Amy

Lexi is totally stable sitting up now and is close to crawling. At the moment, she is working on getting from a sitting position down to a crawling position gracefully without smacking her face into the floor. Today she was saying da-da-da for the first time. It took me a minute to realize what she was doing. She babbles so much I wasn’t really paying attention.

Emma spent the night with Mom last night. She always has such a great time over there and never wants to come home. Mom gives her just about anything she wants and is a great playmate, giving her full attention. Sometimes it makes me feel like maybe I’m missing the mark as a mother when Emma is never that excited to be at home and I never give her 100% attention for very long anymore. I have so much going on normally.

Last Wednesday I had a bit of a breakdown. Scott had trials in Columbia all week and I was so tired and worn out. He wanted to go to church to help with the youth and I was going to have both kids by myself again and I really wanted to be strong and figure it out but I was just tired and couldn’t anymore. Needless to say I ended up in tears on my bed. I came up with a schedule on how to get more dedicated time to the kids and to my work. Thursday was a breeze and I got plenty of work done. I don’t know if the schedule will continue to work, but I’m going to try. Tomorrow Emma is going to have to go somewhere while I have our staff meeting. Actually, I don’t think I have any input to give so I think if I set her up washing her dishes, she would keep busy for the hour. I keep trying to keep the big picture in my head. Emma will be in school in 3 years and then I’ll have more time to work ( I think, maybe I’m naive!) and I really would like to keep the job I have for as long as I can. Anyway, it’s still a continous struggle to get work done. I do love my job. I love going to the office and doing what I do. My manager is very appreciative of my dedication and I’m not ashamed I love my job.

Scott is thinking of applying at the ATF or US Marshalls. It would mean he would have to go back for more academy so it is holding him back but we’ll see. I think he really wants to do it.

Tuesday Lexi really started sitting up and playing with stuff. I keep the boppi around her because she’s still a little unstable but she seems pretty content just playing with her toys at her feet.

I feel like I’m drowning in pictures. I need so many printed and done something with, it’s ridiculous. I do scrapbook, but it’s so time consuming and I have no where to put all that stuff. I think if we arranged my closet right, I could set it up in there or even in the new playroom. See, I just realized I need to do a before and after page of the playroom. Maybe I’ll do it while I’m on this conference call.

I was lying on the floor this morning and Emma came up to me and laid down on top of me and hugged me and said, I love you so much. AWWW! Melt my heart.

I took her to MawMaw’s because she asked to go play with Skyler (even though I knew she didn’t really want to go) and because I had a conference call this afternoon. She cried when we got there and said, I want to go to Mommy’s house, don’t leave me at MawMaw’s. Geez, break my heart why don’t you!

I’m waiting on pins and needles for the results of The Bachelor. I think he should pick Sarah.

We went for a last minute trip to MD to my parents’ house there. We stayed from Wed-Sun. The girls were both angels on the trip. We also bought a new Odyssey. I love it a lot. My bank account doesn’t though. We got the best deal we could though. The other Honda dealerships wouldn’t even beat it for us.

Lexi has been trying to crawl over the past week. She can go in 360. When she scoots, sometimes she bangs her face on the floor so she doesn’t quite have it down but she’s really trying. She still can’t stand to sit down for long although she can do it. Of course, if she tries to move she falls down, but she’s working on it!

Emma amazes me every day with all she can say and all she can understand.

Let’s see. Lexi went to her 6 month check up last Wed. She was 15 lbs. 25% 26″ 75%. I talked to him about her sleep also and he said to just try to give her as many solids at each feeding as she wanted. He said to wait one more month and then we would have to start doing the 5-10-15 thingy at night. She is still getting up at 1 and 4. Ugh. She is doing this cute growling thing though. She sounds like a little baby cub. She is trying to even get up off her stomach. If she can get up against something, she gets up on her hands and feet. She can sit up for a few seconds at a time.

Emma is a hoot. Heather told me when she was in the car and Lexi started crying, Emma said, It’s okay, Lexi, Mommy will be back. How sweet. She says all kinds of things. We have fallen off the potty training bandwagon. She now will cry if we try to take her in to poop. I’ve completely given up until she shows interest in it again or when she turns 3, whichever comes first.

Today I went to see Rhonda and Iyanla from Starting Over at Southpark. They were really good speakers. I got a few pictures and video. I even asked a question. I asked about Aunt Ellen and Rachel and she said Ellen voluntarily resigned from being her trustee and Rachel has begun nursing school.

We are going to buy a new Honda van next week. We’ve looked at new and used and have definitely decided new is better since the new body style/features came out this year.

We are headed to Maryland next week to visit family. Sort of last minute decision and probably why this van thing has become a topic so quickly. Hopefully they can get us the color we want before we leave Wednesday.

Emma is really starting to talk in sentences and is picking up on conversations. The other day Heather was in the back seat in the car and the baby was crying. Emma out of the blue says, Maybe she’ll go to sleep. I wish I could imitate the way she said it. I’m at work today and talked to her on the phone. She was watching Beauty and the Beast “Princess” ( which she would watch 3 times a day if we let her). She says “Princess’ Poppa going somewhere. Maybe he’s going home.” She’s obviously thinking ahead of what might happen in the movie. She’s so smart! I need to start writing down all of the cute things she says. Hmm, let me think. Last week she was on the phone with Mom and Mom told her she had to get off the phone. Emma says, No, Grandma, I not done talking to you. She hangs up and then somehow she calls Mom back and we hear her on her cell phone voice mail. “Daddy, I use your phone! Daddy, I use your phone! Daddy, I drop your phone!” She likes to say “actually” too. She’ll say things like, it’s actually a book. She pretends she’s on the phone with Skyler often. She was in the car with Scott and got his phone and said, We got a tree, uh-huh, uh-huh, yeah, we’re going home uh-huh, uh-huh yeah, ok, bye. She’s hilarious! I guess these things may not be funny to some people but when you see a helpless little baby now be able to make a sentence, pretty much any sentence that comes together seems amazing!

Emma spent the night with Mom last night. I was a little worried, especially since she didn’t get a nap. But Mom called this morning and said they had made it and she was in a good mood. That was really the first time she has done that except for when we were there. Scott is at work so Lexi and I are hanging out before church.

Last night D, J and I went to watch the prom couples walk into the high school. Pastels are definitely a hit, dresses that have a slit off center and ruffles were big. White tuxes seem to have made a come back too. There were 4 dresses that made our favorite list. The top one was white with three black horizontal stripes across the waist and bodice and then another black strap that went around her neck and shoulders somehow. I think Julia Roberts wore a dress like that one time now that I think of it. There was another tropical print with sequins that sounds REALLY bad but it was really cute on this girl.

I think we are going to have a family friend-high school girl come to the house to watch the girls during the summer. Not sure how it will work out but I’m hoping for the best. Emma complains now every time I have to take her to MawMaw’s. One time she told me, It’s too messy for me. Another time she said it was too loud. I really don’t mind leaving her somewhere if I know she is excited about it but it kills me when I know she doesn’t want to go.

Lexi will be 6 months shortly and she has no desire at all to sit down. She scoots down or insists to stand up. I think she might skip right to walking. She is STILL not sleeping through the night. 12, 3 and 5:30 seem to be her schedule at night and it stinks! I don’t know what to do about it either. She goes to sleep on her own like a charm for naps and nighttime but she will not stay asleep!

We had Lexi dedicated on Sunday. She was a doll in her dress and was an angel during the entire service. I need to go have a professional picture made of her in it.

Scott has put the first round of mud on the wall in the addition. He plan to sand tomorrow. I want to have a Pampered Chef show at the end of May and am hoping the room is done by then. Scott is hating this dry wall stuff so we’ll see how fast it gets done. He has done a fabulous job up until now but is now totally unmotivated to finish this part. Like I told, no one else is going to do it, so get out there!