Like I've mention before, Michael loves to spoil his girls. Sometimes he has to do it rather forcefully (at least in my case; Jessica's usually pretty willing). Today he was able to convince both of us we needed spoiling.
We began our morning off at Wal-Mart where Jessica got to pick out a new toy because of some serious potty-time success (I'll spare you the details). She's a girl of simple desires and all she wanted was a shovel. I couldn't believe it when we actually found sand toys this time of year! She's been loving using her shovel and sand bucket out in the snow. Cute kid.
On the drive home we were passing by the mall. "Do you want to go and get some shoes for you?" Michael asked. Wow. He was raised well. Actually, I've been in search of some good basic black dress shoes for a while and everything is either frumpy or not "basic" enough. So he convinced me to search. Here's what I came home with:
Did I need new red shoes? No. But they are SO cute! Plus I have some other shoes in this brand (red ones, actually), and I know they don't kill my feet and they last well. And even though they're the same, they look different enough that I'm not worried about it. AND they were on sale. Do you see the thought process that I was going through? I was trying to decide which to get (the black ones that I needed or the red ones I really wanted more). And then both the salesman (predictably) and Michael said, "Just get both." I'll admit it - the second Michael noticed they came in both colors, I knew this would be the end result. Oh well, Happy Valentine's Day to me! :)
Michael was on a roll and apparently didn't feel like stopping with the spoiling. But I am huge, so clothes shopping for me is currently out of the question. So he dragged (drug?) us into Old Navy (huge clearance sale going on by the way) where we got Jessica a sweater and the little baby-to-be a couple of shirts. While I was looking at some of the baby boy clearance, Jessica comes up to me with this big old bouncy ball (from those vending machines). There really is no stopping my man sometimes. :)
Our last stop (Michael initiated of course) was this little arcade in the mall. Mostly Jessica loved just sitting on the rides, but Michael even let her clink in some quarters on one of them.
Michael, I love you babe. Thanks for knowing when your girls need a little TLC (and some shoes). :)
Us - Michael and Laura
Steven and Brooke
Nicole and Randy
It's been one of those weeks... already. I don't know if Jessica just senses that something big is getting close with the baby or if she's just having a few cranky days. But MAN! She has just been something else to have to deal with. It started Sunday where she was just miss clingy in nursery. It's rough the weeks we're not teaching, but I think it's even worse the weeks that we are. She gets SO upset when we're paying attention to other kids - especially if we're holding them. It was tantrum after tantrum all morning. Thank heavens for her little friend Troy being willing to share his crackers during Sacrament meeting, because all Jessica's dumb mom brought was carrot sticks as a snack. :) Michael and I figured she'd take a nice long nap for sure after church. We really needed her too since we'd invited some neighbors over for that afternoon. I spent a good two hours doing the nap-time fight with
her and it ended up being for nothing. When she makes up her mind, it does not matter what you try. That afternoon we had some neighbors over. I've felt bad that I haven't made more of an attempt before now to get to know them - they have a little girl a few months older than Jessica and a baby boy that's just a few months old. Our complex is mostly single students, so I really should have made more of an attempt sooner, but oh well. Anyways, I finally talked to them and set up a playdate kind of thing. Jessica, predictably, could have been better. It's not a big deal when it's people you already know well, but she was supposed to be my happy little sweety, not Miss Cranky. Monday was no better. Arguably it was worse since Michael was off at school most of the day. Super early wake up, no nap (until 5:00pm), cranky, cranky. Since she went to bed so late (b/c of her late nap) we figured she'd at least sleep in for us. Nope, wide awake at 6am. I realize that I'm feeling 9 months pregnant on top of everything else, but there were times this morning I just had to walk away from her in order to calm down. I knew she needed a nap today. But I was so worried it would be another fruitless 2 hour battle. When I told her it was nap time she, predictably, starting screaming and running away. Never mind that I'd given her TONS of "15 minutes until nap," "5 minutes until nap," etc. Finally I dragged her off to her room kicking and screaming.
The point of all this? I just held her in my arms and wrapped her up in a blanket and actually got her to calm down as I sang her a new song I made up. I sang to her about how much I loved her from the moment I first saw her and how happy I am to be able to be her Mommy forever. There were times I had to choke back tears as it just put it all in perspective for me. And then she fell asleep in my arms, with her arms wrapped around me, holding me tightly. It was exactly what I needed to just help me realize that no matter what she does and the hard it can be sometimes (and how much harder it's probably going to get), it is SO worth every second. I love her more than I ever realized it was possible to love. I am the most lucky person in the entire world.
