Nesting = Monkey Love

At 33 weeks pregnant, my nesting instincts are in full swing!

Trouble is, we rent our house so there's no use in painting or doing any elaborate decorating of the baby's room - who will actually be sharing a room with his big brother, Quinton, anyway.

So I was able to fulfill my nesting instinct by sewing up a few things.

I saw these really cute cloth diapers turned into burp cloths on Etsy.com and figured it wouldn't be too hard to do it on my own. I ordered the cute fabric here and bought the cloth diapers at Target, 12 diapers for about $16. I found a really easy tutorial to follow at Chickpea Sewing Studio and voila! Here are my cute creations!

Here's the full effect:
Did you notice the cute baby shoes, too?
Yep, I became super confident in my sewing skillz and decided to give these a whirl. They weren't easy (for me) but they are totally adorable! Here's the tutorial for the shoes at Family Centered. I can't wait for our little baby boy to arrive and use my nesting creations!

Now that these are done, I'm wondering what to do next...any suggestions???

Life's A Zoo!

It seems that lately, so many things in our life are changing and up in the air.

It seemed only appropriate to make a spontaneous trip downtown to forget about all our cares and just enjoy a nice day together. Matt is out of town, doing some work with his brothers so Quinton and I found ourselves with a whole Tuesday wide open for adventure!

At first, we were going to go to the planetarium to take advantage of a free day but as I was driving downtown, something unexpected happened...I noticed the sun was shining bright AND the outdoor temps kept climbing! Once my outdoor thermostat read 57 degrees, I decided we had no other choice than to change our plans! Who wanted to spend the day inside a planetarium all day when it was this beautiful outside???

Luckily, Chicago has an amazing FREE zoo!

So instead of the Adler Planetarium, Quinton and I found ourselves at the Lincoln Park Zoo - with a super-primo FREE parking spot on the NICEST day so far this year!

Now, I have lived in Chicago a combined total of almost 6 years and am sad to say that this was my first time at the Lincoln Park Zoo. But I am so glad I was with Quinton to enjoy it! We were both a little sad that Matt wasn't there with us so we intentionally didn't see everything at the zoo so that we'll have new places to explore when Matt can go back with us.

Our first stop at the Zoo was to check out the sea lions. Apparently, ALL the zoo creatures were just as excited about today's weather as we were because they were all out playing!


The Lion was so cool! He sat out on this rock the entire day sunning himself. As we left the park today, he was roaring up a storm! I told Quinton that he was saying goodbye to us and Quinton LOVED that!

This Jaguar was pretty cool, too.

Quinton doesn't believe me when I tell him that jaguars and lions are part of the "cat" family.

I think this is a great picture of just how magnificent a day it was!

Striking resemblances, huh?

We must have spent an hour in the Gorilla and Ape habitat. The shenanigans these guys pull are hilarious! There was a giant silverback in one habitat and he totally ruled the place! This poor gorilla below made the mistake of trying to snuggle up with Jo-Jo the silverback's blanket when Jo-Jo wasn't looking. Jo-Jo came right up to him and the poor little guy just handed it over. Then the little guy was left with nothing but some straw and so he tried pulling the straw over him like a blanket. Seriously, it was so neat to watch them interact. Quinton loved telling stories about what all of the gorillas were doing!

Of course, Quinton couldn't resist monkeying around!

After an hour with the gorillas, we hit the cafe for lunch.

Quinton's favorite part? His sprinkled ice cream cone!

This was Quinton's souvenir for the day. A straw safari hat. He cracks me up!

We had such a lovely day, we couldn't wait to share it!

Can you believe that after the day at the zoo, we went swimming tonight, too? Unfortunately, it's WAY too cold to go swimming outside so we went to the indoor pool at the gym. It was a nice way for me to feel less gravity on my 8 months pregnant body and it kept Quinton from taking a nap! All in all, this was a lovely day. Exactly what we needed to escape the uncertainty of daily life!

Ouch!

Quinton had a friend over today for a playdate and was sent to timeout at one point for throwing Hungry Hippo marbles at his friend. When Quinton's four minutes were up, I asked his friend to go and get him.

His friend came back and said that Quinton was tired and that his throat hurt. Quinton has had the sniffles the past couple of days so I went to check on him. When I went into his room, he was laying in bed with all four of his blankies covering him.

I sat on the edge of the bed and asked him if his throat hurt.

Quinton: No, my heart hurts.

Me: Your heart? How does it hurt?

Quinton: You broke it.

Me: I broke your heart?

Quinton: Yeah, because you yelled at me.

Now, I don't know about you, but this about made me cry!

I didn't even yell at him, I just told him firmly to go to his room for 4 minutes of timeout because "we don't throw marbles at our friends." But Quinton is such a tender heart, he really has a hard time knowing he's in trouble.

I asked him a little bit later if his heart was still broken.

He thought for a second and said, "No. I think it's all better."

That makes me feel better, too.

I Blinked...

I admit it, I blinked and it feels like we went from this...

To this...
And I'm not talking about Matt's hair!
It really seems like we were students in Phoenix with a new baby, just yesterday and then, suddenly, we have this sassy 4-year old who keeps me laughing.
I admit, I am so excited to meet this new little boy we have been blessed with...I keep wondering if he'll look like Quinton or be totally different. If he'll be as easy going as Quinton or march to his own beat.
It's so amazing to start all over again!

Dia de Los Pancakes!

If you missed out on National Pancake Day yesterday, you totally missed out on a short stack of buttermilk fun!

Luckily, our friend gave us a shout out and we met up with a gang of crazy kids and even crazier mommies for some free pancakes!

Yes, the kids in this picture are all sitting in the window of IHOP, sticky syrup covered fingers and all. IHOP should really have paid us for all the free advertising we were passing out in front of that window!

Needless to say, free pancakes were the higlight of our day...that and a nap!

Happy Valentines & Chinese New Year!

I hope you had a great Valetine's Day this year or Valentine's Weekend if you celeberated early!

We were lucky enough to celebrate Valentine's AND the Chinese New Year on Sunday!

We watched our friends' 3 kids this weekend so they could have a fun trip to the northwest. It is A LOT different to have 4 kids when you are used to 1 all the time! It makes me appreciate all of the hard work Mrs. B puts in as a mother of four (they took their 3.5 month old with them on the trip)!

This Valentine's was extra-special, too, since there seems to be more of me for Matt and Quinton to love! Quinton is beyond excited for his baby brother! I hit my 28 week mark today! If you know about my first pregnancy, you probably remember my complications but at my doctor's appointment today, everything is right on track - even my blood pressure! This is such a relief! With everything else going on in our lives, right now, I was worried my blood pressure might be an issue already, but I am doing great and so is Beckham...that's what I'm calling this little boy, in utero, since he apparently LOVES to kick and use my organs as target practice!

Below is a card I had made using Shutterfly. Apprently, I spend so much on Shutterfly, they gave me a coupon for a couple of free photo cards. I didn't receive enough to send to everyone but I wanted to share since this pictures really captures Quinton's love for his baby brother!

While watching our friends' kids this weekend, we took them to Chuck E. Cheese's - always a favorite, and then on Sunday, we took them to the Chinese New Year parade in Chicago's Chinatown. Since we had so much fun visiting Chinatown a couple of weeks ago, I thought it would be fun to go back for the parade.

Boy, was this a crash course in working with FOUR kids instead of one!
The kids had a good time, for the most part, but I'm not sure all of the hassle with parking and crowds was worth it in the end.

The architecture in Chinatown is really cool.
Our friends' oldest child thought it was pretty crazy.

All of the kids enjoyed the dragon puppets. I was a little disappointed that there weren't more in the parade but it was fun to see the ones we did!

And what says "Chinese New Year Parade" more than a bunch of dudes in kilts playing their bagpipes? Really?

It was fun to do at least once in our lives, especially since you never know when you'll be able to go to a Chinese New Year parade again!

Friends Don't Let Friends Do What???

Sooooo, this is my friend Amy. She's pretty awesome on Rock Band!

And this is the fun we had on New Year's Eve.

Enjoy!!!