Phoenix and her Butterflies

Phoenix finally got her caterpillars in the mail and raised them until they turned into beautiful butterflies.  We sent away for the caterpillars in May, but they didn't arrive until early August.  She got to watch them grow from their fat caterpillar stage to the covered in a nice warm blanket stage and then finally butterflies.  She had a few that uh didn't come out right, but she loved releasing them and letting them crawl all over her face, hands and head.  She enjoyed it so much that Kindergarten is going to be a blast for her! 



30-31 Weeks 3D/4D Ultrasound

So we got this amazing deal on a 3D/4D ultrasound package from Groupon and decided to snag it up.  I waited until I was 31 weeks and we went on a Saturday.  Phoenix was super excited to get to see the baby and I just wanted to find out if it was for sure a girl and if she had hair or not since we hadn't gotten to see her since my 18 week ultrasound back in May.  Of course I woke up and the baby was kicking me all over the place, but once we got to there she was sleeping away.  We shook her a little bit and I even ate some chocolate, but she didn't do much.  She did, however, grab her cute little foot which we got a shot of and she stuck her tongue out at one point.  That's about it though.  Oh and in case anyone is curious, yes she is still a girl and no she doesn't really have any hair.

30 week belly shot

 Her beautiful chunky cheeks...



Grabbing her foot....

20 Weeks! The halfway point and a new car too!

Well it's that time, for the first belly shot of the pregnancy!  I'm 20 weeks and finally at the halfway point.  What a relief.  I was worried this pregnancy would be like my first one and I'd be sick the entire time, but so far so good.  A couple rounds of nausea, a few weird cramps and an enormous lack of sleep because of restless legs/hip pain/uncomfortableness are about all I've had to deal with so far.  I still have trouble believing I'm pregnant.  I don't have a huge beach ball of a tummy and the baby doesn't move around much so I feel relatively normal.  Such a difference from the first time with Phoenix.  So, here is the pic....

And in other news...the car we've been stressing out about needing before we have the baby because we couldn't fit both of them in the truck is finally here!  Michael surprised me by going out and getting it done without me having to lift a finger.  Such a sweetheart, that guy.  I know I may not show it sometimes, but I appreciate everything he does for me.  He even picked out the car I've been wanting for awhile now.  We rented it for a trip to Disneyland awhile back and I fell in love with it.  Now I finally have one of my own!  I'm so happy!

My 18 Week Ultrasound...

This was the most epic of all ultrasound's.  They stressed how important it was to be up an hour before the appointment and to drink 34 oz of water within half an hour or else I wouldn't be able to get the ultrasound done.  Throughout almost the entire pregnancy so far I've been fine.  A little nauseous at times, but never more than that.  This time, however, either I had some sort of food poisoning or the little "bundle of joy" in my tummy decided she didn't want any part of this water thing.  You can probably see where this is going.  Half a bottle of water, boom all over the bathroom floor.  Thankfully it was just water, but it was still all over my feet, legs, arms and about 3/4 of the bathroom.  So I try again as we are driving to the appointment.  I sipped as much as I could, but didn't have high hopes.  Sure enough, about a block or two away from the office I started having issues again.  The first one I swallowed back down (yuck!), the second round spewed a little from between my fingers onto the dash and floor and the third time luckily we had pulled over and I was able to finish outside of the car.  Whew!  Well, there went all of the water I was supposed to drink, now what?  Try anyway.  Which we did and it worked.  All that worrying and hacking up water for nothing.  After a surprise $158 copay and about half an hour wait time, Dr. Boyd's original guess of a boy was wrong.  It's a girl!  We are going to name her Emma, but the middle name is still undecided.  Yay!  Oh and thanks again to my wonderful hubby for not getting sick too at the sight of all the water bombs.  Love you bunches!

Here is one of her profile (sorry for sideways pics)

And here is the one confirming that she's a girl....

Phoenix's 5th Birthday Party

A Smurf themed 5th birthday pool party for my little munchkin.  Here is a copy of the invitation, which she thoroughly enjoyed. 

Phoenix and a few of her friends swimming in the pool

Phoenix and her friends lined up for the ring toss game

Phoenix opening up her gifts

Phoenix and some of her friends having a go at the slip-n-slide

And finally...blowing out the candles

At the end of the day she was exhausted and crashed early, but she had a blast so I can add another checkmark to the "things I did right this year as a mom" scorecard.  Yay me!

It's finally here!

Yep, it's finally here.  The blog I've been meaning to get started for a very long time.  Now that we have a second kid on the way, things are about to get hectic and that means I will surely get behind on updating friends and family on the comings and goings of our life.  Let's face it, Facebook just doesn't cut it and I try not to post anything anyway because I don't want to clog up the newsfeed.  At least this way I can feel comfortable posting tons of pictures and interesting tidbits without the constant worry of being a nuisance.  So, stay tuned for lots of updates and pics!