The cat's out of the bag

Hi all, if you've already noticed my ticker, I'm sure you know the secret that is no longer a secret.

We're having another baby! Yay!

I'll be 12 weeks along on tomorrow, which means only 6 more months to go. I've had some nausea and I've been really tired, but otherwise things are going very well for me. We had our first ultrasound on June 25th and we were able to see our baby's heart beating. This is all very exciting for us and I'm glad that my secret is out finally. You don't know how hard it was for me to keep this a secret so long. But now, everyone can know.

I'm due January 22nd. Which means another winter baby.

Raleigh doesn't yet understand, but we're thinking that he will once my belly starts to grow a bit more. Speaking of my belly, yes I'll be posting belly pics again so that you can see the progress.

One thing's for sure, I'm not going to have bangs this time around. I'm hoping to take advantage of how well my hair grows during pregnancy so that I can donate my hair to Locks of Love.

4th of July weekend

Happy 4th of July everyone! Sorry, it's taken me so long to post. Thursday, we drove to Detroit Lakes to meet with two of my good friends, Kerry and Jamie S.

Raleigh enjoyed playing on the beach with his buckets.
We were able to see pan fish right from the shore. Raleigh enjoyed that almost as much as Josh did.
After DL, we continued the drive to my parents and like usual, I spotted some beautiful lady slippers in the ditch on the way there.
Every 4th of July, when we make the drive from Fargo to Cohasset, I see Lady Slippers. I was able to take some great pictures.

I'll post more pics of the weekend at my parents in a few days.

Normalness

Last weekend we were at home. Oh, how nice it was to have a weekend at our house.  Saturday it rained, and we made up for our boredom by going to see

Wall-E the movie. It was Raleigh's first movie and he did so well. Of course he had popcorn and fruit punch and fruit snacks to tide him over when he got bored. He made it all the way to the end with only 1 minute to go.

He's starting to put two words together now. He says, "Momma go?" when he want's to know where I went. He says, "I sorry" when he bumps into things.  His vocabulary his exponentially increased over the last few weeks.

He has also started liking choo choo trains...specifically Thomas the train.  He says "choo ch chain" and he says "stomats" for Thomas. It's cute.

Here are some pics of him playing with this train set.

Community picnics are crowded but fun

Last night Josh, Raleigh and I attended our city's community picnic sponsored by our Police Dept.

There were Gyros, and Hamburgers, and other goodies. Free ice cream sandwiches and free chips, and pop or bottled water for only 50 cents. YUM!

Raleigh was able to enjoy his first ice cream sandwich. See proof below.

He also jumped in one of those inflatable bouncy things for the first time.

At first, he was all by himself. And boy was he brave just bouncing around by himself.

As soon as other kids entered, he stayed on all fours.

Camping at Maplewood State Park

Maplewood State Park will always be near and dear to our hearts. It was the place where Josh and I went camping 3-4 times in the first summer that we were dating.

Since, then, we've been back loads of times, and we are always excited when we can share it with our friends and family.  This time we shared it with Chelsea, who had never been there before and Jamie.

Look at this great picture of them enjoying the scenery.

Here are some pictures of Raleigh playing in Lake Lida.

Above: Raleigh wading through the water.

Below: Josh and Jamie stomping on the boat to make a beat. Raleigh was grooving.

Above: Raleigh surprised to be sitting in the water.

Below: Josh, Raleigh and I after a hike to the look out.

Below: Josh, Raleigh and I at the same location last September.

Weekend in Cohasset

Above: Raleigh pointing to one of Grandpa Dave's many apple trees.

Below: Raleigh and a rare lilac delicacy

 

Above: Raleigh on Uncle Ryan's Three Wheeler.

Below: Raleigh and his Momma at Tioga Beach

Above: Raleigh at 18 1/2 months.

Below: Sam, Raleigh's youngest cousin, at 16 1/2 months.

Badminton, Bubbles, and Raking

As an apology for not posting sooner, here's three cute clips of Raleigh from this spring.

We attempted to camp

Ok, so we drove 45 minutes away to our favorite state park last night after I got home from work. Josh has been excited for this weekend all week because of the camping.

Josh packed the food, tent, sleeping bags, and other important camping stuff.

I came home from work, and I packed Raleigh's clothes and my clothes.

The drive out was great, we talked and listened to music, and Raleigh was mostly behaved in the back seat.

We registered for the campsite that we reserved. When we got to the site, we began unpacking.  Guess what we forgot? The tent poles. It's pretty hard to put up a tent when there are no tent poles.

So, went for a hike, and made a fire, and then we stopped at a local ice cream shop to treat our sorrows away. And then we drove home.

Below are some quik snaps of Raleigh playing on our new chair. You can see part of the matching sofa next to it.

Playing in the pool

Last Sunday it was nice enough out for us to fill up Raleigh's pool. You can see by the pictures below that Raleigh had a whole lot of fun.

Above: Raleigh testing his skills as a fireman.

Below: Just hamming it up for the camera.

Below: Attempting to drink lemonade from my empty lemonade can.

Trip to Yunker Farm

We visited  Yunker Farm yesterday. It's an educational farm for young kids. We ended up buying a year membership.

Raleigh simulated milking a cow.

He was able to listen to the ocean in a seashell.

He attempted to place Mongolia back where it belongs; between Russia and China.

He also saw himself in a very large mirror.