Vacation Thus Far

We have been in PA since April 8th and we have been having fun! Enjoy!

At the Philadelphia Zoo

On the carousel
Drivin' a tractor

Yes she is our little monkey

Really tired and sleeping on Meemaw

Petting a goat

We also took her to get Easter pix taken so expect those to be coming your way soon!

We just found out we will be having a boy and we are thinking of naming him Preston Jules McLaughlin so more on that too later...

Ch-Ch-Ch-Ch-Changes

A lot of changes in the McLaughlin household! We are all so excited for me to be finished with my student teaching and school in general. Can I tell you how weird it feels to not have to do any homework, study, take tests, or be anywhere for most of the day? I have been in school since kindergarten with only a year off since then. Now to be finished, well it seems surreal and unbeliveable. Good, but strange. I hope to get used to this fast though!
On another topic, we all need to sing a sad eulogy for Fred. For many of you who know us well, know that both Josh and I have always named our cars and called them by their respective names. Another odd idiosyncracy maybe, but it works for us and (even though Josh laughs quietly at me for this) makes them feel like part of the family in a very small way. I got Alfred, or Fred, right after I graduated from college. I had him to entire time Josh and I dated, he drove us around after we were married, he faithfully drove us across the country, brought our first child home from the hospital, and never had any problems. We always tried to take care of him, washing him often, cleaning out and polishing his interior, getting oil changes, and not letting people eat in him. People have called me a bit OCD with the car, but it helped when we traded him in for a slightly bigger car.
Josh was so excited and we were able to haggle our way into a really great deal. He loves driving the new car, which I have called Celia (which may need to change as Josh hates the name). She's a lot bigger than Fred, and when we were switching our stuff from Fred to Celia, I was really sad. He was sucha great car, and I just wish I could know he was going to go to someone who could take care of him...
Other than that, Ada has been doing well and really learning to walk just by holding on to something with one hand. She didn't like it at first as she was so wobbly and din't feel like she could move forward without falling, which let's be honest, happened often. But she's better at it now and has now moved to on to every once and a while letting go of things and walking a few steps towards it until she falls down. I also now have more time to realize I am pregnant as the baby kicks, or I notice the kicking, more. We will be preparing to move into a 3rd floor apt (yeah, 3rd floor with soon two small kids who can't tackle stairs). We move in on the 6th, which should prve fun as Mondays are so hard for Josh as he gets no sleep. Then on the 7th we find out what baby #2's gender is. and on the 8th Ada and I leave Josh to go home to Philly. It will be a great vacation and we are so excited (not so much to leave Josh or to have to leave at 3 am on the 8th) to visit my side of the family. So we have a lot going on, and I would really like to know I passed my PRAXIS II tests so I can get my teachers certificate, but it is really nice to just be at home being a mom.

Getting messy

Bath time with Dad


Saying our Goodbyes to Fred.

By the way, Celia is a Ford Expedition

St Patricks' Day

Out here you don't find too many Irish, and so I was explaining to my students about St. Patricks' Day and the food/celebrations etc, and they all stopped short when I said Irish potatoes. In potatoland, the word potato does not make anyone excited, so many people were curious why I was. I explained what they were, thinking that would make at least a few people say, "Oh yeah! I've had those before." But alas...nothing. So I had to make some for everyone. Most of the students liked them, if I could get to them to say to take small bites as many just shoved it all into their mouths and then were coughing up cinnamon that is. Other than that, we had a green feast of Salad, Martinellis' dyed green, green Jell-o with marshmallows and the leftover irish potato candy. I am nearing the last week of my placement and of course I will be so sad to go, but also leaping for joy next Friday. This semester has been hard on all of us; Josh has not been able to get the study time he needs (but not really wants when Ada is all smiles for her Daddy). Ada has taken a large step forward: She has learned to stand on her own. No, she has long ago surpassed the pulling herself up to stand alone phase; now she is fully in the realm of standing up from the floor to a standing position by herself. She now and again will let go of something and take a few hesitant steps forward...and then fall or lower herself to the ground (crawling being much faster). So take a look at what we have been up to and don't forget the new video of Ada (climbing up from the floor unaided to get to Daddy). Enjoy!

Look! No hands!
Our Green Feast. Can you tell why I love this holiday?

A Holiday Toast

A Bubble Tiara

Awwww, she just adores her Daddy!

Moving right along

Ada has really started taking off! She crawls so fast now and makes us feel like our house is always dirty as she will find the small pieces of whatever on the floor and eat it...
She now has two teeth which are completely in and has started letting go of things and trying to take steps. It usually doesn't end with her walking so she gets upset most of the time.
I am trying to finish all of my schoolwork so I can really study more for the (hopefully) last standardized test I will ever take. I hate taking tests, and I have not taken a paper based test in a long time (since HS!) as the GRE and Praxis I tests were all computer based tests. But BYU-I is not set up to have people take computer based tests yet so next Saturday I report to the BYU-I campus and take two 2 hr tests back to back...I am so looking forward to it. Otherwise student teaching is almost over, I am starting my 10th week out of 12...and it's down the stretch I come.
Josh and I will be so happy when it is over so we can both calm down a little and have at least some free time once in a while. My sisters wedding is coming up and Ada and I are really looking forward to a trip...but it's so sad to take one without Josh. But happiness and finality are on the horizon so just keep praying, thinking, and hopeing time goes by fast and everything turns out well!

Also, we have our next baby appt on Wednesday and we will be 18 weeks!

Daddys' favorite shirt of Adas'
Don't you just love this face?!

Eating cheese for the first time

Looking so comfortable and wrapped up

Eating some bread too

Peas

This week has been interesting; we both had off from school on Monday, and Devin and Leo watched Ada so we could have our belated Valentines' Day. We went to see the movie Taken, and let me tell you that while it was a great movie, having a child myself and being pregnant, it was all I could do at some points to not break down and cry hysterically (which I did later last week as I stayed up late to watch Sophies' Choice and ended up crying hysterically for the longest time and fiercely trying to resist the urge to run into Adas' room at 12am to hug her, so don't watch that movie pregnant!)
Then when we started school, I discovered that almost 1/2 of the school was out on Tuesday for Strep/flu/bad head colds; there were a lot of students gone all week long and it happened all over town which made getting medicine hard (and there is only so many kinds of medicine I can take!). Blessedly, again Ada has not gotten sick even though Josh and I are still feeling stuffed up, tired and achy! Ada is also becoming more and more adventurous, and almost standing up from sitting all by herself! It is so great to watch her struggle and strain to stand up without touching the ground, us, or anything else! She can stand up know for a few seconds before we can't count anymore as she reaches and grabs us or she falls back down. So hopefully, we are thinking she will more than likely be walking before the next baby comes (which I have already felt move!!!).
So look at the pictures we have (most are from the hilarious feeding where we discovered that Ada still hates peas and cringed and screwed up her face so much every time she found some in her food!) and enjoy the new video!

Taking a bath

She is adorable!

Here not so much, but hilarious and cute!

Yep, Daddy, I still hate these!

A toothy grin

For those of you who have been anxiously waiting (Mom) for Adas' gums to finally bear fruit you are in luck! She finally has a tooth and we had a reprieve from drooling (not completely-we should be so lucky) for about 2 days and now it is back in full force. We are through speculating though about subsequent teeth as we have been sort of announcing the arrival of teeth for some time now, so they will come when they come and we will keep you updated. We tried to take a picture of the illustrious new pearly white, and we succeeded (sort of so look closely in the pic) but any of you who have ever tried to take a picture of a tooth in an infant will most likely know that it's not easy! We sort of celebrated valentines' day today-we got each other cards and Josh got me some Dove candy in a heart tin (even though we said to just do cards for now). I say only sort of celebrated it as Josh doesn't get home until 8am and then goes to bed around 9, wakes up around 5-ish and has to be back into work at 8:30...so celebrating today was kind of silly. We both (yes!! a day off from school!!) have Monday off and my lil' sis Devin and her soon to be husband Leo have so graciously agreed to watch Ada while we go out and see the movie Taken (seriously...what movie with Liam Neeson hasn't been a great movie?!). So we were all very excited for Adas' first Valentines' Day and we got her a shirt she wore 2 days in a row (and why not right? this will be the only time she can wear it!). So enjoy the pics! Look closely for the tooth...
Ada likes to be upside down and she also likes to bounce (infinitely harder to take a pic of that)

A little too close to the camera

Daddy overrun by girls!

Ada and her friend BraeLynn

Playing around

Well I used to post much more regularly, but as life is busy and I am frequently tired after a long day, blogging usually takes a backseat to homework, sleep and being with my family. As I have been working with first graders, you can imagine that they are the epitome of cleanliness and hygiene. They always cover their mouths when they cough/sneeze (and clean their hands afterwards), and they never wipe their noses on their hands or sleeves; they are so great at it that I have been battling a cold for the past few days. It normally would not have affected me that much, but then I need to go to school and talk over the din and act happy and peppy every second of the day, which some of you will be surprised to know is a struggle even for me sometimes! We also went to the doctor today for a checkup for the new baby and as so many of you know how much I love getting my blood drawn (coupled with the fact that I am feeling lightheaded and sick anyway) I convinced the nurse to not take my blood now, but next month (when I am sure I will have wished it was already done...). If I would not have been feeling so crappy, I might have been worried when the doc tried to listen to the babys' heartbeat but couldn't quite find it. Luckily, the only room available for our checkup was one of the ones with the ultrasound machine already in it, so he just looked at the baby right then and there just to check. We found out that the placenta is right beneath the skin on my stomach, which covers the baby...so that might make it very hard to ever hear the baby's heartbeat just using the exterior ultrasound/heartbeat monitor gadget. But it was great to see the baby and to see that everything is fine, and the baby helpfully moved around a bit while we were looking in. So sometimes even though Ada does some adorable things, they sometimes do not get chronicled as I would like. I have been trying this past week to remember to take more pictures so here's what I have come up with. Playing with Mamas' scarf
Playing on Daddys' feet

Playing and crawling around in the kitchen (noticing a trend? yeah, she plays with everything and crawls everywhere!)

Caught sleeping before her nap