Just an Update

So unfortutately I'm still very pregnant, as you can tell from the picture. I finally decided to give in and post a picture since I have only taken about 5 this whole pregnancy. I really had grand illusions of having our little girl by now but obviously she is quite stubborn. Several weeks ago the doctor said it could be any time so I think I got my hopes up. So it has been a long couple of weeks, especially with everyone at work telling me that they were sure I was going to have the baby immediately. At least now there is an end in sight. The doctor said he would induce me on Thursday morning if I haven't gone into labor by then. Part of me still has hope of her coming on her own earlier but I'll survive. Maybe she knows that we still don't have a name for her so she is holding out for a final decision. We have really been trying, including getting votes from everyone at my baby shower. Since one of my names won the vote at the shower I thought it would be a done deal but Abe didn't buy it.

My mom came into town to give me a hand and that has been very nice. Ethan knows that I'm too slow to catch him these days and uses it to his full advantage. We had been telling Ethan that grandma would come when the baby got her so when she showed up he kept looking for the baby. He is going to be a good big brother. He keeps bringing her toys and pushing them to my belly so she can play with them. The other day he said he "needed baby food" and then proceeded to push it at my stomach. He just might be a little disappointed when she doesn't come out ready to play and eat. The kids at Ethan's daycare are also fascinated with the fact that I have a baby in my belly. The other day when I went to pick him up one of them ask me if the baby had a bed in my stomach too. One of the other kids came with her mother to my baby shower. She was convinced that the baby would come out at the shower and was quite disappointed when she didn't. I'm sure everyone else was glad she didn't come at the shower.

We will keep you all posted after Thursday. Keep us in your prayers. ~Meredith

We Need Your Help!

We are fast approaching week 37 of this pregnancy and we are starting to realize that we may never come up with a name for our little baby girl. Ethan had a name from almost the time we knew he was a little boy. I can't imagine going to the hospital not knowing what we are going to call her. One of our problems is that Abe and I have different ideas of what names we like so we can't agree on any names. So we thought we would reach out to our wonderful friends and family for help. We have some names that one or the other of us likes but we are open to other suggestions. Her middle name will be Nicole so it has to sound okay with that. I'll give you some of the names on our list but I ask that you not tell me which ones you hate because if we do pick that name it will be hard to forget how you thought it was an awful name :)



So here is our list:

Caitlyn

Corinne

Morgan

Brenna

McKenna

Lauren

Sydney

Brooklyn

Annaleise

Savannah

Kennedy

Brianna



Feel free to give us your thoughts or suggest something we can both agree on. Thankfully Ethan has stopped calling her Bingo and now calls her Baby Nicole but it will be nice to teach him what everyone else will be calling her.

Christmas Break

I've finally gotten around to posting some pictures from our Christmas break. Ethan and I both got the flu this week so it has been a pretty hectic week. Poor Ethan has been a real trooper with the whole illness but it has been so sad to see him sick. He also hates being stuck in the house so he was so anxious to get out. He would start collecting everyone's shoes and coats and say "Let's go to the mall" even just after getting sick. We thought he was completely over the illness since he hadn't thrown up in three days so yesterday we gave in and took him to Burger King so he could play there. I had told him it was time to go and he started to cough a little and then proceeded to vomit ALL OVER THE PLACE. It was awful! He was covered, along with Abe, and this huge area of the playplace. We both felt terrible for all the other families there. Today he asked to go back but I'm sure we have been banned from Burger King for a long while.

So back to our Christmas vacation. Abe and I both had two weeks off and it was wonderful. We went to North Carolina to visit some of our friends for a Christmas party. Ethan had a good time playing with his friend Amelia. She was so funny because she would grab his hand while sitting on Abe's lap. Ethan wasn't a huge fan of sharing his dad so he kept saying "Go find mommy". He doesn't mind if I told other babies but he doesn't like sharing his daddy. (I think Abe was done with me taking pictures at this point in time).

After our trip to NC we went to Richmond to spend time with my family. Ethan starts making a list of things he wants Grandma to bake for him weeks before we visit Grandma Singletary. Number one on his list this time was donuts. Grandma can't say no so this is Ethan pounding down some powdered donuts. Even today he was telling me that he wanted to go to Grandma's house and have donuts. While he has been sick we have been trying to give him bland foods but he doesn't quite understand the concept so he just thinks we are being mean. He would beg to go to Grandma's house for dinner.

We celebrated Ethan's birthday while we were in Richmond. The child had a never ending couple of weeks of presents, a birthday party at daycare, a Christmas party at daycare, a birthday party with the family, a Christmas party at Grandpa's work, and then Christmas. He keeps asking when he is going to get more presents. Here is a picture of him blowing out the candles on his birthday cake.

My dad's work had a little Christmas party for the kids with a visit from Santa. Ethan was VERY excited about seeing Santa. Each of the children were called up when Santa pulled a present out of his bag. Ethan couldn't wait for his name to be called but once it was he was a little hesitant. All the other kids had gotten some fun toys, which they were opening after they got off Santa's lap. "Santa" decided that he would get a book at the party so Ethan opened it up and was so disappointed. Obviously he doesn't think of books as presents because he kept saying "my present" and looking around at the other kids. He even tried to go back to Santa hoping for something better. We got a pretty similar reaction on Christmas day when he got another book.

Ethan and Grandpa Singletary at the party.

We had a nice time hanging out with the family. Ethan loves all the attention of his aunts and uncle. And for us it was great to have a little break as Ethan had other people to play with.
Once we got back from Richmond we spent the next week doing projects around the house. Abe was a good sport about working so hard during his break. It was so nice to have the time to get the house clean again. Though after a week of feeling under the weather we could use another break before the baby comes to get the house under control again. ~Meredith

Finally... Our New Kitchen

Since we moved into this house we have hated our kitchen. We were spoiled in our last house so it made it even harder to move into a place with a tiny outdated kitchen with absolutely no counter space and a tiny fridge shoved in the corner. Here are some pictures from before we moved in so you can see the full effect. We have always had grand illusions of remodeling the kitchen once the house in North Carolina was sold. Unfortunately that took a lot longer that we had anticipated but we learned to tolerate the kitchen for the last year and a half. But finally with the other house sold we got our new kitchen. We had a lot of fun trying to figure out how to best lay out the new kitchen and we have been thrilled with the results. We now have some continuous counter space, which is my favorite part. Before when I was making dinner I had to move from one little piece of counter to another since there wasn't more than 3 feet of counter anywhere in the kitchen. It's still a small kitchen but it is so much better.


My favorite part of the remodel was coming home the first day of demolition and Ethan couldn't get over the fact that our kitchen was gone. He kept spinning in circles saying "what happened to my kitchen?" He literally stood there for 10 minutes just saying the same thing. Though the process is always a hassle and no one enjoys being without a kitchen for 2 weeks it was so worth it.

A Great Thanksgiving

We had a wonderful visit to Utah over Thanksgiving. Ethan hasn't stopped talking about it all week. He can't figure out why we don't get to play with his cousins or see Papa any more and mom isn't nearly as exciting. The highly anticipated trip was everything Ethan had hoped for. We have been telling him for months that grandpa had a digger, and with his obsession for construction equipment he couldn't wait. He probably would have spent the whole week outside if given the chance. Luckily for everyone the weather was pretty good so no one had to freeze to death while keeping an eye on him. I have no doubt that he would have been out there rain or shine. At least twice a day he talked Abe or dad into taking him up on the hill to drive the digger.

Ethan also quickly discovered the swing set and toy dump trucks in the sandbox. We are still trying to get the sand out of our shoes and suitcases.

Ethan still wants to know where Tuff and Gator are. As an animal lover he had a blast playing with the dogs and riding the horses.

The Bean Museum at BYU had a little reptile show. Ethan just wanted to hold the animals and didn't want to listen to the man talk about them so we didn't make it for much of the show.


It was so nice to spend some time with the family. We don't get out there nearly enough so it was great to chat with everyone and see all the kids. We missed seeing everyone else who didn't make it into town and we wish we could come at Christmas to see more of the family. We miss all of you and can't wait to see you all again soon. ~Meredith

Sold

It is finally done we sold our "lake house".  After having our house under contract for almost two months we finally closed on Monday. I can't believe how inept some people are at there jobs. After having a month to schedule the necessary things for the closing like home inspection, appraisal, and power of attorney (the buyers husband is deployed) in the last couple of weeks before closing they decide to start working on it. Needless to say it didn't get done. Then the buyers power of attorney wasn't any good because it wasn't notarized. So that took an extra two weeks, it was a combination of sending it snail mail and the fact that the first time he sent it wasn't notarized because he thought that it would be faster just to get it sent and then the second time sending it he sent it snail mail, which was annoying. At one point in time I was wondering if it was a good idea to for the buyers to make such a purchase because lets face it they don't seem to be very bright. But that is not our problem. Thank goodness it is done. 

Fall Fun

Ethan had the best time at Halloween this year. He was obsessed with pumpkins everywhere we went. I made sure to get him a pumpkin big enough that he couldn't pick up because he wanted to carry around every pumpkin he found. Ethan went to a couple of Halloween parties and it was hard to get him out of his costume afterwards. He tried to talk us into letting him wear it to church on Sunday.

Last week we got to take a little mini vacation to Williamsburg. We all had a great time. Ethan loved playing at the pool and enjoyed the "jumping place" as he calls it. They had lots of indoor inflatable play areas. Unfortunately Ethan had the most fun sitting on the coin operated toys that we never put money in. He's so easy to please.

My parents were even sweet enough to watch Ethan for the weekend so Abe and I could spend the rest of the weekend in Williamsburg alone. We had a great time wandering through all the historical sites. We definitely needed the break after a tough couple of weeks for Abe (and the rest of us).

Here are a few pictures from our trip. I think we are about the worst at taking pictures so we didn't get any good ones of all the places we saw.