Baby Alert Level: Yellow

First a primer in Baby Alert Levels:

Blue: calm; no chance
Green: all systems go, but little chance
Yellow: all systems go, 50% effaced, dilation has begun
Orange: labor could occur at any moment; keep your head (email/phone/etc) on a swivel
Red: baby is imminent

So, yes, Laurie is 50% effaced, 1 cm dilated as of this morning. Everything checked out great. She is 35.5 weeks right now, but measured 37 weeks. Simon was born at 37 weeks, so at this point it will be not be shocking whenever it occurs.

All this to say: we're in the home stretch.

Easter 2009

On Saturday, we introduced Simon to the art of dying Easter eggs. Cort tried to teach him how to use the egg dipper ...

...but Simon decided that just using his hands was much more effective.

Simon showing off his "peaster eggs."

Historically, we have visited both sides of the family for the Easter holiday, but this year we asked them to join us in BG (mostly due to my extreme state of pregnancy). :) They were entertained by Simon "playing peaster eggs" in the backyard. And yes, he hunted for both the real and plastic eggs. Needless to say, the real ones were not in great shape by the time the hunt was over.

Here is the little man, all dressed up for church on Sunday.

A family photo ... Happy Easter, everyone.

Eggcellent Birthday Fun

Last weekend, the Vance family gathered to celebrate Uncle David and Aunt Kelly's birthdays.














Afterwards, NanaB and Granddaddy held an Easter egg hunt for the little ones. Below, Simon, Henry, and Ada await the call to begin with their gardening buckets in tow.














Simon, admiring the purple egg he found.














He really liked the green one he found up in a tree.

Simon, reviewing how many eggs he found, and wondering how to get to the M&M's that he knows are inside.

Preparing for "Baby Sister"

On Monday, we went for another 2-week baby doc visit. Laurie is still measuring about a week ahead, and Naomi seems to be a bit on the big side. Otherwise, everything looks good. We go again on April 21, and afterwards we begin our weekly visits!

The past couple of weeks, we've been preparing for the arrival of "baby sister." Cort painted her bedroom a light green color -- Simon was his helper. As you can see below, he wanted Daddy to do "more paint."















During touch-up sessions on the room, Simon would go back and forth between "checking on Daddy" and crawling through his tunnel with his "friends."















Cort also put together Naomi's crib -- he's been a busy guy! We've even gotten her bedding on, which makes us realize how soon she could be arriving.














Simon's remark when he saw Naomi's bed was, "I wanna sleep in it!"