Grace Like Rain

Monday, March 29, 2010

It's a ...

Finally, after many weeks of waiting, we found out today that Baby Smith is a BOY!!!!

We're thrilled to find out that we're having a boy although we would have been just as happy if baby turned out to be a girl.

We thought we were going to have a 3D/4D ultrasound today, but it turned out to be a traditional 2D ultrasound. That was fine though. We were able to see lots of baby's parts and everything looked perfectly normal. That was a big relief and a huge praise.

The ultrasound tech recorded our scans on a DVD for us. When we found out that it was a boy, I asked Emily what she thought and she said "it's alright". Then when the real doctor came in, she said it was "more than alright! It was good!"

She said she changed her mind and he can sleep in her room. I told her we would have to fix his room up for him and pick out some new sheets for his bed. She said she would help me. She's got it all figured out!

She was telling the doctor all about the things we were going to have to teach him. She thinks he might not know his numbers yet and he might get his "ones and his two's mixed up". The doctor said this baby was definitely going to be born with two mothers. Yes, that's so true!

The doctor was very nice. He was a lot more laid back than I imagined he might be. I asked him if that was anything I could do to prevent the high blood pressure issues that I had with Emily. He said there is nothing proven to work, but fortunately the problem usually starts later with the second pregnancy and it's less severe. I'm hoping to avoid the problems altogether!

This doctor (an expert in Maternal-Fetal medicine) is totally on board with continuing the metformin throughout my pregnancy. My ob/gyn agrees with this, but she pretty much left the decision up to me. It was nice to get confirmation from another doctor that this is a good choice.

We're just thrilled that everything is good with Mama and Daddy's little boy!

Letter Person Dress-up Day

Tomorrow is Letter Person Dress-up Day in Emily's class. Each child was supposed to choose a letter person and the parents is supposed to help them create an outfit related to that letter person.

I had been asking Emily what letter person she wanted to be. I was hoping she would say "Ms. E" the Exercise Expert. I thought that one would be pretty easy. Or maybe "Mr. B" Beautiful Buttons. (Vowels are girls and consonants are boys.) That one would be fun.

But she didn't choose Ms. E. She didn't choose Mr. B. She chose "Ms. A" Achoo!

How do you create an outfit for Ms. A? Give a kid a box of Kleenex and send them on their way. Yeah, somehow i don't think that would work.

So I decided to get a t-shirt and put a handkerchief in the pocket. Except that the shirt I found didn't have a pocket. So I had to make a pocket with hankey out of a red bandanna. The A is made of foam and Emily helped me cover it with red pom poms.

We had such a good time that Emily wanted to put more pom poms around the neckline of the t-shirt. She wanted to put them around the arms too, but we didn't have enough pom poms to go around. We used every one that we had though.

This is one fancy shirt and I think it turned out really cute. Emily and I really had a good time putting it together earlier this week. I hope she enjoys wearing it to school tomorrow.

And you can see below what Ms. A really looks like! I thought she was pink and red, but apparently not. Ha!

Tomato Billboard

Several weeks ago, I was driving home from work and I noticed a billboard that just had some gigantic 3-D vines around the edges of it. I watched the giant billboard for several days in a row, but nothing changed on it - still just those strange vines.

It reminded me a lot of the time the new casino had some cryptic billboards for weeks before we finally found out what they were all about.

So anyway, back to the vines on the billboard ... a few weeks later, some giant tomatoes showed up on the vines.

Now, let me just say that it really irritates me that I'm looking at this thing every day on my drive home to see what will change because I know that's what the billboard creator wants me to do and I don't want to do it. But I do it anyway. Every day.

So many weeks later, I finally get to see the final billboard and it's these huge cans of tomatoes. I don't remember the exact wording, but the point was that they were fresh. And, much to my chagrin, I do remember the name of the product - Red Gold Tomatoes. Gah! I hate that. They got me right where they want me.

And now I'm "advertising" for them on my blog. Gah! They got me again!

Driving Miss Daisy ... or Mister Dashing

Today on my way home from work, I heard on the radio that part of westbound I-40 was narrowed down to one lane due to a 1 foot by 2 foot hole in one of the bridges. This is the same highway that I drive to work every day.

Unfortunately, this is not the first time the highway has been closed due to holes in the bridges. When you drive down the highway, it looks like a patchwork quilt with different colors and types of cement and asphalt. It's not a smooth drive at all. At ALL.

To be honest, I usually don't even think about the road as I'm driving to work and back every day. But it sure is a scary thought that the road is in such bad shape. They are putting in a new highway a few miles south of the old one, but when will it be ready for traffic? Can the old road wait long enough?

Only time will tell!

How much snow?

On Friday night after work, Mike and Emily and I went to Wal-mart to get a few things that we needed - like milk and ice cream. The parking lot was completely packed, but we drove up and got the spot closest to the door. A lady stopped us as we were getting out of the car and asked if we needed a buggy because there were none inside. She was right and we were very thankful to have a buggy to use.

So we wade through the packed store and get a few things that we needed. While we were in there, a line of heavy showers came through. We could hear it hammering on the roof.

But then we had to stand in line for over 30 minutes just to check out. And when we get to the check stand, Mike starts up a conversation with the Chatty Cathy Checker dude. The guy would scan a few things, look at Mike and talk, and then bag a few things .. and over and over again. I started to poke Mike, but I figured we'd be out of there in a few minutes anyway and then someone else would have to deal with Chatty.

After we left Wal-mart, we stopped by the new Braums to get an ice cream. I ordered a small frozen yogurt twist. I think they gave me a large. Either way, I ate every bit of it. Yum!

On the way home, Mike and I were talking about how we were forecasted to get 6 to 12 inches. I told Mike that I thought we'd only get 2 inches or less. I was fairly confident in that so I made him a bet that we'd get 0 to 2 inches. If I was wrong, I'd treat him to a steak dinner of his choosing. He said he felt like we would get 4 to 6 inches of snow. And if he was wrong, he'd treat me to an ice cream treat of my choosing.

So really, how much?

So, we stayed home all day Saturday waiting for the snow. When we woke up, it was definitely snowing. And it snowed off and on most of the day. But we only got a couple inches on the ground. I have not heard an official snow total so I don't know who won yet, but I'm feeling really good about this one.

After our (long) naps, Emily helped me make some strawberry cupcakes. We were going to make chocolate sheet cake cupcakes and the best ever icing, but we didn't have any buttermilk. Luckily, I had the strawberry cupcake mix and the can of pink icing. Emily and I had a great time baking. She is a great helper.

And Today ...

And today, most of the snow is melted and gone. We stayed home most of the day today as well, but we did get out to go to Texas Roadhouse for lunch. Emily actually suggested it and I thought it was a great idea. If you must know, she loves loves loves the loaded sweet potatoes at Roadhouse. Well, I think she mostly loves the marshmallows. *wink*

When we got home, we spent some time working on cleaning out our home office that may be our new baby boy nursery. I am so excited. We should find out if we'll be using that room as a nursery in about a week.

Either way, we have a lot of work to do in that room to get it back in shape. It's been a long time since we've used it as anything but a storage room. But I'm feeling good about the progress we made today. I think we know what we have to do to get it done.

Well, Emily's spring break is over and she'll be going back to school in the morning. I know she is excited to see her friends. Although we're sad that our relaxed week is ending, we'll be glad to get back to the routine. In just a few short weeks, the school year will be over and we'll be preparing for Kindergarten. *Phewww!*

Hope you all have a great week!!!!

It Smells So Good

I'm just going to put it all out there right now - it smells so good in my house.

As you may know, we were forecasted to get 6-12 inches of snow today. Today - on the first day of spring. Great news!

When I got home from work yesterday, I noticed my beautiful yellow daffodils happily waving in the 70 degree weather. I couldn't let them freeze to death under all the snow. They were so beautiful and such a welcome sign of spring.

They were blooming in the middle of the circle drive, around the tree in the front yard, a couple in the flowerbed by the front windows, and in the big raised bed at the end of the house.

But now they are shining brightly in my living room. I picked about half the blooms and put them in a vase and brought them inside.

Emily noticed them right away and had a hard time keeping her hands off of them. They smell so sweet. We have been enjoying them all day today while it snows outside.

We looked outside to see what happened to the ones still growing outside and they just looked so sad. I hope they will perk up when the snow melts, but I don't think that's going to happen.

At least we'll get to enjoy these inside for a few more days.

Wednesday Thankfulness

Today, I'm thankful that we're not having Cubbies tonight. Don't get me wrong. I love my Cubbies class and I love spending time with them every week. But it's very nice to have a break every once in a while.

I really wanted pizza today (Hmmm, pregnancy craving?) so we went out to dinner to find some pizza tonight. We drove over to the pizza place and it was packed! They had half the parking lot blocked off and had a big party going outside. And, to me, a big party = a big wait = not fun for a pregnant lady.

So we kept going on down the road hoping to find something good to eat. We ended up at a little diner and the food was not good tonight! I felt so sorry for our waitress because she was no less than 80 years old. She did a good job although she had a bit of a hard time hearing me.

Feeling Green

This year, Emily is really into St. Patrick's Day and wearing green. Last night, she had to make sure she was wearing green before she went to bed so that she wouldn't be pinched this morning. She wore a shirt with green gumballs on it today. So that meant that I had to find something green to wear too. No way I want her pinching me!

Being Real

This morning when I woke up, I had a bad headache on the right side of my head. I immediately had to do what I always have to do first thing in the morning these days - run to the bathroom! Mike was getting ready to get up at this time, but I crawled back into bed and went back to sleep for a few minutes. When I got up again, I took some Tylenol and hoped for the best.

By the time I left for work, I was feeling a little better. But as soon as I started driving, my eyes started feeling heavy. It was so so hard to keep them open. I don't know if it was because it was dark outside again or because of the loss of my hour from Daylight Savings time, but I was having a really hard time this morning.

When I got onto the interstate, I actually rolled down the window a little bit to try to liven myself up. It messed up my hair, but it didn't help much. I was just having a hard time driving 70 miles per hour because it just felt way too fast for my drowsy state.

When I got a little past halfway to work, the traffic stopped because two firetrucks were in the road working a car fire. As I went past, I happened to look over at the car and it was totally burned out and nobody was inside. I felt a pang in my chest and immediately started to get teary-eyed. I was thinking "What would I do if my car caught on fire with my kids inside??" Oh my goodness, what a terrifying thought.

(Ring .. Ring ... Hello? Honey, we have GOT to buy a new car TODAY. No, not tomorrow. Today. Like right now. I don't want my babies to burn up in a car!)

Gotta love those emotional and irrational thoughts. It was really not a fun drive to work today.

When I got to work, I went straight to the vending machine to get a diet coke. I usually don't drink sodas during the day, but I needed some caffeine to perk me up a little bit. My doctor said that caffeine is okay in moderation so I try to do that. Now, I don't know if my Route 44 diet coke from Sonic last week would be technically considered "in moderation", but sometimes you gotta do what you gotta do. But I digress ...

Our department has a Monday morning meeting every week so I took my caffeine to sip during the meeting. Unfortunately, it didn't really seem to help very much. I had just given my weekly recap and listed out a baker's dozen of projects that I needed to work on this week. And then every person in the room had "just one more thing" that they wanted me to "work in" this week. Really? Are you kdding me? I guess I gave them all a nasty look because they sorta backed off and said "ya know, but do whatever you want". Ha ha! That'll teach them to mess with a hormonal pregnant woman!!!

So that was my day in a nutshell - the good, the bad, and the ugly.

How did your day-after Daylight Savings go?

Daylight Savings

Well, we saved some daylight today, but it sure was hard. It was hard to get out of bed this morning in time for Sunday School. It must have been hard for a lot of other people as well because we only had one little boy in our Sunday School class.

After church, we went to lunch with Mike's parents and Madison. We had a nice lunch and a good visit. The weather was not as warm as expected today. When we came out of church, it was misting a little bit and pretty cool.

This afternoon, we came home and took naps. I told Emily that if she took a good nap, we could go outside and play later in the afternoon. Unfortunately, she never took her nap today. I think I am the only one who ended up taking a nap.

Emily didn't get to go outside (and she was very upset about this), but I went out and worked in the flower beds for a few minutes. We have a few daffodils blooming and some blue vinca. I hope I didn't hurt them when I was raking out the flower beds.

I saw a lot of other things that needed to be taken care of outside, but I could only stay out there a few minutes with Emily throwing a huge fit inside. I came back into the house to find her fully dressed for outside play, including her socks and shoes. Poor thing - she should have taken her nap.

She quickly forgot about playing outside as soon as I asked her if she wanted to help me make some brownies. It took us a long time to whip them up, but they turned out really good. After the brownies were in the oven, I made some chicken tenders and mashed potatoes while Emily played in the sink. By the time we were done, I was so so tired.

I was worried about how Emily would be able to fall asleep with her room being so well-lit because of daylight savings time, but she actually went right to sleep. I hope that trend continues over the next few weeks.

Quad Screen Results and Embarrassing Moments

First things first ... I called all week to get the results of my quad screen blood work. On Friday, I finally got an answer and found out that everything came back normal. This was a big relief and a big praise. I was glad to get the results before the weekend.

We're still over two weeks away from our next ultrasound. We're so ready to see this little kiddo again. He or she is moving a lot these days and that's so fun.

In Other News ...

I've been feeling under the weather since we got home from our trip last weekend. I've had that sniffling, sneezing, sore throat, stuffy headed feeling all week. I went to work every day, but I was just not feeling well. And that was the source of my embarrassing moments. Lets just say ... sneezing is not a pregnant girl's best friend. So. not. fun. And it's especially not fun when it happens several times a day.

Fortunately, Emily did not end up getting sick. Unfortunately, Mike did end up getting sick. I feel bad for him because this is one of those things that just hangs around for days on end.

Speaking of Emily, she's on spring break next week. I know she will miss her friends, but she will enjoy doing some different things for a week. And when she gets back to school, we have lots of things coming up in the next few weeks. We'll be dressing up like a letter person, bringing filled plastic eggs for an Easter Egg Hunt, going on a field trip, and ... I can't remember what the other things are. This is not good since it'll be my responsibility to get all these things done. I hope I have it all written down somewhere.

Just a reminder ...

Don't forget to set your clock forward one hour before you go to bed tonight! I noticed tonight that the clock in my bathroom didn't "fall back" last fall so it's already ready for daylight savings time. Slightly embarrassing.

Girls Weekend 2010

Last weekend, Emily and I went to visit my sister for Girl's Weekend. This is something we try to do every year. My mom comes up and we have a great time.

At first it was "just the three of us". Then Emily came along and there were four. Then Heather married Stephen and there were five. I mean he's obviously not a girl, but he lives there and we spend lots of time with him too. Sometimes he even takes us shopping, as was the case this year.

Will there be six next year? That's still yet to be seen.

Besides the shopping, we usually spend some time at a local park playing on the equipment and talking the trails.

Sometimes Emily needs a little help on the equipment, but that seems to be getting less and less each year.

She was a lot more adventurous this year. There was nothing she couldn't do!

We didn't get to stay long at the park and so I didn't get to take as many pictures as I normally do. We still had a good time though.

Good food. Good friends. Good times.

Baby Update

My doctor's office called on Monday to let me know the date and time of my ultrasound appointment. I'm going to a different office that has the best of the best equipment so they had to get the appointment set up for me. Well, it turns out that my appointment is not for another 3 weeks! Waaah!

I received some paperwork in the mail from the new office today and it said I can bring a blank DVD and they will record some of my ultrasound for me. That's so cool. I'm definitely doing that. I can't wait to see it and find out for sure if we're having a boy or girl.

Parting Shot

I wanted to leave you with one last picture from our weekend in AR. It's kinda hard to see, but do you see anyone that you know sitting on one of those park benches at the outdoor mall?

They are such good buddies!

16 Weeks - Dr Visit

This morning, I went to my 16 week Dr appointment. Baby Smith was an uncooperative little thing today. He kept moving away from the Doppler when we were trying to hear the heartbeat. The nurse tried and then the doctor tried, but neither could get him. We could hear him moving. (It sounds like a loud WOOP on the Doppler, kinda like a record when it scratches.)

So we went down to the ultrasound room to take a peek. And to my surprise, he was being uncooperative again. He was laying sideways right around my belly button and he kept pulling his legs up to his chest, sorta like he was curled up into a ball. He was moving all over, but we really couldn't see much. Couldn't tell if it was a boy or a girl and couldn't get any pics.

We'll go back in a couple weeks for another ultrasound scan. We were scheduled to go back in a couple weeks for the ultrasound anyway so this scan today was just a little bonus.

Everything looked good. The heartbeat sounded good although I forgot to ask how fast it was. I had my "quad screen" blood test done today too. It tests for the likelihood of chromosomal abnormalities like Downs Syndrome or things like spina bifida. It's an optional test. We had it done with Emily and it made us feel so much better when it came back normal. Hopefully this one will as well.

Well, Emily and I are headed out of town to visit my sister and brother-in-law after school today. It will be a fun trip full of shopping and family. Or maybe family and shopping. Either way, it's girls weekend and we will have a great time.

Okay I better go pack before I go pick up Emily from school. Hope you have a great weekend!

Happy Anniversary, Mike!

Happy Anniversary

Happy Anniversary, Mike!

8 years ago today, I said "I do" to a wonderful man. And I have ever since!

I tease him that it's been "8 long years" and it does seem that way at times. It seems like I've known Mike forever. And in other ways, it seems like we've just begun.

Isn't that the joy of marriage? Things change, but some things remain constant.

I love you, Mike! Thank you for 8 great years!

That Ol' Car, Shall We Dance?

We were going to rent a car today because Mike's car was still not working, but it ended up that we didn't have to do that. Thanks to Mike and his dad (and his mom!) , the car was fixed today. I'm glad we won't have to do this whole carpooling thing any more. It is really difficult being late to work every day.

Tonight's the night that Mike and I watch the Bachelor finale. I'm already disgusted with Jake's choice and he hasn't even picked anybody yet. Later tonight, we'll get to see who is going to be on Dancing With the Stars. Yah! I hope they have some fun people this season.

Still more busy days this week. Tomorrow is Mason's Birthday party. Wednesday is Cubbies night. Then there's more fun to be had.

I can hardly wait!

Another Day

Today after church, we went to lunch with Mike's Mom and Dad and Mason at Toby Keith's restaurant. I think we all pretty much had the chicken fried steak sandwiches and they are yum.

After lunch, we went over to Mike's parents house for a few hours. Mike and his dad are still trying to figure out what's wrong with the car. So far, the problem sounds pretty perplexing. Hopefully they will figure something out soon.

When we got home, Emily took a quick nap and I started the usual laundry and dishes and getting things in order for the week. Looks like this is going to be a busy week for us.

I am looking forward to spring. Some of my daffodils are already starting to come up. They will probably be blooming in just a few weeks. I need to get out there and do some raking in my flowerbeds, but I know I am going to need to cut back on my outdoor activities this spring and summer. I'm just not going to be able to keep up with everything while pregnant.

I don't know how I feel about that. I'm sure I will still try to do way too much, but I love working in my flower beds. I like coming home in the evenings and seeing my flowers in bloom. I always have to go around and check to see what's new out in the yard. It's one of my favorite times of day.

Slow Saturday

Nothing much going on for us today. Mike had to go in to work for a few hours early this morning. While he was gone, Emily and I ate breakfast and then she took a bath with some of her Barbie toys.

Mike came home well before noon and we decided to go out for lunch. We went to Ted's Cafe Escondido and had a yummy Mexican lunch. After a bit of after-lunch shopping, we headed back home for a nap.

Emily took a short nap and I took a very long and interrupted nap in my recliner. A lot was going on, but my head was pounding and I really didn't want to get up.

Later, we had some leftover spaghetti and banana pudding for supper and then we all watched "Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs." We had seen this movie before at the theater, but we wanted to do something special with Emily tonight.

I think she enjoyed it and we enjoyed it. She's in bed so now I'm pretty sure it's time for me to go to bed too.

Good night!!

By The Numbers

15 - Weeks Pregnant.

2 - Days of achy legs. All better now.

3 - Potential causes - sleeping on my back, crossing my legs, or dress shoes.

3 - Tried solutions - sleeping on my side, legs in a chair, and comfy sturdy shoes.

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2 - Days worth of car troubles. One more tomorrow. Hopefully the last.

2 - "Carpool" days with my honey. Car trouble is not all bad.

1 - to 3 inches of snow tonight and tomorrow. Not my idea of fun.

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9 - Kids in Cubbies last night.

1 - with 2 time outs. *sigh*

9 - "Streets of Gold" string craft projects.

18 - Color sheets.

1 - Important Bible story about Heaven.

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1 - Sister. The best, if you must know.

1 - Year older. This weekend.

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1 - Nephew turning 2. Also this weekend.

1 - Nephew turning 4 next week.

2 - Fast that kids grow up.

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1 - Request for Hamburger Cookies recipe. Will post this weekend.

8 - Very important. Will post more details in a few days.

Happy Birthday, Carter!

This weekend, we went down to the Dallas area for this little cutie's birthday party. Our nephew, Carter, was turning 2 years old.

He got lots of fun presents, including this cool hat.

It did not take him long to figure out how to get those presents unwrapped. He just tore into those packages.

His mom made a very cool cake with a fire truck on it and some yummy cupcakes. Isn't that cute???

The kids really enjoyed the cake and ice cream. Here they are getting ready for Carter to blow out the candles. (I think all the kids joined in to help him get them blown out.)

Mike and I had a good time. I took his picture and he thought that was unfair.

So he had to take my picture too.

We would have gotten Emily's picture too, but she was having too much fun playing with her cousins.

We came home this evening. It was a fun trip, but we're always glad to be home.

The Department of Redundancy Department

Thank you all so much for ignoring the parts of my last post that did not make any sense. I must have been pretty tired by the time I got all those pictures uploaded because I re-read what I wrote this morning and much of it did not make any sense.

How can I have an awesomely awesome blog when what I write does not make any sense? I am sure I spellchecked it, but I should have done a little proofreading too.

Anyway, I went back and corrected some of my pathetically pathetic mistakes this morning. And I will try to do better next time.

Happy 60th Birthday, Wanda!

For the last few weeks, Mike and Emily and I have been helping plan a surprise party for Nanny's 60th birthday. It was going to be a 50's party since she was born in 1950.

We found a place online that sells cute 50's poodle skirt outfits for the little girls. In case you were wondering, we got them from Hip Hop 50's Shop.

We had a couple cakes. Cherry's sister-in-law made this adorable, pink 50's inspired cake.

We had a spread of sweets that included two cakes, chocolate-dipped strawberries, pretzels, cookies and "hamburger cookies".

Nanny actually ordered her own birthday cake from a local bakery ... but we changed to order to a much smaller cake. I believe it was an almond cake with chocolate icing.

I made the hamburger cookies. If you're interested, I'll post the no-bake "recipe" another day.

We had lots of other good food too - chips and dips, veggies with dip, tortilla roll-ups, little smokies, sausage balls, cheese ball and crackers (my personal fave), rotel dip, spinach dip and lots more.

All the kiddos were dressed up so cute. The girls had their cat eye glasses with rhinestones. Mason had some Elvis glasses with some hip and cool sideburns.

I loved the color of Emily's poodle skirt. It was pretty in pink, just like her. I was very surprised, but she wore her scarf and cat eye glasses almost all night.

Wanda and Gary and their guests were supposed to be home around 7pm so we moved the cars up and down the street and turned off all the lights in the house. It seemed like forever, but they were soon home and pulling into the garage. They came into the dark house and we all yelled "Surprise!".

Poor Nanny was in the kitchen when we yelled at her and she jumped halfway across the room. When someone turned on the light, she was so surprised to see about 30 people in her house.

Despite the surprise, she was really happy to see everyone and deemed it "the best birthday ever!!!"

After the guest of honor arrived, everyone got to visit some more and we had some awesome entertainment in the form of some song and dance numbers.

And then everyone decided to join in on the dancing fun - first the young ones.