Getting Ready

I don't think anyone can be truly ready for a new baby. I think you can be pretty darned prepared but never 100 percent ready. With that being said, we are like 20 percent ready. LOL. We have the room straightened. We have a couple of names in the works but nothing definite (or anything we can agree on!). Some of the baby gear is set up. We have one pack of diapers. See what I mean? Nothing is done. Complete. But I figure, hey, who cares? Is this baby who is coming into the world really going to care if I have the room a perfect color the minute he/she gets into this world? No. I have been nesting in another ways. I am a stickler about laundry being done and about the kids toys being picked up at the end of the day. The baby's clothes are washed and put in drawers (if we have a girl that is). I am almost 34 weeks pregnant. I am as ready as I am going to be. Bring it on.

A True American Family

So, we now have a minivan. I have been fighting it for a long time. But now, with Baby Goy coming I don't think there is anyway we were able to get around it. Kenyon tried his best to fit three casrseats across in our Santa Fe but it just wasn't happening. So, minivan shopping we went. We weren't looking for something brand new. Something with some mileage on it. Just enough so that the price wouldn't be through the roof. There were plenty of options for us out there. I was even able to narrow it down by color. We went to the first dealership as many of you already know and I got the privilege of driving a brand new 2011 Toyota Sienna. Not a good way to start. Going down one or two years was hard after that. So we picked our heads up after that disaster of an evening and headed out again. We went to the dealership in Dayton. They were awesome. It also helps when you have exactly what you want and are willing to pay all printed out in front of you. We negotiated for *maybe* 30 minutes and then the car was ours- at the price we asked for! So, here it is. The car that finally helps us to fit into our neighborhood!

Appointments and Updates

Time is flying. I don't know how or when it happened but I woke up yesterday and realized that I am seven months pregnant. In just a couple of months time, we are going to have another crazy little Petura in the house! Now, this kind of makes me a bit nervous because my schedule and routine has become awesome with the girls! With Maeve going to nursery school and Cara taking great naps, things have just fallen into place. The house is clean most of the time (with exception of toys which I don't count). The girls are happy and I am sometimes think, what the hell have I done? LOL. But the greater part of me knows that everything will eventually fall back into place. It took almost two years for us to settle into this so I know that it won't be right away but it will come. I am feeling like Maeve will be the motherly type. She is constantly hugging my belly and talking to the baby. Cara on the other hand might need to be kept a great distance away from the baby. She thinks it is funny to do things she is not supposed to and she likes to get a rise out of us. Hitting the baby might be a common thing in our house. We will see. Maybe they will both surprise us!
I am going to the doctor now every two weeks. They just did the blood work for the gestational diabetes. I am anticipating that everything should be okay there. The doc did mention something about my weight gain going up the past two months. I tried to ignore him and just went to my happy place- peanut butter cups. LOL. Maybe that is why I have gained? Oh well. I will lose it after. And if I don't, Kenyon will love me anyway.
Maeve has finally fallen into a great routine with school. Her teacher lives across the street from us! That helps a lot. We are thinking that if I go in the middle of the night, we will call her and ask he to cover until someone can come over. Maeve knows her and trusts her. Now I just need her to say yes. :)
There is a lot of love in the house this weekend! We hope that everyone has a wonderful Valentine's Day. Love everyone!

Here are some pictures of us finally getting outside the one day it hit 40!!

Baby Goy

That is what I am calling this baby. We have no names set and we don't know the sex of the baby so it will be Baby Goy for now (boy+girl=goy). I had my 25 week check up and all looks good with Goy! Maeve got to help out and pour the gel all over my belly and then the doctor gave her the doppler. She LOVED that and she found the heartbeat right away! Goy then decided to do laps inside of me and it was hard for the doc to find him/her again. Soccer player? Track star? Maybe. I gained a lot of weight but its all good. I have been really slow to gain this time around so I knew a big month was coming up soon. BAM! This was it. :) I go back to the doctor in three weeks for my glucose testing and then the doctor looked at me and said after that, EVERY.TWO.WEEKS. Um, really? Because I am kind of not ready. Can we just reverse time a teeny bit so I can get Maeve sleeping in her own bed for the whole night? Or maybe stop for a minute so I can relish in the fact that I just have two carseats in the car at the moment. Every two weeks??? Are you kidding me? Already? Okay, freak out for the moment over. But it scares me to think we are nearing the end. We really need to think of some names for Goy!

Our Little Misfit

Look how guilty she looks!



So, I find it amusing that I titled this post and in the same instant, Cara published it without me writing anything! This title suits her perfectly. This is all about Cara. Her little personality is shining through right now. Boy are we in trouble! She is the sweetest most snuggly little girl one could ever meet. That being said, she is also a little misfit (in the most loving way possible). She loves to steal her sisters lovey right out from under her and run for it. It gets Maeve so mad! But Cara just giggles and giggles thinking she is the funniest thing ever. She really does make us laugh. When she gets into talking, she has a whole conversation with us- half of which we have no idea what she is saying! She does love Maeve very much and just wants to play with her all day. This makes for a very hard and frustrating day because sometimes Maeve just likes to be alone. Cara loves to sing and dance! And her love of reading is coming through. Her favorite right now is Brown Bear, Brown Bear. Sometimes I just catch her sitting in the corner reading by herself and it makes me so happy! We love her!!

Shocked and Ecstatic!

So yesterday went a lot better than I thought it would! We got into the car and she was super excited! When we walked into the building, the director came up to say hello. She sctually responded so I knew we were off to somewhat of a good start! Maeve saw so many women walking through the hallway and with each person she asked me if it was her teacher. When I saw her, I pointed her out and she was so excited! She signaled for us to walk down and she let us into the room. Maeve immediately left me to walk around and check the place out. The teacher (Mrs. Law) showed her her cubby and also showed her her pictures around the room. At this point, Cara started losing it due to no nap. The teacher kind of gave me the signal that this might be a good time to leave. I told Maeve I needed to go and put Cara down for a nap. She said, "Mommy, I didn't know they had a crib here for Cara!" LOL. So I said good-bye and she said, "okay mommy, good-bye." I left while she was playing with princesses. Now, what I didn't expect was for Cara to SCREAM for Maeve the whole way home. I never thought about how Cara has had Maeve around her whole life. The two hours were golden. I am not going to lie, the phone was on me the whole time in case she needed me. But lets be honest, did we really think she would need me once she was actively engaged? No. I went to pick her up at 3:15. I peeked in the secret window and saw her doing puzzles at the table like every other kid. Made my heart proud that she was so brave! When it was time for release, they let Maeve out first and her face lit up as she saw me and Cara. Cara was also screaming in delight that Maeve was back!! She talked incessantly the whole way home (wonder where she gets that from??). She had chips and cheese and bananas for snack. She also picked milk and drank it out of a big girl cup! It spilled a little and that made her sad but then Mrs. Law (God bless this woman!) gave her a wipe and she was happy again. She did puzzles and pegboards and listened to a book. She went to music with teddies (I had no idea what that was about) and made them dance. But most of all, she got to ring the bell ALL day to signal clean up time. She loved it. And that makes me feel all sorts of things. Proud, sad, happy... all wrapped up into one. My little girl is growing up whether or not I like it and it makes me love her even more than yesterday.

Enjoy the pictures!!

Deep Breaths.

I knew this day would come. I always read other peoples posts about their kids going to school for the first time and while you can smile and say, that's nice, you just don't get it until you are taking your own. Maeve is starting preschool today. She was a bit apprehensive as I stated before this past weekend but since then, we have moved away from that. She is starting to tell me that she will be doing projects and playing with toys. I am nervous. I am scared. I am not sure why. I am so afraid that when I take her into that room she is going to burst into tears and I am going to want to pick her up hug her tight and run the hell out of there. I know this is not possible nor is it the best thing for her. She will be so much more independent when she goes. She needs friends her age. I am just going to have to hold onto that feeling- knowing we are doing the right thing. So honestly, why do I feel like I might throw up as I choke down my coffee? All the joys of parenting I guess. We are putting on her favorite Horton Hears a Who outfit, taking La La with us (teacher said its okay!), and strapping on her princess backpack and walking in together. I will post later on how she handles it (okay, okay, on how I handled it!).

Pics will also come in a later post. :)