Birthdays…

Braden’s Birthday is done and now we’re looking forward to Barney’s.  But we want Barney to wait at least 3 more weeks.  Actually, it’s probably a bit of a conundrum for Kathie since she’s really sick of being really uncomfortable.  But the most important thing is Barney being ready to come into the world kicking and screaming and healthy.  This is where I remind my wife that she’ll actually miss being pregnant after he’s born, as weird as that is.

I think we’re mostly ready for Barney to come.  His room and clothes are pretty much set and waiting for him.  The car seat is out of storage.  We even have diapers out at the changing station/butler’s pantry.  It seems hectic at times (always), but I do think we’re more ready than with either of the other two.  Of course it won’t seem that way when the time comes, but I know we’ll have all kinds of support from our friends and family to help. Right? Right?!?

Braden’s birthday party went off without too many hitches Sunday.  Apparently it was the talk of the class Monday at school too, so I think we did a good job.  We had nine kids total and it wasn’t too much of a zoo.  We went to Saltos, a gymnastics…um… gym?  We had a ‘baseball’ theme, which may have been a little odd at a gymnastics place, but they don’t really have gymnastics party supplies.  We ordered pizza from a new place, Glass Nickel Pizza.  I recommend it.  Lots of variety and great pizza. The kids and the non-pregnant parents had a blast running, jumping and swinging on the pads, pommel horses, trampolines and foam pits.  Braden really had fun and got some very cool gifts.  Pictures are coming.

Braden was a little more timid than a lot of the kids his age.  But I think that’s more mental than anything at this point.  I believe he had some occupational therapy type issues early on, along with his speech issues, and that has made him a little timid to push his physical boundaries.  I think he’ll get over it though.

Emma, on the other hand, has no fear whatsoever.  She was jumping, swinging and generally giving her parents heart attacks the whole time.  In fact, she kept joining other groups and escaping during dinner to go back and play.  She climbed a pommel horse and jumped off the other side.  She wouldn’t let us help her in the foam pits and had to do it herself. She was doing iron crosses on the rings.  Well, ok maybe not a real iron cross, but she would hang from the rings and pull her knees up to her chin. 

Aunt Penny and Cousin Abby came to visit Saturday and Sunday for the party.  We all had a lot of fun.  Emma and Abby are definitely two peas in a pod.  They had fun playing together and fighting too.  All the kids had a great time and they wore Dad out playing tackle Daddy, hide and seek and whatever other games they thought of.  We were really glad they came and hope they come more often.

We are getting attacked by Robins.  It’s like the sequel to Hitchcock’s ‘The Birds.’  I’ve had to remove three nests from places we just can’t have nests:  Over our front door, on the swing set and on my bike in the garage.  Yes, I use my bike a lot.

Work is still a pain, but I’ll get it figured out soon, I hope… Every time I figure out how to do one thing, it causes problems somewhere else.  But such is life and I’ll get through it!

Ok, enough rambling and back to work.