Labor Day Fun

This labor day weekend we were able to get out and do some fun things and spend time with our families. We were able to sneak in a much needed date night at a new (to us) restaurant in town on Friday night and then on Saturday we woke up bright and early to watch the hot air balloons at the "Color the Skies" event in town. What a cool experience!

Waving at the traveling balloons. 

Enjoying the sunrise and the cool morning air.

Family picture!

We also hit up a Modesto Nuts game on Sunday, enjoyed the warm weather and swam at my parents' house and got to have a Lockridge family dinner in Atwater. We're trying to get out and do some fun, local things before this baby decides to make an appearance. We are also trying to tackle things on our "Baby To Do" list so we just took the Stork Tour at our new hospital. We're certainly getting closer and closer to becoming a family of four!

Busy August

August is officially behind us and it has been a very busy month! We celebrated Levi's 1st birthday, took a couple of overnight trips, Dave traveled (A BUNCH) for work, I helped out at my reunion, we attended the wedding of a great family friend, I helped host a baby shower, the whole extended family suffered a MAJOR bout with the stomach flu (thanks Levi) and now it's September 1st... where did the month go? 

Bryan, Megan, Dave, Sarah finding some shade by the bocce court at the beautiful Hellman-Oxenrider wedding.
It was out at a lavender farm in Turlock and was a beautiful wedding and a great venue!

Dave barely got into town in time to make it the wedding and then turned around and flew out to Pennsylvania for the Little League World Series for 8 days. It was probably the longest that he's been away from us and it felt like FOREVER but we managed to get through it by filling up our week with fun stuff. First up was a quick trip to Fresno to visit some friends.

Levi, Kambria and Maxton keeping each other company on a trip to Target.

Then we hung out with my family and I did some prep work for the baby shower of my great friend Angela who was flying into LA from CO to celebrate the upcoming birth of her first son. We had a great theme all picked out (airplanes because her hubby is in the air force) and I was all ready to pack up and head down for a very quick overnight trip to decorate, celebrate and drive back. Then on Thursday morning Levi woke up from a very good night sleep and had gotten sick at some point during the night. He'd never really thrown up before so I was surprised but he seemed in good spirits and feeling fine. We laid low all day making sure that he was ok and feeling good enough to hang out with Grandma and Grandpa overnight for my little trip. Seemed fine all day Thursday and woke up happy Friday so I dropped him off and hit the road for the South Bay. (I stopped at Starbucks on my way out of town and got to listen to whatever music I wanted to the whole way... I almost didn't know what to do with myself without Disney sing-a-longs and kids worship music blasting for 5 hours! It was heavenly. :) ) I got into town in enough time to hang out and chat with Becky a little before heading over to do some serious baby shower decorating and prep work. We had the whole house set up, favors made and ready to go in a couple of hours so I headed back to Becky's for a good night sleep before the Saturday morning festivities. And then plans changed. I woke up with the worst bout of stomach flu I've ever had. I was sick all night long, all morning long, missed the baby shower, missed seeing Angela for even a second that she was in CA. I was feeling so bad that my mom convinced me to call my OB to ask at what point we needed to be worried about dehydration and the baby. His answer was an emphatic "NOW" so I drove myself to the hospital for a quick round of fluids. The ER immediately sent me to labor and delivery to check on the baby but everything was fine so we just did an iv and a couple bags of fluids and then I was on my way. It was no fun and definitely a rough day but everything turned out fine and I felt better right away. I even drove myself home that night so I could sleep in my own bed and rest at home. By the time I arrived back in Modesto my entire family had been stricken with the flu too. Little loving Levi had singlehandedly taken out my entire family with his germs.  We just love him. So my quick little baby shower weekend trip turned out very differently then I had envisioned. I'm so thankful for Becky for letting me stay and taking care of me but I feel terrible for coming all that way and sharing my germs. What a great friend for putting up with me! And thanks to everyone for all the concerned phone calls and emails and texts, I felt very loved and prayed over throughout the whole ordeal. We're finally all back to normal and healthy and Dave is back in town and thankful that he missed the whole sickness.

So instead of ending on a gross/depressing note, August actually ended up with a reason to celebrate! My dad and brother have been working hard at opening up a new running specialty store in Modesto and the process always takes longer then you think it will. So after a few speed bumps and delays, they finally got the keys to the store yesterday. Demolition starts today and they hope to be open for business in the middle of October. Sarah came back into town yesterday for her last week before school starts, Dave was back in town, everyone was healthy and happy again and we had keys to the store so we celebrated with some grilled kebobs and cobbler and took a family trip down to see the store.

Levi enjoying the storefront window before the carpet and pillars and everything else gets ripped out and remodeled.

So Modesto people, be looking for On The Run to be opening in the McHenry Village in October. We're all so excited that it's finally happening and can't wait for the grand opening. I'll keep you posted!!!

TDHS 10 Year High School Reunion

Two weekends ago Dave and I were able to get some babysitters and attend my 10 year high school reunion. It was the perfect way to reconnect with some people after just moving back into town and it gave Dave an opportunity to see a glimpse into my high school years. Lucky him! It doesn't seem like that long ago that I was wearing my cheer uniform and decorating for dances and going to football games, but it must have been awhile ago since I've haven't even lived here for 10 years, I've been married for 5 and have one cute kiddo and one on the way. Needless to say I wasn't stoked to see everyone for the first time in a long time while I am 7 months preggo but I did my best to dress up and put on my dancing shoes and have fun!

The Cardigan girls decorating the hall-- just like old times!

Me, Dave, Mike and Crista enjoying a night out sans kids.

Goofing around at the "photo booth"

Stephanie, me, Crista, Lindsey

Don't let Dave tell you that it was a total bummer of a night-- he had fun too!

Class of 2001 reunioners!

Thanks President Stephanie for all your hard work. It was a total success and we had FUN!! What's next? 20 years? :)

Chronicles of a Babywise Mom: "Boys Will Be Boys"

I was ordering some things off of diapers.com this morning for the new baby (he's seriously going to make his appearance in about 9 short weeks!) while also doing some blog reading... I came across this great article about parenting boys and immediately knew it was one that I would mentally catalog and figured I would share it with anyone else out there who might be parenting boys. Her premise is that the "boys will be boys" mentality does not have to be true but instead we can adopt an attitude of "boys will be who we teach them to be" and they will rise to our expectations. This shouldn't be such a paradigm shift but I think in today's society that it truly is thinking outside the box. And it easily applies to raising girls too. LOVE IT!!!

Chronicles of a Babywise Mom: "Boys Will Be Boys":

Levi's Birthday Party

We threw our first party (of MANY) in our new house for Levi's 1st birthday. Most of the invitees had already come to visit but hopefully they got to see the house a little more finished and we got to see what it really takes to throw a party for all our closest friends and family. Whew, it was a lot of work! :) We were so glad that everyone was able to come and feel so grateful for all the love Levi was shown. It was a hot day so we spent most of the party inside but we had some good food, lots of fun one-year-old presents and yummy cake. What more could you ask for?!

The photo board in the entry way. Some of my favorites from the whole year.

The living room, looking into the dining room.
It helped not having any furniture in these rooms because we were able to seat 30!
Also, Levi's 0-12 month pictures were behind his high chair.

The Cake!

The Lockridge family.
Thought I should include a belly shot as we so obviously are preparing for #2 as we're so glad to be celebrating #1!

Laughing it up with Grandma and Grandpa Lockridge and also showing off his famous "ear pull".

The kiddos eating at Levi's new outside picnic table.

The boys taking Levi's new wagon for a spin around the yard. It has been a hit!
Thanks Grammy and Grandpa Harden!

Singing to the birthday boy!

 The birthday boy who refused to eat his birthday cake. Seriously. My child who eats EVERYTHING, cried and refused to even taste the yummy mini cake his Mommy and Daddy bought him. We think it was the long day, too much excitement, maybe a snafu with his party hat that bothered him... who knows?! All we know is that we have no footage of our sweet birthday boy tearing into his cake. Oh well. I guess you can't plan everything, right? And plus, now we have a fun story to tell him for the rest of his life. And the video to prove it. Haha, that is real life with a one-year-old!

It was a great party!

Thanks again to everyone who came to celebrate with us and thanks to our favorite friends who sent presents from afar. What a lucky and blessed little boy Levi is! (And a special thanks from me to everyone who helped tear down and clean up after the party. This preggo was so blessed to have the house clean, dishes running, pj's on and feet up by 8:30 that night!)

Levi's First Year

3 Days Old 

One Month Old

Two Months Old

Three Months Old

Four Months Old

Five Months Old

Six Months Old

Seven Months Old

Eight Months Old

Nine Months Old

Ten Months Old

Eleven Months Old

Twelve Months Old

It's official! Levi Daniel is ONE YEAR OLD!!!

We're out of stickers, folks, so this is our last monthly Levi update. He is such a joy to have in our lives. I'm not sure of his official "stats" because we won't get in to see our new Modesto pediatrician until the end of the month but if I'd have to guess I'd say "big"! :) He's sleeping a good 12 hours and night, still taking two two hour naps daily and waking up happy and singing and waving. He's been walking for a couple of months now so he's getting good and fast and more confident in his abilities. He moves CONSTANTLY and, if he's awake, he just doesn't stop. He loves cars and trucks and balls and especially books. It's fun to watch him play with his new toys and it's surprising to see him play with them in the way they're intended. He still loves his pacifiers and he's still a great eater. He rarely refuses meat, likes most vegetables and fruits and has never met a carb he won't eat (just like his mom). We tried introducing cows milk cold turkey but that was a disaster, so now we are mixing it in with his formula and he seems to be handling it well. He's got a great personality and a love for people and he has this great belly laugh that just melts my heart. He has a couple of funny little "things" that he's doing these days that never fail to make us laugh so I definitely need to get them on camera because I'm sure he won't do them much longer. He has begun to "dance" when he hears music but unlike most kids he doesn't move his body or feet at all, instead he wiggles his head. Not sure where he learned those moves (Dave maybe?) but it's super cute. This has been such a great year of learning to parent this little guy and, for the most part, he's made it very easy. We love you Levi and are so proud to be your parents!!! Happy first year of life!!! 

Milestones

It's been a busy couple of weeks in Lockridgeland! On the 21st I celebrated 28 years of life and also 5 years of marriage to my wonderful husband. We got to do two special celebrations thanks to having family so close for multiple babysitting opportunities. On my actual birthday we walked down to the local coffee shop for breakfast as a family, went to Levi's swim lessons and then Dave and I got to go eat at Galleto's downtown without little Levi. Then on Saturday, we dropped Levi off at my parents' house and we drove up to San Francisco for the night. We stayed at a nice hotel on top of Knob Hill, explored North Beach and ate yummy Italian food (thanks Steph for the recommendations!) and got to stay up late and sleep in on our own schedule-- which was NO schedule-- it was awesome and a much needed little break. We came back Sunday afternoon, a little early because we honestly missed our little man, and were so appreciative to know he was in great hands for the night.

Does it just reinforce my pregnancy cravings when the only picture I have from 30 hours in the city is one of our hot fudge sundae from Ghiradelli? :) Although this place is extra special to us because this is where we went right before Dave proposed to me 5 years earlier. And, let's be honest, they have the best dang sundaes anywhere!

While we're pretending be to young and fun in the city, Levi got to go on his first bike ride with Grammy & Grandpa!

After our celebrations, we got to celebrate the biggest accomplishment yet: Levi turned ONE! On August 2nd we woke up feeling so proud and excited. There are some moments that it's hard to believe that one whole year has passed since we walked and paced and waited so impatiently for him to enter our world. It doesn't seem so long ago that Dave got to wheel his little bassinet into our hospital room and then we realized that HE was OURS. Then there are other moments that make it seem like we've been doing this forever- those sleepless nights, the cranky teething spells, and the confidence we have of learning how to do this parenting thing day after day after day. What an incredible journey this has been!

Enjoying his new musical instruments from Mommy & Daddy!

His favorite thing right now: TRUCKS!

 Levi has had a weird week sleep-wise so his birthday was no exception. He was up early and fussy then went back down for a nap at an odd time, then was back up at a more normal time for breakfast and presents. (Maybe he's getting more teeth?) So Dave and I sang and opened a few presents and ate eggs and toast for breakfast. We've tried a little bit of cows milk but he's not a huge fan yet. Then Dave had to take off for a business trip, so Levi and I headed over to my parents' house to get some more people in on the birthday action.

Levi loves to "work" and Grandpa's desk is the best place to get that done.

We ended our day with Levi's first chicken nugget Happy Meal. A great place to end our birthday boy celebration!

We also hit the 3rd trimester mark of my pregnancy which means Baby Boy #2 is coming sooner than we think! Lots of big things going on around here, lots of reasons to celebrate and lots of reasons to be oh-so-thankful. More updates on the birthday boy to come...