My Dog...

Is FAT.  She's a Jack Russell, but long and lanky, not one of the short stumpy ones.  Well, she used to not be stumpy, ha ha.

It seems that toddler-hood can not only take it's toll on the short-on-time mommy's body with not as healthy eating as I would like, but also on doggy's body when said toddler thinks there is nothing funnier than calling the dog's name and throwing food at her.  Honestly I don't even know why we buy dog food anymore!

So now my dog needs to go on a diet, she must weight the equivalent of 200 lbs for a human, she doesn't even have a waistline anymore, the little chunk.  I hate to make things harder on myself and take away the hoover quality she brings to the table but her puppy health is more important than the 15 minutes it will take to sweep.  Plus, to be entirely up front, her begging and whining have brought me to a breaking point lately.

On to my whine rant for the day.  Chicken butt has decided lately that he needs to take a break from sleeping in the wee hours of the night for playtime.  As someone who is getting pretty far along in pregnancy, and has to wake up at 5 am for work I'm sure you can imagine how happy I am with this.  If husband tries to go in there and take care of it for me it always results in crying and I end up having to go in there anyway, I'm sure you can imagine my frustration.  So last night was one of these nights.  Husband is hogging the bed, damn near sleeping on top of me, fetus is trying to kick every single part of my insides, husband refuses to turn his phone on silent at night (getting old, really fast) and then chicken decided it was playtime at a quarter to 4 this morning.  I pretty much just stayed up until it was time to get up (there was no point in going back to sleep after that).  This morning I am tired, crabby, and in a hormonal rage.

I've been working with Eli on his body parts, lately.  I'm honestly not one of those moms who goes out of her way to teach the world to her child, I prefer to bring him everywhere with me and let him EXPERIENCE through his environment.  I talk to him like a person, explain things to him as they happen, but we don't have structured "learning" time.  He's got plenty of time to just be a baby and I want him to enjoy it.  It doesn't mean that I don't engage him, I just don't push it.  His body parts fall into this category.  I will say the name of the body part I'm touching or referring to (like when I beep his nose, put lotion on his belly or his back, etc) but I don't go out of my way to test him all to time to see if he knows.  So out of curiosity last night I decided to see what he knows.  Tummy?  Check (he knows it's tummy or belly).  Ears?  Got those down (so cute when he says ear).  Eyes?  This one is 95% spot on but sometimes he'll touch his ear instead, I'm sure it sounds pretty much the same to him.  Toes?  He's a pro at this one because I love his little toes and talk about them all the time.  Then I decided to check one more thing...his wiener.  Yep, boy does he have that one down, ha ha.  It's probably because we let him run around naked enough and he's always holding on to it so I'll laugh and ask him what he's doing to his wiener, stuff like that.  It's amazing what babes will pick up when you simply just interact with them.

I think he's going to be a great big brother.  He's very rambunctious and energetic, but he's also completely sweet.  He loves to give hugs and kisses, especially to babies.  I just hope he doesn't get jealous and realizes that even if I can't spend as much time with him I still love him so much.  He's an amazing little person and I really think he's going to grow into an amazing man.

Obligatory Christmas Post

I don't have the pictures to post on here, they were all taken by husband on his phone and since our home computer is down (being naughty and updating from work like always) I have very little access to anything.

Baby Chicken had such a fantastic time!  He's just about 18 months now so is to the point where he can open gifts by himself (with a little help) and he was so excited!  He surprised me by actually playing with his gifts, though he did have a lot of fun with the wrapping paper, making paper angels on the living room floor.  Too cute.  Also, he does not really fit into garment boxes anymore.  Kind of big for that, but that doesn't stop him from trying!

I feel like between my husband and I, I really came out ahead in the gift department.  He got me a Kindle Fire and an amazing bathrobe (I've been wanting one forever but find it so hard to spend money on myself), I got him some cologne.  Though, he did get his new phone as an early gift so I don't feel *as* bad, but I still feel guilty.  I'm still in the process of getting used to not being completely broke/frugal and any time I spend money on something that isn't necessary (even with Christmas gifts) I have complete buyer's remorse.  I don't like to waste money but I do like to be able to buy things for my family, just little things that let them know I was thinking about them when I was out doing whatever.

I'm quickly approaching the third trimester of this pregnancy, I'll be 28 weeks on the 1st or 2nd (depending on who you go by).  How did this happen?  I remember with Eli the pregnancy seemed to drag on and on, and now I'm scrambling to get everything done.  We've barely touched on names, I need to get the nursery painted (and the paint colors even picked), I have to go through Eli's baby stuff to see what I can re-use with this little girl.  I feel like I had all the time in the world last time, and now there isn't nearly enough.

Husband has made it pretty clear that he doesn't want anymore children, I'm really torn on this.  While I don't want anymore children right NOW I could see having another down the road a few years or so.  However, I'm firmly of the mindset that if one parent says no, the no's have it.  As much as I don't want this to be our last I would never in a million years force another child on him and possibly have that child be/feel resented, or have that be the end of our relationship.  I'll be talking to my doctor about getting my tubes tied at my next appointment.  I have such bittersweet feelings about the whole thing, though.  While I am incredibly happy with the two we will have, and there are so many pro's to just having two, I still feel like I'm losing the child we *could* have in a few years.  Does that even make sense?  To mourn something you've never even had, only just though you could have eventually?  Then there is always the morbid thoughts that come into my head since my eyes have been opened up to how quickly you CAN lose what you HAVE.  What if something happens to one of my babies?  I can't say how I would react if that did happen, but I'm almost positive I would need to have another.  Not just want, I think it would be a physical need to hold another child in my arms.  Then I scold myself for even thinking those things.  Our second child isn't even here yet and I'm already worried that I'll need to be prepared if she doesn't make it.  Sometimes I just hate my brain.

The New Year is upon us!  Can someone tell me where this year went, please?  This time last year I was still out on maternity leave with my 6 month old baby boy, now I've got a running, sort of talking crazy boy on my hands and another on the way.  It's amazing what can change in a year.  The first half of this year was really up in the air but the second half proved to be amazing.  My baby boy's 1st birthday, finding out we're having another less than a month after that (4th of July baby, ha ha), Aron starting a decent job after a couple of years (finally!).  I need to remind myself when I get down exactly everything I have to be grateful for, and it really is a lot.  I can always find things to complain about (can't everyone?) but I do have so much to thank God for and I need to humble myself sometimes.  There are so many people with so much less who would give a lot for what I have.

Until next time, folks!

It's Been A While

Things have been kind of hectic around here with the holidays, work, being sick, computers crashing, etc.  Life just take a hold of you sometimes and doesn't let go, and before you know it so much time has passed it leaves you wondering what just happened.

Christmas is on Sunday, already, how did this happen?  It seems like we just celebrated last year as Eli's first Christmas.  He didn't really open gifts as he was only 6 months old, but he had so much fun playing with the paper, bows and ribbon.  This year he's already trying to get into the gifts.  He's been pretty good about leaving them alone, but he tries to sit on them, ha ha, he's such a silly boy.  I really can't wait for him to dig in and start ripping things apart.

I'll be hosting the family dinner at my house this year and I'd be lying if I said I wasn't terrified and feeling completely overwhelmed.  I did offer, it'll be nice not to have to drive close to two hours away with a small child during the wintertime, but I've never undertaken such a large dinner before and I'm afraid I'll completely mess it up.  I'm sure it'll be fine, I'm just nervous.

I'm also terrified of having another baby.  I already feel like I don't have nearly enough time to devote to the chicken and now I'll have to try to divide what little time I have between my sweet little boy and my very needy newborn.  How do you do it?  Once I go back to work I'll literally have an hour and a half a night before Eli goes to bed (this almost brings me to tears every day, and hour and a half to spend with my child per day, hardly seems fair to anyone), how is he going to survive without feeling completely neglected?  Anyone have any advice for me?  I'm just so afraid that I'm going to completely fail.

I'm already 26 weeks into this pregnancy, with roughly 13 to go depending on when we schedule the c-section.  This is another cause of anxiety for me, the surgery itself, but also the timing.  Since my last c-section went so horribly this one is sending me into a panic, I have no idea how I'm going to calm myself down.  I guess I'll just have to remember that in the end my baby will (hopefully) be alive and screaming and that's all that matters.  That brings me to my next fear which is having a stillbirth.  I believe babies should be left to gestate as long as they feel the need.  I obviously am not going to be allowed to go into labor but I don't want to take the baby as early as possible because I want to allow as much time for that baby to grow strong in my womb.  That being said, you read stories about how women have lost their babies days, hours, minutes before they were born and that scares the crap out of me.  What if I wait too long and never have a chance to see her look at me?  I would be shattered and it would be my fault (not really, but I know how my mind works) because I didn't let them do the surgery sooner.  I will have missed my chance to ever see my baby breathe all because I stupidly thought that another day was going to make any difference.  Those are my biggest fears this pregnancy.  I hate always thinking my baby is going to die, I hate freaking out when she doesn't kick for a long period of time.  I miss that naive pregnancy bliss that I had with the chicken, knowing that at the end I will bring my baby home and he will grow and thrive and stay with me for the rest of my life.

I guess that's what happens when you see the worst a family can go through.

I hope everyone out there has a fantastic holiday season, no matter what you celebrate or why.

Oh, a baby sister!

So we found out yesterday finally that Eli's little sibling is a girl!  It's funny because I wanted Eli to be a girl to the point of shedding a few tears.  Obviously I got over that pretty quickly and I know I've been absolutely blessed with one of the most awesome little boys a mom could ever ask for.  This time around all I asked for was a heathy baby, 10 little toes, 10 little fingers, 4 chamber heart, you know, all the essentials for a hopefully normal life, and I've got my wish so far.  Baby girl looks absolutely perfect and I couldn't be happier.  I am a little sad that Eli won't have a little brother to tear the house down with, but I'm hoping that he and his sister grow close and take care of each other as they get older.

I would add ultrasound pictures, but it's your typical "yep, thats a foot, that's a face and a hand" type of picture, plus they told me that the heat from the scanner may ruin the pictures and I would like to keep them viewable.

I'm in love, I love both of my babies and can't wait for Eli to meet his little sister.

24 weeks as of Today

Welp, I am 24 weeks pregnant and baby is officially "viable".  It's one of those points in a pregnancy where (if you're aware that there can be such devastating issues such as pprom and the like) you breathe a small sigh of relief.  I also kind of hate the word in and of itself.  My baby is "viable".  It is of course very clinical but it just makes it seems like the baby is not being nurtured and loved, but rather grown in an artificial manner and at this point it is deemed worthy enough to make it on it's own.  I just seems rather cold and heartless when compared to the subject to which it regards.

Either way, if everything goes according to plan, I will officially know as of tomorrow whether Baby Beluga is a "he" or a "she" so I can stop referring to baby as "it".  Pretty life changing stuff here, folks.

And now for a picture or two of the chicken because he has some serious cutes, depending on whether or not blogger will cooperate with me today.

Eli being cute in his Elmo jammies:

Eli in the only hat he will keep on his head (the hat in the picture two above this one was ripped off immediately following the picture):

Seriously, how could someone resist that face?

That boy is my reason for everything.  I love him ever so much.