Wordless Wednesday: Put In Bay Reunion

My dad with my nephew, Brayden, and Shiloh

Shiloh and my cousin's daughter, Rylee

Brayden fishing in the street with my grandpa and brother

My Aunt Connie with her grandson Connor

My cousin Paige and Rylee

Me, Shiloh and my cousin Emily

My cousin, Eric, his daughter, Corrine, and Brayden

Shiloh and Rylee swinging together

A Little Update

We're back in PA! The family reunion was awesome and I'm pretty sure everyone had a great time! It was so cool seeing the three great grandbabies together for the first time! All three of them had such different personalities and it was so neat to see how they interacted with eachother. And it was so awesome seeing the whole Vegas clan! The last time I saw the Mericle family was about 5 years ago when Rich was out at Camp Pendleton and I haven't seen my cousin Paige and Aunt Brenda in about....well, let's just say it's been even longer! Aside from the blood thirsty mosquitos (multiple people, including me, even had bites on their butt!) it was a perfect reunion!

Now we are relaxing in PA until late tomorrow morning when my mom, dad, Shiloh and I will drive to New York! I'm looking forward to boat rides, camp fires, and fishing up there! Oh yeah, speaking of fishing, I went out on the boat with my dad yesterday and caught TWO fish! This was my first time fishing "for real"....not using a bobber and worm. I caught two sheepheads (slang term). I'm not sure what their true name is. Anyway, I am extremely proud of myself and can't wait to, hopefully, catch more fish with my dad this weekend!

A Great End To A Stressful Week

It looks like I will not be returning to work after all! To keep an extremely LONG story short, my boss was telling me one thing regarding my return to work (I would be working from home primarily, Shiloh would be able to come to work with me when I did need to go in, etc) and the higher ups another (I would be working out of the offices about half the time and Shiloh would be in daycare when I was there). I have to say, I'm not a bit upset by this at all. I ended up going to the main office today and talking with one of the higher ups about my return to work and through that conversation I came to realize that it's just not worth the money. Deep down in my heart I know that not going back to work is the right decision. After a very stressful week I truly feel at peace knowing I will be continuing to stay home.

The other high note to end the week happened at Gymboree. Today we went to the open gym (all ages play together) and Annalise was there. She's my favorite out of the three teachers. She is also the teacher we had for our very first Gymboree class. She was so impressed by Shiloh then and all Shiloh could do. Before we left that class she made a comment about how she just knew it wouldn't be too long before Shiloh was walking and every other week it seemed she was asking if Shiloh was walking yet. Well, today was the first time we've seen Annalise to tell her Shiloh had taken her first steps. Needless to say, she was so excited when I told her. I also explained that Shiloh is still pretty sporadic about step taking and some days she's all about trying to walk while there are other days where I don't think she even takes one step at all so it may be a couple of weeks before Annalise actually sees her walk. Sure enough, in true Shiloh fashion she made me eat my words! A few minutes after getting there Annalise had Shiloh take 4 good steps in front of everyone! Even I was impressed! She's never taken 4 GOOD steps in a row! I was so proud of her but even more so I was happy that Annalise was able to witness it!

I guess this will be the last post for a while...at least until after the 29th. Our flight leaves tomorrow a little before 1 which should have us arriving in PA sometime before 2:30. I hope everyone has a great upcoming week and if you want to say a prayer that Shiloh gives me a break during the flight. I'm just a little bit nervous about that!

Fun Times Over

I finally made the trip out to Target today to buy some cabinet latches for the kitchen. I had expected Shiloh to start exploring the kitchen cabinets soon after she started crawling but she never showed any interest in them. I, of course, decided then that Shiloh must be sparing us that not so adorable baby phase. She's such a good girl! Not so. I got home from Target and threw the bag of latches onto the couch next to Rich and told him to get to work. Now I will be able to make dinner without this happening....

Sign Me Up

It looks like I will be rejoining the ranks of the work force upon our return from PA. I wish I could say that I am excited and looking forward to it, but, in all honestly, I am nervous and not so excited. You may be thinking to yourself, why then is she going back? For many reasons, I guess. The money is #1, of course, and everything else stems from that. It would be nice to take some pressure off of Richard, the extra money would be great for savings, and it would allow us to also have a little extra money for misc things...trips, random purchases, holidays, etc. Basically, it's all about the money and that has me a little upset. I'm not unhappy about it because Rich doesn't make enough money for me to stay home with Shiloh. He does. I'm irritated that as I sat down and tried to think of the pros and cons of going back to work the only pro I could think of was extra money. But that one pro was enough to out weigh the many cons that came to mind. As I think about the future, though, I realize we will need a bigger house before we even start thinking about expanding our family and then there are the expenses that come with said expansion!

Ok, I'll stop complaining and move on to the more positive points of me going back to work. It will allow us to enroll Shiloh in fun activities such as, swimming at the "Y" this fall, build our savings, save up money for adoption #2, and it may even make moving in the next year or so a possibility. And as I sit here and think about things more I guess there are a couple of nonrelated money pros. I did have quite a few good friends at work and it will be nice to see all of them on a regular basis again. Also, like I already said, it will take a lot of pressure off of Rich which will make his life a little easier.

In the end, I'm just going to continue to pray about it and ask that God's will be done. I just hope that I am able to stop trying to figure it out myself long enough to hear what God wants of me.


Anyway, now that I'm finished venting I'm going to go to Pennsylvania with Shiloh and enjoy a relaxing visit with family. Then I'll come back with a positive attitude and just be thankful that I have the opportunity to help Rich out by going back to work. All while not having to put Shiloh in daycare.

Swimming Lessons!!

At Gymboree today Kayelin's mom (I don't know any of the mom's names, even the ones I've become friends with. Just baby names. That's so sad!) was telling me she signed him up for swimming lessons at our local "Y"! How much fun would that be?! I've decided, well I still have to talk to Richard, but I've decided that if I go back to work we will definitely be signing Shiloh up for that! It's a month by month schedule so we wouldn't even have to do it every mouth. It could just be something special we do a few times a year. I'm sure Shiloh would have a blast and I know I would love swimming a couple times a week! Rich will be so happy to hear that I am finding more and more ways to spend his money!

So much on my mind

The good news is Shiloh and I are flying up to Pennsylvania Saturday for the Warren Family Reunion in Ohio! We will be at Put n Bay, OH Sunday-Wednesday with almost the entire Warren clan! I believe everyone will be there except a few cousins and an aunt or uncle. Altogether I think there will be 2 grandparents, 10 aunts and uncles, 12 cousins and 5 great grandkids! This will be the first time the great grandkids will all be together! It should be a blast!

From Put n Bay Shiloh and I are going to head to NY with my dad while the rest of the family goes back to PA. It's been 6 years since I've been to my parents' house in NY and I am so excited to take Shiloh there! My dad moved up there the summer before I went into 8th grade and the first couple summers after that it is where my mom, Andrea and I lived! There's a building behind my dad's house...I'm not sure what it is now...but it used to be a marina. My dad befriended a guy (eric) who worked there so when An and I were up there in the summer we worked at the marina washing/waxing boats all day. It was actually kind of fun....looking back. The nice part of it was Eric and his wife Jody lived next door to my dad so after hours Eric would let Andrea and I ride the marina's jet skis on the lake....aside from selling boats they rented out jet skis during the day too. I have so many memories from the lake....4th of July's out on the lake(the ring of fire), ice skating on the canal, swimming in the lake, riding the paddle boat up and down the canal, 4th of July paddle boat races, Andrea "wrecking" one of the marina's jet skis after hours, and (andrea will remember this one) Gary....anyway, my point is the house in NY is a special place for me and I hope I'm able to get Shiloh up there more when she's older so she can enjoy it as I did and make some of her own fun memories!

But first I need to start packing!

The other thing on my mind is, well, believe it or not but I might be going back to work. I received a phone call from my old boss this past Thursday asking me if I was ready to come back. If I do go back to work it will basically consist of me working from home on the laptop and only going in to the office when I need to. After talking things over with Rich this weekend we've decided that I should at least meet up with Mike (old boss) and discuss in detail what kind of hours they are thinking, pay, etc so we have more info to base our decision off of. We're leaning towards me at least giving it a try though. I just need to make sure they are aware that if I do go back, while I will of course do my best, Shiloh is number one. If work interferes at all with my ability to care for her or she doesn't react well to her schedule being changed it's not going to happen. But I'm willing to give it a try because, well, the extra money would be great. I guess we'll see. I'm very thankful that the reunion is coming up so I don't have to make any real decisions anytime soon.

Four Years Ago Today...

was mine and Rich's "church ceremony". For those of you who don't know, we were originally married on January 17, 2003 at the Athens-Clarke County courthouse after learning Rich was going to be deployed. I just happened to be visiting when he got the news. We didn't know if he would be remaining in the states or if he would be sent overseas so we went ahead and took the plunge while I was in town! He ended being sent to California for nine months and then was sent home. We later learned his name was on a list to go to Iraq but the guy from Rich's MOS who was already over there volunteered to do another tour so he was spared. Anyway, Rich returned home August of '03. We took some time to settle in to our new life together in Athens and then had a "church ceremony" back home in PA July 10, 2004. It was basically another wedding....except this time Rich and I weren't the only ones there and we had on a little more proper attire....oh yeah, and it was in a church.

We treat the January date as our actual wedding date and generally just acknowledge today's date by going out to eat or something. This year, thanks to a lack of babysitters...meaning zero....we'll be staying in and enjoying...or not enjoying (I'll be cooking) some chicken, mashed potatoes and asparagus.

Wordless Wednesday: Random Feedings

Updates

A late Happy Fourth of July to everyone! I hope everyone had a great weekend with friends/family! We had a great weekend in Helen with AJ and Brittany. AJ's mom has a cabin up there we stayed in. Rich and I were pretty hesitant to go because 1. Shiloh doesn't always travel well 2. We had to bring our dogs. Add their 4 dogs to our 2 and you've got a houseful right there! Everyone we well though! The dogs stayed out on the front deck the whole time and Shiloh was great! We watched fireworks in downtown Helen on the fourth to which Shiloh had no reaction. I was so excited to watch her watch them and she just sat there with this bored look on her face. She's goofy!


This morning was Shiloh's 9 month doctor's visit! The doctor said she looks perfect! She's continuing to grow like a weed! Height wise she is still in the 90th percentile coming in at 28 3/4 inches. Her weight is 18 pounds 10 ounces which has her in the 50th percentile....she had been in the 75th percentile everytime since her 1 month visit.


There's not much else going on here! Just counting down the days til the Warren Family Reunion in Put n Bay, OH....less than 2 weeks!

Shiloh's face while watching the fireworks

Watch Out World, Here She Comes!!

Shiloh took her first two steps today! It's funny to me because just today I had decided that it was going to be a while before she made any real attempt at walking. We've been trying to practice with her by holding her hands and walking with her but she would just lock her knees and take these large, akward, straight legged steps.

This afternoon we were sitting on the floor playing and I decided to let her try to take a step by herself. I picked up the remote (she loves remotes) and held in front of me and called her name. She stood there for a few seconds just looking at me and then took one kind of half step with her left foot, then another half step with it. She stood for a couple of seconds again and then took a fast step with her right leg and then a fast step with her left leg and then she went plop! She didn't really seem phased by it at all...just very unsure of herself! We sat on the floor a bit longer and I tried to get her to do it again but she hasn't. I guess we'll just keep working on it so hopefully with daddy gets home she can take a step or two for him!

Wordless Wednesday

9 Months Old!

Today is Shiloh's "Happy 9 Months Old" day!! Here are her 9 month pictures we took this morning.