The Most Un-blogged Pregnancy Ever

I'm so sorry, Anna! I'm a bad mommy!

I suppose I should first document that we finally picked out a name. Anna Catherine Doyle - doesn't that have such a pretty ring to it? Anna Catherine was also my great-grandmother's name. I was majorly stressing about not having a name picked out. But, once we did I could breathe a little better. Oh, and I could start getting stuff monogrammed, too!

As of this week, I am 36 weeks pregnant. And at my appointment this week, I was almost 3 cm. dilated, 50% effaced and well...other things are happening, too. So, as far as my due date of January 1st, 2012...I really doubt I'll make it that long.

I've been doing really good this pregnancy. I've gained more than I would liked to have - especially compared to my last pregnancy. But, I'm still very much within normal, healthy weight gain limits. I haven't had any weird cravings. I ate a lot of peanut butter in the beginning. But nothing real consistent other than that.

I've felt really good up until recently. Turns out...chasing after a busy 2 1/2 year old is hard when you're 9 months pregnant. Who knew??? I come home from work, get dinner going, fold laundry that never seems to end, give baths, fold more laundry, put Caroline to bed and nest my little nester off. I won't go into much detail. Other than Wally insisted that I NOT vacuum the house last night at 10 PM. What?

I am paranoid that I'm going to go into labor and the house is going to be a wreck. I think the our house has been the cleanest it's ever been in the 6 years we've been there. Not that it was ever filthy. But, it sure is picked up every night.

Anyways, back to the pregnancy...Anna moves a LOT. More so than her big sister ever did. And I thought she was going to come out dancing a jig. I'm having some Braxton Hicks contractions that started almost 2 months ago. As I get further along, they get a little more uncomfortable, but they are not consistent at all.

Wally and I have agreed that we are both more nervous this time around more so than we were with Caroline. Not sure if it's because we know what's in store? Or if it's the added stress of the holidays? Or it's the fear of having TWO children instead of ONE?

My bags are packed. I even have a list of last-minute items and their description/location in case Wally or someone else has to come home and pack for me. The nursery is 99% done. We still need to hang the wall art we have. But, the glider came in and has been assembled and we have the carrier all ready to be occupied.

All we are waiting on is for sweet little Anna to grace us with her presence!

Halloween 2011

I can't believe I'm just now posting about Halloween! Actually, I can. There's so much going on right now. Sometimes I find it hard to just sit down and breathe!

I thought Caroline would be so into Trick or Treating this year. But, she wasn't. She was ONLY interested in wearing her princess tu-tu. Which, in fact, was really a Dorothy from Wizard of Oz costume that was LOVINGLY made by my BFF Meredith and her mom. I can't thank them enough!

I know I already posted about how horrible my morning was. But, the evening made up for it. No, Caroline wasn't all that thrilled about walking around the neighborhood. No, she didn't say "trick or treat" once. No, she would not hold her bucket out to get her candy. But, she sure dug into it when we got home!

We learned from our mistakes last year and headed out earlier rather than later. We took some pictures right when we got home from work/school. Then headed out once the sun started to go down. We didn't walk around too much because I refused to carry Caroline all around the neighborhood.

Some before school pics. I tried to make a collage but it just wasn't working. She loved her pumpkin outfit!

The absolute most precious Dorothy I've ever seen. She still wears her red sparkly shoes all over the house. I keep finding red glitter sequins everywhere.

Looking for more candy!

It's the great pumpkin, Charlie Brown!

My Halloween Morning

Yes, I'm pregnant. Yes, I'm hormonal. Yes, I'm emotional. There, I said it. But yesterday morning was ROUGH. If there ever was a day where I thought I could just go home, go back to sleep and have a do-over...it was yesterday. This was my morning...all in about an hours time. (We all need a pity party once in a while, no?)

Wake up and get going as normal. But, my muscles in my back, hips and legs ache terribly like they have been for months. I'm used to it but it's frustrating.

As I'm getting ready, I start to feel sick. Like, head cold sick. And I think that maybe I should just sit out from work today. But, no, I keep trucking along.

Caroline wakes up in a wonderful mood and she's being "playful" in the bathroom as we're trying to go potty & get changed. She keeps telling me no "playfully" to everything I ask her to do. I'm getting emotional and start to cry. I don't have time to fart around all morning.

Get Caroline dressed and head to the kitchen to figure out what's for breakfast. This turns into an ordeal most mornings because she always wants to "show me" what she wants. Which means: I hold her up at the pantry and she points to everything from marshmallows to Cheez Its. That, 99% of the time, turns into a meltdown. But, heaven forbid I just fix something to have ready for her because she just won't eat it.

Get her cereal and put her in the bed with Daddy so she can eat, drink her "chocolate milk with milk" and watch Mickey Mouse.

Dry my hair and go eat my cereal. In peace in the den. Never happens like that.

She starts calling for me wanting me to come to her. I say "Can you get your daddy to help you?" since, you know, she's laying right next to him.

I'm able to get dressed and brush my teeth in peace. Never happens like that, either.

I'm ready to go start the car and put all my stuff in it so it's warm and ready when we walk out the door. I have in my hands: treat bags for her friends at school to take home, rice krispie treats for C's Halloween party at school, the bag with her costume & change of pants for the day, a bag with wipes & diaper ointment, my purse and my camera bag. I think I can make it out quickly before C sees me and freaks out. Oh no, she comes out of my room and sees me and thinks I'm leaving her. But, it's too cold for her to go outside with me since she doesn't have any shoes or socks on yet. I stand in the kitchen for 2 minutes begging & yelling at her to go back in the room with her daddy. I could have just walked out, but that would have been a HUGE meltdown and I don't like those before school.

She finally agreed to stand in the hallway until I came back inside. She's baaaaaarely inching toward me even after I tell her not to move a muscle until I got back.

Take some really cute pictures of her in her over-priced, under-worn Halloween outfit.

Put coats on, tell daddy bye then I dump out half of her cereal in the laundry room floor as I'm walking out with the trash bag in my hand, too. Had to put everything down and clean up. "What are you doing, Mommy? You forgot one right here, Mommy." Thanks. Can you not clean up, too?

Get in the car, almost get out of the neighborhood and Caroline asks "You got your phone, Mommy?" UGH. Had to turn around and go back home.

On the way to school, she asks "Are you going with Daddy?" "Go where with Daddy?" "Go home with Daddy and lay?" Just reiterates the fact that her daddy is always still asleep when I leave for school/work. And she's starting to notice it too. Starting to get more flustered than I already am.

Get to school, unload C from her seat and start loading up my arms. And drop the homemade rice krispie treats ALL OVER the parking lot. I start to cry. "OH NO! What happened, Mommy????" Clean that up and throw it back in the car and finish loading up my arms. And Caroline's arms, too. But, while we're walking up to the school, she keeps asking me to hold her cereal. Um, I can't...my hands are full. As we're walking down the hall, my stupid maternity pants are falling off my hips and Caroline is yelling "Wait for me! Don't leave me!". I guess I'm walking too fast for her little legs to keep up.

Drop Caroline off and hop in the car and call Wally to cry. And cry and cry and cry. Run over to Kroger to get ::cringe:: store-bought rice krispie treats. Yuck. Hopefully the kids won't know the difference. but, I do. Plus, these are not pumpkin shaped like mine were. Go back to the school and drop them off.

I should have stayed home like I wanted to. Thank goodness the day got better. I kept my head down at work and stayed as busy as a bee to keep me from having another meltdown. And it was a success. Only one meltdown yesterday.

2011 Vacation - Blalock Lakes

Everytime we go to Gayle's house in Atlanta, we beg them to take us to Blalock Lakes. Ha - no begging necessary. They don't pass up an opportunity to go out there at all! We invited the Smathers out there since they live in the next town over. We were there for hours! Caroline developed her fins and started swimming like a fish. She loves being in the water. And I had a horse fly that hovered over my head the entire time. EEK!

Here are the girls eating dinner. Mainly cheetoes and juice. Oh well - we were on vacation. As if she eats any better at home!

Love, love, love this picture.

I think Sadie likes to have her picture taken. What do you think?

Caroline and her god-mother, Lindsay!

2011 Vacation - Georgia Aquarium

Our next stop on our vacation was to the Georgia Aquarium. It is so beautiful in there. The sea life they have on display are amazing. But, if you ever decide to go - park in the Coca Cola parking deck. It's so much closer to the aquarium. As in, you walk out the front door of the parking deck into the front door of the aquarium. But, if you park in the aquarium parking garage, you will walk a mile (or two) before you get there!

Caroline was very apprehensive at first. Which makes sense - she hated being at the Ripley's Aquarium here at the beach the first time we took her. Oh well. She finally warmed up!

These things kinda creeped me out. I think they were a breed of an eel.

The seahorses were just beautiful. We got some great pictures of them.

This jellyfish kept changing colors! Wally says the were just changing the lights out inside the tank. But, who knows...

This was so cool! You got to walk/crawl around with the penguins! Not with them, but sorta. They had tunnels mapped out for you to crawl around in. That was hard to do being 5 months pregnant. Caroline loved it!

Morgan was able to join us! She had fun with the penguins, too. And I love Caroline's expression here!

This guy was handsome.

Isn't she beautiful!?!?

Caroline said "Look Mommy! I'm driving!"

We made it out with only buying a tee shirt and a pink penguin that squeeks. OH! And the food court also had these monster Froot Loop treats - like Rice Krispie treats. They were so good! And we came home and made some, too!

2011 Vacation - Stone Mountain

Back to my vacation pictures from 2 months ago! EEK! I know, I know, I'm a horrible blogger. Anyways, I thought I still needed to post about this for my own memory's sake. Anyways, once we got to Atlanta, we went to Stone Mountain one day we were there. This place is beautiful. The gondola ride up to the mountain was kinda scary, but I was so glad I didn't chicken out. The view from the top of the mountain was just spectacular. Since we went in the "off season", there weren't many attractions available to us. Just the mountain and two Confederate museums. But, we still had a full day out there!

Me & Wally at the top of the mountain. And my small baby bump that is quite large now.

Miss Priss at the top of the mountain. She was not thrilled about getting her picture taken.

Me, Caroline & Gayle. I had to force a smile out of Caroline!

I know it looks like they're walking toward the edge of the earth. And it sure did fell that way. I was a little apprehensive because Caroline is notorious for running away from us. There was a fence up around the edge, but I was still a Nervous Nellie.

Caroline and her fake smile. :-)

Me, contemplating life.

Wally contemplating life. Haha!

Caroline is here taking pictures with her camera on her phone. She is a monkey see, monkey do. All the way up to making me look at the pictures she took on her camera on the phone.

The monument behind us is carved into stone. The entire carving take up 3 acres of space! THREE ACRES! It's huge! In the museum, we watched a video of how the carving was made. And, let me tell you, there would be no way their work habits would have passed safety inspections these days. The men were literally dangling from ropes and scaffolding - swaying in the wind, no protective gear. I bet their wives had no idea they worked like that!

Also in the museum, they had a sample of the stars on Robert E. Lee's collar shown to scale. The three stars were about as big as a square dinner table. That's how huge the carving is.

Caroline is here perfecting her model walk. And if you look close enough, so are mommy & daddy.

Love my family!!!!

An Angel

It pains me to write this post, but our sweet niece, Jessica Wendy Smith, was called to Our Father last Monday after battling Alpers Disease, a rare mitochondrial disorder. I don't have many words to express how I (we) feel; nor would the words I could find do the situation justice. Jessica fought a hard battle over the last 8 months and surprised us all by fighting as hard as she did.

Jessica was a beautiful little girl. She had a smile that would light up the room and a personality to match. She touched many hearts and had a LOT of people rooting for her, even those who didn't know her personally. And in her short, precious life she taught me so much. She taught me that life is frail and fragile. She taught me to love a little harder and hug a little tighter. And she taught me that a parent's love is even more indescribable than I had originally though. I have so much respect and admiration for Wendy and John Wendell that I could never put into words.

I have not been to many funerals in my life, but I can say with pure conviction that Jessica's funeral was the hardest one I've had to witness. No parent should ever have to bury a child and my heart breaks for Wendy and John Wendell.

Wally and I have decided to be a little guarded when it comes to explaining the situation to Caroline mainly because we know she wouldn't truly the concept of death. We have told her repeatedly that Jessica has gone to live with Jesus, that she's an angel and that she is very healthy now. And while visiting her gravesite, we tell her that we are going to see Jessica's pretty flowers. I don't know if we are doing the right thing, but this is something that Wally and I both talked about for hours it seems and this was the best solution we thought we could come up with. We know that as Caroline gets older we will be able to fully explain to her what a special little girl Jessica is.

October 19, 2008 - October 3, 2011

Oh, The Funny Things You Say

To say that Caroline keeps us laughing is a gross understatement. She is a tiny little girl (who is getting kinda meaty, might I add) who says these grown-up things all day everyday that just makes us laugh. And also makes wonder what she will come up with next.

Here are some of the funny things she's come up with lately.

Tonight, she was helping her Daisy Duck go potty. What? Don't judge. We're still working on this potty training thing. Anyways, as she's coaxing Daisy to go she says: "Daisy. You pee pee-d in your undies. Why you didn't tell me you had to go potty. Huh? Because I said so. Don't kick me, Daisy."

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Often times, she will ask me something and after I answer her she will say "Oh, mommy! You're right. You are so smart." What I am really thinking is "Yeah, you keep saying that now. But in about 3 years, I'm not going to know ANYTHING."

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This one I'm not exactly proud about because it's not true. But, funny no less. I told her tonight that we had to brush her teeth later tonight and she says "Why? Where are we going?" HAHA! As if we need to be going somewhere to brush the teeth.

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Of course as I'm sitting here typing this, I can't think of all the funny things she says. But, I will try to update this post as my memory gets better.

2011 Vacation - Cabbage Patch Hospital

Our next stop on our roadtrip was to Cleveland, GA to the Cabbage Patch Kids Babyland General Hospital. (Side note, our GPS took us the back-roads way...it was quite a sight!) I was nervous about how Caroline was going to react. She's not 100% consumed with babydolls like a lot of little girls her age are. Truth be told, we were probably going more so because I wanted to, not necessarily because I thought Caroline would enjoy it. Plus, CPK don't look quite like they used to. In my opinion, they are a little creepier looking than before.

Anyways, back to my story. :-) The house was interesting, to say the least. The outside was BEAUTIFUL. But, the inside looks like a 1960's institution. These employees are S.E.R.I.O.U.S. about their jobs. All employees looked like old-timey nurses. The LPN "Licensed Patch Nurse" in the nursery was rocking a swaddled Cabbage Patch baby. And Wally got yelled at for walking out of the "hospital area" into the "waiting area" while holding a non-adopted doll.

Caroline was not all too interested in looking for her own doll. She just had fun picking them up and sitting them down. And straightening them up. And fixing their hair that might have been out of place. She's kinda a neat freak like that. I ended up shoo-ing Wally and Caroline out so I could leisurely find a doll for Caroline without her telling me that she didn't want any of them. I was determined for her to have one. Of course, I still haven't taken a picture of her with her new baby doll.

These two dolls are Xavier Robert's first two dolls he sewed. Aren't they creepy? Aren't you glad they're better looking now? You probably can't tell in this picture but the doll on the left was sold at an auction for $30,000. That's right. And turns out, I have one of the originals, too. Not THIS original, but close to it. My mom was on to something back then!

Caroline was really excited to be arranging the dolls in the chairs at this table just so. I guess she thought they weren't in the right places before.

My little beauty. She more so enjoyed walking on the brick pavers "like at gym-astics!"

Oh, another thing - we witnessed a real live birth! He was their "on-call doctor". He made sure the mother was 10 leaves dilated, listened to the heartbeat with a real stethoscope, cut the umbilical cord, etc. etc. etc. I told you these people were serious. Oh, and it's an "easy-odomy" instead of an "episiodomy". (I know I spelled that wrong.) AND...they've never had to do a "c-section or a cabbage-section". I mean, come on....

This was about 3 minutes after leaving the hospital. She was wore out!

2011 Vacation - Clemson

Back in August, the three of us headed west for our vacation. We actually went no further than Atlanta, but still west of Horry County. :-) We had quite a busy week planned and we sure did have a great time. We spent one night in Columbia with my family, one night in Clemson (or God's Country, as I like to call it), then the rest of the time we spent with my aunt and her family in Peachtree City, GA.

I was so very excited to be going back to Clemson. We don't get to make it back there very often as it makes for a very long trip to make just for a short weekend. But, I sure am glad we went. We debated not going because it was also move-in weekend for the new and returning students. I was a little apprehensive about the crowd and wondered if we would get the full benefit of being up there. Turns out we did. Except I wish we could have stayed longer.

The campus doesn't look the same as it did 3 years ago which was the last time we went. On that same note, it looks TOTALLY different from when we graduated (10 and 8 years ago, thank you!). Downtown Clemson has exploded. And the kids all look younger, too.

When we got there, we went straight downtown only to find they were holding a Welcome Back parade. Nobody I've spoken to remembers a Welcome Back parade. But, remember I told you I graduated 8 years ago... But, it was kinda fun to walk around with all the other younger people. After our walk downtown and playtime on Bowman field, we went to our favorite restaurant in Clemson - Columbo's! It was every bit as good as I remember. After that we just rode around, took pictures, thought about old memories, swam in the hotel pool until about 9:30 that night and quickly headed out that next morning onto our next adventure.

Caroline was a trooper - she liked all the sights and sounds of the parade, playing soccer on Bowman field with her brand new Clemson soccer ball and the pizza at Columbo's. Not to mention, she's a little fish in the water!