Seasonal Pictures

Ok, here is my nod to the season:



Really, that is all we do for Halloween (besides buying 8 times more candy than we'd ever need to feed trick-or-treaters LOL). We don't even carve the pumpkin. What a bunch of Scrooges we are LOL.

And, since today is Love Thursday (oh, you don't know what that is? Apparently someone started the idea to post pictures of Love every Thursday, so when you visit different blogs you can see a variety of kinds of Love) so here is my contribution:

Puppy Love


What better love is there, than the love between a boy and his dog?

Things Are Going to the Dogs Around Here

This morning the boys and I were discussing the names of all their stuffed dogs. They get quite exasperated with me when I confuse them or forget a name. But really, can you blame me? Here is a picture of the whole pound:



You can see, there are more than just dogs; that is because #1, Troyer doesn't like dogs, so he collects frogs and bunnies, and #2 not all the boys recognized non-dogs when they were very young, and so some "odd-breeds" were adopted in.

The names? As best as I can determine: Doby, Caleb Puppy, Skunky, Bully, ?(not named yet), Troyer Puppy, Tuffy, Licorice, Ticklish, Voof, Baby Voof, Radia, Dash, Tom, Lavender, Kessie, Crunch, Boing, Charge, Baby Flex, Arrow, Zed, Dotty, Goldie. Troyer's animals include Froggie, several Kermits, Hopper, Bunny, Carrot, Zaboomafoo, and Lester the Bat. And yes, they do refer to their animals by name. I suppose if I'd had girls, we'd have as many barbies in the house, and they'd each have different names, too, right?

I've got Troyer's birthday pictures uploaded, so I'll share those:


Troyer with his "created" Cars cake


Present Vultures


Levi is always prepared to grab and run


A successful grab!


We had pizza for dinner, can you tell?


Mom, watch my karate move!


So, sorry it's been so long since I've posted. It's not that nothing has been going on, and not that anything bad has happened. I just haven't felt like posting. Not sure why, though I've been feeling tired and depressed lately. Somewhat because the weather has been getting grey and cool, and mostly because Chris is STILL working so much overtime. I miss him, the boys miss him, and even when he is home he is so tired there's not much to him. He says he has enough vacation time to take all of December off; I almost wish he would.

Last week I went on a tour of the hospital where I'll be giving birth. I was supposed to find a babysitter for the boys so Chris and I could go together, but oddly, there was no one available for a Wednesday night, not even MIL. So instead, Chris stayed home with the boys and I took Troyer with me. I figured he needed to come along too, because he wants to be there for the birth of the baby again. He really liked being there when Levi was born. I told him to take notes so he could help his dad around when we go in February.

The hospital is very nice. The "old" wing is only 10 years old, and the "new wing" is brand new. Labor and Delivery are in the old wing, along with the neonatal unit, and Recovery is in the new wing. All the labor and delivery rooms are private birthing rooms, very nice. There is one central room for Cesareans. I'm not sure how many LD rooms there are but it seemed like 20 or 24. In the new wing there are 42 private rooms. We were told that some of the rooms are reserved for pre-term moms on bedrest, and others are recovery rooms for women with other "women's concerns." Still, that's a lot of rooms! The hospital where all my other boys were born had one LDR room, and 4 recovery rooms. They were never all full either.

I felt a little silly on the tour, because out of 8 couples there, all but me were due between the end of this month and the end of December. I didn't even look pregnant next to these women! My doctor had told me I should take the tour "soon" and when I called to set up a time, the hospital seemed to think 20 weeks was right. All the other women were also taking childbirth classes, and the tour guide kept saying "you'll learn more about that in your classes;" of course, I won't! LOL I'm considering trying again to get Chris on a tour mabye in Dec or Jan.

In other news, the boys had a dentist appointment on Thursday. Noah had a small cavity, but he says it was the same tooth he had filled last time, which makes me think it was more the dentist's fault than his, and the dentist was able to fix it right then, so we didn't have to come back. But Troyer had to be scolded for not brushing well enough. The dentist said he had as much tartar as a typical adult! I've noticed he's had this problem since his first adult teeth came in, but he also admitted that he does not brush every day, even though I send him to brush. So I guess he's been lying to me! He's 12 years old, but I have to have him come and show me his teeth every night now. sigh.

Happy Birthday Troyer!

Troyer's birthday was last Friday, the 29th, but he and Noah went on a camping trip for the weekend, and they left at 9:30 Friday morning. Troyer opted to wait for his birthday cake and gifts until yesterday.

I had my ultrasound yesterday, so Chris came home at lunch time to watch the kids. Troyer got to go with me. It was really cool, this is the first u/s Troyer has seen. He thought seeing all the bones was cool, LOL. I will announce what we saw later. *evil grin*

On the way home we picked up pizza and his cake. He wanted a Cars cake, but WalMart was sold out of those kits, so I had them make up a cake with a race track on it, and bought a matchbox sized Lightning McQueen to put on myself. Troyer was very happy with that, since the toy was better quality than cake-topper toys. He also loved all his gifts, which included a Ninja Turtle themed CD Walkman and a Veggie Tales CD to play in it, 3 Star Wars action figures (Han Solo, C3PO, and R2D2) and a Johnny Lightning VW Bug model. He also got a Batman figure and a Veggie Tales DVD.

After moping all last week about having to go away for his birthday, it was a nice change to see him so happy and cheerful.

Ok, so on to the results of the u/s.....

The baby is very healthy, and growing right on track for our due date of Feb 22. The baby was also very active, squirming around everywhere and avoiding the technician's attempts to measure legs and arms and get a good shot of the heart. However, it only took 20 seconds, and seriously this was the first picture she got, so see that it was a BOY! OMG another boy. I'm amazed that God truly thinks that I am such a good mother to boys that I should be given ANOTHER one! Doesn't he know I don't know what I'm doing???

I have to say, watching that little baby wiggling around on the screen, I fell in love instantly. Absolutely adorable (bones and all, LOL) and I can't wait to be able to hold him in February. I am not at all upset to be having another boy. What upsets me is the fact that I am STILL NOT A MOTHER TO A GIRL. It's the general fact and not the specific child that I am disappointed in. There is so much cute pink stuff out there on the racks that I was really looking forward to spending my money on ;-) but now will just sit there. Of course not so much cute blue stuff, plus the fact that I just don't need much more blue LOL.

My other quest has now become finding another cross-stitch baby sampler/annoucement for boy. I am very picky about the designs I choose, and they are hard to find. Everywhere I go I see the same patterns over and over again, and they are the ones I didn't like the first time I saw them. I was unbelievably lucky to find 6 unique designs already, but where will I find a 7th? Plus I have a book of beautiful designs that are all floral and so only appropriate for girls. Now going to waste in my closet. Sigh.

Finally, we need help with names! We have had such trouble already agreeing on 6 boys names, how will we ever come up with another one? Chris has a lot of rules for choosing names, but I'm thinking he'll have to relax some of those rules this time around. I might even have to cave in and buy a baby name book. At least I have 20 more weeks to work on it!