Last Call for Sunshine

Today was the last warm day of the year. I took Addie for a walk, which was a nice change. I think it's been well over a month since we could do that. Just for grins we even went out on the porch this afternoon and watched the leaves fall and the cars drive by. Addie's little eye's couldn't take all the action in fast enough. She tried hard to keep track of the cars, but they went too fast. It was pretty cute.

Three weeks until Thanksgiving! Addie can't wait for Nana and Pops!

Shopping in Des Moines

 
 
I never thought I would drive 2 hours to Des Moines, Ia just to get my shopping fix. If you'd told me I'd be doing that 4 years ago I never would have believed you. But alas, we did drive to Des Moines yesterday to get out of town for a while. Anthony hasn't left Iowa City since May and he was itching to go somewhere so we went to Des Moines and met some friends for lunch.

On the way back she started pitching a fit after we'd been on the road. When we stopped to get our Sonic fix, I jumped in the back with her to keep her happy for the drive. I quickly realized that was not necessary. Once we were back on the highway I could see that she was crying because the sun was in her eyes. I forgot that driving east as the sun sets in Iowa meant she would have it right in her face. That's because there is NOTHING to block the sun. NOTHING. So once I shaded her she crashed and I was stuck sitting in our uncomfortable back seat for the rest of the ride. Either way, it was a fun day.

I've found a new way to get Anthony to leave stores that I think are boring. We went into the Apple store at the mall and he was showing me all the things he likes. As soon as I start saying, "Okay, let's buy one..." he is ready to go. By the time I got to "Why don't we just buy everything you want in here today" he was dragging me by the arm. It's almost too easy! These pics are Addie at the mall. She rarely looks right at the camera and smiles, so I really liked that one. 

Big Girl

 
 
We finally got to the doctor today to check out the goopy eye and found out this girl weights 14 lbs, 7 oz. She's no small bird. Like I said, I think she's trying to help me out in the weight department. Fine by me. Chubby babies are much more accepted than chubby women.

Seems like every time I am up at the hospital with Adeline, we get to see Anthony. It also seems like every time we're there he wants me to take the baby up to see one of his colleagues. Because of this, I wanted to make sure I looked nice today so I dressed up a bit and wore slacks and high heels. I looked pretty cute, only Anthony could not get out of surgery so it was pointless. I really felt stupid for doing it after strolling through the mall in these shoes. My feet have not worn heels since...May? April maybe? Anyway, I could feel it today. I was determined to make one "lap" around the mall, so by the time I got to my car I thought I would never walk again. Beauty can be so painful.

In all my wisdom of motherhood (or just common sense?) I reprogrammed the heater yesterday. I actually hadn't turned it on officially despite the fact that we've already had freezing weather. So, either way, I set the heater to turn on at 4:15 in the morning. Amazingly, Adeline did not wake up at 5 this morning. Hmmm...maybe the 64 degree temperature in her room was a problem?? We'll see if this is an ongoing trend. Last night she went to bed at 9:30 and was up at 7:20 this morning. Not too shabby. 

Wasted Sunshine

The sun was kind enough to shed some light on our corner of the world today, but it was a total waste because I was inside all day. I had big plans to take Addie to the doctor this morning to check out her chronic gooped up eye. Then we were suppose to have lunch with Anthony and maybe go to the mall if I was feeling ambitious. All of that was wiped out when the car would not start this morning. Cute Addie was all bundled up for the weather, sitting in her carseat just sucking away at the pacifier and the car would not cooperate. So sad.

So we've been home all day while the sun shines outside. Anthony got home early so he could jump my car and get it over to Sears for a new battery. Just to add variety to the day, when he was positioning the Camry to jump the 4 Runner he backed into a tree. The tree is fine, but the bumper took it badly. So, there go my silly thoughts of asking for a necklace for Christmas. I think I'll cross my fingers for some new kitchen towels. It's a week from the day I quit my job...maybe there's a correlation? Some cosmic message saying, "Just in case you thought you'd worked long enough and saved up a cushion...we're going to take it now." Then again, we could go with the norm here in Iowa and just slap a democratic candidate's sticker on our car right next to the big gash and call it a day! Nobody would think anything of it.

So, Addie...she's a doll. What else can I say? She woke up again at 5 a.m., I calmly wrapped her up and gave her the pacifier, and she slept until 8 a.m.! Craziness. This girl loves her mother. I'm going to have to start setting my alarm or something. My photo of the day is just her being sweet. I like this picture because it highlights her huge belly. It is proof that she really is trying to take away all the chub I got having her. It's not working yet, but she's trying. That's all that counts.

Is My Fall Gone?

One of the things I was so excited about as I drudged through a long summer of pregnancy was the beautiful Iowa fall weather to help me walk walk walk my many baby pounds away. The weather channel says it "feels like" 29 degrees outside right now. RIGHT NOW! It's October 23rd! It might as well be 15 below because there is no way I'm taking my 12 week old baby out for a casual walk in this. I'd be lucky to motivate myself to go it alone, much less put her through it.

Sadly, I cannot find my Pilates book either. So in desperation for a workout other than the three flights of stairs in my house (if that worked I would not have the said pounds to shed in the first place), I tried to do Pilates from memory downstairs while Addie slept today. I also sat on my stability ball. A friend loaned me a book of moves to do with the ball, but they all look so complicated. And what if I'm not doing it right? I mean, what you read in a book can be somewhat left up for interpretation. So how do I know I'm doing it right? I read somewhere that just sitting on the stability ball is worth something so I thought it was at least better than sitting on the couch. Maybe tomorrow I'll change it up a bit!

Addie did wake up again at 5 a.m. this morning. I made an executive decision and calmly went in, wrapped her up tightly, stuck the pacifier in, and walked away. I'm not completely unfeeling, I watched her from the video monitor for at least 15 minutes until I could see she was sound asleep. Yesterday when she woke up early I tried feeding her, but she didn't really eat much. So, this morning, even though it seemed kinda mean to leave her in the crib after she had gone seven hours without food I decided to give something else a try. Much to my surprise, it actually worked and she slept until 6:30. So, for a few minutes this morning I felt like a real smarty pants. I'm sure tomorrow I will be humbled by something and feel totally clueless about what I'm doing. Oh, and she did give me a break on the stored up poo and simply produced three disgusting, but contained, dirty diapers today. Maybe she could sense my fear. The picture here is actually what she wore to church yesterday. Cutie pie.

So Cute

Here is the cute photo of the day. She's the best 5 a.m. wakeup call I've ever had, that's for sure. Back to the topic of being comfortable with poop...there wasn't any today. That means that I will either get a rude awakening in the middle of the night when the inevitable happens in her sleep or there will be some kind of historical explosion tomorrow. We'll see. Either way, these sorts of events may be considered, discussed, feared, and endured but I will NEVER photograph it and post it here. I have my limits.

Wee Hours of the Morn

My baby sleep book says that three to four month old babies tend to wake up around 5 a.m. and play for an hour or so. Then they fall back asleep. I'm not sure if this is what happened this morning or not, but after weeks of a waketime between 7 a.m. and 8 a.m., she was up at 5:30 today. Now, thinking back, I had the monitor sound on last night which I don't normally do. For some strange reason when Anthony is gone for the night, I find extra security in turning the monitor sound up. When he is here, he doesn't even so much as stir when she cries anyway so I'm not sure where I draw the need for extra sound when he's gone. Maybe she has been waking up and playing at 5 a.m. for a while I and just slept right through it? Either way, she was up way early today.

Now this all knowing book says that if I get up and feed her at 5:30 a.m. that this will become her normal wake time. It does not, however, offer ideas of what else I'm suppose to do. My experience so far has shown that after she has slept for 8 plus hours in a row, she is likely to get very upset when she's not fed. Further, I was completely disarmed by her cuteness. If 5:30 a.m. is a play time, I'm not sure I want to miss it. I don't know how she switched so quickly from what I awoke to as a cry to the sweet playful thing I found when I got in the room. She was just laughing and kicking all over the place. Just the cutest thing I've ever seen. So, oh wise sleep book...I'm suppose to just turn the lights off and go back to bed?

Life As We Know It

So, I'll explain my strange blog title first thing. I quit my job this week. It's a job, sure, but I must say it was one that I really enjoyed. I was good at it. My husband had his job and I had mine. Each night, for the past four and a half years of our marriage, we would converge for dinner and discuss the different happenings of our jobs. I would console him about the upside-down politics of his and he would give me ideas of ways to hit my next target. Our jobs provided a nice home, nice enough cars, nice clothes, and the opportunity to do a lot of fun things like travel when ever we could get time off from them. This was our life up until August 1, 2006.

Now life as we know it has changed. We knew it would, but had no true idea how great it would be. The birth of our daughter, Adeline, truly changed everything. All of the sudden, the job that I thought I enjoyed so much couldn't even hold a candle to the fun of being home with her during the day. Naturally, other things have changed. We are both now comfortable talking about poop on a regular basis and have little regard for our clothing when spit up hits it for the first, second, or even third time.

That being said, life has ultimately changed for the better and I thought it should be documented! Besides, I need something creative to do while Baby Einstein educates my child...