glamour girls

I took the girls to JCPenney's last week to get some good dress-up shots.  The shoes they're wearing are my wedding sandals from almost 9 years ago.  The heels are a quite high, but Millie managed to even run in them!  She wasn't too big on getting her picture taken, so there are a few more of Addie.

it's a....

BOY!!! Yay!  We are sooo excited!  And a little surprised too!  The funny thing is, I've been calling this baby a "him" this whole time, which might seem normal to most people, but with both of my girls, I called them "her" before we even knew.  Must be something about that mother's intuition.  Plus, this baby took a lot longer to move around than the last two, so I figured it was probably a big, lazy boy.

And there is no doubt that this is a boy.  It was very obvious.  We had the ultrasound tech whisper it to Adeline first so she could tell us - which she loved!  But looking at the screen was a dead give-away.  I didn't think I would be able to tell, but it was right there staring at me.

This is all new and a little scary for me.  Those of you with boys will have to pass on some tips to this newbie!

We're all beaming around here tonight!  Time to clean out the girl clothes and look for great deals on baby boy clothes!  How fun!

No worries, Brooks family.  The Brooks family name will now be carried on. 

anxiously awaiting...

So tomorrow at this time we will hopefully know if this baby is a boy or a girl!  I say hopefully because I know there are several cases where the babies don't cooperate and either cover themselves or don't turn the right way or something naughty like that.  My last two cooperated just fine, so I hope this one follows his/her sisters' examples.  Even if they're not totally sure on the gender tomorrow, chances are I'll have more ultrasounds.  With both of my previous pregnancies, I had 5 ultrasounds each because the babies always measured small in the last trimester.  They always ended up being just fine, but it was fun to get to peek at them again!

I've had a lot of people asking what I prefer, and of course I give them the "good mom" answer:  "I really don't care as long as it's healthy."  I know that sounds cheesy, but if you're a mom, you definitely understand that it's so true.  I will honestly be excited either way.  Already having two girls, it'd be fun and easier to have another girl.  Just thinking of 3 little girls running around seems like fun to me.  Call me crazy, but I love all the fun girly stuff.  Plus, it'd save us a lot of money on clothes!  But adding a boy to the mix would also be fun.  Although it does scare me a little since I'm clueless when it comes to boys.  They just seem like they require so much energy and I don't have a whole lot of that to give these days.  But after seeing all the adorable baby boys that my friends have had recently, I get excited to think that I could be holding a baby boy of my own soon too.  Plus, I wouldn't feel guilty buying new baby clothes, since we'd really need them!  Who knows?  Well, I guess God does, and hopefully He'll let us in on that secret tomorrow.

I promise to blog tomorrow night to let you know what we find out.  The appointment isn't until 4:00 and then we're going out for dinner to celebrate, so it won't be until late evening.  If you haven't voted yet, time is running out!

craft week!

I've been so tired lately that last week I felt I wasn't being a very fun mom.  So, I dubbed this week, "Craft Week" since I know the girls (especially Adeline) love crafts.  Each day of the week we did a new craft.

Monday was an easy one.  Since we needed to get some Easter eggs ready, we dyed eggs.  The girls loved it!  Addie had fun putting stickers on the ones for her room.  The rest are gracing our kitchen table.

On Tuesday I stuck the kids in the bathtub with tub paints.  They liked it so much that they were in the tub for over an hour!  They're quite the little Picassos.

Next was Easter Lilly day.  I had seen this craft in the Family Fun magazine and thought it looked like fun.  Unfortunately, I didn't realize how difficult it would be for a 3 year old to trace her hand and cut out leaves, so it ended up being mostly a mommy craft with a little assistance from Adeline.  But she made her own vase of flowers (on the right) by coloring flowers on paper and having me cut them out.  She taped them onto the straws all by herself.

She'd been begging to paint all week, so Thursday we got out her paints and she made tons of little paintings.  She's really into little things these days.

Today we got out the Sand Art gift we had gotten at Christmas and made some bracelets and a necklace.  Fun, but messy!

I know these weren't that creative, but it's hard to come up with crafts for a 3 year old that don't end up being done mostly by mommy.  Plus, I was still tired, and it was hard for me to stretch my brain far enough to think of anything really creative.  But the girls still enjoyed them!  If you have any fun, easy craft ideas, please pass them on!

Hope you all have a great Easter weekend!

my old man

Yes, my man is now old.  Actually, it's been since March 20th now that he turned 30, but I'm just now getting around to posting this.  30!  Can you believe it?!  I remember not that long ago when 30 seemed dreadfully old, and now I'm married to a 30-year-old!  But, my day is coming... just 4 months away... yikes!  But I'm going to relish these few months I have left of being the young 29 year old married to the "older man" before my birthday rolls around.  Anyway, here are a few pictures from Chad's birthday.

He requested a giant-cookie-cake, so I obliged.  Addie helped with the sprinkles.  The writing has much to be desired because the black icing had hardened, making the "30" nearly impossible to get on there, and the only other color we had in the house was pink... but it was good, nonetheless!  I'll post the recipe at the end, because it's my favorite giant cookie recipe - moist and yummy!

We had a small birthday party at HuHot, Chad's favorite!

Chad pretending to blow out his "3" candle. 

("3" for 3 decades... again, the only candle we had in the house...)

The girls sure enjoyed the cookie!

Chocolate Chip Cookie Cake:  (I don't know why this is underlined.. I can't get it to stop underlining what I write...)

1 cup butter

1/2 cup sugar

2/3 cup brown sugar

2 eggs

1 tsp vanilla

2 cups flour, plus 4 Tbsp flour

1 teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon cream of tartar

1 teaspoon baking soda

2 cups semi-sweet chocolate chips (I use milk chocolate chips)

1.  Beat butter and sugars together.

2.  Add eggs and vanilla.

3.  Mix flour, salt, baking soda, and cream of tartar.

4.  Add dry ingredients to the batter and mix until well blended.

5.  Stir in chocolate chips.

6.  Spread dough into a 15 1/2 inch round pan.

7.  Bake for 20 minutes at 350 degrees.