Ryan's 30th Birthday

Wow, last time I checked we were two wide eyed "kids" just graduating High School looking wishfully into the great blue yonder that was to be our far off distant future together

Well, fast forward 11 years and pheeeew!!! Where did the time go? A wonderful wedding, a dog (our first born), two beautiful kids, a little piece of land, wonderful jobs, loving friends, and poof, we're here, our far off distant future is the present.! It's just mind blowing and wonderful to see how far we've grown and how far we have to go!!! So many things to look forward to and so many blessings to be grateful for. Still, I just never thought we would turn 30!!! It just sounds so grown up yet, I feel the exact same.


Well, luckily for me, I don't have to reach this milestone for another year and a half!!! For Ryan however, it came and went. I was intending to do a surprise birthday for him and that quickly got quenched when I realized with friends and baby schedule's, this would be much too difficult. So when I asked the birthday boy what he would like to do, he expressed that he would love to just have a birthday party. Whens the last time I had a birthday party was actually what he said. So, done and done, a birthday party it was. After figuring out the details and our friends the Coli's graciously allowing us to terrorize their house, it was on. 21 of our friends and a bunch of kiddos, taco's, and last but certainly not least, yummy, yummy margarita's! We had a wonderful time laughing, talking, eating and drinking! The Coli's did a marvelous job at sprucing up their newly purchased home's back yard for the party and the setting couldn't have been better, 75 degree's, sunny, warm and gorgeous!!! Here are some photo's for you to enjoy the day with us;



















Oh, by the way, the birthday boy conveniently noticed just days before the event that our BBQ was on it's last leg's and sadly, finally quit working!!! Lucky for him, he got a brand new one the day before the party, just in time to pre-cook all the food!! Here he is dirtying it for the first time the day before;

Update on my Peanut

So, after talking to the lactation consultant on Mon. morning, she wanted a weight check to see how we should proceed after all this "building". After a headache and a half we finally got him weighed Mon. afternoon. Who would have thought it would be so hard to get a baby weighed!! Anyway, he gained 2oz. That might not sound like much, but in 3 months he gained a little under a pound so, 2oz. for a week is pretty good! Another call into Pat Ross, who promptly called me back later that afternoon, confimed that all my hard work had been good and I should probably keep it up to the best of my ability! What!!! Keep this up!!!! I was doing "okay" thinking that this was going to be a temporary thing for a week, now I have to keep this up!!!! Oh boy!! So she asked me, key word, asked, which I thought was just great, how I felt if Dr. Kotin wanted to supplement with formula. Thank you, I said, what I feel about that is; I feed him every 2hours and pump for 10-15minuets afterwards, solids in between and now you want me to supplement!!!! Where is the little guy going to put it? So, to answer your question, I feel like N-O!!!! Is the boy malnutritioned? No. Is he unhappy and seemingly hungry all the time? No. Is he growing and healthy? Yes. So back the f$%& off!!! Excuse my rage but really? A busy Mommy can only take so much! So after a talk with the pediatrician, I agreed to see a nutritionist. I will track what Ryder will eat for 2 days prior to the appointment and she will be able to analyze his calorie intake and how appropriate all this "over-eating" is. The one thing I like about this and probably why I agreed to it is that if she see's that he is doing the best he can and still not gaining, this is probably just his body type and that's that!! Really, I don't need a degree to tell you that. Well maybe a degree in Mommy 101! Anyway, stay tuned for that appointment, Apr. 8th I believe. For now, pump, pump and pump!!

My Peanut

Ryder had his 9 month Dr. appointment on Monday March 15, Auntie Amanda's Birthday!!!! Anyway, much to my assumption, he is a tiny little tot! While for his age in height he is average (32%) and his noggin circumference (44%), his weight is not matching up (.59%)! So, per Doc's requests, we are working on building my milk supply!!! What does this entail do you wonder?
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Well even if you don't here it goes;

• Get up, feed Ryder, pump,
• Feed Ryder 2 hours later, pump,
• Put Ryder down for nappy time,
• Feed Ryder upon awakening, pump,
• Feed Ryder 2 hours later, pump,
• Put Ryder down for second nappy time,
• Feed Ryder upon awakening, pump,
• Feed Ryder 2 hours later, pump,
• Pump one more time before drifting off to sleep until about 1:30a.m. when I feed Ryder
• Around 6:30ish, wake to feed Ryder yet one more time and start all over!

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This is just on the days when I'm home with him and I failed to mention all the other things I need to get done in between all that!!!! Things like grocery shopping, cleaning, laundry, e-mails, breakfast, lunch and dinner for all 4 of us, etc. Sometimes I'm so thankful for work cause' it gives me a break from my "real" job!!!!! Pheeeewwwwww!!!!!
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I'm exhausted just writing this, oh boy!!! The good news is that it's only for a week and then we will have him weighed at the 10 day mark (March 25) and see if all that effort did anything to bulk my peanut up! If not, we will have to resort to supplementing with formula, which don't get me wrong is not a big deal, just more time, money and effort, that I don't' have! Anywho, for now this is my life and what can you do but love it. I love spending so much quality time with my baby who despite what the Dr. says, is growing like a weed. I just love cherishing our time together as Mommy and Son, for I know these days of "baby" Ryder are soon coming to an end.

Building Character Qualities

I try to work on building character qualities in my kiddos, not only is it important for them to learn them, but I get joy in teaching my kids to some day be able to "fend" for themselves. One we get to work on on a weekly basis at the grocery store is thriftiness. Constantly walking around the store I hear, "aw Mom, can we get this? Is it on sale?" Now sometimes I feel that I take this a bit far and worry sometimes what type of "character" I'm building.
As you know we are stretching our budget and trying to really pinch pennies, while I think it's important for Gracie to know this, sometimes I think it rubs off a bit much. Last night I came home late from work and accidentally "woke her up". (I think she wasn't really asleep, even though everyone else in the house was!) Anyway, she came out and I graciously let her come downstairs while I ate dinner, pumped and took care of house type things. We then snuggled up on the couch for a bit and watched one of our favorite shows, the Duggers, with their 19 kids and counting!! Anywho, I was not skipping through commercials for some crazy reason and a Kohl's commercial came on. They were advertising this weekends MEGA sale and continued on to advertise that EVERYTHING was on SALE!!!! My little frugal frog who is watching intently says to me "Everything is on sale?" (in one of those cute voices that goes up at the end as if to say, can we go, it's all on sale!!) Well, looks like were on to another character building quality, discernment!!! I of course explained to my 3 1/2 year old that this is a propaganda gimmick and that while everything might be "on sale", it's just a tactic they use because they just want you to buy stuff!! "Oh"! is all I got!

The American Cancer Society - Relay For Life of Oakdale:

http://main.acsevents.org/goto/MicheleReed

Please help out to donate or just pray for resources, efforts, and a CURE!!!!!

If you decide to donate, can you please click on My Team Page and donate to anyone on my team who needs help with fundraising. Thanks so much!!!

Little Accomplishments

With a 3 year age gap between my chitlin's it's hard for me to remember a lot about the first year and even the second. Going through it all a second time has opened my eyes to how wonderful the first year can be. We've already been through some great milestones such as the first smile, the first laugh/coo, sitting up, first meal, all that good stuff. However, now were getting into the "real" awesome milestones. While Ryder's been "scooting" all over the family room honing the nick name "Scooter" for a while now, today I officially saw a real crawl!!!!! This is especially neat to see because Gracie never "crawled". She defiantly got around but she did this half attempt at a real crawl where she would keep one foot out in the event she would need to get back on her bum, because she never quite figured out how to do that from her tummy, she than quickly walked and that was that. Ryder though, has mastered getting on to his bum from virtually any position. It defiantly hasn't been all that helpful with his new sleeping situation, but were trying to figure it out.

Anyway, seeing him wave, crawl, figure out the snack trap and eat Cheerios' from it, turning the pages in a book, saying some real words (we are all Dada these days) it is just amazing to me that these completely helpless creatures turn so quickly into the children they are growing to be! It is truly amazing and I love to watch his transformation almost everyday! While it is a bit bittersweet, watching him grow makes me happy and fulfilled that I hopefully will raise a great little human being. Especially in that first year, when there is not a whole lot of discipline, not a whole lot of "parenting" just love and fun and enjoyment of seeing them grow so rapidly! I hate that he's growing up so fast but for now, it's so much fun to watch his accomplishments and marvel at his incredibleness!!!!

Finger"less" Momma!

Well, I guess I don't have enough going on in my life so I decided it was time, time to cut my finger tip off!!! Yep, that's right clean off. The vision that goes around in my head, often at night while "trying" to fall asleep, is a gruesome one. It makes my stomach churn just thinking about it. All in the name of hair. Contrary to what one might think, I did not do this little deed while "cutting" the actual hair, no no, that would be to boring of a story. I was opening a little squeeze bottle for a perm, and instead of finding a pin like you supposed to use, I was trying to stick the tip of one of my scissor blades into a tiny little hole! Well, lo and behold it slipped and kung-foo style, karate chopped my little buddy clean off. Luckily the ordeal didn't hurt one bit, in fact I probably wouldn't have even have known that it happened, but seeing the tip fall to the counter was confirmation that indeed I had become fingertipless!! What is so much worse than the fact that this is not fun, will be a long recovery and so annoying, is the fact that it's such a burden!! It's hard to work at home and in the salon and learning to re-cut hair using middle and ring finger is not my idea of reinventing a new "style"!!! Ugggg, oh well, for now, I look back and think well, I sure hope I won't do that again, but it's a perk that comes with the wonderful world of hair!

To Preschool or Not to Preschool, that is the question

Gracie has been in preschool now for the last year and a half. We chose that preschool back when she was just a little over 2. Seems like so long ago, she was so much littler (sp., even a word?), not potty trained, was just starting to muster up some "deep" conversations and hardly socialized. Based upon all this, we found a great little place in Pleasanton, that met our needs financially as well as spiritually and comfortability with teachers, classrooms, criteria, academics, play, etc. Well, fast forward a year and a half later and our shy, diaper wearing 2 year old, is a vivacious, stubborn, sweet, lovable, strong-willed, chatty, friendly, imaginative, goin' in the potty all by herself 31/2 year old. Those are just the adjectives right off the top of my head!!! She has done so well in school and I believe it has really helped her to blossom into the little girl she has become! Which is why this decision is so hard on us.

My thought was for her to always in her 3rd. and final year of preschool, to go 3 days a week, to prepare her into the "scary" world of Kindergarten. Well, her school now, will not allow us to choose the days in which she attends their fine establishment, apparently all the Mom's in Pleasanton are stay at home Mom's that don't have to have their kids revolve around their work schedule! All that aside, okay, time to make some important decisions do we

A. keep her at her 2 day a week schedule and hope that it will be enough to prepare her physically, mentally all that for the big 1st day of Kindergarten? Or....

B. move her all together to a school with a more flexible schedule therefore fulfilling our plan of having her go 3 days a week.

As you can imagine, both these come with a lot of considerations; money, a big one, considering the time right now; moving her away from all she knows in a school, teachers, friends, schedule, etc.; and finally, our comfortability with all this!

It has been on my mind a lot lately and trying to decide what is best is really tough. I am reminded that she is adaptable and will probably be just fine in whatever we decide to do and that God too will provide in whatever decision we make. I just fear that these decisions only get harder and more important as time moves forward. I can't imagine having this very conversation in about oh let's say 14 years about choosing COLLEGE!!!! Oy vay!!!

We have decided for her to go to another preschool starting in the summer and then continuing through fall of this year into the following spring. I'm still struggling with the decision and worrying financially how we will make it work. But, time will tell and nothing is permanent, so all we can do now is see what the future will hold and try to remember that this is only the beginning!

Tough Times

Well, the interest is up and the stock market's down and you only get mugged if you go downtown. Lately "A Country Boy/Girl can Survive" seems like our mantra!!!!! Times are tough for everyone and life get's hard. But, I'm trying to keep my focus on that in which I know is constant, strong, fearless, happy, and all that is good, our LORD!!!!! Without my faith I wouldn't get through, and I thank God for his Grace and Mercy on our family! Even though money is tight and times are tough, I know that this too shall pass, and it allows us to see what is most important, family, love and friends : )
These last couple weeks while revaluating our finances, we have not eaten a meal outside of our house, we have not spent any unneccessary money. You know what we've discovered? Our family! We have spent a lot of time together and seeked out things to do that are free or essentially free, parks, library, playing a game. You know what? I love it! I think it has brought us closer and happier! We will see what the next few months will show, but for now, I'm thankful that the Lord put's roadblocks to make us stop, look up and try to figure out a different path. Thank you for your support and love.

so terrible at this

Well, I haven't "blogged" in a while, but I'm new at it and hey, what can I say, I'm a very busy Mommy! Sometimes I don't even have time to pee, let alone blog!!! Anyway, I dont' have much to tell you other than it's 5:07a.m. and I have no idea why I can't sleep, so I'm writing. The New Year has treated us well. We had a great snow weekend with our small group friends as Gracie would say and have come down from the "high" of Christmas to our normal everyday routine, which I hate to say it nice right now. Gracie had a lot of fun in the snow, I believe it was her second time and Ryder seemed to enjoy it as well, his first time of course. Here are some pic's;

So as you can see we had a ton of fun, some of the highlights included the great cabin we rented's game room, fully equipped, we nicknamed it the "mancave" but the women had fun there too : ) We surprisingly got to take a snowmobile ride with the whole family which was awesome and the adventure of "trying" to snowshoe was one in itself!

That's pretty much it for now, I'm enjoying my new camera and taking tons of photo's, I will need a new computer pretty soon just to store those!!!! Life is hard and fast, but we try to hold on and enjoy the ride, here at The Reed Ranch : )

Well hello there world : ) Where do I begin? Well, Thanksgiving.....it was wonderful. This year was our alternating year to spend with my family and we always go to a littel cabin in Twain Harte. We had a blast. Gracie had fun playing with her cousins and Auntie's, doing "girly" things and Ryder got way spoiled by all being held and played with the whole time. Mommy was grateful for this time to be able to have some time to do things I wanted to do without two kiddos on the hip. So, I found my love for Rock Band, very dangerous!!!! I will not be asking for one because instead of the computer, I will be addicted to that!!!! Anyway, we all had a blast and ate some great yummy food. We had to take off a bit early on Fri. because Ryan had to work on Sat. Come to find out though that the job took a different turn and he was able to come home a lot earlier than expected so we went to get our Christmas tree at a self cut place in Half Moon Bay. It was very cute and we picked a cute little tree for us and also found Grandma Terry a HUGE tree that was just beautiful!!! We got to ride a train with Santa and a "Squirrel" (for those of you who don't speak Gracie that was a Rudolph the red nosed Reindeer)! That was great and we got some great pic's too, stay tuned for those on the website : ) We were able to visit Grandma Marion on the way home which was nice to chat and visit with her. We spent the next day decorating and hanging lights on the house which is great, definatly makes the Holidays feel more real!!
Now we are looking forward to this weekend for Ryder's Dedication at our church. It is a beautiful little ceremony dedicating your baby and yourself to raise them up in God's family! We are so excited and having a little party after at Grandma Terry's house. Should be fun, I will keep you posted, for now ta ta

10 year High School Reunion

Well, it's official, 10 years have come and gone and not much has changed! Everyone pretty much looks the same and everyone still has their "clicks". We had so much fun though. It was definatly weird seeing all those people from 10 years ago, but it was great to catch up and reconnect with long lost friends. Here's to another healthy, fun 10 years in the lives of grown-ups!!!

Wow, I got a Blog

Well, this is my first time blogging, let's see how it goes.......My high school reunion is coming up on Sat. 10 years, WOW, where does the time go? It's pretty hard to believe it, especially when life is as full and hectic, you think, how did I end up here? Crazy, well it should be fun, provided I find something to wear, yes, that's right, it's this Sat. and I have nothing to wear!!!! Leave it to me to wait til' the last minute. With Halloween last week, we got so busy doing fun stuff, totally didn't have time and then BAM reunion snuck up on me!!!! Well, should be some good times anyway and it's right down the street so no travel time, nice! Tune in to next week when I let you know how this crazy adventure was : )