27 Weeks and Counting

I haven't been very good at updating my blog. My first trimester was not the best and then the holidays took up my second trimester. I'm now starting my third trimester and can't wait to meet this little man. Yep, that's right, another boy. To be honest I was a little bummed at first, but now I'm so excited it's a boy! This picture was taken at our 20 week ultrasound.

Time to start decorating and gearing up for the baby. We've pulled out of storage all the baby equipment and have painted the baby room. I'm really enjoying this part. Since we moved into our house we haven't touched the spare room or Alex's room. So now we get to have fun and decorate both rooms. We have chalk board paint for Alex's room, and I'm getting new baby decor for the nursery.

I'm also gearing up for my maternity leave! I - Can't - Wait!! In a perfect world, it wouldn't be just a leave, my stint at home would be permanent. We are working towards a happy medium, but for now I don't want to get my hopes up so I'm planning on just that, a 12 week leave from work. More updates to come soon, hopefully! ;)

My Plum Baby

Today, I'm 12 weeks and 5 days. I am so close to my second trimester I can smell it! This time around has been pretty different than when I was pregnant with Alex. Everybody keeps telling me that it's because I'm having a girl, but I just think it's because this time around I have a 1 year old to take care of!

I'm due April 21st, 5 days before Alex turns 2 and I REFUSE to be in the hospital for his 2nd birthday. Mental note: must get Dr. K on board with this plan as well!

Emotionally, I'm excited and a little in denial about the whole thing. I can't wait to have a newborn in my arms again. But, I'm also in denial about the decisions that have to be made before the little one comes. Such as, will my work situation stay the same? Will daycare stay the same? What about our bedroom situation??? Some questions are more important than others, but all relevant questions, right?

I still have a good 6 months to figure this stuff out, so right now I'm just focusing on making it through each day (waiting and dreaming of the second trimester "babymoon").

Updates & Random Pictures

So, I've been terrible about updating our blog since we moved into our new house! I wish I could say I've been spending our time organizing, decorating, and the like, but I can't! We've been busy with BBQ's, weddings, birthdays, and the list goes on. I have been able to get a few pictures along the way so I'm finally posting them. Do not judge me, each of these pictures came from my BlackBerry! We have a better variety of quality pictures on our Mac at home, but when am I ever on that computer?? Never.


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Yesterday we got up early and headed to the Zoo for the morning! We hit it just right. Got there right as it opened up and didn't have too many people to compete with near all the animals. We got to see the Elephants wake up and get their morning treats, and got to see the Lions wake up for a quick yawn, then fall back asleep on the huge sun rocks they were sunbathing on. Alex LOVED it. I love that he's old enough now to recognize the animals.












Off to the beach for the day! I always forget how great it is there. It took Alex a few minutes to get used to walking on the sand, but by the end of the day he loved it so much he was even trying to put fist fulls of sand in his mouth!







Pool party in the backyard!







Loves!!





With Great Grandpa Guillory (GGG), watching the cars go by...




Soon to be camping buddies.





Bathtime!




This is how he woke up one morning. I'm thinking he was a little uncomfortable!




Getting ready to help Mama paint.

Home Sweet Home

We have finally moved! After 3 offers, and 2 rejections, the third time was a charm, and I'm very happy with how everything turned out. Here is a quick picture of our new place!



As of now we still have boxes everywhere in the garage but the house it looking better and better each day. We definitely need to paint but other than that we don't have to do anything on the inside. Which feels great, considering we've lived in a fixer-uper for over 3 years. Gussie is loving our new back yard and antagonizing the neighbor dogs already. And Alex is enjoying all the new places to explore!

Happy Birthday Baby Boy

It all started a year ago today. My water broke at 3am and I haven't slept since... j/k! I love my little boy so much it hurts. Watching him turn 1 is very exciting and very sad at the same time. I miss the tiny tiny person that I held for hours upon hours. But I also love the boy he's growing into, so happy and curious. I'm not super sentimental, but I'm pretty sure I won't make it through this 1st birthday without crying.


















Thanks to my amazing cousin, Shonda Barlow Photography, I now have a new family photo, 1 year later.

Alex

Does this look familiar to anybody...


Thanks Whit ;)

Updates..

Although the first few months of the year always seem to take the longest due to the weather, we've been super busy lately!

Right now we are in the middle of selling our home, planning Alex's first birthday (ahhh, 1 year already) and just finished our visit with Uncle Casey who was home on leave from Afghanistan.

More updates to come shortly! =)

Greed

Greed

"We suffer, often unknowingly, from wanting to be in two places at once, from wanting to experience more than one person can. This is a form of greed, of wanting everything. Feeling like we're missing something or that we're being left out, we want it all. But being human, we can't have it all. The tension of all this can lead to an insatiable search, where our passion for life is stirred, but never satisfied. When caught in this mindset, no amount of travel is enough, no about of love is enough, no amount of success is enough.

I am not saying that we shouldn't explore our curiosity and venture into the unknown. I very much want to experience the world and love to encounter new people in my life. What I'm referring to here is that seed of lack that makes us feel insufficient, and then, somehow, to compensate, we start to race through life with one eye on what we have and one eye on what we don't.

Greed is not restricted to money. It can work its appetite on anything. When we believe we are behind or less than, we somehow start to want more than we need, as if what we don't have will fill in our pain and make us feel whole, as if the thing we haven't tasted will be the thing to bring us alive. The truth is that one experience taken to heart will satisfy our hunger to be loved by everyone".

- Mark Nepo


Wanting to be in two places at once.... ha, this has become the story of my life! I thought I'd share this little message that I read last night. Somehow God always sends me the encouragement I need to make it through my days.

Holy Moley

Alex has had a mole on the bottom of his foot since, maybe about 3 months old. It wasn't there when he was born, and just appeared as a speck one day. I actually thought it was dirt and tried to wipe it off. Gradually it grew and grew. And gradually I became more and more freaked out. A few months back we took him to my dermatologist and she looked at it and said it looked fine and that it was growing because his foot was growing. She told us to keep an eye on it and make sure there weren't too many changes going on. Well low and behold, a darker spot appeared inside this tan mole. And over the past few months this dark spot grew and grew. So, yesterday we had it removed! They are going to biopsy it and make sure it isn't anything to worry about. Alex did great. He did the no tears cry thing when they were numbing his foot up, but that only lasted a few seconds and then he was fine. Just sat there watching the doctor remove his mole. After we got back home Alex didn't seem phased. He was crawling around like crazy and pulling himself up and standing just like he always does. Here are a few pictures of him playing and hanging out!

Patience is a Virtue... or is it?

They say patience is a virtue, but is it just plain dumb in certain situations?

Colt and I put an offer in on a house that we absolutely fell in love with on December 3rd. Here we are, going on 2 months later, and we are still waiting to hear a response. Why is it taking so long? Because it's a short sale. Anybody who knows me well knows that I am NOT a patient person. Waiting to meet Alex for 9 whole months was ridiculously hard and taught me that good things are worth waiting for. But what about in a situation like this house? I just got an email from our realtor, who happens to be my uncle, saying that the banks are planning on doing a second appraisal on the house. This process can take 90 days or longer... basically saying that we might not get a single peep from the banks for another 3 months. To top it all off, there has been a second offer on the house and we don't know how much that second offer was for. Patience I can handle if we were guaranteed the house, but in this case we might be the lower bidder and wait around for 5 plus months to hear that somebody else got the house.

It really is a great house, for a GREAT deal. So is it worth waiting for? 85% of me says yes. It's the other 15% of me telling me to move on that is so hard to ignore.

Christmas Flip

We got a flip for Christmas and have been having a lot of fun with it. We have a nice camcorder we got when we got married but it's much bigger and not as easy to use so we don't end up taking many videos with it. Now with the Flip we just grab it and press record! This is NOTHING exciting, I'm more or less just playing around and seeing if I can get this to actually post, hehe.




We had a great Christmas, by the way. Hope you all did too!

The Elf on the Shelf

Last year my friend Lindsey introduced me to The Elf on the Shelf, and I couldn't wait to start my own tradition. Now, although Alex is way too young, I might have Colt play along this year!

In case you haven't heard, the elf watches the kids during the day and each night leaves the house and reports back to Santa how the kids behaved that day. Then when the elf comes back to the house, he hides in a new place. When the kids get up every morning they have to hunt to find the elf's new hiding spot. I think it's a super fun tradition and can't wait until NEXT year when Alex will get to play along :)

Thanksgiving

Top 10 things I'm thankful for in no particular order...

1. Alex
2. Colt
3. Family & Friends
4. My fellow Mama friends - who just get it ;)
5. My job...this one is tough, but in the end, I am thankful.
6. Gus
7. My faith
8. Chocolate
9. Chai
10. Disney Movies

Random

Giving Mama kisses. I just love this guy so much!

Crawling..

We took a trip to the beach with some friends over the weekend. 7 adults and 5 babies! It sounds much scarier than it actually was. We had a great time, and as I expected, Alex started crawling. Watching his two buddies, August (7 mos) and Joey (6 mos), crawl around all weekend long was all it took to motivate him enough to give it a go. I love it and can't wait for him to get faster. I'm excited to see where he decides to go once he realizes he can explore. I know, most of you are rolling your eyes thinking, just wait Candice - you will miss the good ol' days of putting them on the floor and knowing they are stuck there. That's probably true, but I can't help my excitement for him. Baby gates, here we come!

Pumpkin Patch

Our first trip to the pumpkin patch with Alex was so fun! We went to Lakeview Farms in North Plains and it was such a cool place. Train rides, face painting, and of course pumpkins everywhere! Alex was such a good sport for all of our pictures too ;) I already can't wait to go back next year! It was definitely a success.

Something's Gotta Give...

I've stolen this title from not only the popular movie, but also from Scrummys. I couldn't help myself, it is the perfect phrase for my life right now. Have you ever felt like you are juggling too many things at once, or that your balancing act is becoming unbalanced? I read somewhere that having too many choices is actually more stressful than not having any choices. My two seemingly simple choices have become extremely hard. One choice would be the financially responsible choice, and in these economic times nobody can afford to be irresponsible. The other choice has more to do with family values. Have you guessed yet what I'm talking about?

Speaking of family.... Alex is now 5 months old, and weighs 17.3 lbs! He's rolling, almost scooting, and laughing up a storm every night. He's not a baby anymore, he looks like a toddler! I will post pictures next time, I promise!

And as far as our house goes, we almost have a garage! Colt recently tore down our carport and has been working since August on building our garage. Hopefully this will add a good amount of value to our house. Speaking of that, there is another important choice we will be making in the near future. To move, or not to move...

There's Not Enough Hours in the Day

I've heard this phrase for years and until now, have never fully understood how horribly true this is. This past week, I have been praying for more hours in the day. Tuesday evening, Alex fell asleep at 6pm and didn't wake up the rest of the evening. I was a little devastated. I woke him up a little after 8pm to feed him but since he barely woke up I put him right back to bed and he slept all night. Poor kid must have needed the sleep but that gave me just under two hours with him. Yep, that's it, less then 2 hours. Last night was a similar situation. Maybe this week has been particularly hard because I'm coming off of a GREAT 4 day weekend with Alex. It sure makes me think, is a reliable paycheck, an insurance policy and other working perks worth the time I lose everyday with him? Or worth the extra lbs I've gained burying myself in M&M's? (The M&M's really are the only way to keep from crying some days!). Boohoo, I know. I really am very lucky and shouldn't be complaining at all. Some weeks are just hard though and it's nice to "vent" here.

Georgia

Colt made a very quick trip to Georgia a few weeks back to watch Casey graduate from Basic Training in the Army. I was suppose to be on that trip but with all the struggling I've been doing just leaving Alex to go to work, I couldn't bare the thought of leaving him for 3 whole nights, so I stayed back.

Colt had a great time, other than the travel. The first ceremony was the Turning Blue ceremony. Not exactly sure what this means other than meaning he's an official U.S. Soldier now. Each soldier was allowed to have one family member place their blue "ribbon" (not sure if that's what it's called) on their shoulders, so Val did this for Casey. The last picture is of the big ceremony the next day with a band, a gun show thing, and all the units marched out onto the field. Clearly I don't know the terminology! Maybe I'd be more knowledgeable if I went. Congratulations Case :)

Back To Work

I'm back to work now and it's been very rough. We met a great lady through a friend of a friend who is now watching Alex during the day. She has been a daycare provider for 20 some years and she seems great with Alex. I think he really enjoys being around the other kids too because he seems fascinated by them and is always watching them. So Alex seems to be taking this transition much better then I am. It's been so much worse then I thought it would be. Leaving Alex with a stranger is almost impossible for me so Colt has been dropping him off in the mornings and I've been picking him up in the evenings. But even picking him up has been a struggle. Watching Alex start to bond with somebody that isn't even a part of my life is awful. It's great for him, but hard for me. I should be thanking my lucky stars that she came into our lives because so far she's been nothing but a blessing... but I struggle with being thankful. It's a work in progress and I'm hoping each day will just get easier and easier.