30 week ultrasound and more snow!

We had our 30 week ultrasound today to check on the baby's growth, which is a concern because of the single umbilical artery.  Weight looked great at 3 pounds 4 ounces, 59th percentile.  The baby, Munchkin, is still breech at this point, but should turn evidentially.   Here are a couple of pictures.  Looks like that Kelling nose in the profile.  We will see if any of Nick's genes other than the nose were strong enough to beat out mine this time around. :)

                                           

Munchkin was not being cooperative for a good face shot.  The cord was near the baby's head, hence some of the lumpiness.  But here is a 3D one.  I think they are a bit creepy.  But Munchkin did not reveal gender, either, so I am happy.  I was worried the technician would easily tell and put it in our chart.  Assuming things keep progressing well, we should be done with ultrasounds, so as far as gender goes, your guess is as good as mine.  Sam is saying boy today.  Other guesses?

We had another few inches of snow.  Sam had no school on Monday, so we went to a friends house to sled/tube.  It was fun.

Here is a video clip.  None turned out great since I was in charge of the camera and stopping Sam from going into the road.  But you can get the idea.

Sam also had a 2 hour delay on Tuesday.  She had a much better day.  She still did not eat lunch, but she did eat snack.  And she played a lot more with other kids instead of mostly sitting and watching. So small steps in the right directions right before we have a huge break :)

We continue to wait on any news on the job front.  Holidays and finals make it hard for committees.  Nick did have one positive phone call that may result in an on campus interview in January at George Mason University (outside of DC in Fairfax, VA).  And he got a positive we are still pushing a list through administration email from South Florida Polytechnic (Lakeland, FL near Orlando).  I have not heard anything on any of the 4 colleges I had phone interviews with yet.  Fingers crossed all around!

Good cold fun!

We have been having a lot of Winter fun lately.  Sam and I went to Charleston with some friends to go to their ice rink.  They have an event called totsicles.  They basically put a bunch of toys out on the ice and let the kids wear shoes and helmets and have fun.  Sam has a great time.

One of the women that worked there played with Sam some.  She would set up the pins and skate while holding Sam so she could knock them down.

Sam loved pushing the cart around.

We also went to a nearby city called Ashland, Ky which has a great light display (http://www.winterwonderlandoflights.com/).  It was so cold, about 28 and windy.  But we rode in the train and saw all the lights.  We then warmed up a bit and went to see their Santa.  This is Sam's first of the year.  We are planning to take her in Atlanta to the same one she has been to for the last 2 Christmases.  But she was excited to sit on his lap and tell him she wanted a doll with a hair clip.  What a difference a year makes.

We have been super busy with fun stuff on top of finishing up classes and sorting all the Atlanta stuff.  Grades should be done soon, which will be a relief.  I have also been busy with phone interviews.  We are still waiting to hear beyond that.  Fingers crossed.  Timing may be a bit rough, but we will see.

This week will be my 30 week appointment, which will have an ultrasound, so we will see if we can still avoid finding out gender.  Sam has now declared that she wants 2 babies, a girl now and a boy later.  We will see.  We will find out in the ultrasound how the baby is growing to be sure everything is on track with the Single Umbilical Artery.  I do seem to be measuring at or above expected size and the movements are getting more forceful, including elbows or knees left in certain spots.  Many people tell me I look small for my week, but I feel huge!

Sam is also doing a lot better at school.  She only cries on drop off.  She still will not eat, but at least it is progress.  And she seems to be enjoying the day a bit more.  I think one aspect that helped is that they are practicing for a Christmas program and she loves to sing.

The sky is falling!

Dressing up is a frequent happening around our house.  Sam found this Christmas hat and jewelry, so she wanted a picture with it on.

 We have gotten quite a bit of snow lately.  Saturday saw 3 inches of accumulation while Sam took her nap.  When she got up we decided to play in the snow a bit.

She had a great time.

 This is her snow angel.

 Sam always likes Nick to build her a snowlady.  So he obliged and scraped together some snow.  What a wonderful dad!  Sam is a big helper, bringing handfuls at the time to add to the pile.

She was so excited to put the carrot nose on.

Here she is with the finished product, although Nick added some legs as well.   It is snowing again today, but the sun yesterday left our lady a little leaning.

Sam continues to amaze us with her vocabulary, logic, and imagination.  She told Nick he was a daddy panda and she needed to check him out.  Not sure many veterinarians dress in hulu skirts, but you never know.

  

Since Sam was a baby, Nick has sung "The Wild Rover" to her.  She did not like when he sang the traditional songs and he needed something to calm her down.  He edited it some since it is a drinking song, but Sam has started singing it lately.  She loves to make up songs and sing them, so we also got a "New Wild Rover" song.  But her is her version of the original.  She did much better before I got the camera out of course.

Sam continues to have issues at school.  We have tried so many things, but she still cries all day on and off and will not eat.  We were hoping she would succumb to the consistency, but it seems to not be going that way.  It has been very rough, but we know we cannot keep her home because that would make it worse and I will need her to go in the Spring.  I will be teaching an online course, editing articles, and getting ready for and then taking care of the baby.  We only have these 2 weeks left until break, but we hate for her to be so miserable.  She loved school for weeks in the middle ands was excited to go .  And she is usually so adaptable, but the teachers being gone really threw her.  She has been learning about strangers, so we are not sure if the uneasiness from that is carrying over.  Or if she is sensing something with the new baby.  But it is a battle 3 days a week and we really hate for the teachers and Sam to have to go through this.

If it's not one thing, it's another!

So, we had a crazy Thanksgiving week.  Sam did not sleep well the night before we left for Atlanta.  She had a nightmare and kept me up for about an hour.  So, the 9 hour drive was a bit long.  Sam did well for the first part, but hit the wall.  She did not nap until pretty late and only got about an hour and a half.  She was happy when we got there.  Very excited to see Nana and Papa.  She played and went to bed fine, but then woke up at about 2 am in a panic.  She said she was sick and I could not tell exactly what was wrong, if she was gagging or what.  We finally determined she was having trouble breathing, so we took her outside to the cool air and also into the bathroom for a steam treatment.  We were not sure exactly what was going on, thinking she may have gotten her face in the pillow and freaked out when she could not breathe.  She got better, but was still scared.  So into our bed she went, which meant no one got much sleep.  She woke up again in a panic and wheezing at just after 5.  We watched her chest this time, and it was retracting and she began the barking cough, so we knew she had croup.  Back outside and back in for a steam bath.  We knew we were not going back to sleep, so after getting her a little better I called our pediatrician to see if we needed to go to the hospital or could we wait until the clinics opened at 10 am.  The nurse said she really needed the treatments and would probably have another attack, so we headed to Egleston.  She did have one more minor breathing issue, so we waited outside.  We ended up waiting a long time, but got out at 9:30.  She was much better, so they just did steroids to reduce the airway swelling and sent us with an inhaler if needed.  She was much better and only had a minor attack the next night, sending her back to our bed.  So again, not much sleep.  She also ended up getting a lot of congestion and a fever up to 103.  So she was pretty miserable.  We also had to cancel most of the fun stuff we had planned.  She was finally better at the end of our trip and did get to make one run to Krystal with my parents to see all her "friends" on Friday.  But even when she was feeling better, she did not sleep well, staying up and sometimes being scared, so no one got much sleep.  who would have thought the longest week of the semester would be break!

Here is Sam at Egleston.  She only wore the mask a little while, but it was so cute.  She insisted on getting dressed in one of her dresses before we went to the doctor.  They even commented how well dressed she was for the hospital.  And everyone was super nice and loved Sam.

 Sam has been asking for silly bands a lot lately.  I figured she deserved something for being such a trooper at the hospital, so I got her a package when Nick and I ran a few errands.

To keep Sam from getting too stir crazy, we let her play in the yard some.  She had the best time spraying all the plants and such with water.

Nick also found a good deal on a Diego DS game, which Sam loved.

Sam spent a lot of time reading books or being read to.  

We also all played some games with her.  Her she is playing Dora Memory with Dad.

Here we are on Thanksgiving.

Here are Sam, Nana, and Papa on Thanksgiving.

We also had some not so fun luck getting on the road yesterday.  Nick and I rented a trailer to get the rest of our stuff we had left in Atlanta from our move in 2009.  We wanted to get it all together in case we have another move and we needed all that baby stuff!  So we got the trailer on Thanksgiving, loaded it on Friday and were set to take off Saturday morning.  Everything had been working, but when we all loaded up, Nick checked the trailer lights one more time and they were not working.  My dad and Nick tried to fix it, but it was all a mess, spliced and junk and they could only get a very dim light.  We knew it was too dangerous and we could get a ticket.  So I called the roadside service, who said take it to the place we rented it.  We were afraid they would just give us another trailer.  I called to say we were coming in, and when we pulled in they called back and said go to the one an exit up that had a shop.  We went there and they said they were not a shop, it was in Candler and closed on the weekends.  But they would look at the lights.  Amazingly, they were working.  Apparently, something changed on driving it, something dried out from the rain or the ground made contact after rust was rubbed off, etc.  We do not really know.  But we ended up getting on the road at 10 am.  It made for an even longer day since we had to go pretty slowly with the trailer and got in well after dark.      But we did make it and got everything unloaded today and the trailer returned.

I hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving and hopefully it was less eventful than our break.  We do have a lot to be thankful for and will have even more in the coming months.  Nick and I also got contacted about phone interviews, so we may be making progress on figuring out where we will be living come next August.  Fingers crossed everyone!  Hugs to all!

A song for you!

Sam's imagination is really impressive and the things she does sometimes are really funny.  Recently she took her stacking blocks and put a little wooden figure or plastic animal or each one.  She then walked around and sang to them.  She did not want to pose for a picture.

Here is one version of the song for her animals, interrupted by a rude dog.

And then a couple more funny stories.  The other night Nick was looking at the Target toy catalog.  Sam jerked it our of his hand.  Nick said, "I was looking at that.  Maybe I wanted to buy you something."  Sam said, "You can buy me something.  I will help you look."  I asked Nick if it reminded him of anyone.  She really is a mini me.

Another funny one relates to the baby.  I have taken to calling baby Munchkin.  We needed a nickname since he/she was kind of weird.  When I put Sam down for a nap or to bed, she always wants three songs.  One of those is "I see the moon" which involves singing "God bless the moon and God bless ____".  We always include Samantha, mom and dad, grandparents, others based on situations, and now Munchkin.  Today when I sang about Munchkin, Sam said, "That sounds like cereal."  I guess it relates back to making Monkey Munch recently.  I could not help laughing, it was so random.  Hardly a day passes that she does not amaze me and make me laugh.

I had my parent/teacher conference today.  Of course, we got a great report about how advanced she is on skills and what a joy she is.  Whenever the teacher asks about a certain letter, Sam and one other girl are in a race to say it first.  It was nice to know more about how she spends most of her school days.  Basically, reading on the rug with some play in the house area with the babies.  She also has a lot of conversations with the other kids.  Just like when I was a kid, she has a lot to say :)

100 days to go!

I love the number 5, its multiples and very even numbers.  So today is exciting because it is 100 days until my due date.  I am also 25 weeks along.  I know the next couple of months will fly by and before we know it, it will be 2011.  It is exciting and daunting at the same time.

We were going to the wilds today, a safari like park near us.  But we found out last night it shut down for the winter.  So we have to wait until May to go.  We decided to still have a fun day and went out to breakfast.  Sam loves going out to eat.  She is disappointed on days that we only eat at home, which happens a fair amount.  While we were at breakfast, she was drawing and did the circling below.  I did not even know she could circle things so well and on the apple she said there is the apple and there is the stem.

We also went to the park to do pictures for our Christmas cards and then let Sam play.  She did pretty well, but she is at that stage where she wants to be silly and tilt her head and such.  Here are a few images.

She wanted me to sit by her for a few.  Too bad I dressed for being the photographer and not the subject :)

Sam had a great time at the park.  We went to Ritter park, which is more for older kids with some great sand areas for younger kids.  It always makes me a bit nervous because of some of the structures, but today Sam went right in the tunnel area and climbed the ladder all by herself.  She is getting so big.  Just last Fall, I did not even want her in the tunnel by herself.  

My Southern Girl!

Sam has always been pretty good about eating a variety.  She loves fruit and typical toddler foods like french fries and fruit snacks.  But some of her preferences are surprising.  Like the other night she ate multiple helpings of edemame, passing up mac and cheese and chicken and ranch.  At the junior spook event she picked a boiled egg over a pumpkin muffin, although she only ate the white part of the egg.  And the other day I was listing off snacks and she over rode me with a request for carrots and ranch.  But a funny one lately was when she asked for grits for a snack.  My little southern Belle.  I was so proud :)

 She continues to love dressing up.  Tonight was her GT cheerleading outfit.  She was too cute saying, "Go Cheerleader!"

              

She has been really expressing a desire to have a say in what she wears, which translates into wanting a dress every day.  So I sometimes have to be clever in getting her in pants on cooler days occasionally since I can only do so much laundry.  The other day I talked her into her elmo shirt, but only if I dug out the elmo socks and let her wear the pink leggings.  She really worries about matching and what matches an elmo shirt better than elmo socks.

 She never wants to be left out, so when Nick was watching a quick clip on the ipad, she had to see it too.

And the other day we both wore dresses and our black boots.  Sam loved being like Mama.

Sam has been having a bit of a rough time with all the changes at school.  Her one teacher should be back Monday, but the other is now on maternity leave.  Sam has been crying again when I drop her off.  Hopefully it will just be a short term issue.  Of course, school will get back to normal right after the holidays, which will be right before home life goes into turmoil.

Some other cute things are what she says.  We floss her teeth some with children's floss shapes.  She keeps calling it "Moss."  She has also picked up the phrase, "I tell you what..."  As in when she is trying to get her way she will say, "I tell you what Mama, I will watch a show and then clean up my toys"  or "I tell you what, I will eat just one piece of candy."  She seems to think it should have magical powers.  She is a pretty good negotiator.