I feel so old...

And not because in December I will be turning 30.

Today we had a gathering for Easter. It was great. But once 5 pm starts rolling around man-oh-man I'm ready to get in my PJ's and relax. Except tonight I had a TON of laundry to do because yesterday was spent with another gathering for Easter. ANYWAY it just so happens (in my old age) that I forgot my purse and something for Marie at my Granny's house. As I call to see if anyone could bring it my way I hear they are about to do this and they are about to do that. And I'm thinking "I'm about to want to be in bed!!" Am I sick? Old, for real? Is it the fulfilled life I have with 2 extremely energetic counter-parts? Am I just like my father (now I might be getting warmer). My father and I have never been the type to stay up late. I would love to sleep in late but here lately even sleeping in late hasn't done me justice. Just like last night and the night before. Last night Brad and I got 9 hours of sleep! Now that's pretty darn good. But the night before I got about 12 hours. But I still start to slow WAAAAY down at 5 pm. I've also felt a little sick here lately so maybe I came down with a virus, who knows. I just feel so ashamed to say sometimes that my bedtime is seriously within an hour or 2 of Marie's. She goes to bed between 7:30 and 8pm, fyi. I try to think how things will be when baby #2 comes along. I see that others have done it and I'm sure they have all felt the same as I do now, or maybe not. As I go through my medical checklist I see things that are part of the problem, poor appetite and lack of water. It seems that my ability to whine about the situation is stronger than my ability to fix the situation. I have seriously been dealing with this for a while now. A good 3-6 months at best. Lets see when did they first bring out Cadbury eggs this season?? haha. I eat more of those than anything else. BAD BAD Cadbury eggs!

Needless to say, despite my exhaustion, I am running my 3rd triathlon in about 2 weeks. As the date gets closer and closer I rethink my agreement to torture myself with this race. I just have to think about the finish line and know that #3 is going to be great!!

Now on to the whole 30th birthday thing. I actually sent the Zac Brown Band a message asking if they would do a private concert for a 30th birthday party!! I'm sure I won't get a reply from them...haha. But seriously I was thinking of getting the AWESOME DJ Brad and I had at our wedding and have a little party. But where should we have it? If Zac Brown did respond with a decline wouldn't be funny if the reason was because they were "stuck in colder weather..."

HAHAHAHA

The past week and its blessings

This I must say has been one of the best weeks I have had in a while. Marie and Brad have been such a blessing this week I can not describe. We had an afternoon date last Sunday that was filled with Fuddruckers, movie and a nap.

Don't laugh too hard but one of the best moments of this week was Wednesday. I more or less did a triathlon. Christy and I swam before work, ran at lunch and then I road my bike after work. We did just about every distance we will need to complete in May. Brad, bless his heart, took Marie with him to Hobbs to visit with some of his family. SO I got a night all to myself after a hard day of training. THAT WAS AWESOME!! I love my husband and child but man it's great to have one night to myself, even if it was a Wednesday.

Brad finally went and got himself a grill and we have cooked and relaxed in the backyard more than ever since we moved in to the new house. AND I must say he is a most excellent cook on the grill. We have already had steak and chicken, YUMMY! We have had a glass of wine or 2 after Marie goes to bed. And we aren't great wine drinkers. We actually get the cheapest wine (Arbor Mist...haha) but the best tasting to us.

We went to a birthday party for some of my highschool friends son, he turned one. It was a great party! Marie had fun messing with her new surroundings. I also got to chitchat with some old friends and Brad met some new friends. Thanks Luis, Alisha and Gavin!!

That night my mom kept Marie. SO Brad and I went on a date. This was 2 weekends in a row that we have gone out on a date. AND honestly I ask myself "Why the hell don't we do this more often?" Usually I make excuses about the house or I'm tired or whatever. I will stop doing that. Forgetting that the house needs to be cleaned or that the laundry needs to be done feels sooo good. We watched "Lincoln Lawyer." HOLY CRAP it was good. It's a great drama film with GREAT twists and turns. If you have seen it you will understand my next comment. As we were leaving I gave Brad a great big hug and told him I was lucky to have him as my husband. Brad is a great protector of me and Marie, if you didn't know that about him.

We went to church this morning to end the week just perfectly! Marie was a very good girl in church. We didn't have to leave the main room once. Usually we sit in the cry room or just stand in the back so she can exercise her little legs. Maybe the reason she was so good was because she slept the first 15 minutes...haha. She fell asleep on the way there and woke up about 15 minutes in to the service. After church we ate and then took Marie to a local park to get her nice and tired for a nap. That girl is like the energizer bunny. She can go and go and go as long as you will let her. I love that she loves the outdoors. I would stay in the house more if it wasn't for Marie. Thank goodness for her!! Everyone needs to feel that sunshine on their skin.

We went to the store this afternoon and I got some more Cadbury Eggs!! Thank goodness. I was starting to have withdrawal symptoms for real!! I enjoyed one while writing this.

And now instead of ironing my pants or sleeping I am writing this. I remember one of my friends on facebook posting a joke one time about how girls on facebook judge their other girl friends on facebook by either the number of "blessings" they talk about or how much they complain about their lives. I think about that as I write this blog today. I'm glad I get to post a blessing.

Easter is next weekend. I hope we get some good pictures of Marie and her new Easter basket.

I hope everyone has a great week!!

It was one of those days...

It actually was a good day for Brad and I. I woke up with all the intentions of getting a bunch of stuff done but in the end I spent most of the day with Brad doing date night things. That was all fun and good, until now. At 9:30 at night I have a few chores that really should be handled but instead I am typing this blog and thinking about counting sheep. It's hard being a full time mommy, wife and professional. Working full time 5 days a week then having a busy weekend can really wear on a person's nerves. I'm not saying it's anything specific that wears you down just the pace and the constant GOING. But I will agree that if my life is not always filled with the things I do on a daily basis I wouldn't know what to do with myself. SO why do I bring this up? I look around my house...particularly to my right...



And see this mess. Now some of you may say that's not bad. But in that particular area I see about 20 things that I need to work on. I have what some people would call a "type A" personality. If I could I would diagnose myself as having some degree of OCD. My own personal experiences with this is that I sleep much better knowing I will not wake up with a mess in my house. But I will stay up late making sure the house is clean, so in the end I lose sleep. Tonight I believe I will just go to bed with a dirty house. I have those days when my type A personality doesn't really get to spend much time exposing itself. And it was one of those days.

Brad and I enjoyed a lovely day together going out to eat and then to a movie, baby free. We seriously must do this more often. Marie spent the afternoon with her Grrrrnny and Papa. It was nice spending a few hours doing stress free things.

We also took the dogs to the groomers. Gizmo now has her summer haircut!!



She can no longer "whip her hair back and forth," at least for a few weeks. She gets a little sassy and frisky when she has no hair.

Also Marie is Marie. She still has her cough but I am hoping she will do better tonight. Last night wasn't that good of a night. COUGHED all night long. If this crazy wind would ever settle down all these little ones might be able to breath a little better. Marie never acts like she is feeling bad. She is one of those kids that comes in to the office and the parent swears up and down their child is sick but never seems to act like it once they enter the office building. Yes I have one of those children. She had a 101.4 fever on Thursday when she went in to our office and had a blast running around making her momma chase her. She really is a good baby. Brad and I are truly blessed to have such a great family.

Oh and one of those things on my list today was to clean out my car. WOWZERS!! That was an experience. It's been a while since that has happened...I knew I smelled sour milk somewhere. I FOUND IT!! GROSS. My poor car. I also stripped down Marie's car seat as well. My conclusion is that no food should be fed to a baby in a car seat, haha. So many crumbs fell out of that sucker this evening. But after tonight she will have a super fresh smelling car seat. That type A personality is slipping away day by day. I just hope I don't turn in to a total slob!! HAHA. Ok the thought of that just makes me laugh.

Random

So as I was getting ready for bed I had a few thoughts I would share with the rest of the world.

I am truly in love with my hair here lately. I realize that sounds very narcissistic of me BUT you have no idea. About a year ago I discovered what a flat iron what. OKOK don't give me too hard of a time. I'm a little slow sometimes. BUT I absolutely love the way it makes my straight hair even straighter and sososo shiny. About a few weeks ago I rediscovered a product called "Biosilk." Thanks to my old pal Anne, she first introduced me to the lovely product in junior high. I love putting this on my hair before I go to bed. Not only does it smell good but I appears to make my hair even softer the next day. And since I seem to flat iron my hair alot it hasn't really been all that fuzzy looking. Thanks Anne. BUT NOW OMG I have discovered the hair "waver." Someone please stop me. This is the coolest thing since the "crimper." And if people still thought crimping your hair was cool I sure would be doing it. So I now have a waver. I get that look I've always wanted without getting a perm. It's so freaking cool. I must enjoy these little victories in life. My next paragraph will show you why.

So this week has not been much fun as far a daily routines go. My little princess has been fairly ill just about every day this week. Monday she started with this weird cough and had a low grade fever, so she was fussy. Daycare called me on Tuesday because she would not stop crying so I had to go pick her up. Wednesday was better sorta, but I was still up late giving her a breathing treatment and worrying about how bad her cough sounds. Oh yes and I almost forgot I had to pick her up again today because she was running a 102ish fever at daycare. But on the bright side she gets to spend some good quality time with her Gammy tomorrow. Sometimes I think being a PA is a blessing and other times I truly wish I had no clue about medicine. I will try to figure out the situation and make a plan and then Marie decides she is going to go another direction. It's so much fun when you are rocking her back to sleep after a battle with the nebulizer, you are about to fall sleep yourself and then you hear what sounds like a burp and think "oh well that's good," no big deal right? WRONG...what you thought was a burp you then feel this liquid going down your chest and arm, and then comes the smell of vomit. YAH!! Oh and this week Brad has been out of town. SO happy happy joy joy Marie gets this happy mama 24/7 while she is sick. I'm sure she's pretty darn tired of seeing my face in the middle of the night. And another thing about Marie. She wets out of her diaper nearly ever night. She drinks a ton, I understand that doesn't help, BUT I hate to go and change her diaper in the middle of the night. It always seems like a battle and I don't want to wake her up. But I'm getting pretty tired of cleaning her clothes so often. I even went up to a bigger sized diaper thinking that would help. I'm telling you this girl can pee! Just the thought of waking up at 3 in the morning to change a wet diaper sounds horrible. Here we go back to sleepless nights. Maybe she's training us for the next child.

AND lastly one thing I am pretty excited about is my upcoming triathlon. I get to participate with 2 of my good friends from high school. This year we are going to Florida and will be on the Disney World grounds. HOW COOL IS THAT?!?! Hows my training you ask? Well not that great, but as long as I cross that finish line alive, it's all good! haha. But seriously my training isn't going as planned here the past 2 weeks. We've been bouncing illnesses off each other in the McDaniel household and can't seem to get better. BRING on the LYSOL!!

Ok so I think I will be able to sleep now that I've put most of my thoughts out to the world. Don't think I'm crazy because I love my hair. I've got to think positive in order to stay positive. A co-worker said that one week. So if my hair is making me happy this week then I'm going to hold on to that positive thought like hell...haha. Ok maybe you can think I'm a little crazy.

"I whip my hair back and forth..."

OMG

Goodnight

New year, new things!

I was excited to see a friend post a new blog a year after having her child. It made me think about my blog. I haven’t posted anything since November!! Lots of things have happened since then. We moved back to my hometown of Odessa in December. The reasoning behind that was because Brad was having some changes in his job, he would now be gone for a month at a time. Being so far away from family and being alone didn’t sound like fun to me so we agreed to move back to my hometown. Brad has actually been home a lot more than expected because his “home away from home” was Libya. Well we all know how that’s turned out. He’s been home for about 40 + days now, poor guy. I know he likes to be off and enjoy time with myself and Marie but I also know he’s a working kind of guy and needs to work!! He’s supposed to be going to another place overseas but at the moment we don’t know where that will be. We are slowly making changes to our new home. This past weekend we finished painting the walls in Marie’s room so I can get some pictures up on the walls.

Marie also turned one!! This past year has been something else with her. Changing to a new daycare was almost a disaster. She would cry and cry every day when I would drop her off. It broke my heart. The situation made me really reconsider working and staying at home with her. Everything is great now. Its wonderful hearing the daycare women tell me stories about Marie and how advanced she is. I was told one morning that Marie was a handful. The daycare lady didn’t know how I handled her all the time. Just when I think I don’t have a good enough reason for losing my mind someone validates my feelings by telling me things like that!! Marie recently got tubes put in her ears because of chronic fluid and ear infections. She was babbling a lot before the tubes were placed and it seems she is connecting more words to objects. I pointed to a picture of her when she was quite a bit smaller and said “baby.” She looked at it and went on about her business. Later that afternoon she picked up the picture took it to Brad and said “baby.” We were both shocked and excited. Our little baby is growing up. She is officially a toddler. But I still love it when I get the chance to hold her in my arms and rock her to sleep.

I also started a new job at the Texas Tech Pediatric clinic in Odessa. It was a good career move, so I am excited. It’s hard changing jobs when you were comfortable with the people you work with. I also never thought I would miss some of my very loyal patients that I had in Victoria but I certainly do. However, I am getting more and more wonderful patients in Odessa. Texas Tech is just a great learning environment. I work with great physicians and other PA’s. The patient load is a little different, but I’m not complaining. We are switching over to a new electronic medical records system, which always makes life exciting. I truly love what I do for a living!!

The move has been a little stressful on this McDaniel family. But I think it will eventually be the best thing for us at the moment. Brad and I plan on having more children and to have my family just a few blocks away makes that idea more exciting!

To rock or not to rock....that is the question?

OK so here's the deal. Since Marie is starting to get her teeth I REALLY want her to stop taking the bottle to go to sleep. This idea comes from my personal history of having lots-o-cavities when I was a child. Mom and dad tell me the dentist said it was because I would fall asleep with a bottle. I don't know how often my parents would brush my teeth at Marie's age but in the McDaniel household we try to brush at least twice a day (if I don't COMPLETELY forget, it happens). Last night she had a little bit to drink before I laid her in the crib but she wasn't aleep. She cried for about 7 minutes (I watched the clock like a hawk, I vow to not let her cry past 15 minutes...softy I know). Tonight I was sooo proud because she ate really well for dinner. She had about 6 ounces of formula after her meal. All seemed fine. In her room where it's dark, cool and fairly quiet I am rocking her, patting her back, softly humming a bedtime song. All the time she's rubbing her eyes, yawning and bouncing her head off my shoulder (I say bouncing because she will look up at you then slam her head in to your shoulder, then look up and then SLAM...repeat). I'm thinking ok NOW is the perfect time to lay her in the crib. So I kiss her. Put her down. Crying is already starting. I walk out of the room, close the door and look at the clock...7:51. Ok 7 minute countdown. 7:52 still come crying I hear the sounds of a little gag (normal for Marie when she's crying). 7:53 Crying, Gag, GAAAG, then I hear the sound of vomit hitting the floor. And repeat. DANGIT! So I go in to rescue my child. Turn on the lights. Not only is she convered in vomit but so is her bed and the floor. DANGIT! So what should I do differently? OR should I just forget about the whole idea and just remember to always brush her teeth twice a day? I really want her to have a healthy attitude about sleep but I don't want her to vomit every time I let her "cry-it-out." I don't think that would develop a good association with sleep. To be honest I guess I could have let her play a little longer after drinking the last bit of her bottle and be assured there are NO air bubbles in her tummy. But dangit when she cries hard she REALLY gets to gagging. So please contemplate and discuss. I've got vomit to clean up...

42 long

I've started this new workout program at my gym (which by the way is kicking my BUTT!!). Somedays I'm all alone in the locker room while I'm getting ready and other days it's full of all different ladies, like today. It just so happens as I was putting on my make-up and fixing my hair the water aerobics class ends. So here come all the "mature" women to get dressed after their workout. AND they start to chatting it up. Hilarious conversations! BUT one comment by one of the ladies made me laugh out loud. I could hear that they were noticing each others bodies and making little comments here and there. Then it got to the boobs. You know us women, we are never satisfied with our bodies. These ladies started making jokes about how saggy their boobs had become. One lady made some comment about "sweeping the floor" with hers...and then the funniest damn boob comment I have EVER heard in my life. The lady said "Yah now when I go to the store to buy a new bra and the assistant asks me my size I tell them 42 long!" Even now thinking about it I laugh out loud. I had to tell them I really enjoyed their conversations when I was on my way out of the locker room. Oh the joys of life...