The baby bump is coming along! This picture was taken on Friday when David and I went out. We celebrated our wedding anniversary (3 years!) a bit late this year, but you know what they say - better late than never! Our actual anniversary was on Wednesday, but we couldn't get a sitter for David during the week so we put it off for a few days. Didn't really matter in the end. We had a great time.

I have my big ultrasound in 11 days! We'll find out how this kiddo is doing and (hopefully) get a peek at the gender. I am now over 18 weeks so whatever we see is what it is. Ultrasounds at this stage are very accurate. I am still feeling pretty good. I am having some trouble sleeping due to leg cramps and the constant need to pee, but every morning, by the grace of God, I wake up refreshed and energized. I am so grateful that He is on my side. I don't know what I would be doing right now with out His strength, patience and joy. I'd be pretty miserable.

In other news, we are going camping this week. Am I crazy? Yeah, I think I am. Going camping with a toddler at 4.5 months pregnant? Good move! David, David and I are going with David's parents and his sister and her kids. None of us have a ton of recent camping experience so this should be quite the adventure. I'm sure I will have loads of stories to share with you all when I get home this weekend. We will be gone Thursday and Friday night and will come home Saturday afternoon. This trip is going to fall in the middle of a week and a half long vacation for David. He is off work starting today and won't go back until October 1st. Whoo Hoo! I sense some family time coming on!

It's rainy and gloomy outside today, but let's go make the best of it! It's the last full day of summer. Fall officially begins tomorrow evening. Happy Fall everyone!

It came back to haunt me.

So I was sitting on my couch, watching my news, eating a salad and minding my own business when this pesky (but adorable) little boy came running up to me begging for food.
"Bites, please" he signs to me.
Man! He's a cute one - and polite too! His mommy did a good job. She must be very proud. :) Anywho, he was calling me Mom and acting like he knew me or something so I humored him and talked for a minute.
"Are you hungry, little boy?" I asked him sweetly.
"Yeah, Mom." He says.
"Well that's too bad," I tell him. "because I just have a salad and you don't like salad. It has lettuce and tomatoes and gooey dressing and....hey kid, where are you going with my croutons?"
The little stinker plucked my croutons off the top of my salad and took off running. What in the world? He should know that the croutons are my favorite part and the only reason I eat salad! Who does he think he is?!?

Oh yeah, my son. I never should have done that to my poor father as a kid. It's coming back to haunt me.

Praising God....

...for no more migraines! What an answer to prayer! I had daily migraines for about 6 weeks straight and now I'm down to occasional regular type headaches. Praise God! I also have renewed energy and the morning sickness is gone!

I am now 17 weeks pregnant which marks the end of my 4th month. So many of the early pregnancy symptoms have ceased to exist (finally) and I am feeling a lot more human now. I still have my occasional mood swings (and when it does, you better duck!) and I'm finding it much harder to sleep at night. My belly is growing more now and I have been feeling the baby kick for 5 weeks. I have had strangers starting to ask about another baby on the way. With the growing baby comes squished internal organs and decreased lung capacity. How pleasant, right? I have definitely been feeling the lung part. I am so easily out of breath - over doing nothing!! I guess it's a nice excuse to take it easy though. :)

I was having some minor issues about 3 weeks ago. Don't worry though, the baby and I are both fine. My doctor wanted to do an ultrasound at the time just to be sure though. Our first ultrasound came at 7 weeks. All we could see then was a blob. The baby hadn't yet developed arms or legs and it's head was still bent over and not square on it's shoulders. It looked sort of...blobish. With this ultrasound at 14 weeks, we could see a face with eyes, nose, mouth, chin and forehead. We got to see arms, legs, fingers and toes, umbilical cord and it's heart beating. *sigh* It does a mommy's heart a lot of good to see all those things. :) We were slightly too early to tell what the gender was, but the ultrasound tech gave an educated (unofficial) guess. She thinks it's another boy! We were instructed not to buy anything in blue yet because we were still technically a week to early to give an official answer to our question. Until the 15th week, the baby's intestines are outside of the body forming in the umbilical cord. At 14 weeks on my ultrasound she could have been seeing umbilical cord and bulgy intestines or "boy" parts. I have another ultrasound scheduled for early October. We'll see then!

Family Time

This fall has provided us with the most beautiful and precious family time. We have been to grape fest fireworks in Paw Paw, one night camping with a two night trip planned for later this month, celebrated the youngest member of the family and dedicated him to the Lord, helped with some home canning of tomatoes, peaches and salsa, had a fabulous cook out for Labor Day and we went over to Jackson to see the show at the Cascades. Whew! We've been busy, but it's a good kind of busy. There is nothing in life more important than your family.

There was a time back in the day when our family was not quite this close and we craved the opportunity to do this kind of stuff. Hallelujah! That day is here. Unfortunately, on the flip side, David and I have been really cruddy friends and have not made any real attempt to hang out with all of them. We're hoping all our friends will still be our friends here in a week or two when we try to call them and talk!

Everyone goes through phases in life I guess. We call this one Family Time and it's one we'll cherish.

It's fall already?!

Why, hello there September! You sort of snuck up on me! Not to make things awkward, but where's August? I wasn't quite ready to say goodbye to it yet. Oh! Look at that. You brought chilly weather and changing leaves with you. How pretty. Let me grab my camera. Good. That's a nice one for the scrapbook. I'm a little chilly. Would you like to warm up with a cup of tea? Hot cider maybe? I have donuts to go with it. Tempting isn't it? Don't indulge in too many. November will be here any day now with Thanksgiving and you know the tasty treats that brings! Oh my, September! You're showing your sunny side. This is nice. I don't even need my jacket. Let's spend a few more days like this together. You know what, September? I think I like you. I'm not really all that sad about losing August anymore.

Mmm! Tasty!

Haha. Here's a good story that I couldn't resist sharing. Enjoy!

Yesterday, little David had eggs, toast and yogurt for breakfast. He was pretty full by the end and didn't finish all his yogurt. I put the half eaten container back in the fridge and saved it for lunch. Every time I opened the fridge all morning he looked in, saw his yogurt and asked for bites. Right before lunch, David and I were sitting in the living room. Little David was wandering the house and playing with his toys. He disappeared into the kitchen for a while, but we didn't worry. He does that often and usually ends up playing with my pots and pans. After a few minutes we heard him saying "Mmm, Mmm!" from the kitchen. He has no access to food so David and I threw each other some worried and curious looks. Before we could even go investigate, he came wandering into the living room with his half eaten yogurt cup and a messy finger. He walked right up to me, stuck one finger in the container, licked it off and said "Mmm!" and laughed in my face. What in the world?! I was very thankful that he was neat and clean about it though. Only his one finger was messy. But seriously, how does he consistently manage to amaze me?!? How does he all of a sudden, in one minute, learn to open the fridge? What the heck! What do I need to do? Watch him constantly EVERY single second of the day and never let him out of my sight?...Oh wait, I probably should.

Bottom line: We decided right after lunch yesterday that it would be a good idea to start using the fridge latches we bought a few months ago. :)

Snapity snap!

Little David learned to "snap" today. So cute!!! He and David were listening to some music on the computer. The song "That's Amore" came up. David put his arms in the air and started snapping to the music. Little David was quite captivated. He watched for a while and then tried. Turns out it's harder than it looks! :) They replayed the song again and little David kept on trying the whole snapping thing. By the end on the song he had us rolling on the floor laughing at him. He gave up snapping the traditional way like everyone else does and created his own little way. He puts his hands in the air with his fingers in little pinchers just like Daddy and rubs his thumb and first finger together. It doesn't make any noise on it's own so he had to improvise. He clicks his tongue up and down to make the "snap" noise. It's about the cutest thing I've ever seen. And let's be honest, he's done some REALLY cute stuff before! I'm trying to get a video of it. Be on the lookout!