watching football with dad
loving on dad, she just can't get enough of him these days
sweet baby face
trying to figure out how silas's electric car works
testing silas's new slide out for him at his birthday party


just some more pictures...not much to report. marley's been battling a cold and ben's been working a lot. mom and i started sorting through marley's outgrown baby clothes to see what we have. we have a lot. unfortunately marley was born in ohio in the middle of winter. simba will be born in texas in the summer. i don't think we could get more different climates, and therefore more different baby gear needs. but a lot of it is pretty gender neautral, so will work for a boy or a girl. it was fun and kind of sad to look through all her old clothes. she was so tiny. and she is such a big girl now. but i have enjoyed her every step of the way. and will continue to do so, though i think her teenage years will be quite a handful. i can hear my mom laughing from here. party invitations are in the mail today, for the big number two.

simba

a quick update on simba's progress, for those who are interested. marley and i are off to the library for story hour. more new pics of marley soon

Week 22: Your pregnancy

Your baby’s growth: She can feel!

Your baby weighs almost a pound now and is 7 to 8 inches long. Although she's filling out, her body still appears wrinkled because she lacks a significant layer of fat beneath her skin.

This week nerve endings become functional enough so that your baby can feel! She may experiment with this new sense of touch by stroking her face or feeling other body parts to see how they move. You may feel your baby stretching her muscles by pushing against the muscular wall of your uterus with her feet or head.

In addition, your baby's liver is busy breaking down bilirubin, a substance formed by the breakdown of hemoglobin in blood cells. Because a baby's liver can only break down a limited amount of bilirubin, the excess is passed on to you through the placenta to filter from your liver.

Other developments taking place this week:

• Lips. Your baby will form distinct lips.
• Testes. If a boy, the testes, which have been tucked up inside the pelvis, will begin to descend into the scrotum this week, and immature sperm will form in the seminal vesicles.
• Eyes. Your baby's eyes will complete formation, although the iris (the colored part of the eye) will still lack pigment.
• Pancreas. Essential to hormone production, the pancreas will continue to develop steadily.

What’s happening with you

• Weight gain. By now you may have gained from 12 to 15 pounds. Starting this week you'll begin to put on weight more steadily, averaging about half a pound to a pound per week.
• Contractions. This week you may also begin to notice your uterus practicing for delivery with an irregular, squeezing sensation called "false labor"—or Braxton Hicks contractions.
  
  This refers to an irregular tightening of the uterus that may get stronger and longer as pregnancy progresses. Near the end of your pregnancy it may be difficult to tell the difference between strong Braxton Hicks contractions and true labor pains. If the contractions become painful or if you have more than four contractions in an hour, contact your doctor. Painful regular contractions may be a sign of preterm labor.

diapers galore

so i've been doing a lot of research about cloth diapers, since that is what we are going to do with simba. who knew there were some many different types of cloth diapers?! luckily we have the internets and lots of my friends have gone this road before me. we have narrowed down the different diapers to two main kinds. for those of you interested in buying gifts for baby, we would appreciate cloth diapers. they are on the pricey side to begin with, but it pays off in the long run. we're going to start collecting them now in the hopes that we will have plenty by the time simba arrives. please don't feel like you need to get us a gift, but if you were already thinking about it here is what we would find most useful.
Swaddlebees Simplex cloth diaper size small~ 15 of these
Swaddlebees Simplex cloth diaper size medium~ 15 of these
Fuzzibunz one size pocket diaper~ 15 of these
this should totally set us up for the first year in a half to two years of simba's life. if you were going to get these, there are is a website that offers free shipping in the us. www.abbyslane.com they have both types of diapers and lots of colours available. the more colours the better.
again, please don't feel like you need to get us a gift. this is just a suggestion for those that were already thinking of getting something.

fun at the store

we went grocery shopping yesterday. i know that doesn't sound like news, but marley helps to turn it into a fun adventure, as she tends to do with everything in life. here are some cute photos of the mini shopper. she loves her tutu and insisted on wearing it all day long yesterday.

time flies by

the future concert pianist at the bryan children's museum
about to go on a train trip, at the end of a very long day. so still happy, but very tired
part of the mere cat exhibit
choo choo
uncle kirby taking marley for a walk around eric and lori's place
watching the fish at the zoo
start of the zoo day and oh so excited
this was going to be our christmas card this year, but ben has horns. actually i just didn't get a digital copy in time. i think it's pretty cute of all of us.
helping uncle eric pick his persimmons.
feeding the dogs with aunt lori
and petting the bunny with uncle kirby


getting safe from the tinley, who was just as scared of her as she was.
bunny time
playing piano. she really loved it.
riding the train
she would have been happy to have uncle kirby carry her all the time
the belly and the babe...five months and 23 months.

so yesterday was ms marls' 23rd birthday. can you believe she is going to be two in less than a month?!!! i can't. she is such a big girl. these pics are all kind of higgldy piggldy...but they are from christmas and the zoo trip we just took.

yesterday and tomorrow.

one of my favorite pictures of me and my momma. we were at a work camp in arizona, i think.
me and my buddy evan before a night out in brenham. with elmojane, of course.
me at about the age marley is now. wasn't i a cutie?
simba's photo session from monday. they're almost like a rorschach test. the middle one simba is curled around in the fetal position. i watched the enitre thing and still have no clue what the sex is. ben had an idea, but then he changed it. so he has no clue either. mom thinks it's a boy, but she just pulling that out of her tookus. she didn't even see the ultrasound.
the new decor for simba's room-it's pooh bear yellow on the walls and a variety of purples.

so i got a really awesome present in the mail a couple of days ago. my aunt lynne (dad's brothers wife) sent me a dvd of the jones family reunion from the summer before my dad died. i'm guessing she's in the process of converting old vhs to dvd. the video was great on so many levels. a lot of it was my cousin kenny at about the age marley is now. kind of crazy to see him that small, especially since he's a big burly football player now. i also got to see some really awesome hairdos and clothes. we were a fashionable bunch back then. but the thing that made it truly priceless was being able to hear my dad's voice after twenty something years. not just his voice. him. it was heartbreaking and wonderful all at the same time.
i've been going thru some of my old pictures and recently put a couple on cd. pictures from high school and some older. my friend evan was killed in a car accident a couple of years ago and some of the pictures were of him. so for my next bout of nesting, i am going to organize my sewing/ photo room. i shared the photos with evan's parents and they requested copies. i know i have lots of pictures of him, so i guess it might be the push i need to organize myself a little. what's the point of having all those photos if i can't see them or enjoy them?
we went for our half way there ultrasound on monday. simba is looking pretty healthy. i can feel him/her moving around a lot now. and last night ben could feel it too. such a cool magical feeling. we have decided how we are going to decorate simba's room. we have all the baby gear left over from marley and ten tons of clothes, so we won't need to add much. the room is painted yellow and we are accenting with purple. nice and gender neutral. and then we are going to use giraffes too. marley has monkeys and simba will have giraffes.
speaking of marley. she has given up on nap time. i don't think i'm emotionally ready for that. but this week, she has not taken a nap once. granted she now sleep until 9am, sometimes 10am. but i really love nap time. c'est la vie. i'll keep trying for it. she gave up two naps a day about this time last year. she has been the sweetest thing lately. she is learning how to say please and thank you. she knows thank you in sign and struggles to say it verbally. please she says verbally. well, she tries to. it's very cute. and of course she is always calling gg on the phone. she loves playing with ben and i's old cell phones (she has 3 now) and every time when you ask her who she's talking to she says gg.
i guess i've entered into the anxiety stage of pregnancy. i didn't remember being worried all the time with marley, but ben remembers it. the other night i couldn't sleep b/c i was so worried. about everything. but one thing in particular is simba and marley. not that they aren't healthy and happy. but how could i possibly love another child as much as i love marley. sometimes it feels like my heart will burst. i guess that's the great thing about love, there's always room for more.

grocery shopping fun

thanks to grandma susie, we had a very fun grocery shopping trip. and if you know me, you know i hate to grocery shop. more christmas pictures to come, as soon as i can get my computer to read the cds.

resolutions

after santa came
her first glimpse of the horsey ben and i got her
the cowgirl
opening her very first dump truck
modeling her new duds
playing with her truck
the awesome choo choo uncle kirby got her
opening presents with dad
kirby gave this to my grandma for mother's day back in 1983.
cool pots and pans from aunt resa
reading break
fun present from grandma barb
mmmm hot chillies from grandma barb
for kirby too
playing with her new tea set with granny


this has been a hard week. marley has been very very sick. the first time in almost two years that she has been sick enough that we had to take her to the doctor and even thought about taking her to the er. but she is over the worst of it, just a snotty nose and cough are left. we went to the doctor on thursday and ended up having to give her albuterol thru a nebulizer. if you have asthma you know what i am talking about. a nebulizer is a machine that uses the medicine albuterol and it somehow vaporizes this liquid that you inhale and in turn your airways open up. this is putting it simply. she had to have breathing treatments because her blood oxygen level was down. so that was very scary. and she had a pretty high fever for a couple of days. tylenol worked, but as soon as it wore off the fever was right back. so several sleepless nights and long days later, she is well on her way to being back to normal. it made me think about how easy it is to take tings for granted, especially things like our health. it's not something you really think about, at least not me, until it's not there. so my new year's resolution is two part, stemming from this past week. one is to try my hardest to remember to be thankful and appreciative of all the wonderful things in my life, to having a healthy daughter or a car that works. or a husband that loves me and his family. so i am going to stop being such a grumpy ungrateful person. laugh more, frown less. part two has to do with my own health, and that is something i am going to take more seriously. i've had health problems in the past, but nothing ever severe. and i would like to keep it that way. so i am going to eat better, ie less junk food, and excercise more, even if it's hot/cold outside. i don't usually do resolutions b/c i hate new year's as a holiday and b/c i think if there are things about you that need to be changed, don't wait for a holiday. kind of like valentine's day. if you love someone tell them everyday. not just on one special day. anyway. i just happened to think about this this past week b/c of marley being sick. more picutres of christmas are above. ben and i got new phone numbers (texas ones) and i'm not sure who all i've given them to, so if you would like our numbers send me an e-mail and i'll get it to ya.