36 Weeks!

As of yesterday, I am 36 weeks pregnant! This isn't the best picture, but I hadn't slept much the night before and the picture was taken after a long day. I am quite a bit smaller than I was with Lexie, but a lot of that has to do with no swelling and retaining water from the heat of summer and high blood pressure. I am getting to the uncomfortable stage which makes it hard to sleep, but we are getting close to the end! In fact, my Dr. was very surprised that I am ahead of schedule. At my appointment yesterday I was already dilated to a 3 and starting to thin. He wants me to take it easy this week so I can make it to at least 37 weeks which is considered "term". I am hoping to go two more weeks then anytime will be fine with me! The house is mostly ready now, most of the smallest baby clothes are washed, and my bag is partially packed...ready or not, here we go!!!

Easter Weekend

This year for Easter/Conference Weekend we headed up to visit the Lyman Family. We haven't seen most of them for almost a year so it was nice to go for a visit! We headed up Thursday afternoon and as you can see from the following picture, we were a bit tired when we got there. However, Lexie was ready to run around after being confined to her car seat for several hours.

Thursday evening we had fun visiting & Lexie was able to get reacquainted with her Grandpa & Grandma Lyman.

Friday morning Bryan's Dad had surgery up at Huntsman Cancer Institute. We first headed to Trolley Square to have lunch at Spaghetti Factory with James, Jenny, and Bethany for Jenny's birthday. Bethany and Lexie had fun dancing around together which was very cute! They also got to play together in Grandpa's hospital room.

Here is Dad/Grandpa Lyman looking good after surgery. He did great and is recovering quickly!

Lexie liked the view from the hospital room and she loved seeing Aunt Annie! We really enjoyed visiting with everyone (minus Steve, Lucy, & little Patrick), and we are glad the surgery went so well!

Saturday morning the Easter Bunny found us at Stan's house.

Bryan (with his lovely morning hair) was happy to have some chocolate, and Lexie was super excited for everything in her basket!

She especially loved the bubbles and the "Super Why" coloring book was a big hit!

Saturday & Sunday we watched conference and visited with Stan & Kristie's family, then headed home Sunday afternoon. We had a great weekend and were able to get a lot of errands done, including getting my wedding ring cleaned and serviced, and buying clothes for our new little guy set to arrive sometime in the next 6 weeks! We are so grateful for the chance we had to visit family and listen to our Prophet and Apostles. Most especially we are thankful for the Atonement and Resurrection of our Savior Jesus Christ which we were able to celebrate on Easter. We are so blessed!!!

March Updates

March flew by and I really slacked on the blog. I will be 31 weeks pregnant tomorrow, which means only 9 weeks or less until our little guy arrives (I refuse to go past my due date)! This week we had a 30 week ultrasound and everything looks great! He's around 4 lbs and measuring just over a week ahead so everything looks right on schedule. Just like with Lexie, it was hard to get very good shots of him this late because his head is down and against my uterus, and in the 2nd picture in front of his face is the placenta. You can see his left eye is open and the right eye is closed. Also, in one of the other shots we got to see that he has a lot of hair on his head so that was kind of exciting...it will be fun to see if it is brown or blonde.

Here I am at 30 weeks. I'm feeling great for the most part, except for a bladder infection that refuses to go away. I'm on a new antibiotic and feeling a lot better so I'm hoping to be back to normal very soon. My blood pressure has been great so far this time around and it has been nice to not have huge ankles and excessive weight gain. I also think spring is a much better time to give birth because I don't have to suffer through the heat of summer with a little furnace on my belly.

And what would a post be without pictures of our silly Lexie. The pigtails are a miracle because she refuses to leave anything in her hair. This time it lasted maybe 5 minutes while I snapped a few pictures then she immediately pulled out the elastics. Lexie is now learning colors and her favorite is yellow. She also likes to count, but will not start out saying one. When we say "One" she continues with "two, three, four". She is starting to have a bit of stranger danger (only with adults), but has made it through nursery class without a problem and never cries when we leave her. She is also starting to love her baby dolls and rocks and pats them while singing. I think this is a good sign that she'll be a great big sister and helper to me with her baby brother! When we ask where baby brother is she points to my belly and will kiss it...super cute!

18 Months & Holiday Weekend

On Valentine's Day, Lexie hit a big milestone...18 months old! As I looked at her this weekend all I could think was how she is starting to look less like a baby and more like a little girl. The past 18 months have flown by and being Lexie's mom has been the greatest gift I've been given in my life (besides being Bryan's wife...I love you honey)! I will post her stats after her Dr. appointment in a few days, but she is such a happy girl with an easy-going, fun personality that I enjoy getting to know better each and every day.

At 18 Months Lexie enjoys many things. She loves Winnie the Pooh and asks to watch "The Pooh" every day while doing a little dance. Speaking of dancing, that is one thing she really enjoys; we can turn on the KSL weather channel with the jazzy music and she really puts on a show for us! Singing is also among her favorite things. She can pretty much sing the entire theme song for "Winnie the Pooh" and if she sees snow she sings "Once There Was a Snowman". It seems like just about every day she surprises me with new words she has learned and she loves to talk even if I don't know everything she is trying to tell me. One really cute thing she does is get on her pretend cell phone and walk around the room chatting away...I really don't know where she learned that one from. :)

Our pretty 18 month old girl!

Lexie would not get her picture taken without Pooh Bear and Kitty, and wanted to spend most of the weekend going up and down the stairs. She has such a cute smile and now will pose and say "cheese" for the camera (when she isn't running).

Making a fashion statement & enjoying her "ba-oon" (balloon).

Our Valentine's Day family photo.This weekend was a lot of fun! Lexie had a great time playing at Grandpa and Grandma's house with her aunts and uncle. They were kind enough to tend on Saturday so Bryan and I could go to St. George. We had a great time going to the temple, going to lunch at Olive Garden, and shopping for a few things (like boy stuff for our baby). We had fun just being together alone for a few hours. It was a wonderful Valentine's date!!!

Growing Baby and Belly

Well, time is flying and I am now over 24 weeks pregnant with our little baby boy! As you can see, my belly is growing and I feel bigger than I want to be, but there is less than 16 weeks until the due date! Our little guy is growing also (now about 12 inches long and just over 1 lb.) and starting to be a hyper little thing. He is kicking really hard now (especially at night when I'm trying to go to sleep), and I love being able to feel the movement every day.

I need to get some new pictures of Lexie since she is turning 18 months this weekend, but she has been way sick this past week. She came down with a high fever over 104 on Thursday and even with medication it still wasn't coming down so we took her to the Dr. at 4:45 on Friday (nothing like doing it last minute before the weekend) and found out she had strep throat which we are sure she got from her trial run at nursery. Needless to say it has been a rough week and got scary when her temp got above 105, but she is finally on the mend and we are looking forward to a fun holiday weekend!