we have been busy...

Eric had yesterday and today off and we were deciding what we wanted to do. We had been talking about putting some trim moulding up in the new baby's room and so I sprung the idea on him to go price it out at Home Depot. Before we knew it, we had it all loaded up in our cart and were ready to get started. We painted the trim first with one of my dad's paint sprayers. Then we got busy cutting and putting it up. Today, it is all up, caulked and spackled and now we need to do the paint touch-ups. I am planning on painting below the trim in a green color, but I am waiting for the new bedding that I ordered to get here (it is supposed to be here today, FedEx always gets here late in the day, aarrrg!). We still have plenty of time til the baby gets here but I figured I might as well get it done while I have the energy and time!

Here are the before pics:

And here it is with the trim up:

Please excuse the mess! This room has been the guest/junk room for the last few months. I can't wait to get it all organized and ready. I will post another picture once I get the green painted - I am so happy with how it is turning out.

Have a great weekend!

we're still rockin'....

For any of you who were wondering if the coolness of the new toothbrush has worn off...it hasn't! I believe his love for it has probably just grown. In fact, he is on a mission to tell each and every person we come into contact with all about his toothbrush and how much he loves it and Guitar Hero. The conversation usually goes something like this:

Charlie: Hi! What is your name?

Stranger: {insert name here}

Charlie: That's a cute name. My name is Charlie. I have a Kiss toothbrush that plays Rock n' Roll all night like from Guitar Hero. Have you ever played Guitar Hero? I have a small guitar and a big guitar, but I am not allowed to play with my daddy's guitar. My toothbrush plays music while I brush and I dance to it....(and on and on and on!)

He usually gets some pretty funny looks and smiles from the strangers. They are always so impressed by how well he speaks and how much he loves Rock n' Roll all night. Of course, they are usually confused about the singing toothbrush part, but they don't ask questions. He has become such a social butterfly and will talk to anybody and everybody. So cute.

You may have also noticed that he says the stranger has a "cute name". This is also something new - he says that everything is "cute". When we went to Port of Subs yesterday he told the lady making our sandwich that it was a "cute Port of Subs". When we were at Babies R' Us, all of the toys he saw were "so cute". When we looked at a house with Eric last week, he said "those sure are cute kitchen cabinets." And when I helped him put his shirt on this morning, he looked in the mirror and said "I look cute today". Hmmm....wonder where he may have heard that from? :)

Here are a few pictures from when we went to the park last week:


I just LOVE the last picture! He looks so serious. He would have never gotten on this last year - he has gotten so much more independent and courageous this year at the park. My Mr. Cautious - so happy to see him branching out.

some catch-up...

It has been a crazy, emotional week! I wanted to say thank-you to everybody who has been praying for us and has been our support system the last few weeks. I have GREAT news. We got the test results and the baby is healthy and doing great. We also found out that we are having a..........


BOY!!!


I am feeling so grateful and also very surprised...We are very happy that we will be having another little boy running around this house causing trouble. So, if you have any great name suggestions, I would love to hear them.

We have been keeping busy and enjoying the beautiful summer weather. We went to the pool for the first time this year. Even though Charlie was hesitant about it and kept saying he didn't want to swim, once he got in he was a little fish that did not want to leave. I, trying to work on getting rid of my farmer's tan, got sunburned. Not too bad, but painful enough. Wednesday, we went to the park and enjoyed a picnic lunch with Eric on his day off. We ended up coming home with a small duckling that had been abandoned at the pond. He was looking pretty bad and Eric did not have the heart to leave him. We took care of him for a few days, but unfortunately, that story does not have a happy ending. On Friday night we went to the Meridian Dairy Days Parade with Rodger and Anita. The weather was perfect and we had the best seats. We enjoyed all the junk food from the vendors. Then after the parade we took Charlie over to the carnival rides and he rode on the Merry-Go-Round and some of the small rides by himself. He was so pleased with himself for going by himself! Of course, I forgot my camera so no pictures! Bummer.

I have had many requests for more video of Charlie singing so here are some videos for your viewing pleasure. Aunt Dorothy, the second one is especially for you....Charlie sings the goodnight song every single night - I love how he says your name!

happy father's day....

We had a great Father's Day weekend. On Friday night we went over to Rodger and Anita's for a BBQ. We grilled up some ribeyes and enjoyed the beautiful evening outside.
This morning we went to McDonalds for breakfast with my mom and dad and then Eric went to work for a little while. This afternoon we met up again with my parents and went bowling and then got some pizza. Just a fun, relaxing weekend spent with family.



Here are some pictures of the book I made for Eric. I made him one last year and he really seemed to like it, so I thought I would do it again this year.

strawberry pickin' fun....

Today Charlie, G-Pa and I hit the local berry ranch and picked some strawberries. We took the hay ride from the barn out to the patch and got right to work. Charlie needed some reminding to only pick the red ones, but he became a pro pretty quickly. He ate most of the ones he picked, but that's the fun of it, right?

Thanks, G-Pa for coming with us, we had fun with you today!

And thanks to everybody for their prayers regarding our tests. I had another test completed on Tuesday that will give us some definite answers so we are patiently waiting for those results. I appreciate all your concern, thoughts and prayers, you are wonderful!

I am hoping to finish up a little father's day project I am working on tomorrow (well, I guess I have to - I am running out of time!) I will post pictures when I am done. Hope you all have a wonderful weekend!

a few prayer requests.....

So, it's been a rough afternoon. The doctor called with the test results on the genetic testing that they completed last week...the news was not as positive as we had hoped. Nothing is definite and it is all just percentages, but it is still hard to hear all the same. We have an appointment tomorrow to go over the options of how we should proceed. Please pray for us - that we will have a peace with the next step and that we will have the strength to do what we want, not just what the doctors want.

My brother could also use some prayer as well. A few weeks ago his apartment was broken into and he was robbed. They did not get as much as they hoped because my brother's neighbor had caught them in the act. Apparantly, they did get a set of his car keys though because when Jon went to go to work this morning, his car was gone. He is pretty shaken up and feels violated, frustrated and angry. I feel so bad for him and know he could use some encouragement.

On a lighter note, this evening I went through the drive-thru at Taco Bell for some dinner. As I handed the cashier my card, she said "Oh, no need, the lady in front of you paid for your dinner." What an unexpected, nice thing to do. She must have known I needed it :)

rock and roll all night.....

Eric mentioned to me the other day that we should get Charlie one of those toothbrushes that plays music for two minutes. So when I was at Target yesterday I thought I would check them out. Most of them were all High School Musical themed so I was going to pass. Then I saw one with the group KISS on it and I thought how odd is that for a kids toothbrush? I looked at it closer and saw that it played "Rock and Roll all Night" and I knew it was absolutely perfect. For those of you who may not know, Charlie has become a HUGE fan of this song since his dad started playing Guitar Hero. Everytime Eric plays, he requests Rock and Roll all Night over and over. Once we got home and I showed him what the toothbrush did he was over the moon excited about it. He played with it until his nap and then it was the first thing he asked for when he woke up. We took it away from him after a while telling him that it was not a toy but a toothbrush. Then he just kept asking to brush his teeth. We told him not till bedtime. At about 7:00 (his bedtime is 9:00) he started to ask if he could go to bed. Eric brought the flip upstairs with him and shot this video of Charlie rocking out with his toothbrush. It is dark at first, but stick with it. The music from the toothbrush is very quiet so you can't hear it, but you can hear Charlie, just be sure to have your sound up. Don't you just love how he is using his right hand to strum his guitar? :)

a very sweet surprise....

I spent the entire morning cleaning the house from top to bottom. I had just finished putting Charlie down for his nap and sat down to take a break and I hear someone at the door. I wasn't expecting anybody, so imagine my surprise when there was a woman standing there to hand me these:

A very sweet surprise from my VERY sweet friend Heidi - just because. Thank-you so much Heidi, you really brightened my day and made it special. :) You are such a dear friend and I am so blessed to have you in my life. (I tried to call you to say thanks, but my phone is acting up - I will keep trying this weekend!)

I have also been meaning to post an update about my first trimester screening that I had on Wednesday. I was really looking forward to this appointment because I wanted to see the baby again, but I was a little anxious because of my past experience. When I was pregnant with Charlie it seemed like we were always receiving bad news at these appointments and I was not sure if I would be ready for that this time. Luckily, all went great! The baby is right where it should be and was moving around like crazy. The heartbeat was 165. My blood pressure was the lowest it has been since we have been monitoring it. It really was a great visit...until we had to meet with the genetic counselor. Eric and I had pretty much already decided prior to the visit that we weren't interested in doing any genetic testing for Trisomy 18 or 21. The genetic counselor did not want to take no for an answer. I think this is when I realized exactly how emotional I was about this pregnancy. As I broke down in front of this woman that I did not know, I realized that while I was scared out of my mind about this pregnancy, I also feel so much peace at the same time. I guess I know that I have already handed this pregnancy to the Lord and I know it will all unfold how he wants it to, but it is still easy to let that fear creep in sometimes. I thought about all that bad news we gotten last time and I also thought about all the "clues" that we were given along the way that may have let us know what we were in for. When we decided to go through with another pregnancy it was because we felt informed this time around. We knew what we may be in for and we felt okay about it. In the end, I finally just gave up and let the lady take my blood. I am sure there will be many more ups and downs on this emotional roller coaster. :) (I did get a disc with some photos from this ultrasound, but they were worse than the first ultrasound, how can that be possible?)

I am looking forward to the weekend, hope you all have a great one!