Finally able to blog....

Phew! I've been hoping to get a chance to sit and blog ALL day....it's now 9:15pm and I finally have a few free minutes to sit at the 'puter. Sheesh! I miss my blog-time. :( I miss feeling like I'm connected to you guys. My blogging (and your comments) always helped me to feel 'plugged in' . It was my way of being able to reach out to those of you who I can't talk to on a regular basis. Just knowing that you are out there reading (even if I don't always here from you in the comment section) made me feel like I was a part of something. But now that my days are so much busier and computer time is at a premium, I'm feeling a sense of loneliness and isolation of sorts. Its a little ironic to think that sitting at a computer, typing endlessly to people I can't even talk to somehow fills a little bit of that social void, but it does. And having that time taken away right now conversely makes me feel alone. Strange how that works.

Anyway....speaking of isolation......last week was a rough one for me. I kinda felt like I was imprisoned in my house, with still not being able to drive, Ty being back at work and friends still feeling a little leery of intruding. I was started to develop a serious case of cabin fever. Wednesday was my first time driving and getting out of the house. I had my two week post-op checkup with Dr. Hage and let me just say that getting out of the house, even for an hour, was a HUGE deal to me. Freedom! Fresh air!! People!! I made the most of the time and took the long was home...driving as slowly as the people around me would allow. Ha! :) It did wonders for my spirits. I'm wasn't technically supposed to start driving until this week, but when you have appointments you have to get to and no one else to drive you, that's how it goes. I'm feeling pretty well....nearly healed anyways, so driving wasn't a challenge. I just made sure to be really careful, since I know that it's my ability to react quickly (i.e. stomp of the break in the event of an accident) that is inhibited...hence the suggested waiting time of three to four weeks to drive again after abdominal surgery. It takes awhile for all those nerves to heal.

Anyhow...I digressed. Back to my prison. After getting out on Wednesday and the 'fresh air' high that followed, I soon realized that I wasn't as free was I thought. For now, I'm still trying to figure out how to navigate grocery stores, Target or any other stores with a newborn and a toddler. Since Ellie is so tiny, she has to ride in the car seat (covered with a blanket, of-course, to ward off any unsolicited, grimy stranger-hands) which makes it necessary for Luke to either ride in the back of the cart (preferably) or walk beside me. Now I don't know about you, but I'm not a fan of having Luke walk. It's just too much of a headache trying to keep the curious hands of a two and a half year old off all those goodies! But having him ride in the back of the cart wherever we go (providing the store even has carts) makes it rather tough to purchase much of anything. So here is my dilemma of last week. I did attempt Target one day...just to get out of the house again, and it went pretty well, but poor Luke was nearly buried alive in the cart with all our loot piled on top of him. :) LOL! Anywhere else I was interested in going either didn't have carts or their carts were too small to hold Luke AND Ellie. Hmph. So I resorted to driving around a lot.....I made a special trip all the way out to Costco just to fill my gas tank, and then drove up through Oak Glen just to get a change of scenery. It was still so stinkin' hot too, that even the thought of leaving the air conditioning made me cringe. But over the weekend, Sarah brought me the Moby wrap that I had ordered, and along with it, a new level of freedom! I love that thing!!! Now I can wear Ellie all snug as a bug and still have my hands free to grocery shop, do chores around the house, or push Luke in the shopping carts just as I always have. Hooray! I've been wearing her around the house to get used to it and we ventured out to Trader Joes, Bed, Bath and Beyond and a few other stores this weekend so that I could practice my baby-wearing. I'll tell you what....I sure got a crazy amount of looks from people as they tried to figure out what I was wearing and then the stare usually transformed into a little bit of surprise and a sweet smile or gush over the little bundle they saw curled next to my chest! People sure love to see tiny babes. But with the wrap holding Ellie so close to my body, it makes it pretty darn impossible for strangers to feel comfortable reaching out to touch. She's pretty much under lock-down in that thing! :) LOL! That's the way I like it too! No germs for my newbie!
So.....I'm feeling a little more hopeful now about my ability to get out and about as I used to. Hopefully, I'll be able to ward off that loneliness and isolation!

This week will make that task eay for me. Diana, my best friend from college, is flying in tomorrow morning to stay for a few days, so I'll have company and adult conversation during the week. She'll be staying until Friday morning. I'm so excited to see her! She's 20 weeks pregnant with a little girl too, so it will be fun to hand down some of my maternity clothes and maybe do a little baby shopping too. Luke is looking forward to meeting his "Aunt Dianana" too. He was too young to remember the last time he saw her, which was when he was a mere 9 months old. It should be a fun week!

Speaking of Luke.....our little man seems to be doing much better this week. He's still a little tougher to handle that usual, but each day we see glimpses of our old Luke returning. We went to Olive Garden for lunch yesterday and he was an absolute angel the entire time! He ate well, behaved well and was overall just a joy to have around. No tantrums or trouble! It was so nice! Ty laughed at me from across the table when I welcomed the old Luke back and asked him where he'd been hiding for the last week and a half. :) Luke didn't understand what I was talking about of-course, but Ty and I got a good giggle out of it! Our sweet son is slowly being returned to us! :)

As a special treat for him, we put up some of those glow in the dark stars on his ceiling today. Ty said that he always wanted to have those in his room as a kid, so we picked up some for Luke. Geez......I've never seen him so eager to get to bed and turn out the lights before!! :) He was in awe of the stars as we left the room tonight and kept asking us if they were going to have to leave or if they would keep glowing all night long. Cute kiddo. I love how the simplest thing light him up!

Well....looking at the clock I see that it is now nearly 10pm and I know that if I don't get to bed soon, I will be hurting come the middle of the night from a lack of sleep. Ellie is still having a tough time waking to feed in night, but it's slowly getting better as she gets a little bigger. She's roughly on a three hour cycle (with nursing sessions taking about 35-45 minutes) so I'm getting hour and a half spurts of sleep in between. It's not quite as bad as I remember it being with Luke, but I'm still having trouble keeping my eyes open and HER AWAKE in those wee hours of the morning. Blegh. I'll be glad when she can go longer in between feedings.

Okay...I really am going to go now. Thanks for staying tuned into my ramblings. And thanks for still checking in, despite my lack of frequent blogging. It really does me a lot to me that you stop by to check in on us! I'll leave you with a few more pictures from Ellie's newbie photo shoot before I go. Night, friends!



Daddy's little girl...


Big brother.....I think this is the only other one of the two of them that came out...kinda!


And a rare moment of wakefulness!


A few cute shots of silly Luke...


And lastly......I snapped this on Saturday afternoon during a little catnap....had to laugh at their identical sleeping positions!