O-A-H!

 Listen closely at the very end of the video!

 Last week Noah woke up from his nap with a temperature of 104.5 so we headed straight for the ER.  He was so sad and pitiful while we were there.  His ears/throat were clear so they sent us home without much explanation.  The next morning we went to the clinic on base and they diagnosed him with Hand Foot & Mouth Disease.  The doctor said is was going around base pretty bad and she could see the beginning of a sore in his mouth.  Thankfully his case wasn't too bad and he only developed a few sores. 

Noah sitting in the ER.  Poor boy was so sad :(

We've been paci free since Daddy left, but unfortunately this is the only thermometer that we own. 
Needless to say, he didn't mind take his temp every few hours :)

Sister at 35 weeks!

I've considered getting Noah his own little chair, but apparently I was taking too long in finding the right one. 
He discovered that he can pull out a portion of the foot stool and plop right down.  It's so funny cracks me up!

Noah & his new pillow!

  

I thought Noah would be super excited to open the box, but he was more worried about "picking up" instead.  Daddy, I promise he does love his new pillow!  He carried it around all night and would pretend to go "night-night" and give you kisses.

In case you are wondering about his Japanese prison t-shirt, no he's never been there before.  Daddy brought it back from his last deployment while he was in Japan.  It's complete with his own prison number and everything!
 

Sister's new taggie blanket!  I ordered the pillow and taggie from the same company
who made Noah's Daddy Doll the last time Randy was deployed.  It's so girly and soft~ I love it!

  

A better picture of the pillow since Noah was being a complete monkey
and wouldn't sit still long enough for a decent picture!

I have my 36 week appointment tomorrow!  I'm so excited and I'm praying that I've made some sort of progress.  I know I shouldn't get my hopes up, but it's so hard not to at this point.  I have contractions nearly all the time so I'm just hoping they are doing something, because no one should have to go through this much practice for nothing :)

Noah & Daddy on Skype!  This was one expensive phone call!!!

This summer Noah has decided that he likes to wear his sunglasses~ yay! 

Noah doing a little remodeling in the kitchen while I'll look away for .2 seconds.  Notice we don't have any cute little magnets on our fridge?  I just realized it today so I'm hoping they didn't go out with last weeks trash. 

The base library has a program called "United Through Reading" and I think it is amazing!  Randy went in and read a few books to Noah on camera and they created a DVD for us.  Now we have something to watch every night while I give him his milk and rock him to sleep.  We used to lay him in bed and he's fall asleep on his own, but I love that he's been falling asleep to Daddy's voice the last few nights! 

Just a random video from this week!

This week has been incredibly busy for us!  Noah started swim lessons and they are every afternoon here on base.  He loves it and he's definitely the only one in the class who makes shark sounds while he swims (doo-doot, doo-doot, doo-doot!).  It's really funny! 

Even though all the images were taken with my phone, I'm going to try to do better at posting images for Randy.  Our daytime/nighttime is about as opposite as could be with the time change.  I have no idea how often he'll be able to use a computer, but if he ever has down time during the day I want him to be able to look at new images of Noah and see what he's been up to. 

As for that expensive phone call, well it was pretty darn expensive!  Love if you are reading this before I have a chance to talk to you then surprise!  Don't worry though, I was able to get the balance lowered....much lower!  Anyway, what would you guess two Skype calls would cost from your husband who was in Ireland?  Double our normal bill?  No, it was more than double.  Hint: factor in that we didn't have an international data plan at the time.  Maybe a couple hundred dollars?  Nope~ $1500 something!

I nearly fell off the couch and couldn't do anything but laugh when the AT&T lady called me.  Are you serious?  $1500 for two phone calls?!  They had emailed me the day before asking that I call them due to "excessive international charges on our account".  I "knew" that phone call was probably going to cost $75-$100, but it was going to be the last phone we had for awhile so we didn't mind.  For every deployment we have always done this, but it has never been anywhere close to that amount!  She was really nice and helped me lower our bill by adding on the international data plan (which I can turn back off next month).  She told me the new amount, but I was just so thankful it wasn't $1500 anymore that I don't even remember what she said.  I'm guessing our bill will be about double though.  Live and learn right?!

We were SO happy to wake up to an email from him today!  He is safely where he will remain for the next 6-7 months.  They are busy taking over from the unit they are replacing so I'm guessing he is going to be pretty busy for awhile.  He said they do have phones, but he wasn't sure when they'd be able to use them.  I saw a good friend yesterday and her husband just got home about a week ago.  She received 6 phone calls the entire time her husband was gone.  I don't know where he was at exactly, but I pray Randy has better access to communication than that.  If not, how are we ever going to name this baby girl?

I just want to thank everyone again for the phone calls and the prayers!  I think the three of us are doing the best we can, but it's still just so heartbreaking at this point.  Noah misses his Daddy so much and asks for him all the time :(  Anyway, if you could keep the prayers coming that would be great! 


(It's late and I'm headed to bed so I didn't proof anything that I wrote~ sorry for all the typos!)

Deployment #4. Afghanistan.

As most of you know, Randy left last Saturday morning.  I planned on writing a bunch about our last few days together in hopes of making myself feel better, but I'm not quite ready to share all those emotions yet.  Truthfully, I'm not sure if I will ever be ready this time around.  It's one thing to say goodbye to each other, but to watch him tell Noah goodbye for the next 7 months... I can't even begin to describe how difficult that was for our little family :(

Hanging out as much as we can that morning!

Snuggling with Daddy!

The four of us :)

Zero eye make up & the largest, darkest sunglasses you own are a must on deployment day!  We are trying to cool off in the shade while our hubby's run around doing last minute stuff. 

Saying goodbye after their final formation :(

 

Poor baby Noah knew something sad was going on.  He snuggled right in!

 

Daddy having a little chat with sister.  It was so sweet!

 

 

It was so hot that morning and everyone was miserable.  By the time we said goodbye Noah was beyond down!  I thought we'd wave at Daddy through the window, but Noah got so excited and started yelling, "Bus, bus, bus!"

Waving goodbye & blowing kisses!

A huge, huge, huge thank you to Carol & Lindsey for coming and taking pictures for us!  We appreciate it so much and are so thankful to have these images.  Yes, we know they aren't of the happiest of times but we wouldn't trade them for anything!  You ladies are the best! *hugs!*