iron

my mom was anemic when she was pregnant so i knew it was a very good possibility that it would be the same for me. sure enough, in my first pregnancy, after my 28-week blood draw, i got a call. "your iron is low." and not just a little low, either. it was enough that they told me to go right to a pharmacy, get some iron tablets, and start taking a double dose that very day. i figured it would be similar this time around. what i didn't know, though, was how much it could impact me.
i had my first blood draw at about 16 weeks. already low (the level was 33.3 if that means anything to anyone). so, i ate a LOT of spinach (spinach salad, spinach pasta, spinach and egg salad, spinach with humus, etc), drank tea made out of rose hips (actually quite good), and ate a lot of dried fruit. so i was hopeful that at my 20 week appointment, the level would have at least held steady. no such luck (dropped to 30.something). it's apparently not a good thing that it dropped so much in such a short time. and that the diet did absolutely no good. so, i bought an herbal supplement and i'm getting an over-the-counter supplement, too. and while i'm not thrilled about having to take all of that, it's not a big deal... except...
here's the bad news. if my iron levels don't "iron" out (ha ha) i can't have an out-of-hospital birth. and i really like my midwives and the birth center and i don't want to have to switch. so here's praying these supplements do their thing!

what alia sounds like

i had a midwife appointment yesterday and caleb came with me (what i wouldn't give for family nearby to watch him or come with me to the appointment... sigh). he was actually really great and was understanding of when he couldn't come up onto the bed (blood draw) and when he could (listening to the heartbeat). he really liked hearing alia. in fact, he kept talking about it the whole trip home. and when we picked troy up from work, caleb was ready to tell daddy just what alia sounded like "hwoo hwoo hwoo".

listening to my son

yesterday, caleb woke up crying from his nap... which is fairly unusual for him. as i was holding and rocking him, he had a hard time settling down, so i asked him if something hurt. "yeah" was his response. next i asked him to tell me what hurt. "head", "ear" he said, while pulling on his right ear. so today i decided to honor his communication and take him to the pediatrician. sure enough, an ear infection (thankfully only his second ever) in his right ear. poor little man! i'm so thankful for his ability to understand and communicate and am glad i actually listened so he didn't have to suffer any longer. bring on the cherry antibiotics!

how can you say no to that??

recently, caleb has been obsessed with his children's bible. we've always read it to him right before bed, but lately that hasn't been enough. usually we're pretty set on only sleeping with doggy at night, but how do you say no to sleeping with his bible? especially when all he wants is for it to be in the crib with him. last night, i wasn't home so troy put caleb to bed. apparently, he went down just fine but then started crying a minute or so later. and he wasn't crying for mommy or daddy, no, he was crying for his bible. so, like any good christian dad, troy went in there, put the bible in the crib, and about 12 hours later, caleb woke up. what a way to sleep!

my how they grow!

caleb and i have really enjoyed our PEPS group. it's a great way for me to connect with other moms who have kids the same age as caleb. and now it's fun because many have started working on "round two" :) anyway, one of the kids caleb enjoys the most is Kian...he can even say his name (sort of). this was caleb's first friend and now look at them!

play dough

thanks to a great recipe from elizabeth, i made play dough this week for the first time. it's nice and soft and smells like cinnamon! at first, caleb wasn't too sure of what he thought. he wanted me to make a fish, a 'Y', an 'O', and a heart but beyond that, he was content to just stab it with a fork and make sure he didn't touch it. but i was finally able to coax him out of his comfort zone with a very fun play dough game. here's how it works...

first, you make (or have your mommy make) a ball of play dough... smaller usually works best when you're just learning the game.

next, you take your hand and smash it onto the ball. the nice thing about a small ball is that you don't even have to press very hard... which is important if you're a bit hesitant about touching said play dough.

finally, remove your hand and see the amazing results. it's FLAT! and sometimes, if you're really lucky (or have recently eaten something with jelly), the play dough might even stick to your hand!

pink lemonade please

the other day, i was totally craving some pink lemonade. and i had to go to the store anyway so i figured i'd pick some up. no such luck. i somehow chose a store that didn't have pink lemonade. instead, i ended up with 1 bottle of sweetened sparkling water flavored with pink grapefruit, 1 bottle of sparkling regular lemonade, and 1 bottle of regular grapefruit juice. which one do you think hit the spot? which one satisfied my craving? definitely NOT the first one. it was actually kind of gross. the second was good and i did drink the whole thing that night. but it was actually the regular grapefruit juice that filled my need. and the best part is that now i get to have it every morning for breakfast!

look what's on caleb's wall

a wonderful gift from troy's mom and grampa. she drew and painted the pictures, he made the frames (which match caleb's crib perfectly!)

it's a GIRL

wow. i'm surprised... even more than i thought i would be. but excited, too, about a whole new world of parenting and purple! we've decided to name her Alia Marie. the first name means "The LORD is my God" and the middle name has been passed down to daughters since my Gammy (grandma). i love the reminder in the first name that it's the LORD who should be God and i pray that Alia will come to know Him early and with a single-hearted devotion. and i'm so looking forward to her knowing and learning about the women who have had her middle name.

now that i know it's a girl, i've developed my own theory about how to tell if i'm having a boy or a girl.
craving citrus: both
craving pringles and other chips: boy
craving any and all sweet things, especially chocolate: girl
craving italian: boy
craving hambers: girl
throwing up occasionally: boy
so nauseous i wish i could throw up: girl
sick in the morning: boy
sick in the morning and evening with occasional afternoons: girl

so now i'll never wonder again :)

tomorrow's the big day

the day we find out if the old wives tales (which said i have a 60% chance of having a girl) are right or not. a boy would be more practical (as in all the right clothes in all the right sizes, decorating the shared room, etc.) and i've always pictured myself have at least a couple of boys before any girls. but i sure would love a girl someday... and i'm even finding a few names i like... so maybe now's the time. i am leaning toward boy, but maybe just because that's what i'm used to. i don't know... i won't be shocked either way. just a wonderful surprise!
as far as names go, well, we're still working on it. we had a boy name. it was one i loved loved loved. but then i found out it is in the top 5 most popular boy names. and i just don't want him to have the same name as everyone else. so, while we may still choose it, we're entertaining other options. the nice thing is that we have LOTS of boy names we like and can imagine as a part of our family. for girls, more difficult. we don't really have a name we love right now. some we like, but none that we're sure of. and it's been hard finding one that meets all our criteria. i just really want to be able to start calling him/her by name. and for others to do the same. so hopefully soon!
i'm actually really excited about going for the ultrasound tomorrow. except that our babysitter had something come up so caleb will be joining us... making for an interesting time for troy :) i just love the place where my midwives are sending me. there are stars (little twinkle lights) on the ceiling. and i get my own monitor so i don't have to crane my neck to see what the tech is seeing. and the techs are awesome and send you home with LOTS of pictures. if i can get my hands on a scanner, i'll post a couple up soon.

caleb's newest word

"loud"

as in "car"... "vroom"... "LOUD"
or
"spoon"... "bang"... "LOUD"

like mother, like son

guess what caleb slept with today for his nap? his toothbrush. i just couldn't pry it away, he so desperately wanted to snuggle it!
and for those of you who don't know why this is an indication of his being like me... suffice it to say that, while i have never slept with my toothbrush, i have been rather obsessed with the use of it.

colors

caleb is starting (emphasis on starting) to learn what colors are. actually, i think he gets the concept, just not the wide variety of options. so far everything is either purple or yellow. he's really good at purple (although he does call blue things purple, too) and everything else is yellow. yesterday at the store, caleb was running back and forth along the refrigerated section of juices, pointing to all the cartons that had purple lids. i think he pretty much made the day of several older ladies shopping nearby.
sometimes, caleb even gets the color brown... well, only in one case. if he's holding both his purple frog stuffed animal and his brown doggy, i ask him "what color is your frog" and he says "purple". then i ask, "what color is your doggy" and he says "brown". but if i ask him at other times what color his doggy is, he'll either say "yellow" or "color" :) it's still a work in progress!

welcome annelie!

last night, my sister had her baby! it was a long and exhausting labor that started sunday evening and didn't end until late tuesday night. although everything was progressing as is usual, it was simply taking twice the amount of time as usual... or more. hanell was so strong and so brave and did a great job, despite the fact that she didn't have any sleep or much food. i was getting regular updates from my dad, who was in the waiting room.

my favorite part was when dad called me to say annelie had been born. he was standing outside the delivery room with his ear pressed to the door. he heard the midwife saying "the head is coming" and the wonderful "one more push". he heard the announcement of "IT'S A GIRL" (which is when he called me) and the first, very loud, cry. it wasn't until later that he could call back to give me size details (8lbs, 2oz, and 22.5in) and the official name (annelie grace).

and, while i was talking to dad, hearing the good news, i felt my own new little baby move for the first time. soon it will be my turn!

expanding vocabulary

i can't believe it! i was just looking back at some old posts and saw the one called "words" from february 1st. i mentioned my list of caleb's words being somewhere around 35 or so. i'm still working on the list and now, a month later, my list is at over 70. no wonder it feels like his communication has been exploding recently.
some new favorite words: lid, walk, paper, Elmo, and pants.

classifying a zebra

caleb has this awesome animal magnet puzzle that he loves. he especially has loved figuring out that all the pieces can stick to the refrigerator and don't have to just stay in the puzzle. one day all the pieces were on the fridge and we were playing a "find that animal" game. we had done all the easy ones (elephant, giraffe, fish, dog, etc) so had moved on to zebra. first, he pointed to the cow... nope. then, the tiger... again, no. finally, he found the zebra. it took me a bit to figure out what he had done. first, he found the right colors (black and white, for those of you who never had a complete animal education). then, he found an animal with stripes. finally, he put them together to find the right animal. what a problem solver!

weaned

it's official. caleb is weaned. i haven't nursed him in 1 month and he hasn't asked to be nursed in 1 week. i really wanted to be done in plenty of time so that it wouldn't be hard for caleb to see the new baby nursing. i'm hopeful that this next 5 months or so will give him time to forget... or at least move on.