Thinking I'll start with some honeymoon photos.  This was the day after our wedding at the Paris, LV hotel.  We didn't stay there but we had fun walking around and going up on the Eiffel tower at night.  We had a 2 week honeymoon in 3 parts- 4 nights in Vegas, 3 nights in San Juan Puerto Rico, and a week long Carribean cruise that left from San Juan.  I've never taken a vacation like that before and I doubt we'll be taking such a long and extravagant one ever again.  Definitely the best one ever.  Hands down. My grandma is to thank for making this happen- she is the QUEEN of getting stellar travel deals.  For a very reasonable price, she got us an ocean-view hotel room in San Juan at a very luxurious Marriot hotel, right on the beach, and an ocean-view cabin on our ship.  We were also placed at a special table for our meals- a small table that had only two other couples, one on their honeymoon and the other celebrating their first anniversary. 

So we leave on Sunday morning for Laughlin.  I looked up the weather forecast, and while it's supposed to be in triple digits, there are also scattered/isolated thunderstorms EVERY SINGLE DAY we are there.  Why does this ALWAYS happen when we go to  Laughlin?! I thought we'd be in the clear this time because our other two prior Laughlin trips for our dating anniversaries took place at the end of October.  During those trips we did not have a breath of fresh air until we got into our car to go  home.  We stayed in our hotel/casino the ENTIRE TIME.  You have no clue how much I am/was looking forward to making use out of the fancy pools at our hotel along with it's own private BEACH.  Hopefully things will be okay on Tuesday, the day of our anniversary, when we were planning on going jet-skiing.  We'll be getting wet, anyway...

Today was an amazing amazing day.  I enjoyed every moment of it.  It started off with Jeremiah and I going to pay our electric bill and grocery shopping. We came home for his nap, then went to the bank, Target, and to his very first trip to the mall!  I was shopping for clothes for my trip and managed to also get a good chunk of CHRISTMAS shopping done!  My cousins  and Louis's cousins have a ton of kids, and we all give the kids presents.  I believe we have 12 kids to buy for not counting Jeremiah.  For the little kids (not my 14 year old cousins), I have a budget of $10 or less per kid.  This gets divided with my brother, who chips in half if I do all the legwork- shopping, wrapping and then handing him a bill.  Until he gets married (hopefully next year!) he wants to have the kiddy presents be from the both of us.  I got four GREAT presents on clearance for six dollars or less.  So far for four kids I have spent a total of $22 (not counting tax), divided in half to make $11.  That's less than $3 per kid  I am the bargain queen shopper.  Anyway, my grandma met up with me at the mall towards the end of my rather long shopping excursion.  Jeremiah was a champion. I thought he would sleep a lot in his stroller but he didn't sleep one wink.  Several bottles of water, some fun toys and me letting him loose in the changing room (the large wheel-chair acessible one) to crawl around in while I tried on clothes did the trick.  When we were done, my grandma treated me to a root beer float and onion rings at Johnny rockets, and then surprised me by babysitting Jeremiah so I could get a manicure and pedicure, all paid for by her =).  After I got back from that I stayed for dinner and a visit.  Definitely a wonderful evening!

Tomorrow Lisa is coming over for lunch and to play with Jeremiah while I pack.  Then it's off to my mother's house, where we will spend the night so we can head out hopefully around 6 a.m. and she will have Jeremiah already there.  She's making my favorite corned beef and cabbage tomorrow... mmm...

Signing off with some more honeymoon pics-



In a fort in San Juan, PR.  We got stuck in a thunderstorm in a turret- very romantic!


On the balcony of our hotel room, right before leaving for our cruise



Jet skiing in St. Maartin




Sunset in St. Maartin

Here we are during our first dance, "All My Life" by KC and Jo Jo.  It took us the longest time to agree on a wedding song; we didn't finalize it until just a few days before the wedding!  My second choice was "The Way You Look Tonight" by Frank Sinatra.  Louis surprised me for the very last dance of the night, serenading me to that song while the two of us danced to it.  Such a sweet memory.  He also sang to me with the mariachi band, a sweet gesture that made me semi-okay with having them at our wedding (my mom and I were doing our darndest NOT to have them!  However, with my Mexican husband and his family of course we lost that battle.  Originally my mother in law wanted a frickin TWO HOUR CONCERT in the middle of our reception. Yeah that didn't happen!)

Today Jeremiah and I had a quiet day at home.  My little one absolutely loves to play by himself, and while that is nice for me that he isn't so clingy to me, wanting to explore everything, I do miss playing with him all throughout the day.  He is really at his happiest when left to explore his world.  I brought out some pots and pans for us to bang on together and that held his interest for a while.  We went to the Uptown Whittier Farmers Market tonight and spent about half an hour looking at the animals in the petting zoo (from the other side of the fence!) and the ponies for the pony ride.  Jeremiah has taken to making a very loud fart-like noise with his mouth, doing it to my  mom when she tried to kiss him yesterday.  Tonight one of the horses made that noise to Jeremiah and he found it quite funny. 

Tomorrow I'm working for my mom for a few hours, and then continuing to clear out the bedroom that Louis and I shared when we lived there.  Yes we still haven't finished cleaning it.  The majority of the stuff in there are my belongings from before we got married that I hadn't cleaned out yet, and my dad is ready to be rid of them.  Not that I blame him. 

Jeremiah is on his way to liking having his teeth brushed.  My dad suggested that I let him play with it on his own so that he could put it in his mouth and get used to it.  That did the trick.  I hope that the brushing that I did on his two teeth was satisfactory; there is really no way for me to tell how much the toothbrush is actually clicking with his teeth.  He likes to keep his mouth shut!

That's about all for now.

Here are my brother and I after the reception, waiting for Louis to finish changing out of his tux so we could leave in our limo to the hotel.  My brother was waaaaaaaaaay plastered.  I believe this picture was taken moments after he went up to Louis and asked him if he needed to make a 7-11 run for him to get condoms.  I can't believe my brother! The reason for his drunkenness?  His ex gf decided to come to our wedding with her parents- they broke up a few weeks before the wedding but the invite was already out.  She spent the entire evening HOUNDING him, trying to win him back. I did not get ONE SINGLE dance with my brother and barely saw him the entire time.  I was way pissed at her and way hurt.  I was asking my mom at that time if she danced with joe and she said no, and I proceeded to vent major-time about Miss Ex, without realizing that she was right behind me.  I could have cared less.  The gift I got from her and her parents?  A MEASURING CUP! Oh well, I really didn't care. It was rather funny, though.  What i DID care about was the fact that a girl only gets married one time (hopefully!) and I was extremely bummed that I couldn't even have one little dance with my brother.  At least he played the song my uncle Steve wrote for my mom and dad's wedding on his guitar during the ceremony while my friend Becky sang. He's carrying his guitar.  Oh, and the ugly suit I'm wearing?  My grandma bought it for me the Christmas before we got married as my "going away" suit and my mom forced me to wear it.  The things we do to keep our grandparents feelings from getting hurt!

Me and Jeremiah at my grandpa's birthday party last weekend- after a bath in the sink

I feel really really bad saying that being a parent sucks at times.  There are days when being a parent isn't the easiest thing in the world but it is such a joy and a blessing.  I guess I should have rephrased it to say that there are certain aspects of parenting that sucks.  Because there is no way in this world that I would trade being a mommy for anything. 

Yesterday was not the greatest day in Mommyland.  Jeremiah had his very first accident yesterday.  He fell asleep on our bed for his morning nap (normally not something I allow). He conked out when Louis was feeding him, and he looked so sweet that we didn't want to disturb him, plus our room is cooler than his.  I swear to God that I was checking in on him every few minutes, but sure enough he fell off of our bed.  When I heard that ear-piercing wail, my stomach turned to knots and I screamed "Jeremiah!!" fearing the worst.  God was looking out for my little boy because he landed on some pillows and BARELY missed knocking his head on our dresser. Our bed is rather high up too.  He wanted to be held for 2 minutes before he was laughing and squirming again.  I felt like such a failure of a mom to let my baby fall off of our bed and irresponsible for not putting him in his crib to begin with.   Top that off with him screaming at the top of his lungs for almost 45 minutes for his afternoon nap, I was quite frazzled and not at my best.  No excuses but it happens to the best of us.

In the midst of all this, I am definitely getting baby fever again.  I know that right now is not the most ideal time for us to have a kid, but seeing my cousin Rayna 3 months from having her first little girl, my friend Christy due any day now with her first little boy, and a whole slew of friends expecting babies this January (was there something in the water in April??) I can't help wanting to have another one.  It didn't help any holding that sweet little baby Karma last weekend.  

I know that our plans (well, mostly MY plans) of starting to try for #2 this November or December is probably not going to happen. Financially, it would be in the best interest of our family to wait a little longer (we're still paying off bills from Jeremiah's birth!!) but I absolutely do NOT want to wait any longer than next May or June to get pregnant.  Given the choice, I would have had our kids be a year and a half apart.  That's how my brother and I were and I love the idea of having our kids little at the same time.  Now I'll be happy for 2 years and a few months apart like Louis and Lisa.  I keep going back and forth between wanting a little son or a daughter next- if we have a boy then we are definitely going to go for 3 kids, but if we have a girl next then Louis wants to stop.  Neither of us are crazy about the idea of having two daughters.  Two or 3 sons, yes.  Daughters, no. I LOVED being Daddy's little girl and don't think I would have done well sharing him with a sister.  I never really had any desire to have a sister, either.  And Louis thinks girls are just plain trouble and doesn't want to raise more than one.  He would love to have  a daughter, but isn't going to be disappointed if we wound up with all sons.  Aghhh....

Time to go wake my little one up from his late Sunday afternoon nap with Daddy or he's never going to get to sleep tonight!!

Signing off with a picture of me and my precious family of 3- hopefully someday a family of four =)