Aphonic Me.

What a lovely weekend...minus all the sinus/throat ick that was going on. However, it was still fun and all the denial that I did that maybe I wasn't feeling the best worked. Ish. Friday night my Dad & Susie came into town just before Morgan went to bed (rather late b/c she was really excited to see them) and then Adam came home in the wee hours of the morning b/c he missed a connecting flight. No worries, he came home safely and that's what matters.

I must say (and yes, this post will likely be all over the place and make no sense) I am VERY excited for the potential snow day/early out/late start (whatever I'll take it!!) coming up on Tues/Wed. Best case scenario? Two-day snow day. Worst case? Nothing. I'm shooting for a happy medium and maybe we'll get an early out and snow day. Who knows. Bring it on, Mother Nature!

We had a really nice time with my parents here. They enjoyed spending time with us and were excellent babysitters for us Saturday night when we went to the Annual Chili Cook-off at the Voss'. A great time was had by all and the chilis were all YUMMY. There was even a dessert chili that involved brownies, marshmallows, nuts, and tons of chocolate. Adam did a little too well at beer pong but all in all it was a great night.

I am not very audible today. I can talk but am rather squeaky and breathy and overall aphonic at times. Hopefully this subsides before I have to talk to tiny humans tomorrow and help evaluate them to determine their level of services needed, if any. :)

Still thinking about my potential snow days. You bet. Thank you in advance local and even national news stations for blowing this storm up ahead of time and making everyone nervous.

Dancing...Morgan's starting to come into her own a little with dancing. This weekend she started dancing with her hands up in the air instead of out in front of her and flying from side to side in a circle shape. Who knows where she'll go next. I don't have much to teach her. Maybe she could learn from her friend, Cammie...what do you think, Abbie? :-P

Today I cooked a turkey we had in the freezer to make room for all the rest of Adam's venison from his deer this year. It was really good and thankfully I had Susie-cooker-woman there so she could give me tips on using the entire turkey to make an awesome base for the turkey soup I made all afternoon. YUM. (sheesh, tons of good food this weekend = eek for the scale tomorrow). Not that I care. I had an awesome food weekend. :)

Adam just asked me how I'm going to "do my therapy" if I can't talk. Good question.

I think it's apparent that I'm rambling now so off I go to watch the rest of this National Treasure whatever movie that Adam turned on. It's good. But the suspense is what I like more...or maybe the brain teaser part of it. Nerd. :)

L.O.V.E.

So somewhere between the dry/erase crayons, babies being fed and crying, going in/out of the princess tunnel, reading 15 books only half-way through b/c none of them were Brown Bear Brown Bear, I realized (yet again) with an almost bursting sensation that I love Morgan more than anything in the whole world (don't worry - Adam's right next to her).

This happens to me every once in a while but especially after she's had a big spurt of growth or genius or something awesome. I was sort of taking a step back and just watching her flit about the play room from one toy/activity to another, putting her babies to bed, patting them on the back when they cry, feeding them and making little mouth noises while they were "eating" ... and it hit me like a ton of bricks that she's the most amazing thing I've had a chance to watch grow from nothing. Next to? Watching our relationship go from friends, to best friends, to dating (for.eh.ver.), to engaged, to married. To married with dogs (easy). To married with kid (extremely taxing yet awesomely rewarding). So watch me get all mushy and lovey and think my kid and husband are the B to the O to the M to the B. It's cool. I know you all in my position anywhere, kid(s) or spouse or whatever, have felt this way or you are a dead cold rock. :) Or something.

And just like that I ran out. Wait, there IS something. Yesterday I went to a meeting about how the AEA I work for is going to do their RIF (reduction in force) starting the next contract year (July 1). I am pretty sure I'm safe, but unfortunately part of the RIF will be determined by seniority and in my opinion (strong...opinion) I'd love to see them take a good long hard look at job performance (keep in mind I do not feel like Super SLP by any means). For fear of this part of my post getting in the wrong hands, let's just say that there are some people in this agency who are doing more harm then good (hello, who is normal/FT and gets to come in at 10am and leave at 3? That's a 5 hour day WITH a lunch hello). 'Nuff said. The end. Or so we hope. There may be a solution but we're just going to wait and see. More later.

I'm tired. I was exhausted by 8:23pm after I'd cleaned two bathrooms, put meat in the freezer from the "outdoor freezer" (thank you garage), cleaned up (rats, just realized I didn't do sippy cups)...so I will eat my grapefruit and crawl into bed after seeing this new show I found about three couples? Anyone? A name? Ah, thank you DVR - it's called Perfect Couples. Hopefully it's my next Friends show. Who am I kidding, there will never be another, right Steph and D? :)

15 Month Well Check

I have a giant child. Or maybe just a slightly larger than average child. Unless we're talking about her noggin, that is. Results of Morgan's 15 month well check today:

• Head Circumference (putting on a "headband pretties" while measuring) : 90th percentile
• Height : 31.5" : 75th percentile
• Weight : 24.04lbs : 70th percentile

She did very well. Biggest shocker? NO tears or even pouty lip for checking in her ears. This is even more surprising b/c she was just at the doctor on Monday and should easily have remembered. I was given advice on how to finally get rid of (or at least treat) her dry spots on her back so we should be good to go there. No shots this time as a result of the revaccination crap we've had to deal with. When asked about how things are going with monitoring the vaccines now, Dr. Frye said they got a better fridge a while ago and just last week got the top of the line one and it's pretty sweet. I don't care as long as I don't have to double vaccinate my kid ever again. Because if I do as a result of this office's mistake, we're outtie and I'm going to raise some hell. Just sayin'.

Tonight for dinner, we went out with some friends to the local mom/pop place for a quick cheap dinner b/c I absolutely didn't feel like cooking or leftovers. Morgan ate an entire stadium-sized hot dog (bunless), a few fries, some raisins, milk, corn...starving child? No, I'd say recovering from ick child.

PS. If I suddenly start making no sense b/c I'm simultaneously watching Chase and writing this and I'm on the edge of my seat b/c it's a really good one...seriously. Shaking and scared and everything. Like it's not obvious that she's going to make it out ok...otherwise the series would be over. Silly me.

Really this means I should just stop and watch that while having a brownie sundae, right? Thank you pause for live TV and everything that makes my brownie sundae possible. YUM.

The day of the Doctor

I spent a good portion of my day in the doctor's office today for almost all of my family. Thankfully all puppies were healthy and they didn't need to go to the "doctor." :)

Adam's endoscopy went very well this morning. Long story short he has an inflamed esophagus and it is already improving with the meds that they started him on last week. The doc took several biopsies and we'll have those results next week. It didn't sound like the doctor was too worried since it's only been going on for months and not years and years. I had tons of questions afterward on our way home since I was more focused on Adam immediately after the procedure. We were both pretty scared in our own right due to self-research (not always advised) and past experience of others but thankfully they were unfounded at this time. Yet another hurdle cleared and extra thankful prayers said (and a great big thanks for all prayers sent our way).

Then we came home and Adam rested. I went to pick Morgan up from Mary's around 11am and she had taken a 2hr nap which made me think awesome, there goes my afternoon nap with her since long morning naps usually = short afternoon naps. Not the case! Almost another 2hr nap and a 1hr nap for me. Perfect. At 1pm we went to the doctor, though, before her nap to make sure that what she's got going on is viral and not bacterial (requiring antibiotics). We were right (you're welcome Trinity for the $25 and thank you for the peace of mind) and were instructed to keep her on a routine of Tylenol/Motrin for the next day and a half. Since she's going in for her 15 month well-check on Wed morning, we should be good to go. She hasn't had a fever since 11:30am this morning so the meds are helping and she's feeling much better. She finally ate an almost normal dinner tonight which always makes me feel tons better. Still working on getting more liquids in her today but she's been doing well there prior to today so I'm not worried about dehydration or anything. Ok, family. That's enough sickness/doctors for a month or more. ;-)

Ah, back to the grind tomorrow. I have two IEP meetings and am prayingprayingpraying that Morgan does not wake up with a fever in the morning or she can't go to daycare (duh). She woke up with a 101.5 temp this morning and Mary was amazing (as usual) and took her for the morning so we could take care of Adam. It's times like this that I really wish we lived closer to our family. How nice it would have been to call up a grandma and see if she'd be willing to cuddle all morning with a feverish baby? Everyone else we know in town that might potentially be able to watch her have babies at home (teeny ones) and it would be completely unfair and not right to ask them to take her while she's sick. I wouldn't want to do that if I were them so that's why we're so lucky to have Mary. Thankfully Mary makes an excellent back up to grandmas and we are so blessed to have her in our lives.

Adam travels to Vancouver this week from T-F. I feel like he hasn't traveled in forever when in reality it's only been about 5 weeks. Thankfully it's a 4 day travel week and he'll be back before we know it. We just heart him.

That's not really what I meant...

I find it odd that my last post was a loving mother whining that her beautiful daughter is so constantly on the move that she rarely cuddles for more than 30 seconds at a time ... and we just spent a large part of the weekend doing just that. Morgan was (and sort of still is) sick. She woke up Saturday morning with a low/moderate fever so we gave her some Tylenol and didn't think much of it. However, she progressively yo-yo'd her temp all day and when she woke up soaked (sweaty) from her nap with a 102.5 degree temp, we decided to call off our date night and stay home with her. We left Mary a message...called her later...and since Mary's so amazing and Morgan was feeling a bit better, we went anyway. :-) Not worst parents ever - leaving Morgan with Mary is just as good as leaving her with a grandparent in terms of knowing her stuff. ;)

That said, we had cuddled much that day which was a bitter sweet happening for me (us). Bitter b/c no one wants her baby sick yet sweet b/c I had my baby cuddling with me at the slightest suggestion to do so. So off we went on our date night which consisted of an amazing dinner at Biaggi's (omg so yummy as were leftovers tonight) a few errands, and then decided to go home and watch a movie rather than see one at the cinema (they were either not good or too late). We picked Morgan up about 45 minutes after she'd gone to bed and she again was a sweaty mess. Mary thought it was her fever breaking so we went home all excited and watched a movie. Adam said we were up several times but all I remember is around 1:30am I got up and was going to give her more Motrin but she'd stopped crying by the time I got to the stairs. BED for this mama. At 5:30am Adam went up to see her (more crying) and she was HOT and sweaty and I thought the thermometer for sure was going to read in the 103s...but it didn't. She still had a fever and needed more Motrin, but poor baby. This high fever bought led to lots of cuddling/snuggling/snoozing in the glider before heading back to bed. She was still up at 7am but at least she was feeling better. We kept up with Motrin/Tylenol back and forth all day but again she woke up soaked from her nap which was of course, too short.

She's on the mend though and I think we're on the right track. She ate a very small breakfast and almost no lunch for Morgan standards but managed to eat some snacks during the Packer game and an entire kids' ravioli so I think she's feeling a bit better.

I can't say that I've not thoroughly enjoyed all the snuggling and cuddling we got to do all weekend. I'm sad it was caused by a fever (thankfully and surprisingly no other signs/symptoms) but still enjoyed it. I just had to go up and get her back to sleep b/c she'd woken up and you guessed it - covered in sweat. I am positively sure she had no fever...but the poor kid's sweating like crazy! I know she'd staying hydrated b/c her pee is almost clear in the potty chair. We shall see what tomorrow brings, I guess.

Tomorrow is another interesting day for the Schmidt family. Adam is having an endoscopy done b/c he's had pretty regular heartburn for some time now (and I think we're talking months and months if not longer) and after a trip to his regular doctor, she quickly referred him for endoscopy to make sure that the damage (if there is any) isn't too extensive and monitored. The doctor also gave him a Rx which is really helping and keeping him almost HB free. I have to take him b/c (he's lucky in my mind) they are putting him completely out for it. I'm sort of hoping I can watch the TV while it's happening (I don't want to see them put it in him mouth, however; that's too real) b/c I'm of course fascinated by these things given my professional background. Hopefully things go smoothly, they find little to no damage, he takes his Rx regularly and we're on our way to normal again. (prayers wouldn't hurt though and we'll take them please)

Today we invited a few friends over (no major party or anything) to watch the game. One brave family tested the Morgan fever household and we had a great time. Morgan got to play with three other little girls who had a great time with her and all her toys. Can't wait to do it again Superbowl Sunday since they're having the game at their house.

And that's that, I guess. We're tired since we've had several nights in a row with many trips up the stairs to the poor sad sick baby, so it will hopefully be an early night especially since we have to get up earlier than usual tomorrow. And just like that, it's almost February. Sort of.

To cuddle or not to cuddle...

I've been meaning to post on this for a few weeks and she finally took a day where she didn't do anything ohmyGodsuperamazing that I had to talk about so here goes.

I love Morgan almost more than our own lives and the fact that we are living, breathing people. If that makes sense. But anyway, I am disappointed in her ability to cuddle. I can recall and tell you details of the longest time she's ever cuddled with me - it was a few months ago (I likely blogged about it) and she wasn't feeling well (to be found out later that evening by confirmation fever) and she cuddled with me while I rocked in the recliner for 10.5 minutes. She didn't move for 10.5 minutes and laid against my chest while sucking her thumb. I hardly breathed during said cuddle b/c it was so great.

Dear Morgan, honey, why don't you like to cuddle with us? I can answer that in a heartbeat - you are ALWAYS moving. Always. It is a rare moment that you are not moving somehow somewhere to get something done. I have no concerns that this beautifulperfectmyfavoriteever child is ADHD/ADD or anything b/c she can sit for a favorite book, concentrate and play with single toys for appropriate lengths of time, etc. I think in this respect she takes after me a bit where she has a hard time sitting still. I find myself up and around before I've even thought about it and I wonder if it's partly b/c her environment involves a crazy, moving all the time mom (ok, I do sit at night at some point usually) or if it's her age or if she's just that curious...

But then I wonder if we wrecked her for cuddling b/c we were bound and determined to follow our pre-set rules (and by pre-set, I mean rules set years ago when such things as marriage/house/babies/etc seemed a bajillion years off) that included NO babies in bed (which we've laxed on in scary places (hello sharing a room in WI Dells) or if something serious isn't quite right), she WILL sleep on her own and in her own space, etc.

Tonight (and sort of lately too), Morgan was really upset after her bath and cried and cried (I think it's a combo of cold/being tired). I wrapped her in her towel and picked her up to cuddle her against my chest. Her little left thumb (the best one) popped out and she easily melted into me while I rocked her on the floor. Those moments make me almost burst with a sense of feeling whole b/c I have my very own baby cuddled against my chest, a place where only Morgan (so far) has been so close to that she could almost FEEL my heart beat from my inside. Ah. That child is the most beautiful thing in the whole world and I love how she makes me feel. I absolutely soak up those short moments of cuddling b/c they are so short even though I really do get them several times throughout the day.

To conclude my cuddling post, I'm a cuddler. My daughter is not. At least not to the extent that I would expect a tiny child of her age to be. She cuddles when she's sad. She cuddles when she feels love for us. She cuddles when she's tired. However, these cuddles are rarely longer than a minute and sometimes I miss when she was super little and I could just hold her and look at her and know she was going to be my baby forever. Sigh. What a big girl.

Few other notes I forgot in recent posts:

• Morgan's pretend play skills are pretty dang amazing. She loves her babies and feeds them, soothes/hugs them when they cry, and laughs with them when they laugh. She now loves to put them in their crib and covers them with their little blankets. Aw...
• Morgan is obsessed with her easel letters. They are cheap and have the tiny magnets in the back that easily fall out and choke tiny humans and dogs. They are heavily guarded so that said tiny humans and dogs don't ingest them. Or willingly give them to dogs to see what would happen...
• Suddenly at dinner tonight (thank you Applebee's for curing my "I do NOT feel like cooking" blues), Morgan took an extreme interest in coloring. Usually she just sort of half-heartedly tries and then starts her game of throw the crayons on the floor. She looked like she was 4 at dinner tonight.
  
• Today is Mary's birthday. Morgan got her a card and a gift certificate to a favorite restaurant here in town. When we were leaving Mary's house today, instead of doing her usual babble of "see ya later" and waving, Morgan put her little hand up to her mouth and blew Mary an audible kiss. (you know how you say "mmmm-MA!" when you blow kisses? she now does that too.) What a nice little happy birthday goodbye.
  
• Adam's diploma came today. He (and we) is (are) VERY proud of himself. As he should be. Final hoop complete.
  
• Did I mention I love my family? Sometimes I can't wait to get away but about 99% of the time I am doing everything in my power to see their shining faces again. Life is good and we are so blessed.
  

And we have a 15 month old, folks

It might be a longie so hang tight. So many things to blog about...mostly good. :)

And just like that, Morgan's 15 months old. It sort of snuck up on me and I didn't realize it until almost lunch time. It's so sad that she's this old already...and once I'm over it, I'm filled with glee for all the new things she does, says, and understands. Ok, maybe I'm not a fan of the tantrums and the like but meh, it's part of the territory. Here are some highlights before I jump into other fun things.

• We have a 5th tooth, people! Finally her other top/front tooth decided to just break through today. She's still teething like a crazy person and her thumb (usually) or something is almost always in her mouth being chewed on. Poor baby. When she's unreasonable, she's a HUGE fan of Orajel and when asked if she wants 'medicine,' she always replies yes. (makes me slightly nervous for when she's in her teens but that's a ways off)
• Epic 1st - Morgan totally POOPED on the potty tonight!! Adam caught her tooting and ran her to the potty just in the nick of time. We have, in the past, tried the same thing (running when tooting) but she always got stage fright and didn't poo when there. Adam also stated that he was not a fan of cleaning out her potty chair afterward...totally different b/w #1 and #2. :)
  
• Morgan not only knows at least 17 body parts, but she also knows all of her different clothes as well as her sleeves on her shirts.
  
• She now insists on washing her hands after going on the potty. We just recently started really enforcing it so of course it's her new fav.
• Oh yes, Adam just reminded me. Morgan now sort of stomps her feet when she's really mad. And by really mad I mean almost inconsolable. But...she's usually redirectable so it's not always a huge deal unless it's over and over throughout the night ... which never happens...

And on to other Schmidt news...I put on my gray work pants this morning and realized that I looked absolutely foolish. Reason, you ask? They are now huge on me. I look like I have sag in my "trunk" and that I bought them a size too big so no one could see me. This is completely bitter sweet, you see. Huge pros - 1st off: um, hello, my PANTS are too BIG. 2nd: my PANTS are too BIGGGG!! This has never happened to me ever. Quick con - now I have to buy new pants. I think Pros 1-2 outweigh the only con. That said, my jeans are all the right size and the pair I wore on Monday had me wondering if I had gained 10lbs b/c they just fit. Either way, a pair of my normal pants no longer fit b/c they are too big. Sweet.

I have more to blog about and this didn't get as long as I thought. More tomorrow or later. :) 15 months. I feel great. Life is pretty good right now.

Another weekend in WI

We're baaackk....from another weekend in WI. Everything went well and recovery is underway. We are so happy and blessed that God has graced our family with his healing presence. Thank you and Amen.

On Thursday when we picked Morgan up from Mary's, she mentioned that Morgan had had 2 messy diapers...when all was said and done by the end of the day, she'd had 6 messy diapers and one helluva diaper rash going. Poor baby. It was pretty bad. She's almost fully healed after TONS of cream and lots of trips to the potty - we had lots of good success (when do we really start pushing her to be consistent and not just when we ask her?!) which helped heal her faster.

On that note, that reminds me - Morgan is fully beginning to use two-word phrases for reals now. Thursday night when we were on our way north, I could tell she was working on the above issue...so I asked her, "Morgan, did you poop?" and she would repeat poop. So the last messy diaper before we got to our destination, I knew she was 'taking care of business' but just let her go. Suddenly we hear, "I poooop" over and over again. I was less excited about the fact that this was our 3rd poo stop but filled with glee that she was able to put the two words together. Mary also asked me late last week if Morgan was saying "I hungry" and sure enough that night at dinner time, Morgan was running all over the place yelling "I hungry! I hungry!!!!" like I never feed her. On we go, little talker.

In other news, Morgan's other top front tooth is rightthere. If I pushed her gums hard enough, it would be through (gross/owww, I won't do that) but we're hanging in there and it's got to come here in the next few days. I called it by the end of the weekend which means it didn't come through. Sigh. C'mon!! I want my happy all the time child back, please.

So of course I got another flu while in WI. I told Adam I better not be allergic to WI...I feel better today and just have a "flu hangover" headache. I can deal with a headache if it means I get everything unpacked, house cleaned, and groceries bought while she has a pleasant time at daycare. I don't feel bad about sending her there on a random day off...I had a long weekend with her so it is a "healthy separation." :) I'm getting her after lunchtime so we still have extra time to play with all her new toys that we brought back in Christmas haul #2. I'm SOO excited for her to play with them. I can't even tell you which I'm more excited for...

I have a "not fair" paragraph...Today is a non-contract day for me (day off) and wouldn't you know it? Muscatine gets scared by the snow (1-3" only!!) (and ok, they are calling for freezing rain later...) and calls off school. My NC day was totally used in waste!! Grr...but I suppose I don't have to make it up later then...still. It was time for a snow day. :-/

On a somewhat exciting note since I haven't posted about it in a while...I am currently -6lbs from my prepregnancy weight! Ok, ok, it's more like -4 but the flu I just had may have helped me out a bit there. Either way, I'm totally pumped and feeling great. It calms my heart/soul to know that I can get back to 'normal' and that the next pregnancy won't leave me totally broken like I was feeling like a while back and thinking it would never end. But PS - if I'm pretty well the lightest I've been for some time, why are these jeans so dang tight?! I blame the wash machine and Morgan for stretching me out to kingdom come. ;-)

I suppose that fact that I have four hours to do all I listed above should motivate me to get off the computer and get my rear in gear...so off I go and happy snow day you lucky ducks.

Cooper John

Cooper John Gregory has finally graced the world with his presence!! Here's his info...

Cooper John Gregory
born Jan. 12th at 1:22am
8lbs 15ish oz, 21"

He's beautiful. You know how sometimes newborns are all goofy looking after all the trauma they've been through? Not this kid. I'm not even saying this to be nice. He's truly a beautiful baby especially after the intense work Julie had to do to get him into this world. We are SOOO excited for them and they are truly blessed to have such a cute little guy...and Morgan has a new friend. However, now that she has a new friend, they better not be making all sorts of shinanigans when they get older... ;-)

This week has been significantly better for my attitude. Everyone in my house is very appreciative of this fact. :)

Tomorrow we leave for WI. Things should be good...but we still have to get from A to B so off we go. Mary is amazing and gave us tons of Wiggles and Dora DVDs to get us through. After the initial bang start to the long weekend, things should be pretty smooth for the duration. Bonus - I have off on Monday as planned in August. Sweet. That gives me time to either play with Morgan, send her to daycare and take a nap, and/or go help Julie with Cooper since I think Jason's going back to work that day? Or maybe I'll just go visit for fun. :)

I hear a grapefruit calling my name so off I go. Thoughts/prayers again, appreciated, more than you know.

Game Night, Sitter-Swap, Great Weekend!

Last night, we all got to sleep through the night for the first time in several weeks (reference Flight of the Bunny post below). It was glorious. No getting up to plunk bunny back in Morgan's crib, no crying, no frustration. Just beautiful, blissful sleep. Fabulous. Let's try that again tonight...

Friday night we went to Keiblers' for a game night since my close (work) friend, Denise, and her husband are moving to Maryland in a few weeks for a fresh start, new jobs, and a few sad women to leave behind. We will miss her so much as she is truly a gem of a friend. We had lots of wine, laughter (the kind that makes me cry and almost pee my pants), and a desire for more sometime when Abbie and I take a mommy's (long) weekend out to visit. Oh yeah, Abbie, are you interested? :) D - can we come? ;-P Morgan did fabulously with sleeping there while we had all the fun.

Yesterday morning was relaxed until suddenly it was time to kick it into high gear. I ran to HyVee since there were some good deals and then off to fun we went. We had planned to swap "sitter time" with our good friends Nick & Melanie as they have a little boy named Carson who's 4 months old and cute as a button. She did wonderfully and only cried when she saw us pull in to pick her up. It was the saddest thing - she saw us pull in, smiled, started to look sad...and then started screaming and bawling!! I ran from the car to the door (which was locked, not a problem) and scooped her up as soon as it opened. I think she thought we might be leaving without her or something. Needless to say, her good behavior, longish nap, and happy demeanor really boosted my confidence in leaving her to be babysat with someone else as stated in my New Year's resolution. Sweet.

Later that night our friend, Carson, came over and is the sweetest little guy...get this - his fussiest moments lasted about oh...10 seconds. I'm not even kidding you. The child was easily soothed just by being held (what?! no bouncing until I thought I might die?! no endless wailing from either of us!? This HAS to be a taste of what our next kid will be like, right?) :) Either way, it was a joy to have him over and I have a feeling we will be doing more sitter swapping in the very near future.

Today was great too (I heart this weekend please don't end). Morgan slept in (bonus to STTN) until about 7:25am which meant it was off to the races to make it to church (8:15) on time. Which we totally did. Score. Since we are the best parents EVER we didn't feed her breakfast on purpose and brought her a waffle and banana to eat during the service under the premonition that she would be occupied for a longer time during the service...and it totally worked. However, she ate the entire waffle and the entire banana, huge sippy of milk...I can't wait to take her to her next appt in a few weeks. She's going to be huge. I officially took all remaining 12 month clothes out of her dresser today and she's in 18 months for sure. And they fit. And I've forbidden myself from buying her anything else 18 months since she's got more clothes than we do combined. I am, however, VERY excited b/c I think in a few short weeks she's going to be in her size 5 shoes. We tried them all on this afternoon and she was HILARIOUS with her squeakers (light pink with a brown piece across the top which ends in a bow - a.dor.a.ble) - she started walking and squeaking and looking all over the place to find out where this sound was coming from. By the time the realization hit her, I was rolling on the floor laughing and she was super excited. Adam? Not so much about the squeaking. I don't care. They are cute. :)

We have a short week this week as Adam and I took off Thursday afternoon and Friday so that we could go home to WI for a family matter. It's not something I'd like to publicize at the moment, but any prayers you want to randomly send in the direction of northeast WI would be appreciated. Thank you. Sincerely.

I'm also very eager for this week as I'm pretty sure I've left most, if not all, of my negativity and bad attitude behind in last week. Here's to hoping as I know I still have a Friday fire to put out and hopefully before we leave for WI. What a great weekend. Perhaps we could do another Sunday again tomorrow? I swear I'll go back to work on Tuesday...

Flight of the Bunny

Dearest Morgan,

I love you. I love you to pieces and pieces. But I swear, child, if you throw your bunny out of your crib, cry until we get there, and then not go back down for bed almost instantaneously, we will have an issue. Bigger than the almost 2-hr ordeal we had last night when nothing was wrong. Your job overnight is to sleep unless something is wrong for reals. Your mommy is tired. Your daddy is sleepy. We have a 14 month old, not a 14 week old. Do we understand each other? I'm glad we do. I love you and good night.

Love always and forever,
Mommy

Back to the ol' grind

So...I was forced beyond my control to go back to work today. Sigh. Stupid bills and enjoying not being broke. :-/ It was ok though...although I'm not going to lie, I was nervous (a little) for Morgan to go to Mary's and share all of her new screaming (a lovely, high-pitched, I'm acting like a 2 y/o scream when mad/don't get what I want/not instantly gratified) and incessant use of the word, 'no.' Turns out she didn't do too bad. She DID use the word no often but was otherwise good.

Morgan needed a time out yesterday so I had her sit on the bottom step in the basement for about 30 seconds (I could see a minute may end the rest of the evening this time around) and it was done. About 10 minutes later, she wandered over to the step, sat down, and yelled to get our attention. I'm pretty sure she was asking if she could get up. Funny. She did the same thing again tonight - sat on the step, looked to see if we were looking, and hollered so she could get up. Silly baby...

Alright, I'm tired. We are going to bed early tonight, I swear. 5:45am was a toughie this morning and I actually sat up and laid back down 3x before finally getting out of bed. Sigh. Why can't my money tree just bloom like a crazy tree tomorrow? C'mon...

New Year's Resolution

This is going to be simple and I think I even may have a head start on it after yesterday:

My NY's resolution is to be more willing and less anxious about leaving Morgan with a sitter. A "sitter" can be defined as someone that is not a family member or Mary. They may be another adult or even high school sitter (I've got a few good ones I just need to start using regularly). I will also spend at least one unforced overnight away from her...maybe two...I see a couple's trip to Chicago in the future...

That said, I'm anticipating a "date night" at least once this month. This could get tricky b/c we have to go home to WI Jan. 13-16, but I think once a month is definitely fair game. That said, I need to go plan this in advance so I can actually find a sitter in time before January is over and I'm left blinking in confusion.

Happy New Year 2011!

Happy New Year! Our annual NYE party looked very different than in years past when there was anywhere from 25-40 people in our basement, you could hardly find a place to sit, and a mean game of drunken Catch Phrase was going on - this year you could hardly find a place to be without toddlers or babies, I don't think anyone was a drunken anything, and the party closed around 10:30/11pm. Oddly enough, it was a really nice party and Adam and I couldn't stop saying how fun it was to have a relaxing night with friends - ours and Morgan's included. :) We did need to 'cut her off' at one point for a few things - kisses for Carson (thanks for being a trooper, buddy) and crackers. They were just at her level/reach and she was all about them. Before the party really got going she managed to sneak a truffle and was happily sitting on the bottom step like a good girl enjoying it...until mean Daddy took it away. :) After dinner, darling. THEN we can have truffles. So the rest of the night was great - I had most of the clean up done before bed which always makes this gal feel like a million bucks knowing I wasn't going to wake up to sticky booze stains anywhere. :)

After I did "in other news" a post or two ago, I realized I forgot a few things (and a relatively major one oops) so here goes -

• Morgan now has a visible 4th tooth. Would it be her other middle top tooth? Of course not, that would make my symmetrical needs met...it's on the OTHER side. How weird is that?! I have a feeling though that there are several teeth on their way as she is chewing on her fingers more and even just looking at her gums, they are white and puffy. Bring 'em on so I can feel better (selfish me).
  
• We are working on Morgan saying "Mama!" in the car when she needs/wants something instead of yelling/fussing/something else less than ideal. She does well given a reminder but the past day or two she's even done it on her own. I'm hoping it catches on (I may regret this later) and we hear more "mama/daddy" than whining to indicate a need/want.
• Holy. Smart. Pants. Morgan now knows all her major body parts including (from bottom to top) - toes, foot/feet, leg, belly, chest, fingers, hands, arms, cheeks, tongue, teeth, mouth, nose, eyes, ears, hair, head. Floors me. That's just a piece of her receptive language but she's doing so well. She's getting to the point where she's following two-step related directions about half the time. She also understands first/then, if/then a majority of the time which is a life-saver (ok, sanity-saver) when she needs to wait for something or do something else first (such as eat veggies before truffles). She continues to improve her expressive language as well but for now, her receptive language astounds me.
• Bye bye cloth diapers. It's official. I'm back and forth on how I feel about it. Several months ago, remember how she was battling some horrendous diaper rash? Well, we ended up going to disposable b/c of all the creams we were using - they were going through the liners and getting on the diapers which can break them down over time. So anyway, we went back to cloth when we got home this week b/c she's been rash/diarrhea free for a while now...only to have a mild version of her rash come back by last night. We made the executive decision to stick with disposable now until kid #2 comes along. S/He can use the cloth ones then. Which reminds me to get on diapers.com and order more.
  
• On a whim this morning, I texted my friend (from work), Sarah, and asked her what she thought the odds were that her husband would watch their three girls and mine (theirs are 3;6ish and twins 2;2) while Sarah and I went to Kohls to score some deals. Adam had plans to have a man-game-day at 11am at a friend's house. She said chances were good and wanted to know when we'd be there. AWESOME. So off we went after her morning nap and she did wonderfully. NO tears. Can you believe it? I guess she was a little sad when the twins went down for their nap but just did some sniffling. She of course cried in the car b/c I interrupted her brownie consumption (meanestmamaever) to (gasp) start the car and strap in. I kept her up until we got home and nap time was one of the easiest ones this break. :) Thanks again, Eric!
  

On that note, I have some final budgeting to do before starting to put the Christmas decorations away. My goal is to have that complete and everything up where it belongs by the time I start back to work on Monday (bleck - yes and no). Morgan's so much more fun to be around as she gets older and I find that I'm not thanking my lucky stars we made it to bedtime in one piece nearly as much as I used to. I love being a mommy. Happy New Year!