Smarta Smarta!

Today I let Maddie color with markers for the first time.  She seemed to really enjoy herself...and tomorrow I'll be buying WASHABLE markers so she can enjoy them again :)  Anyway, I put a piece of paper up on the fridge with magnets like an easel so she could color there (when she was sitting she was getting markers all over her shirt).  I went about making dinner and the next thing I know Maddie says, "M.  I make a M".  I started to praise her for doing a good job when I looked at saw THIS...

She was really making M's!!  I am just so proud of my baby girl!  She also drew a cat (it looked nothing like a cat, but I applauded her imagination!)

Another thing I'm super proud of her for...every night before her bath I sit her on the potty and tell her to pee before she gets in the bathtub.  Three bath nights in a row she's done it!!  We're still not working on actual potty training, it's much too early to be successful, but we're taking baby steps :)  She's getting comfortable sitting on the potty and I'm so proud of her!

5 Days Down, 49 To Go

Eric left just 5 days ago and it already feels like it's been weeks.  I wish it would get easier and easier to have him gone but it seems to be getting harder and harder.  Maddie's finally at the age where she KNOWS Daddy's away and that he'll be gone for a long time (of course a weekend is a long time to a toddler).  She's been asking for him every day and saying things like "Daddy home" and "See Daddy again".  She says, "Daddy...where are you?" then quietly says to herself "Daddy airport".  She misses him.  She's already been talking about going for bike rides and holding Daddy's hand so I tell her that she can do all those things with Daddy next time he comes home :) 

As for me, I miss him terribly too.  I'll admit that sometimes by the end of THREE SOLID WEEKS of having him home, I'm talking 24/7 here...I get a little anxious to get back to the routine Maddie and I have when he's not here.  I'm ready for him to leave so we can be "normal" again. By the time we get to the airport I'm already rethinking that!  By the time Maddie and I get back to the car in the parking garage the tears are rolling down my face.  8 weeks is a long time to not have him home.  8 weeks of being the sole provider and care taker for Maddie stare at me as I walk back to the car.  It's exhausting just thinking about it, I don't want to face it when I get home.  Eric was a HUGE help with Maddie this time.  He gave her more baths than he usually does, put her to bed more than he usually does, he cooked dinner a few times (which is A LOT more than he usually does) and just helped me out around the house so much!  I was looking forward to a break and I did get a lot of time to rest and take a nap while he was home.  It was so nice.  I hate to give that up.  (Did that just make me sound really selfish?)  It's also nice to have him home so my evenings aren't so quiet.  When Eric was home after Maddie was put to bed we had time with each other. We watched some movies, or just hung out watching tv and talking.  My evenings weren't boring and lonely.  It was so nice.  I miss that already. 

On a brighter note...Maddie continues to flourish every day.  She started speaking in full sentences while Eric was home.  Every day I'll hear her narrating her day, saying things like, "I hold snuggly couch", which means she's holding snuggly ON the couch.  She also says what she hears and what she sees.  She started telling me what she likes.  She had a nectarine for the first time the other day and she told me "I like a nectarine" with  big smile on her face.  She's just so sweet!!  Also she told me "I love you" the other day without me saying it first :)  I just wanted to start bawling...it made me so happy.  I told her "I love you, too" and she replied with "I love you SO MUCH".  That was the best conversation I've ever had in my life!

In pregnancy news...I'm now 15 weeks and 2 days along.  I felt baby moving a lot last Sunday but haven't felt it much since.  I know it's still quite early so that doesn't concern me.  Sunday we were in the car just about all day (or at least it felt like it) so I had a lot of time to relax and could feel every little move baby made.  It was so sweet to be able to feel it, just knowing there's a new little life in there continues to amaze me!!  After Sunday my life got hectic again and I don't have a lot of time to just sit and relax to feel the baby moving.  I'm always doing something or taking a nap :)  I have felt it once or twice in the evenings, but not nearly as much movement as I felt last Sunday.

Well, I'm going to leave with that.  Please keep our family in your prayers.  I know as hard as this situation is on me and Maddie is just as hard, if not harder, on Eric.  I can't imagine how he goes so long without seeing his baby girl.  It must be so hard for him to listen to me tell him cute stories about Maddie and not be here to see it in person!

What a Slacker

I have REALLY been slacking on the updates...sorry!  Eric's been home so my routine has been thrown off!  I'll just give some randome updates and maybe a few pictures since I haven't posted pictures in FOREVER!

1.  We had our second prenatal appointment today.  We got to hear baby's heartbeat for the first time today which was so exciting.  I didn't think it would be that big of a deal since I've experienced it before, but I was just as emotional this time as I was with Maddie!  It was also pretty cool to be able to share that experience with Maddie.  I'm sure she didn't know what was going on and thought the baby sounded strange when we told her "Maddie, that's your baby brother or sister!".  She's probably expecting an alien or something...

2.  We went shopping for Maddie's big sister furniture today!  We bought her a toddler bed that she's been sleeping in with no issues for the past week and a half.  But we want to get her a nice bedroom set that will be hers as long as she lives here (and she can take it with her when she leaves home if it's not falling apart by then).  We're in no hurry, just had time to waste today so we thought we'd go see what was available.  Here's what we found at Ashley Furniture today...  http://www.ashleyfurniture.com/Showroom/Showroom.aspx?PageId=Showroom&CategoryId=0&SetDomTab=4&style=&IsClicked=1&Keyword=cottage%20retreat%20bedroom&bFromSearch=Y
Again, we're in no hurry and this is the first one we've liked but we're going out to look around again later in the week.

3.  We went to San Antonio last weekend!!!  It was our 6th anniversary and I LOVE San Antonio so I asked Eric if we could go there for the weekend.  Of course weekend getaways aren't the same when you have a toddler in tow...instead of romantic dinners on the Riverwalk or drinks out on the town, or carriage rides through the city our weekend was filled with swimming at the indoor pool at the hotel and Sea World!  :)  We did have dinner on Friday night at Landry's Seafood house and that was really nice.  It's definitely my favorite seafood restaurant so it's always nice when I get to eat there.  We had an awesome time at Sea World.  Maddie seemed to remember being there last summer and was super excited to see Shamu.  Speaking of Shamu...it was so sad watching the video in rememberance of the trainer who was recently killed in Orlando.  I didn't think it would be so emotional...I'll blame the pregnancy hormones :)  I had to try REALLY hard to not bawl like a baby!  I just find it so sad that these trainers love these animals so much and trust them completely and then for this terrible tragedy to happen.  It just breaks my heart.  The Shamu show wasn't nearly as good as it used to be now that they aren't letting the trainers in the water. It was actually quite boring...but we did get to see a baby orca swimming around the tank with it's parents!  That was super sweet :)  The baby was born at 350 pounds...can you imagine?  And people thought Maddie was a big baby at 8 lbs 3 oz!  :)

4.  My mind is blank...I'll leave you with some pictures and then I'm going to head to bed early tonight.

The cutest baby bathtub picture EVER. She's thinking ahead to her future when I embarrass her with these bathtub pictures... 

Maddie NEVER falls asleep anywhere but her bed or her carseat.  Until this day...then another day after she sprained her ankle she fell asleep on the couch.

Maddie couldn't stop talking about Shamu and waved to him from a distance but didn't want to look at him too closely for a picture.

She would've stayed at the dolphin tank all day if we had let her.  She just loved them so much!

And Daddy got to touch one!!

Maddie and I chillin', waiting for the sea lion show to start.

Being silly with our sunglasses :)

A Boo Boo and a Trip to the ER

Well, it finally happened...our first trip to the ER.  We had such a gorgeous day yesterday so Eric wanted to take Maddie to the park for the afternoon.  We were planning to go to our neighbor's house for dinner so I needed to make some hummus and veggie dip for that but needed to get groceries.  After the grocery store I dropped Eric and Maddie off at the park then headed home to make my yummies and was going to meet up with them after I was finished.  Well, I had just gotten home and only started to prepare a few things (like juiced the lemons and rinsed the garbanzo beans) when my cell phone rang.  It was Eric.  He sounded pretty upset and asked if I could come pick them up because he thought he hurt Maddie's foot.  So I jumped in the car and headed out.  Thank God the park is only about a quarter mile from our house!  I got there and Maddie was still pretty upset. She didn't want to get in her carseat.  But I managed to get her in and took her shoes and socks off to see if there was any swelling.  There was just a little, but no bruising so I didn't know what to think.  Eric explained what happened on the way back to our house.  He took Maddie to the top of the curly slide but she didn't want to go down it by herself (like she's done before).  So Eric sat down, put Maddie on his lap and they headed down the slide.  The slide is so narrow (it's at the playground to an elementary school...) that Maddie's foot got caught between Eric's leg and the slide.  It twisted around funny and Maddie apparently let out a scream that instantly let Eric know something was wrong. 

So, we went to a local emergency clinic but they told us we had to go to the ER because of Maddie's age.  YAY!  I thought we were going to be gone for HOURS as soon as they told us that.  It was a beautiful Saturday afternoon, I imagined the place swarming with people who had "nice weather" accidents.  Luckily it wasn't very busy at all.  Unfortunately she didn't like when ANYONE looked at her, or especially when they touched her.  It made for a stressful experience for Mommy and Daddy...as well as Maddie.  She had to have x-rays and that about killed ME!  I couldn't go in the room since I'm pregnant so I had to stand outside the room listening to her screaming bloody murder.  It's one thing to be able to listen to her screaming and crying when I feel like I'm somewhat in control...but to be on the outside of the room and not being able to do anything was horrible!  Eric said despite what I heard she actually did very well.  There was only one time she moved and they had to retake the picture.

The result was there was no fracture (thank God!) but it's sprained.  So we don't know how long it's going to be until she'll be able to walk again.  She WANTS to walk, but it's just too painful for her to put her weight on it.  We watched an episode of Go Diego Go the other day and they were crawling around like leatherback sea turtles.  So I reminded Maddie of crawling like a turtle and she's gotten around like that a little.  But then she seems to be impatient with how slow crawling is and tries to stand up and then remembers she has a boo boo.  :(  I hate seeing my baby in pain!

For now she's passed out on the couch so hopefully she's getting some much needed rest and will be a little happier when she wakes up later.

I'll keep you posted on her progress!
Oh, and yesterday we switched her to her big sister bed!!  That was going to be the blog post for today but then the ankle happened...  :)

Headaches

Tonight is the third night in a row that I've had a headache.  Tuesday was pretty mild and didn't bother me too much.  Yesterday was pretty intense and I just had to rest and ended up going to bed early.  Today my headache started before 5pm and is so strong I can't even eat dinner.  Headaches can be expected in early pregnancy due to progesterone levels going up.  I had a few in early pregnancy with Maddie and took quite a bit of Tylenol for them.  I can't remember what time of day they were, but it does kind of seem like it might have been the evenings...maybe I just need to get even more rest than I am now?  I don't know if that's possible...

My concern with the headaches is my blood pressure.  I wasn't worried about the headaches when I was pregnant with Maddie because I read all the books that said it was to be expected.  But when I went in the day before my due date and my blood pressure was up, the nurse asked me if I had been having headaches.  I had been...every evening around dinner time and they didn't go away when I went to bed.  I'm going to get my blood pressure checked tomorrow.  I have to run out to get Maddie's vaccination record (more on that later) so I might just swing by Walmart and use their machine by the pharmacy.  Better safe than sorry!  I certainly can't afford to have high blood pressure during this pregnancy!  The baby will be scheduled to arrive on Sept 2nd and Eric will get home on Aug 31st.  The baby CAN'T come before August 31st!!!

Now, about Maddie's vaccination record...
I stopped to pick up a packet to get Maddie in a Mother's Day Out program.  Eric and I had been talking about this for a while and now that we're expecting again I'd like to be able to have some one-on-one time with baby #2.  We'll start her enrollment in the summer so she's already established in going two days a week before her sibling comes.  I don't know the exact start date, but it should be right around her 2nd birthday.  In exchange for the MDO I'm probably going to have to give up the cleaning lady :(  But that's ok...I'm kind of over it now anyway.  When I clean my house, I KNOW it's clean.  When someone else does it, I have my doubts.  Anyway, back to MDO.  Registration is on Monday (the 22nd) so I have to go tomorrow to get a copy of Maddie's vaccination record to include in her packet.  Registration begins at 7:30am but this particular program is in such high demand that parents get there to get in line around 2-3am!  Insane, right?  They are opening the doors to the church at 5:00am so I won't get there before that.  I'm going to shoot for around 6ish and pray that's early enough.  It's not easy to entertain a 20 month old for an hour and a half, especially when you have to wake them up out of bed.  I might take her in her pjs and I'll have breakfast packed to take along with us.  Hopefully it will all go well and we'll be enrolled!!

Happy Valentine's Day

I thought I'd share the story of how Eric and I met, got engaged, and got married in honor of Valentine's Day...

Eric and I met in the fall of 2002.  I don't remember exactly what day, I kind of wish I had taken note :)  Anyway, I was deployed to Bosnia with the Pennsylvania Army National Guard and Eric was working for KBR (Kellogg, Brown & Root at the time).  He was filling in in our transportation office while another contractor was on vacation.  I was the section mail clerk...yeah, fancy, huh?  I had the "pleasure" of going to get the mail every day and hand delivering it to each person in my section.  Anyway, I went to take CPT Johnson his mail for the day and saw a MUCH smaller guy than usual sitting in Dave's chair.  (Dave was probably about 6'5", 350 pounds or so.  Obviously, Eric ISN'T that large).  I thought I'd be funny and say "Wow, Dave, you've lost weight!"  Eric spun around in his office chair and I couldn't believe this handsome guy looking back at me (I didn't notice the taper leg jeans until later...eeek!)  CPT Johnson introduced us and was sure to point out that we were both single.  I felt myself blush and soon left the office to deliver more mail.  Eric and I kept running into each other here and there, he was part of our G4/S4 conference one day (maybe more, but I remember one specifically) and we had lunch afterwards with SGM Durand.  We talked about working out (something we'd still like to be doing together) and set up a "date" to go to the gym.  We consider our anniversary Dec 31, 2002...the day we shared our first kiss.  Awww...

I redeployed back to the US in March 2003 and Eric and I couldn't stand being apart from each other.  He found a job opening for me, I applied and by the end of May I was back in Bosnia to be with him.  It was much different being there together as civilians.  People could actually know about our relationship, which was kind of cool :)  We had lunch together, we had dinner together, we worked out together, we played ping pong together, we played pool together, we hung out at Triggers a lot to eat pizza.  We just had a really nice time getting to know each other without a lot of the "real world" interfering. 

In August 2003 we planned our first R&R together and went to Italy.  We rented a car and drove from Croatia, through Slovenia (where we met up with Eric's cousin Polona), and then on to Italy.  We visited several cities including Venice, Verona, Naples, Lavorno (sp?), Florence, Milan and Rome (I may have missed some).  I got to see where Eric was stationed and he showed me the sidewalk he helped put in...awww, how romantic :)  When we were in Venice we definitely took a gondola ride.  The gondolier gave us champagne and sang a little.  We just took in the sites and relaxed after a long day of site seeing.  I don't remember how it all happened but Eric asked me to marry him while we were on the gondola.  He didn't have the ring :(  It was being mailed to him in Bosnia but it didn't come in before we left for our trip so I had to wait until we got back to see it!!!  I was tempted to not say "yes" until I saw the ring :)  No, I said "yes" without hesitation...I knew this was the man I wanted to spend the rest of my life with.  The ring was an added bonus when we got back...1 1/2 carat emerald cut platinum.  HELLO...WINNER!  I still get compliments on my ring and I LOVE every minute of the attention it brings me :)

Now we were ready to get the wedding plans started!!  I have to take you back to Feb 2003 for a second...the Stars & Stripes newspaper had this Valentine's Day thing where you could put a greeting for your special someone.  Everyone who put in a greeting was entered to win two round trip tickets from anywhere in Europe to anywhere in the United States.  You'll never believe it...WE WON!  I was so embarrassed because they put a picture of us covering the entire page of the paper.  So much for no one knowing we were an "item".  Oh well, at least we got free airfare to our destination wedding in HAWAII!!  We flew from Vienna, Austria all the way to Honolulu, Hawaii.  I think the trip took 53 hours from start (from the time the van picked us up on Eagle Base) to finish.  I could be wrong, but I do know it was exhausting.  We had to stay overnight in Germany then we had several lay overs and plane changes in the US.  We couldn't wait to get in to Hawaii and rest!  The time difference was 12 hours (Bosnia being 12 hours ahead of Hawaii) so we thought we'd have a hard time adjusting.  But let me tell you, with all that traveling we had NO PROBLEMS going right to sleep!

We got married on March 6, 2004 with only 12 people in attendance...my dad, my mom and her boyfriend at the time, my brother, my aunt cindy, uncle tony and their girls Steph and Sierra, Eric's sister Jennifer and her husband Joe and Eric's parents.  It was a beautiful wedding and I wouldn't change a minute of it.  We had a single violinist and some refreshments for after the ceremony (probably even some before since I was late to the wedding...oops!).  The funniest thing that happened was there was a wedding going on in the lot adjacent to our wedding and they had a big ol' loud organ playing the wedding song (you know the one after they announce you husband and wife) and it was playing somewhere in the middle of our ceremony.  It's the only thing you can hear on our wedding video :)  After the wedding we went to a local Hawaiian restaurant that served traditional Hawaiian foods buffet style.  We ate, drank and were merry :)  It was a beautiful day and a beautiful experience over all!  I hope Maddie wants to do a destination wedding when she gets married!

We spent 2 full weeks in Hawaii, one week with both our families there, then one week just for us to do some SCUBA diving and site seeing on our own.  Eric went skydiving.  I didn't.  It was sad to have to return to Bosnia :(  I find it funny that I don't remember how long the trip back took.  I guess I didn't care since I wasn't in a hurry to get back, huh?  I stayed in Bosnia until June 2004 and went back to the States when my contract expired.  Eric headed over to Iraq in July 2004 and we didn't see each other again until Thanksgiving of that year.  That was rough!  But now it makes our 8 weeks apart seem like nothing compared to that!

Sorry for the long post :)  I enjoyed this walk down memory lane...I can't wait to see my hubby again in 11 days!!  He'll actually be home for our 6th anniversary :)  YAY!

Prenatal Appt #1

Well, my doctor's office called and got me in sooner for my first appointment!  I was pretty excited because I was so anxious to see the little baby growing inside me, but I was disappointed that the appointment took 2 HOURS!  Grrrr.  I had Maddie with me so thank God she was a trooper!

The results of the appointment were good.  The baby has a perfect little heartbeat inside it's little .6 inch body.  Isn't that just amazing that something the size of a raspberry can have its own little beating heart?!?!  It was so cool to see.  Other than that they didn't do much at the appointment.  I'm measuring right at 8 weeks, 5 days and baby is measuring at 7 weeks, 6 days.  I thought that was interesting :)

In other pregnancy news...the aversions have been getting stronger and stronger by the day.  Yesterday I crossed chicken patties off of my list of foods I could eat.  Then fish sticks (although I think maybe it was more the tartar sauce than the fish itself).  Today I crossed off spaghettio's and scrambled eggs.  That leaves me with blueberries, almonds and CRACKERS.  BLAH.  I'm drinking some ginger ale but that's not even settling well.  I mostly have to stick with water or fruit juice.  I've discovered a love for Ocean Spray's cranberry and concord grape juice.  YUMMY!  It settles my stomach pretty well but I have to be careful I don't drink the whole bottle in a day!  It seems my "morning" sickness is more "afternoon/evening" sickness. Yesterday it hit me while I was watching the Biggest Loser.  Today it hit me right after lunch.  I'm feeling ok right now so hopefully I'll be able to get the house straightened up before bed...oh yeah :)  Because I have a cleaning lady coming tomorrow!!!  I can't wait for her to come but I just hope I can stay out of the house for 6 hours without getting sick and needing to come home...

In Maddie news...this little snot is really pushing the limits.  She's testing me to see if I'll follow through on my "threats".  As hard as it is to get up off the couch sometimes I still make sure I'm consistent with her.  She had two time outs yesterday and three today.  I'm not making her pick up her toys so much these days just because I don't have the energy for it.  We pick them up once every couple of days or I just get overwhelmed with too many toys.  Most days she doesn't make a HUGE mess, but when I let that go for 3 days it looks like a disaster area!

Maddie hasn't had any food aversions with me :)  Unfortunately I still have to prepare meals for her.  She had spaghettio's for the first time today and LOVED them!  She still likes the fish sticks and tartar sauce and mac & cheese (another one I had to cross off my list yesterday).  She has been asking for scrambled eggs and waffles so sometimes she'll have that for lunch or dinner.  It's easy for me to make and doesn't require a lot of clean up!  For breakfast we've been sticking with a banana and cereal because I can't get into meal preparation that early :)

Well, I guess that's it for now.  It's time for me to get Maddie up to bed now.  Wish us luck :)