I Love Once Upon a Child

So today I went Christmas shopping, I thought I could use a little retail therapy. I found some great stuff for Jeff and some fun princess dolls at the Disney store marked down 50% for Em but best of all I found the Once Upon a Child store. For those of you who don't know what that is, it is a children's resale shop. They have tons of gently used clothes and toys. I bought Emmy eight pieces of clothing including a velvet Christmas dress from Children's Place and a toy for $40. SCORE!!!! I love love love the little outfit from Gymboree that I got her. Having a child is sort of like having a Barbie except easier to dress (then again maybe not at least the plastic legs didn't kick.) I love dressing Emmy in fun clothes and bows in her hair and all of that sort of thing. I have no idea what she will like when she is old enough to choose her own clothes so I better enjoy it now. Here is her little overall set I just bought, yes I did change her in to it when we got home. I am a freak! It has teeny cupcakes on it - I mean seriously, cupcakes!

The first one is a close up - once I got the camera out it was hard to keep her from walking up to me.

Pity Party of One

your table is now available. Sorry for the Debbie Downer entry yesterday. I feel much better today. After I sat and had some tea I felt a little more like myself. I got off my butt and dug out the sleep book which had some good suggestions and I took Murphy to the vet, who also had some good suggestions. I tried to count my blessing literally and they are to many to number. My friend Jess also gave me some good perspective. Sometimes I expect things to get better sooner than is realistic. I think I should just be able to snap out of it and put things together. I think that is my anal control freak side. Instead of waiting patiently while God works all things out for His glory I get to thinking I can fix it myself. Man I hope I don't pass that on to Emelia, that and my thighs oh and my freckles.

Turns out the vet thinks Murphy may have a urinary tract infection so he is on antibiotics. He also gave me a cream to put on his pee pee because it is inflamed. GROSS!!!!! But if it means he stops peeing in the house, I will put it on four times a day like I am supposed to.

We are expecting an ice storm tomorrow. I like winter and I like snow, I don't like ice. I don't like being unable to go places when I want to go. This will be the first big test of winter in Omaha and the weather people here. I discovered it is much harder to be a weather person in the Midwest than in LA. Fritz Coleman was always like "it looks like it will be 78 and sunny today, for tomorrow we think it will be 79 and sunny." The Midwest has actual weather patterns to evaluate and try to interpret.

Dear sweet blog thanks for bearing with me and loving me even when I am not sunny and cheery. So everyone can pray for Murphy's pee issue I have included his picture, how can you not pray for that dog! And here is Miss Em with the ballpopper extraordinaire.

Out of Sorts

I am feeling a bit out of sorts today. I am not sure exactly what my problem is but I feel a little bit isolated. I am sort of wandering through my days lately. I have no real plans other than grocery shopping and naps. I thought maybe I was just feeling a bit blue because of the holidays. I usually miss my mom around now. It could be that I am struggling with the move and having no friends here. It could be that I am feeling icky because the baby is being a fuss bunny today. I don't know what it is but I am sad. I miss my friends and I miss feeling like I have a sense of purpose. I feel like all I do is cook and clean and change diapers. Oh and clean up pee spots, for some reason Murphy has started peeing all over the house. Between Emmy's erratic naps and the dog's wayward bladder I am tired. I would get out the sleep book and try to figure out what to do about Emmy's nap but we have not unpacked the books yet. I feel like I am living in a state of flux. We haven't hung things on the wall in the bedrooms because we need to paint and we don't really have all the furniture we need to decorate the rooms so it sort of feels like we don't really live here. I just have this feeling like I want to go home and have my life back. I know that is not possible and it is selfish because Jeff is so much happier here in Omaha. I try to convince myself that I am too but I am not. I know I should be praying about all of this but I can't even put my mind to that. This whole funk is probably Satan trying to get at me and I know I am letting him. I just feel sort of sad and desperate. I wish my mom were here she was always the person I called when I feel like this. I could call any one of my friends but I feel like such a whiner, probably because I am right now. I just put Emmy down for a nap which is funny since this is neither her normal nap time nor her new nap time. Being type A is so hard. : ) At least that made me smile. If you can't laugh at yourself who can you laugh at?

I think I will make myself a cup of tea and try to focus on the blessings in my life and pray that I snap out of this.

Naps are for sissies

So we have started a new nap trend. Okay I shouldn't call it a trend because that implies consistency and well, there is nothing consistent about it. She seems to be moving to the one nap a day model. This would be fine if we would just switch over and politely sleep for two hours in the afternoon and then sleep for 10-12 hours at night. I would love that, but I am afraid that is not the case and that transitioning may take longer than I would like. Go figure. Yesterday she only took one nap and it seemed to be okay, but we will see what today brings.

We put up Christmas decor this week and Emmy helped me. She has also figured out how to get her dad's xbox controllers out and turn on the box. Oy vey!

Make new friends....

but keep the old, one is silver and the other gold. I had that song, "The Friendship Song" from the Girl Scouts in my head today because last night I got to see some old friends. In the timeline of my life I suppose they are actually new friends but they are my St. Louis church friends which now makes them old. (Not in years but you know what I mean.) It was so nice to spend time with three women who I consider terrific examples of how to be a Godly Christian wife and mom. These women really are role models for me. Each of them are different and each of them will readily admit their flaws but they are all living each day trying to be the best wife and mother they can be. I love that about them. (Some are soon to be moms and even though they don't have kids yet (only a few more weeks) I still think they know more about Christian parenting than I ever will.)

I was at my friends wedding in Topeka Kansas, wow that is a boring drive , which is where I was able to see my friends. Jeff called me last night and said Emmy's diaper rash has gotten worse and that she howled when he tried to clean her tush after her two butt explosions. I think it might have a yeast component to the rash so I will call the doctor on Monday to talk to a nurse about her symptoms and see what we should do. In other fun news I came home this morning and tried to get Emmy to nurse since I had not nursed since yesterday morning, nor have I pumped, and she said nope. It is not time to nurse therefore I will not. Man she is a child of routine. I loaned my pump to my cousin since I don't really use it anymore so now I look like Pam Anderson. We will see if I can get her to nurse before her afternoon nap. If not I will just have to wait until bedtime tonight and hope for the best. So far it is not to painful but they are definitely firmer than I would like.

My friend Lindsey sent Emmy a Busy Ball Popper for her birthday and she loves it. It is by Playskool and I definitely recommend it to anyone with a toddler. I am not sure what the age range on it is but Em thinks it is loads of fun.

Jeff just told me that our realtor called and three separate people are looking at the house this weekend for the first time. Let's pray one of them is the right one!

Grammy is soooo fun

Jeff's parents were here this week, they just left this morning. It was heartwarming to see Emmy really warm up to Jeff's mom. She ate more food siting on Grandma's lap than she did in the high chair. We had a really nice visit. I made my friend's famous caramel chex mix and Elsie asked for the recipe. I will cherish that moment until next Thanksgiving!

A certain friend of mine asked for photos of the house. I will see if I can get some good ones and post them soon.

Happy Black Friday everyone!

Seriously, would you look at this face

This is the face of a darn cute baby. Although currently she is a darn cute baby who refuses to nap and has been crying for the last 20 minutes. UGH, but she is still cute.

Baby it's cold outside

Here is why I love winter...

The earliest blog entry

So as I sit here at my computer at 6:39, I have been up for almost two hours already - cripes, the day is half over! At least according to the baby. She woke up this morning at 4:54. I brought her back to bed with me and nursed her in bed hoping she would nurse and go back to sleep. No dice. She nursed and then laid there snoring, it seemed, for just long enough to get my hopes up before bolting upright and giggling. Oh man, that is early.

In an effort to find the beauty of God's creation in everything even the clock that says it is 5:00 a.m., here is what I noticed about my early start.

Starlight walks with the dog - it was lovely the stars were still so clear. Then as I came inside I was greeted by the smell of freshly brewed coffee. It reminds me of waking up at my mom's house.

Breakfast with friends - Since Emmy has taken to her Elmo doll the last few days she did not want o put him down for breakfast so Elmo sat in the high chair and joined us for waffles.

Sunrise - So I can actually see the sun rise over cornfields from some of the windows in my house. We live in a new development that is on the southern edge of 96th street. The pavement literally turns to gravel one block south of our street. Last night I saw the most beautiful sunset. (I took a picture of it and when I find the cord that connects the camera to the computer I will post it.)

A jump start on my to do list - Being as anal as I am, having the opportunity to cross even more things off of my to do list is exciting!

So good morning world may your day start as well as mine has... just a few hours later.

Why I am too old to text message

Okay so clearly I am not the target text message demographic, I get that, but every now and again I like to send text messages. Usually I do it when I know my husband is unavailable by phone or something along those lines. Well last night I wanted to get my friend to send me his email address. It was 9:30, which I believe makes it about an hour to late to politely call someone, but I didn't want to forget, so I sent a text message. Thinking I was funny I signed it "love your favorite midwestern housewife." (Yes I know you don't have to sign text messages but like I said I am not so good at this.) So he writes back and says who is this? I, again thinking I am being funny, write, silly goose it is me, e. So he writes back again and says seriously who is this. This particular friend of mine and I have an inside joke about punctuation, especially the use of i.e. So I write i.e. it is me. Then I went to bed. This morning I woke up to a text message saying "this isn't funny WHO is this? I have a sleeping six year old and if you have any respect for me you will tell me who this is or quit texting." OOPS! My friend that I was writing to has grandchildren that are around six but not children that age. I couldn't figure out what went wrong until I realized that I was using my friend's old cell phone number to send the messages to. I sent an apology text this morning but not before feeling like a gigantic idiot!

Shame

I am so ashamed of myself. Last night I completely lost it with Emmy. Jeff was running late coming home and I was trying to get dinner ready. She was tugging at my pant legs and wouldn't leave me alone while I was trying to cook. I thought she was hungry so I gave her a snack and a sippy cup of milk to hold her over until we could all eat dinner together. She wouldn't stop fussing, Jeff called to say he was running later that he thought and I was at the end of my rope. I put her in the high chair and tried to give her some cheeseburger pocket (what we were having for dinner) she spit it back at me so I tried again and she wouldn't open her mouth. I was sure she would like it if she would just try it because she loves cheese. I caught her with her mouth open and managed to wedge a piece in and she apparently felt violated because she began to scream so I screamed at her to just eat it and then she screamed louder and then I screamed again and angrily pulled her high chair tray off and picked her up and yelled, "what do you want?" She just looked at me and screamed and cried, as I sit here typing this I could not feel any worse. I suddenly snapped to my sense and was thought , "dear God what am I doing?" I held her and apologized to her and tried to calm her down because at this point she has big fat tears streaming down her face and was sobbing. I finally got her calmed down and we sat and watched Wheel of Fortune and ate cheeseburger pockets.

I was so ashamed of myself and felt awful. The only saving grace was the thought that she is not old enough to remember that ugliness from her mom. I am trying hard to turn over her eating issues to God. I know in my head that if she is hungry she will eat and if not she won't. I never quite know if she is done with what I have given her or done with dinner and then I worry about her not getting enough nutrition. I know this is only going to get worse based on what I have read and I can not force her to eat so I am praying about it fervently and trying to let go of my anxiety about the situation.

I hope that last night's ugliness will serve as a reminder that not eating is not cause for not loving.

Make the Boxes Go Away

Well we officially own the house now even though we have been living here for two weeks. We closed on the house today and it feels good to get that out of the way. The previous owners let us preoccupy the house since they were not living here. The deal is these people basically went to this builder and built this house but in the nine months it took to construct it they got a divorce so they sold the house without ever having lived in it. It is a sad story to me. How does so much go so wrong in as little as nine months? Anyway, we own it and now we just have to finish unpacking. I am finding it a little hard to finish unpacking as there are some key furniture additions we will need to make in oder for everything to be complete and it is tough to work around that stuff but I am trying.

Jeff's parents are coming next week and I really want the house to look nice for them. I am sure they will tell us it is too big and too fancy but I at least want things to look nice.

I am reading a new book called Faith Based Family and it is rocking my world. It is completely challenging me not just on how I want to raise Emmy but on how I want to be as a Christian. It is a great book.

Back to the move, I still want to paint a few of the rooms but I am trying to decide whether to attempt it myself or pay someone to do it. I could probably do it myself but when we did that with the old house I saw every flaw every time I walked in to the room and I don't want it to be that way here. Maybe I will get a quote and then decide, or maybe the quote will decide for me.

Umm Yeah I've Been Meaning to Write

So I know it has been a really long time since I posted and I also know last time I posted I said I was going to write more and I also know I haven't so well Oops! So much has changed since last time I posted. Jeff got a job not with the Chicago company and not with the St. Louis company but with ConAgra Foods in Omaha. So alas, we live in Omaha. When I was a kid my dad was in the Air Force and we always wanted to get stationed in Omaha because that would be the base closest to family. We never did and yet here 30 years later I am in Omaha. God is so funny sometimes. I now live in the same city as two aunts , an uncle, four cousins and four second cousins. It is so weird to live in the same city as family. I am still not entirely sure how it is supposed to work. On Monday I ran in to my aunt in the grocery store - seriously that is weird.

There are good things and bad things about Omaha. The good things first...
Our house - It is lovely and larger than anything we could have ever dreamed of owning, three times the size of our St. Louis house for 15k less. We live near a SuperTarget and a Super Wal Mart as well as a Hy-Vee. For those of you who don't know what a Hy-Vee is, it is a grocery store but ours is like a grocery store on steroids. It is brand new and has an eat-in area that has not only your standard market deli counter but a killer salad bar, chinese food and pizza.

Cost of Living - The cost of housing is the most noticeable decrease but the cost of everything else is slightly cheaper as well. Jeff also makes about 40% more than his old job so the money just seems to go so much farther.

Slower life - If I thought life in St. Louis was slower-paced, life in Omaha practically stands still. It also just feels like another time. I went to a Fareway today - another grocery store. (When I get to the bad stuff you will realize there isn't a ton to do here hence the daily grocery trips.) The Fareway had no prepackaged meat only a butcher counter. I asked for a roast and he asked how much I wanted. I had no idea, I usually just pick up the package that is the cheapest at the regular grocery store. Then I checked out and the nice young bagger wanted to help me out to my car with my one bag of groceries. I declined.

Family - It is nice to live near family. My prayer is that I can be a blessing to them and serve them the way I tried to serve my friends in St. Louis.

Now the bad stuff...

No Chick-Fil-A - Seriously, this currently tops my list of issues. When we moved her Jeff checked the web site and told me there was a Chick-Fil-A. I was okay with there only being one. Then I discovered yesterday that it is in the Mutual of Omaha cafeteria and I don't think it is open to the public. I have a few calls to make still to confirm but I am not holding out much hope. My next plan of attack is to find a friend who works for Mutual of Omaha so I can meet them for lunch and have Chick-Fil-A.

Lonely - I do have family here but I miss my friends. I know I will make new friends but it will be years before I am connected the way I was in St. Louis. I am just praying that God helps us find a church so we can start to meet people.

Not a ton to do - I think we will miss the plays, concerts and sporting events most. They have a nice zoo here although I think the one in STL is better. I will check out the botanical gardens and museums in the spring.

That is a snap shot of life in Omaha. On to other things.

Emmy is doing well, she started walking right after we moved here which was 10/27. Now she walks more than crawls and has a harder time siting still. My new obsession is her eating habits or lack thereof. She only wants to eat things she can feed herself and yogurt or ice cream. Every now and again she will let me feed her something but only for about 6 spoonfuls. She is refusing most vegetables and will only eat some fruit some of the time. Her desire changes daily. The one constant is cheese. She would eat my arm if i covered it in cheese. Today I made her a grilled cheese sandshich and smuggled peas in to it. I looked over and she was squeezing the chesee and peas out of the sandwhich, dropping the peas and eating the cheese. Seriously!!!

I will add a couple of pictures and then try to get back in the swing of things. It should be easier now that the computer is on the main floor and the monitor isn't out of range.




Our new house

Long Time No Talk

I know it has been awhile since I have posted on here so for any of you who have been checking - sorry! Things are moving right along in some ways and are totally crazy in others. So, the baby is doing well but she is teething which makes her a bit clingy and a little bit of a fussy bunny. (There is a whole song I have composed to accompany the fussy bunny role but I will have to sing it for you another time.) We have settled in to a pretty good schedule. She gets up, plays for awhile, eats some breakfast, naps nurses, we run errands, she nurses again then naps again and then daddy comes home and the real fun starts. She eats another solid meal in the evening, takes a bath and goes to bed. It is hard to even remember the days when I thought she would never go to bed. We have cured, for the most part, the night waking. She sleeps straight through the night most nights and wakes a couple times a week, but usually she can get herself back to sleep. I highly recommend the Ferber Sleep Method his book is titled Solve Your Child's Sleep Problems and it certainly did. God has been blessing our family tremendously as we continue to evolve from two to three.

Now the crazy part. Jeff is not really happy at work and hasn't been for some time. We really feel like God is leading us away from Hardee's. The tricky part is we are not sure where he is leading us to. Jeff had a good interview in Chicago with a PR agency there. Everything about the position sounds great. The trouble is we don't really want to move and we are not sure if we can afford to live in Chicago without Jeff having to add two hours on to his day in commuting time. Jeff has an interview with a St. Louis company on Wednesday and we are really praying that it would go well and he would get an offer from them. We are trying to be open to where God wants us to go but it is tough to know.

I guess that is about it for now, I will try to be better about writing. Not only does it help me stay in touch with people, it helps me organize my thoughts.

We have started solid food and this is what it looks like.

Famous Baby

So Emmy is famous yet again. Last night she and I were a part of a local news segment about savvy grocery shopping. My crazy coupon clipping is now documented for the world. On that note, I practically stole Pampers from Target today. Two packs were on sale for $17 and I had two $1.00 off coupons plus a coupon for 2.50 off if you buy ten dollars worth plus four other coupons for money off if you purchase wipes. I basically used 8 coupons on two packs of diapers and two packs of wipes. I am crazy but I swear it is like drugs or something, I am addicted to saving money.

My dad is coming for a visit this weekend so I think we are going to go to the zoo. It will be Emmy's first trip. We went to the botanical garden last week and had a great time.

I will write more about the state of things after my dad's visit. For now, here is the link to the news story.

http://www.ksdk.com/news/cover_story/cover_article.aspx?storyid=119222

Rubber Duckie You're the One....

you make bathtime lots of fun.... Okay now try to get that song out of your head. We recently begun to have fun with rubber duckie during bathtime.

Wow, Single Parents are Brave

I have a new found respect for single parents. Jeff is on a business trip which means I have no second shift relief. I figured how hard can it be, what is four more hours? Well, I can honestly say after doing it for two days I feel like I have run a marathon. It is hard work. Thank God she has been fairly calm and gone to bed with a minimum of crying. We had a fun day today, I met some friends for lunch at a local Mexican restaurant. We sat on the patio and it was lovely. The weather has been great the last two days which is so helpful, getting out makes a big difference. Then we came home and played. I think she is getting ready to roll over. I will roll her on to her side and then when gravity takes her the rest of the way she giggles with glee. There really is no better sound than her laugh. I hope to get it on video so that when she is 13 and tells me she hates me I can listen to that laugh and remember why I love her.

Here are some more photos from today's play session. Murphy got in on the action too.

And the Bottom Drops Out

So last Thursday was the hardest day I have had since I brought the baby home. I wasn't sure if I wanted to write about it for several reasons. One, I don't particularly like what I saw of myself that day, two, in hindsight it wasn't that bad. Then I realized that in the moment that day, it was that bad and I felt awful. So much of our society portrays motherhood as this idealized romantic emotionally fulfilling thing. On most days it is or can be all of that. There are days I love her so much it hurts. Then there are days I love her but I don't really like her. That sounds awful, even to me as I read it, but that is the truth and I can't help it.

The trouble is she wouldn't nap. She didn't want to even be put down and when I tried the sleep training method for naps she cried for 45 minutes. That is a really long time. In addition I was struggling to try and work on some projects and my printer wasn't working and the phone line was staticy and the sky was blue. It started to feel like everything was against me and there was no end in sight. Jeff called in the middle of all of this and I was just so mad at him. Actually no, I wasn't mad at him, I was mad and he was there. Why is it that we are the meanest to those who love us the most? Maybe because we can rest in the knowledge that no matter how awful we are they will forgive us.

Jeff came home and we managed to get her to be fairly calm and then we put her down for bed and she cried. She probably only cried for about 20 minutes but again, that feels like a day and a half when it comes at the end of a long day. At one point I went and sat in the car because it was the only place I couldn't hear her. The worst part about it is I wish I could tell you that I couldn't listen to her cry because it breaks my heart but at that point I couldn't listen to her cry because I wanted to throw things.

When I look back on it I know there are a couple of things that contributed to that day being so bad. Some of it is my personality, my anal nature makes failure and an inability to get things done very hard for me. I wish that would get better but I am not sure it will, I am working on it. Part of it is that the weather has been very cold which makes it hard to get out to get some fresh air and that is hard for me. A lot of it is that I was not able to take a step back and be still and know that God will get me through. The sermon in church on Sunday was about God's promises. It was very powerful to me because the pastor asked, why is it so hard for us to remember God's promises? It was humbling.

At the end of it all I only pray that next time a day like that comes along (and I am not foolish enough to think that it won't) I hope I can take a deep breath, pray for help, let myself be loved and remember what a blessing she is to me.

Opening Day

So I know I have been sort of quiet lately and that is mostly because life has not been quiet for us. My dad was here the weekend of the 18th for the baby dedication. We had a great visit. He and Nancy seemed to really enjoy the baby and she was good. Then that next week we had a little bit of a baby melt down. For some reason she started hysterically crying on Thursday night and then she did it again on Friday night. On top of that she didn't want to be laid down and she was up constantly throughout the night. I almost wish she had never slept through the night so early because then we would not know what we are missing. Now she sleeps through the night maybe two nights a week. The last two nights we have had better nights and have only woken up once, ate and went back to sleep relatively peacefully. I think the problem is that she is now aware enough of her surroundings to know when and how she is falling asleep. I am reading a sleep book by Dr. Richard Ferber that basically says if they fall asleep in your arms and then they wake up and they are not in your arms they will not be able to go back to sleep. He likens it to if you fell asleep each night in your bed and suddenly you woke up and you were in the living room and not only that but the door to your bedroom was locked. Well you would wake someone up to let you back in to your bedroom plus you would be ticked. Then you would start trying to stay awake to try and catch whoever is moving you to the living room. Wow, who knew it was this complicated. So now we are getting in to a better pattern and woking through it.

In happier news Sunday was opening day for the Cardinals. If it was like a holiday before it is like Christmas this year since we are the reigning world champions. We took the baby to the rally downtown and had some fresh air and sunshine before Jeff went on to the game and Emmy and I went home to watch Extreme Makeover Home Edition. A good time was had by all. I did apparently miss Emmy's debut on the jumbotron at the stadium. She appeared in a Hardee's in-game feature. Pretty fun stuff.

The Parents as Teachers lady is coming today, I fully expect her to tell me that my kid is a genius or at least she is cute. I always tell her it is better to be smart than pretty but lucky for her she is both.

Enjoy the pics...

My Girl is a Shopper

We went to the mall today for FOUR hours. Wow, it was a shopping extravaganza... unfotunately it was for Jeff. Oh well I was just excited to be in the mall. I can't type long because it is time for a certain bean to eat but here are some new photos for you all to feast your eyes on. She is so darn cute I can't stand it....