2012 - Wow! Whoa!

I've been terrible about blogging! My little ones are keeping me hopping. We're having a lot of fun though. Ruby is getting into arts and crafts, which is a blast for me (once I overcame my notion of how she should be crafting-ha!). She does really neat mixed media pieces, too cute. I'll post some soon.

Race is growing and changing. His personality is blossoming. He thinks Ruby is HILARIOUS. She keeps him in stitches, even if she's growling, "Stop lookin' a' me." He thinks it's so funny.

Life is good...

I'm doing some painting (a little bit). I'll post some WIP soon!

Mama of two...

Well, it's been an interesting summer! Mama of two keeps me way busier than I'd ever imagined. Race is a honey, loves to smile and coo at us. He's quite the little talker. I'm so excited to watch him grow and learn and can't wait for him to be big enough to play with Ruby a bit. He loves to watch her play and smile at her.

Ruby is an amazing big sis. She gives little bro big hugs and brings him her blankie and Booboo bear (her very special things) when he is upset. It's heartwarming to see.

Our little newbie...

Our little man, Race has arrived. Born at 11:55a.m. Friday after 4 hours of labor and one push (or four pushes, but the doc said he considers that a set and therefore only ONE push). I couldn't even believe it had actually happened at first it was so fast. Race came out completely asleep and dangled limply in the docs arms for a moment. I was a little nervous until the doc and nurse started laughing about my little man coming out snoozing. :D

We are so blessed, he's a total sweetie and Ruby's totally enamored with him.

Little Helper

Ruby's been a big help gardening so far this spring. She loves to wear her bug boots from Nana. :D

We're just hanging out over here, waiting for baby two to make his entrance. I think he dropped last night, could be any day, could be two weeks...  The waiting game!

Big girl bed

Here's a pic of the Peep in her big girl bed. It's filled up with babies, books, etc. at all times. Sometimes she hauls them all out to the living room in between sleeping. It's a big job, but a girl's gotta do what she's gotta do!

22 more days 'til my due date!

I'll be 37 weeks tomorrow which is considered full term. So hard to believe! Chuck's boss told him one of his kids came 4 weeks early and Chuck said he started to hyperventilate a little. ha! It's going to be a switch  to have two kids instead of one, but I think we'll do just fine. I'm excited to meet our little man and see what Ruby thinks of her brother.

Hopefully I don't have problems nursing this time like the last, but if I do, I know where to go for help and that I can get through it. I'm also hoping I don't have PPD, but again, I know to get help and hang in there... 

Any other preggo moms out there? When are you due? What are you fears/excitements?

Ruby speak, boy has it changed!

Ruby is growing up so fast and talking more every day. Some of the things she's been saying lately:

-In response to, "Do you want chicken for lunch?" "I want a hoc (hot) dog... and chips."
-"I oh (lo) you Mama (Daddy, etc.)." - Love you
-Chuck kissed me goodbye one morning and Ruby said, "I want a kiss!"
-Ruby on the phone with her daddy, "Hello Daddy! Book Daddy? (She says pointing at the book in her   lap) Daddy doing? Workt Daddy workt? See you Daddy!"
-Talking to Nana and Papa, she turns the phone to her feet cuz she's taken off her shoes and socks, " See! My toes! My toes! See Papa/Nana?"
-Simmin/simmie pool - swimming pool
-Clippered the big dog - Clifford the big red dog
-Ning room - Living room
-Heard alot, "Come on Mommy/Daddy!" She's always wanting us to go with her to the "ning" room and play after meals. But she says it all the time, she needs someone (a brother?) to follow her around. :D
-"I cutesy!" When leaving the bank after all the ladies/tellers said she was cute. And modest too!
-"I pity gir!" After putting on a new outfit from Nana.
-"Abc, abc, abc, abc." She even fills in sometimes, she said, "l m n o p" and then "y" at the right time.
-She's working on Twinkle Twinkle Little Star, first Tickle tickle star star star and now "Tinkle tinkle star star star."

Cute upholstered toddler bed...

I started to do a search for DIY toddler bed quilt, but before I could type quilt this super cute toddler bed picture popped up:

You can find the instructions on how to make it here!

We've already bought Ruby a Step 2 Snooze 'N' Cruise Toddler bed:

And all I really want to do is make a little pillow and comforter for her, to make it more adult-bed-like for her. I'm not really finding anything, so I'll just have to come up with something on my own! I'll let you know what I figure out...

Interesting boy names

When I was pregnant with Ruby and looking for girl names I came across some strange names (in my opinion, sorry if this is your name)...  Now that I'm looking for names again, here are the odd boy names I've seen:

Adoption
Annabelle (what?)
Annmarie (seriously, do you want your kid to get in fights at school?)
Beetle
Egbert
Gandolf (I liked LOTR, but come on!)
Pope
Sake

Melanoma

I had a mole removed last week; it was suspect for melanoma. Luckily I just found out it was benign. Everyone should get checked. Age doesn't seem to be a factor, heredity, nor whether you've been sunburned. There's no cure at the moment, all a dermatologist/specialist can do is remove the cancerous tissue and if that's not possible, melanoma can be deadly.

I almost hate to recommend checks because I know I dislike having chunks of skin removed for biopsy, but much better that than the alternatives.

Check yourself today!

30 weeks today!

Hard to believe how far along I am in my second pregnancy. Time sure flies when you have a little peanut to watch over.

I'm missing my desk job a bit, this nesting at home could kill me. Much easier when all I could do was tidy up my office in between projects with a few evening hours/weekends to dedicate to the house. Being at home my nesting is taking the form of deep cleaning the house, organizing the basement, tearing out our old juniper bushes in the front of the house, digging up lily bulbs and thinning them...  It's a bit much for my back, in addition to carrying around the baby bump. :D

Wow...

My baby a year ago!  My goodness, I can't believe how she's grown and changed.  Here she was just crawling and babbling, now she is running as fast as the wind and speaking in sentences, broken sentences, but sentences none the less.  I cannot believe how fast she's growing up!

Rubyisms:
Buckle - bockoak
We say, "Who's this?" and point to her and she says, "The peep!!"

Savvy shopper

Chuck got a "bonus" from work in the form of a Macy's gift card.  He was bemoaning the fact that we had to pay tax on it and said he didn't think he'd accept another.  I'm always a saver, but in order to make him feel better about the gift card I went to special effort today, spent $109.17 (so really just 9.17 after gift card) at Macy's and between sales and coupons saved $67.37.

Our towels look like that of a college students, a hodgepodge of mismatched towels and beach towels, so I got 6 nice towels and 4 matching hand towels (all chocolate brown).  Our bathroom has fern green (if you're looking at the other colored towels) tile and then I have paint to do the walls robin egg blue.  I also got 3 outfits and socks for the boy and one gift for an upcoming birthday.  Yay me!

*Spring Cleaning*

I've been galvanized lately!  After our trip to Florida, I could think of nothing I wanted to do more than simplify, simplify, simplify.  So I've been sorting (=giant garage sale pile), throwing out, organizing, cleaning.  It feels SO GOOD!  I want to keep this going.

I have some outdoor plans to put into place as well.  Build a chicken coop and get some chicks for laying hens and thereby organic eggs.  Set up a compost pile.  Build a jungle gym for Ruby, Chuck has a telephone pole that he'd like to build into it.  Lots to do, lots to do before baby two arrives in JUNE.

Florida

I told Ruby the morning we were leaving that we needed to eat breakfast because we were leaving to go to Florida.  She went to the front door, reached for the handle and said, "Me me ah Florida."

Her speech and vocab have improved so much in the past week, it's incredible.  She's got a big thing with, "Oh no!" lately.  As in, "Oh no, my bucket (baby, blankie, penny, juice, milk, etc.)!"

An allehhh-yator (Ruby's pronunciation) we spotted behind our cottage.

We laid her down in our inn room for a nap (in a pack n play, bless you so much Anchor Inn & Cottages!!) and we laid down to take a nap too.  Ruby says, "Hi, Momma. Hi, Momma. Hi, Momma."  I didn't respond.  Then she says, "Momma sleep. Night night Momma, night night!" I hear her lay down.  Approx. 30 seconds later she stands up and repeats the process.  She did that, oh, 3 or 4 times.  I'm just laying there trying not to laugh out loud.

She ADORED the beach. She'd have spent all day there, no problem.  I don't even think she would have stopped for lunch. She waded into the surf, scooped sand with her shovel and bucket, watched people, picked up shells, followed seagulls and other birds around (that was too cute).