Ready For The Catwalk

Round 3 of pregnancy has resulted in a kind of painful varicose vein and my doctor strongly recommended wearing compression socks to help.  So I went ahead and got some, thinking it might be a good idea for when I know I'll be on my feet a lot.

We got a real kick out of how they advertised a smooth opaque fabric for an "attractive appearance".

Even better?  I got open toed socks so I can wear them with my flip flops all summer!  AND it's quite the work out to even get them on, so there's that benefit too.

I may feel like an 80 year old woman, but I have to say- after wearing them for the first time, I think I can tell a difference!  Compression socks for the win!

Waaaaaiiiiiiiiiting For SPRING!!!

Much like the rest of you, we are getting impatient in our wait for Spring's arrival.  Yet, we just keep waiting and trying to find things to fill our time, because that's all we can do!

Lots of play doh time.  Sawyer gets to play with it until he starts eating it.  Then he just gets the toys.  And don't worry- he has since gotten a haircut!

We did Easter eggs with the kids for the first time this year.  They loved it!  We did it late though since we were in Florida up until Easter weekend.  You know, one of those places where it's warm??? Siiiighh.....

It was Oh Happy Day when mommy said they could use their fingers and hands instead of paintbrushes!

This kid and his obsession with shoes.  I keep saying number 3 really needs to be a boy because there's so much female influence around these parts!  He also likes the princess crown which I don't mind as much because I can just say he's a king or a prince.  But the princess slippers???  I guess if this next one is a girl we'll just roll with it!

We've finally been able to get outside a little the last couple days.  YAY!!  Looks like another round of cold/possible snow is coming though.  Surely it's the last one.  You would think.  Until then, we'll just keep waaaaaiiiiiiting.

FMB 2018

Oh Florida, how we love you!  We had such a great week at Fort Myers Beach this year.  We left Sawyer with my parents and had so much fun with just Summer!  Aaron and Cassie also left their youngest so we piled into a van with them for the trek down and back.  

Oh, this girl.  Last year on the way down she slept AWFUL.  And I do mean awful.  We had high hopes that she would do better through the night this year.  Our hopes were crushed.  I can't say I blame her too much, not being able to move around in her seat at all when she's used to tossing and turning all over the place.  But really- it was like, every 20 minutes she would wake up and whine and cry and be totally irrational. And she does have an annoying whine.  Especially when you are also feeling irrational because it's 3 in the morning and she just won't sleep for more than 20 minutes at a time.  Not fun.  And that was with an adult dose of melatonin!  Siiiiiggghhhhh.....

Finally after breakfast she fell into a nice peaceful sleep.  For about 30 minutes.  But at least there was no more whining when she woke up.

Our first visit to the ocean for the year.  I definitely prefer lounging by the pool, but Summer looooved the beach.  Would have spent all day every day there if she could.  Thankfully she has a daddy who was pretty willing to take her!

Our Sunday afternoon tradition is to go to Sun Harvest Citrus to taste their amazing juice samples, load up on oranges and grapefruit, and get ice cream.

We were the mean parents who didn't get Summer her own ice cream cone and so she went begging to others to get her fill.  She found one generous cousin who would take a bite of her cone,....

..... and then kindly offer a bite to Summer.  That went on for most of the cone!

There is a library with a great kids section just down the road from where we stay and we went there one day after breakfast.  It's kind of a nice break from the sun for us fair skinned types:)  It also just happened to be story hour when we got there so we got to participate in that.  It was agreed that our normal story hour is better!

This hole got bigger and bigger as the week went on.  The kids all had a great time with the excavation project!

Sunset on the pier one night.

Another favorite of Summer's: bike rides with Daddy.  If you haven't noticed the trend, Daddy is the more adventurous one who Summer likes to tag along with!  Mommy enjoys sitting by the pool reading books:)

Cousins, cousins, cousins!!

We went to a lot of yummy restaurants, and while I am not typically a selfie person, sometimes a long wait requires taking some to kill the time.

One of our annual breakfast spots has this fun pond filled with fish and turtles and some animal statues around it.  These three cuties had a grand ole time jumping off of the alligator until the one of the right took a hard fall and came face to face with the concrete:(

When we started the week, Summer was still petrified of swimming by herself.  Holding onto an adult with both hands was the only way she felt safe and didn't freak out.  By the end of the week she could swim all around.  Still not ready to jump in or put her face in the water but for now?  Mission accomplished!

So much fun in the sun!

We left Friday night but went to grab a quick bite to eat before hitting the road.  Summer had woke up at 6:30 in the morning which is almost 2 hours earlier than normal.  But she was doing great and not getting crabby so we didn't have her take a nap.  Come supper time though, she couldn't do it anymore and fell asleep on Danny's shoulder while we waited for our supper.  We had gotten it to go so once we got back to the room she nestled in for a nice nap.

The night time travels went a teeny weeny bit better on the way home and we didn't hit any traffic.  Still, we were glad to be off the road and out of the van!  And glad to see our Sawyer Boyer.  We are thinking next year won't be quite so care free since we are planning to have three kids with us instead of just one.  Bring it on???

Fun Family Weekends

We are heading to Florida soon and I realized I still haven't posted about some fun family times we've had in the last month or so!  A couple of great back to back weekends- first with my family and then with Danny's.

Getting to spend time with cousins you rarely see is always a great time.  Especially when they are old enough to read books to you and you love to be read to!

I also got to see one of my besties that weekend and enjoy some lunch at her coffee and pie shop.  Twas a treat!  (Her and the food!)

The next weekend we headed a couple hours north to a giant house with Danny's family.  This place had an indoor pool, hot tub, and gym!

Summer really enjoyed the hot tub and started to overcome some of her fears of swimming without a death grip on a nearby adult.

However, she IS her mother's daughter and the big pool was still a little much for her to conquer on her own.  So on the sidelines she sat.  That was me growing up.  Okay it still is a little bit:)  Anyway, hopefully a week in FL will help that along???

Buddy was locked out of the pool area and had to stay in the other part of the house.  Don't worry- there were adults nearby.  But he was not very pleased about it!

But then he got to have some one on one time in the gym with mommy so that was a little bit better.

These were also the weekends we told our families we were expecting.  For my side, we just came out and said it.  My brother asked why we were there and I told him it was either that weekend or not for another couple of months.  Plus we like to tell people in person when we're expecting.  Then we got to watch them all react:)

For Danny's side, we secretly set out my positive pregnancy test in the breakfast line and just waited for someone to find it.  I mean, it was right there by one of the egg casseroles.  But we went through the entire breakfast and NOBODY saw it!  Finally once we were cleaning up and most people had moved on with their lives someone noticed and the news was out!

And that's that!

My Next 16 Years...

For all you non country music people out there, that title is reminiscent of Tim McGraw's song about his next 30 years:)  So recently, like just a few weeks ago, I finished reading through my entire blog, start to finish.  I enjoy doing that from time to time because it's just a big scrapbook of my life from 2005 until now.  Now, I realize 2005 was not 16 years ago.  But 2002 was, and 2002 marks the beginning of four different four year segments of my life.

2002-2006

In June of 2002 I moved into my first apartment with two other girls.  We affectionately dubbed it "The Hangout" because shortly before we moved in there was a rumor that someone in that apartment complex had hung himself from the second story balcony.  Classy, I know.  That complex was a little sketchy all around and it wasn't uncommon to come home to cops all over the place.  But we survived and had a lot of good times, and after one year we moved into a duplex where two more girls joined us.  This was a time in my life where all (or most at least) of my friends were still single, and we had the best of times.  It was also before I entered the age of digital and have no pictures on my computer to show for it.  I thought about doing a picture of a picture and putting it on here but I am feeling a little too lazy to do that, so words will have to do.  I did flip through a few old photo albums from that time, and one of the albums has a logo on the front that says "Fabulous People And Places".  And those four years were absolutely filled with just that.  However, life changes so much and so many of the people that made up this time in my life now just live in my memories.  Those four years were FUN and footloose and fancy free.  Then I moved to Alabama.

2006-2010 

When I knew God was calling me to Alabama, oh how I fought it. Tooth and nail.  I was far too busy enjoying the life I had.  It was good and I had no desire to leave it.  I had a serious case of FOMO before FOMO was even a thing. (Fear Of Missing Out).  I feared being forgotten.  I feared being single for the rest of my life.  I just KNEW that Alabama would be a drag.  But the Sprit's prompting was so strong and it won over the flesh, praise God for that!  If you know me at all, you know how much I loved Alabama.  How much it shaped me and grew me into who I am today.  How, even now, I still have days where I dream of living there again someday.  That's not to say there weren't hard times down there.  Lots of homesickness, a few tough relationships that come with being with the same people for basically everything, and almost all of the friends from that first four years getting married.  I remember looking at a big group picture from something and realizing that every person in that picture had gotten married except me.  As much as I loved AL, it wasn't always a bed of roses!  But I worked with some great kids.  And one of the things I loved most about that preschool was how family oriented it was.  I didn't just know the kids, but also their parents, siblings, grandparents, and even a few aunts and uncles.  Some of my weekends were spent going to t-ball games and birthday parties for my kids.  I always had such a longing to have my own children, but since it wasn't in God's plan yet, he gave me those kids.  Those were MY kids and I poured my heart and soul into them.  Not only that, I had some awesome people from church that filled in some of the loneliness of being away from family.  A small church becomes your family.  There were some great stand ins when I didn't have my own!  Also during those four years, God brought a group of friends into my life who would be there for me when I moved back home.  And there was one guy I met while I was down there that eventually would become my hubby but I sure wouldn't have guessed that when I met him!  Just like the first four years, these can be labeled as FUN, but also very stretching and growing.

2010-2014

When I moved back to IL from AL, I cried just as hard as when I first moved down there.  Go figure.  This was actually more of a 3 1/2 year span, but for the sake of continuity, we'll go with an even four:)  This was a time of deepening a lot of relationships.  I hadn't been able to spend a lot of time with my sister-in-law or my oldest niece when I was in Alabama, and this time span really helped solidify those relationships.  I had a lot of good quality time with family and friends, and had the chance to do things I will never again do.  Like spending six weeks in Mexico trying to learn Spanish!  I had some very rich experiences during this time.  It was also a time of a great identity crisis.  When I moved back, I wasn't sure what life would end up looking like.  The things I had originally set out to do weren't really happening, I floated around between a few different jobs, and I was back living with my parents which was something I thought would never happen.  I had so many questions and I just felt like God was silent for a long time.  Eventually the doors did open for me to get started in the OTA program and I finally felt like I had a purpose or goal in mind again.  I was no longer floundering.  I was teaching Sunday School which really gave me a purpose at church, which can be very difficult for an older(ish) single to find.  I had a great group of friends that I spent time with most weekends, but I was old enough and mellow enough that the occasional weekend without plans was okay.  I also learned to really appreciate singleness for what it was.  I still wanted to get married, but I could be single and enjoy that as well, and the thought of living that life long term no longer scared me.  Once again, here is a time frame that was FUN, but with all that time searching things out, it was also the most spiritually deep.

2014-present

The last four years have been full of LOTS of change!  Getting engaged to Danny was an unexpected surprise!  A good surprise though:)  We spent the first six months of our marriage travelling and doing fun things because we knew we were going to try to have kids soon.  That's what he gets for marrying an older woman!  And sure enough, we soon became a family of three, then a family of four, and here we are in the process of becoming a family of five.  I also had another identity crisis.  I moved here and people only knew me as "Danny's wife".  That's not a bad thing to be known as, but I had 31 years of life filled with lots of things besides being the girl who married Danny.  Someone at church, who now is a good friend of mine, sat down once and said she had no idea who I was before I moved here and would I tell her about my life before I came.  I cannot tell you how much that meant to me.  Also, moving somewhere as a single person is different than as a married person.  As a single, I could always go home.  Moving somewhere with your new husband is way more permanent, and it gave me somewhat of a trapped feeling.  That's not to say I haven't loved being married though!  I do love it, and I love Danny and our kids and his family, but the adjustment to IN has been way harder than the adjustment to AL.  That being said, we've had a lot of great times the last four years and so I can still say they have been FUN.  But hard.  Change is hard, period.

Well now that got a little long, eh?  I guess 16 years is a long time and it's hard to make it short!  If you were to ask me which four year segment was my favorite, I'm not sure I could say.  They have all been so different.  All good, but in very different ways.  I'm thinking the next 16 years will likely not be blocked off into four distinct segments.  I know we can't see the future, and I know that changes will come with kids getting older and such.  If you would have told me 16 years ago how life was going to go, I probably would have had big eyes and a few tears thinking woe is me.  I would have never thought that it could be such a good thing.  So looking into the next 16 years, even though I don't know how it will go, I'll just be all cliché and say I'm glad to know the One who does!

Round 3...

Well here we go again!

I always feel weird talking about all this on a blog but since I really like to read when other people do I will!

Due date?
September 25.  But if this one is anything like the first two, we can expect to meet him/her around October 2 or 3.

How do I feel?
Meh.  Not terrible but I'm looking forward to the second trimester!  I am not a puker but I do get nauseous.  I have noticed it is kind of dependent on what I eat too.  If I stay away from too much junk it's better.  Except it's pretty much always yucky in the evenings.  For example, today I baked some cookies to take to someone and because I like keeping them in the freezer.  And so far I've had two.  They taste good but they don't feel very good!!  And I can't eat creamy things without feeling nasty.  Same with the first two pregnancies.  It will go away once I start feeling better, but for now ice cream, cheesecake, alfredo, and even milk are on my bad list.  They taste good, but I feel awful after I eat them.  Not sure why!  Meat and fruit go down pretty good.

Will we find out the gender?
Not planning on it this time!  I know that when we have that 20 week sono it's going to be reeeeeaaaaallllllyyyyy hard to not.  But I think I would be a little bit sad to never have a surprise.  And I really don't think I care what it is this time.  I did care with the first two but there's good reasons to have either gender this time around so I really think I'll be okay no matter what.

Any intuition?

The only thing that makes me think maybe boy is because sickness wise this has been similar to Sawyer.  I was definitely worse with Summer.  But I will be interested to hear the heartbeat and know how fast it is.  Summer was always 180ish and Sawyer was always 140-150-stereotypical for both genders.  So if it's a faster heartbeat with the more mild sickness, I'll just be confused!

Cravings?
Not really.  Do those come later?  Like I said before, meat and fruit go down pretty good and sometimes at night right before I go to bed I eat some turkey because it makes me feel a little bit better.  And I can't plan my weekly menus at night because NOTHING sounds good at all then.  But during the day I can think about food without feeling too gaggy.

Speaking of being gaggy, brushing my teeth is the worst!  I can handle it okay in the morning but more often than not my night time teeth brushing gets skipped.  Gross, I know!

How for apart will all the kids be?
Summer will be 3 in May and she is 17 months older than Sawyer.  He will be 23 months when the baby comes so there's a little more space between them.  Regardless, we will have 3 3 and under for about 9 months and it will be busy!  Because of that I can get a little overwhelmed, especially these days when I'm just so tiiiiiirreeeed.  But I know it's pretty common and people do it all the time and survive so we will too.  And I'll be glad when they're older to have them close!  But there will still be two school years between each one.

So there you have it.  I'm only 10 weeks which is a little early to tell, but I hate hiding it!  And we had good opportunity to tell family the past couple weekends so we went ahead and did it.  It's way better when people know!