Hiking in the Mountains

On Friday Abbie and I wanted to escape the heat so we decided to go hiking up at Silver Lake. The less than one mile flat loop around the lake seemed perfect for a two-year old and pregnant woman who wouldn't be too disappointed if the hike induced labor. (MAJOR UNDERSTATEMENT).

We started around the North side of the lake and Abbie quickly became enthralled with gathering rocks and throwing them in the lake. That combined with a traditional two-year old pace of stopping and looking at everything along the way made the journey long but quite enjoyable.

Until we got to the South end - about 3/4 of the way around. At the South end of the lake there were large patches of snow on the trail that hadn't yet melted. Also by this point Abbie had decided that she was too tired to continue. I knew that at this stage in my pregnancy unless I wanted to deliver a baby at Brighton ski resort, I couldn't carry Abbie back the way we came. So with Abbie in one arm, snacks, diapers etc, in the other and flip flops on my feet we plunged into the snow banks. Thankfully we did not slip (which I guess really would have started labor) and we made it home safe and sound.

Abbie still talks about the fun "hiking in the mountains."

Breathing Easy...

Well I am feeling like a terrible mom today. About two months ago Abbie got a cough/cold. The fever and runny nose went away and the cough tamed from the croupy bark to dry coughing at night occasionally. I had been told by several people that sometimes coughs just take awhile to disappear in kids so I wasn't worried.

Unfortunately though over the last couple of weeks the barking seal returned in the evenings and this week it joined us during the daytime. By this week, I didn't worry too much because we had Abbie's two-year check up on Friday so I thought I'd wait until then. Well immediately the doctor told me she was wheezing and needed a breathing treatment.(This is where they put something like an oxygen mask over her nose and mouth and she breathes in some medication to open her lungs.) Abbie has reactive airway disorder(RAD) (basically the technical name for wheezing (What? Wheezing isn't good enough for a medical dictionary?). If it becomes chronic it will be asthma but not yet - thankfully. By the end of the visit we were fitted to buy the nebulizer (the machine that vaporizes the medication), a mask, additional medication, liquid medication, (and the new epi-pens just to add to the bill) and told that she needed the breathing treatments every 4-6 hours and had to take the most disgusting medication known to children twice a day. Needless to say it has been a longer than normal night.

After the peanut incident this is not nearly as worrisome - it just makes me feel guilty I didn't take her in sooner and feel bad at how she is feeling (although she is acting fine, unless we try to give her the medication).

Birthday Pics and other Misc

So I'm finally getting around to posting pictures of Abbie's birthday. We had two small parties, one with Russ's family and one with mine. Unfortunately we only have pictures of the party with Russ's family. Abbie had a blast at both parties and by the end got the hang of opening presents and blowing out candles. All of the presents were bit hits and she has been enjoying playing with them since.

I also included some pictures from our recent family trip to the zoo for members night. You can probably tell that by the time we made it to the tigers she was pretty beat.

Oh...operation "Bye Bye Binki" is officially a success. Within one weeks time she has stopped asking for the binki and goes to bed and naps without a fuss.

Bye-bye Ginky

Well now that Abbie is two -pictures from her birthday pending - we decided that it was time to say good-bye to the binki - or "Ginky" as you prefer. I wanted to move past this event before I become excessively sleep deprived with night feedings from a new baby here soon. Now I know there are some who are appalled that we've let her use one for this long - albeit only for bed and nap time - and others that think why stop a good thing but for better or worse (this weekend - worse) this is where we are.

This is the most traumatic thing to happen to young Abbie (and considering that, she is a pretty lucky kid). Every night, and every nap time she asks for it and we have to remind her it is lost (conveniently done by herself last Friday.) She get such a sad expression on her face it nearly breaks my heart. Poor kid. Unfortunately this has made falling asleep more difficult and nap times considerably shorter. So we are not only dealing with a disappointed child, but a sad and very sleep deprived one as well. Poor me.

I've been told by friends that this adjustment phase lasts anywhere from a couple of days to a week so hopefully we will see the light soon and she can catch up on some sleep - and I can too.

Nice People in the World

I am so grateful for two nice old red neck men. Today I was driving on the freeway when a large truck started flagging me to pull over. I wasn't too worried about the 50 somethings in the truck but more confused than anything. I pulled over, made sure my doors were locked, grabbed my cell phone and rolled down the window a little bit. The two guys, in hunting tee-shirts told me I had a flat and they would fix it for me. They seemed harmless and when I got out to look, indeed my rear tire was almost gone.

There is only a slight possibility I could have figured out how to change the flat on my own, but about zero at eight months pregnant. The did it in 15 minutes and I was on my way. From the looks of the old tire I was minutes away from blowing it - I hadn't heard a thing.

As much fun as it is to spend money unexpectedly on tires, drive 40 mph on the freeway for 180 blocks on my spare, and waste my morning it is much better than blowing a tire, or trying to change it myself or having all this happen with a newborn. All in all I'm very grateful.

It is nice to know there are good people in the world.

The Diaper Pouch Returns

I've told you about Abbie's use of her diaper for storing hair clips and elastics but yesterday she found an entirely new and innovative use for this convenient storage area. We were at the park when I noticed that she was taking handfuls of sand and sticking them down the front of her shirt. I called her over so I could brush the sand out and explain that we don't put sand down the front of our shirts. (An important life lesson for all.) She walked, somewhat awkwardly, to me.

When I looked down the front of her shirt I saw into the front of her diaper and there sat a rock, roughly the size of a matchbox car! When I pulled it out I noticed a handful of other tiny pebbles along with the sand. She had filled her diaper with rocks and sand!

The thing I don't understand is what exactly is appealing about rocks in the diaper? Why do you even start such an experiment? And once you've started feel the discomfort, why do you continue with larger and larger rocks? Do you think it will become more comfortable if you get enough in there? Is the discovery of untapped storage capacity so appealing that the discomfort is worth it? Are these rocks special or would any old rock be worth storing? Have I stunted scientific experimentation by asking Abbie not to put rocks in her diaper?

I - not being of a scientific turn- will probably never know....

The Amazing Russ

I have always known that I had an amazing husband but today he outdid himself. First he spent most of the day building shelves in our garage. We have a tiny, "one car," garage that I have loved although it is cramped. As we've piled in the junk it has gotten more and more cramped so we could only get in the car from one side. This will obviously not work well - if at all - with two kids in car seats so my wonderful husband built enough shelving to compress almost all of our junk to the back of the garage. (While it may seem disorganized on the shelves, it is actually a highly developed organizational system known only to the designer.)
The second - and even more amazing accomplishment of Russ today is he finished painting a picture of my dad and my niece, Vicki, for my dad for his birthday/father's day. This painting was a special request from me at the last minute that he has been working on for the last couple of weeks. It is based on a picture from a family camp out and represents all that I love about my dad. I absolutely love the painting and think it is one of Russ's best, if not his best, painting to date. We are giving it to my dad tomorrow (May 25) so if you read this before then don't tell him. (For better or worse my parents aren't the most up to date on blogs and blogging so I'm not terribly worried about them checking this before we give it to them. Dad, if you are reading this before you've seen the picture ....act surprised.)

Baby Banana?

So we are about 90% sure that our new addition will be named Savannah. We've talked to Abbie about baby sister, and more recently about Baby Savannah. She, of course, responds with "Baby Sa- nana," which sounds terribly close to "Baby Banana!" And we had been so worried that Savannah wasn't conducive to nicknames......

Fun Weekend

So I'm a little late in blogging it, but last weekend we had a blast. We spent some time at Bear Lake and had a much needed vacation from the four walls of our home. I like our house just fine, but every now and then I get claustrophobic being home so much. We spent some time hiking Saturday morning. Abbie was so excited and kept talking about hiking in the mountains. Of course, one-year-old speed is not exactly conducive to getting anywhere so after we let her exhaust herself we put her in the kid pack and really got going. (As much as I can seven months pregnant.) We love the mountains and even though there were large patches of snow to cross and not much foliage we were glad to be out in it.

After a very short nap we went down to the lake. What a blast! It took Abbie a little bit of time to warm up to the water. But we found a nice tiny inlet where the water had heated up to lukewarm and soon she was splashing away and filling her bucket with wet sand. We didn't bring a swimming suit because we thought it would be too cold to really get wet, so of course she soaked her clothes. I think that a prerequisite of fun for children is to make as big a mess of oneself as possible. We didn't mind though as that is what we came for (the fun not the mess). I figure a little dirt never hurt anyone.

It was so nice to get away and relax and while we missed all the Gray cousins that had been invited we are very grateful that they didn't share their strep throat with us. We hope to do this with them all again sometime soon.

Mother's Day Weekend

First I want to say Happy Mother's Day to both of our mothers. We are so grateful for everything you have done and continue to do for us. The longer we're parents the more amazing you become. And an especial thanks to Laura because your wonderful son made sure I had a great Mother's Day.

This morning I got to wake up late to the smell of waffles and the sounds of Abbie laboring up the stairs. When I came out she threw a card at me (with a smile of course) and said "Thank you mama." Inside was a nice note from Russ and scribbles from Abbie - the perfect card. Then Abbie (Russ) got me a new maternity shirt, which at this stage of the game is greatly appreciated. Amazingly he picked out the same one at the store that I had been ogling but never bought. What a great guy.

Yesterday was also near perfect (for me anyway). We went hiking with Abbie up around Red Buette Gardens. It is still too snowy to go too far up the canyons, and between the one year old and the pregnant lady this was about as much as we could do. It was SO beautiful and I love being in the mountains (well foothills) again.

Later in the afternoon Russ decided we needed a ceiling fan for our room. Having never had one I wasn't convinced but went a long with it anyway. For any of you who thing Russ is a mild mannered individual just sit and watch him fight with an inanimate object (computer, traffic light, or in this case poorly designed screws and lighting fixtures). He gets as mad as I've ever seen him. At one point he was threatening to melt the fan down if it didn't cooperate. At another he was getting ready to punch holes in the ceiling. It was quite hilarious. Thankfully,Russ won the day and we ended it wonderful cool breeze in our room (I'm completely sold on the ceiling fan in the bedroom idea. It is amazingly relaxing)

Fool me Twice!!!

So Abbie locked me out again!!! For the past for months whenever I have gone into the garage I've grabbed my keys on the off chance that Abbie would lock me out again. Whether it be when I'm bringing in groceries, grabbing something whatever - I have my keys. And of course, she hasn't locked me out. I've meant to get a copy and hide it somewhere but had just not gotten around to it. But today I ran to the garage to put something in the picnic basket, and attempted to run back in. The door was locked. I still can not figure out how or when she did it as she was buckled in her booster seat when I went outside. It must have been in the two minutes from the time we got home washed her hands and I sat her in the seat for lunch.

I was beyond frustrated. Of course my neighbor with the key to my house wasn't home again and so I had to call Russ home during his lunch. I stood at the back sliding glass door so Abbie could see me and not be scared. Unfortunately she was done with her lunch, wanted out and throwing a fit by the time he was able to make it home. Thankfully she was easily cheered up moments later and probably forgot about the whole thing. Where I to be so lucky.

Meltdown!

As I'm typing this Abbie is having a first class meltdown. So for all of you with kids over the age of 18 months you can smile smugly that we have finally reached the "twos" and all the joys that come with them. Honestly, overall Abbie is a great kid and very obedient but lately she has decided that everything in our home, our friends homes, and everywhere we go is "hers." When we are dealing with toys and other kids usually the concepts of sharing and taking turns will do the job. We've had a few meltdowns but not many.

But today she wanted to play with some of the nice family photos my parents had taken a few years ago. When I told her no we had a collapse. This episode is complicated by the fact that the rule in our house is the binki stays in the crib, which quickly became the focus of the tantrum.I want to believe - hope, pray, plead - that this is because she is catching up on sleep from earlier in the week, teething, or other such thing, and not that we have definitively entered an era of constant battles for independence.

I'm told that Abbie inherited the ability to scream nonstop and loose complete control of herself from her father - apparently the stories of him as a child were legendary. It is the first time I've seriously questioned my choice in spouse (I love you, Russ). Of course, I'm sure I was a complete saint as a child.......:).

So to all of you I'm sure you are just counting your blessings that you have not yet reached this stage, through it , figured out how to manage it better than I, or - at a minimum - not dealing with a screaming child while online