Mommy's Project 52:31 Singing

When I was little I loved singing. So much so, that often times, I would pretend to be a famous singer. Granted that fairy tail daydream never actually came to light because I have a horrible voice, but I still do love to sing. I now sing to my girls every night that I am not working. Well, here lately, I only sing to my oldest because my baby does not want her songs. I still cringe whenever I truly listen to myself sing without music to drown out my voice, however, it does seem to calm my children down when they are upset. If my singing is good enough for me, that's all that matters. I only hope I still have a few more years left of being able to calm them with singing.

Mommy's Project 52:14 Nap Time

So I am very late with the post this week...the results of being just a bit too busy right now.

This is a picture of a very rare occasion of my oldest actually taking a nap (granted it is from a year ago). She does not nap often so these moments are far and few between. Mommy thoroughly enjoys these rare times!!!

Another Year Older

And another birthday passed. I did actually celebrate this year. Unfortunately, I made my husband miserable in the process. Last Christmas, I received a trip from work in the Christmas present drawing. The trip was to Tempe and with it we received two tickets to an ASU game. I decided it would be a great way to celebrate my birthday. Little did I know that my girls would come down with colds during the week before the game and pass it on to my husband. We were actually both feeling a little down on Friday morning when we left, but I figured we could down the vitamins like usual and all would be good. For me, they were...for him, not so much. Friday night, we visited my college roommate who I have not seen in a few years. It was great to catch up with her again. Saturday night was the game. By then, my husband was absolutely miserable. The game was good, but I felt bad for making my husband come out when he should have been in bed resting. Sunday, my actual birthday, my husband was feeling even worse. Neither of us had gotten much sleep due to him being up half the night coughing. It was also the day for the long drive home. I was not looking forward to this drive, nor did I want to do it by myself. However, my husband was in no shape to drive. We were making pretty good time, when all the traffic on the highway came to a complete stop. Fortunately, it only took us about a half hour to get through the "big accident". By the time we got to the accident scene, all that was there was a tow truck and a trailer on the side of the road. Not what I was expecting considering the stop in traffic. We start moving again and only have about an hour in a half left to the trip when we see signs stating that the highway is closed 19 miles ahead due to a stalled semi. About this time I get the feeling that something does not want us to get home. So we take the detour which added about a hour to our trip. I am completely exhausted by this time, but continue to drive. Naturally, I start falling asleep at the wheel. My husband starts talking to me, but really, it was not helping. He finally told me to pull over and let him drive. Of course, by this time, I am so frustrated with the day not going the way I wanted it to that I decide to be stubborn. I still am not quite sure how we made it home safely, but we did. When I walked into the house, I was greeted with two very happy little girls telling me "happy birthday". That was the highlight of the day. My oldest then tells me that they baked a cake and shows me the cake, still cooling on the racks. Later, she helped grandma decorate it. I think it turned out pretty good...

I think this is probably the best cake I have ever had as well!

As for my husband...he is now feeling a little better. Monday morning, he went to urgent care since the doctor didn't have any openings. Diagnosis...ACUTE BRONCHITIS! I guess celebrating my birthday should have been put on hold.

Happy Birthday

Four years ago today, I received a wonderful miracle. A miracle that I thought would never happen. A dream that I had just about given up on came true. I became a mother. My husband and I tried for 7 years before we were finally blessed with becoming pregnant. It was a very long 7 years and during that time, I went through many emotions from happiness for others to anger towards others. Close friends and family that tried for only 1 month and were immediately pregnant. Other's who were on birth control and did not want children finding out they were pregnant. The one that really broke me...my sister. She was not supposed to be able to get pregnant and yet, she was. Don't get me wrong, I was very happy for all of these friends and family, but I was in a world of self pity. I could not figure out what was wrong with me. My husband and I were really ready to give up. In fact, the month that we conceived, we were extremely lucky. It almost didn't happen. We were both sick and not really feeling it, but reluctantly, we gave in. About 3 weeks later, 2 days before our anniversary, we found out we were finally expecting. We were caution of who we were telling at first because of my family history. We told my parents and were only going to tell my mother in law, but given that his grandmother was very sick, we decided to let her know that her first great grand child was on the way. We then had our first doctor appointment, only to find that the baby had no heartbeat. We were scared out of our minds and thinking the worst. We made a follow-up appointment for a week later to check the heartbeat again, but before we had the chance to go, we received the phone call that my husband's grandmother had passed away. This was not the best time as we had to drive half way across the country to attend the funeral, which meant that we had to reschedule our appointment. It was a hard week with the funeral and the stress of not knowing what was going on with the pregnancy.

After coming back home we had to wait another week before our appointment. It was a very long week, but finally the appointment arrived and we were extremely relieved that we had a heart beat. We have been told and firmly believe that my husband's grandmother is our baby's guardian angel. While she was alive, my baby did not have a heart beat and we were not sure of the future, but after her passing, we were at peace. We knew our baby would be okay.

That was 4 years and 8 months ago. I didn't know it at the time, but that should have been the first clue that my baby was going to be a difficult, head strong child. The pregnancy was not the easiest. Towards the end, I had high blood pressure and had to be taken off work early. Then, two weeks later, I had to be induced due to my blood pressure. I went to the hospital the night before and had a very rough night. I was given 2 Ambien to help me sleep, but did not sleep at all. The next morning, the doctor came in and broke my water. I was in immediate pain. After some drugs and an epidural, I finally was able to get some sleep. At the time, I didn't know how long I was out, but I woke up to a strong urge to push. The nurse kept telling me that I could not push because I was not complete. That did not go over well at all. Finally, the doctor came back in and I was allowed to push. I thought I had pushed for well over two hours, only to learn later that it was actually about 15 minutes. During this time, I was feeling every little thing, but everybody kept telling me that I had the epidural so it was impossible for me to be feeling everything. I felt the doctor cut me, but was in so much pain from the birth, I really didn't care. I wanted my baby out! Then she got stuck. They started calling for back up. I was past the point of return and there was only one way she was coming out. The doctor had to pull her out of me. When she was finally out, she was not crying. Again, I was about to freak out, but then heard the sweet sound of her screaming. Once the doctor was stitching me up, he finally believed me that I was actually feeling everything. Thankfully he numbed before he continued to stitch me up. Then of course there was my new baby girl. After doing all the checking on her to make sure she was okay, it came back that she had Erb's Palsy due to her being pulled out of me. My sweet baby girl was not perfect as every parent hopes for. We were given stretches to do with her and range of motion exercised. As time went on, the condition corrected itself.

Once we settled into being parents, we realized that we had one very colicky baby. So began a new thing we were dealing with. I was also going through some PPD, although it wasn't until going through it with my second child that I realized this was what was going on. Of course, as time went on, things improved, for both, baby and mama. Now here we are, four years later, with a very determined, head strong, free thinking preschooler. And I wouldn't trade any minute of it! Happy Birthday my baby girl, I am honored to be your mother.

Busy Weekend

It has been a busy weekend and it's not over yet. Friday, I basically worked graveyard and then was up half the night working on the girls birthday cake for their party. Here is the finished product:


Saturday morning was their party and of course, I was running late. The lady that was doing the balloons took forever! Lesson learned for any future parties...order balloons ahead of time! Then I was given the wrong information about how the party was going to go, and instead of swimming first at we were told, we had the room first. Of course due to the miscommunication, we did not have the pizza ready. In the end, it all worked out, even though over half the invited and confirmed guest had to cancel last minute due to illness. Here are the girls blowing out their candles:



Today was more running, but at least had a bit of a chance to relax. Tomorrow it is back to being busy with doctor appointments and then my parents coming in for a visit.

Mommy's Project 52:4 Dirty

Dirty Diapers!!! That has been life this week. My poor baby girl has been sick since last Thursday and we have been going through diapers like there is no tomorrow. She was even sick on her birthday. Here hoping tomorrow she will finally be feeling better and We can stop going through the diapers.

Mommy's Project 52:2 Silly

I have been trying to figure out something silly to post all day long, and honestly, I havent been able to. So, I am going to post a couple of pictures of my children. My mother in law is always calling them Silly-Dilly and that is what my children are...Silly.

This on is my youngest making toilet paper jammies when she was supposed to be in bed:


My oldest, sleeping inside her pillow case:

Child's Imagination

You have to love a child's imagination. Some of the excuses that they can come up with are amazing. Usually my daughter's excuses are limited to reasons why she can't go to bed, however, the following is her first excuse to attempt to get out of trouble. What an attempt it was!

A couple of weeks ago, my oldest decided to get her own breakfast instead of waking her grandmother up to help her. What did she have...a banana and a slice of whole wheat bread. Okay, it was a pretty good breakfast for a not quite 4 years old. She then decided that she would be very independent and feed 2 of our dogs breakfast as well. And what did they enjoy? Well, bananas and bread of course. Let me be more specific...They had a total of 4 bananas, 1 loaf (minus 1 slice that my daughter had) of whole wheat bread, and a half loaf of homemade wheat bread! All the while, her grandmother and sister were sleeping. I, who was at work, eventually received a text from her grandmother that simply stated "call me". The worst was going through my mind. I quickly called and grandma explained the events to me. Besides being relieved that it was nothing more serious, I was confused as to why she did it, upset about all the wasted food, laughing to myself at what a sight it would have been, and of course, worried about what kind of effect this would have on the dogs. During dinner that night, I started to question my daughter about why she fed the dogs all that food. After several minutes of her thinking and me rephrasing the question a couple times, I finally had an answer... "The worm in the clock made me do it"! There you go. That's the best excuse I have heard all year. It even beats the excuse her daddy used to tell his mom when he didn't want to get in trouble which was "The elephant did it".