Heart in Throat #1

Walking into school this morning, the auditorium is all set up for the winter programs that all the classes are doing this week.  Trevor excitedly points to the stage and tells me that is where he and his friends will sit to sing tomorrow morning.  He then asks "Daddy come see me sing?"  Ugh, a kick straight to the gut.  Voice cracking, I tell him "No buddy, but Mommy will bring the big camera and we can send pictures and video to Daddy so he can see you sing. Sound good?"  An enthusiastic response from Trevor, "Yeah!  That's a great fun idea!"....and then he moves on to asking about when the mailman comes to school.

Oh, to be three (almost four) and not have a care in the world.

Little Fish

Fall soccer ended perfectly schedule-wise.  We had our end of the season party the weekend before Thanksgiving, and free from weekly practice nights and Saturday morning games, we steamed right on ahead through the holidays.
Spring soccer does not start until March here, so to pass the time between New Year and then, Trevor has been doing swim lessons at the YMCA.
When he started his first session in January he hadn't been in the pool since we closed ours for the summer (on my birthday Oct 22--HAH!) so he was a little timid, but as soon as he "remembered" everything he was back to being the little fearless fish that he was a few short months before.
We are now in our second session of the year.  Trevor passed the level class that he did in January with flying colors and is ready for the next level physically, but he is much younger than the kids in the next level, so we weren't sure how he would do.  For this go-round we are having him repeat the same level just to make sure he has it 100% down.  If we have another break between the end of the spring season and when summer really ramps up, we'll do the next level.

Hey There, Second Trimester!

Today is the first day of my second trimester.  Yay!  Along with my energy ::hopefully:: it brought a day complete with 75 degree temperatures, which meant that, at least for today, I was able to trade in my increasingly uncomfortable dress slacks for a nice comfy dress.

In honor of entering the blissful part of pregnancy (can you tell I am trying to will myself into feeling better?) I figured I would update on where I've been pregnancy-wise and all that loveliness....

• Clearly, since I was pregnant back with Trevor in '08-'09 I forgot everything about what it was like to be pregnant.  Like, everything.  I may have even had to text some of my mom-friends with what are typical first-time-mom questions.  (thank you for your gentle responses, ladies)  This is definitely a downside to there being close to 4 years between kids.  
• I lied, I didn't forget everything.  The one thing I didn't forget was how terrible morning sickness is.  It is cruel and unusual punishment.  That is one memory that had no issue flooding back...ugh.  
• Speaking of all day morning sickness, the one thing that was a bummer about this go-round was the two weeks of bliss that we had between finding out we were expecting Trevor and when I started living in my bathroom.  Apparently, when you are not stalking your cycle and find out that you are expecting because you accidentally look at the calendar and realize you are late means that (at least in our case) you find out you are pregnant on a random Thursday night and are feeling like poo by Saturday.  Yay for finding out at almost six weeks pregnant.  Sike.
• This time we didn't announce our pregnancy until much later....and I loved it!  It was nice to keep our little secret to ourselves.  The downside was that I am a horrible liar and had to come up with some lame-o excuses for not going out much, or having to bail on stuff last second.  
• It is true that you are more exhausted with your second child...so true.  Taking it easy is a joke.  
• Hopefully, I will also fall into the class of people who don't gain as much weight during their second pregnancy.  I am currently  7lbs down from my pre-pregnancy weight.  I have been able to get back into the groove of going to the gym a couple of times a week recently, so hopefully that will help as well.  
• Am I showing? Well, it is still too soon to tell.  Before I snapped these pictures this morning I would say 'no' or that my "bump" is just a 'pre-existing condition' but after getting these of the memory card this morning, I'd have to say this is a pretty rounded 'pre-existing condition'.....so, officially in that awkward in-between stage.  I asked Shaner what he thought when I emailed him this today (I think my exact wording was "Baby, or BLT from lunch?", hopefully he will answer **correctly**.  

And so, here we are.......13 weeks 4 days pregnant:  

full disclosure

My initial thought when it came to documenting this pregnancy was that because Shaner wasn't going to be here for most of it, that I would start a separate blog, for him, close friends and family to see where I bared it all...the good the bad and the ugly.  The same thought went for how I would document blog-wise, Trevor and my adventures while he was away...I even had a super-fabulous blog title all secured for it too.  But in the last few days it has hit me...why?  Why do I need to segregate what is going on during the deployment from the regular run-down (allbeit usually late) that I do on here?  (Truth be told, I go down the rabbit hole bad enough with him away as it is)....Even with Shaner rocking and rolling somewhere else in the world, we are still a family, and this is our life, separation and all.  So...full disclosure is the policy from here on out....

We just have to smile and keep pedaling along, right?

Right.  

Trevor in the Snow

We finally got some snow for the season Friday afternoon into Friday evening.  We got about 2 inches, 3 in some spots depending on the wind.

We went outside to shovel and play and Trevor had a great time.  It was nice to finally put our Christmas gifts from last year (shovels) to good use!  Thanks Mom and Dad!

I am way too clumsy to trust myself with the nice camera outside, so I apologize for the cell phone picture.  

2013….let the fun begin!

We knew that 2013 was going to be a challenging year for our family with Shane’s deployment taking up most of the year. 

But, apparently that wasn’t enough excitement for us……..

Christmas

Spending Christmas in Connecticut always makes the holiday a MILLION times better.  This year, we even had some snow, which made everything almost perfect!  We drove up the day before Christmas Eve and were able to get a good couple of days with family.  Of course, my camera battery was not fully charged, I didn’t bring my charger and the colder weather up there drained my battery faster than usual….SO, enjoy Christmas…through the moment right before the boys started opening gifts.