Happy 21 Months, Adeline! :)

One year ago today was Adeline's 9 month "birthday" and it was also Easter Sunday.


I think we all looked a little different back then... :)

Around the Conrow House

If you were to have spent some time around the Conrow household the last few days, here are some things you might have heard...

• "You're okay, you're okay..." - Adeline, holding Elmo and patting his back. Apparently he's been having a rough go of it lately. She's comforting all of her animals these days.

• "Ooh, cute!" - Adeline picking up and inspecting her old newborn clothes I've gotten out for Pink Floyd.

• 9am: Adeline and Meredith eat breakfast; 9:30am: Breakfast ends; 10am: Adeline- "Eat, eat." Mommie- "We just had breakfast! What do you want to eat?" Adeline- "Lunch."

Speaking of getting out old clothes, I discovered in making various piles to be washed and prepared for Pink Floyd that some stains that never came out in regular washing before I packed the clothes away seem to have intensified in their stored state. After some searching online people seem to swear by "Zout!" stain remover and Oxyclean. My google search was specific enough to try to find stain fighting formulas for old - like 1-2 years old... - spit up and formula stains. So we took a trip to the happiest place on earth, aka Target, and picked up some Zout and Oxyclean and yesterday I began to fight stains with every power within me! :) I sprayed and rubbed in Zout on all the stains, then today I soaked all the stained clothes in a highly concentrated tub of Oxyclean dissolved in water (12 scoops in 5 gallons of water). You can soak clothes like this for up to 6 hours and I'm going to go ahead and let them soak for the full amount of time, but I checked on them after about 4 hours and was already really pleased with the results. Some stains I thought would never come out (especially after nearly 2 years) have come out completely, and outfits I thought could never be worn again literally look as good as new. I've heard this is a great trick for deep cleaning and removing stains from secondhand clothes bought on ebay and craigslist and at garage sales and things. The clothes literally look new. So that's my exciting laundry adventure. Tonight I'll be doing 3 loads of tiny baby things, blankets, and burp rags all in preparation for Adeline's little sister's arrival. It's getting pretty exciting around here :).

Note: You do have to have a fairly significant amount of time to devote to this stain-fighting routine, and you need to make sure you can take the clothes out of the concentrated Oxyclean solution no more than six hours after you begin and then have the time to wash/rinse them completely immediately afterward. I did read horror stories about people leaving things overnight thinking a couple more hours wouldn't hurt, or letting an Oxyclean solution dry on their clothes and it producing adverse effects.


And in other news, potty training in the Conrow house has officially begun! When I bought this potty seat it says right on it that you might have trouble getting your child to get off of it because it's so comfortable - turns out they were actually right. The kid loves this thing! :)


We also enjoyed our first foray into pigtails this weekend...


And Adeline was very helpful unwrapping Rolos for a fun project for Mommie. When she was done she got to eat one :)

No Strep...

or ear infections. That's the good news. The bad news is I'm now sick too :( and none of us is sleeping at night. Adeline's runny nose is still just as runny as ever and the drip causes the coughing almost all night. It will be very nice when sick season is over!

Beckie is visiting today and we had a little visit from Rob (and friends :) last night on their way through town.

That's the update. Hopefully more soon.

The Lastest and Cincinnati

Sorry for the lack of posting. I've been trying to take naps in the afternoon during Adeline's nap and it's been good - even if I only end up getting about 10-20 minutes (today I got an hour :). I'm taking my iron, too, and just trying to be better about eating more in general and I think all of this combined is helping my energy level. I'm going to need it. I can't believe I'm going to be a stay-at-home mom to a 2 year old and a newborn. What am I thinking??? :)

The most recent news is that Adeline is once again sick. Today is the second day of another high fever, terrible coughing and an incessant runny nose. I can tell her throat hurts, too. All signs point to strep once again, although I'm a little concerned that it might be more than that -- strep + ear or sinus infection. I'm going to call the doctor first thing tomorrow morning to see if I can get her in for a visit.

In other news, we visited the Alternative Birthing Center in Southfield last Friday and have to say we were kind of disappointed. Long story short is that we will now be birthing at a nearby hospital instead of at the ABC. Although I am not guaranteed being able to birth with a midwife at this particular hospital, I'm going to take my chances. Southfield is just too far away.

Anywho, I haven't posted since we took a family trip down to Cincinnati to visit our friends Nathan, Johanna and William. Here are some pictures from our visit:

Adeline has become quite the good traveler!

Views of downtown Cincinnati from in front of the Children's Museum:

At the Children's Museum Adeline was so adventurous! I was so proud of her for going all the way through this tunnel/net which was probably about 10 feet above the ground!

There's a really nifty ball pit that William loves to play in and he showed Adeline all the neat things to do in there:

On Saturday when we planned to leave we found ourselves returning to our friends' house to get cleaned up after Adeline's lunch didn't agree with her. She was so sad that she got Doug so dirty :(. William let Adeline borrow some of his clothes while we did some laundry and prepared to leave - for the second time :).

Where's Adeline?

There she is!! :)

And finally, Daddy has been teaching Adeline all sorts of new things lately. Such as...

How to play Wii...

And how to clean up after myself... :)

Okay Pictures - Finally!!!

First off, no belly pix. The ones we took at week 27 just didn't turn out great, so they have met the recycle bin. One of these days we'll get around to taking some good ones, hopefully before any post-pregnancy pix!!

Also, "slipper" was the third word Adeline said yesterday that I didn't know she knew and couldn't remember when I was posting :).

On to the pictures...

We took a family trip to Outback a couple of weeks ago. Adeline sat in the booth with Daddy (on a booster seat) instead of in a high chair. She liked that a lot better. She LOVES their bread - she is Daddy's little girl when it comes to her love of all things bread. And she had a very entertaining time making the menu a hat.

And we took this picture of Adeline wearing her scarf quite a while ago - prior to the weaning off of the plug. So while I don't really like that she's got her plug in her mouth in this picture here is the demonstration of how much she loves the scarf Grandma made her for Christmas. It's funny to see a picture of her with her plug now because I feel like it doesn't look like her at all! She has so much more personality without it :).

And finally, this morning she decided her Elmos needed a "nap". Well, first she tried to put a diaper on them which was adorable. She ran all the way to her room to get some diapers then came back out to the family room to "change" them and put them down for a "snooze" (which she says quite clearly now). She gave up on the diapers pretty quick, but she did put the Elmos in the laundry basket - apparently that's their crib or "bed" - gave them her stuffed "Pooh" Bear and covered them with a "blankie" so they were "cozy" (all the words in quotes were the ones she said as she explained to me what she was doing). Then she decided it was time for her to take a "snooze" with "Doug" and "blankie". It was too adorable. I had to take pictures.

Glucose, OK - Iron, not so much...

I received a call from my midwife last evening. When she told me it was her on the other end of the line I immediately thought, "Shoot. 3-hour Glucose Test for me!" Thankfully, after way too many words were spoken that did not contain this reassuring news, she did indeed tell me that the GTT came back normal - no diabetes here. I am, however, anemic. This explains a lot about the lack of energy, etc. I was anemic with Adeline as well, but this time it must be more severe or this particular group of practitioners takes it more seriously, because I now have to go on an iron supplement. I'm also going to start trying to get more iron in my diet, and I did go back to taking a regular prenatal vitamin because my gummy bears didn't have iron in them. I think all of this will help. I absolutely do not, in any way, want to compromise my eligibility or ability to give birth in the birthing center as opposed to the hospital (especially given some literature I've been reading lately about maternity care in the US...) so more iron it is for me! I've also stepped up my protein intake as I know that is key in the final months of pregnancy to avoid having a low-birthweight baby.

In other news, Adeline said three more words this morning that I didn't know she knew - square, stool and... shoot, I can't remember the third one. She's getting really good at recognizing red and blue without prompting, and now will say, "Love you" if you ask her to. Haven't quite gotten to the point of her just offering a "Love you", but the "hug" and "kiss" are enough for now. It's so adorable when Daddy leaves for or comes home from work. She meets him at the door, hugs his legs and says, "Hug, kiss." Soooooo cute :). (She says "cute" too.)

That's all for now. More soon.

Much love,
Meredith

What's New

A few updates, since it's been a while...

I had my monthly prenatal appointment this morning which included my Glucose Tolerance Test to check for Gestational Diabetes. All seemed to go well. I'm almost back at my pre-pregnancy weight and my belly is measuring one centimeter shy of my number of weeks along, which is just fine. Pink Floyd has a strong heartbeat on the cusp of the upper 120's to 130, and she is currently head down with her little bottom sitting to the right. I now know those rolling movements across the top of my belly several inches above my belly button (or "boo-tee" as Adeline calls it) are feet ;-). She's actually laying on the opposite side that Adeline preferred. When I push the lump jetting out to my right this time instead of feet I know it's a little tushie :) - at least for now. Now that I'm in my third trimester I'm already due to start visiting every other week! I can't believe it! If I have more than 4 Braxton-Hicks contractions in an hour I'm supposed to call in (and follow some other instructions to get hydrated and rest). At the top of the to-do list is still to find the time to get over to the birthing center for a tour. We can't take a scheduled tour because they are only on Wednesday evenings a couple times a month and Alan has youth group. The only other option is to call them when we think we might be able to stop by and they let us know if they're busy or not and have the time to walk us through! [**As I type this Adeline is feeding Daddy fishies and trying to stick her sippy cup of milk in his mouth. Such a good sharer :)**] I'm beginning to get more and more excited about the arrival of little Pink Floyd and more and more excited about being able to share her real name with the world, which is not 100% decided upon but pretty darn close :). I'm working on my Bradley exercises and relaxing and take the uncomfortable Braxton-Hicks contractions as an opportunity to pretend it's labor and consciously relax all the muscles in my body. For having done this before there are still so many unknowns, and being in a new place with new midwives and a new birthing place makes things just as unfamiliar as they were the first time. It's like having baby #1 a second time :).

Anywho, enough about me... Adeline seems to get bigger everyday. I continue to be astounded by all she understands and is able to communicate back to me. She says, or at least tries to say, EVERYTHING! Just today at lunch Alan offered her some of his tuna saying, "Do you want some tuna?" She'd never even heard the word tuna before and she promptly replied, "No tuna," clear as day. She knows a whole host of animals and their sounds (cat, dog, monkey, cow, duck, frog....), is becoming a pro at her clipo blocks, can complete her farm animal puzzle and put the shapes through her shape sorter, and continues to add to her phrase vocabulary daily. We're starting to do some intense work on "I Love You" ;-). Everyday she mentions other family members she hasn't seen in weeks or months and remembers that she's seen their pictures on our camera. She loves the scarf her Grandma made for her (and says, "Scarf" quite well too!) and turns almost everything into a phone and/or a hat (including her food, much to her parents' chagrin). She is also getting very good at saying her name. She started that about a month ago, but it is starting to get much clearer. She also can pick the letter "A" out of just about anywhere and knows it "stands for" her name. We sit at the dinner table together for our meals, now that we're all able to be home and together for dinner most nights and even occasionally some lunches. She sits in her booster seat and eats at the table with Alan and me, no longer off of a tray, and can manage forks and spoons with ease now. She loves to sing. Some of her favorites are "Wii Pooh" (Winnie the Pooh), "Baa baa" (Baa Baa Black Sheep), "Ah-C's" (ABC's), "Row Row Boat" (Row Your Boat), and - my personal favorite - "Ooh Boo-Tee" which is the belly button song from the Boynton Belly Button Book. It has a real tune but we don't know it so we made one up. She loves her "boo-tee". I think it's funny she calls it that because she knows how to say "belly" and "button". I guess it's just its own thing! She also knows lots of body parts - from hair to neck to back to toes - and is getting better at "Head, Shoulders, Knees and Toes". She also loves to bounce like Tigger :). She really does and says so much more than this too but it's a lot to type!! Hopefully this is enough to satisfy our long-distance readers at least :). Oh, and the plug has been all but forgotten :).

We have a busy and exciting couple of weeks coming up. Today Alan's sister Beckie is coming to town and will stay with us tonight. We haven't seen her since... hm, actually at the moment I can't think of the last time we saw Beckie! We're glad she's passing through on her way to her new job. Papa is coming to Michigan for a few days this week so we get to see Amma and Papa probably on Tuesday. The week after that we're heading down to Cincinnati to visit Nathan, Johanna and William for a couple days. So we'll finish out February with lots of fun visits with people we love.

I think that's all for now. Again, sorry for the lack of belly pix. We took some at week 27, I just haven't gotten around to uploading them yet. Maybe we'll take more this week and try to get them all posted soon.

That's all from our neck of the woods for now. Happy Valentine's Day to all :).