Valentine's Day

It is pretty cool being the only girl around here on Valentine's Day!

This morning I woke up to all of my favorite guys bringing me breakfast in bed.

Here it is!

Fancy french toast hearts and strawberries.

I also had these beauties waiting for me in the kitchen.

Nice unexpected treat!

Griff then gave the card that he and his brother made to his Daddy.

We then got dressed and headed out the door.

Roman was so proud to give his card to Ms. P.

And here is Griff giving his card to Ms. D.

I think the boys enjoy playing cupid! :)

Satch and I were able to enjoy lunch together at our favorite lunch sushi spot.

We really got to enjoy each other's undivided attention.

The waitress forgot to put our order in so it took a tad longer than it should have.

Any moment shared with my guy is alright by me!

Here is our delicious lunch.

It was worth the wait!

Later in the afternoon I picked the boys up.

Postman Griff was showing me all of his love letters from his friends.

We then got home and were able to spend a little time outside.

Oh how I adore these two little people!

These moments make my heart melt.

To end the day we gave the boys a new book.

We started giving them books for Valentine's Day last year rather than junk.

Here they are checking out their new read.

Valentine's day is a commercial "holiday."  

Yeah, I get it.

These are the people that I both show and tell that I love EVERY. SINGLE. DAY.

With all of that said,

I still enjoy celebrating Valentine's day with my loves.

It is my pleasure to enjoy a long lunch with my husband,

and to get a few extra hugs, kisses,
 and I love you s.

Nothing like loving a little extra on those that I already love the most!  

Valentine crafts

The past week the weather has been chilly.

We have spent our evenings working inside

on Valentine's Day crafts.

I don't know who likes to craft more.

Me or the boys?

Here is our first project.

We made a card from each boy for MiMi and Pop.

We used an empty toilet paper roll, dipped it in paint, and created very abstract hearts. 

Here they are gluing cut out hearts to the inside of the card.

Griff putting a lot of love into his card.

This is so scary.

Letting a toddler loose with red paint!

To add an extra element of danger it is a tempera paint and not washable.

(I guess we all learned a little something from this project)

Nothing like living on the edge! :)

Me and my crafting cuties!

Seriously, how can you not love this face?!?

Inside finished product.

We mailed the cards to MiMi and Pop.

They enjoyed receiving love letters from their favorite boys.

Here is our next project.

Valentine color heart craft.

The first night we had to create the crayon hearts.

He had to unwrap the crayons and cut them into smaller pieces.

Next, Griff filled the heart molds with the cut up crayons.

Next up set in the oven to bake.

Baby Bear watching a little lovin' in the oven.

Once the crayons cooled we took out of the molds.

On another night we had to attach the crayons to the cards.

Here are Griff and Baby Bear attaching Zot dots to the crayons to stick to the cards.

After the hearts were attached to the cards we then stamped their names on the cards.

Ta-da!

The cards look adorable!

(I must confess I skipped a step.  I ran into these pre-cut hearts that we used as the cards.  My goal is to simplify people!)

Here is our final Valentine craft.

We literally hand made cards for Satch and their teachers. 

I do not have pictures of the making of these cards.

Why?

Because I had 2 little boys hands covered in paint.

That's why!

I started out with great intentions.

Once the paint came out it got a little hectic.

I actually imprinted their hands upside down.

I did the inside of the cards first and later realized that the card was now really upside down!

Not a problem.

The upside down hand imprints still worked out just fine.

I then cut the card and used a hole punch and attached with ribbon.

Anything NOT to pull the paint out again, right?!?

Here is the card that they made for their Daddy. 

And here are the cards for their teachers.

We had lots of fun creating these fun crafts and cards for some of the people that we love most!

Lots of love was put into the making of this.

xoxoxox

Reasons that I smile...

Reasons that I smile?  

I have so many.

Let me show you just a few...

Everything about this picture makes me smile.

Little brother looking at big brother while singing Happy birthday.

Baby Bear massacred enjoyed every last bite of this cake.

I mean to the last crumb.

It just so happened the cake was red and it looked like he was bleeding from head to toe.

It also just happens that red food coloring is hard to remove.  :)

Still smile just thinking about it. 

Satch sent me this picture one night while I was out at a meeting.

Nothing sweeter...

This ALWAYS makes me smile.

7:30 and the day is coming to a close.

The boys are quietly starting to dream and I have a few hours before bed with a quiet house.

Nothing finer...

After we showed Griff and Roman the ultrasound pictures of the little peanut

Griff asked to make a card for "new baby."

Here he is putting the final touches on his card.

Ta-da!

I can still sort of see my feet. :)

Sunday morning church with Satch.

Satch and I sit and get what we need in big church

while they boys are in the nursery getting what they need.

This always makes me smile.

See this button right here?

This is what happens when you press the tickle button.

Oh how I adore that smile...

Griff working on a card for a friend in the hospital.

Special prayer time with Daddy...

Saturday morning cinnamon rolls upon request!

Cheesing for the camera.

Ahhhhhh........

Don't forget about me!

Sitting with all of my babies.

Cuddle time with my big guy...

and playing peek-a-boo (or "a boo") with this beautiful face.

More than enough reasons to smile!

20 Week Ultrasound

Last week Satch and I went in for the BIG ultrasound.

You may say it isn't really that big because you don't find out the sex of the baby. 

Well, actually it is huge to us.

We didn't decide to have our 3rd child to have a baby boy or a baby girl.

We decided to have our third child to have another baby.

Another person to add to our family.

For months we have been praying for a healthy baby.

This is the ultrasound that goes in and really checks things out.

This is why it was so big to us.   

Truth be known I just also really like to peek in on our little peanut.

It is so amazing to see what is really going on inside my body.

A precious life is growing inside my tummy.

Here is Satch as he got his first glimpse of his baby.

Here is the little peanut.

Isn't he/she a little beauty! :)

Proud Papa.

This is probably 1 of the 1000  10 times that we looked away

 to make sure we didn't see any key body parts.

Honestly, we have never seen these key body parts in an ultrasound.

Would we even know what we were looking at anyway?!?

We were in the ultrasound room for about 30 minutes

Ooooing and ahhhhing at our newest beauty.

This is probably about the time I said a prayer of thanks for our healthy baby

and walked next door for my doctor's appointment.

The doctor walked in and checked for the heart beat with the Doppler.

We were talking when all of a sudden we heard "it."

The heart beat clearly skipped a beat several times.

I was even able to pick it up with my untrained ear.

This is when you realize that life can change in an instant.

One minute I was letting my guard down and thinking of fun things like baby names,

the next moment I was wondering if something was wrong with my baby's heart.

It was so confusing to me.

I was in an ultrasound minutes before and everything was great.

Minutes later the heart sounded off.

My doctor immediately started to comfort me and tell me that this is very common.

However as a mother worried about the well being of my child it is not common to me.

I was then set up to go in for a stage II ultrasound 2 days later.

I went in and had a very thorough ultrasound.

They poked around and extensively checked out all of the baby's organs for about 45 minutes.

We did not hear the arrhythmia at all and the structure of the heart looked great.

Praise Jesus!

I asked the doctor if I will worry about my child's heart for the rest of his/her life.

His reply, "don't worry about the baby's heart for the rest of your pregnancy."

I am so thankful for a healthy baby.

These scary moments in life remind you just how fragile life actually is.

We can't wait to finally meet who God picked for us to complete our family.

We only see what is immediately in front of us.

However, He sees the big picture and has always been faithful to all of our needs.

I just know that he has picked the perfect little person to compliment and challenge all of us.

Here are big brothers taking a look at "New baby."

Griff pointing to his baby tister. (he has insisted that it is a girl from the beginning)

Roman checking out the baby with his chubby little hands.

This year will challenge our family in every way as we know it.

I can't wait to see what God has in store for us...

**Before going in for the ultrasound I wasn't feeling much movement.  In the ultrasound I learned it was because my placenta attached in the front of my uterus.  Since then I have been feeling lots of movement everyday.  Feeling my baby squirm around is one of the most comforting feelings in the world.