Babies and links abound

Another good friend has announced her pregnancy this week! Karly is one of my avid readers (thanks Karly) and is a blogger herself. Check out what else Karly is up to at her blog here. It’s mostly about her pugs, and recently she casually mentioned she just moved and returned from a 2-week trip to Europe. So, as if she doesn’t have much going already she’s also producing a new life.

My other friend, Kara, who announced her pregnancy earlier this week has also informed me she has a blog. I love it. I can catch up with these girlfriends who I don’t get a chance to see. Read about her and her husband’s experiences through her pregnancy here. It just started, so there’s not a lot of posts, but it seems she’s pretty frequent already.

Anyway, I’m loving all the baby news and the blogs and I can’t wait to find out the sex so I can go out and buy more tiny clothes that keep getting bigger and bigger at my house …

Keep up the blogs girls!

A really random post

It’s been very eventful since we returned from vacation. First, I don’t really feel like getting into it a lot but after an hour of severe abdominal pains yesterday I ended up in the ER. They didn’t find anything which is what I was afraid would happen. I guess that’s the one thing that I should have not been afraid of. But really, it’s no fun to spend 3 hours and make your husband spend 3 hours at the hospital and pay $100 for nothing. But the pain was so bad! I started thinking I was going to be one of those women who suddenly has a baby and they didn’t even know they were pregnant. But really, my belly is not quite THAT big. We’re blaming the flu. Anyway …

We bought a Nintendo Wii a few nights ago and we’re really excited about it! We played a long time ago at a friend’s house when they first came out and it was really fun. But $300, geez. They probably were even more then. And I’m really not an electronic game player. But then we played again at my SIL Tami’s house over the Fourth. And it was so fun. And what’s really cool is that the 60-year-olds played, the 20- and 30-year-olds played, the teens played and even 3-year-old Rylan can play a little.

So we found several reasons to justify why we deserved one.

1. We never go out. Hardly ever. This will give us something to do other than just sit and watch TV or a movie.

2. We just got our economic stimulus check, and hello, we’re trying to help stimulate this economy!

3. It’s good exercise. Maybe true athletes will scoff at this, and I’m a little embarrassed to say it, but I’m sore from our two hours of tennis/bowling/golf/baseball we played the other day.

4. Fun for the whole family. Like I said, all ages like it. We’ll see when everyone comes over this weekend…

Then last night I talked to a dear friend I’ve worked with at two different newspapers and with her husband as well, and she informed me she is 5 months pregnant. I am sooo happy for them. She is one of the nicest people on earth and is going to be such a sweet mom. It was so fun to hear all about her pregnancy so far. That was such an exciting time.

And completely unrelated but really cute, here are some photos of Ella playing peekaboo behind Max – who is not amused.

Things I learned this Fourth of July

1. Schedules are very important for toddlers. Late nights + fewer naps = crazy baby.

2. Aunt Becky carries a lot of stuff in her purse. Including a flashlight.

3. Little Maximilian loves an audience and has a hundred faces to amuse them.

4. Ella doesn’t like cold pools. But a heated pool or a lake with waves and she’s completely satisfied.

5. Parades were invented for children. Lots of waving, lots to look at and candy being thrown right to you. It’s like heaven on Earth for kids.

6. There’s nothing better than going to another person’s house who has different toys and a child-proofed home. Thanks Tami!

7. We should take our pop-up camper for a test run before using it for an 8-day stretch. Working water would have been really helpful this week.

8. Always prepare for rain the week of the fourth. It will rain at least once. Have a book and dvd player as backup.

9. Shirley throws a mean baby shower. Loved the chicken salad sandwiches, sausage/bacon rolls and cream cheese/beef bites.

10. Bryan is a master outdoor chef. I didn’t know you could even cook a casserole on a grill.

11. Having older cousins is extremely helpful.

12. Ella really likes to grab and poke at people’s faces.

13. We’re encouraging more toe grabbing.

14. It’s really hard to get a good picture of six kids.

15. But it can be done.

You may now realize I have a really good excuse for not blogging for over a week – we went camping. No Internet, no TV, barely working phones. Now I’m trying to conquer heaps of dirty laundry and round up some food for us to eat this week … so hopefully this post will keep you all happy for now. More later!