So my due date has come and gone (that would be yesterday for anyone who doesn't know). My house is looking better and better. I'll post pictures after we finish putting everything back in the proper place. We've crammed a whole lot of home improvement projects into the last few months, and Tyson and Rex really stepped it up during the past month.
My fabulous sister Jenni took both of the kids for the entire weekend, so I'm trying to balance my massive to do list with equal parts rest/putting my feet up so that the swelling in my ankles goes down. I have decided to go private with my blog. I've been thinking about it for some time, but do to some recent developments, I'm going to do it within the next few days. Please leave me a comment or email me if you'd like an invite to the new blog. I'm actually exporting this blog to the new place I'll create, so that I can leave this current one running and use it if I decide to do any more scrapbook designing in the future. I want a place to be able to discuss the kids and put up baby announcements without using code names etc.
I'm OK with whenever the baby decides to come now, but I honestly don't mind waiting a few days longer, as it will give me a few more days to put my house back in order. I'm a little nervous about finally being outnumbered by my children, but I think everything will go great. I've already designed the birth announcement, I'm just waiting to fill in the details and the picture. Now we wait...
Thursday, September 03, 2009
Tonight after dinner I retired to my room to put my feet up. My left foot looked as though it was about to explode (still does) and I just needed to relax. BittyBit came into my room after she finished her dinner and cleared her plate. "Are you having a fun time?" she asked. I told her that I was just resting and was about to begin reading a book. She asked if she could join me, but I pictured her getting bored quickly with just sitting there next to me, so I asked her what she would do while she was there with me. "Why don't I rub your feet so they don't hurt so much" she suggested. And she did. What a sweet kid.
We had a fun time at our Stake's Pioneer Day celebration at church. They had a ton of cookies and breads, along with lemonade and water to drink. I heard that there was a pie eating contest, but I didn't join in that particular event. I talked with some friends I hadn't seen in a while and Tyson took the kids around to the different activities. We were running out of time for the craft activities, so I went into one of the rooms and made rag dolls for each of the kids. They thought those were pretty cool. When I tucked the kiddos into bed, BittyBit asked me what my favorite part of the day was and I told her that it was when I was able to make dolls for her and her brother. She said her favorite part was the parade (where they got to walk around the parking lot and pretend that they were pioneers crossing the plains). Then she asked LittleMan if he had a favorite part of the evening. He said, "I eat cookies". There's a man for you, give him some cookies and he's happy. Tyson told me that LittleMan ate so many cookies and drank so much water that he lost it all during the parade. A minute and a half later he was back at the dessert table trying to cram his mouth full of more goodies.
My friend Jessica has taken to calling the baby Sam (for Super Awesome Man), since Tyson and I won't tell anyone the baby's name until he is born. Well tonight "Sam" was wiggling around like crazy in my tummy and during one particularly uncomfortable moment I might have gotten an incredibly uncomfortable look on my face. BittyBit noticed and asked, "Mom, is the baby about to come out?" "No", I replied. "Then why is your face sour?" she asked.
On another note, happy birthday to my big sis Jenni!
We met Jenni and the gang out at El Chico for dinner. Her best friend Spring (from when we lived in Fredericksburg) came to stay a couple of days with Jenni and Derek. She and her family were relocating from one state to another and swung by Texas on the way to visit. We had a good time at dinner, then headed back to Jenni's for dessert.LittleMan and JenniBittyBit asked if we could take pictures on the colored tile bench that was in the entryway of the restaurant. I love the picture of her looking up at Tyson. LittleMan was much less into having his picture taken. When we arrived back at Jenni's house he was able to do what he really wanted...play with her computer.
We awoke early to eat breakfast and get ready to head out to Arlington for their annual parade. Tyson made smiley face pancakes for everyone, complete with red and blue fruit. Independence Day has to be my favorite holiday, or it is at least tied for me with Christmas. I love the parades, the fireworks, the patriotism. It's a lot of fun and we are developing fun traditions with the kids. After breakfast we drove out to Arlington, where we met Julie and her family to watch the parade. We actually missed a good portion of it. It seems to take 3 times as long to get anywhere when you have young kids. It was just as well though as it was over 100 degrees outside and extremely humid. We were there just long enough to get a feel for the parade and then it was over and we traipsed back home. After everyone took naps, we headed out to our friend Peggy's house in the country for BBQ dinner and to set off small fireworks and sparklers. We took the kids to look at some of her animals. The donkeys came right up to us and let us pet them. The kids favorite animal was a miniature horse named "Miss Texas". She followed us around and ate right out of the kids' hands.Check out Tyson's shirt up close, then take a look at this link. Our friend Sean started a really cool service project and the article describes it well.
After the kids had their fill of the animals, Grandma Connie took them for a ride on one of Peggy's golf carts. LittleMan paid close attention and tried to take himself for a ride when Connie declared that they were finished. He knew how to turn the key and everything, so we had to take the keys and hide them.Some of her neighbors bought some good sized fireworks and set them all off. We got to watch another free fireworks show. What a difference a day makes. This time LittleMan was captivated by the lights and not the least bit bothered by the sound. Granted these weren't quite as loud as the ones from the day before, but he didn't mind at all. He kept saying "Fireworks go BOOM!" and clapping after each one.
On July 3rd we packed up the family and Terrence and met up with some of our friends for an Independence Day celebration in a nearby city. We've gone to the same event on July 3rd for most of the last several years, the exception being 2 years ago when it was postponed and eventually cancelled due to weather. They have a park where the kids can play, a live band with family friendly music, free snow cones, train rides, water activities, a rock climbing wall, etc. Dickies BBQ even caters the event and offers a very reasonable BBQ sandwich, chips, and a drink for only $2 per person. They offer shuttles to take you from the parking areas to the area where they host the event, and at the end of the evening there is an impressive fireworks show. *Note to parents - Make sure your husband locks the double jogging stroller before he tears off ahead of you pushing the stroller, with both kids in it and decides to pop a wheelie...your kids might not like it if the stroller collapses and folds them over inside it. Just a thought. ;)
I got a snow cone for LittleMan, thinking it was the least likely to stain his shirt, but he ended up tipping half the juice on himself anyway. Tyson suggested that if we poured out some of the juice it might be easier for him to eat it, so I "borrowed" the snow cone and went around the corner to get rid of some of the syrup. I figured Tyson would keep LittleMan entertained while I did it so he wouldn't see what I was doing, but I guess I wasn't specific enough in my instruction, because he let LittleMan pad off after me. When the poor guy saw what I was doing he screamed bloody murder for a full five minutes. Our friends could hear him over the band and all the way across the park. He didn't fuss a bit when I took off his shirt and rinsed it in the fountain, he just didn't want me messing with his snow cone. Lesson one about coming in between this man and his food, I guess.
Here is a video of LittleMan dancing along to the live band's music.
LittleMan still wasn't a fan of the fireworks this year, they were too noisy for him and he spent most of the show in Tyson's lap cringing every time he heard the explosion from the fireworks. At least he didn't cry this year. BittyBit however was relaxed and right at home for the whole process.LittleMan's vocabulary has exponentially increased during the last month or so, and on the ride home he kept saying "Fireworks go BOOM!"
I introduce to you my summer splurge (which is available for rent for local birthday parties, etc, by the way). I see these things every summer at the store and this year I decided to go for it. The kids had a ton of fun and Tyson even got into the mix and went down the slide with the kids. I tried chasing them around on it, but I kept forgetting that I'm pregnant and I can't climb up the slide like I might normally be able to do. Oh well, maybe next summer. :) Tyson has a few phrases that he likes to say in a funny voice, and every time he says one of them, LittleMan cracks up laughing.
Tyson and his dad began working on building a pantry in our house about 3 weeks ago. So far I think this is the fastest home improvement project we've ever had. He's been motivated to get all of our projects in this house finished so that it will be ready to rent out when we close on our new-to-us home. We are in underwriting for the bigger house we are trying to buy. Our fingers are crossed that everything will work out quickly before the seller gets tired of waiting, as we were supposed to close June 30 and we still don't have an ETA for our closing date. We were told they are putting a rush on it and will try to get everything approved this weekend, but we'll see how that goes.
Here are the progress pictures for the pantry. Everything is primed, we just need to pick a wall color for the exterior and paint it.
Sunday, June 28, 2009
When I was maybe five years old my dad and I were in the ward talent show for my church. I wore an "Annie" wig and my dad wore a fake cap on his head to make him look bald like Daddy Warbucks. I sat in his lap and belted out "Tomorrow".
My mom found the wig somewhere in a closet of old stuff and brought it over for me to give to the kids. LittleMan would only wear it as long as we'd hold him in front of the mirror to look at himself and laugh. I guess this is what he could look like if curly hair ran in the family.
Last night I found out another thing that my kids can do to entertain themselves when they are supposed to be sleeping. The kids have been resisting bed time a bit lately. Usually they'll open the door a few times and ask for drinks, or tattle on each other for something. I try to just ignore them so that they'll go to bed and they usually do fairly quickly. Last night however I was 45 minutes post bedtime when I heard a mysterious thumping coming from the kids' room. My mommy alarm went off immediately and I went to go investigate.
I opened the door only to see a giant white cloud settling over the entire room, with LittleMan standing in the middle of it coughing, laughing, and shaking the bottle of baby powder. I wish I hadn't been too angry to think about grabbing the camera at that moment, but unfortunately I wasn't able to calm down enough to think about pictures until after I'd vacuumed and wiped down the entire room, stripped the kids bedding and gotten new sheets and pillow cases, and had hauled LittleMan into the bathroom to begin cleaning him. BittyBit was laughing it up until she realized she was in trouble too, then she turned completely serious and said, "Hey, that's not fair, why am I in trouble? He's the one who made the mess." I explained that she was laughing and encouraging him instead of coming to get me, to which she replied, "I thought I was supposed to stay in my bed and not tattle". Augh!!!
LittleMan thought it was hilarious until I realized that I couldn't get the cornstarch baby powder out of his hair without several shampoos. He normally loves bath time, so mean mom that I am, I stripped him down to his diaper and leaned him backwards over the sink to wash his hair and body instead of letting him play in the tub more than an hour after he should have been asleep.
This morning I awoke to a fine film of baby powder all over the house, thanks to my central air conditioning unit. Sigh. A day later I can see the humor, at the time, not so much.
The nurse practitioner from my work had a baby at the end of May. She and her husband decided to wait until the baby was born to learn the sex, so all of us at work decided to have a shower for her after the baby came. That way we could give personalized gifts. She ended up having a little girl, so I traipsed to the fabric store to pick out some girly prints for a quilt. I finished it in less than a week, which only required a couple of days where I completely abandoned my children. My mom came by the day of the shower when I was trying to scramble to finish the binding because a) I'm a procrastinator and b) a couple of days before the baby shower the hostess moved the time of the shower to about three hours earlier in the day. I was on a tight schedule as it was and I didn't quite finish, but it all worked out. I took it to her later and she absolutely loved it. Here are the pics of my project. I originally had something more elaborate in mind, but as I got closer to the deadline and life kept getting in the way, I decided to do a simple 45x60 crib size quilt with 4"squares. I designed the quilt on my computer and color coded it for the fabrics Then I strip pieced the squares together. I made a little puzzle for myself and labeled each different set of pieced blocks. Then I pieced them together using the labels I'd made "A-G-F-B-C" etc. All of the patterns repeated, so it was pretty easy to piece after I'd mapped it out. I double checked everything as I went then I went and then ironed the rows and lined them all up to make sure they still matched the original design. So far so good. Then I sewed all of the rows together and pressed the finished top. I pinned the top, batting, and backing to the quilt frame that Derek built for Jenni years ago. (I inherited it when they moved to Florida years ago.) Then I tied the quilt together at the corners where each square met, 4 inches apart, with brown embroidery floss. The finished quilt.
Most of the tribe met out at Jenni's house for a farewell to Robyn, who is moving back to Virginia. We all brought our own dinner and ate and laughed throughout the evening. The final event to our festivities is a game that Jenni calls "Fruit by the Foot Racing". The gist of the game is that each person unrolls an entire fruit snack and puts the end in her mouth. Then on "go" everyone tries to eat the entire thing as fast as they can. You can't use your hands, only your mouth. Fun stuff.
This morning BittyBit found an oil and vinegar bottle from her play food set and decided that it would make a good baby bottle for LittleMan. The funniest thing is that at her request he climbed right into her lap and played along. They must have sat like this for 5 full minutes while she "mothered" him.
Ever since Tyson took the side rail off of the crib and we convinced BittyBit that it was a day bed, LittleMan has been sleeping in the toddler bed. He always ends up on the floor next to her bed sleeping on the sheepskin rug. Every night before we head to bed, Tyson checks on the kids and puts LittleMan back in his bed. He's mastered the art of moving him without waking him.
Our church stake organized a night for any members who wanted to be able to buy discount tickets to our local minor league baseball team. Tyson bought tickets for our family and we joined a lot of our friends for a night of hot dogs and baseball. The game was fun, but at one point BittyBit said, "Mom, why won't that cat come shake my hand?". The mascot for our team is a cat and he came out to hype up the crowd. He was dancing along on top of the dugout and waving to everyone. BittyBit thought he should come right over and say hi. Just before the seventh inning stretch, he came out into the crowd a few sections over, and she begged me to take her to meet the cat. We made our way over to the big cat and he gave her a hug and shook her hand. That was definitely the highlight of the night for her.
I am mom to a daughter and two sons. My husband and I have been married for thirteen years. We like to watch movies, mixed martial arts, and hang out with the kids. I am trying to teach myself more about photography and I love to preserve all my memories by creating digital scrapbook pages.
