16 weeks - avocado

Were officially 16 weeks along...

Baby is the size of an avocado - 4.6'' and 3.5ounces.

Starting to feel kicks and flutters, no longer just question if its hunger pains. I was cuddling dave the other night before bed and it was kicking his back, not that he could feel it but it was cute.

Still have morning sickness at night and and in the mornings.

Levi asks all the time how big the baby is and loves to put his head on my stomach and says "I can hear her growing mom!". He's convinced its a girl.

Find out the gender in 3 weeks, March 20th!

Have no inklings to what the gender is... I've always been wrong.. so maybe I should guess a boy this time, ha!

Still haven't heard the heart beat, hoping too at Mondays appt.  Was 11 weeks at the last appt so it was just a little too early.

Can still sleep on my stomach at night, woohoo! I remember by 14 weeks with the boys I had to start sleeping on my side. Maybe this baby will be smaller... I'd love to try a tiny baby labour!

Starting to feel a little more energy, this has been so nice! I almost forgot what its like..

Will now thinks he has a baby in his tummy too, its pretty cute. He loves to kiss my belly and say baby.

Limbo land...

What a few weeks...

Dave and I were looking at buying a house and were excited at the prospect of owning another house and being done renting (!!!) After searching and looking and meeting with our realtor the bank called and said we actually can't pull the equity out of our house in Lethbridge. Since its sold as a rent to own, we can't pull it out. What a bummer... after recovering from that..(we can't wait till that house is done, its been such a stress)

We started the hunt to rent, I have to have a yard this summer. The boys are so active we need a place they can run wild. We found a great townhouse with a yard and the lady who showed it to was the secretary at Levi's last preschool. So we were excited and said we'll take it, since they needed it filled March.15th. We gave our notice for our place, we love our landlords and wanted to give plenty of notice. They said they we're sad, we are leaving but totally get it. Since prices keep going up here, they decided to bump up the rent.

We filled out the application for the rental and waited to hear back. Once we heard back it was so frustrating. The husband does the business side of the rentals, the wife does the showings and she was so nice. He seemed so paranoid and not trusting. Long story short, we didn't feel comfortable with them anymore. Luckily we hadn't given them the damage deposit yet... phewf! But now we had given our notice and the rent was going up here and we have no place to go...  So were on the search of finding a place and fast.

Its been stressful not knowing what were doing now. Also I've been getting sick again, I'm 16 weeks and don't know whats going on. But I'm waking up at night getting sick and the mornings have been bad... maybe I have stress induced morning sickness. who knows? Plus my calling at church is giving me grey hair, and we have an activity 4 days after the move.. to where we don't know ha! So were living in limbo land and praying one of the places we see this will work out. We looked at an acreage 4 miles out of town last night, that I think the boys would just love. Deer, cows and a giant yard! But the house was so old.. cool house tho but old. So we'll see, fingers crossed tonights place works out!

Family Day 2015

We headed to Mountain View for the weekend and had to hit up Uncle Barrys farm. 

The boys and Ai got to ride a horse and a tractor. Ai was in heaven, she loved the horses.

We took her to our favourite place ever, WATERTON!

There was no snow, like zilch! It was crazy to drive up as far as you can before the barrier at Cameron Lake and there was still hardly any snow. 

In town we saw sheep licking off this car, and mean Dave wouldn't roll my window up. This dude just stared at me and if I reached outta the car I could've pet it.

Check out the size of this dudes rack! He was a beast.

Dave and Ai freaking me out how close they are to the edge. But look how beautiful it is tho.

Doug took Ai up flying! She was so excited, she thinks alberta is so beautiful.

Levi playing in the plane Doug and Susan are building.

We got to meet up with my family and go bowling.. or as Will thought it was Bouncy balls... He sure threw them like they were bouncy balls, ha!

The boys enjoyed it! I biffed it hard on the floor and hurt my ego... and felt it for a few days. My knee is still sore.

Big Brothers

This morning I took pictures to announce that were expecting. I bribed the boys with smarties, ha!

Heres some other cute ones that didn't make the cut:

Valentines.

Levi had his valentines party at school and was convinced yesterday was Valentines so we did our dinner and little gifts last night.

I finally found an excuse to use the silhouette and made Levis valentines and gave out bubbles this year. His classmates were pretty excited, and Levi loved being able to hand them out.

We had pink pancakes, heart shaped bacon, scrambled eggs and Shirley Temples. Our exchange student thought it was so fun and was shocked we got her a gift. She is so polite and always thankful.

The boys got anew coloring book and some "Planes" toys. Dollarama has the metal die cast cars for $3 instead of $10 at walmart, woohoo!

and of course Levi being silly..

We got Ai some warm socks since she always has those hot paws in her pockets and shoes, ha!  Her own mug, she has hot chocolate every day after school and tea almost every night. And some of her favourite treats.

It wasn't anything fancy but I feel like despite still being sick and having bad headaches Im slowly getting my groove back. 

Banff

Dave bought levi snow shoes over Christmas holidays and both boys have been anxious to try them out. We dont have much snow here, so we figured it's a good excuse to go explore Banff! On the way there dave showed us this hotel just outside of Canmore with a good restaurant. Good place to stop and get the wiggles out and get a bite to eat.

 What a ham!

the hug turned more into a tackle.

We went up to Cave and Basins to check out the snowshoeing trials. There was hardly any snow there but we decided to check out the cave and sulphur springs.

Inside the museum at the Cave & Basins. 

So hard to get a good picture in the dim light.

The sulphur springs were neat to read up on and go check out, they smelled horribly tho. There was a cool little trail that we hiked up going through the sulphur springs.

The stream ran under the stairs. 

Ai, our exchange student was shocked that we went into a real cave. It's fun having her new perspective on things we are all just use too. I enjoy all her questions and comments about Canadian things. For example, she can't believe how clean public schools are and that we hardly pay anything to go. That houses here are so far apart. That there is so much land with nothing on it. 

Afterwards we went to find some snow and it happened to be at the same place as the hot springs. Levi always amazes us with how well he does in the snow, maybe thats because I dislike it so much. He was such a trooper climbing a big hill with his snow shoes,  We didn't last long at the Hot Springs tho it was so packed (like not a single spot to sit on the edge) and so hot! We were disappointed in how tiny the hot springs were compared to the ones were use to at Radium. But the kids still loved them.

Trapped him in van so he was contained, he really wasn't mad. He was in heaven pushing all those buttons, he was just being a stinker and not smiling!

He was sliding down the hill and soaking wet but so happy. 

We then got some ice cream and headed home, it was about 5pm by this point and we had wore the kids out! Levi slept a good chunk of the way home and Will had a small nap, we were worried they wouldn't sleep that night so once we got home we kept them up till 9. Surprisingly they slept and they slept till 7 am! Dave and I were so glad.

It was so nice to get out of the house and go play as a family. Made us miss Waterton, but glad we still have some mountains somewhat close.

February and 12 weeks!

We made it to February! We survived January, I feel like it deserves a party! 

That was a hard month for me, physically and mentally. The morning sickness just about did me in, and it made it so hard to stay happy and be positive. But we made it through the month and to 12 weeks. So maybe it should be a double party!

As I've been reading up on a septate uterus and its effects, its made me so grateful for the 2 boys we have and this baby on the way. Because mines quite severe, most women have an 80% miscarriage rate, making it extremely hard to have kids. Dave and I have had our struggles with miscarriages but were so blessed to have our kids. Ive tried to remember this as I've been so sick and not feeling so grateful for the sickness and exhaustion. Im getting excited to go hear the heart beat this week, it always seems to make things more real. So glad to have made it to 12 weeks and am now off bed rest. 

(Strathmore's thick winter fog)

I signed Levi up for Kindergarten this fall at the school just down the street from us. It was such a hard decision for me, but I think it all worked out in the end. The school has a Montessori program i'd love for him to be in, but its just half days and with a brand new baby I don't want to be walking back and forth for half days. So I signed him for full days in the hopes of getting into the program for grade one. Fingers crossed! Everyone keeps asking if im sad to be sending him, Im not. Im so excited for him, he's done 2 years of preschool and LOVES it. I am nervous for the transition of having a new baby in the house and full time school, im worried it'll be too much for him.

( sick with a fever, sleeping in our bed)

Wills been such a handful this month, maybe I'm forgetting what Levi was like at this age but I do not remember cleaning up so many messes. He loves to color and keeps finding markers no matter how high we hide them. Good thing its only highlighters so far, cause that comes off our computer with a wipe. He's so busy, unless he's sleeping or sick the kid just goes non-stop. Hes talking so much, I can't believe how much he says already. I have two boys who talk non-stop now. He loves to be funny, and loves when we acknowledge it. We get kisses and hugs from him non-stop still, im trying to soak it in. Seems so crazy still he wont be my baby for much longer. Were getting ready to do a big bed and cut out the soother, so nervous but he'll do great.

( wills face when you pull out the camera, "cheessseee") 

Levi playing with an app on my phone. 

Enjoying the snow.

Started doing hair again, boys were glad that the chair is back out to play with. 

Well I started this blog post 3 hours ago and in that time I've run out of gas (and it's freezing out today, bah!), levi was 25 mins late for preschool and Will fell asleep in the van at 9:30am. That's what happens when your brother wakes you up at 5:30am... So there goes this afternoons nap, so maybe we'll celebrate tomorrow! One day at a time right?!