Happy Birthday, Brad!

Yesterday was Brad's 34th birthday, which makes him older than Jesus! (We won't say what that makes many of you out there!) Yes, sir, there are advantages to being the youngest sibling and marrying an older guy! Just think, your gift to me is helping me always feel young!

Kidding aside, Brad is a super special guy and we're very happy for the chance to celebrate him. He had a great day: his new smartphone arrived (a phone/pocket PC/camera combo), he got a sleek little new digital camera and lots of nice cards and well wishes, we enjoyed some good ribs and key lime pie, watched Lost's season finale... and other people were in our house doing "his" nasty job of smoothing our bedroom and bathroom ceilings! Thanks to everyone for your thoughtfulness in remembering him.

One of the biggest challenges of Brad's birthday was coping with Brooke's disappointment that it wasn't her birthday! All week long, when we were shopping for his presents, Brooke kept insisting that she should be shopping for her! But, it did help that we all got to wear party hats last night.


Yes, we actually hired painters, painful as it has been to us DIYers. All week three amigos have been smoothing ceilings, taking down our hideous 1991 wallpaper, patching, priming and painting. The contractors brought their own problems and reminded us why we usually do it ourselves. My experiences hiring various painters over this past year have taught me that my standards for quality work are much higher than a lot of professionals'. Tomorrow their supervisor is either coming himself or sending someone else to come finish the job properly. He stopped by tonight and agreed with us that the job has a lot of clean-up and touch-ups still left undone. So, hopefully the problems will at least be resolved soon. The good news is that the ugly wallpaper and ceiling popcorn is GONE!

I'm very glad that we're going through all of this mess and disruption now instead of after the second baby comes!

Here's the hideous before picture. I'll post pics of the rooms' progress when they're further along.


In the meantime, here are some of Brooke playing at the zoo's park on our last visit to tide you over.

IT'S A... !!!

I had my first appointment with my new OB practice today and surprisingly, it turned out to be "The Big One" with the 20 week sonogram! I was very sorry that Brad couldn't be there, but it was nice that they rearranged their schedule for me. Apparently, now is the preferred time for that. I'm within a week of the official halfway point. The due date is still October 9, but we do suspect it will be earlier (more on that below).

The baby is doing great! (It's kicking as I write this.) I got to see it put its fingers in its mouth and pedal its legs a bit. As you can see, it struck a nice profile for us! (Hint: You can click on the picture to see a larger view.)

This baby is on the big side, measuring a week and a half ahead of schedule, which is quite a change from little Miss Brooke who was so small that we got extra sonograms. (Maybe I'm eating more ice cream this time around?) The doctor said that second babies are typically a little bit bigger. My weight gain (13.5 lbs.) is great.

I was very relieved that the doctor made a big note about how quickly Brooke came. Hopefully we'll be more prepared if we have another quick delivery (since second babies tend to come faster than the first) and we just might even have time for an epidural with this one! She said we'll probably look at scheduling an induction and do the same prep work that kicked off my last labor without the Pitocin (the induction drug) and see if that works again. That way my odds of delivering in a GA 400 gridlock would be greatly reduced. I was just glad to see that she took Brooke's lightning fast arrival very seriously and is planning accordingly.

Of course, the most exciting part of the midway sonogram is getting to find out the sex of the baby! Brad has wanted to find out, but I haven't this time (which is reversed from Brooke's pregnancy). So...

It's a baby!!! Hey, Brad wasn't there and we hadn't planned on the sonogram today; thus, we hadn't finalized the decision. I didn't find out. Sorry! I know you're all disappointed, but hey, that will just make the news of the arrival all the more exciting. The suspense will just have to continue to build!

That's okay with me. Forget wanting a boy or a girl. I just want a baby, which I'm sure this one is!

Beach Babe

Yes, we're long overdue for a post. We've had a crazy month: I've been sick with colds (twice!), we were in KY for a week (thank you, Katie, for the great post on your blog where I was negligent), I completed a pen and ink portrait and then we were in Myrtle Beach for a week!



Our trip to the beach was fabulous in nearly every way. Brad was there on business and Brooke and I just tagged along. Of course, that meant that we didn't have the luxury of Brad's company for most of the week, but it was a very nice trip that we wouldn't have taken otherwise. We did pay for an upgrade to a condo from a hotel room, and after some problems at check-in, we were blessed with an even nicer one than we had reserved! It was a large, 2 bedroom, 2 bath apartment with a full kitchen, washer and dryer, living room, and screened in breakfast patio overlooking a small lake that was only 20 feet away! In other words, it was heaven!

We were even visited by a nice family of ducks during breakfast a couple of mornings.


I LOVE going to the beach with a 2 year old!!! Brooke had a wonderful time playing in the baby pools and on the beach. Every morning we enjoyed both, came back for a bath, had lunch on the patio and then -- joy of joys -- Brooke took a three hour nap and gave me glorious down time when I didn't have to be cleaning!!! I indulged in Jane Austen's "Pride and Prejudice" all week and discovered a new favorite book. I LOVE the new movie with Keira Knightly and was absolutely enthralled by the novel.

At night, we'd go out for dinner with Brad and go for a walk or short play session on the beach.


Brooke's favorite part of the week were the baby pools. We stayed at the big Hilton complex and so we had access to all of the amenities -- including four baby pools and a water park. Her new favorite phrases are "Splash babies!" and "Down!", describing a huge bucket at the top of the play structure in the water park that would fill every few minutes and splash down over everything with much fanfare.


This was her first time at a beach. She loved the sand, shells, and playing with her beach toys. She didn't like the ocean at all, though, and was even upset when we'd walk along the beach at night and her stroller wheels would get wet. She had no problem, though, sending Mommy and Daddy out to fill her buckets with water! On the fourth day, though, I did find a little tidal pool and she really enjoyed playing in the "baby pool" that the ocean had made! It's all in the terminology!


As you can see, she loved filling her buckets with sand:


She sported some Pippi-Longstocking-esque braids for the pool:


And she even stayed still enough to try her first french braids!


Here she is in her very stylish hat from Jimmy Buffett's Margaritaville:


Thanks to my diligence with the SPF 50, there were no burns and even no tan lines on my fair-skinned self and baby! (I do actually have a nice tan, though, thanks to a bottle of self-tanner.)

So, a fun time was had by all! I'm all for Brad getting more work in Myrtle Beach. Thank you, Supportsoft!