Hello, My Name is Brooke

so i am not even gonna make excuses or say how i am a terrible blogger.  i will let the obvious speak. ok so there is that.
summer...oh my summer.  summer has been fabulous being at home with the kids and playing and taking it easy.  i have been working at school some and working on school stuff at home but that is nothing new.  i enjoy teaching and creating new things therefore i still work on stuff in the summer. <3
no broken  bones this summer, or surgeries, or anything scary like that so far and praying we are in the clear. we started out our summer vacay brilliantly in san antonio where we went to sea world, the natural bridge caverns, and shopping in san marcos.  we had a fabulous time as our family of four.  the kids {and us} adored sea world and we went two days.  kyler was a rock star and braved a 60 foot high obstacle course with his daddy.  kam got to do the kiddie 4 foot course and i did the zip line! we made lots of amazing memories and the kids want to go back and see shamu again very soon.
kyler made all stars in baseball so we played ball all of june as well.  he sure loves it.  so do we.
now that it is the middle of july, i am shaking my head and realizing summer is going way too fast and it is quickly approaching our official report time back to school, in about a month. {shreeeek!}
again, i love what i get to do each day but i certainly love my time at home with my babies with no make up, sun tan lines, and wet fun buns.  oh life is good.

Vault Denim

So I realized I have not posted any Vault Denims pics so.....let me do that! If you want any information about Vault Denim as a customer, a party hostess, or even to join my team, I would love to chat with ya!
Please visit my business Facebook page and "like" it!
www.facebook.com/vaultdenimwesttexas
You can also check out my Vault Denim website at www.brookemcdowell.vaultdenim.me

T is for Terrible

Geesh...really? I get back to work and then I am TERRIBLE about blogging.  It is so much easier in the summer because I can blog while my kiddos nap and I have more "free" time.  I.must.get.better.  This post feels repetitive as well because I go through this cycle.  Sorry to the whole two people who may read this! LOL :)
We are into the second semester of the school year and it is flying!!! Crazy!!! We just finished the first week back after Christmas vacation and boy did it wipe me out! I got truly used to our lazy vacation days hanging out in our pjs all day and doing whatever we wanted, when we wanted.  More of those days are not too far ahead as summer will be approaching before we know it!!
Our family is staying super busy as usual.  Kamdyn is LOVING her in home daycare where she is with five other precious kids.  They are so loved and taken care of and it is so nice that I do not have to worry one single second about her when she is not with me.  Kyler is loving Kindergarten and is so excited to be going to the library, checking out books, and taking AR tests.  He feels quite big for sure! He is about to start winter tball indoors and he is excited! He loved playing soccer in the fall but he is ready to hit that ball! :)
I am still loving my job.  This is the more "stressful" time as our state Writing assessment is in a mere 12 weeks but over the last few weeks I have tried to get a hold of a different approach.  I am trying to stress and worry less.  I know I am doing my job and my kids are working hard and that is that.  We can not ask more than that.  That test is a hard sucker! NO DOUBT! But, as I tell my kiddos, we are required to take it and we will do our best.  There is life beyond the STARR test....so the love of teaching will continue! :)
I am also loving my second job as a Vault Fashion Consultant.  It has been a blast! I originally signed up under my friend's team in June to help may down some some of Kamdyn's adoption debt quicker.  I have loved every bit of it!! I have great customers, great co workers, and an amazing company who supports us so much! It has been a blast!! My business continues to grow and I am blessed.  I am also one of two inventory coordinators for the the Lubbock area so I was thrilled to take on that role as well.
Wade is loving being an equipment operator (aka "driver) at the fire department and truly loves his job.  He enjoys his crew and loves what he does.  That makes me happy! He still works his second job as well with a dear friend doing landscaping.  Needless to say, we do not have a lot of "down time" but we ALWAYS have play time and family time.  That is the most important thing to us.
Well, I guess I better update with some recent pics, too....hopefully I will write again soon.  I love it and I don't know why I forget to do it.  I will work on that, too! :)

Bling Baby

Welp after much talking with a friend of mine who is also a Miss Texas sister to me, I have decided to join her team and take on a super fun venture! I am now a Fashion Consultant for Vault Denim.  I like the words....fashion consultant.  haha! That is my title...really! Anyway, Vault sells fashion and designer jeans for up to 50% off of retail prices.  As a VFC, I host parties in people's homes or in my home and sell jeans, shorts, capris, and bermudas.  Soooo fun! Coolest part is Vault does not require us to buy the inventory and we are not required to have a monthly quota.  So basically it is no pressure fun and it is up to you on hard you want to work.  Girl's night out having a jean party, shopping with your friends, fabulous jeans at a great price...yep...sounds fun to me! I have been busy getting some of the inital stuff taken care of and I have hit the ground running!
Kyler is still doing great with his cast and we are down to two weeks left! : )  He is attending a Junior Wizards Science camp for three days and is loving it.  He is having a blast, as usual, and enjoying time with two good friends.  Kamdyn is still precious and gets in to a lot of trouble...no really she does!!! She is HILARIOUS and quite the charmer with her big brown eyes.  She gets in trouble and just gives the biggest smile and bats her eyelashes at you...yep we are in TROUBLE! Love my precious babies though and loving my time off with them.
I am quite excited to be back at the pool in a couple of weeks...because I have ooooohhhh so missed that! We still will have plenty of that left in the summer after the cast comes off.  Yay! Yay! Yay!
Life.is.good.

Casted and three weeks to go....

Welp, Kyler got his hard cast on Monday.  He chose black and he is thinking it looks pretty "cool"...which it does. ; ) We got metallic gold and silver markers (per his request) to have people sign it.  Three weeks and he will get it off.  The pedi ortho normally does waterproof casts BUT that was not an option for us since he has three pins in.  : (  Oh well, it honestly was not even expected as an option so that is okay.  He will be getting if off before we go to the firefighter olympics and to Oklahoma to see grandma and grandpa.  That is super great...plus it will be off for the beach in August!!
We are trying to stay busy playing games, playing "gently" outside...lol, doing crafts, and finding other things to do than swim.  That is hard because we normally swim almost every day. 
Keeping both kids occupied can be difficult at times but they are hilarious and fun.  Miss Kam gets into everything...and I mean EVERYTHING.  She is a little mess, but a beautiful little mess whom we love DEARLY!! I know a few other people who are little messes, too...just sayin. ; )
We are enjoying summer and our relaxed schedule for sure!!!
Thankful for this time with my babies!!! xoxo

oh snap

It was a typical summer evening around our house.  We had dinner and then went off to get some ice cream.  We got back and put Miss Kam to bed and it was time for a little patio time.  Kyler and Wade were on the trampoline and I was on the patio reading my Nook...then came the blood curdling screams.  Screams. Yes more than one.  I ran over to the trampoline where Wade already had Ky in his arms and I could see the "not so great" look on Wade's face and I looked at Ky's arm and I knew...it was not good.  His arm was deformed to say the least...almost looking like the bottom half from his elbow down was facing the wrong angle compared to the top half of his arm...that's cuz it was! I looked at Wade and he confirmed my fears that it was ER time.  First trip ever for him.  First trip ever for one of our children.  I ran across to our neighbor's house, who had just been by chatting with us five minutes before, and they came to the house to keep Kam since she was already in bed.  Wade loaded up Ky very carefully in his truck.  Ky wanted me to sit by him in the back so of course I did...trying to hold it together.  Ky was not crying he was in shock.  True shock.  His face became paler and paler and the more white it became, the more green it became, if that makes ANY sense.  Of course we do not live by the hospital but it sure did not seem to take Wade long to get there.  I think he was pretending he was driving a different red truck...his big ole fire truck!

The staff at the ER in the children's hospital was amazing.  We got back quickly and they began to access Kyler.  He was very calm.  He was in pain, and in shock, but very calm.  Once the pediatric ER doc took a look at it and said it was probably broken, my heart broke a little more.  They brought the portable x-ray machine to Kyler and took x-rays of his arm.  He confirmed his earlier suspicion of a break and said the pediatric orthopedic surgeon was on his way.  WHAT? He said it was looking like surgery and the surgeon was called in.  Once the pedi ortho was there, his news broke our hearts further by telling us he had two breaks and it not only required surgery but it required pins.  Talk about a blow to the gut and heart.  I kept reminding myself that Kyler WAS ok and this was totally fixable.  Yes. It was. That did not help it hurt our hearts any less though. 

They gave Ky some versed, which was quite funny, and he began to splint his arm.  I will get back to the versed in a bit...
They actually were fighting a double edged sword in a sense because they need to wait to do the surgery to the swelling by the break in his upper arm but they needed to do the surgery right then do the swelling in his fingers and hand.  ???? huh???? Well, basically it is best to do the surgery after some swelling has come down which was his main goal.  However, they were concerned about his pulse oxygen rate to his fingers and hand.  If they could not get that stable, it could do major damage to his fingers and the tissue so he had to splint it twice and attempt to get the pulse ox where he wanted it.  If they could not, they would do surgery right then.  Thankfully they got it stabilized and he felt we could wait until the next day to operate, giving his injury site a chance to relieve some swelling. 

Versed...oh versed.  I have had versed plenty of times during fertility treatments and it is a super QUICK super funny cocktail.  Oh geez within seconds Ky's little eyes started glowing and rolling around a little and you could see he was trying to focus so hard.  He kept mouthing something and the words would not come out.  So of course I got a little closer to his face and he kept trying to say something as the doctor was splinting his arm.  He finally got out..."mommy....you have four eyes." Of course that helped the mood tremendously because Wade and I as well as the doc and nurse began to laugh.  We all needed that. 

With the swelling to his hand and fingers being an issue, we had to keep his arm "just right" through the night until the surgery.  He looked so tiny in that hospital bed but once we got to his room he wanted cartoons.  Of course, why not at almost midnight.  Of course there was not a lot of sleep for anyone but I did not care.  Ky was already heart broken because the doctor said no beach, which we were planning to leave for two days from then. He finally dozed a bit and I slept from 5 am - 7 am.  (I did however love the fact that I had my Nook app on my iphone and I read through the night. Truly helped me.)

About nine the next morning they came and got Ky and they were ready for surgery.  He sucked down a Sprite the night before at 11:45 and could not have food or drink after midnight so I was so afraid he would be starving.  He was a trooper.  Surgery did not take too long at all.  The surgeon and his team were phenomenal and we were highly impressed.  Ky was calm.  We were...ok...Wade was calm.  I was almost calm.  I was ok.  I just had a hard time because I was terrified that Ky was terrified.  Ummm he was not.  He asked questions in the OR, the said, and he was great.  They gassed him and he was out.  He came out of the anesthesia just fine as well.  They put in three pins to repair the break, with no major incision.  Just three holes for the pins.  PRAISE THE LORD!

He did great through the afternoon and was not in too much pain.  They had given him morphine in the ER, once through the night, and one small dose in the afternoon after his surgery.  He was so tough! After he went potty, walked a bit, talked coherently, ate without getting sick, we could go home.  We got home about five that afternoon.  The nurses and doctors all fell in love with Ky, of course.  His sweet manners and easy going self charmed everyone.  We can not say enough how blessed we are that we had amazing people taking care of Kyler, as well as us. 

He is doing great.  Keeping him still and occupied at the same time is difficult.  Say it with me...five.year.old.boy.  haha! We play lots of games, do art projects, watch movies, and we are trying to get out of the house for brief outings.  We have gone to feed the ducks and we even took him to see Madagascar 3.  Great idea!!!

He will get his cast on Monday so I won't be so fearful then.  With it just being splinted, it freaks me out.  Having his cast on will make mama feel better for sure.  He should have the cast on about four weeks.  If all goes well, he should be good to go when it comes after.  Prayers for that please!  We still get to go to the beach in August before I go back to school so his heart is mended...hopefully his arm will be, too...very soon.

BuCkEt LiSt, CHORE chart, and A HOY Mateys!

Oh YAY! I have seen on Pinterest many, many "summer bucket list" ideas so Kyler and I sat down and made our own summer bucket list.  Well, I thought about a cute way to display it and so as I was re-organizing Kamdyn's closet, I found a precious pink bucket.  So, a light bulb went off! All of the supplies I needed to use were right in the house.  I used the pink bucket, scrapbooking letters, and scrapbook paper that was pre cut into squares.  I punched holes in the paper and then used a handy dandy bread sack tie to tie them to the bucket handle.  We wrote the bucket list items on the cards and then when we complete one, it goes in the bucket.  SOOO super fun!! Kyler is pumped, too.  I am sure Kam would be but...she just wants to chew on the bucket!

Since I have been re-organizing RaNdOm things (WHICH I HIGHLY LOVE TO DO) I also saw an idea on Pinterest for an organizational board for the kitchen.  Oh I am in love with it! It is nothing fancy but it keeps a to-do list, our weekly menu, our monthly calendar, chore chart for Ky, dry erase markers, and a grocery list.  It is all used with frames so you can erase them for the next week.  I LOVE it!! ...it is the small and simple things that give me such pleasure.

Speaking of the chore chart for Ky man...wow...it has been a HUGE success so far.  It is only day two however, but he is super pumped to do his chores so he can mark them out.  Maybe he is a little OCD like his mama.  ; )  We have always had him help us pick up and clean but now he "officially" has a chore chart with an allowance to go with it.  He is so funny, too because he wants to do tomorrow's list today...oh funny boy. 

Back in May we re decorated Kyler's room.  At our last home, the first home we built, that is where Kyler's first nursery was.  It was precious! The bedding was called alphabet soup and it was letters, numbers, and zoo animals.  It was red, brown, yellow, green, blue, and orange.  So super cute!

When we built this house, he was not quite two, so we kept his "nursery" stuff and had them paint the walls yellow, which is what they were in the other house.  It was cute for sure.  Well, last year after he turned four, he wanted to paint his walls blue over the yellow.  We still kept his nursery theme but he had a big boy bed now with a brown bedspread and curtains with accents of the other colors and abcs, 123s, & animals.  Well the time has come where we are all done with his original decor.  We have slowly taken parts away and now BAM! We have moved onto PiRaTeS!! We painted his baby blue walls back to a good, clean khaki and did one wall with a fun color block of strips.  This way, as he grows, we won't have to paint each year.  Even as he grows out of pirates, he won't grow out of the khaki, black, red, and white. : )  BONUS!  It was fun doing his room and we are pleased and he is totally pleased with it!!

Here are his letters that I repainted from his nursery.  That was a bit sad painting over the letters Denise and I made for his nursery but it was time...

I made a memory board for Kyler, too.  I got the idea from...wait for it...Pinterest!  :)  I got metal from Home Depot and covered it in cute pirate material and now he can put pictures up with magnets. 

Well, I am off to go re-organize something else fun!!! ta-ta!