Drake's 2nd Birthday!

We had such a fun day celebrating Drake's 2nd birthday. He woke up to blue balloons in his room of which he pointed to and had a whole conversation with me about even though I didn't understand what he was telling me. :)

 Then, we grabbed Chick-fil-a for lunch and ate it with Drew at school.

 Drake loved eating with his big brother at his school - he felt like such a big kid!

 The best part of any birthday is seeing how excited the other kids get to celebrate each other.

 After David got home from work, we went to a pumpkin patch. The kids loved being pulled around in the wagon looking for pumpkins.

 There was a hay maze too that the kids liked doing.

 Funny that we picked Drake's birthday to go to the pumpkin patch and it was freezing! 50 degrees with a very cold wind chill definitely shortened our time there but here's a family shot.

 Mimi trying to get a picture with the kids

 one more before we go...

 and onto eating pizza for dinner! Drake loved his birthday dinner. :)

 David and his mom who came in just for Drake's birthday

 

We came home for cupcakes and presents. Funny thing is I ordered the cupcakes from Walmart and when I went to pick them up, they weren't ready. Yes, this has happened to me before at Sam's club, what is with my luck? So, I waited for this lady to put together a dozen Cars cupcakes and she asked me what colors he likes. I said, "you know, red, blue, yellow." And then she hands me these rainbow cupcakes! huh? I thought she'd do one cupcake red, one blue, one yellow and so on. But because it's Walmart, I just said 'thank you' and headed out. Drake didn't care so I figured I wouldn't either. He had his awesome Cars birthday cake a few weeks ago so I was trying to do something different and easy. 

 Yummy!

 Dilan only eats the icing

 and finally this kid got a huge truck that holds all of his cars. He loved it and we love this little boy!!!

House update 10-26-12

The roof is on! And there is a door too. We were able to walk through the house and it looks great. :) 

House 10-19-12

I was shocked when we drove up to the house this week. I couldn't believe the progress! It's the most excited I've felt in a while. The workers were still there but I was dying to walk through the house. Next week I'm going in!

House progress

The first floor is framed!

Baby girl Pistorius at 33 weeks

 

We had an ultrasound today at 33 weeks along to make sure the baby is not getting too big like Drake did. The baby is measuring a week ahead of schedule but the doctor was not concerned that she should be too big by my due date. The baby is 5lbs 6oz right now and will most likely gain a half a pound each week until the due date. With seven weeks left, this would make the baby about 9 lbs by then but I guess that is not worrying the dr. any. The baby's head is still down which is good and her heartbeat was strong at 143. She actually has a lot of hair and we could see it in the first picture but also she looked at the top of the head and we could see a lot there too. The technician also confirmed for a second time that it is a girl! I've never had an ultrasound at this point in a pregnancy and it was really neat to see. Her hands were even more formed and she rubbed her eye at one point, even opening them too. The technician then showed us the baby in 3-D and took a picture of her face. The placenta is on the left side while her hands were off to the right of this picture below. With all of this information, I still have no idea when she'll be here but it's good to see that she is doing well!

Drake's Family Birthday Celebration

We celebrated Drake's birthday with my family over the weekend. Drake has less than two weeks until he turns TWO! He's such a big boy now, talking and doing everything the big kids do. He cracks us up and he really is such a happy kid. Drake is into cars right now so we went with that theme this year.

 When we started singing "happy birthday" to Drake, he chimed right in singing to himself.

 Blowing out the candles with Dad

 Us with Drake

 This kid loves cake and can totally feed it to himself now!

 Sometimes, he still uses his fingers to push the food into his mouth, wouldn't want to miss any. :)

 Present time!

 Almost a melt down as he was very tired by this point

 Nannie and Uncle Lars gift was a hit

 Drake played with a new car PawDee gave him, he also got his own guitar and a trunkie from MawMille and Popo

 Celebrating David's birthday too, I decided to get him a dozen donuts for his treat since we had his traditional cake the night before. Here's Dilan helping him blow out the candles. 

Happy birthday to our October boys! Of course, we'll still have a small celebration with Drake on his actual birthday coming up... this kid is so loved!

David's 35th Birthday

Mid-30s for David means mid-life crisis so he says. Since men in his family live to an average age of before 70, David says it's time now to get his corvette. How about a fourth kid instead? :)

We had fun celebrating David with many presents this year. His main gift was a set of binoculars for shooting, and he also got an angry birds t-shirt and the movie, the Avengers, from the kids. He happened to get a blender in the mail that he ordered the day before too. And because he's been complaining about our trash "stand" (not our trash can because I always take the trash out and put the bag on the top of it until we fill up the bag), I got him a brand new trash can. Yes, this actually took me going to Costco with a friend earlier that day to get the trash can we wanted for only $50. We have had the same stainless steel trash can since we were married almost 12 years ago, so it was time for bigger and better. It really has changed my life no kidding. I am very happy he complained so much. :)

 

Some of David's gifts, balloons and superhero table cover he found all decorated in the morning

 My Dad happened to be in town for business so he was there for David's birthday morning.

Here is my Dad with Drake - the kids loved having PawDee come and stay a night with us!

 The kids trying out the new binoculars and David has his new angry birds t-shirt on

 Looking at the squirrels in the trees

 David with the kids on his birthday. Drew with his newly-adopted stuffed bear from school and Drake munching on wheat thins.

 Pizzaria for bday dinner after we went to look at the progress on the house

 mmmmm... veggie pizza for David and me, cheese for the kids

 our boys chowing down

 Drew in the middle of a giggle with Dad

 David and his traditional ice cream cake from Baskin Robbins - Drew chose a "tool" theme for him this year. :)

Happy birthday, David! We love you!!!

October Pregnancy Picture

I traveled to Houston (for the third weekend in a row) for the TX/OU weekend. We like to watch this game together as an extended family and last year we began a tradition to celebrate all the October birthdays on this day as well. Somehow my brother, sister and I married all of our spouses with birthdays during this month and Drake's birthday is in October too! We all wear our longhorn gear and because Keely and I are pregnant, she and I did not have anything to wear. So, I got us these t-shirts which are not maternity but fit us anyway without making us look too huge. And we took a quick shot (okay maybe a dozen because someone is very picky!). This could be the last time Keely and I see each other before either one of us gives birth. We have 7 weeks left...

oh yeah, and the game was a total bust... good thing we had birthdays to celebrate!!!

Pregnancy Pics

Here is a picture of my sister, Keely, and me labor day weekend. I am 26.5 weeks along with baby girl Pistorius and Keely is 24 weeks along with twin boys. 

Here we are a month later at Keely's baby shower. I am 30.5 weeks and Keely is 28 weeks. 

It's a lot of fun being pregnant at the same time! Except for the part that I am bigger than my sister and I only have one baby and she has two... but I am thinking that might change in the final months. :)

Oprah's Life Class

A few weeks ago, my sister emailed me an announcement that Oprah Winfrey was taping one of her life classes in Houston and that we should enter the lottery system to get tickets. So we all did, my sister, me, my mom and my sister even got her husband to do it. Sure enough, my mom got tickets! Then, Keely's husband got tickets too! We had struck entertainment gold. The class was on a Friday of one of the weekends I had to be in Houston anyway so I took the kids out of school on Thursday to cactch a flight to Houston. My sister was gracious enough to watch my kids Friday morning while my mom and I went. Then, Keely took a friend to the afternoon show.

I have to say that I was definitely an avid Oprah show watcher for many years. David and I even went by her studio in Chicago when we were there once taking pictures by her sign and visiting her souvenir shop. But I really just wanted to see her in person as she is a true icon no matter how you may feel about her. However, I don't watch her new network at all. So, I have been out of touch with the Oprah craze for a over a year now. Therefore, it was no suprirse that I was a little taken aback with the obvious Oprah groupies who showed up, yelling and screaming for Oprah and trying to get attention for how much they "love her." I have never "loved" any celebrity or pop star for that matter. If you were to ask me who my favorite singer was at any time in my life, I would not have an answer for you. I always liked the music or the songs, not the actual person behind it or at least I wouldn't get obsessed with them. But given the chance to see Oprah Winfrey live was once in a lifetime.

For the morning show, she had Pastor Joel Osteen on who is from Houston and they talked about "I am" statements which are basically positive affirmations and how God dreams bigger for our lives than we do. It was very much a motivational few hours which was good but also just okay and not anything life-altering for me or my mom. But I have to say, Oprah was on and didn't miss a beat. She related personal and funny stories during commercials and that was definitely the person I've seen on tv all those years. It was worth going and definitely fun to do with my mom and hear my sister's afternoon show experience as well. But at the end of the day, when I came home and Drake woke up from his nap cuddling with me, that was the best part of my day and it had nothing to do with Oprah. :)

Here's a picture of me about to go inside the Hobby Center

 Our view of the set

 Me and my mom in our seats

 Pastor Joel Osteen and Oprah doing the show

 As close as I could get with my camera so it's a bit blurry, but this is during commerical of the second hour (notice the change of clothes) :)