Halfway There

The first half of this pregnancy mostly quietly crept by- I can't believe I'm halfway there and at the same time can't believe that I've only been pregnant for 20 weeks.  It seems like forever- especially now that I get to field the never-ending (and adorable) questions from Leah about, "When will my baby sister be born?" and "Is my baby sister ready to come out yet?"  She prays for her baby sister at every chance, hugs and kisses my belly, and has decided that her name should either be Emma (the most popular name of the decade) or Leah (ummm.... no.)  I'm just glad she hasn't mentioned the name Allah- the baby that has been growing in her tummy since Adam was born.

I'm in that weird in between stage where none of my clothes fit and people are still kind enough to act shocked when they find out I'm pregnant.  Really?  I've already gained 30 pounds, people!  But thanks for making me feel good. 

I would also swear that I can feel the extra estrogen coursing through my body- now that I know it's there.  More emotional, more swollen, more prone to devour chocolate and then wonder where it all went.  At least I can blame the baby sister now!

All in all, things are good.  I've had more than a few people ask me (as politely as they can) how old Adam is now- he's 20 months.  His birthday is July 17th, and assuming that this little lady comes around her due date of August 4th, they'll be two years apart.  Leah will be 4 and a half by then.  Are we crazy?  Who knows?  And who cares?  It is what it is, and we'll take it!

And Adam was doing something silly out of the corner of my eye while I was taking this picture, hence the silly smile.

The Annual Haircut

It's only her third one, but Leah's new haircut is a hit!  It took a few months of convincing, and she made me hold her hand the whole way through, but once I caught her admiring herself in the mirror and declaring that she really did want short hair after all, I knew the haircut was a success. 

Just how tiny are you?

I love finding my kids in these little nooks and crannys around the house.  Reminds me how tiny they really are.  (Don't mind the post-lunch nakedness- that's just another perk of being tiny.)

And a trip around the kitchen in Mom's high heels is always another reminder of how tiny those feet really are!

It's A....

We had the 20-week ultrasound yesterday.  I was so excited I could barely sleep.  I dreamt most of the night about a big neon sign flashing the baby's gender in my bedroom- the wrong gender, no less.  I realized how truly motivating it would be to take the excitement we felt and use it to power through labor and decided that is something I definitely want to do someday.  Maybe with our last baby.

Everything looked good in the ultrasound, at least from what we could see (the techs never tell you anything!) and we decided to have a special FHE last night to tell Leah and Adam.  They were bouncing off the walls crazy all night long (this is a Monday night trend in our home) so I was a little concerned about how they would act or if they would even hear us over their own shrills and shrieking.  We had a few ultrasound pictures from each of my pregnancies and a few books from the library to cover the basic questions we expected to get.  Earlier in the day we practiced what we were going to say and even Jason couldn't deliver the "very special hug" line without cracking up.  Our kids are in big trouble, indeed.

And it went great!  As soon as we told them Leah declared, "Just what I've always wanted!" and began petting and poking at my stomach.  Even Adam sat quietly for a few minutes to look at pictures and said, "bebe" once or twice.  We talked about how big the baby would get and how long it would take to get to August.  Then before long Leah decided she wanted to act like a newborn baby and Adam went back to jumping off the couch and the craziness resumed.

So what were we talking about all this time?

It's a girl!

We are all thrilled for so many reasons- Leah is so excited to have a brother and a sister now, this baby girl will share my birth order in our families, and Jason is confident that he knows how to handle girls (he does just fine with his boy, too).

I'm thrilled to have the cat out of the bag.  Leah immediately became more cautious about jumping onto my lap and now I can say things like, "It's naptime.  I'm tired and the baby's tired, so let's all go to sleep."   And it works!

Now the work begins, too- I have saved just about every piece of clothing my kids have ever worn, and now I have to sort through it all.  I'm not sure what I'll find- Leah was born the dead of winter, and this baby girl is coming in the height of summer, so it could have all been for nothing.  

And there's the name game.  I think my criteria is still the same- two syllables, soft sounds, nothing crazy-unusual, possibly Biblical.  In the meantime, we'll just be calling her this-

But mostly it's just excitement.  We're having a girl!  A sweet, cuddly little baby girl- yay!

Say My Name

This video is a perfect example of Adam's talking ability- perfect diction and know-how, it's just a matter of whether or not he feels like saying the words.  I always worry that he is so quiet compared to Leah- not that that's hard to do with Miss Chatterbox around.  The poor boy can't get a word in edge-wise.  But Jason assures me that it's just the difference between boys and girls.

Adam Overload

I have been gathering up lots of pictures of Adam over the last few weeks, with nothing really noteworthy to write about any of them.  Adam is still my cheerful little baby.  At least, I think he's a baby, until I see him next to a real baby and realize that he's going to be a competent little two-year-old by the time his little brother or sister gets here. 

Jason calls Adam a little tinker-er.  He loves to sit and pull thing apart, put things together, just figure out how things work.  He has zero interest in watching television, but he will flip through the page of a book or pull apart a stack of post-it notes (one at a time) for hours.

He is getting to the insisting stage- his vocabulary is growing by leaps and bounds, but he still chooses to grunt most of his requests at me in hopes that I will just give him what he wants without insisting that he say the corresponding word first.  But he insists on doing things the way he wants to do them.  He has finally made peace with the vacuum and insisted on helping Jason vacuum our room the other night.

He is also developing a major love for the outdoors and insists that we go outside- in the front yard, together- several times a day.  He always wants to put a helmet on his head and loves to be pulled around in the wagon.

He's also full of mischief and knows to clear the room fast if he's caught doing something against the rules.  He makes my heart skip a beat at least seven times a day.  

And if you're wondering if he's having a little brother or sister... so are we.  We find out on Monday!

Go Fish

For no known reason, I have been collecting metal juice can lids for years now.  I have just always assumed that some day I would come up with a great use for all 55 of them.  That day hasn't come yet, but this week for FHE I came up with a fishing game.  The fish are glued to the metal lids, and a magnetic fishing pole picks them up perfectly. 

The kids loved the game for about 5 minutes, and then Classic Box Syndrome took over- they just wanted to play in the "pond".  But we have been having lots of fun with the pond for the rest of the week. 

Now what to do with the other 45 lids...?  Make that 46- I made orange juice again this morning!