21 weeks

We've passed the half-way point!  Woo Hoo!

And we have a name!!!  Jamie named her new brother Cason.  We didn't have a name, and we liked it so there you go!  The middle name will be James (Daryl's middle name) and then we have the option of calling him C.J.

I have a vicious chest cold, so you will have to forgive the fact that I had no desire to go upstairs and put on the white T & shorts.

I am so ready for all of us to be well.  This head/chest cold has tormented the whole family (including extended family) and we need to be well before Easter since that is one of the holidays that we all spend together and we are hosting it this year (each year, we rotate who will host Easter, July 4th, Thanksgiving & Christmas).  Easter is the best for us since, all of the rest, I will either be huge pregnant or the new wee one will be here.

It's a BOY!

Hello Baby Boy!

We took Jamie with us to find out if baby is a boy or girl.  I'm not gonna lie, Jamie was pretty sad that she wasn't going to have a sister.  It took her a few hours to come to terms with the fact that she was going to have 2 little brothers, but after dinner, she decided she was happy with the idea of having another boy around.  She told me "I've changed my mind, I would rather have a boy than a girl."  Well, that's good, because that's what you are getting.  :-)

She decided over her chicken tenders that she wanted to pick out an outfit for him and buy him a toy to bring to the hospital to give to him, so of course that's exactly what we did.  Any steps towards acceptance are ones we will gladly support!

Now we have to come up with a name!  The making of the list has begun.

Soccer Begins

Jamie started soccer this week.  I had already planned on hosting my neighborhood Ladies Dinner that night, so Daryl took her.  He said every time she would kick the ball, she would stop, turn, and strike a pose.  Yep.  That sounds about right.

She picked out her cleats and socks.  So girlie.  :-)

She REALLY wants to be Goalie... When she plays soccer with her dad, she will get in front of the ball and stop it.  She is determined! 

So excited to dribble the ball.  She is actually pretty good at it.

19 weeks

So I gained back 3 of the 4 lbs I lost courtesy of the stomach virus.  Can I just say I was STARVING once I was back to my normal self.  Incidentally, during the throws of the bug, tiny tot decided to FINALLY start kicking like a champ.  I mean, it has been crazy since Tuesday night.  I feel #3 all day now, as opposed to just once a day before the bug.  I was kind of worried since I felt J & E so early and so often, it makes me happy that this one has decided to get going.  I can even see them move from the outside sometimes.

Jamie starts soccer this week, so I will post pictures of her first practice.

Potty training is still going on with Mr. Evan.  He is doing relatively well, but still gets lazy from time to time.  He also tries to hold it too long (but hey, he is going thru the night and his naps dry, so that is good).

On the illness front, the last one down is Daryl, but he is doing better.  I made him go to the doctor and they told him what OTC's to take so he is closer to his normal self today.  I'm ready to have my partner in crime back.  Luckily, Jamie is a trouper about going to bed on her own, so instead of her normal night time routine with daddy, we read a book in Evan's room while he has a snack (have I ever mentioned what a HORRIBLE eater he is? He will eat a chicken nugget and one bite of side item and then is done and starving by bed time) and then she goes off to her room and tucks herself in.  So grateful that she is such a little independent girl.  She is also a VERY big help to me. She is great with Evan and makes sure everything runs smoothly.  She is my 2nd in command, for sure!  She is SUCH a great big sister.  She lets Evan have "horsey rides" and plays so well with him.

For this week, I'm working the consignment sale at the church, so hopefully I will bring back tales of wonderful finds!   I wish I could shop for #3, but we don't find out until FRIDAY if it is a boy or girl.   How can I wait that long?!?!?!  haha.  We already knew at 17 weeks that Evan was a boy so this seems like F-O-R-E-V-E-R!!!!  At least I can shop the half off day for #3.  :-)

sharing is caring

So I know I am dreadfully behind on my post but this weekend brought not only snow flurries to play in, but also a "nice" variety of illnesses to our family. Jamie has a double eye infection and sinus infection.

And Evan had a stomach virus which he graciously shared with his mommy.  2 days later, so at least it wasn't at the same time.  And thank you to my mom who stayed with my while Daryl was out of town since I got sick the night he left!  

So here are the only belly shots I've been able to fit in our crazy last 2 weeks.

17.5 weeks

 18.5 weeks.... 

sorry for the weird pose.  I was taking a picture to show my SIL a shirt I bought and it ended up being my belly shot photo for the week.

UPDATE:  Now daddy has decided to join in on the fun.  Daryl now has a horrible head cold.  Which incidentally my dad also has (and they weren't around each other!!!)  Also, my grandma got the stomach bug from Evan and somehow our nephew also got it on the same day as Evan (and they, too, were never around each other in the week leading up to the illness...  ODD!!!!)

Destiny and Karma

Daryl has wanted a truck for almost 3 years.... maybe even longer than that.  We take our financial goals very seriously, so a number of stars had to align before he would even consider looking.  Also, he wanted to wait until the technology was overhauled.  Well February was THE month for everything to come together.  Daryl finally had the truck of his dreams picked out:  The Ram 1500 Laramie.  It is a super sweet ride.  We weren't planning to purchase one for a few more months, but a great deal came up at a local dealership so we went in for a test drive, but said we weren't buying that day.   We came back a few days later and decided to pull the trigger since the deals they were offering were actually really good.

We bring the kids with us and are all excited about sealing the deal on the truck.  Well they decide to start playing the back and forth game with the numbers and then, at the end, start throwing in all of these junk fees that they should have told us about in the beginning.  So we walk.  It was a $411 difference but, the thing is, we don't NEED the truck, but they NEED to sell it, so there.  Adios.  And for good measure, Daryl decided to tell the Sales Manager off for the shady dealings.  He told me all he could imagine was them trying to pull a fast one like that over one of our moms or my grandma and it just made him mad (to put it mildly).

So the search for the perfect truck continued and Daryl finds another dealership that was on top of their game. They talked everything through over the phone and email so all we had to do today was walk in and sign the paperwork.... and saved $2000+ over the offer from the last place.  Once all was said an done, we had mentioned the last place we almost bought from and they said "That is where this truck came from."  So lo and behold, Daryl DID end up with his original dream truck, for $2000+ less.  So HA to the other guys!

The Happy New Owner

 Jamie was VERY excited about Daddy getting a new truck.

16 weeks

I went for my monthly check-up last Thursday.  Baby's heartbeat is 142 and it took the doc forever to find it because he was looking too high.  He finally decided to try the exact same spot as last time ad found the heartbeat.... Doc then looked at me and said "you need to have a discussion with this baby about being so low, it is right on your bladder!"  No kidding!

15.5 weeks (Since I forgot to post)

16 weeks

My blood pressure was 100/60 and I've gained 4 lbs so far.  I'll take that.  We also scheduled the appointment to find out if tiny tot is a boy or girl!  I have NO inclination.  It will be exciting to find out.  SO much less pressure than the other two.  I REALLY wanted Jamie to be a girl and I REALLY wanted Evan to be a boy, so it is kind of nice going in not really caring either way and just getting to be surprised.  Jamie is excited because the doc said she could come with us to find out.  She can't wait.  I think she is the most excited to find out!

So potty training has gone very well.  We were worried that vacation might set back the progress Evan has made, since the whole time we were away, he never told us when he had to go, but the second we returned home, it was back to telling us.  Some days are better than others, but he is headed in the right direction.  We have some days where he tells us EVERY time, and some days we have to sit him down every so often.  I'm hopefully that he will be all set by the time the baby comes.

Trip to Gatlinburg

Woo Hoo!  We went on vacation!  We took the kids for an extended weekend to Gatlinburg & Pigeon Forge, TN.  We had a good time.  Evan is not as good as a traveler as Jamie has always been, but you work with what ya got.  We got right down to business Friday night by getting an old  timey photo of the kids.  They should enjoy this when they are older.

Saturday we went to Ober Gatlinburg for Jamie's 1st time skiing.  Dad went with her while I braved the kiddie snow zone with Evan.  Here they are getting their gear.

Evan and I in the Cubbie Zone.  A nice lady gave Evan a stuffed frog because he was cute.  Use your powers for good, not evil, Evan.

Jamie at Ski school.  She did really well!  She was skiing by the end and not falling at the end of the slope. Already leaps and bounds better than I did my 1st time!

The view.  Daryl went down twice, and then Evan was shot and Jamie was hungry, so our ski day was brief, but you gotta start somewhere!

Our hotel had a playground right outside of our room, so we took advantage of that a few times.  Jamie loved the big slides. (you can see our hotel in the background - http://westgateresorts.com/smoky-mountain/)

Sunday, Daryl took Jamie for an hour long horse back riding tour.  She loved it!  Their horse was named Lt. Dan and the tour guide gave Jamie one of his old horse shoes as a souvenir for her first real horse ride.

 Once they returned, Evan had woken up from his nap so we took the kiddos to the Ripley's Aquarium.  They loved it. They loved the sharks and Evan said "Fishy!" about 85,000 times.

We ended our vacation with Ice Cream & Indoor Glow-in-the-dark Putt Putt (because it was raining).  But still, a very fun way to end a great vacation!

The Prize

Daryl had a company meeting last night and had to work late, so my parents took the kids and me out to Stevi B's for dinner.  Jamie & Evan are all about the arcade room now.  I let Jamie play one game.  Luckily, she picked one of the games where you have a pretty good chance of winning.  It is one of those games where you can either win the cheapest thing-a-ma-bob or continue on to the more awesome prize (that there are only two of and they have been there for the last 2 months so you know they must be SO easy to win, right?)   But luckily, J got enough points to win the cheap prize.  I didn't even tell her there was an option to continue.  She just wants to win.   Here is the spoils of my dollar and her lifting a lever 3 times.

Afterwards, she said something along the lines of "I don't even want it, but I WON IT! So give it to me, yeah!"  So at the end of the day, it isn't about WHAT you win, it is that you WON.  :-)

freaky belly....

so this is weird...

here is my belly last night...

And here it is this morning.

It does this every day, so how pregnant I look depends on what time of day you see me.

I see this and want to sing "Sally the Camel has one hump, Sally the Camel has no hump."

14 Weeks

14 weeks.... and I feel huge (compared to where I was with Jamie & Evan).  Oh well.  Last kid, right?  Right?  I've gained 5 lbs (I'd only gained 1 or 2 with Evan. ugg). Oh well, I'm STILL 8 lbs lighter than when I started with Evan - shout out to training for a marathon, woot woot!  At least everything else has gone smoothly.  No morning sickness (which would probably explain the weight gain) and the fatigue is gone now, so I've been able to run some.  I've been going for 3 mile walks the last few days and that has been nice.  Daryl has a fitbit now, too, so we have been "competing" to see who can get the most steps in a day - although SO not fair when he goes for 6 mile runs!!!  ;-)

Look!  She wears real clothes!

I figure the random "real clothes" picture is in order.  :-) Check out the fitbit in my pocket.  I'm dedicated.

Jamie had rodeo day at school.  I thought she looked so stinkin' cute! 

Evan can reach the pedals on the Jeep now.... oh no.  So he can push the gas, but neglects the steering wheel.  nice.

Evan had his 2 year check up.  He is 29 lbs and 35 in tall.  He didn't have to have any shots so that was a nice surprise.  I guess that preemptive Tylenol was the reason he took a 3.5 hour nap.  He is getting one of his last two molars, so that is probably why he slept so good.

13 weeks

Welcome 2nd trimester!  Woo Hoo!

So far I've had a really easy pregnancy.  It has been nice!  The only things going on now are a daily mild headache that one dose of Tylenol takes care of and I get these freaky heart palpitations.  I've had them for as long as I can remember but they've always been just here and there but I seem to have at least one episode a day (I had about 4 last night).  Not cool but I figure it is just all the extra blood in my system these days.

Evan is ALMOST potty trained!!!!  YAY!  We switched to real undies and after a few accidents in real underwear, he realized how uncomfortable that was and is now telling us when he needs to go even when dressed.  I'm glad to know my son can wear clothes again.  :-)    He even held it all night long and woke up with a dry diaper (which was much nicer than the night-before-last when he woke up at midnight and 5AM to go to the potty).   I got him Thomas the Train briefs and he put them on and said "Tombin?!?!  Wow Wee!"  hahaha

Jamie has snack this week at preschool.  In an effort to exert, you know, effort, I made the below cookie cake (the letter of the week is J).  I can't rotate it.  sorry.

Jamie went to a tea birthday party for her friend Marleigh.  Jamie's tea was pretty much milk and honey, but she enjoyed it and had a great time getting her nails painted, eating finger foods, and decorating a magic wand.

That night Daryl & I went to our SIL's 40th birthday party. We had a great time but getting home at midnight was tough on this old lady that is used to going to bed at 8:30. I am So...lame...  

But luckily, Nana spent the night after watching the kids for us and let us sleep in.... ahhhhh.  

Later that day, we went shoe shopping with Nana.  We had a girls day.  We went to Red Lobster for lunch and then went to every place we could think of in the mall to buy Jamie some lace up tennis shoes so she can learn to start tying.  You would think we were looking for the Ark or something.  After about 6 stores we FINALLY found some in her size.  Hallelujah!  

Needless to say, Jamie shopped until she dropped.

The Easy Way Out

My son is smart.  Way smarter than he lets on.  He is potty trained.... but he has kept this fact a closely guarded secret.  So tonight, I stripped him down after his nap and let him run around nekkid.  Lo and behold!!!!  The child knows how to use a potty!   It seems when he doesn't have the inconvenience of having to take his clothes off, he is more than happy to run over to the potty and go.  So far he is 3 and 0.  So we are going to try and keep him stripped for a few days and see if he gets used to the idea of the potty and hopefully he can start dressing like a civilized person again.  Wish us luck, this boy is STUBBORN!  :-)  1-22-13:

1-23-13: UPDATE:
The child has gone to the potty at LEAST 10 times today and another two for #2. Every single time, he asked to go.  He never went when I asked him if he needed to go he just looked at me and said "no way!" the ONLY accident that happened today was when he asked to wear his pants.  After the accident, we went back to bare bottom and that ended the accidents.  So I guess he will just be naked for the rest of his life....  ;-)

12 weeks

We are at the home stretch of the first trimester.  Woo hoo!  Just one week left and hello second trimester!

I had the New OB visit this week.  Baby's heartbeat was 164 and my BP was 104/63.  The vials of blood were taken and it didn't cause massive bruising this time around, so yay for that!  :-)

Jamie spent the night with Nernie for the first time this weekend and had a blast.  I remember how much grandmomma spoiled me when I would stay with her so I can only imagine the amount of decadency that took place for the GREAT-granddaughter.

Nernie & Jamie and J's 5th birthday

I've tried to start running again and it is Sllloooowwww going, but at least I'm trying, right?  I'm sticking to 3 miles for now since it has been so long since I've REALLY ran.... I ran a 10k race at a respectable pace on the day I found out I was pregnant and pretty much stopped after that due to weather, morning sickness, life, blah blah blah.  So now I'm trying to get back in the habit of running 3 days a week.... uggg....  It is hard to be motivated to do so when you don't have a race and you know you can't really improve because you are only gonna get more pregnant.  BUT it is healthy for me and baby so run I shall.  Now Daryl, he is returning to his running rock star state.  He has slacked off with me, but now he has the GA half on the horizon so he is kicking it back into high gear.  That is helping me to stop being a slacker.  If he can go and knock out 9 fast miles, I can jog 3 measly miles.

Happy Birthday, Nana!

We celebrated Nana's 76th Birthday this weekend.  We went to Cheesecake Factory - oh yum! - and then went back to her place for gifts and ice cream cake.  

mmmmm cake.... 

Here are some pics from the day:

Nana and her boys.

Jamie photo-bombed about half the pictures.  haha.  So this became a Ladies Picture instead of a Daughter-in-law picture.  :-)

 Yea.... we took the pictures AFTER we ate ice cream... not such a great idea with my kids. oh well.  :-)

11 weeks

And here we are at Week 11.  I go to the New OB visit this week.  Thanks, past blog posts, for reminding me that I get 85 vials of blood taken at this appt.... awesome.  I am totally popping out, but I think it is mostly from too much birthday cake.  uggg.... so off to workout I go. haha.

So I have to tell you about something Evan does when they have TV time in the mornings.  They each get to pick a show to watch, and whenever it is Jamie's turn, he turns to her, points and wags his finger at her and yells "NOOOO!!!  My Show!!!!"   Oh son.... he HATES it when it isn't his turn.  He is also starting to blame Jamie for things that he OBVIOUSLY did.  So funny.  You ask him "who broke that?" and he says "Jamie did it."  Nice.... real nice. 

Happy 2nd Birthday, Evan!!!

Our sweet boy turned 2 today.  Hard to believe that 2 years ago we were in the midst of an ice storm and today we wore short sleeves and played outside!  Evan had a small party with our family and it was Train Themed (of course).  He got tons of train gifts and loved them ALL!  He is just growing like a weed.  He is really trying to consistently make sentences beyond two words now.   He follows Jamie around like a little puppy.  He has to do everything she does and be where she is. It is so sweet when they snuggle on the couch while watching a show.  He adores her and Jamie loves him too.  She likes to take care of him and baby him.  She says he is her first baby, haha.  She picked out a pretty dress to wear to his party and said that he looked older when she saw him after he woke up.  I think today would have been sad for me if we didn't have another one on the way.  I can't believe my baby is TWO!!  He is just a ray of sunshine.  So funny.  So sweet.  Cute as a button.  Every boo boo needs a kiss and is instantly better.  Everybody gets a hug when they leave.  Every neighbor gets waved to as they go by.  Every plane is worthy of being pointed out.  Every dog should be petted.  Every afternoon can be made better with bubbles.  and Anytime is a good time to "Brush teef!"  (he has great oral hygiene)  ;-)

We bought a Thomas cake and he loved it!  He was so excited. He couldn't wait to eat it.

Picture time!

Nana

 Memaw & Paw Paw

Nernie

Uncle David & Aunt Deeshia

Cousins Caleb & Chase

 SMILE!!!

Cousins