will back sooner rather than later!

Mina just walked up to me with grammies RED lipstick all over her.....hum, this should be FUN to clean off her!

I think it's time to potty train Mina

2008-10-22T14:06:00.000-07:00

I've been holding off on training Mina to use the potty for a few good reasons. We moved from Orlando to my home town, my husband had to stay in Orlando for work and only saw us on the weekends, Mina started school 3 days a week once we moved here, and I had a baby, who is now 2 months old. So with all the new changes in her life, I decided that now was NOT the time to try and potty train.

She goes to the potty here and there and tells me sometimes. I keep thinking, ok, this will be GOOD in a couple of months and we can potty train. WELL, for the last 2 days she's been taking off her diaper once she goes to the potty and tells me more and more she needs to go pee pee and she goes. Since we are moving again in a couple weeks I was trying to hold off.

Not anymore though. I just found my lovely daughter outside with her shorts off and her diaper off. When I went outside on the porch to see where her diaper was, i found a BIG surprise! Mina had started to pooh in her diaper, took it off just in time to go on the porch and then decided that since she went on the porch, she would try and clean it up with a broom and then i guess that got old, so she played in it. i know she was playing because I found a straw sticking up in the middle of it!

NICE!!!!!

The broom was NASTY and I almost threw up cleaning the wood on the porch. Mina took a bath and is nice and clean now, but i think that she is trying to tell me that she is "ready" to use the big girl potty. Hum???

Yet anther crazy day here with the Crescitelli's!

2008-10-19T15:22:00.000-07:00

Just got back from Orlando, a 2 hour drive down to take a look at our new home we will be renting. It's nice. I'm excited about living there and being a family again. We had some issues getting the key, thanks to family, but after about an hour, we were in.

I knew this was the place for us when I walked around to look at the rooms. The little girls room had a unicorn on the wall and I thought, o how Mina is this! She was running around screaming in delight and she kept saying my room, my room and pony, pony! She's super excited to have a room with unicorns on the wall. I mean how did that work out? We leave her bedroom at our old house with the unicorns I painted on her wall to come to this place with anther! It's too much for me to try and grasp, I just love it is all.

The boy's room had a dock painted on it and was also really cute. I'm not sure if I should stick with the frog theme for Nico now. Maybe something more boy, like fish and bugs! Since i've yet to buy his bedding, I can change it! Either way, this is a nice room and he will sleep very sound in it once he starts sleeping on his own, LOL!

It also has a very LARGE bonus room upstairs and that will make a perfect work room for me. The walls are orange and they have polka dots on one wall. I think this use to be a playroom for the kids, but to me, I LOVE it as an art room. I can get inspired by looking at bright paint and polka's on the wall.

The rest of the house is really nice and the kitchen is big with lots of open space. Carlos and I will live well here and we are just excited to get in and be together again.

Mina and her daddy melted my heart today. They chased each other around and around and Mina screamed in delight playing with her daddy. He tickled her to death and I heard laughter from her I have not heard in a LONG time. She truly was a happy girl today and I smiled in my heart knowing that soon this will be everyday again. Watching her with him is the most precious thing I've ever seen. It says something about a man and a father who takes time with his kids like this. I can't even count the ways on how lucky I am to love a man like this!

Ok! Mina is giving me "fish" to eat and her hands are wet and after "eating" one I now realize where she is "fishing" for them.................um, that would be grammie's toilet! YUCK! I have toilet water all over me and Mina is happy as a clam digging in it for fish.................need to go get her out! Ahhhhhh, the fun times with kids and imagination!

Tired something

2008-10-18T14:15:00.001-07:00

lol, and it didn't work so it left me this space. ARG, I'm trying to get a slideshow to upload and it won't work. O well. On to other things!

Ok, FINALLY getting this done

2008-10-18T11:24:00.000-07:00

And I'm ready for it! I have finally started a blog. Something that I have wanted to do for a long time now.

Carlos and are getting ready to move back to Orlando. We sold our home back in May and Mina and I, 7 months pregnant picked up and moved in with my parents. Carlos stayed in Orlando with his job in the hopes that he would get a transfer. He has put in a transfer request 3 months prior to us selling the house and we just knew it would be soon.

Here we are 5 months later and no transfer from AT&T. Since that time, we have had a baby boy, Nico and we just can't stand to be apart anymore. Mina cries for her daddy and doesn't understand why she only sees him once a week. I try and tell her daddy is at work, but she is still confused as to why he leaves us every Sunday.

Although Orlando is NOT the place we want to be, together IS the place we want to be, so that's what we are doing. All of our things are up here in Gainesville in a storage unit and w/in the next week or two, we will be pulling it all out and heading back down.

Hopefully his transfer comes soon so we can move back to where we want to be, but in the meantime, we will be a family living together again under one roof!

I'm happy to see my husband again everynight. Boy have I MISSED him!

Starting a Blog

2008-04-05T04:01:00.000-07:00

Hello all. Well, since our life is always so funny and crazy, I thought I would start to write things down that go on in our everyday life so we can always look back and remember them. I was inspired by friends to blog and think this will be VERY fun. I am going to try and write often and see what I can do to go back in time a little so I keep the fun family life of the Crescitelli's always being remembered.We will sure enjoy finally putting our funny family in words and we hope anyone reading will enjoy the same things.

Melissa