My Big 3 Year Old

The New Addition

'Twas the night of September 4th and I was feeling antsy. My period was a couple days late and I demanded answers. I talked to Art before he left for work and pleaded with him to buy me a pregnancy test, not really expecting him to do so. Art believed from my past experiences that taking a test would make me immediately start my period. I decided that in the morning if he didn't show up with a test, that I would save my pee in a cup until I could go to the store and get one myself. Much to my surprise, he actually bought one so I hurriedly took it and quickly received the positive result I had been praying for for nearly 2 years.

I patiently waited for my 8 week appointment, and got to see the baby on an ultrasound October 3rd. We saw a heartbeat and the baby is nestled snugly in my uterus.

I didn't experience ANY morning sickness when I was pregnant with Keira, so I was caught by surprise when around 7 weeks I began to feel nauseous all day every day. I am just shy of 9 weeks and there has been no improvement. I have been SUPER exhausted. I take a nap every day and spend the rest of the day on the couch. My house is a disaster, my husband and daughter are neglected, and I can't remember the last time I cooked a meal. Thus is the nature of the first trimester. Just the beginning of many sacrifices to come during the incubation of our beloved baby, who is scheduled to appear in mid-May.

Road Trip

Last weekend Art, Keira, my mom, and I got to take a trip to northern California for my cousin Blake's wedding reception. We stayed at my mom's aunt's cabin in Oroville Friday night, then went to the reception in Yuba City on Saturday and stayed at Aunt Joy's cabin again that night. Then Sunday morning, Aunt Joy and Uncle Ken took us out on their boat which was awesome. Keira LOVED it. I have never seen her more relaxed. She even fell asleep on the way back in, which is miraculous if you understand the fact that she DOES NOT fall asleep anywhere but her own house or her car seat.

Cousin Blake and Shawni Westmoreland's Wedding Reception at Grandpa Bud Peter's House

Krysta, Art, and Keira with Great Uncle Ken and Aunt Joy Arnold

Mom and Aunt Joy on the Boat

Sunday evening we drove from the eastern side of the state to the western side and stayed at Art's grandparent's house in the bay area. I have previously explained in great detail how much we love his grandparents. We stayed there for 2 nights and came home Tuesday evening. This was our longest trip to date- 4 nights away from home. Up until now we haven't stayed anywhere longer than 2 nights.

Navarro Family - Grandpa George and Grandma Kathy Navarro, Art, Krysta, and Keira Martinez, Uncle Georgie and Becky Navarro, Susan (Suzy), Sophia, Elena, Nick, and Nick Martinez, Jr.., Cousin Lexi Mata (Becky's daughter), Aunt Colleen and Cousin Hailey Spofford, Aunt Annette and Todd Tognetti.

Martinez Siblings - Arthur, Sophia, and Nick

Keira and Daddy swimming in Grandma Kathy's pool.

It was so awesome to spend time with both my family and his in the same weekend. Family is important to us and we like to spend as much time as we can with them. As a result, I can tell that Keira is building relationships with her extended family that she would otherwise miss out on. She already wants to go back to Oroville for another boat ride with her Great Great Aunt and Uncle and go swimming with her Great Grandma Kathy and Papa George. I know she will have fond memories of the time she spends with them, because I do too.

Obsessive Compulsive Disorder

The top 3 reasons how I know my daughter has OCD:

1: She puts her movies in neat rows. She does the same thing with shoes.

2. When choosing a straw to drink from, first she picked all of the yellow ones (except the one she missed) then moved on to the blue ones, then she will use the red ones. If you grab the wrong color she gets mad and picks out the right one. Next time I buy straws I will try to find a pack that's all the same color.

3. Since she was a baby, she has had a soft blanket and as a comfort she puts one corner of the blanket on/in her nose and feels it and "sniffs" it. She always uses the same corner and she knows if it's the wrong one. She will feel each corner until she finds the correct one to hold.

I'm sure Art and I are to blame for her personality since I am the type of person who likes things very clean, uncluttered, correct, and organized. Art is the type of person who likes things just how he left them and doesn't want anyone to touch his stuff. Keira seems to be a pretty particular person too, and hopefully she will be able to harness that to her benefit in life.

Progress Report

I have been practicing my flute nigh unto every day since it arrived 3 weeks ago. Here is a sample of what I can do so far.

Happy Birthday for Kyle since today is his birthday.


Love is a Song - Bambi


Over the Rainbow - Wizard of Oz

The Bird Box

Today Keira was playing with an empty box that jewelry comes in, pretending that there were birds inside. So, I made her imagination come to life and printed out birds and a nest for her to play with.

The nest and mama bird are attached and the hungry baby birds are loose. She calls it her "Bird Box" and she thinks it's pretty cool.

A Dream Come True

When you're poor like me, it seems more often than not that you have to focus on what you need and make yourself forget about what you want. No income is ever "extra" so when money comes along, there is always some bill or need to eat it up. So, naturally, when I got the idea that I wanted a flute, I thought it to be a distant dream instead of something I might acquire anytime soon. Lucky for me, my Uncle Mark decided to make my dream come true and surprised me with a gorgeous Gemeinhardt 2sp - the number one top selling student flute. It arrived at my house one week and two days ago and I can hardly put it down.

My only prior experience with a flute was in about 7th grade or so at which time I played clarinet in the school band of about 8 kids. I think we had 4 clarinet players, 3 trumpet players, and one trombone. We were a pretty pathetic band and our teacher only taught us to play by finger numbers instead of notes so we really didn't learn properly. Well, one time we came across a song that had a short flute solo in it and the band teacher recalled having come across a couple flutes in the school shed so my friend Ashley and I volunteered to learn the flute solo and play our clarinets the rest of the song. The flutes we used looked like someone had been bludgeoned to death with them... twice. They were awful. So, I guess you could say my desire to own a flute wasn't entirely a wild hair, and may or may not have been fueled by a flute performance at church on Easter Sunday.

Despite not learning to read clarinet music, I had taken some piano lessons as a kid and have enough choir experience to be able to read music at a very slow pace. On the piano, I can't sight read and it is very difficult for me to play anything I haven't heard before. I struggle through the sheet music until I learn it then I memorize it so I don't have to look at it again. Thus, I can play a few songs on the piano complicated enough to trick people into thinking I can play the piano, but it is only a facade. I am most talented at playing my vocal cords.

When I first assembled my flute, I found I have a natural ability to blow a tone and a good ear to pick out a couple basic songs based on the notes that are straight forward enough to play without instruction. Then, I began the task of learning the names of the notes I was playing and the fingering for more notes. Flutes aren't as simple as one might thing. They aren't like a recorder where the more holes you cover, the lower the note is- not in all cases anyway. It seemed like a daunting task, at first, but I was surprised at how quickly I was able to memorize the fingerings and even learned to read and play the music to some easy arrangements. One thing I am really enjoying about playing the flute is that you only have to worry about one note at a time, which is great for someone like me who is not fantastic at reading music.

Playing the flute hasn't been everything I hoped it would be, it has been even more. Thanks again, Uncle Mark, for paving the path to another musical adventure.