Micah's 2 month stats

We had his 2 month appointment today, and he's growing like a weed!

13 pounds 3 ounces - 75%
24.5 inches long - 88%
16.5 inches head circumference - 85%

He had his 2 month shots, and took them like a champ. He cried for all of 5 seconds, and then he was in such a good mood all day!! We've been trying to get him to go to sleep unswaddled the past week while Eric's been home. He'll lay down for naps unswaddled, but doesn't sleep as long as he used to, and before tonight, would not go to sleep unswaddled for bed time. I'm not complaining, because being swaddled, he's been sleeping up to 10-11 hours without a feeding!! Tonight, however, we got home around 9 from my in-laws (they invited us over for dinner and Mamma Mia! (cute movie)), and he had nursed at 8:30 at their house. Eric changed him, got him ready for bed and laid him in his crib while we got Cara ready. He just laid in there talking and cooing. After we put her down, he seemed happy enough, so we left him in there, unswaddled, and vacuumed (we've been rearranging now that the tree is down and built ins are up, and every time we move a sofa, there are clumps of dog hair, no matter if I vacuumed 2 hours before!!!). He was still fine, so we cuddled on the couch to watch an episode of the Office season 4 (a christmas gift for me from eric's family) and he fell asleep all on his own. This is not a new feat, he's done it many times before, but it usually involves us going in and re-inserting the paci, or giving up and swaddling him. So far it's been about 2 hours and he's still going strong. I just pumped and am getting ready for bed. Hopefully tonight goes well. This is EXACTLY when Cara stopped being swaddled. She didn't take her 2 month shots nearly as well, and did not want ANYTHING touching her legs that night, so she just completely went cold turkey on the swaddle thing. Anyways, here's hoping ;). We're taking him to get his 2 month pictures taken tomorrow at JCPenney. Can't wait!!

Parent/Baby Dedication

DSC07957
Originally uploaded by mistylnewsome.

This was taken at our church this morning. Bailey actually got Cara to smile, too bad she wasn't looking at the camera. The church takes pictures too (some with us, some with all the family, some with Pastor Alex), so I should get those in a few weeks. We had the privilege of dedicating Micah James to our Saviour today. We promised to pray daily for his salvation, and to live a Godly life to be an example to him. We did this with Cara back in 9/2006. We are so happy to have our church family, and to be able to do this for our children.

Gift cards drive me crazy!

Oh my goodness gracious! We had such horrible experiences yesterday. Let me first say, I love the people who gave us the gift cards...just wish maybe they had picked a specific store or just sent the cash! So we went to wal-mart to spend a gift we got that said it had $40 on it. We had also received a $25 gift card (mastercard) and a $25 visa gift card from wal-mart that had the receipt taped to it, which we thought was weird, but more on that later. After deciding what to spend our $$ on, we were all ready to check out. We have the double stroller, but Cara has to go potty, so Eric takes her while I check out with Micah. The total is like $49. We had 1 gift card with $21 on it (long story), so we scanned that first, then we have $27.70 left. I gave the gift card marked $40 on it. She scanned it and said I owed $7.70 still. UGH. No big deal, the card was marked wrong, but it's that awkward thing, do you want to ask the person who gave it to you if they put $40 on it and it only got marked for $20 (because you don't want them to waste/lose their money), or do you just assume they were buying a few at once and wrote the wrong amount on there. I chose the latter, but ugh. So, I owe $7.70, that I hadn't planned on owing, so I whip out one of the $25 gift cards we have. After trying it like 5 times, and it not going through, I notice that it says it has to be activated on the little sticker, so I just put it away and thankfully Eric walked back up at that point with the other one that worked and we were able to leave.

So, we get in the car to go home and I call the number to activate the card. Except it needs this 14 digit activation code that is on the receipt that the card came with.....that I threw away last night! And we have 2 of these cards. At this point, I mistakenly say, "this is freaking ridiculous" and quickly my little tape recorder, Cara, shoots it back out of her mouth (in a much cuter version), but still we have to explain that that is not something we say and Mommy had to apologize. Can you just see her in Sunday School saying that?!?!?! :) So we get home, and know exactly which bag of trash it is in. Had it not been worth $50 to us (2 $25 cards), we may not have done it, but we dig through the trash. Not too horrible, but gross still the same, and we find them. Now I noticed before that it had $25 gift card and another item on the receipt for $8.94, what I didn't realize was that was the FEE Eric's aunt paid to get the card (times 2)!! Shoot, that sux! Just give me the $33! So I get online to register the card, thinking it would be faster. What I didn't know (and probably Eric's aunt didn't realize) is that these are basically prepaid visa cards for people who have bad credit. So you have to give all of your information (including certain ID #s that you should NOT have to give, that I tried not to, but wouldn't let me continue until I did) and they take it all and send you a personalized card in the mail in 7-10 days. I don't want a personalized card (or a second card with someone else's name for another $8.94)! Plus, there is a $4.95 MONTHLY fee, so if I don't spend my $25 GIFT card by 1/6/08, I get charged $4.95. My in-laws came over after Micah's parent/baby dedication today (another post on that later) for lunch and we mentioned it to them, because Eric's sister and brother got the gift cards too. They had even more problems, because Amanda (eric's 14 year old sis) is underage, and so they ended up having to register it in his dad's name. Anyways, if any of you are looking for gift cards for people, DO NOT buy the Walmart Money Card! What a waste of money!

Could you survive another Great Depression?

I found this quiz from a blog I linked to on yet another blog I read :)

Take the Quiz

Here's my score, I'm surprised!

You Are 67% Likely to Survive Another Great Depression
Even though you may not be expecting the worst, you're the type of person who prepares for the worst.You live a relatively modest life. You don't overspend, and you aren't very materialistic.You are also quite self sufficient and independent. You have many useful skills.You can take care of yourself and those you love... which is crucial to surviving another Great Depression.

Newsome Christmas

Newsome copy
Originally uploaded by mistylnewsome.

On Christmas day, Eric's family came over to exchange gifts and we had a great time.

Built ins almost complete!

DSC07947
Originally uploaded by mistylnewsome.

Go click on this photo to see all my notes on flickr. These are the AMAZING built ins Eric promised me for my birthday. The only thing left to finish is for him to build the doors for the bottom. Besides that, everything is all trimmed out and perfect. The photos don't do them justice, they are just GORGEOUS in person!

This is from my family's visit yesterday

It wasn't a fluke!

Micah ate at 8 pm and slept till I woke up him at 7 to eat. Hallelujia. Christ is King and he hears my prayers :). I will post pictures soon, but Merry Christmas to all who are online on Christmas day reading my blog! :) Jesus is truly the reason for this joyous and gorgeous season. We've already sang happy birthday to Him and ate some of His cake we made! What a fun Christmas when you can sit around in your PJs and your dinner is already made sitting in the fridge ready to cook! Much Love to all!

A Merry Christmas Eve indeed!

Micah slept through the night for the first time. My night isn't the 7-8 hours they say in the book...I mean slept through the night like I didn't have to wake up and feed him at the crack of dawn! He last ate at 8pm. He woke up at 3 ish for about 2 minutes, but went right back to sleep. I woke up at 6 am bursting at the......seams, and went and woke him up and fed him. I was still super full, so went and pumped the rest. After that it was time to start the turkey anyway! He was fast asleep, he'd probably kept sleeping, but now that he's full, he'll probably do his normal and sleep till 9 am. I am just so refreshed and excited! I hope he keeps this up!

Merry Christmas!

Sorry I've taken a blog break recently. I've been enjoying all of our family time since Eric's last day last Friday for 2 weeks. He'll be super busy after the next semester starts back up since he will be short an assistant until he can hire a part-time one (long story, more details to come!).

The turkey is ready to put in the roaster at 7 am. The sweet potato crisp and broccoli, rice and cheese (2 dishes each, one for Wed, one for Thurs) are in the fridge waiting for tomorrow. The Happy Birthday Jesus cake is warm and making my house smell wonderful, and cookies have been delivered to our great neighbors! All I have to do tomorrow is enjoy my family (mom, darrell, bailey and matt are all coming) and make the green bean casserole and watch the turkey. I can't wait!! Cara is going to be so fun this Christmas!

Love to all!

Santa Visits

Memorial_20081219_000061
Originally uploaded by mistylnewsome.

Well, we finally got our Santa pics for the year. We actually went to Bass Pro Shop at Katy Mills mall last week and got their free pictures, but our scanner isn't working, so I can't show them to you. I took the kids to Memorial City Mall this morning, and they both did great. Cara never did the scared of Santa thing. I let her out of her stroller and she walked right up to him and got in his lap. Micah slept through most of it, but we got some cute pictures! Check out my flickr (if you're friend/family) and you can see their individual shots.

Claire?

PS Aimee....doesn't this look like Claire?? haha.

I've been tagged...

My friend Kendra tagged me to do the following:
Here's what you have to do when you've been tagged:

1. Open the 4th folder in your computer (I went to 4th folder in my 2008 file of pics).

2. Choose the 4th picture in the folder and post in in your blog.

3. Describe the picture.

4. Tag 4 people.

I don't know much about this picture, so I went and looked on flickr (where I have all my photo storage). I took it on 4/4/08 at 6:08 pm. It says "I just thought this was too cute, she was in her 'pearls' (beads) and dress shoes with a tshirt and blue jean shorts :)"

Man, if I can't remember 8 months ago, I'm glad I've uploaded all pics since Cara was born there and tried to describe some of them!!

I tag: Sterling, Valerie P, Erin B and Jen Barnes (you know, because at 13 days overdue with baby #3, there's not enough for you to do!). Only because I know they check my blog and might actually post! And I want to see Val's totally random torso pic! :)

I know, it's been awhile!

This has probably been my longest break since Micah was born with no blogging! It wasn't on purpose. It just got busy (CHRISTmas season tends to be that way sometimes). Last Friday night we had a rip roaring good time here with about 7 of my girlfriends. We call them 'Scrapbook Nights' and we invite all the girls from our ABF (to my house usually). In the beginning, we actually scrapbooked a LOT, now we tend to bring pictures, look at them for about 30 minutes, and then just talk/eat/hang out/fellowship/swap war stories for the next 4-5 hours! It was a blast, and probably what we all needed right before this busy season. I also got my Christmas cards made and ordered (to be delivered today), so I did get SOMETHING done! Saturday Eric had region band clinic/concert all day, so the kids and I went to Pearland to hang with my sister. She and her hubby had their annual Christmas party that night so we stayed for a little bit, then came home (through an hour and a half of the tollway being closed down due to a wreck traffic) and hit the hay. Sunday morning we went to church, and when the kids were sleeping Eric stayed home and 'let' me run a lot of errands that I needed to run (in and out of lots of stores--for returns, more on that later). It's funny how I used to live for nap time so I could nap. Now I live for nap time so I can go places ALONE and not have to haul two kids, one either in a basket or throwing a fit that she doesn't want to be in a basket, and one in a sling/moby wrap that I have to maneuver while trying to keep the 2 year old in the car long enough to not run out into traffic! :). Fun stuff. I must qualify this to say nap time when Eric is home...not when I'm home alone, just in case anyone was confused!! haha.

But my girl, she is a little copier right now. I think I've mentioned that a time or two. Her latest trend is babywearing! She sees me wearing Micah all the time (totally love the 'bonding' that it brings, but also love the hands-free-ness it lends itself to), so one day, she wanted me to tie a blanket around her. Then she wanted me to put her new purple cat (that she calls a bear) that she got from her sunday school teachers for Christmas in it, but not in the front 'like micah, in the back!" Of course Mommy obliged, and this is probably the first time I've gotten her to smile for a picture in 6 months!!

Also, Micah is smiling a LOT now! It is the most precious thing. I can't wait for him to smile AND be baby acne free!! It looks horrible in these pictures, but it is actually clearing up a lot now.

Also, Micah hit his 6 week growth spurt right on time, and man did the whole 'eating every 3 hours' take on a new meaning! For like 4 nights in a row, I was up a LOT. More than I remember being up when he was fresh home from the hospital! I know it's not true, but it's what God does to allow women to want to have more children. You forget the pain/sleepiness!! Ok, maybe not totally, but enough to be insane enough to want to do it again (and again, and again!) :). He has also decided that his *fussy* time is from 9pm - 12 am! He did this a few times a couple weeks ago. But last night, right on cue, he fussed straight for 3 hours. Once I finally fed him again at 12:15 (to truthfully shut him up suffice him again, since the 10:15 feeding didn't work) he slept through till 6:20! That was the first time in what felt like a week I got more than 2.5 hours sleep at one time. And it was nice! Although my boobs didn't like it after not getting a break for 4 days, but they got over it :).

Here is one more baby fix, my two little sweeties cuddling right before Cara's nap the other day. She L.O.V.E.S. it when I lay him down with her!! She is the best big sister.

I have more to post about Christmas gifts/returns/budgeting, but it will have to wait! More on that later.

6 weeks old and first bottle (warning--may be TMI!)

So my little man has been sleeping awesome. Not GOING to sleep awesome, but once he's down, awesome. I fed him around 11 last night and he slept till 6!! And because I was so super full and had already leaked out of one side, he got all he needed from that side. So when Cara woke up at 8, I was leaking out of the other side. I thought, well, my mom is going to give him his first bottle next Friday night (our NewGround Christmas party), maybe I should at least attempt it while I'm here with the boob just in case. So I pumped at 8 and got 5.5 ounces. He woke up around 8:30, and let. me. tell. you., I was meant to be the crazy nursing for a year mom that I am! I can't handle bottle feeding. Usually he eats on 1 side 5-10 mins, burps, eats on the other side, burps and we're done, maybe a little spit up. This bottle thing was crazy. About every half ounce he'd start choking or need to burp, and I could see all my liquid gold breast milk rolling down his chin and neck! He only took about 3.5 ounces, and I could tell he was frustrated. I used the same bottles that I (rarely) used with Cara. I made sure I had the newborn (size 1) nipple in them. I don't know. I know he didn't get what he wanted, because then he latched on for a few minutes and calmed down. I'm sure he didn't get much, but he sure liked it. But, in the hour since then, he's spit up about as much as he normally does in the morning, so who knows! Hopefully it goes ok for my mom, because since she's spending the night, we're hoping to sneak to a movie after the party :).

PS if you haven't checked my flickr site, I've uploaded lots of cute new videos.

Sibling love and Cara's new song

[url=http://www.dropshots.com/mistynewsome#date/2008-12-02/20:05:24][img]http://media4.dropshots.com/photos/194403/20081202/200524.jpg[/img][/url]

Cara learned a new song at school to perform at their Christmas program next week. I can't wait to see 10 2 year olds perform it!! It has hand movements too :). She is such a sweet big sister....just ignore the last 5 seconds!

Rebel FOR a Cause!!

You know I LOVE MckMama's blog right (I check it more often than I check my actually known face to face friend's blogs!)?? So now, right before Christmas she is hosting an AWESOME way to give back and, possibly win an amazing prize package. Please PLEASE click on the link (the camera picture) on the right and DONATE DONATE DONATE to three amazing causes. And if YOU haven't already linked to her blog and started reading it, DO IT. It's God's hand at work in normal people's lives. She is a blessing to her blog readers, and will be to you too!
God Bless!

1 month

Micah was one month old last Tuesday, 11/25. We had his 1 month appointment and here is what we found out:

10 pounds, 13 ounces (73 %)
15 cm head (50%)
24 inches (97%)

He's so long!! :)

Cara updates

So she is such a sweet little lady! She is a big time copier, so we have learned to only stay nice things (especially in the car....no more "STUPID DRIVER!" :)). The girl LOVES to sing. EVERY thing! We've been singing with her, and 'dancing' before bedtime for months to our cute Christian CDs. Now she knows all the words. She's known a few songs here and there for awhile, but now it's like every song she sings along with. It is just too cute. She loves our puppies, and they are so good with her. She loves helping with baby Micah. She's such a good helper, I can ask her to go get something while I'm feeding him and she obeys like a big girl. She also likes to put his pacifier in for us.....sometimes however he doesn't want it and she doesn't understand it. He just isn't a paci boy like she was a paci girl! Ok, gotta run!

Cyber Monday?

Ok, maybe I've missed the loop the past couple of years (because we had little to no money to spend on Christmas gifts for the family AND I have somehow gotten on EVERY store email list in the past year), but I LOVE cyber Monday! I get to sit in my pjs and order my gifts and they come straight to my door with FREE shipping. I went to order a book on amazon.com that was $12 cheaper online than in the Books-A-Million near my house (plus free shipping). Then I found almost everyone else's gifts! I'm done except for 3 things! Woo Hoo, and as of 3 days ago, I hadn't gotten anyone anything! Plus with the money we saved and received as gifts for Thanksgiving (my mom's side of the famiy does Christmas at Thanksgiving), Eric and I can get our new tv. Which means Eric has been working like a mad man to get my built ins finished!! So it's a win win! Will post pictures once he gets more than the main box up. I can't wait.