First nights away from my little buddy

I had to travel to Philadelphia for work on Wednesday this week, and it was the first time I have had to leave baby Frank overnight. Thankfully, Frank was able to stay in Dallas and work from home this week, so he was here to take care of Frankie. I was pretty nervous, and I left Frank a huge list of information so that he would be prepared while I was gone. Luckily, everything was fine and Frank did a great job taking care of him. I missed him so much when I was away, but I was able to catch an earlier flight home on Friday night, so I was able to see him and put him to sleep when I got home. I cried when I picked him up and he smiled a HUGE smile, like he was so happy to see me! His smile absolutely melts my heart. I am very excited to spend the weekend playing and catching up with my sweet boy.

Happy Easter

Happy Easter!! We had an absolute blast celebrating Easter with my family this year. Even though Frank is still too little to know any better, I really wanted to do all of the traditional stuff, so we colored Easter eggs, got him a basket full of candy, and had a visit from the Easter bunny. It was so much fun! I have always loved holidays, and I already see how much I am going to love them as a parent. My parents and brother Tyler came up from Houston for the weekend, and on Saturday night we cooked a big lamb dinner for everyone. Allison and Steve came over for dinner, and afterward we played a hilarious board game. It was so much fun, and it was so good to see everyone and celebrate such a special day. On Sunday we got up with Frankie and let him play with all of his new goodies from the Easter bunny. Frankie loved spending so much time with his Daddy this weekend, and I know he loved seeing Nana, Grandpa, Uncle Tyler, Uncle Steve, and Aunt Allison too!

On Sunday night we decided to try to give Frankie some carrots for dinner, and he loved them!! We have started having him sit at the table with us in his high chair and watch us eat dinner, and he has definitely showed interest in our food, so we decided to give it another try. It went really well, so I think we are going to try to feed him cereal in the mornings and veggies at night and see how he does.

Frank is going to be home this week, because I am going to Philadelphia later this week for work training. I am really sad to be leaving Frankie for the first time--I will be gone for three nights--but I am also pretty excited about having a little break and having three days to myself. I have not had any time to myself like that since before he was born, and I think it will be really nice to have that.

Here are some pictures from this weekend:

Me & my little man

the Proesch family

me & Tyler

Frankie, Mom, Dad, and me

hanging with Daddy

getting into the eggs

pretty eggs!

opening gifts from Nana and Grandpa

reading my new book with Grandpa

eating my Easter basket

my basket is as big as I am

Happy Easter!

my baseball basket

the Gramps

with Mommy & Daddy

with Al & Steve

funny face Grandpa!

my Aunt loves me!

I love mama

playing with Grandpa

5 months!

Happy five month birthday to my sweet little buddy! We love you so much and cannot believe how fast you are growing. Love, Mommy & Daddy

Happy Friday!

All smiles sitting up like a big boy (almost)

whoa, Mommy!

loves watching TV

loves his monkey Magoo!

so frustrated b/c he can't move the monkeys!

Frankie

e have officially decided to call the baby Frankie. Calling him Frank is just too confusing, and this is the nickname that seems to have stuck. I still call him Mr. Magoo a lot, but I don't want him to think that is his name! My Mom started calling him Frankie immediately, and my entire family slowly caught on, and now, even Frank and I are calling him that. So I thought I would give you some updates on little Frankie!

*he is wearing size 3 diapers and size 9 month or 6-12 month clothes. I recently washed and pulled out all of his 9-month clothes, and I was shocked to see that some of them are already almost too small for him! He seems to be growing so quickly, it is nuts! He is almost as long as the width of his crib, and I keep praying he does not smack himself in the head while sleeping.

*he is sleeping almost exclusively on his stomach now. He has been sleeping much better at night, usually sleeping through the night until I wake him up at 6:45. Every now and then he wakes up at some point during the night and cries for a few minutes, but he is able to put himself back to sleep, which is nice.

*he has outgrown the swing, so we have just started putting him in his crib for naps. Today he took a 1.5 hour nap in there, which is better than he has ever done! I was so proud of him. He naps fine in the crib at day care, so hopefully the transition won't be too hard.

*he has no interest in eating cereal. We have been giving it to him for almost two weeks now, and even tried mixing it with bananas, but he just does not seem interested. So we are going to hold off for a few days and then try again.

*he miraculously appears not to have caught my strep throat or flu, although I suspect he had one of them a couple of weeks ago when the doctor told me he had "allergies."

*he spends a LOT of time on his tummy these days and he seems to love it. I think he will be an early crawler because of it.

*he does not care much for sitting, but he can sit unassisted for about 10 seconds before toppling over. He much prefers being on his tummy to sitting up.

*he is mesmerized by Frank's voice. When he is talking, he stares at him, it is so cute.

*he gets upset around new people, but especially new men, and it takes him a few minutes to remember people who he has not seen in awhile, like my parents.

*he plays with a purpose and he gets very intense when trying to figure something out. It is so neat and amazing to watch him master new skills and it is so funny to watch him get frustrated when he just can't do something.

*he is still a very happy baby, and he always wakes up in the mornings with a big smile!

*his favorite place to be is outside. He loves the sounds, the smells, and looking around at everything.

*His second favorite place to be is in the bathtub. He loves being naked, and he loves splashing in the water. However, he hates bubbles--we tried to play with them in the bathtub last week and he got really scared!

*He likes to touch EVERYTHING.

*He is the absolute love of our lives and we treasure spending time with him. Even though we are so busy, Frankie is such a blessing and we are thankful every day that he is here!

Here are some pictures of Frankie from this week:

loving the great outdoors

playing with my feet

staring up at Daddy, mesmerized!

hanging with Nana

big blue eyes

what are you looking at?

being silly

looking suspicious

my little cutie!

Sick & tired of being sick!

So I have been sick for the last two weeks. For the first week, I assumed that I just had a cold, and I was very congested with a sore throat. Then, on Friday of last week, I felt like I had a fever at work all day, and I came home and discovered that I had a low fever. I started to feel a lot of pressure in my head, but I figured that it was something minor probably, like a sinus infection. I spent the rest of the weekend resting, and I started to feel worse and worse each day--definitely feverish, intense headache, ear pain, and still tons of congestion. I decided to go to the doctor on Monday, and I found out that I have strep throat and the flu!!! I couldn't believe it. When I got to the doctor on Monday, I had a fever above 102. I was pretty much miserable all week. I broke down after I went to the doctor and asked my mom to come up to Dallas and stay with me until I was well enough to go to work. She drove up on Tuesday afternoon, and was a huge lifesaver!!! I don't think I would have been able to handle taking care of Frankie and myself at the same time while feeling so sick.

On Monday evening after my appointment I went to CVS to pick up my medicine, and I waited in the drive through lane for about 30 minutes--without moving--when Frankie started screaming in the back seat. I decided to go inside to get the medicine, and I unwisely just carried Frank in with me, and went to the end of the huge line inside. It took another 35 minutes to get up to the register, and most of the people in front of me were still waiting on the sideline to get their prescriptions filled. The poor cash register must have taken pity on me (I am sure I looked insanely sick as I was sweating profusely and shaking with a fever and having to carry my 16-lb baby for so long), because she filled my prescription right then and I was able to leave without waiting anymore. Thank goodness!!!! The doctor gave me Tamiflu and antibiotics, but those medicines were not helping me with my fever, pressure in my head, or my congestion, so I also was taking extra strength tylenol and cold medicine. I wasn't sure if I could take tylenol with the other meds, so I didn't for the first 15 hours or so, and I was absolutely dying.

Finally, by Thursday, I started to feel better! Even today, I am still very congested, and I am still feeling pressure in my head in the evenings, but the worst has passed. My mom was a huge help this week, taking care of both me and Frankie. She cooked me dinner, made me milk shakes, washed all the bottles, and kept me company. I don't know what I would do without her, and it is times like this that I really wish she and my Dad lived in Dallas. Actually, I wish that all the time!!! MOVE HERE MOM & DAD!! This whole episode has also made me realize that I may need to hire a nanny. I am going to begin the nanny search again this week and see if we can find someone. I really like the day care that Frankie goes to, but I cannot handle getting sick so much! It is just too much for me to work full time, have Frank travelling for work and doing grad school and reserves on the weekend when you throw in getting sick all the time on top of it. So we'll see what happens!

Spring cleaning = clothes for sale!

A couple of weekends ago, I got the urge to clean out my closet. I got all of my maternity clothes and took them out of the closet to put in storage for possible future use. Then I decided to try on all of my dresses and work clothes and get rid of everything that does not fit me. Unfortunately (for me) a LOT of stuff did not fit. So I took a ton of stuff over to Goodwill, and one of my friends put a bunch of my nicer items for sale on Ebay. You can access all of the stuff for sale at this site: http://shop.ebay.com/bigcbass/m.html?_dmd=1&_ipg=50&_sop=12&_rdc=1 I have dresses, jeans, a couple of purses, shoes, and some shirts on there, so go check it out!!! Most of this stuff was only worn once or twice.

Here are some pictures of some of the items for sale:

black BCBG halter dress (worn 2 times)

brown BCBG halter dress

cream & black Phoebe Couture dress (worn 2 times)

diane von furstenburg wrap shirt (worn 2 times)BCBG silver sequined cocktail dress (worn once)

green Milly cocktail dress (worn two times)

white house black market cream cocktail dress

red nanette lepore halter top (worn 2 times)
black Botkier purse
pink Marc Jacobs purse
black and white Nanette Lepore dress
my "honeymoon" dress--Nanette Lepore
black beaded Cache dress (worn twice)