A Trip to California + Lots of Surprises!

Last weekend we headed to CA to visit Gm and Gp Bailey. We got a ride to the airport from my amazingly awesome friend Lis who was pretty excited about the Diet Coke we got her for her efforts ☺. She dropped us off and we checked in, but soon after realized we had left his one and only bottle full of milk in Lis's car! Bless her soul though she had noticed and came back! Thank heavens.

After we got to the gate Justin went and grabbed some food while I tried to get Nolan to take some Benadryl. Nolan hadn't napped well that day so I was super nervous that he would have a tough time on the plane. He wasn't having any of it though and threw an absolute fit, which was unlike him and I worried that's what we were in for for the rest of the night. Justin even told me he could hear Nolan yelling from around the corner at Wendys (in a crowded airport)!. Oey. Stressed me out. But after I stopped trying to shove icky medicine in him he calmed down a bit, then Justin got back with the "fies" and Nolan was good to go. He didn't sleep on the plane either, but was really good (once again, I worried for nothing!) His favorite thing to do was pull down the window shades.

I found this little Elmo doll the morning of the trip and he loves it! Here he is showing Elmo the view ☺

Surprise #1 

Pam picked us up at the airport and took us straight to BJ's to meet Doug for dinner. Little did Pam know that Doug had left work a bit early and made his own trip to the airport to pick up one of her best friends, Debbie Egge, to surprise her for her birthday! (Although at this point she still didn't know that Debbie had shown up for her birthday, just that she couldn't come the next week as planned ☺) Nolan took to "Aunt Debbie" pretty quickly and by the end of the trip knew her name and could pick her out in pictures! He even was asking for Debbie in the car on the way to the airport, too cute.

Nolan has been a little shy lately, even with family, but this trip he was on top of his cuteness game! I was so surprised he was so animated at dinner, especially considering he hadn't napped much and had just gone on a flight. Leave it to him...

Pointing out the phone on the menu

I'm pretty sure Gp Bailey ordered spaghetti just so he could share with Nolan. That kid loves spaghetti! 

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Surprise #2

We had an appointment to find out the gender of BB2 first thing in the morning on July 14 (the day we left for CA), but told Pam and Doug we wouldn't be finding out until later in the month so we could surprise them. 

Well, we are SO excited to report that we are having another BOY! Every single member of my family called it correctly when I asked what their guesses were over text the night before. That makes 5 grandson's for my parents. Now we can't wait to find out what BJ and Kirsten are having!

We made the announcement with blue balloons and a 'Little Brother' onesie.

Just Nolan being cute, checking out Gm and Gp's bathtub

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Surprise #3

Brianna made the trip from NYC! To avoid any suspicion she took an Uber from the airport to Pier 33. Justin had dropped a pin with the location of our parked car, where Doug had left a key on the front tire (risky in downtown SF) so she could store her luggage, then run to catch the boat to Alcatraz. Talk about planning, timing, and lots of luck!! She barely made it onto our ferry as the last passenger. Pam hasn't been that surprised or speechless since we told her we were expecting our first baby! ☺

A mom's work is never done. Trying to stop Nolan from pushing the stroller into strangers on the ferry ☺

Nolan was super cute looking out onto the water

Hanging out with Gp. 

This little boy was Gp's shadow (especially the last couple of days). It seemed like his head was on a constant swivel looking for "Tapa." Gp always has a phone and let's him sit in the front seat of his car and "drive" for long periods of time - what more could Nolan want?!! ♥

Pam and Debbie

 Alcatraz from the boat

One of the most fascinating things to me was learning how many families with children lived and played on Alcatraz. This is me in front of the school house/apartments.

Where you would pick up your clothes and toiletries

 Showers

Cutest little inmate ever!

It was a little hard to listen to the tour with a 20 month old that wants nothing more from life than to press any and all buttons within his reach, but I think we got the gist of it! Grandma even let him listen a few times. 

Justin and Nolan in "the pit."

Where visitors would come to talk. Here I am visiting my husband the criminal hehe. 

Justin would have been ok as an inmate at Alcatraz because they apparently played a lot of baseball.

A windy, but beautiful view of San Francisco from Alcatraz Island

I love the look of pure joy on his face being swung by Gm and Aunt Brianna. You can almost hear the giggles coming out of him! 

Waiting in line to get back on the ferry, hungry but still an amazing, cheerful little boy!

Family selfie on the ferry back

I also wanted to add this awesome pic from the car heading towards Embarcadero Dr. It looked like we were driving into a painting. So beautiful!

After Alcatraz we headed to Walnut Creek to see Debbie's parents old house and meet up with my good friend Melissa, her husband Srini and son Leo. It was a looong drive with lots of traffic and poor Nolan kept asking for milk, but we didn't have any and couldn't get off the freeway to make a stop. I was able to stave off his hunger with some other snacks and he finally fell asleep about an hour into our hour and a half drive. I can't believe how good he was confined in the car and wanting milk that we didn't have. Oh wait, I can. I love that boy so much!

Leo was very friendly and kept wanting to touch Nolan, but Nolan was a little shy/tired and leaned as far away from Leo as possible whenever he tried to touch him haha.

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Saturday morning Justin, Doug and I headed to the golf course for a lesson and 9 holes while the rest of the gang went and got their nails done (Nolan didn't get his nails done ☺, but apparently was perfect at the salon).

The lesson was awesome and so helpful for me. I finally feel comfortable hitting with my irons!!

 

After golf we headed to Costco to grab a few last minute things for Pam's surprise party. I may have also picked up this super cute 49ers chair for Nolan hehe.

We got back home, picked up Nolan, and headed to In 'n' Out for lunch. 

Gp showing Nolan how to drum

While we headed to lunch, the other girls headed to the Oakland Temple to do some initiatories. Here's where Brianna being in town, and Pam's inability to say no to her, came in handy ☺ See, Pam still didn't know there was a big surprise party planned for her that evening, however she had invited several families + children over for dinner and there was still a lot to be done. Doug had a plan to get Pam out of the house for a few hours so that some friends could set up, but to be honest I'm not sure if it would have worked. I'm sure she would have argued that she just had too much to do and suggest we go without her or something. I probably would have done the same thing. Well, Brianna kept insisting on going to the temple and somehow was able to convince her mom to go not even four hours before the party. Only Brianna could have pulled it off ☺ plus, Pam probably felt guilty denying a trip to the temple. It's the temple! haha. Well it worked like a charm and got her out of the house for a solid 3 hours which gave us plenty of time to get ready for the party!

Surprise #4

  The BIG surprise!

I guess I don't have a picture of her walking in, but I think it's safe to say she was pretty surprised to find everyone there!

To the dismay of his grandparents that really wanted to show him off, Nolan was napping when the party started. We waited about an hour, but couldn't fend off the grandparents any longer than that and woke him up ☺

Eating his favorite...chips!

These three were pretty darn cute sitting here together so we had a little photo shoot.

The bubble machine was a big hit, but the kids kept picking it up or knocking it over so Justin came up with the genius idea to put it up on a ladder. Problem solved. 

Lastly, Doug had a bunch of pictures of Pam out on display. I can't get over this one of Pam as a baby. It's like baby Justin wearing a dress!! Cute ♥

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On Sunday we decided we just couldn't wait any longer to post our exciting news on social media. We took about a zillion pictures trying to get a good one and while it didn't turn out exactly as I had envisioned, I think they turned out pretty cute!

We announced that "Nolan is pretty excited to be a big brother!! Baby brother is due to arrive December 2nd ♥"

A couple cute outtakes

Brianna came in and gave Nolan a big lipstick-ey kiss when she left on Sunday which woke him up from his nap. He was in a bit of a mood after that, but it didn't stop her from stealing kisses!

I think in this picture he took Mr. Binks out and was handing it to me without even looking, like "here, take it." haha.

Out for a Sunday stroll 

Unknown to us our flight was delayed for over an hour which meant we didn't get into the SLC airport until almost 1am and didn't get to sleep until 2. Yuck! But we made it! Thanks again to "Summer Lis" for being willing to pick us up at that ghastly hour!

Well, I've gotten to the point in my pregnancy where it's pretty obvious that something's going on in my belly, but no one is quite comfortable assuming what ☺ We still haven't announced anything on social media, but have been telling everyone we see on a regular basis about BB2. We are getting pretty excited to find out the babies gender! 

From my journal (7.13.2016): Well tomorrow morning at 8am is our big ultrasound where we find out if BB2 is a boy or a girl. I remember this with Nolan, it's such a fun and kind of nerve-wracking time! What we find out tomorrow will be the first piece of information we have about our child and the next piece in the puzzle of how our family will take shape. In a way it will establish the dynamic of our family for the rest of our lives. If you look at families whose children are grown they have a set number of children, so many boys and so many girls, that's just how it is and how it's been for a long time. But we're still building our family so who knows! Nolan could be our only son and the rest girls, or we could have all boys, only time will tell! It sure is a fun stage of life.

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Nolan is amazingly observant and has always loved keys and wants to hold them whenever he sees them. Luckily he's gotten over the phase where he just wants to press the buttons (a phase that I'm pretty sure burned out the battery on my key fob :)) and is now content to just be in charge of holding the keys while walking. However, now he loves trying to reach up and "uhlock" (unlock) the car door and the front door (he's still not quite tall enough, but don't tell him that). With some help he can get the key in and out of the lock, but even more impressive is that he knows which key goes to which door! The other day I was walking up the stairs with him in my arms. He was holding the batch of keys by the car key (because he had just locked the car for me) and I asked him if he wanted to unlock the apartment door. He of course wanted to and reached up and started putting the car key in the lock, then quickly noticed his mistake, searched on the key ring for the house key, found it, reached up to put it in the door! I couldn't believe it! Smarty pants!

He loves my friends Sara and Lis! Last movie night he was out on a walk with Justin when they arrived and when Nolan walked in the door and saw them he was positively giddy! He started laughing and flirting and running around showing off toys. It was adorable. Also, speaking of movie night, he still stops everything to listen to the theme song of The West Wing! Last week we watched Sara's very favorite episode and I didn't want to be distracted so I handed him the tablet (mom of the year over here). He was well into an episode of Super Why when the theme song came on and to my surprise he actually looked up from his tablet for the whole song! It's seriously so funny to watch.

Nolan used to perform pretty well for people, like when we'd ask him to say something or give someone a high five for instance he would always say or do it. But now he just gives you a shy smile and looks away, which is cute, but frustrating for Justin and I because we just want to show off how cute and smart he is haha! Anyway, even though he doesn't do it for a lot of people I wanted to record that Nolan can count to 10! He can do it all by himself "one, two, phree, foh, fie, sic, seben, eigh, nigh, TEN!" (he always yells TEN! ☺). He also likes to count every other number with you. If you say "one" he'll say "two," etc. 

Nolan is getting better at just holding the remote, but not actually pressing any buttons. He still changes the channel or goes back on the Roku every once in awhile though and says, "What did I do?!" But he knows if he doesn't press any buttons he gets to hold it for longer. I'm pretty impressed with his self control!

He's definitely getting closer to 2 years old. Nothing he does is too bad, but he's definitely testing boundaries. We're constantly telling him not to do something and he will then point his finger and get as close as he can to doing the thing we just told him not to do, then look back at us as if to say, "How's this?" "Do I still get in trouble for being close?" 

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So cute in flip flops, too bad he won't keep them on for more than 2 min.


He's always trying to shave like daddy. Justin took it away though when it looked like he shaved his eyebrow! (no worries, he didn't ☺)

Story time with daddy. My mom always told me that my dad was always in charge of reading us bedtime stories and I absolutely love that Justin has also taken on this role. It's such a great bonding time. Not to mention that he always reads with a little more flare than mommy haha.

One Saturday we took a trip down to Scheels to look at golf clubs. As soon as we turned one corner and Nolan saw this play structure he pointed and yelled, "side!" (slide). Of course we let him play. He's too little technically, but loves climbing up inside and looking down at mom and dad.

Putting lesson

After Scheels we went to Texas Roadhouse for dinner. He was definitely tired and fussy and I was getting a bit upset with him. I always feel bad when I do that because when I stop to think about it I realize, hey, I get fussy and irritated too when I'm tired and hungry!

Fun at Jeanni's house

Playing at the library

I can't get over this silly kid!

4th of July at the Cabin

We went to my grandparents cabin for the 4th of July weekend again this year and, like always, had a blast! Unfortunately my parents and Granky couldn't be there this year and it was really weird not having them!

We did a lot of hanging out, napping, reading, chatting, and let's be honest - kid watching. Justin wanted to get a hike in, but unfortunately I didn't know that before we left and didn't bring the carrier :( Nolan loved being outside, swinging, throwing rocks into the stream, and 'driving' great grandpas rhino.

The others did some fishing (of course) and even Beck got in on the action. He went out to a lake with his dad, Uncle BJ, and Uncle Andy one night and - get this - he caught TWO fish!! It was absolutely adorable how excited he was to tell all of us. I don't fish a lot, never have (I guess I'm mostly my father's daughter), but I'll probably have to make an exception in a few years if Nolan wants to go!

Speaking of Beck, he and Nolan were SO cute together. Rhett is still kind of quiet and likes to do his own thing, but Nolan and Beck seemed to enjoy playing together. In fact, Beck was one of the very few (maybe the only one!) that got a willing goodbye hug from Nolan ☺

Also, it was during this trip that I came to the realization that I am failing. 

I was dressing Nolan one day and started putting a shirt on him. He kept pointing behind me and saying something. He repeated it a few times and then started saying it a little louder. It sounded kind of like 'Steelers' so I looked behind me, saw his Steelers shirt (that his dad had packed), and picked it up. I asked him, "is this what you want to wear?" "Ya," he responded. Oey, seriously?! I put it on and he was happy as a clam so that's definitely what he wanted. You should have seen the smile on Justin's face.

I went downstairs to ashamedly explain to my family why my son was wearing a Steelers jersey and how I'm obviously failing as a mother and 49ers fan. They chastised me for not trying hard enough while Justin sat next to his Steelers shirt wearing son and beamed with pride.

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I stayed up late Thursday night and made these patriotic sugar cookies. I'm glad to report that everyone loved them. In fact they were so loved that the last one may have been hidden by Andy to avoid anyone else claiming it ☺

Beck all ready to ride the Green Machine + Justin and Nolan

BJ and Kirsten brought a bow and arrow and we had a blast trying it out!

Not bad for first timers! Mine is on the left, Justin's on the right

Once again, Nolan and the other boys loved the swing set and spent lots of time on it. Nolan and Rhett even fell asleep swinging!

Towards the end of the trip Nolan started acting a little sick. It started one night when he woke up coughing a bit. We thought he might be getting a cold, but since he acted mostly like his normal self during the day we didn't think too much of it. 

Each night though he would wake up coughing and gasping until we sat him up and got him some milk. He'd have similar trouble right after naps and he'd be really snuggly and uninterested in playing for 30-45 min after each sleep. After that hour though he'd act fine, he didn't have a fever, and only coughed maybe once an hour, so we still weren't sure if he was really sick or not.

(The day after we got home we took him to the doctor and it turns out he has croup! Poor little guy. He's been a trooper though!).

Also, notice the shiner on his left eye? Poor guy fell against the wooden corner of a window sill. He's pretty tough though!

I kind of felt bad because my poor family didn't get to hold him much or see him at his best and silliest because he wasn't feeling well, plus the fact that he just hasn't been going to other people as easily lately as he once did. He was obviously still super cute though, everyone agreed on that. 

There was definitely a lot of napping that went on

The last day, while Nolan was napping, Justin and I went on a long quad ride together (my favorite!) and asked my grandma (GG) to watch him. When we got back she said he had woken up, but "lost his marbles" when either she or Andy went in to try to pick him up. So they got him his binky and bottle and let him be haha. Sure enough, when we went in the room he was wide awake, just hanging out.

Preston was one of the few who lucked out and got some Nolan snuggles. Devin is convinced Nolan only let Preston hold him because he's my twin ☺

BJ did also finally win him over a little bit when he played legos with him (I think BJ enjoyed it too). BJ made a gun and made shooting noises, then Nolan took it and copied him! haha so cute.

Another favorite cabin activity of Nolan's is collecting rocks and throwing them in the stream.

He and the other boys loved getting in Great Grandpa's Rhino and 'driving.'

They all climbed in like this. I think all of them wanted to 'drive.' I'm surprised there actually wasn't any crying haha.

Look at all those blonde heads! With these new babies we're wondering how long the blonde streak will last or if it will be broken this time around ☺

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This cute picture also reminded me that Nolan got a haircut from his Aunt Devin (and me!) at the cabin. I've been wanting to get a set of clippers to save some money on haircuts and hoped to get a lesson from Devin. Nolan is still pretty good while getting his hair cut, but he HATES to have itchy hair all over him.

The Bailey family heading out for a ride! The Rhino is perfect for taking little ones out on rides and is much safer than taking them on the quads.

We found this fun little pond and waterfall on one of our rides 

The crew making dutch oven chicken for dinner (mmmm!!) BJ loves cooking dutch oven, and we're oh so happy to eat it (he's really getting good at it!). Uncle Andy is a pro and always a big help, and of course, grandpa is always there to supervise. Apparently GG has been requesting less pepper on the potatoes for 60 years, but to her everlasting annoyance, grandpa never listens haha ☺

 My friend Carli gave me this old framed picture of George Washington several years ago. She found it at a sale and was told that it used to hang in an old schoolhouse (my grandma says all the old schoolhouses had this picture on the wall). I liked the picture, but just never had a place for it so it collected dust under my bed for a long time. Then last year I had a light bulb go off and asked my grandma if she would like it. She loves George Washington (and knows a lot about him) so she was pretty excited and said she already knew the perfect place at the cabin for it. I think it looks great!

The BEST part of the trip though, without contest, is the surprise we got from BJ and Kirsten. One afternoon they came down the stairs and BJ said Kirsten had seen these cute pregnancy shirts on pinterest and decided to make one for Devin and I. "Aww, that's so nice! And they're so cute!" I said, thinking nothing of it. "We should definitely put them on and get a picture" (still clueless). Then Kirsten grabbed the zipper on her hoody and said, "Well I was hoping we could all wear them TOGETHER!!" and pulled down the zipper to reveal she was wearing a pregnancy shirt too!!

I seriously jumped up and down from excitement! How fun is it that we are all pregnant at the same time and that these THREE babies will be only 4 months apart?! My parents grandbaby brood is doubling by early next year!