After five (yes, count them FIVE) long calls to Windstream and two tech visits to my house the internet is working again.  Who knows how long it will last.  It’s slow, but I don’t care as long as it comes on.

The issue seems to be that the firmware in my modem–the new modem they gave us–needed to be updated, but no one told me until call number five.

Why would it take five different people and two different techs to tell me this information?  Those idiots on the phone kept going through the whole, “unplug your router for a minute, then plug it back in and restart your computer…”  Gee, I hadn’t tired that 209832432 times already!  Clearly something else is wrong.

Why would they not let you know the firmware needs to be updated as soon as the tech unpacked the thing from the box and set it up?  You need their password and username info to update it too, so it’s not like I could just know and do it myself.

Anyway, now it’s updated and we’ll see how long the internet stays on before no longer working. Hopefully longer than an hour this time?

This mycoplasma bacteria crap we are sick with sucks.  It’s just like a bad cold/sinus infection/respiratory infection depending on how it decides to attack each person’s body.  Mine is of course in my sinuses and ears.  I just want to take handfuls of ibuprofen, but that isn’t safe during pregnancy.  Tylenol does absolutely NOTHING.

Ada is probably the worst sick kid ever.  The whining!  The not sleeping!  It goes on for days and days and days.  OMG.  Every time she gets the tiniest germ it’s impossible to just continue daily life.  I have to put up with her misery for about two weeks straight.  This is so fun while moving.  So fun.  Of course Tyler gets up at 1:30 and leaves for work at 2, then gets home at 6 in the morning six days a week, which means it’s only me with no break at all.  What I wouldn’t give for someone else to be responsible for just a few hours, or for one meal, anything.  Even just for five minutes while I brush my teeth and stare at myself in the mirror would be nice.  Never going to happen though.  I hate this aspect of my life.

The baby definitely had a growth spurt. My uterus feels HUGE now.  I don’t know where else it could possible go.  His toes are up at the point where my ribs come together, in my lungs.  The maternity clothes I wore up until the end of my previous pregnancies are laughably too small.  I’m a little scared!  I don’t know if it’s because he’s a huge baby boy or because my uterus is just stretching out easier after multiple pregnancies.  Time shall tell!

I’m not afraid he won’t fit out or anything, I had no issues giving birth to Rosie and Ada.  I’m not a large person, but I have a roomy pelvis and expandable hips according to my midwife.  Rosie and Ada both had perfectly round heads and everything! I am very curious what size Baby H will be, and how he will look, and what his personality will be like. He seems so unreal to me.  Who is this little person filling every inch of my belly?

I can’t imagine having a newborn.  We haven’t bought anything at all.  If he’s born at 39 weeks like Rosie and Ada then I only have about 10 weeks to go.  I have a feeling it will fly by.  Next thing I know I’ll be having those all night pre-labor misery things going on, then one day it will be the real thing and there he’ll be…seems like a dream.

This is belly for week 29.  (The mirror above the tub isn’t actually crooked, it’s just distortion.)  My belly is huge for my super slim body, considering my stomach is normally totally flat. Everyone is always like, “Oh your belly is so tiny!”  Yeah, actually not if you’ve regularly seen me naked!.  The girls are enjoying watching it grow and rubbing it daily! It feels like I’m wearing a 300 ton elephant suit.  If you look closely you can see how it’s not perfectly round. I think there’s a baby knee just on the far side of my belly button there.

(That’s a cat scratch on my back…don’t ask. And my ass is not actually totally flat, it’s just annoying ill fitting maternity pants! Driving me crazy!)

Living out here is still epically awesome. I’ve been taking lots of pictures with my iPhone due to lack of other technology.

I’m overwhelmed with moving disorganization, illness, pregnancy exhaustion, and setting up my farming things.  I’m determined to get it all done though.  Determined.

I charmed my neighbor (the goat owner Dale) into plowing up my garden space earlier this past week.  He made it a bit…huge.  What will I do with all this space!  (Exciting and overwhelming!)

I still have to get out my rototiller to chop through the clods of grass and dirt, then rake out the debris.  It’s very rocky soil.  I’m not sure how well things will grow in it, but it’s too late to till in compost mixture right now.  I can’t afford to buy compost for that large of a space, and I don’t have any of my own made.  I’ll have to start composting in anticipation of next year’s garden.  Then I have to buy and put up the t-post fencing, which isn’t hard to do…though I’m not sure how well it will go at 29 weeks pregnant. I’ll let you know in a few days, probably when I’m laid up with horrible pulled muscles…

Did I mention I’m determined?

Rosie is having the time of her life playing excavation in the garden space.  The original farmhouse used to be back there, so she’s finding all kinds of bits and pieces of old pottery and broken glass jars in various sizes.  She’s having fun trying to match up all the pieces, then imagining what they used to be and who used them for what.

I have a bunch of seedlings for the garden already started.  About 25 tomato plants of various kinds, about 8 bell pepper plants, a couple Zucchini plants, and a few green bean starts, plus my big strawberry patch I need to move from my old house. If I can hurry up and get the garden all set up this week I can plant a bunch of green beans, corn, maybe some summer peas if I can find heat tolerant ones, more squashes, and I don’t know what else.

I also have chicken eggs coming out of my ears.  I get more than a dozen a day, even with the stupid Lucy Andalusian chicken eating some eggs before we can gather them.  (Maddening!!)

Their pen is working out really well, but it’s a bit crowded.  I need to order a couple more rolls of electric netting (200 more feet) to expand their space to 300 feet total.  Tyler also needs to build a second hoop coop, but he won’t have time for awhile.  Not until we get everything moved in and unpacked.  I plan on moving the hoop coop(s) and fencing every two weeks so that they are always on fresh grass and never on mud.

I’m loving this electric netting so far.  I read it takes 3,000 volts to zap a coyote through its fur.  Even with weeds on the fence (which causes the fence to not be as powerful) my voltage meter is reading at 7,000 volts. Take that murderous predators!  I’ve also promised the girls bunnies, but not until our house sells.  Billy Who Wants to Buy Our House hasn’t called back.  Too bad, maybe that was too good to be true.

This is their hoop coop.  It’s not fully finished–the tarp is supposed to be nailed on tightly, and it needs nest boxes.  But it works fine for now.  I’ll get it finished nicely before the baby comes, at least.

The electric netting needs to be tighter, but I haven’t had internet to watch the troubleshooting videos yet.  It’s sagging because the land is uneven. I know there’s some solution, I just don’t know what yet.  It still works fine for now despite hitting the grass and popping a bit.

Over the winter I’m going to use bales of straw to keep the hoop coop warm.  I saw on a blog where someone made an entire floor out of straw bales and set the coop on top of it, then let the chickens scratch it down over the winter.  After that they composted it all.  Glorious idea!

Rosie is feeding them scraps.  Both girls already know how to unhook the electric fence at the battery, and then hook it back up, so they can go in and out without getting zapped.

I also need to build permanent housing for the battery energizer that hooks to the fence…so much to do!  Right now it’s just in a bucket with plastic.  More temporary short cuts.

The thing about living way out here is that everyone has random stuff going on. No one has picture perfect homes, lawns, or magazine worthy farm set-ups. Just not the way it works, so no worries.  Goodbye suburb perfection, hello reality!

I wish these two were focus properly! This is Jenny, their favorite little banty hen.

Rosie is simply glowing.  She is incredibly happy to be living here.  (Also, why/how is she so old now! What the heck happened!)

The scenery out here is just mind blowing.  I LOVE waking up and going to sleep surrounded by this place.

(I’m also loving the panorama ability with the iPhone 5.  Wow!)

This is the cabin at night, as viewed from the chicken pen.

Rintoo enjoying a breeze through the front door.

Yes, that’s my giant screen front door and my wide plank willow wood flooring.  Bliss!

The moths out here are very large, and there is such an interesting variety in color and size!

(Ignore all the disorganized moving mess on my porch…it will be straightened up one day. Eventually.)

I really like this spot.  The graveyard is just through those trees.  This is behind the chicken pen.

This is one of my favorite spots just around the corner. It’s a cattle farm.

After all that garden bed digging…

The graveyard path through the woods…this is where our property line ends.  I love visiting here.

These people lived on this gorgeous property a hundred years before I did. It seems fitting that they are still here, in some form.

I don’t know why they don’t mow around these.  There are snakes in there, but I’m dying to see what those gravestones say.

Rosie is in her pajamas because we walked out there this morning before breakfast.  We wanted to run through the fog, just because it’s fun.

See? I can’t believe this is where I live.

Morning time. I’m more than happy to roll out of bed.

The kids love it here so much.  Every time we go back to our house in town to finished packing stuff all they do is cry and whine to come back to the cabin as soon as possible.

Today–

We seem to be stuck in a pattern of one nice day, followed by a week of rain and cool weather.

Yesterday at the cabin, it was actually this color outside.  Gray.  Blue.  Rain.

See that white gate?  That’s the last neighbor on the “street”.  Everything beyond the fence line there is her land.  Everything in front of it is…MINE.

One of my future lawn mowing crew, out of three.

Rosie standing in the road.

We were going to a princess birthday party after the cabin.

Ada was walking from the neighbor’s white gate and the horses back to our cabin.

Not wet grass on the princess dress! Noooo!

We took Hank out there to run around.

He’s totally fine loose with our chickens and ducks, so I was surprised that he barked and growled at the horses and goats.

Not sure what I’m going to do about that!  I’m not sure if he was actually barking at the animals or if he got them confused with the guard dogs in the fields.

Hank inside watching the goats through the living room window…hopefully he’ll get used to them?

Moving is going as slow as I thought it would.

As in we haven’t moved anything yet…

Things with the house reorganizing are coming along every so slowly doing it mostly by myself.

Yesterday I reorganized all the boxes in the POD outside and brought in 95% of the toys.  They’re semi-organized in our old bedroom, the new playroom/office.  I got completely worn out and sore after moving all those boxes.  I’ve been too tired to do any more today!

I managed to take the girls outside earlier to check out signs of spring.  We also potted some flowers they picked out when we were shopping yesterday.  I was intending to plant some seeds too, but after feeding the chickens and carrying the chicken feed, then walking outside with the kids, and putting a few flowers in pots I suddenly had no energy left.

This pregnancy is really wearing me out for some reason.  My body just stops.  Cannot keep going, must lay down.  Dislike!

I get antsy when I can’t get up and do things.  If there’s no chaos I feel the need to create some, I can’t just sit here. Body, really…I’m not feeling sick anymore thankfully, just worn out sometimes.

Maybe I’m becoming elderly and feeble.  You know, at the ripe old age of 26.  ;)

And my toes are swollen.  Dude! I’ve never had swelling this early in pregnancy before.  June and July might be long, hot swelly months for me.  Yikes.

I am getting cautiously excited about a teeny brand new baby to snuggle and love on.  I’m still paranoid about miscarriage, or I guess now still birth.  He’s not nearly as active as Rosie and Ada were, at least not that I can feel all the time.  My placenta makes an L shape along the side and top, so maybe that’s blocking some of his movements?  He’s down so low too, way lower than the girls.

I’m already in love with him, somehow.  That scares me since he’s not safe in my arms yet.

But a new baby! I might really be having one?  To dress in cute baby clothes, and with a tiny bum to pat.  Soft baby hair to sniff.  Send help.

Hate being pregnant when I feel awful, but I could easily have a million newborns.

I’ll just…post pictures now.

First, here are a couple of instagram pictures from yesterday at lunch.

These pictures are from our time outside this afternoon:

Our strawberry patch got decimated by the ducks.  I wasn’t sure they would come back up, but yesterday tiny leaves appeared and today they’re even bigger.

Rapidly growing!  These little dew looking drops are not dew.  Guttation, maybe?

This would be perfect if Rintoo was sniffing a flower, but instead he’s sniffing dead tomato stalks from last year that I never cleaned out…

Periwinkle is in bloom!

This is the almost actual color of these flowers. They are very dark blue/purple in person.  I’ve never, ever seen ones so striking before! I can’t remember the name of them.

I saw them at Walmart yesterday, which isn’t somewhere I normally buy flowers but I couldn’t not buy them!

Rosie and Ada picked Primrose flowers for themselves.  We put them in clay pots today and since they only need 3-6 hours of direct sunlight per day the girls can keep them their rooms.

Rosie was distressed because the petals on her plant got old and white overnight.  Luckily there are brand new buds down inside waiting to open.

The wild violets are blooming!

I don’t know why people put weed killer on their yards, some weeds are beautiful.  What is our obsession with plain perfect grass??

I don’t know what these are, but they’re so cool!  They’ve never grown under this tree ever before.  We just found a random patch of them had popped up.

They’re tiny.

Leaves: Coming soon to a tree near you!

It’s supposed to storm tomorrow and then turn cooler again.

The past couple of days of 80 degree temps were heavenly!  Can’t wait for summer.

Rosie had her winter dance recital on Friday night.  Tyler couldn’t go because he had to work.  I hate that he never is able to take days off, he has to miss all of these things.

Rosie did a really good job dancing this year.  Her dance class is just for fun, it’s not strict competition dance or anything.  They only practice one evening a week.  Ada absolutely cannot wait until she’s old enough to take dance class!  I think she can start next year when she’s three.

Rosie’s group danced to Winter Wonderland this year.

Pictures:

With her friends before the program started…

This is her best friend at dance class. I need to get them together to play outside of class.

Rosie has one front tooth halfway in and we’re waiting on the second one to make an appearance.

All she wants for Christmas are her two front teeth!

Miss Rebecca applying lipstick.  Rosie was so excited to wear make-up.

Why is my baby so big??

I took a few pictures of the littlest girls because they were ridiculously adorable.

Rosie’s group was next!

I couldn’t fit them all in the frame from where I was sitting with Ada in my lap.  Oh well.

Rosie loved this part the best, the final pose. I wish I’d gotten a picture of it centered but I couldn’t just jump up out of my seat…

This one is funny. I took it right as the lights were going down.

Afterward each girl got a ribbon to commemorate participating in dance for fall 2012.

Here’s Rosie getting hers.

Then Rosie turned and said very loudly, “Well what do I do now?”  and the entire audience laughed.

Here’s the edge of their group shot for the entire dance studio.  Rosie’s looking like a goofball…

Afterward.  When Tyler saw this picture he said, “Thanks for covering her up as soon as possible.”

With my parents:

I totally lost the battery charger for my camera!  I realized it on Friday when I went to charge the battery before the dance recital.

I need it for when my little boy gets here in just a few days!!  I need it for a wedding I’m shooting this coming Saturday!

I tore apart the house and it’s not anywhere.  My battery lasts a long time, but it only has one cell left and I’d never, ever go to a wedding without all batteries fully charged.

I finally gave up and ordered another one, an off brand that got good reviews, and paid for 3 day shipping.  It’s supposed to be here between the 18th and the 21st.

Might have to use my old camera at the airport on Thursday.  Ugh.

I’m so frustrated. The last time I had the battery charger was when I was unpacking from the beach trip.  (Yeah, my batteries last that long for the 5d mk II!)

I hope the new charger comes soon.  I’m sure I’ll find the old one any second, now that I’ve bought a new one.  There’s no where locally I can buy one that I know of.

I feel too sick to go out and search stores or call around either, way too much effort at this point in my misery…I mean pregnancy.

Oh and I got some Zofran!  It works only halfway.  Takes the edge off.  I’ve only taken three of them so far, when I feel super sick at nights.

Ok so the warnings that this stuff makes you constipated are no joke.  (TMI, run away now!)

I’m normally a constipated person, always have been except for that parasite issue after Mexico.  But this Zofran is really, really screwing something up.

I think it’s beyond natural remedies.  HELP!  My intestines are so delicate after the parasite that I’m terrified to take a lot of Zofran or stool softener, they just get angry and out of whack so easily.  Ugh, ugh, ugh.

But at this point the constipation is not nearly as scary as feeling like you’re going to throw up any second for hours and hours.  That is pure misery.

Yay pregnancy.  I don’t think I ever want to be pregnant again.  I want a large family but I cannot handle being this miserable with kids and a house to run.  I just can’t.

Tyler is never home, he even worked Saturday, leaving here at 3 in the afternoon and getting home at 5:30 in the morning.  (Where he found me still awake, in bed crying and trying not to dry heave.)

I could handle more pregnancies if I had someone to do the dishes, feed the kids, vacuum, mop, and take care of the chickens for about two months in the first trimester.

I think I need a sister wife.  Only she can’t actually have sex with my husband.  She can just do chores.

Wait, that’s a maid. Except I can’t pay her.  That would mean I need a slave.  That would be too mean.

I just need a volunteer, how about that?!  Too bad there are no takers.

In about six more weeks I should feel somewhat less miserable.  Just six more weeks.  I can make it, right?

I wonder if I can explain to Host Boy why I’m not feeling well.  I’m so upset that I’m sickly now, of all times. I keep crying over it.

I’m really stressing about how I will get Host Boy from the Atlanta airport.  I keep praying there will be some painless solution.  I know at 8 weeks pregnant  (Click here if you missed it!) I am not going to feel like driving 16 hours round trip alone.  Tyler doesn’t understand, because he’s never been pregnant.  He keeps rolling his eyes and saying I will be fine.  I know it’s not just me…most pregnant women at 8 weeks wouldn’t feel like doing that and would be hard pressed to miss out on sleep for 24 hours.  I will drive down there during the day on Thursday and then turn around and drive back home all night.  I have no other options because I have to be back for a wedding I’m photographing on Saturday.

My back-up plan was to get Zofran, until yesterday when we got a letter in the mail saying since I am Tyler’s ex-wife I have no health insurance coverage on his plan, and neither do the kids, retroactive to his hire on date.

Uh, what?

After several attempts to get straight answers from the unhelpful call center people we finally were able to figure out what happened.

When Tyler got his hire on packet it instructed us to go to a website and sign up for the health insurance plans we wanted.  We did that, filled out the proper info, added the required social security, numbers, and the little green check marks next to the info boxes lit up.  We submitted the online form, and began receiving the family benefits email newsletter.  They took the family insurance cost out of Tyler’s paychecks every two weeks.  We assumed everything was fine and dandy.  Who wouldn’t?  When you’re paying for insurance you’d think you have insurance coverage, right?

Well apparently there was supposed to be a pop-up window saying we needed to fax in copies of our birth certificates, marriage license, and social security cards.  We never got that pop-up, obviously, and they never said anything else about it until 60 days later!

So when Tyler called the customer service people they told him that the 30 day window had passed and that we could reapply for coverage in 2014.

NO WAY.

When he asked them what had happened to the money he’d been paying for family coverage the past few months the lady said it was just lost and couldn’t be refunded.

Seriously?  Yeah right.  She said there was no one hire up he could talk to so he hung up on her and called back and got a different person on the phone.

After talking to a rep from HR at work last night he found out this has happened to other people too, including the HR rep herself!  We have to right this long detailed letter about how we took the proper steps to apply for coverage and request and appeal, then fax in the proper documents and wait for them to either accept or deny us.

I am INCREDIBLY frustrated.  We don’t have any health insurance.  I can’t go to the doctor and get Zofran so that I’m not miserable when driving 16 hours round trip to pick up Host Boy.  I can’t get an ultrasound to reassure myself that the baby is alive and growing.  (The midwife for homebirth is paid out of pocket, so it doesn’t mess with that at least.  And for those that asked about the illegal aspect–the legality issues belong to the midwife, she is the one that will get in trouble. I can have an unassisted birth, that is legal.  Yes, I know it’s backwards. Technically the midwife is practicing medicine without a license but only because our stupid state doesn’t recognize her license.  She is well qualified and certified…just not in Kentucky.)

Anyway, how could this happen? How can we just not have insurance? It’s not fair.  We did everything we were supposed to do in order to get health coverage, but we have a pop-up blocker…as do most people on their browsers.  There was no other mention of these documents they required AND we were paying for family coverage.  They obviously processed our online form because they immediately started taking the payments from Tyler’s checks.  I have no idea why they listed me as an ex-wife.  Not our fault, but we are the ones suffering.  I hope we don’t need to go to the doctor any time soon.

We’re not going to let it go.  We’ll keep fighting until they give us coverage for 2013 and refund the money we paid for 2012.  But that takes time, and it doesn’t help me much right now.  Can’t believe this is even happening.  Sometimes I feel like nothing can ever just be easy.

By the way I *think* Host Boy should be getting his visa tonight our time/tomorrow morning Ukrainian time.  (They are 8 hours ahead of us.)  I’m nervous, of course, and can’t wait to hear good news.  Fingers crossed, prayers sent up, and waiting with baited breath to hear something…hopefully I will be posting the good news tomorrow.

I have lots of pictures to share!  My eyes are crossing…really feeling some pregnancy exhaustion going on, shew.

The girls decorated a giant gingerbread man.  We thought it would be easier than the house, which was kind of a disaster last year.

A few days later we put up the Christmas tree.  Funny thing–every year we forget how to attach the base to the post.  It’s so obvious!

We desperately need a new tree, but we decided to wait until we move so we can see what sort of space we’ll have.

(I’m allergic to real trees. Sad!)

Tyler was so frustrated that once again we could not put the base on, hahaha.

For some reason this outtake is hysterical.

Ada stuck her finger up her nose and Rosie photo bombed it.

We were going to do white lights but then half the strand didn’t work so we had to stop and go to the store, where they only had colored lights left…

A few hours later as the sun was setting…

Now, time to do some evening school work with Rosie!   :)

We had another bridal shower while at the beach.  It was supposed to be one where you give the couple items to use on their honey moon, which was going to be at the beach.

The bridal shower was in the house where we were staying.  A very big house!  It had six bedrooms and six full bathrooms on two floors.

(I already posted some of these, but I don’t know which.  I finally finished editing all of them.)

Ada showing off a weathered conch shell we found on the edge of the dunes.

Beth’s friends…

Tyler’s Grandma, so happy!

My mother-in-law.

Rosie was grumpy because she had to come in from watching the sea turtles hatch to this party.

Mother of the bride.

Tyler’s Grandma, his aunt, and a family friend who also happens to be Rosie’s dance teacher.

Beth opening a gift, and the reaction of her friends below.

The wedding rehearsal was at 5:30 on the beach the day before the wedding.

The minister wouldn’t let me take many pictures on the actual wedding day (and he was quite rude about it!)  so the rehearsal pictures are actually better than the real wedding ceremony photos.

By the time everyone was ready to start the very golden late evening sunlight was beaming.

The tallest house directly behind them in the middle, the white one, is the house the bride’s family stayed in.

Tyler was a best man.  That’s his cousin directly behind him.

Beth and her dad.

Beth’s nephew.

Zel, Beth’s niece, who was the third flower girl.

Bride and Groom!

Ada, wandering away.

Congratulations, you are practice married!  (Bridesmaid is pretending to fluff Beth’s imaginary wedding dress behind her.)

(Note the funny arrow shaped light flare on Weston!)

Flower girls playing in the dunes before the rehearsal dinner back at our beach house.

My mother-in-law and Tyler’s Aunt Elaine worked very hard to prepare for the rehearsal dinner.  There were 55 people there…!

I didn’t take any more pictures of the rehearsal dinner because it was crowded and dark in there, not to mention my kids were exhausted and grumpy.

Only Friday was the real vacation day of our vacation.  The rest of the time was taken up by wedding stuff.  I feel like I need more vacation time at the beach!

Tomorrow I’ll post more.  I still have to share the piers we visited and the wedding itself.  I haven’t had time to edit the wedding pictures yet, but thanks to the minister there aren’t very many.

Three airports later we have finally returned home.

After being in that awesome beach house our home seems even smaller than I remembered.  Trying not to dwell on it, but man…I had happily forgotten that I lived in The Shoe Box.

Flying was extremely exhausting.  Next year if we are able to go to their yearly Holden Beach trip hopefully Tyler will be able to take more days off of work.  We can drive five hours to Spartenburg, NC.  Spend the night, then drive the remaining 5 hours to Holden Beach.  I don’t think that would be any worse than dragging the kids through three airports in one day.  Shew!

Our second flight was delayed because of mechanical issues–the flight data screens weren’t working properly.  Ada burned through all of my airplane entertainment in the time we were waiting on the plane for the flight data to be repaired.

Luckily that flight was the best one because we were on a bigger plane with three seats on each side of the isle.  It was one that normally does international flights and it left from the new international terminal in Atlanta.  (I love that new terminal, it’s so nice!)

The other flights we took were teeny tiny planes with teeny tiny seats.  One of them we even had to walk outside to board, the covered walk way thing didn’t fit on it because it was so small.

Tyler thinks it would be fun to be a flight attendant.  Me?  Nightmare job!  Though the free airfare would be pretty awesome.

Overall we had a great time at the beach!  On the last day (Friday) it was the warmest of all.  We spent most of the afternoon in the ocean.

Rosie was terrified of the waves.  She screamed so loud that she got a mouthful of water.  We kept telling her to keep her mouth shut so that wouldn’t happen!  Finally she just went up on the beach and played in the sand with Tyler’s aunt while Tyler, Ada and I went out past the breakers.  Tyler and Ada squeezed into a floaty thing together and I held onto the back.  (The anxiety filled part of me was terrified Ada would fall out and be swept away, but Tyler swore she would be fine, and she was.)

Ada LOVED it.  She did not want to come in!  Every time a big wave would swell up she would scream in sheer delight as it lift us up high and dropped us back down.  If a wave broke over her head she would laugh and laugh while we all choked and sputtered.  She wasn’t the least bit afraid, or even a little bit concerned when water got in her eyes.

Here are pictures from the third day, when it was almost warm enough to swim.  It was 65 degrees out and the girls insisted on putting on their swimsuits and playing on the beach.

Many more pictures later!  I still have tons to upload.

The day dawned gray, cool, and depressing for beach weather.

The weather forecast said sunny in the afternoon, but the sun never appeared.  The girls wanted to go to the beach anyway, so first thing this morning we headed down there.

Good thing we did because overnight the baby sea turtles hatched!  There were still a few stragglers coming out of their shells in the dunes and crawling slowly down the beach to the ocean as the tide was going out.

I wanted to touch one so badly, but that’s not advisable.  They are actually fairly fragile creatures and completely in the wild many don’t make it out into the sea.

Their crawl to the ocean is long and arduous.  They kept going parallel to the shore, and then back towards the dunes.

I read that they automatically try to head away from noises and potential predators.  I think the onlookers were confusing their senses.

This one was in motion towards the water!  (I love its tiny tracks.)

They would make it to the water only to be wash back up onto the beach as they hit a wave.  Over, and over they would wash up then crawl back into the ocean.

When they finally made it past the waves breaking on shore and begin to swim towards open sea we clapped and cheered for them.

Yay!  Go tiny sea turtles, go!

I think I was more thrilled than the girls.  Teeny tiny adorable sea turtles hatching from eggs, holy crap!

I will admit I was seriously tempted to sneak one out and take it home, but logic prevailed.  What would I do with it after I got done squeeing over it?  No one keeps a huge sea turtle as a pet.  (Do they??)

I had to settle for patiently watching them make their way into the ocean.  I will pretend that they will never be harmed by predators.  They will live long, happy lives.

This their protected nesting area.

 I got yelled at for getting this close, even though I was still outside of the tape and there were no sea turtles near it.  The volunteer sea turtle patrol was sort of uptight and annoyed this morning.  How they can be annoyed when watching adorable tiny sea turtles, I don’t know.  They totally needed to get some joy back into their lives.

Hello, tiny sea turtles are popping out of ping pong ball sized shells and flapping their way down to the ocean.

GET HAPPY!

They said they’re waiting until Friday.  Then they will dig up the nest to see if any didn’t hatch or if there are any that need to be helped.

I really want that job.  I’m good at helping small creatures out of egg shells!  Of course uptight volunteer sea patrol men don’t read my blog or know these things…

Oh well.

Despite the cool weather the girls played on the beach quite a bit today.

I’m pleasantly surprised at how much cautious Rosie loved the water and sand.

Her eyesight is actually pretty poor.  We took her for a yearly vision check up last week and her eyes had gotten four levels worse over the course of the year!

With her new lenses she is suddenly much more adventuresome again.  I love how excited she is when she realizes she can see something that she didn’t realize she was missing before!  Clouds in the sky have been amazing her for days now.

The eye doctor said it’s somewhat unusual but Rosie might need to come in for a check-up every six months instead of yearly.  We had no clue she wasn’t seeing well out of her glasses again.  I guess Rosie didn’t know enough to tell us.

We found a bunch of cool shells!

We had to come inside to a party–a beach shower for the bride.  Apparently a beach shower is when you have a bridal shower thing and give presents for use on the beach…?

The girls were hungry and overwhelmed at all the people.  Neither of them were in good spirits, especially after I had to drag them away from the tiny sea turtles and awesome shells to come inside for the beach shower.

I do not envy the amount of thank you notes that will need to be written after all six (?) of these bridal showers.

That’s Ada with my MIL.

(Note Rosie’s annoyed expression…she was not happy about coming inside.)

Mother of the bride.

Tyler’s Grandma, the one we recently visited just outside of Atlanta.

(Hi Grandma Freida!)

Immediately after the shower it was back to the beach!

It was 60 degrees out by that time.  A cloudy, cool 60 degrees on the water.

The rest of the evening was spent getting ready for the rehearsal dinner tomorrow.  Baking cakes, squeezing lemonade, hanging lights.  A lot of work is going into this wedding.

Tomorrow afternoon Tyler flies in.  YAY!  He’s missing $360 of overtime to come, which really breaks our finances for the next few weeks.  We rely on his overtime to have enough money for groceries and stuff.  Not to mention the cost of boarding the dogs, long term parking, etc. while we’re gone.  Trying not to think about that.  I am happy to spend a few uninterrupted days with him.  That rarely happens.

The days are flying by.

I’m having an awful allergy season.  I’ve had the same crippling sinus headache for three days now, nothing gets rid of it.  I can’t wait until it frosts outside.  Goldenrod is blooming right now.  Ada and I are both so allergic to it.  She woke up crying that her eyes were hurting.  I’m ready to feel human again!

We babysat Eloise and her brother Dexter the other day.  It’s been a full year since I attended Eloise’s birth.  That went by quickly!  Isn’t she super adorable?

She was sleepy in this last picture.

Tyler and I think about Nazar a lot.  We wonder what he will be like.

Will he love our family?  Will he have been to abused to love normally at first?

Will he be ok around pets?

What will he like to play with?

Tyler hopes he likes legos, comic book characters, and sports cars. Ada says she hopes he likes dinosaurs.  Rosie just hopes he doesn’t like her dolls.

Will our goofiness scare him, or will he be goofy too?

About 79 days until we meed him!

I hope Nazar likes to get messy, because we do that a lot around here.

This is Ada after a dinosaur skeleton excavation.

My kitchen looked worse.

Rosie thought her powdered covered face would be perfect for a vampire.

I am truly scared.  We are going to need to pick something a little…cuter…for her actual halloween costume me thinks.

(It was first thing in the morning, hence the epic bed head Ada is sporting.)

The entire skeleton!

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