Maddy Randomness

I've known for some time now that Maddy has a really sweet heart, but I was finally able to capture a little of it on camera. She takes such good care of her baby. If her baby gets a boo boo she will talk to her and kiss her to make sure she is ok. She feeds baby, gives baby drinks, changes baby's diapers, and most importantly loves on her. When we play outside she has to have baby with her. If she needs to take her car out for a spin...she will never forget her baby. It's just one of those things that really makes you go AWWWW!!! You can't see it too much on the videos I am going to post but you can kinda get the idea :)

As you already know I am a huge fan of Zulily! I was looking through the brands and happened to notice this one:

The brand is "Madison Paige." I thought that was so neat, because that's Maddy's name, that I HAD to buy me a shirt. I know I'm weird but whatever makes us happy lol. I actually think it's neat because from the time Maddy could interact at all with the world around her she has always had a fashion sense about her. Even now she seems to really like her clothes and loves to pick them out. When we get ready I let her pick out her outfit. She doesn't always pick things that match, so I try to steer her in the right direction by picking out two things that will match the shirt or pants she picked. She picked out her own Easter dress this year as well as her bathing suit. The bathing suit she went for they did not have in her size so she had to go to an alternate. Mommy picked out her favorite bathing suit for Maddy as well...a girl needs options lol. Maddy also has a love for shoes. She much prefers to buy shoes over clothes.

The other night Maddy had her first run with eating corn on the cob. She didn't really understand how to eat it and kept trying to eat the end of it.

Hope you all are enjoying your weekend :)

Laughing Randomness

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This isn't an "I'm a huge Whitney Houston" post. Back in the day...as in 1990-ish...I did enjoy a lot of her music. I didn't own every tape...yes...TAPE but did have one or two. This week has kinda been a bummer. Every week seems to be stressful due to work, but I'm finding with each passing week that I'm starting to burn out. I can only give so much of myself before I say enough is enough. I really enjoy spending time with Maddy and Saturday is really my only day to do so. I look forward to picking Maddy up in the afternoons. I really enjoy getting to break free from work and have a little fun. On my way to get Maddy Tuesday, this song came on my ipod....I Wanna Dance With Somebody. I think I stay so stressed that I enjoy things a lot more than maybe a normal person would lol. This song just made me feel so happy for some reason. I sang my heart out in the car, even though I can't sing worth a flip, and I was just dancing away...safely that is. I got so into it that I envisioned me being in the music video and my voice sounding like Whitney's. This song helped put a lil pep back in my step and it was just a breath of fresh air. I know not everybody is like me nor does everybody enjoy all the kinds of music I do, but just want to say if you ever feel so weighed down in life...of coarse you should pray and give it to God, but why not turn on some tunes for a minute and just dance/sing it out....it has to release happy endorphin's some how lol.

I did use the word random in the title for a reason...this is why...I don't have one specific topic to talk about. Tonight was bath night for Maddy. When I picked her up she was in a good mood. I had chocolate and juice for her as a snack on the way home and all was good. Oh yeah...can't forget we listened to Bob as well. We get home and start to have a meltdown over eating dinner, but she decides if she's gotta do it that SHE is going to find what she wants. In her words, "MADDY HAVE TO DO IT!!!!" yes, she screams...literally. For the record I do not give her what she wants when she does that. I calmly talk to her until she hears me talking and tell her what she needs to do to get what she is requesting. Anyways, she gets over it all and eats dinner. I buy the single cups of velveeta shells and cheese and she eats a whole one and easily asks for more after that one...my child can eat like nobody's business lol. She doesn't like bath nights most of the time and I think it's because she knows when she gets done with the bath it's usually bedtime. I finally convince her to take a bath. It went well up until time to bathe her. I tell her it's time to get bubbles on her...she knows what that is...and it puts her into fit mode. She does her screaming thing and I realize she's mad cause she wants to do it herself. I always tell her mommy does it first then it's Maddy's turn. I would have done that tonight had she not been screaming and crying and throwing things all because she wanted to do it. I tell her she needs to be nice and not throw things and the whole nine yards, but she is just so worked up nothing was working...the more I tried to talk her down from her fit the madder she got. I finally just let her scream it out for a few seconds and then I did the unthinkable. I did something that I get on to everybody else for doing if they do it in front of me. I really have no idea why I reacted this way or why I did it at all....I found myself laughing hysterically. I tried my best to stop but it was one of those kinds of laughing that once you started you couldn't stop...kinda like a slap happy laugh where any and everything is funny...yeah...I did that in the middle of my child's fit. Do you know that I felt horrible for reacting that way? Here Maddy is so upset that she is acting out in a screaming/throwing rage and I'm laughing. I did get myself under control and no I didn't laugh for a long time...just a few seconds but it felt like forever in my mind. First of all I don't like laughing when she is pitching a fit because it gives her a reaction...that's what she is after...the reaction...the attention...and that is now how you get mommy's or anybody else's attention. Second...these are her feelings. I don't think feelings should be laughed at. Maddy really is a very very sensitive child. If she thinks she disappointed you in any way she instantly gets her mad look on her face and starts to pout because she disappointed. I don't want her to think that I don't care about her feelings...because I do. She fought me all the way until she was completely dressed for bed. No, I didn't laugh the entire time...just once or twice while she was in the bath. She wanted me to hold her and I just quietly went to the kitchen to fix her bottle and asked if she wanted to give my step dad hugs and kisses. She opted not to and just said night instead. We got to her room and she just snuggled with me for the longest time. I had to tell her to go to her bed but I decided I would carry her to bed. I love how sweet she is and how loving she is. She'll put my head on her head and she'll just rub my face or she'll want me to lay my head on top of her and she'll just hug me so tight and then she'll stop long enough to pat my back then she'll go back to hugging. I'm so thankful tomorrow is Friday and I'm looking forward to spending the weekend with Maddy. Laughter really is the best medicine, but in the right circumstances/situations lol. Laughing during a temper tantrum is not really the best time but just goes to show if ya don't deal with your stress it will come out sooner or later and it usually happens in the worst times lol. Lesson learned...kinda

First Sickie of the Year

Yesterday morning when I woke Maddy up she had this weird look about her. I asked her what was wrong and she simply said, "Look!" as she pointed to her nose. Her nose was just pouring snot, but it was clear thank goodness. It's normal for her to have a runny nose throughout winter, except this winter she hasn't had that problem thankfully, so I was hoping it was just the typical runny nose. On the way school I kept watching her in my mirror and she just looked like she didn't feel good. She wasn't smiling or playing...just sitting there playing with her hair. I got off the exit I normally do and as we were stopped at the red light my gut told me to just turn around and take her back home. Did I listen? of coarse not. I proceeded to take her to school. I fully expected them to call me to come get her, but they never did so I thought everything may have been just fine. When I picked her up they told me she acted like she didn't feel good and she coughed all through nap. She only napped for 35 minutes and she looked pretty bad. I snapped a pic of her before we left, but this is before she started to look real bad.

She's always tired on the way home but she fights through it and talks and plays and sings and sometimes yells at mommy lol. I noticed it was really quiet and when I looked back at her she was sound asleep. I let her sleep until she woke up, which was around 6:45 p.m. I carried her in the house and she curled up in my lap and just sat there and watched tv, which is something she never does. She asked for bite bites, but didn't eat any. I put her to bed and the only way she would let me leave is if I told her I would be right back. I told her I had to work but that I'd be right back...she said ok and let me go. I couldn't work as late as I normally did because I was worried about how she felt. I had taken her temp before I put her to bed and it was 100.1. I felt bad that she wanted me to stay in there and I had to work. I knew I wouldn't be going to work Tuesday so I chose to forget about trying to work and just focus on Maddy. I peaked my head in her room and finally saw her sitting up in bed. I crawled in her bed with her and told her I was back and she could lay down and she fell forward on me and fell sound asleep. I did my best to take a picture of her sleeping on me but I didn't get a good one...here is what I did get...

Had I not been propped up on my arm, she probably would have laid there all night. I had to get off my arm though because it was really hurting. She did lay back down on me for a while longer. I had trouble sleeping because I worried that she would break out in a high fever and I would have to take her to the ER. I stayed awake until around 1:30 a.m. before I was finally able to go to sleep. The night before she was coughing non stop and last night she didn't cough at all. I had refilled her humidifier last night and I think it was a huge help in her coughing. When she woke up this morning she seemed just fine, just sounded really stuffy. I was thinking I could have sent her to school, but I'm glad I didn't. Her nose was still running nonstop and it had changed from clear to green. While she was eating her breakfast she started coughing, then got choked on her mucous. She ended up throwing up and a good bit of mucous came out. It really scared her. After that incident her nose went back to clear and it seemed to not run as much. I'm figuring if it isn't a sinus infection it's allergies. I'm thinking it's more allergies because aside from night before last she has no fever and it's not consistently green snot. We got to do a lot of playing today and had some good quality one on one time that we hardly ever get. I really hate that she was sick, but I really enjoyed our day together. We watched Bob and Sprout and ate cupcakes and fruit and cornbread and played house and rolled ball and worked on mommy's coupons and then played more house and other things. She did end up locking herself in her room this afternoon, but luckily I got the idea to take her doorknob off. It wouldn't let loose at first, but I say God intervened and turned it loose. I will either be switching doors because my room has no lock on it or will be getting the child proof doorknob covers so she can't do that again. She no longer has that I don't feel good look about her. The only thing that has me concerned right now is she only used the bathroom once and it didn't even fill her diaper. She didn't drink a whole lot today and I tried to encourage her to but she only took a few sips. Her throat may not feel real good but I really don't want her getting dehydrated. Hopefully tomorrow she will wake up feeling even better.

Crane Humidifier

I am a huge fan of Zulily. I have the app on my phone and everyday at 9 a.m. I get so excited to see what cute things are on sale for the day. One of the deals I purchased is the frog Crane humidifier for Maddy. I was unsure if it was really a good deal and it was suggested I look online to see what it would run. This was running around $40-$60 at other stores, so I thought $29.99 was a great deal.
This is an image I found from amazon.com. The particular listing I am looking at is selling for $52.90. I would never have thought this cute lil guy would cost so much lol. I am so happy I purchased it. I gave Maddy the choice between the cow and frog and thank goodness she chose the frog lol. It is very easy to use and is super quiet. In looking at the reviews people are giving it a bad rating because it is extremely hard to clean. You can't take it fully apart to get it good and clean, but you can clean it by using vinegar and water. I was very nervous when I first used it because it talks about not letting the water sit for more than a day or bacteria will grow. Maddy normally has terrible sinus/cough issues at night...especially in the winter and spring. This humidifier claims it will take away flu symptoms and get rid of coughing and it just sounded amazing. The first night she used it she did not cough one time. The night before we used it she was up quite a bit coughing. She loves her frog and is very curious about him. She watches me pour the water in and put it back together and then we turn it on. As soon as we do she normally says, "Maddy's frog!" I only want to use filtered water in there and have been out the past few days and her sinuses have just bloomed full force. I can tell a big difference when we do use it verses when we don't. I'm hoping I can get her back on track and get rid of her runny nose and coughing at night. She is coughing tonight, but I also have her fan and heater going, so I probably need to bump up the setting. I really wish I had gotten one a lot sooner. Right now my review is basically that I love it, but that may change in time :)

Tornado 2012

March 2, 2012 was such a wild day around my area. We had potential strong storms Wednesday February, 29 but it wasn't anything to worry over. I knew we were in for strong storms today but I still did not think anything would come of it. I saw on Facebook that morning from a local news station that was advising everybody to make sure their cell phones stayed plugged in throughout the day so they would be charged and to make sure weather radios were charged and you had batteries. I knew from that post that we definitely had potential tornadoes coming our way. They predicted around 4 p.m. to be the worst so I took their word...they were wrong (not at all downing the weather people, I fully rely on them and think they do a great job). Maddy's daycare director sent an email stating the kids had a safe zone to go to in the event a tornado touched down and they had practiced a tornado drill first thing that morning. When I read that Maddy had gone through a tornado drill I'll be honest and admit I cried. My 2 year old should not have to be practicing for a tornado and even worse be practicing without her mommy there to protect her. I kept my eye on the clouds all day that day...I obviously could NOT focus at work. Here is the first picture I took outside:

Honestly it did not look bad at all so I was beginning to wonder if we really were in for bad storms. I kept my eyes glued to news channel 9's facebook page as well as the weather in motion map on weather.com. The new station finally posted a map that showed just what we were in for and I knew we were definitely in for some bad weather. Here is the map they posted:

I had a friend keeping me up to date in their section of the woods and they were reporting hail. Soon after I heard there was hail I received word that there was a tornado on signal mountain (which is near the downtown area of my town) and had jumped over to Red Bank, TN. It became real to me that tornadoes were on their way. I kept a close watch on our dogs. For the April 27, 2011 tornado outbreak all the dogs were going crazy. This time around my dog Manny was definitely shaking like a leaf, but he wasn't going crazy and neither were the outside dogs. The outside dogs were all in their house being quiet as a mouse, which I didn't understand. The rain finally hit my house and in my mind I was thinking ok...let's do this. This is what I saw out of my window:

I know..it looks just like a typical rainy day. I started hearing reports that there was a torndao on the ground in Harrison and then in Ooltewah. I guess I was in disbelief because I just refused to believe that was true. It wasn't until I saw pictures and heard people near the situation start talking about it on facebook that it became more real to me. Island Cove marina got destroyed and the pictures my friend Wendy posted were just unreal to me. When I think of tornadoes, I do not think of my town as having them. In school we were told not to worry about tornadoes because we live in a valley and tornadoes would just bounce off the mountain...now it's becoming more and more common it seems and it's just crazy. Finally close to 2:00 p.m. things started to ease off as far as warnings go and I began to wonder what 4 p.m. would bring. Roads were closed all over the place and it was taking people 2.5 hours just to get home. The exit I normally get  off of to go home was closed. Both roads you take on the way to my house were closed. Never has that happened that I can remember. The next round of storms were brewing and it was around 6:30 p.m. I took some more pics of the clouds just for my documentation purposes:

It really did look much worse than the pics show. It was funny because I'm all into seeing what was going to happen and is a tornado gonna fall from the sky and next thing I know this lightning that seemed to just be like a huge claw reaching down struck and I screamed and tried to take off running, but I forgot I was right next to my car and ran into it backwards tryin to get outta there lol. My mom and I stood in amazement at what it looked like outside and we both agreed that a tornado was definitely going to be forming from that storm. The rest of the night we hung out in my mom's room, which Maddy loves because of their awesome king size bed they have lol. Here she is:

She was munching on grapes and talking to her cousin Aria. They were so cute talking to each other. I have them on video but haven't uploaded it yet. I put Maddy to bed at regular time, 7:30 p.m., and then went back to work. By the time I was done with work at 10 p.m. the weather was starting to ease off. It was a very wild and crazy day and I truly feel so sorry to the people who lost their homes or were affected by this tornado. The tornado has been categorized an EF3 and started in Harrison, TN. We drove by on Saturday and I honestly didn't want people seeing me take pictures of the damage to their homes because I feel it is disrespectful unless they tell me they are ok with it. We drove through again Saturday night and I felt a little better about it because it wasn't obvious what I was doing. The road I am talking about is Mahan Gap. I travel this road every day at least two times a day, seven days a week. Never in my life have I seen a house completely taken from the foundation, partially twisted, and then looked as if it had just been sat back down. As my mom put it, it was like something you would see in the Wizard of Oz. I saw kids just sitting on parts of trees and my heart just broke for them. I cannot imagine what they must be feeling and I will definitely be praying for everybody. I will post the pics I have of the damage, but they are blurry as we were driving through:

Thankful For...

No, it isn't Thanksgiving but it's on my mind so I had to write:


I'm thankful for:

• Maddy-she has been a true blessing to me and I really don't know what I ever did without her. She is my motivation to keep going when I feel like giving up. I love her more than any words could describe
• My job-I may not like my job nor the time it takes away from Maddy, but I'm very thankful to have one. It pays most of my bills but most importantly it gives me enough to provide for Maddy. I know there are many people who would give just about anything ot have any job and it's not something I take for granted. I've been very fortunate/blessed to have and keep my job this long.
• People in my life-This includes family and friends, past and present. People may only be in your life for a season and I have def experienced that but their words of wisdom have remained in my heart. I def miss a few people frome my past and wish so much we could be friends again, but I don't let it keep me down. I have met new people along the way who have been encouraging to me and I find myself asking why weren't we friends before now lol. Telling me you're proud of me means more to me than anyone will ever know and I appreciate those 3 words so much. I'm thankful for family who has been here to help me along the way and have been available to help with Maddy when my work schedule gets crazy. When I had Maddy my mom stayed in the hospital the entire time with me and didn't go home once. When we came home from the hospital she stayed under house arrest with me for most of the 6 weeks and made sure I was able to get out every now and then because I was going insane being stuck inside all day every day.

I'm pretty much thankful for my life. It hasn't been easy but God has gotten me through every obstacle that came my way (and will continue to come my way) and has made me a better person. I'm thankful the Lord has brought the people into my life that He has because they are always just what I need. I'm thankful that He cares enough about me to provide for me and give me the desires of my heart. I'm thankful that He is always growing and stretching me so I can grow in my faith and relationship with Him. I'm thankful that He paid the ultimate price just for me (and everybody else) by dying on the cross for my sins. I'm pretty thankful ;)

St. Patty's day is just around the corner and because I can't stand waiting much longer I'm going to share a sneak peek of Maddy's outfit. I'm really hoping it fits and looks like I think it will :)

Slacker?

This post is more for me to look back on so I can reflect on where I have been and remember the journey I feel I am on. I haven't read my devotional today, but I kept thinking about it today so I decided to read it. When I read the scripture, Proverbs 6:6-11, I almost didn't finish reading. It's the don't be lazy verse. I don't always take every devotional personally, but I do try to apply what I learn/read to my life. As I was reading the devotional I immediately assumed I would apply this to my current job and that be that...I was wrong. When I read this one sentence I stopped dead in my tracks..."If we are not doing what we know God wants us to do, we are certainly spiritual slackers." One more sentence caught my attention as well, "It is sin to know what you ought to do and then not do it." That last sentence is from the book of James. After reading this devotion I felt as if a light bulb had gone off in my head. I can say it has to do with my job and whereas I am not just going to make any rash decisions, I definitely am thinking differently than I had in the past. I've seen it happen as well as have been told that if we think we have it figured out, you can rest assured you don't. I do feel that a little more light has been shed on how I will end up where I know I will one day, but it is definitely a very scary road for me. For now I will continue praying about mine and Maddy's future and one way or another we will see how it pans out. I hope everybody had at least a decent Monday and thank goodness we are down to four days until the weekend :)