Merry Christmas from the Anderson's

Merry Christmas! We had a fun day yesterday. Mom and Dad couldn't come up because...well there really wasn't a reason...so we had to just make due. We went out to Jon's parents and to Grandma's and Grandpa's for awhile. That was nice. It's just not the same without your parents though. Brad got a big Tonka car carrier truck from Santa and Brookie got a singing and dancing V-Tech thing. I can't really explain it. Jon got me a new pair of shoes to work out in and a movie and I got him an electric shaver and a couple of movies. Overall it was nice I suppose. I never really got into the Christmas spirit at all this year so it was not as good as Christmas's in years past. Anyways...I'm looking forward to a new year and getting back on Weight Watchers. I've gained back about 13 pounds and back to only fitting into one pair of jeans. So I need to change something. New Year's resolution time!

OG Christmas party

Getting up early is getting easier. I went to bed at almost 10:00 last night and didn't have very much trouble at all getting up at 5. This morning was the Olive Garden Christmas party. We brought a loaf of bread for a gift exchange and got a huge box full of Christmas candy! it was awesome. I'll have enough treats to last through January. I have to work today so that's not cool. I was at work from 8-9:30 and now I have to go back at noon. Oh well, I should make some good money!

Round 2 of 5 am!

It's day two of waking up at 5 am to go to the gym. I realized this morning that there's a spinning class at 5 am on Mondays and probably Wednesdays. I might try to make that class at some point but that would mean me getting up at 4:30 to make it.

The semester ended on Friday and grades still haven't posted. Every time I log onto the website I start getting major anxiety and then the grades aren't even there. It's driving me crazy! I'm sure I did well in most of my classes. I probably barely passed biology, but as long as I passed I'll be happy.

Brooklyn is doing a little better with sleeping. She usually wakes up at about 6 am and wants to get up, but I'm still just letting her cry until 8:00. She really shouldn't need to get up before then anyways.

Brooklyn's sleeping dilemma

New day, new leaf. I am going to try to get back on the weight watchers program and lose the rest of the weight that I wanted to lose, plus the 10 pounds that I put back on since June. I decided the best way to fit the gym into my life is to go on the weekdays at 5 am. That way I can get back home before Jon leaves for work and before the kids are awake. I did it for the first time on Friday and it felt great! It just got my day off on the right foot and I wasn't stressing about it for the rest of the day.

Brooklyn is getting closer and closer to walking. I feel like if she just got up the courage to let go of the couch or my hands she would just go. But she's too scared so we're slowly letting her take her time.

We also decided it was time for Brooklyn to start sleeping through the night. We had a hard time with this because she won't take a binkie I always felt bad making her just sit in there and scream with no way of comforting herself. But I was losing more sleep than I ever wanted to...especially where she is over a year old now...so we just put earplugs in and let her scream it out for a few nights. Last night was the first night I slept without them in and she didn't wake up until 6:00 this morning. That is a huge improvement compared to where she was a week ago...so I'm hoping maybe a couple more nights on her own and then we might make the transition to Brad's room when she is completely sleeping through the night.

Wow...it's been like 6 months since I've written. I wish I was one of those people who had time to write every single day. I might actually have my family and friends subscribe to my blog but I never write enough, it wouldn't be worth it to have people come on everyday expecting to read something and as much as I tell myself I need to write, I probably never will!



Anyways, another semester of school is almost over, and this was by far the hardest semester I've had since I started school. I took mostly sciences courses and science is not something that I comprehend at all...so every test and every lecture was a struggle. I had to change my major because of this. I decided to go into social work. I know that it's not the highest paying job out there, but it's something that I have an interest in and I think I'll be good at it.

Brooklyn turned 1 on November 2nd. She had 3 birthday parties, but it was fun! She got blue frosting all over her face and loved every minute of it. She started crawling about 2 weeks before her birthday and will hopefully be walking in the next month. She probably could if she wanted to, but she gets too scared to go off by herself.

Brad is 2 and a half and is into everything and wants to do it all by himself. He wants to pour his own cereal, get his own juice...but he also helps out a lot with Brookie. He gets her diapers, toys, juice cups, and he will even get stuff for me out of the fridge if I'm too lazy to get up and get it myself!

Well, I'll try to write more, but no promises!

So I started working completely full time 2 weeks ago and honestly, I'm really enjoying it as of right now. In a month it's possible that I could be singing a different tune, but right now it's nice to have a routine and not have to be stressed out about homework and tests and studying. I just want to do mind numbing work all day and then come home and play with my kids and watch mind numbing tv until bed for the rest of the summer!!

As far as the kids go, everything is good as far as their health goes for once. Brooklyn seemed a little sick this afternoon but the kids were both pretty good. Brad is starting to enter into his terrible twos and is testing his limits around every corner. He wants to know if we're going to let him cross the line on every little thing. It's been hard because I feel like he's in time out all the time and I feel like I'm constantly mad at him. Poor thing. But we're definitely holding our ground because this is a crucial point for him to understand what he can and can't do. I'm super tired because I'm getting up at 5:20 every morning and I honestly don't know how I juggle a full time job, two kids, getting the house cleaned, the kids fed, going to the gym, and still having time to do something for myself every night. It's like there isn't enough time in the day. I wish I was one of those people that could stay up until midnight and still be ok with getting up at 5:00. My life would be a lot more smooth and probably less stressful, except I would be dead to the world for the entire day.

Twilight has completely captured me!!!

It's been way too long!! Ever since school got out I haven't had any time to write. I went back to work at the beginning of May and even though work pretty much sucks, it's kind of nice to not have to worry about school and homework and stress about grades. For three months I can look forward to 8-5 mind numbing work that means absolutely nothing at the end of the day. So that's nice! On the homefront, the kids are good. Brad is starting to go through his terrible 2's a month too early and has been nothing but defiant for the last little while. It's tough because I hate being mad at him and when he looks at you with those big brown eyes and long dark eyelashes you just want to hug him, but he's testing his limits so nows the time that rules need to be established. Brooklyn is good. She is getting better at grabbing toys and she is getting closer to sitting up on her own every day. She rolled over from her stomach to her back the other day and it was so amazing! I was so worried that she was physically behind in her age group, but I think she'll be right on cue! She gets cuter every day and I'm pretty sure we'll have a couple of teeth before long.

On another topic, I finished "Twilight" today and I'm so obsessed! I haven't been this way about a book in a long time. It's the kind of thing that emotionally captures you and you wish more than anything that there is someone like Edward out there (if I was single of course.) I honestly don't remember the last time I read a book and felt so in love with the main character. It's like I wish I were Bella! Anyways, the movie comes out in December and I'm literally counting down the days. The trailer portrays him exactly as I would have imagined him so this movie might actually be better than mos book to movies are. I'm so excited.

I'm also super excited for Sex and the City movie! May 30th. I don't know why I got so connected to that show, but when I watched the series for the first time I think I was in a time in my life where I wanted to feel single and happy in New York City. Maybe that was one of the reasons that I wanted to move to Connecticut. I was only going to be an hour away from New York City, and in the back of my mind, I literally saw myself as Carrie walking through Times Square without a care in the world. I don't know. If nothing else it will be a fun girls night out!

Stupid Cars!

So Jon's car wouldn't start this morning. I'm really stressed about this. This is absolutely the worst time for car problems. I want to take it to a mechanic, but I don't really have the money to do that. I don't know. This is a short vent post. I just hate cars. They are so expensive to buy, and they are so expensive to fix and everyone needs one! It's like, what are you supposed to do? I think that cars need to be a lot cheaper to fix. It would make everyone's life so much easier! Stupid cars!

the light at the end of the tunnel

Ok, so it's been a few days. I usually post while I'm sitting in my boring Political Science class, not listening to anything the teacher is saying, but I didn't go to class on Thursday, so I didn't post! Latest news, my mom was in town over the weekend, and what a crazy thing that always is for me. I love her to death, but she is like a little squirrel, going, going, going and not ever stopping for anything. I couldn't sit down for two seconds and just relax. We cleaned the carpet, took the kids downtown, went to the mall, went to lunch, and when Brad took a nap, I finally thought that we would be able to sit down and watch Dr. Phil or something, but nope! She went to the store, got the oil changed in the car. It's just so funny that someone can have that much energy. She literally has the energy of a two year old, which did make it nice when Brad was awake. They played and played, and he just thought she was the greatest person there ever was. So it was good. But that's over and back to regular life. Today was my last day of Anthropology and will probably be the last day of Political Science. I may go to work on Thursday, I haven't decided yet. And tomorrow I have to give a presentation in Mass Communications and that will be the last day of that class. It's getting close to the end!! So exciting! It's kind of sad though. I didn't get at all attached to any of my teachers this semester. Last semester I was almost sad to leave a couple of my classes because I just loved the teacher so much. But all of my teachers this year just weren't very fun. Maybe anthropology...he loved the subject, and has done field work in Burma, so he had a lot of good personal experience to talk about.

Brooklyn isn't sick anymore!!! That's the best news of the week. She's 100% back to herself. I love it! It's so hard to not get any sleep, wonder if she's ok at daycare, scared that she's not eating enough. So she's back to normal. Life is great when your kids are happy!

Poor Brooklyn

So Brad was bad for the second day in a row in daycare. I don't know what's wrong with him. He's totally fine when he gets home. He's usually so good at Brandy's. It's so frustrating. I want to know that he's having fun at daycare. I don't want to think about him crying all the time. Especially over the summer when he's going to be there all day long while I'm working. Hopefully it's just a attachment phase that he gets over soon. Then we took Brookie to the chiropractor today and he feels like she only needs to be seen once a week now, so that's good news. I still think that developmentally she's really far behind developmentally. She can't sit up by herself at all in her bumbo or on my lap. But the chiropractor thinks she's doing fine. I don't know. We take her to the doctor on May 2nd, so I'm going to ask the doctor about it when I go. Poor thing. This stupid torticollis has been such a pain for the last 4 months. I wish one day she would wake up and it would just be totally gone. I saw a baby the other day that had a totally normal shaped head and she looked to be just about Brooklyn's age. It made me feel so bad that she can't be where every other little girl her age is. She should be pretty close to sitting up about now, but she's still acting physically like she's only 3 months old. Here's hoping she ends up being normal when she's a little older. Maybe she'll catch up and surprise us all!

Stupid Idaho

The last few days have been crazy! The kids got sick a week ago and Brooklyn still isn't totally better. She's been waking herself up coughing since last Tuesday night so I pretty much have gotten no sleep in the last 6 days. Then I had to wake up at 5:45 yesterday morning and go to work! Geez, having two kids is hard when you step back and think about everything you have to do on a day to day basis. I can't imagine if I would have had my kids closer together. Every day is a struggle. I finally got a little bit more sleep last night, so I'm hoping that this stupid cold is finally passing. Why is it still winter at the end of April?!?!?! It should be nice enough weather for Brad to play outside every day and we should definitely not be getting sick anymore. This is totally ridiculous. Usually I'm all for the winter thing. I look forward to wearing my big coat and my scarf and bundling up at night, but it's gotten to the point now where if it's not close to 50 degrees, I'm PISSED. why can't we just get into summer already. Stupid Idaho!!!

This is my first blog

I didn't even understand what a blog was until about a week ago. And I work in web support! What is wrong with me. This week has been a busy week. Brad and Brooke both have horrible coughs and for the first time since Brooklyn was born, they were both up a lot of the night last night. It's usually one or the other. Not both! I have been dead tired all day. Once again, I've forgotten what it feels like to sleep through the night. That was the main thing that I DID NOT want to give up when I had her. I loved going to bed at 10 or 11 and waking up at 8. Now I'm up at least twice before 8. I still have 3 more months to let her make her own choice to sleep through the night, but at 9 months, we are doing the cry it out method if she's not sleeping for at least 8 hours a night. Then there's Toby, our 10 week old dog who will not stop pooping in the house! I let him out and he doesn't go, then I let him back in and 2 seconds later he's pooping on the floor. What do you do?! It's not like I can put diapers on him. But he is just as hard to take care of as a baby! Jon (husband) is no help and I'm seriously considering getting rid of him at this point. Getting a dog that already has the potty training thing down. I don't want to be potty training two babies! Hopefully my kids will sleep better tonight.