Musings of a Mommy!

Adventures in Undies, Day 1

2011-10-11T20:55:00.000-07:00

Evelynne is really interested in Jeremiah's potty training. She loves watching him go and has been asking to "go pee pee" on the toilet the past few days. She hasn't actually made a movement in the toilet, but her willingness to sit on it is a step in the right direction.

Anyway, I decided to buy her her own little undies today, because Jeremiah started learning the quickest how to control his bladder when I let him run around in underwear. Evy was THRILLED to pieces to have her own undies. She spent 20 min playing with them in the cart at Target (and I was a nice mommy and didn't take pictures of her pink Yo Gabba Gabba undies on her head!). I put them on her at home, and within 2 minutes I hear her start to cry "oh no, yucky yucky!" with tears streaming down her face. Yup, she had an accident. Poor baby! Later on that afternoon she brought me another pair of her undies, excited to try again. The same thing happened again less than 2 minutes later. Oh well, she'll get the hang of it soon enough :) If Luis had it his way, she'd stay in diapers forever, because "she's a baby, and babies wear diapers." She will always be my baby....but I can't wait for our diaper expense to be cut! It's already gone down a bit with Jeremiah being in undies only when we're at home, but at night and out in public he's still in pull ups.

My Crazy Kiddos!

2011-09-03T12:21:00.001-07:00

I am so excited to be blogging again! It is great getting back into the swing of things. I especially love it when my readers reply to my entries even anonymously. I know it seems like all I write about are my kiddos... but they are my life! As a stay home mom, (who is actually now a work at home mom- more on that later!), Jeremiah and Evelynne occupy every moment of every day for me. Whether it be playing with them, teaching them, getting things ready for an outing/meal/bath/bedtime/etc. or thinking ahead for the next outing/meal/bath/bedtime/etc. So, apologies are in order if I have nothing but my babies to write about :)

Today I'm going to be doing a quick "catch up" on the kiddos- how they're growing and what they've been up to!

Jeremiah Luis

Jeremiah has been my busy bee! He has been in preschool since his third birthday (Dec. 2). He absolutely LOVES school. He goes 5 days a week, 4 hours a day. Last year he was in an autistic class at Maizeland Preschool, and adored his teacher, Ms. Lincoln, and even made a few little friends. This year things are switching up a bit- he will be in a special needs class with kids of various disabilities, and 3x a week "typical" peers are brought in to work on social skills. Luis is excited because his preschool class is on the same campus as his old elementary school, Aeolian. He starts on Tuesday!

Jeremiah is such an active little boy, always on the go. He loves playing outside, getting dirty,and playing in the water (give him access to the sprinklers or the hose and he's a happy camper, or better yet, take him swimming!). He loves watching TV (what kid doesn't?!) Favorites include Toy Story 1 and 3, the Leapfrog DVDs (he knows ALL his letters and their sounds, and can count to and ID all numbers up to 20), Special Agent Oso, Sesame Street, and Finding Nemo. He also loves, loves LOVES birthdays. Birthday cakes, birthday parties, birthday presents, and especially candles on birthday cakes. He loves to find things around our house (ex: my hair brush), pretend it is a cake with candles, sing the birthday song, blow the candles out and cheer. I can't wait for his 4th birthday- he's going to have a blast.

For the past two weeks we have intensively been working on potty training my big boy. He's done SO good with it! His accidents are minimal (if at all) for #1! We have him in undies if he's at home or at my mom's house; pull ups are only for long outings and overnight. #2 is another story...but we're working on it :) I swear if he poops in the toilet I'll buy him a Lexus :) In the beginning we were giving him pieces of ice cream sandwich as an incentive for going #1, and on the second day, Evy caught on to this and was cheering him on when he was sitting on the toilet. She got up in his face and yelled "pee! pee!!" So cute. He's absolutely fine now with just verbal praise (although my princess misses her ice cream!) On Thursday Jeremiah had a big break through and went 3 times at Disneyland- he has yet to use a toilet other than ours and my moms until then. Yay!! Only a mother would get more excited about 3 pees in the toilet at Disneyland than renewing passes :)

Evelynne Arlene

I jokingly refer to this as Evelynne's "Am I pretty?" picture, taken purely by coincidence as she was stretching while I was trying to get her to smile for the camera. At 18 1/2 months, Evelynne is already such a girly girl. She loves playing mommy to her stuffed animals and dolls, carrying around her purse and putting things in it, playing with Little People (or other little figurines), coloring (everywhere. the walls. our sliding back door. the bed frame in our play room. and sometimes coloring books). And...as of today...she adores getting her nails done. She found a bottle of nail polish, ran over to me, plopped her self in my lap, handed me the nail polish and told me "okay!!!" She was thrilled to get pink toes! She wasn't a huge fan of getting her nails done before (I've painted them a few times) but this time she loved it- and sat still for almost all of it :) She also loves looking at the pretty dresses and Disney/Princess emblem clothing when we're out shopping...and thank goodness I have enough self restraint not to buy every pretty thing she sees and tries to grab for! Although I am very excited that she's just about outgrown all of her 18 month clothing so it's time to go SHOPPING soon! She'll finally get the Rapunzel shirt and PJs she's been eyeing.

Evelynne loves playing with Jeremiah, and saying "hi" to almost every kid she sees when we are out- picking up Jeremiah, at the park, etc. She prefers kids Jeremiah's size and up to kids her age, but she's getting better at socializing with them, too. One of her regular playmates, Ian, is a few months younger than Evelynne and therefore is smaller than her- and she has gotten very jealous on a few occasions where I have picked him up and held him. I'm praying this phase passes before February, when their first BABY COUSIN, Micah is born! That's right- I'm going to be an AUNTIE for the first time! My brother Joe and his wife Lindsey are expecting their first child, a boy, due just 5 days after Evy's 2nd birthday.

Evy has been a chatter box for a long time now. Her vocabulary well exceeds the expected vocabulary of a typical 18 month old. I think the norm is 6 words, according to books and her pediatrician, but I can't even count how many words she knows- and small phrases. All day long I'm hearing her talk, and now starting to link words together, rather than just standard phrases like "oh boy", "oh no," "all done," etc. As wrong as it is to compare your children, I think it's fun to see how a "typical" kid develops linguistically versus Jeremiah (who I am equally as proud of! It's just that the spot she is at right now is where he was at when he was 2 1/2 , almost 3). It's the cutest thing ever!

My Princess Met a Princess!

2011-08-29T19:54:00.001-07:00

It's no secret that my kids and I love to go to Disneyland. A lot. I got my first pass when Jeremiah was 13 months old, and renewed it last September when he was almost 3 and Evy 6 months old. Originally I wasn't going to get my pass til closer to Evelynne's first birthday, but Jeremiah's OT recommended we get him one so that he could get used to being around big crowds, loud noises, and become desensitized to lots of flashing lights/colors/etc. You didn't have to ask me twice! I got the most basic pass you could get (which still cost an arm and a leg!), that only lets you go weekdays only during non peak seasons and is blocked out the rest of the time. I kid you not, when the pass isn't blocked out we are usually there at least once a week, sometimes twice (and once I think 3 time in one week!). Luis didn't get a pass because too much Disney and him do not mix, but next week he will be getting one :) We usually only went for the afternoon, and almost always met a friend or two there for play dates. Both of my kids absolutely adore going. And now that Evelynne is getting older, more aware of her surroundings and more verbal she knows exactly where we are headed! In fact, we pulled into the parking lot today and she yelled out "Oh boy! Minnie!" before you could even see ANYTHING Disney related; just the boring parking structure. I think I'm in trouble :)

Jeremiah's OT was right- getting the pass has worked wonders for him. Definitely the best money I have ever spent! Some of my friends and family are in a state of shock that I think it's way easier to take both my kids to Disneyland for the afternoon, just me and them without any help, than to the playground for 30 min. I laid down the law very firmly and VERY early on that you always always hold my hand, stay put, do not run, etc. and it has worked beautifully. Now that Evy is very mobile things are getting a little trickier, but she has always been better at holding hands, staying put and listening than Jeremiah was in the earlier years. So far so good.

The picture to the right was taken today with Ariel- Evelynne's first time meeting a princess! I think she liked her.

Catching Up on Growing Up

2011-08-26T21:11:00.001-07:00

Nearly a year has passed since the urge to blog has come. I used to blog a heck of a lot more when Jeremiah was small, and when I was pregnant with Evelynne. I had the best intentions of blogging last year, during her first year of life, but in the beginning I had the fall back excuse of "I'm so busy with having a newborn and a toddler!" Then as the year went on and Evelynne required less demands of me, the demands required of me from Jeremiah were growing so much more. Things that should have become easier as he grew up got increasingly harder, and were not getting easier. Last year was supposed to be one of the happiest years of my life- gaining another child, especially the daughter I dreamed of and prayed for so long and so hard for (especially after a failed pregnancy), Luis and I were doing well financially, and Jeremiah was growing up... yet it was one of the darkest times for me. One that I really had no desire to blog about.

I believe I posted that Jeremiah started receiving speech therapy and occupational therapy when he was 21 months old (September 2009). I went into his speech therapies thankful for the services provided for him, but thinking that he would "blossom" and not need the therapies within six months. I was wrong. I had a gut feeling deep down from the moment his pediatrician even suggested that I look into interventions for him that something bigger might be wrong with him than being a "late bloomer," and that feeling turned into stress. And fear. (Because what parent actually wants something to be wrong with their child?) And my worst fears were confirmed on October 5, 2010, when my precious Jeremiah was diagnosed with a high functioning form of autism. It was not something I wanted to talk about, let alone blog about. Only a small handful of friends and even family members knew for the first few months. But now that nearly a year has passed since the diagnosis, I am finally able to talk about everything with confidence and pride, not discouragement, depression and anxiety. I've had to take baby steps- talking about it first with friends and family, then talking about it here and there on Facebook, and now actually journaling about it. It's not a secret anymore. I never wanted it to be a secret, but for a long time it wasn't something I could really talk about without tearing up. It's one thing to mention casually to someone in person or on Facebook about Jeremiah's interventions or progress; it's another to actually tell its story. And I'm ready to start telling our story again- because I truly miss capturing my children's childhood in words. So I'm back... I'm going to start blogging again :) The pictures above were taken just yesterday. Jeremiah is going to be four years old in just a little over 3 months, and Evelynne just turned 18 months old. I can't wait to continue sharing our story...but for tonight this is plenty for me. Stay tuned for more!

Sibling Rivalry is Sinking In!

2011-01-04T21:51:00.000-08:00

Jeremiah has gone from doting older brother to pesky older brother overnight. Gone are the days where he runs up to hug and kiss Evelynne all day long. Yes, he still hugs and kisses her; however it is usually after he takes a toy from her and makes her cry, and we scold him.

This morning, my sneaky little son truly amazed me. I saw him toss his basketball into his bedroom. He knew Evelynne would chase right after it, and sure enough, she crawled at breakneck speed into his bedroom. I saw the little guy grin, shut his door and yell "bye bye, Evy! Bye bye, Evy!", knowing that my poor little princess would not be able to get out.

One thing is for sure...kids with autism are SMART and CLEVER!

Kids...

Thank goodness my daughter is no pushover! She is going to need every assertive bone in her body!

Happy New Year!!!

2011-01-01T09:58:00.001-08:00

New Years Resolution #1: Get back to blogging!! No matter how short the post may be, i want to make it a goal to update at least once a week. The past five months have been absolutely insane in my household, with lots of family changes taking place not only in our personal lives but also in our daily routines, so come the end of a very long and stressful day, the thought of blogging was absolutely not appealing to me at all. Time to get back into the swing of things. I certainly miss writing about my beautiful family! So keep your eyes posted for a few big updates very soon- there are a bunch of things I want to get off my chest :) Happy New Year!! (BTW- those huge kids you see sitting in our laps are now 3 years old and 10 1/2 months old!)

Four

2010-07-23T14:50:00.000-07:00

Yesterday Louis and I celebrated our 4th anniversary. All day long I was thinking back to what I was doing at that time on our "big day," and brought out our wedding album to go through the pictures. Every time I open it up I start to cry, and yesterday was no exception! Our wedding was the MOST special event of my life. Why, you may ask, was this event more special than the birth of my children? Because without the marriage I wouldn't have the kids! Without the love, trust, commitment and covenant that Louis and I have in our marriage, we wouldn't have our family. I love my husband more than I could ever describe. No words in this blog would do justice to that. I know this blog is mostly filled with stories of my kids, because face it, life after kids is always about them, but this entry is dedicated to my husband =) The rock of our marriage and the head of our family. I really can't find the words to say right now without sounding completely cheezy, so I'm simply going to end this with a great big I LOVE YOU...and I can't wait for the next set of adventures that come our way as we continue through our marraige!

For your viewing pleasure!!

2010-07-14T21:37:00.001-07:00

This is my feeble attempt at blogging for tonight! I just uploaded some great pictures that my cousin Rebecca took during the past few days when she was staying with us, and I thought that while I had the computer up and running I might as well share them with my readers =) We have been having quite the fun summer, doing quite a bit of swimming at Grandma's house, and now with our own (tiny!) kiddy pool. On Monday we are taking our very first trip as a family of four! We are spending two nights in Carlsbad. The agenda? The beach, Lego Land, and lots of time in the hotel swimming pool! I am so excited. I'm crossing my fingers that this is the only year where the kiddos join in on Mommy and Daddy' s anniversary trip I can't leave Evelynne overnight or else she'd starve =( We also need to get in all the family time together now that we can because the following week, Louis starts his new JOB!!! He got rehired BP- he had a VERY good contract position with them last year, which ended two weeks before Evelynne was born (yeah that was fun...) and now he has been rehired to launch a new project, all of which was his idea, and if it is as successful as they project it to be, then after 8 months he will be permanently hired! Praise God!!

....so perhaps this entry is just a smidge longer than I intended it to be =) Enjoy the pictures!

Jeremiah, 2 1/2 years old

Evelynne, almost 5 months old (on Friday!)

Here we are!

2010-06-30T15:23:00.001-07:00

This is one of Evelynne's 3 month portraits. I have my kiddos portraits taken every 3 months (and picture worthy holiday- Easter, Halloween, and Christmas) during their first year. Evelynne is now 4 1/2 months old, rolling over, starting to eat rice cereal and babbling up a storm. So yes, I am quite a bit behind in my blogging! And that's okay. You have to learn what is a priority and what is not when you have two small children. For example- "clean" and "organized" take on a whole new meaning when it comes to the status of my house. As long as my house is sanitary and somewhat neat, I am perfectly happy. A house with a 2 1/2 year old and a 4 1/2 month old is NOT going to sparkle and constantly be spick and span. And I'm okay with that. However, since Marissa is now living with us, I try to be more consciencious of the state of tidiness that our house is in. Her mere presence in my household is such a motivation for me to be more on top of the housework after the kids are in bed rather than putting it off til the next day and cuddle up with Louis simply because I am too exhausted to think about it.

I can't believe that tomorrow we will already be in July. I am so thankful that (so far) this summer has been fairly mild. It's supposed to be in the mid 70's on the 4th of July! I hate it when it gets miserably hot. I have no desire to play outside with the kids or take them on walks if it is sweltering hot. Their rooms get so stuffy since we don't have central air conditioning, only the wall units, so naptime and bedtime can be quite difficult unless we have fans blasting. Speaking of July, on the 22nd Louis and I will be celebrating four years of marriage! The past three years have always been celebrated with taking a little vacation, just the two of us- Vegas, Laughlin or Coronado have been our prior weekend getaways. This year, with Evelynne still exclusively nursing (minus the one or two bottles of formula she gets every Saturday when my mom takes the kids for a few hours, and even then she will only drink an oz at a time) we will not be able to take a trip by ourselves. We are thinking about taking the kids on a little getaway to San Diego but still haven't made a firm decision on that yet. I would LOVE to get away for a few days with my little family and spend some time at the beach, however Jeremiah refuses to sleep in a regular bed. The only time he will crash with us (not that it's a bad thing!) is if he is very sick, like when he had the flu last month. He's too big for the play pen now (and besides, Evelynne would be sleeping in that). So I have no clue yet what we will be up to for our anniversary. Definitely a romantic date night, just the two of us, the night of our anniversary, but we don't know about any sort of trip yet.

That's about all i have time to write about now. Jeremiah's babysitter is here (she comes twice a week for two hours a time) and she's playing with Evelynne because Jeremiah is still taking his nap- so I'm going to relax myself!!

Evelynne's first (and hopefully LAST!) hospitalization

2010-05-20T20:59:00.001-07:00

Evelynne came down with a fever out of the blue on Sat, with no other symptoms or even fussiness. since it peaked at 103 we were sent to the ER, but got released within a few hours since it was going down and had nothing else apparently wrong with her. The dr. didn't want to subject her to too much testing on day 1 of her illness. The fever was still there Monday night so we had to take her back, where we found out she had a urinary tract infection, which caused the fever. They ran blood work, did x-rays, and even a spinal to rule out meningitis. My poor little girl... it was SO hard seeing her subjected to all those needles and catheters! Shots I can handle; IV's, spinals and blood drawing is totally different. She had to stay in the hospital until today- luckily everything is perfect with her now! No allergic reactions to the medication, and all her other tests came out clean as well. I just felt so bad for all the other babies and children that I heard crying and screaming in the pediatric ward, especially since my little girl was so HAPPY the entire time, unless she was having something poked in her or prodded. I had so much to be thankful for.

I'll do my general "Evelynne update" like I did for Jeremiah later this weekend!

My Sweet Son!

2010-05-06T21:47:00.001-07:00

I am going to do my updates in a few different segments to prevent me from having another LONG blog (such as Evelynne's birth story). Oh, Jeremiah. My sweet, sweet Jeremiah. Getting oh so big and amazing me every single day! His speech lessons are certainly paying off because I can't even count how many words he knows now, and new words are sprouting out of him every day. He is also starting to form small sentences, sometimes two words or three words. His favorite words all revolve around Evelynne- "Sister, Evy, and Diaper" are heard All Day Long. Speaking of his sister, he loves her to pieces. From the moment he wakes up he is asking for her and wanting to give her a hug and kiss. Very cute, but when she was still sleeping in her cradle in our room it would cause me much distress that he was going to wake her up! (We bring him in our room when he wakes up in the morning to cuddle, drink his sippy cup and watch a little TV). Now that she's in her crib in her own room things are much better =) I recently put away the majority of Jeremiah's "noise making toys"- the kinds with tons of buttons that light up and play music. He would spend the majority of his day just sitting down and pressing them rather than engaging in more social or educational play, even though most of those toys are labeled "educational." I call tehm "anti-social." He now LOVES wood puzzles, shape sorters, play doh, coloring, balls, his sand box, and racing dead batteries off of our coffee table (his little invention!) Twice a week he has a babysitter, a college student we had respond to an ad we put on Craigslist, come over and play while I hang out with Evy or clean if she is napping. He adores his babysitter and gets so excited when she comes over. I am so thankful for the four hours of undivided, individual attention that he gets each week from her that is so hard for me to give him right now. If you take a look at the picture closely, you will see Jeremiah's first set of stitches, which he got a week before Easter after running into the closet door. It was a mess- blood everywhere, and he absolutely hated getting straightjacketed to get the stitches, but my brave little man pulled through =) Boys will be boys!

Jeremiah is going through that terrible twos stage, embracing his independence and new abilities to vocalize just what he wants. He is known to change his mind about what he wants to eat as soon as I present him with his requests. He is still really picky with eating so I usually make him his own dinner for now, until he gets a more broad palette other than fish sticks, sandwiches, dino nuggets and hot dogs. It's a slow process but I'm hoping for the best that this won't last forever! He knows that he can get away with a LOT when I am nursing Evelynne- I can't exactly chase him down when I have the baby suctioned to me. Things have gotten better but I have more than a few gray hairs from this stage of his life.

Stay tuned for my update on Evelynne!

A Teaser =)

2010-05-03T22:21:00.001-07:00

I have *FINALLY* uploaded more pictures to my laptop and fully intend on writing a good lengthy update, complete with pictu sometime in the next day or two- provided I see some feedback on my blog =) Honestly, PART of the reason that I hardly update anymore is due to lack of feedback. Anonymous or not, I love to hear from my readers!

Third Time's The Charm

2010-04-17T11:59:00.000-07:00

Miss Evelynne Arlene is already two months old!!! I think it's finally time for me to actually blog about her birth, because I definitely do not want to forget it =) Be prepared- it's a bit lengthy!

I thought all along that Evelynne was going to be early- and we certainly had our share of false alarms with her, including two trips to the hospital- one at 38 weeks and one week later at 39 weeks. From that point on, I was having contractions on and off on a pretty regular basis. I kept waiting and waiting for it to be "time" but things just weren't happening (yet they were growing stronger and more painful), and I was going out of my mind being in so much pain for nothing. I tried everything in my power to get her out on my own- doing laps around Target with Jeremiah for what seemed like hours, taking him on walks in his wagon twice a day for an hour each (he loved that!), taking castor oil (blecchhh), you name it I probably tried it. I was so sick and tired of having contractions get started and painful, yet not going anywhere. And from being confined to our city limits- Louis was adamant that I would not leave Whittier in case I went into labor from the week before my due date. He wanted us close to the hospital so that I could get my epidural in time (sweet of him, I know, but it drove me nuts), which resulted in me missing out on a few family functions. I woke up on Valentines Day, my due date, praying to God that she would come that day. It certainly didn't seem like it- and it resulted in me having a few bouts of tears throughout the day. Call me an overly emotional pregnant mama who was ready to be done with the whole ordeal and meet her little girl!! It seemed like Tuesday, which was my next scheduled prenatal appointment, would never come, and Dr. Melnik promised that we would make an induction game plan that day if Evy wasn't here by then. Anyway, we took Jeremiah to the Children's Museum (which he LOVED), and to Steak Corral, which is our family tradition on Valentines Day. We got home that night, put Jeremiah to bed, and had a *romantic* evening cuddled in bed, watching the Olympics =)

Then the fun began.

I woke up sometime in the middle of the night (around 2:00ish or 3:00ish- I can't remember) with small, yet painful contractions. I thought, here we go again- more of those painful contractions that would keep me up all night and not go anywhere. I didn't bother timing them, I just did everything in my power to go back to sleep. That didn't happen. Finally, around 5:00, I decided to walk laps around our room to keep things going, woke Louis up, and we started timing them. They were coming every 5-7 minutes for around 30 seconds, but gradually were tapering off to the point where it wasn't even worth it to keep timing them. I was pissed. The contractions continued to come scattered throughout the morning. Louis and I took Jeremiah to the grocery store around 10:00, and then Louis dropped us off at home to go to a customer's. By the time Jeremiah was taking his nap, around 11:30, I was SO exhausted, could barely move, and tired of the contractions, which I was still convinced were fake and mostly were "cramps." However, I did start to see some signs that labor could possibly be happening- I started to lose lots of my mucus plug, which I lost 2 days before having Jeremiah. So I still wasn't buying that lI was in labor, just in TONS of pain. I called my mom and begged her to come help me with Jeremiah. She promised that she would pick him up to have him spend the night around 3:00.

After that I got a sudden burst of energy and started doing super cleaning around the house, and packed Jeremiah's things for an overnight trip to Grandma's. I was on and off the phone with my friend Tiffani throughout the day, and it was when we were talking around an hour before my parents arrived that I noticed the contractions, which were quite painful at that point, were consistently coming every 10 minutes. I think my mom sensed that something was going to happen because both she AND my dad came to get Jeremiah. When they arrived, I had the sudden urge to take a shower and asked them to stick around while I took it, just in case I doubled over in pain and slipped. I am very glad they stayed, because my contractions were becoming even more frequent at that point, but still scattered and never forming a perfect pattern.

My parents decided to stick around my house for a while, playing with Jeremiah so that I could rest. Yeah.... that didn't happen. I tried going in my room, closing the doors and watching TV but those darn contractions just would not stop, coming 2-3 times every 10 minute period, but not lasting longer than 30 seconds (usually you're supposed to wait for them to hit a minute before going to the hospital). I finally called Louis and asked him to come home. I went outside and sat on my birth ball for a bit, which helped *slightly* with the pain but not much. My mom and I were talking and she told me that my grandma had a little pool going on with my auntie Linda and two little cousins Hailee and Chase for when my baby would come. I called her up, asking *jokingly* what she was doing trying to make a profit on my baby, and she said that it was all in good fun, no $$ involved. I then asked who had that night because I had a feeling I was going to leave for the hospital within the next hour or two. My mom told me that she thought all throughout the day that I would be heading to the hospital between 6 and 8 pm, and I was starting to believe her! My mom then asked if I wanted her to paint my toes, since I never got around to getting my pedicure, and she wasn't able to finish- I was just in way too much pain to sit still. Louis showed up at that point, and, bless his heart, tried following me around the house with our laptop to time the contractions. I got pissed and told him to put it away, we needed to go to the hospital. He tried insisting that we should time them a bit (as if I hadn't kept my eyes on the clock for the past few hours)- I know the last th ing he wanted was to go to the hospital AGAIN and get sent home for a third time, three weeks in a row to the date. I told him to shove the laptop some place indecent, and bolted for teh car. My mom kept asking me for instructions on what to do w/ Jeremiah, which I had already given her several times, (I know she was just too excited to think straight too,) as I was getting in the car, and I was getting SO pissed off, frustrated and doubled over in pain that I started shouting at her, too! We were outside, so I think my neighbors must have thought I was nuts. Hopefully they saw my belly and my hospital bags and put two and two together! We gave Jeremiah one last "only child" kiss and headed down the street to the hospital (we could see Presbyterian from our front yard!)

By this time, we were quite the familiar face in the L&D admittance and triage area. I kept hearing "you're back again!" from several nurses. (I had been there every monday for the past 3 weeks, this time being my third appearance). I kept telling Louis that if they didn't keep me this time I was going to make them quite sorry, that I wasn't going to put up with being in all that pain yet again for nothing. I was filling out the now routine paperwork to go into triage when a dad brought his little boy up to meet his baby brother. He asked me if I was nervous, and I told him, no just in a lot of pain, and doubled over in another contraction. The lady at the desk told me she had a feeling they were going to keep me, and I was praying she was right. A few minutes later I was in my triage room, hooked up to the monitor and was being checked for dilation. Sure enough, the nurse told me "what do you say we have a baby? You're at 6!" I yelled out "Finally!! I can have my epidural!!" The epidural was ordered promptly so that it would be ready for me when I got to my room =) (A drug free delivery was NEVER in my plan!! However, like with Jeremiah, I refused to get one before 6 cm to get the most amt. of pain relief at the most crucial parts of labor, so I was quite happy to enter the hospital at my goal.) More questions were asked... most of which were answered by Louis since I was in pain, and phone calls were made by him as well. The triage nurse estimated that Evy would be there within 2-3 hours (it was around 5:30 pm by that point) and I was whisked off to my room, and only had about 20 min. before my best friend- aka the anesthesiologist showed up.

My epidural was in place by 6 pm, and my nurse told me she'd be back at 8:00 to check me. Around 20 min. or so after she left, I started having a really hard time breathing. It was like I could never catch my breath! I was having some sort of reaction to the epidural, which didn't happen last time. Thankfully, it was only affecting me and not the baby. My pulse and heart rate would go way up and then taper off to normal over and over again. Finally, the nurse had me lay on my side, gave me some oxygen, and by 8:00 I was somewhat stabalized, but I still kept the oxygen on. I was doing my best to rest, knowing that I was going to have a long night ahead of me, whether it be pushing or caring for a newborn, but I could NOT sleep. At 8:00 I was still 6 cm. dilated and the baby was very high- a -3 station. She also administered some pitocin to get my contractions going- they were still regularly every 2-3 min. but had yet to pick up the pace for duration. My water was also still in tact but bulging. The nurse had me switch sides every hour until 10:00 to try to lower her. At 10:00 she was a bit lower, I was at 7 cm and almost all the way thinned out. My nurse was about to break my water when all of a sudden it burst on its own- and she got out of the way from checking me JUST in time! When she came back at 10:30 to help me switch sides, I felt lots of pressure and the urge to push- something I never felt with Jeremiah, my epi was SO strong with him. She checked me and sure enough I was at 10 cm! She had me do a few practice pushes, and after two pushes she had me stop before she wound up delivering the baby! She called the doctor, and I was informed that my doctor was not going to be delivering me- he had switched on call shifts with a friend of his, Dr. Lopez, whom I had never met. This made a second delivery in which my OB did NOT deliver me =( The doctor said he would be at the hospital in 20 min, so we waited. And waited. And watched the Pairs Skating Finals on tv. The doctor was certainly taking his time, and I kept feeling tingling like I should push, so the nurse called in a resident just in case the baby started coming without me pushing. Finally, an hour later, the doctor showed up at 11:50 pm. By the time he gowned up, checked me and my stats, I was pushing around 11:57 or 11:58. Exactly at the stroke of midnight Evelynne Arlene Castillo was born, 7 pounds 8 oz, 19 1/2 inches. She was placed on my belly and I was basically in shock that she was here so easily and so effortlessly. I did not get to have Jeremiah on my belly and didn't get a peek at him for a few minutes, so I was so busy taking everything in. She was so cute and looked JUST like Jeremiah! Louis cut the cord and I got mended up (with WAY less damage this time around- a first degree tear compared to the THIRD DEGREE tear with him, and no episiotimy this time, yay!) . I thought I would cry when she was born like I did with JEremiah (tears of joy) but those didn't come until the next day. Yes I was THRILLED she was there, but for some reason the tears didn't come. After she was cleaned up, I let Louis be the first to hold her like I did with JEremiah, mostly because I could not stop shaking, which sometimes happens after delivery. Finally I got to hold my beauty and then nurse her- she fed for AN HOUR STRAIGHT. I couldn't get Jeremiah to nurse for anything until he was almost 3 weeks old! God answered that prayer! We finally brought the family in around 1:30 am. My parents, Joe, Lindsey, my mother in law, sister in law Lisa, her boyfriend Angel, and Louis's uncle Emmett were all there waiting to meet Evelynne Arlene,given her first name after a very sweet little old lady customer of Louis's, and given her middle name in memory of my grandma Arlene. I was in my room by 2:00 am, scarfed down a turkey sandwich, cookies and juice faster than I ever ate before from starvation, and tried my best to go to sleep while Louis and Evy were in the nursery. That did NOT happen. Finally she came back around 3:30. Louis asked if I wanted to hold her but I declined, not wanting to wake her up and for me to get sleep before I had to feed her again. The nurses let me sleep as long as I could, saying I could sleep til 7:00 am if I liked since she ate so well with me earlier. I got maybe an hour and a half of sleep, and I was up at 5:30, in such excitement and amazement that I had a daughter.

God has truly blessed me so much with her! I was really anxious for breastfeeding to go well this time around, and it has been picture perfect from the start. To this day, Evelynne will NOT take a pacifier and will hardly drink from a bottle. She's such an easy baby- very smiley, social, and does not mind at all being put down in her bouncer or playmat if I need to get something done or play wtih her brother. And Jeremiah thinks the sun rises and sets on his little sister. And she's a dream baby at night- in the beginning waking every 3-4 hours to feed and going RIGHT back to sleep. I don't even have to wait for her to fall asleep; I can put her down drowsy and she will go to sleep on her own. Now she basically only wakes up once before I have to get up =) Naps are a bit more of a challenge but still aren't as difficult as they were with Jeremiah.

So there you have it- the birth story of my beautiful little princess. And as it turns out, she really was right on time- I completely forgot until I delivered her that her original due date was February 15, which is when I went to the hospital with her! Had our doctor been on time to the hospital, she would have had that birthday rather than February 16. God is SO GOOD! Thank You for my perfect family!!

Easter Pictures!!

2010-03-22T06:32:00.001-07:00

We took the kids to take their Easter pictures yesterday, and even though I'm completely, 100% biased, I'd say they came out extremely cute!! My mom and I went shopping for the kids Easter clothes on Saturday, and we couldn't make up our mind between two dresses for Evelynne, so we ended up buying both of them. However, we only had her wear one for her pictures. My sister in law Lindsey made her headband- that girl is extremely creative!! Hope you enjoy the pics of my gorgeous family!

Before I lose whatever readers I have...

2010-03-14T12:46:00.001-07:00

I know I have been VERY absent lately. Lets face it, your priorities change BIG TIME when you have a new baby in the house. Whatever microscopic amount of free time I have is usually not spent at the computer- it's usually spent picking up the house or trying to scarf down a sandwich before one or both kids needs me. I do apologize!!

Baby Evy will be a month old on Tuesday. I can't believe how fast the time has flown- and how second nature it now seems to have two children to care for =) The first week of me being alone with both kids was TOUGH- especially considering we were having some work done in our back yard and jackhammers were going off for most of the afternoon. It turns out newborns do not like to nap (or stay happy) when big, loud machines are making tons of noise in their back yard. The second week was much easier, and now we're starting to develop a little bit of a routine! The "sleepless" nights aren't quite so sleepless- Evelynne is a pretty good night time baby. We all go to bed around 10:30, and usually she wakes up only two or three times to eat, and for the most part goes back to sleep as soon as she's finished her meal. We have been blessed! She is such a smiley, happy baby girl and is growing like crazy. And her big brother ADORES her. All day long all I hear is "Evy Evy Evy" and see him go to pat her head, give her a kiss or hold her hand. The jealousy has been minimal and is basically gone altogether.

I would love to write more, but Evy is due up from her nap any moment! I am working on writing out her birth story, so as soon as I have that finished I will post it on here, hopefully in a few days. Take care!! OH, and I didn't realize anonymous comments were turned off...I'm enabling them again. Show my blog some love, it's more fun to write when there is feedback!

Evelynne Arlene Castillo!

2010-02-20T09:54:00.001-08:00

Born on Tuesday February 16th at exactly Midnight! (right after the pairs skating finals)
7 pounds 8 oz
19 1/2 inches

More to come later!

Four Days!

2010-02-10T19:52:00.000-08:00

Man oh man, this little girl is already giving me gray hairs (err... I mean adding to the collection of gray hairs that I already have!) and she isn't even here yet! Let me tell you about the fun-filled week that I've had:

Ever since I got discharged from the hospital last Tuesday night, I've been having contractions on and off. Not just little ones, big ones! They have not been consistent enough to send me back to the hospital; however they have been plenty strong and consistent enough to keep me up most of the night in pain several nights in a row. I went to my doctor's appointment on Monday with high hopes that I would be well underway with dilation so that he could send me in for an induction- or at the very least, do a little something to get my labor going =) However, after two long hours waiting to even SEE my doctor (he got tushed away for an emergency c-section and then had a few patients before me to tend to), all he had to tell me was that while my cervix was beginning to soften, I was still completely CLOSED. UGH!!!! However, Dr. Melnik did tell me that he thinks the baby will be here by Friday. And she almost was...

I got home and immediately went to the restroom. That's when all the fun began- I started gushing bright red blood. I called my OB in a panic, thinking it could be the start of placenta previa. By that point, though, the gushing had slowed down to spotting so he told me to just monitor the baby's movement for a few hours, and if she wasn't making five kicks an hour to go in and get checked out. I thought all was well, until less than 10 min. later I started spouting out a little clot! That got me sent back to the hospital. I was scared out of my mind, thinking I was going to need a c-section or that something was wrong with the baby. Praise God, though, that everything turned out to be just fine- my cervix was just acting way sensitive from the exam I had that evening! And, when the nurse at the hospital checked me, I dilated to 1 cm! They monitored me for around an hour, and even though I was starting to contract, they sent me home. My contractions weren't long and regular enough to keep me, and they wanted me to labor at home as long as possible to avoid having a c-section, in case no progress was being made. They told me that I'd probably be back within 24 hours (ha...yeah... I'm still home 48 hours later!) Can you believe Louis wanted to wait until 2 1/2 men was over to go home?! I had to pry him away from our triage room and reassured him that the episode was being recorded on our DVR.

Yesterday (the day after the big blood scare) I was having tons of contractions all day long, and started waddling like the trees in the Lord of the Rings (Louis's words, not mine). I thought yesterday was going to be the day, but of course it was wishful thinking. I woke up this morning feeling absolutely fine once again. Tomorrow I have an ultrasound apt. to check the size of the baby, and I'm going to have the dr. check my progress again, just because =) I really hope my dr. was right about her coming by Friday, but I'll be thankful if she's here by my due date on Sunday! We'll see what happens.

10 Days!

2010-02-04T19:31:00.001-08:00

Ten more days. T-E-N. Ten days til Valentines Day for you normal people who aren't carrying around a baby in their tummy. As for Louis and I, it is ten days until our precious daughter's due date! Not that a "due date" really means much, because hardly any babies are actually born on the predicted date. Take Jeremiah, for example. He was due on Thanksgiving Day 2007, November 22 (what is it with me conceiving babies who have due dates on holidays?!). November 22 came and went. As did the next 9 days that followed November 22, until December 2, the day he decided he had enough of Mommy's cozy belly and wanted to enter the big, bright world. So who knows when his little sister is going to make her grand entrance. Something always told me that Jeremiah was going to be at least a little late, so I wasn't too surprised that he didn't come right away. As for this little gal, I have thought all along that she would come early.

And she almost did.

Tuesday night started out as a wonderful evening here at the Castillo household. I finally made the corned beef that has been sitting in my freezer for a few months, and that I have been dying to make. It came out delicious. Louis and I curled up in front of the TV with our delicious dinner, and settled down to eat and watch the previous night's new episode of "2 1/2 Men" and that night's "American Idol." That's when all the fun began. I started getting lots of contractions- big, big contractions that wouldn't stop coming. Two hours later I was on the brink of tears, so I told Louis we better pack our hospital bag, just in case. The next day was laundry day, so most of the things we had to throw in the bag wasn't the cleanest. Anyway, I decided to call the dr. just to see what he wanted me to do- labor at home for a little longer, or go to the hospital. Judging from the fact that I was crying on the phone, he told me to get to the hospital ASAP. One hour later, after my mother in law arrived at our house to stay with Jeremiah, we made it to the hospital. And that's when everything stopped.

STOPPED.

All that pain, all that labor for nothing. Not just nothing- I didn't even begin to dilate a little! Not even a smidge! The nurses kept me for observation for the next 3 hours to see if anything would change, but nope- our daughter thought she played an excellent joke on Mommy and Daddy. We got to the hospital at 10:30 pm and walked through our door at 1:30 a.m.

I hate false alarms.

But what I hate even worse than false alarms are mommies that have to share my triage room, who come crying and practically screaming, and are already dilated to 7 cm, while I'm hooked up to a monitor, praying that those awful contractions that went away come back. Because massive pain sounded pretty good at that point.

We're 100 percent ready for this baby. In the past two weeks we had three fantastic baby showers. Our daughter has more clothes than she is probably going to be able to wear, tons of diapers for her little tushie, bottles, blankets, burp cloths, you name it she has it. Our hospital bag is re-packed, filled with plenty of clean clothes for us. Jeremiah's bag is packed as well. We have a bag of lunchables and snacks in our fridge for Louis to munch on when I'm laboring (something we didn't have on Tuesday night). We're all set and ready to go. I know I should take the next few days leading up to her birth enjoying the last days of having Jeremiah be an only child, of being able to nap when he naps, of having one independent kid to care for rather than a toddler and a needy newborn, of being able to sleep through the entire night. But I just want to hold her already!

2010-01-16T07:47:00.000-08:00

Good news- I don't have any issues with my gallbladder or liver! The pain I've been having are because everything is extremely cramped right now, and my baby is pushing everything up into my ribs. The dr. said that because the pain is persistent all day long, rather than only after I eat, that I have "nothing to worry about." Well I guess that's good news... even though there's nothing I can do to make the pain go away! I suppose I'd rather be in pain all day long than receive medication for having a gallbladder or liver problem.

Today my mom and I are cooking up a storm so that my freezer will be nice and full of yummy things to eat when I come home from the hospital and don't feel like cooking. On the menu for today are: Spaghetti and meatballs (without the pasta- I"ll make that before I serve), chicken enchiladas, baked ziti, meatloaf, chicken brocolli and cheese casserole, and 15 bean soup. Lots of yummy things to eat so that I won't have to survive on Louis's cooking (aka constant take-out) until I'm back on my feet. I was rather spoiled last time when I had Jeremiah because Louis and I were (very temporarily until the tenants moved out of our house!) living with my parents, so pretty much I was waited on hand and foot by not only my loving husband but my parents and brother. My only job was to worry about recovering from my delivery and taking care of Jeremiah; all the cooking and cleaning was done by them, no questions asked =) This time around it will be our responsibility! Louis is going to take a week off of work after the baby comes and I'm so looking forward to it.

Tomorrow is 4 weeks til my due date!

2010-01-12T15:53:00.001-08:00

Disneyland...with a two year old...by myself...one month away from my due date?!

WHAT THE HECK WAS I THINKING?!

Less than 10 minutes after my last post, my leg cramps, which have been absent for a few weeks, suddenly returned. Along with lots of cramps. And Braxton Hicks contractions (I think I was having false labor most of the afternoon? I had a ton of it with Jeremiah starting right around now, but he managed to stay inside me 10 days past my due date). Oh, and the crazy pain right underneath my left rib, which hasn't gone away in two months. I thought it was heartburn; it turns out I might have a gallbladder or liver issue brought on by my pregnancy. FUN! We'll find out more about that on Friday at my doctor's appointment. Oh and did I mention how low the baby is? Which makes walking around WITHOUT carrying Jeremiah harder than normal?

In short, I will NOT be taking Jeremiah to Disneyland tomorrow. No way Jose. Maybe I"ll take him to the playground this weekend. With Louis. Jeremiah isn't capable of understanding that our season pass expires next week, or that we won't be going again until the fall. With his baby sister. In other words, he'll never know what he's missing out on.

I'm so glad that Louis's only "trip" this week is a local one, not requiring him to be gone overnight.

5 more weeks

2010-01-11T11:39:00.001-08:00

...and so much left to do to get ready for my princess. SO MUCH. My biggest concern is spending as much one on one time as possible with Jeremiah before the big day arrives, because once his little sister is here, he will not only be spending a few days away from home with his grandparents, but he will no longer have my undivided attention once he is home. How in the world am I going to manage having two small children?! I hear that the transition from having one child to two children is the hardest transition to make for any parent. Oy.

Our Disneyland pass expires on the 21st (next week). I know I said there was no way I was going to be bringing Jeremiah back there before our pass expired, but I am kind of tempted to take him for just an hour or two TOPS on Wednesday, just for one last special mommy-son outing. I would bring our lightweight umbrella stroller rather than his big, comfy (and bulky) travel system, and forego a back pack by cramming a few diapers, a munchie and small toy in my purse so I won't have that extra weight to tote around. We'd do his favorite things (It's a Small World, Dumbo, Goofy's playground, Winnie the Pooh and Pirates of the Caribbean) and head on home. If I feel up to it on Wednesday morning I think we'll do it. If not- oh, well.

Anyway, the things left on my to-do list before the Big Day are as follows:
*Organize the baby's room, which entails:
-Wash all hand-me-down clothes and blankets
-Separate clothing according to size.
-Figure out organizational system for dresser drawers
-Create an organized storage method for all clothes beyond 3 months sizes
-Sterilize Jeremiah's old infant toys (does anyone know if it is safe to put plush rattles and squeak toys in the washing machine, or will it ruin the sound effects?)
-Assemble Jeremiah's Rainforest Mobile; replace batteries and hang on her crib

*Purchase and assemble curtains for her room. Order an extra window valence that matches her crib set (it came with one; we need two)

*After all baby showers are over on January 31st (I am having three- what a blessed mama I am!), make a list of necessities that still need to be purchased and go shopping! Things I still need as of right now are fresh bibs, wash cloths, hooded towels, baby wash, nighttime bubble bath, socks, pacifiers and bottles (I'm planning on nursing as long as possible, but for those times when Grandma and Grandpa will watch her, or I feel like letting Louis take a turn at the nighttime feedings I will need new bottles. I fell in love with Sydney's Born Free and Dr. Brown's!). All of these things are standard new baby necessities that every new mama needs, no matter how many kiddos you have.

*Make lots of meals to freeze for when I come home from the hospital and don't feel like cooking. My mom is going to help me with this task this weekend =)

*Deep clean my entire house! We are considering splurging on having a housekeeper come a week before my due date because God knows I won't be up to doing this, and I don't think Louis has ever scrubbed the bathroom before.

*Stock up on basic household necessities so my grocery shopping trips will be shorter and less frequent when she arrives- lots of toilet paper, paper towels, paper plates/cups/cutlery (to minimize dishwashing the first few weeks she is home), toothpaste, shampoo, conditioner, cleaning supplies, and lots of nonperishable foods- oatmeal, pasta/rice a roni, cereals, bottled water, frozen veggies, etc.

I have a doctor's appointment this Friday and I believe that I will be seeing my doctor on a weekly basis from now until my delivery! We're definitely on countdown!!

Overwhelmed

2009-12-29T21:42:00.001-08:00

Sunday marked the 7 week countdown til my due date. I am positively OVERWHELMED with everything that I have left to do before the arrival of our daughter. Some things are minor (like stocking up on groceries, organizing the linen closet, my dresser, and bedroom closets), others are rather big. Like setting up her room. Trying to get Jeremiah into his new bed was an absolute joke. It took all of 30 seconds after I left the bedroom for our little stinker to get up and play... and when he would hear me come back to his room to put him back in bed, he would run to his bed and hide under the covers. After an hour of playing this game I gave up and stuck him in his crib. Louis and I talked about it, and since Jeremiah does so well in his crib (and refuses to sleep in anything other than a crib or play pen- not even in our bed!) that we would just get a second crib and leave the twin bed in his room to get more used to. I don't have the energy right now to switch him into his twin bed, and I don't want to push something new on him so close to the arrival of his new sister- especially with how well he does in his crib and how much he truly loves it. When he starts climbing out of his crib on a regular basis (he's only done it once so far and it was when he was PISSED!) then we will start to do the whole transition again. For now it's a battle that we aren't ready to fight. The only reason we were even attempting the switch at this point was to avoid buying a second crib when we already had one, and a free twin bed from my parents (they gave us my brother's old twin bed). Luckily we found a great deal today on Craigslist- a crib, mattress, changing table, changing table pad and dresser for $250. We took it as a sign that Jeremiah needs to stay in his crib =)

I was planning on writing more but I can barely keep my eyes open right now, and would prefer to have a short and coherent post tonight than a long and sloppy one. Tune in for part 2 tomorrow.

I survived Christmas

2009-12-27T20:09:00.000-08:00

With the grace of God (and a little bit of help from my husband!) I survived five Christmas celebrations in two days with a sick two year old while being 32 weeks pregnant. I pray to God that I am never ever this far along in a pregnancy around the holidays again. If Louis had it his way (and he has me halfway convinced as well!) this will be my last pregnancy, so there is (hopefully) no risk of that happening again. Unless God has other plans.

We still dont' have a digital camera! Our plan to get one as our Christmas present went down the drain when Louis found a set of speakers he wanted for his truck dirt-cheap on Ebay last week. So now I have to wait to get my dad's digital camera from him to upload Christmas pics. Oh and my Christmas present from him? A Wii fit and a new Ipod! =D Jeremiah has more toys than can fit in his closet.

Look for another update tomorrow; Louis and I are going to watch TV now!

2009-12-21T13:40:00.001-08:00

To answer the tummy pic question... I actually haven't taken one yet! I'll take one over the holidays and post it hopefully this weekend. The entire rest of the week is CRAZY so don't expect too much until after Saturday =)

Just a quick baby update- I think the baby "dropped" yesterday. I started getting all those not-so-fun symptoms that the baby has officially lowered herself into position for being born but has every intention of sitting cozy for the next 6-8 weeks (6 if I'm early, 8 if I deliver on time. I'm praying she doesn't stray more than a day or two past my due date). If I could have her at the end of January or first week of February I will consider myself a VERY lucky mama... I'm so through with this thing called pregnancy right now! I see my OB/GYN again on Monday. Hopefully by then I will have somehow burned off the two dozen or so cookies I have polished off last weekend alone and the tamales, chorizo and eggs, cinnamon rolls, ham, and potato salad (among other things) that I will be enjoying on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day! Stepping on a scale after a huge holiday weekend is not exactly pleasant, and I am hoping to avoid a repeat of the scolding I got for the weight I put on from eating too much Halloween candy.

'Twas the week before Christmas...

2009-12-17T11:22:00.000-08:00

Is it just me or is anyone else in as much of a shock as I am that one week from today is Christmas Eve?! Honestly... where did the entire month of December go... scratch that... where did this year go?! I still have much to do to get ready for Christmas Eve (when we celebrate with Louis's family) and Christmas Day. On my list to do are the following:

*Send out Christmas Cards. I"m doing that today... we had to wait to get our Christmas pictures back, which we did yesterday. All the cards are already written and addressed; I just need to stick the pictures in the envelope, seal them and stick a stamp on the envelope. I'm hoping to drop them off at the post office on my way to Jeremiah's speech lesson this afternoon.

*Finish buying gifts- for my Dad, Jeremiah's teachers, and stocking stuffers for Louis and I. I thought I still had Louis's haul of presents to buy, (I was waiting for his last paycheck to come in before I hit the stores), but we just agreed this morning that rather than exchanging presents, we would do a joint gift of getting a new digital camera and buying "Band Hero" for the Wii. Band Hero won't be too much of a splurge since we already have the instruments from Rock Band, and enough Best Buy gift cards to make up half of the cost of the game. I'm excited about getting a new camera at last- I hate having to constantly borrow my dad's or my mother in law's!

*Decorate our Christmas tree! We bought it on Sunday (Day of Louis's birthday party), but didn't get around to decorating it, since Louis spent most of the afternoon hanging up our Christmas lights outside, and then he was in Phoenix from Monday night until last night. We're going to make a romantic evening out of it tonight after Jeremiah goes to bed. (Speaking of bed, we're putting Jeremiah in his twin bed for the first time tonight. Definitely send some prayers our way if you think about it; our little guy isn't known for staying put very well and he LOVES his crib!)

*Bake, bake, bake cookies. Lindsey is hosting a "cookie exchange" party on Saturday, where everyone in attendance brings a certain amount of cookies to share, including the recipe, and you leave with a nice assortment of cookies. I'm making strawberry jam thumbprint cookies- I'll bake those up tomorrow. Then on Sunday, Morgan is hosting her annual "cookie baking" party, where a big group of us spend all day baking up dozens upon dozens of cookies. Each recipe that we make (usually around 5 or 6 cookies from what I remember) gets tripled or quadrupled- and everyone also gets to take home a nice assortment as well. We've been doing this since high school and everyone looks forward to cookie baking- it's usually the one day a year where a lot of our high school friends see each other in person rather than just facebook!

*Wrap presents... I still have quite a few presents left to wrap, and the ones that I have wrapped already need to be decorated. I've been storing them in the baby's closet, since Jeremiah is known to climb on top of boxes, throw them, you name it, and I didn't want to have to wrap things more than once. I haven't decorated any presents yet so that the bows and ribbons don't get too smashed before they get opened.

In the midst of all this chaos, I still have to take my second glucose test to test for gestational diabetes (which will take up at least an hour of my time; you have to wait an hour after chugging the glucose before you can draw blood), clean our house, watch the last few Christmas movies that I haven't seen this holiday season yet (Home Alone 1 and 2, the Nativity Story, and A Christmas Story), take Jeremiah to look at Christmas lights and visit Santa, and find a few moments to stick my feet up and relax. Every little thing wears me out... and being 8 1/2 weeks away from my due date that is to be expected. Everything I eat also gives me heart burn, but since I' m constantly hungry (and needing to nourish my daughter) I can't exactly give up food. I can't wait for all of these horrible pregnancy symptoms, especially the leg cramps, to go away!!

Here are a few more pictures from our trip to Disneyland on Jeremiah's birthday:

T Minus 10 Weeks!

2009-12-06T15:15:00.000-08:00

As of today I am 30 weeks along in my pregnancy! Starting on Friday I no longer have monthly OB/GYN appointments; instead I will be going every other week for the next six weeks, and then weekly up until I deliver. With Jeremiah I knew all along that he was going to be late (and boy was I right- 10 days!) but I have a hunch that our princess is going to be either just a little early or right on time. Or perhaps I"m just having some more wishful thinking, who knows.

Jeremiah turned two years old on Wednesday. His birthday party two weeks ago was wonderful, and our family day at Disneyland on his actual birthday was even better! Louis refuses to set foot in Disneyland unless it is on Jeremiah's birthday. He will endure a long day of walking around and Mickey Mouse for our son on his special day but that's it! My annual pass expires the third week of January, and I honestly can't see myself going back before then =( I would not have been able to handle Jeremiah by myself at this point of my pregnancy. Louis helped out SO much with carrying Jer in line, pushing the stroller, and keeping up with him. I don't know how I would have done it by myself, so as sad as it makes me to not be able to use my pass up until the very end, it's probably for the best. I won't be renewing it until sometime next fall, or possibly closer to Jeremiah's 3rd birthday. I refuse to take a newborn to Disneyland, especially if I have to take care of Jeremiah on top of it. Louis does not have a pass, nor will he ever get one! We took lots of pictures on my mother in law's camera (yeah we're still working on getting another one) but I forgot to borrow the cord to transfer the pictures from the camera to the computer, so those will have to wait.

I can't believe that the holidays are here again! I have been really on top of Christmas shopping this year, doing lots of it all year round, that I really haven't had to fork out a ton of cash at once or do lots of massive purchasing all at once, either. I still have to get Louis his Christmas gift; I just decided to give him the present I got for him on his birthday (which is in one week). I have a hard enough time coming up with one great gift for him, but having to come up with two great gifts so close together is extremely difficult!

Anyway, once again I apologize for the lack of posts. I have barely had a moment to sit down at the computer, between Jeremiah's party, hosting Thanksgiving, Louis being gone a LOT, Jeremiah's lessons, his birthday at Disneyland, and attending my cousin's baby shower. Look for another update in a day or two, I promise I"ll be good =)

Our Happy Family

2009-11-22T21:23:00.001-08:00

We took our last family Christmas portraits as a family of 3 tonight!

Two more weeks!

2009-11-18T13:37:00.000-08:00

Two weeks from today my baby turns two years old. TWO. This Saturday we are having his birthday party, in order to avoid having it Thanksgiving weekend like we did last year. So far all I have left to do are order his balloons, purchase the plates and forks, and some kid-friendly snacks. By popular demand, we're having our taco man come back and serve his outstanding all-you-can-eat, made to order carne asada and chicken tacos, with all the fixings, so I don't have to worry about preparing any major food =) Since my picky booger won't go anywhere near a piece of cake, we're getting him a piece of his favorite pan dulce (Mexican sweet bread) to enjoy while everyone else devours his Mickey Mouse Clubhouse birthday cake. I can't wait!

After his party, it is time to start getting ready for Thanksgiving, since once again I will be hosting. You might think I"m just a little bit crazy, trying to cram everything in on top of Jeremiah's birthday, at the beginning of my third trimester of pregnancy, but in all honesty I LOVE hosting parties. And having Thanksgiving at our house prevents us from having to run around, having dinner with my side of the family and dessert w/ Louis's side. This way, everyone is together and we don't have to go anywhere but to our kitchen. Last year, Louis flat-out refused to touch the raw turkey, making me wash it and put it in the roasting pan and oven all by myself. I was PISSED. The darn bird was heavy and slippery, plus I was freaking out about making my very first turkey. My husband doesn't get grossed out by much, but apparently an in-tact, plucked, raw bird is too much for him to handle. This year, however, I"m not putting up with such nonsense, and using the baby as an excuse for not being able to lift anything heavy (although, Jeremiah is much heavier than our turkey!), he agreed to help me out, provided that I'm the one that de-guts the turkey and he doesn't have to see any of those guts.

On Saturday after Jeremiah's party, my dad is helping Louis put together Jeremiah's twin bed, because on Sunday night we're going to have Round One in his big boy bed- just bedtime to start; once he gets more comfortable with sleeping in there (hopefully in a week) then we will have naptime in there as well, and the crib will be moved to the baby's room.

Another Week Ahead....

2009-11-08T11:47:00.000-08:00

Here we go again, another week where Louis is going to be gone for most of it =( His destination this week: Somewhere outside of Sacramento (Elk Ridge?) He leaves tomorrow night, and will be home Wed. or Thurs. (his meeting on Thursday is TBA). Last week he was gone overnight to San Diego, which was fairly manageable. I just hope this week doesn't drag on; it's double hard to have him gone when Jeremiah and I are scrounging for things to do!

Yesterday my wonderful parents took Jeremiah overnight so Louis and I could have some much-needed time to ourselves! I can't even remember the last time we went out on a date together, probably back in August when we went away overnight for our anniversary. It was time. I spent the afternoon making my registry at Target, then we went to dinner at Marie Callendars and saw "The Men Who Stare At Goats." Don't waste your money on that movie! It was as stupid as the title. But we still had fun just enjoying each other's company =) I thought I was going to sleep til 10 this morning, but no I was up at 8:30 (the time I wake up when Louis lets me "sleep in.") We just got back from a delicious breakfast at Arthur's (best diner breakfast ever!!), and in an hour I leave to go pick up my lil man. I sure missed him!

Progress in the baby's room are coming along quite nicely. The paint is on the walls, the carpet and crown molding installed. The shutters are going to be delayed a little bit, because we desperately need new windows in the kids rooms first. There is no point installing shutters only to take them off later when we replace the windows. But first we need to get a second car before any window work takes place. We've done really well with only having one car for the last six months (or more? I can't remember how long we've been a one car family!) but it's definitely time to get a second vehicle. We're not looking for something fancy; just something functional to get Louis to and from where he needs to go, since he's not working from home as much any more. Something inexpensive on Craigslist until we decide to splurge on something bigger, and until we're we're ready to have a car payment again. Since the Matrix was completely paid off earlier this year, we have thoroughly enjoyed not having that monthly expense. Right now we're looking at pick up trucks.

As soon as the finishing touches get put on the crown molding (painting over nails, cleaning up smudges) we're going to move Jeremiah's crib into the baby's room, which means that we will be transitioning Jeremiah into his big boy bed. Something I'm NOT looking forward to! Jeremiah LOVES his crib... never climbed out or anything. But I don't see a point in purchasing a second crib when he will be ready to be out out of his crib no later than June (when he will be 2 1/2 years old). Not worth it. Plus, I want him to have plenty of time to adjust to his new bed before his sister is born. I read that making the transition 3 months before the sibling is born is ideal. So... probably T minus one week until he makes the switch!

Need a quick laugh?

2009-11-03T19:26:00.000-08:00

Today Jeremiah spouted out four new words: Fishie, Jesus, owie, and "Oh shit!" I know he picked the first three up from us... not quite sure who to blame for that last phrase! The last time he said it (three times total) was when I was getting him out of time out today. Smart kid. And he said "owie" after he dropped a bottle of body wash on his wee wee during bath time tonight.

Even on the longest and crappiest of days, my kid never fails to amuse me.

Sometimes you just need a good steak...

2009-11-02T19:43:00.000-08:00

As much as I love being pregnant, and feeling (and seeing!) my little girl kick kick kick all day and night, I have to say that there are are a few things I am looking forward to once she is born- and somewhere near the top of that list is no longer being hungry 24 hours a day! I'm not just talking about "hmmm, I"d like a snack," I'm talking about full blown hunger. No matter how much I eat at a meal, I'm ready for more less than an hour later. It's disgusting. Having leftover Halloween candy laying around (as well as the stock pile of clearanced candy that we bought yesterday for Jeremiah's upcoming birthday party), hasn't helped, either. I have been pretty darn good about the amount of "empty calories" that I have been consuming, however chocolate has been calling my name lately. Along with ice cream. I have done everything short of massive bribery to get Louis to fetch me ice cream at 11:00 p.m. from the market. Yet when I finally have him convinced (or annoyed and wanting to shut me up, I'm not sure!) enough to get out of his pajamas, put on some clothes and go get me some Ben Jerry's Cherry Garcia, I take pity on him, hand him back the pajamas and hide the car keys. Today, however, steak was calling my name- big time.

The only problem, is, I can't cook a decent steak to save my life. And I keep forgetting that! I can bake chicken tenderloins, roast a chicken, and bake pork chops like there's no tomorrow. Steak, however... not my forte. And I'm always disappointed with the results once it is on my plate! It doesn't help that I lost my taste for our favorite steak restraunt, Steak Corral, since I got pregnant. Which is very sad, because where else can you get a FANTASTIC $7 steak dinner with all the trimmings on this side of Las Vegas? I love the salad, baked potato and cheese toast that come with the meal, but I just can't get into their steak anymore =( And you don't go to a steak house (especially with the word Steak in the restraunt's name) and order, say, chicken. Or even a hamburger.

The steak I made for dinner tonight was equally disappointing. Oh, and the stereotype that men know how to make the perfect steak does NOT apply to my husband, so handing him the responsibility of giving me my beef is pointless. He can BBQ carne asada, no problem. A regular steak on the other hand? He's as clueless as I am. I'm sad. And still hungry! If anyone has any tips for making a great steak on the stove would be greatly appreciated =)

In other news....
Operation Baby Room Remodel began last Friday! So far her room is painted (Sleeping Beauty Pink walls and dark brown ceiling), we have the crown moldings ready to be installed, and the carpet is being delivered tomorrow (and installed by our painter's friend once the crown molding is installed). We still need to choose and order shutters, and a new light fixture for the ceiling. We are doing a complete transformation of her room because of what poor condition the tenants that lived in our house before us kept that room. Their teenage son slept in there, and we found gum and wax all over the carpet (which is only about 5 years old, by the way), and since the house is OLD, it needed a good sprucing up as it is. We decided to do it up now while nobody is living in there since it would be easier now than having to move the baby out temporarily. Plus, we didn't have the finances to do more than throw a new coat of paint on Jeremiah's walls when we moved in here, so we decided to go all out this time =) Jeremiah is getting new shutters on his windows, too.

Speaking of my boy, one month from today he turns the big T-W-O! He had a lot of fun on Halloween, first at Sydney's first birthday party and then going trick or treating with Marissa and I. He loves wearing his costume, and kept wanting me to sing the "trick or treat" song from Little Einsteins over and over again. I love him =)

Louis goes to San Diego on Wednesday overnight, and most likely elsewhere for 3-4 nights next week. Yeah I'm not looking forward to that... Please keep me in your prayers that I don't wind up with the massive cold and sore throat that he has had since Friday! He's slowly getting better, and I've been doing everything possible to avoid getting his germs, but sleeping on the couch got really old (and uncomfortable) for me after one night. I'm crossing my fingers that the tickle I"m getting in my throat doesn't turn into anything. I hate being sick... especially when there is nothing I can take for it.

Our Little Yoda

2009-10-26T19:46:00.000-07:00

Today we took Jeremiah's Halloween portraits! These are the three decent ones out of nearly 40 minutes worth of effort on the part of our poor photographer. She assured me that two year olds are the ones that like having their portraits taken the least and are most likely to NOT stay put for the camera, so I felt a little better about things and didn't expect too much. I"m just glad we got something to commemorate his second Halloween =)

I survived Louis's absence last week rather well. Aside from having a major run-in with our now ex-painter, which resulted the moron yelling at the top of his lungs that I"m a crazy broad, among other things (completely uncalled for, by the way, and which he denied even happened when Louis called him immediately after to yell at him!) it was a rather quiet three days, and it got so much easier to be alone at night as each day passed. Louis is staying put this week, but is off again next week to San Diego for a few days. Oh, and the outside of our house looks FANTASTIC. I'm just thankful this major battle w/ the creep happened when he was coming to pick up his gear after the job was complete, and not while he was in the middle of the project.

That's about all for now... I'm falling asleep at the keyboard, but didn't want to forget to upload the pics. I promise a more decent update within the next day or two =)

He's Gone =(

2009-10-20T20:03:00.000-07:00

Last night Louis left for Sacramento. The original plan was for Jeremiah and I to go with him this week. However, while researching my airfare, I found that starting today, through the month of November, Southwest has a special fare of $44 each way to and from Sacramento. Much better than the $144 I was going to pay if I were to go yesterday... Louis was willing to pay it, though, until he found out that he will pretty much be in Sacramento nearly every week for the next month! Yeah I can wait a week to see Kappie =) He doesn't know his exact schedule as of yet, but it looks like our trip is coming up pretty soon!

I was really sad last night when Louis left. I think I've only been on my own at our house for 3 nights since we've been married (not counting my trip to Colorado, or a few other random nights here and there where I spent the night at my mom's house for one reason or another). I just love sleeping next to Louis at night, despite all the snoring, blanket fights we have, and stinky feet. I love waking up next to him in the morning and cudding close when it gets cold. Sleeping alone just feels wierd to me now after 3 years of marriage. Plus, I get creeped out at night... badly.... if he's not around. Even in college I hated being the only one home at night or overnight! However, last night I was pretty proud of myself. Once I realized I had to suck it up not just for my sake but Jeremiah's as well, and found some decent TV to watch, I was alright. I'm sure tonight's not going to be nearly as nervewracking as last night! However, I can't wait for Thursday night when my precious is home.

I"ve been keeping busy since Louis left. I think that is the key to not going nuts! Last night I took Jeremiah to the park on our way home from the airport. By the time we got home, it was time for dinner, bath and bed. This afternoon, I helped my mom at her shop, and then stayed for dinner. In between work and dinner, my dad and I went to take Jeremiah to get a haircut. He HATES haircuts, with a passion. The last time my dad took him, when Louis and I were away for our ann., the stylist had to cut his hair while he was hanging upside down from my dad's arms! Talented lady. Today was MUCH MUCH better... there was some fussing and crying, which was to be expected, but he stayed put REALLY well. All this is thanks to the TVs that are at every station in the kiddy salon by my mom's house, and they put on one of his favorite Sesame Street DVDs. It was worth paying the extra $7 to get his hair cut there vs. the barber Louis takes him to! Tomorrow after his Speech lesson, I am taking him to Disneyland for just a few hours- mostly to see the Pixar parade and take a picture with Mickey Mouse, to enclose in his birthday invitation. I can't believe his party is a month away!!! We're having it two weeks before his actual birthday to avoid the Thanksgiving rush.

Anyway, it's time for me to catch up with some TV and reading. Goodnight!

Oh Where Oh Where Has My Baby Gone?!

2009-10-13T11:17:00.000-07:00

Once again, I am absolutely marveled by how much Jeremiah is growing up by leaps and bounds. Just a month and a half away from his second birthday, he is definitely NOT a baby any longer! The 7 pound 12 oz baby that I gave birth to, and who could not get enough of me holding him and singing to him for hours on end is no more (minus the part about me wanting to sing to him. If I even start humming a tune, he will beg for more and more, especially if the song is a favorite of his!) Instead, this baby has been replaced by a 25 pounds (as of August- I think he's gone up a pound or two) boy who will not sit still, and whose cognitive abilities never cease to amaze me. For example...

*Just 20 minutes ago Jeremiah found his PJ bottoms and put one leg on all by himself, no help from me! I was so amazed, and gave him such huge praise that he kept taking his leg out and putting it back in for 10 more minutes, just wanting to hear me applaud him. WOW. He's not going to need my help getting dressed much longer...

*or with his shoes! He won't keep them on if he's in his car seat, and has come SO CLOSE to putting them on all by himself so many times.

*Speaking of clothing, he went through another growth spurt, and as of last week none of his pants fit him and most of his shirts didn't, either. He now wears 2T shirts and PJs, and size 24 month pants (rolled up just a smidge on the bottom so he doesn't trip). However, the pants NEED to be the kind with the adjustable waist; I think his true waist size is 12 months, but since he's on the taller side, of course those are high waters on him. I was tired of having to roll up the waist (since they don't have belts for 2 year olds) and even then his pants would fall down, so I splurged on some pants with the adjustable waist from the Children's Place (normally I'm a Target or JC Penny shopper) . Best investment EVER!! By the way, it seems every kid out there is wearing 2T right now- I had such a hard time finding shirts in his size! There were plenty of 3T but hardly ANY 2T shirts. Even the 24 month size (practically the same as 2T) were hard to come by.

*And his vocabulary! I honestly don't know if it's the one week of speech therapy that he has been through, or just the fact that he's almost 2 and everything is finally starting to "click," but this boy is now a chatter box! Whenever he wakes up now, he spends a good 20-30 min. just chatterng away in his crib, saying things like "I do," "I go," "I gotta go," and other garbled words/phrases that I"m starting to be able to decipher. He still spouts out random words once in a while but then I don't hear them for quite some time. I'll take what I can get!! I"m really hoping to cancel his speech therapies in six months or so. I like the program and am SO thankful for what God and our state have provided, but it's taking up SO much of our time. Four sessions of speech a week and one session of learning how to feed himself with utensils on his own. Lots and lots for one little boy to handle.

And since I"ve bragged about my son for quite a bit, it's time to mention my daughter =) Yesterday I had my big mid-pregnancy ultrasound, and my worries about a wee wee popping out were proven wrong- the three little girly lines showed up loud and clear. WOOHOO! Our princess was very active during her ultrasound; waving at us, kicking, wiggling her toes, sucking her thumb. I love her!! I am 22 weeks pregnant and am starting to get so impatient to finally meet her. We bought her crib bedding yesterday, since Baby Depot was having a 25 percent off sale. Louis and I wound up completely changing our nursery theme, and it is now a very girly looking jungle- girly monkeys, giraffes and elephants are on her bedding. The colors are purple, pink and brown, so Louis and I both got what we wanted =) I love it! We're going to have her room painted within the next week or two. The outside of our house is being finished TODAY (Thank God!) and as soon as the painter is finished painting our storage shed to match the house, we will put him to work on her room. Not sure of the color yet, considering we changed the bedding theme.

Tomorrow Louis starts traveling for his job =( Thankfully, he will only be gone one night this week, to San Diego. Next week he will be gone for 3 nights, but Jeremiah and I will be with him for two of those nights! He is going to Sacramento, where my wonderful friend (and old APU roommate) Kappie and her hubby and son live, so Jeremiah and I will be tagging along to hang out with them while he works. I haven't seen Kappie in over a year, so I can't wait! Again, I am amazed at what a seasoned traveler my son is; this will be his third plane trip. I told him we're going on an airplane and he got SO excited, thinking we were leaving that moment to go on one. I hope he understood me when I tried explaining "not now," but he kept looking around for the plane.

That's about all for now! Show my blog some love =)

More progress...with some changes!

2009-10-06T11:23:00.000-07:00

*Finish unpacking our boxes that are stored in Baby's room
*Purchase and assemble a storage shed for our back yard. Transfer all holiday decoration bins out there . We are in the process of buying a storage shed! Louis found a great one on Craigslist for dirt cheap... it should be here this weekend.
*Figure out how/where to store my boxes of scrapbook supplies.
*Go through Jeremiah's baby clothing bins. Sort clothing according to type and size. Separate what can be saved for Baby DONE.
*Have another yard sale. (or two or three). DONE. I had one on Saturday and that will be my LAST one, seeing as I donated the remaining products (an entire car full!) to Goodwill immediately following the yard sale.
*Move Jeremiah's changing table into Baby's room
*Shop for a twin sized bed for Jeremiah DONE! My parents gave us my brother's twin bed and a newer matress. The bed even has storage drawers underneath, sweet! It is disassembled at our house and will be put together in December (when he turns 2)
*Shop for a love seat or comfy couch for Jeremiah's room to replace the glider/rocker
*Move glider/rocker into Baby's room once couch has been purchased
*Move Jeremiah's crib into baby room once bed transition has been made
*Shop for a dresser for Baby's room DONE. We brought over my baby dresser from my mom and dad's house. It just needs a new coat of varnish and some new knobs and we're good to go!
*Shop for crib bedding for Baby (and sell Jeremiah's old bedding) I showed Louis the bedding that I wanted to buy for Baby... however he has differing opinons than me! Rather than lavendar bugs and butterflies he wants light pink and brown birds... or something like that. We're finalizing our choices this weekend. Will sell Jeremiah's bedding once we get his twin bed around his birthday
Shop for curtains or blinds for Baby's room
*Paint Baby's room. In the works- we're having the outside of our house painted this week, and the guy that's doing it is fantastic! His project for next week (or as soon as we get the storage shed in our yard and everything transferred from baby's room into the shed) will be to paint her room.
*Purchase a new Exersaucer; sell old one
*Purchase a play mat/ play gym Found a cute, rather inexpensive one that I will be registering for at Target
*Continue purchasing 1 box of diapers and 1 box of wipes per month I have bought one more of each- The grand total is 6 boxes of diapers in various sizes and 3 boxes of wipes (8 refills each)
*Make a final decision on if I"m going to register for my baby shower, (I am!) and create my registry (will do that closer to the shower. I think my shower is in January so I'll register around Christmas. There isn't a lot that will go on it- mostly bottles, onesies, bathing supplies, a swaddler blanket and of course diapers)
*Buy Baby her first doll. I want to be the first one to buy her a dolly =)
*Figure out financial responsibility for hospital stay not covered by insurance and set up monthly payments. Make it a goal to be payed in full come January 15th (one month before due date) I pre-registered at our hospital, and after they ran our insurance policy we found out that it is cheaper to do the cash payers route without running our insurance! I'm PISSED!! Why even have a policy?! We are making our first payment to the hospital on Friday, and we are slated to finish paying off our OB the beginning of January

Inquiring Minds Wanted To Know...

2009-10-02T20:44:00.000-07:00

I've had a couple people ask me to update on my pregnancy, so here's a general rundown!

*On Sunday I reached week 20, which is the halfway mark!

*My belly seems to have popped over the past three weeks or so. I still don't need maternity shirts, and my belly isn't huge (tall people hide babies very well!) but I think you can tell that I"m not just chubby and that there might be a baby in me at first glance. I am working on a belly pic for those interested. I didn't really take too many with Jeremiah

*Even though I'm halfway through my second trimester, I feel like I'm well into my third. The leg cramps appeared big time this week (especially at the Star Wars concert last night- being crammed into a tiny seat at the Honda Center wasn't fun!). Thank God the horrific Charley-Horse-like pains, lasting 30 sec-3 min at a time and causing me to cry every single time have not shown up (yet).

*However... the Braxton Hicks (practice) contractions have shown up WAY earlier than last time! I don't think I had them until around 7 months along w/ Jeremiah. They hit me this week (roughly 4 1/2 months along). Fortunately, all of the second time + mommies in the Feb. 2010 babies group that I"m part of on Cafe Mom are experiencing the same thing, and their OB's say it's perfectly normal. Even though they don't really hurt, they freaked the heck out of me when I started getting them this time... not just because of their early arrival but because the reality of this baby is becoming more and more clear. And the fact that I'm not at the beginning of my pregnancy anymore is becoming evident as well.

*Our princess has been kicking kicking kicking for around a month now. She kicks more frequently than Jeremiah (through most of the day vs. night only) but her kicks are very ladylike and gentle. By the way- she either loved or hated the concert last night, I couldn't tell. But whenever the music got to be especially blaring she would run a stampede in my tummy!

*I have my mid pregnancy ultrasound on Monday, October 12th. Even though we took that ultrasound at 15 weeks and were told it's a girl, I am still a (teeny) bit scared that I'm going to be told that she is really a he. Like having a girl is too good to be true. If she really is a boy I have a LOT of shopping to do because Jeremiah's baby wardrobe is practically gone.

Growing Up

2009-10-01T16:42:00.000-07:00

Okay, I know this picture is over four months old (taken at my brother's wedding!) but it is honestly the newest picture of Jeremiah and I that I have on my computer. It has been quite a while since I have uploaded pics onto a computer, since the one we have is Louis's work computer. (As for that free laptop I was waiting for?! It turns out that if you are even late on your payment ONE time, Verizon excludes you from the free laptop offer. We were one day late, one time. Boo...) The little boy that you see in this picture is so much more grown up now, in both mannerisms and physique, but because my blog has been lacking pictures lately, and this one is my new favorite of us, I decided to go ahead and post it anyway =)

Anyway, I just had to take a few moments and brag about my precious little boy. The fact that his second birthday is two months from tomorrow scares me quite a bit. He is no longer a baby- and he spends quite a bit of time kissing his baby sister and patting my tummy! All of this being done on his own accord and not prodded by me. Because, trust me, if you ask him for affection he will usually not give it to you. Every hug and kiss I get from him is given on his own terms- and greatly appreciated! Lately I have been getting showered with hugs and kisses, so I"m a happy camper =) He is more than happy to let YOU give him hugs and kisses; but when it is time for him to reciprocate, you're better off waiting for him to come to you =)

The past week or so I have noticed so many signs of "growing up" with Jeremiah. His intelligence never ceases to amaze me. Just yesterday at Disneyland, for example, he was sitting in a high chair eating his cheese. He would take a napkin after almost every bite and wipe his mouth! Something he has never done before. Normally I have to fight him at the end of a meal when I wipe his mouth off. He is also starting to spout out words at random moments- yesterday I was taking a picture of him, counting down "one, two..." and all of a sudden I heard him say "fwee!" (For those that don't speak Toddler that means three). Then this morning, we were playing with the remote for our DVD player. He handed it over to me, and I swear I heard him say (a rather garbled) "Here you go!" The inflection in his voice was mimicking mine and everything. Whenever he spouts out a new word I am always amazed... especially since a lot of these words don't stick around for long. Just the plain and simple fact that he is expanding his vocabulary is good enough for me. He starts his speech therapy program next week, and I'm crossing my fingers that within six months he won't need it anymore. Although I am truly thankful for all of these free intervention programs our state has to offer! Every little bit helps.

Today is the first day of October. I love the fall season. My house is halfway decorated, and surprisingly, Jeremiah is being rather respectful of the decorations. Louis would prefer if they didn't come out at all (men....) but of course I won that one =) By the way... have I mentioned how much I love my husband lately?! I'm so sad that starting this month he will be traveling for work roughly twice a month for 2-3 days at a time. I hate being home overnight without him. I miss him terribly... and I get freaked out. And with two sets of our neighbors moving this weekend, two sets that we actually know and talk to regularly, I'm going to be even more uneasy being home by myself. Especially when the time comes for me to be home alone at night with an infant, doing the multiple feedings a night and then having to wake up early and take care of a toddler on practically no sleep. But God is in control and I am truly thankful that my husband has this wonderful job!!

That's about all I have time for right now. Louis and I are going to the Star Wars in Concert show tonight, hosted by the guy that played C3PO. Not my choice for a date... but Louis has barely been able to sleep since we bought the tickets a month ago. At least it's a night out on our own, and Jer is with Grandma and Grandpa tonight!

2009-09-21T11:59:00.000-07:00

Well, the inevitable happened- poor Jeremiah caught my cold =( So far it isn't as bad as when I had it. Right now he just has a runny nose and a little chest congestion (from what I can hear). I pray that it turns into nothing more! He's a little more lethargic than usual but is still in very upbeat spirits, running around as much as he can.

He needs to get well because we have lots of fun activities at the end of the week! On Thursday we have a playdate at Disneyland with my friend Rosanna and her 8 month old son, Anakin. I haven't seen either one of them since I visited them in the hospital when Anakin was born, so I definitely don't want to miss out on this. Then on Saturday, we are attending a birthday party at Chuck E. Cheese for my friend Michelle's son's 2nd birthday. Another thing I don't want to miss out on... but of course my son and his health come before any of this stuff. I was hoping to take Jeremiah to the L.A. County Fair this Wednesday as well, but will most likely push that back til next week.

My parents leave tomorrow morning for their last convention of the year, to Portland. Which means we get stuck watching their dog, Candy. Again. I LOVE my dog to pieces, don't get me wrong. But this will be her 4th visit for 1 week+ at a time since June. It's a bit much having to care for an active toddler AND a dog. Making sure she's locked in our room every morning so she won't wake Jeremiah up with her claws on our wood floor... letting her in and out and in and out again... keeping her from bolting out the door every time I need to go somewhere. They will be back in one week.

Yesterday I pre-registered at the hospital! It feels so good to have that checked off of my list. We will get a packet in the mail within the next month outlining our financial obligation after insurance, and I'm hoping it's not too bad. Although with only 80 percent coverage, it's bound to be a chunk of money...

No witty title comes to mind!

2009-09-16T17:50:00.000-07:00

Remember the list of 101 goals to complete in 1001 days that I made, which included bi-weekly blogging? Yeah, that so has not been happening. I apologize. Again. Because it always seems like I am apologizing for an empty blog. Yet... there is life outside of blogging and the internet! And I am still without access to a computer with sufficient time to blog for most of the day... Verizon is taking their sweet time shipping me my free laptop. It's free... so I guess they take FOREVER...

I have decided that mommies need to have sick days built into their schedule. Not only for our comfort and relaxation, but to prevent our little ones from getting sick as well! The sore throat and stuffy nose I have right now is bugging me to no end... but it doesn't bug me half as much as my fear of Jeremiah (or Louis) catching it from me. Do you know how hard it is for me to remember to only kiss the back of his head rather than his sweet, kissable cheekies?! My mom is such an angel and has, once again, come to my rescue. I'm not feeling SO sick that I'm bedridden, but I have no energy to run around and chase after Jeremiah. So she took Jeremiah around 3:00 this afternoon so I could relax at her shop, chill on the internet and answer the phone. She will bring him back here, fed and dressed in his pj's, at 7:00 tonight. Her shop normally closes at 5:00, but on Wednesday nights a class is taught from 6-8:00. I love my mother!

Yesterday my brother celebrated his 25th birthday and my parents their 30th wedding anniversary. Yes, my brother was an anniversary present to them! Had he been born just a few minutes later, he would have had his own day. Growing up, he would taunt me all the time, saying that September 15th was THEIR day and not mine, trying to make me feel left out, little bugger that he was. It got to me (sometimes!!) but now that I"m older and married I can fully appreciate having my own birthday and own anniversary. My parents have always been such troopers and celebrated their anniversary by themselves on a different date so that my brother's birthday could always be special to him. We're taking them out to dinner at this fancy steak/seafood restraunt, Le Cave, in Huntington Beach on Saturday. Lobster... yumm....

Anyway, even though I have been slacking on the blogging, I have been quite productive in other areas! Remember the list of things I made to do before my third trimester a week or so ago? Well, I have made some progress! Here's the list w/ updated notes (tasks completed or in progress are in red):
*Finish unpacking our boxes that are stored in Baby's room
*Purchase and assemble a storage shed for our back yard. Transfer all holiday decoration bins out there After pricing them and realizing they're roughly $800, we decided to put that project on hold until after we buy our new car (shooting to be able to pay cash for a newer used Lincoln truck (can't remember the model name- hubby's in charge of it) by end of October! Our days of having one car are numbered, finally. We're going to move the holiday bins from baby's room to somewhere in our tiny one car garage.

*Figure out how/where to store my boxes of scrapbook supplies.
*Go through Jeremiah's baby clothing bins. Sort clothing according to type and size. Separate what can be saved for Baby DONE. I even sent a box of some of the clothes up to Kappie's house for her new little boy, and the rest will be given to friends or sold in a yard sale
*Have another yard sale. (or two or three). I have one scheduled for this Saturday, providing the cold I have right now goes away in time
Move Jeremiah's changing table into Baby's room
*Shop for a twin sized bed for Jeremiah (Closer to birthday- Dec. 2).
*Shop for a love seat or comfy couch for Jeremiah's room to replace the glider/rocker
*Move glider/rocker into Baby's room once couch has been purchased
*Move Jeremiah's crib into baby room once bed transition has been made
*Shop for a dresser for Baby's room*
Shop for crib bedding for Baby (and sell Jeremiah's old bedding) I found the bedding that I want to purchase at Target! It's lavendar with a flower and bug pattern. My brother is going to pick it up for me w/ his handy 10 percent discount- I still need to buy a dust ruffle and changing table pad cover, though. Will sell Jeremiah's bedding once we get his twin bed around his birthday
Shop for curtains or blinds for Baby's room
*Paint Baby's room.
*Purchase a new Exersaucer; sell old one
*Purchase a play mat/ play gym (we actually never had one for Jeremiah!)
*Continue purchasing 1 box of diapers and 1 box of wipes per month I purchased another box on Monday! The grand total is 5 boxes of diapers in various sizes and 2 boxes of wipes (8 refills each)
*Make a final decision on if I"m going to register for my baby shower, (I am!) and create my registry (will do that closer to the shower. I think my shower is in January so I'll register around Christmas. There isn't a lot that will go on it- mostly bottles, onesies, bathing supplies, a swaddler blanket and of course diapers)
*Buy Baby her first doll. I want to be the first one to buy her a dolly =)
*Figure out financial responsibility for hospital stay not covered by insurance and set up monthly payments. Make it a goal to be payed in full come January 15th (one month before due date) In progress- found out from hospital that I need to pre-register w/ them before I start making payments, and I will need some packet from my OB before I pre-register. I will pick that up at my appointment on Friday. We are slated to finish paying off our OB the beginning of January

Home Sweet Home!

2009-09-13T13:05:00.000-07:00

Jeremiah and I got back from our brief 3 night trip to Colorado last night. I survived my first time taking Jeremiah on a plane ride without my husband. God was good to me! I didn't want to risk him not having his own seat without anybody there to help me since he is SUCH a wiggle worm, so I bought him his own seat going to Colorado. Even though there wound up being plenty of seats left on the plane, that peace of mind that I was not going to have to leave his car seat at the gate made it worth every penny. I didn't buy him a ticket going home since Marissa was flying back with us, but it turned out I was able to bring the car seat on anyway. This especially was a blessing because, after an hour drive to the airport plus two hours inside the huge Denver airport, going through security and eating lunch, he only had roughly 10 min. to run around before we boarded our flight. He was not a happy camper and I constantly had to be on my toes, entertaining him with song after song (including a 10 min. rendition of "Old McDonald" using every animal my poor, tired brain could think up!)

We arrived in Denver around 3:30 on Wed. afternoon, and by the time Marissa got through customs (flying in from Germany), the drive from Denver to Loveland and a quick stop at Target, we got to Shiloh's house around 6:30ish. I haven't been back to Colorado since Shiloh's wedding 3 years ago, and it was my first time seeing their home, and I haven't seen Shiloh since she came for a brief weekend May of last year. We had such a great time! Jeremiah did absolutely wonderfully. On Thursday we had a picnic lunch at Lake Loveland by Shiloh's house. Jeremiah had a blast splashing in the water and getting filthy in the sand. That night we went to dinner w/ Shiloh's husband, and after we went home and put Jeremiah to bed us girls went out! We went to this fun Mexican restraunt in Ft. Collins where I had the BEST virgin mango margarita I have ever tasted. On Friday we drove up into the Rockies to this cute little town called Estes park. It was sooo beautiful up there! I'll have to wait until I get pictures from Marissa to post them on here. We had lunch, walked around the shops, ate ice cream and went wine tasting! (Well, Shiloh and Marissa did. I got some free tastes of cider). The winery had this great play room for kiddos, and Jeremiah had a blast goofing off in there. We didn't have to leave for the airport until 2:00 yesterday, so after we put Jeremiah down for his nap (with Shy's husband staying at the house with him) Marissa, Shiloh and I headed out to Old Navy, where Shiloh must have purchased at least half of the summer clearance rack for our little princess. Our girly is certainly blessed. (and she's been KICKING me for the past week!!) Then we went to get some coffee and watched "Friends" before heading to the airport.

Our trip was very short but very good for the soul. Jeremiah has certainly become well traveled in his short 21 months of life and gets excited when we go on airplanes (until he wants loose). And I love hanging out with my girlfriends! Good friends are hard to come by, and I know the friendships I fostered during my 4 years at APU with my roomates are going to last a life time =)

Today

2009-09-04T22:36:00.000-07:00

It just dawned on me that today would have been my due date had my prior pregnancy gone to term. I thought that when this day came I would be completely depressed... yet I am at a sense of peace with everything. And I have a full and happy heart- I have a loving husband who provides for me endlessly in all ways possible, the cutest 21 month old son who charms me to no end and is filled with more love than I can imagine, and a precious daughter on the way.

I am blessed.

Much to Do!

2009-08-28T12:08:00.000-07:00

Now that I"m officially in my second trimester and know the gender of my baby (I still can't believe it's a girl!!) I'm starting to think of the many, many things that need to get done before February 15th (and preferably before my third trimester begins in November!) Making check lists always helps me to get more motivated to accomplish a huge list of tasks, so I"m going to post my list here as an inspiration to get my rear in gear =)

Here's what I need to get done that's at the top of my head:
*Finish unpacking our boxes that are stored in Baby's room (Yes, 1 1/2 years later we are still not unpacked!). Figure out what we are keeping and get rid of the rest!
*Purchase and assemble a storage shed for our back yard. Transfer all holiday decoration bins out there
*Figure out how/where to store my boxes of scrapbook supplies.
*Go through Jeremiah's baby clothing bins. Sort clothing according to type and size. Separate what can be saved for Baby (lots of gender neutral 0-3 month clothing!)
*Have another yard sale. (or two or three). Donate to Good Will what won't sell.
*Move Jeremiah's changing table into Baby's room
*Shop for a twin sized bed for Jeremiah (Closer to birthday- Dec. 2).
*Shop for a love seat or comfy couch for Jeremiah's room to replace the glider/rocker
*Move glider/rocker into Baby's room once couch has been purchased
*Move Jeremiah's crib into baby room once bed transition has been made
*Shop for a dresser for Baby's room
*Shop for crib bedding for Baby (and sell Jeremiah's old bedding)
*Shop for curtains or blinds for Baby's room
*Paint Baby's room. I know we recently painted it white, but I am leaning more towards light yellow. Something to enhance the walls!
*Purchase a new Exersaucer; sell old one
*Purchase a play mat/ play gym (we actually never had one for Jeremiah!)
*Continue purchasing 1 box of diapers and 1 box of wipes per month
*Make a final decision on if I"m going to register for my baby shower, and create my registry
*Buy Baby her first doll. I want to be the first one to buy her a dolly =)
*Figure out financial responsibility for hospital stay not covered by insurance and set up monthly payments. Make it a goal to be payed in full come January 15th (one month before due date)

That's about all that I can think of for right now. I know there is a lot more and I will be adding to my list as things come to mind!

Sugar and Spice and Everything Nice!

2009-08-27T11:40:00.000-07:00

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That's right, we're having a little GIRL!!! Louis and I went for a 3D ultrasound yesterday because we just couldn't take the wait any longer, and much to our surprise we found out that we are adding a little princess into our family! Louis and I both had a hunch that we were having another boy, and I was mentally preparing myself for that announcement all day long. Well, our modest lil lady decided to keep her legs crossed for most of the ultrasound, so I didn't even think we were going to find out the gender that day after all. The ultrasound technician had me to empty my bladder a bit to see if that would help the baby change position, and I was praying the entire time not only for the baby to uncross its legs but for it to be a girl. Sure enough, less than 5 minutes later we got confirmation that indeed we were having a girl! I started to cry (and I think Louis did, too- he was sitting on a couch watching the ultrasound on a projector while I was on the examination table watching from the monitor. I'm so excited!! I already went to Wal-mart this morning and bought a few of those cute outfits I saw last week, and I plan on doing a lot more shopping tomorrow =) We're not going to disclose our name choices just in case they change at the last minute like they did with Jeremiah. I can't believe I'm getting my girl!! Hurry up, February!!

No More Patience

2009-08-24T21:25:00.000-07:00

The day after I found out I was pregnant with Jeremiah, we made the decision not to find out his gender during our pregnancy. I left the decision up to Louis, and was completely, 100 percent okay with it. Yes I was curious about his gender, but there was no moment that I can remember where I regretted the decision or became excruciatingly impatient for him to be born simply so we could see what we were having. (Our family and friends were another story- I think the waiting was harder on them!) Deep down in my gut I knew he was a boy, anyway, so it was absolutely no surprise to me when he was born, I asked the doctor what he was (because I was concentrating so hard on pushing that I didn't hear the announcement!) and was told "It's a boy!".

We were debating on whether or not to find out the gender this time around, because it was fun having the mystery throughout the pregnancy, but pretty much decided that the suspense is only fun one time around. I was excited at the prospect of finding out the gender of this baby, and pretty much figured that a 16-20 week wait would fly compared to the 41 1/2 week wait I had to find out Jeremiah's gender. Oh was I wrong!

I got myself all geared up earlier this month for finding out the gender on August 31st. This month has dragged by. And now that August 31st is just 5 days away, and I cancelled that appointment at the suggestion of my nurse practitioner, I"m kicking myself. Several times a day. I even went so far as to call up the office yesterday to see if I could reschedule, but all the ultrasounds in our office our booked through September 14th, which is roughly 2 weeks before when my 20 week ultrasound will be. I'm going nuts. I NEED to find out what I'm having right now!! Maybe I"m just going crazy since my cousin Tiffany finds out what she's having on Friday. Maybe it's because I saw the cutest little girl clothes at Wal-Mart last week and I"m dying to buy something personal for my baby (okay, preferably something pink and frilly versus blue and sporty!) . I thought I was okay with the possibility of this baby, our second and last child being a boy, but I was wrong. I want a little girl SO badly. Someone to bake cookies with. Someone to buy dresses for, play dolls with, and curl her hair. Someone to watch all of my favorite Disney movies with (because, face it, Jeremiah probably won't be into The Little Mermaid and Cinderella). I know deep down that if this baby is truly a boy that I will love him and I won't care one way or another, but since I don't know what I'm having yet, I can still hold out hope that I'll get my little girl- and if it's a boy, well I'm going to do everything in my power to convince Louis in 2 or 3 years to give it one last shot! (No matter what I want to be done after 3 kids).

I think tomorrow I"m going to be scheduling a 3d ultrasound somewhere......

2009-08-20T20:34:00.000-07:00

I'm really going to make a conscious effort to blog more than once a week (or less)! So here we go, a rare-for-me-lately Thursday night post =)

It looks like I"m not going to be finding out the gender of my baby on the 31st after all. The nurse practitioner that I"ve been seeing (she sees pregnancy patients until the last trimester) has no clue why the nurses at the front desk would schedule a gender peek ultrasound as early as 16 weeks, so she suggested I cancel it. And, because my friend Nicole's baby didn't cooperate for her last month at 16 weeks, I took her advice. The way things are looking right now, we're going to be waiting until the end of September for my 20 week ultrasound (although Louis was making noise about wanting to splurge on a 3D/4D ultrasound this time around, so possibly earlier!) To say that I'm bummed is a huge understatement. Marissa and Shiloh were really hoping I would know the gender before my trip to Colorado (September 9th!) so that we could go shopping while we're there, but that's going to have to wait. On the bright side, I got to hear the heartbeat on Monday! A perfect 153 beats per minute.

Yesterday afternoon my friend Melissa and I took Jeremiah to Disneyland! The last time I went was 3 months ago before the summer rush began. It's the last week of the night shows and I really wanted Jer to see the Electrical Parade. We arrived around 3:00 pm, had lunch and went on 3 rides- Pirates of the Carribean, Winnie the Pooh, and It's a Small World. Jeremiah went absolutely bonkers when we approached Small World; it's a favorite of his! I hope he enjoyed the parade; he fell asleep for about half an hour before it began and woke up shortly before it started.. He sat in my lap and just looked at everything wide-eyed. I certainly had fun =) And I can't wait to go back again next month when everyone's back in school!

Loving Summer

2009-08-15T19:57:00.001-07:00

This pic was taken on Thursday after my cousin Rebecca (left- she was the photographer), Jeremiah and I spent an hour or so swimming in my grandma's pool. Have I mentioned how much Jeremiah loves swimming?! He gets so excited every time we even walk by a pool. Put on his floaties and he's good to go, only staying on the steps for a moment or two before flinging himself into the shallow end. He is quite skilled at maneuvering himself around the shallow end on his own and has absolutely NO fear. He's already getting good at moving his arms and kicking his legs. I'm kicking myself for not signing up for mommy and me swimming lessons this summer- definitely next summer. Perhaps I'll be heading to the Summer Olympics in 18 or 20 years as a proud mother of an Olympic Champion? Watch out, Michael Phelps, Jeremiah Castillo is a champion in the making!

One of our home improvement projects this summer was having a sprinkler system installed in our front yard (our lawn is enormous and Louis was getting tired of spending 2 hours watering it with his hose). Our neighbor/gardener installed it last week and today I thought it would be fun if Jeremiah and I played in the water while the sprinklers were going. After the initial shock that water was coming out of them and knocking him down on the grass, Jeremiah had a ball. He loves getting wet and my little investigator had such fun figuring out exactly how the rainbird sprinklers worked, and playing with the mister sprinklers that were installed by the small patches of grass on the other side of our sidewalk. I wish my camera was working so I could have snapped some pics of him- he was holding onto this huge stick the whole time, and it reminded me of Moses with his staff, before parting the Red Sea. So cute! (Note to self: invest in a new digital camera before going to Colorado in 3 1/2 weeks). We played outside for an hour, gettig wet and eventually splashing in the puddles on the sidewalk and squishing our fingers in the mud. I really wish we had the sprinklers installed at the beginning of the summer rather than towards the end so we could have been doing this more often.

Jeremiah had his first checkup of the year on Thursday. I know, I was sitting on finding him a new pediatrician once we got our new insurance. I was getting so frustrated calling up new pediatricians only to find that as a new patient, we would have a 1 1/2-3 month wait before being able to get an appointment. A nurse at my OB's office reccomended one to me and we were able to get an appointment within 2 weeks. I LOVE our new pediatrician, she's so nice, so wise and has Jeremiah's best interest at heart. And she also understood completely when he flipped out as soon as we entered the examination room- my boy has good memory and HATES going to the doctor! He's the perfect height and weight (25 pounds, 32 inches). Dr. Ali recommended that he begin speech therapy because, at 20 1/2 months, he's saying less than 5 words, and mostly just says "mama," "dadda", and "go." Every once in a while he'll say another word, such as "amma" (grandma) or "abba" (grandpa) but he only says them once in a blue moon and then forgets about the word for quite some time, or never repeats it again. She knows that some k ids blossom at 2 years old, but there is a free program that gives children less than 3 years of age free speech therapy up until their third birthday,a nd she'd rather start it now than wait til his 2nd birthday in order to make the most of it, just in case. I'm hoping the Regional Center is able to fit him in fairly soon because I"m anxious for all the help we can get getting him to talk!

... and eat normally. She also is referring us to a nutritionist that will hopefully get him to eat something other than bread and cereal products, cheese and bread. My boy can't live on carbs alone... and he also can't push away new foods forever! One glance at something "different" and he throws a fit and pushes it away. Although Louis said he did eat a bite of bacon today at Ihop...

That's about all for now.! thanks for reading!

I'm back!!

2009-08-08T12:05:00.001-07:00

I honestly have NO clue where the past few weeks have gone. It seems like this summer is just flying by... is the first week of August already over?!

Anyway, things have been super busy over here at the Castillo household, which partly explains my absence from blogging. Louis and I went away last weekend to Coronado just for one night rather than 3 nights, but we still had a blast =) In a nutshell, here's what we did:
*Stopped at the Carlsbad outlets on the way down... Louis surprised me with a new Guess purse and wallet
*Our room at the Best Western was complimentary upgraded to a suite rather than a standard room because there were only really bad-smelling smoking rooms left- we jumped at the offer to have our room upgraded, even though we had no use for the extra bed or kitchen =)
*Sat. afternoon was spent hanging out at the harbor beach and marina area. We saw several weddings and quincaneras (Mexican Sweet 15 parties). I wasn't feeling well at ALL that afternoon; the long drive down wore me out and gave me bad leg cramps, even though we stopped twice- to eat and shop.
*Evening: I was still feeling like crap but we wanted to go out and have a nice dinner. We went by the Hotel Del Coronado, this extremely fancy resort that we wanted to stay at (until we found out it was roughly $500 a night for a standard room). We couldn't find anything there that we wanted to eat.... but we did meet a celebrity! We met Ben Weber, who plays Molly Ringwald's fiance on the "Secret life of the American Teenager" (which we watch eagerly every week). He has a very small part; only on air for maybe 5 minutes per episode, tops, but it was still fun to meet someone famous! He was playing with his kid by the pool when we spotted him and went to go talk to him. I think he was in shock that someone actually recognized him, since he usually plays small parts in shows, and that people our age are huge Secret Life fans. We ended up dining at a fancy little Italian restraunt down the street, but absolutely NOTHING there appealed to me. Louis even sent my meal back and ordered me something else when I thought I was going to be sick... darn pregnancy... but they didn't charge us for the sent back meal, and gave me unlimited virgin Mojitos to drink =)
*Sunday: Slept in, then went Kayaking after checking out of our hotel. We will N.E.V.E.R be doing this again. It's exhausting. And not much fun. But it was an adventure. Then we went to Old Town San Diego, had lunch, walked around and went home!!

I'm starting to feel better as my first trimester is winding down. I'll be 13 weeks pregnant on Monday! I'm feeling the baby flutter around a lot lately,a nd I cant' wait for those first kicks to come. Or for my "find out the gender" ultrasound on August 31st!! My doctor seems to think that I'll be able to tell at 16 weeks what I'm having. Personally it seems a bit early to me, but I'm eager to find out what we're having,a nd if nothing else, we'll get a clearer picture in four more weeks after that for my 20 week ultrasound. I can't wait, I can't wait. I'm beginning to feel that I'm having another boy... and honestly, I don't mind one bit. I thought I would be so sad if I found out that we're having 2 boys and that's it, no daughter- but I swear, last weekend I saw SO many families of all boys. It's like God was trying to tell me something. The brothers seemed so happy playing with one another, like true pals- not like myb rother and I. Yes we played together but it was definitely not the same thing as what I saw between the brothers. And the mothers seemed to love having their boys. So, either way I know I'll be happy. I've already bought 2 huge boxes of diapers and wipes, a fun musical rattle (that Jeremiah is obsessed with), and a new pump- the top of the line Medela one, Pump in Style. I decided to invest in something more sturdy and stronger than the dinky one I had before, which ended up dying right around the time I had to stop nursing (3 months, so sad).

Tonight we are hosting a UFC fight night party at our house. I hate UFC. And boxing. And wrestling. But I love hosting get togethers. Unfortunatley, just about everyone in attendance are Louis's pals, employees and customers. His auntie Sabrina (who is my age) is coming with Louis's uncle Emmett (also our age) but she's really into the whole UFC thing so I know we wont' be just hanging out and chatting. I'll be doing the whole Suzie Homemaker thing, refilling drinks, serving appetizers and my taco soup that Louis promised our guests.

Some quick updates

2009-07-25T20:33:00.000-07:00

*I saw our little peanut on Monday as well as his or her strong and steady heartbeat. This baby is beginning to feel more real to me now!

*...especially because I felt him or her move (flutter) today! I thought I felt it all week but attributed it to tummy rumblings. This time I definitely could tell the difference =)

*Our anniversary was amazing. I love my husband. And the giant lobster tail and creme brulle that I enjoyed during our delicious dinner. Unlike my pregnancy with Jeremiah, I limited myself to one creme brulle and not 5 at once during our Vegas anniversary trip.

*We leave Thursday night for Coronado island. 3 nights of child-less sleep, tanning at the beach, swimming, biking, great food and hopefully Sea World!

*Yesterday Jeremiah and I went to Newport Beach to spend the day with my AZ cousins, Uncle Bob and Aunt Madeline, and my grandma. My uncle rented a boat for a few hours so we cruised around the harbor, then played at the beach, hung out at their hotel and had dinner. I love my family. And Newport. My GPS... not so much anymore. It took me this complete roundabout way that ended with me having to take my car acrosst he Balboa Island Ferry. Didn't see that one coming... what should have been a 45 minute trip took us 2 hours as a result. Only 3 cars can go across the ferry at once. It was a huge line. I couldn't believe my ears when the words "take the Balboa Island Ferry" came up towards the end of our trip. I wanted to chuck it in the water, and by then it was too late for us to turn around and take a detour. We were stuck.

*Jeremiah, Marissa and I are going to Colorado the beginning of September to visit Shiloh and her husband Ryan. I can't wait! 3 of the 4 roommates reunited again.... and the week that we are going is the week that Kappie's baby is due. So she will be stuck in Sacramento, but we're hoping that the 3 of us will be together when we get "the call" that Baby Keates has made his or her appearance! My flight leaves Wed. September 8th and we come back that Saturday. I will be flying alone w/ Jeremiah since Marissa is coming to Colorado via Germany, where she will have spent a few weeks visiting with her parents, sister and aunts.

Yard Sale!!

2009-07-18T09:00:00.000-07:00

It's been 3 years (on Wednesday!) since I've been married and moved out of my parent's house. My parents were very gracious to let me keep a ton of my stuff from childhood and college in my old room and their garage while we lived in our tiny one bedroom apartment- but now that I'm in my house (for a year and a half now!) my crap has gotten the eviction notice. So.... I'm camped out on our front lawn right now, praying it doesn't get too hot, and trying to get rid of a lot of my stuff! Yard sales are a BIG thing in Whittier, and we live on a great street for having one. I've been out here an hour and have already made around $20. I'm planning on staying out until 2:00 or until the heat becomes unbearable. Louis is inside with Jeremiah.

Rather than exchanging presents for our anniversary, Louis and I decided to invest in a Nintendo Wii and a new TV! We found both on Craigslist for REDICULOUSLY (and I mean rediculously) low prices. Plus, Louis found somebody that knows how to hook up the Wiis with tons of Wii games in addition to our childhood favorites- Super Nintendo and Sega Genesis! I got my Mario Brother's back!! I LOVE IT. I completely suck at the Wii games right now, coming in DEAD last on Mario Kart every single time I played Louis last night, but I'm hoping to do better as time goes on =) I want to save up and get a Wii Fit to help keep off the flab during my pregnancy and after. I predict that I have a week at most left in most of my favorite pants and shorts. Louis and I went clothes shopping on Sunday and I left the mall in tears, nothing fitting right or looking decent on me. I also knew that whatever I bought would only fit for a short period of time so I felt wasteful spending $$ on clothes. However, I'm not far enough along for maternity clothes right now. It's so frustrating. Your belly is not as cute with the second (third?) pregnancy as it was the first- your belly isn't tight any more. Sure it's growing bigger but there's a layer of flab underneath that baby belly. And yes I'm starting to get a belly. A small one but a belly none the less.

We decided to push back our weekend away an extra week so we will be able to save a bit more cash to spend. We like going on vacation with a set amount of cash and once it's gone- well it's gone! Plastic does NOT come with us when we travel except for hotels that require a credit card rather than cash. We are going to a very nice restraunt on the night of our anniversary but the rest of the festivities in Coronado will wait an extra week. Fine by me! My parents have already agreed to watch Jeremiah since they will be back from Houston by then- but leaving for Ohio a few days afterwards. Summer is SO busy for them, with an out of state convention every month in months June-Sept.

Well our sale is picking up again so I best be going =)

With Apologies

2009-07-14T12:14:00.000-07:00

Before I lose whatever audience I have here on my blog, I'd like to apologize for once again slacking off in the blogging department. I don't want to use my pregnancy as an excuse but honestly come the end of the day when I am able to blog I am ready to crash. And, during Jeremiah's naptime I have to go into our garage to use the internet, and most of the time Louis is working in there, so I either can't be clacking away on the keyboard or simply don't have access to one, since sometimes he uses both of his computers at once. However, I"m guessing things will change when my new laptop comes in the mail soon =) Verizon FIOS was having some sort of special for their customers where they will mail you a free laptop if you pay for shipping, and Louis surprised me by ordering it for me. I can't wait =)

Next week is a big week for us- On Monday I have the remainder of my first prenatal appointment, now that I have my pregnancy confirmation from my blood test, plus my very first Ultrasound! I didn't get an ultrasound until around 20 weeks along with Jeremiah, so I can't wait to see what our little peanut looks like- and make sure that there's only one in there! And next Wednesday is our 3 year wedding anniversary. We are planning on going to Coronado Island in San Diego Thursday night after work for the weekend, but Louis has yet to ask his mom if she could babysit- so you never know what could happen. My parents are leaving on Saturday for yet another convention,t his time to Houston, so I can't count on them. Truth be told I"m sad about leaving Jeremiah again for a weekend, but it would really defeat the purpose of a romantic getaway to celebrate the two of us if he were to come along.

That's about all I have time for at the moment- I'll try to post some pics from our Saturday in Hollywood later tonight!

February 15, 2010

2009-07-02T21:01:00.000-07:00

That is my baby's due date! I'm secretly hoping for a Valentines Baby- we already have a Halloween baby in the family (Sydney was born on Halloween last year). I also want the baby to be early rather than 10 days late like his or her big brother Jeremiah- first of all, the waiting SUCKED- big time. Second of all, my parents are scheduled to be in Vegas less than a week after my due date for a major convention for their business. Not only do I want them present (well, in the waiting room or taking care of Jeremiah at our house, but none the less in the same city as we are) for the birth of their second grandchild, we were also counting on them to take care of Jeremiah during our hospital stay and for the first day or two at home with the baby. Recovery from Jeremiah sucked soooo bad. Worse than any part of my labor (no pain during the delivery thanks to my best friend Epidural!) I remember wondering where all the pain came from, going into the delivery naiively thinking that the only painful part was the labor and delivery, and if you were sore afterward, it lasted a day or two, tops- not a full two and a half weeks.

Anyway, today I had my first appointment. It was pretty standard and quick- just the initial female exam, and a blood test to verify the pregnancy. Once the lab sends back confirmation that I am pregnant, I will be going back (July 20th) for an ultrasound and the rest of my initial appointment- glucose test, lots of blood work, medical history. Oh, and I absolutely LOVE my new doctor's office. It is sooooo much nicer having insurance, getting to go to a nice office that specializes in pregnancy versus a crowded clinic that sees everyone for all sorts of ailments. Here's a few of the reasons why:
1) Wait time. With Jeremiah, it didn't matter what time my appointment was, I always had a minimum of an hour wait past my scheduled appointment time- or longer! For my first appointment I had to wait 6- yes S-I-X hours. And once I got into my room after blood/urine work was done and weight/temperature was taken, I had another half an hour to go before the doctor showed up. Today I waited at most 20 minutes , and was seen right away when I got into my room.

2) The waiting room itself was small, intimate, with nice music playing and MAGAZINES. In the clinic, there were rows and rows of chairs but still not enough for everybody to sit. Sick people were all around, couging up a lung. It was noisy, chaotic, and there were maybe two magazines available. There was a tiny tv tuned into either a Spanish station or the news, but good luck trying to hear it. This office has a policy where if you bring your kids, you have to wait outside for your turn so that they don't spread their germs to the mommies to be. Thank goodness, no foreign runny noses and screams! Because 80 percent of the moms in the waiting room at the clinic made no effort to control their children.

3) The overall visit itself- I did not feel rushed at all vs at the clinic- and the nurse practitioner was SO friendly- and gentle. I didn't even realize she had completed the procedure, it was over so fast. Let me tell you- it's a lot nicer having a pap done by a middle aged female than an 85 year old cranky man!!! Plus it was so nice not having to worry about how much everything was costing. I can handle a $10 co-pay vs. the insane amounts we were paying with Jer!

In all, I'm thrilled to be where I'm at. And thrilled to be pregnant =)

Tomorrow Marissa and I are taking Jeremiah to the beach! Have a great 4th of July weekend!

Hello Morning Sickness

2009-06-30T16:31:00.001-07:00

Sometimes I wonder how much empathy I would have for my husband if men were able to have babies and our roles were reversed. I am not one that handles other peoples illnesses very well (with the exception of Jeremiah). I get totally grossed out by vomit- like really grossed out, and I am not so inclined to do things such as mop it up, hold back hair or fetch water. The only times that I have seen Louis throw up are after he has had too much to drink- so, my lack of sympathy and empathy for him is probably well understood, because I don't like either him or I drinking to the point of throwing up. He has had to clean everything up. I have more empathy for him if he is truly sick with a fever or cold, but my patience with him isn't as great as his is with me.

This morning I had my first bout of morning sickness for this pregnancy. And, just like when I was pregnant with Jeremiah and vomiting nearly every morning for two months, my sweet husband followed me into the restroom, held my hair back, kissed my cheek and fetched me a bottle of water. I love him. God bless my husband. With Jeremiah, once I threw up I was fine for the rest of the day- today, however, my stomach ache lingered for a few extra hours- then I began craving Lays potato chips, something I normally don't like to eat (too much grease). Luckily we had some in the house =) And I can't wait for us to bbq some hot dogs tonight!

I have my first doctor's appointment on Thursday. I can't wait! And tomorrow I have my first day with my new Mother's Helper- my best friend's 17 year old sister, Diana =) You have no clue how excited I am about having two free hours twice a week while someone else plays with Jeremiah. I have so many plans for things I want to get done around the house and books to read, but I know I have to use at least part of that time to take a nap. I'm worn out.

I guess I'm having a boy....

2009-06-26T11:19:00.000-07:00

I'm not one to believe old wives tales, Chinese calendars or anything like that, but when I want a little daughter as badly as I do (especially considering how much Louis does not want more than two kids), all of these old fables that tell me that I"m having a boy start messing with my head! My friend Michelle is a firm believer in the Chinese calendar for predicting genders, and her trusted one says that I'm having a boy. Then last night, my Uncle Ken told me that I'm having a boy because Jeremiah's cowlick is in the middle of his head. Apparently, according to my grandma Arlene, the position of the older siblings' cowlick determines what the gender of the following baby will be- center means boy, off to the side means girl. It worked for all of my dad's siblings- My dad and uncle Tom each have it in the center of their head and wound up with little brothers; my uncle Ken has it to the side and he has a little sister. Plus there's lots of speculation about me not throwing up yet- more barf apparently means a girl. But... I'm only 6 1/2 weeks along, and I didn't start throwing up with Jeremiah until I was 8 or 9 weeks along. I've definitely come very close to throwing up in the last week but nothing has happened yet. My cousin Tiffany has been throwing up all day for the last few weeks, and so we're convinced she's having a girl. Lucky duck...

Yesterday I bought the cutest little dress at Target that was on clearance for $4. Call me crazy, not officially knowing the gender or anything but I just could not pass it up!! If I do indeed get the announcement that "it's a boy!" when I go for my ultrasound in a few months, then I will gladly give the dress away to some other lucky duck mommy. But for now I like seeing it hang up in the baby's closet =)

Don't get me wrong; I would LOVE for Jeremiah to have a little brother. Little boys are a ton of fun, and from what I hear, less drama-filled =) But if we really are only having two children I would love to have one of each... I need some more estrogen in this house! I know that either way I will be perfectly happy with the blessing that God is giving me, but please- cross your fingers for a precious little girl!!!

Happy Father's Day!

2009-06-21T16:27:00.000-07:00

Those two handsome guys pictured to the left (and the baby in my tummy!) are the most important people in my life. Today we are celebrating how that precious little boy, Jeremiah, made my amazingly sweet and handsome hubby the best father in the whole world (well, tied with my dad of course!). So far the day has been perfect- Jeremiah slept in til nearly 7:30 (a big feat for him!), and Jeremiah and I played while we let Daddy sleep in. However... Daddy was SUCH a trooper! I was intending on letting him sleep til 9:00 or 9:30, but after making Jeremiah's breakfast (oatmeal mixed with a stage 2 bananas) one whiff of the bananas made me so close to hurling- oh, pregnancy! Louis very graciously got up an hour before he needed to to feed Jeremiah and even stayed up afterwards to play with him so I could shower! What a sweet husband. Then it was present time- Jeremiah and I filled in some missing volumes of Louis's "Family Guy" anthology collection. We can't wait for Jer to go to sleep tonight so we can start watching it! I love Bryan. After Jeremiah's bath and nap, the three of us went to "Cielito Lindo," this Mexican restraunt that has a brunch buffet and live mariachi show- something that Louis LOVES, and I tolerate on his behalf =) Actually, this kind of show is more my style- 45 minutes long, quick up beat songs, and plenty of yummy food in front of me =) Jeremiah also loves listening to the live music- but is starting to wail like a banshee whenever the clapping at the end happens. I think it scares him... poor guy!

We came home, I fed Jeremiah (since he pretty much lived on Goldfish and punch at the buffet), he and Louis watched some Discovery Channel show, then I put Jer down for his nap. Louis is asleep on the couch. I could really use a nap too, but I hate napping when Jer is. First of all, I hate waking up from my naps. Secondly, I always am scared that I'm not going to hear him (which is darn near impossible because he makes it VERY well known that he's awake!) When Louis wakes up we are going to dinner with his dad and sister. I feel like I"ve eaten all day. Which isn't good- I'm almost 6 weeks pregnant and ALREADY outgrowing some of my shirts, and my pants are feeling tighter. ALREADY!! This didn't happen until towards the END of my first trimester with Jeremiah, not at the very beginning! No, I"m not ready for maternity wear, but it certainly would be nice to fit into my clothes for just a bit longer.......

I really wish I could give my dad a hug right now. As I type this, he and my mother are driving a moving van somewhere through Missouri, coming back from a convention their business participated in in Illinois last week. My mom's birthday was Friday... so I missed not only that but Father's day as well! =( We are going to celebrate next weekend when they get back (they should be home by Tuesday). They've been gone for over a week now and I miss them!

Happy Fathers Day to all the daddies out there!

Pure exhaustion

2009-06-15T16:57:00.001-07:00

When I got the good news that I was pregnant with Jeremiah, it was on Easter Sunday. I had an entire week and a half of spring break from teaching and I spent most of it in bed, sleeping or watching TV. This time around... well Mommies don't exactly get a spring break, do they! I am not AS tired as I was last time (then again I found out about this pregnancy around 3 weeks earlier than with Jer so I know it's coming) yet by 5:00 I am pooped. And all those fun pregnancy symptoms are starting to kick in- upset stomach (no barfing... yet)... heightened sense of smell, food cravings (sour cream with fresh black pepper, grape tomatoes, smoothies- pretty much my pregnancy cravings from last time around) and food aversions- anything greasy (no pizza last night), or "fast food," ranch dressing and LETTUCE. Well, nasty iceburg lettuce. I think I can stomach some crisp romaine or spinach. And then there's the issue of me needing to pee on the hour, every hour. Jeremiah thinks it's hilarious when I go "potty." He will stop what he's doing and run at break-neck speed to the restroom when he hears me mention the word "potty" or hear me open the door, and will stand in front of me, grinning his head off until I flush the toilet- then he wants to play w/ the nasty potty water. I'm now locking the door when I go and he's not too happy about that.

I thought last Tuesday was my last day w/ Sydney but it turns out this Thursday is (it's my only day this week). I already miss my little gal. Now that she's crawling and is much more independent and way less needy, we have some great times together and my days go by sooooo fast. Just when it starts to get easy it has to end. Boo.

On Thursday a contractor is coming over to give us a quote for our kitchen remodel. I'm sooooo thrilled about this- I've been dying for a new kitchen since before we moved into our house- ours is ANCIENT. And there's hardly any cabinet space- and the entire opposite side of the kitchen is just bare wall, dying for some more counters and cabinets. And a dishwasher. I'm praying that come the end of summer my title as head dishwasher gets turned over to Maytag.

I'm also in the market for a Mother's Helper to come in and play with Jeremiah for two hours a day, twice a week so that I can clean or nap. If anyone knows a high school or college aged girl that wants some extra cash this summer (or if YOU want some extra cash this summer!) just let me know! Hours and days are flexible.

A Great Big Positive!!!

2009-06-14T17:07:00.000-07:00

Yes it's true.... baby #2 is on his or her way, due sometime around Valentines Day!! I found out on Wednesday evening and Louis and I couldn't be happier. I have my first doctor's appt. on July 2 with a new doctor (since we have insurance this time around) and I'm crossing my fingers that I get one that I like. So far I'm feeling great but exhausted. The morning sickness hasn't kicked in yet- I'm only around 4- 4 1/2 weeks along so I'm sure it's not long before it happens; however I have been feeling a little more queasy than I'd like to. I think we're going to be "normal" people and find out the gender this time around, but we'll see how we feel when we get our ultrasound =) Just wanted to share our good news and ask for prayers that we actually get to meet this bundle of joy this time around!

Beefy Mac and Cheese!

2009-06-10T15:56:00.001-07:00

Tonight's dinner is Beefy Mac and Cheese in the crock pot from this cookbook:
Louis and I both love Sandra Lee! Louis loves how yummy her recipes always turn out to be; I love how fast and easy they are because a lot of the ingredients you can purchase pre-made! Like the beef stroganoff I made on Friday (which turned out FANTASTIC, by the way- and I wound up throwing in a can of cream of mushroom soup as well), this recipe is also being altered to compensate for my husband's pickiness. In case you're interested, here's the recipe!

12 oz dried elbow macaronni

1 1/2 pounds lean ground beef

1 packet (1.5 oz) beef stew seasoning mix

2 cups shredded four cheese blend (I'm just making my own with cheddar since I think the packaged shredded cheeses are a ripoff)

1 can (10.75 oz) condensed cheddar cheese soup

1 cup frozen chopped onion (I'm using fresh though and adding them in to my portion only at the very end since Louis hates them. I might sautee them for a few min. in butter to eliminate the raw onion taste)

1/2 cup reduced sodium beef broth

choppedf fresh tomato (optional- I'm using)

chopped parsley (optional- not using since I forgot to purchase it)

1. In a pot of salted, boiling water, cook macaronni for 5-6 min or until almost al dente. drain and transfer to 5 qt slow cooker

2. In a large skllet, cook and stir ground beef and beef stew seasoning mix until beef is brown, breaking up clumps. Drain off fat. Stir remaining ingredients (minus tomato and parsley) into slow cooker. Cover and cook on low for 2-4 hours. Serve with chopped tomato and parsley if desired.

Has anyone ever traveled to....

2009-06-09T16:01:00.000-07:00

... Monterey or Santa Cruz, CA? Louis and I are thinking of going there for our anniversary trip. We are bouncing back and forth between lots of ideas right now... including the following:

*San Diego/Coronado (but the rooms are insanely expensive for July weekends)
*3 day Carnival Cruise- makes one stop in Ensenada and one day at sea. We would not be getting off the ship because of Louis's fear of the swine flu and other crap going on in Mexico right now, but we LOVE cruising, and the prices are so cheap that its less expensive to go on the cruise, all meals included *plus $100 ship credit with a deal going on for incidentals like beverages and photographs!* than the hotel stay alone in Coronado or SD
*Santa Barbara
*And Monterey and Santa Cruz. Louis has been to Santa Cruz and liked it; I"ve always wanted to go to Monterey so we would do both during our trip (depending on how close together they are. We think they are near each other?) We would fly up there and rent a car. I would also want to do a day stop in San Francisco... but again I haven't even checked a map to see how close these places are to each other. And Louis is scared of going to SF because of that huge quake that took place there like... almost 100 years ago?! He watches too much of the History Channel

Anyway, if you have been to either Monterey or Santa Cruz, did you like it? What was there to do? It would be fun to go someplace new!

I survived...

2009-06-07T21:46:00.001-07:00

... FOUR birthday parties this weekend- three of them being yesterday!

I'm exhausted.

Tuesday is my last day of babysitting Sydney! I'm going to miss my little girl... and so will Jeremiah. She's his new favorite playmate. I won't miss waking up at 5:30 every morning, however!

I'm off to bed. The alarm is going to go off way too soon

And tonight's dinner is...

2009-06-05T11:18:00.000-07:00

Slow Cooker Beef Stroganoff!

I am on such a cooking kick lately. I purchased 6 cookbooks with my Barnes and Nobles gift card from Mothers Day, and I wish I had the time (and financing!) to make all the recipes I want to. The cookbooks I'm the most excited about are :

and The Complete Cookbook: Asian. Tasty Recipes for Every Day. (I couldn't find a good picture of the cover on the internet). Louis is also really excited for my Semi-homemade by Sandra Lee cookbook that hasn't arrived yet. The recipe I'm making tonight didn't come from my slow cooker cook book but from the back of the Lipton soup box. I swear, Jeremiah better hurry up and stop his baby food preference SOON and start eating more normal food because I can't wait for him to finally enjoy my food rather than just push it away!

In other news, this month is chock full of birthdays. This weekend we have three parties to go to- Jeremiah's cousin Adrian's 2nd birthday tomorrow (Louis's cousin Victor is Adrian's daddy), my aunt Sophie (Grandma's sister)'s 85th birthday party, and Sunday my cousin Chase (my cousin Kelly's son)s' 4th birthday. Every other weekend between now and the beginning of July is filled with at least one other birthday party. Busy- and expensive! That's why I love shopping at Target!!

Anyway, here's the recipe for the beef stroganoff in case you're interested. I've never made a beef stroganoff before so I'm really excited to see how it turns out! Tune in for more great recipes as I make them!

2 lb boneless chuck steak, cut into 1 inch pieces

1/4 cup all purpose flour

10 oz sliced mushrooms (we're substituting for crinkle cut carrots since Louis hates mushrooms)

1 envelope Lipton Secret Recipe Beefy Onion Soup Mix

1/2 tsp dried thyme leaves, crushed

1 can (14.5 oz) diced tomatoes

8 oz sour cream

1. In your slow cooker, toss beef with flour. Stir in remaining ingredients except sour cream. Cook covered on LOW 8-10 hrs or on HIGH 4-6 hrs until meat is tender

2. Stir in sour cream. Serve, if desired, over hot cooked egg noodles

Best Vegas Trip Ever!

2009-06-01T10:30:00.001-07:00

***I have NO CLUE why the prior post was in all characters!!!***

Louis and I arrived home last night after three glorious nights in Las Vegas. I have to say that of all the trips there we have been on together (and seperately!) aside from our honeymoon, hands down this was the best one. By the time my mother in law picked up Jeremiah, we finished our last minute trip preparations, and we picked up my grandmother at my mom's house, we didn't get on the road until shortly after 8:00 p.m. on Thursday night. We were walking to our rooms at the Motel 6 at around 1:00 a.m. only to find a hooker (well we THINK she was a hooker! She certainly looked like one!) being arrested in the parking lot outside of our room. Only in Vegas...

Louis had to work on Friday, so my grandma and I hung out by the pool playing cards until it was time for us to check out and head over to the Luxor, where Louis and I were staying that night and Saturday night. My grandma was staying at the Excalibur but couldn't check in until my aunt Bette arrived, who was paying for the room. I LOVE THE LUXOR! We stayed in the pyramid. I like the slanted walls and windows, the atmosphere, and the lack of enthusiasm to gamble there. The casinos weren't overly crowded, and the higher limits at the tables kept me from wanting to play (which was great because we had a very TINY amount of $$ set aside for gambling,a nd we were saving it for a trip to the small O'Shea's casino, a favorite of ours). After we checked in, Grandma and I got in our suits and spent the afternoon at the pool, swimming, drinking, reading and napping. I brought the fixings for margaritas with us from Cali plus some mango Smirnoff ices and plenty of chips, so we were all set for a party. And it cost a tiny fraction of the rediculous $10 per drink at the pool! The sponsors for Malibu rum were giving away free shots of Malibu and coke so we got some of those as well =)

Friday night was the first family gathering of the weekend (we went for a wedding- my aunt Bette's daughter, Ellen, was getting remarried. Bette was my grandma's cousin-in-law, so her daughter Ellen is like my 3rd or 4th cousin?) The party that night was at Mandalay bay where they were staying- in the PENTHOUSE. Which is where the picture above was taken. OH my goodness talk about luxury- especially the panoramic view of the strip outside the windows. They had Panera Bread cater with sandwiches and goodies, and a full service bar. Needless to say Louis and I had a lot to drink that weekend... and had a great time with my family, most of whom I don't see very often because most of them in attendance live in New York. And Louis's favorite part of the evening was watching the Lakers clinch the playoffs. Thank goodness we weren't the youngest ones there- Ellen's daughters who are my age were there as well. It was my first time meeting them- even though her daughter Debbie was my pen pal way back when we were kids!

After the party, we decided to go to the LAX club in the Luxor. Neither of us had ever been to a club in Vegas before so we decided to go, especially hearing all the great things about it from Debbie- and having free admission for staying in the resort. It was a great club- but let me tell you, we waited over an hour in line only to stay half an hour, tops. Louis and I felt very out of place, being that we were probably the only married people in attendance, and most definitely the only parents. I think clubbing is something that people do when they are single and looking to meet someone (and get wasted, which we were not going to do). Perhaps if we were still dating each other it would have been more fun?

Saturday: Louis and I slept in- or rather, he slept in because I"m still on "Jeremiah" time. I woke up at his usual 6:15 and then fell back asleep til 8:30, which is the time I get up when Louis lets me "Sleep in." We went to the buffet for breakfast (champagne brunch, way yummy), and then Louis went back to our room to prepare the music for the wedding reception. He was playing DJ at the dinner that night and needed to make his playlist and practice his songs that he would be singing. That took pretty much the entire day. I went to the pool for a little bit, then back upstairs to read "Gone with the Wind" and take a few good naps.

The wedding at Mandalay Bay was really nice! Neither of us had been to a Vegas wedding, either, and it was QUICK. Like 10 minutes. Even in a fancy resort like that they want you in and out. The reception was in a small room at Aereole, this 5 star gourmet restraunt inside of Mandalay Bay. Tons of hour deourves and small dishes for dinner were served- along with the BEST open bar I had ever been to. At the suggestion of Debbie's friend I got a strawberry mojito- the best drink I have ever tasted ever. Everyone was saying how good m y drink looked and lots of my relatives ordered it as well- so much in fact that they ran out of the mix after my second mojito! So I had to settle for two more pomegranite martinis =) (I told you I drank a lot this weekend...) Louis's music and his singing were amazing. I love my husband. I love it when he sings. And I love the reason why he sang at this wedding- the bride's father, my Uncle Louie, was also a Frank Sinatra buff like Louis and they would always sing kareoke together when he would come to visit. Louis knew that my aunt Bette would be so touched for him to sing at Ellen's wedding since Uncle Louie is no longer with us. So we went to a wedding with distant relatives- a few we knew well (including my grandma) but most we didn't know at all. And we had the GREATEST time. I can't emphasize that enough. It doesn't matter how "distantly" you are related, or how many times you have met. Family is family. And I love everyone in ours.

Sunday- after checking out of our hotel, we picked up at my grandma at the Excalibur and went to the champagne brunch at Harrahs. This has become a Vegas tradition of ours since our honeymoon. My grandma is so sweet- we fully intended on treating her but, as always, she beat us to the check and wouldn't take a cent. Then we gambled for an hour at O'Sheas. Louis won back everything I lost at the black jack table with some VERY lucky plays on Roulette and we actually came out ahead roughly $40. Not too shabby... then we went home and picked up my precious son! Oh how I missed him dearly! Vacations away from the kiddos are always a blast- a great time to reconnect with your spouse, eat great food, sleep in, have a few drinks- but there is nothing like coming home to two arms wide open and a huge grin from your precious child!!!

Recovering

2009-05-26T20:58:00.001-07:00

We are very exhausted here in the Castillo household. Jeremiah an I especially have been going nonstop for the past week. We spent the day at Disneyland last Wednesday, which is tiring in itself, and then my car broke down on the freeway just a few exits before we arrived home. By the time my dad, CHP, AAA and Louis arrived to come and get me( thankfully I was able to get over to a shoulder!) and we got home it was nearly 10:00, almost 3 hours past my son's bedtime. Then, my grandma picked up Jeremiah and I early the next morning to take us to my parents house, where we stayed until Sunday night. Louis joind us on Friday. I worked for my mom Thursday afternoon, then got my pedicure and manicure w/ my mom. Friday was lots of running around plus the rehearsal and rehearsal dinner. The rehearsal was supposed to start at 5:30 but didn't begin til nearly an hour later. As for the dinner? We didn't get out until nearly 10:00. One of teh bridesmaids totalled her car on the way from the rehearsal to the dinner (thank God she's okay) so everything ran way late because of that>

Saturday- wedding! My mom and I had our hair appt bright and early at 9:00 am and were nonstop busy the rest of the day. The wedding ended around 7:30 pm, and Louis, Marissa and I went to an afterparty at one of my brother's friend's houses (another Luis). It was very strange partying with my brother's friends without him there,, and seeing my brother being replaced with my husband in their circle of friends, but we all had a great time playing beer pong, flip cup and eating pizza. We're planning on getting together regularly to hang out until Luis winds up God knows where playing minor league baseball, and whenever Daniel's 4 year old son is in town from Seattle we are going to get our kids together.

Sunday- my cousin Paul very generouslly offered to lend us his Lexxus until our car gets fixed (the engine and transmission are shot). Before picking up the car in Huntington Beach, my dad took Louis and I to Long Beach to pick up my brother's tux and Lindsey's dress and return the tuxes. We didn't get home until 8:30 and believe me- it was GREAT to be home! And I absolutely love driving the Lexxus- I am not looking forward to having to give it back.

But just as we're starting to settle back into a somewhat normal routine, we're going to be on the go again this Thursday! Louis and I are going to Vegas Thursday night for the weekend for the wedding of a distant relative. We are driving my grandmother and staying at Motel 6 on Thursday night since we're going to arrive late (leaving after work), then Louis and i are at the Luxor til Sunday! I've never stayed there before and can't wait. I have to admit that I was really looking forward to some alone time Friday afternoon while Louis is working, but my grandma is goign to be tagging along with me to the pool. She's staying with my aunt at the Excalibur, and since the room is in my aunt's name she can't check in until she arrives. Oh well... I love my grandma and can't exactly tell her to go shopping so I can tan and read! Jeremiah will be staying with Louis's mom Thursday and Friday night and with my mom Saturday night. I hate to leave him but know that Louis and I really need some alone time- one of teh reasons we're staying at a different hotel than the majority of the relatives attending the wedding and one of the reasons we're even attending this wedding in the first place! We just need to get away, the two of us and no kidlets. The wedding is going to be at the Mandalay Bay and Louis is going t be singing and DJing. I cant' wait!

Mr. and Mrs. Joseph Billheimer!

2009-05-24T21:19:00.000-07:00

Yesterday my baby brother got married. The beautiful blonde woman in his arms is my new sister! I can't even begin to describe all of the zillions of emotions that went through me yesterday as I saw my brother get married. For those of you who have married siblings- especially if you yourself got married before they did- you probably know what I am talking about, especially if you are as fond of your sibling's spouse as I am of Lindsey. Lindsey, if you are reading this, I love you!

More pics to come tomorrow!

101 Update!

2009-05-18T19:28:00.001-07:00

It's been 2 months since I began my quest to complete 101 goals in 1001 days. I have been having fun with this, although not as obsessively so as I was in the beginning. For example, I am no longer keeping track of if I read to Jeremiah every day and take my vitamins daily. They happen most days during the week, and thankfully reading has become a daily habit for Jeremiah and I! He loves to be read to now! Here's an update on how things are going:

Key:
**To be completed by November 23, 2009
In Progress
Completed

Creativity and Projects
1. Finish wedding scrapbook, honeymoon scrapbook and Jeremiah's 1st year scrapbook (0/3)
2. Learn to tole paint and complete at least two projects
3. **Finally order my wedding album!
4. Order pictures from Snapfish at least 10 times (0/10)
5. **Organize East Coast Tour pictures into an album
6. Blog twice a week (1/286)
7. Drag out my violin and spend an afternoon or an evening playing... just so I can't say that I haven't played since APU Graduation (May 2005!) anymore!

Education and Learning
8. Read at least 20 new books of choice, including Gone with the Wind, Pride and Prejudice, The Proper Care and Feeding of Husbands, and The Proper Care and Feeding of Marriage (finished 2)
9. **Find our local library and get a library card
10. Read at least 3 books related to the field of education
11. **Finish reading Dr. Jame's Dobson's Bringing Up Boys
12. Finish all paperwork necessary to apply for my California teaching credential and apply for it!

13. **Take a Red Cross CPR Course

Environment and Outdoors
14. ** Take Jeremiah on a walk 3 nights a week for 3 months (0/36)
15. Enroll Jeremiah in a swimming class (does not count for "Mommy and Me" goal)
16. **Go horseback riding with Lindsey
17. **Take a hike
18. Go camping
19. **Take a personal day to go to the beach alone!
20. Transition to earth friendly cleaning supplies once current supplies are depleted
21. Use only "Green" bags or reuse paper bags for 3 months

Family and Friends
22. Get pregnant and have baby #2
23. Nurse that baby for at least 6 months, provided I maintain an adequate milk supply this time around
24. Host 3 family holidays (0/3)
25. Call Grandpa weekly
26. Call Grandma weekly
27. Visit Grandpa once a month
28. **Enroll in a "Mommy and Me" class
29. Mail out homemade birthday cards to family and friends
30. Host another family cribbage tournament
31. **Host a cheese and wine night when Morgan is in town
32. Have another Disneyland day with Anna
33. Read to Jeremiah daily
34. **Eat at 3 of Anna's favorite restaurants that she's been dying for me to try (1/3)
35. Have dates with Louis at least twice a month (1/66)

Health, Fitness and Appearance
36. Take a folic acid supplement every day
37. Wax my eyebrows once a month for a year (0/12)
38. **Paint my toenails twice a month for 6 months (0/12)
39. **Make a fresh loaf of bread once a week for two months (0/8)
40. Try cooking one new recipe a week for 3 months (0/12)
41. **Purchase produce ONLY from our local farmer's market for a month
42. **Plant an herb garden, including the following herbs: basil, rosemary, thyme, parsley, mint, cilantro and chives
43. **Grow tomatoes this summer
44. **Learn to style and curl my hair
45. Make a conscious effort to wear makeup daily
46. Donate clothes to Goodwill
47. Exercise three times a week for a month (0/12)
48. Take a multivitamin every day
49. Buy 5 new dresses (1/5)
50. Make homemade chicken stock and freeze it
51. Buy 5 pairs of shoes (1/5)
52. Go running with Marissa. Decide on a good mile time goal for myself (_:_) and work at improving my time (best: _:_)

House and Home
53. **Have all dishes washed and put away before bedtime for 3 months (0/90)
54. Purchase curtains or blinds for all rooms of our house (0/5)
55. Organize dresser drawers in our bedroom and maintain that organization
56. Organize kitchen cabinets and maintain that organization
57. **Organize hall closet and maintain that organization
58. Turn our spare bedroom into a guest room, office, activity room or baby room- something other than a storage room
59. Buy a DVD player
60. Plant flowers in our front yard and back yard
61. Learn five new crock pot recipes (0/5)
62. Acquire a Dutch oven
63. Learn 3 Dutch oven recipes (0/3)
64. Learn 5 new cookie recipes (0/5)
65. Learn 5 new muffin recipes (0/5)
66. Learn how to make sushi and host a sushi night
67. Remodel our kitchen
68. Purchase a new refrigerator
69. **Make Ina Garten's (Barefoot Contessa) Cream of Wild Mushroom Soup
70. Paint our bathroom
71. Paint our hallway
72. Paint our kitchen
73. Organize living room bookshelf
74. Frame pictures and hang them on our walls
75. **Subscribe to the LA Times Sunday Edition for one year
76. Replace our living room couch and love seat

Money, Finances and Work
77. Clip coupons from the Sunday paper every week
78. Open a bank account for Jeremiah, depositing at least $20 a month upon opening
79. Roll all spare change and deposit it into a college fund for our children

Responsibility and Good Things
80. Have all 2009 Christmas presents, other than those for Louis, Jeremiah, our parents and our siblings, purchased by October 1st (purchased 3 presents to date)
81. Do 15 random acts of kindness (1/15)
82. Get up an hour before Jeremiah 6 days a week for a month (0/27)
83. Spend an afternoon watching all of my favorite Disney movies
84. **Get my wisdom teeth pulled

Spirituality
85. Read the Bible cover to cover (Current book: )
86. **Find a home church in Whittier and attend regularly
87. Contribute to the children's ministry in our new church
88. Start a prayer journal

Travel and Places to Go
89. Go on a cruise
90. Travel to 3 new places, at least one of those requiring a plane ride (1/3)
91. Take at least 3 child-less trips with Louis, consisting of at least 3 nights each (will complete one next week!) (0/3)
92. Renew Disneyland pass before the 1001 day deadline (Expiration date: January 21, 2010), and, if needed, purchase a pass for Jeremiah as well
93. Spend the night at Coronado Island with Louis
94. Eat at a Greek restaurant
95. Go to Six Flags, without kids
96. Attend a concert either at the Disney Concert Hall or the Hollywood Bowl
97. Attend an LA Philharmonic "Concert in the Park" at the Arboretum this summer
98. Visit Uncle Ken and Aunt Jean in Virginia
99. Take Jeremiah to the Children's Museum in Los Angeles (If it's still around? If not, find another hands-on children's musem and take him there instead)
100. Spend an afternoon in Hollywood
101. See a live musical

Oh, Toddlerhood

2009-05-15T10:40:00.001-07:00

Just when I thought I had this thing called toddlerhood down pat... Jeremiah decides to mix things up and throw new challenges my way! Nap time and bedtime used to be a breeze. Sing a few songs, lay him down with his beloved teddy bear, close the door and he was in dream land. Not any more! Now Jeremiah has this new game where he throws his bear out of the crib as soon as I start to walk out- and will not stop wailing until I go back in and fetch it for him! I played along the first night he did it- but not any more! I'm tired of it! He needs to learn. Last night he only cried for two minutes before he conked out. Today he decided to do this at NAPTIME as well. I put him down 15 minutes ago and I can still hear him crying. Oh, lordy.

I can also tell that Jeremiah is starting to understand what is right and what is wrong for things that I do not want him to do. He will start to do something naughty (ex: climb onto the coffee table) but as soon as he sees me coming or look his way, he usually will correct his behavior. At least he's showing some good judgement- but other times, oh man! He makes a game out of me correcting the behavior for him (i.e. pulling him off the coffee table and telling him NO) and will laugh his head off while I'm doing it. He's starting to test me and I don't like it.

I never thought that raising a child would be easy! But seeing as he's my first, I'm still learning everything right along with him. How to discipline a child so young is so new to me. He finally has sharing his toys with Sydney down- he doesn't care if she plays with his toys and, for the most part, doesn't take something he wants out of her hands. He will play along with her if he wants something that she has, like his fisher price piano. No real discipline was needed here; he just had to get used to her being around. But what about when he's testing me like I just described?

We finally got smart and put a gate up in the hallway to block the bathroom and spare bedroom (storage room) where he's obviously not allowed to play. Now that he's able to turn knobs I'm tired of constantly running over to the bathroom or spare bedroom and pull him out of there, while he's laughing his head off. The gate is a blessing. It makes my life so much easier. But I don't want to block everything he's not supposed to touch or climb on. How in the world do you teach a child self control?!

And lets not even get started on his picky eating. I think he's going to be on baby food when he's in kindergarten at the rate he's going. He refuses to touch anything that looks new. It's baby food, cream of wheat, bread, cheese, cheerios, bannannas, goldfish, granola, and animal crackers ONLY for him. I never thought I would have to coax a child to eat ice cream but he won't touch it. At least he's getting his fruits and veggies in with the baby food. The stage 3 casseroles are hit and miss with him. Some times he'll gobble up the spagetti, lasagna, chicken noodle, etc.; other days he wont touch them. Same with the baby meats. I worry that he's not getting enough protein. Every mom worries about what her child eats. I just pray this one doesn't grow up being as picky as his daddy.

But then he does something sweet, like wanting to cuddle with me for an hour while I sing his favorite songs over and over again (and letting me know that he does NOT want me to stop!) and it makes everything worth it.

Busy weekend ahead!

2009-05-14T11:41:00.000-07:00

Tonight- Lakers game! Making a yummy dinner for Louis

Tomorrow- Doing something with Marissa... haven't figured out what yet. Hoping to have lunch with my grandma and pick up Jeremiah's tux for the wedding

Saturday- Kylie's birthday lunch (3:30ish) at Mimi"s Cafe... still deciding if I"m going to have time to make an appearance at Lindsey's bachelorette party. I suppose I should since I'm in the wedding and everything.... but her all-day event is far from where I"m going to be, and I don't know if by the time I"m done with Kylie's party it will be worth it to drive there for just a little bit. C an't give away too many details though since all events are a surprise to Lindsey!

Sunday- clean clean clean. And hoping to visit my grandpa!

Next week- Disneyland on Wednesday w/ Jeremiah and Melissa... Friday is the rehearsal dinner and Saturday my brother is getting married!!!

Happy Mothers Day!

2009-05-10T10:15:00.001-07:00

I am so happy that this little boy made me a mommy! This picture was taken in Phoenix at the Phoenix zoo, where they have this amazing fountain area for kiddos to splash in and get wet. Jeremiah LOVED IT! And I love him... oh so very much. I really do think he knows that it is a special day today. My little man is a very busy boy who spends more time exploring and playing than giving hugs and kisses (kisses are VERY VERY rare) but today he's been SO affectionate. Yesterday he spent the day with Daddy while I had a girls day out- having a very fast lunch with my gals, then we went to Paul Mitchell beauty school in Costa Mesa to get our hair cut and colored. I was gone for a good 7 or 8 hours- and when I came home he was thrilled to pieces and would not leave my side. Now, Daddy has been his "favorite" lately- everything is all "di di dada daddy daddy daddy!" all day until he comes home and plays with him. So it was very sweet and much appreciated that wanted all the attention from me when I set foot in the door =) I LOVE HIM!

I also love sleeping in. You may not think sleeping in til 9:00 is really considered "sleeping in," but when you wake up at 5:30 most mornings to babysit, and your toddler wakes up at 6:15 on the dot- 9:00 is like sleeping til noon. Louis got up with Jeremiah so I could stay in bed, and when I got up they gave me the cutest card and a Barnes and Nobles gift card! B&N.com is my new obsession. There isn't a borders or a barnes and nobles anywhere near my house so I love shopping online- especially when orders over $25 get free shipping. I'm really into collecting cookbooks lately- I think my Grandma Arlene's genes are kicking in because she had quite the collection herself. Then, in an hour we are leaving for a nice champagne brunch at the Sheraton hotel in Pomona. We took my mom there one year and I loved it. Afterwards, we are going to see my mom and then my mother in law. Busy busy day.

To answer the anonymous blogger if I"m done blogging- I"m not. I have a 3 1/2 week break from babysitting so I will have way more time and energy to blog. I usually blog during Jeremiah's naptime, which is usually when Sydney takes her main nap too, but for the past two weeks she wouldn't fall asleep until right before he woke up. And come the end of the day, like I said in my last post I was way too tired. I'm back.

Happy Mothers Day to all the wonderful mommies out there!

Exhausted

2009-05-05T19:31:00.000-07:00

I have had absolutely no motivation to blog lately. To my faithful readers- I'm sorry! I don't know what it is about the past week and a half of babysitting Sydney but I am more exhausted than normal- which, considering Sydney's grandma wanted to watch her two days last week I am surprised at. Although... a teething six month old and a genious toddler who has recently learned how to turn the doorknobs to open the doors is enough to make anyone want to take a nap! But alas, I'm forcing myself to write right now, because I know how frustrating it is to constantly tune into your favorite blogs and not seeing an update for what seems like ages!

The countdown is officially on for my brother and Lindsey's wedding! 18 more days until I gain a sister! I'm hosting Lindsey's lingerie shower on Friday (if I get more positive RSVP's than just her mother!) and am looking forward to it =) Another thing I"m excited about- I put an ad on Craigslist expressing my need for a suit for Jeremiah (he's one of the ring bearers!) because I didn't exactly want to fork out lots of $$ for a suit for him that he would be wearing once. Someone emailed me back today saying that she would sell me her son's brand new tux, in Jeremiah's size, for only $10! Her son wore it once for her wedding. Now if only I can lose a few pounds so I can zip up my bridesmaids dress I"ll be a happy camper....

The week after Joe's wedding Louis and I are going to Vegas for another wedding! I'm sooo excited- especially since it will be a mommy and daddy only affair =) Jeremiah will be staying with his Grandma Bertha. We will be gone for 3 nights, leaving Thurs. May 28th after Louis is done working so that we will be in Vegas friday morning for him to work (yes the laptop has to come again). I don't mind though because while he's working I"m hitting the pool! Because we're getting to Vegas late on Thurs night we're going to stay at a Motel 6 that night and then Friday morning we're off to the LUXOR!! I've never stayed there, but have always wanted to, and it's Louis's favorite.

I've been doing a lot of cooking lately. On Saturday I made ranch chicken, one of the many things that Louis's aunt cooked for us in PA =) Sooo easy- dunk your chicken pieces (we use breast tenderloins at our house) in ranch dressing, and then again in unseasoned bread crumbs, and bake at 350 for 40 min. YUM! Then last night I made taco soup for the first time- another amazingly simple recipe. The most difficult part of that recipe is browning the ground turkey and shredding the cheese. Everything else- just open up cans of lots of goodies and boil! Louis has definitely been enjoying all of these new treats coming out of our kitchen, and I have to say that I am enjoying it as well. Hence the need for me to shed a few pounds.

Jeremiah is growing by leaps and bounds. When we were on our trip his level of chatter has exploded. Before he carefully chose if and when he would want to speak- now it's all day every day! Most of it is still babble but he is trying so hard to talk! Precious. Plus there's his new found hobby of opening doors with the door knobs, which is making us double our babyproofing and supervision. He loves to color, and his appetite is growing also. He is still primarily on stage 2 and stage 3 baby food but is starting to show a slight bigger interest in "big people" food- animal crackers, bannanas, and granola in addition to his bread, crackers, cream of wheat and cheese.

Once again I apologize for the lack of blogs as of late, and for how boring this post turned out to be. I'm kind of in a bit of a blogging rut- there is just so much going on right now that the mere thought of blogging just exhausts me! Show my blog some love though and I promise, if you do that I will blog more!!

Vacation Part 1: Virginia and Washington DC

2009-04-23T21:40:00.000-07:00

Okay okay I know I have been really bad about blogging lately! But to my defense we did just get back from our trip on Monday, and I have been busy babysitting Sydney since Tuesday, plus getting the house back in order and Jeremiah back on a routine. So blogging has taken a back burner!

Rather than do one huge entry about our trip, I will just blog about the first half of it right now- Virginia and Washington DC.

First of all I have to mention that I am SO PROUD of how well Jeremiah did on the flights! We were so blessed to be able to use his carseat the entire way to Baltimore, and from Baltimore to Phoenix. He was incredible. Of course there was some moments of fussing but it was NOTHING compared to what I thought might happen... or would have probably happened had he been forced to sit on our laps. So in all the flights were uneventful...as was our first night in Baltimore. By the time we got our rental car and made it to our hotel it was almost 6:00 pm and we had been on the go since 3:30 am. I was beat... but I still had to take Jeremiah to Target to get his diapers and food supply that I didn't want to lug. I was VERY pleasantly surprised with the 6 percent sales tax (vs the nearly 10 percent it is here now!) Went back to the hotel, ate dinner, watched Survivor and attemptd to go to sleep. Jeremiah would not have any of his play pen that night, so he crashed with us, falling asleep to some prison documentary. Don't ask why but we always wind up watching prison documentaries or Cops when we are on vacation. We don't plan on it; it just happens.

Friday- drove an hour and a half to Leesburg VA to my Uncle Ken (Dad's brother) and Aunt Jeannie's house. Pretty much stayed there the whole day; Louis had to work. I hung out w/ Aunt Jeannie and my cousin Kyle, explored their gorgeous condo and took Jeremiah on a walk.

Saturday- rain! We were going to go to Washington DC but obviously didn't want to go in the rain. So we went to the Air and Space Museum instead. I"ve been there before and yes it was just as boring this time around as last time, but Louis enjoyed it. Then the rain cleared up and we went shopping at the outlet mall w/ my aunt Jeannie. Truth be told I wanted some "adult" time w/ her but Louis insisted on tagging along. I left him to shop w/ Jeremiah and my husband went to town... not only for himself but for me as well so I can't complain =)My husband has stellar taste and I am always pleased w/ what he chooses for me =)

Sunday- Easter! Kyle took us to Washington DC and played tour guide w/ us since Uncle Ken and Aunt Jeannie had to work (they are managers at different Bed Bath and Beyonds). It was bitter cold but a beautiful day. I keep joking that Jeremiah's future home is going to be the White House as the first Mexican American president (or half Mexican American!) Out of all the things that we saw in Washington DC Louis's favorite was the bohemith (sp?) which was a huge sloth at the museum of Natural History. My favorite was still the WWII Memorial. I can't get over how proud of I feel to be an American citizen every time I go to Washington DC (this was my third trip) and stand in the monuments. I feel so small yet a part of something so big. Obama is like a celebrity over there; I can't even tell you how much memorabilia there is around town of him, including cookies w/ his name on them at Starbucks. There was NOTHING like that for Bush when I went five years ago! Then we went to dinner at Aunt Jeannie's sister's house.

Monday- Last day! Louis and my family all had to work, so I went to Mt. Vernon w/ Marissa, her friend Meghan and Meghan's adorable daughter who is Jeremiah's age. We ate at this nice restraunt there and tried their famous peanut soup, which pretty much tasted like warm peanut butter, but I liked it. Then we went on a tour of George Washington's mansion. I can't even begin to tell you how gorgeous the property is and how beautiful the Patomic river is! I didn't stay there very long because I wanted to be on the road in time to beat the awful traffic, so most of my visit to Mt. Vernon consisted of eating lunch and waiting in line to enter the mansion.

Tuesday morning- said goodbye to Aunt Jeannie and Uncle Ken to drive up to PA... will continue w/ that later =)

Sorry I'm not going into too much detail; I'm so exhausted right now. I went to Disneyland this evening w/ Michelle, Braden and Jeremiah. I needed to get out of the house; Louis is away with his mom in AZ for the weekend for some Mariachi festival. I'm lonely and completely freaked out about staying here overnight by myself. I swear I can't sleep if Louis isn't here. Luckily tomorrow night I"m staying w/ my mom, and Sat. he should be home. I"m putting most of my pictures into an album on Facebook, but for now enjoy the few that I posted on here. Goodnight!!

Almost Home

2009-04-19T22:14:00.000-07:00

Louis, Jeremiah and I have had a WONDERFUL vacation. It was so wonderful, in fact, that it was extended by an extra two days. We were supposed to be home last night (Sat.), however God had other plans. We made it from Baltimore to Phoenix, where our plane had a "stop over" (no getting off for those continuing to LAX). The connection from Phoenix to LAX was wide open when we left Baltimore but filled up completely while we were in transit. So, we were bumped off the flight- and told that if this were to happen that the following flight an hour later was also wide open. Yeah that one filled up as well- along with EVERYTHING until Monday morning. Praise God for us getting stranded in a city where I have amazing family! All I had to do was call my cousin Stacy and she and Mike dropped everything to come pick the three of us up, bring us to their house for the weekend and give us a heck of a good time. We loved it!

Now if we don't get on the 7:05 am flight tomorrow morning I'm going to cry. I'm ready to be home. 11 days away with a toddler is a LONG time. So yeah, please pray for that- along with our tickets. The boarding pass collector in Baltimore didn't give us back the proper documentation we as buddy pass holders needed for a possible transfer, so after half an hour of moaning and groaning about it not being our fault in Phoenix, we were given some sort of vouchers that may or may not be honored tomorrow morning. There are notes in the computer system about what happened but who knows how easily it will be taken care of. Thank you so much!

More updates to come... tomorrow =)

3:00 AM

2009-04-09T06:58:00.001-07:00

That is the time my alarm clock went off this morning, much to my dismay, seeing as I didn't make it into bed until nearly 11:30. Right now I am sitting in the airport, waiting to board our flight (which leaves in an hour). God has been SOOOO amazing! We were able to get on our flight just fine (standby tix, remember?) AND... this is what I"m most excited about... Jeremiah doesn't have to sit in our lap after all! There are enough empty seats that allow us to strap him into his CAR SEAT!!! PRAISE JESUS!!!!

Anyway, the shuttle picked us up this morning at 4:30 with two suitcases (one of them a backpack style suitcase), our stroller, playpen, carseat, back pack, duffel bag and lunch pail in tote. Oh yeah and Jeremiah's child harness. We couldn't forget that! . We got to the airport around 5:15, went through security and ate breakfast. Apparently Jeremiah's milk was a matter of national security because we had to get it inspected and tested. Our flight leaves at 8:15, has a stop in Las Vegas (that doesn't require us to get off of the plane) and we land in Baltimore tonight around 5:15 eastern time. We are staying in Baltimore tonight rather than put Jeremiah through an additional hour and a half car ride down to my aunt and uncle's house in Leesburg VA. I'm rather excited about our hotel... we're staying at a Motel 6 (we were going for cheap over comfort) but the one we booked is brand newly remodeled complete with a 32 inch plasma tv. Looks like we'll be watching Survivor tonight!

We don't have too many firm plans yet as to what we are doing when, but we are staying in VA until Tuesday and are driving up to Carlisle PA Tuesday afternoon to stay with Louis's aunt and uncle. My amazing friend Marissa is going to be in VA as well, around half an hour away from us this weekend. We are planning to get together Monday and go to Mt. Vernon. I am looking forward to finally meeting her high school friends from when she lived in Germany. I have been hearing about them for the past 8 years since I met Marissa in college and it will be nice to finally put a face to the name.

Please continue to keep us in your prayers for a solid flight booking on the way home! I swear these free tickets were a blessing but a stomach ache at the same time. I dont' know if I would fly with them again if given the opportunity. Have an amazing weekend and blessed Easter- I will update you as I can!!

V-A-C-A-T-I-O-N!

2009-04-02T11:22:00.000-07:00

This post will have to be a quick post like my prior post, so hopefully I will get everything in that I was hoping to write about before Jeremiah and Sydney wake up from their naps =)

I suppose the most important thing to write about is that next Friday (Good Friday- April 10) Louis, Jeremiah and I will be taking our first vacation as a family of 3! We have a 6:30 am flight going from LAX to Washington, DC! We will be staying with my Uncle Ken and Aunt Jean in Virginia til Tuesday and then driving up to Carlisle, PA to stay with Louis's Aunt Martha and Uncle Phil! Virginia is one of my absolute favorite states that I have been to, and my trip back east 5 years ago with UCO was one of my favorite ones ever. Louis has never been to the east coast, so I can't wait to show him all my favorite Virginia and Washington, DC spots =) Marissa will be in VA as well the same time we are, visiting friends that live rather close to my uncle's house. We are planning on meeting up one day to go to Mt. Vernon or Williamsburg. We will be gone 8 days, coming back home Sat. the 18th. Our tickets are free standby tickets that I won on a CafeMom contest last year, so if you could pray that our flight reservations are able to be kept I'd really appreciate it! So far the flights we chose are rather empty but you never know what could happen in a matter of a week.

My laptop is currently broken. You think being married to a man that runs a computer business, it would be fixed by now- but no, Louis is quite busy fixing other ppls' computers, so I have to make do w/ using the desktop when he's not busy using it for work (hence what I'm doing right now).

Jeremiah had his first trip to the zoo on Monday w/ Jenni (roommate from APU) and myself. For being at the zoo most of the day he did quite well, and even got in a nice long nap =) I was very excited about this outing with him at first, but after half an hour there I came to the conclusion that the zoo is a good place for older toddlers- not 16 month olds. They can't really focus in on animals that aren't overly huge and hidden. He liked the zebra and the gorilla, but that's about it. He loved being able to explore when I took him out of his stroller,t hough =) It was awesome seeing Jen- and finding out that she's extending her stay til next Wed., so I will have another opportunity to see her before she goes back to Idaho!

Since Im going to VA I will not be going to visit Kappie and Steven in Sacramento. I was going to use our free tix to go see them, back when Louis didn't think he could take time off. Now that he is able to we want to take that bigger vacation instead. God is amazing- our tickets expire in a few weeks, and Louis's time off coincides perfectly with when we need to take our trip, along with my time off coming up from babysitting!!

Thats about all I have time for- I have a million other little things to do before the kids wake up from their nap. I'll update more with pics when I can!!!

PS: To the reader with the crock pot tamale recipe- I'd LOVE it!! Thank you so much! You can email it to me erin.e.castillo@gmail.com

A Quick Update

2009-03-26T12:08:00.000-07:00

I'm hoping to squeeze a quick update in before Jeremiah wakes up from his nap and I have to run to my mom's office.

My two week break from babysitting is coming to an end. I start up again next Tuesday for a week, then I have another two week break! I wonder how Jeremiah will take to seeing Sydney again? I have certainly enjoyed having my days of freedom back with my son, and going to my mom's office a few days a week.

On Saturday is Lindsey's first bridal shower! I'm very excited about it, seeing all of our family and celebrating my brother's upcoming wedding, and especially since I can start unloading some of the many presents that I have been storing for the past few months. Then on Monday, Jenni will be in town! I have missed my wonderful friend for the past 15 months since I saw her last (when Jeremiah was just a few weeks old). I'm happy that she's loving her life in Idaho with her amazing husband (who won't be joining her), but I miss her. We're going to take Jeremiah to the zoo with her friend and friend's children, then Jen will come back to m y house and spend the night =) Tuesday's activities are kind of up in the air, but seeing as I'm her source of transportation, I have her at least until Rayna comes to pick up Sydney at 3:30. Jenni was one of my most treasured APU friends, and a roommate for first semester of our senior year (until she graduated early).

I have been having LOTS of fun with my 101 list! I purchased my DVD player, finished reading the "Jon and Kate" book, well into "Bringing Up Boys," called my grandparents, bought yeast to start to make bread, and started taking Jeremiah on our nightly walks. I have been doing very well with my daily tasks- vitamins and reading to Jeremiah, but have determined for the daily and weekly goals that there HAS to be some room for error. It is unrealistic to think that I didn't accomplish my goal because I forgot to take vitamins one day (such as yesterday) or didn't get to read to Jeremiah one day. For the daily and weekly goals (that are to occur for the entire 1001 day period, not for a short period of time) that a 95% achievement goal is a good goal to strive for. That equals for roughly 50 days of "error" and still have quite a nice pass rate. For the goal of reading to Jeremiah, I have also kind of bent the rules to where if I wasn't able to read to him one day, I have the option of reading to him twice the following day for it to count.

Well i can hear Jeremiah now, so I better go! Thanks for reading and show some love if you can!

My poor lil guy!

2009-03-21T11:10:00.000-07:00

My lil man is sick =( Jeremiah woke up around 11:00 pm on Thursday night with chest congestion and the most heartbreaking whimper in his voice =( Thursday night was a long one for us- Jeremiah going back and forth from wanting to sleep in our bed to his crib, or just being held. However, around 3:30 am he finally conked out for good until 7:30 am. He woke up bright eyed and bushy tailed, running around playing with his toys, but still had that horrible raspy breathing and squeaky voice. So, off to the doctor we went! The doctor determined that Jeremiah has a small chest cold and prescribed him some amoxycillan. I think he's finally starting to feel better today, but he still sounds horrible. I hate seeing my son not feel well. It is heart breaking, knowing that beyond giving the prescribed medicine, some mommy TLC and a few prayers, there isn't much more you can do to make them comfortable.

However, after watching Jon Q. last night on TV and starting to read Multiple Blessings (the Jon and Kate Plus 8 book), I know that there are parents out there with even bigger worries about their children than chest congestion. Parents are worrying about whether or not their child will receive an organ donor in time for a transplant. About carrying their child as close to term as possible... where every day in gestation makes such a drastic difference in the quality of life their child(ren) will have once born. About wanting to mother their children but can't even hold their precious newborn because he or she is hooked up to machines intended to help them survive, and their tiny, frail bodies can't cope with human contact. I am truly blessed to never have known these kinds of motherly worries other than through watching it on TV or reading it in a book. If you haven't read Multiple Blessings: Surviving to Thriving with Twins and Sextuplets by Jon and Kate Gosslin, go pick up a copy. Even if you can't stand their TV show and think that Kate is a monster, go buy a copy. Kate has shown me how to truly give your problems up to the Lord and rely on Him for comfort, guidance and strength. Each chapter begins with a Bible verse, and throughout each chapter one thing is evident- God is her rock. Science and doctors can only do so much, and then there is God, the great physician- shepherd, comfortor, Father, rock. I only started reading the book last night but couldn't put it down. I'm over halfway through with it, and hope to have it finished by tomorrow.

In other news, my birthday celebration at Disneyland was amazing. I wanted to post some pictures, but I can't find the USB cord to upload them to my laptop. Louis and I had such fun together, more fun than we've had during any other Disneyland trip where it's just the two of us (Louis is known to be somewhat of a grump at Disneyland!) It was rather crowded there on Sunday, so we spent most of our time eating eating eating ... and eventually spending the afternoon taking in a few drinks! First a beer at the Grand Californian Hotel (my new favorite being Blue Moon), then at the ESPN Zone (a Bloody Mary for me, another beer for Louis-that I helped him polish off-followed by one shot of tequila each!). Oh, and one more Scooby Snack shot at this outdoor bar between the ESPN Zone and the Disneyland main entrance. Just enough alcohol to keep us "happy" yet not sloppy =) We had dinner at the Cafe Orlean's restraunt after a few more rides, then went over to California Adventure so Louis could have his first trip on the new Toy Story Mania ride. It's become one of my favorites, and is now Louis's all time favorite Disney ride. It's another one of those video games inside a ride. Louis and I get rather competitive with one another, and I was rather dissapointed that he managed to slaughter my score, even though I had gone on the ride a few times before. Oh yeah, and we never made it over to his friend's birthday party last Saturday. It just got way too late by the time his friends were done with their dinner at BJ's and I was exhausted.

Tonight I'm having a girls night out with my wonderful friends, a birthday tradition that I started last year for myself and fully intend to keep it up annually! We were going to cook dinner together at my house and then head off to Lucky Strike (a bowling alley for 21+ with billiards, a full bar, and DJ), but with Jeremiah being sick we're just going to go to Lucky Strike. I've been wanting to go there for some time but haven't had the chance. Louis's ex girlfriend is one of the managers there and was very kind in helping me plan this event, booking my party for me and giving me lots of advice and inside information on making it a wonderful evening =)

As for my list... I am proud to say that I have so far kept up with my daily obligations (vitamin taking and reading to Jeremiah) and weekly obligations (talking to Grandma on the phone- still have to call Grandpa today), and blogging. I have gotten started on my reading 20 new books task (Jon and Kate!) and am plugging along finishing "Bringing Up Boys." AND... as far as travel... Marissa and I are planning on going to visit Kappie and Steven next month in Sacramento! So that will take care of not only a new place to visit but the plane ride as well. AND... (i'm even more excited about this!) Louis and I are taking a child-less trip to Vegas in May! A distant relative is getting married there the week after my brother's wedding, and Louis offered to sing at the reception. The bride's father was my uncle Louie, and he and MY Louie would always sing kareoke together during his and my aunt Bette's California visits. Both are huge Frank Sinatra buffs. Uncle Louie (who is my grandmother's first cousin) passed away a few years ago and my aunt Bette now permanently resides in California with her son. She was CRYING when Louis offered to not only attend the wedding in Vegas (we've only met her daughter one time, for her engagement party in January during a visit from New York) but to sing as well, she was so touched. So that will take care of one of the child-less trips. I can't wait!!!

Have a great weekend everyone!

101 in 1001!

2009-03-18T20:09:00.000-07:00

I came across the idea in Emily's blog to create 101 goals to complete in 1001 days. There are SO many things that I want to do but a) can never remember to do them! or b) simply do not have the time or motivation to do them, so I figured why not try this out? Sometimes seeing my goals outlined on paper helps keep me on task for finishing projects. So, borrowing Emily's format for organizing her goals, I spent the last week coming up with my list and perfecting it. All goals are meant to be realistic enough to where they will actually be possible to complete, yet challenging enough to stretch me, either physically, mentally, or emotionally, or encourage us to save $$ to reach some desired goals (mostly in the home and travel section). I will be updating my list as I go along, and blogging about my progress as most of the major goals (i.e. not goals to be completed on a daily basis for the 1001 day duration) are completed. 25 goals need to be chosen to complete in the first 250 days and are noted with an **

I was going to wait until April 1st to start my list, but now that I am finished I simply can't wait! And, after finding out that my 1001 day period is up on my husband's 30th birthday (Dec. 14, 2011) I figured... why not start today? Have fun reading my goals and I encourage you to start one of your own!

Erin's 101 in 1001!
To be completed by Dec. 14, 2011

Key:
**To be completed by November 23, 2009
In Progress
Completed

Creativity and Projects
1. Finish wedding scrapbook, honeymoon scrapbook and Jeremiah's 1st year scrapbook (0/3)
2. Learn to tole paint and complete at least two projects
3. **Finally order my wedding album!
4. Order pictures from Snapfish at least 10 times (0/10)
5. **Organize East Coast Tour pictures into an album
6. Blog twice a week (1/286)
7. Drag out my violin and spend an afternoon or an evening playing... just so I can't say that I haven't played since APU Graduation (May 2005!) anymore!

Education and Learning
8. Read at least 20 new books of choice, including Gone with the Wind, Pride and Prejudice, The Proper Care and Feeding of Husbands, and The Proper Care and Feeding of Marriage
9. **Find our local library and get a library card
10. Read at least 3 books related to the field of education
11. **Finish reading Dr. Jame's Dobson's Bringing Up Boys
12. Finish all paperwork necessary to apply for my California teaching credential and apply for it!

13. **Take a Red Cross CPR Course

Environment and Outdoors
14. ** Take Jeremiah on a walk 3 nights a week for 3 months (0/36)
15. Enroll Jeremiah in a swimming class (does not count for "Mommy and Me" goal)
16. **Go horseback riding with Lindsey
17. **Take a hike
18. Go camping
19. **Take a personal day to go to the beach alone!
20. Transition to earth friendly cleaning supplies once current supplies are depleted
21. Use only "Green" bags or reuse paper bags for 3 months

Family and Friends
22. Get pregnant and have baby #2
23. Nurse that baby for at least 6 months, provided I maintain an adequate milk supply this time around
24. Host 3 family holidays (0/3)
25. Call Grandpa weekly (0/143)
26. Call Grandma weekly (0/143)
27. Visit Grandpa once a month (0/33)
28. **Enroll in a "Mommy and Me" class
29. Mail out homemade birthday cards to family and friends
30. Host another family cribbage tournament
31. **Host a cheese and wine night when Morgan is in town
32. Have another Disneyland day with Anna
33. Read to Jeremiah daily (1/1001)
34. **Eat at 3 of Anna's favorite restaurants that she's been dying for me to try (0/3)
35. Have dates with Louis at least twice a month (1/66)

Health, Fitness and Appearance
36. Take a folic acid supplement every day (1/1001)
37. Wax my eyebrows once a month for a year (0/12)
38. **Paint my toenails twice a month for 6 months (0/12)
39. **Make a fresh loaf of bread once a week for two months (0/8)
40. Try cooking one new recipe a week for 3 months (0/12)
41. **Purchase produce ONLY from our local farmer's market for a month
42. **Plant an herb garden, including the following herbs: basil, rosemary, thyme, parsley, mint, cilantro and chives
43. **Grow tomatoes this summer
44. **Learn to style and curl my hair
45. Make a conscious effort to wear makeup daily
46. Donate clothes to Goodwill
47. Exercise three times a week for a month (0/12)
48. Take a multivitamin every day (1/1001)
49. Buy 5 new dresses (0/5)
50. Make homemade chicken stock and freeze it
51. Buy 5 pairs of shoes (0/5)
52. Go running with Marissa. Decide on a good mile time goal for myself (_:_) and work at improving my time (best: _:_)

House and Home
53. **Have all dishes washed and put away before bedtime for 3 months (0/90)
54. Purchase curtains or blinds for all rooms of our house (0/5)
55. Organize dresser drawers in our bedroom and maintain that organization
56. Organize kitchen cabinets and maintain that organization
57. **Organize hall closet and maintain that organization
58. Turn our spare bedroom into a guest room, office, activity room or baby room- something other than a storage room
59. Buy a DVD player
60. Plant flowers in our front yard and back yard
61. Learn five new crock pot recipes (0/5)
62. Acquire a Dutch oven
63. Learn 3 Dutch oven recipes (0/3)
64. Learn 5 new cookie recipes (0/5)
65. Learn 5 new muffin recipes (0/5)
66. Learn how to make sushi and host a sushi night
67. Remodel our kitchen
68. Purchase a new refrigerator
69. **Make Ina Garten's (Barefoot Contessa) Cream of Wild Mushroom Soup
70. Paint our bathroom
71. Paint our hallway
72. Paint our kitchen
73. Organize living room bookshelf
74. Frame pictures and hang them on our walls
75. **Subscribe to the LA Times Sunday Edition for one year
76. Replace our living room couch and love seat

Money, Finances and Work
77. Clip coupons from the Sunday paper every week (0/143)
78. Open a bank account for Jeremiah, depositing at least $20 a month upon opening
79. Roll all spare change and deposit it into a college fund for our children

Responsibility and Good Things
80. Have all 2009 Christmas presents, other than those for Louis, Jeremiah, our parents and our siblings, purchased by October 1st
81. Do 15 random acts of kindness (0/15)
82. Get up an hour before Jeremiah 6 days a week for a month (0/27)
83. Spend an afternoon watching all of my favorite Disney movies
84. **Get my wisdom teeth pulled

Spirituality
85. Read the Bible cover to cover (Current book: )
86. **Find a home church in Whittier and attend regularly
87. Contribute to the children's ministry in our new church
88. Start a prayer journal

Travel and Places to Go
89. Go on a cruise
90. Travel to 3 new places, at least one of those requiring a plane ride (0/3)
91. Take at least 3 child-less trips with Louis, consisting of at least 3 nights each (0/3)
92. Renew Disneyland pass before the 1001 day deadline (Expiration date: January 21, 2010), and, if needed, purchase a pass for Jeremiah as well
93. Spend the night at Coronado Island with Louis
94. Eat at a Greek restaurant
95. Go to Six Flags, without kids
96. Attend a concert either at the Disney Concert Hall or the Hollywood Bowl
97. Attend an LA Philharmonic "Concert in the Park" at the Arboretum this summer
98. Visit Uncle Ken and Aunt Jean in Virginia
99. Take Jeremiah to the Children's Museum in Los Angeles (If it's still around? If not, find another hands-on children's musem and take him there instead)
100. Spend an afternoon in Hollywood
101. See a live musical

He's been gone 10 minutes...

2009-03-14T21:20:00.001-07:00

... and I miss him like CRAZY. Jeremiah, that is!

Tonight we celebrated my birthday with my family (a day early! ) so that tomorrow Louis and I could go to Disneyland, just the two of us. We had a wonderful evening of conversation and yummy dinner, followed by some amazing presents =) My parents took Jeremiah home with them, and he will be there until Monday morning when I go to work for my mother. (I have the next two weeks off from babysitting- sweet!!!). My parents left roughly 10 minutes ago... and the house feels so empty. I long for times of solitude when he is napping or in bed for the night, and count down until he gets babysat with earnest, when the time comes for him to be gone for a day or two- I MISS MY LIL GUY!!

Now, I"m not one of those mothers who refuses to go on trips without her children. My mother in law was like that, even going so far as to bring her kids on company cruises where children were explicitly NOT invited; spouses only. It was very rare that my husband and his sister were allowed to spend the night at their cousin's house or their grandmother's, if ever. Jeremiah has already had a handful of overnight trips to grandma and grandpa's house, for mine and Louis's anniversary last year, when I had my miscarriage, and a few other one-night trips. I love the time alone with my husband... but I find myself going into Jeremiah's room, playing with his toys after a while. The house isn't the same without him there. I can't wait to go on Splash Mountain tomorrow... and I REALLY can't wait for Monday morning when I can give my lil man a hug!

Anyway, my night is far from being over. Despite the fact that we are meeting Louis's grandfather at Disneyland at 9 am, Louis and I are going out to a club in Fullerton to celebrate his close friend Javi's birthday (Javi was our best man). Louis's grandpa is going to sign Louis into the park with his lifetime annual pass, which is good not only for him but 3 other people per visit. We aren't leaving our house for another hour- which means we'll get to the club by 11:00-ish. Javi and his friends won't be done eating their dinner at BJ's until shortly before that. Now, I'm no night owl (I'm ready for bed NOW in fact!), I hate clubs, I HATE dancing, and I hate spending tons of money on drinks. Oh, and I hate taking care of my husband when he drinks. And I hate driving late at night (I"m probably going to be the Designated driver). But, it's one of my husband's best friends (and one of his few friends that I really like!! Javi's awesome) so we have to go. Louis had me call up Marissa and invite her to come along, and she's more than willing. She likes this kind of thing, and usually keeps me company when Louis's friends have parties. I'm trying to be a good sport about things, because lets face it- my husband has spoiled me immensly yesterday and today with presents (a new set of Mac makeup yesterday- my first set everrrrrrrrrrrr and I love it! There's no going back to Maybelline now!) and a rather healthy Barnes and Nobles gift card. Plus he's taking me to Disneyland tomorrow, which he really doesn't like going to, especially on crowded days like it's probably going to be. So I have to do this for him- with the stipulation that we stay no more than an hour and a half! =)

I think it's safe to say that this birthday definitely tops my birthday last year. My grandma Arlene passed away 3 days before my birthday, and per my grandma's wishes of being buried on a weekend (because she hates imposing on people to take time off of work, and our pastor doesn't do funerals on Sundays for obvious reasons) we were left with having her funeral actually on THE DAY OF my birthday. Definitely the worst birthday ever. My grandpa Hector (mom's dad- Arlene was my dad's mom) passed away on teh same day as my Grandma Arlene, 7 years prior, but his funeral was the day AFTER my birthday. So it was a rough birthday but not as bad as last years.

So here's to 26 being an amazing year!!!

(Oh, and happy 28th birthay, Ryan! Wish we were there celebrating w/ you and Stephanie in Chi-town. Take care, cousin!!)

I KNEW He Was A Puppy!

2009-03-13T15:24:00.001-07:00

I call Jeremiah my little puppy on occasion. He is very frisky, curious, and loves to investigate. He has no problem eating cheerios or goldfish that he finds on the floor, and LOVES drinking the water in the bath tub, puppy style. Balls are a favorite toy of his... as is his new child harness- aka THE TODDLER LEASH.

Louis wanted to register for one when we were creating our baby registry. However, at the time I flat out refused. I thought they seemed cruel, confining, and lazy on the part of the parents. I mean, shouldn't you just teach your child to hold your hand and stay put?

And then Disneyland happened.

Now that Jeremiah is walking, he is no longer content being cooped up in his stroller or in my arms for hours on end. As big and crowded of a place that Disneyland is, I refuse to let him walk by himself, unassisted, especially since he does not obey "Come here NOW!" or hold my hand. Plus, with me being half an inch shy of 6 feet tall, I'd have to walk like Quasimoto just to hold his hand (if he were to let me, which he doesn't.). So, following the advice of my neighbor Nicole (Mariah's mommy- Jeremiah's little playmate and "girlfriend") I went to Target and invested $12 in this:

An Eddie Bauer child harness!

The look in Jeremiah's eyes when he realized that he was given a taste of "Freedom" on Wednesday at Disneyland was priceless. If he had stood still for two seconds I would have been able to get a picture! They all came out way too blurry to even bother saving. I think it's safe to say that exploring has officially topped going on Dumbo and It's a Small World, his two favorites. And it was worth every penny. It is not something that I will be using on a daily basis or for every outing, just to huge places like Disneyland and the airport. Places where there are mass crowds that we will be at for longer periods of time and he will need to stretch his legs.

Now we just need to teach him not to eat pieces of food that he finds on the ground at Disney!!

Your thoughts/experiences on child harnesses?

Boo

2009-03-09T21:54:00.000-07:00

I hate David's Bridal. I wasn't thrilled with them when I worked with them for the bridesmaids dresses for my wedding. I gave them business for 11 (yes 11!) girls- 8 bridesmaids and 3 junior bridesmaids. Did my gals get any sort of discount? NO. I didn't order my dress through them . Plus, they ended up screwing up some of the junior bridesmaids accessories, and were rather rude to my 12 year old cousin, who was too big for the junior bridesmaids dresses.

However, I was rather excited with the cute dress that Stephanie and I wound up choosing for my brother and Lindsey's wedding. The 6 regular bridesmaids paired up in twos to choose a dress, and the maid of honor has her own dress. The dress was very classy, fit perfectly without needing alterations, and the price was perfect. We were told that my dress would take 6 weeks to deliver, so in January we had PLENTY of time to order it. I waited until today to order it because I knew I would have extra spending money from babysitting. Its still around 11 weeks til the wedding, and I didn't need any alterations so no problem.

Except that David's Bridal lied.

My dress apparently is a 12 week dress, ordered from overseas. Which would arrive roughly the first week of June. Not by May 23.

I'm pissed.

So now Stephanie, Lindsey and I have to find a time to all get together and go to David's Bridal (by Ontario Mills. An hour from my house). Find another dress that both of us agree on, that isn't one of the other bridesmaids choices. And, more likely than not, fork out more $$ than we were planning on. At least Stephanie hadn't ordered her dress already, too. Then things would really be messed up as far as the pairs of dresses going!

Lindsey and Joe are going to give David's Bridal a piece of their mind.

I hope those bridal consultants are prepared to take them on!

In other news... I made a grand total of $12 at my yard sale on Sunday. I closed shop up around 11:30, getting tired of waiting for non-existant customers. I also have had a terrible bachache since Friday, barely able to walk or lift Jeremiah. I mostly walked like Quasimoto, the Hunchback of Notre Damne over the weekend. I'm fine if I'm sitting down or laying down, and I can walk short distances- but can't be on my feet too much. I cancelled my babysitting for Sydney today. Luckily Sydney's grandma doesn't work Mondays, either, and was happy to have her again. But thank goodness my bachache is now 90% gone.

I'm hoping to take Jeremiah to Disneyland tomorrow after Rayna picks up Sydney. We STILL only have one car (!!) and I hope Louis will be able to lend me the car in the afternoon. I just need to get out of the house, and I know Jeremiah does too.

2009-03-08T10:13:00.000-07:00

(CARA- what happened to your blog?!! )

Well I'm back out here on my front lawn, for day 2 of my yard sale. I wasn't planning on making this a two day event, but I had a few people that came yesterday call me up (getting my # from the ad on craigslist), asking if I could open shop again today. By this time yesterday I was a rich woman. Today- $11 profit. Oh well- it's Sunday, and between church and daylight savings, people aren't moving very fast or early. I'm hoping that after church lets out things will pick up a bit. In all honesty I'm not doing this for the $$ as much as I am to simply get rid of things and make room in our house (and my parents house!) Lots of my college dorm/apartment items sold well yesterday, all of which were being stored at my parents house. They're happy to see the end of that. And with my brother moving out in a few weeks, pending him and Lindsey finding and leasing an apartment, they'll have even more space available. So yes, in an effort to do a little spring cleaning, once again I am sitting on my front lawn, this time with some fresh pan dulce and a glass of milk =)

And now Louis and I are going to run around the front lawn with our precious son!!

Oh what a week!

2009-03-07T10:45:00.000-08:00

Finally the weekend again! I apologize for my lack of blogs as of late, but as you could probably tell from my previous entry, I have a little bit more on my plate than time allows for blogging. As I write this, I am parked outside on my front lawn, having a yard sale. I started lugging things outside around 7 am in the freezing cold, and by 8 am (the official start time I put on craigslist) I had quite the crowd. Things that I never thought would move (such as my "reject" dvds), baby blankets and bibs, stuffed animals and some of my old dishes from college- GONE. Or mostly gone that is. My biggest sellers seem to be my boxes full of old teacher prizes- brand new packages of character pencils, little toys and stuff that I bouoght on clearance from Target for a quarter back in the day- selling them two for $1, pushing them as Easter Basket stuffers. Out of two huge boxes I'm down to one. Right now I have about $100 more in my pockets than I had before ($20 of those dollars being in quarters!) Yes some lady paid in all quarters. That's okay though- all of our change goes into this huge water jug for Jeremiah's future college fund, so it's forcing us to save that money rather than spend it at the Steak Corral tonight or Target next week. Yard sales are a huge thing around here- people have them all the time. Lots of people buy things to send to family in Mexico. I am determined to stay out here until 2:00, or until one of my Craigslist customers comes to pick up some things I set aside for her this week. I LOVE selling things on Craigslist!

This week with Sydney has been a little easier. We have our routine down, I know most of her cues and signals, and Jeremiah has been a bit better with her around. Also, Rayna had a sweet surprise for me on Thursday- my auntie Anne, Sydney's grandma, wanted to babysit her on Friday (and a few other fridays coming up too!) so my weekend got to start a day early. I adore unexpected surprises! Since we are still with one car for the next week (I HATE CAR REPAIRS!!!) I had Louis drop Jeremiah and me off at my mom's house at 8:00 am yesterday. I worked for my mom for a few hours,a nd then she let me use her car while I ran errands w/ Jeremiah. We went to Target and to get his hair cut. I took him to the salon I worked at in college and BOY did he kick and scream!!! his haircut is a teeny bit jagged because of it but at least it's short again. 4 months later. Louis has been saying he would be the one to take him as af ather/son outing but never got around to it. After this very difficult experience I am more inclined to wait for Louis next time!! In retaliation I cut Jeremiah's bangs on Tuesday b/c I was sick of seeing them in his face, figuring the stylist could fix whatever came up crooked. I wish I got a picture of that- his tiny bangs and SHAGGY head of hair! Oh well at least he's presentable now. Jeremiah and I stayed until nearly 10:00 at night. I put him in his pjs and in his crib for bed around 8:00 and he was out like a light. I love how he has his own room there.

The reason Jeremiah and i stayed so late at my parents is because, once again, we didn't get notified of (or invited to!) Louis's uncle Victor's birthday dinner until 20 min. before the event started. I feel so badlyl for Victor- he's an amazing guy and his children do not take the courtesy to invite people in advance! The rest of Louis's family has picked up on that habit as well. I am sick of having to drop everything I am doing and go to a family function just b/c people didn't take the time to notify you in advance. I swear a day or two would be more than an improvement. But yeah with Friday traffic and everything Louis woudln't have had time to come get us- and it was too late for Jeremiah to go to the cheesecake factory anyway. Taking him to a BUSY restraunt on a Friday night, 45 min before his bedtime is a major no no. So my mom and I went shopping while my dad played w/ Jer, then came home for a gourmet dinner of hot dogs and pork and beans! YUM. Sometimes its the comfort foods that taste the best, ya know? Then after we put Jeremiah to bed we watched Hells Kitchen with my dad. I love how irrascible Chef Ramsey can be.

I decided that Jeremiah needed a pick-me-up on Tuesday and took him to California Adventure to watch the Pjxar Play Parade after Sydney left. We met up with m y friend Melissa and her husband, who were there celebrating their anniversary. Jeremiah lit up as soon as we pulled into the parking structure and he saw me take out his stroller. I"m telling you- these fast evening trips are so much more enjoyable for me!! I don't bother with his bulky stroller or diaper bag; just the lightweight fold-up one and a backpack with two diapers, PJs and his dinner (and Goldfish. Never go without the goldfish). After the parade, we went on Its a Small World (which he lit up again when we walked up to the line! I love how he remembers), hit the Pizza Port for dinner, and said goodbye afterwards to my friends. Stopped at the baby care center to change and went home! Since I didn't have the huge stroller we took the tram, which is a luxury for us. I normally don't bother and just walk through Downtown Disney to the entrance if Louis isn't with me. Speaking of Louis... we're leaving Jeremiah w/ my mom next Sunday so Louis and I can go for my birthday! Louis's gpa will get him in for free, and we will have the day to ourselves to go on all MY favorite rides- no more kiddy rides! I"m immensly looking forward to it.

Well that's about all for now. Thanks for reading and check back soon- I will make a point of updating more!!

Adventures in Babysitting!( lots of pics)

2009-02-26T20:21:00.001-08:00

What you see to your right is a rare moment in which both Jeremiah and Sydney are actually happy at the same time and playing nicely together. Usually, one of them is grumpy, crying, needing to be changed/rocked/held/fed/cuddled or unwilling to share his toys/mommy's lap/mommy's attention. Don't get me wrong, Sydney is mostly a happy little gal and Jeremiah (well, used to be always but now sometimes) a happy go lucky toddler. But honestly... this has been a week of adjustment for all three of us. For me- taking care of an infant and a toddler. Figuring out a new routine and schedule for our day. For Jeremiah- not being the center of my attention all day, every day, and having his turf invaded. Having to share his toys and his mother. For Sydney- spending a good chunk of the day away from home, from Mommy, a change in schedule and learning to take a bottle more than once a day. Learning how to be put down if her caretakers hands are needed to feed, change, put down for a nap or cuddle her big cousin. (Or try to pacify his new tantrums!)

I'm praising God from the rooftops that Louis mostly works from home now. His hands are very helpful in the morning feeding Jeremiah his breakfast while I put Sydney down for her first nap, and giving Jeremiah a few minutes of undivided attention here and there as he has free time. I'm also quite thankful that Jeremiah's morning nap (which has pretty much become a rather long nap= his now only nap of the day) and Sydney's longer nap pretty much coincide, and that her afternoon nap falls around his lunch time. Makes things just a smidge easier. What isn't easy is trying to teach a 15 month old to share his (or Sydney's!) toys (if that's even possible!) I honestly have no clue how to go about that one. Any and all advice would be greatly appreciated. I feel so badly for Jeremiah. He's kind of lost in his own little world most of the day, playing by himself and occasionally glaring at Sydney or myself. I try to include the three of them in games together but with an 11 month age difference and huge developmental milestones between them, it's not easy. He seemed to warm up to her more towards the end of today than he has before, but we still have a long way to go. And neither of them are happy to share my lap- both Sydney and Jeremiah like to be the only one sitting in my lap, not one on each side. Ugh.

But, truthfully, I am enjoying my days with her even though I am always on countdown. I love babies. And I love spending time with my family. I know that eventually Jeremiah and Sydney will develop a friendship and be close cousins but it won't happen over night. Of all my cousin's kids they live the closest to us (their Huntington beach home is about 25 min without traffic away) and we have more opportunties to see them than my AZ cousins and my cousin Kelly and her kids in Fontana. I really like the time I have with Sydney when she's awake and Jeremiah is asleep and vice versa. Babies are so much fun and it's making me even more anxious to get the all-clear to start trying again! Yet after this babysitting experience I am also tempted to wait just a smidge loner so Jeremiah is a little older and can understand more about sharing me and his space.

I have tomorrow off because Sydney has her 4 month check-up. I know it will do Jeremiah a world of good to spend the entire day with just me (and his great grandma Sally for lunch, and Uncle Joe and Auntie Lindsey in the evening! They are babysitting so Louis and I can have a date), and I definitely know he is looking forward to seeing Grandma and Grandpa on Saturday! I miss seeing my parents 3 times a week at my mom's shop. On the weeks where I don't babysit Sydney (3 weeks on 3 weeks off) I'm going to be going back to my mom's shop and she is thrilled. So is Jeremiah. He goes nuts when we pull up to her shop, her house, or when he hears his grandparents voices. So precious

Anyway I'm going to close tonight with a few pictures from the past few weeks! Enjoy!Sorting change with Daddy
Loves his ball pit!
Paws off my vitamin water!
At California Adventure
My Little Model

5:00 A.M.

2009-02-23T05:44:00.000-08:00

That is the time that my alarm went off this morning, determined to get dressed, refreshed and have some time to myself before Rayna drops off Sydney at 6:45 a.m. for my first day of babysitting. Lets just say that I reset my alarm for 5:30 shortly after it went off, and here I am, 15 min. later, dressed, teeth brushed, and watching Apollo 13, praying that Jeremiah stays asleep til his normal 6:15-6:30 time. Even though I'm exhausted right now at this very early hour, I'm also very glad that I took my mother's advice about getting up earlier than I planned to get some "me" time.

Anyway, so yes today starts my big babysitting adventure! Today and tomorrow are half-days; Sydney will be picked up around 12:30. Wednesday starts full-days where I will have her until 3:30ish. Honestly, I have NO clue what it's going to be like watching an almost 4- month old and an almost 15-month old child. I brought out Jeremiah's bouncy seat and some of his old infant toys that I had packed away, and tonight I am going to pick up his swing and play mats from my mother in law's house. She is storing them for us in her garage since ours is being used for Louis's office. From what Rayna was telling me, Syndey is a lot like Jeremiah was at that age, taking cat naps here and there (20 min being a long one!) and loves to be held. I'm sure my blog is going to be filled with lots of hair-raising stories about how my days have been spent!

To make things just a little bit more interesting (because, honestly, isn't normal boring?) this afternoon I am picking up my parent's dog, Candy, to dog-sit for the next three or four days. My parents leave for Vegas tonight for a convention for their business. My brother is going very early tomorrow (try 5 am) after he gets off of work at Target, to help set up the booth, and will come home late that night/early morning. So he won't be around to watch her, let her out and feed her. Now I LOVE my dog to pieces, and so does Jeremiah, but two babies and a dog? Especially when our back yard isn't completely fenced in? Going to be slightly complicated!

Anyway, on Saturday Louis and I went to Paul and Rayna's house for some fantastic homemade sushi and an afternoon of spending time with my cousins. Afterwards, Louis took Jeremiah home and Marissa and I got to spend an evening together! We stayed in Huntington Beach where Paul and Rayna live, and went to Whole Foods for a smoothie, then saw "Confessions of a Shopaholic." Not the most intelectually stimulating movie, but it kept us entertained for two hours. Then we hit up Taco Surf for dinner! Mmmmm. She's coming over tonight so that we can watch the Bachelor finale together. Crossing my fingers for Melissa!!

Anyway, going to get a quick bite to eat. I'll update more as I have time!

Things are about to change =)

2009-02-19T19:47:00.000-08:00

I apologize for my lack of blogging lately. This week has certainly been a busy one for me! Starting on Monday I will be babysitting sweet Sydney (almost 4 months old) 5 days a week for 3 week shifts- three weeks on then 3 weeks off. Because of that, I've been doing my best to get this house in tip top order! I prefer to spend most of my time playing and interacting with my son rather than scrubbing the house all day, every day. Thus, my house is neat but not spotless, and not as organized as I would like it. However, if I were sending my son to somebody's house on a consistent basis for child care, I'd want that house to sparkle! I want to provide that kind of atmosphere for little Sydney. So... I've been cleaning and getting ready for tomorrow when we bring in a HOUSEKEEPER! Yeah yeah, the stay-home mommy and housewife shouldn't technically have one, but everyone deserves a little help every once in a while. The lady we're hiring is one of Louis's employees, who apparently cleans like a pro and wants extra hours of work. If all works out then we are going to hire her on a bi-monthly basis. I'm looking forward to her doing all of our deep cleaning that I've been putting off for some time (cleaning the fridge, mopping, baseboards, etc.).

Anyway, I am sad to announce that I am officially ready for a break from Disneyland. I'm looking forward to taking a break when I'm babysitting Sydney. Jeremiah and I went on Wednesday morning only to find tons of crowds. Apparently several private schools have the entire week off. It took us 20 min. just to get through the main gate, where you show your tickets or your pass. No joke. Since I didn't want to get back on the tram and go home without doing ANYTHING, we went on just a few rides- Peter Pan, Dumbo, It's a Small World and Winnie the Pooh (twice). And Jeremiah flirted shamelessly with Tigger. We left two hours later and had our first playdate with Nicole and Mariah (one week younger than Jeremiah) who live across the street from us. Louis put together Jeremiah's Step 2 wagon and we took the kiddos for a walk, and played outside with Jeremiah's slide and push toys. Those two are simply adorable together! I kid you not, Jeremiah acts totally different around her than with his buddy, Braden. It's like my little man is trying to strut his stuff and act all macho. To all you mommies out there- how do you handle the kiddos not sharing at this age? Taking toys from one another, etc. I know it's darn near impossible to expect 14 month olds to share their toys willingly, but how do you do it? Do you intervene when they take toys from one another or let them work it out?

Tomorrow will mark one week of Louis working from home. It certainly has been a treat seeing my husband more than we normally do, and having him around to play with Jeremiah and actually put him to bed! Jeremiah has completely fallen in love with his daddy the past two weeks, since we came back from Phoenix. All I hear from him is Daddy daddy daddy! I just love seeing the two of them interact with one another, whether he and Louis are wrestling, racing cars down his slide, or Louis is singing him a song before going to bed. However, with Louis being around more also comes the constant requests for sandwiches, drinks... and other things! I swear, all I hear when he has a break is "when does Jeremiah take a nap? Is it his naptime yet???" If you catch my drift. We have to work out some boundaries....

Anyway, I have a few things left to organize before Sandy comes tomorrow. Goodnight everyone!

Valentines Day!

2009-02-15T14:44:00.001-08:00

(Photos in this blog courtesy of my wonderful cousin, Rebecca!)

So yesterday was Valentines Day! Valentines has never been a huuge holiday for us, so I was not surprised when I didn't wake up to flowers and chocolate and a card. However, I was rather annoyed that Louis didn't let me sleep in; rather he got to sleep in. I was exhausted. We had to be at my grandma's house to set up Louis's computer equipment for Joe and Lindsey's engagement party by 12:30 for the 1:00 start time. Louis was going to play DJ for the day. Anyway, I was in a rather bad mood from not being able to sleep in, and the fact that it took Louis 3 (yes 3!) hours to pick up his speakers from his mom's house (10 min away). Little did I know that he was also getting a haircut... and flowers for me! A beautiful half dozen bouquet of red roses. As soon as he walked in the door and I saw those gorgous flowers my bad mood disappeared. I love getting flowers! And I love my sweet husband, and felt guilty for being annoyed when he was really just doing nice things for me. I love the way he looks after a fresh haircut.

Anyway, we had a good time at the party. The food was delicoius! My mom hired the same caterer that we hired for Jeremiah's bday party, except rather than having a taco station, she ordered fajitas. MMM. Plus all those yummy appetizers that we got at Costco the day before. My brother and Lindsey liked (I hope!) the gifts we got them. I swear I always deliberate long and hard before buying presents and then worry that people I give them to don't like them! I got them a photo collage they had on their registry,a nd also a cute chip and dip bowl.

We were planning on going to the Steak Corral with Jeremiah after the party (last Valentines was the first time we had gone), but it was nearly 6:30 when we left the party and we were stuffed, so we just went home. After we put Jeremiah to bed, Louis and I watched "A Walk to Remember" on TV in candlelight. Very romantic =) Not one of my all-time favorite romantic movies, but it was the one we watched on our very first Valentines day. In a drive-in movie theater. So romantic =) So when we found out it was on TV last night, it was very easy to decide what to watch. Tonight we are dropping Jeremiah off at Grandma Bertha's house while Louis and I go to the Outback for dinner! yay for date nights!
Anyway, here are a few pictures from the engagement party:

The Bride and Groom- my handsome brother and future sis!
Jer playing w/ Daddy's glasses

Peace =)

2009-02-13T17:20:00.001-08:00

Okay so obviously this picture is a few months old (see the Christmas tree?) but I wanted to post SOMETHING on here =) Once again I"m guilty of not uploading pictures to my laptop and I'm just too darn comfy to get up of of the couch right now.

Right now my precious lil guy is sound asleep in his crib, after a long, rainy afternoon going to and from Costco. Tomorrow is Joe and Lindsey's engagement party and I went with my mom so that she could get some appetizers and such (I have a membership). He's such a trooper, especially since he has a wunny nowse right now. Much of this has to do with the fact that Grandma was with us. He absolutely adores my parents. I can't say this enough. All day long he asks for Grandpa, and can't get enough of his Grandma when he sees her (which is usually 3 times a week).

Today was Louis's first day working from home for his new job. Jeremiah certainly got a kick out of seeing a lot more of Daddy than he normally does, but as for me? Well if I wasn't being asked for sandwiches and things, I was being shooed out of our garage (where he was working and where our washing machine and drier are!) or being asked for some other favors. Definitely a different sort of routine to get used to.

Another routine to get used to- babysitting Sydney starting a week from Monday! I'm having one of Louis's employees come to our house and deep clean it next week, and possibly hire her on to clean twice a month. I simply do not have time to do all of the detail cleaning (refrigerator, stove, mopping, etc). My theory on housework? Spending time with my son is way more important. As long as it's sanitary and somewhat tidy, the other nitty gritty stuff is not a priority. However, if I were leaving Jeremiah in the care of someone else on a regular basis, you better believe i'd want the house to be SPICK AND SPAN! HEnce the reason for the housekeeper.

Anyway Jer just woke up so I better get going. Have a great weekend!

A bit excessive?

2009-02-11T10:26:00.000-08:00

Two days in a row at Disneyland? I don't think it is! My husband thinks weekly trips are way overdoing it, so I didn't even mention to him that Jeremiah and I went yesterday, too =) I wanted Jeremiah to see the Pixar Play Parade at CA Adventure (only plays Fri-Tues) and he LOVED IT! We only stayed for two hours; I fed him lunch on Main Street, then we did It's a Small World (loving the new additions!), Alice in Wonderland, and Toy Story Mania before the parade. As soon as it was over- diaper change and headed home. As soon as he wakes up from his nap we're headed back for a more thorough day, and a few rides with Michelle and Braden when they arrive at 3:00 =) We'll be heading home by 5:00

Anyway, Jeremiah will be up from his nap soon so I better get dressed and pack the diaper bag!

Home Safe and Sound

2009-02-08T21:15:00.000-08:00

Jeremiah and I got back from Phoenix around 2:30 this afternoon, safe and sound, without any major incidents. While my grandma flat-out refused to give up her car keys the entire drive over on Friday (and it's not like my aunt and I didn't try- repeatedly- to let us drive!), I am praising God that the rain we encountered only lasted up until we reached West Covina, 20 min. into our trip. God had His hands in our drive because, even though it's pretty much a straight trip on the 10, my grandma isn't the most skilled driver as of late. I prayed a LOT. Jeremiah did surprisingly well in the car. Scratch that- he did EXCELLENT. A two hour nap before we reached Blythe (a little more than halfway) and didn't have any real meltdowns until shortly before we got off the freeway to reach my cousin Mike's house. My cousin Jasmine (15 yrs old- daughter of Mike) very graciously gave up her bedroom for Jeremiah and I so that we didn't have to share the basement with my grandma and aunt Jenny. He was so tired that it didn't even matter that he slept in his play pen; he conked out for the entire night, hugging his bear, and then woke up mesmerized with Jasmine's bright, colorful room, her ceiling fan and the closet mirror doors. On the way home my grandma let me drive when we reached Blythe, and Jeremiah was just fine until the last 20 min. Halleluliah. He had such a fun time playing with his cousins, their toys, and seeing the huge geese and ducks that made home in the park where Cheyenne's birthday party was held. He also got a kick out of playing in the jumper with me and swatting bubbles from the huge bubble machine that Mike bought for the party. I had such a wonderful time catching up with my older cousins Paul and his wife Rayna, Mike and his wife Stacy, and my Uncle Bob and Aunt Madeline. We don't see everyone nearly often enough, even though Mike and Stacy are the only ones residing in Phoenix; the rest not too far from where I live. And I just LOVED spending some quality time with Sydney, Paul and Rayna's daughter. Turns out I'm going to be babysitting her starting in two weeks when Rayna goes back to work! I can't wait!! Bummer- I forgot to take my camera out of my duffel bag, so sadly I have no pictures from this fun filled weekend.

This week:
Monday and Tuesday- helping out at my mom's shop, last minute preparations with my mom for my brother and Lindsey's engagement party (Saturday!) There is SO much left to be done
Wednesday- Disneyland! (Surprise surprise). Michelle and her husband will be there with Braden, and we might meet up for a few rides. I won't be staying the whole day
Thursday- Mom's shop, more preparations, purchase engagement party present
Friday- set up for the engagement party (held at my grandma's house)
Saturday- Valentines day and the engagement party!
Sunday- Valentines date with Louis. I feel bad asking anyone to babysit on the holiday so we will go out on the 15th.

Road Trip!

2009-02-05T16:24:00.000-08:00

Tomorrow morning Jeremiah and I are off to Phoenix! Hopefully the rain wont' be too bad, and I especially hope that my grandmother will be true to her word and leave the driving up to my aunt and I. She is a very independent woman who prefers to do all the driving herself (especially since we will be taking her car; it's the most spacious of the three of our cars) and insists on doing most of the driving on road trips. To say that I"m terrified of my grandmother's driving is an understatement. I hate the stereotypes that elderly people are bad drivers, but this is such the case with my grandma. PLEASE PRAY!! We are leaving tomorrow morning around 10:30, hoping to get to Phoenix by 4:00 or so. We would leave earlier, but Mike and Stacy (my cousins that we are staying with and parents of Cheyenne,t he birthday girl) are working until around that time anyway. The rest of the family that is coming are flying out early in the evening. Smart people... but my grandma insists on driving to save money. If we weren't driving then I wouldn't be going. Cheyenne's 5th birthday party is on Saturday and we will be returning on Sunday. If it is raining on Saturday (which it is supposed to be) then the party will be moved from a local park to their brand new house (which we aren't staying at; barely anything is moved there yet and they haven't sold their old home yet). I am really looking forward to having all the kiddos around for Jeremiah to play with, including miss Sydney Anne, who is now 3 months old! I just pray that Jeremiah will be able to sleep alright in a playpen, and won't wake everyone up since we won't be having our own room. He still (once in a blue moon) wakes up around 1:00 a.m. for a sippy and then again between 5:30 and 6:00 a.m. for another sippy, and usually conks right back out, but since we're not at home you never know. I hate staying in other people's homes in situations like this because I hate being an inconvenience to anybody, and I hate maneuvering around other people's homes that I"m not used to being in. I still have yet to hear back from Stacy as to whether or not I need to bring my playpen and high chair or if they still have theirs left from the girls (their youngest being 2 1/2). Hoping that if I need to bring mine, there will be enough room in my grandma's trunk for those things plus our luggage. Oh and Jeremiah's lightweight stroller, and a few toys to occupy him. Mike and Stacy gave me and Rayna (Sydney's mom) all of the toys from their kids for ages 2 and under, so there wouldn't be anything for him to play with over there.

Yesterday we spent the whole day at Disneyland with my friend Melissa. Jeremiah did wonderfully, and had such fun on Pirates of the Carribean, Dumbo, and the Toy Story Mania ride. It was his first trip to California Adventure and he would NOT STOP LAUGHING during that last ride! It was great. I'm so amazed at how brave my little boy is. Pirates scared me so much at his age (okay up until 8th grade I admit I wouldn't go on it!) but with my lil guy- no fear. Chattering through the whole ride. It's precious. I think it's just going to be the two of us next Wednesday, and then the following week we will meet up again with Braden and Michelle.

Anyway there's much to do before tomorrow morning. Have a safe weekend everyone!

I just had to say

2009-02-02T18:16:00.001-08:00

...That I am slightly disturbed by the fact that some people are more concerned with what happened to my other blog or the frequency of my posts than the fact that I had a miscarriage.

I'm taking a blogging vacation for a few days

February!

2009-02-01T18:51:00.000-08:00

Finally, January is over. The worst month of my life. Hopefully it wasn't a predecessor to what is left to come this year. All I can do is trust God that the rest of this year is in his hands. Not always the easiest thing in the world to do, but I am definitely trying.

Tomorrow Jeremiah turns 14 months old. I miss my little guy. I really honestly feel like I have barely seen him this month, which is nuts for me being a stay home mommy. Pregnancy, miscarriage and flu have left him in the caring hands of his grandparents for what I feel like a lot of the month. This month will be different. Louis is picking him up from his mother's house right now. She wanted to spend an afternoon with him, since lets face it, 99.9% of the time he's with my parents, even though she lives 10 min. from us. Honestly, it has nothing to do with her personally; she's just a very busy lady like my husband who works late nights and only takes Sundays off. It was nice to have an afternoon alone with Louis that didn't come about from me being sick. We barbecued carne asada, I made rice and guacamole, and watched (some of) the Superbowl. I can't stand football, and while Louis likes it, he wasn't into either team this year. Mostly we were just enjoying the HD picture on our screen. Our LCD TV has been living in our garage, being used as a monitor for Louis's computer. But since he's getting a new computer for his new job, we decided it was finally time to bring it inside, and tonight we're moving our other tv into our bedroom. I haven't had TV in our bedroom for nearly a year and a half and I"ve MISSED IT! When we switched from Time Warner to Verizon FIOS a few weeks ago, they gave us a DVR box for our bedroom. Not like I even NEED to record anything in there, but it will be nice to have more than just basic cable in our bedroom. While I'm hating the 1,000 channel line up of FIOS (it's so confusing having to re-learn all the channels I love, plus having lots of international, city programming and repeat channels), I"m loving that our package came with HBO and Cinemax. I love movies. I can watch my favorites over and over again, even if I just saw them. I don't keep the TV on too much during the day with Jeremiah, so I indulge during his naps and bedtime.

I really need to get back into taking lots of pictures of Jeremiah. I know these moments won't be around forever. I especially need to get better at uploading the pictures from my camera to my laptop, and lastly to my blog. I'm sorry my posts haven't been very visually appealing lately. I love looking at pics on the blogs that I read, Melissa's being my favorites =)

Anyway, the line up for this week:
Monday and Tuesday: helping my mom at her shop
Wednesday: Disneyland with Melissa (friend from Target, not the photorapher of the fabulous photos I just mentioned). I haven't seen her in over a year and we can't wait
Thursday- very tentative afternoon playdate at California Adventure with Michelle and Braden, but most likely not going to happen until next week. Pack for Phoenix
Friday morning- off to Phoenix with my grandma and Aunt Jenny! We will be there for the weekend to celebrate Cheyenne's 5th birthday party. We're not sure if we're staying at Mike and Stacy's house or at a motel yet; we just have to see how many people from Cali stay at their house. I hope we are able to stay there; I barely get to see the girls (Cheyenne- turning 5 and Kiara, 2 1/2) and Jasmine (15!!!). Plus Jeremiah will have more room to spread out and play than being in a motel room with three other people. We're returning Sunday. I'm going to miss my sweetie but I'm sure he already has plans with his boys lined up.

No more flu

2009-01-30T20:43:00.000-08:00

This is going to be short tonight.

My flu is FINALLY gone. Finally. And Jeremiah is just fine, too. Whatever was the matter with him on Wednesday when he woke up from his nap disappeared as soon as Louis strapped him into his car seat to go see the dr. He was all smiles and laughs (until the examination of course) and did not have a fever or exhibit flu-like symptoms, but the dr. prescribed some medicine, just in case (and said I could take it too! But in a larger dosage of course). Today was the first day I have felt well since Tuesday. I'm so grateful that my brother babysat, without Lindsey, yesterday for me so I could get well! Not that I am happy that Lindsey was not there; I'm just trying to emphasize what a feat this was for Joe. Jeremiah worships his Uncle Joe, but Uncle Joe has never technically been left alone with him before. Yesterday Joe managed to not only diaper my son (a first), feed him lunch (only one container of stage 2 but what can you do) and PUT HIM DOWN FOR A NAP (I was worried about this one b/c Jeremiah hates the crib at my mom's house!) but they also had some other secret, hysterical adventures that I'm sure none of us will ever know about. My mom came home to find the two of them hanging out in the garage. Oh I wish I could have sneaked a peek. When it was time for Joe to leave for work my mom closed shop and took over. God bless my family. I felt so lazy staying in bed or on the couch all day, watching Juno a total of 3 times yesterday (but only being awake for one of those times) on HBO, among other things. But the day of rest was well worth it. Praise God I am well!

I also wanted to say hi to Theresa, Joe and Lindsey's friend from church and the mother of Levi, Jeremiah's co-ring bearer for the big day. Thanks for reading!

Anyway, my sweet husband just walked in with Subway so we are going to eat and call it a night =)

My lack of judgement...

2009-01-28T18:22:00.000-08:00

I'm kicking myself right now. Or at least as well as I can when I'm battling the flu. Last night I had horrible body aches, an upset stomach (but didn't throw up) and a fever. I woke up with a normal temperature and a body that, miraculously, felt whole and new. I decided to keep my playdate at Disneyland with Michelle and her son today. Boy, what a mistake.

We didn't even make it on one ride. We were just about to climb in the submarines to go on Finding Nemo, and I had to run out of line (with Jeremiah; I wasn't thinking enough to think to leave him with Michelle; although two 14 month olds is a ton of work with only two hands!), ran to the bathroom and got sick. Jer was in his stroller at the time, and even though we were in the disabled handicapped stall, he was still closer to me than I would have liked. On the way to the restroom, I ran into my brother's good friend (son of my mom's best friend) whom I haven't seen in years, and his adorable 3 1/2 year old son (whom I'd never met before). He must have thought I was nuts, pretty much just saying hi and bye to him while he was trying to get a "catch up" in.

Needless to say, we left Disneyland afterwards. I was well enough to go take my picture for my pass (since the line was out the door when I arrived- thankfully no line when I went back), and made it home in one piece, feeling better after my little incident. However, about an hour ago, Jeremiah woke up from a nap, screaming like a banshee, doubled over in pain. Louis just took him to the doctor's and I pray to God that he is able to be seen before they close. Otherwise- to the hospital. Jeremiah must have passed his stomach bug (see prior entry) onto me, and when I passed it back to him today he got it in a much stronger form. All this could have possibly been prevented had we stayed home today rather than go to Disneyland, and I could have gotten sick in the comfort of my own home, with him in his crib rather than two feet away. Although he might have gotten sick anyway because I can't resist kissing him all day long. I swear to God that if I hadn't felt one million percent better this morning and on my way to Disney that we, without a doubt would NOT have gone. now its all a mess and I feel like the worst (sick) mother in the world

My poor lil guy

2009-01-26T19:41:00.000-08:00

Poor Jeremiah hasn't been feeling too well since Friday. At first he was constipated, and somehow that turned into the complete opposite of constipation, if you catch my drift. He's pretty much been confined to the BRAT diet (bannanas, rice, apples and toast) since Saturday night and banned from his beloved milk, which seems to irritate his tummy more. Yesterday he was miserable for the first half of the day, but perked up after his second nap in time to go to my parent's house for dinner. Today he seems to feel fine, but still has some minor issues after eating. We've had to resort to force feeding him some pedialite and water with a medicine dropper because he flat out refuses to drink it by himself, in his sippy or a regular cup. I feel badly for him, but what can you do? The last thing I want is for him to wind up in the hospital, dehydrated and attached to an IV. I hate IVs. It hurt worse than my epidural when I was giving birth to him. I don't want him to have to go through that. So...we shall continue to pin him down and squirt yucky liquid into his mouth while he's crying =(

So on Saturday all of us bridesmaids went shopping for our dresses for my brother and Lindsey's wedding. I have to say that I am very pleased with the dress. The original plan was for all 7 of us to have our own dress in the same color, but with 7 girls of various sizes and shapes, and not a huge array of "must have" choices, you're bound to have girls that want the same dress. So rather than duking it out, the six regular bridesmaids paired up to choose the same dress (3 dresses for 6 girls) and the maid of honor, who didn't like any of our choices anyway, has her own dress. I wound up hitting it off with Lindsey's friend Stephanie (who, I didn't realize at the time, was the only other mother in the group!) and we chose a very cute dress. We were trying to decide between two dresses, and wound up choosing the cheaper one of the two because we couldn't pick which one we liked best. Lindsey thinks the other dress makes my butt look good... but my husband thinks it looks good all the time =) It did have a really cute "butt ruffle" as Lindsey calls it... but the way I look at it, the less $$ I have to spend on my dress, the more $$ I have for presents for her showers. (I tend to go a little nuts shopping for showers). Or to put towards the shower I'm throwing her. So it evens out in the long run =)

On Wednesday Jeremiah and I have a playdate at Disneyland with Michelle and Braden. Yay! I swear I've been counting down to going back since I arrived at home from our trip last week. And scouring the weather reports like crazy (sunny!!!). As far as I remember, we don't have anything else too exciting going on this week, but next Wednesday we're going back to Disneyland with my friend Melissa. We used to work at Target together and she has a pass, too =). It seems like Wednesdays are going to be our Disneyland days for some reason. Then on Friday, Jeremiah and I are going to Phoenix for the weekend with my grandma. My cousins Mike and Stacy are throwing their daughter Cheyenne's 5th birthday party at their home for a change, rather than driving out here like they always do (all the relatives from both sides live here). We are staying until Sunday. I've never been to their house in Phoenix before and am looking forward to the weekend away... but not to the drive. I honestly have no clue how Jeremiah will handle 5-6 hours in the car. We've never been on the road that long. But I guess it will be an indicator of how our flight to Washington, DC will be in April! And he'll be sitting on our lap then... oh boy.

Anyway, it's Monday. That means the Bachelor and the Secret Life are on. Goodnight!

Friday!

2009-01-23T15:28:00.001-08:00

The weekend is here! Even though I don't work (I don't consider helping my mom "work" since it's just for a few hours a week and I like it!) I still get excited for the weekend. Louis and I usually go out to eat at least once and, even though he doesn't take Saturdays off, we usually see more of each other on the weekends than during the week. Tonight I'm going to be ambitious and make some spaghetti. I bought a jar of vodka sauce from Trader Joe's when I went for all my pregnancy snacks, and I'm going to cook that with some ground turkey and pasta. Should be yummy... I rarely (and I mean rarely) cook a big meal like this anymore. Louis's arrival every night is so unpredictable- as early as 6 or as late as 11:00. I don't even bother because I don't want to cook late at night or have food just sit around growing gooey and yucky. We'll eat light for dinner during the week and either go out to dinner on the weekends, or I'll cook. I love to cook! I can't wait for him to start working from home in a few weeks with his new job =) Then it will be yummy dinner every night! And hopefully Jeremiah will finally be off of baby food and can partake in the meals as well. He refuses to eat anything that isn't pureed baby food other than bread products and cheese. Picky, picky.

This weekend's going to be a busy one. Tomorrow afternoon I am going to David's Bridal with my wonderful soon-to-be sister to go bridesmaids dress shopping! OOOOH boy! Lindsey, it just dawned on me that your wedding is four months from today! Four months! We need to set a date for your lingere shower =) Anyway, so that's tomorrow afternoon, and on Sunday we're going to my parent's house for dinner.

Not much else is new between Wednesday and now. Have a great weekend, everyone!

We Made It!!!

2009-01-21T19:30:00.001-08:00

Yes folks, Jeremiah and I finally made it to Disneyland today! I am (almost) the proud first-time owner of a Disneyland pass. Almost? How does that work? Well, it just so happens that when I went to pay for my pass today, I realized that my poor debit card was sitting at home, by my computer, having just paid some bills online. However, thanks to miraculously having enough cash on me to purchase a two-fer ticket (where you visit one park one day and go to the other park for free next time, within a month) and some new policies (which I still don't understand completely), I am able to put the $ I paid for my two-fer ticket towards my season pass when I return to go to California Adventure. The only loss from today was the $ I paid for parking. Had I been able to pay for my season pass today, the $12 (yes $12- it costs more to park your car at Disney than to watch a movie!) I paid for parking would have gone towards my parking pass. Now I have to pay for it again. A small price for absentmindedness.

I woke up around 6:00 this morning, after Jeremiah's first morning sippy (where he goes back to bed for another hour or so) and scoured the weather reports on the news and online. It appeared that the rain that was supposed to come around noon was going to hold off until 3:00 minimum. I really (and I mean REALLY) wanted to get out of the house today (and go to Disneyland!) so I decided to arrive at Disneyland around an hour before it opened (which was 10:00) so that I'd have enough time to purchase my pass and get a few hours in before possible sprinkles hit. It couldn't have worked out better. We had less than 5 minutes of rain the whole time I was there, and when I decided that we did enough Disneyland for the day, it was still warm and semi-cloudy. The gush of rain has yet to fall. God is Good!!

Needless to say, Jeremiah and I had a wonderful time today. The only difficult part about braving Disneyland by yourself with a 13 1/2 month old is getting on and off the merry go round. I was rather leery of having Jeremiah sit by himself on it, even if I was holding him while I stood, so we had to ride together. It was quite difficult to get on and off the darn horse but I did. Twice. The crowds weren't horrible; we went on tons of rides, some twice. The only ride we didn't make it on that I wanted to was Nemo; the line was nearly half an hour long by the time we made it over there. I really feel that Jeremiah and I made up for all the lost time between us from the past few weeks of chaos and sadness. We were with each other the whole day, and if he wasn't in his stroller he was in my arms. I love that little guy so much. We had a ball. His favorite ride this time was Dumbo and his favorite character was Tigger. I can't wait to take him back; Michelle and I might take the boys next week. If not... well I'm going to take Jeremiah myself again! I really want to make the most out of the slower season before it gets crowded with spring breakers and summer vacationers. Besides, I"m definitely not a fan of going to theme parks in extreme heat conditions. This weather was perfect. Enjoy some photos of today!

Dumbo

TeacupsJer Jer and Mommy
Tigger

Jeremiah made some new friends

Will We EVER Make It??? =(

2009-01-20T19:34:00.000-08:00

I swear, it must not be in the cards for Jeremiah and I to make it to Disneyland and get a pass. This will be the third week in a row that I have planned on taking him and it most likely will not happen. Two weeks ago I was going to go with Michelle and Braden, but then Braden got sick and I found out I was pregnant. Last Friday.... well you know what happened. I was planning on taking Jeremiah tomorrow or Thursday until I saw the weather report for Wednesday -RAIN. For the rest of the week. When I saw the weather report on Monday I planned on taking him today, until my mom reminded me that I had my doctor's appointment today. I'm hoping the rain will let up by Friday... if it doesn't I'm going to go nuts! I need some sort of positive distraction right now. Marissa was going to meet up with us at Downtown Disney to have lunch when she got off of work on Thursday, but now we're going to have to move our lunch to somewhere else. Unless it's pouring, and I can't take Jeremiah out at all.

I've missed my son terribly lately. Between his weekend at my parent's house last weekend and various doctors appointments left and right, I feel like I've barely seen him. He learned how to say "grandma" (Amma!) and "grandpa" (Abba!) last weekend. Very loudly and very strongly, and directed at the right people. All we have to do is pull into their driveway now and he starts shouting those names from the rooftops. My lil guy is growing up. And just tonight he figured out how to fill his drippy cup with water in the bathtub and watch it drip out (although most of it tips out). Tomorrow I want to teach him how to color. He's at that wonderful age where he's like a sponge and I can't wait to put my teaching skills to good use on him. He absolutely adores it when I sing the ABC song, and this song where I count to 20 to the tune of "Brother John." They're tied with the Itsy Bitsy spider for his favorite. Now if only he would sit still for a story... at least he loves to go through big board books on his own.

As far as everything else... I can tell that this pain just isn't going to go away as quickly as I thought it would (or thought it did). I thought I was over it... until I got to the doctor's office today, and realized that the nurse I was on the phone with all day on Friday didn't put it in my charts what happened and I had to tell my OB why I was back after only a week, and stop the nurse that weighed me and took my vitals from double checking my due date. Between that and being locked up in a waiting room full of pregnant women (half of them being teenage girls confirming a pregnancy or receiving prenatal care), I almost started crying several times. However I was able to hold it in until I got home. I'm going to have to be careful to control my emotions and my temper. I can tell I'm getting rather snappy with Louis, going off for the smallest things. I let the person in the drive-through at McDonalds have it tonight (granted they were really rude to me first!) and I think they got a silent revenge on me by not putting the lid on my soda on properly, and half of my soda wound up in my lap on the drive home.

Anyway, Louis is on his way home. We're going to cuddle up and watch a movie. Anything to distract me right now is a blessing. By the way... even though I didn't cast a vote for Obama today, I felt really proud that he is our president when I was listening to/watching the coverage today. I can't wait to see those girls grow up the next few years and see what God has in store for this country. Goodnight!

With apologies

2009-01-19T20:58:00.000-08:00

To those faithful readers who do check in every day, I'm sorry I haven't been around much this past week. I have had a lot on my plate lately with helping my mom out at her shop, Jeremiah, pregnancy... and something else. I'm not broadcasting this all over Myspace or Facebook, but since I did mention on here that I was pregnant, I guess I have to announce that I had a miscarriage on Friday. No, it's not something I really want to talk about, but Louis and I are both doing alright (emotionally, or as alright as to be expected- we've come to terms with it but it's still sad) and I am doing okay physically, pending a trip to see my OB tomorrow. We are also looking forward to trying again sometime in the near future. Thank you to all of our family and friends who knew what was going on and were praying for us. We know that God has a plan for our family and feel very confident that our family is not done growing yet.

So, since I obviously didn't make it to Disneyland on Friday, (God had his hand in that one, too- I don't know what I would have done if I were alone at Disneyland with Jeremiah when my miscarriage happened!) I am going to try and take him one day this week. Rain is in the forecast for Wednesday and Thursday, but my mom thinks that it's not supposed to rain until the evening on Wed. Hopefully I will get our trip in during the morning; if not then Friday. And on Saturday, I have the pleasure of going bridesmaids dress shopping with my soon-to-be sister, Lindsey! All 7 of us bridesmaids are meeting with Lindsey at Davids Bridal to fight for (er.... graciously choose!) which dress we each want to wear for the wedding. All of us get to wear whatever dress we want, as long as it's floor length and in her choice of color, preferably with each of us wearing a different dress. Lindsey is truly a girl after my own heart- I had 8 bridesmaids, she had 7.

To be honest... I'm not really in the mood to blog tonight; I just noticed that I had a request for an update and I'm more than happy to oblige. Louis and I just got back from treating my parents and brother to dinner in honor of my dad's birthday (Happy birthday, dad!) at this wonderful Japanese restraunt, and as soon as I can pry him in from his cave, we are going to watch "The Secret Life of the American Teenager." Yes, he is still anxious to watch it every week, despite what he said before the season premire. Check back soon, and perhaps I will include some pictures! Those are highly overdue. Goodnight!

It's Back!

2009-01-13T21:06:00.001-08:00

American Idol was Jeremiah's favorite show last year. There were a few nights towards the end of the season (pre-crying it out days) where he would be up around 9:30 pm and would NOT go back to bed. An hour of watching American Idol on our projector did the trick! He was mesmerized; he LOVED the music, and went to sleep peacefully afterwards. Tonight is the premire and I"m watching it as I write this. I'm not personally a fan of the whole audition process; I like it when the competition gets serious, maybe around the final 8 or so.

Anyway, today I had my first official prenatal appointment. I met my new OB/GYN and I love her to pieces! She's so patient, takes her time to let me think about questions rather than rushing me in and out, and was a heck of a lot gentler with the initial internal examination than my other OB! She changed my due date by one day to September 4th. So far it's looking like our baby could be sharing a birthday with several people. My friend Ashmi's birthday is September 4th; my grandma Arlene's birthday was September 7, grandma Sally's birthday is Sept. 14, and my brother's birthday (and parent's anniversary!) is Sept. 15. Somewhere in the midst of all this is my uncle Ken's birthday, Lindsey's mother's birthday, and I believe her father shares Joe's birthday as well. All I had done today was the internal examination (pap), but I go back in 4 weeks to hopefully hear the heartbeat. My dr. didn't even try to listen for it today; I believe at 6.5 weeks it is still too early.

I'm still hungry (more like famished!) nearly all day long. I don't want to use pregnancy as an excuse to eat like a pig, so I've been making sure I'm just eating regular meals with a few small snacks and plenty of fluids. I'm way hungrier this time around than I was with Jeremiah. Tomorrow I'm going to Trader Joe's to stock up on lots of yummy (and healthy) pregnancy snacks.

And on Friday... I'm getting my very first Disneyland pass! I was debating on whether or not to get it any more once I found out I was pregnant, but it dawned on me that this will be my last time to get one for a while. I don't want to take a newborn to Disneyland with a two year old (next year!), and not only will walking around Disneyland provide me with lots of exersize, it will be a good way for Jeremiah and I to have some really good quality time before he becomes a big brother. And bond even more with his buddy, Braden! I'm so glad Michelle has a pass as well; we're going to have the most awesome playdates. Louis refuses to get a pass... and is pretty against me getting one, but I'm putting my foot down on it =)

Anyway, back to American Idol. Goodnight and thanks for reading!

September 5, 2009

2009-01-11T16:42:00.000-08:00

That's right, Jeremiah is going to be a big brother- I'm PREGNANT! I'm so excited I can hardly stand it. I found out on Wednesday night(the 8th), and even though it has been a work in progress for a while, it was still somewhat of a surprise to find out that indeed, I was pregnant. I took a test on New Years day and it came up negative, but when a week went by and still nothing was happening, I figured I'd better test again. I was praying it was positive because, of course, I wanted another child, but also because I was hoping that my sudden chocolate obsession was normal. I wanted choclate 24/7. I was even dreaming of chocolate, believe it or not. I polished off a piece of molten chocolate cake last Saturday in a matter of minutes, and scarfed down an entire half-pound box of Sees candy, by myself, in less than an hour. I didn't have food cravings like this with Jeremiah. Now that I know I'm pregnant, I'm staying away from the chocolate- because, no matter how much I may want it, I want tons of post-pregnancy baggage even less.

That's not the only thing that is different with my pregnancy this time around. My reaction alone to seeing the positive pregnancy test was a big one. When I found out I was expecting Jeremiah, I yelled out a big "OH SHIT!" upon reading the pregnancy test, even though it was a work in progress as well. I was scared out of my mind finding out that we were indeed going to be parents and my life was about to change forever. I was up until 4 a.m. that night, panicking and worrying, and didn't even feel the least bit excited until the following day when we got a doctor's pregnancy confirmation and estimated due date. This time? I'm surprised Louis's friend, who was working in our garage when I took my test, didn't hear my screams of joy. Louis wasn't home at the time, so I ran into Jeremiah's room, screaming in elation, and telling him over and over "you're going to be a big brother!" Poor guy must have thought I was nuts. I was so excited that it was a miracle that Jeremiah was fed, bathed and put to bed without a hitch. Louis didn't come home until a few hours later, and when he did, his cousin Monique was with him, wanting a little bit of girl time with me. Ironically enough, she mentioned that night that she thought we should start trying for another kid so they would be close in age. I bit my tongue- hard! Finally, she left and I had Louis go find the "present" that Jeremiah and I bought him at Target on our pillow- the positive test. Just like when I told him I was preggers with Jeremiah, he was THRILLED and instantly swept me off my feet. We told the family the following day. I purchased a "Big Brother" shirt for Jeremiah at Babies r Us and let our moms read it and try to figure it out. Needless to say, everyone's excited. Our kiddos are going to be 21 months apart!

I went to the doctor's on Friday to start my bloodwork and paper work (medical history, etc.) I am using a different OB/GYN this time around, because the one we had before is in West Covina, and since we now live in Whittier, it is pointless to drive 30-40 min. each way for appointments and the delivery. We have a fantastic hospital just blocks from our house. In fact, I can see it from our yard, and that is where we are going to deliver Baby #2 (Whittier Presbyterian). I get to meet my OB on Tuesday when I go in for my physical. I heard that she's a woman (YAY! no more 85 year old man looking at me!!!) and is very, very sweet. She won't be delivering my baby because she works out of the other (crappier, from what the nurse told me) hospital in Whittier, but the nurse also said that the doctor who will deliver me also comes highly reccomended. The office I'm going to is the same office that I take Jeremiah for his pedi appointments. It's going to be a bit of a challenge to find a sitter for him during my appt's, since my mom is half an hour away and both Louis and his mother work late. I'm praying that Monique will be able to watch him during my appointments because her house is right down the street from the office.

Okay, before I completely bore you with my pregnancy excitement, I'm going to say that, once again, we will NOT be finding out the gender of our baby. I could go either way on the issue, but Louis loves being surprised. In all honesty, it was a lot of fun with Jeremiah, even though that motherly intuition told me towards the end that he was a boy. PRAY for a girl!!! I'd be happy with a son, but I would LOVE a daughter. Thanks for reading and sharing in our exciting news!!

Tune in tomorrow...

2009-01-10T21:10:00.001-08:00

.... for a BIG post!

♥, Me!