My Husband Always Tries to Read My Posts Before I'm Finished.

A few weeks ago, I told Travis that my birthday gift this year would be the trip we're taking to Hattiesburg. I figured, it costs money to board the dogs, drive to Mississippi, and I plan on eating at all my favorite restaurants from my good ol' college days... so why spend money on a gift? Besides, I couldn't think of anything I wanted. But then, as the days went by, my trusty macbook started acting up. And by "acting up" I really mean "dying." It froze all. the. time. For the last year or so, I haven't been able to do a whole lot of multitasking because it was just too much for the old guy to handle. (old guy: macbook) I was able to deal with limiting my multitasking, but restarting my computer multiple times a day (restarting took a good 30 to 45 minutes each time) was pushing me over the edge. I frantically searched for my external hard drive to back up my computer (something I hadn't done in over a year!) and barely got everything backed up. I started backtracking my "I don't need a birthday gift" stance yesterday and asked Travis if there was any chance I could get a new laptop. I made every case I could... and he didn't say a whole lot (which really isn't all that unusual). About the third time my computer froze up in a thirty minute period, Travis left the room and returned a few minutes later with a beautiful new Macbook Pro. I cried. He wanted to wait till my birthday, but the old guy gave out a week too soon. And in the end, it was an even bigger surprise. So I'm now writing my first blogpost on my brand new laptop. It's just so wonderful. And you know what else? My old laptop won't come back on. I got one last backup last night... and then he died. Travis has tried to revive him, but I think it's a lost cause. He held on till he knew I was taken care of. ;) He was a good laptop. So thoughtful.

Also, yesterday marked the one year anniversary of my positive pregnancy test. Apparently September 27th is a big day for me.

Logan no longer sleeps through the night. (I can't remember if he'd given that up when I last wrote...) However, we officially moved him to his own room, because I found that he was spending more time in my bed than his pack n' play. (And technically he's only supposed to use the bassinet portion of the pack n' play till he's 15 pounds... he's almost 17 pounds. Oops.) I was just too tired in the night to stay awake, so I kept falling asleep while he nursed back to sleep... and neither of us was getting the good, restful sleep we really need. I'm slowly figuring out this whole "baby sleep" thing. He naps a lot. He takes a nap somewhere between forty-five minutes and an hour and a half after he wakes up. After every nap. So by the end of the day he's taken about five naps. Or six. But he's a happier baby and he sleeps better at night. (One or two wake-ups instead of four or five.) I learned last night that Travis isn't allowed to help with nighttime wake-ups. He tried last night, but caved in when the little guy smiled at him. He smiled back! So of course, Logan thought it would be fun to stay up for a little while. It may be mean of me, but when Logan wakes up in the night, he gets fed and then goes back to sleep. I can barely open my eyes in the middle of the night, so smiling at him is less of a concern for me. Hah. Sometime during his nice long sleep last night, he figured out how to put his butt in the air and kind of get onto his knees to scoot forward. He can't move much at all, but it's a pretty impressive attempt. He's really trying to figure out how to become mobile. He doesn't like staying in one place. However, he's only [almost] four months old, so he's got some time. Though I do think our aspirations of an immobile baby on our international flights is far-fetched now. I think we'll be up and down the aisles a lot.

We have a new area rug in our living room. The dogs love it even more than I do. Hah. We've used our TV a few times...it's pretty small and hard to see. Maybe someday we'll upgrade. We ran out of rice. We went through ten kilos of rice really fast. It's the Asian in us. Travis doubled the chocolate chip cookie recipe (it's the absolute best ever!), so now we have a ton of frozen cookie dough balls in the freezer. And Magnums. They were on sale. And I need to get some sleep before my little one wakes up for his first (and hopefully only) middle of the night feeding.

Slow Motion vs. Fast Motion (...and Logan, of course)

In the last week or so, I've been paying more attention to which scenarios cause Travis and me to disagree or argue more often. You see, I felt problems were arising more often and I couldn't figure out why. As it turns out, there's one common factor to nearly every argument we've had in the last... probably since we got married. It only took me three years to figure it out. You see, I move in fast-motion a lot of the time. When I get hungry, I want food. right. now. And if I'm say, nursing or otherwise busy with my dear child, I might ask Travis to get me some food. If I ask him to get me some food and he says yes, it's as if I have an internal timer that, quite honestly, is not very long. So half an hour later, when my stomach sounds beyond angry, I express that anger towards Travis. After all, he did say that he'd get me some food. Travis's perspective, I've come to find out, is very different. When he agrees to get me some food, he never thinks it's an immediate agreement. He said he'd do it... he didn't say he'd do it now. Our new compromise is that if I ask for food, I have a very short wait period before the hunger takes over my mind... so if he can't or doesn't want to help right then, he needs to say "when I finish ___" or "I will in ___ minutes"... then I have a better idea when my food is coming. OR I can decide that he's going to take too long and I need to master the art of nursing standing up with one hand while making a sandwich with the other. ;) Or just learn to be more patient. It's all about compromise. My second example of "fast motion" is while shopping. I'm not a "let's go shopping for a few hours 'cause it's so much fun" kind of person. I know what I'm going to buy when I go out, and I want to buy it and go home. (I literally feel exhausted as soon as we've found the item I sought out to buy.) I'm a bit more flexible on this when we're at Target and I wander into the baby section... but grocery shopping. Blah. Travis, on the other hand, wants to compare prices for every item we need or just stroll along at a leisurely (ahem, slow) pace, while I feel as though we're tiptoeing through our mundane grocery shopping. Travis is basically the most laid-back person in the world. I mean, I was in full blown labor and he decided to take a shower. If a man isn't going to get into gear and move at a high speed when his wife is screaming in pain, I don't know that there's anything that will. So we're working on compromising our "fast motion" and "slow motion" personalities into a... medium motion. We'll see how it goes.

Logan giggles now. Not often. But when he does, it's the best thing ever. I'm sure in a few years, we'll go back through all our videos of Logan and wonder why we thought him lying on his back "cooing" for ten minutes was so exciting... but today, right now, it's wonderful. If his noisiness at 3.5 months is any indication of talkativeness later in life, he's going to talk our ears off. He's rarely quiet. It's pretty cute though. (Except when he's beyond exhausted and has decided that the best way to stay awake is to yell. Not cry or scream. Yell.) My poor little guy has a cold and isn't a big fan of the snot-sucker. It works really well... if he'll let us use it! He loves his door jumper and is determined to sit up all. the. time. Or pull himself to his feet (while holding our hands, of course). And the only things that work in getting him to nap now are the car seat (both in the car and out... though out of the car takes longer) and the ergo carrier (magic!). He used to fall asleep on his own in his cozy little swing. But then one day he decided swings aren't cool and pacifiers are gross, so we were back at square one. I'm pretty sure his preferences change daily.

I'm back to babysitting now. I watch a three year old boy, a seven month old girl, and my little guy. It's quite a party! A week ago Logan would fall asleep when the seven month old cried... now he stares around the room in utter confusion.... or joins in himself. The three year old says things so practically. He went to the Baylor football game a couple weeks ago. I asked him, "Did they run really far?" He answered, "No, they runned close together." He has a point. And while he was playing with his legos the other day, I asked him what he was building. He said, "A mistake." "What's a mistake?" I asked. He said, "I don't know, but Daddy knows." :) I'm guessing his dad was building something with the legos and said, "I made a mistake!" and now it's an official thing to build. It's fun! It's better on the days that the babies are calm and easy. Once Logan can sit up without help, that will be one less thing I have to do--support him while he insists on sitting.

In other news... we're going to Hattiesburg, MS (where I went to college) next month. I'm very excited. We have our tickets to Indonesia for December, the dog boarding is already paid for, and we have a used car seat to take along just in case it gets damaged. And our passport applications (Logan's and mine) have been sent off. Exciting things are happening. Life is good. God's blessings are the best.