"Mommy, open your tummy," Jack tells me. He's sleepy...he wants me to pull up my shirt and then lay on my bare belly. Then he'll say, "Mommy, did you put lotion on your tummy?" He loves my belly and just told me yesterday, "Mommy, I want to get inside of your belly with baby." He lays against it constantly. "Mommy, let's watch cartoons and I can lay on your belly." He is growing up so fast and shooting things with his imaginary guns, playing with his trucks, tackling us during a game of football, then comes at me with the sweet baby comments to totally knock me out of whack. He is my sweet little bear who is grouchy in the morning like me and snores like his daddy at night. Just yesterday he crawled into bed with us and whined that he needed my body pillow because his legs hurt. Which is the same excuse I used for having it a few nights before. "Mommy's legs get sore at night sweetie, this pillow helps." Apparently he is pregnant also. He wants to come with me to exercise and rub lotion on my belly and then his own before bedtime. Just the other night we spent 10 minutes on this important task. Each morning he gets into his daddy's drawer to put on "shave" (deodorant). Over his shirt. Today he asked me to smell his armpits.

I love that little guy so much...I know I face the dilemma that all mothers do when they decide to bring a second little one into the world. I know I can love them both enough, I just don't want Jack to be mad at his momma. I know it's inevitable that he will be jealous and upset at first. But I still want him to know he's my first baby and that's a place no one will ever have in my heart. (Oh my God, am I seriously crying right now? I am.) Will he ever know just how much I love him? That for me, he hung the moon? I feel guilty these days doing things on my own, thinking I should spend as much time with him as possible before new baby comes. Then I think of how little time I will have alone in a few weeks and know that I need that time to myself. It's a never-ending cycle for mommas. I don't think dads share the same guilt and feelings. There's no way they could - and it's not bad - it's simply different for moms.

I just want to kiss and love Jack a zillion times a day. Hear his laugh echoing through my ears like last night when we read some silly penguin book that I never dreamed would make him laugh like it did. We read it three times in a row. I want him to call me "mama coyote" (or horsey, birdy, piggy, kitty, insert animal here) to his "baby coyote" forever. As with all mothers, I could go on and on, but instead I will post pics.

Driving to "practice"...

Wearing his favorite "Go Cubs Go" shirt
At the parade