second pregnany vs. first pregnancy

Hello.

Today is a bit strange for me. It's Thursday. Graeme and Penny are with my parents for the day. Aaron is working. And someone else is deep-cleaning my house right now. (Merry Christmas to me!) The Christmas shopping is done. Maisy's room and clothes are ready. We have some newborn diapers. The hospital bags are packed. The infant carseat is installed next to Graeme's seat in the van.

Today is a day where I actually have no to-do list. And it's probably going to be the last day I can say that for quite awhile!

Tomorrow marks the start of the 37th week of this pregnancy. Only three weeks left until her due date! I very much want Maisy to stay inside until she's healthy and strong and ready for the world out here, but I would be lying if I said I wasn't ready for her to get here! So I'm hoping she's gearing up for her healthy debut sometime in December!

Graeme Grayson began his arrival three days after his due date and actually arrived four days past. At the time leading up to his birth, it of course felt like he was a billion days late. But, looking back after he was here, four days late seemed hardly bad at all. Except now that I'm pregnant again and nearing the end, I obviously can't think logically like that. My due date already seems far away and four days past that day sounds like an eternity from now. At the beginning of this pregnancy, I did not want her to come before Christmas. Now, I'm all like "Please come. Now."

So, we will see. Maybe Maisy Kate will take after me and like to be early for things.

She has been a bit different than her brother in several other areas, so, it could happen!

My pregnancies have been pretty similar to each other, but as I've gotten towards the end of this one, I have noticed it has been different in quite a few ways...



With Graeme, once I hit 14-ish weeks, I never got sick again.

With Maisy, I will very randomly get sick and throw up every two weeks or so. I can never place why. It's so strange. I also definitely have the swollen ankles/feet this time. Probably because I am just on my feet a lot more! I just feel more pregnant this time. Normal pregnancy symptoms that I didn't feel like I had last time...now I notice them. I don't know if that makes sense.



With Graeme, I exercised at the gym for 30 minutes almost every day until the very end.

With Maisy, I tried 5:00am gym days for a couple weeks before I got sick during my first trimester. Because 5:00am was about the only time I could go without sacrificing time with Aaron. Then the first trimester sickness hit hard for eight weeks and exercise was out of the question. And after that, yeah.... My exercise has consisted of running after a toddler all day long and keeping him alive, getting up and down off the floor one thousand times each day as he switches activities (a feat that feels like a 30 minute workout at this point), and picking him up at least 100 times a day (he is not light) because I could never say no to holding him when he's only going to be little and ask to be held for a short time and soon I'm going to have another baby to hold and will have to say no to him more often (sad!). So, there's my exercise...cardio, lifting weights, and whatever getting up and down off the floor equals...squats? 



With Graeme, I worked part-time and kept up with cleaning the house, laundry, grocery shopping, and cooking. But other than that, my time (and sleep!) was pretty flexible.

With Maisy, I also have a toddler to take care of. So, yeah. You get it. And I can't even imagine working full-time. You pregnant moms who work full-time...you're amazing.



With Graeme, Aaron and I could get up and head straight to the hospital with nothing to worry about when it was time to go. Penny would be fine for several hours until someone could get her.

With Maisy, we clearly have one other huge factor to consider:  Graeme. Meaning we cannot necessarily rush straight to the hospital in the middle of the night or something. I realize it is unlikely to be a rush. But it's still a bit nerve-wracking to me, the master planner. Another lesson in how my plans are really not important at all...




Believe me, I am definitely not trying to complain. And I'm not shocked by how this pregnancy has been a little harder because it is kind of common sense that it would be different this time. It's just comical to me. 


Anyway, of course, it is all worth it, and I know I have nothing to complain about. Carrying a precious life is an unbelievable blessing from the Lord and I honestly am getting a bit sad that the baby kicks inside are coming to an end soon...they are my favorite part! I am forever grateful that God has chosen to bless us with these sweet babies and I cannot help but thank Him for everything that goes along with them! All of the exhausting, wonderful moments.

But I do feel like I should tell my first-time pregnant self that she really had nothing to complain about! Ha!



So, I will try to get on here and blog again before baby Maisy arrives, but if not, I'm sure you understand! And then you can just look forward to another birth story. Because I myself am quite curious about when and how that will happen...

 This was taken on December 1, 2015, one month out from our due date...Maisy Kate, you are more than welcome and wished to be born THIS month!

Graeme is 20 months old!

Even when time seems to drag pregnancy-wise, the time it takes Graeme to turn another month older flies by.

On Monday he turned 20 months old and somehow we are just four months away from his second birthday. I feel like I JUST planned his first birthday party! And I feel like he will turn two before I can even blink.

At his birthday party!

Our little (but very tall) Graeme Grayson is as adorable as ever and has grown so much, so fast. Yes, he is still tall for his age, and we are still at a loss where his height comes from! I'm thinking one day he will even out, but who knows...maybe he will tower over us by the time he's in middle school! He's been wearing 2T clothes for a few months now and certain things he wears are 3T to be long enough for him.

If this is our future...we are clueless.

His speech and vocabulary blow my mind every day. I recently found a video of him saying "Batman" when he was only ten or eleven months old, and that was not his first word. It's hard to remember a time when he wasn't talking. He hasn't stopped since he started and seems to add at least one new word every day. He says or tries to say anything we ask him to and speaks in little sentences a lot of the time. His memory is amazing as well and he will randomly bring up something that happened a couple of weeks ago.

For example, one day he and I were sitting outside watching cars and trucks drive by. A truck drove out of the neighborhood and when it hit a bump, a hard hat fell out of the back. Well, this was very intriguing to Graeme. Over and over he said, "Red truck drop hat!" We talked about whether the truck would come back to get it when after a few minutes a car stopped next to it. A boy got out of the car and took the hat. This was even more interesting to Graeme. "Boy took hat!" And then we wondered whether or not he would give it back to the red truck. Even now, weeks later, he will sometimes bring up the red truck, hard hat, and boy.

I would just love to see inside his little brain sometimes.

What do you think about, little one?

Sometime in the last month he suddenly went from saying "Dada" to "Daddy" (except it sounds more like "Dah-ee"). So very cute. He has a similar way of pronouncing Penny ("Peh-ee"). I am still "Mama." One of my favorite new things he says is "Hi, Buddy (Buh-ee)!" I say "Hi, Buddy," to him all of the time, and one day he said it back to me. And now he says it to me a lot. Every once in awhile he will say it to me before I say it to him. I so wish I could get it on video. I love that we are buddies.

What else? 

He has all four one year molars in and accounted for and is working on the two canines on the bottom currently (the top ones are in). Teething is never too bad with him although it does cause some very early morning wake ups...5:00am is never fun to see.

We tried potty training for one day, but decided to hold off as he was becoming a bit scared of even sitting on the potty. He gets the concept, but now I am at a point where it sounds like way too much work for the ninth month of pregnancy. Oh well. Diapers for everyone for a bit longer!

And little diaper butts are adorable.

We've learned that he is not a fan of change. At all. (He may get this from me...and by "may," I mean he totally does.) I made him something to hang on the wall above his crib. He hysterically refused to get in bed until we took it down. And then he was scared to go to bed for a few nights afterwards. Goodness. A week later I converted his highchair to a booster seat thinking a "big boy chair" would be exciting. He cried and cried big, sad tears and wouldn't let me pry him off of me to sit in it until it was back to "normal."

He did not appreciate the cuteness at all.

I figure neither of these things are at all worth fighting him about right now. Eventually, he will not be terrified of hanging yarn above his bed or a big boy booster seat. What a funny, interesting boy he is.

Anyway.

Graeme is pure joy and I am so excited to see him become a big brother sometime in the next few weeks. Even if he has a hard time adjusting, it will only be for a season, and eventually he will not remember a time without having a sister. 

We, on the other hand, are definitely cherishing all of the time we have and have had with only him around. I am so thankful for the 20-21 months we have had with just him. He has set the bar pretty high as far as being an absolutely amazing kid!

We love you, Graeme!

Maisy Kate's Nursery

A few weeks ago, I was looking back to my blogs during my pregnancy with Graeme and saw that his room was done and ready by the time I was 30 weeks pregnant. Ha! I was definitely very on top of things! Here I am this time around just a few weeks later. I'm 34 weeks pregnant, and the extra few weeks it took to get a nursery done are definitely because it's much more time-consuming this time around when there's an adorable toddler to look after. He's not really into interior decorating, and really, who could blame him?

Anyway, Maisy's room is ready for her whenever she decides to come in the next few weeks. There was never any doubt that she would have princess things in her room, but it took me quite awhile to settle on a color scheme. Her room is (mostly) pink, gray, and gold, and believe me, I never thought I would want much gold in my house. In her room, it works and I love it. So, here it is:

Room sign from Etsy.

Gold pillows, curtain rod, curtain, and pull-back are from Target (along with about 75% of things in her room). The pink pillow in the middle was a lucky clearance find at Pier 1!

The white hope chest under the window was my great-grandmother's! My mom passed it on to Maisy and painted it white for her (with Aaron's help). It's around 100 years old and very special!

Giant, very soft, and adorable stuffed bear was a gift from Gigi and Pop. And the nightlight was a gift from Mimi and Grandy.

Corner shelf from Target. And the mirror is from At Home. The tiny canvas next to Cinderella was the very first thing we bought for her room. And the tiara is what I wore on our wedding day.

The wooden sign is from Target. The bookshelf is from Bed, Bath, and Beyond. She has an autographed photo of Snow White (signed by a real Disney Princess!) courtesy of our friend Julie. And our friend Liz painted/drew that amazing watercolor picture!

After making Graeme give up his reading chair, he decided (and we agree) that it is the best place to read. It's staying in Maisy's room, but he asks to read in "Maisy's chair" every night. The pillow is from HomeGoods. The blanket was purchased on clearance at the Disney Store by us long ago and just so happens to perfectly match and be a Cinderella blanket. For the win. The end table was handed down from Graeme's room (also from Target).

I got the urge to be crafty and made this based on an idea I saw on Etsy. It was ridiculously difficult. Gluing hearts in straight lines is no joke. 

The castle print is from At Home. We wanted a white dresser that could be a changing table for a time. It took awhile to find one that would work. But, we love the one we finally ordered. It's a Delta dresser from Walmart. The hamper is from Babies R Us, and Mimi had the brilliant idea to sew a pink button on it.

The carriage lamp is from Pottery Barn Kids, and the Cinderella quote is from Etsy (frame from Target, and if I haven't labeled something, you can probably assume it's from Target. Ha.)

The ribbon mobile was my other craft project. It was much easier than the canvas! But ribbon isn't cheap...I learned that!

Aaron's parents bought this for me before we even had Graeme. I didn't have anywhere to put it for a long time, and was holding on to it in hopes of using it in our little girl's room one day. It's a beautiful Thomas Kinkade print.

If you go back a few posts, you can read all about how we obtained this crib. Painting it white was Aaron's "craft project" for Maisy. 

One of our favorite local stores, Nuvonivo, had this adorable blanket.

Cute little friends for Maisy to cuddle were gifts at her shower. And her pink Lovie matches her brother's blue one.

The crib sheet and gray mesh bumper are from Target.

This was my crib skirt from my nursery when I was a baby. My grandma made it and my mom saved it all these years. I am so excited to use it for Maisy.

There you have it! We had so much fun decorating a baby girl's nursery this time. Seriously now, if we decide to have any more kids, they're going to have to start sharing rooms. My idea tank is empty. We will just have a house of superheroes and princesses.

my time change cheat plan

Normally, my "blog days" are Wednesdays. Aaron and I meet my parents at Starbucks, and they take Graeme with them. And we have a coffee date before work.

However, today is Thursday as we sit in the Starbucks. I had my last day of "work" last Wednesday. It never really felt like work to me because I loved doing it. And I still plan on doing a lot of the things I did at Journey as a volunteer.

My mom might lose it if I kept Graeme (and eventually Maisy) with me every day now that I'm not working, so the plan is for him to spend Thursdays with Mimi and Grandy. This will allow me to have a day to get housework, laundry, shopping, and other things done that are easier to do when I don't have a toddler tagalong. It works out for all.

And Aaron and I still get our weekly morning coffee date, which we love and look forward to. Right now, I am writing this and he is reading. So we aren't talking much or anything. But just sitting here with each other is a really perfect date sometimes.



Anyway.



Our due date is less than two months away now! We are getting excited about our baby shower in a couple of weeks. Maisy's room is coming together and my goal is to have pretty much everything in order for her arrival by the time Thanksgiving gets here. I want to be able to focus on enjoying Thanksgiving and Christmas with Graeme, as it will be the last time when he is our only little one!




Aaron and I were able to sneak away last weekend for a last getaway before we have two children. It happened to fall on the weekend that I had scheduled Graeme's flu shot AND the time change. He stayed with my parents, and I apologized for leaving them with two "inconveniences." Ha. There's not much I could do about the flu shot. He needs it and it takes two seconds and then he's fine anyway. But, I did try to help out with the time change.

I'm sure you've heard that when you have kids, young ones especially, the "extra hour" we get in the fall is a big joke. Example being:  Graeme goes to bed at 7:00pm and sleeps until 6:00-6:30am. So, when the clock shifts back an hour in the middle of the night, his little internal clock does not. And he therefore wakes up at 5:00am. If you're thinking, Just put him to bed an hour later that night and then he'll sleep an hour later in the morning, you would be mistaken. At least for my child. Typically, the later he goes to bed, the earlier he wakes up.

I realized this dilemma last year and decided to try to beat the system. And it worked. So I did the same thing this year. And it worked again.

It requires a bit of planning and adjusting the week before, but I think it's worth it. It makes the hour time change much easier on Graeme and doesn't have us (or my parents this year!) waking up an hour earlier on Sunday. If you are curious for next year, here's what I do:

This works for us because Graeme is on a (fairly) consistent schedule. I'm sure you could make it work for your child even if they weren't necessarily on a schedule too!

The Saturday a week before the time change is when I started. I shifted everything 15 minutes ahead, starting with breakfast. That meant 15 minutes later for all meals. 15 minutes later for nap time. And 15 minutes later for bedtime. I did this exact same schedule for Saturday AND Sunday.

On Monday, I shifted everything 15 more minutes. This meant it was 30 minutes later than what his normal schedule was. We did this for two days as well, Monday and Tuesday. By Wednesday morning, his "wake up for the day" time was starting to catch on, and he slept in until 7:00am.

On Wednesday, we did another 15 minutes shift, putting us 45 minutes later than a normal day. This is when the day started to seem really long! He was adjusting fine, but a 7:45 bedtime just seemed really late to us! Another two days of this (Wednesday and Thursday).

By Friday morning, we had reached the beginning of "Phase 4," the final 15 minutes that put us an entire hour later. This meant he slept in until 7:30am. He ate lunch at noon. He went down for a nap at 1:00pm. He ate dinner at 6:00pm. And bedtime wasn't until 8:00pm. My parents took the torch and finished off the time change plan on Saturday using this same schedule.

Therefore, by Saturday night, he was an entire hour ahead of time. If that even makes sense. Ha. And when time fell back an hour that night, he fell right back to normal. I texted my mom on Sunday morning, "DID IT WORK?!" And I was happy to receive, "He slept until 6:30!" back from her. Back to normal. And no trouble at all from then on.



So, if I seem entirely crazy to some of you, you may be right. I try not to be "schedule nazi" too much, but yeah...I am pretty reliant on our nice routine we have going for us most days! There's a time to flexible, and a time to want sleep, right? Right?!

time flies...mostly

We are just 72 days away from our due date (which also means there are only 72 days left in 2015!). I will be 30 weeks pregnant on Friday. This pregnancy has mostly gone by a little faster than my pregnancy with Graeme, but I still feel like I have been pregnant 

for-ev-er.  

It is pretty crazy to imagine going from having one child to suddenly having two. We already talk and think like Maisy is one of our children of course, but it will be different once she's actually here with us. Lord willing, we will go to the hospital with one carseat and leave with two.

I am curious how Graeme will react, and there's really no way to know. He is a complete momma's boy for one thing, so I'm sure it will be an adjustment for him. I don't know how he compares with other kids (maybe he's just a normal amount attached to me!), but some days I think my ears will fall off from hearing "Momma" one more time. He just says it over and over with nothing else to go along with it a lot of times. Ha! I will never really tire of hearing him say it though.

Typical conversation:  "Momma!" "What?" *silence* *wait a few seconds* "Momma?!" "Yes?" *silence* *repeat* 

Last Tuesday I took my one hour Glucose Tolerance Test. I wasn't too worried, but it is a little nerve-wracking to wait for the results. Thankfully, I got my results on Friday morning and everything was in the normal limits. That's pretty much the last thing to worry with until it's time to actually go into labor. Crazy!

Just like with Graeme, and in my case, forever (the result of not having a thyroid at all!), I have had my thyroid levels monitored throughout this pregnancy. They have changed my prescription once and we will check it again next week to make sure it has leveled out appropriately. 

Other than that, things are going well and I am feeling good, thankfully!

My birthday is next week and I will be 28. Age doesn't really bother me too much, but I do realize I am right on the doorstep of 30 basically. So that's weird. Wasn't I just in high school?

Shortly after high school. With my brother. So young. And still had a thyroid to boot (giant lump in my neck!) :)

Speaking of time flying, Aaron and I have our seven year "dating anniversary" coming up on November 2nd. We have said a couple of times in the past week, "Seven years ago we weren't even together...and now we have two kids and have been married for 5.5 years." 

From the beginning...we had no clue what was in store!

Well, I'll stop rambling now. Oh, but I will mention how we are about to have a 19 month old on our hands in just two days. We will then have a little boy just five months away from his second birthday. Only five more months of saying his age in months. Then he will be two. And no one goes around saying 24 months. Aaron will be glad for that. He wanted to stop saying Graeme's age in months after he turned one. 

You can't really say "one" for the whole year when this is at the beginning of being one and...

...this is just seven months later!

Pregnancy goes by pretty slowly. 

My own age goes by a little faster. 

My time with Aaron has gone and goes by quickly. 

But surely our children growing older goes by the very fastest.

Time is funny that way.

finishing the crib

A lot has changed in a week as far as my last post. We were still waiting on the crib hardware when I last wrote, and it came in within the next day. Rodney texted that he was free to come over Saturday morning to finish setting it up. He and Aaron ended up having to make a run to the hardware store to get some Gorilla Glue (some of the holes in the crib had been a bit tampered with a bit...oh, Craig's List finds...).

They were able to get everything put together except the little gate on the top. When they got to that they were missing a few little wood screws. Rodney left Aaron all set up to be able to screw that part in himself. After Rodney left, I asked Aaron how it went since I had been entertaining Graeme and Bensen mostly. He said, "Well, as it is whenever I help someone who knows what they are doing, I basically just hold things and hand them things."

Our one job to accomplish on our own.

We picked up the screws we needed when we got groceries that afternoon, and then I helped Aaron hold the gate in place while he screwed them in. We were pretty proud of ourselves for this accomplishment until we went to close the crib and, of course, it wouldn't quite close. This was not due to our lack of handyman skills, thankfully. The latches that the crib company makes now are different than when this crib was originally made so they no longer worked in the original holes.

A little unsure of moving the latches to a new place by ourselves, we troubled Rodney to come over for the third time. (Thankfully he doesn't mind!)

Finally, on Sunday afternoon after just a few more minutes, the latches were shifted, the crib closed perfectly, and it was FINISHED! Rodney and Aaron pushed and pulled on it everywhere and it's perfectly safe and looks great now that we finally got it together! Again, we are very thankful for such great help in figuring out this crib! We love it!

Graeme checking it out. He's still pretty clueless about what's happening.

Her room is coming together now and has all of the major furniture pieces. We have decided on a pink, gray/silver, and gold color scheme with princess accents here and there. After some debate, we decided the cheapest option that made the most sense was giving Maisy Graeme's chair. We felt bad about this because we all love to sit and read in his room. To make up for it, we created a cozy reading corner. He doesn't mind at all.

It just needs things like a mattress and sheets and things hung on the wall and a changing pad and diapers and oh my...there's still some work to do.




Anyway, in other news, we celebrated Aaron's birthday yesterday! Graeme had fun coloring his birthday card to Daddy and picking out some balloons for him. He refused ice cream, per usual, but did eat a little bit of chocolate chip cookie for birthday dessert. And he wanted Mommy to sing the "Happy Birthday Song" twice.

I had a doctor's appointment yesterday morning and had my glucose screening test. I should hear back in the next couple of days if I passed or not. I passed the one-hour test with Graeme, so I'm hoping it will be the same this time. Fingers crossed!

Maisy Kate is doing well and her heartbeat is strong and steady. She gave a big kick while the doctor was listening and he said, "I felt that one!" She's a pretty active little girl. We are already to the point of having appointments every two weeks now, so that's crazy. I have a feeling the end will fly by pretty fast.


Aaron's younger brother is getting married this weekend so we will see how Graeme does at a wedding now that he's older. Thankfully it is outside and should be a super short ceremony.

I'll let you know. Until next time!

the crib saga

We are already a whole week into October (best month ever). It's been a few Wednesdays since I have actually had the free time to try to get a blog post written out. I am winding down my time at my part-time job, and since Wednesdays are my only full day to work, they've been busy.

Plus, we are about 12 weeks away from Miss Maisy Kate, and there are only about a few hundred things to do. Goodness.

What's been going on?

My last post mentioned how our due date is moved to New Year's Day. We are super excited about this and it's made things speed up just a little bit. I am in the third trimester, I will be 28 weeks on Friday, and Maisy is moving around a lot. We can feel her and see her move. Baby kicks are my favorite part of pregnancy.

We have had a slight debacle with her crib. What had happened was...

Before we were even trying to get pregnant the first time, I was still nannying and the lovely family I worked for mentioned they were selling their very nice crib and crib mattress. Not wanting to seem crazy, I asked if they would be willing to sell it to us. We knew we wanted kids in the pretty near future and it was a very nice crib! They were overly generous and gave it to us for a fraction of what it was worth. I wrote about this here.

The crib is pictured below. The first one was the picture I took of the crib in their garage so I could show Aaron. The next one is the crib set up in Graeme's room!

So, you may notice the folding down piece up top? In the first picture it's folded down. And in the one of his room it's folded up. For the past two years, I haven't thought much about it. I know other cribs don't typically have it, but I didn't think it made a difference in the size of the crib.

Oh, but it does.

When we began looking for Maisy's crib, I was very confused why all of the cribs seemed so small and short. After looking at Babies R Us and Target, I decided to dig out the papers for Graeme's crib and see if I could figure out what kind it was.

I found the name of the company and looked them up. They didn't make his exact crib anymore, but it didn't take me long to find a similar one. And then I realized the reason I wasn't finding a crib like his was because this company was the only company that made these cribs. They are called "safety gate cribs" and they add an extra five inches to the depth by latching the top gate. And I also realized that the pennies (exaggeration, but really, we paid a fraction of what it was worth) we handed over for his crib paled in comparison to it's actual cost and we in no way could afford this crib that cost more than most of the other furniture in our house.

I called my mom and told her about my first world dilemma. "Oh don't worry about it. We can help you if you need it." While this was a super generous offer and much appreciated, we still could not feel right about spending that much money on a crib. (Although it converts to a toddler bed and full size bed too!) The next day, we started browsing Craigslist for something else, and I said, "Hey, just type in that crib just to see if we get lucky."

Lo and behold, up popped a listing for Graeme's exact crib in white. And it was less than half the cost of a new crib from the company. It seemed meant to be. Aaron quickly emailed to make sure it was still available. The next day he talked to the man on the phone who gave him some more information and said he would hold the crib for us while he went out of town over the weekend. One slight inconvenience was that he lived in Winston Salem, but this was definitely not a deal-breaker as it would save us hundreds. Aaron made the drive to pick it up last week.

It was in great shape, but the "white" wasn't technically "white"...it was more of an "antique white." We decided we would like it better if we painted it. Since my parents were already coming to paint Maisy's room this past Saturday, we declared it "Paint Day," and Aaron set out to paint the crib.

It was a bit tedious, but it made a huge difference (you can see the white next to the not really white) and we loved it even more.

We are still extremely close with the family I nannied for and had been keeping them up-to-date with our crib saga. Rodney, who had now put this exact model together about three times (he put Graeme's together for us too!) generously offered to come put it together on Sunday afternoon.

In anticipation of helping him out, we retrieved the plastic bag of hardware the Craigs List seller guy gave Aaron with all of the crib pieces. We pulled out the directions from Graeme's crib to organize the hardware. And then we realized something was amiss. We dumped out the bag of random metal scrap parts and discovered not one of them went to the crib.

We are still not sure if we were purposefully duped or if it was an accident.

Alas, to avoid a trip to Winston Salem and out of the wonderful, kind generosity of our good friend Rodney, it is all being taken care of. Rodney made a list of what was missing (we did have some of the pieces that were still in the crib) and said he would just take care of getting everything for us. He is well aware of our total lack of handyman knowledge. We really can't thank him enough.

Hopefully, the crib will come together in the next couple of weeks and we can laugh at our misfortune/fortune.

Despite this slight setback, Maisy Kate's room is coming together. Her walls are "Charming Pink" and she has a dresser and bookcase. We are probably going to move Graeme's gray chair over to her room, but we feel a bit bad about this because he loves to sit and read so much. We will probably make him a cozy reading corner out of beanbags and pillows to make up for it.

In other news, I am still feeling great. So great that I am crazy and just might attempt to potty train Graeme this weekend in a three-day blitz. Yikes. We aren't going to push it, but we both think he can do it and it would be SO nice to not have to buy diapers for two kids. He picked out underwear at the store last weekend. To Aaron's dismay, he wanted Thomas the Train and not Batman. Uh oh.

I'll keep you posted! 

18 months old!

The past month flew by without much time for writing on the blog. 

Graeme is 18 months old as of September 23rd. 1.5 years. 

Eighteen months ago he was a little, tiny snuggly baby. And now he is a running, talking little boy.

Every month we marvel at how much he has grown and how much more fun he is, when we don't think he can possibly become any more fun than what he currently is.

He always does though.

Last night, it was breezy, cloudy, and warm. We sat outside with him at the end of the day. He ran through the grass chasing bubbles yelling, "Catch it!" and stopping to marvel at every car or truck that drove by. He was having so much fun we hated to end it as bath and bedtime approached. It is so fun to watch him play and hear his thoughts on the world around him. 

He has his 18 month well visit Friday so we are curious to find out all of his stats. He is basically as tall as a two-year-old, according to standing him up next to the two-year-olds we know!

This past month, all four of his first year molars popped through, (finally)! After hearing many horror stories of how teething molars is like a million times worse, I will say that it actually wasn't as bad as I thought it would be. Besides being extra clingy and whiny during the day, he never had any trouble sleeping through the night. Praise the Lord. He did go through a two week period of waking up between 5:30-6:00am, but now he is back to sleeping until at least 6:30 every morning. 

His vocabulary is mind-boggling to us, per usual. I can't keep up with all the words he knows anymore. He can say what he wants and can be quite persistent about it, too! He has his rainbow colors nailed down, so he can say and identify red, orange, yellow, green, blue, and purple. He's started saying small sentences like, "Here comes Mama!"

This month he has grown attached to several of his stuffed animals and asks for them to sleep in his bed. His favorites are his Vermont Teddy Bear with the superhero costume, the mouse from If You Give a Mouse a Cookie, a stuffed penguin (that had an unfortunate stay in the trash at Journey before we realized he was missing!), and a little black bear that he thinks is a cat. 

Penguin is not pictured here, but he was probably in the chair somewhere.

In other news, we had an ultrasound Wednesday morning to check on Maisy Kate. There was some question about our due date, and after the ultrasound Wednesday they moved it up almost two weeks (I do not mind this at all!). She is now due on New Year's Day, and tomorrow I will be 26 weeks pregnant.

It is not entirely too much difference from January 12th, but it feels like quite a bit. We have lots to do, and I am anxious to get things ready now! It's very fun planning a little girl's room. More details on her nursery to come.