New Baby!!!!

Bethany will soon be a big sister!

Well, not too soon, as the little one won't make its arrival until May. But it was go quickly as the first pregnancy seemed to zip by us! Things are progressing really well. We do have an extra concern for this baby. The doctor said there is an extra blood condition that we need to be attentive to. I have some extra anti-bodies in my system that could potentially cause problems; however, the stats are in our favor & it is unlikely to cause any problems. The doctor today actually said my anti-body levels went down from last month, that is a major blessing!!!! I will continue to have monthly blood work in order to monitor my levels. If they anti-bodies increase to a dangerous level, then we will potentially need to have an amniosintisis or at the very worse the baby will need a blood transfusion. So, we would definatley appreciate any and all prayers you can throw our way.

Back on the positive...we are so excited to welcome another little Milles in our household. Sometimes it catches me off guard to think about toting around 2 kiddos around everywhere. Bethany has been such an amazing blessing that we just can't wait to meet our next little miracle!!!

Piggy Tails!

This little piggy is just too cute for words!

Look at her hamming it up for the camera, how appropriate with her new piggy tails!!!

She is absolutely adorable!!!!!!!

Attached at the hip!

My poor Bethany has gone from being attached via an umbillical cord a short 16 months ago to attached to the hip. The past week or so she has been extremely clingy; wanting to be held or cuddled by Mommy as much as possible. How can I resist her "Mummy, Mummy, Mummy, Mummy" as she grabs my legs with all her might. It make my heart melt knowing she loves and "needs" me so much! But it is getting hard doing everyday, mundane task with a almost-toddler in tote! Poor Cory, he can't even get a hug or kiss anymore without causing her to have a nuclear meltdown.

"A--noi-ed"

Hmm...despite all the toys around me. I want something at the bottom of the toy box. But my puny arms don't have an adequate length to reach them...

NOI! NOI! NOI! NOI! NOI! NOI!

See...it is right there mommy...
NOI! NOI! NOI! NOI! NOI! NOI!

Finally, I got the farm...but it isn't making any noises. I don't possess the dexterity to turn on the sounds. I need help with the sounds.

NOI! NOI! NOI!
Finally, I get to play!

(editor's note: If you didn't quite get the moral of this story, I will explain for you! Bethany has her own little language. If she wants something---anything---she will repeatedly state, "Noi! Noi! Noi! Noi! Noi!" and point to the object of choice. It will be the only thing she says until she gets what her little heart desires. Although, she is pretty good at signing and saying "Peasssss" when prompted to say, "please!" She is just too cute!!!!)

Happy Birthday Uncle Derek!

We got to help Uncle Derek celebrate his 27th Birthday this weekend. Boy is he getting old! I really enjoyed being able to spend some time with him, his girlfriend Sarah, and Grandma & Grandpa. They are a crazy bunch!

Hoosier!

I like putting my feet on a table like the little hoosier that I am! :-)

Two Whole Weeks Already!?!

Sitting with my Elmo phone!

My first Ponytail! Finally my hair is out of my eyes!
Bethany & her Elmo balloon! We went to McDonald's Thursday night and they had a balloon guy, he made her this balloon. She recognized it immediately, "LaLa". That's what she calls Elmo do to his opening theme song on his show!

Things for us has been pretty much the same...school...papers to grade...play outside with Bethany...clean the house. Sorry we haven't posted up here more the past 2 weeks.
I'll try not to be so slackerish in the future! ;-)

Playing Outside!

Yea! I love playing outside! I am just like a cat...I paw at the garage door when I went out!!

Buckethead!

We've gotten to play outside every day this week, since the weather is absolutely wonderful!!!!! It is great. Bethany doesn't have a huge variety of outdoor toys...but she surely makes do with what she has!

Here is a video of our Bucket-Head Bethany!

Yeah for us for posting our first video online. Don't expect this all the time. I am at the library with their "fast" internet & it still took 198,849,282 years to load!

The 80's called....

& they want the one-shoulder strap look back!

Hor-rreee Mama lalalalamamamama!!!!!!!

Bethany loves this book! It is her favorite. It is called "Llama Llama Red Pajama" ("lalalalamamama" in Bethanize). Cory got it for her for last Valentine's Day & we read it almost every day. (occassionally she picks out Cat in the Hat). I have the story memorized for the most part. It really helps that it rhymes. Now Bethany wants to read this story whenever she can. She'll grab it and sit on the floor and flip through the pages. When she gets to the one page where Mama Llama is running up the stairs to get to Baby Llama (who is yelling for his mom) Bethany started to tell the mom to "hor-rreee, hor-rreee". She has memorized that page of the book & it is super cute to see her to tell the mom to hor-rreee up the stairs!

Seriously...she can't stop cleaning.
It is slightly insane...100% adorable...but still slightly insane!!!!

Oddities!

Who needs a toy box packed so tight with toys that it doesn't shut when you have straws!

Going in for a kiss! Something that Daddy has taught me!

Good news from the Casa de Milles....we are all feeling better. Isn't that a relief? Bethany's antibiotics are kicking in & the fever has been gone for 2 days now. I am finally over the cold that has had me down for the past week. Cory is still Cory. Lucky him hasn't gotten a bug yet!

Hopefully this good health tends to be a trend and not a fluke!

Infected Ears & Saddened Hearts!

Ah...this is comfy.

Why is Elmo talking to a cactus? That isn't realistic!
Why don't I feel good?

Bethany has been home sick the past 2 days. Monday the sitter reported that Bethany felt warm after her nap. We took her temp & sure enough she was running a mild fever. Cory stayed home Wednesday & took Bethany to the doctor. We learned that Bethany had her first ear infection!
:-( All Wednesday her fever has been relatively low (99.something or 100). The dr. gave her some antibiotics. Which we started last night. We had open house last night. So I was away from Bethany the whole time. That was heartbreaking for me! :(

Bethany woke us up at 3 in the morning this morning (until 4:30). She had a 101 or 102 fever! Yikes. Poor thing was one hot tamale. We gave her some Ibuprofen & it broke when we got up again at 5. She was drenched in sweat. I stayed home from work today to stay with the sleepy baby! Her fever is coming and going. It came back right before her second dose of Ibuprofen was due, then it went down within a hour of the dosage. Currently by the official Mom's Thermometer (the back of her hand) she definitely has a small fever back. Not the 102...but a small one.

We've already taken 3 sick days this year for Bethany. (1 for Cory & 2 for me) I hope this doesn't continue to being a trend. We'll for sure run out. Tomorrow Grandma is on duty. We have standardized testing at work...and subs and standardized testing isn't a good combo! ;o)

Say a quick prayer for our little Bethany to get better fast.
It makes me sad to see her so lethargic & icky!

Workin' Hard!

I like to help Mom & Dad around the house. Whenever I can, I try to grab ahold of a white sheet like they use to clean the house. (editor's note: Mom uses Clorox wipes, I use dryer sheets, butt wipes, kleenex, napkins, etc.) So, yesterday those fools of mine...I mean...folks of mine left the butt wipes where I can reach them & I went to town cleaning this house of ours!!! Sheesh...someone has to do it.

Cleaning the china cabinent.

Cleaning my rocking chair.

These wooden shoes have some grime! On to my toy chest!

Finally the floors. This will be a while. Isn't this why they invented mops?
See. I am a big helper! If you need help cleaning your house, I can be rented out at a rate of $15/hour, plus I require cheesy puff/milk breaks! :)

Who me? Couldn't be!

Look at how adorable I am! Wouldn't you say I was the cutest thing ever? Well, then how can my own mother blame me for making her and dad sick. Both of the folks got a milder version of the stomach bug this week & I also managed to pass my cold on to mom. She was feeling pretty miserable the past few days (yesterday being the worse). It looks as though she is getting better. Good news is that I am getting better. My raspy voice is cleared up and my stomach ickyness is 99.46% through! That is great news to all involved! ;-)

Chilling, pushing, and "bum"ming

Chilling: Bethany loves chilling in her rocking chair. This is her Saturday morning watching Elmo on tv. She LOVES Elmo or as she calls him "La, La, La." If you have a child under the age of 5 you'll recognize that as the beginning song of his little show.

Pushing: Perhaps there is a reason there is a minimum age limit on the Jack-in-the-box. Poor Bethany really struggles getting that silly clown back in his box. Once he is out, is he is pretty adamant about staying out!

"Bum"ming- Bethany's poor bum had another attack this weekend. She must have eatten something Saturday that, eehhhh, you know, didn't agree with her. We had the worst BM's since her milk allergy last summer. This "disagreement" between her intestines & supposedly-infected food not only resulted in the MND award (most nasty diaper) but also resulted in a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad diaper rash!!! I stayed home from work today in order to completely assess the stinky situation. If she still had bad poops, then I was going to take her to the dr. The good news is that the poops are gone & the rash is getting better. It has officially been down-graded from a Category Red Bum to a Category Pink!!! That is good news! We will keep on lathering on the $20/a tube bum cream until it is just a faint memory!!!!

Back to School!

So this has been a long week for the Milles family as we readjust to life as working folks. Look how BIG Bethany has gotten. Click here to see Bethany on the first day of school last year!!!! She was a wee little thing back then!

Monday we started teacher meetings & Thursday we start school with the kiddos. Cory and I handled things well. We were able to transition smoothly to the new schedule. I'll give you 3 guess for who didn't adjust smoothly to our new schedule. Give up???? Well...I'll just have to tell you! BETHANY!!! Surprised, huh?

Well, our little stinker (err....) daughter decided to boycot this whole back to school thing by NOT eating at the sitters! AT ALL. That is 2 meals that she is refusing to eat as the sitter feeds her breakfast & lunch. So we had a little monster in the evenings as she was famished & we had half-an-hour car ride to endure before we were able to feed the lil' monster some dinner.

But finally she waved her little white flag on Friday and finally ate a few bites at breakfast & ate a substantial lunch. I was very thankful. But we will still say our prayers for the little stinker as we go to work on Monday that she maintains this progress. But our sitter did "cheat" while trying to entice Bethany to eat breakfast. She gave Bethany some Fruit Loops instead of the Cheerios that the other kids eat. Apparently, we are bad parents and allow Bethany to eat sweet cereal & none of the other parents allow their kids to eat sweet cereal. We just feed her what's in our house. But she is still living...so I don't think a dozen or so pieces of sweet cereal killed anyone (that I know of anyway!)

Wish us luck as we continue on with the school year. So far, Cory & I are off to a pretty good start with planning our curriculum & getting to know our students. It is great that this is the 1st year out of my 6 years teaching that I haven't switched classrooms & I haven't switched curriculum. Both of those have switched EVERY OTHER YEAR of my short career! It is such a blessing to have some consistency in our lives in terms of our jobs!

This is "Normal"

Life is amazing! I hope that each of you are fully aware of this by now. But sometimes I sit back and reflect on our lives & I am usually left completely awestruck. You might be wondering where this is coming from. Allow me to backtrack a little. So, the other day Bethany was reading a book to herself. Upon finishing the book, she kisses the back cover. This is a part of our "normal" routine when we read books. Whenever I read her a night time story we kiss the character on the book "night-night." I think she now thinks it is normal behavior to kiss your books when you are done with them. You will often find her kissing her books upon completion. Then I realized that I lost track of just how impressionable Bethany really is. Everything we do with her is going to help establish the "norm" in her world. If we decide to start licking our walls as we enter the house...she'll think that everyone in the world licks their walls as they enter the house. It makes me realize now more than ever that I need to be the model of everything I want Bethany to be in her life. If I want her to grow up to be Christ-like, respectable, responsible, moral, honest...then I need to be Christ-like, respectable, responsible, moral and honest. If you really sit back and think about it....child-rearing is a pretty awesome but daunting task. There are a thousands What-if's & Should've's that are always buzzing around my head.

But I guess in the end you just have to have faith that you are doing the best you know how & just pray that your "normal" is going to be good enough.

Reunited & it feels so good!

Saturday was Bethany's first family Reunion. It was actually more of a family Union for Bethany. I don't think it can be qualified as a REunion unless, it is actually REuniting people. This was the first time Bethany has meet many of her aunts, uncles & cousins. Good times was had by all!

Last Day of Summer!

Today is officially the last day of summer for the Milles-clan. It is sad! :-(


We are going to miss the 7 am Sesame Street. What will our mornings be without ELMO??? But we do recognize how lucky we are that we get to have 2 months off with our baby girl. Most people have to take vacation and they still don't get the everyday-hum-drum aspects of life. It was great spending the summer with Bethany! Only 10 more months 'till the next summer! :)

5 long (err...enjoyable) years!

5 years already! It is hard to believe it, I know. I am very blessed to have found the perfect man & some how convience him that I am the one for him! A lot has changed for us in the past 5 years & I am glad to have Cory by my side for every triumph and challenge we have gone through!

***FYI...the picture is a do-it-yourself in front of our wedding picture! We don't look to shabby, if I do say so myself! Perhaps the next five years will bring us even more snazzy and skinny-ness!***

Zany Zoo Fun!

We had a great time at the zoo on Thursday. Here are a few pictures of some of the highlights of our visit. Although, we did decide NOT to take pictures of the 50-something-year-old couple that was completely making out in front of Lakeside Cafe!

No Hippos....just fishes! She thought they were the coolest! Perhaps the fishes ate the hippos!

Penguin Time! The penguin house was totally AWESOME!

Bethany enjoyed petting the hampsters...gerbels or guinea pigs...whatever these are! :)

Forget about the Leaping Lizards...it's time to worry about the Bouncy Blue Frogs!
Bethany loved petting the "dogs". We tried to explain they were goats...but she insisted they were dogs!!!

I "otter" know better! (The rest of the otter body is cut off...sorry!)

Other than being hotter than the dickens, it was a FANTASTIC TRIP! I great start for Cory's birthday! :) We really enjoyed ourselves! The penguin house was perhaps the coolest part of all! It was just so neat to see them upclose!