40w3d

We're all looking for signs that this baby is going to come soon.

A perfect caption for this picture would say something about Hudson and Harper both looking out the window for the stork to bring their brother or sister. Because seriously....we're getting a little impatient.

So...........Stork, where are you? We didn't move....we're in the same house! Please, pay us a visit soon! We want to meet this little babykins!!!!!

Day shy of 40 weeks.....

Our due date is tomorrow! CRAZY!

Baby is 40 weeks "cooked" and can come out and play ANYTIME! You hear that baby? ANYTIME!!!

Dr appt today confirmed what I feared, it's nice and cozy in there and not looking like it's ready to come out and meet us yet. Sad!

We've scheduled a c-section for Sept 27th and are praying to go into labor before. We can't be induced.....so it's wait on the baby or deliver via c-section. I would like to baby to come when it's ready, so we're praying we don't make it to Sept 27th.

Your prayers are appreciated!

In house news....unfortunately our contractor had an out of town wedding so it's been very quiet here yesterday and today. But.....the house has been wrapped, roof is ready for shingles and it was another solid week of work! Looking great, huh? It looks like a HOUSE now!

Update...

Well.....things are truck truck truckin' along here! No baby and no finished house...but progress on both fronts!

The House

Lookey here......we have a house!!

Crew has been busy! Walls up, roof almost complete and plumbing and electrical are way over 1/2 done. This week.....windows and doors get installed!!!
We've been picking out fixtures, paint colors and all that fun stuff! It's been busier here than ever, but that means progress so bring it on!

The Baby I'm 39 weeks pregnant and just now feeling like I'm prepared for the whirlwind of change that awaits us. Blake and I laughed last night about needing to brush up on the 5 s's (Shhh, Swaddle, Side, Suck and CRAP what is the 5th S????)
Sleep for me has gotten dicey, I sleep hard until 2-5am and then I'm up and trying desperately to fall back asleep before Hudson and Harper (my alarm clocks) wake me up around 7:15.
My hospital bag is packed, I have snacks for daddy, magazines for him to read and a list of last minute things to throw into the bag.
I'm SCARED I'll stay pregnant forever......and YES I know that is impossible. But the further into week 39 I get, the more scared I feel that this due date is going to come and pass. I really want to let this baby decide his/her due date and yet I feel like I'm ready to hold this little mystery human NOW!

Soo......prayers are appreciated! Mama needs patience, Daddy needs more time in the day to get all the things done and Hudson and Harper....well they have NO idea what is about to come.

xo

September Already???

It's baby month!!! In fact, it's T-minus 10 days until our due date and life is busier than ever.

A few things:

The house is plugging along. HVAC was here and installed a new furnace which will efficiently heat our entire house since we basically doubled the square footage of our existing home. It's not complete yet, meaning we can't turn on the heat so I pray the cold air stays far, far away! Supposed to be beautiful this week....but it feels like fall in the evenings. Burrrr!!!

Pic below is the hallway leading to the office and master bath

This pic is the new "family room" way back which will have large french doors that lead into a screened in porch.

Twins....busier than ever. Both are stringing together words (ie: sounds) that appear to be gibberish to us, but probably mean something profound to them. They understand SO MUCH of what we say...it's amazing. Asking them to do something, where something is, etc and they just get it. The other day Harper took my phone into our bedroom and dropped it when she got sidetracked by Blake's HUGE basketball shoes. She came out of the room carrying his shoe not my phone. When I asked her where my phone was and if she could go and grab it....she dropped the shoe and walked back into the bedroom to retrieve the phone. Sounds mundane....but it's so incredible to see that they understand!

Another cute story.....we met another twin-set at the Splash Pad last week for a playdate. These twins were only 2-3 months older and so we thought they'd have a blast together. Well....it was more independant play for all 4 kids until snack time which then I felt like I had 4 hungry birds standing around me as I fished out goldfish for them.

Anyway, back to playing. So it's kind of expected for little little kids that you go to the Splash Pad with a few buckets, cups, etc so they can play in the water. Though when you get there, the buckets you bring end up being used by some other kid while your kids play with theirs. Well Hudson saw a little guy and walked up to him, took his bucket and handed him his. A fair trade. His mom rushed over to me and asked "Is he your son?"....I said he was and that I could go get his bucket back if her son wanted his. She said "No No....did you see what they did? Your little guy traded with my son, Eli. He offered his bucket, and they traded".

I am left feeling a little confused, wanting to say "And............your point is........" but then it hit me that these are things that I take for granted because I have twins. My kids share. They understand they can't just snatch a toy out of eachother's hands. They comfort each other and give up the toy in their hands if one is having a meltdown and they want to cheer them up. These things happen daily....and because I have just had 2....I didnt' see why this was a big deal to this woman.

Anyway, just a fun observation.

Also on the twin front- we're in a transition period. Going from 1 nap to 2....eliminating that bedtime bottle and booking their first dentist appointment!

They had their 15 month appt....Hudson was 22lbs14oz but in 75/90th percentile for height! STRING BEAN! Harper was 21lbs6oz and in 25/50th for height and weight.

My sweet little nephew, Izaak had his first day of preschool today. Hard to imagine what it was like for my sister to send him off, with that big, huge backpack and smile. Life seriously moves at warp-speed when raising children. It feels like days turn to weeks, to months to years in a blink of an eye. I remember the ache I would feel in my heart and knot in my throat everytime I'd pack up a set of clothes (newborn size, 0-3 month) knowing that my babies would NEVER be that tiny again. The good thing is that they are growing and becoming more incredible by the day. Just makes us mama's a little emotional, nonetheless.

Well, that's it for now. Dr appt this afternoon so I'll update if there is anything worth updating. I'm 38.5 weeks and baby is getting chubbier, I believe, because it feels like the only strong movement I feel lately is his/her feet kicking in my right side since that is how it's positioned. I've gotten tons of guesses on baby's gender, birthday and weight. Overall....out of 14 friends and family.....10 think it's a girl, 4 think it's a boy and the most popular date for the birthday is September 19th (2 days past due date).

SOON WE WILL SEE!!!!!!!!!

Floors, Walls and Window's.....Oh My

We are starting to see the walls of our new home addition! Yay!

Blake said he knows I'm going to get giddy over this part of the project because it's visual! It takes my brain which lacks visualization and gives it something tangible to SEE! I love it!

A few pics from the last few days. The floor joists were laid- this took 2 full days since there was so much detail that had to be done to install these.

Then, as you can see, plywood was nailed down and the walls started coming up. Unfortunately, our carpenter is alone working today without his usual sidekick so I think it'll go a bit slower but as long as we're moving forward...I don't care!

The walls will continue to get installed....so more pics to come. The big open spaces in the pic show the big glass doors we'll have that open out to a small deck. I had a moment yesterday where I got pulled away from work to act as General Contractor and make a few decisions on windows. OH THE PRESSURE! Spaced x or x amount apart, extra stud here or there....Just gave me a glimpse at how much stress Blake has on top of his extremely busy and consuming job.

We are plowing ahead!

In other news.....everyone is doing great. Twins are busy learning body parts, new words, new moves (Harper LOVES to walk backwards these days and Hudson loves to jump, or try to jump). I'm just about 37 weeks pregnant (on Saturday) and have a Dr appt on Monday to see how things are progressing.

I'll do a seperate post in the next few days about details for when the baby decides to come. Just where we'll be, etc.

And I'll leave you with a pic of our two junior General Contractors, on a recent trip to Home Depot. These two love going out into the "new house" and checking the day's work with dad when he gets home from work each night. They're keeping all the workers on their toes as they watch the work through the glass sliding doors all day!

Life Lately

Ok...someone stop time for us please?

Time is absolutely FLYING by!

And we are SO excited to meet this baby....I can hardly wait to see what the baby is, who he/she looks like, and feel and smell that sweet, brand new baby skin.

But we need a leeeeeeetle more time please. We're just not ready....
But just as this mystery baby's existance was a bit of a shocking surprise, he or her enterance will happen when it's supposed to and so who are we to try to control things?

So, yeah we're at about 1 month and counting ;-)

House stuff.....framing starts tomorrow. We have bundles upon bundles upon bundles of lumber in our yard and waiting to tended to. Very excited.

And the twins....what's an update without an update on our beautiful H & H? Life with these two....hilarious. They love to look at each other lately and giggle uncontrollably. I wish I knew what was so funny, but I also love that they have this little secret thing going on that the rest of us are oblivious to.

They've both been trying to say all kinds of words. Ba, Da, Ah Da, Uh Oh, Dada, Mama and Hi are just a few words that we hear ALL day long here. Which stand for (Ball, Dog, All Done)

They are just so much fun. Loving books, loving their new retro kitchen their daddy lovingly put together piece by piece, and loving those pups. Harper lately has liked to cuddle up to them and prop herself on their belly and lay. Hudson lately just has to keep track of where they are at all times. If they are outside.....he is guarding the window watching his puppies.

This series of pics below....priceless!

Starts out like this: "Harper, can you give Hudson hugs and kisses?"

Good girl, leans in and plants a wet one on her big bro
Whoops.....then she topples over on to him
And then the giggle-fest begins. They rolled around just laughing and laughing. The pics are cute, but oh it would have been awesome to catch it on video. So incredibly sweet...these two are going to be a very loving pair to their new baby brother or sister!

Foundation Station

Guys finishing up the walls- brick by brick

Walls complete!

Ground is prepped and ready for concrete!

This morning, this HUGE truck casually pulls into our backyard (my poor pear and apple tree are taking lots of abuse from these big trucks invading our yard)

Big slide (no clue what this is called) is ready to begin spitting out ugly grey concrete!

Here we are peeps.....it's FINALLY foundation day! This is big!

This is basically our LAST day with our friends at the concrete company who have been here at the wee hours of 6:45 mostly every day for a month. We are extremely fortunate to have understanding and patient neighbors!!!

Yes, we have a huge addition which required lots of time, manpower, dirt, digging, concrete blocks, backfilling, rock, large footings, etc.......but we won't be sad to see these guys go.

With our original timeline sort of out the window......we'll be bidding these concrete dudes farewell with a big smile on our faces.

As soon as this concrete foundation is finished it'll sit for a few days before we can haul in steel beams, have lumber delivered and begin framing out the 2nd floor.

As I rapidly approach 35 weeks....this puts me into a state of panic as there seems to be SOO much more to do. However, as my General Contractor/Husband/Baby daddy says....the framing is much more visibly gratifying. You can see the progress. With everything that is required to build a house on a rock solid foundation...it's a lot like sitting and watching paint dry (or concrete harden).

Soo....what's a going on today here! Pregnancy and H & H update to come!