I Think She's Happy

Baby Update

I am about 22.5 weeks pregnant.

Any guesses as to what we're having? Here's a closer belly shot.

If you guessed "a baby," very funny, wise guy.

I'm sure you have a guess. Everyone has a guess. Here, does this help?

Give up?

Well, all right then. I'll tell you. The Boogie is going to be a big sister to ...

... a little sister!

I had an ultrasound a couple of weeks ago and all looks well. We told our families on Christmas Eve and Christmas day -- it was so hard not to slip up and refer to the baby as "she" instead of "it" over the past few weeks! We are very excited to add another sweet little girl to our family. My Man is going to be terribly outnumbered ... but I really don't think he minds that much. :)

Post-Christmas

I need to ask a question.

Why did I do this to myself?

I am a Nintendo DS widow.

Nah, not really. Actually I need to brag about My Man. Today was my Saturday morning to work. While I was there this wonderful guy washed every single plate, bowl, coffee mug, glass, cup, utensil, pot, pan, and casserole dish from yesterday. And there was a lot, let me tell you. Not only did he wash everything, he dried it all. Not only did he wash and dry it all, he put it all away. All. Of. It. I really love that guy.

This is what the Boogie is doing as I type. She loves to play with her "taydo". She has several different colors but ninety-nine percent of the time she asks for orange. I don't know if it's because she loves it, or because it's the color she recognizes first. She is playing with it and singing her rendition of "Hark the Herald Angels Sing."

Today I did the dreaded task -- I balanced the checkbook. I had two weeks worth of Christmas shopping receipts to enter, along with all the other normal weekly receipts. Yuck. But guess what? It balanced! Miracles never cease.

Late Thursday night I yawned really big and my jaw popped. It popped right out of alignment. How weird is that? I've never had that happen to me before. My teeth didn't line up and I could actually feel with my hands on the outside of my jaw that it was pushed to the left. My Man could feel it, too. It was sore and it hurt to chew (it didn't stop me from eating, I just had to eat more slowly. Ha!) All day Friday I thought, "When I go into work tomorrow I'll ask the doctor to adjust my jaw." This morning while I was getting ready for work I realized that it wasn't as sore, but it still wasn't right. I thought, "When I get to work I'll ask the doctor to adjust my jaw." All the way to work I thought, "As soon as I get there I'll ask the doctor to adjust my jaw." But it wasn't as sore and didn't bother me as much. When I got there I got distracted with work stuff and forgot to ask! I forgot! What is wrong with me? But then while I was eating lunch it popped back into place. So weird. Seriously. I've never had that happen to me. So now my teeth line up and it doesn't hurt to chew, though it's still a little sore. Bizarre.

Speaking of eating, I'm hungry. I'm going to eat turkey and stuffing and mashed potatoes and gravy for the third time in 24 hours. Yum.

A Merry Christmas To All!

Last night after our Christmas Eve service all the cousins and their parents descended on 52 for food and gift exchanging. The LCs were very excited about presents!

 

 

We all got lots of great stuff!

This morning we exchanged our gifts with each other.

The Boogie is totally in love with our camera and wants to take pictures with it all the time. I'll let her play with it every now and then but am worried that she will break it. For months I've been watching for good deals on a kids digital camera and I found one the week after Thanksgiving.

My Man got a Nintendo DS which he has been playing with all day (I've managed to get my hands on it, too.) The Boogie likes to watch, which means that she pushes her head in front of our face completely blocking the screen.

I got some boots I wanted, and a steam mop that I've been wishing for!

After gift-opening we went out for breakfast/brunch at a local diner. The service was so fast -- I don't think we waited more than ten minutes for our food. The afternoon was spent playing with new toys, leisurely tidying up and doing final food prep (we did most of the cooking yesterday.) MIL/FIL and SIL3 came over for dinner and a quiet evening of talking and watching Food Network. :) It was so nice and relaxing, despite the coffee accident which resulted in everything on one side of the kitchen being pulled out and cleaned behind/under. Oh well, it needed to be done anyway! That's one less thing for me to think about later.

The Boogie was too excited to eat dinner, so of course she was hungry later. Did she want turkey with all the trimmings? Of course not. She wanted cereal. A late night last night + a normal rising time this morning + no nap + the excitement of opening gifts and playing with new toys = this:

And that is exactly how I feel, too, so despite a kitchen full of dishes that need to be washed, I am going to bed.

Merry Christmas to all, and to all a good night!

Things My Mother Taught Me

Stalactite

Stalagmite

Aren't you proud of me, Mom? All those years of homeschooling really paid off. I didn't even have to look up how to spell them. (Did I spell it right?)

We are in the throes of Christmas preparation; namely, cooking and a little bit of wrapping. I determined that this will be the year that I am not up until 2 a.m. Christmas morning wrapping gifts. Only the Boogie's are left. We are preparing some of our appetizers and dishes for dinner tomorrow -- the turkey is in the oven and boiling water from potatoes has steamed up the entire apartment. Christmas music is playing, the Boogie is quietly entertaining herself, and My Man has made what will hopefully be the only Wawa run for the day.

Tonight is our Christmas Eve service and afterward we will head to 52 for good food and gift exchange among grandparents and cousins!

I hope you are all having a wonderful day before Christmas!

Boogie Bowling

Just need some bowling pins and we're set!

White Pre-Christmas

We had a lovely winter storm blow through here leaving us a Christmas gift of over 20 inches of snow. It looked so pretty falling all day yesterday. Church services were canceled this morning but the families in this building and the ILs from 52 met in our apartment for a short sermon and some lunch. Afterward we bundled up and headed outside with snow shovels to clear around our vehicles so that we can go to church tonight and get to work in the morning. Soon after we finished, someone from apartment maintenance showed up with a snow blower! Oh my aching back ...

Yesterday

Last night from our windows

 

This morning from our windows

 

 

 

Let's go outside!

My Man tried to back his car up last night and got stuck.

 

 

I walked over to 52 to borrow a shovel. FIL had already cleared out their sidewalk and driveway. The snow was past my knees!

FIL's truckbed full of snow

From inside My Man's car -- the door barely skimmed the top of the snow.

 

 

 

Tonight is a Christmas program that the kids have been working on with SIL1 and SIL2 so we are looking forward to it!

The Boogie Recites

Recently some older children graduated from my Sunday school class, so I pulled the Boogie and H-man out of the nursery and into my now younger group of kids. They both do really well and love to sing and color. I've been pleasantly surprised at what the Boogie retains from the lesson, and here is a clip of her saying the verse we learned last Sunday (Luke 2:11.)

I am so proud of my big girl.

Her auntie straightened her hair today! Doesn't she look different without her curls and waves?

 

 

Ninja Boogie -- Silent But (Almost) Deadly

Around 6:30 this morning I woke up a little bit, realized I was slightly uncomfortable, and rolled over ... to find the Boogie standing silently next to the bed mere inches from my face. Startled wide awake, I jerked backwards and gasped loudly several times, waking My Man who in turn also jumped and exclaimed, "What? What is it?" The Boogie's door sticks so it always wakes me if she opens it in the middle of the night, but not this time. She about gave me a heart attack. She leaned toward me and whispered loudly, "Honey, I awake." No kidding.

Tonight while with SIL3 the Boogie started digging around in her nose. You can imagine what she did with what she got. Her auntie said, "Hey! Don't pick your nose -- that's nasty!" The Boogie replied calmly, "But it's yummy."

This was party weekend. I am too tired to blog about it. It was exhausting but fun! 

15 Days Till Christmas

That is actually kind of an overwhelming thought ...

The other day the Boogie tried to get a travel-sized deodorant off of my dresser but couldn't reach it. "Oh, no!" she cried, running to find me, "Honey! My baby armpit!"

We put up our meager Christmas decorations on Sunday. Though we don't have a lot it works out pretty well since we don't have many places to put things out of Boogie reach. She's done pretty well with the nativity scene that is at her level. We're planning to get our tree tomorrow which will make it really feel like Christmas in here! I love Christmas trees. Also I picked up a gorgeous ponsettia for a steal at $.99 last week -- it really is beautiful. I hope I don't kill it too quickly.

It's crazy stormy today! Dark, very windy, and very rainy. If it continues through tomorrow we will NOT be getting our tree until the weekend.

Last night in the car we listened to a Christmas cd. The Boogie danced in her seat and sang along with "Jingle Bells." When it was over she clapped and said, "I love that Jingle Bells song!" It is her favorite. If I try to sing anything else she stops me and says, "No. Sing Jingle Bells." The same cd has some songs about Hanukkah which she also sings along with, and will even sing a few words of on her own at random times.

I have much to do today. My requisite 2 cups of coffee have been consumed and so has my breakfast (grilled ham and cheese sandwich, my current favorite. I can eat it every day.) I have made myself a list of things to accomplish before leaving for work -- time to get started!

Lucy Van Pelt

The Boogie did not get a full night's sleep Saturday night. Then she refused to nap on Sunday despite being confined to her bed for almost 2 hours. By the time we left church last night she was over-tired and irritable, and whined about everything from the back seat, finishing up with "I'm a pill, and crabby!" I tried to distract her with a song but she turned "Deep and Wide" into her own version by singing "I am crabby" to the tune. If this baby is a boy who loves his blanket, I guess we'll have to name him Linus!

Mysteries of Life

For her birthday last April the Boogie received (in addition to many other things) a little marketplace set including a cash register complete with coins, cash, and credit card; fruit stand; mini-version of a reusable shopping bag; and five stuffed fabric fruits and vegetables. It has been much played with ever since though the cash has long since been destroyed and the coins have been dropped into the wrong slots of the cash register, requiring a screwdriver to retrieve them (this has happened so many times that we just leave them in there.) Several months ago one of the pieces of fruit disappeared. I searched for it for a while then gave up. I figured it was in the apartment somewhere and would eventually turn up. Since it went missing I have sorted through the Boogie's toys many times, always keeping my eye out for it. I've moved furniture and cleaned carpets -- no luck. The remaining four fruits continued to be returned successfully to their tiny shopping bag home and in the back of my mind I thought perhaps the fifth one had been accidentally thrown away or taken home with a small visitor to disappear in the depths of their own toys.

Last night while I was washing dishes the Boogie appeared in the kitchen doorway. "Look, Honey, a parrot," she said, showing me a small soft pear. "Oh, a pear," I corrected her, "that looks yummy!" She went on her way and I finished up the kitchen. Later I began to gather up toys that had migrated from her room to the living room. I saw the pear on the floor and looked around for the rest of the fruits and vegetables -- where one is the other three are usually close by. But there weren't any more and I slowly realized that this was the missing fruit! I found the shopping bag and sure enough, there were the other four. Where was the pear all of these months? How did the Boogie find it by chance when I had searched for it over and over again? Where was it??? Good grief.

Here is another mystery: how did the Boogie drag the crib out from under her bed by herself? Without me hearing? You all will think I'm deaf or something, not hearing her break a picture frame or pull a clunky crib frame out from under her bed. I can't figure out how she managed to do it in that space between the storage bin and the end of her bed. I can see her pulling it straight out, but at an angle without getting caught on anything?

It's puzzling, ain't it? (That's for you, Pops!)

This last one we figured out. The other night when the Boogie was in her room (we thought) making a strange thumping noise?

Rapidly unrolling a roll of toilet paper sounds just like banging on a drum!

It's Christmastime!

December already! Part of me can't believe that it's here, and the other part of me is so excited for the holiday season. I am uncertain as to why my level of Yuletide spirit is quite so high. The reasons I can come up with are these: 1. The Boogie is old enough to really enjoy Christmas songs, a tree, special seasonal treats, and lots of twinkly lights and I plan to enjoy it as thoroughly as possible with her; or 2. Pregnancy hormones exaggerate my feelings about everything. I highly suspect that it's a combination of the two.

Here's a little something to get you into the holiday spirit:


On Saturday night we were having a quiet evening at home. We turned on "White Christmas" and the Boogie watched for a while then went into her room to play. Her room is right down the hall from the living room and we've shoved a washcloth in her door to keep her from slamming it closed, so it is always open when she's awake. We could hear her playing and talking and singing in there. After a bit I started to doze. I could still hear the movie and the Boogie playing as I drifted in and out. Eventually the Boogie came back into the living room and I woke up enough to notice a smear of red on her eyelid, as if she'd taken a crayon and rubbed it on her face.
 "What's on your face?" I demanded, wide awake now.
 "My colors!" she said, holding up her hand to show me what looked like red marker all over her fingers.
My Man headed back to her room and while I followed I wracked my brain to figure out where she got markers ... only to discover it wasn't that. My mom had sent me a framed picture of the Boogie that I had laid flat on her dresser, intending to hang it on her wall, and it was on the floor with the glass broken into long shards and stacked neatly on top of it! Somehow, without us hearing anything, the Boogie had broken the glass, picked it up and cut her finger, handled the picture enough to get blood on the front and back of it, and stacked the glass on it. There was a little blood on her face and some on her door but that was it, and she never realized that she hurt herself, insisting that the red was from "my colors". I still don't know how she could have broken the glass without us hearing anything; though I was dozing I was awake enough to notice an unusual noise, and My Man wasn't sleeping at all. Someone suggested that she stepped on the picture which makes the most sense to me -- if she knocked it on the floor face-down and then stepped on it, the sound of breaking glass would have been muffled by the carpet. Praise the Lord the glass broke into shards instead of shattering into a million little pieces ... praise the Lord she only cut her finger a tiny bit ... praise the Lord she didn't step on glass or get any in her eyes ... And I've learned my lesson: no more picture frames within reach of the 2-year-old!

On Sunday we dressed up and had SIL3 take some family pictures for us after church. I love this one because of the Boogie's pose.

I think she was trying to eliminate the memory of her recent nursery behavior which resulted in her being kicked out of there ... by me.

Oh, the shame.

Poor little girlie started sneezing her head off last night and sure enough woke up early this morning with a stuffy nose and cough. I hope that's all it ends up being and that she doesn't give it to the rest of us! She is happy, though, as she usually is. 

Happy Wednesday, y'all!

Thanksgiving

We had a very nice Thanksgiving Day. We had a lazy morning and headed over to 52 around 1:00. Mom3 and Pop3 from Delaware were there, and BIL/SIL2 and HE came over for a bit as well. MIL made an amazing meal and I didn't have to do a blessed thing except help eat it! (Well, I did help with the clean up -- had to be sure to get plenty of leftovers.) Since I neglected to take our camera I swiped a few pictures from SIL3's Facebook.

Cousins looking out the window

 

Hugs!

18 weeks pregnant ... and eating, of course.

We're going to eat that? YUM!

 

Everyone at the table except FIL

 

"Thank you Lord for this food and please let Daddy finish praying soon so I can start eating."

 

Dig in!

 

Even he was full. ;-)

 

Hi Auntie!

SIL3 always puts the Christmas tree up on the Friday after Thanksgiving, but she had to work early in the morning so My Man and the Boogie helped her do it Thanksgiving afternoon.

 

 

 

Whew, all that hard work makes me hungry for dessert!

H-Man spent that night with us so his parents could do some Black Friday early-morning shopping. They brought him upstairs after both he and the Boogie were asleep, and we put him in her room. Around 5:30 a.m. I heard her wake up, "Huh? Huh? H-man? What?" She was very excited and wanted to get up and play with him right away, but I managed to convince her to lay back down and be quiet and she thankfully went back to sleep. They played and played and played most of Friday -- I'm so happy that they have learned to share and play nicely with each other and the screaming/whining/crying days are past.

While I did not get up and brave the crowds early Friday morning, I did hit a couple of stores around noon on my way to work. I picked up a few things I needed and was happy to find some sales while avoiding major crowds.

I hope all of you, my family and friends, had a wonderful Thanksgiving. I'm so thankful for you and for a wonderful husband, a sweet little girl, a baby on the way, all the daily blessings God gives us, and most of all for the salvation Christ provided when He gave His life for us.

But God commendeth his love for us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.

Romans 5:8