All in a days worth of parenting

No wonder the saying, "It takes a village to raise a child." exists. It probably has something to do with the fact that it takes multiple adults to match the entertainment needs of a toddler. Or, maybe I should say entertainment 'wants' of a toddler. In any event, we had a 'village' here last week for Grace's entertainment pleasure.

These are a series of snapshots, courtesy of Auntie Marcie, taken in about a 6 hour time frame. This girl was BUSY! Everyone around her was exhausted but Grace just ate up all the attention. Her 'Energizer Bunny' enthusiasm may have partially been powered by her Kool-Ade, or as Grace would say Too-nade, popcicle. She enjoyed sitting with Grandma while eating it.


And what would a sunny day be without a little backyard skinny dipping? Grace couldn't imagine spending the afternoon any other way. I have long given up on having her wear a swim diaper in the backyard and she seems to enjoy a little nudie action.

Lucily for her, her doll Sammy also enjoys a little skinny dipping.

One of the obvious perks of having Aaron as her dad is all the physical things he does with her. He can help her jump higher, fly around the house doing 'jet', hold her on his shoulders while he mows the lawn and speed around the house and patio in her babies stroller. According to Aaron, these are the reasons he works out :-) Grace thinks he is so much fun, but this poor guy is always tired from these activities. He has a great motto though. Even when he's too tired to play, he always does it because he says "I know when I look back on these years I'll be glad I did." So sweet.

Here he is zooming Grace around the patio in her baby stroller. She loves this because he gets her going REALLY fast. I'm always nervous about the possibility of road rash, but neither of them are interested in slowing down.

Low-Rid-er

Aw, come on daddy. One more time. PEASE (as Grace would say)

Aside from totally pushing Aaron to the point of physical exhaustion, her other favorite activity is to 'fing'. She loves to fing at the park and always talks about it when we drive by in the car. Of course, this park is located less than 1/4 mile away and we drive by it daily. When we do she likes to tell me about who pushed her last. She'll say, "Fing mommy! Auntie Push!" So cute. She NEVER forgets to mention it and talks about it CONSTANTLY.

Here she is getting a push in the fing from gama.

Grandma also has developed the 'upside down game' with Grace. She loves when Gama comes to visit because she knows she can go "upsid-oune"

This is immediately followed by "Ta Da" and lots of clapping.

Um, Pop-Pop, I don't think you clapped enough for me.

Fanks Gama. That was fun!

Practicing funny faces with Pop Pop Love you Pop Pop.

Whew....that was a long blog and was literally only a 6 hour period in a day in the life of Grace. All without an afternoon nap! I'm exhausted from just blogging about it. So glad my 'Village' was here to help out for the afternoon!

I'm so tired of leaving the hospital STILL pregnant

Well, we had another visit to the hospital yesterday. I thought the full moon was going to bring baby into our lives a few weeks early, but alas it was a false alarm.

I woke up at midnight on Sunday/Monday, to a full moon, and some serious contraction pain. It wasn't consistent, so I was able to go back to sleep only to wakeup at 3am with serious cramps and contractions every 7 minutes or so. I thought "here we go!" I let it continue for about an our before waking Aaron to tell him "Our baby is coming!" I was thrilled to meet our new addition and get this show on the road. While I was having painful contractions, what bothered me most was HORRIBLE back pain. I'm talking, paralyzing, nauseating back pain. This was quite different than I experienced with Grace, but then again, this pregnancy has been totally different.

I called my parents about 4am and asked if they could come up. The first thing my mom said to me was, "It's a full moon. Babies always come on a full moon." They hit the road shortly after we hung up and I just hoped that I could hang in there till they arrived. Well, by about 6:30am my contractions had subsided but the horrible back pain was still there. I was able to take a little snooze for about an hour and then started thinking that this was very unusual for someone who was in 'labor'. Not good.

My parents arrived about 8am and Aaron and I headed out about 9am to get some walking in to speed things up before heading to the hospital. By this time the contractions were back, painful but kind of irregular. The horrible back pain was still there and I started wondering if this is what 'back labor' is all about.

We did a little walking and shopping and my contractions got worse. We headed to the hospital and I instantly thought they would send me home. I was not in 'bad shape' like I was when I was in labor and admitted with Grace. The nurse checked me and told me that the contractions weren't changing anything and she said that the backpain was likely due to the baby being 'sunny side up' (which is not the desired position for pushing. OUCH!) and wasn't due to me dilating anymore. I was having contractions every 4-5 minutes while I was there, but they weren't doing much, so the nurse discharged me and sent me on my way. On the way out the door I told Aaron, "I'm so sick of leaving this hospital STILL pregnant!"

What a bummer! Nothing worse than the guilty feeling of waking up your family in the wee hours of the morning, having them drive 3 hours to my house only to have a 'false alarm'. One would think I would know what labor was like since I experienced plenty of it with Grace!

Sigh. Anyone know when the next full moon is?

37 Weeks Pregnant

Well, I'm still pregnant. Both a good and bad thing. Well, mostly good I guess. Bad in the fact that it has been a scorching 95 degrees outside with humidity and Grace wants to spend all day in the kiddie pool in the back yard. I'm a constant sweaty, swollen mess! But, the longer the bun stays in the oven, the better.

Here are my latest pictures. I haven't mastered the art of taking pictures of myself in the mirror. Makes me wonder about all of those people on Facebook who have tons of pictures that they have taken of themselves. They seriously have WAY too much time on their hands. That is something that must come with way too much practice. I digress.....





Every week I think to myself..."Just when you thought you couldn't get any bigger!" My belly is still really growing and, even though I'm a week away from the point at which I delivered Grace, I'm convinced that this is a larger baby already. There is just so much baby here! Of course, the other girth may be the direct result of the peach pie I've been consuming. I like to think it's 100% baby and this is my blog, so that's my story and I'm sticking to it!

Speaking of peach pie....We picked a TON of peaches last week. Did some canning and have been eating all things peach. Mostly peach bread (not worth the calories because it's both made with butter and I MUST eat it with butter on top as well) and peach pie. I'm happy to report that I may have actually perfected the peach pie. Only took me 6 years to do it :-) I'm a slow learner but have really enjoyed the trial period of baking and eating peach pie on a seasonal basis. Not sure what Grace is going to think when I'm not pregnant anymore and we stop having peach pie and ice cream as a 10am snack :-)

I have my 37 week appointment tomorrow. We shall see if I've dilated any more than I was last week. I am half expecting to go in and be at 4cm, since that is the pattern I experienced last time just before Grace was born. Although I can't wait to NOT be pregnant anymore, I'm already grieving the loss of sleep and know at some point I would give anything to trade the sleepless nights just to be pregnant without an infant to wake me up.

I'm so excited to find out what we are having and am so glad we decided to wait this time. I highly recommend it!

I Think Grace is Channeling Elton John

Seriously......

36 Weeks

Just a quick update on my pregnancy. I had my 36 week appointment this morning. Aaron was kind enough to come home this morning from work so I could go by myself to the appointment, a true luxury! While Grace is usually really good during my doctor appointments, she is still a 2 year old and likes attention all the time. She is not the best at sitting patiently while I speak to my doctor. Imagine that?!

I have been feeling OK lately. Still having lots of contractions, which isn't that abnormal for me. Exhausted. Achy. All in all, things have been fairly normal. So, I was a little surprised to find out this morning that I'm already 1-2 cm dilated and 70% effaced. Eeek! When I asked her, "Do you think I'm going to have a baby this weekend?" (Fully thinking she would tell me No) She answered, "I don't know." Not exactly the answer I was looking for.

My doctor always errors on the side of being conservative. If I'm stressed about all of my contractions, she's always the one to say it's no big deal, etc. She has a 'been-there-seen-that-not-worried' kind of attitude. So for her not to give me that kind of reassurance surprised me. Of course I came home and told Aaron to install the infant car seats and pack his bag just in case!

That's all for now!