Happy Halloween to all!

Ethan was so excited to be Curious George for Halloween that he thought it would be a good idea to wake up at 5:30am! :-) We had a busy, but pretty good Halloween. Ethan and I went to a Halloween party this morning at his friend, Liam's house. Ethan really enjoyed hanging out and showing off for the ladies. At the water table he showed Linnaea, Ashleigh, and Abbie just how hard boys can splash and had to show the adorable Audrey (in pig tails) how strong he really is! We will be in trouble when he is a teenager!! He did not want to wear his Curious George hat, but didn't mind the rest of his costume.

This afternoon we had my second OB appointment. My midwife said everything looks good and the three of us got to hear the heart beat for the first time. Ethan actually thought that was pretty cool. The baby had a really strong heart beat, but it took her a minute or two to find it because he/she was sitting pretty low in my pelvis. I started feeling the baby move when we were on vacation, mainly at night when I am finally "resting" from the day. My next appt is on December 1st and we will get to see the little one on ultrasound. I am tired (some days more than others), but overall feeling pretty good. God has truly blessed me with an easy pregnancy thus far. I know Ethan doesn't grasp that he is going to be a big brother yet, but if you ask him to say "hi" to the baby he will rub my tummy and say "hi". It is so adorable!

Tonight we have a low key evening at home. Ethan is having a blast opening the door for the trick or treaters (maybe next year we will actually go around the neighborhood)!

Hope everyone has a safe Halloween and wonderful weekend!

At home is where your story begins...

I didn’t know what guilt was until I became a mother, it is really unbelievable how much mothers really carry around with them in their hearts. I have tremendous guilt about raising Ethan and this next baby here in Florida, away from our family and friends. I know much of this is brought on by myself, but some of it is brought on by family and friends that don’t intend to put that burden on me, but miss and love us so much that they can’t help but can’t help but share their opinions/feelings.

I had the opportunity to reflect on this several times during our visit to our previous homes in Minnesota and Iowa over the last few weeks. But it was a passing comment that Jared made when we visited Des Moines that stuck with me. We drove past our old "home" and Jared said "there are a lot of memories in that house". Funny thing when you put it in perspective Jake and I lived in that house a very short period of time (less than 2 years), but what he said was so true. That house contains in it to this day many, many memories...Halloween parties, my infamous b-day party that resulted in "Megan and Andrew", bringing our puppy "Visken" home for the first time, the cleaning that took place when we moved in, etc. etc. It wasn't the quantity of time we had in that house, but the quality of of time we spent in that "home" at 1444 43rd Street in Des Moines.

I hope and pray that Ethan and his brother or sister will learn that it is not the quantity of time you have with people, but the quality that creates memories. That traditions are more important than gifts (because in all honesty I have a tough time remembering what I got for gifts for any holiday last year). I promise to do my very best as their mother to help them know our family and friends, but it is ultimately up to them to nurture that relationship.

So....like it or not welcome to our home in Gainesville, Florida and not the one that is made up for company, but our honest and everyday home. Yes, we have weeding to do outside, dishes piled up by the sink, laundry piled high on the dining room table, beds unmade, and toys everywhere. There are things in this house you will never see in pictures though...lots of love and many, many memories. I have no idea how long we will live here or where God will call us to next, but I am truly grateful for our beautiful home, for the friends that we have made here, for the memories in this house, for our favorite places in the area, for the warm sunshine, etc. etc. This is our current "home" and "At home is where your story begins..."

Day 23...Home Sweet Home!

We had a fairly short drive from Pensacola to Gainesville, took us about 6 hours with a stop for lunch in FSU country (Tallahassee). I don't know why it is the closer to home you get though the longer it seems to take. We arrived home finally at 3:30pm (EST). Ahhhh, it is so good to be home! Ethan was so excited to be home that he didn't want to go inside and played outside for a good 20 minutes before finally deciding to go in. Once he finally did get inside we really didn't need to entertain him much as he was quite happy to play with the toys he hadn't seen in 3 weeks and chase Visken and Suzie (our clean house was destroyed in a matter of minutes). Well tomorrow is a crazy day as it is back to work for Jake and MOPS for us (hopefully E won't be a bear in the morning since he has converted his sleeping schedule to CST)!!

Thanks to everyone we visited along the way for your hospitality and companionship. We truly enjoyed seeing all of you...and we are very sorry for those that we missed on this trip. It seems no matter how long we are there we can't manage to squeeze everyone in. (Winter is coming though...and the weather is usually beautiful in Florida in the winter....hint, hint!)

Love to you all!

Day 22...Pensacola Beach

We spent the morning walking along the beach picking up sea shells and digging in the sand. Ethan is totally into digging in any form of dirt these days so he was in heaven in the world's largest sand box. He felt the need to lick the sand on a number of occasions, not sure what that was all about. The afternoon (nap time) was spent watching the Gators cream Kentucky...Go Gators! Then it was back outside to the super awesome kiddy pool. Our hotel has a fairly large pool that is 1/2-1 foot deep with all kinds of cool fountains and sprinklers. In a way I wished we could stay here longer, it is so peaceful and gorgeous, but I am more than ready to be home. I am exhausted and looking forward to sleeping in my own bed...and I truly can't wait to be back in a routine again. Hopefully someday we will be able to come back to Pensacola Beach!

Day 21...Olive Branch, MS (Memphis, TN) to Pensacola, FL!

We spent the day driving through much of Mississippi, what beautiful country we saw today. The weather was foggy and misty in the morning, but cleared off nicely around noon. We continued our geocaching today and after finding a couple of caches in Alabama...we successfully completed our goal of finding a cache in all the states we drove through which was 12! Ethan had a meltdown at Cracker Barrel in Jackson, MS causing us to leave after getting our drinks. I think he was over tired and in all honesty ready to be home. He was a trooper the rest of the day though and took over a 3 hour nap in the afternoon. He is funny because when you are waiting for traffic (like stopped at a stop light) he will frequently say "set, go". We arrived in Pensacola, Florida around 7pm (EST).

Day 19 and 20...Elvis!

We continued our drive south to Memphis, TN on Day 19...uneventful driving with some geocaching along the way. We woke up the next morning however to it pouring (and I really mean pouring). Our plan was to spend that day going to Graceland and seeing the sights in Memphis. We were able to make it to Graceland, which was really cool and fun to see and then decided that since the weather was bad we would spend the afternoon at the Children's Museum so Ethan would have a place to play. Ethan absolutely loved the Children's Museum, I think it was one of his highlights of the trip. We had to pull him away literally kicking and screaming. It got me dreaming again about starting a Children's Museum in Gainesville. Hmmm, I think I may need to do some serious looking into that when we get home. Unfortunately we didn't get to walk around downtown Memphis, which I think would've been a lot of fun but we had a great day despite all the rain. Of course we forgot the camera at the hotel that morning, but with all the rain it was probably safer for our camera to spend the day in the room.

Day 18...Pepin, WI to Hannibal, MO (and Quincy, IL)

We woke up to frost on the car this morning (brrr!), so south we headed with our goal for the day being to make it to Hannibal, MO (home of Mark Twain). We had a nice day of driving and geocaching, fairly uneventful. We saw a camel in Missouri...yup, a camel and it was not my pregnancy brain. We had some delicious pizza along the way at a little diner in southern Iowa. Ethan as always was a trooper in the car. We arrived in Hannibal, but couldn't find a non-scary place to stay so we did a little back tracking to Quincy, IL. We found a beautiful Country Inn and Suites and were able to get some rest before heading off the next morning.