Christmas Day

Tessa woke up very, very early on Christmas morning and peeked over the banister to see that Santa had brought her lots of presents.  She came in to our room and whispered that Santa had come!  We just couldn't get up that early so we all snuggled in bed and went back to sleep.  She ended up sleeping until after 9am which was fabulous.

We did a video call with Ryan's parents so that they could see her open some of her presents.  Technology is great that way, even from Texas they can be part of the fun.  My parents arrived soon after and we opened more presents. 

Her big present was a Wii gaming system.  We gave her the system and the grandparents gave her games.  She was so excited when she opened these princess games.  Daddy was excited to open the driving game.  

While we don't do much for the adults in the family, we are trying to teach Tessa the art of giving.  She got Ryan a light for his grill, which was just what he had asked for. 

And she made me another tea cup.  She came up with this one all on her own and I love it.  I now have a set of three with her sweet little handprints on them. 

Sweet Anabelle liked her squeaky penquin.

And Tessa loved her Sofia doll.  It was actually the only present she asked for the whole Christmas season.  Also under the tree for her were games, puzzles and the super popular Rainbow Loom.  Making those rubber band bracelets is a little challenging for both of us, but we figured it out. 

Baby Brother had a few things under the tree too.  A beautiful blanket that my mom crocheted, plus one to match for Tessa's Baby Brother doll.  And he got more additions to his wardrobe, including a onesie that is monogramed Jackson.  It's still my number one name pick.   

Tessa posed with Gampa.

My mom and I cooked dinner while Ryan hooked up the Wii.  Apparently our old TV is not set up for this kind of thing and it wasn't a fun job for Ryan.  But he got it working and Tessa was a happy girl.  I see a new TV in our near future.  Here she was singing Disney karaoke.  We all took turns with this hilarious game.  My mom was the best, singing "Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious" at warp speed. 

We kept dinner easy, a rib roast with mashed potatoes and gravy, rolls and veggies.  The steak was delicious, if I do say so myself.  Baby Brother loves red meat, as do the rest of us.  Since I am wearing the same shirt I was wearing in our Christmas pictures, it's easy to see how much he has grown with our big appetite. 

 

 

Merry Christmas!

38 Weeks

Up until now I have been posting pictures every four weeks, but I'm so close to the end that I think I will do weekly pics now.  Theoretically I could deliver any day now, but realistically I still have at least two weeks to go.  When the doctor checked me this week, I showed no signs of impending labor.  But I confirmed my registration at the hospital and started packing a bag, just in case.  I am fortunate to still be feeling great, just a little tired.  It helps that Ryan is off this week and we can all sleep late.  Whenever I go out in public people comment on how big my belly is, gee thanks.  The ladies at the nail salon are the only strangers to actually rub my belly.  And I guess they are not exactly strangers since I have been in there so much lately.  Unfortunately, we still don't have a name for Baby Boy.  Current top contenders are Cameron, Joshua, and Kyle.  I am still holding out for Jackson Ryan but we just read that Jackson was the #1 name for 2013.  Ryan doesn't want to use such a popular name so we can't agree.  Guess we still have time to think about a name.       

Christmas Eve

Russia was our country for Christmas Eve this year.  We all donned fur hats and posed for the annual theme picture. 

We were cracking ourselves up with the hats.  My dad was channeling Sean Connery from "Hunt for Red October" and my mom the character Lara from "Dr. Zhivago."

Ryan says that I am keeping our house so cold these days that he is going to sleep in his new Russian hat.  It even has ear flaps that drop down for extra warmth.  This will be the only winter I don't complain about the cold since Baby Boy is keeping me so toasty warm.   

My parents did a fantastic job with the menu.  We all had a taste of caviar.  I don't know who protested the caviar more, Tessa or Gampa.  Even though I covered Tessa's bite in cream cheese, she needed lots of encouragement to try this delicacy.    

 

We had an appetizer of borscht, a beet soup, that I personally found very tasty. 

For the main course we had Chicken Kiev over buckwheat groats with veggies.  The chicken was pounded thin, rolled around garlic herb butter, breaded and then baked.  It was delicious!  As was the Russian black bread that my mom made from scratch.  I love learning new foods from different countries each year.

And, of course, there was vodka because nothing says Russia like vodka.

Tessa painted her very own Babushka dolls for G&G.  She loves crafts and this was a fun project for us before Christmas.  They turned out pretty darn cute.

Tessa's gifts were Russian themed too with an Anastasia doll and games.  She also received the new Disney Princess Anna costume.  Technically, Anna and Elsa are from Norway, but with a title like "Frozen" we could easily borrow them for Russian Christmas.     

In honor of the occasion, we chose Russian names for Baby Boy.  All night we called him things like Dimitri, Vladamir and Nikolai.  Somehow I don't think any of those names are really going to work.  We made guesses on when Dimitri (my personal fav of the Russian names) would make his appearance.  Everyone, except for Ryan, predicts that he will be late and big.  We shall see.  It was a very merry Christmas Eve. 

Baby Shower at Work

I was so touched that my co-workers gave me a baby shower.  I really wasn't expecting all these showers with a second baby but my friends are just great like that.  After a long day of work, people hung around for cake, snacks and presents.  I got lots of cute things and my last big items, a mattress and a monitor, to complete the nursery.  The funniest part was when I dripped punch and it landed on my shoe.  That in and of itself wasn't funny, the funny part was that my friend Cathy had to tell me it was on my shoe because I couldn't see my feet! 

 

Ballet

Tessa has ballet on Mondays and I usually run errands, make phone calls or work on my laptop while she practices.  This past Monday I had been planning to use the time to download pictures from my big camera to my laptop.  So, when parents were invited in to watch the lesson I was thrilled that I had my camera with me.  I'm sure that I will love baseball practice too when Baby Boy's time comes, but right now I think there is nothing cuter than my little ballerina.  The girls did a little Christmas number for us.  I'm impressed with how quickly they picked up this little number.

36 Weeks

So this pregnancy is moving right along and I still feel great.  Spin, yoga, prenatal massages, pedicures and Tums are keeping both of us happy and healthy.  I am still working, very part time, but last night was my last call night before the baby is born.  I went out with a bang, over 14 hours on my feet and I was beat.  One of my after hours cases was with my own ob doctor.  When a patient, also 36 weeks, texted him complaining of minor problems I was not sympathetic.  Good thing he answered that one instead of me.  My last scheduled day to work is New Year's Eve which is just around the corner!    

The girls at my regular spin class were sweet enough to give me a Baby Blue Shower.  Our instructor played all kinds of fun baby related songs while we worked out and then we had blueberry pound cake and presents.  I knew we were having baby songs but the cake and presents were a total surprise.  I felt so special!

Adoption Day

We are so thankful we get to call this beautiful, sweet, smart little girl our daughter.  Each year we celebrate the day she became ours legally.  This year she chose to have a Sofia cake.  This is so fitting because she is "Sweet as a Princess."

Christmas Cookies

We have a tradition of making cookies each December.  This year we were particularly ambitious and made this nativity set.  It took forever!!!  After finishing the people and the animals I didn't have it in me to build the gingerbread stable.  So we borrowed the stable from our Little People set, glued on a cookie star with icing and took a picture.  It was so worth the effort when I volunteered at school and heard Tessa telling her little friends about these "away in a manger cookies" that we made.       

The rest of our cookies were much easier.  We made Christmas trees, stars, snowflakes and gingerbread men.  I love that this is one of our traditions, Tessa is so fun to bake with. 

A Birthday Party For Jesus

Each year we have a Sunday School Christmas party with the kids.  We had pizza and then a birthday cake for Jesus.  Usually Santa shows up at this party too but, due to a scheduling conflict, he wasn't able to make an appearance this year.  I don't think the kids minded at all.  They ran around like crazy wild things, wearing themselves out playing chase.  I can't get over how they are growing.  Our precious babies are such big kids now! 

Thanksgiving

For the first time in thirteen years, Ryan and I stayed home for Thanksgiving.  Between our France trip, Tessa's school and our surprise pregnancy, travel just wasn't feasible this year.  Thankfully, both sets of grandparents were able to come to our house so we were all together and it was wonderful.  Before school let out for the holiday, Tessa had a project where she disguised a turkey.  Of course, she wanted her turkey to be dressed as a princess and she chose Ariel.  Tessa colored the turkey feathers ocean blue and added some glitter to makes the waves sparkle.  Then she painted seashells for the beach and Ariel's bikini top.  We curled ribbon together for hair and glued on the tail.  Then she spread glue and sprinkled sand all along the bottom to make the beach.  A few stickers of Ariel's friends and she was done.  It turned out so cute and we had fun doing it together.   

Frank and Paula arrived the day before Thanksgiving.  Since I was on call both Tuesday and Thursday that week and was eight months pregnant, everyone helped with the cooking.  I did what I could ahead of time and Paula and my mom did the rest.  Here Tessa is helping to brine the turkey.  It made the turkey so moist!

On Thanksgiving day we started the party around noon and had a great time.  Tessa posed with my mom while everything was cooking. 

 Here's a picture of the boys with Tessa. 

The food was all delicious, I love this delegating thing.  We killed several bottles of champagne and Prosecco and had a grand old time.  After dinner we had coffee and espresso and played games.  I had a double shot of espresso, my treat to myself, and actually stayed awake after 9pm!  Even though I was buzzing on caffeine I was very glad not to be called into the hospital that night.     

 I am so very thankful for my wonderful growing family.  Happy Thanksgiving!

Baby Boy's Shower

The Sunday School girls were nice enough to throw me a baby shower.  I still can't quite believe I am pregnant but my belly is growing by the day.  We snapped a few pictures before heading out to the party.  

Guess who didn't want to be left out.  My sweet Tessa is going to be the best big sister ever!

Here's a picture of most of the girls, a couple came in after we took this shot.  Three of us are pregnant right now and all of us are having boys.  We ate and chatted.  Lots of advice was given plus a few delivery horror stories, with happy endings, were shared. 

I opened lots and lots of presents.  I had gotten rid of almost everything from Tessa's baby days so we are starting over from scratch.  Whenever I would get sad about giving away Tessa's baby things we would joke that if a miracle happened we would buy all new stuff.  Of course I never really expected it to happen!  Thanks to these girls and my mom I now have much of what I needed and don't have to buy quite so many things. 

I can't thank my friend Tobie enough for hosting this party.  She has been great support through this pregnancy.

Thank you, thank you, thank you for all the wonderful gifts!  I'm very excited to get the nursery set up for Baby Boy.  Someday we will actually decide on a name for him.