Bellies and Babies

About Me

2012-02-18T08:00:00.000-05:00

I was recently tagged by Callie Nicole from Through Clouded Glass to do an about me post. I have to tell you 11 random things about me, then answer the 11 questions that she asked.

Here we go.

1- If it were acceptable to have a child in high school, I would have. I have always wanted to be a mommy and I couldn't wait until I was old enough to do so!

2-I used to live in Las Vegas. I went to college there (for 3 semesters) and had such a blast! It's such a different town when you actually live there. It wasn't all about partying and being a crazy college girl. I met some great Christian friends, lived with 3 other girls, and had a really great time.

3-I've gone to 5 different colleges. Crazy! One in my hometown in California, two in Vegas, and two in North Carolina.

4-I am a total hypochondriac. I always think things are wrong with me, or Jax, or the baby. At least I'm aware of it and I try to calm myself down and think rationally.

5-I also tend to be a "glass half empty" kind of girl. And I hate it about myself.

6-I'm a little bit of a picky eater. But as I've gotten older, I've definitely gotten better. These days I'm more willing to try things that I didn't used to like. However, I still can't stand mustard, pickles, seafood, and olives.

7-I'm very clean, organized and uncluttered. I can't stand clutter. Seriously. If we haven't used something in the recent past (say, 6ish months), it is getting thrown away.

8-I also go through lazy times and let chores pile up. Sometimes I just don't feel like doing the laundry, or scrubbing the sinks and toilets. Really, who can blame me??

I know that's not 11, but I could only come up with 8. Don't hate me!

And now for the questions that Callie Nicole asked...

1. If you could only listen to one album for the rest of your life, what would it be?
-- I actually listen mostly to the radio or Pandora, so I don't have a lot of albums (except all my Britney Spears, NSync, Backstreet Boys etc from Junior High... ha!), but if I had to pick, it wold probably be The Altar and the Door by Casting Crowns.

2. If you were a teacher, what subject would you teach?

-- Well, since I am trained to be a teacher, this is an easy one. Kindergarten, 1st or 2nd grade. Which means multi-subject.

3. What is your favorite verse and/or quote?
--"For you created my inmost being, you knit me together in my mother's womb. I praise you for I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Your works are good, I know that full well" (Psalm 139:13-14). I know this isn't really a verse or quote to live by, but it means so much to me at this motherhood stage in my life.

4. Why did you start blogging?
--Because I was pregnant with Jax and living 3000 miles away from family. I figured it would be a good way for family and friends to know what was going on with our lives.

5. What is one book you think everyone should read (besides the Bible, because that's a given)?
-- Love and Respect by Emerson Eggerichs

6. Favorite drink to get at Starbucks?
--Iced grande nonfat upside-down caramel macchiato (I worked there for 5 years, I know my drinks y'all)

Photo Credit

7. Would you rather it snow or rain?
--Probably snow, just because we don't get that much around here

8. Advice that your mom gave you that you never forgot?
--Never disrespect your husband, even in a joking manner. Men need to feel respected by their wives. (See question 5)

9. Most read website or blog?
--Does Facebook count? Ha! I also frequent Kelly's Korner, Pioneer Woman, and the LPM Blog

10. One thing you would tell your 13 year old self?
--Respect yourself. Don't let friends tell you what you should and shouldn't do. Trust God's plan for your life.

11. What do you hope people will say about you after you die?
--That my loved ones always knew how much I loved them, and that I was a good person who was a Godly example to those around me.

Well, there ya go... lots of new stuff that y'all know about me now! I had a lot of fun thinking of things to write about. Thanks, Callie Nicole!

19 and 20 weeks!

2012-02-16T18:26:00.003-05:00

I'm halfway through my pregnancy! Woohoo! Overall, it has gone by very quickly. However, I do feel like 20 more weeks is a long way to go. But I've felt great, like I'm not even pregnant, this whole time. So I really can't complain!

I got too busy last week to do a 19 week post. It would have been boring anyway. Pretty much the same ol', same ol'. Here is my 19 week picture, taken a day late. (Ignore the fact that I am constantly wearing teal shirts. It's my favorite color, and I just happen to have a few that fit well right now. )

And here is the comparison with Jax

I'm really not sure why it looks like I have no hands in Jax's picture!

Now onto my 20th week...it has been a little more interesting because I have felt her moving a little more! Finally! It has been driving me crazy how little I feel her. Even still, I don't feel her that often. But I have definitely felt more movement throughout this past week. And the best part was that I felt her kick my hand!! Whenever I do feel her, it is very low and often to one side or the other. Right close to my hipbone. The other day she kicked twice in a row in the same spot, so I stuck my hand there and she did it again! It was so fun to actually feel it on the outside. Of course she stopped once Ryan tried to feel her. Doesn't that always happen?!

Here is my picture from this morning

And here is the comparison with Jax

I think they look similar, however its probably because I was pushing my belly out so far with Jax. I think I was just a bit excited that my belly was really starting to grow!

And I couldn't leave out the big brother...

Goofy smile and all :)

Road Trip Randoms

2012-02-13T19:56:00.004-05:00

Most of these pictures are from my phone, but a few are ones from my camera that I didn't include in my previous posts. It's inevitable that during a road trip you will see some funny things and make some great memories. These are ones that I don't want to forget!

We ate at Cracker Barrel in Fayetteville before we hit the road.

We don't have them out here (boo!),

so we wanted to score some yummy food for one last time.

Jax always has to sit in the rocking chairs.

He insisted that Daddy join him

This was what our car looked like as we drove out of town with 3000 miles ahead of us. It was very peaceful!

It was overcast through the Carolina mountains, but I thought it was so pretty!

Jax still has to have his guys whenever he sleeps.

He loved being in the hotel bed with me, too.

This was how Mojo hung out for most of the trip.

My tummy makes a nice pillow for her!

We drove through Carrie Underwood's hometown in Oklahoma

Texas sky. GORGEOUS!

This name just cracked me up. I'm a 14 year old sometimes.

Our hotel breakfast area in Flagstaff.

Told ya it looked like a lodge!

Jax decided that he should take pictures from our Vegas hotel room with my camera.

He actually did a great job!

See...

Jax fell asleep with his hand in the cereal bag, his headphones on his head and his movie playing in his lap. It made me giggle. I just love him!

On a completely separate note, I didn't get to my 19 week post last week, so I'll be combining last week and this week on Thursday. See ya then!

Road Trip: Vegas to HOME!

2012-02-11T20:33:00.004-05:00

We got to Vegas around 2 on Tuesday afternoon

We checked in at the Planet Hollywood hotel. We dropped our bags in our room, along with Mojo, and headed down to walk around The Strip. It was SO fun to be back in one of my home towns! I went to UNLV for a few years and it was such a fun time in my life. This was only the second time I'd been back since college and I always love being there.

This was Jax's first time being there, and even though there are some things to protect him from, I knew he would love seeing all the lights, and the fountains at Bellagio.

We stopped at Cabo Wabo Cantina outside our hotel for a late lunch/early dinner

For some reason, there were a bunch of characters standing in random places throughout The Strip. A little out of place, if you ask me! But Jax was excited about seeing Woody!

Ryan was mostly excited about the Harley Davidson Cafe/Store

so that he could buy a Vegas Harley shirt.

No surprise that Jax LOVED the fountains!

We ventured inside Bellagio and walked through this display

celebrating the Chinese New Year

We also stopped at my favorite crepes place.

I got a berry one and Ryan got Nutella. Yum. Yum. Yum.

Just a little pause to take a picture...

Jax was a little distracted by everything

Here is our lovely hotel

I've driven by this sign tons and tons of times,

but I've never in my life been so happy to see it!

This cracked me up! We had both of our phones charging the whole time, plus mine was on connected to our speakers to play Pandora and Ryan's was being used as our GPS. Thank goodness for iPhones!

My handsome dude was so SO excited to get to Nana and Boppa's house!

We finally arrived around 6 on Wednesday evening. It is so good to be home sweet home!!

Road Trip: Oklahoma to Nevada

2012-02-09T08:00:00.000-05:00

After we left Oklahoma City we headed toward Texas. First we stopped at the Route 66 Museum to take a look around. It was pretty cool to see the memorabilia and imagine what things were like when everyone drove that road!

Next we made it to the Texas border

And for the next 12374328761632 miles, this was my view. BUT, it actually was a beautiful day, so I'm not complaining!

And whenever I turned around, this is what I saw. Not a bad view ;)

After Texas was New Mexico.

It was such beautiful landscape, and such a change from Oklahoma and Texas!

We ended up combining two days into one, so instead of stopping in NM we drove all the way through to Flagstaff, Arizona. It was a looooong 12+ hours of driving but I'm so glad we decided to push through and shorten our trip by a day.

Did ya'll know that Flagstaff is at 8000 feet?? I did not know that! It reminded me of a Colorado ski town (not that I've ever been to a Colorado ski town). It was beautiful! Our hotel was like a lodge and there was even some snow on the ground. Jax loved that part!

The next morning we ventured a little off of our route and went to the Grand Canyon. Neither of us had ever been, so we were excited to go, but it was F.R.E.E.Z.I.N.G!!! We ended up just jumping out of the car, taking a quick picture, then getting back on the road.

Next (and final) stop- Vegas! My college town!

Road Trip: North Carolina to Oklahoma

2012-02-07T08:00:00.000-05:00

We had been planning this road trip and looking forward to it for months! When we left Fayetteville and hit the road, we were civilians! So surreal! We headed about 5 hours to Asheville, NC and stopped there for the night.

We had a very full car, and Jax was excited to go to "Calishornia"!

Beautiful sunset over the Carolina mountains

The next day we headed to Tennessee and stopped in Knoxville for lunch. Then we got back on the road and headed toward Nashville. We stopped at the Adventure Science Center so that Jax could get some energy out. It was a really cool "museweum", as Jax would say. It was a very nice way to stretch our legs and our brains!

Jax got to play a giant guitar

He also got to feed the hungry mouth

We also drove through downtown

We left Nashville and headed to Memphis for the night. The next morning we got up and got on the road just before 8. We decided to find a Starbucks for breakfast and to hopefully get some wifi (which didn't end up happening). We found one right off of Beale Street so we stopped there to walk around and take some pictures. Everything was closed but it was still fun to see.

There was a sports arena across from Starbucks and there were all these giant balls out front... Jax loved them!

We stopped in front of the Mississippi River to take a picture

Then we drove into Arkansas

And then into Oklahoma

Jax is such a good car napper (he always has been), and his little crossed leg was making me laugh!

We stopped just past Oklahoma City for the night.

We ended up getting a hotel suite and relaxing, enjoying some yummy local pizza and watching the Super Bowl. We have driven 1400 miles and are halfway home! Next we're off to Albuquerque, New Mexico!

18 weeks!

2012-02-05T19:51:00.004-05:00

***Edit- I wrote this post 2 days ago as we were getting ready to leave NC, and we are now in Oklahoma City. This is the first time I've had Internet strong enough to post this blog. Ugh. But we're in our hotel now and watching the Super Bowl so I'm a happy girl. And we're halfway home!***

This week has been full of packing, organizing, and living in our house like we were camping. We are now out of our house and heading to California!! I'll be blogging about the trip whenever I have internet access, so stay tuned throughout the next week. We are stopping in some big cities and fun places!

Miss Lexi is now 18 weeks along. She weighs about 7 ounces and is about 6 inches long. We had a doctor's appointment yesterday. Her heartbeat was very strong! Everything from my ultrasound and my blood work came back good, and I got the okay to be in the car for the next 7 days. I just had to promise to take lots of breaks so that I don't develop any clots in my legs. Not a problem for this pregnant woman. My bladder wouldn't allow anything different!

I apologize for the quality of pictures this week. I don't have the cord to connect my camera to my computer, so I had to use the iPad instead. As much as I love my iPad, its camera is not the greatest!

Here we are this morning on our way out the door

And here's my silly boy with his big bag of cereal (snack for the road trip)

Pray for us over this next week and as we start this adventure into a new chapter of our life!

Thanks Pinterest!

2012-01-31T08:00:00.000-05:00

For these two brilliant ideas...

First, this little on-the-go coloring kit. Post-its, crayons, empty travel first aid kit. Easy!

(Ignore the smudgy 't'... thanks Jax)

Second, this fun bath trick. Glow sticks, no lights. Super fun!

Our weekend

2012-01-30T08:00:00.000-05:00

It's really sinking in that we are moving in a week. At the same time, it's so surreal to be taking things off of walls, pulling down curtains, packing boxes and boxes of clothes, and patching and touch-up-painting walls.

I am so thankful that the Army is moving 95% of our stuff. I'm grateful that after 8 years of service to them, they will pay to pack, ship, and then unpack all of our belongings at our new place.

We are loading our car with essentials for our road trip across the country. (Which I'm SO excited about, by the way). And we are also packing up some kitchen and bath essentials because we will be in our new place for a couple of weeks before our stuff arrives.

I am so excited to get back to California and back to friends and family, but I am already getting a little sad about leaving our first house. It's the house where we learned how to take down wallpaper, tile floors, patch holes in walls, and paint every possible wall, door and board. It's also the house where we learned how to soothe a crying baby, change diapers in the middle of the night, function on little sleep, and watch our firstborn grow into an amazing toddler who is so excited to have a baby sister.

But while I look back with such fond memories, I look forward to everything these next few months will bring. A new house to make memories in, a new civilian job for Ryan, a new baby girl to hold and snuggle, and being close to family and friends who get to enjoy it all with us. Bring it on!

The Little Gym 2.0

2012-01-28T08:00:00.000-05:00

Last Saturday we went to our final class at the Little Gym. If you remember, I was sad because we had gone to a makeup class the previous Wednesday with a different teacher, and I had forgotten to take my camera. So, we ended up doing another makeup class for one that we missed a few weeks ago, on Saturday with Miss Miranda, Jax's regular teacher. Ok, enough confusing run-on sentences. Why don't I just show you the pictures, since I remembered to bring my camera this time! Since you guys have seen similar pictures already, I decided to just make a little collage with some of the cutest ones!

17 weeks!

2012-01-27T08:00:00.000-05:00

This week was a very fun week in pregnancy news! In case you missed it (here), we are having a baby girl!!

A little background about Lexi Nicole's name.... there isn't any. Ha! We had a girl name picked out during Jax's pregnancy, which we thought we would save for whenever we had a girl. Once I got pregnant this time, I started second guessing it and found another name that I loved. Ryan liked it but wasn't convinced. Then just a few weeks ago we found another name that we both liked, and I thought we had settled on. Then my dear husband decided he wasn't convinced about that one either. He's picky about names.. ugh! Last night, after we found out she was a girl and we would FOR SURE be needing to choose a girl name, I suggested Lexi. He loved it! I still loved the name we chose a few weeks ago, so we gave Jax the final decision. I asked him a few different times throughout yesterday evening and this morning which name he liked, and he said Lexi each time. So Lexi it is! And Nicole is my middle name, so we knew that would be her middle name from the beginning.

Our ultrasound was great yesterday. I always love getting ultrasounds... what mom doesn't?! We got tons of pictures to put in her pregnancy journal, which I love to look back on as she gets bigger. She is measuring right on track and is 6 ounces, or half a pound! This coming week she is getting her waxy coating (vernix) that protects her skin from the amniotic fluid until she is born. All the cartilage in her body is forming into bone, and she is starting to store fat and gain some weight. Which means that I am too. Eek!

Side note: I swear that while I'm pregnant, my body saves every.single.calorie that enters my body. Not cool.

Here is my 17 week picture

I have definitely noticed my belly growing this week, which is kind of fun!

Here's the comparison with Jax

I think that I just look rounder this time around... and not just in my belly. Ha!

And just for fun, here is a little progression collage of my pregnancy so far

It's also a progression of the length of my hair... since I haven't had it cut since July. Oh, I cannot wait to get back to California!

It's a...

2012-01-26T09:11:00.000-05:00

Girl!!!

The little stinker wouldn't open her legs though! She was moving and squirming like crazy, but her legs stayed mostly closed the whole time. We poked and prodded and shook her around, and after about 15 minutes of not seeing anything that looked like boy parts, we finally got a few decent shots of some definitive girl parts. And she also gave us a great profile shot!

We are SO excited for Lexi Nicole to make her appearance in July!

"For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother's womb.
I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made.
Your works are wonderful, I know that full well.
My frame was not hidden from you when I was made in the secret place.
When I was woven together in the depths of the Earth,
your eyes saw my unformed body.
All the days ordained for me were written in your book
before one of them came to be"

Psalm 139:13-16

Randoms

2012-01-25T08:00:00.000-05:00

I thought this picture of my boys was so sweet. They were just snuggling, watching a movie, and I couldn't help but snap a photo. Love them.

We picked up a few things at Joann's the other day and we found this little hat in the dollar section. Perfect photo opp, obviously

Jax always loves to put my headbands on. The other day he decided to put on all the ones he could find at one time.

Crazy kid!

"Mommy, I'm gonna hug my toy, can you take a picture of me?"

Ummm.... Sure....

Pretend sleeping in our bed... Notice the sneaky smile

I did a prenatal exercise video this morning and was resting on the couch afterward. Jax came up and started hugging and kissing the baby... SO sweet!!

On another random note, I am SO sad that Picnik is closing! I just recently posted about how I had rediscovered it as a way to do my comparison pictures with my pregnancies. Boo! Anyone know of something similar??

And finally... we have our gender ultrasound this morning!!! Stay tuned for the big reveal!

Mommies Group

2012-01-24T08:00:00.000-05:00

I started attending Mommies Group at my church while I was pregnant with Jax. That was three years ago. In those three years I have made many wonderful friends.

Some of my closest friendships have been formed during those two hours every Tuesday morning. Those ladies have been there through my lowest lows and my highest highs. They have seen me laugh and cry and babble on and on about life and motherhood and marriage.

There are not many things that I will miss about Fayetteville once we are gone, but my wonderful Mommies Group friends definitely top the short list.

Each week we gather in the far-too-small infant nursery at our church and sit and talk and learn about God, while our children play and run around us. It's usually a bit chaotic, but it creates memories that none of us will soon forget. Yesterday was my last day to see most of these ladies. It was sad and wonderful all at the same time. But I do know that I will look back on this time in my life with nothing but smiles and happy tears!

My silly boy

2012-01-23T08:00:00.000-05:00

As most of you know, my kid is a big ham

He loves to look at himself in the mirror

And make funny faces

He loves to have pictures taken of himself

And be the center of attention

Don't be surprised if this kid shows up on stage or in movies someday

It wouldn't surprise me one single bit!

Caterpillars

2012-01-21T08:00:00.000-05:00

I helped out a friend this morning and watched her two kiddos while she went to the dentist. Jax and Adam love each other and always have tons of fun playing together. Jordan just likes to tag along to whatever they are doing.

I had been meaning to save an egg carton to make caterpillars, and I finally remembered to do it last week. I decided it would be a perfect craft to make with the boys this morning. I got out some stickers, markers, and pipe cleaners. They boys decorated their caterpillars then we added antennae, legs, and a face to each one.

While they were decorating, I read them The Very Hungry Caterpillar. They had lots of fun decorating their caterpillars and comparing them to the one from the book. It's hard to keep 2-year-olds occupied with crafts, but this was a good one. They were both very proud of how they turned out!

16 weeks!

2012-01-20T13:13:00.003-05:00

If I change the publish time, does that mean that this post actually got up before 1 pm? Since I'm already a day late, I would have liked to get it up this morning, but it just didn't happen. Mostly for the fact that I didn't have anyone (i.e. my husband) to take my picture until just now. I could get the tripod out, but that's a whole lot of work to take one picture, and I'm quasi lazy when it comes to things like that.

This week has been a little weird since we are down to one car. There has been a lot more time at home for Jax and I, and a lot more juggling of schedules to work it all out. Starting next week, Ryan won't have to report for duty every morning, so that should help alleviate some of the juggling. We have so many appointments and things scheduled in these last 20 days (what?!) until we leave. One of those appointments is our gender ultrasound on Wednesday! WOOHOO! Don't forget to vote in the gender poll on the top left of the blog... only a few days left!

The baby is heading into a big growth spurt these next few weeks. He/She will double in weight and add a few inches in length. As of now, he/she is approximately 5 inches and weighs 4.5 ounces. His/her legs are much more developed, so the kicking should become more apparent and frequent (Yay!). I seriously feel like my belly hasn't grown in a few weeks. I'm sure I'm just being paranoid, but I'm just in a weird place. I can't wait to hear and see the baby on Wednesday!

I'm not doing a comparison this week because I hate my 16 week picture with Jax. Ha! I look like a hot mess, so no one needs to see that. But, I would never leave you without a "16 week" picture of my sweet boy!

Happy Friday!

The Little Gym

2012-01-19T10:16:00.000-05:00

Last night we took Jax to a make-up class at The Little Gym. Since Ryan and I are sharing a car now, I knew we wouldn't be able to make it to his normal class this morning. We arrived there for the 630 class and there were approximately 4 million people there (give or take a few...).

Apparently, this class is way more crowded than his normal class, AND it's a combo class with his age group and the age group just below him. So he was far too advanced for the class. AND on top of all that, I forgot it was showcase week, which means I didn't bring my camera.

Thank goodness for iPhones, but they sure don't take great pictures of moving toddlers. We still got a few decent ones, even though they aren't as clear as I wish they were.

Jax still had a blast and was very proud of his ribbon that he received at the end of class. I was sad that his regular teacher, Miss Miranda, wasn't the one to give it to him.

I thought we would be there for his normal class this week, so we haven't gotten to say goodbye to her. Last night I promised Jax that we will get to the gym one last time to say goodbye before we leave. We are really going to miss our Thursday morning fun!

16 week post is coming later this afternoon or tomorrow morning. I just have to take my belly picture... and Jax's, of course!

Let's revisit Love Potion #31

2012-01-18T08:00:00.000-05:00

3 years ago, almost to the day, I posted this blog about my love for Baskin Robbins' annual Valentine's Day ice cream, Love Potion #31. Each year I look forward to the middle of January because it means that I can make my way to B&R and score some of this yumminess.

Photo

White chocolate and raspberry ice cream, swirled with a raspberry ribbon, with dark chocolate pieces, and dark chocolate hearts filled with raspberry. I know, right?! It sounds much richer than it is. And the funny thing is, I don't even really like fruit and chocolate mixed together, but this stuff just so. dang. good!

I attribute my large weight gain while I was pregnant with Jax to this ice cream. And wouldn't ya know, I'm pregnant during Valentine's Day again, 3 years later. I am trying very hard to pace myself, but it is calling to me from my freezer. Oh yeah, did I mention that we bought a quart and brought it home? No? Well, we did. Yeah, I'm addicted. I'm actually quite thankful that it only comes around once a year because if it were available all the time, I'm certain I would weigh far more, pregnant or not!

The B-I-B-L-E

2012-01-17T16:53:00.001-05:00

For some reason this video won't play on here, it's linking to YouTube. But it's still cute :)

YouTube Video

Randoms

2012-01-16T09:01:00.001-05:00

We sold Ryan's car yesterday morning! So now we are a one-car family. The plan is to buy Ryan a car in California, but it probably won't be right away. However, I don't want to be stuck at home all the time, so it will definitely be as soon as possible!

We spent the afternoon and evening hanging out, watching football, and grilling some burgers. A friend of Ryan's came over and brought elk burgers. I've never had elk before but it was pretty good. A little more game-y than I would prefer, but not bad. He also brought appetizers... Small pieces of duck breast with a slice of jalapeño wrapped in bacon. I'd never had duck before either (that I can remember), but they were so good! And I failed to get any pictures. Boo me!

I do, however, have some other pictures for you guys.

Here is my little belly from my angle... I already can't see my toes. What?!

We went to the kids museum on Wednesday and Jax was having fun playing with the construction stuff. He kept putting the goggles right on top of his eyes.

We took him to Beauty and the Beast a few nights ago and he sat through the whole thing! He had such a blast eating popcorn and M&Ms, and wearing the cool 3d glasses.

He has always been a snuggler!

Ryan has wanted to learn guitar for years so he finally bought one. Jax is pretty enthralled by it!

I have a cute video of Jax singing that isn't uploading for some reason, but I will try to get that up as soon as possible. It's pretty darn cute!

Show Us Your Life- Military Families

2012-01-12T22:53:00.001-05:00

I'm linking up with Kelly today for her Show Us Your Life series. Today's topic is Military Families, and I figured that it was a good time to finally link up with her.

Here is our story-
My husband and I have known each other our whole lives. Our parents went to college together and we grew up hanging out with each other. His sister is my age, so he was always the annoying older brother! Fast forward some years, he joined the Army in 2004, then deployed to Iraq in August 2006. His mom emailed me and said that I should get in touch with him so that we could be pen pals while he was overseas. Well, one thing led to another and soon we fell in love... across the world from each other! He came home for leave at Christmas and we got engaged, then he headed back to Iraq until October. We got married 2 months later on New Year's Eve.

Iraq homecoming

Our wedding day

As for our military life, we have been at Fort Bragg in North Carolina for the last 4.5 years. His job has allowed us to stay in one place, which has been such a blessing!. We've been through a few short deployments to Haiti and Thailand, and another long one to Afghanistan.

Afghanistan deployment day

Homecoming

For those who already read my blog, you know that we are getting out of the Army in a few weeks. However, these last 5 years of military life have changed me, in the best possible way. The sisterhood of military wives, learning how to be a single mom when duty calls, turning friends into family, figuring out how to be strong when you have nothing left. These are just a few of the things that I take with me as we step out into the civilian world.

Wish us luck!

15 weeks!

2012-01-12T15:25:00.002-05:00

I'm settling into my second trimester and feeling pretty good. Only 25 weeks to go! Ha... that sounds like a lot.

I'm certain that I've felt a few baby movements this week. I think that I can feel it more easily since I've been through this before and I can identify what I'm feeling. I know I've said this, but I just can't wait until I feel this baby moving all the time!

He or she is about 4 inches from crown to rump and weighs about 2.5 ounces... approximately the size of an apple. However, I've never understood the fruit comparison because there are apples that are tiny and apples that are huge. I also don't understand how one week the baby can be compared to something short and squat (like an apple), then the next week it can be compared to something long and skinny (like a banana). But I digress...

Here is my picture this week....

Here is the comparison from when I was pregnant with Jax...

Don't I look so much bigger with this one this week? Eek! I gained a lot of weight with Jax, so I'm super paranoid this time around!

And we can't forget my little man...

We're in the middle of selling one of our cars, doing job interviews and trying to find a place to live in California... so I'm off to go be a grown up!

These are a few of my favorite...

2012-01-11T14:15:00.002-05:00

Pins!

Please sing the title to the tune of "Favorite Things" from The Sound of Music, because that's what I did.

I really wish Pinterest had been around when I was planning Jax's nursery. It would have made my life so much easier because I am not very crafty, creative or decorator-y. Ignore my made up word. So now that Pinterest IS around, I've been taking full advantage of all the ideas for nurseries, newborn photos, birthday parties (never mind that Jax's is still 5 months away), yummy food, and fun ideas for toddlers.

I thought I would share a few of my favorites with you guys. Mind you, I haven't actually done any of them yet except for the Finger paints, which were a smashing success!

For the nursery-
Love the soft colors and the picture arrangement
(Link here)

I am totally making this for the baby! Just not these colors...
(Link here)

Great wall decor!
(Link here)

One of my favorite verses!
(Link here)

For my tummy-
I cannot wait to be able to drink a margarita again.... Only 6ish months. Ha!
(Link here)

Red velvet brownies. Yum.
(Link here)

Oreo brownies. Yum.
(Link here)

For my house-
I always scribble my menu plan on a post-it on the fridge. This is a much cuter idea!
(Link here)

Love this idea
(Link here)

I love picture arrangements, and this one is just awesome!
(Link here)

For Jax-
I would love to do this in his room or playroom someday!
(Link here)

A "calm down" jar... Shake it and wait until the glitter settles. Such a great idea!
(Link here)

Homemade rock candy!
(Link here)

For the baby-
So cute!
(Link here)

I'm definitely doing this once I get a little bigger!
(Link here)

Precious!
(Link here)

I. Could. Die.
(Link here)

You can follow me on Pinterest here.

And if you have some great pins, leave me a comment with your Pinterest link so that I can follow you!

Randoms

2012-01-10T08:01:00.001-05:00

Well I am typing this from my brand new iPad! We decided to spend a little bit of our savings to buy ourselves an iPad before we hit the road back to California. Partially so that Jax can watch movies on it during the drive, but also just because it is fun/useful for us to have :)I haven't posted pictures from my phone recently, so I thought it would be good to show you some recent goings-on around here!Showing off his blue Icee tongue at Monkey Joe's

Sharing a beater with Mojo

This kid loves tepanyaki!

Snuggling with Mojo by the warm fire

Waiting for Daddy at the dentist. I forgot to charge the DVD player ahead of time... Oops!

Riding in the fire truck with Bert and Ernie

Trying on the pregnant belly at Motherhood Maternity

We cleaned out our shed in preparation for moving and Jax was so excited to play with a bunch of his old baby stuff

And here he is enjoying our new toy... He was especially excited about "BIG angry birds!"

This week is going to be filled with lots of phone calls to figure out living arrangements, getting some extra stuff sold, and transferring my medical coverage. We're less than a month away from hitting the road!

Guest Post- Our Little Almanac

2012-01-09T08:00:00.000-05:00

Today I have a guest post for you guys! It's from Kendra at Our Little Almanac. Enjoy!

Hello fellow friends of Jenna's. Isn't Jenna lovely? She and I have known each other since high school and it has been fun to keep up with each other's lives thereafter via the blogosphere.

I could introduce myself by stating my name and where I'm from, but let's make it a bit more of an introduction, shall we? Here's a bit about me: I hate the crust on bread, I can eat a rittersport in about 1 minute and if practicing patience maybe it'll last two, I'm self conscious of my hips, I'm an organizational nutcase, I am a Sprinkles Cupcake fanatic, I have 4 ongoing journals to document all the thoughts that fill up my brain, my husband and I have a secret language, I am super frugal but don't like to sacrifice sophistication for tacky and I am a mother to the most beautiful baby girl, Evelyn. Sadly she turns one in a month and I can't call her a "baby" anymore so I'm throwing that word out there as long as I can! I love to write about my experiences as a new mother, our travels far and wide, things I cook, things that I think make me artsy and a whole lot of in-between stuff. And my name is Kendra but my siblings call me Hen.

Jenna asked if I would write something about my new year resolutions. I blogged some of my fun trivial ones here the other day, although they are very serious in my eyes :) However, if there is one thing this life has taught me it is to take advantage of every little moment. The title of my blog is "Our Little Almanac." I thought it was rather fitting because within it's "pages," if you will, is a small chronicling of our happenings each year - some are huge momentous occassions and others are small things that at the time seem insignificant when in fact those became the things that mattered most. This year it is my resolution to be more grateful. I have made it a goal to write down 5 things every day that humble me. Whether it be toothpaste for my teeth, a man holding a door open for me or an email from a friend, I know that God works in small ways to brings us the greatest amount of happiness. So I guess that is my thought for you. To be more grateful.

"Let a spirit of Thanksgiving guide and bless your days and nights. Work at it. You will find it will yield wonderful results."

- Gordon B. Hinckley

May 2012 be a blessed year for you all! And please feel welcome to stop by here and say hello!

14 Weeks

2012-01-06T08:23:00.002-05:00

I'm a day behind! Agh! Yesterday turned out to be a rough day. Jax had a yucky cold and he was a hot mess yesterday morning. I tried to take a shower and he completely lost it. So I ended up putting him in the shower with me, and he cried the whole time. The water was in his eyes and he was cold, but he didn't want me to hold him up closer to the water. He was just a wreck. Sooo.... instead of putting myself together, taking a 14 week picture and heading to the store (which was my original plan), I ended up throwing my wet hair into a pony, snuggling on the couch, and watching movies with my boy. Thankfully he settled down and we even managed to head around the corner to munch on some Mexican food for lunch. Mmmmm..... chips and queso!

Pregnancy-related, this week has been boring. The baby is about 3.5 inches and can make lots of facial expressions, which is fun. It's boy parts/girl parts are fully developed so I can't wait to get our ultrasound in 3 weeks! I mostly don't feel pregnant still. It's really such a strange thing. I forget about it most of the time. However, I think that I've started to feel a few baby movements. It's hard to tell for sure, but I'm pretty sure that the little twitches and pokes are the baby. It won't be long until I'm feeling them all the time!

Here is my picture this week...

Not too much different, huh?

Here is a comparison from when I was pregnant with Jax...

I feel like they are similar, but this time it's more round overall. By the way, excuse the unbuttoned pants... Geez!

And of course, here is Jax's picture this week...

His shirt stayed down this time :)

I have a guest post coming from a friend of mine, so come back on Monday to check that out!

Look what I did!

2012-01-03T15:03:00.003-05:00

First, I figured out how to make a picture collage! Thanks to Jenna for doing a recap of 2011 and reminding me of her tutorial for picture collages. I used picnik to make this collage. It's free and super easy!

As you can see, I also made Jax some finger paints! I found the recipe on Pinterest (follow me here). They were really easy to make and only took a few minutes. I made green, red and yellow because those were the colors of food coloring that I had on hand. I put Jax in the tub and let him paint away. As you can see, he wanted to use a paintbrush. He still managed to make a big mess :) And he loved it! I'll definitely be making more again soon.

Helpful hint- keep them in the fridge because they will mold after a few days. I obviously learned this the hard way. Boo!

2011

2011-12-31T19:25:00.001-05:00

January-
We were excited because Ryan was returning from deployment soon.

We spent time with our best friends in California.

We were preparing for Disneyland.

February-
Ryan came home from Afghanistan!!!

We took a trip, ALONE, to Vegas!

March-
We took a trip to Disneyland.

We came back home to North Carolina.

April-
I really started feeling the ache about not getting pregnant, and decided to pursue fertility testing.

We had an awful tornado that hit just down the road from our house.

May-
We had a fun Memorial Day at the lake.

June-
Jax turned TWO!

We began fertility testing.

July-
We celebrated our last Independence Day as a military family.

My best friends came to visit from California.

I got baptized.

August-
I turned 25.

My mom, Jax and I visited Charleston.

Potty training!

September-
We went to the zoo.

We watched Daddy jump out of a helicopter.

Ryan turned 27 and we went ziplining.

October-
We had some big prayer requests.

And God totally answered, because I became pregnant with baby #2! (But kept it a secret)

Jax was a pirate.

November-
Jax became obsessed with my iPhone.

He also became obsessed with his guys.

December-
I announced my pregnancy!

And we got to see our baby.

We celebrated our first and last Christmas alone, as just a family of three.

I started my second trimester, and am starting to show.

2012 will bring huge changes for our family! Moving back to California, finding a new job for Ryan, finding a new place to live, having another baby, Jax starting preschool next fall, and many other surprises that I'm sure God has in store for us. I can't wait!!

Happy New Year, dear friends!

13 weeks!

2011-12-29T15:18:00.001-05:00

I can't believe I'm already into my second trimester! I'm 1/3 of the way to holding this sweet baby in my arms!

I had my 12 week checkup yesterday and everything looks great. We had a little scare because the doctor couldn't find the heartbeat with the doppler. I got really nervous, but he said it's not uncommon to have a hard time finding the heartbeat with the doppler at 12 weeks. He sent me over the the ultrasound room to check that way. Right away I saw the baby squirming around, and it only took a second to see the flicker of the heartbeat on the screen. It was nice and strong! I asked the ultrasound tech to check between the baby's legs, but the little stinker wouldn't open its legs and wouldn't stop squirming around. It's a little too early to tell anyway, but I wanted to try!

We couldn't get very good pictures, but here's the best one...

We actually will be doing our 20 week ultrasound at my next appointment! I'll be 17 weeks, but since we are moving 2 weeks later, we want to make sure everything looks good before we head back to CA. Soooo.... that means only 4 more weeks until we know the gender!! Make sure you go vote in the gender poll on the top left of the blog. Right now, it's pretty split down the middle, so we'll see :)

Here's my picture from this week...

I compared it to pictures from when I was pregnant with Jax... and this is what I looked like at about 17/18 weeks with him! Ha! My body must have remembered what it was doing and started expanding before it was necessary ;) I tried to crop the pictures side by side to compare, but I'm not sure how to do it on my computer. Anyone know how to do that? (I have a MAC and I don't have Photoshop)

Here's Jax's picture from this week...

He's such a ham :)

Can ya'll believe that the end of the year is already here?! It sure has flown by for me! Happy New Year!!

Lots of Christmas Pictures!

2011-12-28T16:50:00.003-05:00

We had a good, but uneventful Christmas this year. It was the first year that we were completely alone, and it felt a little weird. I tried to make it feel as Christmas-y as possible, but it just wasn't quite the same. We still had a good time, and Jax was excited about everything... which makes it that much more fun for us!

We went to our church's Christmas Eve program on Saturday night. They did a huge production at an arena-like thing... it seated about 4500 people, and was almost completely full at both 5pm and 7pm. It was a great way to focus on the real reason we celebrate Christmas, and the fact that Jesus was born so that he could, in turn, die for our sins. We set up a tripod and took a family picture before we headed out the door.

Jax fell asleep in the car on the way home, so we didn't end up putting out any cookies for Santa, and we also didn't get to remind him that he got to open presents when he woke up. My early-riser came into our room at 550 the next morning, and didn't even mention Christmas. We laid in bed for a little while and then reminded him that it was Christmas day! He immediately jumped out of bed and headed to the living room. We opened stockings first.

(His Kisses candy blends in with his jammies!)

I got breakfast started after we finished opening our stockings. Monkey Bread!

After I got breakfast in the oven, we distributed presents and got to work! Jax was so excited to open all of his presents this year. It was the first year that he really understood what was going on, and he understood that he could ask for what he wanted. He has been asking for a race car (remote control car) for a while, and Santa totally delivered! We made him open that last, so he had to open his other 471821938893819021 presents first. Next year there will be a limit (for us and for family members) of how many presents can be given to our kids.

Clothes

A new watch (because we lost his old one)

A shaving kit! He pretend shaves with Daddy every morning, but now he can "really" shave!

His race car!

After opening presents, we ate our breakfast and spent the day playing with our new toys, reading books, and watching Christmas movies.

I made Chinese food for dinner, and chocolate roll for dessert. A tried a few new recipes for dinner, and they turned out okay. We had broccoli beef, cashew chicken, egg rolls and fried rice. I'm glad it was just the 3 of us eating the food! Ha!

Broccoli beef

Our little buffet for three

But the chocolate roll was delicious (it's a tried and true recipe) and I inhaled a huge piece after Jax went to bed.

YUM!

Extra YUM!!

Overall it was a nice day, and now we get to look forward to getting back to California and having a huge family Christmas next year!

From our family to yours!

2011-12-24T07:14:00.002-05:00

Merry Christmas!

12 Weeks!

2011-12-22T15:10:00.002-05:00

I've made it to the end of my first trimester! Woo! Starting next week, I will official be a second trimester gal. I have to say though, I really can't complain much about my first trimester. I pretty much don't feel pregnant. (Which can be a little scary/frustrating, but I try to count it as a blessing). I'm grateful that I haven't had awful morning sickness, or terrible heartburn, or extreme exhaustion. This pregnancy has been very similar to Jax's so far, and for that I am blessed. I barely felt pregnant with Jax. The only thing that was real was his kicking and punching my insides. I can't wait to feel this baby do those same things!

I am at such an awkward stage with clothes. I look chubby, not pregnant. All my clothes are too small, but maternity clothes are too big. I've been living in sweats and baggy shirts as much as possible. I am SO thankful that I have one pair of maternity jeans that fits... and I pretty much wear them whenever I go out in public, which isn't that often (thank goodness) since it's Christmas time and all our normal activities are on hiatus.

The baby is the size of a lime this week... about 2ish inches! His/her nerves are connecting and he/she is starting to have facial reactions, and bodily movements. I can't wait to feel them. It is by far the best part of pregnancy.

Here are my pictures from weeks 10 and 11....

And here is this week...

I'm definitely starting to show!

A few final things---
-I finally died my hair now that I'm out of the "danger zone" aka weeks 5-10. And ohhh, it felt so good to do it. Now I just need to get back to California so that I can get this mop cut!

-Don't you just love my new blog design?! I do! It's from LeeLouBlogs.

-I added a gender poll to the top left of the blog... so go VOTE!!

20 Questions

2011-12-21T16:14:00.002-05:00

I found this idea on Pinterest. It's 20 questions to ask your child each year on their birthday, starting at 3 years old. I thought I would ask Jax these questions now, just to see what his 2.5-year-old self would say. I want to type these up and print them out each year as a keepsake for when he grows up. It's so fun to hear what his opinions are at this age. Some answers are typical, and some are a little silly... just like him!

1. What is your favorite color? Blue

2. What is your favorite toy? Race car

3. What is your favorite fruit? Watermelon

4. What is your favorite tv show? Veggie Tales

5. What is your favorite thing to eat for lunch? Mac N Cheese

6. What is your favorite outfit? Toy Story clothes

7. What is your favorite game? Connect 4 (he loves to put the pieces into the frame!)

8. What is your favorite snack? Goldfish

9. What is your favorite animal? Lion

10. What is your favorite song? Veggie Tales song

11. What is your favorite book? The Llama book (Llama Llama Red Pajama)

12. Who is your best friend? Max and Ben

13. What is your favorite cereal? Lucky Charms (which he's had once!)

14. What is your favorite thing to do outside? Rake (let's hope he still says this in a few years!)

15. What is your favorite drink? Coffee (ummmm.....)

16. What is your favorite holiday? Gift party (HA!!!)

17. What do you like to take to bed with you at night? Water

18. What is your favorite thing to eat for breakfast? Watermelon (which he's never had for breakfast!)

19. What do you want for dinner on your birthday? Fantastic food!

20. What do you want to be when you grow up? I wanna have a baby sister (awwwww!!!!)

Making a fort

2011-12-20T19:07:00.002-05:00

We ended up running an errand this afternoon, and afterward the three of us were hungry. And it was only 3:30. Ha! I have a good excuse (ya know, growing a human and all...), but my two boys are just boys and, therefore, are always hungry. Jax wanted "beans and rice" aka Mexican food. So we decided to just eat a very early dinner at a yummy restaurant right by our house.

Once we got home and settled, it was only about 5. We watched a kid show on Netflix, then looked around at each other. What were we going to do for the next 2 hours until Jax went to bed? Build a fort, of course! We grabbed a sheet and some chairs and set up an awesome fort in the middle of our living room. It was Jax's first homemade fort experience and he loved it, obviously! He is such an adventurous little kid. Daddy grabbed the flashlight, I grabbed some books and we had a grand ol' time enjoying each others' company!

Take my picture

2011-12-17T19:31:00.001-05:00

Jax has started smiling on cue when there's a camera pointed at him. He's also become obsessed with having his picture taken and is constantly saying "Mommy, take my picture". I thought I would share a few :)

And just because I love how my 2.5 year old still likes to snuggle me after his nap (or when he half naps then sleeps on me for the second half)...

So sweet :)

7,8,9 Weeks

2011-12-16T10:01:00.002-05:00

When I was pregnant with Jax I took weekly pictures of my belly. For the first 12-ish weeks, they mostly looked the same. Ha! My belly didn't change much until about 13 or 14 weeks, and even then it was only noticeable to me. I have been so surprised by how quickly my belly has bulged with this baby.

Starting next Thursday (12 weeks), I will be doing a weekly pregnancy post. I'll have pictures and updates on anything pregnancy related. I did this with Jax, and I LOVE looking back at how I was feeling and what was going on while he was in my tummy.

I currently can't find my USB cord for my camera, but once I do, I will post pictures from weeks 10 and 11.

7 weeks

8 weeks

9 weeks

Each week when I take my picture, Jax asks to take his "belly picture" too. So here's one of his weekly pictures :)

Happy Friday! Only 9 sleeps until Christmas!!

It's official!

2011-12-07T19:07:00.001-05:00

After 14 long months of trying (with an 8 month deployment thrown in the middle), Jax is finally going to be a big brother!!

I am 10 weeks pregnant!

I've been dying to tell y'all but I wanted to wait until we heard the heartbeat. Last Wednesday we finally did! Oh, how it was music to my ears! Jax loved seeing the baby and hearing the heartbeat. We recorded it and he is always asking to hear it again. So sweet!

Baby #2!!

THANK YOU to each of you who prayed for us along this journey. (If you are new to my blog, read about it here, here, and here). And by the way, it happened naturally and without Clomid! Although the Clomid was sitting on my night stand, ready to be used the next month :)

We are beyond excited and we can't wait for July to get here!!

It's the Holiday Season

2011-12-03T17:10:00.001-05:00

Our neighbors have a huge tree in their front yard, and every year it dumps tons and tons of leaves into our yard. We try to stay on top of it by raking at least once a month, but it seems to never end. Ryan was outside raking the other day and Jax wanted to help. And by help, I obviously mean throw leaves around and make a bigger mess than there was to begin with :) But he was having the time of his life "helping" Daddy rake leaves!

We always put up our Christmas decorations on the weekend after Thanksgiving. Last Sunday we went and bought our tree. Real, of course, because fake trees are just WRONG! We spent the afternoon drinking hot chocolate, pulling everything out of boxes, and putting all the ornaments on the tree. Jax put about 15 ornaments on two bottom branches. But he was SO proud of himself for doing it. We just moved them around once he wasn't paying attention anymore. Christmas is so exciting this year because Jax is really into it.... which makes it so much more fun for Ryan and I!

Here he is helping Daddy put water in the tree stand

Some kind of crazy face... he makes those a lot!

22 days until Christmas!!

Randoms

2011-11-26T21:17:00.001-05:00

I hope y'all had a great Thanksgiving! Ours was quiet and nice with just Hubs, myself and Jax. We can't wait until next holiday season when we are back in California with our families! But in the meantime, I could never let a Christmas season pass me by so we spent today making our house festive. Jax is really excited about Christmas this year so we're already having lots of fun.

Nana sent some Christmas stickers, markers and a coloring book. Jax is obsessed and we've had to limit him to one sticker sheet per day!

While Jax was drawing 2-year-old things, Ryan was drawing this. Nice.

We had a fun Thanksgiving craft and snack at Mommies Group last Tuesday. We do a craft once a month and the kids always love it!

Growing up, we had a Rudolph that lived under our tree. He walked a few steps at a time and sang his theme song. To carry on that tradition, we let Jax pick a musical character to live under our tree. He chose Frosty... And he LOVES him :)

We spent last year in California since Ryan was deployed, so I didn't get to do any of my own Christmas decorating. I forgot about half of the stuff I have. It's been fun to get it all out this year and deck our halls for one last time in our first home!

It's the most wonderful time of the year!!

2011-11-23T19:20:00.001-05:00

Happy Thanksgiving from my little turkey :)

This year he is thankful for piggies, cows, Max, friends, elephants, Daddy, Mommy, and Mojo. I had to remind him that he is thankful for those last three. Ha!

Have a great and yummy day!!

His Guys

2011-11-20T16:39:00.001-05:00

Back in February we went to Disneyland and my parents bought Jax a really cute stuffed Mickey.

He started sleeping with it every night, tucked in under his arm. A month(ish) ago we went out of town for 2 nights and we forgot Mickey at the hotel. Major bummer! The hotel found him and sent him to us... Except they accidentally switched our package with someone else's so we ended up with two pillow pets. We finally ended up getting Mickey back, but Jax was without him for about 10 days. In the mean time, I gave him a stuffed bear and a Build-A-Bear puppy that had been sitting in a toy chest. After we got Mickey back, he slept with all three guys for a few nights. Then he decided that he no longer wanted Mickey and he only wanted his "guys". He asks for them every night and he has to have one tucked under each arm. I loved his Mickey and really wanted him to have that one, but he just loves his guys more. And seeing this sweetness each night...

Well, I can't argue with that!

To My Veteran

2011-11-11T16:45:00.001-05:00

Happy Veteran's Day to my handsome veteran and to all the other veterans who bravely and proudly serve our country!

Randoms

2011-11-09T21:45:00.001-05:00

This week has been pretty uneventful. Just the usual church on Sunday, Mommies Group on Tuesday, gymnastics tomorrow (Thursday). Ryan went back to work today for the first time since his surgery almost a month ago. It was weird to have him gone! But, he has a 4-day weekend for Veterans Day so that will be nice. I get to celebrate my handsome Veteran and all the sacrifices he has made to serve his country and provide for our family!

Jax is funny and cute as always. He's really into saying "I can help" with everything we do. He also asks "what that do, Mommy?" about everything he sees. He's such a curious and smart little guy.

Here's some proof :)

Guitar playing!

Shaving with Daddy (He uses the toothpaste tube. Excuse the sleepy eyes!)

My guys watching TV. Boys will be boys!

Playing in the toddler section at Monkey Joe's.

Such a lover-bug!

Wearing Mojo's Halloween dress as a... Hat? Scarf? I'm not sure! Ha!

Eating VEGETABLES! With chopsticks! I was amazed at how well he used them (the kid ones) and even more amazed that my child who refuses to eat any vegetables actually ate mushrooms, zucchini and broccoli! What the?!

And finally, here's the cute fall wreath I made. I LOVE how it turned out!

I'm off to finish watching the CMA's. Happy Wednesday!

Jax's iPhone

2011-11-04T10:16:00.002-04:00

Ok, so my 2.5 year old doesn't actually have his own iPhone. HOWEVER, he does like to think that what's mine is his. He is constantly asking to play with my "shone" and watch "bideos" on it.

It started innocently enough. I got some toddler-friendly games from the app store and let Jax play them when I needed to distract him or keep him occupied. For awhile, this held him over. He had learned how to unlock my phone (by watching me do it... I definitely didn't teach him that!), and I made a folder with all his games. He knew exactly where they were and he would mostly stick to those.

Then, he started opening MY games folder. He started playing Where's the Water? (aka- the alligator game) and Angry Birds. Then he figured out that if he clicked on the Golden Bird, it would have a button that took him to "bideos" (aka YouTube). This became his routine for awhile. He used his new discovery to go to YouTube and watch Mickey Mouse or Special Agent Oso.

He actually figured out how to go straight to the YouTube app, and was doing it so consistently that I finally had to put a stop to it. I've put some major limitations on how often he can be on my phone, and also what he can do on it. He's rarely allowed to watch YouTube anymore and mostly has to stick to his toddler games.

I just really can't believe how quickly he figured it all out. The world our kiddos are growing up in is unreal!

It's November!

2011-11-02T22:01:00.001-04:00

I love Halloween for the simple fact that it means it's the official start of the holiday season! I LOVE fall, yummy smells, crisp weather, fire in the fireplace, baking treats, hearty food, snuggly blankets, Thanksgiving, and Christmas!! It really is the most wonderful time of the year!

Even Mojo puppy loves the warm fire!

I also made a fall wreath to make our house a little more festive. It's my first homemade wreath! I velcro'd the flowers so that I can switch them out for spring colors once it's springtime!

Happy Holidays, friends!

Halloween

2011-10-31T20:24:00.001-04:00

We didn't have big plans for Halloween this year. We've had some close friends move away recently, so we didn't have our normal trick-or-treating crew. We also are getting close to moving back to California, so we are more focused on that than anything else. PLUS, it was raining all day, which pretty much ruined the fun.

We decided to just head down to the preschool carnival at our local children's museum. They had a little craft, a few games, and a snack for the kids. Jax had fun with his friend Adam. They played and ran around and acted like 2 and 3 year olds. After we left, we headed to Chipotle to grab some yummy dinner! I love that place and we hadn't been in a while.... definitely hit the spot. After that, we headed home and let Jax answer the door for all the trick-or-treaters that stopped by. It was a nice, relaxing day and Jax had a lot of fun. I can't wait until next year when we are back in California with our friends and family!!

Making a treat bag

Prizes for playing games

Jax and Adam

Daddy helping with the games :)

"Good job Daddy, here you go"

HAPPY HALLOWEEN!

Some Randoms

2011-10-24T13:30:00.001-04:00

I'm having a hard time getting back to the blog. Ryan is off of work for a month, so I'm more distracted than normal. Plus, I'm just moody about not being pregnant yet (as always...). I figured that it's never bad to just post some pictures, so here's a few from the past 10 days.

Jax decided to be a bed thief while we were waiting for Daddy to get discharged from the hospital last week.
PS, the surgery went great! More complicated than expected but all is well!

I'm making an advent calendar for our family. It's almost done.

While I was working on the advent calendar, Ryan was making a turkey costume for our pumpkin :)

Here's Jax's pirate costume. Pretty cute, if I say so myself!

Prayer requests

2011-10-12T16:24:00.001-04:00

Hello dear friends.... Sorry I've been MIA. I'll be gone for a few more days, but in the meantime I have 2 prayer requests.

1-- Ryan is having surgery tomorrow to fix a hiatal hernia (where his esophagus meets his stomach). It's a pretty big procedure because it's near a lot of major organs. Pray for his safety and for the doctors to know exactly what to do. And pray for a safe and speedy recovery.

2-- We met with my OBGYN this afternoon and we will be starting Clomid for my next cycle. I've officially been diagnosed with "unexplained infertility". Super awesome. (Insert sarcastic tone). We're really hoping that Clomid will give us the help we need, but in the meantime we are also pursuing other options. My doctor is scheduling a hysteroscopy to check for scarring. He also put in a referral to a fertility doctor so that we can get started on potential IVF, if Clomid doesn't work. Please, please pray that there is no scarring and that Clomid will work!

As always, I'll keep y'all updated once I have any news.

XOXO

Laugh your way to a better marriage

2011-10-04T17:11:00.000-04:00

We spent this past weekend in Williamsburg, Virginia at an Army sponsored marriage retreat. This is the 3rd retreat we've been on, and it was the best one by far! We went through a marriage series by Mark Gungor called "Laugh Your Way to a Better Marriage". We thought that it would be about how to make your spouse laugh and how to laugh at yourself.... but it was actually a funny take on marriage. Mark Gungor is a pastor/comedian and he explained the differences between men and women from a very hilarious point of view. If you are married or engaged, I would HIGHLY recommend his book. Ryan and I learned some great things and were able to see our marriage from a new perspective.

We were also excited because the retreat was at The Great Wolf Lodge! We had been wanting to go there for a while, but it is on the pricey side, so we hadn't been able to save up the money. We were so happy when we found out that the Army would pay for us to go stay there! And provide us with meals and childcare! Thanks, Uncle Sam :) We took full advantage of the indoor waterpark, on-site Starbucks/treat shop, and arcade.

We also had free military tickets to Busch Gardens so we used those on Sunday. It was a little cold and overcast (and it briefly rained), but it was a really fun day. There were very few crowds so we didn't have to wait in any lines! Ryan and I were able to rider-swap on some of the roller coasters, so that made it even more fun. Jax loved all the kiddies rides, plus some of the more adult rides that he was allowed to ride with us... they had very few restrictions, which was great for my daredevil kid. I swear he would go on all the roller coasters if we would let him! I didn't get any good pictures because we were to focused on ~~avoiding the rain~~ enjoying our time :)

This was probably our last hoorah before we become civilians and have to start paying for fun stuff ;)

It was a great time and we definitely made memories to last a lifetime!

The cuteness

2011-09-29T22:31:00.001-04:00

Jax is at such a great age. Yes, 2-year-olds are tough. And yes, he drives me crazy a lot. But he is also so much fun! He is always making me laugh and saying cute things and being so, SO sweet.

(The end table makes for a much better seat)

He constantly comes up to me and gives me hugs and says "awwwww.... Mommy.... awwww" and "I miss you too, Mommy". It melts my heart.

(Trouble maker!!!)

The other day, he squatted down, held out his hands and said "Mojo, come to papa". Ha! Where does he get these things?!

(Apparently Maroon 5 needed some help with drumming)

On the way home from gymnastics this morning, Jax decided to name each restaurant we passed. The whole ride was narrated with "I want Red Robin", "I want Panda", "I want ice cream", "I want McNodles", "I want Chic way (ChickFilA)". You would think we only ever eat out!

(Because it's much more fun to watch a movie on the tiny DVD player than on the regular TV)

He loves to sing songs. His favorites are "Wheels on the Bus", "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star", and "ABC's". His ABC's go like this- "ABC, ABC, next time see you soon". Ha! He hasn't quite learned that one yet. He also started counting to 10 (in the right order!). He loves to play hide and seek, and tag. He loves Ring Around the Rosie. He constantly asks me to make him popcorn. He would eat it at every meal if I would let him. He insists on putting his own shoes on. He loves his "puppy Mojo" and is always asking "Mommy, where's my puppy Mojo?"

He is such a sweet, sweet boy and I couldn't have asked for a better kid!!

Zipquest

2011-09-24T18:16:00.001-04:00

Ryan's birthday was yesterday, and I had been planning a birthday surprise for him for the past few weeks. There is a new place in town to go zip lining called Zipquest and I have been wanting to try it out. I decided a while ago that it would be a great birthday present for Ryan. It is rather pricey, but I was lucky enough to come across a Groupon that made it half price!

I was actually able to surprise Ryan with it!! Keeping fun things secret is really hard for me, so I was very proud of myself for keeping my mouth shut. I was also very proud of myself for wanting to do the zip lining in the first place because I am not very adventurous. This was a big step for me!

Ryan was very surprised and very happy about his present. We had a blast!

Randoms

2011-09-17T21:36:00.001-04:00

I've got lots of pictures for y'all this week! It's been a good week... It's finally fall! Our weather dropped drastically overnight on Thursday. It was in the upper 80's on Thursday, then lower 60's on Friday! It's been amazing, but we had to do some last minute cold weather clothes shopping for Jax. I'm certainly not complaining :)

Here's my sweet boy helping me with grocery shopping.

Did I mention that I made homemade goldfish crackers? No? Well I did. I'm super cool ;)

Jax was helping out Maroon 5... Apparently they needed some more drums.

"Mama, got my sunglasses, not bright anymore!"

I finished Jax's Halloween costume this week! Pirate says.... Arghhhh!

I will call the following group of pictures "Jax was playing games on my phone but turned on the camera and took 785,538,528 pictures of himself"

(I guess he figured out the swap button at this point.... No more face shots)

Some of our cold weather clothes shopping. Jax decided laying on the bottom of the cart was super cool.

We went to the mall today (blargh) to get new tires on Ryan's car. We ate lunch, rode on the carousel, some quarter rides, and window shopped. This is Jax's "happy face". Ha!

Yay cold weather clothes!!

Look who's a big boy!

2011-09-15T14:55:00.002-04:00

There have been 2 big developments in the Hansen household over the last 2 weeks.

Development #1

A certain 2-year-old is now in a toddler bed! I had been putting it off as long as possible for two reasons. (And really, we could have waited longer but we decided to bite the bullet). Reason one: he never tried to climb out of his crib so we decided to just keep him contained for the sake of.... us being selfish. Ha! Two: he's growing up too fast and a big boy bed = a big boy. And that makes me sad.

We decided to bite the bullet and he has been doing SO well! He didn't try to get out of bed, he just laid down and went right to sleep. And in the morning, he still called for me to come get him. It took about a week before he realized that he could get out of bed once he woke up. This is fine except that he wakes up at the crack of dawn. BOO! He was "sleeping in" until 630 or 7. Then he woke up at 6. Then he woke up at 545. Then he woke up at 520. Then he woke up at 445. No joke. I took him back to his bed but it only lasted about 5 minutes before he was up again. I finally got him to lay with Ryan and I in our bed for awhile.

So the last few mornings have included a lot of experiments to figure out what to do. He's consistently waking up at 530 these days, which is WAY to early for me. Sometimes I put him back in bed and he goes back to sleep until about 615. Other days he climbs up in our bed. Other days I turn on cartoons for him in his playroom and either go back to bed or sleep on the couch next to him. Y'all I am not a morning person! And my smarty pants kiddo realized that by saying "mama, I have to pee pee", that I would get up with him instead of putting him back to bed. It's still a work in progress, but overall he is doing amazingly well.
(PS- these pictures are of him pretending to be asleep so he can demonstrate how he is such a big boy :) )

Development #2

He is pretty much fully (daytime) potty trained!! The last two days he has been in big boy undies all day and hasn't had any accidents. AND has told me when he has to go potty instead of me always having to ask. I'm not going to tackle night time potty for awhile because most days he still wakes up with a pretty wet diaper. But, I am so proud of him for doing so well during the day!

But again... big boy undies = a big boy. And that makes me sad!

Jumping out of a helicopter

2011-09-09T11:31:00.001-04:00

Ryan started out in the Army in the 82nd Airborne Division. So he's been jumping out of airplanes and helicopters for the past 7.5 years. Family can often go to the drop zone to watch the jump, but it's common for them to be at odd hours and/or take forever so I rarely go. But today was a smaller jump because it was out of a helicopter! It was scheduled for 8am and Ryan was on the 9th lift (6 people jump at a time), so it was good timing for us and I knew Jax would love it. We left the house at 715, ran through Starbucks to get a pumpkin spice latte (yay fall!!), then headed out to the drop zone. Jax had such a blast watching the helicopter taking off and landing, and watching all the soldiers jumping out. He kept saying "I want parachute! Me!".

Here's Daddy and Jax watching some of the first jumpers. Those dots at the top of the picture are them!

Daddy loading up

There he is!

(the smoke is so they know where the wind is blowing)

Yay Daddy!

You're alive!

Here, let me help you carry your helmet, Daddy

Shaking out his 'chute

Waiting patiently so we can go get some breakfast

Pirate Jax celebrating Daddy's successful jump with some yummy food

I'm so glad Jax is old enough to enjoy what his Daddy does for a living!

Randoms

2011-09-08T08:35:00.001-04:00

This week has been so uneventful. Boo! We are on break from our mommies group. The weather has been rainy so Hubs has taken the good car to work. So Jaxers and I have been stuck at home for the last two days. I'm so excited for gymnastics today so we can get out of the house!

Here's some iPhone pictures from the last week and a half. I'm obsessed with Nutella so we've been eating a lot of toast recently. Jax certainly doesn't complain!

Mojo is more like a human than a dog. She does so many things that are un-doglike. But this is a total dog thing... How does she breathe??

We've been spending more time outside (when it's not raining) because the weather has been in the mid 80's! This kid likes to get dirty!

Now that Daddy is home, Jax has resumed shaving with him each morning. Love.

Ryan's side of the family loves popcorn. Apparently it's genetic because Jax loves popcorn too. Every few minutes I would hear him randomly say "yummmmm popcornnnnn!". Pretty darn cute, if you ask me :)

Jax has reached another big milestone and I'll be posting about that in the next day or two, so come back soon!

A trip to the zoo!

2011-09-06T10:21:00.000-04:00

I started writing this post about another poop story, but decided that I didn't want to dedicate another post to that topic.

In brief-- Jax had a poop accident on the floor, Mojo ate about 90% of it (GROSS), we went to run errands, we came home to thrown-up poop on the floor, Mojo started yelping and walking around all crazy, we thought she was dying from poo poisoning so we rushed her to the vet, turns out it was just cramps, all is well and life has moved on. OH, the joys of potty training.

Now to the good stuff... our trip to the zoo! We decided last minute on Saturday morning to head to the only zoo here in NC. It's in Asheboro which is about 2 hours away. We showered, ate breakfast and got on the road around 830. Jax did great in the car and it was an easy drive. Somehow Ryan and Jax were matching and we didn't even plan that! Ha!

Jax liked looking at all the animals, but not for long. Once he saw the animal, then he was good and said "I'm done". But he LOVED this seal and kept asking for more. It was fun to have the seal swim by so close.

Jax enjoyed the things to play on/in/with more than he enjoyed the animals. I think that is pretty common at this age. It's way more fun to play than it is to stare at something! This polar bear cave was fun!

This playground was full of giant bugs! A giant spider web to climb up, a praying mantis to climb through, beetles to slide down, spider tunnels and other fun things to play with.

Jax really liked walking around and getting as close to the animals as possible. He sat in front on these tortoises and followed them around as they crawled from one side to the other.

We purchased to special tickets that included a carousel ride, a Dora and Diego 4D movie and a chance to feed the giraffes. Unfortunately, the giraffes didn't want to eat once we got there. But Jax loved the carousel and the movie!

This white alligator was SO cool. It looked fake!

This ostrich was so close to the fence. He (she?) was just standing there looking at everyone for the longest time. Jax had fun with it being so close!

Toward the end of the day he was getting really fussy. It was well past his nap time so we rushed through the last little bit. But he did have fun playing in these giant eggs.

He slept the entire way home and we had to wake him up when we got home at 5 so that he would go to sleep that night. It was a really fun family day... it's so nice to have Ryan home again!

A Little Bit of Life

2011-08-31T21:50:00.001-04:00

Well, I guess when I said to check back in a few days, I really meant about a week. Oops. Sorry about that. I got caught up in.... life... I guess. Honestly, we haven't had much going on and that is partly (maybe mostly) because Hubs has been gone for the last month. He was doing Army business in Thailand, so I've been a single mommy... which is nothing new for us Army wives. Not that I'm complaining! It's been tons of fun potty training Jax by myself ;) All kidding aside, I don't like to make it public knowledge that I'm home by myself, so I haven't said anything. However, as we speak Ryan is getting on a plane from DFW to Fayetteville, so I think I'm safe now!

I've actually been very focused on getting our house as pretty as possible. We have two showings tomorrow (pray for us!) and, since I've been home alone, all the getting ready has been up to me. It's actually been relaxing to clean all the little things and organize things and touch up paint and trim the shrubs. Well, maybe not that last one. But the rest of it has been lovely. It makes me excited to get out of here and back to sunny California.

I've been keeping Jax with very little to no clothes on all day so that he doesn't mistake underwear for diapers. But this means that all the pictures of him over the past 2 weeks are either half-naked pictures, or full-frontal. This is also why I haven't been posting as much, because really, who wants to read posts with no pictures? Every once and a while it's appropriate, but most of the time it's no fun that way!

I'll leave you, friends, with some cute things Jax has said recently....

Yesterday, I had asked him to put his shoes on. His reply? "The wheels on the bus say no no no!" I swear, he is the funniest kid I know!

He has also informed me that for Halloween he would like to be a pirate, a truck, a cowboy with a horsie, a robot, Thomas, and "Ka-chow" (aka Lightening McQueen). This kid sure has a lot of requests!

I can't believe we are already thinking about Halloween costumes! Bring on the fall weather and the pumpkin flavored yummies!!

Potty Training 101

2011-08-25T19:46:00.003-04:00

This is a post about pee and poop... so if that turns you off, come back in a few days :)

Jax has been doing really good so far with potty training. I'm still so impressed that he's not even 2 1/2 and he's consistently peeing on the potty. And yesterday, he pooped on the potty for the first time!! I had a little mini freak-out... in a good way.

So here's what I've learned so far in the week that we've been potty training--

1- Offering a treat is good, except when the kid realizes that potty=treat and subsequently wants to pee every 3 minutes.

2-Offering a "big treat" for poop is good, except when the kid realizes that poop=big treat and subsequently wants to poop every 3 minutes (luckily this only lasted one day).

3-Big public potties are scary. And sometimes they flush on their own. Not good for a just-learned-to-pee-on-the-potty kiddo.

4-Buy a folding potty seat to solve #3... and hope that he'll stop saying "No thanks Mommy" every time you bring it out.

5-Pee and poop go IN the potty, not on the floor. Sometimes this is hard to remember. (For him, not for me)

6-Even though there will be accidents, celebrate each success with lots of clapping, cheering, high-fives and bear hugs. Jax insists on the last one :)

Any tips from you, friends??

More Randoms

2011-08-20T21:11:00.001-04:00

We had a very lazy day yesterday because I was focused on getting our house ready to sell. We are selling it by owner, so I'm really trying to get it out there and noticed. Check it out HERE

This morning we had a friend and her kiddo over to play. Asher and Jax had fun running around, and of course bickering over toys! Ha!

Other exciting news, I'm potty training Jax!!

I had no intentions of doing it right now... Every time I sat Jax on the potty, he just wanted to get off. I figured it would be awhile before he was really ready. He had all the other signs of being ready, but he would never actually go. Then yesterday he pulled his diaper halfway off so I decided to see if he wanted to potty, and he did!! He quickly figured out that potty=treat, so he's been going more frequently than necessary, but he pees almost every time. He doesn't always go on the potty, but I didn't have to change his diaper all day today! I hope this new development sticks!

On Monday and Tuesday we were dog sitting our friends' doggy, Carina. Jax lovers her a lot and showed it by slightly abusing her ;) She was so good and just let him play around with her!

We were driving home after dropping Carina off on Wednesday and I saw this beautiful sunset! I love when the light from the sun shines rays out from behind the clouds! A phone picture really doesn't do it justice.

It's amazing how much kids copy things that they see you doing. Little things that would never even occur to you. Like putting sunglasses on your head! He's been doing this all week!

I'm always posting pictures of Jax but we can't forget about my first baby, Mojo. This is her usual position in the evenings on the couch with me. She's such a sweet girl!

I took Jax to our neighborhood park yesterday morning because the weather was much cooler than it has been recently. Jax was using this stick and saying "Mama, I'm digging for gold!" then when he would find a tiny twig, he would get super excited and say "GOLD!!!". Ha!

He's always making me smile!

Randoms

2011-08-18T19:40:00.001-04:00

We've been busy with swimming, gymnastics, mommies group, and running all kinds of errands (as always!) but it's been a good week. Here's some pictures from the past few weeks. I actually have more from the past few days but I'll post them this weekend. Enjoy these for now!

Jax got this TeeBall set for his birthday and he loves it!

We go to Barnes And Noble pretty regularly to play with the Thomas train set. Jax was very set on wearing his hat... backwards :)

Mom and I made this pizza while she was here. Fresh mozzarella, corn, onions, red bell peppers, garlic, parmesan cheese... Yummmm-o! The recipe is from the July Cooking Light magazine, with a few of my own tweaks.

Again, Jax is wearing his hat backwards. He's pretty obsessed with hats these days!

One of Jax's favorite games is to turn the laundry basket into a car. He sits in it and we push him around. And by we, I mean Ryan, because Mommy get too tired too fast!

Happy Friday, friends!

Chahhhhhleston

2011-08-16T19:00:00.002-04:00

That's Charleston for all y'all non-Southern folks :)

While my mom was here, we decided to take a little trip down to Charleston for a few days. It's about 4 hours away and neither of us had ever been. We spent last Wednesday evening scouring the Internet for hotels and ideas about what to do there. There really is SO much to do, we had to pick and choose what we wanted to do the most.

{Unfortunately, the weather was really hot and humid (something I'm more used to, but my mom is not) and it really got in the way of a lot of the things we would have liked to do. }

Thursday after gymnastics, we loaded up the car and headed South. The drive was very easy and Jax did a great job. We checked into the hotel just before dinnertime, then headed downtown to find a place to eat. We had planned on checking out a restaurant that had gotten some great reviews... but their AC was broken and it was miserable in there! We decided to wander a little and we came across this little gem, Jim 'N Nick's Bar-B-Que. It was AMAZING!

(I couldn't get a good picture of the little wiggle worm :) )

I am so glad that we ended up there instead of the first place!

After dinner, we headed back to the hotel because we had promised Jax that we could go swimming in the "heated" indoor pool. Apparently heated just means room temperature-ish, because the pool was not very warm! After that, we headed back to the room to try to get some sleep (which is hard when sharing a bed with a 2 year old).

The next day, we headed to Boone Hall Plantation.

It's considered to be the most photographed plantation in the US.

Parts of The Notebook were filmed there! (Side note- we came home and had to watch the movie, of course. The plantation was used for the outside shots of Alli's family's summer house. It was fun to compare the movie with the pictures that we have!)

After the plantation, we found a place close by to eat lunch. Then we jumped in the car to drive to the oldest living thing east of the Rockies, the Angel Oak Tree. It was about 30 minutes away and we knew it would be perfect for Jax to be able to get a quick nap. The tree was HUGE, and the limbs had to be supported because they were draping all the way down to the ground. It was beautiful!

We left the tree and headed back to downtown to go to the Children's Museum of the Lowcountry. It's bigger than our kid's museum and Jax had a lot of fun!

We went from the museum to go eat dinner at Jestine's Kitchen. It's famous for having Rachael Ray eat there on her show $40 A Day. Anthony Bourdain has also eaten there. I have to say, I wasn't super impressed. We got the "famous" meatloaf, and it wasn't good at all. The sides were better, and the mac n cheese was delish! They did have good desserts, but overall we were kinda disappointed.

After dinner, we wandered over to the ocean and walked up and down some paths lining the waterfront. We also let Jax play in this water fountain.

He LOVED it!

The next day, we went to Cracker Barrel for breakfast. Obviously not a local restaurant, but it's always so yummy and it was close to the hotel!

We packed up, checked out of the hotel, then headed to the South Carolina Aquarium. The tickets were pricey, plus you have to pay for kids older than 1, so we had really been debating about going. We ended up deciding to check it out. When got there, I asked if it was really necessary to pay for my 2-year-old. They ended up letting Jax in for free! I was so glad they did because it was a bit of a disappointment. We are used to the Monterey Bay Aquarium, and this one was much smaller and had fewer exhibits. It was still fun to look at all the pretty fish!

Overall, Jax had fun and it was a good way to end our wonderful time in Charleston!

PS- Half of the pictures are from the camera, and the other half are from my phone... sorry about the blurriness/coloring in those ones!

Mercies in Disguise

2011-08-15T12:22:00.001-04:00

As most of you know, we have been struggling to get pregnant with another baby. We have officially been trying for a year and it's really taken a toll on me. I get so discouraged and am consistently in a negative mood, which is no good for Ryan or Jax. I have my ups and downs but there seems to be a lot more down than up over the past year and a half.

Over the past week, I've really felt things shifting towards positiveness... Is that a word?! I've had multiple people tell me that they have been praying for me/us, and that they feel as though God is preparing me for the future. That I will remember this difficult time in order to be a witness and support for others who are going through something similar.

I've also come across the song "Blessings" by Laura Story multiple times over the past week. One person suggested it to me through a text and two other people posted it on Facebook. I think God is trying to tell me something! Check it out on YouTube or download it through iTunes. I've been playing it over and over and over... And clinging to every word! Here's the chorus...

What if Your blessings come through raindrops?
What if Your mercies come through tears?
What if a thousand sleepless nights are what it takes to know You're near?
And what if trials of this life are Your mercies in disguise?

This morning during my quiet time, I was looking up "promise" verses and come across 2 Corinthians 1:21-22. This is what it says,
"Now it is God who makes both us and you stand firm in Christ. He anointed us, set His seal of ownership on is, and put His Spirit in our hearts as a deposit, guaranteeing what is to come. (Emphasis mine)

That last line just really got me. His Spirit is a deposit in our hearts as a guarantee of His promises. Amen and amen!

I hope that song and that verse can be an encouragement to any of you who are struggling, like it has been for me!!

Swimming Lessons at the Pool

2011-08-13T12:20:00.001-04:00

I have been trying to get Jax into swimming lessons on post (Ft. Bragg) since June. For one reason or another, it just hadn't worked out. I accidentally signed him up for the wrong one, then had to cancel it. Then we had visitors the next month. Then I missed the sign-ups and the class was full.

A few weeks ago, I finally got him registered! We had almost missed it again... he was the first person on the wait list, but thankfully someone dropped out. I swooped in and picked up their spot as soon as I saw it was available.

It is 30 minutes twice a week for 4 weeks.

We are halfway done and so far it has been a lot of fun!

I've been putting Jax in the pool and under the water since he was just a few months old. I know that it's the best way help kids feel comfortable in water as they grow.

I'm so happy that Jax is old enough to learn actual pool skills

and really enjoy himself while he's swimming!!

3 birthdays later...

2011-08-12T10:20:00.000-04:00

This past Tuesday was my birthday... which got me thinking about how big my not-so-little-anymore boy is getting!

He was born 2 months before I turned 23

(and had an extra 20+ pounds on me. Blah!)

Last year we were in California while Hubs was deployed

This year we are back home, and my mom was here to celebrate!

It's been a very rocky year, but we have so much to look forward to over this next year. I can't wait to see what God has in store for us!

A Break

2011-08-02T21:31:00.001-04:00

I don't have a ton to say right now except that I'm taking a small blogging break... Probably about 2 weeks. In all honesty, I've been having a rough time. After the good news about our fertility testing, I thought this month might be THE month. And then I was a few days late. I started getting my hopes up way more than I should have, especially after multiple pregnancy tests came back negative. Then my monthly un-friend showed up. So needless to say, I'm not having an easy time. I'm having a big pity party with lots of "why me's?". So I need a break. I know my God is good and faithful, but I'm having a hard time understanding why He has put us in this place. I will take all the prayers I can get. Thanks, friends.

Airborne

2011-07-31T08:57:00.001-04:00

We had some errands to run on post yesterday and Jax fell asleep in the middle of them. We decided to grab some Starbucks and drive around for a while to let him sleep. After a little while, we headed towards the Airborne Museum. There are a bunch of airplanes, helicopters, and tanks out front, and for some reason we had never taken Jax before. Once he woke up, we got out and wandered around for a while. Of course, he loved it!! It was too bad that it was soooo hot because we wanted to stay longer. Jax still had lots of fun and I think I'll take him back again once the weather cools!

Randoms

2011-07-24T18:33:00.001-04:00

This week has been very uneventful. We really didn't have much planned and it's so stinking hot, we pretty much hung out at home all week. Here's a couple pictures though :)

Extreme Home Makeover was building a home in our town, so we stopped by and watched them building for a little while. The episode is set to air in October!

I tried to get creative and do some crafts to pass the time this week. I'm not AT ALL crafty but I have a fun book that I got ideas from. This turtle was a big hit!

Check out this video of Jax being his crazy 2-year-old self!

Have a good week!!

Baptism!

2011-07-18T14:44:00.005-04:00

I've been a Christian since I was four years old. We don't believe in infant baptism, but instead believe that baptism should be a profession of faith once you are old enough to understand what it means to fully give your heart to God. So because of this, I was never baptized as a child. As I grew up, I thought about getting baptized but I spent many of my teen years rebelling and acting like I was too cool for God. It wasn't until college that I really re-discovered that love for Jesus that I first found when I was four. Since that time I have been intending to get baptized, but for one reason or another I hadn't done it.

When I heard that our wonderful church was doing a large church-wide baptism, I knew it was my time. They set up two baptismals and in total, over 300 people were baptized! It was a great morning and I'm so thankful for my church, my family, and my friends who are wonderful examples of how to live for God!

(Excuse the crazed look on my face! Ha!)

Randoms

2011-07-17T16:16:00.001-04:00

Hubs has been super overwhelmed at work recently, but as of yesterday things will be much more calm for the next 6 months. I am looking forward to seeing him more than a few hours each day!

This past week I was working on cleaning up the house and getting it readied to show. There is a small thin that came up so we won't be listing it for another month. Boo! But I'm jut praying that God puts the right buyers in our life at the right time!

I haven't done randoms in 2 weeks so I have quite a few pictures to share :)

The day before my friends got here, Jax was playing with this phone cord saying "Helloooo Max!"

Jax and Max were sitting with Ryan on his bike. Max wasn't so sure, but Jax loved it

This was just before went down to Myrtle Beach. Jax was rather excited!

Broadway at the Beach. The ONE ride we let them do. Stinkin' expensive tickets.

Just before leaving to drop my friends at the airport, Jax was running and fell into our bed frame. It is impossible to go more than a week without an injury in this house!!

The Chipotle in town just opened!!! Woooweeee!!! Y'all don't understand how exciting this is to me. This is one of the things I miss most about home, and now we have one here. Fayetteville is really coming up in the world! This long line was totally worth it :) We're also getting a Mellow Mushroom and I'm pretty excited about that too!

McFlurry goodness

Sweet Mojo was cuddled between our pillows last night. I couldn't resist taking a picture. Ignore the freaky red eyes!

We just bought Jax a bubble mower. The bubbles don't work (lame) but Jax absolutely loves 'mowing'. He insisted on helping Daddy!

Happy Sunday folks!

Friends!

2011-07-14T13:15:00.009-04:00

As I've said in a few previous posts, my best friends came to visit this past week along with 2 of their 3 kiddos. All 8 of us squished into my 3bed/2bath house, and we had a great time. Jax loved seeing his friend Max, but they were definitely missing their friend Ben. He stayed home with his daddy because it was too hard for Mary to bring 2 kids, and it was much easier to leave a 2-year-old than a 3-month-old. We talked about Ben a lot and the boys kept asking for him. Someday soon they will all be able to play together. Jax and Max had a hard time sharing and unfortunately there were a lot of spankings and a lot of (forced) turn-taking. But overall, they still wanted to play together and they still seemed to have a great time. I, of course, loved having girl time. It was nice to be surrounded by girlfriends and get the chance to chat and have fun with them.

I took them to Cracker Barrel for breakfast on Friday because they had never been. It was SO yummy... as always! After that we visited the Splash Pad and let the boys run through the water. Then we came home for naps, ran back out to get stuff to make pomegranate margaritas, then came back home to grill pizza. It was a fun day!

Sullivan was pooped at the end of the day

Jax loved holding him... can't wait to give him a sibling!

Cute boys eating their food

On Saturday we decided to risk the 50% chance of rain/thunderstorms and headed to Myrtle Beach. It was really the only day that worked for us, and luckily it didn't start raining until right when we got back in the car to head home late in the afternoon. Going to the beach with toddlers and a baby is tough. There is so much stuff that is needed and then everything gets sandy and muddy, and it was just very overwhelming. Plus it was super hot and super humid. We only stayed there for about an hour and a half, then we headed to Broadway at the Beach. The rides were waaaay overpriced ($3.50 PER TICKET!!), but it was fun to walk around and eat an early dinner there before heading home.

The boys LOVED the waves!

My handsome beach babe

Me and Jax

Danielle and Max

Mary and Sully

Us girls with our kids

Sunday we went to church, then grilled chicken for lunch. After naps we headed to Monkey Joe's and let the kids play for a couple hours. We came back home and had dinner and just let the boys play until bedtime.

Monday we went to a nice park on post but it got way too hot way too fast. We weren't there long before we decided to just head home. I had my HSG appointment at noon. (And everything came back NORMAL!! Woo! It feels good to know that there aren't any medical reasons for us not getting pregnant. Now I just have to work on trusting God and His timing for baby #2) So, later that night we headed to Miyabi, our favorite tepan-yaki place. It was a great way to end a fun week with friends.

The next day we just got everything packed up and I drove them up to Raleigh for their flight at 2pm. Once I came home, the house seemed so quiet and empty. It made me sad! I have the best girlfriends and I had such a great time with them here. I can't wait to move back to California and be able to see them all the time!

Absence

2011-07-12T17:01:00.001-04:00

Sorry I've been MIA... I've been enjoying time with my girlfriends and their kiddos. And forgetting to take lots of pictures :-/ I'll get a post up ASAP about their visit :)

The Fourth

2011-07-06T16:34:00.006-04:00

We spent the afternoon/evening with friends... swimming, grilling, eating, firework-ing. It was very relaxing and very fun. Our dear friends are moving to a different base so this was our last time to see them. It was so bittersweet. They've been such good friends over the past 3 years and our kids love each other. I'm sure we will see them again at some point! '

Here's some pictures from our day...

Can't skip the watermelon on the Fourth of July!

Or the swimming!

Or the popsicles

Or the slip-n-slide!

And you DEFINITELY can't skip the fireworks, sparklers, and poppers!

(A whole box at once.... nice....)

Hello, cuteness!

After our friends left, we decided last-minute to head on post for the free concert and fireworks show. Charlie Daniels and Little Big Town were performing. It was almost over once we finally got there, but I was really looking forward to the fireworks, so I wasn't too disappointed. It got a little rainy and windy, and we were thinking that they might cancel the fireworks, but they didn't... And they were awesome! I suppose you can't beat a military base's fireworks show! Jax enjoyed it... as long as he was on our laps. It was a good day and a good way to celebrate our last Independence Day in the military!

"Fireworks!"

Love my little family :)

Commenting Challenge

2011-07-03T17:19:00.004-04:00

This year I'm participating in Jenna's Journey Blog Commenting Challenge. The goal is to comment on 10 blogs per day for one week. It's a great way to meet new friends in the blog world, and have people get to know you and your blog. Check out the link above for the details.... and comment on my blog, too :)

Randoms

2011-07-03T06:49:00.001-04:00

This week we've been working on getting our house ready to sell. We will be listing it in 2 weeks so we're trying to get a few last minute things cleaned and ready. We're having people
over to grill and swim tomorrow for the Fourth, so that should be fun! And then my best friends get here on Thursday and I can't wait!!

We've been playing outside a lot because the weather was a tiny bit cooler... In the low 90's instead of 100's. Ha!

Part of working on the house was the little DIY project I did. I'm a dingbat and forgot to take a before picture, but imagine it being the green being gray, and imagine the hook being rust colored. I repainted them, then put them up in our playroom. Now I just have to figure out what to hang on them. Any thoughts??

We had a work picnic for Ryan this week and Jax fell off a bench, face first, onto some concrete. This kid is constantly getting hurt!

Jax naps on the couch in his playroom and yesterday he woke up earlier than normal. I was outside doing another DIY project, so Hubs grabbed him and put him our bed with him. This is what I saw when I came inside. So sweet!

In preparation for my friends coming out, I've been getting car seats and baby stuff out of storage. There will be a 2 year old and a 3 month old so we'll be busy, busy! It didn't surprise me that Jax saw this bouncer and instantly wanted to lay in it.

And finally, we were in the playroom the other day when Daddy got home. He was taking off his uniform and of course Jax wanted to wear his hat. Such a handsome little guy!

Have a wonderful holiday weekend, friends!!

From The Hospital

2011-06-27T15:32:00.006-04:00

I didn't take any pictures when we went to the hospital after Jax ran into our grill two weeks ago. It (obviously) wasn't really on my mind to document this event. But, I ended up taking him back two days later because I could tell his cut had re-opened and I wasn't sure if the skin glue/bandage needed replacing. This was while my mother-in-law was in town so she came with me and took some pictures. We were there for probably 25 minutes total and Jax was in a great mood, so it was an easy trip. And the doctor decided that taking the bandage off would cause more damage than just leaving it on and letting it close on its own. The tape finally came off a few days ago and now all that's left is a little skin glue (that's stuck in his eyebrow :-/) and a nicely-healed scab/scar.

I'm sure this is just the first of MANY more trips to the ER for cuts/scrapes/bruises/broken bones. Lord, protect my little daredevil as he grows!

Randoms

2011-06-25T16:25:00.001-04:00

Every time I write 'Randoms' into the post title, my iPhone corrects it to say 'Ransoms'. I hope I always remember to double-check what I write! Ha!

Hubs is off at some motorcycle blah-blah today so Jax and I have been spending some good ol' QT together. We went to Target, CVS, Babies R Us, Sam's, Bath and Body Works, and ChicFilA. Whew! That seems like so much! I actually enjoy running errands, for the most part, and Jax was in a good mood today. We came home for naps, and I worked on cleaning the house and doing laundry. I'm getting ready to make some pesto and pizza dough for us to have over the next few days.

I've decided that I'm going to try to potty train Jax over the next few weeks. He seems ready, but he still doesn't actually pee on the potty. I'm hoping that setting a timer and having big-boy underwear will do the trick!

He was pretty excited about Thomas undies!

We went to see Cars 2 yesterday. Jax was pretty squirmy. He did well for a while but we ended up leaving about 30 minutes early. He really liked sitting on the stairs :)

It's hot around these parts so we spend a lot of time in diapers and nothing else. By 'we', I obviously mean Jax. Ha! He wanted to wear his Mickey ears today. And he was playing with a floor vent. Silly kid.

I've been waiting and waiting for this blueberry bush to produce fruit and it finally has! I can't wait to pick a whole bunch of ripe berries!

I'm off to make some yummy food! Have a great weekend, friends :)

A short update on baby stuff

2011-06-22T12:17:00.001-04:00

I haven't talked much about this recently because it's been very hard for me. We still aren't pregnant and it's now been almost 5 months. I understand that is not too long, but when you add it to the 6 months before the deployment then it's almost a year. Plus, we had to wait 7 months while Hubs was deployed (obviously). So in terms of how long I've been wanting and waiting, it's been almost a year and a half. That's a long stinkin' time!

When I went in for my annual last month, I talked things over with my OBGYN and he suggested doing some tests. So that's where we are right now. So far I've had my annual pap and two blood tests. We are still waiting for the results of some of the blood work but so far everything has come back normal. I have one more (more invasive) test in 2 weeks. This will involve checking all my reproductive organs for any blockage, scarring or cysts. I could really use some prayers for this one. I'm nervous about the test itself, and about the results. I feel good about getting it done because we need to find out if there are any problems. And if everything looks good, then we know that it is just God's timing that is telling us "not now". Please keep us in your prayers as we go through this fertility testing. I have always been so fearful of this, and once I got pregnant with Jax all those fears went away. I never thought I would have to be facing them again. Thanks in advance for your love and support :)

So cute!!

2011-06-20T11:02:00.001-04:00

Jax had a blast at gymnastics
today!

I knew he would

We are doing it on post for this week

And then The Little Gym's summer session starts next week so we'll be doing 8 weeks with them

I can't wait!!

Summer is here!

2011-06-19T21:19:00.007-04:00

Today is Father's Day, which means that I am sitting on the couch watching hubs play video games :) Before we had Jax, he had a lot more time to sit and play. While I was pregnant and huge, we would both sit on the couch for hours and I would just watch him play. Looking back, it seems pretty pathetic! But having a newborn-->baby-->toddler isn't very conducive to sitting and doing nothing for hours on end. So hubs rarely gets a chance to "relax" (his words). Because I love him so, we went to Red Lobster for lunch (gross), and this evening he's been able to play video games since Jax went to sleep. So, I'm sitting here enjoying the chance to catch up on some pictures that I've been promising y'all!

It has been hot, hot, hot and there's nothing more refreshing than a watermelon

We bought a slip n slide, and hubs would push Jax down and he'd go flying toward the end. He loved it... of course!

We got a new, larger inflatable pool (that can actually fit more than one adult) so we've been spending a lot of time in it!

We've discovered that Jax very much prefers to be naked in the pool. He apparently doesn't like wet clothes. But he sure loves bouncing his naked self against the sides!

OF COURSE we had to get Otter Pops!

I thought this was the cutest thing! Jax was "helping" daddy water some plants :)

We've also spent time playing with the trains at Barnes and Noble

We've taken advantage of our membership to the kids museum downtown

We visited a local farm where you get to feed all the animals. Jax wanted to hold the bucket and feed the animals by himself. He did a great job!

Taking a break on Daddy's shoulders

Hi-fiving his friend Jayden

How nasty is that tongue?!

We've also spent a lot of time at the park in our neighborhood. Grammy took Jax down there almost every morning. He loved walking Mojo around.

He also loved pulling his wagon. I was so impressed because that thing is not small!

Of course we've spent time relaxing at home... and playing dress up in daddy's hat and glasses :)

Grammy took this picture. He loved having her here!

I hope y'all made it to the end. I know it was a ton of pictures! I'm mostly caught up now. I will do a separate post with pictures from the ER the other night. His eye is healing well and the tape is starting to come off. I can't wait for it to come off completely so I can clean it up a little bit. Jax also starts gymnastics tomorrow, so I hope to have some fun pictures from that!!

Happy Father's Day!

Saturday and a boo boo

2011-06-18T21:05:00.001-04:00

Today has been a really good day! Some friends of ours were planning a garage sale and they asked us if we wanted to add to it. We were very excited to do it because we are going to be selling our house soon and we needed to get rid of some extra stuff. We were nervous about getting enough traffic through the garage sale but it turned out great and we sold most of our stuff! We made a good amount of money which will be put towards replacing my dying MacBook with an iPad! I can't wait!
After the sale, we headed home to rest and freshen up then we had a birthday party to attend. It was for our friends whose little boy is turning one! We swam and grilled and had a great time. We don't have many plans for Father's Day tomorrow but Jax and I will definitely be showering hubs with love :)

Backing up a few days to Tuesday night, Jax was playing on our deck and ran into the grill. He got a really deep gash over his eye and we ended up in the ER. Poor guy was such a champ and thankfully he ended up not needing stitches! They patched it with skin glue and put a steri-strip over it. It's slowly healing and we're hoping it doesn't leave too big of a scar.

Here's the little man on the way to the hospital

Here's a picture of him resting the day after the trauma

Well, I swearrrrr I'm going to get my other pictures off my camera and posted on here. I've just been so busy. Things are settling a bit for the next few weeks so hopefully I'll get more chances to blog. In the meantime, here's a few other recent phone pictures.

Randoms

2011-06-12T20:20:00.001-04:00

We've been enjoying this week of having Grammy (aka my MIL) here! It's been a lot of fun and Jax is loving it. He's always calling for "Gwammmmmyyyyy". It's pretty darn cute!

We stopped by a grocery store and decided to let Jax play on the ride out front. It was his first time!

We also went to the kids museum here in town. We have a membership so it's nice to be able to go whenever we want!

Jax was talking to his best friend Max :)

We had Jax's 2-year appointment on Tuesday. He weighs 25.8 pounds and is 33 inches tall. I forgot to ask what percentages those numbers are, but I know he is finally growing and evening out with friends his age!

We stopped by both Lowe's and Home Depot this morning and Jax HAD to "drive" the tractors at both places.

Grammy is here until Thursday and we have a few fun things planned between now and then. Hubs also has short work days for the next 2 weeks so in looking forward to extra quality time with my two favorite guys!

PS-Im still working on a post with pictures from playing in our backyard. My computer isn't acting right so I'm
only able to post from my phone right now. Lame.

Elmo's World

2011-06-06T21:13:00.003-04:00

We spent the day in Raleigh on Saturday. My parents had only been there when flying in and out. (They're in town, by the way. Did I mention that yet?) So they wanted to see more of what Raleigh has to offer. One day last week I saw an ad for Sesame Street Live in Raleigh. It happened to be the weekend after Jax's birthday and the weekend that my parents would be in town. So I happily bought tickets for my big boy, myself and my mama. Hubs and my Dad both opted out... I don't understand why?! Who wouldn't want to sit through an hour and a half of life-size puppets dancing and singing on stage?! ;)

Jax just recently got into Sesame Street. He has known Elmo for a while, but he had never actually watched Sesame Street. No reason in particular, I just always turn on Disney Junior and Sesame Street isn't on that channel. So once I knew we were going to see it LIVE, I made sure to record a few episodes. And of course Jax loved it. He started naming all the characters after only watching it a few times.

The week of Sesame Street prep really helped and he was so excited to see Elmo in real life. The show was very cute and overall, Jax did great. He's only 2 so I didn't expect him to sit still for 1.5 hours. I had to walk him around a few times and buy him an Elmo toy (that he is now completely obsessed with). But we made it to the end of the show and at the end he said "Yay! Good job Elmo!". Ha! He cracks me up!

After the show we met back up with Hubs and Dad and ate lunch at PF Chang's. Yum-o! We don't have one here in town so we always take advantage of both PF Chang's and Cheesecake Factory when we go to Raleigh. After lunch we headed to the Natural Science Museum. Hubs and I had been there once before we had Jax and it was so fun to go back with our kiddo. After the museum we walked around downtown Raleigh and got Italian cream sodas at a little cafe. It's been ages since I'd had one and it was delish!

Unfortunately I lost all my pictures from the second half of the day. I had to get a new iPhone and I took the pictures with it but once I synced my old stuff, it deleted what I had taken that day. Bummer! But it was a very fun day and it's been so fun to have my parents here. Jax has loved having his Nana and Boppa to play with. We've been playing outside a lot, so I'll get a post up soon with pictures from our pool and slip-n-slide!

Happy Monday :)

Birthday Boy!

2011-06-05T21:16:00.004-04:00

We had such a fun birthday for Jax on Friday evening. It was his actual birthday, so we decided to do his party in the evening at a local bounce place. Jax had been there before and loved it, so I knew it would be a hit. Unfortunately, he was in some kind of mood over the past week and Friday was no good. Poor guy. I think he might be working on his 2-year-old molars. So he was fussy and whiny for most of the day. We got to Monkey Joe's for his party and he was begging for cupcakes and he refused to let anyone else (but me) take him on the bouncies. He finally cheered up once we let him have a cupcake, and his friends showed up. The rest of the evening went really well and he had a blast. We had about 10 kids there, ages 10 months to 5 years, and we had about 25 adults. So it was a great turnout! The kids played for a while, we ate pizza and cupcakes, opened presents, then the kids played some more. Jax kept asking for "more jump?!". I know I keep saying this, but I just can't believe that my sweet little boy is TWO! Time sure does fly by!

I made these cupcakes from funfetti cake mix, then used this recipe for buttercream frosting. I ordered the cupcake toppers from here on Etsy. They turned out super cute, and super yummy!

Favors I made... I bought coloring books at the Dollar Store, then cups, crayons and lollipops at Party City. I downloaded the Disney font from online then created these tags that say "Thank you for coming to my party! Love, Jax"

I also made this banner using the same downloaded Disney font

It only took one blow for Jax to blow his candle out! He was so excited!

Jax with his friends Taylor and Brecken

He got lots of fun toys and DVD's

He LOVED this Lightening McQueen car :)

HAPPY BIRTHDAY MY BIG BOY!!!

Memorial Day Fun

2011-06-04T07:43:00.004-04:00

As I already said, we went to the lake for Memorial Day. It was a little surprise trip that my husband and his friend organized for the wives. They planned a trip to drive about an hour away to go shopping at Trader Joe's, eat lunch at Chipotle, then head to the lake for the afternoon. It was a perfect day!

*Side note, I saw a building that is being built on our main street in town and we are getting a Chipotle!! SCORE!!*

We didn't end up heading to the lake until about 1pm, and by that time, it was super crowded. We drove by all the entrances to the swimming areas and each one was full. We thought we weren't going to be able to get in, but we decided to make one more round to each of them and, thankfully, we got into one! Jax took a few minutes to warm up, but it wasn't long until he was jumping off the dock into our arms, and running through the waves and digging in the sand. It really was the perfect Memorial Day!

Jax's birthday was yesterday! There will be a birthday post coming as soon as possible... we have family in town so I'm a little pre-occupied. But I will get it posted soon!