Mexico, baby!

Ahhhh Mexico, how I miss you.

Our recent getaway to Puerto Morelos was absolutely perfect.

Perfect in every single way.

I never thought I'd say this, but it was just as

fabulous as our honeymoon in Jamaica.

I don't even know how to describe how beautiful

our resort was. Maybe a good description

would be heaven on earth...

Oh, how I miss the sun in my face and the sand between my toes.

But probably the thing I miss the most is waking up

to the sound of the ocean as the cool breeze filled our room.

The time we had together, just the two of us, was wonderful.

It was such a refreshing trip for our relationship and marriage.

I just wish I had taken more pictures.

Guess I was too busy having fun!

We will be returning soon.

Josh just doesn't know it yet. :)

It is Official

I
am
addicted
to



Josh & I literally spent our whole evening
watching the first season together.

It
is
so
good.

I think I uttered the words,
"Please! Just one more episode,"
about a hundred times.
No lie.

Where have we been all this time!?
Do you watch LOST?

What did you Say?

I can barely hear out of my right ear. And my left ear, well, it is beginning to ache. This all started Saturday on my flight back home from Kansas City. My ears were popping like I've never experienced before. I got off the plane and noticed my right ear was clogged up, and although it was slightly annoying, I thought it would only be a matter of time before it popped and it would be back to normal. Au contraire. I'm starting to think this "annoyance" is quickly turning into something worse. I think my ear is infected. And I am miserable. I have tried every trick in the book to try to get my ear to pop, but nothing {nothing!} is working. I'm a little frustrated, can you tell? Looks like I might be paying the doctor a visit very soon. Would you pray for me? I would really appreciate it so much.

Of course this little boy always knows how to make Mommy feel better.



I just love his expression in this picture. Makes me laugh!

Night on the Town

For a while I thought dating was a thing of the past, and really it kind of was for the first six months we lived here. Josh and I didn't go on a single date for six whole months! But things have changed; we are dating again, and it sure feels good. Since January we have been on 3 dates {one of those was an overnight date!}, and there is no stopping us now. Date nights are now a luxury, and when we do get to go out together we definitely cherish the time we have together...just the two of us.

A couple weeks ago, my parents came in town for one reason. Well, they actually came for two reasons. Noah is always a reason grandparents come visit. But the main reason they came was so Josh and I could go on a date. An overnight date. 24 hours of dating! Doesn't get better than that, right?

Before we left, we went to Kincaid's with my parents for lunch so we could catch up a little bit. We really enjoyed that time with my parents.

And then we were on our way! Bye-bye sweet Noah. Have fun with Granddad & Mimi!

Downtown Dallas is not a place we often visit, so we thought it would be fun to stay there for the evening. We booked a room at the Magnolia hotel, and loved it! It was a very elegant hotel with a historic feel to it. I think it is one of the older hotels in downtown.

The entry way where the elevators were located. Beautiful.



Our room. It was nice and cozy.

After we dropped our stuff off in our room and settled in, we decided to get out and have some fun! Our first stop was the Bodies Exhibition. Josh wanted to go to the John F. Kennedy museum, so I had to bat my eyelashes and work a little magic on Josh to persuade him to go to Bodies. Of course he couldn't resist my charm, so he gave in. So we decided to walk because it was so beautiful outside, and the exhibit was only only about 10 blocks away. We had a lot of fun walking along the streets of Dallas. Downtown Dallas is completely different than even Downtown Fort Worth. We finally arrived, and I was so so excited. What can I say, I am a nurse. The human body is so amazing!

The Bodies Exhibition was amazing. AMAZING! The depth of knowledge that exists in that building is unreal. The exhibit consists of 20 human cadavers and 260 body parts that have undergone a process called plastination.

The Exhibition allows people to learn about their own bodies and, ultimately, teaches them how to take better care of their health and make positive lifestyle choices. The Exhibition enables them to see and understand the medical conditions friends and family members face in a whole new way – by highlighting pressing health concerns, including obesity, breast cancer, colon cancer, cirrhosis of the liver, ectopic pregnancy, arthritis, osteoporosis and bone fractures. The Exhibition also highlights damage done to organs due to the perils of smoking and dietary excesses. -- Bodies Webpage

We definitely left with a better understanding of the human body; it was very informative. But I think what we gained from it the most is how truly intricate and detailed the human body is. We were left in awe at what an intricate Designer and Creator our awesome God is. If you haven't been to the Bodies Exhibit I encourage you to go! You will not be disappointed.

After we left the Bodies Exhibit, we decided to walk back to the hotel to take advantage of the free happy hour! We thought we would rest our feet, get a Coke, and talk about what we wanted to do next. So we started our 10 block journey back to the hotel. As we were walking we came across the original Spaghetti Warehouse! I had to take a picture. That place is one of our favorites!

Almost immediately after I took the above picture and we started walking again, we were stopped by a street vendor with an armful of roses. He was feisty; there was no stopping this guy. He says to Josh, "Look at this beautiful lady you are with," as he sticks a rose in my hand. "Don't you want your beautiful lady to have some roses?" As soon as Josh starts to say no thanks and tries to take the rose from me to give back to street vendor {apparently I had a death grip on the thing, and Josh said I was smiling like there's no tomorrow}, the guy says, "Give her a kiss! Come on boy. Give your woman a kiss!" At this point, Josh is still trying to get out of it, and he isn't giving me a kiss. Ha. You should have seen the guy. He starts going off on a tangent telling him what a lucky guy he is to have such a beautiful woman... blah, blah, blah, blah, blah... and that he better lay one on me. Josh then realizes he has lost the battle and leans over and plants one on me as the guy says to him, "Just give me whatever you want as a donation for the flowers."

Josh gets his wallet out, and the guy leans in and says, "That'll be $10, sir." And me, well I was just standing there happy as a june bug with my 3 red roses. Did I mention they were beautiful? Anyway, so Josh {unhappily} forks over $10, and we were on our way.

Yeah, we got ripped off. Oh well. It is a funny story to laugh about now.

Our cozy little area where we enjoyed our free Cokes. Isn't it beautiful!? It was just so nice to sit and put our feet up for a bit.

After we relaxed in the hotel for a while, we decided to go to the Butcher Shop Steakhouse for dinner. We had never heard of it before, but we thought we'd give it a try. Apparently you can cook your own steak there, but we decided to let them cook it for us. Anyway, to make a long story short, it was wonderful! We would definitely go back.

We debated whether or not to go to Simply Fondue for dinner, but we decided we would just go for dessert. And oh my, it was yummy! Another place you must try if you are in the Dallas/Fort Worth area.

I'm not sure if it was a sugar rush or what, but my crazy husband was cracking me up. At one point he was going all wild with the skewers, he stabbed himself in the hand with it. Haha.

Our amazing dessert. We ordered Reeses Pieces Chocolate fondue to dip our desserts in. The plate was covered in all sorts of wonderful things to dip in our chocolate fondue: strawberries, marshmallows, bananas, brownies, cherries, and rise krispy treats. Yeah, amazing! I think we gained probably 10 pounds from everything we ate that night.

After we stuffed our faces in chocolate, we decided to go see a movie: Alice in Wonderland 3D. We weren't sure if we would like it or not {Johnny Depp is a little kooky}, but we really did enjoy it. We were diggin' our 3D glasses too.

After the movie, we went back to the hotel, put our pj's on, and watched some t.v. and then we were out! We had a busy day.

The next morning we woke up, got dressed, and decided to head over to the J.F.K. Museum. We didn't have much time before we had to get back, so we only got through about half of the museum. So sad. But the parts we did get through were very interesting. We will definitely have to go back through it again.

We had the best time together. It was so nice to spend some quality time alone where we could talk and just enjoy one another. And we did pretty good and only talked about Noah, oh maybe, 20 times total. Ha. We sure did miss the little guy, and we were so happy to see him when we came back.

So far, we are averaging one date a month. Not too bad.

Thank you so much Dad & Mom for taking the time to come down to watch Noah for us. We appreciate it so much!

Project Big Boy

Well, Noah is 13 months old today, and he's still hittin' the bottle. The baby bottle, that is.

I think the hardest part of parenting so far--harder than cleaning up atomic-explosion diapers and harder than keeping Noah out of Einstein's food bowl--has been trying to wean Noah from the bottle. You see, Libby and I made the grave error of letting Noah become dependent on the bottle to go to sleep.

Noah likes his sleep. But he has become accustomed to a bottle of milk any time he wants to go to sleep. For the past year, any time we've put Noah to bed, it's been with the comfort of a bottle; any time Noah has woken up in the middle of the night, it's been a race to soothe his midnight cries with a bottle. And it's always worked. I'm an "If it ain't broke, don't fix it" guy, and like I said, the bottle has always worked. It still works. But it's time to fix it.

We actually tried to wean Noah from the bottle a few weeks ago, and it lasted all of one hour. We put Noah down without a bottle, and predictably, he cried. We went in a little later to give Noah a sippy cup and to try to get him to sleep, but no go. After about 45 minutes, Noah got angry. He started really crying. And yelling. Basically in baby-speak Noah was telling us this.

We gave in to Noah, but we were wrong. So, we're starting the process again today. We're going to update you every day on our progress (or lack thereof), and we'll call it Project Big Boy. Updating you every day serves two purposes: first, it holds us accountable to follow through with the weaning, and second, it means you'll be suffering with us. Because we will be suffering.

Everything we've read and heard from people with experience says that cold turkey is the way to go when weaning from the bottle. So that's how we're going to do it. Your prayers are appreciated. No, seriously, pray for us this week. It will be rough, but God will help us through it.

Since Libby says that posts without pictures are boring, I'll leave you with this one. Noah loves to play peek-a-boo, and he just laughs and laughs when we play it with him. I'm going to take a minute to just stare at the picture, because it may be the last smile I see from Noah for a while. Feel free to join me in staring.

Ok, I guess that's all for now. Have a great Sunday! We'll be back with an update tomorrow.

Feeling Like Poo

Poor poor little Noah. He has had a rough day. Actually it seems like he has had a rough week. Changing to whole milk and eating solids has been rough on his system. He has been in so much pain lately, and my heart breaks for him to see him this way. We have slowed down on the milk products and have focused on putting more fiber and fluids in his diet, so we are hoping that will do the trick! Tonight we let Noah stay up a little bit since he hasn't been feeling very well.

Please keep Noah in your prayers this week. Little babies aren't supposed to hurt. :(

Happy Birthday My Sweet Baby

One year ago today, my precious Noah came into the world. I can't recall what I did during the day of August 27th, 2008, but I vividly remember that evening. It was a Wednesday, so Josh was at the church finishing things up for Bible study that night. It was my first pregnancy, and I didn't know what it would feel like if my water broke, so I hoped it would be very obvious. I remember calling Josh around six that night saying, "Josh I seriously think my water broke." I didn't know for sure, but I just had a feeling.

Josh's response was, "Well if you think it broke, why don't you call the doctor." I don't think he actually believed me. Haha. Anyway, Josh told me he would be home shortly.

Meanwhile, I called the doctor's office and talked to Dr. Freeman, the doctor on call, and I told him I was pretty sure my water broke. He asked me a few questions, and then he told me to go to the hospital to get checked out. I will never forget that moment. My heart started pounding in my chest. "Could this really be it?"

At that point, Josh arrived home, and I told him we were going to the hospital. I jumped in the shower, because I knew if this was really it, I wouldn't get a good shower for a while. I knew I'd be having a c-section, because Mr. Noah decided he was comfortable in the breech position. I always had his little head poking up at the top of my big, round tummy.

So, we got our stuff together, and Josh patiently walked with me as I waddled to the car. We were so excited as we drove to the hospital, because we knew that we would be meeting our precious gift from God that evening. But I remember my heart was still pounding in my chest. I was going to be a mommy. Was I ready? What if I didn't know how to be a mommy?

We arrived at the hospital, and sure enough we found out my water had broke. Noah was ready to come! And we were ready to meet him! Within a couple of hours, I was being wheeled into the c-section room, and at 8:59 pm, I heard Noah cry for the first time. I can't begin to express the emotion I felt hearing his sweet cry. Our little Noah was here and just by hearing him cry I already felt a connection to him. Tears were streaming down my face; it was one of the greatest moments in my life.

I waited for what seemed like a very long time to meet him and kiss his sweet face. Kim Clark, one of my co-workers and Noah's nurse, brought him over to me, and and I met my sweet little one for the very first time. Oh, what an amazing privilege it is to hold the child God has created within you.

Today Noah turns one. It seems like just the other day we were in the hospital room holding our tiny little baby. How does a year go by so fast?

It may have gone fast, but it has been the best year of my life. God has poured out his abundant blessings in our lives, but the greatest blessing of all is Noah.

I made this slide show the other night to show our first year with Noah. When I heard this song, I couldn't hold back tears. There is nothing more I want for Noah's life than for him to know Jesus as his Lord and Savior. This is my prayer for Noah.



Happy Birthday Noah Bear! Daddy, Mommy, and Einstein love you so much!

Diet Dr. Pepper

Noah loves the refrigerator. It doesn't matter what he is doing, if he hears it open, he'll drop what he is doing and crawl over to the fridge. He doesn't really care what is inside the fridge; he just loves swinging the door. Noah gets pretty darn mad when I make him close the door, so most of the time I try to grab what I need really quickly and close it before he can get over to it.

Tonight I was getting something out of the fridge, and of course Noah came crawling over as soon as he heard it open. But this time, he wasn't as interested in the door as he usually is. No, Noah had his eye on something else tonight.

Noah found himself a Diet Dr. Pepper! Apparently he is quite fond of mommy's favorite drink.

Isn't he so cute trying to drink from the can?! Look a little bit closer at the picture.



He has it upside down!

"How do you get this thing open!?"



He can play with the can all he wants, but let's just hope he doesn't get addicted to Diet Dr. Pepper like his mommy!

Baby Boyardee

Noah has been eating table foods for a little over a month now. Every time Josh and I would eat something, Noah just stared at us. Eventually, he started opening his mouth making it clear he wanted to taste whatever we were eating. So we started giving him table foods. I actually put off giving Noah table foods because one day, when he was around 9 months old, I gave him a Cheerio, and he choked on it. I literally almost had a panic attack. We continued to try different foods here and there, but most of the time the food would go straight to the back of his throat and he would gag, so I decided that he might not be ready for table foods just yet.

About a month ago, we tried again, and he has been learning to chew and doing so well. Our only problem is that, well, he does not want to feed himself. He will play and play with the food, but will not bring it to his mouth to eat it. He sits and waits with his mouth open wanting one of us to feed him. I'm starting to realize we should have been encouraging him to feed himself from the beginning. For the past week or so we have been placing the food in front of Noah to teach him to feed himself. As much of a mess and struggle it has been to get him to pick food up and put it in his mouth, it has paid off.

Tonight Noah fed himself for the first time! I gave him ravoli and he loved it! Of course he still wanted Mommy to feed him, but with encouragement, he brought the food to his mouth. I never realized how excited I could get watching Noah accomplish what seems like a simple thing, but I was clapping my hands and cheering like I won a million dollars. I'm so proud of my ravoli baby!

I guess it's a learning process for all of us!

Dudes Day -- A Running Diary

Today, for the first time in almost four months, I played the role of Mr. Mom. That is, I had Noah all to myself all day while Libby worked. Four months isn't a big deal when you're an adult, but when you're going from six to ten months old, oh man. The difference is night and day. Yes, I've seen Noah change and grow in the past four months, but I haven't taken care of him all by myself for a whole day during those four months. Either Libby has been with me, or she's taken care of him without me while I work. God bless her soul.

Anyway, I thought the easiest way to tell you about our day would be through a running diary, a la my favorite sports columnist, Bill Simmons. Here we go...

5:58 am: Libby wakes me up with a kiss on the cheek to tell me she's leaving for work. I think I mumbled something like "I love you, have a good day," but I'm not sure. My brain is in "off" mode at 6 am.

9:02 am: I awake to the sound (via the baby monitor) of Noah laughing as he plays in his crib. He's up. I'm still tired. I roll over, hoping he'll be content to play in his crib until noon.

9:15 am: Noah politely informs me (again, via the baby monitor) that, while he has enjoyed playing in his crib for the past 15-20 minutes, he is hungry and ready to get up.

9:17 - 11:45 am: Nothing too eventful happened during this stretch. I got Noah up, fed him, we played a little bit, and then he watched a Baby Einstein while I showered.

11:46 am: Noah starts rubbing his eyes, which is the telltale sign that he's tired. Nap time!

11:52 am: Noah whimpered a bit, but he's sound asleep now. Libby's advice to me last night: "When he's napping, you go nap too. Otherwise you'll be dead at the end of the day." I don't mind if I do.

12:24 pm: Apparently Noah is now into power naps, because he's already up and screaming. What happened to the 2 hour naps he used to take? I get up and make him a bottle. Hopefully he'll take it and go back to sleep.

12:26 pm: I pick the bottle up off the ground in Noah's room. He threw it a good 3 feet out of his crib.

12:32 pm: Looking out the window, I see that there are only 2 people at the pool. Noah's still in a pretty sour mood, so maybe swimming will cheer him up.

12:33 pm: I put Noah in his play pen for a while so that I can get everything ready for us to go swimming. I start making a mental to-do list, but then it gets too long, and I have to use pen and paper. It feels like we're going of town or something.

12:35 pm: First on the list: get towels. Check.

12:36 pm: Air up the yellow submarine, and scare Einstein to death in the process. Check.

12:42 pm: Get Noah's stuff together: Swimsuit, Check. Sunscreen, Check. Hat, Check Swimming Diapers, umm...

12:50 pm: Where in the world does she keep those things?

12:55 pm: Check.

12:56 pm: Gotta get my stuff together too. I get my swimsuit on and find my flip flops in the closet buried underneath every shoe that Libby owns. I need to put some sunscreen on but decide to forgo it because my boss is getting restless in his playpen.

1:05 pm: Ok, we've got everything ready to go. All that's left is getting Noah in his swimsuit and hat. Oh, and I also need to dip him in a vat of sunscreen.

1:06 pm: One thing that hasn't changed in four months: Noah likes wearing the outfit that God gave him. Getting him out of his clothes and diaper is as easy as it's always been.

1:07 pm: One more thing that hasn't changed: Noah hates putting clothes on. Except now it's more of an issue because he can crawl, twist, and turn his body into every position imaginable to avoid putting on said clothes. I'm currently trying to get his swimming diaper on him, and it's not an easy task.

1:12 pm: It took me five minutes to get the diaper on him. I'm dreading the swimsuit.

1:15 pm: Still working on that swimsuit. I'm out of breath. Noah is laughing.

1:23 pm: Here's the thing about growing up in a house with five boys: you always have someone to wrestle. And you become very good at performing an assortment of wrestling moves. I end up using a variation of Ric Flair's Figure Four Leg Lock on Noah to keep him still on his back while I inch the swimsuit up his legs. I knew that move would come in handy some day.

1:25 pm: We have two different kinds of sunscreen for Noah: A stick for his face and a spray for his body. I have a hard time applying the stick to his face because he thinks it's a Push Pop. He opens his mouth real wide and tries to lick it. In fact, I laid it down for a minute and then looked up, and here's what I saw:

1:30 pm: See the red jacket that Noah is wearing in the picture? Let's just say it was easier to put that on than keep him still long enough to spray the sunscreen on him. It'll do a good job protecting him from the sun. I mean, surfers wear long sleeve body suits like that. Same idea, right?

1:38 pm: Over an hour after we started getting ready for the pool, we're walking out the door ready to head to the pool. I'm carrying Noah, the yellow submarine, 2 towels, and my keys. Let's hope I don't drop anything.

1:40 pm: We make it to the pool in one piece! But when we get to the gate, this is what we see:

1:41 pm: I weep uncontrollably. All my sins against my parents have caught up with me.

To be continued tomorrow...

One Step Closer

I've been a stay at home mommy for the past month and a half, and it's hard to believe that I'm going back to work tomorrow. Honestly, I'm not excited about it. Well I am, but I'm not. Does that make any sense? I am so thankful for my new job, but I have absolutely loved being home with Noah. What a blessing it has been to be able to stay home and care for him and to watch him grow and learn. The good thing is, I will still be able to be a stay at home mommy for the most part. I'll just be working one to two days a week, so it won't be too bad.

So that my orientation wouldn't go on for weeks on end, I agreed to work three twelve-hour shifts this week. I'm gonna be one tired girl, because working three twelve-hour shifts makes for a really loooonnnnggg week. But after my orientation is over, I will be able to have a pretty flexible schedule. And Josh, well, he gets to be a stay at home daddy this week. It will be a good time for him to rest up and spend some good quality time with Noah.

Remember the post about Noah pulling up on everything? Not long after he learned to pull up, he started cruisin'. And everyday he gets more comfortable with his ability to walk as he holds on to things. We have had a few falls and ouchies here and there, but nothing that can't be fixed with a hug and kiss. My baby is growing up! I know I say that a lot, but it's so true, and it's hard to believe that each day he gets a little bit closer to walking on his own. When Noah walks he just laughs and laughs; it's the most adorable thing ever.



Aw. Isn't he sweet? Well I better call it a night and get to bed. 5 am is gonna come way too quickly.

Goodnight!

The (waaaayy overdue) Father's Day Post

Occasionally, Libby will give me assignments and deadlines for blog posts, and when Father's Day rolled around this year, I was given a 3-day deadline to post about it. Those 3 days came and went with no Father's Day post, and, surprisingly, no bodily harm to myself. However, I dare not test the Blog-Nazi's patience too long, lest I provoke her to wrath.

So, here it is: The Father's Day Post.

This year was my first Father's Day, and I took the time to think back on how being a father has changed me. I've changed most in my understanding of God. Now that I'm a dad, I cherish the intimacy of the word "Da-da" in Galatians 4:6. I can understand the joy in Zephaniah 3:17. I can fully appreciate the sacrifice in John 3:16. Thank you Lord for the opportunity to be a father.

You may recall Libby's Mother's Day gift from her 3 boys. Well, when I woke up on Sunday morning, I had a pleasant surprise awaiting me on our computer:



I was speechless. In a good way. Making videos is my thing; never in my wildest dreams did I expect Lib to make me a slideshow (with music!) for Father's Day. Turns out, she'd secretly been peeking over my shoulder as I made various videos, and she figured out Adobe Premiere all by herself. What an awesome video. I am still so impressed.

Wait, that's not all! I also got one of these:

A shower head! To call the original shower heads in our apartment "low-flow" is a compliment. I literally haven't taken a shower with such low water pressure since I was in the staff shower at a Ukranian youth camp. In both cases, it was necessary to jump around to get wet.

But it's amazing how much a shower head can make a difference. We had replaced Libby's shower head the week before but decided to wait on replacing mine. So, imagine the rush of joy I felt as I installed my new shower head. I couldn't dream of two Father's Day gifts better than the two that I got.

Where, do you ask, did Libby get the shower head? I'm not sure, but I imagine a scene similar to the one below.



You never know.

I'll leave you with a couple of pictures of Noah and me on Father's Day.

I had an awesome Father's Day. Thank you Libby, Noah, and Einstein for everything. It's a privilege to be the Dad in our family.