Recovering

It took a long time to recover from the C-section. In some ways I'm still recovering. I've heard from other women who've had c-sections that it'll take about a year for it to stop hurting. Which is lamo cause my child like to kick me in the stomach and that can hurt a lot. Also anytime anyone touches it it hurts. Which also sucks. But I haven't started working out yet. So maybe when I work out and strengthen my stomach muscles then I'll feel better. It took a few weeks too to be able to walk around for a while and it took a while to be able to stand and just have stamina. Luckily I had a lot of help and now I can handle both kiddos alone.

Here's me and RoRo coming out of the hospital and on our way home.

Here's Ronin's first bath. He actually really didn't cry and seemed to enjoy it. Maybe it reminded him of the womb, all the cozy warm water.

Ah after bath. He slept a lot in the beginning and now basically sleeps through the night. Mary still doesn't though.

What Happened Since June?

So about the time I stopped blogging I got put on a modified bed rest because I was getting pubis symphysis dysfunction (read about it on wikipedia.) Ironically I was not supposed to do much but sitaround I didn't blog because that would require me to sit very uncomfortably at the desk in the kitchen. So I fell off the face of the earth.

Apparently Ronin was breech and his hips were sitting in my hips and causing quite a lot of pain. But then I had to have someone home with me and Mary all the time. I couldn't lift her. I couldn't stand for long periods and to dishes and laundry and stuff. So my mom came down a few times for a week or two at a time. Rich stayed home a little bit. Derrick even came out a couple of times to help out.

Then my best gal Diane and Carol Annie came down to help us out. They were here for almost 2 months or something like that. We were all crammed in our little 2 bedroom 950 sq ft apartment. It was pretty crazy and I was pretty huge!

Then finally on Aug 25th at 4:48am RoRo was born. Ronin Oliver Augustus

It was pretty stressful at the end of the pregnancy. And I decided then that we needed to move into a rental house. For the sanity of the family!

Christmas Time Update

Wow! It's been a while since I blogged. Well we had a baby, Ronin, and we moved. Diane and Carol Ann came down to visit for a while. Grandma Kay's been down a few times and now we're getting ready to go up north for a few days for christmas.

End of June

And here it is already the end of June. We've been busy busy. Mary did a swim refresher course. She remembered stuff that she learned last year and swam to the edge by herself. She's really good around water now and she still loves it even after all the work we made her do.

We spent some time up north for a quick visit with some family and then headed back down to so cal to get more ready for the baby. Mary loves the piano, we found out. And she's not that bad for 2 years old and having no lessons. We'd like to get her a keyboard for her birthday. One that sounds like a piano but isn't too expensive.

And of course Mary loves cupcakes. Especially chocolate ones with frosting.

I haven't taken any pictures of Mary's room after we've added some things for the baby to it. we added back in the crib and a changing table and another toy storage bin thingy. The room is pretty crowded now. So we're thinking of moving again in October when our lease is up. We can't afford much but we're hoping to find a 3 bedroom house we can rent for a while. And then we'll be a little less crowded. Four people in a 2 bedroom apartment is getting crowded.

Mary got sick this week too. I think she had a bladder infection. So we're giving her antibiotics and she seems to be getting well now. She had a fever of 101.5 for a couple of days and was tugging at her diaper a lot.

Here's a picture of me at 31 weeks. Moooovin along. eventually I'll give birth.

We'll keep you posted.

End of May

So it looks like I only posted once in May. Mommy went to Vegas. We all got sick, again. And it's been busy busy. Lots of doctor's appointments for me. I had to go in for the 3 hour glucose test. I'm all good though. I don't have gestational diabetes. A couple of my other tests showed high blood sugar but I'm fine. Uncle Derrick and Marina visited for Memorial Day and that was fun. I baked cookies. We shopped and we had a BBQ. Well we cooked the meat in the oven but we had corn and a kick ass fruit salad.

We took a couple of family pics.

And we got to go to the strawberry fields with auntie Lara. (This is a much more flattering picture of me!)

We actually cleaned Mary's room too.

I got a haircut this month too. But it's actually not as short as I wanted it. So I'm going to get it cut again right before the baby's born.

We also started swim lessons last week. No pictures of her swimming yet because she was crying  a lot, but we'll get them this week. Here she is right before swimming.

We'll let you know what happens in June. See you then!

New News

So we finally got plans finalized for the summer. See as how I won't be able to travel soon. We're going to Nor Cal for the family BBQ for the first weekend in June. Then Grandma Kay is coming out for a couple of weeks right after that. 

Mary's swim lessons are May 26th -June 4th right before we leave for Nor Cal. This weekend, for Mother's Day me and my mom and Diane are going to Vegas to see the Dave Matthews Band and Jason Mraz in concert. And we plan on seeing the new Star Trek movie too. It'll be my last getaway chance til Jr is like 2 or something.

We did get to go to a Birthday part recently for a playmate. She turned 2 and it was a Hello Kitty party. Mary had a good time. She loves cake!

And we also went to the beach the other weekend. There's more pictures up on the picture website at picasa.google.com/dancingmelissas. It was a little cool. But we got some sun and had a good time.

Hopefully in August we'll be able to get Diane out here for a couple of weeks when Jr is born. Depending on her school scedule. Gma Kay will be out again in July and August too to help us get ready for the new baby. Other than all that not much has changed in the past few months. TTFN!

What's Happenin

I've been a little out of it lately because we all got the flu. Well me and Mary got it and Rich was feeling tired for like half a day and then he was better. We did have Mary's swim lessons scheduled for this week and now we'll have to reschedule them. Mary has a cough and my nose is still stuffy. I also got strep throat to go along with my flu, but I nipped that in the bud fast. I don't think we're contagious anymore so now we can get back to life. Which is nice. 

Also our air conditioning had been out for a few days. Which is a bummer when you're pregnant and it's the hottest day of the year. But they fixed it and now I'm blissful in a cool house.

And we've had a lot of requests for pictures of mom and dad as well as the kids. So we'll get to that soon. Don't worry.

We had our Sonogram

So on friday we did go in for our 20 week sonogram. We're half way done cookin this bun. We found out that it's a boy! This is fun. Now I can shop for boy stuff. It'll be cool to have one of each.

The sonogram lady said that everything looked good. And he was moving and kicking the whole time. We just have to come up with a name now. We really don't know what to call him and would appreciate any suggestions. Thanks.

Easter Hunting!

Mary has had a great Easter week. She's done about 3 or 4 egg hunts (I lost count.) and had lots o chocolate. (That's her favorite candy.) Here's Mary and her friend Marcus at one hunt together.She does have a pretty dress on but it was pretty cold that morning and raining off and on so we'll have to catch her in the dress later.

Here's some more hunts we went to. Bummer it's been cold and rainy all week.

Here we are stuffing our face with chocolate.
And we didn't actually do this egg hunt because the playground looked so inviting and it was sort of a mad house.

It's been a fun week. We'll let you know how Easter Sunday went soon.

Remember the main site

Remember our main website at 

http://sites.google.com/site/marypiemouth/

It has more info than i post on the blog and I just updated it with some cool stuff. Check it out!

Disneyland

We had a great time at Disneyland. The Carosel was Mary's favorite ride. We went on it twice and she'd scream every time we got off. So we moved on to other rides. We went on Priates of the Caribean and she was a little scared but did well. And at the end where you see the Parot, she was excited. I had baught her a Tinkerbell balloon and it turns out that she doesn't like Tinkerbell. She said "No" so I traded it for a Mickey Balloon.She was happy with that balloon. We met Mary Poppins but Mary got all shy when it was time to take a picture. We love Mary Poppins though.
We also got to pet some goats. That was pretty fun. Mary loves all animals including pygmy goats.

We had a pretty good time. Next we'll try Legoland (where she can actually go on a lot of rides.) and Sea World. And we'll need to go to some Aquariums. Keep you updated.

We did it!

So her room is a little messy. But as you can see, we got her a big girl bed! Grandma and I decided that a bunk bed would be best especially with one on the way. They can share it when they get older. We kept her crib in her room just in case she wanted to use it. But she didn't.

On monday we went to IKEA and found a bed for her. We got the bedding at Target. (They have some great stuff.) We built it on tuesday and put the bedding on it and she never gave her crib a second thought. She slept through the night on the first night and through her nap the next day. Pretty cool.

Here's a picture of the bedding we got. I think it's called Garden Party.

So that's the scoop. Mary loves her new bed and I'm so excited that she's learning to sleep in a big girl bed. She still gets up sometimes and opens the door and comes out to see if it's really bed time. But she's getting better at that.

Sleeping well

I think we finally got Mary sleeping through the night. Her schedule is 7:30pm to 6:00am. Not my favorite schedule. But, Mary seems to do well with it. She's an early bird, that's for sure. Sometimes she has off nights but for the past couple of weeks she's basically been sleeping through the night. Last night she just wok up once for a few seconds and then was fine. It's weird having a kid sleep through the night when you're so used to them not. At first I was a little worried because she wasn't waking up. But that's a good thing. But sine I'm pregnant 8 hours sleep for me isn't enough really. But I take naps and sleep on the weekends with Rich's help.

Our new car...minivan

Hey so we baught a new car. Or actually a minivan. I actually baught a minivan! I actually found one I liked. We got it at a great discount because it's a 2008 and they wanted to move them. We got leather seats and a dvd player. It has power sliding doors and fog lights. :) It's the gls trim with all the packages. Anyhoo. We both love it and it'll be great with 2 kids. So far it drives well and feels good!

http://www.hyundaiusa.com/vehicle/entourage/gallery/photofullshot.aspx

We found out that the poor camry needs a new transmission and the head gasket seals are blown so oil leaks into the cylinders and it'll burn oil when you turn it on. It'll be about $4000 to repair and the car's worth like $6000. So we'll be donating it to Kars4Kids. We'll get a small tax write off and then the charity will get more use out of it than us.

It's a New Car!

So our poor Toyota is dying. It's a 2002 Toyota Camry with about 130,000 miles on it and it needs a new transmission and intake manifold. We just put a new carburetor in it and new tires. It's sort of a money pit. 

I was driving along a main road and the car stopped in the middle of the street. The engine was on and vroom vroom but no go. It was like the car was in 

neutral. I had Mary with me and I finally got the car to a side road. I called AAA and Enterprise rent a car, and then went home. 

We're still discussing whether we should buy a new or used car and what kind of deals are out there right now. Rich wanted to fix the Camry and drive that, but I'm thinking it's a money pit. And it'll always be in the shop. I wanted a more reliable car.

So if we get a more reliable car then rich says he likes minivans. I wanted an SUV. But I did see this new minivan from VW. I like VW. I might go for this one. Or an SUV from like Hyundai or something.

So it'll be my job to test drive cars and narrow them down and then Rich has drive it to make sure he fits. When we figure it out we'll let you know. Good luck I say!

Bedtime!

Ok so we changed the bed thing again in Mary's room. We put the side back on her bed and turned it back into a crib. You can't really see it in this picture but the mattress is actually still on the floor. We didn't put the springs back in and took out the bumper so it'd be harder to climb out.

Then we started a different kind of sleep training. One for Mary now that we know what she wants from us in the middle of the night. We put her down at bed time and let her scream. At first if she woke up in the middle of the night we'd sit with her til she fell asleep again. Then that stopped working so she would keep herself awake so we wouldn't leave. Smarty pants.

So then now we let her scream for a few minutes every time she wakes up and if it's longer than 5 min we check on her. Pick her up and check her diaper and say "we love you" then put her back down. Then she screams till she falls asleep and we don't go back in there.

Last night it worked and she woke up at 930, 10:30, 3:30, and 6:30. She went down at 8pm. And she put herself back to sleep every time but at 10:30 where she cried for a little bit and it turns out she had a poopy. So Rich changed her and then she went back to sleep. Other than that we didn't have to go in there all night! How about that. Her voice is a little horse right now from screaming, but she really only screamed for like 2 min at a time.

I hope this means that she'll begin sleeping through the night. Because with the new little one on the way. I'm not rocking 2 kids to sleep, that's for sure.

From Christmas Time

We celebrated Christmas eve at my mom's house and we had Christmas at Rich's parent's house. Mary had a good time and unwrapped some presents. But by present 5 she was pretty overwhelmed and tired. At this point she still wasn't sleeping through the night (more on that later) and she hadn't slept well Christmas eve. But as you can see, she was a little excited about the new toys.

She got an Elmo Live! and a ball popper. Those were her two favorite toys. We got some Pooh movies and lots of clothes for when she gets a little older. We had a great time and we'll hope to be seeing the family again later in the year.

Eating Spagetti!

A week ago I wanted pizza. So we went to Oggi's pizza. It's a pretty good place and they serve ittalian food too. Mary loves spagetti so we had pizza and we ordered Mary a kid's meal of spagetti and sauce, on the side, with one meatball. She ate all her meatball and a lot of spagetti.

Then she ate all the chicken off of the BBQ

chicken pizza and then some ice cream from our dessert. She likes ice cream too. But who doesn't.