Things My Child Says Which Are Funny

The other evening, Jeff told Aili that after dinner he would make her popcorn (I was at work and they were having a little father-daughter bonding time). While he was cleaning up the dishes, Aili came up to him, and their conversation went something like this:

Aili: Daddy, I need to talk to you (looks serious)
Jeff: Um, ok, what's going on?
Aili: There's no popcorn

Haha. What a little foodie. Toddler's aren't exactly known for their patience, but the little lady did get her popcorn, after the dishes were done. In case you were curious.
The past week I have ballooned. It's a little concerning, how quickly my belly has grown just in a little over a week. My appetite's also skyrocked. I'm praying to the pregnancy gods (again!) that I don't start piling on the pounds too quickly, and I vow to east sensibly, but then I see a cute little itty-bitty cupcake with pink sparkly frosting that is, like, sooo adorable, and so delectably delightful, and it's over. Who am I kidding? I have no willpower, nor am I seeming to find enough free time to go to the gym ('cuz who wants to do THAT when they finally have downtime?!) But when I did go to the gym the other day, something weird happened. My blood pressure's been pretty low this pregnancy (lower than normal, which is already a little low), and I have to be careful not to jump up too quickly. During my first trimester I got rehydrated at the hospital one time, because of that and because of hyperemesis (fancy medical term= puke too much), but stopped going and waited it out for the yucks to get better. Anyway, I felt ine during my workout and afterwards while doing my stretches, but when I got up to find Jeff, I started feeling super-yucky- my vision was blurry and had black spots, and I wasn't sure if I was going to pass out, throw up, or have the runs. I *barely* made it to the locker room, where I had to lie down. How embarassing. Needless to say I am nervous about that happening again. Gym=No Bueno. I'm probably just anemic again, with Aili I had pretty severe anemia. And I have been looking at ice again recently, with just a hint of lust. Yummm ice. Uh-oh. So, the plan: Start taking some iron. Drink more fluids. Attempt to work out and eat semi-reasonably (oh, the horror). And enjoy some lovely, hospital-style crunchy ice here at 4AM ('cause mother-baby has the best ice, did ya know?) Feel free to join me here, and could you bring an extra ice bucket? Thanks.

The GENDER Cake Party!

Is it Pink or Blue? In case you're not familiar with the concept, the gender cake party is where you "find out" the sex of the baby during the ultrasound by having the tech write it on a piece of paper in an envelope (or, as we did, have another friend come and have the tech tell her, and she coordinates everything). Make sure you don't peek when they check the booty shot/do the lower area scans. Then you take the envelope/friend goes to the baker and instructs them to bake a cake that is gender-neutral on the outside, but is pink or blue on the inside. At your party you cut the cake and your friends, family, and you find out together what you're having...

Here is the cutting of our oh-so-adorable GENDER CAKE (Thank you Steph for getting it and to Kelly's Cake Creations/Juanita- it was gorgeous!! Definitely would recommend her if you want a cute cake)~

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L1a_XsXuRHs
(naturally blogger couldn't manage the whopping 130MB)

And here is a nice shot of the cake:


I hope Aili enjoys having a little sister :-) I always wanted one! (of course, I was super-glad to have a brother, too- just saying I definitely would've enjoyed having both!) It looks like I get another opportunity to enjoy hairbows, tutus, and dancing. Jeff is gonna be outnumbered in a house full of girls wanting to go shopping and get pedicures, hehe.

...And then lastly a picture of my little family, soon to be plus one more girl~

...Because some people love a belly

...I've finally taken a belly pic. I'm 18 weeks now and feeling pretty much the same- still getting a bit queasy, headaches, etc. Blogger is currently angering me right now, so I think I may be done with this post. I'm a little sleepy too :-) So, maybe just some poorly arranged photos for now. Updates soon.

Some Cute Kids

Some cutie-patooties to start off the post...
Everything is going pretty well here, except I'm still getting sick occasionally (boo). We had our 16 week pregnancy check up last week, and everything looks pretty good- still down two pounds, but the uterus is at the right height, baby's heart rate was 138 (boy?), yadda yadda :-) Aili is doing a little better at being left places- usually she throws a huge crying fit if you will whenever we leave her at the daycare or Mops group, but lately I have been able to talk to her about how she is going to play with her friends and I am going to play with mine, there is no crying, and I will be back soon to pick her up. So, she is slightly more accepting of this.
In other news, Uncle Sam is currently NOT my friend. We owe $2800 in taxes whaaaattt? We paid so much in taxes this year, only claimed 1 dependent between the 3 of us...sucky. Did you know there is an income limit for the child tax credit? Yeah apparently we don't get it, which is totally unfair! I'm not sure how we ended up in some "wealthy" category, because we're not. I should be rolling in a new mercedes or something! Bummer. Oh well- I guess it's only money. On the to-do list for the next few weeks is tulip field visiting and Jeff is trying to get the work on the boat done before summer (Lord please let him get it done...he is so determined he will be majorly bummed if he doesn't 'meet his goal!')
That's it for today :-)

I'm SO Over It

...pregnancy, that is. Well, to be fair, the first trimester nonsense. Luckily, I am now a member of club 2nd tri (15 weeks today-yippee!) and with my babe bambino numero uno (Miss Aili), I didn't feel better until 15-16 weeks, so I am hopeful that things will steadily improve from here. You know you're a member of Club Baby Bakin' when:
A. You puke your guts out on the side of the road when you're in the car and then pee your pants from the sheer force of the vomiting (Hey, don't judge- I have given birth before, to a 9lb baby. It won't ever be the same in the pee dept.)
B. You pop zofran like it's candy
C. Immediately after the puking finishes you begin to think about what might be good to eat
D. You're so darn exhausted that the idea of doing anything other than making a perma-behind mold on the couch cushions sounds like too much work, even if your hubby threatens you with the D word if you don't start helping out with the laundry. Thankfully, this is getting better.
E. Let's just say things move sloooowww. And hard. If you've been pregnant you probably know what I am hinting at. If not, consider yourself blessed. It's the most horrible thing ever. It's like practicing giving birth. Ok, enough before I make all of you vomit (by all of you, I think I mean like the 2 people who actually know I have this blog and read it).

Yeah, I kind of feel a bit stuck in a rut. I want to go back to school...but I don't. Taking classes on things like how to analyze whether or not certain data collected is statistically significant sounds boring as crap, and definitely might not help me get out of my rut. So, then I consider other options for the creative side of me. Photography? Spanish? Wine and cheese appreciation?Hmmmm. And work- same thing. Maybe it's that I work too much, maybe it's that I need a challenge other than mother-baby (newborn-ed out?) and I regularily fantasize about going per diem, but the money is kind of nice. Ugh. Not sure what to do there either. I just know that I have far too little free time with my husband and daughter, and when we do all have time together, it seems like we are just treading water- getting dinner on. Cleaning up. Laundry. Managing temper tantrums. Trying, sometimes in vain, to put Aili to bed. Not actually spending quality time, whatever that is. I need to go on a vacation. How the heck will we manage with another? I keep meaning to find a cleaning lady, but haven't gotten around to it yet. Maybe that will help me regain my sanity?
In other news, Aili started her new daycare/preschool thing, and all is well so far. When I picked her up the other day she was having lots of fun and waved to all the kids and said "Bye bye! Bye bye, friends!" Cute. Baby #2 seems to be doing well. Not much to report there. Haven't gained any weight, which makes no sense since I look bloated and hippo-like. My stomach's definitely bigger, so I turned around the other day to see if the little bit of weight I'd lost came off the backside? Nope, the azz is definitely not smaller. Neither are the boobies. My husband's pretty pleased about their return to their former glory. I'll be sad when I finish nursing this one and have to return them. Not looking forward to post-nursing-breasts again, but I am just going to enjoy them for now! So I don't look smaller to me, but the scale says so and it never lies right? What a relief. By this time the first go-round, I was already up, ahem, 10-14lbs. Even though I was throwing up more. Go figure. Those pregnancy gods are weird.
If I can manage to get some summertime time off (as in, a couple of weeks preferably) we'll probably make another California-somewhere exotic-babyless trip again. It worked pretty well last October to leave Aili to be spoiled by grandma in California for a bit while we enjoyed some tropical time in Mexico. The only drawback is that I will be 7-ish months pregnant so we'll have to go somewhere with decent medical care, just in case. Last time I was 7 months pregnant, our babymoon was in Kaui, which was pretty awesome, except I couldn't do fun things like surf (haha, that would be funny huh? fatty on a surfboard), go on any boats (why oh why? Those boat people are strict and lame), scuba, etc. But the sun and the sand were nice. Sigh. I miss living in California. Sob. Ok, let's see if I can have a blog where I don't mention abandoning Washington for somewhere sunny? :-)
So, my question today is, fellow blog reader (s?) and random people who got stuck on the wrong page: How do you manage to still enjoy your life and fill it with fun things when the "chores" and have-to-do list is overwhelming? How do you find that so-called balance? Or, with young children and a young family, trying to get ahead, work hard, procreate, and make a good income, is this just unrealistic, to an extent? What do you think?

Unconditional Love

Some of the best advice I've gotten came from my mother, and it is this: There is no such thing as unconditional love outside of a mother's love for her child. I add to this one's relationship with God or a higher power, if they so believe. But I stand firm on the previous statement. Now some of you may argue or disagree- you love your mate so much, nothing will ever change that, and so forth. And I seldom say this, but I firmly once again say, You Are Wrong. Would you still love your husband, family, etc. if they raped or killed someone? What if, God forbid, they hurt your child? I know, your significant other or family member wouldn't do that, but everyone thinks that (or at least, almost everyone does). I know that I could never love someone again who intentionally hurt Aili (maybe forgive- but not love), but if Aili did that, I would still love her. I would hate what she had done but the love would still be there, always. Now this is not to say that I don't deeply love my husband, extended family, etc. I do and with all my heart. But the experience of age has led me to realize that my mom is right. I do not look at this as a negative thing, although at first glance it may appear to be a negative statement. I look at it as an insightful tool to help better our relationships and keep us from taking the ones we love for granted. I say this with the experience of having wrecked my first relationship due to the belief that we'd always love each other no matter what. I was bound and determined not to make that mistake again, so when things get difficult with my husband, I try to take a deep breath and look at the situation from both sides and apologize even when I don't think I'm really wrong. I try not to take him for granted and assume he'll always be there no matter what. That being said, I'm a work-in-progress, and I am still learning how to be in a relationship- I figure that is a lifelong learning experience!
The other night Aili and I were snuggled up together (we were co-bunking because we were at my dad's). She was happy as a clam to be with mama for the night, and I love watching her sleep- it is the one time she looks so peaceful! I must say, the unconditional love you have for your child is pretty amazing- I love her so much, even though she makes my day-to-day life about a million times harder, she throws tantrums, etc. I then realized something that to me, is pretty unbelievable- right now, for this small part of her life, she unconditionally loves me. She loves me and wants to spend time with me and only me, even when I'm boring because I am exhausted, even when I lose my patience and temper, even when I drop her off to be watched by someone else when I need to get something done. On the occasions that I have spanked her for a particularily naughty offense, she still runs crying to me to be comforted and for a hug, wanting the reassurance that yes, I still love her. For right now, she will continue to love me despite my flaws. It is pretty amazing. I know I have to cherish this time now, where I can help mold her into a good person, while she still thinks the world of me. Before long the love she has for me will change to regular love- love with conditions. She'll love me if I don't mess up too terribly. Hopefully, I will do my job right and she will continue to love me her whole life. For now, I am just grateful to be the one she runs to when she cries, the one she runs to when she is happy, and to be the reason her face lights up when I walk into the room.

Victory!

Aili is not a good vegetable eater. As a baby she would would eat her homemade purees happily- she was even known to eat things like sweet potatoes and broccoli mixed into oatmeal. Fast forward about 2-ish years later, and I cannot get the girl to eat veggies. She'll still eat them pureed, or mixed into things, but that's it. And I sort of have conflicting views about "hiding" veggies, a la sneaky chef- I mean, you get the veggies in, sure, but isn't the whole point to get them to want and then choose healthy foods by themselves so they learn lifelong healthy eating habits? I dunno. Anyway, I made roasted veggies the other night- broccoli with chopped garlic cloves, sea salt and cracked pepper, and a drizzle of olive oil, in the oven on foil for 25 minutes, and enjoyed them myself, but I didn't have high hopes for Aili, so I only gave her one piece. I did the usual "yumm, look at mama eat the broccoli, it's so good!" but expected, at best, for her to pop it in her mouth and spit it right back out and say "Yucky!" as she usually does. Welll....She loved it! She went on and on about the yummy broccoli and wanted more! She went after my plate as well, and didn't even touch her beef chimichanga. The next day I decided to try again and test my luck, and was very happy to see her gobble down her veggies again! Yea! I guess persistence- and trying many different cooking methods- does pay off. I'd tried to woo her before with cheese sauces an such, but without too much luck (she'd usually just lick the cheese off and leave the veggie). Oh well, this is healthier anyway :-)
Well, everything else is going ok here- night shift is making me super tired, but I'm kind of stuck at the moment- no day shift openings, so I'm just gonna have to suffer through it. Hopefully I will get some of my energy back soon. Aili's been naughty lately too- we're definitely in the throes of the terrible twos, my easy little baby has transformed into a temper-tantrum throwing emotional rollercoaster who wants what she wants when she wants it! Ugh. I hear from some people that three is worse, but hopefully not for Aili ;-)