We've had several big and small accomplishments this week.
The first being that I slept through the night with no aches or pains for the first time in a month! I'm retaining enough water with this baby that I could make a camel jealous. Which is causing back pain, leg pain and carpal tunnel which radiates up my arm and to my shoulder. I'm realizing why women used to be done having kids by 35. I'm too old for this. In any case, I only got up 10 times last night to go to the bathroom and I feel fantastic today.
Ben learned how to eat a cherry and spit the pit out. Up until now, I either had to bite off half a cherry and give him the part with no pit or he simply ate the entire thing. He has about 50 cherry trees growing in his belly. Whenever he spits a pit out he raises his fist in triumph and yells, "I did it!"
When one learns to spit the other learns to swallow...
Emily learned how to swallow her allergy pill. Poor girl is always a little stuffy. Instead of spending 5 times the amount and getting half the doses for the children's version of claritin, I just bought the adult Costco generic and split the pills. She's been chewing them with her vitamin. But this week, she gave swallowing it a go and after 3 tries, she got it. She was so excited the first time that she ran to me and gave me a high five.
Emily is making huge strides in swimming lately. I took the kids to the pool one day this week and she learned how to dive down (in the 3 foot section) and pick up one of the diving rings. She will do this over and over. I was so proud of her. We had to go back to the pool right after dinner to show David her new trick. She is also swimming a good 20-30 feet with no problem and starting to incorporate a bit of a breast stroke with her arms. She's doing really really well and does not want to wear her floaties at all.
Ben on the other hand almost drowned the other day. How is this an accomplishment? Well, we all went to the pool and Emily headed for the stairs. She hangs out there or in the 3 foot section until we get in. Then, Ben went running in that direction. David was getting undressed (well just his shirt, it's not THAT kind of pool) and I was getting the essentials out of the bag (goggles, diving rings, Ben's floaties). Ben's floaties. I look up and he's on the second step as the words are leaving my lips that he needs his floaties, he's leaping into the water. David jumps in immediately and is swimming to him across the pool. Emily is watching as he's in a little too deep for her to become a lifeguard. And Ben is almost drowning? No, he's actually treading water, keeping his head up and holding his breath when he'd dip down. He obviously wouldn't have been able to do this for minutes, but for the 15 seconds it took to get to him, he was doing great. Luckily, a nice man who we see often at the pool was in a lounge chair right there and got to him seconds before David. Ben didn't even cough or choke. He hadn't swallowed any water. He was just a little scared. He got out and came over to me to get his floaties on. All he had to say about the experience was, "Tat was welly deep." I on the other hand was almost in cardiac arrest. But, I'm proud of him for being able to stay up and use some of the skills he has learned in swim lessons instead of sinking to the bottom. It's just a reminder of how quickly accidents can happen.
I'm also able to hold 2 wretches of Ben's throw up in my very own hands. When he was done, he looked at me with those eyes and said, "I throwed up." Ya think?!
We decided on a baby name. Noah Gregory.
Oh, and the best thing, David learned how to make fantastic chicken wings courtesy of The Neely's on the Food Network. Thank you Pat and Gina!
Saturday, August 1, 2009
Monday, July 27, 2009
Say Cheese!
The last time I took the kids to get pictures together was about 2 years ago. I had taken Ben when he turned two, but they were way overdue to get pictures. Call it nesting, call it checking things off my mental to-do list, but I knew if I didn't take them before the baby came it would not happen.
I know Emily will get school ones done, but I can't count on them to turn out nice nor would I get any of her and Ben. So, I needed to head to Sears. In this small town, it's Sears or Walmart or a professional studio that is out of our price range.
I dread doing this, from the outfits to the hair to their shoes, it raises my blood pressure 20 points just thinking about it. I had a rough night, a really rough night. I was up by 1:00 with some pains under my rib cage, maybe it was muscles stretching or a foot, in any case I was up for over 4 hours in pain. Then, right when I was about to fall asleep one of the dogs went diarrhea all over the bedroom carpet. David had gotten coerced to sleep with Emily which is normally fine by me as I sleep better if I can have all my pillows lined up on each side. But, when the dog has an accident and I'm in pain, the last thing I wanted to be doing at 5 AM is steam cleaning the carpets. Of course, David lectured me that I should've woke him up, but I didn't. He came in at 6 right as I was finishing up and pretty much at my wits end. He called in sick today. Luckily that meant he got to help me with the kids pictures.
We get there and I quickly find out the trainee is taking our pictures and the manager is helping the previous customers. Oh no. This always happens. We get the newbie and nothing ever comes out right. After about 10 minutes, she had snapped the camera twice. Then she asked the kids what they wanted to do and she told them to say "cheese" followed by a "please". I'm thinking this is not going to work. My blood pressure went up another 20 points. Luckily, the manager finished up and came in to rescue the photo shoot.
The kids went from this:
To this:
The rest of the pictures were great and luckily David whisked the kids off to the play area in the mall while I sifted through pictures. Two hours later, we left happy.
Here are some of my favorites:
This is Ben's normal expression:
I know Emily will get school ones done, but I can't count on them to turn out nice nor would I get any of her and Ben. So, I needed to head to Sears. In this small town, it's Sears or Walmart or a professional studio that is out of our price range.
I dread doing this, from the outfits to the hair to their shoes, it raises my blood pressure 20 points just thinking about it. I had a rough night, a really rough night. I was up by 1:00 with some pains under my rib cage, maybe it was muscles stretching or a foot, in any case I was up for over 4 hours in pain. Then, right when I was about to fall asleep one of the dogs went diarrhea all over the bedroom carpet. David had gotten coerced to sleep with Emily which is normally fine by me as I sleep better if I can have all my pillows lined up on each side. But, when the dog has an accident and I'm in pain, the last thing I wanted to be doing at 5 AM is steam cleaning the carpets. Of course, David lectured me that I should've woke him up, but I didn't. He came in at 6 right as I was finishing up and pretty much at my wits end. He called in sick today. Luckily that meant he got to help me with the kids pictures.
We get there and I quickly find out the trainee is taking our pictures and the manager is helping the previous customers. Oh no. This always happens. We get the newbie and nothing ever comes out right. After about 10 minutes, she had snapped the camera twice. Then she asked the kids what they wanted to do and she told them to say "cheese" followed by a "please". I'm thinking this is not going to work. My blood pressure went up another 20 points. Luckily, the manager finished up and came in to rescue the photo shoot.
The kids went from this:
To this:
The rest of the pictures were great and luckily David whisked the kids off to the play area in the mall while I sifted through pictures. Two hours later, we left happy.
Here are some of my favorites:
This is Ben's normal expression:
Thursday, July 23, 2009
That's Love
Have I mentioned how wonderful my husband is? It's true. I can reach my toes, but not well enough to paint them. He did a pretty good job. I was a little scared at first when he said, "I just dab and pull it towards me?" I guess a guy doesn't instinctively know how to paint fingernails. He's hired though for the next 2 months.
Wednesday, July 22, 2009
Monday, July 20, 2009
The Name Game
We have a little more than 2 months left before the arrival of this little guy and we still don't have a name picked out. It's not that we don't agree on names, but it's just nothing is popping out.
With Emily, I liked Emma and Ella. David wanted more traditional and we went with Emily. Then, I told my Aunt Rosie the name who suggested that Rose would be a nice middle name. We loved it right away. All set. If Emily had been a boy, we would've named her Noah Michael.
I don't remember who suggested Benjamin for our little man, but we both agreed on that. His middle name is David for obvious reasons. I realize for me, names are attached to people I've known. Noah was this hunky tall drink of water on All My Children in the early 90's. I thought he was hot and a bit of a bad boy, so I like the name because it reminds me of him. Same thing with Ben, the unattainable guy on the show Felicity that I used to watch. Sometimes I hear a name and think oh no, I knew a girl/boy in school with that name and they smelled like feet or whatever. It's funny how names become so synonymous with a particular person.
If the baby in my belly were a girl, we were going to name her Allison Elizabeth. Allison was (and is) this wonderfully fun cute girl that was on cheer with me. Elizabeth was my best childhood friend who died after I finished high school. It was simple. Until we found out the baby in my belly has a penis.
We still like Noah after almost 6 years, but it's not giving us the wow factor because it's been on the back burner for 6 years. We've gone over a few other names...Samuel, Luke, Jacob... I'm a stickler on what the shortened version is as I know that always happens. I know in this small country town Jacob will turn into Jake. Not that there is anything wrong with Jake, but we like Jacob. I've never called my husband Dave, but we'll meet people and within a minute, he goes from David to Dave. I'm pretty sure at this point that we will stick with Noah. It says something that we still like it after all this time. However, we are leaning towards Gregory for a middle name after David's maternal grandfather.
We also have a difficult last name. It doesn't flow with everything. Also, I'm not about to do a difficult first name paired with a difficult last name. We always have to pronounce and spell it for everyone. So, we need something simple for a fist name that is clear cut.
We aren't into weird spellings or gender neutral names either. I met a lady who told me her daughter was also Emily, but spelled Emmaleigh. Are you kidding me? Then, Emily wanted me to paint her nails because Teegan wears blue nail polish. I thought what Mom is painting her sons fingernails. Teegan is a girl. Didn't know that. In any case, we are traditional and won't come up with anything too crazy.
Speaking of, I ran into a Mom and her son in Walmart the other day. Her son was in Emily and Ben's gymnastics class. We chatted for a minute when she said we should exchange numbers to keep in touch and try to get the kids in the same class. She's friendly enough, so that was fine. I programmed her number in my cell and told her I'd call her. We hadn't exchanged names at that point, so we got that formality over with. We finished chatting and said goodbye when she said, "Bye Ruby, it was great to see you." Ruby? My name is Ruby? I didn't correct her though because I kind of liked it. To me the name Ruby conjures up an image. Ruby is fun. Ruby is beautiful. Ruby is the life of the party. I long to be Ruby one day after I deliver this baby.
It proves that a name means a lot. Now if only we could come up with one...
With Emily, I liked Emma and Ella. David wanted more traditional and we went with Emily. Then, I told my Aunt Rosie the name who suggested that Rose would be a nice middle name. We loved it right away. All set. If Emily had been a boy, we would've named her Noah Michael.
I don't remember who suggested Benjamin for our little man, but we both agreed on that. His middle name is David for obvious reasons. I realize for me, names are attached to people I've known. Noah was this hunky tall drink of water on All My Children in the early 90's. I thought he was hot and a bit of a bad boy, so I like the name because it reminds me of him. Same thing with Ben, the unattainable guy on the show Felicity that I used to watch. Sometimes I hear a name and think oh no, I knew a girl/boy in school with that name and they smelled like feet or whatever. It's funny how names become so synonymous with a particular person.
If the baby in my belly were a girl, we were going to name her Allison Elizabeth. Allison was (and is) this wonderfully fun cute girl that was on cheer with me. Elizabeth was my best childhood friend who died after I finished high school. It was simple. Until we found out the baby in my belly has a penis.
We still like Noah after almost 6 years, but it's not giving us the wow factor because it's been on the back burner for 6 years. We've gone over a few other names...Samuel, Luke, Jacob... I'm a stickler on what the shortened version is as I know that always happens. I know in this small country town Jacob will turn into Jake. Not that there is anything wrong with Jake, but we like Jacob. I've never called my husband Dave, but we'll meet people and within a minute, he goes from David to Dave. I'm pretty sure at this point that we will stick with Noah. It says something that we still like it after all this time. However, we are leaning towards Gregory for a middle name after David's maternal grandfather.
We also have a difficult last name. It doesn't flow with everything. Also, I'm not about to do a difficult first name paired with a difficult last name. We always have to pronounce and spell it for everyone. So, we need something simple for a fist name that is clear cut.
We aren't into weird spellings or gender neutral names either. I met a lady who told me her daughter was also Emily, but spelled Emmaleigh. Are you kidding me? Then, Emily wanted me to paint her nails because Teegan wears blue nail polish. I thought what Mom is painting her sons fingernails. Teegan is a girl. Didn't know that. In any case, we are traditional and won't come up with anything too crazy.
Speaking of, I ran into a Mom and her son in Walmart the other day. Her son was in Emily and Ben's gymnastics class. We chatted for a minute when she said we should exchange numbers to keep in touch and try to get the kids in the same class. She's friendly enough, so that was fine. I programmed her number in my cell and told her I'd call her. We hadn't exchanged names at that point, so we got that formality over with. We finished chatting and said goodbye when she said, "Bye Ruby, it was great to see you." Ruby? My name is Ruby? I didn't correct her though because I kind of liked it. To me the name Ruby conjures up an image. Ruby is fun. Ruby is beautiful. Ruby is the life of the party. I long to be Ruby one day after I deliver this baby.
It proves that a name means a lot. Now if only we could come up with one...
Thursday, July 16, 2009
Pirates
One of Emily and Ben's favorite things to do is play pirates. They gather treasure and use a cardboard paper towel roll as a telescope. They were playing pirates in the living room tonight and David and I were watching So You Think You Can Dance.
We hear Ben cry. We know the difference between she took my toy and I'm seriously hurt cry. We were off the sofa in about a second. Ben is holding the side of his face by his eye. We ask Emily what happened and she said he fell and hit his face. We can tell when she is lying. They needed another telescope, so they got the hose attachment from the vacuum cleaner. They do this sometimes, but a fight must have broken out over it and she whacked him.
She admitted what she did and was sent to her room (with a spanking to follow). She won't be doing that again anytime soon. Ben had a welt across his forehead and by his eye along with a little cut above his eyebrow. She clocked him good.
While David was "tending" to Emily, I was consoling Ben. He stopped his sobs for a moment, lifted his head off my shoulder, with tears streaming down his face and pooling in his eyes he said, "We need to make Mymy (his name for her) walk the plank!"
Captain Jack Sparrow would be proud.
We hear Ben cry. We know the difference between she took my toy and I'm seriously hurt cry. We were off the sofa in about a second. Ben is holding the side of his face by his eye. We ask Emily what happened and she said he fell and hit his face. We can tell when she is lying. They needed another telescope, so they got the hose attachment from the vacuum cleaner. They do this sometimes, but a fight must have broken out over it and she whacked him.
She admitted what she did and was sent to her room (with a spanking to follow). She won't be doing that again anytime soon. Ben had a welt across his forehead and by his eye along with a little cut above his eyebrow. She clocked him good.
While David was "tending" to Emily, I was consoling Ben. He stopped his sobs for a moment, lifted his head off my shoulder, with tears streaming down his face and pooling in his eyes he said, "We need to make Mymy (his name for her) walk the plank!"
Captain Jack Sparrow would be proud.
Wednesday, July 15, 2009
Big Kid
Monday night we went to a neighbors house that lives a block away. They are one of those fun neighbors that everyone wishes they had. We actually lucked out and have them. They do fun parties and spontaneous get togethers. I actually had to go to one of their parties to meet some of my neighbors that live on my own block. I don't know how they know everyone, but they do. Actually, I do know...he's a pediatric dentist, they have 4 kids, the kids play sports, it's a small town, they are super friendly... Anyway, it was no surprise when I got a call Sunday night inviting us to celebrate national ice cream month the following night at their house. Friends, ice cream, I'm in.
The kids had a blast. They dug out a huge hole, so their trampoline is flush with the grass. That ought to cut down on injuries and it makes it more fun to not have to climb on top of it all the time. They also had this great horse swing made from tires that Emily just could not get enough of. There were kids everywhere, laughing, sweaty, sticky from ice cream and in the middle of all the kids playing is my husband. He's taken up a game of soccer with Josh, a friend of ours 7 year old boy. David couldn't get enough.
Tonight (well last night, I'm writing at 4 AM more on that in another post), we went to the clubhouse pool after dinner. It's small and cold, but it's better than nothing. We met up with our friends and us Mom's are gabbing a mile a minute. Emily is swimming around with her friend Alanah. Ben is sitting in the hot tub preparing for his role on the Bachelor season 47. That kid loves a hot tub. We have to make him get out every few minutes because he looks like he's about to fall asleep.
Then, I hear the kids...a big group of 8 of them yelling, "David, throw it here." And I turn to get a glimpse of this kid David when I realize it's my husband. He's on one side of the pool playing ball with 8 kids. This went on for a good 30 minutes until Josh was leaving and had to take his ball with him.
David has always been very hands on with our kids, but I don't think I ever realized that he is just a big kid himself. Just another thing to love about him...
The kids had a blast. They dug out a huge hole, so their trampoline is flush with the grass. That ought to cut down on injuries and it makes it more fun to not have to climb on top of it all the time. They also had this great horse swing made from tires that Emily just could not get enough of. There were kids everywhere, laughing, sweaty, sticky from ice cream and in the middle of all the kids playing is my husband. He's taken up a game of soccer with Josh, a friend of ours 7 year old boy. David couldn't get enough.
Tonight (well last night, I'm writing at 4 AM more on that in another post), we went to the clubhouse pool after dinner. It's small and cold, but it's better than nothing. We met up with our friends and us Mom's are gabbing a mile a minute. Emily is swimming around with her friend Alanah. Ben is sitting in the hot tub preparing for his role on the Bachelor season 47. That kid loves a hot tub. We have to make him get out every few minutes because he looks like he's about to fall asleep.
Then, I hear the kids...a big group of 8 of them yelling, "David, throw it here." And I turn to get a glimpse of this kid David when I realize it's my husband. He's on one side of the pool playing ball with 8 kids. This went on for a good 30 minutes until Josh was leaving and had to take his ball with him.
David has always been very hands on with our kids, but I don't think I ever realized that he is just a big kid himself. Just another thing to love about him...
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)