Recap in pictures

Nicole and her great-Grandpa after Christmas Dinner reading a book

Greg & Grandma T approve of dinner.


Mom and Dad are happy to not host 2 days in a row!

Our house.... what a white Christmas!

Nicole's first attempt at solids- a success!

Nic wearing her first pair of blue jeans!

Holiday Cheer and Aftermath...

I'm sitting on hold in my office on my day off. What a way to spend a Thursday.

The Christmas holiday was great – gifts galore (diamonds, clothes, coffee cup warmer, personalized book, etc. for me; a gobload of power tools for Jim; clothes, toys, shoes, and games for Nic), a lot of family time, and the first holiday hosted at our new house was a success on Tuesday. Nicole wore her red corduroy dress Grandma (my mom) made her with little embroidered sheep at the bottom. She was adorable. I bought about $50 worth of Christmas stuff 75% off on my way in today. WaHoo!

I took off through next Tuesday and I'm enjoying the time off. I have a TON of stuff to do around the house and being here at work is not helping me accomplish any of it. My goal is to get one room painted and art hung up in the house before I start the new year. We’ll see….

The Holidays & Cold

I think I might have a cold. At first I was convinced it was just allergies – sneezing, congestion, itchy eyes. Now I’ve graduated into a totally blocked left side of my nose that I can get NO air through (yet somehow it still manages to drip??) and a phlegmmy cough. I'm super tired but I think that’s equally due to being slammed at work only to be slammed at home and never getting more than about 6.5 hours of sleep when I really need/want 8.5.

I'm WAY behind on my Christmas shopping. Fortunately my brother Mike and I determined we’d exchange restaurant gift cards and babysitting offers so I picked up his and Lindsay’s about 3 weeks ago. I’ve known what I want to give Ryann for about a month now but haven’t had the time to actually go and get it. My parents are mostly done but I feel like I need just one thing each more… but I don’t know what. Greg is almost done for Christmas but he hasn’t decided what he wants for his birthday (12/26/07) other than a new car (ha). Same for Mom whose birthday is 1/15/08. Just seems like people don’t actually need anything anymore…

I made a photobook at Shutterfly for Jim’s parents- it’s all about Nicole. I put some pictures from it below – if you click on them you can enlarge it and actually read the text. We gave it to them last night at Outback - they really liked it which made the effort worth it. : )

Happy Birthday, Jenny!!!

Enjoy your 20's while they last!

Weekend of 12/14/07

Another long weekend. Here are the [what turned out to be extended] notes!
Watched Déjà Vu this weekend (Denzel Washington) – it was by the director of the Minority Report and had the same type of feel. Good flick – A.

Jim turned 31 on Saturday! I’ve only seen a few (ie 5) gray hairs on his head and I suspect that even when they start coming in more (ie when Nicole is a teenager- ha!) he’ll make a good-looking salt and pepper guy. He got a miter saw from my parents, Mike, Lindsay and RyRy as well as a deck building how-to book. He’s going to be picking out new bowling shoes from Nicole and I some time soon.

Saturday was also my last day of teaching – went really well and the students all bid their farewells. I had one actually use the words “this class empowered me at my job”. Guess where she works? The only place where people sincerely use phrases like that in “real” conversation – Procter & Gamble. J Still, it was quite a compliment.

We’re making house progress – the mattress was delivered for the new bed, we’ll sleep there for the first time on Thursday when Sarah F comes to take over the guest room we’re currently residing in (the comforter is at the drycleaners). We also moved in the dining room table into the dining room and loaded up the china cabinet with china. The entertainment center was delivered and is MASSIVE but beautiful.

On Sunday we went to a cookie exchange for the neighborhood over at the model house. We got to meet the neighbors who will be moving in next door to us – an AA couple who’re retired and empty-nesters. He told Nicole she could play in his grass which I thought was a good sign. I raised an eyebrow though when he later stated that he didn’t want “any of those Springbrooks moving in next door”. A Springbrook is the ranch-style house and his reasoning is that he doesn’t want a little house next to his big Courtland. Yeahhhh…. Anyway, Nicole pooped through her outfit so we had to head home early but Jim stuck around for some more partying and found out the following:
* There are 10 houses sold in our neighborhood including 3 yet to be built
* 3 more lots are “on hold”
* There are 3 more hot prospects looking that will probably make a decision in the Spring leading our new sales rep to state that she’s “running out of lots”
* There was a meeting to officially discuss the lot behind us (the one we just want to take over) and the developer is looking for an offer that he can counter-offer to buy it. We have to discuss this more thoroughly as the value we’d place on it is certain to be MUCH less than what he wants…
* Lots of conversation on the options that people got in their houses. For reference, one couple started with a Courtland model (base price $210,000) and upgraded it to the final price of $480,000+. Once conversation started we found out about more options (ie a fireplace blower) that we didn’t even know existed!
* OK, a little bragging… What was surprising to me was that it was OUR house that dominated the conversation- people liked how far back it was set from the street, how large it was, the fact that it’s an Avalon model and we drive an Avalon car, our retaining wall, etc. I had no idea that people were actually sincere about how great our house was- I thought that it was mostly politeness of “oh you have a nice house” but these people were really impressed. Now when our house finally lists on the auditor page they’ll go “oh, they must not have gotten many upgrades” (which we did- 3 pages of them)– we have the second largest house in the neighborhood and according to the online records paid the second least amount of money for the house. The lack of a finished basement, granite countertops and deck lead to that lower cost. In the end our final money spent total will get jacked up when we add those items on ourselves, but the cost isn’t reflected in our buying price.
* I got a little chiding about looking a little unwelcoming (my words, not theirs) as we don’t leave our outside lights on and are rarely seen. The sales agent explained to them that we work a lot which isn’t true but apparently worked as far as an excuse. Really it’s that we forget to turn on the lights and our living rooms are in the back of the house so you can’t see that the interior lights are on and we’re home by looking at the front. I’ll have to work on that as that reputation is the antithesis of the image I want to portray to my neighbors.

We wrapped up the night with attending Ronny’s wake (babysitter’s husband) which was a LONG line (1 hour +). Nicole lit up like a light when Andrea picked her up. She was all smiles and coo’s, as was Andrea. Further evidence that we have loving daycare. I understood why the line was so long – Andrea didn’t want to let Nicky go and we delayed things They’re going to start taking kids back tomorrow which I thought was quick but Jim agreed with.

Lastly, we caught Dave and Carole’s Christmas concert at their church which we attend every year. Beautiful music and my mother-in-law loved the whole thing. Job well-done!! Nicole was exhausted from a full day of people-seeing so we had to leave quickly afterwards to get her to bed.

I CAN NOT WAIT until I'm off for a full week at Christmas!!!!! I have so much to do!!!

Nicole Update

I think the romance novels are helping – yesterday when Jim was playing with Nicole she kept making faces. Suddenly when she started making noises he figured out what she was trying to do – pronounce consonant sounds!! She said “baa” today which was the first non-“ahhhh” sound I’ve heard her deliberately make in a while. I teased her that she’s a sheep and tickled her tummy in reward.

Yesterday was much better with the grandparents – a 4 hour nap in the morning and no crying in the 4 hours she was alone with them after until I got home from work (took a late lunch).

Nicole's Day and Evening

About two weeks ago my babysitter’s husband, Ronny, had a heart attack. His recovery unfortunately did not mirror my father in law’s and last night he passed away. This has been terribly hard on the family as you can imagine. Nicole stayed with her grandma and grandpa for half a day on Tuesday and all day yesterday. I was hoping that being in her home environment that this arrangement would work well, but apparently she screamed, not cried, all afternoon. I'm shaking my head as I'm still unsure why, after about 2 months Nicole has still not warmed up to them. They couldn't love her more, but she’s very temperamental.

I suspect yesterday perhaps a few things played in:
1) I didn’t come to see her at lunch as I normally do
2) She misses her routine of being at Marsha’s
3) Our house isn’t as interesting as Marsha’s – no little kiddies running around to watch
4) She isn’t Grandma’s biggest fan. Many people have suggested scent as the issue… only thing that I can think of there is the smoke residue as she’s not around anyone else who smokes.

Well, as a result of being upset all day she wanted Jim or I in eyeshot all evening, got tired early, and slept ALL NIGHT (8:30pm – 7:00am). If today is a repeat of yesterday I think I’ll ask Lindsay to watch her until Marsha’s back in action…

On a fun note, when Nicole eats her last meal before bed I’ve started reading aloud to her. She’s getting sex-ed early though she doesn’t know it. I'm reading my novel, Love Slave (a book Lisa and Kendall gave me when Nicole was born), and we’re starting to hit the juicy parts. What’s the plot? According to the back of the book:

It is no act of love that Regan experiences the night she takes her sister's place in the marriage bed, a counterfeit bride to sate the lust of her twin's new husband. Come morning, her sister, carrying another man's child, resumes her place and Regan is spirited away to a nunnery.
But a more exotic fate awaits the fiery Celtic beauty: Regan is sold to a slave trader. It will be her destiny to come under the tutelage of Karim al Malina, master of the erotic arts, who will mold Regan -- now renamed Zaynab, the beautiful one -- into a Love Slave fit for a Moorish king, though the pair break the first rule of teacher and pupil . . . they fall in love.
But Zaynab is not Karim's to keep. She is given to the Caliph of Cordoba, who vows to love her . . . and pleasure her as no younger man can. Yet Regan still longs for her one true love, Karim al Malina, and vows that, somehow, their fates must be reunited . . . .

You know it’s a good life when your main source of income is to be an “erotic arts” teacher. Ha!

Weekend of 12/7/07

We’re becoming our old selves again- party central. We had a few months of “off” time with Nicole and the new house – hadn’t gone to my parents to play cards in literally 6 months (something we had done 1-2X a month before) and haven’t had the many times/month dinner parties either. With the holidays approaching and the subsequent plethora of holiday parties to attend, our weekends are now jam-packed again.

Nicole met Santa on Saturday morning at the local grade school. She looks a bit skeptical of his brown mustache though! To prove her suspicions she left with a big handful of white beard.

Friday night I had a cookie exchange to attend with Nicole. Jim went for a guy’s night with Sean G. so he conveniently missed out on the niceties. My MIL made the 12 dozen cookies required and I brought home 11 dozen in exchange for them. Worked out great as Jim and I attended a different cookie exchange/holiday party at Tom/Meghan’s the following evening. Tom called Jim a few week ago to book the 8th with us and it was good he did – we had a total of 3 Christmas parties that evening and an invitation with an overlapping time to their party came in about 6 hours after their conversation! Following Meghan’s party (great time, great people!) we headed over to Jim’s boss’s boss’s house for a work party. AMAZING catered food (crab cakes, fruit, shrimp cocktail, etc.) and lots of laughs with Jim’s co-workers. We didn’t pick Nicole up from my aunt and uncle’s until 11:20 that night!

Sunday was another full day – we hosted friends for lunch that afternoon and they stayed until 4 when we left to continue our quest for the perfect mattress and bowl-out. Why are we bowling out? Because David Polley & crew have a Christmas concert that we attend every year when we’d normally bowl. If you would like to join us for some Christmas music next Sunday, 12/16/07, the concert is at 7:00 (see flyer for more details).

I have to start Christmas shopping… I feel out of the loop as I haven’t engaged in the mall rush even once yet this year!

Always behind...

Last night after dinner Nicole and I played with her toys. She's much more interactive now, even more so since she can sit and more easily reach them compared to when she was laying on her back. This unit is one she borrowed from her friend Ryan Childers who was generous enough to share with her! :)

After Nic went to bed I cooked for an hour and a half for my day of the office "Food Bonanza". We're having make your own tacos/nachos and enchiladas (chicken and cheese). All was going well until Jim asked me to lay down with him while the final cooking was wrapping up. Yeah, fell asleep. I woke up at 11:45 and flew out of bed. I'm praying that the enchiladas taste good and they aren't too dry from 25 minutes of overcooking. They look okay but you never can tell.... I'll be ticked off if all that effort was for naught.

This morning there was 2" of snow and these idiots in Cincinnati mistaked it for 2 feet apparently. I had to take Nicole to daycare this morning as Jim's getting the oil changed in the Avalon. After a 30 minute trip when i wasn't' even half way there (normally 16 total minutes) it dawned on me that Jim loaded the crock pot shell, but not the bowl that the taco meat was in. He's nice enough to bring it to me here at work on his way into the office. Otherwise the tacos would be missing a very key component which I'm not willing to have in light of my enchilada concern.

And the day started well, I fit into my skinny jeans!

The Firsts are coming fast and furious

Nicole was really fidgety when I tried to feed her last night so rather than frustrate both of us Jim made her a bottle. I'm so glad he did- we got to experience another first!

That makes 5 firsts in the last week and a half- first snowfall, finding her feet, sleeping 11 straight hours, sitting up, now holding her own bottle! awwwww! She's getting more and more independant- I'm mixed between excited and wanting to help her keep learning and being sad and wanting her needing me to last longer. :( Don't get much of a choice though!

Baby, It's Cold Outside

Yeah, Laura's daughter Ella is sporting a bathing suit for her new pool adventures. Nicole is dawning her new snow suit from Aunt Mary Ann. It's in the 40's here!

She's sitting up BY HERSELF! Officially recorded for the first time on 12/1/07 at 4 1/2 months!

Baby Activities

Nicole has been having a few developmental milestones lately to report. First, I've been encouraging her that if she wants to be picked up she needs to reach her arms out - it's going pretty well. Especially when I just stand there and look at her until she does it. I also say "up" each time I pick her up and look forward to "up" being an early word in her vocabulary. This might backfire on me i realize if she learns it and then is pleased when her commands get results she'll probably keep repeating it to death.

She also reaches for things in general and has a firm grasp that her hands are her own. She plays with toys and can grab items dangling above her, even if they're swaying.

We're also playing "indian" with her - bopping our hand on her mouth when she talks so she makes the "ba-ba-ba" sound. This amuses her as much as us and is an effective way to get her to stop whining/crying as the sound is so darn funny. She has not yet learned to say "ahhh" on command, even when i try to show her how by "ahh-ing" myself.

I'm not sure how, but she's selectively ticklish. When I change her I can tickle her rib cage and she'll giggle but other times she seems to care less... I think I'm hitting the same spot, but maybe not.

She's also big into Peek-A-Boo with this lightweight piece of material I have and playing airplane. She doesn't mind a little thrill when we "take off" or if we tilt her to one side like she's falling and quickly bring her back vertical- she smiles and at times outright laughs at the activity. Jim had her rolling the other night when we put up the tree.

She's wearing an adorable outfit today (flowery onesie, white pants & a knit pink sweater with embroidered roses) and like all days I dress her up pretty i hope for 2 things: 1) someone at daycare will comment on how cute she looks and 2) she doesn't poop through her clothes and wears them all day. I'll admit I'm quite possessive over picking out her outfits in the morning and wrinkle my nose when others do it, even if it's a combination I've put on her before. I'm getting to be a control freak!

Per Megan's Request

We can't have an open house until January because of how busy our schedule is with the holidays and because rooms aren't painted/finished and we want to make a great impression on our guests.

HOWEVER, you asked, so here are some photos of the place!

Great Room (as taken from the breezeway)

Nicole's curtains


Nic-knack's closet

Dining Room (can you see the subtle stripes?)

Dining Room with China Cabinet

Our new bedroom furniture (imagine the mattress)

The dresser in our master bedroom

Life Happenings

• My mother-in-law is finishing up the paint in the dining room today and we’ll have the furniture moved in there tonight! Does anyone know where I can get the plastic/metal frames that you set plates/bowls in to display them in a china cabinet? I don’t just want to lean them against the back mirrors…
• Vendors: The hardwood floor people should be at our house fixing nail pops as I type! The window people are coming to replace 2 windows that have a seal leak in the living room this afternoon. The TV repair guy needs to be called back out as we have an HD input issue that Time Warner diagnosed for us and Jim confirmed. Our new walkway up to the front door will be replaced with a prettier, curvier walk next week. The drywall folks are coming tomorrow to replace the ceiling in the basement stairs – it needed to be cut to gain access to the squeaky kitchen stairway. The countertop people, who are going to redo 2 parts of counter seams I'm still not happy with, are coming at the end of the week. All these things = so great that my MIL is home all day to greet them!
• We had a walk-thru on the “old” house yesterday. We are very eager to hear the comments from the prospective buyers. I'm about ready to go off royally on my realtor who I feel has done very little but Jim’s keeping me cool…. For now.
• The lot next door to our “new” house just sold. A Courtland (same model as the model house) will be built to a couple who may or may not have children. We wish it was one more down and not RIGHT next door as we’re enjoying the extra space but they didn’t ask our opinion. :) Another lot in the neighborhood sold and will break ground mid-December which seems like odd timing to me, but what do I know? This makes for 9 total houses in the neighborhood sold so far.
• The lot behind us has been officially deemed “unbuildable”- more reason for us to take it over!!

Weekend of 11/23/07

It’s amazing how long weekends always end with a Monday morning yawn and a “I need another day off” escaping within the first five minutes of being awake.

Even though I got out of work at 4:00 on Wednesday, I burned up the extra hour at Target and Hancock’s buying stuff to make the bathroom curtains. That night, after dinner and Nicole’s bedtime, Jim and I went back out to Home Depot to buy more house supplies so we could have a productive Thanksgiving Thursday.

Productive was the right word – as the dining room furniture was to be delivered on Friday I worked hard to paint the room in preparation. I got a sage color beneath the chair rail and a light foam green on top. I painted stripes on the top half (same hue, different sheen) which took FOREVER to tape. We didn’t get it finished before having to leave for Grandma’s for dinner though.

Thanksgiving dinner was great as always. Whole family gathered to celebrate. Nicole and Ryann behaved incredibly well and Nicole went to sleep at 9:00 in Aunt Mary’s arms. I took the opportunity to take an “all-grandma” picture with her as this was the first time that every grandma she has was present together. I also caught a shot of her sitting – she can prop herself up for a few seconds (20?) before toppling, but is quite happy while she’s vertical. She can stay up longer if she puts her hands in front of her, but that doesn’t really count as sitting on “her own”. She’s close though!

Friday, Jim woke up at 4:30am to go shopping. Yes, I said JIM woke up on a vacation day at 4:30AM to SHOP. Who is this man!? What did he want? 1) 2G memory card for the camera for $6.99 (sold out), 2) Size 3 Pampers for $10.99 from Meijer (plus coupon made them about 55% off!), 3) painting supplies (ran out of tape the night before!), 4) tools 5) 80G External hard-drive to back up our computer (got it for $55!).

Vickie and I worked diligently on finishing the paint but didn’t make it before the furniture folks came. I didn’t realize that our taste in furniture is dark wood and BIG. I think we got the biggest furniture they sell. It’s huge and took those two delivery guys all they had to get the pieces upstairs to our bedroom. I’d say I love it but we’re not in it yet – still don’t have a mattress for the bed or the touch-up paint in the living room done, so the furniture taunts us as NONE of it is in use but is so nice to look at!

We left on Saturday to head back to Spencerville for Jim’s dad’s side’s Thanksgiving. Good food, good company. Nicole slept from 9pm to 8am without getting up once! HOORAY! Long evening and next day of visiting family and friends. We were disappointed to hear that Dale W’s youngest (5 mo old) was diagnosed with Downs and Kevin C’s 5th kid was diagnosed with Autism. Makes me ever-grateful that my daughter is as healthy and happy as she is.

We came home Sunday and immediately started cooking and cleaning to impress Mike C. who came to dinner. We had a nice time but it was cut way too short by Nicole who wanted to maintain her bedtime schedule and go to sleep at 8. I put up the tree after she fell asleep but ran out of lights to put on it which seems to happen every year (how the heck…?). Tonight I aim to get the rest of the lights and ornaments on the tree and finish the touch-ups in the dining room so the furniture can go in. hopefully we’re turning the corner as far as getting fully settled into the new house!

On to another work week…

Deep Breath... Now Keep On Going!

I think it’s about time I file a “Missing Blogger Report” on myself. Things have been busy at home and work and haven’t allowed for even a spare 2 minutes to write or comment lately. Busy = good as I’m actually being somewhat productive.

Some updates:
1) Nicole’s sleeping is really coming along. She now goes through the night and when she wakes up it’s for less than 7 minutes normally and though she whines (mostly not crying) she gets herself back to sleep on her own without our intervention. We set up the monitor in both of our rooms but were chided as novices by Jim’s co-workers- “Monitors are for day, when the kid’s napping, not for night when they should put themselves back to sleep and you shouldn’t care if they’re awake” was the gist. Ah well. Note that I’m still getting up around 2 most nights to check on her (make sure she’s still breathing- will this concern ever disappear?). Still, it’s over 6 hours of sleep- I’ll take it. It’s funny, when Nicole sleeps we put her down long-ways in the bed. When she wakes up and whines she spins and we find her perpendicular in the bed the next morning.
*update: Last night she slept from 8:30 - 6:15 with only one 4 minute wake-up! Maybe we've made it through sleep training in 1 week!!!! *fingers crossed*

2) As you might have noticed from the past blog’s comments, we did attend a new church this weekend. Though small, they were some of the most polite and welcoming folks we’ve met in a long time. Nicole chatted, often loudly, through the service but people didn’t mind a bit. We’re going to go to another Methodist church in the area (making our Methodist“interview” process 3-fold) as well as 1 or 2 other non-Methodist churches just for good measure. Hopefully we’ll settle into a new place by the end of the year.

3) Work has been BUSY. Being out of the office has not allowed me to get many projects done and I’m REALLY behind on a few. Megan’s helping me out quite a bit but even she’s inundated.

4) We ordered furniture! A LOT of furniture. Thank God for financing!! Our new master bedroom set, dining room set, and jewelry chest should be arriving on Friday. The entertainment center is on special order and hopefully will be here by Christmas. Jim has talked me into buying a new flat panel plasma for our bedroom wall and we might be hitting a black Friday sale EARLY (6am?) to get a good deal on one at Sears.

5) Things with Jim’s parents are still going well. Vickie makes dinner every night and has gotten
into a cleaning routine that includes bathrooms, dusting, swiffering, etc. We are getting spoiled! Hopefully we’re showing our appreciation well enough. Another month though seems like a long time.

6) Jim’s taking tomorrow off to take Doug to the doctor but claims he has too much to do and won’t let me add to his list. Booooo!

7) Oh, and the nice lady from the wedding we went to called to get together. Remember her, she's the one who gave me her phone number! Anyway, I was pumped she called and laughed when her suggestion of things we could do was take the kids for a walk (her daughter Lindsay is just a week older than Nicole if I remember correctly). So cute! So stay-at-home mom!

Taking off work to work

I took yesterday off to work on the current house and to get Nic to her 4 mo. doctor’s appointment. Somehow I didn’t even get to start working (painting) until 12:45 and I only got 1 thing done! AUGH.

Nicole Updates:

• Nicole’s head is in the 25%ile
• She is 25 inches long which makes her in the 50th percentile for length
• She’s grown to a whopping 16lbs. 3 oz which means she’s in the 93rd percentile

Sleeping through the night is NOT going well and we have some new marching orders from the pediatrician to try. Last night was a L-O-N-G night of trying to comply with directions of not feeding her mid-night which we ultimately altered at 4:15am with the excuse of “breaking her in”. Hopefully tonight will go better.

I did get to paint her bathroom though – it’s a periwinkle color and looks quite nice. I need to make some curtains for the room and hope to accomplish this (*gasp* on my own without mother’s supervision!?!?) this week.

Buster

Some good things happened this weekend including my parents-in-law treating us to Kabuto (hibachi grill) for our anniversary and Nicole being SO well behaved throughout the meal. You should have seen her eyes light up at the fireballs the chef was creating! Class on Saturday went well and I now have 18 midterms to grade.

What didn’t go so well was Buster, Greg’s pug of 6½ years. Buster is diabetic and is constantly “starved” as he’s on a strict diet to control his sugar levels. He’s gotten creative about getting food through his diabetic tenure so it wasn’t a complete surprise when my dad found an empty bag of gummy bears when he came in from mowing the lawn. Buster spent several hours getting sick and then having what we later found out were seizures. Greg, Mom and Dad stuck with him and tried to comfort him throughout, but it got to the point that he had to go to the emergency vet clinic.

His sugar levels were over 1000, which is astronomical for an 18lb. dog, and his fever was at 107 degrees. The hospital got his sugar down to 500 and his fever to normal but the medicine needed to stop the seizures put him into a diabetic coma. When he started dehydrating they administered some additional medicine to help and it was more than his body could take. Buster passed away around 3:00 on Sunday morning.

It’s been a very emotional end of the weekend. It’s especially hard as the whole ordeal started and finished in about 12 hours total so there was not a whole lot of time to mentally or emotionally prepare for what transpired. We (Greg, Dad, Mike, Jim and I (Mom was too upset to go)) buried Buster in Mike’s woods and put a very pretty stone to mark the spot.

Though I'm crying as I write this, Buster was an incredibly special, loving, and fun dog, we all recognize that life will go on and we get to hold strong to all the memories he made with us.

Please keep Greg and my mom especially in your thoughts as they were the primary care-givers to Buster and are taking this the hardest. Buster was more than a pet, he was family, and he’ll be greatly missed.

Treading Water

Life’s been coming at me pretty fast lately. While there’s a lot of stuff going on in other people’s life I feel like a bad friend to people as I’ve put my life and my stuff first. I haven’t talked to Lisa or Sarah in weeks and I’ve missed all of the previously scheduled monthly dinners with Tom. The holidays approaching so quickly are not helping matters either as I have no shopping done or even ideas of what to get, even for my own kid!

What’s occupying my thoughts:
1. have three sets of items to grade for school and I'm done with 1¾ of it. Class is in less than 24 hours.

2. I haven’t even posted the slides for tomorrow’s class yet

3. The parents in law have helped out a bunch around the house but there’s so much they can’t physically do that Jim and I don’t have time to do either so it all remains with no Open House in sight

4. We haven’t taken the time to church-visit for Nicole. We need to pick a new church so this kid can get baptized.

5. Last night Jim and I used our whirlpool tub for the first time. No so happy about my figure with no bubbles to hide it. While I'm now under my pre-baby weight, I am certainly not flat-stomached in the slightest. Not that I’ve made time to sit-ups or anything to fix it… While Jim looks good all of the time (see below for evidence), he HAS the time to maintain what he’s already got and I need to start from scratch. But still, it’s probably not fair that what he has to look at in a wife isn’t somewhat comparable to what he’s offering physically as a husband.

6. We have several rooms with white walls. Hopefully I can be a painting fiend next Tuesday on my off day.

7. Our 30-day walk-through on the house was this morning at 7:30. There were about 32 items on the list, most small, nearly all cosmetic.

8. Our babysitter had a small stroke 2 weeks ago and is having outpatient surgery to remove some cancer from her rectum. While we love the job that she does with Nicole, we have had the necessary conversations of “what if we have to move Nicole some place else”- not fun to have to consider but fortunately hasn’t been a problem

9. We’re working on a new nighttime routine with Nicole to get her to sleep through the night. So far we’ve got down the 7:45 bath, sometimes a book, and a 8:00 feeding. Last two nights we’ve tried formula at this last feeding to see if it’ll “stick” with her longer. This also lets me have the opportunity to collect for her at the end of the day and hopefully build up a supply. So far she’s still getting up somewhere between 12:30 and 1:15am and then again at 3:30. Last night at 1:14am we let her cry it out for an hour; she fell asleep for 10 min and woke up again. By then I felt bad as I knew she was probably hungry so I gave in and fed her. Not sure if that negated any progress with the crying it out stuff or not…?? She did wake up again at 4 anyway wanting to sleep with us.

10. We’ve offered to let Doug and Vickie stay with us through December. They haven’t made a decision yet and are worried about imposing. None of the four of us particularly like their back-up plan though.

11. Nicole’s curtains will be done TONIGHT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

12. The old house is still not sold, but does have a prospect!

12. I'm also worried about some of my friends and the personal struggles they’re going through. Problem is that they’re lives are upset at the same time I'm worried about 1-12 in my own life. As a result I feel like I'm not giving any of the above enough attention which makes me feel guilty.


I did get a nice message from Anjali the other day (another person I’ve been neglecting! Grrrr!)- she lives in NC and a radio station has gone to playing Christmas music 24X7 already. What glory!! I was just excited that Wal-Mart has already gone Christmas, but an entire radio station!? Fabulous! Still not switching over my work playlist though…

My two favorite people

Nic-knack enjoying some Monday evening bath time.

The hubby, hard at work on making the propane tank "prettier".

Yeah, I'm a lucky woman. :)

Weekend of 11-2-07

Friday night was the third night in a row that Nic wanted to go to bed around 8:15 which I am now happy to indulge. I'm appreciating that her need for sleep trumps my keeping her up for the sake of seeing her. Further, it allowed me to go to bed at 8:45pm which I really really needed. When Jim came upstairs around 9:30 (probably to see where the heck I was) I woke up and remembered that I had to read the chapters I was to teach the next morning. “Do it tomorrow morning, you don’t want to re-wake your mind,” Jim advised. And so I did and consequently got up at 5:30am on a Saturday morning. What’s wrong with me!?!?

Teaching went well – the projects that the students gave were all around really really impressive. Some of the package designs they came up with were mistaken as REAL products by my mother-in-law when I brought them home they were that clever and well-done.

That afternoon Vickie, Nic-knack and I attended an estate auction up the street. There have been several times that I’ve consciously thought “I really like the location of our new house”- the first was when we ran late to Mom’s and I was thanking God that she now only lives 4 minutes away, the second was when I took the time to notice all the beautiful trees changing color and how lucky I am to pass the hundreds I do each day to and from home, and this weekend, that I had something cool and different to do and it was walking distance from my house (the neighbors are auctioneers and hold the events in their yard). Vickie and Doug apparently attended auctions all the time, but I didn’t and was interested in the process.

First, let me state that this stuff all looks like JUNK. Not knowing the first thing about antiquing, no thing stood out as a money-making opportunity (where you could resell a piece for 5X what you paid for it), and the literally dozens of blankets and throws they sold for $47 look to me as more of a hassle to get home than a “this could make a cool quilt if I cut them up” like the woman who bought them might have been thinking. Anyway, what was interesting was that they would take a big box and just start rapidly putting more and more into it and the auctioneer is working the audience for the price on the whole box. It’s not a place to pick what you want per se, but hope that what you want lands in that box for you to bid on. What do you do with all the other crap in the box (like the metal bedpan or the scratched Christmas ornaments) you didn’t want?? Vickie advised that the number one reason to attend these things is to resell the stuff at a flea market later- but who wants to give up a whole day buying and then another whole day selling?!

That evening we took Nicole to my mom’s and we went to a wedding- standard wedding fare. I did get literally burst on (as in the guy broke the lock off the door trying to get in) while pumping in the linen closet at the reception hall.

Sunday everyone left for Spencerville and Nic and I got treated to lunch with Sarah and Alex. That child is A-D-O-R-A-B-L-E. So much energy and he loved Nicole’s doll baby. He even gave me a kiss good-bye too! Oh, and Sarah was a cute pregnant lady though it’s too soon to visually tell she’s prego.

Bowling sucked – we lost 4/4 though I bowled well – 168, 139, 147 (I think)- all scores over my 122 average. Movin’ on up!

Back to the work-week. Blahhhhhhhhhhh….

Whaz Up

Few life updates:

1) Three weekends in a row- 3 attended weddings! Whew! The Cetti’s commented that we go to more weddings than anyone they know and “shouldn’t you be out of the wedding phase yet?” Apparently not! The one tomorrow night is the last one we know about though as I don’t know any more engaged people!
2) Jim’s parents are now staying with us through December 2 (at our new house).
3) I think Nicole might be getting some tooth buds… she’s drooling more and biting more- including things I wish she wouldn’t if you catch my drift
4) Nic is also gone through a growth spurt I think – she’s now as long as a standard pillow!
5) Remember how I said Vickie (MIL) and Nicole were getting along better? I was wrong.
6) The nursery décor will be done this weekend *fingers crossed* with the work I’ve done this week. The bumpers Sarah’s quilting will be the finishing touch - I’ll post pictures if so!
7) Thanks to a full day and a half off work, Jim and his mom have the old house cleaned out and ready to sit vacant, but in showable condition. Pictures to follow…
8) I'm in third place for the league for my individual bowling in the women’s series category!
9) I feel itchy to order new furniture – I got a tour of a neighbor’s house on Halloween and they are fully moved in and it looks like a real house. Rooms are painted, no boxes, even decorative pillows are out on the beds. I want furniture.
10) My 3 year wedding anniversary is next week. This is our “leather” anniversary – perhaps some FURNITURE is in order?
11) Jim looked up how much our neighbors paid for their house (public record) which might be tacky, but we’re tacky so oh well. Yeah, don’t see where the extra $130,000 they spent over what we did makes their house any better… they do have a deck and a finished basement, but we will too eventually and for a heck of a lot less than $130K

Happy Halloween!!

Yesterday I took some Halloween tattoos to the kids at daycare and bestowed them upon Cameron (age 4) who I let pick the first one. He got me some diapers and wipes for Nicole on Monday so I rewarded him for being such a good helper. He was thrilled. The giving put him in such a good mood that he decided to give Nicole one of his pumpkins that Farmer Brown brought into pre-school. He even colored on it for her and wrote “Nikki” at the top. As you can see, she likes it!



Nicole isn’t going trick or treating tonight as it’s her parents who’d end up eating whatever she collected. Instead, she and I are going to go and visit/meet our neighbors. I’ve been TERRIBLE about making time to do so because our weekends are so jam packed and lately our weeknights are too. So, we’ll head out tonight when we know people are home to meet and greet.

Happy Halloween!!

House Costs

So we’ve started getting some bills for the new house. They’re a bit higher than the old house, but we expected that as we have 3X the room compared to the old place. For perspective though, here are some things we’ve run into in our first month of home ownership:

1) in 7 years in Fairfield Jim and I used a total of 97,000 gallons of water at a cost of $25/month (which included not only water but sewage and trash too). In this house, thanks to the sprinkler system, we used 20,000 gallons in 4 days at a cost of $74. Ouch! Yeah, those puppies got turned down and we’re not disappointed that they’ve been officially shut down for the year

2) Speaking of the sprinkler system, the company who put it in has been paid for ½ the sprinkler cost and that’s it. We’ve called several times to pay them the rest, including the full $1700 for the backyard sod, and they won’t return our calls. We’re not sure why they don’t want the rest of the money owed to them, but when we finally did get a call back it was to do MORE service for us at no cost. Seems strange but we’re not arguing- we’re earning interest on their money in the mean time…

3) Our electric bill was high too – heating and cooling a 3300 sq. ft. house will do that I suppose. Good news here- when we cost compared to the old house’s cost on a monthly basis it was not only proportionate based on the sizes of the two houses, but this house was just a tad less comparatively.

4) We are officially getting mail. People magazine hasn’t missed a week! We do suspect the post office is holding some of our mail downtown though as it’s been lighter than usual as far as quantity.

5) I'm going to pull the trigger on the blinds today - $3300 for the upstairs and part of the downstairs. OUCH. Never had a clue how expensive blinds were.

So far, so good. Now if the old house would just sell and we had some equity to pay off all these people….

Bumbo Seat Recall

Most people with a young kid are familiar with the popular Bumbo seats for babies. Nicole has one, Alex W had one, and they are great tools to help your kid sit up and watch the world.

Anyway, 28 children have been hurt in them recently because of falling out. What’s happening is that the kid’s getting mad, arching his/her back which throws off the balance of the seat and tips it over. What do you expect but the kid gets hurt when they topple… The kicker- parents of the hurt kids are getting mad because when the kid fell it’s not just the 18 inches from head to floor, it’s the kid tipping and falling off a counter or some other raised surface.

Here’s an article snipet regarding the recall Bumbo’s now doing:

The following caution label is attached to the back of the seat:

WARNING — Never use on a raised surface. Never use as a car seat or bath seat. Designed for floor level use only. Never leave your baby unattended as the seat is not designed to be totally restrictive and may not prevent release of your baby in the event of vigorous movement.

….

What you can do:

• Don't let your child sit in the baby seat unattended, and don't use the seat on a table, countertop, chair, or other elevated surface.

• Contact Bumbo if you'd like to receive a new warning label and instructions. The new warning label will say: WARNING — Prevent Falls; Never use on any elevated surface.

How was the initial label not sufficient enough to get the point across and how is the new one any different or better? Geesh!

Weekend of 10/26/07

Jim’s stepfather was released from the hospital on Friday afternoon and I was surprised to come home from work to find not only him and Vickie (Jim’s mom), but Jim’s stepsister Laci and her daughter Nicole too (Bill, Doug’s friend, was supposed to drop them off at our house, not Laci). The only time I’ve ever stayed in the hospital was for my Nicole’s birth, and I actually liked the hospital food. What did Doug want for his first meal post surgery!? SKYLINE CHILI.

That night was CRAZY. Sean and Jessica were scheduled in for a game night at our place Friday night and they brought their kids who go to bed right away upon meeting. When “big” Nicole got home from Wal-Mart with Laci she was all wound up- banging on a toy piano, throwing balls on the hardwood floors, slamming cabinets, you name it. As you can imagine, the noise woke up Em and Ben and put “little” Nicole into a frazzle. I was literally about to lose it when all 4 kids started crying in chain reaction. Jim’s parents felt the same way and went to bed at 9:30.

At the end of the evening it dawned on me that somehow I didn’t re-read the chapters I was to teach on Saturday morning so I was up after the Gardners left, reading about Demand Analysis and Product Development until about 12:45.

Up at 6:30, I got ready, fed Nicole, and bid everyone good-bye as I headed out for class. Things went well there and I came home to Jim putting together our new desk. Finally I spent some actual quality time with Nicole playing with her toys and reading her stories in the afternoon. We were both exhausted from a long week so she took a bath and we both conked out before 9:00.

Sunday we got up, I had brunch with Lori in this ADORABLE coffee house in Hyde Park and then we rushed around to get dressed and ready for the evening. Jim and I attended Geoff’s wedding which was a lot of fun – lots of laughing (an unashamed “geek”, Geoff talked Roswitha into having their first dance be “She Blinded Me With Science” and they cut the cake to “Just Eat It” by Weird Al) and very touching toasts by the parents. Nicole meanwhile attended a Halloween party with my aunt where she took her first hay ride, watch the kids play games, and got oodles of attention from all around including a waiter who held her for a while.

We did miss Greg's visit - he stopped by on his new motorcycle to show it off. He'll have to come again soon!

Vickie and Nicole are getting along better now. For several days there’d be crying as soon as I was out of Nicole’s site and normally she’s not too picky with who has her. I didn’t want it to give Vickie a complex though it apparently was as the comment “she doesn’t like me” came out once or twice when asked how she and her granddaughter were getting along. Anyway, on Sunday I came home to grandma and baby “talking” to each other while rocking in the nursery. Both seemed very enthused with their “aughhhh”-based conversation and I was happy to gain some comfort that they can peacefully co-exist without me checking in every 15 minutes.

Here I am, back at work, yawning. Time to start the madness all over again!

_____ for President!

A fun and informative guide to picking a candidate that thinks like you:

http://www.usatoday.com/news/politics/election2008/candidate-match-game.htm

Here're my results:

Guess I'll need to do some research on this fella as I don't know who he is!

Jim matched with someone not in my top three.... guess we won't be talking politics in our house!

2011 Decisions

Believe it or not, questions as to where we’ll send Nicole for school have already come up and she’s not yet 4 months old. Fortunately for us, because of the location of our new house we have several options: Colerain Elementry, St. John’s (where I went to grade school), St. James, or any other open-enrollment private grade school.

Karen C. reminds me that Summit Country Day is also an option. I suspected the prices were probably more than we wanted to spend on our kid’s education at this level (now if we were talking college that’s a different story; we’d pay for Harvard if she could get in!). Anyway, in case you were considering a Montessori pre-school for your three-year-old, here’s the going rate for a Summit education:

Three-day half-day $5,360
Five-day half-day $8,025
Five-day All-day $11,995

Remember that this is for a school year of just 9 months if you were trying to compute “well, you’d spend $X for 5 day, all-day day care”. Ouch!

Karen did make mention that faculty get a discount off tuition. I wonder if XU would give me a discount on Nicole’s tuition if she went there… I’ll have to check into sending my 3-year old to the University…

Pictures from the Wedding

Somehow EVERY picture of Lindsay is perfect. Here she is with my niece Ryann in the limo before the wedding.

Mike is VERY into Ultimate Fighting and his Groom's cake reflected it. Note the corner supports- each has the name of a group that will ultimately support them as a couple. We made the cut and intend to live up to the commitment!

Mom's first little boy has officially left the nest. Here's his send-off dance.

The happy family!

My Name is Karen

... and I am addicted to Candy Corn.

and Sarah W just continues to add fuel to the fire. The 24oz bag she gave me yesterday is nearly half gone. Woman- I want my waistline back and you're not helping!!!!!!!!!!!!

Surgery Update

Doug is out of surgery and everything went well – no complications! He’ll be unconscious for several more hours and will be in the ICU for 3 days. Vickie is coming home with me today to spend the night and will go back to the hospital ??? - they won't let her spend the night in the ICU so we'll be doing some shuttling... Hooray for the road to recovery!

Weekend of 10-19-07

Our weekends are jam-packed anymore and it’s downright exhausting. Thank you again for all your thoughts, prayers, and generous offers to help with Doug. Jim’s mom spent Thursday and Friday with us to have the opportunity to sleep in a real bed instead of a hospital room. While we were at work she spent hours helping us with the house – breaking down boxes, loading bookshelves in the office, vacuuming every crack of hardwood for drywall dust in the downstairs. Whew!

Though we would have liked to have spent more time with her, this weekend was also full of wedding excitement for my brother and his fiancé Lindsay whom most of you know. Friday was the rehearsal dinner which went without a hitch. Dinner was at the White House Inn where my father gave an exceptional (though Jim said it was too long) toast to the couple and their family. The meal was great, but the dessert was a highlight- baked Alaska that they had flaming to the ceiling at several points that eventually set off the fire alarms!!

Saturday was an EARLY day after so much excitement the night before. I was up and at ‘em at 6:30am as it was my first full day of teaching. Things went fine there- about 20 min shorter than I had planned- but that worked out well as I skipped out for lunch and to get my hair done for the wedding. Three words: Midwest Wedding Hair. I need say no more about how I looked or how it was fixed.

The wedding itself was really nice. Nicole was being cared for by my aunt and she got a little fussy before falling asleep so I saw them travel to the children’s room twice. Lindsay looked beautiful and Mike was as he always is, laid back. I have pictures that I’ll post tonight. I did take what I consider a kind of big deal because it was at my brother’s wedding- I didn’t receive communion. I’d taken the bread before at Catholic events but I'm to the point that I don’t want to be hypocritical- critical of the church and then accept its greatest sacrament. Anyway, yes, it was a bit surreal to look at the couple saying their vows and realize that your little brother is all grown up. I think I’ll lose it when Greg gets married.

The reception was full-out rockin’. Mike and Linds had about 275 people in attendance including a large smattering of their friends. Greg gave one of the best best-man speeches I've ever heard and though he said he was nervous, it didn't show at all. They did all the traditional dances with the bridal party and parents, and had a special family dance with Ryann too. The beer and wine flowed, there was dancing on the tables, they turned on the lights to end the party and about 50 people lingered on for another 40 minutes! Perhaps the most creative element of the reception was the groom’s cake- more on that when the picture goes up!

I spent a lot of the reception toting Nicole around to see people. I wanted to make sure that folks who had sent her a gift got to hold her. While this was the “right” thing to do it meant that I only danced to a few songs; conversely I did get to talk to a lot of people by spending my time this way. She was exceptionally well-behaved but stayed up until about 11:30 before she hit the sack. Jim was very concerned about the volume of the DJ and her developing ears. While noise is part of the package with a reception, I had a new appreciation for really how loud it was. We attempted to keep her outside or away from the action towards the end of the night.

Our whole family slept in on Sunday as we were WORN OUT. The day was spent cleaning the new house and plotting how we’ll ever get to the old house to tidy up. We capped the night off with a 4/4 bowling record (Special Props to Dave P for his 699 series! 1 pin away from a pin!).

Doug’s triple-bypass surgery is this morning, going on as of 3 minutes ago. Please keep him in mind and heart. The new plan is that perhaps they will go to Vickie’s sister Connie’s up in Van Wert as they know more people there in that town and would have access to a car. More on that when details are shored up.

Doug Update

Thanks for all the well-wishes and help offers with Doug. We went to see him yesterday and he was definitely pretty weak. Lots of wires going in and he's tethered to a few machines that limit him from going outside and smoking (making him "grumpy" according to Jim's mom though none of us care and think it's for the best that he can't puff!).

Jim's mom came home with us last night and, sweetheart that she is, asked what she can do around the house while we're at work. She actually seemed eager to sweep out the cracks in the hardwood with the shopvac (a fine layer of drywall dust resides in them now that is driving Jim crazy).

The firm plan, baring any unusual complications from the surgery (which stroke is apparently the largest and most realistic one), is to move them into our old house. We have a fridge that we moved to the new house that we'll simply send back and we'll buy our new bedroom furniture in short order so they can sleep in our current queen-sized bed. My uncle said he has a couch and a larger TV that we can borrow too. Grandma has some dishes and pots of mine from college we'll transfer; and since we left the appliances and the kitchen table I think they should be pretty set.

Martha's comment about fate had me feeling better on a lot of fronts - better that the house isn't sold and is available for their use, better that where they will stay is convenient (walking distance) to a Walgreens in case they need milk or a prescription, better that both they and us can have some "normal" transition into living in the same city.

It'll be nice that Nicole will get to see her other grandparents more than twice in three months!

Doug

As many of you know, Jim’s parents (mom and stepdad) drive a semi truck for a living. In a stoke of amazing convenience they were actually in Florence, KY on Tuesday morning when Doug was stuck by a heart attack. He has had 2 stints already put in as well as an angioplasty done. They determined yesterday that he’ll need triple bypass surgery on either Monday or Tuesday. Normally they’re in Arizona or California or someplace far when this happens, so being just 40 minutes down 75 is a fluke of good luck.

Anyway, we’ll be headed down there today to pick up Vickie and have her spend the night. Timing could get goofy with Mike’s wedding this weekend (means our schedule is 3X as busy as normal) and shuttling her to KY and back. We’ll work it out though.

This might put them here in Cincinnati as much as 5 months post surgery while he recovers. We’re already planning how to work this out – potentially moving them into our old house so they can settle in and have their own space. More news to follow as we know it.

Shots from Picture Day

She's ready for her close-up!

This is the family picture we settled on. Wish Nic would have given us just one smiling shot to choose from... We adjusted the framing so that it's vertical.

My favorite one of her! Look at those cute toes! This is also the dress she'll be wearing to Mike and Linds's wedding this weekend.

Weekend of 10/12/07

Friday: The "old" house needs a lot of work. There are dust outlines where the furniture was and still some random stuff on the closet and pictures on the walls. After work we headed over there so Jim could do some exterior work and Nicole and I went shopping for curtains, etc. Come 10:00 the baby was tired and neither Jim nor I felt like we accomplished anything significant.

Saturday: Family picture day! Nicole has taken dirty diapers to a new extreme. Practically EVERY one is a blow-out and Sunday was literally THE WORST it’s ever been. Kid had to get dumped in the tub and the PJ’s she was wearing might not make it to circulation again… All these little delays put us further and further behind until finally we were rushing out the door, make-up not quite perfect and baby not dressed.

We got the shots done at Portrait Innovations and ended up spending about $70 on 2 poses of Nic (her 3 month shots) and 1 pose of our family. Nicole was not amused by all the antics of the photographers, despite their patient and constant efforts, and we only got a few smiling shots out of her. This did help in narrowing down the picture selection but means our family picture has a little girl with a neutral look on her face. Ah well.

We went back to the old house after an IHOP brunch and cleaned. We have 2 rooms in showable quality now but the exterior still needs work and there are 3 other rooms that need some work. We’d be more panicked about this if people were actually walking through our house but that’s unfortunately not the reality.

That evening Jim and I headed out to Mike and Lindsay’s respective bachelor and bachelorette parties. Both of us had a good time, Jim copped out around 9 I hung in there until quarter till 1. Both Nicole and Ryann got to hang out with Grandma.

Cute story: at the bachelorette party Karrie was holding Nicole and I had Ryann. Ryann and Nic kept looking at each other so we put them close together. Ryann reached out and hugged Nicole several times and “kissed” her (she had a pacifier in at the time). ADORABLE. Later that night Nicole was not all about sleeping on the floor with her cousin and was crying to be held. Ryann army crawled over to her concerned and held her hand to try to calm her down. Mom said it was really sweet.

Sunday: We got up early, I taught at XU, Jim played racquetball with his boss and then promptly got the bug Lisa, Kendall and I all had last week. Timing was inconvenient as his cousins came into town to spend the night with us. Between Nicole's being wide awake and eager to be entertained and him praying to the porcelain goddess all night and needing various things I didn’t get to have a lot of quality time with the cousins either. I'm exhausted this morning.

And I get to get up at 5 tomorrow to go to Akron for business meetings all day. Hoor-ay. :P

3 Months Old!

Nicole is 3 months old today! I weighed her this morning and she’s almost 15lbs which means she's gaining about 2 pounds per month. She laughed for the first time on Tuesday night – she’d giggled before but this was her first full-out laugh. See the video below!

She remains to be a really good baby- she loves getting baths, being cuddled, sleeping in bed with her mom and dad (bad bad habit that we’re ending this week hopefully now that her nursery is getting set up), and is starting to reach for interesting objects (ie her Molly doll), especially ones that make sounds. When she gets “talking” she is a chatterbox! She still loathes being on her stomach but has learned to turn on her side which is how she perfers to sleep as well. In the last week she's gone down for naps on her own which is fantastic! Now if she'd only drop that 4:00am feeding...

Sometimes it’s still surreal that we have a baby. Especially with moving it’s been very busy and taking time out to enjoy the moments is something I have to pay attention to accomplish. She’s changed so much in 13 weeks- I attached some side-by-side comparison pictures for reference. The one on the left was taken 7-16-07 when she was 5 days old. The one on the right was from last Wednesday, October 3.

My Kid and Me

2 days ago Nicole was clearly very happy being with Andrea, one of her babysitters. She was all smiley, cooing and giggling at her. Even as I was changing her, Nicole would turn away from me to “talk” with Andrea. When I packed her up and put her in her car seat to go home she let me know how unhappy she was to leave.

While this is great- I want her to feel happy and safe with her day care- no mother wants their kid to prefer the babysitter to them. My head danced with how I can spend more time with her, beyond weekends, evenings, and the thrice weekly lunches I visit her over. I made several off-handed comments to Jim, waiting for him to reassure me that I was still Nicky’s favorite and blah blah blah, but he didn’t pick up on cues of needing encouragement.

Well, as if Nicole did pick up on my need, she has spent the last day enthralled with me. OK, maybe that’s an exaggeration, but she is very happy with me at the moment. On several occasions I’ll notice she’s stopped nursing and when I look down to see why it’s because she’s beaming up at me. I sit her on my lap and talk to her and she squeals with delight. I stopped to see her at lunch this afternoon and she woke up with a smile when she saw me first thing. LOVE IT!

Maybe I am still her favorite. : )

Beep! Beep!

A compliment is a compliment and all given to me are appreciated. There is one group of people whose compliments have, over the years, taken higher precedence- truck drivers.

Ever since I was in high school I’ve always been very grateful when a truck driver honked at me, even better if I see them waving when I glance up in my rearview mirror. If I get more than one honk in a day or back-to-back honks from truck drivers driving near each other I actually take note of what I'm wearing or if the seatbelt is positioned in a “flattering” way to attract the attention; not that I change it if it is because by then my head's held a little higher and the sun’s a little sunnier.

I think it’s because they see hundreds of women a day and yet they acknowledge me specifically. I'm choosing to ignore the fact that they could be honking at 18 other women and 3 guys a day… And, no, I don’t think I'm being honked at because I'm a bad driver. It’s not that hard to stay in my lane on the highway.

Anyway, a few weeks ago, when I got my first honk post-kid I beamed the rest of the day. I took it as the official sign that I had gotten my pre-baby figure back. A couple days ago I actually got honked at with Nicole in the back seat which I thought was a huge compliment – I am a mom and still cute!- something I don’t normally associate together.

I wonder if my father-in-law (a semi-truck driver) used to honk at pretty girls. His personality is such that I bet he did. He's the type that would tell a truck stop waitress that she "sure looks pretty today" and he'd say it just like that and be completely sincere. Now that Jim's mom rides with him I think it's safe to assume he's quit honking if he did before- she can be the jealous type and would probably reach over and pop him if he beeped at another woman.

Weekend of 10/5/07

I'm tired. It’s been a long weekend.

Friday: I took the day off work to finish painting Nicole’s nursery, which I was successful at. It’s a more melon-colored version of mint green. I also stopped into work with her to show her off- everyone fawned all over her which made me smile.

The house had a showing at noon and the feedback was that ours was the favorite of the day… but they have to sell their house in Chicago before they can move to Cincinnati. Boooo!

When I got home that evening we had more to pack and get ready. It was kind of sad but with all the partial moving we somehow sent all of Nicole’s diapers to the new house forcing us to go to Meijer and buy another pack. This of course made my dinner cook longer than necessary and resulted in an uneventful and bland last dinner at Kay Drive. :(

Saturday: The movers came at 10:30am and we had 95% of all our stuff packed and ready upon their arrival. Nicole was very good – she sat on my lap and watched three guys work very hard and very fast at loading all of our stuff. Hiring movers was the way to go- they were so much more efficient than we would have been and to not have to do any of the work made the process almost unstressful.

What did take some emotional toll was when Nicole’s projectile vomiting started. Lisa and Kendall helped tremendously with getting her cleaned up, changed, and ready to go while we directed movers and worked on lunch. Unfortunately the vomiting didn’t end at the first bout, it continued through her next meal, forcing Kendall to make a Pedialite/thermometer run for us to Meijer. Poor kid slept most of the day but did give Lisa and I some scares with how lethargic she became and the multiple rounds of her eyes rolling back into her head. Dr. K prevailed though and her last puke was at 11:00pm.

Lisa gave me a new sense of awareness that I wasn’t fully aware of until after the conversation. After Nicole’s big 9:00 puke that required a change of clothes for both her (her fourth that day) and me, I stripped her down for a bath. Lisa asked me if it bothered me that I was covered in vomit. I never realized it but the mom thing has set in- I literally didn’t give my own clothes a second thought, they were a simple casualty of “war” and easily laundered. AUGH. I’M A MOM! AUGH!

Sunday: There are boxes EVERYWHERE in our house. We didn’t get much done on Sunday before it was time to go bowling. We won 4/4 games but that only bumped us to 8th place out of 16. It’s still early in the season though.

Monday: Whatever Nicole had on Saturday came out in me on Monday morning, forcing me to stay home from work. It’s been a LONG time since I threw up (perhaps those wild night’s revenge with Joe and Rick??) and I wouldn’t mind if it’s a long time until I do again. Not pleasant. Just as frustrating was how achy I was. Here I am, surrounded by boxes and things to do and way too ill to move and accomplish anything. At one point I stared at the ceiling for 27 minutes without moving. I did perk up a bit around 3:00 when I opened all of Nic's clothes boxes to sort them and put them away. She owns A LOT of clothes. I did take up the opportunity Nicole presented to go to sleep for the night at 8pm. Ahhhhh, sleep!

While I tended to Nicole, poor Jim put up the fan in the morning room as he was eager to finally check something, anything, off his to-do list. Unfortunately we were missing a piece and he has to call the manufacturer so even that didn’t get accomplished. Hopefully he can change out our front door handle tonight and feel a little better that things are getting done.

One other positive thing happened last night – our neighbor up the street, Shirley, stopped by with flowers and a welcome note. I was only mildly embarrassed that our house was a disaster zone (she knows what it’s like as she moved in just 2 weeks ago too) and I was in my “sick clothes”. It was sweet of her to come though and I'm glad Jim got to meet her. I hope her and her husband Rob can be our new friends! We need someone to fill in for the Sacks who are leaving us for Arizona!

Now that we've officially been in for 2 days here are the "WTF" things about the house:
1) we get no mail. I didn't even know the post office was allowed to deny service but apparently they've said they wont' deliver until 1/2 the subdivision is complete. If they mean the whole thing of 88 houses that could mean we don't get mail for years. Larry down the street apparently "knows someone inside" at the post office and is working on it for us.

2) we don't have a linen closet or drawers in the bathroom. How is this even possible!? Working on a place to put our towels and my make-up now....

Hats

When I was a junior in high school Sue and I became infatuated with hats. I think it’s because people didn’t really wear them and so to do so was to stand out a bit from the crowd. We even rigged the Secret Santa exchange amongst our friends so we could buy each other a hat. NOTE: I never once saw her wear hers…. Maybe I have bad taste?

When I was in college I bought a black dress hat to go with my pea coat. My boyfriend at the time, Kenny, loved me in the hat and always complimented me on how nice I looked when I wore it, which of course prompted me to wear it more often.

Now the only hats I wear are knit or fleece ski cap type in the winter because Cincinnati can get frickin’ cold with the wind chill. I still think you have to be pretty cool and confident to pull off a hat like the chick in the picture above. Further, I don’t have the right kind of hair cut to look good in a hat like that so I'm hesitant to buy one even though I like the style.

The first person who comes to mind who could/should wear a hat is Rachel, but I suspect if she did it wouldn’t be as trendy as the one I posted. Someone good with photoshop should play around with different styles for her.

Going National

Since my freshman year of college I’ve read a column, “Ruminations”, by Aaron Karo which I think many of my readers are familiar with. If not, hit up http://www.aaronkaro.com/. Anyway, in ’08 he’s launching a public rumination forum for guest writers. I figure I do this anyway via this blog, so, being totally egotistical, I suspect others might be interested in reading what I have to say. Hell, I conned someone from Austria to read regularly! ; )

To apply to be a writer I have to send in 3 writing samples of topics I’ve ruminated about. SO, is there anything that comes to mind that I’ve written about in the last nearly 2 years that you found funny or thought-provoking?

If YOU are interested in applying, check out the following site for more info: http://www.aaronkaro.com/ruminations.htm