19 Weeks

How Far Along: 19 weeks

Baby Size: 9 ounces, heirloom tomato, 6 inches head to bottom

Total Weight Gain: I have no clue?

Maternity Clothes? Pretty much normal clothes again but with maternity tanks. It's hot though...I need to figure out something that doesn't require layers!

Stretch Marks? No.

Sleep: Good. Pretty good. He is much more active at night and I tend to stay up obsessing over his name, room, etc. so it's hard to actually go to sleep.

Best moment this week: Feeling more kicks, definitely. It is so comforting and is the first way I can get to know him. :) Also, we got our doula this week! I am so excited. Our hospital started offering a doula service (with Parker we hired one additionally), so I cannot wait to start to meeting with her.  

Miss Anything? Kind of starting to miss feeling skinny. A little early for that, I know! Also, if I could drink Diet Coke all day I totally would.  

Movement: He has become more active even in the last day! Mostly when I lay down, but I feel kicks and nudges throughout the day. Best feeling ever in my opinion. I think I saw an outside kick yesterday, but I'm not 100% sure. 

Food Cravings: Water, fruit (watermelon), pizza!

Anything making you queasy or sick? Only if I let myself get hungry....it's the miserable too much saliva queasy feeling, otherwise I'm good. 

Other Symptoms: More round ligament pain, more emotional than normal

Gender: BOY!!!!

Labor Signs: Nope.

Belly button in or out? In

Wedding rings on or off? On

Happy or Moody most of the time: Pretty happy this week!

Looking forward to: Still to need to pick a middle name! Can't wait to start prepping the house for his arrival. We have our anatomy scan next week and well as our first check-up with the doula. 

Alrighty, I'm done because I'm attempting to write this with my toddler running around and it isn't working out too well. :) 

18 Weeks

How Far Along: 18 weeks

Baby Size: 7 ounces, the size of a bell pepper

Total Weight Gain: I'm going to stick with 12 pounds

Maternity Clothes? Still in maternity tanks but normal jeans, shirts, dresses. 

Stretch Marks? No.

Sleep: Good. Can't really sleep on my stomach any more. Having to do the good old leg hitch on Bryan again!

Best moment this week: Sharing with everyone that we are having a BOY!! 

Miss Anything? Again with the wine....I have no clue why. 

Movement: Okay, I'm about 98% sure that I am feeling movement now. Except it's not flutters like with Parker, they are nudges. I love nudges! Especially when baby gets bigger, which is why I'm not 100% positive that that's what's happening now. But it happens a lot and makes me happy!

Food Cravings: Water, fruit, Comfort food. My MIL made meat loaf last week and I can't stop thinking about it.

Anything making you queasy or sick? I don't know...Parker has had a stomach virus all week and I thought I had caught it when I lost my breakfast yesterday morning...but then I was fine, so I'm thinking maybe it was just pregnancy hormones? Either way, two people throwing up in one house is two too many. 

Other Symptoms: Need to pee, tired, have had some round ligament pain (which makes sense since I look like a whale this week!)

Gender: BOY!!!!

Labor Signs: Nope.

Belly button in or out? In

Wedding rings on or off? On

Happy or Moody most of the time: Still pretty moody. I have gotten mad at the dumbest things this week and have had a pretty negative attitude about a lot of things. And then I cry about it, so that's fun. I think I cried almost every day this week, which is a little ridiculous!

Looking forward to: Picking out a name (I think we have zeroed in the first name, but can't decide on a middle)

Differences from last pregnancy: I'm definitely a lot bigger at 18 weeks than I was with P. So, there's that! Also, I tend to forget that I'm pregnant a lot since I have Parker to chase around. It's so weird how much less fragile I think I am this time around. Truly, all of these symptoms are just afterthoughts compared to how much I focused on them when I was pregnant with Parker. Poor second child! ;)

And it's a....

BOY!!!

We are so excited! Bryan and I have always envisioned having a house full of boys for some reason, like to the point that I got two twin headboards for Parker's big boy room before I even knew I was pregnant just because I was SURE that he would one day share that room with his brother.  ...And then I took a pregnancy test and was just SURE that this one would be a girl. :) Pregnancy intuition was wrong, but that doesn't change our excitement in the slightest! I am proud to be a boy mom and am  surprisingly getting this "boy thing" down.

I love watching the relationship between brothers who are close in age and cannot wait to watch these two grow up together... play cars and trucks, make messes (kind of kidding there), fall in love with sports (and girls...waaaay later), and become big stinky men and dads. ;) 

Parker loved this confetti thing, by the way. He kept saying "More! More!" so we did it about 50 times.  This never happens when a camera is involved so I had to share.

Since this is my decorating place, I will also share that I hope to make a few changes to the nursery 

(that dang board and batten, maybe some different stuff on the walls, etc.), but the bulk of our budget will go to Parker's new room! My head is full of ideas but I haven't bought anything yet (except for the headboards from Craigslist). Excited to get going!

Parker Turns TWO!

Our sweet and crazy little boy turned two almost 2 weeks ago and we still cannot believe it. We had a party for him the day before his real birthday and I am happy to say that everything turned out really well and we had so much fun with his little buddies.

Let me start with decorations---I decided on a "Donuts and Dump Trucks" theme because Parker LOVES trucks. And I love donuts. :) 

I reigned myself in and limited decorating to the dining table. I was very proud that I stuck with it and didn't go too overboard!

Parker's toys were obviously a big part of the decorations and I managed to make all of the labels and signs for the party. I especially loved the road signs and food labels!! Here is the menu:

Gravel Pile (dry cereal), Stop Light Bulbs (mixed fruit), Land For Sale (egg casserole), Bolder Yard (sausage balls), Wrecking Balls (donut holes), and Spare Tires (donuts).  We just invited our small group and a few of our neighbors so it was the perfect amount of food.

Donut cakes are a lot easier than real cakes :).

As I already said, the road signs were my favorites. I used Parkers age and birth date for the highway signs and fun little construction sayings to show what each set-up was for. 

You are probably sick of pictures, but I loved how the dining table turned out!

We set up a "fuel station" drink table on the buffet.  I filled the big dump truck with juice boxes and Capri Sun. We also had coffee for the grown ups--although now that I think about it, I didn't have any of it!

For the kids activity, we decided to do a digging construction zone outside. I saw the idea on Pinterest and thought it was adorable! We just filled up a kiddy pool with sand and I went crazy at Target buying toys from the dollar spot to hide in it. The kids got to dig them out and put them in paper bags to take home as favors. 

It was a little windy outside, so I set up the empty favor bags in the kitchen. They say "I dig you for coming to my party!" Another Pinterest find.

Here are some of the kids at work! Some were into more than others...including the birthday boy.

The last little decoration was on the mantel in the living room. I had some extra signs so I made a little unwrapping station set-up for gifts. 

Oh, and I wrapped the door in caution tape and stuck a "Caution Party Ahead" sign in our wreath.

One funny little quirk about Parker is that he is terrified of the Happy Birthday song. He always cries (and snuggles) when he hears it at restaurants so we were not surprised when he sobbed at his party (we even asked guests to sing quietly!) It made for a funny (and sweet) home video though...

He was actually not in the greatest mood for a lot of the party...oh, the life of a two year old!

He did better though once we got going with presents and went outside to play.

I got my FLOR rug, by the way! Hoping to most pictures soon (I always say that, I know.)

I got Parker's little shirt on Etsy from the shop Great Stitch.

Parker was of course happiest after everyone left and he had his toys and his grandparents all to himself :).

He is such a loved little boy and really enjoyed all of the decorations and the theme of his party, which made it worthwhile for me! 

A few things about Parker as he turns TWO:

-He loves to sleep. Like a lot.

-He is very noisy and silly with family but pretty shy everywhere else. 

-He knows that he is funny and will do things multiple times that he knows we will laugh at.

-He started throwing temper tantrums the week that he turned two--without any warning! So fun. :-/  I just bought a time-out mat because of this. 

-He is 37 inches tall, which is the 97th percentile. He weighs 30 pounds and has an off-the-charts head.

-His favorite foods are milk, yogurt,  cheese pizza, peanut butter, fruit and veggie pouches, grilled cheeses, french fries, and refried beans and rice. Oh, and Chick-fil-a. Sometimes bananas and grapes.

-He still loves his paci (which he calls "dobby"), although we are trying to wean him off of it.

-He hates the Happy Birthday song

-He loves his blankets (ba-bas), which are really lightweight swaddle blankets, and he will carry 6 of them around at a time when I let him.

-His favorite phrase is "No Way!" and "Whyyyyyyy", which he yells ALL the time out in public. Again, so fun. ;) Also his "Please" sounds like "Psssssssss!!!!!!!" Always so excited.

-He gives the sweetest kisses and snuggles when he is super tired.

-He is obsessed with pointing out babies everywhere we go.

-He loves cars, trucks, trains, and planes. LOVES them. He also like to ride in the car because of this. Road trips are a piece of cake! He also loves reading books and building blocks or legos. Right now he calls every book a bible. 

-His favorite movies are Cars, Frozen, Finding Nemo ("memo"), Planes, and Thomas the Train. 

-He is very, very tender-hearted and can't handle people yelling period or laughing at him. :( Breaks my heart every time!

-He loves to go on walks, ride in his wagon, and ride the escalator at the mall. 

I love him. :) 

If you got through this post, you get a gold star!!

17 Weeks.

Here we go again!

I'm going to try to make things simpler this time around so we'll see how that goes. (Hence the iPhone photo.)

How Far Along: 17 weeks

Baby Size: 5 ounces, the weight of a turnip, the size of an onion!

Total Weight Gain: Ah! I just got weighed today  but didn't have the guts to ask. I think like 12 pounds. :-/

Maternity Clothes? Sporting my miracle worker maternity tanks under all clothing already, but definitely still wearing normal jeans and shirts on top.

Stretch Marks? No.

Sleep: Good.

Best moment this week: Today we found out what the baby is!!! We are SO pumped, but haven't told all of our family yet so I'll wait to post it everywhere else. 

Miss Anything? I've really been wanting a glass of wine lately, which is weird because I really don't like wine.

Movement: Maybe a few flutters? I can't tell 100%, but I wish!

Food Cravings: Water all. the. time. Fresh fruit. Mexican food. Steak.

Anything making you queasy or sick? Not really any more, thank goodness. Smells and the thought of sweets made me gag for a while though.

Other Symptoms: Still a little tired, already getting awful leg and foot cramps. Need to pee a lot.

Gender: It's a secret for the moment :) 

Labor Signs: Haha, no way.

Belly button in or out? In

Wedding rings on or off? On

Happy or Moody most of the time: Both? I swear I cry at everything right now. And when I'm mad, I super mad.

Looking forward to: Feeling first for sure kicks, picking out a name. Everything, really!

Differences from last pregnancy: This time around has been SO much easier, so far. Not near as sick, didn't break out, haven't had all of the weird skin stuff that I dealt with last time. Definitely feeling bigger a lot sooner this time though. And I have to pee a lot, which I never had to do with Parker (and I was well hydrated, I think)

Funny words/moments from Big Brother: Lately when I ask, "Is there a baby in Mommy's tummy?" He just looks at me dead-on and says "NO". He does love to point out all babies though and wants to pet them. Then he chucks a baby doll across the room and laughs.

We Have Some News!

For anyone who actually still reads this, we are excited to announce that we have another little one coming along this October! 

I think that the last time I posted on here I didn't even know I was pregnant, haha!

We are so excited and have been really looking forward to giving Parker a sibling and growing our family. The new baby is due October 22nd, although he or she may come a little early since Parker decided to show up a week early, but we will have to wait and see. I am 16 weeks today and look HUGE compared to what I did at this time with Parker.

Quite honestly, I have been meaning to announce this to the general public for about a month now but I had very unrealistic expectations of wrangling my two-year-old down to pose oh-so-perfectly for a picture with his new sibling's shoes but in the end neither of us had the patience to make that happen... 

I have been feeling a lot better with this pregnancy overall, just queasy and tired for a few weeks, but nothing like what I was with Parker. (Thank goodness!)

 I'm hoping to take my first bump picture tomorrow since it's finally starting to look like a real bump instead of just one too many cheeseburgers. :) My goal is to take them regularly this time!

That's about it! We had Parker's birthday party last weekend so I would like to post pictures of that sometime soon, too!