Christmas has come and gone

This year was very different for us. With our family spread out all over the country and even in Mexico, and me not able to travel, we were on our own for the Holiday. We had plans to make the most of it, including great food, church, drives to see Christmas lights and Christmas movies. But when your daughter comes down with the stomach flu and throws up on her daddy in the middle of Christmas eve service plans sort of get thrown out the window. Sam continued to throw up threw Christmas day and then I caught it on Saturday night.
We were thrilled to have my parents come up to see us on the 26th but I spent the whole first day of their visit in bed, unable to even keep juice down! My parents were wonderful though, helping to keep Sam busy and away from me for that whole day and then they even changed their plans to stay an extra day with us so that we could get some good family visiting time. It meant a lot to us that they adjusted their lives just to stay up here for one more day with us.
With all the sickness there wasn't much to take pictures of so unfortunately this Holiday has come and gone with very few photos.

Christmas Eve...BEFORE the throwing up in church occurred.

Christmas morning. Still sick and crabby but opening gifts anyway.

CHEESE!

Sledding with Pawpaw and Grandma while I stayed in bed.

CHEESE!

A trip to the National Mustard Museum...oh yes, Madison has a National Mustard Museum!!

And an amazing dinner out at a beautiful restaurant that actually has an underground tunnel to get from one building to another. So cool.

Now, we play the waiting game. The emergency bags are packed, plans have been made for who to contact to help out with Sam, and we think we are ready...think. So we wait to see when Avery will be ready to join us. The absolute worst case scenario I think would be for her to come tonight or early tomorrow morning!! I don't think we can count on our in town contacts to be available on New Year's Eve. I am 38 weeks along today and at my last appointment I was 2cm dilated. Could be days, could be weeks. I will keep you posted!

Who knew Baby Alive would be such a hit!

Last Saturday Chris's grandparents came to visit and bring Sam her Christmas presents. They have given her some amazing gifts in the past and this year was no different. Sam got a Baby Alive doll and a stroller. Chris and I had talked about wanting to get Sam a doll before Avery gets here so that she has a baby to take care of just like how I will be taking care of Avery. So we were excited to see the doll. However, Baby Alive can actually be fed, wet herself, POOP!, cry and laugh. The crying and laughing is not bad, although it kind of freaks Sam out, but the rest of it is a bit much for me to deal with. Sam is too young to change a diaper so I would be responsible for doing that part of the "playing". The last thing I need is another diaper to change so this Baby Alive is just going to be a doll with a strange hole in its mouth! When Grandma picked out the doll she didn't realize all the functions that it had, she just thought the face was cute, which it is, so the "alive" part was a surprise to her too! Either way Sam LOVES the doll. Chris and I very quickly got sick of hearing her say "baby" over and over again so we named the doll Madison. She takes Madison with her everywhere and gets very upset when she has to do things like eat a meal or take a bath and Madison cannot do it with her. But it is so cute how she gives Madison hugs and kisses.




Tonight is Christmas Eve Eve and at my parent's home in St. Louis there will be 30+ people gathered together eating great food, catching up, singing Christmas songs and playing games. This year because of the timing of baby Avery we won't be there for the big Christmas party. This is the first year I have ever missed it. But it will be okay. Chris and I have a great meal planned and then will be heading out to see Christmas lights. Our family may be small tonight but we will be celebrating Eve Eve all the same!

Happy Christmas EVE EVE Everyone!

No Santa Picture

Sam sometimes struggles with men. I don't know what it is but it can take her a lot longer to warm up to guys than it does to women. So I was a bit worried about how she would react to sitting on Santa's lap. I talked up Santa all day on Tuesday, we read books, looked at pictures and said Santa a lot. I thought this would help to get her excited and not be scared. We got there and she was actually excited to see him but the second we set her on his lap she started freaking out! Once she started crying Santa immediately put her down; apparently he does not hold screaming children. We tried a couple times to calm her down and get her to sit with him but she wouldn't. So they had me sit down next to Santa and have Sam on my lap. Well of course I originally had no intention of being in this picture so I looked awful, may have even been wearing sweats! So when she showed us our Santa picture that we could purchase I said absolutely not. I would have MUCH rather had the screaming one! I am so bummed that we don't have this photo this year; we may have to try again this weekend.
Sam looked way too "cute" to not get some kind of picture of her, so we made her stand outside the Santa area to get a picture.

a walk, a ball and COOKIES!

Our first snow/winter walk!For Christmas my sister got Chris this pad of paper that has the patterns of balls on the reverse side so that when you are done with the piece of paper and ball it up you have a little ball to play with. Sam totally gets the concept and has had fun with the soccer ones!


Sam "helped" me with Christmas cookies yesterday. I got all the melting and mixing done and thought for sure that given enough instruction she could put a redhot on each of the wreaths. Well she soon realized that what she was touching was yummy and she went from "helping" to eating! You will notice the green marshmallow goo EVERYWHERE, including on her legs! Bathtime happened immediately after cookie baking was over.

The finished product.

smarter than me ALREADY

I knew that someday my daughter's technological abilities would surpass mine. There was no doubt that this would happen and I was fully prepared for her to come home from elementary school, shoot even preschool, and know how to use some computer program that I had never even heard of. But she is not even two yet and knows more about how to use her father's IPod Touch than I do.
Chris started playing games with her on it while we were on the plane to Mexico and since then she has been addicted. Asking to play with "dada's phone" all the time. This morning as I was brushing the dog's hair I could hear the sounds of the animal matching game. Then I realized that Chris was NOT sitting with her! She was actually playing the game, and making matches, all on her own!! This seems a bit ridiculous to me. I don't even know how to turn the thing on! I am sure I could figure it out (maybe after being shown once, HA!) and could probably even learn how to do some things on there but she is not even two yet. I was just not prepared to be made to feel stupid by a child that is still learning to use a fork!

Good grief!

apartment life just gets better and better

We are trying to make the best of this crappy situation but life just keeps throwing us more challenges with living in this apartment. Since the snow fall we have not had consistent television because the Dish that we have is apparently covered in snow (no shit!) and doesn't work when it has snow on it. No kidding, the technician that my husband talked to said that we would just have to wait for it to melt!! We got almost two feet of snow and this is Wisconsin once it snows it doesn't melt until March! We got the Dish instead of Charter originally because it would save us some money and we have had so many problems with Charter in the past that we didn't really want to go back to that again. I know TV should not be that big of a deal but it is how I relax and as pathetic as it is I have my shows that I do not want to miss. We finally got someone to agree to come out and look at our dish but they wouldn't fit us in until next Thursday! Crappy service.
The big apartment drama this evening however was over parking. We recently arranged for me to have a parking spot in the garage and were given the spot number by the building management. They seem to have given us a number for a spot that was already taken. The person who's spot we took, took someone else's spot. THAT person decided to just park the other person in! Tonight, the car that did the blocking had his car alarm going off for almost an hour! Imagine a car alarm going off in a garage that is located UNDERNEATH an entire apartment building!! There were some pretty pissed off people. One of which was the guy who's car was blocked in (he has twin little girls that I can only assume were being woken up by the car alarm). There were threats to "take it outside" by the two men and then HE (the guy with the girls) CALLED THE POLICE! So the cops came and started going door to door until they found out who's car was the original spot stealing culprit (that would be US!). They came to our door and asked us why we were parked in someone's spot. Chris said it was the number we were given but we would gladly move to an outdoor spot until we could get this sorted out.
Crazy neighbors!

We had such good neighbors in Stevens Point, oh how I wish for them back.

lazy day

Well, playing in the snow turned into baking cookies and watching movies. Sam didn't take much of a nap and Chris and I were feeling pretty lazy, so once she did get up we didn't really feel like getting everyone all bundled up to go outside. Not to mention that this afternoon the wind picked up and has been blowing the 18 + inches that we have on the ground all over the place, along with the snow that continues to fall.
When we gave up on getting Sam to nap I started working on my first batch of Christmas cookies while Chris and Sam snuggled on the couch and watched Polar Express. It was adorable to see the two of them with a sippy cup and bowl of cheerios all cuddled in the blankets together. Sam almost made it through the entire movie too which was quite impressive. She has never been one for TV and usually won't sit still that long for anything.
But it was really a very peaceful afternoon. With the music and sounds of Christmas coming from the TV, the smell of ginger snaps filling the apartment and falling snow out the window I was almost able to really get into the holiday spirit!

SNOW DAY!

Chris got a snow day from work today! Didn't even know that was possible. Madison has been totally covered in over a foot of snow. It is beautiful but kind of a nightmare to get out of the apartment at all. I was in desperate need of something from Walgreens this morning (pregnancy related...don't ask!). Chris took the dog out and checked the roads, quickly realizing that our small cars would never even make it out of the parking lot. So, he walked a mile and a half to Walgreens for me! And according to him it was uphill both ways. HA!
We are hoping to get out in the snow sometime this afternoon with Sam and the dog. I may risk a snowy camera just to capture Sam in her snow suit and her first big snow this year!

Happy Snow Day if you are also having one!!

our house

I haven't mentioned our house in Stevens Point for a while because it is kind of depressing to think about it just sitting there. We haven't had but one or two people come to see it in the last few months and no more open houses. The Stevens Point housing market is just dead right now.
But the most recent development is that the house is currently NOT listed! WTF you say? Oh yeah, our house is actually, technically, off the market right now. See we got an email on November 30, rather late that day actually, from our realtor stating that he was moving to a new agency and that as of December 1st he would no longer be our agent. Kind of a shocker! You would think a little more notice might be appropriate. Our options were to stick with the same company and have them assign us a new agent, switch agencies to be able to stick with the same guy or start the process over and have the house off the market for a little while. We chose option three. This means that we have to start "interviewing" potential agents again and figuring out a new price (or stick with the same price). We are also going to be looking at possibly renting the house to friends of a friend so this gives us some time as well to work that out. The plus side is that if we keep the house off for a full 30 days then when we re-list it becomes a new listing again and might catch more peoples eyes. 30 days doesn't seem like that big of a deal especially because of the holidays, I mean who is really out there house shopping right now anyway.
The whole thing is extremely frustrating. I cannot tell you how much I want to sell our house and start looking for our new home; we are ready to be done with this apartment!

one more post about Cabo

I know you are totally sick of hearing about our trip to Cabo but there are just a few more pictures that I have to share. Aunt Lori, Uncle Carl and Uncle Craig all went surfing and it was fun hanging out on the beach and watching them battling the waves.
Uncle Carl with an amazing wipe out!




Uncle Craig and Uncle Carl also showed off their "slack lining" skills. Don't ask me to explain really what it is or why it came from but Craig and Lori have been doing it for years, and it is fun to watch. Chris and I are horrible at it but Sam was a natural!

one of many

I feel like I have lots to update you all on and thought this morning that I would do one great big post but instead I think I am going to break it up into many small posts today and tomorrow! Lucky you!

34 Weeks! Today I am 34 weeks along. Doctor's appointment yesterday went very smooth. I am back into normal weight gain range (apparently all you need to do is go to a foreign country and eat guacamole almost everyday!). Avery's heart beat was very strong. Sam was with me and her face when Avery kicked really loud over the monitor was pretty cute. My blood pressure was fine and my belly measured right on target. Everything is normal and going great. We still need to get pre-registered with the hospital for the delivery and figure out what the heck we are going to do with Sam when the time comes for me and Chris to head to the hospital but I am sure we will figure something out.

Okay, time for breakfast....be back later.

Belly Photos!

I haven't done a great job of documenting this pregnancy. I don't do many updates just solely devoted to the baby on here and my pregnancy journal that I was really good at keeping up with for the first pregnancy was all but forgotten after the first few months this go round. I also have not been great about taking belly photos. Since I am not keeping a pregnancy journal really I have no place to put the belly photos so I haven't taken many. But while we were in Mexico, and I was dressed up for a dinner out, I decided it was time to show off the belly!

So these first two are my attempt at being sexy and creative with my belly shots. I saw a maternity shoot that my sister did with Fresh Art Photography a while back and fell in love with the way they made the pregnant woman just look so cool and sexy; I thought I would try...apparently I just don't have the right look! HA! I will leave the creative posing to the professionals from now on!


Then I got really brave and did a bare belly shot! LOOK AT THAT BELLY! Good thing you can't see it up close!
And finally just a normal profile shot attempting to smile with what of course turns out to look like the fakest smile in the world. My sister would have been yelling at me to smile for real at this point!So there you go. Belly shots. I have a doctors appointment on Wednesday, 34 weeks at that point, hopefully I will remember to get on here at least tell you all how things are going.

AND... we have a name! We can officially say that Avery Lee Enlund will be joining our family sometime in the next 6 weeks (hopefully towards the end of that!).

Happy Thanksgiving!

Even in Mexico you can have a traditional Thanksgiving feast. It may take a bit longer to find all the ingredients and you may have to sacrifice a few things but it can still taste just like Thanksgiving. We had a great day yesterday filled with the beach, the pool, a little bit of shopping, football and a lot of great food. Seems pretty typical.

Some pictures from our Thanksgiving!



Not the greatest picture but there is the family enjoying the Thanksgiving feast.
Post-turkey lounging with Aunt Lori.
Pool keep-away helped to burn off some of the enormous amount of calories that we had eaten! Grandpa, Nana and Sam watched safely from the hot tub. I did participate quite a bit but seeing me try to jump around, chase after a football and compete with my very tall family was not a pretty sight!
Hope your turkey day was filled with family and great food!

Okay, Chris worked his magic and got the very large sized pictures up on here. We are headed into Cabo San Lucas today for some site seeing and shopping!







Sam and I enjoying our virgin strawberry daiquiri.

Lovin Life in the Sun

We survived three airports and two long flights to make it to Cabo safely. We have only been here a couple of days but already I feel so relaxed and refreshed. It has been very nice.

Chris got to go deep sea fishing yesterday, caught a fish and even saw whales! I could not handle the 8 hours on the boat, and of course neither could Sam, so we stayed behind at the house. I am very jealous about seeing the whales. Even though I am not a big ocean person for some reason I have ALWAYS wanted to see a whale in the wild (not that I have seen one in captivity either, but I think that would just make me sad). I won't lie that when they told me they actually saw a whale I was so jealous I almost cried, almost.

So, here are some pictures from our first few days. Of course there will be more to come.

*Okay, I have been trying for three days to finish this post and upload the pictures and finally my patience has run out. I don't know what is wrong but the pictures just do not want to upload. Sorry, but you are going to have to wait to see the whale!

Meeting Spot

Wednesday Sam and I went to a library program to meet the storybook character Spot. Sam loves her Spot books and I knew she would get excited to see the actual dog in person. The program started out with the library staff reading Spot books, then we watched a quick Spot video. Sam did not want to sit still with all the other kids during these portions and it was a bit difficult to keep her on my lap. But then they got to meet Spot. She joined the rest of the kids as they mobbed this poor adult dressed up as a dog. It was pretty cute.

Shaking hands with Spot.

Fascinated by the tail!

Waving goodbye to Spot.

She did not want to leave at the end of the program, of course, so there were lots of tears but overall I am glad that we went.