Milestones IIXX / BabyWatch2

Here's the latest scoop on the Reyes Quartet:



• As of tomorrow, V will be 11 weeks pregnant and the 4th member of our family will have grown to about 1.5 inches in length; the size of a fig... and no, I don't have a picture of a fig... but babycenter.com does! 

• Last Thursday V made a visit to her acupuncturist specifically to address the nausea and excessive fatigue that I've written about... and just like that the symptoms were gone. Now typically I'm a (huge) skeptic of "alternative medicines", but between the success this acupuncturist has had with V's previous chronic hip pain and now her nausea, I'll be the first to admit that it's getting kinda hard to maintain my skepticism. So I just shut up and pay the bills. But on the bright side, I can at least still make fun of her for the little seeds that the acupuncturist makes her tape to her body all week. You weirdo! :oP

• Justin Alexander decided that elementary school (not to mention daycare and preschool) was overrated and enrolled in high school; hence the photos below. And while the experiment didn't last long, we did at least succeed in brightening mommy's day with a few visits to her workplace last week. 

• Justin also made his 1st visit to the doctor in quite a while. After 3 weeks of sniffling and whatnot, he was finally prescribed amoxicillan plus an inhaler / breathing apparatus to address the asthmatic symptoms that seem to always accompany his colds. The good news is that I think it's been about 6 months since he has last been sick, which to me is an accomplishment after what seemed like a flurry of infections during is first 9 months of life.

• Tooth #4 has made it's debut. Justin's progression towards words also seems to be going well (translation: he won't shut up). As soon as Congress approves adding an 8th day to the week, I'll be sure to make time to edit and upload a new video highlighting his verbosity.

• The doctor also took his height and weight. At 15 months & 3 days he measured up at 30 inches tall, and (good grief) still 20 pounds for what I think is about 4 months now. The good news is that he was actually 20 pounds and 15.5 ounces... so with two more hamburgers and a milkshake, we just might break that 20 pound barrier once and for all. But I wouldn't suggest holding your breath for that one.

Financial Snapshot V

While I didn't plan on doing another financial snapshot anytime soon, it just dawned on me that V and I recently hit another important financial milestone worth sharing. Did we pay off our house? HA! Very funny... In fact, if you combine the 3 mortgages we carry (primary + 2 rental props), we are still on the hook for over $450,000 of mortgage-related debt (and that can be a scary number to look at in these uncertain times)...

So what's our milestone? Well, for the first time since being married, V and I have a positive liquid worth! wooo whoooo. In other words, that just means that we actually have more money in our bank account than we owe on our (non-mortgage related) debts. In the past 3 months, we basically made about a $7K swing in our finances by means of a summer teaching program, a wedding photography opportunity, 2 eBay auctions, and the usual Scrooge-like budgeting and spending habits.



And while a positive liquid worth is probably not a huge accomplishment for many, it is definitely huge for us. Are we debt free yet? Um... no, not quite. But in the last 2+ years, we have gotten our short-term (e.g., student loans & credit card) debt down from $32,000 to about $9500. And even though that's still a lot of money owed, finally shedding that negative liquid worth was a needed pat on the back and encouragement for our efforts so far... because if I had a dollar for every time I wanted to throw budgeting and sacrifice out the window... I mean, sometimes a brother just wants a new camera, a plane ticket to anywhere, and better reception on his no-cable-television.

So what's next? For now I still have not decided if we will continue with the public financial snapshots or not. Truth be told, I think the public accountability provided by this blog helped us a lot; particularly in times when tough decisions had to be made concerning sacrifice for the betterment of our finances. And I've also enjoyed the dialog that the finance portion of the blog has facilitated with family and friends... If nothing else, we're trying to do our part to help take away the taboo associated with discussing ones personal finances. And so since we still haven't reached our bigger goal of being totally debt-free, I'm leaning towards continuing with the updates until we get there... but we'll see.

Justin & I crunched the numbers together 

and were pleased with the results 

Oh! One more thing. I'd be remiss to close my first finance entry in a while without addressing the current economic situation. There are people writing about the economic downturn that are way smarter than I am, so I will not bore you with my unremarkable opinions (except to say that I'm as opposed to the proposed bail-out plan as a person could possible be). However, I did want to share two emails that V forwarded to me recently. The first is Dave Ramsey's alternative to the current proposal. Even though I think the title of his plan is a bit presumptuous, the plan seems to accomplish the same intended results without the broad brush of amnesty that the government is suggesting. The second is an email she got from a friend who is not only financially savvy but also works within the banking sector. The email detailed what I thought was sound advise for the everyday guy and gal from a person much better informed than I. In fact, at least one thing in the email (her point #4) caused us to rethink some of our current financial strategies (e.g., prioritizing the accumulation of savings versus debt payments in volatile times); and so I thought I'd share the entire email in hopes that at least one other person found her insights worthwhile. Click here for the full letter. Enjoy.

BellyWatch2 | 9 Weeks

Our first visit to the doctor last Tuesday was only eventful in that we officially now have a new obstetrician. As it turns out, the doctor that delivered Justin moved to Florida sometime during the past year; which of course (given the awesome experience we had with her) left us crushed once we learned the news. But all is not lost, as our new doc also has her fair share of charisma to lend to the occasion.

The only downside is that V and I definitely got spoiled by getting an ultrasound at just about every doctor's visit with Justin Alexander. This new office, on the other hand, plays by the rules and so it'll be a few weeks before we get our first peek inside. I was also reminded that we got to see Justin so much because of some complications we had early on; at least one of which landed us in the emergency room (funny how much we forget from one pregnancy to the next). And so with that, I'm content to have "healthy pregnancy, no pictures" versus "complications & lots of pictures"... but jeez those pictures sure were fun (despite the fact that I couldn't tell an elbow from a knee on most of them).

Lastly, I think we both took a little solace from the doctor's mention that the second pregnancy does have a tendency to be tougher than the first. It doesn't help with the symptoms, but at least we know that it's not unusual. In comparing the first with the second, the doc said that some have it easier or just as easy... but it is more common that your previous experience will be amplified during pregnacy #2. Easy usually becomes not-so-easy, blah becomes mild depression, and depression becomes WATCH OUT! As for us, we're not in the "WATCH OUT" category, but this pass week was definitely more of the same. Other than a few spots here and there, the frequent nausea, fatigue and frigidness hasn't let up much. Yet and still V has made it through every work day and she hasn't killed any of her students (yet). So for that I commend her.

Of course, there's also the fact that during the first pregnancy we didn't have a 14-month-old to try to keep up with. That alone probably spikes the fatigue up about 170%. And while his energy is non-stop, he's still too young to understand when you tell him, "Daddy and mommy are so tired right now it's not even funny... Mommy needs a nap and I've got 113 papers to grade... do you mind going to chill out in your room for a while."... Trust me... I tried. But he just laughed and smacked me in the knee with his sippy cup.



As for baby #2 him/herself, (s)he is has progressed to about the size of a grape. V is definitely showing (has been for a while... much sooner than baby #1) and still trying to figure out how long she can go at work before having to break the news. I give her another week or 2. In the meantime, here are some pictures from her 18 minutes of high energy last week. Enjoy.