Julian is 2!

At four o'clock in the morning on October 7, 2006, our little Julian was born. Two years late, he's not so little. Out little guy loves all of the following; his big sister, his dog Begbie, Elmo, Speed (otherwise known as lighting mcqueen), trains, his daddy, the Beatles (specifically the songs Yellow Submarine, Hey Jude, All You Need is Love, and You Say You Want a Revolution), Milk (liquids in general, really), bathtime (the part when he isn't getting his hair washed), books, dancing, puzzles (he is so persistent with them), spaghetti (like his daddy), monkeys, his mommy, climbing up slides, his Mickey Mouse CD, sounds of all kinds (from the wind to birds calling), and babies. We are especially grateful for the last one as he will soon be both a little brother and a BIG brother.
He is such a sweet kid and a joy to parent. I keep saying I want #3 to be a girl, but when I think of Julian, I realize how I would be so thankful for another little boy.
Here are some pictures taken this morning to commemorate his 2nd birthday.

Toilet talk

Mommy is excited! Julian turns two in about two weeks. How many times have I heard that boys are harder to potty train? Yet, Julian has instigated going to the toilet twice this week with immediate success (#1 & #2!). The only thing I've done to encourage this action is purchasing M&Ms that stay up in the bathroom cabinet. At this rate he should definitely be potty trained by baby #3's arrival. One small problem though...how are his pants going to stay up without the help of diapers? The boy has no booty.

On other Julian news, he has adopted the term "touchdown" to his vocabulary now that it's football season. After every down, he yells TOUCHDOWN, and we have to say, "Not yet."

Some other terms that we find super cute... I'll tell him something (anything), and he'll respond, "Reeeaaaally?" I respond, "Yes, really." He says, "You really fink so?" I say, "mmmmhmmmm". He says, "Of Course!"

We are also very thankful to have a thankful little boy. He has replace his non word for thank you, "Eeceys", with an actual thank you. We very rarely have to prompt this. It's nice to have a big sister to copy.

Lastly, Stephen and I have been laughing at the difference between D'arcy and Julian in regards to them getting out of bed when they should be sleeping. D'arcy has always had an excuse for getting out of bed without permission. "I just want a kiss and hug." "I just needed to say 'see you in the morning'." "I need a glass of water." OR She'll play quietly enough in her room in order to not be heard.

Julian, however, gets out of bed and picks the loudest toy possible to play like a drum or a flute. When I come in to correct him, he either very sweetly greets me at the door and announces "DRUM!" or he runs as fast as he can to get back in bed. Unlike his sister, He never tries to reason his way out of his punishment.

Sound tech in training...

This picture is courtesy of Julian's (and our) dear friend, Benjamin, who runs sound at our church. Benjamin always takes time to say hi and play with kids which the kids just eat up. This pic made me smile so I thought I would share!

Baby #3 has a heartbeat!

On Thursday, we went to our first prenatal appointment. We found a great midwife who delivered Julian two years ago who we are using again for this baby's birth. Since Julian's birth, she has opened up a new birth center in the middle of the San Antonio Medical center (aka across the street from five hospitals all grouped together). I'm excited about delivering there. Check out their site www.birthcentersa.com. You can take a tour of the facility via pictures that I took! We are also blessed that our insurance will pay the full bill. Last time we payed completely out of pocket.

Anyway, we took the whole family to the appointment so they could see what the birth center was and hear the baby's heartbeat. D'arcy has been asking loads of questions about how and where the baby will be born so this trip helped answer some of those questions.

The baby's heartbeat sounded strong, and both D'arcy and Julian were pretty amazed. Julian's reaction was, "Sound. Baby. Har Beat?."

Once again, my uterus is measuring big. She said it felt like I was more like 15 weeks instead of 11. This happened last time. When we went to get our ultrasound with Julian the first question we asked was, "Are there two?" so I wasn't surprised when I was measuring big again. The conclusion we've come to is that the way they measure is based on an average woman's body, and at 4'10'' I'm certainly not average.

So for those of you who are interested, here is a sneak peak into our name choices. For a girl it would be, again, Teresa Margaret Lucy Williams (Maggie Lu for short). and for a boy, everyone take a deep breath, it will probably be, Duren Schroeder Vonnegut Williams (Schroeder). We are still debating the boys name as I would like to use Emmett (after Stephen's dad) as a name before I use Duran (Stephen's maternal grandfather), but Duran goes so well with Schroeder, don't you think : ) ? No, we are not doing drugs, and yes, someone can buy him a little piano.

The 1st day of preschool

I've always said that preschool was for spoiled kids. Well, our daughter is officially being spoiled this year. Stephen and I are not extravagant when it comes to birthdays and Christmas for our kids, but I have to say that it feels really nice to be able to spoil her in this way.
She popped out of bed on Tuesday morning, and got dressed in a hurry. When I was changing Julian's diaper, she got down on the floor beside him and started stroking his hair. She said, "JuJu, I am so so sorry, but I have to go to preschool today and you can't come with me. I'm really sorry, but I'm going to miss you. When I get home we can play with my new guitar and sing "Deep and Wide"." This sparked Julian to start singing "Deep and Wide".
Her excitement faded a little once we got to the school. Last Friday, we had taken her to meet her teacher and see her "cottage" (there are three little houses that have classrooms in them). When we showed up on Tuesday morning, she was expecting to go straight to the Bumblebee cottage and see her teacher. We should have explained that all the kids go to the main building to play until 8:30 when their teachers come to pick them up. When she got to the main building, there were lots and lots of kids and she got a little overwhelmed. We leaned down to say goodbye and give her a hug, and she grabbed onto us really tight. Her eyes got a little red. All of which helped to boost mommy & daddy's egos a bit. She does really love us! We pried her off of us, and left a little emotional.
I picked her up at 3:30, and over the next few hours little bits and pieces of her day spilled out. Here are some of the more memorable tidbits.
"Mommy, Mrs. Bagnachi made me a Birthday sign that I wore all day."

I asked, "Did you meet any of the kids in your class."
D'arcy responds, "Yes, a little girl told me her name at naptime."
I ask, "Do you remember her name?"
"No."

"Mommy, I told my teacher at naptime that I was a little sad. I missed you and JuJu and Daddy."
I said, "We missed you too!"
D'arcy says, "Yeah, I was a little sad, but I was a lot happy!"

"We played pirates and "blast off to outerspace" during recess."

She popped out of bed again this morning, and something triggered her memory because she said, "Maybe Meadow will be at school again today!". I'm guessing Meadow is the little girl that she met at naptime.

D'arcy is 4!

D'arcy is turning 4 today. We don't have any big parties planned, just a simple family celebration complete with cake and presents sent from far and near. D'arcy got to skip her nap today to help me make her cake. She is excellent at cracking eggs. We also took some time to take some four year old pictures. She got to open one of her presents early so she could wear one of her new dresses in the picture. We curled her hair, and she asked that I only make four curls to represent how many years she was. So I divided her hair into four parts and did four curls : ). I'm always taken back by how pretty our little girl is, and how blonde she is. Well, she says it's white... I never would have guessed. I'm wondering if she will be our only white haired baby, or if this new little one will get that gene too. Anyway, here are a few of the pictures, and the rest are in our 2008 photo album at http://picasaweb.google.com/melissa.ac.williams/Family2008. Enjoy!

 

 

 

 

A little tummbling...

Thanks to my husband who got our bunny ears to tune in NBC, we are watching the Olympics. The woman's gymnastics team was on TV last night, and of course, the kids can't just watch them they have to try to do what the gymnasts are doing. After a couple of attempts, I pulled out D'arcy's old napping mat. After a few lessons on tucking their neck, the kids were busy taking turns doing somersaults on the mat. Julian would get stuck on his head, and D'arcy would help throw his feet over him. Once he landed he would say excitedly, "See DAT!? See Dat?", and would run over to get a high five from me.