Today I was a yeller

This morning I decided we were going to go to the store because naturally, even though we spent 30 euros two days before on groceries, we had no food. It looked like it could rain anytime but I really wanted to take the bike so we could get there fast and get home.The morning had already consisted of some whining, a teething baby who I was finally able to coax to sleep with some teething medicine, and a few episodes of Little Einsteins so I could get the kitchen cleaned. I got the kids ready and then had to get myself ready, which was not acceptable to either child. Ellie kept opening the front door, turning around saying "ok ready? ok ready? mama bike? Ellie bike?" Jonas was making himself heard. Before I could get over to lock the door, Ellie had managed to get her finger stuck and somehow also scrape Jonas's leg with the door. Commence crying and wailing from both kids. I calm them both down and continued to gather all the 101 things you need for a short outing. Ellie continued to get frustrated because she could no longer open the door and Jonas was just mad.  Finally, after more and more whining, crying, and tantrumming, I yelled. I yelled, "MAMA NEEDS 2 MINUTES TO GET READY AND A LITTLE QUIET TO THINK!" If you're wondering if that helped to calm them down, it didn't. Did I feel a tiiiiny bit better? Maybe just a little bit.

 Finally. . . finally we are all ready and I scoop up Jonas and carry him downstairs with Ellie trailing behind. Thankfully, my sweet husband had left my bike out in the storage hallway so I didn't have to maneuver it out of our storage room. It's still quite an adventure to get both kids on, the door open (because of course it's a door that has to be held open or it slams shut on your heels...don't ask me how I know that) and get the bike out. But we make it and the kid's shrieks of joy as we head outside, make the little struggle worth it. So we bike to the store and I'm thinking to myself, "Ah this is nice! and so much faster than walking with the stroller!" But I know the more difficult part lies ahead.

We arrive at the store and I finagle both kids off the bike, while it's sandwiched between two other bikes in a very narrow bike rack (narrow if you're trying to get two kids off the bike anyways). I didn't have the correct change to unlock the cart from the other carts (which, seriously, no one wants to steal your stupid carts. Is it really necessary to lock them?!) so a cashier gave me a token to use. After messing with it for 5-6 minutes, in which time I'm holding a squirming 10 month old and Ellie has found her little cart and keeps trying to go into the main store and I'm trying to redirect her to wait for me, I end up breaking the token. I call over the cashier and she has to hunt down tools to get the token out and get the cart unlocked for me. By this time I'm sweating from wrestling with Jonas, chasing after Ellie, and a little embarrassed  from trying to get the stupid token out of the cart and then breaking it. I plop Jonas in the cart and off we go. The shopping itself was pretty good, except for Ellie dropping some pre-made wraps on the floor and me stuffing them on a shelf because I couldn't find a worker anywhere to give them to. I'm frazzled and can't really remember what we need but keep throwing stuff in the cart, mentally trying to imagine how it will all fit in my bag I had to carry home on my shoulder. We checkout and Ellie attempts to push herself through the line of people saying, "WATCH OUT!" as she tries to get through. That's really my fault because I say that to her at home when I'm trying to move around her. We're working on using excuse me. After "helping" Ellie to put her cart back, while she was trying to get out two more, and then packing the kids on the bike, I realized that my bag is freaking heavy and I have to carry home.

By the time we get home, there is a light mist, both babies are hungry and I still have to maneuver the bike into the storage shed, get both kids off without tipping over the bike, and get upstairs. I get Ellie off the bike first and tell her not to go outside (because the heavy door is still propped open). She meanders around a minute and then I see her slowly making her way to the door. I can't get to her right away because I'm still holding the bike, trying to get it to stay in place while I get Jonas off the front. I grab Jonas, my bike falls halfway over as I apparently didn't wedge it in right. I give it a shove back the other way and it stays put, but my husband will definitely have to rearrange it if he wants to fit his bike in. Ellie is standing outside the door. I yell...again... "ELEANOR ANNE!INSIDE!NOW!". I'm pondering what I can do because I can't very well sit her in timeout on the dirty floor. So I make her hold my hand up to our apartment. She is not happy about this and frankly neither am I, as now I am holding her hand, have Jonas on my other hip, and still carrying a freaking heavy bag of groceries on my shoulder. She is sitting herself down in the hall because she is mad about holding my hand. I kneel down in front of her and tell her that she must walk to our door like a big girl and once inside she can let go of mommy's hand but if she cannot walk, she will have to go to timeout. She decides walking is the better option here. I manage to get everyone and everything inside and start unpacking the groceries. Still frustrated,  I drop the box of strawberries on the floor and they all go everywhere. I let out what might be described as a primal, gutteral, moan of exasperation...that pretty went on for a full 15-20 seconds. I see Ellie looking at me, unsure of what to make of this new, animal sounding mama, so I go with that and say, "Ellie, look, mama's sounding like an elephant". She doesn't buy it but luckily the site of strawberries strewn across the floor distract her enough for me to catch my cool.  I turn away and take a few deep breaths and then lean down to pick up the strawberries. Both kids have handfuls and are stuffing them in their mouth like it's the only food they've seen in days. I don't even care.Dirty floor? Leafy stems? Don't care, eat the whole thing. And they did.

All of this happened in a span of an hour. ONE HOUR. Some days are just like this. Some days the deep breaths, the calming voice, the controlled patience, just doesn't quite make it out 100%. My kids are fantastic kids! They are not super challenging beyond just their normal age craziness. But it's exhausting trying to raise good kids. It's exhausting being consistent with discipline. It's exhausting just doing normal, everyday tasks like taking a trip to the store.

 I have read the blogs about how much yelling can affect your children. I have read the "tips for remaining calm and patient with your toddler". I receive the emails about "child-led discipline" (what does that even mean? Because if I'm a child, I can tell you right now that my "discipline" is going to lead me right back to whatever it is I wanted to do in the first place). I sometimes wonder if these articles are written by people who have never had children or whose children are grown and forget what it's like to be in throes of toddler-hood. I read all these "tips" and still some days, let's be honest, a lot of days, I'm just trying to stay afloat on my life raft as my almost 1 and almost 2 year olds keep dunking me under. Most days I can keep my calm, discipline well, and repeat the same thing 100 times without getting too annoyed. But not today...no, today friends, I was a yeller.

On the lighter side...

So, even though my last post made it sound like everything is doom and gloom (and let's be honest, it pretty much was for the last several months), there is also a lot of exciting things happening in our life.  I'm a fan of lists (plus with 2 small children, it's faster and more efficient :) ) so here's a list of happenings in our life; past, present, and future.

1. Both kids are happy and thriving and doing different stuff every day. Ellie's language is just exploding and she cracks us up on a daily basis. Jonas is right on the verge of crawling. He can move himself around but has just started getting up on all fours and rocking back and forth and then lunging himself forward. It's hard to believe he is 6 months today.

2. We have dear friends coming in 2 weeks. I'm so excited to spend time with these friends, that I cannot contain it! It's been over 2 years since we've seen them.

3. Speaking of them coming, that also means in a little over 2 weeks, I'll be sitting in London with my friend, drinking high tea, paparazzing the royals, and getting uninterrupted sleep for the first time in 6 months. I'm excited to see London but I'm more excited to have 2 days of kid-free, girl time. Also, this will totally be me...and if you don't know what this is, I'm not sure we're really friends.

4. After we come back from London, we leave a few days after that for Mallorca, Spain. Our family, their family, and another friend have all rented a Spanish villa for a week and plan to spend our days soaking up the sun and drinking Spanish wine.

5. Dan is plugging full steam ahead to finish up his PhD. Which means we are also in full job searching mode. This is an exciting, yet scary time.

6. Since Dan is finishing up, it means we should be back stateside in the fall!!! It's hard to believe we've been here almost 4 years! We left as newlyweds with 7 suitcases to our name and will come back with 2 kids, a ton more stuff, and memories that will stay with us forever.

A lot of changes are headed our way but we're excited to see where our next adventure will lead us. I'm going to try and stay on top of blogging but you know how that goes so we'll see:)

An honest account

Deep Breath.

This has been a long, tough season. After my last post, things continued to spiral downward. Jonas got better (diagnosed with a milk allergy, put on special formula and VOILA! a new , happy, cooing, laughing, child!) but I continued to feel sad, angry, joyless, overwhelmed, etc.

I knew that I wasn't feeling like myself. I kept chalking it up to having a screaming baby and a young toddler, with no family support around. But things kept getting worse, even as Jonas got better and I had two happy kids. Dan and I would have huge arguments over crazy, ridiculous things and I would feel out of control.If I wasn't angry, I was crying. I had zero desire to do anything fun-wanted a break from the kids but didn't really want to do anything. My house was a disaster and I hadn't cooked a decent meal in months. Something was not OK.

I worked in mental health long enough to know that I had all the signs and symptoms of Post Partum depression. Part of me was briefly in denial and just wanted to keep waiting for my hormones to regulate again. But the larger part of me knew that I wasn't ok and needed to do something about it before I drove myself, my husband, and my kids, crazy. I thought about going on some medication but decided first that I wanted to try counseling. I felt like my hormones were still trying to regulate from the birth and I didn't want to throw new chemicals in there. I was/am in no way opposed to medication and felt that if I continued to get worse, I would go on them in a heartbeat but I wanted to try talking with someone first. I made a counseling appointment and went with a feeling of desperation but also with a glimmer of hope.

My counselor was/is fantastic. She helped me to see that it was ok to be depressed and more importantly, to need help. For those who know me, I'm more the helper, not the helpee...hence my work in social work:) But I was so desperate to get back to being me and to bring back a sense of peace to our house, that I didn't care who I told or asked for help.

One of the more difficult aspects of this time was being away from friends and family. We had a couple wonderful friends help us with watching the kids a few times and that was a great blessing.  But I needed more. I needed time to breathe, to think, to journal, to pray, to shower, etc. And had we been closer to family, it would've made that a lot easier. However, we are getting through it.

I feel so much better, especially over the last few weeks. I feel like myself again. I kept telling my counselor that I just wanted to hurry up and get better faster and one of the best things she told me was just to accept where I'm at, to realize I am where I am and to just be. I think that advice helped me to fully accept that I was depressed. I am taking steps to overcome it but for the time being, this is where I'm at and that's ok.

Only for a Season. . .hopefully

Well, we are a little over 2 months in to this 2 babies 14 months apart deal and I can honestly say it's one of the hardest things I've ever done. I've put off writing this until I could start to see the light at the end of the tunnel and hope that I'm not jinxing it now.

These last 2 months have been TOUGH. Ridiculously tough. I knew that there would be sleepless nights and exhausting days but what I wasn't prepared for was a baby who cried. . . a lot. I wasn't prepared for the extreme feelings of being alone, because we had no family around (after our moms left).  I wasn't prepared for the daily feelings of "I cannot do this one more day". I wasn't prepared for the amount of tears that would fall (of mine!) on a daily, sometimes multiple times a day in those early day, basis.  I wasn't prepared to feel like I was inept as a mother because I felt like we were barely surviving each day.

Jonas had a rough delivery (as did I, let's not leave my efforts out here:) ) and from the time he was placed on my chest, he was a crier. He cried for about 30 minutes after delivery, although I can't say I blame the poor kid. He has had terrible gas and also some reflux issues. This has resulted in him having long, loud, crying spells for several hours a day. Call it colic, call it stomach cramps, call it whatever you want but it's miserable. I felt bad for him because I knew he was in pain. I felt bad for Ellie because I would sometimes be short with her because I was so overwhelmed. I felt bad for me and Dan because we were about at our wit's end. Talks with the doctors didn't help, just sympathetic looks as I held my screaming baby and tried to wrangle my toddler. Comments from people about how "heavy" it all must be on me and how it will get better were not helpful.

I found it hard to bond with him early on because of all the crying. I breastfed for the first month but found no real bonding moments in those times. I know everyone says it takes about a month to really establish breastfeeding but a little before a month is when my mom left and I was left to try and breastfeed a screaming baby and take care of Ellie on my own. It was too much.  I quit and have had no regrets. It's just been in the last few weeks where I felt like we've been able to start bonding a little. He's more alert, smiling and cooing, and crying less. I found it hard to bond with a baby when all he does is sleep, eat, and scream.

I worried that something was wrong with him. As hard as I tried not to, I compared him to how Ellie was as a baby. I convinced myself multiple times that something must be wrong with him because he was crying so much and seemed unaware of anything around him. Ellie came out of the womb alert, checking out her surroundings, resting peacefully on my chest. I knew in my head that babies are all different...that boys and girls are different but I just wasn't prepared for just how different they were. My boy seems to have every minor thing wrong with him that you can have! He had a clogged tear duct for the first few weeks, cradle cap on his head and forehead, a flat spot on his head and a preference for looking to one side(which, funnily enough is not the side he has a flat spot on) and has started physical therapy. They initially thought something was wrong with his hips but looks like now those are ok. His gas is worse than an adult's and when we switched his formula to one that helps with cramps, he broke out in a rash all over his body. You know your son has had it rough when the days he has been the happiest are the day he was circumcised and the day after.

But it's not all doom and gloom. I would say that we have more good days than bad days now. My husband is not getting daily phone calls at work with me in tears and screaming babies in the background. Jonas is crying a lot less and when he does cry, the majority of the time he is able to be calmed down quickly, especially if I can hold him. He is smiling, recognizing our voices and faces, rolling over from stomach to back, and has really seem to come alive in the last 2 weeks. The one thing that Jonas and Ellie do have in common is that they are both great sleepers. They both go to bed about the same time, Jonas is waking up once about 1am or 2am to eat and then goes right back to sleep until 7ish. This past weekend, we moved him out of his bassinet in our room and into his crib in Ellie's room and it's gone great. They both sleep through each other's noises and wake ups. So for sleep, I am infinitely grateful because I'm pretty sure I would be writing this from a mental institution if his sleep was horrible.

I hope we are starting to emerge from the heavy, heavy fog that was the newborn stage. Maybe we are just getting to know him better, maybe he's starting to feel better, maybe it's none of that and we really have no clue but whatever is happening, I hope it continues.

To other moms out there who have gone before me in this adventure...people should be paying you the big bucks and slapping medals on you left and right. To moms who are currently in the trenches with me or about to be, I won't tell you that it will get better (although allegedly it will) because that's not helpful right now. But I will tell you that it's ok to cry...a lot. It's ok to share your struggles with people. It's ok to ask for help. It's ok to love your baby but not really like them some days . It's ok to put them down (someplace safe) while they're screaming and walk to a different part of the house where you can't hear them for just a few minutes so you can think straight without the ringing of crying in your ears. It's ok if the one thing you accomplished that day is going to the store without having a major meltdown...from the you or the baby! Things are super hard now but every night, after a hard day, I would think, "tomorrow is a new day". It may be a better or worse day but each day is new and before you know it, you've made it through some of the toughest times and life slowly returns to normal...for a few years anyways.

But the next time I talk about having another baby before these 2 are out of the house, slap me. ;)

Circumcision in a foreign country

Today we took Jonas to get circumcised. I write this blog, not to debate circumcision but to share more about the differences in raising kids in a foreign country.

When we found out we were having a boy, we knew that circumcision was going to be an issue because unlike in the States, most men in Europe (and much of the world for that matter) are not circumcised. It is not a standard procedure in the hospital after birth. So I started asking around, starting with my midwife and then the OB at the hospital where I planned on delivering. The OB told me that it was "impossible" in The Netherlands. Well, I knew that wasn't true because we had some other American friends who had their son circumcised a few years back so I challenged the doctor on that. He then started backpedaling, saying that it was possible but he didn't know where and that maybe we would need to talk to a urologist. He also said that they wouldn't do it at birth and we'd probably have to wait several months. Obviously this guy was not supportive of circumcision or of our decision. We decided at that point that the doctor was a dead end and that google would be a better source than this guy. So long story short, I talked to my friends who had it done and then found the place online.

Fast forward to today. Jonas is 6 weeks old, which still seemed a little too old for our comfort but this was the soonest we could get the appointment. This office only does circumcisions and caters mainly to muslims and jewish people. This office was in Amsterdam and we arrived late due to the trains running behind. It was basically like a doctor's office in the bottom of an apartment complex. At this point, I was still unsure if I was going to go in for the actual procedure or wait in the waiting room. I finally decided that I would, because I wanted to be there to comfort Jonas if he needed it. We get called back and the doctor introduces himself and asks if we have ever witnessed a circumcision before. Dan breaks the ice by saying, "only my own", to which we all laugh and the doctor says he hopes he doesn't really remember it. I forgot until later that I actually have witnessed a circumcision before...two actually. A co-worker during a summer internship in college gave birth to twin boys and she was jewish and somehow I was invited to the ceremony. But that is really irrelevant to this story.

The doctor was very kind and explained everything he was going to do, at which points Jonas would cry and also told us that it could be a little traumatizing for parents, especially because they have to strap Jonas down to the table. After he explained the procedure, he then asked if Dan would prefer to hold Jonas down instead of strapping him so we decided to do that since Dan felt comfortable he could keep Jonas still. The procedure started with the doctor administering some local anesthetic via a few shots. This is one of the times throughout the procedure that he warned us Jonas would cry. And he did...poor guy. But as soon as the last shot was done, Jonas was done crying. It was super weird to me how quickly he stopped crying, until later when Dan pointed out that he was probably numb, hence no more pain from the injection. Jonas cried one other time during it, basically when the doctor was pulling the foreskin back, because he had to apply some pressure but I was able to give him a bottle and then he was fine. There was no crying during any of the actual removal and Jonas was just looking around, holding my hand. The whole procedure took about 5 minutes and then we were done! Jonas was calm and happy and cries more whenever he's hungry than he did during this.

The doctor explained to us that it's much better to get it done early on, for the child's sake. It's typically less painful and they have a much faster recovery time. He said that there is also less likely a chance of an infection in children this small. In fact, he said he's never had or heard of a child under 2 months developing an infection from this procedure. He told us to give him some baby tylenol every 4 hours and that within 2-3 days, everything should be healed up and back to normal. He is on call 24/7 for the first 48 hours in case any sort of complications were to arise.

It's now 5:00am the next morning (his procedure was at 11am the day before) and he's had a better day than he's had all week! No crying, sleeping as usual and we haven't given him anymore tylenol in the last 12 hours. Overall, it went great despite it seeming a little weird that it wasn't done in the hospital, right after birth and that we were both present for it and even active participants.

Just another adventure in the life of an American living abroad!

Jonas's birth story

 Jonas Rex Caputo made his arrival 5 days late on Sunday September 22, 2013 at 8:52 in the morning.He weighed 8.5lbs and was about 19 inches long. His birth was a bit more traumatic for me than Ellie's. Traumatic is probably a bit of an exaggeration as we are both healthy but it seemed that way at the time!

On Saturday night, I started having what I thought could be real contractions about 9pm. I decided to wait to say anything until I was sure and started timing them in my head. We went to bed about 1130 and I told Dan that I thought I was in labor but that they weren't intense enough or close enough to need to go to the hospital. I knew this time I wanted to try and labor at home a little longer than I did with Ellie because those hospital beds aren't the most comfortable. With Ellie, I was only dilated to 3cm when I got to the hospital.

The midwife said not to call the hospital until the contractions were 5 minutes apart, lasting one minute, for an hour. Well it got down to 6-7 minutes and an occasional 5 minutes but never consistently 5 minutes. Finally about 3am I told Dan we should call the hospital and just tell them they were 5 minutes apart because they were getting a lot more painful and I wanted to see if I was making any progress and have the ability to get medicine if I wanted. So we called our friends with a car and had them come get us and take us to the hospital. They got me all hooked up to the monitors about 4:30ish and the midwife came in at 5am and checked me and i was at a 6! Yes!!! The midwife then told me that Jonas wasn't moving down far enough and that my contractions weren't strong enough (HA! I'm pretty sure I gave her a look that could kill. Never tell a woman in labor that her contractions aren't strong enough!)  They gave me medicine to make the contractions stronger. Cue even more intense pain. I told them at that point that I wanted the pain pump because last time with Ellie I had the medicine to intensify the contractions and they just came one right after another with no break in between and it was unbearable. So I got the pain pump and that was nice...for a little while. 

About 7:30am another midwife came in and said I was at an 8 and that the baby still wasn't moving down enough, even with the contraction medicine.So she was going to let me labor longer, increase the contraction medicine and see what happens. At this point, the pain pump was not working. I kept pushing that button to inject more pain medicine but it had zero effect. At 8:30 the midwife came in and checked me again because my heart rate was going way up and Jonas's was dropping. (If you're squeamish, you might want to skip the next  sentence) I was at a 9.5 and she said she was going to manually stretch my cervix the last .5 cm.  That was the worse pain I think i have ever experienced. I had been laying on my side and she had me switch sides because his head was swollen from the side I was laying on and we had to get his head evened back out for him to be able to make it through the birth canal. When she was checking his position again, she felt Jonas and realized he was sunny side up/star gazer (facing up instead of down), which explained why he wasn't moving down despite the super strong contractions as well as explained his distress. So she said that we had to get him out quickly and that if we didn't get him out soon, she would have to use the vacuum.  I pushed for about 5 minutes and once he started crowning, they had me pause so I wouldn't tear too much, then I pushed again and at the end of the push, she grabbed his head and pulled him the rest of the way out and plopped him on my chest. He had such a cone head because of how he was positioned in there, it was hilarious.

(Another disclaimer, if you're squeamish, you might not like this part either) I needed one stitch, which she then proceeded to tell me that they can only use an anesthetic  if I need 3 or more stitches but it was  "ok because you just had a baby, you'll be fine". uh thanks. So she does a stitch and then says "oh I'm really sorry but I did it wrong and I'm going to have to do it again". Uhhh. first of all, what did you stitch up that you weren't supposed to and second of all REALLY? So finally that was all over and she told me that we did a great job and a lot of births in Jonas's position end up in the OR with an emergency C-section due to the baby not moving down fast enough and the distress on the mom and baby. She also said that he was actually rotating in the birth canal while coming out. I don't even know what that means. . .but she acted like it was really rare and said she hadn't seen that before.

And in true Dutch fashion, they came in an hour later and said I could go home. Jonas was born at 8:52am and we were out of that hospital room by 11:45am. We spent a total of 8 hours at the hospital, giving birth to our son.

While I pushed longer with Ellie (an hour and a half), Jonas's birth was more painful and difficult. The actual delivery was some of the most intense pain I have ever experienced, I'm sure because of his position. Despite all of that, we were so blessed to come home with a healthy baby boy.

Our Story-Part 2

We finally arrived in Leiden! After a long journey over the Atlantic, my first time out of America, we landed on Dutch soil. We had a friend waiting there to pick us and our 7 suitcases up and take us to our new home. People asked me a lot in that first year how I could just pick up and move to a whole different country and wondered at how tough it was. Honestly, it was hard at times but also we had the attitude that it was just the start of a new adventure for us. We were newly married and starting our life together. What better way to do that than thousands of miles away from anything either of you have ever known??
We had a beautiful little apartment that we rented online...a few days before the wedding. Yep, that's right. When Dan came back for the wedding, we still did not have a place to live when we went back. The housing market is soo difficult here because it's a university town and we were blown away by the prices. Dan had looked at this apartment before, shortly after arriving but it was just too expensive for us. When we looked again, they had lowered the price and he said it was clean and in a nice location-which was more than he could say about other places he had looked into. So we went for it and I prayed that it would be livable. Thankfully, that house was such a blessing. It was in a perfect location, we had amazing neighbors and it met our needs exactly. It was a one bedroom, one bath/toilet room apartment that we made our own. I love that that was our first place together. 

Life those first few months were...different. Not only were we trying to adjust to married life, we were trying to adapt to a whole different culture. It was great for our marriage because we felt like it was us against the world. We'd come home with funny stories about missed translations, crazy cultural norms, and the different places we had found. We'd spend the weekends exploring the city, looking for a bike for me, and trying to navigate life in this new country. We found an international church where we started to get plugged in at, which led to use meeting some of our great friends.  It didn't take too long before we started feeling at home in our new place.

Now, all this sounds so wonderful but it definitely didn't come without its hardships. There would be days where I would leave the grocery store in tears because I had no idea what things were and where to find what I needed to cook something. Our apartment didn't have any lights when we moved in (it's common here for people to take everything when they leave, including the floors!luckily our had floors) so for a few weeks we survived by candlelight. I almost got ran over several times before figuring out the bike system here. I spent many a day in the early days sitting and watching out the window for Dan to come home from work. But in the end, it was all a part of our adventure.

We went home for Christmas that year because I was on the tv show Wheel of Fortune. Feel free to read that story here and part 2 here.  Talk about reverse culture shock. I think I stood in Wal-Mart for 30 minutes, just overwhelmed at the number of choices I had! It was hard to come back after that but that was the last time I felt that way after going back to the States. Each trip after that, while it was hard to leave family, I was ready to get back to my own home with my own stuff-which happened to be in The Netherlands.

The next year was an exciting one as Dan took me to Paris for my 30th birthday, we went to Italy for 2 weeks for a conference and vacation (Sicily in particular), had friends visit me-where we traveled to Rome, Venice, and Barcelona, took a trip I won on Wheel of Fortune to the Bahamas and went back home for Thanksgiving. Oh, and it's also when we found out we were pregnant with Ellie. :) . 2012 brought morning sickness,a trip back to the US for a baby shower, a babymoon to Venice and then a trip further north in Italy to Lake Como, a beautiful baby that was born 9 days late, a trip to the northern coast of France and Belgium with a 3 week old and finally a few months of rest before jetting off to the States again for my best friends wedding-which meant traveling alone with a 3month old. We spent Christmas there again and by the time we made it back, after cancelled and delayed flights, we had less than a week to pack up our little apartment and get ready to move into a bigger one. 

Right after our move, I was still exhausted and knew it wasn't just from jet lag and moving. I told Dan I was pregnant but he didn't believe me. But those 2 little pink lines don't lie! and thus began our adventure of preparing for baby #2, while having a 5 month old. Then in June we got a call that my dad has passed away unexpectedly so we hopped on a plane and went home to deal with that. That was a really hard few weeks. Finally, we made it back here and celebrated Ellie's 1st birthday and are now preparing for the imminent arrival of baby boy Caputo! 

Our whole marriage has been one big adventure so far. We've had so many incredible experiences that we know we are lucky to be doing together. When I look back at all we've done, there's no doubt that there is no one else I would want to walk this journey with than Dan. He is a big part of what has made this adventure what it has been. I can't even begin to imagine what our future holds. His contract ends next May (2014) and at this point we have no idea what our next adventure will be. But I do know it will be one heck of a ride and that we'll have each other plus 2 more! to navigate it with!

Here are some pics of when we first arrived in Leiden