Baby shower cake

One of my friends from church hosted a baby shower for me two weekends ago. I didn't take any pictures at the shower other than of the cake I made. Since I don't really eat sugar or starches, I volunteered to bring the cake (ok, I'll admit it's a bit strange to make your own cake, but I wanted to be able to eat the cake at my own shower :). I made the cake while David was at a guys' game night at our lead elder's house. Watching John Harrison (who likes lots and lots of attention) and baking a cake at the same time wasn't very easy, but I cleaned up my HUGE kitchen mess and piped the cake once John Harrison went to sleep.

Spring Break...a few weeks early

34 1/2 weeks pregnant
Beautiful Cancun water
view from the resort
Cancun beach
Last week, David's parents watched John Harrison while David and I took a trip to Cancun. We had such a fun time and liked Cancun more than we had even imagined. The tourist area/hotel zone was really clean and safe and the locals seemed genuinely friendly. Several years ago, we had taken a cruise that stopped in Cozumel, but we had never vacationed in the Cancun/Cozumel area. Hopefully we will be back sometime in the next few years!! The water was absolutely beautiful, the sand powdery white (supposedly, the sand, which doesn't get hot, is made from crushed coral), and the weather was in the 70s and low 80s during the day. We stayed at the Marriott Casa Magna and loved the resort. David and I stayed for 4 nights/5 days and spent most of the time relaxing on the beach. We also got in the pool a few times, walked some along the beach, and of course, ate good food:). I always envisioned Cancun to be an endless party scene and I'm sure you'd have that type of atmosphere at some resorts, but the resort we stayed at was very family-friendly and classy (no night clubs, people weren't drinking excessively, etc.). I guess my traveling days are over for the next 4 weeks at least considering that I will be 36 weeks along on Friday. I went to the doctor today and all seems to be going well--I'm starting to dilate a little bit and Elise is head down :). I still have a long to-do list, but we will welcome our sweet little girl any time now. Even though I feel our baby move almost all the time now, it still seems surreal that we are about to have a second child. I am scared at the responsibility of caring for a newborn and a 2-year old, but also excited about having a little girl and about John Harrison becoming a big brother. John Harrison still frequently gives my belly hugs and kisses or lays his head on the "baby." We pray with him every night before he goes to sleep and always pray that the Lord prepares his heart to be a good big brother to Elise!

Pengiuns and Petting zoo

Chasing the geese at the petting zoo
Feeding the Emu
Hanging out in a fun swinging chair at an outdoors store
Enjoying the Penguin Playhouse at the Ripley's Aquarium
Taking a nap in the car (with favorite black bear stuffed animal)

Awesome jellyfish at the aquarium

Quite the change from last summer.....John Harrison used to quickly rip sunglasses off his face and now, he loves wearing them :)

The weather was beautiful two weekends ago and we took John Harrison to a petting zoo. I thought that John Harrison would get a big kick out of touching and feeding the animals, but in reality, he seemed to like the geese and ducks a lot, but mainly glanced at most of the animals and then just wanted to run around. David, Jonathan, and I had fun feeding the animals....especially the quirky Emu. We also took John Harrison to the Ripley's Aquarium in Gatlinburg---he really liked seeing the fish, marine life, and penguins!

Updates...

Updates....
1. Baby Elise is due in a little over 6 weeks now.....everything seems to be going well at my doctor's visits. I am going to the doctor every 2 weeks and will soon move to going every week. The waits are always long (yesterday I waited over 2 hours to be seen!), so I always try to take something to do so my time waiting is productive. I used to take my computer and get work done, but as of 12/31/2010, all of my work obligations related to the sale of our business in December 2009 are completed. YEAH! Yesterday I took notecards and wrote long overdue Christmas thank-yous while I waited...I finished almost half of the notes I needed to write.
Heartburn has been attacking with a vengance the past few weeks (much better than last pregnancy, though, when I popped Tums like they were candy from 14 weeks on!), I frequently feel and see little feet move across my belly, and I am having quite a few Braxton-Hicks contractions. Overall, I am feeling good and can't believe how quickly the weeks until March 25th are passing by.
2. We are recovering from a nasty bug. David got sick Sunday a week ago and John Harrison and I both got sick last Tuesday. David and John Harrison both ran fevers close to 103 for several days, and we all felt pretty awful until just a few days ago. Our energy and appetites aren't completely back and we all still have bad coughs, but are on the mend. It wasn't easy being sick and caring for a sick toddler (who becomes much like a baby!) at the same time. John Harrison was really sweet the days he was the sickest and let us hold him a lot. Then, when he felt a tiny bit better, he wanted to play....while all we felt like doing was crashing (which is not possible with as much as we had going on at the time and a child to keep up with).
3. John Harrison's 2nd birthday is in less than a month now. Our little boy is growing up so quickly and it is so fun to see his development. He was almost 100% potty trained before he got sick, but then went back to mainly diapers and pull-ups while he was sick, so we have been working on re-training....today has given me hope that we will be back on track in just a few days. John Harrison loves animals (especially horses), trucks (the bigger the better), and is saying new words frequently (such as "morning"). I am thinking about a truck-themed 2nd birthday party.
Recent pictures of John Harrison to come soon!!

New Year's Day brunch

We will miss Uncle James!!

Sitting down for the meal


Saying "goodbye" to Aunt Caroline :(







Having fun with Great Grandmama

The past two years, we have invited our immediate and extended family over on New Year's Eve and stayed up till past midnight. I guess that David and I have aged tremendously over the past year......we didn't host or attend a New Year's party and were asleep before midnight. Instead, we had our parents, David's brother, and my Grandmama over on New Year's Day for a brunch.

Playing in the snow, potty-training, and pregnancy

Raleigh joined in the fun, too.
David had to chase his dad with snowballs....one of which was rather large
Grandpa and John Harrison
Grandpa helping John Harrison stand on top of the snowman

Grandpa's snowman
We had fun playing in the snow last Monday. We got about 4-5 inches and John Harrison had so much fun playing outside. John Harrison especially liked that Grandpa came over to play with him in the snow and make snowmen. David made a huge snowman that was taller than he is and also made a huge snow "sculpture" that was going to be a snowman, but the base was HUGE and the mid-section ended up being too heavy to stack.
Other things going on with us recently.....John Harrison is well on the way to being potty trained! We are about 8 days into potty training and today, John Harrison only had one accident. The first few days were very challenging and left me wondering if potty training was possible with our 22 month old toddler! At first, I was letting John Harrison run around in underwear, socks, and a shirt, put him on the potty at frequent intervals, and taught him a symbol that indicated he needed to go potty. After cleaning up numerous urine puddles....many of which came as quickly as 7 minutes apart, I was really frustrated. My mother-in-law suggested that I look into cotton training pants----David went out and bought some and they definitely helped control the puddle size when John Harrison had an accident (I was trying to avoid pull-ups or diapers as I thought that John Harrison wouldn't have motivation to learn to go in the potty with these on). We did buy some pull-ups today to put on John Harrison when we are out running errands, but keep him in the cotton training pants (and hopefully regular underwear soon) while we are at home. My primary motivation in potty training John Harrison has been the fact that our baby girl is due in less than 10 weeks! I think I could have easily put potty training indefinitely unless such a strong motivation had existed.
With the pregnancy, I am up to doctor's visits every 2 weeks now. I am feeling pretty good and my belly seems to be growing rapidly. I am still buttoning two pair of my regular jeans and wearing many of my normal tops, sweaters, athletic pants, and leggings. Thankfully, many clothing styles this season include long shirts and sweaters:)...(I really don't like maternity clothes very much). Elise is very active and we can't wait to meet our precious little girl in a little over 2 months!

Christmas with Grammy and Grandpa

John Harrison curious about Grammy's candle

playing with his new ring-sorting board from Uncle Jon

eyeing a gift

David's parents let John Harrison open a Fisher Price Precious Planet monkey that they bought for Elise and he immediately loved pushing the buttons to make monkey talk and sing...I'm sure he'll have fun entertaining Elise with this new toy at Grammy and Grandpa's house.

John Harrison and Grandpa
John Harrison has been having so much fun playing with his new toys that he got for Christmas. So much fun, in fact, that he still has several gifts left to open. We've divided most of his current toys between his room, the bonus room, and the living room (where he plays most often). One of his favorite new toys is a Fisher Price Little People Farm set from Grammy and Grandpa. John Harrison loves taking the animals in and out of the barn and gets a huge smile on his face and swings his arms around when the rooster plays "Old MacDonald Had a Farm." Grammy and Grandpa also gave John Harrison a Duplo farm--John Harrison's favorite thing to do with it is to drive the tractor into and out of the barn. A few days after Christmas, John Harrison and I were playing upstairs and he decided that every single toy in the bonus room...including the recently put together Duplo farm....needed to be moved into his playhouse. It was quite cramped with all of the toys and John Harrison and me in the playhouse, but he seemed happy with this arrangement.
Christmas lunch was the first meal we had ever hosted at our house on Christmas (or any major holiday for that matter....other than Fourth of July this past year). David's mom and I both cooked various dishes and David smoked a turkey....everything turned out really well! We had so much fun having everyone in our home for lunch and hope to repeat the tradition in years to come. It was really nice being able to put John Harrison down for a nap at our own house (and also having him contained to one area of the house while we visited and opened gifts). We are so excited that David's parents live in our neighborhood now and really enjoy being able to drop by for a short visit or drop off John Harrison when we need a babysitter (my dear mother-in-law will almost never say "no" when we ask her to babysit, so we have to be careful not to take advantage of her generosity:).