Midwife Madness :)

Had my midwife appointment yesterday. All is well with Ferncliff and with me. My BP is still LOW (106/60), my iron is finally climbing (over 11 now!), and everything measured great with my belly--29cm!

The baby had a heart rate of 160 and was head down. I felt Ferny do a huge somersault on Wednesday and since then have only been getting kicks up high. Hopefully the baby will stay head down, though there is still plenty of time for things to change. ]

I am feeling great. For the past three nights EJ has only gotten up once a night (usually because he is cold). He has decided that 5am is the perfect time to start his day, but he has been sleeping hard and soundly and taking a 2 hour nap every day so I can't complain. After 3 nights of sleep AND taking naps I am starting to feel human again and the bags under my eyes are fading. For those of you who know about the ongoing sleep struggle you may be thinking --what did she do?? Well, we switched to cloth diapers overnight. He was already in cloth all day with me and only wore disposables at his nana's and at church and overnight. I started thinking maybe they just feel too different and he doesn't like it. So we switched to cloth overnight with about 5 extra absorbant pads in there. Voila! A sleeping baby. Not sure if it is the only reason, but since it is working we are sticking with it!

Recipe Sharing

Hey all--
I am looking for a great recipe for a healthy breakfast cookie or bar that I can make to give Elijah at snack time. Do you have one that you like? My little boy hates bread so anything muffiny or cakey won't pass muster. It needs to be cookie like, crunchy or chewy. He is 16 months old so whole nuts won't work but he does fine with chopped stuff.

Anyway--thought since I was looking for help I might also share. This is a recipe for a hashbrown casserole I made for Christmas morning. I normally hate breakfast casseroles for 2 reasons:
1) Greasy!!
2) Eggy!!

This one is neither greasy nor excessively eggy. It was really delicious and everyone ate it up.

Hashbrown Casserole
1 lb sliced bacon, diced (I used the center cut because it is less fatty)
1 medium onion, chopped
6 eggs, lightly beaten
4 cups shredded spuds (I used yukon golds because that is what I had--you could buy the plain shredded frozen hash browns too)
2 c. shredded Cheddar cheese (I used 2% extra sharp)
2 c. cottage cheese (I used skim milk cottage cheese)
1 1/4 c. shredded swiss cheese (I used 2%)

In a large pan cook the bacon and onions until bacon is crisp. Drain (I rinsed it as well to remove even more grease). In a bowl combine everything else and stir in the bacon mixture. Put in a 13x9x2 baking pan (I used Pam cooking spray to make sure it didn't stick).

Bake at 350, uncovered, for 40 minutes. Let stand 10 minutes before cutting.

I did everything except bake it on Christmas eve and just covered it and kept in the fridge. I then cooked it for 50 minutes (since it was cold). It was delicious!

Enjoy!

Merry Christmas!!

And what a Christmas morning!! Elijah actually went back to sleep last night when I told him Santa wouldn't come if he was awake. He heard that, stopped crying and asked to get back in his crib. What a nice change from two hours of solid crying that we normally get from 3-5am! Elijah and his Nana and Papa and Grandmama and Mom and Dad went to see a light show last night. He had a meltdown so we ended up coming home early. We tried to set out cookies and carrots for Santa and his reindeer--Elijah pitched a fit because he wanted to eat all of Santa's cookie. This morning we came down and did our presents, started a fire and had breakfast with the clan. Elijah did presents with his Nana and Papa. He went down for a nap and we spent the rest of the day at grandmama's house. It was nice and relaxing and fun for everyone. Merry Christmas and enjoy the pics!

Stealing Santa's cookie!

New Choo-choo set

New "Cycle"

A stocking from Santa.

Ohh-Fire is hot!

Breakfast with the clan!

Presents with Nana and Grandmama and Papa.

Snuggle Puppy board book--no one reads it like mama.

Blues Clues in the new wagon. What a way to calm down before a nap!

The new chair and "Melmo" that Santa left at great-grandmama's house

Lathan Christmas Post 2

Saturday morning was our Christmas with Granny and Grampy. It was really fun. Elijah had a Blue Christmas--getting Blues Clues PJ's, overalls, a Blue Dog, Jacket, Backpack and a Blue's Video.

This morning (Christmas Eve) we worked and made Jesus a Birthday cake. We are going to celebrate his birthday tomorrow morning with candles and presents.

Cracking the eggs . . .

Pouring the oil. Elijah is reading the box to find out what's next . . .
Putting on the decorations . . .
The finished cake-complete with little finger holes (we had to taste the icing).
And putting the present for Jesus under the tree with Daddy.

Lathan Christmas-Post One

We celebrated with my brother and his wife on Friday night after our "Christmas Eve" dinner. It was fun. They gifted us with a primo Shop Vac for Justin, a Harley Davidson Motorcycle lamp for Elijah and a grab bag of piggy stuff for Covey. It was fun. We polished off the evening with a trip to Rocky Mount to see the Bethelehem lights. It was fun and cold! It was an outside tractor ride. Elijah loved it! He didn't love Santa (though after this shot he gave Santa a high five!).

Woo-Hoo!

Tonight my wonderful hubby got our new (used) computer set up and running. It now only takes about 5 minutes to get connected to the internet. It is sooooooo much faster than our old computer!! Thanks mom and dad for the computer!
Hopefully we will get some pictures uploaded to the Blog tomorrow of our Lathan family Christmas celebration that took place on Saturday.

Happy Third Trimester!

Today is the official start of my third Trimester!!
I have gained 8 lbs!
I can still fit in all but 2 of my pre-pregnancy pants, though it isn't very comfortable with no preggy panel in there.

The baby is growing and powerful! Yesterday I ended up slinging Elijah while we took his great-grandmama shopping at Target (he was not in the mood to be in the cart). I did him in the mai-tai on the front of me since my belly is so small. The baby didn't feel squished or anything to me but after 45 minutes of all 30 lbs of him I took him off to put him in the car the baby started ricocheting all around! I guess he was cramping its style.

Elijah "knows" there is a baby in my belly. He pats my belly and says "Baby--come out!" He points to his belly and asks "baby?" I tell him no that only mommy has a baby in her tummy. He says "Mommy has baby. Daddy, Lijah penis." Got to love the logic there! He knows that mommy's don't have penises. I know he's got Lathan blood in him because we had this penis discussion at the dinner table. Anyone who knows about my family knows it is hard to get through a dinner without a penis or fart story. We are just that mature! After he said Daddy and Elijah had penises he went on to name other family members and we classified them as having one or not having one. Oh the fun of anatomy!

And for a few laughs, the latest conversation with my son:
Elijah: "Birds Mama"
Mama: "Where do you see birds?"
Elijah: "Sit there" (and points to the wire on the phone pole)
Mama: "Oh I see--there are lots of birds. What do you think they are doing?"
Elijah: "Sitting. Tweeting. Shhhh listen. Tweet Tweet Tweet" (He gets quiet and signs listen to show me he's listening to them)
Mama: "What are the tweeting about?"
Elijah: "Worms"

No Smoking

This morning it was cold enough that my breath fogged when I exhaled--that's the first time this season. Elijah noticed and pointed it out as we walked inside the gym where he loudly announced to the receptionist:
"Mama's Smoking!"

Can you say "BAM!"

Ahhh--nothing says Christmas like gaining 10 lbs in cookie and fudge weight. Elijah was a HUGE fan of making cookies from scratch. He thought the mixer was awesome! He counted, measured, scooped and cracked his way to some pretty good Dutch Windmill cookies. We forgot he had an apron (mama-made Dino Apron!) until after he got baking soda all over his pants, but we managed to put it on him before any real damage was done to his clothing. Whew!! Cooking with a toddler sure can be messy!

Happy Birthday to Me!!

Today is my birthday! I am 27 years old today! I look back and see what I have accomplished in my 27 years and I am amazed. I am a born again Christian, I have two degrees from the best school on the planet, a wonderful husband, a beautiful son and a home to live in. We are debt free except for our home. I can decorate the mess out of a cake, sew from a pattern, quilt, make clothing (and fish costumes!!), crochet and knit. I know how to iron even though I don't do it often. I can cook or bake almost anything I have a recipe for and come up with creations all m own. I know I can clean my house from top to bottom in 2 hours flat if I am really trucking and don't have a toddler in tow. I can sight read music for the piano and still play well enough to enjoy it. I can look back over my scrapbooks from the start of college on and know that all of my pictures are in there except for October-December of this year! (Yes I am current with my scrapbooking!!) I have lived in 11 different places, nursed a child for 11 months, been pregnant for 16 months (and counting), been married for 4 1/2 years and been a mother for 16 months. I can speak Spanish well enough to converse with someone about a whole bunch of things. I am fluent in Sign Language.

Wow!!

I am truly amazed at the blessings that God has given to me. I can't believe the capacity He blessed my brain to have to know and to do all of these things.

Now, my birthday . . .
It started off horribly. As the nights have been now for over a week, Elijah decided the day needed to begin at 2am. He cried from 2am until I got him up at 6:30am. It was a REALLY long night of going in there every 30 minutes to try and get him to lay down and then every time he started to gag and barf I would run in to stop it!! After a breakfast of "memeal" with Elijah, I went out to my car and found a very sweet card my hubby had left for me to find. We took a quick trip to the gym and took a 2 hour morning nap then we headed out to the park and to run one quick errand. We then headed home for another short nap and played at the house. I sold a cake to a lady at church and then Justin was home-yeah! Elijah helped me open my present from Justin--a new pair of bedroom slippers. (Apparantly my hints were enough to point him to the pair of slippers I wanted :) ) We went to Quizos subs--my favorite place to eat in the whole world!! I got a Real Meal Deal honey ham sandwich-yum! We met my brother Cody and his wife there at the restaurant. They had beaten us there and Elijah was thrilled to see his uncle and aunt and their motorcycle. After eating Cody surprised me with a Waffle Iron and 8 slices of cheesecake from the new cheese shop in town. The cheesecake is quite possibly the best cheesecake I have ever eaten. It is so smooth and rich and delicious and absolutely sinful. I think I gained about 45 lbs just looking at the platter of cheesecake. It was so delicious!! It was a wonderful surprise. My little brother is the best!! After dinner we headed home where Justin put Elijah to bed without me, took out the trash (including the poopy diaper pail!), and took the recycling to the curb. Ahhhh--so relaxing!!

Ahhh. . .We made it through!!

This past week has been absolutely crazy!! Justin has been performing nightly with our Church's Christmas Theater. The whole cast and crew have been rehearsing since August!! He was there on Wednesday night (until after 11pm!!) for the final run through and then had performances on Thursday, Friday, Saturday and Sunday night!! It was a HUGE time commitment.

We are so proud of him and the hard work that he put into this. He played the French Horn and the trumpet (though not at the same time :) ). Elijah is going to be thrilled to have his daddy back. Justin went straight from work on Wednesday-Friday so EJ didn't see him at all. On Thursday night, Elijah woke up and I couldn't console him. Now, normally I don't wake up Justin during the week to help with Elijah at night because he can normally sleep through the screaming and he has to work and bring home the bacon. (Justin helps on the weekends.) Thursday night though I was at my wits end. Elijah had already been up about 3 times and it was only 2am. I asked if something hurt and he cried "No!" I asked if he was hungry, did he want milk "No!" Finally I said "Can you please tell mommy what's wrong?" To which he replied: "Daddy. Want Daddy uggles!" Well--that one was easy enough to solve. I went and plopped him in the bed with daddy, apologized for the baby in the bed and slept until 5:30 am with my hubby and my baby all snuggled together. Apparently not seeing daddy during the day was just too much.

And here is a little story that Justin wanted me to blog simply because he doesn't think many 16 month olds do this and that most moms and dads won't believe it. Last Wednesday when we were grocery shopping Elijah saw broccoli in the produce section. Now, EJ likes broccoli but hasn't had it fresh, only frozen, but he asked for it. I asked him if he wanted that to be his treat and he said yes. There was another mother there with her 2 or 3 year old that just stared at me as I put it in the cart. Elijah held the bag all the way through the store and when we got home insisted we "Cook it!" So anyway, he has been loving the process of cutting off the broccoli and cooking it and eating it every single day since then. He even asks for broccoli for breakfast. So anyway, the story Justin wanted me to share is that on Saturday Elijah wanted "dooldles and cheese" (Macaroni and Cheese) with broccoli in it. I made it for him and he proceeded to eat out all of the broccoli and none of the noodles. Then he wanted to make more broccoli and stir it in. He loves that stuff!! I have to admit I was a little shocked that he refused to eat any of the noodles, but hey, whatever floats his boat :)

Who does he look like??

This is so fun to do!

Doctor Update

Well--Elijah got a great checkup from the doctor today. He is 33 inches tall and weighs in at 29 lbs. He is in the 90% for height and the 75% for weight. He amazed the doctor with his talking--he told the doctor to "sit down", "thank you", "don't look there" and said a bunch of other words. He was also running around like a madman. The doctor said his language was off the charts and that he was a "high energy" child. Yeah! He is going from dawn to dusk! The doctor was also surprised at how many teeth he has (14!!) and said that yes, the end of teething should be in sight. As far as sleeping there aren't any drugs that will help until he is two years old and we should just keep on trucking on and hopefully he will start sleeping through the night soon. Sigh! Not what I wanted to hear!!
Elijah got his first round of the flu shot and we have to go back in January for round two. We decided to wait on the other two vaccines he was supposed to get today because he is fighting off a cold. Hopefully he will be well in January and able to get them.

Go Heels!!

Here's the shot from today . . .

and here's the shot from March!

EJs Been Elfed

Click here to see Nana, Papa, Scout and Elijah elfed!