silly boys, tractors are for girls!

we went to my mom's tractor pull today. she drives, and bob, my step-father, is her pit crew. she (usually) dominates a very male dominated sport :)

today she pulled the farmall super mta (pictured above). other times we have gone, she has also pulled a farmall 140(pictured on the right).

to pull a tractor actually means to pull a sled with the tractor. they hook it to a huge weighted (as in tons) sled that's as big as a semi trailer and pull it down a track. essentially, whoever gets the furthest wins.

she usually places in the top four, but she had a grand-daughter to distract her today. nathan has gone to several of them and has even pulled a couple of times in his day :) but mom doesn't usually have shelby to show off to the crowd, so she wasn't watching the track and the competition like she should have been and didn't do as well as she would have liked.

3rd trimester

it's official! i am in my 3rd trimester. if you go by the book, i have 12 weeks to go. however, dr. balaloski will schedule my c-section two weeks prior to that on november 19. happy birthday dad! although, if elise is like shelby and comes early then i have about nine weeks. boy, that's going to go quick.

in case you are interested, i am registered at babies r us. it's registry number 98182555, but you can find it by mine or stephon's name.

the wheels on the mini-van go round and round...

we traveled to youngstown today. this is our first trip in a mini-van. can you believe it, i, jo bilberry, am driving a mini-van! stephon bought me a 2008 nissan quest. it's not bad, it's black and has some style and shape to it for a mini-van. at least that's what stephon and my dad keep telling me. i think they're just trying to make me feel better.

it was a nice ride. there is a ton of space in the back for our luggage. i didn't have to sit everything on the driveway and pack it like a 3-d puzzle for a change. we just sat it all in there :) and check this out... we now don't have to ask for free home delivery when the new baby comes! there's room for all of us :)

we're staying at my dad's for the week. tomorrow we'll go to a tractor pull, sunday is my niece's (elizabeth) 1st birthday, next saturday is another tractor pull, and my aunt kay and uncle rick are visiting my mom's next sunday. so we will be heading back home next monday, the 15th. stephon didn't come with us :( he's working and taking care of the dogs.

initially you might think that he got the short end of the stick on this one. however, think of all the meals and glasses of ice water he'll be able to enjoy without little fingers in it; all the video games without pulled plugs and powered down x-boxes in the middle of them; and all of the uncensored / non-cartoon tv shows he'll be able to watch! i think he'll survive just fine without us.