My little boy turns 1 year old today

January 21, 2011- I hardly slept the night before. I got up early with your daddy, who had flown in from Afghanistan to welcome you into the world. We we’re SO excited to meet you, to see who you would look like (you looked like me at first, but now you look more like your daddy.) I remember standing in front of the bathroom mirror brushing my hair and thinking about how it’s going to feel to hold you, to kiss you and to hold your little hand. I smiled so big that I think you could hear the joy and excitement coming from it. I know that a smile doesn’t have a sound, but at that moment it did. Daddy and I packed the car with your diaper bag, my overnight bag and drove to the hospital. It was  7am I sat in my hospital bed and waited for you to come. And then 25 hours later at 8:01 am, with 22 of those hours being in labor you came into the world, Our little boy. The first time I saw you, I cried because of how beautiful you were, how little you were and the way your little lips looked just the way I had dreamt. My dream had come true in that moment.

Now, hear you are, still my little boy and your about to turn 1-year-old. I swear I just blinked and you were just a little newborn baby. But now you’re a little boy, so sweet, gentle, kind and loving. You make us laugh and cry at times. I never felt such joy and fear at the same time.  Joy to see you happy and fear when I see you hurt. Nothing, hurts more than when you hurt and nothing brings greater joy than when you’re joyous. I love seeing your little personality flourish. And boy-o-boy do you have personality! You love to talk (dada is your favorite word), sing, read brown bear, unload the dishwasher and take things out of the refrigerator, listen to Sesame street 1234, share (especially with Brody), play fetch with Brody, pretend putting lotion on your hands (mimicking mommy),  make us laugh and simply be adorable.

There are times when Daddy and I are exhausted, but God has given us the strength to rock you back to sleep in the middle of the night, our have 3 am playtimes, because you just wont go to sleep, or taking you to the E.R. because you were coughing and I was afraid you couldn’t breathe or kissing your little face until you fell asleep. All of those moments I remember praying that God would protect you and keep you safe. And He did. I know He has a plan for your life. Because, we’ve prayed for you since before you were born.

I still can’t believe you’re mine. I will always feel blessed by the fact that God has given you to me and Daddy. We love you so much and I couldn’t be any more happier to be your mommy. Happy Birthday, My little boy! I love you!

A glimpse into what our future holds

So much has happened since my last post! Baby James has learned so many new skills and has broke three new teeth in. He pulls himself up and walks along the couch now…Um, didn’t he just start crawling yesterday!? My baby boy is growing up so fast and I am now taking back all of my “smile and nod” remarks from when other moms told me that it goes by SO FAST! I am now at the brink of tears at how fast my little guy is growing up. I suspect he’ll be telling me “Mom, don’t kiss me in public.” and “Mom, can I go hang out with my friend who just got his license?” to which I will reply ” Have I told you the story of  how many hours of labor I went through before having you.” All, of this and he’s only going to be 11 months old! For now he loves giving me slobbery kisses and  playing with toy cars. And I’m enjoying every moment of it.

Yesterday, I had my good friend, Julie visit me with her sister, Laura and adorable little nephew, Abram. It was the first time baby James has had a baby younger than himself visiting in our house. He was SO interested and excited about touching  baby Abrams nose and cheeks. I had to keep telling him “gentle, be gentle.” he would look at me, smile and then go back to touching the baby’s nose. As of late he has been so amazed by touching my nose and mouth. He even touches the nose  and mouth of the teacher in his Brown Bear book,which is his favorite book. And, to prove that my sweet son can put a smile on anyone’s face, he made little baby Abram laugh for the first time. Of, course when we tried to record it, it didn’t happen again. But, I thought it was so sweet the way my little guy put a smile on this sweet little baby’s face. I know that he will be a wonderful big brother. Our future holds one very loved baby brother. I can’t wait to see my two boys together. We are so excited to meet the new addition to our family. As of today I’m 25 weeks and 3 days

Oh, yeah,  we took our family Christmas pictures this weekend. Which consisted of me setting my camera on a Tri-pod, trying to set up the perfect shot and then mad dashing to my spot, fixing my hair, sucking the belly in (yeah you can’t really suck a 6 month pregnant belly in.) and trying to look flawless. Then getting up looking at the picture to find out that I look like a crazed deer in headlights that has Chaka Khans hair, My son is not smiling, my husband blinked and the dog’s butt is the only thing in the picture. Needless to say, we’ll be taking that picture over again.

For now, here are some cute (non- Chaka Kahn) pictures of my sweet son and precious baby Abram. Baby James loves his new friend and apparently he loves his nose, lips and cheeks,too.

 

Baby James is amazed by Abram

Trying to touch his nose

My sweet boy

Ahhh, Mom I'm taking a bath!

Next week I’ll have to post my 26 week belly pic, since I haven’t taken my 25 week one, yet (or maybe I’ll take it tonight and be productive and post it tonight! And I’ll try to have our Family Christmas picture up, not the crazy deer in headlights one.

Cravings, rants and other things at almost 24 weeks pregnant!

It has been a crazy week so far…and it’s only Wednesday! Baby James has been having trouble with taking naps and sleeping through the night. We were both sick a week ago and still have some lingering symptoms, but we’re on the mend. My husband has been having to work late nights at the office (this has been going on since he got back from his deployment), which has been hard on all of us. Some nights I still feel like he’s deployed, especially the nights he gets home at 8pm. I’ve been praying fire and brimstone upon those who are making him stay late…I should probably stop that, probably. I’m just grateful for a sweet husband who still comes home and loves me and helps me as much as he can.

Lately , baby boy #2 has been moving around a lot…It probably doesn’t help that i drink the occasional 12 oz. coca-cola and eat cherry cordial and peppermint kisses. Chocolate is a food group, right?! I thought it was on top of the food pyramid

Baby James has been the happiest baby, even when sick. And he is crawling all over the place. I thought my floors were clean, but this kid can find the littlest speck or dust bunny…so there’s lots of vacuuming and moping going on…you know with all the energy I have being almost 24 weeks pregnant and taking care of an active 10 month old! I clean floors like Cinderella during my free time singing “Oh, sing sweet nightingale!” It amazes me how much energy this little guy has. He has also learned to tell me “NO” by shaking his head “No”…so it begins! I also can’t believe he is going to be a year old in less than 2 months! I’ve slowly been planning some things I want to do for his first birthday party. I hope we can have some family and friends out to visit…Or maybe we will got to Dallas and have something there? I want it to be special, since we will be moving farther away from family and friends in early April of 2012! Who knows the next time we will be this close to some of our family and friends.

One of the things I want to do for his birthday  is make his cake…here’s what I’m going for. I’m sure you can guess the theme of his birthday party!  Hopefully I wont make a cake wreck of it! I have so many fun ideas for his birthday and want others to enjoy it too! Let’s see if I can pull it off

For now our family is preparing for Christmas and for the arrival of our baby boy. It’s going to be a fun next couple of weeks…Some more Christmas shopping, wrapping, Dr.’s appointments, Army Ball, Bible Studies, Christmas Parties, Taking our Christmas picture ,mailing out  Christmas cards and cleaning the floors lol!

Until then…I’ll be whistling while I work and getting a bigger belly!

Happy Reformation Day!!!

On October 31, 1517, Martin Luther nailed his list of 95 theses to the door of the church in Wittenberg, Germany, and more or less unintentionally set into motion the series of events that we now call the Protestant Reformation. Roughly half of the Christians in the world today worship in churches that exist because of Luther’s actions.

I think that it is important to remember those who were persecuted, died and stood strong in the faith of Jesus Christ! We all have a role in church history! I pray that we Christians of the faith stand strong in perilous times. Stand firm in Jesus the author and finisher of our faith

QUOTES BY MARTIN LUTHER

“Faith is a living and unshakable confidence, a belief in the grace of God so assured that a man would die a thousand deaths for its sake.” M.L

“Blood alone moves the wheels of history.” M.L

“Faith is permitting ourselves to be seized by the things we do not see.” M.L

“I am afraid that the schools will prove the very gates of hell, unless they diligently labor in explaining the Holy Scriptures and engraving them in the heart of the youth.” M.L

“Grant that I may not pray alone with the mouth; help me that I may pray from the depths of my heart.” M.L

“I have held many things in my hands, and I have lost them all; but whatever I have placed in God’s hands, that I still possess.” M.L

“People must have righteous principals in the first, and then they will not fail to perform virtuous actions.” M.L

“Whatever your heart clings to and confides in, that is really your God.” M.L

“You are not only responsible for what you say, but also for what you do not say.” M.L

 

Maranatha!

 

 

“Christ wants not nibblers of the possible, but grabbers of the impossible.” — C.T. Studd

Learning to be a Mom

I don’t think i will ever reach a place where I have learned all I need to, to be a Mom. I will still be learning until the Lord takes me home. Everyday is an adventure. And it’s about to become even more adventurous come March. But, with all the duties, responsibilities and adventures that come with being a mom…I know that this is who God has created me to be. I am still learning and get frustrated with myself when I don’t do enough or I’m not doing what other moms are doing. So, here’s to learning to be a mom for all the day’s to come…A mom to an infant, toddler, Kid, teenager, college student and Adult. The road may be bumpy at times, but boys like off roading, so we’ll be fine Plus this is who God created me to be.

Just making a reminder so I can look back and remember moments like this…moments of looking to the what the future holds….Infants, toddlers, kids,  teenagers, college students and Adults.

In baby boy news… Our little guys just turned 9 months on the 22nd. He is a whooping 19.2.oz and 28.2.5 Inches! He sure is growing fast and wants to explore EVERYTHING! it will be so weird to see our new little baby next to my firstborn, new baby will look so little and firstborn will look so big! The time goes by so fast.

Till next time..I’m hanging onto every word the Lord speaks to me…

I’ll post pictures soon!

My Boys!

I know it’s been awhile since I last blogged…and I had promised to keep the updates coming. Well, thank goodness for second (third , fourth, fifth…) chances.

We we’re so blessed to have my parents with us for a week. We were going to have them a bit longer but some things came up and they had to leave. I am grateful for the time I did have with them. I’m glad they got to spend some much needed time with Baby James.

Speaking of Baby James (who will be 9 months old in a few more days!)…These past weeks have been very exciting. He has become much more mobile, talkative and according to his dad a “drool machine.” So, fun stuff here in the Williamson house.  We are so excited to see the growth take place in our son. He amazes us with the cute personality that God has given us. He definitely brings joy to our life.

Now for new baby News. Well, Our due date has changed to March 24th and since I am having another C-section I will have him a week before my due date, which is March 17th. Funny because that was my original due date and it’s St. Patricks day. And yes I’ve already been told to name the baby Patrick, but sadly that name hasn’t made onto our list of boy names.

So as of today I am 17 weeks 4 days…I think. With all these due date changes (there was another one before this last one that scared me almost to death. That one was January 19th…which was all a BIG mistake in my paper work due to a lovely nurse.) I’ll ask my Doctor at my next appointment.

Well, here are some pictures…

I don’t know how far along I am in this picture (15 1/2 weeks?)it was taken while my parents were here… But, it’s my first belly picture. I’ll be more precise with the next belly pics. It’s a miracle that my hair is brushed and I have make-up on in this picture, LOL!

And here are some of our cute little guy…

My baby at 15 weeks

I feel bad for not documenting this pregnancy as much as I did with my first one. It’s just that I’ve either been to busy, or feel I don’t look pretty enough to take a belly shot (I have taken a few though, but am now forgetting what week I was when taking them.) or have just lost my creativity to write things out the way I did the first time. Nevertheless, I am ecstatic about our newest addition. It has just been a different type of excited. Preparation for our new baby is going to be a slow process. One of the main reasons is because we will be moving a couple of weeks after he or she is born. So preparing a nursery is going to be put on hold until we get into our new home and I recover from my c-section. I feel bad not preparing as much for my baby. But, I know it will all come together. From here on out I am going to try to document more, because there are some cool things that I am experiencing while carrying my little one. One being that I can now feel little flutters in my tummy. I am now 15 weeks and 4 days. I can’t believe how fast it’s going. I feel like I just announced yesterday that we we’re pregnant and now here I am almost half way through my pregnancy.WOW!

If you can pray for me I have still been feeling nausea and weak and could really use the strength to take care of my little 8 month old, do laundry, clean the house and make dinner. I am having to rely on the Lord to get me through each day with a joyful attitude and the strength needed. I sure do feel different this pregnancy, but then again I have a little 8 month old boy who keeps me on my toes. I’m loving seeing him grow and am wanting to take it all in, since I know he will be grown up in the blink of an eye.

I have tons of pictures to load and will make time to do it when our special guests arrive this friday and I will have more help with my little guy. So, hopefully you’ll be seeing more posts. And I’ll try to load a belly pic, but only if I’m feeling pretty

October fun!

I just ordered Annie Sloan Paint for our antique bed, chair and baby number 2′s dresser! I’m so excited to see how it will all come out. I’m having some family come out to visit, so it will be the perfect time to start these projects…since I’ll have help with baby James for a week or two …It’s going to be a fun time. We’ll be getting things ready for our sweet little baby. We’ll also will find out if we’re having a boy or girl on October 8th! YAY! And you better believe I will be doing some sort of shopping for our little boy or girl once we find out

October has plenty of fun things going on. I can’t wait for it to be here… and of course it just brings me closer to meeting our new little one.

I’ll post pictures of the finished projects and fun things we will be doing in the month of october.

Baby James has been super attatched to me right now.Which I LOVE, but can also be hard at times. My mom thinks it’s because he can sense that I’m pregnant and that maybe it’s because it’s a girl. We’ll find out soon I’m just trying to soak up as much time as I can with my little boy.

We’re going to be a family of four!

First of all I can’t believe I waited this long to tell everyone that we’re pregnant. I just felt in my heart that I needed to wait till I knew everything was alright with our little one. And yesterday’s doctor appointment confirmed that for us.

So here’s a little background on how I found out, told my husband and my parents that we were going to add another sweet baby to our family.

We we’re on block leave to California to visit family and celebrate our 2 year Anniversary. It was at my parents house, July 22nd (baby James had just turned 6 months) and the song “Glory of Love” by Peter Cetera was playing in the background lol! I was excited to see the positive sign on the test and took a deep breathe and thanked God for another little blessing. Then I had to think of a way to tell my husband. At first I thought I would tell him when we would do our family pictures with a friend of mine, But then I thought It would be fun to do some more family pictures in my parents backyard. And somehow incorporate telling him. So, later that afternoon we went to the store and I bought a big piece of construction paper. James asked what I was going to do with it and I said ” write Williamson Family 2011 for our pictures.” He smiled and said ok. Little did he know that I would be writing “We’re going to be a family of four!”  So, we got home and started getting ready to go take our pictures. And who would be taking our picture…My parents! They had no idea what was going to happen. So we started walking back into the woods and took a few pictures and then I said I’m going to use our sign. Here are our pictures…

Telling my hubby for the first time

His reaction I love it!

We're SO happy!

Our little growing family!

It was so exciting to tell him in such a fun way. My parents cried and we’re so excited to know that they we’re going to have another little Grandbaby! We are 13 weeks tomorrow Wow, I can’t believe I’m already in my Second Trimester and boy am I glad to be, because it has not been a pleasant first trimester. I’ve never felt so nausea and weak, but it is all worth it. Plus, God gives me extra strength on those days and a gracious and patient husband to hear my cry about it.

Here are some pictures of our little peach (he or she is the size of a peach right now). My husband was  able to come to my appointment yesterday along with baby James and we got to see our little baby. I think baby James was pretty excited about it, because he was such a good boy.

12 weeks 5 days

12 weeks 5 days

I’ll be posting more as we find out more. Right now I’m going to go play with my little boy. I think we’ll go outside and enjoy this lovely weather.

6 months- plenty of giggles, sitting up and talking more

I wish I could up load home videos on my blog…because it’s just easier to show you how cute my son is, but I don’t mind writing it out, he’s cute in the form of words too.

We just got back from our family trip to california to visit my parents and to celebrate our 2 year Anniversary. We had a great time! One thing I’ve noticed with my sweet baby is that whenever he reaches a milestone it’s usually somewhere other that home. He rolled over for the first time at my in-laws. He got two new teeth and started grabbing things at my friend Julie’s mom’s house. Now he sat up by himself and played with his toys at my parents house. I wonder where he will start crawling and walking at?

I have been so overjoyed by the smiles, giggles and little voice that my son has been sharing with me. I love that I am able to make him smile and laugh out loud. It is my goal to find new ways to get that fun, cute reaction out of him. He also lights up when Daddy comes home for lunch and gets home from work. I am so grateful  to have my husband back home after a very long deployment year apart. I don’t think I can express how much of a help he is to me. I’m just grateful to take a shower daily (sometimes a bath even).As my husband said yesterday, as he treated our little family out to dinner…”It is very good to have our family back together again.” I agree, there is no greater joy, love and security than knowing my sweet family is all together.

here are some recent pictures…

We also got to take some family pictures. I can't wait to see the rest!

till the next post…I’ll be basking in the joy and love of my family.