Hadley's first molar poked through on Monday (or at least that's when I found it) which hopefully is the reason behind her awful diaper rash. You'd never know - she's been happy and fine this whole time save for chewing on her fingers, but she's been doing that for several weeks now. Easy teething? I'll take it any time. That's tooth #9 at 14 months, if you're keeping track, which obviously all of you reading this are.
On Tuesday, a snowstorm moved into the area and the schools got nervous enough to call an early dismissal. The school I was at was done at noon. It was awesome. The only thing that might have made it more awesome was if I'd thought to bring workout clothes and hit the Y on my way home since it wasn't THAT bad yet, but the extra time home with the girls and playing outside after naps was fantastic and we loved it. I was really hoping for a 2 hr delay this morning and got my wish! Thank you Wednesday districts! It was a lovely morning of getting an extra half hour of sleep (thankyouMorganearlyriser), sending the girls to daycare around the normal time, and then shoveling/showering alone for me. Perfection on a week when Adam travels. We got somewhere between 4-5" of snow whereas back home, they got over a foot after being forecasted 2-3". HA HA HA buried.
Speaking of Adam (a little bit ago), he comes home LATE tomorrow night! I'm hoping his flights go as planned and since I think he's going through the Denver airport instead of Chicago, I think his chances are upped significantly. When he's gone after a stretch at home, it's easy to miss him and I'm doing so quite a bit today. :-/
I planned the meals ahead of time for this week (such a help when Adam travels) and tonight was supposed to be brinner (breakfast for dinner!). We went ahead with that but I took it a step further and we "dressed for the event," meaning that immediately after settling in when we got home, everyone was required to put on jammies. Don't you eat breakfast in jammies?? It made sense and was the best idea ever. Morgan thought it was hilarious and Hadley was adorable in new (to her) jammies that were favorites from Morgan. The girls were WAY into hugging each other tonight and it was adorable. As soon as my computer stops being weird about photos (it keeps spinning...?) I'll post a pic or two on Facebook.
So far a great week with my girlies. I'm eager for Adam to come home late tomorrow night so let's all join linked fingers and cross them tight that his planes/flights all go according to plan b/c if one doesn't, he doesn't come home until Friday.
The Schmidt Family Grows: Adam, Liss, Morgan, Hadley, Maddie, & Jessie
Wednesday, February 27, 2013
Friday, February 22, 2013
And she's off!
Hadley, that is. The past few weeks before this one, Hadley's expressive language skills began taking off. They've continued this week as well (she's saying "shhhh" for shoes, etc) but I've really noticed her receptive skills exploding this week, too.
My throat really hurt yesterday, I was tired, and didn't have it in me to make a great dinner. So...thank you, HyVee, for providing my family with yet another healthy rotisserie chicken that I didn't have to cook/prep/get anything dirty preparing. We got home, settled, and I asked the girls if they wanted to watch a show (something I haven't let them do in AGES upon getting home b/c hello, they should be able to play and not watch TV). Of course I received an enthusiastic YES and turned on the much requested Diego (the animal rescuer, in case you were wondering). Morgan watched it like usual but Hadley was so enthralled that Morgan and I were yelling her name (she's got this new thing to stand thisclose to the TV) and she didn't even flinch. I tried sitting her in the middle of the floor and directed her to "sit by the baby" and plopped a baby next to her. Nope. She grabbed the baby and showed her how close she could REALLY get to the TV just to see better. Fail.
So finally I gave up whatever I was pretending to do, grabbed Hadley, and plopped her next to me on the recliner, where she continued NOT moving. Morgan joined us. I've never seen Hadley that still voluntarily while awake ever. She sat for the entire episode and didn't even flinch while I was playing with my phone (something she's always dying to get her little hands on). It was bliss, I got to snuggle with my girls for a half hour, and was able to rest a bit.
A few Hadley funnies:
My throat really hurt yesterday, I was tired, and didn't have it in me to make a great dinner. So...thank you, HyVee, for providing my family with yet another healthy rotisserie chicken that I didn't have to cook/prep/get anything dirty preparing. We got home, settled, and I asked the girls if they wanted to watch a show (something I haven't let them do in AGES upon getting home b/c hello, they should be able to play and not watch TV). Of course I received an enthusiastic YES and turned on the much requested Diego (the animal rescuer, in case you were wondering). Morgan watched it like usual but Hadley was so enthralled that Morgan and I were yelling her name (she's got this new thing to stand thisclose to the TV) and she didn't even flinch. I tried sitting her in the middle of the floor and directed her to "sit by the baby" and plopped a baby next to her. Nope. She grabbed the baby and showed her how close she could REALLY get to the TV just to see better. Fail.
So finally I gave up whatever I was pretending to do, grabbed Hadley, and plopped her next to me on the recliner, where she continued NOT moving. Morgan joined us. I've never seen Hadley that still voluntarily while awake ever. She sat for the entire episode and didn't even flinch while I was playing with my phone (something she's always dying to get her little hands on). It was bliss, I got to snuggle with my girls for a half hour, and was able to rest a bit.
A few Hadley funnies:
- Last night I was pouring Hadley some milk while she danced around and giggled like it was me waiting for a bottle of wine to be uncorked after having a baby (ie. no wine for 10 months). All of a sudden she started mooing like a starving cow - turns out she saw the cow on the side of the milk carton. Hilarious. We mooed together and then she drank 6oz of milk in 10 seconds.
- Hadley took a digger last night over the vacuum extension hose and got a big, fat, bloody lip. Nothing the iPod couldn't cure. Best.Parents.Ever.
- Size...I *think* she's growing. She's certainly getting taller b/c her 18 month pants (most) don't hang down over her toes, but last time she was in a few weeks ago for being sick, she hadn't gained much weight (I think still in the 21s). Also, she still only has 8 teeth and has lots of room in her size 3 shoes. This one's an odd duck - I was used to Morgan looking at a pair of shoes and outgrowing them...same with pants and other clothes...but she's well into her 18 month clothes, no more 12 month things left out, so maybe there's hope that all the new 2T stuff I got her for the summer WILL work out?!? A mommy who spent money on cute things can hope. ;-)
- Morgan gets to go to a birthday party for a good coworker friend of mine's daughter (I never know how to write that grammatically correct) who is turning 4. She's so very excited that she sang Happy Birthday to Campbell already while I was doing her hair this morning. Added bonus? Moms are all but required to wear sweats. My favorite.
- She's sad today b/c her Grandma Sherri and Grandpa Al aren't able to come visit b/c Grandpa's sick. :( But we have things to do that are fun and with the new snow, all bets are on playing/freezing outside all weekend and lots of crying when it's time to come in. I'm way pumped.
- Morgan has been talking a lot lately about not wanting to go to sleep alone at night. When I offer to sleep in her bed FOR her, I receive an emphatic no. She's so weird.
- And last but not least, we made our own family night at the Y Tuesday night. Morgan got a new, small basketball with a gift card from Toys 'R Us over the weekend so we wanted to go try it out. Hadley also brought along the small basketball she got for her birthday from Adam. We found an empty racquetball court, grabbed an adult basketball to mess with, and let the girls go crazy. Crazy it was. Hadley pretty much just chased hers and Morgan all over the place and was enthralled at times with the glass wall. She also LOVED to watch the people on the court next to us when we went out of our court for one reason or another. Morgan played and played and ran the track with me for a while too - and kept up pretty well! It started getting close to time to leave and we prepped them with time warnings (ie. 5 minutes left, 2 minutes...) and then when it was time to go she totally melted down. She begged and begged to go back and play basketball and we were the worst parents ever for making her leave on a weeknight to get to bed. Needless to say, both girls had fun and it's going to be great to do this with them on a routine basis as they get older. And if I do say so myself, when not defended or impeded by anything, I still got moves. LOL I kid, I kid.
Monday, February 18, 2013
Modesty? BAH. Fugettabautit.
I know, bad poster, bad poster. Blah blah blah let's get to the good stuff.
So it's President's Day and I have off which I don't remember happening for the past few years, but I decided to take full advantage of it since I've felt less than fun lately with the girls - just SO much to do at night including getting things ready for Valentine's Day (girls and myself, had to make a dessert for a work meeting), homemade valentines, etc. Work has been nuts and it all just seemed to come to a head this past week. I decided to take today and spend the whole thing with the girls and have a blast. So far, so good.
So...what is there to do in good ol' Muscatine, you ask? RIGHT! Nothing! So while it sounded fun-ish to battle huge crowds and try not to lose a girl at the newly renovated (and newly re-opened) Children's Museum in Bettendorf (45 minutes away, something Morgan has been BEGGING to do every other day lately), I decided that wasn't in our cards right now and we'd find something in town instead. Library? Yeah, that sounds like fun but that's not SUPER fun. We can do that any time. Wait! The Y! It has a kid pool (water is chest-height on me, where Morgan has her swimming lessons) and after checking family swim times, it was magic. 12-1pm. We were THERE.
Adam had to fly out this afternoon for a coworker's funeral in PA unfortunately, but he was home at lunch before leaving to help me put twogirls together in swimsuits. We jumped in the car and off we went. Getting undressed to go in? Fine. Getting in the water safely and having a BLAST for an hour in the pool? Mission accomplished. Getting out? Ok...(starting to get more difficult) Putting things down, showering/rinsing, good...getting dressed...EVEREST. Hadley's lips were blue and while Morgan was 80% independent getting dry/dressed/etc, she HAD to go behind a curtain today to get dressed which is fine but she had to crawl over Hadley and I to get there.
Someone walks by? Hadley flips over. A noise? Hadley's flying out of my hands. Mom wants to get dressed now? HA HA HA good luck, lady. Now that Hadley was dressed (and Morgan too), I thought it would be a good time to get myself in something dry. Fail. Hadley did everything in her power to use her legs while on dry land to run EVERYWHERE she could. Great balls of fire - if I had any modesty left after having kids, it might have gone out the window while trying to get dressed, corral the monkey, and try to keep her from falling into whatever she tripped over and onto/into. Finally, mission accomplished and next time, it might be worth the wet ass on the way home to just throw clothes on over my suit and leave. SHEESH!
Then we were on the way home and I made a new rule - no sleeping in the car for the next 12 minutes. Morgan ended up in tears b/c she wanted more swimming time (translate - I'm exhausted and looking for reasons not to sleep after I just said I'm so tired). Hadley did her best to pretend she wasn't taking her shoes off but I'm a mom and have super hearing so I can hear velcro from a shoe 10 miles away. She wasn't fooling anyone. 15 minutes later everyone was pottied, drinks of water/milk consumed, and BED. It's been bliss for almost an hour now and I'm loving it. Wait. I'm tired, too. I should probably take a nap. And do a core workout. And start the diapers.
In other news, not much else is new although I will now type no less than 1,000 words about what's going on in our lives while watching House Hunters.
Hadley is on the cusp of a vocabulary splurge. She is imitating us lots and has at least 10-15 spoken/signed words. Her words are still not super clear or anything, but she can moo/arf with the best of them, call for me and scream for Adam when he gets home, and sign lots of things like all done, more, please, up, help, and others. She still only has 8 teeth but I haven't dug in her mouth lately for anything other than Play Doh retrieval and I wasn't feeling around for teeth then. She's hilarious and does funny things all the time. Happy baby. I realize she's a toddler but I'll probably call her a baby until she's 2 b/c I once heard one of my student's mother call him a baby past the age of 2 and she sounded nuts. So, baby Hadley for now. Big girl Hadley tomorrow. :-/ Oh, and for the record, she had a grand time on the way to swimming saying "Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah" when I was singing along with Bruno Mars in the car.
Morgan continues to be a smarty smart cuteasaurus rex. She's counting higher and higher all the time and most recently was up to 40 although she has something against 17, 18, 27, 28, 37, and 38 and always skips them unless prompted. She writes her name on everything and is doing marvelous with her chore chart. She loves earning money and putting it in her respective envelopes on "payday" (Saturdays). Morgan PINKPUFFYHEARTS Sunday school and creating art projects both there and at Mary's. Speaking of, Morgan calls me Mary all the time. Poor Mary. She must wish her name was something else most days as I'm 99% sure Morgan isn't the only one saying her name over and over and over again for one reason or another. Morgan also loves singing to the radio and is learning songs faster and faster. I don't think I blogged about this - one night we were on our way to Culver's (Adam's bday??) and Alicia Keys' new song came on (This girl is on fiiiiyaaaaa - fire) and I asked Morgan if she was on fire. She freaked and said, "NO!!" and I explained to her it actually meant awesome, great at something, etc. She then said, "Mommy, you are so awesome, you're on FIRE!" Aww! Adorable. The next night, Morgan said a prayer while we were reading her bible story and then asked me to say one, too. I did, and then she said, "Mommy, that was good. You're on FIRE." Love.
I'm doing fine. Work is busy busy busy and sometimes I don't agree with others but I'm doing my best and trying to get things done in a timely manner. It's working but the bottle of wine I had at the Valentine's party in the Quad Cities with work friends this weekend helped. ;-) Lots of water and ibuprophen also helped on Sunday. ;-) Things are good otherwise! Busy, good, missing home as usual. We are planning a trip to WI mid-March for Chase's baptism and I think we might be able to make it a 3-day weekend since I have some non-contract time for spring breaks. Woo!
Adam is also doing well. He's lost almost 10lbs in the past few weeks/month due to hard work and eating right. He looks great. He's also got a goatee until next week and it's a fun blast from the past. He had one all through college until he moved here (and they made him shave it off so he could wear a respirator if needed, whatever, who needs to breathe...) and I always liked it. Shortly after starting to grow it, though, he gave Morgan a kiss goodnight and Morgan said, "Daddy! I need to be careful of your fur!" Anyone who knows anything knows that goatees can be rather picky. And funny.
Speaking of funny, one more thing. Hadley would eat Play Doh for breakfast, lunch, and dinner and not bat an eye. So.Gross. Morgan must have wanted to know what the fuss was all about b/c yesterday morning, she had some time with PD. She must have missed some when putting it away b/c all of a sudden she was coughing, eyes water, the whole ball of wax. I thought she was just choking on spit/something and she told us she was choking from Play Doh. I almost peed my pants laughing b/c the poor kid must have done everything in her power to swallow it without vomiting and came thisclose to doing so. HA HA HA serves you right for eating PD! Adam thought I was being mean by laughing hysterically and almost crying myself. Note to Morgan: PD is not what Hadley thinks it is and the commercial kind is not for consumption. I'm still laughing.
So it's President's Day and I have off which I don't remember happening for the past few years, but I decided to take full advantage of it since I've felt less than fun lately with the girls - just SO much to do at night including getting things ready for Valentine's Day (girls and myself, had to make a dessert for a work meeting), homemade valentines, etc. Work has been nuts and it all just seemed to come to a head this past week. I decided to take today and spend the whole thing with the girls and have a blast. So far, so good.
So...what is there to do in good ol' Muscatine, you ask? RIGHT! Nothing! So while it sounded fun-ish to battle huge crowds and try not to lose a girl at the newly renovated (and newly re-opened) Children's Museum in Bettendorf (45 minutes away, something Morgan has been BEGGING to do every other day lately), I decided that wasn't in our cards right now and we'd find something in town instead. Library? Yeah, that sounds like fun but that's not SUPER fun. We can do that any time. Wait! The Y! It has a kid pool (water is chest-height on me, where Morgan has her swimming lessons) and after checking family swim times, it was magic. 12-1pm. We were THERE.
Adam had to fly out this afternoon for a coworker's funeral in PA unfortunately, but he was home at lunch before leaving to help me put twogirls together in swimsuits. We jumped in the car and off we went. Getting undressed to go in? Fine. Getting in the water safely and having a BLAST for an hour in the pool? Mission accomplished. Getting out? Ok...(starting to get more difficult) Putting things down, showering/rinsing, good...getting dressed...EVEREST. Hadley's lips were blue and while Morgan was 80% independent getting dry/dressed/etc, she HAD to go behind a curtain today to get dressed which is fine but she had to crawl over Hadley and I to get there.
Someone walks by? Hadley flips over. A noise? Hadley's flying out of my hands. Mom wants to get dressed now? HA HA HA good luck, lady. Now that Hadley was dressed (and Morgan too), I thought it would be a good time to get myself in something dry. Fail. Hadley did everything in her power to use her legs while on dry land to run EVERYWHERE she could. Great balls of fire - if I had any modesty left after having kids, it might have gone out the window while trying to get dressed, corral the monkey, and try to keep her from falling into whatever she tripped over and onto/into. Finally, mission accomplished and next time, it might be worth the wet ass on the way home to just throw clothes on over my suit and leave. SHEESH!
Then we were on the way home and I made a new rule - no sleeping in the car for the next 12 minutes. Morgan ended up in tears b/c she wanted more swimming time (translate - I'm exhausted and looking for reasons not to sleep after I just said I'm so tired). Hadley did her best to pretend she wasn't taking her shoes off but I'm a mom and have super hearing so I can hear velcro from a shoe 10 miles away. She wasn't fooling anyone. 15 minutes later everyone was pottied, drinks of water/milk consumed, and BED. It's been bliss for almost an hour now and I'm loving it. Wait. I'm tired, too. I should probably take a nap. And do a core workout. And start the diapers.
In other news, not much else is new although I will now type no less than 1,000 words about what's going on in our lives while watching House Hunters.
Hadley is on the cusp of a vocabulary splurge. She is imitating us lots and has at least 10-15 spoken/signed words. Her words are still not super clear or anything, but she can moo/arf with the best of them, call for me and scream for Adam when he gets home, and sign lots of things like all done, more, please, up, help, and others. She still only has 8 teeth but I haven't dug in her mouth lately for anything other than Play Doh retrieval and I wasn't feeling around for teeth then. She's hilarious and does funny things all the time. Happy baby. I realize she's a toddler but I'll probably call her a baby until she's 2 b/c I once heard one of my student's mother call him a baby past the age of 2 and she sounded nuts. So, baby Hadley for now. Big girl Hadley tomorrow. :-/ Oh, and for the record, she had a grand time on the way to swimming saying "Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah" when I was singing along with Bruno Mars in the car.
Morgan continues to be a smarty smart cuteasaurus rex. She's counting higher and higher all the time and most recently was up to 40 although she has something against 17, 18, 27, 28, 37, and 38 and always skips them unless prompted. She writes her name on everything and is doing marvelous with her chore chart. She loves earning money and putting it in her respective envelopes on "payday" (Saturdays). Morgan PINKPUFFYHEARTS Sunday school and creating art projects both there and at Mary's. Speaking of, Morgan calls me Mary all the time. Poor Mary. She must wish her name was something else most days as I'm 99% sure Morgan isn't the only one saying her name over and over and over again for one reason or another. Morgan also loves singing to the radio and is learning songs faster and faster. I don't think I blogged about this - one night we were on our way to Culver's (Adam's bday??) and Alicia Keys' new song came on (This girl is on fiiiiyaaaaa - fire) and I asked Morgan if she was on fire. She freaked and said, "NO!!" and I explained to her it actually meant awesome, great at something, etc. She then said, "Mommy, you are so awesome, you're on FIRE!" Aww! Adorable. The next night, Morgan said a prayer while we were reading her bible story and then asked me to say one, too. I did, and then she said, "Mommy, that was good. You're on FIRE." Love.
I'm doing fine. Work is busy busy busy and sometimes I don't agree with others but I'm doing my best and trying to get things done in a timely manner. It's working but the bottle of wine I had at the Valentine's party in the Quad Cities with work friends this weekend helped. ;-) Lots of water and ibuprophen also helped on Sunday. ;-) Things are good otherwise! Busy, good, missing home as usual. We are planning a trip to WI mid-March for Chase's baptism and I think we might be able to make it a 3-day weekend since I have some non-contract time for spring breaks. Woo!
Adam is also doing well. He's lost almost 10lbs in the past few weeks/month due to hard work and eating right. He looks great. He's also got a goatee until next week and it's a fun blast from the past. He had one all through college until he moved here (and they made him shave it off so he could wear a respirator if needed, whatever, who needs to breathe...) and I always liked it. Shortly after starting to grow it, though, he gave Morgan a kiss goodnight and Morgan said, "Daddy! I need to be careful of your fur!" Anyone who knows anything knows that goatees can be rather picky. And funny.
Speaking of funny, one more thing. Hadley would eat Play Doh for breakfast, lunch, and dinner and not bat an eye. So.Gross. Morgan must have wanted to know what the fuss was all about b/c yesterday morning, she had some time with PD. She must have missed some when putting it away b/c all of a sudden she was coughing, eyes water, the whole ball of wax. I thought she was just choking on spit/something and she told us she was choking from Play Doh. I almost peed my pants laughing b/c the poor kid must have done everything in her power to swallow it without vomiting and came thisclose to doing so. HA HA HA serves you right for eating PD! Adam thought I was being mean by laughing hysterically and almost crying myself. Note to Morgan: PD is not what Hadley thinks it is and the commercial kind is not for consumption. I'm still laughing.
Thursday, February 7, 2013
30.................................one.
There, I said it. I'm 31. I think I'm officially old now b/c I can't say I was 20something last year.
So then I thought, why not write a letter to myself so I can read it in 5, 10, 15, 20(?) years and laugh and laugh about how ridiculous I currently am? How the things that seem huge now really don't matter as much? Sure, why not. Here goes.
Dear Self ___ years from now,
Way to go - today (a few days ago, you were distracted by your new iPhone5 and life in general and couldn't finish this post) you're 31 and have met all the goals you've wanted to by now. You have an amazing family, great career (although I suppose it depends on the day you asked me), and a core of supportive, caring friends. You have a home you never feel is clean but that's because you LIVE while you're there. The little boys you thought you wanted are turning into the most stunning little girls you could have ever wished for and are your whole life (in more ways than one).
Sometimes I think about what I want in the next 5-20 years and it's so daunting I can't do it. Do I raise the bar? Go for gold? Work my way up the work ladder? No, that's not the path for me - I like my job and I want to work directly with kids. That was one of my super criteria for choosing this profession - working with kids - so why would I want to be an administrator and work with adults all day? Nope, I'll stick to my "in the trenches therapy" for now. Things that matter now and likely won't in the future: the immense amount of paperwork (wait, this is NEVER going away, sorry), specific difficult cases that will figure themselves out by 5 years from now (hopefully less!), and .......
Guess what?!?! Who's shocked that I started this post days ago and am just now getting to it again only to know that I can't really fully finish it b/c tonight will include packing as much as possible for a trip to WI tomorrow and if I'm not doing that, I'm either going to try to sneak in a quick workout and/or play with my phone. So, self, this is your life right now...worrying about work a little here and there, worrying/thinking about home a whole lot and loving my girlies/hubs, and trying to hold it all together and not look like I'm a raving lunatic who has no idea what she's doing 82% of the time. I mean 46%. Ok, I really mean 90%.
Life is good, there's always room for improvement, and I'll be better tomorrow than I was today. At least that's my goal. Bring it on, 31! I'm ready for ya!
Love, Liss
So then I thought, why not write a letter to myself so I can read it in 5, 10, 15, 20(?) years and laugh and laugh about how ridiculous I currently am? How the things that seem huge now really don't matter as much? Sure, why not. Here goes.
Dear Self ___ years from now,
Way to go - today (a few days ago, you were distracted by your new iPhone5 and life in general and couldn't finish this post) you're 31 and have met all the goals you've wanted to by now. You have an amazing family, great career (although I suppose it depends on the day you asked me), and a core of supportive, caring friends. You have a home you never feel is clean but that's because you LIVE while you're there. The little boys you thought you wanted are turning into the most stunning little girls you could have ever wished for and are your whole life (in more ways than one).
Sometimes I think about what I want in the next 5-20 years and it's so daunting I can't do it. Do I raise the bar? Go for gold? Work my way up the work ladder? No, that's not the path for me - I like my job and I want to work directly with kids. That was one of my super criteria for choosing this profession - working with kids - so why would I want to be an administrator and work with adults all day? Nope, I'll stick to my "in the trenches therapy" for now. Things that matter now and likely won't in the future: the immense amount of paperwork (wait, this is NEVER going away, sorry), specific difficult cases that will figure themselves out by 5 years from now (hopefully less!), and .......
Guess what?!?! Who's shocked that I started this post days ago and am just now getting to it again only to know that I can't really fully finish it b/c tonight will include packing as much as possible for a trip to WI tomorrow and if I'm not doing that, I'm either going to try to sneak in a quick workout and/or play with my phone. So, self, this is your life right now...worrying about work a little here and there, worrying/thinking about home a whole lot and loving my girlies/hubs, and trying to hold it all together and not look like I'm a raving lunatic who has no idea what she's doing 82% of the time. I mean 46%. Ok, I really mean 90%.
Life is good, there's always room for improvement, and I'll be better tomorrow than I was today. At least that's my goal. Bring it on, 31! I'm ready for ya!
Love, Liss
Friday, February 1, 2013
Family Update Time
I feel like I haven't updated everyone in a while so here goes...youngest to oldest b/c they're more fun than we are anyway...
The Baby One:
The Baby One:
- crawls up stairs no problem and has for a while now...but can now go DOWN the stairs too! (supervised, of course. duh.)
- is on ammoxicillin (sp?) and albuterol breathing treatments b/c she had an ear infection and wheezing. When she's interested in TV, breathing treatments are cake. When she's got other ideas, they're hell.
- is a fine eater except when she's sick. Shocker, she ate TONS of pizza and avacado tonight for dinner. Love her.
- is interested in ANYthing Morgan has/does. She's imitating movements and trying to dance and it's hilarious. For example, tonight one of us parent people said, "Who loves pizza!?" and Morgan yelled, "I DO!" and raised her hand, Adam followed suit, and then Hadley started hollering and raised her hand too. Me too, sweetie.
- is starting to really speak her mind...or maybe I mean yell her mind.
- doesn't have tons of words but is constantly erupting noises/sounds and is imitating.
The Big Girl:
- is growing more and more independent every day. Every time I ask her to stop getting big, she starts talking about "When I'm 30 and I can drive..." sigh.
- 's fine motor skills for coloring is starting to rock my socks off. She brings home colored pages from Mary's all the time and seriously, in a week or two she was suddenly a big girl who can color in the lines no problem.
- has an attituuuuude sometimes. What can I say...she's related to me. sigh (poor kid)
- is so very thoughtful and is constantly loving on her sister. That said, when I hear, "I GOTCHA!" it's a given that Hadley is now stuck in some form of "embrace" be it by the ankle trying to get away or a big bear hug while I pray Morgan doesn't do the "throw-let-go"
- never ceases to amaze us with her smarts. She knows so many things and she loves to keep learning. She wants to find out who/what/where/when/why things work and is excited when she's learning about sounds/letters/blending them on new apps we find.
- made it to the end of her first Disney movie today after SHE chose it. It was the first time I said we'd watch a movie, which one do you want, and she responded with a DISNEY movie. Super score.
- thinks she might be getting done with her naps. She has another thing coming. I told her she can stop napping around mid-August. ;-)
The Mommy:
- LOVED the extra time home this week for a half day with sick Hadley Tuesday, snow/sick Hadley day Wednesday, and the 2hr late start today.
- is busy with work while at work and doing pretty well with keeping it there and not at home. For now. I always feel like this could be a ticking time bomb.
- got to play volleyball after getting her hair did last night and it was the best night in a long time flying solo. LOVED IT and felt athletically alive again for the first time in a long time.
- is getting tired and moving on to the daddy person.
The Daddy:
- is being an athletic machine too and working hard at his weight loss goals (much like the mommy person). It won't be long before he passes up the mommy person in total weight lost this year.
- works hard.
- loves his girls like a crazy person. It's so fun watching them crawl all over him and get so VERY excited for him to come home every night. I love when he walks out of our bedroom with one in each arm and I pretend to be all shocked that he's got TWOGIRLS instead of just one. They love that.
- is not as good at Words With Friends as the mommy person. Just sayin'.
- is so good at keeping the mommy person grounded. Most days. ;-)
Adios, amigos. I'm exhausted and tomorrow morning holds lots of shuffling around of Maddie to the vet at 8:00am and Morgan to swimming at 9:30. Potential fun time at Monkey Joe's in the afternoon. We'll see!
Comparisonitis
Warning - for those of you in the Quad City area, I'm totally copping this post idea from the Quad City Moms Blog because Heather (who's a friend of mine through Stroller Strides a few years ago) wrote a post about "Mommy Comparisonitis" which is a "condition" in which you find yourself comparing yourself to other super moms (or those you view as super moms/coworkers/anyone) to the point in which you start to lose perspective and feel like what you have/do isn't good enough. So here goes. I'm going to air out some of my comparisonitises and hopefully it will help bring some perspective about how great my life really is. Truly! I love my life. Happy girl right here. Onward.
Comparisonitis: While I am pretty sure I am a rockstar single mom most of the time when Adam travels, I'm still extremely jealous of moms who get their husbands home all the time (I mean 90% of the time or more).
Reality: We chose this life/career path. Mostly. When Adam interviewed for jobs, his current company was the one that fit us the best. Then they moved him within the company here...there...and then over THERE. All of these moves are completely normal for this company (any GPC employee/wife of can attest to that!). This new (old) job involves travel and it makes it difficult to be a rockstar SET of parents almost every night of the week. Am I insanely jealous of other moms who have reliable schedules week to week? Sure bet I do. Do I cry when he leaves? No, but I can get pretty sad when a tiny person in my house looks at me and asks for him or looks to where she'd normally find him in the morning when she gets out of bed.
Comparisonitis: Careful - this one's a doozy. I can't believe I'm not 5'10" and 145lbs of sheer tiger. (PS. I AM 5'10" however)
Reality: Seriously...I think every other person on this planet who's had a baby was back to "normal" within 10 minutes of popping out said child. Ok, ok, that may not be the case, but with Morgan it took me a YEAR to feel like I *might* sort of look like I should be allowed in a swimsuit without a moo moo over it and guess what...we're going on 13 months strong here with Hadley and I'm STILL ~9lbs up. STILL. I'm on my way down though - I had an AH HA THIS BLOWS moment FINALLY and decided it's time. I'm not being crazy gung ho here (as in no 10 mile runs in the dark in 10 degree weather for me!) but I'm doing SOMEthing at least 3-5x/week. I love this one Pin on Pinterest - it gives a workout for each day of the week which is totally doable and I can do without shoes on (good grippy socks though or I'd fall on my rear). It makes me feel like at least I got off the couch (when I finally hit it) and am doing SOMEthing. I'm going to love my body again...hopefully by summertime.
Comparisonitis: Everyone else has their families around to help them but us.
Reality: When we were young and didn't know anything, we figured all the job offers/interviews Adam was up for shouldn't be a flight away so we didn't pick any of those (we didn't mind living farTHER away, just not FAR away). So we ended up in good ol' Iowa. It was our choice. Do we always love it? Nope, sure don't. Do I sometimes want to cry my eyes out from missing our families and wanting our girls to spend more time with them? Yup. So...we put tens of thousands of miles on our cars, let our girls watch entirely too much TV in the car, and go up to see them as much as we can. Once I did the math b/c I was curious how much it really cost to do this oh, 10-12x/year, and I don't want to do it again. The cost was HIGH. Hey, HEY! Totally worth it.
Comparisonitis: The other amazing SLPs I work with learned more/retained everything/keep current on things I have no idea about. Since I don't do these things, I'm totally sub-par when it comes to being a Speech-Language Pathologist (SLP).
Reality: I don't suck at my job. Some days are definitely better than others and I can meet a deadline like nobody's business. Am I a graphing queen? HA. No. (although I am working on it with a little "help" I suppose...but I digress). I'm learning as I go and can't believe how much more I know now than I did even a year ago at this time. This is a work-in-progress career. I think I'm finally grasping this...although I swear there are some of my colleagues who stay up late reading the latest research and using it perfectly in their therapy sessions....anyone feeling guilty??
Comparisonitis: All our friends have beautiful homes that are always clean (toy clutter doesn't count), updated, and don't have glaring issues wrong with them, much unlike our house.
Reality: Our house is not a bad house (Adam will vehemently disagree, but then again, he's the one doing most of the projects these days). The girls have the HUGEST/cutest bedrooms I've ever seen for kids (an entire floor to themselves! ah, the space!) and we've decorated them well. While their rooms are practically perfection, the rest of our house lacks...cohesiveness. Things are kind of hodge-podged all over and there's no real theme. Not that a house needs a theme necessarily, but things don't match, pictures remain propped up near where they should be hung, there's chips in paint, the trim is a disaster (we hate wood trim, want white)...and I'm not willing to spend the time/money to redo each room's decor when we could be moving in the next few years or so to our forever home (we tried and failed at this the summer I was pregnant with Hadley). More reality - this house is the house where we brought home our babies (fuzzy and human). We made this house our HOME. Laughter fills these spaces as well as tears of all kinds, good and maybe not so good. We hate all the projects this place that is as old as we are still has left to do. It feels like a never ending battle and we realize you'll have that almost any house save for new construction (eep! big cash!). So we work on projects, try to keep it clean, and someday, dang it, when the government stops taking so dang much money from us, maybe I'll have a cleaning lady. ;-)
Comparisonitis: My friends never yell at their kids. They are super patient with them and their kids are near perfect as a result.
Reality: I'm relatively patient with the girls (see C#1). There are times, though, where I get away from myself and I'm mad. I'm frustrated. I don't see why they can't see my point of view and this makes total sense to me, an almost 31 y/o woman, about a 1 and 3 year old. Ok, I lie. I have a temper and it can get ugly (thank you Adam for still loving me anyway. I blame my genes mostly). Sometimes, as most parents do, I'm sure, I have to step back and breathe. Remember they are kids. And that they're healthy and normal. And wonderful!! We are truly blessed to have these two little people in our lives and I hate putting them to bed after a rough night knowing I have to wait hours and hours until I can be a better mom again. I was mad at the dog the other day for something...and Morgan actually "coached" me to take some deep breaths (it felt like I was talking to myself out of her mouth like when I have to help her calm down). Woah, reality check. Since then I've been better. It feels like sometimes I'm so patient during Adamless weeks that it gets all bottled up and flies out when he's home b/c I know they'll have someone else to fall back on when mom's nuts again. It's not like I scream and yell, guys. It's the feeling of constantly saying NO, repeating myself over and over and just kid-testing-mom kinds of things. It's normal...right?
Comparisonitis: Everyone has their best friend in their back pocket (ie. lives down the street, close city, next door...)
Reality: No they don't. Geez. This is just a shout out to my bestie because I miss her like crazy and it's really not fair that she lives 5.2503 hours away from me. I blame her. ;-)
So here's the reality, folks (self?). I'm so very lucky to have the best husband, amazing children, and beautiful roof over our heads. I wouldn't change a thing unless it meant I'd be better for them. So onward with thanking God for all the blessings we have and continue to enjoy this life we share b/c honestly - it's the best one I could have hoped for.
Comparisonitis: While I am pretty sure I am a rockstar single mom most of the time when Adam travels, I'm still extremely jealous of moms who get their husbands home all the time (I mean 90% of the time or more).
Reality: We chose this life/career path. Mostly. When Adam interviewed for jobs, his current company was the one that fit us the best. Then they moved him within the company here...there...and then over THERE. All of these moves are completely normal for this company (any GPC employee/wife of can attest to that!). This new (old) job involves travel and it makes it difficult to be a rockstar SET of parents almost every night of the week. Am I insanely jealous of other moms who have reliable schedules week to week? Sure bet I do. Do I cry when he leaves? No, but I can get pretty sad when a tiny person in my house looks at me and asks for him or looks to where she'd normally find him in the morning when she gets out of bed.
Comparisonitis: Careful - this one's a doozy. I can't believe I'm not 5'10" and 145lbs of sheer tiger. (PS. I AM 5'10" however)
Reality: Seriously...I think every other person on this planet who's had a baby was back to "normal" within 10 minutes of popping out said child. Ok, ok, that may not be the case, but with Morgan it took me a YEAR to feel like I *might* sort of look like I should be allowed in a swimsuit without a moo moo over it and guess what...we're going on 13 months strong here with Hadley and I'm STILL ~9lbs up. STILL. I'm on my way down though - I had an AH HA THIS BLOWS moment FINALLY and decided it's time. I'm not being crazy gung ho here (as in no 10 mile runs in the dark in 10 degree weather for me!) but I'm doing SOMEthing at least 3-5x/week. I love this one Pin on Pinterest - it gives a workout for each day of the week which is totally doable and I can do without shoes on (good grippy socks though or I'd fall on my rear). It makes me feel like at least I got off the couch (when I finally hit it) and am doing SOMEthing. I'm going to love my body again...hopefully by summertime.
Comparisonitis: Everyone else has their families around to help them but us.
Reality: When we were young and didn't know anything, we figured all the job offers/interviews Adam was up for shouldn't be a flight away so we didn't pick any of those (we didn't mind living farTHER away, just not FAR away). So we ended up in good ol' Iowa. It was our choice. Do we always love it? Nope, sure don't. Do I sometimes want to cry my eyes out from missing our families and wanting our girls to spend more time with them? Yup. So...we put tens of thousands of miles on our cars, let our girls watch entirely too much TV in the car, and go up to see them as much as we can. Once I did the math b/c I was curious how much it really cost to do this oh, 10-12x/year, and I don't want to do it again. The cost was HIGH. Hey, HEY! Totally worth it.
Comparisonitis: The other amazing SLPs I work with learned more/retained everything/keep current on things I have no idea about. Since I don't do these things, I'm totally sub-par when it comes to being a Speech-Language Pathologist (SLP).
Reality: I don't suck at my job. Some days are definitely better than others and I can meet a deadline like nobody's business. Am I a graphing queen? HA. No. (although I am working on it with a little "help" I suppose...but I digress). I'm learning as I go and can't believe how much more I know now than I did even a year ago at this time. This is a work-in-progress career. I think I'm finally grasping this...although I swear there are some of my colleagues who stay up late reading the latest research and using it perfectly in their therapy sessions....anyone feeling guilty??
Comparisonitis: All our friends have beautiful homes that are always clean (toy clutter doesn't count), updated, and don't have glaring issues wrong with them, much unlike our house.
Reality: Our house is not a bad house (Adam will vehemently disagree, but then again, he's the one doing most of the projects these days). The girls have the HUGEST/cutest bedrooms I've ever seen for kids (an entire floor to themselves! ah, the space!) and we've decorated them well. While their rooms are practically perfection, the rest of our house lacks...cohesiveness. Things are kind of hodge-podged all over and there's no real theme. Not that a house needs a theme necessarily, but things don't match, pictures remain propped up near where they should be hung, there's chips in paint, the trim is a disaster (we hate wood trim, want white)...and I'm not willing to spend the time/money to redo each room's decor when we could be moving in the next few years or so to our forever home (we tried and failed at this the summer I was pregnant with Hadley). More reality - this house is the house where we brought home our babies (fuzzy and human). We made this house our HOME. Laughter fills these spaces as well as tears of all kinds, good and maybe not so good. We hate all the projects this place that is as old as we are still has left to do. It feels like a never ending battle and we realize you'll have that almost any house save for new construction (eep! big cash!). So we work on projects, try to keep it clean, and someday, dang it, when the government stops taking so dang much money from us, maybe I'll have a cleaning lady. ;-)
Comparisonitis: My friends never yell at their kids. They are super patient with them and their kids are near perfect as a result.
Reality: I'm relatively patient with the girls (see C#1). There are times, though, where I get away from myself and I'm mad. I'm frustrated. I don't see why they can't see my point of view and this makes total sense to me, an almost 31 y/o woman, about a 1 and 3 year old. Ok, I lie. I have a temper and it can get ugly (thank you Adam for still loving me anyway. I blame my genes mostly). Sometimes, as most parents do, I'm sure, I have to step back and breathe. Remember they are kids. And that they're healthy and normal. And wonderful!! We are truly blessed to have these two little people in our lives and I hate putting them to bed after a rough night knowing I have to wait hours and hours until I can be a better mom again. I was mad at the dog the other day for something...and Morgan actually "coached" me to take some deep breaths (it felt like I was talking to myself out of her mouth like when I have to help her calm down). Woah, reality check. Since then I've been better. It feels like sometimes I'm so patient during Adamless weeks that it gets all bottled up and flies out when he's home b/c I know they'll have someone else to fall back on when mom's nuts again. It's not like I scream and yell, guys. It's the feeling of constantly saying NO, repeating myself over and over and just kid-testing-mom kinds of things. It's normal...right?
Comparisonitis: Everyone has their best friend in their back pocket (ie. lives down the street, close city, next door...)
Reality: No they don't. Geez. This is just a shout out to my bestie because I miss her like crazy and it's really not fair that she lives 5.2503 hours away from me. I blame her. ;-)
So here's the reality, folks (self?). I'm so very lucky to have the best husband, amazing children, and beautiful roof over our heads. I wouldn't change a thing unless it meant I'd be better for them. So onward with thanking God for all the blessings we have and continue to enjoy this life we share b/c honestly - it's the best one I could have hoped for.
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