You Think We're From Chicago???

Not sure how many people who read this, which is probably not many, know that we are a Phoenix family, but we are!  I personally have lived in the Phoenix metro area for over 5 years now.  Gasp!  (Damn, I'm getting seriously old.) Anyway, both the hubs and myself are from the Chicago-land area and I personally didn't have a strong connection to Chicago sports teams, but my husband and his family surely, surely, surely and just one more surely do. 

These are just a select few of the Illinois/Chicago teams apparel we have in Madison's closet.  What we have missing are some White Sox tees and more Cubs tees, a D. Rose Bulls onesie, like a crap ton of Bears wear.  On top of that we have about 15 U of Illinois tees and onesies one which is so cute and says "I'm going to be a Division 1 athlete just like Mommy and Daddy" hehe cuuuuute!!!

So Madison is currently 5 months, wearing roughly size 6-9 months and will not be able to wear any of these outfits for at least another 6-12 months, but they are there ready and waiting for her because she is a Chicago Girl after all!!! :)  I can't say I won't be disappointed if she doesn't go to Illinois!!  Hmm, I guess we have a little time to figure that all out ;)

One of those HARD ROCK days...

Actually I don't know if you would consider it "hard rock" but I remember this song from back in the day...

The video is so tacky it's hilarious and the tune is definitely catchy

I believe in a thing called love, do you?

Worst Computer Disaster of All Time!

Roughly 2 months ago I came up with this amazing idea to get an external hard drive to move all my pictures to and open up some space on my iMac.  So I went in search and found myself a Seagate GoFlex 2TB external HD. Yippee...I was so excited to plug that sucker in get it all formatted and ready to go.  And 2TB, what would I do with all that space?  

So over the course of the first couple of hours of getting home I managed to move every single picture I have taken over the course of the past 5 years over to the external HD and delete them off my iMac.  Everything was hunky dory as I was still able to move the images back and forth for editing.  I was in technological heaven. 

And then disaster struck.  Ugh!  I plugged the HD into my computer to work on some images and what happens??  "Your HD is unreadable - please reformat"  WTF!!!  Quickly, I maneuver myself to the disk utilities and attempt to do a repair of the HD.  Error.  Error.  Error. Oh motherf*cker!!  In my non-computer genius head I decide to use the seagate website to troubleshoot to no avail.  I finally lower my head in defeat and  come to the realization that this particular job needs to be outsourced.  I figure I need to get my iMac cleaned up anyway.  I'll bring the whole getup into Geek Squad the next day and get them to fix everything for me.

WRONG!!!

After checking in all my equipment signing a million and two pieces of paper and handing over my life so to speak I leave with an emptiness in the pit of my stomach.  Those pictures consist of both my nieces births and subsequent birthdays.  My very own daughter's birth.  Our rehearsal dinner and wedding pictures.  I mean all the memories I could ever want to hold on to are on those HDs. 

Couting the days...day 4 I call, no answers.  Ugh! 

A week later...seriously a week!?! "Yes we would like to inform you that your external hard drive is not working properly and we cannot get your data recovered at this point.  Also we would like to inform you that you iMac's hard drive has also failed"  Yeah.  So I go in to get a tune up on my computer and I get back a non-functional iMac.  Fabulous! $150 later, I have less than what I went in with.  I could literally, and I mean quite literally, bite someone's head off.  Just jam my teeth into one of those tech's neck and start chompin' away until decapitation occurs. Grr..

But I haven't completely given up.  I am taking my iMac to the Apple store tomorrow to be repaired followed by an attempt at a DIY restoration of data from external HD.  We will see how that goes.  I'm keeping my fingers crossed!!

Muffin Top

What is with women wearing what I can only assume are size 24 jeans when they are very clearly not a size 24, closer to a 34.  Can we say muffin top!  And I mean an overloaded cupcake pan type muffin.  Yikes.  Ghetto!  My number one question I want to ask is "How the hell do you get those ON?" number 2..."Do you think that looks good?"  It is beyond me why women do that.  Do you think they would be offended if I asked them?? Because I am honestly super curious.  I can imagine how that conversation would go...

ME - "I'm so sorry to bother you ma'am, but I'm just curious, what's up with the muffin top?"

MuffinTop Lady - "Muffin top?"

ME - "You know, all that fattiness pokin' out from under your skanky halter top and hanging over your way too tight jeans? And while you're at it can you explain to me the physics behind leveraging such a body size into those tiny little jeans?"

MuffinTop Lady - *gasp* "BITCH!"  *WHACK*(her fist hitting my face)

ME - "Ahhhhhh" *SPLAT*(my face hitting the ground)
Hmm...on that note...I'm not going to ask.  I'm just going to assume they don't look in a mirror before they leave and are in absolute denial about their actual size or have not purchased a new pair of jeans since they were 12 years old, in which case I would be more than happy to buy them a new pair of pants, no joke! 

Maddie's First Taste of Food!!!

Madison has started "solids"!!! YAY I'm so excited for her.

Right before we left for Chicago we decided to start Maddie on rice cereal.  She was not a huge fan. She ate a little bit, gave us that disgusted look and spit most of it out.  We repeated the process for about 10 minutes and gave up.  We attempted a handful more times of rice cereal to no avail.  I tasted it myself, its pretty gross. blegh!

When we returned from Chicago I busted out the Beaba and made her some Fuji Apple applesauce!!  She loved it.  We have video of her screaming because a spoonful of applesauce is not in her mouth.  We wanted to make sure that there was no allergic reactions so we waited about a week and 1/2 and now she has progressed to bananas.  Oh my goodness if I thought she loved her some applesauce she is all about the bananas!! She has also recently become addicted to Mum Mums.  Bananas flavored baby rice husks.  THey jsut melt in her mouth and are something for her to chew on, cause I'm pretty sure she is teething.  She loooves them.  So, today is day 3 on bananas and applesauce and she went through 2 oz of each in addition to her regular feedings.  Oh my chunky little monkey is gonna get so big!!!! :)

I think tomorrow I'm going to make her some carrot puree and freeze it in preparation to start her on Monday.  I think apples and bananas are great, but they are fruits and I want to add in some veggies.  I think after carrots I'll add in some sweet potatoes.

Can you believe on Thursday she is going to be 5 months???  Wow all these solids foods before she's even 5 months old?? I'm sooo proud of my growing little girl... I'm a crazy mom I know :-P

Monday, Monday

Feeling a little slow going this moring, groovin' to the oldies - swaying back and forth to one of the best Monday songs of all time...

Enjoy the sounds ;)

Have a great Monday everyone!

Family Photo Picture Time! :)

I am normally taking pictures left and right of everyone and Billy refuses to have his picture taken, so the fact that we even got 2 family "portraits" this past weekend is AMAZING!! I have to share :)

This one was taken at Maddie's baptism.  Maddie is obviously in her baptism dress, so stinkin' cute!!  Billy and I are as dolled up as we get haha :) I'm a little red in the face, not sure why...oh well

This was taken when we arrived at the Koepcke/Nybroten family reunion in DeKalb, IL the Saturday before Maddie's baptism.  Maddie is distracted by her cousin Alarah in the corner.  Fairly obvious in this picture that I have some work to do post pardum (on the bod) but Billy looks great! :) 

So they aren't the perfect family portraits, but they are as good as its going to get at the moment, so I'm happy!

Little Miss Maddie at 4 months!!

Madison Noelle, you are growing up too fast for poor old mama...will you please slow down!! 
Month number 4 has been such an amazing milestone for you, you are being such an active little girl and I cannot believe my eyes everyday you are doing something new! You truly are advanced!!! =D

Last month you began to turn over with a little assitance from the parentals, but this month you busted down the gates and really started flipping around completely on your own.  You actually don't even like laying on your back very much and everytime we lay you down on your play mat you flip right over and lift your head up super high.  You are soo very strong and your head never falls.  You are starting to hold your chest up with your arms and even attemping to bring you knees in under you - the first signs of attempted crawling!  I cannot believe my little baby girl will be mobile soon.  You get very frustrated easily I think because you really want to start cruising around but need to gain a little more strength.  When you bring those knees in you tend to scoot backwards a bit, but you are definitely making strides in that department!

I took you to your 4 month well check up yesterday morning and I cannot believe how much you have grown.  You are currently 25 1/2 inches long which puts you in the 75/90th percentile in height.  You are also 15 lbs 4 oz putting you in the 75th percentile for weight (my hefty little chunkster) and your head circumference lands you in the 25/50th percentile which rounds you out and makes you very proportionate (so the doc said).  Not that I had any doubt, but you surely are growing like a little weed! 

You will not remember this at all, but you had what doctors refer to as a labial adhesion.  Your cousin had this same issue so when I saw it whilst changing your diaper I knew what it was right away.  It is extremely common in the "heavier set" babies verbatum per Dr. Struble.  She fixed that problem with a little Q-tip and I was expecting some screams out of you, but your reaction was completely opposite, as if nothing has even happened! However the story is completely different with your second round of shots! : ( you screamed so loud, thank goodness Auntie Marissa was there to hold you while the nurse was giving you all 5 shots because sadly your mama was freaking out, those needles are so big!!  But after just a few minutes a little milk you were totally fine and eventually slept the day away.  A slight fever, but the grape flavored infant tylenol really helped (even though you don't really like the taste!)

So now that your 4 month well visit is over and I have written proof that you are a growing healthy little baby girl I am content. 

You love you some Baby Einstein.  It is absolutely crazy.  While we were in Chicago for 2 family reunions and your baptism your Grandpa Steele loved to hold you on his lap and watch Baby Einstein with you.  You just completely zone in on it like nothing else is around.  When we are at home you love to have it on in the backgroud while you play with Jeffrey the Giraffe hanging from your belly time play mat.  Your favorite song to laugh and play to are the ABCs my little genius.  And when you are sleepy I sing "I love your my little baby girl" the song I made up for you and you just stare at me with those adorable loving little eyes as you drift off to sleep.   

I could seriously go on for hours about every little thing that you do, but I will end there.  Another month has passed and my love for you continues to grow.  My sweet adorable chunky little baby girl! :) I love you. 

Maddie has been Baptized

And to be quite honest with you, it was amazing and touched my heart and I cried because I'm overly emotional!  She was a princess the whole time and Father Frank is literally the nicest man on the planet.  When he held her she barely fussed.  The only time she started to fuss was when we laid her back for the actual baptism with the blessed water and it was amazing how she stared up at Father Frank as he touched her sweet little forehead and a hush fell upon her lips as if she was listening so intently on his baptismal words.  Again, I love you my sweet little baby girl and now you are a child of God and even though there was no doubt in my mind before, He really does love you too!!