Boys and Their Toys

I am a firm believer that every weekend should be a 3 day weekend with a 4 day work week. I think everyone would get on board with me. It was such a relaxing, beautiful weekend (if you missed the rain)! But somehow Monday felt like it should have been the beginning of the weekend...not the day before we turn around and start the week over again. Even so, we spent Sunday after church and Monday on the lake with friends. By Monday afternoon, the boys decided it was time to really get down to business and do some serious water sports with their toys. The perfect solution...a low-key boat for the girls to watch them and get some sun and a high speed water sport boat for the boys. Ben had a blast wake-boarding and I loved cruising around the lake at a much more desirable speed for my pregnant belly!

The Dreaded Maternity Photos

So, we did it. We had maternity pictures made. I had been dreading this for months. Having pictures made of my swollen face, big belly, fat feet, large arms, and thick legs is not my idea of a fun afternoon. Not to mention the scary maternity wrap that shows WAY TOO MUCH skin for my taste. But Ben was excited about the pictures AND the wrap and his perception of me is much better than my perception of myself at this point, so I went along with it. Of course, all of the pictures of him turned out great! His 5 a.m. workout physique looks way different from my 31 weeks pregnant physique. I must admit that some of the pictures did turn out better than I thought they would, though. It was really a very sweet and endearing photo session and tears came to my eyes when I realized that this was the first time that we had had pictures made of us since we got married 8 years ago. Nothing more than snapshots, anyway. In the age of digital everything, we got to preview them before we left and the photographer even put together a little video set to music of some of the pictures that made me cry (gotta love the hormones). All in all, it really wasn't bad. Here are just a few of them...Sorry, I really don't think you want to see the maternity wrap!

The Nursery is Painted--Finally!

After a month of working on weekends, Ben has paint and chair rail up. The nursery is not finished, things are still sitting around, nothing is on the wall yet, and we are waiting on a few pieces to go in his room. But the crib is put together, his bedding is in it, and the dresser in in there. I can't wait to get the letter tiles on the wall above the crib and the blue and lime shadow boxes hung up! Here are a few pictures of the process so far.

Nursery News

So, the painting has begun. I have had stripes in my mind from the very first thoughts of decorating the nursery, EVEN before we had bedding. I had these glorious visions of a chair rail separating a solid color on top and stripes below. After we chose the bedding, the colors were simple to determine because we decided to use the 3 colors that we compromised on for the bedding; baby blue, lime green, and white. We chose to paint baby blue above a white chair rail with 10 inch stripes alternating the 3 colors beneath it. So...last weekend Ben and our great friend Rodney got started. They did a fantastic job painting the nursery baby blue. This week, Leigh Ann and her amazing family that we love dearly came over and we outlined the stripes, determined the pattern, and put up painter's tape. Amy, Rodney, Samantha, and Ally were pros and we couldn't have done it without them! They even talked me out of painting a white stripe because we have already have so much white trim in the room. Ben LOVED them for this because that cut his work in half! Since the room was already blue, all he had to do was the green stripes. This morning when I left for school, I was so excited because I knew that Ben and Rodney were going to paint the stripes today, then all we would have left was to put up the chair rail! Well...I got a call at school this afternoon from Ben. He said that our yellow stripes looked great. So back to the drawing board to find the perfect green to complement our bedding. Oh, the woes of painting. Pictures to come later...

The Tri-State Tour

Wow, Spring Break has been a blur! We left last Friday on what we like to call the Tri-State Tour, which includes North Alabama(close to Tennessee), North Georgia, and South Alabama(ON the Florida line). Ben and I used to try to make this trip to see family twice a year, but has dropped to once a year for the past few years. Even though we drove through North Alabama, I guess this time we should have called it the duo-state tour because we didn't stop to visit my family there since they met us in Georgia. Needless to say, we are exhausted! While we were in Georgia, Ben's sisters threw TWO baby showers for us! They are such a blessing and his family was so generous to us! Then we drove to South Alabama to visit my Dad and he took us on what felt like a shopping spree at Babies 'R' Us. I can't get over how amazing everyone has been to us and how people want to take their limited funds during this difficult economic time to do something special for us. We drove back to Texas with the car loaded to the roof! We spent today unloading and looking through all of baby Ethan's exciting new things.

Yep, you heard it ...the name will remain. Ben is in love with it and in his opinion it was good enough 7 years ago when we came up with it and NO ONE had the name, so it's good enough now even though it's one of the most popular boy names and we even have friends with a toddler named Ethan. Precisely the reasons I wanted to explore other names. Don't get me wrong, I do really like his name, you just want to think of your child as being the only one with a unique name...which it was 7 years ago!

For those that do not know, Ben and I have had a little bit of an issue finding bedding for the nursery. I love that he has been very involved since the very beginning of the pregnancy, but we both have our own ideas about bedding. We finally found a website, Polkatotdesigns.com that has super cute fabrics for custom bedding. Magically, they are located in Mobile, Alabama, which we drive right through on our way back home. So...we made an appointment with my superhero, Deb, and she helped create something that Ben and I are both excited about, I can't wait until it's done! It's not too frilly for Ben, nor too simple for me, and has just enough compromise for both of us. Now, anyone up for painting???

Consignment Heaven!

I had the best time Saturday night! Leigh Ann and I went to the First Time Moms consignment sale at the Convention Center in Plano and it was SO MUCH FUN! It was an all out shopping spree! It was the first time that I had ever been to a large consignment sale and I am hooked. I can't wait for the next one! After we came home, we took everything out so that we could take it all in and the formal living room was where it all ended up. Now I get to come home and look at it every day. And, of course, Alex loves our new play area! Not that we will need these items anytime soon, but our current debate is where the permanent playroom will be. Ben is quite satisfied with getting rid of the foofey furniture and turning the living room into the playroom but I haven't been convinced of that yet.

Ben's Getting Jiggy With It

Ben is doing his happy dance because we found out what we are having.