Jackson turns the BIG 1!

This will probably be more of a picture post then a blog. I got so many good ones that it's going to be hard to narrow down. Anyway, My nephew tuned 1 on August 20th and he had quite the celebration. We started off his birthday morning by all singing "Happy Birthday". He kept looking at us like we were crazy. I don't blame him. It was 7:30 in the morning after all. We also tried to get him to eat his healthy birthday breakfast of glazed donuts, but he wasn't a fan. I wish I could say the same. After Breakfast, we got him ready for his big photo shoot. His pictures are going to be so cute! However, he fell into the corner of a suitcase during the pictures and ended up with a goose egg right between his eyes. Thank goodness for photoshop. The photographer was running late so Mom and I snuck our own pictures.
Mimi and Jackson
Then we wrapped up the day with a little Chuck E. Cheese. Driving the carChuck E. Cheese came out to wish Jackson a happy birthday! And the best part...cake! Then on Saturday we had Jackson's Big 1st birthday party. The theme was sponge Bob, but I'm sure you could have figured that out all on your own. Here is the cake. Isn't it cute?All dressed for his partySliding down the 13 foot water slide. The child has no fear! His big day ended with lots of presents.
Happy Birthday sweet boy! I can't wait to see what your 2nd birthday will bring.

The BIG Ultrasound

Just a quick post! We had the big ultrasound appointment where they check every inch of the baby. Everything looked perfect, and we can't ask for much more than that. She weighed in at a whopping 13oz., which is right where she should be. Of course, they wanted to get a profile, but she refused to get into position. This seems to be a common occurrence for Miss Priss (if you recall our NT scan, they tried for an hour and a half to get a profile). We did, however, get a great shot of her backside!

We feel so blessed!

Oh, and she's still a girl!

We've got Kicks!

This little lady is kicking up a storm lately! About a week ago, I started feeling these tiny muscle twitches. I didn't really think anything about it, until they kept happening. Finally, a light bulb went off in my head...the baby!I wanted Brandon to feel her ,so I decided we were going to plop ourselves on the couch while I enjoyed a few marshmallows. I realize feeding Miss Priss pure sugar to get her hyped up and kicking is not the best thing for a Mommy to do. However, desperate times call for desperate measures. Sure enough, about 5 marshmallows in(they were the tiny ones, and there may have been more then 5... but who's counting?), she was kicking like crazy. I believe Brandon's exact words were, "Wow, there really is a baby in there!". Well, I certainly hope so! I am also missing a lot of my favorite television shows because I would rather stare at my tummy. It's so cool to be able to feel her kicks from the inside and see it from the outside.

Dear Presley,
I woke up bright and early to your little kicks this morning, and it is probably one of the best ways in the world to be woken up! I would lay there all day if I could. However, when I'm about 38 weeks pregnant and no longer sleeping very well; maybe you could wait until a little later in the morning to begin kicking me. For now, kick away, Miss Priss.
Love,
your Mommy

Nursery In Progress

Just a side note, I have about 20 things on my To Do list and blogging is not one of them. You can tell where my priorities lie. Now back to the purpose of this post.

The Nursery!!!
Today our baby furniture was delivered and I love it. I would like to just throw in a huge thank you to my parents, who so graciously bought it for us. Thank you, Thank you, Thank you! We love it ,and Presley will too. Anyway, we got a call saying it was going to be delivered earlier then we expected, which thrilled me. However, we are currently using the room as our gym and needed to get everything out. The treadmill is so big that we have to take it apart to fit it through the doors. Well, at almost 10 at night we (and by we, I mean Brandon) began disassembling. It was going so smoothly until we (again, I mean Brandon)got to the last bolt. Turns out it was shredded and there was no getting it out. We attempted to shove what was left through the door, but that was NOT happening. After a few choice words, Brandon's solution was to take the doors of the hinges of the old gym/new nursery and to the old guestroom/fabulous new guestroom/gym combo. Success! We were able to empty out the room in preparation for baby furniture. Lesson learned...never wait until 10pm to start such a big project. Come to think of it, we have been learning lots of lessons lately. Miss Priss, you are certainly teaching your parents a lot, and your not even here yet.

The nursery is literally a blank slate and I can't wait to get started. However, I just can't seem to make a decision on what I want to do with the room. Even though we still have plenty of time, it has been keeping me up at night. I will post as soon as I decide what I'm going to do (I know you will be on pins and needles waiting for that post...I hope you sense the sarcasm). Here is what Presley's room looks like so far.


and here's the furniture from a different angle because I know your dying to see!


Everytime I walk past the nursery, I can't resist popping my head in and taking a look. It just makes everything even more real! So all we need now is bedding, curtains, a rug, a glider, maybe a chandelier, and most importantly, a baby!

Halfway There!

"Believe you can and you're halfway there."
— Theodore Roosevelt

Sometimes being halfway through something can seem unsatisfying. However, there are some halfway things that give me great pleasure, for example:
-Looking at the time on the treadmill and seeing I'm halfway through my workout
-Making it to Wednesday because I'm halfway through the week and that much closer to the weekend
-Passing Centerville on my way to Houston because I'm halfway home.
-Compromising with Brandon because we each met halfway (this is huge for me as I am rather stubborn when I feel I'm right).
But the thing that I am most proud of is making it HALFWAY through this pregnancy!
Today marks 20 weeks exactly, and I couldn't be happier! Lets have a look back at when I first THOUGHT I was getting a belly. and now at 20 weeks
Just 20 more weeks to go and we get to meet little Miss Priss! However, I wouldn't be opposed to seeing her a week or two earlier.

What's in a name...

We would like to officially announce the name of our soon-to-be daughter:

Miss Presley Elizabeth Souders

This name thing was quite a challenge, but I LOVE what we finally agreed on. I have always had baby girl names that I knew would one day belong to my future daughter. That is, until I married Brandon...
We never discussed girl names until I found out I was pregnant, and I just naturally assumed that Brandon would love what I had. Ha! I don't think we could have more opposite taste in girl names if we tried. We have always instantly agreed on boy names, so this was a shock. We would randomly throw names out in passing, just to have each and everyone be rejected. Then one day, I broke down and bought a baby name book. As I was flipping through the celebrity baby name section, I stumbled across Presley. When I saw it, I instantly loved it. However, I knew that Brandon wouldn't go for it, so I just kept it to myself. After a few weeks, I found myself falling in love with it. This is a very bad thing because once I get my heart set on something, I generally find a way to make it happen. I really didn't want to have to sneak the name on the birth certificate. So, as Brandon passed through the living room on his way out the back door, I casually suggested the name Presley. I believe his response was, "not bad". "Not bad"...this was a good sign!!! Usually, it was something like "that's horrible" or "I hate it.. a lot". I think the name must of been floating around in his head because a week later he sat down and said he liked it. Well, that was a done deal in my book.
So there you have it. That's the story of how we picked our name. We realize it isn't an amazing story, but we learned a lot during the naming process. I had to give up a lot of my names, and Brandon had to have a lot of his rejected. This was a true compromise, and in the end we came up with something together. If you ask me, I think it's a pretty perfect name.

T-R-O-U-B-L-E

Yep! I think we might be in trouble. The day after we found out this baby was a little lady, Mom and I went shopping. We stumbled upon a baby boutique that was going out of business and look what Mimi did! The above picture only shows some of the things. I left out the bows and a cute pair of ruffled bloomers. I do have to admit that there is another guilty Grandma. Grammy, my mother in law, has already sewn two blankets and brings new gifts almost every time we see her. I decided to pull everything out that Miss Priss has already acquired and take a big picture. So the TROUBLE is we may not have a closet big enough to fit everything when it's all said and done. Miss Priss, you are one lucky lady! (Oh, Aunt Tiffany and cousin Kallie, I didn't forget about you. Thank you so much for adding to her collection.)