Dear Alex,

Dear Alex,
The past few days have flown by in a whirlwind as we have been busy making last minute preparations for your arrival. It is incredibly hard for me to believe that you will be here in less than 12 hours. We have done endless loads of little laundry, finished up your little room, bought last minute necessities, sterilized bottles and pumping parts, and tried to imagine what life will be like when we bring you home in a few short days. Your big brother, Will, definitely knows about you and talks about you and we pray for you, but I am not quite sure that he really understands that once you come out, you will come home with us and stay :) Your daddy and I asked Will today if he was ready for you to come out and play choo choos to which he replied, "NO!!!" But if you ask him if he is going to love you....kiss you.....hug you.....help bathe you, he is super excited about all of those things. He endearingly refers to you as Baby Axe. Your oldest brother, Bentley, for sure knows what is up. All the tell-tale signs have surfaced again and there is no denying that another little person is going to be invading his space. If you ask me though, I think he is secretly pretty excited about it. He likes to pretend that he and Will have a love/hate relationship, but he is a sucker for the little guy at heart!
Your daddy installed your car seat tonight-the final thing on what seemed like a never-ending honey do list. He even took Will out to show him where you would ride. Will seemed to like that you would be beside him. Bentley quickly realized that your seat is where his seat normally is and walked right back inside and went to his bed....almost as if to say "figures...."
Today once your daddy was home from work, we headed to the pool to spend what would be our last family time just the three of us. Don't get me wrong, we are SUPER excited about meeting you tomorrow. I am not anxious about the delivery or recovery, I am only anxious about how your big brother is going to handle it all. Truth be told, I am also a little anxious about what you will look like. I can't wait to know if you will be dark and handsome just like your brother, or if you will look more like your momma. Either way is fine with me!

After dinner, we wrestled with Will on the floor, had the usual bath time, and then snuggled up with some books. Will chose Charlie The Ranch Dog and Let Me Hold You Longer...2 books that I am sure will be your favorites too in no time! I think Will could sense that I was a bit anxious....he held my hand and ran his other hand through my hair as we read books, something he never does. Then, as I said our prayers, tears streaming down my face, instead of saying "bed! bed!" as soon as I was done, he just let me rock him. I rocked him until he was asleep. I can't remember the last time I was granted that luxury! Rocking Will at the moment is not exactly the most comfortable thing for him...he has gotten so long, and my belly has gotten so large, that he just sort of lays across me. But tonight, he was extra snuggly and gave me a precious wet kiss with a smack that was just what I needed!
You see, Alex, we have prayed for you since before there was you. We know that God has knitted you together as perfect as they come, and we know that our hearts will burst tomorrow with a love we didn't know possible. We will continue to pray for you as you grow. I hope that you and Will are the best of friends. I hope that you always look out for one another and are each others biggest fan. I hope that you both become parents someday so you can know what this kind of love feels like.
We can't wait to meet you tomorrow, precious little one!
Love,
Mommy

Cuteness!

We're Ready!!!

Alex's Nursery

I can finally say that I think we are finished with the nursery. I couldn't be more pleased. It has such a different look from Will's nursery. It is the same space and we kept the same bedding...I had John paint stripes on an accent wall, we had a new window treatment made with a matching crib sheet and table skirt, and we painted an armoire that used to be in my old room at my parents house that made a very nice addition. John put a rod inside the armoire where lots of Baby Alex's clothes are now hung. His poor closet is filled with rubbermaid storage containers with all of the clothes Will has outgrown. This is my favorite room in our house and I can't wait for a baby to be sleeping in it by the end of next week!
*I took these pictures last night and so the lighting is terrible and I am not good enough with my camera to know what settings to use at night with no flash, etc. So some pictures are too light, some are too dark, but you will get the general idea!

Will's BIG Surprise!

We have debated about getting a train table for a few months now. Anyone you talk to has an opinion-"they are great"...."they take up way too much room"... It is no secret that Will is obsessed with all things choo-choo, so when trying to think of a perfect gift to give to Will as he becomes a BIG brother, this was a no-brainer. I did a LOT of research!! Train tables are expensive! Will has plastic "Chuggington" tracks and every Chuggington train, but they are the die-cast trains which makes them not compatible with any wooden train table set. We contemplated just getting a train table and putting the Chuggington tracks on it, but Will likes "big hueys (hills)" and that was pretty impossible with what we have. After looking into it for about a month, we discovered that Chuggington (a show on Disney) just released wooden train table sets that are compatible with any wooden train table already on the market. This seemed perfect and we wondered if his die-cast Chuggington trains would fit on the Chuggington wood set. Of course not! In an attempt to make even more money off desperate parents, along with the wooden train sets, they have released all the Chuggington chuggers that are wooden to be compatible with the wooden set. These trains are compatible on any wooden train set as well. So we thought about going the whole Chuggington route for the table, sets, and trains.....but this was going to be way more money than we wanted to spend. Since Chuggington stuff is compatible with any wooden train set, we decided on the Melissa and Doug table and wooden train set with intentions of adding to it some Chuggington landmarks and chuggers later.We got this in last week and put it together Friday night so it was waiting for Will in the den when he woke up. Saturday morning was like Christmas for us. He did exactly what we thought he would....when he woke up we changed his diaper and told him we had a surprise for him. He casually walked into the den and once it caught his eye he exclaimed "Ooooh What's this!" and then as he got closer, "Look Momma and Dada, weally big choo-choo!" It was priceless. Will then proceeded to entertain himself for about 2 hours before he was the least bit distracted by anything else. We can't get him away from it. Every day when he comes home, he wants to play choo-choos. I can't remember the last time he watched T.V. For us, it was certainly a good investment. We had originally planned on keeping it in his room, but we knew 1) he would want to play it all the time and if it wasn't in a family room, he would want someone in there all the time so they could "watch." and 2) we were afraid this would mess up bedtime and he would start getting out of bed to play.
We told Will the train table was a gift from Baby Alex. Let's hope that helps once baby comes home!! :)

Celebrating Alex!

Yesterday my sweet class (and their momma's) showered me with all kinds of precious goodies for Alex!! These moms went above and beyond to make everything so cute and I could not feel more blessed. Having a 2nd baby is so much different than the first go round...I feel like when I was pregnant with Will it was all about Will...And it was!!! But this time, sometimes I forget I am even pregnant because we do have Will and are still so in love with him and he keeps us so busy that we don't focus nearly as much on this baby/pregnancy. So yesterday was nice for Alex to be the center of attention...even though Will got lots of love too. Here are a few pictures...I can't post most of what is on my camera because my sweet kids are in them, but you will get the general idea :)Some kids even brought a gift for Big Brother Will. We let him open one last night and he was so excited. All of Alex's gifts are laying in the floor of the nursery and Will will go in there randomly and pick something up and say "Baby Alex!" He certainly knows who all of this stuff is for...I just hope he likes Baby Alex as much as he likes Baby Alex's things :)

BIG Boy Room!

Will has been sleeping in his big boy room for over a month and it continues to go great! He goes down just as easily as he did in his crib, stays asleep all night, and I still hear "out please!" on the monitor when he is awake and ready to get up. We are so thankful for such an easy transition! Here are a few pictures of his big boy room. The glider will be moved back into the nursery this weekend and in its place is coming a pretty sweet surprise for Will...sort of a "I'm becoming a big brother kind of gift..."As you can see Bentley is a big fan of Will's big boy room...in particular the tiger pillow pet :)
The bed, bedding, train car toy box, train car book shelves, airplane lamp, train night light, and bulletin board all came from Pottery Barn Kids.

Have you ever wondered.....

what it is like to live with a 2 year old boy....???This was our entryway Saturday morning. In fact, this is our entryway most any time unless people are coming over. On Saturday, I counted 36 things with wheels scattered all over our floor. Will likes to race cars, crucks, and choo choos on this strip of our hallway. I can only imagine what our entryway will look like in about a year with 2 little boys wanting to "race."

Home At Last

We surprised Kiki and Pops at the airport tonight to pick them up. They thought my aunt was coming to get them, but instead Will met them at baggage claim with a bright pink welcome home sign! They were shocked and so excited!!

"These things always happen when you are away...."

When I was a baby, my dad traveled out of town for work on occasion. To say I was a mischievous child would be an understatement. My parents often tease me that they didn't know if I would make it past my 2nd birthday....I think it was just lack of supervision :) At any rate, my dad tells the story that each time he would call home, my brother (eight years older than me) would answer the phone and when dad asked how everyone was, he would reply "Dad, these things always happen when you are away..." Well I think I finally know what that means. My parents left for Italy and a Mediterranean cruise on April 26. When they return tomorrow that will make 19 days that they have been gone. Back in August, right after school started, they left for an Alaskan Cruise in which they were gone 17 days. I just knew Will would get sick and not be able to go to daycare and my Plan B (my parents) would be gone and I would have to take off work right at the beginning of school. As Murphy (as in Murphy's law) would have it, we went to the pediatrician a few days after my parents were gone only to be scheduled for Will to have tubes put in and his adnoids taken out the next week. Will had never had surgery at this point in his short little life, so it only made sense that when my parents left us, this would happen. We survived and I only ended up having to take off 3 days of work. I teased my parents when they planned this trip that I was going to go ahead and prepare myself for Will to need an appendectomy or something major! Well let's review what all has happened since my parents departure...
They left town on April 26...
-On April 27th F5 tornadoes ripped through our state...F2 tornadoes ripped through their neighborhood leaving my grandmother and uncle (who live in their basement with assisstance) without power on and off for several days. They were lucky and their house suffered no damage, just the loss of a few big trees.
-On April 28th Will threw up 20 minutes after I dropped him off at school. Luckily, John was going into work a little late this day and he hadn't left yet. He had no other choice but to pick him up and stay home with him. Will couldn't go to school Friday either, but thankfully John's sister Stephanie helped us out and kept him so I wouldn't have to take a day.
-On May 1st news broke that the terrorist we had been hunting down for 10 years had finally been caught and killed...the US citizen travel alert went up and of course my parents are on a cruise ship whose next stop was Turkey...great.....
-Will returned to school on May 2, only to throw up all over me as I was putting him to sleep on the night of May 3. At 8pm, I had to put in for a sub, run up to the school and make sub plans so something would be prepared for my kids the next day (it is days like that that having a desk job would be much easier!!) Don't get me wrong, I love the chance to spend a day loving on my little boy - it is just much trickier when we don't have my parents to fall back on.
TOMORROW at 6pm can't come soon enough! We have missed Kiki and Pops dearly!!

One Last Vacay

This past weekend we took Will to the beach for a last family vacation just the 3 of us. We all had a blast! For weeks we had been talking the beach up to Will to the point that he was so excited when we were finally loaded in the car that he didn't close his eyes the entire way there until we were about 10 minutes away from our condo!
He stayed asleep while John got his blow up bed all ready (we weren't going to have any broken collar bones this trip!), however he was up EARLY. This picture was taken at approximately 4:50 A.M. He awoke at 4:45 a.m. saying "go to beeeech go to beeeech...." When we told him it was too early, he decided to settle for a pop tart!A few hours later we had our gear on and were ready to "go to beeech..." :)Will loved the beach! We would just drop his toy bag on a spot in the sand and he would entertain himself for a good long while just going through and dumping them all out, building roads, driving his sand trucks along said roads, tearing down his daddy's sand castles (John was a total trooper-he is not fond of the sand at all! But now that he has a little buddy, he didn't mind laying all in it and getting covered just trying to make sure Will had a good time.The ocean was a hit too. He sat in the sand and let the waves roll over him and would giggle so loud each and every time!Gotta love his facial expressions!!We would head in around lunch time to eat and nap. John and I took advantage of not being at home where we always have a "to do list" and napped while Will napped! As soon as he woke up he would again say "go to beeech" and we were off again!If you have a boy, these sand trucks were from Target. They have several for $2 a piece. WELL worth it!
And sometimes we took a break for a little break dancing on the beach...The pool was a hit too! Will liked his turtle float until he sort of slid off the side and his head may or may not have gone under the water, which scared him a bit, so then he just took to pushing it around the pool and never got on it to ride again....We went out to dinner Saturday night, but on Sunday for Mother's Day John just went to my favorite restaurant and got take out. It was much more enjoyable just eating on our deck so when Will was finished he could just run around and play! I am so incredibly blessed to be Will's mom. It is the most fulfilling, exhausting, hilarious, never-a-dull-moment, enriching, heart-melting job I've ever had and I wouldn't give anything for it. It's funny how life changes when you are responsible for another human being. All of your decisions revolve around this tiny person. Being a mom has taught me so much about...life, responsibility, priorities, God, selflessness, and in the grand scheme of thing what is really important. I find myself praying A LOT more than I used to because I realize how much is out of my control. I know that Will is God's first and so that is my only comfort-to look to Jesus for healing and protection when I can't give it.We headed back home on Monday after lunch. Will slept until we got to Montgomery and then decided to act like he was 2 for just a little bit. We stopped off at Peach Park for a treat and to let all of us stretch his legs...Will was not pleased with this decision and took his spoon and flung ice cream all over me and screamed "GO HOME!" Poor little guy had had enough. Once he tasted what was on his spoon he calmed back down and found his way back to his sweet self. We arrived home about 5:30 with loads of laundry to do and already feeling behind on the week...but it was totally worth it!

Muffins for Mom

This morning Will's school hosted Muffins for Mom in each of the classrooms. Basically when you dropped off your child, you were invited to stay a little longer and eat breakfast. When I walked Will in, they had a precious card and handprint artwork, both laminated, waiting for the moms to arrive. They had also placed their hand print and a precious poem on a flower pot. Will carried this to me, beaming with pride. Will was sick on Wednesday and I immediately went to look on his school calendar on our fridge to see what he would miss. I'm not going to lie, I was so relieved to see that the hand print poem was being made on Thursday. I have been waiting all year for Mother's Day artwork :)
This is not the greatest picture, but I have very few of me with my little man. His teacher wasn't quite sure how to work my camera so I took what I could get and did the best job I could cropping and zooming in :)My precious hand print poem...We are headed to the beach this afternoon for a last little vacay just the three of us. Yesterday I went to the doctor and Alex's birth day has been set-June 1st! A mere 26 days away!! Will has filled our hearts to the brim...it is hard to imagine loving another little boy just as much-though I know we will!!!