Meet Claire!

To start off, this had nothing to do with the title yet, so dont get confused. I know it's been a while since Chloe's birthday but I never posted on here about it. The party was a success and Chloe loved her cake and presents! Thank you to everyone that came and everyone that wasn't able to come we missed you! She had a princess cake that I baked and my mom decorated. She did an excellent job on it considering it's been years since she's decorated a cake! Chloe got some clothes that are SUPER cute and warm for winter, a doll that can take a bath with her and a singing purse with all the accessories! We had lots of yummy food and some of Chloe's friends even came! Miles, October, and Breena!

Last week Chloe and I went Christmas shopping with my mom and Selena. While we were at the mall we got Chloe's ears pierced! I meant to do it when she was only a couple months old but never got to it and figured she would mess with them too much now. I had kinda decided that we would just wait until she was older and she wanted it done. While we were at the mall we went into a Claire's (still nothing to do with the title) and got into a conversation with another lady there about when is a good time to pierce a baby's ears. After a little while my mom offered to pay for it, and well.... why turn that down??? To my surprise she's done VERY well with them and has hardly even noticed them. She's so cute!!! She was beyond cute before but the earrings just add to the cuteness! They are little pink daisies, here's a picture:

Last night was Preston's work Christmas party. We had a lot of fun! They had valet parking, casino tables, an open bar, hors devours and a dance floor. I wore a little black dress I bought for it and did my hair like a 1930's pin-up. Woo!!! I was hot stuff! Well my hair turned out really good anyways, but I'm fat so it ruined the hot stuff effect. Oh well, I felt cute so, it was enough. There was a $20 buy in for the casino and that got one person $500 in chips. There was no return on the chips and the three people with the highest amount in chips won a cash prize of around $100. We played Black Jack all night and had a blast losing! Well I lost all mine and Preston did pretty decent considering he had never played before. Neither of us won but, it didn't matter. The open bar (free drinks all night) didn't have many non-alcoholic options, so we ended up drinking a half and half mix of Red Bull and cranberry juice. It was surprisingly tasty. As we left we discovered that the music they had blaring until 11:30 had prompted the neighbors to call the police. One of the business owners was out front but too drunk to really have a serious conversation. We couldn't stop laughing once we got in our car! I've never been to a party that got crashed by the police before. It turned out that they forgot to notify the neighbors that there was going to be a party with loud music. They throw the BEST parties!

And now..... Claire!

Yesterday afternoon (before the party, yes, it was a very busy but fun day) we went to Pet Smart to show Chloe the dogs up for adoption and accidentally fell in love! I have been considering getting a little playmate for Charlie for a couple months but figured we would start looking sometime in the middle next year. She was curled up in the middle of her cage just like Charlie was when we found him. She's about the same size as Charlie and has the same puppy eyes he does. Her name was Leah but we changed it because I had decided that our second dog would be a little girl named Claire a while ago. If you've seen Lost, you know why. Charlie and Claire are my favorite couple on that show! He's already fallen in love with her. I don't think he's caught on that she's here to stay yet but they are going to be very close friends! She's about 8 months old and Charlie finally has someone with his energy level that can wear him out! They even look a lot alike except she has a few brown markings, and they both weigh 10 1/2 pounds.  Our family of 4 has grown to 5!

My In-Laws New Neighbor!

Hi-ho!

We've had a busy week around here! We helped my mom move from Prescott to Mesa. Fun, fun fun! First, on Friday the 30th after Preston got off work we headed up to Prescott with the least amount of stuff we could stand to travel with! So basically it consisted of a play pen, a high chair, bunches of toys, baby food, baby clothes, diapers and single changes of clothes for ourselves and like... our toothbrushes.

Halloween morning, my mom and Preston went to the U-haul place to get the truck. They rented the biggest one they have available. We spent ALL day loading it and Grandad (my mom's dad) worked the jigsaw puzzle of stacking crap on top of all the other crap. He had to actually take off the sliding glass door, both pieces, to get my mom's ginormous couches out! By the end of the day we had filled the truck completely full and my mom's Ford Escape loaded to the brim (including the fish)! The trunk of my Malibu was full of pantry food and the Volvo Josh borrowed from my dad had a few things and Winston their dog in it. It still wasn't everything! (Monday night they went back for the rest and came back on Tuesday morning.)

That night we left Prescott at like 7:30, and I drove all by myself in the dark from Prescott to Mesa for the first time ever and didn't get lost!!!! Yay me! That was the point I was working up to. The rest is all blah blah blah about unpacking and unloading and nothing really interesting happened other than that... so... Yay my mom lives in Mesa now!!! In the same neighborhood that Preston grew up in! Christmas is going to be so convenient! It takes 15 minutes instead of an hour and 45 minutes to drive to see her.

Oh and my little baby, my little newborn baby that I just brought home from the hospital a few weeks ago, my sweet baby I JUST gave birth to... is turning ONE in 11 days!!! ELEVEN DAYS!!! WHAT the...??? Who hit fast forward??? She is up down and all around these days! She hasn't started walking but I know she could if she wanted to. We put her in the walker and she stands up in it and goes without leaning on it more than it takes to push it forward to move with her. We hold her hands to let her walk while holding onto us and while she is holding on with the death grip she almost never pulls or starts to fall. She's just unsure of herself. It's ok though, my stuff can live that much longer!

We are having her birthday party at my mom's new house. I plan to dress her all up ballerina/princess style! I made a pink and white tutu with the pink as the bottom layer and the while on top with little flowerettes and ribbons. I made a matching bow to clip onto her headband and I'm gonna put her in a white long sleeved onesie. Now I just need little sparkly necklaces and bracelets and maybe some little pink shoes! I'm so excited! My mom is making the cake too, and she makes beautiful cakes!

I know it's not much of an update but I'm scraping my brain for something so that everyone can see my new header I made. I made each turkey with our hands and then scanned them into the computer individually. I'm stoked it turned out so cute! In case you're wondering what the words are on the smallest one it's "Chloe Turkey". I know it's kinda small.

Anyways... I'm done! Bye!

Hello! I'm still here!

Hello everyone! I'm back!

Sorry I fell off the planet there for a while. Let me esplain... No, there is too much. Let me sum up...

To be totally honest, I got depressed. I lost interest in just about everything, cept Chloe. She's been my only link to sanity lately. It's hard to even pretend to write happy just to update a blog. It happens to everyone. I started seeing a therapist and made (and still am making) some changes. I've also discovered a lot about myself too. I've learned that if I don't like something all I have to do is open my mouth and say something. I started exercising and I actually like it! I quit buying junk food and instead have a small out of sight, out of mind, stash of chocolate for those cravings that refuse to leave me in peace and cause me to tear apart my kitchen looking for anything that even resembles chocolate.

It all started with stress. I was babysitting October for Brittany for a while and it just got to be too much. I love that baby girl but she's a high maintenance kid at least compared to Chloe who is ridiculously low maintenance. Not only that but taking care of two babies under one is hard. I have no idea how people with twins and more do it! Kudos to you if you have!!!

The next blow was my Uncle Frank's funeral. We weren't ever close but I was always close with my Aunt Therese and my cousin Nancy. It was hard for our whole family. He was the Fire Marshal Chief of the Salt River Fire Department. He died from leukemia at 41, and he was diagnosed at the age of 21. I think he had been in remission twice. The funeral was very grand and beautiful, with 27 fire trucks, probably 50 ambulances and hundreds of police vehicles. There was a wall of blue about 50 feet long at the graveside and a final call over the police radio that brought everyone to tears. Someone found a blog entry about it for the family and here is the fire department's memorial online. Just in case you wanted to know more.

A month later we had another funeral. This one was for Cory Jenkins. Preston was in the same ward and was good friends with him and his younger brother growing up. I had only met him once or twice before but it was still very emotional. He died in Afghanistan an had a 10 week old daughter Reagan. They had a 21 gun salute and played taps at the graveside and folded two flags for his mother and wife Brooke. Here is an AZ central article about him.

Now to bring this thing around to what we've all been waiting for! CHLOE!!! And me! Basically what's been going on around here. We're gonna do this list style (or at least I'm gonna try) because there's so much to get through.

Aug 14: I got a blackberry! It has GPS and it's wonderful because I haven't gotten lost since then!

Aug 17th: Preston called me from work and, very much like a kid in high school, asked me out on a date! That night he came home with two roses (one red, one white) and we took Chloe to the in-laws and went to dinner at the Olive Garden. I needed that so bad!

Aug 20: Chloe had a doctors appointment. She was 29 inches (90th percentile) and 20lbs 7oz (75th percentile). Tall and skinny!

Aug 21st: I was watching her crawl around and she sat herself up all by herself! I couldn't believe it!

Aug 27th: I had a smoothie from Tropical Smoothie Cafe (I highly recommend the Pomegranate Plunge with kiwi replacing the bananas!) I was giving Chloe little tastes by getting a little in the straw with my finger over the end of it but that wasn't fast enough for her so I just put the straw in her mouth and she just sucked it right up! I had no idea she was going to be able to to that!

Sept 13th: Chloe broke her first tooth finally!!! Bottom right. It's a sharp little sucker too! I found it at church (well after church) mid conversation with someone. Yelled out "It broke through!" in the middle of a sentence. As of right now there is a growing bump right next to it on the left. Maybe by her birthday she'll have two!

Sept 20th: Chloe's first spaghetti dinner. Also the first dinner she fed herself! See pictures:

Sept 22nd: Had a boring adventure! Left the house to go get drinking water and to fill the car with gas. I made it .6 miles from my house and put-putted to a stop. If you know where I live, that's not even all the way to Val Vista! Lora Linn and Meredith came to my rescue w ith a gallon of gas!

Sept 26th: Patty called me to tell me she wasn't going to be able to make it to the valley to see the play she had tickets for and asked if I wanted them. Heck yeah! Meredith and I went to see Legally Blonde at Gammage! Lots of fun! Great play but the intro song WILL get stuck in your head and it feels like the only way to remove it would be to remove your head!

Oct 1st: In celebration of my favorite month and the fact that I could open the door to let the dog out and not deep fry, I went for a walk! (I'm also sick of being fat!) It was wondrous! I walked .3 miles from my house but I count it as .6 total!

Oct 7th: Got ambitious and 1.2 miles up the road from my house, 2.4 total! I took Charlie with me that time (he thinks I was trying to kill him or something). I'm very proud of myself!

Oct 6th: Preston stood Chloe up facing away from him and she actually balanced herself using her toes and moving her weight. It kinda freaked her out when she realized she was on her own like that and hasn't done it since, but I did snap a picture with my trusty little Blackberry that night.

Oct 12th: Another call from Patty to tell me my brother Adam was in the ICU with what they think was swine flu. The test results take three weeks to get back so we still don't know. He's fine now, by the way!

Oct 14th: My mom and Selena found a house they both love. (Back story: My mom needs to move to the valley for work and school. She's been looking for about a month now.) They put in a rental application and got accepted! The house is right around the corner from Preston's parents. Like literally three turns in the neighborhood! Christmas is going to be so much more convenient!!!

Oct 16th: Ordered Chloe's Halloween costume on Amazon. Crossing my fingers it doesn't get held up in the mail system. I'll post pictures of her in it when it gets here! (Hint: it's Disney)

That's it for my list of everything that's happened since my last post!

My little monkey is growing like a weed! She pulls herself up on the couch, in her playpen, in her crib (which she jumped out of the other morning) and on my leg. She will walk along the sides of the couch or playpen and now when she is in her playpen she's started throwing her toys out of it. She can have all the toys out after 10 minutes in the playpen except for the big heavy ones she can't pick up with one hand!

We went to Breena's (Bridget's baby girl) 1st Birthday party last weekend and Chloe saw her walking all over the place and ever since then she'll let go of what she's holding onto, realize what she's done and either grab it again or land on her bum.

She's also started imitating my motions in just the last couple days. She always does this thing that I love where she throws her hands up with her palms up and makes a "eh?" or a "huh?" noise like she's asking a question. I always do it when I'm asking her where the doggie is and she repeats the noise and looks for him but never does the hand motion. Last night she did and it was soooo hilarious! I did it like 5 more times after that and have been doing all day today too. I clap and cheer every time she does it and she claps too. I seriously have the cutest kid in the world. Yes, I am biased!

Well... I've taken up enough of your time, if anyone even made it to the end. Hopefully, you'll hear from me again in the next couple days.

Amy Lynn

Officially Moving Forward!!!

Chloe just really started moving around today! I'm in trouble!

If You Could Talk with the Animals

Hello all,

I know it's been simply forEVER since I've updated this thing. I've been out of it and not myself lately. I'm starting to get back to my old self again. Thank goodness! We all get like that, I'm sure.

Chloe is doing great! Getting bigger and bigger every day. She sits up without falling over at all unless it's on purpose. She's not crawling yet but somehow is all over the place putting everything she can pick up in her mouth: her toys, the dogs toys, my shoes, my phone, October's foot, October's pacifier that's still attached to her sleeve. You know, the usual. She rolls and rolls for the major travel but otherwise scoots backwards and then spins on her belly to reach what she was after. She can go forward but it's pretty slow. She reaches with one hand and rocks on her side and when that's not enough she reaches with the other hand and rocks to the other side all the while pushing on the ground with her little toes. She'll get up on her hands and knees like she's gonna just start crawling but then she just bounces and then throws herself on the floor. Sometimes she goes forward and sometimes she goes backwards. She's so much fun to watch.

She's taken a header off my bed three times now. I swear I watch her like a hawk! She's just too quick sometimes. She hasn't gotten hurt falling, yet. I don't let her take naps on my bed anymore unless I'm snuggling with her. I can put every pillow in the house around her on that bed and check on her every 2 minutes and she will still wiggle out of them and jump off the bed. I dragged the playpen into my room for nap time for her during the day. Little stinker!!!

She's discovered how to spit copious amounts of drool and thinks it's hilarious. Preston and I went to BJ's for dinner and we took her with us because she can now use the highchairs in the restaurants. When our food got to the table, little Miss Quick-Hands-with-Long-Arms had her little paws in our food before the waiter had even let go of the dish himself. Poor guy! We had him bring out some oyster crackers for her to eat so she'd stay out of our food. That worked! She loved those things! Anyways, as she's eating and throwing food on the ground and getting the stuff everywhere Preston thinks it would be funny to blow a raspberry at her to get her going. Fortunately, I stopped him before she caught on and made the real mess.

We think she's left handed. When she eats stuff like cheerios, with her right hand she'll grab the food into her little fist and with her left make a perfect pincer grasp. She can still eat with both hands but the finer motions are usually with her left. It'll be fun to see how that turns out. If she is left handed I'll have a hard time teaching her how to write.

We finally broke down and got a video camera. Now she will not only have more baby pictures than any other kid that ever lived but she will also have her childhood on video. Who needs a memory anymore? But really it's great cause now I can SHOW you things like how she gets stuck under the entertainment center. I don't' actually have that one on video but I do have tons of pictures. She just back up under it till she couldn't got any further and started to cry. I do however have this great video of her talking to Charlie. Not in people or baby talk mind you, but in HIS language. Pay close attention to the noises she makes.

What's the doggie say? *cough* *cough*

Going, going... gone.

I took these a little while ago and have been meaning to post them here cause they were so cute! We have a new first! Chloe's first time falling asleep while eating:

A week in the life of the Fosters

On the 19th this month Chloe had her 6 month doctors appointment. She weighed in at 18lbs 13oz and she's 27 1/4 inches long. On the growth chart she's a big kid. Still in the 90-95%! She did much better with her shots this time! I didn't even have time to tear up. I was playing with her before they stuck her and she almost didn't notice the first one. The second one, however, is the one that hurts as it goes in. She started screaming right as I received a text. It reminded me that she'll do anything to get my shiny purple phone in her mouth. So I popped it open and instantly she forgot she was in pain! Yay Chloe! Normally I keep a hold of it to prevent the seizure it has whenever it gets wet but this time I figured the spaz attack later was worth the happy baby now. I let her play with it all the way to Grandma and Grandpa Fosters house! I think it also helped that I gave her the baby Tylenol about 10 minutes before the shots instead of waiting for Crabby Chloe to make her usual post shots appearance. I love drugs!!! (Oh you know what I mean!!!)

On the 23rd, we went to a reception (it's wedding season again!) for one of Preston's friends from MCC (he also went to high school with one of her brothers and MCC with another one of her brothers). It was a very well done backyard reception. Lime green, black and white with a live band and dance floor, lots of yummy food and a lime green drink that exactly matched the decor. Anyway we were eating some really yummy cake at a small standing table (it's tall without chairs so you can just stand around it) off to the side of the dance floor. There were a bunch of kids running around and dancing on the dance floor and we were having fun feeding Chloe frosting and watching them play. At one point I was looking down at my cake trying to get a little bit of the frosting on fork for Chloe when I heard a woman scream "AMMON!!!" I turned my head to see a little boy standing next to me with his pants around his ankles and his underwear coming down fast! Obviously uncontrollable laughing ensued! His mom, I assume as she was the one that screamed "AMMON!", came running over yanked his pants back up and scooped him up and ran into the house. I guess he had to pee. Who needs a toilet when you're a boy and have a whole backyard at your dispense??? Preston was laughing and said "Oh, I can't wait!" I hope he meant that because he'll be the red faced parent yanking up the pants in a public place (I hope)!

Chloe was so tired while we were there. She had refused to take a full nap all day and couldn't hardly keep her eyes open after a while. She held them open as long as she could because there was so much to see with all those kids running around. I got a great picture of Preston and her together, though she looks so tired.
Like 5 minutes after I took that picture though she zonked out. Poor kid. It's clear how tired she was because she never falls asleep sitting up like that. She'll never sleep over my shoulder, only laying down in my arms like a newborn. There's always something to see when she sitting up!

We stopped at the Foster's house on the way home to let them see Chloe for a bit since we were already nearby. Chloe had a bottle there and fell asleep on the way home. I didn't even change her clothes and she barely woke up when I put her in the crib. (Sorry, I had to explain why she is wearing the same clothes in two pictures with dates on them that are one right after the other.) I took this the next morning when I went in to get her up for church on Sunday. This is the morning stretch and smile! She's such a morning person!On Memorial day, we had my sister Selena over and Preston had promised her we would go and play laser tag the next time she came down from Prescott. Brittany K and my brother Louis joined us. We had a ton of fun! I have to admit it was the most exercise I've gotten in one go for a while mostly cause we did 3 rounds!

Afterwords everyone came over for ice cream and some Mario Kart and Boom Blox (super fun Wii game developed by Spielberg). Meredith came over too to bring Chloe home because she had been babysitting while we played laser tag. Brittany left for a while to spend some time with her family and October but ended up coming back for more fun with the Fosters! She brought Tober with her and we got some cute pictures of them in matching onesies. In this one Chloe is on the left and Tober is on the right.
They looked so cute looking up at us. Well, Chloe was looking up, Tober turned out to be stuck like that cause she couldn't lift her head back up. Poor baby!
And this one turned out to be the only on with both of them looking at the camera. Notice the matching onesies!
Yesterday Chloe played... (well, I buried her in toys and she gave me this look that kinda says "Mom... really? Why?"
While I walked on the treadmill (that Preston told my mom he wanted after I had said no because there is nowhere to put it in our cluttered little house) and played Mario Kart. The idea popped into my head as I was falling asleep the night before. I hate walking on treadmills. No! I loathe it! Watching movies doesn't even cut it for me. I can't focus on the movie at all, just how much I hate the treadmill I'm on. And to be honest, it's kinda hot outside now and I'm a wuss that likes to keep my house at arctic temps. Well I was thinking the night before how playing video games kinda require a little more focus than a movie or TV show, so I thought it wouldn't hurt to give it a try. It worked!!! For the most part...

See, I'm one of those people that has to lean when I turn a corner while playing a racing game. I learned yesterday that leaning while walking has the tendency to throw your balance off... Yeah. It would have been funny to watch me in the first place walking and playing and even funnier to watch me fall off the treadmill too. This picture is of the display on the treadmill when I finished. I thought 29 minutes was pretty good considering Chloe kept crying and making me stop and I haven't done that much in a long time. Yesterday was the experiment and it was a success! Look out! Here comes the new and improved diet plan!!! Video games!!! Boo-ya!!! To celebrate my wonderful discovery on how I, too, can enjoy the treadmill, I made cookies! Yeah, well... Two steps forward, one step back, right? Bite me! I did mean to have leftovers for Preston but, uh, that didn't last long. At least I only made six in the first place right?!? Notice my Burger King Spock cup! Sweet right? Yeah, I'm awesome like that!

Happy 6 Month Birthday Chloe!

Today was Chloe's 6 month birthday! I can't believe it's already been 6 months!!! Where did the time go? My baby isn't going to be a baby very much longer huh? I better stop blinking. But the thing is I really do soak in every moment with her, so I don't understand why it's the middle of May and she's 6 months old.

I also recently noticed that she's growing a little more hair lately and her little bald spot on the back of her head is starting to fill in! Yay!

I took pictures of her today to commemorate her halfway mark and noticed that she's starting to look more and more familiar. I dug through some old pictures and figured out why. So here goes... Like Father Like Daughter:

And here we have... Like Mother Like Daughter:

I love that she has her father's grin and her mama's crinkle eyes when she smiles. And I got those from my dad. Too bad she didn't get my dimple! Maybe my next kid. I love this baby girl!

She's getting more and more coordinated and I swear she reads my e-mails... And what I mean by that is I get these e-mails from BabyCenter.com and they will tell me about another milestone or development that I should look for in the next week or two if I haven't already seen it. For example I got one that said my baby should be able to hold a bottle on her own. The next bottle I gave her, she grabbed and held it in her mouth till it was gone. Oh and as an update on the whole rolling over thing. She finally rolled from her tummy to her back but it was more of an accident that I tricked her into. She definitely has her own agenda or schedule or whatever you want to call it. Little stinker!

She's so much fun to play with now too. She will clinch her eyes shut when you blow on her tummy, and laugh when you make a funny noise, or if I just grin at her really big she'll grin really big back at me. We just have too much fun together! I love her so much I just can't stand it sometimes!!! Ha ha! I hugged her so tight today that she barfed on me. I love watching her grow and learn but I wish I could slow down time because it's going too fast!

I better go now. It's way past bedtime and Chloe wakes up with the sun now and the sun comes up before God turns on the air in the summer. I need to get some blackout curtains for her room! Goodnight!

Roll Over Beethoven!

This morning I was laying in bed with Chloe. (When Daddy leaves in the morning he brings Chloe into our bed so we can snuggle.) She had woken up and was kicking me in the stomach (I guess she misses the good ole' days) so I moved her a little away from me towards the middle of the bed. I took my phone off my nightstand and was checking to see if I had any messages. Chloe reached for the phone and I was floored when she ended up on her stomach! I couldn't believe it! I thought it had to be the incline from me laying on the bed with her. I was still excited because before she would always catch herself from going all the way over. So we both moved to the middle of the bed and I moved away from her so I couldn't interfere. I grabbed the camera and I put the phone in her little hand. This is what happened!

Just to be sure I flipped her back over and we tried again. This is proof it wasn't just a one time fluke!

Yay Chloe! My big girl!

PS. This is the VERY first time she has EVER rolled over. She won't even try to roll from front to back. I tried to use the phone to get her to but she caught herself and wouldn't go nearly as far the next time.

*Sneeze*

Bless you.
Need I say more?

The Morning Rain

I have a quick funny story to tell:

This morning I fed Chloe breakfast. I got her in the Bumbo, put the tray on and prepared some rice cereal and mashed bananas. Yum!

I am always surprised when I feed her how much she can pack away before she lets me know she's full. I always make too much so I can save some for later for faster prep. So, we're shoveling food and little miss decides she wants to try out being independent (this isn't the story but it's kinda funny too) and try feeding herself. She's only 5 1/2 months! I cleaned off the spoon, her face, and tray and removed the bowl of food. I gave her the spoon, and she, in a very coordinated way for a 5 month old, took the spoon and scraped it across the tray and put it in her mouth. I was floored! My baby is trying to grow up too fast. The only thing she's behind on right now is that she still hasn't rolled over yet. I know she could if she tried but she won't try. She has the muscle and the ability just not the know how, or curiosity, or whatever it is to try. The funny thing is she can sit up on her own for about 10-20 seconds unsupported now. She'll be walking before she learns to roll over.

Back to my funny story... So we're shoveling food into her little mouth and on one particular bite she didn't swallow but opened her mouth for another bite and I put another one in. Little ham. Then she does that pre-sneeze breathing thing and I'm like "Oh No!". And she sneezes.

Rice cereal sprays everywhere! I caught about half of it of course being right in front of her. The other half of it landed on the tray. I quickly started to clean it up before she started to play in it. And she sneezed... again. Lovely. More spray. Most of this one landed on me because the bits were smaller. Nice. Just for good measure she sneezed one more time but I was ready with a napkin in front of her mouth. Ha! I win! Too late, but yeah.

That's my funny story. It made me laugh, hope you did too!

Happy Birthday to Preston!!!

Preston's birthday was on the 18th of April. He turned 27! He doesn't like how close that is to 30. Poor guy! But we had a good day nevertheless!

The night before the big day Preston and I finished something we started on August 25, 2006! That's 2 years and 8 months! Wanna know what it was? Are you sure? You might roll your eyes... Ok, I warned you.

We finished watching all of the Star Trek series. Seriously. We started with the Original Series with Kirk, then The Next Generation with Picard, after that we skipped ahead to Enterprise with Archer (it takes place before all of them), we started Deep Space Nine with Sisko while we were still working on Enterprise, and finally we finished with Voyager and Captain Janeway. I am officially a nerd. Thanks Preston. The sad part? I really got into it and enjoyed it! I get all the jokes now too! It's totally awesome when someone makes an obscure reference to Klingons and I get what they are saying!!!

So for Preston's birthday we went down to the AZ Science Center to the Star Trek Exhibit they have there. It was so sweet! Knowing what everything was and noticing the indiscrepancies in the replicas and examining the details of the real stuff. We weren't allowed to take pictures in it but they had photographers there and I got the one I really really wanted. This:

Freaking awesome right??? (In my best Crush-from-Finding-Nemo voice (head nodding included)) Chloe in the captain's chair.

Preston liked his presents. I gave him The Fountain (his favorite movie) and a iTunes gift card. His parents gave him a bunch of stuff too. As well as a nice dinner at B.J.'s, mmmmm...

The Grandparents and their baby's.

Of course no post is complete without a melt-your-heart-super-cute picture of Chloe! I love this kid! She's not rolling over yet but she loves to talk. And sing! She sings to the music I play in the car now! I love it. We sing at the top of our lungs in the car together now! I almost cried the first time she did it and actually was hitting some of the notes. My baby didn't get her singing genes from her father!!! YAY!

Doin' the Hokey Pokey...

Ok, that title sounded kinda bad... or was that just me? Anyways... I was getting a bottle for Chloe this morning while she was sitting in her bumbo on the table waiting for me. I started walking towards her while I was shaking it and it made me think of the hokey pokey, so I started singing it. She laughed when I spun around, clapped my hands and threw my leg up in the air. So I did it again, and again... and like 5 more times after that. She was laughing so hard and it made me laugh and all was wonderful!

Meredith came over a few hours later so we made a video... enjoy!

WARNING: Chloe's laughter is EXTREMELY contagious!

Getting what I want...

After very little agonizing on my part about chopping off my hair, I picked a haircut and called a friend. Every time before now when I thought I might want to cut my hair I would make the decision very slowly. First I had to be absolutely sure I wanted to cut it at all. Then I would agonize over several pictures and ask everyone and their dog which one they thought I should get before finally picking one. Then I would take my time getting around to asking someone to cut it for me.

This time I blogged and the next day called texted a friend and she came over a day or two later. Of the few pictures I had selected this was the favorite of the friends that commented and me.
My beautiful hair!!! Soon to be someone else's beautiful hair! I hope they like it. I sure did.

Well anyways I made a discovery... apparently it's hard for a friend to cut off that much hair on someone who has as much thick beautiful hair as me! I asked for that haircut and she said no at first so we compromised. It was cute but not what I wanted. I wanted it really short this time. Not quite a pixie cut but not a bob either. I called another friend... She's amazing! It took awhile to get together to do it but we did yesterday and I love it!!! The night before I went to her house I also colored my hair. I have a favorite color that I LOVE. It's by Garnier and it's called Cherry Chocolate! I was sold on the name alone when I found it the first time. The great color was a perk that came with it!

It turned out great I think. And this is the final product... The first picture is the first haircut, cute but not short enough, and the second is me now...Yay! It's way cuter in person too! I love it!
Thanks to both Nici and Lynette for all the hard work they put into my hair! Love you guys!

Bad Day?

Today I went to Costco. It took me 4 hours to get out of the house and go, but I went. Yay me! On the way back home with milk, grapes and some frozen food in my trunk, I decided to make a quick stop at JoAnn's Fabric to get some fleece to make a really girly little blanket for Chloe (I'm the only one who hasn't so far). I knew they were having a 50% off sale on exactly what I wanted too. So I stopped to check and get some if I found the perfect thing.

I turned off the car, pulled my wallet out of the diaper bag and put the bag behind the passengers seat (I was just going in really quick), opened my door, got out, opened Chloe's door, hit the lock button on mine and closed it. Then I put the keys and my wallet down on the seat to get Chloe's car seat out of the car. I pulled her out and managed to not wake her up, grabbed my wallet and shut the door.

I had a nice time shopping around looking at all the different patterns and I was torn between a few for a bit but gave up and went with what I liked the best (she won't care, right?). I mean why wouldn't Amy Lynn's daughter have a blanket that looked like this???
So I paid for my fabric (11 bucks for 2 yards and a foot! Woot Woot!) and headed out to my car. As I approached the car I reached into my pocket and my heart stopped... Where were my keys?!? I checked the other pocket as I looked in the back door window. CRAP! There they were. Just waiting for me to grab them when I grabbed my wallet to go inside.

Fortunately my in-laws live close by and they came to pick me up AND I had the car seat on the outside of the car. The UNfortunate part was I locked the diaper bag in the car... No diapers, bottle, formula... Nothing! Well, they had diapers from when they had her while we were sick recently, and formula, but no bottles. So we made a quick stop at a Walgreen's to get one. Everything turned out ok. Thank goodness!

Oh but the fun didn't end there!!!

Preston stopped at their house on his way home and gave me his keys so and yada yada yada (who cares how I got back?). So I'm in the car again... I get home and as I'm about to put the key in the door I notice a disturbing outline sitting on the door frame much to close for comfort to my hand. I quickly yanked my hand back and fumbled with my little flashlight on my key chain and confirm my fears. A very large icky spider that looked like it could eat 3 or 4 horse flies in one sitting was there right above the doorknob!!! I flicked it off with the envelope I had just pulled out of the mailbox and open the door.

MORE drama awaits me inside!!!!

There was ('was' being the key word) a bag of garbage sitting just inside the door because it hadn't made it outside yet (we get lazy... what can I say?) that I hadn't noticed on my haphazard way out the door (why, oh why, didn't I notice it???). Charlie apparently decided that there was too many wonderful things that smelled too good to stay on the inside of the plastic so he gave it back it's freedom... ALL... OVER... THE... HOUSE...................... (insert swear word here)!!!!!!!! Among his new found treasures were several diapers, junk mail soaked in something brown, and several unidentifiable little bits of ew mixed with some yuck and a bit of nasty sprinkled over the top. I'm sure he ate everything that once was leftovers but there was a smell that hazed over the top that I'm sure is what doggie heaven smells like. (I hope no one was eating while you read this, if so consider it a new type of diet and you're welcome!) Anyways... when I come home to a destroyed house the dog seems to mysteriously vanish. He knows he's in trouble before I even see it. This is my version of "Where's Waldo?" Only it's "Where's Charlie?" can you find him? I took this a while ago, when the sight of him was funnier to me than the mess was irritating. But it's all the same.


I usually feel bad to see him like this. I swear I don't ever hurt him but he has such a guilt conscience. I just wish it would kick in before he got into stuff! I didn't feel bad tonight. I told him (in my most evil deep voice... several times) he was a bad dog and put him outside. Then I sat down with Chloe and let her distract me from crying. She did the trick, she's just to cute to want to cry!

When Preston came home I told him I had a bad day and he cleaned up the WHOLE mess for me! I didn't even ask him to! (Weird, he must want something ;) ) I love you sweetheart!

I really don't understand why I am in such a good mood right now... after all that. That's weird too.