Big boys do it!

First off for those family members who have commented on Colin's need for a haircut - this is as close as we got the other day. One ice cream cone doesn't keep him still long enough and there are still a few areas to trim shorter but he looks cute as always.

Our beautiful Azaleas. I have waited all winter for these to bloom and its been excited to see what color they all are. The whole front and side of our house are azaleas and this weekend will be in full bloom. And you can see our NEW WINDOWS! They came Saturday and it was so exciting. I can finally open windows. We haven't even opened them yet since the pollen count has been really high and Saturday Colin and I were very congested since all the windows were taken out and I'm still wiping down all the pollen that blew in. But very exciting. It makes all our windows seem bigger and lets more light in which is great!


And this is where I was told "Big boys do it" Colin and I walked down the street to one of the playgrounds today. He chooses which one he wants to go to as there are three within easy walking distance (one of the reasons we picked this house) but I looked up and Colin was trying to jump off that ledge. I told him he that it was too high and he said "but mommy big boys do it and me big boy" and then proceeded to drop. He did fine so I took out the camera from my bag and caught him doing it again. He was so proud of himself. Shouldn't be a surprise since he loves to jump and climb. He likes to jump off his little climber in the back yard - which is only a foot or two off the ground - and the whole time I have to say "everyone get ready for the best jumper in the world to jump" and then he jumps. And I have to do it over and over and he jumps over and over. Makes for great afternoons naps! We were at one of the other playgrounds this weekend and met another 3 year old in our neighborhood - very exciting - but he didn't want to do half of what Colin did on the playground. The other parent commented how we really do have a daredevil on our hands!

getting closer...

As some of you know, Brent now has to go to charlottesville Thursday and Friday for work which means he has to spend the night there Thursday. Its a blessing to have those accounts but each week I secretly pray that he'll lose those accounts and not have to go :) Well this Thursday night I was putting Colin to bed and thought woah this baby is really wanting to come out. Lately it seems he keeps pushing my stomach out wanting to make more room. A few minutes later I felt it again and then it registered. That wasn't the baby that was a contraction. I don't think you ever forget what those feel like. It didn't happen again so I put Colin to bed, went and drank some water and laid down. Then I started to freak out. Brent is out of town, my parents are gone this weekend on vacation, my grandparents are at the farm, Jamie is in New York, the Burleys are home and do I call them. How late do I wait? What if they aren't there? I don't even know where the hospital is!!!! Do I take Colin with me? Can my sister come from Richmond in time? I didn't really sleep that whole night. Well it didn't happen again and I finally figured out it was Braxton -Hicks which I didn't feel with Colin until a few weeks before he was born. They come at night probably only because during the day I am running after Colin. So no one got called and we didn't rush to the hospital - which is good since I don't know where it is. (haha many of you probably didn't know you were on my call list yet!) But the baby is fine. And I'm fine too - just a little tired from worrying all night! At 38 weeks they are going to induce if I've started dilating so hopefully everything I'm feeling is my body getting ready but we still have 9 weeks left possibly if they can induce so I'm hoping to keep this baby in until then. And this week I am going to register at the hospital and Brent and I are going to drive there so we both know where it is :) When I was pregnant with Colin my doctors office was in the hospital, and Brent was never more than 15 minutes away from me or the hospital. This time its completely different so being induced might actually be a blessing not only for an easier delivery but so Brent can be sure to be there! Here is my handsome boy. He is so much fun. I'm really enjoying our Thursdays alone since I try to plan fun things for us to do in the evenings and just making the most of our alone time together since once this baby comes it will all change. His new thing is asking "but how? or But Why?" for everything.

Easter

We had a wonderful Easter weekend. On Sunday we went to my parents church (if you remember from last year it was the one we started going to while we were living with my parents and they go there now) We had to leave our house at 7:00 am to make it over the tunnel in time :) but Waters Edge Church had their Easter Egg drop , or one of them, at 8:30am. It is all Colin talked about all year and was very excited to go see the helicopter drop eggs again. He loved collecting the eggs and didn't realize there was candy inside until much later. Colin didn't want to go into the kids church so he stayed with us and loved the music. (We really love Waters Edge Church and wish we lived closer but we have found a really great church near our house with an amazing children's program. And I love the mothers bible study!) But after church we went over to my grandparents house for brunch. My cousins and uncle showed up for part of it and Colin loved playing football with the boys. In fact he played football all day with anyone who would play with him (mainly ant ant) It was a beautiful day and we loved being able to spend it with so much family. These are all pictures my sister took since right as the helicopter came my batteries died. Thanks sarah!Last week we dyed easter eggs and Colin thought that was fun - each egg had to have some green in it. Only he cracked most of them in the process. I opened up one of the hard boiled eggs to show him what was inside and he saw the yellow yolk and goes "WOAH..... big butt!!!" haha he thought it was the baby chicken's butt and was SO disappointed when I finished peeling the whole egg and it was just a round yellow ball and no baby. I tried to explain that the eggs we buy to eat don't have baby chickens or ducks in them but I'm not sure it registered. He looked at the carton of eggs in the fridge and asked me later "babies in there mommy?"

Busch Gardens

Here we are at Busch Gardens with our good friends the Kim's. Colin had a blast with Susanna and Sam... and of course Bert and Ernie. It was a beautiful day and we really enjoyed just going from place to place with no real agenda. We are excited Pete and Ashleigh and the kids will be back a few more times. Colin had a great doing just about everything Susanna did and they enjoyed making each other laugh. Busch Gardens has the "fun pass" where if you have a VA license and buy a one day pass, it is good for the entire summer! Not a bad deal. Let's hope we make it many more times.

Baby is getting bigger!

Since I took a picture of Colin at 6 months I figured I should take one now. And I still probably deleted half of the ones Brent took :) This baby is getting bigger almost every day. I went for a walk tonight and felt what I think was his head trying to push his way out of my stomach. I know Colin did that too but I think it was much later. Colin loves his baby brother and thinks being a big brother is great right now. He will come up and ask if the baby is playing soccer today and want to feel him kick (since thats what this baby is playing when he kicks) Colin is always telling the baby "make a hole and come out" We told him soon.
And I thought I'd leave you with a view of Colin's garden. He has planted pumpkins, sunflowers, and watermelon. (he picked them out) I was sure they wouldn't grow but they are doing great and look better than the hundreds of seeds Brent is growing in our other window sills. I guess seeds like to be shaken and over watered and talked to by an almost 3 year old. Colin is very proud and checks them every day.

playground fun

This week Jamie and I took the kids to the playground to play. And these boys are too cute not to put pictures up. Colin loved having Benjamin follow him everywhere. Colin taught him how to climb the slide the wrong way. Only poor Benjamin couldn't get enough traction to really climb it himself. And thats not the only bad habit he taught Benjamin - he also taught him today what fun it is to jump on the bed. Lets hope Jamie lets us keep playing with them :) These boys are so cute and its so fun to watch them start to interact and play together. Colin loves having someone younger looking up to him.

me like worms

This weekend we built Brent's raised garden bed. Colin thinks its amazing and had so much fun helping dig up the dirt and get it ready. Along the way he found lots of nice squirmy worms. I was in the kitchen cleaning up lunch and turned around just in time to see Colin run in, open the freezer and try to stuff a handful of worms into the freezer to keep for later! Anyone want to come over for lunch? Just kidding. I found his bug home that Jeff and Kerri brought for him and we filled it up with dirt and it has tons of worms in it. So there are no worms in the house. He loves these worms and walks up and says "hi worms how you doing?" In fact today we were on a bike ride and he had to stop and get off his bike because he saw a worm on the pavement. It was squished and dead and he didn't understand why he couldn't take it home with the other worms. Colin cried the whole way home. "me sad for worm. Make happy in my home. Mommy worm waiting for baby worm. No squished. Worm fine" its hard to explain that the worm isn't ever going to move again to an almost 3 year old. But Brent's garden is finished and already has snow peas planted. Yum!Brent and Colin also planted a really pretty climbing vine I got to put next to our patio. Its suppossed to get pretty tall so will hopefully provide some some shade for us in the afternoons. I still have to mulch and have some other flowers to plant around it but that might have to wait for next weekend.

yard sales, blog books, firemen and new faucets

First because many of you have asked - I made my blog book through blurb.com. Great site. And very easy to work with. I made one for my brother and sister-in-law and also one for us. I was going to make them another one for Christmas this year but blurb stopped using blogger and there was such an outrage that they brought it back. SO excited about that. I thought it turned out very well and can't wait to work on my new one. The quality is great and the price isn't bad either. Much cheaper than scrapbooking. Now though I'm wondering - do I order two books for both boys since this is how I'm scrapbooking or just let them fight over which ones they want when they get older. Any suggestions?

In other news its now yard sale time. I have been to two really great ones. The first one I went to I got this ugly green sandbox :) We weren't going to get one for Colin since we live so close to the beach and go a lot in the summer. He just loves to dig in the sand there but after seeing our holes he made in our yard I was very excited to find this one really cheap. It rained and filled with water so Colin put on his swim suit and played in it. The he got wet and that brought a discussion on how we don't go naked outside since you turn around and this is what you sometimes see....

But now the sandbox is filled with sand and Colin is in it almost every day. And don't you just love our weeds instead of grass in those pictures. We're working on that and have big plans for our yard this summer. We want to put in a fence but just ordered new windows so the fence might have to wait a little bit. But brents garden is already started as we have lots of seeds started and hundreds of plants coming up already. This weekend we hope to get his garden laid out and raised beds started.... we will have to see if that all happens.

Colin is obsessed with firemen. He is a fireman every day all day now and really gets into it. Here he is looking at the map I made for him that shows where the fire is. He will answer the phone, look at the map, get his fire hat, coat, and boots on and then go fight the fire. Only he has gotten it into his head that he needs a REAL BIG fire truck. One you can drive on the street. I got a small garden hose out and attached it to his red car (one of those flinstones cars) for him to get in and drive all over the yard and driveway. I thought it was perfect only its not a real fire truck and his car can't be a fire truck - silly mommy. So all week I've heard him answer his phone. Say oh no fire. Have to save the people. Then get hat, coat, boots on and race to the front door. then sadly turn to me and go "mommy can't save the people - no have real fire truck and people are down the street" Even pretending or walking down the street doesn't work for him. But its OVER AND OVER. Phone rings, gets gear on, runs to the front door, then tells me he can't save the people. Poor people. Then a few minutes later he does the same thing again. I try not to laugh and think he's pretty smart. He thinks if he does this long enough i might feel sorry for the poor people in the fire down the street and go get him a real big fire truck. We're going to have to be on our toes for this one as he gets older!

And here are Brent and Colin installing a new faucet for our kitchen sink. Its so pretty and doesn't drip like our old yucky one. Colin used his new "bob the builder" tools that he got at a yard sale we went to with Jamie, Benjamin, and vera the baby that Jamie babysits. I got to see first hand what its like to go out in public with an active little boy and a baby! This yard sale we had to wait an hour to get in the door - anything you could possibly imagine for kids was there. I told Colin he could pick out a toy and he picked bob tools. It was perfect since he used them to help daddy this weekend and he sang the bob theme song over and over "working together to get the job done"

I want a pet

I know two posts in one day but Brent is outside with Colin and I'm going to start working on my blog book soon so I figured I'd get another entry in for this book. For the past few weeks Colin has been asking for a pet. And not just any pet - a pet rooster. Named Joey. And the reason - so the rooster will cockadoodle-doo and wake him up when the sun comes up. Colin has been sleeping a little later since the time change and it really bothers him that he's not up with the sun. We love it - he doesn't. Thus a rooster will solve his problem. Anyone know where we can get a stuffed rooster that crows for Colin's' birthday?

3 months left

As I was looking at the calender this week I realized that we only have 3 months left before our baby comes if the doctors have their way. Where has the time gone? Its going by so fast all of a sudden. My doctor has told me that they will induce me early if everything with the baby is fine or do a csection because of my labor with Colin. And labor with Colin wasn't bad at all in the beginning. When I went in for my checkup a week before his due date they realized he was getting really big and wanted to induce that night but there were no hospital beds (something about it being a full moon...) so they scheduled me to be induced Friday morning at 7am. Instead they stripped my membranes to get labor started and it worked. Thursday morning I started having contractions. We were in staff meeting and I didn't tell anyone because I wanted to pick my bible study girls for the next year:) By the time they got close together and very painful they stopped for a few hours. Then that night they started full force and what does Brent do - he goes out to cut the grass!!! It took an hour on that yard but he didn't want to leave it until we got back. Meanwhile I was so ready to go to the hospital :) And labor progressed pretty easily at the hospital. It was a lot more enjoyable than I thought and I wont go into all the details but he was born at 7:17am Friday morning. At 7am my doctor walked into my room and laughed that she didnt need to induce me. Also the head of labor and delivery stopped by since she came on at 7am and she stayed with me too. Thank goodness and shows how God was watching over us because as soon as he was born I was rushed to the OR to get tons of stitches. And being first time parents and not knowing anything Brent and I thought it was all normal. ha! I had two doctors working on me and I don't know how many nurses. One stayed by my head and just kept praying for me and talking to me. What a blessing she was. The whole time they kept commenting on how I was smiling so much! I was just so excited to see my baby. So three hours later I was wheeled back and could hold and just stare at my baby. And besides having a hard time walking for a while I healed pretty fast. So because of all of that my doctors now are worried about me going through labor again and making sure that doesn't happen. Which is good. They are going to try to avoid a csection since that is surgery but they wont know that until I guess i start going through labor. So I'm trying not to get my hopes up that this baby will be here early but if all goes like its seems he will be here in about 3 months. And I'm not scared about labor this time because God's hand was clearly on Colin and I last time and it really wasn't until my doctors now (I'm starting to see all the doctors in the practice now in case they are on call when I go to the hospital) seem to keep telling me that my labor wasn't normal that we have realized it wasn't. Ignorance is bliss sometimes :)

Colin keeps talking to the baby and loves feeling the baby kick. The other day we were standing in line somewhere and there was a father with his little girl and baby and the baby kept smiling at Colin and Colin's response to them was "my baby's coming out soon!" He can't wait so hopefully he'll keep loving the baby when he does come out.

uncle opie

This is a picture Colin drew of Pee-ta-pe,his Uncle Opie. I think he did a great job - the blue circle is his head and the orange lines are his arms. It even has glitter on it :) The purple and green dots are his eyes and mouth - Colin thought he'd make a "dilly" (which in colinese means silly) picture of his uncle. We may get around to mailing it to James but for now its hanging on his new art wall pictured below. Its been done for a while now I just keep forgetting to take pictures. I got so many ideas from everyone and have places all over the house where they will eventually show up (thanks and stay tuned to see your ideas on our walls!) But I went with the wire since when I went to order the magnet strips from Ikea it cost more to ship than to buy. So we'll just wait until we make a trip to Northern Va. I'm so proud since the curtain wire hangers were more than I was willing to spend, I went to Lowes and had wire cut to size and found the clips - total was $5. Its fun for Colin to hang his art work and also fun for us to look at. He is also proud of the fact he helped paint.

Here is a picture of Colin's bed. I made the bedspread and Colin from time to time ask me "you make this for me?" and love the fact that I say yes every time. It actually turned out much better than I thought. Its such a great bed for him - has huge drawers underneath. He doesn't really need the safety gate on his bed anymore but he stashes his flashlight and other toys between his bed and the white gate so he wont let us take it off. I should put more pictures of his room up too. He has such a large room which is great but to give you an idea - his bed is on one wall and his art wall is on the opposite wall. So uncle opie I hope you enjoy your portrait :)

weekend fun

We had a busy but fun filled weekend. Saturday was such a nice day we went to the Virginia Zoo in the morning. We decided to get the family pass so we can go as many times as we want and can also bring guests. Colin loved it and the best part for him was riding the train. The conductor was nice and came and talked to all the kids and even took this picture of us. We only made it to half the park that day. Colin was really interested in all the signs talking about the different animals. He's going to be one of those people who have to read everything when we go to museums! What a smart guy. We enjoyed it and can't wait to go back. They have story hour Tuesdays where they read books and bring an animal in for the kids so we might go soon. Its nice to live so close. Brent laughs that the minute we pulled up in the parking lot it was car after car getting their strollers out. Then while Brent went to watch George Mason play in their tournament game with some friends, my parents came over for dinner. Colin had a blast and loved the fact that they brought their glider for the baby's room (even though he has a rocking chair in his room)I was able to get a good picture of my mom and Colin reading his "new" books. (we went to our neighbors yard sale earlier in the day and got a bunch of fun books for Colin)

Sunday we went to Benjamin's 1st birthday party. Hard to believe he is one. The Burley's loaned Colin Tony's old truck which Colin calls his crane and had to put it to work. Although I'm pretty sure Benjamin will be wanting it soon :) Its so great since Colin loves to dig in the backyard and has his spot right now where he digs all the time. We're thinking a sandbox for his birthday might be a good idea :)

prayer request

This is NOT Colin but Eli, a friends little boy who is very sick. He is 4 and what started as an ear infection a little over a week ago ended up as a blood clot and also a sever infection. His family lives in Hungry and he has been in ICU there all week. His mom, Julie, went to college with Brent. He has had surgery to remove an infected bone I think in his ear and they are still trying to reduce the blood clot. He has thrombosis (I think thats how you spell it) Please pray for this little guy as he doesn't understand what is happening to him and is very scared. Also pray for his parents as they haven't sleep in over a week and are just emotionally drained. It also doesn't look like he will get out anytime soon from the hospital. Here is a link to their website so you can read more about Eli and be up to date on their prayer requests. http://www.zachandjules.blogspot.com/

70s one day... snow the next

This past weekend it went from being in the 70s Friday to snowing Monday. And this weekend we're hoping for 60s. We love this weather. On Friday Colin went outside first thing to play with his trucks and stayed out all day. And yes in his pj's. He LOVES wearing pjs all day every day. It embarrasses his father but I just have to laugh and take pictures to remind him later :)Then it rained all weekend and turned to snow Sunday night. This is all we got. Colin was so excited and took his bucket outside to gather enough snow to make a snowman and when he couldn't get any he promptly went back inside. Poor kid just wanted to make a snowman. Then today (Tuesday) I had to go to Newport News to stop by Bead Retreat so we went over to my grandparents house in Yorktown since they got more snow. It was amazing. Just across the water they got at least an inch. Colin was so excited and we built a small snowman and its baby.Then when we were all done this is what happened to the snowmen. Job well done!