family pictures

Some of the Oklahoma crew visited last weekend for a belated Christmas. I managed to talk Amy into some family belly pics because I thought it was going to be 50 out. As it turned out, the wind picked up and brought a cold front with it and it felt about 0 instead. My idea of pics in a field blew by with the cold front and we settled for some super quick pics in an alley instead (for the record- it was still windy and cold even with the extra walls). Big thanks to Amy for braving the cold with us for what could possibly be our last official family of three pics (really?!).


(Also, I'm hoping there's at least one more warmish day before baby's debut so I can wear the outfit I had originally planned on for some quick pics of the bump in the field. I think I've convinced R to play photographer so stay tuned for that.) ;)

my favorite things about three (so far)

I was completely bummed when B outgrew the awesome two year old scene but he's hit his groove with three and it's looking pretty awesome so far too.

Some of my favorite things about him right this minute:

He asks for kisses in his hand to save for later. He stores them in his pockets and under his pillow and sometimes sneaks them onto his cheek and convinces mama to give him a spare. He likes to give us kisses in our hands to save for later too.

He tells us all about how Jesus lives in his heart (because 'Jesus told me that He does!'). He tells us about how Jesus helps him to not be scared and to be strong. And he tells us about how Jesus likes juice (mostly red hawaiian punch) and ice cream too if we could please give him more of those things. :)

His prayers these days are usually something like, "Thank you for all the food. Thank you for all my rest. Thank you for naps and all of my blessings. AAAAA!!! Men!" Tonight's bedtime prayer was, "Dear Jesus thank you for all of the animals. A! Men!" He typically requests to say mealtime prayers because he knows his are short and sweet. He's even been asking to do it in front of other people these days which has been a huge step of bravery for the little guy.

He started watching non-animated shows this week (Chalotte's Web and Beethoven) and all of a sudden I stopped hating screen time. (Daniel Tiger, Mickey Mouse, Bob The Builder, Clifford, Jake, etc etc aren't all that bad…. until you've seen them all a million times.) And he's actually been doing way less screen time this winter than last. (We're saving up on screen time binging for when the baby arrives.) ;)

His play has just been so awesome to see lately. He is loving hoops now. He cooks in his restaurant all the time. He loves his corn pool (his 'orchard' as he calls it). He pretends all sorts of crazy things. He loves a good dance party (courtesy of DJ B, of course). And we've started playing family games. He even knows (and mostly follows) the rules of memory now. He generally wins. (And we don't let him.)  We've done a lot less art projects and sitting to learning work lately but occasionally he asks to play school and we work on his 'flashcard puzzles' while he plays school.

He's becoming quite the little man at the basketball games these days. Earlier this week he even went to the concession stand and ordered and paid for his snack ALL BY HIMSELF. I stood on the other side of the lunchroom and watched him and it kinda broke my heart a little bit that he didn't look back even once. :(

He's mostly set to entertain himself for games. He has a few bleacher buddies he likes to play with and he does pretty good staying entertained with his bag of toys and occasionally the iPad. If those fail, he's super content to organize the med-kit for daddy and help the managers in the training room. He's a huge help to them, I'm sure. ;) He talks about the high school kids all the time and the other day he was looking at the pictures on the service wall and was telling me who some of them were and how much he likes them. So fun to see! He's also big into playing 'up high, down low' with them. ;)

Speaking of… that's his favorite trick these days. Anyone that will give him time gets the 'up high, on the side, on the other side, down low' pulled on them. If you happen to get the down low too fast for him, be prepared for the game to never end. It's also his favorite joke…. 'Knock knock, (who's there?) Up high…. " He thinks he's pretty hilarious.  I do too. ;)

Every morning he wakes up and needs squeezy hugs and kisses from mommy (and then the same for sister). Some mornings he wakes up and just starts listing all the people he loves. It's pretty cute.

He always asks to hide with [sister] and climbs under the blanket with her. He starts whispering secrets to her and doesn't want mommy and daddy to interrupt. (I'm not sure this is a fave thing or not… maybe I should be scared of what he's telling her!) ;)

He builds random things out of random things and tells us he's going to be an engineer (we don't' even know where he got the word engineer but we're impressed with his work).

I love how he makes up his own words… Two of my faves: He enjoys 'nakeyin' around and he likes to play in the 'picturin' room.

He's super sweet and loving and always gives back rubs, hugs, kisses and random 'I love yous.'

I really couldn't ask for a sweeter three year old. We're so blessed!

ramblings about a baby bump

We're having a heat wave (if you consider 20s a heat wave), so instead of rushing into the house as fast as we could (the normal these days) after church, we snapped a quick belly pic. Even though my feet (and legs) were killing me after yesterday's Take Heart sessions, I wore cute shoes. I knew I'd be working in the nursery and could take them off for most of the morning. I didn't end up in the baby room. My toes were numb by the time we got home. (But the shoes were cute, no?)

Twenty nine (ish) weeks (thirty if you're into rounding). I still catch myself saying twenty weeks. But whose counting? (Or rather who has enough blood flow to their brain to keep track? Not me.)

I still stand by my baby poll vote of 10 weeks from today.

No vote on her size from me. I passed the glucose test by one point and they are keeping an eye on things so she doesn't get too big. My vote for labor is another easy labor (like B's) with about 2 hours LESS of pushing. That's not too ambitious is it?

I hear mixed reviews about the size of my belly these days. Honestly, it really depends on the way she's laying on any given day. Lately she's been into folding herself up into a ball and hanging out on one side of the belly. It's the weirdest feeling and looks quite odd.

She's busy growing. Still not head down but she's been thinking about it. She's in the rolling like crazy feels like an alien is in there stage. B gets a huge kick out of (get it?) feeling her kicks. She's much more of a mover and kicker (and boxer) than B ever was but she gets the hiccups less than he did. (I swear he had them at least five times a day. She's only had them once that I've noticed so far.) I think she'll have long little legs according to the stretches she does that make it look like her foot is going to literally tear through my belly and pop out the skin.

Big brother has been asking all kinds of questions about her lately. About what she will be like and look like. He says he would like for her to be brown like his friend. He says he really just wants a brown sister. We told him maybe some day via adoption but that sister in mommy's belly is probably going to look more like him or mommy or daddy. He's still praying for a brown sister.

He proudly tells everyone he meets that he has a little baby sister and he's so excited to be a big brother. I hope the enthusiasm sticks when she arrives. He says babies don't cry at our house. I hope he isn't too disappointed there. ;)

He wants to share everything with her. One of my co-teachers from Ames gave him a baby blanket with matching burp cloths when he was a baby. I pulled the burp cloths out last week and he insist this one is his baby sister's blankie (because it's just her size) and he loves that they match. He is looking for more ways to match her.

I realized we hadn't told him sister's middle name yet. When I told him he said, "OVEN!? That's not a very good name!" (For the record- her middle name isn't oven.)

I worked all day yesterday. When I finished he asked me to lay with him a bit before nap time. I said, "Oh did you miss mommy?" He said, "No, I just really missed my sister. I want her to stay and take a nap with me. Just her." I had to explain to him how she can't leave my body just yet. He didn't see why not.

We've made more progress in the nursery. The biggest projects left are the gallery wall and the closet door. We ended up just finding a rod in our basement to use for the closet so we didn't have to buy a closet system for her. We stuck a few storage bins in and I think it's good to go for awhile. I think the big things left on the list are a monitor, clothes and diapers. I'd like to make her a homemade quilt but since I still haven't finished B's yet I'm guessing that may not happen.

I can't make a complete sentence these days so I can't promise any of the above post makes any sense. In the last 24 hours alone I couldn't figure out how to spell fifth or very. (I wish I were kidding.) Thank God for spell check.

Happy Sunday.

all things baby

At some point over the last few weeks, it finally clicked with us that we are going to be bringing a little baby into this house. Soon.*

We started looking through B's baby book with him and talking about what he was like as a baby and what baby sister might be like. We talked about how she might cry but he says babies don't cry in our house. ;) We looked at how tiny he was and I can hardly remember it. Those early days are such a blur. They go by so fast (but feel so long at the time). I'm racking my brain for anything and everything I've probably forgotten since his baby days and not sure we're ready for little sister just yet. :)





What I (vaguely) remember:

Sleep. B was an awesome sleeper but even so, baby still has to get up to eat. R was the dad of the year and helped a TON with the overnight shifts but it wears on everyone. I'm grouchy without sleep so we'll have to figure out how to make it through the short on sleep period again.

Breastfeeding. It's hard. B was nearly 15 months old when he (finally) weaned and I remember thinking at one point that it was so much easier to breastfeed than to pack bottles and formula (and everything else) just to leave the house. Eventually I felt like a pro at nursing and could do it anytime, anywhere. But don't let that fool you. Those early days were HARD. His latch was awful. I was back to work (way too early) and we needed him to take a bottle but didn't want him to get nipple confusion. He did. It was a (frustrating, hard, exhausting) process but it was worth it. We had to use the shield and we had to enlist lots of help. I remember being ready to give up (more than once) but since the pump was the one thing we bought I wanted to get my monies worth out of it. I decided if I could just deal with the frustrating part for three months we would get our monies worth (in the price of the pump vs. price of formula) and then I would give myself permission to quit. Three months rolled on by without me thinking about it again. We eventually (before that three month mark) got the hang of it and even decided it was easy at one point. It was so hard but so worth it. I'm sure having a three year old to take care of simultaneously will add it's own set of issues to the breastfeeding process but I hope to stick it through this time as well. (Remind me of that when I say I'm ready to give up, okay?)

Diapers. Lots of diapers. B was a laid back baby and wet diapers never really bothered him. We were lucky and he never (okay, super rarely) got diaper rash. So at some point (I can't remember when) we got it down to four diapers a day. A new one in the morning, before nap, after nap, and bedtime. But the other day I mentioned to R that newborns go through 16 diapers a day (I think?) and he was shocked. I started thinking maybe I was wrong (am I?). But I still think it's a lot more than 4. Right? We talked about starting to stock up on diapers now before I'm on a pay freeze (oh the joys of being self employed) but we really have no idea how many we might need. I feel like we used a lot of size one and size three. But maybe not? As it turns out I don't remember much about the diapering phase. ;)

Laundry. B never spit up. Rarely peed out his diaper (and only due to the way the diaper was put on). And only had two blow outs (that I remember anyway). This will for sure seal my mom of the year award but we may have only changed his sleeper once every couple (or few if I'm being completely honest) days. We never had to change his sheets (up until the great diaper escape phase of twenty thirteen). He didn't add much to the laundry pile in those early days. But I know we have friends with babies that go through 3-5 outfits A DAY. So I'm trying to brace myself for the possibility that an extra body will make a dent in our laundry routine (or lack of).

Schedules. There were days I refused to leave the house so B could sleep. We were mostly flexible (and still are) with when he gets his sleep but if he's missed out on it too much we lock ourselves in and sleep, sleep, sleep (we still do that with him)! These days he can play catch up on sleep pretty quick so usually after a day of good sleep we can throw the schedule out the window again but in those early days we would lock ourselves in a few days at a time to get back on track. Anticipate me being a flake with no good excuse (except in the name of sleep). ;)

Stages. Foods, sippy cups, milestone activities, and more oh my. Will I remember these this time around?

Attachment. I can't remember being away from him very many times before his first birthday. He had a couple overnight stays with grandmas but otherwise he was with us. I made my picture schedule around R's schedule and one of us was almost always with him (mostly me). I know two people whose babies have died from SIDS and both happened at daycare. I read somewhere SIDS happens more often in the care of someone that is not the primary caregiver (and doesn't necessarily know or follow all the crib and bedding rules). Looking back, I probably should have just taken the time to make sure a sitter did know and follow the rules but apparently my newborn mom fogged brain couldn't come up with that and just thought it was easier to do it myself. ;) I am not sure what we'll do this time around.

Momness. I puffed up like crazy AFTER B was born. I thought I was huge and swollen walking into the hospital (and I was) but it got even worse after he was born. At the end of my pregnancy with B I couldn't wear my own shoes and borrowed my moms. After he was born, I couldn't even fit into those anymore. (I left the hospital wearing slippers.) I'm not sure how long this lasted but I'm a giant puff monster in the pictures for quite awhile! I also remember trying on pre-pregnancy jeans every once in awhile. I don't think I'll even put myself through that this time. ;) And the recovery. It was rougher than I expected or anticipated. I was sore. For days. No… weeks. When I did finally feel like working out again the weight started coming off too fast (which isn't good for breastfeeding) so I had to stop. It was quite the balancing act for awhile. I was hungry. All the time. Nursing burns a lot of calories and they needed to be replaced somehow! (Honestly our increase in food bill during that time may have been about the same cost of formula…) ;) I also struggled a lot with who I was, who my friends were, etc. I feel like that transition won't be as rough this time (because hey, I'm mom) but I still want to remember it's possible for relationships to change during life transitions and that's okay.


Cheeks. And baby smiles. And cuddles and snuggles. This is the baby goodness I remember the most. This is the baby goodness that makes the sleepless nights and crabby mornings oh so worth it.

Oh baby girl, we're getting excited to meet you soon!

*I'm not naive. I know there's always something that can go wrong and there's never the guarantee of bringing home baby. That said, once we hit the 90%-95% survivability rate, I stopped worrying (as much) about an early labor and delivery and started to really think about bringing home baby. But that's a whole other blog post. ;)