Top 2 Tuesday- Splurges

 

This weeks topic for Top 2 Tuesday hosted by Taylor over at The Undomestic Momma is Splurges.

Here are mine:

1. ANYTHING for Ethan. My husband says I have a problem buying baby stuff. Its true I do. Clothes, toys, food (ha!) really pretty much anything for him. Currently it is stuff for his 1st birthday party. 

2. This is more of an "us" splurge. But our boat. We got it together right before Scott proposed (June 2008) and in general everything about having a boat is expensive-- maintenance, gas, wakeboard and tubing supplies, etc, etc. We love it though!

Here are some pictures of my 2 favorite splurges together this past weekend: 

If it looks like the pictures are on land not water it's because they are. Scott was washing the boat and E and I were playing in his baby pool when he decided he wanted to help.

Other splurges that almost made the list:
3. My SUV (Volvo XC90) -- love it!
4. Getting my hair done- my dad has always said I am paying my hair stylists' kids college education.
5. Target -- all of it in general
6. Comforters and sheets-- I just love the way it can change the look of a whole room!

What are your favorite splurges? Link up over at The Undomestic Momma!

Top 2 Tuesday- Favorite Things About Summer!

So I have been wanting to join this blog link up for a while now and even though I am a day late I am going to do it anyway because I am looking forward to summer big time! This Top 2 Tuesday is Favorite Things About Summer!

Mine are...

1. Being out on the boat!! Last summer I was pregnant/had a new born so I did no boat trips! I am going to order Ethan a little life vest and I bet he will love to be on the water! And oh yea, since I am no longer with child I will definitely be enjoying some tubing!

2. Time with Ethan and his FIRST BIRTHDAY (and party) because during the summer, school will be out I will get to cut back my hours and spend more time doing fun things with this little ball of energy. His birthday party is SURE to be quite the extravaganza. I mean you only turn 1 once!! I am thinking of a sailboat theme with red navy light blue and white. But not totally decided yet. More to come on that!

What are your favorite things about summer? Head on over to Taylor's blog to link up! =)

First Trip to the Zoo! or not

I must have lost my mind...but I decided that today was a GREAT day to take my little man to the zoo. Now let's just clarify that he is 9 months old (tomorrow) and I know that he will not know or understand the concept. But he LOVES staring/chasing the dog so I assumed that an elephant or a monkey would be triple as cool. So, I call up my friend Katie (who is still on maternity leave) and since I am on spring break (oh the joys of working for the school system) and see if her and baby Chase would like to join me on this adventure. She says of course because she would love to get out of the house, walk around and let the baby see the outside world. So off we go.. mind you it is about an hour and a half drive.. but the kids did awesome! They both napped and we chatted and we were like oh this is going to be so easy right!?

WRONG.

We get there 30 minutes after the zoo opens because of all the traffic from the Cherry Blossom festival.. and all parking lots are FULL and there are people with small children walking in front of cars without looking everywhere. At this point baby Chase is hungry and starts to cry and Ethan looks at him and tries to talk to him and even threw gave him a toy. So w are pretty desperate and we look for spots to parallel or a garage and there are nothing within a 10 block radius. Ethan is now upset because his friend is so upset. I make Chase a bottle and feed it to him from the front seat and I give Ethan a sippy cup. This keeps them content for about 15 minutes. In the mean time we decide we are just going to go get some lunch and walk around a bit so we can at least get something out of the trip. Which we finally do another 30 minutes later with highly pissed upset kids. That 45 minute drive through DC  (after the 1.5 hours it took to get there) where many people honked at us, we almost hit a few pedestrians, our children screamed, and we didn't even get to go to the zoo took a few years off my life

Alls well that ends well. Katie and I had yummy crab cakes for lunch and I got a new shirt from Ann Taylor Loft and Ethan enjoyed riding in his stroller outside and people watching.. which was close enough to a zoo within itself.

Snow (again) and a list.

So we are currently in the midst of a blizzard.. or Snowpocalypse 2010 as they are calling it. Apparently, we could have over 2 feet by the time its over.. or more considering there was already snow on the ground that hadn't melted yet.

This is Maryland not Alaska.. and I need to move back to South Carolina STAT.

Since all this snow is damaging my brain.. this blog will have to be in list form.

1. E has an ear infection from teething.. poor baby.
2. I have a sinus infection from working with snotty kids all day.. poor momma.
3. Where is spring/summer? I want to break out my fav J.Crew shorts (yellow with navy anchors, duh) and the sundresses. Mostly because I was prego all last spring/most of summer so I miss those clothes  as maternity clothes are just not quite as cute!
4. My 2 boys are currently napping together and I love seeing them together sleeping or playing - I am truly blessed to have such an amazing husband and father to my baby boy.
5. Speaking of prego and baby boys. I have baby fever lately. and I am not too sure why. Scott and I always wanted to have our kids close together (by close i mean 2 or 3 years.. not 9 months) so it might just be something we are putting on our radar for this fall.
6. We will not be having more children until our house situation progresses some more. Hard to build a house with 3 feet of snow on the ground.. UGH.
7. I love spaghetti!
8. I miss Clemson and all my girlfriends in the south! Shout out to you bitches! Love you all!
9. My dog is hilarious in all of this snow. -- pictures to follow for sure.
10. This might have been the most random post ever.

2009 = blur

2009 was a huge blur for me!

In picture form it went like this:

Married and a beautiful baby boy all in one year -- and I could not be more happier!

I don't think 2010 can top this year!

True Life: Sometimes I am a bad blogger..

Well, well, well bloggy world, long time no see! No worries all is well here in the Tennyson household. and by the way Happy Thanksgiving and Merry Christmas! I have much enjoyed catching up with everyone over my holiday break.

You see what happened was- that part time..flexible hours job I wrote about over a month here on this very blog has turned into a full time (often overtime) I still LOVE but it takes up much more of my time then originally anticipated which means much less time for family, friends and blogging. I cannot complain though because I am lucky to have a extremely supportive husband, a great daycare provider for the love of my life (baby Ethan - who is now almost 6 months old!!!!) and a job that I am excited to go to daily-- and let's be real in this economy that is a huge accomplishment.

Anyway this semester is over for me and while next semester I may or may not be taking 3 classes (wtf I am thinking?!?!)  I am announcing my official bloggy return!  Look forward to posts on the holidays (obviously), updates on baby Ethan (obviously again), thoughts on my new car!, job related shenanigans, and so much more!!!

oh blog I missed you!

Back to work..

So last week was like a whirl wind.. but I have a new job that I LOVE.  I will be working with children that have autism. And it is pretty close to my dream job right now. I get to help children AND it is only part-time so I still get to spend plenty of time with my baby boy.

Today will be the first day that he goes to day care! I am nervous but only a little because Scott's best friend's Mom will be doing his daycare. She also watched Scott when he was little so he grew up with her son, Vince. Vince and Scott are still best friends and he was Scott's best man and Scott was his best man. Vince and his wife are expecting a baby boy in March so hopefully they will get to grow up together and be just as close!

The worst part about this whole thing is that on days like today I will drop him off at 12:30 and I won't see him until 8 because Scott will pick him up and I will go straight from work to class. Luckily my schedule every week won't be exactly the same so hopefully I will be able to avoid days like today.

Wish me luck!!

October!!

October brings lots of exciting things this year!! (and most years!)
In honor of one of my favorite months I have Halloweened out my blog! What do you think??

Things I LOVE about this month:

• My Birthday (10/10 easy to remember so don't forget!)
• My mom and both of my sister-in-laws birthdays
• My baby boy will be 3 months old! -- thats 1/4 of a year!
• More Clemson and Giants football

Which brings me to something really exciting!! The day after tomorrow many of my favorite girls from Clemson will be in Maryland for the Clemson vs MD game and mucho tailgating and catching up and I CANNOT WAIT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! eeeeeeeeeeeekkkk!

back to my list..

• Cool fall air and the clothing it brings (sweaters and boots!)
• Ethan's first Halloween!!!!
  

Which brings me to something else! I cannot for the life of my decide what he should be.. his first Halloween is a big deal!! We were thinking maybe a dinosaur since we call him Stink-a-sorous. Any suggestions would be appreciated!

back to my list again..

• Candy Corn, Pumpkins, & Halloween decorations
• Heck, Halloween in general!

Ahhhhh, life is good. In other news..

A fab sorority sister of mine mentioned Thankful Thursdays in her blog.. and I love the idea especially in honor of fall.. so..

I am so THANKFUL that it looks like we will be in our brand new house that is OUR's by Christmas! Homeownership feels so good and we havent even finished signing on the dotted line yet!

What do you love about October/fall?

Back in the swing.. plus random thoughts

So we were on vacation for part of last week, the weekend and part of this week here..

Chincoteague Island, Virginia

Vacationing with a 2.5 month old about wore me and the hubby out.. but it was great to see the family and hang out with them. I have pretty much needed a vacation from vacation but we are getting back into the swing now.

We have a busy weekend ahead because one of Scott's best friends from childhood is getting married. Scott is one of the groomsmen so we will be attending the rehearsal and rehearsal dinner Friday as well as the wedding and reception on Saturday. Wedding season is almost over for us. I feel like we have been non stop at weddings since my best friend Amanda's in May of 2008. We don't have nearly as many on the agenda for 2010. Kinda happy kinda sad because I sure do love weddings.

We are switching from weddings to babies though (there have been a few along the way though.. including my favorite baby ever my Ethan!!) but one of my first friends in middle school Megan and her husband Aaron just had their baby Augie. And he is such a cutie!! I can't wait to catch up with her since we were pregnant for a lot of the time together.

We have more babies on the horizon because we will be welcoming 4 more before March. I can just not wait to meet Kylie Brianne (our first blood related niece!) As well as Jackson Colt, Landon William, and Blake Vincent!

As much as I love weddings I love babies even more and I can't wait to meet all these cuties and for Ethan to have even more playmates!

This post just went in a clearly different direction than I intended.. maybe I'm not back into the swing after all.. ha!

Daggers

So my dear husband and I have a system when it comes to getting up with the baby at night.

Before 4am: Me
After 4am: Him

Now some might think this is unfair since I have way more hours to cover. However he works and I don't. So thats a fair trade off in my book. Plus if it is after 4 he can feed him, change him, and put him back to bed.. then shower and go to work.. which allows me to get a few more hours of sleep.

This morning:

5am- Ethan wakes up-- Scott gets up
5-5:45- Ethan randomly screaming bloody murder
5:45- Jen gets up to see if she can help
5:46- S: can I help you?
J: just wanted to see if I could help?
S: I dont need help he is fine
E: *deafening screaming*
J: did you change his diaper? (seems obvious but often that is last on my sweet husbands list)
S: I said I don't need help
5:47- J turns around and walks back to the bed and puts pillow over her head
6- J hears S put E in crib. and thinks. He must be back to sleep
6:01- J hears E on baby monitor crying.. and shower running
6:02- J gets up and gets baby E

Nope he didn't need help at all.

Cue texting:
J: what was the deal with your big attitude this morning?
S: I was defending myself from the daggers you were shooting through my head with your eyes and body language
J: I didnt know that was possible.. sometimes we all need a little help with the baby, dear
S: There were definetely daggers. PS can you make sure the dog has food?

He sure does know how to change the subject.

Men.

Burritos, Nipples, and Running

So yesterday I ventured out to get a few things.. cereal nipples for my little one and new running shoes were on the top of my list..

as was having lunch with my mom here:


But shhhh don't tell my loving husband because he gets mad everytime I eat there with out him..


Which brings me to my next point.. my little man (who is almost 2 months ahh!) eats like a horse/pig/gorilla.. any of the above work.. so his pediatrician has suggested we add rice cereal to his formula.. we tried this before and this results were not pretty. I will spare you the details. However we have since added a new bottle to our collection (mostly because Ethan is not at all picky when it comes to eating and because I liked them) BUT they don't make nipples for thicker liquids (such as rice cereal added to formula) so I bought fast flow ones and I am going to make the hole bigger myself.. please pray that this does not lead to me spilling formula all over my child or him turning into the fat kid at school in a few years


Wow my life is so exciting..


anyway.. If you have read this far you should also know that my doctor cleared me to return to normal activity after my horrible delivery c-section. So I decided it was time for me to shed the rest of this baby weight and the extra weight I had before getting pregnant and get back into my running routine. So I bought some new running shoes because my old ones don't fit quite right after having a baby.. people said my feet would grow at least 1/2 a size. They were wrong they are still the same size I just think they are a tad wider so my narrow nike shox were not working for me. Back in the day I didn't sweat when I spent over $100 dollars on running shoes.. however now with the 3 B's.. Bills, Baby, and Building a new house (not to be confused with the 5 B's of recruitment all my fellow sorostitutes -- Bibles, Boys, Booze, Bucks, Brands) I was on the search for yet another "B" a bargain..


3 stores later and just over $40 dollars later I came home with some black/pink/gray/white Sauconys. They are way comfy and equally as cute as my other much more expensive shoes.


How did my run go you ask?


I ran a mile. ONE mile. and I thought I was going to die. So did my running partner, my pup Jackson.

Happy One Month!

Yesterday was Ethan's One Month Birthday!!! and today we had his one month check up at his doctor and he did so well! I think I was more upset about him getting his vaccination than he was!
We took pictures with Jackson and with Ethan's big lion stuffed animal so we can compare his size every month and see how he has grown!

So little baby boy.. What are you up to now that you are one whole month old!?

• You weigh 11 pounds and 7 ounces
• You are 23 and 1/4 inches long
• You wear size one diapers
• You wear size newborn but more and more of your 0-3 month outfits are starting to fit!
• You love your pacifier
• You also love your swing
• You love looking at yourself in the mirror on your swing, tummy time mat, and in the car
• You have crazy arms and legs and your grandpa says that because your exercising your little muscles so you can be an awesome athlete!
• He is probably right.. because you are SO strong! you hold your head up and sometimes you try to stand up on Mommy or Daddy when we are holding you!
• Mommy and Daddy have lots of nicknames for you including: Baby Boy, Stink-a-sorous, Curious Ethan, and Savage (daddy's favorite)
• You are starting to like bath time
• Everyone says you look just like Daddy!
• You have a lot of his mannerisms too -- like sneezing lots of times in a row and sleeping with your arms above your head.
• Dr. Sheth says you are very healthy and right on your developmental marks =)
  

Time is flying! When I was pregnant I never thought he would get here and now that he is here it is going soo fast. I'm loving every minute of it!

I'm a mom!

WOW that is weird to say. But I have to be honest-- it is the single most amazing job in the entire world and I wouldn't trade it for anything. All it took was Ethan to look up at me with his big blue eyes one time.. and I knew my life was changed forever. But in true Jen style we couldn't possibly bring a child into the world without some sort of commotion. So I give you my birth story:

Disclaimer: This is going to be long and probably confusing. But it was long and confusing. And stressful and scary among many other emotions.

Disclaimer 2: There will probably be some parts of this that are TMI.. but hey no one is forcing you to read it!

July 1, 2009: Due Date. I went to the doctor and I was about 2.5 cm, she stripped my membranes and told me there was no way that I would make it to my 41 week appt and she would probably see me the following day in Labor and Delviery (L&D) as she was on call. I was so excited that the end was in sight! I took a long walk with my mom and pup that afternoon and got excited to meet my baby boy. I was having contractions but I wasnt really timing them because I could tell they werent close enough together or intense enough to be the real deal.

July 2, 2009: Scott decided to stay home from work because I told him I wasn't feeling good.. I had had a headache since about 2am that was just not going away even with lots of tylenol. Around 10 my vision started to get blurry so I called my Dr and around 11am and she said head to L&D to get my blood pressure checked. So we went to Subway for lunch and headed that way.. I was not trying to eat nasty hospital food as my last meal before labor if they decided to keep me at the hospital. Walking out of Subway I was just not feeling good at all.. still contracting but again not regular and I mean they hurt but I could still talk through them. When we got to L&D and they asked if i was contracting and I said I was so they decided to hook me up to the monitors while they checked my blood pressure. I apparently have a high pain because my contractions were alot more intense and alot more regular than I thought. Oops. Anyway they checked my blood pressure which was a little high so they told me to wait and see what my doctor said. My doctor came in and checked me and I was 4cm! I was shocked. She told me that because of the headache and blurry vision and my contractions I could stay if I wanted and have the baby. She explained that I would need the help of pitcoin probably unless I wanted to change the name of Labor and Delivery to Labor All Day. haha. I was fine with the pitocin especially since I didnt even realize how strong my contractions were. I was bascially to excited for words that they were gonna let me stay and have my baby!! So I sent Scott to get my stuff and got comfortable. The doctor broke my water at around 3pm. I labored on my own (with the pitocin) until I was 7cm then I decided to go ahead and get the epidural because I was in pain now and the anesthesiologist was already there doing 2 other ones. This was around 10pm. The epi went way smoother than I expected. I was really nervous about it because needles and tubes in the spine are just not my thing.

Super long story cut short I basically just not progressing fast enough.. my water had been broken and I had been laboring for a while at this point. They were upping my dose of pitcoin but everytime they upped it Ethan's little heart would spike with one contraction and drop with the next and so on and so on. This caused my husband to park himself in front of the heartrate monitor and study it. Everytime his heart rate dropped below 100 (read: every few minutes when I had a contraction) and alarm would go off. There were so many other people in labor though that no one would come turn it off. So that became Scott's job because I could not take the crazy beeping in my ear. So he would watch for the heart rate to go back up and turn it off. And on top of it all my nurse told me I wasn't making fast enough progress. They thought he was laying on the cord and that when I would have a contraction since my uterus got smaller his heart rate would jump either up or down. So they turned off the pitocin and pumped me back up with fluids and did an internal montior on his heart rate through his little scalp and my contractions on my uterus.. At this point I had so many tubes coming out of me. I had mulpitle IV bags.. multiple tubes coming out of the bird and an oxygen mask on to try to get more oxygen to Ethan (This was at about 2am) Basically my doctor and the nurses were trying to just get him past this crazy heart rate business and me over the 7cm hump so I could make some progress quick and get him out. Well after the doctor got me all hooked up to these crazy tubes and upped the pitocin again his heart rate suddenly dropped to the 40s. And the alarm went extra crazy this time and I thought we were under nuclear attack. I was so worried/scared/nervous. All I remember is the words C SECTION STAT come out of my doctors mouth and it then looked like an episode of Grey's Anatomy with doctors and nurses running and coming out of the wood work.

His heart rate came back up (thank god) before I even got to the OR but they weren't taking any chances at that point.. and I was so scared and everything was happeneing so fast I didn't know what to do but lay there and take it. They hurried my mom and MIL out of the room and got DH all scrubbed up. They were hooking me up to stuff and unhooking me up from stuff. They wheeled me away within 5 minutes of the doctor saying C Section. And it was just a crazy whirl wind after that -- all I can say is it happened FAST. The c-section hurt.. hurt ALOT. When they say pressure and tugging that is the understatement of the century. And I got the shakes from them upping my epidural. Shaking uncontrollablly is just no good for business.

I guess I just had NO IDEA what to expect with regards to the c section because no one had ever even mentioned to me the possiblity of having one (all I heard was the chance was so low because I had such a healthy pregnancy and I was so young and healthy) I was just and trying to keep myself together. In every book I read I skipped all the C-Section parts. Scott was great in the OR trying to keep my calm or I would have gone absolutely crazy. He told me how great I was doing. All in all it was the quickest and scariest process ever. One second I was laying there watching his heart rate monitor and the next I was getting cut open.

BUT...

Ethan Scott Tennyson made his arrival on July 3, 2009 at 3:21am He was 9 lbs 0oz and 22 inches long. I got to see him for about 15 seconds and they told me he was healthy wisked him away to the nursery. Scott did get to cut the cord though and he stayed with me while they got me closed up and then went to see him at the nursery. I had to go to the recovery room for an hour by myself where I got really naseous and threw up. Which is easier said than done when you cant even barely lift your head from all the drugs they had given me. But I figure I got sick probably because I was worried sick about my baby boy. Turns out he was healthy as can be.

I finally got to my post partum room at about 5am and Scott was allowed back and they brought me my baby. He was so perfect!

We spent the next 2 days in the hospital having visitors and snuggling! I am more in love with him than I ever thought I would be. We got to come home Sunday July 5 in the afternoon and I have been in ALOT of pain. But it is worth it to have him here and healthy.