Last night, I got home from here.

That’s California, in case you can’t tell. I left last Friday morning for five fun filled (and work filled) days. I got to spend Friday and most of Saturday with Patrick and Noel, and then Sunday through Wednesday with some of the best girls I’ve had the privilege of knowing.

Corinne, Jessica, Carrie (and Erica and Jenny who aren’t in this pic) are fellow scrapbookers/wives/mothers/Christians/friends who I seriously cannot say enough good things about. I am so glad that I met Carrie online (I know, I know…it’s so weird!) And through Carrie, I met all these other great girls. We laughed. We cried. We prayed. We sold Paper Trunk products. And best of all, we had so much fun!

Thanks to my sweet mom for flying in to be on kid duty this week. Without her, I would not have been able to go. And thanks to my sweet husband for being so supportive of my hobby, of my need for a getaway, and for making it possible in so many ways for this trip to happen. I am filled with love this Valentine’s Day. Love for my Derek, my boys, my family, and my friends who bless me each and every day.

I’m pretty sure that Derek will keep letting me go to California each February as long as I bring him back cool souvenirs like this one.

It was just too good to pass up.

There is a 75% chance that 75% of you are RIGHT!
It looks like it’s going to be a girl!!

She was being quite modest during most of the ultrasound, but Kathy and I both saw the three lines of girl parts. And we definitely did not see any boy parts! Unfortunately, we didn’t print any pictures. Every time we would see the money shot, she would move away before Kathy could freeze the frame.

I can’t wait for my big ultrasound at my doctor’s office to confirm!

It was so cute when I told Connor that it looks like he is going to have a baby sister. He looked up at me, slightly bored by the news. ” I already know that mom. ” Guess I should have just asked him!

I am really still in disbelief that we might actually have a girl!!

I’m going to be like Staci and conduct a little poll.
On Thursday, my sister-in-law is going to do a sonogram, and as long as the baby cooperates, we will be finding out the gender! I can’t wait!!

So what’s your guess? Boy or Girl? You can just leave it in the comments.
(because I love getting comments.)

In other pregnancy news, I think I might have “popped”. I had 4 different people today comment on my belly, including Derek. It could have been the outfit, or it could be that at 17 weeks 2 days I finally look a little bit preggo.

Happy Tuesday!

Just finished up this page. This is my niece, Abby. Cindi, thanks for the picture! It was absolutely perfect with these papers!

When I got my box of Paper Trunk stuff a few days ago, I couldn’t wait to get started scrapping! These were both created using the brand new 1974 line. Love the bright colors of these papers!

Didn’t Cindi do a fantastic job with this picture?! It was taken as part of my mom’s Christmas present….which I’m not sure she has quite yet, but soon she will.

But I have this weird quirk where it’s really hard for me to fall asleep if I don’t go to bed first. I think it comes from being married to a night owl, of which I am not one. Until tonight, and I’m going to hate myself for it in the morning. But I have been scrapping and having so much fun! I will be posting them really soon.
So I thought since I am forced to stay awake until I fall over, I would share the weirdest dream I have ever had. Maybe someone wants to analyze it for me.

I was back in L.A., headed to an OB appointment. I had 3 different doctors at 3 different offices, and this particular one was located in a building that was a maze. Like a carnival maze. So I finally find the right office, and it is the most disgusting place I have ever stepped foot in. I am thinking this must not be right, but I patiently get in line at the reception desk. Suddenly, the receptionist is handing a metal mixing bowl to the girl in front of me and asking for a stool sample. Right there in the lobby. And when the girl balks about doing something like that in front of people, the receptionist gets all ugly and goes in the bathroom with her. I decided to leave at that point, and I get completely lost in the maze building. Luckily, this cute little black girl finds me and offers her help. I follow her for what feels like forever until she gets to this tiny little tube she wants me to crawl through. I can’t fit, so she directs me up a staircase. We wind up in the attic, which is actually the living quarters of a bunch of homeless kids. So, I pretend to be a homeless kid. There was one adult there, I guess in charge, and she handed out dog treats to us and told me I was no longer Megan and my new name was Kate. In this little homeless shelter for kids, there was a train ride. whoever could make the ride go the fastest won Disneyland tickets, and I made it my personal mission to win those tickets. I made the ride go so fast that we took off into the air, and ended up on the island in the tv show Lost.

Then I woke up.

Weirdest dream ever. No doubt.

And this picture has absolutely nothing to do with anything, but I thought this post needed a picture. It’s 12:35. This is what I look like at 12:35 a.m.

My family is sick. Derek has strep, Connor has an ear infection, Logan is snotty (I’m sure it’s only a matter of time before he comes down with something worse), and my sinuses are killing me. Yeah, we are a fun bunch.

The good news is with the low key-ness of everyone, I’ve had some fun browsing Etsy for fun and cute baby stuff.

Wouldn’t these fabrics make a cute crib set?

And I love these diaper bags.

Browsing for baby stuff is so much fun!

Yesterday was my birthday. The big 2-8. I woke up full of optimism for the day. I selfishly decided at the last minute to reschedule Logan’s speech evaluation for next week so he could go to school and I could do whatever I wanted for 5 whole hours. I dropped the kids off and headed to Kohl’s. I scored some cute shirts and a dress, all for 80% off. Not too shabby at all! But as I was leaving Kohl’s, I started to get lonely. I was hungry and wanted to go eat lunch somewhere good. But I didn’t want to go by myself. Unfortunately, all my Houston friends were not available for lunch…okay, truth be told, I didn’t call anyone because I felt silly. “Hey, did you remember that today was my birthday? Want to do lunch?” Yeah, not so much. So instead, I cried. I came home and cried because I wanted to go to lunch with someone. And I started thinking about how Derek wasn’t even going to be home until late that night, and I had no plans for my birthday. No special birthday dinner, no presents waiting for me on the table, no cake, nothing. So I cried some more. (Hey, I’m pregnant and I can cry about whatever I want!) I moped around for a good hour, and finally pulled myself together. I decided to go to the scrapbook store for a little more retail therapy. But, as soon as I pulled into the parking lot, I started crying again! I. Am. Out. Of. Control. I turned around and came home. I watched One Tree Hill instead. RyAnn called. I cried again. Finally, it was time to go get the boys from school. We went to the grocery store, and when I got home, I found a message from my brother. “Happy Birthday! Hope your day is awesome! Oh, and Kathy is sick and not going to work tomorrow…so…the ultrasound is off.” You see, today, my sister-in-law was going to do an ultrasound and we were hoping to find out the sex of the baby. Can you guess what I did when I got the message? Yup. I cried. Again. I managed to pull myself together for the remainder of the evening. Derek called at 6:45 and asked what I wanted for dinner. He arrived 30 minutes later, bearing yummy food and a dozen roses. Then he asked how my day was.
I cried again.
It’s really not that my birthday was bad, because it wasn’t. It’s just that I am an emotional mess. And, birthdays simply aren’t as much fun as a grown up, but I really want them to be. Am I alone is this??

On a happier note, my husband helped me record this yesterday. By my count, it’s approximately 156 bpm. Pretty amazing! (Blogliners, you have to come to the blog to listen.)

The boys have recently started sharing a room. While the first week went very smoothly, we are now in what I call the “testing phase”. Logan feels the need to test all of the bedtime rules again. Can I get out of my bed and play? Can I talk to Connor and keep him awake? What about climbing up on the top bunk? These are of course emphatic no’s at our house.

I just heard a little commotion in their room. This is the third of Logan’s “tests” tonight, so he’s already on this ice. I just found him in Connor’s bed, literally on top of him. He was climbing on him over and over again, trying to accomplish who knows what. Logan’s in big trouble (this is the third night in a row we have found him in Connor’s bed.) D and I get done disciplining Logan, and we cannot contain the laughter any longer.

Why are we laughing? Because Connor did not even move during any of this.
And this is the kid who tells us on a regular basis that he doesn’t ever sleep. He just rests.
Yeah. That’s some pretty heavy resting!

I forget how literal kids are.
Just now, I gave Logan a little medicine for his snotty nose. He likes to do the syringe himself, so I handed it to him and said “Here’s some medicine for you nose, bud.” I turned my back to put the medicine away.

“Like dis, mommy?”
I glanced in his general direction and said “yeah.”

Then I turn back around just in time to see him squirting dimetapp up his nose! I yelled “no!” and he looked at me with this stricken look. It only took 2.3 second for his face to crumble and the wailing to begin. I could not stop laughing. I alternately cracked up and soothed. He recovered quickly and then administered the medicine to the correct orifice.

Next time I’ll be careful when I tell him I have some medicine for his nose!

And while I am doing a Logan post, I have to give a potty training update. Last Monday I decided it was time to potty train. He has used it before, but never with any consistency, and in fact had regressed to crying if “potty” was even mentioned. I’m sure I broke all kinds of potty training rules, but last Monday I told him we were not going to the park to play until he sat on the potty. Just sat, nothing more. I figured he couldn’t regress any more than crying if potty is even mentioned. This was met with a 15 minute stubborn fit, until finally with the lure of m&m’s he sat for one second. We made a huge deal out of this. Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday, he sat several times a day, this time without the tears, but nothing happened. That’s okay, it was progress. On Friday, we had our first pee. That was 4 days ago, and for the past 2 days he has not had a single pee accident! In fact, he is already telling me when he needs to go and wanting to do it all by himself. He even told the baby-sitters at bible study this morning that he needed to go. I cannot believe how well he is doing and how quickly he caught on to it!

He’s getting so big!