Baby Sea Turtle

Nick and I are excited to announce that we are expecting our second child. And Lord willing we will be ringing in the new year 2012 as a family of 4. G2, also known as Baby Sea Turtle, (more on that later) is due around December 30th making me 13 weeks pregnant. We are truly thankful for the blessing of children and think Lauren will be a great big sister. After being 9 months pregnant in August with Lauren I am thrilled to be due in the winter and entering my third trimester in the fall. Hopefully that means less swelling? We shall see....

Unlike my pregnancy with Lauren (no morning sickness, no nauseousness) this one has been filled with exhaustion and nauseousness. Maybe that is a sign it's a boy? Nick would like to think so but we will be thrilled regardless. I am very much aware that every pregnancy is different but I am looking forward to the start of the second trimester and hope to be welcoming back my energy and appetite soon.

So back this Baby Sea Turtle thing...when I first found out I was pregnant with Lauren I took my first ultra sound picture to my sister Angela to tell her the good news. Well, at the time I was only 10 weeks pregnant and an ultra sound picture looks nothing more than a white blob. I thought it looked like a little peanut but she thought it looked like a seahorse. Which then coined the name... Baby Seahorse.

Look like a seahorse to you?

Lauren at 3 months

So when I told Angela that we were expecting again she immediately started thinking of a sea creature for G2. And although she doesn't think him/her necessarily looks like a sea turtle in the picture below:

we have to continue on with the theme... every child will have a "sea" nickname. Weird? Maybe. But they do swim in water their first 9 months.... :) AND one of my favorite movies of all time is Finding Nemo...which is why we will call him/her Crush. Pretty rockin' nickname, right? It's okay to be jealous :) ... We look forward to seeing our little one in a onesie like this one day. And when Angela gets married Aunt Crystal will look forward to nicknaming her children! :)

With all jokingness aside, we would really appreciate your prayers for a safe and easy pregnancy; a healthy (full term) baby and an easy adjustment for big sister Lauren.

Workin' At The Car Wash

Summer is in full swing...and at our house that means our drive way becomes a car wash. There are many pro's to this:

1:) We don't have to pay $7 per car at the automatic car wash
2:) It cools you down on a hot day
3:) An old ice cream bucket, soap bubbles, and a wash cloth can keep a one year old entertained for a VERY long time.

Here are a few pictures of Lauren helping daddy wash the car.

Lauren has many silly faces these days but the "say cheese" face is definitely her favorite. It is called the "say cheese" face because whenever you tell her to "say cheese" this is what happens. Although, these days, we no longer have to "say cheese". She pretty much does this face whenever you have a camera pointing in her general direction. This day I believe I said something totally boring like, "Hey Lauren, Look at Momma!"

Here's a good example of how an old plastic bucket with soapy water can keep a toddler busy. Her slide was very dirty.... :)

Sneaky Sneaky

So this morning while I was putting a load of laundry in the wash I turn around to this:

Lauren had pushed a chair from the kitchen table over to the oven where I had a fresh batch of blueberry muffins cooling and helped herself to one. Mind you, she had just eaten one for breakfast 15 minutes before but apparently she was still hungry. Don't worry the oven nor the muffins were hot.

Here you can see her standing on the chair asking me to take the paper off. Such an ornery girl... but they must have been pretty tasty.

Darth Vader

Well, it has almost been an entire month since I've had a blog update but March was a crazy month for us. Full of sickness. Ick. Lauren was officially the sickest that she has ever been, Nick had walking pneumonia and I just had bad congestion. Lauren had been battling a fever (around 102), congestion, raspy cry and voice. So after a couple days (and before the weekend) we wanted to get her checked out.

Here is Lauren modeling our way of trying to lower a fever before heading to the doc.


Turns out Lauren had RSV, a respiratory virus. For you Star Wars fans out there the doctor described it as "breathing like darth vader." Absolutely nothing we could do for her besides Tylenol and IBProphen to try to lower her fever. This is a virus that anyone can get but can be very dangerous in children under the age of two. Which explains why Nick and I were also not feeling well. Needless to say we did a lot of this:

And this:

And after five days with no improvement, we headed back to the doc, where Lauren got to enjoy this breathing treatment.


Yah, actually, if you couldn't notice, she was TERRIFIED of that mask but it helped to open up her airway and we did not need to return to the doctor. Thank the Lord. Turns out, RSV peaks on day 5 so it was a downhill slope after that. I am praying for a healthier April :)

Oh, What a Little Paint Can Do!

Alright... so a coat of primer and three coats of paint (yes, do that math that is 4 coats of paint, ridiculous, is what it is) and moving our painting operation inside (we knew 70 degree Iowa weather in February wouldn't last long) to our tiny spare room, I can finally say after, what? Like three weeks we are FINALLY finished. Well, mostly. So for those of you who are wondering what our kitchen looked like before....

Here are the red walls and dark cabinets in all their glory. We actually painted the walls in the kitchen about a month before we painted the cabinets. We are not haters of red walls or dark cabinets but we are haters of dark colors in small spaces and that is definitely what our kitchen is, small.

This is how we lived for three weeks while the doors were being painted.

One positive aspect is emptying the dishwasher was much easier (don't mind the green painters tape or the dishes sitting on the counter)

But keeping a toddler out of the cabinets was not so easy.
Here is Lauren checking out all the bio-hazards underneath the sink.
Yeah, lets just say she wasn't allowed in the kitchen much.

Cabinets doors back on but without handles

And... whala... done-din-o.

Not sure how I feel about the hardware but it works for now. It is better than not having any handles at all. We kept going back and forth between knobs and handles and finally settled for handles. Ideally this project was to satisfy us until funds are available to completely gut the kitchen and start over. Lets just say that whoever installed the cabinets in the first place wasn't exactly a skilled carpenter. In one picture, you can see how the cabinets are about a half inch from the ceiling and above the refrigerator its flush with the ceiling. This makes some doors slant and off centered which I HATE. But it will have to do for now. I do like how just a little paint brightens up a space. Our kitchen feels much larger and less claustrophobic. We still need to do a few artsy-fartsy things like hang colorful art and get a rug (or two). But until then...

Tag Queen

Lauren has always had a love for silky things. At the beginning, she loved a stuffed lamb (that we named Lala) because it had a ribbon around its neck that she would feel and rub between her fingers.

Here is 7 month old Lauren with Lala and Great Nana (Nick's Grandma)

Lala used to go with us everywhere. Which was great in the summer! Instead of carrying around a heavy blanket, we carried around Lala. That was until she started loving her blankie.

Lauren has like 7 blankets that were either made for her as an infant or given to her at my baby shower. And she only likes two. Yep, two. This is because they have very large tags. (Big props to Babies R Us for making large tags on baby blankies). Here is another picture of Baby G starting to like blankies.

I was talking with my Mother-in-Law, Robin, one day about how she only likes two of her blankets. Which most of the time isn't a problem, except for when they are dirty or she was sleeping with both of them and they got pee'd on during the night (she frequently wakes up wet, stinky diaper leakage). And plus, one tag was loved on so much it started ripping off! Anyway, she had this brilliant idea of sewing on a piece of ribbon...why didn't I think of that? Now Lauren enjoys the blankies she didn't like so much anymore. All because of a piece of ribbon. Oh, and, by the way, she has a lightweight "summer" blanket that now has a tag thanks to Robin. Summer is no longer an issue. Genius, I tell you! Genius! I have the best Mother-in-Law!

Here is Lauren loving the "ribbon tag" Grandma Robin sewed on. Thanks Grandma you're the best!

Now that we got that out of the way and you understand my child. Here she is carrying around a bib. Enjoy! :)

Spring? In February?

Today was a wonderful wonderful day. Not only because it was Valentines Day but the mounds of snow are melting and the weather was BEE-utiful for February (temp in the upper 40's). So after we ate our heart-shaped pancakes we headed outside to enjoy the spring air.
Last fall, Papa and Grandma Christy (Nick's Dad and Step-Mom) gave Lauren this little tykes gym/slide type thing. Well for the entire winter its been stored in our backyard (under snow) so today we uncovered it and she played on it for the first time....she LOVES it! Thanks Papa and Grandma :)


I especially love being a stay at home mom now that Lauren is starting to play. Don't get me wrong I love babies and I don't want to wish her life away but she's interacting and she understands what we say and most of the time she will respond in her own version of mumbo jumbo. But its great because most of the time I understand her (nobody else does but I do)!

Another gift that Lauren got last year (for her Birthday) was this fisher price lawnmower. Last fall she wasn't able to play with it because she didn't start walking until 13 months (she was a little behind, but its okay:) and by the time she was steady on her feet it was well into winter. Here are some cute pictures of her "mowing the concrete" as we called it. The grass was icky and slushy and still full of snow. But instead of "pushing" the lawnmower she "pulled" the mower. So for those of you who are wondering how to mow the cement.... that's how we do. :)