Wii are Family

I have always been a girl that loves to play Nintendo games as well as games on the computer. I don't even know that I've ever even played a single game on a Sega system or an Xbox. I'm just a loyal fan of Nintendo. Thank goodness that I married a guy that feels similar in their choice of gaming systems.

Trevor is also fast becoming one of us with the Wii, a few computer games, and the Leapster. I bought the Leapster as a distraction toy for when we were traveling last January to Boston and then to Mexico. I had heard that "new" toys really keep them occupied for a good while. I was thinking about hiding the Leapster and only bringing it out for car trips and such, but then I thought that as long as I monitored how much he played the games, it would be ok. Lately, all three games have clicked for him. Part of it has to do with his dexterity, and some of it is trial and error. I'm really happy to see that one of his Leapster games has him actually writing numbers and letters, and I can hear that he is learning how to draw them very appropriately.

As far as the Wii goes....he REALLY gets into it, and gets a wonderful work out. This is a VERY big plus for me as I'm very much a blob and while I can walk around, running, jumping, and chasing are not a possibility at this time. So yesterday, Trevor got a nice workout and finally figured out how to bowl. Plus he is really good at it. He loves to beat the records, and is really working on his hardest sport: tennis. I can play with him or watch. He doesn't care.

And now that we just bought two additional remotes, all 3 of us can play along. Golfing is pretty fun. I'm pretty sure we are less than a year away where Trevor will be beating both of us at these games. He just takes to it so well. Must be in his genes.

Unfortunately, I don't have anything new to report on the new baby front. The tests I thought they would run are for next week. But it's not like they would help me go into labor. So here I sit, waiting another week for an appointment. I'll be sure to post if anything changes.....

Well, we made it this far.....

Yep, today is D-day. And another day where nothing is going on. After hearing at my last appointment that they will not let me go to 42 weeks, I think the thing that has been keeping me sane is knowing that I only have 13 more days AT MOST left of this pregnancy. It has kept me in a better mood knowing that I do have an end date through all of this. I think it has lowered my stress, pain, and insomnia. Now what's interesting to me is everyone around me and people that know I'm now past my due date. I have been getting a lot of sympathy comments. Which are kind of odd. There isn't anything I can do about it. It's one of those things that doesn't help to dwell on it, as I've found out. I probably could have avoided a lot of stress if I had just accepted the fact that this baby is not going to be here early like Trevor was.

Of course I could get surprised at my midwife appointment tomorrow. They start monitoring baby movement, measure for enough amniotic fluid, and I'm sure run a few standard tests. I guess there is a chance that things don't measure where they should, so they might have to induce, but I'm guessing that's just false hope on my part. I'm STILL not swelling except for the last few hours in the day. My blood pressure has remained within a few numbers of how I always am. And I'm actually still sleeping ok...once I relaxed and stopped worrying about when the baby would be here. I do, however, feel bad that a lot of the extended family are starting to have to go on a few trips for work and sports.....and I would feel bad if I had the baby at that time. But again, I don't think I can help it.....hopefully they will forgive him/her when they meet it.

I'll be back another day with the midwife appointment update. Wish us luck in these last few days!!!

Last day of being "early"

And no sign that anything is going to happen today. I guess I should feel happy that I haven't a lot of false labor thoughts. Like I haven't already been to the hospital 3 times only to be sent back home. It probably will happen quickly and I'll know right away. But it doesn't help that it hasn't happened yet.

So today is the last "early" day I can have the baby. After this date, I'm either having it on the due date (tomorrow) or I'll go LATE.......aarrrgghhh. I'm curious to see how the midwives will handle me on Wednesday for my appointment. Will they be sympathetic because they too didn't think I would make it this far? Will they be accepting like I am that this baby will come on his/her own time? I do have to start taking what are called Non-stress tests where they monitor the baby for I think 20 minutes or so? Making sure it moves appropriately, there is enough amniotic fluid remaining, and a few other things I'm not sure about. I may even have to schedule another appointment before a week.

Interesting stuff.....I'll let you know how it all goes. In the mean time, Trevor has been taking everything in stride. Russ has been helping me out with any miscellaneous projects around the house, and Trevor loves to be daddy's little helper.

This week, Trevor gets to go to the Children's Theater with "Bubba" on Sunday. I'm excited to hear how he will like that. I haven't taken him to a movie since Cars came out a year and a half ago. But the Children's Theater shows are less than an hour I believe.

And THEN.....here comes SEASON PREMIERE week. Russ is getting up to speed on Heroes, which we will keep as taped until he sees all of last season. At least I can watch a few other shows in the mean time...so I should be kept plenty busy. Then when the baby is here, I'll fall WAY behind. Hopefully the DVR can hold enough that I can just keep them for when I do have some time.

So that's what's been on my mind for today. Keep those labor vibes coming, for any of you that want to meet the baby soon. ;-)

Bringing you up to speed....

Hello all,

I'm very sorry that I haven't felt up to blogging lately. I can't exactly say things have been hectic here, although I really wish they were. As that would mean baby would be here. But nope. 2 days left until the due date, and at this point I have given up all hope that it will be here by then, and even the fact that I will have a September baby. And BELIEVE ME we have tried every "natural" way of inducing as possible.....this baby just wants to stay put.

Dealing with the fact that I'm still pregnant has been a big source of anxiety for me. And I also mistakenly thought that I might be able to convince the midwives to induce me possibly this week. After talking with them, their policy is no earlier than 41 weeks, no later than 42 weeks. After hearing that, and having my little melt-down, I have become much more accepting of what I can and cannot change, and how that impacts my own health and well-being.

So here I sit, having gotten done just about everything I could have possibly wanted to do before the baby gets here which leaves me with the boring activities of doing simple up-keep on the house and such. I'm not in a huge amount of discomfort, sleeping ok...especially since I let all the stress go.....and trying not to expect anything so as not to be disappointed.

I cannot be thankful enough that T is in preschool. He seems to be loving it. If I can get him to talk to me directly after it ends, he gives me a pretty good account of what happens, and what he learns. He is REALLY into the religious aspect of school. Last week they toured the church, and he loved talking to me about all the places God was, including his actual preschool room.

Trevor is also getting much better at both his Leapster and playing the sports games on the Wii. The Leapster is great for getting him a little more practice with things like math and reading skills, and the Wii really gives that kid a work-out because he gets so excited when he plays baseball or golf.

His reading skills are really coming along too as evidenced when he plays the Wii. In golf, it will congratulate you by putting the words "birdie, par, Bogey, double Bogey" after you have finished the hole. I know we haven't mentioned those words to Trevor yet, but when he saw the words on the TV, he thought the words translated to: "party, park, birdie, big birdie"

Anyway....that's what has been going on with us lately. I do promise a big welcoming post when the baby is here, so don't worry that I will forget about it. It has just been a little disappointing on my own part, and I haven't felt as up to it as I usually do. Thanks for everyone's understanding!!!

Sorry so long....

No, I haven't had the baby yet, but hopefully in the next two weeks it will be here.

Here are T's first day of school pictures:

Notice the nice bag that mom made for him ;-)

Starting to read

Another thing I've noticed lately, is that I think the concept of putting letters together to make words is finally sinking in. A LOT of it is simply remembering colors and symbols together with letters that make specific words (Like McD's, Target, Stop on a Stop sign, etc.) but we were at a restaurant Friday night and trying out making letters into words.


It is pretty cute, and a very proud mommy moment. It's not even so much that he gets things correct, it's that he tries, based on what he knows things to "sound" like. Some of them then jog his memory into a word he knows, and some just stay a little different sounding than the word that they are. The one that he really worked at was "Buzz". It sounded just like it was supposed to, but with two "Z" sounds at the end.


He is still "reading" his books by memory, but I'm pretty sure he's going to start putting that together too. And he also likes to play the game with me of "what does this spell?" But this is just another reason why I think preschool has started at a great time for him. Not that they even introduce any sort of words/reading, but I know they teach things, and he just seems ready to learn.

Speaking of preschool, yesterday was the first true day of school. I will post the first day of school picture in a little bit. Nothing too big to speak of. I think a lot of their day is playing with toys and each other until they establish rules and schedules with the kids. But Trevor was already asking when he can go back, so I think he's very happy to be there.

I guess I can read minds ;-)

I've always been able to sense what other people are thinking/feeling to a certain degree. Specifically people that I'm close to, not strangers on the street or anything. But really, it has come in handy A LOT with Trevor. Some of that has to do with the fact that he and I have a lot of the same personality traits, so I can get what he is thinking even without him saying anything.

Now I'm not perfect, especially if he was with someone else and he is telling me what happened. If I wasn't there, I don't know exactly what happened, but he's pretty good at expressing what he wants.

There have been a few examples of this recently. One was when we were at McD's. Unfortunately, I have learned that being this pregnant, Trevor knows he can quickly run away from me and get away without me being able to catch him. So we were finishing up, getting ready to leave, when I KNEW he was going to take off. I even stopped him and said, wait for me to hold my hand. I had to throw away the garbage. As I was walking to throw it away, he took off for the main entrance. I quickly scooted out the side exit and got to the front door before he could get out and into the street. I caught him just as a car was coming down that part of the road. No, the cars don't go fast at that point, but still....I KNEW he was going to run into the street, and unless I have a death grip on him, he wants to do what he wants to do.

Another time, we were driving up to "Grandma's" house and looking at the watertowers we were passing by. One of the ones was in a town called New Hope. He quickly asked if New Hope was like on "Star Wars". For those of you that aren't familiar - Star Wars Episode IV is titled "A New Hope". Trevor and Russ were playing a Star Wars Lego game on Nintendo where they had the story scrolling on the screen like they do in the movies. So Russ would read about "A New Hope" and Trevor thinks its pretty cool that New Hope is just like on Star Wars ;-)

And most recently, we have been talking A LOT about the new baby. Actually, a lot about when things happen. Specifically birthdays and such. But there are lot of things going on in September. So we've been talking about how Trevor starts school, Amy, Brian, and the new baby's birthday is in September (at least I hope so).... So through these talks, Trevor has always said that he first goes to school, then it's Amy's birthday, then the baby is coming. I don't ever remember saying that the baby would come after Amy's birthday, but I couldn't say for sure it would or wouldn't.

Well, Friday evening we went up to Grandma's house, and celebrated Amy's birthday. Immediately after we sung happy birthday, Trevor got very scared that the baby was RIGHT THEN going to come out, and he was going to have to watch. I knew exactly why he was scared and tried to calm him down. While we have brought Trevor to a few of my dr. appts he has always been really afraid whenever the doctor has gotten too close to me. We play doctor a lot with Dr. Trevor listening to the baby's heartbeat, but that's as far as he wants to go. He's not actually afraid of having a baby around, it's the actual act of me HAVING a baby. Thank goodness I haven't wanted to have Trevor in the delivery room with me. If it comes to it, I would much rather Russ and Trevor wait outside and me be by myself than put Trevor through that trauma.

Anyway, it really is nice to have a child I'm so connected with. It also makes it easy for me to tell if he really isn't sure about something, or if he is answering the best way he knows how. I can see it and feel it in his eyes. The goofball. I'll be sad when he grows to the point of not being around me as much. He is such a cool kid.

We made it! First day of school!

It finally came! Although it wasn't a true first day of school, it was the first day that Trevor was able to go to preschool, visit with his classmates, and play with his teachers. It was only an hour visit and normally preschool goes from 9:00 until 11:30 but it was a great way to get him introduced to the place and people. The parents were asked to leave and get some paperwork, have some discussions, etc. Unfortunately, we were not told this beforehand. We just thought it was a chance for us to play with the kids for that hour to get them used to the place. So when we were separated, there were a few tears but according to the teachers, the kids settled down quickly. (Trevor did fine....he's not really going through a separation anxiety this week ;-)

Parents got a bunch of paperwork and were introduced to the programs at both the church and preschool. Kids got a snack and I think a story. Trevor's friend Elizabeth is attending the same preschool so they were chatting as soon as they saw each other in the parking lot. E's mom and I were remarking that this could not have come at a more perfect time. Although we play with our kids, it just feels like they are entering a new realm of development where they could use a lot more stimulation and chances to learn things than we can give them. And we will be given a weekly lesson plan so instead of trusting the kids on answering the "what did you do in school" question we can tell them what we know they learned.

Upon my return to the class, Trevor was happy as always to see me. He also was very excited to show me that he learned about the weather. Now, he has picked up things about the weather like rain, sun, snow, and the seasons, but it was clear that he had never really talked about it in terms of "weather". So he had to show me what he "learned" and what happens when is all the different types of weather outside. MY does this kid love to learn and teach me about what he learns.

So - all-in-all I think it was a great experience. I'm feeling really happy about the choice in preschools and think he'll have a great time. And maybe even get tired out enough to have regular naps on Tuesdays and Thursdays! It's going to make those days go by entirely too fast!

To Do's

It is so strange to think that starting next week, I'm going to have around 2 hours to myself when I drop Trevor off at preschool. I know I could get a lot more done if I was not pregnant, but I think it will give me a pretty good amount of time to get a little more organized.

While I'm not a very good person about making lists, I really like that feeling of being able to cross things off and throwing the list away when I'm done. It also feels good to know that a lot of the things that I do need to do will not take much of my time. Organizing, laundering, sorting, etc.

The bigger projects I have been working on are things I am almost done with, so it will be nice to have those taken care of.

Sorry this post isn't going to be all that interesting, but I promise coming up, there will be plenty to talk about. Trevor's first day of preschool (where the parents are there) is tomorrow. And we are very excited about it. Hopefully he'll be ok getting up earlier than today. It is 8:38am and he is still asleep. Seeing as preschool starts at 9:00, we have to change this routine, and fast.....

Labor Day Holidays past....

You know, I always think about how it was growing up...the things we did as a family, vacations, trips to see relatives, etc....and compare it to what we do. I think part (most actually) of the big difference is the fact that my grandparents, and even all my aunts and uncles AT LEAST required a 3 hour car-ride to visit. My grandpa lives and has always since I can remember in Florida. GREAT for when we take a spring break in the middle of a cold and snowy winter.



Labor Day weekend, until my parents bought the cabin, was spent at Piney Ridge Lodge. It was a cabin-like place off of a big lake, up even more north than we already lived. About 3 hours. Not quite in the direction of Duluth, but still a while to drive. Although the cabins that you can rent do have all the nice hotel amenities, like cable TV, we always had the same cabin. Two beds, two twin beds up on a loft, but no TV. It caused us to find our own activities, or other activities. It was right on a lake...so sometimes it would involve a boat, more often it would be tennis, racquetball, or golf. Late at night, we might even get a treat by having dad take us to the really tiny "bar" type place. They had a pool table, jukebox, a popcorn machine....hmmm...what else? I think it was just the opportunity to stay up late. Oh, and another thing, we ate dinner and breakfast at the lodge. Lunch we did on our own. If it ever rained, we usually broke out a new puzzle.

So those are some of the activities we did as a family on our Labor Days. A lot of the holidays really have me wonder how and what we should do to start our own traditions. Not to say we haven't already, but there are going to be times when we should do things as our own family. I know in the years to come, there will be plenty of activities that will be keeping us busy, and some time away from all of that will really be welcome.

But as for this Labor Day (and FYI....no labor for this mom-in-waiting ;-), we had a very low-key but relatively nice weekend. Trevor was in one of his really good listening moments. Perhaps because we didn't rush him from place to place and activity to activity like we sometimes do. Or perhaps it was because he got a decent amount of sleep and was still able to run off a lot of energy. Whatever the reasoning, he was a great "listener" and that always makes it that much more enjoyable for the parents.

What will future holidays bring? Who knows. For now, we'll just have to enjoy what we have.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY #2 ELLIE!!!!

Just wanted to say that we wish "Baby Ellie" a HAPPY 2nd Birthday! Sorry we couldn't be at the cabin to see you guys this weekend, or last weekend at the reception, but hope to see you again soon! It has been a fun summer playing with you guys at the lake, at the park, and riding around in the wagon (and on your toys).

Love, Trevor ;-)