Family Update

So it's been a while since posting...and even longer since posting real substance (verses silly stuff)...so here is a family update:

Ryan usually takes the new Frontrunner train to work now. It's so nice. I have yet to ride it, but it's on the list of "Unimportant Things To Do Sometime." He loves working for Adobe and has even filed some patents - so cool! Our '97 Honda has been having issues lately and Ryan has been spending a lot of time working on making the car a) run better and b)look nicer. It's so nice that Ryan has the ability (and desire!) to fix stuff up himself instead of taking it to a shop. He can't do everything a real mechanic can, but boy oh boy is he saving us money. (Side note: It just dawned on me that it's a 16 year old car. Does that mean it is old enough to drive itself?)

I don't think I've mentioned this is the blog world yet...Ryan and I are expecting Baby Girl #2. She is due Sept. 7. We are very excited about it. It's considered a high risk pregnancy because of the severe preeclampsia and growth restriction and prematurity we encountered with Caroline, but so far, so good. I do have gestational diabetes again. Sigh. But other than that, no problems yet. Every time I see a blood pressure machine at the store, I always check to make sure I'm below the 140/90 danger zone. I've learned pretty quickly that the best way to not go crazy from the diabetic dietary restrictions is to have lots of food in the house that is low-carb (like cheese sticks and cashews). Access to "safe" foods seem to be the key to being happy eating low-carb. (Oh, and not buying goldfish crackers - because I can eat one of the huge boxes in a couple days all by myself.)

Caroline has no clue that a new baby is coming. She currently thinks that a belly button is where a baby is. Caroline and I did a mommy and me swim class last month and it was tons of fun. She doesn't mind having her whole head go under the water and loves chasing rubber duckies. She can even grab onto the edge of the pool and monkey crawl along the edge to get the duckie. And tonight we asked her to "kick kick kick" in the tub and she totally laid down on her tummy and tried to swim. This month we are doing a mommy and me music class. Her favorite thing to do there is put away her musical instrument (tambourine, bells, rhythm sticks, etc) and get the next one. She has really gotten into imagination play lately and it is so cute. She'll take the baby monitor and have her stuffed animals "talk on the phone." She kisses any picture of any person/animal she sees. And she'll feed her stuffed animals with a bottle, sippy cup and spoon. She's getting really good at body parts too. More than once I've asked her where a certain body part is for the first time and she'll already know where it is. I could write forever about the cute/smart things Caroline can do, but I'm sure it ends up sounding boring when it isn't your kid, so I'll leave the Caroline skills to what has already been said.

We had my family in town for an extended family reunion earlier this month. Besides the family reunion, we also did a lot of day trip things with my parents and brothers and sisters. We went to The Leonardo to see the new "101 Inventions that Changed The World" exhibit (don't go - it's not worth your time/money; stay tuned to My Strongly Worded Letters Blog to find out more about that.) We also went to the Tracy Aviary and the Natural History Museum and Provo Beach Resort. It was a lot of fun. Ryan and Caroline and I also went to the Utah Arts Festival.

We recently got new carpet. YAY!!! Getting new carpet required moving EVERYTHING out of the upstairs (we didn't recarpet the basement...yet) which made it really convenient for switching around things for the girls' bedroom and toyroom. Originally I was going to give the girls their own room, but then I decided to have them sleep in the same room (once Baby Girl #2 is born, out the bassinet and into the crib) and then the other upstairs bedroom can be a toyroom. I'm loving the toyroom so much. Basically, my vision for the toyroom is: if it's in the room, the girls can touch it. It's a little messy right now because of getting things organized and ready for new baby. But as I type this, Ryan is putting together the new dresser for the girls' bedroom which will make organizing the bedroom a lot better and then the toyroom can get better too (instead of having unassembled furniture pieces in it). And then Caroline can go back to sleeping in her toddler bed. She was demoted back to the crib because once she figured out she could get out of her toddler bed, she'd put EVERYTHING she could reach into the bed with her. After things are put away in the new dresser, hopefully there won't be much that she can get into and place in her toddler bed with her.

Anyway...hopefully this wasn't too boring to read. If it was, you probably didn't even get this far anyway. Have a great day!