Busy Busy Bees

We have been SO busy around here. 

Josh was out of town for 5 days last week, so I had my first solo adventure with two kids.  I was exhausted by the end of each day, and even though he got back on Sunday I'm still not quite feeling fully recuperated. 

Last week Bon turned 2 months old! 

She has her 2 month appointment tomorrow, so I'll do a post with all of her stats and what she's up to after that.  Rudy also has his 2 year appointment tomorrow.  I'm a little nervous because of the way he's been acting about boo-boos, but we'll just keep our fingers crossed that he's outgrown that by tomorrow. 

This weekend Bon and I went up north to see our little Easy E get hitched.  I got to see some of my very favorite girls in the whole world, I only wish it would have been longer.  I failed to take any pictures since I had my hands full with a little one, but I stole some from them!

I don't love this pic, but it's the only one with all of us in it... so I'm using it.  Not that you didn't do an excellent job with the picture, Rach (Ben?), but I look a little bit like a "little person" and it's a reminder to me that I definitely just had a baby.

I like this one alot better, but the beautiful bride isn't in it!

It was a beautiful wedding, with perfect weather and lovely company!  Love those ladies. 

This week I am in party prep mode.  Rudy's birthday is on Saturday and he is having a PUPPY PARTY!  I've been hyping it up to him for about a month now, so he's pretty excited about it. I've been painting banners and making door signs and cupcake toppers for the past few days, and I've actually been enjoying myself doing it!

Related post to follow.

6 Years and Dad's Day

Sunday was a pretty special day in our house.  We celebrated SIX years of marriage in addition to Father's Day.

We "kind of" went on a date on Friday night for our anniversary.  We took Bonnie with us while my mom watched Rudy.  We went to a really nice restaurant, but Bonnie was a little fussy.  So we had to take turns eating, baha.  That's about the story of our lives lately!  We had fun anyways.  On the car ride over we talked about all of the things that happened year by year in our marriage.  It was fun looking back and reflecting!

We decided we weren't going to get each other any gifts, but Josh broke the rules and got me a new pair of Toms.  He actually got them off of Etsy from a lady that buys Toms and then hand paints them.  They have the words to the song that he sang at our wedding.  Love the shoes, love that man!

I got the kids "I Love Dad" and "My Dad is Rad" shirts to wear for Father's Day.  Aren't they cute?  Our Daddy is pretty awesome. 

We wanted to give a big shout out to all of the Grandpa's too.  We love you guys. You're the best!

Boo Boo

Rudy fell and skinned his knee on Sunday night.  He has skinned his knees before, but only just a little.  This is the first time it took a good chunk out of it.  He's a pretty wild child and likes to climb on everything.  But, he has an unusually good sense of balance.  He hardly ever falls.  Except for that one time that he fell out of a motorhome.

One would think that the world has ended with the way he has been acting the past couple of days.  He has been crying and complaining about it for days, literally. 

I even got him some collectors edition Mickey Mouse Bandaids. 

Those helped a little bit. 

He's also been watching alot of Mickey with his two best friends. 

I think he's going to make a fully recovery, hopefully sooner rather than later. 



Summer Days

Earlier this week we took the kids to a baseball game.  It was Two Buck Tuesday and the Danville Dans baseball stadium.  The Dans league is a summer baseball league that college baseball players from all over come to play in for the summer. 

It was a little chilly so Sis got to wear her first pair of jeans!

Oakwood was doing a fund raiser for the Fourth of July Celebration involving these flocking flamingos.  The lady in charge thought Rudy would like to see them so they ended up in our yard for the evening. He got to see them just before we left for the game and he loved them!

Rudy had a blast at the game.  He stood up and cheered when everyone clapped and ate lots of popcorn.  He also ate alot of cheese sans the nacho chips.  He digs cheese.  Sis slept for most of the game, but was a little peach when she did wake up. 

Yesterday it was hotter than hot outside.  So we got out the sprinkler for Rudy and set up his sand and water table.  Note the brown, sandy water in the table.  Rudy thought it was awfully tasty to drink that.  Strange child.  

I also started running this week after my 6wk check up on Monday.  It is NOT a pretty sight.  I have yet to make it a full two miles, but I'm taking baby steps and making progress.  So I'm patting myself on the back for that!

Other things worth noting:  We bought Rudy a big boy potty this week and he has successfully gone on it a couple of times.  Usually he is trying to squeeze a few drops out after he has already gone in his diaper so that he can get some candy, but we are still cheering him on loudly for that!  And... Sis rolled over from belly to back on Wednesday night!  It was more than likely an accident and I'm quite certain she couldn't do it again if she tried, but it's officially getting noted as her first roll over.  She's also starting to coo alot more and smile a little bit!

Wedding Season

We have been busy, busy, busy!

Last weekend we went to two weddings, one on Friday and one on Sunday.

The kids that were seniors our first year here just graduated college (makes me feel old) and are starting to get married (makes me feel even older). 

Justin and Anna got married Friday night.

It was about the only cold day of the entire year, but the wedding was really beautiful.  This is the best shot I got because I sat in the back with the little lady in case she started screaming.

Thursday night after the rehearsal we stayed in a hotel with the kids, which was a DISASTER , but I won't get into all of those details. 

Rudy went swimming and Bonnie got to dress up like an Anne Geddes baby to sit by the side of the pool and watch. 

My dad came up to visit for the weekend so he (and Pam and Liana) spoiled watched Rudy during the wedding on Friday and then we hung out with them on Saturday over at my Grandma and Grandpa's house. 

Here's a picture of Rudy at my Grandma and Grandpa's,  planking, watching Mickey, in his diaper because he ran through a huge mud puddle and I didn't bring a change of clothes for him.  Stinker. 

Sunday we went to a Taylor friend, Jordan Rupp's, wedding while my mom watched Rudy.  I didn't get to see a lick of the wedding because Bonnie Lu was a little bit crabby.  So we hung out in a "coat closet" in the back of the sanctuary for awhile and then went outside.  The reception was beautiful and we got to see some old Taylor friends, so that was fun. 

I can't wait for the next wedding in 2 weeks to see my little Easy E get married and add another member to the Troops!

Sweet Summertime

Aren't these little loves so sweet?  Yesterday Rudy went to the babysitter's house.  He goes once a week while I work and has continued to go while I'm on maternity leave to try and keep him in a routine. (We also took out money for daycare on a flex spending account, so we have to use it or we lose it!)  Also, he LOVES the babysitter and all of the kids there. 

It was a pretty low key day with the little lady.  We hung out and I enjoyed having the TV for a little bit with something other than Mickey Mouse playing.  I have 35 episodes of criminal minds on DVR that I need to catch up on! We went for a little walk to the post office and to the park.  It was pretty hot outside, though, so it was a pretty short walk. 

When Rudy and Josh got home we ordered pizza and hung out and then took Rudy outside to play.  The evenings have been absolutely beautiful, and the neighbors let Rudy borrow some of their yard toys since their grandaughter won't be around this week.  He wants to ride that horse all day long!! 

We are really enjoying our summer so far!

1 Month

Our little love was one month old on Saturday.  How is that possible?  There isn't too much to report on her.  She is still brand new so she pretty much just eats, sleeps, and poops.  She definitely isn't the best sleeper, but over the past week she has gotten much better, giving us a few 5 hour stretches.  (I can handle that!)  She is a good eater and a pretty big spitter-upper.  We had her one month appointment yesterday and she is weighing in at 9lbs 3oz and is 20.6in long, so she gained almost three pounds and an inch and a half in her short month of life!  She was busting out of her newborn diapers, so we switched her to size 1 diapers yesterday.  Her newborn clothes are getting a bit snug on her, but 0-3 months are still a little baggy.  So she's wearing a little of both right now.  We are loving having her around and getting to know her sweet ways.  Her brother is absolutely smitten with her and kisses her head and says, "Hiiiiiii, sissssss" at least a hundred times a day.  He has been great with her so far, and we've only had a few jealousy issues.  He is doing much better with her than I anticipated.  Josh and I are adjusting slowly to having a newborn again.  The sleepless nights have been rough, and it has definitely been a challenge learning to juggle a newborn and a demanding toddler.  We are starting to get the hang of it ,though, and it feels like life is starting to normalize a little bit.  I am loving being on maternity leave and am dreading the day I have to go back to work.  (At least I have 6 more weeks!) 

Bonnie Lucille

Meet Bonnie. Isn't she just about the prettiest little thing you've ever seen? 

She was born at 6:04 a.m. on Thursday, April 19th.  She was 6lbs 8oz and 19in long. 

She came out screaming and in picture perfect health. 

If you don't want a really long story of how my labor and delivery went you can go ahead and skip this part.  I just wanted to write this out for my own sake so I could remember all of the details!

My labor and delivery were quite a bit different than with Rudy.  I had sort of expected to go into labor a little bit earlier since she was my second, but that definitely didn't happen.  The end of this pregnancy was quite a bit more difficult than with Rudy as well; I was much more worn out and sore.  So every minute that passed I was wishing that I would go into labor.  On Wednesday morning I had an appointment with one of the midwives.  It was actually with the one that delivered Rudy, and it was the first time I had seen him this entire pregnancy.  I had progressed quite a bit since the week before so I decided that I would go ahead and get my membranes stripped.  (Yowzas!  Not pleasant.)  He jokingly predicted that I would be at the hospital by midnight in labor.   I started having irregular contractions throughout the day.  Painful.  But not regular or frequent enough to time.  That night we went on a walk around 8pm to see if we could get things going a little more regularly, but it didn't really seem to help.  We layed down for bed around 10:30, but by 11:00 I had decided that there was no way I could sleep.  My contractions were around every fifteen minutes apart, but way too painful to sleep through.  Plus, the anticipation of waiting for another one to come had me a little amped up.  Around 11:15 I decided to take a bath and during that time my contractions sped up to about every 6 minutes.  I woke Josh up around 12:30 and told him I was going to call labor and delivery and see if it was okay if we headed in.  They gave us the thumbs up, so I called my mom to come over and watch Rudy and we headed to the hospital.  By the time my mom got here my contractions were every 2-3 minutes apart and we were practically running out the door.  On the ride over to the hospital my contractions slowed back down to about every 7 minutes and I started getting a little nervous that I would get sent home.  When we got to the hospital we had to go in through the emergency room since it was after hours.  Normally, if your water hasn't broken they make a nurse come and assess you to make sure you are really in labor before they send you up to labor and delivery.  But, I knew the ER nurse from high school and she let me bypass that step since she knew that I worked at the hospital.  We walked all the way to the labor and delivery ward and another girl I knew from highschool checked me into my room.  Haha.  They got me on a fetal monitor to make sure Miss Bonnie was looking good and checked to see how far along I was.  I was almost six centimeters, and I was surprisingly disappointed because I was hoping to be at least 8.  I was also expecting my labor to be twice as fast last time (6 and a half hours) since that is the normal trend with pregnancies.  But, I was out of luck there.  So, once everything looked okay they moved me to another floor around 2:30.  It's a fairly new floor where you labor, deliver, recover, and have the rest of your postpartum stay in the same room.  The midwives like to use the floor with their patients and it is alot more like a birthing center than being at the hospital.  They had asked me several times throughout my prenatal visits if I'd be interested in delivering there and I said yes.  Honestly, I really didn't expect to deliver there though.  Since I work at the hospital, I knew that they rarely staff the unit and usually only do about one delivery there a month.  However, someone had already delivered there during the day so the unit was open.  The room was so nice and had a huge whirlpool and birthing ball and all of that good stuff in it! 

I never really wrote out a birth plan for either of my labors.  I sort of just wanted to see how things went and go with the flow, which is not really a very good strategy for a natural birth.  After my delivery with Rudy I was scared that I wouldn't have time for an epidural with my next labor and tried to mentally prepare myself for that reality.  I had one with Rudy and loved it, even though it only really worked on the right side of my body. 

This time they kept asking me what I wanted to do for pain management.  I had plenty of time for an epidural, but for some reason I didn't get it.  My contractions were really painful, but they were spaced far enough apart that I was able to handle them pretty well.  Even an hour after I arrived to the hospital they were still five minutes apart, but they were lasting anywhere from 90 seconds to a minute long.  I wanted to wait as long as I could for the epidural because my blood pressure dropped pretty low with Rudy and then his heart rate dropped quite a bit.  So around 3:00 I got in the whirlpool and the midwife said that she would come back around 5:00 to check me and if my contractions hadn't picked up by then we would talk about breaking my water.  Those two hours passed SO slowly.  My contractions continued to be 5-6 minutes apart from 3:00 to 4:00.  At that point I decided that I would try to get out of the tub and walk around for a bit to try and get them to go a little faster.  Immediately they picked up to every 3 minutes.  Around 4:45 the nurse wanted to get a 20 minute strip on the fetal monitor before she checked me and called the midwife.  As soon as I sat down my contractions slowed down again to about every five minutes.  She checked me and said that I was 8cm and that Bonnie's head had come down quite a bit so she called the midwife to come.  As soon as the midwife arrived I told her she could go ahead and break my water so we could get this show on the road.  They gave me one last chance for an epidural and I didn't do it.  Most people with natural deliveries that I had talked to said that pushing was a relief and it was so much easier than the labor itself.  (I 100% disagree with them though)   I figured if I had made it that far I could go the rest of the way.  The midwife checked me before she broke my water and said that I was completely dilated.  At about 5:30 she broke my water and within a couple of contractions I was feeling the need to push.  I pushed and screamed and cried (I hadn't cried up until that point) my way through about four contractions and our beautiful baby girl arrived into this world.  I got to hold her on my chest for a long time and was immediately able to nurse her, something I wasn't able to do with Rudy since he had to be taken to the NICU.   Josh got to cut the cord and everything was perfect. 

We left the hospital the next morning around 11:00 and have been slowly adjusting to life at home.  We are definitely sleep deprived, but we feel so blessed to have this little love in our lives now. 

For all the haters..

Haha, I just wanted to say that because I really don't love taking pictures of myself with an extra thousand pounds on.  But this is for all of you ladies that have been begging. 

You're welcome. 

The Most Pregnant I've Ever Been

I'm 39 weeks + 3 days pregnant today, and I'm officially more pregnant than I've ever been.  I've been hoping to go a little bit early so that I'm not wasting my maternity leave, but starting last night around 9 pm I started hoping that I would go all the way to my due date.

Last Thursday Rudy started getting a runny nose and being particularly fussy.  I attributed it to teething, but I'm pretty sure that's not what it was now.  Last night I started getting a sore throat and have been pretty much miserable since then.  I really don't want to go through labor with a cold, and I REALLY, REALLY don't want to give a newborn a cold.  So, I'm hoping to hold off until this thing starts to subside. 

Bahaha.  I'll probably go into labor tonight.  That's just my style.

Here are a few cute Rudy pictures, just because....

Maternity Leave

Well, I'm finally on maternity leave!! Technically I am on vacation for 2 weeks, and then my maternity leave starts, but however you look at it, I'm not going back to work for a long time.  Woohoo!   I have slept better over the last few nights than I have in months and I am finally starting to feel less like a zombie and more like a human!  I've been able to cook, clean, hang out, and do some fun projects around the house.  My blog is one of my projects I've been hoping to put some time back into, especially with this little girl on the way.  I love having all of the posts from Rudy's first year because it's basically like a baby book for him!  Here are a few fun pics from the last few days/weeks since I know that's what everyone really wants! 

Rudy really likes wearing hats these days.  He doesn't really like to smile for pictures, but I told him I'd give him some candy if he smiled.  He REALLY likes candy. 

Look at this little stud in his Easter best. 

Rudy loves "Melmo."  And he loves this shirt.  And he loves this picture.  And when he looks at it he loves to say, "Melmo on the shirt."

One of my recent projects, bow making.  Definitely need a little bit of practice, but I'm starting to get the hang of it! 

And here's a little video for you.  I really don't know what prompted Rudy to do this.  But he decided that he needed to go to the corner and wipe his booty.  I think it's hilarious.