Uncchris!

This has been the broken record playing in our house the past week.  Daniel's brother Chris (Uncle Chris or Uncchris!) has come to see us for a little while before he starts a new job!  Hollie adores him.  She took a little while to warm up to him, especially since he arrived late (after bedtime) and when Hollie woke up in the morning she found him in the kitchen instead of her daddy, but ever since then she has been like a second shadow.

A few updates:

I'm feeling good.  Big, but good.  When I sit too long my legs start feeling super heavy (which I don't remember from last time), but getting out for walks and exercising as often as possible have been helping with that.  And my back huuuurts...but what else is new, right?  It's a brief, shooting pain...sometimes even when I put a foot wrong.  Youch!  I recently started feeling hungry all the time, which didn't happen until much later with Hollie (and when it did I put on weight fast), so I'm like, oh crap!  I'm trying to have healthy snacks, or see if I'm actually just thirsty, or even just wait to see if the hunger goes away in a minute or two (which it does sometimes!)(not starving myself, don't worry).  As far as I can tell, my weight gain has been right on track, so I'm thankful for that.

I guess the reason I haven't written at all lately is because my head has been somewhere else, and I can't write about our mundane family life when this kind of stuff is on my mind.  Wish I could tell you more, but we're waiting to find out something definitive.  All I want to do is sit by the phone and sweat bullets, but I have a toddler who pulls my attention away occasionally.  Daniel has a great opportunity at work.  If he doesn't get it (or decides not to take it) it's no big deal, so don't worry - we're not stressing over anything potentially bad.  If it does happen and I get to tell you about it, then it will make sense why I'm going crazy over it.

Speaking of toddler, we've got a full-fledged one around here lately.  Some days (becoming most days), man, Hollie will fight tooth and nail about something...anything...and then later, fight about the opposite.  Like she really really really wants juice.  And then she really really really wants water.  Or NOOOO I don't want a shirt on!!!   And then later NOOOO don't you DARE take my shirt off!!!  Unfortunately, Daniel and I appear to be slow learners in this game.  We've found that by being patient, catching her in the right mood at the right moment (some pre-planning on our part helps), not fighting fire with fire, and the big one - choosing our battles, we've been able to avoid the meltdown...sometimes.  Still learning, yes, we are.  The not-fighting-fire-with-fire and the not-staying-mad-after-tantrum's-over parts have been the toughest for me, but I feel like I'm learning a little everyday and making improvements (to my own mindset) one step at a time.  I do have all the motivation in the world, after all.  She is sooo loving, when she wants to be!  She even pats your back when she gives a big hug...I love it!

Another big one - we've been making an effort to give her what she wants when she asks nicely (even if it's something that not ordinarily allowed)(but within reason).  I guess that falls under choosing your battles.  It's funny how we complain that her answer to everything is no-no-no! but sometimes we're just as bad.  Hoping this strategy has some long-term effect.  Also, we try to turn our no's into yes's: No, we're not going to have a bath now, but we're going to have one right after dinner.  And 9 times out of 10, she does remember...and reminds you!

Toddlerhood really is amazing, though.  She's become so demanding, but in a cute way!  She completely takes the lead: tells you where to sit, what toy to hold, what to do with it, etc.  She has a pretend blood pressure cuff and stethoscope, and one of her favorite things to do is have you lay down so she can put the cuff on you and "listen" to you everywhere!  It blows my mind sometimes.

Another funny thing:  when we're getting dinner ready, she sees all the food out and tells us she's hungry (hungee!), and we tell her don't worry, dinner will be ready soon!  Then she immediately climbs up in her chair, buckles herself in, and tells us about every 30 seconds that she ready to eat (ready eat!).

Her speech is growing in leaps and bounds.  Starting to string words together and everything!  However, she does tend to repeat things without really knowing what they mean, so it's tough to really gauge what she knows.  She also tends to use the same pronunciation for similar words, like monkey and blanket (mankie) and kitchen and chicken (just chicken, but ending with -on instead of -en: chick-ON!).  Her counting has taken two steps forward and one step back...she started repeating "one" and then weeks later added "two" (and she would sing "one-two-one-two-one-two!") and just recently added "three"...except that now sometimes it's "two-three-one"!  Uh-oh.  She knows and recognizes the music of Glee, one of our favorite TV shows (she calls is gee!).  The soundtrack for season one is the most requested CD in our collection!  Yeah, we might be kind of proud of that.  :)

If we're talking about more traditional kids' music, The Itsy-Bitsy Spider song (neebee spider) is her favorite, with the hand motions, of course.  Second favorite would be the Elmo song (youtube video here), rewritten to include Hollie's song, Mommy's song, Daddy's song, and lately Uncchris's song.  She will start singing that one all on her own!

Long update!  I will try to write more often.  I did add a new belly photo last week, and I'll have another one tomorrow (27 weeks!).

I've got it stuck in my head now: la-la la-la, la-la, la-la, Hollie's song...  

We've got parties set for life

This weekend during Hollie's birthday party, Daniel and I realized something awesome.  Hollie's birthday will always be fairly close to Mardi Gras, mine will be fairly close to Easter, Daniel's is four days after Christmas, and the new baby's will (probably) fall near the 4th of July.

Party themes...check!

So, we didn't really plan much for Hollie's big day...what do you plan for a two-year old anyway?  But with Daniel's parents in town from Lake Charles, and the family friends we invited having roots in Lafayette...it turned out to be a Cajun party all by itself.  

We played French music, had pasta-laya for dinner (that's jambalaya with pasta, instead of rice.  Not exactly Cajun, if we're being nit-picky.  More of a New Orleans thing, I think), and later enjoyed a king cake (carried carefully on the plane by the grandparents)(here's a link).  

The family we invited over had two kids- a three-year-old boy, and a one-year-old girl.  Despite the gaps in their ages, they had a blast together.  Hollie loves to be chased, and this boy, apparently, loves to chase, so there were many many laps around the living room and kitchen, with little sister trying her best to keep up.  It got pretty wild, but as long as they weren't hitting or pushing, we let them have fun.  They all had a hand in opening the gifts, and then the house really turned upside down!     

Trike from Abuelita and Pepere

Bowling set from Mommy and Daddy.  They could not even wait for all the pins to be stood up- they just dove into them!

So, it was a blast.  Everyone slept pretty well that night, I think.  Hollie's check-up with the doctor was yesterday, and she's doing great.  She's 26 pounds, and 33 and 1/4 inches tall.  

New picture up over there!  (Darn soap dispenser snuck in again.)  I know I skipped a week.  It might happen again- you've been warned.

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There are a few bits and pieces from the OB appointment two weeks that I forgot to share.

I've been starting to really feel the growing pains lately, sometimes an ache at the top of my belly but most often on the sides.  I remember that from before, but not this bad, so I asked and Dr. J confirmed that it is round ligament pain, and that it will probably get worse with each pregnancy.  Soooo, I think after this one we're gonna be a family of four permanently!  Just kidding, but maybe not.  We'll see.  :)

When he felt my belly to find the top of my uterus, he said, "Wow, you're already above the belly button!  Normally at 22 weeks we expect you to be just about even."  So, I think- cool, I'm measuring big!  Then he takes out the measuring tape to get an actual number, and says "Hmmm.  You're actually measuring small for 22 weeks.  Looks like your belly button is just really low."  We had a good laugh about that later...I guess you really do learn something new everyday!

How cruel of me

...to tell you we've been having fun, and there are even pictures...and then disappear for a week and a half.

There have been epic technical difficulties, which you have to ask Daniel about because I don't have a clue.  It only impacted me because we lost the use of our hard drive (got everything off first, don't worry) while we used an old laptop for internet usage in the meantime.  But we are, along with our new hard drive and half a dozen other computer bits which we apparently needed (yep, talk to Dan), back in business and I have my photos again (yay!).  

There's a new photo over there,

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and I don't even have a good excuse for why I took it four days late, either.

And now, Miss Chocolate-face...   

[still good]

Are you wondering if we have the world's tallest almost-two-year-old?  Nope.  Just an almost-two-year-old with a brand new stool...

New favorite hobby: rearranging (and closely examining) the silverware.

Other newfound skills include:

• Washing her hands.  At first she always wanted like a gallon of soap in each hand, but after I tried to show her that we only use this much, she decided she doesn't want to use any at all.  She loves looking in the mirror.  She plays a solo version of peekaboo by crouching down on the stool and jumping up, saying "kah-boo!"

• Turning on all the lights and fans in the house. 

• Using a fork to stab all the fruit in the bowl on the counter, repeatedly.  This has only happened twice, thankfully.  Both times she gave up and brought me the fruit, and told me she was "hungee".

I have more to write about: new words, bizarre habits of a certain toddler, baby kicks (big ones!), 22 week OB visit (which went great, so I guess I don't need to write about it), but I hear the silverware clattering, and I just bought bananas and a bunch of oranges, so I better go...