And she's gone......

Its sad that when you spend so much time with a little child, you can being to think that she is your own.

And then one day you find yourself sitting alone.

Depressed.

You keep finding her little toys around your house.

Her blanket in your bed (btw Nik- we have her purple blankie..opps)

and you wonder to yourself.... does she even think about me anymore.

Ok, so its really not that bad. But I will be honest and tell you that, I MISS HER! I am going a little stir crazy without miss Olivia at my heel! However, the exhaustion hasn't given me much time to wallow in my sorrows. It was a total of three weeks that we got to share with Olivia (a.k.a. "livers" - not to be confused with her dog "libbers") and boy did we have fun. I, again, have a huge respect for mothers that do this 24/7 day in and day out! Olivia was a peach- we had NO issues with attitude, NO accidents in her pants, and NO naps! Truly, she didnt take one nap. That is probably because on night 1 she heard Ted say the words "thunder storm" and it was over from there. EVERY night of the 3 week stay the three of us crawled into bed together, watched some curious George and then shut out the lights. It was like a 21 day sleepover. I tried to put her in her own room once or twice and then she would look at me with those eyes and say "what if there is a thunder...." and I would melt. For all you who are wondering.... I promise I will not sleep in bed with my child. :)

Ok, so here are some of my faveorite pictures from our time together.

Olivia is OBSESSED with playing baby! This was one of the ONLY times I was able to convice her to play with her baby instead of making Ted or I be the baby. She sat and read book after book to her baby.... it was precious.

Spaghetti night at the pool!!! Look at her face in these pics.


These are the "eyes" I was mentioning earlier....

Holding my girlfriends new baby boy. Liz was SO impressed at how well she handled him!

Making "pup-cakes" as she calls them....


We had to wait so we could frost them with Ted. They had more fun eating them then frosting.




Even though we miss her, we are so thankful that the whole family is home and out of the hospital! What a long 3 weeks for Jed, Nikki and little Maddie. We are so thankful that Mads seems to be doing better and will continue to pray for a life of "normalcies"! After these past few weeks of having a kid in the house, Ted and I are beyond excited to welcome our baby in just 9 weeks!

Fun moments with The Smiths....

Olivia is obsessed with painting nails right now.... the first night they were here she painted my mother-in-laws, mine, Nikki's, Jed's and Ted's finger nails! We captured some pictures of Jed's manicure session. He looked so good with the hot pink nails.

One night we were all lying in bed and the baby started moving. So we thought is would be fun for the girls to be able to listen in the heart monitor. They also would lay their head on my belly and laugh so hard when it would kick!

It's Done!!!!

After many LONG hours... the construction part pf our nursery is done and now we are ready to move everything in! Nikki, Jed, Ted and I (mostly Ted & Jed) worked for 5 days straight for this finished product. They also managed to hang the drapes in the living room and dining room. I am SO excited about it and LOVE the end result. I feel like our house has turned into a home!

(drapes that Miriam made)

(Closet organizers were installed by the boys)

(this is my bedding.... the bumber has more of the green, the skirt is all the striped, and the sheet is the brown circle pattern. All of our furniture is a very dark finish.)

(Mirror will hang on the green portion above the crib)

THANKS JED, TED AND NIKKI!!!!

I'm Back!

I know it has been a while since my last update, but I have alot to share now! I had a wonderful week in Illinois and my sisters spoiled me rotten by throwing me a fabulous baby shower. It was so fun to be with so many of the women in IL that were apart of my life growing up! A few days after I returned from IL, Jed and Nikki made their way up to our house for a few days before Maddie's surgery. We have been BUSY, BUSY, BUSY with all sorts of project... the most fun has been working on the nursery! Jed and Ted have SLAVED away (even worked through the night til 9:30am on night!!) and my house looks completely different now! Here are some "before" pictures and "work in progress" pictures.....








We are hoping to finish it all tonight, So I will be back SOON with more pictures!

Need for speed....

So I think the saying, "You want what you cant have is true". I have been in such a mood to do something adventurous the past few weeks. Horse back riding and going for a ride on a four wheeler have been the top two. It is probably just because the weather is nice and in our neck of the woods that is all you see people doing. Well... my cute little hubby arranged something a little faster yet a lot safer to satisfy my need. :)




Ted's uncle passed away 3 years ago at the age of 53. This was one of his many toys. Coral, his wife, works with us at the funeral home and she is very close with Ted. She keeps this car in storage now but lets the kids borrow it every now and then for a joy ride. It was VERY fun to drive but as soon as Ted got behind the wheel my maternal instincts kicked in and I kept telling him to slow down. :)

I love my dogs.... I love my dogs....

About three days ago I noticed that there was blood all over my bathroom floor. After a quick exam, I deducted that it was not me and moved onto examining my dogs. Nothing. Called ted to see if he had a bloody nose... he gets them from allergies this time of year. Not him. Finally found a slice on Bauers upper pad by his ankle. We wrapped it several times through out the last two days - he rips them off every few hours - but noticed that it seemed to be healing. Today this is what I see...






And this, my friends, is why my mom always told me to put your duvet cover right back on when you were done cleaning it. Did I listen no? Too bad IL is so far away... I need her "elbow grease" right about now. Needless to say the cut re-opened and is deeper. The Emergency Vet did not think that my dog bleeding all over my bed and carpet (ohhh you should see the carpet) was an emergency, so we will be taking him for stitches on monday. :)

Shopping with Val!

Today was a GREAT day! Val and I met at an outlet mall in-between Akron and Columbus. For those of you who do not know who Val is, we grew up together in Freeport and she was always very special to me. We did a bible study together for several years and she was always the type of friend you could call for anything at any time! Never would we have guessed that we would end up married to Ohio bred boys and pregnant at the same time! There was a long period of time where I was struggling with my miscarriage and Val was desperate to be pregnant herself. We were discussing this as we were at a coffee shop during one of our get together's and Val said to me, "I think God wants us to go through pregnancy and motherhood together, and he knows when when it is going to happen." That was in December and today, after months of morning/all day sickness, we were reunited in our SIXTH month of pregnancy! She is due on Sept 30th and I am only a few days after. It is so amazing to look back at that time frame where we thought we would never make it through and to be in such a happy place now.
Here we are in our pregnant glory...

This would be right after the giant beetle flew down Val's shirt causing her to scream frantically and, in a not so modest way, try to remove
it. We laughed so hard that I think I did wet myself. Ohhh the joys of being pregnant. :)