This feels GOOD.

Today I have the afternoon off, which will be the first of my Mondays off for the rest of the year! It feels so good to be home and playing with Michael and getting things DONE like laundry, grocery shopping, and meal prepping. You know, all those important things!

I've really enjoyed subbing and the extra income, but now I am ready to slow down a bit. I figure if I'm not getting paid much, I might as well enjoy the perks of having free time. Right?? We had a busy week last week with me going into school every day, plus Scott's parents stayed two nights, my dad visited for two mornings, and my mom and sister were here (and babysat!) on Friday night. It was great to see everyone! This week we are getting ready to host Scott's sister and her family and I think we are going to have a really fun weekend.

Here's a little picture of my snack monkey!

Updates

Wow, it has been a busy week! Where did the time go? Here are some quickie updates for you all:

• Today is my last day of (scheduled) subbing, except for Monday when I am helping another friend, but I'm not counting that.
  
• Scott moved into his new office this week and he's been super busy with late nights getting everything in the right place. It is a really beautiful office, I will have to stop by now that it is all finished and take some photos to share!
• Michael has started saying "Oh!" and "Uh-oh!" very excitedly and pointing with his finger. He loves to look out the window and point at all the things outside. I'm not sure really what he is looking at, but it sure seems exciting. He is really babbling and saying a lot of things that sound like words.
• We are going to a post- holiday party tonight and my mom and sister are watching Michael! I'm really excited!
  

Have a great Friday!

Swimming!!

I finally remembered to take my camera with me to swimming time. I really like the photos I took, mostly because Michael looks like such a big boy. He looks especially big compared to the little roly poly infants in the class! Seeing those little babies makes me really excited to be getting a new baby at house too. I wanted to take some pictures of the little chubby babies, but I figured that would probably be weird. You'll just have to trust me- they were cute.

Michael went down the big slide all by himself! I helped him up the stairs the first time, but then he didn't even need me at all.

I realized as I looked back on these photos that it looks like Scott and Michael are the only people in the pool. There are actually quite a few people in his class (10, maybe?) and the instructor is super awesome. I cropped the other people out because I sure as heck would not want a photo of me in my bathing suit appearing somewhere in blog land! Eek! :o)

Next week is our last class and then we are hopefully signing up for the 2nd class which runs in February.

Toy Organization

This morning we are skipping our dance class and decided to have a low key morning at home. I've been working Friday afternoons and while I like getting out of the house, it is too hard to try and do something in the morning and then try and get ready to go again to school and childcare.

I have been really overwhelmed lately with the amount of TOYS that are all over my house!!! I'm sure many of you have this same feeling, and I'm sure I will be dealing with it forever.

I weeded out the upstairs toys and books and took two big clothes baskets of them downstairs. I just kept one basket of books, one basket for library books, and then two baskets of toys that we store in the bottom of a bookshelf. Here is what we were left with upstairs:



I just feel so much better about the state of my house if there are not a million toys in the main living area and I can actually pick them up and put them away.

In the basement we keep our toys in a little area behind the big sofa. I bought this shelf on sale at Target after Christmas for $40. I actually have one in a different color buried deep in our storage room so hopefully someday I can utilize that as well.

It felt good to get all the toys sorted a little bit and put away. Before they were just all sort of piled up behind the couch and you couldn't even walk around.

I also had these white storage things from my college dorm room/apartment and I'm glad I could use them again. They don't really match but I'm just glad I can get the toys off the floor. Michael really loves taking the bins out and dumping the toys so I guess he's getting some entertainment out of the deal!

I found this great bucket at Target in the $1 section and I wish I would have bought more. So cute!

I sorted out all of the little people stuff and put them in one bin. We have so much! Yikes.

I like that the cubby holes are big enough to keep some of his little people sets.

It felt good to get most of the toys in one place. We had some baskets of toys in the TV area part of the basement and I moved them all back to the main area. In the process of sorting through all the toys I also weeded out 3 big plastic bins of baby toys that I can put away for the new baby. Things like links and soft toys that go on carseats. I had a TON of things like that and I think it helped to get them out of the mix.

After all the work, it's time to play!

I know the toy organization won't last forever, but for right now it is saving my sanity!

Have a great Friday!

Sweet baby boy

How is it that big boys (even when acting silly) can look like little babies when they just have their diaper on?


p.s., this sweet baby boy is getting a haircut today! Like in a few hours....I just can't stand it anymore. He has a hockey mullet!

22 Weeks

I'm going to start doing my baby #2 updates on Tuesdays because....that is when the new baby will be born!!

As of right now our due date is schedule for Tuesday, May 17th. Can you believe it? At times it seems so far away, other times so close!

We had our ultrasound last Friday and the baby look really good. It was all bunched up into a little ball so we didn't get very many good ultrasound pictures but I am totally okay with it. We'll see the real baby soon enough!

I've was shocked to hear the baby has grown from 6 oz. at 17 weeks to 14 oz. at 22 weeks. So you are right...I have also just gained half a pound! :o) Ha, no seriously. I've been trying really hard to be aware of healthy eating and I've been weighing myself mostly every day just so I can keep tabs on how things are going. My blood pressure was excellent (I'm always worried about it since it got high when I was pregnant with Michael) and I passed my early glucose screening.

I have really been feeling great. I've had some back pain but even just doing a little stretching every day does wonders. At school one of the teachers congratulated me and said I didn't even look pregnant! She is a good fibber. :o)

We are so excited for the new baby's arrival and are busy making preparations! I'll keep you updated!

Please?

I was trying to take a photo of Michael yesterday to use for our Valentines and he was having a hard time sitting still. So I decided to do what any awesome parent would do and bribe him with a treat. Yes...just like a puppy dog. He really wanted it and would sign "please, please" until I gave it to him. He was so cute!

He knows a couple of signs, but usually he will just do them all in a row to say that he wants something. It's usually a combination of eat, milk, and please. We rented the Signing Times video from the library and are working on a few more signs to add to his vocabulary.

We had a great weekend with swimming again on Saturday and then relaxing the rest of the time. We even had one of my favorite nights ever- Papa Murphy's pizza and a movie at home! Thanks, Scott for suggesting it!

Baby #2 Update

I feel like I kind of sprung the #2 announcement on you guys as a little surprise and haven't provided many details since. I hope to start doing a weekly update with pregnancy progress, but here is a little back story.

I had just started my new full time working schedule when I felt like something was off. I was really crabby, tired, and had a headache every day. At first I thought it was just my lazy butt getting used to being at school so much but then there was that little thought in the back of my mind like....I think I might be pregnant. So sure enough, I was! I feel like once you have been pregnant before, there are no mistaking those feelings. When we were trying for Michael, every day I thought every little thing might mean I was pregnant but this time I just knew. Mother's intutition, maybe?

So this week I am 21 weeks along and we have our big ultrasound tomorrow. I am pretty excited, although it is hard to believe we are over halfway through. I am going to have a repeat C-section delivery and we'll pick a date so I'll deliver at 39 weeks. My OB is very supportive of VBAC's, but she said there just wasn't enough time between pregnancies to make it more of a reality so I'm fine with the repeat c-section. The good news is that right now (barring a ton more snow days) my 39th week is also the last week of school. So I won't have to take any time off and just come back at the beginning of the new year!

I've been feeling pretty good. I've had some weird stomach things going on in the beginning but I figured it was probably better than being really hungry all the time. This is the first month that I've gained weight and I'm trying to do a better job of eating healthy this time around. I've also felt more energized than I did with Michael, but usually I hit the hay around 8:30 every night instead of doing an afternoon nap.

Michael is such a fun guy and we love him so much. I can't imagine how much more love and happiness is going to be in our lives with another baby in the house. We can't wait! :o)

Thanks so much for all your kind thoughts and words!

Snow Day

Yesterday we had our first snow day of the school year! It was very snowy, windy and cold outside so I think they made a good call. I sent Michael to daycare and had a nice day catching up on some rest. I probably wouldn't have sent him if I wasn't feeling a bit under the weather, but sometimes I just feel like he has more fun playing with other kids at daycare than when he is home alone with me. On Monday I thought I had another round of the stomach bug, but luckily it passed in just a day or so. I went to school anyway and ate nothing but a roll of life savers all day. Healthy, right?

So now after a day off yesterday, I am all screwed up on my days this week. Isn't it funny how one different day can make everything else seem off? Today is my official day off and we have grocery shopping, library time, and errands planned. I'm excited to go back to story time, it is always good to have something planned in the morning to help structure the day and plus it gives me a good excuse to get to the library every week. After our last class ended it took me WEEKS to get our books back to the library...isn't that terrible? I paid my fines so hopefully they will let me check out books from them again.



I bought Michael one of those little chairs that hooks onto a countertop after drooling over them for months. I wish I would have bought it sooner! It is nice to have him hanging out with me while I am working in the kitchen and it's also easy to take downstairs or to travel with. I bought it on amazon.com and it came in just a few days and was about $50.



Oh Michael, you shouldn't smile with food in your mouth!

He looks like such a big boy in his new chair!

Week One Down

Well...one week in 2011 down.

It is so nice to have all the holiday business over with and have my house back to normal. Everything feels so much spacious and uncluttered now that I took all my Christmas stuff down. I am so glad I can finally stop being the Christmas tree police because by the end, the poor tree was not pretty at all. It took me forever to round up all the ornaments from all corners of my house! I think we are going to have to think of a new strategy for next Christmas.

It was a nice week back at school, nice to be back to the routine.

We also had a low key weekend with baby swim lessons on Saturday morning and then hanging out the rest of the time. I loved it!

Scott has really been into hockey lately. This winter he is playing adult league hockey on two different teams and I think he really likes the guys he plays with. They are planning a trip to Manitoba this summer (after the new baby is born!) to play against Scott's high school hockey coach's team.

So anyway, our pond finally re-froze after a big melt we had and the ice was really slippery! Scott had lots of fun skating all around it and Michael and I came outside to watch for a bit.

Michael was clearly excited....I think this is just his "I'm cold!" face!

I thought the ice was so pretty. We are in the process of finding me an old pair of skates so I can join him! To wrap up our weekend we watched HBO's 24/7 Hockey Special with the Capitals and Penquins (surprisingly good!) and Mystery, Alaska (which was also surpisingly good!). I think we have Miracle on Ice to watch later this week so I guess we are continuing with the hockey theme!

I hope everyone is staying warm out there today!

New Years Eve

Happy New Year!

We had a great time ringing in the new year with our friends at our house. This was our second new year's party in our newly finished basement. It is hard to believe we've had it finished for a year- we use it so much every day!

My first attempt at a group photo using my timer- I think this should be an annual tradition!

We all did a good job of staying up late by playing games, listening to music, singing to sing star, and watching football.

Kylie and Nate brought their twins with them and they were such good babies! We were wondering when do babies stop looking like babies and start looking like little boys?

Not too happy to get his photo taken! It's okay, I understand.

Michael continues to "play" with Scampy....I'm sure Scampy is going to reach his limit one of these days. The poor cat must be so traumatized.

It was nice to hang out, have fun, eat lots of food and ring in the new year! I would say we have 2011 off to a great start!