Update on Faith's chaos...

It is great hearing about others methods of sleeping chaos. It helps to know I'm not the only one. I'm glad you posted about your "fun" Shannon. Anyway, so my psychology husband doesn't think it is the bottle causing all the lack of sleep. Faith had a HORRIBLE night last night. She has slept through the night since 4 months and since about 12 months gone to sleep easily by herself and slept till 8:00 or later. I guess it is time for her to go through some sort of stage. Last night she woke up at 12:30 and I was up with her till 2:30 and Stacy was up with her from 3-4, when she finally went back to sleep. She has never done that before. Stacy thinks she is having anxiety being alone. She use to ask for a bottle or a drink or want us to pat her back till she went to sleep as soon as we walked in her room. But, it is strange, because now we can walk in reassure her that it is ok and just sit down and she will lay down and stop crying immediately, but if we leave it is like nightmare screams. I don't get it, but the more I watch her, it IS like she is scared. I don't know!!!!! I wish she could just tell me, but she is not quite to that point in talking yet. All I know is that we are about to leave on this trip for 2 weeks and I will be sleeping in the same room with her, so any work we do now to fix this problem will be messed up on the trip. SOOOO we have decided she is having a second round of the "mommy stage" or that she knows something is about to happen but doesn't know what. Which that could be Sophia coming or simply that we are about to go on this trip, which takes a lot of prep work that we don't normally do (and she has noticed that). Anyway all that to say, if you have any advice or similar experiences or ANYTHING, I will take the advice. It will all begin again when we get back from the trip, I am afraid. Luckily my mom will be staying with us a few days here, so I look forward to having some support and someone to talk it through with. Crazy times!!! We just want it worked out by the time Sophia is keeping us up all night. We don't want them both up... please God!!

Breaking Habits

I thought I would post something as I listen to my daughter scream bloody murder in her room. Many kids get attached to something, for me, as a child, it was the pacifier. I thought since Faith never really took one maybe we would get to skip the breaking habits part, but here we are. She nursed till she was 15 months and when I found out I was pregnant I thought I would see if she was ready to be weaned. Well, luckily, she was totally ready. She stopped nursing in one night with NO tears, but we did it by giving her a bottle of water. Well, guess what she got attached to... the bottle. We only gave it to her before a nap or bed time, but that is all it took. SO here I am trying to break this habit and listening to her scream. I am pretty tough as a person, but to listen to your child scream (as many of you know) is torture. I think it is harder now that she can talk. It is heartbreaking to hear her saying mama or dada or up, up, up or whatever else she comes up with. We have been working on breaking this habit for the past 2 days and I thought she was getting better and better. She cried less and less each nap or bedtime. Last night she only cried for a few seconds as I left the room, but today's nap must be the big test. She has cried for what seems like forever. I am not one that can just let her cry for a straight hour, so I do the 15 min. cry and then check on her. I can't decide if it is worse or working. She starts crying harder when I leave of course. Anyway, I just thought I would share my torture with the rest of you. We will try to avoid this situation with Sophia for sure. Of course, you never know what they will attach to as a baby.

Pregnancy Dreams

First, if you notice you are not on my list of people anymore, please leave a comment so I can save you again. I changed the background and I always end up deleting all of my links to blogs. Very frustrating!!

Ok so dreams... I have the strangest dreams when I am pregnant. I didn't remember many with Faith but I remember all of them with Sophia. I thought I would let you know how weird it gets.

#1 - This one isn't very exciting, but still strange. I was dreaming that I didn't complete a history worksheet. The worksheet was like elementary level because it was fill in the blank. The class was watching a movie and I kept trying to get a book to finish it. All these obstacles kept me from getting the book. The strange part was I kept thinking, in my actual dream, why am I dreaming this. This is so dumb. It was weird to have my thoughts in my dream and what was going on in the dream.

#2 - I was back in high school dating this guy that I never dated. We were friends, but never liked each other. I couldn't figure out why he even came into my dream because I haven't seen or talked to him in years. Usually you dream of people you see often or friends or family. It was short, but I don't know where it came from.

#3 - I was with Stacy, my sis-in-law and her kids, and Faith. We were in my sis-in-laws house, but it wasn't their real house. It was a house I have never been in (that I know of). Somehow a squirrel was in the master bedroom and we were trying to get it out. We finally did and Stacy started trying to figure out how it got in. He took a piece of the wall out and went outside. I went back to the room for some reason and saw 2 bugs flying around. Assuming they came in from the open wall I just walked it. Well it was actually swarming with wasps. They were everywhere and coming out of the wall still. We obviously had to leave so we were trying to pack some clothes and get the kids out and it was chaos. That was it. Don't know about this one, but I am thinking I might have some anxiety.

#4 - This is the STRANGEST and VERY SCARY to me!!!! I call it my Medium dream (if you have ever watched that show you will understand what I mean). OK so I am seeing everything through the eyes of "the husband/dad". Keep in mind I have NEVER seen the family in this dream. Ok so the dad and 2 kids (boy and girl) are playing in the living room and the mom is in the back bedroom. A guy (who I never see his face even though I(the dad) looks right at him several times) breaks into the house. The dad grabs the kids and runs into a bathroom. The guy follows them and stands in the bathroom doorway for a few seconds then turns around for no reason and goes to the back room where the mom is. The dad sees the neighbor in the yard and sticks the kids through the window to run to her and tell her to call 9-1-1. Luckily I don't see all the horrible stuff, but the parents are killed. The weirdest part is I could tell you what the house looks like down to the type of furniture. I could tell you what the neighbors house looked like and what she was wearing and everything. The detail in the dream was strange and made it even more scary. I told Stacy all the details and that I would really freak out if something showed up on the news anytime soon.

Well that is just the dreams from this past week. I dream even when I am napping. I usually don't dream at all or at least I don't remember anything at all when I am not pregnant, so all this dreaming is stressing me out. Pregnancy does some weird things to me I guess.

What is to come...

I know I have gotten really bad at blogging regularly and even reading up on all you guys, but sadly it will probably only get worse. Our little Mother's day out school is almost over and it is keeping us busy. How can a 2 day a week school keep you busy, you ask? Well each class puts together a scrap book of pictures for each child that shows what we did throughout the year. Well we happen to have the biggest class with 19 three year olds and only 2 teachers to get all these scrapbooks done. SO we have been working like crazy on them and it is very time consuming; I really like that we do them, it just takes some time. Also, we have our little program in a week, which is going to be so cute and we have been getting all ready for that. Plus, just like any school there is always the end of the year madness of cleaning your rooms up, sending everything home, getting Mother's Day gifts ready for all the moms, and the teachers' party (fun!!). So even when I am not doing the work, that is all I think about. It has been busy, busy.

As soon as summer hits, traveling begins... I have my high school 10 year reunion in Austin on the 24th. I can't believe it has already been 10 years. I feel so old!!! I remember high school like it was yesterday, it's crazy. But I can't wait to catch up with some old friends that I haven't seen or some even talked to since graduation. It will be exciting. So I will be heading for Austin before long.

After that, trip #2... This is the craziest of all. I just hope to survive. Julie (sis-in-law) and I are taking all the kids with NO HUBBIES to Alabama and Tenn. It will be 2 days of driving there, staying a week and a half, then driving 2 days back. Keep in mind I will be 8 months pregnant, so not much help and we will have a 19 month old, 13 month old, 3 year old, and 6 year old. It will be fun, but I am sure complete chaos. We have a wedding to get to by the 30th that Chloe is in, so it will be a mad dash to get there and do all the wedding things that come with every wedding. Then we will visit with some friends and family in Alabama. Then off to Tenn. Many of you know this, but my family and 4 other families have gone every year to Gatlinburg, TN. for the past 26 or more years. It is so fun. We stay for a week and do all the fun stuff around there, like white water rafting, LOTS of shopping, swimming, the aquarium, hiking/biking, and rides of all kinds. I am so excited because this will be the first time Faith gets to go on some rides. She will love it!! Plus we will have lots of help with the kids there. Julie and I are thinking about ditching the kids with the "old folks" (my parents and all the other "parents") and going out on our on for a while. By then we will need a break. Anyway, Julie and I will need some prayers for this trip I am sure!!!

Not long after this trip, Sophia will be arriving. I never understood just how fast the second pregnancy went until now. With Faith I could tell you to the day how far along I was, but with Sophia I have to just think to know the month I am on. I kept a journal with Faith about everything from when I first felt her move to each and every doc. visit. I haven't written a thing about Sophia's pregnancy. I guess this is what everyone is talking about when they say the "2nd kids" don't have as many pictures and stuff. I hope to do better once she actually gets here, but we will see.

Well that is a future cast of what my family will be up to for the next few months. I hope to still blog every once in a while, but I know it will not be a regular thing until after all this excitement happens. I will for sure try to throw some blogging time in before Sophia gets here, because I will be really bad at it right after she is born. Anyway, I will let you know how all the trips go. And with summer coming quickly all of you have safe travels.