No News Is Frustrating News

I have been waiting, not very patiently, for my Dr.'s appointment today so that Sean and I could get another peek at this baby and finally know if we've got a Mr. or Miss on our hands. Everyone I talked to this week seemed to dreamily reminisce about how they waited to find out the sex of their baby until it was born. I always replied something along the lines of "How very nice for you but I'm quite certain my head would explode if I tried to wait that long, pregnancy and childbirth are full of surprises and well I GOTTA KNOW". I'm, uh, not very laid back about some things, can you tell?

Well, in we marched at 8am sharp, and the ultrasound tech proceeded to poke and prod and huff and puff in frustration.

Her: "They're in a really low position and I can't see the brain very well, or the heart or the abdomen"
Me: "Yes, yes, right, whatever, keep going"
Her: "I can try and figure out the sex though.....(we waited for about 100 years here)....nope. The legs are crossed and they won't move".

NO. Nooooooooooooo. No no no no no.  This baby is grounded! Time out for you baby. The tech then said she'd venture a guess that it's a girl simply because she couldn't see any hint of boy parts, no matter the angle she tried, but we'll just have to wait two more weeks and they'll try again. Even though she had a difficult time seeing the rest of the organs they all look great. A healthy baby, but a stubborn one it seems.  

At least there's lots to do in the meantime. Aiden starts school in 2 weeks. We finally caved at bought his school supplies and are going to restock his wardrobe this week since he's grown out of every last item of clothing except a handful of tee shirts. He's had lots of play dates with fellow new-kindergarteners and gets to go on a practice bus ride this week. I have every confidence that he will have a great time at school, but I am worried about whether or not he'll actually get on the bus without hysterics. 

Rory is still not walking on his own*, although he will happily walk around just barely touching someone's hand. It like in the old road runner cartoons however: the minute he realizes he's walking or standing without holding on he just plunks right down to the floor. At least Aiden loves to hold his hand and walk around the house in circles over and over again. Hopefully with a little more practice he'll be confident enough to let go.

We're going to try and fit in a few more fun activities before the end of summer. Today I took the boys to the science museum to see an exhibit on dinosaurs and it was only as we were walking in that I realized maybe big moving and roaring dinos might be a little scary for the kids. Whoops. Aiden was a little scared at first but warmed up as we went along while Rory being Rory was ready to fashion a saddle out of my purse and ride them around the room.    

   

  

These two guys have been so much fun this summer that I can't even imagine the hijinks that will come with a third.

 

* About three hours after I wrote this Rory was clinging for dear life to the edge of the table where he spied some grapes he was not supposed to have. He then grabbed those grapes and WALKED away across the kitchen all by his lonesome while stuffing them in his mouth. So there. HE WALKS. 14 months old.

The Afternoon Drive

These pictures sum up every one of our summer afternoons. These two boys driving around in the Cozy Coupe. Illogically, Rory insists on pushing even though he can barely keep up and Aiden insists on riding inside with his long legs held up at an awkward angle. Hours and hours are spent like this, around and around the yard.

3 Is The Magic Number

Almost everyone in our family/our friends/people we barely know keep asking why I haven't posted anything here in awhile. My mom was complaining that I only post once a season. Well, to tell you the truth, I haven't posted in awhile because I wasn't feeling that great. I was feeling terrible actually. That's was morning sickness will do to you. Oh, yeah, ANOTHER BABY. Good gracious we just had one right? I mean, we are so young! Three kids! That's crazy! And yes, this has been the soundtrack running through my head for the past four months.

I always wanted three...eventually. But wow, we still have a baby (since Rory refuses to walk, I refuse to call him a toddler since, you know, he's not toddling). Anyway, there is so much to consider this time around since Rory will only be 19 months, and our SUV can't fit three car seats so we're either getting a new monster SUV or succumbing to the dreaded van, and just....wow. THAT'S A LOT OF KIDS.

I'm fifteen weeks along, baby looks good so far, our last ultrasound showed a very calm baby who was happy to pose for all the necessary measurements. Aiden was the same way, always calm. Rory, on the other hand, left us with a very frustrated ultrasound tech and several blurry sonogram printouts. It all makes so much sense.

I'll share more news as we have it, such as gender, which we'll find out at the end of the month. I don't think I even need to say what I'm sort of hoping for this time around.

In other news, summer is trucking along. Aiden is done with his plethora of camps, all of which he loved, and we'll be spending August mostly just hanging out before the craziness of kindergarten starts. Watching him and Rory everyday makes me feel so lucky they have each other. Rory does his best to keep up with Aiden and they've invented a game where Rory pushes Aiden around in their little toy car, despite frequently losing control a toppling over. Rory has no fear and is definitely the more aggressive one. It's actually surprising how fearless he can be. One day he and Aiden were sitting on the ground fighting over a toy lawn mower and before I knew it Rory had King Konged his way up Aiden's back and started pummeling him in the head. Yikes. I fear the teenage years but I have no worries about Rory "getting lost" as the middle child.  Other than that incident they really do get along well.

Here's a glimpse of Rory's Angry Face:

 He looks so innocent. Don't believe it.

Someone has his first loose tooth!

 LOVELY.

 

Both of these boys are in desperate need of haircuts. Sean wants to let them grow it out. He's convinced they're going to look like this: 

Rrrrrright. Well, this is coming from the guy who wanted to name them Genghis and Spartacus. I shouldn't be surprised.


Anyway, they WILL be getting haircuts eventually. We're locked into sort of a holding pattern until the end of the month because I refuse to buy school clothes and supplies when it still feels like we're smack in the middle of vacation. Until I am forced to actually, finally get ready for school we'll just be over here playing soccer, riding bikes, pulling Rory out of the mud, taking walks, pulling Rory out of the neighbors garden and so on. 

Summer Is Here

It's summer, Aiden is out of school, and I have 5,000 pictures to prove it. I haven't posted anything in forevah, because we've had a lot going on. Here are some of those things:

Aiden finished his preschool career with the annual spring show which was full of adorable. He sang his little heart out despite the fact that it was only slightly cooler than the surface of the sun.

He is now officially Kindergarten bound! He went through the district pre-kindergarten testing and has been assigned to a class and even received his Official List of Class Supplies. He's just excited to get a new backpack. He's requested one with a snake on it. I'd better get searching.

His change in personality as of late has been completely astounding. He's gone from meek and tentative to being full of action and opinions. LOTS of opinions. He never went through a "terrible twos" but boy has five been a challenge. With this new personality in mind, I signed him up for several summer camps. In the past I would've had to pry him off my leg to get him into a new activity but now he's charging forward ready to try anything. ONe new major feat? He's riding his bike without training wheels. The confidence boost he's gotten from this accomplishment is just fantastic. He's becoming so self assured! He just finished a week of soccer camp and will be starting art camp this week. My baby in shin guards:

Magnet ball!

And of course we just celebrated Rory's 1st birthday.  He too has done a complete 180 personality-wise. He spent a lot of his first year suffering from colic, and then near constant teething and head colds. It was rough for everyone. Now however, he's Mr. Sunshine. Everything is funny and enjoyable and his loves to act like a ham. It turns out that he's also quite the snuggler. If he happens to find something (or someone) soft, he will crawl over to it and snuggle his face against it. Your shirt, a pillow, a blanket or your love handles. It doesn't matter. If it's squishy he wants to hug it. It's a little weird and a little nice. 

We did discover that he is not a fan of cake. We let him have his own special slice of birthday cake and he took one bite and pushed it off his try. No sweet tooth here.

Between the camps and the birthday and the other various activities the boys have had a lot of quality time to play together. They are becoming better friends and we've really enjoying have lots of unscheduled time to enjoy the season.

 

One.

I have a million things I'd like to write down about how our summer is going so far, and I will, but today is just for someone special:

Happy First Birthday Rory!

May!

It's May and everything has bloomed! It seems like within a week the trees went from a few small buds to big green leaves and all the flowers have burst open. It's been gorgeous out and we've spent all week at the park and taking walks.

I remember last year in May when it seemed like nature had cozied right up to our front door and we stumbled upon duck eggs in the yard and a baby rabbit in our (now covered!) window well. This year has been no different. We live in the suburbs and although a small portion of our back yard is fenced, the area beyond the fence is a mess of woods. Animals seem to loooove it. We've had all manner of creatures from deer to woodchucks come moseying on through our yard. This year it's started with what we assume to be a mink. It is longer and lower to the ground than a fox and has a shiny black coat. My brief google search says mink. Then yesterday we saw this guy:

A turkey, right? We have lots of wild turkeys in the area although we usually see them in the Fall. Aiden took out his binoculars and watched him before saying "Hey mom, he's eating a piece of paper" which I know is definitely not in the standard wild turkey diet. I looked for myself and yeah....that's a turkey vulture. Eating a fluffy bunny. It's the ciiiiircle of life! Like the wheeel of fortune! Nature in all it's glory right there. 

 

When he's not being scarred by scavenging birds, Aiden seems to be blooming right along with nature. Anyone who's met him knows he has a tendency towards being reserved if not out and out shy. It's no different at school. He has a lot of friends but he hangs back a bit and it takes him a while to warm up to everyone. Well, the past couple of weeks have been a complete 180. I picked him up from school one day and instead of walking out to the parking lot he walked into the center of the kids all milling around getting ready to go and said "I'm the fastest biker here and no one can catch me!" and hopped onto one of the trikes and took off. All the boys followed him and he started shouting out directions to everyone and they all listened. I just sort of stood there wondering who this kid was because he certainly wasn't the one I dropped off earlier in the morning.

He has come into his own all of the sudden. All the worry I had about whether he'd handle kindergarten and the bus ride have evaporated. The only thing is that this attitude is sometimes directed at Sean and I and while I want to nurture this new independence and self assurance, the constant back talk is pretty wearing.

Earlier in the year I had been 100% positive that Aiden wouldn't be ready for any kind of summer camp. New activities up to now have come with a lot of tears and clinging and I didn't want to spend the summer convincing him to please go have fun with the other kids. Well now with this new personality I'm on the verge of signing him up for everything. I know he'd for sure going to soccer camp and a craft camp but who knows how crazy we'll get.

He's currently in swim class, which loves and also cheats at because he's very tall and can sort of bounce across the pool bottom while all the other short kids are actually having to try and swim. He also fails miserably at the floating portion of the class because he has approximately .07% body fat and there is just nothing to keep him up. Other than that he's been rocking it.

On a whim I also signed both he and I up for a cupcake decorating class. I thought he'd be excited since he bakes with me all the time but when I told him about it he just stared at me like it was the dumbest idea he'd ever heard. Turns out it was AWESOME. Mostly because we got to take home six elaborately decorated cupcakes. Also, because I realized that he has a magical skill that few people old or young possess and that skill is: he can follow directions. Both parents and kids alike bickered and talked and daydreamed while the baking instructor talked but Aiden, hold on to your hats, payed attention and listened and then he went and did exactly what he was supposed to. WHOA. That's like 80% percent of success right there. I was so proud.

  

And since I haven't said a word about Rory yet, here are some parting photos. He's got four teeth coming in, all at the same time. Oh joy! He's been busy just holding himself together this week and wasn't really in the mood for having his picture taken. But here he is, doing what he does best: trying to get Aiden's attention and trying to eat stuff.

Dark Night of the Stomach and the Bright Light of Spring

Last Friday night we started our weekend by having dinner out. The weather was beautiful, the kids were great and I wasn't cooking. All good things. We got home from dinner, put the kids to bed and I felt exhausted. And weird. And then Aiden woke up covered in...vomit. Suddenly everything clicked. FOOD POISONING.

Aiden and I had shared a dinner, and within a half an hour of each other we were horribly ill. All night neither one of us slept, poor Sean ran back and forth and I tried to decide whether I was going to die or whether I just really hoped I was dying because I felt so awful. The next day we were still barely functioning. Both of our moms came over and brought (easily digestible) food and sympathy. Food poisoning was terrible. Until the next day when Sean got sick and my mom got sick and whoops that wasn't food poisoning happy stomach flu everyone! You're welcome, we love sharing, no need to send a Thank You note.

Sorry about that everyone we came into contact with. OUR BAD.

Luckily the baby never got it. Miracle of miracles. I have no idea how he avoided it. It didn't really matter that much however because he quickly came down with a pretty nasty cold. So all this past week we got nothing done, everyone was recovering from some bout of awful illness and there was just a whole lot of screaming and crying (even from me! Haha, alright, it was mostly just me. And Rory. We screamed a lot).

Needless to say, it was a rough week where I felt emotionally incapable of being a good parent and lamented not being able to take care of every little detail of our lives while regaining my strength and caring for sick kids. Fun stuff. Sean kept quietly whispering "And you still want a third kid? SERIOUSLY?". Yeah. I kind of do. Eventually. 3 would be nice. (Or 7. Or 15. Sorry, I need to keep myself in check here.)

However, this weekend pretty much made up for all of that awfulness. The weather finally acknowledged what the calendar has been saying for a month: it's Spring! We spent most of our time outside digging in the garden (me and Aiden) cleaning up the lawn (Sean) and eating grass and leaves (Rory). The kids ended each day sweaty, dirty and smelling like sunscreen. Basically, the proper way kids should look and smell.

 

  

 

Aiden also had his second swim class this weekend. I wasn't sure how he'd like having swim class in the giant High School pool with lots of new kids but he loves it. I'm pretty sure it's way too easy for him since he's already mastered most of the skills they're trying to introduce but we're kind of looking at it as a lesson in socialization. He's already gravitated towards the class clown as his new friend and has the teenage girl who assists with the class totally wrapped around his finger. Business as usual.

Rory is also learning some new skills as he decided to stand up. Out of the blue he decided he'd like to see inside the tub as it was filling with water and boom, there he was standing up, peeking over the edge and looking like he couldn't understand why Sean and I were shrieking with excitement. My guess is that he's never going to properly crawl. He'll do this weird army crawl and then he'll walk. That will be that.

Anyway, now that we're through with illness and ill weather everything is looking up. Here's a goodbye kiss from Rory: