Happy Thanksgiving!

We had a very happy Thanksgiving yesterday and hope you all did too!

3 Day & San Diego Recap

Ally napping in her stroller after a morning walk
Happy girl in the car seat

Ally & Wendy with Bob-bob

Ally stood up on a chair all by herself as Bob & Christa looked on

Happy great grandparents

Ally and I had a great time in San Diego! She was a fairly good traveler on the way out there but it was a long trip and I was ready to cry tears of relief by the time we arrived and were met by my parents at the airport. She adjusted to the time difference much better this time around- generally going to bed around 7pm and waking around 4:30am- which was really early, but we had to get going for the 3 day anyway so it wasn't that bad. My dad and Ann did a phenomenal job caring for her while Shannon and I walked each day- not that I had any doubts about their abilities! We left the house by 6am and didn't return until after 4pm each day. Ally seemed happy to see me when we returned, and a little upset when we left each morning, but she survived just fine.

The 3 Day was just as awesome of an experience as I remembered from last year. Shannon and I walked all 60 miles together and had ample time to get all caught up since it had been a year since we'd last seen one another. The supporters, volunteers, and crew in San Diego were awesome and we were both inspired and moved to tears on occasion by the awesome show of support for such a worthy cause. The 3 Day is the only place in the country where it is appropriate to use terms like "titties", "boobies", "ta-tas", "knockers", etc. We were quite amused by many of the signs and slogans we ran across- several are pictured in my previous picture post. I definitely want to participate in the 3 Day again, but I think I'm going to take a year or two off first- I need a break! Shannon escaped with only minimal blisters and sore feet and legs but I'm still having lots of pain in my right foot. I talked to a doctor friend yesterday and she said I probably have a stress fracture. I'm hoping it will heal up on it's own so I'm going to wait for a week or so before scheduling a visit to the doctor. All in all, the 3 day was a great experience for both Shannon and I. I want to thank all of my supporters out there in blog land- I appreciate all of your donations, thoughts and prayers. Now, go examine your boobs!

The rest of the trip was filled with visits to family & friends, a much needed pedicure for me, and as little walking as possible! There are some family pictures at the top of this post that we took during the trip.

Thanks for checking in!

Breast Cancer 3 Day Photos

Shannon & Wendy at the opening ceramony- ready to walk!
We walked all along Coast Highway 101 on the first morning.

This was the scene at our first pit stop at the base of Torrey Pines State Park

There was lots of pink at lunch on Friday.

2 of my favorite signs

This was taken in LaJolla

This beautiful bully was my favorite supporter!

An awesome sweep van

The Hard Walk pit stop on day 2

Hard to read the sign in the background, but it says "Free Breast Exams- no waiting!"

Boobs make this supporter smile!

Our tired feet- adorned with some fun shoe pom-poms

Shannon with the Treasure Yer Chest Pirate

Finishing up on Day 2

A lot of pink tents at camp

Observed at the medical tent the morning of day 3

These girls got a lot of attention on day 3! We had to move away from them because we couldn't stop staring. We decided to take their picture to please our husbands!

The San Jose bike police volunteer their time every year to provide route security. They were awesome in their pink shirts on Day 3.

A lot of walkers stretched out behind us.

Thank God!

One of our more humerous crossing guards.

Finally finished walking at Petco Park in downtown San Diego

"Walking with you got me through!"

Finally home with our aching feet up!

What, no pictures??

Amazingly enough, I didn't take one picture this weekend! An entire weekend of Ally's life went by undocumented! Horrors! Okay, so it's not the end of the world I guess. I'll make up for it next week while we're in San Diego.
We had a fun & relaxing weekend together. We had some new friends/ neighbors over for dinner on Friday night. We had lots of laughs and were introduced to a fun new card game called Nertz. On Saturday we made the obligatory twice monthly trip to Costco to stock up on water, wine, dog food, formula and a few other odds & ends. On Saturday night I went over to my friend Bonnie's house for a fun craft project with a few other ladies. Although I always have a hard time leaving Ally behind for the night, it was nice to spend an evening in adult company- even if I was the first one to leave because I was so tired!
Sunday we went to church, brunch, and did some early Christmas shopping at the mall. Matthew enjoyed watching the Redskins game last night even though they lost to their arch rivals, the Cowboys, in the 4th quarter.
It's shaping up to be a busy week so far. This afternoon Ally has her appointment with the GI specialist, tomorrow we have feeding therapy and Wednesday we leave for San Diego! I'm really excited for the trip, but I'm also a little bit terrified of making the plane trip by myself with Allison in tow. The last time she flew Matthew was with us and she slept a lot more than she does now. I'm worried about entertaining her on the flight, about being able to schlep around the diaper bag, my pump, my purse, the stroller and the baby, I'm worried about bad weather in Chicago where we make our connection, and lastly I'm worried about how I'm going to feed Allison since she refuses to take a bottle in my arms. I'm sure I'm making it out to be a much bigger deal than it will be, but right now I'm having a hard time getting past the anxiety of the whole ordeal.
I'm excited to see my friend Shannon, my family and San Diego friends. I'm looking forward to walking in the 3 Day, although we may not make it all 60 miles, and I can't wait to take a sunset walk on the beach! I miss San Diego so much so it's always a treat to go home.
I probably won't do much blogging while I'm away but I'll update as soon as I can find the time once we return. In the mean time, happy Thanksgiving! I hope you all have a wonderful holiday with those you hold dear!

Cutie-pie in a red dress

This is the outfit Ally ended up wearing for her school pictures yesterday. She looked so adorable that I couldn't resist taking a few pictures of my own when we got home.

Break out the latex gloves!

What a morning! It started off great.... Ally slept in until 5:30 am today! A wonderful change from her normal wake time of 4:05am! Matthew developed a theory that she's getting cold at night (even though we have the thermostat set at a toasty 72 degrees) and that's why she's been waking up so frequently thorough out the night and so darn early. Last night we bundled her up in her sleep sack on top of her sleeper pajamas and wouldn't you know it.... not a peep out of her until 5:30! Perhaps it was just a fluke or maybe she really has been cold all this time which officially makes me a terrible mommy for not considering that earlier! Oops!

I digress.... Anyway- after sleeping in I got her dressed in an adorable little dress because it's picture day at school today- again. We hustled downstairs and she took a bottle without too much fuss (another morning anomaly!) Afterwards I plunked her down in her activity gym for a few minutes so I could get all my stuff packed up and into the car. She played like a little angel for 10 minutes. When I scooped her up to leave I stopped dead in my tracks... oh no, what is that terrible smell?!? You guessed it, she'd pooped!

I whisked her upstairs praying the whole way that she hadn't gotten any of it on her clothing since it was time for us to run out the door. No such luck... this was the mother of all blowouts... this is the reason that the daycare providers wear latex gloves when they change diapers, this was the Mt. Vesuvius of Ca ca! In her 8 short months Ally has never had a blowout like this. I kid you not, the poop reached all the way up to her shoulder blades! How is that even possible? There was poop on her outfit, poop on her shoes, poop on my hands, poop on the changing table cover, and poop on my pajamas! We went through 20 wipes (easily) when I should have just plunked her into the bathtub and hosed her down if there had been time.

I managed to find another outfit for her fairly quickly, get myself cleaned up and get us out the door a mere 10 minutes late. I made up some time on the way to work so I was only 5 minutes late to the office. As I dropped her off at daycare I realized there was one tiny spot of poop on the toe of her pristine white tights- oh well, hopefully no one will notice that I sent a poopy child to school!

In other news, we have another appointment with the GI specialist on Monday to try to get a different medication since we're still struggling with reflux issues. Our feeding therapist agrees that it's time for a change of some sort. She can teach us all the tricks in the world, but if Ally is still in pain it's not going to make a difference. Hopefully we'll find a way to get her some relief soon.

That's all for now- time to do some real work. Here are a few pictures taken over the last few days. Enjoy!




















Pensive Ally

Silly face

Smiley girl

Rocking on her hands & knees

Bundled up and ready for a walk on a brisk fall night

Chillin' on the floor with MoMo

A self portrait with Mommy

Asleep at the wheel....

There is one word to describe how I've been feeling for the past week or so and that word is EXHAUSTED! Ally has decided that her new wake time is 4:05am. I think that it's somehow related to the time change. Even though we've reset her bed time she gets up over an hour earlier for some reason. It's made for a rough week for me. For the past few nights, we've let her stay in her crib for an hour- she doesn't really cry, she's just up there babbling and making noise. I go get her at 5am since that's close to our normal wake time anyway. I've heard that wake time is driven by metabolism so I'm hoping if I don't rush up there and feed her right away that she'll get the hint and start sleeping in a little later.
Ally and I leave for San Diego next week and I'm dreading that time change. I'm afraid she's going to be waking up at 2am every day! I'll be out there doing my 3Day walk so I'm going to have to be up early every day, but not that early! My parents will be taking care of her during the day while we walk so hopefully she won't be a complete crabby nightmare or they may never offer to babysit again!
We had a fun, lazy weekend (with the exception of our ridiculously early alarm clock!) We had dinner with the Martins and Matthew's grandmother Jody who is moving to Phoenix this week so it was our last chance to see her for a while. We went to a very nice restaurant that wasn't particularly kid friendly- no highchairs- but we had a nice time anyway. We went to church and brunch on Sunday with Bonnie, then took the dogs to the beach yesterday afternoon after Ally's nap since the weather was so nice. I even managed to sneak in a nap or two during Ally's nap time! They were heavenly.
It's back to work this morning though. I hate holidays that fall in the middle of the week. It's nice to have Veteran's Day off, but I wish it would have fallen on a Monday so I could have had a 3 day weekend. It seems silly to come to work for a day then have a day off. Oh well, guess I shouldn't be complaining too much- it's still a day off!
Here are some pictures from our weekend- Enjoy!



























We received this activity table as a baby shower gift and tucked it away in the attic for 9 months. I just found it the other day and discovered that she loves it! Great practice standing up too!

Mommy and Ally out to dinner at a nice restaurant

Mommy has gotten really good at eating left handed while feeding Ally.

When she's hungry, SHE'S HUNGRY!

Ally with her great grandmother, Jody.

Sporting some sweet purple overalls- a gift from Grandma Dee & Granddad Ray.

Ally turned 8 months old on Saturday- the day these pictures were taken.

Ally doing the sprinkler. Go Ally, Go Ally....

Feeding Therapy Update

Ally and I went for our second feeding therapy appointment yesterday. We had the same therapist from our last visit as well as the director of speech therapy sitting in on our appointment. It was much more productive and I came away from it with some good suggestions. The most important thing we learned is that Ally's reflux is not yet under control. She is still exhibiting classic reflux behaviors indicating that she is still experiencing discomfort while eating. We are unable to properly medicate her because she refuses to take the medicine from the syringe. We try mixing it in her bottles, but a lot of the medication cakes up on the side of the bottle and doesn't actually get to her. We tried an experiment yesterday by putting the syringe into the nipple and administering it that way. It worked reasonably well at the appointment, but the two times that I've tried it at home since it's been a disaster. Little Miss Grabby-hands has made me spill it- twice! Both the therapists believe that if we can get the reflux under control the rest will follow. While observing her eating some solids they noted that she processes foods like a 5 month old so she's developmentally behind in that respect, but it's all related to the reflux in the end. Does that make sense?
The therapists also encouraged us to start trying to hold her when we're feeding her. This is easier said than done. She's typically very squirmy and arches her back and twists her head around so we've started feeding her in a little reclined seat- similar to a bouncy seat. When she's sitting there we have a free hand to dangle a toy in her face to distract her. When she's sufficiently distracted, she'll go to town with that bottle. Since our appointment yesterday, I've tried feeding her in my arms several times but it isn't working. We're trying though and we'll continue to do so until we get this thing figured out. The medicine is the key to it all. I'm convinced that if we can find a trick to effectively deliver the medication everything else will fall into place. We have a standing appointment on Tuesday afternoon so we'll see what kind of progress we're able to make in the next week.
Thanks for checking in and for all of the kind & encouraging comments after my last post regarding our feeding woes!

A Weekend in Pictures....

I'm running a little short on time today but I wanted to get some pictures posted from a really fun weekend. My parents were in town visiting for Ally's first Halloween. Highlights included taking a trip to the Norfolk Botanical Gardens, attending a Halloween party at our neighbor's home, dinner at a favorite local restaurant with Matthew's parents, lots of long walks, a shopping trip to Williamsburg, church & brunch with Bonnie, and lots of laughs together.

Thanks Dad & Ann- loved having you here!

Without further ado- here are the pictures. More soon.

Little Pumpkin Ally- she wouldn't keep the hat on

Our happy Halloween family

Getting ready for bed time with daddy

Reading a book in the sunshine with Grandma Ann

At the Botanical Gardens with Daddy

Sweet girl at the gardens

Mommy, Daddy & Ally

Ally with Grandpa Nick & Grandma Ann

I took this shot on the fly and unfortunately cropped out most of my dad's head but I still thought it was pretty cute

Crossing the bridge at the gardens

On our way to a Halloween party on Saturday night

Relaxing with Grandpa Nick on Sunday morning

Enjoying some sunshine with Grandma Ann

Family picture- taken Sunday morning before church- we were trying to get Ally to look at the camera but she wasn't having it.