She's a Big Girl Now!

2 Big things this weekend.



First, I noticed she had figured out that to get to your milk out of your sippy you must turn in up. I saw this happening Saturday morning so I decided to try to just go with the sippy and see how it works. Seems to be going pretty well. It's late Sunday afternoon and she hasn't had a bottle since first thing Saturday morning. I think she really likes her sippy cup! And I like not having to wash all those bottle parts : )










Second, we FINALLY moved her crib into her room. I spent a big chunk of yesterday packing up all the 6 month clothes and some of the other things that she no longer used and carted all that off to the storage unit. This afternoon Ben took the bed apart and put it up in her room. Now I've got to get her E-I-E-I-O sticker up on the wall. So, almost 1 year after she was born, she's finally in her own room! She could have been in there forever ago, but we've finally got it moved. We will see how she sleeps tonight, she did nap in there this afternoon.



So, my little Bean is all growing up!



I realize I haven't said much about Tucker lately, but I guess it's because truthfully, I totally forget he's blind most of the time. Really, there is very little different about his life now and his life before he lost his eyes. He gets around the house fine, gets around at Mom and Dad's fine as well as Ben's parents house fine. If you sit something out in the floor that's not normally there he might run into it and occassionally he might get a little confused on where he's at, but most of the time I totally forget that he cannot see.



Our vet in Louisville, Dr. Erica Tolar, was just amazing. She recommended a book to us for living with a blind dog that I ordered from Amazon. I read the first chapter or so and actually haven't picked it up again. There is so little difference in life before and life afterwards that I just haven't bothered to keep reading it. There will be some things that will be different, especially as summer comes around. We can do walks but I don't think him running with me is in his future, but who knows, he might surprise me. No more fetch and things like that, but really, the changes are minimal. It's really amazing!



And YAY! Even though I'm not much of a basketball fan, it is fun to know Kentucky will be in the Final 4!!

Neuro Update and March of Dimes Fundraiser!!

Friday morning we went back to Louisville for Bean's follow up with the Neurologist. It was as I figured, we'd drive 2 hours there for a 5 minute, yep, looks like it's working and then a 2 hour drive back.

That pretty wells sums it up in a nutshell. She said it's improved quite a bit and probably within a couple weeks she will be done with it. 2 reason for being done with it. 1, it's working and her head shape has improved a great deal. 2, around the age of 1 is when their soft spot grows closed and once that happens there is not going to be any further changes in the head shape. Her soft spot is pretty small now, not closed yet, but not too far off, so it's getting close to having done what it's going to do!

That would be a nice birthday present for Bean, to get her helmet off on the 7th. Yes, I know my child was born on the 5th, but the 7th is when we go back to the helmet dr and the neuro thought we might get to take it off for good.

We had a nice little surprise today while at the Norton Complex. The neuro is in the building that is attached to the parking garage that we used when me and Mallory were in Norton's/Kosair's, so I park there because it's familiar to me. After our appointment, we have to walk across the parking lot, into the elevators at the hospital to go up to where we parked. As we were waiting for the elevators Jacqueline came out the doors. (She was the chaplin in the hospital that I liked so much and reminds me so much of Melanie) We hugged and chatted for a while and of course showed off Bean (can you believe it's been almost a year!!!)

Apparenlty I'm quite the legend of the Anit-Partum wing of the hospital, lol! Jacqueline said she thinks of me often, tells other women who are going through a potential long stay about me and how I got through those long 7 weeks. She told me today she actually learned a lot from me. I asked what she learned and it was basically tips and tricks to share with others to make their stay better. Leave the door open, be sociable, meet others, try to keep as much of a normal routine as possible, find support even via online such as thebump.com, which is where I lived it seemed like on their preemie and high risk pregnancy boards, and other stuff. She said it just also helps to tell others about people who were successful and got through everything in a positive light. When we visited the anti-partum wing back in December the nurses and doctor's told me the same thing.....oh, when someone who's been in here for a couple days and is moaning and groaning and all depressed about being stuck in the hospital, we tell them about you!

On another note, in my efforts to reach my goal of raising $1000 for Team Butterbean, my friend and co-worker Lacey, who is a newish 31 consultant, has offered to have a catalog/internet party for me and 15% of everything that goes through the below link between now and April 8th, will come back to our team fundraising efforts. If you aren't familiar with 31 bags and accessories, be sure to check them out, I have quite a few and love them! I will also have some catalogs available to look at as well, just let me know. And if you don't want to go through the hassle of plugging it all in online, just tell me what you want and I'll take care of it for you.

Now go shop! It's all for the babies!!

Click Here for 31 Shopping!!

Mrs. Carole has taught Mallory to blow raspberries on demand, so cute. Here's a little video!



Here's a few other pictures.....seems like she's adapted quite well to riding in a cart. A little more relaxed!

Weekend in Sikeston

Last week overall was pretty uneventful. I've gotten to work 2 whole weeks in a row essentially, which for me this year, is huge!

Here's Mallory in her Green for St Patty's Day. It wasn't Kelly green, but it worked!


We headed out middle of the afternoon on Friday to spend the weekend in Sikeston. We hadn't been there since October!

When we arrived Friday night, Amy, Blake, Eli and Scott's parents (Pat and Emma) were there as well spending the night on their way back to Kansas City from spring break week at the beach in Mississippi. It was great to get to see them, even for a few short hours!

I learned one hard lesson about having a blind dog early am Saturday morning, pay attention to what he's doing when you take him out for his morning pee break. I was standing there in my un-caffeinated stupor, not noticing what he was doing until I felt something warm going down my leg. Tucker thought I was a bush. Not the way I wanted to start my morning. Oh well, had to laugh, it wasn't Tucker's fault, he couldn't see, lol!

Saturday morning Bean and I headed out to Sikeston High School for a 5K run that was to support the Kenny Rogers Children's Center, a children's therapy place, so we took BOB out for his first official 5K with Mallory! Thankfully Ben had time to realign BOB Friday night because it had become very hard to keep straight because it was veering hard to the right. But, Ben worked his magic and we were good to go!!

It was about 50 degrees and crazy windy. I got Bean wrapped up in a blanket and finally got to use my weather shield that blocks the wind and rain (if it would have been raining) and she stayed snug as a bug in a rug!


We didn't win any speed races but my pace was much better with the jogger than it had been now that I wasn't fighting it the whole time! I even stopped a time to take off a layer of fleece, stopped at the water station, stopped to check on her a time or two and ended up with a time of 39:21, and the first half I was pushing her into a 20 mph head wind, gah! So not a great time, but because my calf had been bugging me from my dual runs last week, I wasn't going to push. I was pretty happy with that time for all that I mentioned above!

No medals for my age group but they had a $100 drawing and I won that! So, we took the $100 and went to the Carter's Outlet, so it made that shopping trip much less painful! Perhaps Mallory is my lucky charm!

We then headed up to Perryville to surprise Grandma Lilly for a visit. She hadn't seen Mallory since July! Big change in Bean since July!

Here's some good pictures we took while at the nursing home.






Saturday night Ben's parents watched Mallory for a few hours while Ben and I went to a crawfish boil, yummy!!! Love that stuff.

Oh, how could I forget! After we got back from the race, Nathan and Parker came to see us! Parker is such a cutie and he was trying to give Mallory kisses and she just pushed him away, lol! Here's a few of the two of them with their proud Daddy's!!






Sunday was church and then we headed out around 3 or 3:30 to head back home. Thankfully we will see them all again in 2 weeks when we celebrate Miss Mallory's 1st Birthday!!

Here's a few other hodge podge pictures from the past week!

CT: biking and a short run

Still trying to take it easy in the running so I got some CT in, did a mile of running and then 8 miles biking, so getting closer to accomplishing 2/3 of this mini Tri. The swimming piece scares me the most for some reason.....I've got to get my butt in the pool soon!


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Flowers in Bloom

Sorry for lack of blog post over the past week, it just seems like it’s been a crazy week!

Monday was our first baby sign language class. We had missed the first 2 of the 8 week classes because of RSV and then me being out of town. We got caught up pretty quick, there are about 5 other babies in the class as well and several of them are also right at around 11 months. I know I learned a lot, Mallory just wanted to crawl around and play, but I think with me working with her, we will pick up a few things!

I actually got to work a 5 day work week this past week, woo hoo!!

Mrs. Carole had a couple dress up days this past week at Day Care, one was I Love NY day and one was PJ day. Since we didn’t have an I <3 NY shirt, Mrs. Carole hooked up Mallory! So cute! And then a picture of her before we left the house on PJ day…..I’m thinking PJ Day should be every day…..







Here’s a couple more teeth pictures of Mallory showing off tooth #1 and #2, they are so cute!!







Saturday I had a 7K in Evansville. It went well, I ran 4.33 miles in 51:47, which averaged a speed of 5 mph, and that’s good for me! Here’s a picture of me after the race with this crazy lady all dress up for the St Patty’s day theme of the race:



Ben and Mallory went down to Mom and Dad’s while I was at the race so he could help Dad with some tractor stuff so when I got there we went out for a walk. On the way back in we took some pictures with Mallory and Mom’s Buttercups and with the funny Daisy headband I got her at Hobby Lobby on Saturday! So cute!












And last, Sunday night I realized that my hats fit her when she wears them over her helmet, I found it hilarious, Ben not so much, but she’s cute regardless!!

Two Toofers!

Mallory is 11 months old today and along with everything else going on, Mallory officially has "Two Toofers" now!

Not a good picture, but the only one I could get where you could actually see them!



We spent last weekend at Mom and Dad's in preperation for me heading to Raleigh way too bright and early on Monday morning for a quick work trip. I left for Nashville Sunday night after I put Mallory to bed and then Ben and Tucker headed back to Utica on Monday morning.

Mom and Dad kept Bean while I was away since Ben's not quite ready to be soley responsible for her overnight while I'm away. Dad and Mallory like to "talk" and eat their puffs. Dad's version are gold fish and Mallory's gets baby puffs. It's rather comical!






Ben and I went out to eat, just the two of us, to the Blackhorse, and Ben even drove so I could have my fav Vanilla Pale Ale!!



I was back in Elkton by 5 pm on Tuesday, so thankfully it wasn't a long trip, seemed pretty productive and I got to see my friend Melanie who I worked with at Bayer and hadn't seen since I left NC 8 years ago! So it was fun to catch up!

By the time I got back to Kentucky, Mallory's second tooth had popped through and you could really see it. Her little teeth are just so darn cute!!

The rest of the week went pretty quickly. I had a zillion things to get done at work since I was basically out the entire week prior while Mallory had RSV and then 2 days this week, so that's why there wasn't much time for posting!

We ordered Bean her big girl car seat and it came in, so here she is testing it out in the living room!



As I put in the breif previous post, we had her Helmet follow up appointment and everything is looking good. Some slight improvement, so that's good!! We go back in a month.

Obviously it doesn't effect her sleeping, or her ability to stick her butt up in the air while sleeping!



Today Ben had another customer appreciation pancake breakfast at the local H&R Agri Power, so Mallory and I went up there for a little while too. Here's a couple pictures of her while there and by the pink IH peddle tractor that we think has her name on it!






Bean also had her first ride in a shopping cart this week. I'd say by the look on her face, she wasn't too impressed with my driving!



Happy March everyone, Lord knows I'm glad February is over!!

Helmet Follow Up

Just a quick post, Bean had her follow up appointment today for her helmet. We've had it for not quite 3 weeks I believe. It had started rubbing some at the base of her neck, so I was a little concerned about that. He trimmed that down a little and said it happens and to just put some Vaseline on it, it's just a friction rash basically. A few other minor tweaks and he measured her head to see if there were any improvements. She has made some slight improvements, so that's a good sign. Basically it's just waiting until she hits a growth spurt so she can get some serious growth going on to even out her head. So we go back in a month.

So, it will probably take longer than 2 months, but things are improving!!

I'll post more this weekend and more pictures!