Well, believe it or not, I have gotten just about everything done on my to-do lists! The upside is having things in order, the major downside is that now all there is to do is WAIT for this baby to come.
Here is what we've been up to for the last few weeks. First off, I got Sophie's allergist appointment taken care of. She was scheduled for a skin prick test, and while I was hoping for some major progress, what we got was minor indeed.
This is what a skin prick test looks like:
Each of those numbers correspond with a food that is being tested for an allergic reaction. A red bump, or hive, is proof positive that an allergy exists. As you can see, Sophie is still allergic to quite a bit. "Oh wow," said the nurse as she came in to check, "did you know she was this allergic?" Indeed we did, my friend, indeed we did. Luckily Sophie was fantastic for the whole appointment (I think she REALLY enjoys all the attention she gets from going to the doctor) and was completely entertained with a Wiggles video tape during the 20 minute wait for the test to develop.
(This pic is somewhat misleading, because she sat for maybe 2 minutes before she was up and dancing all over the place. It was actually quite hilarious.)
AND, I was more than impressed with her when she didn't even cry when she had to get blood taken for additional allergy testing after the skin prick test was over. I was seriously expecting a meltdown because the nurse was poking all around in her arm trying to find one of her tiny little veins that kept rolling out of the way, and it took a few minutes to finally get one. Sophie was a superchamp, though, and just sat there hardly moving at all during the whole ordeal. And, in her young mind, she was more than rewarded when she got to pick out a sucker when she was done.
Luckily we won't have to do that again anytime soon. And while she's still allergic to a few major things (e.g. milk, eggs, peanuts, and regular nuts for that matter), she HAS outgrown her allergy to bananas! Baby steps, right? Here she is eating her very first banana -- and let's just say she LOVES them:
As for other happenings, we enjoyed a week's visit from my mom and Jacob. And even though they had to leave today for Jacob to get back for football and school this week, they were a HUGE help while they were here. We miss them already! Mom helped me get the last of my to-do's checked off my list, AND took Ethan and Grace off my hands for 3 days and 2 nights while they went to visit my sister Sarah.
Ready for their adventure!
I'm told they behaved, so hopefully that's the truth! Hahaha. I do have to say, that while it was nice to have some peace and quiet around the house while they were gone, it was also exceedingly WEIRD only to have one kid at home and none of the noise and chaos. I have to admit that I actually missed it. Crazy, I know! Me and Soph did share some mother-daughter bonding time, which I know my little mama's girl loved, so that was fun. And of course, it is SOOOOO much easier dragging around only one child to run errands with. All in all, though, we were happy to have everyone back at home on Friday.
Self-portrait with the supermuppet
While my mom was here, we also scored some free stuff courtesy of our neighbor's curbside, and let's just say that Grace is in heaven with all of the new toys. It is RIGHT up her alley. Ethan has actually enjoyed playing with her as well. Although, I do have to say that I wish the poor boy had a brother to play with sometimes. I think he does, too, evidenced by his recent musings that perhaps the lady (meaning the ultrasound technician) was wrong and that it's really a BOY we'll be having. That would be a surprise indeed.
Here's Ethan wearing the "Pet Vet" lab coat. Hahaha.
And here's a picture Ethan snapped of Grace while she was having fun with one of the new toys at bedtime on Friday night.
One of the other curbside treasures -- could this be any more perfect for my little junk loving Grace?
In other happenings:
I got my hair done.
Back to School supplies (yay!) were bought.
I took Ethan and Grace on a date to pick out some school clothes.
I can't even TELL you how much this picture of the 3 of them just tickles my fancy. Each of their expressions are GOLD.
I hit the 37 week mark (anytime now, Jane).
I packed my bag for the hospital.
AND we celebrated Scott's 32nd birthday.
Scott has forbidden me to embarrass him by listing 32 fabulous things about him, so you'll just have to take my word for it that he's the coolest. Hahahaha. We were able to celebrate last night while mom was still here to babysit by going to eat at Benihana. Because this place is super expensive, we don't frequent it that often, but when we do, it's DELISH. It was made especially delicious last night thanks to signing up online for Benihana's birthday club which gave Scott 30 bucks towards his meal -- essentially a free dinner for him.
Scott didn't want to take any pictures of us at the restaurant so this one will have to do.
Ethan was excited to make decorations today for Scott's "party," Grace was excited for the ice cream, and Scott was excited when he opened his birthday present. After much thought and deliberation, I decided that it was better to get the Wii for Scott for his birthday than to have Santa bring it for the family for Christmas. Ethan has been wanting one since before LAST Christmas, but I just didn't want to have to deal with him wanting to play it all the time. Now that it's SCOTT'S present, however, I'm hoping that it will be easier to put limits on when and how long the kids can play. Wishful thinking I'm sure.
Ethan's decorations.
Scott discovering that his sneaking suspicion was right.
Posing with his new toy. Hahahaha.
To close with, here is a story about our little free spirit, Grace. Grace is proving to be completely hit or miss with Sunday (and more specifically Primary) behavior. Last Sunday was a catastrophe due to a few factors. First of all, she went to sleep WAY too late the night before. Second of all, Scott was substituting for Ethan's primary teacher and Grace does NOT handle having either of us there very well. And finally, her OWN teacher was gone and a substitute was in place which must have thrown Grace off a little bit more. Oh, and how can I forget? I made the mistake of letting her wear accessories to church. With a hairbow and bracelets to distract her, she disintegrated from bad to worse over the course of sharing time -- culminating with Grace telling her teacher that she would "break her arm and her legs" when she threatened to take the bracelets away if Grace wouldn't turn around and stop playing with them. When the teacher followed through with the threat and TRIED to take them away, Grace would not let go and they ended up popping and the beads went everywhere. A full-on, meltdown fit then commenced with Scott finally just collecting her, and the rest of us, and going home.
It took all week to convince her (ok, ok, MAKE her) compose an apology letter to the teacher -- her reasoning being that the teacher owed HER an apology first for breaking her bracelets -- but she finally gave in yesterday and colored a little picture for her and wrote "I'm Sorry" on the back. AND our little schizophrenic was actually REALLY well-behaved for all of church today! So there you go. Hopefully she'll stay on this mood swing for the next few weeks. Hahaha.
Well, that's about all that's been happening. Nothing too exciting, so I apologize, but hopefully the next post will bring an update with a baby!
(Look how much hair she has! And how dark it is!)
Before leaving for the hospital.
Getting all set up -- this is quite possibly the ugliest hospital gown I've ever had to wear.
The cute little peanut after she had her bath.
Proud mother and babe.
The kids come to meet their new sister.
And we try to get a better family shot.
Happy -- yet VERY tired -- new parents.
The Girlie Bugs.
Big Brother Bonding...
And then moving on to more entertaining things.
Happy Big Sister.
And newest Big Sister.
It was love at first sight, really.
