keepin' it real

Grace is obsessed with my belly button. She pushes on it with her little finger all the while saying "tickle, tickle, tickle" and laughing hysterically :) She loves to "talk" to Hudson and will often run to me, lift my shirt, and say "a big, big hug for Hudson" wrapping her sweet arms around my belly...sometimes she'll do this when she's about to get in trouble **wink, wink**. How is it that they figure out all of our soft spots so early on?

I have some other "fancier" maternity pictures, but these impromptu ones - big belly and all - are the ones that warm my heart the most and make me dream of the two of them growing up close as brother and sister.


about motherhood...
Last week while out to dinner with my girlfriends, we started talking about motherhood. Now, this perspective comes from us - mothers with young children, so it may be quite different for those with older ones. Anyhow, we talked about how much guilt mothers seem to carry these days compare to prior generations. How we try to do it all, yet feel like it's never enough, or good enough in any one area. How often it's the "me time" that gets sacrificed in the mix. How there is so much arguing on the topic of working moms vs. stay-at-home moms when in reality most moms are doing the best they can for their children. How we doubted that our mothers/grandmothers second guessed themselves as much as we do in areas of discipline, organic vs. regular food LOL, where to send your kids to school, what activities to involve them in, how they're doing developmentally and so on and so on.

Now, I must say the mothers in my company that evening are all amazing moms in my eyes. They love their children unconditionally and truly care about their well-being. I see their eyes light up when they talk about their kids. I've seen the transformation occur from single gals, to married wifes, to beautiful mothers. And I wonder...I wish they could see themselves as I see them. But I'm guilty of it too. So when I stumbled upon this quote by Jill Churchill, I knew I needed to add it to my sidebar so I could read it every day and let it sink in...

The most important thing she'd learned over the years was that there was no way to be a perfect mother and a million ways to be a good one.

little treasures

Some sweet discoveries from today...

For Hudson's nursery:

Cutest little junior elf book
(I love how tiny these are!) Vintage ABC book Check out the sweet illustrations Pics of Hudson's nursery coming soon! I'm waiting on his new (old) slipcovered glider and a wall monogram and then we'll be ready for pictures :)

And a little something I think Grace would love: I found this cute UNUSED vintage birthday card and had to get it for Grace! Yes, I know her birthday is not until next March ;) but I love the colors and the little girl's expression reminds me of the little pumpkin so much!

Have I mentioned I love etsy??? Oh, I have?
he, he, he

a different kind of baking

Crayons - and for that matter markers, paints, chalk, and all other art supplies - are some of Grace's favorite things. So what to do with the gazillion little broken crayon pieces??? Turn them into "new" fun-shaped kaleidoscope crayons as we like to call them!

Definitely not a new idea, but oh, so easy and guaranteed to provide the littles with entertainment for at least an hour :)

I'm sure there's a bunch of different and more sophisticated ways to do this, but here's our VERY simple steps.

1. Designate an old muffin/cupcake pan as the "art baking pan" so that you don't confuse it with those you use for food consumption (nonstick works best, but not required). As you can see in the pics, ours is very old and rusty.

2. Peel off the paper off your crayon bits and pieces and break up any larger pieces into smaller stumps (Grace LOVES this part).

3. You can sort them by color, but we prefer a kaleidoscope effect for more fun, except the PINK ones, of course...Grace is very territorial about her pink :) 4. Preheat the oven to 250 degrees and bake for approx. 15 minutes or until all the crayons have melted. They will look like this when you pull them out: 5. Let them cool off in the pan until they harden and then pop them out. If you're not using a nonstick pan, a few might break as you try to remove them (some of ours did, but we weren't going for perfection here!) 6. Voila! Fun-shaped kaleidoscope crayons ready for little fingers to tackle. Hint: These make fun party favors and preschool class gifts, especially if you use a theme pan like hearts, flowers, fish, etc. and stick to a more monochromatic color scheme.
Now go be creative!!

about cake & sprinkles...

Grace loves to bake - whether real or pretend. So do I, so I guess the apple doesn't fall far from the tree after all. As many treats as I've indulged in this pregnancy, I think even Hudson knows all about my sweet tooth. He's even onto Grace as he has a cute little wooden cupcake set complete with a 2-tier stand ready to give his big sis when he meets her at the hospital :)

Grace puts in her request to bake at least once a day, so today we decided to create a simple sheet cake and I let her do most of the frosting and "sprinkling" all by herself.

Check out her lips - a good chef has to taste her creations along the way, right? About to saturate her cake with sprinkles! The inspection, LOL! So proud of her creation (Mama is too!) Little Pumpkin, Cake Decorator



Have you watched Cake Boss on TLC? So fun! Cake Boss, you better watch out for the little pumpkin! She's quite the decorator :)

Jumpy-Jump

Still here and still no Hudson, so I think he's decided he's really cozy in there and is in no hurry to rush things along :) I'm so excited to have made it to 37 weeks!!! THANK YOU to all of you who have been praying along with us for a term baby :)

This morning Grace and I joined my friend Bridgette and her super adorable little boy Hayden for a fun play date at one of those INDOOR inflatable play places (very important when you're very pregnant and it's 90+ degrees outside :)

Such a STRONG boy!! This shot reminds me of that old tv show American Gladiators, where they used to compete in all kinds of crazy sport endurance stunts. All this jumping is serious business you know! Time for the slides! Notice anything familiar in this picture? I'll give you a hint...it's pink. Yup, Grace didn't let go of the pink princess ball the ENTIRE time we were there :) What can I say, the little pumpkin loves her some pink! After jumping for a good hour and a half, we took a break for lunch at a yummy health deli. The kiddos looked so adorable. I so wish I would have thought to take a picture. They were seated right across from each other at a little 2-topper table complete with flowers...looked like they were on a date...he, he, he...everyone stopped to say how sweet they looked, and I must say both were on their best behavior (or maybe they were just worn out from all the jumping?!?) - either way, isn't it so nice when you can have a nice lunch with your kiddos while gabbing with your girlfriends? Pure bliss!

Bridgette~ thank you SOOOOOOOO much for offering to jump with both of them! I owe you BIG as I know you got a workout chasing after two little busybodies!

And thank you Heidi, Segi, and Bridgette for a WONDERFUL girls' dinner. I had a lot of fun. You guys are the best and Lance & I really appreciate all the sweet baby gifts!

Curious George

Another first! One of the local movie theatres offers a free kids' matinee every Tu/Wed during the summer. This was their first week and the selection was Curious George! Perfect for the little pumpkin as she is a big fan of the cute monkey and the man in the yellow hat.

I figured this was the perfect opportunity to take Grace to the movies for the first time since the theatre would be full of kiddos and their mamas and people would probably not mind the loud (but cute) comments, crying, dancing and whatever else from the wee ones. Grace had a blast and only cried once toward the end when George gets put in a cage on a ship back to Africa :) ...not to worry, in the end the man in the yellow hat rescues him and they are best pals for life!

And the little pumpkin? Check out her new trick: closing her eyes whenever someone tries to take her picture. Fun times!

the best kind of shopping

I've been on a cleaning spree...has nothing to do with the pending arrival of the little guy, just some belated spring cleaning I keep telling myself...yeah, right! Truth is making room for Hudson has me rethinking every nook and crany of our home and really trying to simplify.

Part I was the massive garage sale we had memorial day weekend. It was a huge success, but man oh man, what was I thinking doing that at 35 wks. I had forgotten how much work garage sales really are. Definitely glad that's over!

Since then, I've been working on Part II - moving things around and repurposing things we already have at home (fastest, cheapest decorating for sure!). I changed out the photos and frames on this side table and now I really like the warm, eclectic vibe of this little spot. And I cheated a little bit 'cause I bought this new rug for the living room, but I LOVE how it looks with our sofas and decor. I then moved on to our bedroom. After taking down this display from Grace's old nursery *sniff*sniff* I used some of the decorations along with her old nursery shelves to create this little photo wall in our bedroom. Isn't it sweet? Prior to the change, I had just the two weathered frames one above the other, but I really like how it all looks anchored now, thanks to the shelves. And I'm sure I'll tweak it even further after we have photos of Hudson :)

Speaking of...yes, it's the wee hours and I'm up rather than snoozing. I've been having contractions all day, painful ones. And now leg cramps too, and I can't seem to get comfortable lying down. Instead of tossing and turning I decided to do more constructive thngs...like blog (ha, ha). That is, after I washed all of his 0-3 mo. clothes, packed the hospital bags, and laid out Grace's clothes for when we go to the hospital. May not be too long now. At my doc's appt. this morning - I'll spare you the details - let's just say she said things were moving right along :) so it looks like the little guy may be making his debut sooner rather than later.