Of the few people who I know check this blog regularly, I think most of you know this. We're pregnant! We found out a few weeks ago but I wanted to wait to post it on the blog until I went to my first appointment and made sure everything looks good. I took the pregnancy test one morning in late January, then Grant and I went out later that day to buy a T-shirt to surprise Dean when he got home. I've seen the shirts around at various stores and thought it would be a good way to spread the news. Unfortunately, Grant had just woken up from a late nap when Dean got home that day and was clingy to me (usually he hears Dean open the garage door and stands there waiting for him to come in). But Dean eventually saw it and was very happy! It took us 5 months to get pregnant this time, so we were elated when it finally happened!Everything looks good so far; we went to our first appointment on Feb 12 (Tues), when I was about 6.5 weeks. The baby only measured 3mm on the ultrasound, and was too small to estimate a due date. We could see the heartbeat, but my doctor wanted me to come back in another week to do another ultrasound. He said I'd be surprised how much growth would happen in a week, and he was right! When we went back on the 19th (also a Tuesday, exactly one week later), it had grown from 3mm to 17mm!! This was amazing to us! Based on the size, the ultrasound machine estimated the due date as Sept 26 (a full week ahead of my orig due date). But my doc said he'd leave it where it is for now, just knowing that we have reason to believe it could come sooner.

I have been feeling okay.....mostly VERY tired! And I have nausea that comes and goes (every few minutes sometimes!) throughout the day. I never thought about how hard it would be to chase a 15-month old around while being pregnant at the same time. I definitely took it for granted last time that I could lay down and rest whenever I wanted. During Grant's naps, I usually head straight for the couch to rest (and usually end up taking a nap). That's why it's been so hard this past week since he hasn't been napping as well.

I am 8.5 weeks along now, and my next appt is on March 26. So that's the latest!

Trip to Bryan

As I said yesterday, we went to Bryan on Saturday to visit my parents and to see Rob, Leah and Evan. We hadn't seen Evan and Leah since October, so it was fun to watch the two boys play together again. Of course I use the term "play" very loosely....they'd each play in the same general vicinity, and usually just stare at each other for a second in passing!

Grant was playing in a dirt pile outside when Rob and Leah got there, and Evan and Grant both loved that. I think I'm either going to have to clean out the sandbox that our previous owners left for us or buy a new one, because Grant was enthralled with the dirt! He loved scooping it up and spilling it back out. He also was enchanted by the broom (as he also is at home). He loved pushing and pulling it.

Evan and Grant playing in the dirt pile:

Rob, Leah, Evan, Dad, and Dean all went to the Aggie basketball game, and my mom and I took Grant for a walk in my parents' neighborhood. Grant was getting so tired that I laid back his stroller to the reclining position (which I've never done before) and he fell asleep! He hasn't fallen asleep in the stroller since his early days! It was such a beautiful day and I guess a perfect day for napping outside. He continued sleeping on the porch after we got home.
Later that afternoon, Grant and Evan took a ride in the laundry basket together:

We had hamburgers that night, and our friends Lana, Jerry and Jennifer came over to eat with us. I was REALLY nervous about putting Grant to bed....my parents borrowed a crib for him (so he didn't have to sleep in the Pack and Play), but I was afraid that if he awoke in the middle of the night and saw us, he wouldn't go back to sleep. He actually only cried for a minute when I put him to bed, but he did wake up when Dean and I went to get ready for bed a while later. So we ended up sleeping on couches downstairs! I figured it would be worth it, to give him his own room and avoid a possible nightmare night! And he did fine....I only heard one peep out of him all night. Whew!

The next day, the boys played some more and we left early that afternoon. We stopped on the way out of College Station so I could get a hot chocolate from Sweet Eugene's (it's my favorite hot chocolate.....so unique!). And we also each got a cookie from The Blue Baker. I really miss some of those College Station restaurants!!

Here's one last picture of the boys playing outside; from the back, they look very similar....just about the exact same height and build. They almost look like they could be twins!

It's been kind of a hard week....just as I said that Grant has settled into a good nap routine, he's started changing again! Last Tuesday, my parents came down to stay with him while I had a doctor's appointment. He slept 1.5 hours (the entire time I was gone). Well, that was the last day of that! Wednesday, Thursday and Friday he cried a lot before finally settling down to sleep (and Friday he cried in his crib for an hour and never took a nap). I was so frustrated!!! I really don't think this means that he doesn't need a nap anymore....I think he's just being obstinate. One particularly frustrating thing he's been doing the past few days is throwing his pacifier out of the crib just as I leave the room. I think he learned that I'd often come back in after 10 minutes or so of crying, because I had assumed he'd dropped his pacifier (which he usually had if he was still crying). So I think he learned that if he threw it out as I was leaving, I'd have to come back in to give it to him! Aahh!!

We went to Bryan this weekend to visit my parents and to see Rob, Leah and Evan. So this weekend has been a little messed up as far as naps go. We'll see what happens tomorrow....hopefully I can train him to get back on his 1.5 hour afternoon nap schedule again. I am so tired!!

More later about our trip this weekend.

Trying new templates

Inspired by my friend Kristen's new blog design, I am trying out new templates for our blog. I'll see if I like this one for a few days and I may switch it if I find one I like better (if this one becomes hard on the eyes!). The website is pyzam.com....you can find a lot of really cute templates, and they're very easy to copy into your blogger account. It mentioned that pyzam works much better with Mozilla Firefox (internet browser). We always use Firefox anyway, but I'm not sure exactly what that means. Hopefully it will still look the same if you use Internet Explorer or anything else.

Thanks so much, Kristen and Carissa, for your comments about speech stuff!! I think the tendency these days is to diagnose kids with things (and worry parents) before giving the kids a chance to grow up in their own time. It makes me feel better to know that it seems to be fairly common! Carissa, it seems like Logan and Grant are very similar in a lot of ways!! I may be asking you guys for their moms' email addresses if this seems to continue, though. Thanks again!

Here are a few recent pictures. This was on Dean's birthday....Grant loves to walk all over the couch that Corie gave him. He LOVES that thing! He plays on it all the time. Here is Amminadab "reading" the book that Grant got for Dean for his birthday. He just walked up next to it and stood there.....and actually stayed long enough for me to get the camera! More later on Amminadab's surgery some other time....I need to go downstairs soon to hang out with Dean!
A picture of Grant's wispy hair at the park about a week and a half ago. It's not usually like this, but it was particularly full of static that day.
Dean came to the park to meet us (and drive us home!) on his way home from work. The park isn't very far, but it was getting cold fast and I didn't feel like trying to convince Grant to get back in the stroller (not the easiest job after he's been running around for an hour!).
What a cool kid!

15 Months Old!

Grant is 15 months old today! We went to his checkup this morning. He has grown A LOT since his last visit. He's over 33 inches tall (94th percentile) and weighs 25 1/2 pounds (60th percentile). I asked if he weighs enough for his height, and she said that he's fine....he's just tall and slim (although he still does have some baby fat). The one thing that made me a little concerned was his talking; she said that by 15 months, babies should be able to say 5-6 words. All that Grant can say now is "ti ti" for the kitties, and he can "vroom" if you ask him what noise a car makes. He also says "ma" and "di" but he doesn't have any other really recognizable words. She wasn't too worried because he IS talking a little, but she said that if he doesn't have a few more by 18 months that they might refer him to some kind of intervention program. That scares me!

I really do think, though, that he's probably fine and is just taking a little bit longer. He's really not around other kids on a regular basis, and we know that he understands a lot of what we say. We can tell him to clap his hands and he'll do it. We can ask him to bring things to us, and he'll do it. If we ask where his belly button is, he'll lift up his shirt and find it. He dances when he hears music. And if I ask him if he wants a food that he particularly likes (like bananas or cookies), he gets really excited and looks at the pantry. So I do think that it's just a matter of time. It's like he just thinks that we're the ones who are supposed to talk, and he looks at us like we're crazy when we keep repeating words over and over again in front of him!

He's awake from his nap now, but I will try to write later today about our poor kitty and his declawing experience this weekend. :(

Ant bites and a funny story

Last Friday, Grant and I were out running errands and it was beautiful outside. So I decided I'd try out a new park near our house and let him run around before coming home. We had only been there 15 minutes or so when he climbed from the playground area up onto the grass (about a 6-inch step). He used his hand to help him with the step, and when he stood up, he started shaking his hand. It looked like there was a lot of dirt on it, but when I looked closer, I could tell they were ants! I shook his hand and had to pry a few off of him. I was standing right there and I know they couldn't have been on him for more than 5-10 seconds. So I figured he maybe got a few bites, but he went on his way after that as if nothing was wrong.

Well, a few minutes later I looked at his hand, and it was pretty red, with tons of little white dots all over it! I got a little worried and put him in the car to leave, when I saw a girl I worked with at our church before Grant was born. She has 3 kids of her own and told me to just get some Caladryl for it. So we went to Randall's on our way home and bought some. But I never had to use it....his hand looked awful for a few days, but he never tried to scratch them and it never seemed to bother him! I tried to count once, and I got up to 25 bites before he grabbed his hand away. There had to have been about 30 or so....ouch!!

Kinda hard to see, but you can see his red hand and some of the white dots if you look closely enough:
Later that night after dinner, when all the bites had turned to the normal red color:
Not related to the ant bites, but here he's studying his foot before putting it into his mouth!
Ooh, yucky! That didn't taste very good!
Also.....this is just kinda funny. Yesterday up at church (for our weekly mom's Bible study), Grant and the other kids in his class were taking a buggy ride (where they sit in three rows, two in each row, and are wheeled around the church). First, let me say that I feel SO sorry for the teachers in Grant's class.....there are four babies in there (one being Grant) who have a VERY hard time with mommy being gone, and they all feed off of each other's cries! Every time Grant and I walk up, we can hear the other kids in his room crying from down the hall. So at least I know that Grant isn't the one causing all of the others to start! The teachers say that the kids do pretty well in the buggy ride....they just don't like being in the classroom.

So anyway, they were going for a buggy ride yesterday and Jacob (Sierra's 10-month old son) was sitting next to Grant. Apparently, Grant was eating his biter biscuit and Jacob grabbed it from him and stuffed the entire thing in his mouth! The teachers didn't know what had happened until Grant started crying. Then I guess a few minutes later, Jacob tried to steal Grant's pacifier (Sierra says that Jacob doesn't even use a pacifier, but for some reason kids always try to take other kids' pacifiers....not sure why!). Well, everyone has to draw the line somewhere, because Grant fought back and wouldn't let Jacob have it! A biscuit is one thing, but nobody better mess with Grant's pacifier! That is serious business! I can just picture Grant giving him a nasty look and trying to defend his stuff.....babies are so funny!

This week has been a little better.....thanks to those of you who responded and emailed about all of these discipline issues. I went to my girls' Bible/book study on Tuesday night and Grant did great with Dean.....they played and had a lot of fun together. This week has definitely had its trying moments, but I'm trying to be much more stern with him.....it's just hard not to completely lose my temper when I get so frustrated with him!

Today we planned on going over to Sierra's house for a potluck Valentine's Day lunch with a few other girls. I said I'd bring the main dish (a casserole, which I prepared before Grant woke up this morning). When I went to get Grant out of bed, he had a yucky yellow runny nose. Yes, another month has passed, so it's time for another cold! Anyway, I didn't want to let them down and not bring the main dish (and give them such short notice), so we went over there to drop off the casserole. I waited to give Grant a nap until we got in the car...he fell asleep on the way, so I was able to go inside and talk for a few minutes. Then after he woke up, I brought him in for a few minutes before everyone got there, and he surprisingly let me hold him so I could keep him a few feet away from Jacob.

We left as they were about to eat, and Grant and I went to the League City park (close to Sierra's house)....it's a beautiful park with pretty flowers and a few nice fountains. Grant ate lunch there and loved running around. As we were about to leave, he kept standing a little too close to the water (I was getting nervous even though I was holding onto his hand), so I finally pulled him away. This started a tantrum....I know Grant well enough to know when he's going to react poorly, so it's frustrating to see it coming and not be able to do anything about it!

Anyway, we finally got into the car (after a few smacks on the hand) and came home, where he crashed again for another 1.5 hours. For Valentine's Day tonight, we made omelets and Dean just put Grant to bed for me. These days, I need more help than I used to....Grant wears me out during the day!!

One step forward, two steps back!

Well, Grant is finally napping like a "normal" child! He takes one nap in the morning, usually between 9:30 and 10am, and he'll sleep for usually 45 minutes to an hour. In the afternoon, he usually goes down for another nap anywhere between 1:30 and 2:30pm, and he'll almost always sleep for well over an hour (the past couple of days it's been 1.5 hours). And probably even more amazing than the amount of time he's sleeping is that he's not very hard to put down for naps anymore! The past couple of weeks it's been fairly easy; I'll read him a few books and then try to rock and sing to him for a few minutes. But usually at naptime he's too restless to lay there, so I just lay him in his crib. He cries while I walk out the door, but for the most part he'll go right to sleep afterwards. He's been doing this for a while at bedtime, but naps have been unpredictable until now. I used to have to come back in his room and lay him down (or hand him his pacifier if it had fallen on the floor) once or twice before he'd go to sleep. So this is a nice change!

But.....he has been a very badly behaved boy lately! We went to my friend Bethany's house on Saturday for a mommy and baby get-together. Bethany doesn't have kids and her house isn't completely baby-proofed, so Grant kept trying to grab everything he wasn't supposed to have. Every time I'd take something away, he'd collapse on the floor and cry. Or if I picked him up to remove him from an area, he'd slap my face or arch his back to try to get away. It was horrible....I stayed as long as I did because I really wanted to see a lot of the people there (I haven't seen them since Grant was born!). But he has never behaved that badly before. The general guideline I've heard for starting spanking is 18 months, but I look back and think that I probably should've taken him outside and given him a little spanking when he was acting up. At home, when he hits me, I say, "we do not hit mommy," and set him on the floor and walk away. He'll cry and walk back over to me, wanting to be picked up. And he's usually fine after that. But on Saturday, I couldn't do that, because he'd go right back over to what I had taken him away from!

So....the past few days have been hard. Today we had to leave the library early because he was acting up, and then later he fought SO hard getting into his car seat. It took me a few minutes to get him strapped in, and I had to press on his belly so hard to get him to sit down so I could do it. He had a tantrum almost the entire way home.

If anyone reading this has any advice, please comment or send me an email! I don't know what to do?!! He is extremely strong-willed and I know I can't change his personality, but I don't want him to continue acting this way. Help!!

Peek-a-boo! and some of Grant's other favorite things

Grant figured out this little game of Peek-A-Boo at the table a couple of weeks ago. He doesn't do it a lot, but he's really proud of himself when he does!

Where's Grant??
There he is!!

He also is in a stage where he loves to climb into containers (boxes, crates, laundry baskets) and then get back out. He thinks it's really neat to put stuff into containers too, then take them out or carry the container to another room. He loves to practice getting into and out of this little pink crate in our living room.
Any time the refrigerator opens, Grant comes over to see what he can play with! I've had to move all the glass containers to a higher spot because we've had an accident or two. Here he is checking out what's for dinner.

We're in the last stages of weaning, which is a little bittersweet for me. I have loved breastfeeding Grant over these past 14 months. At around 11 months old, I started only breastfeeding him twice a day, first thing in the morning and last thing before he went to bed. He was getting increasingly distracted during his daytime feeding and I figured he'd just give all of them up before too long. I also had no idea how hard the transition to whole milk would be!

But now that Grant likes his whole milk and drinks it up like crazy, I've been tapering off the feedings for the past couple of weeks. I started dropping the morning feeding. That lasted for a few days, then I started feeding him every other night instead of every night. I wasn't intending to stop this quickly, but it seems to be working out okay. He will definitely take it if I offer, but he's never pulled on my shirt or acted in any way like he specifically wants it (I'm glad I haven't gotten to that point!).

I never expected that I'd do it for this long, but it is a little sad to be done with this chapter of his life. I guess it's just another one of those things that means he's getting to be a big boy and is growing up! Sniff sniff!!

Daddy's birthday!

Dean's birthday was on Saturday, and I thought I'd better write about it before I forget what we did to celebrate! I don't have any pictures uploaded yet (and I didn't take many), but hopefully I'll get to it in the next couple of days.

It's become somewhat of a tradition (if two times counts!) to go get donuts on the morning of our birthdays. Mine fell on a Saturday this year, and now Dean's did, so I guess it may be a little harder to continue when they fall during the week. But we went over to Riley's Donuts (close to our house, and very tasty!) and had breakfast.....Dean got the biggest cinnamon roll I think I've ever seen, AND a blueberry donut! I had to have one with chocolate sprinkles, and we got Grant a few donut holes (even though we brought his Kix too). He spit out the first bite of donut and made his classic scrunched up "yuck" face, but then gave it another try. He was begging for more before too long.....I think he ended up eating a few of them. That boy likes sweets!

After we got home, our 9-year-old neighbor Brynna and her friend came over to see Grant (any time Brynna has a friend over to play, she wants to show Grant to them. We've already met four or five of her friends!). Grant and I played outside with them (and Brynna's dog Wrigley) in the front yard for a few minutes. Then Dean walked outside, and Wrigley immediately ran over to the door and started jumping and barking at him! We think that Wrigley is protective of Grant, because one other time Dean went to grab Grant abruptly as he was about to fall, and Wrigley pounced towards him and started barking like crazy. So my guess is that he thinks Dean is trying to hurt Grant. Anyway, it was funny watching it all. Brynna's mom Collette ended up coming out in her robe to tell Brynna to get Wrigley in the house. Brynna was trying to pull him away, but that dog was persistent and very strong! All the while, Grant was just happily walking around in the yard without even seeming to notice what was going on!

While Grant took a nap, I made Dean's cake. One of the reasons I really like making two-layer cakes is that you can taste samples of it after taking it out of the oven.....you have to make the layers flat, you know??! Brynna came over and ate a piece, and Grant of course kept wanting more and more bites too. I hope he is not diabetic by the time he's three!

Anyway, later we went out to do a couple of errands, and Grant fell asleep in the car on the way home (which he doesn't do very often anymore). When he woke up around 4pm, we got in the car and headed straight for Texas Land and Cattle. Dean (like most guys) wanted a steak for his birthday dinner.....I will never understand boys and their extreme love of steak! Grant did okay for the first 20 minutes or so (and enjoyed playing with the crayons a little), but then his patience wore off. Once he was done eating his dinner, he wanted to be moving around. So we had to eat our meal really fast and rush out before Grant imploded on us. It was kind of disappointing to spend a lot on a meal and have to leave before you're ready, but I guess that's how it is with toddlers! The food wasn't that great, though....we'd never go back there again. And, we lost Grant's pacifier (and strap) in there too, so it was not the best experience!

We came home, put Grant to bed before too long, and ate some yummy chocolate cake. Then Dean and I watched "3:10 to Yuma." It was a really good movie.....we recommend it!

New Appliances

Soon after we moved into our house (built in 1995), we realized that the appliances would be in need of updating fairly soon. The stovetop/oven was fine, but the dishwasher and microwave were getting pretty outdated! We had replaced our dishwasher before we moved out of our old house, and we got a great GE for less than $400. In our new house, I was getting tired of rewashing a lot of bowls that didn't look so great after going through the first wash.

So we went ahead and replaced the dishwasher, microwave, and oven....we wanted to switch from white to black (to match our refrigerator) so we ended up replacing the oven too. I think the black looks good in our kitchen....we thought about getting stainless steel, but it was quite a bit more expensive. I'd also love to replace the countertops and backsplash too, but that will have to wait a couple more years! Here are some before and after pictures.