Poor, Neglected Froglegs

Yes, I am still growing a baby. 

You may have noticed how sadly silent we have been on this subject. Turns out that already having a child completely throws a wrench into planning for the next one. With Luke, I knew exactly how many weeks along I was, was reading prenatal books and updates each week to find out how he was developing, was taking weekly pictures (sort of), can remember the exact moment I first felt him move, spent a good chunk of each day thinking about who I was creating and had daily birth preparation exercises to help prepare me to be a mother. And pregnancy took forever.

With this one, I can sometimes spare some mental space at night after I am already in bed, but not always, and am surprised to find myself almost halfway there! Plus, Kenny has taken it upon himself to nickname our children based on what they look like at their earliest ultrasound (Luke was peanut), and this poor child got the unfortunate designation of "froglegs". So here we are, froglegs and I, at 18 weeks and 2 days:

Sadly nothing can be done about the giant white arm. 

As if this baby already knows it is entering a world where it will need to fight for attention, it is a serious mover. I don't know what froglegs is doing in there, but he/she completely skipped the "little butterfly flutters" movement phase and went right to kicking and punching and flipping, hard enough that Kenny has already felt movement. My midwives suspect that this will be another giant of a baby (apparently that's just the way my body grows 'em), so maybe we're already running out of room? 

Take that, Pottery Barn!

So I rarely post about crafting and never post how-to tutorials, but this one had to be bragged about. 

Behold, the Young Family Gratitude Tree.

A two-year project in the making, I got the idea from a similar tree I saw in a Pottery Barn magazine, although mine is so much cooler. Everyday you take off the corresponding numbered leaf and replace it with a leaf or acorn mini-chalkboard, upon which you write something you are thankful for. There are also blank leaves to replace the numbered ones for the years when Thanksgiving comes a little early, all kept within the handy leaf drawstring bag seen on the left. 

Just to give you an idea of why it took so darn long to finish (to be fair, I only worked on it during November and last Thanksgiving my mom was around to entertain Luke), here is the crazy amount of work that went into it:

• 96 leaves cut out
• 62 pieces of velcro sewn on
• 8 bobbins of thread respooled
• 28 wooden pieces spray-painted
• 3+ yards of felt used 

...all for 20 minutes of interest on Luke's part when I finally hung it on the wall. :)

Cougars and Horses and Dogs

This past weekend we flew up to Kansas City to see BYU lose (in a very miserable game) to Mizzou, as per Kenny's yearly tradition of attending a BYU away game since he graduated. Nate Tanner's parents were kind enough to let us stay at their house, even though it was very full with the rest of their entire family, and Luke had an absolute blast exploring their enormous backyard, complete with horses, a massive dog named Danny Boy, a trampoline, a swingset, and a sandbox. 

In fact, Luke loved pretty much everything about the weekend. He loves flying on airplanes for some reason (but thank goodness, amiright?), and was beyond excited to head to the airport both times, could not get enough of being outside, got a kick out of going potty on all sorts of new potties, took to the babysitters for the game instantly, and was even stoked to go to a new nursery on Sunday. He tried so very hard to get Danny Boy to play fetch with him and even rode a horse without crying for several minutes (albeit with a death grip on the saddle). The little man sure knows how to enjoy himself. 

Ken and Nate made full use of a house full of people with plenty of games, and I made full use of the numerous outdoor activities with some very rusty tennis on my part, horseback riding, and shooting. And yes, we did see the game. 

*sigh* BYU, when are you going to stop breaking Ken's poor, trusting heart?

The War

We have entered the last and worst realm of what I now refer to as self-inflicted toddler H-E-double-hockey-sticks (second only to breastfeeding/weaning and sleep training): 

Potty Training.

And because of Luke's personality (and mine), and the success my cousin Janessa has had using this method, we decided it would be best to cut diapers cold turkey and never look back. Luke is just the type of smart, stinker-like toddler to say, "Oh, I can wear diapers when I sleep? Well, I'm just going to wear them forever, thank you very much," And I decided long ago that two kids in diapers was going to be a no-go for me. So to avoid training too close to the baby to have regression issues and hopefully to avoid active training during the bulk of the holidays, I changed my last Luke-produced poopy diaper on the night of November 2nd. 

So far the results have been promising! After several small accidents in the morning two days ago, we did get some pee in the potty, and I was rewarded with Luke running towards me mid-morning frantically yelling, "Gotta go poopoo!" and a successful bowel movement in the toilet shortly after that. He also woke up dry from his nap yesterday and developed some really obvious dancing and frantic crotch-grabbing signs that helped me haul him to the potty more often than not (only one accident inside, the rest out on our balcony). This morning he woke up dry and immediately went potty when we put him on the toilet, which was just the encouragement that mama needed to keep it up. He is always very proud of his accomplishments, and this is no exception. Hopefully we make it out with minimal emotional scarring, on both sides. Honestly, "losing the battle but winning the war" has got to be a reference to potty training. 

Yes, I totally blurred the penis. I wonder how much he will hate me for putting this on the internet. 

They Call Me Mellow Yellow

Curious George was quite the hit, both at the ward Trunk or Treat and sloshing through the wet after it had been raining all day on Halloween night. Plenty of pictures were posed for, including some sweet grandparents who had to send it to their grandchild because his favorite TV show was Curious George, and lots of little kids came up and went, "Hey! It's George!"

Even more of a hit with the kiddos, however, was our man in the yellow hat. Visible even in the dark from far away, several kids came up, their moms in tow, just to stare at Ken while their moms apologized and said, "He saw you and just had to come see you up close; you're one of his favorite characters!"

Ken thinks it's because he is the ultimate father figure; he lets his monkey do anything!