Hello SPRING!

After a LONG winter full of very, very cold weather, countless snow days, and lots of sickness in the Harvell household...we are very happy that we can finally say HELLO SPRING!  Yes, that's right, I think we are finally over the hump and the warm weather is here to say and I could not be more thrilled about it.  Here are some of my favorite things about Spring right now:

• Family walks - I've missed these over the winter and love that they are becoming part of our daily routine again.
• Sidewalk chalk, playgrounds, and bubbles - Yes, Addie is into all of these childhood favorites right now and it is so much fun to have a change of environment and activities.  She loves exploring and we love to watch her explore (but I promise we stop her from exploring the taste of chalk among another things!)
• Cooking out - With any change of season comes a new set of meals and grilling out is one of my favorites.  I love the idea of throwing just about anything on the grill these days and I have already been on Pinterest for new grilling recipes to try out this year.
• Flip flops - who doesn't love flip flop season?  It's by far my favorite type of footwear!
• Fresh air - I love that the weather is perfect right now to have the windows open, not too hot, not too cold, and I love the fresh air.  The only thing that would make it better is if I heard the sound of waves when I opened our windows, maybe one day....
• More daylight - there's nothing better about coming home and having a few more hours of daylight before it gets dark. 
• Flowers - although I HATE gardening and am absolutely terrible at keeping plants and flowers alive, I still like to look at them.  Our neighborhood is in full bloom and it's so pretty.
• Pretty colors - after a season full of grays, black, and neutrals, it's nice to see (and wear) colors again.

Last, but certainly not least, spring means that we are one step closer to SUMMER!  Bring on the beach days, ice cream, and family vacations - the countdown to summer has officially begun :)

Hanging out with the fam on the boardwalk Easter weekend.  

Addie looking adorable in her braids...thanks Carla!

Going for a walk with juice and goldfish...life doesn't get much better than this!

Working on her masterpiece

Picnic for 2!

We are still working on walking her dog.

Addie's new playground that Daddy put together for her and she LOVES it!

It's a GIRL

"A daughter is someone you laugh with, dream with, and love with all your heart."

Addie looking adorable in her tutu!

"Wait, what does that say?"

"NOOOO I don't want to share my mommy and daddy!"

Gender Reveal - Easter Style

Since we had family in town for Easter the same weekend that we found out that we were having another GIRL, of course we had to plan a fun way to reveal our news!  We went along with the Easter theme and had an Easter egg hunt!  If nothing else, we thought it would be hilarious to watch grown adults search for the eggs, plus Addie could play along too.  Eric and I hid 3 eggs for each person and they had to find 1 of each color.  Everyone had to find all of their eggs before they were allowed to open them.   Everyone searched the house, Addie included, and collected their eggs.  Little did they know, the gender was not within the eggs...we saved the best for last and let Addie reveal that she was going to have a little SISTER!  

Look mom and dad, I already found 2!

Aunt Kristen with all 3 of her eggs.

Grandma found hers too, even though she kept trying to steal Addie's who were hidden very out in the open!

It's a

......

GIRL!

Addie was more excited about the plastic egg than the fact that she is going to have a little sister in August.

There's that smile :)

Baby Bump - Month 5

How far along?  20 weeks

Gender:  GIRL

We can't wait to meet our little princess in August! 

It's a GIRL!

Our sweet baby girl waving hi to us :)

Feeling:   My growing bump and very active 14 month old have been tough on my back.  I had a little soreness toward the end of my pregnancy with Addie, but nothing like this!  Apparently crawling around on the floor with Addie and carrying her around 24/7 aren't good activities for my back, but also are far from avoidable.  Some days I feel like an 80 year old woman when I get out of bed! My only other complaint right now is I've started getting some heartburn here and there, if we are lucky that only means our baby girl will be blessed with a full head of hair when she's born just like her big sis :)

Maternity Clothes: Yes and as the weather continues to get warmer my long sleeve shirts and sweaters just aren't cutting it anymore.  It looks like I will be going on a shopping spree very soon for some warm weather clothes!

Sleep: I'm still sleeping really well, but with all of my back pain I have gotten out my pregnancy pillow which seems to help a little.  Plus, our sweet Addie girl has started sleeping in more on the weekends - I'm talking between 9-10am sleeping in, so that makes for one happy mommy.  Even if I can't sleep in that late anymore it's nice to wake up and relax a little before Addie gets up.  I know sleep with a newborn is pretty non-existent at least in the very beginning, so I am really treasuring my sleep these days.

Favorite Moments:

-Finding out that Baby #2 is a GIRL!  Girls are the best and we are thrilled for Addie to have a little sister so close in age!  They will be best friends at times and worst enemies at times, but we can't wait to watch them interact with one another!

-Now that we know she's a GIRL, we've started shopping (I had to splurge a little!) and preparing for her arrival which makes me very, very excited!  It always seems more real to me when we can stop referring to the baby as "IT" and start calling her by her name.  I cannot believe that we are already half way there and I cannot wait to hold our sweet girl in my arms in August.

-I felt you for the first time this month and a week or so later your dad felt you for the first time.  Feeling baby kicks is one of my favorite things about being pregnant!

Bunny Fun & Egg Dying

I love the holidays and all of the fun activities that come along with them!  Some are usually a hit and some are a miss with our fun loving 14 month old Addie girl.  This year, we were one for two I would say.  You were NOT a fan of the Easter bunny, I really don't blame you, but you still looked adorable regardless is your blue lace dress - tears and all!  Luckily, we decided to see the Easter bunny on a weekday right after dinner time, so it was just a quick wait followed by a quick picture and a quick cry!  Dying eggs was  a completely different story!  You LOVED it!  Apparently, your love for slam dunking the ball in your toy basketball hoop carried over into this activity as you would take the egg and slam dunk it into the cup and then clap for yourself.  It was hilarious.  We did end up with a cracked egg or two and a very colorful child in the end, but it was all worth watching you love every minute of it.

Easter Sunday

Our Easter was full of fun, family, and lots of food.  My family was in town for the weekend - Grandma, Pap, and Aunt Kristen came in Thursday night and Uncle Brian and Carla came Friday night.  It was a beautiful Sunday morning and we were all up early for a Castello favorite, eggs benedict, for breakfast before we headed to 11:00 mass.  Anyone who knows my family, knows that we are never on time, ever.  I am proud to say that all 9 of us were sitting in church not only on time, but early!  It's a Castello miracle!  Normally, I would say it's a good thing to arrive at a crowded mass with time to spare, but that just meant we had an extra 15 minutes to entertain our very active, noisy toddler.  Overall, Addie was pretty good.  But, she is only 14 months old and on the move.  We read books, ate goldfish, passed her around, walked in and out several times, smiled and waved at everyone around us (that all took about 10 minutes, so we repeated all of that about 8 times)...it was a workout!  We made it though and without any major meltdowns, so I would say that it was a success.  When we got home we took some family pictures and then little Miss Addie did an amazing job finding her Easter basket.  This year she got a toy xylophone, bunny book, new pajamas, crayons, some chalk and bubbles, fruit and veggie pouches, and plastic eggs filled with goldfish.  I think out of all of her goodies, the pouches were her favorite as she said yumm every time she looked at them!  She also loved banging on her new xylophone and making some music!  After all of our Easter Sunday fun, it was time for some lunch and a quick nap.  I say quick because Uncle Brian thought it was a good idea to wake up our exhausted toddler after only an hour so he and Carla could spend some more time with her before they left.  So that we did, we woke her up, and then met everyone down on the boardwalk at the oceanfront for a little (that is after a 25 minute car ride with a screaming toddler!)  Once we arrived she cheered up, we spent some quality time hanging out at the fire pit table because the breeze made it a little chilly, and then said our goodbyes to Uncle Brian and Carla.  We ended the day with a cookout, some Notre Dame women's basketball, and finally getting around to dying Easter eggs.