Beach Days

The first full day in Hilton Head we loaded up the cart and wagon and took the boys down to the beach! It was a beautiful day for digging in the sand and getting some much needed vitamin D! We only had one day that the weather was kind of iffy so we spent as much time with our toes in the sand as possible.

Yup, you guessed it…more to come!

Hilton Head Island

The third week in September we met our entire family for a week long vacation in HHI! There were fifteen of us in the “big house'” and my Grammy, Aunt Cindy, and Uncle Greg were there too! We arrived late on a Saturday afternoon and immediately set off to check out the ocean. My mom picked an unbelievable house that was second row and had beautiful views of the Atlantic from the top floor. It was an easy stroll down the boardwalk to dip our toes in the sand! I was thrilled to bring Carter to HHI because it was the first time we went to the beach when he could walk and actually didn’t mind touching sand. Our other trips to the beach with him were less than successful but this time he loved it! Ok, maybe not loved it…but had way more fun than in the past! He is still weird about sand touching his hands, but so am I so I can’t really blame him ;) He did enjoy jumping the waves with his daddy, building lots of sand castles, playing ladder golf, and hanging out with all his relatives. He made a new best buddy in “the other” Alex (cousin Jessica’s long time boyfriend) and had a blast with his little cousin Nathan. I am so thankful to my awesome parents for arranging this amazing trip and allowing us to come along! We made some great memories and it was a fun last hurrah with everyone before baby h2o comes along!

We made it! Hello HHI!

Stay tuned for more pics to come from the rest of our week!

Baby Brigade at the Park

Back tracking a few weeks to catch up on posts! Earlier in September we met some fellow Baby Brigaders that don’t have school on Friday at Cogburn Park. We love it there because it is small, contained, and usually not very crowded. Our new friends Lauren and Cullen joined us too and the boys had a great time being monkeys on the play structure. Baby Kayden held her own and the Gordon twins took in the sights from the comfort of their car seats. The weather was perfect for a few hours outside and afterward we grabbed a bite to eat with Lauren, Cullen, Halie, and Kayden. I am so thankful that fall is on the way so we can be outside more and start enjoying all the local parks before h2o comes!

Bennett was concerned about the enormous amounts of pics I was taking ;)

Bumpdate- 32 Weeks

32 Weeks on 09/12/12- This post has been written for a while but I kept forgetting to upload my belly pics! These last four weeks have flown by and as I’m finishing up writing this post, we had just gotten back from a week in Hilton Head Island. I will actually be 34 weeks but am going to back date a bit so it posts in the correct order. It’s funny to read the survey below because that was actually written on time and a few things have changed. Now, my belly button is basically an outie. I can see it through my shirts which I hate. I have also been having way more contractions and they are starting to get a bit painful. Both car rides to and from HHI I was timing them and getting a little freaked out at how consistent the contractions were. They were actually taking my breath away but thankfully after some water, stretching, and shifting positions I was able to get them to calm down. I never got closer than ten minutes between contractions and we had already mapped out the level three NICUs on the way to the island just in case ;) I don’t think this baby is coming early though, just getting in lots of practice between now and November. I am going to the doctor every two weeks and they are happy with how things are going.

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How far along? 32 Weeks

Total weight gain/loss? Up four pounds since my twenty eight week check up (28 total).

Maternity clothes? Somehow still managing to fit into some non maternity shirts and dresses. As long as they are stretchy and long they fit fine. I need to stock up on new bras though because none of those fit anymore!

Stretch marks? I have noticed a few tiny marks right around my belly button that weren’t there before (guessing I will have a few new battle wounds to remind me of this pregnancy!)

Sleep? So, so, so tired…all the time. I can’t even think ahead to the newborn stage because I just want to cry at how much worse the exhaustion will be. I have to heave ho myself over into position at night and wake about every two hours to go to the bathroom even when I cut myself off and don’t drink any water for hours before bed. And then of course once I’m up to use the bathroom it takes forever to fall back to sleep. Ugh. Two more years and everything will be better hahaha

Best moment this month? Goodness. This month flew by and I’m having a hard time remembering all the details! Carter started preschool, I joined MOPs, we spent lots of time at the lake, I started playing tennis again, and we hung out with our buddies. As far as baby boy goes, we finally finished cleaning out his room, moved some furniture around, and are ready to get this nursery put together! Paint is ready and waiting!

Movement? Mr. Wiggle Worm is head down and pushing hard! He loves to kick me in the ribs and sometimes it takes my breath away. He gets the hiccups a lot which is an odd sensation down near my underwear and is SO active after I eat or drink. Sometimes when I go to lay down I have to push his behind out of the way so I can get comfortable and he loves to punch back. I have been noticing him a lot in the middle of the night when I wake up to go to the bathroom. He seems to take just as long as I do to settle back down after disturbing his slumber!

Food cravings? I am not really interested in food these days. The acid reflux has gotten a lot worse and it makes me feel sick all day long. I have been downing Tums after every meal. I usually have to force myself to eat breakfast so I won’t be starving and have been skipping dinner because I’m just not hungry. But then of course I’ll have to eat something right at bed time because I start to get nauseous. I think this baby is just taking up so much room that there isn’t any space left for food!

Gender? Baby h2o is all BOY!!!

Labor signs? Getting a few contractions a day but only once was I able to keep track of them. I talked to my doctor and she said it was good practice and an indication that my body should be able to go into labor on its own like it did with Carter. Hopefully she’s right and I’m not visiting her at 41 weeks begging to be induced!!

Belly button in/out? At this point it’s like half and half! The top sticks out a bit but the rest of my belly button is flat. Very weird. I hate that I can see it through my shirts and might be adding a band aid to my daily wardrobe to keep things under control.

What I miss: SUSHI. I just can’t risk it because I did get food poisoning the last time I ate it :/

What I am looking forward to: Finishing the nursery, the Baby Brigade Winter Babies Sprinkle coming up next week, washing all of baby boy’s clothes and getting his room ready for his arrival, getting to play as much tennis as possible before little man comes, and spending lots of time savoring our family of three!

Milestones: 32 weeks seems like a huge milestone for whatever reason. The single digit weekly countdown has me a bit freaked out though! I guess another one is that baby is head down. That was great news because I was worried he would be too big and run out of time to flip before D day!

Random cell phone belly pics :) Weeks 4-32

What I’ve Been Working On

Besides growing another human being...hehehehe I used to be a huge scrap booker, spending all my free time pouring all my memories into huge books! Then I got sucked into the blog world and put my energy into keeping up and maintaining our family blog. When Carter was born, I used the blog to share stories, pictures, and all things baby but then wanted a way to print out what had been going on. I know there are some sites that take your blog and put it directly into a book, but I never found one that I really liked and wanted something a bit more custom. I have always used Shutterfly for cards and various other projects so I decided to try them for my photo books too. I started from day one and as soon as I blogged, I would add the stories and pictures into a photo book. I was really good at keeping up with the books until Carter turned one. I made a photo book for every month of his first year and then a huge first birthday book. After that, I stopped working on them and have fallen behind! Well, lucky for me, Shutterfly has been running a free 8x8 photo book promotion so I have been hard at work getting caught up on all of Carter’s monthly happenings. Even though I have the blog, it is so nice to have these pictures and memories printed out so I can read them to him and share with friends and family. Because I have a few different accounts (shh…don’t tell…) I ended up making four books and am finally back on track. Instead of doing separate books for each month like I did with his first year (I finally came to my senses…those darn things get expensive!!!) I broke it down into 13-18 Months, 19-24 Months, A Second Birthday Book, and 25-30 Months. I absolutely love the way they turned out and can’t wait until they come in the mail next week!

To be honest, I just haven’t been in a blogging mood lately and the few times I have been on my computer this month have been spent working on these books. I have a couple things to write about, like my 32 Week Bumpdate, so one of these days I’ll get back to it! Thankfully life has been pretty uneventful and quiet so there really hasn’t been to much to write about anyway. So, in the meantime, here are a few previews of the pages in C’s books.

Baby Brigade Says Goodbye!

The Baby Brigade (minus a few friends)- August 2012

Just shy of our 2.5yr anniversary the Baby Brigade had an end of the summer/last hurrah party! After all this time together, things are about to change drastically as most of the big babies are starting school. This group has been such a God send and these friends have been with us through some amazing times! We have had lots of parties, play times, mommy’s nights, bumps, bruises, kisses, and hugs! I cannot imagine having gone through motherhood without these special friends and even though things will look different this fall I know we will all be connected for life! It’s hard to believe we went from five brand new mommies to a group of 14 and by the end of the winter we will have 23 babies!! WOW! I wish all of the group could have made it the other week to our farewell party, but such is life and hopefully we will have lots of opportunities to spend time together over the holidays when the babies are on vacation!

We were missing buddies Miles, Madeleine and Hayes, Evan, Samantha, and Bennett

The original “Fab Five” have been meeting since April 2010 and consisted of

Macey, Spencer, Carter, Madeleine (not pictured below), and Nicholas!

Preschool Update

Did I mention Carter’s school has cameras in the classroom? It is such a nice feature that gives this first time mama a chance to peek in on her boy and see how the day is going. 90% of the time he is off camera or they are out of the classroom doing other things, but it gives me a lot of peace to know I can get a baby fix if I start missing him too much! It’s also nice because I can see that he is not in fact crying the entire day like I was so worried he would do. In fact, daddy dropped C off at the start of his third week and he walked right into his classroom without any tears! I was so proud of my boy and so thankful that this transition seems to be going a little better for him. We have started going to church at his school too so he’s even more familiar with his new surroundings. I am so grateful for all your comments, thoughts, prayers, and well wishes as we embarked on this journey! I know it was tough going for a bit there but I am hopeful that the worst is behind us and C will continue to enjoy his school! I continue to ask God to reassure me that we are doing the right thing and this week I finally have peace about our decision to start school so early.

C talks about sitting “Criss-Cross Apple Sauce” all day long!

He ate something! The first time in three weeks he actually ate some lunch.

And just to clarify- as much as I am tempted, I don’t sit around watching the video feed all day long! This particular day I had it up while I dusted, vacuumed, and scrubbed my house! It’s nice to be able to be so productive while still peeking in on how he is doing. It also works on my phone so occasionally I watch when I’m in between errands to make sure he is all right. Having the monitors lets me relax a bit and know that he is in a safe, fun, loving environment. We did just spend almost every single day of the last 2.5yrs together after all so I knew giving up control would be especially tough on me!

Sunday Silence

Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit.

Rather, in humility value others above yourselves,

not looking to your own interests but each of you to the interests of the others.

– Philippians 2:3-4 (NIV)