Sheinah's Memory

Sheinah want to look at pictures of mommy today so we got out the wedding album. While Melissa was getting it down from the shelf, Sheinah said "I went to a wedding. It was Dan and Annie's wedding. We went to lunch with only one of them not two of them because Annie had to work." This, of course, was all true. Dan and Annie are a couple from our church who we led the premarital counseling for. We went to their wedding back in June, but Travis and Sheinah just went to lunch with Dan last week. Then, as we were looking through the wedding album, Sheinah pointed to a picture of Dan and Jodi Martin and asked who they were. When Melissa told her his name was Dan, she said "no mommy, he has hair!" (Dan, our friend from Duluth, has a shaved head). On the next page, there was a picture of our friends Ben and Eryn. Ben happens to have a shaved head. Sheinah pointed to the picture of Ben and said, "that's Dan." But wait, there's more...we saw another friend of ours from church at Sam's club today named Dan Ahlfield. This Dan has hair on his head. When Sheinah asked what his name was and we told her "Dan"...you can guess what she said :) Thus, we tried really hard to explain to Sheinah that many people can have the same name. She said there is only one Dan...and he has no hair!

Week 28

Melissa had her oral glucose tolerance test to check for gestational diabetes today. For those of you who remember, she had diabetes with her last pregnancy so we were pretty much expecting she would get it again. Sure enough, she failed her test...major bummer. Thus, she's back to poking her finger 4 times per day and counting carbohydrates. Her weight gain is going well though, she up to 14 pounds gained.

Singing to Baby

We bought a book for Sheinah several months ago called "What to Expect When Mommy is Having a Baby." It does a really nice job of explaining, in kid terms, what's happening to mommy during the pregnancy. There is a section of the book that talks about how the baby can hear from inside the uterus and encourages the child reading the book to sing to the baby. Well, it just so happens that Lori taught Sheinah the "You are my sunshine" song this week specifically so Sheinah could sing to the baby. She sang the song and then told us "I forgot some parts" before we could get the video camera out. When we finally got the camera going, she decided to sing the birthday song. She happens to be facinated with her birthday right now because we've been telling her about things that will happen after her birthday (like the baby being born and she has to stop sucking her thumb). Anyway, check out the video of Sheinah singing to the baby.

Princess Piggy Bank

While we were in St. Louis, Aunt Jo-Ann gave Sheinah some money to buy a piggy bank...because every little girl needs a piggy bank. We had told Aunt Jo-Ann that we had tried to buy her one awhile ago but we just couldn't find one. Well, Sheinah kept reminding us that we needed to go to the store to buy her a piggy bank so tonight we did. We went to WalMart because we knew our local Target didn't have one that we liked. We walked all through the store and asked three different workers who sent us to three different places looking for a piggy bank. As a last-ditch effort, Melissa decided to check in the bedding department where they sell the kids themed bedding. She looked down the aisle and didn't see anything but decided to walk down it anyway because it was on the way. Of course, Sheinah wanted to stop at the display of the princess bedding. Wouldn't you know, wedged between the princess pillows and the princess comforter was a princess piggy bank. It even makes noise when you put the money in. She is beyond excited for this special piggy bank. See below for the video and listen carefully for the sound it makes when the money goes in. Thanks Aunt Jo-Ann!

Horsieback

Sheinah has become a little bossy in her old age :) Last night she told Travis she wanted to play "horsieback" and then proceeded to order him around until he performed the way she wanted him to perform. See below:

YTB Convention 2008

Last weekend marked the 2008 Annual Convention for YTB in St. Louis. The whole family went, including Al and Lori Bumgardner, Travis' Aunt Boots and her daughter, and Melissa's Aunt Jo-Ann and Uncle Brian. The theme of the conference was Liberty and Travel for All and the founder of the company commissioned a near-life-sized replica of the Statue of Liberty to celebreate this theme (it's about 20 feet shorter). The Statue will make her permanent home in Indiana as a tribute to our soldiers after the convention is over. We took Sheinah to the opening session when lady liberty was unveiled and she had a blast! The best part was when she saw the picture of the statue on the YTB magazine and she said "I saw her!"...she remembered seeing the statue! The convention was amazing and everyone is excited for what 2009 holds in store. We are most excited about the changes that will be happening with our travel website. By January 2009, you'll be able to save your profile and search preferences just like the other booking engines. The best part is, if you book with us, the commissions go to us instead of the mystery folks behind the big-name travel engines :) So, next time you're heading out on a trip somewhere, please consider checking out our travel website: www.ichoose2travel.com We appreciate your support!

While we were in St. Louis, we got to connect with Erin Kletti-Keich, one of the bridesmaids from our wedding. She and Ben have two little ones now and their oldest, Maddie, is just a few months older than Sheinah. The girls had a good time playing together at the restaurant and the mall.

Of course, we also had to go check out the famous Arch. Travis' wide-angle lens was able to capture the whole thing. Sheinah wanted to "touch it" so Travis took her over for a closer look.

where do the underwear go?

Sheinah has been going to the potty by herself for awhile now. She even empties the potty container into the toilet, flushes, rinses it out and then washes her hands. She likes to take her underwear and pants/shorts/skirt all the way off while she sits on the potty sometimes. She knows how to get dressed by herself so it's not a big deal. Today, she came running out of the bathroom with a sly grin on her face. It took us a minute to figure out what she was smiling about. She had put her shorts on first and then her underwear over the top. She was quite proud of making a "funny", but she wasn't quite so happy when we asked her to get dressed the proper way.

Sheinah's new room

We decided to move Sheinah upstairs and put the baby in Sheinah's old room. The rationale behind this decision was that Sheinah sleeps through the night now so the number of trips upstairs should be limited. We were wrong...not on the sleeping-through-the-night theory but on the limited-number-of-trips-upstairs theory. It seems we (read that as Travis since Melissa does a lot more sitting now-a-days) spend a whole lot of time going up and down the stairs. On the plus side, Sheinah really likes her princess room and actually goes up there to play by herself. We decorated it in a princess theme and let Sheinah pick out pretty much everything in the room. We got a new, upright desk to put in the guest bedroom which is now Travis' home office also and cleaned off the bottom three rows of shelves for Sheinah's toys. All in all, we think it's going to work out pretty well.