2014 Christmas Card

I am once again linking up for the annual Christmas Card Carousel hosted by Faith!

 

I decided to just go with a simple card with one photo this year. Looking through the photos we had done earlier in the fall, I knew which one I wanted to use almost immediately!

 

 

I love these two little munchkins so much! I love their smiles, and their blonde hair, and their wild spirits!!! I cannot believe we will have a third little baby on our card next year!!!

 

Wishing you and your family a very Merry Christmas!!!

Getting this thing caught up

These last few weeks leading up to Christmas have been SO busy! We are on the go, go, go. Everyone gets out of school on Friday for Christmas break, and I’m taking a week off of work and we cannot wait!

I feel so behind on so many things on this blog so I think I just need to do a big ole catch up to get us up to date. Then I can MAYBE stay caught up?

Halloween came and went. Ava wanted to be a rock star and Reed wanted to be a fireman. Easy enough. 

Reed didn’t want to trick or treat at first but he finally got a little less scared. At every door, he would run up and stand behind Ava. It was so cute. I guess he felt protected behind her!

We finally finished up Ava’s four rounds of getting cavities filled. We are PRAYING we have NO MORE!

The last two rounds were really tough on her. The 3rd one, the doctor accidentally got a blood vessel in her cheek when he was giving her the numbing shot. She swelled and hurt pretty bad after that visit.

Ava also started having spelling tests at school. She’s done very well on the ones she has had so far!

Ava has homework every night now and she gets very frustrated when I make her correct letters or numbers are backwards. We have learned that she and her daddy mesh much better when it comes to sounding out words and reading. I can handle the numbers and spelling.

I will NEVER get sick of photos of my babies sleeping!!!!  

I will also never tire of the sweet moments where these two really do love each other!!!!!

We had our first snow of the season in November!! And then it got warm again…   

My brother came into town one weekend and picked the kids up from school. He then sent me a pic of them having an ice cream treat!

Ava has had a Christmas tree in her room for several years. This year when we got it out, Reed got really upset he didn’t have one. Ava told him that he could have hers in his room until we could get him one. Some days she really makes mature choices!

Zach and I celebrated our 8th anniversary!

We had Thanksgiving with both of our families!

Ava asked for the turkey leg and she did pretty good with it!

We have made good use of our Christmas wear since December rolled in!

I take any chance I can to let my baby snuggle me. He is growing up so fast and these moments happen so rarely!

We told the kids the news about the baby after they were out of school for their Thanksgiving break. Ava couldn’t want to go back and tell her friends. She asked for a copy of my ultrasound pics to show them. Her teacher texted me this photo of her sharing her news!

On the night of Zach’s Christmas concert, he had to stay at school and since we had to be back there so shortly after I got off work, we just went and had a quick dinner at Chick-fil-a.

Reed still likes Mickey Mouse, especially when a new one is on. He was excited to snuggle up with his daddy and watch a new one a couple of weeks ago.

This kid. That is all.

The kids have an Advent devotional every morning and gather in the school foyer. I got a text with this photo of the kiddos sitting together last week!  

Ava’s class sang one morning and we all went to watch her!  

They also sang at the Holiday Open House at our public library yesterday! She won’t look at me while she performs!

Last week we also did one of our favorite holiday traditions – we went and rode the Holiday Express at the local park. We love going and riding the train to look at all the lights they have up. The kids love it especially, even though Ava’s face says otherwise!

So. This is a LONG post but I feel like it catches us up on the most important things that have happened! Now – to stay caught up!

Telling the kids

Before we told the kids we were having a baby, we had several conversations with them that made me think that they somehow KNEW even though they didn’t know.

Before I was ever pregnant, one morning out of the blue, Ava said to me “We are going to have another baby next year.” I asked her what made her say that and she said “I don’t know. I just think we are.”

A week or so after we found out, we were on our way to school, Reed said “Momma, we should have a little baby that can’t walk, and we should name it baby Reed.” I told him we already had a baby named Reed!

Later, that same week, Ava told me I looked like I had a baby in my tummy. I asked her why and she said I just did.

Reed had a few more conversations after that about having a baby, and then it turned to having a baby sister. He has continued ta talk about a baby sister even before he knew about the baby.

So, we decided to tell them after our doctor appointment. We knew that when we told them that everyone would know because we knew Ava especially would want to tell everyone! We actually had a date that night because it was our anniversary.

When we got home, we shared the good news.

We decided our elf on the shelf would come back a little earlier than normal this year and help us share the news. When we got back from our date, Jana, our elf, had appeared in the backseat of the van with a note and a cookie cake! The kids were SO excited to see Jana and we read them the note she gave them.

I am SOOOOOOO happy we have this on video because they were just the cutest and sweetest!

Here is a close up of the cookie cake – not the best way to say it but I wanted something Reed would understand, too.

After we told them, Reed tried to look down my shirt to see the baby. He also later tried to lift my shirt so he could find it. He and Ava both think the baby is a girl. Reed wants to name her Margaret! They are so funny. He’s also upset because he asked where the baby would sleep and I told him it would sleep in his bed (he’s still in the crib-converted-toddler-bed). He wasn’t so happy about that. He also wants to know if he can push the baby in the stroller. He’s cute though – we were walking through a store and asking if random stuff was stuff the baby could have.

Ava vey quickly asked mw who we would invite to our baby shower! Ha! I told her we probably wouldn’t have one of those this time. I think my favorite part though was when Ava came up to me and said “i hope we have a boy or a girl!” Me too, sister. If it’s anything else, then I’d be a little concerned!!!!! :)

Details

Ahhhhhh!! It feels so good to have our news out in the open! This is the pregnancy we’ve waited the longest to tell anyone and it was hard!

So, for memory’s sake, this is the story:

I took a test in the evening on 9/24. It was negative. I knew my time was coming along and figured that it would happen any day. Saturday came and went and nothing. I had been having cramps and knew it was just around the corner. By Tuesday, 9/30, I was three days late. I woke up that morning and took a test. I only had a digital test, and pretty quickly it popped up pregnant! It had to work a little longer and it then it popped up with 2-3 weeks (past ovulation). I was a little shocked since I’d had a negative the week before, and because I somehow missed the 1-2 week window! I wonder if I’d gone back and looked at the other test more closely, if it would’ve shown a faint line. I think that b/c it was the end of the day, and because I’d used the restroom a lot, it just didn’t pick it up. With the other two, I knew before I was late. I guess I should’ve known because the days before this, I was SUPER emotional. I mean, crying like it was my job. I had also started having insomnia the week before (more on this later).

I proceeded on with my morning and decided not to tell Zach right away. Unless God has other plans, this will most likely be our last baby and I just wanted to tell him in some other way than just “i’m pregnant”. I went that day and got him a card that said “you’re expecting a little bundle of joy”! The kids went to bed early that night and I told him I had something for him and gave him the card. He was a little surprised but very excited! I had called my doctor’s office that morning and told him my first appointment wasn’t for five weeks (AGONY!). We had family pictures scheduled for that weekend (which you saw in the previous post), so other than our photographer, my friend who made our signs, and the nurse, we had our little secret.

We had our first appointment at 8w6d. Everything looked perfect! I have a new doctor this time as my old OB retired and moved away. It’s definitely going to be a little different, but he is very thorough and competent and I feel as though both me and the baby are very safe with him.

We had our first appointment on 10/31 (they called me that week and said they had a cancellation and did i want to come that day instead of the next Tuesday? UM DUH!) After that, we finally told our families and a few friends. We decided not to tell the kids until our second appointment just in case something happened.

We had our 2nd appointment on 11/25, our wedding anniversary. :) We couldn’t find the heartbeat through the doppler which we knew wasn’t uncommon, and got another quick sneak peak. It was wiggling like crazy and it’s heartbeat was 160 bpm.

We finally shared the news with the world after that. I’m 13w2d as of today and I feel like it’s flying by. We’ll know in about 7 weeks if we have another boy or girl joining our family!

I think the funniest part of this pregnancy has been trying to hide it. I started showing around 10 weeks and it became a CHORE trying to find clothes that a) fit and b) didn’t give away the secret! I’m glad I don’t have to worry about that anymore!

I felt kinda gross between weeks 6-8. Nothing awful, just general grossness throughout the day. My worst symptom by far is insomnia. I am EXHAUSTED. I would fall asleep on the couch between 7:30-8:30 (just whenever I’d finally finish up with chores for the evening), and then I’d go to bed shortly after that. The problem was, I’d wake up anywhere between 12 and 3:30 and be up for 2-3 hours each night. It was really hard when I’d wake up at 3:30 and never go back to sleep before it was time to get out of bed. Now you know why I have had such a hard time keeping up with this blog. In between working and all the things I have to do at home, I had NO energy left for anything else. I am hopeful that as I’m moving out of the first trimester that this will get a little better, soon!

So there’s the rundown of finding out and leading up to sharing the news! My next post I will share how we told the kids and their reactions!

Thanks for your congratulations and excitement for us! We are so thrilled and everyone’s excitement just adds to ours!