Mondays with Crosby

At 11:24 am, Crosby Fox turned 3 years and 13 weeks old!!!  Baby Girl and I are now at a whopping 37 weeks!!!  I have a FULL TERM baby in my belly.  How amazing to be at this point and to still be pregnant!  What a gift.  And what a beautiful reminder of just how blessed we are...  

I just love seeing this tree bloom every year in memory of Finley and Caroline.  The pink and white blooms could not be more fitting or beautiful...

I am so thankful we spent the day outside so we could enjoy them.  The wind blew most of them away the very next day!  Kind of appropriate I guess.  Much like the blooms, they were only with us a short time.  But what an impact that made while they were here...

The weather had just been splendid in these parts the past few weeks.  Definitely my favorite time of year.  Minus the pollen. But let's think positive.  If you couldn't tell, our little fella got his hands dirty with the help of his dad on Tuesday.   Blake introduced Crosby to the worm...

He was so very excited to introduce his friend to me.  "Look, Mommy!!!  You can hold him!!"

Not a fan of the worm, I tried to act calm and collected.  "No thank you.  You can hold him.  You do a much better job than I do!" :-/  Being the momma of a boy, I want to encourage him to be outside getting his hands in the dirt.  But me, yea, not so much...  

He also got a new pair of sunglasses!  Hilarious.  He lost his red pair so we had to replace them.  He is a big fan of the new look.  He wore them to the park on Wednesday and he said, "All my friends are going to say my sunglasses are cool."  I am sure they did! ;-)

Pile 'o worms... And a grub!

It makes my skin crawl just typing about them.  And to think there was a time that I would gladly hold slimy creatures...

And finally some type of larvae.  Just nasty.  I mean, precious..,

Crosby is such a handy helper...

Except it is hard to plant a bush with a child in the hole!!!

It is so fun to watch my boys "working" together.  I just love them to pieces.

Today we were driving and I pointed out "a Trooper (Isuzu) like Daddy's old Trooper!!!"  He loves seeing them on the road.  Our conversation went like this...

Me: "Crosby!!!!  There is a Trooper like Daddy's old Tropper!!!"
Cros: "Yep.  It sure is."
         "You rode in Daddy's Trooper when you had on a white princess dress."
         "And then you were married."
Me: Smiling from ear to ear. "Are you talking about my wedding dress??"
Cros: "Uh huh."
Me: "You are right, sweet boy!  Mommy did ride in Daddy's Trooper wearing her white wedding dress."
Cros: "Was I riding with you that day?"
Me:  "No, you weren't with us.  You weren't born yet."
Cros: "One day, I am going to be born again later and I am going to ride with you in Daddy's Trooper."
Me: "Well...that would be fun but I don't think that is possible."  Big smiles...

Oh my.  He is such a fun little boy.  I cannot get enough of him!!!

After months of bed rest, watching the ever expanding waistline and feeling Baby Girl squirm with impressive force, it is hard to believe we will be adding a new person to our little family.  I am silly for hoping she will come sooner rather than later?!?  I am just ready to have her here and in our arms.  According to my to Dr. B at my appointment on Tuesday, there was less progress than Friday's appointment! Seriously!?!?  Oh the irony of it all.  Thank goodness we made it through Dr. B's vacation though!  Now she can come any time she wants!  For now, we wait for this new little one to make her grand appearance...

Mondays with Crosby

At 11:24 am, Crosby Fox turned 3 years and 12 weeks old!!! Baby Sister and I hit THIRTY SIX weeks!!!  What?!?  How did that happen??  Not sure but it did.  And according to my doctor's appointment on Friday, there is not much progress to indicate that she will arrive any time soon.  How crazy is that?!?  Looks like we may actually have a full term baby. Amazing...

One thing I did learn at my appointment has me a weeeeee bit concerned.  Dr. B is scheduled to be out of town this week from Thursday until Sunday at 5 pm. Ahhhhh!! Does this sound at all familiar??  Dr. B was on vacation right before Crosby was born.  I came off of bed rest the day after he came back to town and Crosby was born the next day!  Knowing that I have made virtually no progress is the only thing keeping me sane.  I cannot imagine our last little one coming into the world without Dr. B!  I am pretty sure it would crush my heart!  So, I really need this baby girl to stay put through the weekend.  Anything after Sunday at 5 pm is fair game.  Nothing before!! ;-)

Since I have officially been allowed off the couch, I have been able to do a little more with my best boy. We went to an open house at Tennessee Central Railway on  Saturday with his little buddy, John Christopher, and their family.  These boys had a good ole time.  This was about as still as they ever managed to be...

 And that didn't last long at all!  

Being that I am a little on the slow side, I failed to take the camera with me when we made stops at I Dream of Weenie (hot dog place) and Jeni's Ice Cream.  It was quite the adventurous day for the 3.5 of us!  I sort of felt like I had been hit by one of the trains that night!  The ole back doesn't know what to do with all of this extra weight.  Thank goodness Blake can still keep up with this wild boy!

I am pretty sure we are going to have another wild one on our hands pretty soon!  She manages to make my belly look like a torpedo with her crazy positions.  And then when she starts moving.  My goodness this sweet, little angel is aggressive...

I sure am ready to see this little girl's face!  If it is going to happen this week, it needs to be before Wednesday or after Sunday.  I go back to see Dr. B on Tuesday before he heads out of town.  If there is progress I may kick it up a notch.  If not, I may slow it down until his return!!!  We shall see...

Mondays with Crosby

At 11:24 am, Crosby Fox turned 3 years and 11 weeks old!!!  It was a BIG week for Cros.  He has had a love/fear relationship with the car wash for over a year now.  He talks about them.  He request we draw them.  He knows where they are located on all of our routine paths.  He watches videos of people going through the car wash on You Tube.  He has a car wash toy for the tub and a Lego car wash.  Get the idea??  Obsessed with the car wash!!

You may recall the last time we took him to the car wash, on his 2nd birthday, he flipped out.  Scared to death.  Yet, he talked about the thing all the time.  We have since made a few attempts to revisit the place.  He would be in total agreement until we got in the car.  Then he would start questioning if it would be loud, if it would be dark, etc.  When we would pull in to the gas station, he would start protesting.  So, we would abort the mission and head home.  

After the monster truck show and the purchase of noise silencing head phones, I suggested he go to the car wash WITH his headphones!  Crosby thought it was a splendid idea.  Sooooo, on Saturday, March 10th, when Blake got off from work, we loaded up and headed to the car wash with headphones in tow...

When we pulled in to the gas station, Crosby started to get nervous.  We assured him we would put the headphones on and let him sit with Daddy.  Once the ear protection was in place and he was in Blake's lap, he settled in.  He even wanted to help Blake pay.  That was a good sign!  Once we made it inside, those big, green eyes were as wide as could be.  Then it started...

He stared in amazement.  I am pretty sure he was thinking, "This is just like the You Tube videos..."  Then I suggested we take the headphones off...

What a champ!!!!  He was in car wash heaven!!!

He agreed the car wash wasn't that loud after all!  He just sat there soaking it all in, figuratively speaking of course...

Thumbs up!!  "I survived the car wash!!!"

If I am honest, his obsession with the car wash had significantly declined in recent months.  Oh, but now.  Now we have reignited the flame of passion.  It is all we talk about.  And we have had to add additional brushes into our sketches!!  This kid cracks me up!  I am pretty sure the exterior of our cars will always be in need of a good cleansing from now own!  ;-)

As for Miss Priss...  She is just that!  We are now at 35 weeks.  She decided to cause a little drama on Friday.  She failed her biophysical profile on Friday (only took 2 out of the required 3 practice breaths) and sent me to the hospital for monitoring.  Then, as soon as we were connected to the monitors, her heart rate dropped in response to one of the many contractions I started having.  They were coming every 2-2.5 minutes, creating lovely mountains on the contraction monitor.  Fortunately, that only happened once.  After as few hours and a second ultrasound, she passed her test with flying colors and we were sent on our way.  I had rounds of contractions all weekend but nothing persisted.  Then tonight, they picked back up, coming every 2-3 minutes for 3 hours straight.  I finally put in a call to Dr. B, took some extra medicine, and they finally calmed down.  (Hence the reason I didn't get this up Monday night like I had intended...)  

I have been given permission to increase my activity level at this point so we will see what happens.  Crosby was born at 35 weeks 5 days!  Will she beat his record??  Only time will tell...

Mondays with Crosby

At 11:24 am, Crosby Fox turned 3 years ad 10 weeks old!!!  School pictures came this week.  We think they are pretty cute, minus the fact that his face looks a little wider than it is?!?! Hmmm.  After last week's post full of pictures, I hate to say I failed to take the camera out of the back in the past 7 days.  Slacker.  Thankfully, Blake was a good parent and snapped a few pictures of the little fella on their fishing trip.  They went to the Harpeth River on Tuesday to see what they would catch.  This is the first picture text I got...

Crosby actually reeled in his first fish!  He even held the slimy thing in his hands!  Needless to say, he was proud of himself!!  Don't you just love the sunglasses on the overcast day?!?  He has has been all about his sunglasses lately, wearing them at the most random times.  Oh he makes me laugh, this boy.

So the second text comes through..

Oh dear.  This was not supposed to happen!  Sure, it has been warm around here the past few weeks.  But this water was definitely cold!  And my child is waist deep in it!  Blake says he told him not to get in the water "but he did anyway."  From the look of things, Crosby was no worse for the wear.  I suppose this is another moment of "boys will be boys".  It should be interesting adding a girl to the mix... ;-)

We got the headboard for Crosby's room this week!!!

I love it!  We still need to hang things on the wall to add finishing touches.  That will happen one of these days.  For now, I couldn't be more happy with the way his room turned out.  And I am thrilled that he is doing so well in his big boy bed.  He has yet to climb out without us in the room!  I am sure the day will come sooner rather than later.  But for now, he is adjusting like a champ.

We have made lots of progress in Baby Girl's room too!  Window treatments are up.  The bedskirt is on. The sheets are in place.  Lulu found a dresser at the flea market and has it painted!  I haven't seen it in person so I am excited about that!  It is all coming together beautifully!  I will have to post pictures when we get a few more things in place...

As for Baby Girl's progress, she will stay put 2 more weeks according to my FINAL fetal fibrinectin test from Friday!  That gets us 3 days shy of 36 weeks.  Basically, when Crosby was born!  We are seriously in the home stretch.  Crazy!!  I have my last scheduled ultrasound this coming Friday.  I am looking forward to taking one more peek at her before we see her face to face.  Well, that it is she cooperates!  We shall see...

Back to my little man.  He absolutely LOVES to sing.  He picks up on the tune and words so quickly.  Coming from someone who knows very few songs in their entirety, I am impressed!  He doesn't quite have the words down for this old hymn just yet.  So he just made them up and sings his version!  See if you can figure out this old hymn...

He is pretty much obsessed with the Avett Brothers these days.  Oddly enough, we didn't even know who the Avett Brothers were until Blake and I were given tickets to their concert back in the fall.  Bake's coworker made a CD for us so we could hear a few of their songs beforehand.  Now that is ALL Crosby wants to listen to.  His favorite song is Tin Man and he knows every single note and word!  He loves watching their live performances on You Tube and has started adding in their dance moves into his routine.  He really goes wild in the second half of this video.  Hilarious...

He now combines the head banging moves with the dance.  Eyes closed like he is seriously feeling the music.  I will have to get that one of these days.  What a hoot this boy is.  I am one lucky momma...

Mondays with Crosby

At 11:24 am, Crosby Fox turned 3 years and 9 weeks old!!!  Baby Sister and I are now at 33 weeks!  Wooooah.  Time is really starting to move quickly.  Now I have to prepare to HAVE this baby.  I am starting to feel a weeeee be stressed about that part.  I attempted to pass the buck to Blake.  I think he should have to give birth to one of our children.  It only seems fair, no???  He declined.  

I did get my way with him on one issue this week at least.  I pulled out my best nagging skills and coerced the guy into taking a day off.  Yes, he has to be coerced.  I had BIG plans for this weekend.  And they all involved manual labor, which I can't exactly do!  On Thursday night, he painted the trim and doors in Baby Girl's room.  Seeing how he did her walls last week, the task is now complete!  Thursday night was also Crosby's very last night in his crib.  Of course we had to document the occasion in pictures.  He was so proud of himself, if you can't tell...

Crawling in one last time...

Yes, it is a drop side crib and they are outlawed or something.  But let me tell you what a blessing that drop part has been for bed rest!  We have the conversion kit to prevent it from dropping in the future so fear not.

Would you look how big my baby looks in that bed now!!!  And to think he used to sleep with his head at the monogram and was lightyears away from touching the bumpers, which are also against the rules I suppose...

So very excited.  Poor Lloyd the llama (the new and very first lovey he has ever been attached to) got squeezed over it all!

Such a poser...

On Friday, morning Blake took Crosby to school and then we headed out for an ultrasound and visit with Dr. B.  All looked great with Baby Girl.  They estimate her to be 4 pounds 5 ounces!!  Did I mention I am getting nervous about the whole birthing part?  I think I may have.  Anyway, we could see peach fuzz on the back of her head.  Crosby had hair at this point, too!  Wonder what color hers will be...  The 'ole cervix was still up in the low 3's (cm), which is fabulous.  Dr. B even talked of letting me do a little more at 34 weeks if things are still looking good.  Oh the thought of it!!!  That is just a week away!!  After a quick bite for lunch, we headed home to start the BIG project!!  Even with a 2 hour time crunch to get it done, Blake was able to setup Crosby's big boy bed and move all of the baby furniture into Baby Girl room!  We were soooo excited to pick him up from school.  We had been talking up the move to his big boy bed all month.  It was all we talked about last week and it got Crosby so pumped!  You can see him coming in his room for the first time...

He cracks me up!  He thought every thing was new!  We have had that CD play for 2 years.  Move it from one side of the room to another, and you've got yourself a brand new toy!  Who knew?!? :-)  Here are a few pictures of the grand reveal...

One excited little fella...

We told him to get under the covers and try it out.  This is what he did...

Beginners mistake!! ;-)  We showed him the right way to sleep under covers, which he has NEVER done.  He refused to use a blanket in his crib 99% of the time he had a say so.  I wondered how sheets and a comforter would work...

Soooo, Friday night was the big test.  Would he sleep in his new bed?  He started saying he was "sooo tired" around 5:00, which absolutely never happens.  When we finally got him ready for bed, he was thrilled to go.  We had to come up with a new routine since the rocker is no longer in there.  If I am honest, it kind of makes me sad that we can't read and rock anymore.  I am going to have to take him to Sister's room on occasion just for old times sake!  Rather than rocking, I crawled in bed with him, read him a story and said prayers, like we do every night.  Then he calls out for Blake, "Ohhhh, Daaaaaaddddy!  Come sing me songs!"  Blake came into the room, crawled in the bed with him, and sang their favorite song, The Steadfast Love of the Lord.  Then he called me back in, we gave hugs and kisses, took a sip of water, and turned on his turtle light and music. Of course there were a few pictures to be taken before we said "good night"...

Yes, we wear the same PJs 2 nights in a row sometimes around here!!  No judgements...  

So excited to go to sleep...

I had to put this sweet one in twice!  This kid just melts my heart...

We finally closed the door on Friday night, wondering what lie ahead of us.  How many times would he call us in?  Would we hear his little feet pitter pattering around the room? Much to our surprise, there was nothing!  He passed right out and we didn't hear a peep from him until 8:20 Saturday morning!!!  "Ohhhhhh Mommmmmmyyyyyyyy!!!"  We told him the rules before he went to bed.  "As long as the rail is up, you have to stay in your bed.  There is no getting out unless Mommy or Daddy come in and get you.  Call for us if you need anything.  Okay??"  So far, it has worked like a charm!  We are so proud of our big boy.  Here he is on Saturday morning...

Taken with my phone.  I just now figured out how he managed to change the camera settings to this weird color...

Here are pictures of the near complete room without a wild boy in it...

I just knew it would feel tee tiny in there once we moved his "big 'ole bed" in place.  Much to my surprise, it actually feels a lot bigger without the rocker and crib!  Go figure?!?  The only piece of furniture we lack is the headboard.  We have actually had it since his 1st birthday but needed to have it sturdied up a bit before we installed it.  I will be sure to post a picture when we get it in place!

And his newish dresser.  We have actually had it a while, too.  I love it...

Have I documented this momentous occasion well enough??  I don't know.  I may should have taken a few more pictures!! ;-)

Now for the other bedroom!!!!  We have a fabric picked out.  Lulu says the panels for the windows (the strip below) are complete and the top treatment is almost there...

The light has been switched out to this delicate little thing....

If you look about halfway down the picture, you can see the transition from the ceiling to the wall.  The color could not have turned out more perfect. I was hoping for a faint shade of pink.  Not a "gag me this room is so pink" pink.  I love it!!  More pictures as things come together!

For fun, I took a few pics of the babe in the belly.  I suppose I need to document these things so I won't forget what I look like pregnant!  Here we are at 32 weeks 6 days.  From the right...

From the front...

From the left...

It is a good thing I can't take a picture of the back side.  She has been camping out back there since day one and it ain't pretty!  Oh well.  She will be so worth it.  And this is how I know it...

Oh my goodness.  Are these not the cutest you have ever seen???  

I cannot wait to meet her and to see this face in person.  Oh how I already love this little girl...

Mondays with Crosby

At 11:24 am, Crosby Fox turned 3 years and 8 weeks old!!!  I would normally say Crosby was at school all day today.  But not this Monday.  I was once again reminded that choosing a Monday/Friday school schedule was not the best financial decision I have ever made.  I am pretty sure we have missed at least  one Monday a month, every month for one holiday or another.  Today was one of those days!  Don't get me wrong, I love having my little man at home with me.  But bed rest and holidays don't exactly work well together.  It means I have to ask for help one more day out of the week.  What would we do without family and LeAnne for covering all of these holidays?!?  I am pretty sure making it to 32 weeks would have been impossible!  That is right!!!  I am officially a silver medal recipient for reaching this HUGE milestone.  Blessings abound...

Speaking of blessings, Otter Creek had the year Baby Blessing service this past Sunday.  We had 2 special members of our family being blessed.  Harper Jean and Malone Alexander were both part of the baby dedication.  I wasn't able to make it to the services.  But, I did sneak out in order to attend part of the luncheon afterward.  Too bad my presence caused a certain 3 year old to get a bit whiny!   I attempted to get a picture of Crosby with both of his cousins.  It didn't go so well...

Crosby and Malone...

It only went downhill from there.  Here is the one and only of Crosby and Harper...

Major meltdown mode.  That was until he locked eyes with his girl friend, Addy.  Funny how a girl can turn his frown upside down already.  I am thinking I should be worried!

As for today, if you haven't guessed what we are doing around here based on the first picture, I will explain.  Somebody will be making a pretty big boy move this week!!!  Crosby will be sleeping in a twin bed by the end of the week.  Let me just say he is SUPER excited about the plans for Friday.  See...

The final "accessory" we need is a bedrail, which we should be getting tomorrow.  Other than that, we are pretty well set for the transition.  Much like the friends of mine who have already taken this plunge, I am experiencing the typical nervousness about him adjusting to his new sleeping arrangements.  They all survived unharmed so I am sure I will too.  I am excited to see how everything will come together.  Of course there will be pictures of the occasion for next week.  There may also be a few pictures of the progress being made in Baby Girl's room!!! ;-)  Things are really starting to change around here!  I have mentioned this is all exciting and scary at the same time??  We will see how this all goes...

Gotta love that new smile!!!