Tuesday, August 31, 2010

I'm Just a Girl

When I was a little girl I just loved to play in my grandma's jewelery box. She used to sell Avon and she had so much beautiful costume jewelery and she always let me play with it. I remember her long pearl necklaces and beautiful dangly earrings. The most prized possession of mine to play with was her tiara from her wedding day.

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I used to wear it and pretend I was a princess. Today Kensley played in my jewelery box.

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She picked up and played with each piece slowly and carefully before moving on to the next piece.

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She played with the flower her daddy wore on the day he married me

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and she wore the tiara I wore that very same day

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I have to say its sort of surreal watching her play with the things we wore on a day when she was just a future dream of ours. A wish that had yet to come true.

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For she is such a fabulous dream come true

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Monday, August 30, 2010

Blast From the Past

vanessa

Yours truly at age 3.

Sunday, August 29, 2010

Coming to a Close

Can you believe that we are almost into September? I feel like this summer just flew right by us. Last week it even felt like fall was right around the corner with temperatures in the low 70's here. This weekend it was back up to the high 80's and the next two days should be in the 90's so we are trying to soak in the last few days of summer we have left. Lord knows that in 2 weeks it could be snowing. This is Ohio after all.

Today we headed down to my parents house so that we could all go swimming. It was my first time since I got the go ahead from my doctor and the water was lovely. I can't believe how much Kensley enjoys the swimming pool. I am definitely going to look into open swim times to take her to the YMCA this fall/winter. I know she would love that and I want to keep her used to the water and working more on her swimming.

We completely stuffed ourselves on burgers and pasta salad and my mom made chocolate brownie sundaes with ice cream and chocolate syrup. I think my mom is one of the only people who still buys Hershey's syrup from a can. I laugh every time I see one because it is such a reminder of my childhood and how my brother and I used to get to suck the last little bit out when it was almost gone.

Kensley chowed down on some fresh from the garden tomatoes and pasta salad.

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Rowan pretty much slept the entire time. It was so warm outside it lulled him into a deep, deep sleep.

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As much as I am looking forward to fall I sure am going to miss these warm summer days!

Wednesday, August 25, 2010

Wordless Wednesday

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Monday, August 23, 2010

A nice weekend

This weekend was a busy one. Saturday Dave and I got a chance to go on a "date" in the afternoon while his mom watched the kids. I call it a "date" because we spent most of it running errands that we just don't like to do while we have the kids with us. I picked up my prenatal vitamins, returned some things to Babies 'R Us, and stopped at Kohls to get Kensley some footed Pajamas. We did get to stop at Quaker Steak and have lunch so it wasn't all business ;)

Here is a pic of Dave and I on our little "date"

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Here I am bored and waiting for Dave to get back from running in the store. Please excuse my terrible roots. They are getting highlighted tomorrow! ha!

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We came home and went to our friends house for dinner and let the kids play. We got home around 9:30 and we were pretty much all in bed by 11. That is pretty early for us but we were exhausted. In big news- Rowan slept 5 hours in a row that night! He woke up to eat and then slept another 4. He is getting much closer to sleeping through the night!

Sunday we headed to the outlet mall for some shopping. Gigi came with us because she has never been. Let me tell you, we need to get those dvd players that go on the back of your seats. Kensley is so much better in the car when she can watch a movie on the way there. They go on sale pretty cheap around Christmas so I think we will get them so both the kids can watch. Well, once Rowan can face forward ;) We got a lot accomplished at the outlet mall. Both kids now have fall/winter jackets, we got Kensley a pair of boots and more socks, and they both got a lot of fall/winter clothes. I am so excited to try to get their pictures taken in some of the outfits.

Kensley was in love with this ride inside the food court. She DID NOT want to get out of it and continue shopping.

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We left the mall early because Gigi started to feel really ill and was having blurred vision. She went to the doctor today and he thinks it might be ocular headaches? If she has an episode again she was told to go to the ER to make sure. I hope that is all it is, it was pretty scary yesterday but she was feeling much better by the time we got home. She took us out for ice cream because she felt bad! haha That's Gigi for you!

Then we came home and napped. We sleep whenever we possibly can! ha!

Friday, August 20, 2010

Good Friday

Today is a great Friday and you want to know why?! This is the last day that Dave will be working nights! We are beyond excited that he will be working days starting Monday. I will be the first to tell you I think I am the most excited about this. The idea of having my hubby home each and every night to snuggle with and watch movies with is just about enough to make me jump for joy. So yes. Today is a good day :)

It is also a really good day because daddy will be home the next two days to hang out and play with us. I think this makes a certain two-year-old very happy. We have a few things planned and are looking forward to just soaking in some really good family time together.

On a side note and something totally unrelated I had to crack up today at Kensley walking around with her hair looking like this...

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My little hippie!

Thursday, August 19, 2010

6 week checkup and more visitors!

Today I had my 6 week checkup at my doctors. Everything checked out fine and I am so ready to get back to the gym and start working out again. Is it sad that I actually miss it? Or maybe I am just looking forward to an hour to myself when I can actually hear myself think...Anyway, while I was at my checkup the nurse came in and asked me if I had received my present yet. I didn't know what she was talking about so she took that as a no. I guess my OBGYN's wife goes shopping and buys a gift for every baby that is born within their practice. Isn't that so sweet? The nurse asked me how much Rowan weighed and I told her 12 lbs but that was two weeks ago. ha! When I got home I had Kensley help me open the package and this is what was inside...

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How cute huh? It sort of cracked me up that the size of the outfits was 6 months! Of course, Dave was wearing 12 month clothes when he was 3 months so looks like Rowan is right on track to be like his daddy ;)

Later on in the evening Dave's mom and grandma stopped over. I finally got a picture of Rowan with his great grandma Audrey.

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Here is Rowan with grandma Patti

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And this seems to be how every picture with Kensley turns out...

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After they left I decided I had better give Rowan a bath because he was starting to stink ;) I had him all washed up and smelling yummy when I gave him his bottle. When I went to burp him he projectile vomited on me, himself and about 6 feet across the bedroom floor. Kensley sat on the floor beside him saying, "Awe RoRo. Awe RoRo. Its aight." I just finished giving him his second bath and scrubbing my carpet praying that it doesn't smell like rotten milk in the morning!

Sunshine of my Life

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Run Run

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In the sun

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My sweet little one

Tuesday, August 17, 2010

Visitors

My cousin and her boyfriend came to visit from Wisconsin last week. They surprised us with a visit along with Gigi and Papa. It is so nice to see them because they usually only get a chance to visit once a year. This was the first time they got to see Rowan and they couldn't believe how much Kensley had changed in a year.

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This is my cousin Christy holding Rowan for the first time.

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Here is Gigi (my grandma) holding Rowan. She wanted a picture of her holding Rowan with K in the picture and this next picture cracks me up. This is definitely how it goes when trying to get a two year old to sit still long enough to take a picture.

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Here is my Papa holding Rowan. I believe this is he first time he held him. They came to the hospital to visit but I don't think he held him then. Papa likes babies a little bit bigger so that he can wrestle around with them. Poor Rowan had enough of being passed around right about now.

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I am so glad that they all stopped by for a visit. I just love when people stop by as a surprise and it was great to see my cousin :)

Saturday, August 14, 2010

Happy Birthday/Kid Fest

First off I would like to tell everyone that today is my momma's birthday! I don't dare say how old she is (although she is still quite young)! We spent the afternoon visiting with her and then we headed over to the Kid's Fest that was going on in my hometown. Kid's Fest is something put on by the churches in our community for the kids and it is all free. They had bouncy houses, hot dogs, snow cones, ice cream cones, face painting, balloon animals and they even brought the fire trucks over for the kids to see.

Can I just tell you how much becoming a mother has made me lose all of my brain cells? I now must make a list for everything and I never used to be like that! The other day at the grocery store I had a list but had to keep going back to isles I had already been down because I kept forgetting things! We must have spent over an hour in the grocery store and I think Dave wanted to shoot me! ha!

Then today I took my little pocket camera so I wouldn't have to lug my nice big one all over the festival. I took some pictures and when I went to take pictures of Kensley with her ice cream cone I couldn't find it anywhere! Here I left it on the sign-in table and thankfully it was right where I left it. I swear, if my head wasn't screwed on so tight...

Anyway, Kensley had a blast at Kid's Fest. (Rowan stayed home with Gigi because it was unbearably hot today). She really loved the bouncy houses. I think they had 5 or 6 different bouncy houses and she ran and jumped in all of them.

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Here are some of the members of the church who helped make balloon animals

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Kensley got a balloon dog. He tragically popped from the intense heat about 5 minutes later. Believe me I felt his pain!

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Thankfully they did have an air conditioned area set up where you could have an ice cream cone and cool off!

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I can't tell you how days like today make me look forward to fall and cooler temperatures. It would have been so fun to stay longer and let K enjoy everything at the festival but it was far too hot to enjoy it. We came home tonight to a thunderstorm and we played in the rain to cool off a little. You should have seen the steam coming up off the road!

Wednesday, August 11, 2010

Hallelujah

I have finally found something that works to get Kensley in the tub!



A lot of you recommended these to me and to be honest I didn't really think they would work. How could just changing the color of the bath water lure my child. I mean, we had tried EVERYTHING. We both got in the bath with her (not at the same time, our bathtub is really quite small), we tried giving her a shower, we bought crayons for in the tub and new tub toys. Nothing worked. Until now.

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Look! Its my child! In a tub! With a smile on her face!

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Who knew orange water could be so fun?

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Now let us all pray that the novelty of this doesn't wear off anytime soon ;)

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Monday, August 9, 2010

Tummy Time

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We have been spending a lot of time on the floor lately.

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Working on some tummy time with Rowan.

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I love how Kensley thinks this is the perfect time to show him all of her toys.

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And show him some love

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Even if he doesn't seem so interested yet.

Saturday, August 7, 2010

1 month check-up

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Stats

Weight: 12 lbs (98%)

Height: 21 1/2 inches (25%)

Head: 15 inches (25%)

Rowan had his one month check-up yesterday. Everything is looking really good. We had a few questions about his eating because when he takes a bottle sometimes it all runs out of his mouth and he wastes a lot of precious breastmilk! We were worried he might be tongue tied but the doctor checked and told us that he wasn't. He also has a pretty bad looking diaper rash and since he is soiling his diaper so much its been hard to get it to clear up. He suggested that we spend a little time each day with the diaper off so that he gets exposed to fresh air and oxygen which will help clear it up. So after bath time today we let him lay around naked for awhile. Of course he peed all over us ;) I am hoping it clears up soon though. He didn't have to have any shots this time around which was a good thing. Next month though :( We are just super happy to have a healthy baby boy!

Thursday, August 5, 2010

Happy 1 month Rowan!

Dear Rowan,

Look at you buddy! Today you turn one month old and can you believe we made it out alive? Boy was this month a rough one. Maybe not so much for you, but I'm going to be completely honest and say it was for me. I am sure one day you will read this and look at me and ask what exactly could be so hard about a baby that does nothing but eat, sleep and poop. So let me break it down for you. You do a whole lot of the eating and pooping thing. Not so much the sleeping thing.

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I know you are going to hate being compared to your sister, but the truth is that when your sister was born we didn't have anything to compare her to. We had to fly by the seat of our pants with her. This will sometimes benefit you, as we have a little bit more of a clue what we are doing since we have lived through it before. Just think of your sister as our guinea pig. But the thing is, you are nothing like your sister. You are you. Where your sister loved a binky, you don't really need one all that much. Where your sister ate and went right back to sleep at night, you eat and then want to be held for awhile before you drift off to sleep. Where your sister ate every two hours like clockwork, you eat every hour or sometimes half an hour and you eat a LOT. Your sister loved to be swaddled, sometimes wrapping you up like burrito makes you very happy. Sometimes it causes you to turn bright red in the face and break out of it like the Incredible Hulk. Where your sister always fell asleep in the car, there have been plenty of times that you have been wide awake and screaming your head off as we go for a "joy ride."

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What I am trying to say is although we have been on this roller coaster before, yours has a few extra twists, turns and nosedives. We are still figuring out what works for you. This has been a hard month. Made even harder by the fact that daddy isn't home at night and mommy has to figure out a lot of this on her own. There have been plenty of nights where I called your daddy bawling my eyes out and telling him I couldn't take it anymore. There have also been nights where I soaked up your little scent while you laid with me in bed. The nights that I smiled at the sound of your breathing. The quick quick quick breathing followed by a huge sigh. Laughing at the little gassy smiles and the look your face makes when your eyes roll into the back of your head. There have been plenty of good times too.

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The one thing we were most terrified about was bringing you home and seeing how your sister would react to you. Seems the thing we were most worried about ended up being the thing that was the easiest transition. Your sister absolutely adores you. Not once has she acted jealous of your presence. In fact, she acts more like your protector than anything else. She gets upset when you cry and we have to reassure her that you are fine. She runs into our room to check on you first thing in the morning and she is constantly gives you kisses.  This is what we dreamed of when we thought of our children. That love that is unlike any other. The love shared between siblings. This might change once you learn to crawl and chew on her toys, but for now it has been such a blessing to see.

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It is so very hard to believe that a whole month has already gone by, but at the same time it seems like I can no longer remember a time that you were not a part of our lives.  We may have lost a month of sleep but we have gained so much more.

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We love you so much Robuggie.

Love,

Mama