I know it's been forever...

But I'm just so tired! These days I'm napping when Joanna's napping. That's sometimes only 30 minutes, but other times 1 1/2 hours! I really didn't do it much when she was a newborn, but by golly, I'm getting my sleep in now. Growing a tiny baby is hard work. I think I had forgotten, a little. While I'm on the subject, I guess I'll give a little update on that front. Things are going well. I'm almost 10 weeks pregnant, and definitely less sick than I was with Joanna. Things are also very different, so it's hard to compare. With Joanna, I was working full time so I didn't really have the opportunity to nap, but I don't remember feeling as tired. I guess keeping up with a toddler is harder than sitting behind a computer, but I'll take what I've got any day! I love the flexibility of our schedule these days! Like today (okay, I'm getting off on a tangent here) Joanna and I got some shopping done this morning, then stopped at IHOP for lunch -- how fun! Then we were gonna go swimming this afternoon but I couldn't make myself get out of the house. I will admit it: I'm lazy, and I like the A/C. A lot. Okay, back to pregnancy stuff: I'm feeling the "momnesia" in full force. I'm trying really hard to concentrate on things so I don't mess them up, but mostly I forget to concentrate hard on things. It's a sad little vicious cycle. We've started little preparations (mostly thinking) for the new baby, because I know the birthday is going to sneak up on us, especially with the holidays. The due date is January 8th, so I'm planning on Christmas. It's funny to think that the baby may have a 2008 birthday or maybe a 2009. Who knows? Joanna was a little bit early, and we were not ready (how can you ever be, though), so I'm hoping/planning/striving to be "baby ready"-ish by Dec. 1st. So anyway, we're setting up our bedroom to be a lot more baby-centered than it was with Joanna. The plan is to have new baby in there until it just doesn't work anymore, then s(he) will bunk with Joanna. We're clearing out a closet and a corner for baby stuff (chair, changing table, diapers, blankets, whatever). We're also painting (nothing really to do with the baby), I'm just ready for a little darker color. So far there's just a couple of splotches on the wall, but the paint is purchased, and it's just a matter of moving furniture and slapping it up there. I'll post pictures of our empty corner once the room is painted (and the corner is actually empty). Now for the actual reason for this post: Cute pictures of Joanna.

Friday we headed to Caleb's house for playday. We love going to Caleb's house. He has lots of great toys, lots of space to run, and stairs to climb!

Joanna very rarely wears bows, mostly because her mother is lazy, but Abby handed hers over at playday. Abby's mother is not lazy, and Abby always wears bows (she also actually has bangs), but she's getting to where she likes to pull them out. I think this picture is precious -- Joanna's playing "Peek-a-Boo" with Amy. So sweet.

As people were starting to leave, Joanna (and Caleb, not pictured) stood at the windows saying good-bye to everybody. Caleb likes shoes. I'm just impressed he could actually walk in mine. Pretty fashionable.

Other Random Joanna Moments:

First, I must preface this picture by saying that my mom started it, okay. Joanna loves french fries (what's not to love, right?). Sometimes we go to Sonic or McDonalds or wherever and get a little snack to share.

I just thought this was funny. I followed Joanna into her room the other day and she was sitting on a pile of stuffed animals. Weird. I later discovered she had gone there to do some diaper business. Less weird, I guess. That's what a cat would do. :)
We recently got out the "Cozy Coupe" that I got for Joanna at Baby Daze back in February. Now that she's pretty steady with her walking, we thought it was time. SHE LOVES THIS CAR. I was not expecting that, exactly. I thought she might like to get in, maybe push it around a bit, but she is constantly playing with the car. She gets in, honks the horn, closes the door, gets stuck sometimes, gets out, pushes the car around. She'll go and get toys to play with inside the car. I saw her grab her milk and snack trap and get in to watch a little HGTV -- drive-in movie!

Now that we officially have a toddler, which really just happened over the last couple of weeks, we had to go get some tennis shoes. Here she is testing them out on the deck out back.
This pole is for bird feeders (long since destroyed by squirrels), but Joanna loves it. This afternoon she kind of tried to use it like a fireman's pole to get to the grass. She was less than successful, although she did get to the grass.
The new shoes: size 3 1/2
First scraped knee as a toddler. Spiderman bandaid! She only kept it on for like 5 seconds, though.
And lastly, the first major injury. Saturday morning we were all outside on the driveway. Matt's bike was out, and Matt and I were looking the other way as Joanna leaned up against the back tire and flipped completely over, landing on her face. Oops. Oh, she cried! But it is practically healed as of now (Wednesday evening). She's like a super-healer! Call her Wolverine-ette.

Just a side note: it took me like 2 days to complete this post. (Remember, I'm really tired lately.) So if the time frames are a little confusing, that's why.

Other interesting new Joanna things:

• She likes to go into her room and shut the door. I listen closely and usually go open it when she either starts hollering, saying "hello" really loudly, or knocking to get out. Or when she's really really quiet. Oh, she's so cute! Today, though, she went in there, closed the door and played for a few minutes. When I went over to open the door, I discovered a huge ALIVE cockroach behind her in the room. Ehhlagaewww. And shudder. So Joanna slept in Gran's room in the port-a-crib for her nap. And I shoved a towel in the crack under Joanna's door until Matt came home.
• She will scream and holler and cry and tug on me to go outside. If we're sitting down and she's in my lap, she'll grab my shoulders and attempt to pull me up so we can go out. If I ask her, "Do you want to go outside?" she does her fancy excited shudder, sometimes with a "more" sign thrown in. Sometimes I can satisfy her just by going to check the mail, other times needs to be out longer. This afternoon, I really did not want to give in (did I mention I LOVE the A/C?), but I got a phone call from a friend and did not want her to have to listen to Joanna screaming at me, so we went out. I'm glad we did, because the plants were looking really droopy so we watered them. Joanna is so silly. I had the sprinkler on, and she was pretty interested. So she walks toward it, and of course starts getting wet, but it makes her mad/sad. Does she turn around and walk away? Um, no. Granted she is REALLY GRUMPY in the afternoons and kind of hard to deal with, but seriously, just walk away!
• We're firmly down to one nap a day (have been for a while), and occasionally they're good and long. I think it was yesterday that she took a 1 1/2 hour nap! I can really tell a difference in that Joanna versus 30 minute nap Joanna in the afternoons. The best thing to do when she wakes up after only 30-40 minutes and is grumpy is to just get out of the house. It is SO HOT outside that I never want to, I just want to lay under the ceiling fan until Matt gets home. Joanna does not think this is fun. Go figure.

I apologize for the really long rambling post. I just I'm in a long and rambley kind of mood. I also apologize that it's been so long since I posted. I'm not going to promise to do better. But I will try.

Old MacDonald had a farm...

EIEIO. And on that farm he had a Joanna... EIEIO. I'm not really sure what that face was about. I think it's cute, though.

Today we went to Old MacDonald's farm, a fabulous place nearby with lots of, well, farm animals. There's also lots of play equipment, a pool, a big pile of dirt, and a train. It's a pretty amazing place for kiddos. Joanna practiced a lot of walking today. She did really well. We went with lots of other mommies from our play group, and the kiddos seemed to all have a blast.

Even though I figured Joanna would not want to feed the animals, I got a bag of seed (cause I wanted to!).

Here are some very hungry goats!

The deer were just running (or laying) around. Joanna didn't really think it was anything special to be sitting right next to a deer. The deer didn't really think it was anything special to be sitting right next to a Joanna, either. She did pet the deer, and I fed it.

Here are a couple of friends riding ponies! I think Bailey is a born cowgirl. Caleb's like, look Mimi, I got it. Riding a horse is no problem.

Joanna was playing in the dirt during most of this. Anytime I stopped looking at her for a minute, I look around to find her playing in the dirt or the grass. Joanna and a cow.
Joanna playing in the grass.
Joanna and some birds. She actually wanted to get really close to them, but beaks make me a little nervous.
Joanna and some baby cows.
Anna and her mommy on the train. Joanna looking out of the train.
Clever name.
After lunch, most of our friends left to go have naps. Since I knew Joanna was going to fall asleep on the way home no matter what I did, we stayed for a few more minutes. I still had animal food burning a hole in my diaper bag.

I really liked the sheep. It's seems funny to me, but most of the kids were scared of them. I didn't know it until today, but sheep "baa" really loudly. It's startling! I put some food in Joanna's hand and held it out to the sheep. I wanted her to feel their little lips. She didn't mind it too much. She started crying a couple of minutes later, but I don't think it was related.

"Oops, I dropped the animal food" "I got the animal food."
"Here, Mommy, have the animal food." I really like this shot of Joanna with the sheep in the background. Did I mention I really liked the sheep? I gave them the rest of our food.

Just because I thought "When is she going to have this opportunity again soon?" more than I thought she really wanted to, I put her on a pony. Joanna is so funny. She didn't even bat an eye. Like riding a horse happens all the time. I walked with her, because I know she doesn't know how to hold on, and we went around in a little circle. Joanna pointed at the horse and said, "woof, woof." Yup, that's my girl.

About 3 minutes into the trip home. I had no hope of a nap today (sniffle sniffle).
This morning I dumped out my purse and diaper bag on my bed to get things organized and decide what I wanted to take. Joanna LOVES pretty much all the contents of my purse (keys, wallet, granola bar, etc.) so she was really motivated to climb onto our very high bed! She took it in two steps. Step one: climb on the frame. Then, when Mommy moves all the stuff out of reach, step two: haul myself onto the top of the bed. Wow. I thought this day was down the road aways. Not so much.

Awwww...

Our babies are so cute! Okay, technically one is still in production, but we got to see it's little peanut self on the ultrasound today (and I can already tell: it's so cute!). I am 8 weeks pregnant today, and I had my first obgyn visit for this pregnancy this afternoon, and Matt took off half the day to go with me. Mamma came over and watched Joanna because it was naptime, and we didn't think it would be so much fun to have a tired toddler with us at the doctor's office. Plus, it was nice to get to go alone and pay attention. (You know cause it's been like two years since we did this!) I really enjoyed having confirmation with my own eyes (basically) of this little baby. There was always this tiny little nagging thought in the back of my head that thought maybe I was having some kind of weird symptoms but not actually pregnant. Then there was that other even tinier thought that maybe we'd have twins or something. NOPE! Just one (but thankfully one) baby in there. Here is new baby's first appearance on the blog: (To help you a little, it is upside down, and you can't really see it's leg buds.)

Here is Miss Joanna's 9 week gestation picture:

Can you tell they're related?

Now on to some cute Joanna things. I'm on this new kick where I'm trying to cook pretty often, and serve Joanna what we're eating, when we're eating it, instead of my usual feed Joanna in the kitchen while I pull together mine and Matt's dinner. I've only managed a couple of nights so far, but it's been really nice. Last night we had spaghetti, and I think Joanna was a fan. Of course we stripped her down to the diaper first.

"No pictures, please."
Oh, she is so cute!


It's not a purse, but it's the same concept. This afternoon she was walking around with this GIANT bucket. It overbalanced her a couple of times, but she sure didn't let that stop her. She's definitely a girl after my own heart -- I always carry a big purse!

Jellies!, some food firsts, and other cute Joanna things

Those of you who were children in the 1980s know what Jellies are. For the rest of you they are plastic/rubber shoes, sometimes clear, sometimes bright colors, and they were a major trend when I was a kid. You'd wear them out (did I mention they were plastic) and run out to get more ASAP. You could absolutely wear them with everything. I've started noticing them in the stores for kiddos lately, and I couldn't resist getting a pair for Joanna. Technically I was on a hunt for size 3 white sandals, but I couldn't pass these up, especially when I couldn't find exactly what I wanted. They'll serve basically the same purpose, and they are SO CUTE! First, here is the cutest shoebox I've ever seen in my life: Joanna's jellies! She really seems to like them :)
I came home from work today to find this face. Yup, that's chocolate -- oreo to be exact. Later today she also had a piece of a kit-kat from the same woman who gave her the oreo. She claims Joanna wrestled her to the floor for it. Mmm Hmm, right.
This evening I decided to be lazy and have Skeeter's cook dinner for us (a very good decision, I must say). We love going to Skeeter's. For us, it's a pretty perfect family restaurant. It's close to our house; you can sit wherever you want; it's usually pretty noisy; there are usually a lot of kids/families so everybody understands when your kid is screaming (YOUR kid, not MINE). They cover the tables with brown paper that you can draw on (or your kid can, providing she doesn't still eat crayons) and is presumably cleaner than a table top. Tonight for the first time, I ordered Joanna a kid's meal instead of packing a sack dinner. It was fabulous! I mean, who doesn't love toast covered in butter and cheese (I did not say this was a healthy outing). She ate almost a whole 1/2 a sandwich and all her grapes and strawberries. My baby girl is so big! I'm glad we're growing another tiny one :)
Joanna has recently started pushing this little buggy around with some babies in it. If you can't tell by the very stylish colors and wear and tear, it was mine when I was little! Somehow I managed to hang on to it 'till now. Awww....
She's a little frustrated in the first pic because she hasn't mastered turning around, but in this next picture she taking care of her baby. Again, I must say it: She's so cute!Matt and I found this little hat that matches her swimsuit the other day and it was on clearance so of course we picked it up. Have I mentioned that I'm a sucker for Joanna giraffe clothes? Here she is having a little fashion show:For several minutes she entertained herself (and me) by taking it off and putting it on over and over again.She only stopped when she spotted Gran's luggage. Of course she had to check things out.
"Is this where I ride?" "Oh, here's where I ride."

Another extremely cute thing Joanna is doing I haven't actually taken a picture of yet, although I think I have video. For now, you get a description. Joanna has 2 toy purses, plus a couple of small bags of mine turned purses, plus two cooler-bags from the kitchen turned purses, and a bucket or two that serve the same purpose. It is the cutest thing in the universe to watch her put one or two in the crook of her elbow and walk around. She has her little hand out like a lady. Nobody I know actually wears a purse like that, so I don't know where she picked it up, but it is precious! She fills them with her favorite little toys and takes stuff out and puts stuff in. I think she's discovering that she can carry stuff with her if she puts it in her purse!