Being 3

Isn't this the cutest 3 year old you've ever seen? I think so :) I've had intentions of writing what Luke has been up to at age 3 since his birthday but obviously I'm a few days late. Anyway, below is a list of what my munchkin is doing these days.

*Luke is very independent. He wants to do everything, "...by myself mom." I appreciate this independence although at times it's a bit challenging.

*Luke is a big helper. He still loves to help me change the laundry and now he daily helps me feed the animals, set the table for dinner, start the dishwasher, make kool-aid, make his chocolate milk for lunch and dinner, get the mail, water my flowers and lots of other things that come up. He also loves to "help" Troy mow the grass with his little mower.

*I think that Luke is going through a growth spurt right now--at least I hope so. He's been eating a ton including vegetables (Hooray!) and he's also sleeping a bunch. We've only had one day the last two weeks where he hasn't napped for over two hours.

*Current favorite toys include dinosaurs, cars, legos and puzzles. Luke also really likes fire engines and "Cars" stuff. We've also been working on playing more games including Hungry, Hungry Hippos; Chutes & Ladders; and Candyland.

*I would like to say that in the middle of the summer we've been playing a bunch outside but this awful heat wave doesn't allow for much time outside. Luke would love to spend all day outside and at the swimming pool but it's just so hot and pregnant mom can't tolerate the heat too well.

*Favorite activities include: squishing and bonking with Dad (wrestling basically); playing hide and seek with anyone willing; watching home videos and looking at pictures on the computer; building with Legos and just generally being a bit destructive with cars and dinosaurs like a typical boy.

*At Luke's 3 year check-up last week at the doctor he weighed 30 pounds (25-50%) and was 36 1/4 inches tall (25%). The doctor said she was happy with Luke's growth curve and estimated he may always be in those percentiles.

*Luke's schedule hasn't changed too much lately. He typically gets up around 8, takes about a two hour nap and goes to bed between 8:30 and 9. The later bedtime is the only slight change.

*We are still working on potty training. For a while things were going very well and about 2 1/2 weeks ago Luke would wake up and take his diaper off and put on big boy underwear. So following his lead we tried underwear for a couple of days. The first day went well but the second day Luke had a couple of accidents. I didn't make a big deal of them but he happened to be sitting on pillow doggy for one of them and he was most upset that he got doggy all wet and wasn't able to sleep with him that night. He was very restless that night and even cried out a few times leading me to think he was having bad dreams. I asked him about it the next morning and he said he was dreaming about going potty on his pillows and that he didn't like it. Since then we've regressed a bit. He hasn't been interested at all in using the potty but I'm not pushing and we're gradually having a success every day or two.

*I've heard numerous people say that the terrible two's are nothing compared to the three's. At this point I'm going to go ahead and agree with that. Temper tantrums are at an all time high and unfortunately occur at least once daily. Listening skills also seem to have declined dramatically over the last couple of months along with a rise in talking back and attitude. Don't get me wrong, Luke is a very good kid but there are definitely more challenging moments and days now it seems.

*One relatively new behavior that I enjoy greatly is quiet time. Luke has a down time in the morning and also some afternoons. It is not an every day occurrence but he will sometimes ask me to have quiet time with him up in his room. This typically includes laying in his bed and reading stories which is so awesome. He snuggles as close as possible to me and we lay in his bed for up to an hour.

*Luke also will occasionally ask to go to his room to be by himself if he is really upset about something. He will go upstairs and get all of his cloth diapers (still a VERY important comfort item) and bring them back down. The best part of this is that he usually returns in a much better mood. I'm proud of him for knowing how to calm himself down and knowing when he needs that time alone.

*Luke is still excited about the baby. He refuses to call the baby Rudolph or Rudy anymore and he not so politely tells family members that the baby doesn't have a name yet and that it's just a baby. We talk about the baby on a daily basis but Luke is still a bit hesitant about "talking" to the baby. I'm guessing the bigger my tummy gets the more interactive Luke will be. He will occasionally give the baby a kiss though and it just melts my heart. I know that Luke is going to be a terrific big brother and I can't wait to see the bond he will share with his sibling.

So, I'm sure I could list many, many more things but you might stop reading if I continue on any more. Luke is such a blessing in our lives and we enjoy every moment his antics and adventures bring along.

AND IT' S A...

SURPRISE!!!

Yep, that's right, we will be waiting until this baby is born to find out whether it is a boy or a girl. Troy and I made the decision last night. We had both come to the conclusion that we were willing to do what the other wanted but in the end decided not to find out today. I will have one more ultrasound at 30 weeks so if we change our minds we have one more chance to find out but I don't think we will.

I will say that during the ultrasound I asked Troy more than a couple of times whether or not he was sure about our decision. I can see how it would have been so easy to change our minds while we were watching the baby move and kick but Troy said he was good so we did not find out. I also have to say that I'm surprised this was the final decision and very excited about it.

Okay, so on to my appointment--it went well. The baby's heartbeat is 150 bpm and it measured right at 18 weeks and 2 days (just as expected). The other major relief from the ultrasound today was that my placenta is not low at all. I was really concerned about this and was so thankful when the ultrasound tech said it looked great. All of the baby's organs looked good and measured as they should. Luke was not as interested in watching the screen as Troy and I were but he did talk about the neat baby we saw while we were eating lunch.

Other information from the appointment:

I still have not gained any weight. This completely amazes me but the doctor was not concerned so I'll go with it. She did tell me that I can eat more if I wanted to which is great but I'm not sure I could. I feel like I eat a bunch already.

We also scheduled the date of the c-section today because the baby measures the most accurately during the beginning of the second trimester. So unless something changes I will be having this baby Monday morning December 12. 12/12/11! A very easy date to remember I think. The doctor said I can expect to be in the hospital between two to four days after the surgery so I should be home no later than Friday of that week.

Other tidbits about pregnancy at 18 weeks:

I am really starting to feel a bunch of movement now. It is not consistent but the past few days I have definitely noticed an increase. I love feeling the baby move. I remember with Luke that feeling the baby really helped me connect and let it sink in completely that I was pregnant.

I have had tons of round ligament pain the past week or so. It's concentrated pretty consistently on my right side and it is definitely getting my attention.

I have also been very light-headed the past 5-6 days. The doctor told me this morning that it's completely normal because your blood pressure is at it's lowest point during the second trimester--mine was 110 over 70 this morning. I really have to be careful about standing up to fast or just standing too long in general. Getting up and ready in the morning is the hardest. Thankfully Luke and I don't have a lot of places we have to be too early in the morning.

Up until now I haven't really had many cravings. I find this odd too because with Luke I had a bunch of them. Thankfully I can eat almost anything I want and I am hungry almost all the time. My current favorites include: Rice Chex with a peach for breakfast, sugar free Kool-Aid and jello. I also try to have a bowl of cereal every night before I go to bed but that doesn't always happen.

Okay, now it's time for some more fun ultrasound pictures. The one below is the baby's leg extended straight out along with the rest of the body. The tech told us it was rare to see that happen and even gave us a bigger than normal picture of it because she said it was such a good picture--way to go baby!

Grandma & Grandpa Weekend

This past weekend my dad and step-mom were here. It was great to have them especially since Troy was gone. They got here late Thursday night and left this morning. Luke had 3 full days of playing with Grandma and Grandpa. He loved every minute of it! Luke had fun squirting Grandpa and vice versa; they played hide and seek; Luke "helped" Grandpa play MarioKart; Luke and Grandma crashed and banged cars; they all put together a puzzle; Grandma and Grandpa read lots of stories; and generally they just all had fun together. Plus for me it was nice not to be alone all weekend without a break. I even got to out with a friend Friday afternoon to see the new Harry Potter movie (completely awesome adaptation I thought). The other really great thing was my dad taking the border down in my kitchen which I have wanted to do since we moved in two years ago--way to go Dad!!!

Decisions, Decisions

As in what am I going to decide to do on Monday at our ultrasound--find out if it's a boy or a girl or wait and be surprised. I still don't know what my final decision will be. I have wavered back and forth the last couple of weeks because Troy has made a strong argument in favor of knowing; however, I really do want to be surprised.

A couple of people have told me that it's my body so I should ultimately have the final decision. As much as I would like to claim that and take the easy way out of it I don't feel that is fair to Troy. The baby is just as much his as it is mine. I just get the privilege and challenge of carrying the baby. So, ignoring Troy's feelings is out and I'm back at wavering.

Troy's argument (which I am choosing not to share the details of) is valid and strong. Based on our experience with Luke it makes sense but it's not as simple as wanting to know so we can decorate the nursery or buy girl stuff if that is the case. A couple of people have told me that they agree with him in his argument and based on that alone they would find out. The only problem with the argument for me is there is no guarantee that Troy is right. If I could know for sure that he was I would agree and find out. So, again no decision based on his argument alone (at least for me).

And then there's my argument that this is the only surprise factor in this whole thing. As I've mentioned previously I'll be having a repeat c-section so the actual birth day will be scheduled (unless of course the baby decides to come quite early and I go into labor which is possible but not too likely in my head). Other factors of this pregnancy make the gender being the only surprise more of a big deal to me too. There aren't very many true surprises in life and I do like a good surprise. Troy says that no matter when we find out it will still be surprise which is true but I do have more patience than he does (I'm not bragging only telling the truth). So, no decision based on my argument alone either.

We have discussed just having Troy find out but he is concerned he may not be able to keep it a secret from me and also it wouldn't really help his argument if only he knew. So that option is out.

{{Sigh!}}

The other tough part of this decision is that Troy is going out of town for the weekend. He's leaving this afternoon and won't be home until Sunday afternoon which doesn't leave us with a lot of face time to talk this through. I have a bad feeling that this might come down to a last minute decision which isn't what I want to happen. My goal is to have this figured out no later than Sunday night. Wish me luck!

(Just so that I can remember, the final poll results on finding out or being surprised were 9 to 8 in favor of finding out.)

1st Bike Ride

This morning Troy and I took Luke for his first bike ride on his new bike. He seemed pretty excited about his first ride although it didn't last too long. We went up and down the sidewalk in front of the house just once but I will say the temperature was already ridiculous (that's why we went this morning rather than this afternoon). Troy started out helping Luke and trying to explain pushing the pedals around and then I helped him for a bit. For his first ride it went pretty well and he did manage to get the pedals around a few times.

Luke is Three!

Today is Luke's 3rd birthday. We've had a birthday filled weekend with 2 sets of grandparents and we also celebrated last weekend with the other set of grandparents, aunts and cousin.

Last weekend included fireworks, swimming in the lake and a Cars birthday cake along with many rounds of hide and seek with Grandpa. Luke was most excited about his Cars cake and enjoyed seeing his first fireworks.

This weekend started on Friday afternoon when my mom, step-dad and Troy's parents got here. We spent Friday afternoon playing and getting ready for the dinosaur birthday party on Saturday morning.

The party started at 10 Saturday morning and I have to say that I think it was a big success. There were a total of 4 boys here including Luke and they really had fun together. We had a dinosaur egg hunt, dug for fossils, opened presents, splashed in the pool and sprinkler and had pizza and ice cream cake. Luke was worn out when everyone left (so was Mom for that matter).

After nap time and waking up a bit Luke opened his presents from the grandparents, aunts and uncle and Mom and Dad. It was really entertaining for the adults because Luke would say something similar to, "This is cool" or "Wow" after opening each gift. He got lots of new Legos, a fire station and truck, some games and a new bike.

After a nice dinner Luke enjoyed all of his new toys and he played numerous rounds of Hungry, Hungry Hippos with all the grandparents. Even though Luke was exhausted it took him quite a while to settle down and go to sleep. We enjoyed listening to him through the monitor tell all of his stuffed animals about his party and his new toys.

This morning the guys played golf so Luke got to spend some extra time with Grammy and Grandma. It was a pretty chill morning playing with his new toys and entertaining the grandmas. After the guys got home from golf, we had lunch and then everyone left before Luke took a long nap.

The rest of the day we spent as just a family of three relaxing. For dinner we enjoyed a pizza picnic in the family room while watching Planet Earth (Luke loves to see all the different types of animals).

Underwear

So yesterday was an interesting day around here. Interesting for progress in the potty training department that is.

When I went to get Luke out of bed, he was laying in bed with the covers pulled up just singing along to himself. I pulled the covers back and realized his pj pants were on inside-out. Not too unusual but it surprised me because I didn't think he had gotten out of bed yet.

Then Luke says, "Mom, I took off my diaper and put on my underwear."

So I checked that. Sure enough his diaper was gone and he did indeed have underwear on only they were backwards. I didn't see his diaper anywhere and asked him where it was. He looked at me with a duh look and said, "It's in the trash can."

Yep, the diaper was in the trash can. So, I asked, "Do you not want to wear a diaper today?"

"No Mom not today."

We then proceeded to use the big boy potty successfully and put the underwear and pj pants back on correctly. All the way down the stairs I kept telling Luke that he had to tell me when he needed to go potty since he was only wearing underwear.

We ate breakfast and I asked if he wanted to go potty. No. I asked about 10 minutes after that. No. I probably asked about every 5 minutes until it was time to run our errands for the day. I did put on a diaper for venturing out to much objection but I knew we weren't ready for that big a step yet.

When we got home we took off the diaper, went potty and then had lunch. Again I started with the asking. Well, apparently I didn't ask often enough because about 10 minutes after lunch we had our first accident. No big deal right? Well, I took Luke to the big potty to make sure he was finished and then went to put a towel on the carpet. I was gone all of 10 seconds maybe. Luke managed to get half the roll of toilet paper into the toilet while I was gone. So several flushes later we put on another diaper because it was almost nap time and we're definitely not ready for that step.

Luke wakes up from his nap and I head upstairs to get him anticipating no diaper and a pair of underwear on. Nope. I had the first half of it right--no diaper but the underwear was laying on the floor and I'm looking at bare bottom (which is rather cute I have to say especially with the swim suit tan line). Luke told me he couldn't get the underwear on by himself. I had a couple more errands to run so we put another diaper on and the underwear on top of that.

We didn't take the diaper off for the rest of the day but I consider it all good practice and a sure sign from Luke that we are inching ever closer to no more diapers :)