Happy Birthday Mom

Today is my mom's 50th birthday! We had a surprise party for her on Saturday. She is worried about being "old", but look at her... she hardly looks old, she looks beautiful! Happy Birthday.

We're having a baby!!!

Yes, I am pregnant!!! I am 7 weeks along, so my due date is December 15th. I have to add a disclaimer, however... I have not been to the doc yet, so Mike is worried that I am telling people too soon. But, I am excited, so I don't care. So, if I am not pregnant then there is something wrong with me. I have not been too sick, a little queasy at times. If I am on the same sickness schedule now as I was with Hayden I may get a little worse here in a bit. I just get really tired easily. I have been sneaking in little power naps here and there, and have gone to bed a little early a few times. We are really excited, now we just have to figure out how to do it with two little monkeys running around!

We're home!!

We got home from our trip last week, but it took me about a week to recover from it. I have been meaning to download all my pics and post some, but it took me a while. We saw so many fun things and had a great trip, so I will try to keep the post short since there are so many things I could write about. Here are just a few pics we took.

The plane rides were interesting with Hayden. Luckily, he slept most of the time, but there were moments when we were about to scream, being confined with him in a little space, him wriggling all over trying to press the flight attendant button or grabbing the people's hair in front of us! Overall he did great being gone from home so long.

We arrived in New York and the first thing I noticed in the airport was that everyone was wearing business suits. We noticed everyone was very dressed up the whole time. Our hotel was right by one of the Trump Towers and the United Nations buildings. We rode the subways and walked everywhere we went so we saw some very interesting things in the city. There weren't as many "scary" or "weird" people as I had imagined, so that was good. I am sure if we had ventured into different parts of the city more it would have been a different story. Some of the places we went to and saw were the Today Show, the Statue of Liberty, Ellis Island, Times Square, Central Park and Ground Zero, which were all very interesting. We had some great food and wore ourselves out. The humidity was crazy there so my hair looked crazy the whole time, too. Hey.. it's a big deal. Mike even made fun of my hair a few times.

Next was Baltimore. We were in the Inner Harbor area, which is a very touristy place. Mike was working so Hayden, one of Mike's co-worker's wife, and I ventured around this area during the day. Our hotel was in walking distance so it was perfect (aka no mass transit system for Maria to be alone on with Hayden). The National Aquarium was there and it was really fun. Hayden loved seeing all of the sea life. There were shopping malls, different museums and lots of fun restaurants. Mike went to a Baltimore Orioles baseball game one night.

The last part of our trip was to Washington D.C. We stayed in a really nice Hotel. Mike managed to find a discount code somewhere for it and I am surprised we got it for the price we did. There have been several Presidential Inaugural Balls there, including President Clinton's. So, it was fun to be in a fancy place. We rode the subway's here, too. We went to the National Zoo, which had amazing animals that we do not have at our zoo. We basically spent all of our time at the National Mall and saw the Nation's Capitol, the White House, all of the presidential monuments, one of the Smithsonian Museums, and the Holocaust Museum. We had to cut one of the days short because it was pouring rain all day and Hayden was getting soaked in his stroller. We had a rain cover for his stroller, but I guess he is claustrophobic like his daddy, because he would not leave it on.

We had an amazing trip. It was fun to see the diversity we do not have here at home. We are glad to be home though. I am especially grateful that Hayden can sleep in his own bed. He slept with us the whole time and he was pretty good but he likes to sleep practically on my head and hold onto my hair. It was cute for a minute, but I could only stand him breathing on my face and yanking my hair for so long before I had enough. Just another fun memory I guess!!!

Spring

I am so happy the weather is getting better and better. Hayden has been playing outside for the last couple of days..filling his little bucket up with dirt one shovel full at a time. I love it when he finds random things to do to keep him busy for a long time.

OCD

I am a little obsessive compulsive when it comes to wearing rubber gloves. I will not do dishes or any sort of cleaning that involves water with out my trusty gloves. I will also admit that I clean Hayden off, after he eats, with them on (poor baby). When he gets older he is going to say to his friends "why doesn't your mom use rubber gloves to clean you off?" I think I spend more in a year for rubber gloves than most people do in a lifetime. Hayden has seen me wear them his entire life, so lately he has become quite interested in them. Today he wanted to wear them and was getting really frustrated when they were falling off his little hands because they are way too big. He is so funny. I know that I am not the only one with OCD, so come on, fess up, what is yours????