I Don't Wanna Grow Up

After MUCH debate about when to buy Andrew a "big boy" bed, we decided to buy him one on Monday. I've been agonizing over this decision and going back and forth on the issue for months (my friends actually laugh at my unwillingness to move Andrew to a bed...). Andrew doesn't seem ready to sleep in and stay in a bed (our experience with him learning how to climb out of his crib kind of underscores this) but I also worry about how he would handle it if we tried to switch a couple of month's after the baby is born. I think (based on what I know of his personality) that he would NOT handle it well if we told him he got a big boy bed and that cribs are for babies, and then proceeded to give his crib to the baby (which is what I was leaning towards doing). Anyway, John and I decided that we would buy a bed and do a very gradual transition. We decided that sleeping in the big boy bed would be a privilege, one that would be lost if Andrew kept getting out of his bed. He'd get a couple of chances, but if he didn't stay in his bed, he'd end up back in the crib. So that's the plan...

So Monday night we went to Target and let him pick out a fun comforter and sheet set. Shockingly enough, he picked the Thomas the Train bedding! There was actually an adorable planes, trains, and trucks set at Bed, Bath, and Beyond that I LOVED but I couldn't justify spending that much money on bedding for a toddler, especially considering the fact that this train phase could end in a couple of months, and then I'd have to make him use the bedding for the next ten years just to get our money's worth. After Target we went and bought Andrew a nice little twin mattress, since we find toddler beds to be kind of a waste of money and want to buy bunk beds in a year or two anyway. So we strapped that bed to the top of our tiny car and drove it the thirty feet it took to get home. Andrew was SO excited and kept petting the mattress and saying "nice, nice!" He, by the way, picked out a very nice queen sized mattress for himself, but we had to tell him to keep dreaming. Anyway, I spent a large part of yesterday washing new bedding and setting up the frame and bed, and rearranging the furniture in Andrew's room. At one point I was actually worried about making myself go into labor or something, but I just really wanted to get it all done because Andrew was so excited. I think the hardest part of it all was putting the stupid safety railing on the bed (we know without it that Andrew would roll right off that bed), it was so irritating!

So excited for his "nice choo choo bed!"

After we got the bed all set up, Andrew was SO excited and kept climbing into bed and saying "night night mommy!" Since he was so excited, I thought he would be mad if I made him nap in his crib, so I put him down for his nap in his bed. Well, as I expected, after maybe two or three minutes he came wandering out of his room. What did surprise me, however, was that he'd been crying. I took him back into his room and told him that since he didn't stay in his bed, he had to sleep in his crib. Ya know what? It turns out he WANTED to sleep in his crib and was happy when I put him in it. Huh. I'm thinking this may be even harder than I expected, and that's saying something.

St. Patty's Day

While I didn't have the energy to go all out for St. Patrick's day, I thought it would be fun to have an Irish dinner. Corned beef and cabbage! Except no cabbage, because John and I both hate it. Anyway, I did a lot of searching for a recipe that looked good and made my corned beef. The verdict? I just really don't like corned beef. It was not only my first time making it, but my first time eating it as well. That is just some weird meat. The flavors and seasoning of the recipe were great, but the meat itself was just weird. What is corned beef anyway?

Mmmm...or something.

So anyway, that was the extent of our St. Patrick's day dinner/celebration (I ran out of time and didn't get to make the Irish soda bread that I'd been planning on). We also all wore green, cause how could you not? But that really was about it.

Andrew in his awesome Red Sox St. Patrick's day shirt. He's crying because we were trying to make him eat some of the corned beef. Not such a fan...

ER Visit

Last week was really fun! Or something....So, last Tuesday Andrew dumped out John's jar of pennies and was playing with them. Since I didn't want him to swallow another penny, I made him help me clean them up. Well, while he was lying on the floor surrounded by pennies, Andrew popped one in his mouth. I was sitting right next to him and saw him kind of choke on it and then swallow it. He had just swallowed a penny the week before (I know, you'd think we'd learned our lesson) and had been fine, so I wasn't too worried. Later that night, however, he was coughing and wheezing really hard, so I started to wonder if it had something to do with the swallowed penny. I decided to take him to an urgent care place to see what they thought. After we got there and waited for quite awhile, they finally took us back to see the doctor, who, upon hearing what had happened, told me that I needed to take him to the ER. So I drove down the street to Denton Regional, where I spent another half hour trying to keep Andrew relatively calm in the waiting room. They called us back, hooked Andrew up to a machine that monitored his breathing, and then took an x-ray. Funny thing though, no penny appeared in the x-ray. Huh? Seriously, it was so weird. I would have sworn on my LIFE that I saw him swallow that penny. The doctor was still worried about how bad his cough was though, and it looked like there was some infection in his lungs. He wondered if Andrew had perhaps swallowed something plastic (which wouldn't show up on an X-ray) and if it was stuck in an airway and then irritating his lungs. The doctor said he didn't feel like he could say "Oh, I don't know what's wrong" and then send us home. Then came the great news: there was no one at Denton Regional who could put a scope down in Andrew's lungs to check, so they were going to send us down to Children's Medical Center in Dallas. In an ambulance. Oy! I COULD have refused, but they seemed concerned, which made me think I should play it safe and accept. It was hard, because I didn't want to be just blindly accepting whatever they told me, but at the same time, Andrew's health and safety are more important than anything and I didn't really have time to think a lot about what else I could do. So I signed the paper allowing for an ambulance transport and called John to see if he could somehow come with us. I had the car though, and it was already past 11pm (I know we could have called one of our friends to drive him over to the hospital, but I was distracted and there was no way John was going to be the one to call and wake someone up). Anyway, I left it to John to figure out while I tried to keep Andrew from destroying the ER. He was so tired, yet wound up, and was just trying to get into everything. He started crying because I wouldn't let him get down, and then I started crying because I was freaking out imagining how ridiculously expensive it was going to be. It was not fun.

Eventually the ambulance arrived and they hooked Andrew up to all sorts of stuff and wheeled him out to the ambulance. It all seemed very surreal. It's not like they were rushing or turning on the sirens or anything, but it was still weird. Fortunately, this particular ambulance was specifically for children, so the crew was great with Andrew. I wasn't allowed to ride in back with him, so at first he was freaking out, but after a minute with them he was fine. Plus he was excited because they had a TV and they put on an episode of The Wiggles for him (which he'd never seen before but was enthralled by). He was super cute, saying "bump!" as we went over all the speed bumps and "what's that?" throughout the drive.

Here we are on Andrew's little bed at Children's. Andrew was really snuggly with me for a change, so that was really nice at least.

I think we got to Children's around midnight. I filled out some paperwork and waited and waited for someone to come talk to us. John arrived right about the time the doctor came in, so that was nice. He had been able to get our car and follow us down, though as he was driving he got a flat tire and had to get out and put on the spare on the dark freeway at 12am. Fun! Anywho, from 12am to about 9am, we sat in our little ER room, interrupted only a few times to go do x-rays. Andrew FINALLY fell asleep at 3:30am, and we had to carry him in his sleep to do the x-rays. He was pretty traumatized that I couldn't be in the room for the x-rays (pregnancy and all...) but he would go right back to sleep afterwards. While waiting throughout the night/morning for someone to come talk to us, we kept wondering if we'd been forgotten. Turns out they were really busy that night (this story is one of the reasons why) , and we weren't a major case, so we were low on the list. Finally, sometime after 8am, the doctor came in and pretty much said that Andrew was fine, he just had some pneumonia in his lungs (I'm assuming it was leftover from when he was sick in January, since he hasn't been sick since then) and we could go. So basically, we spent all night in an ER to find out the same thing we already knew. And the cost! I can't even handle thinking about it. I really shouldn't complain, because what matters is that Andrew is ok, but it all seems like such a waste to me. Ah hindsight...I would never have agreed to that stupid ambulance ride if I had known that was how it would all turnout. I am very thankful that Andrew is ok though.

We left the ER around 9am, and when we got back to Denton, John had to prepare for his job interview and I had to go get new tires (turns out we needed more than one, yipee). Andrew had slept some at the ER and on the drive home, so he was just nice and awake. When I put him down for his nap at 1pm though, he slept for 4 1/2 hours (which meant I did too :). I finally had to wake him up because I didn't want to mess up his sleep schedule. Anyway, we treated ourselves to Chili's that night and then all came home and crashed. Andrew slept until 10am the next morning (beautiful!) and has actually continued to sleep in every morning since. I'm enjoying it while I can. Here's hoping for no more ER trips in the near future...or EVER, for that matter.

John told me to keep the post short, or else nobody would read it all the way through...so, if you made it this far, thanks for proving him wrong. :)

Another Week

I cannot believe that another week has come and gone...time is just going by so fast! On one hand, that's a good thing because I can't wait to meet our new baby boy. On the other hand, I still have so much to do before he gets here!

Speaking of the darling baby boy, I had to do a second glucose tolerance test because I failed my first one. Yikes! The thought of gestational diabetes scares me, Andrew was a big enough baby without me having GD. I suppose I should cut back on the Crunch Eggs...darn Easter time. Anyway, I had my test on Thursday, and it wasn't the best 3 hours of my life. They had me start fasting at midnight (though with my heartburn being as bad as it is now, I usually cut off food around 9pm) and I went in at 8:15am to do the little test. First, they took my blood, then I drank the nasty glucose drink (which, I have to say, on an empty stomach at 8:30am was not too pleasant) and then they took my blood every hour for 3 hours. Fun! Fortunately, the person who scheduled my appointment recommended bringing a portable DVD player, so I brought ours and got to watch Vanity Fair (while John got to spend the morning with Drewbie!). I was doing fine hunger-wise until about 11am, and then I started to feel really sick. Around 11:30 (just a few minutes before they had to draw my blood for the last time) I started to really think I was going to throw up all over the waiting room and/or pass out in the middle of the waiting room. And then, just as I thought I was going to die, they called me back for the last of the blood work. I stumbled back there and managed to not give away the fact that I was feeling so faint, because I was afraid they'd make me stay longer until I felt better. After they took the last of the blood, I pretty much inhaled a granola bar, which I think is what saved me. Pregnancy + fasting + having your blood drawn 4 times in 3 hours = not fun! Here's hoping the results come back ok, because the diet changes I would have to make would stink (increase protein, limit carbs? Sad!).

So anyway, after sitting in the doctor's office for over 3 hours, I went outside and discovered that we were in the middle of a snow storm. What the heck?!?! I was not happy. We ended up getting about 5 inches that day, which is a TON for this area (apparently there hasn't been that much since the 1920s). We got to take Andrew out in the snow after his nap, which was pretty fun. He thought it was hilarious when we threw snowballs at each other and was as happy as a clam until he fell into a big slush puddle, and then he was done. He's been talking about snow a lot since then though, and is sad that it's all gone now (of course it's gone now, the weather here is crazy!).

Andrew all bundled up for the snow.

Snow!

Andrew's having fun in the snow!

The slush puddle that claimed Andrew.

My favorite thing about Texas snow is how Texans handle it. It's hilarious! No one can drive in it, people seriously drive 5-10 miles an hour. Now, in the middle of blizzard that would be understandable, but this was not a blizzard! This was perhaps an average Utah snow storm. And when I went to Target to get some milk around 8pm, everything (with the exception of Target, Wal-Mart, Kroger, and good old Whataburger) was closed. It was a ghost town! I think I was one of three non-employees in Target, and this was a couple of hours after it had stopped snowing. All of the schools closed (which was nice, since John was supposed to have class that night) and the place where John was supposed to have a job interview called to reschedule because they didn't want him to have to drive down to Dallas in the snow. Hehe. The only funnier scenario I could imagine would be southern California in a snowstorm like that. That would be hilarious!

Ok, I think those are the highlights of the week...I could go on and on complaining about my exhaustion, physical pains, heartburn, and moodiness, but I'll spare you all.

I hate cold!

On Saturday it was sunny and in the high 70s. Yesterday, it snowed. SNOWED! Ugh, Texas weather is so crazy! And I really, really don't like the cold or the snow. The only good thing about snow is that it provides good skiing, so snow here is pointless since Texas is flat as a pancake. I was reminded of how much I hate snow as I was trying to run errands with Andrew while it was snowing--what a pain! And it was barely cold enough to be snow, so it was really wet snow. Even worse.

Ok, I'm done whining. Here's hoping that's the only snow of the year.

My Wonderful Hubby

So I think I've been tagged (am I part of "all of you"? :). Here's my hubby tag:

This is a picture of us at General Conference in April 2004, just a couple of weeks before we got engaged. Man, we looked so much younger and skinnier then!

All About my Hubby

What is his name? John.


How long have you been married? It'll be 4 years in August!


How long did you date? For about 10 months


How old is he? He'll be 28 in April....old man! ;)


Who said "I love you first"? Let's see, who did everything first....that would be John.


Who is taller? John's 6'3" and I'm 5'10", so he's got a nice 5 inches on me. That was one of the first things I noticed about him!


Who eats more sweets? That's not even remotely a hard call....me me me! I think I eat more sweets than anyone I know.


Who can sing better? I would say we're pretty equal...hopefully that doesn't offend John.
Who is smarter? Definitely John. He's smarter and definitely more hard working, which is a great combination.

Who does the laundry? Me...for now (though we both used to do it when we were both in school). John graduates in August, so things may be changing around here.... :)


Who pays the bills? Me, though if John did them perhaps they'd get done on time...


Who sleeps on the right side of the bed? Me, though we did fight over the left side when we first got married. I was too nice then, I don't think John would win that battle now. :)


Who mows the lawn? If we had a lawn, John would do it (though he tried to teach me how to do it when we had a lawn at our last place).


Who cooks dinner? Me, because I like to cook and bake. The only issue I have with making dinner is having to do the dishes. UGH! I can't wait until school is over and John has to go back to doing the dinner dishes. :)


Who drives? John. He doesn't like my crazy driving and I don't like my road rage issues.


Who is more stubborn? Me, I think.


Who kissed who first? Definitely John. If I had had to make the first move, he'd probably still be waiting for that first kiss.

Who asked who out first? John.


Who proposed? John. We're both pretty traditional, so I don't think either of us would've liked it if I had proposed.


Who has more siblings? John has 4, I have 2.


So now I tag Maren, Lindsey, and Emily!

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