Dreaming of Baby

Once.A.Month.Cooking

2012-01-18T07:55:00.000-05:00

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!

2012-01-17T08:16:00.000-05:00

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

2012-01-16T07:39:00.000-05:00

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

2012-01-13T08:40:00.002-05:00

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

2012-01-12T08:14:00.000-05:00

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!

2012-01-10T08:46:00.001-05:00

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!

2012-01-04T08:06:00.000-05:00

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!!!

Another Picture Post

2011-12-26T08:00:00.001-05:00

So this was supposed to post on the 22nd, but didn't and I'm not really sure why! So to tide you over until I can get an actual Christmas post up, here are some pictures of my adorable little girl...

She would re-decorate the tree every night if I let her.

Lilli makes cookies!

Ok, really she just played with the flour after like 2 dough roll outs.

She really did enjoy frosting though!

She just loves the cozy stockings!

And she loves talking to Santa! She was so excited for him to read her a book, but when he was finally working, she didn't want to hear it!

She insisted on dressing like a "inja"

Those are snowflake stocking on her head and tied in a not, and my bathrobe belt around her waist.

She sang "I'm a inja, I'm a inja" while watching herself dance in front of the mirror.

This Christmas

2011-12-23T08:04:00.000-05:00

I have a feeling this Christmas is going to be one for the books...

First Lillian is totally getting the Santa concept. She even went up to him at the mall and told him she has been a good girl and wanted toys for Christmas. Nothing specific, just toys (good for me right?). This morning on the way to the sitter she was telling me "Santa will bring me toys and I will go to bed like a good girl. Then I can open the presents when you say I can." I have been very impressed with her minimal fits about not being able to open the gifts under the tree.

This Christmas could also bring on temper tantrums and fits of epic proportions. On Christmas eve the plan is for Lillian to wrap her binkies in a gift bag and leave them for Santa to take back to the "Pole" in exchange for her presents. I'm actually kind of liking the idea of Lillian giving Santa a present every year.

Anyway, right now she uses 2 binkies, one in her

mouth and the other she rubs on her face, to fall asleep. Of course this is only at night because during the day she doesn't have binkies at the sitter's. What I'm worried about is Christmas night when the excitement of presents is gone and she is going to bed with no binkies. What I did was get a Pooh stuffed animal and I sewed part of a binkie nipple to each of his hands. At least this way she can still have something to rub on her face and I figure eventually she will give that up. I don't mind a ratty stuffed animal as much as I do a binkie hanging out of her mouth. I don't plan on giving this to her unless there is melt down on Christmas night though. If there isn't and we can get away with nothing, I will remove the binkies and give her the Pooh bear when her baby sister arrives.

Speaking of her baby sister... less than 75 days left!!! Oh and my MIL casually mentioned at bowling last night that she thinks she wants to throw me a shower at the end of January. This has me rather excited. After not having the gender reveal party I was disappointed to not be having a shower, but I'm not one to throw one for myself or ask some one else to do it for me. I guess we'll see what happens.

Hope everyone has a great Holiday!

2011 Family Pictures

2011-12-21T08:00:00.001-05:00

I think we have a future model on our hands. When we were finished she asked if she could do it again!

29 Weeks!

2011-12-20T08:18:00.000-05:00

Wow! 29 Weeks I can't believe just after Christmas I'm going to be 30 weeks, which means (fingers crossed) I have less that 10 weeks before baby girl is here! In a strange way, while it is completely real to me that I'm pregnant (really how can it not be with a huge belly, kicks and contractions), it still doesn't seem real to me that I'm going be holding another little baby girl soon.

I also can't believe that I haven't posted in 2 weeks. I've written many posts in my head about so many things that I can't even remember, but when it comes to sitting down and typing them out, I just don't seem to have the energy :(

Last week was nice and exciting. Both Wednesday and Friday I had to leave work early due to contractions. Thankfully both times relaxing and not doing anything helped and the contractions slowed and eventually went away.

Saturday Lillian and I spent the day with Aunt Pocca baking and frosting cookies. I have to say, I was very impressed with how well Lillian did considering a 2 year old's attention span. While I only had a few contractions that day, I did have several sharp pains and the few contractions I had were actually painful. Sunday thankfully was less eventful in my uterus, but the top had a bruised feeling again and her lack of movement had me a little worried.

By Monday afternoon I was feeling better.

So for today, here is my 29 week pic. Maybe for the next day or 2 I'll get some great pictures I've gotten of Lillian lately.

27 Weeks

2011-12-06T07:58:00.000-05:00

Seems hard to believe some days that it's already been 27 weeks! At times it still doesn't seem real that I will be holding another baby girl of my own in just a few short months. I really can't wait to meet her. She has me very confused on her personality. She will kick up a storm and squirm around for a few days and then it's like she just stops for a day or two. Obviously not completely, that would send me rushing to the hospital in a panic, but she stops enough for me to start to worry. And her kicks become so light it's like the first feelings of movement again. I've also noticed she seems to be more active at night, which gives me the feeling that unlike Lillian who was very good with her days and nights, this little girl is going to have them confused. Only time will tell!!!

Right now I feel like I'm struggling with my weight and emotionally it's killing me. I hate how I feel about myself which makes me want to eat my favorite comfort foods, but I know that these comfort foods are just going to make me gain even more weight and feel even worse. Simple solution, don't eat comfort foods right? Yeah well any emotional eater can tell you that's a heck of a lot easier said than done. So this is me this week (with 28 extra lbs on):

And here's what's going on with baby girl:

This week, your baby weighs almost 2 pounds and is about 14 1/2 inches long with her legs extended. She's sleeping and waking at regular intervals, opening and closing her eyes, and perhaps even sucking her fingers. With more brain tissue developing, your baby's brain is very active now. While her lungs are still immature, they would be capable of functioning — with a lot of medical help — if she were to be born now. Chalk up any tiny rhythmic movements you may be feeling to a case of baby hiccups, which may be common from now on. Each episode usually lasts only a few moments, and they don't bother her, so just relax and enjoy the tickle.

Sick Little Girl

2011-12-05T13:27:00.000-05:00

My poor girl woke up in the night last night and cried out as she has been doing nightly for weeks now. Like most nights I rolled over and woke B up. He met her half way between our room and her room and picked her up to go back to her room, when he all of a sudden realized she had puked all over herself. My poor baby was scared. He brought her to me who's first thought was "she isn't supposed to come into our bed" until he pointed out she was sick. She was shaking and trying to find the words to tell me what happened. "Mommy, my tummy hurts, I spit." So after stripping her down, making sure the rest of her was clean, changing the diaper and attempting to take a temperature, I wrapped her up in towels and put her "Choo-Choo All Aboard" movie in (that's the Polar Express for those who are wondering). Daddy was nice and cleaned up her bed and then slept on the couch so that mommy could stay with her. She got sick 3 more times between then and 6am, but not nearly as bad as that first time.

It was very hard to leave her with daddy at 11:30 to come into work for a half day, but she seemed to be feeling much better and hadn't been sick since eating some frosted.mini.wheats. She still wanted to cuddle with mommy though and I felt bad having to tell her no. And just before I left she said her belly hurt and asked for ice. It was too cute. When I left her and daddy were cuddled up on the couch watching Home.Alone for the millionth time this season.

30 Days Of Thankful - Day 30

2011-11-30T12:54:00.000-05:00

Well, I didn't do as well as I thought I would at posting daily, but today, that is what I'm going to be thankful for. I am thankful that I am not so caught up in social media that I feel the need to post here or on FB every day. I do have a twitter account, but pretty much never use it.

Today I also want to share a few of the things Lillian is doing that I just love!

She says "silly goofy" instead of "silly goose"
If I lay down with her at night she cuddles right up and puts her arm up on my shoulder
The way she talks to my belly and hugs it
The stories she tells are amazing
Her imagination can turn a simple bath basket into 5 different things in a matter of minutes
And if we let her, not one branch on the Christmas tree would be lacking an ornament.

A sweet Reminder

2011-11-29T12:26:00.000-05:00

Double Digits!

2011-11-28T10:24:00.000-05:00

That's right, the tickers are down to double digits now! 99 Days! 14 Weeks!! 3 Months!!!

So many feelings about those numbers: excited, nervous, anxious, and there's another one that I just don't know what to call it.

I'm so excited to have a little baby girl to hold and care for again.

I'm extremely nervous about how Lillian is going to react to me having to give so much time and attention to some one else.

I'm anxious to get the house, particularly her bedroom done.

And this other feeling comes at night when it's time for Lillian to go to bed. It's that overwhelming feeling of love I get in my heart that almost hurts and makes me cry. It's not a sad cry, but it's certainly not a happy cry either. I used to get it when she was first born too. Like a separation anxiety or something. I've been trying so hard to let B do bed time cause he will have to when the baby arrives and to let him be the one to go to her when she wakes up. But it's hard. I want to be there for her, but I know that I won't always be able to be there once the baby gets here and I don't want her to resent her sister for that so I'm trying to back off now. But it hurts :(

A Quickie Today

2011-11-22T07:45:00.000-05:00

Today's post is going to be short and sweet for 2 reasons.

1. The post I'm about to link to is soooo true! Only Lillian started at 2 1/2.
2. I'm starving already and want my damn breakfast!

So here you have it. Top 10 Reasons Why 3 is Worse Than 2!

PS - It's 50/50 on behavior with Lillian 50% of the time she's an amazing angel and the other 50% of the time she is a terror, there is no in between!

Didn't Take Long!

2011-11-17T08:02:00.000-05:00

For me to fall off the "blog a day" bandwagon! I wish I had a great excuse, but I don't have a great one, just lots of little ones. Mostly, I just haven't felt like it. I've had lots running through my head, but I'm not sure I want any of it out there to be found.

As for the 30 Days of Thankful, I have thought about it every day. Some days I've even posted on FB. I've been thankful for being able to meet my brother and his family, thankful to have a wonderful loving husband at home waiting for me, thankful that my little girl is an AWESOME traveler! And more recently thankful to have clothes on my back, shoes on my feet and a warm place to lay my head. All too often we forget about those little ones out there that don't have that.

Yesterday after realizing BRU was having a great 8hr sale online for bedding we decided on a set!!! Well actually Lillian decided for us because we just couldn't. Here's what we got...

And we got it for $80 off!!! Granted I had to order 3 accessories with it, but I would have bought them anyway, so why not get the $80 off right? Plus now I can tell people what to get us for Christmas!

I hope everyone is well!

30 Days of Thankful - Day 9

2011-11-09T07:44:00.000-05:00

I am thankful for those little moments that make you smile.

This morning on the way to the sitter I asked Lillian what she wanted for Christmas. This is the conversation that followed:

Lillian: I'm getting a car!
Me: Mommy can't even get a car.
Lillian: I want a motorcycle then!

I hate to think about what she's going to ask for when she's 16!

It's these little moments though that you can't help buy smile and be reminded of the innocence in the world. Lillian has little conversations all the time that just amaze me!

And more with Lillian is that her potty training is going pretty well. I know it sounds like the same thing over and over and it feels like it is most the time, but I take the little victories when I can. This weekend she went to the bathroom and pooped all by herself, on the big potty, while I was switching wash! Any potty training parent knows that then doing something like that WITHOUT HELP is a huge step!

And because I haven't posted a pic of my belly in a while, here's this weeks and a comparison...

19 Weeks

23 weeks

23 Weeks w Lillian

I have to say that although to me my ass currently feels huge, I don't think it's as huge as it was with Lillian at this point.

30 Days of Thankful - Day 8

2011-11-08T07:55:00.000-05:00

I'm thankful for upcoming adventures! Thursday night Lillian and I leave with my father to go meet my half brother for the first time! I have known about my brother for a long time, he is 5 years younger than me. My father has also never met him, so this could be a very interesting trip. I think we are all a little nervous and excited about this trip. I think what I'm most nervous about though is riding in the car with my father for 12 hours! I don't think we've ever spent that much time in the same house together, let alone in a car, just the two of us. Well Lilli will be there too, but you get what I'm saying. On the way there we will be driving over night and since Lilli will be with us he understands and suggests that I sleep while I can. We will be driving home Sunday during the day though so we'll see how things go I guess.

In other news I'm 23 weeks today! Seems hard to believe, only 4 weeks until the 3rd trimester! It amazes me that she will be starting to swallow this week so the hiccups will be beginning. It still seems a little odd to me how little I feel her moving, but I do feel her moving for a few minutes at least twice a day. Mostly at night when we are settling down for bed and also in the morning on my way to work or when I first get there. I can't wait until I can start to see my belly move!

I think we have decided on a first name! I'm not yet sure if I want to share it. We don't plan on sharing it with the family until she arrives and I'm not sure I want to chance it getting out there.

30 Days of Thankful - Days 5, 6 & 7

2011-11-07T08:00:00.000-05:00

Yes I know I promised to do 30 days and I have posted every day on Facebook what I'm thankful for.

Day 5: Very thankful for a Date Night with my hubby. As much as I hate leaving Lillian, it was some much needed time for adult conversation. The next day I was feeling emotionally better than I have felt in weeks and my patience limit seemed to be a little higher too!

Day 6: The Sunshine! Living in NY you have to be thankful for all the Sunshine you can get this time of year. While we didn't go out and enjoy it, it did keep me motivated to get some house cleaning and laundry done. Sunshine gives you energy!

Day 7: Today I am thankful for change. Change can be scary, but it happens all the time. Some times it's quick and other times it happens over a long time. The thing is, most of the time change is for the better. Right now I am most thankful for the changes that have happened over time in B, myself and our relationship.

30 Day of Thankful - Day 4

2011-11-04T07:48:00.000-04:00

Today hasn't been so easy to decide on what I am going to remind myself of what I'm thankful for. Yesterday was a very emotional and frustrating day. But this morning as I was getting around for the day and reflecting on yesterday, I knew exactly what to be thankful for... My friends and their support.

Today I want to be thankful for all my friends, the friends that live in my computer, the friends that live near by and the friends that live across the country. I'm thankful for their support and willingness to support me in my times of ups and downs. For being there when I'm right and when I'm wrong, and for not judging me for the mistakes I've made.

And I'm extra thankful for the ones that are there when there is really nothing they can say or do to change the situation or how I'm feeling, but they try anyway. I may seem hopeless at the time, but all the kind words of encouragement really pull me through.

30 Days of Thankful - Day 2 and 3

2011-11-03T07:30:00.000-04:00

So it hit me this morning that I started this a day behind, surprised? I didn't think so! So, today I'm going to do 2 and be caught up.

The first thing I'm going to be thankful for is my home. More specifically, my home that has a working furnace again! We went a week without a working furnace. Thankfully we have a space heater that did a great job of keeping us warm. Especially considering that the day the furnace quit working, this is what the house looked like:

The second thing I'm thankful for today is my job. This is mostly because at this moment I need to remind myself I need to be thankful for this. I could have a toddler and a baby on the way and be trying to live on a laborer's pay. I got to work this morning to find that a worker threw away my samples I need for testing. Partially my fault because I am behind on submitting the samples for testing, but there are several reasons not to throw away samples! For Heaven's sake we don't even throw away samples for years after they have been tested! She said "They were in the way." Ugh. But I am grateful to be hear and have to deal with this since it could be a lot worse than just needing to find samples.

Borrowing an Idea

2011-11-02T07:56:00.000-04:00

Well I guess really it's more like stealing since I can't really give it back. Ashley over at More Than Dog Children is doing a 30 Days of Thankful and I think it's a great idea and just what I need right now.

Today I'm thankful for my little girl, who isn't so little any more! She had her 2.5 year well child visit last week and when the receptionist said "we won't need to see her again until she's 3" it hit me that it's only 6 months away! For so long 3 has seemed like this number way off in the distance and now it seems like it's speeding at me like a bullet. But my big girl is healthy and very smart according to the Doctor. And she amazed the crap out of me when she came to me with her sweatshirt zipped the other day. Yes, my 2.5 year old started the zipper herself for the first time! Potty training is going fairly well. It's taking a lot longer than I thought it would, but I appreciate the good days and try to forget the bad days.

Not much in the way of a pregnancy update. I'm 22 weeks now, so hopefully on 16 or so more to go, but I'll figure on 19 and try not to get my hopes up too high. I'm getting very frustrated with my weight gain and I'm considering giving up trying to watch what I eat. What's the point of depriving myself of comforts when it's not doing me much good anyway? Hopefully this last week of trying will give me confidence.

I'm feeling baby girl move more and more and that's comforting. I can't wait for Lillian to be able to feel it. I love that she rubs and kisses my belly. And it's just too cute when she looks in my belly button and says "yup, she's still in there."

Passing Time

2011-10-27T07:57:00.000-04:00

It almost feels like time is passing without my knowledge. How did I get to 21 weeks already? Things feel so emotionally different this time. I feel kind of detached or something. I feel so busy with every day life that I don't have the time to enjoy being pregnant, but that has me wondering, what did I "enjoy" so much last time.

I've started freaking out about picking a name, I have this feeling I will bond better if I have something to call her other than Baby Girl. Problem is I don't know if I like any of the names. I went through the entire girls name list on babynames.com and came up with a list of about 30 names to consider. I've narrowed it down to 15 or so and I think I have a top 5 out of that, but not a one of them has a middle name and my brain feels like mush trying to think of one.

Then this week it hit me. I have 19 weeks, if I make it to 40 weeks this time. Since I work full time that pretty much leaves me 19 weekends, which is 38 days to prepare my house for this baby girl. Considering I have a trip the weekend of Nov 11th, family visiting Nov 10th and 26th weekends and pretty much every weekend in Dec busy due to Holidays, I'm down to only 11 weekends and when you subtract 3 more so every thing is ready by 37 weeks, just in case, I'm down to 8 weekend, that's 16 days!!! Granted I try and sneak things in here and there, but some of the work will be a whole weekend project, like cleaning my craft and other stuff out of her room and painting and such. So I finally started looking at bedding this week and realized that I have no idea what I want!

But besides this stress I'm going through now in an effort to not have anxiety later, everything seems to be going well. Here are some new ultrasound pictures that I got last week when we went back to get her heart and profile views.

The Halfway Point

2011-10-19T08:09:00.000-04:00

I sincerely apologize for it taking so long to get to this post. The last part of the first half of this pregnancy was not a very happy one. No worries, everything is fine with the baby! I got my flu shot and confessed about my depression to the midwife. She has offered a medication that has been tested to be safe in the second trimester, but depending on the doctor they may suggest discontinuing use in the last month of pregnancy to prevent the baby from having any withdrawal symptoms. She said she would leave the decision up to me if I want to go on it and if in the last month I would want to continue use or not. The withdrawal doesn't last long, but can cause feeding issues. I'm still up in the air on how I feel about the whole thing.

My cake balls turned out awesome! Probably not the prettiest ones, but they sure were yummy! Strawberry cake with cream cheese frosting and coated with chocolate. Like heaven in your mouth!

My girls get away was ok. I was the only one who stayed up past 9, I couldn't eat much and felt sick half the night, but it was nice to relax and not feel like I was being pulled in a million directions.

Sunday Lilli and I spent the afternoon with my sister AKA Pocca.

Sunday night when I went to bed my shoulder was very achy. I thought that the ache from the flu shot had gone, but I just chalked the pain up to that. By morning both shoulders my neck and chest were sore and taking deep breaths hurt. I got up and got ready for work anyway. I had a supplier coming in that I'm working on a major project with. By the time I got to my desk I was no longer hoping I could make it, I was sending and email to my boss with all the information he was going to need to run the meeting in my place. By the time I got home again it hurt just to breath. And trying to lay down in bed was some of the worst pain I think I have experienced since giving birth. I slept ALL day. Yesterday I stayed home again, the pain wasn't as bad, but I knew if I pushed it I wasn't going to get any better.

Also Sunday night as B and I lay in bed, just dozing off, the phone rings. Everyone knows not to call our house past 8pm. I knew it had to either be a drunk buddy of his or something important. Considering the person it was we decided to let the machine pick it up. The message left was just "B, it's T, get a hold of me." Not odd for the person, just the hour. 5 minutes later the phone rang again, same person. I decided to let B decide if he wanted to answer it. He didn't, I found out later he already knew what the message was going to be, but it was "B, it's T again, I'm in Roc with L and they are taking J off his machine."

T is B's cousin and L & J are brothers that have been their friends since childhood. B actually lived with L & J and their family for a few years growing up.

Turns out he was expecting this call because my FIL had been told by J's mom that they were seeing no brain activity for a while. J had a rough life, in his early 20s he was diagnosed with brain tumors that wouldn't go away. This was about 8 years ago, just after B and I met. May he rest in peace pain free.

Now on to what you are actually reading this post for...

It's a... Girl!

Since there were only 5 votes (that I knew who voted) I decided to enter everyone in the drawing. Turns out it was a girl vote that won anyway. Congratulations to Joy!

Send me an email at brandisboutique@gmail.com to talk about your prize! And if any of the other voters would like a discount on a hat feel free to email me there too!

Well, I think this is long enough for now, I better get some work done!

Productive

2011-10-13T07:25:00.000-04:00

In an effort to get myself out of this depression slump this week I've been trying to be productive. When I get home at night, as much as I just want to go sit on the couch and relax, I have refrained from even sitting. I sit all day at work, sitting isn't going to make me feel any better.

Instead this week my nights have generally started off with doing some dishes and then starting dinner. But in addition to just that, Lilli and I made apple crisp on Monday, Chocolate covered apple slices on Tuesday and yesterday we made the cake for my cake balls and put together the lasagna that is for dinner tonight.

And while my kitchen doesn't look like I've washed a single dish all week, I'm feeling good about the fact that I proved B wrong when he said all our apples would end up going bad, and that I actually followed through on my plan to make a lasagna and not have to wait until 8pm for dinner to eat it!

I also love that Lilli and I have been doing these things together. She loves to help me cook apparently and I've tried to incorporate learning into it too. We count the number of times we have to pour the ingredients in and we talk about what colors things are and what they taste and feel like. Some times her impatience gets to me, but a quick "if you want to help mommy you have to listen" gets her back on track. She'll then say "OK, I can just hold it" or something like that because normally she's anxious to start dumping things before I'm ready or it's measured. Last night the big problem was that she had to stop stirring so that I could put the cake batter in the pan to bake it.

I'm so excited for these cake balls. Since I'm not using them for the gender reveal like originally planned, I decided to go with strawberry cake under the chocolate coating.

Don't forget, the gender poll ends at 9:30 tomorrow morning, along with your chance to win a free crocheted hat! You HAVE to leave a COMMENT along with your vote for me to be able to enter your name into the drawing. Right now the poll has 7 votes, but I only have 5 names (Jenn, Sunny, Patch Hats, Tory and Joy). If you are one of the other 2 that has already voted but didn't leave a comment please do so I can get you in the drawing!!!

19 Week Depression

2011-10-11T08:25:00.000-04:00

Today's post is going to be more on the serious side. No one ever thinks that once they finally get what they've been praying for, for almost 2 years, that they would get depressed. But the truth is, depression doesn't only happen during hard times or with the loss of a loved one.

To some one who's never been depressed before, it's a very hard thing to understand. It's not something you can just "snap out of" or "get over". Its typically this feeling of seclusion that keeps increasing until you realize that you are depressed. Most times you find that while you are generally happy with your life, you feel unhappy and like nothing will make you happy. That probably doesn't make sense to anyone who hasn't been there, but that's what it's like.

For example: Right now, besides still having to work every day at a job I don't like, my life is generally happy. Problem is, I don't feel happy. I feel like I'm going through the motions and that things are hopeless, even though I know they aren't and that everything is going to be fine.

Most times it's hard to diagnose depression during pregnancy because most doctors will just blame it on the hormones. I do think hormones make it so much worse.

I feel bad for all those who try to help those who are depressed. Hearing over and over again that they don't know what's wrong and that there is nothing you can do to help has to be discouraging and sound like they don't want help. But the truth is, we really don't know what's causing these feelings and that if we knew what would make us feel better, we'd be sure to tell you.

REMINDER: Friday at 9:30 the poll for Gender and chance at a free hat closes. Be sure to leave a comment with your vote! Just voting doesn't tell me who voted. I have 5 votes on the poll but only know what 3 people (Sunny, Jenn, PatchHats) voted for. If you already voted, but didn't leave a comment, leave a comment now.

Not in the Mood

2011-10-04T07:34:00.000-04:00

In all honesty I just haven't been in the mood to blog lately. Really I don't know what write about. Right now it just kind of feels like time is passing by, an rather quickly. I've been trying to spend every minute I can with Lillian. I've thought about looking into placenta placement and movement, but really what's the point. I know baby is ok because I've started to feel daily movements (finally) but they are much different than with Lillian. Lillian would feel like little pokes or popping bubbles. This little one feels more like a ball rolling across the front of my uterus. As long as I keep feeling the movements I'm good though.

Plus it's time to get my Boutique stocked for the Holidays and as usual I'm behind! Plus making custom items for friends and trying to make extra things to send out for pictures. Not to mention Lillian has grown out of all of her hats from last year so it's time for some new ones. So I'm off to pretend I'm working...

PS - I'm 18 weeks today!!! Only 10 days until my ultrasound. Be sure to vote in the poll and leave a comment tell me what you voted for. You could win a free hat!

Flaws

2011-09-28T08:15:00.000-04:00

I have decided to give up on the party, there is just too much crap going on between the day we find out and the weekend we were going to have the party. I'm very disappointed because this was going to be the only "celebration" for this baby. It's just been too stressful trying to plan around this and that. In reality it doesn't really matter to anyone else how they find out the gender of the baby.

There is also a flaw with my Poll, I still want to do the drawing for the hat, but if you want to be entered you also have to leave a comment with your guess because apparently I can't see who votes for what using that poll. Sorry for that.

Then we have my own flaws, or possibly pregnancy flaws, but either way, I'm going nuts. I'm already having anxiety attacks over leaving my babies when I have to return to work. I still HATE leaving Lillian every morning and I know that when this baby gets here I'm going to feel even worse about leaving her because I will have even less one on one time with her. Moving her to her big girl bed has really hit me hard. I didn't realize how much the cuddle at night in my bed meant to me until it was gone. I know that for her own good and mine I can't let her continue to be in the habit of going to bed with mommy, but I miss it. It makes me cry. I know it will get better, but these damn hormones make me feel like I'll always feel this way. I've even wondered if I'm really cut out for this whole Mommy thing. I mean I know I can raise my children up to be good, decently intelligent adults, but what I don't know is if I can handle the "firsts" and the letting go. This Big Girl Bed has made me realize how many firsts I have coming, there are so many!!! Her first day of school, her first time being left alone, her first shower without me in the room... That's just a few, but right now the thought of everyone of them makes me want to cry!

I'm sure it's just hormones, but I just feel like this feeling will never go away...

17 Weeks

2011-09-27T12:35:00.002-04:00

I can't believe I'm almost half way there! For some reason that seems to be a big point for me this time. I'm really hating this in between stage of only feeling the baby every few days. I keep telling myself to be patient, but it doesn't keep me from worrying. And I also know that soon after feeling frequent movement comes the uncomfortable positions and feet, hands, butt, whatever in my ribs.

October 14th is the big ultrasound day if I haven't mentioned it already. I am going to add a poll to the sidebar so you can vote for boy or girl. Of the people who guess correctly, I'll use random.org to choose a winner for a free crocheted hat of your choice!

17 Weeks with Lillian

17 Weeks Baby 2

Week 17 according to Baby.Center:

Your baby's skeleton is changing from soft cartilage to bone, and the umbilical cord — her lifeline to the placenta — is growing stronger and thicker. Your baby weighs 5 ounces now, and she's around 5 inches long from head to bottom. She can move her joints, and her sweat glands are starting to develop.

This week we have a Hockey Puck/Turnip. In all honesty I don't really have any idea of the actual size of either of them!

So here is another one we should all be familiar with...

Big Girl Bed!

2011-09-26T08:31:00.000-04:00

The switch has been made and I really thought it would have more of an impact on Lillian than it would me! I really shouldn't be thinking obviously! Things have gone great so far!

Saturday Lillian and I went to the mall. We got picked out her bedding and may I say she did a wonderful job. Not only did she pick a set that matches her room colors perfectly (pink and green), but the 8 piece set was on clearance for $20!!! In the mean time Daddy was home taking down the crib and moving her bed into her room.

Arranging her stuffed animals

After shopping and seeing The Lion King 3D (I don't remember there being that much violence in that movie) we went to my MIL's for dinner and a movie. My exhausted big girl fell asleep on the couch around 7:30. Considering she only had two 10 minute naps, I wasn't surprised. When we finally got home around 9:30 she slept in the recliner until Daddy and I got the sheets on her bed (I washed them while at my MIL's). When we moved her to her new bed she woke up. She was a little confused, she wanted to know where grandma was. I think I layed with her for a half hour before she drifted back off to sleep until 6:30 yesterday morning. Considering she is normally up at 6 I thought that was great!

"Mommy get your camera please!"

She had to have room to sit with them!

Last night at 7:30 she wasn't ready to go to bed, but Mommy and Daddy insisted and after only one raise of the voice she picked out her PJs and got ready for bed. We read her bed time story, gave her kisses and turned out the light with the promise that I would be back in a few minutes. After 10 minutes I went back to check on her. She was awake laying there trying to sleep, but asked for her little lamp to be turned back on. Which actually made me feel better because it was pitch black and if she was going to get up I want her to be able to see a little. I kissed her again and told her I'd come back to check on her. 5 minutes later I peeked in and she was out! Considering we went from sleeping with mommy for a week and watching a movie to fall asleep every night in mommy's bed, I was amazed!

Excited to cuddle with them

She had to make sure she had enough room to sit with them along the wall.

She did wake up at 3:30 and came in my room, but we went back to her room, found her binkie and she went back to sleep. I hope this continues with as much ease as it started!

Sleeping after her first night with the new bedtime routine.

This has honestly been much harder on me than I anticipated. I didn't realize how much that cuddle time at night effected me too. Although I hated being woken up by kicks and then having to move her to her bed, I loved the cuddles. Her not crying for me to watch a movie with her or even lay with her hit me like a ton of bricks!

Party On!

2011-09-23T08:14:00.000-04:00

Just a quick update for those that care...
I asked B what he thought of limiting the guest list to people that we see and/or talk to on a weekly or biweekly basis at least. He thought it was a good idea!

Let the party planning begin!

Sick

2011-09-22T09:22:00.000-04:00

Yes I know I promised a 16 week update, but I came down with a sinus cold and just didn't feel like it, and still don't really. I'm exhausted and really want to be home in bed again today, but I just can't use the time off right now.

As for the party, I'm still up in the air. I'm leaning more towards just not doing it, but if I do decide to I think I may just invite the people I see on weekly to biweekly basis. Or at least talk to once a week. This would narrow my list considerably. And I figure I should do that with the "friends" too. I guess we'll see what B has to say. Right now he says we can only invite the friends if the family is invited.

16 Weeks and More Unexpected Happenings

2011-09-20T09:22:00.000-04:00

Thanks for the comments yesterday girls. I don't think my family and friends would think ill of a gender reveal party and I suppose anyone that doesn't care to celebrate it with me, doesn't have to.

Now the next problem is the guest list. Who I really want to invite is just our immediate family (the grandparents and my sister) and our closest friends. This would be about 30 people total, if everyone showed up and I know that there are a few that couldn't. Ideally I only want 25 people there anyway. The problem, this means not inviting the 15 extended family members that expect to be invited to everything and won't understand why friends got invited before they did. Don't get me wrong, some of them would completely understand (and of course they are the ones that if I could pick and choose would be invited).

Unexpected: B talked this through with me last night and since most of the extended family is on his side he says that either we just have a dinner party to celebrate or invite everyone. What would you do? Inviting everyone is almost 50 people!

Unexpected #2: My midwife had a student working for her yesterday. This normally doesn't bother me for an exam or my general health, but when it comes to my unborn child it makes me a little nervous. He was good though and admitted when he wasn't sure about something and needed to ask my MW which I was thankful for. What I wasn't thankful for was him searching for a heartbeat for over 5 minutes before going to get my MW. I knew right away he wasn't going to find it because even though I told him the baby was low he never put the doppler low enough and second he certainly wasn't pressing hard enough. Thankfully he went and got my MW just before I was just going to ask for the dang doppler. She came in and found the heartbeat right away! Talk about relief. (oh it was 153 by the way, I'll do my weekly post tomorrow)

Unexpected #3: Lastly was a very nice surprise. I was telling B how I had been talking to Lilli about getting the big girl bed that's in her play room and giving her crib to the baby and she was so excited she wanted to get out of the bath right then and move it! His response was, well then as soon as you are feeling better we'll get on it. I said "you realize that means you have to start doing part of her bed time right. Like putting her to bed, in her bed?" He understood! I think we may get going on this, this weekend! I'm very excited.
Well, I'm sure there was more I wanted to say, but work interrupted me, grrr.

Please click on the link and vote for me. I'm quickly falling out of the 200s!

Not What I Was Expecting...

2011-09-19T09:10:00.000-04:00

Apparently a lot of things today are not going to be what I was expecting. First I figured I'd wake up with an extremely sore throat as I'm getting my first cold of the fall season. Instead I woke up with my throat feeling a little better, but a sinus headache that I just know is going to linger all day!

I have my 16 week OB appointment today and when I asked B if he was going to try and make it I was fully expecting an "of course". I mean this is his baby too, right? Well instead I got "Probably not, we're working in..." I'm not even going to go into how I feel about this.

I figure I will probably be making my appointment for my 20 week anatomy scan today. It got me thinking, that means there is only 4 weeks until we find out the gender of this little monkey! Since before getting pregnant I've thrown around the idea of a Gender Reveal Party. I don't want to have a baby shower as I already have most of what we need for this baby. I got all the big things in gender neutral colors so I wouldn't have to worry about it. So yeah, this means I have only 4 weeks to plan this party because we all know I can't keep a secret very long. Anyway I started searching for ideas.

I was very disappointed when I started to read all the comments on articles and blogs about gender reveal parties. 90% of them are negative. Saying things like "When I said greedy, I really meant more greedy in wanting attention than in wanting gifts", " agree that it's overkill. I have no problem with expectant parents being totally immersed in the pregnancy and sharing a lot. But to expect everyone to gather for everything about it... no." "No, no, no, no, no! This is really obnoxious. Even if you don't expect people to bring gifts to this gender-reveal party, you're still taking up people's time on another party that's just for you." "The byproduct of high unemployment." "I think most people probably have better things to do on a Saturday afternoon than find out if your cake has pink or blue frosting. Get over yourself."

And those are all after just 2 articles. Does the general public really feel this way? Are my friends and family just going to think I want attention? I'm thinking maybe I should just forget it.

Did you have a Gender Reveal? What were people's reactions?

BEER???

2011-09-16T12:03:00.000-04:00

Either when I was pregnant with Lillian I didn’t have as many stressful days, or I was completely miserable and have chosen to block it out of my memory.

After a long frustrating day at work typically I would go home and have a beer or a glass of wine, or wait for days (that felt like weeks) for Thursday night bowling to roll around, to relax and take the edge off of feeling like I’m losing my sanity. While I still have the stress relief of imagining I’m rolling a rather heavy ball at whatever my current frustration is on Thursday nights, it just isn’t cutting it!

I need a new method of relaxation that isn’t going to take time from Lillian or cause me to be up until midnight, or make me gain 100lbs.

I know picky right?

There has to be something out there that will help relieve some stress, release some endorphins or something!

So, what is your new “drink” of choice???

Room for Change

2011-09-14T07:19:00.000-04:00

I am having a very hard time deciding on what to do for bedrooms for our little ones. Do I want them to share a room? Do I give up my craft room to still have a separate play room? Do I give Lillian’s crib to the new baby? Do I get Lillian a toddler bed? Do I give Lillian the futon we have? Do I combine Lillian’s room and play room into the bigger room? Do I combine my craft room and play room?

Ok so rather than rambling off all of the question rolling through my head over and over I’ll start explaining.

Right now we have a full size bed we are keeping at my mother’s, plus a full size futon bed that is currently in the play room.

We bought Lillian’s crib with the fact in mind that she will use it for a long time. It turns from a crib to a day bed to a full size bed. Of course, this was back when the rooms we had were almost twice the size of what they are now.

I think we could fit her dresser and full size bed in her room, but that’s about it. Right now we have her crib, rocking chair, book shelf and dresser.

This is what the room set up is. The second bedroom is exactly the opposite except for window placement so any arrangement options would be the same. The second bedroom is currently my craft/workout room. It has all my bow, crochet and sewing stuff along with the treadmill.

Yes it looks roomy, but it's not to scale

The third room we have isn’t exactly a bedroom since it doesn’t have a closet, but we could still use it for one. It is currently being used as the playroom and guests typically sleep on the futon when they spend the night.

So here at the options we have:
1 – Leave Lilli in her current room with her crib. – This means buying new crib and either getting rid of my craft room. I can’t combine it with the play room because the futon would still be in there.

I don’t know if I like this idea for a few reasons. 1) a new crib is more expensive than a toddler bed. 2) I’d have to give up my craft room and I have no idea what I’d do with the treadmill that I will obviously need.

2 – Leave Lilli in her current room but buy her a new toddler bed. – Everything would be the same expect we wouldn’t have to buy a new crib.

3 – Leave Lilli in her room, but give her the futon. – We wouldn’t need to buy any new furniture and I could move my craft stuff and/or treadmill to the play room. I don’t know if I like the idea of my craft stuff, possibly dangerous, in the play room where I feel the kids should be able to play relatively unsupervised. If my stuff was in there I’d be worried about then hurting them selves or ruining something I’ve worked hard on.

4 – Move Lilli into the play room and give her the futon. Basically this would just mean moving her dresser. This would mean I could keep my craft room and baby would get Lilli’s bedroom and crib. I like the idea of still having my craft room, but I’m not sure I want toys in Lilli’s room. Right now her room is a place for settling down and sleeping, not playing and it works well for us. Especially when she doesn’t think she needs a nap. If moving her in with her toys and keeping the crib was an option I’d be happy cause she doesn’t try to get out of her crib, but I have no where to put the futon.

5 – Put Lilli and the baby in the bigger play room – We would then turn Lilli’s room into the play room. I’m not sure I want the kids sharing a room, although baby will be in our room for a few months until the nightly feedings stop. Also Lilli’s room isn’t as visible from everywhere in the house like the play room is. I like to keep an eye on her while I cook dinner or whatever.

6 - Put the play room or craft room in the dining room - Truth be told we don't use the dining table much, we typically eat in the living room. I hate it, but can't seem to get B to revert to a kitchen table. At any rate there is still room for the table in the kitchen should I get lucky enough to have a family dinner again some day. The only problem I have with this idea is messes. Lillian put her own toys "away". Usually this consists of her just throwing her toys back in the toy room where we can clothes the door. The craft room could go out in the open, but I tend to get a little messy when I'm working and don't always get to finish projects the same day I start them.
There are a few random thoughts that bother me.
~ I don’t know if I like moving Lilli directly to a full size bed. I know she would do fine in it as she’s slept in them alone before, but I fear I’m taking away some of her childhood, like having a tent on her bed and all the fun kid bedding with her favorite characters.
~ If we move her to the bigger room will she think it’s because we are giving the baby her room. My little girl is smart, I don’t know if she will just accept that she is “a big girl now so she gets the big room.”
~ Should I ask Lilli if she wants the big bed? What if the thought of being in the big bed in the big room is scary to her?

OK, so now that you've had a sneak peak into my over worked and over tired mind, what do you think? All and any suggestions are welcome to help me through this because according to DH (you pick what the D stands for) "Its your decision, I don't care."

15 Weeks!!!

2011-09-13T08:05:00.000-04:00

Yep, another week down. Some times it's so hard to believe how far along I am. In the numbers game it still feels very early and some days in the pregnancy game it does too, but the truth of the matter is in 5 weeks (less time than I've known I was pregnant) I will be half way there!

While I have "looked" pregnant for quite some time now, my belly is slowly starting to feel pregnant. I noticed this this morning while laying in bed that the lower part of my belly now has a bump while laying down that is "hard" compared to the rest of the fat the nicely melts off to the sides.

Tomorrow's post is most likely going to be asking for lots of advice and trying to sort things out in my head. I really need to make decisions on what we are going to do about bedrooms for the little ones!

Stats:
Weight: Honestly I'm clueless. Saturday I was +9 and today I'm +11, I have no idea which is more accurate.
Next Appt: Sept 19, hopefully I'll be scheduling my anatomy scan after this appt!

According to Baby.Center:

Your growing baby now measures about 4 inches long, crown to rump, and weighs in at about 2 1/2 ounces (bout the size of an apple). She's busy moving amniotic fluid through her nose and upper respiratory tract, which helps the primitive air sacs in her lungs begin to develop. Her legs are growing longer than her arms now, and she can move all of her joints and limbs. Although her eyelids are still fused shut, she can sense light. If you shine a flashlight at your tummy, for instance, she's likely to move away from the beam. There's not much for your baby to taste at this point, but she is forming taste buds. Finally, if you have an ultrasound this week, you may be able to find out whether your baby's a boy or a girl! (Don't be too disappointed if it remains a mystery, though. Nailing down your baby's sex depends on the clarity of the picture and on your baby's position. He or she may be modestly curled up or turned in such a way as to "hide the goods.")

Yup, I have a little

Or for those of us who are not fruit savy...

The Lion King

2011-09-12T08:01:00.000-04:00

Saturday night my MIL and I went to see The Lion King play. I have been waiting to see this play for 12 years! Yes 12, years. At the age of 16 my mother and I were in NYC for a week and I wanted to see this play in the worst way. Of course we couldn't afford it let alone get decent tickets while we were there.

The touring show finally came to a theater close by. The show was amazing! The costumes were extraordinary and the thought that must have gone into them is beyond my comprehension. Obviously I was not permitted to take photos, but here are some that I found on the internet...

All of these photos can be found on Broadway.com

Hard Work

2011-09-09T12:46:00.000-04:00

I got a nice surprise today. Well, kind of nice. It is review time at work, a time I generally dread for many reasons. Today it was a nice surprise to read what my manager had to say about me though.

A little background is that back in 2009 after returning to work from my maternity leave, I found it very hard to get anything done, I couldn't concentrate on my work and I spent way too much time using the companies internet to communicate with fellow mommies. So much so that my boss and the HR lady called me into a meeting where I broke down crying about how hard it is to be away from my daughter and how depressed I was. Thanks to my boss, who I've been working for since 2002, I was not fired as he assured HR I was a very capable worker. We came up with development plan to get me back on track and for the most part it worked. After only a few month on the plan and meeting weekly to review my project statuses and sign papers for HR saying that I was following my plan and improving my work ability, the meetings started stretching out farther and my boss was complimenting on accomplishing some things and coming up with some great ideas for the group.

Last year's review was positive in the fact that I didn't have to have a special plan and I got a raise again. I still struggle with my concentration on work and getting certain things done in a timely manner, but I'm working on it.

This year I think I've improved a little maybe. Nothing drastic, but I work and get things done before the detrimental dead lines. Which let me note, around here is not always done because everything is an emergency.

Today I got my review from my boss and to my surprise he feels that I am exceeding expectations in some areas and feels with a little improvement in a few other areas I will qualify for a promotion next year! This is amazing to me cause honestly I had no idea what it would take to get a promotion around here. Really, it's just a job title change and a little more $. Even though this is a fortune 500 company, there isn't much room for career advancement My boss and his boss have both been here 25 years or more and are still a distance from retirement. There really isn't any where else to go besides their positions unless I move to another department, but then it's the same situation in all the departments...

So that's my happy news on hard work. I'm thrilled at even the prospect of a new job title. What scares me is the thought of what could happen when I come back from maternity leave this time. At least I think HR will be more willing to work with me on the return to work transition this time, I hope...

Thought I'd Share

2011-09-08T12:14:00.001-04:00

I'm feeling kind of cute today so I thought I'd share...

Yeah I know you can't really see what I look like today, but it's been a while since I put up a bump picture.

I'm glad I'm feeling decent about myself today because yesterday wasn't such a good day in that department. And it's even better that it's today because tonight is my first night of bowling for the season and I'll be seeing people I haven't seen since April, back when I dropped 20lbs and everyone thought I looked great...

Toddler Lovin'

2011-09-07T07:55:00.000-04:00

Should I be worried that everyday before leaving the sitters Lilli has to kiss the sitter's boys good-bye? She sure does love those boys. This was her R yesterday morning after not seeing each other for 4 days!

What I'm loving at the moment though is how when I showed up to pick her up yesterday afternoon she ran to the gate saying "It's my mommy! It's my mommy!"

It's been quite some time since she was that excited to see me and she kept running up to me and hugging me all night. It was a great feeling and a great reminder of how much I mean to that little girl.

14 Weeks

2011-09-06T08:42:00.000-04:00

I feel like a bad blogger. It's been a whole week since I posted last and I swore to myself I wouldn't let that happen. Oh well, guess I was wrong. I just haven't been feeling all that sociable. I know it's the internet and it's not like I'm actually interacting with people, but it still take a level of social skills that I just haven't had the last week or so. I've even had to refrain from sending out a few work emails because I just knew that I would probably get in trouble for them.

I'm hoping I start feeling a little bit more like myself this week. Well maybe not, my normal self isn't all that sociable either.

My MIL and I generally get along and never have any issues. This weekend and a few times previously since telling her I'm pregnant she has seriously pissed me off. Most women and even men know that you don't talk about weight or weight gain with a pregnant woman. It's just not something that is any one's business and it's a touchy subject without the pregnancy hormones to begin with.

So we were talking about how I'm feeling and such and I told her much better now that I'm taking the prilo.sec and the indigestion isn't so bad. I think it was causing a lot of my nausea. I also said that I can also eat a little more normally now, not quite so often and more of a variety of things. And I said I'm trying to make sure I eat as healthy as possible without feeling sick. She said "well that's good cause we aren't going to gain all that weight again this time are we." Like my weight gain with Lillian affected her in some way. Honestly, if I have to gain 55lbs again to feel half way decent for the next 6 months, then I will and I don't really think it's any of her business. Obviously I don't want to gain that kind of weight, it's a pain in the ass to get off and I'll like crap emotionally, but if that's what it takes to not be miserable and feel sick every day, then so be it. I don't need her telling me I can't gain that much weight. A lot has changed in the 35 years since she was pregnant last and they told her she COULD NOT gain more than 15lbs.

With that being said...
Stats:
Weight: +10lbs
Next appt: Oct 19

I'm not all that happy about my weight because I really don't want to gain a bunch of weight this time, but being 1/3 of the way there if I keep gaining at this rate, I'll only gain 30lbs and that's 20 less than last time! Plus I'm only working out half assed. I still can't get my energy to cooperate. In my mind I'm very motivated, but when my alarm goes off at 4am getting my ass out of bed to actually go do something just doesn't seem possible. And at night I tend to fall asleep while putting Lillian to bed so it's kind of hard to work it in there anywhere with dinner, bath and bed in the whole 3-3.5 hrs I actually get to see her at night. I wish there was a mall or something near my work where I could just go walk during my lunch. I suppose I could use my work's walking trail, but it's outside and I'm not a big fan of walking in 80-90* temperatures and returning to work after sweating for 3 hours before I can shower again. I don't like walking in the rain or snow either, which will be coming soon :(

In exciting news, despite what the link below for this week will tell you, I've been feeling the baby move every once in a while. It's weird though cause I don't really remember what the beginning movements felt like with Lillian, I thought they felt fluttery, but this time, it's more like pressure of the baby "sitting" on the side of my uterus or something and it slowly moves along and then it's gone. It does seem in line with what I've read about second pregnancies though and feeling baby a few weeks sooner. I ready back in my blog and noticed I started feeling Lillian about 16 weeks so around 14 weeks would be right on.

This week I have a little lemon . . .

And my stomach kind of feels like I've been eating a lot of lemons, but hey, that's better than feeling like I've been drinking vinegar by the gallon right?

If you're interested in what's going on with the baby this week head on over to Baby.Center

13 Weeks!

2011-08-30T07:58:00.000-04:00

Are you bored yet with the weekly updates? I am. Ok, in reality I'm bored with just about everything right now. Nothing seems to be really exciting me. Well except for the thought of being able to feel baby move, that's pretty exciting.

Last night I had a great night with Lillian. We watched part of a movie, ate dinner, and then for the first time in a long time I put down my crochet stuff and played with her while she was in the tub. Normally she prefers to do this by herself, but last night we were having fun filling her different sized cups and dumping them and stacking them, etc. After bath we had a little fun while we got ready for bed with tickles and kisses and then we cuddled and watched Bo.lt. Well I think she watched more of it than I did, but oh well. I miss my night like that with her and I hope there are many more to come in the future.

If you're interested in what's going on in my uterus this week head on over to Baby.Centerr and check it out.

All Jumbled Up

2011-08-29T12:50:00.000-04:00

That how the thoughts in my head are. So as much as I hate to do it, I'm going to give you some bullet points.

We survived the all mighty Irene. Not that I thought we wouldn't, we do live upstate, not on the coast, and the weather man was only calling for rain and wind. Yes it was all day rain, but nothing too heavy and only a few inches maybe. Some people blew this way out of proportion and really irritated me, but alas it's over and we all survived and I was right.
I have a brother whom I've never met. I've known about him since I was very little, but until about 6 months ago we had never even been in contact. I had always wondered what it would be like to talk to him and get to know him. Our conversations through email and later texting and even a phone call stirred up many emotions for me. You see my father had never met him either. I'm not going to get into the details of that now because what really bothers me right now is that my brother is sick. I have learned over the last few years that you can care a great deal about people whom you've never met in person. Friday night my brother went into the hospital and was put in ICU. It is now Monday and he has been moved out of ICU, but they still don't know what's wrong with him. In the beginning they were pretty sure it was meningitis, now one doctor says he thinks it still is and the other doesn't. I am a good 10-12 hours away (I don't know for sure obviously cause I've never been there), but I feel helpless and I wish there was something I could do, but I'm not even on the "Inform immediately" list because of our situation.
Pregnancy guilt is high. Although I'm finally starting to feel better (I love you Prilo.sec) and I'm getting spend more time with Lillian, I find that I still have a rather short fuse when it comes to her whining. Some times I just give up the fight cause let's face it we need to pick our battles. But then I wonder if I'm creating a monster by letting her think that some times a fit may work so she may as well try. The binkies for example, I created a freaking monster and I'm regretting every second of it right now. I hate the damn things and for some reason every day when she gets in the car to leave the sitter's she asks for them. Of course while at the sitter's, even if she's offered them, she doesn't want them. This is currently a battle that I have just quit fighting, I can't take the screaming after a long day at the office. Am I enabling a brat though? Honestly??? Is she going to whine forever to get what she wants or is this just a phase?
My Etsy shop is draining me, financially and mentally. Didn't know I had one? Check it out, Brandi's Boutique. I'm buying patterns for new things and then buying yarn and ribbon or whatever, but I end up having to make 2 of everything before I can post them because I have to give one away to get pictures of it. And really what good are the pictures if you don't have an item to sell anymore? And well my creativeness went out the window when my sleep did. I have been creative enough to make a few single items, but by the time I get around to duplicating them, I can't remember how I made them and have to start the process all over again. Oh how I wish I could just be home working on this stuff all day!

12 Weeks!

2011-08-23T09:05:00.000-04:00

I'm here, the magic 12 week mark.

Right now I'm not really so sure what is so magical about it, but I'm so glad to be here!

Stats:

Weight: +7lbs

BP: Good

Heart Beat: 162 bpm

I had my 12 week appointment yesterday and we had a bit of a scare. ML was sure she was going to be able to find the heartbeat on the doppler, but after several minutes of trying and finding nothing that indicated baby was in there and well she sent me to the hospital for an ultrasound. I have to say that I am very happy that she is proactive and didn't just blow it off saying "It might be too early, we'll try again next time." cause I probably would have freaked out. Anyway, the ultrasound showed a happy, bouncing baby with a healthy heart rate and perfect size.

The video in this link shows pretty much what I saw during the ultrasound yesterday. Unfortunately I didn't get any pictures.

Here's what's going on this week according to Baby.Center:

The most dramatic development this week: reflexes. Your baby's fingers will soon begin to open and close, his toes will curl, his eye muscles will clench, and his mouth will make sucking movements. In fact, if you prod your abdomen, your baby will squirm in response, although you won't be able to feel it. His intestines, which have grown so fast that they protrude into the umbilical cord, will start to move into his abdominal cavity about now, and his kidneys will begin excreting urine into his bladder.

Meanwhile, nerve cells are multiplying rapidly, and in your baby's brain, synapses are forming furiously. His face looks unquestionably human: His eyes have moved from the sides to the front of his head, and his ears are right where they should be. From crown to rump, your baby-to-be is just over 2 inches long and weighs half an ounce. Or the size of...

Bite Me!

2011-08-19T09:02:00.000-04:00

Before getting to my originally planned post I want to give a big Congratulations to my friends David and Sunny on their new baby girl, and of course to big sister Gabby too!

Like these

This last week Lillian did something she has never done before, she bit me! Well that's not completely true, she did bite me once while nursing, but I think my shriek in pain scarred her enough to never do it again. Anyway when I went to pick her up at the sitter's she was using the BIG potty. So I sat on the floor to chit chat with her while she went. She leaned towards me to give me hug so obviously I leaned in for the hug. Well, all of a sudden, she bit my shoulder! My instant reaction was to pull back and smack her hiney. You know, that quick, but firm one? She looked at me with the widest eyes I've ever seen on her.

As if she had no idea what she did wrong.

Now, I know she knows what she did wrong cause the sitter's son that in only 4 months older than her has a biting problem. Lillian has been the victim of his biting several times, but not recently. I asked why she bit me and she just looked like she was going to cry, I don't think she actually knew why and she felt horrible for doing it. I did tell her though, "You will not be punished this time, but if you bite again, I'm going to bite you back, do you understand?" She said "yes, I'm sorry mommy." and we moved on and she hasn't done it since.

So you see, the biting problem is not that of my child, it is of my sitter's child. He's had a biting problem for quite some time now although we all thought it was a phase and over with. It had probably been almost a year since the last time he bit her until the last couple of weeks where she has come home with bite marks a few times.

Now the sitter always tells me this happens, she doesn't try to hide it and I know he is being punished because Lillian tells me he is. "R had to go up to his room today, he bit me." and so on. The sitter and I have discussed it a few times and we think his biting problem is due to his older brother. His brother is 18 months older than him and likes to play rough, like boys do, including R. But L (older brother) doesn't always realize that R still isn't as big as him and when R has enough he bites his brother cause he knows it's the only thing that will bother him. I know the sitter tries to stop it all, the rough play, the getting to the point of biting, all of it, but you can't always do that. I get it.

So here's my question, how do you/will you/would you handle the biting? Any tips or tricks on deterring it?

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A Little of This and That

2011-08-18T07:51:00.000-04:00

The end to a miserable day:

My miserable Tuesday didn't end much better. I was feeling ok when I got home, but I was tired and my stomach was off. Lillian was slightly miserable too so B told us to go in the bedroom where it was cooler and watch a movie. I certainly didn't object. He went out to do some yard work. In a half hours time Lilli decided she had to go to the bathroom 3 times. While normally this would make me ecstatic because she peed, pooped and peed again on the potty, this wasn't the case. Every time I had to get I started feeling increasingly sick. B came in just in time. I was laying on the bed and just couldn't move, if I did the only place I was going was to the bathroom to lose whatever may have been in my stomach. B could tell I was miserable and helped Lilli with whatever it was she needed. I ended up passing out around 6 or 6:30. I remember being woke up around 7:30 for something and then again at 9. Neither time did I have any trouble falling back asleep and didn't wake up again until my alarm went off at 4! Apparently I really needed the sleep!

Just Another Day:
Yesterday pretty much did end up being just another day. My appointment got canceled because my MW had to get to the hospital to deliver a baby. While I realize at a lot of practices this wouldn't happen because there is always some one to take over their patients. My office though only consists of my midwife and the OB she works with, and the nurses of course. Also this rarely happens, maybe 3 times since I started going there in Sept of '08. And they typically call to reschedule before you get to the office. Yesterday it just so happened that she got the call just before my appt though and the girl was at 9, almost 10. While I know some people would have thrown a fit (I've heard stories from the receptionist) I don't mind. I remember my nurse waiting until I was at 10 to even call and then wouldn't let me do anything until the OB got there. That was the longest most horrible pain of my life and the only time during my whole labor that I asked for something for the pain. Not to mention the only time during my 24 hours of labor that I was even remotely rude. I believe after the 3rd contraction I was told to not push through my words were "Where the f*ck is she, her office is only 2 F*cking blocks away!" And yes I knew she was at the office cause when I was only 8cm the hour before they told me she was there. Alas, no appt yesterday, it was rescheduled for Monday afternoon. I did weigh myself though and I'm still only up 5lbs, so I'm happy with that, should me based on MW scale I haven't gained anything.

Eh, I'm done for today, that's enough rambling. Tomorrow's post is most likely going to be about biting, I bet you can't wait!

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Happy Anniversary

2011-08-17T07:47:00.000-04:00

Although today is a very big day for me and bean, I will wait until tomorrow to post about that because today is my anniversary and as much as it's just going to be another day, in some ways it's a very big deal to me.

4 years ago today was one of the happiest days in my life. In some ways I can't believe it's already been 4 years and it some ways it's seemed like a long 4 years. The truth is though, that our marriage is still very young.

In the last 4 years we have fought about many things, but none have them have been enough for either of us to say "I can't live like this." Well, that's not completely true, we've said those words and then found ways to make it better.

I really think the biggest problem in our relationship is actually bringing up the problems and telling the other that we are upset. Neither of ever wants to hurt the other or make them feel as if they have done something wrong. In a way it's good, but it can also make both of us build up lots of little things and explode.

I love this man more now than I did when I married him and I know he would do anything for me and our family.

11 Weeks

2011-08-16T08:33:00.000-04:00

And completely emotional today. I hate feeling like I'm on the verge of crying when I have nothing to cry about. I've lost all ability to be smart and witty today and I just can't wait for my early lunch with my mom and my sister where I will get some nice yummy crispy chicken wings.

Again I'm not posting any stats. My mood is horrible enough today, maybe I'll do it tomorrow after my appt, where I will be hearing the baby's heartbeat for the first time! (Like my optimism there?)

What's going on this week according to Baby.Gaga:

Your wee baby is now comparable in size to a plum!

Or for you men,

His Boys Can Swim

Pregnancy Week 11:
Fore! The next time you swing
your golf club, know your baby
is about the size of a golfball.

Your baby's favorite game right now is exploring their face and especially their mouth.

Not only does this game improve your child's newly acquired voluntary muscle coordination of their limbs, but it also starts hard-wiring their hand nerves for newly gained sensations as they're now able to experience in their hands, because their palms can now "feel"!

Extensive facial exploration also primes their facial nerves by setting the stage for a lifetime of subtle sensations from kissing to spitting!

Final interesting fetal developments for the week: their newly acquired swallow reflex, and the beginnings of a sense of smell, which when combined with their maturing taste buds, will provide your baby with their first experiences of taste and smell in the womb.

Yeah, we're also curious what wombs smell like. We'd like to think warm and homey, which just might be the smell of freshly baked cookies.

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Losing Weight?

2011-08-15T08:38:00.000-04:00

I wish I was referring to me actually losing weight, but alas I am not. I will weigh myself and do my weekly update in the next few days. Can you tell I really don't want to? Not so much the weekly update, but weigh myself.

Anyway, in the last 2 weeks I've had a few people ask me if I was losing weight. Bless these wonderful women! Although I looked at them like they were crazy, the truth is I probably have "lost" some weight since I saw them last. I did lose 20lbs and even if I've gained 5 of it back already I'm still probably 15lbs lighter than the last time I saw them. It makes me feel good to know that my body doesn't look as big as it feels.

Yesterday I decided that with approaching the 2nd trimester and the impending return of some energy, I need to start getting some exercise.

I didn't mention last week with my golfing decision is that on Wednesday I started having sciatic pain, Thursday it turned into a lower back ache and by Friday I couldn't even stand up straight to walk. This is a problem I've had before while not pregnant so I started doing my stretches and exercises to get my back into shape again. In the beginning it was very hard to even get in the position to do the stretches, let alone actually do them. By yesterday afternoon though I was at least able to go do my grocery shopping without too much trouble. I did decide last night that I need to start sleeping with my body pillow again though to help with sciatic pain and back problems. Which seems early to me because I didn't need them until I was about 4 months with Lillian. Oh well, at least I don't need to go buy them this time!

Anyway, as I was saying, I decided to start my day off with some yoga this morning. It's 30 minutes and not too strenuous, but I think it's perfect for now with my back and lack of energy. Maybe I can get back to walking in a week or so.

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The Golf Saga Continues

2011-08-11T08:18:00.000-04:00

Well, not really, it is over now, but it didn't end until last night.

Not long after posting yesterday B sent me a text saying that now they had to find 2 golfers because if I wasn't golfing the other wife wasn't golfing unless she could find one of her girlfriends to golf, and she hadn't. I felt bad and found it kind of childish. I understand that she didn't want to be a stick in the mud if she was the only girl and possibly didn't even know the other person, but still. So, I told B I would golf, but if I started to feel sick or if I started to get tired and dizzy I would just sit it out in the cart. He really didn't like the thought of it because he didn't want me to be miserable and not feeling well on a golf course.

In the end they have now found 2 new golfers and all it well, but boy did it take some brain racking to get there.

Taking Chances

2011-08-10T08:06:00.000-04:00

I'm not a big risk taker, I like having a good idea about how things are going to. Saturday we have a golf tournament we have signed up and paid for. We are playing in this with another couple. When B signed us up he said he would get some one else to golf for me if I didn't think I was going to be able to. Well apparently he only had 1 person in mind to ask. During this past week, that friendship has fizzled. Along with the friendship, so has my stomach. I was doing great for a few days, but for the last couple I'm feeling sick again. We both really want me to golf in this tournament, but we also don't want me (or anyone else) to be miserable all day. B keeps telling me he needs to know, but really, how am I supposed to know how I'm going to be feeling in 3 days? Do I just take the chance that I will feel ok again, or do I have him find someone else to golf and just give it up? I'm gonna hate missing out if I feel fine, not to mention feel bad ditching the other wife, but is it worth risking having a horrible time because I feel like crap?

What would you do?

10 Weeks

2011-08-09T12:52:00.000-04:00

Or 1/4 of the way there, hopefully a more if this little one is early like their big sister!

Not much in the way of stats since I forgot to weigh myself this morning. I have noticed I seem to be getting some energy back, but the nausea is still there and my fuse seems to be shortening. I'm wishing more than every that there was a pill I could give B, but alas there isn't, an honestly I don't think I could live with him for a day if he felt the way I do.

I had so much I was going to write about today, but I honestly can't remember what it was right now. I busted my butt last night. Between 5 and 8 I managed to make dinner, do the dishes I used, bake 2+ dozen cookies (the pre-made batter kind), change the sheets on our bed, eat, and give Lillian a bath. Then this morning I got up at 4:30, put a load of wash in the washer, folded a load, made my and Lillian's lunch stuff for the day, put dishes away, and started putting some of my stuff away.

I wish I could say most of this was motivated by new found energy, but it is not. It's more motivated by my frustration and anger. I'm not going to get into it though, I feel like I'm constantly negative and complaining lately and it's really not me.

So according to Baby.Center here's what's going on this week:

Though he's barely the size of a kumquat — a little over an inch or so long, crown to bottom — and weighs less than a quarter of an ounce, your baby has now completed the most critical portion of his development. This is the beginning of the so-called fetal period, a time when the tissues and organs in his body rapidly grow and mature.

He's swallowing fluid and kicking up a storm. Vital organs — including his kidneys, intestines, brain, and liver (now making red blood cells in place of the disappearing yolk sac) — are in place and starting to function, though they'll continue to develop throughout your pregnancy.

If you could take a peek inside your womb, you'd spot minute details, like tiny nails forming on fingers and toes (no more webbing) and peach-fuzz hair beginning to grow on tender skin.
In other developments: Your baby's limbs can bend now. His hands are flexed at the wrist and meet over his heart, and his feet may be long enough to meet in front of his body. The outline of his spine is clearly visible through translucent skin, and spinal nerves are beginning to stretch out from his spinal cord. Your baby's forehead temporarily bulges with his developing brain and sits very high on his head, which measures half the length of his body. From crown to rump, he's about 1 1/4 inches long. In the coming weeks, your baby will again double in size — to nearly 3 inches.

Ok, if you click on the banner below I promise I'll stop complaining...

I Live in a What?!

2011-08-08T12:31:00.000-04:00

I’ve been trying to live in denial for almost 2 years now and this weekend it hit me that I just need to give it up.

Hi, my name is Brandi and I live in a trailer. It’s a double wide, but a trailer none the less.

When we bought the place I loved (and still do) how spacious and open it is. But that’s beginning to be the only thing I love about it. When we moved in, we had a bunch of plans of things we were going to do. We started by painting, which was mostly done before we moved in. Lilli’s room was painted and our room was painted, the living room and our bathroom, the kitchen was primed and I really thought since B was going to be laid off all winter (we moved in Nov.) that there should be no problem getting the painting and what not finished over the winter. I really wanted to re-sheet rock everything and get rid of the stupid seams and stuff, but we didn’t have the money.

Well it’s been almost 2 years now, and it’s been 2 lay off seasons and my kitchen is still only primed, with the addition of several huge walls where the puppy managed to scrape through the sheet rock. The living room is still lacking chair rail and molding around most of it. Our bathroom needs molding, Lilli’s bathroom needs molding and a new floor, not to mention new caulking. Our bedroom still needs molding. The play room still needs a coat of chalk board paint and the molding replaced. And even Lillian’s bedroom, that was “done”, is missing 2 pieces of molding on the closet door!

I will give some credit though, B has put in a wood floor in the kitchen and dining room and generally does small tasks I ask of him at the opportune time.

This past weekend my grandfather came over to help me put a few things up and I just realized what a pain in the ass it is to do anything in a house that is purposely made to go up so quickly and easily. All I wanted was some storage in my laundry area and it took forever to find a stud to screw it too! If you want to hang anything that needs to bear some weight in specific place (you know like centered on a wall), you have to first hang a board that is mounted to at least one stud, then hang whatever off of that. Now what looks worse, an off center hook, or a random huge board with a hook on it?

We also have absolutely NO STORAGE. This makes me want to cry. I don’t even have anywhere to store my beloved Christmas decorations. I currently have then in bins, covered by blankets so you can’t see what’s in them.

If anyone has some creative storage ideas that are little cost please let me know. I HAVE to do something.

9 Weeks 2 Days

2011-08-04T08:40:00.000-04:00

To my disappointment they canceled my ultrasound yesterday, but it didn't surprise me since the first two I had were only off by two days from my LMP and the growth between them was perfect. I won't have another one until the anatomy scan between 18 and 20 weeks. Nothing too exciting about yesterday's appointment. Mostly lost of questions about diseases I've never heard of. Then an exam and blood drawn. The next one should be a little more exciting.

Stats:
Weight: +5lbs, my lack of energy is really hurting me!
Next appt: Aug 17, review blood work and try to listen for a heartbeat!

The floating baby to the right is a pretty good representation of what baby looks like this week.

Here's what's going on with Bean, according to Baby.Center, this week:
Your new resident is nearly an inch long — about the size of a grape — and weighs just a fraction of an ounce. She's starting to look more and more human. Her essential body parts are accounted for, though they'll go through plenty of fine-tuning in the coming months. Other changes abound: Your baby's heart finishes dividing into four chambers, and the valves start to form — as do her tiny teeth. The embryonic "tail" is completely gone. Your baby's organs, muscles, and nerves are kicking into gear. The external sex organs are there but won't be distinguishable as male or female for another few weeks. Her eyes are fully formed, but her eyelids are fused shut and won't open until 27 weeks. She has tiny earlobes, and her mouth, nose, and nostrils are more distinct. The placenta is developed enough now to take over most of the critical job of producing hormones. Now that your baby's basic physiology is in place, she's poised for rapid weight gain.

In other news I think Lillian is getting her final baby teeth. She started with a fever yesterday that won't go away with Tyle.nol or Mo.trin, but she is acting fairly normal besides sleeping more frequently. She let me look in her mouth this morning though and I couldn't see any sign of teeth so who know.

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Who Does That???

2011-08-03T07:44:00.000-04:00

Last night was a rough night in this mamma's house. I was tired, stressed out and feeling like crap. I also decided to torture myself a little by refusing to give Lillian her Binkies until it was time for her to actually go to bed. See she's been in the habit of starting to ask for them the second we get in the car to leave the sitter's. It kills me that even if the sitter offers them to her there, she won't take them, but at home OMG she flips out if you won't give them to her. And frankly I'm just sick of seeing them in her mouth and I think it may be part of the reason she is having trouble with her "L"s. Anyway, it was one fit after another last night. Believe it or not, my rant, I mean post, today isn't even about that.

What it is really about is one of B's friends. I swear the guy has less common sense than B does! We all know in general men have less common sense than most women. Of course I may be slightly over reacting with these raging pregnant hormones and all, but a girl can only take so much from the guy who invited himself on our family vacation.

Last night something was up with our phones and when B's friend called he wasn't able to answer. Maybe an hour passed and I went in to give Lillian a bath. We weren't in there long and B comes in handing me the phone. Now what do I need the phone for you ask, in case some one calls obviously. B can't answer because he is outside entertaining his friend who just showed up, unannounced, even though we didn't answer the phone! Apparently his girlfriend had to go pick up her boys and he didn't want to ride with her. But, get this, where she had to pick them up is about a 20 minute drive from their house, our house is about a 15 minute drive in the same direction. So basically he only had to ride with her another 5 minutes to pick them up!!!

The guy just annoys the crap outta me. He actually called at 6:30 on a Saturday morning and said "what are you doing up, you should be sleeping." Umm if you think I should be sleeping then why the hell are you calling my house?!

OK, I really am done ranting, I swear! On a good note, I have an OB appt today. That long boring one where they ask you a million questions with words I've never heard before.

Once you're done rolling your eyes at yet another rant, can you tell I'm not a morning person? Please take a second to click the banner below. That's all you have to do to support my blog. Just click and let the page load. Nothing else!

Reunions and Anniversaries

2011-08-02T09:41:00.000-04:00

Good thing for this blog post or I may have forgotten that my anniversary is in 2 weeks! But, my anniversary is not the topic of this post, my Great and Uncle's 50th anniversary and the 10th anniversary of my high-school graduation (better known as a reunion) is the topic.

I have mixed feelings and contradicting thoughts on reunions, especially high-school reunions. On the one hand I've always thought that if I cared to see any of the people I graduated with then I would have stayed in touch with them. The nosey part of me (you know you have one too) wants to know if my opinion of them in high-school was right and if they turned out the way I thought they would.

Thanks to my sitter I do know how some of the people are doing, but we aren't "friends" per se. I do find it strange how many of the people I graduated with are still friends though. Am I the only one who went away to school and made new friends? I won't lie, I do have this fear that going to the reunion is going to be like going back to high-school with all the clicks.

One short month after my wedding, my grandparents celebrated their 50th wedding anniversary and everyday I hope that B and I can have the kind of relationship they do after 50 years. Now it is my great aunt and uncle's turn and while I'm not overly close to them (we only see them when my grandparents are visiting) I feel it would wrong not to go to their anniversary party. They've always made it a point to come to all of the functions they are invited to. Not to mention I really think that 50 years is something to be celebrated. Some days it's hard to imagine being 50 years old, let alone being married that long!

My biggest dilemma is that the reunion is from 11-5, but the anniversary party is from 1-4. Could the time conflict be any worse??? I hate to be at the reunion and heaven forbid enjoying myself and have to skip out to go to the anniversary party, but I'm not sure how long we will be stuck at the anniversary party.... Oh the decisions!

If you like my ramblings, or even if you don't, please click on the link below so I'm not kicked out of the cook kids group :-) It only takes one click, and you can do it every day!!! Thanks!

Testing... Testing...1 2 3

2011-08-01T09:15:00.000-04:00

Lots of testing going on right now! Lillian is in another stage where she wants to test my limits and it's driving me crazy! I can't tell you how many times this weekend I had to "Spank her mouth" for talking back to me. Her favorite phrase is "No mom, don't tell me!" Of course she does this while pointing her finger at me. That automatically gets a light smack to the mouth. Right or wrong, I don't know, but it's the only thing that seems to get her attention that it's bad. Also if I say "You better ... by the time I count to 3 or ... 1..." she says "2, 3." And I just want to scream! So I've started letting that be her count and once she says 3 I just give whatever the punishment is.

Here's a question for you. If your child does what you told them to do just after you say 3, do you hand down the punishment, or because they did what you said do you let it go?

I remember being pregnant thinking "I dont' want to spank my child, it will be a last resort." In a way it still is a last resort, I try time out, but it doesn't always register. I guess it's just that I didn't think spanking would be so frequent. And all parents (well decent ones anyway) say "I won't ever ~~hit~~ spank my child in anger." But let's face it, if your child is doing something that requires spanking, you are already angry.

In happy testing news, as you can see I'm testing out some new stuff on my blog! I've joined TopMommyBlogs.com . Stop by and check out all the awesome blogs they have. Please, click on one of the banners to vote for me and let them know you like me!

In case you didn't notice I moved my page links to under my header and I've added a new one, Lillian's Life in Pictures! Check it out for total cuteness without the attitude! I will also be updating Our Journey here in the new future and may be doing some revamping on my side bar. Let me know what you think!

8 Weeks and a Pill

2011-07-28T07:21:00.004-04:00

8 Weeks!!! I can't believe I've made it 8 Weeks!!!

Before anyone worries, the pill I'm speaking of doesn't exist. It's a pill I wish existed, one I could give to my loving husband that thinks he understands what it's like to be 8 weeks pregnant. He tries to sympathize, but really he doesn't get it. I understand that he works a physical job on a roof all day and that it's tiring and miserable, it in no way means that he can come close to understanding what it's like to sit at a desk all day trying to make yourself not throw up. Or trying to ignore the horrible acid in your stomach that feels like it's eating away at itself, and the only thing that makes it feel better is to eat any carbs you can get, but you can't because gaining 50lbs is NOT an option! I wish he could feel how I feel, even doing what I do, for just one day. Maybe then he would understand why last night I went to bed crying because even though I told him Lillian spilled Freezie.Pop juice on our bed and I needed to change the sheets when they came out of the dryer, he went to bed anyway ignoring that I was going to have to sleep in that sticky mess. Or that he left me alone to deal with our 27 month old daughter who wouldn't even close her eyes to try and fall asleep for an hour and a half. Who I eventually just left to her own devices in her crib because I could no longer sit there with my stomach turning and my head bobbing. And maybe then he would understand why I get up at 4 and skip my much needed work out because it's the only time of day I feel well enough to get some house work done.

Oops, I wasn't going to go into that rant, but oh well, I did and it is after all the truth. Happy Birthday Babe, I really do love you!

On to the 8 week update!

Stats:
Weight: +3.8lb (damn carbs are killing me)
Next Appt: Aug 3 (dating ultrasound!)

This is what a 3D ultrasound should show at 8 weeks. I'm actually guessing at my ultrasound next week the baby will measure around 9 weeks 1 day, rather than a little under 9 weeks.

According to Baby.Center, this is what's new this week:
Webbed fingers and toes are poking out from your baby's hands and feet, his eyelids practically cover his eyes, breathing tubes extend from his throat to the branches of his developing lungs, and his "tail" is just about gone. In his brain, nerve cells are branching out to connect with one another, forming primitive neural pathways. You may be daydreaming about your baby as one sex or the other, but the external genitals still haven't developed enough to reveal whether you're having a boy or a girl. Either way, your baby — about the size of a kidney bean — is constantly moving and shifting, though you still can't feel it.

Now that I'm 8 weeks and feeling like shit, I mean confident, I'm trying to accept that I need to just embrace the pregnant look, even if people who ask can't believe I'm only 8 weeks. Really what choice do I have???

Nursemaid's Elbow

2011-07-27T07:54:00.002-04:00

Lilli and I made our second trip to the ER in 3 weeks last night for Nursemaid's Elbow. I'm not sure if she's just prone to it or what, but we happened to see the same Doctor we say on the 16th when we were there. I'm so glad it's a quick fix, it really amazes me!

The first time she never made a peep while he did his little elbow bending trick. We then went to the bathroom and when she was done she reached right up for the door and opened it with the arm that only minutes before she refused to move.

This time, same thing. She's quite funny when she's telling you that the Doctor fixed her arm.

Last night while visiting my sister at work I got my first "how far along are you" question. The guy was about speechless when I told him "Only 8 weeks" I really can't believe I look that pregnant already. I know it's just because of the way my body is shaped, but still, I didn't plan on telling people, especially strangers, this early. Oh well.

Back to Reality

2011-07-25T14:38:00.007-04:00

Going back to work after a weeks vacation, no matter what you did, pretty much sucks. I even had a girl tell me I looked tired today. Yes, of course I'm tired. Not that I slept any more over vacation or that my days were relaxing, but it wasn't work and work just makes me tired. Not to mention, I'm growing a baby :-)

I have decided to leave my vents about this vacation off of my blog because let's face it, when you don't normally spend 24/7 with a person and then you do for a week, things are sure to get a little rocky at some point. It mostly had to do with maintaining the same roles we have at home, even though we weren't at home. I don't think it's right and he doesn't notice. No matter though, overall it was a wonder vacation and I was sad to see it end.

We spent Tuesday through Friday in Old.Forge, NY. I just love the town. I don't think B loves it as much as I do, but he does understand the connection I have to it since growing up we went there every year for a good 10 years anyway. Most of the shops are still there, the restaurants, the arcades and of course the water park, Enchanted.Forest!

We stayed in these cute little cabins that had a double bed and bunk beds. Lillian did pretty well on the bottom bunk the first night, but fell off several times the 2nd night. So on the third night she slept with me on the double bed and B slept in the bunk. She had so much fun at the park and at the cabin. I have so many pictures I could share, but I'm to manage to only pick a few.

I forgot to mention, when they say be aware of the bears and keep all food inside in the Adirondacks, they mean it! Yes that is a small black bear at a neighboring cabin.

Wednesday afternoon we did the dry rides and Storybook Lane at the park.

Eating the candy house from Hansel and Gretel.

Driving the car. She wanted to ride this over and over again.

On the Carousel. She had to ride once with Daddy and then with mommy. The whole time saying "Up and Down", my smarty pants!

Thursday we went and did the water rides! I wish I could have taken more pictures, but it's kind of hard when you are in the water with her!

Riding with mommy on the "Lazy River" We did this several times.

Mommy let her play in the dirt to her hearts content on the last night.

Friday morning we headed home, did some wash, picked some veggies from the garden, then headed off in the opposite direction to stay with B's mom at a cabin her friends rented. Well, we left before actually getting a hold of her because she's never away from her phone for long. We kept trying and trying to call her, but finally realized we were going to have to turn around and head home because she wasn't answering to give us the last bit of direction to get to the cabin. She finally called us around 9:30 feeling horrible. She and her friends went on a wine tour because she didn't think we were coming until Saturday. B had been really upset about wasting the gas and time, but I explained to him that it wasn't all her fault and we probably should have waited for her to answer her phone before we left. I was just glad she was ok as I had started to worry about her. Not to mention, I wasn't all that disappointed to get to sleep in my own bed.

Saturday we got up early and headed back to the cabin, it was beautiful and right on the lake. Lillian just loved swimming in the lake and playing with the rocks. She loved riding on the boat once she got used to it and even went for a little ride on the jetski. I think one of her favorite parts though was jumping off the back of the boat into the middle of the lake. I can't believe what a dare devil she is! We spent the night Saturday and Sunday was a cook out with lots of swimming and fun. Lilli was not happy when it was time to leave.

Swimming in the middle of lake!

First water gun fight. She has pretty good aim for only being 26 month!

Daddy let her go for one last swim. Now he knows why they make swim diapers!

Last night we got home and Lilli and I did some gardening and shucked our peas (which she loves raw) before going to bed. She was so happy when I told her she was going to the sitter's today. She missed her and the boys a lot!

I will say one good thing about coming back to work though is that I'm no longer out in that muggy heat. I felt sick probably 75% of the time we were gone just because the heat made me feel sick. Every time I walked out where the heat was I felt nauseous instantly. The only way I survived the heat at the park was thanks to the water. The after noon we walked around and did the dry stuff I was amazed I didn't get sick.

7 Weeks!

2011-07-21T08:01:00.000-04:00

And feeling like crap! Although this is something I'm very happy about even if I am miserable. I've never had heat effect me like this before. Its been 90 to 95 this week and the second I'm not in front of a fan I feel like I'm gonna be sick. Even when I was 9 months pregnant with Lilli the haet didn't make me feel sick.

I can't really update on anything this week since we are on vacation. Believe it or not its the first family vacation we've been on! I'll tell you more about it when I'm back on a computer and not my phone.

But I will try and post a picture of the love of my life.
Sent from my Verizon Wireless BlackBerry

121

2011-07-18T09:53:00.003-04:00

That's what Bean's heart rate was today! Right where is should be! And Bean was also exactly 1 week further along in growth!!!

I'm feeling very confident now and I'm so over the moon I don't know what to do with myself.

This picture shows the baby's head at the top. Due to my extensive research (and staring at pictures on the Internet) I can see the little arm and leg buds. Of course this is a picture of a picture and my actual picture isn't as good as what the screen showed. It was amazing to see the little tail and umbilical cord though!

I really can't wait to tell my little girl that she's going to be a big sister! She is going to be sooo excited!

Oh and the midwife for now has suggested tums for the excessive acid in my stomach. We'll see if they work this time. if not she does have something she can give me, but they try to any type of meds in the first trimester.

Does it help???

2011-07-15T07:57:00.002-04:00

So here's a silly question for those who've been pregnant.

Does actually getting sick make you feel better?

While pregnant with Lillian I pretty much felt like I could be sick all day. Most times to the point that had I knelt down in front of the toilet, I would have gotten sick. Well the fun begins again. I HATE getting sick, I avoid it at all costs, to the point that I will hold off going to the bathroom because the thought of looking at a toilet makes me almost lose it, let alone actually walking in the bathroom.

It seems this time though the actual feeling of "I'm going to be sick" is lasting longer and not fading into a bearable "blah, my stomach is really upset" feeling. Like I sit at my desk and concentrate on not getting sick rather than anything else.

So my question is, does getting sick make you feel better? After you get sick does the feeling go away?

Also, any suggestions for curing the increased acid in my stomach would be greatly appreciated. I constantly have indigestion and that burning in my stomach that makes me nauseous.

Have a great weekend!!! My appt on Monday was changed to 8am so I will probably wait until after to blog the good news!

6 Weeks for the 3rd time!

2011-07-14T07:20:00.004-04:00

That's right, this is my 3rd pregnancy that has made it to 6 weeks! Well actually according to the measurement from my ultrasound on Monday I'm 6 weeks and 2 days, but I am going to stick to my original due date (based on ovulation) until I have my dating scan on Aug. 3.

Still not much in the way of stats:
Weight: +1.8 lb
Next Appt: July 18

The weight besides being normal fluctuation for me in a matter of a week, is also most likely to do with my issues of expelling waste. In 4 short days (I'm trying to convince myself here, humor me) we will have a follow up ultrasound to make sure the heart rate is increasing.

As far as symptoms goes, I have them... Some times just the thought of something makes me want to run to the bathroom. Smells that I like I have been finding over powering and nauseating. Bloated, well just look at the photo below. And exhausted isn't even the word for how I feel when I get home at night!

Although I don't feel ready to be telling people I'm pregnant, I would rather have them thinking I'm pregnant rather than thinking, "wow, she lost that weight and gained it back." or "she's chubby/fat."

This is what's going on with the little Bean according to Baby.Center:

This week's major developments: The nose, mouth, and ears that you'll spend so much time kissing in eight months are beginning to take shape. If you could see into your uterus, you'd find an oversize head and dark spots where your baby's eyes and nostrils are starting to form. His emerging ears are marked by small depressions on the sides of the head, and his arms and legs by protruding buds. His heart is beating about 100 to 160 times a minute — almost twice as fast as yours — and blood is beginning to course through his body. His intestines are developing, and the bud of tissue that will give rise to his lungs has appeared. His pituitary gland is forming, as are the rest of his brain, muscles, and bones. Right now, your baby is a quarter of an inch long, about the size of a lentil.

The Binkies in the garbage didn't last very long. I found Lillian in the bathroom hiding with them in her mouth after digging them out. Thankfully there wasn't much in the way of garbage in the can. Just some paper stuff. I was way too tired to deal with the screaming and crying last night so B sanitized them and we decided that when we tell her about the baby we will see if she wants to give them to her little brother or sister. The first trimester when lack of energy is so high, is not the time to be fighting a strong willed toddler for her binkies! I really can't wait to tell her about the baby though, I think she will be very excited!

We'll Call it a Success!

2011-07-13T07:15:00.003-04:00

Last night was the first night sans binkies!!! It was not something I planned or was planning to push, but for the last few months it's something that I occasionally mention to Lillian just waiting for her to be ready.

Last night we were playing bedtime on the bed in her play room. She had her binkies and she mentioned something about them. And this followed

Me: don't you think it's about time we throw them away? You're a big girl now.
Lilli: No I don't want to put my binkies away.
Me: No I said throwthem away in the garbage. I have something else for you to sleep with when you want to throw them away.
Lilli: OK, let's throw them in the garbage.
Me: That means you won't have them for bed time anymore. Once they are in the garbage they are gone.
Lilli: OK

She proceded to get off the bed, walk to her bathroom and throw them in the garbage. Then we went in her room and I gave her the little Boots.doll I had bought for her last weekend. She says "Boots!!! I want Dora too!" Yeah silly mommy didn't think I needed to get both of them.

She was fine until it was time for bed, which I expected. Then she didn't want Bo.ots anymore, she wanted her binkies back, but they were kaka. We tried rocking and then laying in the crib rubbing her back, listening to her seahorse and different combinations of it all for about a half hour. Then Mommy gave in. We went in my room and put a movie in. By the end of the movie she had fallen asleep and so had I. She is normally quite well at putting herself back to sleep in the night, but without the binkies I decided I would probably get more sleep if she just stayed in our bed where she could cuddle if need be. I don't know if I was right or not since she only whined out a few times without even waking, plus that mean I had maybe 2 feet of bed space. But all is well. When she first woke up this morning she was upset that she didn't have her binkies but she got over it after a few minutes and then she was upset again when we got in the car because she normally doesn't give them up until she gets to the sitter's. But after talking a little and then her telling me "I'm not a big girl." She was fine again. She even seemed proud of herself when she told the sitter what she had done because she knew she would be proud. She hasn't had a binkie at the sitter's since she was a year old.

Here's to hoping tonight goes better and she can sleep in her own bed! Mamma's tired today!

What I've Been Waiting For

2011-07-12T07:41:00.004-04:00

Yesterday seemed to take forever!

I love my midwife! She is just so happy for me I thought she was going to cry. She just kept saying "Yay, I'm so happy and excited for you!" We talked about symptoms, which I have a ton of and how we're pretty sure I know the date of my last AF. We talked about my happy pills and the decisions I have to make regarding them. Then she asked if I had any more questions. I was shocked she never even mentioned an ectopic so I asked what my chances were. She looked at me strange and went back in my file. (I love that their office uses laptops and everyone brings one in with them for easy reference). The OB had noted that I was at a slight increased risk and my MW knew I was worried so she ordered the ultrasound, of course with the warning that being I'm only 5 weeks and 6 days (according to LMP) we probably wouldn't be able to see anything, but we'd check the tubes and if we couldn't see anything anywhere she'd order some blood work.

I got right in for the ultrasound and again was warned that we may not see anything. I her I completely understood, but I didn't want to risk any more harm to my tubes by not checking. It's funny that she even mentioned "I was supposed to see you today, then I wasn't and now I am. How's your little one doing, I remember you from you last pregnancy." The personal interaction is what I love about this place!

So anyway, you don't care. She explained she was doing all the measurements of my uterus, tubes and ovaries, but she things she sees an interuteran pregnancy. After all the measurements, she went back to my uterus and I saw it right away, a sack and an embryo. As soon as she zoomed in to take a measurement we both saw that beautiful flicker of a heartbeat! That image keeps replaying over and over in my head. I could have laid there all after noon watching that. She was even able to zoom in enough to get the heart rate, 98bpm. It's low, but I have been assured over and over again it always starts low and chances are that it just started beating in the last day or two. But without me asking my MW said she was scheduling another ultrasound for next week to make sure the rate increases. So I'm sure you are thinking "Just shut up and show me the damn picture already." OK, OK.

There are some other things that are growing well too! I'm so proud of my garden and soon I will be eating my first vegetable from it! I don't know why, but this zucchini has grown 10 times faster than the rest of them!

Tomatoes on the plant that I thought had drown from the rain.

Green beans and peas that need a little tending this weekend.

Happy Thoughts

2011-07-11T07:44:00.005-04:00

I would really appreciate happy thoughts and/or prayers from everyone.

In 7 (what will feel very long and drawn out) hours I have my first midwife appt. This appt was originally scheduled to check to see if the fluid had drained from my tubes. I hoped and prayed that this appt would end up being to check for an ectopic pregnancy instead and thankfully it has turned out that way!

Now I could use all the happy thoughts anyone has to offer that first they do take a look (which I do plan on insisting on if they don't think it's necessary) and second that what we see in a comfy little bean nestled snugly in my uterus happily exercising it's newly formed heart muscle. I do believe that is what we are going to see, but any extra help would be greatly appreciated.

The last few weekends Lillian and I have made the hour trip up to my mom's camp ground because my uncles T (from Boston) and H (from West Palm) have made the trip there to visit family. I surprised them all yesterday by just showing up and it really was a nice relaxing time. Lillian actually took a nap with Grandma and Uncle T and Aunt D and I got to just sit and chat for over an hour. I can't remember the last time we had a chance to do that. And of this time with family lent itself to some great picture taking opportunities.

Lillian painted her own fingernails for the first time!

I just love this picture! Lillian and Uncle T hanging out!

"No mom I'm not tired! No nap!" And after 5 minutes of a movie. . .

Reading a book and showing the pictures to her second cousin.

Pretty good form for a 2 year old don't you think? Never mind if she actually hits the ball.

She loves the older boys. And don't let him fool you, he loves playing with her too!

What a tiring day! Wish I could have fallen asleep on the way home!

I may be a little bias, but isn't she just the cutest thing?

I had this written

2011-07-08T08:07:00.002-04:00

In my head last night, about 2am.

When I got up to go to the bathroom for the 3rd time last night I had a hard time falling back asleep. So I lay there thinking about all the things I wanted to blog about, I even had it titled and a rough draft in my head. Do you think I can remember any of it now?

Remember when I mentioned in this post how I've always thought there may be an issue with my thyroid, but both my GP and OB said my levels were normal. Well yesterday my new NP (nurse practitioner) called and wanted me to get more blood work done. Turns out that calcium and the function of your thyroid are connected. She ordered the PTH Intact test. There is some good information here. I have had symptoms of both hyper- and hypo- calcemia. They are also checking my Vitamin D and calcium levels again. I'm so glad I finally have a doctor that is taking this a step further than just "oh everything is relatively fine."

Do you remember me talking about the MIL that irritates me? You know, the one who took sleeping Lillian out of her seat while I was in the bathroom the day that I brought her home from the hospital. Well I've just recently "gotten over" how inconsiderate she is (not really the word I want, but it's all I can think of at the moment. Anyway, she calls me yesterday and says "where did you get that mat for under Lillian's car seat?" Then she she tells me that she bought Lillian a car seat. Now I appreciate the fact that she doesn't want me to have to keep switching the car seat from our car to hers when she has Lillian, but don't you think maybe she should have discussed this with me before buying it. Here are my problems 1- it's used. Not to say it isn't in good condition, but I would really like to have checked it out before she spent $50 on it. 2 - it's a brand I've never hear of. That doesn't mean it isn't a good brand, but I need to know ratings and such. She justified this by saying "I looked it up online and it's normally $190." Umm hello, expensive doesn't mean safe.

If she had talked to me I would have told her to go to Walmart and get one like the one I have that was only $60 and has high ratings for safety and use. Then I was sitting there thinking "there is no way Lillian is sitting in it unless I install it". Which thankfully she asked me to do. I honestly don't even trust B to put her car seat in a car. He never seems to tighten it enough, I think he gets frustrated.

So I'm thinking of saying something to her like "wish you would have said something, you could have gotten a new one like mine for $60."

Well that's all I can remember now... Hope everyone has a great weekend!

5 Weeks!

2011-07-07T07:15:00.006-04:00

1 week down, 35 more to go!!!

Not much in the way of stats right now...

Weight: -.4lb

Next Dr appt: July 11 (only 4 more days!)

Last night I was feeling a bit worried because I never felt sick at all yesterday. Although I did feel bloated every time I ate something (which isn't much before I feel stuffed), it isn't quite as reassuring as the nausea. My little bean must have heard my thoughts though because I was up 4 times to go to the bathroom last night and several times this morning I'm pretty sure if I had been in front of a toilet I would have been sick.

I'm really not sure how long I will be able to keep this pregnancy a secret. Even though I'm just extremely bloated, I look like I have a belly already...

What's going on with Bean this week according to Baby.Center:

Deep in your uterus your embryo is growing at a furious pace. At this point, he's about the size of a sesame seed, and he looks more like a tiny tadpole than a human. He's now made up of three layers — the ectoderm, the mesoderm, and the endoderm — which will later form all of his organs and tissues.
The neural tube — from which your baby's brain, spinal cord, nerves, and backbone will sprout — is starting to develop in the top layer, called the ectoderm. This layer will also give rise to his skin, hair, nails, mammary and sweat glands, and tooth enamel.
His heart and circulatory system begin to form in the middle layer, or mesoderm. (This week, in fact, his tiny heart begins to divide into chambers and beat and pump blood.) The mesoderm will also form your baby's muscles, cartilage, bone, and subcutaneous (under skin) tissue.
The third layer, or endoderm, will house his lungs, intestines, and rudimentary urinary system, as well as his thyroid, liver, and pancreas. In the meantime, the primitive placenta and umbilical cord, which deliver nourishment and oxygen to your baby, are already on the job.

Passing Time

2011-07-05T07:44:00.002-04:00

That's what I'm trying to do, pass the time. I was very happy to have a long holiday weekend this week and wish it could have been longer.

Saturday was my sister's 21st birthday and party. She rented out part of a local bar that gives drink specials and a DJ for 3 hours. Obviously my original plan was to celebrate my little sister's 21st birthday to the fullest with her. But when I found out I was pregnant I figured the next best thing I could do was be the DD for everyone. The problem with this plan became very apparent quickly. No one would believe I was just being a nice sister and driving for her. Then when my family realized I was sick it was very obvious to them I must be pregnant. So pretty much all of our family knows now. It was a long night, but I managed to make it to 4am after several trips to the bar and then back to my mom's where my wonderful uncle made pizza and wings for everyone to enjoy.

Sunday I spent the day with the family up at my mom's camp. Lillian had fun bonding with her uncle's that she doesn't get to see often and I had fun catching up with everyone. My sister road home with me and we were watching fireworks as I drove, well that was a mistake because I missed my exit off the thruway and it took us on a 20 minute detour, resulting in me not getting to bed until about midnight.

On Monday it was another Family picnic with B's family. We decided to tell the family there as well since it really isn't much of a secret anymore. I felt horrible when I fell asleep for 2 hours with Lillian during the cookout, but I couldn't help it. The last two late nights had finally caught up with me.

I was so glad to have yesterday off too. I had so many things I wanted to do around the house, but instead decided to take Lillian on a shopping trip since I don't have time for that stuff during the week. It was great, I found clothes for both of us and shoes for B. Then I took Lillian to her first movie. She was in awe at the screen and how big it was and that I was letting her eat popcorn while she watched the movie and she didn't have to be at her table.

Now today I am back to work and wishing time would go by faster. I can't wait for the week to be over and then for Monday to be here so I can have my appt. I really want to know that there is a heart beating in my belly. I'm extremely bloated every time I eat, have indigestion a lot and feel sick in the night, but I need confirmation for my brain.

The Ups and Downs

2011-07-01T07:28:00.004-04:00

Yes, I think that roller coaster is shaped about like the emotional one I'm riding is. After my post yesterday I started to feel guilty, or something. I started to feel like, maybe I should be more worried, maybe I'm kidding myself. While I still feel rather confident that this pregnancy is going to go to 37 weeks, I'm paying way too much attention to what I am or am not feeling.

After my post yesterday I cramped most of the morning. This had me scared. It was like the bake breaking, just kill me now cramps I get with AF, but it was there and it was constant. Now did I maybe manifest these cramps because all of a sudden I was doubting my positive feeling? Possibly. I mean come on now, I've had no problem manifesting pregnancy symptoms in the past.

During the day I had decided I was going to tell my grandparents that I was pregnant. They live in NC (14 hours from me) and we only see them a few times a year. This was something I was very excited to tell them in person rather than a card and a phone call like last time. But by the time the after noon arrived I was thinking, but if something goes wrong I will have to tell them and I don't want to have to tell them something like that like I did before. But I sucked it up and told them anyway. It made me realize besides you Internets how few people really know what B and I have been going through for the last year and a half.

My grandmother said to me "Someone was just asking me the other day when I thought you would have another one. I told them I didn't know. Maybe you liked the age difference between you and your sister (7 years) and you were waiting." I told her "No, we've actually been trying for a year and a half." And she just kind of looked at me like "Oh". She did understand though why we aren't really telling people, or Lillian.

I'm so excited to tell Lillian because she has been around enough pregnancies and is old enough now to understand that when a girl has a baby in her belly, eventually there is a new baby to play with. And she LOVES new babies.

As for this very moment, I'm confident. It may have something to do with nausea/indigestion I've had for 3 hours now. I'm not complaining though, I'll take whatever symptoms I can get for the next 8 weeks and more.

And I want to leave you with this. Child Bearing Hips posted this link on her blog and I think it is worth sharing. When some one goes through a rough time in life, the most important thing is to be there for them. You may not know what to say or do, but the wrong thing is better than nothing.

4 Week Random Thoughts

2011-06-30T06:58:00.002-04:00

Well, maybe they aren't quite random cause they are consuming my brain, but to you they will probably seem random.

Having experienced a miscarriage with my first pregnancy, taking 9 months to get pregnant again, and then 19 months to get pregnant a second time, well I'm sure you can imagine it's a whirlwind of emotions in me, or I was expecting it to be.

With my first pregnancy, I didn't know miscarriage was so common. And although we told everyone at 5 weeks I didn't feel like I was going to have a baby. It just didn't feel real to me. I don't know if it was subconscious or what, but I wasn't all that shocked when I lost the baby at 7 weeks. Something just didn't feel right.

With Lillian, it felt right. I had moments where I felt like the other foot was going to drop, but generally I felt like I was going to have a baby. Not physically, but mentally and emotionally. I feel that way this time too. I feel like I'm going to be having a baby. It seems real to me that in March (or if it's anything like Lillian in February) I will be bringing home a new member to our family.

What is getting me though is how I will feel if this does become a nightmare and not the wonderful dream it is right now. I'm feeling so much confidence in this pregnancy, even with an increased chance of miscarriage from the fluid, that if it does happen I will crushed, devastated, inconsolable.

Enough of that. I'm so happy and excited because I WILL be bringing home a baby (a boy I think) next year.

So for this pregnancy I have decided I'm am going to be active. I am going to keep my weight down! With Lillian I was so scared that exercising and such in the beginning was going to make me lose her that I didn't do it. Then by the time I thought it would be ok, I just didn't have the energy to get back into it. So this time, things are going to be different. Although I'm going to take a step back and only jog and walk, I'm going to continue to do my morning work outs paying closer attention to my heart rate and how hot I am. This morning I went 1.8 miles on the treadmill. I'm also going to make sure that what I eat is healthy, and not just carbs. I can tell already that the nausea I had with Lillian (which was all day) is going to be nothing compared to what I'm going to have this time. I'm pretty sure I've been having it since the day this bean started to implant and it's only starting to last longer. If anyone has good suggestions to for easy to bring to work snacks that are good for nausea, I'd love to hear them!

I guess I'll stop rambling now. I did weigh myself this morning and will update every week on how things are going.

I Could Cry

2011-06-29T07:01:00.002-04:00

Last night I had been thinking over and over about if I wanted to test or not. Finally while we were eating dinner I decided that if I had a test I may as well use it. So I told B "If I have a test I'm going to test in the morning." I could see the wheels turning in his mind so I said "To see if our sex marathon worked." He just said "Oh, ok."

Men just don't get how taxing it is on a woman to see BFN after BFN and how scary it is to sit there waiting by yourself. So I found a test, but it was a First Response, not a cheap dollar store test like what I was hoping to find. I wasn't sure I wanted to use it. Those suckers are expensive you know. But I put that and a cup out anyway, just in case I changed my mind.

Before going to bed I decided that if my temp went up in the morning and I had no signs of AF or anything that I would test.

**Warning, if you don't want to know personal information skip to the end**

This morning when I took my temp I had to check it 3 times before I was sure I read it right. I mean it was 4am and the only light was the TV. I went in looked at the test and decided well, I'll pee in the cup, still unsure of if I wanted to test or not.

There was no sign of AF when I wiped so I decided to check my cervix. Low, hard and closed. I don't know what I was thinking, that it would be a sure sign or something, but whatever.

So I bit the bullet, opened the test and dipped it. I watched it for a second and wasn't even sure it was going to process. I went and put the toothpaste on my toothbrush and started brushing my teeth. I wandered back over to the table by the toilet where the test was sitting and looked to see if it even processed.

**This is the end**

So it's tears of joy I could cry. Please pray that this little bean sticks. We certainly aren't out of the woods yet.

I Resisted!

2011-06-28T06:56:00.002-04:00

Yup that's right, I didn't test this morning. Although I did think about it, I was just too tired and had to go too bad to look for an HPT. I won't lie, part of me wishes I had tested because I hate the feeling that anything I feel all day could be real or all in my head. According to Fertility Friend, tomorrow is the last day of my average LP. I actually think it is today because I'm pretty sure I O'd the night before my temp rise. Either way, I'd really like to wait it out until Thursday, I just don't know if that is going to happen.

I'm definitely having IPS (Imaginary Pregnancy Symptoms). Passing nausea, slight cramping, and my bbs are itchy. Yeah I know sounds weird, but they are. On the other hand, signs of AF, break out on face, slight cramping. I'm really trying not to get my hopes up.

If you would like to vote for Lillian in the Parent's Magazine Cover contest please click here. There's no signing up and it only takes a second. You can vote once a day from every computer/phone! Right now she's in 98, but I'm hoping with repeat voters we can get her up to the top.

Help Lillian Win!

2011-06-27T12:18:00.002-04:00

Lillian is in a photo contest to get a photo shoot in NYC and be on the cover of Parent's.Magazine! Please help her out and vote for her. It's easy, there's no signing up or giving email addresses or anything. Just click here and vote!

Measuring Time

2011-06-27T07:29:00.002-04:00

We all measure time. Some times it's a count down to an event or date. Like I've been counting down to my sister's 21st birthday. Which is now only 5 days away (counting today)! And some times we measure by saying "it's been # weeks since..." Did you know it's been 26 weeks since Christmas???

It's strange that I can pretty much remember every cycle that I truly thought I was pregnant. I know it's been 26 weeks since Christmas because my friend got her BFP on Christmas. I can't believe she's 30 weeks already! This also means that if I had been pregnant like I would have swore I was on New Years, I would be 29 weeks now. I still remember the day AF showed up and the feeling of defeat I had and wondering if I had been imagining all those symptoms.

I have been doing quite well this cycle trying not to think about things. Of course it helps that I've been feeling weak and tired anyway. But since Wednesday and Thursday last week, it has been difficult to not wonder. See I was 5 and 6 dpo and had some spotting. Nothing like AF, just a few brown spots on the TP. Now of course I was also dealing with a YI (and if you don't know what that is, you probably don't want to). Anyway, this weekend I've had a few pains in my cervix that stopped me in my tracks and made me take deep breaths. If this means anything, I have no idea, but at 12 weeks with Lillian I went to the ER because I was having cervical pain and was worried about a miscarriage. In any event I've had some very slight come and go cramping, could be AF, could be my imagination, could be just about anything. I am going to try my best and hold out until Thursday before I test. And I'm also going to try and convey my daily thoughts and feelings to you, the internets, if hopes of shedding some light on the emotions an infertile goes through.

Happy Monday everyone. I could really use any baby dust you have to spare.

Scattered Thoughts

2011-06-23T07:36:00.002-04:00

I'm not really sure what I want to blog about today, but I have a million little things running around in my head. So, here's the ever dreaded bullet point post....

I love thunderstorms and I wish I was at home and able to sit on my couch and watch and listen to this morning's storm. Instead, I got my second shower of the day while walking into work. Yup, been here 40 minutes and my hair and pants are still damp.

I have a million and one ideas for my shop in my head, but can't seem to get one of them to completion and it's driving me crazy! Oh and if you haven't yet, visit My Shop or My Shop's Blog

I don't have mono, but I also don't know what's causing this exhaustion and weakness.

My exhaustion and weakness is making me feel like a horrible mother because I can't seem to do anything with Lillian in the evenings.

I need to get back on my weight loss track. Even though I'm maintaining quite well, I need to eat a little better, I've been slacking.

I have so much to get done around my house that I don't know where to begin, or even want to. And my husband doesn't seem to understand that if we keep going places and doing things on the weekend, none of it is ever going to get done!

Well, I don't know if that helped me any, but you wanted to know what was running around in my head, right???? Sure you did.

Have a great day!

50:40

2011-06-22T07:28:00.003-04:00

That was my time in the Chase 3.5 mile run last night. Well that was my official time anyway that I had to report.

They were only about 10 people short of 7000 entries into the Challenge. Although I wasn't late, when I got there, I didn't have time to wait in the line to relieve my hydration efforts from the day.

I lined up at the 12 min mile marker and waited and waited to get going. I probably actually could have waited in the bathroom line and made it out in time to start. By the time I actually got to the start/finish line the clock was already at just over 3 minutes. I was very disappointed in myself when I didn't even reach the 1 mile marker before I had to walk for a few minutes. After looking at my Nike+ watch I realized why though. I had been running at a pace 2 miles faster than what I normally run for a 3 miles. Not to mention it was 20 degrees warmer than what I am used to running in. I was overjoyed when I got close to the halfway point and saw Port-a-Johns. You bet I stopped, waited and finally got to go to the bathroom. The second half of the race was good besides the smell of skunk that made me want puke.

Overall I'm very proud of myself. It typically takes me 50 minutes to run the 3.5 miles, so considering the 3 minutes already on the clock when I crossed the start line and the 1-2 minute bathroom break, and walking I probably ran the 3.5 miles in 45 minutes. That's 5 minutes less than my average on the treadmill!

And I was so thankful to have my husband there at the finish line to cheer me on! As boring as it was for him I'm sure, it meant the world for him to be there and be so proud of me. He even told me again this morning how proud of me he was.

Oh and Lillian had fun with her Grandma and Grandpa too, especially when they went to visit Aunt Pocca at work (the ice cream shop)!

Race Day!

2011-06-21T07:33:00.003-04:00

I'm not really complaining here, although some might say I am, but the number of labs I've had done in the last year is just too much. Now I know it could be way worse and some people do have it way worse, so I'm not complaining, but let's be honest, who wants to have their blood drawn at all.

I honestly don't even know how many times in the last year I've been to the lab, but I can say that everyone in there recognizes me now and says things like "back so soon?" Yeah it's crappy.

I bring this up because I really appreciate the thoughts on what may be going on with me. Yesterday Jenn suggested that I could have a problem with my thyroid. And honestly I've always thought I may have a problem with it, but the at least 3 times its been tested in the last year, it's come back normal. The last of those times being back in May with my fertility testing. And normally I'd get a second opinion, but considering that both my OB and GP (general practitioner) say that its ok, I'm going to believe them.

Please, feel free to leave me comments on anything you want to suggest may be the issue, or any experiences with exhaustion like I'm experiencing. I try to refrain from googling since all that does is make me anxious that I have some weird disease.

On to more important things like the title of this blog. It's Race Day!!! I'm running in the Cha.seCorpo.rateCha.llenge tonight and I'm totally excited! This is my first race and it's a 3.5 mile run rather than just a 5K (3 miles). I signed up because my boss here at work is heading up the team. Of course work paid for it and they are supplying a delicious meal afterwards. I also like the cause. This event "will benefit [local] not-for-profit organizations that support affordable, quality early care and education." The race I'm in will specifically benefit Child Care Solutions.

So please wish me luck that my energy will last until this evening and that it isn't too hot and humid, or storming...

Exhaustions and Confusion

2011-06-20T07:32:00.003-04:00

Exhausted seems to be a permanent state for me right now. No matter what time I go to bed or get up I seem to be exhausted all the time. It's weird though. I get up at 4 am during the week so that I can get my at least 2 mile run in every day. I'm find during my run and while I'm getting myself and Lillian ready for the day. And typically I'm fine for the 5 minute drive to the sitters. But, by the time I leave the sitters and get heading to work, I'm exhausted, like to the point I can barely hold my eyes open. By the time I get close to work (it's a 20 minute drive) I'm fight myself to not let my eyes close.

Currently I'm sitting at my desk typing with my eyes so heavy they are falling shut, even while I type this. And caffeine has no effect! I seem to be ok if I'm up and active, but the minute I sit down for 5 minutes I just want to pass out. Considering I have a desk just and spend much of my day staring at a computer screen, that's non a good thing!

As for frustration, that's with my temperature. I'm starting to wish I hadn't started temping again. Its all over this week and I don't know why. My best guess is that it's because we've been sleeping with the window open since our AC unit broke last week so we don't have much in the way of temperature control. I really hope this is the case because if not, this will be the first month ever that I haven't Ovulated.

Ok, enough complaining for now...

OPKs and Other Useless Things

2011-06-17T12:30:00.002-04:00

OK, maybe it's really just the OPKs on my mind right now....

I got a + OPK on Tuesday. According to how OPKs and the woman's body is supposed to work, I should have O'd yesterday at the latest. And I really think I did, but there wasn't much of a temp rise this morning. It went up some, but not like the smack in the face you O'd kind of rise. So guess what, hubby and I are going on 4 days in a row of trying to make a baby! Yeah I know some people think "Oh you lucky girl." Don't get me wrong I enjoy it, but it's just so unromantic and frustrating. Anyway, I really hope I get a rise tomorrow because I don't think things can get any more perfect than they are this month, well assuming the fluid is gone from my tubes.

Another useless thing is the dog collars I've bought for our "puppy". He's a year old and part Bullmastif and has gone through 3 collars this week! I just picked up another new one today, if this doesn't work he may have to become a neighborhood dog.

In some good news, Lilli is pretty much potty trained!!! Only 2 weeks!!! I'm so proud of her. The only hard part now is when she's in new places and feels like she might miss something. She still goes, but doesn't give quite as much notice that she needs to go.

Hope everyone has a good weekend, I'm spending mine on some major house cleaning.

Hopeful

2011-06-14T07:37:00.002-04:00

That's how I've decided to look at things for now. I may regret this decision in the next 3 weeks, but honestly, I don't know how else to get through the next few weeks. If you read the comments to previous posts though, you know that I have some wonderful women supporting me. And my husband isn't too bad either.

I am definitely hopeful that I will have a potty trained little girl very soon! Since Last Tuesday we have had 4 accidents I believe. Considering last Monday there was 5 in one day I don't think that's bad at all. I'm so proud of my baby girl. I mean, my BIG girl. She reminds me that she is a big girl all the time. Even last night when she had her diaper on while we watched a movie before bed she asked to potty. I couldn't believe it!

One thing that I am not feeling so hopeful about right now is getting my house back in order. It has been several weekends since I've been home to do any amount of cleaning and it's driving me nuts. Closes are getting washed and folded but I'm sick of having to dig through laundry baskets to find thing. And I'm not even going to get started on the clutter from all the bags that are either half unpacked, or not even touched after being brought back in the house. My exhaustion has been getting the better of me at night lately. I feel lucky to even make it through the work day, let alone get anything extra done at night! I hope things turn around soon!

Torture

2011-06-10T07:25:00.003-04:00

Do you ever feel like you are torturing yourself, but you can't help it?

That's how I've been feeling the last few days. You see on Monday, I found out that the last of my TTC friends got her BFP. And while I am so excited for her, I hate being the only one left. Especially since I started TTC first. <--I just read that and realized how immature and selfish it sounds, but I will leave it.

I am in contact with these girls (all 8 of them) pretty much on a daily basis. And while it pains to me hear all the exciting news of their pregnancies, be it gender ultrasounds, first kicks, the bfp, contractions, the aches and pains, etc, I wouldn't miss it for the world to share in their experiences. I am proud that these girls call me their friend and probably have more in common with them in some ways than I do any of my friends that I see in person. (I won't say "in real life" vs "not real life" because after almost 4 years of almost daily contact I consider them to be real life friends).

The greatest part of being friends with these girls is that they understand if I'm quiet for a few days and don't say much. Or even if I pretty much say the same thing over and over while I have a pity party for myself. They understand, they've been there.

If you are experiencing trouble TTC or in any other part of your life, I suggest you reach out. I found some of my greatest friends on WTE. There are forums out there for so many things now that you are bound to find some to talk to that will understand, you just have to be willing to find them.

Thank you to all my friends who have been there to support me through the tough times in life. I don't know where I'd be without you!

A New Day A New Hope

2011-06-09T07:21:00.002-04:00

Preface: I have an OB and a midwife. They work in the same office. My midwife handles my pregnancy and yearly check ups and such. The OB handles any abnormal findings, infertility diagnostics, c-sections and the like. The OB is actually the one who delivered Lillian as she was on call that night. I won't lie, I was very glad she delivered her because I think she did an AMAZING job, but my midwife's bedside manners are a little better.

So I had an appointment with my midwife, ML, yesterday for a fallow up from Dec. Everything looks good now, which I expected. I had almost canceled the appointment, but decided I wanted to see her and ask her some questions now that I've had a chance to let this whole hydrosalpinx news sink in. So when she asked how I was doing I told her "Good besides the news I got here last week." She said "That's right, I remember seeing the hydrosalpinx in your report now. Don't stress over it, the last two patients I had with it, it resolved itself." Then we went on and talked about other things for a few minutes. Before I left she gave me a hug and said "I'm glad you came in and I got to see you. It's a great sign that we were able to get the dye pushed through and I'm confident it will resolve itself. You are coming back next month for and ultrasound right?" I told her yes and we said our good-byes, with her adding she hopes to see me soon (my ultrasound is with the OB, not her). ML is one of those people who just makes you feel like she's on your side. And she told me to call immediately if I get a positive pregnancy test before my ultrasound.

All in all I'm feeling a little more hopeful today that things will clear up this month and we will be pregnant soon.

I'm also hopeful that Lillian is making good progress on the potty training. She only had 2 accidents yesterday, and for the way things were going, that's great. She even freaked out last night while we were laying in bed watching a movie and she had to pee and started going in her diaper. (she had a diaper on cause she was exhausted and I thought she may fall asleep).

I've been feeling pretty fat lately. Although my weight is pretty much only fluctuating about 5lbs, I've been feeling huge. For some reason I decided to try on a skirt I bought myself last year as a goal gift, but I haven't been able to fit into it yet. Well it fit this morning. I was able to pull it over my hips and button it! It's still a little tight in the thighs for sitting in it all day, but it fits! Hopefully it will give me the motivation to get back into my exercise routine. I've still been exercising, but not with the energy and effort I should be.

I guess that's enough rambling today...

Dare I Say...

2011-06-08T07:48:00.004-04:00

I think we are starting to turn the corner in potty training! I'm so proud of my (not so) little girl. Yesterday she only had one accident at the sitters and when we got home the only accident she had was when she didn't get her dress out from under her butt. And the best part, she told me when she had to go potty and just walked right over and sat down!

Riding a "dirt bike"

In other exciting news, my niece Maddilynn Fayth was born yesterday!

I also thought I'd share some pictures of my garden. It is the first garden I have been able to actually have grow! In the past I've planted flowers, but have had no luck. This year I decided to try my hand at some veggies and I'm very excited. I wish I had more time to plant more!

Top left to bottom right: Broccoli, green beans, peas

Top Right - Onions, Top Middle - Peppers, Top Left - Zucchini, Bottom Left - Strawberries, Bottom Right - Tomatoes

The tomato plant was almost died due to all the water it got with 19 straight days of rain, but I think it is going to survive since I saw some new buds on it last night. And I'm very excited about my strawberry plants!

Hydrosalpinx

2011-06-06T12:15:00.003-04:00

That's the technical term for what I was diagnosed with a week ago and I still don't really know how I feel about it.

Some times I feel hopeful and other times I'm quite depressed. At one point I had a list going on my computer with a list of all the emotions I was feeling and why, but then the breaker blew here at work and that list is gone.

I think my 3 most prominent feels are Depression/Sadness, Denial, and hopeful.

Yeah weird combination right? I'm very sad and depressed to be in this situation. I just can't stop thinking about how all I've ever wanted was to be a mom and the thought that it would be a problem never crossed my mind. Which puts me in denial that I will only have one baby girl. I refuse to believe that I will never have another baby. So, I am hopeful that since the contrast dye from the HSG was able to be pushed through my tubes that the fluid will also be able to escape and my ultrasound next month will show little to no fluid. Or maybe I'll even win the lottery and my ultrasound next month will be to make sure I don't have a tubal pregnancy rather than to check for fluid.

What frustrates me the most is that I can't seem to find much information about treatment online. I have found lots of definitions and causes, but not much about treatment. I was assuming that when my OB said in extreme cases the tubes are removed and then IVF is used, but I didn't realize that besides that there isn't much that can be done. I have found a few sites that reference a massage type treatment where they manipulate your tubes to free blockages, but I don't know if it works for fluid. I've also seen a few mentions of larposcopy to clear the tubes of blockages, but again I'm not sure that applies to fluid. I feel like my ultrasound on July 11th is forever away. I just keep picturing fluid flowing out of my tubes and praying that it clears up.

I have also been dealing with lots of pregnancy news lately. While I am over the moon for my brother who's second little girl will be arriving on the 22nd, and for my friend who has been TTC for about as long as I have, who just got her BFP this week, I'm admittedly completely jealous of both of them.

The Good, The Bad, The Ugly

2011-06-01T07:23:00.003-04:00

The Good:
B's swimmers are just fine!
My labs! My thyroid is good, insulin and 2 hour glucose test were normal

The Bad:
My cholesterol. It's a little high, but nothing that needs medication or should prevent pregnancy.

The Ugly:
My tubes. Below is essentially what tubes should look like and what they do look like.

Turns out the dilation of my tubes is a bigger deal than the radiologist thought. My right tube is bad to severe and the left is just bad. The dilation is caused by fluid and this fluid has many bad effects on achieving a healthy pregnancy:
~ Egg may not be able to travel down the tube
~ Sperm may not be able to travel up the tube
~ If egg manages to fertilize egg there is a good chance of ectopic pregnancy
~ If fertilized egg does make it to the uterus if there is fluid in there it can prevent implantation.
~ If egg manages to implant there is still a higher chance of miscarriage.

Where we go from here:
As of right now if I do manage to get pregnant they want to see me right away to make sure that I don't have an ectopic pregnancy. In a month they want to do an ultrasound to see if the fluid is going away. If it is we will continue to monitor and try naturally. If not, we will consult with an RE. At this point and time I'm not sure what the course of action after that would be.

I can't even talk about my emotions of all this right now because I haven't yet figured out how I feel about this. On the one hand the OB thinks I have a good chance of it curing itself since we've achieved a normal pregnancy, on the other hand I feel hopeless. I need to do some research.

Half Way There

2011-05-26T07:21:00.002-04:00

I was happy to see this morning that I am half way to my weight loss goal!!!

I keep reminding myself though that the second half of this journey is going to be much longer than the first half. Especially if (fingers crossed) I get pregnant. The positive to that is that if I do end up getting pregnant, my diet is much healthier and my weight from the start of this journey should be about my max pregnancy weight.

I feel bad that I have been slacking on my exercise this week. On Tuesday I walked for a half hour instead of running like normal and Wednesday I skipped my workout all together because I woke up so exhausted. This morning I did force myself to get up and do my Turbo.Jam workout and I'm glad I did, it felt good. I just wish I could shake this feeling of exhaustion to the point that I'm having a hard time keeping my eyes open as I type this.

It does help having such a supportive husband though. He's great about telling me how proud he is of me. I also love that he is considerate enough to ask me if I can have certain foods like butter and such before putting it into our meals. (Yes he cooks, we take turns)

Here's to a quick and some what painless rest of my journey!

Keeping Busy

2011-05-25T07:43:00.003-04:00

That's pretty much all I've been doing. Now that I have no testing to worry about getting done, I'm trying not to think about the results and all the possible out comes.

So far this week I've crocheted 3 hats, weeded one garden and planted peas, beans and broccoli in another. And yes, it's only Wednesday morning!

I wish I had some pictures to share of Lillian "helping" me in the garden. She is just too cute trying to do everything I do. Right down to leaning on her shovel saying "whew, hard work." and taking her hat off to wipe her brow.

I'm trying to enjoy these days as much as I can, even though it can get frustrating with her throwing the rocks right back to where I just picked them up from, or piling up the seed or dumping and mixing them all together. I know that some day working in the garden with me is the last place she is going to want to be, so I'm soaking it up while I can.

On the garden topic, does anyone have some ideas on how to keep cats out. There are several cats that roam around our house and during the day they tend to stay away. But there is one that thinks my garden is a litter box. Not to mention it tried digging up my zuchinni.

Also any suggestions for no carb snacks that I can take camping this weekend would be great. We are going to be tenting it so all we'll have is a cooler.

Which reminds me, I really need to start making a list of things to take!

3rd Time's a Charm

2011-05-23T08:14:00.003-04:00

Right???

Well it has to be. B told me this morning that if they didn't accept the sample this time, yes they rejected it a second time because I dropped it off too late, that we could forget about having it done.

I don't blame him really. Even I'm getting pissed off and I'm not the one providing the sample. But this morning the guy behind the desk (a different one from both other times) didn't understand why I insisted on staying there until he found the paperwork. I told him "This is my 3rd time trying to drop off this sample, I want to make sure you have all the paperwork and this gets tested." So he finds the lab slip and looks at me and says "I can understand why he's upset about this." Then he looks at the sample that was now a half hour old (you are supposed to have it there within a half hour, which I did, but all the waiting made it longer) and then he says "I will get this right back that and make sure it's tested." That was almost 2 hours ago now and I haven't gotten a phone call so I think we finally got the SA done.

OK, I'm sure you're sick of hearing about B'd woes. On to another topic that I never thought would make me so happy, pee and poop! Lillian did both in her potty yesterday! I was so proud of her. No accidents and she used the potty 3 times! I never thought I would be this excited about it! After she pooped she walked around saying "I pooped in the pot-ee" you know like the conga song, over and over. I love her pride!

I Survived!

2011-05-20T07:02:00.004-04:00

I am very thankful to be the girl that can say "it was no big deal." Besides having to wait almost 2 hours for my blood work to come back (apparently only verifying that I wasn't pregnant, insert eye roll), everything went rather smoothly.

One thing not so cool, was the nurse having me get on the table and put my legs in the stirrups and then going to get the doctor who I probably had to wait 10 minutes for, in a freezing cold room! Yeah not a position I like to be in for no good reason! Anyway I felt very little pain or even discomfort until the end. It was also pretty need to be able to watch the screen and see the contrast going in and moving through my system. At the end I did get one very big cramp. Unofficial results were that everything looked fairly normal. The one bad cramp I experienced was because he had to add extra pressure to the contrast to get it through meaning there may have been a small blockage. He also said that the right tube is extremely dilated (Like 5 times bigger than the left), but it should not be a cause to prevent pregnancy.

So that was it. Now oddly enough all week I had been stressing because I was pretty sure that I O'd on Tuesday, based on several factors. Well after the HSG I decided to stay home, not because I was in pain or anything, but because my craft room needed some major cleaning and trying to do that with my "little helper" around is about impossible. As you can see she loves to help:

Anyway, throughout the day my cramping got worse and worse. Nothing I was concerned about since my Oing pain is normally pretty bad. Then I realized, maybe we didn't miss our chance this month! Maybe I was having O pains on top of HSG cramping. I still don't know for sure and probably won't for a few more days, but if you want to follow along, check out my Fertility Friend Chart, or click on the ticker to the right.

How Could I Forget???

2011-05-17T07:02:00.005-04:00

If you actually read yesterday's blog and came back, thank you. I apologize for the rant, I normally try to leave those things out because, well, we all have days like that, it's nothing new.

So on to other rants... I was worried last week that I wasn't going to be able to get B to provide a sample for his Semen Analysis (SA). Well Friday morning he did it. I was so proud of him, I honestly can't imagine how hard that is to do without being in the mood and possibly thinking about why you are doing it. But then again I'm a woman.

Anyway, It takes me a half hour to get to work, thankfully the hospital (where the lab is) is just off my route. The sample has to be dropped off within an hour of collection for testing. I made it there with 20 minutes to spare. I go in to register and the lady asks for his insurance card and my heart sank, he carries his insurance card. Well luckily we just got new ones and I actually had his. So I go into the lab and give the tech the sample and he asked if B had been fasting. Again, my heart sank, umm no. Then he says or is this for fertility. Way to give me a heart attach buddy, yes it's for fertility. So I tell him when the sample was collected and how long he had abstained. The tech says "OK, you're all set I get this right back there." I was so happy it was over with I sent B a text saying we were good to go.

Now my work is about 5 minutes away, 10 if traffic is bad. I no more than get to my desk and sit down and my phone is ringing. It's the lab. The tech was calling to tell me the sample was rejected. What?! Why would a SA sample be rejected unless it was too old. Which it definitely wasn't. Why, because I didn't put a label on it and the tech didn't look for one! Then the following conversation
Me: well can't you just label it, I just gave you all the information!
Tech: No we aren't allowed to do that.
Me: Well can I come back and label it?
Tech: It won't do any good cause the sample will be too old to test.
Me: So now what?
Tech: I will set aside another sample cup for you and you can submit another sample. I'm so sorry, I should have checked. I called you because I didn't want to ruin his day.

Really?! You didn't want to ruin his day, how about me, now I'm going to have to hear it because YOU screwed up! I was livid, I'm still livid. I was certain that the tech would put a label on it with the information I gave and what testing needed to be done, just like they do with all the other lab work I've had done.

I can't believe I forgot to tell you all about that.

And tomorrow is my HSG. I don't know how I'm feeling about it, but I'm sure glad to know so many women who've had one. I think this is one of those things that you can't completely prepare for because all of the women I've talked to have had different experience. Ranging from "it's no big deal, just a little pressure" to "OMG from the moment it start to the end I was in toe curling pain." Obviously I'm hoping for "it's no big deal," but just in case I have my sister going with me and I've warned my boss I may not be in tomorrow.

It will all be worth it if we can get some answers!

Work or Play?

2011-05-16T08:49:00.001-04:00

How do you spend your weekends? Me, I try to keep a combination of work and play. Let's face it, during the week there isn't much time for work or play, at least not at my house. Especially with the schedule I try to keep us all on.

My Schedule:
4:00 am: Get up do the bathroom thing, work out, shower, make coffee, let the dogs out, get dressed, pack Lillian's bag, make my lunch, pack my bags, get Lillian up and get out the door.

6:15 - 6:45: Drop Lillian off at the sitter's and head to work.

7:00-4:00: Work, sneak in other stuff (crochet, edit photos, meal plan, grocery list, etc.)

4:00-5:00: Leave work. Most of the time I have to go stop at a store, get Lillian, go home.

5:00-5:30: Spend some time playing with Lillian

5:30-6:30: Make dinner while trying to keep Lillian occupied, or from creating a complete mess.

6:30-7:00: Dinner. And Praying Lillian doesn't finish before me so I can actually eat the whole meal.

7:00-8:00: Lillian's bed time routine. Bath, teeth, hair, story, rock, bed

8:00: Finish any laundry I may have managed to get in the washer or dryer. Try to prepare my lunch for the next day.

9:00: Sleep!

B's Schedule
6:00: Get out of bed and start getting ready. He normally wakes up well before 6 and lays in bed watching the news, spo.rts cen.ter and music videos.

7:00: Leave for work

Now he is a roofer so his work day can end at any time really. May end by 7:15, may not get home til 6.

Either way he typically comes home watches TV, gets on the computer, on short days he'll take a nap or go hunting or fishing or whatever activity it is that's in season.

One night a week he'll mow the lawn which takes most of the evening.

After dinner he will sit there and watch TV until I am ready to go to bed. He normally will pick up mine and Lillian's dinner plates, but several times this last week Lillian's dish is still sitting at her table when I come out after putting her to bed.

The reason I went into all of this is because I am still extremely irritated about how he acted this weekend. Friday night he was great. He dropped me off to go out with my sister while he went to his mom's with Lillian because he was getting up early to hunt. After his hunt he came back to his mom's where I was and we both took a nap, on our way home we stopped at the store. He went out and grabbed us a late dinner that evening and Lillian was in bed when he got back with it. Sunday morning he again got up at 3am to go hunting with his buddies. I had asked him Saturday if he would be home with us in the afternoon. Well around 10 he comes in and gets his bow to go bow fishing. He said he was sure he'd be back early after noon. I spent the morning with Lilian doing and laundry and cleaning. My king size bed was covered in clothes! My dresser was cleaned off and the living room was dusted and vacuumed. This took me 6 hours! He came home a little after noon, ate and went and took a nap. 2 hours later he got up, came out to the couch and complained how tired he was. Grabbed his pillow and blanket and napped some more on the couch. He was finally up and some what sociable when I got back from picking up dinner at 6:30. We ate dinner in the living room and Lillian made a mess on the coffee table with her rice and brown sauce. We did our normal night routine and when I came out from putting her to bed I see that B picked up our bowls, but didn't clean up any of the mess that Lillian had made. So I went got a washcloth and cleaned the table again. Then I finished folding laundry and headed to bed. While I was getting ready he came in and actually started putting his clothes away! I was shocked, I was for sure he was going to through them in a basket and they would sit there all week.

As he's getting in bed he told me the house looked great, I was so glad he noticed, then he proceeded to say "I guess I get the kitchen then don't I? Why do I always get the kitchen?" Now mind you pretty much since we've been living together (just about 7 years now) he's been in charge of doing the dishes. Mainly now because he'd rather do that than bath time. Well he hasn't done the dishes in about a week. It's gross, but I refuse to do them!

And the worst part is if I want to have some one over he will say something like "The kitchen is disgusting, I don't want some one in our house with it looking like that." And I just want to scream at him that he should keep on top of it then. And I try to be really good about things, when he has the kitchen all clean and I'm cooking dinner, I try to clean the dishes I use as I go, I make sure to clean up any little dishes that aren't part of our meal as they get used. But once he starts leaving dinner dishes in the sink I stop because he would expect me to wash those too if I was washing the ones I just used and I'm not letting that happen. He has very few chores in the house and I'm not taking any of them over!

Sorry for today's rant. I'm just feeling very frustrated that I try very hard to balance my work and play and some times I feel like all B does is play and bitch about having to do any work!

Guilty or Not Guilty?

2011-05-12T08:16:00.001-04:00

Me, I'm some where in between and it changes based on how I'm feeling every day. I'm talking about the guilty feelings of TTC.

TTC with a child and TTC without a child are completely different in some emotional aspects. Yesterday I was talking with my TTC friends and we were discussing what our TTC plans are and what lengths we are willing to go to to get our 2nd pregnancy. It made me realize that depending on what lengths you went to the first time makes you feel different about the second time. For the girl that knows she will have to do IVF to get pregnant, she is completely content with her family of 3 and does not want to have to do another fresh IVF cycle. The girl that has suffered many miscarriages is also very happy with her twin girls. She plans to try for only 6 months with no medical procedures. If it doesn't happen, she too is extremely happy. Then there is me. I've had one miscarriage, and was about to begin fertility testing when I got pregnant with my precious little girl. At this point I'm not sure how far I am willing to go to get pregnant again. What I do know is that I can't wrap my head around the thought of us being a family of 3 forever.

This is where guilty or not guilty comes in. Lillian is the light of my life and I love her more than anything in the world. I feel guilty for not being happy with just her, for refusing to believe that she will be my only child. I appreciate the fact that I didn't need any medical intervention to get her and I can't imagine a more perfect child, but I can't imagine not having another one either.

Some times I don't feel as guilty because I know Lillian will be an amazing big sister. She loves babies (even the ones that are only months younger than her). She likes to play with them, "read" to them, and take care of them any way you will let her. She is the only child I've ever scene not get mad when her mommy is holding another baby for a prolonged period of time.

But what I can't get out of my head is "why can't she be enough?" All my life all I've wanted is a family. Before my teen years I wanted lots of kids, in my teen years I decided I wanted to be an independent woman and have a career so I decided 2 kids and a good job would be great. Now, all I want is to be a SAHM or even a WAHM with as many kids as god is willing to give me. And I just can't accept that it will only be one.

Sorry for rambling so much, I hope it makes sense and doesn't jump all over too much! I will leave you with pictures of my favorite times!

I Got Lucky!

2011-05-11T12:36:00.002-04:00

Not the way I want or the way I enjoy, but in the blood drawing sense, I was pretty lucky today.

I went for my blood work today and when I first got there I realized there were at least 2 other girls there doing a glucose test. I only know this because I saw the bottles in their hands. After registering I go into the lab and the lady just looked at me like I was crazy. Then she says "Do you have an appointment?" I must have looked as shocked as I was. I said "No, I was told I didn't need one." I really thought she was going to tell me to come back because they do all the labs for the hospital and considering it is time sensitive I thought she was going to tell me to come back later.

There was no way I was fasting any longer though! 8:30pm to 9am was long enough. Turns out she was nicer than I thought though because she ended up doing all but one of my blood draws. The first draw was 8 vials! And when I realized she didn't use the butterfly (I can't look at needles in me) I was surprised at how steady her hand was. The worst part of getting my blood drawn is when they switch vials and the needle moves your vein around.

While pregnant with Lillian I only had to do the 1 hour glucose test, so I didn't realize that they were going to have to draw blood 4 times during this one! Nor did I think I was going to be able to pee in a cup every time they drew blood.

I'm glad it's done with though. And I escaped with minimal marks. So far no bruising, even though I was poked in the same spot twice! Just some red marks. And the worst part is from where the tape irritated my skin from being put on and ripped off twice!

Now I just have to get B's sample to the lab and my hsg done.