Those Darn Olympics

I can't wait for the Olympics to be over so that I can get to bed at a decent hour again. Who knew how much fun it was to watch Badminton? ha ha I woke up early this morning and caught the end of the very sad Softball Gold medal game. ugh. Can't believe they lost. It's the only game I could catch on tv - apparently I was bad luck. I wish they could have covered it better, but I can see how table tennis is more exciting...oh wait...I mean the trampoline...oh wait...speed walking? are you serious??? I think my mom and I will start training for 2012 - we can speed walk with the best of them.
Well, we had our sonogram and NO we did NOT find out - that's always the first question. Still don't know whether Austin's dream of having a brother will come true. Although, I must say he is quite fond of his sisters and I think he would secretly be just as happy with a sis. Ashlyn wants us to have another Ashlyn - oh my....please, no....I can't handle two teenage Ashlyn's.
We did get to set our C-section date - Dec 29 at 7:30am. Way better than having it the 26th like we originally thought. Our doc doesn't have to work Christmas anymore so he put us on for Monday the 29th - should be perfect, it's an odd number and better yet - it's prime. I'll finally have a baby on a prime number - my dream is complete...
I have a ton of work from the textbook company which I'm very excited about. We are enjoying our new deck almost everyday. We had playgroup here on Monday - I think I had 25 people over. And "wine Wednesday" last week was packed too. LOVE the new deck!
I'm watching the men's beach volleyball finals which is quite close so I must sign off and hopefully go to bed soon.
Hope you are having the time of your life!
ST

{1/2 way there}

I realized this weekend that I am already 1/2 way done with this pregnancy - kinda flew by! I was 19 weeks on Sunday and the c-section will be sometime after 38 weeks - I sure hope we are ready to do this for a fourth time! Our sonogram will be Monday afternoon, but, sorry, we will NOT be finding out (for a fourth time). Just don't think that's how it's suppose to be. I love surprises and what better surprise than to wait til it actually pops out? So, Austin will just have to be patient (yeah right) until he finds out if he gets his brotherly wish. I've been feeling great - way better than I did in the first trimester. I've definitely got a belly on me too.
We had a great weekend. Some friends came in town over the weekend from St. Louis - one of Shawn's old fraternity brothers. They have 3 adorable kids around the same ages as ours and the kids just had a blast. Austin has asked about 100 times when we can go to St. Louis. Luckily it is in our plans to head that way sometime sooner than later. We had a big BBQ with a bunch of Shawn's fraternity brothers on Saturday night - tried out our new deck and patio and it was awesome. The weather couldn't have been better - especially in August. It was a crazy weekend and we were all exhausted by the end of it. We took the kids and my mom to a "mr. stinky feet" concert Sunday night. He's one of the kids favorite singers. The kids had a blast singing and dancing - Gabriella being the one with the most hip moves. Just hilarious.
Austin starts school in 16 days!!!!!!!!!! He is sooo excited and asks me everyday if it is the day he gets to go to school. I can't imagine how much fun he is going to have - I just hope he stays out of trouble and doesn't talk too much. I dread the day his teacher says, "Mrs. Turner, could you stay here for just a minute - I want to talk to you in private." Oh, the things that are to come.
Hope you are having the time of your life!
ST

Tarzan vs. Spiderman

In the past month and half or so, Austin's latest obsession has been superheros - mostly spiderman. He has a full spiderman costume (thanks to Ms Kim) that he wears constantly - mask, gloves and all - and the only way we can get him to get dressed is to convince him that he must turn back into Peter Parker to go out in public so no one will know he is spiderman.
Well, we went to a whole new level this week. I made the mistake of renting Tarzan from the library. Austin watched it over the weekend and has now insisted on only wearing underwear because he IS the REAL Tarzan, and since all Tarzan is wearing is underwear - well, you see where this is going. So, the past three days I have had more conversations than I can count, about why we can't go in public when all we are wearing is underwear. I told him that there are "rules" when we go in public and one of those "rules" is that we wear clothes over our underwear. He told me he is NOT Austin, he is Tarzan, so it's ok if he only wears underwear. Now, anyone that knows me, knows that arguing and debating is not one of my strong suits - I may be able to do calculus, but I couldn't win an argument to save my life - not even with a three year old. Oh, did I mention he also enjoys doing the chest thumbing and yelling that Tarzan does too? Gotta love 3 year olds.

One other Austin tidbit - this is something he drew on the patio last week - his first drawing of a person!!! He told me it was me and Colin watching Austin mow the lawn!! Amazing - simply amazing. And THAT is why I love being a mom. (and why I'm doing it for a fourth time!)Hope you are having the time of your life! (and if you're not - try imitating Tarzan for a day - seems to work for us!)
ST

A Cold Beer Never Tasted Soooo Good...

I can hardly believe it, but the unthinkable has been done. Yes, Shawn, my dad, his dad, and a bit of help from Brian Scarlett - a friend of Shawn's, have built a deck this weekend. And it is awesome!! There are still a few little things to be done (little might not be the right word there), like staining and screwing in about a million screws on the decking, and sanding off the step so Gabriella will stop gashing her shins in. Then we have a bit of landscaping to do around the patio and around the edges of the deck, but the main portion is done! And I already have fallen in love with the outcome. I think it looks so good - I'm not sure how they stood in the heat all day Friday, Saturday and Sunday - it was 100 degrees today and humidity was about 95%. I was sweating just sitting in the chair watching the kids (from inside the air conditioned house...).
These boys definitely deserved their cold beers when Sunday night rolled around.
And, Tom - I don't even think you'll need to bring your work clothes next weekend!!
I hope all the guys can roll out of bed tomorrow without too much pain - although I think secretly dad and Shawn are looking forward to their air conditioned offices tomorrow...
I love you all and thanks for all the hard work!!
Hope you are having the time of your life!
ST

The Hottest Weekend of the Summer

And we are building a deck! Yes, Shawn picked the hottest weekend of summer to be outside doing manual labor 24/7. We've been hard at work for about 2 weeks now (well, after work Shawn works for a few hours til dark, this is only the 2nd weekend of real-all-day-work. Shawn took yesterday off and worked from sun up til sun down and I was impressed when he rolled out of bed ready to go again this morning. Here's their progress as of yesterday around 3pm.


Shawn's dad got to join in the fun yesterday - I hope he was able to get out of bed today too...thanks Ed for the hard work! It's hard to see what it actually looks like in pics. We'll have the big patio as you walk out and then to the left is the deck - one step up. My husband is such a stud.

Shawn's deadline for the deck in this Thursday as we have company coming in town on Friday and we are having a big barbeque with a bunch of shawn's old fraternity brothers and their families on Saturday night. I'm so excited to see the finished project!

Ok, I am being beckoned by my three children at my feet - more later!!
Hope you are having the time of your life!
ST

Patio....Check!

First of all - We have a new patio!! Seems like it took months for it to get done (well, it did) but it is finished!! We pretty much had to get our old one torn out since it was all cracked and draining into our basement. The new one is quite a bit bigger - nothing special, just a huge cement slab - looks great though. The kids were obsessed with watching the workers - they loved the jackhammers and diggers. They literally stood at this window for a week! We invited James and Kiernan over one day just to sit and watch them work. They loved it! True boys I guess. (although Ashlyn enjoyed it too)Now we just need to do all the work around the edges. Shawn has several ideas going through his head. But for now, we are working on the new deck that will sit directly to the left of the slab. Shawn is building it with (hopefully) the help of my dad, his dad and anyone else willing to help - or anyone that owes us a favor...hmmmm....I'll start up a list on that one. He is filling the post holes (whatever that means) this weekend, then we have to wait a week for the cement to sit. Then we are going canoeing and then the deck will be erected. Can't wait to see it get started!

The next pic is of lunch over here last week. My good friend Callie is in town and we had a little get together. That's 9 kids you see there eating lunch. The kids had a blast. What a fun day!! We sure do miss you Cal!!


Monday night we headed out to Waverly for Ohio Days which is a big parade and carnival that we have gone to for the past several years. The kids were so pumped - Austin could not wait to get candy in the streets. I have lots more pics, but some computer malfunctions so you'll have to wait for the rest. Happy Happy kids this week!!


That's it for now - we've had a busy week with Cal in town. We went to the Farmstead yesterday and had lunch at Kim's, went and picked blueberries this morning at a blueberry patch - so fun!! And tomorrow we have much more playing to do. The fun just never ends. Please pray for no rain as Shawn has a deadline for getting this deck built before we have some out of town guests coming from St. Louis in early August. We promised them they wouldn't have to work while they were here which means the deck has to be finished...yikes....
Hope you are having the time of your life!
ST

The Fun Stuff

As I was downloading and sifting through pics I had taken from the camping trip I found all kinds of pics I had totally forgotten about.

Here's Gabriella with her Godparents - my sister, Kimberly and her husband Nick. I can't believe they said they want to pay for her college tuition - isn't that so generous? Oh wait - did you not say that?? Hey, can't blame me for trying.
That's just me - what else can I say??

This was after a morning of play here at the Turner house - Aren't they cute and innocent??Shawn and his assistants putting the tent up for the first time in our backyard (trial run)

Austin found my Ipod recently and somehow knew exactly how to make it work - to my knowledge he had never touched it before. I came downstairs and he was dancing in the living room. It was hilarious and had to be documented. Gives me a little glimpse of what he'll look like when he is a teenager. And this is my baby, Gabriella (not for long)...I just think this look is priceless...
Here's the trial run of camping - Shawn and the kids set up the tent and camped in the backyard about a month ago - me and Gabriella opted to sleep inside.
This one will be awesome at High school graduation someday - This is Gabriella and her boyfriend, Will - he's only 5 months old - a bit big for his age - don't they look hilarious??

That's all I got for now for pics. Hope you enjoyed them!
The kids and I and 7 moms plus 14 kids went to a concert this morning at the park. It was Mr. Stinky Feet - the kids love him. It was hot and humid but we all had a great time dancing and singing (and sweating) and then we had a huge picnic. Kim took some pics so hopefully she got some good ones.
Until next time -
Hope you are havin' the time of your life!
ST