will power

Tuesday, July 16, 2013

20 weeks

i just love how blue our bedroom looks in the morning. isn't that wall color pretty? i want to take it with us every time we move.

we are well into the second trimester now, aren't we? it's going by so fast this time. i often forget how far along i am or that i'm even pregnant. sometimes someone will ask me how i'm feeling and i'm like great, why are you asking? oh yeah. if my tummy wasn't bigger and if i didn't feel this baby almost constantly i wouldn't even be able to tell that i'm pregnant. that's the magic of trimester number two. it's always so nice to me.

i feel like i used to go on and on all the time to anyone who would halfway listen to me about being pregnant. it's no joke, being pregnant just isn't what it used to be when you've already got a little wild thing running around and distracting you. i'm struggling to find things to tell you about. cravings? i can't think of any. sleeping habits? i'm pretty sure kahree is in charge of how well i sleep at this point. weight gain? you don't wanna hear about something lame like that. although i am very proud of how well i've kept that under control this time around. i gained 45 pounds with kahree by the time she finally came. which i told myself was only 5 more than 40 and that's only 5 more than 35 which is the recommended number, right? well this time around they said that since i'm so short i should really be able to cap it at 25. so lots of running and not very many treats and we just might make it. now see, i've gone and talked all about weight gain anyway. can i think of anything more interesting?

movement. we can talk about feeling little babies move. it's so delightful. i can't remember exactly how far along i was when i felt kahree move. i think i was past 20 weeks. i felt this little baby around 14 weeks. and the stinker hasn't let up since. i thought kahree was surprisingly bold and brave when we started getting to know her, two introvert and shy parents and she's still as wild as a lion. for some reason i thought she was as crazy as we were going to get and i even feared she would bully the rest of our type b children with the strong hand of a big sister dictator. but the more i'm around the new baby the more i realized that it may quite the firecracker all on its own.

kahree held still during her ultrasounds and turned every way she was supposed to obediently. this baby refused to budge in any direction expect to throw kicks and punches with a fury, no matter how we tried to move it. kahree has sweet and timid little kicks until she got bigger and more crowded in there. this baby BEATS me. it's still pretty tiny and so not very strong yet but i fear for the day that there will be more force behind those movements. all the time, kick kick punch punch, all over. it reminds me of the feeling in your stomach when you go down a roller coaster, not painful but forceful, except for it's all the time. i'm not complaining...yet. so far i'm pretty impressed. but also worried. kahree is so good but she's so strong willed and independent. i think i was secretly wishing for a mild mannered child. i don't think this one is it. but that's okay. it's comforting too, like i know our little one can handle anything it needs to. at every point in this pregnancy when it seemed something was just going to go so wrong this baby seemed to be saying "it's alright! i'm still here! i'm fighting to stay with you, and i'm going to win." and that makes me smile. i'm ready to have another one of our children come stay with us for a while. no matter how many firecrackers we have running around. it'll be a party. all day, and probably all night too! i'm tired just thinking about it but still, bring it on.

guess what! we have another ultrasound on thursday! i think i already mentioned this but it's a special, super long and detailed ultrasound. i have to go to a different hospital than usual with different equipment and they said they are going to be checking everything, "head to toe," making sure nothing is wrong or unusual. and it's going to take at least an hour. can you believe that! i must be the luckiest girl in the world. i've always wished ultrasounds lasted so much longer and even though we originally planned this one with a few worries right now i'm just so excited. and we'll be finding out if this baby is a boy or a girl! i think if we didn't want to know we'd either have to close our eyes the whole time or find out anyway, but let me tell you, we want to know. we reeeeally want to know. i can't handle anymore crazy surprises this year and i need to be prepared. if you'll recall from last time my intuition isn't the greatest when it comes to these things, so i won't tell you what i've been thinking or hoping. just know that so far almost everyone has been united in their guesses but i'm still saying it can go either way, it really can. so here's your chance to put your bets in! only a couple more days and we'll KNOW, so guess now!

thanks for listening. we are starting to get so excited over here finally, halfway through, but it still feels like a dream sometimes. the best dream yet.

Monday, July 15, 2013

summer berries

friday night was a rough one. most nights kahree ends up in our bed but friday night she requested an entrance much earlier than usual. and she didn't feel one bit like sleeping.

when she spends the night with us i try to quietly coax her to sleep while disturbing craig as little as possible. it takes a lot of snuggles and back rubbing and bum patting. but goodness, she can be so stubborn. she shook me awake, wide awake herself, and wanted to have quite the lengthy conversation, ignoring my pleas to go back to sleep. sometimes i get so tired or frustrated i feel desperate. i wish i could keep calm all the time. she deserves more patience than i usually give. she always proves that she isn't a malevolent dictator after all, she's just so little and still learning how to show me what she really means.

eventually she slid off the bed and walked to our door, a tiny little ghost in her white pajamas. i got up with her and opened the door. she toddled to the kitchen without a word and stood in front of the fridge. when i opened it she picked up a container of blueberries that our friend jenny picked for us earlier that day. and plopped down on the kitchen floor.

she's been so hungry lately, eating every meal and snack i make and asking for more in between. she must be growing. i guess growing babies deserve nighttime snacks. and you know what, so do pregnant mommies. so we sat there quietly on the kitchen floor and split a whole container of blueberries between us at 11:30 at night. she popped them like candies. i took mine two at a time. it was perfect.

i wish i could tell you everything about kahree lately, everything she does and everything she says with her sweet, toddler voice. i'll try to tell you a little bit at least. she's been learning so many new words and she's even learning and remembering people's names. mostly family members but when we had a play date with a little boy named jaxon kahree told craig about it later, said some gibberish along with a very clear "baby jaggy!" she loves babies. she's got a lot of love in her.

we asked her what her favorite animal was one day. she said a word that sounded very much like "tiger." we don't talk about tigers much, they aren't in any of our favorite books and we've never taught her what they say. lions and bears, yes. tigers, not so much. so we asked her if she even knew what a tiger was. she got up and ran off. we figured she wasn't into our conversation and moved on. a few minutes later she came back with a little plastic tiger my dad gave to me. we keep it on a bookshelf in her room. i must've told her what it was once and she must've remembered. and that's her favorite animal now. so neat because when i was little it was my favorite too.

we've been spending our summer days with craig alternating between awesome adventures and serious relaxing time at home. we love both. we went to the beach with some friends the day after independence day and as soon as she saw the ocean she told me it was "water." water, like she asks to drink at home all day long. she knew just by looking at it. she loves being there as much as we do.

for the past 5 days the very first thing she says when she wakes up is "where's daddy?" and then she cries when i tell her he's at work. he had to work all weekend and i think she knew it was unusual. it breaks my heart but i love how much she adores him.

her favorite movie right now is "how to train your dragon." she brought me the case the other day and said "draggy!" and she hasn't let up since. every chance i give her to watch a movie she picks that one again. there's one part in the movie where she shouts "NO!" every single time. she can be so dramatic and adorable.

she's really hard to take anywhere these days. she just wants to run around as fast as she can. it makes church and doctor appointments and eating out pretty impossible. she's just so adventurous and curious. it's hard to deal with but i don't want to squash her spirit. every day we go outside just for the sake of exploration, at least for a little while. we've also been spending a lot of time at the pool, the splash park, and the library. she's all signed up for the summer reading program and it's been such a blast. she just loves books. craig and i read to her every night before bed and she never, ever wants it to end.

she has a little stuffed toy joker, maybe you've seen it. it's the only joker she's ever known, he's a cute little baby-esque villain and we haven't bothered to show her any of his other forms yet. but the other night i was wearing an old shirt of craig's with a stylized version of heath ledger's joker. she pointed at him and said "joker, joker!" she's the coolest. i worry for the day she realizes her snugly little joker pall isn't so nice sometimes. but she'll always have batman. always.

we laugh all the time. she tells me stories and jokes and laughs and laughs. we chase her through the house, tickling and tackling her, and she giggles so hard she can hardly breathe. when she wants to tickle us she grabs our feet and fake laughs with all her might, as though it's the sound of her laughter that forces us to do the same.

she's been giving high fives for a while but now if you present her with a fist and say "top shelf" she'll make a tiny fist and punch yours. kind of the best, ever. i wish so much she'd stay little but my resolve keeps slipping when she continues to get better and better the older she gets.

friday night, almost midnight. all of our blueberries were gone. i gave her some water and started closing the fridge door so we could head back to bed. she slipped in before i could and emerged with a carton of strawberries. here we go.

i love this summer.

Tuesday, July 9, 2013

june photo roundup

in june craig finished his degree.

then he went on a business trip that kahree and i fought to survive.

he came home and had a lovely father's day weekend with us.

then kahree and i finished up work for the summer and went on vacation to see my family.

many puppies were snuggled and puddles splashed.