Excuse me while I practice posting photos...here is what our house looked like on July 25th. It looks pretty much the same now, but with a roof and and garage pad over on the left.
Wednesday, August 18, 2004
Tuesday, August 17, 2004
Return of the Post
It has been more than seven months since I last posted here and I don't know why that made me feel like I couldn't just start up again. I suppose trying to "catch up" seemed too daunting. So I won't catch up. I'll only tell you that we are alive and well and now we are four...
Meaning that Rich, Addie, and I are still alive, and I had my baby girl on April 15, 2004 (during the "Apprentice" finale at 9:40pm) and she is delightful and healthy and smart and beautiful. I thought I couldn't love a baby as much as Addie, but I do. They are fabulous kids and I love being their mom. I can't believe I'm their mom sometimes (I mean, they are cute and smart and funny, etc...did I really give birth to all this?), but I do love it.
Oh, yeah...we named the baby Heidi Lynn. Heidi because (a) it's Germanic like Adeline and (b)all the Heidi's we have ever known are so cute and fun. Lynn because it's my dear Grandma's name and my middle name.
Also, we started building our house in a mutual self-help housing development. That means we get a nice low interest rate and lots of support from the USDA. Plus, we all help build the 10 houses in the development as our downpayment--about $13,000 in sweat equity. It's cool because I am learning how a house goes together, which makes maintaining a house as an owner a lot easier. I am also learning what a wimp I am--I only work there 2 or 3 times a week (Rich goes almost every day) and I get blisters and a sore back everytime! Tonight we were rained out by a wicked summer storm while trying to backfill window wells, so I didn't get sore, just wet and muddy.
It's super late and I am super tired and my whole family is asleep, so I must say g'nite. But I will be posting more often, trying to document this time in our lives.
It has been more than seven months since I last posted here and I don't know why that made me feel like I couldn't just start up again. I suppose trying to "catch up" seemed too daunting. So I won't catch up. I'll only tell you that we are alive and well and now we are four...
Meaning that Rich, Addie, and I are still alive, and I had my baby girl on April 15, 2004 (during the "Apprentice" finale at 9:40pm) and she is delightful and healthy and smart and beautiful. I thought I couldn't love a baby as much as Addie, but I do. They are fabulous kids and I love being their mom. I can't believe I'm their mom sometimes (I mean, they are cute and smart and funny, etc...did I really give birth to all this?), but I do love it.
Oh, yeah...we named the baby Heidi Lynn. Heidi because (a) it's Germanic like Adeline and (b)all the Heidi's we have ever known are so cute and fun. Lynn because it's my dear Grandma's name and my middle name.
Also, we started building our house in a mutual self-help housing development. That means we get a nice low interest rate and lots of support from the USDA. Plus, we all help build the 10 houses in the development as our downpayment--about $13,000 in sweat equity. It's cool because I am learning how a house goes together, which makes maintaining a house as an owner a lot easier. I am also learning what a wimp I am--I only work there 2 or 3 times a week (Rich goes almost every day) and I get blisters and a sore back everytime! Tonight we were rained out by a wicked summer storm while trying to backfill window wells, so I didn't get sore, just wet and muddy.
It's super late and I am super tired and my whole family is asleep, so I must say g'nite. But I will be posting more often, trying to document this time in our lives.
Wednesday, January 07, 2004
Happy New Year
It doesn't seem that long since I wrote, but I guess it has been. Our wonderful CHristmas trip to AZ was a bust--we got the worst bug ever and had fevers and chills and chest coughs and vomiting starting Christmas eve and persisting even until today--2 weeks and counting. Shucks. We DID have a good time with family and friends, even though we looked and felt like slugs.
Also, I did have a second ultra sound on December 15th and the baby appears to be a girl, which I am quite happy about.
I don't have much else to say right now and I keep having coughing fits anyway, so I'll write more later. Happy 2004!
It doesn't seem that long since I wrote, but I guess it has been. Our wonderful CHristmas trip to AZ was a bust--we got the worst bug ever and had fevers and chills and chest coughs and vomiting starting Christmas eve and persisting even until today--2 weeks and counting. Shucks. We DID have a good time with family and friends, even though we looked and felt like slugs.
Also, I did have a second ultra sound on December 15th and the baby appears to be a girl, which I am quite happy about.
I don't have much else to say right now and I keep having coughing fits anyway, so I'll write more later. Happy 2004!
Friday, December 12, 2003
Kid Chat
Nothing really exciting has happened this week. We got all our Christmas mailed off and now we are just getting the house clean and organizing stuff for our big AZ trip on the 22nd.
Addie has been really sassy this past week--not playing well with other kids, talking back to her dad and me, throwing fits (like getting down on all fours and banging her forehead on the floor when she doesn't like what's going on)--weird phase we hope will pass. Or maybe this is what they mean by terrible two's.
She HAS been pretty funny at times, though, and so verbose. She calls her mittens/gloves her "gubs"--"Mom, it's cold. I wanna wear my gubs." When I made puppets for my niece and nephew for Christmas, I showed them to her and she said, "OH! Funny gubs!" She has also been watching Finding Nemo a lot. She was laying on her tummy in the tub the other day, swishing around. I said,
"What are you doing?"
"I swimmin'"
"Are you Nemo?"
"No! I shark! I swim fast--rraaaahrr!"
Funny punk.
Oh, I did find out my cousins, Aaron & Amy, are expecting a baby in August. They have been married for 4 years, so this will be an expected and anticipated event!
Nothing really exciting has happened this week. We got all our Christmas mailed off and now we are just getting the house clean and organizing stuff for our big AZ trip on the 22nd.
Addie has been really sassy this past week--not playing well with other kids, talking back to her dad and me, throwing fits (like getting down on all fours and banging her forehead on the floor when she doesn't like what's going on)--weird phase we hope will pass. Or maybe this is what they mean by terrible two's.
She HAS been pretty funny at times, though, and so verbose. She calls her mittens/gloves her "gubs"--"Mom, it's cold. I wanna wear my gubs." When I made puppets for my niece and nephew for Christmas, I showed them to her and she said, "OH! Funny gubs!" She has also been watching Finding Nemo a lot. She was laying on her tummy in the tub the other day, swishing around. I said,
"What are you doing?"
"I swimmin'"
"Are you Nemo?"
"No! I shark! I swim fast--rraaaahrr!"
Funny punk.
Oh, I did find out my cousins, Aaron & Amy, are expecting a baby in August. They have been married for 4 years, so this will be an expected and anticipated event!
Wednesday, December 03, 2003
Bummer
We had our ultrasound this morning with a grumpy man who thought our "finding out the gender with the whole family" idea was silly, and told me that the gender was not what's important in this ultrasound. So after he prodded and measured and determined that our baby is healthy and put together correctly, and that I am measuring 19 weeks and 5 days, he waved the wand around for a second and announced that the baby's bum was right up under my belly button and he couldn't see the gender--"sorry--but that's the least important thing anyway." Um, not for a shoppin' mamma!
I was so annoyed. I didn't even get a good look at the baby--the images were super fuzzy! Dang it. I was so spoiled by all the comforts and technology in SLC with Addie. In fact, our first ultrasound with her was at the super hi-definiton machine at the LDS Hospital high risk clinic, so we saw her ears and eyes and organs, and each little bone. This time around we could only see fuzzy outlines of everything and the tech was not the least bit excited for us.
So shucks. I'll have another peek in 2 weeks when my OBGYN tries out a machine in her office; until then, it'll stay a mystery. I AM grateful that it's all healthy and stuff. I try to focuson the positive and quit being a baby myself. *Sigh* When we asked Addie if she's having a brother or a sister, she said, "YEAH!" And she's right.
We had our ultrasound this morning with a grumpy man who thought our "finding out the gender with the whole family" idea was silly, and told me that the gender was not what's important in this ultrasound. So after he prodded and measured and determined that our baby is healthy and put together correctly, and that I am measuring 19 weeks and 5 days, he waved the wand around for a second and announced that the baby's bum was right up under my belly button and he couldn't see the gender--"sorry--but that's the least important thing anyway." Um, not for a shoppin' mamma!
I was so annoyed. I didn't even get a good look at the baby--the images were super fuzzy! Dang it. I was so spoiled by all the comforts and technology in SLC with Addie. In fact, our first ultrasound with her was at the super hi-definiton machine at the LDS Hospital high risk clinic, so we saw her ears and eyes and organs, and each little bone. This time around we could only see fuzzy outlines of everything and the tech was not the least bit excited for us.
So shucks. I'll have another peek in 2 weeks when my OBGYN tries out a machine in her office; until then, it'll stay a mystery. I AM grateful that it's all healthy and stuff. I try to focuson the positive and quit being a baby myself. *Sigh* When we asked Addie if she's having a brother or a sister, she said, "YEAH!" And she's right.
Tuesday, December 02, 2003
All About Adeline
I forgot to mention that Addie had her 2 -year checkup at the doctor yesterday. She is 37 inches tall and 31 pounds and very healthy, polite, and verbose. Dr. O’Hara loves her, and so does the nurse who gave her three shots after which she didn’t make even a peep. That’s my brave, happy girl!
She is saying “thank you “ and “you’re welcome” totally unprompted now, and she says, “I’m sorry” a lot, sometimes when she means, “Bless you.” And I am a fan of the spontaneous hugs and “I wuv eeeeyou”s.
Here is an exchange between my brother and me, trying to figure out what his son, Liam, would like for Christmas. It gives some fun little details about how our little cuties are developing:
Will to Jamie:
Liam’s favorite things are still trains, but he is starting to really like Bob the Builder and Buzz Light-year. We got him a big set of those wooden trains, the Brio/Thomas style, but generic, and a bunch of those mini Tonka cars from Costco. So whatever, I am sure he will love it. He plays with the strangest things, if you got him a funnel, he would be happy as can be. Right now he plays with a plastic bottle and a funnel and calls it “recycle, recycle, so cool, “ from the cyclone experiment on Blue’s Clues. Then he spends the rest of his time playing with Marley our dog.
Love ya, bye. Oh, and by the way, Addie’s room looks so cute, I want to get a little flower rug for Mel like that. Too bad you are stuck with brown splotch barf carpet, We had that exact same carpet in Idaho. What are people thinking when they lay that stuff?
Jamie to Will:
Those flower rugs are at Walmart for $9.99. I think they have them with the bathroom stuff now, but I know they have a purplish one because I was gonna buy it. Target has some too, but they are nicer, softer, and more expensive...around $20.
We saw a fun little kid's tool set and I thought Liam might like it. If he likes Bob, then he'll probably have fun with it. Maybe that's what we'll do. Hmmm.
Will to Jamie:
He’s really into helping Daddy, its so funny, he says “I hellou daddy…I hellou plees”. He was handing me the lug nuts for the Jeep tires the other day while I was rotating the tires. It was really cute how important he felt, just handing me the nuts as I put them on. He also loves to hammer in nails. So he may like a tool set. But don’t go overboard, our kids have more toys in storage than you and I saw over our entire child hood. No kidding, we probably have 10 of those plastic bins just full of toys that we keep put away and alternate with the other 4 or 5 we let them have out.
Love ya bye
Jamie to Will:
That's so cute! Addie does the same thing! If I go in the kitchen, she makes a mad dash to get a chair and says, "Mommy, Addie hepyou." She also says "hepyou" when she means, "help Me"--asking us for help. She says, "I wanna cook" or "Addie do dishes" or "Keen up a mess."
I know what you mean about toys. We hardly ever get her toys because other people get them for her. I like to invest in DVDs and books. Actually, though, my friend whose youngest is in 1st grade just brought over these great Discovery toys that are counting, matching, sorting games and they are really fun to play with her. Usually though, we have to put new toys up in the closet and rotate them. Maybe we'll go with a book or movie or a poster.
Love ya!
-Maj
It’s fun to be parenting along with all my siblings. I am so glad Addie will grow up with a plethora of cousins to love and support each other the way we did with our Elrey and Mayberry cousins. Yay for extended family!
More tomorrow…
I forgot to mention that Addie had her 2 -year checkup at the doctor yesterday. She is 37 inches tall and 31 pounds and very healthy, polite, and verbose. Dr. O’Hara loves her, and so does the nurse who gave her three shots after which she didn’t make even a peep. That’s my brave, happy girl!
She is saying “thank you “ and “you’re welcome” totally unprompted now, and she says, “I’m sorry” a lot, sometimes when she means, “Bless you.” And I am a fan of the spontaneous hugs and “I wuv eeeeyou”s.
Here is an exchange between my brother and me, trying to figure out what his son, Liam, would like for Christmas. It gives some fun little details about how our little cuties are developing:
Will to Jamie:
Liam’s favorite things are still trains, but he is starting to really like Bob the Builder and Buzz Light-year. We got him a big set of those wooden trains, the Brio/Thomas style, but generic, and a bunch of those mini Tonka cars from Costco. So whatever, I am sure he will love it. He plays with the strangest things, if you got him a funnel, he would be happy as can be. Right now he plays with a plastic bottle and a funnel and calls it “recycle, recycle, so cool, “ from the cyclone experiment on Blue’s Clues. Then he spends the rest of his time playing with Marley our dog.
Love ya, bye. Oh, and by the way, Addie’s room looks so cute, I want to get a little flower rug for Mel like that. Too bad you are stuck with brown splotch barf carpet, We had that exact same carpet in Idaho. What are people thinking when they lay that stuff?
Jamie to Will:
Those flower rugs are at Walmart for $9.99. I think they have them with the bathroom stuff now, but I know they have a purplish one because I was gonna buy it. Target has some too, but they are nicer, softer, and more expensive...around $20.
We saw a fun little kid's tool set and I thought Liam might like it. If he likes Bob, then he'll probably have fun with it. Maybe that's what we'll do. Hmmm.
Will to Jamie:
He’s really into helping Daddy, its so funny, he says “I hellou daddy…I hellou plees”. He was handing me the lug nuts for the Jeep tires the other day while I was rotating the tires. It was really cute how important he felt, just handing me the nuts as I put them on. He also loves to hammer in nails. So he may like a tool set. But don’t go overboard, our kids have more toys in storage than you and I saw over our entire child hood. No kidding, we probably have 10 of those plastic bins just full of toys that we keep put away and alternate with the other 4 or 5 we let them have out.
Love ya bye
Jamie to Will:
That's so cute! Addie does the same thing! If I go in the kitchen, she makes a mad dash to get a chair and says, "Mommy, Addie hepyou." She also says "hepyou" when she means, "help Me"--asking us for help. She says, "I wanna cook" or "Addie do dishes" or "Keen up a mess."
I know what you mean about toys. We hardly ever get her toys because other people get them for her. I like to invest in DVDs and books. Actually, though, my friend whose youngest is in 1st grade just brought over these great Discovery toys that are counting, matching, sorting games and they are really fun to play with her. Usually though, we have to put new toys up in the closet and rotate them. Maybe we'll go with a book or movie or a poster.
Love ya!
-Maj
It’s fun to be parenting along with all my siblings. I am so glad Addie will grow up with a plethora of cousins to love and support each other the way we did with our Elrey and Mayberry cousins. Yay for extended family!
More tomorrow…
Monday, December 01, 2003
Take Time to Make Time
It’s been way too long since I blogged here, I’m surprised I haven’t been unsubscribed or something. I have to blame it all on the first trimester. September and most of October crept by at a snail’s pace and I thought I might be pregnant and sick forever. My first pregnancy went fast until the last trimester; this one seems eternal.
I was also kinda mad because I was hoping all those things that people say about the second pregnancy being easier would be true. Psychologically, yes, it’s easier, knowing what to expect and all. But physically I was just as exhausted and barfy as with Addie even though I didn’t have to get up and go to work at 7 am.
That said, the nausea has pretty much let up since the first week of November, which IS a lot earlier than with Addie. But I cheated—my chiropractor suggested some homeopathy. I usually scoff at such things, but I was desperate after an especially violently-ill weekend. I took a bunch of little lactose pellets with magic herbs inside (they looked and tasted like Nerds candy) and I woke up the next day feeling pretty normal, and I haven’t been morning sick since. One dose. I wouldn’t believe it if I hadn’t done it my self.
So there have been a lot of things I have wanted to say here—stuff like cute things Addie has been saying and doing, annoyances, observations, etc., but I haven’t felt well enough to sit down and think straight until now. I’ll just narrow it down to this:
§ Addie turned two on Nov. 21st. Every time someone told her “Happy Birthday,” she would say, “I blowed out the candles!” The candles were her favorite part of the whole celebration. She got lots of cool things like big girl panties, a big girl bed, and fun DVDs (which will go with her Christmas present—a car DVD player). She totally sleeps in her bed without our having to put her there more than once at bedtime. Isn’t that cool? It’s about time SOMETHING about parenting be easy!
§ We found out the day before Thanksgiving that we will be building a house starting in May in a new Dept. of Agriculture development. Trying to bring real residents out to the boon docks, I guess--there are way more old houses here than new ones. It’s a lot just down the hill from our church and about 8 blocks from the Melin Agency office. Good stuff.
§ I love that Hewlett-Packard is using that Cure song, “Pictures of You” on their digital photography commercials. I haven’t listened to the Cure in ages, and that commercial was so unexpected, it drew me out of the kitchen in a sudden flood of late-adolescent emotion. I suppose I should listen more often so it won’t take me by surprise. It reminds me of when Cacharel used a This Mortal Coil song on their Noa commercial about 3 years ago and it woke me from a couch nap—I was so shocked to hear Liz Fraser singing from the television in the year 2001! Shocking but very effective, I guess.
That's all for now. I'll be back on Wednesday to announce the gender of the fetus--we have an ultrasound at 11am. So far, this is how the baby score is going amongst my pregnant sisters: Will & Audrey: Boy in Feb.; Erin: Girl in March; Matt & Amie: Boy in March; just today Jill found out she's having a boy on or around May 1st; I find out Wednesday and Kelli Melin finds out on the 9th. Rock on with the gestation, sistas.
It’s been way too long since I blogged here, I’m surprised I haven’t been unsubscribed or something. I have to blame it all on the first trimester. September and most of October crept by at a snail’s pace and I thought I might be pregnant and sick forever. My first pregnancy went fast until the last trimester; this one seems eternal.
I was also kinda mad because I was hoping all those things that people say about the second pregnancy being easier would be true. Psychologically, yes, it’s easier, knowing what to expect and all. But physically I was just as exhausted and barfy as with Addie even though I didn’t have to get up and go to work at 7 am.
That said, the nausea has pretty much let up since the first week of November, which IS a lot earlier than with Addie. But I cheated—my chiropractor suggested some homeopathy. I usually scoff at such things, but I was desperate after an especially violently-ill weekend. I took a bunch of little lactose pellets with magic herbs inside (they looked and tasted like Nerds candy) and I woke up the next day feeling pretty normal, and I haven’t been morning sick since. One dose. I wouldn’t believe it if I hadn’t done it my self.
So there have been a lot of things I have wanted to say here—stuff like cute things Addie has been saying and doing, annoyances, observations, etc., but I haven’t felt well enough to sit down and think straight until now. I’ll just narrow it down to this:
§ Addie turned two on Nov. 21st. Every time someone told her “Happy Birthday,” she would say, “I blowed out the candles!” The candles were her favorite part of the whole celebration. She got lots of cool things like big girl panties, a big girl bed, and fun DVDs (which will go with her Christmas present—a car DVD player). She totally sleeps in her bed without our having to put her there more than once at bedtime. Isn’t that cool? It’s about time SOMETHING about parenting be easy!
§ We found out the day before Thanksgiving that we will be building a house starting in May in a new Dept. of Agriculture development. Trying to bring real residents out to the boon docks, I guess--there are way more old houses here than new ones. It’s a lot just down the hill from our church and about 8 blocks from the Melin Agency office. Good stuff.
§ I love that Hewlett-Packard is using that Cure song, “Pictures of You” on their digital photography commercials. I haven’t listened to the Cure in ages, and that commercial was so unexpected, it drew me out of the kitchen in a sudden flood of late-adolescent emotion. I suppose I should listen more often so it won’t take me by surprise. It reminds me of when Cacharel used a This Mortal Coil song on their Noa commercial about 3 years ago and it woke me from a couch nap—I was so shocked to hear Liz Fraser singing from the television in the year 2001! Shocking but very effective, I guess.
That's all for now. I'll be back on Wednesday to announce the gender of the fetus--we have an ultrasound at 11am. So far, this is how the baby score is going amongst my pregnant sisters: Will & Audrey: Boy in Feb.; Erin: Girl in March; Matt & Amie: Boy in March; just today Jill found out she's having a boy on or around May 1st; I find out Wednesday and Kelli Melin finds out on the 9th. Rock on with the gestation, sistas.
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