Halfway Point

So today is the halfway point for this pregnancy.  It's hard to believe how fast the first 20 weeks have flown by.  I can't say we're even close to "ready" for #3 yet...not that I think you can ever be ready.  But we have a LOT to get accomplished in the next 4.5 months.  Need to get Reese moved into her new room, which means I need to paint it, get the carpet replaced, buy bedding...just to name a few things.  Need a boy and girl name.  Remind me why we didn't find out AGAIN???  Need to get as much sleep as possible to prepare for another 2 years without sleep....OK, better not think about it too much or I will cry.  haha

We took the kids for a good long hike today...over an hour.  And for the first time, Carter walked the entire time...no riding in the backpack.  So it looks like he's officially graduated from the stroller and backpack now, and riding his own bike...by big boy!

Reese has been asking me every day now if the baby is still in my tummy.  Too cute!  Tonight in the bath she looked at her own tummy and said,
"I think I have a baby in my tummy."
Me: "No Reese, you're too little to have a baby in your tummy."
Reese: "I do have a baby in my tummy.  I can feel it kicking in there."

Oh gosh...where is this conversation going!?!

What to do on a Friday afternoon?

It's 3 pm and I've finally managed to get my breakfast dishes washed and out of the sink.  There's one accomplishment for the day.  Now I begin to think, what are we having for dinner tonight?  The cycle is truly never ending!

Well, it's best on a Friday afternoon where very little is being accomplished to do something really low-key with the kids.  Something that isn't too crazy messy...like FINGER PAINTING!  Hah!   Yea, what was I thinking?  I started off letting them paint with different textured wheels from Carter's cars, which they loved.  This of course soon regressed into finger painting and all out paint chaos...but they were happily entertained for 45 minutes, so I guess it was worth it in the end.

Traces of the black eye still remain...goes well with her hairdo too!

On Being a Parent

"Parent" is such a weighty word.  I never really took it seriously in my earlier years of naivete...in the first few years of my marriage...even during my first pregnancy.  Oh how things have changed.  What does it mean to be a parent...and not only a parent, but a good parent??  I've had so many moments of doubt along the way.  Am I being too strict?  Am I not strict enough?  Are they eating the right foods?  Getting enough sleep?  Too many toys?  Enough time reading?  Enough physical activity?  There are so many things to second guess yourself about, you could spend all day worrying every day.  But I can't do that...that's no way to function.

But what is a "Good Parent" really and truly made of?  Today was a day I was second-guessing myself a lot.  Wondering if my kids would turn out OK.  Today was one of those days you just knew the minute they woke up that things would not be easy.  That they'd challenge every request, reject every proposed outfit, turn up their noses at every meal, jump off 5-foot high slides and dance on top of tables.  (yes, that happened).  Today was a day I was silently apologizing to my new baby, warning it to consider staying in there for an extra month or two to get a little bigger in defense against it's crazed siblings.  As I watched Reese playing with a baby doll this morning, running it over with a car she was riding and smacking it against the wall, I wondered...will she be a good big sister?

No amount of exposure to children can ever prepare you for having your own.  And no number of years of being a parent, I am discovering, can turn you into any kind of an "expert."  There are many days I still feel as new to this as the day things all started, 4 and a half years ago.  There are still moments of doubt, times of sheer exhaustion where I want to run into a room and just hide from them.

I am reminded of James 1:2 "Consider it pure joy, my brothers, when you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith develops perseverance."

Yes, my faith is tested...often!  Yes, I probably need to work on developing not just perseverance but oodles more patience.  I need to smile more when I'm frustrated and pray more when I'm at my whit's end.  I'm so thankful to have this opportunity to be a parent.  Yes, it's given me many more white hairs on my head and wrinkles on my face...but what a privilege to have the opportunity to learn something new every day...any my teachers are 2 and 4.

Baby B Video

We had our ultrasound today!  I hope this little video they gave us works on the blog.  You can see the beating heart.  Can't wait to meet him or her...no we didn't find out!!

Happy Happy Birthday

 We celebrated Derrick's birthday today.  He requested a homemade Oreo Ice Cream Pie and I have to say, we delivered.  It is pretty awesomely good!  Carter and Reese helped me make the crust by crushing up a bunch of the cookies.  Then we made our own ice cream...mixed in some more crushed cookies...pure Oreo heaven!

 Tomorrow is a big day for us.  We'll all go in the afternoon for my 19 week ultrasound.  Excited to see the little one kicking around in there!!!











Reese looks a little like a drowned rat in these pictures...sorry Reese, should have brushed your hair after your bath, but EVERYONE was dying for some pie.  Reese gave herself a nice little black eye last night by trying to dive tackle the cat. She instead came in contact with the kitchen bench.  I've never seen her cry so much or for so long...poor thing.

 Nani visited us this weekend and took some pix of the kids with the tulips that Uncle Ed gave us from Holland.  They are blooming quite nicely, considering I didn't get them planted till almost February.  Perhaps the oddly warm weather helped.  I really hope it doesn't snow tonight...Derrick said he's never had snow for his birthday before but it looks like he has a pretty good chance for it this year!

















Reese suddenly decided this weekend to start going on the potty...pee and poop.  Unbelievable...she was pooping like 5 times a day...on the potty.  Where did this come from?  Does my daughter do anything that is not to the extreme?  Will it LAST??????

3rd one's a....feisty one?

If there's anything I'm hoping for with baby number three, it's a calm child who really likes to sleep...preferably at nap and bedtimes.  I remember all too well when Reese was still in the womb it felt like I had a little soccer player in there...and that extreme exuberance for life has certainly played out in her personality to this day.  I started feeling little flutters from #3 just after 15 weeks, which is really early.  Yesterday at my regular appointment, the nurse was trying to find the heartbeat.  It was as if there was a game of hide and seek going on.  She had to keep sliding the Doppler sensor all over my stomach. She'd find it for a couple of seconds and then it would move...find it again and it would move again.  After several minutes of this she commented, "Looks like you have a feisty one in there!".  OH...NO!!!  Are babies even allowed to be "feisty" in-utero???

Speaking of feisty...Reese has been at it again with the potty training.  She is SO into her "special treats" she will purposefully go pee just a little on the potty to get a treat, then 10 minutes later, say she needs to go again.  In this way she can effectively spread out her treats in 15 minute increments all day long, I swear.  Whenever Carter does something that is treat-worthy, she observes him getting his treat, and within 10 seconds will come over to me and say, "I need to use the potty."  What can I say???  No???  I just hope she has a few teeth left by the time she's 4.

Jeep

 After months of neglect, the good ol' jeep made a reappearance today.  For whatever reason, Carter finally decided he wanted to drive it again and they sure did have fun.

A completed project

I just had to post a picture of my finally completed table and chair set for the kids.  This was in the works for over a year I think...not because it really took that long but I just couldn't seem to find the time to get it done.  One rainy Saturday afternoon was all I needed.  I think they turned out cute.  We ended up just staining the table because I lost motivation after I did the chairs.  Derrick then coated them in polyurethane to protect them and so they're nice and shiny.  I got the chairs, (formerly plain white) from the thrift store a while back for $7 total and the table from Ikea for about $12...not bad!

Makeshift pool?

Poor deprived children!  It is so hard growing up without a swimming pool in your backyard on these hot spring days. Sometimes you just gotta improvise.  I really don't know how much longer both of them will fit in the water table though???  And what happens when #3 comes along.

We took the kids Frisbee golfing today and Carter took to it like a fish to water. I think most of his throws were better than mine.  He even asked to ride his bike tonight and rode further than he's ever ridden before.  Finally coming out of his shell, perhaps?

What's cookin...

Just a couple new things I tried this week:

I made this Tortilla Soup earlier in the week (thanks Martha!!) and it is quite yummy.  This is a meat-free variation, and very hearty.  I added a few extra crushed chips on top and a little grated cheese.  Will definitely be making this one again!

I made these chicken strips for the kids.  They were easy and fairly healthy and tasted yummy.

Words to Ponder

I wanted to transcribe a bit of my Pastor's Sermon from Easter Sunday, more for my own remembrance, but also just to get people thinking about some of the problems our world is faced with.  If you have any desire to hear the full sermon, you can listen online anytime...happy to share the link with you.

Our culture, our deteriorating culture, is trapped in a long-running, intellectually intoxicating affair with unbelief that can only end badly.  I was thinking this past week of some of the things I have seen and  heard in our culture in my short time here.  I have watched as our culture has rejected God's inspired truth in favor of their own incoherent stories.  I have watched as human ego has replaced, "I must go to Jesus for help."  I've watched as we've rejected our identities, as God's Creation...made, wonderfully made, fearfully made in His image, and reduced ourselves to mere accidents of mindless, impersonal forces.  Instead of living victoriously in Christ, we now live vicariously through celebrities.  We follow the King when we're in faith, but in culture many do not follow the King, they follow the Kardashians.  Jesus' sermons go unread, while we tune in to Jersey Shore.  And instead of asking the Savior to help us stand in dignity, we watch, consider it entertainment, as Snookie stumbles in drunkenness.  My how we have fallen!  Serious intimacy with God has been replaced by serial intercourse with people, that never fills the void that only God can fill.  Soul-stretching adoration of God has given way to soul shrinking addiction to any number of things.  And we shop, whether we have the money or not.  We shop, not to get what we need, but to somehow discover what it is that we want.   And we never make that discovery.  


We connect on Facebook.  But we can't connect with God and we can't face the future.


We talk and text about nonsense, but we ignore the sacred text that makes sense of anything and everything.

Crime and Punishment

What do you do with a child who doesn't mind being punished?  This is not some rhetorical kind of question but more of a plea for help!  I feel that I have tried nearly everything to get Reese to listen and obey and she is indifferent to every attempt I have made to get her behavior in line.  Let me give you an example.  Last night she dumped out a puzzle on the floor after dinner and then didn't want to work on it but also would not put it away.  I told her if she didn't put it away, there would be no more puzzles....nothing.   I told her she would lose a piece of candy from her treat bag every time she didn't obey....she LOVES her treats so I thought surely this would hit home.  She walked over to the pantry, got out her bag, and said, here, take this one...and this one...and this one.  She kept digging out treats and handing them to us, completely un-phased by it.  She ended up losing the entire bag I got so frustrated and still, no puzzle.  We've tried to avoid spanking if possible.  Whenever we have tried that in the past, even that doesn't work with her.  I've done time-outs, making her go to her room, taking away books, toys, her bunny.  I am at my whits end with knowing how to get this kid to cooperate.

Reese's other vice right now is her refusal to poop.  Not just poop on the potty, I mean poop...period.  She goes as many days as she can without going, getting more and more uncomfortable by the day until she can barely function.  After 4 or 5 days, she is literally crying that her tummy hurts and she needs to go, but she won't go.  She's had nights where she is screaming and screaming, I guess because it's hurting her so much...but still won't go.  We've tried rewarding her whenever she goes, even in her diaper.  We've used various forms of "intervention"...I don't need to give you the gory details.  Needless to say, we have yet to find a solution or ease her fears of going and it is becoming rather wearing on me.  I'd really hoped to be done with potty training by now...but we are nowhere close.  The other night after crying about needing to go all day, she went behind the recliner, took off her pants AND diaper, and pooped on the floor.  Is there no rest for the weary mommy???

Museum Day

 We had a great visit to the Children's Museum today.  It was actually the first time I took the kids there by myself (didn't meet a friend there) and we did just fine.  They spent the most time in the water room, which was surprising to me...but they LOVED it today and got nice and soaked there.

Too Truthful?

Easter morning

The kids really enjoyed their Easter yesterday.  We all did.  It was another beautiful spring day to celebrate Christ's Resurrection!

They had fun finding their Easter Baskets in the morning before church and making an inventory of all their new candy.

In the afternoon we had some of Derrick's relatives over for Easter dinner.  Carter chose this time to make our guests feel right at home.  He went up to a friend of Derrick's sister and asked him, "Why are you so fat?", while punching him in the gut.  He was standing for Derrick's uncle to tie his shoes and leaned forward, looking at his head.  He said to him, "Did you know you don't have any hair on top of your head?"  Also, both kids kept asking me, quite loudly, "When is everyone leaving?"  Ugh....at what age do children learn tactfulness???  Fortunately everyone was a very good sport about it.

Smiling in front of the "egg tree"

Derrick and his Grandma making Haluski

Derrick attempted to make a Berad family traditional disk called Haluski for dinner.  It has cabbage, onions and noodles that you make.  His Grandma was there to give him a few pointers.   It turned out pretty good!

Easter Treat

I made my first coconut cake for Easter tomorrow using my Barefoot Contessa cookbook.  I can't wait to try it!!!!  Had to throw in a few birthdays while I was at it.

Egg time!

We took the kids to the Eggstravaganza Egg Hunt in Cranberry today.  It is quite a production.  The kids LOVED it!  This was their third egg hunt in the last two days so they are very well-practiced for when the Easter Bunny arrives on Sunday.

Carter said something to me yesterday that I have waited a LONG time to hear.  He yelled to me from another room, "Hey Momma"  "What?" I asked him.  "Reese is my good friend."  Awwww...

He has totally been back into the "Whys" lately...it is rather ridiculous how many times a day I hear that word.  So the other night in their bath, Derrick was quizzing him on his letters with some foam bath letters we have.  He held up the letter "Y" and said, "This one should be easy for you, this is your favorite letter, Carter."  And Carter, asked, "Why?"

Day at the Train

Reese the conductor!

 I took the kids down to play at the old steam engine today and they LOVED it.  It turned out to be another gorgeous day here and I practically had to drag them away.

Down by the River

New Easter Basket

Mission Easter Basket/Bucket completed!  Didn't turn out too shabby.  Just used some scrap fabric, modge podge and a plain metal bucket I already had in the basement and voila...

Let's see her try to break this one!

Great Message for Palm Sunday

Love this song!!