Random Ellie

I desperately need to go grocery shopping. My daughter is existing solely on bread and butter. You think I exaggerate, but it's true. For breakfast this morning? 4 slices of bread with butter. Originally I just gave her two, but she came back begging for more. Now, granted, the bread is 100% whole wheat and the butter is of the "I Can't Believe" variety, but still not what you want a 3 year old to consume in mass quantities.

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I recently bought Ellie a pair of cheap dress-up shoes. She has been coming home from school, changing immediately into one of her princess nightgowns, and prancing around in the shoes. Three days ago she came to me and said very urgently, "I need a crown. I need a crown and two bracelets." And she has continued to inform Tom and I of this multiple times a day ever since. I am taking her to get her haircut today and as she is not often well behaved when getting her haircut (swatting at the scissors, screaming, etc.), I am using the crown and two bracelets to bribe her into sitting still. Nice, huh?

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I have three framed pictures from my wedding sitting on the bookshelf here in the computer room. Ellie pulled one off the shelf and very excitedly brought it to me. "Look, Mommy! You turned into a princess! And you have a crown!" She then carried that picture all over the house. I did feel like a princess that day.

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Ellie has named our unborn child Jack. We don't know any Jacks and I can't think of any Jacks on her television shows so I am unsure where she heard the name. However, she has stuck to it, telling anyone who asks that she is having a baby brother and his name is Jack. I like the name Jack, but I am not so sure I want to pair it with my last name. A little too presidential for my taste.

Memorial Day at Nana's

I am so sad to see our long weekend come to a close. This has been such a great weekend for visiting family. We spent today at my mother-in-law's house. Ellie was so excited to go, not only because Nana always has a present for her, but also because Nana told her she could give Baby Brannon a bottle. Ellie has been talking about giving Baby Brannon a bottle for 3 weeks now. Of course, the baby was asleep when we arrived, but Ellie was soon distracted by the fishing taking place in the back yard. She was kept entertained for almost an hour in the pursuit of a fish. She finally caught one which we returned after snapping a few pictures.
When Baby Brannon decided to grace us with his presence, Ellie was able to help give him his bottle. She was so sweet with him. It made me excited for when I finally have this baby. Oh, the pictures I will be able to take!One of my personal highlights of the day is when my MIL left to go pick up the pizzas and she came back with a chocolate cake! I had casually mentioned to her how I have been craving a slice of chocolate cake for two weeks now. In typical Judy fashion, she made it happen!

Sunday Best: Road rash edition

Ellie and I spent Friday night at my parent's home in Beaumont. Tom was away at the regional track meet and I didn't want to be home alone so Ellie and I left right after school on Friday. What was supposed to be a two hour drive ended up taking 3 1/2 hours because of an accident. And, of course, Ellie decides she absolutely needs to go to the bathroom while we were stuck in grid lock and no one could let me over. Thankfully, she made it. She has impressive bladder control. We had fun at my parent's house, swimming and eating lots of yummy food. The one not so fun part of the trip was when Ellie decided to exit the car face first, giving her a lovely case of road rash.
I am so glad that tomorrow is a holiday and we only have a week and a half left of school. I am so looking forward to the lazy days of summer. It looks like Ellie is getting a head start.

The Big Reveal

Today was the oh so important ultrasound. The one I have been anxiously awaiting ever since I scheduled it 6 weeks ago. Tom and I arranged to meet at the doctor's office for The Big Reveal and then take Ellie out to ice cream afterwards to celebrate.

As I lay on the slippery exam table, watching my baby kick his legs and wave his little arms, I completely forgot my migraine headache and my overpowering exhaustion. All I could feel was excitement and wonderment that something so amazing was holed up in my tummy (fine, uterus, if you want to get technical). The sonographer (is that what she is called?) right away said, "I know what you are having!" But, of course, she made us wait until the end of the exam before she spilled the beans. She is cruel like that. I decided I would do the exact same thing on my blog entry.

This whole pregnancy, I have been pretty certain I am having a boy. Mostly, because I have been experiencing everything so differently than when I was pregnant with Ellie. And only a boy could make me feel so miserable, am I right? So, as Tom and I threw baby names back and forth, we quickly found a girl's name we both loved (Katherine). But we could not come to an agreement on a boy's name. And, as I was sure we were having a boy, this really bothered me. The only name Tom even suggested was Robert. Robert. It is just so...bland. I had a huge list of great boy names, but they were all shot down. Wow, I am really having fun going off on this long tangent without ever saying exactly what I am having. I almost want to just stop here and leave it at that.

I have the ultrasound picture that makes it glaringly obvious what we are having, but I am too tired to go crawling around under the computer desk to connect the scanner. So I will just have to tell you without the visuals...we are having a Robert (or some other boy name).

Hatching

We have been talking to Ellie a lot about the new baby. I wasn't sure just how much she understood until a couple of weeks ago when she brought me her photo album. She pointed to the picture of Tom and I at the hospital, just prior to delivery. She asked, "Mommy at the doctor?" I told her yes and pointed to my gigantic belly in the picture. "That is Ellie in Mommy's tummy." Then I pointed to the picture of all three of us right after the delivery, "And that is Ellie right after the doctor took her out of Mommy's tummy." Ellie nodded and told me, "I hatched out of Mommy's tummy." We then talked about how the new baby is going to hatch out of my tummy as well. I kind of like thinking of the baby being "hatched" rather than my belly being sliced open and the baby being yanked out.

This morning, Ellie told me that she has a baby dinosaur in her belly and that it is going to hatch. I said, "Really? A dinosaur?"
"Yes, Mommy. THREE dinosaurs!"
"How are they all fitting in your little tummy?"
"Oh, they are very small dinosaurs."

7 years of (mostly) wedded bliss

Today Tom and I are celebrating our 7 year anniversary. We both called in sick to work and dropped Ellie off at daycare so that we could spend the day together. My mom is going to watch Ellie this evening so we can prolong our day of fun. I love that after all of these years, Tom is still my favorite person to hang out with. We have been together since we were both just 15 years old. There was a period of time in college when we broke up and I was so lost during that time. A part of me was missing and I wasn't sure how to act. I call that time period my crazy years because I bounced around from college to college, almost got married to someone else, and pretty much drove all my family and friends nuts. But once Tom and I got back together, it was like everything fell into place and I found myself again. I am so thankful to be married to my best friend.

Mother's Day

Since this would be my mom's first Mother's Day without her mother, we decided to head on out to Beaumont to spend Mother's Day with her. Daniel, Sabrina, and their kids came out, too, so Ellie had a blast playing with her cousins while the adults had fun playing in the pool and then playing board games in the evening. I am already envisioning spending a good part of my summer at my parents' house, floating lazily in the pool and not feeling so weighted down by my rapidly expanding belly. Here are a few pics of our weekend together.Ellie is a pro at kicking around the pool in her little arm floaties.Kolby and Ellie worn out from the pool.Ellie's response to me telling her she is showing her panties.The men totally spoiled us this weekend. Tom woke up early with Ellie this morning and let me sleep in. My dad fixed us delicious omelets and hashbrowns for breakfast. And all the guys pitched in preparing the meal after church and even did the dishes! I wish every day was Mother's Day!

I was thinking a lot about motherhood this weekend. I love being a mother more than anything, but I also have lots of days where I feel like a complete failure as a mother. Today, for example, I felt like I spent the whole day getting after Ellie and telling her "No." There was not much positive parenting taking place today. However, when I have days like today, days that I feel like a terrible mother, I remind myself that tomorrow is a new day with plenty of opportunities to redeem myself.

Sunday Best: Posing with Cousins edition

Pregnancy Update: 16 Weeks

I had my 16 week appointment yesterday. I sat around with 7 other hugely pregnant women while we waited for over an hour. Pregnant women are not very patient. Especially when you are stuck staring at a oversized cardboard cutout of a bikini clad woman advertising for some weight loss program my OB-GYN offers. Seriously, is that appropriate for an otherwise upscale waiting room? I think my goal for the next 5 months of pregnancy will be to find some way to get them to remove it. Maybe by leaving anonymous letters? Knocking it over "accidentally" and then falling on top of it? My OB is super cute and super tiny. She seemed pretty excited that I had only gained 1 pound since my last appointment. I was shocked because my stomach is really growing fast. It is pretty early still so I know my lack of weight gain isn't that big of a deal, but I hope she realizes that I will need to gain some weight during this pregnancy. Especially since I like to birth the 10 pounders.

I am starting to feel better. And I am regaining my appetite for food. This concerns me because I am worried that I will go hog-wild and just start eating everything around me. Then won't my doctor be upset. She will probably force me to sign up for her stupid weight loss program.

I haven't really had many cravings, but we were watching American Idol the other night and Simon compared one of the songs to eating a glass of crushed ice for lunch. Ever since then I have wanted crushed ice so bad. I can just taste the crisp, satisfying coolness of it all. It has been driving me nuts until I told my sister this afternoon and she suggested just going to Sonic and asking for a cup of ice. Genius!

I felt the baby move for the first time last week. Just little flutters, but still pretty neat. I am looking forward to summer when I can actually start preparing for this child.

Sunday Best and Tea for Two

Ellie had a new dress for church yesterday, courtesy of Tom's Aunt Patty. She looked so grown up in it. Yesterday was a big day for us because it was also Olivia's 2nd birthday party. I used the birthday party all day long to elicit good behavior from Ellie. You know...if you don't be good, you can't go to Olivia's party. Yeah, I need to start threatening her with punishments that I will actually follow through on.
As always, Sabrina threw a super creative, adorable party. The theme was Tea for Two, Two for Tea...since Olivia was turning two. Clever, right? The backyard was decorated and ready for a little tea party and the guests arrived, dressed in their Sunday best.

Look at the birthday girl. How cute is she? Check out that little foot...don't you want to nibble it? Just me? Hmmm.

But wait, where is Ellie? The little stinker who was so excited for Olivia's party crashed on the drive there and we simply could not wake her.
Luckily, she awoke in time to get dressed and have some food.And just because she is dressed like a princess, doesn't mean she will act live one.