Pennsylvania Road Trip

Last Monday we started out on Sarah's biggest road trip to date.  Dad, Robert, Sarah, and I started our journey to Pennsylvania to visit my dad's side of the family.  We left MO Monday morning and stopped for the evening in Springfield, OH.  Sarah traveled very well and really didn't need to stop any more often than we would have stopped anyway.  We got a nice suite and all slept pretty well.  We got back on the road again on Tuesday morning and arrived to my grandparents' house in time for some delicious pizza.  We made a pit stop on the way there and squeezed in a quick trip at Penn State.  We had to get some ice cream at The Creamery and get a picture with the Nittany Lion statue!

After the world's largest poopy diaper

Everybody instantly fell in love with Sarah.  She has a way with people!  Robert, Sarah, and I stayed nearby at The White Birch Inn, and we would highly recommend it.  It was nice to have our own space, the room was clean, the bed was comfortable, the manager was friendly, and the breakfast was delicious!

Our time in PA was great!
Wednesday - Recovered from the trip and enjoyed games, chatting, and watching Sarah be adorable
Thursday - The guys went golfing while the girls hung around the house.
Friday - Dad, Robert, Sarah, and I went to Benton to enjoy feeding the ducks and fish, hiking around Ricketts Glen, driving around town, and eating lunch and ice cream.

Saturday - Aunt Cathy, Robert, Sarah, and I went to a fall festival and enjoyed looking at the craft booths, eating some tasty food, and being out in the fresh fall air.  The trees were gorgeous during our time in PA!

We started the journey back home on Sunday and made it to Lexington, KY.  Sarah traveled well again.  The final day of the trip (Monday) was the roughest, but it definitely could have been worse.  Sarah was just over the car seat, so we had to stop every hour and a half to two hours.  Sarah even slept through her first snow on the way home!

We're so glad we got to make this trip!  We're thankful for our family, and I know we made lots of good memories!

Sarah At Two Months

Stats
Length: 23.3" (85%)
Weight: 12lbs 3oz (70%)
Head circumference: 15.3" (73%)

Sleeping
Sarah is making great strides in the sleep department.  She's always been a good sleeper, but she's started sleeping longer stretches.  At night she's started being able to go for about 7.5 hours without a feeding!!!  She usually takes a big nap in her crib in the afternoon for 2-3 hours.  She also takes smaller naps throughout the day in her car seat/stroller, swing, and our arms.  She has officially made it three nights without a nighttime feeding!!!

Eating
She eats 4-5 ounces 6 times a day.  It's crazy to think that just two months ago she only ate 1/3 ounce each time she ate.  She loves her bottle and cries when you take it out of her mouth to burp her.  She knows what she wants!

Personality
This girl could be nicknamed Smiley Sarah!  She knows how to steal your heart with her sweet smiles, squeals and coos, and twinkling eyes.  She's a happy girl.  She's always looking intently at something and studying things.  She locks in and really focuses.  I think she's going to be a funny girl.  She already knows how to make us laugh!

Health and Physical Ability
Sarah is still struggling with the clogged tear duct in her left eye off and on.  I want it to feel all better soon!  Sarah loves laying on her activity mat and hitting the red fox.  She kicks her legs and swats her arms around.  She can lift up her head and chest together and turn her head for more than a minute.  When you hold her upright she loves lifting her head and doing her own tummy time.  When she does tummy time she likes to scoot her legs like she wants to crawl but just doesn't know how to do it yet.  I think she's soooo close to rolling over.

Superficial
She has a bit of an old man hairdo - thick on the sides and back, thinner on top - but it's so cute!  She has big, beautiful, blue eyes.  Her long fingers are so dainty.  Her tummy is rounding out, and she's getting quite the belly and double chin.  0-3 month clothing is starting to get a bit snug, and we've put her in a few 3-6 month outfits.

Dear Sarah,
You are an example of God's handiwork.  He made you to be you, and nobody else in the history of humankind is quite like you.  I hope you always like being you, because you are awesome!  Thank you for teaching me how to go with the flow and not try to plan out everything in my day.  Thank you for letting me snuggle you.  I hope you always know and feel loved by Dad and me.  We love you, baby doll!

September 2015

September is always a busy month for us, and this year has been no exception!

My dad's birthday is 9/5, and mine is 9/8, so we did a combo birthday party with Labor Day.  We enjoyed a great dinner at Jim and Taylor's house and had a super fun day all around.  Robert snagged some four generation pictures for us!

The next day, on my actual birthday, I went out for lunch with Becky, but otherwise had a fairly normal day.  It's a different kind of birthday when you have a one month old.  I don't think she knew it was my birthday and didn't let me off the hook in the diaper and feeding departments.

I started MOPS (Moms of Preschoolers) this month.  It's at an Assembly of God church about 20 minutes from our house, so it's a bit of a drive, but I chose this location because I know someone who attends MOPS here, and they meet on the first and third Tuesday of the month from 9:30-11:30 which works well for my schedule.  I didn't want to set too high of expectations since I really didn't know what it would be like, but I really liked it!  I've been assigned a table to sit at all year.  The table has a conversation leader who has elementary age children, a mentor (aka grandma), and six of us moms of preschoolers.  We've only had our first meeting so far, and it was mostly an instructional, get to know you meeting, but I'm really looking forward to our future get togethers.  I think it'll be a great time to share stories and experiences who are in the same season of life as I am.

I had my 6 week OBGYN follow up appointment this month as well.  It was great to see Dr. Graves and nurse Gail again, especially since Gail had never met Sarah.  I obviously didn't mind the opportunity to show off Sarah to the office.  I thanked Dr. Graves again for taking care of my needs so well during my delivery and after.  She's great, and I'd recommend her to anyone!

Okay, so I grew up on Aldi.  When Robert and I started dating I introduced him to the awesomeness of Aldi, and he's a total convert.  The Aldi that we shop at is the busiest one in the country, and I totally believe it.  You basically have to walk at a snail's pace to go down the aisles.  Anyway, a couple of months after moving here we heard that Aldi was coming to a suburb of us, and we got very excited knowing that we could either shop at this new Aldi or that maybe our Aldi would be less busy because other people would go to the new Aldi.  My dad saw an article in the newspaper saying that Aldi would have some great giveaways for their grand opening, so we couldn't resist!  We got a $5 coupon in the mail - Aldi NEVER does coupons, so it was kind of monumental.  Anyway, the first 100 people would get a prize.  Guess who was #66!  Woop woop!  We got a $25 gift certificate and free grocery tote.  We also entered into a contest to win free produce but didn't win.  It was still kind of cool to be there for the first day, and it's definitely classier than any other Aldi I've ever been to before.

Mom's fifth grade students came to town for a field trip, and she invited me to meet up with them at a park for a bit so they could see me and meet Sarah.  The quote of the experience would be, "She is the definition of adorable." :)

Robert and I hadn't been to SBU homecoming since 2012, so we were very excited to be able to attend this year.  Of course, we loved getting to see the bed races, parade, and lots of friends, but the best part was seeing my mom receive the Life Service Award.  My mom is such a great person and very deserving on this award.  Here's a link to some info about it.  Mom's sisters, Pam and Dana, came to town for homecoming and got to meet Sarah for the first time, too!

By SBU's new fountain

Honors chapel to receive the Life Service Award

Second generation friends hanging at the parade

The happy family - note Dad feeding Sarah behind Robert's head

Sarah's First Road Trip

On September 18 and 19 we made a whirlwind road trip to Mississippi (just outside of Memphis, TN).  It was a bit last minute as we decided about 3 days in advance to meet Robert's dad, Ray, and his wife, Terri, there as a halfway point between MO and AL.  This was Sarah's first out of state road trip, and I was a bit nervous, but I shouldn't have been because she did such a great job! 

On Friday morning we woke up at 7:00 like usual and changed Sarah's diaper and outfit, fed her, and hit the road.  We'd already packed and loaded up the SUV the night before.  Theoretically, it's only a 5 hour drive, but we knew that we could potentially have to make 2 stops making this about a 7 hour trip.  However, Sarah was awesome and only needed to stop once at her normal feeding time around 9:30.  We stopped at a gas station for 45 minutes.  I changed Sarah's diaper while Robert went to the restroom, and then he fed her while I went to the restroom.  This would have been a short 15-20 minutes stop, but you really can't put Sarah in the car seat right after eating unless you want some major spit up action, so we just held her and let her stretch out for awhile.  She started fussing when we were about 5 minutes from the hotel, so we knew we could hold out, but we ended up getting in some traffic and having a screaming baby on our hands for 20 minutes.  Hopefully she doesn't hold it against us forever.

Sleeping like it's her job

I was the entertainer while Robert drove

The hotel was really nice, and we got there just a couple of minutes before Ray and Terri.  We had a suite style room which was nice so we could each have our own space.  The weekend was fairly low key.  I think Ray and Terri got in their share of baby snuggles and ooo's and ahh's over Sarah.  This was Terri's first time to meet Sarah, and Ray hadn't seen her since she was 4 or 5 days old.  We ate Corky's BBQ, and it was delicious!  Sarah did well in the restaurant, and a 3 year old girl next to us kept sneaking peaks and commenting on how cute she is!  After dinner we got ice cream at Baskin Robbins and I had the pleasure of getting peed on for the first time.  Baskin Robbins didn't seem to have a public restroom, so I went out to the SUV and changed her.  Fun times! ;)  

Sarah slept very well that night.  She hadn't ever had a full night in a pack n play before so I was a little unsure, but she just did her normal 3:00am wake up.  We enjoyed breakfast and lunch together and hit the road.  Sarah did just as well on the way home, only having to stop once.  We felt bad that she'd been in her car seat all day, so when we got home we took her for a walk in the Becco baby carrier.  Apparently the travel really took it out of her, because on Sunday morning she slept until 9:15!!!  She's such a teenager.  I'm so pleased with how this trip went, and it gave us hope for our upcoming road trips to KS and PA!

This girl is all set with her burp cloth, pacifier, and fox

We made it home!

Riding in the back with Sarah reminded me of all the time my mom spent entertaining me, specifically playing Barbies, in the back of our yellow Chevy Cavalier station wagon.  I hope Sarah loves Barbies as much as I did, because I'm definitely up for some serious doll time!