a little scare

We were scheduled to go to the hospital for an orientation, tour and preregistering last night, but instead ended up in the labor and delivery triage. I had some complications yesterday throughout the afternoon and when I called, they wanted me to come in and monitor everything. Praise the Lord everything overall ended up being okay and the baby's doing well. I'm just supposed to take it easy, not do any major lifting and go back in a week. I really don't want to visit the triage again until September! And as it turned out, we were still able to join the tour group and go see the birth suites and nursery.

Woody's birthday

Last Tuesday was Woody's birthday...so yes, I'm a little late in getting this posted! He had to work pretty much all day and then that night had a class (he's co-leading a Crown financial class this summer on Tuesday nights). Usually I'm at the class too, but Esther had a fever all day, so the girls literally saw him a total of 15 minutes all day. We did, however, get a homemade cookie cake made and taken to the class for him to be surprised with.
Saturday night, Woody and I got to go out and actually celebrate his birthday...we went and had dinner and saw Pierce Pettis live at a local cafe! Thanks to Lauren for keeping the girls for us and getting our picture before we headed out.
Happy Birthday Woody/Daddy-we love you!!

recent events

It finally happened...I turned my back for a second and Arden touched the eye on the stove that I'd just turned on. Thankfully, the burn wasn't too bad and as it turned out it was on her right thumb...the one she has sucked since she was 8 weeks old. So if there could be a pro to all of this, she actually stopped sucking her thumb...well for the week that is. Her thumb is all healed now and though we've noticed her sucking it a couple of times, it's only been at night when she's in bed, so we're very happy about this!! Also, she did really great with having the burn...the first time we put medicine and a bandaid on it, she was really still and didn't cry, so I told her she was being very brave. (We have a Franklin book where he goes to the hospital and is brave, so she was very proud of being brave.) From that time on, anytime we put more medicine or a bandaid on her thumb, she would say, "Look Mommy (or Daddy), I'm braving!"

Other happenings...yesterday morning in the car, Arden, who isn't even officially 3 1/2, was talking about turning 4 on her birthday. We then talked about how Esther was still one, but would be 2 in a little over a month....so the girls were saying the numbers 4 and 1 and out of nowhere, Esther counted completely on her own from 4 to 10!! Who knew the girl knew her numbers so well?? I was very impressed, so of course we had to call Daddy and tell him. And last night we got her to count again for us, so it wasn't a fluke!

Yesterday afternoon during naptime, Arden got really quiet (she usually has quiet play time in her room and doesn't go to sleep)...anyway, I went in to check on her and found this...she had put on a bathing suit...the second of the day b/c we'd gone swimming that morning at a friends' pool...and fallen asleep on top of the changing table!! I, of course, had to get a picture before moving her to her bed safely...this is definitely a first...I think we'll need to discuss staying in the bed or on the floor to go to sleep...and finally move the changing table out of her room!



And finally I"ll leave you with some pics of the girls playing on our kiddie pool and slide this morning...







One more thing...still no name for the baby...Woody gave me permission to say he's still dragging his feet! Oh, he did mention Billie Jean, whacha think? :) (So after I posted this, we realized that name wasn't too far fetched...Billie and Jean represent both of Woody's grandmothers!...but no, we won't be using the name Billie Jean!)

Happy Father's Day

I think Woody's having a good Father's day so far despite a little incident this morning at church...he was helping put a sign up with a bungee cord and the cord had other plans...Peggy said he took a bungee for Jesus! :)


Happy Father's Day to all the Daddies out there!

27 weeks

Here's the latest belly shot...

in the backyard

Well I can't get enough of the sunflowers, so here's a couple more pics of them, and I can never get enough of the girls, so there's also a few pics of them playing in the backyard this morning...

sweet, sweet song

We're always singing and/or listening to music in our house...I got on a Waterdeep kick several months back and we also sing some of their songs at church, so the girls are very familiar with them. At least once a day, I'll hear one or both of them singing, "Sweet, sweet song," better known as "You are so good to me." Arden also knows which CD it's on, and she'll ask to listen to it at least once a day as well. She actually knows a lot of the words, and it's really precious to hear her singing it. Esther just knows the words, "sweet, sweet song" but still, it's equally precious to hear her chiming in too. Sometimes I'll also hear Arden singing "you are lovely, you are lovely (Lord)" for those who are familiar with Waterdeep. As I'm writing this, they're actually dancing around the living room to "sweet, sweet song."
Other songs that Esther's been singing lately..."Jesus, Lover of my soul" ( I sing this to her at naptime.) Several times a day I'll find her rocking a baby or stuffed animal and singing this before laying them down for a nap in anything that remotely looks like a baby bed. She also sings "I've got the joy, joy...down in my heart" This one's really fun to hear her sing in her low voice, because it comes out more like..."doy, doy, doy, doy...hearrrrt."
These are sweet moments that I don't want to forget and I'm so thankful the girls are learning to praise God with their voices.
I know it's been a while since I've posted a pic of the girls, so here's one I took a couple of weeks ago. Don't know if they were singing, but I'm pretty sure they had been dancing to music before I took this.

opposites

The girls both love the water, but it was interesting this weekend to see how different they are when it comes to being in the water...on Friday we went and played with Brittany and Gabe, Sarah and the Davis' at their neighborhood pool. Arden was fine staying on the steps and didn't want to venture out into deeper water. Esther, on the other hand, was fearless and wanted to be out in the pool without any help...a couple of times it was all I could do to keep her in my arms or hold some part of her body! Pretty scary considering she can't swim and doesn't have any concept of it! (Thankfully, we're pursuing swimming lessons!) On the flip side, Woody and I took the girls to the beach yesterday afternoon...Arden loved going out into the waves with Woody and jumping them...no fear whatsoever being out in the ocean....while Esther did not want to be in the waves, but preferred staying right at the edge of the water to pick up shells for our bucket...go figure.
Either way, I've got my hands full when we're around the water...and therefore I don't have any pics of our fun times this weekend...maybe next time!

but she's still growing

Conversations with Arden have been quite interesting the last few days and quite entertaining...The past several days she's thought that the baby was coming that day. (And yes, the baby still has no name!) She'll say...
"and the baby's gonna come today"
"we're gonna take the baby out and she's going to sleep in the crib"
"and we'll take the baby out and I'll have a new sister"
It cracks us up that she says WE are going to take the baby out!
She talks a lot about the baby lately and can't wait to see her. A few times a day she'll put her hand on my belly and say she wants to feel her...and there have even been a few times when she wants me to feel the baby in her tummy! Then she'll say, "but there's no baby in my tummy, no, and there's not a baby in Daddy's tummy, no...daddies don't have babies, just mommies.
I think we've finally convinced her that the baby still needs to grow some more before we meet her...she'll talk about the baby and then finish by saying, "but she can't come out yet, she's still growing." And we told her that Lord willing, the baby will come in September. So now she'll also say the baby's coming "on September."
All this conversation makes me wonder what she'll be saying once the baby does get here and what she'll say about nursing!!

blooming!

The sunflowers are blooming! The bigger ones have just started, like the one pictured above, and the smaller ones have opened up as seen below.



Our oranges have also started growing...for those who don't know, we have an orange tree in our front yard. I meant to do a post on them back in December when they were ready to be picked, but I never did with everything else going on. It looks like we're going to have a tree full this year compared to a very few that we got last year!