Soul Meets Body

By Carmen

This morning I had a baby shower to go to.  I was on the way there when I received a very random text from Tyler.  It read "What r u doing May 6th?" 

I racked my brain trying to figure out what was going on that date....nothing that I could think of.  Maybe I had accidentally sent him a calendar invite for a non-existent event on May 6th.

My reply:  What?  Why?

Tyler:  I have a surprise for you

Inside my head:  A surprise really???  How exciting? It must be awesome especially since Tyler planned it out that far in advance.  I mean WOW!!!

Lori: What are you reading over there?

Me: Tyler has a surprise for me on May 6th

Lori had a very surprised look on her face and asked me what day that was.  I checked, "its a Wednesday".

By this point I was racking my brain trying to figure out what on earth my surprise was.

We got home and Tyler asked me if I wanted to know what my surprise was. Anyone who knows me knows the answer was yes.

I guessed that it was for a concert and it was. 

Then he sang this line to me

"I do believe its true that there are runs left in both of these shoes"

Which is "Death Cab for Cutie"

I am soo excited.  I love that band. 

Tyler you get like 1000 brownie points.

Annley's Terrible, Horrible, Very Bad Day

By Carmen

Tuesday started out like any other day for Annley.  She woke up at 6am.  She played with her Daddy for an hour so I could get a little more sleep.  Then we all came downstairs for breakfast. The morning continued to be wonderful until I sat down to practice the piano. Annley stood at the end of the piano happily hitting the keys until she decided she just had to get on the piano bench.  In the midst of pulling herself up on the bench she slipped and whacked her forehead on the corner of on of the legs. A purple bruise promptly appeared right smack dab on the middle of her forehead.

A little later in the day I asked Annley to help me fold clothes which is something she likes to be a part of.  Usually this involves Annley unfolding everything I have just folded.  This particular day Copper was "resting" (hovering) close by.  Annley decided to crawl over and say hello; something that is not out of the ordinary.  He saw her coming and seemed to be very calm, she went to pet him (very gently) and he spun around, bit her and snarled at her.  I was shocked, furious, terrified and mad.  I jumped up and ran over to them scolding Cooper and trying to comfort my hysterical child at the same time.  Her little arm puffed up instantly around the area where she was bitten.

Seeing his teeth wrapped around her little arm is permanently burned into my mind.   I was shaking for like an hour after it was over and tried not to think about it until Annley took her next nap.  What if he wouldn't have let go? What if she hadn't been wearing long sleeves?   What if he does this again? These are the questions that have been running through my mind since it happened.

Obviously Annley is no longer allowed to be near Cooper or play with him anymore. Tyler has decided he is not to even be in the same room with her.

Sleep Training

By Carmen

Four months ago Tyler and I decided to teach Annley start sleeping through the night we had to put it off until after the holidays since we had just moved,  she was constantly teething and we would be traveling to much to have much consistency.

I didn't mind waiting because I was dreading putting Annley through sleep training because of all the horror stories I had been hearing.  Once the holidays were over and I decided I could no longer handle being sleep deprived. We picked the weekend we wanted to do it, we let Tyler's parents know what was going on and asked that they ignore any crying or screaming they heard, and discussed our game plan to get us through this potentially trying ordeal.

Saturday night we put Annley to bed like we normally do. Tyler was to have the first shift.  He stayed up until she woke up which was 2:20am.  He went in and comforted her for a minute or two, told her good night and left.  She cried for 10-15 mins and Tyler repeated the process.  Sometime during all this Tyler said she was crying and then started half crying and half saying "ta-da" to get him to come back in (she usually says ta-da when she is excited or when she wants excited attention).  She went back to sleep and woke up at 4:30 to eat and slept until 8:30am.  She has never slept that late in her life.  I was so happy and well rested.

Sunday night I only had to go in once to comfort her for about 2 mins and she went back to sleep on her own with out much complaining.  Last night she slept all night!!

I don't think I realized how sleep deprived I had actually been until I started sleeping more than 2-3 hours at a time.  I finally have my energy back.  I haven't felt this good in 18months:)

Christmas Fun

By Carmen

I love the Christmas season.  I love the smell of Christmas trees and fresh baked goodies.

I love decorating the Christmas trees and going to look at Christmas lights.

I love listening and singing Christmas carols and of course watching Christmas movies.

This year I was excited to start some of our own Christmas traditions.

The week of Christmas we got full swing into the Christmas fun.  I made sugar cookies and Tyler and I frosted them.

We took Annley to go look at Christmas lights at Tiny Town.

     

We visited Santa twice, once in Georgia with my mom and again here we bumped into him at Tiny Town and we got a picture with him.

Christmas morning was lots of fun too.  Annley loved her presents and we loved watching her look at everything and play with everything.  She loved the Christmas wrapping paper aftermath.

 

 

All in all it was a nice relaxing Christmas.