Decorating For Christmas!

I was really excited to go get a Christmas tree this year. We didn't do one last year so this was the first year Keely got to really be a part of this. She helped us pick out a tree at the lot and as Daniel drug it to the car (it was a cut your own lot), she asked if he was going to walk home. Once home she went down for her nap and we put up lights. I'll post video eventually of her coming out and seeing all of the "decorations". She was so overwhelmed she couldn't stop moving and pointing and being excited.

Then we decorated the tree. We decided to let her put on the little balls we have while I put on the rest. Daniel kept offering to pick her up so that she could put the balls in different places. But if you've met Keely you KNOW how stubborn she is. She wanted to decorate the tree her own way...

So our tree has a ring around the front half...right at Keely's height of about 20 of these little balls. She wanted them as close together as possible. I haven't had the heart to spread them out because she checks on them and "tweaks" it each time she passes by. Besides, at least you can tell our two year old really did help.!

A 2 Year Old's Point of View!

Keely is obsessed with cameras, taking pictures, and looking at pictures. We've recently been letting her play with the Flip video camera because we're upgrading to the HD version. She LOVES taking pictures. Here is a 2 minute compilation of the 100's of clips she's taken. Be forewarned it is a LITTLE bit nauseating.

Odds and Ends

Haven't had anything big to post, but lots of little tidbits so I thought I'd just put them all together.

I'm officially no longer taking any pain medicine, even to sleep. I've been off of all the narcotics for about 4-5 weeks now. I'm in less pain now than I was before the surgery. I don't have much pain at all, just stiffness and what I think is my body getting used to moving around the two titanium rods in my back. I'm feeling good and I can't wait for my neurosurgeon appointment in NINE days when I hopefully get out of my brace and off of my restrictions.

I did get an explanation of benefits regarding my hospital bill. Not only am I blown away by the total cost (it was more than my hospital bill post car accident where I spent 10 days in the ICU). And I agree that Blue Cross (my network) deserves SOME savings. By making UT Medical Center an in-network hospital they bring them a lot of business. However, a 124k discount??? If the hospital can take only $37,240 of a $161,260, why do the uninsured have to pay so much??? I feel like something is wrong with our health care system.

Also, I was assured by my financial advisor at the hospital at my pre-op appointment that I'd have to pay my maximum out of pocket, $2,000. So I went ahead and paid that much on check in. Notice that I should only have paid $200! (Which I've known for 2 months now and the hospital wouldn't refund it until my insurance paid the bill.) They quoted me the out of network amounts, not the in network amounts. And how could they NOT know that they were in network for BCBS?? So today, UT medical center's financial department called me. I got really excited thinking I was getting my $1800 back until the lady started talking about my CT scan next week (for the neuro appt). She said she'd 'talked with my insurance' and that I still had $300+ to meet my deductible and the scan costs over 1000 bucks. I stopped her there and let her know 1) Your hospital already owes me $1800. 2) I've had 2-3 CT scans already, and I don't pay a dime. They're covered 100%. I was shocked that they made the SAME mistake again. Lesson learned, NEVER pay ahead of time for medical care. Ever.

So Keely is awesome. She never stops talking. She's had some pretty interesting comments lately.

• In church on Sunday she knelt with us to pray after communion and I leaned over and whispered to her that we were praying to say Thank You God for a good week, and please let me have another good week. She clasped her little hands and said "Thank You God". I teared up.
• I ask her a lot of days what the best part of her day was. She never really understood the question. One night she said to me "Mommy you're the best...part of my day." Another tear-jerker.
• Today Keely asked what I was doing and I told her that I was doing my laundry. She asked why and I told her cause I had no more clean underwear. She said "you got poopy on them?" When I told her know she thought and then asked "you got pee on them?" After I stopped laughing I explained that I like to change my underwear everyday, but I don't poop or pee in them because I'm a big girl. Love that kid. 

I'm loving the people we've met here in Knoxville and I'm so glad for the friends I've made here. On the Friday before my birthday we had a nice dinner here with Kerri, Sophia, and the Bostroms. Keely is so adorable with her friends. She really wants friends at her house all of the time. Its a bit pitiful. Since I've been slacking on the pictures, here are pictures of her with the Bostrom boys (Max and Cooper). The first is from a day we went for dinner and they had popsicles after. Since she was wearing a nice dress, I made her strip first. We figure this will only be socially acceptable a bit longer.

Two weekends ago Keely and Daniel went camping in the Bostrom's back yard with Jeff, Max and Cooper. They had a new shed built and thought they might as well before they filled it with stuff. Keely did GREAT and loved it. Despite the fact that she tells everyone that she slept in a "fireplace". She's now obsessed with camping and Daniel and I bought a tent so we can try it out. Hoping to squeeze in a one night trip to the nearby mountains before it gets too cold. Here are some pictures from that.

Lounging with the boys 

She was kind of creeped out by the texture of the s'more.

Her in the morning. See the carefully covered babies? Daniel woke her up getting this picture.

Reflecting

So I sit here in the last 15 minutes of my 29th near looking back and thinking about the changes in my life over the last year. This past year has been pretty intense.

Our road trips in the past year:

• Charlotte - 3 times (i think)
• Georgia - ~4-5 times
• Raleigh - once 
• Myrtle Beach - once!
• Columbus, Ohio - once
• Asheville - once!
• Illinois - once (though that was a plane ride!)

I finally got my dream of being a stay at home mom, only to realize maybe it wasn't my dream after all. I felt really guilty about that but I hope I've found my happy medium with my part time job with an online high school.

I developed and strengthened some friendships with some wonderful women (and their families) here in Knoxville.

Medically this was an exhausting year. At the end of September last year I was diagnosed with interstitial cystitis. (after a renal ultrasound, an abdominal CT and a endoscopic check of my bladder lining). This was just the beginning as over the past year I've had 38 bladder instillations as part of my treatment. These were done in two different groups, twice a week for 8 weeks starting in October and twice a week for 6 weeks starting in May. A bladder instillation is when they dissolve my medicine in saline, put a catheter in me and put the medicine directly in my bladder. Let's just say I've gotten a whole lot less embarrassed about people poking around down there. I'm even seeing a male OB/GYN for the first time in my life!
I also FINALLY (after 3 tries here in Knoxville) found a neurosurgeon willing to DO SOMETHING to fix my spine and end my pain. We're closing in my 3 month post-op visit where I will hopefully have all my restrictions lifted (I cannot wait to pick up my girl again) and be allowed to toss the hated back brace. This surgery has been a miracle to me as I'm already in less pain than I was pre-surgery. Its a life changer.

And of course this big number, reaching my 30s, makes me reflect back on my 20s. I realize that the whole of my 20s have been centered around Daniel and I's life together, including our amazing daughter for the last quarter of it. I know I am lucky to have quickly found the person I'm meant to be with and I'm so blessed to have him in my life. Even though he drives me INSANE sometimes I doubt anyone else would put up with me. And damn did we make an awesome kid together. What two year old says "I noticed you helped me wash my hands twice tonight papa"? Almost every night we lay in bed talking about something amazing/wonderful/adorable she did that day. We're so in love with her. Despite our different views on some parenting issues I think we're doing a good job with our girl, and with each other.

I look at my life and my beautiful family and think...its a good life. Happy Birthday to Me! I hope the next decade is full of just as many beautiful friends, love, and laughter.

Turned a Corner

I feel as though last week I finally turned a corner. I'm able to take care of Keely around the house during the day. Though we seem to be late to everything these days because getting ready is mostly in Keely's control. I dress and change her in her bed and she always lays down as far from me as possible and asks "How bout here?" and when I say, no that's too far, she'll move like 2 inches closer and ask again. It's a serious test of my thin patience, but I think I'm getting better at it.

On Thursday I went to see my neurosurgeon for my first check up and a set of X-rays. First, I really wish I'd taken a camera and taken a picture of the X-rays. The anterior (from my chest in) view clearly shows ALL of the hardware. The CT picture in my previous post below only show a small portion. There are two large rods on either side of my spine and ~12 screws holding those rods into place. I have no idea how big the screws really are but they looked GIANT to me. I spent all night wondering how they weren't poking holes in my lungs!

The doc said everything looked excellent on my X-rays. No signs of bone fusing yet, but not really any signs expected at 7 weeks. He was looking for stabilization of the hardware at this point. He said he thinks that the hardware is about 70% stabilized. Once the rods and screws are set firmly in place I believe nothing short of another trauma would disrupt the fusion. I asked about restrictions and starting to exercise and picking up Keely, etc and he said he would like me to stay on the same restrictions (including brace wearing) for the next 6 weeks until I go back for my 3 month post-op. He told me that at one point in my surgery he'd removed the vertebrae and disconnected some ribs from my spine and there was a hole in my spine. Just a big gap. So he wanted to be extra careful with me and not take any chances. I told him that made me want to puke on his shoes just a little bit.

Overall, we talked about my pain management (I'm down to Tylenol all day and one dose of hydrocodone and valium to sleep). He was really impressed and said that he thinks I'm recovering much faster than expected and than the average.

My scar is looking much better and I thought you may like to see how to looks now, post staples, instead of having the previous, kind of scary, image stuck in your heads.

Creative Counting

Keely's current obsession is with baby dolls, including her foam dinosaurs, elmos, and bunnies. Last night while I was working in our bedroom she brought in ALL of her babies and lined them up along the edge of the bed. She kept telling me "Shhhh. Babies Night-night". Then she brought in a plastic toy smurf (yes, a McDonalds's happy meal toy) and said "smurf crying". When I asked why the smurf was crying she said because "he has to go night-night". Because of COURSE going to bed = tears. (It has here recently.) Then I asked how many babies she had and she counted 1-9 perfectly. Though I don't know that it actually correlated with the babies. When I asked what came after 9, she picked up the baby on the end (stuffed Elmo) and shouted "ELMO!"

Surgery Update

It's been a month since my surgery (1/3 of the way through recovery!). I'm feeling better and I'm way down on the amount of narcotics I'm taking (one hydrocodone every 5-6 hours). The pain is still there and is still bad, but its manageable. I've done it before. We're about back to the level of pain I went back to work with post-accident. I KNOW I can suck this up. Last week I was really depressed and had several freak out moments but my mom came for most of this week because I JUST did not feel ready to be home alone with Keely. I practiced today changing diapers and doing most of that stuff and managed to do it. Keely was thankfully more or less helpful. I'm worried about next week because I still can't drive and Keely is going to go CRAZY stuck in the house with me all day. I'm just going to send out a plea to mommy friends and ask them to come over and play in the mornings a couple of times a week, just to keep her sane!

I Making Busy

So after 2.5 week straight of being constantly entertained Keely needed a brek. She went back o her room and was quietly playing. When we'd go to check on her she would say "go my room, i making busy." After about 45 minutes she came about out to the living room but i could not resist going to see what she'd been doing.

She had gone into a dresser and found her pajamas. Each doll was wrapped up in a pice of PJs and lined up in bed and ready for sleep. absolutely adorable! This is only a tiny sampling. All told there were about 5-7 babies wrapped up and waiting for bed. 

Nana and I went last week to get mani and pedicures and since then Keely has wanted her fingers and toes 'pretty'. Nana and I painted her fingernails (a really pale color) a night or two before she left. Julie and i (ok Julie, she is way more coordinated than I am) painted her toe nails a bright red. Daniel thinks its hilarious that I refuse to pierce Keely's ears but I'll girl her up with toenail polish.

How can you not find those little piggies ADORABLE???

Before and After

Surgery went really well. Dr Abel came out and said that surgery went even better than expected. He was able to fix 98% of the curve in my spine (the curve caused by the accident and not the natural curve). Healing has gone pretty well. I came home from the hospital on Wed. I'm still in quite a bite of pain and the drugs tend to knock me out which is why this post has taken so long to write.

Pictures speak louder than word, so here are a few pictures that tell the story better than I could:

The curve of my back pre surgery.

The curve of my back post-surgery. 

EDIT: The above 2 pictures were taken less than a week apart from each other. I didn't lose any weight between them. Straightening my spine made THAT big of a difference.

This is what my spine looked like for the 3 years between the accident an my surgery.

Th

This is my spine post surgery. In the front of my spine is where Dr Abel was able to actually replace T9 (the vertebrae that was crushing and causing the spinal curvature).  You can see the pins used to help hold my spine in place while the bone fuses. 

This picture shows my foot long scar where they did a posterior approach to straighten my spine. I'm so thankful that  they were able to do so so only going through the back instead of doing a thoracaotomy  (remove a rib, deflate a lung to reach my spine.

EDIT: This picture also shows my beautiful tattoo (Thanks Caitie!), which most of my extended family had no idea about. Whoops...

4 more days

So four more days (really 3 and a bit) until the big day. I've gotten this far by REALLY not thinking about it, but now its on my calendar (Surgery 8 am, hospital 6 am) and my pre-surgery instructions are taped to the fridge. Its really happening. I'm SO READY to get this chapter of my life overwith. I've been dealing with the effects of that accident for almost 3 years now and I'm ready.

I wanted to make sure everyone knows what is happening in surgery Friday and to make some specific prayer requests for those of you who like specifics. They're going to do a posterior approach, which means they will cut through the muscles in my back to reach my spine. At my pre-op appoint Dr Abel shared some great news. After much studying of my scans he THINKS that he can actually remove the 2 crushed vertebrae and replace them with titanium cages from the back. Previously he thought I'd have to have a thoracotomy (deflate the lung and go in that way) in order to do this. This would be GREAT in so many ways. First, it would completely straighten my spine (which we didn't think would happen with this posterior only surgery). Second, it would give the surgeon bone to use for my bone graft to encourage fusion without him having to harvest any from my hip bone. This would be the best possible outcome of this surgery and we only just found out it was even an option. PLEASE pray that Dr. Abel is able (hah) to do this. Otherwise he may suggest that I have a second surgery a week after the first where the vertebrae are replaced via a thoracotomy.

Please also pray that Keely does well with me being gone, its been awhile and she's gotten way more attached since the last time. Pray that my surgeon (Dr. Abel), and anesthesiologist and all of the rest of my doctors make wise decisions and have steady hands while they're playing so close to my spinal cord. Pray for a quick recovery and my pain to go away completely after healing.

Thank you everyone for keeping me in your thoughts and prayers. I will make sure Daniel sends out texts and posts on my facebook (Heather Morris Hillesheim) as soon as I'm out of surgery. Now I just have to get through these last few days without having a panic attack or breaking down.

Gives me chills!

I received the galleys for my first physics book in the mail on Friday afternoon. Galleys are physical layouts of what each page in the book will actually look like. I'm checking one last time for typos (I've found way too many already) and for the placement of photos, etc. But THIS page....gave me goosebumps.

That's so COOL!

One of Keely's newest tricks is to ask what you're doing and then say "That's so cool!" Its pretty hilarious what she thinks is cool. Everything from crushing garlic for dinner to brushing teeth.

But in the last week Keely has started singing along with songs. I've really been waiting for this because we listen to Raffi a lot in the car and I wanted to hear her sing along! After our bear hunt in the car I've started playing Dr Jean for her at home, including the bear hunt song. She started singing along with that and hasn't stopped singing since. Her favorites are twinkle-twinkle and the ABCs. Last night at the kitchen table she said "Its raining cookies!" When we looked at her curiously, she said "I singing" and I recognized the song from the Sesame Street we'd watched that day.

Today I took the Flip recorder into the car with us on the way to school. I got some cute footage, and here are two clips. A bit more is on my picture website.

Keely singing Twinkle-Twinkle.

Itsy-Bitsy Spider

A Bear Hunt

Today on the way to school while we were driving through downtown Lenoir City, Keely told me “I see bear.” I kind of laughed and said that I didn’t think so. She replied, “I see bear, far away.” I told her that was good. Further down the road she said again “I see bear, far away. It’s running.” We spent the next 10 minutes talking about if the bear was scary or nice (scary), if it was going to catch us when we stopped for red lights, etc. I’d gotten used to her telling stories about things she’s done, but this is the first time she’s told a full-blown imaginary story. I LOVE IT! On the way home from school today she started saying that she saw a bear in the tree and then said "bear hunt." I bet I know what song they've been singing at school this week!

Sorry for the lack of pictures lately, I’m waiting on Daniel to get a few edited and I’ve been putting in a lot of hours with work lately. 

Snuggle Mommy

Last week Keely went through a not wanting to sleep phase. She didn't take a nap longer than an hour all week (most days no nap at all) and still fought bedtime. We've changed out bedtime routin a bit and it seems to be working. One change is that I play music for her. The other is "snuggle mommy" time. This started in desperation to get her to sleep one night. I broke the rules and went in when she was crying at bedtime. I scooped her up and sat in her chair and rocked her. Now this sounds like a great plan, but I knew it would be bad eventually because she WILL NOT fall asleep if someone is in the room (she's laid awake in our bed for 2 hours in the middle of the night before). So i rocked her for about 15 minutes then put her back in bed, to much tears. But then she fell asleep quickly. So the next night she asked to snuggle mommy so I told her we'd do it for THREE songs on the radio. That went much better. Now its a habit and I LOVE IT. I'm happy to have this little piece of my baby needing me when so often I look at her and wonder where the heck this big girl came from! These are the moments moms cherish.

Oh Crap

Ever since Keely was born I've been nagging Daniel to watch his language around her. And he'll admit he's pretty bad. On the other hand I've done really well with at least replacing curse words with non-curse words. Cussing Lite maybe? We figured we'd be getting an uncomfortable phone call from her school some day and it would be all his fault. Funny how things turn out...

So today Keely was eating corn and kept talking while eating so pieces kept falling out. I said "we're just going to recycle this crap." To which Keely promptly replied "Crap."

Well Keely repeats a lot of words that we say without any understanding of how to use them so we just tried to ignore it. We were afraid if we made a big deal about it it would make the word more important in her mind. Hopefully she'd just forget it?

No luck. A few minutes later she was looking in her basket of fake food, apparently for something she couldn't find because she said "Oh, crap!" 

The Beach!

So life has been pretty crazy here, but I finally finished my online course (on how to teach an online course) and we're done traveling for at least 2 weeks. I'll make a couple of posts this weekend to help 'catch up'. We went to the beach for a week (May 14-21) with Nick. It was really wonderful! Megan was even able to come down for the first Saturday and acted as our official photographer. Keely loved the ocean and playing in the sand. She keeps asking for the beach and the ocean again. I'll let the pictures tell the rest of the story!

Keely rocked these glasses everytime we were at the beach. I love the "thug" look!

Her very first sight of the ocean!

First steps in the sand

This is one of my favorite pictures! What a priss!

In this picture she is running towards Megan yelling 'Meh-meh'!

Megan and I showing off our new shirts. These shirts are part of a pretty hilarious story from high school. 

Apparently I'd labeled a page in Megan's senior year-book "Heather's Page" and then I never signed it. Whoops? She only half filled out my yearbook.

Keely rocking out to some music on the TV.

There are a TON more pictures, so please visit our picture website (in the bar on the right) to see more. There are also 2 videos that will get posted on the shutterfly site SOON.

In other news, Keely's language skills continue to grow at a crazy pace. Wed after her first day in her summer class (mon and wed mornings) after we came home she told me "I put sticker on box". (They decorated treasure boxes.) While sentences and story telling isn't new, it IS new that she is putting together stories that we haven't coached her with. Like telling her that she was going to go on an airplane, and then she'd say "I go on airplane." And just a few minutes ago I sneezed and she said "bless you." I love it!

Sweetest Thing EVER

So for the last 2 weeks Keely has decided to wake up between 6 and 7. I know, I should just be thankful she's slept until 8 for most of her first 2 years, I'm spoiled. So she's been up early enough to see Daniel before he leaves for work. She's been pretty ok with him going thus far, but this morning he said bye bye and he had to go to work and she started sobbing. He left and she kept saying something over and over. I looked at her and she was touching her lips. I finally figured out what she was saying "Papa KISS, I need Papa kiss". I ran out to stop him before he pulled out of the driveway so he could come back in and give his broken hearted girl a kiss. After that she said 'bye bye papa' and was fine. I had tears in my eyes it was so sweet.

Easter, a job, FINALLY, and my future amazon

   Its been awhile since I've updated so you're getting a mixed bunch of news here. First, Easter weekend (and Keely's actual birthday) were wonderful. It started with breakfast with Aunt Cathy and her family on their way to Gatlinburg. Then we spent the weekend in Georgia with our "family" there. Saturday night dinner in Douglasville with lots of people was great, and our Easter sunday tradition with the Carros family was the best. I sure love that family.
   Keely's concept of "happy birthday" has become "i get cool stuff". I'm not sure how its going to go the next time we go to someone else's birthday party. Like yesterday morning Keely was sad at having to take off her monkey pajamas (which is typical), so i told her I had a present for her (I'd bought her a monkey t-shirt for just this reason). And her response was "happy birthday"?
    Life has gotten quite a bit busier lately. I was finishing up proofing the copyediting for the first of the two books I've written this past year, last Thursday I started my online class on how to teach an online class, and last Friday I got a job offer. I'm helping to develop curriculum for an online school, and hopefully eventually teaching for them. I'm really loving it so much and I like having a job. Its not that I don't love being home with Keely, but I like feeling as though I'm contributing something concrete to this family. It also means a lot less fear and stress for the two of us regarding finances. God has really answered a prayer on this one.
  I THINK I finally got my first spontaneous "love you" today. She's repeated it on demand, but today on the way to the doc for her 2 year well check she said "dance mommy". She likes when we "dance" (bob our heads) to the music on the radio. So I obliged and she said "wuf you". Which I'm pretty certain was a love you. Finally!!
   So at Keely's well check today Dr. Courts said Keely was perfectly healthy. She's at her lowest weight percentile EVER (75th) and her highest height (90 something). Dr. Courts said that at this age they can sort of predict a final height, which isn't 100% accurate but gives a good idea. First, Keely is going to be tall. When i told the doc that Daniel was the same height as me, he looked surprised until I mentioned that we both have bothers over the 6 foot mark. He said Keely should be within an inch or two (plus or minus) of 5'11"! She'll probably be taller than Daniel and I around her 12th birthday. At least someone will be able to reach the top shelves...I always hoped we'd have tall boys but not sure if I want Keely to be 6 foot tall. However, Aunt Amy is very tall and handles it really gracefully so maybe Keely would be like that.
  Hope this is a good catch up. Sorry for the lack of pictures but I'll work on those soon.

I'm falling apart :(

      So, you all know about the back issues that make me feel like an old woman all of the time, but thats not the only medical issue I have. I was also diagnosed with interstitial cystitis in October. Basically it means that the lining of my bladder is permanently irritated. I'm lucky enough to not have the worst of the symptoms but before treatment I did feel like I had to pee all the time and have some flare ups (which were confused with UTIs). The drug I've been prescribed creates a kind of coating inside my bladder to prevent irritation (think pepto for the bladder). So in October I started the initial treatment to kind of jump start the drug into my system. The problem with taking a drug orally for the bladder is that only a small percentage of the drug actually gets to the bladder, the rest is absorbed before it gets there. So the way around this is to insert it directly into the bladder...with a catheter. So I had 16 bladder instillations were exactly that was done. Since then i've been taking the drug orally but recently started having some pain and a return of the constant feeling of having to pee. So I went to see my doc and he said, particularly since I'll have to be off the drug entirely for the week before and after my surgery (it has MILD blood thinning properties) that we'd just do another 6 week (12 treatments) course. Yay. And half of these fall after Keely is out of school so I'll be begging my mommy friends to help out a bit. (And I'm sure they will. They are such a great bunch.)
   I just find it seriously depressing that I'm not even 30 (unlike Megan!!) and my body is falling apart. I've had a hard time since the doc appointment with being depressed about this. Probably doesn't help that Daniel is in San Francisco and I'm flying solo here. I shouldn't whine since things certainaly could have been worse, but they sure could be better too!

A Really COOL Birthday Party

If you were anywhere near my Uncle Al on my wedding day, the title of this post will remind you of that day.

So I spent a week obsessively checking weather.com to see if it was going to rain on the day of Keely's birthday party. Thankfully, it didn't rain, but it was COLD. In the 50's and it had rained the whole night before so the playground was full of mud puddles. Thankfully the moms of Keely's friends love her enough to come out in the cold and celebrate with us. Before dinner we played by the lake and watched the 'waves' roll in. Yes, it was THAT windy.

Keely was really excited to be able to drink from a big girl cup, and not just water! She's been getting water in a real cup at meal times, but this was JUICE! Ok, it was really crystal light, but she doesn't know any better!

After Daniel and my dad got the burgers and hot dogs ready, we all dug in!

To spare everyone from eating Keely spit (despite her obsession with bubbles she still has not figured out how to blow effectively), we went ahead and cut Keely a piece before putting candles in it and singing Happy Birthday to her. I really wish Daniel had gotten a shot of her face while everyone was singing. It was absolutely dumbstruck. "Everyone is looking at me??" I never would have thought Keely was the shy type, but I couldn't decide if that face was excited or panicked. After, Keely was quite happy to eat the cake!

Then all of the kids went to play on the playground. We had a good time. Keely kept trying to get Grandpa (Bagdi) to go down the slide with her. He's such a sucker he gave in and she was thrilled. Once people started saying goodbye to her she started crying, realizing that the fun was almost over. John D helped me to distract her by helping her blow bubbles. It was such a great evening, despite the weather and I really appreciate everyone who came out to celebrate my baby turning two with us. Wow, two.

Come Bagdi!

We have a ton more pictures of the party, Keely opening her presents, and soon to be (late next week probably) of her actual birthday. Please check them out on our picture website.

I NEED it

Keely's newest phrase is... I NEED that. And yes, with the stress on need. It was cute...the first few times. I'm a bit tired of hearing it at least 100 times a day. And about anything, like food, toys, a bird in the yard. Thankfully she doesn't usually get annoyed when we tell her no, she doesn't actually NEED that.

(Also, a birthday party post is coming as soon as Daniel gets some pictures ready!)

God is SO good!

     Yesterday Daniel spilt a coke on his laptop. He immediately turned it off and took it apart to clean it. After ~6 hours he turned it back on and it didn't work. He was very upset as we dont have the money to fix or replace it. We even checked the prices on ebay for used laptops, finding that functioning ones cost at least 500, but more typically 600-700. I told him God has always taken care of us when we think we won't be able to make ends meet.
     Today he took it to the Genius Bar at the apple store, and they weren't able to help him, being unable to open computers there in the store. They gave him a list of approved apple repair places in the area and told him that sending it into apple for repairs would cost a minimum of $700. Daniel even spent several hours trying to swap parts between his laptop and Patrick's old one (which he generously gave us) to no avail as the parts were slightly different.
    In desperation we went to google's shopping site and looked for a macbook...and what do we find but a very similar macbook to his for $331. We both just stared blankly for a minute trying to figure out what was wrong with this laptop. It was so cheap because of a $100 mail in rebate and the site was doing a special 10% off of mac products that ended at 10 pm TONIGHT. It was 9:50. I looked at Daniel and asked him "How can this be anything other than God looking out for us?"

THANK YOU!!!

Miscommunication

Keely refused a nap this afternoon so she was pretty fussy. After eating a surprisingly great dinner--she was so excited to eat some red onion she bit her finger while trying to shove it in her mouth--we thought we'd run over to Uncle Patrick's house to pick up some things. So we asked her if she wanted to go for a ride. She got very excited and kept repeating ride, so we all got ready and put on shoes (during which she talked to her feet the entire time, "silly feet") and went out. Except when we tried to put her in the car she started screaming and pointing to the road saying "ride!" We couldn't figure out what she wanted so we shut the car and asked her to show us. She promptly took our hands and started walking down our little street. Apparently she was convinced this is what ride meant. We made one lap and then asked if she wanted to go see Uncle Patrick now, and she said no. After two laps, she still didnt want to go see Uncle Pat, and also did not want to go play on her swingset out back. After three laps she didn't want to do either of the last two options, OR play on the porch. Finally during the fourth lap she turned to one of us and said "up". I'm pretty impressed with how much she walked, even though she still melted down and cried when we came inside. Too tired to walk, but didn't want to stop! While we were walking every so often she would put down her head (like a football player trying to push through defenders) and yell "running, running" with "fast" occasionally thrown in. Thankfully she was holding onto one of us on each side so she did not faceplant onto the concrete.
    In other funny news, today Daniel was peeing in the bathroom and she went in and said "Papa, sit down!" He had to explain that boys don't sit to pee. Then she offered him toilet paper. And now I just thought that someday when she's older she is probably going to be embarrassed about all of these things I've posted. Eh, we've got time yet.

My Addiction

     Every night before Daniel and I go to sleep we sneak in to check on Keely. Now I know many parents do this and its not a big deal, but in our house it is. Keely's sleep has always been very much a do not disturb time, partially because if she sees someone in her room and they leave she will cry like her heart has been broken. This is also why we typically don't go in to cuddle her when she wakes up a bit in the night. We've learned the hard way it honestly just makes it worse.
     But back to my addiction. It started when Keely first started sleeping in her big girl bed because I wanted to make sure that she hadn't climbed out of the bed and fallen asleep on the floor. But now I do it just because there is nothing more beautiful in the world than a sleeping child. I love seeing her surrounded by all of the stuff she HAS to sleep with (right now its 3 stuffed animals, 5 foam dinosaurs, 2 blankets, and 4 books) in whatever weird position she's gotten herself in (two nights ago she was upside down in the bed). Sometimes its the best part of my day, and honestly my days are pretty great right now.

Love you!

Every mom waits to hear those magic words. I tell Keely I love her about a million times a day, mostly because I am frequently overwhelmed with HOW MUCH I love this girl, but some because I want her to say it back to me. Well today she said it...to her plastic phone. She was talking on her plastic phone and pushed a button that made it say "bye bye now, love you!" and she repeated back "lub you". Ugh. Every mom's dream, right?

Done!

A few hours ago I sent the last files, and an invoice to my editor at Facts on File. I am officially done with the two books I have been writing! These books are aimed to provide supplemental instruction to high school physics students, one on Light and Sound and the other on Electricity and Magnetism. They are on the way to being published sometime by the end of the year (I think). I will soon be a published author! 

Now what to do with my "spare" time?

Big Girl Bed!

      For Keely's 2nd birthday next month, Daniel and I bought her a big-girl bed. Instead of doing a toddler bed or a mattress on the floor we decided to buy a bunk bed set. We bought a twin over full bunk bed, with the plan to not put the full bed together at this time. She'll sleep on the 'top' bunk (on the ground) since it already has the safety railings. Hopefully by time she outgrows the railings we will have a second child ready to move up into the bed with railings. I don't know if these beds will ever be bunked but it seemed economical to buy 2 beds at once.
      So the beds came in last weekend and since Keely tends to resist changes to her pattern we thought we'd set it up in her room so that she could play in it, get used to it, etc. And we could just wait until she was ready and asked to sleep in it instead of pushing her. Though if she waited too long we would have had to force her since she has to be out of the crib before my surgery (since I won't be able to pick her up out of a crib for months after). Keely really enjoyed helping Daniel put the beds together Saturday night. She had a screwdriver in one hand and a long bolt in the other and she kept pretending to screw in the screws on the sides. She kept saying 'working' and 'helping'. It was pretty adorable as you can see in the picture below!

      So it was bedtime by time we were done setting up the bed and Keely immediately wanted to sleep in her "big-girl bed".  To be honest, I was not at all prepared for this but I wanted to be supportive so we put her down in the bed. However, as soon as we closed the door she was in the dark and freaked out, I assume because she just wasn't sure where the edges of the bed were. I couldn't handle it so I went in and moved her to the crib, which was actually a terrible plan! She cried for about an hour about her big-girl bed. Finally she fell asleep. The next day we tried napping in the bed, and it went alright. She wasn't scared (maybe because it was light?) though she did play in the bed for about 2 hours before falling asleep for a few hours. We moved the stepstool away from the bed and she seemed to believe that trapped her in. Here is a picture of her playing in her new bed that first night.

      This whole week Keely has slept all night in her bed with no problems. She frequently lays in bed and talks to herself for awhile, though this wasn't uncommon in her crib. Naps have been a little bit more difficult. Sleep is hit or miss for nap time. Sometimes she gets a great nap and is pleasant all evening and others she doesn't nap at all and makes herself (and us) miserable.  She is super proud of the bed though and spent about 30 minutes showing it to Nana and Bagdi (her name for my dad. No we have no idea where it came from.) via Skype. On Wednesday we went ahead and took apart her crib while she was in the tub and she hasn't even seemed to noticed. I am, by far, having a harder time with this transition than she is. Where did my baby go???

Keely's Hiding Spot

So this past week we found Keely's spot for hiding things. Except it is more of a one-way hiding spot. She can put stuff in, but can't get it out. When the recliner in our couch is reclined, there is a gap in the back of the couch. See below.

Apparently, Keely has been dropping stuff into this gap for some time now. We discovered it when she dropped her Mardi Gras beads down into this hole and flipped out. (She was obsessed with those beads for about 5 days. They went everywhere with us.) I couldn't figure out where she lost them until I asked her and she pointed into the hole. Daniel reached into the hole and pulled out...
3 spoons - 1 serving spoon, and 2 toddler spoons
1 dirty sock (thanks Daniel)
1 favorite book (Dear Zoo)
3 sets of beads

He is pretty certain that there is more in the couch that he just can't reach. I love our silly girl!