Last weekend I had the pleasrue of joining you for a rollicking romp 'round the 'rboretum. We love the Dallas Arboretum- that's why we're members- and we love just being to up and go to it whenever we want. So, last weekend, your Mom needed to illustrate, and you and I needed to get out of the house. So we went to the Arboretum! I had a blast with you. You only had one two-year-old tantrumic moment, but we worked through it and enjoyed the water features, the old west Frontier Village, the wildlife and, of course, a delicious ice cream sandwich.
This is a photo of our day together, just the two of us.
Complete with a gourd with a "face" on it, pumpkins with silly tongues-out painted on visages, a costume due to the soaking good time at the tadpoles and froggies, one deliberately drenched daddy hat, a delicious PB&J lunch by the Picasso house, and lots of fun and laughter this was one awesome morning...and cause for one heck of a nap afterwards.
We'll always have time together-- no Cats in the Cradle here-- but, our times will of course grow and evolve as we grow and evolve. But here's to that day, September whatever-it-was 2012- a fun little slice in time where no one was hurt, everyone had fun, everyone got really wet and a little sun-kissed and one ice cream sandwich was shared by father and son.
A lot of people have been posting their children's 'favorites' as part of the new school year. I think it's a great idea, as it's really cool to take a time-capsule-esque snapshot of a kiddo at that date and time.
Julia, as of now, your list is really quite easy:
Favorite Food: Placenta Favorite Band: The Darkness Favorite Song: The Sound of Silence; Heartbeat Favorite Movie: Dark City; Dark Crystal Favorite Book: The Heart of Darkness Favorite Activity: Growing, Bouncing on your Mommy's bladder. Favorite Place to hang out: the womb
But soon enough- yikes...in 2 weeks!- you will soon have a whole new experience, and we can beef up your musical and culinary tastes.
But Aidan, your favorites are a bit harder to pin down. You can be obessed with something for weeks on end, or minutes on end. Some favorites are evergreen, like Toy Story or the color Yellow; you never get tired of them. Others, like broccoli or sweet potatoes, you may have over-dosed on and now you aren't as fond of them as you used to be. I set out on a week's long quest to find out all of your favorites direct from the horse's mouth. This was foolish, because one cannot simply ask a 2 year old what their favorite movie if they have no intention of watching said movie and, as mentioned before, your favorites vacillate from day to day on some items. So, there is some parental editorializing in the lists. But, trust me, this is pretty accurate, and has been approved by your mother.
Favorite Color: Although you love many colors, this one's easy:Yellow. Always has been. 'Nuff Said.
Favorite Super Hero: Hulk. Unless Buzz Lightyear counts as a super hero.
I made your lunch for school yesterday and included a little hand-drawn Hulk that said "Hulk Love Aidan." Miss Jessica said when you saw it, you whispered "WOW!!!"
Favorite Book: This is a tough one. You LOVE to read. In fact, you fell asleep on a book over the weekend, napped on it, and spent the rest of the day with 'newsprint' on your face.
You've loved two pop-up books nearly to death: "The Wheels on the Bus" and "Charlie and Lola's I will not Ever Never Eat a Tomato." Those could clearly be candidates for favorite book. "Olivia" was a fan favorite for a long time, as were the old "Sesame Street" books Mimi and Pops brought over. You love "Mouse Cookie"(what you call "If You Give a Mouse a Cookie") and "Everyone Poops" ("Poops book!") "Gossie and Gertie" and REALLY love "Ice Mice" (what you call "I can Read with my Eyes Shut"); In fact, 1 of the 4 times I asked you what your favorite book was, you replied "Ice Mice." Time two, you said "Horton Hears," which is a very good book too. But, 2 out of four times you said the same book:
"Hippo, no Hippo"
and
"Hippo book"
So, you really like Sandra Boynton's "But not the Hippopotamus." And that's going down as your favorite!
Favorite Song: This is a tough one. You love you sing; you love to listen to songs; you love to request songs be sung to you; you love to do sing-a-longs with Mommy and Daddy.
Lately you've been singing "Happy Birthday" to yourself quite a bit (Happy toy ou/happy to you/happy to you). You've also been really into Muppet's Bohemian Rhapsody for the longest time. You used to call it "Mama," now you call it "Muppets." But the cool thing, is that now you are singing it! You know one whole verse, and sing it like this:
Easy Come/Easy Come
Little High/Little Low
Any rainbows
Dont Matters
To Me
to me!!!!!!!!!
So that's definitely a candidate for favorite song.
But, you also love 'classics' like the "Itsy Bitsy Spider," "Twinkle, Twinkle," "Old King Cole," "You are My Sunshine," "I'm Looking Over (A Four leaf Clover)."
Your favorite Lullabye right now is "Pooh Song" (aka "The House on Pooh Corner" by K-Log), which was one of your favorites as an infant and has recently made a comeback.
But, executive decision here, I'd have to say that your favorite song is "Let it Be." This is one of your favorite tunes, whether it's "Letter B" (the Sesame Street cover) or the actual "Let it Be," this tune rocks your socks off for some reason. You sing it with us, you sing it on your own, we can us it as 'bait' to get you into the car when you don't want to go ("Want to listen to "Let it Be?"). The answer is always "YES!" to Let it Be.
Favorite Food: You are a pretty dang good eater. The problem comes when we find something that you really like, and then make a lot of it, and then you burn out on it...like mashed sweet potatoes, rice, etc.
But, some foods are always golden, and you could probably eat them every day if we let you. But we're not going to risk letting you burn out on them!
So, your favorites are: sausage, edamame, mango, oranges and avocado. Oh yeah, and pizza!
Favorite Movie: Toy Story. You love Toy Story. Toy Story 1, Toy Story 2, Toy Story 3. You've loved Toy Story since before you could talk. You called it "Ha ha" because of the scene where Woody and the Shark have that little conversation about Woody's hat in the first movie (yes, we've seen it a million times). You love Toy Story so much that you had a "Two Story" themed second birthday party. Thanks to some very kind Uncles and Aunts and Grandparents you have a whole "Andy's Toys" set. You carry them around and play with them daily. Buzz is your favorite. You cheer "Finity and BEYON!" at home...and on the swings...You know the words to "Fren in me" ("You've got a friend in me"). So, yeah, Toy Story is the bomb.
You've been branching out lately, though and enjoy "Horton Hears a Who," "Bug's Life," "Madagascar," "Finding Nemo" and "Monster's Inc."
But, when you ask to watch "Woody Moozy" we know that you're a Toy Story guy at heart.
Favorite Toy/Posession: "Blankies." That's your blanket. We don't know how it happened; you've slept with many stuffed animals and toys and even books. But you grew attached to your Blankies. It's great to sleep on, makes a great monster maxsxsk (as you showed your mother and I last night), and even is sometimes a lion's mane! It's great to hide under, and to wear as a cape, or to tuck your toys in to bed with.
Where you go to sleep, blankies goes too.
Favorite Activity: You love to play outside. Running around, picking up rocks, making rock soup, looking for rolley polies, blowing bubbles, doing 'airplanes' and kicking the ball...you're an outside kinda guy. You have been for a long time.
But, you're also a water guy. If there's splashing or dripping water around, you're gonna find it, you're gonna splash in it, and you're gonna love it!
Favorite TV Show: Wonder Pets/ Timmy Time/ Blue's Clues/Sesame Street
You don't watch many shows, but when you do, you've got an opinion on what 'epsodes' are the best. You do love Sesame Street, and were asking for it yesterday ('sesame street moozy plesase'), but as of today, I think that if you had to choose any show to watch, it'd be Timmy Time, the spinoff of Shaun the Sheep (which you also love, and like to sing the theme song to "Shoppa Sheep, Shoopa Sheep...Bleet!), the spinoff of Wallace and Gromit.
Favorite Animal: Tough one. You've been liking horses, dogs, koalas, kangaroos, grasshoppers, butterflies, cats, and pandas. But, here's another executive decision, your favorite is the "elephant." You love making the elephant noise, singin the elephant song (from the "Jungle Book"), reading "Stomp the Swamp" (an elephant romp), and "Horton Hears a Who" (a Seussian Elephant of great esteem).
Favorite Phrase: Normally only sitcom characters have catch-phrases. But, here are a few of my favorite 'catch-phrases' that you love to use as you're learning this language.
"Bye-bye, See ya!" (useful to say bye-bye, see ya to inanimate objects, animals, toys and nature as you're leaving a room, building or park. Such as "Bye-bye park, see ya!" Or "Bye-bye bed, bye-bye diaper, bye-bye Buzz. See ya!")
"Have it" (like "Strawberry. Have it!" or "Have it, Daddy!")
Alright, so it's taken me a week to put this post together, and thus, your favorites have probably all already changed and changed back. But, consider this a 'snapshot' of a young man, with a lot of opinions, and a lot of love...and a lot of favorites. Your favorties may change as you grow up, but one thing won't: you're one of your mother's and my favorite boys in the entire world (and our favorite first-born son). So put that on OUR lists. It won't be changing.
Julia, you're now 36 weeks along on this magical journey they call the road to life, or pregnancy, or whatever. Whatever it is, you've only got about 3 weeks left of it!
You've been doing your job quite well: You're growing, rolling around, kicking and squirming.
Your Mom is as beautiful as always:
It's so interesting to compare the Julia with the Aidan belly at the same week in pregnancy. Here's your Mom about 3 years ago, very pregnant with Aidan:
I think you may be a bigger belly, Miss Julia...but just by a hair! But, there's no real sense in comparing apples to oranges, when you're really the size of a honeydew melon.
News from the womb indicates that your heaing is fully developped, that your liver and kidneys are in working order, that your circulation and immune systems are pretty much good to go and that you're finalizing those steps to be able to breathe on your own. Also, we know that your Mom's cervical lining (that glue which basically keeps the first steps of labor from starting to happen) is all-but gone. It was thinned to 80% two weeks ago, and this week the doctor didn't even bother to check.
Now since you're coming via C-section anyway, we don't really need to worry about dilation and all that, like we did last time. BUT if you decide you're ready to come earlier than October 11, 2012, then we'd better be ready.
Which makes the honeydew even more important. See, we've been scrambling to get everything ready for your arrival. Feels like we've been prepping hard since the beginning of summer, but we really kicked it into high gear recently. We made our "honey-do" lists (you know, like "honey, do this", "honey, do that", we checked them twice, and we started crossing them off our list. Everything's falling into place...
Your Yaya finshed work on your dresser, and we got that put in place of the old changing table.
I painted different walls in different rooms.
We went to Ikea to finish setting up your Mom's new office (so we could move the office stuff from the playroom, so we could get the playroom all set up).
We sold old stuff, and bought new stuff: new swing, new stroller, new bouncy chair.
I cleaned out and organized the shed (yes, that had to be done before you came!)
I scooted over Aidan's seat and installed yours.
Looks Good right? I keep asking Aidan if he knows who's going to be sitting next to him soon. His answer thus far has been, "huh?"
We're prepping Aidan for our stay at the hospital by doing a test run of spending the night at Yaya's house tonight.
We're working extra hard with Aidan on being gentle with the items you will soon frequent.
We got out all the old baby toys and put them away. Aidan keeps taking them out.
All this honey-do-ing can sure make a guy tired...
But, we're getting there baby, and there are only a few more honey-do's to do. But you know what? You have a loving brother waiting for you (occasionally he waits behind trees):
You've got a loving, beautiful Mom who is QUITE ready for you to arrive.
And you've got a devoted Dad who is so excited to meet you and finally get to hold you.
Plus two doggies who you're just going to love, 4 awesome grandparents, aunts and uncles and friends.
So, if you come tomorrow, you'll be all set. It doesn't matter if that picture doesn't get framed and hung, or the ceiling paint touched-up. Those honey-do's can all wait once our perfect honeydew arrives.
The summer just ended here in Dallas, and we can finally go outside again (with lots of bug spray, especially at dusk...thanks West Nile Mosquitoes...). But it's cool...it's crisp...it's Texas-style fall here with temps peaking in the high 80s and low 90s, and much nicer than that in the morning. So we took advantage of the beautiful day and went to the arboretum.
I had a seret agenda: take pretty pregnancy pictures of your Mom. We're in the 35th week, which means, little Julia is not so little anymore. You're the size of a coconut...and that's nuts!
But...looking at your beautiful mother and her bodacious bump, I'd say coconut seems about right!
Your Mom is just ravishing, though if you talked to her she'd protest and say self depricating things. But I just pretend not to hear those at all. She's cute, she's cool, she's preggo, she's sassy and she's beautiful. Just look!
But, even if your Mom is not pleased with the photos, (despite all logical people telling her that she's gorgeous), at least -in her words- she's happy with the photos because they'll get me "off her back." See what I mean about sassy?
I just wanted to take some fancy shots to officially commemorate what may be our last big bump! (We'll see what the future holds, though...)
Amongst all the professional modeling and posing, we also had time to run around, chase butterflies, try to get into waterfalls, fly around and run up and down a hill in the wind.
Fun in the sun, now that it's not trying so hard to scorch all living things.
So, a successful day for Aidan in the fun department, and a very successful day for Mommy and Julia in the coconut department.
Wow! Is it already week 34? Let's check the bump size:
Yup. That looks like a 34 week belly to me! And I think your mother would agree with me. Her aching feet ache, her pregnancy-arthritic hands hurt, she's suffering from dunlap disease so much that when she sits down in a chair her belly (aka, you, young lady) are resting on the chair itself! She's having difficulty breathing at night, feeling rather large and inactive and sluggish and generally very, very pregnant.
If any of that sounds negative, it's not. It's very, very positive! You're growing, baby, and with growing comes some growing pains from time to time. But right now, with 6 weeks to go, we are just happy you're thriving so well in there!
We're getting ready for you to come too. In fact, the nesting has kicked into high gear. We've reorganized yours and Aidan's closet (and re-installed all the shelves that fell out after that happened), we've organized your wardrobe, added extra storage cubes for your personal effects, gone shopping a few more times to add to your wardrobe even more (pinks and yellows and reds, oh my!). We've sold some old stuff and bought you some new stuff (double stroller, new bouncy chair, new swing!) and even assembled most of the new arsenal of baby stuff.
The boxes are making a certain someone quite happy:
Namely me! I'm building a large cardboard train! Choo choo!
But, really, we're all getting happy in expecation of your arrival. I mean today you're the size of an acorn squash, but soon you'll be the size of a newborn baby...because that's what you'll be. And we can't wait.
Developmentally, it now says that you can recognize and react to simple songs. These very songs may actually even soothe you when you come out! That's great, because we do a LOT of singing, and lately everyone's been getting in on the act.
In the quest to get Aidan back sleeping through the night, we've started over with sleep training. Which means back to the days of Lullabye medleys at night. So you'll love "Return to Pooh Corner" (which Aidan requests nightly "Pooh song please," "Somewhere over the Rainbow," "The End," "Golden Slumbers," and so much more.
In fact, your Mom says you really seem to like it when she sings "Return to Pooh Corner" to Aidan at night time.
Plus, you may also start to recognize your brother's lovely singing voice too, as he's recently learned a few new songs and gotten more comfortable belting out a tune or four:
And, whether or not you'll be a singer, we'll just have to wait and see...but, we already know that you're going to be a dancer. Check out these moves!
Soon you'll be a little baby out here in the world; until then you're a wonderful bouncy, big, rambunctious bump. If you keep dancing, we'll keep singing. Both You and Aidan are my sunshine, and you'll never know how much I love you.
Julia, I was thumbing through my phone this weekend and realized how far you, me, your mom and the bump have come! Of course we've been documenting your bumpiness with semi-bi-weekly photos, but these candids seem to capture something different than those pictures. So, enjoy, the lost (but not forgotten) pregnancy photos, showing the ever growing bump, and ever shortening hair styles of your Mommy during her pregnancy with you!
It's so crazy to think that you'll be here in just about a month. Our lives are going to change forever, and we can't wait.
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