Thursday Tid Bits

Jogging with Daddy.

Emersyn thinks it's pretty funny when Daddy runs next to her instead of behind her. :)

Don't worry, it's organic mac and cheese. I usually put peas in it too but Daddy made lunch and forgot them. Not shocking if you know Brett. :) He is not a veggie fan.

Bibs can be over rated apparently according to Daddy.

Emersyn's favorite place to drink her bottle, other then Mama's arms.

"Helping" Mommy empty the dishwasher.

Accident Update:

*Apparently our car is not totaled. Brett was less then thrilled to hear this news, he said that wrecked cars can be harder to sell for resale. The good news, we got a sweet new Toyota Sienna mini-van for a rental, thank you Progressive.

* I have been off work since the accident and am off for another two weeks at this point. Taking it one day at a time.

*Progressive gave us a check to replace our car seat. Right now she is using her infant seat, which she still can technically use but we are ordering her new Britax this evening. I can tell she doesn't like the infant seat anymore. She is a big girl now.

Random Thoughts:

*I watched an episode of "Toddlers and Tiara's" that made my blood BOIL. There was this awful mother that clearly favored one of her twins over the other and was emotionally badgering to the other twin. I cannot believe how angry this woman made me. I even made Brett just watch the parts that she was in and he couldn't believe it either? Anyone else watch this show? I normally don't but it was on and I was icing my neck.

*Emersyn has a little bit of a bug, poor thing. I took her to the dr. today, thinking she might have an ear infection but nope! We have taken her in three times for ear infections. Guess how many she has actually had? ZERO. I guess this is a good thing. The NP that saw her said she is a beautiful and happy child. My heart just bursts with happiness when I hear things like that.

*We are going through a ridiculous heat wave here in Portland. 3+ days at 100 degree temps. Yesterday I think it was 106?? That is an ungodly temp. We don't have central air but have some window units that actually work really well. However, I have been using the heat to avoid cooking completely. Chevy's, Olive Garden and Pastini's...

it was so nice getting to visit you this week.

*I had a real estate closing last week, praise the Lord! We are officially paying off Brett's car, our first paid off car! Whoo hoo!!!!!

Hope everyone had a great Thursday!!

Wordless Wednesday- First time at Beach and First Bonfire- July 25th

Tuesday Blog Hop- Favorite Kid Photos

This week's Blog Hop is: Favorite Kid Photo's. These are some of my favorite photos of my favorite kid! I am so glad they didn't make us pick just one.... :)

I think that looking at pictures of my sweet girl could officially be classified as a hobby!

And now, a couple pictures of this sweet baby girl's parents....I don't have hardly any of our pictures scanned, something to work on in the future!!

This is me around age 3. Jealous of my "feathered" bangs? :)

Brett and I with our pets at similar ages, maybe 4ish.

**Side note: Thank you everyone for your care and concern in regards to my recent accident. I am still working through it all. I am seeing a chiropractor on a daily basis now and am off work for the week. I will keep you posted. God is good and that is all that matters!

Six Word Saturday

I feel blessed to be alive.

On Thursday evening, I left work to go pick up Miss Emersyn for her last swimming lesson. I was at a red light with another car in front of me. The light turned green. The car in front of me went through the light and I followed. Except a green BMW from the traffic that was supposed to be stopped at the RED light just DIDN'T stop and plowed into me, going probably around 45mph, which is the speed limit on that road. I looked to my right and saw her flying towards me and I don't even think I had time to react. She slammed into me, spinning my car 90 degrees. My head hit the side of the car above the window and my shoulder was also impacted. I pulled the car over and got out. My first thought was that I couldn't believe that I was going to miss Emersyn's last swim class.

There were two witnesses, both that said the lady had run a red light. Right after she hit me, I had looked up at MY light and it was yellow so I realized that it had been green. For a split second I wondered if I had ran the red light, it just all happened SO fast. One of the witnesses pulled over and I asked her if she saw what happened. She said that the green BMW was flying down the road and completely ran the red light.

I gave my report to the police officer and he said that the green BMW said that I ran the red light. He said he didn't believe her though. This made me happy. I was REALLY irritated that she said I ran it. So careless. I know that accidents happen but seriously, if she was paying attention she could have prevented the accident. It wasn't like her light had just changed.

I called Brett right away and he left work immediately and got to me within 20 minutes. We emptied most our things from the van and into his car. A tow company came and took both the cars away. I decided to go to the urgent care down the street from the accident to make sure my head was okay. At that time just my head hurt. My head checked out just fine and we were on our way in 20 minutes, praise the Lord. I hate waiting around ER's. Ugh.

Called the insurance companies. I have Safeco and she has Progressive. After this I will most likely change to Progressive, my insurance is L A M E. Anyways, Progressive is taking good care of me so far and for that I am grateful. They got me a sweet new Toyota Sienna rental van this morning and I feel pretty cool driving it around. I didn't want to do much driving today but it worked out that I had to. I get pretty tense at every intersection though, what if the other cars just don't stop like the green BMW!?!?!?

I woke up with a headache and some neck, shoulder and back pain. No fun. Basically super sore but with a little more intensity then that. After much research and suggestions from friends, I decided to go to a chiropractor. He was amazing. Gave me great advice on the accident since he specializes in car crash injuries. Took some x-rays, saw that my neck, back and shoulders have sustained injuries. Taking some herbal medicines right now and also nursing my wounds with ice packs. I feel so blessed to have found this chiropractor.....the Lord really orchestrated the whole thing. I am going back on Monday for a follow up appointment. Have an appointment with Progressive on Monday too where I suspect they will try to get the claim settled and closed. It looks like the car may be totaled which would mean it would be time to start mini van shopping. That is a bummer. Trying to look at the bright side though. If I had been inches forward in the intersection, the green BMW would have slammed into the driver's door and I would most likely not be posting this blog post as we speak.

God is good. Life is precious.

The infamous green BMW. Took these pics at the tow lot where our cars were this morning. Had to go and clear out all of our valuables since it is likely that the van is totaled.

ME

Most of my blog revolves around the happenings of a certain little girl. But I feel like it's been awhile since I have talked about what's going on with ME! :) Not that there is anything overly exciting going on, but still......

In honor of myself, I shall use my favorite format of all time to recap what's going on with me, myself and I.....the bullet points!!!!!!

• I am love love lovin' Summer! It has been REALLY hot lately but we have done a good job of getting outside and enjoying my FAVORITE part of Summer....the evenings!!! Emersyn is at a really fun age and as much as I can't believe I am saying this, I am excited for her to walk. She will be able to enjoy the fountains and water features so much more once she can stand on her own. Plus, I am pretty sure chasing a toddler is a good workout plan, don't you think??
• I am still working on my Summer Bible Study; Me, Myself and Lies. Do I spend enough time doing this study? NO. Does that make me a failure? NO. Does that mean I should try to make it more of a priority? YES!
• I have pretty much forgotten how to cook dinner. I think that in the summers, I feel that everything should be grilled and that is Brett's job so it makes meals pretty simple. But we are bad about eating at home consistently. We can eat out for pretty cheap, most places have kids meals that are fantastic, such as Baja Fresh! But we so prefer eating at home so I am hoping to get back on my game and and start planning more often. It's that never ending quest to become more domestic, ya know? :) Plus, it is/was fun to post a new weekly recipe on my blog! I loved seeing all the new recipes on the Blog Hop yesterday. Some of them are on my list to try for sure!!
• Emersyn's first birthday party is about a month away! The invites have been designed by a fabulous gal on Etsy and then I had them printed through ArtsCow.com. If you join ArtsCow.com, you can get tons of free prints, you just have to pay for shipping. I got 50 5x7's printed for $6.99 and in a matte print too! I decided to print her invites on photo paper versus on cardstock, much more economical. Plus, I did a trial run at Costco.com and they turned out fabulous!!!!!!! I can't believe my baby is going to be one!!! We are keeping her party very simple, just doing cake and maybe some other finger food goodies. We are having the party at a park and I am hoping that the weather is cool enough to be comfortable but warm enough for our guests to play in the water fountain! :) I can't wait to send out the invites once I get them!!! After they have been received and property ooohed and ahhhhhed over, I will post one on here so you can see the adorable-ness. In the meantime, I am working on fun goody bag ideas, and other ideas to make her party a blast. Any ideas from you experiences mama's out there?? :)
• We are halfway through the 4th season of LOST. I am anxious to be done. That show stresses me out but I love it. It is pretty much all we watch on TV now. I am so tempted to get rid of my cable. I.am.so.over.TV. Especially with the nice weather, we would much rather be outside in the evenings then sitting on a couch being lazy! Any other LOST fans out there??
• I have been getting some killer deals on next year's summer clothes for my little miss. It is SO fun to buy her clothes. Most of her clothes at this point have been purchased for her as gifts, which is a HUGE blessing. But it is fun for me to score some good deals and shop for my little girl, such a dream come true. There were two main things that made me SOOO excited to have a baby girl. 1) Pig tails 2) Clothes. Both of these dreams have been fulfilled!! Children's Place had an additional 40% off their sales clothes so I got some things there and Fred Meyer had an additional 60% of their sales clothes so I got some more things there. Trying not to go too overboard though, I definitely think that she has had more things then she has needed at this point and would rather focus on quality, not quantitiy. She is very blessed...not spoiled!!!! :)
• Emersyn is almost completely weaned from nursing. I can't believe this chapter in my life is wrapping up, how quickly it flew by! Probably about a month ago I quit pumping while at work, I wasn't getting enough milk to make it worth the 30 minutes that it took to pump. Not that Emersyn isn't worth it, I just felt like it was time to maybe move on. I am now just nursing her in the mornings for her very first feeding but I have a feeling that this will soon end. She just isn't interested any more. It cracks me up, I will sit on the bed and try to nurse her but she knows that Daddy keeps the remotes for the TV and fan on his side of the bed so she is constantly lunging for them. Emersyn has done SO well with feeing issues, never had any problems taking a bottle and now she is self weaning. One thing though, formula is EXPENSIVE, dang!!!!!! I chose breast-feeding 100% for health reasons, didn't really take into account the financial aspect. But after buying her 3rd can of formula, I realized how much money we saved by nursing!! My goal was to nurse Emersyn for a year but I have heard that some babies just decide when they are ready to wean and that seems to be what is happening. I hope potty training goes just as easily someday, a Mommy can hope!! :) If I was 100% a SAHM, I would have continued nursing primarily but for such a time is this and Emersyn is happy and healthy, I couldn't ask for more!! It is still strange to not be nursing her, this activity took up much of my life for the last 10 months...seems like such a short time now.
• We are getting SOOOO excited for our upcoming trip to Hawaii this Fall!!!!!! Lord, I need a vacation!!
• Brett is so happy in his job which makes my heart happy. We are praying that a promotion is on the horizon for him in the near future. He is an assistant property manager right now. Once he is promoted to a property manager, we can start looking at our budget and I can focus solely on real estate and be able to be HOME with my best girl. The Lord knows that this is my heart's desire so I am waiting patiently for His timing.
• Emersyn's new "nanny" started today. I will post a pic of the two of them soon, they are sure to be best buds. Thank you Lord for sending her our way! :)

Hmm....not sure if this update was entirely neccesary but it helped me organize my thoughts and that is part of blogging therapy, right??

Happy Thursday everyone!!!

Wordless Wednesday- Puppy Love

This is Brandy, a dog that we dog-sit for when her family goes out of town. Emersyn was quite intrigued with Miss Brandy and she giggled whenever the dog licked her hand. Pretty cute. :)

Weekend recap.....

We had a fun weekend, with the exception of my darn sore throat! I started to feel that itchy scratchy uh-oh feeling on Thursday evening and on Friday morning, it was a full blown sore throat. It lingered for the entire weekend and even still today a little bit. :( I went to the dr. but they did a strep test and confirmed that is isn't strep. I am thankful for that since I didn't want Emersyn to get sick but still, I had hoped for an answer. Instead, I got the vague "it appears that you have a virus" speech which really is a code for "there is nothing we can do for you". Bummer!

Anyways, back to our fun weekend......

First off, Emersyn is teething again and it is really bothering her this time, more then any other time I can remember....

This is her sad "poor-me-I-am-teething-and-in-pain" face. Don't you just want to give her a hug and kiss and make it all better??

Despite her teething issues, we were determined to have a fun weekend enjoying the sunshine! :) On Saturday we went to a baby shower for Vanesa, a girl that I used to mentor while she was in high school and involved in our church's youth ministry. It was fun to get to see her and her family and celebrate her upcoming new arrival, Aviyeh!

My favorite little monkey with her favorite little monkey. :)

Emersyn and Amariya, the future big sister!

Emersyn and Yvette, Vanesa's sister. She is also pregnant and due with a little girl to be named Emma. The sisters are 3 or 4 days apart in their due dates, how crazy is that?

Saturday evening we went to a shopping center in the Bethany area that has a fountain to play in with our friends, the Kaushals! We grabbed dinner at Subway and took it down to the fountain to eat while the kids played.

We got Emersyn this umbrella stroller in anticipation of some travel this Fall and Winter. Her Uppa stroller is fantastic but not one we want to lug back and forth in an airport, nor risk getting beat up from checking it. I love the hot pink color of the stroller, I think Emersyn likes it too!

Enjoying the fountain!

Yay for the beautiful weather!!

Blog Hop Tuesday- Favorite Recipe

This week has been pretty crazy...in fact this month has been crazy. Something about Emersyn having swim lessons twice a week has made it so I have been struggling to cook or come up with new recipes. That and the heat maybe....excuses excuses!! But I love me a Blog Hop and I can't bear to not participate. Sooo I am referring you to a previous post on one of my new favorite summer recipes, Frog Eyed Fruit Salad. Kind of a fun spin on fruit salad that you and your little ones will LOVE!! :) My neighbor turned me on to this recipe and now it is one of my favorite side dishes/desserts!

http://brettandpatti.blogspot.com/2009/05/frog-eyed-fruit-salad.html

I was doing so good at my weekly recipes. These will resume in the Fall, I promise!!! It has been in the 90's here in Portland, which to most people is pretty hot but to me it is like raging inferno HELL!!!! I am an Oregonian to the core. Anything above 75 starts to make me cranky. :)

Not My Child Monday!

One of my favorite blogs, www.mycharmingkids.net, does a fun Monday tradition called "Not Me Monday" where you can recall the fun events of the week, usually surrounding parenting in a somewhat sarcastic and witty way. I normally don't take part because I just don't consider myself to be witty enough. However, this week it is "Not My Child Monday" and I just so happened to have a little experience at swimming lessons that falls under this category, as well as a little "Not Me" mixed in.

On Thursday, I picked up Emersyn from her Nana's house and we headed off to swim lessons. In an effort to save time, I changed Emersyn into her swim suit and swim diaper before we left. We drove about 25 minutes to the aquatic center. Upon arriving at the aquatic center, I got all our gear and unbuckled Emersyn. She was SOAKED. Like beyond SOAKED. Apparently her swim diaper has a capacity and she exceeded it. Her car seat was soaked too. Fantastic. And I certainly did NOT only bring ONE swim diaper with me, that would be just silly! I am ALWAYS prepared for anything and my diaper bag NEVER lacks of the essentials, such as wipes and, oh I don't know....DIAPERS!!!

So we march into the swim center to the family locker room where I did NOT put my urine soaked daughter on the bench while I changed into my swimsuit. Once I was changed, I put on my swim suit cover up and we went into the hallway where the lockers are. Emersyn, at that point, did NOT proceed to pee on me, all over my cover up, my leg and my foot..... nope, NOT MY CHILD! And I certainly did not just pretend to NOT notice the cascade of liquid coming from her swimsuit as other people walked by, NOT ME! I took off my freshly peed on cover up and stuffed it into the locker, along with my other valuables and then Ems and I walked down the hall to the showers so that we could attempt to rinse off the lovely pee bath that we had just taken.

The end.

The moral of the story: don't change Emersyn into her swim diaper until right before we get into the pool. Oh, and bring more then one swim diaper!

Six Word Saturday

Ten teeny tiny toes. So precious.

I am in the midst of planning Emersyn's first birthday party which is part of the reason for the older pictures as of late. They are so fun to look at and remember how little Emersyn once was!

Flashback Friday- First Bath