Jonathan's Birthday Party at School

Yes, more celebrating! Today at Jonathan's school not only did we celebrate his Birthday, but we also celebrated Easter! The kids had an egg hunt and then we had cupcakes! It was raining outside, so we had to keep things indoors, but it was still fun!! 

Getting ready for the egg hunt!

The Egg Hunt! - I was trying my best to stay out! :)

This is all the kiddos in his class! They are such a great group of sweet kids! And I love his teachers too! We were really lucky to be apart of this group this year!

  Excited!!! (Thank you Leanna for his "3" shirt!)

 The awesome cupcakes! I didn't make these! I ordered them from Hot Chocolates, the bakery my friend Becky owns! Don't they look yummy?

CUPCAKES! To say they were excited, might be a bit of an understatement!

Prayer. It's just too cute not to share.

 Singing Happy Birthday!!

Jonathan's Happy Birthday Wish on TV

For the past 3 Birthday's, I have submitted Jonathan's photo to the local Good Morning Show so they can wish him a Happy Birthday!! Here is his reaction!
Sorry, I completely forgot to remind everyone to watch! But at least you can see it here!

Happy 3rd Birthday Jonathan! 3 Years in Review!

I am a bit of a nostalgic person, if you haven't noticed yet! :)
In honor of Jonathan's birthday and thinking about Ben's arrival...I went back through the last 3 years of Jonathan's life in photo's and picked some of my favorites! I hope you enjoy!



1 Week Old. He is in as much shock as we are!



1 Month Old. My little Angel.

2 Months Old. Just a Happy Baby!

3 Months Old. With his Nana.



4 Months Old. We were entertaining ourselves at the Dr.'s office one day!




5 Months Old. Bath time! One of my all time favorite photo's!



6 Months Old. Pumpkin Patch!

6.5 Months Old. At Chishlom Park (where we had his 3rd Birthday Party). Such a cutie!



7 Months Old! My sweet little Santa!




9 Months Old. Very serious in the backyard!




11 Months Old. Not so serious in the backyard!




1 Year Old. Eating his birthday cake, sugarless applesauce cake with yogurt frosting! :)




1st Birthday Photo.



18 Months Old. Just being a ham!



19 Months Old. Posing for the Christmas Card.



24 Months Old. Bluebonnets!

2nd Birthday. First Tricycle!

25 Months Old. At Fossil Rim, a wildlife park.



25.5 Months Old. Fresh from his Fist Buzz Cut!




26 Months Old. First Ranger's game with his Papa, Gran, Daddy and me. He loved it!



27 Months Old. He loves his cousin Scarlet.



30 Months Old. He finally gets to tell people he is going to be a big brother! (after waiting 3 months)




31 Months Old. Pumpkin Patch!



32 Months Old. Posing for our Christmas Card (Naughty).



32 Months Old. Posing for our Christmas Card (Nice). - The card said, who said you can't be both?? :)




32.5 Months. Michael and Jonathan in Galveston for Michael's Birthday. One of my favorite photo's of my favorite guys.



33 Months Old. My little helper and side-kick. I was shopping for new glasses and he had to try some on too!

34 Months Old. Snow Monster!



35 Months Old. This picture cracks me up for so many reasons. He had just gotten this new PJ set of his favorite, 'red car'. We were getting ready for the day and he REFUSED to take them off. We were only going over to Amy's for the day so I said okay. But then he insisted on wearing his Cowboy's hat. Once the sneakers got on and the 'outfit' came together, I just couldn't stop laughing! Right before I took this photo, he was dancing and looking at himself in the reflection of the car. He just makes me laugh! 



36 Months Old. Taking his 3 year photo's, I asked him to show me how old he is...I think he is showing me 6 fingers...don't worry, I'm working on it!



3 Years Old. My sweet, sweet baby!

Benjamin Update

Can you believe that we are in a single digit count down until Ben joins us? I CAN! 9 DAYS! Yes, I have reached the uncomfortable last part of the pregnancy. Something my mom told me and a friend recently reminded me is that God makes it so uncomfortable at the end so we aren't scared of having the baby anymore! We just want him out!!! :) It's really all Eve's fault!

I am very ready to greet my new little sweetheart! My bags are packed, we have Jonathan's caretakers lined up, to do list's are pretty much checked off...I'm ready to do this! 

At my 36 week appt a couple of weeks ago, my doctor measured Ben for the first time. - For those who don't know how this is done...basically, on the sonogram, my doctor measures Ben's femur bone, tummy circumference, and head circumference. Some how the computer takes this info and guess-timates how much the baby weighs. - So at my 36 week appt, Ben was weighing in at an estimated 6 lbs 13 oz! That is about 1 pound bigger for an 'average' baby at 36 weeks! The next week I went back in and he measured again and this time Ben was estimated at 7 lbs 15 oz!!! WHAT?? At his rate of growth, my doctor warned me that it is possible he could be close to 10 lbs when he is born at 39 weeks! BUT, as I said, it's a computer guessing, so it can be wrong, but I tell you what, he feels like an 8 pounder right now! Yikes! Today was my 38 week appt, he didn't measure him, but he showed me on my tummy where Ben's head is, where his bottom is and where his feet are. My doctor was so funny, his eyes got real big and he said, "Julie, you got one big baby in there! You are literally ALL baby!" ...all this to say we already have a nick name for our precious little boy, "BIG BEN"! :)

Besides his size, he is looking very healthy! Everything is what it should be or better. I am feeling a little weak these days, he is taking everything I have to give and then some. At my 37 week appt, I had lost 2 lbs and that is when he gained just over 1 lbs. This week I hadn't gained or lost and I had increased my eating to 5 meals a day! It's just amazing to me how all this works!

I will be in touch with updates once he is born! Next Friday, April 29th around 7:00 am is the projected arrival time! Just a couple of hours after William and Kate are married! Ha!



The past few months Michael, Jonathan and I have been working on getting the nursery ready for Ben. There wasn't too much to do, since we kept everything pretty much the same, at least furniture wise. We changed the theme of the nursery to Maps. For those of you who don't know, Michael, my husband, makes maps for a living. When I met Michael the only thing that he had hanging on his walls were maps. I liked them, they are cool, but, 8 years later when we bought our house, I was ready to look at something different. (sorry) When we were contemplating nursery themes, it occurred to me that we have a ton of maps in storage! Michael and I both love them and it just seemed right! We are very pleased with the end result and can't wait for the last piece of the puzzle to arrive and live here!



I came up with the idea that I wanted to do a map decoupage of Benjamin's name. I had so much fun doing this! I can't wait for my next decoupage project! As I started, I didn't have a rhyme or reason. I grabbed the N and just started gluing map strips to it. Then I realized, there was a letter that represented each member of my family. So to make it more fun and even more personalized, each letter is tied to a family member and has specific places in Texas!  - Sorry they aren't the best pictures of each of the letters. Just come over to see them in person!



B is for Bill, my father. I included Corpus Christi, where we lived in the late '70's early '80's. Also, I made sure that I kept Victoria, a little town just north of Corpus, in the mid '80's we almost moved there (I was disappointed that we didn't) Arkansas is on there because both my father's parents are from Arkansas. Austin was one of my dad's favorite places to visit, yet he never lived there. I made sure that Salado was still on the map, another one of dad's favorite places to visit!  




E is for Ewert. Michael and Me, plus Theron and Pat. I included the mid-cities area, which is where Michael and I met and still live today. I included Dallas, which is where Michael was raised by Theron and Pat. The bottom of the E includes Galveston, which is where I went on my first vacation with the Ewert's. We met in Galveston and then went on a cruise to Mexico. It was such a fun trip! I can't believe that was almost 10 years ago!



N is for Nancy, my mother.  I had a lot of fun with hers! Starting with the bottom left, that is a street level map of downtown Austin. Just like dad, Austin reminds me of mom too. We visited there a lot when I was a kid and mom would take Amy and I shopping in downtown Austin while dad did computer related things. Next to that is a street level map of Fort Worth of just Forest Park Dr, the route she and I took to my private school for junior high and high school. 1 hour round trip every day, that is when we got super close. We both agreed that Forest Park was our favorite part of our drive. Then there is a map of Fort Worth. Then there is a map of El Paso, where she lived most of her life (dad did too). Then Wichita Falls, which is where we lived for most of the '80's. Then there is Kemah, that was the last fun place that mom and dad went together in June 2008 and they both loved it so much. Then you see mountains, which is actually a continuation of the El Paso map, I just didn't cut it off. I left them on because mom loved the mountains.   




J is for a little bit Julie, ME and a little bit Jonathan! Fort Worth, because that is where I lived most of my life. Shreveport, LA, for many reasons, but basically because I really like going there, but also, that is where Michael and I were the weekend we found out we were pregnant with Jonathan!!!



A is for Amy, my sister. I had a lot of fun with Amy's. She has lived in a lot of different places, so I tried my best to include them all! Stephenphville, where she attended Tarleton University. Houston, where she, mom and dad lived briefly right before I was born. Burleson, which is where she lives now and I made sure I included Joshua, because that is where Waylen is from. Then I was able to get Wichita Falls on hers too. Then there was a perfect strip of the map that had Irving and Euless, it's perfect, because that is the 2 cities that she and I were roommates out side of living with mom and dad. And that red Texas shape was just cool.



M is for Michael, my husband. I included Lubbock, because he went to Texas Tech. There is Arlington, he lived there right before he and I met. Dallas, since that is where he grew up. Galveston, because that is our favorite place to go on a mini-vacation together. And Hunt Co. because he works for Hunt!



I, doesn't really stand for anyone. So I used more Fort Worth maps since I had it.



This N doesn't stand for anyone either. This is the first one I worked on and didn't have a game plan yet.




Michael and Jonathan reading. Sorry it's kind of a mess, that is my hospital suit case that I have all in the corner with stuff stacked on it.  




I was so glad that the beautiful curtains my mom made, originally for Jonathan's nursery would still work for Ben's!



My grandpa Dale Ramage (who I never met) cross stitched the US map to the left. My aunt Holly painted the bible verse to the right. I am so glad to have such special items to had down to my boys.