Snot Faced Kids

I was beyond blessed with Avery. She literally NEVER gets sick. She has been sick ONE TIME since she was born and it was a wicked bad cold and cough the week we brought the twins home and she was quarantined to the upstairs loft so she didn't get the babies sick.

ONE TIME. EVER.

I never had to use the booger sucker with her. Not once.

Forget it. Right now, the twins are bright green, snot faced little aliens. Like, you'd think we were killing them every time we suctioned out their noses. I've heard that with your first kid, they almost never get sick and then you have one or two more and someone is always sick. Well, that is proving to be true.

I keep thinking that they're awake, but really, the video monitor we have has such good microphones that I am hearing their little snorts and snores and grunts because they can barely breathe. It sounds like a pack of wild pigs in their room. With a cold mist humidifier. Which is making feeding them really fun. Whenever I try to nurse Caris, she has a complete meltdown because her nose is stuffy (even after using the evil booger sucker) and with her mouth sealed on my boob or a bottle, she can't breathe.

Has anyone seen the X-Files movie? I love that movie. Anyone? You know the scene at the end where Mulder saves Sculley from the alien ship in Antarctica? And she has started to turn into an alien and kind of looks like she's intubated with a giant mucus hose? Let me remind you...

Well, when we get the kids up from naps, the tip of their nose to their lips are pretty much SEALED with bright green boogers. They're smiley and laughing though. And blowing bubbles in their snot mustaches.

Of course I made the mistake of googling "infant colds" and I just need to stop googling infant problems. Inevitably, I am diagnosing my children with terminal illnesses when I google.

So now I come to you all as I am TOTALLY inexperienced with infant sickness. Tips for dealing with infant colds? Home remedies? HELP! My twins are turning into the X-files aliens and it's a little disturbing.

Bed Rest - Day 1

Yesterday was not a good day.

It started off great. Troy took leave for the day so that he could do some things around the house and spend some quality time with his mom. We all went out for an early breakfast at Babystacks, a local specialty pancake place. They dropped me off at home so that I could have a relax day. All alone. YES. They traded me for Optimus and went to Floyd Lamb park, which has peacocks and is very cool. They all went straight to the vet on base.

I was feeling kinda weird at home. I was relaxing on the couch, drinking tons of water, and watching trash tv. It should have been a good day. But I was having contractions and heartburn and my stomach hurt and I just felt "weird." I called Troy around 1230 and asked when they were going to be home. He said they were on their way and I told him I was going to head upstairs to lay down because I didn't feel well.

Once I got upstairs, I climbed in bed with my kindle. Now that I was completely still, not watching TV, with no distractions, I decided to start timing my contractions. I was had 5 in 10 minutes. Woah. I texted my doctor and he immediately told to forget my meds schedule and go ahead and take a muscle relaxer and get back to him in 2 hours. DONE!

Troy put Avery down for her nap and climbed in bed with me to keep me company while I ate lunch and kept timing contractions. They were NOT calming.

At 3 I texted Dr. Adashek again and told him what was going on. He wasn't in the office that day, but told me to get to the office within 15 minutes or to head to the hospital. We decided to book it out the door and avoid the hospital. That was the LAST place I wanted to go. Thank God Troy's mom was here, we could head out the door immediately and know that Avery was taken care of.

We got to the office and they immediately ushered me back for an ultrasound. SURE ENOUGH, Kinley's head is RIGHT on my cervix and I had 2 contractions during the ultrasound, during which you could see my cervix dilating all the way to where the stitch was the only thing holding everything in. Crap.

Then they took me over to a fetal monitoring room where they strapped me in and measured my contractions for about 10-15 minutes. Sure enough, there they were. Steady and strong. Double crap.

Another doctor I had never seen before came in and gave me a new medication called nifedipine. It's actually a blood pressure medication and some kind of calcium blocker...which the doc said could make me really dizzy since my BP runs low anyway. YAY side effects. He also said that this medication should be considered an "in case of emergency, break glass" medicine. I made sure to take it right when I picked it up. He also told me that if I started bleeding or having pain to go to the hospital. If the medication didn't help he also wanted me to make an appointment the next day.

Troy and I went and picked it up immediately and I took it in the car before we headed home. I hung out on the couch and snuggled Avery, watching "Toy Story" while Troy and his mom made dinner. My contractions were still going. We ate dinner. My contractions were still going. Avery got a bath and came down and said good night to me. And my contractions were still going.

So I texted my Doc again. He asked me if I wanted to go to the hospital. Um no. He called and gave me a pretty ugly lecture. He informed me that the medications I'm on are a pretty heavy duty and there is nothing else they can do at this point. AND that those medications SHOULD be the second line of defense behind bed rest, but he's been giving me the benefit of the doubt that I've been taking it easy already. Which clearly I wasn't.

He explained that if I didn't figure out a solution for help at home with Avery, he would admit me to the hospital and FORCE ME to figure it out and get help. I am allowed to go to the bathroom, shower, move from the couch to the bed (and vice versa) and use the microwave. That's pretty much it. OH and go to doctor appointments. He said that the LESS activity I did, the less contractions I'll have. Which makes sense because when people are trying to get babies OUT at 40 weeks, they are walking, cleaning floors, having sex, hula hooping, etc to bring on contractions. Which is what I want to avoid. No hula hooping for me.

So I am officially on bed rest. If you know me at all, this is torture. I'll have some tips for you later this week for how to keep from going insane. YAY!

My cousin will be here friday, so I'm currently arranging help until then. And attempting to bribe family with slobbery Avery kisses to fill holes in the visitor schedule until my mom comes in October.

All I can say is thank you Jesus for our Air Force family and small group from church.

Mom. Seriously. If you don't send that paperwork soon, we will have words. Loud ugly ones. Mkay? LOVE YOU!

Thank God for Her Puddle Jumper

Troy's schedule is going to be weird the next few weeks. His hours are scheduled from 12noon to 8pm. He leaves for work around 11 so that doesn't give us much family time in the morning.

On Troy's first day of his crazy schedule (and me on my own for the first time since the cerclage), I decided to take Avery to the pool. I thought this was a good idea. Avery can get in/out of the car/car seat by herself, in and out of the pool, and walks in and out of the facility. And we spend some time in the sun and Avery burns off energy. And it makes my hips feel good. Win win all the way around, right? WRONG!

We get to the pool when it opens and everything is going fine. Avery wears a puddle jumper floaty (which is Coast Guard approved...and cute) and spends MOST of the time at the kiddie pool climbing out of the pool (which is about 2.5 feet deep) and jumping back in. Over and over. There is a beach walk in area on one side and it gets to about 2.5 to 3 feet on the other side. The kiddie pool has 3 lifeguards and is about 20 feet from the deep end of the big pool with the diving boards. When I take her alone, we just hang out in the kiddie pool. When Troy comes with us, he takes her to the big pool to swim and they watch the people jump off the diving board. She likes being in the pool with HIM, I think, more than being in the big pool where she can't touch the bottom, but floats great with her floaty (which we call her "Shark").

Here is Avery and Shark:

I was sitting with my back against the deep end of the kiddie pool and Avery 2-3 feet from me, jumping in and out of the pool. I would count to 3 and she would jump. Over and over.

Well, this time, she climbed out and took about 3 steps towards the big pool and pointed and said, "daddy over there?" And I said, "no, daddy's at work." And she took off RUNNING at full speed towards the big pool. I immediately stood up and tried to haul my pregnant ass out of the pool, with no ladder, 3 feet deep and started yelling her name.

Avery jumped RIGHT into the 12 foot deep end of the pool. She went down about 3 feet and floated right back to the top.

I was only halfway out of the kiddie pool when the lifeguard pulled her out. The lifeguard only had to stand on the edge and pulled her out of the deep end using the straps of her puddle jumper and another hand under butt. I got over to her and I said, "AVERY, you CANNOT swim over here alone. Are you ok?"

She looks up at me with a BIG smile and says, "that was FUN!"

Seriously? Child, I almost had a heart attack.

I felt so judged by the lifeguards. I mean, I was right there watching the whole time! It wasn't like I was sitting on a lounge chair, scrolling my Facebook newsfeed. I'm hugely pregnant and she's fast. And she had on a life jacket. I'm just not as physically able as I normally am.

I guess I have a water baby on my hands and will definitely make sure to put her in swim lessons. Like ASAP. She has no fear. None. She gets that from you, Troy...

And seriously...thank God for the puddle jumper. I recommend them to ANYONE with a child from 30-50 pounds. She loves hers and asks to put it on, even at home in the plastic baby pool. It doesn't inhibit her movement, but it's Coast Guard approved. Go buy it.

UPDATE*** Here's Troy's response when he found out. Such a dad...

Another Shining Example of My Gullibility

You can read about the time I thought road kill seagulls were chickens.

You can also read about the time I ate butter off a baked potato bar like ice cream.

This one is seriously embarrassing. And a horrible example of how dumb I am. As well as Troy's ability to bold faced lie straight to my face. And he wonders why I never believe anything he says. Prime example right here, babe.

This happened in high school. Troy was packing up his room after graduation, about a week before heading off to college. He was going through the desk in his room and pulled out a whole drawer and set it on his bed. He started shifting through it and pulled out a bottle of cologne and handed it to me. It had a red, white, and blue striped label on it (he's an American guy through and through) and the bottle had his name on it.

Natalie: What is this?

Troy: It's my scent.

(I opened the bottle and smelled it)

Natalie: Oh wow, it smells like you!

Troy: I know. It's my scent.

Natalie: What do you mean? You went to a factory and combined a bunch of scents together and then "copyrighted" it?

Troy: I went to the Tommy Hilfiger factory last summer with my family and they have this thing you can pay extra for on their factory tour. You go and sit in this bath thing and the scientists are able to pull your actual natural scent out of your body and bottle it.

Natalie: REALLY? Wow, I've never heard of that. You'd think it'd smell like B.O. I guess not... (opens lid and smells it again) You smell good.

Troy: It's a totally one of a kind bottle. You can have it if you want.

Natalie: Are you sure? It's the only one!

Troy: I'm sure.

I know, I know. That's ridiculous. But I believed him. So much so, that when we went to youth group later that week, I told my friend Ashley about it. Ashley thought it was cool too. We chatted about it. And Troy overhead me. He busted out laughing and told me that he had lied. He couldn't have this rumor going around about the Tommy Hilfiger company making "magic cologne" because of a story he made up. He still makes fun of me about it.

ALTHOUGH I must also mention that Ashley believed it too. That doesn't make it any less embarrassing, but at least I had company in the gullibility boat on this one.

SO embarrassing. Imagine if I had told this story to someone else who knew that it had to be bull. I'm just glad I told someone who believed it too and didn't make me feel stupid about it. And now you all know.

The Time I Didn't Know the Difference Between a Baked Potato Bar and Dessert

Troy and I started dating in high school. Someday I will tell that story. But for now, we are doing a week of silly/ridiculous things that Natalie has said/done. And let's be real. It happens A LOT. I can only remember these ones because, somehow, I manage to do/say them in front of Troy. Or his family. This particular instance is the latter. I do ridiculous things all the time, but when you do them in front of people, they don't let you forget them.

Troy and I were in college. It may have been my FIRST time down to North Carolina to visit Troy when he was a freshman at ECU. We were both from Washington, DC and part of the reason Troy went to ECU was because ALL of his extended family lives in Wilson, about 40 minutes from Greenville. This gave Troy lots of opportunities to visit with family on some weekends or go to family dinners or whatever.

I had met a lot of Troy's family when we graduated from high school and his family had a BBQ at their house. This was my first time going to NC and seeing them at their homes. Troy and I headed out to Wilson on a Saturday night for a family dinner at a buffet in town called "Western Sizzlin'." And I guess I wanted to make a memorable first impression.

We are talking his whole family on his dad's side. Grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins. Somewhere between 12 and 15 people were probably there. Enough people to witness the event. And anytime we go to a buffet together now, they say, "look out for the dessert bar."

Okay, so we get a big table in the restaurant and are all eating at our own pace and drinking sweet tea. It was my first time meeting some of his family and I was trying to make a good impression. I LOVE dessert. LOVE. I do not understand when someone says the phrase, "it's too rich." NO. Nothing is too rich. You just aren't in the mood for whatever it is you're eating. I have a huge sweet tooth. So after I had my fill of dinner, I headed up to grab dessert.

The whole dessert area was on one end of the baked potato bar. So on the left side, there were potatoes, bacon, green onions, shredded cheese, butter, sour cream, etc. On the other side were Oreo cookies, brownie pieces, sprinkles, gummy bears, cherries, etc. I mosey up to the bar and make myself an ice cream sundae with all the fixings and head back to the table.

I sat down with Troy's family and make the PERFECT first bite. And time slows down. I feel like everyone is watching me (even though I know they weren't). I take a bite and it isn't cold. It isn't sweet. And it isn't ice cream.

I totally took a bite of BUTTER and toppings. I immediately opened my mouth and the bite fell back into the bowl. Troy's Aunt Betty was like, "where did you get the ice cream from? I thought they only had soft serve?"

Realization dawned on me. I had scooped butter from the baked potato bar and made a sundae with butter. Now, I like Paula Dean just as much as the next person, but a butter sundae is not on my menu of favorite desserts.

Realization hit his Aunt Betty quickly and she started laughing SO hard. I discreetly tried to put my full ice cream bowl down in the dirty dishes pile at the end of the table for the server to pick up, but everyone wanted to know why Aunt Betty was laughing so hard. She couldn't talk because she was crying, so I just said "I made a butter sundae by accident."

I am now the running joke at buffet dinners with his family. Well, the good news is, Troy and I got married 4 years later and they like me. I think :)

But they will never let me forget the day I ate butter with Oreo cookie topping.

So, as a lesson to you all, butter and vanilla bean ice cream look VERY familiar. If you go to a buffet where the potato bar and dessert fixings are on the same bar, make sure you aren't taking a HUGE scoop of butter. But maybe there is a problem when there is an ice cream scoop in the butter!!! My bad.

When Chickens Fell Off the Truck

This next week we will be discussing Natalie. More specifically her gullibility. And ridiculous things that she has said and done. Unfortunately (or fortunately for you), Natalie is REALLY, REALLY gullible and ridiculous.

So to kick this week off, I am going to start with a story about how stupid I can be. This comes with a warning label. Sometimes I talk without thinking. And sometimes Troy almost crashes his car because he is laughing so hard. Off a bridge. Into the Chesapeake Bay. And almost kills us. But alas, I am going to tell you the story anyway. Troy will NEVER let me forget it. Because I was THAT dumb. OR CREATIVE! Depending on how you look at it. TROOOOOYYY!

You be the judge.

So about 4 years ago, Troy and I were driving from Dover, Delaware to Wilson, North Carolina to visit his family. We normally drove through Washington, DC and down 95 to get there following route 1:

One time, we decided to take this route. It was only 3 miles further, but it took an extra 40ish minutes. We were getting sick of the same ole drive so we decided to switch it up and take the Chesapeake Bay Bridge and Tunnel system from the peninsula of Maryland and Virginia down to Virginia Beach area. You can see it on the map where it looks like you are driving over the ocean following route 3:

So the whole waterway part is a GIANT system of bridges and underwater tunnels. It's like a half a mile above water and then a half a mile under water. It's really pretty. A nice change of scenery from our normal drive, right?? WRONG.

All of a sudden, we are seeing a TON of this (picture from here):

And WITHOUT even thinking, I say:

Natalie: Huh. This is really weird.

Troy: What?

Natalie: I wonder when the truck realized one of his cages were open.

Troy: (trying not to laugh because he knows where this is going but wants to see if I'll actually go there) Excuse me? What truck? We haven't seen hardly any cars, let alone trucks.

Natalie: You know. Look. The chicken truck. One of his cages was open. Look at all the chickens.

Troy: BAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHHAHAHA

Natalie: What?

Troy: BAHAHAHHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAH

Natalie: What? Deductive reasoning here. Dead chickens. They must have fallen off a truck.

Troy: WORST DEDUCTIVE REASONING EVER!!!!!

Natalie: What? Haven't you ever seen those trucks driving around with chicken cages on them?

Troy: BAHAHAHAHAHAHHAAHHA!! Please please stop! I'm gonna pee!

Natalie: Can you please let me in on the joke?

Troy: Okay, we're outside now. Do you see anything flying around in the sky that's white right now?

Natalie: Um, yeah, but they're seagulls.

Troy: (looking at me expectantly, waiting for the light to turn on) Keeping talking. And doing your "deductive reasoning."

Natalie: No, this is different. The chickens are on the ground. How would seagulls strategically land ONLY on the bridge. It's too coincidental.

Troy: AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA you have to stop...

Natalie: Did they get hit by a car?

Troy: (smacks me in the forehead Aladdin style) She can be taught!

Watch at :48 - :54 seconds for reference. And yes...he does this to me whenever I say something stupid and then realize the stupidity of my statement.



This is a true story. And every time we are on a bridge and we see a dead seagull, Troy is like "LOOOOK NATALIE!! A CHICKEN!!" And I'm like "you're stupid."

Except I'm stupid.

Avery Proves She is NOT a Superhero. She bleeds.

Our family has a free YMCA membership because our home is over 30 miles from our base. It's a great perk. It has free childcare, free classes, an indoor AND outdoor pool, and did I mention that it's free? For some reason, previously, I had associated YMCAs with low income areas with programs for families without the resources for safe activities. I don't know why. Boy was I wrong. It is SO nice. And we are really enjoying it!

I have been going to the gym about 3 times per week, which if you know me AT ALL you know this is a huge deal. I hate hate hate working out. Hate. However, now that I have a child and the child care is free, it's awesome. I am doing something good for me and she gets playtime/socializing time. I get to work out, read, listen to music, watch TV, take classes, whatever. All of a sudden, exercise has become "me" time. Which is amazing and a super motivational reason to go work out.

Recently, I decided that it was time for Avery and I to use the indoor pool every once in a while. They have a therapy pool and it is 92 degrees. AKA BATH WATER. It is SO nice and toasty. And Avery loves it. I think she's going to be a little water baby.

On tuesday, Troy and I took her swimming. She was taking great joy in going backwards down the stairs up to her neck and then climbing out and going to a deeper part of the pool (that was exactly the same height as the water) and lowering herself into the water up to her chest before lifting herself out of the side of the pool. This became a great game for her...of running and seeing how fast she could lower herself into the water from side to side.

Of course, we had already been swimming for over an hour and she was starting to get tired. But if you have kids who love water, it doesn't matter how tired they are, they are going to keep playing. Troy was in the water and I was sitting on a bench next to the area she was making laps and kept "catching her" to keep her from running. Of course on her last lap, she totally slips and goes down face first onto the pool deck and totally splits her chin wide open...

I immediately scoop her up and take her into the locker room to check it out and change her clothes because we were heading to Target to pick up the last of our Christmas gifts.

She quit crying pretty quick (I stuffed a bottle of milk in her mouth) so I could look at it. She has a Harry Potter lightening bolt cut right in the bottom of her chin. She is bleeding line a stuck pig. I change her out of her suit and put her clothes on. And she bleeds all over the neck/chest part of her shirt. It was looking all "psycho" up in that area.

I gather all of our stuff up and we all walk out to the car (Avery included, we try to have her walk all the time) and I'm like "TROY WE NEED TO GO TO THE EMERGENCY ROOM!" And Mr. Calm is all "Eh, we'll get some new skin at Target and she'll be fine." And then Mrs. Freakout is like "YOU DIDN'T EVEN LOOK!!! YOU DON'T LOVE HER AT ALLLLLLL!!!!!!!!!"

We get into Target and there is more blood all over her face and shirt, which I am continually mopping up with a wipe from her diaper bag (which now looks brown instead of white). And I am now "that mom." You know, the one who grabs things off the shelf and immediately opens them and pays for them later? With a first aid kit.

We taped up her chin and she was not bothered at all. And didn't seem to be in any pain either. This is after we got the "new skin" on there.

And here are the pink "Hello Kitty" bandaids that she has been wearing.

I took her to the gym the next day and while I was waiting to drop her off at childcare, some other moms made me feel so much better when they saw her pink bandaid. They both said that their kids have also had scraped up faces. One mom said "my daughter fell off a curb and scraped her whole nose up and wore bandaids for weeks." The other mom said that her son fell 2 times in 6 months tripping over the hearth on the fireplace and split his chin in the exact same spot both times. At least I know it happens to everyone :) And baby girl seems fine!

Our Bathroom is Finished. And Natalie Overshares. But She Predicts that Many People Will Sympathize. And All Will Be Forgiven.

Cue the Angels: HALLELUJAH!!

UGH. I was so sad when our bathroom totally fell apart because of an upstairs water leak. It especially sucked because it is the only bathroom on the first floor. Which meant running up and down the stairs whenever the "urge" hit.

So, I have the most sensitive bladder/bowels in the universe. I realize that I have to go and then in less than 10 seconds it turns into an emergency. So NO warning. And running up the stairs to use the toilet is a total nightmare. Especially with an unpredictable toddler who knows how to open doors. I end up gating her somewhere or snatching her and dragging her up the stairs and barricading her in the bathroom with me. I am a desert creature on car rides. I don't eat or drink anything for hours before going somewhere just to avoid an argument with Troy about stopping again. And what I mean by that is Troy laughs while I cry because I think I'm going to have an accident in the car. He has suggested that I wear diapers in the car. Just to run up to the gas station. Because 10 seconds is my limit. It's bad.

So what I was REALLY trying to say, is that it is ABOUT TIME for the bathroom to be finished. It was broken for exactly 13 days. The bathroom issue with Natalie has only gotten worse since having a baby. That is the reality of pregnancy and childbirth people.

Here's the timeline of "Operation: Repair Bathroom so that Natalie Can Run to it About 5 Times a Day and Troy can Laugh at her"

Troy discovered the leak on Saturday. The plumber came saturday night and ripped everything out. Sunday, the environmental people came and started with the big industrial sized dryers. They were in the house until wednesday. The dryers were removed.

The following monday, the insulation guy came. He did the outside of the house and the inside of the bathroom. Here's the insulation finished:

The drywall guy was here monday evening and all day tuesday. And then the drywall:

Wednesday the drywall guy came and sanded all the drywall edges to prep for painting in addition to adding the texture to the walls for the inside and outside stucco. Then the door frame repair guy/reinstalled all the bathroom hardware came thursday. The painters came friday.

In just enough time for Troy and I to have friends over for dinner and drinks and be able to use the bathroom. Without touching the walls. The paint was still wet but there was no way I was running up the stairs after a couple drinks. Win. I am just SO grateful that the damage was not more invasive and we didn't have to pay for the repairs. SO grateful.

Deceived. By Sesame Street.

Sesame Street. You pulled the wool over my eyes. I should have known.

Now, I am aware of the duplicate voices of characters done by the same actors (is that even what they are called??) on adult cartoons like South Park and Family Guy. I know. I am naive, but not that naive (I mean, I see credits sometimes). NEVER did I think they would try to fool kids. Ok, they definitely would, but at least try and disguise it a little better. Maybe I just am too gullible. Lets be honest, I know I am too gullible. Ok, watch this clip.

Now watch it again with your eyes closed. DO IT!!! DO IT NOW!!! Try not to be fooled. Whose voice is this? You already know that it is Grover's voice. But who else's voice is it? I. Was. Shocked. Who are they trying to kid? They didn't even change the voice AT ALL to make it sound like the other person! LIARS! DECEIVERS! Here I was, heating up Avery's breakfast of apple mush and all the sudden I'm like, MISS PIGGY IS NOT ON SESAME STREET!!! Are they doing a cross-over episode like when they try to get people to watch Grey's Anatomy and Private Practice to increase ratings??? What is going on!!? So I turn around and there is Grover...with Miss Piggy's voice. So THEN I look it up on IMDB. The voice is A MAN!! His name is Frank Oz. A gazillion points to the reader who knows another voice he does OTHER than Grover and Miss Piggy (there are many to choose from).

YODA!! I feel very dumb. And naive. How did I not know this??? He also does Fozzie Bear, Animal, Cookie Monster, and Bert. Any of those answers would have been acceptable. Kudos to you if you knew any of this. Maybe I am just not enough of a Star Wars geek to know this. I bet they know this :( How dumb am I? Don't answer that.

As a side note, Avery LOVES Elmo. We watch Sesame Street on Netflix for a bit in the morning and then before bed. She was having a bath the other night and the "Elmo's World" segment of the show came on. She heard it in her bath and started dancing and made her "O" face when the theme song came on. Adorable. Everything she does is adorable. Except when she wants to eat my dinner. Or doesn't want to get dressed. Or any number of things. But her Elmo dance is adorable.

Autocorrect Disaster of Embarrassment. I Almost Died. Especially Because I Didn't Notice Until He Hadn't Responded for Almost an Hour. Now I Know Why.

Troy and I got smart phones this week. I finally caved. Troy has been wanting them for forever. Our phone contract was up on July 2nd and on July 3rd we were banging down the door of Verizon. In an ironic twist, the sales representative informed us that we could have come in for upgrades 4 months before our contract was up. Troy was mad. I laughed. The evil kind.

They offered us a "deal" where we could trade in our old phones and they would subtract the trade in prices from the cost of our new phones. This is Troy's old phone:

And this is mine:

Needless to say, the sales guy LITERALLY laughed at us. He looked up our phones in his computer and informed us that the trade in value was 1 dollar. You read that right. A SINGLE DOLLAR! We told him that we would keep them and Avery could use them as play phones. She already has 3 play cell phones but she can SOMEHOW tell the difference between toys and the real thing. So now she has 2 real phones to play with.

Anyway, there have been several adjustments since getting the iphones. We are used to having keyboards. It is very easy to text on those. Iphone touch screens are not so easy to type on. We also didn't have autocorrect previously.

I had a HORRIBLE autocorrect on saturday. I was out with 2 friends and we were hitting up the thrift stores in town. For 6 hours. It was amazing. I got some good stuff and spent $24.75. AWESOME!

I was texting with a friend while we were out. He asked us what Troy and I were doing that day. Here's what happened in the text.

OH. MY. GOD. I was laughing so hard I almost started crying. Thank God it was a good friend and not Troy's mom or my Granny. That would have been awful.

Has anyone else had a horrible autocorrect incident? How about recommendations for good apps? I'm trying to get a hang of this.

Avery Mommy and Daddy Learn about Quetzals

For anyone who didn't already know, Avery has an Eric Carle/mostly "The Very Hungry Caterpillar" nursery. I know it's kind of boyish, but I figured, we are going to have more children (God willing) and all of our kids can use the same decor. Good plan? I think so :) Here is a smattering of pictures from our house in Texas.



Troy's mom is a genius! She made the bedding. The crib sheet and pillow in the glider chair are from Pottery Barn Kids. Love. I ordered the wall stickers here. I ordered the framed pictures over her book shelf on amazon here.





One of my co-workers in Dover got this for me (Avery?) as a baby shower gift, knowing our nursery theme. Avery is just now getting to an age that I really feel like she is learning things and observing our behaviors with interest so now seemed an appropriate time to bust them out. They are Eric Carle flash cards and I LOVE them.



Here is the side with the letters. I love how they all have a different color/pattern on the back (front??). They are made of super thick cardboard, so I am hoping that she doesn't get bitten by a genetically altered spider or something and end up bending/breaking them with superhuman strength.



On the other side of the flash card is an animal that corresponds with that letter. Now before I address those issues, here is a picture of the other sides of the cards:



Now for the issues. I know you can probably guess what most of the correlating animals are for the letters based on the picture. We feel that some animals could have been more "regular." For example, a frog instead of a flamingo, a horse instead of a hippo, a pig instead of a peacock. However, Troy and I noticed a few things that I will share with you via a play by play of our conversation as we flipped through them together.



Regarding the Jellyfish:

N: Awww, this one is so cute. I want to frame it for our house!

T: What? Why? I don't know if I want to sensationalize murder.

N: What are you even saying?!

T: Look at the little fish swimming towards their death! You know they are going to die in 2.5 seconds.

N: Whatever.

T: Look Natalie, these cards are for learning and I want Avery to learn that jellyfish can hurt her. Haven't you seen "7 Pounds"?

Anyway, moving on to the next card:



Regarding the Narwhal:

T: I love this one!

N: This is weird.

T: What would you have picked?

N: I don't know. A newt? I'm sure there's some other common "N" animal they could have picked.

T: Exactly! Avery is going to be a genius. I'm pretty sure I didn't know what a narwhal was or that it existed until after college.



Regarding the Quetzal:

N: Really? They couldn't pick something else?

T: Queeeetzel? Quatzel? Cue-tzel? Or like pretzel with a Q? How do you say this?

N: Avery can barely say "hi." How is she going to say quetzal?

T: laughs*

N: I mean, pick a QUAIL. They could have even used the same picture.



Regarding the Urchin:

N: (shows Troy the urchin card) Is this technically an animal?





Regarding the Xolo:

T: Oh my God. They had to include a definition for this one.

N: What! What's a xolo?

T: Well let me tell you. It's a "xoloitzcuintli - the mexican hairless dog"

N: Oh good, an animal that we talk about all the time and use in everyday language. I'm pretty sure Avery is going to be smarter than us.

T: I hope so. She's learning words that we just learned today and animals I didn't know about until after college graduation.

N: Go ECU.

As weird and unusual as some of the animals are, I am thrilled with the cards. They come in a sweet little box with a hinged lid and are perfect for her fat hands. I know we are laughing about some of their animal choices, but when it comes down to it, I know she will learn the "normal" animals (sing Old McDonald and try to match those up with the cards...not gonna happen) from everyday life. So I'm glad she can learn some of the unusual ones as well.

Here we are looking at them with her. Excuse the nasty Natalie look...I actually went to the gym. You can close your mouth now. It's true, there's no faking the sweaty hair.











Avery feels the same way I do. Or she's just my daughter. That's totally a Natalie face...



What do you think of my flash cards? Love em or Leave em?