Holy Crap

This is getting ridiculous. People in my neighborhood have Christmas light up now. And it's not just that they're up... they're on. I am officially boycotting Christmas until the day after Thanksgiving. No more talk of it until then.

I had my first out-of-town trip today. I went to Tulsa and it went really well. I had to take my pump with me and to my surprise, the liquids ban is not in effect for nursing mothers. They didn't look at my pump or any of the liquids I had with me. I thought that was strange, but that's fine. I was a little nervous about leaving Ellie for the first time (even though it was a day trip), so to let me know she was okay with the whole situation, she threw up first thing in the morning. Of course. Because why wouldn't she vomit on the first day I have to go out of town? She went to daycare anyway and she was fine. Lee was such a help by taking her and picking her up. I pulled a Foldger's commercial on her today and secretly switched half of her breast milk with half formula and she would have none of it. Refused to eat. Great - now I have a breast milk junkie on my hands. Ellie - I'm giving you fair warning. this bar isn't staying open forever.

More on the title of this post at the end of the blog... in short, we had an Eileen-style "Code Brown" situation on Sunday night. But first - the weekend recap. We had quite a busy schedule. Lee took Ellie and me to our first Highland Park football game on Friday night. It was the last game of the season and the Scots kept their undefeated record intact by defeating West Mesquite and winning the district title. Ellie went to bed about an hour later than normal, but she was so great the entire game. So great, I thought the grandparents sitting in front of us were going to sneak out of the game with her. She loved watching the band, the drill team, and all of the people.

On Saturday morning, Ellie and I met some co-workers to help clean up the White Rock Lake shoreline and then we met up with a mother's group from our church and my friend Stephanie for a play date. Ellie was the youngest one there so she didn't really interact that much with the other children, but she had fun playing with all of their toys. It was really nice to meet some other mothers with similarly aged children.

When I got home, our friend Mike was there to watch the Tennessee-Arkansas game with Lee. After it ended, he and Lee went to the SMU game. I can't believe they've gone the whole season without winning one game. While they did that, I went to the mall to look for a Christmas outfit for Ellie because she had her Christmas portrait made on Sunday. It took me four hours to find something. Because according to many of the shop workers, you have to come in October to get the really good outfits. On Sunday, we went to the Christmas bazaar at my parent's church and took Ellie for her portrait.

After the long weekend, Ellie was really tired by bedtime on Sunday. We have started putting her in the high chair while we eat because she seems pretty happy there and neither of us has to try and eat while holding a baby. She started getting pretty fussy at 8:10, so I got her out of the high chair to get her ready for bed. I was carrying her with her butt in the crook of my left arm when all at one time, I heard something hitting the hardwood floor and realized there was something all over my arm. I looked down and my beautiful, sweet child had crapped all over herself and there was a line of poop from my armpit to my knee and down onto the floor. Let's just say if she was Chinese, her name would be Who Flung Poo. I stood there holding her out in disgust and shock and Lee ran over to help. He wiped up the floor and then started wiping me off, which pushed the poo deeper into my clothing. So. Freaking. Gross. She peed on Lee as he was getting her ready for her bath on Saturday night so I guess she thought it was my turn.

Ellie is turning six months on Friday (can you believe it?!) and we're going to try the rice cereal with her this weekend. I am sure next time you check, we will have some great picture of her "eating" her cereal for the first time. Let the solid food fun begin.

Happy Birthday, Aunt Elizabeth!

Halloween has come and gone and now it’s Christmastime? When did the holiday commercials start the day after Halloween? Poor Thanksgiving. It’s like everyone forgot about it. Sadly, all of this Christmas marketing is working on me because I’m already buying… or at least thinking about what I want to buy. I'm glad it’s starting to feel a little bit more like the season since a cold front blew through last night.

Ellie had a great first Halloween. She wasn’t scared of any of the costumes at all. Since it was so nice outside, Lee and I parked two chairs in the front yard, had a glass of wine, and passed out candy. One little boy about four years old came up and stared at Ellie for a minute and then said, “Can I touch it?”. I told him sure and he poked her jack-o-lantern on the front of her outfit. Maybe he thought she was part of our decorations? It was funny to watch the boys and girls trick-or-treating because they’re so different. Boys run up, grab as much candy as they can and then run off while girls will examine the candy bowl, make a decision, take one piece, and say thank you. We ran out of candy around 8:30 – about the same time the non-neighborhood kids started making the rounds so we called it a night and turned off the light.

Aunt Elizabeth turned 25 on Friday so Beth and Tee hosted a little get together for her at the Corner Bar. A lot of family friends who had never met Ellie were going to be there so we took her. That’s right – we took Ellie to a bar. And Lee wore her. It wasn’t smoky or anything because we had a private room and it was early so I really don’t think Ellie minded. For the record, everyone wants to talk to you if you’re wearing a baby so I think Lee was kicking himself all night for not wearing one to bars when he was in college. Maybe he’ll start wearing her to poker.

On Saturday, Mom, Ellie, and I went to the Chi-O Christmas Market for the first time. This is the Christmas market to end all Christmas markets. It’s so huge that they have it at the Dallas Convention Center. I think we wound up spending about 5 hours walking around and looking at everything we didn’t need. Mom actually did get some Christmas gifts and bought Ellie a little outfit. I bought an ornament with our names and the date on it and some other items. I am a sucker for those packaged soup mixes that you have to add water and a few other ingredients - so easy for weeknights. I think we’re going to have one I bought this week. Afterwards, Lee, Ellie and I met Beth at Patrizio’s for an early dinner and then went home to watch A&M loose. All I can do is hold onto memories of our glory days when I was still in school there. In seven years (keep in mind I stayed for grad school), I never missed a home game, but now I think I’d just stay home if I went there. Sad.

Lee had his last soccer game of the season on Sunday. That’s where my allergy problems all started and by that night, my sneezing was out of control. But now I don’t know if it’s allergy problems because I feel like it’s a head cold. I need to spend a week in a bubble and get well.


Ellie has a new toy. Actually, she got it a few weeks after she was born, but she's just now getting to the point where she can use it. Lee assembled it for her tonight and she seemed to enjoy it. I think it's like the jumperoo - she has to get used to it. It makes all sorts of different sounds and plays music. The top of it has the entire alphabet on it and when you push a letter, it says that letter so you can spell things. If you're my husband, that means you spell dirty words with it. When you're a guy, that's funny no matter if you're 7 or 37.

Sugar Plum tuckered out

I really need to remember my camera every day. When I went at lunch, she was back in her pile of toys and as you can see she was totally asleep. What a rough life Miss Bright leads. The words on her t-shirt say it all - "Sugar Plum".

Mine all mine!

It's another day of fun and laughs for Ellie! I like to take a picture on my camera phone while I'm there at lunch and send it to her daddy and grandmothers. She's sitting in the middle of a padded toy box and as you can see, she's really happy to have those toys all to herself. She should be fairly used to that by now. Are you starting to notice a trend with the past few pictures? I think this kiddo knows when a camera is on her. Little ham.

I am on hour 25 of an allergy attack. I have sneezed more in the past day than I have in the past 5 years. Not kidding. Hopefully more blogging tonight...

She's at it again

Here's a shot from daycare. It's off my camera phone so it's not very clear, but you get the point.

And after lunch:

Ellie had a fun first Halloween. More pictures to come.

Ellie's first Halloween

HAPPY HALLOWEEN!!

Seriously - how cute is my kid? She could not be any cuter. She's a Bee! She's our little Ellie Bee. Look at those feet - they crack me up. I had some greeting cards made for Halloween with the above picture and sent them out to family. Hope everyone got it! Have a safe and Happy Halloween, everyone! More picture soon of Ellie's first time to hand out candy.

Pig for Pigg

WARNING: The following post contains graphic images that may offend vegetarians.

Yes, that is what it looks like. Meg Pigg next to an enormous barbecued pig. I tried to get her to bite the apple for this picture, but she declined. Meg and Ruben are getting married in two weekends so we threw a little shin dig at Bonnie's house for them to celebrate. I'm not sure the exact number of people that attended but I'd bet it was between 50-60. Good times. A lot of people came in town for it including the Piggs from Lubbock (had to give you guys a shout out on the blog). Ellie couldn't attend the party because it ran late so my parents babysat again. I keep wondering when they're going to make me start paying them.

Having everyone back together makes me miss all of my old college buddies, so I'm planning a "family reunion" trip for this summer. I think we're going to try to rent a beach house or lake house someplace in Texas. I cannot wait until all of our little kiddos are running around together. Since everyone wants to go, it looks like we're going to have to find 3 houses next to each other to rent. Either that or one big one that has ten bedrooms.

Ellie has a new way that she likes to sleep:

How strange is that? She sort of looks like a hostage. I went to her daycare at lunch last week and she had her lovey over her face like this. Tanisha, her teacher, said that they routinely pull it off her face when she's sleeping, but when they go back to check on her, it's right back over her head. Maybe I should get her a tiny little eye mask to wear at daycare? My girl needs her beauty rest.

And here she is sitting up like a big girl. It was the strangest thing... last Saturday, she wasn't sitting up and then on Sunday, she could suddenly sit up like she'd been doing it for months. When I took her into day care on Monday morning, I said, "Look what Ellie learned to do" as I place her on the ground. She sat there looking around and Tinisha said, "She can sit? She learned that this weekend?" Apparently so. I wonder what other tricks she's got up her sleeve that she hasn't let me know about yet. She can also roll her tongue now. So when I'm driving around, it sounds like I have a baby Chewbacca in my backseat.

I was trying to get this post out last night, but my night owl wanted to stay up until midnight. I was going to let her cry it out, but Lee had a felony one trial that started this morning so the timing wasn't great. She's usually pretty good about going to sleep, but I can't figure out what it is lately. She's starting to wake up in the middle of the night or at 5:00. She may be teething or hungry. I guess the only way to fine out if she's teething is to wait and see if she gets teeth soon!

Girls' Weekend

I haven't been really great with the picture taking lately. This is a picture from the arboretum last weekend. Poor Ellie (and poor me too). I feel like we'll never be well again. She's been fighting a cold and when she got home on Wednesday night, she was not in a great mood so I took her temperature and it was 100.2. I called the pediatrician and the nurse told met that they don't consider a child as having a fever until the temperature reaches 100.4. After a sleepless night, I took her temp on Thursday morning and it was 101.5. I knew she felt really bad because she usually eats and then wants to play, but all she wanted to do was eat and then go back to bed. So I packed her up and headed to the doctor's office. Luckily, I was able to get in with her regular pediatrician. He checked her out and did an x-ray of her chest to confirm she wasn't getting anything really nasty. And let me tell you how excited she was to be stripped down for that. I had to told her arms over her head so she couldn't move while they took the x-ray. She just looked at me and screamed - not even crying - just screaming. She was so mad.

She pretty much slept the rest of the morning and when she finally woke up in the afternoon, she was ready to play. I stayed home with her and we had fun visiting my stylist in the afternoon for a cut and color and then we took a walk because it's finally starting to feel like fall. They weighed her during the check up, and with all of her clothes and diaper on, she's 15 pounds 4 ounces. I'm guessing she'll be about 16.5 when she goes for her 6 month checkup. I also spoke with the doctor yesterday about the possibility of adding rice cereal to her diet. After talking to him (one other doctor, a nurse, a lactation consultant, 10 other mothers, and researching what the American Academy of Pediatrics says), I decided to hold off on letting Ellie try her first bite of cereal until 6 months. She's happy and she's not starving, so why rush it?

By Friday, she was a lot better. Lee went out of town to the dove hunt with his father and a large group at the Herradura Ranch. It's owned by Josh Beckett, Red Sox pitcher, and run by his father. This place sounds pretty posh - it came complete with a swimming pool and fine dining - so I don't think either of them were roughing it. My dad was out of town at a singing competition so it was a girls' weekend all the way around. On Saturday morning, Ellie and I went for a long walk and then visited my friend, Jill, the Kappa house mom at SMU. When I think of house moms, I usually think of our Zeta house mom, Poopsie, who was 101 years old. But Jill is not your typical house mom. She's an aerobics instructor and she keeps the Kappa kitchen stocked with candy and homemade bread. The Kappas just built a new house and - wow - I'm willing to bet that this is the nicest sorority house in the nation. From the art room overlooking downtown to the conference room with high speed internet hookups to the sun deck with lounge chairs... I may go back to school so I can be in a sorority again!

That night, Ellie stayed with my mom while I headed out with Bonnie, Kristine, and Chelsea for Meg's bachlorette party. We started off with wine and opening some gifties for Meg at Bonnie's beautiful new house and then dinner at Cantina Laredo. I know times have definitely changed when I'm the designated driver and we're headed out for a big night in my station wagon while Kristine holds my car seat base in her lap. Ohmygod. Did I really just write that sentence? We had a really great time and I can't wait for the big wedding shower this weekend!

On Sunday, Ellie, mom and I went to church and then I went to get a flu shot. This is where it all went wrong for me. I felt like I had been coming down with a cold and you're not supposed to get a flu shot when you're sick. When they asked me if I thought I was sick, I said no because I really don't have a lot of free time to be running back and forth to the grocery store pharmacy to get a shot. Word to the wise - do not get a flu shot if you're sick because it does make you sicker. Then Ellie decided that sleep was not something necessary on Sunday night so on Monday, I was a total disaster. All I want to do is curl up in bed and sleep, but life goes on.

Ellie has a new trick she's going to show everyone next blog... she can sit up now!! And it's not the halfway sit up where she has to use her arms for support. She's all the way up and she's so excited she can do it. I don't think she's close to crawling though. I feel like she's closer to walking than she is crawling, but we'll see. She can also put her paci back in her mouth now. Praise Jesus. Sometimes it takes her five minutes, but she works on it until she succeeds. That's my girl!

Little Pumpkin

First of all, we are SO EXCITED for the Erwins because they found out they are expecting a GIRL in February!! I have been sending girl vibes to Knoxville since I found out Nicole was pregnant, so it must have worked. Now Ellie has someone to go to Camp Marymount with. If Ellie goes, she will be the third generation Marymounter. My mom went one summer and never went back (Mom loves not camping), and I went for four summers with Nicole. But who knows - Ellie will probably want to go someplace in Texas with her school friends. When we die, Lee and I want to be cremated and Lee says he wants his ashes scattered on the 50 yard line of Neyland Stadium. I have no clue where I'd like to be scattered so I usually default to saying just dump me in the lake at Marymount. I'm afraid that if they did that, I'd become one of the scary stories they tell the campers like "Enoch and Erma" or "Cheryl". According to camp legend, Cheryl was the crazy girl who used work in the kitchen and started digging up dead bodies to use for meat in the spaghetti sauce. She now lives in the cave by the spring. If they dumped my ashes in the lake, they'd probably tell the campers if you chant my name three times and look in the lake at midnight, you can still see my face. And nobody wants to be remembered by a story like that.

I'm going to have to squeeze two weekends into one blog. We had a fantastic football weekend last weekend because all four of the football teams we were rooting for won: Texas A&M, Tennessee, the Cowboys, and the team playing Texas. This weekend we went 1-3 because only Tennessee won. I felt really old for the first time last weekend. It was the annual Texas-OU game at the Cotton Bowl. We've never gone to the game, but every year the Friday night before the game, we go to a party hosted by a club that Lee belongs to. When I got the invitation this year, I was shocked to see that the party that the party started at 9pm. Are you kidding me? I'm usually on my way to the Land of Nod by that time. Then I remembered that it's been at 9pm every year we've gone and I realized I just can't hang anymore. So sad.

During all of the football madness, Lee decided that Ellie needed a Jack in the Box so he went to pick her up one at a local toy store. While he was there, he thought that she needed a two-foot tall Cookie Monster too. He was so excited about giving her Cookie Monster, but when he pulled it out of the sack, this was the scene that unfolded:

If you can't tell, Ellie is not a Cookie Monster fan. Every time we showed it to her, she started crying. We took it back the next day and got her a much smaller Elmo doll. She loves it. I think I'm going to have to find a Tickle Me Elmo for Christmas.

On Friday night, Lee and I went to the Dallas Stars game. We got to view the game from a suite because one of the labs we use at work invited me. Job perk. My mom spent the night that night to take care of Ellie. The next day, Ellie, mom and I went to a market the mother's association was putting on at our church. Both of us proceeded to buy way too much stuff. Mostly for Ellie, of course.

On Sunday, we did what every parent with a small child does at Halloween - dressed her up and took her to a pumpkin patch. After church, we went to the Dallas Arboretum for a photo op. Right in the middle of church, I realized we didn't have Ellie's stroller because we had taken Lee's car instead of mine. We had Ellie's Bumbo so we could sit her up for pictures, so we rented a wagon and put the Bumbo in it so she could look around. She loved it. We took her Halloween costume so she could take pictures in it, but I'm not going to put those up on the blog yet. I have to keep some things under wraps. Check back on October 31 for her costume debut!

Now that Ellie is well from the stomach flu, I think she's getting sick again with chest congestion. I can hear her in bed coughing now. It's the same thing I'm just now getting over. Uuuggghhh. Poor kiddo. I get everything she gets at daycare and she gets everything I get.

Last but not least - Happy Anniversary to my parents. Thirty-five big ones today!

The stomach flu

Poor kiddo. She's had a rough week. On Friday night, Ellie had her first stomach flu. I knew it might happen since everyone in her day care seemed to be coming down with it. One little boy in her room even had to be hospitalized, so I was hoping she wouldn’t get it. But she did. She woke up crying at 1:30 AM on Friday night so I went into her room to put her pacifier back in her mouth. She spit it out and looked at me so I picked her up and when I did, I realized she was covered in vomit. And for the record – spit up is totally different than vomit. Spit up doesn’t smell like anything and vomit smells like I did after Chilifest '99 when I got on stage with Jerry Jeff Walker. I must have made an impression on him when he got off his tour bus and I asked him if he was going to play "Sangria Wine".

I thought she was better the next morning so I tried to feed her, but it all care right back up again. I spent most the rest of the day trying to get her to keep down some Pedilyte. The nurse at Ellie's doctor's office was so great. She gave me her personal cell phone number and even called to see how Ellie was on Sunday. By about 8 PM on Saturday evening, she was back to normal. My parents came over to celebrate my Dad’s birthday, and luckily she was back to being up and around to wish dad a happy birthday by the time he left. We had a really good time grilling out some dove Lee shot over Labor Day weekend.

By Sunday, Lee started coming down with what Ellie had and 24 hours later, I did too. We were all sick with the virus at some point over the last 5 days. I was the sickest on Monday night/Tuesday morning and to top it off, my boss was here on Tuesday to do my mid-year review so I had to come to work. My last review was on my due date. He sure knows how to pick ‘em. On the bright side, the stomach flu is a really great diet so maybe I dropped some more lbs.

I also had my bi-annual work physical last Thursday. I won’t go into all of the gory details, but they had to draw blood. If you’re a long-time reader of The Bright Spot, you’ll know that there is no way this story can end well. It took the tech 30 minutes to find a vein and then 5 minutes to fill 3 of the 4 vials that were required. I couldn’t take it after 5 minutes so she pulled the needle out and didn’t get the fourth vial filled. I’m sure I’m going to have to go back. Why me.

Lee also had an interesting Thursday last week. Sometimes he visits Ellie during the day. When he drove up at noon, ALL of the kids in the day care center were in the parking lot because they were having a fire drill. There are 8 babies in Ellie's class. It never occurred to me as to how they evacuate infants during a fire drill, but apparently, they throw 4 babies in one crib and 4 in another and roll them down the hall. Ellie was asleep when the alarm sounded and according to her teacher, she was not thrilled to share a bed with 3 other kids and be transported into the hot sun. All I could picture was that scene from the movie, Jackass, where they’re all in the shopping cart rolling down the street. I’m sure it was quite a sight.

Ellie had to get her 4 month shots on Monday. I did much better this time than last time (and so did she). She’s really been through the wringer for the last two weeks - first the cold then stomach flu then the shots. I bet she's ready to crawl back into the womb. According to the doctor, she’s doing great and is still in the 95th percentile for height at 25.75 inches. She’s 70th percentile for weight at 14 pounds and 7 ounces. I was a little disappointed with the appointment because her regular pediatrician is out because his wife just had a baby. We had another doctor who I thought was going to be really great because he's been a doctor for 35 years. I have so many questions about feeding, weaning, rice cereal, when she should start first foods, etc. Basically, it went like this:

Q: How long should I breastfeed?
A: However long you want. Don't kill yourself.
Q: Should she start rice cereal?
A: You're her mother. If it feels right, it probably is.
Q: When should I start trying to feed her rice cereal?
A: Whenever you want to start it.
Q: Does it seem like she's getting enough food at night?
A: There's no real formula for this. Every baby is different.
Q: Are you even a pediatrician?
A: No, but I stayed in a Holiday Inn last night.

Okay, that last part didn't really happen, but it should have. I know he's been around thousands of babies, but I've only been around this one, therefore I am clueless. So I am turning to the experts for help - other mothers. If you're a mother and I haven't asked for for feeding advice yet, I will. Here's my little Tootsie trying to stand up. I keep my hands close just in case she starts to tumble.

Pony Keg Time

I know, I know. It's been a while since I've blogged - but really, nothing has been going on. And I've been horrible at taking pictures. Sometimes I forget I'm the Bright yearbook editor, photographer, and copy writer. Last week, my parents entertained their friends from England so we got to visit with them. Then this past weekend our big event was going to our friend Trey's 40th birthday party. That's us above at the party. It was a surprise party, and Lee helped with the fake poker story to get Trey out of the house. We had all had a lot of fun including Ellie. She fell asleep in my arms halfway through the party and then woke up in meltdown mode about 15 minutes past her usual bedtime so we had to make our exit around 9:00. I don't know when that little girl got so heavy, but Lee and I have to take turns carrying her now. Ellie usually loves our friend, Mike, but for some reason she screamed time he got near her. Poor Mike. He was like baby kryptonite.

I think Ellie must have been tired from a full day of shopping. Since Lee had to work on Saturday, Ellie and I took a girls trip to the mall. There are so many cute little girl clothes out for fall right now. And since she's more fun to shop for than I am, we spent most of the time looking for her. It's hard to think that she'll only be able to wear the clothes I bought her for one season. I try to send her to day care in simple long sleeved onesies because every day when I go get her, she's in her back-up outfit and the outfit I brought her to school in is handed to me an a baggie.

On Sunday, we got to see another winning Cowboys game against the Bears. After Lee's soccer game he game home and I heard, " Look what I got!" He stood there holding a pony keg. "Hon, why do we need a pony keg?", I said. "It's a keg of beer!". "Yes, I know that", I said. "But why do we need 5 liters of beer?". "Ohmygosh. You are no fun sometimes. This thing is so cool and plus it was only $19.99. I would have killed to have one of these things in college!" That's great. And 17 years later, he has his wish. So... now we have a mini-keg of beer in our fridge. Because it's cool. Later that night, Lee asked me if I dared him to drink it all and I told him no. I was absolutely not going to dare him to drink his pony keg all in one night.

Ellie came down with her first cold this weekend too. Poor little thing. I have to use that blue suction thing on her nose all the time. She knows what it is when she sees it. She starts kicking her legs and then when I put it in her nose, she lies perfectly still until I finish. Then she tries to swat me away. She's almost over the cold now, but when I went to pick her up today, her teacher told me to watch her because one of the kids in her class came down with a stomach bug and had to go home. Wonderful. Maybe she's been blowing out all of these diapers as a fire drill to get me ready for the real deal. She also has a new trick - she can stand up if she's holding onto something. I stay behind her the whole time in case she falls, but she can do it. I know she's my baby so I think she super skilled, but I really wasn't expecting her to stand at 4 months. She looks around and squeals as she's standing there. I'll try to get some pictures of that this weekend. She's almost sitting up too, but now quite. She can do it if she's leaning forward but then rolls off to the side after a while. It's a start. I promise more live action shots next

post!

Ellie's Baptism

Wow - I finally found some time to blog again! After two weeks of full time working, I've decided I'm not a "working mother" - I'm a "work and then mother and then work some more and then mother again". But I wouldn't want to miss one minute of any of it! I couldn't decide on the title for this blog. It technically is all about Ellie's baptism, but an alternative title could have been "Confessions of a Breastfeeder". I'll get to that in a minute. Ellie had both of her great grandmothers and two great aunts, Kathy and Judy, in town as well as a whole host of other friends and family members to celebrate her Baptism. We started off the weekend on Friday night by going to see Mimi and Judy at Lee's parents house and then having barbecue. The big event was on Saturday at 10:30 AM.

I had called the church on Friday morning to confirm the event and to ask if there was someplace I could privately feed Ellie beforehand. They said all of the rooms were taken so I came up with it brilliant (so I thought) idea of breastfeeding her in a confessional. It's quiet, private - perfect. They said that would be fine. We got there at 9:20 AM and I scoped out the confessionals. The one to the right of the priest's door just had a kneeler inside and so did the one to the left so I decided to use the one of the middle, usually reserved for the priest, because it had a chair. I locked the door and got down to business.

I should also mention that we had a photographer that was coming at 10AM. My dress zipped up the back so I unzipped it down to the waist but then realized that if I didn't take it off that it was going to be messed up for the pictures, so I just took it off. Everything seemed to be going swimmingly as I sat in the confessional in my thong panties breastfeeding when someone started banging on the door and trying to turn the doorknob. I thought it was Lee because I told him to stand guard, but I later found out he went to Starbucks. So the knocking continues and all of the sudden I hear an elderly woman say "Father?!! Father are you in there?!!". Oh crap. "Um, hi... I'm um feeding my baby in her. I called the church and they said-" "FATHER??! FATHER ARE YOU IN THERE?!!" I looked around and realized that the confessional closet was soundproof so the eager confessor couldn't hear me.

Then the door to the "Open Confessional" side opened and I heard someone moving around. Sweet Jesus - I'm about to hear a 95 year old woman's confession. Then she exited and came over to the "Closed Confessional" side. I figured out she was one of the women there to clean the church so I said "Hi there - I'm really sorry to be a bother but -". She cut me off and I think she was deaf because she screamed "That's okay Father!! You just do what you need to do in there!!". Wonderful. Now she thinks our priest has holed himself up in the confessional. When I finally exited, another little old lady who had obviously witnessed all of this was sitting in a pew praying the rosary looking at me like I'd been in there sacrificing small animals. Could all of this been avoided if I'd just brought a bottle? Yes. But when I had this baby, she ate my brain and I can't problem solve anymore so cut me some slack.

So back to the baptism... it was really beautiful and so many friends and family there. Ellie got a little vocal toward the end of the ceremony, but didn't make a peep when they poured the water over her head. Kathy said she's a future swimmer. My dad is Ellie's godfather and Lee's sister, Elizabeth, is the godmother. Afterwards, we had a luncheon at Lee's parents house catered by Angela's. It was wonderful. Since Mimi's birthday is the 18th, we went ahead and celebrated with a dinner that night. On Sunday, we went over to my parent's house so Ellie could spend some time with her great grandmother and great aunt. Ellie had been good all weekend, but I could tell that all of the passing her around was getting to her because she was getting cranky. She slept like a rock both nights.

Ellie has been doing very well at daycare. I really like her teachers and they seem very attentive to all of the children. I think they thought I was trying to starve her because they asked me to up the amount I'm sending with her in the bottles. She's up to 6 oz. in the two bottles I send. Full Ellie = happy Ellie. I'm still going at lunch to feed her which is working out fine. Because she's wearing 6 month clothing now, she went to school in all new outfits every day this week - and had a blowout every day. I guess she's testing my stain fighting abilities. When I was feeding her on Wednesday and Thursday, she had a blowout while I was feeding her. We had a near miss on my clothing both days. I told her that I felt honored that she was so excited to see me that she crapped her pants, but we were going to have to stop meeting that way. She also wants to touch my face all the time while I'm holding her. She'll reach up and start patting my cheek or grab my lip. Very cute until she grabs and pulls my lip.

One more picture - it's four generations.

Labor Day 2007

How do you like our matching mother/daughter camo outfits?!! There's Ellie in her Brady Goat Cookoff onesie and me in my 1992 Dove Hunt tee shirt. Ellie had her official first road trip over Labor Day weekend. We took a trip to Lee's parents' ranch in west Texas for the annual dove hunt. It's normally a 3 hour drive, but the construction and all of the traffic made it more like 4 hours. Ellie was really great on the way there except for the last 30 minutes or so, but it was way past her bedtime when we got there on Friday night and she was hungry. Lee's parents were there along with Ben and his friend, Price.

Other than the fact that I had Ozzy Osbourne's "Crazy Train" stuck in my head for three days straight and I have chigger bites in unmentionable places, we had a really fun Labor Day weekend. We spent most of the time relaxing, watching football, and Lee even got a few dove. Sooooo glad it's college football time again. Ellie was cheering for her second favorite team, the Vols, but they lost to Cal. She even sported a bright orange onesie for the occasion. Lee will be excited when Ellie can finally say things like this. I found one more thing that makes Ellie laugh - the dogs. She loves to watch them play with each other and she even thinks it's funny when they bark. She had a really good time watching them retrieve tennis balls from the water.

We got back on Monday afternoon, and I immediately started working to get things together for Ellie's first day of daycare. I have to have double everything now - diapers, wipes, outfits, bottles . Everything. From the time I woke on Tuesday morning to the time I made it to work, it was 2.5 hours. Wednesday was a little better - even with massive rainstorms causing traffic lights to be out, I still got up, got ready, dropped off Ellie and was here within two hours. I'm trying to figure out ways to trim that even more. Her first day was pretty good. I took her in the class and sat her in a swing next to a little boy. He started kicking and grunting when he saw her. Already turning heads at 3.5 months. That's my girl. I didn't cry when I left her, but I felt guilty. She probably spent all day wondering where her mom was.

I've gone back at lunchtime all week to feed her, but when she saw me on Tuesday and Wednesday, she didn't want to eat - she just wanted to look at me. Today was better. When she got home on Tuesday night, she was a nightmare because she'd only slept 1.5 hours all day. I'm hoping that will get better as she gets more used to it. Maybe this will help her go to bed earlier - who knows.

I had one of my more embarrassing moments at work on Wednesday. I have to pump in the computer closet and they keep it about 60 degrees because of all of the equipment. The door is locked from the outside and I always put a sign on the door so nobody comes in. So I'm sitting there working on the laptop and I hear the key slide into the door and it opens. There stands our IT guy. "HI", I say with a glare and my best "you'd better get the hell out of here" voice. "Um, hi - I need to switch out the tape for the server". Hey knucklehead - can you see I'm a little busy??!! I was wearing a big jacket to keep warm so he couldn't see anything but still. Now I'm getting pissed because he's had the door open 10 seconds longer than he should have in the first place. "Do you see the 'Do not disturb' sign on the door?!!". "Uh, yeah.". "THEN GET OUT!!!". "I have to change the tape". Seriously, don't make me unteather myself and come out there to beat you. Because I will. "Jerry, CLOSE THE DOOR." Good God. Now I can't look at him. I told one of my co-workers and she was like "Ohmygod - were you topless?!!" No. "Well, were you naked?!?!" Yes, I was buck naked in our computer closet. NO! Whatthehell. Do my co-workers think I'm naked in there? Reason #541 to self medicate with wine - IT guy seeing me pump in the closet.

A big congrats to Jenny who got engaged this weekend. We're so happy for you! Also very happy for cousin Kyle who got engaged two weeks ago and Lee's friend, Terrance, who proposed this past weekend too. Looks like we'll have plenty of weddings to attend this spring. And the most exciting news of all... Nicole is expecting her second bambino in February. I can't wait!

Back to School

All the kids went back to school on Monday and football season is just around the corner.... ahhh, fall. The little girl who lives next to us started her freshman year in high school this week. I saw her on Sunday and she was trying to finish a report for her required summer reading (I remember those days). She said she was excited to start high school, but a little nervous because they had their first dance in two weeks. It made me remember the first day of school - when I had to have the perfect outfit (even though we had uniforms), and all of your books and folders were new and you felt like a total dumb ass because you couldn't get your combination lock to work right. I can't decide if I miss it or need therapy to purge it from my memory.

I have so much good news... where to begin?!! First off, Ellie has started a new line that she likes to call Diaperhead. It's very fashion forward.

Can you tell how I amuse myself during the day? That's right - I stick diapers on my kid's head! I know - I'm hilarious. Well, I'm about to have to find some other way to amuse myself because I found out yesterday that she got a spot in the daycare place I've been yearning for and had my name on the list at since September 2006. They left me a voice mail on Wednesday morning to tell me to she had a spot. I checked my messages as I was leaving the gym (at 9:15 AM trying to pretend I was a stay at home mom). I started jumping up and down in the street when I found out she had a spot, but then I got sad because I realized our weekday mornings of listening to Muse in the News on The Ticket and then reading Brown Bear, Brown Bear are about to come to a close. She starts Tuesday so that means that Grammie's days of Tuesday and Thursday babysitting ended today. She was sad too. So next week, I officially join the ranks of the "working mother". If I lost it when she had to get her first round of shots then I'll be interested to see how I react on Tuesday morning. I'm sure that will be an entire blog next week...

I haven't been talking about it much, but if everyone can remember, my goal was to loose 25 pounds by Labor Day. I weighed in a Weight Watchers last week and *drum roll*.... I've lost 25.8 pounds since May 26!!! Very exciting. I'm now back to the weight I was when I started Weight Watchers in 2005 so now I'm just regular fat again. Yea!! I'll be working to get "the rest" off by Christmas. I'll make another public goal... lose 10 pounds more pounds by Halloween (I know you're all thinking "good Lord fatty, how much did you gain?!?!). That not going to be that difficult since it's getting cooler so I can use our jogging stroller soon. Plus, I'm so busy at work, it's hard to find enough time to eat.

Ellie had her first big girl portrait made on Saturday afternoon in her Baptismal gown. It's the gown my mom wore and I wore and everyone else in between has worn. We got the proofs today and they're just okay. I'm still trying to decide if we're going to keep them or reshoot. Next weekend it the big weekend for the Baptism. Lots of out of town people are coming from Tennessee and we're really excited for them to meet Ellie! After the pictures, we came back to the house and a freak electrical storm blew out all of our power. We decided to go shopping since we had no AC, but before we did, Lee tried to cut Ellie's nails while she was sleeping. He got the middle and index finger nails okay, but then went for the left thumb and chopped the skin off the end of her finger. Poor kid. Poor dad too. Her thumb started bleeding, she started screaming, and Lee didn't know what to do. The good news is that it was just a little skin so she's no worse for the wear. That's her finding her feet on Sunday. As you can see, the blood-letting did no lasting damage.

I also joined a new group this week - the mother's association at our church (because apparently I think I need something else to do). It's going to be really nice to be around other moms with kids Ellie's age. They have playgroups, mother's night out, and holiday parties. And in keeping with the Catholic tradition, they serve alcohol at all of the functions! Very fun. I guess if there's one demographic that needs a booze break, it's new mommies.

Hope everyone has a great Labor Day. The next time I blog, I'll let you know how that day care thing went... Here's a picture of our little family out at dinner last weekend.

Ellie's new friends

I wish I could be as relaxed as Ellie. Here's our little Queen of Sheba looking like she owns the place in her yellow cow jumpsuit. Lee reminded me last night that I hadn't blogged in 10 days. Work is really amping up right now so when I'm at home most of my time is spent caring for Ellie and then immediately switching gears to buckle down and get things done for work. To let you know how busy I've been, I haven't looked at Perez Hilton in a week! Under normal circumstances I'm usually on there three times a day.

Ellie is doing some new things this week - she has discovered her feet so she grabs onto them and holds her toes. I need to get a picture of that. She also has discovered that she can make a new sound. She purses her lips together and blows making a raspberry sound. On Monday night, she wouldn't fall asleep so after 30 minutes, I went in there to rock her. I held her and gave her her pacifier. She spit it out and started with the "Pppppbbbt!! Pppppbbbt!! Pppppbbbt!!". That made me laugh so she started smiling. But then we had to get serious because it was 11:15 and mom seriously wanted to go to bed.

Speaking of pictures, I ordered 250 pictures from Shutterfly last week. I didn't think I had taken enough pictures of Ellie, but after ordering, I'm off to a good start. I can't remember the last time I had actual photographs printed out. Lee gave me my first digital camera for Christmas in 2002 and aside from our Honeymoon, I have no pictures. I have tons saved on the computer, but none printed out. I am promising myself I will print out pictures every three months. Now I just have to get all 250 of these bad boys in albums...

Ellie made some new friends last week. I had lunch with my friend Gina and she brought her her little boy, William. He was born 1 week after Ellie. Then on Sunday, we went to Hudson's baptism. She's Lauren and Brian's little girl, and Ellie is 11 days older than her. This is the first "interaction" Ellie has had with another baby. I'm putting interaction in quotes because I don't know that she actually realized there was another baby next to her. Of course we had to prop them up together and take their picture together.

Neither one of them has great core strength yet so they toppled over. Maybe some baby yoga will help. It was good to see high school friends and introduce Ellie to everyone. Ellie threw up while Aunt Katy was holding her during the baptism. Katy turned around to tell me, "She's barfing!!". Sorry Aunt Katy! Spit happens. That night our friends the Wheelocks were in town so we went out to dinner with them and Lee's family. I started to feel a achy during dinner and when I got home, I had a temperature of 100. I think I had mastitis (a.k.a. the "boob flu"), but it cleared itself up by Monday afternoon without me having to use antibiotics.

I left Ellie with her first non-family member to babysit yesterday. Our gym has a kids place so Ellie stayed there while I attended class. It was just next door to my class so the entire time I wanted to run over there and check on her, but I didn't. When I picked her up, she was asleep in one of the babysitter's arms. My class was pretty good - it was this weird yoga/dancing/kickboxing hybrid. During the first part, we did all yoga and I thought Lee might like it. Then we starting dancing and Jeff, the instructor, started yelling things like "Make it hard" and "Tight asses, everyone!" and I instantly knew my fifteen year old husband wouldn't be able to take it.

And finally - we uncorked some of our Chardonnay last night. It was... interesting. It wasn't bad - in fact, it was good for a first effort. It's sort of a weird color. Lee thinks it's because he oaked it for too long in our barrel. Yes, we have a barrel. He thinks that we should order grapes and crush them ourselves for our next batch of wine. I can see Fed Ex showing up at our house with 500 pounds of grapes. That may make us the talk of the neighborhood.

FP and the Dreamcatchers

I love this picture. I took after church this morning, and she is wearing a Feltman dress that I wore as a little girl. There are a couple of things that make her smile and laugh now - one of those things is to make a noise like a bee. BUUUZZZZZZ!! My mom figured that one out. So now when I take a picture, I don't tell her to smile, I just start buzzing.

Oh, where to begin. I have been going to a step class on Saturday mornings that's sort of weird. The instructor is a little Nazi-ish and the participants all know each other for some reason, so I feel like the outsider when I attend. The guy teaching the class is really into his choreography so there is no room for me to add my own flair. Example: We were doing this little number where you do a mambo, chasse, chasse around the bench. I replaced the last chasse with a little spin. It just worked better. So we're doing this in class and he's queuing "mambo, chasse, chasse". I mambo, chasse, spin. On the second time around, I hear him say it with with a little more meaning "Mambo, chasse, CHASSE!". I mambo, chasse, spin. Then I hear "MAMBO CHASSE CHASSE!!". I look over my shoulder to see what Fancy Pants has his knickers in a knot about and he's staring right at me! F.P. is calling me out because I am not doing his combination right. Are you kidding me? Listen Fred Astire, if I want to come in here and whip out a piece of cardboard and breakdance for an hour, I'm going to do it. And he's one of those instructors who has you do all of these weird arm things. If he starts in with the jazz hands, I'm out of there.

Then there are the participants. The first time I took this class was in March when I was still pregnant. I found it a little strange that four - FOUR - of the women were dressed alike in black spandex leggings, black sports bras and yellow tanks. They looked like an over 40 semi-competitive aerobics troupe. I secretly named them the Dreamcatchers (and don't tell me I'm crazy because crazy is wearing matching outfits to step class). I was hoping that it was just my pregnancy hormones making me read more into what was surely a strange coincidence. Nope. On Saturday, the ringleader/captain of the Dreamcatchers, Kim, chastised another member for not wearing the right outfit. "You didn't hear that we're wearing all black today?". Kim, baby we need to have a talk. If you have enough time to be the costume designer for your Saturday morning step class, the you have way too much time on your hands. The woman behind me was coincidentally dressed the same as me - black capri leggings and a green tank top. I thought about asking her to help me challenge the Dreamcatchers to a dance off, but didn't think she's understand what I was talking about.

Back to our weekend. On Saturday night, my parents came over to watch Ellie so we could have our second date night since she's been born. We went out to dinner and then to see the Bourne Ultimatum. It was really good, but I would have enjoyed it more if I had remembered what happened in the first two. But hands down, it was the best action movie I think I've ever seen. When we returned, Mom and Dad said she "cried a little". I think is grandparent code for "she screamed like a banshee for the three hours you were gone so we're going to remember our earplugs the next time we do this". Thanks Grammie and Grandi!

On Sunday, I assembled Ellie's Rainforest Jumperoo. It's the size of the space shuttle. No seriously, I bet someplace in Europe, they have a little one-seater car that's smaller than this thing. I don't think she knows quite what to make of it. It is designed so that she can move around 360 degrees, but she hasn't figured that out yet. When she jumps, the lights and music start going off (in the first 15 seconds of hearing it Lee asked me if it had a mute button). I think she likes bouncing up an down. I always wondered why parents have so much crap in their house... it's so they have a place to put their kid down so they can get their hands free. Just kidding - it's so they can learn. Or that's what the box said.

Rockin' Rockin' Rockin'

Ellie received a surprise gift from our friends Gina and Scott on Friday. It's the cutest little rocking chair I've ever seen. It's in all the colors of her nursery, it says "Time to Read" and has a little clock on the back. There's a spot on the side for her books. I absolutely adore it. She's still a little small for it now, but I know she'll love to rock and read in in a few more months.

Lee picked up a new case this past week that made the newspaper and television headlines, so he was interviewed and made the 5:00, 6:00 and 10:00 newscasts. Due to the public nature of the blog, I won't go into details, but e-mail me if you want the scoop! We Tivoed the newscasts and I think Lee has worn out the remote rewinding and rewatching. Here's how Wednesday night went: Play segment. "I look okay, right?" Yes honey. Rewind. Play segment. "Does that tie look okay?". Looks great. Rewind. Play segment. "Did I sound okay?" I was hanging on every word. The rinse, lather, and repeat went on for a while. I'm giving him a hard time, but he looked terrific and sounded even smarter than he is handsome. Ellie and I are very proud!

On Saturday, we went to the outlets in Allen. I'd never been there before, but they're pretty good. I got some "back to school" items for Ellie since she'll be starting day care soon and some "back to work" items for me. I'm focusing on items that I can still wear when I loose all of the weight, but I feel like it may be next spring before I'm fully back to old size. I hate buying fat girl clothes. After the shopping, we went to the house of a co-worker's who was having a party for the office. It was hot. It's finally beginning to feel like summer here - and if summer held off until August then I'll take it. I hope we don't have a delayed summer that lasts until November. That night, we watched 300 which was pretty good.

I bought a mirror for Ellie's crib and she loves it. I know she is mesmerized by the attractive baby staring back at her. She enjoys her mirror so much that I had to turn her around so she couldn't see herself anymore so she could fall asleep for a nap. I told her this is the only time in her life she was allowed to have a mirror hanging over her bed.