Allergies here have been just awful for the past week. The tree pollen count has been high and the Lutz household is definitely suffering. All three of us (yes, Jonathan has developed allergies too) have been taking allergy medicines as often as possible trying to contain our symptoms.
That being said, it's been difficult to get outside to play without making our allergies worse. So, yesterday, Jonathan decided to bring some of the outdoors in!
Caleb was helping from inside...Orion was helping too : )
More helping
"Hello!"
Playing with the box... of course, he would want that after the tent is put together!
Daddy and Caleb
Crawling around
He likes sitting in the back corner!
I hope the pollen counts go down soon (not likely, but I can hope right!) and we can get outside more, until then, I guess it's happy camping in the living room. : )
Wow...this pregnancy is flying by! I can't believe I'm already 22 weeks along, and I only have around a month left in my 2nd trimester. This baby is going to be here before we know it!
I have been feeling him move for several months, but I'm now getting some of the stronger kicks! I love those feelings. When Caleb moved he tended to have several kicks in a row, so it was easy for Jonathan to feel. This one tends to kick once and then be still for a while, so Jonathan hasn't felt him yet, but I feel sure it'll be soon. I really wish I had kept some kind of journal (or blog) while I was pregnant with Caleb so I would have more to compare to!
I've been loosing weight through my pregnancy, but at the doctor yesterday I found out I have finally started to gain. According to the dr's office I have lost 15 pounds, but I know I had started to loose prior to my first appointment. I think I lost a total of 22 pounds. Not at all the direction I was supposed to go, but I lost quite a bit with Caleb as well. As of my appointment yesterday, I have now gained back 4 pounds. The doc would have liked me to gain more than that, but I'm happy with it - at least the scale is going in the correct direction now!
As far as "planning" is going...well, we haven't really planned anything. Sorry little boy....it's not that we don't care, there's just less urgency to get everything done this time around! We are 95% sure of his name, but aren't announcing anything just yet. But as far as registering for a few items or picking out nursery things...we haven't done anything. Jonathan did move the changing table from Caleb's room to downstairs a few weeks ago so it would be in a central location for both kids, and I'm enjoying not having to go up the stairs every time Caleb needs a new diaper.
Not much else to report on. I feel like in the last two weeks I have suddenly exploded and started to show my bump. I don't mind looking pregnant, but I was a bit shocked at how quickly I went from feeling pudgy to pregnant. It literally felt overnight and every day since then I feel bigger than the previous day! I guess that means little boy is growing the way he should be. I made the jump this weekend from regular jeans with a band to maternity pants, I don't know why I put it off so long, they are much more comfy!
Here's me at 22 weeks. I didn't take many pictures of myself when I was pregnant with Caleb, so nothing to compare it to. But you can tell Little Boy is in there!
Ok.... I think this is the last post in my series this evening...
This has been yet another busy weekend...busy, but wonderful!
We started out with a brunch on Saturday morning with a group of people who have been wonderful friends in the two years we've known each other. I could write a post all about that, but friends that hosted our brunch have posted about it on their blog and I think Che did a great job of sharing. You can read about our brunch here. Che shares that it was their first group to lead, it was our first group to be in. That group was an amazing experience and we are now leading with the Acords. Jonathan and I have both grown so much through our time with these wonderful couples and I'm so glad we had the opportunity to spend some time together.
If that was all we had done this weekend, it still would have been a great weekend, but we didn't stop there. We had a few hours at home for naptime and some calm play time before we went over to Grandma Mal's to have a family dinner while Sarah, Alex and Lana were in town packing up the last of their things. We had a good time catching up with the both of Jonathan's sisters and their families. Lana and Caleb had a good time playing with Grandma's toys.
One of Jonathan's favorite toys as a kid was a push popper. You know, the toy you either push or pull and as you go with it, the balls in the end "pop". Well, Grandma brought it downstairs and Caleb immediately attached to it. He played with it for the rest of the evening. Jonathan got a cute video of Caleb running around the house with it. We also took some great pictures with Grandma...Caleb was in an unusually smiley mood yesterday, so we took advantage!
Besides all the fun on Saturday, we enjoyed some time just the three of us this afternoon after church. Jonathan wanted to get some yard work done, so Caleb and I went outside to watch Daddy and enjoy the beautiful weather. Caleb routinely carries around my water bottle any time we're outside and today I thought I'd let him play with it a little. I may have been crazy when I decided this, I'm not sure.
Below is a 6 minute video of Caleb having fun. He was probably playing with the water bottle for 15 minutes before I thought to grab the camera. I realize most of you won't want to watch the whole video, but enjoy the first minute! You can see Caleb's engineer mind working!
Caleb had to change from his wet clothes as soon as we got inside, but it was fun to let him explore and discover the water bottle.
We had a busy, fun-filled weekend and I'm sad to see it ending already. The weekends always go by too quickly. Hope everyone else had a great weekend too!
Two weeks ago Jonathan had the opportunity to see the final launch of Space Shuttle Discovery in Florida. On this flight, NASA sent Robonaut (the humanoid robot that Jonathan has assisted with) to the International Space Station. Jonathan was sent with the second Robonaut to do some demonstrations before and after the launch.
Just some background - this is the first human-like robot that has been sent into space. Robonaut is human-like from the waste up. The goal is to have him do simple tasks around the ISS (cleaning, easy repairs, etc) so that the astronauts can spend less time on those tasks and more time on the bigger picture items. The NASA website has much better information on Robonaut here if you're interested.
Jonathan worked on some of the camera balance/focus details during one of his co-ops and, since graduation, one of his projects has been the mechanics of the base for Robonaut. The base wasn't sent up on this mission, but allows the robot left behind to do more tasks and be moved for demonstrations.
So... Jonathan went to Florida for the launch two weeks ago and Caleb and I stayed home. Unfortunately, Caleb came down with the tummy bug the day Jonathan left and I came down with it the day before he returned. So the two of us stayed home the four days Jonathan was gone and just tried to find things to do around here. I took a few pictures of a cute Caleb while Jonathan was gone. We sure do have a cute boy! If I can get pictures from Jonathan of the launch (they aren't currently on this computer) I'll post some of those as well. And if I have any incorrect information, I'm sure Jonathan will let me know and I'll update that too! (He read this and says I did ok!)
Hope you enjoyed some educational information about Robonaut and seeing some pictures of our cute, sick boy!
He put his bowl on the ground upside side right at the backdoor and used it as a chair for a while....completely his idea!
Eating cheerios - about all he could keep down for a full day.
Beginning to feel better. He looked cute "reading" his book in his chair.
Jonathan with Robonaut on the rover he helped design in front of the countdown clock on launch day for STS-133.
I've got several things to share with everyone, so this is the first of a series of blog posts I hope to post tonight.
First - I am just amazed at how much technology allows us to do! Jonathan's sister, Sarah, and her family recently moved away from League City to Colorado. We are super excited for Alex's new job opportunity, but were sad to see them go. I have enjoyed watching our niece, Lana, and Caleb begin to play together as they are getting older and was sad to see his playmate move away.
Jonathan and I have friends that have used skype in the past, but I never really bothered to figure it out. What a blessing it has been for us! We have now had the opportunity to "skype" several times and this past week we had Grandma Mal, cousin Juliana in Iowa and cousin Lana in Colorado all on with Caleb at the same time! It was so neat to see everyone and give the cousins a chance to see each other. The adults are definitely doing more talking than the kids right now, but I think this will be a great way for the kids to get to know each other as they get older.
We plugged the computer into the tv in our living room so that we could all see the screen and there would be less chances for Caleb to touch the keyboard (a definite no-no right now). Here are some pictures from the "playdate".
Smiling at everyone! (The camera is on the computer, so he has to stay in front of it)
