Just Refreshing

On April 7 we went up to Pinehurst NC to visit my BFF Lacey and her family for a few days.  It had been a year since we got up there, but with gas prices so high and it being a 6+ hour trip, it's just not an easy one to do no matter how much you want to do it.  It is so refreshing to get to just be with someone you miss so much.  I think the hubbys had a good time too and I know the kids did.  Grace had so much fun enjoying the bigger kids, though compared to Jane Dare who is 10 weeks older, she is a little wimpy.  I guess that's the difference between being the first baby and being the fourth, lol.  Since we've been home though she has been much more adventurous.  She has gone down a big twisty slide without hesitation and climbed up a "rock wall" type ladder up to a slide at my friend's place.  She still isn't drinking milk out of a sippy despite watching Jane Dare do it all weekend, but it will come in time I guess, lol.

Ryan & Lacey have the PERFECT kid backyard.  Swings and a slide, a huge sandpit and Grace's personal favorite - a HUGE trampoline.  She loved, loved, loved the trampoline.  She even did ok when the bigger kids were out with her.  I was impressed.  :)

She woke up with a fever Friday & Saturday nights and ended up sleeping with us for the first time since she was just weeks old.  I couldn't believe it.  I wasn't sure what was wrong as she was completely fine during the day, but when we got home she cut 2 molars so I'm guessing that was it.  She has always had a fever when she is ready to cut teeth and these were by far the biggest.

I never make enough time to take pictures because we're having so much fun, but here's a few pictures from our together...

This was our first morning there and all 3 girls just randomly happened to be in pink monkey pjs, too cute!

Ainsley enjoying the fire place and Reid,  being ALL boy, was climbing all over everything.

The girls had a blast watching David launch rockets

I think David enjoyed "jumping off" the big kids as much as the kids did - here he is with Jake in the background.  

Look at those beautiful blue eyes!  I can't believe how big my Jane Dare is!

At dinner one night Jane Dare and Grace were sharing with each other, it was very sweet.

It was a wonderful visit, I sure wish they lived closer! In the mean time I'm just grateful for the opportunity to just have a refreshing visit with 6 of my favorite people.

Major Mommy Fail

So today was the BIG day.  Grace has been talking about going pee pee and using the potty for a few weeks - she has even been saying "pee pee" and grabbing her diaper when she's wet.  She is no where near being ready at night, but if she wants to try to give up the diapers during the day, I'm on board.

So, we got the potty in, Dad & Linda left yesterday, and we pulled up all the rugs in the basement last night and today was going to be our first official potty training day.  I got her up and we went downstairs and I was prepared to spend our day with a naked 17 month old.   Except I forgot her books, her cereal and her juice.  I ran upstairs for less than 2 minutes to grab those 3 things and in that amount of time she peed twice and pooped once on the floor.  The real kicker - I didn't find the poop until I moved the desk chair and rolled over it.  Oh Joy.  20 minutes later I FINALLY got her, me, the floor and the wheels on the chair clean.  I took her back upstairs, put her in a diaper and we are going to wait a day or 2 for mommy's sanity to return before we try again.

Hope you're day started off a little more dry than ours.  I have Easter pictures including a recap of our time with Dad & Linda and our trip to NC from earlier this month coming soon, promise.

25 Weeks!

I can hardly believe we are already 25 weeks into this pregnancy.  I said to David the other day we have 15 more weeks to go and it kinda woke us both up.  He has said it's funny that with Grace there was SO much to do before the baby came...classes, reading, painting, shopping, etc and this baby is just gonna come.  I said we still had some prep work to do, but since we did everything gender neutral and we already have most of what we need there isn't much to do.  Most of what we need to buy and what we need to do is more for Grace than for the baby, go figure.  :)

It did encourage me to get moving though.  When we cleaned out the attic a few months ago I had sorted out all the gender neutral newborn layette, bottles, burp cloths, etc. and put everything in a big bin in the closet.  My stepmom generously offered to buy the dresser we need (which will eventually become Grace's but for now it will house all the baby's stuff) so we went to IKEA yesterday and bought it.  Last night I pulled out that bin and started washing the clothes.  Wow, it was so surreal to have this big belly and look at those tiny, tiny clothes that my sweet big girl used to fit in.  It's getting exciting!  Oh and speaking of big bellies...here I am at 25 weeks.

On Monday we had our follow up appointment with the perinatal specialists.  They said everything looks great and even though the baby had rotated positions and was forward facing, we still didn't get any great pictures.  I blame the tech this time, lol.  We did get this cute profile picture of our precious bean...

Baby Bilbo 24 1/2 weeks

The Doctor said they did want to continue to monitor us monthly which we are more than fine with.  It will be nice to get to see the baby a few more times in utero before he/she joins us in person.  We have decided to switch practices and go back to the Specialists we saw with Grace.  Their office is over by David's work so we can make midday appointments which should make it easier to get child care for Grace and David won't have to miss as much work.  Plus we were generally in and out in less than an hour with them and these last 2 appointments have taken forever.  We'll see if they agree we should continue to be seen monthly when we go in 3 weeks.  We'll keep you posted!

Just Plain Cute

Grace got this precious outfit from my friend Troy.  Troy has the BEST taste in everything and I have loved Grace in this outfit for the last few months.  We're coming to an end of our time in the 6-12 month footed apparel, so I had to get a few pictures of her in this one before she grows another inch and it won't fit anymore.  With the AC broken, and it being almost 80 degrees in our house, Grace has slept in this super cool, short sleeve outfit the last 2 nights and today we're having an all day PJ day.

You may be wondering about the "You're Special" balloon in the pictures.  Grace LOVES "boons" as she calls them.  Her Nana bought her the coolest big Happy Birthday balloon for her birthday and it lasted for almost 4 months!  Since it deflated she has been talking nonstop about balloons so when we went to Kroger the other day and they had this one non-occasion, likely to last balloon (with a slogan that just happens to apply to our sweet girl) I had to pick it up.  I saved more than $2 using my coupons so I was ok with it, lol.  Anyway, hope you enjoy these pictures I took this morning...

In Baby Bilbo news, we got to hear the heartbeat again last week and everything seems to be going great - Praise God!  We will have another ultrasound on the 18th and hopefully by then our little bean will be turned upward or forward so they can get all the pictures they need and hopefully get us some good ones too!