20 Week Update: It's a ....

Well here we are HALFWAY done. Wow, what a crazy thought, considering I haven't really thought about being pregnant most of these 20 weeks. I guess second children's pregnancies are kind of like that. You are busy with one child already, so your thoughts are ever about them and (in a lot of cases including mine) you end up chasing them around all day not having time to relish the thought of another baby. This has induced a sort of "Mommy guilt." I'm not thinking about this baby at all, does that make me a bad mother? Of course not. I'm not going to leave Reed to play by himself so I can sit and stare at my non-existent stomach. I need to enjoy him while it's just him and me. Baby will get lots of attention later.

So the update: Still very smooth sailing, like Reed's pregnancy. My only complaints are heartburn (just like with Reed, but I have my medicine again for that, so that's taken care of) and back pain. This is a TOTAL pain (Hah, but seriously it is). I didn't have anything like it with Reed, but I wasn't picking up a 20 lb child throughout his pregnancy. I'm sure the constant bending and playing on the floor is the culprit, but what are you gonna do? I love playing with him and I'm not going to stop because of a little (or a lot, ouch!) back pain. I'm sure it'll only get worse the more weight I have to carry around, but only a few more months and hopefully it'll go away.

An ever-growing belly. Sorry, no pictures.

Gender reveal! Crazily enough, it's a girl! I had been secretly hoping for a girl, and since I wanted one I was convinced it was a boy instead. I had my mindset right so I wouldn't feel disappointed when I found out it was a boy.

So we went in for the anatomy ultrasound where they look at just about everything: heart, kidneys, lungs, spine, nose and lip, etc. Everything was perfect and measuring right on time. The tech asked if we were going to find out, because he already knew. At that point I thought "this has to be a boy if he already knows." We told him 'yes' and he asked if we had any other children. We said we had a little boy who was about to turn 1. He said "well, you're in for double trouble now" so I'm thinking, yep, definitely a boy. Then he types girl on the screen and I pretty much start shrieking "Are you serious?! No way!! No WAY!!" And in true pregnancy/hormone-overload fashion I get all emotional. Wes is pretty much in shock, even though he guessed girl from the beginning. All the girl/scary/teenage years are flashing through his mind and he is having a silent freak-out. But he is good about compartmentalizing things, so he quickly recovered and hasn't been thinking too much about it to stay sane. I secretly like bringing things up like "you'll have to walk her down the aisle one day" just to see the look on his face. I'm such a bad wife.

So here's out sweet little girl. Bow added for extra cuteness. No name yet because Wes is in charge. It'll take him FOREVER to choose one, so I'll be pestering him for the next few months until he gets good and annoyed and finally decides.


So that evening we decided to have a little celebration. We went to dinner as a family, then stopped by Sonic for a shake (and they were half-price ALL day: score). I got strawberry in honor of baby girl.

 Then we dropped by Kohl's because I had two coupons that were going to expire, and Wes picked something out for his daughter. Love it!

Almost everyone in our Sunday school class at church has boys. Currently there are 4 of us pregnant and 3 are having boys. SO MANY BOYS! It was only a matter of time before someone had a girl, so I had to do something special. So I made cake balls with strawberry cake in the middle. The class was split about 50/50, but everyone was pretty surprised. Wes said their boys are going to have to compete really hard for her attention.

Of course, Mommy has already been shopping for little sister. I didn't go too crazy (yet), but found some really good deals at Kid-to-Kid and Target. Everything was majorly discounted or on clearance, so I felt pretty good about it. This little girl is going to be spoiled, I can feel it.

 

 

So with 2 under a year and a half, I'm going to need a bigger stroller. Seriously.
I had the chance to go to Buy Buy Baby (if you've never heard of it/been there, it's an experience) and test a bunch of strollers. I decided on a Contours double stroller and had it in the back of my mind for later. We obviously have no need for it now, so I was going to wait for a coupon and purchase it. Now strollers in general can be pricey, so just imagine what a double stroller goes for. It was a necessity, so we were just going to have to bite the bullet and do it.

I'm a member of several local online garage sale groups on Facebook (which are genius, by the way) and Friday night I saw several pictures pop up from a lady saying she was cleaning out her garage and having a flash sale that night only. And there was a picture of a double stroller, literally THE stroller I wanted. So Wes and I loaded the car to go check it out.

It was a little dirty as it had been sitting in her garage for a year, but other than that it had all the accessories and was in good shape. We got an extremely good deal on it, saving ourselves HUNDREDS of dollars. After hosing it off and scrubbing some of the gook off, it looks brand new. This is one happy Mommy!

It is a fantastic stroller because you can very easily take the seats out and face them any direction (forward or backward), plus I can put baby girl in her car seat in the back while Reed hangs out in the front seat. AWESOME! It sure will make transporting two little ones a lot easier.



Coming up! Reed turns 1!!


Enjoy!

The Turners

 

Happy Happy Happy Father's Day

Wes got to celebrate his very first Father's Day yesterday, which I think he rather enjoyed.

We started off the day with his very favorite breakfast, sausage and biscuits. This, coincidentally, is also Reed's favorite breakfast. The boys thoroughly enjoyed their food.

 Then he got to open his present from Reed. Some Daddy-type gadgets and things, plus some clothes and a sweet card from Reed.

We tried to get a picture of father and son before church, but we had a rather fussy child.
Here is what he is usually like:

Perfect angel

So after church we relaxed at home for a bit before Wes' parents came over to babysit so we could go to a movie. Wow! A movie?! People still go see those?! We really need to get out more.

Anyway, we saw Star Trek, a movie Wes has been wanting to see for a while now. (I'll admit, I've been dying to see it, too).  It was good, and very nice to have some husband/wife time and let Reed play with his grandparents.

Staying at home and 'relaxing' sounds nice and easy, but never underestimate the power of getting out of the house as 'just the two of you.' Seriously.

So Wes had a fabulous first Father's Day, as he totally deserves. He is so busy with work and grad school but he always makes time to give Reed a bath at night and help feed him dinner. Such a loving Daddy.

LOVE them

Enjoy!

The Turners

 

Guacamole!

My husband is a very laid-back kind of guy. He doesn't really get fussed about things and is constantly trying to chill me out. It has rubbed off on me a little over the last (calculating....) 12? years. He seems to understand what things are really important and what things are not a big deal.

But there are moments when he gets absolutely RIDICULOUSLY crazy. Saturday was one of those moments...

Wes loves mexican food, namely guacamole. This is a relatively new concept for him because he used to be a VERY picky eater. He has since branched out and tried foods he used to think were gross. That's how guacamole made it on the list.

Wes gets to go to lunch every day with guys from work. They have their 'rotation' if you will of favorites. H3 Ranch in the Stockyards happens to be one of them. If you can figure out by context clues, this restaurant serves guacamole. From the very first time Wes had their guacamole, I have been hearing about it. He claims it is the best guacamole he has ever eaten, EVER. *Disclaimer* My husband is in no way a "foodie." Please take this recommendation at your own risk. I am not liable for you ordering the table-side guacamole and feeling it is not the 'best you have ever eaten, ever.' Yes, I have eaten it, and yes it is good. I don't remember it being the best I have ever eaten ever, but I've had a lot of sleepless nights since then.

Anyway, he has been raving and raving about this guacamole (for 2 years now). He eventually started asking if we could try to make some guacamole. Well, my rather involved mash-up-avocados-and-add-salsa recipe did not cut it. So Wes decided to find out the ingredients. Every time he went he would ask exactly what was in it and completely forget by the time he got home. (reminds me the old Texas Lottery commercial where the group of people is ordering at a restaurant and keeps changing their orders and the waitress doesn't write it down. One man says "don't you want to write any of this down?" to which she replies "Oh I'll remember" What are the odds?) So after about 3 months of failed attempts he finally got smart and TOOK A PICTURE of the plate of ingredients. Way to go Wes!

That was about a year ago.

So we finally got around to making this guacamole Saturday night. We had all the ingredients and the hallowed picture Wes took. What followed can only be described as complete ridiculousness...

 

Our trusty picture

We began prepping our ingredients and, at Wes' insistence, got a plate to put them on so it would look like the picture. 

So we got a plate.

We started piling our ingredients on the plate, which was not going to work, because again, Wes insisted that they be put in the EXACT place on our plate that they were on the picture plate.

Really?

So Wes put the ingredients on our plate EXACTLY where they were in the picture.  

Then there was about a 30 minute debate about the size of the piles of ingredients.
-This looks like too much
-No I think that one is OK
-We need more onions!
-But that DOESN'T look EXACTLY like the plate!

All the while I am trying to tell him that we can always add more, but we cannot take it out once it's in there. This argument was no good, as his engineering attention to detail would yield the exact results if he got the piles just right.

*Sigh*

Then my dad decided to chime in (who I think wanted to aggravate Wes) and claimed the plate in the picture is bigger than the plate we have.

This threw Wes all out of sorts and he began scrutinizing the picture and comparing his thumb to the thumb in the picture to check size. I kid you not. Then he had to adjust the piles accordingly which took another 10 minutes. For such a laid-back guy, he was really stressing about this guacamole.

Finally, he decided we had the right amount of ingredients and mixed it all up.

 Ta-Da! Our beautiful guacamole creation (that took about 40 minutes.)

 The moment of truth!

The outcome was positive, with Wes stating that it was really good. Not quite 'best he ever had', but we got really really close. Even my dad (who was being a smarty pants during the whole thing) liked it so much he took a picture of my recipe. 

I can't really blame him for wanting to make it right, but there is a line there somewhere.

So here is our copycat recipe for table-side guacamole:

2 large avocados

1/4 small red onion - not quite diced

1/4 cup lime juice

1 Tablespoon cilantro - roughly chopped

1 teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon jalapeno - diced

2 cloves garlic - finely chopped or squeezed through garlic press

Add a couple spoonfuls of pico de gallo on top if you like.

I made my own pico because I couldn't find any in the store. Chop some white onion and tomato and add diced jalapeno and cilantro to taste. It was pretty good.

Enjoy!

The Turners