Happy Birthday to Our Precious Howie

Today our boy turned 4. I can't believe it- it's so cliche to say the time has passed quickly, but the time has passed so quickly! We're so proud of Howie. He's growing into an intelligent, caring, protective, funny little boy and he's such a delight. He is the joy of our hearts and we've spent a wonderful day celebrating thus far. Here's to you, Howie!

P.S.- Here's a funny story for you- Grandma and Howie were playing yesterday and Grandma had some kind of problem. Howie said to her, "you have a problem, Grandma, and I have the solution." Whether or not he did, he said it with utter confidence. This is the kind of stuff that makes us laugh the day away!!

What I'm Loving Today

LEFT: SUMMER FRUIT!! Hallelujah! At least a couple fruits my boys will eat! Justice and I went to Schnucks this morning and I reveled in the prevalence of all of my favorite things!! Blackberries, raspberries, strawberries, peaches, blueberries, cherries, plums, WATERMELON- that could be a post in and of itself, as all of my friends know. My obsession with watermelon runs deep. Anyway, Justice and I were overjoyed (actually I don't think Justice noticed- he was too busy calling a cantaloupe an apple?? What??) to find such luscious fruit ready for eating.

RIGHT: This sweater I'm knitting for Baby Girl. My aunt Martha gave me some drool-worthy yarn with gold sparkles running through it, and I thought it would be fitting to make a teeny sweater ready to be worn by Baby Girl when she appears!

Ironically the item on the RIGHT, intensely amazing french press coffee, creates the need for the item on the LEFT, insanely large bottles of water. (A small tangent: I don't care for Illinois water. St Louis water tasted lovely right out of the tap, but I don't find tap water so nice here. Am I being a bit of a diva? Yes.) I love the morning routine of dragging myself out of bed, grinding coffee beans, boiling water in the tea kettle, pouring it into the press, and waiting. It's such a slow, contemplative process... it just sets such a nice pace for the day. Also the caffeine is a no-brainer!! But often mid-morning rolls around and I haven't had anything to drink but coffee (you are free to judge me... obviously not very good for a pregnant lady) that I go find a huge bottle of water, or a glass of water if I'm not being a diva, and pay for my coffee sins by feeling quasi-parched until I chug half of it.

Howie and His Dad

In Howie's world, Josh is the biggest, most powerful person on the planet. Here's a real-life conversation that took place this morning between Howie and my dad, who were talking about Goliath.

Howie: My dad has bigger muscles than any giant in the whole world. He would crush Goliath.
Grandpa: Oh, is that so?
Howie: Yeah, Goliath would be dead.


How about that for thinking your dad can do anything! Those who see Josh may not see the world-class bodybuilding muscles, but they're there. Just ask Howie.

Circa 2001

One thing about living with your parents is you find all kinds of old stuff from years gone by. Here is one such item, from the vice-versa dance my senior year of high school. I hadn't seen this pic for many years and after this I hope to not see it again for many more years. Yup, that is my hair. Gotta love those high school days.

Justice Gets A Serious Haircut, and Other News

Since Justice was beginning to look like a toddler Justin Bieber, Mama decided it was time to get him his first Haircut. Now mind you he's had haircuts before, but not a Haircut. We had been to Great Clips in St Louis a few times for trims, but never for a total hair overhaul. He was getting very hot and sweaty with his head of luscious blonde hair and I was getting weary of swooping it over out of his eyes (in true Bieber fashion) every 2 minutes. You can imagine that an almost 2 year old is not fond of having his hair adjusted frequently. Especially one who has earned himself the nickname "Dennis the Menace"- but that's for another post. So one morning I decided it was time for Justice to encounter the scissors in a transformative way. Mom and Howie accompanied us to Great Clips. In the past Justice hasn't ever been that bad for a haircut- give him a lollypop and put him on my lap and snip away, for the most part. Not this time. I think he definitely would have won the award for loudest, squirmiest, most complaining patron of the day. His behavior, in true Dennis fashion, was awful. Not even my lap and his lollypop with his paci thrown in out of desperation were enough to satisfy him. Thankfully his stylist had kids almost exactly his and Howie's ages, so she was well-armed to cut his hair despite his antics. She asked me what we wanted for his hair, and I said "we just want a summer cut. Surprise us." Then she pulled out the clippers. I got cold feet momentarily, thinking of all of his silky baby hair falling to the floor, but when I remembered the sweaty hair and swooping requirements, I strengthened my resolve and helped pin him down as needed. He emerged from the chair looking quite handsome but was almost unrecognizable at first. I initially panicked as I saw how different he looked, but now I love it. He looks like a very handsome big boy, and I haven't had to touch his hair once since he got the cut!! Makes for a happy mama and a happy Dennis!

Here he is, fresh from the salon. Please notice the pacis (one in his hand as a security blanket) and lollypop stickiness on his romper. The pic doesn't show you all the hair covering him all over, but if you look closely you can still see evidence of tears. But how handsome???!!!!

Josh in the blow-up pool with the boys!! This has been wonderful!! They love wading around and goofing off. The water from the hose is too cold to be submerged for very long, but refreshing!!

Howie and Justice have soooo much enjoyed spending time with aunts and uncles!! And cousin Pax!! Here they are enjoying a story read by Aunt Marnie, a world class reader.

Cruising around in their junky old car on Grandma's driveway!! Fun!!

Grocery shopping with Mama. They will both be toothless by age 5, I promise. Justice bites his lollypops instantly. Good mothering moment? I think not. I am trying to teach him the difference between licking a lollypop and biting it. Usually feels like an exercise in futility.

ugh

Here is a good indication of our stress level this spring. I've been waking up scratching. I'm sorry for the gross pic... just thought it was kind of amusing in a sick way. We ran out of bandaids- they don't sell a box big enough when you use like a million a day, so I was forced to use Woody and Buzz Lightyear this morning. Welcome to the freak show.

It's a GIRL!! WHAT??!!??

We didn't find out the gender of Howie and Justice in utero. We went to the traditional 20 week ultrasound, stayed strong in the face of temptation, and waited it out. Although I'll say I was absolutely positive that Howie was a boy so finding out seemed superfluous, thus we really only had one surprise. This time around we were struck with indecision from the outset, for the main reason of "what if this is a girl???" But I was still pretty convinced it was a boy since that's just what we seemed to do, so I was content to not find out and I had Josh satisfied that another surprise would be fun.

Then enter my dear friend Jodi. She is such an amazing woman whom I love dearly. I have watched her walk through very difficult circumstances in her life over the last couple years with more grace than I would have thought possible. She is quite a woman. Anyway, one night Josh, the kids, and I were having dinner at her house and over the course of a couple hours she had us convinced that not only should we find out the gender of this baby but we should also give her the information straight from the ultrasound, which we wouldn't know ourselves, and let her make a cake, the filling of which would either be pink or blue. When we cut into it we would find out if we were having another boy (obviously) or a girl (not possible). She is one persuasive woman! But I think if I'm honest with myself I wanted to know all along anyway and she just gave us the nudge we needed.

So Josh and I went to the hospital to have the ultrasound. We told the tech who did it that we wanted her to look at the gender of the baby and put the info in an envelope without telling us anything. She did it without any clues. We walked out to the car clutching the envelope with the privileged envelope, sorely tempted to look but resolved to not. I delivered the info to Jodi as quickly as possible to get the temptation out of the house. She made a gorgeous cake with the telling filling but covered with both raspberries and blueberries, and we were in suspense for 24 hours.

Here's what happened.

So you can see that we were pretty shocked!! I was for sure that this was another sweet little boy to add to the man clan, which would have been just wonderful. But a girl. We won't know what to do with ourselves.

It was such a special celebration with precious friends. It was a way to share this baby early although we don't have any idea where we'll be when she's born! I'm so grateful to Jodi for all her hard work... isn't her masterpiece gorgeous?