Thrilled to see Santa

Saturday morning we headed to Arends-Awe (the John Deere dealership) to see Santa.  Ainsley walked around the house that morning saying "Ho Ho Ho" and I kept telling her we were going to see Santa Clause.  We had to get there a little early to get a number, because there were a lot of little kids that wanted to see Santa that morning!  Ainsley did pretty good during the wait.  It helped they had M&M's, marshmallows, and cookies.  She also liked looking at all the tractors, books, and toys.

Playing with her tractor while waiting for Santa

Love the blue eyes!

Santa arrived in a John Deere tractor right at 10.  What else would he come in?!  He also had reindeer with him that he brought in for pictures.  We missed seeing him arrive in the tractor, but Brian and Jennifer were behind him on their way and happened to get a picture!

Shortly after Santa arrived, Ainsley fell asleep on Daddy's shoulder.  She had been up since 5:55 that morning and it was her nap time! 

We were kind of worried how she would react to Santa.  We thought for sure she'd be one of the kids that screamed and wanted off of his lap.  That ended up not being a problem with her asleep.  We had waited over an hour to see Santa, so asleep or not, we were going to get a picture!  Joel walked her up to Santa, and handed her over.  Once Santa took her, she woke up a little, looked around and then at Santa, and passed back out!  Everyone just laughed!!!  I thought for sure when she woke up she was going to have a meltdown, but she was wore out!  She didn't wake up until we put her in the car.

Below is a pretty good summary of how the meeting with Santa went in pictures.

Starting to wake up...

Looking around...

Why are all these people looking at me???

Her scrunched up nose face after she looked at Santa!

Oh, heck...I'm going back to sleep!

Santa's lap is pretty comfy!

Drake was able to tell Santa what he wanted for Christmas.  I would have loved to have heard the whole conversation between Drake and Santa that morning.  Drake asked him for a lawn mower, and then started looking around the showroom for more things to add to his already long list!  He just kept rattling off things! 

Santa and Drake...here's a good picture of the live reindeer also!

He had to make himself comfortable for the long list of things to tell Santa!

All in all, our visit with Santa went pretty good. 

Joel's birthday



Joel's birthday was last week and Ainsley helped me get his presents ready.  She colored on his birthday card from her, and even pointed and told me who the bears were on the card.  There was a Daddy bear and a little girl bear, and without even mentioning them, she pointed to the Daddy bear and said "Daddy".  I'm not going to lie, it caught me off guard.  My little firecracker is pretty dang smart! 

She also didn't understand why she couldn't open the card after I sealed it up, or open the presents.  That last hour or so waiting for Daddy to get home was pretty rough on her.  She wanted the presents!!

I got her to say something along the lines of "Happy Birthday", but she refused to say it once Joel got home.  I made cupcakes, and that evening Ainsley saw them in the pan on the counter and was reaching up over the counter trying to get one out of the pan.  She loves her sweets!

We went over to Evandy's Boatel last night with Jim, Rita, and Drake for Joel's birthday.  It just opened a month or so ago, so we were excited to try it out.  We got there around 5:30 since they don't take reservations, and had a 10-15 minute wait.  They weren't the most organized, and it took us a while to get our food.  Ainsley absolutely loved the fried green beans that we got as an appetizer.  I think she ate at least half of them! 

She only had one major meltdown, and Papa Jim took her outside for a few minutes, but it was almost 7 at that point and we still hadn't even got our salads or entrees.  She was ready to run around.  Not too long after that, our food arrived and Ainsley found the sweeteners on the table that kept her busy the rest of the time.  Thank goodness!!!  It's so hard to take her out to eat at a restaurant that doesn't immediately serve your food.  She doesn't like to sit, and especially not in a high chair!

Take 1...Drake took this one!

Take 2 with Drake in it...notice the fingerprints on the window?  They look like little Ainsley handprints to me!

On our way home, we stopped at Placke's for some ice cream.  Ainsley loved her ice cream cone! 

I love how her belly is hanging out!

18 weeks

I'm 18 weeks today, and the baby should be 10 inches from head to toe.  I had my monthly doctor's appointment a week and a half ago.  Everything was good.  Heartbeat sounded good and it was a quick visit.  I gained four pounds, so I'm up to 5.5 pounds so far. 

I don't know why my shirt looks psychedelic in this picture....

My sonogram to find out the gender was scheduled for Jan. 2nd, but I told Dr. Huston that I wasn't very happy with that date and I would love to find out before Christmas.  My doctor's office likes for you to be 22 weeks before they do a gender sonogram, and I would only be 20 weeks (almost 21 weeks) the week before Christmas. 

I guess they need a "reason" to do a sonogram early.  He asked how tall I was, looked at my weight chart,  and said "You're skinny". I'm going to use that in my argument to try to get your sonogram moved up. Whatever works, but did he really just call me skinny?!? I've always liked him, but now I like him even more!!!  I think he made my day (okay, maybe my month) when those words came out of his mouth. 

He worked his magic, and they called on Friday to let me know they got me in on Friday, Dec. 21st for my sonogram!  What a great early Christmas present to me!!!  Jamie find out on the 21st also, so we'll both know what our little peanuts are before Christmas. 

I wanted to do a gender reveal party with either balloons or a cake to find out the sex, but I don't know when I would be able to schedule it with the busy weekend we have planned with Christmas and my Mom and Dad's work schedules.

I've thought the entire pregnancy that the baby is a boy this time.  My pregnancy has been completely different than with Ainsley, and I just have a "feeling".  That was until last night and I had a dream about the sonogram.  We ended up going ahead and finding out during the sonogram instead of waiting until my planned "gender reveal party" to find out the sex, and it was a GIRL!  I was completely shocked!  I guess we'll have to wait a few more weeks to find out if it's a boy or girl.  We really don't care either way, and just want it to be healthy. 

I'm not as tired as I have been, and am still feeling pretty good.  I've been feeling the baby move for a few weeks now.  I haven't had a definite "kick" yet, but the baby is definitely moving around in there.  I'll never forget the first few times I felt Ainsley move.  I was so grossed/freaked out by it and would squirm around and tell her to quit! 

Last weekend I woke up with a major cramp in my lower abdomen.  I could hardly roll over in bed and stand up.  It continued throughout the morning, and eventually got a little better that afternoon.   It lasted a few days, although it wasn't as strong as the first day.  I'm sure it was the round ligament pain, and I think I remember having it with Ainsley a few times, but never as bad as it was last weekend.

Ainsley still has no clue that Mommy has a baby in her belly, even though I tell her constantly.  She's going to get a huge surprise when this baby does make its appearance!

Update on Ainsley's arm

Once we left the hospital on Monday morning, we didn't hear another peep about Ainsley's arm.  She ran around and played like normal the rest of the day and that night.  Joel got her up Tuesday morning to go to Lisa's, and before they left, she didn't want to put her coat on.  Joel told her it was cold outside, so she needed her coat on.  She proceeded to plop down on her butt and pulled  her right arm into her stomach, while holding it with her left hand and started whining/crying.  I don't know how she remembered the next morning, but she did!  Joel laughed at her and told her she was holding the wrong arm and they needed to go!!! 

She went right to Lisa when they got there, but Lisa said for the first few hours she was there yesterday morning, she was very cautious.  Lisa said she would walk around and just look at things, but not touch anything and Ainsley didn't want anyone to touch her either.  I guess it really was a traumatic experience for her!  With her being so young, I never dreamed she would remember anything about it, but I guess she does.  Lisa said after a few hours, she warmed right up and was back to her normal, crazy self running around with the rest of the boys. 

Bubble wrap is pretty cool!

Check out that face!

Ainsley went to Lisa's again today, and we didn't have any issues.  Lisa said she acted fine all day and she didn't fight Joel before going this morning.  It makes me feel even worse that she did remember it.  I guess I need to give her more credit than I do.  I still think she's my little baby, but she's really growing up into a smart little girl who knows more than her Mommy thinks she does.

I've been working on "please" and "thank you" with Ainsley, and she's doing really good with them.  If she wants something, she'll say "peas" and once I hand her whatever she wanted, she'll reply with "thank you".  I'm so proud of my little girl! 

She found her 1st birthday hat in her closet the other night and refused to take it off, even if it did fall fifty million times and I had to fix it every time.  I'm not exaggerating either.  50,000,000 times!!!

Ainsley loves to stack blocks, or whatever else she can find.  I bought some playdoh for Christmas, and she found the containers.  I showed her that she could stack them, and that's all she wants to do now.  I walked into the living room the other night to find a pretty tall tower or playdoh containers on the end table.  She gets pretty aggravated when they fall, but she's a pretty good stacker!

This last picture cracks me up every time I look at it.  Ainsley kept pulling her diaper down the other night, only making the "crack" situation even worse, but Joel and I got a pretty good laugh out of it. 

Trip to the Emergency Room

What a day!  We ended up in the emergency room this morning with Ainsley.  Lisa called around 9 this morning and I could hear a kid in the background crying.  Lisa said it was Ainsley and she didn't know what was wrong with her arm, but Jace had fallen off of the couch and landed on Ainsley and after he landed on her she immediately started screaming and crying.  Lisa was in the kitchen when it happened, so she didn't see exactly what happened, but said Ainsley wasn't calming down and wouldn't move her left arm. 

I threw on some socks and shoes and ran out the door.  I called Joel on my way out of the driveway, and luckily he was at Arends-Awe picking up the combine, so he was able to meet me at Lisa's.  He actually beat me to Lisa's and was holding Ainsley, who had thankfully calmed down by that point, when I got there.  She wouldn't let us touch her arm and would scream if she moved it. 

We headed out the door and into Passavant.  She fell asleep on the way into town, so that helped.  It was so hard to listen to her cry knowing she was in pain.  You could see the pain on her face, and it was killing me.  We were so worried that she had broke it, even though nothing seemed to be swollen and no bones were sticking out anywhere.

I felt like a bad parent going into the ER, because it was in the 30's and we didn't have a coat on our child, but there was no putting a coat on her.  We wrapped her coat around her the best we could and hurried in.  Once we got into the ER waiting room, she didn't want to get down and run around or anything else she usually likes to do.  She sat on Joel's lap holding her Daisy duck and not moving her left arm.  She didn't even want to drink her milk. 

We finally got called back and assigned to a room, and Ainsley was still holding up pretty good at this point playing with my phone and reading books.  Luckily, Joel's Aunt Wendy was working, and she came right in to check on us.  We tried taking her shirt off, but there was no way we could get it over her head without her screaming in pain because her left arm was moving.  We ended up cutting her shirt off of her.

Waiting to get called back for xrays

When we finally got her shirt off, she was pretty upset.  Wendy looked at her and thought she had a broken collarbone.  As soon as she said that, I started crying.  My baby couldn't have a broken collarbone or any broken bone for that matter!  After Ainsley calmed down, Wendy came back in and looked at her again and said then that she didn't think she had a broken collarbone, and that it just looked like it earlier because she was sobbing and upset.  Thank goodness!!!  That calmed me down a little.

We'd find out soon enough with the x-rays if anything was actually broke.  We went back for the x-ray, and thankfully Joel was able to go with me, because I couldn't stay in the room while they did the x-ray since I'm pregnant.  Ainsley fought, screamed, cried, and fought, screamed, and cried some more while they tried to get her x-rays done.  It was not pretty to watch, especially not being able to be by her side while they did it.  Joel said it was awful trying to hold her down.  He just wanted to hold her! 

She was getting really upset on the bed while they did the x-rays and I knew it was coming.  She ended up throwing up a little while they tried to finish them up.  Ainsley was not a happy camper, and Joel said he's never seen her give so many scowls as she did to the 4 or 5 women that were holding her down while they got the x-ray they needed. 

As soon as they were done with the x-rays, Joel picked her up and I noticed that she was moving her left arm!  I mean, she was really moving it and not crying at all in pain!  They said then that they couldn't see anything broken on the x-rays and she must have dislocated something and while she was fighting them while they were trying to get the x-rays done, she popped whatever it was back into place.  I was so happy that nothing was broke, and we wouldn't be going home with a cast! 

She got lots of princess stickers from the x-ray girls and we headed back to our room in the ER to wait for the doctor to read the x-rays.  Mom was waiting for us in our room when we got back and Ainsley was happy to see her.  Ainsley was acting like nothing ever happened at this point and you would never have known she was in pain just fifteen minutes earlier. 

Playing like normal after xrays

Glad to see Grandma Shelly

The doctor came in and told us Ainsley had nursemaid's elbow.  The paperwork they gave me described it as:  "an injury when one of the elbow bones slips out of its normal place.  A pulled elbow happens when the radius slips out of place.  The ligament that supports it slides over and becomes trapped inside the joint."

After researching it a little more once we got home, a child is more prone to have this again.  No more doing "Superman" with Ainsley while walking into stores, or picking her up by her hands and swinging her around in the air.  I don't ever want to see my baby in that much pain again! 

Snoring in her crib after a long, eventful morning

I still can't believe it wasn't one of her own daredevil stunts that landed her in the ER.  Check out the one she pulled last night where she climbed in her chair and stood on the arm and back of the chair to flip the light switch!  It took an accident to land her in the ER, instead of her being a daredevil.

Joel and I are both so glad we're home safe and sound with our little girl tonight.  We're both pretty drained, and may be spoiling our Ainsleybug a little more than usual tonight.  She got a Happy meal for lunch and strawberries, apples, and raspberries for supper.  I'm pretty sure Daddy would give her anything she would ask for tonight.

I experienced the one thing I was dreading about parenting today, which was my child in pain and hurt.  It is one of the hardest things I've had to do was watch her face grimace in pain with the slightest movement of her arm.  I don't know how I would handle a broken bone, or anything similar.  I'm so glad I had both Joel and Mom there today!

Thanksgiving

Where did 2012 go?  I can't believe Thanksgiving has already come and gone and right around the corner is Christmas.  This next month is going to be a busy one.

We had four or five places to go on Thanksgiving day, but we only made it to two.  It was pretty nice to be able to stay at one place for a few hours instead of running in for a few minutes to each place and then getting on the road again. 

We headed down to Aunt Doris's for lunch.  Ainsley fell asleep on the way down, so she needed some time to wake up and take in the surroundings, but it wasn't long before she warmed up to everyone.  She's such a little ham, and it's pretty much guaranteed that if you give her attention, she will show off.  I didn't even take my camera out of the bag while we were down there, but I did get a few pictures with my phone.

Aunt Doris gave her a new purse, necklaces, and bracelets.  She loved them! 

She also found a little broom, and swept the kitchen and dining room while everyone cleaned up. 

We left to spend the rest of the afternoon at Jim and Rita's.  That place was nuts!  When you get Drake and Lani in the same house, it's guaranteed to be loud.  I don't think five minutes went by the whole afternoon without someone crying. 

We ate some more good food (even though we just ate a few hours before) and were absolutely stuffed.  There was plenty of entertainment with Ainsley, Drake, Lani, Jack, Jennifer, and Brian in the house. 

Giddy up, Daddy!

Grandma Rita played a matching game with the kids after we ate.  Of course, Ainsley wanted up there with the big kids, and was accused of cheating until we got her some cards of her own to play with.

Ainsley decided it was her turn first and just started flipping over cards....that didn't go over well with Lani and Drake!

I think Lani's telling her to stop cheating!

The kids played a game of "kick Uncle Jeremy" later on, which Ainsley got involved in too.  She is little Miss-monkey-see-monkey-do.

She had to find her necklaces and bracelets again...

Ainsley decided to climb in Grandma's window and run around.  When she started pulling on the curtains, we decided it was time to get down.  Oops!!!  Don't tell Grandma! 

Dancing in the window

I'm sure Grandma appreciates the fingerprints and slobber all over her windows!

For the most part, it ended up being a pretty relaxing day with no major mishaps.  I think everyone was stuffed, tired and ready for bed long before they should have been!

Papa Jim with granddaughters

Siblings

Me with Joel's Uncle Craig

Sister in laws

We left in time for me to run home and scan the ads one more time before heading back out to do some Black Friday shopping.  I ended up getting everything I needed, but that meant I had to wake up early so I could be at Staples at 5 am.  I went into Walgreens and CVS at midnight Thanksgiving day to get all their free stuff, so after two nights of little sleep, I was exhausted all day yesterday.  I guess I need to get use to it...I'll be there with a little newborn in a few short months.

I'm looking forward to Christmas and watching Ainsley.  She's at such a fun age, and I think she'll really enjoy being around everyone and opening new toys.  I can't wait!!!