How Old Are You?

Today, I taught Marley how to tell people how old she is! She had a blast doing it all day, and would even do it without me asking!I can't believe that in a little over 3 months, I will be teaching her how to say she is 2 years old!

Mommy's Helper

Marley and I made our first thing in the kitchen together! Sure, it was just Jello, but that's the level you have to start out with! She loved being a part of getting it ready!

She poured the powder in the bowl:She helped me stir in the hot water and dissolve the powder:
And then she watched as i poured the mixture into bowls:
She really didn't like having to put the Jello in the refrigerator right away and not get to eat it, but she forgot after a minute. And two hours later, she got to enjoy it!
I have also figured out that she is more likely to eat something if she watches me make it! So, I put her up on the counter while I made her sandwich or quesadilla, and she will eat it when I serve it to her!

Our Weekend

Last week Asa had The Best Sapper Competition at work. He wasn't competing though, he was working it. So, Tuesday he was there at 4 am and didn't come home until 11 pm. His dinner was waiting on a plate in the fridge, so I heated it up, he inhaled it, and then went to sleep for 2 hours before he had to get up to be back at work by 3 am. He was exhausted for the next two days, and took naps anytime he possible could, but luckily they all got Friday off! He was supposed to have the day off to pack for his training in Louisiana next month, but we just relaxed instead. We went to Rolla and took Marley to the park there and did some geocaching. Marley was in a good mood on the way home, so took the scenic route. We pretty much took the roads that run along the highway, but wind into the land a little. We saw all kind of houses and little communities we didn't know about. And we even found a few geocaches along the way.

Saturday and Sunday were awful days to be outside. It was cold and raining and windy. So, we stayed in our pajamas all day Saturday and watched episodes season 2 of NCIS. Marley played, we had picnics on the floor, and we had 50 tickle fights. At first when we were getting Marley ready for bed, I thought, "That was such a wasted day!" But then I realized that I was really happy about the way we had spent our day! To someone else it may seem like we were lazy bums, but Asa deserved it, I enjoyed it, and Marley loved just being at home with us right there to play with her. We weren't trying to get up and clean the house or run errands, we were just there with her all day playing and reading books and laughing at each other while NCIS played on the TV. It was actually a great day!

Today was very similar, except we had to actually leave the house in the evening. We went and bought a few groceries at Walmart, but quickly came back home and ate dinner together. I have the sweetest little family, and I love spending time together like that.

It will be our last weekend for a while though. Next weekend, Asa will be leaving for training in Louisiana, and Marley and I will be heading home. We have no idea how long the Louisiana thing is lasting, but rumor is around 5 weeks. That's a long time to leave our house alone here, but I don't really want to be alone here in it. So, I am going home to stay at my mom's house while he is Louisiana. And hopefully Asa will be getting weekends off so that we could see each other and he could possibly come to Nacogdoches.

Tomorrow is another day at work for Asa, and hopefully Marley and I can get some of our errands done for this week. Being away from our house for a possible 5 weeks is a long time! We have a lot of planning to do this week!

Scatter-brained update

I am very slowly getting blogs done from the past few weeks. They are all dated in April, so just check the titles on the left hand side and see if there are any that you missed in the next few days. I am still trying to do Asa's graduation, moving, and family day. So, hang on and they will be done soon!

I am lucky enough to say, though, that one of the main reasons I have not been blogging is because I have been hanging out with my daughter! We have been doing things outside all day long!

Last week we went for a hike with Asa when he got off work. Unfortunately, some setting was changed on my camera and it ended up screwing up all the pictures I took. But here are a few that were close to turning out.And Sunday Marley and I had a picnic while Asa caught dinner in a creek we have here.
Yesterday and today were full of playing, unpacking boxes, cleaning, and going to the park. I did have a mishap today where I got pulled over for a random inspection on post and didn't have my proof of insurance, so I got kicked off post. But, luckily I knew right where it was since they had just sent me my new one and I was able to get back on post. And Asa had to be at work this morning at 5 am. It is now 11:30 pm and he is still not home. And he said he may not be coming home. That's not very fun.

Anyway, I am using my free time to catch up on blogs! Marley has been sleeping a whole lot better lately. Even though she is getting her four eye teeth right now, she sleeps by herself in her own bed until about 2 in the morning! That's not sleeping through the night, but I'll take it!

We are slowly getting everything put together here. We still have a few boxes out on the front porch, waiting for their placement. But, for the most part it looks like we really live here. I am back on my diet and exercise plan this week, after 4 weeks of not caring about it. I am finding it a lot harder to stay on it now though... with Asa right in front of me eating whatever he wants. Oh well, I am going to have to do it anyway. I am having fun forcing Asa to try healthier recipes though. He may not like them as much as I want him to, but at least he tries it and tells me he likes it!

Haha. So, there is a really scatter-brained update on lots of random things!

Videos!

Here are a few videos of cute things Marley has done recently! Y'aal were missing videos of her, weren't you?

I took this when the three of us were driving home from dropping my mom off in Branson. She has been practicing elephant noises... and evidently still thinks the burping thing is hilarious!

Playing in the car from Jillian Shaw on Vimeo.

I took this in St. Louis last weekend while we were eating dinner at Chipotle. The people at the next table over were watching her and laughing, that's who you hear ask what flavor the drink is.

Sour Drink from Jillian Shaw on Vimeo.

Marley is getting really good at attempting words when I ask her to. The words she has signs for are a little hard, because she thinks I am asking her for the sign. But she is getting better and better with new words!

Corn? from Jillian Shaw on Vimeo.

At lastly, just a cute video I took tonight at dinner!

She gets it from her Daddy from Jillian Shaw on Vimeo.

The St. Louis Zoo

We didn't get to the zoo as early as we wanted to. Between a breakfast room full of Lacrosse players, needing to buy clothes at Target, and almost running out of gas, we were way behind the crowd. We chose not to pay the $11 for private parking and parked in the street with the normal people. When we went to the zoo in Houston over Christmas, we were literally like the third group to walk through the gate. This was not the case here. It was crazy crowded even 30 minutes after the gates opened.We bought a Safari Pass, which gave us access to the Children's Zoo, carousel, train, and some motion simulator that we didn't do. Our first stop was the Children's Zoo. They had this big building with all kind of things for kids to do that I was really excited about Marley seeing. They had the exhibits lower so the kids could see, rabbits to pet, things to crawl through, a kid's kitchen where they could pretend to make the animals' food, and play equipment to crawl on to get a good view of a sloth. Did Marley like any of it? No, in fact she was in a terrible mood. But, Asa and I enjoyed it!
Our next stop was the butterfly dome, and since we broke out the Milano cookies, Marley was in a good mood again. We didn't have any butterflies land on us, but she had a blast watching them fly all around her. She did freak out when one got close, but at a distance they were great!
The zoo was very crowded since it was such a beautiful Saturday, so it was hard to get close to anything. The highlight of the trip for me was the elephant exhibit. There was many different points where you could stop and see different elephants, and they were all really active! Here are a momma and baby elephant playing.
And here are two sisters playing. I'm not sure which one, but one of them had a baby elephant 6 or 7 years ago. The other elephant treated the baby like her own, so the baby pretty much grew up with two full-time mommies! That's a lucky elephant!
After we navigated our way through a few more areas (it seemed like we were ALWAYS going the opposite way that everyone else was!), we stopped for lunch. The most expensive fast food lunch I have ever eaten. But it was so nice to sit outside over a little lake and eat with the sun on our skin.
Did anyone know that a bear's tongue is that long and disgusting?!
Here is a family picture we took in front of some pretty flowers. This zoo really was beautiful. The more spring comes in Missouri, the more I like it. Everything is so green now! (By the way, do you know how annoying it is to always have to take our family pictures myself? My fat arms always ends up in the picture!)
After looking through the monkey and reptiles houses, we stopped for ice cream and then the camera battery decided to die. But not before I got pictures of Marley enjoying her Daddy's ice cream!
After our ice cream stop, Marley got in the stroller and took a 30 minute nap while Asa and I looked at a few more animals. We ended up not doing the carousel ride because there were so many people, and we also didn't get to do the penguin experience because the line was unbearably long. But, we will save it for next time. The last thing we did was ride the train. We had been seeing it pass by us all day and Marley would do the sign for train and say "Mimi!" She remembered riding a trolley in Branson with my mom the week before. It broke my heart, but I had to tell her every time that Mimi wouldn't be there, because I didn't want to be getting her hopes up. But it didn't help. She spent most of the train ride asking where her Mimi was.

We visited the gift shop once our train ride was over, and bought Marley a shirt. And then we hit the road back home. It was a fun little weekend getaway, and definitely needed after all of our moving stress!

Asa's Big Gift

I just realized I have never written a post about my big gift for Asa! When he signed up for the Army, we decided to sell Asa's crappy Isuzu Rodeo and we would buy him a truck once he had graduated from training. So, the whole time he was in training, he would send letters talking about how he couldn't wait to get his truck when he graduated and exactly what he wanted.

Well, around the beginning of February, I decided that I wanted to buy it for him as a surprise! I don't think the people I told about my plan thought it was the best idea, and sure it made me nervous! But all I could think about was how happy he would be! So, I set out to find exactly what he wanted. There were a few snags in the plan, mostly because of what he wanted. He wanted pretty much the most expensive version of a Toyota Tundra and it was hard to find that in our price range. I had to lie to Asa and tell him I was letting my cousin Mike, who works for Toyota dealership in Houston, was looking for one but not really finding anything. We had planned that Mike would look for us and then once Asa got to come home to move he would go down to Houston and buy it.

Two weeks before his graduation, I found exactly what he wanted!It was perfect, in our price range, and close by! So, my mom, Marley, and I drove down to Houston to test drive it. The dealer let us take it to lunch, so we drove to a nearby Chili's and talked about it. While we were there, Asa called! So, I had to give a very vague version of what we were doing... "Oh, we have just been shopping this morning, and now we are eating lunch at Chili's..." He totally bought it, and even spent some time on the phone with me talking about how he really hoped we could find what he wanted. I went back to the car dealership and told him I wanted it. There were a few things that needed to be done to it, so I had to come back the next weekend and pick it up.

Fast forward to family day, the first time we had gotten to see Asa in six weeks. Both of our families knew about the truck and couldn't wait to see his face when I told him. We parked a few parking lots over so ensure that he wouldn't see it until I was ready to tell him. The night before, he had called me and was really really sad when I told him I couldn't find what he wanted. He said, "I might just have to settle for something I don't want..." Meanwhile, I am on the other end of the phone with a HUGE smile! Anyway, we found him and greeted him (which I still have to do a blog about) and then it was time to walk to the car. I had been trying to figure out what to say when I told him, but I could never decide on the perfect way to say it.

I had parked it at the very back of the parking lot, and luckily there were still plenty of other cars in the parking lot to disguise where we were walking. Once I got my nerves up I said, "Well, I tried to fit everything in the Corolla, but I couldn't. So, I had to go buy this truck over here."

Asa didn't say anything. He just stopped walking, hugged me, and cried on my shoulder.
It was a better feeling than I every could have imagined! He was so happy! Once he had composed himself, Joel gave him the key and we walked up to the truck. He was so excited and surprised! I will probably never be able to pull off such a big surprise for him, and it was a blast! His reaction was priceless, and he is still just as happy about now a month later!
I love it and Marley really, really loves it! I have a great video of everything, but I have to edit it a little bit so you can understand what we are saying. So, I will put it up when I get that done. But you can tell by his smile how happy he was! And that makes me ecstatic!

To St. Louis and The Magic House!

Asa sent me a text message on his way home work on Friday and told me to pack everything we needed for a night, because we were going to St. Louis! We had planned to go to the Springfield zoo on Saturday, but both agreed that the St. Louis one would probably be better and more worth a weekend trip. so, I packed us up and we got on the road to St. Louis!

I had been wanting to try letting Marley watch a movie on my portable DVD player to see if it would occupy her. If I am going to be making any trips home by myself, I will need to either drive at night or find some other way to keep her happy in the car for 10 hours. So, we set up my DVD player, but realized that the only movie we could find was Planet Earth! When I was pregnant, Planet Earth came out on DVD and Asa and I talked about how that is what our kids will watch instead of those super annoying cartoons. So, we popped it in and she just sat there watching it for most of the ride! We didn't have the right equipment to connect it to the back of the front seat, not we tried to make it work with bungee straps. It would stay put for a while, but we had to fix it a few times. But other than that it was great!

On our way, I looked up information about other things we could do in St. Louis and found out they have a children's museum called The Magic House. And every third Friday of the month, from 5-9 pm is free! Perfect! So, that was our first stop when we got into St. Louis!I have been wanting to take Marley to a children's museum like this for a while, but we just never had anything near us. But this place lived up to my expectations about children's museums! It was fantastic! They had a section of a few rooms just for toddlers, so that was where we spent a lot of our time.
They even had an entire playground with slides and everything weaving through the place!
The hardest part about it was that there were so many people there. We did choose the free night to come, so that was probably why. And she had so many things to choose form that she couldn't decide what to do! As soon as she caught onto something, she would spot the next toy and run over to it!This was awesome! Marley and Asa were standing over to my left dancing, and the red light you can see at the bottom is putting their image up on the screen. Marley had so much fun dancing with Asa and watching herself on the screen!
The also had a little town that Marley loved. They had a grocery store, pizzeria, library, bank, electric company, mechanic shop, fishing pond, and a house that the kids could play around in.
She had so much fun and left in a great mood! I wish we had something like this close enough that I could take her all the time, because I totally would! She loved being around other kids, and she got to be somewhat independent with most of the toys. It was amazing!
We ate dinner at a nearby restaurant and then drove across town to where the zoo is to find a hotel there. They were all full, so we ended up staying at hotel right across the street from where we ate. After and hour and a half of trying to find a hotel, we were a little crabby. So, we got a milkshake from Chili's and crashed in bed so we could get to the zoo early!

Bebe

So, Marley has a new friend named Bebe. If Marley wants a turn with something, she says "Bebe" and points to herself. If she sees her town/clothes/cups somewhere she says "Bebe!" If she sees me put pepper on my food, she says "Bebe?" and shakes her hand around like she doing it to her food. If I am walking ahead of her, she yells "BEBE" like "Don't forget your bebe!"

But, Bebe can also be the bad other baby sometimes. If something gets spilled and I say "Did you do that?", she shakes her head 'no' and says "Bebe." If I ask her if she is stinky, she says "uh uh Bebe." So, I have started saying Bebe as much as I say Marley. I say "Come here, Bebe" or "No, Bebe!" She's really going to be confused about if she is Bebe or not!

It cracks me up every time! Bebe can be so cute sometimes!

Finally!

I obviously have a lot of blogs to finish up, but I wanted to put this one up first. For some reason. So, this will be out of order for everyone!

We are back in Missouri as of Saturday, and we have all of our stuff! That means I have a car! I was very sad to leave Nacogdoches, but at the same time I felt like I hadn't given Missouri a real chance. I was here for two weeks, but it wasn't very fun since I didn't have any of my stuff and Marley and I were sitting at home all day. But now that we are back, it is starting to feel normal. Luckily, in the week that we were in Nacogdoches, spring arrived in Missouri! The dogwoods and redbuds are blooming, the grass is green and full, and the birds are chirping. I cannot tell you what a welcoming sight that was. The cold and rainy weather is gone, and the sun is warming everything up.

I got to spend our first day back running errands and playing outside with Marley. I did have tons of things to unpack and organize, but I wanted a day off. So, Marley and I had a blast! I went grocery shopping like a normal person and played with Marley as much as I wanted to! I did have a paper to write and I did put together her new bookshelf during her nap time, but the rest of the afternoon was spent doing this:
She filled the boats up with water, and then poured them all over herself. She probably got a little cold, but she was having fun, so I let her keep going!

On Sunday, my mom and Marley went to the store and bought a bird feeder and some bird food. Marley loves looking at birds now, so we needed to attract some to our yard! In this picture, she is waving at our first bird visitor. It had probably checked out the bird feeder earlier in the day, but wasn't going near it with us there. Marley watched it walk all around the yard and then yelled "uh oh!" when it flew away!
After Asa came home from work, we went driving and found an adorable little park in Waynesville. They have a playground for Marley, a water park for this summer, a walking trail for me, and a river to fish in for Asa! Could there be a better park?! And it was easy to get to and so green!Marley had her first lesson in blowing on a dandelion! I wish I had a video of it, because it was so adorable. She loves spitting and blowing on things, and couldn't figure out which one to do!
I know I say this all the time, but she really does amaze me every single day! the things she picks up, remembers, and figures out are shocking to me! She watches me do something once and then does it for herself. I told her Asa was getting his hair cut once, and then an hour later when I said "Where's Daddy?" she did her sign for hair cut. She will actually say words now if we ask her to, and most of the time she spits them out of her mouth like she has been saying it for weeks! She's also hilarious now! She cracks me up all the time! I need to start taking more videos of her, so you all can see how funny she is!

Moving Days

It felt like it only took a few hours to load up the Uhaul. I know in reality it took a couple of days, but it all went by so much more quickly than I thought it would. Joel, Asa, Bradley, and I put everything in from the storage unit on Thursday morning and then we spent the rest of the day at my mom's house loading up everything there.
They didn't have the 19 foot van that we had reserved, so they upgraded us to a 26 foot van for free! It turned out to be a great thing because we filled that puppy up. It was so heart-wrenching trying to decide what to bring and what to leave. She loves riding in her wagon in the backyard, so do I bring it with us so she can enjoy it there or leave it in Nacogdoches so she can continue to enjoy it there? It was a hard day. I don't remember how many times I cried, but we all put on a happy face for our going away party that night.
The next morning, Asa and I put the last minute things in the cars while Marley enjoyed several egg hunts with Papa and my Mimi. She played, rolled on the floor, laughed with them, and odered them around. She was happy as could be while I was crying in the other room hoping she wouldn't notice.
Don't get me wrong, I wanted to go. I want to be a family of three again and enjoy our time that we have together. But it was still hard to leave my mom's house. I am worried Marley will be lonely in Missouri and miss our families here, and I am worried because we don't know when we will be coming back to see everyone. And I am worried about everyone missing us.
But we managed to get on the road on time, and I was the only one with tears. My mom drove Asa's truck with the Corolla on the back and Asa drove the Uhaul. We made a lot of progress that afternoon and stopped for dinner just south of Tulsa. We had dinner at SmashBurger and then found a brand new Hampton Inn nearby! It was a great hotel and will be a great place to stop if we need a hotel to stay in on our way back and forth. We had a big dance party together when we got to the hotel room and then we all passed out in the king size bed.
The next morning we hit the road for our new home. It seemed to take forever for us to get there though. We made so many stops! They were necessary stops because we were all sick of being in the car, but it did make the trip seem super long!
We stopped in Springfield at the Panera they have there (possibly my new favorite restaurant) and had lunch out on the patio. We had to park a few buildings away in a lot that was big enough for our vehicles! This is where Maarley's obsession with tea began. She was hooked after trying a sip of my mom's tea, and is still asking for it to this day!
After lunch we only had an hour and fifteen minute drive to our new home. We actually stopped in the Lowe's parking lot so that we could take the Corolla off of the trailer to make the drop-off less complicated. Then, we went straight to drop the trailer off at the Uhaul place. That was pretty dramatic, but once we were done we finally got to bring all of our stuff to the house!

Asa's friends were supposed to come help us but they were in the middle of eating at a steakhouse, so Asa and I unpacked the boxes that I could help with. We made my mom a list and she and Marley went to Walmart and Lowe's to tackle it. Luckily, Asa's friends showed up right when the heavy stuff was needing to come out. I am glad he had friends already because I was not meant to move furniture with Asa. It never ends with us in a good mood.

We got everything unloaded that night and returned the Uhaul to the store. We ended up going out to dinner together and my mom made another trip to Walmart that night. We had big plans to stay up late together and put things away, but we were all way too exhausted. So, we crashed early. We had not been in out own bed in six months. It felt amazing after all that time!

The next morning we got some work done before we had to take my mom to Branson. She was meeting her co-workers there for a conference. We put the shelf paper in, unpacked a few boxes, and she and Marley worked on her room. She even got all of her stuffed animals organized! It was so great to have my mom there and feel like she was sending us off in a way. I am so glad she got to see our house and make sure we were going to be okay there.

We all went out to lunch and then headed to Branson. It was a two hour drive, most of which Asa and Marley slept through. Once we got to Branson we had planned to drop my mom off and then head back home since Asa had to work the next morning. But we saw a Target, then a Bass Pro Shop, then a Marble Slab, and pretty soon we had been there for hours! Marley and my mom rode a trolley that Marley loved! She just sat there prefectly still while the trolley man gave them the tour of the boardwalk. That started her obsession with trains. Now every time she sees a train she says "Mimi Mimi!!!"

We had to leave, but I arranged to come back that Tuesday to spend the afteroon with my mom again. So, there weren't any tears like I thought there would be. We had picnic in the car on the way home and then crashed once we got there. That was Marley's first night in her bed, which was a little sad for me. She didn't sleep through the night or anything, but it was still sad that she's to that point. I still want her to be my little baby, but she isn't. It was great to have the three of us all safe in our house and ready to tackle our new lives together. Being grown-ups is hard. You have to make difficult decisions and live with worries of if you did the right thing or not. And we will probably be wondering that for a long time. But as everyone keeps telling me, the most important thing is that we are together and happy. I can't ask for anything more than my husband and my daughter under the same roof with me again.