Dear Jack

Dear Jack,

This weekend hit the 3rd trimester mark for us, which is kind of hard to believe. I'm always hoping that I'll have more time to write like I did when I was pregnant with your brother, but honestly, life looks extremely different than it did 5 years ago. Between work, preparing things at home for you and getting back into "baby mode", running after your very-active 4 year old brother, hockey, taking care of an old-allergy-ridden dog and everything else in between it's all I can do most nights to not conk out by 8 PM.

Okay so sometimes I do conk out by 8 PM.

The doctor's office called Monday to confirm you are officially scheduled on the books for delivery. It happens to be a very special day not only because you'll be joining us, but its also your Papa's birthday. It seems fitting that you would be scheduled to come on his birthday, seeing as how you are partially named after his mom.

Your big brother is really excited for you. I get to wake up most mornings to him crawling into our bed, hugging my tummy and saying "Good morning Baby Jack." He attends every doctor appointment with me and says your heart sounds "like a car engine."  When he talks to you, you respond with thumps, and it sends him into laughter. I'm pretty sure you recognize his voice, and he thinks its pretty awesome. He's been insisting on sharing a room with you, but I'm sure that will be pretty short-lived the first time you don't stop crying at 1 in the morning.

As for you, well, you're a mover, just like your brother. It feels like some days you never stop. You are the most active around 3 AM, so you know, thanks for that. During this pregnancy I've lived for avocado toast on sourdough bread with veggie bacon and a veggie omelet. I've ate it practically every morning while pregnant with you, and sometimes for lunch. I'm not going to lie, I could eat it for dinner too and be totally fine. When we play music you roll around a ton. Right now you're breech, so the wonderful jabs to my ribs are actually your big 'ol noggin with your feet in the lower position to my left. You move when you hear your daddy or brother talking close to you.

I recently pulled out all the baby clothes we kept and washed them. When I stood back it was a little surreal to see tiny little baby clothes next to your brothers big boy clothes. Its still hard for my brain to piece together the fact that you will be here soon. There have been so many times that I've just stopped in the middle of making dinner, or walking through a store, driving in the car ... and looked at your dad and said "We're having another baby. Like, we're actually really-really having another baby. Sully is going to be a brother and we're going to have TWO kids." He just laughs. I love when your dad leans over and whispers "Goodnight" to you before bed and feels you kick his hand.

The fact you're coming, well, it blows me away every time.

There is so much I want to put down that just swirls in my head  throughout the day ... but there's practice to get ready for, a sink full of dishes and a toy siren wailing in the house that Sully is playing with that hasn't stopped in 5 minutes that I must put an end to.

Keep growing little man, we'll see you soon. Just, not too soon.

Around the house lately ... phone pictures dump addition

*Addition? Edition .... Hello pregnancy brain!

Dancing around the house 

Birthday cupcakes 

Birthday flowers from the best hubs 

Painted boxes that provide hours of fun 

Plastic hockey men Winter Classic games 

Fourth of July fireworks with  friends and family 

Terrifying bouncy castle slides 

Birthday cakes for Nene a la Sully 

Lunch dates at the pool to beat the heat 

Street hockey 

Short lived attempts at inside hockey ahem 

More outside hockey as the result 

What a hockey player wears on walks 

Hey ladies, would you like a bite of my cupcake? The perks of visiting daddy at work 

Daddy gearing up lil man for hockey 

Playing goalie in the sports store 

Taking "Finbar" the injured pigeon to the pet hospital 

Finding ponies at the park 

Giving into the begging & childhood peer pressure to buy shoes "Like Tyler has" 

(Seriously he would have worn them to bed if we had let him)

Picnic lunches at a different park 

Passing out from all day swimming marathons 

Baby bumpage (Its much MUCH bigger now. This was about 6 weeks ago)

Sunning on the patio 

Night time garage hockey games with our new rollerblades 

Whats in a name ...

Her name was Alice Willingham. She was one of the wisest, kindest people I ever have ever known  and I was lucky enough to get to call her my Grandma.

At times its hard to believe the number of years we've been without her almost outweigh the number of years I knew her. I was just 16 when she passed away. She was 83.

I don't dream often, and dream of people even less. But on August 18th, 2008, I woke up at 5:00 am after having a dream about my Grandma. There isn't much I remember, but in my dream she told me there was a baby. I went and took a test right then, and the test was positive. I nearly fell into the wall I was so completely freaked out. Nine months later we had Sully, and throughout that entire pregnancy, I always felt she was a force watching out for him. I hadn't dreamed of her since, until a few days before this St. Patty's Day, when she showed up in my dream again. She didn't say anything this time, but she was rocking a baby. Two days later, another positive.

I wish I had an explanation, because truthfully, I'm not sure what I think. Is she somewhere out there letting me know because she knows? Or is it merely a coincidence and some sub-conscience trick of the brain? Either way, I know I miss her to this day and have always wished she had the chance to know my family. Who knows, maybe she does. It's nice to think of it that way sometimes.

When we found out this baby was a boy, and our last, I knew I was sure of one thing - I wanted his middle name to be Willingham. I love my husband so completely for agreeing to it right off the bat, knowing what it meant to me.

The kid's first name was a completely different story.

There were days I wanted to strangle him. If I threw out 1 name to him, I threw out 200. I swear he had a criteria list. Nothing stuck. We agreed on nothing. Neither of us loved anything we came across. Sully kept calling Blueberry "Jack". In fairness that kid has been calling his hypothetical brother "Jack" for two years now because it happened to be the name of one of his  favorite, now ex-King hockey players. And it just kind of became a running joke in the family. But he kept calling the baby Jack. And when people would ask about the baby, he'd tell them its name was Jack. The kids at school and his teachers were asking me if we had named the baby Jack. And then he had our family calling the baby Jack. And before we knew it, he had us calling the dang baby Jack.

We both found that we actually really liked the name, and like turned into loving the name because it came from Sully and obviously meant so much to him. He thinks its the coolest thing ever that he named his baby brother, and I'm sure he'll hang that over his head for the rest of his life.

And that's how our 'lil Jack Willingham came to be. It seems like he's never been anything but Jack Willingham.

I love his name as much as I love Sullivan's. I love what it means to us.

                                                         Sully & Jack 

Blueberry is a ...

"Guys in my family don't make baby girls."

Its one of the first things my husband ever told me. And he's right. The past 3 generations that I know of, no girls have been born into that family. He has only 2 other male cousins on that side, and with 4 kids between the 3 of them, all 4 kids have been boys.

I'm sorry, make that 5 boys. Baby blueberry is packing heat.

We picked Sully up from school early so he could be with us when we found out, good or bad. (He was adamant since we told him I was pregnant that this baby was a boy. Any talk of the baby being a girl wasn't tolerated, and he made it very clear if this was a sister, he was going to cry. No pressure, no pressure at all kid.) Everything looked great on blueberry, and at the very end, he marked both of his legs, and started to make a dotted line to the goods sticking straight up into the air. 

I saw a look similar on my husbands face I've only seen one other time ... the time our Dr. told us our first born would be a son. Still laying down I saw him whisper into Sully's ear "Do you know what that means? You're getting your brother." I saw Sully, with his arm wrapped around his Daddy's neck, light up completely and smile ear to ear. I could feel my eyes start to well up and yelled out "Are you serious?! Its another boy!?"and I lost it. In a really good, my-life-is-complete-there-is-nothing-better-than-this-moment-right-now kind of way.

"That's fine, I've always pictured myself as a mom of all boys anyways." ...

Everyone who knows us knows that our journey to get pregnant Sully was a long one. A three year wait to be exact littered with fertility appointments, tests, medicines and more waiting. Our decision to expand our family wasn't one we took lightly, we knew what we could possibly be up against again. We were prepared, ready and at peace with the fact that Sully could and possible would, be our only child. We made a plan, gave ourselves a time limit that we would pull the plug by. I didn't want to involve doctors and medications again this time around.

And so the pregnancy test that turned pink with two clear lines I took on St. Patrick's Day, right before a get together with friends because I was feeling "off" ... came as a huge shock. We had only been actually "trying" a month. My sister cried, jumped up and down. We just stood there staring at each other in disbelief ... And  the kid we thought could be our only one, now lays on my tummy every night and whispers "Goodnight baby brother."

I feel sometimes still in disbelief. Two sons. This will be my life now.

Its strange to feel like you've come full circle. That the things you always thought could be, are now things that are. Having Sully finally made us a family. Blueberry is finally completing it. I never thought 13 years into meeting the father of my children and having that conversation we'd finally be closing (and simultaneously) starting a new chapter, but I guess its true - the best things in life are always worth waiting for.

Bring on the sweaty sports clothes, wrestling matches,
broken furniture, super hero action figures that litter my halls ... 

toilet seats that never get put down, and shopping trips every other day to keeps snacks stocked in the house. I'm totally ready to live out the rest of my days with my house full of dudes. 

November can't come soon enough little man. We all love you so much already ....

Disneyland

We took Sully to Disneyland for the first time for his fourth birthday. My folks, sister, bro-in-law, best friend and her fiance all joined us. I couldn't ride any of the good rides, so that was awesome. I was banished to Small World and other "safe" rides. Whatever, my sister and I rocked Small World.

Sully had a great time, hasn't stopped talking about it in two months and asks at least once a week when we're going back. His favorite ride was the Toy Story ride, least favorite, The Jungle Cruise (he cried, a lot.) I'm pretty sure he ate nothing but sugar all day. And he of course loved Radiator Springs. I'll never forget his face when he "met" Lightning McQueen and Mater. He would go and live there if he could.

It was a great day, and I'm  glad we waited so long to take him because he'll actually be able to remember some of it, or maybe all of it. And thanks to everyone who joined us for the day! It was a blast.

Memorial Day Camping

We went camping to our go-to up in Malibu Creek for Memorial Day with my sister, brother-in-law and his brother. I didn't take my big camera, mainly because we've been there so many times before the pictures just all start to look the same.

The boys did their seafood cookout over the campfire which has now become a bit of a tradition. Fresh seafood, lemon, some spices and a giant fire pit. Delicious. We relaxed, hung around the campfire, made some awesome camp breakfasts and napped, which was lovely. We played, flew kites, hiked up to the rock pond/lake for lunch and of course made s'mores.

Shaun and I stayed up one night with Sully by the fire watching the stars when Shaun spotted an adorable rabbit in our camp. We watched him for quite awhile hopping around, eating and aw'ing over him and the beauty of nature. Yeh, so the next morning my sister came to our tent saying a gutted rabbit was in our camp by the fire pit. The first thing I said to Shaun was "Oh my god, we outed that poor rabbit!". I felt awful! Shaun graciously removed him from camp. Nature man, nature.

I was also greeted by a coyote one night running around the camp grounds on one of my nightly hikes to go pee. I actually said "Shoo" like it was my dog without flinching. I was more worried about peeing myself than I was him. Pregnancy bladder and camping at night do not mix well.

And of course, Sully cried when we had to leave. My kid would live in a tent if I would let him.