Digging in the Dirt

We had some summer-like temps here last week.
It was HOT.
I think one day we hit 86 degrees.
Too hot for spring, if you ask me...
but we did get Wren outside every day.
She loves it outside.
Every time we go to let the dog out, Wren tries to go out, too.

Here she is helping Chris dig up the dirt from the raised bed...


Helping Daddy.

Diggin' in the dirt.

Pretty hard work here, Mom.

I sure do love my yellow shovel.

 

Super cute gardening set from Grandpa and Grandma B!

Collecting (and hopefully not eating) rocks.

IMA

Last Saturday we spent our afternoon at the Indianapolis Museum of Art.
Chris and I have always loved going there.
This was Wren's very first trip!
We ate lunch inside at Nourish Cafe...
it's seriously one of our favorite places to eat.
They use awesome ingredients in their dishes...
you know, free-range chicken, grass-fed beef, seasonal produce, sustainable and local products...
all of that stuff that is important to us and that we are a bit crazy about.  :)
Oh, and let me tell you, their food is sooooo yummy.
I ordered the cheese and asparagus ravioli with white beans, fennel, roasted tomato, squash, capers, rainbow carrots, and vegetable broth.
Chris ordered the open-faced pot roast sandwich with carrots, potatoes, and provolone.
He also got a bowl of chicken noodle soup with corn bread.
I love their corn bread!
As expected, Wren ate and enjoyed everything we ordered!

After lunch, we headed outside to the IMA's 100 Acres.
It was a beautiful day, so we strolled around the trails a bit.
After a while, we posted up in a shady spot, threw down a blanket, and let Wren play in the grass.
It was such a nice, relaxing afternoon!

Oh, and on the way home we passed a Dairy Queen***(see note below) offering the deal of the century.
Buy 6 Dilly bars, get 10 FREE!
I know, amazing, right?
So, after a quick pit stop, we were on our way home with 16 Dilly bars to go.
What are you going to do with 16 Dilly bars, you say?
Well, Chris has been trying to eat them morning, noon, and night.
No joke.
The other morning he woke up and asked if he could have one for breakfast.
Seriously.
I think he ended up eating 3 that day.
Fortunately, my friend Meghan had a cookout over at her house on Sunday, so we brought a bag of 8 over to share.
We may have one lone Dilly bar floating around our freezer somewhere, that is if Chris hasn't already gotten to it...

***Note:  Unfortunately, unlike Nourish Cafe, Dairy Queen DOES NOT offer local, sustainable, free-range anything.  But, despite popular belief, we still do sometimes eat it (the ice cream, anyway).  :)

Anyway... here are some pics from the day.
I wish I would have taken more, but I didn't... so this is what you get!
:)


Wren excited to be strolling around the 100 Acres.

Family shot!
The 10 second camera timer is much too long for Wren to sit still, obviously.

At least this time she's not trying to get away!

Running around in the grass.

Daddy is trying to nap...

...not happening when Tickle-Moster-Wren is around!

She's trying to peek inside his arms at him.

Wake up, Daddy!

A drink, a snack, and a cell.
She's set.

Hold on a sec, Mom...
just gonna text Cousin Macy real quick.
:)

"He Loves Me, He Loves Me Not..."

I let Wren have a flower to play with from a bouquet of flowers Chris brought home for me a while back.

She loved it, as you can see. 

This poor flower met it's demise with Wren pulling off every single petal in "he loves me, he loves me not" fashion. 

It kept her pretty entertained for quite a while.  

 

"What, Mom?"

"Here, I saved some for you!"

Extras

I was cleaning up pictures on the camera the other day, and I came across some of these from around Valentine's Day.
I know it was a while ago, but I thought I would share them anyway...


She loves her pretty skirt.

...and her balloon.

Baby howler monkey face!

I think she's dancing.... she's always dancing lately.
Any kind of music makes her move.
Even if you just sing a nursery rhyme or something.
The girl loves to move.
You can see her dancing video here.

T.P. Monster Strikes Again

She's baaaaaaaaaaack....


My little toilet paper monster.

Toilet paper at our house cannot be left anywhere where Wren can get her thieving little hands on it.
Seriously.
She loves the stuff.
In the hallway bathroom, we have to put it up on the sink.
In our bathroom, we just leave the door shut.
MOST of the time.
I say most of the time because occasionally one of us will forget...
and if we can't find Wren...
the first place to look is in our bathroom,
where the door was probably accidentally left open.
 And, yep, there she is...
with half the roll undone.
Or she's all wrapped up in it like a mummy.
Or, my personal favorite, is when she grabs a long sheet of it and runs all around the house while tearing off itty bitty pieces, leaving a wonderful little toilet paper trail everywhere she goes.
Kinda like Hansel and Gretel.
So much fun to clean up, too.
Let me tell ya.

Here she is with her coveted prize.

...and here she is eating it.

This is the toilet paper trail I was talking about.
Now, imagine these little pieces all over the house.
All. Over.

Helping me pick up her little paper mess.

...and now eating it.
Lovely.

Loss

It happened to me.  

And I so foolishly never thought it could.  

I always bypassed all of the chapters about it in the books I read.

That won't happen to me, I thought.

I'm young and healthy... I'm safe, I thought.

But it did happen....

I had a miscarriage at the end of February. 

And although we weren't trying to have another baby, it doesn't mean I wasn't excited.

And although we weren't trying to have another baby, it doesn't make it hurt any less.

The beginning of October was the due date.

So many thoughts and emotions were going through my head when we found out.

Scared and nervous at first... Wren and the new baby will only be 18 months apart.  Can we do this?

And then happy and excited... Wren's going to be a wonderful big sister!  We can do this! 

Then one morning I woke up bleeding.

Too much blood to be okay.

Chris and I spent most of that morning at the doctor's office.

They couldn't tell us much at first... except that I was losing a moderate amount of blood.  

Some women do bleed throughout their pregnancy, the doctor said.

Some women go on to have absolutely normal pregnancies, the doctor said.

They ran the entire gamut of tests.

Ultrasounds, blood tests, internal exams... but they still didn't know for sure.

I thought I was 8 weeks along, the doctor thought closer to 6.

It may be too early to see anything on the ultrasound yet, she said.

Don't give up hope yet, she said.

So we waited.

I went back 2 days later for more tests.

And we waited.

Finally, a call back.

Your hormone levels are dropping, she said.

I'm so sorry you have to go through this, she said.

Absolute heartache.

Something may have been not quite right, they all say.
I know this.

It's nature's way of taking care of things, they all say.
I know this.  

But I also know this... it does not matter. 

No one can say anything at the time to make it hurt any less.

Because it does hurt.
Emotionally.  Physically.
And it still hurts.
But I have had time to think.

To reflect, recover.

And I am all right... really, I am.

Everything happens for a reason.  

I do truly believe this.
And life goes on.
It must... and it does.

I am so grateful for all that I have.
My wonderful, loving husband.
My beautiful, happy baby girl.
My amazing support system of family and friends.

But there will always be that tiny part of me missing...

The baby that was... and then wasn't.
But I am okay with it now.

It's part of me now... part of us, Chris and I both.

Part of our story.

It has made me hold Wren a little closer and a little longer at night.

Relishing in the fact that each and every child is a true miracle.

And I know that we will have another one someday.

Wren will be a wonderful big sister someday.

And it's that hope that gets me through this tough time.

And it's that hope that makes me smile.

***I truly appreciate all of the kind words and messages of concern I received after posting this a couple of weeks ago . From emails, phone calls, sympathy cards, flowers... I really am touched by your kindness and caring words.  From the bottom of my heart, thank you all.  

St. Patrick's Day

Chris, Wren, and I spent our St. Patrick's Day downtown Indy.
The weather was absolutely beautiful, so we decided to walk around downtown.
We started on Mass Ave at Mass Ave Toys.
I couldn't believe how much fun Wren had there!
She loved playing with the toys, the babies especially.
We spent a good 45 minutes in the toy store.
Wren was so independent, pushing baby strollers and shopping carts all over the store.
So much fun!


Pushing two babies in a shopping cart and carrying one in her other hand
(you can see the feet sticking out behind her).

She loved those babies!

The cash register's buttons were lots of fun, too.

Not sure where to go next... so many fun toys!

Back to pushing the babies, this time with a kitty cat in tow.
She was so excited when she first saw that cat.
She hugged and kissed it.
I think she really thought it was real!

Peg board with kitty.

After Mass Ave Toys, we walked over to the canal (dyed green for St. Patrick's Day)!
So many people were out and about... everyone wearing green!
Wren had been in her stroller for quite a while, so we stopped at this "fitness park" for her to get out and stretch her legs.
She loved running around....

Running, running, running.

Running back...

...still running.

Pushing the stroller...

...pulling the stroller.

Laughing while Daddy tries to brush off the dirt from her hands.

Must have been some pretty funny stuff.

Spending the day with my lovely little family!

After walking along the canal, we decided to find a place to eat dinner.
I wasn't sure how well Wren was going to do at a dining establishment this late in the day.
By this point she was tired of her stroller and just wanted to eat wood chips while walking down the sidewalk BY HERSELF.
Holding Mommy or Daddy's hand while walking down a bustling city sidewalk?
Yeah, right... not happening.
Uh yeah, she was being very independent and rather stubborn...
I have no idea where she would get that kind of behavior from.
:)
Fortunately, we had Cheerios in the diaper bag, a wonderful distraction from doing all the things we didn't want her to do.
So, armed with our baby-snack-ammo, and hanging onto the hope that Wren would not throw a toddler-like tantrum in the restaurant, we bravely decided to eat at Bru Burger Bar.
And ohmygosh, I'm so glad we did because the burgers were frickin' awesome!
And I'm so glad we decided to give it a go because Wren did awesome, too!
Okay, so about the food... oh man, the food...
I had the ground turkey burger (although I wish it would have been beef rather than turkey, I think it would have been more juicy)... but anyway, it had carrot ginger slaw, peach compote, and curried mayo on a multi-grain bun.
Yum.
Chris had the Provencal burger with basil aoili, red onion, herbed goat cheese, and marinated portobello.
Again, yum.
Wren dug 'em both.
(I'm so glad I have such an adventurous little eater!)
After we ate, it was time to go home.
It had been a long, busy afternoon for our little babe.
She was super tired, crying and signing "milk" to me by 7:00pm!
Tired girl!
While St. Patrick's Day this year was much different than it has been in years past,
I wouldn't trade the day with my little family for anything in the world!
:)

11 Months

 I got a little behind taking month-to-month pics this month.
Oops.
But we finally got them done this weekend.
I can't believe we only have ONE MONTH LEFT of these pictures!

My 11-month old!

Month 11 has brought lots of new, fun things.
Wren loves to play outside... we have been getting out every day with these warm temps.
She has started to say a couple of words.. "dada" and "up."
No "mama" yet.
She signs "milk" and "more" to us appropriately now...
time to teach her some new signs!

She is such a funny, silly girl.
She loves being upside down, having her tummy tickled, and being chased.
....I really can't believe how much FUN she is!
Another tooth has finally broke through... bringing the grand total to 6.
The first 5 popped up from 5 1/2 to 8 months... and then nothing.

She hasn't had a tooth come in since Christmas!
I think she has a bunch working their way through all at once right now...
which has made for lots of drooly fun around here.
:)

Here are some of this month's outtakes....

Oooooh, pretty necklace.

Hey, what the heck is that?

I think I will investigate....

Hmmmm... very interesting.