And Baby Makes Four...

Addison is going to be a BIG SISTER! YAYYYYYYY! Finally, after 5 months of trying we are finally pregnant. I am almost 5 weeks along and doing great! We are soooooo excited and can't wait for this little one to come along and join our family. Addison is as excited as an almost 2 year old can be. When you say "Big Sister" she starts singing it and spinning in a circle and when you ask "what's in mommy's belly?" she answers very excitedly "BABY!", it's very cute even though she probably has no idea, but this is Addison were talking about, the child who knows way more than we give her credit for! We dressed her in this Dora Big Sister shirt and went to all the grandparents's houses and waited until they noticed the shirt (which was a mere seconds) and that's how they all found out, it was cute! I went a little crazy with taking pictures of Addison in her Big Sister shirt (she was just too darn cute) so you can see them all here!

GUESS WHAT ???????

Monkey Joes & Stomach Buggies

Well, the latter part of the title describes our week! It all started with Miss Addison on Monday night, I heard her screaming on the baby monitor around 11:30, I went in and OH MY LORD!!!! She and her big girl bed were COVERED in puke!!! It was all in her hair and on all her blankies and even made it on Dora! After we cleaned her and her bed up (thanks Wes!!) we laid in bed with her for a little bit because we didn't know if she was going to do it again and she didn't so we left and she went right to sleep and was fine after that. We found out the next day that Grammie threw up that same night! So I come next, it was Tuesday afternoon and I got nauseous and I got all excited because I thought well FINALLY I'm pregnant!! Nope that night I puked from midnight until 4 am--fun and was in bed all day Wednesday (thanks Grammie for taking Addison all day!!). I was a little quessy (sp?) Thursday but I had to work so I sucked it up and today I am completely fine! So Wesley is next, I called from work on Thursday to see if softball was cancelled due to the rain and he said no but he wasn't going and I asked why and he said because he has been home in bed all afternoon feeling sick--OH MY!!! He was sick all night and still not too great today but had to go to work-poor guy! So it was a fun week and I can't wait to do it again--j/k! SInce I was feeling fine today I decided to take Addison up to Monkey Joes to play with some of my friends from work JUlie and ALison and we had a blast. She LOVES going down all the slides and laughs so hard!! There are a few pictures you can see here, enjoy!!

Torcaso Park

Addison and I are on a search for the best park in our area. We are on the lookout for somethig with a great playground, lots of shady trees and maybe some water like a lake or something. Today we decided to try out Torcaso Park and Trotwood Park. Torcaso Park was very nice, cute little playground area, not under any trees though, a very small retention like pond with a small pier (more like a little dock), and a very cool splashground area. I was not very impressed with the tree coverage, there was ONE and it was small and not covering anything, it stood by itself on the outskirts of the park. Not a lot of tables and you had to pay for the splashground. Ok, it was a dollar for the year BUT you had to walk about 1/2 a mile to the senior center and pay there, so by the time we ate our picnic lunch in the SUN (remember no trees)and walked to pay for it Addison got to play maybe 5 minutes and the cute little old man said he saw thunder clouds coming so we had to pack up and leave. Oh well, she had a lot of fun for 5 minutes. We might go back, I mean I paid for it for a whole year, right!! It's about 12 miles from the house and with not a lot of shade it wasn't my favorite. So, off to Trotwood Park we went and of course as soon as we got there and parked it started pouring rain. It looked REALLY nice though, tons and tons and tons of huge shady trees and lots of covered pavilions with tables. They had a litle kids playground and a bigger kids area and a little bit larger lake-retention pond- than the other park. So, maybe we'll try it again tommorow. If anybody out there has any other parks that they like to go to that meet my requirements (ha ha!) then leave a comment and let me know!!

Sea World

We are totally getting our use out of these Sea World passes! We are having such a good time going to Sea World and Aquatica. After breakfast with Elmo we played around at Sea World. We met up with Sandra's sisters Kimmie and Ashley and then later on met up with my stepmom and Nicki and Alex. We went to the Abby Cadabby and Elmo Treasure Hunt Show and that was fun, Addison was amazed!! We let the kids play in the water splash area until BOTH children decided to take massive DUMPS in their swim diapers. We also rode on the merry-go-round
with all the animals on it and Aunt Nicki rode this one with us and Addison loved that! We got to see Shamu and watched the dolphin show which is my favorite. We saw the manatees and me and Alex rode Kraken the roller coaster and that was awesome, I haven't rode a rollercoaster in FOREVER!!! At the end of the day the kiddos FINALLY fell asleep when we were in the parking lot going to the cars, figures! Again, picture album will be up soon, I'll let you know.

Breakfast With ELMO

Friday morning we went and had breakfast with our friend Elmo. Oh my what a great time we had. We met my friend Sandra and her little boy Andrew there and the kids had a BLAST!!! We ate our yummy breakfast and then some of the Seasame Street characters walked around and mingled with us. We got to see Ernie, Bert, Cookie Monster, and Rosita. Then, the characters sang a little song and did a little dance on stage and the kids were dancing around going wild. It was so cute. After that we got to line up and go sit with Elmo and get our pictures taken. Addison went right up to Elmo and have him a giant hug. We got some really cute pictures and Addison had a great time. Pictures to come a little later, my hard drive is so full that I can't get the pictures off my camera so as soon as Amazon ships my new external hard drive you will just have to wait in suspense, although there are a few that I posted with this entry so enjoy and I'll let you know when I get the album online.

AQUATICA

We went to Aquatica today with my stepmom and little brother and sister. It was the funnest place EVER! They had so much for Addison to do, I highly reccomend it. There were two really neat places especially for the kids. The one for the really small kids was so cool. There were all kinds of slides that Addison could go on and even a ride that had a raft that we could ride on together. We went in the lazy river a bunch of times and then Addison's favorite was the wave pool. It was very hard to get the camera out and take pictures just because we were in the water the whole day. I did manage to get a couple pictures (for me thats like 20~ha ha!) in the wave pool so you can see those here. But, it was soooo much fun and we have the year pass so if anone wants to go let me know!!!!

Happy Birthday MICKEY!!!

Happy B-Day Mick! It was Wes's friend Mick's birthday and a bunch of us went out to dinner at my FAVORITE restruant Amigos for some good ol' mexican food. After eating we sang Happy Birthday while Mick wore his (free) Sombrero (sp?) and it was hilarious!!! AFter that we headed over to this new place Firkin Kegler. It is a bar, restruant, bowling, arcade and dancing place, very cool, soooo much fun. We went bowling and then went to the bar and payed darts later on.
Oh, and did I mention the FABULOUS shots that the girls had 4 rounds of, they were flavored vodka spriter things that were oh so yummy!
AFter that we headed to Steak N Shake for some late night munchies (did somebody say...CHEESE FRIES...). We had a great time and can't wait to celebrate the next birthday!!! You can see more pictures here.

Father's Day

We had a great Father's Day! It started with waking daddy up and opening lots of presents. Addison liked looking at the scrapbook I made Wes with pictures of him and Addison. Next, we stopped by Grandaddy's house and let him see his little scrapbook I made of him and Wes, and of course Addison too. After that we went to my dad's for dinner. He got his own scrapbook too with lots of pictures of me and him when I was a baby and of course Addison too. I also got him a wallet because he has yet to get a new one in like 15 years because I gave it too him and it was too special to get rid of so I (actually all of his friends called me and begged me to get him a new one) thought if I got him a new one he would use it!! After dinner we had a yummy desert and then went through old pictures and it was so funny to see us all when we were younger (much much younger). Altogether it was a great day and we love all our daddies sooo much!!! Happy Father's Day!

Father's Day Videos

Happy Father's Day

A very happy father's day to my sweet, wonderful husband, my wonderful daddy and father-in-law, I love you guys and wish you all the best!!!

I Might Be A Little Biased...but she's soooo CUTE!!

Monkey Joes

My little sister Nicki spent the past couple of days with us and we had so much fun. Tuesday she came to Little Gym with us and Addison had sooo much fun showing off in front of her what she could do. Later that afternoon they played hard and after Addison went to bed (in her big girl bed!!!!) me and Nicki cuddled up and watched a movie in my big girl bed! Today we went to Monkey Joes, an indoor inflattable playground, and had a blast! There were all sorts of slides and bouncy houses and Addison loved it all. It was totally geared towards the smaller kids and I thought that was great. We will definitley be going there lots this summer. We had a great taco dinner with Uncle Alex and Grandma Dee and then it was time for Aunt Ni~Ni to leave and it was hard for Addison to say good bye. It was quite sad and cute all at the same time! She kept saying, "Nicki WAIT!!!!" and then would look at me and say, "Mommy, ready?" like she thought we were going to go with them. Well, it's off to work tommorow but I will leave you with more pics here from Monkey Joes.

First Day Of Summer Little Gym Class

The BEST Chicken EVER

Ok, so I know this might be a little retarded but I had to post this because I LOVE it!!! I call it "Sticky Chicken", it is the best chicken I have ever had and have ever made (Wes may disagree now because he said the chicken my dad made the other night was the BEST chicken ever, but whatever). So it is soooo easy, you mix up some spices, rub a little melted butter on a whole bird, rub the spices on, put it in a big ziploc baggie, let it sit overnight, pop it in the oven around 1 or 2 in the afternoon and 4 hours later, and some gravy later that it makes (YUMMMMMMM) you have the best chicken EVER!!!!! I swear you will never regret making it because Oh MY it is so good. The link to the recipe is here and you should try it--we love it and I make it ALL the time!!!! HAPPY COOKING AND DROOLING!!!!!

Adorable Auntie

I had to post these pictures!!! We went to my dad's last night for dinner and to hang out and Addison and Nicki are attached to the hip and I got a couple of cute pics of them together. Nicki is out of school for the summer and I am so excited to hang out and play all summer. Yay!!!! More pics from my dad's click here.

NICU Reunion Party 2008

Today we had our annual NICU reunion and it was sooooo much fun. There were a ton of families there and it was so good to see all the kids. It makes what I do all worth it in the end. To see the babies again gives me such an amazing, humbling, wonderful feeling! Yea, some of them are not exactly what most call perfect, but to their loving, amazing parents and us they are the most perfect things in the whole wide world. These parents have continued to do we we did for the babies back when they were with us everyday and they have done such great jobs. I got to see some of my favorite babies like RJ, he was born extremely early and was a mess. I remember he was the first baby I took care of all by myself when I got off orientation and when I came in and got report the night nurse flipped the light on and I about had a heart attack and thought to myself, "no way, I'm freakin outa here!!!". He had 4 chest tubes, was continually seizing from all the blood leaking in his brain, was on an oscillating ventilator which made his whole body "wigle" or "vibrate" and he had a tube coming from his broken off trachea that if even moved the tiniest of a milimeter would be death from the surgeons who put it there and on top of all of this the chaplin and mother were there reading his last rights and baptizing him because he wasn't going to last much longer. Not to mention that when the mother was admitted for preterm labor her mother flew in and when she got to the hospital had a heart attack and died!!! Oh my gosh it was crazy and I honestly thought that there was no way I could do this job and was already thinking about not coming back and switching to Peds or going back to school to be a teacher (this seriosuly crossed my mind)!!!!! But, I took the deepest breath I have ever taken in my life and I just had to jump in and go. Well, 6 months later RJ made it home safe and sound with his amazing mother and father and he now frequently comes back to see us and show off all that he can do. He is the most rambunctious 5 year old you will ever meet. Yesterday if he didn't even know it he thought the party was ALL for him. He is so cute and such an amazing little guy. He was running around EVERYWHERE, talking your ear off, giving everyone kisses, gave me a "red" kiss because the clown just kissed him and he had red lips!!!! He spends his days running around, keepin his mother on her toes at all times and loves playing with and helping to take care of his baby sister. He is sooo cute and such a testamnet to what we do, or more importanly what his mother did. She never gave up on him and was there EVERY single day making sure we were doing everything possible that we could do and that was his saving grace, the unfailing devotion of his mother! We love her (she is the president of our family advisory committee that help out new mothers of NICU babies) and him and always love to see them both!!!!Anyways, enough ranting, I love my job and this is why!!!!! There are more pictures from the party in our photo gallery or you can just click here to see more!!!!!

Grandaddy's Birthday Party

We spent the evening at Wes's parents house for a little birthday party for Grandaddy. We had a good time, we got to see a lot of his dad's side of the family, some of his brothers and sisters and mom were there. We had some barbacue and some cake and ice cream. It was nice and then when we got home we read some books in bed with Addison and then left her and she was out within seconds and hasn't even stirred yet and its almost 12:30!!!! There are more pictures from Grandaddy's birthday in our photo gallery or you can just click here.

Sneaky, Sneaky Mommy

I snuck in her room when she was napping to catch her sleeping and get it on video because taking a picture would have woken her up!!!!

Big Girl Bed Video

You must hit the pause button on the music player on the right side of the screen-it's about half way down the page and then you can hit play and hear the video--enjoy!

My Little Girl Is Growing Up!!!

So, we decided, or rather I decided, it was time for Addison to move into a bed. Luckily we have the bed that I slept in as a toddler that my grandfather built for me. It is so cute and I think it is so neat that she will be sleeping in the same bed that I slept in and the fact that her greatgrandfather built it. Wes had to make some alterations to it, had to drill new holes in it because the other ones were so old and hallowed out. We also had to buy some plywood and 2 x 4's to brace it. I also couldn't find a duvet I liked, because I had it in my mind that I wanted a simple white with pink polka dots and could not find one anywhere, so I decided to make one. I went to the fabric store and of course couldn't find the fabric I wanted. Me and my mom went out shopping for it and we came across some sheets at TJ Maxx that were white with pink polka dots so my mom said we could make the duvet out of two sheets, so we did and it looks so great and is exactly what I had in my mind. After assembling everything we brought it into Addison's room and were going to put her in it tonight to see how she did. Well, after Wes finished tying her dressers to the wall it was naptime and Wes thought we should go for it. We put her down, left the room and turned on the monitor to see what she would do. I started hearing things so I went in and peeked and she was in her bed curled up under the covers reading books, so I left and let her be. 2 minutes later and she was out. She looked sooooo cute, I went in with the video camera which I will try to post later. Almost 3 hours later, thanks to Griffy meowing really loud at her door, she woke up! Wow, I can't believe she did soooo good and slept soooo long. My what a BIG girl!!!! Click here to see more pictures (you know I had to take a million pics of this historic event!).

Happy Birthday Grandaddy!!!