2009: It's been a busy year

I thought I would post a recap of our 2009. It won't be near as funny as Dave Berry's Year in Review (thanks to Steve for tweeting with the link to that, it's hilarious!! If you haven't read it yet, take the time to do so.)

January through March we stayed busy switching rooms around for the new baby that we were expecting. We had to completely get rid of an entire bedroom full of stuff. Our guest room had also become a catch-all for things we had no other spot for. It was really interesting finding space for some things and getting rid of others. Garrett made the transition to his new room with little problem.

February 2 we found out we were having baby boy #2! I wasn't really surprised because I had felt I was having another boy and actually hoped for another boy. But that moment where the technician tells you for sure what gender the baby is, it's surprising either way.

April 7 was the night that sent me to the hospital hemorrhaging. It was a very scary experience, especially being 7 and a 1/2 months pregnant. That day marked the one year anniversary of Angie Smith's loss of her daughter, Audrey. After reading her blog that day where she shared what she was feeling, and then to end up in the hospital that night, I had her and her family on my heart and mind even more heavily than before. I can't begin to imagine what it's like to lose a baby and I wasn't sure if God was going to take my baby then, but Praise Him everything was ok and they had no idea what had caused the bleeding in the first place.

May was spent with baby showers, getting the room ready, and buying last minute things we would need for the baby. So much excitement goes into washing those baby clothes for the first time, installing the carseat, getting bottles prepared. Too bad that excitement doesn't carry itself to when the baby is 6 months old and you've washed the same bib for the thousandth time, and heaved around a carseat with a 17 pound baby in it, and made yet another bottle in the never ending bottle cycle.

I wish his room still looked this nicely organized.

At my final doctor's appointment on June 15, I was scheduled for an induction on the 17th. However at 12:45 am on June 17th, I woke up in the middle of the night (even though I had taken 2 Tylenol PM in order to feel rested for the big day), after rolling over (which takes lots of effort when you're 9 months pregnant) I felt my water break. So instead of getting to sleep in until 6 am, we got a couple hours of sleep and were off to the hospital. At 9:30 am, Cooper Gage was born weighing 7 lbs 10 oz.

The months of July and August were basically a blur of middle of the night feedings, thousands of diaper changes and lots of spit-up. Mix in Keith's birthday in July and Garrett's 4th birthday in August and that pretty much sums up those months in our family. In September, Garrett started his 3rd year of attending Mother's Day Out twice a week at our church. It was heavenly to switch from having 2 kids to just one on those days. Mid-September we took our first family vacation in a long time. We went to Galveston for a long weekend, played on the beach, visited with my brother and sister in law and just generally had a fun time. RIP nice, new, navy blue tennis shoes for we hardly knew ye. A stupid neighborhood dog drug one off, never to be seen or heard from again.

October included our first family of 4 picture session, which turned out wonderfully, Cooper eating baby food for the first time, and Halloween with Buzz Lightyear and Woody.

November was our first long trip with Cooper when we drove 14 hours one way to see my family for Thanksgiving/Christmas for a week. It was a great visit and the trip went really well with a 4 year old and a 5 month old. My legs are permanently shorter from having to sit in the middle of the backseat in order to be in-car entertainment, but that's better than going deaf from the screams.

December was a mad scramble to get everything purchased for Christmas, my attempts to forget the fact that I'm now 31, and enjoying Cooper's first Christmas and Garrett's love of the holiday and everything about it.

High-5 for Christmas!

It's been a crazy year for our family, but a great one. It's hard to believe that we won't have a year quite like this one again, but we're anticipating bigger and better.

So 2010, we're ready for you.

I'm dreaming of a White Christmas

Well, we came thisclose to getting a White Christmas here in north Texas. On Christmas Eve, the flakes started coming down pretty thick, but by Christmas morning, everything was gone except for the cold weather. Oh well, we were still pretty excited to see snow on Christmas Eve.

Christmas '09 went down like this:

Keith had to work up until the day before Christmas Eve, so we were basically business as usual. Garrett didn't have school any the week of Christmas, so his class party was the Thursday before. He had a great time, we made ornaments (which was a bit tricky since Cooper was with me, but I needed to help Garrett with a few parts. Thankfully several of the other moms were really helpful.) We ate kid food, which consists of PB&J (though Garrett does not like those), rolled up lunchmeat (which he loves), cheese cubes, and of course the prerequisite veggie tray which all moms force their child to eat a few pieces from before they can have a Christmas cookie or cupcake. Garrett said he absolutely hates broccoli (who knew?) but I managed to get him to choke down a few carrots before he moved on to dessert. The gift exchange required that each child bring a $5 gift for a boy or a girl. We found a nice nerf gun for $5 to give to someone, but unfortunately Garrett got in return a remote control car that didn't work for even a second out of the box. Too bad he couldn't have ended up with his own gift. But, such is life when a lot of toys nowadays are cheaply made.

We went to church and watched the Christmas musical that Sunday, which was really good. And then I spent the days leading up to Christmas trying to keep Garrett out of the presents. On Christmas Eve, we spent the day at Keith's parents' house where we exchanged gifts with his family. It was a fun day, especially with the snow I mentioned earlier. When we got home that night, we put the boys to bed and then started assembly. Garrett's big gift was a 2 wheel bike with training wheels and Cooper got a "Busy Ball Popper". We only assembled those 2 gifts, put out the stocking stuffers and then went to bed.

Both boys were up at 6am, but thankfully are still young enough that we got them into our bed and we all slept until 7:30. (I know this was probably the last year that will happen, at least for awhile.) Of course we couldn't just run into the living room and start opening presents because for some crazy reason, 6 month old babies tend to insist on eating before anything else happens for the day. So we all had a quick breakfast and then moved on to stockings.

One thing that our family does, that my family did growing up, is that we take turns opening presents. None of this, free-for-all ripping into presents with wrapping paper flying everywhere and you're done in less than 30 minutes. Growing up in a family of 5 kids, the present-unwrapping festivities lasted a good 2 hours. Which we loved because it drug out the anticipation. We went around the room, each person opening one gift and we took turns who got to go first with each round. It was really fun, so that's what we do at our house now. It's nice to be able to see my child's reaction with each gift they open rather than ask them after the fact what they thought because the unwrapping was too chaotic.

Garrett's new bike that he found 2 weeks before Christmas in the box in my closet. He immediately told me "I don't know what that bike is in your closet." Thankfully he never mentioned it again and he seemed surprised on Christmas morning, so who knows.

With the several presents that Garrett opened, he proclaimed 2 of them to be exactly what he wanted. (Though he's liked all of them so far.) One of which I bought on a whim a few days before Christmas. He had never even mentioned Gator Golf, wanting it or otherwise, but I saw it was on sale and thought he might like it since he's currently into golf. Turns out that was one of his favorite gifts. That and the kid sized Snuggie that he got. He's been dying for one for quite awhile now.

Cooper seems to love the ball popper and a driving toy that we bought him.

For Christmas this year I got, the Wii fit, another Wii game, several photo albums, a Shark sweeper (which I've been wanting for a long time and I'm loving it!), a few books (Eat This Not That! is one of them and it's a great book! If you've never read it, you should! So interesting.), and a calendar. It was a great Christmas! We had a nice, relaxing day being at home, just the 4 of us. We've been doing this ever since we got married and I'm so glad we're able to spend Christmas at home with just our family. I fixed a ham for dinner along with the usual side dishes and we had plenty to eat.

The day after Christmas was spent doing some major cleaning. My closet got a big overhaul, the bathrooms were cleaned, floors swept (with my new sweeper, of course!), laundry done and put away, bedsheets changed, and all my Christmas decorations boxed up and ready for the attic. I know that seems early, and it is. But with all the baby equipment in our living room this year, I was getting tired of feeling cluttered. The tree was taking the spot where I've had the Jumperoo, so it's been floating around the living room and the Exersaucer always stays in the middle of the floor, so it was driving me a little crazy to feel like things were out of place. Next year it will be much better because this equipment will be gone and it will just be toys like always. I feel a little bit like the Grinch putting everything away the day after Christmas, but it's nice to feel like my living room is a bit more organized.

It's really hard to believe that Christmas is over! I feel like this year, more than any other year, it just snuck up on us all of the sudden and then flew by without any warning. I hope next year I'll be able to savor it a bit more. I also can't believe that by next Christmas, Cooper will be 18 months old! Definitely no longer a baby.

December Miscellaneous

• It's 2 days before Christmas and I am done! One more present to wrap and that's it. I should be wrapping it now rather than blogging, but I just don't have the energy. I've shopped, I've wrapped, I've baked, I've taken many pictures of the boys by the tree, now it's time for Christmas to begin.
• Garrett has had many and varied items that he has requested from Santa. I'm not even sure I've bought most of the things he's mentioned. He goes from asking for a skateboard (how he even knows what they are is beyond me) to asking for a new Buzz Lightyear. The one he has is a bit worn, but still completely functioning so I don't think we'll see Buzz under the tree this year. (The new Buzz Lightyears that are out in anticipation for Toy Story 3 next summer are upwards of $50! That's a lot to spend on a toy that he could outgrow at anytime.)
• For the first time ever, I had to make sure that the gift count for the boys was even. Now, before you roast me for even buying Cooper many things seeing as how he's only 6 months old, he needs several things so I just bought what he's needing and wrapped it up. I figured it was easier to do that than to explain to Garrett why Cooper had nothing under the tree.
• I really appreciate our household appliances for deciding to all go on strike at this time of year. Well, not all, but our stove blew up (pretty much literally) and our kitchen faucet went down the drain (har har). So we had 2 expenses we weren't planning on in this, the most expensive time of the year.
• Stove story: One morning last week, I turned on the stove to heat up pigs in a blanket for breakfast. This in itself is unusual for me. During the week, we're cold cereal and the occasional piece of toast kind of people. But for whatever reason I thought pigs sounded good. The stove had already preheated and I had stuck the pan in the oven. Keith was about to walk out the door when he said something was on fire in the stove. So I told him to turn it off thinking maybe the foil I covered the pan with had fallen onto the heating element. Turning off the stove did nothing for the fire (and no foil had fallen onto the element.) So Keith grabbed the fire extinguisher and sprayed it in the stove. It did absolutely nothing to that fire, but it did make a total mess all over the kitchen. At this point we kind of felt a bit panicked. Here was a fire in the stove that was not phased by the fire extinguisher. Keith grabbed the stove, yanked it away from the wall, unplugged it and started dragging it to the garage. His plan was to just haul it into the yard and let it burn down, but thankfully by the time he got it to the garage, it had quit. A piece of the heating element had completely split open and the fire was following around the element as if it was a lighted fuse. Weird and scary. Thankfully a new element and a good cleaning (from the extinguisher mess) was all the stove needed. I was thankful I had a weird craving for pigs that morning because under normal circumstances, I would have had the stove on when Keith wasn't home. So I'm not sure how all of that would have gone down if it had been up to me to keep our house from burning down.
• While Keith replaced our kitchen sink and faucet all by himself, he wouldn't recommend anyone else trying it. It was a rough couple of days at our house. But I love my new stainless steel sink and faucet. The ones that came with our house were very cheap, basic white ones that we haven't liked since day 1.
• So for those of you keeping count we've had to completely replace our a/c unit, dryer, kitchen faucet and repair our dishwasher, stove, and refrigerator, all within the past year. The only appliance left standing with all its original parts is the microwave. Please don't quit on me now baby. That's where all the real cooking in this house takes place.
• Garrett is now a commercial afficionado. He told me the other day that I need "Bump-It hair". How awesome that even my 4 year old recognizes my lack of hair volume. (If you have no idea what a Bump-It is, just google it. Southern women like big hair and that's supposed to help you out.)
• I'm feeling weird because I'm actually looking forward to my new eating and exercising lifestyle. My plan is to start this on January 4, so I'm thinking I will try to do a weekly progress report. That will help me to feel as if I have someone keeping tabs on my success/failure so I will maybe feel motivated to keep it up. I WON'T be posting my weight, but I will share losses or gains weekly. So we'll see how it goes. 5 pounds a month is my goal.
• I hope all my wonderful friends and family have a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year. If you have snow in your area, enjoy yourself! We don't see much of it down here.

Happy Half-Birthday!

Dear Cooper,
Today you are 6 months old! I can't believe we're halfway to your birthday. I guess I should start thinking about birthday party themes...

You absolutely love your dad and your big brother. (I think you're pretty fond of me too..) If Garrett is around and doing anything the least bit entertaining, your eyes are glued on him and you're squealing and talking, trying hard to get his attention. When Daddy gets home in the evenings, you don't take your eyes off of him until he finally picks you up. If I'm holding you at this time (and I usually am), your body gets all tensed up as if to say "Pick me! Pick me!" And of course he always picks you up as soon as he can.

So, what are you up to at this 6 month mark?
*You're still practicing your sitting up skills. You sit up very well when propped, but with your attempts to pick up and play with toys all the time, if you sit up independently, you're not upright for long.
*You love your toys, especially the ones you can chew on or the ones that light up or make sounds.
*You hold your pacifier really well and can put it back in your own mouth. You even throw it sometimes. I've found several outside of your crib on the floor, and since you have a bumper pad in the crib, I know they didn't just fall out.
*You LOVE veggies. All veggies. It doesn't matter what vegetable it is, I can feed it to you and you will almost always eat the whole jar.
*You're learning to tolerate fruit. But you still haven't eaten more than half a jar at one sitting. And it has to be a mixed fruit, you don't want one solo fruit in the jar.
*I started giving you baby yogurt this week and you seem to like that well. Better than cereal anyway. You will eat about half of a cup and then you're done.
*You still love your sippy cup and have even tried giving yourself drinks from it.
*You're starting to notice some of Garrett's cartoons on the TV.
*You scoot backwards a lot now. I have to watch you when you're on the floor because you've ended up underneath the couch when I wasn't watching. (That's the negative to having hardwood floors, a scooting baby, and a couch that sits off the ground several inches.)
*Getting on your hands and knees is second nature for you now. You even do it in your crib when you're fighting sleep. You also rock back and forth when you're on them too, so I'm guessing crawling is in our near future.
*You sleep well at night, going to bed around 7:30 and waking up about 6:30 (then I bring you in my bed for half an hour because I just can't bring myself to get up at 6:30). Some nights you wake up during the night for one reason or another. Lately it's been because you're cold.
*You still don't take great naps and they're very inconsistent with how long you go. One morning, you'll sleep for an hour and a half, the next morning you only sleep for 30 minutes. This drives me slightly bonkers because I can't get anything done when you're napping! I never know how long you'll stay down, so of course on the days you sleep a long time, I end up getting nothing done because I think you're going to wake up any minute now.
*You don't have any teeth yet. I really thought you would have your first one now with all the drool, crankiness, chewing on things, etc. But nothing's there. I can feel a spot on your gums, but apparently we still have a ways to go.
*You went to the church nursery for the first time 2 Sundays ago. They said you did really well and all the ladies in there had Garrett when he was a baby, so they are excited to watch you now.

I'm really looking forward to your first Christmas next week! I hope you'll enjoy attempting to open presents, or at least eating the wrapping paper.

16 things you probably didn't know about me

In honor of the fact that I turn 31 today, I thought I would share 16 things you don't know about me. Unless you're a close family member, then you probably do. This wouldn't be a hard list to make except for the fact that I'm pretty much an open book, so if I haven't shared something, it's because I'm not going to. As the old woman on "Titanic" said, "A woman's heart is as deep as the ocean..." And that's all I can remember of her remark, but she was basically saying that there's always things you don't tell anyone. Not necessarily advocating that philosophy, but I think most of us have one thing or another that no one will ever know about us.
So the first thing you probably didn't know about me is that I tend to get sidetracked. Or you probably did know that.

1. My sister, Grace, and I used to play house when we were little. We both had 14 kids and each child had a first and middle name. I actually had those names written down and kept them under the top bunk of our bunkbeds. Becase all good mothers do this. I keep Garrett and Cooper's names on the back of my hand, just in case. Our stuffed raccoons were our husbands. And I didn't use one single name off that list to name our boys. The only names I actually remember were an imaginary son named Nathan and an imaginary daughter named Belinda. And did I mention that I was around the age of 12 when we played this?

2. Anytime my parents left me in charge while they went out, I always made my siblings clean the house. I helped too, but I wanted to keep everyone busy doing something so they were all assigned different chores and had to do them before our parents got home. And they truly loved me for that.

3. When I was 8 months pregnant with Cooper, I mentioned going to the doctor for something on my leg. What I didn't tell you was that it was a staph infection. People tend to freak out when they hear that, so I kept that information to myself. It's healed, but I can still see where it was. My doctor said it will leave a scar or will atleast be noticeable for a long time. This is why I did not get my tubes tied right after delivery.

4. I'm a huge fan of David Cook, the winner of season 7's American Idol. I love his music and his voice. I haven't been this big of a fan of anyone since New Kids on the Block. And no, I'm not a groupie. I've only seen him in concert twice, have never met him, never tried to meet him, and don't care about meeting him. I just love his singing and song-writing abilities.

5. In highschool, I babysat once for a family that could have qualified to be on that show "Hoarders". I was so grossed out about their living conditions, that I called them halfway through the evening at the restaurant (pre-cell phone days) and said I wasn't feeling well. They paid me $5 for my time. And I watched a 6 month old baby and a 2 year old who kept trying to eat dog food all night. Not to mention the thousands of animals living in the house. Needless to say, they never asked me to sit for them again and I would have said no anyway.

6. I don't really like Mexican food much. I'll eat it and have some dishes that I like, and even make it occasionally, but if given the choice I will choose something different.

7. There are some days that I don't think I can be a stay at home mom for another minute and would happily return to work if I found a job somewhere. But I won't. Some days are just really really hard.

8. I am very grossed out when people trash the inside of their cars. It's hard for me to even sit in the seat when someone's vehicle is dirty on the inside because I don't know what I may be sitting on. I'm not talking about a pile of clothes or toys, I'm talking about actual trash everywhere. My SUV is cluttered with toys, jackets, a stroller, diaper bag, etc. But if we eat in the car, I always pull out our trash and throw it away when we get home.

9. I am very critical of myself.

10. I don't keep an immaculate house. If you showed up at my home right now, you would see dirty dishes from yesterday on the kitchen counter, unswept floors, toys all over the living room, and a pile of laundry on the couch that needs to be folded. Not to mention unmade beds and clutter in the bedrooms. I don't like it that way, but some days I get absolutely nothing done because of a certain baby. And I RARELY dust.

11. I am extremely competitive when it comes to basketball. One time, I was at my sister's highschool b'ball game and I gave one of the refs a terrible time because he was doing a horrible job. After the game, I was making comments when he was in earshot and he said that it was basketball rules in Texas. (I may have said something like he wouldn't ever make it as a ref for b'ball up north...) One comment led to another and I discovered he was good friends with my former b'ball coach in Illinois. And he was reffing in southeast Texas. I'm sure Mr. Berg was really proud of me when this guy called him up and told him I was being mouthy throughout the game. This is why I have promised myself that I will NEVER coach my kids in any sort of basketball. Actually I won't ever coach or help with any basketball. I'll sit on the sidelines with a muzzle and just clap.

12. One time I accidentally body slammed a girl during a basketball game. We were lined up for free throws and she kept linking her arm into mine as if to keep me from getting the rebound, so when the ball came up, I shook her off, which resulted in her kind of flipping to the ground. Nothing was called on me, but Mr Berg thought it was pretty funny. My dad too. He was the head coach at the time.

13. When we lived in Illinois, our church had a softball team and they were pretty good. I'm NOT a softball player, but I did keep the book for them sometimes. For some of the games, they would have me and another girl or two, video the game from the score booth. I'm sure they asked us for the additional entertainment factor because I always forgot about that stinking video camera and would divulge ridiculous, high school girl information. One time I said, while the camera was rolling, that I really liked one guy on the team (who did not go to our church, but of course watched the video later on) and I really disliked another guy on the team. I think my exact words about him were "I don't like him and he doesn't like me and that's the way it's going to be." I'm sure he loved hearing that conversation. Later on, when he joined the church (because all PK's insult potential church-members...) I shook his hand and apologized for my comments. Thankfully my mouth didn't keep him from joining the church.

14. For my very first basketball game that I ever played, I was picked to be the first sub to go into the game for one of the starters. Of course our coach had never gone over the "subbing in" routine. So as soon as he told me who I was supposed to sub in for, I ran out on the court to tell her. Apparently you're supposed to go to the book keeper, tell them, and then wait for the refs to signal you in.

15. In that same game, the first time someone threw the ball to me, I immediately went to make a basket. And I missed. Which was a good thing because it was the other team's basket.

16. Starting next month, I will be dieting and exercising, hopefully with more will power and determination than I've had in the past. My initial, tentative goal is to lose 30 pounds by June. So that's only 5 pounds a month. If I was competing on Biggest Loser, I would go home right away. But hopefully doing it like this will make it really work this time.
I still can't believe that I'm now "in my 30's". Where the heck did my 20's go? If you find them, will you let me know?

Garrett stories

The scene:
This afternoon in the living room, playing with our Fisher Price Nativity Set.

I heard Garrett yell "Baby Jesus!!!" So I looked over and Baby Jesus had fallen off the cliff (aka entertainment cabinet) and the camel was watching and yelling for help. The angel swooped down and rescued Jesus, returning him to Mary's anxious arms. Mary said "Thank you sir for rescuing Baby Jesus." Then one of the wise men fell off the cliff and got buried in a pillow avalanche. The angel swooped down to rescue him accompanied by Mary. Either Garrett thinks this wise man is actually Joseph or this wise man is Mary's dad, not sure which, but Mary was hollaring "Daddy!! Where are you? We found Baby Jesus."

The scene:
A few days ago in the car, pulling into the garage after picking Garrett up from school.

Out of the blue, Garrett says "Momma, we need to build Daddy a new house." I asked him why. He said "This house isn't big enough. This is a Momma-size house. Daddy needs a Daddy-size house. So he can fit in the shower." (I should explain that he can fit in the shower just fine. He's 6'5", but the ceilings in our bathroom are 20 feet tall, so there's no problem there.) Garrett was very insistant that we needed to do it and it should be a surprise. I'm sure he would be very surprised.

The scene:
This morning in the car as we were pulling into the Walmart parking lot.

Garrett said "Yay! Walmart! Finally!" I said, "You love Walmart don't you?" He said "No. I love Nana and Pawpaw." He's missing them a lot since we saw them at Thanksgiving.

*Sorry it's been forever since a post. I'm very much behind this year with my Christmas shopping, plus Cooper has been beyond clingy lately, so that leaves me with little blogging time. In fact I'm holding him right now as I type this. Which is loads of fun.
The plus is that everyone outside of our family is bought for (except for a few small gifts) so I just have Keith and the boys to finish. I ordered Garrett's big present this afternoon. Toys R Us is having Free Shipping right now! So I could not pass up getting his new 2 wheel bike with training wheels shipped to our house rather than the hassle of going to the store and lugging it out to the car. I have a few ideas for Keith and have bought him some things already and Cooper could get by on what I've bought him so far. He won't care what he gets. I'm leaving early this Saturday morning and hope to get everything else purchased in one shopping trip. I've never actually done that before because I've always been able to do a little here and there, but that has not really happened this year, so one big trip it is. I promise to post at least a couple more times between now and Christmas. I have a birthday and Cooper has a half-birthday in the next week, so there will be plenty of material. So long as I can get a moment with my hands free...