35 Weeks

I can't wait for this little girl to get here! I feel like she's eating my brain and I'm eating everything else!

My brain function level is on low, I'm tired, no matter how much or little sleep I get and even when I'm tired I have a hard time sleeping, some times I can't get comfortable, some times my head is whirling with thoughts and other times I have a toddler who doesn't think sleeping is a good idea. And then of course there's going to the bathroom constantly or having a chance to sleep, but it's my only time to get something done without my "little helper".

My little helper is doing great though besides bed time.  She's using the potty ALL the time, even to poop!  And if you've never potty trained before you just don't know how awesome that is!

The binkies are now a thing of the past!  She has mentioned them once, while just waking up, since only a few days after getting rid of them.

She sings songs constantly!  And I just love when she combines a bunch of them.  She even gets up on her stool and uses one of her blocks as a microphone.

She pretty much knows all her colors and when she says one wrong she'll say "silly me, that's not..."

She knows most of the basic shapes, she gets a little confused with square and diamond some times, but considering most of the ones on her toys are the same, just rotated, it's not surprising.

Now we need to work on learning her letters and tracing.  She just does not get the concept of tracing.

Oh and her throwing fits/whining and bed time routine.  Both have me at my whits end, I have ideas on how to correct our issues, it's getting the other parental unit to realize how important consistency is and getting him to be consistent and not give in that the big problem is.

I was going to leave you with an adorable picture, but I don't have any I haven't posted right now, so instead you can tell me if you think I've dropped.  It's a question I've been getting a lot lately and I don't really think so, but I do think she may be starting.

33 Weeks

35 Weeks

The Other Foot

It seems that this whole pregnancy I've been waiting for the other foot to drop. So far there hasn't been one, but I can't shake that feeling. I've pushed it to the back of my head for several months, but the pre-programmed "expect the worst" part of me can't help but wonder...

This past week has renewed my fears of "The Other Foot".  My friend gave birth to 4.5lb little boy at just under 37 weeks.  She was expecting a small baby and that he may have to stay in the NICU, but she wasn't prepared for him to be transferred to the Children's Hospital in another town with the initial diagnosis of a missing pulmonary artery.  She was also scared with a few other mis-diagnoses and in the end he has his pulmonary artery, but it is only partial.  He will get a shunt this week and have a surgery in a month or two to fix his artery.  Thankfully he is currently doing well and his body is functioning properly and he's even eating.

It amazed me that they didn't find this condition until after birth.  She was having at least weekly ultrasounds do to her high risk pregnancy with GD and threat of PreE. 

It also scares me that I have two friends that have had babies in the last 4 months that have had heart issues.  My other friends little girl has a much more serious issue and has been in the hospital for almost 4 months now and has already under gone 2 open heart surgeries.  It was this friend that told me she found out that 1 in 100 babies has a heart defect at birth that isn't diagnosed until after birth.

Its funny how a mother's worry starts so soon and never ends!  I'm very anxious for my little girl to get here, only a few more weeks now!

Once.A.Month.Cooking

My original plan for posting today was to put up the pictures from my surprise shower, but to be completely honest I don't feel like getting out of my chair to go get the cord to download the picture and then upload them, so instead I'll tell you about my goal of Once.A.Month.Cooking (OAMC)

This goal I started working while I was off the week between Christmas and New Years.  I found the site OnceAMonthMom and I'm in LOVE!!!  This site has monthly menus for all sorts of diets, including baby food!  Bonus, is that they have made the recipes customizable using Google.Documents!  All you do is type in the number of people you want to make the recipe for and it calculates what you need to make that recipe for that number of people to eat it twice that month!

My first attempt at a cooking day was essentially a failure in the sense that it took me well over one day to do the cooking and I wasn't even making all of the recipes!  I attribute this to several things. . . 1) I should have read the instructions page first and I would have realized they planned all the chopping for the night before.  2) I should have gone out to the shed and found the box my chopper is currently sitting in rather than doing it by hand.  For one meal it's no big deal, but chopping 8.25 cups of onions by hand is very time consuming!  And 3) I'm pregnant!  I have to take more breaks and sit more than the average OAMCooker.

The recipes I have found to be overall yummy.  There are a few things I might change up for my family's taste, but nothing major.  Like using regular 90% lean beef rather than turkey or chicken for some of the recipes.  Only because when my husband saw the turkey he flipped out.  Little does he realize he eats Turkey sausage all the time!  It must be a man thing cause really I can't tell the difference and now I'm stuck eating a whole meatloaf between Lillian and I.  I like meatloaf, but not enough to eat it for lunch and dinner every day!

And can I just say nights are so much more enjoyable not having to figure out what's for dinner!  I portioned everything out and wrote down how many servings of each thing I had.  Then I sat down with my calendar and worked out what nights we are home and what nights we are busy and planned what to eat each night.  Now all I have to do is look at my calendar and I know what's for dinner. 

I won't lie, I'm not looking forward to the shopping and cooking for this month, but I'm so excited to about the recipes in this months menu and not having to figure something out every night that it's sooooo worth it!  Especially with this little girl coming so soon!

8 Months, 33 Weeks, 50 Days!

All ways you can measure how far along I am in my pregnancy.

8 Months Pregnant
33 Weeks Along
50 Days Left (give or take, I'm hoping to take!)

At my 32 week appointment I was told that everything I'm feeling is normal, the contractions, pressure and pains.  Some nights I'm very uncomfortable to the point I can't even sit on the couch, I have to go lay down.  I hate this feeling mostly cause I feel like B is doing everything.  Which in all reality he isn't I suppose.  I still play with Lillian, pay the bills, do the laundry.  It's mostly just the little things with the constant getting up and down that he does for me mostly cause it takes me so long to get up and down.  I move slow, I'm big and I'm trying to avoid pains from moving too fast.  Lillian is finally understanding that I can't carry her!  I'm so happy about this cause I was feeling horrible not picking her up.

I've started to get asked "Have you dropped?" and while I don't know if I look like I've dropped, this morning I certainly felt like it.  I feel like all of her weight is on my pelvis and forward.  Not very comfortable.

It hit me yesterday that there is a very good chance that this little one could be here in 4 weeks!!!  Can you say panic???  As ready as I physically feel for her to be here, I'm not mentally ready and her stuff certainly isn't ready!  I don't even have the bassinet, swing, bouncer or anything at my house yet.  And I haven't washed one thing!  I really need to get a move on!

They Got Me

A little background... Back in July my sister had planned a purse party.  The day of the party was beautiful, which meant that the only people that showed up to this party were me and my mother.  I felt horrible for my sister when she sent the guy and his purses home.  I was also totally bummed because I really wanted a new purse!  So when my sister informed about a month ago that she was having another purse party on January 15th I was so excited.  I've been using the purse she got me for Christmas in 2010 all year!  Anyone who knows me, knows that is a long time! 

So this weekend my best friend made the 2 hour trip to come hang out with me and go to the purse party.  We got there a little early and my MIL and another friend, A, were already there.  Now I found it a little strange that A was there because she doesn't carry a purse, I've never seen her with a purse and I highly doubt she owns one, but I attributed it to J, my best friend and friend of A's being there.  All of a sudden my sister comes down the hall and says "So I just got a message from the purse guy, he has the flu and isn't going to make it."  I was like "are you serious, how does this always happen to me???"  Then Lillian walks out wearing a ribbon that says "#1 Big Sister" on it.  It still doesn't really click until my sister says "So there was never really a purse party today, we are all here to have a shower for you."

Can you say total shock?!    I totally thought I was having a shower Feb 4th and had even gotten addresses for my MIL and finished up my registry.

It was a great surprise.  There was wonderful snacky foods and lots of fun.  I'll have another post with photos soon.  Right now this is the only one I have on the computer.

Lilli had a blast opening Baby Sister's stuff

My Goal for 2012

Or you could say my New Year's Resolution. Yes, I know, I'm a little late. Thing is, I don't really like the work "resolution" for some reason, I would much rather make it my goal for the year.

Anyway, I kind of have 2 goals this year.

First I want to start doing Once.A.Month.Cooking (OAMC).  I'm hoping that I can make this work for my family.  I find that we eat out a lot or have prepared meals a lot because there just isn't enough time in a day for me to plan and prepare meals the way I should, not to mention the only time I have to get to the grocery store is on the weekends or during my lunch at work.  I have found in the past that even when I only plan a weeks worth of meals, a lot of food goes to waste.  Things change, schedules change, and depending on the day I just might not feel like cooking.  Hopefully freezing meals will cut down on the effort put forth on a weekly and daily basis for healthier eating.

Second, we need to work on our debt.  When I graduated college we had no debt other than my school loans, I even owned my car!  Shortly after graduation my car took a crap, not a big deal, I bought a new car and resolved to having a payment for the next 3 years I think it was.  What I didn't realize was how taken I had gotten on the Jeep we bought.  Regardless we were able to save $13000 in a year for our wedding and honeymoon.  What got us was the souvenirs on our honeymoon and then our computer crashing just after we got back.  Had we not had to try and pay for that all in one month I really think we would have been ok.  Oh and I relaxed on keeping track of what money we were spending where.  This was the biggest help to us saving so much money.  I literally knew where every penny we spent went and when we spent too much in an area one week, we got less for that the next week.  I WAS ANAL.  Now, almost 4 and a half years later we are in some major debt.  Yes there are things that we wouldn't have been able to prevent, like the Jeep taking a crap before it was paid off, or some of the medical bills, but I've let this uncontrolled (as in not keeping track of the extra spending) go too far.  I started putting food on credit cards and not paying cash, which was always my motto.  "If I don't have the cash, I don't need it."

So there you have it, my goals for 2012.  I'll have a follow up post on what I've done so far and where I plan to go from here.

Christmas Day

Christmas morning B and I were awake around 7.  In all honesty, I couldn't wait for Lillian to wake up.  I was so excited to see her reaction to the presents and everything.  She started stirring in bed around 7:30 so B kind of coaxed her awake.  It took lots of convincing to let me change her diaper.  I told her she couldn't go see what Santa left until I did though because I didn't want to have to try and convince her in the middle of opening gifts that she needed a new diaper.  When she finally went to the living room around 8 this is what she found...

Gifts are from Santa, mom and dad, grandparents and aunt.

Lilli not knowing what to do first.

 It's always been tradition in my house to open stocking first so that's where we started.  Of course she had to sit on her new couch!

She was quite happy to just sit on the couch bed and eat a Reeses.Christmas.Tree.  She didn't even ask to open another present.

After the grandparents and Aunt Pocca arrived we talked her into opening more gifts.  Never should have left her open the Lea.pster2 when I did.  She would have been happy with just that.  I was amazed how quickly she figured it out, with no help!

One of her other favorite gifts (we had to talk her into opening) was a Do.ra sticker/coloring book.

Baby sister wanted a sticker too!

I was so proud of her, she never whined or asked if there were any more presents and she was very good about saying thank you to everyone. 

We had her open a present for her baby sister and she ran right over to me and lifted up my shirt to show her.  She then announced "baby sister loves it!"

We were able to stay home for a little over an hour after opening gifts which was nice.  We then traveled to see my sister's dad on our way to B's Uncle's house to spend some time with his family.

It was realized the next day that Santa hid some presents in mommy's craft cupboard, but we decided to keep one for her birthday since she had already gotten so much art stuff and the other we gave to her on NYE when we went and did presents with B's dad.

I think just this week we finally got the last toy out of the box.  Not because there was so much, but more because Lilli loved all her new stuff and only has wanted to open and play with one thing at a time.

Christmas and Bye-Bye Binkie!

Christmas was great this year!  I won't lie I stressed out quite a bit the week before, B getting sick that Tuesday really didn't help (he is a bigger baby than Lilli when he's sick), but in the end it turned out great!

Christmas Eve Eve I only had to work a half day.  I picked Lillian up from the sitter and took her home where B entertained her while I locked myself in the playroom/craft room and wrapped presents for I don't even know how many hours.  Well actually, is was only like 3 or 4, but when you are almost 30 weeks pregnant sitting on the floor and bending over gifts for that long, it seems like days!

Christmas Eve I couldn't sleep so I got up and finished wrapping the last few I had.  I was so excited to not have to stay up an wrap presents after Lilli went to bed that night that I can't even explain it!  That evening we went out to dinner with my mom, her DF, my sister, aunt, uncle and cousin.  Normally we would have had a nice big meal at home, but we decided the convenience of not having to clean up after a big meal was worth the trip out.  After dinner we went to mom's for a little bit to hang out and "watch" a Christmas movie.  In all honesty I don't think there was much watching going on, it was more chatting than anything, but it was nice to be together.  Before getting ready to leave we exchanged small gifts with my Aunt and Lillian opened and put on her new PJs.

**Side note about preparing for Bye-Bye Binkie: For over a month we talked with Lillian about how she was going to leave her binkies out in a box for Santa and in exchange for her Binkies he was going to leave her presents.  We really tried to hype up the getting presents and when people would talk to her about Santa we'd have her tell them what she had to do and such.

Of course of all nights, Lillian fell asleep in the car with her binkies on the way home from my mom's.  It's only a 15 minute drive.  B thought I was crazy for waking her up, and maybe I was, but I wanted her to remember giving up her binkies the next day so that she didn't think Santa was horrible for taking them.  It took a good 20 minutes, but she finally agreed to put "all" of her binkies in the box.  Bed time after that was a little rough, but we managed.  It took probably an hour and half of "I just really want my binkies" and "I don't want to go to sleep" for her to finally give in to her exhaustion, but she did it.  And managed to do it not long before B came in to tell me he was done wrapping and it was time to put the presents out...

And I actually have to do some work now, so Christmas Day is going to have to be another post...

Goodbye 2011, Hello 2012!

I've never been one to think of a year as a "bad" year. I figure any year I make it through was a good year. Some are just more stressful than others.

January 2011: We passed the 1 year mark of TTC.  Both of our vehicles take a crap and we decide to give leasing a try.  Love my new Nissan Rouge.

February 2011: B and I take a trip to Vegas to celebrate the wedding of one of my friends!  I got to meet a few of my online mommy friends for the first time!

March 2011: I started the HCG diet and can't really remember much else besides Lillian's horrible attitude.  Thankfully it was just a phase!

April 2011: I reached my pre-pregnancy weight, Lillian turned 2, I turned 28, I lost a total of 21lbs and 12.5 inches from my diet.

May 2011: We began Fertility Testing and went on a family camping trip

June 2011: Fertility testing results came in, My niece Maddilyn arrived, our garden started producing, Potty training began, completed in my first Chase.Corporate.Challenge Race, got my BFP!!!

July 2011: First look at baby number 2, lots of time spent with family, family trip to Old Forge and Enchanted Forest, Water Safari.

August 2011: 10 Year highshool reunion, 4 year wedding anniversary, growing a baby...

September 2011: Went to see the Lion King Play, moved Lillian to a big girl bed.

October 2011: Hit the 20 week mark, Gender u/s, Lillian went Trick or Treating for the first time!

November 2011: I met my brother for the first time!  Spent a lot of time reminding myself of what I have to be thankful for and spent some wonderful time with family!

December 2011: Lillian threw up for the first time :( My little model rocks our family pictures, We get rid of the Binkies!!! (binkie post coming soon!)

Here's to a wonderful 2012!!!