Six Great Years!

Today is Adam's and my sixth anniversary. I can't believe how quickly time has passed (time really does fly when you're having fun) and how much has happened in the past six years. They have definitely been the best six years of my life!

I always get nostalgic, sentimental, and even (big surprise) weepy when I think about how fortunate I am to be married to Adam. He has enriched my life beyond imagination and I feel so blessed to be able to call him my husband. I always heard people say that married life gets better and better, but had a hard time perceiving the concept when I was first married; i thought things were already fabulous enough. Now I know what those people meant...Adam is my best friend and I feel like all of our experiences together have made every day since our wedding better than the one before it. I love being able to live with someone who makes me laugh all the time, takes care of me so tenderly, and is handsome to boot. I'm truly a lucky gal!

So here's to Adam on this special day for us: thank you for being the light of my life! Your patience, kindness, and love mean more to me than anything else. I look forward to spending eternity with you. You're the best!

we so fly

Since both of our girls have grown up in the culturally diverse area of South Lansing, it seems only natural they've coined the following phrases that would make even Lil' Wayne think they were ghetto:

Amber: I'm a hood figga!

Karli: Oh dang (with a head roll and hand push)

Amber: Oh snay-ap! (with a head roll and snap)

Karli: Whatty do, baby boo?

Amber: Step off, girlfriend!

Here's the disturbing part, though: they learned all of these phrases from my sisters who, obviously, are as white as can be. Fo shizzle.

Lil' Mama

Today Karli woke up around 6:30 a.m., so I took her out to the couch to see if she'd fall asleep again. She did, as did I, and I woke up three hours later to Amber gently tucking her special "big blankie" around Karli (who was, of course, [un]dressed in nothing but a diaper). I said, "Good morning, Amber" and she said, "Karli is really cold and she wants to use my big blankie." It was adorable. What a good little mother she is!

Love Thy Neighbors?

As some of you know, we have a bunch of interesting neighbors. Between high-decible XBox all-nighters, drunken displays of loud and lewd language, domestic violence, and illicit drug purchase, sale, and usage among parents with several children, we feel like we've seen the best of Lansing right outside our door (and sometimes we don't even have to leave the apartment; we can hear/smell all of it from the comfort of our own living room!).

Our upstairs neighbor has been particularly annoying; she and her live-in boyfriend--who isn't supposed to be living here in the first place--fought incessantly. By fighting, I mean wrestling, pushing, hitting, clawing and kicking to the point that my pictures fell off my walls. Add to the physical element a low-class vocabulary (it consists of three words: stupid f*$@!#% b&$@!) at unbelievably high volumes and we had a situation on our hands.

Since Adam is the tenderhearted protector that he is, he went upstairs one night to see if our neighbor was o.k. He was hesitant to even get involved, but humanity won over. She told him to please call the police if any of us saw her boyfriend around--that she had been trying to get rid of him for ages, that he kept coming around, and that she even filed a protective order against him. After calling the police once, we were informed by the officers that our neighbor told them she wanted him to stay, that everything was fine, and not to worry about the situation. The police then let us know that there was no protective order...our neighbor lied through her teeth to Adam, who was just trying to make sure she was safe.

Needless to say, we were stunned that she could be such a liar, so we decided to wash our hands and ignore her as much as possible. Since then, the police have been to her apartment several times and we didn't even have to call them. After an arrest a month ago, she's finally being evicted. Being the sweetheart that she is, she left us a hate note on our door yesterday. I couldn't believe how ridiculous it was:
To Whom it May Concern:
You are a #!%@$. %&*# you and your whole life you dont have to keep calling the police.
Again you are a #!%@$ and i just thought you might want to know that. If you have a
problem come see me about it, but I guess thats to much to ask from a #!%@$ like you
Have a %@!$%# life
-You know who
P.S. If this letter does not pertain to you, disregard it

I guess she got the eviction notice! We're excited that our XBox-playing side neighbors will be out of here in eight days, and hopefully our upstairs neighbor will be gone soon, too. It's always an adventure living here...just ask my mother-in-law who visited us last week. :)

False Alarm

Yesterday I started having annoying contractions at about 4:30 in the afternoon. I thought for sure they'd stop after an hour or so; I didn't worry about it and proceeded with my tasks. After two hours of progressively painful episodes, I started to wonder if I was actually in labor (yes, after two pregnancies, I still don't know what spontaneous labor feels like...inductions are the only way to go!) and figured I should go to the hospital. Adam and I loaded up the girls, who had not taken naps and were beyond grumpy, and headed up the street to check in.

Naturally, as soon as I was hooked up to the monitors and had endured thirty minutes of questions regarding my smoking status, etc., the contractions stopped completely. The best part of the whole experience was at the check-in desk when all of the women working said, "Oh, you're probably a pro at this since you've had two already. You must really be in labor!" I felt like such a dork. The only redeeming moment came when I walked out to the car where Adam and the girls were waiting: Amber asked if the doctor took my baby out of my tummy and Karli said, "Mommy, O.K.?"

To put the finishing touches on an especially irritating occurance, the girls didn't sleep at all last night. It was not my idea of fun to wake up to make three trips to the bathroom in the night and see two little heads poking up from toddler beds each time. Finally, at 5:30 a.m., they were awake for good. I got them out of bed and was treated to a symphony of whining, fits of rage, and Amber climbing on all of the kitchen countertops, stealing things from the cabinets, and dumping them all over the kitchen. She did, however, decide to tidy things up a bit by emptying the bottle of liquid dish soap all over the floor and using her sippy cup's contents to emulsify the cleansing concoction into a big, bubbly disaster.

I hope I can survive motherhood! :)

An Advance Apology to Parents

Amber is getting really excited for the birth of our baby. All through my pregnancy, she has asked me how the baby gets out of my tummy, so I vaguely tell her that the doctor helps him come out. She seemed satisfied; end of story. We have been watching "Babies: Special Delivery" on the Discovery Channel lately because I thought it would be a good way for the girls to see (censored, of course) what happens at the hospital. We had watched several C-section births and a few vaginal births that didn't seem to be revealing in any way because the doctors always conveniently stood between the cameras and any exposed female parts.

For those of you who don't know this already, Amber believes she has a baby in her tummy, too. The other day, she was using the bathroom and taking her sweet time, so I told her to hurry up. She said "I can't push too hard because my baby will come out of my bottom." I asked, "What?" and she said "When the doctor helps my baby come out of my tummy, I have to push really hard like I'm doing poops." I was floored! I couldn't believe she figured out the process of vaginal delivery on her own.

If my daughter becomes the responsible party in any premature education of your children regarding the birthing process, I am so sorry! My only consolation in this situation is that she actually wants to be a doctor when she grows up. One can only hope...

Family Happenings as of April 10, 2008

Adam is studying long and hard every day for his final exams, the first of which is on Wednesday. He spent 72 hours awake preparing his final projects for two classes. Needless to say, he's excited to have those out of the way. He finishes exams on April 19th. That will be a blessed day!

Natalie is great with child...need we say more? She only has one month of pregnancy left and is getting really excited to have a smaller belly so she can chase the girls more easily. She's loving Amber's newfound independence, yet needs to adjust to the way Amber operates now that she's a "big girl" and gets her own drinks of water directly from the faucet, spends 45 minutes in the restroom mixing toiletry concoctions, and tormenting Karli. Natalie is working on the outline for her first book. Hopefully she'll be able to make progress on it after the baby is born.

Amber went to her first play date without a parent yesterday. She has a darling friend named Sophie who invited Amber to her house to play. Amber wanted to stay all day and had a grand time. She's quite a monkey these days; no one's furniture is safe from her flips, leaps, and other profoundly rowdy movements. Amber loves to feel the baby move in Natalie's stomach and proudly shows the baby in her tummy (named Cooper) to everyone who seems interested. We all wonder when her baby is going to be born; she tells us it's not for a long time, until she's a grown-up.

Karli is in her "nudie" phase and it drives Natalie crazy! Adam had to sew her onesie shut at the bottom the other day because she kept escaping and removing her diaper. She's on the verge of being potty trained, but somedays she decides that using the potty is just too much effort. As if the stripping-in-the-middle-of-any-public-place tendency wasn't enough, Karli is cutting her first 2-year-old molar and seems to be quite miserable. It's a good thing she's such a sweet, adorable, and snuggly gal most of the time, because she can really be a beast!

Hello, Hello

I've finally joined the fray...I always considered myself being up to snuff as far as basic technology goes until I realized everyone has a blog except me. Hopefully you'll enjoy the pictures, stories, and other trivialities that make up our family life. Have a great day!