And Then There Were Four…Soon!

Hello friends!

My, how time flies! In the day-to-day, in the week-to-week, in the…trimester-to-trimester…

Yes, that’s right! I’m PREGNANT with baby number TWO!

And we’re talking…I’m nine months pregnant with….

A BABY BOY!

Oh my gosh, we just couldn’t be more excited and grateful…or feeling totally unprepared!

It’s absolutely wild how different your second pregnancy is than your first!

Your first go around, being pregnant is the center of your world: you can just bask in every feeling, every moment of daydreaming of what’s to come, plan and create delicious culinary creations that satisfy every pregnancy craving. You take naps, you fall asleep early, you know exactly how many weeks pregnant you are…to the day.

With your second pregnancy, I feel like the only deliberate thing I’m doing for my pregnancy is taking my prenatal every night after Penelope is asleep! Okay, that might be exaggerating a little bit, but truly I have had zero time to think about being pregnant, or planning for our son’s arrival. Not with a toddler keeping me on my toes all day! 🙂 (Which is an absolute joy, don’t get me wrong!) But I just have so many other wonderful motherhood things to occupy my time with, than to fixate on being pregnant! (Like getting Penelope up on skis!)

But anywho – it has been a long time since I’ve popped in here, and it’s not for lack of wanting to! One thing that I am very deliberate about is to not have my phone out around Penelope (who is a year and nine months). I just don’t want her to ever feel like she has to compete with a phone for my attention, so as a result: all text messages, social media scrolling, or anything else I want to do on my phone or computer is put off until the end of the day, after she’s in bed!

And let’s be honest: when 9:00 rolls around, I am exhausted!

But enough about that.

Let’s catch up!

What I’ve Been Up To!

Well, I’m still running every day – it’s Penelope and my favorite time together. We love to look for airplanes and school buses, listen for owls and woodpeckers, and sing along to music together. Raffi is a favorite, as is Hillsong, the Beach Boys, and a tagalog (Filipino) song called, Mabagal by Daniel Padilla and Moira De La Torre. Slow dancing with her to that song is literally the only way we can get her to take a nap!

Penelope is a talker. Holy smokes, when I say this girl’s vocabulary is probably around 600 words, I’m not even joking. She’s even starting to put together 5 and 6-word sentences. It is the most amazing thing, I am so proud of her!

I’m cooking a lot. I spend the majority of my time in the kitchen, to be honest — between cooking and cleaning up meals — which, with a toddler, can take a long time! We are being really deliberate about providing Penelope with a wholesome, nutritious diet…especially given my Ulcerative Colitis history. So that translates to cooking breakfast, lunch and dinner for the fam!

Speaking of, I have embarked on a sourdough journey…so it’s only a matter of time until I’ll ask my husband for chickens…right? 😉 Just kidding…But I finally have an active starter, so I’m planning on making my first loaf this week: pray for me!

I weaned Penelope a little over a month ago, which was one of the hardest things I’ve ever had to do. It was such a beautiful, special time for us, and I feel really good that I was able to share almost 20 months of nursing with her, but gosh it broke my heart to have to stop. But I did so at the recommendation of my doctor to allow my body the time to prepare for baby #2.

That coupled with all the emotions that come from mentally preparing to go from one-to-two children. For as over the moon I am to welcome baby boy, there is also a part of my heart that is grieving the fact that Penelope is going to have her world rocked. She’s going to see me holding another baby, loving and nursing her brother, holding him, giving him so much attention, and I’m just carrying all the emotions of what she’s going to think — how she’s going to feel — to see and feel that.

And I know that giving her a sibling is the greatest gift in the absolute world I could give her, but I know that she’s going to have to go through a period of adjustment, coming to terms with the fact that she’s no longer the only child.

And perhaps I’m not giving her enough credit. Knowing Penelope and her gumption and personality, she’s going to rise to the occasion, and not even think about that, but rather only feel the joy of having a sibling around, and being able to love and care for him together with me and Steven.

But yeah, that’s the only thing I’m really worried about re: the transition from one-to-two. I know I’ll be tired, and I know there will be chaos. But this is what we signed up for! And how great that this time around, we won’t have to learn in real time how to change a diaper, or try to figure out breast feeding or feeding schedules. It’s not our first rodeo, as they say.

That being said: I would love any tips or insight that was helpful in the one-to-two kid transition, especially when it comes to two-under-two! Please sound off in the comments any words of wisdom! It would be greatly appreciated!

And that’s about it!

We still haven’t decided on a name for baby boy…and when I say that, I mean: we have no idea. We have a couple names we kinda like, but we haven’t found the one yet. Boy names are HARD!!!!! With Penelope, we knew pretty much from day one that we loved her name and it was it. So please: if you have any suggestions, leave them in the comments!

Well, that’s it from this gal for now! I have sufficiently stayed up past my bedtime, and tomorrow is going to come bright and early!

It’s so good to be with you guys again! I hope you all are well, I think about you often, and I would love to hear what you’re up to, either by email or in the comments! I’VE MISSED YOU!

God bless, friends!

xo Caralyn