Almost there

I haven't posted much about this pregnancy, and now it's almost done. Here I was at 26 weeks:

 

And here's 36 weeks ( a week and a half ago.) What a difference 10 weeks makes, eh? And in another 10 weeks I'll have a sweet little 6 week old baby!

 

I'm getting more and more excited about this little boy. We still don't have a name picked out, but hopefully we'll know when we see him. I'm pretty much ready as far as preparing for the little guy goes, and I'm definitely ready to stop being pregnant! I dream about labor almost every night and wake up disappointed that it's still weeks away. But in the meantime, I'm trying to focus on my other baby

Daphne will be 17 months old this week. She is such a joy and a treasure (mostly.) In the last few weeks she got 5 new teeth all at once, and we finally weened her from the bottle. She has been such a fun little companion as she learns new words, forms opinions and asserts her personality.

 She started our her life as the most un-cuddly, un-affectionate child, but she's growing into those characteristics more and more every day. At night and naptimes she likes a good snuggle before I lay her down, she works so hard to arrange herself around my huge tummy and then hold on for dear life. It's pretty funny. She also likes to pat my tummy and poke my belly button, but I'm afraid the poor dear has no idea what she's in for.

 She loves to put on her coat and get in the car. She likes to take everything out of mommy's wallet and pretend to talk on the phone. Her favorite toy is whatever item I happen to be using. She likes to brush her hair and mine with whatever she can find that resembles a hairbrush, i.e. doll brush, bottle brush, toilet brush. And yes, she is getting some hair. But only in one strip right on top of her head. Mohawk? Yep.

Planning a career in bank robbery to help pay off dad's student loans.

 She loves babies and I'm so excited for her to be a big sister. I just hope and pray that I will be able to give her everything she needs while I'm juggling a newborn. Bryce has been so amazing getting up with her early in the morning and taking over when he gets home, not to mention listening to me complain about various aches, heartburn, hormones, etc. I constantly remind him that he has no idea what it's like to be pregnant and he should count himself lucky to be male. But the truth is, I definitely wouldn't put up with me, or someone acting like me for so long. My kids have the best dad!

Bath time is her favorite. It's only my favorite when she doesn't poop.

Duck Tales

 Last weekend Bryce and some buddies went duck hunting on the season's opening day. Between the four of them they got a pretty good number of birds, and lucky me, Bryce brought home a sack full of them.

The group shot down about 15 all together.

Getting up at 3 in the morning to go stand around in the freezing early air, waiting for ducks to fly by is not my idea of fun. Daphne and I had a sleepover with our friends Jenna and Macy and then went out for a yummy brunch. But I'm glad Bryce enjoyed it.

We're not food prudes, so we decided to cook the poor things. This is the duck cassoulet we made with the five birds he brought home.  It was surprisingly yummy, as long as I didn't dwell on where they came from.

I felt kind of proud of my hunter/gatherer for bringing home the bacon...or duck.

The Fortner's Visit

Bryce's parents came to visit and we had so much fun. The above picture is of Daphne expressing how sad she is they had to leave.

We mostly just hung out around the house. Chuck and Jan came to see us after spending time in Kansas City and Omaha visiting other grandkids, so they were a little tired by the time they got here. But we did have to show them the sights of course. We walked downtown and went to the Pres. Benjamin Harrison Home Museum. They came to church with us and Bryce and his dad played with the dogs.
And Grandma bought Daphne this pretty dress!
We're so glad they came and wish we saw them more often!

Adjusting

My first week and a half of being a new parent went so smoothly, I honestly couldn't have imagined it going easier. As we got closer to the two week mark things got exponentially more difficult. Hopefully we'll level out soon. But for now here are the ups and downs of new parenthood...

Downs first to get them over with:

1. My baby doesn't sleep during the day. Apparently naps are beneath her.

2. Mastitis sucks, and I don't think I even have a very bad case.

3. My bedroom permanently smells like baby poop, even though I can't seem to find any lingering traces anywhere.

4. I'm no longer allowed to go anywhere because my little lady is only comfortable when she's being held or swaddled and it's illegal to drive while holding or nursing your baby.
5.Miss Daphne always cries the loudest and the hardest when I decide to finally get in the shower.
6. My house is messy, and I would so much rather sleep than clean it.

As for the ups:
1: I get to snuggle and kiss this cutie all day long (and I do mean all day long because she is awake all day long!)

2. I've always hated blow drying my hair, and now I don't have to because I'm never leaving the house again.

3.Bryce is such a cute daddy! He literally pushed me over to get to the baby first when she was crying last night.

4. I've never felt so happy and emotionally healthy in my entire life as I do right now.

5. Baby smell, soft baby skin, cute baby noises, baby kisses.

6. You probably can't tell, but in this picture all of the mail is addressed to my infant. This is all the mail we got Saturday; I have become obsolete. That's totally fine-she's welcome to start pitching in and paying some bills!

7. My messy house doesn't even bother me that much because I'm cloistered upstairs snuggling my tiny sweetheart.

8. Half my preggo weight has fallen off! I know I have a long way to go and the rest of the lbs aren't going to disappear quite so easily, but Man! I feel skinny compared to a few weeks ago.

9. Baby laundry is so much cuter than regular old adult laundry. It doesn't even feel like a chore to wash all those pooped-on sleepers.

Wouldn't trade these days and nights for anything!

I was making cookies tonight and as I started splattering and spilling ingredients all over myself I made the comment that I probably needed to put an apron on.

Bryce looked at me, then in all seriousness said:

"Will any of your aprons even fit you right now?"

I'm trying to chalk this up to a skewed male understanding of how aprons work. As any woman knows, a generic tie-in-the-back apron will pretty much fit anything. They're one size fits all. Thick or thin, rotund or slim, most aprons will fit any person.

I'm trying not to let his comment (which under the surface meant "you've become enormous and absolutely nothing else fits you right now") make me feel bad about eating those cookies that I just made. They look too delicious!

I'm outta here!

Beach towel, sunscreen and a stack of good books. We leave for JAMAICA on Monday morning and I am ready!

Last night we tried to take a picture of the fireflies. There are so many, it looks like someone is dumping gold glitter all over the trees. But fireflies don't show up very well against the black.


Sometimes when Bryce is supposed to be mowing the lawn, he ends up playing around taking silly pictures. Usually they're of his dog, but sometimes he experiments with other subjects.

And here is the tummy at 26 weeks.

So I hope you all have a nice week. The Fortners will be in paradise!

Do I know you?

It's the weirdest thing...for the last 2 weeks or so, there has been a strange man wandering in and out of my house at the oddest hours.

I hear him walking around early in the morning before I get up for work. I am vaguely aware of him coming into my room at night when I've already gone to bed. Last week he was clutching a set of fake teeth. This week when I've past him on the stairs a time or two I have heard him muttering something about the musculo-skeletal system.

He's very tall, handsome, usually dressed in blue scrubs and somewhat familiar...but a stranger none-the-less.

BYRCE

Did anyone else notice I was spelling my husbands name wrong on my blog for over a month?
I am married to Bryce, not Byrce.
Like I said, my brain is missing. Now let's add that I forgot how to read too.