Emolyn and Grammie

Linda came over today to drop some more gifts off for Emolyn (I think every time I see her she has found another cute outfit!). And an awesome gift from Aunt Ginny, specially made for me! I snapped a few photos of the girls together.

She is getting so big! Emolyn, not Linda! 21 inches long! She grew 6 inches in 5 months, you would think that would hurt but she is just a trooper. Eating almost constantly. Making me hobble around. I guess that parts not her fault. 

Haven't heard from the mall people yet, will call tomorrow.

I am doing a test run this weekend working nights. 7 pm to 7 am. Wish me luck! I would make 20% more. Mostly Shawn wants me to do this full time so he and Emolyn can stay home and go to the mall everyday!

Emolyn tried bananas in rice cereal. As with everything else she hated it. But we are continuing to practice! I did give her the hole banana and she loved it. I stuck the end in her mouth and she just gummed it! So I know its not the taste. Any ideas on how I can find a better texture?

Blog challenge: What is your favorite article of clothing? I will post mine tomorrow!

free stuff

The mother of all give-a-ways has arrived. Check it out here. There are crafts and books and toys oh my! Sign up for as many as you can! Here are a couple I like:

Power of a Positive mom

Bath and Body Gift Card

Bumbo covers (I could die!)

Free earrings

on a happier note...

Check out Shawns video blog about his day with Emolyn. He thinks he soooo cool. Also check out the new blog from the Ellis family. My sister in law Michelle has started a blog to document the comings and goings on of her busy family. Her pictures are so fun and her family so awesome. She is a great mom. Its so fun to hear her words of wisdom.

On another note I found something Emolyn likes. Fruit leather! Its just pureed fruit dried, but she can suck on it. I think you guys are totally right, its all about consistency. She doesn't like that thick feeling of food in her mouth. So I have watered down the rice cereal with breast milk and she is taking that better also. Slowly but surely!

Worked this weekend with the boot. Not too bad. I did have to take 3 flights of stairs in a hurry though! That was no fun. Since I left of last time with complaints I will leave off this time with a few more positive thoughts I have been having:

At least I can walk, sort of

At least I can drive (even if it is a million degrees in the car)

My foot only smells bad when I take the boot off

I don't gag from Emolyns poopy diapers like Shawn does (he also gagged pouring breast milk the other day, he said it grossed him out. Thanks. I wanted to say "you gross me out" but I tried not to take it personally.)

And finally, I get to sleep without my boot on tonight!

***

Why doesn't Maurice understand what "please don't step on my foot, its broken" mean? Its like he doesn't even care.

Puree everything

Emolyn has stared eating solid foods per drs orders. But she hates it. I made apple sauce and pureed some carrots and she doesn't like either of those. And let me tell you, the carrots come out just like they went in. I have been making her baby food and freezing it in individual packs so they are ready to defrost.

I should hear today from Mall security about the next step to take in my mishap.

Also today I am making cupcakes with Meredith for Jeannette's shower. Thats right Jeannette started a blog, check it out here.  We are making Paula Deen's lemon blossoms but turning them into lime to match the party color scheme.

Todays complaints:

I have a splinter in the bottom of my good foot.

The boot makes black scuff marks all over my tile. 

I was icing my foot with a bag of frozen cherries. The bag leaked cherry juice inside my boot.

Life is hard for the disabled.

Just had to get those off my chest.

The infamous asphalt

Well in case you were wondering my foot is still broken. I filed my incident report today, as it turns out they knew the dip in the asphalt was there and neglected to do anything about letting other people know it was there until it got fixed. So, at least they knew, so its less like I made the whole thing up!

But today was cousin day! Jason and Michelle spent part of the day together celebrating their 14th anniversary, this is the first time in 10 years he hasn't been out of town doing ministry stuff on their anniversary. So the kids all came over and man do they like Emolyn and Pirates of the Carribean. Nora wanted to hold Emolyn all day and the boys both entertained her. Until the pizza came then she was yesterdays news! But they just love her so much. I was thinking about when she is 10 and Nora is 16. Man will she think Nora is just the coolest thing ever! And the kids were all such a big help getting things for me and helping with Maurice (Winston loves Maurice, the last time he spent the night we had to drag him out of Maurice's gross bed!)

Are you jealous?

Well good news and bad news. I visited the podiatrist this morning. Bad news: My fifth metatarsal is broken, in 2 places (note this is listed as a common injury among athletes like myself). I did work for 8 hours on saturday until going down to the ER to get an xray. Good news: I have this awesome boot. It only weighs like 10 lbs and I have to wear it for 6 weeks. Lugging 10 pounds around everywhere I go. Its almost Emolyn strapped to my foot. Its called a cam walker. Very stylish. 

And the lovely Melanie painted my toes so I wouldn't be so embarrassed. She even put flowers on them! And hopefully I will be able to go back to work this weekend. I will see tomorrow. 

This whole injury thing was not in the budget. 

At least no more crutches! Other than fingers and toes this is my first real broken bone! Its all very exciting. 

So life as usual, just a little slower, its a good thing Emolyn is so patient.

Today in the life of me

Whoa! So I had no idea this was such a big deal seeing as my humble friend has mentioned it only vaguely and when you ask Shawn, "so what does Aaron do at his new job?" he says "He goes to meetings and meets people". So you can see how I could not have known this was such a huge deal. Check out how awesome our friend Aaron is here and here. We are so proud. And there is an interview process for all perspective dates. Please email me if interested. I run the process and it is very strict. Please dress appropriately or you won't even be allowed to proceed with the interview.  Note: The dress is business casual. And I know you don't know what that means, no one does.

On a side note scary event this am. Went to costco with my lovely daughter and on the way to the car we hit a dip in the asphalt with the cart and my beautiful baby went flying in the air. She was still strapped in her car seat but the entire car seat came out of the cart and flipped head over feet upside down toward the end of the cart. I caught the car seat, upside down, before she hit the pavement but oh my gosh, Perhaps the scariest time of my life. She got the tinniest scratch on her forehead, gone now, but I took her out and held her and she consoled fine. She is totally ok. But the cart full of flats of water bottles and other plus sized goods landed on my foot. And wow does it hurt. My wonderful friend Jessica came over and unloaded my car for me. I hope my foot is ok because we already have one handicap friend. I think its just a bad bruise, pray for a bruise.

Some post accident photos to let you know she is ok. She has a small red spot on the left side of her forehead but you cant even see it the pics. all is well.

Sweetest little ladies

Here is an awesome video taken by Grammie Linda of the two Emolyns. This is such a special thing to have captured on video.

We just got our first video camera so hopefully more video to come soon!

I am so lucky

I got it! Her first real laugh! I wanted to cry it was so awesome. It wasn't just the laugh but that, like many of her other firsts, I am there. I am her mom. And we get to do everything together. I love it. And it really makes me love my mom too. Knowing that 26 years ago she was looking at her little girl doing the same thing. So this is dedicated to my mom. Thanks.

Oh and yes she is drooling! I think she is teething already because she is always sticking stuff in her mouth and drooling like crazy!

Picture update

Emolyn and I had a little photo shoot while staying at Jason and Michelles. We spent some time scrap booking but mostly watching the addicting Gilmore Girls. We are almost done with the entire series, tear. But I knew Rory had to grow up some day.

And much of our time at the Ellis house was spent swimming. Emolyn is so comfortable in the water its great! But she has to wear her sun had to protect her pretty little face!

Like her new Zebra swim suit? Guess where I got it. Ok, the dollar store. I know! I thought it might disintegrate when it touched the water, but she has used it several times and it is actually holding up quite well.

My weekend was spent working. Nothing spectacular. But we did get to celebrate my brothers birthday which was fun to get to see the whole family and eat Jason's special birthday cake and my mom made lamb it was delicious! On the bummer side my wonderful friend Jeannette broke her ankle. I am so sad for her. And she is 30 weeks pregnant. So she is so middle heavy it makes crutches nearly impossible. So Emolyn and I will be spending some time at her house this week helping her. Poor Jeannette, so innocent, so clumsy.

First Monsoon!

Emolyn experienced her first monsoon last night! Really her first time in rain! It was raining the day she was born. Of course I didn't get to see the rain but everyone told me it was there. So here she is my cute little button in the rain with her daddy!

Vegas baby!

Here are some pics from Vegas Vacation 2K7. Look forward to Vegas 08 in October at the Bellagio!

Swim Lessons

Emolyn is lucky enough to be surrounded by talented swim teachers! Once a week Emolyn is going over to Miss Jessicas house where Miss Jessica and Miss Jeannette help Emolyn get comfortable in the pool. She floats on her back and when she is supposed to blow bubbles in the water she sticks her tongue into the pool. She tries to kick and she doesn't scream too loud when she gets dunked. The teachers say she is really good.

We having been staying at Jason and Michelles for a few days and so Emolyn has gotten more swimming in, and I got some scrappin done. I am ready to scrap Vegas 07. Shawn and I annually go to Las Vegas with the Trys and Verbargs. It is usually only 2 days but we jam pack like a week of crazy fun in. When I get home tomorrow I will add some great Vegas photos!

Independence Day Girl

Emolyn and I wore red white and blue over to my grandparents house on the 4th (Emolyn only wore red and white but her eyes are clue so we counted that). And I had to change pretty early on since Emolyn got poop on my shirt. Its hard having little tiny butt cheeks, sometimes poop slips out! We also enjoyed the company of my uncle Gary, my cousin Nate and his lovely fiance Nicole. I also brought Maurice so he didn't have to stay home all day alone and my uncle brought his dog Buster, they had a great time together, lots of drool and sniffing.

And then there was Saturday. My day to work and they canceled me in the morning, said they didn't need me until 3, so I was scheduled to work 3 -7:30. Easy you would think, only a couple of hours. The whole thing was so insane it was comical. I had what felt like a million patients and about a million things to do for each of them. I would tell you more but I think the whole patient confidentiality thing might be lost. But feel free to call for the funny story. But alas I got off over an hour late and missed getting to hang out at a gathering with Nate and Nicole, who we don't get to see often enough.

Missed seeing my bro on his birthday, he was too busy. But hopefully a get together when they get back into town. And Scrappin today! I haven't scrapbooked in so long. I thought all this time at home with the baby would mean time to do the cool stuff I wanted but instead it just gave me more dumb stuff to do like laundry and moping the floors. Yuck. Here is my latest mini craft project though. I made going back to school/new apartment magnets for Miranda!

My new favorite things

Here are a couple of fun things a have found recently

1. Baby Bling, you know how I love to combine fun and functional

2. We found out Emolyn is not alone in her "ailment". Heres what can help.

3. Lastly we got Emolyn a bumbo chair! She loves it because it makes her feel like a big girl. We also got the tray that clips on the front for when she is into grabbing things or its good for snacks. She can't quite sit their for a long time without sorta slumping over so switty helps but otherwise she loves it! We chose the gender neutral seafoam green