We think you'll enjoy...

For those of you who aren't familiar with Netflix, on your home page it says "Because you enjoyed:" and then lists three movies (today on mine it listed Anne of Green Gables, I am David, and Believe in Me). Then it says "We think you'll enjoy:" and lists a movie they think we might want to add to our queue. To the right they show the cover of that DVD. Well today it says "We think you'll enjoy Nadia." LOL! Can you believe it?? The picture is of Nadia Comaneci (movie made in 1984 about her experience at the Olympics in 1976). It's just so wild that Netflix thinks I'll enjoy Nadia. I do enjoy her - every day! :-)

Last night I enjoyed staying in bed for 9 hours straight. I can't say I slept very well, but I certainly got more sleep than I had the previous two nights. Nadia slept 11 hours straight and woke up without a fever. YAY! Her nose is still running like crazy, but I think she's already on the mend in terms of her fever and ear infection. She didn't do well with the first dose of Amoxicilian, but thankfully the next two doses went well.

If I hadn't been able to get more sleep last night, I was going to cancel my plans for this evening, but I think I'll keep them even though the thought of staying up later than usual still isn't terribly appealing at the moment. Ever summer the local Christian radio station has a special day at the local amusement park. This park is one of the few that has free admission and free parking (you pay by the ride or buy a hand stamp). The concerts are also free, and they always end the day with a concert by a national artist (the other concerts are by local groups). The 8pm concert this year will be by Laura Story. A few months ago Cheri and I had made plans to meet there (she lives in the same town where the amusement park is). I haven't seen her in 4 months, so I am looking forward to catching up with her some before the concert. Hopefully Nadia will nap well today so that I can get a little more sleep, and then hopefully I won't mind not getting home until after 10pm tonight.

First Ear Infection; Last Class

Last night was another rough night. I could not let her cry it out with a fever, especially when she was calling out "Mommy." She went down easily at 7pm, but then woke up at 10:30pm. Thankfully I had gone to bed at 8:30pm so I had gotten 2 hours of sleep before she woke up. It took 2 hours before I was able to get her to go to sleep without crying. Thankfully she then slept from 12:40-6:15am. Every time I took her temperature it was between 100-101 degrees. We kept giving her either Motrin or Tylenol. As soon as the doctor's office opened at 8:00am, I called and scheduled an appt for 9:15am. The only bad part of that was she actually was taking a nice morning nap, and I had to wake her up to take her to the doctor.

They had entered her weight incorrectly the last time (25 lb instead of 21) so a big "WARNING" came across the computer when they entered 22lbs today (saying she had lost 17% of her body weight). I assured the nurse she had not lost 3 lbs, but rather the nurse the last time entered the wrong number. Unfortunately they can't change that entry. She didn't have a fever when they took her temp, but she was under the influence of Tylenol at the time. The doctor said she has an ear infection in her left ear and prescribed an antibiotic. Hopefully in the next day or two she'll start feeling better. I would love to be able to sleep through the night!
I have enjoyed lots of time snuggling with her during the day. Normally she likes to cuddle many times a day but for very short periods of time. Today she would sit in my lap for very long periods of time.

Tonight was my last class for the summer. YAY! I've finished grading all the papers/exams for the M/W class, but I still have grading to do for the T/Th class and the independent studies. I am looking forward to staying away from campus the next 3 weeks.

These photos were taken yesterday by Paul's mom while they were watching Nadia. Paul watched her on Monday, and the neighbors watched her on Tuesday and Thursday. As you can see, no one is too old to enjoy swinging on a swingset! :-)

First Fever

Over the past 7+ months, Nadia has slept through the night without making a peep 99% of the time. Not counting times when part of her night time sleep was in the car seat and also when we've put her to bed some place other than her own crib (such as a pack n' play), she has probably cried about 5 times total during the night and never more than once in any night. Well last night was a rough night - very different from any other night the past 9+ months. She woke up crying many times throughout the night. The first time I gave her some milk and put her back to bed. She cried quite a bit this time before going back to sleep. The next time I didn't go into her room, and she went back to sleep in less than 5 minutes. The 3rd time (2:30am or something like that) I gave her some Tylenol as I knew something wasn't right. She woke up for good around 5:40am, which is one hour earlier than usual. I have been very tired today. It was a good reminder of the sleep deprivation I am going to be experiencing again in five months.

The second clue that she wasn't feeling well was that her nose was running all the time. She has had one cold before (at 9 months), and that time when her nose was running she didn't try to wipe it herself. Boy what a mess it was today as especially after she'd sneeze she'd immediately put her hand in it and spread it all over her face (in her eyes, etc.). Gross. I kept telling her no touch, Mommy do it, etc., but I didn't have much success today unless I got to her within say 1 second of when she sneezed. The discharge was clear, which I know is the better way for it to be.

The third clue was that she didn't nap well. Lately her first nap has been about 90-100 minutes long, and her second nap has been about 80 minutes long on average. Today her first nap was about 40 minutes long, and her second nap was about 15 minutes. I tried letting her cry some with the 2nd nap, but that didn't work at all. Thankfully she did get some sleep later in the afternoon when Paul's parents were here watching her. She fell asleep in the swing outside, and they kept pushing her so she could take a nap in the swing.

I usually don't get home before Nadia goes to bed, but since I gave a multiple choice final exam tonight (tomorrow's is mostly essay questions), I got home a little before 7pm. When Paul handed her to me I could tell she had a fever. I went up and took her temp, and sure enough she had a fever a little over 100 degrees. This is the first time she's ever had a fever. I had given her Motrin at 10am, and I gave her some again at 7pm. I hope she sleeps better tonight. If she still has a fever tomorrow, I'll call the doctor in case she has an ear infection or something like that.

Paul's reaction was that we shouldn't have gone to MD this weekend. He's probably correct that she did catch whatever bug she has down there - either from a cousin or from someone in the church nursery. That's one advantage of going to a small church (the church I've been going to has less than 200 people). She's usually the only baby in the nursery. That certainly wasn't the case at the nursery at my parent's church this weekend. I wish she hadn't gotten sick, but honestly if we stay away from my family every time one of them has a runny nose, we'd likely never see them as usually at least one of the nieces or nephews are not feeling 100%. We knew it was a risk when we went down as Joshua has had a runny nose for several days and Jenna had a fever on Friday night. My first trip to see my sister in Chicago (Nov 2007), I came back with the stomach flu (something I hadn't had in more than 10 years), and the last time we were ALL together in MD (Dec 2007), both Paul and I got the respiratory bug that was going around. The list could go on. I am hoping that Nadia will be feeling better as soon as possible. It broke my heart to rock her to sleep and feel her little body burning up. I also hope everyone is healthy (if that's possible) when we get together for our family reunion in 10 days.

Choosing a Name

As a child I had great fun talking with friends about what names we might use for future children. I kept a list of possible girl and boy names (first and middle combinations) that I had come up with for several years. Fast forward 20+ years to a time when I was married and I discovered Paul & I have very different taste in names. In general he's a very laid back guy - not someone you would call "picky," but when it comes to selecting names, I would definitely call him "picky." No matter how long a list of names I would come up with, he would reject ALL of them. I quickly came to the realization that Paul would have to come up with the names, and then I'd let him know if a particular name was okay with me or not. We started seriously discussing names in late 2004 when we started pursuing adoption because with Lifetime we *might* have had a last minute placement. In early 2005 (January or February), Paul did come up a boy's name that I liked "Ian Alexander." So for the last 4+ years we've agreed if we have a boy, that's what his name would be. At the time of my 20 week ultrasound with Nadia, we still hadn't picked out a girl's name because Paul thought it was a waste of time because if baby was a boy we already had a name and didn't need to pick out a girl's name. Once we found out baby was a girl, we started working on a girl's name. Unfortunately, a crime was commited against a relative in one of our extended families this summer. It was awful what happened to this person, and unfortunately for us, his name was Ian. Of course what this relative went through is SOOOO much worse than us needing to pick a new name. We have been discussing both girl and boy names as I would like to have them picked by August 23 so we can start referring to baby#2 by name on August 24.

The criteria I consider when picking a name include:

1.) Is the name really common? (I don't want my child to be one of say 3 Elizabeth's in her class, which is true in one of my classes this summer. Even though there are only 12 students in that class, 3 are named Elizabeth.) - I use the recent data on the Social Security website to make this determination. I want a name that has not been too popular lately.

2.) Do I like the sound of the full name? (first, middle, last)

3.) Is the name easy to spell? (I saw what my sister went through with the name "Yvonne")

4.) What is the meaning of the name? (I love the fact that Nadia Renee means "hope reborn")

5.) Nicknames? My first preference is that the name isn't prone to be shortened (or lengthened as happens upon occasion such as Ruth to Ruthie). Paul and Nadia are two names that most people don't modify to create a nickname. If the name is commonly shortened, I need to also really like the nickname or the name is rejected. I know that even if I refer to the child by the full name, if the name is commonly shortened that will likely happen eventually (particularly if the child prefers the nickname).

Nadia Renee and Ian Alexander both met all of my criteria. Back when we were picking Nadia's name, Paul had come up with two first names, and he let me pick. Although he had rejected all the names on my list for a first name, he was fine with two of my choices for a middle name (Renee and Nicole). The other girl's name means "bee" and it's more common than Nadia and also is often shortened - so it was an easy choice for me to pick Nadia so Nadia Renee it was. Well Paul has assumed that if this baby is also a girl, we'd go with the other first name he had picked last year. This weekend he came up with a middle name for that first name. I fully agree with him that the name sounds really nice (first, middle, last). Although I know MANY women with this first name, it hasn't been popular for quite awhile according to the SS website. So although the name strikes me at first as too common, it seems my fear that she would have many classmates with the same name is unfounded. The name is easy to spell, and although the name definitely is usually shortened to a nickname, the nicknames are fine.

The main problem I am having with this name is the meaning. The first name means "bee" and the middle name means "bitter." Great. A bitter bumblebee? I searched several websites hoping to find an alternate meaning to either/both names. Nope. Every single website I checked listed "bee" for the one name and "bitter" for the other. I should add that both of these names are in our family. That is the main reason for picking them. The first name is from Paul's side of the family, and the middle name from mine. Paul doesn't care one iota what the names mean. I know most people wouldn't know what the names meant. I always liked that Ruth means "compassionate, friend" and in my opinion "hope reborn" couldn't be more perfect for Nadia since I had long since given up hope of ever giving birth to a baby and had also lost almost all hope of ever adopting a child. We haven't made any progress on a new boy's name, but I think Paul considers the name to have been chosen if baby #2 is a girl. What do you think? Should I adopt Paul's attitude and not care what the meaning of the names are? Picking a name is definitely not as easy or fun a task as I thought it was when I was a child!!!

Weekend in Review

Joshua (age 2)

Friday night about 1 hour before we planned to leave, my mom called to tell me that Jenna (6 year old niece) had recently developed a 101 degree fever. Paul and I went round and round as to whether we should still leave at 6:30pm or not. The last time we were ALL together (December 2007) the kids were passing around a respiratory virus which Paul & I both caught and took with us to St. Thomas (vacation). We finally decided not to leave that night and to make a decision on Saturday morning after getting a report on how Jenna was doing. The next morning we decided to make the trip since Jenna was doing better. Nadia had her regular 90 minute morning nap, and we were hoping she'd take her afternoon nap en route to Maryland. It was the first time in a LONG time that we took that long of a road trip with her during the day. It went much better since she now faces forward. It's so much easier to feed her, hand her toys, etc. She slept about 40 minutes and didn't cry very much. We made 3 stops so our trip took 4 hours total. One stop was to shop at Ollie's for 15 minutes. I hadn't been to Ollie's since December. I could easily have spent more time (and money), but I was trying to be as quick as possible. I bought 10 books and 20 CD's for $40 total. Paul and I were getting tired of her current selection of CD's now that she wants to listen to them ALL day long. Now we should have more variety although 6 of the CDs are of Christmas music so we won't be playing those yet.

Andrew (4) and Jenna (6)

It was great to spend time with my sister and her family for the first time since May 2008. We met Nathan, who is such a happy baby (8 months old). He is VERY photogenic; he seems to know to smile for the camera. Wish I could teach Nadia that, LOL! We also enjoyed spending time with my parents, brother, and Aunt Janet.

Aunt Janet and Nadia (13 months)

We started our trip home at 7pm thinking Nadia would sleep the whole way home as she has in the past when we've left at that hour. 7:00 is her usual bedtime, and she had only napped 40 minutes on Sunday (compared to her norm of 2-3 hours). We figured she was VERY tired. It took her about 15 minutes to fall asleep, and then she slept soundly for one hour until we hit some construction on I-83 which brought our car to a stop. Not good for a baby. This woke her up, and unfortunately she NEVER fell asleep. She cried off and on for an hour, and then finally I just gave up and tickled her and played with her even though I was very nauseous and exhausted myself. The trip home took 3 1/2 hours (only 1 brief stop). She usually sleeps 11-12 hours at night. Last night including the one hour in the car she slept 9 hours. Thankfully she slept 1 hour and 40 minutes this morning as I was exhausted and really needed a nap myself. I guess we have to rethink our plan to drive at night as driving during the day seemed to work out better this time. I think she would have slept the whole way home if we hadn't come to a stop on the interstate, but with all the construction these days that's likely to happen. We don't plan to take her on that long of a road trip again until November.

Grandpa and Nathan (8 months)

Cookie Monster!

The last few days I have had a hankering for a homemade chocolate chip cookie. So when I went to the store yesterday I bought a bag of chocolate chips so I could make some. I love cookies, especially homemade chocolate chip ones. This is the very reason I never make them. It's been at least 15 years since I've made any because I know I'd eat them. I am much more of a cookie, brownie, or bar type person than say cakes. I can far more easily resist a slice of cake. I knew my hiatus of baking cookies was going to come to an end once I became a Mommy. I look forward to baking with Nadia some day!! I wanted her first chocolate chip cookie to be made from scratch by me; so today was the day! She of course loved it. She cried when Mommy wouldn't let her have a 2nd one. I'm bringing most of the batch with me to MD so I can share them with my niece, nephews, etc. In my defense, I do try to feed her healthy foods most of the time. The other foods she's consumed thus far today include: oatmeal, 1/2 a banana, quite a few fresh cherries, yogurt, peas, cottage cheese, and an assortment of finger foods such as Kix cereal, Goldfish crackers, etc.

Over the last couple of weeks Nadia has gotten more use out of her bouncer/rocker than she has at any other time over the past 13 months. Maybe baby #2 will like it more as an infant than Nadia did, but at least it's being used now although not always in the way intended as you can see by the pics. I included one of the pics because I wanted to show that the hair on the back of her head is rather curly. She definitely didn't get that from me. My hair is 100% straight. Well it's time to go pack for our trip to MD. We're leaving at 6:30pm tonight. I'm hoping the rain lets up. It's rained so much today I am thinking a boat might be a better way to get there, LOL.

Cucumbers

I can think of 3 foods over the last 7 months that Nadia has refused to eat even if she saw me also eating it. The first would be breadsticks at Olive Garden, then fresh strawberries (although she eats plenty of foods that have strawberries in them), and the latest would be cucumbers. Sarah gave us a couple from her garden on Tuesday, and both yesterday and today I tried to get Nadia to eat some while I did. She makes a funny face like it's a lemon or something and spits it right back out. I happen to disagree. I love cucumbers. I ate an entire one yesterday, LOL! My mom said as a child (age 5-6) I used to go in the backyard of our home in Alabama and eat them like you'd eat an apple. Well I am not going to complain since she will eat 99% of the foods I offer her. Today she had her first taste of honeydew and loved it. Honeydew happens to be my favorite melon. I am not a fan of cantelope, watermelon is fine, but honeydew is oh so very delicious!

Two of Nadia's favorite things to do the last few days are #1 play with Mommy's brush and #2 open and close doors. She takes the brush and actually puts the bristles up on her hair. She knows what it's supposed to be used for, and if I help her, she'll brush my hair. Awwww.... I need to buy another brush as she gets quite upset when I want the brush back to use it myself. She also has discovered it is quite fun to close a door. She can't open it if she shuts it all the way, but if it's not 100% closed she can open it again. I am glad she can't reach the doorknob yet as I'd be scared she'd lock herself in a room with me on the other side!

The last 2 days when Paul has gone to pick Nadia up at Sarah's, she has run toward him as soon as she saw him. This made her Daddy very, very happy!

I honestly have tried multiple times a day to take pictures of Nadia the last few days. She's on the go so much it's really hard to take her picture these days!! Hopefully I'll succeed in getting some great pictures this weekend in MD. I know pictures add a lot to a blog. :-)

I'm thankful...

1. that Nadia slept in until 6:40 this morning. May her wake up time keep moving closer and closer to 7:00am!

2. that walking with a shoe on wasn't nearly as painful last night at work as it was on Monday. The toe is already starting to look a little better, PTL!

3. that today one of our neighbors agreed to watch Nadia for 2 hours on Mon, Tues, and Thurs next week since I found out yesterday that Sarah (our regular babysitter) will be on vacation next week.

4. that Paul's advisor was very pleased with his dissertation proposal. She's not one to give out praise/encouragement that often, but she gave him a lot of very positive feedback regarding his proposal that he submitted to his committee recently. In one email she wrote "LOVELY!" for example. It made my hubby very happy. :-) He's meeting with his dissertation committee for the first time this afternoon to discuss his research proposal.

5. for the baby growing within my womb (15 weeks today!). I can't wait until I can feel him/her move every day! The "morning" sickness has been lessening, and the heartburn has been increasing, but it's all for a very good reason and won't last forever.

6. that I get to see my sister and her family for the first time in over 14 months this weekend. We are driving to MD on Friday night and coming back home on Sunday night. On Sunday we'll also get to see my Aunt Janet.

7. for the good health that Paul, Nadia, and I have continued to enjoy. I am still amazed she's 13 months old and never had an ear infection, flu, fever, etc. PTL!

8. there are only 6 nights left of class this summer and then I get 3 weeks off of school. YAY!

9. for the delight it is to be Nadia's Mommy. Her smiles, laughter, and hugs mean the world to me!

10. for the safety Paul & I have continued to experience considering all the hours we spend driving to and from school each week. Although the road construction has continued to annoy me, I am glad that if it had to interfere with one of our commutes, it was with mine since Paul's commute is longer than mine.

Noses and Toes

I was feeling badly about Nadia's leg yesterday morning, and then I injured the fourth toe on my left foot on "the step" in between our kitchen and family room. At first I thought it was a sort of stubbed toe kind of thing that would hurt a lot at first but then the pain would go away rather quickly. The pain wasn't too bad during the rest of the time I was at home (barefoot) however on my way to work (wearing sandals) I began to be aware of how badly my toe was throbbing. I took a look and discovered the top was badly bruised and the toe was swollen. It was very painful to walk and stand at work last night with a shoe on. The swelling has gone down today, but the bruise looks worse. Thankfully the pain is tolerable when I walk barefoot. I am not looking forward to going back to work tonight as I know it's going to hurt again with a shoe on.

Unfortunately of all my 10 toes, this was the worst toe for this to happen to. As a child both of my fourth toes were curved so that when I walked, my third toes would step on my fourth toes. Since I wasn't a very physically active child (most of my time was spent in school, reading, or practicing the piano and flute), it didn't bother me too often. However the first summer I worked (not counting babysitting), it became a serious problem as the toe kept bleeding since I was standing all the time working at McD's and a department store. It hit me then that I'd be doing a lot more standing as a teacher; so I decided to finally go see a doctor and do something about it. They cut the tendons in both toes and removed a section of bone from each toe in order to straighten the toe out. The surgery on the right foot was a success. That toe no longer gets squashed by the third toe. However the surgery on the left foot wasn't. The surgeon offered to do another surgery, but I found the process rather traumatizing so I declined (I was wide awake for the procedure and could feel the pressure of them cutting my bones although I didn't feel pain). Normally it doesn't bother me. It just means when I paint my toenails I only paint 9 nails as that toenail is hiding under the 3rd toe and can't be seen. However it's a problem right now since the top of the 4th toe is bruised and now when I stand (particularly with a shoe on) the 3rd toe is pressing down on the bruise. Ouch! Oh well... this too shall pass! It did hit me yesterday again how we take things for granted until something happens, and then we realize how much pain something like a little toe can cause!

For many months I've been working with Nadia on parts of the body (nose, chin, ear, cheek, etc.). I know she understands some of them because if I say give me your hand she will do that or if I say hold onto Mommy's finger she'll grab my finger. Generally though she hasn't gotten to the stage yet where she'll point on command to a certain body part. Today she did it though! She was sitting in her high chair, and I said "touch Mommy's nose" and she reached out and touched my nose with her index finger. YAY! Afterward I realized asking her to do this while eating wasn't the smartest move on my part since her fingers are usually pretty messy during mealtimes, LOL!

Poor little leg

Nadia cried (I should say whimpered) for maybe 1 minute around 9pm last night which was very unusual as typically she doesn't make a peep from 7pm to about 6:30am. I was going to go up and comfort her if she had kept crying, but she went back to sleep very quickly. Well I discovered at 6:30am the reason she had cried at 9pm. Her leg was stuck out of the crib. She was lying on her belly with most of her one leg outside of the crib. The red marks on her chubby little thigh didn't go away right away. Poor girl!!! I felt awful. I would have checked on her if she had cried more than 1 minute. I can't say for certain her leg was stuck all those hours, but by how dark red the marks were on her leg, I think she did. So Paul said I need to buy the video monitor we've been talking about getting TODAY, and I agreed 100%! I had planned to put it on our Christmas wish list, but I started bidding on one on eBay today instead. Thanks, Chrissy for giving us input on which one to buy! I plan to buy a second camera so that if I set each at a different channel I can flip between the two during the hours they are both sleeping at the same time. The bumper just doesn't do any good these days because she pushes it down. I imagine she tries to use the bumper as a way to climb out of her crib, but the bumper just squishes down below the mattress when she does that.

Nadia is using pointing more and more to express her desires. The item she points to the most frequently is the CD player that is on the fireplace mantle. She likes to listen to music ALL the time these days, and she can tell if it's her music or not. If I turn on the radio she shakes her head "no" and continues to point to the CD player until I start playing one of her CDs. I am glad she likes music!

She also LOVES to go outside. She'd spend hours on end out there if Mommy was up to it. When Debbie babysit last week she said she played outside almost the whole 2 hours that she watched her. The only problem we have while we're outside is that Nadia loves to eat mulch. I constantly say "no eat," but I still have to routinely fish pieces of mulch out of her mouth. I can't imagine that it actually tastes good!