Yes, that's right, the title is referring to what you think it is, Baby #2! The Slimick Family is adding another little one to the crew. Baby #2 is estimated to make his or her debut right around the middle of November on the 13th, give or take a few days, or ten if this one is like Sophie! This will give us a nice 3 year age gap between Sophie and Baby #2, nicely planned. I am just about into the 12 week of pregnancy......shocking I know, that I was able to hold it in this long. For those who know me well, you must be literally beside yourself wondering how I kept it to myself for so long seeing as I don't do surprises really well or hold onto exciting news for long, but after a while it sort of became a little fun to see if I could go one more week, and then another and another. And here I am fast approaching 12 weeks and we decided to let the little bean out of the bag. Another very good reason I did not share the very exciting news earlier is because I was feeling like complete crap. I was having a lot of low back pain early on and I was SO nauseous from about the 5 week mark up until the 10th week, it was awesome let me tell you. Trying to keep up with a very active, very inquisitive two year and feeling like you are going to yak all the time was mind blowingly fabulous! So I really did not feel like sharing the joyous news when I felt like poo. I also think that I just wanted to relish in the fact that Neal and I were the only ones who knew, like our little secret miracle, cheesy, I know, but whatev! We did end up telling both our parents at about 9 weeks, we couldn't hold it from them any longer(I am very proud of you mom for not telling a single living soul, I am really impressed).
We are going to be doing things a little differently this time around, our plan is to have the baby here at home with a very skilled, experienced, and highly recommended midwife. With our more natural approach this time we will not be having any ultrasounds (midwives typically don't do ultrasounds) so therefore we won't be finding out the gender this time either, again shocking with my lack of ability to handle suspense or surprises, but we made the decision and we are not going back. We will be able to hear the baby's heart beat with the doppler wand at each visit to see our midwife. We decided even before this baby was conceived that we wanted a different birth experience for Baby#2, not that we had a horrific time with Sophie's hospital birth, we just would have done things differently and spoken up for me and Sophie a bit more. We have done our research, so for those who are in complete shock of our decision, know that we are not entering this blind. We are very excited and looking forward to adding to our family.
We were able to hear the baby's heartbeat for a brief moment at today's visit, the little bean kept moving around! Every time our midwife would get close to the baby, the little one would swim away, although we only heard the heartbeat for a brief moment we did hear it and that was enough for me. We did hear lots of movement through the doppler, the little one was in there swimming to his/her heart's content trying to avoid the doppler! It appears this little one may be just as active as Sophie was in the womb! Apparently my uterus is a little larger than what is typical for 11.5 weeks, but the midwife said that is very common in second babies.......great just what I want to be BIGGER than I was with Sophie! Check back for updates and follow Baby #2's progress!
This weekend was gorgeous. HOT, but gorgeous I think that we climbed into the 90's Saturday and Sunday. I was loving it and so was Sophie, we spent pretty much the whole weekend outside, much to Neal's dismay (his allergies are really giving him a hard time). Saturday we had Shane and Jackson over to play and Sophie could not wait to play in her pool, she has been dying to swim in her green pool not just any pool, but her green pool! The water was ICE cold, but her and Jackson swam for a solid hour or more like champs. We grilled out and had a fun night. Sunday after church Sophie was itching to get in her pool again since it was another scorching day. After nap we filled up the pool and let it sit in the sun in a futile attempt to warm the water a little before she got in, it didn't work the water was still chilly. While waiting for the pool water to warm up and Gigi and Papa K. to get here, Sophie helped me water flowers, hleped Neal trim up a tree out back and took a ride in the wheel barrow, which aside from the pool I think was the biggest highlight of the day!
Hopefully this week will fly by since the trip to Disney is all the way at the end of the week. I have tried to pack the week full of stuff so that the time flies by for both me and her! She has said at least one thing about Disney each day since our plans were made so we will see how the week goes!
YAY!!!!! Short notice but we are off, although one Slimick short. Sophie and I are headed down to Disney with my parents on May 3rd and we can't wait. My parent's had booked their reservations a couple weeks ago and I had made the monumental error of telling Sophie that Gigi and Papa K were going down to Disney World to see the Princesses, what in the world was a thinking telling a two year old that, I have no idea. Well you can of course guess what happened next, yes that's right she immediately thought that we were going with them since we are going to the beach with them the first week of June, I guess in her mind she is entitled to all the vacays that Gigi and Papa take as well! Being the doting and loving not to mention Disney loving grandparents that they are they invited Sophie and I to go along with them. Neal of course was invited too, but we all knew that he wouldn't be able to get the time off on such short notice. He is very happy that Sophie is going to have such a blast, but he is sad he will be missing all the fun. Sophie is so stoked, it is going to be a long week for her waiting to go and see the Princesses. After I told her she was going to go to Disney World and see the Princesses, she was naming all the characters she was going to see and then she got to Princess Aurora and she told me that, "I'm going to see Princess Aurora and I won't cry". Of all the characters she saw last time the only two she cried with were Cinderella and Aurora.....go figure, but I have been assured that there will be no tears this time, from the source herself.
Another very exciting part of this trip is that we were finally able to get a room at our very favorite resort Disney's BoardWalk. The last time we stayed there was I think back in 2005 and my dad has been trying to get a room there for every trip taken since then with no luck, it is by far my favorite resort! The best part about the BoardWalk is not only the great atmosphere, but the fact that it is nestled right in between EPCOT and Hollywood Studios (formerly MGM Studios) so it is within a perfect walking distance to either park! Neal is pretty bummed on that too since it is his favorite resort too, but like the great husband and father that he is, he is happy that Sophie and I are going to have a great time. Since we will be without Neal I am pretty sure that I won't be coming back with as many pictures and I can guarantee that the quality of my pictures will be no where near his, but I will do my best!
Sophie in tears with Aurora last September.
Neal finally got his new lens in the mail yesterday that he has been so excited about. Naturally, he had to play with his new "toy" and get some shots of his little muse. I even took a few shots of my own, it is a really nice lens that takes great pictures, but it is SUPER heavy, so I really don't see me using it a whole lot! Like always he took some great shots of Sophie and did some really nice edits to them so I thought I would share. Enjoy!
Climbing the Daddy mountain.
The weather held up....sort of. It rained intermittently throughout the planting, but nothing major thank goodness just a little drizzle here and there. It actually turned out to be a great day to do some gardening since it was over cast and the temperature was very comfortable. Neal's parents came down about noon to help us get everything going. Neal and I really don't have the first idea of what to plant where and what will survive and thrive so we rely on Martha, our personal landscaper, to make those decisions for us! Mark stayed behind to listen out for Sophie while she napped and Martha, Neal and myself headed off to Lowe's to pick out what we needed to beautify the front garden. About an hour and a half later we arrived home with an assortment of beautiful plants, some compost and mulch and got down to it. Luckily our neighbor let us borrow his tiller so that cut down on a lot of time spent hand tilling in the compost! Sophie was such a big helper she was digging and raking alongside the big guys! She was having so much fun and she was so excited to have her Papa and Gigi there too. The garden beds turned out really beautiful, I am so excited to have some rose bushes back, we had a rose bush at our old house and I absolutely adored it and now I have 3!!! We were even able to transplant 4 of my lantana that started sprouting up from last summer, hopefully they will take and thrive like crazy as they did last year! What a major transformation from what the garden used to look like , I can't wait to watch it all grow!
Thank you Mark and Martha for EVERYTHING, especially ALL the hard work you guys put in, hope you are not too sore today!!
Before
After
Before
After
Looking for her cricket friend.
It is difficult to plant with a monkey on your back!
Martha laying out where the plants need to go.
This was one busy Saturday for us! Birthdays galore! Our friend's daughter, Sophie's friend Brianna, had her birthday at a local farm, Lewis Farm. Of course Sophie had an absolute ball. She has been so excited about Brianna's party ever since I mentioned it, which I made the mistake of telling her about too early in the week, when you tell a two year old that they are going to a birthday party at a farm with animals, they think they are going in the next few minutes, whoopsie on my part! The party finally came and I thought that she was going to burst with excitement! She got to ride a horse for the first time ever. The horse that she chose to ride was named Honey, and she was so proud of herself, she kept saying, "I ride the horsey, Honey." She played her little heart out there and was such a trooper especially since the party was dead smack in the middle of nap time, so needless to say she passed out in the car on the way home.
Nap time was cut short because by the time we got her home and in bed it was almost 3pm and by 5:10pm she was still out like a light, so I had to wake her up. She woke to find my parents here ready to celebrate yet another birthday! My Dad's birthday was Friday, but they came down to celebrate with us today. Sophie was so excited to give Papa his present, a great framed picture Neal took of the two of them doing the crossword together. After dinner we of course had cupcakes and ice cream, Sophie was so stoked and was pretty excited about the mess she made on her face.
It was a busy Saturday, and it does not look like there will be much rest for us tomorrow. Neal's parents are coming down to help us do some yard work out front, basically an over haul to make it look pretty since it is sort of desolate right now. Hopefully the weather will hold up for us and be just as pretty as it was today!
Feeding Honey some hay.
Patiently waiting her turn to ride the horse, she is so sweet!
Sophie and her new friend Honey.
Giving Papa his present.
The picture that was in the frame.
So excited that she successfully helped blow out the candles.
Proudly displaying the mess she made of herself with cupcake and icing.
