How Old Are You Now?

If you ask Adelaide how old Daddy is she will tell you 43, but really he turned 33 this year.  Last year on Grant's birthday he spent an entire night after work sitting in the daycare parking lot waiting for tow trucks because his battery decided to die in his car.  He has such a miserable day that we tried to make up for it this year.  Not sure how much more we could have done for him, because this year wasn't just a birth DAY, it was more like a birth WEEK.

-Blacky and Lindsey were in town - yay - two of our favorite people.

-Oreo Birthday "tate" (cake), because everyone must have one

-Mini pizza party at home including a homemade birthday hat

-A night of beer and bowling

-UT football in the swamp

-Birthday lunch at our favorite whole in the wall fried chicken place in Jax.

-Karate lessons as a birthday gift.

-Golf gift certificate

-Golf

-Tickets to the Masters

-Learned to cook prime rib 

Not a bad few days in the world of Grant.

Doesn't everyone need a birthday hat?

What a cool dad

G doesn't like cake, so we went with his favorite ice cream instead.

Kari also made the trip for the birthday fun.

Nice socks Blacky

One too many beers and things get creative.

Sweet Sisters

What have these sweet sisters been up to in the last few weeks?  

Penelope is smiling and laughing all of the time, when we need to get her to calm down we try to position her so that she can see the fan which of course is the funniest thing in her little world.  Adelaide had a doctors appointment last week and while we were there P was put on the scale and weighed in around 12.5 pounds with her clothes on.  She is turning into our not so little girl.  P is still not sleeping much during the day as her sister doesn't have an inside voice.  At night we are lucky to say she is sleeping about 7 hours straight, gets up to eat and a diaper change and then back to sleep for another 3 hours.  On the nights when she doesn't wake up around 4 I am up watching the clock and waiting.

Adelaide is still my little helper girl and will jump up as soon as P starts yelling for a pacifier.  She loves her little sister and always wants to hold P.

A helping Mommy while wearing pearls.

Yep, A is always touching Bumbo baby.

A still fits in the baby seat - crazy.

Getting into shape.

Good morning sisters.

A wanted P to play in her bed when she woke up.

Sister is too big, get her off of me.

Fall IS Football

Here in Florida we don't get the feeling of Fall being in the air due to the crisp air and changing leaves.  We get the feeling that Fall has finally come when the football excitement turns into a lot of screaming and inevitably disappointment.  That's right, we are die hard fans of two not so stellar teams this year, but that is ok because my girls look good in orange and teal/black is easy to come by.

This is the first time in 8 years that I have not made the trip to the Swamp when the Vols come into town.  I have officially retired from sweating to death, getting harassed and walking with my head down on the way back to the car.  Of course this was the year that I didn't go and the weather was not sweltering, I really thought that the Vols had a chance to win.  Didn't happen nor do I have photos of Grant and Blacky at the game because yet again they were too cool to take photos.  The general consensus is that Matt Blacky should be banned from entering any state in which the Vols play an away game, because he may be the official jinx to the team.

The Jags are also not playing the way we wish that they would, but Adelaide doesn't seem to mind.  She sits in "her" season ticket seat and yells at the players to "RUN RUN RUN RUN RUN".  Penelope hasn't made an appearance at EverBank Field yet, but soon she will be there cheering with her big sister.

Zoobilee!!

The Jacksonville Zoo holds many fundraisers throughout the year and this year we were able to participate in the September Zoobilee.  This is an after hours family event with bounce houses, food, drinks, games with prizes, and so much more.

Adelaide had a fantastic time checking out the giraffes, petting a snake, playing in the bounce houses, eating different foods from all of the vendors, riding the zebra on the carousel again and again and again, and so much more.  We loved this family event and hope to go again next year.

Not real interested in the baby owl.

Petting the stingrays.

We were supposed to feed the giraffes, but they were more interested in feeding themselves.

Who was having a better time...

My brave girl and the snake - yuck.

Again, again, again!

One family and two hippo shirts.

My daughter is a trader, she loves the gator.

Cantaloupe

Note to self - When a doctor tells you that something is impressive and it's not weight loss, the thing he is talking about is not usually a good thing.

A few weeks ago I went to my ob/gyn for a routine 6 week post partum check up.  I had been there 4 weeks earlier, everything was ok and I was sent on my merry way.  In the four weeks between visits I had noticed that my weight loss was extremely different from my first pregnancy.  When I had Adelaide my stomach almost immediately deflated so to speak.  After a few weeks of complaining that I still looked pregnant after P and feeling something hard in my stomach everyone kept telling me that there was nothing to worry about and the second baby is harder on the body.

We are now at my 6 week visit, I expect the doc to send me on my merry way again, but this checkup was a little different.  When the doctor was checking my uterus size he discovered what he thought was an enlarged uterus, after an ultrasound he found that his original thought wasn't the case.  Yet another doctor visit where I am alone and I get bad news that I only catch half of the information because my mind and ears have gone into shock.  These are the words I remember hearing...cyst the size of cantaloupe, impressive, left ovary, don't know if it's cancer yet, will need surgery, may have to remove the left ovary.

Of course it's now 11:30, I need to pick A up from school at noon, I forgot my cell phone at home and I really need to tell someone about this.  So I had to call Grant from the doctors office to ask him to come home without having a break down in the middle of the docs office.  I managed not to cry at home while A was awake because it would have sent her into a tailspin.

Long story short, I had to wait a week and a half for a follow up exam and during that time thank heavens the cyst ruptured on it's own and I did not have surgery.  The whole event did make me scared and appreciative for what I have.  I've spent the last three years worrying about A's health and never did it occur to me that eventually I might have a health concern as well.

New School Time

Adelaide has been going to daycare full time since she was 13 weeks old.  We pulled her out of daycare when I stopped working in mid July which I thought would make everyone happy.  Apparently being very very pregnant and then caring for a new baby didn't give Adelaide all of the attention she was used to and as discussed in prior posts made bedtime pretty rough.  Neither Grant nor I intended on sending her to school while I am staying home for a few months, but it was obvious she needed more activities outside of the house. I called around to a bunch of different places and I didn't find anyone telling me what I wanted to hear until we discovered A's now "new cool (school)".

We took a tour of the school while they were still setting up the classroom and we happened to catch what is now A's new teacher.  I immediately went home, called Grant and the next day dropped off the registration check because the preschool was fabulous.  I'm pretty sure that I was more excited about A starting school than she was.  These are a few pics from our tour and before the classrooms were all set up.

School director and new teacher.

A loved Mrs. Wolfe immediately.

A was sold on the school after seeing just a little bit of the playground - priorities.

We had a few weeks before school was starting as they operate on the county school district calendar so we took the opportunity to order A her very first big girl backpack.  A didn't want to stop touching it from the moment it arrived on our doorstep.  In fact on her first day she spent half of the morning crying because she wouldn't put the bag down long enough for me to fill it with all of her essentials like a juice box and snack.  Needless to say we were the first ones in car line drop off that morning.

A was so excited about her new "packpack" that she would keep her eyes or hands off of it.

New school time!

Yep, that's A in the middle of line on her first day of preschool and she is a full head shorter than everyone else.

See yah Mom, don't need you anymore.

School has now been in session for a few weeks and A comes home with all kinds of fun projects.  She only goes two days a week and I'm amazed at how much they can cram into a few hours.  When I do head back to work it's going to be disappointing to leave behind this little gem of a school as they do not have hours anywhere close to a real daycare facility.

Teddy Bear Picnic day - Minnie got to visit the school too.

Week 3 was all about clown noses and you should have seen my surprise when she came out to the car with her face painted.

D for dinosaurs and Daddy.