Half Way There...

We are half-way through this pregnancy already! I can't believe it! This baby is a mover and shaker. Feeling good and getting big! :) I had a nice little girls night out last night. My friend Kristen took me out to the bead store. I was able to make a necklace and earings for my dress this weekend to a friends wedding. I surprisingly had a bit of creativity up my sleeve! It was so nice and relaxing and definitely nice to catch up with a good friend. Going out is just something you gotta do... once in a while. :)

Few good stories about Josh this week.

Story # 1: Bib

I usually give Josh a light breakfast in the morning while I pack up my lunch and get some breakfast myself. I was taking a sip from my water bottle and dripped all the way down my chin and of course right onto my protruding pregnant belly. I looked up as I wiped my chin and Josh - completely straight faced and almost annoyed - said, "Mama - Bib" and pointed to the cupboard we store his bibs in. I busted out laughing and thought, awesome, my 2 year old just told me I am a pig. :)

Story #2: Poop puck

We continue to struggle with him going # 2 in the potty. Last night Jim had tried to catch him in the act. As soon as he heard Josh get quiet, a good clue that he needs to go, he saw Josh swinging a drumstick like a hockey stick... and guess what... a poop puck. As soon as Jim scolded him, Josh dropped the drumstick and said clear as day, "Hilo" as he pointed at the poop puck. Seriously? He is 2 but already lying to cover up his naughty behavior. Although Jim was REALLY mad when he saw him do it... he couldn't stop laughing when he told me about it that night. Although it started rough... Jim patiently sat with him for 45 minutes until he finally did the business... and now he gets to go to the Jumpy Gym...

Being a parent is AWESOME.

Crocketfest 2009

Our annual Walsh/Thuente camping trip was this weekend. And it was another awesome weekend. Josh and Lillian were good playmates enjoying the swings on the campsite, the wagon rides, and the pool. Friday night was the late night as usual... staying up to the wee hours... LOTS of good laughs right Joe??

Friday night was FREEZING in tents... Josh was nice and warm this time though in his lined windpants and thermal long sleeve shirt. His coleman sleeping bag from Uncle Joe is also nice and warm. Jim and I on the other hand... not so much. And even though I didn't drink... being pregnant still forced me to get out of the sleeping bag for a trip to the woods in the middle of the night.

Saturday was a nice relaxing day at the pool. Swimming, playing cards, drinking games, and the occasional nap. The menu for the weekend consisted of the old favorites, sloppy joes, walking tacos, omelets in a bag, sandwiches, and a new entry... Breakfast Bacon Explosion. Jim had 4 hard boiled eggs wrapped with pork sausage and then wrapped in a lattice of bacon. Smoked it for 6 hours. All he had to do Sunday was warm it up on the fire. Everyone seemed to think it was delicious. And I made my g'mas carmel rolls... yum!

The keg was cashed at the pool around 4pm and that also foreshadowed the early night. I think everyone was in bed around 10:30pm. At 3am we had a dual with racoons... A racoon was eating the left over sloppy joes from one of the coolers. Yep - it opened the cooler. It was highly amusing to hear the drama unfold as Joe, Jim, and Mark saved our food. My only concern when the fun was over was... did they eat the caramel rolls?

Josh had an okay time with potty training on the trip. It was a lot harder to remember to continually ask. Only one accident but he was in his overnight diaper a bit longer than he would have been at home. And bringing his little Elmo party worked slick for the campsite.

Baby #2 was kicking up a storm on Saturday. Lots of people were able to feel the kicks. Pretty cool for being only 19 weeks along. A little more than 2 weeks until we get to see the baby in the ultrasound. YAY!

Josh enjoying his Harley

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iMEAnGmu52Y

My Uncle Andy and Aunt Tanya decided it was time to clean out their garage around July 4th... And well, Josh is right about the age to use many of the things they were ready to hand-off. He had to wait about 3 weeks for us to get the new battery and replacement seat because well, mom didn't strap it down well enough on the trip back from MN... and the seat is laying on I-94 somewhere.

But that didn't stop him from trying to ride it. Glad we have it all up and running.

And Josh is still wearing big boy pants. We average 1 accident a day. The # 2 is the biggest hurdle ahead I think. The # 1 accidents have likely been mom/dad's fault for forgetting that he needs to go more often. So a few people have asked what we are doing and although I would love to say that we have done some tricky things, we have actually just slowly exposed him to it... and when he had interest... we tried to encourage it.

• Put the potty out when he was 1... he used it off and on over the last year. At most we had a 1 week stretch at 18 mos where he went every night.
• Big boy pants... bought them of course in characters he loved (Thomas the train and Elmo). Had him wear them over diapers.
• When he did start to show interest... we let him choose which potty... the on the floor potty, the big potty insert, or the big potty.
• On the big potty we sat him backwards and he leaned forward with his hands on the seat. Wonderful for boys who don't quite know how to aim. Finding it very helpful now in public because the big potty is so scary at some places... Thanks Mandy for this advice!!
• When we run errands or go somewhere... first stop is the bathroom. Because they always want to see what the bathroom looks like. So we went to church, grocery store, and another store one day. We made him go before leaving, right away at church, first thing at the grocery store, and then the next store, and as soon as we got home. I couldn't believe he actually went at all of them since the whole endeavor took only 3 hours... but he did. Again - Thanks Mandy for this advice!
• Potty chart (made the cars one and he loves stickers) we totally caved on the reward... he made it only to the first bend in the road and we already gave him the Mack truck... but we were so excited he had been dry in diapers all week! Still using the same chart... and stickers are going all over the road! Did you know you can get really cheap stickers at the dollar store?? Thanks G'ma/G'pa Kirkwood for finding that out!
• Rewards - I am all about bribing. He gets 4 mini marshmallows or a few chocolate chips. Or for a really good day - fruit snacks. Odd choices, but he gets really excited for them. So I will gladly hand them over. At first it was every time. Now it is only when he asks after going... which is about 1-2 a night. But stickers on the chart... that is every time.

So Jim and I continue to cross our fingers that this will stick. We are okay with an accident everyday... for now! :) Although we have thrown out one pair of underoos already... it was just not worth the work!

Josh and Potty Training

Josh has gone two days without an accident... wearing big boy underoos... and dry dry DRY! Now we just need to keep it up through the weekend... could this be the end of diapers??? Well maybe until baby # 2 comes along!

Josh LOVES reading books and always has. He usually gets pretty attached to one book for about a week and we have to read it sometimes 2-3 times before bed. I think we average 3-4 books a night at a minimum. Favorites have been One Fish Two Fish, A to Z of Hockey, The Hungry Lion, If you Give a Mouse a Cookie books, Dooby Moo, and Trucks. This week we brought out Cordoroy (about a bear that is a little worn and being sold at a toy shop). After the story, Josh got off of Jim's lap and went to the stuffed animal basket and pulled out my teddy bear from when I was 1 yrs old. I LOVED that teddy bear and it shows, the pictures from when my grandma had given them to the grandkids at Christmas show a nice and plump, furry teddy bear that is a golden brown. I think my mom had to sew on the arms a few times and re-stuff it. I have had that teddy bear with me my entire life... even had it in college. It has been loved. So when Jim told me Josh wanted to sleep with it that night... I actually got teary eyed. I had to go check it out... and then go downstairs to get the camera. That teddy bear is hand made by my grandma Donna, lived to seem me through college... and now cuddles with Josh.

Baby #2 - 17.5 weeks
Wednesdays appointment has made me believe that we are expecting another boy. Heart rate has been in the 160-165bpm range until this appointment. It was 153bpm. Where Josh was at. Weight gain to date 5lbs. Belly size - 34". Again bigger at this point than with Josh. I am forsure 3" bigger around at this point. Kicks - I can definitely feel something but I wasn't sure if I could truly be feeling kicks this early. It is so different from Josh, which felt more like rolling or swishing around than actual kicks and I didn't feel them until 19 weeks. So when the Dr. asked me on Wednesday if I have felt the baby move I said "I think so". She didn't think I was crazy. And when we listened to the heartbeat... Whoosh, whoosh, whoosh, WHACK, whoosh... Dr said - yep that forsure was a kick - did you feel that? I said YES! How cool!!! While I type this baby is moving around like crazy. Must have liked the pizza we had for dinner. :)

Week 16 - work/potty training

Life is good. I have been working quite a bit lately. My division is currently being sold to Bemis... it was announced July 3rd. And they hope to have it complete by Sept 1st. On top of that, we have had a huge surge of potential customers approach our plant and so we have been running trial after trial on our machines to try and qualify the new customer specs. School finally ended July 31st and it seemed work seemed to pick up dramatically after that! Thankfully both weren't happening at the same time! Today I got home at 5:30am and slept till noon. I am enjoying the day off after already putting in 42 hours by Thurs. Only one more day of work and I can enjoy the weekend! This was my first full night shift at this new job.... not bad for having worked there over a year already. Love my job still, so that makes this worth it for now. As for the buyout... I have to apply for my job, which seems like more of a formality than anything. Of course anything is possible, but everything seems to point to this being a good thing in the long run - I think my job is sound.

Pregnancy - Going so much better in the last few weeks. I can't help but think about what the next year holds. I picture our family with another little boy. And get excited thinking about the two boys playing sports, getting messy, and just overall being boys. The next day I will switch and picture a little girl with our family and look forward to being able to dress her up in the ridiculously cute clothes... play dolls... and bring some well needed girl power to this house of boys! :) Either way we are happy. I pray that this pregnancy goes as well as it did with Josh, and of course most of all for a happy healthy baby. It is hard to imagine any other way.

Josh - Hilarious. Life is just fun. He sings "happy birthday" non-stop around our house. Not to anyone in particular. Just loves singing it. Josh now sings the "Alleluia" song at church on Sunday's and this last week ended it with a loud "AMEN" and half of the "ABC's". That is when I quickly whispered, shhhh not now honey, but good job on singing! Josh can count to 11 now and does so every time we walk up/down a flight of stairs. To think that in 26 months he can count and sing his ABC's, name all the colors of the rainbow, and put puzzles together. It is just amazing to see all the growth!

Pictures: 16 Weeks pregnant. Josh and his friend Ella at Chickenfest (Prom picture right!) Josh and Lillian at the lake, playing in the water on the 4th of July. Josh's potty chart. We have it half way filled at this point. he gets 4 miniature marshmallows and to put a sticker on the sticker chart. He went the whole week with a dry diaper after school and through the night. Going potty 3 - 4 times each night and right away in the morning. So we gave him MACK truck to open already and now when the chart is full, we'll get him lightning McQueen to put inside of the semi. He is SO EXCITED. :)