19 Weeks Pregnant

Wow, I can't believe it has been 11 weeks since I've updated this thing.  We are now almost halfway through with this pregnancy!  I am FINALLY feeling a tad bit decent, and that just started this week.  I've also put on a couple of pounds so that's a good sign.  We are still sticking with our plan of not finding out the sex until the birth.  I think the hardest part about doing this is having to pick a boys name and a girls name.  For boys, we like the names Asher, Andrew, and Ashton.  I'm about 90% sure the boy's name will be Asher Bryce.  I love the way it resembles Aiden Brody.  For girls, I love too many names: Adrianna, Arianna, Alyssa, Amelia, and the list goes on.  So we are having a tough time narrowing a girls name down.  I have been able to feel this little one doing flips in my belly since about 10 weeks, and in the last couple of weeks, Mark has been able to feel him/her also.  I love that feeling! Definitely the best part about being pregnant!

No, I haven't forgotten about my favorite little guy Aiden.  He is such a cool kid.  Yes, I am kind of partial. :) I wanted to start out the new year with a couple of new things to try with Aiden to make our lives a little bit easier.  We now use a sticker chart and limit the amount of toys he gets at a time.  Two things I've always read about on those babycenter emails, but was just always too lazy to do.

I wasn't sure if he was old enough to understand a sticker chart yet, so I got online and googled. (Googling is the answer for everything, right?)  Most of the ones I saw were a little advanced for him, so I just took a piece of construction paper, put his name at the top, drew some lines on it, and a sucker at the end of the line.  Every five stickers he gets, he gets a sucker.  I cannot believe what this kid will do to be able to pick out a sticker! It's amazing.  He cleans up all of his toys, lets me change him (he used to run away), and just does anything we ask him to do now.  I seriously never pick up toys anymore..it's amazing.  Now I don't just go get a sticker and put it on the chart though.  It's a whole process.  I have to give him the sticker pack, and he sits there deciding which one he wants, then puts it on himself.  After, we have to count the stickers to see if he gets a sucker, and then we spell his name at the top of the page.  I thought this whole thing would last no more than a week, and then he would lose interest.  Nope! We are going strong after a month of doing it! Yay!

(Don't make fun of my sucker drawings! LOL)

Being so sick with this pregnancy, we have been inside more than we used to be.  Being inside more equals Aiden destroying his room more often.  I was seriously having mental breakdowns over the mess this kid would make.  I had Mark go out and buy five big Rubbermaid containers, took all of Aiden's toys and put them in the living room, and put Aiden down for a nap.  I seperated all the toys by cars, puzzles, books, etc. and then put a little bit of each category in the buckets.  Aiden gets one bucket at a time.  We switch them out weekly.  Another genius idea these babycenter guys had that I should have listened to a long time ago!  Aiden used to just empty his drawers and buckets and not even play with the toys.  I'm not sure if he was bored with them or if he was overwhelmed because he has so many.  Now, he plays with his toys more than ever, and he gets so excited when he sees the new bucket because it's almost like getting all new toys.  He still has his train table, racetracs, stuffed animals, & tool bench that stay in his room all the time, so I'm not a mean mom and only giving him one bucket of toys.

(The toys that stay in his room plus his one bucket.  He had just cleaned up to get a sticker before lunchtime.)

(The variety of toys in his bucket.)

We are looking forward to some changes coming up in our near future and getting prepared for this new baby.  Keep us in your prayers we make the right decisions in the next month regarding raising our family.



Eight Weeks Preggo

This picture is from eight weeks pregnant, and I am now 12 weeks, so I'm just a tad bit behind.  This baby has been kicking my tail, so I haven't felt like doing much of anything, which even includes uploading pictures (believe it or not).  If you look at my Facebook, I don't think I have posted pics (other than mobile uploads) since October.  We didn't even do Christmas pictures or cards this year :(  Hopefully, I will be feeling better in the upcoming weeks! *fingers crossed*

Can't you tell Aiden just LOVES doing this..hahaha

Baby #2 On Board!!

Mark and I have always said that we would start trying for Baby #2 once Aiden turned two years old.  I just didn't want Aiden to have to grow up too fast and not be the baby in the house by having kids too close together.  Some may find this statement funny because I never did "baby" Aiden!  Poor kid had his pacifier taken away at 5 months old, bottle taken away at 7 months old, and has always been dressed like a big kid.  I've definitely slowed down on taking things away and pushing him to grow up though.  He's 27 months old and he still sleeps in his crib with the sides on it and also has not progressed any with potty training!  So, Aiden turned two in August and three months later..surprise! We are pregnant! 

October 22nd was our six year wedding anniversary. (Yay for us!)  We enjoyed a day at the spa getting massages & pedicures.  I think I peed about 7 times at the spa.  I thought it was from having two glasses of champagne!  I also had an extremely sore chest for the next few days following that I blamed on the massage and pmsing.  (I know, a little TMI.)  So after being two days late for my period, on October 25th (also my Daddy's bday), I took a test after dinner and it was positive! I hid the test under the sink so I could decide on how I wanted to tell Mark.  Mark fell asleep on the couch while we were watching tv, so I was googling and googling cute ways to tell husbands that their wives are pregnant.  Then it came to me, anytime we talk about being pregnant with Aiden, Mark always talks about how he was asleep on the couch when I suddenly woke him up and shoved a pregnancy test in his face! LOL (yes, that is how it happened.)  So, I saw him sleeping so hard on the couch and decided to do the same thing.  I went and got the test and woke him up suddenly and shoved the test in his face.  This time his reaction was a little bit slower though.  I totally forgot, he and our neighbor Gene had a few beers with dinner, hence why he fell asleep on the couch! lol  However, the reaction was the same once he realized what was going on..haha. 

Once Mark knew, then it was time to figure out how we were going to tell my parents.  They were actually coming in that weekend to see us in Lafayette.  We waited all week and were so ready for them to get here, when they called and said they couldn't make it! Ohmygosh..we weren't sure how we were going to be able to wait ANOTHER week to tell them! It was hard enough to wait from Tuesday to Friday!  It was so hard because my mom and I talk at least three times a day (yes, we are really close), and I kept forgetting that she didn't know I was pregnant.  I kept calling wanting to tell her about my doctor appointment, choosing between the two hospitals, pregnancy yoga making me ill, etc. So I would call her and start to talk, and then have to say,  "aw man, I forgot what I was going to tell/ask you!"  haha..I did this quite often! 

Well, after what felt like months, the next weekend came and my parents were able to come to Lafayette!  I had a friend, Brittany, make these cute cupcakes with pacifiers on them and also went and bought Aiden a "Big Bro" shirt.  We kept the cupcakes in the box and put a dry erase board in the middle saying, "Coming soon to a cradle near you.. June 29th, 2012." (See Pictures.)  We figured, my mom being the nosey person she is (no offense, Mom), would be like, "hmmm..what's in this box?" and open it up!  We kept telling Aiden to say, "Pawpaw, shirt, brudder (brother)," and point to his shirt.  My parents finally arrived at 9pm, and Aiden greeted them at the door saying, "Pawpaw! SOCKS!"  LOL  yes, he sat down and showed his Pawpaw his socks..not his shirt.  Everyone sat in the living room catching up, and I mentioned the cupcakes I picked up for us to have dessert over the weekend.  I kept telling my mom to go try them, but she kept saying she was too full.  Mark even had Aiden show Pawpaw his shirt (and he got it right this time!)  My dad looked at the shirt and read it out loud saying "Big Bro..that's cool, Aiden."  He didn't get it.. nor did my mom hear him.  So, now I am thinking, now what do I do.  That's when I said, "Aiden, do you want a cupcake?"  Of course, my sweet-tooth kid says, "yes!" I told him to ask his Mia to get it for him.  She opened up the box, read the dry erase board and said, "I don't get it..." It only took about 5 seconds for it to hit her though! I wish I had a picture of her face! It was priceless!

(This is how we plan to keep track of me getting huge as well as Aiden growing up through the pregnancy!  Mark does the writing on the dry erase board, so we are all part of this maternity series.)

(We forgot Dad had that thing on his nose to help him breath better with his cold! lol..sorry Dad!)

Aiden, Elena & Will

When we first moved to Lafayette, Aiden and I were always out and about discovering our new home (Girard Park, Acadiana Zoo, downtown, etc).  It was always so awkward for me meeting new people.  I didn't have a hard time talking to them (imagine that..lol), but when it was time to leave, it was always so weird!  What to do? Do I ask them for their phone number, email, Facebook page?? I mean, my kid and their kid would have fun playing together, the mom and I had had great conversation, and I have no friends here so I wanted to stay in communication somehow!  I would go home and tell Mark, I felt like I was in a new town trying to find a date. 

Some days, I would observe the different groups of mommies.  The benches reminded me of high school drama shows where each bench was a different group of kids. One group would all be in sweats.  Not cute workout clothes, but their husbands sweats!  They were talking about organic this, homeschooling that and their non-vaccinated kids.  I knew I did not fit into that group!  Another group would be dressed straight from Banana Republic.  They were classy, skinny (not fit..just didn't eat skinny), moms, but the ones that were scared to get a little dirty with their kids! So I knew I wouldn't fit in with them either. 

Thankfully, one day at Girard, we met Krissy, her mom, and her son and niece. Luckily Krissy was really outgoing and we exchanged phone numbers without awkwardness! LOL She is also the one that invited us to Little Gym, where we have since found more friends! Since then, we have had dinner with husbands and sons, pool date, etc.

Here are some pictures from our most recent playdate. I brought some cookies, icing and sprinkles for the kids to decorate cupcakes also!

PB&J Time

Will's looked professional because the whole thing of sprinkles fell on it..lol

Notice how only the icing is gone on Aiden's..

Cupcakes!

I love sweets, so when I am craving sweets, I bake something with Aiden.  It's like somewhere in my mind, I justify that they are really for Aiden, not me.  I could not pass up my favorite icing when I saw it in the grocery store.  The betty crocker rainbow icing is impossible to find so I had to grab it! So, Aiden and I made cupcakes.  He did the majority of the baking by himself.  He put all the cupcake liners in the pan, dumped the cake mix in the bowl, cracked the eggs (yes, he did it better than me), and dumped the oil and water in for me.  Of course, we had to lick the bowl too!

I am definitely not one of those moms that won't allow their kids to have sweets.  Aiden has frozen yogurt about every other day, if not every day.  He actually woke up in the morning wanting ice cream for his breakfast one day.  I kept telling him no, so we went to his room, pulled out a John Deere alphabet book, turned to the letter "I", and pointed to the ice cream cone.  I guess he thought I couldn't understand his request! He has also started requesting "pumpkin candy corn" from eating candy corn with Mommy!  I figure the child runs enough all day long, he works it off!  Plus, that's the best part about being a kid! Eating junk and not worrying about putting on weight, right?!

He didn't care too much for the waiting part..

He went from this:

to this in about 20 seconds:

Light Reflection From a 2 Year Old's Perspective

Aiden and I were having our daily dance hour in the living room when I decided to bring out my camera. (You know..because I just don't have enough..lol)  Aiden became sooo excited about a light that was moving all around the living room.  (It was light reflecting off the camera.)  So, I went and got a little mirror to show him how the light reflects off the mirror.  He still didn't quite understand that it was light though, so it became pretty entertaining to watch him chase the light around the living room.  Reminded me of how cats will chase the light! LOL..that may sound a little mean, but he was laughing, and I was laughing so all was good in the Greer house! The best part was when I would put it on his belly because he would freak out trying to get the light off of him!  He may not have thoroughly understood the whole light reflection thing, but putting light on his belly, knees, toes, cheeks, etc. was a learning lesson of its own! At least that's why I told myself so I wouldn't feel guilty about finding humor in my kid chasing around a light like a cat!

Daddy came home and joined in on the fun!  <3 my blue eyed boys!

County Fair with Millie

So, a couple of weeks ago, Amanda had this idea to go to the County Fair in Poplarville to see the animals.  We get there..look for the animals so Aiden and Millie can pet them..and to our surprise only found bulls and HUGE horses! LOL  Definitely NOT animals the kiddos were wanting to pet.  So we figured we would buy some tickets to let them ride some rides.  Well, Millie is going through the "scared of everything" stage that most toddlers go through (Aiden just got out of it a couple of months ago).  The only way she would ride the carousel was on Mommy's lap..this was super comfy for Amanda (LOL..yes, I am being sarcastic.)

Aiden on the other hand would not let me hold on to him.  His new favorite saying is, "I got it."

So we were trying to use up the tickets and put Aiden on a truck ride.  He's obsessed with the rides in the mall that resemble these, so I figured he would love it.

When the employee pressed the button, this ride TOOK OFF!  I thought for sure when it came around, he was going to be freaked out and crying, but nope, he was having a blast "driving" it.

So our 20 minute fun day at the County Fair came to an end and we headed back to Amanda's house to put the kids down for a nap.  We thought they had been sleeping for about 45 minutes when we hear some bells ringing.  Amanda goes in the room to check on them to find Aiden had climbed out of the pack and play and had taken all of Millie's toys out! My sneaky son had been playing the entire time while sweet Millie was sleeping!

Another day to teach us that we parents can make all the plans in the world, but toddlers always have their own plans!