His Head Fell Off

What has been up with this winter weather here in Michigan?  We haven't had much snow, and then the day we do get some we have a massive thaw the next day or so.  Maybe you like that?  We're not all fans over here.  I have a husband who would love to snowmobile and a son who loves to play outside in the snow.  Bright doesn't understand why it so quickly disappears just after it arrives.
Last night Jon and Bright went outside for just a bit as the thaw had already begun, so they made a snowman; it's our first of the year.  When we woke up this morning the snowman's head had already fallen off. Nice.
The weather people said this time last year was that massive storm that closed schools for three days.  Wow!  What a difference.  It might reach 50 degrees today.
I better get this picture on here in case we don't have many more opportunities for snowman making.   

And just in case you were wondering, I am not writing this from the hospital.  I do have a doctor's appointment today, but there is no baby info or plan to pass along at this point other than we're doing fine...just waiting to meet her.

Room is Ready

The baby's room is ready!  It doesn't need much more other than our baby girl.
I'm 37 weeks today, and there is still plenty of time to enter our baby pool for a chance to win a $25 Amazon Gift Card. 
 Click here for the details.

Walcott Baby Pool and Prize

If you haven't seen me lately, here I am...

I am 35 weeks pregnant today.  The nursery is nearly completed.  I think we have a name selected.  We are very close to ready, and even more excited to meet our baby.  So naturally it's time to begin our baby pool.  All of our readers are invited to participate.  The prize is a $25 Amazon.com gift card!  We are using ExpectNet.com to host our pool.  Our game is titled: WalcottBabyPool or you can link directly to our game below.

In order to win, you want to earn as few points as possible.  You will earn points in the following ways: incorrect gender - 400 points, date and time - 5 points per hour, weight - 5 points per ounce, and length - 10 points per inch.

If there is a tie, we will use the hospital room number as a tie breaker.  Jon and I already recorded our guesses, but we are not eligible for the gift card.  The pool will close in four weeks or earlier if our family is complete before then.

Happy Guessing!  Good luck!

We're Takin' It Easy

We're all takin' it easy over here at the Walcott home.  Brighton injured his foot last week jumping off a table - nice.  We watched him with an awful limp for nearly 24 hours, and then we determined we should probably bring him in.  Poor little guy has a pretty bad sprang (thankfully not broken!), and he has been limping something fierce for several days now.  Doctor's orders were to not run or jump for a week.  Umm...have they met my son or I'm guessing any average three year old?  I think it is slowly getting better, and he has been a trooper through the whole thing.

This mama is takin' it easy too.  I had some pregnancy complications a few weeks ago, so I have been instructed to stay home from school and take it easy.  Even though I'm missing my life at school, I'm obviously following doctor's orders. Not exactly how I was thinking this would all work out, but I'm very thankful it's not worse because it very much could be. 

We're all doing fine, we're just not the wicked busy Walcotts you have come to know.  

Make sure you find some time to do some takin' it easy this holiday week.  It really does make you thankful for a brand new set of life's experiences.    

TGIF!

Friday was my last day teaching for the year, and it was really hectic, but AMAZING! I finally was able to meet and spend some time with the sub that will be replacing me for the rest of the year. The kids were really sweet, and I received several adorable gifts from students and colleagues.

The principal and I took the students to video competition award ceremony in the middle of the day, and they won! They won huge! We took first and second place, earning WOBN $3000. I still can't really believe it.

The winning video will be shown at the Holland 7 and the Grand Haven 9 movie theaters before every movie this summer. The hope is to neutralize the smoking message that is present in so many popular movies; this has been proven to influence especially teenagers. 4,000 teenagers in the US try a ciggarette for the first time everyday.

One other thing...I have to include a few pictures because they printed out giant checks for us. I've never been on the giving or receiving end of a giant check. I must say it's pretty cool. You should've seen the kids walking around with those things - priceless.

Shower Day - Times Two

Last Saturday, (I realize I'm a bit behind here) I had two showers to attend: a baby shower for me and a bridal shower for my best friend Kim. It sure was a fun day.

The baby shower was thrown by a few of my friends (thanks so much gals!); it was great. It was neat to see some of my friends from different circles meet and interact. I heard many times, "You have such nice friends." Yes, I do! I received such great stuff along with a kids book instead of a card - what a great idea. We have a nice little library started for our "Little Stinker." Thanks so much everyone!

Kim's shower was tons of fun too. It was in Ferrysburg at a clubhouse with many of her girlfriends and her aunts and cousins too. I won one of the games. We had to draw kim in her wedding dress on top of our heads - not looking of course. I did my best, and then wrote "I love Aaron" at the bottom. Some thought I was cheating a bit, but words are my way - go figure...English and communications teacher.

What a fun day with fun women!

Little Stinker Update

I had another ultrasound on Friday, so I took my sister and mom along. We saw what they said was quite a bit of hair, and we watched him suck his thumb - so cute! At one point his thumb fell out of his mouth, and the "Little Stinker" did not like that. His head and hands were moving back and forth quite a bit until he was back at it again. We saw this all on an ultrasound, and I felt it too. Technology is amazing!

According to the baby size equation that doctors use, he already weighs approximately 7 pounds and 7 ounces. I hear that babies at this stage gain about an ounce a day. I think he should join us sooner rather than later don't you?

My doctor also told me that he wouldn't let me go past my due date. That was exciting news. I have a good friend that went 18 days past hers. It's comforting to know that is out of the equation for me. That means he'll be here sometime in the next 3 1/2 weeks!

Everyone is asking us, "Are you ready?" The answer is almost. We'd be thrilled if he would show up tonight. We're ready in that sense. Jon is excited, but I sense he is getting a bit anxious about the actually day or night when it's time. I'm doing okay in that department, but I'm not ready at school. I'm scheduled to work the next two weeks yet (9.5 days!), but I am going to attempt to have everything ready and waiting for a sub in the next few days just in case. This is no small task, but I'm almost there. Ideally, I'd like to meet with the sub, but they haven't found one yet. It's nice to know I'm not that easy to replace. The administration has been telling me not to worry about it, but now they seem to be scrambling. Oh well. My kids will survive, and pretty soon I really won't be worrying about it at all.

Thanks for your thoughts and prayers. I'll post more about my super fun weekend soon. Have a great week!

What's in a name?

What's in a name? That which we call a rose

By any other name would smell as sweet."

Every year I teach Shakespeare's Romeo & Juliet to freshmen. I'm teaching it right now. It's a challenge, but I really enjoy it. Most students end up getting a big boost of confidence as they make it through and understand a Shakespearean play. Some of the lines we look at are the ones above about names. One of the reasons their love is doomed from the start is because Romeo is a Montague and Juliet is a Capulet; their families are long standing enemies. As they quickly fall in love, they wish names weren't important. The lines above explain that a rose would still be a beautiful rose even if it was called something else. Unfortunately, it's not so simple for them. I think we all know how it ends.

Names are of course taking on a whole new meaning for us right now. I'm pretty sure we have a name selected for our "Little Stinker." It's a big responsibility! At this point, sometimes I question our choice, but I think it's only when I focus on the enormity of the decision. Jon seems more sure, so that is comforting.

For those of you wondering and haven't asked yet, we have decided to keep his name a secret. I get asked by curious students everyday at school. And my mom wins the grand prize for trying to figure it out. She asks questions such as: "What letter does it start with? How many letters are in the name? The nickname?" In Disney World, she also offered to buy a really cute name print for us, but we would of course had to reveal the name. Both Jon and I have resisted the pressure, and we haven't slipped yet either.

Our three year old nephew, Braden, also weighed in on the name topic this week. When Pam asked him what he thought his new cousin's name should be, he replied "Pablo" without hesitation.

Thanks for all of your concern this week about my cold and Jon's thumb. We're both on the mend, and we are LOVING this warmer weather. We're at the Raterink Cottage putting in the dock and shore station. Well, I'm not any help and Jon isn't contributing 100% either, but on days like today you realize that summer can't be far off.

Enjoy your warm weekend!

It's not just my students!

I thought the inappropriate and hilarious comments about my pregnancy were just coming from my students, but it turns out my parents are right there with them.

As we were about to board the plane to Florida, my mother in all seriousness, told me that they probably would have an extenda-belt available if I needed one.



I used a wheel chair quite a bit at Disney World because we put in some HUGE days. I didn't want to miss anything, and it really made the difference. While we were doing some of the more popular attractions at Disney World you can get a Fast Pass which prevents you from waiting line. Dad told the family he would just use me...his Fat Pass (they treat people in wheel chairs really well).


I'll post some more pics of the trip soon.

More Comments from Students

Back by popular demand...

Here are a few more memorable comments from students about my pregnancy that have come my way in the last couple weeks:

• Mrs. Walcott, are you scared?

• Mrs. Walcott, you are waddling.

• Mrs. Walcott, I can see your belly button.

• Mrs. Walcott, did you grow a lot since yeseterday?

It's NOT a Chevy

Some of this baby gear is something else to put together! We got an attachment for our stroller, and figuring things out and putting it together took a bit longer than expected. We have found that to be the case for just about all gear we have bought for the "Little Stinker." If this was a Chevy or just about anything else for that matter, Jon would NOT be reading the directions.

He does look a bit overwhelmed doesn't he? The extra time and a bit of frustration were well worth it. Understandably (and thankfully) Jon becomes a bit of a perfectionist when it comes to gear for our son.

Mr. Fix-It of course eventaully accomplished the stroller assembly. We hope to be pushing around "Little Stinker" in just a couple short months!

31 Weeks

Thirty one weeks and counting! We have about 60 days until "Little Stinker" arrives. Here is what we look like:

We got another look at the "Little Stinker" on Friday. This is his face. His whole body is too big to fit entirely on the screen. He weighs about 4.5 pounds, and he has hair.

The crib is ready and waiting for him.

The Nursery

We're getting there...

Getting Ready

I am 29 weeks along, so we are definitely in the stage of actively getting ready for our "Little Stinker" to arrive in May.

• We attended a birth class at Holland Hospital on Saturday. I really don't know where to begin, so I'll just leave it at that.



• Jon tried to install the carseat today, and although as a mechanic he was confident (and so was I) that he could install the thing, he has decided to call the Lakeshore Safe Kids Coalition just to be sure. Not as easy as we thought.




• We received our rocking chair this past week. A great gift from Dan & Jordan. It's so cool! I was bit concerned about the comfort at first, but then rememembered I'm pregnant, and it's not exactly comfortable to be rocking like that at this stage of the game.
  
• I got a couple of great things from Petunias. Kelly hooked me up with a great blanket, burb clothes, an icky bag, and even a onsie that says...you guessed it..."Little Stinker." You can access her Etsy stores here and here. Great stuff!
  
• Our crib and changing table is scheduled to arrive on Tuesday. Can't wait for that! You know what we'll be doing Tuesday night.

This week at school (and many high schools across the state) is going to be crazy. We've been "Getting Ready" for quite some time now. The Juniors need to take the MME, and the rest of us need to do something while they're doing that. During this time we're not in regular classes, but divided up into grades doing a variety of activities. Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday are going to be crazy. Thankfully the principal decided to release the seniors for one of the days, and I'm with them, so who knows what I'll end up doing when they're gone. Maybe they'll be nice to me because I'm pregnant :)

Have a great week everyone!

The Raterink Grandpas

Little Stinker's Grandpa Raterink and Great Grandpa Raterink painted his bedroom this week. Great Grandpa Raterink spent most of the day painting and then Grandpa Raterink helped the last few hours.

The room looks great! Thank you so much grandpas!

Pregnancy 101

Lots of you have been asking about my pregnancy. Thanks so much for your questions, concerns, and prayers. I am just about 25 weeks along. I'm feeling great. I'm definitely showing. Last week at church, someone congratulated us on our pregnancy by taking a look at my tummy. I guess it's pretty obvious now.

The kids at school have started to say what I call memorable comments, well they always say memorable things, but now they're about me and our little guy. I have done my best to smile and address the fact that these comments aren't exactly appropriate to be making towards a teacher or to anyone for that matter. Here are a few examples from the last couple weeks:

"Does your back hurt Mrs. Walcott?"

"Yes, I guess it does a little bit."

"Is that due to your pregnancy?"

"I think so Adam," I said.

"Well, you should be thankful it's not vericose veins."

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"I can REALLY tell from the side that you are pregnant!"

"Yeah Mike, I can't really hide it anymore."

"Well, you are gonna have to work really hard to get rid of that [weight]."

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"Mrs. Walcott, tell me about your exercise routine."

(I ponder the question.)

"Jimmy, are you calling me fat?"

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"Would it be weird if I came and visited you in the hospital?"

"Yes. You may not come."

"But I'll know when you're there becuase my mom works there."

"It would be weird. You may not come."

"What if I just show up?"

Being a high school teacher definitely adds an interesting layer to my pregnancy experience :)

Move In & Out Day

Today we are moving the office out of the second bedroom upstairs to make way for the nursery for our "Little Stinker." Then the two new bedrooms downstairs are finished and ready to move in, so we'll be setting up our new office down there and our spare bedroom.

We have a little bit of painting to do in the nursery that we hope to do in the coming weeks with some help from Grandpa Raterink - we're thinking bright apple green. It's downstairs in a bathroom already, and we both really like it, so we're bringing it upstairs. A fun and distinctive color for our little guy - purposeful as my friend Jo put it. We're only painting two walls, so don't freak out those of you that prefer the pastels. I think it will be quite cool. This week we also plan to do some work on the inside of the closet: adding some shelves and changing the hanging set-up. Nursery furniture won't arrive until March, so we have some time.

The rest of my family arrives home today, so we are looking forward to seeing all of them. My sister and her husband get home today from their Hawaii Honeymoon, and my parents were gone too in the Florida Keys. We're looking forward to hearing about both their trips. They certainly will return to a winter wonderland here. I've had three snow days in the last two weeks.

Have a great weekend! Around here it's a perfect one for outdoor winter activities. Too bad most of them are off limits for me. I know Jon would really like to be snowboarding or snowmobiling.