I grumble a lot about summer; it’s really not my favorite time of year for oh so many reasons, but I wanted to document a few things about this season that actually make me happy!
Wednesday morning the girls and I worked in the nursery for a little while, then headed home. I decided on the spur of the moment to see if I could get Joanna in for a trim with Miss Stacey. We ended up having to wait for a little while, but the girls had fun!
They had this fan oscillating, and both Joanna and Natalie LOVED letting it blow them in the face.
Look at the joy on this face! (We are NOT summer girls – we like our wind and our winter.)
Here’s my best attempt at some “before” shots. She really didn’t need much, just a little trim to the scraggely stuff in the back.
We’re letting her bangs grow.
I didn’t get an after, but there wasn’t much of a difference; it just looks cleaner. There are some pics coming where you’ll be able to see what her hair looks like now.
Tonight we went up to the church for “Coffee House.” This was the first event like this (we hope there’ll be more!) and we wanted to check it out.
Natalie found a bow in my hair and wore it long enough for a picture. :)
I didn’t want to flash while the people were singing/playing so that’s why this is blurry. Natalie was very into the music.
Both girls were actually.
Later our friend Abby came, and Joanna and Abby had a great time playing together. I just LOVE three year olds – they’re hilarious!
After a while listening to music got a little dull (and I wouldn’t let them eat any more cake!) so the girls had fun racing in the hallway.
Natalie has a very cute little run developing.
She definitely couldn’t keep up with the big girls.
Action shot!
We had a good time: ate cake, drank coffee (well, only Matt did this), listened to music, and visited with friends. Not bad for a Friday night! We left at 8:00 and had everybody down around 9:00. The girls were up early so I’m really hoping they’ll sleep in tomorrow. I won’t hold my breath though.
Today Anna and Emma came over to play! At some point, they decided to line up all the couch pillows and use them like stepping stones.
For whatever reason, this afforded many minutes of entertainment. :)
It is so delightful to watch/listen to the big girls play pretend. I just love how their imaginations go wild as they play together! The little girls get in on the fun too, but they don’t get it as much. Our little Anna will be FOUR next month. I’m definitely not ready for Joanna to have all these four year old friends. :) I’m certainly not ready for her to be four either, so let’s just not talk about it.
Tonight was enchilada night!! Grandma got the girls these very fun straw cups to keep at her house – they LOVE them!
And after a big plate of enchiladas, nothing is better than a vanilla ice cream cone!
Neither of my girls have any trouble finishing off an ice cream cone! Joanna does it very neatly, with almost no mess, but this little one wears it all over!
She also ate 3 or 4 olives off of Matt’s plate – she seemed to really like them. I had no idea.
We love enchilada night!!
32 Weeks 1 Day
How Your Baby’s Growing (from Babycenter.com):
By now, your baby weighs 3.75 pounds (pick up a large jicama) and is about 16.7 inches long, taking up a lot of space in your uterus. You're gaining about a pound a week and roughly half of that goes right to your baby. In fact, she'll gain a third to half of her birth weight during the next 7 weeks as she fattens up for survival outside the womb. She now has toenails, fingernails, and real hair (or at least respectable peach fuzz). Her skin is becoming soft and smooth as she plumps up in preparation for birth.
How far along: 32 weeks
Pregnancy symptoms: Braxton Hicks, back pain, some moodiness :)
Food Cravings: popcorn, ice to chew, gummy worms, shakes, apples
Sleep: still pretty good, but I am having trouble falling asleep or back to sleep
Measurement: 43.5 inches around; 188lbs
Movement: lots, although I was thinking today I feel Braxton Hicks contractions more than I feel him moving around.
Labor signs: not so much
What I miss: falling easily to sleep
What I’m looking forward to: baby shower this weekend, shopping Baby Daze, getting the newborn diaper supplies ordered and ready (do you see the theme of these things?)
Milestone: ummmmm… not so much
Thoughts from the Girls: I can’t think of anything just now. I’m so excited to see both big sisters in action (in a few weeks, of course!)
Doctor’s visit: I had my 32 week visit this morning, and I got to go by myself!! Mom came over and watched the girls since she didn’t have to work until the afternoon. All things look good. It was a routine visit with no excitement.
Baby-related projects: (I still have lots of time for all these, but they’re in my head.)
Public school heads back tomorrow, so today was Promotion Sunday at church.
Taking pictures of my cute girls is hard work! This was the best one I got (in their new matchy dresses from Gran!).
The one above was the last one – here are the others:
Natalie’s not paying attention yet.
Still not paying attention.
Cute smile (wrong direction) on Natalie, but Joanna’s moving.
Poor Joanna; I forgot a clip of any kind this morning. And I think Natalie is looking at Miss Mimi, one of her teachers last year. She loves Miss Mimi, but I think she was a little worried it was time for school. She has a very serious face on.
Joanna is now in the three year old class with all her good buddies. There were some wonderful (wonderful) ladies in there teaching today. I don’t know if they’ll be the regular teachers every week or what, but I really love when there are “seasoned” women/mothers/grandmothers in my girls’ rooms. Don’t get me wrong, they’ve had some wonderful young women (and the occasional man!) teachers, but there’s just something about real grown-ups loving on my babies. Joanna was so excited for a new class! She seemed to have fun too. Could have been the fruit roll-ups and juice boxes for snack (what?!).
Natalie actually promoted to a new class too! The nursery consists of three rooms: crib room (non walking babies), young toddlers, and older toddlers. All the older toddlers (I think) promoted this week because all kiddos who will be two by Sept. 1 go to two year old Sunday School. Joanna never promoted to the older toddler room. Partly because of the demographic of that particular group and partly because she was a late walker, I think. She went straight from the middle room to the two year old Sunday School. Natalie will get to spend the whole year in this third room. How fun! They told me today that she and her buddy Logan played together by pushing a train back and forth between them.
I sure do love my big girls! I’m really glad I’m pregnant though. Otherwise I’d be very sad with all this growing up!
We also decided to go to the Impact service today. Joanna actually kind of threw a fit about it. When we’d been sitting there a few minutes she said, “I want to go to church now.” Um, oops. Guess it’s been awhile since we’d been to that service! I love that so many of our friends attend that service and that noise is expected and welcome, but I really miss the Sanctuary service when we don’t go. So does Joanna, it seems! Hymns and liturgy are really more my style of worship. I’m glad we “visited” today though. I think we’ll need to do that more often.
Somehow I always end up at Ikea while pregnant. I wonder if it’s as hard to walk around that store when I’m just carrying me? I really do LOVE Ikea. I could pretty much walk around there all day… for a few days in a row I think. I love organizing things. I love containers and bags and bedding and rugs and… You get the idea. We looked and looked and looked and looked. It was so much fun! My plan today was to head down this morning, shop, get what we needed, then have lunch out (a treat!) on the way home. Weeellllllll… that didn’t exactly happen. :) First there was much construction on the way down there. Ew. We still managed to get there about 10:40. The girls enjoyed riding around and looking at things. I brought snacks and ice water for them. Sadly I had to make several trips to the restroom, and they’re not super-conveniently located. And there were a ton of people with the same plan as us today. :) Anyway, so we were moving kind of slowly, and I had a few projects in mind to hunt for storage/ideas for, so I was studying things. The girls enjoyed sliding down the slide at the entrance to the children’s Ikea.
We made it downstairs where you get to really collect all the goodies you’ve seen through the store when Joanna and I had to visit the ladies’ room again. We met back up with Matt and Natalie and found this!
She was REALLY tired for that to happen. (See her dress lifted up? That was so she could reach her belly button while falling asleep.)
That was sometime in the noon hour I think. We were actually kind of ready to go – we’d found what we’d really come for (tell you in a minute), but I decided to shop a little more (wouldn’t you?) so Natalie could finish her nap.
She woke up as I was checking out some kitchen storage-y things, and I realized I was feeling a little faint, so we decided to hit the Ikea cafeteria for some lunch to rejuvenate us. It was a bit after 1:00, I think. Much too late for our lunch!
We all felt better after some grub and a chance to sit down (for us) and stretch our legs (for the girls). Ikea has great big ol’ windows. It’s fun to look even at a parking lot through a big ol’ window.
After lunch we picked up the rest of the things we discovered we needed while we were there :) before heading out. We didn’t get home until about 4:30 or so! Oh my!!
The major thing we went for were some cubbies in the Expedit series (LOVE me some cubbies!!) We wanted something that could be a bench and storage in the pantry (now also the “mudroom”). I also wanted to pick up some toy kitchen accessories for the girls. But, shhhhh… we’re hoping to hold off' ‘till Christmas. We got a set of pots/pans, a set of utensils, and a set of felt fruit.
We also ended up picking up some inexpensive frames to either use around here or for gifts. I also saw (and had to have) a cute canopy/net thingie for either the girls’ bedroom or playroom. The first one I saw was plain white and pretty, but then I saw one with some color (neutral!) on it that we liked better. In fact, here it is:
I’ll take pictures once I get it up (and decide where I’m putting it!).
In my kitchen I have this blank wall (floor to ceiling) that has bugged me for a while. It’s totally wasted space, but putting any kind of furniture (or even a trash can) on it blocks the freezer door and a cabinet. However, I’ve thought about putting a couple of spice racks on there, I just haven’t found what I needed yet. So we found a couple of rods in the kitchen section with hooks and buckets and a spice rack that I’m very eager to put up. We’re totally beat tonight though. Hopefully it will make my kitchen just a little more functional and make that wall bug me a little less. :)
We did a ton of work (pretty much all tonight) in the pantry (/laundry room/mudroom) and I took a few pictures for you. I didn’t take any “before” shots, so you’ll have to remember (if you’ve been here).
Since I’m now parking in the garage (yay!!!), this is our new “main entrance.” I moved our shoe pockets over from the front entry, as well as the coat rack. These shoe pockets have been splendid this summer! The girls can go get their own shoes and put them away, all right by the door.
Looking left into the room you can see our new piece of furniture on the floor. It’s at the perfect height to sit and put your shoes on.
The fridge and pantry shelves used to be where the bench is, so that was the major project this evening.
The fridge actually rolls forward and backward, thankfully, but the pantry had to be unloaded, moved, and reloaded.
I really needed to clean it out and reorganize it, so I’m glad I had to.
In the corner is just some storage of things that need to be gone through, reorganized, and probably relocated… another time.
Back behind here (to the right of the first picture of the shoe pockets) is where my recycling center is as well as the cloth diaper pail. I didn’t take a picture because the recycling is overflowing and I didn’t want evidence!
Normally we can take recycling every two weeks with my current set up, but with cleaning out the garage and the pantry, it’s over-full after only one week. Matt will be going tomorrow!
I wish I had some really cute pictures of the girls to leave you after you’ve listened to me ramble on, but I don’t. :) I do have a cute story though. This is the first time we’ve been to Ikea in a couple of years so Joanna doesn’t really remember it, nor was she very comfortable with saying the name. She’d kind of been referring to it as “the place we’re going today” until she finally settled on “Zacchaeus” while we were on the way down there. Hee hee hee.
Alright, I’m off to watch an episode of Fringe and get a foot rub. Night.
