Tomorrow (January 12th) my baby turns 2 years old! It's not that big of a shock to me that he's actually two years old though... He's acted like a two year old for several months now. Unfortunately for me he never really wanted to be a baby. :( He's always been doing things pretty advanced for his age. When he was just a few months old he started refusing a pacifier. He started sitting up at 5 months old. He began crawling a month later. At 9 months old he was walking without any help. By 12 months old he was saying words and had been using a spoon and fork to feed himself. By about 16 months old he was speaking in short sentences. Now at almost 2 he says complete sentences better than most 4 year olds do.

It amazes me at how much and how quickly he's learned everything. (Especially after having my first baby being a bit delayed in everything compared to his peers...) I feel like I haven't had a baby around the house since he was a newborn 2 years ago. I can't wait to see what the future holds for him. I'm looking forward to working a lot more with both he and his older brother on pre-school activities this year. He loves learning new things and I have no doubt that he'll be learning everything just as fast as my 4 year old.

Why am I freaking out? Well, it's probably because I have so little time and still so much to do before Baby Josiah arrives! It could be that I've never waited this long before getting everything prepared. It might also be that I've never had 2 kids, a husband and 2 dogs to take care of as well as my own household to run.

This is definitely new territory to me.

It might seem strange to those of you who have had babies and who have done all of this before and think that it's really not that big of a deal. Especially for baby number three. You might be thinking that I've already had two kids... so what's the difference with number three?

Well... The answer is pretty much the same with both of my first two boys. I was living at my mom's house and I didn't have a husband around to help me. Of course they were both very different circumstances. With Camron, my (ex) husband was on deployment to Iraq. With Brady, my (ex) husband was divorcing me and was too busy with his new (pregnant) girlfriend to help out at all. (Do I still sound bitter? lol Maybe. I just think it's wrong that so many men out there get to start completely over while the women they leave are left to handle all the responsibilities... that they helped to create... on their own.)

With both boys I felt like I had all the time in the world to prepare for the new baby's arrival. I had their rooms ready, all of the baby essentials bought, hospital bags were packed... and it was all done about 3 months before they were born!

I have three weeks! (Give or take.) I feel so unorganized and unprepared. I just barely bought the first package of newborn diapers yesterday... and that will last what? 3 days. If we're lucky. So we need to buy lots more ASAP! I have to finish washing all of the old baby clothes and blankets that I've had in storage for the past 2 years. (I think I have about 3 more loads to go... Then it becomes, where the heck am I going to put it all?!) I have to pack a hospital bag for me and Josh. I'll also need to pack Josiah's going-home stuff. I have to pack a bag for both boys so they have everything they need while staying at Nana and Papa's house while I'm in the hospital. I still have to turn the back part of my living room into a make-shift nursery. Complete with a cot for me to sleep on, the bassinet for baby and a changing area. I also have to find some place for a few extra clothes and blankets for those middle of the night diaper blow outs or spit-ups... because I don't want to wake the boys by getting it out of their room.

I think it felt like things were easier to get done with my first two boys because I actually had a lot of help from my mom. My step dad was working out of town both times that I gave birth while I was living there. So she had tons of time to help me! This time around I have my own household to run. Dinner to make. House to be cleaned. Two boys to take care of. A husband to keep happy... So I'm almost doing all of this on my own. I have a lot more responsibilities on my shoulders than I had before. It's kind of nerve wracking to think that I'm the one who has to make this transition go as smoothly as possible.

I don't want this blog post to sound like I'm complaining about anything. I'm really not complaining. Or even getting close to complaining. I'm just stressing and I think writing it all out helps me gain some sort of clarity to be able to put it all in perspective for me.

I'm so grateful for my little family and the life that I have. I'm so excited about Josiah's arrival and having our family finally feeling complete. I know that in the end everything will work out and I'll feel like I was stressing out for nothing. I have pretty much everything that I'll need for him in his first month of life... it's just a matter of getting organized. I'm great at organizing. I just need to take it one step at a time and focus on the task at hand. I'll set some goals for myself this week... I'll write them down and cross them off one at a time. I think it'll help me in feeling like I'm getting anything accomplished.

So here we go! I'm giving myself one week to get everything done. Time to set some goals and get things done!