Bed Rest

Thursday morning we took off to Overlake Hospital for our planned surgery with Dr. Wall. It was a very short and easy procedure that I was under anesthesia for about 15 minutes so they could, without going into too much detail, sew my cervix shut. The Dr. is hopeful that this will prevent any need for early bed rest this pregnancy... this is all good news and I was again informed that during the ultrasound while I was snoozing away in the Operating Room, my new child was amazingly adorable :)

So for this beautiful weekend I am inside with my feet up having memories of the endless afternoons on bed rest from 3 years ago. I wont lie, I was looking forward to the quiet afternoons, reading my kindle and watching daytime TV... this lasted about 3 hours and then the boredom and missing my toddler set in.

So this afternoon I am wasting the boredom away with my book, movies I have seen a million times replaying on TBS and dreaming of the little baby that will be happily arriving this next February!

Thankfully there is an end in sight... I will be visiting Dr. Wall this coming Thursday when he will hopefully release me from bed rest... wish us luck!

Happy Birthday Party Reece!

Bennett and my adorable nephew Reece have both really been into birthday parties lately. Mostly for the presents, a little for the singing and a lot for the cupcakes! So imagine how happy these two little boys were when they realized it was Reece's second birthday party!

It was the hottest day of the year, the food was amazing and did I mention the kids were adorable?!

Happy birthday buddy, we love you!

There was a bit of fighting over some of Reece's favorite new toys... Woody and Buzz!

The Fair...

About 18 years ago I remember dying to go to the fair, agonizing over what to wear after not seeing classmates all summer, waiting in line for the bracelets that would let us onto any ride we wanted... This memory was somewhat different than the South West Washington Fair that I saw today.

Somewhere along the way I acquired a two year old that was running like crazy, and nearly full speed for the back end of a cow... not quite the magic I remember from my tween years.

Oh well it was a great day with Aunt Katie, Uncle Marty, and cousins Maddie, Reece and Cash. We saw cows, horses, chickens and sheep. We sat on every tractor that we saw and this pregnant mama made a B-line for the elephant ears!

12 Week Screening for New Baby Olsen

One of the only benefits of being a "high-risk" pregnancy is that we get lots and lots of looks at our adorable new little one. This monday I was 12 weeks, 4 days pregnant and I headed up to see Dr. Wall.

This time when we go and see Dr Wall we have to worry about what to do with our 2 year old because something tells me he wouldnt sit still during a ultrasound... But thankfully a couple of his favorite people in the world live 5 minutes away from the hospital in Bellevue... Jania and Charli. Aunt Jania always spoils us with pancakes or french toast (which Bennett now calls "french fry toast") Bennett loves his time with Jania and Charli and it is so nice to be able to drop him off.

The appointment went well, Baby looks great and they assured me that he/she is completely adorable. It was a long ultrasound because I was having a braxton hicks contraction (could only tell via ultrasound and they assured me it was absolutely normal) and the baby was going crazy, like actual log rolls. Hopefully the energy of the ultrasound isnt a forshadow of the energy of the little one to come :)

The little person growing in there passed all screens and the ultrasound tech and the perinatologist have guessed gender... We are so excited whether its a boy or a girl and it is sooo fun to hear everyone guess :)
(ULTRASOUND PICS TO BE POSTED SOON)

4th Annual Wine Family Weekend

Not sure if there is a better combo than 30+ family members and a wine tasting weekend... especially with this family!
First of all I have to give photo credit to Teri... She was great about having her camera all weekend and gave this tired mama a break from busily capturing all of Bennett's magic moments :)

Thursday morning Bennett's dreams came true and his cousin Lily rolled into the driveway and we packed up the expedition to spend the whole weekend away with family. To say that Bennett loves his cousin Lily would be an understatement. He was so delighted she was in the car with us, he wouldn't even close his eyes on the 5 hour drive to Richland (even when Lily was zonked). The kids were nearly perfect all the way over and Bennett was even more excited to be at "lily's Grandma's" house. We had a relaxing afternoon of sitting on the back deck and visiting with family and taking turns taking Bennett over by the pond to see the fish and make sure he doesn't go swimming with them. I am pretty sure he told everyone about the shark he found in the pond about a million times.

On Friday morning our friends Shannon, Hadley and Jameson came from Walla Walla to spend some time with our family. It was so awesome of them to come visit and of course they fit right in with the family. The kids immediately ripped all their clothes off and we playing in the sprinkler like crazy!

Joel and my parents came in Friday night as well as about 30 family members.It was a fun night that ended with a movie night for the kids and a sleepy mama!

Saturday morning we packed up to hit the wineries. Grandpa Jones stayed back to help with the kids and Joel and I loved the free time to spend with the adults! And it was even more enjoyable when we got home and Bennett had taken a 2 hour nap with Grandpa (this mama was a bit shocked that grandpa pulled this off... well done dad!)

It was another fun night of fabulous food, hilarious family and even a competitive croquet tournament that lasted into the dark. The kids all had a "slumber party" upstairs (well until I finally caved at 11 pm to giggling kids that were no where near sleeping and took the little one to bed)

Most family reunions sound like a drag but I must say our family is not one of those families... everyone is so fun and close, I truly appreciate what a great extended family we have grown. I love that Bennett will grow up around such great people! I know we will have this weekend for years to come... we so look forward to it!

Back to Dr. Wall...

It has been three long years since we have seen one of my favorite Drs on the planet. Dr Wall was a Dr. that I googled right after we lost Bennett's twin brother. It was hard to even find a Dr. that had dealt with a case like ours and I feel so lucky that we found him. I saw him nearly every week until Bennett was born and it was definately the highlight of my week of bedrest.

He was so excited when I called him after we found out our little surprise was on the way back in June. We set an appointment to talk about this pregnancy for 11 weeks. When we got there he sat down with us and talked about the surgery that we scheduled for the end of the month and he had such optimism about this pregnancy, it truly warmed my heart.

Next we got a great look at our little babe. He or she finally looked like a little baby, kicking and bouncing around in there. s/he looked aboslutely perfect.

Our cerclage surgery is scheduled for August 25th. I will then be on bed rest for a week (is it bad that sitting in bed, reading and watching movies sounds kinda fabulous at this point?!) After that I should be back on my feet! Keep our new little one in your thoughts... we love em sooo much already!!!

2 very clean boys

As much as I would usually spare you the bath tub husband shots... I couldnt help myself during this bath boy time in our bathroom! I think I heard "Lots of Bubbles!" about a billion times.

Happy to you Papa!

This weekend we celebrated Grandpa Jones Birthday with a BBQ on the back deck... So fun to finally get to spend time in the sun on the deck with family. The boys love birthdays, especially if they involve cake and singing. I didnt have my camera most of the time but got a couple of Bennett running around like crazy. He spent most of the afternoon convincing each person to seperately go "hunt tigers" in the back yard... watching him pretend is one of my favorite parts of parenting thus far... It is hilarious!

Here is grandma running from lions and tigers!

The boys getting dirty!

Northwest Trek

After a crazy busy beginning of the month the little Olsen family has been laying low and relaxing... especially after a long week with Joel in Detroit for work. We woke up this morning and decided to get out of the house and take a little adventure. Joel rarely gets to go on Bennett and my adventures to the park or zoo or whatever so we took advantage of a boring Sunday to make it a Olsen family day of fun!

I have wanted to go to Northwest Trek for a while and since Joel is such an outdoorsy guy... it was perfect.

We didn't even bring the stroller we just walked behind a little boy running like crazy from each exhibit... The tram was everyone's favorite... an hour long trip around to see all the animals. I swear Bennett has eagle eye vision and was pointing out some of the animals before the guide did... so fun!

Cousin Cary

The world lost a bit a sunshine this week when our cousin Cary lost her battle to breast cancer.

Ever since I met Joel I have heard about cousin Carey. She was Joel's closest cousin and seemed to hold some magical power of great judgement in girls. I was a bit nervous to get her approval into the family. Since then she has been such a fun part of the Olsen family for me. She always made me feel welcome and when you talked with her she had an amazing way of making you know she was truly listening.

And she sure loved our little boy... She always talked about him as if he was flawlessly perfect, even on his hardest days.

You fought a tough battle Cary... We miss you.

Big boy B

It seems like every night Bennett climbs up into his bed carrying his bear and blanket in his footy pajamas and seems like this fragile young little toddler, then 10 to 12 hours later I hear "Mama!" screaming out of the monitor by my bed and out of his room barrels this grown up boy asking for breakfast.

Maybe its just the new haircut but this week I feel like he is this grown up little man. He tells me what he wants, needs and what was fun that day. He listens (well as best we could expect at this point) to nearly anything. He even told me this morning that our dog needed to go potty and let her out.... I just stared at him like "when did this little man move into my house?!"

This week was like so many others, filled with play dates and fun stuff for Bennett. This weekend we had Lily and Chloe over and since then he has asked for them to come over at least 10 times a day. It was a fun day of playing outside, and decorating cookies.

Then this Monday Bennett and I went to meet up with our friend Torin and his family at Millersylvania State Park. I had never been there and it was such a pretty park and a fun day with friends. Bennett especially loved roasting his very first hot dog... he ate two! Bennett loves playing with Torin and I can tell they will be friends for a long time.

First Hair Cut!

So after nearly three years of waiting for his perfect little curls to grow in... I finally broke down and gave our little boy his very first hair cut.

I knew I could only trust his Aunt Katie and I am so happy she did it. She was so good about chasing him, even when he was riding his trike and she was quickly and safely snipping away!

It is super cute... still a bit curly and super super handsome... He looks soooo grown up!