38 weeks

This weekend was our niece Kara's first birthday party. Since I'm so close to my due date, I was a bit apprehensive traveling to the other side of the state. However, we knew that Hannah would love to be there to celebrate, so we sent her in our place. From what I've heard from Grandma and Grandpa Cramer, she had a great time!

Jason and I took advantage of the alone time and went out for a date on Saturday night. I'd heard good things about the Beltline Bar, and I was hoping that a bit of spicy Mexican food might kick labor into gear, so we decided to check it out. We split their "world famous" wet burrito, and I had a virgin margarita. I'm hoping to go back sometime to try the real thing :-) Since the night was young after we were done, we headed down to Holland for dessert at one of Jason's favorite restaurants, Boatwerks. After enjoying our sweet treats, we drove out to the beach to watch the sunset.

Kind of funny... Above is our picture from last night, hopefully near the end of my pregnancy. Below is a picture from the night we found out I was pregnant for the second time. Both on the lakeshore. I think I look a bit more tired and ready to have this baby in the top picture :-)




I am now officially farther along in pregnancy than I was with Hannah. I've now started getting the annoying question of "When am I going to have this baby?" Ugh! I wish I knew. I am ready!



38 weeks with Baby Boy...

... No comparable pictures with Hannah :-/

The Davis Diner

Since Jason put the bird feeder in the front yard, Hannah's been thrilled to watch the birds come and eat. We've recently attracted some frequent diners that absolutely thrill her!


We regularly see them each morning for breakfast, and they return each night for dinner. Have to love nature in our front yard!

26 months old

Hannah is now 26 months old and has become Miss Independent.

*She now insists on getting herself dressed. We've figured out that we have to let her try to do it on her own, and wait until she asks for help before we try to give her a hand. Otherwise, she gets very upset. She actually is pretty good at dressing herself once we get her started.

*She LOVES to play outside (sou-side, as she says). She's really gotten the hang of driving the four wheeler on her own Uncle Todd and Aunt Courtney got her last year for her birthday. She's also now tall enough to start peddling her tricycle by herself. The difficult part is getting her to come inside without throwing a major fit.

*She continues to be a big helper. She's very good at helping me unload the dishwasher. She pulls the dishes out and even stacks some of the plates and bowls. She's getting tall enough where she can start unloading the top rack as well. This has actually been really nice for me, as I don't have to bend over to unload it myself, which is more difficult these days.

*She asks to color almost daily. We're going to need more supplies pretty soon. She loves stickers and stamps, too.

*She's starting repeating "I love you" to us!

*She still likes to go on stroller rides, which we've been doing almost nightly. However, once we get her out of the stroller, she does NOT want to get back in. "Hannah walk" is what she usually declares.

*She's continues to get more interested in the potty. Lately, she's been telling us when she's poopy (only after the fact), and then proceeds to pull down her pants and walk to the bathroom to sit on her potty. Sometimes, she even insists that we take off her diaper, which we do after we change her. She still isn't actually doing anything when she sits down, but she seems to be catching onto the idea. Honestly, I'm really hoping to hold off on potty training until at the least the fall, but I guess if she initiates it, we'll just follow her lead and see what happens.

*She's now officially done with daycare! We've loved Miss Brenna, and I'm sure Hannah will miss her, but between our decision for me to stay at home and Brenna's new adventure in returning to school, last week ended up being the last week for daycare. My work has been pretty well wrapped up for about a week, and what odds and ends I may need to do can be worked on from home during naps and at night. We're soooo excited!!!

37 weeks!

This is a milestone week for me. I had Hannah at 37 1/2 weeks, so I'm super excited to be at this point this time around. Granted, I know that the first pregnancy may not be any indicator as to when I will actually go with this baby, but it does feel like a milestone nonetheless. I also got good news at last week's doctor's appointment. To her surprise and my delight, I am dilated to 3 cm!! Again, this is not necessarily an indicator that I will go into labor anytime soon, but it's still progress.

I am definitely ready to go. Although I love feeling the baby move, I am absolutely ready to be done with the back aches, limited breathing capacity, raging hormones, and sleepless nights. Bring on the post-partum raging hormones, post labor pains, and even more sleepless nights :-) I've been stocking up on all of the necessities around the house, so much so that I've spent almost our entire month's grocery budget in the first week of the month! If I don't have the baby before my due date, we may not have much to eat but we'll have enough toilet paper to last us the rest of the summer!

I am still working, although I am so blessed to be able to work much of the time from home. Since I'm delivering in Grand Rapids this time around, I've requested that I work from home from here on out. Since I went back to work after Hannah was born, I've had the privilege of working part-time, which is very unusual for an engineering position. I've worked at a great company for great bosses who have accomodated such a schedule. After much discussion and prayer during this pregnancy, though, we have decided that after this baby comes I'll be embarking on a new career with longer hours, lousy pay but priceless rewards as a full-time stay-at-home mom! I am so excited to be able to be with our children everyday, to watch them grow and learn and take care of our family and house for my amazing husband. We have worked very hard and are growing in our faith as we are leaning on God to continue to provide, and I am especially grateful to Jason who is totally on board with this decision and fully supportive. It won't be easy, but we know that it will be absolutely worth it!


37 weeks with Baby Boy


37 weeks with Hannah

Misc. Happenings

In these last weeks leading up to the baby's arrival, we've been busy doing all sorts of things. Hannah is becoming more and more independent every day. She is going through a phase of NOT wanting to wear clothes. One day last week, she refused to anything but her diaper and socks for her nap. I couldn't help but laugh when I went in to get her after her nap to find her only in her socks. Unfortunately, she was also in a very wet bed :-(

She's really starting to love coloring and regularly asks to color. She pretty much just scribbles, but she is also just starting to try to color in the lines of her coloring books.

Our little artist in action. Notice she's wearing no clothes but is wearing her all-important sunglasses around her neck.

Thursday, we got an unexpected treat. We arrived at Hannah's babysitters at 6:30 as usual, only to find out that her little boy was sick. With our baby's impending arrival, I really didn't want to risk Hannah getting sick, but with the short notice I didn't have time to line anybody else up to watch her so I stayed home with her. Since we were up and at them so early, we decided not to waste the day. We ended up hitting up some fabulous garage sales in Ada and scored some good deals.

My mother's day present came early, as our new double stroller arrived yesterday! We've been researching them for soooo long and finally settled on the right one to suit our needs. Jason and Hannah got to work right away putting it together in the living room.

We took it for a little test drive through the house and had one happy rider.

I took Hannah for a walk in it through our neighborhood this afternoon and can say that I truly love it! I probably looked a bit odd pushing a double stroller with only one child, but we'll hopefully have it filled up before we know it.

We enjoyed a nice Mother's Day today. We kept it pretty low key, which was just what I wanted. Jason's parents came over for a weekend visit, so after church we went to our favorite restaurant Rose's for breakfast. Jason and Hannah got me a very sweet card, and then Daddy took care of Hannah for the rest of the night to let me get some work done. Very nice.

May!

I am soooo excited to FINALLY be able to say that I'm due at the end of this month. It's funny, but I said almost the exact same thing at this stage of my pregnancy with Hannah! I'm now 36 weeks along and definitely feeling ready to have this baby. I had Hannah at 37 1/2 weeks, so in the back of my mind, I'm counting down to that point for this pregnancy. I'm sure that will mean I'll go overdue with this baby :-)

I'm finally feeling ready to bring the baby home. His clothes are all hanging neatly in the closet and folded in his dresser drawer. My awesome friend Sara let us borrow a TON of her little boy's clothes! It was so much fun to wash it all and get it ready for our baby. This past weekend, we bought a mattress for the baby's crib and, after much research, ordered our double stroller! I also packed my bag and Hannah's bag. Nesting perhaps??

Thankfully, I'm off of my feet at work much more than I was the last time, so swelling hasn't been nearly as bad. I do notice it a bit at night, but I can still fit into most of my shoes. Plus, with this nice weather, I've actually been able to wear flip flops and sandals on my days off. I think I've been more active throughout this pregnancy, thanks to chasing around a toddler and the beautiful weather we've had this spring. I think that definitely has helped me feel pretty good. I'm hoping that also helps put me into labor sooner rather than later! Sleep has been difficult, but I suppose that's just good practice for being up with a newborn in the middle of the night. My belly just continues to grow, which is great since I know our little guy is getting bigger, but also means my shirts are getting shorter. I will say, though, that the belly does make for a great shelf to set my (nearly) nightly bowls of ice cream :-) So the countdown begins. Come on baby!


36 weeks with Baby Boy


36 weeks with Hannah (Wow, I look pretty good there. Must have been after a special occasion!)

Tulip Time

After the rain stopped this morning, we took a trip down to Holland today to check out the Tulip Time festivities. We wandered through the arts and craft show, window shopped downtown, and had a late lunch on the patio of one of the local restaurants. It was really nice to just spend some quality family time together.