Just wanted to stop in and record a quick Owen update.

We took him to the pediatrician for his 15 month checkup at 16 months. Oops! He is way ahead on his milestones (imitating adults, stacking blocks and putting shapes through holes) and weighs 24 lbs (so lean!) and is 33.5 inches long. He's still a tall one!

Right now he has a phrase "chi-chi-tie" that we are clueless about. He says it all the time and we just can't figure out what he is saying.

He is so happy loving the Christmas trees and Santas (tantas) and Snowmen (noman) that are everywhere. He met Santa last week and was very aprehensive but very brave and didn't shed a tear. Poor Santa, basically every toddler he met screamed at him. This afternoon we're going to the Heart of Dixie Railroad for a ride on the Santa Express so he will get to meet Santa again. Hopefully he will handle it well since it's on one of his favorite things, a train!

It's beginning to look a lot like...summertime

We just returned from a long weekend in New Orleans. It was filled with working, food, and warm weather.

Owen visited the aquarium for the first time. He loved it! There were scuba divers entertaining the crowd during one part. One wrote a message to starbuck- "nice shirt". Owen didn't know what to think of all the fish, turtles, and dinosaurs (actually those were eels but I kind of see the resmblence and know where he's coming from). Uncle Jeremy happened to be in town this weekend so Owen had to impress him with his stair climbing ablities, over, and over, and over. ..

New baby is starting to change his/her waking patterns. He/she is awake and kicking when I wake up in the mornings and throughout the day which is totally opposite of Owen's in utero patterns. He was always up late which stayed true pretty much throughout his first year. New baby is 24 weeks along now and about the size of an ear of corn.

What is up with this warm weather? We are now back in B'ham and were expecting winter to be here but it's even warmer than it was in New Orleans!

Edited to add: New baby is now awake and kicking and it's 11pm. Just like my babies to prove me wrong, as always!

Owenisms

Owen is now 16 months old! Where, oh where does the time go? He's starting to look like such a little boy, there isn't much time before we can't call him a baby anymore. He's already a toddler but it's so hard to let go of our baby!

His favorite words/things right now: dinosaur, christmas tree, santa.

he can make animals sounds (this actually started more around 14 months for clarification): puppy, kitty, dinosaur (rawr!), cow, sheep and the non animal train says choo choo and the bus says beep beep.

he is truly amazing.

We tell him there is a baby in my belly and he will put his head on it and listen. He also loves to give my belly "high fives", which we assume he is directing at his sibling. :)

Right now lots of things are cottage cheese in his eyes, today we were out and somebody walked by with ice cream. owen started yelling "cottage cheese! cottage cheese!" My favorite is the bowl of mush in his goodnight moon book. We read it to him every night and have for a while but only in the last week has he discovered that the mush is actually cottage cheese!

Sad day on the frontier

Ohh noo! The Frontier hotel in Las Vegas was imploded today to make room for a new fancy complex. The place was gross and moldy but starbuck and i loved it! We always made sure to stop by and play the horse racing game and eat at little caesar's every time we were in town. Seriously, as silly as it sounds, we loved that game. It was falling apart and when we would sit there racing each other, once of us would always win, so we came out way ahead. I'm going to go try to figure out what kind of game it was so this post will make more sense....

Edit:: Here it is, our beloved game. Apparently it is called the Derby game by Sigma and is on the verge of extinction itself. Oh woe!

Halfway To Go

Today I am 20 weeks pregnant. My belly finally started to pop out over the weekend. I could actually feel it yesterday, and I'm fairly certain I could see it growing larger before my eyes. Last night he/she was kicking up a storm and starbuck got to see he/she moving around through the belly. It's all starting to seem sooo real now and 2o more weeks is soon!!

We've been talking a lot about how this next baby's personality could possibly be. We were bleseed with a VERY active first baby and we won't know what to do if we have a sleepy baby! Owen's eyes were never closed for long. He had no use for a bouncer or any other "sleepy baby" device. He was never really a "baby" per se. He was alert from day one, and was smiling on cue by 3 weeks. Surely the next baby will have a totally different demeanor? If so, I'm sure the relaxation will be nice. If so, we'll just stay on our toes, we haven't gotten to come down off them since that hot day in july 2006 so I doubt we'll know any difference.

Week in Review

Was quite a busy week.
Last weekend, we went "camping" in a cabin in Mentone. It was so nice to be up and away from it all! Owen had a great time, esp b/c Mimi and Papa came up and he got to entertain. The weekend was filled with good food and lots of relaxing.

Our other big event of the week was signing a lease on a new store. It's going to be a baby/children shop and is really close to the house, just like we like. It was kind of unexpected, we had given up on finding the right spot here but it fell into our laps and everything unfolded perfectly, so we're pretty sure it was all meant to happen. That's the way we wait for most things in our lives to work, if it's too much of a struggle, we move on and wait for the right thing to come along. Sounds cheesy but that's how things work out best for our family. We hope to be opening in the next few weeks so now we're lost in a whirlwind of buying, planning, and utilities.

Have a great weekend!

We have FINALLY found something that will tire Owen out...Halloween! We had such a fun day all day today, I was sad to see it end.

Recap of the Saturday before Halloween

Yesterday was such a nice day! We got up early and ate breakfast at Lag's, our favorite neighborhood eatery then headed to Avondale Park for an art market. Owen wanted to jump in the pond and swin with the ducks sooo bad! It was all we could do to keep him wrangled and away from it. There was tons of pretty things to look at but we ended up just buying a sunday subcription to the paper (how arty) and a painted glass window that will go perfectly in the craftsman house we will soon have. Our current house is just not our style at all. It's nice and comfortable but not us. Oh well, next time!

Getting back on track-- we came home after the art market for nap time then headed out for lunch at mellow mushroom and spent the rest of the afternoon driving around and looking at junk. Today we are getting ready to head out to another pumpkin patch with Jeremy. Owen can't wait to see more puh-puhs!

I'm very relieved to report that our papa g got out of the hosptial yesterday and with a diagnosis of a few stomach ulcers but everything else they checked out is as good as can be!

Good news from Papa G land-- his heart is in great shape and there is no blockage to be found. Tomorrow he is having some sort of test that will look in his stomach to make sure nothing is going on with it then he'll most likely get to go home. He is still having chest pains caused by some unknown source but we're all relieved that it's not his heart again.


Today was a nice, cold, and rainy day. We took Owen to library story time and took starbuck to tea time tuesday at his favorite bubble tea location. We also had several impromptu business meetings about our new baby website venture. Wonderful lazy day is coming to an end. Goodnight!

ps

We are 17 weeks pregnant with new baby today! According to one of my many weekly updates, this sweet baby is the size of a large onion!

lots of yuck

Oh wow, where do I begin to catch up...I really need to start doing this more often.
this weekend was lots of fun, Papa G and Mimi came down and we took Owen to a pumpkin patch. He LOVES pumpkins these days so it was a super adventure for him. He calls them "Puh-Puh's" The pumpkin patch had a petting zoo so he also got to visit with some animal friends. We took a tractor (Tat-tah in owen speak!) driven wagon out to the patch and he ran around to every pumpkin he could get to and tried to pick it up.It was so much fun to watch! He also loved the hay maze and tried climbing the bales.

Fast forward to today. Starbuck had to fly to New Orleans in the worst weather ever. When he was safely there, I relaxed for a minute only to get a call from mama saying that daddy is in the hopsital with chest pains. They are testing him for everything under the sun, trying to rule everything out. I hope they find something but not something bad. We should know more tomorrow...maybe.
Starbuck managed to make it home tonight after a long flight delay in which he was missing off my radar. I couldn't get him on the phone and every flight tracking website came up void of his flight. It was horrible! Finally he did make it home, but only after the cats and I spent a terrified hour, hiding from a ghost. I heard a male voice mumbling (the cats heard it and came running) and the kitchen blinds moved for no reason then I heard a vibrating buzz...that one freaked the cats out as well. Oh the joy.
Now we are all safely locked in the house listening to the wind howling outside. This is setting the mood for a spooky halloween...

Newest Family Member

This past weekend we got to make a surprise trip to Houston. Starbuck's sister was having some high blood pressure problems caused by her pregnancy and her dr decided it was time for the baby to be born. Almost a month early, Garett was welcomed to the world early last Saturday morning! He is the cutest baby I've seen since our cute baby! We visited with the family there for a few days and are now back in B'ham.

We took Owen to the dr yesterday to check on some stomach issues he's been having. We are hopeful that they are over but just in case, we had the fun task of collecting another stool sample to have checked out. He's been fussy and irratable more than usual the last few weeks but we are fairly certain happy Owen is back and ready to play. Hopefully whatever that stomach problem is is over.

Week In Review

Last week was a fairly boring week. The big excitement of the week was taking Owen to the dr on Friday. It's the first time he's ever visited and had to wait in the "sick baby" room. It was so sad! He has had stomach problems (very gassy, rotten smelling diapers, and some vomiting) over the last week and we decided it was time to take him in. They took some blood and said it showed he had a viral infection. Then we got to go home and wait on him to poop so we could collect three stool samples. What fun! Luckily, the visit to the dr seemed to cure him and we have had no trouble since.

Saturday we went to a Fall Festival and bought a few crafty early Christmas presents and ate lots of great food. Owen loved the roasted ear of corn!

A cute little owen fact- he is TERRIFIED of cow moos. It doesn't matter where the moo comes from, even if it's from a person, his bottom lip quivers and he cries the most pitiful cry. It's so sweet and sad and so hard to not want moo just to see him be a cute sad baby! We have no idea where this came from but it's definitely his one true fear.

I guess that's it for now!

I can feel the baby moving! I have been almost certain for a few days but today I can feel him/her going wild in there! It's still such a faint flutter but i am so sure that is what it is. Supposedly baby is as long as a lime this week. Awwww. :)

I had my OB appt last week and it went well. We heard the heartbeat (i also listen to it at home several times a week) and I talked to her about my lack of appetite. She was a little concerned b/c I lost 8 lbs since my last visit. With my last pregnancy I had little desire to eat but with this one, I have no desire to eat. I get full within a few bites of every meal. She told me to start eating calorie rich things (like milkshakes!) until my appetite returns.

Not much else is going on around here. The weather is very fall like and we're getting excited about autumn. We have a train ride, several pumpkin patches, and a vacation to Baltimore in the near future!

13.5 weeks

I have had the best intentions in keeping up with this thing better but I am using the sick card as my excuse this time. Last week S. and I were both down and out with an awful early fall cold. The weather turned beautiful and at that second we got sick. Luckily, Owen was spared the misery of the sickness, he just had to put up with too pitiful parents. He did a great job taking care of us!

As soon as that yuckiness passed, I was hit with an awful bout of either food poisoning or a stomach virus. Whichever, it was miserable. I'll spare you the details but I was in the bathroom for pretty much 30 hours straight. I didn't eat anything other than chicken broth and lots of liquids. It's hard to do that while pregnant, not feeding the baby seems so cruel but there was no way food was going to stay in anyway. I have had a big problem with eating in general this pregnancy.

Last time, i had plenty of food aversions and didn't eat extravagantly, but this time I have nooooooo appetite at all. Forcing myself to eat is the only way it gets done. My stomach just feels really full all the time. In later pregnancy that is normal b/c the baby is pushing the stomach up so far but right now he/she is so tiny that shouldn't be the case. Tomorrow I'll visit with the OB and ask her for advice.

Other than that, this baby is a quiet one. No morning sickness or anything bad showed up in the first trimester to complain about. I have heartburn frequently and Mama says that means I must be cooking up another redhead!

It's late and bedtime. Goodnight. :)

This weekend was a whilrwind...Starbuck jetted off to new orleans on saturday morning and Owen and I spent the entire day playing and shopping. We were so excited about going to pick Dada up at the airport only to find his flight had been cancelled. So we had to wait on him to make the drive back from New Orleans since there were no more flights that night. What a day!

Today we are up and getting ready to go to Atlanta. We're going to pick Jeremy up from the airport and go to La Fonda, one of our favorite restaurants (no, it's been around a lot longer than Napolean Dynamite's la fonda) then check into the hotel for the night. I'll update later!

Welcome to our new little corner of the world wide web!