2012: Year in Review

We started off the year on a high note, Scotty made partner at his law firm and we'd just found out on Christmas Day, a week before, that we were expecting a sweet baby.  But our excitement was short-lived as I ended up having a miscarriage on January 3rd. We were sad, of course, but I know they are very common with many friends and family having gone through similar situations. And after having gone through it with Rachel almost exactly a year before and then watching her with Anders about 10 months later, I knew we'd be fine.

January is always a tough month for Scotty at work.  And at the end of the month, we went ahead and put our house back on the market thinking it would take a while to sell and knowing that we would eventually need the extra space, hoping it would be sooner rather than later. About 6 weeks later, we had an offer. Yay! It was around this same time that Scotty started having some health issues.

Ongoing headaches, anxiety, sleeplessness, and eventually, tingling extremities were his symptoms. At first we thought it was just the stress of how crazy our first two months of the year had been (I didn't even mention the shut-out LSU rec'd by 'Bama in the Nat'l Championship...it took a while for the sting of that loss to go away...he still doesn't like to talk about it). Throughout the ordeal, Scotty saw an internist, optometrist, ENT, ER doctor, and neurologist. The eventual diagnosis was high blood pressure (which at least one of the docs commented on initially). However, we found out also that he had some nerve damage from overdoing it at the gym as a result of trying to de-stress AND he had undiagnosed carpal tunnel in his wrists which was also exacerbated by certain exercises. So medication, wrist supports, and a change-up of gym routines seemed to help.  Thankfully, as we'd like to keep him around for a while.

In mid-April, we sold our house in Gonzales and moved into a cozy apartment in BR. We were undecided whether or not we wanted to build a house or buy something move-in ready. About a month later, we found out I was pregnant, and the decision to buy a house was made.  In hindsight, after now going through a renovation, I don't know that I'd ever want to build a house given all the decisions you have to make about everything, constant phone calls, running over to the house, etc. -- granted, Scotty took the brunt of the phone calls and impromptu trips to the house to meet with whomever needed to be met with.

Our summer was spent looking at houses, swimming in the pool at the apartment, looking at more houses, and coming to the realization that the 4 BR/3 BA newer house with a decent-sized yard in a good neighborhood was not available in our budget. So we expanded our horizons and found a house about 25-years old that desperately needed updating but had an awesome backyard, was in a great location, and had the 4 bedrooms we needed. You know what they say -- location, location, location!  The sellers finally accepted our 3rd offer.  Talk about frustrating; although our realtor was great and we got to become really good friends with her. We later found out why it took so long for the sellers to accept our offer...it's because there were 6 sellers -- 3 direct heirs and 3 descendants of the 4th heir. Eek. After we closed on the house (mid-September), we quickly got started with pulling down wallpaper, pulling up the carpet (white with stains, navy, and green-- gag), and finalizing our updates with the contractor. And although it took several weeks longer than we were told it would, they finally finished, and we are so happy with the results. We updated everything except the kitchen, which we anticipate taking place in a year or so.  Living through the final phase of renovations...yay...looking forward to that.

Throughout the year, we celebrated birthdays and anniversaries, had health scares with other family members, get togethers with friends and family, and went on a couple of trips to the beach. We worked hard so we could play hard. And we loved watching David Scott play hard and grow, turning from a toddler into a little boy. In the summertime, we concentrated on potty-training and after a few weeks, it was done -- really less than that as I'd kept him in pull-ups at night for a while just being cautious (and not wanting to change the sheets in the middle of the night).  He's learned so much over the course of this last year (colors, numbers, ABCs, words, songs, talking in complete sentences, and greatly improved on his swimming skills which turned out to be very helpful when he fell in the pool a few weeks ago).  He is even getting ready to be moved up to the pre-school class next week. Our sweet boy is also looking forward to meeting his little brother in the next week or so as are we.

2012 was an overall good year, but I am ready for what the New Year will bring. I know 2013 will be an adjustment for our family. But hopefully we won't have any medical mysteries or apartment life to contend with. And life with two little boys can begin...

Christmas 2012...

Christmas 2012 has come and gone but I wanted to document it as this year's celebrations were a first for us. We got to spend the holiday at home...as in our home that's finally refinished (for the time being, anyway). And we got to spend it with both sides of our family.

Since I was (and still am for that matter) so pregnant -- too pregnant to travel to North LA -- we were able to host each of our families here at home, although at separate times. The Anders/Randall/McGehees all made the trek down two weekends before Christmas...about a week and a half before the actual holiday. And we had Mamaw, Debbie, and Lee come down Christmas Eve/Christmas Day. I'm a big fan of tradition so I was sad that we weren't able to do our annual Christmas Eve trip to Sue Sue's followed by Christmas Eve night with the rest of the Wrights. However, it was really nice not to spend any time in the car burning rubber up and down I-20 and Hwy. 15. And it definitely made the holiday last longer since everything wasn't crammed into two or three days. We were able to start/continue some new and old traditions, though -- building a gingerbread house (new), making Christmas cookies with Mamaw and Mimi (continued), and Christmas Day pancake breakfast (continued). And for each celebration we did have some traditional holiday fare mixed with some new stuff...luckily, both sides of the family like to eat so there was no lack of food at all.  We are so grateful to our families for being flexible with their plans and being able to accomodate us/me.

Here are a few pics from each get together:

Cousins (in coordinating outfits)!

Making Christmas cookies

Christmas with a 3- year old was lots of fun. Anders was cute too (as always), but with him only being a year old, didn't really understand what was going on. Maybe he was slightly overwhelmed with everything, but DS was very particular in opening his presents and inspected each one carefully which I thought was so sweet. He loved his train table but has spent hours and hours working and re-working the puzzles Santa brought. I suppose Santa could've spent a lot less money had he just brought this kid a ton of puzzles. Speaking of Santa, DS was really into Santa this year and also Clarke, our elf. Clarke even stayed in DS' room a few nights to make sure he slept in his bed all night (he did).

Santa came!

And look at my trains!!!

And in between the family get togethers, we had David Scott's Christmas party at daycare:

As for me, as I type this post, I am almost 38 weeks, so Baby Drew is now considered to be full-term in case he makes an earlier-than-planned debut. I can't wait to meet this big boy with his head full of hair. As of my 35-week visit, this guy was weighing approx 6#, 10 oz so we'll see how big he really is whenever he arrives. I've felt for a couple of months that he was big. And I've also been having acid reflux really bad at night. So as confirmed by the sonographer, he has lots of hair -- which better turn out to be true since Tums is my new bff. And now, we're just waiting...

Need More Time...

Between trying to finish getting the house set up, baby room ready, Christmas shopping done, working full-time, general life stuff, I have almost reached my limit. I've come to the conclusion many times, especially recently, that there just isn't enough time for me to get to everything that needs my attention and unfortunately for all three of you who read my blog, it has been the casualty of this prioritization. Oh well. The important/big stuff that's happened recently is...
- We spent Thanksgiving in North LA. Really it was a glorified long weekend since we didn't get up there til noon on Thursday and we left Saturday morning. That was our last trip up before the arrival of Baby Drew.
- We are having a couple of Christmas get-togethers with our families this weekend and on Christmas. My family is here for this weekend; Scotty's is coming for Christmas Eve. It will be so nice to spend a major holiday in our home although I know we will all miss the traditions we've had for our whole lives. Some of them, though, will be continued this year -- the Christmas Day pancake breakfast that has been enjoyed by Scotty's family for decades for one. And if I can come up with some kind of tradition our own little family can have, perhaps we'll incorporate that as well. While this may be our first Christmas at our home, it probably won't be our last and when our kids are older, I want them to remember the different traditions we have and get all warm and fuzzy inside too.
- Since so much of our stuff that was in storage got ruined -- just by being in storage at the apartment, I've had to buy so much new baby stuff -- travel system and carseat, bouncy seat/swing, exersaucer (I'll have to get one), and who knows what else I have yet to discover is ruined or missing. I'm still so p-o'd (as my dad would have said) at all the issues living in that apartment caused. However, the one thing I am so glad we got to experience while living there was the frequent swimming. DS learned so much just from us playing with him in the water and teaching him how to move his arms and kick his feet. And that knowledge came in handy this past weekend when our sweet boy fell into the pool at our house. He wasn't paying attention to what was going on and ran into a table which threw him off balance and into the pool. And amazingly, he did not sink to the bottom and in my opinion did a pretty good job of keeping his head above water while kicking his feet and moving his arms. Of course, Scotty was a split second behind him in going into the pool after his boy. We remained calm, but David Scott was cold and "soaking wet" and was upset that he'd gotten the sticker on his shirt wet. The only casualty of the day was Scotty's phone (Thank you, Lord!), so that wasn't a big deal.

"Batman" watching Batman (above) and the official Santa pic for 2012 (below).

David Scott turns 3...

How is it possible that my tiny 21.5-inch, 6 pound, 6.5 oz baby boy is now a 34-inches tall, 32-pound 3-year old boy?!? This kid knows his ABCs, can even identify several of the letters (funny enough, he knows "DSR" is "his" name), can count almost to 20, knows all of his colors, can identify so many animals, and can talk up a storm. He asks situation-appropriate questions and makes applicable comments. But we've also had a few cringe-worthy comments/situations such as the time Scotty took him to the bathroom while we were at a restaurant and he commented to the guy in a nearby urinal, "I've got a penis!" Whoops...oh well, he spoke the truth.

We celebrated his birthday with friends and family last weekend at a local jumping place. We figured with all the house renovations, moving, my being 7-months pregnant, etc., that we were going to take the easy route this year. He didn't seem to mind as he had a great time. The birthday celebration continued this week with cupcakes at school on Friday.

Birthday party with friends and family

Birthday Breakfast of Champions (all while wearing his fashionable helmet)

And today, on his actual birthday, we went to NO to eat beignets and go to the aquarium. DS also requested a salad with tomatoes so we ate a late lunch before heading back home. We had a much-needed family day and showered our little boy with fun, food (who cares that we had cupcakes for breakfast, then ate beignets for a snack later -- your birthday only comes once a year and we like to celebrate), and family time. And he also got a little scooter with Spiderman helmet which I'm sure he'll want to play with more once he wakes up from his big day-induced birthday nap.

The aftermath of beignets...

Our sweet boy was so excited to see the sharks!

David Scott,
We are so excited to celebrate your 3rd birthday! I can't believe you are already 3-years old. It seems like just yesterday I was pregnant with you and in less than two months, you're going to be a big brother. Time has flown by and I would really like for it to slow down, if that's possible. With each stage/year that passes, we have embraced what the future brings. We can't wait to see the continued development of your sweet, spunky, precocious personality. We know you will accomplish great things in life and are so honored to call you our son. Daddy and I love you so very much, my sweet boy.

Love,
Mama

We're In...Sort Of...

The week before last and corresponding weekend were a whirlwind...for me anyways as I had two big things on the agenda: Moving and Anders' first birthday party. And keep in mind, these two events were taking place about 4 hours apart, driving-wise. And while, I didn't get any pics of Moving Day 2012 2.0, I did get a couple of cute shots of my favorite nephew on his big day. Luckily for us, DS stayed in North LA all weekend with Gran and Papa first then with Mimi so he was able to have a good time and not be in the way during the moving process.

Scotty was so good to let me skip out on the major part of Saturday (it's not like I could do much anyway besides "supervise" or tell people what to do (both of which I excel in). But he also knew that I would be back on Sunday to start unpacking what we could. for the last week (and the better part of this one), we have been/will be living in only part of the new house as they are still finishing up the living room and our master bedroom/bathroom. Good times. We have stuff everywhere and there are a ton of boxes that still need to be unpacked but can't be due to the fact that those rooms can't be set up yet. For instance, our "bed" (box springs and mattress on the floor) are set up in what will be Drew's room. And our guest room is currently set up to be the "living room" with a leather chair, tv, and the recently added beanbag for added seating. Our old couch went home with Lee and once they finish the living room, we can have the new sectional delivered (we've had to reschedule it twice already...not happy). But what choice do we have-- so we're trying to make the best of it. Or at least we were until this weekend when David Scott caught a nasty stomach virus that we're still dealing with. We'll just leave it described as him having fever, reverting back to diapers, multiple loads of laundry, and not eating much (but drinking liquids pretty good). Fun times. After a particularly explosive incident, DS proclaimed, "There's poopoo everywhere!" And he wasn't lying. Dr. K said it was going around and to continue doing what we've been doing. But it looks like we'll be staying home tomorrow too due to his fever not having gone away. I'm hoping we are on the mend and that Scotty (and especially myself) manage to avoid contracting this virus. It is not fun.

                                                      Here's Anders at his first birthday:

A Quick Life Update...

We are in a frenzy of packing up the apartment, unpacking (what we can) at the new house, waiting on the new house to be finished being renovated, raising a rambunctious boy, and growing another one. Also, don't forget our jobs with both of us having to travel a little. Oh, and also planning David Scott's third birthday party. The phrase "slightly busy" is a gross understatement right now.

I go back to the doctor on Wednesday when I'll have my glucose test. Joy. I'm currently enjoying a rare treat -- a chocolate milkshake -- knowing there's a possibility I won't be able to have anything like this for the foreseeable future if I am diagnosed with gestational diabetes... again. I hope that we'll get to have another ultrasound soon because I feel like Baby Drew is bigger than his big brother was at this point. I feel like I could spontaneously combust most of the time. But he is just as active as David Scott, although it took him a few weeks to get that way.

First LSU Game...

First off, I'm going to pat myself on the back not only for posting twice in a week -- much less one weekend -- but I'm actually pretty timely with my topics instead of playing catch-up. Go me! So yes, as I mentioned in my post yesterday, we took David Scott to his first LSU game last night. But first, we had to make a quick trip by the Urgent Care to have his foot looked at. Rewind to last Thursday. I noticed our boy had an ant bite and a few mosquito bites on his foot/ankle. The area was red and swollen and warmer than the rest of him, but this was not his first time to have a sensitivity to bug bites; Scotty apparently had similar issues as a kid. I couldn't find the topical Benadryl so I just rubbed some cortizone on it and we went on about our day. Friday, the area looked normal so we really didn't do anything to it. However, as were getting dressed for the game yesterday afternoon, we noticed his "bite-foot" was bruised looking (purpley-red) and said it hurt when Scotty pressed on it (he had not complained about it at all during the day). So, not knowing what was wrong, we made a pit stop by an Urgent Care place by the apt pre-game. Ugh. Those places are cesspools of germs and I just hope and pray that we don't get whatever ailed a couple of the poor, puking kids had who were waiting along with us. I tried not to breathe as much as possible.

Anyway, we finally got called back to our own room where we waited some more. But then the doctor came in and kind of anti-climatically said that he's just had a severe allergic reaction to the bug bites and the blood from the earlier swelling was now settling further down in his foot as pulled by gravity. Yay! So off to the game we went.

As with the Saints game, there were multiple bathroom trips throughout the first half, but distractions with popcorn, ice/water, the band, Mike, and cheering meant that we got to stay until almost the end of the third quarter. DS had a good time once again. This time, there was no mid-game nap, nor did he fall asleep on the way home, and actually didn't go to sleep til almost 10:30. Scotty delusionally asked if the boy might sleep late this morning. I laughed at him. Sure enough, about 5:45 this morning, I hear, "Mama! I'm want to come in your room!" So we let him come on in and all slept a few more glorious hours.

We have all been enjoying the slightly cooler temps and are looking forward to fall.