Leaving on a jet plane...

The bags are packed. It has been a crazy week and I had to pack tonight. My day started bright and eary at 4:30AM with Miss Ella. She went back to bed and I showered, went to Einstein's for 2 buckets of bagels, met Joe outside with the munchkin and dropped off Ella to daycare with bagels for all the teachers as a thank you for Ella's last day. I arrived early to work and had a pretty good day, but long.

I ran some errands after work and then to a bang trim and brow wax. I picked up pizza on the way home and Dorothy joined us for dinner and got to see Ella before we leave.

Ella is much better today. Her teeth are poking through a bit more and I think it was all just teething. She still gets crabby at night and I think she is in pain. We use orajel and motrin!

I had to use Joe's huge suitcase, but we are packed! I knew I would regret the 6AM flight, but it will be worth it when we land in Iowa before noon.

I am so excited to see everyone and I know the shower will be a huge success!!!

I will update and post pics when I can!

My plans are Des Moines on Saturday including bridal shower and BBQ, Charles City Sunday-Wednesday and then back to Des Moines for dinner with Jill and Aaron with a flight home on Thursday! A huge THANKS to Steve and Crystal for hosting us on Saturday and Wednesday night. I am so excited for everyone to see Ella at this fun age. She isn't quite scared of new people and is full of smiles and fun!

Uh Oh!

I picked up Ella at daycare today and find out she has had water, stinky diarrhea all day!!! I asked if anyone else had it and they said yes, but he was sent home. I guess she wasn't quite "sick enough" to be sent home. With another kid with diarrhea, I am worried it is rotavirus. She is teething for sure and I am so hoping this is teething diarrhea and not infectious! I haven't changed a diaper on a plane yet and I hope I don't have to. Joe did on our flight to New York and it sounded miserable. She is happy and playful and not running a fever or throwing up.....so I have my fingers crossed!!!

The Iowa family will be devastated if she is sick in Iowa again!!

I love Delta Airlines!!!

I printed out my flight itinerary for our Iowa trip and I noticed a 3.5 hour layover in Minneapolis. Am I crazy, did I really book such a trip? I knew it would be harder to take 2 planes to get to Des Moines, but really?? I started freaking out at work and my co-worker suggested I check the original email when I booked it. There is was -- a 1 hr layover! I booked this trip using miles through Delta and the flight was actually with Northwest. I called Delta and their customer service was fabulous!!! She offered to call NW and figure it out for me and apologized for putting me on hold. She quickly came back and said, I have a better plan. I can get you on the Delta flight out which will leave me with a 45 minute layover!!! PERFECT!!! I am going to do all I can to remain a Medallion Member with Delta. AT, you will be happy that I didn't have to raise my voice or use my typical "YOU LIED TO ME" to get what I needed!

This will make our trip home much better. I have no one but myself to blame for the insane flight out of Salt Lake at 6AM, but I am so excited to be in Des Moines before noon and I'll be ready to host a bridal shower for Julie.

Watch Jimmy Fallon Tonight!

Joe's sister, Meredith, got tickets to the taping of the Jimmy Fallon show. She told Joe she got at high-five from Jimmy and is sitting next to the 2nd hotdog guy. I hope to be fast asleep during Jimmy tonight, but I will be excited to watch it on DVR tomorrow!

Update me!

I saw Jon and Kate on the cover of 2 magazines today -- what is the deal? I also read on facebook that the last show was incredible. I've only seen a few episodes, but what is going on?

New Salad

We are trying to eat a salad every night with dinner. I buy the huge bag with several heads of romaine and we try to eat it before it goes bad. I was out of veggies to add, so tonight I had romaine, with strawberries and poppyseed dressing. Such a fun summer salad! Joe had plain lettuce, but my salad was fabulous!

Happy Tuesday!

Only 4 more days until I leave for Iowa!

Working 12 hours yesterday did me in. I had a venti iced americano about 4PM and I think it kept me up last night. I am so sleepy this morning.

It's already Tuesday, I CAN make it through this week!

Miss Ella slept all night last night and is giving me great hope for improvement! I so want to look in her mouth to see if those teeth popped completely through, but I can't wake the sleeping giant. The suspense will have to wait until I pick her up from daycare!

Memorial Weekend

We have had a relaxing, lazy weekend. We are all exhausted from a few long weeks of work with little sleep. Ella has not been sleeping well and we all took some much needed naps!

Ella's stridor returned last weekend, so we spent the past week trying lots of things to make it go away! We tried a new formula that is milk-free just in case it is all a milk allergy. She hated it and didn't eat well which meant none of our lives went well! We gave that up and she is officially a Similac Girl! Maybe they could make her a spokesperson -- it's way better to her than the very expensive neocate. Thank goodness she shouldn't need that long term -- one of us would have to get another job to pay for it! I think doubling the dose of her meds has helped and hopefully it will continue to get better as she grows.

She is definitely teething and I really hope those 2 front teeth pop all the way through before our trip to Iowa on Saturday. If not, I will just get her through the trip with some scheduled, alternating tylenol and motrin. I just hate to see her in pain and she lets us know how much she hates it. I'm hoping it's really a blessing that they are coming in together.

I work all day tomorrow and I think Ella and Joe have a day of working in the yard planned. The plans were delayed due to the rain all day today.

I hope everyone is enjoying their Memorial Weekend!

What is the Midwest?

I call myself a midwesterner and there is no doubt that Iowa is the Midwest. I have had this debate over and over again --- which states are really the midwest? I think the "midwest" is a personality really. We debated at work all week and then tonight Joe and I debated until I finally googled it!!! Can you really include Ohio and the Dakota's, and Missouri in the midwest? Those of us that are Big 10 Alumni feel all the original Big 10 schools and there corresponding states constitute the midwest. Joe tried to include Oklahoma in the midwest tonight. What do you think? Here is the map from the US Census Bureau.

In my opinion - the Dakota's are more Mountain West and I include Illinois with the exception of Chicago in the midwest. Missouri is more like the South and Ohio is hard for me. People call Ohio "back East" and that makes me think more East Coast, but the East Coaster's would say they are midwesterners! I am tempted to call Kansas a little south as well.

Things I thought I would never do....

I bought a Mylie Cyrus song. I was on iTunes to buy the David Cook song Permanent and I had to buy this song! I ended up buying the entire David Cook CD, but I could not buy the Hannah Montana soundtrack!!! If you like David Cook's song, the proceeds go to a Cancer charity, so buy it soon if you are going to buy it on iTunes.

American Idol Fever

I'm not that into this season, but I'm pulling for Kris. I just can't believe it was the headline news all day! I think I heard "The American Idol Finale tonight" 100 times on the radio today. Seriously....it's just a TV show. There had to be more worthwhile news today and I am an Idol fan. Sad, really!

I have been surprised by the winner 2 years in a row (I don't vote, but I watch)! I am happy for Kris, but I think they will both score an album and I'll be watching for Danny Gokey's album as well. Fabulous finale - they scored some great performers, although I thought Fergie sounded horrible!

Summer is here!

It was 95 degrees today. We turned the air on tonight and went for a long walk to get slushies! Ella fell asleep on the walk, so we'll see how late she stays up tonight...

Halloween Flashback

I found her penquin costume and it finally fits. She is easily twice the size she was on Halloween! The costume claims to be a size 0-3 months....but it seems to be more 6 months!

Weekend

We had a nice weekend. Joe did a ton of work on the yard. Ella loves to be outside and loves the grass so we "helped" sometimes. I didn't take any pictures - bummer. We went for walks. The weather was fabulous - 75 yesterday and 85 today. I went through Ella's clothes. I finally took out most of the 3 month clothes (some still fit) and I got out all her summery clothes.

Saturday night Joe and I went out for dinner in Park City and it took us almost 2 hours for us to get home (should have been 20 minutes). A very bad accident left I-80 a standstill. Many thanks to Grandma Dorothy for watching Ella and especially for staying much longer than expected...

Miraculously, Ella went to be very easily for Grandma. I am very thankful, but I still don't understand why she wants to stay up all night! I am blaming it all on the tooth we can feel, but barely see and I hope once it pops through her sleeping routine will improve. If not, it may be a very long week....or else, we'll have Grandma come over everynight to get her to bed!

What would I do without the internet?

I have been frustrated with our Garmin GPS navigator. All the sudden, it stopped speaking the street names to turn on. I went through all the settings (or at least I thought I did) and I couldn't figure it out. Tonight I googled my problem and the answer popped right up! Why would they program an option for American English and not have it include the text to speech option (that is why we bought the more expensive model)?? I had to choose American English TTS - Jack or Samantha. Anyway, it's fixed!!

A big thank you to the people who ask questions and a bigger thank you to the kind people who take the time to answer our crazy questions!!! Cheers to FixYa! This takes me back to my freshman year when I moved into the dorms and my roommate's Dad yelled out the window, "calling any computer geeks"!! He encouraged us to befriend some computer geeks to help us at any time! Thank you computer geeks! I appreciate you!

Modified Bedtime Routine

My friend Tiffani recommended beginning a bedtime routine early on with Ella and we have worked on this routine since she was about 6 weeks old. Most nights she does really well. Lately Ella has chosen to modify bedtime routine. We do bath, diaper, lotion, PJ's, Good Night Moon, bottle, Hush Little Baby, Rock and cuddle time and then to bed. Ella has modified this, just when you think she is close enough to asleep to lay her in her crib, she pulls her head up, looks around and is ready to go! I give up and bring her to the couch next to me and she plays for another hour or so. In this time, she entertains herself, smiles for the camera, chats to herself and toys and is just so precious. Eventually she gets a little cranky and I carry her to bed. It's not the routine I created, but she is winning this one.

Friday Night Out

We went to the Red Lantern tonight for dinner. My friend Anthony is helping his family reopen the family restaurant. He has worked countless hours remodeling the restaurant and now spends any free time helping out his dad and brother run it. We had a fabulous dinner and Ella was spoiled with a giant fortune cookie at the end!

Grey's Anatomy!

I watched the season finale last night and I loved it!!! We got home late and Ella didn't want to go to bed and I was planning on watching it on Friday night, but Alyssa called and said I had to watch it. I would have been sad if it had been ruined for me today. Even if you are not a fan, the 2-hr season finale was good worth the time to watch it on abc.com. I hope the writers pod casted something the last few shows! I think it was a great season!

Biggest Loser

I thought the ending of Biggest Loser was rather anticlimactic! I was never a Helen fan and with Jerry being almost the first one kicked off, we didn't really know him. I am most excited for Daniel and I hope he keeps up his weight loss. I was inspired when he said his friends told him even if he did lose 100 pounds, he was still obese and he didn't let that stop him! He looked great and he saved his life!

Happy Birthday Dad and Grandpa!

I hope you are having a great day and I hope it works out to Skype later! See you in a few weeks.

Monday is almost over!

Monday's are rough when I work days! It's an adjustment for everyone when our family has to be out of the house by 7AM. Tonight Ella came home in some donated clothes from daycare -- i guess she pooped through 2 outfits.

Ella has completely given up sleeping through the night and last night she was up 3 times (thanks Joe) and lately she wakes up between 4 and 5 and won't go back to sleep in her crib. I tend to take her to our bed and Joe lets her sleep on the couch with him. We may be creating a sleep monster, so tonight we are determined to only let her sleep in her crib!!! We all may be grumps tomorrow!

Tonight we were entertained for over an hour with Ella and Nicky playing together. She loves to watch him and kept peering around me (I guess I was in the way) when she was hanging with me while I was cleaning up after dinner. He performs for her including speaking his golden retriever language.

She was playing on the floor and Nicky brought his toy over and they hung out together. It is priceless!

Poor Joe is miserable with a fever after 3 vaccines today to prepare for more travel -- yellow fever, hepatitis A, and tyhpoid.

Mother's Day Afternoon/Evening

We spent the afternoon at home and cleaned the house while Ella napped and then went to Lugano's for dinner. Ella won "best dressed kiddo of the day" - an unofficial title from our waitress!

We dressed her up again and this time I remembered her bracelet!
This will be framed!!!
Dinner was fabulous -- I thought the Tiramisu was pretty enough to photograph and share!
We ended the day feeding the naked baby and she continued to entertain!

Mother's Day Morning

We went to church and then to brunch with Dorothy. Ella hung out with Grandma for a bit while Joe and I ran home to get the forgotten gift (it's too hard with a baby and 8:15 church) and made a quick run to Costco. I hated to leave her on this special day, but Grandma's need some time too, although it's hard on me since I go back to working days and she's in full time daycare the next 3 weeks.

Ella has a new move with her tongue and she loves to crack us up!!! It has been a great day and we have dinner plans as a family to continue the celebration!

Thanks to everyone for the kind, thoughtful gifts!

Happy Birthday!

Happy Birthday to Life by Nicole! You have to feel so special today celebrating your birthday and your first real mother's day (it's way better than last year and feels much more real to me when I can hold and kiss my baby).

You are a special friend and great mom! Have a fabulous day!

I miss you and I enjoy blogging with you and keeping up with your everyday adventures (and life is more of an adventure than I ever dreamed it could be)!

I can't wait to see you and your little angel this fall!

Happy Mother's Day!

Happy Mother's day to my Mom, Step-Mom, Mother-in-law, Grandma Eunie, Grandma Dorothy, many Aunts, my fellow Mom friends, my Mom readers, and all the women who have been a mom to me!!! It does feel wonderful to be a mom last year and I am very thankful I can spend today with my precious sweetie. I am thankful I also get to spend this morning with my mother-in-law and this evening Joe made reservations for us to have dinner together - the three of us. I think Ella picked the restaurant! :-)

My friend Tiffani shared this with me and like her I thought it was wonderful and had to pass it on!

Raising Children
by Anna Quindlen, Newsweek Columnist and Author
All my babies are gone now. I say this not in sorrow but in disbelief.
I take great satisfaction in what I have today: three almost-adults, two taller than I am, one closing in fast. Three people who read the same books I do and have learned not to be afraid of disagreeing with me in their opinion of them, who sometimes tell vulgar jokes that make me laugh until I choke and cry, who need razor blades and shower gel and privacy, who want to keep their doors closed more than I like.
Who, miraculously, go to the bathroom, zip up their jackets and move food from plate to mouth all by themselves. Like the trick soap I bought for the bathroom with a rubber ducky at its center, the baby is buried deep within each, barely discernible except through the unreliable haze of the past.
Everything in all the books I once poured over is finished for me now. Penelope Leach., T. Berry Brazelton., Dr. Spock. The ones on sibling rivalry and sleeping through the night and early-childhood education, all grown obsolete. Along with Goodnight Moon, and Where the Wild Things Are, they are battered, spotted, well used. But I suspect that if you flipped the pages, dust would rise like memories. What those books taught me, and finally what the women on the playground, and the well-meaning relations -- well what they taught me was that they couldn't really teach me very much at all.
Raising children is presented at first as a true-false test, then becomes multiple choice, until finally, far along, you realize that it is an endless essay. No one knows anything.
One child responds well to positive reinforcement, another can be managed only with a stern voice and a timeout. One child is toilet trained at 3, his sibling at 2.
When my first child was born, parents were told to put baby to bed on his belly so that he would not choke on his own spit-up. By the time my last arrived, babies were put down on their backs because of research on sudden infant death syndrome.
To a new parent this ever-shifting certainty is terrifying, and then soothing. Eventually you must learn to trust yourself. Eventually the research will follow.
I remember 15 years ago pouring over one of Dr. Brazelton's wonderful books on child development, in which he describes three different sorts of infants: average, quiet, and active. I was looking for a sub-quiet codicil for an 18-month old who did not walk. Was there something wrong with his fat little legs? Was there something wrong with his tiny little mind? Was he developmentally delayed, physically challenged? Was I insane? Last year he went to China. Next year he goes to college. He can talk just fine. He can walk, too.
Every part of raising children is humbling, too. Believe me, mistakes were made.They have all been enshrined in the "Remember-When-Mom-Did " Hall of Fame. The outbursts, the temper tantrums, the bad language, mine, not theirs. The times the baby fell off the bed.The times I arrived late for preschool pickup.The nightmare sleepover. The horrible summer camp.The day when the youngest came barreling out of the classroom with a 98 on her geography test, and I responded, "What did you get wrong?" (She insisted I include that.) The time I ordered food at the McDonald's drive-through speaker and then drove away without picking it up from the window. (They all insisted I include that.) I did not allow them to watch the Simpsons for the first two seasons. What was I thinking?
But the biggest mistake I made is the one that most of us make while doing this. I did not live in the moment enough. This is particularly clear now that the moment is gone, captured only in photographs. There is one picture of the three of them, sitting in the grass on a quilt in the shadow of the swing set on a summer day, ages 6, 4 and 1.
And I wish I could remember what we ate, and what we talked about, and how they sounded, and how they looked when they slept that night.
I wish I had not been in such a hurry to get on to the next thing: dinner, bath, book, bed. I wish I had treasured the doing a little more and the getting it done a little less.
Even today I'm not sure what worked and what didn't, what was me and what was simply life. When they were very small, I suppose I thought someday they would become who they were because of what I'd done. Now I suspect they simply grew into their true selves because they demanded in a thousand ways that I back off and let them be. The books said to be relaxed and I was often tense, matter-of-fact and I was sometimes over the top.
And look how it all turned out. I wound up with the three people I like best in the world who have done more than anyone to excavate my essential humanity.
That's what the books never told me. I was bound and determined to learn from the experts. It just took me awhile to figure out who the experts were.

Booked!

Tonight we booked our flights to Hawaii for next February. We'll be there for Joe's birthday. We were able to score affordable coach tickets and then upgrade to first class with Joe's coupons. Delta gives you upgrade coupons when you fly 75,000 miles in one calendar year. I hate that Joe travels so far for work, but today and when I'm sitting in that seat next February I will be thankful! Remind me of that when I'm freaking out this summer because I will be playing single mom while he is in Brazil, South Africa, etc!!

We are staying at our Worldmark timeshare in Kihei and have invited Alyssa and my mom along as babysitters! We are the only ones in our immediate family that haven't been to Hawaii and I think it will be fun to experience it together. We will make a complementary group because not everyone enjoys the same activities and we will always have someone willing to stay back with Miss Ella. Our resort isn't fancy, but has a full kitchen, washer,/dryer, pool, and is accross the street from the beach.

I ordered two books about Maui tonight. Has anyone been there? Any advice? I hope this is the first of many trips and I plan on this being a rather relaxing trip and I know we won't accomplish everything (I tend to do this on vacation) this time. I am excited to take Ella to the beach and just enjoy the beauty I have heard about! I also want to surf.....I am sure it is much harder than everyone makes it sound.

New Purchases

I was so excited to find this toy at Kid to Kid (kids consignment shop)

I found Ella a Ray Shade today. I worry about the bright sun at altitude and we will be spending time in Vegas in June.

This pic flipped and I don't know why, but you can see, she has no skin exposed! Hopefully it doesn't look too silly walking around the neighborhood.

We also found this at Kid to Kid. Joe still is coaching her to walk!

Random Ella

She has found her toes -- kind of gross, but yet cute

We put Ella in the grass after our walk Friday night -- she thought it was pretty cool and I am pumped our sod project from last fall looks incredible! Very long here, Joe took care of that today. Our front lawn is beautiful and we haven't had to start the sprinklers yet.

Ella and Nicky just crack me up! She just loves to watch him and she laughs at him when he "talks". He doesn't bark, but he definitely speaks golden retriever!

Grey's

Ok - I cried! I loved it! I didn't see it coming and I loved it!

Christmas in my mailbox!

I can't believe the good mail I came home to tonight! Beautiful Mother's Day card featuring Ella and me together, Bag from Parents magazine, Exersaucer piece from Evenflo, Gift box from my mom including gifts for me and Ella, awesome bumpy labels for Ella's bottles at her new daycare recommended by lifebynicole.

What a wonderful treat after a challenging, crappy night at work!

Now I'm enjoying a glass of wine & more and watching Grey's on DVR.

Surprise Phone Call

I really have all sorts of friends, but some of my best friends I rarely talk to. I just got off the phone with Keri who I only talk to randomly every 6 months or so it seems. It is so nice because we just pick up and chat and catch up and it's truly lovely! It does make me a little sad because I have no plans to see her, I've never met her 2 beautiful children, and I don't even know when we will chat again. But I am so thankful and happy to know she is only a phone call or email away and will be there for me in any way.

It's amazing how sometimes friends come into your life in the most random ways when you really need them and they truly do stay in your heart forever! Keri and I met while I was on pharmacy rotations and she was a traveling dietitian in Mt. Pleasant, Iowa! It was so random and so meant to be! We both needed eachother at that time and became life-long friends.

Thanks Keri for being so great and always being there when I need you! I loved the surprise, random call today. I went from being tired and slightly grumpy to feeling great!

Tea Party

We often do potlucks at work. Today we did a repeat of "tea party". We were discussing a potluck and I said I have cream cheese in my fridge that will expire soon. Andrea instantly said -- we need cucumber sandwiches! They are so good!!! Recipe below. We also had grapes, cheese/crackers, iced tea, pears and many cucumber sandwiches. We also splurged on two bundtlets from Nothing Bundt Cakes. We tried the lemon and almond poppyseed. I think a bundtlet may be Ella's 1st birthday cake -- it's the perfect size for a baby to dig into!

Cucumber Sandwiches

8 oz cream cheese (I let it sit at room temp for awhile)

Good Season's Italian Dressing mix package

1/2 cup mayo

Combine above and mix with mixer

French Baguette (thinly sliced)

Cucumber (thinly sliced)

Spread cream cheese mixture on bread and top with cucumber.

Assemble open-faced sandwiches immediately before eating.

Have a tea party for one or many!

Ella has a friend!

Joe picked up Ella from daycare yesterday and she had an evelope with a note and bracelet! A little girl (the daycare director's daughter) made her this bracelet. Kaleigh is in about kindergarten and everyday after school she comes to daycare and asks her mom if "the baby she loves" is at daycare!

This made it extra hard for me to pay the May bill and let her know this will be Ella's last month. I am very happy that Ella is finally going to the daycare affiliated with my work beginning in June, but it's hard to say goodbye as well.

I asked if Ella could come back if things didn't work out in the new daycare and she said she is welcome anytime even if I just need to drop her off for a few hours. She also assured me that we are moving her to an excellent daycare. We are moving her because I think it is a better daycare and because they are open more hours. When I work evenings Joe often has to leave a meeting early to pick up Ella and now he will have until 8PM to pick her up and when he is out of town I will only have to find a babysitter from 8 until 11 when I get off work. I am most excited that each classroom is behind a closed door. Currently the different ages are just blocked by dividers and sometimes the bigger kids are too close to the babies and I blame this for Ella being so sick.

I feel most sad for Miss Kaleigh and I am going to take a picture of Ella in her pretty dress with the bracelet on and give it to her. I can always tell Ella she was "the baby Kaleigh loved"!

Bummed...

We had so much fun at the NCAA tournament this year and I was so excited to go to Round 3/4 in Salt Lake next year. Nope! I was not chosen from the lottery and Joe and my Mom were also rejected....

I am frustrated that it was a random lottery that didn't require you to put any money down, so too many people entered. Last year I had to pay for the tickets up front and then wait and get my money refunded if I didn't get tickets.

I just called my co-worker and she also did not get tickets for Salt Lake or Round 1/2 in Washington.

Do you know anyone who was able to get tickets anywhere?

I guess I will be shopping on Ebay, Craigslist, or Stubhub for basketball tickets next March!

I love this shirt!

I am wearing a great find from the weekend to work today. The ruffles feel girly and I love it! I have it in black, but I may have to go back and find a more spring color as well!

Jelly shoes?

Jelly shoes were on the Today Show this morning. Melissa Jelly Shoes are made in Brazil. I think the flats would be cute with capris and I like this black pair as well. Joe - maybe you could pick me up a pair on your next trip!

One more picture

Ella had so much fun with Alyssa. On Friday she cried when Alyssa left the room and we were able to recreate the crying 3 times! She can spot a sucker for attention with the best of em.

They will be great shopping buddies. Ella says she'll meet you in Vegas for her 1st birthday and your ??th birthday and by then she'll have mastered using Daddy's credit card and you can shop away!

We miss you already!

Weekend

A walk around the neighborhoodAhh... Ella likes her giraffe

Her hats finally fit, but we think she looks like a boy!

Dinner at Michealangelo'sLook at the Hawkeye Girl!Joe and I went out for drinks and Ella hung out with Alyssa and Joey stopped over

We went to church and then to Grandma Dorothy's for breakfast

Seriously...aren't they both so cute!

Ella's new highchair at Grandma's

It was a fabulous weekend and as always it went by too quickly! Safe travels home and we miss you already!