From Allison when I told her she could finish her breakfast after she brushed her teeth: “Mommy, I just do not want any more of my Pop Tart because I am full of it.”
From Nicholas as he looked out the window at sunset: “Mr. Sun, you’re going down.”
From Allison as she sings a song from Chapel time (at school): “I may never march in the infantry, ride in the Cadillac….”
“Catching Up” seems to be the theme of my blog. Maybe I should rename it to something like “Check Back in 2 Months” because that is about how often I seem to update. Anyway, here are some highlights:
We celebrated Allison’s 4th birthday with a Strawberry Shortcake theme on June 14.
We welcomed Audrey Lynn on June 17, weighing in at 8 pounds, 7 ounces. She is a sweet baby and a wonderul addition to our family.
Allison and Nicholas started school on August 11. Allison is now in Pre-K and Nicholas is in a “dayschool” class for 2 1/2 to 3 year olds. They are in school everyday from 8:00 am – 2:30 pm. While I was looking for a Mother’s Day Out arrangement for Nick, I certainly didn’t expect to have him gone all day, every day. But I ran into Allison’s Pre-school teacher and she told me about this class that had been created and it truly is a class. Due to Nicholas’s need for consistency and a schedule, we decided it was best for him to go all 5 days, instead of having to seperate from me every other day. He gave me a “courtesy cry” every morning and every afternoon last week, but was just fine to tell me good-bye and go to class today.
Allison really grew over the summer. She is a great big sister and sweet little girl that I am so blessed to call mine. She seems to be enjoying her new class so far.
Ernie continues to stay busy (and sometimes stressed) at work, but somehow still manages to be a great husband and daddy. I don’t know how he does it. Putting up with me alone is a job in itself!
Audrey is paging me….
So, I announced here four months ago, that we are expecting baby #3. We have arrived at week 34. It looks like I will deliver in about another 3 to 3 1/2 weeks. In the mean time, Allison, Nicholas, and I have a sinus infection. I am on my second antibiotic and the kids are both on Augmentin. We still have to get Nick’s new room painted (someone is coming in to do this for us) and the chair rail border replaced in the nursery that Nick has peeled off. Oh and we need bottles and a new crib for the baby.
Nicholas has started speech therapy, through which we have been told he is gifted (another post entirely), and Allison has finished preschool. She has grown and changed so much this school year. We are starting to make some solid plans for her upcoming 4th birthday. As of today, she wants to have a Strawberry Shortcake party. For several months she wanted a bubble birthday, then it was a football party and as recently as last week, it was going to be a Hello Kitty party. We will make a trip to the party store this week and see where the wind blows us on that day.
That is where we are today. I will post on the party and the new baby as things start to happen.
The two months since my last post have gone by in a flash and have not been dull by any stretch. My dad visited for 2 weeks, we celebrated Christmas, New Year’s Eve, and the LSU Tigers winning the BCS Championship. OH, and we discovered that we’re expecting baby #3!! The week after Nicholas turned 2, the morning sickness set in and took hold for quite some time. Whether it’s an old wives tale or medical fact, if morning sickness means a healthy baby, things should be just fine with this one! We have had a couple of check ups and ultrasounds and things seem to be moving along. We will have a new baby by the end of June/early July. We won’t find out if it’s a boy or a girl. We didn’t find out with the other two kids either. We love the surprise of it all.
On another note, we got a call the night of the BCS game from our flooring guy. He said he could be here in two days (Wednesday that week) to install our pecan flooring. Ernie took the day off, our wonderful brother-in-law Scotty came over and we got furniture, etc., packed up and moved out. We are back home right now while the floor acclimates to the house. We will move out again, probably at the end of the month, so that the floor can be sanded and sealed. While we didn’t expect this whole process to even begin until March, we are happy that it is being done now. The neat thing about it all is that my mom and step dad made the flooring. We have hand milled, tongue and groove pecan that came from them. It’s beautiful even though it’s still bare and we are anxious for the end result.
Allison continues to do well in school and Nicholas runs the place while she’s gone. They are pretty inseperable when she’s home. It’s a blessing to be able to witness it all.
Our sweet baby boy is 2 today! It’s hard to believe. He is all boy and loves his sister very much. His favorite things to play with are his trucks, balls, and much to his Aunt’s dismay, his sister’s baby doll stroller. He has a smile and dimples that light up the room. He laughs like nothing I’ve ever heard. It is a deep, joyful belly laugh. He loves his momma and daddy. He knows that daddy will roll around on the floor, kick a ball, play blocks with him, and pick him up when he falls. He knows his momma is there to comfort and to “bye baby.” This is what he says when he wants to rock (rock a bye baby). He loves his grandparents, his Uncle Scotty, Sa, and Chelsea. He is a joy to have and we thank God that He gave him to us. Happy Birthday Nicholas Scott! We love you!
OK, I know it’s been a long time, but this just happened so I have to blog about it. We were having dinner at a restaurant tonight and it’s kids’ night at this particular place. A clown comes in and starts going from table to table making balloon animals for the kids. The clown asks Allison what color balloon she would like. Alllison says, “Pink!”, to which the clown responds, “I’m all out of pink. How about purple?” Clown: “What kind of animal would you like?” Allison: ”Ummm, a zebra!” Clown: ”Umm, Zoe doesn’t know how to make a zebra. How about a horse?” Allison agrees and receives a purple horse with a white mane. The horse’s back legs popped on our way out of the restaurant. Allison: “Momma, my horse is broken. You need to fix it.” Momma tries for the rest of the ride home to explain to a 3 year old that you just can’t fix a broken balloon horse. Poor baby. All she wanted was a pink zebra….
Today is Allison’s first day of preschool. I woke her up and tried to be very upbeat while she ate her breakfast and got dressed. She has been excited all weekend about going to school. The excitement quickly came to an end when she walked in to the room where the children were being gathered. After a quick picture with her new teacher and a quick kiss on the head from me, she was taken to be with the other kids. As I stood and watched, I got a reassuring smile and the ever famous quote of “She’ll be fine, Mom” from the teacher.
We decided that we should go ahead and put her in school all day, everyday, instead of the 3 half days we initially registered her for. After three long weeks of potty training and anxiety about sending her because she isn’t quite there, off she went in her uniform dress and bloomers with me praying behind her that she could keep them dry. Everyone tells us that she’ll see that other kids use the potty and she will too. I’ve prayed for a happy first day and an easy transition.
So, Allison begins her journey preschool and Nicholas and I begin our journey of “just the two of us” while she is there. And I’ve signed up to be the room mother for Allison’s class. I feel like this will give Nicholas some time with his Mimi or other friends, and will give me some time with Allison in her new environment. So begins what will be the next 20 or so years for us. Many first days of school, changes in the way we do things at home to accomodate school (and hopefully, extra curricular acitivities), and changes for Ernie and me as we pray and do our very best to get them through this thing called Life.
We started potty training this week. Full-fledged, no more diapers, potty training. While I had good intentions and I tried to start the process in mid-June, life took over. We went to Houston about a week after I introduced sitting on the potty. Then we all took turns getting sick for a week. Then we were preparing to take our family vacation. Then we were on vacation for a week. That leaves us with about 3 weeks until pre-school starts. Therefore, we have 3 weeks to get this task accomplished. The first three days were a little frustrating. Then, Wednesday night, we made our first successful trip to the potty. I’m trying to keep up the enthusiam of that moment today.
I’m getting all kinds of encouragement from friends and family. And advice too. But bottom line (no pun intended), each child is different. So you have to take the advice, try it in bits and pieces so that you’re not throwing too many changes at the them, and just GO with it! (Pun intended!!)
We’re back! Well, we’ve actually been back for almost a week. We took a much needed family vacation last week. We left on Sunday for Orange Beach, AL. We spent a wonderful week together in a very nice 2 bedroom condo with a fabulous beach view.
Nicholas did not like the sand – shoes on or not. He just didn’t like it. Nor did he like standing at the edge of the Gulf to let the water splash his toes. Allison on the other hand, loved the water splashing over her feet. Until about Thursday, when a wave caught Ernie off guard just as he put Allison at the water’s edge. It splashed her in the face and got her swimming suit all wet. It’s not an easy thing to explain to a 3 year old that swimming suits are supposed to get wet. She did spend some time in the sand and enjoyed that. Otherwise, we spent a good amount of time in the splash pool and in the big pool carrying them around.
We also celebrated my birthday while we were there. We were planning on taking a dolphin cruise while we were there, so Ernie decided to set the trip for my birthday. Nicholas pointed and jabbered and giggled at the first pod of dolphins that we saw and then promptly went to sleep. It didn’t take Allison long to follow suit. While she was awake, she enjoyed seeing them, but getting up at 6:00 am makes one a little sleepy by about 11:00 am.
We had some great food while we were there. I recommend LuLu’s for a great burger and The Original Oyster House for great seafood. We hit our share of “tourist traps,” as my husband calls them and just had a great, relaxing time in general.
It’s always good to be home, though. Whether we do it all again next summer, or decide to take a different trip, I look forward to many more family vacations with my wonderful husband and my two sweet babies.
I have two elephants in the room right now. What do I do with them? Do I keep talking around them as if they are not there? I have actually been doing this with one of them. The other one is very new to me. I’m not sure what I’ll do about it yet. There are hands extended, ears to bend about it, shoulders to lean on, and arms to comfort with reassuring hugs. I’m just not sure I’m ready to talk about these things yet. Somehow, I think I will have to soon, or they will get bigger and start to intrude on my life with my family.
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