A Few Pictures

I just got a new camera for my birthday and I am super excited about it. I wanted/needed a camera that was just a "bit" of an upgrade from my four year old, fifty dollar, digital camera. I felt like I was always missing the best pictures because it took sooooo long for my camera to take a picture, grrrr. But, I didn't want one of the really nice photography cameras...I have no interest in learning a difficult camera, and no interest in taking up photography as a hobby (I already have plenty of hobbies I am trying to start, haha). So, Brad got me this camera, and I LOVE it. It is soooo much better than my old one and in my twenty minutes of playing with it, I already feel like I have caught some pretty cute moments. I can't wait to play with it some more. Here are some of my first shots with my new camera:

Addison, excited about getting to go outside with her daddy (even though the wind was blowing like crazy).

Watching daddy change the oil in his truck.

Hanging out in her little car.

"Hi, mom!"

Playing with a piece of daddy's air compressor.

Look how much she loves her daddy! :)

25 Weeks

Belly pic at 25 weeks.

How far Along: 25 weeks

Size of Baby: 13 1/2 inches, 1 1/2 lbs. (according to the website)

Maternity Clothes: I have gone backwards a little bit...out of desperation. I have found some clothes that I can "make work" in this time in my pregnancy, with such ambiguous weather. Can't wait for March so I can wear my cuter spring maternity clothes!!

Gender: It's a girl, we have a name...stay tuned! :)

Movement: For a long time I felt like her movements were sooo low, but now I am starting to feel a few kicks and punches about mid-belly which I rather prefer. Today at church a friend told me she saw the baby moving...how fun is that! :)

Food Cravings: Anything sweet. Currently snacking on Starburst jelly beans (try them, they are amazing). Had a Snickers ice cream bar the other day for the first time since highschool, and of course continue to crave any kind of ice cream product, but especially sherbet.

Food Aversions: Mexican food. It just never really sounds good to me.

What I Miss: the thought that I could go skiing if I wanted to...not that I necessarily would, but I would like the option. :)

Sleep: good, especially with a 45 minute nap every day when Addison lays down. It's perfect, a shortish nap for me, and then still a little time to get stuff done, I have quit feeling bad about taking a nap during this stage in life. :)

Symptoms: Braxton Hicks contractions, which are always interesting. I had them from early on with Addison, so this is normal for me.

Best Moment this Week: Spending the entire weekend with my little family, and imagining what it will be like with another little girl in our midst and what kind of big sister Addison will be.

I am so in love with this little girl already. I can not wait to meet her. :)

My Little Chef

Lately I have been trying to involve Addison in more of the things that I do. Baking has been one of the most fun things we have started doing together. Yes, it's a little bit more messy than usual...at least I claim that she makes it more messy (I'm a pretty messy baker), but it sure is fun. And, with such an attentive audience, I get to have my own cooking show whenever she helps. :) This morning I made pancakes for breakfast, and had a wonderful little helper that loved to "stir." I mean, how cute is she?! Not that I'm biased. :)

Baby News

How far along: 23 weeks

Size of baby: my 22 week ultrasound estimated the baby was about one pound

Maternity Clothes: yes. although the last two days I have worn tops that weren't maternity. however, now that I have seen myself in these tops while pregnant, I don't think I'll ever be able to wear them again when I'm not. haha

Gender: it's a GIRL!

Movement: her kicks are becoming a lot stronger

Food Cravings: none that I can really think of, i've kind of been sick of food lately

Food Aversions: see above

What I Miss: my t-shirts

Sleep: has been surprisingly good the last couple of nights

Symptoms: hmmmmm...?

Best Moment this Week: being woken up early one morning by little girl's kicks, twists and turns. It was about 45 minutes before I needed to be up and I layed there enjoying the miracle of this little girl living inside of me.

What I am Looking Forward to: February festivities :)

It appears as though I only wear striped shirts with gathers on the side. However, this is not the case and I will make sure to show this in my next baby update. :)

Ducks in a Row

Addison is a very orderly little girl, as much as she can be at 17 months old. This is something that I think comes from her daddy and her Aunt Janelle, because quite honestly, that is not how I would describe myself. Any order that I have in my life is a learned behavior, something I am still learning, and something that I am constantly working on and trying to get better at. My point being, she did not get this sense of orderliness from me (although I would love to claim it).

Addison loves to help me clean up her toys and gets excited when she puts her toys in her toy box. Her favorite thing to do at Nana and Grandad's house, besides going "up, up" the stairs, is to empty a box set of books out of their box, and put them back in. To my amazement, the books are always facing the correct direction. (Side note: At one point Addison's Aunt Janelle saw her playing with this set of books that I had no idea where they even came from, and made the comment, "Oh, I loved that set of books when I was little." I was shocked as I had been the book reader in the family and questioned her love for these books that I couldn't even remember. Her response? "Well, I don't remember ever reading them, I just loved the orderliness of them. How they all fit so neatly into their box." I felt as if my sister had just given me an insight into my daughter's soul, hence why I say some of her orderliness must come from her Aunt Janelle.)

Addison's latest bit of order is at bath time. She has four rubber duckies, and she finds them and lines them up on the side of the tub. It makes me laugh every time. I guess she just likes to have all of her "ducks in a row." ;)

This is her new look when you ask her to smile. :)

Bundled Up

After our snow day inside I decided to bundle Addison (and myself) up and take her on a little snow adventure. Basically, I just wanted to see if she would like the snow and appreciate that it was something other than grass/concrete/dirt. I thought it would be fun...

Well, bundling up is a chore in and of itself. The first issue came with who should I start getting ready first? Myself or Addison. I decided to get myself ready first as I can tolerate mulitple layers and being slightly overheated longer than a 17 month old can. So, I get ready. No, I do not have appropriate snow clothes. Yes, I looked ridiculous. Yes, I thought about busting out the bread bags to cover shoes as my mom did with us when we were little. No, I did not rubber-band bread bags around mine or my daughter's feet, and made the decision at that moment that that should NEVER be necessary. Yes, I might have been wearing a Carhart jacket.

Now, on to my daughter. Two pairs of socks, inside fur lined boots. Tights, sweat pants, and wind pants layered. Onesie, shirt, sweatshirt, jacket. Hat on head, hood over hat. Hands shoved into mittens (that she HATES).

By this point I was lucky that she had not dissolved in a heap of fits and tears. After all, I just asked if she wanted to go outside. She had no idea her, "yeah, yeah" response would elicite such a horrific result. BUT, we're dressed. Phew! Deep breath. Yeah! Time to go outside.

Pick up little girl. Say, "Let's go outside and play in the snow." Half smile response from said little girl, who at this point is I'm sure very, very confused. Open the door, wind hits little girl in face, little girl wrinkles her brow and whines, mom thinks, 'oh it will be ok once she gets in the snow' (why would I think that would make things better?!). Put little girl down on sidewalk, show her how to walk in the snow, little girl takes one step, and doubles over at the waist making her mittened hands touch the snow - crying, crying crying. Mom picks up little girl, laughs at her own crazy idea that playing in the snow might be fun for a 17 month old and goes in to now strip down all the layers that we spent the last thirty minutes putting on. Haha. Oh well. Maybe next year...?

But, she sure is cute all bundled up, right?! :)

Snow Day

As my tummy is full of stew and cornbread and I sit here in front of the fire anticipating the hot chocolate that my sweet husband is making for me, I can't think of anything better than a snow day. But, as a mom, do you ever have those mornings when you wake up thinking, this is going to be the longest day ever? Haha - I don't either. But, if I did, then hypothetically speaking, this would have been one of those mornings. A snow day to a mom with a 17 month old is kind of like a prison sentence, with a very cute and loveable cell mate. There is just something about knowing that there is no option to get out of the house all day that makes the day seem long and looming ahead - hypothetically of course. So, with that kind of attitude (hypothetically) starting my day you would have thought that I would not have had a good day, but we did! Addison is at a really fun age, and loves to play and discover and if I can just get my mommy juices flowing it's not extremely hard to find new things for her to do. Here are a few things that occupied us on this cold, snowy day.

Play-doh (or doh-doh as Addison calls it).

She loves taking the play-doh out and putting it all back in.
Trying to just go ahead and put the lid on. The play-doh doesn't need to be all the way in, right? (Maybe this is a direct result of Addison watching mommy put her clothes into her drawers?)

YEAH! It fits.

Side note about Addison's hood: I put it on her head this morning while I was working in the kitchen to try and distract her for a minute. She bent over, looked at her reflection in the oven, said, "mi?" (her word for mirror). I told her to go look, she ran to my room, looked at her reflection, laughed and left it on for the next two hours, every now and then reaching up, touching it and saying, "ha" (hat). Haha, silly girl.

We played with blocks. This was another moment Addison had to go look in the "mi." (What have I taught her?!)

We sorted beans and erasers (yes, I was a teacher, I have random supplies on hand).

She was so focused on this activity, and so good at sorting. I wasn't really sure how it would go, and was fine if she just wanted to touch, and scoop and dump, but she actually wanted to sort. She would pick out an eraser, put it in a measuring cup and then dump it in the extra bowl. She got a bean in the eraser bowl at one point and said, "bee?" (bean), "uh-oh" as she picked it out and put it back in the big tub. How cute is she! :)

Lesson of the day: Get a little creative. Stalk some creative people's blogs. Have craft supplies on hand, and salt (which we didn't have, so that will have to wait for another day). And, include your little toddler in whatever you're doing. I wish I would have gotten a picture of Addison helping me make corn bread tonight. She had a blast, and all she did was dump the measuring cups into the bowls.

YEAH for Snow days!! :)

Baby Bump

Have you heard?!! We're having baby number two. Haha. Here are some things about our little, growing, baby girl...

How far along: 21 weeks (and a couple days)

Size of Baby: three quarters of a pound and 10 1/2 in. (according to the website)

Maternity Clothes: I am in mostly all maternity clothes. I started wearing maternity pants a lot sooner this time than last (last time I was still in regular pants with a bella band...sigh), but to my credit, I also already owned them this time, so why not? ;) I can still wear some normal shirts, but am most comfortable in maternity tops. I just received two more pair of maternity pants/jeans in the mail today that I am super excited about. And yes, they just "appeared" in the mail. :)

Gender: It's a GIRL!!

Movement: With every sonogram/fetal heart monitoring that has been done (and trust me I have had my fair share of both this go around), the nurse comments on how much this baby moves. And, it has never been the same nurse to make that comment. I only feel her when I get still. I feel her movements still really low. I don't remember feeling Addison move this low down.

Food Cravings: rainbow sherbet, something about rainbow sherbet just seems to go really well with my pregnancies

Food Aversions: potato chips, cheese-its, goldfish crackers, pretzels, basically that entire food group (yes, I consider that a food group). I craved these things sooo much at the beginning of my pregnancy, and now I am not even tempted by any of them (thank goodness!).

What I Miss: sleeping on my back, and eating something besides TUMS for dessert

Sleep: it's actually starting to get better, I seem to have found a rhythm with the whole potty break in the night and not really wake up thing

Symptoms: heartburn, and slight back aches, and I can't use my left foot to do things like take off my right shoe, close a drawer, scoot something over (I know that's a weird one, but it's big to me because I keep forgetting and then there's the pain...if I could just remember...), oh and I tend to forget a lot of things... :)

Best Moment this Week: getting the new baby bedding in! it's adorable!!

What I am Looking Forward to: my ultrasound on Thursday morning, just love seeing this baby girl!

Here is my 21 week baby bump. I didn't take baby bump pictures with Addison and am determined to this time, although it's taken me 21 weeks to get one taken. Hopefully, posting this picture will keep me motivated to take these pictures.

OH! I almost forgot! Due date is June 10th! Eight days after our fourth anniversary. :)