We celebrated Halloween and Eli was a dinosaur

I made way too much food on Thanksgiving despite being slightly nauseous from morning sickness that was lasting all damn day

Jason wrecked his bike

And broke his leg in such a manner that it required surgery

He’s been off work for 7 weeks, cuddling with “his only companion in sickness” Sophie.

We celebrated Christmas

And found out we’re having a baby girl

2009 turned into 2010

And this weekend Eli took his first train ride

Eli,

Despite your preference to referring to yourself that way, you are no longer Baby Eli. You are now 3 and you are  big boy. It’s hard for me to believe that another whole year of your life has gone by so quickly. Luckily I have some pictorial reminders of the way you were.

For your 2nd birthday party I picked out dinosaur decorations on a whim, you had shown some liking for dinosaurs after I bought you a copy of The Land Before Time. Eli, mommy did not know that you were going to become a dino-phile.

You wasted no time jumping into the “terrible” part of your twos.

Luckily you were so cute when not screaming that I decided to keep you around.

You decided it was very fun to hide in cabinets

And became very crafty about getting what you wanted. You do not take no for an answer very often.

Making mischief is very thirsty work

You decided you were very into drawing on walls. Even ones you shouldn’t like your bedroom or the living room. Mommy decided she loved Mr. Clean’s Magic Eraser.

You adored everything about early spring trips to the playground.

You got your very first haircut

and spent a lot of time practicing your dinosaur roar

Money started to hold a certain fascination

If you had some money of your own you might use it to buy ice cream

You still weren’t as tall as Uncle Marty

Even in the form of chalk

You had a lot of fun playing in your fire truck playhut

And getting hosed down made you giddy

By May your dinosaur obsession was in full swing, complete with multiple viewings of Jurassic Park and an insistence on sleeping with 5 or 6 dinos every night

You were my very best helper

In a step towards becoming a true Pittsburgher you had your very first smiley cookie and looked like the Joker for your efforts

Popsicles kept you cool during the hot summer months (yes I was a lot more lax about sweets this year, Eli. Something you surely appreciated)

And sometimes you’d still fall asleep in your stroller

Someone other than me taught you about water fountains and you surprised me with your skills.

Occasionally your look was a bit mad scientist

You made sure that your dinosaurs were never left behind while you were having fun

For Halloween you even rode one around the neighborhood. Your costume still ends up being your bedfellow most nights, you like me to tuck him under the covers with you.

At the Carnegie you got to practice for your future career as an archeologist

You very much loved digging for dinosaurs

This year you were very feisty.

These pictures of you napping are adorable but deceptive. You very very rarely sat still.

Being goofy was much more your style

This was the best Christmas yet as you were adorably into everything about it.

When you saw that Santa had come you actually gasped before digging into your pile.

Eli I cannot wait to see what 3 holds for you.So far every age has been my favorite age and I don’t expect that to change anytime soon.  This is the year you become a big brother and I’m sure baby sister will adore you as much as mommy and daddy do. You are the funniest, sweetest, smartest, naughtiest, most stubborn little boy I’ve ever met, and I would not want you any other way.

I know I haven’t blogged in ages and ages and a lot has happened that merits writing about; but today I’m blogging to post these two links

http://emilycleone.blogspot.com/2008/02/happy-birthday-baby-elijah.html

http://emilycleone.blogspot.com/2009/02/2.html

Unbelievably my little guy turns 3 today! 3! I have no idea how that happened at all. Tomorrow I’ll post a picture blog and then hopefully get around to a catch up blog after that. Until then marvel in the cuteness that came before.

5 weeks, just a sac, as the arrow handily shows you.

See that splotch? Just like the arrow says it’s a baby and it has a wee heartbeat.

Today at 7 weeks, look at that little splotch grow! That’s baby buttercup.

I graduated today so likely these will be the last baby pics until we find out what we’re having. It feels like a girl to me, but it could just be wishful gender thinking.

I pulled out a plain green striped shirt to put on Eli today and upon seeing it he shouted “A dinosaur shirt! Eli’s a baby dinosaur!” He has taken to running around the house singing “Eli’s a dinosaur!” It’s unbearably cute.

The other baby dinosaur is doing well too, I hit 7 weeks 1 day tomorrow and if everything looks normal on my sonogram I graduate to the regular OB instead of the endocrinologist. I’ll miss getting a sneak peek once a week, but will be happy to feel like this baby is staying in there for the long haul.

In the past year and half since we started seriously trying to get pregnant I have obsessively peed on about 100 pregnancy tests, no lie. And except for one dastardly false positive a few months back they all looked like this:

one sad, heartbreaking little line. So last Monday night when I took a test and got a very very very faint positive I was afraid to believe it. So I took another one, and another one and another one…

I called my doctor right away Tuesday morning and got in for blood work the same day. The biggest plus of going to the fertility specialist by far is the urgency with which they treat my neurosis, they never make me wait. That afternoon I got a call back with a positive result.

I am pregnant! It’s hard to express just how freaking over the moon happy I am to have a new little person taking root inside of me. Most of what I want to say just feels cliched so I’ll do this !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! That’s how I feel times about a million exclamation points. All the months of trying, all the whining and crying and feeling generally broken and useless were well worth it just to see double lines on that stick.

Tentative due date is 6/02/10, as I’m fairly certain conception occurred 9/09/09. I’ll have a more exact idea tomorrow afternoon since I’ll be getting my first sonogram. So far so good; my beta was 33 last Tuesday and today it’s 2,971! A very good jump that along with my incredibly sore boobs and slight over sensitivity and cramping has me pretty sure all is going well. We’re hoping for a girl, but I’m already thinking it’s a boy and have been referring to him as baby Jude in my head.

The strangest thing for me is imagining Eli as a big brother

Even though he is getting to be quite the big boy now

I imagine that there will be a good bit of sibling rivalry and anger over mommy’s divided attention; but I’m hopeful that eventually they’ll be friends. Or at least not try to murder each other.

This photo makes it look like winter is here, but it isn’t it’s still quite warm here I just like the AC on at night. But isn’t Elijah sweet in his footie pajamas? We stopped putting him in them because Jason said they made diaper changes a pain in the arse. I’m bringing them back now!

*text edited as I do not know my child’s gender

Mr. Tickle appears to be really into using the potty; you know who isn’t into using the potty? This guy:

Sometimes after his bath he’ll sit on it naked and we’ll make a big deal about it, but he’s yet to actually do anything. I’m not terribly upset (upset when washing poopy diapers) as he could well be my only baby and I’ll never get to diaper again.

Eli has been making definite progress in the speech area. We’ve had two full sentences

“No good dog, I eat!” When Sofie tried to steal his sandwich. He refers to all dogs as good dog, which is just A-dorable.

“Put more spongebob on!” Spongebob seems like a complicated kind of big word to me so I’m super impressed.

He also picked up, just this week, stay walk and bad. Yay for talking!

In other news I have a cold which I think is turning into an ear infection, so I’m a crank.

 

I am awful at blogging. I do have some new pictures to share though.

Eli got a much needed haircut!

taking Sofie for a run and looking very much like a grown up.

Best buddies

Funny funny guy

His first trip to Chuck E. Cheese on Sunday, he was very into it.

He was a perpetual motion machine.

I currently have a head cold and feel like I’m sleep walking but I promise a post with actual text coming soon.

Oh Pittsburgh, I couldn’t possibly love you more.