Our Christmas Celebrations!

Oh the weather outside is frightful!

Our Christmas this year was low key and relaxing. We haden't really made any plans, because I was CERTAIN we'd have had the baby by Christmas and would be home recovering. Obviously, my plans didn't work out as I'd hoped. So Christmas came, and we were able to spend time with both of our families, and most importantly, with each other.

Christmas Eve we spent with Jon's brothers, Tina and parents, and enjoyed a delicous feast of some Chinese dish which I can't spell. But whhhhoa it was good. I ate myself sick off of homemade fudge, cookies, and an entire variety of irresistable treats.

Christmas morning we spent just here with our little family. Jon was so excited for Christmas, he was up by 6 and in the shower. Jack was awake by 6:30 and we bolted downstairs to see what Santa left us!! Santa knows me so well!! He put a John Shmidt CD in my stocking and brought Jack his very own tool set. My darling hubby got me a Sonicare toothbrush and some board games. I LOVE LOVE my toothbrush and get WAY too excited about oral hygiene. The difference is truly amazing. I got Jon a new toy/GPS so we can easily find places around that offer GF foods. (AKA Wendy's and Chik-fil-a). :) Jack got some Cars and a new Thomas the Train blanket made by his mommy. He keeps calling is "scary" though little stinker. He'll get used to it. So after enjoying our hot chocolate loaded with marshmallows, and letting Jack get his fill of his new tools, we headed on over to the Rusch's for present exchanging with them.

We were again treated to the delicous cooking of Chris and Tina and enjoyed potatoes and bacon, eggs and fruit. Deeelicous!! Jack was so overwhelmed with presents from his generous, doting grandparents and got way too distracted with his new Little People, so I got to open the rest of his gifts. He got lots of clothes, books, puzzles and big Tonka trucks. Hooray!!

We then headed over to Buckeye Ranch for Christmas with the Jones'. This was Dan's first Christmas home and it was so great to get to be with him. We got to talk to Lucas AKA John Bytheway, and he sounds like he's doing awesome. Can actually remember English too if you can believe it! :) My mom must see messes in my future because she got me a Bissell cleaning/shampooing hand cleaner. Pretty stinkin' cool! Jack got new Thomas bath toys, a fire station and some movies. We had my favorite meal for our Christmas feast which included ham, rolls, sweet potatoes, snap peas, corn and my mom's FABULOUS pumpkin pie! Yuum yum!! We concluded the night by watching the new Harry Potter (sooo good!) and going to bed.

I am so grateful to be close to the ones I love and that we can spend Christmas together. We missed Jessica and Alex and their girls, Lucas and Nathan but loved having Daniel home, and getting to spend our first Christmas with Tina and my new sister-in-law to be Jessica.

On a completely other note...YES I'm STILL PREGNANT!!!!! Today is my new date. The 29th. This day has been stuck in my head since I went to the doctor oh so long ago for my 8 week check-up. It became even more ingrained in my brain when my brother announced he was getting married on December 30th. I decided that this baby was going to be cooperative and come 2 weeks early so that I could be at the wedding in Birmingham and help out with the reception. Well, that didn't happen, so I tried to get my doctor's to induce me a week early. But, seeing as I was dialated oh...ZERO, they wouldn't do that either. So here we are. My due date and NO ACTION. I seriuosly think I've tried just about everything to put myself into labor. It's amazing what a desperate pregnant women will do. The worst was drinking the castor oil. That just made me sick sick sick and didn't produce a baby, so DEFINITELY not worth it. The only thing I have left to try is the Eggplant Parmeseon. YUM!

Under normal circumstances, I think I would be more chill, but I really REALLY wanted to be part of my brother's wedding. It is just beyond stinky that they are both from Atlanta, and have to travel out of state to be sealed because our temple is closed. I'm trying to convince my husband that I would be fine driving to Birmingham for their sealing, and just coming home if labor started. He's not convinced though. He frowns on the idea of out of network fees and the possibility of me having my baby on the side of the road in the back woods of Alabama. So I go to the doctor today, and we'll see if I've progressed at all. Hopefully my next post is either of me at the wedding or of me at the hospital!!

My boy's 2 year old portraits

Imagine trying to capture a decent picture of a jumping spider monkey. My sister is seriously gifted. Jack would not sit still for more than 1 second, and she managed to snag these incredible shots. Thank you SOOO much sister for lending your talents!!! You truly managed to capture some authentic Jack expressions.

My favorite!

I call this the "GQ" pose.





And here is my LAST belly picture! 11 days and counting. Coooooome on baby!

Happy Thanksgiving!

I must admit that Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday of the year. A holiday centered around a food is ok by me!! I start looking forward to Thanksgiving as soon as Halloween is over. One of the reasons I love it so much is because of our family tradition of going down to Destin to be with my Grandparents. Thanksgiving at the beach=heaven! I wasn't so willing to give up this favorite tradition when Jon and I got married, so the past 3 years, his parents have accompanied us down to the beach house to enjoy the holiday with the crazy Jones clan.

So our week of thankful celebration started last Sunday as the first crew drove down. My sister's family and the Rusch's joined us Tuesday night. We spent our days enjoying the 70 degree weather and watching my child swim in the not so warm ocean. But how could I restrain him?? I resisted him the first day and just about went into labor carrying a tantrum throwing toddler the mile trek back to the house. The next day, with back-up, I was more lenient and he and his cousins LOVED splashing around in the water, and shivered victoriously the whole way home.

Thanksgiving day arrived, and we were up early and at Papa's by 9:30 to watch the parade and prepare our delicious feast! And a feast it was!!! Jon had a gluten free selection of just about everything, other than the Golden Corral rolls. I ate myself sick, looked at the Black Friday adds, napped, and ate some more. It was a good day.

Black Friday was a success!!! Despite being out in the crowds by 7 AM, I didn't get my $3 toaster from Target, but I conquered several other sales which shall not be named.

Friday night we went up to Baytowne Wharf to see Santa and the fireworks. Jack LOVED the fireworks and just about had a cow when he saw Santa. We weren't ambitious enough to stand in the 45 minute line, but we stood at the fence and waved.

Jack and Hailey were breaking it down to some live country Christmas music.

I definitely slacked in the picture taking department, but my sister however took some 2 year old portraits of my little beast, so those will be coming soon.

I'm 36 weeks, and definitely feeling it. I was up a good portion of the night thinking of what all I need to pack in my hospital bag. I'm getting VERY anxious to get everything done and ready for baby. I have a list a mile long for this week. Good thing I like lists!

Hot Dog! Jack Turns Two!!!

Can you believe my little boy is two?! We celebrated with some of his favorite people, including his two grammies, Grandpa and Pops, and Uncle Daniel. He's such a lucky kid to be surrounded by grandparents and family that love him.

Our original plan for Jack's birthday was to be in Disney World, celebrating with Mickey Mouse. That fell through at the last minute however, so I tried to throw together a semi-festive party for my little man, which was most appropriately Mickey Mouse themed!

So I've been watching entirely too much Cake Boss lately, and got very ambitious at my plans to make a gluten free Mickey Mouse cake. I printed out the face I wanted to do, figured out the clever wording, and got to work. The cake itself turned out quite tasty and you couldn't even tell it was GF. I made the butter cream frosting from scratch, because really, it's just sooooo much better. I trimmed the layers to make them perfectly flat, and stacked them up. Up until this point, I thought I was so awesome and started daydreaming of charging big bucks for making wedding cakes. But the Lord, as always, saw that I needed some humbling. Problem number one: my icing that was supposed to be RED turned out a lovely shade of hot pink. I'd used just about all of my food coloring and didn't notice how pink it was until the cake was frosted. Problem 2: my plans for making Mickey black with oreo cookie crumbs were crushed because I realized it was pointless to contaminate a gluten free cake with dang wheat filled cookie crumbs!! Problem 3: I didn't have the tools I wanted to do all the ambitious things I'd planed. Problem 4: For a most tragic ending to my drama my cake broke apart!!!! It split not just once, but twice!!!! I guess GF doesn't hold together like normal flour cake. Either that or I just completely stink at baking. AAAAAAAanyway, it tasted dang delicious, even if it didn't look like I'd hoped. Not even CLOSE to what I'd hoped. Oh well. Jack could tell it was Mickey Mouse and screamed with delight as soon as he saw it.

He got lots of great presents and my house has been so pleasant the last few days with him playing with all of his new toys. His favorite things were of coarse, his new stuffed Mickey who goes with us EVERYWHERE and even gets tucked in at night next to Jack, and his new, pocket size version of Thomas the Train. His other most favorite thing was the card from his Grandma that sings. He opens it and delightedly dances around. Too cute!

I absolutely adore my two year old and love to watch him all day long. He makes us laugh so hard with all the funny things he has to say. He's started getting a very stern look and pushes his eyebrows together when he means business. He has started to get the hang of "please" and frequently requests "please Nemo" as soon as we get in the car. He is obsessed with Finding Nemo and has probably watched it 50 times in his short life. He can spot a Mickey, Elmo, or Thomas from a mile away. It's seriously quite impressive. When he really wants something, he gets overly excited and studders "wa wa wa wa wa wa want Nemo" for example. He loves candy, applesauce, hot dogs and cheese. He refuses to eat any vegetables and can pick them out of EVERYTHING. I've tried many methods of masking them, and the only successful ones so far are mushing them up in applesauce, and disguising them in zucchini bread.

Jack loves his daddy, and loves to help him with handy work around the house. He folds his arms for prayer and yells "AMEN" when it's over. He does this in church too and people have started asking me if we're raising him southern baptist. Hey, the boy's on fire with the Holy Spirit what can I say?! :)

Happy Birthday my favorite little man!!!

Trick-or-Treating!!!

Little dinasour man. So fearsome!
Jack and his friend Brody. Probably the cutest little monkey I've ever seen!

I just love having a toddler!! He makes everything so fun! This was our first year really trick-or-treating and we...I mean Jack had an absolute blast. We got together with some friends to watch the UGA/FL game (NOT going to talk about that slaughtering) and had delicous soup bread bowls, cookie cake and a whole assortment of my childs trick-or-treating spoils.

Jack loved being in his dinasour costume and especially loved his tail. He finally got the hang of putting the candy in his basket and we made it to like 10 houses! Hooray for a fabulous Halloween!!

The next day we went to my parent house for dinner, and Jack found this "Mick Mouse" hat. He put it one and kept making me sing the "hot dog" song (you know the one..."hot dog hot dog hot diggity dog"?? From Mickey Mouse club house...anyway) he was going nuts and dancing like Lord of the Dance. His little feet were moving so fast. Just the most recent hilarious/adorable thing he's done lately.

Pumpkin Carving

My favorite Halloween tradition, other than eating candy corn, is carving my pumpkin. Well, ok, third favorite. Going to North Georgia to the pumpkin patch and getting fresh apples is my number one favorite. Anyway, so for family night Monday, we carved up our pumpkin. It's been sitting safely on our porch for the past week to avoid being "drop kicked" by an over excited toddler. So he was thrilled to see the pumpkin again and had such a blast helping me carve it. He wasn't so interested in digging out the guts, but loved poking the sides with his marker. And look at how talented he is! Turned out great and veeeery spooky!!!Like his mom, the tongue always goes out if he's concentrating very hard on something.

I'm the one on the left. Completely wretched picture of me, but thought you'd like to see the belly. So there is my 30 week prego self in all my bloated glory.

Pumpkin Picking

It is so funny what Jack is afraid of. Last year, we took him to this very same pumpkin patch to pick a pumpkin, and he wouldn't let us set him down, let alone touch any of the pumpkins. So we'd tried to prepare him for our scary festive venture, and had told him all day that we were going to get a pumpkin. But right on cue, we drive up to the patch and he starts shaking and making the scared face. (Not NEARLY as bad as the scared face when we go through the car wash, but still pretty bad.) He kept saying "bye bye pumpkins" thinking that would make them go away. But we pressed onward, determined to have a festive memory building time!

We walked around and tried catching some of those typical kid with the pumpkin photos. He cooperated a little and at least let me put the pumpkin near him. But despite his dad jumping and whooping behind me trying to get a smile, all we got was the "please rescue me" face. Bless his little heart!!

Jack allowed us to walk him through the patch, as long as he got to hold dad's hand as we searched for the perfect pumpkin.

He eventually noticed the twangy music blaring and spotted a pumpkin just his size!! He sat there being adorable for about a minute and let me capture some pictures, then started doing a little jig with his new found larger than life squash.

Just call me Jack-O-Lantern......

Oh come on! That's clever!

10 weeks to go!!!

What, is that a problem!?



I love this stage of pregnancy. I look very pregnant, and therefore easily make friends with everyone around me. There must be something about a pregnant woman that people feel they can connect too. It's a great conversation starter and I think I know every person at my gym by name and they're entire family history. It's great. But I must be getting large because people think I'm due anytime. REALLY? I've got 2+ months to go people. I'm not to the point yet where people tell me "you look like you're ready to pop" so I guess that's good.

Sorry I don't have any legit belly pictures, we just haven't whipped out the camera in a while! I will soon though promise.

Our hot new ride!!

Ok, so this isn't my ACTUAL car, but I'm way too lazy to go take a picture of it, but this is what it looks like. Cute huh?! Jon and I have been agonizing over a new vehicle for the past few months. It took us FOREVER to decide what we wanted. I wanted an SUV and Jon wanted a truck, so you see what we ended up with. :) It'll be great and economical for our growing family. Hooray!

Help!!

I need some help from you mom's out there. First, Jon changed jobs about a month ago (HOORAY!!!) and with that came a change in our insurance. So I'm due for my 28 week check up next week, and have no OB. Does anyone local have any recommendations of a good doctor in Gwinnett County?

Second, I am constantly out of breath and feel like my heart is racing. It's extremely unpleasant as I'm sure you can imagine and actually keeps me from sleeping at night because I feel like I can't breath. Like right now sitting here calmly at my computer, my pulse is 100. Is that normal?!?! I asked my doctor about it at my last visit, and she said I was dehydrated. Well I think that's a load of bull because I drink a ton. Anyway, PLEASE does anyone have any advice?!

Big Boy Bed

When did my baby become a little boy who sleeps in a big boy bed?? I've been dreading making the transition, thinking it would be a horrible sleepless nightmare. But all my dread was for nothing because the change was smooth and easy. Jack loves his big boy bed!! Another task I can check off my list before baby #2 comes. Hooray!

NYC Trip

My lifelong friend Hillary and her husband Adam have been living in Manhattan for the past two years. We were finally able to work out getting up there to visit them. So that's just what we did for our Labor Day weekend. Jack vacationed with his grandparents, aunts, uncles and cousins, and we vacationed in the Big Apple.

Our trip started with a scarier than all get out taxi ride from the airport to Washington Heights where our friends live. Seriously was fearing for my life as we whipped in and out of traffic and slammed on breaks. But we survived luckily because the next three days would have been a shame to miss!!

Having barely slept Friday night because I was so excited, I'm up with the sun Saturday morning ready to get started. Adam is the Young Men's president in his ward and they had a 10 mile "urban" hike planned for the day. So we tagged along and it was AWESOME! Such a great way to see the city. We started in Central Park, made our way through Time Square, through the various jewelry and fabric districts of the city, stopped in Whole Foods for some gluten-free hamburger buns, got lunch at the Shake Shack in Madison Square Park(hoooly cow it was good!), and ended OUR leg of the hike at Washington Park next to NYU. (And for any of you who might be impressed that a 6 month pregnant person hiked 6 miles on concrete.... don't be. I was dying and paid for it the rest of the trip. Oh but it was so worth it!) So we broke off from the group and made our way to reward ourselves with some Gelato. Of coarse! And as if that wasn't enough reward, we went to a place called Baby Cakes, a vegan bakery, which makes gluten free baked goods. Jon was in heaven!!! He got a big decedent chocolate cupcake, cookies and some other kind of cake and savored every bite over the next few days.

(Gross-o pigeon poo on Jon!)

That night after some much needed recovery time, we headed back to the city. First stop, Rissoteria - A gluten free Italian Restaurant in the Village. The bread sticks were divine and we each ate like 4. Jon got a panini and again, savored every bite. He was ready to move to NY just for the availability of GF foods after this day!

Now, I love some good jazz, and Adam is a musician and jazz connoisseur so he had the inside scoop of good shows in the city. Lucky for us the Kenny Werner Quintet was playing in a little club called the Blue Note for the weekend we were there. We just sat and chilled and enjoyed this amazing group. It was the perfect end for day one.

This is with sand! Cool huh!?

Don't know why he's frowning, probably because he had to stop eating his cupcake to take the picture.

Sunday, we walked to church (how cool is that?!) through a GORGEOUS park. Church was an event in itself as you can imagine. Being in New York, there was a wide array of talent in this ward spanning from opera singers, a violinist, playwrights, broadway performers and much more I'm sure. Sitting in sacrament meeting was a treat and I didn't sing a bit, just trying to listen to the bellowing tenor down the isle from me. Ahhhhh. Amazing. Anyway, the rest of the day we relaxed in our friend's fabulous apartment and went for a walk through the "ghetto" which turned into a hike to Yankee Stadium. Needless to say we took the bus home. Another reason I love my friend Hillary, is because she is an AMAZING cook!! For our Sunday night feast, she made us pulled pork tacos with fresh guacamole, and corn delishousness salad. She taught me how to properly chop an onion (Jessica you would be proud) and how to safely use a knife. I learned so much! Anyway, dinner was incredible and we were wondering WHY we didn't eat at her place the entire time?! Who needs to eat out when your traveling with a gourmet chef? However, this was a mini-vacation for her as well so I'm sure she enjoyed not having to cook for us all the time. :) After dinner Adam and Hillary took us on a tour of their neighborhood. Jon and I decided this might have been our favorite part of the whole trip. They live in a beautiful part of northern Manhattan called Washington Heights. It's right on the Hudson River next to the George Washington Bridge. Adam with his mad photography skills took way better pictures than me on this little walk, so I'll wait to get those from him and post them. Mine won't do it justice.

Monday, after a delicious pork and feta cheese frittata (which Hillary helped me and kind of taught me to make, be impressed) we're off for our last day of sight-seeing and fun. We started with a trip on the Staten Island Ferry which gave us great views of the city, and of coarse the Statue of Liberty. From there we made our way through Battery Park and happened upon a Dutch festival with free cheese samples! Yum! We went down Wall Street where Adam was finally able to "ride the bull"! So perfect seeing as he works on Wall Street. Hiked across the Brooklyn Bridge waited in line for some fabulous ice cream, and chilled in a park by the river, complete with an old man in a pale yellow thong speedo. Nice. Took the subway back into town where we stopped to see the Manhattan Temple, and went on a much needed shopping trip to J Crew. Yay for having friends who work at my favorite stores!! Back to 42nd street, we got sushi and lettuce wraps for dinner, read our fortunes which aren't really fortunes at all, but little pieces of wisdom.... lame, and went down to Broadway to see In the Heights. Hillary recommended this show, which was nominated for 13 Tony Awards last year, and won for Best Musical. First time I've been to a show on Broadway and we lucked out because it was a light house and we got moved up to way better seats!! Show was awesome and my little baby was kicking away inside me. He was jammin' along with the rest of us. Side note, some of the actors from the show were on the same train with us on the way home. That makes us kind of famous right??

After our goodbyes, and a few hours of sleep, Jon and I caught our 6 AM flight back to Atlanta. Picked up our Jack who we missed so much, slept a good part of the day, then it was back to the airport to welcome home DANIEL!!!! He's back from California and looks better than ever! He'll be going to UGA, so we're excited to have him around.

This was the perfect trip to New York, especially because we got to spend time with our awesome friends. We already miss you so much and can't wait to start planning our next mini-tico trip!!