Join My Team!

If there's anything in this life that we can all (and I mean ALL) agree on, it's that we'd rather not get sick.  We all have our own methods to avoid sickness; but if you don't already use the method we use here in the Acker house, I'm about to pitch you quite the deal, and you might just join our team. (That's my pyramid scheme intro...pretty good, eh?)  I'm contemplating making a sign with our team name to go above our door because I believe that strongly in it: TEAM GARLIC.  Or more specifically, TEAM RAW GARLIC.

I feel like I should knock on wood the entire time I'm typing this because I'm about to brag about how many times I was sick this winter season: ZERO.  And yes, I attribute that to my devotion to the intake of raw garlic, hence the post devoted to it.  Not only did I avoid getting sick when both Pete and Susannah were sick a couple months ago, but I avoided an almost impossible-to-not-get sickness last week when I babysat 3 girls who all came down with fevers (one of which was 104º!) while at our house.  So this sick-season, I've been convinced of the goodness of garlic.  It's disgusting, but it works, my friends!

(And in case you're wondering, it's not like I eat it daily.  Gross.  I only eat it when I know I'm around stuff I need to avoid catching--normally a clove twice a day for 3 days.)

And now that I'm off my garlic soapbox and you've joined our team (I'll make bumper stickers in the coming months), here are just a few pictures of our girl now that the weather is WARM!

Static Electricity Angel Babe

Picking flowers is literally our favorite activity.  She might like it more than eating...might.

Talking to the chickens about how much we love their eggs.

"Show me your teeth!"

We're heading to Mechanicsville tonight to see the Gilberts and then on to Harrisonburg for the rest of the weekend to see Pops and Figgy!  Looking forward to lots of fun!

(If you're interested in seeing some of our new wall decor, hop on over to Pete's elk hunting blog.  You might even see a cute baby!)

Cuter Everyday

Susannah has been showing lots of signs of being more like her grandmothers than her mother: she's all-the-time cleaning things up.  Or maybe I should have written "cleaning things up" in quotations.  Because it's more like (here's where I love putting words to what I think Susannah's thoughts are), "Hey, I think I don't want my sippy anywhere my parents can find it, so I'll put it in this obscure cabinet" or "I just opened this brand new package of [fill in the blank], but it looks like trash to me, so I'll throw it away" or "My shoes look kinda dirty, so I'll drop them in the back of the dishwasher" (getting close on that last one!).

She's also proving to be a really obedient child; she knows what "please put that back" means and will actually take whatever item we're referring to and put it back where she found it.  When she's fussing at me in the kitchen during meal prep, I can tell her to go sit in the living room, and she'll march right in there, plop down in the middle of the carpet, and continue fussing until she's "ready to be sweet" or her Daddy comes in to save the day and play with her.  I'll have to remember these times when she's in her Terrible Twos or teenage years...

And one quick paci update: we've moved on and not looked back!  It only took a few days, and she's back to going right to sleep (and staying asleep) during naps and nighttime.  What a trooper!

Modeling her winter wear

Learning to doodle

Nothing is safe in her wake...

A new favorite pastime: sitting in the glider to play with her sound machine 

Hat day at the Acker house!  One lady is covering up bedhead; the other is covering up breakfast food remnants.  I'll let you figure out which description goes with which girl...

I am a firm believer that when you are eating something like ice cream or cereal or cookies or anything else that we hardly EVER have in our house, it's imperative to focus on NOTHING else in order to fully enjoy the treat.  This is Pete eating cereal and blocking out my incessant, irrelevant storytelling in order to enjoy it, and I applaud him for it.

We love story time!  It was our first time to go, and Susannah broke down in tears when I told her we had to leave.

And a John Boy update: he's still measuring perfectly, according to the doc!  The heartbeat sounds beautiful, as well.  I had my glucose test on Monday morning and have not heard back from them about it, which is actually a good thing; apparently I will only hear from them if I failed.  Fingers crossed I don't get that dreaded phone call tomorrow!

And lastly, here's a funny video of Susannah watching Pete workout in the side yard:

15 Months and Goodbye Pacis!

Comparing belly sizes...Sus wins!

Susannah had her 15-month check-up last week, and she is doing great!  She's 96th percentile for head circumference, 66th for weight, and 54th for length.  We love our smart, chunky girl!

Pete and I decided a while back that Susannah would say goodbye to her pacis before John gets here.  We'd already cut the tips off 2 of her 4 pacis (many of you know, she loves sleeping with ALL of them), so we've comfortably been sleeping with only 2 for a few weeks.  On Monday (yesterday) morning, we decided the pacis would just disappear before her afternoon nap.  She doesn't sleep during her morning "rest" anymore, so we knew she'd be really, really tired come nap time.  I bought a stuffed Elmo a while back to introduce whenever we took the pacis, so we had that on-the-ready for naptime.  I was very, very nervous about what the next day(s) would hold.

Needless to say, there were lots of tears despite the initial excitement about Elmo.  Pete and I took turns going in to comfort her, and after about an hour during one glorious daddy-visit, she finally gave up the fight for her "ba-pa" and fell asleep.

Sweet little angel babe during her first no-paci nap

That night, she only fussed for 45 minutes and slept really, really well compared to some of the horror stories I've heard.  Today has been pretty easy, with very little fussing (like, less than 5 minutes) before falling asleep for both nap and nighttime.  We couldn't be more thankful that this process is being so nice to us!  If you look at any online mommy forums, the ease of our transition is seemingly rare.  I guess it just goes to show that my suspicions were correct: I was way more attached to the pacifiers than she was!  And BONUS, Susannah's disposition has been even sweeter than usual the last 2 days, which makes those in-between-sleep times super fun.

Not to mention, we've had SNOW to play in!  [Cue cute snow day pictures]

Loving this white stuff!

Gloves gotta come off to taste the snow.

So much fun!

Today's snow was a little icy, so someone wasn't as excited to be out and about as she was yesterday.

And some other goodies:

Couponing.

Watching Elmo with my babies (Yes, John is pictured...barely)

Apparently something in the water is hilarious!

Trying to get Daddy's attention while he works out outside

The Very Hungry Caterpillar is so funny!

The Cutest Little Shooter

For those of you who do not know this already, the Ackers are nicknamers.  Hardly anyone on Pete's side of the family goes by his/her actual given name, so it's no surprise that Susannah has her fair share of nicknames.  Her most recent and longest-lasting nickname is Shoey, but because Pete is all about nicknames that evolve, her newest nickname is Shooter.  There may be some subliminal messaging going on there from her hunter-daddy, but I still think it's cute watching our Little Shooter walk around the house like she owns the place.

Susannah now officially knows the sounds for chicken, kitty-cat, duck, tractor, horse, and cow.  She also asks for "hep" (help) allllllllll the time.  I taught her that so she'd stop whining every time she needed assistance with something, but now she thinks it's the cure-all call.  And the main problem with that is that Susannah ONLY whispers "hep."  So if she wanders into another room and wants help opening a box or getting a book off the shelf, her whisper for help doesn't always reach the adult ears...which elicits the whining I was trying to stay away from with the teaching of that word.  It's still adorable when you do hear her say it, though.

Speaking of books, that is also something Susannah wants to do allllll the time: READ!  As a former English teacher, I think this is wonderful, but I have to be honest and say that I do get a little tired of reading the same 5 favorite books over and over again through the day.  I can recite all of our Sandra Boynton books by heart now, as well as Brown Bear, Brown Bear and The Very Hungry Caterpillar.  But I'm thankful that she's constantly asking us to read rather than constantly asking us to turn on the TV!

And some picture highlights from the last few weeks:

Selfies at the swing

Susannah has gotten to have lots of quality time with her favorite "Ann-hee" (Angie) lately!

Always loving the outdoors

Also always loving a full tray of food!

Playing in the Chick-Fil-A play area was so fun!

Susannah LOVES Baby Charis, our pastor and his wife's daughter!  They are both enamored with each other.

And speaking of their love for one another, Charis and Susannah had a hilariously sad interaction last week.  Charis is teething majorly and Susannah didn't like seeing her friend hurting...and Charis didn't like silence:

Visitors, New Games, and Fermented Chicken Feed

Pete's best friend Matt came in town last week and brought his wife and baby girl with him.  Pete and Matt went to VA Beach for a night to do some stuff for work, so the girls got some girl time; and we were so grateful to have company!  It took some time for Sus to warm up to Hannah, but it took zero time for Hannah to warm up to Susannah.  She is so sweet and wanted to hug on Susannah all the time; Susannah finally let her by the end of their time with us.

Showing Hannah all her toys

Bath time is so much more fun with friends!

Our big girl entertaining herself with coloring at a restaurant!  

Susannah's new favorite game is Hide-n-Seek.  It is so fun and hilarious to play with her.  She's obviously the one who does the seeking, and Pete or I do the hiding.  Here's how it goes down:
Me: "Susannah, do you want to play Hide-n-Seek?"
Sus: "Hid-Tee!"
Me: "Okay, I'm gonna go hide, and you come find me!"
(I go hide behind a door or something and call her name a few times.)
Sus: (walking toward my voice) "Maaaaamaaaa....  Maaaaammmmaaa...."
And when she finally finds me,
Me: "Boo!"
Sus: (erupts in giggles) "Maamaaaa!"
And we hug and laugh.  It's real cute.

Making friends at the library.

A "wow-weh" for each hand.

Sweet smirk.

This morning I found Susannah elbow-deep in an unidentifiable substance (that looks quite like the inside of her dirty diapers) that was inside a 5-gallon bucket, laughing and flailing and having a grand ole time.  After tossing her in the sink (which she also loved) and flipping out a little, I called Pete, demanding to know the name of that substance and whether or not I needed to call poison control.  He began laughing, of course, and told me he was just fermenting chicken feed and had forgotten to tell me.  Oh, my life...  :)

Some fun, recent Daddy-daughter time:

A little morning play time.

Those cloth diapers sure give this girl a ghetto booty!  (Playing on Daddy's keyboard is a fav activity.)

Coming back from getting the "mmmeh" (mail).  One of my all-time favorite pictures to date.

"Mama is the only one who will do!"

I'm pretty sure the title here is what runs through Susannah's mind 98% of the day.  The other 2% is for when someone else gets her out of her crib (she generally calls for her Daddy to come get her) and if food or a bottle is being offered.  (Note to self: teach Susannah that it is not wise to take candy from strangers.)  Suffice it to say, she has become even more attached to me since I returned from my 5-day vacay last month -- not the reaction we were going for.  I know I'll long for these days when she's a teenager and wants nothing to do with me, but for now, let's all pray that she learns to play happily with others when I'm not present from time to time.  (Seriously, that's a for-real prayer request--please help a sista out!)

Baby Boy's name is going to be John Garrison Acker.  We had this name picked out a looooong time ago, back when Susannah was supposed to be a boy.  So needless to say, we are thrilled to actually get to use it this time around.  John is the name of my late granddad on my dad's side, who was, well, an absolutely amazing man.  He lived off the land, worked harder than anyone you've ever seen his entire life, led and loved his family well, and diligently served the Lord.  Garrison is the name of Pete's late uncle "Gary" (Pops' brother), who died in a hunting accident at 24. much too soon for a someone who so greatly benefited his family and community; he was a 6th grade teacher, a devoted husband, a loyal brother and son -- a man of integrity.  We hope that the legacy of the character these two men wore will carry on in the life of our son!  We are taking suggestions on nicknames, but we've already grown fond of "John Boy" and "Johnny G"... We'll see what others arise!

And here's the fun stuff (video at the bottom!):

Girlfriend LOVES Big Bear!  She crawls into his lap on a daily basis.

"I'll trade you these weeds for those car keys, whadya say?"

She prefers showing off those tight abs.

Hard at work with the boyz at the library.

Caught her absolutely cracking up the other day!  I love that little scrunched face!

John Boy is sitting so low!

One of our favorite new sources of entertainment.

And Baby Acker #2 is a............

....BOY!!!!

We are obviously thrilled!  We would have been excited for another girl, as well, but we definitely did not hide the fact that we both were crossing our fingers for a boy.  Someone to carry on the Acker name!

As for Susannah, unless your name is Mommy, Daddy, Elmo, Angie, Baby, Bottle, Bath Time, or Birdie, you shall be called "Ba-Buh."  Everything is "ba-buh;" Any noise, any object, any room, any person, any thing.  And if you try to tell her what it's actually called, she looks at you like you're insane and continues to call it by its rightful name, Ba-buh.

I think I wrote about this a couple weeks ago, but Susannah got one of her first-year molars about 3 weeks ago, and sometime last week, one of her K-9s came in, too.  Poor girl is drooling and gnawing and snotting like crazy, so it's just a matter of time before the next one pops through.  She's a trooper, though.  Other than being extra attached to me (which is problematic when other people want to play with her... She wants nothing to do with them), her disposition is still sweet and happy.

No pics this week, just our fun announcement!  Happy New Year!