One is the loneliest number...

Saturday Aug 22, 2009

One is the loneliest number...

that you'll ever do.
-Three Dog Night

Yes, you guessed it. Perhaps you noticed that I've given up my nightly glass of wine. (So sad.) Perhaps I've been so tired that I actually fell asleep while talking to you. (Even sadder.) More likely, you noticed that my butt has grown to the size of a small continent. (Really, really sad.) But since one is the loneliest number, we've decided to make it two. The latest addition to the Foster family will be arriving by March 5, 2010 - and not a day later, I might add!

Needless to say, we're super excited and more than a little scared. Why is it so much scarier the second time around? Is it because I know what to expect this time? (Those months of sleepless nights were definitely tougher than I planned for!) Or is it because I don't have a clue how I'm going to handle two little ankle-biters when one more than fills my time and my heart? We've just gotten to the point where I feel like we're getting the hang of this parenting thing. Now, I wonder if I will have to figure out how to do it all over again, but times two?

Contributing to my uneasiness is the fact that I feel HORRIBLE this time. With Jay, I was never sick. Not once. Sure, I was tired. But now, I have this constant feeling of "I'm gonna puke, and yet I'm hungry." No food really appeals to me, with the exception of cheese. I have wanted to eat nothing but cheese for the last six weeks. Seriously. I have always been a big fan of cheese. But now, it's all I want. Cheese toast. Cheesy scrambled eggs. Pimiento cheese. Bean & cheese burrito (extra cheese, please). Pizza with double cheese. Grilled cheese sandwich. Am I starting to sound like Bubba in Forrest Gump yet? Wait, now that I think about it, maybe the ginormous growth of my backside isn't entirely due to pregnancy...

So far baby #2 seems to be doing just fine. We've had a hard time coming up with a pet name for him/her. I mean, really, how are you gonna top "Torquil?" We tried "Annie" for a little while - Torquil & Annie were my great-great-great-grandparents who immigrated to NC from Scotland. But if "Annie" turns out to be a boy, that could have long-lasting repercussions on his mental health. Don't wanna start this kid out needing therapy before s/he's even born. So I'm leaving it to you, dear readers. What shall we call this little peanut?

Posted at 08:44PM Aug 22, 2009 by Jen Foster in General | Comments[12]

Comments:

Your butt may be a continent, but I think Australia is cute!

Posted by Derek on August 22, 2009 at 08:54 PM EDT #

I don't have any name suggestions...yet, but I do want to say I can't wait to meet this little Foster. Keep in mind that Riley's birthday is March 5!

Posted by Amy G on August 22, 2009 at 09:30 PM EDT #

Hey! A blog - I love it! Congratulations! My vote is for "Pat." ;-)

Posted by Ginger Nixon on August 23, 2009 at 09:08 PM EDT #

I think you just named him/er. Your last comment.."peanut". It was my mom's nickname for me. I think it was because I was not only the youngest but the smallest-or was it because I was her biggest baby (at 8 lbs). But as soon as I read it on your post, I thought it a great name.

Posted by Great Aunt Ali on August 23, 2009 at 09:17 PM EDT #

Wow, I stay away from my computer for a few weeks and I find out I've missed all the news! Yay another baby to keep you going...now that sounds like something I might do!!!

Congrats to all and I'm going to fix a cheese tray right this minute!

Loves,
Susie H

Posted by Susie Hoffman on August 24, 2009 at 02:18 AM EDT #

Congrats!! I think the nickname needs to be cheese related...goat? feta? colby jack? muenster? this could go on all day...

Posted by Katrine on August 24, 2009 at 08:11 AM EDT #

Congrats!! So excited for you guys!!

Posted by Bethany Watkins on August 24, 2009 at 12:13 PM EDT #

Congratulations! Not to scare you, but sadly my wife's morning sickness was worse with each of her three pregnancies. With out last one, she actually had 9 months of morning sickness. I think she even threw up the morning Evan was born! Good luck!

Posted by Steven Greene on August 24, 2009 at 02:24 PM EDT #

Oh wow...I think Katrine just found a perfect name for a boy - Colby Jack Foster.

Posted by Ginger Nixon on August 24, 2009 at 04:47 PM EDT #

Yay! Congrats! I like the Colby idea-- relatively gender neutral. Of course you could always go for guppy, which was Grace's nickname for the first few months inside...

Posted by Erin on September 17, 2009 at 09:25 AM EDT #

I want to fly like an eagle...

Saturday Aug 08, 2009

I want to fly like an eagle...

...to the sea
Fly like an eagle
let my spirit carry me
-Steve Miller Band

Ahh, airplane time. Airplane stories always make for the best blog posts, don't you think? (Side note: Avid blog readers or music junkies may remember that my last airplane post, linked above, was Jet Airliner, also by Steve Miller Band. If you haven't read it before, do it. I had nearly forgotten how hard parenting was back then. Almost.)

So, this time, the flight was both easier and harder. When I was nursing, the boob would put him to sleep EVERY TIME. Without fail. Want him to take a nap? Start the milk flowin'. Now, he's much more interested in everything around him and wants to explore new stuff. Interesting things > sleep. More importantly, he's now mobile. If he wants to see what's across the aisle from him, he's going to crawl out of your lap and onto the floor to see it, unless you have him in a straitjacket-style grip. Casual bystanders on a plane tend to frown on you holding your kid in said straitjacket-grasp while he's screaming at the top of his lungs. They also tend to frown on your kid climbing under their feet to explore their shoes. It's definitely a balancing act between letting him explore the new world of your airplane row and becoming a nuisance to those around you.

But there was one really good airplane event that I'm not sure I can accurately describe for you. My brother and my husband still laugh hilariously at the mere thought of it, so it must have been funnier from their vantage points. We bought Jay one of these Foogo Thermos cups with a straw for the trip. It's unbreakable stainless steel, it keeps milk cold for 12 hours, and (most importantly) it has a flip-top cover to keep the straw from leaking and to keep it clean. Perfect for travel! This flip top cover soon becomes significant to the story.

Jay drinks some milk at the airport, we load up onto the plane, takeoff, and the flight attendant begins to come around with snacks & drinks. As we're sipping our Ginger Ale, we think "I bet Jay would like some milk." Out comes the Foogo straw cup. Derek pushes the button to open the cap, and without warning, the straw shoots a geyser of milk across my face, up the side wall of the plane, and across the back of the seat onto the hair of the poor little girl seated in the row behind us. Yes, all the wonderful advertising in the world neglected to mention that the flip top cap is actually air tight. The pressure difference at sea level and at our cruising altitude of 20,000 feet caused this thing to act like a pressurized super-soaker, shooting soymilk across the plane. As the milk begins running down the wall of the airplane and across the window, I start to hear a snicker, which quickly becomes hilarious laughter. No help in wiping the milk out of my hair or off of everything around me. Oh no. My husband and brother are too busy laughing to worry about us or the puddle of milk that's now forming in the plane's window. They are dying laughing. The best part? They actually begin making plans do it again on the ride home! They want to recreate this scene so they can take pictures of it! Boys scare me sometimes.

I still really like the cup. Seriously, it IS great for travel. But a word to the wise: unscrew the lid before opening the cap on an airplane. You'll be glad you did. So will the people on the row behind you.

Posted at 07:43PM Aug 08, 2009 by Jen Foster in General | Comments[1]

With this ring I promise I'll always love you, always love you...

Wednesday Aug 05, 2009

With this ring I promise I'll always love you, always love you...

Wedding season is here again! Perhaps you'll remember about one year ago when Jay went to two weddings two weekends in a row. As a big boy, Jay now gets to be IN a wedding! My cousin Jamie got hitched this weekend at the amazingly beautiful Snow Mountain Ranch in Colorado, and Jay was the non-ring-bearing ring bearer. Actually carrying a ring was a job a little too important for a kid who can't keep up with his shoes, much less small family heirlooms. He instead got to ride in the wagon as the flower girls pulled him down the aisle.

It was pretty funny to hear Jay's running commentary during the ceremony. "Bird!" he shouted as a bird flew overhead. "Uh Oh!" he exclaimed (over and over again) as the Cheerios fell on the ground. "Fell" probably isn't the right word to describe how the Cheerios ended up on the ground. "Were forcefully thrown" might be more accurate. His new favorite words are "Oh Noooooo!" (which is about a 3 syllable No) and "Uh Oh!" (only one syllable, but repeated with great frequency). It's hilarious. He uses these two phrases not to mean, "Oh dear, there's been an accident." He uses the phrases interchangeably to mean "Could ya pick that up for me?"

The trip was too long and has far too many good stories for just one blog post - I gotta save up my material, ya know. So I'll just leave you with this picture of our happy little family before the happy couple gets hitched.

Congrats, Jamie & Jeff! We love you guys dearly and can't wait for Jay to have some little second cousins of his own (hint, hint!).

Posted at 09:22PM Aug 05, 2009 by Jen Foster in General |

On the Beach

Sunday Jul 19, 2009

On the Beach

That's where I wanna be

On the Beach

Baby, baby come go with me

-Chairmen of the Board

I am a beach bum, for sure. And from the looks of things, we're turning Jay into a little beach bum too. We went to the beach last Friday night, and on Saturday a big crew of friends came down for the week. (By the way, it's only appropriate that I use a Chairmen song for this entry ... this crew of friends are serious Chairmen junkies! We used to go to every show, stand in the front row, sing along and dance to every line of every song. Good times.)

It was a great beach trip for everyone. Jay got to spend lots of time hanging out with his buddy P, and while he wasn't especially fond of sharing his toys, he did get really good at saying "MINE!" No, they did really well together. Jay enjoyed the sand and the ocean more than on any previous beach trips. Derek and Wayne dug the boys their own private lagoon on Saturday morning, which gave me & Bethany plenty of time to sit on the beach and catch up on our busy lives.

Here are a couple of pics from our adventures. If only we could have stayed the whole week!

Posted at 09:03PM Jul 19, 2009 by Jen Foster in General | Comments[2]

I'm a yankee doodle dandy...

Monday Jul 06, 2009

I'm a yankee doodle dandy...

We have had the most wonderful July 4th weekend that a little family could have. While I can't say we did anything all that exciting, we just had fun hanging out together, working on our remodel, going to the mall, and enjoying family time. On Saturday night, our plans to watch the Mudcats game were thwarted by the lack of tickets to said game (perhaps we should have called ahead before driving to Zebulon!). But instead we drove back to Raleigh to watch the fireworks at the fairgrounds. We had a fantastic view from the parking lot of Carter Finley, and there were lots of kids running around and playing with sparklers as we waited for it to get dark enough for the real show.

Jay was completely mesmerized by the sparklers ... he called them "karklers." And then, when the real fireworks started, he was even more excited to see the big karklers in the sky. He didn't get cranky a bit, even though it was WAY past bedtime when we finally got him back home.

All in all, I couldn't have asked for a more perfect weekend together with my 2 favorite guys.

Posted at 10:15PM Jul 06, 2009 by Jen Foster in General | Comments[2]

That it's all just a little bit of history repeating

Friday Jul 03, 2009

That it's all just a little bit of history repeating

... and I've seen it before
... and I'll see it again
... yes I've seen it before
... just little bits of history repeating

Shirley Bassey - History Repeating

As many of you know, Derek, Jay and I live in the house that I grew up in. My parents got married under the tree in our side yard, and our backyard parties are continuing a long line of summertime pig pickin's. Jay's nursery is the same one I came home to. So our house has a lot of sentimental value. My parents (with some major help from my grandparents, Appie & Papa) put a ton of work into this house. They built an addition with a great room and master bedroom and made some major changes to the kitchen/hallway/bedroom where we're now re-renovating to create a pantry.

Nevertheless, we occasionally want to take a bulldozer to it. Every project is 10 times more complicated on a house that's 50+ years old and has had numerous layers of renovations already. On this latest remodel, we've found holes in the floor where shower drains used to be, and created our own holes in the floor where the wood has rotted out. We didn't exactly budget for replacing the subfloor.

So to minimize the work (and $$) involved, my dad keeps encouraging us to save what materials we can. "Don't rip down sheetrock if you don't have to," he says. "Just patch it where the mirror used to be, and you'll never know the difference." Sometimes we ignore his advice. Derek priced sheetrock at ~$6/sheet this morning, so we decided we'd replace the whole wall rather than try to patch those major holes.

And in this case, I'm glad we didn't listen, because we found a really cool piece of history behind the wall...

That's "Michael J. McLean, Builder; Laura McLean, architect; Jenny age 3, helper; Matthew age 1, nuisance" We told Jay that he can get on the wall, too. Still determining whether he gets the job title of "Helper" or "Nuisance."

Posted at 09:50PM Jul 03, 2009 by Jen Foster in General | Comments[4]

From this moment...

Saturday Jun 27, 2009

From this moment...

...Life has begun
From this moment,
You are the one

Warning, sappy post coming up. If you're reading for my witty humor (or, more likely, my uber-cheezy attempts at humor!) you'll be sadly disappointed. I just saw this video that one of my Facebook friends posted, and it truly touched me. Life is made of a million little moments, some happy, some sad. It is so easy to lose sight of that in planning for the future and always looking for that greener pasture. This video is by two parents who have redefined for me what it means to live fully in each moment and to cherish what you have.

Get your kleenex ready...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=th6Njr-qkq0

Posted at 08:20PM Jun 27, 2009 by Jen Foster in General | Comments[1]