Summer School Work

Lily's Summer School session was a Camping theme. They learned about tents, fishing, all kinds of camping activities. Here is some of her art from Summer School:

Inside her backpack.

She traced her hands.

A campfire

Ant hill

Butterfly

S'Mores

Binoculars

After school she stayed for a handwriting class. It was a beginners class and I was a little disappointed that they didn't actually write letters. Instead they learned how to hold a pencil and traces lines -- like on the above worksheets. I've actually noticed a huge improvement on her writing and her coloring in the lines since this class, so maybe they know what they are doing after all. :)

Celebration USA

Last night Lily and Chip joined the usual gang for our city's 4th of July celebration. As they do every year, it is celebrated the weekend before the 4th which is great because you get to celebrate twice! I was extremely sad to miss out this year. For some reason this has always been one of my favorite nights of the year. I think I love it so much because Lily loves it so much and it is SO much fun to watch her have so much fun. I mean what's not to love for a kid? Friends, outdoors, music, fireworks and wide open spaces to run, play and dance. It is perfection for Lily. I heard they had tons of fun, especially since the firework show was accompanied with music by Katy Perry and Taylor Swift (Lily and all the kid's favorites). So there was a lot of happy screaming and dancing. Rhiannon and Ben we nice enough to take pictures for me.

I LOVE this picture of Carys, Lily, Matthew and Emily.

Best Friends Forever

Dancing with Makayla

I can almost hear the Katy Perry playing. . . look at that smile.

Happy Birthday Grandma!

Wednesday was my Mom's birthday. Unfortunately, we didn't get to take her out to lunch since I am stuck on the couch. But she did get to pick Lily up from school and bring lunch to me on her day! Thanks Mom! Again, we were waiting for Linda and Jeremy to get here to celebrate. So on Friday night I moved from my couch to hers for the evening and we had dinner and celebrated both Father's Day and Mom's birthday!

Bedrest

On Monday, June 20th I got put on modified bedrest. I was not really expecting that -- although this pregnancy has been WAY different from the first in the way that I am a mental spazz. With Lily, I never worried about anything. But with this baby I have been paranoid from day one and have self diagnosed myself with nearly every pregnancy related malady. I cannot wait to rid myself of these wacky hormones!
When I was sent to physical therapy a few months ago for pelvic pain, I was kind of revealed. I thought that was what was going to go wrong with this pregnancy and SI joint alignment issues wasn't that big of a deal. But I was wrong. As soon as I graduated from PT and was feeling better, I get put on bedrest due to warning signs of preeclampsia.
My blood pressure was slowing sneaking up there -- the highest it has gotten was 132/80, so I was put on BP meds to keep it down. Plus, I am slowing spilling protein in my urine, which is a major warning sign. Those two issues together with headaches and some vision disturbances were enough to get me sent straight to bed. As of right now (and I write this 13 days into bedrest on July 2nd). I am pretty much perfectly fine. The last urine test showed numbers in the 400s. Anything over 150 is abnormal, but the doctor said they wouldn't need to deliver early until the numbers got close to 3000 -- so I have a ways to go. Unfortunately, full on preeclampsia can come on fast and those numbers can jump rapidly. So I am being tested weekly to make sure there are no major changes. The BP meds have kept my pressure down, which is great and hopefully the bedrest will help to continue to keep the BP numbers low to normal. I also get a biophysical profile ultrasound and non-stress test weekly to make sure the baby is still thriving and that my uterus has not turned into a hostile environment for the baby. So far, so good. I've scored a maximum 8/8 on the two tests I've had and the baby is doing great!
I feel the doctors are doing a great job erring on the side of caution. My doctor's partner even had me sent to the hospital for a steroid shot to help the baby's lungs develop faster in case I do have to deliver early. I was not thrilled about this, but after much research I think it was the right choice. Hopefully, it was an unnecessary choice, but better safe than sorry. Dr. Bailey and I are planning on taking this pregnancy all the way to 39 weeks -- I am currently scheduled for delivery on August 17th. So, as long as I can keep all my numbers low we are good to go! Wish me luck! Every day is a new success!

As far as the bedrest goes, I think so far I've had a pretty positive outlook about the whole thing. Of course, it is not ideal and I feel sorry that Lily has to have her summer disrupted and I can't take her fun places. But honestly, it is hot outside and if I have to lay on my couch in the nice air conditioned house watching movies and TV all day while Chip cooks dinner and cleans the house, then I guess I will just have to suck it up and deal. :) Now, I say all this on day 13. Hopefully I have 46 days left and I am sure it is only going to get more and more tedious everyday. Especially since we had Linda and Jeremy here last week to entertain me and more importantly, Lily. And Lily had summer school in June. It is just Lily and I for the rest of the summer -- with help from Grandma, of course. Should be interesting . . . . I'll keep you posted!

Father's Day

We had a pretty mellow Father's Day. Chip worked most of the day, then came home and fell asleep watching the US Open -- which according to him was just perfect. :) In the evening the three of us went to dinner. We didn't get together with my Dad on Sunday since Linda and Jeremy will be in town this week and we decided to wait and all celebrate together. So we had a pretty relaxing and low profile day, just the three of us. Chip did get gifts -- two books he wanted.

Helping Daddy open presents -- notice how good Lily wrote "I Love You" on the envelope. She is getting MUCH better with her letters and therefore is enjoying writing them.

Happy Father's Day Daddy!! We love you!!

Makayla's Recital

Yesterday afternoon we went to Makayla's dance recital. She really wanted Lily and Carys to come and watch her dance and the girls really wanted to go support their BFF. She did a great job and it was so cute and fun to have been able to watch all the girls in their different recitals -- I can't wait till next year to see how far they have come!

Lily was pretty exhausted and I could tell she was tired through the whole show. She spent the night at Grandma and Grandpa's again the night before while Chip and I went out to dinner with Ben & Rhiannon, Patti & Bryan and Jenn & Pete for Rhiannon and Ben's 11 year wedding anniverasry. It was a great night out with great friends and delicious food. But both Lily and I were pretty tired the next day. I didn't get home till midnight (which is way past this tired pregnant lady's bedtime) and Lily went to bed a little later than usual and woke up early -- it is amazing what a difference just an hour or 2 off her normal sleep time can make. But we rested up the rest of the day and it is all good. She is already asking to go back to Grandma's for another sleepover.

Bowling

On Tuesday afternoon Lily went bowling with Emily and Patti (I was there too, of course, but I didn't bowl). This was only her second time bowling and she did SO good! I was so proud of her. She won both games -- even beating Patti!! Of course, the girls had the bumpers up, but still she rocked!

On her very first turn she went past the foul line, slipped and set the buzzer off. It totally traumatize her and she bowled from about 3 feet back every time. It just made her game that much longer and challenging and her wins that much more impressive. :) Her style is to put the ball down on the floor and give it a nice push. Some pushes don't have as much "oomph" as others and I swear it takes the ball a good 5 minutes to reach the pins sometimes.

waiting . . .

Woo-Hoo!

Lily with her score from the second game, not as high as her 81 the first time, but still enough to win!

My Little Ballerina!

Lily had her dance recital this weekend. It is still crazy to me that my baby had her first dance recital!!! She is growing up too fast. As I mentioned before, I was a little apprehensive about the show since she was not very excited about it. But after seeing Emily's show last weekend she seemed to really come around and be ready to go. We had dress rehearsal Saturday morning, where we could take pictures and videos. (The actual show was Saturday evening.) We brought Grandma with us to help run the video camera while I tried to get some photos of her. Lily said she was ready, but I could tell she was nervous. She wasn't having fun as I was applying her makeup and she just kinda sulked back stage when I went to drop her off. Thankfully, when Carys got there she perked up a little and I took the opportunity to make my way to the audience and leave her back stage with her class.
When she first came out, she was a little lost and slow on the routine. It didn't look like she was very sure of herself, but by the second half of the number she was doing great! I was SO proud of her -- just the fact that she got out there and tried. That was all I asked for. After dress rehearsal, she was still being shy and weird. We went to lunch with Grandma and Grandpa and she didn't talk at all. She did shake her head "no" when we asked if she was ready to do it all again, so I was starting to worry a little about the evening show. But as the day progressed she seemed to gain some confidence from somewhere, and by the time it was time to head back to the theater, she was ready to go. Her and Carys were jumping up and down backstage and all energized!!
When it was her turn to dance, she did great!!! It was the cutest thing ever. Again, she was a little behind during the beginning, but she picked it up and did a GREAT job!! I was SO proud of her and I can tell that she is pretty damn proud of herself. I think she is so excited that she actually did it -- no one really doubted her but herself. She even got a little trophy (all the kids did) and she is so proud of that trophy she got "because 'she' is the best!". She is already talking about tap next year and how she'll get to do two numbers in the show (tap and ballet!) which just last week she wasn't excited about at all. I think this whole experience has been SO good for her and her self confidence. I am just so happy and proud of my beautiful little ballerina.

Here are the professional pics that were taken a few weeks ago:



From dress rehearsal:

Rhiannon took these pictures of Lily and Carys backstage.

Here we go . . . .

Are we having fun yet?

She was SO cute up there!

All ready to leave for the main show!

She was loving her makeup by the end of the day -- she couldn't stop checking herself out in the mirror.
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After the recital:

Rhainnon snuck this photo of the girls up on stage with their trophies.

Lily, Emily and Carys after the show.
Since we went to watch Emily last week, she wanted to come see Lily and Carys. It was so nice of them to come and support the girls.

We couldn't take pictures during the main show and afterwards it was pretty chaotic, so I shockingly didn't get many photos. :( I am pretty dissapointed in myself, so unlike me. Thankfully, Rhiannon got some of the girls backstage and after the show. But, I did remember to get a picture of her with her flowers before we got in the car and changed her clothes. :) She got flowers from Chip and me, Grandma & Grandpa and Patti, Bryan & Emily .

Grandma and Grandpa also got her a ballerina figurine to commemorate her first recital and a picture frame. As Lily keeps saying "It was so sweet of Grandma to get this for me." She loves it. After the show, Lily, Chip, Grandpa, Me, Patti, Bryan and Emily went to dinner to celebrate. It was a super fun and special night!
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This morning, Lily was loving checking out and smelling all her beautiful flowers. So I had to take some pictures.

She is such a weird-o.