Welcome Home Elder Shields! Shower and waiting.

My baby brother Sr (or second to youngest brother) returned home after his 2 year mission in the Philippians! He agrees, we DO have the most comfortable guest bed.

My parents went to pick him up and on their way home, they had a 7 hour nap layover in Portland. Brycen stayed home from school and we were able to pick them up from the airport and bring them back to our house for lunch. Elder Shields was fascinated driving through "quiet and clean" Portland (compared to Filipino cities). He also couldn't get over how much Brycen and Cian have grown--2 years is huge! He was very tired but it was sure a treat to be able to see him.

So, remember my awesome neighbor across the street? Well, like 2 weeks after I moved in, she insisted that she was throwing me a baby shower. Not knowing her well, and not wanting to offend, I tried to tell her nicely that I DID NOT want a shower. Especially for my 3rd little guy and the fact that I hate being the center of attention and the whole opening presents thing........not my thing! But she did it and it happened 48 hours after we found out that we are having a girl! Having a more valid excuse, made it a bit more okay for me, but still--out of my comfort zone. Ladies from both the neighborhood and ward (lots I didn't know!) came and were so kind. Among the gifts, several pitched in to buy me the above Ergo carrier!! Isn't it adorable?? I can not wait to use it. And I still can't wrap my head around the kindness of strangers, hopefully soon, to become not so strangers.

The ducks at the library. The boys actually went on their first Father/Son campout the night this picture was taken. They did great! And I enjoyed 5 hours of kid free errands... and then a few movies while I cleaned , cooked, and wrote 'Thank You' cards. I have this terrible thing that I don't sleep when home alone.

The boys have this nice crazy habit of waking up before I would like to, in the morning.

This specific morning, they worked together to play Brycen's homework game. Isn't that awesome??

Cian loves having cousins near by. This particular cousin is only a month younger. It is SO fun to see them play. Side note: Cian's collision with the cement was worn proudly for nearly a week on that forehead of his, poor guy!

FHE to Bullwinkle's! (Kind of like Chuck E Cheese but with a few more activities). We arrived to use our free passes that our neighbor gave us since they weren't going to use them and then someone gave us their passes when we arrived--boy, did we luck out! The frog hopper was an adventure, Cian loved the up part but HATED the sudden hopping down.

But the "car racing" was a favorite!

Pregnancy Update: 38 weeks and still going strong. So strong that I dilated from 2cm down to 1! Confused yet? Me too. Baby girl is apparently not ready... I DO want her to be ready. I just hate missing all the family fun. My brother is giving his homecoming talk TODAY and my sister is getting married in 11 days. So much going on! I'm so excited for them and us, but why at the same time?