Teeny Tiny

You know you're in the 5th percentile when...

You can crawl into unimaginable places with little difficulty.

You can fit into purses.

Birth Date

I am so excited!!!!! My doctor's office just called to tell me the date of my scheduled c-section. Baby Spence #2 will be born on January 27th sometime after 1pm. That is just so exciting to know that I will not have to endure the suspense of wondering when I'm going to go into labor or if my water will break in public or whether or not I'll recognize contractions. And another plus is that I don't have to be at the hospital until 11am. Yea! Ethan's induction was scheduled to start at 6am which is just way too early. AND...I get to be pregnant 11 days less in the stage of pregnancy when you are just so over being pregnant. Fine with me. I remember how miserable and uncomfortable I was at the end. I think it's kind of appropriate; I was 11 days overdue with Ethan and now I'll be 11 days underdue with this baby. Funny how that works out, huh?

AAAAHHH!!!!!

Today I decided to take Ethan with me while I went clothes shopping at Kohls. No, let me tell you what I was shopping for - it makes the story funnier. Bras. I was shopping for bras.

So, I was in the dressing room trying on bras, having no luck, while my cranky baby wandered around the dressing room. Turns out Ethan is not such a fan of shopping. In between trying on items, it happened. I blinked. And when I opened my eyes, my son was no longer in the dressing room. And yes, the door was closed. Now, the dressing room is about 4 feet wide and I had the stroller in there with me, so it's not like there are places to hide, but I still actually spun around a few times and looked behind the stroller hoping Ethan would appear. When he didn't appear, I panicked. I wasn't dressed, but I threw a shirt in front of me and whipped open the dressing room door. No Ethan. AAAAAAHHH!!!!!!!! I threw the shirt over my head and ran out the door and luckily, there he was, sitting on the floor near the entrance to the fitting rooms. I snatched him up and raced back into the dressing room. My little explorer had decided he needed to explore the lingerie section of Kohls. Nice...what's next?

Babymooniversary

To steal my friend Anne's term, we got to go on a 5 year anniversary trip that just happened to coincide with the upcoming birth of our second child. My inlaws watched Ethan on Friday night and then my parents came down and watched him the rest of the weekend so that we could go by ourselves. We stayed at the Wisp Ski Resort near Deep Creek Lake, Maryland surrounded by some gorgeous fall foliage. It was sooooo nice to be able to just do whatever we wanted, whenever we wanted, although I have to admit that I mentally tracked Ethan's routine throughout the day. It was harder to leave him than I thought, partially because the night before we left, he had woken up screaming with a temperature of 103.7, prompting us to call the pediatrician at midnight. Although he was sleepy and miserable the next day, he was better, so we left him in the experienced hands of two grandmothers.

When I think about what we did on our trip, I have to admit that most of it revolved around eating...eating doughnuts, coffee and fruit next to the lake, eating sandwiches and soup at our favorite cafe, eating fine food at the Deer Park Inn. We also drove around the lake quite a bit, admiring all the homes and finding the best spot on the mountain to view the lake. I think the funniest moment was when I made a fool out of myself at the Deer Park Inn. The owner was French, her son was French-speaking and we had been chatting about francophone related subjects throughout dinner. At one point, the owner came up to our table to take our dessert order and I became "that idiot"...I actually said this whole thing in accented English - "We're going to try the Creme Caramel". (French-speakers - hear the French "r" in those words and it sounds pretty silly). Sigh...oh well. Here are a few pictures:

Baby moonglow pears roasted with honey and rosemary with herbed goat cheese and some kind of viniagrette.

5 Years Ago Today

**This was SUPPOSED to be published on Saturday, while we were away on our anniversary trip, but alas...Blogger was not paying attention.**
Dave contemplated the destination of a ring.

I walked down the aisle on my father's arm, looking at Dave's smiling face .
Dave hollered with joy when we were finally married.
We smooched...a lot.
We smashed cake into each other's faces.
We watched my mother-in-law get down to "Baby Got Back".

We danced...a lot.
And lived happily ever after...

23 Weeks

Ok, so 23 weeks is not exactly a milestone in pregnancy, but I just had another doctor's report so I thought I would share. First of all, I have gained a total of 13 lbs (officially), gained 4 lbs since my last appointment, am measuring 24 1/2 weeks (that should make you feel better, Anne), and the baby's heartbeat was 149 bpm. It was funny because as the nurse practitioner was listening to the heartbeat, her comment was, "It's a busy one." Great...like I don't already have one of those. The other interesting thing was I asked her if I was measuring small (which I'm not, I'm measuring slightly big) or if I had gained less weight so she compared my charts and I'm measuring and weighing exactly the same as my last pregnancy. The reason I was wondering if I was measuring smaller was because Dave complimented me last night by saying that I looked great this pregnancy and that it seemed like I had "kept my body" this time. Not that I looked terrible with Ethan, but he was just complimenting me. And then he said, "I think you're eating better this time." HA! My response was to go to the pantry and dig out all of my latest cravings. He took it back...

Another ultrasound

One of my friends from church is the nurse manager at ABBA Pregnancy Care Center and since she has recently gotten her ultrasound certification, she is supposed to keep practicing on as many people as she can find. So she asked me if I would be a test subject and I was more than happy to oblige. It was a pretty sweet ultrasound machine too - she even zoomed in on the beating heart which was very cool. And then I totally lost my will power when she asked me if I wanted to know the gender. So I do know what I'm having, but Dave still doesn't and absolutely does not want to find out, so I'm not going to tell anyone. He's afraid someone will slip up and tell him if anyone else knows. He was a little bummed that I gave in and found out so now I feel bad about it, but it was pretty exciting to find out and have her show me on the ultrasound. Here are a few pictures:

Look at those solid legs! Daddy's genes must be dominant in this regard.
Profile picture: the baby is sort of half turned away towards the top of the
screen; the spine is at the bottom. Looks like maybe a long neck?

Dave's Blog

For those of you who are interested, Dave decided to join the blogging world after attending a web seminar a few days ago. He has previously resisted my attempts to draw him into social networking via the Internet, although he is a member of LinkedIn (sort of a professional version of Facebook). But a few nights ago, we sat down together, and I gave him a quick tutorial on how to blog, what to blog about, etc. It's still a work in progress layout-wise, but I thought the first entry was very well written and I'm looking forward to reading more entries. I added it to the list on the right of "Links to Family and Friends", but for those of you reading this on Facebook, the link is http://spencerealestate.blogspot.com.

Hottie Husband Runs 5K and Wins Medal

On Saturday, Dave ran a 5K which happened to be starting right down the street for us. We all bundled up, picked up his parents and took our coffee down to cheer Dave on.

Ethan got a little bored waiting for Dave, so he walked around with Mommy and Grandma.
And then after Dave came in with a time of 21:19, they stood and watched the rest of the runners come in and checked out some dogs too (Ethan's new obsession).
The only bummer is that Ethan started getting fussy and hungry soon after the race, so we left only to find out later that Dave had won his age category and would have brought home a medal. He was really disappointed, but at least he gets his name on the Internet!

Random Ethan News

1) He likes to moon people. Hmm...does that sound like his father?

2) He's currently cutting a random assortment of teeth. You know how the "standard" order of teething says, "Bottom two, then top two"? Well, he has the bottom two, and is now cutting ONE top middle tooth and the one next to it - not the other middle tooth, but the one on the other side. Talk about a lopsided mouth. Whatever...

3) He loves to go outside and sometimes stares longingly out the front door.

4) He's decided to "train up himself in the way he should go" by reading Shepherding a Child's Heart at the same time as Mommy and Daddy so that we're all on the same page.
5) He's not allergic to peanut butter! We tried it for the first time today at lunch and all was well.

6) He can imitate a lion upon request. We're also working on duck and dog imitations.

7) He is an absolute dog fanatic. He squeals and laughs and smiles and immediately tries to run to any dog he sees.

8) He's finally starting to get the hang of the "more" sign. Yea for parent-child communication!

Musical Genius

The other day, I was trying to think of a new activity to try with Ethan. Thus, I found my way to the piano. He is a prodigy. Look at his hands - he knows exactly where to place them to produce magnificent chord arrangements.