I go on an airplane!

If you're in our house for 5 minutes, you can bet that you will hear the following from Benjamin....

"I go on an airplane"

"I go to Ohio"

"I see my cousins"  (Then he usually lists them off by name)

"I go on a blue one.  I go on a white one."

"Daddy go.  Mommy go.  Benjamin go."

"I go on an airplane a minute."

Then just imagine this conversation repeated over and over and over throughout the day. 

This morning he grabbed his backpack and headed for the door to leave....

I'm pretty sure he's a little excited to go on an airplane for Christmas :-) 

A great reminder

Source:  http://www.daesofourlives.com/2011/08/timely-reminder.html

Monday Randoms

This past Friday was our EPIC girls Christmas party.  We all brought dips to share, and I organized some Christmas related games like Christmas Jeopardy, unwrapping candy cane kisses with ski gloves on, marshmallow catching competition, and melting ice cube races without using your hands.  We also had a White Elephant gift exchange and we had a great time.  There were 9 girls and it was so fun to be with everyone!

Saturday we just took it easy with a day at home. 

Daddy & Benjamin working on a lesson for small group

I baked lots of yummy goodies, mostly for coworkers (and perhaps a few for us) :-)  We made a few last minute travel reservations for our trip to Ohio next week and the only time we left the house was for a quick 15 minute trip to Wal-Mart.  Peter and I watched Miracle on 34th street while Ben napped and we worked on a few projects.  Peter had never seen that movie!!  Later on after Ben went to bed (after screaming everytime I would try to leave the room and eventually causing himself to fall out of his crib) we watched Charlie Brown Christmas while we dipped goodies in chocolate.  And yes, Benjamin's crib is now lowered and he was okay!!

Sunday was a fun morning at church with some extra song specials by the kiddos.  Benjamin looked adorable in his little penguin sweater vest but of course he wouldn't cooperate for pictures.  And I now notice that he has a giant booger in his nose....lovely.  Just know that he was really cute in person :-) 

 okay wow, mama's lookin' a little bloated!

We had Pizza Hut buffet, then while Benjamin napped I ran to Target and Michaels for a couple of items.  We gave Benjamin a quick dinner then headed off to a local Mennonite church to watch a play/musical/live nativity.  We went last year and though it's long, we enjoyed it.  Benjamin was quiet for all of 3 minutes before we had to take him elsewhere to half watch/half keep him entertained.  Our son just does not know how to not talk or not move around.  Oh well!  It was a late night though, we didn't get home until 10:15!

Luckily Benjamin slept until almost 9 this morning.  Unluckily I had a Dr. Appt I had to get up for, so there was no lazying around for me.  We headed to the appointment right after Benjamin woke up and baby boy is doing great.  Though the Dr. told me that he'll probably be bigger than Benjamin.  Um, excuse me?!?!?!  Not what I wanted to hear!  Benjamin was 8lb. 6oz and he was delivered with an epidural that didn't work.....sounds like I'm going to be having a really happy time around Valentine's Day, NOT!  Ha :-)

Benjamin took a great nap today while I worked on a few tasks, and tonight Peter is working on a coworkers computer so Benjamin and I are watching Little Einsteins!  Daddy just came home as I was uploading pictures, hooray!  So now we're all watching!

Oh yeah, I also wanted to post a picture of Benjamin with the Santa Clause at Wal-Mart.  Poppy & GongGong took him while we were in Bend.  I think it's obvious that's he not a fan of the jolly ol' man in the big red suit.  Though looking at him, Wal-Mart Santa IS a kinda scary looking :-)



Stop growing up!

I really need to convince my son to stop growing up.  Stop. it. now.

Peter and I have both been a bit sad at how big Benjamin seems to be, and how much older he's acting.  No more high chairs, he's singing complete songs (and all.the.time), he speaks several sentences at a time, he understands so many new concepts, he's learning to dress himself.  It all needs to stop.

And the real dagger is that he seems to be perfectly okay with being put down for a nap and down for bedtime....without being sung to. 

*GASP*

He tells us he's ready to go to bed, wants us to put him in his crib, give him his animals, tuck him in with his blankets, tell him how much we love him and then turn off the light and say goodnight.  That's it.  No more singing and rocking my sweet baby boy for 10-15 minutes, always ending with his song "You are my Sunshine."  He rarely fell asleep while I rocked him but he always listened and put in "song requests." 

And now he doesn't seem to need that and quite frankly, it makes me kind of want to throw a fit.

Sure, that means that you get an extra 10-15 minutes of downtime in the evening or at naptime that you're not spending trying to get him ready to sleep, but I kind of want those days back.  I want him to tell me he wants me to sing "Jonah" or "Jesus Loves the Little Children" or "Baa baa black sheep, have you any wool, yes sir yes sir three bags full" (and yes, he thinks all of that is the title of the song!)  For the ones he likes he'd say again, again, again. 

It's bittersweet because I absolutely love watching him grow and develop and learn new things.  This week he's been counting backwards....where he gets that who knows.  It's so fun to be his mom and get to be there for all of this.  But part of me wishes I could keep him little forever.  That he'd always need me to sing him to sleep.  I know he may go through phases again where he wants me to sing to him, but for now I'm just feeling a bit nostalgic and remembering my sweet baby boy and feeling amazed at how quickly it does seem to go by.

So Benjamin, please, don't grow up so fast.  The heart in this dear ol' mama of yours just can't take it.  You can stay little for as long as you want.



Little peek at our boy!

Well, unfortunately we weren't able to get any 4D ultrasound shots of our little guy.  His positioning was totally wrong for the shots and he had his arms up by his face so we couldn't get a picture.  That, and the ultrasound tech was (I think) having a bad day and didn't seem to be trying very hard....but that's just my opinion.  We couldn't turn down a free ultrasound though, and it was nice to see a little bit of our boy and hear his strong, steady heartbeat.

She did give us a few pictures and though they aren't very clear (our other ultrasound tech from 20 weeks was much better!) we still loved seeing his face.  Benjamin was really excited to "see baby brother" but I must say, after about 7 minutes he lost interest and was a little antsy.  What's to be expected from a 22 month old though right?

Anyway, here's our little man.  We love you and can't wait to meet you!!

showing a nice steady, strong heartbeat!



Visiting Nana, Grandfather & Auntie Amanda

I mentioned a few days ago that Benjamin and I drove back to Idaho with Peter's parents...we were heading back to spend about 4 days with my parents and siblings.  Since we didn't make it back for Thanksgiving and we're having a baby in February they really wanted to see Benjamin(I mean, us).  We were happy to oblige :-)

Benjamin had a fabulous time having extra stories read to him, special cereals and treats bought, the endless amounts of toys they have for him to play with in the basement, and had fun getting to know his cousins more. 

We were treated to a great dinner on Wednesday night thanks to my brother Alan and his fiancee, Natasha.  My other brothers Adam and his girlfriend Hannah came over for visits too.  Benjamin's favorite part was probably the shopping.....which to him meant running like a complete wild man throughout the stores and having Grandfather chase him.  He seriously wore him out, it was hilarious. 

 Cousins:  Aiden, Alexander, Azalea and Benjamin

 Nana patiently drawing more and more shapes for the very particular little boy!

 Benjamin loved having Grandfather make the train go round and round the tracks!!

 strangely, this toy occupied much of his time!

 storytime with Grandfather

 storytime with Nana

 talking with (great) grandma

"but they're MY Floppy's" says Grandfather

 checking out all Christmas lights with Auntie Amanda

Benjamin is currently obsessed with trains

We just had a great visit and though we were excited to go home on the airplane and see Daddy on Saturday, we were really sad to go.  But we know we'll get to see them all again fairly soon so we'll just look forward to that!



Christmas Printable

I was reading Kelly's blog this morning and saw that she had found some really cute Christmas printables.  I found one I thought would be great on our bookshelf by our fireplace....it's so easy to just print on your home printer and put in a frame.  I used the same frame I had for the Thanksgiving printable last month, and I just kept that one behind the new one so each year I can rotate them out depending on the season.  I love how easily and cheaply it changes the look of our shelf!

Here's the one I liked and printed....



You can print one for yourself here...

http://adventuresofabettycrockerwannabe.blogspot.com/2010/12/christmas-scripture-word-tree-printable.html

Just click on the picture, save it/download it, and print it.  So fun :-)

Thankful

Tonight I was just thinking about a lot of things, some silly and some serious, that I'm really thankful for.

*  A husband that lets me take a 1/2 hour to enjoy a nice bubble bath in the evening.  Soo relaxing and helpful for an aching pregnant mama back!

*  savings that can cover the cost of new tires for our van after 1 had a leak

*  our new laptop.  It is soooo wonderful.  We have never bought a new laptop, we've always bought a college hand me down off of craigslist and I think we even bought one off of ebay once.  So I am just really enjoying this new one....who knew you could be on a laptop without it randomly shutting off every 1/2 hour?!?!  :-)

*  my new set of dishes.  We had ones we really liked the looks of from World Market but they chipped terribly and got so hot in the microwave after only a minute.  They were pretty unusuable.  So my Christmas gift from Peter's folks is some new ones.  We went with something durable since we'll have young kiddos using them, but ones that were still pretty looking.  I found a set Peter and I both liked but they were expensive....however, ShopKo had them on clearance!  It was the only kind on clearance and they had the exact amount I needed.  AWESOME.  Have to love clearance finds like that!

*  my adorable little boy who says the funniest things lately.  When we call for him, or find him somewhere he says "I find me!"  When he hears music lately he's been saying "I hear something.  What is that?  I don't know that song."  When he sees something that peeks his interest he gasps and says "oh looook at thaaaat!"  We could eat him up.  Though we both agree that he is growing up way too fast and it's super sad.  We truly want to freeze time.

*  Little Einstein DVD's and the amazing Aunt who gave them to Benjamin.  40 minutes of distraction time = priceless!

* Christmas music - it just makes me happy.  I love having the Christmas tree lights on, a yummy smelling candle lit, the fireplace going, and festive Christmas music in the background.....perfect night.

*  a baby boy who moves all.the.time inside me.  It scares me how similar his activity level was to Benjamin's but I love feeling him move.  We get to have a free 4D ultrasound of our little guy on Wednesday, super excited!

*  Amazon.com - how awesome is it?  You can easily find what you want at a pretty comparable price and have it shipped to your door in 2 days.  My kind of shopping.

* seeing a sweet sleeping boy hugging his Floppy on the video monitor, seeing my sweet husband sitting across from me working on a Bible lesson for our small group....I really am blessed.



WInner winner chicken dinner!

So I have no idea where that phrase came from but I'm going with it anyway!

This morning I saw that I had won a $25 Starbucks gift card on a blog giveaway....WOO HOO!  Totally made my morning, and most likely my day.  I guess it's the little things in life.....though a Starbucks card is pretty a-mazing!

Here's to maybe treating myself to a fun drink after my doctor's appointment this morning in anticipation of the card to come soon in the mail!

Check out Becky's blog where I won, it's really cute!

Spending time with Poppy & Gong Gong

After we got home from our little getaway in Bend, we got to spend a few more days with Peter's folks at our house.  We enjoyed a great Sunday service, a fabulous roast lunch, and a fun afternoon and evening together. 

Our little stinker has learned how to grab our laptops, put them on his lap, open them up and say "I play the computer"  It's cute....but not a toy he can play with, ha!

Monday Peter had to work so the rest of us headed out to do a little shopping for some new dishes and a few other things.  While we didn't find the dishes that day, they were able to find an awesome Christmas present for Benjamin.  Since we're all going to Ohio for Christmas together it made sense to have an "early Christmas" so we didn't have to bring the toy back in our luggage. 

I'm pretty sure Benjamin loves Little People Animal Farm.  He was so excited.

Tuesday morning we got up fairly early and all (minus Peter) headed into the car for the drive back to Idaho.  Benjamin and I were going to go spend 4 days with my parents since we aren't going to see them at Christmas.  Benjamin was awesome on the drive over....thanks in part to portable DVD players and Finding Nemo fruit snacks :-)

Thanks for letting us drive back with you Poppy & GongGong.  We had such a great visit with you and can't wait to see you again in a few weeks.



Mini Getaway

Peter and I were lucky enough to get away for a couple of days about 1 1/2 weeks ago.  His parents came up from WA and were gracious enough to take care of Benjamin for us while we headed to Bend.  Peter had planned for us to stay at a nice little condo and get a little rest & relaxation time together before baby boy #2 comes in February!

Life has just been so full and busy so it was SO NICE to just relax.  We stayed up later than we normally do, slept in, drank coffee in bed while we watched tv and vegged in the morning.  We drank latte's while we watched the skiingt Mt. Bachelor, browsed a few stores (didn't buy a thing!), walked around downtown Bend at night enjoying all the Christmas decorations, caroling, free red velvet cupcakes....it was soooo relaxing.  I don't think I'd realized how much I just really needed a bit of time to rest.

Of course I couldn't WAIT to get back to Benjamin and missed him like crazy.  He did really well for his Poppy & GongGong.  He didn't cry when he put them down for the night, was great on their hike at Silver Falls, and showed them his incrediby cute yet ornery stubborn side.  I was really glad he did so well.  When we got home he was a bit more clingy than usual but that's to be expected.

Here's a couple pictures of how beautiful and sunny Bend was, as well as a couple of self-timer couple shots :-)  We had a fabulous time, thanks again sweetheart for planning such a fun getaway and thanks again Poppy & GongGong for taking care of our precious little boy.

a clear picture of the mountains from the car 

driving to Mt. Bachelor 

a few quick shots to remember the baby bump of boy #2  

We had such a fabulous time....love you Peter!!