When does it become socially unacceptable to take a child's temp rectally?

So you might have noticed that I gave this ol' blog a little makeover. One of us needs to look so-fresh-and-so-clean, and it sure as hell ain't me today, so there you have it- a cute, clean, hopefully easier-to-read blog.

I have read about how many things seem to go wrong on the homefront once the guys deploy (the Murphy's Law of Deployments or something like that). Washing machines break, cars shut down, water heaters explode, children immediately become possessed by demons, etc. While Steve has not yet deployed, he left to go out in the field for a few weeks. And I think maybe God wants me to have a little taste of Things To Come so that I can be prepared. Hm. I am not really on board with this idea, but apparently I have no say in the matter.

Everything was fine on Sunday. Well except for when Sam threw a very heavy pot lid down on his toe and gashed it open. And then I may or may not have been paying attention while we were holding hands in the hallway and led him straight into a table. Ok so maybe everything was not fine on Sunday. But other than a few incidences, we were all (mostly) fine. Steve was packing and Sam and I were playing and life was normal. Well, then Steve had to go and leave. Bleh.

Sam behaved FAMOUSLY all day yesterday. I have the bruises from constantly pinching myself to prove it. He ate all of the food I put in front of him, he didn't fight me all that much on diaper changes, and we had a play date that went very well. All signs pointed to this being a very easy FTX (for Sam and me, at least). I bathed him, lotioned him up, brushed his teeth, and put him to bed around 6:20pm. He fell asleep so quickly and I went back downstairs thinking, "Oh man! Now I'm really bored! What on earth will I do until bedtime?" Heh. Famous last words.

Sam woke up at 7pm screaming like he had been set on fire. So I went to check on him. His breathing was raspy and congested, so I offered him a drink and then his pacifier, then put him back to bed. As soon as I close the door- more screaming. He probably cried for a good 20 minutes after I put him back to bed. I wish that I could have rocked him to sleep or let him get in bed with me, but the child will have no part in that. He does not snuggle and he DEFINITELY does not co-sleep. So the only other option was to let him figure it out himself, in his crib. He eventually went back to sleep.

Same scenario went down at 8pm. And at 9pm. I took his temp, checked his diaper, made sure he wasn't too warm, gave him more water, attempted to see if he would let me rock him (no), and put him back to bed. At this point, I can see an entire night of this, so I didn't see any point in going to bed at 9, only to wake up an hour later at 10. So I stayed up til 10. (HIGHLY unusual for me) Of course, that was the one hour last night that he did NOT wake up screaming. The rest of the night was like a trip back to the newborn days (FYI: I hated the newborn days.).

Apparently he is sick with something. (You don't have to go telling ME that I'm a genius.) As you might have noticed, I am no doctor, so I have diagnosed him as having a cold. Clear snot, stuffy nose, occasional cough. No big deal. We will wait this one out. Until I took his temp again later and it was 102.4. Have you seen that commercial with the kid who has a 102 temp? Everyone, even the dog, goes, "ONE OH TWO???? NOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!" Well that was me.

Since we are regulars at the doc's office, I have amassed a nice stockpile of various prescription medications, topical creams, and baby tylenol and ibuprofen. And (and!) I have saved all of the boxes that the little bottles go in so I can reread the directions. After a quick consultation with the box (to make sure the tylenol is still in-date), I give Sam his dosage and hope for the best.

I knew he needed to rest since he didn't sleep much last night, but there are very few activities that will keep Sam seated in one spot for very long. I tried reading him some books, but after we blazed through the fantastic few he always requests, he was back to trying out his legs and sprinting around the house. I thought, "I know! I will let him watch TV! He will be so happy he won't know what to do with himself!" (FYI: The child has only watched a few minutes at a time of the occasional college football game. He has no clue about any kids' shows or movies, but seems momentarily interested if he catches the tv on.) So I sit down on the couch with him and try to find some semi-educational kids' channel. I find Barney. Barney has apparently acquired a stuttering problem in recent years as every other word is cutting out. Or maybe we just have bad cable. So I switch it to cartoons. Like, the old-school cartoons with Tom and Jerry. While not educational at all, it was something I could handle (probably my biggest beef with the stupid kids' shows on air today). But that just freaked him OUT. He wanted nothing to do with these shows and screamed hysterically until I changed the channel (my plan worked! ahahahaha!). So I switched it to something much more soothing- HGTV. Despite touring vacation homes on some exotic island for some exorbitant price, Sam was not impressed and got bored after about three minutes. TV is just not his thing. Can't say I'm sad, because I have made a conscious effort to steer him clear of media since birth, but dang it would be helpful right about now if he would just sit still and WATCH.

Oh you can bet the farm that we are waaaaay over our juice quota for the day.

The only other options to keep him still involved a stroller or a carseat. Since we had no errands to run, we were eying down that double stroller. I ended up meeting a friend to walk for about an hour and a half. Not a big deal since I can always use the exercise and an excuse to gab. It appears that tomorrow we will not have the stroller at our disposal though since there is rain moving in for the next three days. That pretty much blows. We will be prisoners to this house until my mother comes to rescue us. I am literally counting down the HOURS until she arrives to save my sanity. (No rush though, Mom!)

Pray for us? Please? The last thing I want to do tomorrow is drag my sick child out in the rain to see the doctor that cannot move past Sam's orangeness.

I am essentially OWNING 2012 so far

I mean, look how many things I am crossing off of my 101 in 1,001 list. I'm wishing now that when I originally made this list that I had put "Be really moody" or "Gain a lot of weight while you're pregnant" on it, because I would rock those too. But instead, I am crossing off #52: "write a piece for a magazine, newspaper, or website."

Jamie, from Handling With Grace, is featuring me on her Military Monday segment. Go on over and check it out! I answer questions! And there are pictures! And I'm not writing anything here today, so that instantly frees up about half an hour in your day.

It's that time again...

Time to start back up with Hypnobabies! Maybe you've heard me talk about HB before, but in case you haven't, HB is hypnosis during childbirth. It can assist you in delivering naturally, with drugs, or via a c-section. I delivered Sam naturally, and it was, essentially, pain-free. No funky breathing, screaming, sweating, puking, cursing, begging for pain meds, or threats towards my husband's privates at all during the process. I'm not advertising that every birth using HB is like that, but that was my experience. I am also not saying that pushing a watermelon through a straw was just another day at the beach, because it wasn't. That was some serious work, y'all. But totally worth it.

Anyways, I've got to start studying up on HB again so that I can be fully prepared for Second Baby's birth. I have a feeling that this kid's birth is going to creep up on me pretty quick. Kinda like Sam has been doing lately when you turn around to flush the toilet, and then turn back around to pull up your pants and BAM! There he is fixin' to head-butt you in the crotch. Stealthy little guy.

To summarize HB in my own words (and take it all with a grain of salt since I am no HB spokesperson), it is self-hypnosis used for relaxation purposes during labor and delivery. But it is so much more than that. The materials you study prior to giving birth give you such a complete education on the childbirth process, what rights you have as a patient, and procedures that you have a say in during and after birth.

For instance, HB taught me about the physical process of during labor and delivery. It taught me how the muscles in our bodies work together to achieve this desired result of getting that baby the hell out of your body. The more you resist, the more pain you will experience. Learning to relax and "go with the flow" will allow your body to accomplish what it was made to do. HB taught me about the different drugs offered during labor and how they work in your body. Some speed things up, some speed things up too much so you need something to slow things down, some slow things down too much, and then you might be faced with a c-section. Overall, I didn't feel like HB was judgey towards epidurals or anyone who wanted something for pain management. They just lay out the facts and let you figure out what will work best for your situation. Since it is an overall relaxation technique you are learning, it can be applied in any birthing situation, even if you end up with a c-section. I would say that going into a c-section would be a good time to employ some relaxation techniques, would it not?

I got into this freaky way of birthing a little bass-ackwards. A pharmacist I worked for in college had mentioned that she was going to use hypnosis to birth her baby, and she was going to do it naturally. I laughed and laughed and told her how crazy she was (lucky for me, I've always had great bosses that don't seem to mind my sassy mouth), but she ended up birthing an almost-ten-pound baby boy pain-free. I didn't believe her. I figured that those endorphins she experienced once that baby shot out were so great that her memory of pain was instantly erased. Pain-free birth. Psh. Get outta here.

So when I got pregnant, she gave me her book on Hypnobirthing. She said that I should read it, and even if I decided not to use it, I would at least get a good laugh out of it. So I took it and promptly lost it. I ended up finding it and reading it on a roadtrip one day. That is when it all clicked for me. It made so much SENSE. It was natural. It embraced the fact that God MADE my body to do this. Women have been doing this naturally for thousands of years! I can do it too! But Hypnobirthing just seemed a little incomplete to me. I searched the internet until I finally found Hypnobabies. This was what I had been looking for. It was a complete educational program that gave me quite a few "tools" to utilize during my birthing time dependent upon the situation. I enjoyed learning about all of my rights as a patient and had never before looked at the healthcare system as a group of people that were working for ME.

I told my doctor what I expected from her as far as interventions and coaching and she let me know the boundaries of what she could allow to stay within her hospital privileges. I lucked out and found a truly amazing doctor that had given birth naturally herself, so she was completely on board with my plans for a natural birth. Thank the sweet Lord in heaven that she was on-call the night I gave birth, because I can't imagine doing it any other way. She was so PATIENT and followed my birth plan to a "T" and even some of the other doctors who didn't think that this HB thing would pan out for me came in to "observe." Originally (pre-birth of course), I was all, "Ew, there will be NO ONE in that room staring at my hoo-ha except my doctor and a nurse. Steve will stay up by my head with the PG13 view." But as things progressed, there were more and more people in the room just WATCHING (not many babies born that night in Richmond apparently) and I was totally fine with it. I was in my own little zone and didn't even notice them there. Plus I think I knew that I would never see a single one of them ever again, so whatever. Stare to your little hearts' content!

I found out later that my doctor (who happened to be pregnant at the time), went to her office next door while I was in labor and ordered HB online for herself. Hearing that made me wanna get up and do one of those cheerleading splits in the air. But I wasn't sure how strong those hospital mesh panties were, and I didn't want to test their limits, so I refrained. I heard from my doctor recently (sadly, she did not move with us to KY) and she told me that she had a wonderful birth experience with HB and was so glad to be a part of Sam's birth. I told her that I will definitely try to plan a pregnancy/birth around Steve's Captains Career Course so that I can be her patient again.

I won't get into Sam's whole birth story or anything, but I am officially 32 weeks along now (YIKES) and this is the time I am supposed to start re-learning all of the HB stuff again, so I thought I'd share. The link to the HB website is here, but you can also email me directly if you want to ask me ANYTHING about my experience with it. I am probably way too willing to share the all of the gross details (just ask Rebekah!), so be ye not afraid!

Wine is almost REQUIRED for me to get through these little "art projects". But chocolate will do, thanks.

February is rapidly approaching and you know what that means... Oh yes, time for me to dip my screaming child's feet in paint and make another memory!

(You can see Halloween and Thanksgiving footprints here. You can see Christmas footprints here.)

I ended up not doing a footprint project for January, and kicked myself for it every time I walked past our little "gallery wall" (I use that term as loosely as it can be used. Basically, it's our wall o' frames.). But since people seem to be decorating for Valentine's Day already and the stores are pushing the red and pink candies (hard), I figured I would knock this little project out ahead of time.

This did not turn out nearly as nice as the one that I pinned, but what can you do with a child that physically opposes paint and art projects with his entire body. Oh well, at least the wall gap is finally filled, and my ears will stop ringing from the screaming eventually.

Since my child will clearly not be sending out any handmade-from-scratch-or-with-paint Valentine's Day cards, it worked out perfectly that I recently received an email from Tiny Prints asking me to check out their cute selection of Valentine's Day cards and write up a little post about them. In exchange, they would send me free Valentine's Day cards of my choosing. Always one to send a little snail mail when I have the excuse (despite my extreme distaste for the postal service), I was thinking about making a few cards to send to the grandparents and other family members. There are some very cute cards to choose from, and I always end up getting our photo cards from Shutterfly or Tiny Prints (sister companies) anyways. They have cards that don't require a photo, but you can bet the farm that I'm gonna take every opportunity to plaster my kid's sweet little face on a card and send it off to his adoring fans grandparents.


So I'm torn between this one:

Short, simple, and to-the-point

this one:

My baby really enjoys playing with cars and trucks, so this would fit personality-wise.

or this one (because really- how much longer am I going to have a say in cute things like this??):

This card is totally gender-neutral. There is green and blue and orange and brown on there. I will rationalize it however I need to in order to convince myself that my child's cute mug NEEDS to be on this card.

So what do you think? Should I do my boy a solid and go with the all-boy truck theme? Should I go with my own selfish wants and desires and pick the "Be Mine" card? Or should I settle for some common ground and go with the simple first option? 
I AM TERRIBLE AT THESE DECISIONS, Y'ALL. No, seriously, you should see how long it takes for me to design our Christmas cards. WEEKS, I tell you. Many agonizing weeks.

Disclaimer: I was given a discount code of my own for the purposes of this review. The opinions expressed are my own, and no additional compensation was received.

You can follow Tiny Prints on Twitter, Facebook, and Pinterest too!

Birthday recap and a mini freak-out

I have good news to report- my donut bribery worked! Steve got to come home at five! (FIVE!) That just hasn't happened in a while so we were very excited. Apparently this commander has a weakness for the sweets. Mm-hmm. Noted.

Steve had a good birthday evening. Even though I stuck too many candles in his cake. "YOU'RE 25. Not me. I'm 24." Riiiiiiight. I just wanted to see how it would look with an extra candle hole in there.
Speaking of cake, well, I don't think I would recommend the ice cream cake recipe that I pinned and followed. It was good, but boy it looked NOTHING like the cake I pinned (mine was so ugly), and it just tasted so-so. Probably the equivalent of just eating some ice cream cakes, but without the hassle or mess. He did seem pretty surprised that I "made" an ice cream cake for him though, so there's that.

the Pinterest ice-cream cake

my ice-cream cake (sad)

He received some gratuitous gag gifts from me: a Screaming Eagles flag for our garage, another challenge coin (Ft Campbell-specific, of course), and a card that he thought was raunchy but turned out to be the complete opposite. (Heh.) Sam gave him a helmet so that he can legally ride his bike around post and pull him along behind. I also wrapped up some ink pens for him because I knew we were running low, and thought I may as well give him something else to open. And get this: he truly seemed HAPPY about those pens. "Ah Jenn! We've been needing some of these at work! This is great! How did you know?"
And I was just sitting there smiling through my teeth because that? That was not really a gift. It would be the equivalent of Steve gift-wrapping dish soap for me for my birthday. But nevertheless! A good birthday.

For clarification purposes, our walls are not green. They are white. Between our bad lighting and my lack of photography skills, we get colorful walls in pictures.

While we were lying in bed last night, he was telling me about what they've been doing at work and what sorts of missions they're training to run over in Afghanistan. It suddenly hit me that he really is going. Nothing is going to just "come up" and prevent this from happening (like I keep hoping). Nothing I can do or say will stop him from boarding that plane. How can he be talking about ammo and guns and killing people that will be attacking him when we were JUST lying in bed talking about how hard his biology class was? Wasn't that just yesterday? Weren't we still complaining about how the stupid transit buses at Auburn never run on time? Weren't we missing each other like crazy when we had to be separated for TWO DAYS for those Guard training weekends once a month? Didn't he just catch a fly in the house and "let it out" instead of killing it like I asked him to? How is he talking about possibly having to kill people to protect himself and his soldiers?! Why doesn't he have one of those jobs where he never has to leave the FOB? Is there any amount of donuts or sweets that I can bring that commander to get him one of those jobs?? You're not even scared? Well this isn't about you, is it?!

Oh wait.

Yes it is.

It's your birthday. Happy birthday. I love you. Good night.

Happy birthday Steve

Today my husband turns 24. Hard to believe. Especially since I told him last night that I couldn't believe he was turning 23. He looked at me and said, "Jenn, I'm only a year younger than you. How old do you think you are?" And I truly believed I was 24. But apparently I turned 25 at some point. Hmm. Don't really remember that happening. But he did the math (because I am not good at math), so IT MUST BE TRUE. Woe is me for being so old that I've already forgotten my age.

Anywho, at least I remembered his birthday (thanks for the reminders, iphone!) and have set out to make an ice cream cake for him today. I recently asked him what he would like for his special birthday dinner. He knew this would be limited to what I could cook for him at home since it's a work night and Sam is not the best eater-outer. So he opted for a frozen pizza. I don't know if I should be thankful that he picked a meal requiring no effort on my part, or insulted that he doesn't want me to actually cook something. I will be easy and go with thankful.

Between last week and this week, I think he's made it home in time for dinner (meaning: sometime before 10pm) all of once. Last week, this was cause for major headaches and bickering. After reading this well-written post, I have since adjusted my attitude and this week has been much MUCH easier (at least for me). I think I tapped into some deep Southern Baptist roots while I was reading it, as I was doing lots of head-nodding, "Amen"-ing out loud, probably had my hands up in the air like, Girl, I KNOW right? PREACH IT.

I can't control how long he stays at work, when he goes out to the field, who inconveniently has a problem that they wait to bring up at 6pm when he is getting ready to leave, or anything else about his job. But maybe if a couple of donuts ended up on the commander's desk, reminding him that today is my beloved's birthday and that I would really love to see him before my eyes shut tonight, he might get home on time just this once? Maybe?

Ah, well, worth a shot at least.

I was forced to do this, you see, because ORIGINALLY, I had these grand plans of making him funfetti pancakes for breakfast when he got home from PT. Even went so far as to make a special trip to the commissary (in the rain, mind you) to get more syrup and funfetti mix. But he comes home last night telling me that the commander says to skip going home after PT. Just stay at the company to shower. Ya know, I wish this guy would at least run these ideas by me beforehand. It could really simplify things. But he does not (yet), so I came up with Plan 2, and that was to bring breakfast to him.

After dropping off breakfast to our birthday boy, Sam and I had to race across town to get to his doctor's appointment. And guess what? He's still orange apparently! I just do! not! see it! So the doc wants to do bloodwork to test his liver function. I am strongly opposed to this because #1. it is a bajillion degrees in this office and Sam and I are both sweating like turkeys on Thanksgiving. (This is not really "winter" here. No need to run the heat like you do.) #2. Sam vehemently opposes having his blood pressure taken on his FOOT; how on EARTH will we survive needles and a blood draw?!?!?!?!?!?!
Why did I talk myself out of wearing my prescription-strength deodorant today.....

The nurse in charge of baby blood-draws comes in, takes one quick look at him, and says, "Oh he doesn't have any liver problems. Just lay off the carrots." I told her that we had already cut all orange food out of his diet for two straight weeks, hoping to fix this issue. And she said, "I take it you were feeding him carrots and orange foods for much longer than two weeks. So it's most likely going to take more than two weeks to correct itself. If he's still orange in six months, call me then." HA! In yo FACE docta'! No bloodwork for us. That was a good thing, because I was going to have to start stripping some clothes off if I had to be in that office much longer. And that is something that NO ONE wants to see.

Speaking of clothes and being ridiculously uncomfortable, we recently got word that our company's military ball is coming up in March. Like, the part of March BEFORE I pop this baby out. So I will obviously be grotesquely huge and not the slightest bit drunk at this shindig (talk about a 180...), and you can all tell that it's just going to be so much FUN. My question to you is this: Where does one go about finding a formal maternity gown/dress to wear to such a function? Why yes, I HAVE searched craigslist, and no, I have found nothing worth spending money on. (I know. Jinxed myself talking about my awesome craigslist luck yesterday. Dang.) I really don't want to buy a brand new maternity gown (GAWD, that sounds so ugly and fat...). Any suggestions? Know of any type of rental company that might lease out giant ball gowns? Maybe I could just find a nice, silk bedsheet and drape it appropriately. Tell folks I'm going for that Grecian look. Also, have any of you military wives made it through an entire military ball completely sober? Is there any hope for me? Or am I doing "the unthinkable"?

A timely accident

I can't remember if I drooled all over myself and wrote about it here, but recently, I scored a pretty awesome double stroller off of craigslist. Now before you start accusing me of trolling that website all day (what with my recent dresser find and all), just understand that I have some kind of freaky luck with that website. But fear not, life makes up for my good craigslist fortune in this one (almost useless) area of my life by "rewarding" me in others.

I will get to the bad luck portion of the show in a minute. Right now we're talking about my new-to-me, awesome stroller. It is a BOB Revolution Duallie and it is navy blue and I just cannot WAIT to use it. It is the Cadillac of strollers, and while they usually come with a mighty hefty price tag, getting something off of craigslist gives you the ability to haggle the price down a bit. And I totally saved a hundred bucks by playing it off like "my husband is so cheap, woe is me, please cut me a deal." (Sorry Steve, you must be the scapegoat sometimes in order to save a few dollars.)
It is in near perfect condition and it rides like no stroller I have ever had the pleasure of pushing. The lady I bought it from had already purchased snack trays and carseat converters and a little detachable pouch on top for my keys/phone/wallet/water/etc. All in all, MAJOR DEAL. I could not be happier with myself for finding that. (In CLARKSVILLE no less. I should get some gold stars added next to my name for accomplishing that here.)

Anywhoodle, I was thinking about listing our current jogger on craigslist since it is a single and I see no good reason to keep this inferior jogging stroller in our garage, taking up valuable space when it could possibly make us some money. So I set out searching the interwebs to find out how much this sucker is worth. After a few clicks, I realized that our current jogger had been recalled long ago due to MAJOR safety issues and that it would be ILLEGAL for us to try and resell it because of these defects. Huh. I guess the person that sold it to me (OFF OF CRAIGSLIST, MIND YOU) was either not aware of these issues or was some sort of felon. Regardless, I figured that I would most likely take it to Goodwill with a note attached explaining the safety hazards and let them decide if it was worth giving to someone or chucking it. But! My dear husband saved me the trouble this morning.

After going for a walk with my neighbor a couple days ago, I brought the stroller back up to the house, but couldn't fit it where I usually park it in the garage (thanks to my very uneven parking job). And since Sam was squirmy and whiny after our walk, I decided that I would just park it between my back bumper and the garage door and I would fold it up and put it away the next day.

Well.

Pregnancy brain done struck me again.

I forgot that Steve was taking my car to PT the next morning. And he hasn't quite figured out how to read my mind yet. (I know, right? What is taking him so long??) So he backed right over it. That poor little jogger is definitely a safety hazard now. To my son AND my car. Luckily the car was fine. And LUCKILY I don't really care if people see me pushing around a double stroller with only one child in it. I just wave at them and pretend that I'm not completely crazy.

I took BOB for a spin yesterday with a friend and ohmygosh it's incredible. I can definitely see why people pay arms and legs for these things. Having now test-driven this miracle on three wheels, I don't think I could go back to my old Kelty jogger. Oh well, it had a good run. (harharhar!)

Let's take a ~stroll~ down Jogger Memory Lane, shall we? (I CANNOT STOP WITH THE PUNS.)

Watching Daddy mow the grass. Look at those CHEEKS. I die from the cuteness.

Ready to ride!

Watching Daddy hang Christmas lights.

All bundled up and ready to scream his little head off in Chicago.

Finally getting around to preparing for Second Baby

Yep, we're kinda slow to get the ball rolling over here when it comes to baby prep. With Sam, we moved right before we had him, but we still had his little room all set up and *perfect* weeks before his birth. Of course, he slept in it a grand total of about two weeks before we moved again, so that was obviously well worth the time and effort we spent getting everything "just so."

In our apartment in VA, weeks before Sam's birth

This time around, we have opted to re-gift Second Baby with all of Sam's gender-neutral baby things (complete with bite marks and stained sheets!) and give Sam a new room (since we are well aware of his gender by now and can decorate accordingly). So I ordered a crib, but did not want to spend a ton of money on a changing table or dresser. My thoughts all along were to find a low dresser that I could put a changing pad on top of, thus eliminating the need for yet another piece of furniture. So off to craigslist I went! You know what they say about craigslist... "If you search it, you will find."
While it is not the most quality piece of furniture (read, not solid wood like I would have LOVED to find), it does match the color of the new crib perfectly. It's clean and not fussy or detailed, and it works perfectly for diaper changes.

Obviously there is still a lot of decorating to do in Sam's new room, but I will get to that eventually. My main focus right now is to figure out what to put on the walls. Besides paint. Because I refuse to paint our walls. Painting them once means I will have to paint them twice (again when we move out), and as much as I hate painting, I just don't feel it's worth it to put that effort in. I would much rather put giant, gaping holes in the walls.

AUsome Aubie mobile that my mom scored for me. It plays the fight song. How. PERFECT.

Help me with this please? This sweet little table and chair cost me all of five fingers as it was lying by the side of the road on trash day, so I scooped it up with grand plans on how I could paint it and make it cute. It was clearly well-loved by its previous owner (a green marker enthusiast), but I am trying to figure out the best way to refinish it so that it works for us. The OBVIOUS choice would be to paint it some sort of orange and blue combination, but I don't want to get too crazy with the Auburn in this room (try to stifle your laughter if you think I've already gone overboard with the rug and mobile- that is NOTHING). The other idea screaming in my head is to do the top of the table in chalkboard paint. Which brings this recently pinned image to mind.

via Pinterest

Okay, so it looks like I've got one vote for the chalkboard paint. Let me know what you think should be done to this little set!

In other news, I fished out all of Sam's newborn clothes and swaddling blankets yesterday. Most of the clothes are usable since we received gender-neutral things before Sam was born. But there are a couple of definite "boy" outfits in the mix, and I thought, what the heck, I may as well wash these too and use them. Because IF I DON'T, surely I will have a day where the child pukes or poops through every other outfit I have available and I will be left with no clothes to put on him/her. That is obviously the worst-case scenario, but I can see it happening, so I'll go ahead and wash the baseball onesie that says "Cute Little Guy" on it just in case. I will just have to keep reminding myself that it's a girl.

IF it's a girl. I'm not trying to send out subliminal messages that I know the gender already or anything. Because I don't. No one does. At my appointment last week, the doctor guessed it was a girl. But that was based on the heart rate, not on an ultrasound image. So take that "news" with a grain of salt.

Everyone tells me it's a girl. I don't know why they say that, unless they figure that since I already have a boy, it is only logical to have a girl next. I will (obviously) be happy either way. But my secret wish (fueled by my thriftiness and fear of sassy teenagers) is for a boy. I have everything it takes to raise a boy! Trucks! Legos! Trains! I know what comes with the boy territory as far as taking care of their privates after birth and I have the CLOTHES for a little boy. That feels very familiar and safe and (in my head) I am well-equipped to deal with it all.

Girls, however, are a bit of an unknown. I really hate princess-y stuff and pink pink PINK, and I really don't want to EVER deal with a teenage version of myself. And definitely not a teenage version of myself AND Steve. Makes me a little sweaty just thinking about it.

Of course I will love a little girl just as much as I will love a little boy, don't get me wrong. I know there are qualities about a girl that I would never experience with a boy, and they say the cutest things, and they like to dress up, and blah blah blah. You don't need to try and sell me on a girl. I PROMISE you that I will love her like a son. Heh.

On the pregnancy front, I am 31 weeks into this game and am now required to visit my doctor every two weeks and that just feels like such a waste of everyone's time. My numbers are ALWAYS perfect. The baby's heart rate is ALWAYS good. And the drive from my house to the hospital is ALWAYS longer than my actual appointment. I wish I could just weigh myself, take my own blood pressure, pee in a cup, and call in my results to her every two weeks. Sounds lazy, I know. But this office does not allow children, so every time I have to go in for an appointment, I have to find a babysitter, write out schedules for different scenarios that Sam might throw at the babysitter, put on REAL clothes (ugh!), and waste time going over things that feel pointless.

Of course, during my most recent appointment, I left Sam with a good friend and was so relaxed leaving him with her, that I secretly hoped that the doctor was running behind. Free time to just SIT in PEACE. Ahh.

But no. I got there fifteen minutes before my appointment time and got called back ten minutes early! Whaa?? I barely read the table of contents in this magazine! I need to read this article about five ways to banish belly flab! Seriously! Look at me! There's going to be a lot of leftover belly flab! But the nurse isn't taking no for an answer, so I go get weighed (total downer), pee in my cup (I am getting SO good at this), and get my blood pressure taken. The doc comes in, tells me how great my numbers look, and sends me on my way! I briefly consider going back to my original seat in the waiting room and reading that article, but then I realize that I'm probably missing the only nap of the day, so I'd better get home and take advantage of that. Sure enough, he was sleeping. Probably only slept for about 30 minutes after I got home and was up until bedtime. <groan> These days are L-O-N-G when there is only one nap involved.

Here's a load of crazy

Steve's job lately has been... well it just wasn't what I envisioned when I thought about being married to the Army a soldier in the Army. I guess I pictured what I had grown up seeing (since I grew up in an Army town): early mornings of PT, dads getting off of work at a very reasonable daylight hour, wives doing their grocery shopping at the commissary, and loads of hot Army guys wandering about in their smokin'-hot uniforms. Present Jenn can look back at Past Jenn and smirk because, oh Past Jenn, you are so stupid. It is not like that at all.

He goes to PT at 4:30am and wakes up not only you (you have turned into quite the light sleeper with this pregnancy), but the BAYBEE as well, and that puts a bit of a damper on your whole day, waking up at 4:30 and all. No more grand visions of being that careless housewife that sleeps in til 8 when he gets back home. Then once you get the screaming child out of bed and fight him over the poopy diaper that he does not want to relinquish control over, you go downstairs to find that, indeed, your dreams did not materialize while you were sleeping; your dishwasher is still not usable and those dishwashing fairies have still not located your house. Something about moving five times in two years makes you harder to keep track of. So you try pacifying the tiny person with milk and whatever kitchen "toys" he would like to play with. Then your dashing husband waltzes in... and cannot believe that you didn't remember that this is command maintenance day! Come on! He's gotta shower and leave and he really needs to eat breakfast!

Hurry to make big person and little person breakfast. Make yourself coffee because you know it is necessary to function today. Get caught up in breakfast and dishes and forget about coffee. Reheat it 67 times. Take a total of four sips. Finally dump it because it is almost lunch time and it probably tastes like leaded gasoline by now anyways.

Husband (who is considerably less dashing after recounting what your tuna casserole "did to him" this morning) leaves for work. Says it will be another late night. You roll your eyes because this sounds like a cop-out to you. He knows the small person turns into some possessed demon in the afternoon hours, and you're betting that work is more fun. They probably have parties there. With cupcakes. And Coke. And they probably laugh about their wives, sitting at home with the whiny children, and think to themselves how lucky they are to avoid the witching hour yet again.

You go about your day and do chores and laundry and change diapers and fix sippy cups and play cars and read books. Just when you are getting ready for the most important (and sometimes only!) nap of the day, you get a text or call that the husband will not be able to come home for lunch. Something came up last minute. Gotta work straight through. Can you bring him something?

Of course! Baby is screaming, so ready to go to sleep, but you plop him on the floor and try to make dish soap look like an interesting toy while you slap together some sandwiches and fruit and chips and fill up a water bottle. Fight the little person into his carseat, again try to pacify him with milk. And Jason Aldean. Such a love-hate relationship you have with Jason Aldean.

You get to work. You text husband that you are here. He texts back, "Be out in a minute." Ten minutes tick by. Angry, sleepy child in the backseat is not happy about this delay. You do your best to play peekaboo and sing silly songs and then kick yourself for not stocking your car with more toys. Another text: "Five more minutes." GAH you cannot keep this up much longer. He finally comes out, runs to the car, grabs his lunch, gives you a quick kiss, tells you that they're super busy and he's gotta get back in there (they're probably playing Yahtzee!), and runs back inside. You speed home (at 25mph) and practically launch the baby into his crib. Good NIGHT, I hope you sleep at least four hours.

Get to work cleaning up the destruction left in the wake of maniacal baby, fold the clothes, swap out laundry, feed the dogs, check to see if you remembered to defrost anything for dinner. You did not. Damn. Pull out some frozen chicken and hope that your thaw-out-vibes help the process go a little faster.

Angry baby-child wakes up. You force-feed him lunch because he's being a picky brat. You go over in your head all of the things you'd like to say your (less and less dashing) husband about how he REALLY needs to keep it down in the morning because 4:30am wake-ups don't make ANYONE happy and look who's gotta pay the price (ME), and *&@#^&$#&*@!@&^%!!!

Clean up the baby, clean up lunch, run some errands, get home to make dinner. A miracle has occurred and the chicken is ready to cook. You silently thank God and apologize for your previous outbursts. The small person is not excited about your paying more attention to dinner than you are to him. More tantrums. Feed the baby while dinner cooks. More playtime, although this time you are required to play too because it is just too much for him to handle on his own. Husband sends vague text message about how much work there still is to do. Gotta meet with so-and-so and go over the such-and-such and it can't wait til tomorrow. Gotta get it done tonight. I ask if tonight is a bath night and cross all of my fingers and toes that it's not. He texts back. It is. Damn. Schlep the super-whiny person upstairs. Another diaper struggle ensues. You win. Once he is naked, he's happy. He plays happily in the tub. Then he stands up and pees in the tub. Strongly opposes getting out (because sitting in filthy bathwater and urine is desirable apparently). You brush his teeth and lotion him up, squeeze him into his pajamas and realize that he has tossed all of his pacifiers between the wall and his crib. You realize that your short, fat arms will not fit in that tiny space. You move the entire crib out from the wall with your superhuman pregnancy strength and the small person is pissed that you are taking so long in locating his sucking device. Find approximately 36 pacifiers against the wall. Blow one off and hand it to him. Crank up the mobile and bolt out the door.

You have the chicken timed to come out of the oven just when husband said he would get home. Once you get downstairs though, you find that you have a text saying that it will be at least an hour from when he last said he would get home. Curse the Army, curse your husband, and curse yourself for even bothering to cook dinner.

Husband gets home. The rational side of your brain is SCREAMING at you that his being late is not his fault (unless they really are having fun Yahtzee parties over there) and you tell yourself to just be nice. Let it go. But you cannot. You have been strapped with this fussy mini-monster all day and reheating a dinner that was perfectly acceptable an hour ago just makes you MAD. So you end up giving him some modified version of the silent treatment (a la moody 16-year-old) and ask about his day. You then unleash all sorts of profanities against the people responsible for keeping him there so long and offer stupid suggestions about what he should say to them the next time they ask for something. ("Oh tell him to shove it up his...") This is obviously not helpful but it sort of makes you feel better.

You realize that you should really be on the same team as your husband and wish that you had someONE to target your anger at. Dashing husband does not deserve it. He is doing the best he can whilst working for a load of idiots. Whiny baby does not deserve it (although would it KILL him to take a second nap in the afternoon?). Who deserves it??? You have GOT to unleash this anger somewhere, at someONE, but can't figure out who exactly deserves the crazy you're ready to dish out.

So. Who wants to go ahead and bet that I'll be checked into a mental hospital by the time the plane takes off for the deployment? Any takers?

A very late 15-month baby book entry

Sorry Sam, Mommy's pregnancy brain is throwing her off a bit. Even going to your 15-month well-baby check didn't alert me to do your post. You can go ahead and blame your sibling. I'm sure you will start doing that soon enough, why not go ahead and get into the habit now?

Let's see, the reason I was reminded to write this at all was because you finally started saying "MAMAMAMAMAMAMAMA!" So there is a God after all! Huh! Because the way you were talking up your dad had me a little confused at first... like, did he labor with you for 23.5 hours and then pop you out, put the most sensitive part of his body out there for you to gnaw your wicked-hard gums on, clean up your really sick diapers once you started on solids, take you to playdates and on errands and to the pool, diffuse your tantrums, hold your hands and calm you down after your shots, or talk to you nonstop during your every waking hour? Because the thing is, I sort of remember doing all of that. I think DADA was at work or in the field or probably on vacation somewhere. So yes, FINALLY hearing MAMA is like getting a big ol' high five from you. Thanks.

Stats-wise, you are now 22.1 pounds. The doctor said you looked orange to him, and I said that it could be because you eat carrots for breakfast every morning and sometimes have sweet potatoes as a side for lunch or dinner. So recently we have cut out the orange parts of your diet in hopes that you will return to a normal human skin tone. Being your mother, I did not see what the doctor was talking about. I mean, since you have orange hair, I think you have an overall orange tinge to you, but he is worried about liver function and whatnot, so we will have to see if you come back down to peach soon. Otherwise we will have to go get stuck with a needle, and I look forward to that about as much as you look forward to fingernail clipping and hair cuts.

I have no clue how long you are, as you squirmed and screamed during that whole procedure like the nurse was attempting to rip your leg off. Same for your head circumference. I'm sure you're fine though.

You've got six teeth now; three on the bottom and three on the top. I have a feeling from your frequent nighttime wakings lately that we are fixing to see a few more pop on through, and I'm honestly thrilled, and hope that they are molars because it can't be that great to chew all of your food with those six front teeth, chipmunk-style.

You enjoy pointing at every light, whether it's on or not. You like "helping" me vacuum, by holding the cord for me. If you hear a horn honk, you try to imitate it. (So cute.) You are getting the hang of high fives, you look to the back door if I mention Odie or Marci, and you clap for yourself after you fart. (You may or may not have picked up this trait from your dear mother. I find your toots so adorable and funny and they always seem to catch you by surprise, which only adds to the hilarity of them.)

You still like books, but we have found that we have to keep the books with "real" pages out of reach now, as you enjoy destroying them more than reading them. You are limited to cardboard books only for your solo reading time. When we read to you though, you are very helpful with turning the pages for us. Such a relief that I don't have to turn all six pages myself anymore. Thank you.

You are definitely allergic to peanuts, as we discovered on New Year's Eve, and still react to gluten. We've yet to try eggs or any other food that could pose a potential allergy or reaction. Although we did try strawberries again yesterday and I didn't see a reaction, so I think you might have grown out of that one. Whew.

Your most-used phrase is now "UH-OH" and it holds a variety of meanings for you. Uh-oh, you dropped a Cheerio (totally on purpose). Uh-oh, you just pooped your pants. Uh-oh, you pulled all of my clean dish towels out of that drawer in the kitchen. Uh-oh, you knocked that car underneath the couch (on purpose, as you find it hilarious to see me lie on the floor and attempt to fetch it for you). Uh-oh, you are all out of bananas. Uh-oh, you peed in the tub. Uh-oh, you just drank your dirty tub water.
 I will admit though that it is very cute coming from you. Now if anyone else in this house tried to smile and get away with peeing in the tub or pooping their pants or mutilating the kitchen, a quick "uh-oh" would not suffice. You are lucky you're so darn cute.

You are wearing size 12 month and 18 month clothing. I finally weeded your closet yesterday and you basically have five outfits left. And now that these cloth diapers are giving you quite the bubble butt, I am thinking that you will be in size 24 month pants in no time at all. Looks like we will get to go shopping for you soon!

You took your first steps. Finally. You still haven't walked in front of your daddy, but I think that has something to do with his lack of enthusiastic clapping and cheering and screaming when you stand up and look ready to go. I keep reminding him of your appreciation of such encouragement, but apparently, that advice has not been taken yet. You prefer to hold onto our hands to walk around still, but if I set you a few feet in front of me and scoot back, you will walk to me and fall into my arms. As much as I love seeing you walk and progress in the gross motor development department, I am not at all anxious for you to have the urge to walk everywhere, all the time.

I think that's about it, kiddo. You're great. A little bit of a handful at the end of the day when Daddy hasn't quite made it home, but I enjoy being here to see your smiles and laughs. I love you and will hopefully be more on top of things when it comes time to recap your first 18 months.

Cloth diapering Day One? Success. Overwhelming success. Day Two? Let's do some laundry!

Sammy's cloth diapers arrived this past Thursday evening, the night before we headed out of town to Chicago. And since I was not going to take my first stab at cloth diapering during a VACATION, I opted to deal with it once we got back home. (Am not as dumb as I look.)

So the other night, I opened up all of the diapers, googled the best way to wash said diapers, and set about trying to wash them. Not wanting to do anything wrong, I googled extra hard and realized that I am the only person on the planet who is cloth diapering with a top-loading HE washing machine (and using powder detergent). Everyone has the fancy front-loaders these days, and while they're nice, it's not what we have. (I really REALLY like the top-loading style.) So I did the unthinkable. I had to bust out the manuals to the washer and dryer and READ about things like temperature settings and rinse cycles and blahbadeeblahblahblah. It was boring, not gonna lie. But seeing as we got this washer-dryer duo a full six months ago and I'm just now reading about how to use them? Kind of overdue.

I am now schooled up on how to properly operate these machines. (For the record, I was already using them correctly about 98% of the time...) So with that knowledge under my belt, I washed those diapers. First with a cold wash, then a hot wash, followed by an extra rinse. (I'm using Charlie's Soap.) I tossed the inserts into the dryer on medium heat and hung the diapers on our smallest rack in the laundry room. Since the dogs were still at their "hotel" last night, this was no big deal, but I will be figuring out a new drying solution soon. When I woke up yesterday morning, I got the inserts out of the dryer, pulled the diapers off the rack, and stuffed the diapers. This took no time at all. Maybe ten minutes. And then we changed Sam's diaper and stuck him in his first! cloth! diaper!

He is super cute in cloth.

The first diaper change of the day did have a number two involved. But those little turdlets just fell right off into the toilet and were flushed away. Easy peasy. Speaking of peas, we need to lay off of those for a while.

The next couple of diaper changes were just number ones, and those consisted of tossing the diapers into the wet bag to await their date with the washing machine. Another diaper change later had a number two in it, but I was not aware of its creation. Usually I am privy to this information since it is preceded by grunts and lack of breathing and a red face. So that one was a surprise. Meaning: it was a little smashed up. We haven't purchased a diaper sprayer yet because I don't know if we can attach it to our wonky upstairs toilet in this military housing, and I'm not sure if it would be worth it anyway. I guess time will tell on this one. I am currently using a Dollar Tree spatula to separate the stubborn poos from the diaper insides. This is not only effective, but super cheap and ultra-gross for you to visualize. (Fear NOT, I sanitize the spatula after each use with a Clorox wipe and place it far from the small person's reach.)

After Steve handed me the first poopy diaper of the day, he said, "Wow! Cloth diapering is so easy!" HAHAHAHAHA MEN. Handing the poopy diaper off to someone else is prettttty much the equivalent of tossing a disposable diaper in the trash. But I will continue to let him think this way so that he will keep on changing diapers.

After a few flushes of the toilet in the bathroom that we don't normally use, we all came downstairs and found our giant fluorescent light in the kitchen gushing water. Hmm. Looks like a call to maintenance is in my future.

So Day One of cloth diapering was a great success (minus the leaky electrical fixtures). The diapers are so soft and look so cute and it feels SO GOOD knowing that chemicals are not coming into contact with my little one's ultra-delicate skin. Sammy is well-known for super-soaking diapers at night, so I'm anxious to see how our first night with cloth diapers goes. Obviously you will be updated accordingly.

*******

Day Two Update:
I came into Sammy's room this morning to find him quite soaked. So. We've got to figure out what to do to keep him dry throughout the night. We were using these inserts called diaper boosters in his regular disposables at night, so I'm thinking about stuffing one into his cloth diaper tonight to see if that doesn't help with the absorption problem. We also went too long this morning without a change (I just can't smell the pee, y'all) and he leaked onto his pants. And after opening that wet bag one too many times today, I am definitely doing a diaper load as soon as the little man wakes up from his nap. STINKY. Not stinky at all if it's not open, but once it's open, BACK UP.
So other than a few minor hiccups (we all knew this wasn't going off without a hitch), cloth diapering is going fairly smoothly.

In other news updates, my phone alerted me that I am a little over 30 weeks into this gestational-baking-a-baby period, so that is cause for a giant freak-out, is it not? It got me on the ball (somewhat) to order Sam's new crib and it should be here in about two-ish weeks. I am obviously still lacking a lot of things that I really want to pick out myself (aka: Steve cannot help): a dresser, changing pad, mattress, sheets, things to put on his wall, a carseat for Second Baby, and I also still need to re-wash all of Sam's newborn clothes, weed out the clothes he's outgrown since the last time I weeded out his closet (probably around 9 months of age...yikes), organize all of the clothes Sam has outgrown (scary scary task- will have to make a Target run for bins), dig the trusty ol' pump out of the garage, locate all available bottles and nipples, sterilize and have on stand-by, stock up on breast pads and "those gigantic maxi-pads" (says Steve), and start back up with Hypnobabies. Nothing like a little to-do list and some procrastination to light a fire under me.

#2, #13, #25= DONE

It all started innocently enough; Steve had a four-day weekend coming up and asked me what I wanted to do. As usual, I had no idea. Steve suggested we go somewhere. Because who can take another weekend of sitting here in Clarksville?!

I asked where we should go.

He said we should go to Chicago.

I laughed because that was a very crazy idea.

It would be as easy for us to bee-bop on up to Chicago as it would be for us to re-do our Christmas flights. (AHAHAHAHAHA no.) So that idea fizzled instantly and we were left wondering what on earth we would do to fill up these four days of freedom.

Then....

And just like that, it was back on the table!

I found a great deal on a four-star hotel in the middle of everything in downtown Chicago, researched a couple of "must-do" things, and then hit the jackpot- there was going to be SNOW! So obviously we had to go.

Some sort of switch finally clicked in my head that traveling is not going to get easier once Second Baby arrives in March. And since March is approaching like a herd of wildebeasts, we'd better get to doing some of the things we want to do before we are back on the two-hour feeding leash/nap schedules/bleary-eyed, no-sleep train.

So I booked our hotel on Hotwire. The only downside to booking on this site is that they do not release the hotel name or location until after you book. So that is kind of a gamble. The OCD planning part of me was reluctant to give that kind of control up. Their saving grace is that it does allow you to see the area that you are reserving in, how many other Hotwire users recommend that hotel, and what kind of rating it has (2 stars, 3 stars, 4 stars, etc). I booked this four star hotel and was anxious to check my email and see where we were staying. We were booked at the Hotel Felix. Steve said it sounded super-shady, like a bad Motel 6. But it was actually ultra-swanky and I cannot believe that we stayed in this place for so cheap. You could definitely walk in and tell that we booked on Hotwire, while everyone else there could actually afford to pay full price and then some. But! We lived it up. It was fun to stay in such a nice hotel.

Ok I should start from the beginning- the trip. We left on Friday morning at 9am. We dropped the dogs off at their *fabulous* little resort and continued north. I should mention that on Thursday, it actually snowed here. Like, they canceled FRG meetings and school and such, and while I am from a part of the south that sees NO snow, even I found it to be a bit ridiculous. It appeared to be snowing "hard" but nothing was icing over or sticking all that much.
So we drove in the snow and it was great. Actually, I didn't do any of the driving. Since Steve is our resident snow-driving-expert, he took the wheel and did his thing. Sam was some sort of angel-baby that took naps, looked out the window, played with the toys I gave him, ate his snacks, and patiently waited for us to arrive at our destination.

Since we drove through Tennessee (that's the half of Ft Campbell that we live in so I'm counting it), Kentucky, Indiana, and Illinois in one day, I am counting #2 on my list as completed. The trip itself was about 7.5 hours, but it was so enjoyable since we were driving on a lot of little country back roads, looking at true SNOW, and wondering what Chicago had in store for us.

We arrived at our hotel after minimal city traffic only to pick our jaws up off of the freezing sidewalk when we realized that someone (possibly me, cough cough) did not read the website correctly concerning parking. I remember reading that parking was included. Or maybe it said that hotel parking was AVAILABLE. Poh-tay-tow, poh-tah-tow. I thought that surely there were other parking decks in the area. But after asking the hotel receptionist, she informed me that the closest parking deck that offered overnight parking was a few blocks away, charged $30 a night, and charged $30 every single time you took your car out. And since we planned on using our car to get to a few key destinations, it ended up being cheaper to use the valet parking at the hotel.

YEOWCH. Maybe I am sounding a bit cheap right now. Maybe this is the going rate for valet parking at fancy hotels in big cities. Maybe I am just poor white trash. But that felt like an awful lot to be paying for parking my car.

But we moved on! Recovered from the sting of that sticker shock and went up to see our room. We were on the 12th floor (the top floor of that hotel- do you think our room position had anything to do with the fact that they knew we were bringing a baby?).

I called ahead and requested a crib, so we did not even have to bring our pack-n-play!

As usual, I wasted no time turning this place into baby-central.

towel bar bottle drying rack

After unloading all of our stuff in the room, we decided to walk a few blocks to a pizza joint called Gino's. Hoping that the wait wasn't fifteen hours long and that the six thousand snacks I brought along would keep Sam occupied while we ate dinner, we bundled up and headed out.

Sam was not the biggest fan of his puffy coat and seemed to resemble the little brother from the movie "A Christmas Story."

We ordered the classic Chicago-style deep-dish pizza, only to be informed that since they are all baked fresh (this is a good thing!), it would be at least 45 minutes before it was ready (this is not a good thing!). We figured that the worst case scenario would involve us asking for a to-go box and eating it in the bathroom of our hotel room while Sam slept. We didn't have to do that though because Sam was a champ!

We ordered some yummy breadsticks.

Bad, bad iPhone picture..

Steve ordered a beer.

Sam wanted a breadstick.

We eventually got pizza!

The lighting was really awful in this place. Also, this whole post contains a mix of iPhone photos and "real camera" photos, so that explains some of the crappy pictures thrown in here.

After dinner, we walked back towards our hotel. We brought a little cooler with us for the drive up that contained Sam's milk, but we were running low and needed to get some more. Thankfully, there was a Whole Foods located about a block from our hotel. Can I just geek out for a second and say that going into that grocery store was AMAZING??? The variety, the organic selection, the produce, the wines, the cheeses! To be in a store that does not consider mozzarella to be an "exotic" cheese was so nice! We got the cutest little pint of milk you ever did see, some fruit for Sam's breakfast the next morning, and a couple yogurts for his snacks, then headed back to the hotel.

Steve and I knew that the nighttime part of this trip was going to be the hardest. Sam goes to sleep super-early here at home, and is used to sleeping in his own room without a ton of noise. So we were a little concerned as to how this hotel-sleeping experience was going to go for us. We had planned to camp out in the bathroom until bedtime, playing cards. But we found that we could stick Sam in a little alcove by the door and open the bathroom door all the way so that it blocked off his part of the room. Then Steve and I were able to play cards on the bed until an hour that is reasonable for adults to go to sleep. Like, 8:30pm. Heh. Sam only woke up once, and I think he lost his pacifier and then freaked out because nothing looked familiar. Once Steve and I got up and reassured him that we were there and he was fine, he went straight back to sleep and woke up in a very nice mood.

I mean, how could you NOT wake up in a nice mood when you sleep fourteen hours and then wake up to beautiful SNOW falling outside of your window??? We got all bundled up again and drove towards Millenium Park to see the Cloud Gate and Lake Michigan.

Onesie, jacket, coat, hat, mittens, socks, shoes, and two pairs of pants. Think he'll be warm enough?

We stopped at a Dunkin Donuts on the way to feed Sam and get some hot coffee.

Then we busted out the jogging stroller and tucked Sam in there as snug as a bug in a rug. (Our jogging stroller has the largest canopy out of all of our strollers, so we thought that would provide the most wind protection for him and keep him the warmest.)

He turned out to HATE it though. We're still not sure why (though we suspect it was the puffy coat). We tried the canopy up, thinking he wanted to see more. We tried the canopy down, thinking there was too much wind in his face. We kept checking to make sure his hat wasn't covering his eyes. We kept readjusting his blanket because he tried his hardest to kick it off. Regardless of what we did, he screamed. And screamed. And screamed. We did a quick tour around the park to see the "highlights" and headed back to the car, utterly defeated by the tiny screaming person.

Despite pushing that miserable little whiner around, you can see how much I'm loving the snow and cold weather, right???

In front of the snow-covered Cloud Gate

Notice that happy person in the stroller!

After rushing back to the car and calming Sam down with the melodic tunes of Jason Aldean (I swear that is the only thing that calms him down while we're driving, and listening to that cd on repeat for HOURS is not doing good things for my mental health...), we decided that driving around would be our best option to see the city. Luckily for us, Sam passed out after about ten minutes of driving and we were able to stop along one of Chicago's "beaches" and snap a picture. I seriously debated whether or not I should ACTUALLY stick my toe in there, but the spot we stopped at had a ledge, so it would have been impossible unless I'd gone polar bear style and hopped on in completely.

 

Exploring the city via car drive was actually really fun. We drove along Lakeshore Drive and saw the many parks that the city offers right along Lake Michigan. People were everywhere, playing with dogs, cross-country skiing, sledding, running, etc. We eventually ran out of road and started driving through the city. Which is when we came upon this...

We don't know exactly what was going on, but it was some sort of Indian parade. Or protest. Or funeral procession. Hmm. We drove through the Middle-Eastern section of town, through the Asian part of town, into the European side of town, and it was AWESOME. At least I thought it was awesome. Being from a small town, I am not used to seeing things like this and found it very interesting. After all of our driving, we arrived at Superdawg, a 50's-style drive-in restaurant that features the Chicago dog.

Obviously, we ordered the Superdawg.

I promise there was an actual hotdog buried under there somewhere. It was quite tasty. While I prefer ketchup on my hotdogs (I know, some number one cardinal sin among hotdog people apparently), I thoroughly enjoyed this one "the way it was intended."

Since Sam took a nap during our little United Nations tour, we headed back downtown to see the Sears (now called "Willis") Tower and hover 103 stories above the street in the Skydeck.

(FYI you military folks, active duty get in free. So we only had to pay for my ticket.) We waited five eternities to ride in this cattle car to get to the 103rd floor.

You can tell by his face that the wait was totally worth it.

And here we are- standing on GLASS, 103 stories above a busy city street.

I was shakin' in my boots.

After thoroughly wetting our pants, we got back in line to ride the elevators down to join the rest of society.

Once we had firmly planted our feet on solid ground again, we realized that Sam left a little momento on one of the elevators- his shoe.

Oh well. The beautiful snow more than made up for that one lost shoe.

For dinner, we went to Giordano's, which is a pizza place that a native Chicagoan recommended to us. And it was GOOD.

So good that Sammy's eyes rolled back into his head when I let him sample a little bit of crust.

We were stuffed full of pizza and slept amazingly well that night because of it. We ended up skipping town the next morning (but not before we had to pay over FOUR DOLLARS A GALLON for gas omg) and had a very easy drive home.

I'm sure Steve was glad to get home and stop having me point out every icicle ("Oh look! There's another one on that house!" "And look! One on that balcony!" "And another one in front of that store!" "Omg! ICICLES EVERWHERE!!!"), but Second Baby is less than thrilled. Besides the abrupt absence of delicious pizza making its way down the hatch, s/he is back to roasting in there with the less than ideal temps that Tennessee lovingly refers to as "winter." I was so completely comfortable while we were out walking in the streets of Chicago that I made Steve SWEAR to me that we would eventually end up living in a place that regularly has snow. (And he did- I will get the signed, notarized copies of this statement shortly.)

So there you have it. Our weekend in Chicago. It was spontaneous, fun, trying at times, but well worth the trip.

We began cloth diapering today, so I will be back tomorrow with an update. Try not to be overcome with anticipation!

**Disclosure: The views and opinions stated above concerning Hotwire, Hotel Felix, and all other establishments visited during this trip are all my own, and unfortunately, no one compensated me for writing this. If you know of someone that would care to give me an all-expenses-paid vacation to some exciting location in exchange for a blog post loaded with crappy pictures, please- do tell.**