Chuck E. Cheese

This year with a brand new baby, a small house that isn't condusive to entertaining, and not wanting to plan for a party, we looked for options that required minimal thought to have a party. That's where we came up with Chuck E. Cheese. It was perfect. Kids love it! And to be honest, it didn't cost us much more than it would have to just have the party at a park and buy all of our own food.

Mer really had a good time. I'm glad it worked out so well. We may have to consider doing it there again in the future!

This was my big 'Mom Fail' moment. What kind of mother only puts three birthday candles on the cake when their child is turning four???

She got a lot of Hello Kitty which was good. She loves Hello Kitty. And I love it too. My influence might have slightly rubbed off on her. I love how the things I loved as a child are still around.

4!

Meredith turned 4 on September 2. 4 years has sure gone by fast. Here are two quick pictures from her actual birthday. We got her a bike. It's a bit big but I'm hoping she will grow into it by next spring.

State Fair

I can't believe summer has already come and gone. The first half went soooooo slow waiting on the arrival of Anna. And the last six weeks have just whizzed by. But end of summer means State Fair time - something I look forward to all year. In fact, I'm looking forward to next year's fair already.

We decided to go twice this year since we only went once last year with the child and we didn't get a chance to see and do the stuff that WE (adults) wanted to do. The first time we took Meredith and Anna. The second time was just me and Greg.

I wanted to document the food we got, but I totally forgot! Between our two trips, we had mini doughnuts, cheese curds, fresh french fries, fried pickles, fudge puppies, more cheese curds, apple dumpling, turkey sandwich, corn on the cob, fried ravioli, a rice kristie treat, and sweet martha's cookies. Hmmm...I'm sure I'm forgetting stuff too.

We started off the day with some mini doughnuts and went to the kidway. We made sure to get the state fair bargain book in advance because there is a $6 coupon off a 20 ride tickets and we knew we had to take Meredith on some rides.

I can't get blogger to rotate this photo but it's cute. She loves the swings.

And then the fake Blue's Clues ride with the hydraulics.

Anna didn't go on any rides. She slept.
Another one I can't get blogger to rotate.

She wanted to go down the big slide. And being the cheapskate I am, I told her that this slide at the kidway WAS the big slide because I was about ready to be done with our ride tickets and I didn't want to shell out another $4 on the real big slide. I can't wait until I can't fool her like that anymore.

We are klassy. She went on the NASCAR ride with the Budweiser advertisements all over the place. And if it weren't klassy enough, it had Hooker advertisiments all over the place too (I have no idea what Hooker is, but it's a bit disturbing on a kids ride). All the while, the Kidz Bop version of Kesha's song Tic Tock was playing while the ride was going.

A picture of me. Poor Anna gets gypped. She doesn't get to partake in the gluttony that goes on at the fair. She only gets a bottle.

Love!

This pink strawberry outfit from Land's End is the first piece of clothing I bought when I found out Meredith was a girl. I don't think I can ever get rid of it I love it so much.

I think the girls look very similar to each other. Can you guess who's who? They are about the same age in both of these pictures.

Fluffy butt

Many of you might know this, but I've decided to cloth diaper this time. For lots of reasons. 1. It's an investment up front but it will be cheaper in the long run. 2. It's better for the environment and I'm kind of crunchy to begin with when it comes to that. 3. They are cute. Enough said.

We waited about 10 days to start on the cloth diapers and used up the disposables from the hospital. For those that might not know, newborn girls can bleed in their diapers from all the built up hormones from being in their mama's belly. We never had much of an issue with that with Meredith, but Anna was having bloody diapers so we wanted to wait until that ended.

It's been a week now doing cloth. I was just a tad nervous at first to put the first one on her but I quickly got used to it and I am loving it. It's a slight adjustment at first but it's really no big deal.

Cloth diapering has come a long way in the past four or five years. There are so many options out there depending on what your needs/wants are. And I do my own laundry. Diaper services are a thing of the past.

Here's a picture of little fluffy butt. We call this one Anna Moo. She has a red/white diaper that Meredith calls Santa Anna.

Anna Elizabeth Carlson

Anna Elizabeth Carlson made her debut into the world at 1:43 a.m. on Sunday, July 31, 2011. Technically I was 3 days overdue as I was due on July 28. Saturday was like any other day. We slept in, had a late breakfast and lunch and then went to the park later in the afternoon. Greg ran some errands. In the evening, we bathed Meredith and put her to bed. Like any other evening, I like to sit in bed after Meredith goes to sleep and play around on my iPod. Shortly after I sat down in bed, I thought I felt a contraction. But I couldn't really tell as it felt very similar as to when the baby would push out on my belly. Here's how things happened:

9:00 p.m. - thought I felt the very first contractions. But I wasn't sure so I timed them for about an hour. I felt one every 10-12 minutes or so. At 10:00 I told Greg that I thought I was having contractions. I figured I had all the time in the world since labor with Meredith lasted 24+ hours. Little did I know that labor would last a whopping 4 1/2 hours from start to finish.

10:15 p.m. - Decided to call my mom and have her come up. Again I wasn't sure but better be safe than sorry. Plus, it takes her about an hour to get here. At this point, contractions were every 6-8 minutes and getting stronger. I took a quick shower and got some of my stuff together in a suitcase.

11:15 p.m.-Mom had not arrived yet. Contractions were every 4-5 minutes so I called the OB office and they paged the doctor to call me back.

11:20 p.m.- Mom arrived. We talked real quick and I went upstairs to finish packing.

11:32 p.m.- doctor called. I told her I think I need to go in. Contractions were really strong and somewhat painful and about 4 minutes apart.

11:45 p.m.- Got stuff out to the car. As I was in the garage, my water broke. I told Greg he better hurry it up because either I peed myself or my water broke.

11:55 p.m.- Greg dropped me off at the ER and I went up to labor and delivery. Filled out some paperwork and got changed and settled into my room.

12:20 a.m.- Nurses checked me and started going over the epidural paperwork. I was 4 cm dilated at that point. Was told the anesthesiologist should be up in about 15-20 minutes. That seemed like forever.

12:45 a.m.- still waiting on the anesthesiologist. Apparently he was down in surgery. I was about 6-7 cm dilated at this point. We were thinking he wouldn't make it in time so the nurse gave me a shot of painkiller to help with the pain.

1:05 a.m.- Anesthesiologist finally made it! I was so happy. I got the epidural when I was about 8 cm dilated.

1:15 a.m. - Epidural was helping a little but it was a lot different than my epidural with Meredith. I felt nothing at all and couldn't even move my legs with my epidural with Meredith. This time, I could move my legs. I could still feel pain. Especially on one side. The nurse had me roll over to help with the one side.

1:25 a.m.- was still having really painful contractions. I really think the epidural was only working 50%.

1:30 a.m.- was 10 cm dilated. Still feeling lots of pain but what can you do? It was time to push. I pushed through about 3 or 4 contractions (10 minutes maybe) and out she came!

1:43 a.m. - Welcome to the world, Anna Elizabeth Carlson.

Fresh out of the oven here.

After looking seriously craptastic in all my pictures from Meredith's birth, I was bound and determined to look better for this one. But I look just as craptastic. I guess that's what happens when you go through labor in the middle of the night both times. This was moments after the cord was cut.

Here are a few more pictures that I like.

Weighing in at 7 lbs., 3 oz.

Right after her first bath.

This was the following morning when the proud big sister got to meet her little sister for the first time.

Grandma holding Anna for the first time.

Grandpa holding her for the first time.

And finally a picture with Daddy.

Heading home.

Home at last :-)

Almost there!

This might be my last post before little Messy Mess arrives. Here are a few final pictures of her days inside my tummy.

Pouty lips!

Hand in front of her face.

Cute, cute, cute!

4th of July

We spent the 4th of July at the ballpark! It was a beautiful day to be there. And lucky us, our last row seats in the upper deck just happened to be in the shaded part of the stadium with a nice breeze blowing in from the back. And even better, the Twins won. And I got to see Joe Mauer play! Meredith was most excited about getting cotton candy. She had been looking forward to that for at least a week! And then of course, she got her face painted with Hello Kitty. AND, she got to wear her red, white, and blue tie-dye shirt she made in preschool. We had a fabulous afternoon!

37 weeks pregnant here and you can't even tell from this picture...hehehehehe!

Cabin

Meredith made her first trip this year out to the cabin last weekend. Her Juana came up on Saturday to pick her up and keep her overnight and Greg and I joined them out there the next day. It's so fun to see how excited they get at this age about stuff like that. Her excitement over the days preceding the cabin were filled with as much anticipation as a 3-year-old can muster up.

Here she is getting ready to head out with Juana.

She gave Daddy a big goodbye hug.

Mommy got a big goodbye hug as well.

Mer had a blast out at the lake. I don't think I've ever seen her as tired as she was. When we got her home the next day, she slept until 10:30 a.m.

She played with sticks and leaves.

She played with my weird uncle Robin.

And she played with my weird uncle David.

It was the perfect weekend at the cabin. Doesn't this look beautiful?

It was perfect weather for swimming. Thanks for keeping your eye on her Mary Jo!

We made some s'mores after dinner over the fire.

And she hung out with Juana some more in the hammock.