Thanksgiving success

It was sad to not be able to spend Thanksgiving with Mom, Dad, Melisa and Scott this year but we managed to have a wonderful Thanksgiving dinner thanks to Oma Ronnie and Opa Peter's hospitaliy. The food was amazing and it didnt have to do with the 2 sides I brought. Thank you Veronika for the wonderful dinner for the 6 of us. It was also very nice to see Rich, Ev and the kids too when they dropped by for dessert. Liesl had a great time with the kids, especially Helena who played dolls with her and cuddled by the TV watching Barbie Christmas with her. I remember when Helena was her age, she is so big now. All of those kids are.

Liesl has been working hard for the past 2 weeks on her potty training. We have been using a caper chart whicha has a little bit of other things on it to get her lots of stickers for doing things well. I do believe she is going on a week plus of dry days now. We should have started the stickers earlier. It also helps me not get frustrated seeing how well she has has been doing with everything. Next task, teeth brushing.

As well as she has been doing with potty training she has been back pedaling on the sleep since the time change. I hate time changes. It screws up the whole schedule. But I suppose with me out of work that she is getting a lot more sleep anyways now that I dont have to drive her in the wee morning hours. Hopefully we can keep up this lifestyle that we are living. We have cut a lot of corners and I am enjoying spending more time with everyone in our little family and being able to focus more on nurturing the baby inside of me.

Last week Liesl and I visited the farm center and nature center with Gavin and Heather. It was quite an adventure as we got to see 2 twin calves that were only 5 hours old. They were very cute and it was nice to see the calves with thier mother as I have never seen one in the pen with it's mother before. The mothers have been seperated from thier calves every time I have been to the farm. Thank god I couldnt smell as well as Heather that day, she said the smell was horrific. I guess I was starting to get the cold I am experiencing now. Liesl and I have been doing a lot of resting for the past couple days to try and knock it out but I dont know if it is doing too much good. We are going to try and go to the movies again today to see Muppets with Kimmee. I dont know why I torture myself so......We shall see how she behaves. Last time it wasnt the movie theatre she misbehaved in it was the restraunt afterwards. That will not be a reoccurrance. I think one thing.....especially if she behaves we should not risk screwing up the good feeling.

Halloween went well, Liesl went as Rapunzel, thank you Dennis for the wonderful costume. She gets into wearing it every other day. In fact I had to tear it off her to make sure she didnt get milk on it when she was eating her cereal. She had a very fun time tooling the neighborhood around Shannon's new house with Shannon's little sister Chloe. They held hands the whole time which was good to keep them both contained. Again, another child I cannot believe has grown so much. She was also a bigtime sweetheart to Liesl. They did several streets around the house and she is still trying to make her way through her stash right now. She loved all of the lights and decorations on all of the houses and told Shannon and I that they were beautiful and wanted to walk around and see as much as she could. She even loved walking around on Tillson St which most kids would find scary. I dont know if that is a good or a bad thing.

Looking forward to finding out the sex of the new baby coming. I am either 20 or 21 weeks along now so I am into my second trimester. I dont know how much better I am feeling... At least I dont have the nausia anymore. I am into the acid reflux now. What the heck? took me til almost the last couple weeks to start up with that. I dont think I am gaining anything with this pregnancy. Last time I went in they said I had but of course I had the soft cast on my foot from the ankle twisting incident. Thank god I am feeling a lot better from that. I am a little unsteady still so hangining onto the gear to make sure I am prepared if I start to feel weak there anymore. I think I am past that though. It's always gotta be something doesnt it. I couldnt believe I took a tumble like that right before I was going to lose my health insurance. Well I am all hooked up now again and able to go to the Dr on the 5th when mom comes back to find out the sex of the baby. It will be good to be able to label the baby better than "It". I am of course putting off finding out til mom gets back from her trip. I couldnt go without her. I am starting to feel some definate kicks that I think others would feel if they had thier hands on my belly. I have definately been feeling the baby for a while now but it felt like bubbles not pushing. Having the experience from the first one helps me know signs earlier.

Photos to come soon. I have been saving them up for a while. I just need to get something in writing before I get too far behind.