Sunshine and an Egg Hunt

Happy Easter!!  Ok ok it was a few days ago but this busy mama hasn't had time to sit down and write about it until now.  This was Brooks on Easter Sunday last year ....

Ah, he's just so cute!!!

After enduring a whole week of cloud cover and rain, the sun finally came out on Easter morning.  How fitting huh?  We were thankful for the warm weather.  We started the day with a big breakfast (as we do every Sunday).  Brooks was happy to pick out an "Easer egg" to eat.

Gotta love that face, right?  He was actually crying about 2 seconds before this picture was taken.  He was exercising his toddler sized voice and demanding pancakes, then oatmeal, muffins, eggs ... basically anything that wasn't on his plate.  (sigh)  Not sure if I should blame teething for the excessive crabiness lately or just the fact that he's almost (terrible) two.

Anyway, enough of that.  On to happier things.  We went to church in the morning and enjoyed a great service of celebrating all Jesus did for us!  Then we came home and had an Easter egg hunt in the backyard.  Amy, Ben and Ollie came too!

This was my best attempt to take a picture of Brooks with his friend Ollie.  I guess I should have known better than to try to get two toddlers to stand still for a picture when there are clearly more fun things to do!

We came inside and the boys partook in the loot!

mmm, Teddy Grahams :)

Neither of them had any problem devouring a bowlful of teddy grahams :)  It was a special treat for us anyway.  Brooks loved opening all the eggs and finding the "bear".  In fact, just yesterday (Monday) I found him opening all the empty eggs still in his basket and saying "bear?  no bear."  He was kinda bummed. 

After the feast of bears, we all sat down for lunch ... lasangna, garlic bread and the best fruit salad I've had in a long time.  (thanks, Amy!)  Since we don't have any extended family near by (and neither do Ben or Amy) we enjoyed celebrating Easter together with friends.

A smattering of pictures

In no particular order, here are some snapshots of our life .....

Gettin' ready to play in the springtime mud.

I believe I was putting away all my too-small, non-pregnancy clothes in this picture. 

A very memorable moment, for sure :)

High five-ing Curious George.

Reading books with Papa Les when he and Grandma Lue came to town.

Brooks holding a giant boquet of balloons ....

... while sitting on the toilet! :)  Balloons truly do make everything more fun!  These were Daddy's birthday balloons, but if we're all honest, they were never really his to begin with.

Brooks loves Charlie.

Getting a few pictures of Daddy's bike before he sells it.

My boys :)

20 weeks & an Anniversary!

Well folks, we're half way through this pregnancy!!  HALF WAY!  Where has this time gone??  I mean, D-day still seems like forever away, but to think we're halfway through already seems kinda crazy.  And with summer coming, I'm sure the second half will go just as fast.  Yesterday we had temps in the low 70's and I thought "summer is finally here!"  But alas, today was back down in the thirties with rain and plenty of wind to accompany it.  Oh, the joys of living in South Dakota.

Ok, enough whining.  On to baby news.  Shortly after my last post, I finally felt the baby move.  In fact, it was on Friday, March 25th to be exact.  Yeah, I wrote it down :)  The kiddo is still pretty small and so are his/her movements, but I LOVE feeling them just the same!  Now this pregnancy is starting to become more real to me.

We have decided to keep this kiddo's gender a suprise!  How exciting, right?  But like I said before, we're not even going in for an ultrasound, so we can't know anyway.  I get mixed reactions when people hear that we're not finding out, but even more so when we tell them we're not getting an ultrasound. 

"Why no ultrasound?" 

"Are they not safe?" 

"How can you plan without knowing the gender?"

"Don't you want to see your baby?" 

"Is something wrong with you??" 

Ok, I haven't been asked that last question, but the reason is simple.  This is a low risk pregnancy, and there's nothing to check out.  So we're not doing an ultrasound.  Makes sense, right?  Good.  Glad we're all agreed on that. 

Now the only trouble is that we'll have to think of TWO names.  And I have all sorts of lovely girl names swirling around in my head (seriously, we could be having quadruplet girls - and we're not by the way - and I'd have them all named) but absolutely no boy names.  Which according to Murphy's Law means .... we're having a boy.  Ok, I don't know that but I'm just guessing it to be true.  But keeping with my gut instinct we've decided to nickname the baby "Guy".  Yep, just Guy.  Little Guy is fine.  Baby Guy works too.  But this is our Guy.  And well, if it happens to be a girl ... she'll never know the difference :)

Oh ... I almost forgot to write about the Anniversary!!  It truly was a big day in our house.  April 12th marks the 1 year anniversary of when I began my new job as a full time mom!!  Hooray!!!!  Again, this year has gone so fast, but I wouldn't have traded it for anything.  Brooks is growing up way too fast already and I'm so glad I was around this last year to see all of it!  And I'm excited for this year to come. Brooks will turn 2, we'll add another kiddo to the family (making us a family of four - eek!), I will continue teaching my Bradley classes.  I love life and my family and I only have God to thank for it all :)