2010 in numbers

My goal was to complete my 2010 year in review post within ten days of the beginning of the new year.... I have 32 minutes to spare!

In 2010...

We gained 1 danish daughter

I took 2 pregnancy tests (one positive just isn't enough!)

We had 3 visits to Children's Mercy Urgent Care

Derek and I celebrated our 4 wedding anniversary

We participated in a 5k each (Derek ran his, I walked mine)

Our family got struck by 6 stomach viruses

I had 7 prenatal appointments

We rented 8 redbox movies

We visited a combined total of 9 states
(MO, KS, IA, MN, OK, TX, IL, SC, GA)

Derek spent 10 weeks at basic training

A few more...

I completed 13 graduate hours

Julie celebrated her Sweet 16th birthday

We enjoyed 17 days of having Derek home at Christmas

Derek is currently training as a 25B (information technology specialist)

Julie scored 26 points in her first American basketball game
Derek can do 53 push-ups and 61 sit-ups within two minutes time frame each

My blog reached 101 blog followers

I posted  169 blog posts and 928 tweets

It's been a crazy year. Overwhelming and scary at times, but fun and exciting too! I think one of the biggest things we learned as a family this year is that life happens fast! We've embraced that and we're ready 2011!

Family Pictures

What better way to celebrate the holiday season than with family pictures? 

We didn't actually go for our us, but for Derek's whole family! 

Top: Me, Derek, Brad (brother), Mary (sis-in-law)

Middle: Linda (mom), Forrest (dad)

Bottom: Jackson, Gabe (nephew)

We did get some good shots of our family, though. And this one of Jackson and Derek is one of my fave ever!

Here's our little stinker- showcasing the *only* actual smile from the entire evening... and he's only smiling because he's been promised a tic-tac. Notice the nice big boo-boo on his forehead?! It's a mystery to us how it go there, but having some sort of mark on his face has become the norm these days. 

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Last Christmas we took the cousins to get their pics taken and we decided to do it again and make it a tradition. Waaaaay easier said than done. I'm totally not even looking forward to adding another little girl into the mix next year! (I'm excited about the girl, just not the process of getting pics.)

(These pictures were taken in the afternoon before the above pictures and Jackson didn't smile here either. No idea what got into this boy. He was nearly in tears when I asked him to smile-- the kid who has been called the happiest-kid-alive and has never met a stranger. At least we ended up with a few!)

Jackson and Gabe are wearing the overalls that were gifts from Great-Grandpa-- so we invited him along too! He is one proud Papa and the boys love him!

We're a pretty good lookin' family if I do say so myself!

We have a name and other baby news

Even though I'm only two weeks further along than when I picked Derek up at the airport, I feel as though as if I am about six weeks closer to being prepared for this little baby girl. My focus had always been on getting Derek home for Christmas and as soon as that happened my mind cleared up and I had time and energy to focus on baby things. Yay!

First and foremost, we have a plan. Well, as much as a plan as you can have regarding having a baby. This alone has been the most complicated, thought-provoking issue. We want Derek home... but we cannot have Derek missing class or a test and falling out of his graduation group. There is a room full of soldiers who fell behind for countless reasons that spend their days looking for the end of the internet day after day just waiting for a spot to open up for them to join a new class and graduate. For some it's just a day or two, a few weeks, others wait around for months. This is NOT an option. Fortunately, the weekend before my due date is a holiday weekend. We have had an induction planned (yes, I would rather the baby girl come on her own... but not more than having the opportunity for her daddy to be there when she comes) for Friday, February 18th. Derek is talking to his COs sometime this week (pending good moods... he'll wait if they are grumpy!) and we should know if he gets approved leave. Please, please pray for it to be approved. And then go ahead and pray for the baby to stay put until that day! We've decided that if she were to come early, we will just have him wait to come home on that weekend as to guarantee that he's not missing out on anything. As of right now, there is no plan B if he isn't granted time to come home. I guess I will just deal with that if it becomes an issue.

We do have a name. Finally. As in, we figured it out on the way to drop Derek off at the airport on Monday. Despite the pleas of everyone around us, we'll keep it to ourselves until she arrives. It's nothing personal. I just know of several people who've regretted telling because they were talked out of a name. I've decided I'd rather have people complain at my decision not to share than to bear people bombarding me with their perfect names as if I have never ever yet heard of them. And to expect me to say, "Oh yes! That's what we'll name her. I will just call my husband right now and let him know because you would know better than us about what to name her!". It's one thing to get a few sentimental suggestions here and there from family, but the other day in the pretzel line at the mall a woman was passionate that I strongly consider Sonya for the name of my child. Seriously.

We've made headway on where the little girl will call home! My Christmas gift from Dad was a cabinet for the empty hole in our bedroom that will serve as her dresser/changing table. I painted it. Dad and Derek started getting it set up... I'm so excited! We've actually got a plan for what her "space" will look like!

This is me at 31 weeks with the new cabinet!! 

(my belly has grown three inches since this picture)

*How far along?: 32 weeks, 5 days

*How big is your baby?: almost 4 pounds, approx. 19 inches

*Total weight gain?: 12 lbs. (only two over the holidays! That's typical for the average non-pregnant American!)

*Sex: Girl

*Maternity clothes: I feel like I wear the exact same thing all of the time 

*Stretch marks: Ugh. Yes. But how can I avoid them when my stomach grows three inches in matter of 14 days!
*Movement: All. of. the. time. 

*Sleep: Sleep was fabulous when Derek was home. I didn't end up sleeping on my back as much and so I didn't wake up being uncomfortable a lot. 

*Best moment this week: Having Derek home!! He got to feel the baby move a lot. We made a plan, got her space a little more ready, and picked out a name.

*Food cravings: Nothing too crazy. I will be purchasing Pizza Goldfish and chocolate ice cream when I go to the store next.
*Labor signs: I've started to get sporadic contractions... talk about annoying!

*Belly button in or out: more like a nothing... It's no longer in, but it's not quite out.

*What I miss: being able to walk up a flight of stairs without feeling as if I just completed a marathon

*What I'm looking forward to: Getting all of the final stuff together for her to come!

The Holidays

Our holiday festivities this year went as follows:

December 23rd- Mom's Birthday
We headed up to my home town for a birthday/Christmas celebration with all of my Mom's side of the family. Grandma, aunts and uncles, cousins (and their kids!)-- there were nearly a kazillion people in Grandma's house. It reminded me of Christmas growing up and it was so nice! Before we opened our stockings, everyone sat in the room together and shared memories of Christmas with Grandma. That was really just a special time.

Me and Grandma!

Top: Jackson showing off his first (of many) toothbrush from his stocking, Mom singing "I'm a little teapot"

Bottom: The big kids had a toilet paper snowman contest (Julie, Julian, and Erin won!), and then the little kids had lots of fun playing in the left over toilet paper!

Christmas Eve

We started out the day with a Hardee's Breakfast- biscuits and gravy. Amazingness! We then drove through a snow/slush storm to Derek's Grandma's house. We met up with Derek's parents along with his brother and family while we were there. It was great to get to spend some one-on-one time with Grandma! ( I'm just now realizing that I didn't take pictures with my camera. Making a mental note to get them from Mary soon!)

Julie was able to "spend" Christmas with her family in Denmark via Skype that afternoon. Christmas Eve is the day they open presents and do the majority of the celebrating, so she was able to be a part of that for awhile. She took turns opening presents with her family, which she had been very eager to open ever since the packages (three!) arrived a week earlier.

Per our holiday tradition, our family headed to the Christmas Eve service at church that evening. The Christmas Eve service may be my very favorite part of the whole Christmas celebration! Derek's family came over for awhile afterwards. Derek and I ended up staying up until after 1am wrapping presents.

Christmas Day
Derek was the first one up (before dawn) on Christmas morning. I keep waiting for him to outgrow this tradition, but I am losing faith that will ever happen. He promises that he didn't wake Jackson up, but I have my doubts.

Even though the concept of presents was brand new to Jackson (one from Grandma on the 23rd and one more from Great-Grandma on the 24th) it didn't take long for him to grasp the concept. Halfway through reading the Bible story, Jackson attempted to cease the talking and begin the opening. He's two for goodness sake. Not only did he open (very, very slowly-- about one inch of wrapping paper at a time) all of his presents, but helped the rest of us as well.

We headed over to Derek's parents for lunch (and more presents). Several of Derek's extended family stopped by and it was good visiting with everyone. Derek was more than bummed to miss out on the annual Risk game, but on a positive note, it meant that we weren't around for the yelling and bad-mouthing that happens during those games.

Jackson and cousin Gabe!

Could our child be any more spoiled?! 

And as much as I have told EVERYONE that Jackson does not need anymore balls, people insist on buying him balls. All of the balls in this house are actually packed away... but somehow they keep multiplying. Jackson enjoyed playing with his basketball at Grandma's house at least. 

And later Christmas afternoon, my parents drove down for dinner... and more presents. We had a super fun time playing The Game of Things and we got to experience Derek's major (hilarious) parenting fail as well! It involved a farting app on Derek's phone, Jackson, and a swear word. I won't go into any more detail because I know that some of my family who read this won't really find it all that humorous.

Seriously... more balls!!! UGH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

(Jackson's Grandpas just LOVE to play ball inside but I will bet you a MILLION dollars that neither of them would have allowed for ball throwing inside with their children. I am seriously considering placing those two grown men in time out soon!)

 

My siblings plus me and my gang 

Julie, Laura, Jackson, Derek, Me, Phil, and Ashley

Overall, this was simply one of the best Christmas's I've ever had. And I am convinced it was because the focus was all on spending time on family and not on gifts and gadgets. (We did end up with some awesome gifts, though) I hope that I will remember in years to come to keep the focus of this holiday on the things that matter!!

Life is still good

I can't wait to share pictures and stories of having Derek back in our lives over the past two weeks! Time went by so quickly, but at the same time, we really made the most of it and so it feels like it was a lot longer than just a couple weeks. I am quite surprised with myself. I don't even feel too sad at the moment. Instead, I feel so refreshed (despite being exhausted) from having him home and confident that the next ten weeks will be a breeze. Okay, maybe not a breeze, but I know that we'll make it. This separation is only temporary and this break showed me that our family will bounce back in no time once he's home in March.

While these past two weeks were quite possibly the best two weeks ever, I cannot deny that I have missed my online social media. Gmail. Facebook. Twitter. Blogger... do you even recognize me!? Don't get me wrong, I would give them all up if it meant that Derek was here right now instead of on a plane headed back to Georgia...

But he is not. And instead of being a complete mess, I am enjoying a nice relaxing evening catching up on my google reader, emails, tweets, etc. I had full expectations of uploading all of my recent pictures and begin posting about them tonight, but that's just not going to happen. It didn't hit me until I was driving out of the parking garage at the airport how exhausted I am from going, going, and going so much while Derek was home! I will definitely be going to bed early tonight and will enjoy a nice lazy day tomorrow (thanks to my mother who has Jackson-duty) to recoup... and sometime over the next 24 hours I know that I will eventually end up a crying mess. That's just easier dealt when I'm not responsible for a little person who can't understand why Mommy is sad at the moment.

Overall though, I refuse to feel too sorry for myself. What a blessing it was to have him home! We're all healthy and happy. We're surrounded by amazing friends and family. And even though we're hundreds of miles apart, we still have each other. Life is still good.