Happy Easter!

Easter was quite different than I had hoped it would be.  For starters, I had to work all day. Liam had been running a fever all day the day before and I was worried that he had an ear infection.  I was worried because the last ear infection he had was pretty bad and happened overnight.  He was pretty pitiful, he just snuggled with Jake all day on Saturday and ran a fever of 102 all day long.  He gave him tylenol and ibuprofen which helped until it wore off.  I really wanted to take him to his pediatrician but  since it was going to be Easter Sunday, that would be impossible.  I didn't want Liam and Jake to sit in an ER or urgent care for hours on Easter Sunday, so luckily one of the amazing physicians I work with was on and I sent him a text when I got home saturday night to see if he would look at him in the morning.  He said he would, so Sunday morning started off with Liam, Jake, and I driving to my work and going up to the unit.  Liam is normally a very friendly, smiley little boy who will interact with anyone.  As soon as we got in the elevator, he looked around at everyone as they were all saying hi to him and he just started crying....bless his heart.   He stopped for a minute when I held him and then when we got in the Dr.s room in the unit, he started crying and was so scared.  He normally does great when we go to the pediatrician, he lets Dr. Mathis do whatever to him.  He lets him look in his ears without any issues, but that day was a sick sad Liam, not happy interactive Liam.  I felt bad bringing him up to work but it gave me peace of mind to find out that it was just a virus and not his ears.  I love my job but it's hard to take care of someone's sick child if you don't do something for your own sick child.  I am so thankful for Dr. Bugnitz for letting me bring him up there!! Thank you Mark!!!

After Liam and Jake left the unit, Jake got lost finding his way out and then he discovered a parking ticket on our car.  I made myself think about what day it was and tried to put all things in perspective.  So I smiled and worked the rest of my shift.  All I wanted to do that day was to see Liam hunt eggs and open his Easter Basket.  I rushed home and it was almost dark outside but I got to see him hunt eggs and it made my day.  He  got so excited for each egg.  We had been practicing earlier that week.  His face was priceless and precious!!! He was so genuinely excited and would gasp with excitement.  He knew there was candy inside and was so good about opening  the egg and bringing the candy to us to open it for him to eat.  He loved opening his Easter basket. He might not of worn his Easter outfit that I had planned but he enjoyed Easter and that's all that matters.  Jake and my mom made Easter dinner and it was great.  I wanted to make these little easter chick cakes, and Jake was so sweet, and baked the cakes so I could make them.  We decided that to make them the next night since we were running out of time but I really appreciated him making the cakes.  My mom got us all a big family Easter basket and she got me some shirts and a beautiful orchid.  After all the mishaps, Easter was fun for Liam and he enjoyed it.  We enjoyed watching him hunt for eggs and had a great dinner.  I hope next year I will be able to be home and enjoy the whole day together as a family.  Hope you enjoyed this post!!

Liam with all his Easter goodies

Checking out the goodies 

Easter decoration

Basket number one

Our Easter Tree

Our Easter basket from Nonnie

Night egg hunter

chocolate in one hand and an egg in another

I love this book!! This was part of his Easter goodies

Spring has sprung and Liam is springing everywhere!!

Wow! It's been way too long since my last blog entry.  There have been so many things going on the past month, it's been hard to get much of anything done.  Since the last blog entry, we have finished the floors and put our house on the market.  It's been on the market for 22 days and hopefully won't be on there much longer!  Jake has 18 days left of clinic!! After 8 years of his hardwork and dedication, May 20th will be his pay day!  Even though sometimes I want to ring his neck, I feel amazingly blessed to have him as my best friend and husband.  I often look at him and am in awe of all the things he has accomplished.  We have been together since September 14th, 2003, his 18th birthday.  I have watched him transform from a teenage boy into a man and father.  He truly is my best friend and I am so proud to be his wife.  I can't wait to watch him transition into the next chapter of our life. 

Loves his boots!

First pair of flip flops...so cute

He loves his brother puppy

Best friends!

sweet little expression

Huh mom?

Focused face

This isn't supposed to be neatly rolled up...

He is such a little picker and explorer

Looking for our neighbors bulldog named pepperoni

Jake, Liam, and I will be traveling home in 2 weeks so he can sign the contract to purchase an optometry practice in Evansville, Indiana.  We are so grateful to be able to move back home so close to family and have the opportunity to purchase the practice.  I will be starting my new job at the end of June and Jake will be probably be starting around the end of July after he gets his license.  Moving to Memphis included so many transitions at once. We purchased our first home, I graudated nursing school, got married a few days later,  moved away from family, started a new job, and then started our married life.  It took me quite a while to adjust to life here in memphis, but now that it's getting close to leave, it will seem so weird to be back in Indiana.  This will be such a bittersweet chapter in my life.  I truly can't explain with words, how humbled an thankful I am for all of the amazing friends I have made and experiences I have been through.  The people I am so blessed to work with every day, are amazing and have become my second family.  I can't explain how much I will truly miss each and everyone of my friends.  They have each touched my life in their own way and I will never forget it!!

Liam is just growing and becoming a little boy more and more each day.  He is so sweet and funny.  I just love watching him explore and discover the world around him.  He is obsessed with being outside and will stay outside playing for hours. He is really starting to talk more and more.  He is currently in love with the words "yes", "this", and "sis-sissy"-for our dog sophie, he calls her sis.  He says yes, no, milk, juice, ball(another favorite), yah, "uck" or yuck. He is able to show you where his head, ears, nose, mouth, belly, and toes are.  He loves making animal noises and is really in love with dogs!  He points to them wherever we are.  He likes music and loves to dance.  Jake and Liam went to a crawfish festival a couple weekends ago.  There was a live band that was playing and so Jake let Liam down to walk around and Liam ran right up to the front of the stage and started dancing like no one was watching.  Jake said everyone thought he was so cute but Liam was having the time of his life and was oblivious to the people around him.  He said he had not a care in the world except that he wanted to dance.  I love how innocent and carefree he is.  He just loves being Liam and having fun. 

I am excited for Easter this year.  I unfortunately have to work Easter Sunday, but will be excited to get home in the evening to hide eggs for Liam to find.  He loves any time of ball and so I got him easter eggs that looks like sports balls.  He has a sweet tooth like his momma and will be so excited to find candy in them!! His PDO has an easter egg hunt on thursday and I think that if the weather permits, we will be attending. Hopefully by Easter he will get the hang of it!!   I will be posting photos and more updates in the next day or so....Hope you enjoyed reading!!

Under construction....

Liam's room with the stain on it

Our room with the stain on it

 Liam has been really good. He has limited play space and we have been working really hard on the house and haven't had a lot of extra free play time.  By no means do we ignore him or not play with him, but he just hasn't been the center of attention the past few days.  He has really been interested in helping.  As you can see in the photos below, he was trying to get going on the living room floors.  He would pick up a pair of pliers or a tool and start imitating  what we are doing.  I think he likes all the activity but wishes he could get a hold of the sander.  Jake and I started yesterday morning by renting the equipment at Home Depot. We started with a less aggressive sander and after several hours of sanding with not as much result as Jake expected, he made another trip back to get the Drum Sander or the more aggressive sander.  I did sanding with the non-aggressive one and Jake was in charge of the aggressive sanding.  Liam and the dogs really followed me with every pass of the sander. We were able to sand and stain the floors by the 7:00 pm last night.  The next step will be to apply the poly-urethane.  The stain definitely had a odor but we had the windows and doors open.  The poly-urethane is more volatile so Liam and Jake will probably be staying somewhere tonight while it is drying.  I think they look great so far and can't wait to see the finished product.  It will end up costing us around $211.00. This includes renting the equipment, buying the stain and urethane, and then after 9-11 hours of work we have managed to save ourselves a couple hour dollars.  Hopefully this will be done by friday and we can get the furniture back and get the house ready for the realtor to come and take photos.  Please know that my house is normally very clean, and pretty organized.  The photos below are not usually what our house looks like.  It's really insane that anyone could ever live like this, I feel like our house looks like we are hoarders.  Hope you have enjoyed the photos and the update! I will keep posting as the house comes along.  Happy reading!!

Jake's dust coated self..His hair looks like he is going grey on the side

 

Jake applying the first coat of stain

The hired help...Serious about sanding

He really prefers to wear a diapers and shoes only

The drum sander..aggressive sander

This is what Liam's floor looked like after  I removed the carpet

It had lots of paint stains and spills

Liam was trying to work on the living room floors

Cute little thing!

Jake working on our room

Liam's room carpet

 
Lately we have been working on our house to get it ready to sell.  We initially were going to do some minor fixes and paint the bathroom,replace the bedrooms carpet, minimal landscaping, and stage the house.  Well, that has changed, we have now added a little more on our plate.  We decided we could save money by refinishing the floors underneath the carpet and we needed to paint the "man room".   I also decided to paint out bedroom furniture and then we had to paint the room trim too.  We have been moving from room to room and the house is in complete disarray!! We are hoping to be done with the house by this weekend.  Here are some pictures off the floors and of course Liam!!

Non-aggressive sander... Liam was very curious

What's been going on lately....

Where has time gone, it's already Feburary and I haven't updated our blog.  Liam is keeping Jake and I quite busy lately.  He is in to EVERYTHING! I literally mean everything he can get into he does.  We have placed a lock on kitchen cabinets and the fridge and I am not sure what we will be locking next.  Liam has decided he likes to climb everything.  He started clmibing in top of the toliet and it has since progressed to our bed, his glider in his room, on chairs, on the couch, the other day I thought I was going to die when Jake told me what Liam had climbed.  There is a little white antique dish that I like to put candy in.  I don't always have candy in there but I started doing this around his first birthday.  I guess after seeing so many people get candy out of it, he decided he should too.  So he pulled the chair out, climbed up the chair and then climbed himself right up on the table and helped himself to 4 or so reese's cups!  Jake found him just going to town and doing it like he had been doing this for months.
Liam's latest obsession is being outside. The past week the weather has been in the 70s and he just loves being outside.  He loves screeching at the top of his lungs to hear his voice echo.  We have been trying to get the leaves raked up and clean up the yard but it is so hard to do yard work with him.  He is either trying to get into the pile I was raking in, bring something out he finds in the garage, he loves pushing his stroller around and loves to aim right toward the street.  He is constantly on the move whether it's running in the neighbor's yard or going up and down the stairs to smack the window to get the dogs attention, he makes yard work quite challenging. 
Each day I think he gets more and more vocal.  He jabbers on about what ever he is doing and his favorite phrase to yell or say is "Da".  He always calls out for Jake no matter what.  Even if I am sitting right next to him he says it.  He says Mama, Da, Ball, Dog, pup= puppy, "Uck=Yuck", mmm-hmm for yes. He can show you where his head, ears, belly, and toes are.  We are working on knees right now.  He can telling you what a puppy, a wolf, and a cow says.  My favorite is the wolf...so stinkin cute.  He has liked this for awhile but he loves being in just a diaper and would prefer to run around naked all the time.  Every time he gets out of the bath tub, I quickly half-way dry him off so he can sprint around the house naked for a minute.  It is so funny to watch him scurry around and his will get on all fours and walk around like moglie from the Jungle Book.  He thinks that he is hilarious. He loves when you say to him, "look at the belly"  he just pats his belly. He also thinks he is so funny to lean back like he is going to fall back and he makes this little face and he strains to lean back and hold himself up... He just cracks himself up! 
I will post some photos soon and get a video or 2 of him being crazy.
Other updates around the Schmitt Household....We are planning to put our house on the market the first week of March and hope that it sells.  This week we have started working on the house.  So far we have cleaned up the yard, Jake has been doing repairs to the ceiling and painting, we have removed the carpet from out room which currently has nothing in it.  We still have so many things to do and a Liam that is not conducive to have us working together to get things done.  Right now, our house looks like an episode of hoarders. The Man room has been dismantled and all of our bedroom is piled in the man room. It's so beautiful... photos will be coming shortly. Well that is all I can think of for now! Hope you enjoyed the update!!

Happy Birthday 2011!

It seems like 2010 went by so quickly.  So many memories and milestones for our little family. Liam turned one, Jake ran his first ultra marathon, I started working weekends, Liam walked, we made many road trips to Indiana, and so much more.  I am truly grateful for all the moments and memories whether they are big or small, they are what made our 2010.  We had a busy and fun trip home to Indiana for Christmas.  We celebrated 3 family Christmas and Liam got a ton of presents. Santa was really nice to him!!

2011 is going to be a year of change for us and it is going to be bittersweet.  Jake will be graduating in May and then we will hopefully be moving back to Indiana.....all fingers and toes crossed.  It will mean leaving our first home.  This is the place where we started our married life, left family for the first time, had our first baby, watched Liam take his first steps in. I started my first nursing job here. I will miss the amazing friends I have made here and miss all the amazing people I work with.  Well, now moving on to a lighter topic...Liam!

He is become quite the mischievous little boy.  He is in to everything he can get his little paws on.  His new favorite activities are opening the fridge and then removing various bottles, soft drinks, vegetables, food, etc.  He will occasionally put things back but for the most part he just likes to open the door and hang on to the shelf and stand there. Activity number two that he likes is climbing up on everything.  He climbs on our bed, on chairs, the toilet climb is by far his most difficult maneuverer. I have taken a video of him doing something toilet climbing, some of his latest tricks and silly things he does.  He has started to shake his head "yes" and "no", sometimes it is in context and then every once in a while he shakes it to be silly.  He still loves the dogs and he now love chasing them around with his shopping cart and his little chompin mower.  They are not really amused by this but are the best and go with the flow.  He is constantly grabbing Sophie by her ears and pulling her leg.  Steve is harder for him to catch because Steve resists his loving a little more.  They will be sitting on the couch and Liam will pounce on Steve and back him into the corner.  Liam squeezes him and Steve's way of fighting back is to lick Liam 777,000 times until Liam lets go.  Steve then hi-tails it off the couch.  Liam has also acquired another little toof!! His 7th tooth came in next to the bottom left one.

Here are some funny videos of wild pants McGee....Hope you enjoy!!