The Littlest Big Announcement

So if you can't tell by the picture and are wondering, "Has she put on some weight or is she pregnant?" I'll go ahead and clear the air and say, "YES. I am...PREGNANT!" We are 12 1/2 weeks along and I'm almost over the sickness, tiredness, and all around suckiness that the 1st trimester brings. This pregnancy is a lot harder to hide than the last one since I'm showing waaay earlier. I'm totally sucking it in and still this picture looks like me at 16weeks with Piper. Oh well, I was warned that you show sooner with the next pregnancy than with the first. I didn't want to believe them. *sigh* I had my first doctor's appointment in November and got a snazzy picture of Lil Mac at 8 weeks and got to hear the heartbeat. He/She's pretty cute and the heartbeat is such a comfort to hear. Our due date is July 12th, but due dates change so I'm not holding my breath (Pip's due date changed 3 times).

This pregnancy has been different from my first and I'll probably constantly compare the 2 because it's all I know. For starters I am convinced, absolutely CONVINCED that this might be my BOY. So for posterity sake, I will entertain my assumptions grounded in old wive's tales and prior experience:

Pregnancy with Pip vs Lil Mac

*extreme gassiness vs just fat stomach

*no morning sickness just food aversion. I lost weight with Pip vs extreme nausea so I had to constantly eat carbs

*I heard a wive's tale that if you are having a girl the mom's prettiness will suffer. For example, my hair turned coarse and grew everywhere extremely dark and fast and I developed a nasty cold sore and acne during the 1st trimester. After that, my prettiness returned and I developed that lovely pregnancy glow vs this pregnancy my hair is silky, shiny, and sparse everywhere else. I did get a cold sore, but it wasn't near as unsightly and no increase in acne. I already feel as if I have a nice glow.

*I was comfortable with weight gain and gained a whopping 40lbs. I exercised, but ate every sweet confection I could get my hands on vs I'm not too keen on gaining weight and am trying to eat healthy along with exercising. Plus, I have no desire for sweet things, but for citrus fruits, salads, and meat-lots of red meat. There's no emotional eating being done with this one.

I know these are long shots since every pregnancy is different and it really does not matter if it's a boy or a girl. Bob and I both agree that being blessed with a baby is enough for us. We are so happy to welcome this little one to our family and for Pip to be a big sister.

Christmas Lights

We decided to spend Family Home Evening at the Denver Zoo to see the lights. The weather was just right for strolling the zoo at night. There were so many beautiful displays. Pip loved seeing the lights and would remark, "Ohhhh pretty!" at each one. The zoo also had a few exhibits still opened to the public like the elephant house, lion habitat, and penguin area. Pip loved seeing the animals at night, but to me it was pretty scary especially when they are more bold in the evening and will walk straight towards you. Kinda freaky.

Gingerbread Houses

I wanted to make a gingerbread house with Pip earlier this month, but time just slipped away. Thankfully, we were able to decorate gingerbread houses at Oma's house with Pip's cousin. Piper had a blast decorating...at first. Once she discovered how tasty the candies were, she had zero interest in placing the tasty treats on the house and 100% interest in putting them in her mouth. I think more candy was consumed than decorated with. Oh well. The house turned out super cute and Pip had fun.

Pip decorated the roof all by herself. I would lay the frosting down and she would place the gumdrops, skittles, and chocolate candies where she wanted them. She also did the hedges along the bottom...after she tasted each one of course.

She was a little tired of taking pictures.

Ho-Ho-Ho!

You can tell Christmas is upon us because I have been SUPER busy! I've been very sick since before Thanksgiving so everything has taken me twice as long to complete. Earlier this month, I decorated the house all cute and even cleared a space for the Christmas tree. Well, that spot is still empty. The weekend we were going to get our tree we had our first big snow followed with sub-freezing temps. Then the next week, we had 3 Christmas parties to attend plus ringing the bell for the Salvation Army. Pip and I also baked reindeer poop cookies and made spice ornaments for our tree that never was. Then we braved the cold and looked at Christmas lights. Pip enjoyed the lights and wanted to go outside and touch them. In between decorating for Christmas and attending parties, we took a few pictures with our brand new camera of all the fun we've been having...well mostly all the fun Pip has been having and it's only just the beginning. We still have to visit mall Santa and make a gingerbread house-maybe we can convince Oma to help us on this one.

Pip wanted to help me put up Christmas decorations. She especially loved taking care of the very breakable, delicate Nativity scenes I have. She kept toting the baby Jesus around and saying, "Shhh baby sleepy." Cute, until you remember what she did to baby Jesus last year

Way too chipper in the morning!

Pip at Preschool decorating her very own ornament! She got to make 2 ornaments this holiday season. The other one is a really cute ornament we made at the Kelley Kids party. She used her handprint to make little snowmen. I think this will be a holiday tradition we will continue with the rest of our children. We already have 1 tradition where we get 1 ornament as a family.Listening to "The Night Before Christmas". I was totally bummed that I had forgotten to go into my teaching supplies and pull out all my Christmas books. Well maybe next year! We did have a FHE where we read the Nativity story to Pip and talked about what Christmas is all about. She kept saying, "Happy Birthday Jesus". Followed with a nice rendition of "Jingle Bells".

Partying Pip! We had 3 very festive holiday parties to attend this year. The first one was for the Children's Therapy Clinic. Pip has been attending physical therapy for about a week now for her club foot. We luckily started our sessions right before their big Snowflake Festival. We had so much fun! There were crafts, toys, and games. Pip even got to sit on Santa's lap (I held her, Santa stood behind us). The second one was our ward's Christmas party. Pip loved the Nativity program and the rolls. Lastly, was the Kelley Kids party. We had treats and a book gift exchange. We also played a game and made an ornament.

Children's Therapy Clinic Snowflake Festival. This was the only picture I could get of her.

Kelley Kids party! The kids enjoyed dressing Pip up as a snowman. Pip enjoyed all the attention she was getting! Ward Christmas Party. She loves her some rolls!

Christmas sure is fun when you have a kid!

Brrrr...it's cold outside!

SNOW! I have a love/hate relationship with the white stuff. I love that it reminds me of winter. I love the idea of having a white Christmas. I hate that it's cold. I hate that it doesn't melt at least 2 days after falling. When I move to Houston, I will miss it and long for the snowy days of winter. I digress.

So, we had our first big snowfall this weekend and I fretted about not having a snowsuit for Pip. I couldn't justify buying one since she'll only use it for 1 season, BUT I couldn't justify not giving her a chance to go play outside in the snow. After fretting and getting all hormonal about it, we headed off to Target (which was extremely crowded with other moms who were as ill-prepared as I) and bought her a spiffy snowsuit and cute boots.

I have to say that the mere 15 minutes of pure enjoyment she got out of playing in the snow was enough to justify the $70 I spent on her spiffy snowsuit. I got my obligatory snow pictures and will treasure them always. (sarcasm should be noted)

"hmmm, what's this stuff they call snow?"

Pip wanted to play not pose

Thanksgiving...finally.

I have been such a slacker. Things have been crazy busy that I'm just now getting around to writing about Thanksgiving. Since we've been in school, we've been blessed with super long holiday vacations. However, our vacationing days will soon become a memory as Bobby inches closer to graduating and working. Alas, we decided to make a go of our Thanksgiving break and visit Georgia and Alabama. If you're wondering, it's about a 12 hour drive (sans child/dog) to Georgia and a 10 hour return to Indiana from Alabama. Yep, it was long. Thankfully, a friend let us borrow her DVD player. We stocked up on Elmo. By the end of the trip, Pip had an entire Elmo video memorized.

We spent 3 days in Georgia visiting with my sister/bro-in-law, aunt and uncle, and some dear friends in Macon. We also went to the Georgia Aquarium where we discovered that our child is penguin whisperer. We have a video and pictures of a penguin that just absolutely loved Pip and gave Pip her own penguin show. It was pretty cute.

On Wednesday, we went to Alabama. We ate a delicious turkey (prepared by me) and watched the Iron Bowl-the game was terrible. Since we weren't going to be together for Christmas, we decided to have a mini gift exchange. It was nice to be together with family.