Mama at 25 weeks,

A lot of people have been requesting some pictures of mama's belly.

Here she is at almost 25 weeks. She's been feeling great and had a burst of energy that we can only assume is nesting. This week, we literally moved everything in the downstairs and vacuumed and dusted every surface imaginable. We even vacuumed all the upholstery. Then we moved on to the kitchen and cleaning and reorganized everything (with the help of Matt, our neighbor). We're now being held under a strict "no clutter" policy, under which everything gets put away every night and the kitchen counter and table gets wiped down and the floor gets swept. So far, so good.

Take a look at mama's cardigan. She's been looking for lightweight cardigan to wear, but not having any luck considering her clothes buying options are drive 30 minutes to Anderson or go to the walmart. She didn't want to drive, so she went to the walmart and picked up a white henley (for $5!). Inspired by some crafty blogs, she refashioned it into this little cardigan. She's pretty pleased with herself and picked up two more shirts on clearance for $3 to repurpose.

Mama thought that the first picture papa took wasn't very flattering and made her look huge, so she made him take another picture in her workout clothes. (Plus, she wanted to make she she didn't look ridiculous in front of all those buff college boys at the gym.) Though papa doesn't agree with it, she's continued going to the gym and still takes her spinning and weightlifting classes four days a week. Half of it is that it genuinely makes her feel much better to stay active and half is that lots of people seem to be impressed that she's still working out and she likes the attention and all the people saying she looks so good for being so pregnant. (But between you and me, the old lady is slowing down. I saw her in spinning and she can hardly bend over her seat without hitting her belly with her knees.)

Last week at her monthly check-up, mama asked her doctor if she seemed to be carrying especially low. The baby was breech at the 20 week-ultrasound, so Dr. Hearn got out his little portable ultrasound machine and double-check to see that the baby was, in fact, still breech. (No worries, though, it is still small enough to flip over.) Then he gently tried to tell mama that before she had any children, her uterus was nice and taut, like a drum. Now that she's on her third, her uterus is more like a stretched out, broken trampoline. And there's a breach baby head up, jumping on all of her pelvis. Thanks a lot, Dr. Hearn.

Camp out- Henry.

On Saturday night, mama was cleaning out our closet while we took baths. She found a tent that Aunt Molly gave me when we lived in Wisconsin. We never got it out in North Carolina because there was never any room in our little house. But now we have so much room, mama pitched it right away. I was so excited that we immediately threw a book party and begged mama to let me sleep in it for the night. Luckily, mama was in a good mood and agreed. She said I could sleep in it on nights that I don't have school in the morning. It was the best, and luckily there was a window on the side I could stick my legs out.

Mama's only worry was that June would be so mad she wasn't sleeping in the tent too. It took her a little longer to calm down (like that's possible- her norm is over an hour). But we both went to sleep with no incident, so mama says we can put the tent up again this weekend.

When mama cleaned the closet, she got out the summer shoes she'd been saving. June has new flip flops to pair with those shapely legs.

And I have new sandals.

Our toys are all getting new lives as I've started designing and building on my own. I have so much fun building my marble run and train tracks, with only a little help from mama or papa.

For all of you contemplating a trip down south, now is the time. June is super fun and adding new words every day. New favorites this week are "Baby" and "Dorge," meaning a baby doll she has made her favorite for bedtime and my old Curious George doll that I decided was no longer my favorite for bed and gave June. Papa decided she also has a highly developed sense of humor. For example, she has started calling mama "Mom-mmmmmeeee" in a highly mocking fashion. She also calls papa "Pa. Pa." when she really prefers to call him "That mama." She also likes to make her eyes very large and round, put her face right up next to yours, and stare you down before erupting into giggles. And she's very well known for faking sleep when mama opens her door to get her out of her car seat.

Like papa says, either she's out of her mind happy or has never been so unhappy in her whole life. She's going to be a handful in middle school.

Here's an image to make you laugh. This is the angel I made at Christmas. It's by far mama's favorite school art. When she asked me what I was doing in the picture, I told her I was making my "angel face." Oh boy.

The day off- June.

We didn't have school on Monday. Some sort of teacher-in-service day, though the same day is celebrated in some states as Confederate Memorial Day. (South Carolina officially celebrates it on May 10- the anniversary of Stonewall Jackson's death.)

Papa was going to take Bubba and I hiking. I slept in until 10am, interrupted by a few brief periods of dry heaving. I woke up in a good mood and drank a little milk. Good thing mama and papa decided that we shouldn't go all the way to the mountains to hike, because we got to the park and I threw up all over myself and my car seat.

That's why I came back wearing only one of Buster's sweatshirts. The good news is that this seems to be one of my spontaneous barfing days. I didn't get sick after this and seem to be fine today.

While I was cuddling my teddy bear and watching Dora, mama was on a mission to clean up the kitchen. She started cleaning out the cupboards and realized that she was not going to be able to clean out all of the lower cabinets, especially as cluttered as they were. So she called up Matt next door and offered him five dollars to come over and empty everything out and wipe everything down. It was well worth the cost to have a willing 7-year-old to help out. Plus, when he was done, he stuck around and played with Henry as well as any 7-year-old can when dealing with a 4-year-old eager to show off his toys. (The kitchen looks great now, by the way. It hasn't been this organized since we moved in. Unfortunately, as soon as we had everything cleaned out, a colony of ants moved in and attacked a jar of honey. So mama and papa got to clean out the pantry again tonight.)

We got a package in the mail and were so excited to get two new books from PawPaw! And they came with DVDs of him reading the books to us!

Mama tried to get us to read along in the book, but we wanted to watch the videos instead. Thanks PawPaw!

Saturday in Central- Henry.

On Saturday morning, we woke up to a rainy day. Luckily, they hold my baseball practice in a gym on rainy days.

Things couldn't be going any better at practice. Papa didn't have to bribe me at all this week to participate. I loved practicing fielding.

John did a great job too!

Here's a good video of both John and I batting. Check me out in the back knocking it out of the park! It took mama a lot of tries to get a good video of me.

Papa gave me a lot of advice about keeping my eye on the ball.

When we weren't batting, we fielded the balls. This kid is really good and papa could tell it was bothering me that he could get to the balls faster than me. What the video doesn't show is me telling papa not to hug me. I guess 4 and a half is when kids learn how to be embarrassed by their parents' interfering.

If you heard June talking int he last video, you can tell it absolutely kills her that she's not playing. She did sneak out on the court to play for a while. We can't wait to sign her up next year, even though the whole team is filled with boys.

When we practiced running bases, I was very fast. Papa says that after the second lap, all the other kids are starting to get out of breath, while I'm still going strong. Looks like "high energy" is starting to pay off.

After practice, we headed into Central for the Railroad Days. Central was named because it is centrally located on the railroad line between Atlanta and Charlotte. It's a struggling little town where most of the Clemson students live and is trying very hard to rebuild its image around the railroad.

There was a lull in the rain and we got there just in time to get rides on all the trolleys before the long lines started.

Lowe's had a workshop set up where kids could build a kaleidoscope. Mama really wanted to build it, so I humored her by pounding in all the nails. (She had so much fun that she says she wants to start going to all the Saturday morning workshops at Lowe's.) I helped her out on the condition that she let me ride the Thomas Train driving around.

I rode all by myself. Mama didn't think much of it until the "train" drove away and didn't come back for 10 minutes. I guess this is growing up.

Look at all these trains you can rent! Someone please convince my parents to get this for my birthday! Not only am I acting goofy in this picture, check out Junie in the background begging for another fresh made mini doughnut doused in tons of powdered sugar. They were so good.

After she downed the last of the mini doughnuts, Junie took a turn of her own on the train.

While they were waiting for us to finish building, June and Papa took a tour of the Clemson "CAT" bus. Mama says some day she'll take us on a bus ride, because everyone rides free.

The city set up an empty store full of train sets. June and I both drove a Thomas set.

And we spent a good hour playing with the wooden train sets.

They even had a TV playing Thomas videos! Could the day get any better?