Happy Birthday!

Today is my big brother Chris's birthday! He is 32 today. Jerrett and I already called to wish him a happy birthday. My brother is one of the best men I know. He is the best big brother a girl could ever ask for. Chris was my best friend and my biggest supporter growing up and not much changed once we became adults. He is also the best uncle a little boy could ever want. He spoils Jerrett rotten. They share a love for hotwheels cars and I think that Chris has supplied more than half of Jerrett's collection. Anytime those boys are together, they are playing either cars or running around outside. I love the Jerrett has such a close relationship with his uncles. I had the same thing growing up and it is so great to see that my babies will have the same chance I did. Something else that touched my heart this past week is about my brothers. I am going to brag on them for a minute. Both brothers called or texted before Jerrett went into surgery last week. Both brothers called or texted while J was in surgery and then they both called after he got out to talk to him. Then they both called or texted at least once a day for several days after his surgery. It meant so much to know that they cared so much for our little monkey. He is one loved little boy and has a couple of wonderful uncles!
On to J's surgery. He came through with flying colors. TJ and I were a wreck but Jerrett did amazing. Coming out of his anesthesia, his only complaint was that he was hungry! He has done a wonderful job of not messing with the incision or the stitches. It is looking great and healing wonderfully. Such a blessing to have it done before the baby gets here! It was really hard to take care of him by myself. TJ went back to work the day after and that left me and J by ourselves. He was not getting around very well and was in quite a bit of pain those first few days. i would have given anything to have my momma here to help but she and Dad were in the Caribbean somewhere. They had a blast and I am glad that they went. I am just getting to the end of my pregnancy and was a little needy myself!
All things on that front are going great! TJ is convinced that I am not going to make it to my due date. We will have to wait and see! My weight is still not going up as much as the dr would like. I only have 7 weeks left and I have only put on 14 pounds. But the baby is looking good so she is not too worried. I am carrying really really low and so she is not convinced I will make it much further either. As long as baby is healthy, I dont really care. The plans for the weekend are working on getting the bags packed and ready to go. I am having contractions like crazy so my body is gearing up for baby. The contractions don't hurt or anything so I hope that once I actually start labor, I will know when to go to the hospital! We have finally settled once and for all on names. So we are going in with a complete girls name and a complete boys name! We sort of went back and forth for a while on names, thinking we had settled but then changing our minds. we really want names that mean something but that are not so common that there will be another one in their grades. Plus we are both in love with old fashioned names. I don't think that anyone could even come close to guessing the names that we chose. But that is part of the fun.
All in all, we are really happy. Everyone is happy and healthy and we are excited for summer. My amazing husband has surprised me with 2 new gifts that I love! I got a new Nikon which is so amazing! He knew I wanted a new one for a long time and now I am having fun playing with it. Once we get our new computer, I am going to have a blast with photo editing. All this just in time for baby! My other new gift is a Nook Color! It is so cool. And I think that we are all going to use it. TJ got it for me to take to the hospital with us when the baby is born.

Spring Time

This is one of my favorite times of year. The blooming of tulips and daffodils. The sunshine yellow forsythia blooming and the pear trees with their gorgeous spring whites. Birds are returning and singing from the trees and building nests in our trees. I also just love the thought or rebirth and renewal. To me, that is what spring means. And this has been one amazingly busy beginning to spring! We started about 2 weeks ago with both feet going. It all began with an evening tour of the hospital for TJ and me. Jerrett got to stay with his girls. Bless Alison and Scott, they kept him a little longer so that TJ and I could have a grown up dinner too! Those are few and far between. J woke up the next day sick as a dog. It makes me so sad t o see my little man not feeling well. It was a serious attack of allergies so there was nothing that I could even do for him. Anyway, that following Saturday, Dad drove up to stay with Jerrett while TJ and I went to our all day birthing class. It has been a long time since Dad spent that much time with a toddler all on his own! But he and had a blast and we are so blessed that he came up and stayed with Jerrett. J would not have stayed with anyone else for that long so we are really blessed. TJ and I actually had a blast in class. We were dreading it but it was fun. Our teacher was a hoot and so were the other couples in our class. I was the second furthest along in our class and by far the smallest one in there! It is hard to believe that we are so close to our due date! I finally had to cave and go buy some maternity clothes. I am still too small for them to look right but my normal stuff was getting too small. Oh well. Thankfully I stay home most days so I can live in TJ's tshirts and cotton shorts!
Lets see... This last week was pretty busy too. We had a roofing company that came out and fixed our roof. Ouch to our savings account! Took J to see another pediatric urologist. Scheduled his surgery, and took him to get an antibiotic for his allergies.
This week is crazy too. Mom and Dad left for their cruise this past weekend and they will be gone all spring break. I am so happy for them. I love when they travel. It makes me smile to know how much they still love each other and that they get to spend this special time together. They really needed it this year since they have had to spend 5 days apart every week since November. It is really hard on them to be apart like that. Soon, they will be together though. They close on their new house at the end of the month and then Mom is almost done with school. We are all on countdown for the end of May! Not only does that mean baby time for us but the end of school for Mom. We are really excited to have them closer and cannot wait to go and spend time at the farm with them. We are all going to love having them close and the fact that we will be up there so much!
Jerrett also started tball. He is so stinking excited and looks so cute out there! TJ is the coach and is doing so well too. I am proud of him. TJ is a great dad who makes the time to spend with J teaching him and coaching him. What an amazing dad for any little boy to have! They have matching hats and everything! We toured a private preschool and enrolled J this past week. After a lot of thought and discussion, not just with me and TJ, wee have decided to send J one day a week to a private school this fall. Academically Jerrett is way past his peers and does not need to go to preschool before kindergarten but he is needing the social aspect of school. he needs to learn how to be with a teacher all day as well as how to listen to someone other than his mom and dad. TJ and I, as well as my mom were really impressed with this school and are really excited to see our little man mature some. He is really excited to start and wanted too start now not in the fall! We also scheduled Jerrett's surgery. He goes in this Wednesday at 815. TJ and I are way more nervous than he is. J does not know what to expect no matter how many times we tell him what is going to happen. All he knows or cares about is the fact that he is going to have stitches. I guess that is better then him being terrified of going.
So that has been our spring so far. I am sure that there will be loads more to add and I do have pictures but my pregnancy brain has misplaced my cord! Anyway, have a wonderful week!

March

So it has been a full month since I have posted. I really didn't mean for it o be that long! Things in our house have just been crazy busy though. We are spending as much time with Jerrett as we can before the baby gets here. So we have been enjoying the warm winter outside as much as we can. We play outside, J rides his big boy bike while I walk, we go to the park, all sorts of fun things. We had to take J to the dr for a referral, but the good news there is that he is getting so stinking big! He has put on 5 pounds in the last 6 months! We never thought that he was going to grow. I am so excited. He is getting to be such a big boy. Right now, we are starting to look into preschool or a mothers day out program for this coming school year. More than likely J will only go one day a week if we do in fact go ahead and send him. The deal is that he is so stinking smart and really does not need the academic prep for kindergarten but I am really afraid of the being separated from me part of the equation. Since coming home a year ago, Jerrett has only been away from me for a max of 2 hours at a time. And that has only been a couple of times. We will see.
Other news, we are so excited for this summer! My parents have finally bought their new house closer to us. It is a really big, nice house on 40 acres about 2 hours away. I am not sure who is more excited, J, me, or TJ! I have not lived this close to my parents since I went away to college. It will be so nice to have them close! Jerrett is excited because he will get to see them a lot more and they have promised him lots of camping and fishing at the new place. TJ is excited because now they have someplace closer to go skeet shooting and the property backs up against a hunting lease so there will be lots of deer and stuff for the guys to hunt. Plus lots of land to explore on the 4 wheelers. Dad has already asked him to help fence in some of the land that is not fenced because they are planning on running a small herd of cattle. So lots of changes going on for my parents. I am so excited for them. The whole house hunting thing was really stressful and they looked at who knows how many houses before deciding on this one. Just glad that they found one that they both liked.
Baby news... I am still pregnant and getting more and more that way by the day. I am now 7.5 months along. It is hard to believe that Baby will be here in less than 3 months! The room and most of the furniture are finally painted and just waiting on the crib and the baby! This is a busy week for us baby wise. I have an appt Wednesday afternoon and then Wednesday night, we are doing our tour of the hospital. J can't go with us and so he is staying with our friends and their girls. He is really excited because he hasn't played with them in a long time. And then on Saturday, Mom and Dad are coming up to watch Jerrett because TJ and I have an all day birthing class. Sounds like tons of fun doesn't it? We chose the all day class over the weekly ones though because it is so hard to find some one to watch Jerrett for us. But I think that we will have fun and learn lots. Jerrett will have fun with mom and dad too. I am not sure what they plan on doing but I am sure that it will be a blast and they will spoil him rotten. All is well with the pregnancy though. As of right now, I have still only gained about 12 pounds so I am right on track for only putting on 25. I am just glad that I started to put some on! Baby is kicking and moving like crazy and it is so fun to just sit there and watch my belly move. TJ talks to the baby all the time but so far the baby doesn't seem to like him much! Every time he tries to feel it move, the baby will stop moving until he moves his hand again! Jerrett loves talking and singing to Baby too. He prays over the baby in mommy's belly before every meal and gives it lots of hugs and kisses. He also pats it all the time and talks about what all he is going to teach baby to do. He is going to be a wonderful big brother!