Dentist and other stuff

I have been a blogging machine lately!

Today, Keira had her first dentist appointment. This place was amazing! It was recommended to us by a friend (thanks Jenny!) and Keira is already ready to go back. The waiting room had about 4 different video game consoles plus another play area. There is a fish tank once you get passed the waiting room that Keira loved because they had a "Nemo" fish in it. They took her picture and gave her a little certificate for this being her first trip. The dentist saw her and counted her teeth and she was totally fine with that. Once we went back to get her teeth actually cleaned, she was not such a fan - she didn't care for the flavor of the toothpaste, so that caused a little bit of a problem, but other than that, she did great! Well, she didn't care for the flouride either, but even the hygenist admitted that it tastes pretty gross. They had televisions above them when they lay down so they can watch cartoons while the are getting their teeth cleaned. After they were finished, Keira got a balloon, a bag full of goodies (toothbrush, paste, flosser, stickers, egg timer), a token to put in the machine to get a toy, and ice cream! Seriously, how can kids NOT like this place? Maybe I wouldn't hate the dentist so much if they were like this when I was a kid. If you live in Kansas, you should be taking your kids to Jenkins and LeBlanc!

On to other things ... weather is beautiful, should be a great weekend for grilling and maybe even some pool time!

A week from today is our next ultrasound. I'd like to say I'm exited, but I think anxious is probably a better term for it. It is going to be a long week. But had lots of movement this morning from the little bean, so it seems like someone is listening and trying to calm those fears.

Last Random pics from the trip

So here are the last of the pics from vacation. Pics from the pool, the beach and the pier at Santa Monica.

Sad because the ride was over.

She loved these cars!


Wade and I at the beach watching Grandma and Papa chase Keira around the beach. Good times!

Building sandcastles with Daddy.

Come on, everybody, let's go!

With Grandma and Papa on Ocean Ave.

She had lots of fun with the shower at the pool.

As always, lots of fun at the pool.

Garden

So I am totally digging going into the back yard and bringing back stuff we can eat! I mean seriously, how cool is that?!? You can see the strawberries above - that was the first batch, we've gotten two more since then that were about twice that size. I'm thinking strawberry milkshakes tonight with the ice cream that is on sale at Price Chopper!

My lettuce is doing excellent as well - see below. I trimmed off what you see in the bowl for dinner tonight - it's a mixture of lettuce and spinach. I think I probably got a little carried away with how much I planted, so we'll be eating a lot of salad. But that is ok because I am totally addicted to salad right now - spinach leaves, craisins, mandarin oranges, almonds, and poppyseed dressing - yummy! It's been my lunch for quite some time now!

Sadly, the watermelon is not going to make it and the cantaloupe is questionable. Something ate the entire leaves off the watermelon and they didn't grow back, so I think those are done. The cantaloupe look like they are dying, so I am disappointed about that. But everything else looks good so far, I think next we'll probably have radishes.

My Princess

Dress up seems to be the favorite game to play lately!

We're back - Part 2

For the 2nd part of our trip, we left Keira with Mom and Mark and headed to Vegas! It was so relaxing. I know that isn't probably what you expect to hear as a description of Vegas, but we spent 12 plus hours by the pool, so it was great. Better had I been able to enjoy some frozen adult beverages while laying by said pool, but great nonetheless. As you can see, Wade enjoyed himself!

We stayed at the Flamingo, which I love because it's center strip, the pool area is nice, and it's still pretty cheap - all my prerequisites for vegas. We went and saw O at Bellagio. Wade had never been to a Cirque du Soleil show, so I really wanted him to see one. It did not disappoint, though I still think of all the ones I have seen, Mystere is my favorite. We stopped at Margaritaville for some soveniours. Sadly, Jimmy was performing in Vegas about a week ago, I can't believe we missed him by that much!

Can you believe that they put THIS in our room!!!! Seriously, have they not met me? Do they not know that the sprays hit me right in the face and cannot be adjusted down? What were they thinking? Wade said it made a nice hand washer!

We also made it out to the Fabulous Las Vegas sign! One of those things you always see pictures of, but never do! I was pretty happy about the photo op!

We, of course, made our "donation" to the casinos, some of us more than others, but I won't tell who! Though I will say I ended day 2 up by $20! That was pretty exciting ... ha! We played these roulette computers that I thought were pretty cool - basically it was roulette, but you bet on your own on a computer screen and then they had the normal set-up in the center with the wheel and the ball. Wade did quite well on this ... just don't ask him about the black jack tables ;) We went over to O'Sheas for a bit and they were playing Beer Pong there - hilarious!

A great time was had by all! I'll post a few more pics tomorrow from the pool and beach!

We're back - part 1

Well, we are back - tired and sick of doing laundry already, but back! We had an excellent trip. I really can't pick a favorite part as everything was extremely enjoyable. The first part of the trip was spent at Disneyland. Keira did great! She had no problem waiting in line this time, which was quite a relief! Lines weren't really too bad until about 3:00, but Keira conked out at about 3:30, so that was good. Our first stop at disney was the Bibbidi Bobbidi Boutique. This is a little salon where the dress the girls up as princesses. Keira wasn't so sure about it at first, but by the end she insisted that all day she be referred to as Princess Keira.

Getting her hair and nails done by the Fairy Godmothers in Training

Not a huge fan of eye makeup!

Loved the lipstick!

The finished Princess!

Keira loved meeting the characters as well. It is hard to say which was her favorite, but I think Cinderella probably took the prize with Minnie a close second!

Here is Keira waiting in line for the Dumbo ride. She did really really well this time with waiting in line. No melt downs at all, even after we waited an hour to see the princesses!

She really liked the Dumbo ride!

Here she is on the teacups ... I think she rode these 4 or 5 times, this were definitely her favorite!

Well, that is it for part 1! I'll post some more later - I've got beach and pool pictures to come!

Gardening and more

As Keira is showing you, we picked the first strawberry out of our garden today. She was really excited about it and none too pleased when she couldn't pick ALL of them. Only two were ripe. The strawberry was super sweet - reminded me exactly of my grandparents garden. The rest of the garden is going ok. I don't think the cantaloupe and watermelon are going to make it though - the leaves have some serious issues. Everything else looks pretty good. Onions and carrots are a bit shaky, but we'll see how they do.



Had a 15 week appt. this week. No ultrasound, just heart rate, pee in the cup, etc. Everything sounded good. Baby was super active and heart rate was in the 140s. If doc had to guess, she would guess boy, but we'll see. Next appointment is June 5th - which is the big ultrasound, I'll be 18 weeks then, that is the appointment we've been holding our breath about since we got pregnant.



Weather had been kinda loony. Hot and humid one day, high of 65 and beautiful the next. At the moment it looks like we are going to have the thunderstorm from H E double hockey sticks. Which is not good as I prepared shish-ka-bobs to grill for dinner tonight. Hmm, wonder if they can be broiled.



We are getting ready for our trip on tuesday. I think everyone in the house is excited. We'll be hitting Disneyland on Wednesday. I made Keira an appointment at the Bibbidi Bobbiti Boutique. This is a little salon where Keira will get to chose what princess she wants to be and then they will do her hair, make-up, nails, put her in a costume (that she gets to keep) with shoes, a wand, etc. I will freely admit that it is obscenely expensive, but I think it will be tons of fun for Keira, especially b/c she is totally into the princesses right now. Thursday, Wade and are leaving K with M&M and going to Las Vegas for a few days. Will be staying at the Flamingo - they have the best pool area, which is what I am most looking forward to. We are going to see a show while we are there too - One of the Cirque de Soleil ones - probably O as I haven't seen that one yet.


Guess that is all I've got. No big plans for the weekend - get packed and get the house and yard in order. Fun stuff. Have a good weekend!

Mother's Day

Thanks to a wonderful husband and a great daugher, I had a wonderful Mother's day. Keira thought I would enjoy donuts for breakfast and insisted that Daddy go get some. So we had donuts for breakfast and then went to church and lunch. Then I was given the afternoon off and went and got a mani/pedi and did some shopping while Wade took care of Keira and cleaned up the house. Then we all went out to dinner for some mexican food - yummy! A great day!

The Garden is in!

So our garden is finally planted. I'd say it wasn't too much work, but Wade did a lot of it since I am still on light duty. He dug the holes and I filled them in, pretty good team work. Here is what we planted: Peas, Onions, Cucumbers, Tomatoes, Carrots, Spinach, Lettuce, Green Peppers, Jalapenos, cantaloupe, and watermelon. The cantaloupe and water melon were sorta thrown in at the end as we had a bunch of extra space that I didn't plan on. If even half of this stuff comes up, I will be surprised and happy! Here is what it looks like at the moment. And just a note, we were at the beginnings of a massive weed problem as there was all kinds of junk in this bed last year, that's why you see the black paper and mulch - we're hoping that helps. As a bonus, one of the books I read said that that also helps keep the soil warmer which is great for a lot of the plants. Keira didn't help much planting as she was distracted by her swingset, but she LOVES to water - so that should help keep her busy this summer.

Here are the Tomatoes and Green Peppers; we bought these as plants. The watermelon and cantaloupe are to the right.

There are 4 rows here: Onions, Spinach, Carrots, and Lettuce. These were all planted as seeds and are all starting to sprout!

These are peas and cucumbers that we started inside. Behind the trellis are the jalapenos. Wade plans to make some salsa!

Baby Pool

We got the baby pool out this week! Hooray! I think it was thursday. The weather was pretty warm and we were bored, so I thought, what the heck! Keira had a blast as usual. She is most definitely a water child. She decided that she needed my watering can in the pool with her - mostly to try to drink out of - yum! Here are some pics.

It feels good to be back in the game!

So I finally made my way back to CVS and Wags today and it was FUN! At CVS, I got FREE deoderant (Addidas deal w/ coupon) and super cheap cereal (3 boxes of Frosted Mini Wheats [Keira's new fav], had bogo coupon and $1 off coupon, plus $5 ECBs back = $0.22 per box!). At Wags, I got FREE toothpaste and cheap deodorant! Plus $0.99 cheese at HyVee. All this saving is totally needed as it seems the rest of the weekend all we did was spend money. Needed mulch for the yard, bought a new patio set the deck upstairs (which we'll be buying sealant for next weekend), a couple of things for the garden - but those were cheap, went out to dinner and lunch, hmm, I need to stop talking about this! Wade is currently upstairs putting the table together. And his good news is that he doesn't have swine flu! I've been freaked about it since he was in Mexico, but he has been back forever now, so it seems we are in the clear. However, his latest complaint is that yet another piece of glass has come to the surface on his forehead from the accident [yes, the accident that was over a year ago - docs warned us this would happen] and he would like me to "rip" it out with tweezers. Umm, I think I am busy.

Keira has been running around the house talking about disneyland and going to grandma and papa's house - which we aren't doing for a couple more weeks ... good times. She has also entered the "Why" stage ...more good times.

Just a friendly reminder that Mother's Day is Sunday, so don't forget to get those cards in the mail!