Not a Monday, but Still Miscellaneous!

So, I just realized that I haven't met my original goal of getting back into posting at least once a week, because it has already been a month since I posted last! Where does the time go? o.O


Anyhow...I'm way past due for posting an update! So much has happened this past month--and I really meant to blog about the events as they were happening, because I didn't want to forget any of them (which I'm quite certain that I have indeed forgotten something that I wanted to blog about). As you can tell though--it didn't happen!


Now to at least *try* to get caught up. Where to begin? .... Ah, I know: my sister. :-)

First some background; for years my sister has felt a calling to be a missionary--and more specifically--to go to India and use her life for God's glory working with the orphans and widows of India. So, last year after being disappointed by a door being closed at the last minute for her to go to Honduras for 6 months and assist a missionary couple who were already there, my sister was networking with native Indian missionaries to try to make some contacts and see if any doors would open. She began communicating with a man named Byju who runs an orphanage in Northern India. As they talked they began to realize that they had many of the same dreams and goals for what they felt like God was calling them to do with their lives. Byju asked my sister if she would think about marrying him, and after a while they began a courtship and--to make a long story short--earlier this month my sister traveled to India (along with our mom) to meet and marry her Byju. :-) They were married on July 10th and judging from the brief phone calls and Facebook statuses, my sister is blissfully happy and completely adores her new husband (but that's nothing new is it Sis? :-p). ;-)

 My beautiful sister and her dashing new husband on their wedding day!

If you ever read this Sis--congratulations again! We are so happy for you and Byju and can't wait to meet him (hopefully sooner rather than later)! Love you bunches! :-)

Well, in other news, Peanut Butter Cup has been cutting his canines (so far the lower left and upper right ones have broken through, but the other two are still below the surface) which that has been making him cranky, and is likely also responsible for his somewhat diminished appetite as well. We have been working on potty training (very slowly) since May, and have had some progress but still have a LONG way to go.... A very long way to go. o.O

My horse, Titan, is *possibly* going to be broken soon! I am SO excited about that, but am so sad to be missing all of his training. I'm hoping to find out an approximate date of when it is going to happen--before it happens (even if it gets changed and has to be delayed for any reason)--so that I can share in the excitement and anticipation of waiting for an e-mail or something to hear how it went. Silly, I know, but I feel like I'm missing so much with him and it would be so awesome to be able to feel more a part of such a big event in his life! Phooey--I miss my pony!!

My handsome boy! (Thanks to Karissa, one of my best and dearest friends, for taking this photo and sharing it with me! You're awesome!!!)

Well, I guess I should try to get some other stuff done before Peanut Butter Cup wakes up for the day. :-) I really will try to write again soon--and post more pictures! I'm so far behind....

I'm Back!

Whew!! Long time, no write!! At first I didn't mean to be away from the blogosphere for so long, but then I decided to take a bit of a sabbatical.... Only I never actually got around to posting and letting y'all know that! I'm not even sure if anyone even checks my blog for new posts anymore. Sorry about that everyone!

Life picked up for a while, and I just didn't have the time or energy to write anything. I did THINK about things I wanted to write about, they just never made it to the computer. :-p I actually started writing this post back in May, and it's taken me this long to get a chance to finish it!

Anyhow, here's a quick update for anyone who may still be reading this blog -- or randomly stumbles across it, ha ha. Peanut Butter Cup turned 18 months old in May, and less than a week later he decided that it was high time for him to be climbing out of his crib, so as soon as his daddy got home from some away training a couple of days later Peanut Butter Cup's crib was made into a toddler bed. It was an interesting adjustment to say the least, but it didn't really change his sleeping habits much aside from the very first night when I had a nightlight on so he would be able to see if he woke up in the night and got out of bed--the light was too stimulating for him and we ended up having a five hour party-time instead of his normal 1-3 hours. Needless to say, we were both exhausted the next day, and he actually slept for about 11 1/2 hours straight the next night (a rarity to be sure!), for which I was VERY grateful.

Now things are pretty much back to normal and he actually sleeps through the night on occasion--sometimes several nights in a row which is SO wonderful! I can't wait until he sleeps through the night every night.... It will make planning out my days and nights a little bit more predictable than they are currently. :-)

Peanut Butter Cup is in the process of cutting his four cuspids and then all that will be left are the very back molars. Teething is another thing that I can't wait to be done with. It will be a huge relief to know that he isn't hurting from cutting teeth anymore!!

June 4th was quite an eventful day--not only was it my husband's birthday, but it was also the day Peanut Butter Cup got his first set of stitches (not something I'd care to repeat for a VERY long time). So, how did it happen? Well, we were Skyping with my husband's parents in the play room while Peanut Butter Cup ran around playing like he always does, only this time he tripped and hit his forehead square on a toy (one that was supposed to be safe because it had rounded edges...he just happened to find the one sharp joint underneath the rounded edge). Because it was a head wound it instantly started bleeding quite a bit which of course shook me up because he's my baby and I can't stand the thought of him getting hurt like that. My husband took charge of the situation and told me to get tissues and put pressure on it. Peanut Butter Cup was thrashing around quite a bit though and I was scared I was going to hurt him more so my husband took over that and told me to get ready to leave so we could go to the emergency room. I think we were out of the door and on our way within about 7 minutes of it happening. I sat in the back with Munchkin on the way there and tried to distract him and keep him calm while I tried to clean most of the blood off of him. He had stopped screaming by then, but started crying a few times during the short drive, fortunately though he was pretty easy to distract so that kept him from crying the whole way there.

By the time we had gotten to the clinic (my husband had decided on the way that he probably didn't need to go to the E.R.) and had signed in, Peanut Butter Cup was pretty much back to his normal self--wanting to run around and be chased, all the while giggling--which was a huge relief to me (and my heart--which I think had stopped momentarily when he fell and I saw all of the blood).

He ended up having to get three stitches, and let me tell you--he was SO brave. He didn't whine or fuss when the nurses swaddled him, or had to clean it out--or even when they had to numb the area, which was the point at which they said things usually started to "get interesting". I think he would have been fine during the whole stitching process as well, but they insisted on covering his face up with a cloth--which is something that he absolutely hates. He was very upset by that and by the time the nurses had finished stitching him up he had exhausted himself, was beet red, and had soaked the sheet under his head in sweat and tears. I felt so bad that he had to go through that and was very relieved when they had finished and would finally take the cover off of his face.

His stitches are out now and it has been healing very nicely. Now, hopefully God and Peanut Butter Cup will both have mercy on me and there won't be any more injuries for a loooooooooooonnng time.

I'll post pictures soon!

I've missed blogging...hopefully I'll be able to get back into posting at least once a week here in the near future!

Nap Times and Party Times

Peanut Butter Cup has been taking his naps in his crib for over a week now, and it has been going really well . . . at least is was until yesterday when he decided that he wasn't going to take a nap after falling asleep in my arms a couple of times and then waking up when I put him down. He's doing the same thing today (though I'm going to try to convince him to go to sleep again in a little while) -- and he's done it off and on in the past. I'm just hoping that he isn't at the stage where he has decided to not nap AT ALL anymore (kind of like when he decided he didn't want to take two naps a day anymore). In a way it wouldn't surprise me. I've read that the older High Needs (Fussy) Babies/Children get, the less sleep they seem to need -- they just have SO MUCH energy.

Nevertheless, I am hoping that this is just a stage that he is going through due to discomfort from teething and another bout of separation anxiety. I'm not ready for him to be done with nap times!! He hasn't been sleeping very well at night again as well, and I am usually up with him for what I call "Party Time" -- due to the fact that most of the time he is wide awake and simply wants to sit/stand up, squirm, and chatter away in my arms -- though sometimes he will fall back to sleep quickly, he just doesn't stay asleep when I put him back down and so then we have to start all over again. He usually has one Party Time each night lasting anywhere from as little as 40 minutes to 3 hours (like last night's!).

He started doing that months ago, but stopped a while back and was actually starting to sleep through the night off and on (which was lovely!). As of almost two weeks ago though, everything changed. He started being fussier/more clingy, drooling like a fountain, eating less, sleeping more fitfully, and having Party Times during the night again, of course. All of those things point to teething, but so far no new tooth has broken through. So, in the meantime, Peanut Butter Cup and I get what sleep we can, and I try to stay awake during the night while he is bouncing off the walls -- in my arms. Hey, it's hard to stay awake when sitting in the dark in the middle of the night with the same song playing on repeat the entire time. Ha ha! :-p

I'm very grateful that he hasn't been in such extreme discomfort during the night that he will cry inconsolably like some teething babies. He is actually quite a chipper little Munchkin and will try to give me hugs and kisses in the dark. :-) He's such a Sweetheart and such a little Trooper -- even when he is sick he is still such a cheerful little guy! Oh how I adore him!

Even though I would really like to get more sleep most nights, I know I will NEVER look back on these times and wish that I hadn't held Peanut Butter Cup as much or spent these nights 'sleep training' him so that I could get more sleep and he would be more convenient. This is just a season that will pass in time (whether it be a short amount of time, or whether it takes a longer amount of time).

Now, I'm not trying to paint a picture of myself bouncing joyfully out of bed when he wakes up in the middle of the night -- because more often than not it takes me a couple of minutes to groggily pull myself together before I head into his room and then oftentimes I will petition Abba (Father) that my little Peanut Butter Cup will go back to sleep quickly. However, I can't help but to constantly remind myself that there are childless women who would gladly take my place during these nights of sleep deprivation because it would mean that they have been blessed with a child -- and when I think of things like that I think of how I should be just as grateful for the blessing that I have been given -- and not take him for granted just because I am uncomfortable in some way. I was going to say more, but I've lost my train of thought -- must be due to the lack of sleep! Ha ha!! :-)

Eventually he will sleep through the night (of his own accord) and will no longer need me in the middle of the night to help him back to sleep, so I treasure these moments of time spent with him in the middle of the night, and I won't begrudge him the comfort/closeness he needs during the night in this season.

I am truly a blessed Mama!

P.S. As I was writing the above, Peanut Butter Cup was 'bouncing around' in his crib expending some energy (if we leave the nursery during the time when he is supposed to be taking his nap, it's almost a 100% guarantee that he won't ever get back to the point of falling asleep during the day -- without the help of going for a drive anyhow. So we have to stay in there in the dim light so he'll eventually get tired again) . . . he started to get more and more subdued and then the next thing I knew he was laying down and starting to fall asleep -- ON HIS OWN. He is now slumbering peacefully, and he did it all himself this time. So, you see what I mean about his needing my help to go to sleep only being a season? Who knows how much longer it will last. He's already growing up.

Ladies: treasure your babies in all aspects no matter what stage they are going through . . . they won't stay babies for long and will quickly become independent. Don't take their current need for you for granted!!

Okay, I'll get off my soap box now!! Hope you are all having a blessed day! :-)

Tooth Number 4 Has FINALLY Arrived!

So, after many weeks of the upper left middle tooth being visible as a bump below the surface, it finally broke through sometime last night. Which may explain why Peanut Butter Cup had a better night and only woke up three times. He actually had a three hour stretch at one point (which is very rare)!! It was SO nice to be able to sleep for three hours straight! After that I didn't really mind when Munchkin decided to start the day at 6:30. :-)

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My Photoshop CS5 disc arrived yesterday, so I have been playing around with HDR . . . if you have Photoshop and haven't tried it yet -- you really should. Do the photos look completely life-like? Well, no. Does it look neat anyway? YES! At least, my husband and I think so.

Here is the result of my first attempt. It's by no means perfect, and I have a lot to learn, but I just wanted to share (and hopefully inspire others to experiment with HDR as well. *Ahem* Karissa *cough, cough* Ha ha). Hope you like it! Critiques are welcome!!

Tooth Number 3 is in Sight!

I'm pretty sure I can see a little bit of Peanut Butter Cup's middle upper right tooth as of today. I'm not 100% sure as the little munchkin has a habit of never staying still long enough for me to get much more than a glimpse of what is happening in there, and he hasn't been too keen on me feeling in there due to his gums being sore. However, from the glimpses I did manage to get, it looked like the tooth was either starting to break through, or is getting very close to doing so!

Oh, a quick update on his sleeping pattern of late . . . I think it is mostly due to separation anxiety, along with discomfort from teething and other things. Some nights are better than others, while others are how I described them before. Most likely though, it is just Munchkin needing a little extra closeness to help him feel more safe and secure. Hopefully this stage won't last for a LONG time, but I will be there for him as long as he needs me. "This too shall pass . . . ."

Peanut Butter Cup tried Butternut Squash for the first time tonight and seemed to like it . . . I'm hoping to try avocados with him again in the near future, but I'm not sure when exactly that will take place. I have been working on restocking our freezer with homemade 'baby cubes' for the past couple of weeks. I still have a lot of fresh/frozen produce I need to steam/cook and freeze in the next few days, so hopefully Peanut Butter Cup will entertain himself long enough for me to get a lot done in the near future. :-)

Well, I should be heading to bed soon! Have a blessed day!

Update! Long Time Coming . . . Sorry!

Hello All!

It's been awhile hasn't it? Quite a while. Since Peanut Butter Cup is sleeping currently I figured now would be a good time to sit down and write an update on where we are currently.

The movers came and packed up all of our stuff June 14th and 15th and we flew away from the Mainland to our new home on the 23rd.

Since then we have been staying in a hotel and doing a lot of house-hunting . . . all the while hoping and praying that a particular, new housing community on-Post would be opened up for officers (there is a shortage of officer housing on-Post) as it was currently only for enlisted. Last week we were told that, yes, two streets would be opening to officers, but that there were still a bunch of people ahead of us on the waiting list, so we probably wouldn't be able to get into one of those houses and would have to wait and see if any more streets would be opened up for officers--but that it might not be until the beginning of August, if it happened at all. On Monday we found out that there were supposed to be 10 houses allotted--and we would have been called and offered one that day--but there were actually only 8 houses and they were going to have to get approval for the other 2 houses and that could take anywhere from two days to two weeks. So we waited. Wednesday evening we got a call saying that one of the families who had been offered one of the eight houses had found a house off-Post and turned down the on-Post house, so if we wanted it, it was ours! We went in on Thursday morning to look at the house, and OH. MY. GOODNESS. It is GORGEOUS! The house is brand new, and so much bigger than we were expecting and it has a fenced yard (it's a small yard compared to what we are used to, but by Hawaiian standards, it is pretty big, so we are really happy about that as well). Even better though: we get to move in on Monday! No more hotels for awhile! YAY! Plus, our household goods should get here in two weeks or less, so we won't be without the rest of Peanut Butter Cup's stuff that we have been missing (e.g., his swing and jumper, ha ha).

So, that is what has been happening here. Getting the house in that particular housing community is such a huge blessing! I will post pictures later . . . .

Oh, and we bought a new 'Baby-Mobile', ha ha. It's a Hyundai Santa Fe and gets a lot better gas mileage than our xTerra did! :) Which is awesome in Hawaii because gas prices here are as ridiculous as ever.

Ooooo, and remember how excited I was about getting the freezer? Ha ha! Well, we just bought a washer and dryer and I am just as excited! I've never had a brand new washer and dryer before, so the thought of being the first person/family to wash and dry a load of laundry in them is pretty thrilling to me. :) Bear with me folks.

*Update on Peanut Butter Cup* The day that the movers came and picked up our stuff (June 15th) Peanut Butter Cup pushed himself up to an almost sitting position. The day after we arrived in Hawaii he cut his second tooth (the bottom left), and a few days later he was sitting up like it didn't take any effort at all and saying "ma-ma-ma-ma-ma-ma-ma" a LOT. A couple of days after that he pulled himself up in his playpen. Several days later I couldn't do anything to keep him from pulling himself up and now he isn't satisfied with sitting at all really. We think he will be walking by about 9 or 9 1/2 months . . . he is just past 8 months now, so we shall see. :) So, there have been many changes in the past month for my little Munchkin!

Well, I guess I'd better head to bed here in a few minutes. Hopefully it won't be quite as long before you hear from me again! I'm not sure how long it will take to get internet at our new house after we move in on Monday . . . it may not be for a couple of weeks, but hopefully it will be sooner. Hope you are all doing well! :)

And So Begins A New Phase. . .In Many Ways

Peanut Butter Cup cut his first tooth last Thursday! Finally. Ha ha! It's his lower right incisor. I first noticed it when he was chewing on my finger and something felt a bit 'sharp', then I looked and could just barely see the top of the tooth breaking through the top of his gums. It's strange to think he's going to have a visible tooth here soon . . . I'm so used to him being toothless, ha ha.

And because I haven't been doing very well with updating here lately, I have another HUGE milestone to announce: last Saturday afternoon (May 29th), my sweet, little, Peanut Butter Cup  started to tentatively (and rather unsteadily at that point) crawl. It all started when I had him in the playpen for a little while so that I could eat, then after that he was practicing on the bed (with supervision of course). While it has been exciting to see him getting more and more confident with it, I'll admit that I almost shed some tears initially at the thought of how 'big' my baby has gotten and how much more independent he is now (and how he is just going to continue getting more and more independent). *Sigh* Peanut Butter Cup is certainly excited about his newfound skills, and the past week and a half or so he has been pretty determined to learn how to sit up on his own (I think that may take a little while longer yet before he gets that down, *phew*).

On another note, my husband graduated the week before last! Hurray!! He is officially a pilot in the U.S. Army now! The past year and a half hasn't been an easy road and he worked so hard to earn his wings, I'm so proud of him for all he has accomplished and learned. The graduation was pretty exciting; I was given the opportunity to pin his wings which was pretty neat!

After the graduation there was a mandatory banquet for all of the newly pinned pilots and their spouses. It actually turned out to be a kind of 'spouse-appreciation' mini ceremony where all of the new pilots pinned their spouses with miniature copies of their own wings and gave us honorary diplomas for all we've done to support them throughout Flight School. That was pretty cool.

Rough Night. . . .

Last night was a rather rough night for all of us sleep-wise. It all started when Peanut Butter Cup would fall asleep in my arms, but then would wake up and start crying every time I'd put him down in his crib. I tried rubbing his back, singing to him, turning on one of the baby toys attached to his crib. . .nothing that usually works was working last night. He would just cry and cry and hold up his arms for me to pick him up. After the first three failed attempts I started to wonder if maybe he is either going through a growth spurt or is begin to seriously teethe (I'm still not any more enlightened as to the cause for his fussiness as of this morning). In the hopes that something would work I decided to give him a couple of homeopathic teething tablets to see if they would help. . .interestingly enough, it was after that when he fell asleep and stayed asleep when I put him down again.

Except for one nearly three hour stretch, he did the same thing as the night before and woke up once each hour, which made for very little sleep for all of us. Because he's been waking up so frequently the past couple of nights we are really wondering if he is going through a growth spurt. Though he seems to be on the verge of separation anxiety currently -- does that manifest itself at night as well, or is that usually just something that occurs during the day when he is with new people? I'm not sure, so if anyone has any thoughts, please feel free to share. :-)

With the upcoming move I keep wondering how we are going to swing not having his crib for an unknown amount of time. Co-sleeping is out of the question for us (though nights like last night definitely make it tempting!). We were thinking of him possibly sleeping in his playpen because I know a lot of other couples have done that, but the problem is that he doesn't associate his playpen with sleep at all, and doesn't usually want to stay in it for very long. :-/ So, I'm a bit concerned about how that would work. Any ideas?

One Week Down...Three to Go!

Of the last phase of my husband's school that is.... I'm so excited about him being done and us (hopefully) being able to spend more time together as a family without the stress of him constantly needing to study. Not to mention the fact that sometime soon after that we will be moving! We are so ready to leave this place though we still don't have an exact date yet of when we will be leaving. I'm not sure how much longer after graduation we will be hanging around here to get things done around the house to prepare it for being rented out. Hopefully we will be able to get a lot done in the two weeks between classes ending and graduation so that we won't have to be here much longer afterward. I need a change of scenery.

There is still so much left to do before we move however. For example: sell the xTerra, find homes for the cats (Panda = YAY! Penny = :'( ), find someone to watch Quigley (our Australian Cattle Dog/Blue Heeler) for a couple of months until his FAVN bloodtest comes back negative and then stick him on a plane bound for Hawaii, find a place to board my horse for the next 3 or so years (I'm sad that I have to leave him for so long, but there is no way I can afford to have him shipped to and from Hawaii and he's such a good horse -- albeit untrained currently -- that we aren't really willing to part with him) -- and then drive him to wherever that may be, replace the carpet in the house, and find a property manager for the house. I'm sure there are many other things to be done in the next five or six weeks, but those are the highest on my priority list right now. I know that everything will come about in God's timing, I just can't wait until all of the animals are accounted for (they are my main concern).

On a totally different topic...one of my cousins had her second baby today -- a BEAUTIFUL baby boy! I'm so thrilled for them! They already have a little girl and she'd told me before that looking at pictures of Peanut Butter Cup was making her excited about having a boy. :-) I think being on the mom side of things now makes me more thrilled when I hear about someone else having a baby than it ever did before...maybe that is because now I understand and know how much love a parent has for their child and how amazing the whole experience of being a parent is. Babies and children are such a blessing! I'm so excited for my cousin, her family, and the new addition -- I can't even put into words how happy I am for them!

Speaking of precious baby boys...my little Peanut Butter Cup is still teething with no sign of the 'toofers' (ha ha) yet. Since I've never experienced a teething baby before I'm not sure if this means anything as to how much longer it will be before a tooth emerges, but for the past few days he has been pulling in his lower lip over his lower gums and just holding it there. Also, if I try to gently push his lip down so I can see the gums, he will pull his lip in like I just described and squeeze his mouth shut (it's so cute when he does it). If he decides that he wants my finger in his mouth though, in it goes. Yesterday he had my hand and he tried each of my fingers one by one -- starting with my pinkie and working his way towards my thumb. :-) He would put one finger in his mouth for a couple seconds, pull it out, look at it, grab the next finger, look at it, put it in his mouth, and so on and so forth. It was too funny! He was concentrating so hard. :-)

Well, I guess I'd better go try to get some sleep before Peanut Butter Cup wakes up. Goodnight everyone!