Happy Birthday Ma!

My mom celebrated her birthday in early August. This was a big deal for Caleb because we had told him his birthday was next (in order of our family birthdays)...this may not have been the best thing to tell him because he didn't forget that for one second! As we wrapped Grandma's presents he kept asking where his presents were and was so disappointed when I told him he didn't get any presents for awhile. We went to my parents' house for dinner the night before my mom's birthday and gave her presents....Caleb told her what every gift from us was, during dinner...I guess he can't keep secrets! The next day (her actual birthday) we went back over there for cake and ice cream and her sisters came over, too. We had a nice little party and Caleb enjoyed that...he'd celebrate birthdays every day if he could!
Now he's really looking forward to his birthday. We went to the 'party store' recently to get some birthday party supplies and he had fun picking out things there. His choice for birthday party theme this year was....tractors! Unfortunately the only kind of party supplies in tractor theme are John Deere...so the family will have to suffer through a green tractor day (they are RED tractor fans...I think one of my dad's t-shirts reads 'if it ain't red, leave it in the shed').

Family picnic

Every summer we have our annual Carlson Family picnic..the Carlson family is my mom's mom's side of the family. Only one of my Grandma's sisters is still living and we were celebrating her 90th birthday at this picnic. Since there was such a large turnout we did some family pictures. The first picture is the 2nd generation, so my mom and her sisters and cousins. The second picture is my generation, so my siblings and cousins and second cousins. The last picture is of Great Aunt Jenny with the 4th generation, Caleb and his second cousins and third cousins! It really is amazing to see so much family together. I remember going to these summer picnics (and our annual Christmas parties, too) almost every year when I was younger.

Baby update

Things are just moving right along with baby #2! I saw my doctor this morning and the check-up went well. Next appointment will be the halfway mark and our big ultrasound! I scheduled it for September 9th. I'm excited and nervous for this appointment. It's always fun to actually 'see' the baby...but this time around we've also decided to find out the gender, if possible. We didn't find out with Caleb and while it was hard waiting, it was also so exciting at that moment when they had to yell out "it's a boy!" And at that time, I was just so pleased to be done with labor and have the baby safely here, I didn't really have a solid reaction to the gender news. This time it will be low key, in the ultrasound room, and I hope either way, I will have a happy reaction! All we really want is a healthy baby, of course, and I've kinda been envisioning myself as the mom to boys....so I am preparing myself for boy #2. But I would love to have that little girl, too. Either way, it's kind of hard imagining our family with a 4th person. Finding out the gender will make it a little more real.