Details

In response to all the comments and questions on the last post, I would just like to say that while I may technically have been pregnant when I last discussed this topic, in my defense, I didn't figure it out until almost a month later. That's what having three kids will do to you. There's just not time to sit and ponder on the reasons you feel out of sorts....

And here are the answers you've been looking for:

This ultrasound was taken at 12 weeks, so I'm not quite 4 months along.

I'm due mid October.

With an apology to all my SILs, we will NOT be finding out whether it is a boy or a girl - at least not until October :). I would check the Chinese lunar calendar for you, but so far it's been wrong every time.

I've been feeling really pretty good, all things considered. When I'm pregnant, I only experience nausea when I'm tired - however, with three kids under the age of five... one of whom still can't decide if he likes sleeping at night... well, you get the picture.

Thanks for all the well wishes and we'll keep you posted on how things go.

On a side note, we told the kids last night and Leah's response was: "Woo hoo! I've been waiting and waiting for this!" Lincoln decided to start picking out names - his best suggestions were Shrimpy and Spaghetti. It's a good thing that they're so excited about this baby, because I have a sneaking suspicion that Peter (my momma's boy) is going to be less than thrilled.

Worth a Thousand Words

My Kind of Pet

Andrew came across this lovely specimen while untangling a grapevine from one of our oak trees this weekend. Of course, Leah immediately wanted to put it in a jar and keep it forever. Since forever is not a long time with these guys, I agreed...This is the best my poor camera could do... but it really is a very pretty caterpillar - kind of gray with orange spots and an orange head. We found that she loves grape leaves, so she's living the high life in a mason jar with a few sticks to climb on and some fresh grape leaves to munch on - and is safe from all predators except my children. We're pretty sure she'll eventually turn into some kind of moth - so if she actually lives that long we'll keep you posted.

Easter Saturday

At our house, the Easter Bunny comes on Saturday - in part because that's when Grandma and Papa come, but it also helps us focus a little more on Christ on Easter Sunday. We had a fun Easter Egg Hunt to start off the day - although, because this is Texas and bugs are plentiful, we hunted for empty Easter Eggs. The older kids didn't seem to care and just had fun with the finding... it probably helped that Papa was stealthily following along behind them hiding more eggs. It was actually pretty funny to watch them since each egg they found could have been the first one for the excitement they showed!Peter, on the other hand, knew that there was supposed to be something in the eggs and looked for a few but got a little annoyed when he realized they were all empty.After the egg hunt, we all worked in the garden for a while planting pumpkins and watermelons until it started to rain. Then we had a yummy dinner of ham, macaroni and cheese, roasted beets, and roasted asparagus - and while we were eating the Easter Bunny snuck into the house to hide baskets and the hunt was on again.

All in all, it was a fun relaxing day - Thank you Grandma and Papa!

New Shoes and a Haircut

We finally broke down and realized that Peter wasn't going to fit into Lincoln's toddler shoes anytime soon, but his Robeez just weren't cutting it for outside play anymore. So we went out and found him a cute pair of surfer shoes much to Dad's delight.



He loves them (mostly because it means he gets to go outside) and just giggles everytime I put them on him. Then he goes around the room pointing at everyone's shoes and saying "Shuus". He's growing up so fast! He already has a collection of about 20-30 words that he uses pretty regularly to let us know what he wants. The cutest are "Ten too" for thank you and "tub tub" when he wants to take a bath (another favorite pasttime). He's also learned to say "Too" when he wants something - probably because we always ask him if he wants some too.

Unfortunately, he also now has a big boy haircut - which I totally wasn't ready for. We were giving everyone a trim out on the porch and decided to touch his up as well. Of course, a toddler doesn't sit still very well and one poorly timed head turn later, we found ourselves shaving it all off.I was so sad to see my baby turn into a little boy with one swoop of the clippers! I'm starting to get used to it, but I think we'll leave the top a little longer next time.

Strawberries

We went strawberry picking out in Fredricksburg again this year... and had much more success in our berry picking. The kids did a great job looking at the strawberries to make sure they were all red before picking them, so we didn't have nearly as many green ones as we did last time. And Peter kept us on track by providing our quality control sampling. Of course, I managed to forget my camera and missed out on tons of cute pics, but here is a picture of the result of our labors!

We took advantage of our Conference weekend stay-at-home time to make strawberry jam and I thought it turned out rather well. This was the first time I've made jam (besides freezer jam) and we sealed the jars using the upside down method, but all my jars sealed and the jam tastes great! It's not quite as thick as I expected it to be (more of a syrup really), but I think that may be because my pectin was a little old. Oh well, we like strawberry syrup too!