The Collage Box - A No TV Solution

Do you struggle with keeping your kiddos away from the TV or iPad? I do! Broadcast TV is never on until after Makenzie goes to bed but we have some PBS shows recorded on our DVR, okay "some" is understatement, 90% of our DVR is Barney, Curious George, Cat in the Hat, Super Why & Clifford, then there's the shows on Netflix and the Disney movies we've "borrowed" from my parents.

TV is such an easy fix. Got a nagging toddler while you're trying to make dinner? "Who wants to watch a show???" Need to get something cleaned and all you keep hearing is, "I just really want to watch a show!" "Okay, fine! A show it is!" Don't get me wrong, the TV is not on all day but I know I need, and still need, some more resources to default to when Makenzie is bored or wanting to watching a show.

Welcome to the collage box. It's my best idea yet! (See my notes below about adaptation for younger toddlers)

Makenzie doesn't like to color but she loves to draw, and glue and paint and create. So one day I thought I'm just going to raid all of my craft supplies and my junk drawer and see what I can throw in this box for her to glue. I just started throwing stuff in there, stickers, bits of tulle, bits of felt, pom poms, foam cut outs, paper cutouts, bits of silk plants I had left over, feathers, random markers, colored pencils, glitter glue, anything random that I could get my hands on.

I gave her a 12x12 piece of white paper a bottle of glue and all of the contents in the box. She was elated! She spent at least 30 minutes on her first creation, all the while talking about what she was doing, "Okay, this should go here because it's perfectly sparkly, and this round sing (thing) should go here because we love round sings." Seriously, I could listen to her talk to herself all day.

This was her first creation:

And here's another:

Now she wants to glue EVERYTHING! Dirk got a gift in a small cardboard box, Makenzie saw it and said, "Daddy, can I have that???" He gave the go ahead and it became this...

You never know what's going to be made into a creation in our house.

Do you have younger toddlers? Why not try using clear contact paper instead of glue and paper. You can tape the contact paper onto a table or window and allow your toddler to stick things to the sticky contact paper. No messy glue and no fuss with taking stickers off of the paper. An easy and less messy collage! :)

I love so many things about this:

• You can keep adding new and fresh items to keep the interest level high. 

• Pick up is so easy, even a toddler can do it, no seriously your toddler should clean it up because it's so easy. We literally just take everything that belongs in the collage box and throw it back in, put the lid on and put the box away for another day. 

• It boosts creativity. Makenzie is now looking at things as a way to make them art and asks if she can use all sorts of media that I wouldn't have thought of. Some of it is of course not stuff that she is able to cut and glue but others are great ideas! 

• You can take the box with you! We had an outside church event that was mostly for adults but kids were welcome. I brought the box with us and she was able to complete a quiet task and fully enjoy it. 

• A wide range of skills being practiced, especially fine motor: Exploring color combinations, using glue, learning to cut with scissors, exploring with writing utensils (chalk, pens, markers, crayons), and SO much more. 

• Language Development: when kids are left alone and their creative juices are flowing, they get into their own world. They are able to freely speak without anyone judging them or without any expectations. It's their time to just let go.

• Declutter: I get to declutter my house. As I find random things I think, "hmmm...would this be good for the collage box?" When someone gets her a little something, usually involving stickers, they all go right into the collage box instead of strewn across my house, only to be thrown away as we step on them in some random place. 

This is so easy to literally throw together and costs little to nothing! If you give it a try, I'd love to see your little one's creations. So much fun!

An Uphill, Losing Battle

My first act of true "sacrificial" motherhood started just minutes before Makenzie took her first breath.

I remember only bits and pieces of my labor but one thing I remember very clearly is the doctor yelling, "Someone get the kiwi!" and me yelling back at him, "What's a kiwi?" I remember the doctor telling me he was going to suction my baby out and I remember telling him, "You are NOT suctioning my baby out!" He told me I had a few more pushes and if the baby wasn't out he was going to suction her out. I remember a flood of determination and a surge of energy coming over me and pushing with all my might, and thanks to all those kegels and God answering the prayers I was shooting up to Him, I pushed that baby girl out and tore myself in two. That was the start to a nightmare that I will never forget. That picture above? I look like that because, well first of all I just delivered a baby, but really because I'm trying to be happy that we have our daughter here and she's healthy, but what you don't see is the rookie doctor at the foot of the bed attempting to sew me up for TWO hours, while my baby girl screamed and was passed from her daddy, to her poppy and her grammy, I was in excruciating pain because they were sewing me up and I could feel EVERY.SINGLE.STITCH. That was the start of a horrible breastfeeding relationship that then led me to exclusively pump for nine, long months.

I also remember when they finally let me take a shower, how I hobbled over to the bathroom, feeling like my insides were going to fall out of my body, every single inch of my body throbbing, and swollen. I had the hardest time getting out of bed and even watched from afar as Dirk give Makenzie her first bath because moving HURT.

I remember looking in the mirror in the bathroom and saying to myself, "What just happened to me?" I didn't have an overcoming sense of joy, I just wanted to go home and take a shower in my own bathroom, lay in my own bed, cuddling my new baby and pretend that everything that had just occurred, never happened.

So now, as this birth gets closer I am anxious. I am anxious about the fact that the two hospitals we are looking at make you share a room with another post-partum mom. I'm anxious about the fact that I don't have a doctor that I can trust. I'm anxious that I'm going to be stuck at the hospital for longer than I want to, when really I just want to be home with my hubby and my two girls, getting adjusted to our new life.

So, in my ideal world, we have a home birth, but the cost is way more than I'm willing to pay, especially when we are blessed with amazing insurance that fully insures a hospital birth.There are a few people who have said to me, "You should have the perfect birth at all costs, don't let money hold you back." Really? That might be what God has pressed upon their hearts,
and that is perfectly amazing, seriously!, but for me, I cannot justify putting my family's finances in jeopardy because I wanted to be comfy in my own bed. In the end, Makenzie is healthy as can be, I'm totally healthy and this pregnancy is going great. We are not scarred with the exception of a few bad memories and Makenzie doesn't remember a single second of it.

I am still looking into the midwife option but it is an uphill, losing battle. I went to my primary care physician's office yesterday to get them to send in a request and as soon as I said, "midwife" some guy in scrubs (who knows what his job was) next to the receptionist, laughed out loud. Seriously, laughed out loud. I guess the idea is that there are hospitals and doctors totally qualified to help you and, in our case, for no cost out of our pocket, why would you be looking elsewhere? Seriously nobody knows what's up and I can't get a straight answer from anybody. It's like chasing after the wind. Nobody knows who to refer me to or where we should go. And after spending hours researching ALL southern California birthing centers, it sounds like you won't know what you're insurance will pay until AFTER you have the baby. I'm not taking that risk. I would rather be in the same situation, pumping every two hours, than stressing over how we're going to pay thousands of dollars to a midwife. We are currently looking into a new doctor and new hospital, both of which have come highly recommended, it sounds like that might be our best bet. I know I have a lot of people praying for us and I know that God has a perfect place for this baby to be born...now we just have to wait and see what He has in store.

Un-Easter Basket

Last year I mentioned the "Un-Easter" basket that I first heard about from Oh Amanda.

We tried this last year and I really liked it so we're going to do it again this year. So what is an Un-Easter Basket and why? I think it's different for every family. For me, I feel like this helps me keep the "holiday" about what it's intended to be. I want to always view Easter as a celebration of Christ's death and resurrection and the ultimate love story, as He stretched out his hands and died for us, our wretched sins and shortcomings. That's not to say that if you do regular Easter baskets that you are missing the point. This is just a way for me personally to SORT OF un-commercialize Easter and keep the focus on Jesus.

So how does this work?

We do ours on the Saturday night before Easter.

First you send your kids out to collect rocks (or you can collect them if your little one is still really young). After you collect your rocks, read and talk about Ezekiel 36:26, "I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you; I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh." (NIV) Talking about the sins that make our hearts stony.

Then, with a Sharpie, you'll write down, on the rocks, the sins that each child struggles with (this should come from their hearts, perhaps with some help from you if they're really young).

Place the rocks back in the basket and cover it with a red cloth to remind us that Jesus' shed his blood on the cross for our sins. Then it's time for bed...

While your kiddos sleep, remove the red cloth, get rid of the rocks, place your gifts into the kids' baskets. When your kids wake up in the morning you can discuss how Jesus' death on the cross takes away all of our sins and He remembers them no more and He gives us a NEW heart. Just as the rocks are now gone and they have received new gifts. 

I do ours, just a bit differently from Amanda, but she has pretty pictures to help explain the process so you'll definitely want to check out her post!

Last year Makenzie was still young so I didn't put much in her basket. She got a new "Really Wooly" devotional (which I highly recommend for young toddlers, we have both the "Bedtime Prayers" and the "Little Book of Bible Verses" and both were great for bedtime devotions). She also got a bracelet that says, "Faith, Hope, Love" along with a chocolate bunny.

This year she's getting a bit more. We got her the Adventure Bible for Early Readers, NIrV

A cross necklace that I still need to get, but I'm thinking something like this from TwoChicklets...

"What's in the Bible? Volume Ten " which is all about Jesus' life.

And of course some candy. Do you have any traditions that help you keep Christ at the center of Easter?

Nature Walks with Purpose

Are you on Instagram? Who isn't right? One of my absolute favorite "IGers" is Kristin Rogers (@kristinrogers). She is such an inspiration. She is a homeschooling mom and often posts pics of their nature group's outings and their nature journals. We live in a home that has a VERY tiny backyard and even then it's just dirt and weeds. Kristin has really inspired me to go seeking nature, not just taking Makenzie to the park to get her outside but to find places that allow for exploration. What's so cool, is that since we've started doing this, even walks around our neighborhood have picked up so much more meaning. Makenzie stops and collects all sorts of things and pays attention to things she used to just walk right on by.

Our first outing was to the UCR Botanical Gardens. We've been here several times before but always with an agenda. This time I just let her loose and followed her wherever she wanted to go.

Along the way I pointed things out to her, like vibrant flowers and unusual plants. After awhile she got excited about things on her own and would call me over to take look. She would collect some things and others she used my phone to take pics of the things she wanted to remember. We saw a lot of animals like turtles, fish, lots of lizards, a squirrel and a rather large spider. I loved watching her little self explore and the questions that came with the exploration. She wanted to know what each animal eats and where they sleep. Why the leaves fall to the ground on their own, etc. These are things she would never have thought to ask had we not been out exploring.

Then it was time to fill out her nature journal. Ideally I think this would take place at the area your exploring but it was past nap time and I knew we wouldn't get very far without a full blown meltdown, she is only three, so we headed home, she napped and then we looked at all of the things she collected and the pictures she took. This is another example of not underestimating what your child is capable of, I had very low expectations for what she would put in the journal but she surprised me. I set out the watercolors and colored pencils and told her that she was going to paint or draw what she saw today. We went through the things she collected and the pictures she took and she drew or painted some kind of representation of each.

Here's the pink tree she saw and how she painted it.

I asked her what colors she saw on the tree and told her to find those colors to paint it. I was surprised to see that she actually painted something that kind of resembles a tree.

Here's a picture of the turtles and fish and how she portrayed them...

Our main focus was the conversation about what she saw and using the correct colors to portray what she saw. She LOVED doing this. On the left you'll see a big orange oval. There was one really large fish and she said that one fish was SO big that it needed it's own page. :) As she finished each page, I wrote down what she dictated to me and labeled each animal for her so that she can go back to it and "read" it or have us read it to her. Drawing or painting the items also led us to talk about how fish breathe underwater, and that spiders have 8 legs.

This is such a simple and fun thing to do. All you need is a place to go explore, the beach, gardens, even a park with a variety of greenery. A watercolor tablet, watercolors, and colored pencils. Some additional fun things to add are binoculars, a magnifying glass, camera/camera phone and a tote bag to collect fun things. Remember to respect the wildlife you're around. Since we were at the gardens we made a point to only collect things that had already fallen off the tree or plant, you don't want to harm the nature around you. I already have a list of local places to take her to, to explore. I can't wait to try them all out!

Loaded Sweet Potato Rounds - Any Way You Like 'em

I love sweet potatoes, Dirk hates them unless they're served as fries or smothered in butter, sugar and marshmallows. As I was browsing A Couple Cooks (a new blog I came across, which I love!) I saw a recipe for Loaded Sweet Potato Rounds. They seriously looked amazing and I knew I had to convince Dirk to try them. When it came time to make our weekly dinner meal plan, I asked him what he would think and he said, "Sounds yummy, let's do it!" Yay!!!

Guys, these are seriously so yummy. I think I could have eaten an entire batch by myself... We tried two variations. They were both yummy and the perfect side dish to our grilled chicken. You could totally customize these for any meal and every palate! So fun and so yummy!

Loaded Sweet Potato Rounds - Two Ways

Ingredients for all rounds
2 lbs of sweet potatoes, with a large circumference
1 1/2 tablespoons olive oil
1 teaspoon garlic powder
1 teaspoon chili powder
1 teaspoon kosher salt

Ingredients for "traditional" loaded rounds
Hot Sauce (I used regular Tabasco but I could see some Sriracha being equally as good, if not better)
Cheddar Cheese
Bacon, cooked & crumbled
Sour Cream
Green Onions, chopped

Ingredients for blue cheese loaded rounds
Blue Cheese
Bacon, cooked & crumbled
Green Onions, chopped

Directions

1. Preheat the oven to 450°
2. Cut the sweet potatoes into 1/4 inch slices.  Place the slices in the bowl and sprinkle with olive oil, garlic powder, chili powder and kosher salt, toss to ensure that both sides are coated well (I prefer to use my hands for this part). 
3. Place on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper (for easy cleanup).
4. Bake 10 minutes on one side, then flip all rounds, and bake another 10 minutes until soft.
5. When the potatoes are done, remove them from the oven. 

For "traditional" loaded rounds
Add a dot of hot sauce on each round. Top each round with cheddar cheese and wait a few minutes for the cheese to melt. Place the rounds on a platter and top with a dollop of sour cream, bacon & green onions. ENJOY!

For blue cheese loaded rounds
Sprinkle a bit of blue cheese on each round. Top with bacon & green onions. Enjoy!

I'm already thinking of other ways to spice these up. I'm thinking Greek yogurt and fresh dill to accompany a Greek Burger or for an appetizer maybe top these bad boys with some chopped grilled chicken, barbecue sauce, green onions and sour cream? The possibilities are endless! If you try a different variation, let me know! I'd love to hear all about it.

And Her Name Shall Be...

It was about a year and a half ago, my mind was totally focused on the moment, not thinking ahead, and almost repulsed at the idea of another kid. I knew we wanted more children EVENTUALLY but at that moment I couldn't even think about it. Makenzie and I were running errands and I heard this name. I "wrote it down" as a note on my iPhone thinking, "Just in case we are in need of a baby girl name someday, I really like it!" I don't think I even brought it up to Dirk or really even thought of it again. Then the news came, much later, that were being blessed with Baby Dallas #2. As I mentioned before, we've had our baby boy name picked out since before we were even married but we knew if it was a girl we were going to have to come up with something. Dirk and I were constantly throwing names around and as I went to type some of them in my phone, I remembered that I had done this once before. I looked at the note and there it was...

(you pronounce it: eyes-lee)

I was pretty sure I loved it. I told Dirk and he liked it too. Then I told my mom and future sister-in-law and they liked it too. I was pretty sure that if we had a girl, her name would be Eisley. The day after we found out we were having a girl I was already talking to "Eisley" in my tummy. I texted Dirk and told him that if he wanted to change it, he needed to do it quick because I was getting attached. He said he didn't want to change it, he loved it.

Now, as you're reading this you're either loving this name or hating it, that's the reaction we've had from those we've told so far. I know it's "unique" but I just love it and I know that if you don't love it, once you see her you will see that it just fits because I really believe that this is what her name is supposed to be. I can just hear some conversations between you and your husband tonight... "So Alicia announced the name of their baby girl today...Eisley...Isn't that a band name?" Well yes, yes it is, and I had no idea until Dirk told me but I still love it. Another conversation will sound like this, "So, I guess Dirk and Alicia are naming their baby girl Eisley...isn't Mos Eisley that place in Star Wars referred to negatively by Obi-Wan Kenobi?" Yeah, again I don't know much about Star Wars and again it doesn't have meaning to us or to anyone we've told so far so. I suppose there can be negative issues to most names. All I know is that the three of us love it and that she has no middle name. Haha! We're working on that and I'm kind of thinking that she may not have one until she's born. We'll see. We have a long list going but we just can't settle on one yet. Anyway, I know that God has a purpose for her life and I know that none of these references have anything to do with who she is. I think Makenzie and Eisley sound so cute together, and they both still go well with our boy name if God chooses to bless us with a boy someday. The best part is hearing Makenzie talk to her baby eye-zee and all the things she's going to do with her. I am more excited every day!!!

Makenzie Turns 3!!!

In case you've been wondering what happened, my blog has been having issues but they are now resolved. During that down time we celebrated Makenzie's 3rd birthday! I can't believe it's been three years since we first met her. It seems like a lifetime ago and yesterday all at the same time.

This year we decided to do a special day at Disneyland in place of a birthday party. We have Disneyland passes that are about to expire and we aren't renewing so I knew this was our one chance to do a special day that I've been wanting to do. We started our day out at Goofy's Kitchen with my parents and my brother and future sister-in-law.

Goofy's Kitchen is for sure expensive but it was totally worth it. The food was actually really good. All of us had so much fun. (see the very bottom if you're curious for more details on our Goofy's Kitchen experience) Of course the best part was seeing the excitement on Makenzie's face as she met some of her favorite characters.

Makenzie loved seeing the characters that were there but us adults were a little disappointed. The morning we went we saw Goofy, Pluto, Chip, Dale, Cinderella's Fairy Godmother, Baloo, Rafiki and the Mad Hatter. Most of the characters seemed kind of random to us but Makenzie was totally thrilled to see Goofy, Pluto and Chip & Dale. She was scared of the Mad Hatter and really, who could blame her? The guy was scary!

I had planned to make Makenzie a special outfit for her birthday and she requested a Tinkerbell outfit. I was super surprised because it's really not even one of her top favorites but she had it all planned out. She said she wanted wings, a green tutu, her hair in a bun and "snowballs" on her shoes, this was all without any prompting from me, silly girl. After I made her outfit she said, "Um, Mom, Tinkerbell actually doesn't wear a tutu, she wears leaves." She wasn't exactly buying the tutu idea but I explained to her that there was no way that she could wear leaves and I think she was satisfied with her outfit.

After our awesome breakfast, we headed to Disneyland. We have been able to go to Disneyland quite a bit so we weren't really pressed to do much. We rode Dumbo and the Carousel, which we ride EVERY.SINGLE.TIME.

 She also saw Minnie Mouse which she was super excited about.

After exploring for a bit we watched the parade with Grammy & Poppy (and some popcorn)...

and then headed home.

On her actual birthday I made her a special breakfast with rainbow pancakes, for dinner we ate at her favorite restaurant, Chick-fil-a, and then had brownie sundaes back at our house with all of our family.

We had so much fun celebrating her! We are so thankful for this sweet girl and for the special time we were able to celebrate her last birthday as an only child. Next year, she'll have a 6 month old baby sister to celebrate with...so fun!

***

In case you are interested in heading to Goofy's Kitchen here's what we thought...

We made a reservation for 10:30 on a Friday morning and found that to be a good time. We stayed for about an hour and a half and as we were leaving, the characters seemed pretty sparse, so I'd say that's the latest you should you go for good character interaction. I'm sure they were preparing for the lunch rush though??? The breakfast food was all really good, must try the PB&J pizza, haha. They totally catered to my mom who has a gluten allergy, there was actually plenty for her to eat. The chef came out and told her what she could have, made her some GF Mickey Mouse pancakes and brought them to the table. Pretty cool! As I mentioned earlier, we were a little disappointed that there weren't any "main characters" (many reviews I had read had characters like Aladdin, Jasmine, even Sleeping Beauty...) but Makenzie was happy and that's all that mattered. Overall, it was totally worth it and we all had a great time!!!

It's a...

Cravings for spicy foods, extended "morning" sickness, massive food aversions, migraines...this pregnancy has been SO different than my first and so naturally we are so having a boy right??? Well, we had our ultrasound appointment and...

I was so surprised! I have been going back and forth on what I thought baby was and what I thought I wanted. The newness of all things boy is exciting but then the thought of Makenzie having a sister sounds like so much fun! I thought Dirk might've been a little bummed, after all, we've been talking about "our" baby boy since before we were married. He's already been named for years, in fact, we named Makenzie based on our boy name. But Dirk is so ecstatic, we both are. I'm so excited to see what she'll look like and what her personality will be. Will she be anything like Makenzie or completely different? When it comes to infancy I hope she is the complete opposite of her big sister. I pray that she breastfeeds like a champ and that she's not colicky like her big sister was.

This time we're pretty set on a name, unlike Makenzie who wasn't named for a great portion of the pregnancy and we're going to use Makenzie's nursery stuff with a few refreshers so we're way ahead of the game this time. It's so exciting to start thinking of all that our lives will be now that we know what we're having. I'm so excited!!!

The Big Sibling Book Review

When we first found out that we were having another baby I scoured the internet for a book to get Kenzie involved in the pregnancy. I was originally looking for a book with real pictures of the baby week by week. I still haven't found one of those that I really liked but we use the Sprout Pregnancy app and the Baby Center app which have been great for seeing weekly pictures of what the baby looks like and for short videos to show the baby's development. While I was scouring the internet I found "The Big Sibling Book."

It looked super cute and had good reviews so I thought we'd give it a try. It is seriously SO cute. It is essentially a pregnancy journal and baby book from the big sibling's perspective. We filled out the first few pages today.

One of the first pages says, "Here's a drawing/photo of me BEFORE you came into the picture." I had Makenzie draw herself and this is what she came up with. I may add an actual picture of her to it later but I love that I can see Makenzie's development along with the baby's.

In the beginning there are questions like, "Do any of your friends or cousins have siblings, if so what are their names and what do they do with their siblings?" (although written in more kid-friendly terms) Another page has a checklist for activities that the big sibling is able to do before the baby is born, things like knowing their ABCs, tying their own shoes, etc.

After the baby is born there are several interviews for your child to fill out. I think there are four of them throughout the baby's first year. So fun!

There are also a lot of sticker pages, like one for putting on different faces to express the feeling that the big sibling has when the baby does various things, like having a poopy diaper or crying.

There's also a few fun sticker pages for recording milestones that the baby goes through during various months. Plus a lot more interactive, fun sticker pages.

One last thing that I really like is that there are comparisons for the older sibling and baby. There's a page where you place the baby's foot prints and the big sibling's foot prints in a box to compare sizes and then there's this one where they compare pictures of themselves as a newborn with the new baby.

The book goes through the baby's whole first year and at the very end has some pages that can be used as scrapbook pages, along with title stickers to give you ideas of what you can paste on the various pages. The suggested ages is 3-6. Makenzie is almost three and I know a lot of it will be done by us, but I asked her every question and she was able to answer correctly. You can choose if you want to put in right answers or the funny ones your kiddo comes up with. I could see older children, like ages 7-10, filling this out themselves and having a great time with it. As for families with multiple children, the book is written for one child but you could try a collaborative effort, or you could buy each child they're own, they are very affordable at under $12 each.

The Announcement(s)

It was November 21st, Dirk was in LA and I was a day late. I was so hesitant to test because every month I "thought" I was pregnant and for the first time I was totally surrendered to the Lord. Well, I'm never late and so I took Makenzie out to the store to get a test. I took it as soon as I got home and it was immediately two lines. I was shocked and excited and giddy. I had this whole thing planned out, I was going to find out early afternoon while Dirk was at work, go out, buy a "I'm a Big Sister" shirt for Makenzie and when Dirk came home she would hide, as she does every night and when he found her he would see her shirt. What a fun plan right?! Well, it was like 7:00 pm, getting to be bath & bedtime and Dirk wouldn't be home until really late. I knew I didn't really have time to go out to hunt for a shirt so I quickly & sloppily wrote on a piece of white paper, "I'm going to be a big sister" and had Makenzie hold it up.

She said, "Mommy, why do you want me to hold up the picture you made?" I told her I just wanted to show Daddy my pretty picture and that was good enough for her. The night went on as usual and Dirk finally got home around 11:00. We did the normal chat and catching up and then I said, "Oh, you should see this cute picture of Makenzie that I took." He looked at it and his face was like, "I don't get it..." I mean she's a cutie of course but the pic wasn't anything special. I said, "Did you read the sign she's holding?!?!" He says, "Yeah, why is she holding that?" OYE VEY boy, come on!!! He's usually so quick and on it, I didn't think I'd have to spell it out. I told him, "I'm pregnant!" He was so ecstatic and couldn't believe it. It was such a change from when we found out we were pregnant with Makenzie, we were in shock!

The next day I went out and bought her an official "big sister" shirt and we used that to tell our family. (Thank you to my mother-in-law for sneaking Kenzie up to her studio and taking this quick pic of her)

We even got to Skype with my brother Adam in Texas and my Aunt in New Mexico. Before we told anybody, we knew we had to tell Makenzie. Here's how the convo went...

Mommy: Makenzie, remember how "K"'s mommy had baby "M" and now she's a big sister?

Makenzie: Yeah...

Mommy: Well, Mommy has a baby in her tummy and you're going to be a big sister!

Makenzie: Oh, is it going to come in mail? (seriously where does this kid come up with this stuff????)

Mommy is recovering from laughter so Daddy responds: No, the baby is going to grow in Mommy's tummy and Mommy's tummy is going to get bigger and bigger and bigger and then the baby will be born.

Makenzie: Ohhhh...is it going to come tomorrow?

Mommy: No, it will be in August so after Christmas, and after your birthday and Easter and we'll do some fun summer things like go to the beach and then we'll have a new baby.

Makenzie: Oh, that's a long time, can you just set a timer? (WHAT?! Oh man, I did not anticipate this conversation at all) Is it a boy or a girl?

Mommy: Well, we don't know. We'll have to wait awhile before we can find out.

Makenzie: Okay, well I just want a sister, not a boy...

I had expected her to be either baffled, or not quite understanding or excited, not as matter-of-fact as she was. This girl kills me. She has since been so excited and talks about the baby ALL THE TIME. She is going to be an amazing big sister, which I didn't quite expect. Her excitement is infectious and makes Dirk and I think of the new baby all the time. It's so fun to be going through this as the three of us and not just a "grown-up" thing.