It's A...

BOY!!!


And not surprisingly, I'm a little late getting this post up since Matthew was born about three weeks ago, but hey--I'm getting it posted before his one month update, so that counts for something, right?

But before I delve into Matthew's birth story, I have a few "back story" bits of information to share (and I promise to throw a few pictures in as well since that's probably all you are here for anyway)

Backstory One: When I was pregnant with Garrett, my doctor brought up getting induced. I was 41 weeks and 5 days and rationally I knew the induction conversation was coming, but I still remember leaving that appointment in near tears. Labor was something that was supposed to happen on its own, and it felt like I had failed because I needed to be induced. Add to that all the horror stories you hear about inductions--the contractions being worse, the increased likelihood of needing a c-section, etc--and it's safe to say I was pretty much a wreck the rest of that day. Fortunately, Garrett ended up coming on his own (and in relatively quick fashion!) later that night, so I didn't actually need the induction (full birth story here). Fast forward 2.5 years later and the same situation presented itself with Connor; while I was a little more mentally prepared to schedule an induction, I was still dreading it and was equally glad when he came on his own the day before the induction was scheduled (although I was not glad that we almost didn't make it to the hospital for his delivery--full story here).

Backstory Two: When I found out we were pregnant with Matthew, I called my OB to schedule my first appointment only to find out he had retired. We weren't terribly surprised by this, but it kind of put us in a pinch for finding a new one. After some recommendations from a few trusted friends, we picked a new OB and scheduled our first appointment. At that appointment, she asked about my previous pregnancies and deliveries, so we shared with her all the quick and chaotic details about Garrett's and Connor's births. She chuckled a little over the craziness of their deliveries, and immediately followed up with a comment that she would like to see this baby born in a much more controlled environment, perhaps by breaking my water at one of my last appointments and then sending me over to the hospital to be admitted. Darrell immediately jumped at this plan (the prospect of having to "catch" the baby terrified him), and I was surprised to realize that I was also okay with this plan.

Backstory Three: At Christmas with my mom's family, my sister and I got to talking with some of our female cousins about babies and labor and delivery. My sister was sharing about the birth of her second child and how she was supposed to be induced with him (mostly due to gestational diabetes) but that she complained enough to the doctors and nurses at her induction appointment that the rescheduled the induction for the following week and she went into labor naturally before then. She then proceeded to basically bad-talk inductions and all the issues/problems with them, and after a few minutes of this she turned to me and halfheartedly apologized because she had forgotten that I was planning to be induced. I laughed a little bit, and responded with "Let's have this conversation again after you've almost delivered a baby in the car and we'll see if you still feel the same way about inductions"

Now the fun (and actually relevant) part. At my 37 week appointment, my OB went ahead and scheduled my induction for a few weeks later when I would be 39+2. She had said from the start that she was never going to let me go past my due date, and my gestational diabetes diagnosis pretty much solidified that the induction would happen sooner than later in my 39th week. Despite my rationalizations that an induction made the most sense and was ultimately the safest choice for me and the baby, I still had a fair amount of doubt and reservations in the days leading up to the induction. Nevertheless, we showed up at 7:00 on our scheduled day to get things going. I'd had been dilated since my 37 week appointment, and was up to 4 cm that morning, which was a good start to the induction. By the time they got all the monitors set up and everything ready to go, it was probably around 7:30 when they started the pitocin. Despite all the horror stories, I didn't really feel anything, and Darrell and I proceeded to walk laps around the labor and delivery wing. Every 30 minutes or so we had to report back to our room so they could increase my pitocin, and it was at one of these "checks" that our decision to have an induction was solidified. The nurse was adjusting my monitor and asked how I was managing the contractions. I responded that I hadn't really been feeling any, at which point she looks up at me (hands still on my belly) and says "well, you're having one right now". I laughed a little and joked "well, I guess I'm managing them fine then!". She then checked the record on the monitor and told us that my contractions were coming about 3.5 minutes apart. At that point, Darrell remarked that he was so glad we were already at the hospital, and I must say, I had to agree. We continued our walking routine until 9:15 when my OB came to break my water. I was warned that the contractions would likely start to pick up soon, and sure enough, around 9:50 I had my first "real" contraction that I could identify the beginning and end of. At this point we were still walking laps as best we could, but I was also stopping in the room more frequently to sit on the birthing ball for a little bit. It was on the birthing ball (probably around 10:30) that I had my first contraction that I couldn't easily breathe or talk through, at which point Darrell immediately called for the nurses (he had been instructed to do that; for some crazy reasons the nurses didn't exactly trust my ability to be able to recognize what was happening in my body and they wanted to be sure that I actually had my baby in the room and not in the hallway or something). They had me get in the bed so they could check me, and I was nearly at 8cm. I immediately asked if it was too late for an epidural, and the nurse laughed a little. When she realized I was serious she leveled with me--she told me that she would certainly call the anesthesiologist if I really wanted her to, but she felt fairly confident that if I could power through for another hour or so the baby would be here, versus running the risk of slowing things down by getting the epidural (or, even worse, getting everything prepped and ready for the epidural but then not being able to get it in before it was time to push). Darrell shared her sentiment, so power through I did. They were able to give me some sort of localized numbing shot into my cervix that was supposed to help numb the "ring of fire" sensation, although it's hard to say exactly how well that worked. After a few position changes (my cervix had a "lip" that was stuck and not moving out of the way), some seriously long contractions that made it really difficult for me to be able to figure out when to push, and some wonderful coaching from Darrell (a student was serving as primary "catch", and I think it was her first catch because she wasn't exactly giving me any cues to how baby was progressing, so thankfully Darrell stepped in to let me know where the head, shoulders, etc were), Matthew was born at 11:16 and I very happily solidified my status as "Boy Mom". The post-birth stuff was a little messy and they had to keep the pitocin going to force my uterus to contract back down (as well as give me some sort of shot in my leg to help with the bleeding), but it's amazing how much easier it is to tolerate those shots and stitches when you have the sweetest little baby on your chest to cuddle.

We've been loving life as a family of six, and I can pretty confidently say that our family is finally complete!

Connor’s Birth Story

If you’ve been reading this blog for any period of time (or have ever hung out with me in person), you’ve surely heard about the ridiculous ice storm William decided to be born during and the unexpectedly quick arrival Garrett chose to make. We were hoping Connor (aka BG3) would be a relatively normal and drama-free labor and delivery, although we joked that the “excitement” this time around would probably end up being something where I went into labor and then couldn’t get ahold of Darrell to get home from work. As it turns out, it’s a very good thing that didn’t end up being the case, because once Connor decided to come, he came in a hurry. And despite our best intentions to not make the same “mistake” twice, we discovered that it was possible for labor and delivery to go more quickly (and chaotically!) than it had with Garrett.

On Thursday the 14th, I had my weekly check-up with my OB. I was 41 weeks and 4 days, and feeling more than ready to have the baby; in fact, I’d been telling people that I assumed my doctor would schedule my induction for the following day (and was kind of hoping that he would). However, he was willing to give my body an extra day to go into labor on its own, and scheduled the induction for Saturday, although he candidly told me that he didn’t expect me to make it that long. Even though I was dilated to 3cm (like I had been with Garrett), I tried not to get my hopes up and mentally prepared myself to be pregnant for at least 24 more hours.

The rest of the day was uneventful and I felt perfectly normal. Darrell and I briefly debated having the boys stay at my parent’s house overnight, but ultimately decided that since I hadn’t been having contractions and since my parents would have them for at least two nights while we were in the hospital that we would keep them at home Thursday night, but plan on them staying with my parents starting Friday night. Well, sure enough, not more than ten minutes after we put the boys to bed (around 8:00), I started having contractions. However, I’d been having Braxton-Hicks pretty consistently for the weeks leading up to (and past) my due date, and the contractions weren’t painful in the least, so I didn’t say anything right away because I wasn’t convinced I was actually in labor. Around 10:00, I finally told Darrell that I was pretty sure I’d been having contractions, but I’d only had six or seven in those two hours and was having no issue walking/talking through them, so I didn’t think it was anything major. We considered calling my parents to give them a heads up, but decided it wasn’t worth putting them on alert for what very likely could be a false alarm. We did, however, decide to pack all our stuff in the van, because we figured if we didn’t end up going in that night we’d likely be going in the next day, or Saturday at the latest. Then, around 10:30, we headed to bed, figuring that we might as well get whatever sleep we could (ironically, Darrell’s last words to me were “I don’t know how you expect me to sleep when you just told me that you *might* be in labor” and I reassured him that if I feel asleep then he should also sleep without having anything to worry about).

A little before 11:45 I woke up feeling like I had to go to the bathroom, which at that point in my pregnancy was nothing unusual. However, the pain and discomfort I was having while trying to go was definitely new. I’ll admit that I wasn’t fully awake and aware of what was going on (which Darrell still thinks is just ludicrous, given how far overdue I was), and I probably sat in the bathroom for at least five minutes trying to go and figure out why it was so painful. In fact, when I first called to Darrell telling him to call my folks to come over to the house, I still wasn’t associating the pain as being labor pains, but it was bad enough I wanted to go in to the hospital anyway (in my defense, the pain was pretty much entirely in my bottom area, not in my abdominal area, which is why I initially didn’t think they were contractions). Darrell was a little groggy and slow-moving at first, but by this point I was out of the bathroom and it took just one look at me for him to realize how serious I was. So at 11:55, he made the (first) call to my parents (who thankfully answered right away).

After that, things get a little foggy for me. I know I made Darrell help me change out of my nightgown and into athletic shorts and a tank top (I was concerned about being immodest in my slightly too short nightgown) and I know we made very slow progress out to and into the car, despite Darrell’s best efforts to make me move quickly, especially in between the contractions (although candidly, we weren't exactly dealing with a lot of "in between" time). At some point Darrell called my parents again to make sure someone was on their way, because he was going to go get a neighbor if they weren't, but my dad assured us that my mom was coming. So Darrell called her (while we were sitting in the car in the street), found out she was only five blocks from the house, and promptly left, knowing she'd be at the house soon (and the boys were sleeping, so it made no difference to them). To put the next part of the story into perspective, that phone call happened at 12:10, and (spoiler!) Connor was born at 12:25.

The drive to the hospital was ridiculously uncomfortable for me (probably because I was basically sitting on Connor's head), but thankfully pretty short (we only live 3.5 miles from the hospital, and because of the time of night we had the right of way on pretty much all the traffic signals so we didn't have to wait for other cars. And Darrell was speeding, of course). We pulled up to the ER entrance of the hospital and Darrell immediately ran in to get me a wheelchair. The gal at the front desk tried to get our information to get us registered, but I'm pretty sure the only thing Darrell said to her was "my wife is in labor" before he ran back outside. A security guard (casually) came out to the car to help Darrell, and when I had a contraction while getting out of the car I grabbed on to his arm. At that point I think he realized the urgency of the situation (apparently his eyes got huge), and when we got back inside the receptionist tried again to get our information, but I had another contraction and said screamed that I needed to push, at which point she jumped on the phone and told labor and delivery that they needed to send a nurse our wayimmediately (to the defense of the ER staff, they probably get the "I'm in labor" statement frequently and the women are usually not nearly as progressed as I was. In fact, the labor and delivery nurses told us later they'd had a pregnant woman come in a few hours prior to us dealing with labor pains, but it ended up being false labor. So I don't blame the ER for not immediately treating the situation as urgent. We're just grateful they let us leave the van outside the ER entrance--engine running and doors open--until Darrell was able to get back downstairs after Connor was born). At one point I tried to climb out of the wheelchair during a contraction (while Darrell was running through the hospital, mind you) because I just couldn't bear sitting, so the security guard had to help hold me in the wheelchair. We met the labor and delivery nurse in the elevator and she tried to joke with Darrell about the fact that he had gotten me a "bad" wheelchair (the one she had was quite a bit bigger, but there was no way I was going to move), but once she watched me have a contraction she dropped her casual banter and kicked it into gear. In fact, as we were running into labor and delivery, the receptionist there also tried to get our information to get us checked in, and this time the nurse was the one who shouted at her "no time!" and directed us into the room while also shouting for the other nurses and OBGYN on the floor to get into the room.

The next few minutes are a blur. I know my water broke as I was getting out of the wheelchair, and Darrell and the nurse were helping me into the bed while simultaneously getting my shorts off so I would be ready to deliver. A nurse did check me to see what my progress was, and she declared that my cervix was "gone" (aka completely dilated and fully effaced). At 12:22, they finally got us registered in the system because Darrell was stationary long enough to answer their questions regarding my name and other vitals (although we didn't get the "consent to treat" paperwork signed until after Connor was born. Whoops). I remember the on-call OB commanding me to make eye contact with her while she gave me instructions about when and how to push, and I know I was grateful that I was no longer sitting and that someone was actually telling me what to do and giving me the okay to push (and for the record, I didn't once ask for an epidural or anything. I was pretty aware before we even got to the hospital that I was past that point. I was just so glad to be delivering at the hospital that I didn't really care about the pain). At some point one of the nurses called my OB, and he was given the message that his patient was here and she was crowning (shockingly, he didn't make it in time for the delivery, although he was there pretty shortly after the birth, which was impressive). And then, a mere three or four contractions after we made it into the birthing room, Connor was born.

It was wild, it was crazy, and it was certainly chaotic, but that's our story and I kind of love it. Just like I love this sweet little face...

And my sweet little family

Beach Weeks

So apparently having two kids and busy summers means I no longer get around to blogging about our beach trips with Darrell's family. And I'm fairly certain 90% of the reason I made a point to blog about our trip in 2014 is that we took some pictures on that trip to use in our announcement of my pregnancy with Garrett. But, rest assured, even though posts haven't happened, the trips (and the fun!) still have. And I decided that instead of racking my brain and trying to recap this year's trip (or, even worse, last year's trip), I'm just going to share a photo from each year I've been there. Darrell's been going since he was a wee one (minus a few years where he was away at college or working at summer camp), but my first trip was in 2007--we haven't missed one since.

A couple of babies in 2007!

No picture together this year, but Darrell did manage to snap this very artistic picture of a seashell

In 2009 we had some fun taking engagement photos on the beach (nothing professional, of course--just Darrell's sister with his camera!)

We were apparently burned out from wedding photos at the beach in 2010, because we didn't take a single picture together. I had to steal this photo with us in the background from Darrell's sister (and let's be honest, our nephew is way cuter than we are anyway)

A selfie off the pier in 2011!

Why take a picture of just the two of us when we can take one with our cute nephews?

First family photo at the beach in 2013

So this is the picture that almost wasn't... Darrell's sister and brother-in-law were helping us get the "perfect" photo to announce our second pregnancy, and I had them snap a family photo as well. What I didn't realize until months later (#pregnancybrain) was that Darrell's brother-in-law had actually taken the family photo on his phone, not our camera. I was in tears (#hormones) because I was convinced they wouldn't still have the photo and our tradition of getting a family photo on the beach was going to be ruined after just one year. But thankfully, here the picture is. In all its glory. (I should note that we do, in fact, have other pictures of the three of us from this year, but this was the only one of us on the actual beach. Which, for the sake of the "tradition" that I had convinced myself we were starting, mattered.)

Family of four in 2015!

LOVE!!

Of course, now that I've gone and done this post, I don't know what I'll do next year for my 10th anniversary of beach trips. Maybe I'll make the post in a timely manner and actually recap our week... But that seems pretty ambitious.

Reality

When you've spent most of June sick and most of July traveling (or preparing to travel), it's only fitting that you decide to go on an impromptu three-hour road trip the first weekend in August. Because life just hasn't been crazy enough. Don't get me wrong--we had really good reason to go--it was just a little crazy. But I'm pretty sure that's just the norm for life these days...

My brother's baseball team, whom we love to support even if we don't get to as many games as we used to (darn 7:30 start times), was playing in the District Tournament for a chance at a berth to the State Tournament. So we decided to go. Spoiler: they didn't advance and we don't actually have any pictures to prove that we watched two baseball games. Moving on...

The city that was hosting the games is also home to the "famed" Storybook Land, home of the roller coaster to ride in South Dakota (at least according to a recent parenting magazine I read). I'm pretty sure it won that distinction because it is the only roller coaster in the state, but whatever. The whole park is very family orientated, including the coaster, so William actually got to ride on it with Grandma.

He was pretty tense the whole time and didn't really seem to enjoy himself, but he didn't scream or cry--and he even smiled when he got off (although that might have been from relief more than excitement). I'm guessing it will be awhile before he agrees to go on a roller coaster again though.

The park also had a really cool swing that allowed parents to swing with their children--we've never seen anything like it before and it makes me wonder why. It was pretty cool.

Now, if you're thinking "a cool park plus a few baseball games doesn't seem like that bad of a way to spend a weekend", you'd mostly be right. Because we definitely had enough fun to justify the six+ hours in the car. But here's what hasn't been mentioned: having all four of us stay in a single hotel room. We get spoiled when we visit Darrell's family because we rarely, if ever, have to stay in a hotel, and outside of those trips we don't do a ton of overnight trips (at least ones where we don't have someone's house to stay at). So when both boys are asleep by 8:30 and all Darrell and I want to do is have a late dinner, drink a few beers, and watch NCIS... We end up in the bathroom.

Candidly, it wasn't awful, as long as you aren't a major germaphobe or something (which we obviously aren't). But it definitely left us strategizing how to make hotel stays more enjoyable, especially if our family continues to grow in size. I'm thinking we should look into getting a suite--or at least making sure to remember to get the key to my parent's hotel room, which was right across the hall. Live and learn, right?

Memorial Day Fun

Guess what? I actually have quite a few pictures to share from the weekend (although let's be serious--I stole most of them from my friends off Facebook)! So rather than bore you with my mindless babble, I'm just going to let the pictures do the talking.

Loaded up the car Friday afternoon to head up to the Cities for a reunion with a bunch of my high school friends. This was the trunk before the cooler and pillows got added. Van shopping is definitely going to begin soon!

These boys were troopers in the car. Thank goodness for libraries and bags of "new" books to help keep them entertained!

What do you do when you are staying with parents of a friend who don't have any grandkids yet? Bring your own (borrowed) train set to help keep you kids entertained!

Our whole group of girls (including the one absent member Facetiming with us on my cell phone). We've been friends since at least high school, in some cases as early as elementary school

All of the spouses and kids that are now part of our group!

Saturday night the menfolk were nice enough to give the ladies a night out, which included a delicious dinner, tasty gelato, and a nice stroll in downtown Minneapolis

Sunday it was time for a barbeque. The middle picture is five of the six kids that were born in 2015, with birthdays ranging from February to December.

The unexpected "fun" of the weekend was leaving Minneapolis at 9:00 Sunday night so we could drive back to Sioux Falls in time for Darrell's parade Monday morning. Let's just say it was a miscommunication that was 100% Darrell's fault, but thanks to plenty of caffeine it all worked out fine

Silver lining of our little miscommunication was that we got to spend more time at the lake than we had initially planned on. The boys were definitely happy about that.

Someone even got to drive the boat!



I still get exhausted just thinking about the weekend, but it was so, so, so wonderful. I'm tempted to say that I wish every weekend could be like the one we just had, but I don't think my body could handle that much excitement and busyness (and the amount of caffeine necessary to keep up with everything!) that frequently. They sure are nice once in a while though!

Weekend Productivity

Proof that we had a crazy busy productive weekend? It took me (and the boys) all day Monday to recover from it, which is why I am just now getting around to share a little bit about it. And it doesn't help that this week is also going to be pretty busy, so even once I did manage to get both of the boys to bed Monday night (solo, I might add, since Darrell was at a meeting) I had to spend the rest of the night cleaning and doing dinner prep for the week (which, despite our productivity over the weekend, didn't happen Sunday night because #anniversary. But I'm getting ahead of myself...)

Friday night was nothing remarkable--we grilled, we played, we lounged, we amped ourselves up for the weekend ahead. Saturday was when the real fun got started. After a fairly leisurely morning (minus the 30 minutes I was outside running), my parents picked up William to take him to an event hosted by the YMCA, which was our cue to get busy. Darrell started power-washing the deck, I started planting the garden, and Garrett roamed around in the backyard playing with his toys and trying to "help" me in the garden. Before long it was lunch and nap time for the little one, followed closely by nap time for the bigger one once Grandma and Grandpa brought him home. After a long couple of hours, Darrell finally finished power washing, and I was able to get the rest of my seeds planted. Then it was time to prep for arguably the best part of our weekend: dinner at a nearby state park. The Game, Fish, and Park Association was hosting a free fishing weekend, and while we weren't interested in the fishing aspect, we were all about taking advantage of the fact that entrance fees to the parks were being waived due to the fishing festivities. So, after naps, we loaded up the boys, a cooler, and wood for a fire (which--just because it's too funny not to share--when we were getting the wood and explaining to William that we were going to cook dinner over a fire, he immediately followed it with "and marshmallows?" Definitely my kid) and made the quick drive to the nearest state park (only twenty minutes away, although there are two others that are only about thirty minutes away). We've never actually camped at the park and didn't really know what to expect, but it was just what were hoping for: an open grass area with a playground for playing, fire rings with nearby picnic tables for dinner, and even a trail for a little hiking. Needless to say, the boys loved it--and Darrell loved getting his big-boy camera out for the first time in a long time to document the fun.

It was a pretty quick turnaround to bed time once we got home, and then Darrell and I had quite a bit of clean up to do despite the fact that we'd been gone less than four hours. But it was well worth it.

Sunday was our six year wedding anniversary, and we had a whole day of nothing planned. Which, of course, turned in to us being plenty busy, although Sundays always feel that way. We have a little bit of downtime in the morning, but then church, lunch, and nap go bang, bang, bang, so it feels like all of the sudden it's after one and we have no idea where the day has gone. I escaped to Target during nap time to run some errands by myself (nothing says "happy anniversary" like going to the store alone!) while Darrell wrangled a particular three-year-old who thought he didn't need to take a nap. The rest of the afternoon was spent outside--mowing, more planting, and playing--followed by homemade pizza for dinner, much needed baths and then bedtime for two little boys, and crashing on the couch for some NCIS. There were definitely things that needed to get done to prep for the week (hence yesterday being so busy), but since it was our anniversary we decided to treat ourselves and forego our normal Sunday responsibilities (and yes, apparently we're that old married couple that considers a few TV shows and a bottle of wine "celebrating").

We definitely needed a productive weekend like we had to get our outdoors ready for the summer season, and thankfully we were able to pack enough fun in to still make it feel (a little bit) like we celebrated our anniversary (although we make it a point to celebrate our love/marriage on a regular basis, so we don't hype our actual anniversary up too much #clichébutitstrue). We still have our "real" celebration in the works--our annual winery visit--although looking at our calendars it doesn't look too promising that we'll fit it in anytime soon!

Apple Orchard... Er, Pumpkin Patch Fun

So last weekend we decided to (finally!) head to the apple orchard that we've visited the past handful of years. William was super excited to pick apples because he remembered doing that on our trip to Omaha. We were all set for a fun Saturday morning... Until we got to the orchard and they informed us that there were no longer apples on the trees. Rant: Admittedly, I had worried that might be the case--it was pretty late in the season and we'd already had a mild frost. But, I had diligently been checking the website and Facebook page for the orchard, and there had been NOTHING to indicate that the apple-picking season was over. I heard at least five other groups go up to the counter asking for apple bags as well, so we weren't the only ones who thought apples would still be available to pick. Needless to say, I was not impressed by the lack of updates (especially for poor William's sake), plus the person behind the counter informing people that there were no apples to pick had really bad customer service about the whole ordeal. Majorly soured our morning. Rant over.

Fortunately, the same orchard had a few pumpkin patches, with plenty of pumpkins still to choose from. William enjoyed picking out a pumpkin for himself and a pumpkin for Garrett (and then didn't notice when we swapped one of them for one that didn't have a hole in the bottom), plus we were still able to take a short ride on the tractor, so the morning wasn't a total bust. He did have a minor meltdown when we left and kept asking "Where apples go?", which made Darrell and I feel really guilty. Darrell did spot a tree with apples as we were driving away, so he jumped out of the car and pulled one down for William to eat on the way home, which seemed to be more than enough to make him happy. Plus, once we got home, we had the added fun of decorating the pumpkins!

It wasn't exactly the day we had envisioned, and it definitely took a conscious effort on our part not to let the incident at the orchard ruin our whole day, but I'm proud to say we all went to bed Saturday night feeling pretty darn content. And I even remembered to take (a few) pictures!

Doing our best to enjoy the chilly tractor ride

Tried to get a decent picture of the boys at the little photo staging area. There's always next year, right?

All that remained of the apple Darrell grabbed for William. Needless to say, he most the most out of the one apple he got

William painting his pumpkin

Daddy decorating Garrett's pumpkin

Token photo of Garrett with his pumpkin

The finished products! (I'll take all the credit for the ideas--Darrell gets all the credit for the execution. We make a pretty good team.)

Note: Wordless Wednesday is on temporary hiatus until further notice. My phone and iPad have decided to stop wirelessly communicating with Blogger, which means that in order to get photos for the posts I'd actually have to (gasp!) hook my devices up using their USB cords. Momma ain't got time for that every week, so until I get the problem fixed I have no easy way to access my photos (plus I've been majorly slacking on taking pictures anyway). But I'll try not to let that keep me from posting altogether--and who knows, maybe this will inspire me to pull out our actual cameras more and take "real" pictures!

Weekending, Minneapolis Style

So I know it makes more sense to do my weekend recap at the beginning of the week and not the end of it, but hey--at least I'm getting it up before the next weekend starts (although not by much!)

We headed up to the great city of Minneapolis this past weekend, pretty much for no other reason than we could. When people asked why we were up there (which was just about everyone--apparently people with two kids can't just travel for the fun of it), we said it was to visit a friend who recently had a baby. While that was definitely a big motivator for making the trip--as was visiting the other family and friends we have in the Cities, it certainly wasn't the whole reason. Similar to our Omaha trip a few weeks ago, I mostly wanted to travel just for the sake of traveling. Just to prove--if to no one but ourselves--that we could still do (not-so-spontaneous) weekend trips with two kids. And I'm so glad we did, because we had such a wonderful--and yes, even relaxing--weekend.

Pretty much the only thing we actually had scheduled all weekend was head to Como Lake to meet up with our friends and their newborn for a walk. And while we failed to take any pictures of them and their sweet baby girl, we did have some fun snapping some photos of our boys enjoying the fall leaves.

We stayed with my aunt and uncle (who graciously watched the boys Saturday night so we could meet up with some friends for a drink!), and William was in heaven. He is all about trains right now, and was soooo excited to get their train set up (and Daddy may have had just a little bit of fun setting it up). Pretty much every waking moment at their house was spent playing with the trains--and even today he's still asking to go to Tom and Rose's to watch the trains more.