This is the Day

This is the day, my God has made.
I've got a reason to celebrate!
To jump up and down,
And spin all around,
And shout it, "HEY, This is the day!"

This is Michael's favorite song. He sings it at least 10 times a day and it probably runs through my head at least 50 times. Just thought I'd share. :)

Hey, at least it's not, "This is the song that never ends....."

Well it happened

We were lucky with Michael when he slept in his crib that he never tried to climb out. I never had to walk in and find him precariously balancing on the top rail or anything like that. When we moved him to a bed, the funny thing is that the trend continued. He never got out of his bed until one of us came to get him. And then yesterday morning - Sat we didn't have anything we needed to get up early for and I was awoken around 8:00 to Michael climbing up onto our bed. When I looked at him a bit baffled he proudly said, "I wake up!" grinning at me. So then again, 20 minutes into his "nap" he comes down the stairs proudly saying "I all done - nap." When I told him that no, he wasn't and that he needed to stay in bed until I came to get him after his nap, his response what a pondering "Oooohhh." Hopefully that will keep things from getting too crazy. Tomorrow is another sleep in day for us so we'll see what happens....

Groceries

Monday is usually grocery day for me. Often times I get to sleep in while hubby gets up with Michael and then I take Michael off his hands to go to the store. However, this morning I got up first and then left Michael home with dad while I went shopping. Sad to say that going shopping alone is like a treat for me, but that is the life of a SAHM.... Anyway, it seems that each month our grocery bill gets more and more expensive! It is getting unreal. This week, the bill was 50% more than it was just a year ago. Now to put things in perspective I am eating more than I usually do since I'm pregnant but still. I hope that this trend comes to an end soon!
Budgeting for things like this can be so tough. How do we know how much we will need to buy groceries in a year? The great thing is that I know that God will provide. In our small group Bible study on Sunday we all shared ways that God has provided for us. What a blessing to look back and see all of the ways God has taken care of us over the years and to know that He will continue to. Praise God!

I need two more!

Well, my sister always teased us that by giving our son the initials MTH we were predestining him for a math major in college and true to his initials Michael is fascinated with numbers already and seems to understand them pretty well. Today we were making play-doh balls and counted out three of them. Michael said he needed more, so I made another and held it up. He said "4." Then we did #5. I stopped and Michael said, "No, 6 and 7. Need two more!" He just amazes me! I've spent hours and hours with kids saying "If we have 5 and we need 7 how many more do we need?" and the like.

No longer a chicken noodle soup virgin

This is not to say that I've never eaten chicken noodle soup before. I highly enjoy the meal actually, but I'd never made it. It was always one of those things that seemed so easy that I was afraid to try for fear I'd mess it up and then the world would know my true ability in cooking!
I poured some chicken broth into a pan, added some carrots and celery. Brought this to a boil and then added some left over chicken and egg noodles. As I cooked it for about 10-15 minutes, I added some original Mrs. Dash seasoning. I am happy to announce that it turned out really good! I was so proud. My hubby even decided to eat the leftovers for lunch today instead of his beloved chili which is really saying something! lol

I'm back with news!

Well, I obviously haven't been on here much lately. The main reason is because I have been purely exhausted. Any guesses why? Yes, I'm pregnant. And it has stripped away all of my energy. I am close to 4 months now, and starting to get some energy back. So here are the details:
We have been trying for baby #2 since about Dec 06. This past Nov we were out to dinner with the pastors from our church and shared with them that we were getting frustrated that it had been almost a year without any results. I was ready to go to the doctor to start some test to see what was wrong. Our pastor prayed for us and in a couple of weeks, we had a (+) test! How exciting is that?!
The baby is due Aug 7. And the other big date is that my ultrasound is on March 24. Hopefully our little peanut will cooperate and we can find out the gender.
This pregnancy has been so different for me. With Michael I was tired and of course had frequent trips to the restroom, but other than that not much out of the ordinary but a growing belly. This time, I was horribly nauseous for three months - mostly from noon until dinner. For a while I couldn't even look at "raw" food including uncooked noodles. I had to sit in the living room and talk my husband through making dinner step by step. Luckily he was a good sport about it. :P I am also even more tired than the first time around (maybe because of a toddler running around my house?!) and find myself in the bathroom more times than I can even count. I'm having trouble sleeping already and am uncomfortable a lot.
OK, well I guess that's enough of that. I don't want to just sit here and complain. My point is though that things are so different this time around. How can I have the same pregnancy hormones going through my body and react so entirely different? When people ask me what I think I'm having I say, "All I know is that this baby is a very different person than Michael."
In other news, we just celebrated Michael's half birthday. He is fascinated with birthdays and especially with singing Happy Birthday that I thought it would be fun to let him celebrate his half birthday since his full birthday is so far off. I had baked banana bread that morning, so we stuck 2 1/2 candles in the bread and sang "Happy Half Birthday" to him. He had a blast.

Thanksgiving and Family

We visited family in New Jersey and New York for Thanksgiving and had a blast. The first of all blessings to be thankful for is that Michael did so well in the 7.5 hour car ride there. He played and even took a 2 hour nap. Tim and I passed the car time by listening to an unabridged version of Pride and Prejudice - a story with great characters, fun narration, and lots of laughs that just goes on and on - perfect for a long car ride.
When we get there of course, everyone is thrilled to see Michael and he was flooded with questions and toys to play with. After his first initial five minutes of cautious watching from Mom's arms, he jumped right into the family mix. He learned everyone's names and seemed to feel right at home. Here are a couple of pictures from our New York trip.












Michael refers to his great-grandpa as GG-Pa and he was so excited to get dressed that morning in his special clothes from GG-Pa. And we got to their place, Sandy offered us drinks including a sweet juice for Michael. When I showed Michael this last picture he says, "GG-Pa, Michael, Sandy - orange juice!