A "Sprinkle" for Ellis

On February 23, 2014, Kori and my friend Carrie threw me a little "Baby Sprinkle" at Gloria's restaurant in Arlington.  Since I had lots of showers with Lane and have moved away from DFW, I didn't see a need in having a big shower again.  Kori and Carrie insisted on doing something small, so we did a casual lunch with friends.  It was perfect!  The restaurant made it easy because there was no decorating or clean-up!!  I really appreciate them planning it for me! 

The whole group!  Riley's sister Brooke, me, Kori, Tara, Carrie, Ashley and Riley.  

 Two little gentlemen joined us...Riley's nephew Nolan... 

And her baby boy, Carson!  So cute!

Carrie ordered these adorable decorated sugar cookies from a bakery in Dallas that were so delicious!  I loved the sweet monogram and baby girl colors.

I got so many cute, personalized things from everyone.  We pretty much have all of the baby essentials from when Lane was little, so I was excited to get some cute girly items, and I am a sucker for a monogram!!!

 

 

Kori bought Ellis a TINY swimsuit!!  To make it even cuter, she got a matching one for Evin in her size.  There will be two stylin' ladies by the pool this summer!

Ellis got lots of cute clothes, too!

In addition to the cute clothes and personalized items, I was given some diapers and wipes, a car seat blanket and matching travel changing pad, some nursing essentials, a pretty blanket, and a few other goodies!  Thank you, thank you to my sweet friends for all of the gifts.

Claire kept Lane for me during the shower and they had fun playing at the park and her house.  After he got back to Mums' house, he got to open a present from her.  Since Ellis got a bunch of gifts that day, mom got a new book for Lane in honor of his baby sister.  It's called Shhh! Don't Wake the Baby, and is perfect for a rambunctious big brother who will have to keep it quiet at nap and bedtime!

 

 

Later that night, we ran by Kori and Mitch's so I could get a bunch of Evin's old baby clothes and items to borrow.  I ended up leaving with a major haul for Miss Ellis!  Hopefully Kori will have a boy someday and I can return the favor by loaning out all of Lane's clothes and shoes!

A quick pic of me with Ellis' future best gal pal, Evin!

She has a name!

Kyle and I celebrated our anniversary on December 2nd.  He had ordered me an anniversary gift before Thanksgiving and it took a while to be delivered.  It finally came and it is one of his most thoughtful gifts he's ever given me!  We were celebrating 7 years of marriage, and the traditional gift for 7th anniversaries is "copper."  When I opened the present I found a pretty copper necklace with 2 charms on it.  One with an 'L' and one with an 'E."  Kyle and I had been going back and forth on names for our baby girl and couldn't agree on anything.  My top choice was Ellis and his was Landry.  When I saw the 'E' I looked up at him with a grin and saw that he was smiling too.  He finally agreed on Ellis after months of trying to sway his opinion!  It made the gift that much sweeter! 

 

So, without further ado.....our baby girl will be named:

We realize it is definitely not a traditional little girl name, but both of us can already envision our cute little daughter and the name Ellis just seems to fit.  I had it on my boy list for a while, and transferred it to the girl side once we found out we were having a daughter.  The middle name Paige has always been one of my favorites.  It is my sister Kori's middle name, and it just seemed to fit perfectly as a middle name with most of our first name choices.  Lane had been campaigning for the name Ellis, and told Kyle "Mommy and I won!"  It's nice to be able to call her something other than "the baby," and we can't wait to put a face with a name in April!

Pregnancy 16-20 Weeks

10/28/13-11/25/13

Well, I have reached the halfway point of this pregnancy!  Weeks 16-20 were exciting ones!  As mentioned in a previous post, we found out that Baby Coots #2 is a girl!  This month I had some random morning sickness creep back up and began battling major migraines.  I am pretty much having headaches almost every day and often times they turn into migraines.  It is no fun!  At 19 weeks I was finally able to feel movement with my hand when pressed to my belly.  So cool!  I feel movement off and on all day, but almost always feel the most when I am laying in bed at night about to go to sleep.  The good news is, the movement doesn't continue during the night, so I am able to get a good night's sleep so far.  

On 11-19-13 I had my 19 week checkup.  The heart rate was in the 150's and everything seems to be great.  I have gained 11 lbs so far.  I asked my Dr. about my migraines and she said they should taper off as my hormone levels regulate, but if not, to let her know.  That night, I ended up having one of the worst migraines of my life!  I took one of my prescribed migraine pills at 9:30pm, somehow fell asleep, and woke back up at 2am with my head THROBBING.  I woke up Kyle just to tell him how horrible I felt, took another pill, and tried to force myself to sleep.  After about 45 min of agony, I finally fell back to sleep and woke up that next morning feeling a little better.  

Week 20 was the week of Thanksgiving!  I enjoyed all of the yummy food and took full advantage of my stretchy maternity pants.  The headaches and migraines continued this week, but were a little bit better.  We are still discussing names and saw lots of family members this week that all had some name ideas to throw out.  Paw has renamed the baby girl Peggy Lynn.  Peggy was my grandmother's name and Lynn is my mom's middle name.  While the name has special meaning, I just don't think we will use it.  ;-)  (When he originally predicted boy, he was calling it Cody Colt.)  Hopefully our daughter has the perfect name soon!  

Here is our monthly photo.  Growing quickly!

 

And the progression thus far:

 

In other news, Big Brother Lane has been starting to revert back to his toddler ways lately.  I think the new baby on the way has him acting a little crazy!  Here are some of his recent shenanigans.

Decided he needed a Sharpie mustache while I was in the shower.

Wanted to be a helper and fed Scout without me knowing.

Walked in wearing a bib he found.  (And no shirt?!?)

Tested out Mommy's new lip gloss.

Sat in the Bumbo that we let Evin borrow.

Let's hope he gets this all out of his system before April!  My bet is it could get worse.  :-/

IT'S A..........

On Thursday, November 7, 2013, we had our appointment with the perinatologist for my 18 week anatomy scan sonogram.  It was originally scheduled for November 14, but Kyle was scared he would have a work conflict, so we were able to move it up a whole week!  We were thrilled because we had already planned a trip back to DFW that weekend and could tell our family the baby's gender in person!

The appointment went well.  Most importantly, the specialist was able to see all of the parts of the baby and confirmed that the heart, brain, limbs, and the baby in general looked GREAT!  Baby Coots was measuring right on track and cooperated by letting us get a peek at her girly parts!  :)  The specialist knew right away it was a girl and got a couple of extra views in to make completely sure.  We are thrilled to be adding a little girl to the mix!  I know Lane was set on a sister, and Kyle and I are excited to experience having a daughter.  We both didn't care at all if it was a boy or a girl, but were happy to hear that SHE is healthy and can't wait to meet HER!

The sonographer snapped this picture of us right after we found out the news.  We all have such genuine smiles!  I love this picture so much and am glad I had her take it.

I searched Pinterest for some cute gender reveal ideas and came across these do it yourself confetti poppers using push pop containers.  Rather than having to eat a bunch of push pop popsicles, I was glad to find empty ones at Michael's and stuffed them with pink confetti.  I wrapped them in scrapbook paper and sealed them with tissue paper. 

Lane was really excited to tell Mums, Gran, Pops, and his Aunts and Uncles his big news.  We stayed with my mom for the weekend and she was excited to pop her popper and find pink confetti.  She must have had a premonition because she was wearing the right color!  ;-)

I put an "It's a girl" strip of paper in each popper so Lane could pose with his loved ones.

We took Kori and Mitch's Christmas card pictures at the park, so Lane took their confetti poppers to give to them there.

Gran and Pops were excited to hear the news too! Their confetti poppers worked the best of all!  Lots of pink showering everyone!

Even Sawyer was happy!

 

This same weekend was the Walk to Defeat ALS that my family participates in every year.  My Aunt Kathy, Tiffany, Mason and Marley all were in town to go to the walk, so Lane let them know the news by spraying the kids with pink silly string!!  Marley hid under the table so she wouldn't get sprayed, but Mason was quite ready to be a target!

I think Mason was having so much fun getting sprayed that he didn't really realize what it was all about and what the pink meant.  Tiffany said "Mason, do you know what this means?  Lane is going to have a baby sister!"  This picture was right as she told him!

Uncle Mitch was just minding his own business and got the last few sprays of silly string directed at him.  Such a good sport!

We let the rest of the family know by phone calls, texts, and emails and everyone was very excited.  My grandpa, Paw, has correctly predicted the gender of all of his great grandkids and had told me back in September that he thought it was a boy.  He picks his own names for all of the babies and to this day calls Lane "Dusty" after choosing the name "Dustin Blake" for him before he was born.  Evin was "Lisa Lynn," and he had decided that my new baby would be called "Cody Colt."  He is serious about his predictions and had never been wrong, so I was kinda sad for him that his streak had ended!!  I called to tell him the news and he said "Well, I don't really believe them, but I am just thrilled to have another little great grand-daughter!"  He later blamed his incorrect guess on the radiation treatments he has been receiving for some cancerous spots on his head!  I joked and told him that she may be a girl, but I bet his prediction means she will be a tomboy!

Now that we know we will be having a sweet little girl, we have to decide on a name.  Kyle and I each have our own favorite name and can't seem to agree on many others.  Let's hope the right name comes to us!  Any suggestions???