Plums and Bike Rides... two new firsts

First off, I should warn you- this is a very boring post. It's the end of July and the weather is crappy. I should be posting pictures of us swimming at the pool. But no, I'm posting pictures of my child eating a plum. Come on good weather- summer is half-way over!

The last two days, Lily has experienced two new "firsts". She has been loving "The Very Hungry Caterpillar" lately (she still loves Brown Bear, Brown Bear better though) and she loves trying to name all the fruit and food in the caterpillar book. One of the fruits in the book are plums and Lily has never tried plums. Marty surprised Lily the other night and bought some plums for her to try. So of course, we read "The Very Hungry Caterpillar" and let Lily try her first plum. Lily thought she was the coolest kid in the world eating her plum. It was hard getting a picture of her since she was so excited about her plum. She ate the entire thing by herself.

Eating her plum and holding Baby Jamie oh so nicely. Poor Baby Jamie gets carried like this a lot around here.

Well at least she shared some of her plum with Baby Jamie.

Now for her first bike ride. My mom picked this bike seat up for a dollar at a garage sale last year. After sitting in our garage for over a year, Marty put the bike seat on his bike and took her around our neighborhood. We bought her helmet a month ago when she filled up her potty chart and it's the smallest helmet we could find... it's for kids ages 1 and up and it is still really big on her. She had a blast on the bike! Off they go!

4 years later (4 days late)

4 days ago, Marty and I celebrated our 4th wedding anniversary. A lot has changed in 4 years... we both graduated college, Marty got his Master's Degree, we bought a house, we actually paid money to get a puggle who is crazy, bought our first brand new car, had Lillian, had 13 months of happiness with Lillian, got pregnant with Lil' Speck, and now we are just waiting, and waiting, and waiting to meet Lil' Speck. I CAN'T tell you how much I want to say her name!

It's been a great 4 years and we can't wait to see what the next 4 will bring us...

Here's some pictures of Marty and I "back in the day"... okay, okay... not "back in the day" but back in the not so distant past.

Prom 2002- This was taken with one of those one time use cameras (super flash) That is why I look so white... not sure why Marty looks like Ray Romano :) Oh yeah, had to have our Slurpees before Prom!!!! Our honeymoon... we went to the Atlanta Braves Turner Field and got to sit in the dugout. I look so skinny. *sigh*And a few weeks ago... it's very rare if we get a picture of just the two of us together without our little sidekick Lil. Maybe that will be our goal in the next four years- to get more pictures of just the two of us together.

Seriously, we are sorry that we haven't updated in awhile. We are trying to enjoy our last moments being a family of three while we wait, and wait, and wait for Lil' Speck to join us. We have a lot to post, just not enough time in the day.

One last game...

Sunday morning, Marty and I woke up and decided to take Lily to one last Indians game of the season. It was totally a spur of the moment thing. We wanted to do something fun as a family of three and we really couldn't picture us going to another Indians game this year with a toddler and a newborn. Besides, the Indians are not playing well at all this year and it's not like they are going to the playoffs or anything :) We will see you again next year Cleveland Indians!

The game was at 1:00. That's Lily's nap time. She never misses a nap. We thought she would sleep in the car before the game. Nope. We didn't know what she would be like without a nap. Luckily, she was in a GREAT mood the entire time and Marty and I kept saying to each other what a great family day it was. As soon as we got into the stadium she kept saying "Indians. Baseball. Indians. Baseball." She was so excited. We were so proud of her for sitting with us and just watching baseball until the 8th inning when we decided to play at the Kids Land and go wait in line for "Kids Running the Bases". She is such a true fan and I'm amazed by how much she likes the sport (then again- we were training her early on to like baseball!)

We usually buy our tickets ahead of time. This time we bought them at the window. Daddy and Lily buying tickets: Then we had to find Slider (the mascot) for a picture. Lily was too fascinated by him that she didn't look at the camera. It's was her first real encounter with Slider. Other than that she knows him strictly by her new belly bobble Slider that they handed out at the game and that Slider is in her Indians 101 baby board book.

Waiting for our lunch at the picnic table

We chose to sit in the bleachers in the outfield. It was super hot and sunny. I'm glad I remembered Lily's sunscreen and sunglasses. The most she has ever kept her sunglasses on was 5 minutes. However, at the game she kept them on almost the entire time!

We liked sitting near the drummer! Lily clapped her hands when he played~ but when the Indians got a home run she didn't really like how loud the drummer played :)

A family picture while watching the game

Daddy and Lily

Lily and I

A special treat- Cotton Candy! She loved it! We had to hurry and eat it before she could eat it all!

Playing in a car at the Kids Land. Out of all the toys and play houses they had there, she only wanted to play in the car. She couldn't move forward yet, so she was backing into everything.

We waited in line for a half hour to run bases. As soon as we put her down she went running and smiling! Marty ran with her, while I TRIED to run ahead of them to take pictures. However, being 37 weeks pregnant (with swollen ankles and legs) I can't run. So no really good pictures of her running the bases.

As soon as we put Lily back in the car, she sang "Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star" to herself and she was sleeping as soon as she was done singing! That is all of our super fun day. Oh, yeah, Cleveland lost. Boo!

Belly Pictures at the Park

I'm now officially "full term" and after realizing that we haven't taken too many belly pictures during this pregnancy, we decided to take a walk at the park and take some pictures along the way.

37 weeks pregnant- Who wants to guess Lil' Speck's weight? From looking at how huge I am- I'm guessing 8 pounds. I'm hoping for a baby a little smaller :)

Lily on my shoulders. She weighs almost 20 pounds, so don't worry, she isn't too heavy!

The only bare belly picture I liked. The others were way too scary (how can I be so huge?!?) This picture is black and white because my belly is super white from not getting any sun this summer! Lily is giving her baby sister a kiss. She's so sweet to my belly!

We let Lily have a hold of the camera to take a picture of Marty and I. Didn't she do a great job? Maybe she will be a little photographer when she grows up...

Just kidding- it is a small world and while at the park we ran into my friend Linda and she took this picture of us. Thanks Linda!

Trying to get some last family of three shots in before we are a family of four!

During our walk we also took some pictures of Lily exploring and running free...

Smelling flowers Running around- I like this picture a lot!

Playing in the dirt

And yes... kissing trees. She did this a lot!!!! I have never seen her do this before and I hope it doesn't become a habit. She was really obsessed with kissing the trees- isn't it too early to be practicing kissing????

Oh, a much better picture of my little 21 month old not kissing a tree :)

She loved this little fountain... kinda surprised she didn't kiss the frogs to see if they were Prince Charming!

Just having a ton of fun on our walk

We hope everyone has a terrific weekend!

Not sick anymore!

Lily is not sick anymore! However, morning sickness has crept back up on me. At least it's only in the morning and not all day. Back to Lily- well it turned out that she had an urinary tract infection. She's on medication and is back to her old self. No more fevers, no more not eating, no more just wanting to be held all day. She never complained that it hurt to use the bathroom or anything. I'm just so happy she is okay. It really made me worried that she wouldn't eat her favorite food (cottage cheese) or want to play outside.

Happy Lily is back.

The blog has been neglected this week for sure. We are trying to finish last minute things before Lil' Speck comes. I'm so ready to call her by her name and not Lil' Speck. The name is probably going to slip soon too because Marty and I call her by her real name 90% of the time now. Lily isn't saying "sister" as much and is calling her by her real name all the time too. However, nobody has figured it out yet. I guess it's a good thing that Marty and I are the only ones who really know what Lily's saying still.

I've gotten to try out the double stroller twice this week. I have been babysitting one of Lily's friends who is 18 months old. They are so cute together and the day actually goes by a lot faster. I have found myself thinking more than twice that "I could handle twins someday". But let's focus on having one baby at a time!

Hopefully this week I will post pictures of Lily swinging in her new swing, some *gulp* belly pictures, and whatever else we have going on. I probably should post pictures of the nursery too- I haven't done so yet since we have all the baby gear in that room. This weekend we will be bringing out all the baby gear and letting Lily get used to it before the baby comes. Times running out for sure...

Finally Facing Forward!

A few days ago we weighed Lily and we were very happy to see that she finally weighed 20 pounds! Where we live, the car seat law is that the child has to be one years old AND weigh 20 pounds before they can face forward in their car seat.

We made an appointment with a certified car seat technician at the police station this morning to install our car seat forward facing. I'm not going to go all crazy on this subject, but safety is super important to me... all I will say is that 80% of car seats are installed incorrectly. It's really important to get your car seat checked out. We had our infant car seat checked out before Lily was born, and we are doing it again next week to make sure it is ready for Lil' Speck's arrival too. It's free to get it checked out/installed and totally worth the time.

Anyways, here is Lily all forward-facing and loving it!!!

Though she doesn't look like it much in this picture- but she has been really sick today. She has had a temperature of 103.9 and is just very quiet. We went to the doctors this afternoon and her ears and throat looked fine. They wanted to check her urine so they tried TWICE to put a catheter in her. Marty and I had to hold her down while she cried. I started crying seeing her in so much pain. She ended up peeing on them and they hurried and got a small sample in the urine cup. Everything looked okay... they are going to check her urine tomorrow and let us know if it changed. Poor baby. Tylenol isn't really bringing her fever down. We will see what tomorrow brings. Cross your fingers for a healthy, happy baby that will be ready to play on her new swing set.

4th of July Festivities

This is mostly a picture post since I'm so tired. Hope everyone had a great 4th of July!

We visited a local nursing home with my mom group and had a little parade!

And since one parade wasn't enough- we went to Lily's friend Jameson's house to take place in their neighborhood parade. It was so cute!!!

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Going out to Maumee to watch the fireworks

Waiting for fireworks to begin...

... Meanwhile, playing with the glow necklace Aunt Erica gave her...

... enjoying a cookie and being silly with Frank and Aunt Erica...

... posing with me (and then she got cookie all over me)...

... giving Marty a hug (and then getting cookie all over him)...

AND THEN... that's it! My camera battery died just as the fireworks started! Lily seemed to enjoy them, she was super quiet and pretty tired since she had stayed up 3 hours past her bedtime!!! This was her 4th time seeing fireworks.

Actual 4th of July day... we went to Lily's grandparents cottage to spend the afternoon/evening. Lily liked looking at the water...

... she mostly loved running up and down the hill.

Then we took a boat ride!

She liked helping Grandpa steer the boat.

Grandma and Lily

And sadly, again, I didn't get pictures of any fireworks. Maybe next year :)