AngelBrat's Blog

New Year’s Meme (Part Three)

2012-01-23T03:42:00.001-05:00

This is a New Year’s Meme I originally did in 2009, then again at the end of 2010. The answers in black are my original answers, the ones in red are last year’s, and the ones in blue are this year’s.

1. What did you do in 2008 that you’d never done before? Went to Houston, won a trip to Hawaii (although we've not gone yet).
In 2010 I became a stay at home mom for the first time and also launched a photography business. In 2011 I started an etsy shop (and made a few sales!). I also shot a wedding with Nick. And I was hospitalized for pregnancy complications.

2. Did you keep your new year’s resolutions, and will you make more for next year? I honestly can't remember last year's resolutions, but we've decided to make some financial changes this year.
This year's resolution was just to trust God more, and we've definitely had to do that. Next year I'd like to expand my photography business. We had the same resolution this year as last, and God has definitely carried us through! I also wanted to make enough with my photography business to cover our initial investment, and I did that.

3. Did anyone close to you give birth? Yes. Unfortunately she also got divorced. We also found out that Nick's sister is pregnant. Sadly, still not me, although at this point that would be something of a financial disaster.
Two girls I graduated high school with gave birth. But considering my 2009 answer, I want to point out that I got pregnant about three weeks after I posted that answer and I entered 2010 with a 13 week old baby of my own! Um, me! Me! And my friend A (ironically enough the same girl from my first answer to this question).

4. Did anyone close to you die? My grandfather
No. I'm blessed to have attended no funerals in 2010, although I did learn that a former co-worker passed away a week ago. No one close to me died, but one of my close friends lost her dad just before the end of the year.

5. What countries did you visit? Just this one.
Same answer. Still same old boring answer.

6. What would you like to have in 2009 that you lacked in 2008? A SLR digital camera
This coming year I'd like to have the full Photoshop Suite/Lightroom and a better lighting equipment package. And since I've been reading all these craft blogs, I've fallen in love with the idea of having a Cricut machine. We’d love to be able to move to a bigger house.

7. What dates from 2008 will remain etched upon your memory, and why? March 3, the day my papaw passed away, and June 26, our 10th anniversary.
January 7, 2010 was the day I went in and quit my job. June 6, the day I found out I was pregnant, and December 14, the day I was admitted to the hospital.

8. What was your biggest achievement of the year? I don't know how much of an achievement you'd consider it, but I did win that trip to Hawaii.
Actually getting a few photography clients. Also, moderate overall success as a coupon ninja, and serious coupon ninja success when it came to Christmas this year. Hanging onto my pregnancy as long as I did. Also, managing to get most of the Christmas gifts finished and out the door (although I actually still have a few to do).

9. What was your biggest failure? Probably that we could have handled our money better.
Not keeping more on top of the laundry. Not being able to control my blood pressure during my pregnancy (although I did try!).

10. Did you suffer illness or injury? Not unless you count strep throat
Nope! Unless you count the time I slipped in our backyard and ended up with a very sore spine and tailbone for a few days. Well there was that little blood pressure thing…

11. What was the best thing you bought? Probably my car - it's been a great investment so far.
My camera! Probably the Sequoia.

12. Whose behavior merited celebration? Morgan has really gotten it together with school. She had some issues in October with not really wanting to get her work done, but she's improved 110%.
Morgan has been an ah-may-zing big sister! Nick was an AWESOME husband and father during the chaos of the last few weeks of my pregnancy!

13. Whose behavior made you appalled and depressed? A couple we've known for years and years and actually introduced. They both just gave up on their marriage and decided to get divorced rather than putting any effort into fixing things.
Barack Obama. The plethora of men behaving badly in the media this year!

14. Where did most of your money go? Bills, food.
Bills, diapers, formula. Bills, diapers.

15. What did you get really, really, really excited about? Our trip to Houston.
My camera and our trip back to Texas. The birth of our son.

16. What song will always remind you of 2008? Anything Hannah Montana. If I never hear Hannah Montana again it will be too soon, but since Morgan sings the stuff in her sleep, I'm probably not that lucky.
Anything by the Avett Brothers. Nick has been playing the crap out of them! Billionaire as performed by the cast of Glee. Odd choice I know, but I think they just blew the original out of the water!

17. Compared to this time last year, are you: a) happier or sadder? Probably happier, Probably about the same, Happier b) thinner or fatter? About the same, maybe a little heavier, but not much, probably about the same, which I’m pretty proud of since I just had a baby! c) richer or poorer? Probably about the same, although we really should be richer, Poorer, Money-wise, about the same, but infinitely richer in our family.

18. What do you wish you’d done more of? Photography
Day to day photography just for myself. Cleaning – we have way too much stuff in this house!

19. What do you wish you’d done less of? Eating out.
Staying up way too late. Eating lots of Ramen noodles during the first few months of my pregnancy. I ate them because they were cheap, but I know they must have added to the later problems with my blood pressure.

20. How did you spend Christmas? With family, eating, opening gifts.
This year will be the same. Out of the hospital – yay! And frantically trying to finish making gifts!

21. Did you fall in love in 2008? Yes, with my husband and daughter, every day.
Yes, with my husband and both of my daughters, every day. Yes, with my husband, my daughters, and my son!

22. What was your favorite TV program? Lost
Lost, until it went off, then Sons of Anarchy and Terriers. Glee. I know – it’s a guilty pleasure.'

23. Do you hate anyone now that you didn’t hate this time last year? Nah
Nope. Still nope.

24. What was the best book you read? I couldn't even begin to narrow that down.
Same answer, although there have been some great ones! Probably The Hunger Games Trilogy.

25. What was your greatest musical discovery? That Itunes will let you redownload your purchases if your hard drive crashes!
The Avett Brothers. Adele. And Glee.

26. What did you want and get? A better car.
A Nikon D90. A son (although technically he didn’t arrive till 2012).

27. What did you want and not get? A Nikon D90
Photoshop/Lightroom. Photoshop/Lightroom.

28. What was your favorite film of this year? Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, Fireproof
Sherlock Holmes. Well, the only one we got to go see was Hugo, but it was pretty good.

29. What did you do on your birthday, and how old were you? I turned 31, and I hung out with Nick, went shopping, went to see the movie Fireproof, and stopped to visit with some friends.
I turned 33, and to celebrate we had a cookout with family and friends the day before, then I had a photo shoot. The day of we went to church then went and had lunch with Nick's sister and her husband. I turned 34, and I got to do a little bit of shopping and have lunch with Nick.

30. What one thing would have made your year immeasurably more satisfying?More money? Definitely more money, and a baby, or at least having one on the way.
Having made enough off my photography to have paid for my camera in full. Right now I'm a little over 50% of the way there. I can’t think of one blessed thing!

31. How would you describe your personal fashion concept in 2008? Same old jeans and cute shirts I'm afraid.
Not much has changed here. Lol, it was maternity wear for most of it!

32. What kept you sane? Nick beating my butt when I got too stressed, although I probably could have used more of that.
Concentrating on letting God take care of us and our finances. Still trusting in God, although I wouldn’t have turned down a few more spankings!

33. Which celebrity/public figure did you fancy the most? Mmmmm....Josh Holloway, although Harrison Ford wasn't bad either.
Still Josh Holloway - Oh, Sawyer, I miss you! Is it weird that I’m still crushing on Josh Holloway even though Lost has been off the air for almost a year?

34. What political issue stirred you the most? No politics here, please.
The health care fiasco! Honestly I’ve been a little too occupied to pay much attention.

35. Who did you miss? My friend L
Still my friend L, although I got to see her a bit more this year. Same answer, although I got to see her even less this past year.

36. Who was the best new person you met? I can't really think of anyone new I met in real life that made a big impression, but I met lots of great people on here!
Same answer. Same answer.

37. Tell us a valuable life lesson you learned in 2008. Life is not fair - sometimes the people who make the worst decisions can still end up swimming in money.
God is always there for us - His mercies are new every morning! Sometimes you just have to take off the Super Mom costume and take care of your own health (and life will continue when you do).

38. Quote a song lyric that sums up your year. I can't really think of a good answer for this one.
Still can't come up with one! Sigh, still nothing.

Life these days…

2012-01-22T23:36:00.000-05:00

Hi, guys! Jack got to come home with us on the 13th, and he’s doing fabulous! At 3lb 13.27oz, he was actually the smallest baby our hospital’s NICU had ever sent home! Since then he’s gained steadily, and as of this past Friday he weighs 4lb 7oz. I don’t generally (or really ever) post pictures of my kids on here, but these are all pretty anonymous, so I had to share:

My baby shower was yesterday, and it was terrific! I got tons of diapers and clothes, and so many people that I love came to help us celebrate. My sister-in-law made us the BEST diaper cake alternative:

My mom actually stayed home and kept Jack for us. We didn’t feel comfortable having him out in a crowd yet (we’re still almost 3 weeks from his due date), but we played a slideshow of pictures on Morgan’s iPad, and everyone understood.

We’ve had so many wonderful blessings lately. The check Nick’s sister and her husband sent us for Christmas allowed us to pay off a few bills as well as buy Nick and I each something we’d wanted for a long time. Nick has long wanted a hand gun (every guy in my family loves to shoot), so that was his gift. I got to go get myself both a serger and an inexpensive embroidery machine.

But the best thing the money did for us was allow us to get through my 16 days of hospitalization plus Jack’s 9 days beyond my release. Obviously I was unable to cook during this time, which meant extra money spent on eating out every day, plus quite a bit of gas spent with Nick and I driving to the hospital every day (sometimes several times a day for me as I was pumping milk as well as nursing).

Another blessing was how we got our car seat. We had hoped to get a car seat in the baby shower, but that of course was before he decided to show up 5 1/2 weeks early! Because he’s so small, we knew we would have to have one rated 4lb and up. Daisy’s old one wouldn’t work, because not only was it not rated for preemies, but it was also past it’s expiration date.

Now I don’t know if you’ve ever priced infant car seats, but they aren’t cheap, and those rated for 4lb babies are definitely on the pricey side. When Jack was 5 days old, my cousin sent me a text telling me she had some baby stuff for me. Included was a car seat/stroller travel system that was exactly what we needed! It had belonged to her best friend, and my cousin had used an identical system for her son who’s 8 weeks older than Daisy. Nick and I had decided against getting one on Craigslist just because you can’t know the history of the seat that way (once a car seat goes through a car wreck, it’s considered compromised and no longer safe). But my cousin is a nurse, and certainly one of the most conscientious moms I know, and she could vouch for the car seat having never been in any sort of accident.

She and her mom (my aunt) also brought 2 bouncy seats, a Boppy pillow, a baby swing, and the BEST little outfit! A few months ago Nick’s sister had sent us this precious little sleeper set from Gymboree, and I had decided it would be his coming-home outfit. Then when we found out he was going to be really small, I realized that it would be way too big on him, so I resigned myself to finding something else. The outfit my aunt and cousin brought that night was from the same line, but preemie sized!

They also brought him a layette set in the hospital, and then FOUR more sets tonight! Plus, they brought me a Moby Wrap, something I registered for but didn’t get (probably because they’re so stinkin’ expensive!).

And speaking of blessings, a longtime prayer request of ours has been for my mom and my aunt to be able to sell their dad’s farm. My papaw passed away almost 4 years ago, and the economy being what it is, the property has sat on the market since then. Tomorrow they are due to finally close the sale on it.

An unexpected side effect of that for us was that my aunt bought a new refrigerator and gave us her old one. Now we’ve needed a better refrigerator for AGES. Ours was used when we got it, and we’ve had it for over 10 years. Besides being on the small side, it just had a lot of wear and tear. Several of the shelves in the doors were broken, the ice maker would sporadically decide to stop working, and the dairy drawer was broken. All of that said though, it still kept the food cold, so it was just something that kept getting put on the Someday List.

The model my aunt gave us is far from new, but it’s in great shape – a side by side with lots more room than ours, water and ice in the door, and no broken shelves! The ice maker does need to be repaired, but we’ve been told it can be fixed for about $40. And it fit in the space we have without a centimeter to spare! It’s just so neat how God gives us good things even if we sometimes don’t “need” them yet!

Anyway, I know this is a terribly long post, so I’ll wrap it up. Have a great night!

A blessed New Year

2012-01-04T16:01:00.001-05:00

Well, I’m finally getting a moment to post after a whirlwind couple of days. Monday (the day after my last post), my doctor had someone bring me over for my ultrasound about 10:30.

My amniotic fluid looked great, but Jack was not as active as he had been up until that point, and it was harder to see his breathing movements. My doctor decided we needed to go ahead and induce, so they took me back to my room, and I called Nick, then my parents and in-laws.

I already had an IV in, so they just needed to get the epidural and pitocin drip started. The nurse wanted to start the pitocin drip first (which would have started the contractions), but I insisted on the epidural first, lol. The epidural actually went very smoothly, very little pain from the injection or the insertion of the IV line. My doctor came in once the epidural was in effect and broke my water, around 1:30 I think. Family was in and out, but Nick stayed with me the whole time unless he was walking Morgan out when they needed to check dilation, etc.

Shortly after 5:30 I was 7 cm, which was about as far as the doctor planned to take me before delivery since he was so small. There was just a bit of my cervix that still needed widening, so she had me push gently a couple of times. That did the trick and got me to 8 cm, but it made Jack’s heart rate (which had been great until then) drop down, so we knew we had to go fast. We got everyone’s attention, she had me push one whole time and he was out. There was a scary moment because the cord was wrapped around his neck twice (thus the heart rate drop), but the doctor had him untangled within a couple of seconds, and we heard beautiful, loud, pissed off crying!

The doctor was so pleased with how gorgeously pink he was, and his Apgar scores were 8 and 8. She laid him up on my chest, and as soon as I put my hand on him he quieted down. Because he was so small, they only did basic cleanup and vitals in the crib warmer, and they had him in the incubator and out of the room within a couple of minutes.

It was so hard to watch them wheel him out and have to stay put, but I knew it was best that they get him down to the NICU to check him out. My nurse came back in about 15 minutes with his stats and the news that he looked to be doing great and had not had to have any breathing intervention. He was born at 5:42 PM, 3 lb and 11 oz, and 17 1/4 inches.

Nick took the family down to see him once they gave him permission (about and hour and 1/2 after delivery), but they wouldn’t let Morgan come in because it’s flu season. She was pretty upset, but she did understand. I didn’t get to go see him in the NICU until he was almost 5 hours old, which killed me! I tried earlier, once the epidural first started wearing off, but when I got up I was too lightheaded to even make it to the bathroom without a nurse on either side to help me walk. By the time I was able to get up and move without passing out, the NICU had closed temporarily for shift change, so I had to wait for a bit longer.

When I finally got to see him, it was a bit terrifying to see how very small he was, and all the monitor wires and the IV line (all standard accessories for brand new NICU babies) made it even scarier.

But he’s done just wonderfully well! He never had to go on any sort of breathing treatment, and yesterday he actually did a great job of latching on and nursing on two separate visits, truly impressing his nurses (and his parents!). I’ve been pumping breast milk, which they’ve been giving him via a feeding tube or a syringe in addition to the nursing, and they got to take out his IV line today. He became a little jaundiced earlier, but that’s more or less expected at his age (Daisy went through it too, and she was full term). They’ve got him under the bili lights right now, although they’re taking him out for feedings of course. I’ll be going back down in about an hour and a half to try nursing again.

I can technically leave at any time, although I’m delaying check-out (with my doctor’s approval) until after Nick gets off work and can pick me up so that I have a place to hang out between feedings. Of course we had been hoping and praying that he would not have to stay longer than I would, but the news is still much better than it could have been. The NICU doctor anticipated as of yesterday that we will get to bring him home by the end of next week, which is a huge change from the 5-6 weeks they were predicting before I had him!

I think we’re going to try to bring the girls down later so that they can at least see him through the window. Morgan was in the room for all of my labor except for the approximately 7 seconds it took for him to actually be born, lol. She chickened out at the last minute and left to join her papaws in the hallway, but I didn’t mind.

Thank you again for all your prayers, and I would really appreciate their continuation that we can bring him home soon (but when he’s ready of course!). Off to pump more milk…

Happy New Year!

2012-01-01T22:15:00.001-05:00

Hello, everyone! I hope you’re all having a great New Year! I’m back in the hospital and only have access to post to the blog via Window’s Live Writer. I can’t actually view my posts because my blog isn’t allowed by the hospital’s firewall, so hopefully I won’t get home and realize I’ve made all kinds of typos lol.

I got to go home for Christmas, which was very nice. I actually went home (or rather to my parents’ house) on Wednesday the 21st. Nick picked me up at the hospital, and we stopped by the house on the way to my parents’ house so I could get a few clothes and craft supplies I needed. Nick grabbed the mail, and I had the most wonderful surprise in it! One of my dear friends that I met through blogging had sent us a Christmas card with some money inside! This was such an unexpected gift, and it was such a blessing! Nick had ended up having to miss a day and a half of work with me being in the hospital, and on the way home I was just telling him that we needed to be in prayer because funds in the bank account were running pretty low. What a blessing this wonderful lady and her husband were to us!

My doctor’s visit that Friday went very well, good blood pressure readings, and my amniotic fluid level was back at a 12, which is the magic number of where it is supposed to be. Friday night we had my family’s Christmas celebration, and I spent most of the day trying to finish up the gifts for that night without overdoing it. By the end of the night though I was worn out, and myself, my parents, and the girls were all going a little stir crazy with each other, so Nick decided to take us home.

It was a relief to get back to my own bed, and I tried to take it easy, although that’s easier said than done with a two year old. Saturday night we had a Christmas celebration at Nick’s aunt’s house, and Nick and I spent a few hours that night getting all of Morgan’s and Daisy’s gifts wrapped and under the tree.

Before going into the hospital, I had found Nick a few token gifts, nothing big, but things I knew he would like. We rarely get each other anything of any substance for Christmas, just because our money generally goes toward buying for the girls and everyone else, but we usually come up with something small for each other. I gave him the things I had for him, and he surprised me with the start of a Willow Tree Nativity set, complete with a stable he made himself! I’ve collected Willow Tree figurines for years, mostly getting them from family as birthday gifts, and I’ve wanted a nativity forever, but the price was always too high. He found the 6 piece starter set on sale at a little Christian book store, and he told me that he plans to buy me a new piece every year! I love, love, love the idea of this, and I was thrilled with the gift!

Sunday morning Morgan woke us all up bright and early, and we all piled downstairs for the girls to open their gifts. They loved everything they got, and I was pleased and relieved to find that they appreciated the handmade and thrift store items just as much as the few new things they got.

After they opened gifts at home, we went to his dad’s house, and that’s where Christmas got really interesting! I got some makeup that I’d been needing, and some body care stuff from Victoria’s Secret, as well as a curved shower curtain rod, something Nick had been wanting for our bathroom for ages. Nick got an airbrush kit, some golf shoes, and a couple of florescent light ballasts with extra light bulbs for our garage, something that we’d needed FOREVER.

Morgan got some pajama pants and some boots and some hair styling tools and some scrapbooking stuff. Daisy got a fuzzy pink rocking horse, a very sweet handmade snowman shirt and tutu (from my SIL R), and a cute pair of shoes (that she immediately put on the rocking horse lol). Then my MIL brought out the gifts Nick’s sister K had sent.

Now I’ve mentioned before that K and her husband are both very well off and very generous, but I honestly wasn’t expecting the level of gifts they got us this year. First of all, Morgan opened up a really cute pair of boots that she’d been wanting, and then she opened up…………..an iPad 2! And not just an iPad, but an iPad with about $250 worth of accessories, including Skull Candy headphones, a smart cover for the iPad, a car charger, and $140 worth of iTunes gift cards! We were stunned, to say the least, and we just about had to peel her off the ceiling!

Then my MIL brought in these two super nice rolling duffle bags, one with Nick’s name embroidered on it, and one with Morgan’s. Morgan’s was stuffed completely full of gorgeous clothes and shoes for Daisy, and Nick’s was completely full of clothes, blankets, etc. for Jack! There was also a very cool little toiletries case inside one of them for me.

THEN, my MIL handed me a card from K and her husband. Inside was a very nice check and a note that it was to help with bills! What an amazingly generous gift altogether!

When I got the unexpected card on Wednesday with the money inside, there was a note from my friend telling me that they were so glad to be able to be in a position to be of help to us, and they hoped that we would someday soon be in a position to pass the blessing along. We knew immediately that this was our opportunity to do so, and we began making plans to bless my brother and his wife, who have been facing some financial issues lately. The next evening we took them out to dinner, and while there they spilled the secret that they had just found out that they’re expecting their first baby! After dinner we stopped at Wal-Mart, and bought them their first baby gift, and it was so much fun to be able to treat someone else! We were also able to pay my parents back a couple of hundred dollars that they loaned us when we bought the Sequoia, and I know they were relieved to get it.

Anyway, back to the pregnancy…that day (the day after Christmas), my blood pressure at the doctor’s visit was a little on the high side, and the amniotic fluid level had dropped to 10. But things were not worrisome enough as of yet to send me back to the hospital, so she sent me home again with orders to drink lots of water and really stick to the bed rest. Other than dinner with my brother and his wife, I did just that. My mom came over the next day to watch the kids for me, and I only got out of bed to move to the couch just before Nick got home.

My next doctor’s appointment was Wednesday. Despite all the continuous resting, hydrating, and low sodium diet, my blood pressure readings had continued to climb since the visit two days earlier, and I was concerned enough to pack a small bag just in case I had to be readmitted. It turns out that was a wise choice, because the visit showed that my amniotic fluid was back down to an 8, and the baby had dropped down to the 11th percentile on the growth chart. They estimated his size at 3lb 13oz. She me sent back over to check in again, and I’ve been here ever since.

She’s been doing ultrasounds every two days, and today’s indicated that we can likely only get another 2-3 days out of the pregnancy before we have to induce. She will do another ultrasound tomorrow instead of waiting till Tuesday. The good news is that Jack himself seems to be doing very well other than just being very small. Today we could see him sucking his thumb and making other little nursing motions, and his breathing movements are looking great. He’s very active, and is handling the frequent nonstress tests very well.

When she did the ultrasound on Friday she told me that she thought that if we could get to 35 1/2 weeks now we would have a take-home baby, which is a week sooner than she was thinking before. I’ll be 34 weeks and 4 days tomorrow, so we’re within about a week of that now. I did take a tour of the NICU a few days ago, just to prepare myself, but I’m praying fervently that God gives him the strength and level of development needed to avoid us having to leave him here at all!

Last night Nick brought the girls down to ring in the new year with me. My brother and his wife and well as Nick’s sister R and her husband also came down. The siblings and spouses left about 12:30, but Nick and the girls stayed all night. That wasn’t exactly the plan, but Nick pulled out the pullout couch to lay down for just a minute, and in no time at all he was fast asleep. Morgan played on her iPad, and Daisy snuggled up next to me, and I just couldn’t bear to wake him up and send them home. I had the nurse bring us a couple of extra pillows and blankets, and Morgan shared the pullout with Nick and was asleep by about 2:00. It was really so sweet to have them here, and just the best feeling in the world to have Daisy’s little arms wrapped around me while she slept. My blood pressure was lower today, and I really believe that’s why!

Anyway, that’s what’s going on with us. I really, really, REALLY appreciate all your prayers and sweet comments, and I apologize for not having access to reply to them. Please do continue to pray for us – Matthew 18:19 tells us:

“Again I say unto you, That if two of you shall agree on earth as touching any thing that they shall ask, it shall be done for them of my Father which is in heaven.”

So I’m asking you to please be in prayer that our baby is born healthy and strong, with no complications resulting from his prematurity, and that we are able to take him home with us when we leave!

Quick Update

2011-12-24T12:25:00.001-05:00

This is just a very, very quick update to let everyone know what’s going on. I was finally able to come home from the hospital on Wednesday afternoon. It took some experimenting, but we seem to have finally found the right combo of blood pressure meds, and I’m getting doses at 6AM, 9AM, noon, 6PM, and midnight. Still, it’s better than having to be woken up every two hours for blood pressure readings!

The girls and I stayed at my parents’ house Wednesday night and Thursday night, but Nick brought us home last night, at least for a couple of days, which was wonderful. I love my parents, but it was honestly really stressful just spending that much time with them and the kids in the same house. Yesterday my dad took me back to the doctor, and things still look good on the ultrasound. My amniotic fluid is back to normal, the baby looks good, and the blood flow to the placenta is still improving. I have to go back again on Monday for another ultrasound.

Last night before we went home we had Christmas at my parents’ house, so I spent a few hours after my doctor’s visit working on the unfinished gifts we had to give last night. Nothing terribly strenuous, and my bp stayed within the acceptable range, but I’m glad to be done with that part of it.

I have a few more to finish today, so I’ve got to go, but I wanted to say thank you so very much for all the wonderful thoughts and prayers (and a very special gift from a dear friend on here – thank you L!).

So here’s what’s up…

2011-12-17T02:25:00.001-05:00

Okay, so it’s been a couple of weeks since I posted. I’ve been crazy busy trying to get all the Christmas presents made (and a few of them bought). Unfortunately that all came to a standstill a few days ago, but more on that in a minute.

Nick ended up buying the truck from my dad. We used part of the insurance money to pay off some bills, which got rid of some high interest stuff and freed up more than enough to cover taking out a small car loan at a low interest rate to pay for the truck. It also had to be registered and have new tires (the others were seriously dangerous), and it will have to have a new fuel pump, but the rest of the insurance money has pretty much covered that.

Now, baby news:

At my doctor’s visit on the 1st, I had gained 10 pounds (from a starting loss of 3). She had wanted me to start gaining some, but I was a little unhappy to see 10 pounds in one month. Still my doctor was fine with it, so I decided to be too. My blood pressure was up a little at that visit, but I had forgotten to take my pill that morning, so we assumed that was why.

Wednesday I went in for my next visit and an ultrasound. My weight was up another 11 pounds (in 13 days time!) and I kind of freaked out. There was just no way that I had gained 21 pound in 6 weeks. It turns out it was all (probably including the first 10) fluid. My bp was very high, despite having taken my pill that morning.

We discovered the high bp after the ultrasound. Nick had come with me to the visit, and we anxiously watched the monitor to see how much the baby had grown and how my amniotic fluid level was. As it turns out, things were not ideal. My fluid level was pretty low, somewhat concerning, but even more so coupled with the fact that the baby was showing smaller than he should be. At the last ultrasound 4 weeks prior, he was in the 35th percentile on the growth chart. This time he had dropped to the 15th percentile.

The ultra stenographer had me go out to have my bp taken and to talk to the doctor. I was kind of worried at this point, but Nick was saying, “Look, don’t freak out, I’m sure it’s no big deal.”

Then my doctor came in. Now I LOVE my doctor. I’ve had her for all three babies, and besides being just an awesome practitioner, she’s also got an amazing bedside manner. She’s very low key and laid back, so when she came in with a grave look on her face and said, “Okay, we need to turn this around. I want you to go check in and we’ll get you on the baby monitor and hooked up to an IV”, well I really started to panic. Even then though, I assumed she was talking about a 3 or 4 hour procedure, after which I would go home.

Nope, this was to be at least an overnight visit. At this point Nick was looking a little pale himself, but we grabbed my purse and headed over to the women’s pavilion part of the hospital to check in. We called my mom on the way to let her know what was happening since she was watching Daisy, and she assured us they would get Morgan after school and keep the girls overnight.

I got checked in and put in a room on fluids and a baby monitor, and they gave me a steroid shot to help mature Jack’s lungs in case he needed to be delivered.

They did some blood work to see if it looked like I was in danger of needing an immediate c-section, but fortunately that all came back okay for the time being. After a bit my doctor came to check up on me and let me know that I would be in there till at least Friday to give the amniotic fluid time to build back up and my blood pressure to get under control. She tripled my bp meds dosage and told me she would come do an ultrasound Friday morning.

Friday morning there was absolutely no change in my fluid level after about 30 hours of being on an IV as well as drinking plenty of liquids orally. The placenta shows some damage from the combination of the low amniotic fluids plus the stress from the high blood pressure. At this point it’s not unrecoverable damage, but it’s very important that the fluid levels come up and the bp stay down so that the placenta can grow and recover. Right now it’s showing a diminished level of blood flow, which is why the baby is so small. They’re measuring him at about 3 lb 1 oz.

She told me after the ultrasound that the very, very, very earliest she was willing to even speculate that I might be able to go home will be Monday, and that’s only if everything looks great on the ultrasound she will do then and my bp is consistently low. If there’s not been a marked improvement by Monday, then she will most likely induce labor or do a c-section.

I’m 32 weeks and 2 days now, and she’d ideally like to get me to 36 and 1/2 weeks. She said that with the steroid treatment (I had the 2nd shot 24 hours after the 1st) that at that point I should be able to take him home with me. But if he comes now, we’re looking at several weeks in the NICU, possibly up to 8.

This has been such a crazy surreal experience for me, mostly I guess because it just happened with no real warning. I never had any sort of problems with Morgan’s or Daisy’s pregnancies, at least not to the point that it would have caused them to have to be born too early. Morgan came 3 weeks early on her own, and Daisy was induced 2 weeks early because I was halfway dilated and she was fully developed and considered full term.

Nick stayed overnight with me Wednesday and Thursday, then went to work the next day, but tonight I’m by myself. There was a family Christmas celebration tonight (which I was pretty sad to miss), and he attended and took the girls home with him to give my parents a break. They did stop by to see me for a few minutes, but it’s killing me to be away from them so much. Prior to Wednesday, Daisy had never been away from us overnight. She did okay that night, but Thursday night she got to missing us really bad.

I would really appreciate all your prayers on this situation, most especially that I can hang onto the pregnancy long enough for him to not have to go to the NICU.

Crazy, busy, blessed life

2011-12-03T23:53:00.000-05:00

Gosh, I can’t believe it’s been 11 days since I posted! Ah well, it’s been a busy couple of weeks. The last time I posted was right after Nick’s car accident. Let’s see…

The next day (Wednesday) we had an appointment to have an inspector come look at our roof. There was no real reason for this other than that the company called offering free inspections and there have been some pretty bad storms in the area in the last year. We really weren’t expecting any sort of bad news, but it turns out that we had an actual hole in the roof about 6 inches in diameter, along with various other damaged spots. The roofing guy made it sound like it was the worst roof he’s ever seen, which naturally worried me a bit. I called my father-in-law (who is head of construction at a large hospital in our area), and he came over to check it out after the guy left.

The hole in the roof does indeed exist, but it’s on the edge of the eave. While it does need to be fixed, it’s not as urgent as the roofer made it sound. My FIL did a temporary repair with sheet metal, and we’ll have to see if we can get the insurance to pay for a new roof. The issue there is that we had to get a new insurance company a couple of months ago. The damage on the roof seems to be clearly from prior to that time, so we’re going to have to try to get the old company to pay for the repairs/replacement. Just another thing we’ve got to leave in God’s capable hands.

Thanksgiving was that Thursday. Ours was nice. We spent it at my parents’ house, as we do most years. Afterwards Nick and my brothers went hunting while Morgan, Daisy, my sisters-in-law, and I went to a local Christmas tree festival. This is something I’ve attended a number of times over the years, and my mother-in-law’s co-worker got us free tickets, which was very nice. It did turn out to be pretty exhausting (the perils of hauling a two year old around while 7 months pregnant), but it was a good way to get into the Christmas spirit.

Thursday was also the day I was supposed to get the final payment for the wedding Nick and I shot in October. We were actually supposed to be paid the previous week, but the bride asked if we could wait till she got paid again on Thanksgiving, and I agreed. This was the money I was counting on to pay our electric bill. Because it was Thanksgiving day I texted the bride and told her I’d be happy to wait till the next day if she needed me to. She texted me back saying that she would be out of town till Friday night and asking if she could pay me the following Thursday when they got paid yet again. Unfortunately I had extended our electric bill final notice as far as possible after the bride couldn’t pay me the first time, and the coming Monday was the last day we had to pay before disconnection. I explained this to her and she said she would try to come up with the money by Saturday.

Saturday she texted me and asked me to meet her to get the money at 2PM the next day. But the next day she called me and told me that she wasn’t going to be able to pay me that weekend after all. At that point I told her that I understood and that I would just be praying about it, and I asked her to please call me if she was able to come up with the money. A few hours later she called and said she had $200 (of the $300 due) and asked me to meet her. While it wasn’t quite enough to pay the electric bill, it was certainly better than nothing, so I headed out to meet her. When I got there she had the whole $300. I don’t know how or where they came up with it, but it was certainly a relief to be able to put it in the bank and pay the electric bill the next day!

The next hurdle on the horizon was the house payment. The very last day it could be paid without being late enough to go on our credit report was this past Wednesday. You know, there have been many times in the last couple of years especially that we’ve been in a relatively desperate situation financially, and God has come through for us. Every. Single. Time.

But this time, although I knew He would provide, I was completely stymied as to how He was going to do it. There just seemed to be nothing at all on the horizon, especially considering Nick’s car wreck, the whole roof issue, and the fact that his next paycheck looked to be shaping up to be pretty short due to the holiday (and resulting lack of customers at his job).

On Tuesday the car insurance guy came out to do the adjustment on Nick’s car. He not only totaled it out (the best possible outcome for us), but he gave us about $2000 more for it than we expected. This allowed us to pay the house payment as well as supplement Nick’s paycheck as we needed to for the rest of the bills. We still have some money left to put down on another vehicle for Nick. My dad recently bought a used truck at auction for a good price, and he’s told us that he’s willing to sell it to Nick for what he has in it. We’re still praying about whether or not this is the direction God wants us to go, but He has been so amazingly good to us, and I know He will lead us the right way!

On Wednesday my friend Elizabeth had her baby – a beautiful, perfect 5 lb 12 oz girl! She’s tiny, but oh so beautiful with tons of gorgeous dark hair. Elizabeth was just 8 weeks ahead of me, and I can’t believe my own pregnancy is getting so far along!

Thursday I went in for my 30 week appointment, and I’ll go back on the 14th for another ultrasound. Friday I went in to see Elizabeth and the baby and took her hospital pictures for her. It was so awesome to get to snuggle that precious baby girl, and it just made me ache to have little Jack in my arms!

Tonight was Nick’s company Christmas party. This was the first year he didn’t win any prizes, but it was so much fun to get to dress up and have a date night with my hubby! We also got to go see a movie this past Sunday. We hadn’t been to see a movie in a theater since May of last year, so when my mom offered to watch the kids, we jumped on the chance. We still had the movie gift card Nick got for his birthday in 2010, so it was completely free except for $4.00 toward the drink we shared (seriously – $5.75 for a drink! You’d better bet we got a refill!). We saw Hugo in 3D, and it was a really neat movie.

Anyway, this has been a crazy long post, so I’ll save the ABC’s of Gratitude and the pregnancy update for the next one.

Blessed nonetheless…

2011-11-22T23:37:00.000-05:00

It’s been a stressful few days. Sunday the baby was very, very inactive. As in I didn’t feel him moving for about 22 hours. Now this happened with Morgan too, and they had me go in for monitoring. I’m nearly 29 weeks along, and I’m at the point where I should be able to count kicks a few times a day and get 10 movements within an hour. So I called my doctor, and sure enough she sent me down to the women’s pavilion at the hospital for monitoring. As it turned out, he was just fine, and once they hooked up the monitors he woke right up, so they sent me home pretty soon. Yesterday and today he’s been quite active, and in fact is rolling around in there right now.

Yesterday I realized that the function keys on my laptop were no longer working. This wasn’t a huge big deal since there’s a work around for almost all of them, but the major problem was that I had no way to disable my touchpad. This was a real issue because my cursor had developed some crazy level of sensitivity, jumping around constantly during typing and making it a huge pain in the butt to write an email or blog. It kept jumping back to earlier on the page and causing me to type in the middle of a word or even highlighting sections and causing me to type over and delete them.

I wanted to be able to disable to touchpad while my mouse was plugged in, or at least decrease the sensitivity so that it wouldn’t read every little accidental brush as a click, but the computer repair guy had not reinstalled the controls for my touchpad when he reinstalled Windows 7. I gave him a call and he asked me to bring it back down. I took in back in this morning on my way to get Daisy’s hair cut, and they called me before the end of the day to say that it was done. I picked it up and he had reinstalled the touchpad controls and set it to disable the touchpad only when the mouse is plugged in, which is what I wanted.

He also opened up the keyboard to make sure all the cords inside were properly seated and discovered that someone (cough, Daisy) had spilled something on the keyboard. Not sure what it was, but fortunately it had missed all the critical parts and dried quite harmlessly. There was again no charge for this trip, and I really think I’m finally done with repairs.

We also had them look at Nick’s laptop the other day, and they were able to get it operational again, but we will have to wait to pick it for a few weeks because we don’t have the $149 to cover the repair fee.

Tonight Nick called home about 6:00 to tell me that he’d been in a car accident. He’s okay, thank God, but it wasn’t a pretty picture. No one at all was hurt, but his foot apparently slipped off the clutch and he slammed pretty hard into the car in front of him, causing a chain reaction of rear-end collisions including 5 cars counting his.

My parents were due to pick Morgan up for church soon when he called, so I called and asked them to come on down so I could go pick him up. Daisy was asleep, and we left Morgan in charge of her for the 10 minutes it took my parents to get there while I headed out to get him. It was a really awful rainy night, and I’m just so thankful it wasn’t worse. He was pretty shaken up, but it wasn’t as bad as it could have been. When I got there the wrecker service had already arrived for him, and the wrecker driver was one of his good friends from high school, which gave him a bit of a distraction.

We do have full coverage insurance, and the cop didn’t ticket him for anything, probably due to the awful road conditions. I know the accident will be written up as his fault, but his tags were also expired, and the cop didn’t seem to notice. It’s not something we were neglecting – in fact we had planned to get them renewed last week, but we ended up having to pay for my computer repairs first so that I could finish the wedding photos.

Car accidents always feel like the end of the world to me for some reason, even when they aren’t serious, but I know that God is still in control, and He certainly had His hand on Nick’s safety. And we’re fortunate to have two vehicles, so it won’t be a problem for Nick to get to work and back until his is repaired (if it can be repaired). Actually, it might even be better if they would just total it out. We own it outright, so that way we wouldn’t have to pay out the $500 deductible, but could instead just take the payment for it (less the deductible) and put it toward getting him something else. In fact, he’d been seriously considering selling it to get a pickup truck for a while. Since the Xterra was too small to fit all three kids in, we’ll be taking the Sequoia everywhere as a family anyway once the baby’s here, so it makes going with a much needed pickup for him to drive daily a feasible prospect.

I guess this post is just to remind me that even in the middle of all these little and big crises, God is still right here taking care of us. In fact, since I’ve been such an awful slacker about it, it would be a good time to list a few more things I’m thankful for:

O, P, & Q:

Orgasms – enough said on that one!
Orange Italian Ice – yes, I know I listed this one under “I” too, but I really love it!
Old friends – like the one who drove the wrecker tonight, and the one we had a visit from last week. That one was one of Nick’s best men when we got married (he had 2), and we hadn’t seen him in ages, so it was great to get to catch up. I also got to visit with one of my old friends from high school about a week and a half ago, and it was such a fun day of girl talk and crafting!
Ordinary days – where nothing much happens, but nothing much goes wrong either
Pasta – I know, I know carbs, carbs, carbs. But I do love it, and it generally makes dinner a snap.
Pinterest – Holy Inspiration, Batman! I’m ridiculously obsessed.
Precious two-year olds – Daisy has reached the stage where we have a hard time even wrapping our heads around how cute she is. Example: watching her do the sign language motions along with the host on her night time toddler program. They also run a montage of all the characters on the network sleeping every night, and she tells every single one good night as they play across the screen. I mentioned before that when she wants something, she says “Hin me (hand me)_____.” The other day she said “Hin me fiss bum.” I didn’t understand her, so she rolled her eyes and said with great patience “Hin me five.” Turns out she wanted a fist bump and then a high five, lol.

Photography – I’m so blessed to have a good camera and to even be able to make some money with it sometimes!
Quiet – sweet, sweet silence when I can get it lol.
Quilts – I love blankets of all kinds, but I especially appreciate a nice, heavyweight quilt.
Qi – Wikipedia tells me this means life force or life energy, but I just like it because it’s almost always a high score on Words with Friends, the game Nick and I play with each other via phone all day every day!

Other blessings:

Morgan brought home an A/B Honor roll report card today, as well as a certificate showing she was promoted to the next reading group level.
Morgan also cleaned out the freezer for me the other day (something I had been dreading), and she helped me clean out the fridge.
A guy Nick works with gave us a huge trailer full of free firewood a few days ago.
My mom found a good deal on diapers and bought us a box out of the blue yesterday.
Last week my mom also bought me this awesome double jogging stroller for an amazing price. I found it at the Goodwill. It was priced at $50, a great deal since it was in perfect shape and retails for about $225, but to make it even better it was half-off day, so we got it for $25! I actually just called my mom to see if she knew anyone who needed it since it was such a fabulous deal and I knew we didn’t have the extra money for it, and she had me just get it for us and gave me the money for it.

Nick has had a few side jobs lately that have helped with bills, and I should get the rest of the wedding photography money on Thursday. That will pay the electric bill, although we’re still waiting on God to send the house payment.
My brother who has been in L.A. on assignment for a few months just bought a house about 3 minutes from us. He’s still in California till January or so, but my parents are closing on it by proxy tomorrow. As part of the deal, the current owners agreed to put on a new roof with my brother only responsible for half of their insurance copay.

And a baby update:

Week 29 of Pregnancy

Your baby's packing on the pounds, which look so cute on her. If only you could say the same for your varicose veins….

Your Baby in Week 29 of Pregnancy

How big is your baby this week? She weighs nearly three pounds now and measures about 17 inches. Though she's getting pretty close to her birth length, she still has to chub out a bit. In fact, over the next 11 weeks, she'll more than double — or even come close to tripling — her weight. And as she grows and the room in your womb gets tighter, you'll be less likely to feel those big kicks and more likely to get poked by an elbow or jabbed by a knee.

Learn more about your baby in week 29 and baby fat.

Week 29 Pregnancy Tip: Counting Baby's Kicks

Have you counted your baby's kicks today? Once you've passed week 28, you should be counting them every day. To make sure that you do — and to make sure that everything's A-OK in your belly — make a habit of counting your baby's kicks twice a day, once in the morning and once at night. Best to do your counting lying down (since babies are more likely to kick up when Mom's lying down — a pattern they tend to continue after they're born). If you can't lie down, sit. Count any and all movements (even swishes and rolls) until you hit ten. If you haven't reached ten within an hour (your little Rockette may just be on her break right now), have a light snack and try again — that blood-sugar rush is likely to get baby on the move again. Just remember that fewer than ten movements within two hours warrants a call to your practitioner. Chances are everything's fine, but it's always better to be safe than sorry.

Source

New toys!

2011-11-22T04:23:00.001-05:00

Hi, guys. I know I just did a toy review, but I wanted to tell you about some that I picked out for myself. A few weeks ago Eden Fantasys offered me the option to feature a banner and/or a text link on the blog in return for store credit.

Now I don’t participate in affiliate programs for a couple of reasons, the main one being that I always find myself mildly suspicious of recommendations from people who are making money off of me following their link and purchasing. That’s not to say that I dislike you if you use affiliate programs or that I think you’re dishonest, just that I think affiliate programs in general tend to cast a shadow of doubt on honest reviewers. Obviously I don’t mind reviewing a product, but I don’t feel comfortable asking people to buy when I know that it will profit me (I know, I’m a lousy salesperson!). If you’d like for me to review a product, by all means, get in touch, but please understand that I’m only willing to offer my honest opinion.

All of that said, I’ve always been happy to feature a banner for a company that I have a reviewer/customer relationship with if I feel that the company is indeed worth it. In fact, I’ve had a non-compensated Eden Fantasys banner up on my sidebar for months now. That being the case, I was tickled to have them offer compensation for something I’ve been doing anyway, and they were very easy to work with in finding something to fit in with the design and width of my sidebar.

My gift cards arrived quickly via email, and I got to pick out some very cool toys that were definitely not within our regular budget, and I thought it would be neat to recommend something to you that I picked out all by myself.

First of all, I did a quick Google search for coupons (something I do no matter what I’m ordering online) and found a 20% off coupon on this site. This gave me some extra money to play with, and Eden Fantasys orders are always free shipping over $59. I made a list and came up with 4 toys I wanted.

First of all, to get the small one out of the way, I’ve long been interested in having a small, unintimidating butt plug. This one seemed to fit the bill, and I’ve been really pleased with it. And with my 20% off coupon, it was only $10.39.

The second toy I picked out was a Hitachi Magic Wand. Sometimes it seemed like I was the last person on earth without one, and I just couldn’t resist. Plus they were on sale (and still are as of right now) for $41.24. I have to say, I’m very impressed with it, although maybe not in the way everyone else is. I find that it’s a bit too powerful (even on low) and broad to be effective at bringing me to orgasm, but in it’s intended use as a massager it’s amazing! Nick went over my whole body with it, and it was the most relaxing massage I’ve ever had! I will say that I used it to add some general vibrations down there during sex, and Nick was pretty much blown away, so it will definitely come into play for that again. All in all, I’m very glad I bought it.

The third toy I got was a JimmyJane Form 2. Let me first of all say that this is NOT an inexpensive toy. It retails on Eden Fantasys for $144.99, and even with my coupon it was $115.99. However, I had heard tons of good things about JimmyJane Form Vibrators, and I really wanted to give it a try. I have to say that I’m really impressed with it, and if you can afford it, it’s worth getting. First of all, it’s rechargeable, always a HUGE plus in my book. And a single charge gets you 7 hours of use! It’s also waterproof, although I’ve yet to try this feature out. I found it very easy to operate, and there are multiple speeds and pulse modes. The texture is very comfortable, and the two “ears” are tremendously well suited to clitoral stimulation. The only downside I’ve found to it so far is that if it’s tucked in place and I squeeze my legs together too hard it’s possible to accidentally turn it up, down, or off.

The fourth toy I got was a Lelo Lily. Now these are normally $117, but right now they’re on sale for $87.75, which is even cheaper than I got it for ($93.60). This is the toy I recommend the most. In fact, I already have one, and I love it so much that I took the opportunity to make sure that I have a back-up if anything ever happens to the first one. I got the first one as a review product from another company almost 19 months ago, and it has been used literally 5-7 times a week ever since then. It shows absolutely no wear and tear, and I usually only have to charge it once maybe every 5-6 weeks. Like the Form 2, it gives you 7 hours of use on a single two hour charge, which means that if it happens to reach the end of its charge in the middle of things, I can actually plug it up for 5 minutes and get enough of a charge to finish things up.

The shape is absolutely perfect for tucking in against my clit, and the velvety texture is very comfortable. Also like the Form 2, it has multiple speed and pulse modes, although the Lily is not waterproof. I have a tendency to have a hard time getting to sleep at night, and a quick orgasm gets me settled almost every time, which is why it gets used so much. It’s very, very quiet, and it even features a locking feature to keep it from getting turned on accidentally during travel. It comes with a little satin travel pouch, but when we travel anywhere overnight I have a zipper pouch that I made myself that carries the Lily, my favorite glass dildo, and my favorite pair of tweezers (I inherited my dad’s eyebrows, and I’m not letting those suckers get out of control!).

Anyway, I obviously recommend the Lelo Lily. Yes, it’s a bit pricey, but in my opinion it’s totally worth it, and over a year and a half’s worth of significant use has proven that it’s a quality product. It was so much fun to get to pick out some toys I couldn’t normally afford, and after all my gift cards and the coupon, I only spent $1.22 out of pocket! Merry Christmas to me!

Well, I’m off to bed! And the, er, Lily…

Eden Fantasys Review: Tenga Egg

2011-11-21T14:44:00.001-05:00

It’s review time again! Actually it was review time a few days ago, but my computer woes turned out to be more extensive than I thought!

I got the laptop back last Monday afternoon, and it ran pretty well for all of one whole day. Then on Wednesday morning I got a Windows message telling me that there was a hard disc error and that I should back up my files ASAP. I called the computer repair place back, and they told me to bring it back down. Further inspection showed that my hard drive was indeed dying. Fortunately they still had all my files backed up on their server (I hadn’t lost them yet, but this way they didn’t have to go through the whole time-consuming back up again). They told me that there would be no labor charge since they had just given the computer back to me, but I would need to pay for the new hard drive.

To make long story short(ish), I had them put in a 500 GB hard drive (it was only $20 more than a 250 GB replacement would have been). I got it back the next day, and it’s been running BEAUTIFULLY!

Anyway, as the title says, it’s review time again! I’ve felt kind of bad that all the toys I’ve reviewed have been pretty much just for me, so this time I asked to see something from their line of masturbation sleeves. What they chose for me/us was a fun little toy called the Tenga Egg.

This neat little product is a very discreet, very portable, one-time-use silicone masturbation sleeve. There are a number of different internal textures, but the one they sent us was the Twister.

When we unwrapped the egg, the shell looked just like, well, an egg. It was pure white, had an eggshell texture, and opened just like your typical Easter egg hunt toy. Inside though, it was definitely the prize egg! The shell contained a hollow silicone egg. The hole in the bottom of the egg contained a small white tube with a single-serve foil pack of lube inside. The inside of the sleeve was ridged in the pattern indicated on the egg wrapper.

It was all pretty self explanatory, but there were instructions included if you need them. You just fill the sleeve with the included lube, slip the egg over the penis and go to town with it. It was a lot of fun to use together, Nick was very impressed with the feel of the egg, and it definitely got the job done. It also had a tremendous amount of stretch to it, so even though the resting length of the sleeve is about 2”, you won’t have to worry about running out of room when it’s in use.

The price on the Tenga Eggs is $9.99, so it won’t break the bank, but keep in mind that this is a one-time-only use toy. That said, I wouldn’t recommend buying this just as an addition to your toy box since it’s not intended for reuse. BUT, I do think it would be an excellent purchase for certain occasions. For instance, it would make a lovely stocking stuffer for the man in your life. I also think it would be fabulous to slip into his suitcase with a seductive note if he’s going away on business for a few days. And it would certainly be a wonderful addition to an anniversary date - after all, you can pay almost as much for a card, and they’re certainly less fun!

The Tenga Eggs are 100% silicone (except for the shell, obviously), and the specs straight from the site are as follows:

Safety features:: Food-grade material / Hypo-allergenic / Latex free / Non-porous / Phthalates free

Shape / Design / Size / Fit

Color:
Clear
Length:
2"
Fits up to:
3"
Circumference:
5 1/2"
Weight:
1.7 oz

After use, we did wash the egg out, let it dry, and put it away to try it again sometime, but I did notice some thinning of the silicone at the top of the sleeve, so I don’t anticipate it lasting very long. Still, for a single serving toy, it was a ton of fun, and we’re both glad we got to try it! As always, please remember to check out Eden Fantasys for all your sex toys needs!

Eden Fantasys provided me with this product to review at no charge, but I was in no was compensated for this review, and all opinions are my own.

Laptop, sweet laptop

2011-11-16T04:21:00.001-05:00

So, It’s been a while since I posted. My laptop started running REALLY slow about a month ago. I tried all kinds of things, including of course multiple virus scans, but nothing helped. Finally, about a week and a half ago, I was having a terrible time wading through the editing on the pictures from the wedding Nick and I shot. Nick told me to take the computer in to be serviced, and they told me I would have it back within a couple of days. Unfortunately it took them a full week, but they did get it all fixed. There were several viruses on board, so we just had them back up all my files and reinstall Windows 7 completely. Apparently I had over 10 times the amount of files to as the “average” user, heh, which is what took so long. Sadly I missed this years Love Our Lurkers Day in the meantime.

Anyway, I’m very glad to have it back, and when I get a chance I’ve got some very cool new toys I want to tell you about.

Nick and I had a conversation about DD the other day. It was very low key, which was good, and he admitted that he’s just not comfortable with spanking while I’m pregnant, but that he’s still on board with the rest of it. That was very welcome news to me since it’s been a few months since there was any spanking.

Baby Jack is doing well. I had an ultrasound a week ago, and he’s about two pounds now. I gained the 3 pounds she wanted me to plus (gulp) 7 more. BUT, I made the mistake of going to my appointment directly after eating a pretty heavy lunch at a Mexican restaurant with Nick, so I honestly think about 3 pounds of it was due to enchiladas. Either way, a net gain of 7 pounds is not terrible for being almost 7 months pregnant, and my doctor is actually quite happy with my progress. Still, it’s hard for me to watch the number on the scale go up, but I just have to remember that it’s good for the baby. I go back for my next appointment on December 1.

Anyway, that’s what’s been going on with me. Hope you guys are doing well!

November already!

2011-11-01T23:51:00.000-04:00

Gosh, I can’t believe it’s already November! This whole year has honestly just flown by! So, a few gratitude items:

ABCs of Gratitude:

L,M, & N since I missed a few weeks…

Love – it almost seems to trite and obvious, but how could I leave it out?

Lemons – I love just about anything lemon flavored (Nick made me a lemon cake with cream cheese icing for my birthday), and I love how fresh and clean they make things smell!

Lips – Nick has the most amazing lips, and I love everything they do!

Laptops – Right now we’re having some problems with both of ours. Mine has something wrong with it that no virus scan seems to be able to find, and Nick’s is currently in pieces waiting on us to be able to order a part it needs. But even if I can only use mine in safe mode right now, I’m so glad I have it!

Making things – this year is going to be by and far a handmade Christmas, but I’m pretty confident that the projects I have in the works are suitable and gift-worthy, and I’m grateful to have the skill to make them!

Marriage – I’m so very blessed in the marriage God has given me. Like any couple, we have our disagreements, but I truly believe that ours is a great love story.

Nick – Of course this is the guy that makes that last one so great.

Naps – I don’t get to take them all that often just because life is so busy these days, but I sure do enjoy the luxury when I get the opportunity! In fact, I came home today from a super stressful trip to Wal-Mart and Target with both kids, just ready to pull my hair out, and Nick sent me upstairs to take one and just decompress. It was wonderful!

Nikon – I love my camera, and I’m so glad I went with the one I chose!

Recent blessings- The wedding Nick and I shot the day after my last post went very well. It was Nick’s first time shooting, and he was really nervous, but he did great, and we had a lot of fun working together! Also, when Nick’s sister came to pick her camera back up, she refused to take the $50 payment for letting us use it!

I passed my glucose test! I was VERY excited about this. Diabetes runs heavily in my family, and every time you have gestational diabetes it increases your likelihood of developing the disease later on down the road. Since I had it with Daisy despite keeping my weight gain strictly under control, I was pretty resigned to finding out I had it with this baby too. And beyond dreading all the extra precautions and sugar testing and special diet, I was really dreading having to shell out an extra $40 a month or so for blood sugar test strips, so it was a big relief to find out I passed!

Nick was on vacation last week, and I loved having him home! We did the wedding on Monday, then just kind of had a relaxing week together. He got to go spend one day playing golf with one of his friends and one of my brothers, and on Thursday he was able to go haul off some more scrap metal, which gave us some much needed extra money to make a couple of payments (including the house payment!)

The kids had a good time last night trick or treating. Morgan had just kind of a random costume going on with heavy zombie looking eyes and fake blood all over her face. Daisy had the CUTEST lady bug costume, but she HATED it! I ended up just sticking her in her warm fuzzy footsie pajamas and wheeling her around the neighborhood in her stroller with Morgan. She was amazed at the whole thing though - she couldn't believe all the candy she got (and neither could I!).

I’ve gotten a few Christmas gifts knocked out already. I’m making some zipper pouches for some of the women in the family. I have one of those done, as well as a couple of bird feeders made from thrifted tea cups and saucers and copper pipe. They’re really pretty! I’m also giving out 7 sets of these nativity sets, and I’ve got all of them done, along with a set for us.

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I’ve also made a set of coasters for one of my brothers, and I’ve got the painting done on 4 of the 6 recipe card holders I’m making. I also made a heat bag/neck warmer for my parents. And I got a free bottle of nail polish with a coupon at Target today – stocking stuffer! But I still have a ton to do, so I’ve got to get going on it! Less than 8 weeks till Christmas!

Baby Update:

Week 26 of Pregnancy: Baby's Eyes Open

Your baby's eyes — which have been closed for the past few months — are now beginning to open. Your baby's brain-wave activity is also kicking in at this stage in fetal development, which means your little one can not only hear noises but can now also respond to them.

Look who's looking. Your baby's eyes — which have been closed for the past few months (so that the retina, the part of the eye that allows images to come into focus, could develop) — are beginning to open at 26 weeks pregnant. What this means is that your baby is able to see what's going on now (unfortunately the view in your uterus isn't all that exciting). But do try this at home for kicks (baby's that is): Shine a flashlight at your stomach. Your baby might kick in response (as in: "Get that light out of my eyes!").
The iris, the colored part of the eye, still doesn't have much pigmentation (that'll fill in over the next month or two), so it's too early to start guessing your baby's eye color. Even the color your baby will be born with might not be the permanent shade; so you may be kept guessing until your baby is close to six months old.
Look what else is going on this week: Your baby's brain-wave activity is kicking in at this stage in fetal development, which means your little one can not only hear noises but can now also respond to them. Not in so many words, of course, but with an increase in pulse rate or activity.

And talking about activity, at your baby's current height and weight (about nine inches tall and two pounds), and at the rate he or she is growing, your baby will soon be feeling a little cramped in your uterus. Not to worry, there's still plenty of room for your baby to grow. It just means your gymnast will have less room for those somersaults, cartwheels, and other Olympic feats.

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Randomness

2011-10-23T23:30:00.000-04:00

Ok, clearly I’m terrible about keeping up with the Thursday posts. But anyway…

So here’s what’s been going on in my life lately. First up, the 3 hour glucose test I took last Tuesday: um, I don’t know. My doctor’s office still hasn’t called me with the results. I think that’s kind of weird, because the results should have been in Wednesday at the latest. I’m sure I’ll hear from them tomorrow, and if not I’ll call them Tuesday. To be honest, I haven’t called them already because I threw a baby shower for my friend Elizabeth yesterday, and I just didn’t want to have to know about it before then if I failed.

Despite some problems getting funding, I think the shower was a success! Originally I had hoped to get donations from 7-10 people of $15-$20 each, hopefully totaling around $150. That’s about what my mom and I figured it would take to cover food and decorations, and If we had anything left over we would just give it to Elizabeth and her husband as a gift. Unfortunately we were only able to collect $70 total from 4 people, and it looked like we weren’t going to be able to do very much for her. I knew that I just didn’t have any money to put with it, and I was really praying that God would help us pull it off within the budget. We found some really good deals on some of the food, and E’s SIL came through and picked up some favor boxes and a few extra tablecloths. We ended up serving chicken salad sandwiches on french bread, a veggie and dip tray, cowboy sushi, cupcakes, cream puffs, snack mix wrapped in pink napkin diapers, and the BEST coffee punch (I’m having it at my shower in a few months). For the favors we had little clear plastic boxes topped with pink bows and filled with pink candy pearls. I also got her a balloon bouquet, and for the centerpiece on the table my mom brought her antique silver tiered plate stand to display the cupcakes. We managed to get everything for right at the $70! I didn’t have a whole lot for her in the way of a baby gift, but the night before I was cleaning out Daisy’s closet (I’m working on turning her room into a boy’s room!) and I found 5 or 6 little dresses and sweaters with the tags still on them! They were things that my mom or I had bought on sale but that Daisy had outgrown by the time the appropriate weather rolled around, so they rounded out the gift bag nicely! I’m so glad I was able to throw the shower for her, and I’m especially grateful for all the help I got from my mom and E’s SIL!

Tomorrow Nick and I are shooting a wedding together. I'm both dreading and looking forward to it. I’m looking forward to the fact that the money from it will finally mark having made enough to pay off the initial investment for the camera (and then some). We also really need the money this week (and will still need about $300 besides). But weddings are just very, very stressful, not to mention a ton of work. I’d much rather do portrait work any day, but I’m very, very grateful for the income!

We have had one hiccup already that could have been a real problem, but thankfully turned out okay. B, the wife of one of Nick’s best friends has the exact same camera as I do. Months ago when I booked the wedding (and they wanted two shooters), Nick asked her if she would be willing to rent us her camera for a few hours for $50. Nick’s sister also has a DSLR, but hers is a Canon, not a Nikon, and it’s an older model. We thought it would be best to use B’s camera if we could, just because that way I would be completely familiar with it, and all the images would be of the same quality. Anyway, she agreed, and in fact Nick brought it up with her several times, as recently as two days ago, at which time she very specifically assured him that she was still on board with it.

Tonight he texted her husband several times to tell him we needed to come get the camera, but it was taking forever to hear back from him. Finally (18 hours before the ceremony), he texted back saying that she’d changed her mind and didn’t want to rent it to us after all because the fee for the rental wouldn’t buy her a new one if we broke it.

First of all, of course it wouldn’t – if we were spending that much we would have just gone and bought a second one for ourselves. The whole reason you rent a camera is because you can’t/don’t want to invest the money to own it. Plus, she agreed to the $50! Second of all, if anything were to happen to it we would replace it, even if we had to take out a loan to buy her a new one or (gulp) give her mine (which is actually a few months newer). And lastly, it was a really crappy thing to do to someone at the 11th hour. If she had said this 2 weeks ago, or a week ago, or even 3 days ago, I would have still been irritated that she was backing out after agreeing to it at first, but I wouldn’t have been really mad about it. But to do it on a Sunday night, less than 24 hours before the wedding was just incredibly rude and inconsiderate. There is not a single place in our city where you can rent a DSLR (I checked before we even thought of asking her), and this obviously left us with no time to rent one via an online provider.

Fortunately Nick’s sister graciously agreed to rent hers to us for the same price, so I made a 10:30 PM trip to her house to pick it up and shower her with gratitude. If you happen to think of it, Nick and I would really appreciate your prayers that things go well tomorrow. Also, Daisy and I were both feeling really lousy this morning at church, and I was really afraid we were coming down with something. But we stayed home from church and rested this evening, and it seems to have helped us both.

I’ll get caught back up with the ABC’s of Gratitude, but I need to head to bed, so I’ll leave you with my baby update for now:

Week 25 of Pregnancy: Baby's Lung Development

At nine inches and more than a pound and a half in weight, your baby is taller than two juice boxes stacked one on top of the other, and almost as heavy as four of those little boxes (an analogy you'll find particularly apropos in a few years, when those juice boxes start taking over your refrigerator, your pantry, your car.…).
Don't look now (as if you could), but your baby's skin is turning pinker. No, not because he or she's getting overheated (in fact, the amniotic fluid is perfectly climate controlled, keeping your baby at an always comfortable temperature), but because small blood vessels, called capillaries, are forming under the skin and filling with blood. Later this week, blood vessels will also develop in your baby's lungs, bringing them one step closer to full maturity — and one step closer to taking that first breath of fresh air. But at 25 weeks pregnant, those lungs are still very much works in progress. Though they are already beginning to develop surfactant, a substance that will help the lungs expand after the baby is born, the lungs are still too undeveloped to sufficiently send oxygen to the bloodstream and release carbon dioxide when he or she exhales.

The lungs aren't the only system that's gearing up for air intake. Your baby's nostrils, which have been plugged up until now, are starting to open this week. This actually allows your little one to begin taking practice breaths. (Of course since there's no air in there, your baby is really only "breathing" amniotic fluid, but it's the practice that counts, right?)

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Birthday Musings

2011-10-17T23:00:00.000-04:00

Warning: some admitted whining ahead, followed by my normal sunny outlook.

Today was my birthday. Honestly, it didn’t start off very well. I stumbled out of bed this morning and got Morgan off to school, then went back to sleep for a couple of hours. I was woken by my doctor’s office calling to tell me I failed the glucose tolerance test I took on Thursday, and I’ll need to come in this week to take the three hour test.

If you’ve ever had this, you know how much it sucks. You start off by fasting for 8 hours or so. Then you go in first thing in the morning and have your blood drawn. Then they make you drink this awful syrupy glucose drink that tastes like flat orange soda that’s been sitting out for a few days. And they want you to drink it really fast. Then you wait around for an hour. Then they draw your blood again. Then you wait around for another hour. Then they draw your blood again. Then you wait around for another hour. Then they draw your blood again. Of course during all of this you feel really crappy, because you’ve been fasting, then you have to down the gross drink, and you’re dealing with all the fun of hanging out in an uncomfortable waiting room in between getting repeatedly stabbed with a needle. So basically you’re tired, bored, hungry, sore, and usually a little nauseated.

So anyway, I called my mom to see if she could watch Daisy one day this week (because that adventure is not happening with a two year old in tow). She and my dad were on their way somewhere and just seemed really distracted and irritated to be bothered with the call, but she said, sure, she could watch her, but only tomorrow. So, I get to end my birthday by fasting. And neither one of them remembered that it was my birthday. I know that’s a really immature thing to complain about, but it kind of hurt my feelings anyway.

Also (and this is way petty, but I’m absolutely venting here, so just overlook me), Nick’s sister (in Texas) told him a few days ago that she was putting my birthday gift in the mail that day. Since all my gifts were opened at the family fall birthday get together a couple of weeks ago, I was really excited about having something to open on my birthday, something that rarely happens. Then she texted me this morning to tell me that she’s absolutely going to go to the post office tomorrow to mail it out. Honestly not a big deal (it’s not like she had to give me anything at all, and I gave her hers over a month late, when we went to visit them), but it was just something that added to the disappointing way the day started. But that just means I get to open a gift in a few days, extending the celebration a bit!

Things really did look up after that. I went and had lunch with Nick (with Daisy along for the ride of course), and we had Jet’s Pizza, the absolute, hands down best pizza I’ve ever had anywhere. And after that I got to go do some light shopping, and I bought myself a very nice (and deeply discounted) purse, as well as knocked out a couple of Christmas gifts for Morgan and Daisy (using a coupon of course!).

Nick very sweetly made me a delicious birthday cake last night, and I found out that 34 candles makes for an impressive blaze, but I got them all blown out in one breath. He also made dinner last night and tonight, and a couple of days ago he let me do some thrift store shopping. He worked incredibly hard this past weekend hauling off scrap metal and doing some mechanical work for a few different people. God really provided for us, allowing us to pay some bills we otherwise would not have had the money for. And my mom did call later to wish me a happy birthday and apologize for forgetting to earlier.

Since I missed Thankful Thursday, here’s my baby update for the week. Also, we finally settled on a name. I won’t post it here for privacy reasons (my girls go by alternate names here too), but I’ve decided to call him Jack on the blog. My last visit was this past Thursday, and everything is going well, although my doctor would like to see me gain a little weight. I’m about three pounds down from where I started when I got pregnant, and she’d like to see me gain those three pounds back by my next visit That’s hard for me to hear because I’m so used to hearing that I need to lose weight! I gained a ton of weight with Morgan and frankly never quite got back to where I was, so I was super careful about weight gain when I was expecting Daisy. With her I lost 10 pounds before I knew I was pregnant, then gained back those 10 plus 1 by the time she was born. She was perfectly healthy (in fact, her APGAR was 9), so I was really proud of doing such a good job keeping it in line (for the record, I’m um, voluptuous to start with, so it’s okay for me to gain less than average sized women). Anyway, since there’s a good chance I may be gestational diabetic again, it’s going to actually be a challenge to put weight on now (at least if I follow the diet like I’m supposed to!).

Week 24 of Pregnancy: Fetal Hearing

Your baby weighs more than a pound and a half right now and sports a crown-to-rump length of about eight and a half inches (standard letter size!). At this point in fetal development, that beautiful face (though still tiny) is almost fully formed.

Your baby weighs more than a pound and a half right now and sports a crown-to-rump length of about eight and a half inches (standard letter size!).
Wondering what (and who) your baby will look like? If you had a baby cam at 24 weeks pregnant, you'd almost be able to tell by now. That beautiful face (though still tiny) is almost fully formed. What's still missing from the picture is the fat that will be piled on under baby's skin. Until those fat deposits are made, that very tender skin is still very transparent, which means a close look would let you see clear through to all the organs, bones, and blood vessels. Fortunately, that see-through look won't last much longer. Babies at this stage of fetal development are gaining about six ounces each week — with much of that gain coming from fat, in addition to growing organs, bones, and muscle.

What's been playing on your little rocker's stereo system these days? All kinds of sounds can be heard by your baby in your womb: from air exhaling from your lungs (deep breath now), those gastric gurgles produced by your stomach and intestines, your voice and your partner's (which your baby will be able to recognize at birth), and even very loud sounds such as honking horns, barking dogs, or a wailing fire truck.

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Eden Fantasys Review: Magnifique

2011-10-12T02:50:00.001-04:00

It’s review time again! I got another fun package in the mail from Eden Fantasys, and this one contained the Magnifique, from their line of vibrators. I’ve progressed to the point in my pregnancy where I’m no longer able to comfortably lie on my stomach. This is killing me, because that’s how I always sleep, and it’s also my go-to position if I’m using a toy. One thing that makes the Magnifique especially useful right now is that it’s best suited for use while lying on your back.

The design is innocuous enough – it looks a bit like a Wii remote. In fact, it probably wouldn’t cause too many raised eyebrows if your carry-on luggage happened to get searched. As far as actual function, it does have 3 different speeds, all easily accessible through a simple push button on the top of the massager. I will say though that if you prefer stronger vibrations, this may not be the item for you. I found that only the top speed really worked for me for stimulation purposes, although all three speeds had something to offer when used for simple muscle massage.

One note of warning – top speed can be pretty noisy. Some nice features: very nice ergonomic design, it’s phthalate-free, reasonably priced at under $24, and it comes with the needed 2 AA batteries in the package, something I found very handy since we were all out!

Here are the specs, straight from the site:

Material / Texture:
Material:
Plastic
Material safety:
Safety features:
Food-grade material / Hypo-allergenic / Latex free / Phthalates free
Design / Shape / Size:
Color:
White
Length:
7 3/4"
Insertable length:
4 1/2"
Width:
1 1/2"
Weight:
0.5 lb
Functions / Performance / Controls:
Functions:
Vibrating
Special Features:
- Batteries included
- Contoured
- Multispeed
Control type:
Power switch
Powered By:
Aa-2

As always, check out Eden Fantasys for all your sex toys needs!

Eden Fantasys provided me with this product to review at no charge, but I was in no was compensated for this review, and all opinions are my own.

Thankful Thursday

2011-10-06T23:56:00.000-04:00

Yesterday was my sweet little Daisy’s 2nd birthday. It’s so hard for me to believe that it’s been 2 whole years since God brought her into our lives! She has been an even bigger blessing and source of joy than we could have ever imagined, and it just fills my heart to see the happiness and love she has brought to our family!

God has once again really blessed us this week.

First, the ABCs of Gratitude:

Kids – I love kids, especially (but not only) my own. All I ever wanted to grow up to be was a wife and stay at home mommy, and thanks to God and my precious husband, I’m finally living out that dream!
Kisses – from Nick, from Morgan, from Daisy, and still from my mom and dad!
Kink – No, there’s not a whole lot of it going on these days, but I certainly still have an active fantasy life, and I look forward to the day when we have a bit of time to get back to it in real life!
Kittens – we actually can’t have one because Nick’s allergic, but I’m thankful for the one his sister R got for her birthday last month. She and her husband have lost two dogs in the last year, one to illness and one to accident. R was absolutely devastated by both deaths, and I’m so glad to see her with a sweet pet she can cuddle again.

Recent Blessings:

Remember the electric bill we didn’t have the money to pay last week? God brought the money for it in right on time! My parents gave me $100 for my birthday, and Nick was also able to haul off some more scrap metal from my papaw’s property, and his part of the profit paid the rest of it!
About a week ago Morgan injured her toe while she was playing outside. By Sunday it was still very painful, so we decided to take her in to the doctor. She’d also been complaining about some headaches and dizziness recently. Now she can be a bit of a drama queen, and none of this had hampered her desire to play outside with her friends any, but the combo of the toe, the headaches, and the dizziness all together concerned us, so I got her in on Monday. Now I didn’t have the money for either gas or a co-pay, so I called my parents to ask if they would care to let me borrow $30 to cover both if no other money came in in the next couple of days. They not only agreed, but they insisted on giving me $50 flat out and having me buy me and the girls lunch too while we were out.
The doctor’s visit went very well. The toe was just bruised, not broken. And the culprit for both the headaches and the dizziness was Morgan’s tendency to not wear her glasses if she could get away with it.
We had another bill that had to be paid by yesterday to avoid a late fee, and Nick was also very low on gas. Tuesday he made $110 from another junk car haul. With that we paid the bill and got him gas, and had a little left over to go toward the rest of the week.
Last Saturday we had our family fall birthday gathering, and I got some really neat gifts! Nick’s sister R and her husband got me some ribbon (they know me so well!) and a travel cup like this one (except mine has pretty pastel flowers all over it).

Anyone who knows me knows I don’t leave the house without a drink, so I love it! Nick’s grandparents got me a bottle of Bath and Body Works lotion and a ring that looks like this:

Nick’s cousin A has the same birthday as Daisy, and she made me a delicious loaf of zucchini bread on a cute little loaf plate. Nick’s parents got me a divided organizer box for some of my craft supplies, a medium storage tote for some of my fabric, and a set of metal punch stamps for jewelry stamping (something I had asked for). Nick’s aunt and uncle got me a very pretty pair of earrings. Daisy got a number of neat gifts as well, and everyone loved the gifts I got them (all handmade except for a book for Nick’s papaw and a journal for my brother).

This is a small thing, but still pretty neat. At the dealership Nick works at, a lot of times they will get in a used car that comes with a first aid kit. They have a certified used car program, and if they certify a used car, the first aid kit has to be replaced if it’s been opened at all, even if nothing has been used. The old kits just get tossed. Yesterday Nick came home with about six discarded first aid kits, full of the kinds of things we tend to constantly be out of (band-aids, gauze, tape, etc). Yay freebies!
Tonight my parents had me, Nick, and the girls out for dinner, cake, and ice cream to celebrate Daisy’s birthday. It was a sweet time with family, and nice to not have to cook dinner!

Baby update:

Week 23 of Pregnancy: Fetal Weight Gain

At eight inches and slightly over a pound, your baby is the size and shape of a small doll. You've probably heard your developing baby's heartbeat through a Doppler a number of times, but by now you can also hear it through a standard stethoscope. What a heart throb!

At eight inches and slightly over a pound, your baby is the size and shape of a small doll when you are 23 weeks pregnant. (But then, you already knew that you were carrying a living doll, didn't you?) This week marks the beginning of some serious weight gain. Your baby's weight in the next four weeks alone should double (and you may feel as though yours is too).
You have probably heard your developing baby's heartbeat through a Doppler a number of times already (though you never get tired of hearing it), but by now you can also hear it through a standard stethoscope. What a heart throb!
Your baby's skin is reddish in color now because of the developing blood vessels underneath (remember, the skin is very thin still). It also hangs loosely from his or her little body at this point. That's because the skin grows faster than the fat develops during fetal growth. But don't worry. By the time your baby is born, he or she will be pleasantly plump and filled out — from chubby cheeks to chubby toes.

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Thankful Thursday

2011-09-29T03:19:00.001-04:00

Hello, everyone! God has been so good to us this week! Let’s get started:

ABCs of Gratitude:

Jesus: He gave me the greatest gift ever in my salvation, then topped it off with an incredibly blessed life. I love you, Lord!
Joy: I’ve found so much joy in my life lately, and it just humbles me with how much I’ve been blessed!
J-my mom: My mom’s name starts with J, and I really couldn’t ask for a better mom. She can sometimes drive me crazy like everyone’s mom occasionally does, but if I can be half the mother she is, my kids will be doing pretty well.
Jokari: Gosh, it’s been a while since it (or any of our implements) has been out of the toy chest, but it figures heavily in my imagination these days, and I’m grateful for the times it’s come into use in the past, even if I wasn’t too happy about it at the time.
June: 26th to be specific – the day I married the love of my life! It’s proven to be a pretty special day in our family. Nick’s great-grandparents married that day, as well as his aunt and uncle. We actually didn’t know that when we set our date, but last year his cousin (the aunt and uncle’s oldest daughter) tied he knot on the same day!
Jeans: Right now it’s the sole pair of maternity jeans that I have that fit me (fortunately all the others are too big and not too small!). But I live in jeans whether I’m pregnant or not. I really have more pairs than a reasonable person should, and I’m looking forward to the day I get to get back in the rest of them!

Recent Blessings:

Last week I mentioned that we had a number of large bills that we just couldn’t pay this week. We went ahead and made the car payment, but that still left the electric bill and the house payment as the two most pressing needs. Now we don’t have a huge house payment compared to most people. But it is over $500, and that’s just not easy money to come by for us. God blessed us both with some additional work. I had an engagement shoot where I received a down payment on a wedding for next month, and Nick was able to do some side mechanic work and also haul off some old junk cars on my papaw’s property and keep part of the profits. The mechanic job even brought in a $30 tip, and yesterday I was able to put enough in the bank to pay the house payment and have $26 left. Praise God! And we’re still trusting him for the electric bill.
Last Friday night my parents stopped by with about 6 bags of groceries for us. They insisted that they were out shopping for themselves and just came across such great deals that they couldn’t pass them up, but it was a pretty transparent plan to bless us and help us through a tight week, and I love them for it!
Monday Daisy said “I wuv you” for the first time and it was AWESOME!
This morning I got to play baby dolls with Daisy for a while. It’s been so long since Morgan was at that stage, and I had so much fun just playing along and watching her mother her doll!
Sunday my friend D gave me about 4 brand new bras that she had bought and then just didn’t like. The best part is that they are in several different sizes, so some I can wear now, and some I can wear later when my boobs quit going so crazy! And I can tell you that a few good bras was definitely something I needed!
Saturday we get to have a family cookout to celebrate the fall birthdays. For years Nick’s grandmother has hosted a June birthday party up at the lake cabin because she, Nick’s dad, Nick’s sister, Nick’s great Aunt, and now Nick’s nephew all had birthdays in June. Quite a few of the rest of us have birthdays in August, September, and October, so last year I suggested we do a fall get-together too. Nick’s stepmom (an August birthday) ran with the idea, and I can’t wait to see everybody and enjoy some family time together. And because Daisy and I are both October birthdays, my parents are going to be there too!
One thing I was worried about was the fact that Daisy’s birthday is on the 5th (before Nick’s next payday), and I didn’t have anything for her. We had been kind of doing the whole “maybe we’ll have enough money next payday” thing for a while now, but it was pretty obvious that it just wasn't going to happen. Now I looooove to go to thrift stores. When I was growing up there wasn’t always money for new toys or clothes, and we learned early that just because something had been previously owned, it didn’t mean that it wasn’t still useful, valuable, and/or lovable. In fact, there were many birthdays/Christmases when we opened up (well cleaned) previously loved toys, and we were just as delighted as if they’d been brand new. I’m proud to be able to say that Morgan considers thrifted clothes “vintage” and extra cool because they’re generally one-of-a-kind. Anyway, I stopped at my very favorite thrift store on Monday just to kill some time. This place is so informal that they don’t price anything, or even take checks or credit cards. They just eyeball your purchases, give you a ridiculously low total, and take your cash. I found Daisy four Webkinz, four Care Bears, three baby dolls, and two other stuffed animals, plus some vintage sewing trim for me, about 4 bottles for the new baby, and a couple of baby shower decorations. My grand total? Six bucks. I almost felt like I should apologize for getting out so cheaply! Now I have plenty for Daisy to open, and I know she’ll love it all!
Speaking of baby shower decorations, those are for my friend Elizabeth. She’s about 8 weeks ahead of me, and this is her third baby. She and her husband are in pretty rough shape financially, and she doesn’t have very much stuff for the baby. She has two older kids, but this was one of those “as soon as you sell everything in a yard sale you get pregnant again” babies, and none of her family were planning to give her a shower. I know a lot of people believe that you should only have a shower for the first baby, but I disagree! Every baby is a celebration, and unless your last one is still a toddler and is the same sex as the one on the way, you probably need a few things too! I wanted to throw her a shower, but obviously we’re not really able to spend the money right now. So I contacted some of her friends and family, and it looks like everyone is willing to contribute financially so that she can have one after all! I’m so glad I get to be a blessing to her, and I can’t wait to put it all together!

Baby Update:

Week 22 of Pregnancy: Baby's Hair Growth

Your baby has finally broken the one-pound mark. The eyelashes and eyebrows are well formed now — and even more hair is sprouting atop that cute little head. But hair at this stage of fetal development has no pigment, so it's bright white.

Guess what? At 22 weeks pregnant, your baby has finally broken the one-pound mark. How heavy is that? Hold a one-pound box of sugar in your hand the next time you're in the grocery store (and expect people to ask you why you're grinning from ear to ear). Is the box eight inches long? That's about the length your baby is too!
This week, your sweetie is making more sense of the world as he or she develops the sense of touch. In fact, your little one's grip is quite developed by now — and since there's nothing else to grab in utero, he or she may sometimes hold on tight to that umbilical cord (don't worry — it's tough enough to handle it). The sense of sight is also getting more developed. Your fetus can now perceive light and dark much better than before (even with those fused eyelids). But remember — unless you're shining a flashlight over your belly (which you can do, by the way), it'll be mostly dark for your baby inside that cozy womb of yours.

Moving up from the eyes, the eyelashes and eyebrows are well formed now — and even more hair is sprouting atop that cute little head. You'd be quite surprised, though, if you could see your little one up close and in color. Hair at this stage of fetal development has no pigment, so it's bright white.

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Eden Fantasys Review: Hot Love Massagers

2011-09-29T02:02:00.001-04:00

I was lucky enough to get to do another review for Eden Fantasys, and this time I got to try something completely different than I’d ever tried before. They sent me the fun Hot Love Massager set. These delightful little gel packs are a terrific alternative to a hot stone massage, and I like that they are innocent enough appearing that they wouldn’t raise eyebrows if spotted in your medicine cabinet.

The way they work the first time is really neat. The inside of each pack contains a slightly concave metal circle. You bend the metal circle until it inverts, then watch the magic. The clear pink gels turns incredibly quickly into an opaque crystal substance that instantly heats to 129 degrees F. The heated crystals still make for a soft pack though, feeling a lot like a bag of fine wet sand. As I type this I have one sitting on my neck, and I’m quite enamored with it.

After the first use, the gel packs can be reheated by boiling in water for 7-8 minutes. I like the fact that they are reusable, and at $9.99 these are on the lower price end of their sensual massage selection.

Please check out Eden Fantsys for all your sex toys needs!

Eden Fantasys provided me with this product to review at no charge, but I was in no was compensated for this review, and all opinions are my own.

Thankful Thursday - Extra Edition

2011-09-22T23:56:00.000-04:00

Sometimes I feel like I must be such a huge burden on God with my many constant needs. Somehow though, He always comes through. This week we’re facing some incredible obstacles financially. I won’t say that we’ve never been in this tight of a spot before, but it’s rarely been this bad. Nick’s work has been unusually slow, and we’re staring down the barrel of several pay-it-this-week-or-it-will-go-against-your-credit bills, among them the car payment, the house payment, and the electric bill. We just don’t have the money to pay them all. I have to remember though, God is bigger than all of our problems. He knows our needs, and His pockets are certainly deeper than ours. I’m not afraid to post this here, because I know that His promises are real, and He has promised to provide for us. With that in mind, I want to go ahead and do my next Thankful Thursday, early for once!

ABCs of Gratitude:

Italian Ice – okay, this one is kind of silly, but the one and only thing I’ve craved with this pregnancy are Lindy’s Orange Italian Ices. I’m eating one right now, and it is soooo good!

Innocence – It is such a privilege for me to be able to be home with my children, and I just drink in the innocence in them. I feel like I missed out on a lot of the baby years with Morgan. Even though I only worked part time until she was four, I was still away from home for parts of 4 days every week, and they just change so fast at this age.
Ice Cream – right now one of Daisy’s favorite things to say is “Eye-keem, Mommy?” It’s cute enough to get me to share those precious Italian Ices with her.
Insurance – I am so incredibly grateful that we have medical insurance right now. Although I’m having a serious issue with our homeowner’s insurance! Out of the blue they decided (after ten years with them!) that they don’t want to renew our policy. This wasn’t precipitated by anything on our part, but rather by new policies on acceptable home value set out by management. Apparently our home doesn’t meet their minimum replacement value threshold. Or actually it does, since our agent sent over updated numbers, but they then decided that because our roof has never been replaced (even though it’s in decent shape), we’re too much of a risk. Very frustrating since the next cheapest company is going to take our annual premium from $425 to $788. Plus we have to get new car insurance because it’s with the same company. But even this is a blessing, because I have to believe that God is guiding us away from them for some reason, so I’m trusting Him to lead us to a good company with good rates!
Income – I’m so blessed to have a husband who was willing to be prayerful and follow God’s leading about going to a single-income lifestyle. It’s never been easy, but it has been rewarding, and the gift Nick has given me and the kids in allowing us this time together is priceless!

Recent Blessings:

Okay, first the big one: my dad had his heart cath test and it came back with absolutely no blockage! I don’t know if the stress tests showed false positives or if God just removed the blockage, but I am very, very grateful! They’ve put him on some new blood pressure medications, and we continue to pray that he won’t have any further episodes.
Today I was so stressed out about everything from money to the insurance issues to housework. I went out to get the mail and found a package from Nick’s sister K in Texas. It was full of precious little clothes for the new baby, and even a couple of outfits for Daisy! It was just what I needed to brighten my day! The things she sent the baby are soooo precious, and I can’t wait to get them on him. Included was this outfit (minus the bib), and I think I want to bring him home from the hospital in it!

Daisy has been ridiculously cute the last few days. She’s started saying so much stuff! My favorites include “Yokay, Sissie?” (Are you okay, Sissy?) – said during the many occasions Morgan pretends to fall down to entertain her. “Pimmy-uh, pimmy –uh!” (Pick me up, pick me up!) – made even cuter by the come-here hand gestures. “Hin me a nanana” (Hand me a banana) – about eighty times a day! I had to cut her off after four the other day! “Hin me baby” (Hand me the baby) – said whenever she drops her baby doll. Today she was reaching for a scented rice bag and said “Hin me smell, Mommy!” Maybe the best was today when she said “Hin me book”, and when I handed it to her, “Good job, Mama!” She will also, if lying between me and Nick, put one arm around each of our necks and hug us both at once. Today I was scolding Morgan for something, and Daisy climbed up on the couch between us, put an arm around each of our necks, said “Guys…”, and pulled us in for a group hug. It was pretty hard to stay upset at anybody after that!
Besides getting the clothes from K today, Nick also brought home a huge garbage bag full of baby boy clothes from a guy he works with.
One big blessing is that even though we don’t have the money we need right now for bills, we do have most of the stuff we need for day to day living. We have plenty of diapers, wipes, dish and laundry detergent, fabric softener (actually I’m trying a homemade recipe right now, and it seems to work great), toothpaste, toilet paper, deodorant, shampoo, conditioner, Tums (life or death for a pregnant woman with crazy heartburn!), etc. And we may be a bit sparse on meat for the next few weeks, but we have enough for a few days anyway, and plenty of rice and beans for after that! The only things we should absolutely have to come up with are milk and bread and maybe butter.
Wednesday as I was driving home from lunch with Nick this metal plate about 6 inches by six inches and maybe a quarter of an inch thick came bouncing down the interstate right at my car. There was no place I could go, and it hit the bumper and put a pretty nasty gash in it. Unfortunately the insurance company (them again!) will count it as an at-fault collision and charge us a $500 deductible if we want to report it. Honestly, we’ve never had so much as a hint of a problem with them in 10 years time, and suddenly all this stuff! I’ve never heard of a company that will count road debris as an at-fault collision! But the blessing here is that it didn’t hit higher up on the car and bounce up into my windshield. I honestly think it would have caused a very serious wreck if it had done so. It definitely would have cracked the windshield, if not broken all the way through it. Or if it had hit the road and bounced up under the car it could have done some serious damage mechanically.
While there’s not been any real mention of DD lately, Nick has at least (at my request) given me one room a day to focus on for the last few days. I could really use some stress relief, or even some motivational help, but I’ll take what he can give.

And because my “What to Expect When You’re Expecting” online profile changed weeks a few hours after I wrote the last post, here’s the new one. I’m actually 20 weeks and 1 day, but since that means I’ve just completed my 20th week of pregnancy, it gives me the info for week 21.

Week 21 of Pregnancy: Baby's Taste Buds Develop

At about seven inches in length and almost 11 ounces in weight, your baby is about the size of a large banana. There's still a great deal of room in your womb — though your tenant will soon begin to feel cramped, so be prepared!

At about seven inches in length and almost 11 ounces in weight, your baby is about the size of a large banana.
By 21 weeks pregnant, your baby swallows at least several ounces of amniotic fluid each day — not only for hydration and nutrition, but also to practice swallowing and digesting — skills your baby will need as soon as he or she arrives in your arms. And keep this in mind: The taste of the amniotic fluid differs from day to day depending on what you've eaten (spicy enchilada one day, sweet carrots another). And that smorgasbord of tastes won't be lost on your baby. That's because your little one has very developed taste buds already. In fact, researchers have noted that babies who were exposed to certain tastes in utero via the amniotic fluid were more eager to eat foods with that same taste after birth. Want your baby to eat his or her broccoli later? Eat yours now!
Your developing baby still has a great deal of room in your womb — though like anyone who lives in one space for a long time, this tenant will soon begin to feel cramped. Until those uterine walls start closing in, however, there's plenty of space for twisting, turning, and even an occasional somersault (so that's what you were feeling last night!).

With all that belly dancing going on, it's hard to believe your baby gets any sleep at all. But believe it or not, your fetus sleeps as much as a newborn, perhaps 12 to 14 hours per day! (Now if only you could get some sleep!)

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Thankful Thursday

2011-09-22T03:32:00.001-04:00

Hello, everyone. I really should be in bed, but right now I just really need to focus on the things I have to be grateful for. About 14 years ago, not long before Nick and I got married, my dad had a serious heart attack. He actually had two, but the second one came on the heels of the first and was much less serious. It turned out that he had major blockage in the big vein they call the widow-maker. At the time he was just 52, and he made a full recovery, although he was out of work for almost six months.

Sunday before last my mom called me before church and told me that he’d had a nosebleed they couldn’t get stopped and had been in the ER all night. His blood pressure has spiked, and caused a ruptured vein, which was thankfully in his upper nasal cavity and not his brain where it would have caused a stroke. They packed his nose and gave him some medicine, and on the following Monday he was able to get the packing removed, and everything seemed fine.

This Tuesday morning he called me and told me that his blood pressure had spiked dangerously high again and that they were on their way back to the hospital. I called Nick and my brothers and let them all know, and after a while my mom called and let me know that his bp had stabilized, but that they were going to run some blood work. A bit later she called back to tell me that his blood work looked fine, but they wanted to keep him overnight and run some heart tests. I wanted to go see him, but she said that he was resting and would be checking out early the next morning, so rather than injecting my toddler into the situation, I just waited. I talked to him that night, and he seemed to be feeling well.

Yesterday morning (Wednesday as I’m writing this very early Thursday morning) my mom called again and they had run some stress tests on him, and they had come back with some abnormalities, but they were waiting on the cardiologist to come and tell him was that meant. It turns out that it meant that there was serious blockage again and that his heart was only functioning at 45%. Nick was home by then, so we all loaded up and went to see him.

There’s just something indescribably frightening about seeing the man who raised you, the very epitome of strength, lying tethered by tubes and wires to a hospital bed. In a few hours they’ll do a heart cath to see if they can put in a stent or if they’ll have to do open heart surgery. I covet your prayers.

Focusing on good things: The ABCs of Gratitude:

Hospitals – they aren’t very fun places to be, but oh how grateful I am that we have access to them, and that the one currently caring for my dad is such a fine one.
Husband – I am far beyond blessed to be married to such a wonderful man, one who didn’t hesitate to, without having dinner, pack up me and both kids and drive across town to take me to see my dad.
Hugs – right now Daisy is a world-class hugger. I’m talking about those priceless little toddler hugs where she throws both arms around my neck and squeezes as tight as she can while saying “Mmmmm-mmmmm!”
Halfway – as of today, I’m half-way through my pregnancy. Yay!
Heaven – the place that I know I have waiting for me, and if you don’t know it too, you can!
Heat – it’s starting to finally cool down around here, and there’s nothing cozier than the first time you turn the heater on in the fall!
Home – these days our house is feeling a bit crowded, and it’s only going to get more so, but crowded or not, it’s our home, and I’m grateful for it.

Recent blessings:

First of all I’m grateful that my dad was sensible enough to go to the hospital when he needed to. He very nearly died with his first heart attack because he was too stubborn to go on his own. My mom found him in bed and made him go, and the doctor said that if she’d gotten home 15 minutes later we would have lost him.

I have a client who I’ve done a couple of photo shoots for. She always wants to buy the CD, but she has a hard time holding onto money, so she mails it to me a little at a time. A couple of days ago she sent me the last $20 on this order, and that paid for our hospital parking as well as our dinner tonight (since I didn’t have time to cook).

Daisy and I got to have lunch with Nick today. It was just sandwiches and chips from home, but we really enjoyed the time together.

I went to the used book store today and traded in a bunch of children’s books that the kids didn’t care for. I didn’t get much for them, but it was almost enough to pay for two books that I know my dad will love for Christmas.

Saturday I got to go to a car show with Nick. He finally got to drive his Fairlane, and we really enjoyed the kid-free time.

Night before last Nick’s parents had us over for dinner. Hooray for food someone else cooked!

I’m super excited that we’re having a little boy! Of course we would have loved another little girl just the same, but we’ve both always wanted a little boy.

Speaking of, when I went to the doctor last Wednesday to find out what we’re having, the ultrasound tech came out just before I went back and announced that the ultrasound machine was broken. I was terribly afraid that we’d have to wait another month to find out, and Nick had even taken the morning off to come to the appointment with me! Fortunately the doctor across the hall was out that day, so we were able to use his machine. The baby looks great, everything’s normal, and he’s growing right on schedule!

Saturday I have an engagement shoot. It’s a bit of a drive away, but I should get the down payment on the whole wedding package, which Nick and I will be shooting together next month. Yay, teamwork!

Baby Update:

Week 20 of Pregnancy: Boy or Girl?

You've got a heavyweight in your belly now (well, in baby terms, anyway). Your little champ weighs about ten ounces and has a height, crown to rump, of about six and a half inches. Think of your developing baby as the size of a small cantaloupe (and probably as sweet too). Boy or Girl? You'll also be able to see your baby's gender in the ultrasound by now!

You've got a heavyweight in your belly at 20 weeks pregnant (well, in baby terms, anyway). Your little champ weighs about ten ounces and has a height, crown to rump, of about six and a half inches. Think small cantaloupe (and probably as sweet too).

Is it a boy cantaloupe or a girl cantaloupe? You'll be able to find out your baby's gender via the ultrasound by this point. If you're carrying a girl fetus, her uterus is fully formed this week and her vaginal canal is starting its development (which means that in about twenty-five or thirty-some-odd years, she could be just where you're at, Grandma!). She also has primitive eggs in her tiny little ovaries now, seven million of them — though by the time she's born, that number will be down to two million (still more than she could ever hope to use). And interestingly, your baby girl will be born with all the eggs she'll ever have.

Have you got male? If your fetus is a boy, his testicles have begun their descent this week, though they're still located in the abdomen, waiting for the scrotum to finish growing so they'll have a place to drop into in a few weeks.

Though the external genitals in both male and female fetuses still have a way to grow, you should be able to find out the sex of your baby (if you want to) during an ultrasound exam.

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So I had my ultrasound today, and…

2011-09-14T23:10:00.000-04:00

Thankful Saturday

2011-09-10T04:38:00.001-04:00

Yes, I missed Thursday again, but it was a really busy week! Nick was out of town at school for most of the week, and I got to play single mom for a few days. But he’s home now, and I sure am glad!

ABC's of Gratitude:

Groceries – while we didn’t go hungry last week, we were definitely eating out of the back of the pantry, and it’s nice to have a few more groceries in the house this week.
Gift-giving – I spent a good part of one day last week making up a couple of lists (I’m a big list maker). One was our Christmas list, and the other was a list of the supplies I’ll need to make all of those gifts. Yep, I’m going to do my best to make almost every gift we give this year. Last year I made a significant portion of them, and it really added a new layer to Christmas for me (not to mentioned helped the budget quite a bit!). Now I know that there will be a few things I can’t craft myself, but I was actually pretty impressed with the number of ideas I found online, and I even came up with a few all by myself!
Grandparents – Tomorrow is Grandparent’s Day. I no longer have any living grandparents, although both of Nick’s on his dad’s side are healthy as horses. We’re so blessed to still have them, and we’re even more blessed that our parents are such amazing grandparents to our children. Both my mom and Nick’s stepmom were in the delivery room for both my girls’ births, and they’ll both be there for this baby as well, and it’s so important to me that they get to be grandmothers from the very first moment of the baby’s life!
God – Wow, how on earth can I express how grateful I am for and to God? If not for Him, there would be nothing else at all.
Grace – Grace is a concept that is so incredibly important in both marriage and parenting, and I’m so grateful God has shown so much grace to me.

Recent Blessings:

My parents safely returned from L.A. this past Tuesday. They also dropped off $50 with me just because they knew Nick was out of town and we were pretty tight for money.
Nick safely returned from school on Thursday. He had a great time, and he learned a lot!
Nick’s dad came over Thursday before Nick got home and mowed our front yard and cleaned out our gutters.
I took advantage of this deal on www.moneysavingmom.com, and it’s going to get me a sweet little stocking stuffer for Nick, always a hard order for me to fill.
A few weeks ago I also signed up for www.savemore.com and ended up getting a couple of kids watches for free, which will also make a couple of great Christmas gifts. They came in the mail a few days ago, and I love them! By the way, the link in the last sentence only is my referral link. If you would like to sign up through it, you get a $10 credit, and then I get a $10 credit if you make a purchase (but it will not tell me your name or email address, just in case privacy is a concern). I got the watches completely free because I signed up and got my $10 credit and used it to purchase the $7 watch deal, then referred Nick, and he also purchased the same deal with his $10 credit. And because he made a purchase (albeit one covered by his free credit), I got another $10!. Currently I’m hanging onto my remaining credit for the next great deal that comes along for a Christmas gift!
Last year I signed up for an off-site storage account with Mozy. I lost my hard drive a couple of years ago, and it was a pretty devastating experience. Once I started doing photography professionally, I knew there was just no way I could risk losing client images. At the time I got a great deal with Mozy, and I’ve been very happy with them. Unfortunately they did away with their unlimited storage option a few months back and went to a new (much pricier) by-the-GB plan. My first year with them cost me about $46. Under the new plan I would be paying over $300! My contract with them was up August 31, and they were going to renew at the higher rate if I didn’t cancel. I knew I needed the service, but I also knew we just didn’t have the money to either renew with them or open a new account elsewhere that week. Fortunately a friend who’s tech-savvier than me suggested I try out Crashplan (not an affiliate link), and they were running a 30 day free trial special. I signed up with them, and I’m so excited to have an extra 30 days to come up with the annual fee (which is comparable to the one I started out with at Mozy).
Pinterest – If you’ve never hear of Pinterest, you should really check it out. It’s basically a free bulletin board for you to pin up all the great ideas you find online, and to see other people’s finds as well. It’s where I’ve found a big chunk of my Christmas gift ideas. A warning though: it will suck you right in, and you might find yourself exploring there for hours at a time!

Baby Update:

Week 19 of Pregnancy: Vernix Develops

Six inches long this week and about eight ounces in weight, your baby is the size of a large mango and is now covered in a protective substance called vernix. Arms and legs are finally in proportion, neurons are now connected between the brain and muscles, and cartilage throughout the body is turning to bone.

Six inches long this week and about eight ounces in weight, your baby is the size of a large mango.
Your little action figure is able to choreograph Matrix-like moves at 19 weeks pregnant. Arms and legs are finally in proportion, neurons are now connected between the brain and muscles, and cartilage throughout the body is turning to bone. All these upgrades combine to give your baby more control over limb movements. Which explains all that kicking, stretching, and bodysurfing (or rather bellysurfing) you've possibly started feeling by now.

Something else going on this week: Your baby is getting a cheesy varnish. Say what? Yup — a protective substance called vernix caseosa (vernix is the Latin word for varnish; caseosa is cheese) now covers your baby's skin. It's greasy and white and is made up of lanugo (that downy hair), oil from your baby's glands, and dead skin cells. This waxy "cheese" may not sound too appetizing or attractive, but it's there for good reason: Vernix protects your baby's sensitive skin from the surrounding amniotic fluid. Without it, your baby would look very wrinkled at birth (sort of what you'd look like if you soaked in a bath for nine months). Some babies — especially those born early — will still be covered with vernix at the delivery, so you might get a look at your baby's first anti-wrinkle cream.

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Thankful Thursday

2011-09-03T03:59:00.001-04:00

Er, Friday. Okay, fine, SATURDAY. So yeah, I’m late again. But I’m here now!

ABC’s of Gratitude:

Family – you can’t choose the one you get, but Nick and I are both incredibly blessed with the ones we have. My parents have been married for 43 years; Nick’s mom and dad were married for just over 20 years when Nick’s mom passed away, and Nick’s dad has been married to Nick’s amazing stepmom for almost 12 years now. We are so thankful for the wonderful examples we’ve had of married couples in our family!
Fathers – First of all, my own father is just an incredible dad. He’s taught me so much, and I’ve never for one day doubted his love for me. Secondly (but just as importantly), Nick is a wonderful father to our two girls – and I know he’ll be just as fabulous with our new little one. And the most important Father of course is my Heavenly Father. I cannot even begin to express how much I love God and how very much He loves me!
Fathers-in-law – Nick and I both got lucky here. My dad considers Nick a son, and he truly treats him as such. Nick’s dad is forever coming over to help out with something we need fixing around the house, and my very first Mother’s Day he was the only person who thought to buy me a gift.
Fixing stuff – Today I had something scary happen: the charger cord on my laptop died. It had been fraying right at the base of the end you plug into the computer, and it finally completely broke tonight. Right now we do NOT have $80 to go buy a new one, and I depend on my laptop for SO much. We do have a desktop upstairs, but all of my clients’ photos, as well has all my editing software is on this laptop, and frankly I would be lost without it. Fortunately, after a lot of prayer, soldering, and electrical tape, Nick got it fixed good as new! Now we’re dealing with a broken DC jack on his laptop, also a serious issue because he uses it daily for work. The part that will fix it (we hope) is really cheap on ebay, but it’s still not quite cheap enough for us to buy it this week. Anyway, we would really appreciate your prayers that we can get the part soon and that he will be able to fix it completely!
Faith – these last two years our faith has really had to stretch with the switch from two incomes to one. But I am so glad to be able to say that not once has God failed us. Right now we’re definitely running on faith: It’s 6 days till payday, and I only have enough food for about 3 more days, plus Nick is completely out of gas, and I have just enough to get us to church on Sunday. But I’m not panicking. Matthew 6:25-34 tells me all that I need to know, and I can know it with such certainty because He has proven it over and over again:

Matthew 6:25 Therefore I say unto you, Take no thought for your life, what ye shall eat, or what ye shall drink; nor yet for your body, what ye shall put on. Is not the life more than meat, and the body than raiment?

²⁶Behold the fowls of the air: for they sow not, neither do they reap, nor gather into barns; yet your heavenly Father feedeth them. Are ye not much better than they?

²⁷Which of you by taking thought can add one cubit unto his stature?

²⁸And why take ye thought for raiment? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they toil not, neither do they spin:

²⁹And yet I say unto you, That even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these.

³⁰Wherefore, if God so clothe the grass of the field, which to day is, and to morrow is cast into the oven, shall he not much more clothe you, O ye of little faith?

³¹Therefore take no thought, saying, What shall we eat? or, What shall we drink? or, Wherewithal shall we be clothed?

³²(For after all these things do the Gentiles seek:) for your heavenly Father knoweth that ye have need of all these things.

³³But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you.

³⁴Take therefore no thought for the morrow: for the morrow shall take thought for the things of itself. Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof.

Freebies – It’s getting to be the time of year again when I start thinking about Christmas gifts. Last year almost every gift that went out of our house was something I got for free or almost free with various online deals and/or coupons. It was actually a lot of fun to be able to get Christmas gifts for everyone for so little, and it really helped us focus on the true meaning. I’m looking forward to a now holiday season full of great deals and freebies, not to mention lots of crafting and handmade gifts!
Fabric – I’ve mentioned that I’ve really gotten into sewing and crafting over the last year, and I’ve found myself developing a real love of fabric. There’s just so much you can do with it, and I love how unique a project can be depending on the type and print you use.
Fun – well who doesn’t like to have fun?

Recent Blessings:

At my last doctor’s visit I had my quad screen. This is the blood test that checks for, among other things, indicators for chromosome abnormalities (such as Down Syndrome) and neural tube defects (like spina bifida). This is a common test, and one I’ve had with all three pregnancies, but it’s still nerve-wracking, especially since the results take a few days to come back. Toward the end of last week my test results came in, and they were all normal.
Nick will be going to school for work next week. This is a mixed blessing for me, because I always hate being without him. But they feed him (quite well, actually), as well as pay for travel and lodging, so that means we wont have to pay for gas for him to go to work and back for most of the week, and we also won’t have to worry about lunches for him. This is also a necessary step for him in getting his ASE certification, an accomplishment that will mean more money for him. He also gets to go with one of his closest friends at work, which is nice.
God has already stretched our food this week. More than once I’ve found things in the cabinet that I didn’t know we had, and our bread machine has really been a lifesaver, giving me the ability to put together things I would not have otherwise been able to. I also really appreciate my meat and potatoes husband sweetly eating whatever I put in front of him (and even taking it for lunch the next day!), even if it wasn’t exactly what he would have chosen.
My parents are currently in L.A. visiting my brother, who’s there on assignment. They visited him in Houston last year and hated almost everything about the trip, but this year they’re having the time of their lives, and I’m so happy for them!

Baby Update:

Week 18 of Pregnancy: Fetal Nervous System

This week your baby is about five and a half inches long, crown to rump, and weighs about five ounces. And fetal development has reached the stage for you to start feeling those movements some time in the next few weeks — so get ready!

At 18 weeks pregnant, your baby is hitting the height chart at five and a half inches long (remember, that's crown to rump) and weighs about five ounces (the weight of that boneless chicken breast you're making for dinner).
And now for the skill of the week (drum roll please…): The art of the yawn has been mastered by your baby (someone's sleepy!). In fact, you might catch a glimpse of that adorable yawn if you're getting an ultrasound this month. You'll also catch a glimpse of all the fetal movement your baby's doing — twists, rolls, kicks, and punches. And would you believe your baby is finally big enough for you to start feeling those movements now (or anytime in the next few weeks). So get ready!

Something you won't see on the ultrasound, but you'll know is in working order, is your baby's nervous system, which is maturing rapidly at this time. Nerves, now covered with a substance called myelin (which speeds messages from nerve cell to nerve cell), are forming more complex connections. And those in the brain are further specializing into the ones that serve the senses of touch, taste, smell, sight, and hearing. Talking about hearing, your baby's is growing more acute, making your little one more conscious of sounds that come from inside your body (which means you could both be listening to each other hiccup — a skill that your baby has by now).

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Thankful Thursday

2011-08-25T22:34:00.001-04:00

It’s Thursday again, and this week I made it on time!

ABC’s of Gratitude:

Eggs – I’m not a huge fan of just egg dishes, like scrambled eggs, deviled eggs, etc. But I do love Nick’s egg salad sandwiches, and I definitely wouldn’t get very far in my cooking without always having a carton or two on hand.
Dr. E – my OBGYN’s last name starts with an E, and I just have to say that she is a FABULOUS doctor! She’s delivered both of my babies so far, and Lord willing she’ll deliver this one too. She’s a doctor who really, truly cares about her patients, and her practice reflects that. I can’t tell you how many times over the years she’s sent me home from her office with 6 months worth of birth control samples just because she knew we were having a rough time financially, and she’s always gone above and beyond the call of duty in addressing any concerns I had, whether over my PCOS or any of my pregnancies.
Elevators – since I no longer work outside the home (other than for photography), elevators don’t play a huge part in my life anymore. But I had to visit the hospital’s billing office when I went in for my doctor’s visit this week, and you can bet I was happy not to have to traipse up and down stairs between all those floors!
Electricity – We ended up going without power for most of the day a few weeks back due to some area storms. Now I know that there were plenty of folks without power for weeks, so we were quite fortunate to get it back so quickly, but I sure did miss it while it was gone!
Easter – the day we celebrate the greatest gift we were ever given!

Recent Blessings:

I went to the doctor on Monday, and everything is going well with the baby. I even got an unexpected peek at him/her! I wasn’t supposed to have another ultrasound until next month, but my (awesome) doctor asked me if I wanted her to try to see if she could tell what I’m having. Unfortunately our little peanut wasn’t cooperating AT ALL. My doctor said that a lot of times when she says she can’t tell for sure, she’s pretty sure it’s a girl, but this time she wasn’t getting even a glimpse of the relevant parts. But it was still really neat to get to see the baby, and this way Nick will get to be with me when I find out. Plus, I get to go back 3 weeks from yesterday instead of waiting a whole 4 weeks like I usually have to do.
God has, as always, kept His hand on us financially, and as we face some upcoming expenses in the next few weeks, it’s wonderful to know that we can depend on Him to continue doing so.
Morgan is back in school, and she’s enjoying it. Now there’s a little more to the story than just that. For the last 6 years she’s attended the Christian school that I attended from 1st grade through graduation. My mom worked there for 22 years, retiring just a couple of years ago. Now this has always been a great (if small) school with some great teachers, but over the last few years it has quickly begun to decline. The founding pastor retired in 2009 and passed away later that year, and unfortunately the man he hired to replace him has made some really terrible decisions. Sadly he has proven to be a less than honest man, although I think he genuinely wants to do a good job. Piece by piece the ministry has started to deteriorate as he has replaced some of the much loved and very capable long-time employees with people of his own choosing. At this point there are a total of 8 teachers for the entire K through 12 school, and enrollment has bottomed out. Since he took office, the school has lost about 20 different teachers and office workers, some of them who have dedicated 20 years or more of their lives to this ministry. Some, like my mom, retired because they felt like it was no longer the place God had for them, some were forced out by pay cuts, and some were outright fired because they didn’t agree with his policies. Anyway, since last year Nick and I have been in serious prayer about where to send Morgan this year. Just a few days before the school year started he fired a lady who had not only been a tremendous asset to the ministry, but who had also kept a close eye on Morgan, no small thing for us in the climate that had begun to develop there. We felt it was God really working on us to go ahead and move her to a new school, so with much continued prayer, we have done so. Her teacher at the new school seems to be a really great guy, and Morgan is really enjoying the new setting. The academics are also on a whole new level at the new school, and I just thank God that He guided us and smoothed the way for her to have everything she needed to enroll there.
Morgan wore a uniform at her old school, and since the decision to send her to a new school was not made until literally last Friday, we didn’t have much in the way of school clothes for the new school. Nick’s dad and stepmom came and took her shopping for most of what she needed, and I was able to get a few other things on clearance for her.
Morgan’s school bus now picks her up and drops her off 3 houses down from ours. This is great news, because at first it was going to be about a quarter mile away – not a huge distance, but far enough that I had to stick Daisy in a stroller and walk her to the bus stop the first three days. This is not such a big deal right now, but when I have a toddler and a newborn, it will be a huge help to not have to get them both out every morning.
With the bus now coming to get Morgan, Nick no longer has to drop her off at school, and I no longer have to pick her up, saving us both lots of gas!
We went out to eat tonight (a rare treat, but I had to take Morgan for her school physical and didn’t have time to make supper). Shortly after leaving the restaurant, I realized I didn’t have my phone. I borrowed Nick’s to call the restaurant and see if they’d found it, but they said they didn’t have it. Praying hard and trying not to panic, I drove back down there and found it under the table where we were sitting. Yay!

Baby Update:

Week 17 of Pregnancy

Your baby is practicing sucking and swallowing as she gets ready for the real thing: a breast or bottle! As for Mom, you may be warding off some unwanted belly touching.

Your Baby in Week 17 of Pregnancy

My how your baby has grown! She's about the size of your palm, weighs about five ounces, and is developing some body fat (join the club, baby!). Her heart is now regulated by her brain (no more random beats) to beat 140 to 150 times per minute — about twice as fast as yours! What else is up? She’s practicing the survival skills she’ll need at birth — like sucking and swallowing.

Learn more about your baby in week 17 and a baby’s body fat.

Your Body in Week 17 of Pregnancy

Now that you're starting to show, chances are that friends, coworkers, and even strangers may feel the urge to reach out and touch your belly. If you don't mind, that's fine. But if you do, speak up kindly but firmly. More new developments with your body: a slight vaginal discharge (leukorrhea) and a greater sensitivity to allergens these days — both are totally normal — and the appetite of a truck driver now that the queasy feeling is (probably) gone.

Learn more about your body in week 17 and your growing appetite.

Week 17 Pregnancy Tip: Snoring

If your partner finds your new snoring habit about as sexy as a hippo in a thong (which, by the way, you're starting to feel like), take heart. The stuffiness that often triggers world-champion snoring is common and temporary, another unexpected (make that inexplicable) side effect of those pregnancy hormones at work (that’s right, even your nose is affected by pregnancy hormones!). Try putting a humidifier in your bedroom, using one of those nasal strips on your nose to open up your nasal passages (doesn't look pretty, but it works for some people), or sleeping on a couple of pillows to keep your head slightly elevated. And if he still complains, buy him a set of earplugs — or banish him to the couch for the night; after all, it's more important that you get a good night's sleep these days.

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Thankful Thursday

2011-08-18T23:35:00.000-04:00

Ok, I really am sucking at this. After being late with Thursday before last, I forgot last Thursday completely, and here it is almost midnight on this Thursday. But I made it!

ABC’s of Gratitude:

Dip. Cannoli dip, specifically. This one. Make it and eat it with animal crackers and you can thank me later.
Dollars – like it or not, we’ve gotta have them, and it sure is easier when we do.
Dogs – not all of them, necessarily, but I sure do love ours.
Donuts – Okay, I don’t actually love donuts. They’re okay, but I’d much rather have a cupcake. But our church serves them with coffee every Sunday after the evening service, and I cherish the fellowship time.
Date night – we really, really, REALLY need another one of these pronto.
DVR – it has revolutionized our TV watching.
DD – is it a sad sign that I almost forgot this one? Yes, it’s been awhile since there’s been too awful much sign of it, but I think it’s still there under the surface, and I‘m grateful for however much of it there is.

Recent Blessings:

Nick installed our new garbage disposal and it works great! Yay!
Last year when we went on vacation, Nick’s supervisor forgot to put his vacation in to payroll, and his paycheck was majorly short. This year Nick made extra sure to fill out the necessary paperwork (which he also did last year, not that it mattered). Unfortunately, his supervisor did the exact same thing this year. Last year they refused to fix it till his next paycheck, two weeks later. Fortunately at the time we had some money coming in from elsewhere, so we made it, but this year there was just no way we could make it another two weeks. We both really prayed about it, and his supervisor pulled some strings and got Nick a check cut for the difference the same day.
On several separate occasions both my mom and Nick’s dad have found Nick nice used left-handed golf clubs at flea markets and thrift stores. Today his dad dropped of a very cool golf bag along with another club, and his set is nearly complete.
We’ve been interested in moving Daisy to a toddler bed in the very near future. She’s gotten very proficient in climbing out of her crib, plus we want her out of the crib well before the new baby arrives. Less chance of her feeling like the baby has pushed her out of her bed that way. Nick’s dad and stepmom found a perfect one for a great price at a little antique store while we were away in Texas, and they bought it as a gift for us.
Nick got a little bit of side work today, which is always nice.
More movement from the baby over the last few days. Happy times.

Baby Update:

Week 16 of Pregnancy: Baby's Hearing

Listen up: Tiny bones in your fetus's ears are in place this week, making it likely that the baby can hear your voice when you're speaking (or singing in the shower) at 16 weeks pregnant. In fact, studies have found that babies who are sung to while they're in the womb recognize the same tune when it's sung to them after they are born (so choose your baby Muzak with that in mind…).

And baby's busily boning up in other ways. For one, the backbone (along with the back muscles) is stronger now — strong enough, in fact, to enable your baby to work on straightening his or her head and neck even more. Baby's crown-to-rump measurement is between four and five inches in length, and weight is hovering around three ounces.

This little one's a looker — with a face that has both eyebrows and eyelashes — but a skinny looker since there's no baby fat yet. And here's the skinny on baby skin: It's practically translucent now, so if you took a peek inside your uterus, you'd be able to see your baby's blood vessels under that thin skin.

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Reflections Candy Cane Vibe Review

2011-08-17T20:38:00.001-04:00

It’s review time again! I was really excited about this month’s selection from Eden Fantasys’ array of g-spot vibrators. I’m a big fan of glass toys, so I was pleased to find out they were sending me the Candy Cane Vibrator from Doc Johnson’s Reflections line.

Now if you’re like me (and I suspect most people), you probably aren’t going to put your toys on display for the in-laws. But this one is just about pretty enough to do so!

As you can see, it bulges in the middle of the shaft, and it features raised lines spiraling around the bump. Operation is a easy button on the end of the cap. It has three speeds, and turns off with a single push once you’re to high speed. One feature I really like is the fact that it only takes one AA battery. It’s also waterproof. The glass is super slick, but the ridging around the shaft does a great job of holding it in place if you choose to use it internally, and the ridging also provides a wonderful sensation if used externally.

As always, the specs from Eden Fantasys’ site:

Material / Texture

Material:
Tempered glass
Material safety: Indication of overall safety based on cleaning and chemical properties, on a 1-10 scale (10 being the safest).

Texture:
Ribbed / Swirled
Safety features:
Food-grade material / Hypo-allergenic / Latex free / Non-porous / Phthalates free
Functions / Performance / Controls
Functions:
Vibrating
Special Features:
- Multispeed
- Waterproof
Control type:
Push button
Powered By:
AA-1

Please check out Eden Fantasys for all your sex toys needs!

Eden Fantasys provided me with this product to review at no charge, but I was in no was compensated for this review, and all opinions are my own.

A bit late, but so much to be thankful for!

2011-08-09T04:26:00.001-04:00

Sorry I’m late with my Thankful Thursday post, but I was busy in Texas last week!

ABC’s of Gratitude:

Cuddling – whether with my husband or my girls, I’m a big fan of cuddling, and I can’t wait to cuddle with the new baby!
Comcast – okay, most of the time. There are occasions when we lose service for a little while (like yesterday), but their customer service has always been phenomenal with us, and I love their On-Demand and DVR services.
Casseroles – I admit, these are my go-to dinners when I don’t know what else to fix, and I’ve got a million of them.
Couches – I mentioned a few months ago that we got a new living room set with our income tax return back in March, and I just have to say how very much we all love our couches. One is technically a love seat, but it’s almost big enough to stretch out on, so I think it counts as a couch.
Chair – Oh, and I love the huge chair and 1/2 that came with the couches too!
Cousins – Morgan and Daisy got to spend the week with their cousins while we were in Texas, and it was so much fun to watch them interact with each other, especially Daisy and our nephew M, who’s four months older than her.
Crafting – the last year I’ve really grown into my crafting hobbies, especially with sewing, and it gives me so much pleasure and satisfaction to be able to create something. My mom was always an incredibly talented person with sewing and crafting, and it makes me happy to wander down the same pathways.

Recent Blessings:

First of all, I felt a liiiiittle bit of movement from the baby on the Saturday after my last post. Be still my heart!
A big one of course is the fact that we all got to go to Texas and spend the week with Nick’s sister and her family last week. It was just a wonderful vacation, very comfortable and relaxing, and with staying at their lake house, very luxurious as well.
We got to Texas safely!!! We left on Friday evening after R got off and arrived Sunday morning. It’s a long trip, but we split the driving, and it wasn’t too bad.
K and her husband actually have their lake house on the market (so this will be our last visit to Austin, although we’ll still visit them in Houston where they live full time). As soon as we arrived they had a showing on the house, despite prior instructions to their realtor that they didn’t want any showings this week.

We were happy to just hang out and get lunch, but K’s husband S sent us to Academy (a huge sports store down there) with instructions to all pick something out for ourselves, and they would meet us there as soon as they could and pay for our purchases. Now that was an incredibly generous offer, but it was also sort of an unusual one, and we all felt kind of strange taking him up on it. None of us really felt comfortable with that kind of freedom with someone else’s money, so we all just kind of hung around the store till they got there. Morgan had picked out a few little things, but she had her own money that she had saved for the trip, and she was planning to pay for everything herself.

When K and family arrived, we all hugged and exclaimed over how much all the kids had grown, then S and K did some shopping of their own. K immediately picked out a couple of pairs of shoes for Daisy (something she really needed!), and they insisted on paying for Morgan’s stuff as well. It was so incredibly sweet of them to do, although I’m glad the rest of us didn’t take him up on his offer, especially considering how generous they were with us the rest of the week!

Beyond just the trip itself, there were many other blessings last week. I’ve mentioned before that K and her family are very, very blessed financially, and they obviously love to do things for those that they love. It ended up costing us more in gas than we had thought to get down there, leaving us with barely enough to get home. Of course we never said a word about it to anyone, but we were a little worried that something would come up that might leave us short. The third day we were there K pulled Nick aside and handed him a handful of Visa gift cards and just said, “Here, these are for you.” It was completely out of the blue, and she just said that they wanted us to have them and use them to enjoy the week. It turned out to be $600 worth, and there were also six $10 iTunes gift cards in there as well. He of course told her that we appreciated it very much but that it was completely unnecessary, but she insisted he take them and told him it was just something they wanted to do. That generous gift not only allowed us to have some fun down there, but it’s also helping us this week too!
On Tuesday Nick and his sister R’s husband C got to have a guy day and go visit Austin Speed Shop, which is Jesse James’ motorcycle shop and has long been on Nick’s bucket list. They really enjoyed the day, and Nick got to bring home a really cool t-shirt.
The same day Nick and C hung out, Daisy, Morgan, and I went shopping with both of Nick’s sisters and our niece and nephew. I didn’t know at the time about the gift cards, so I didn’t do any shopping of my own, but K bought several outfits for Morgan and Daisy, and took us all to lunch.
Wednesday Nick’s sisters agreed to watch the kids for us so Nick and I could spend some time together alone. We went shopping at one of my own personal favorites – the Goodwill! I loooove to go thrifting – I think it’s just so much fun to find hidden treasures at a fantastic price, although lately I’ve not really had much extra money to go with. Let me just say that the Goodwills in Austin (at least in the rich part of town lol) are AWESOME.

We went to three different ones, and I cleaned up! I got two brand new, never-been-worn pairs of shoes, a low heeled dressy pair with the original price tag still on them for $6.99, and a pair of Converse All Stars (which retail for about $40) for $4.99. I also found a pair of awesome maternity pants for $6.99, and several shirts for $1 to $1.99 each.

My very favorite purchase though was………….a garbage disposal! How random is that at the Goodwill? But it was also brand new, never been installed, still had all the paperwork with it and everything for $14.99. See, a few months ago, our garbage disposal bit the dust. I had really missed being able to use it, but a replacement was over $100, definitely not in our budget, so we were just living without it. The one we bought in Austin is actually a better, more powerful one than the one we had previously, and I can’t wait till we get a chance to install it!
Wednesday S got to rejoin us (Monday he’d had to drive back to Houston to work for a few days). He took us all to an incredible dinner at a really high end steakhouse in downtown Austin, and afterwards we went to Congress Bridge to watch the bats take off.
Thursday they took us all to Sea World. It was an awesome trip, and we all really enjoyed the Shamu show as well as all the other animals and attractions.
We got home safely on Sunday morning – what a long, long drive! Whew!
After the last fill up that Nick’s sister R did on our way home (we were splitting the gas with them), we had enough gas to make it home plus get Nick to work and back this week.
We had enough left on the gift cards to go on until payday this Friday.

Baby Update:

At 14 Weeks Pregnant, Your Baby is a Mover (But Not a Shaker Yet)

Growing by leaps and bounds, by week 14 of pregnancy, your baby is leaping and bounding. He or she is on the move almost constantly — and those movements are a far cry from those jerky twitches of last trimester (though you won't feel any of them for weeks to come). They are now ballet-like, smooth and fluid.

Your Baby at 14 Weeks: Developing Perfect Posture (or Better Posture, at Least)

Speaking of ballet, it'll be years before you'll start nagging your offspring to stand up straight — but unbelievably, he or she is doing it right now, without any prodding! No slouch anymore, your baby's neck is getting longer, helping his or her head stand more erect. This gives your 14-week-old fetus a more straightened-out appearance.

Your Little Bigfoot — A Hairy Baby at 14 Weeks

Growth is happening on top of the head as well — by 14 weeks pregnant, your baby could be sprouting some hair (though the final color may not be determined until birth) and the eyebrows are filling in, too.

Hair growth isn't limited to the baby's head, though. He or she is also covered with a downy coating of hair called lanugo, largely there for warmth. As fat accumulates later on in your pregnancy (the baby's fat, not yours — though that will accumulate, too), most of the lanugo will shed — though some babies, especially those born early, still have a fuzzy coating at delivery (it sheds soon afterward).

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Thankful Thursday

2011-07-28T23:24:00.000-04:00

ABC’s of Gratitude

Babies – of course!

Breastfeeding – I loved nursing both of my girls (although I’m glad to be done for the moment), and I can’t wait to nurse the next baby!

Blogs – Craft blogs, spanking blogs, money saving blogs – fun, fun stuff!

Blogging – being a blog writer myself has allowed me to meet lots of wonderful people and have an outlet for all my spanko-ness.

Brothers – I have two, and I’m so proud of them both!

Bed – I love my bed, and I can’t wait to go spend some time with it!

Recent Blessings:

We get to leave for Texas on Saturday! I’m soooo excited to get to go!
Nick’s sister and her husband are going with us and will be paying for half the gas.
While it’s definitely going to be pretty tight, Nick’s paycheck was enough for us to be able to afford our part of the gas and have a little bit of money to go on while we’re down there.
Morgan’s new glasses. Okay, a bit of back story: I mentioned a few months ago that Nick’s dad and stepmom took Morgan and bought her two new pairs of glasses.

A few months ago her favorite pair got broken (I can’t remember how, but it wasn’t that she was being rough with them). There was insurance on that pair that paid for one complete replacement, so we went and got them replaced. Then, the earpiece got broken while she was at my mom’s house one night. Since we had already used the replacement, we just tried gluing it back on. It worked for a while, but the day she left for camp last month, she pushed them back up on her nose and they snapped again. And she had conveniently “lost” her second pair because she didn’t like them. The only reason she got them in the first place was because the store was running a BOGO deal.(This was the same day I found out I was pregnant – stressful much?) Anyway, we eventually found them and got her packed off to camp. And like them or not, she did wear them (except when she could get away with NOT wearing them).

Then a few weeks later we went to the cabin for the weekend, and she had them hooked into the collar of her t-shirt while we were unloading. Of course if she’d been wearing them like she was supposed to…but she wasn’t, and they fell off in the gravel driveway just behind the car. She realized they were gone, and she and I were frantically looking for them when Nick found them for us – by stepping on them.

The lenses were pretty scratched up, but once we got home Nick was able to get them back in one piece with some crazy epoxy work, but they could no longer be closed. We also tried making a workable earpiece for the other pair out of a matching pipe cleaner (don’t judge – we didn’t make her wear them in public like that!).

ANYWAY, we knew we needed to get her a good pair before school started, and hopefully before we left for Texas. Her new insurance fortunately has vision benefits, so I took her today to get a new pair, and by combining insurance with a store special and a coupon, I was able to get her TWO pairs, BOTH of which she loves for a grand total of…..wait for it…….$9.98! Woohoo! We use Dr. Bizer’s Vision World, and if you have one in your town, I HIGHLY recommend them.

The other day Nick’s dad and stepmom came by brought 5 packs of the diaper wipes we use as well as a pack of diapers for Daisy. The diapers are rather large, but they might work in a pinch, and we will certainly use the wipes! They also brought Nick 3 used golf clubs they picked up at a flea market. Back in March Nick played in a charity golf tournament using some borrowed clubs from a friend of a friend. They guy never called to get them back, and Nick has really gotten into the game. It’s rare for him to be able to afford to play, but he would go to the driving range quite a bit, and my brother took him out to play several times. Then a few weeks ago the guy wanted his clubs back, and Nick has been mourning their loss ever since. Unfortunately left handed clubs are hard to come by secondhand, so it was great that his dad brought him a few to get started with.
A few days ago I got a partial payment on a photography CD for a photo session I shot a few months ago.
I sold a couple of pillow covers to a girl at church, which gave me the money to pay for the sweet double stroller I got off Craigslist for $20!
I’ve been wanting a bread machine for a long time now, and I found a great one at the thrift store a few days ago for $4.99!

Baby Update:

Your Baby in Week 12 of Pregnancy

By now, your baby weighs a full half-ounce and is about the size of a large plum. Most of his systems are in place, though there's still plenty of maturing to do. For one thing, his fetal digestive system is beginning to practice contraction movements necessary for eating, and his bone marrow is busy making white blood cells — weapons against germs once he's out of your safe haven. The pituitary gland (at the base of the brain) has started producing the hormones that'll enable him (or her) to make babies of his (or her) own in a couple of decades or so.

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Thankful

2011-07-21T23:30:00.000-04:00

So I’ve decided I’d like to do a series of gratitude posts again. While doing a series can sometimes end up feeling a little bit like a chore, it also always (at least with the gratitude series) makes me really appreciate the wonderful things about my life, large and small.

So this is going to be a hybrid sort of thing – part alphabetized Gratitude Tuesday (but on Thursday), part recent blessings, and part baby update (since Thursday is the day the I go from one week of pregnancy to the next – I’m 11 weeks today). WARNING: I’m pretty blessed, so these may be some looooong posts!

ABC’s of Gratitude:

Again: As in, pregnant again. What a wonderful and unexpected blessing!

Amazing Grace: Not just the song, although it’s one I love, but more importantly the meaning behind the song. I truly once was lost but now I’m found, was blind but now I see.

Autumn: my favorite time of year, and the season of both my birthday and Daisy’s.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Recent Blessings:

I cannot begin to tell you how very much God has blessed and taken care of us recently, but I’m going to try. Some of this I’ve mentioned before.

After over a year without insurance of any kind, this pregnancy not only qualified me for a FABULOUS insurance plan through our state, but it also provided Morgan, Daisy, and eventually the new baby with full medical, dental, and vision coverage.
The hospital where my doctor primarily delivers, the same one where I’ve had both of my girls, did not accept this insurance plan – until right around the date this pregnancy got started.
My hospital only works with one group of anesthesiologists. This group was not in-network for my insurance plan, and with my last pregnancy I ended up with a $900 bill that accrues interest at 18% (which I’m still trying to pay off by the way). I knew that we just could not afford to have another interest accruing bill piled on top, but I also knew that an epidural is not what I’d call an optional procedure. (I know lots of women have babies with no pain meds, and more power to them, but it took 45 minutes just to stitch me back up after I had Morgan. I’ll take that needle, please.). After many, many phone calls, I finally reached someone at the anesthesia group who let me know that, despite the fact that none of the doctors in their main office are listed in my provider directory, they are in fact in-network for my plan because some of the doctors in their other offices are in-network, and they subscribe to all insurance plans that include any of their doctors, and I should be covered fully. Yay!
With the rest of the family covered, we have been able to pick up medical insurance for Nick through his work with the cost being about $120/month as opposed to $1500/month for employee plus spouse and first two kids, the reason we were without insurance in the first place!
Monday Nick was able to sign the papers and bring home our brand new used Toyota Sequoia!
Trading in my Camry on the Sequoia saved us $13 a month on our car payment and $50 a month on our car insurance!
This is a small thing, but our insurance company also started accepting payments by phone for free, saving us another $5 a month.
Getting the Sequoia means I get to go to Texas! Hooray!
When we bought the Sequoia, the dealership sent it home with Nick with a full tank of gas, no small thing with today’s gas prices!
This week has been Vacation Bible School at our church. Besides offering the standard kid fare, they’ve also had an adult class and a full meal every night, so we’ve gotten to not only have some great fellowship, but also have dinner for free all week!
Yesterday my brother-in-law C found out that he was hired for a new position in his company, something we’d really been praying for. He loved working for his old boss, and the job was one he enjoyed, but the new position is a move up.
Coincidentally (or rather through God), my friend D had applied for a position at the same company. She’s been having a REALLY tough time with her job at the bank (where C and I both used to work), and she was just ready to walk out, but had no job lined up. C saw her name on some paperwork there at his current company and recommended that his old boss hire D for the position he (C) just left. D has an interview next week, and she couldn’t be more excited!
Daisy has been officially weaned for a week now. I never intended to nurse her past 18 months (when I weaned Morgan), but she just didn’t seem ready to give it up then, so I didn’t push it. Then I got pregnant, and it was like she sensed something and wanted to nurse ALL THE TIME. I really wanted to get it done sooner rather than later so that she wouldn’t see the new baby as encroaching on “her” territory. Finally my mom suggested I try weaning by the Farmer’s Almanac. Whaaaaaaat? But I was desperate, so I decided to give it a try. The suggested dates were July 12-19, and I have to admit, it was surprisingly easy to accomplish during those dates. She hasn’t looked for it more than a couple of times, and she was easily distracted when she did.
Recently we’ve noticed that when Daisy runs, her left foot tends to turn in. This concerned us, so today I took her to see the doctor. Fortunately, after a thorough exam, he declared that while there’s a slight turning right now, it’s nothing to worry about and should correct itself over the next few months. Whew!

Baby Update:

Your Baby in Week 11 of Pregnancy

Your baby (now about two inches long) has been pretty busy this week, growing hair follicles, fingernails, and ovaries (if she's a girl). She has distinct human characteristics by now, with hands and feet in front of her body, with ears nearly in their final shape, open nasal passages on the tip of her tiny nose, a tongue and palate in the mouth, and visible nipples. What else makes her look human? Those hands and feet have individual fingers and toes (meaning good-bye to those froglike webbed hands and feet). Hooray!

Source

I-Kit Vibrator Kit Review

2011-07-18T03:05:00.001-04:00

Hello, everyone – review time!

I was lucky enough to get to do another sex toys review for Eden Fantasys this month, and this time they sent me the Doc Johnson I-Kit from their large selection of vibrators.

This versatile kit come in red, blue, or purple (mine was purple). It includes 5 different attachments - Vibro Bullet, Baby "G", Teasing Tongue, Slim Probe, and Titillating Fingers, plus the pocket rocket vibrator to which they attach. It takes a single AA battery, which is nice – no odd sizes to buy. It also comes with a sample pack of lube.

The vibrator itself was nice and strong, although perhaps a bit loud. As far as the attachments, I can’t say that I was a fan of all of them, although some of them, like the teasing tongue, were quite nice. The main downside was that the attachments are made of hard plastic. I think jelly or even just a softer plastic would have made them more attractive. That said, the pocket rocket itself is a lot of fun to play with all by its lonesome – no attachments needed. And it is nice to have the option to mix it up a bit with the different shapes and sizes.

Here are the specs, straight from Eden Fantasys:

Design / Shape / Size:
Length:
7"
Circumference:
3"
Diameter:
1"
Functions / Performance / Controls:
Functions:
Vibrating
Special Features:
- Lubricant included
Control type:
Dial-base
Powered By:
AA-1

The kit retails for $34.99, not a bad price at all for everything that you get. I think it would be a great first toy for someone interested in finding out what works for them. The I-Kit offers a lot of variety with easy use and reasonable battery requirements without the consumer having to purchase several different products.

Eden Fantasys provided me with this product to review at no charge, but I was in no was compensated for this review, and all opinions are my own.

Bunch of randomness :)

2011-07-15T03:21:00.001-04:00

Gosh, I feel like I never post anymore, but it seems like the days have gotten shorter, not longer! Did you all have a good July 4th? Ours had a bit of drama.

The night of the 3rd we went to a friend’s house after church for fireworks and a cookout. They had a bonfire for us to gather around, and a big trampoline within viewing distance of where we were. Morgan was playing on the trampoline just like she does every time we visit.

Suddenly I heard a scream, then Morgan calling for me, sounding pretty breathless, scared, and desperate. I ran to her, and she was rolling around on the trampoline, unable to really speak. It scared the crap out of me, and I was begging her to tell me what hurt. Finally she was able to tell me that she had been trying to turn a flip and landed on her head/neck. It knocked the wind out of her, which was why she had a hard time talking, but what really terrified me was the fact that she was crying so hard. Morgan can be a whiney, dramatic preteen with the best of them, but she very rarely cries if she gets hurt. I ran and got Nick, and we got her into the house to lie down. Within about 15 minutes it was clear that she was still in real pain, not just scared, and we headed to the ER. It turned out (thank God!) that she had only strained/bruised her spinal cord (which is certainly serious enough, but at least she didn’t break her neck!). The doctor gave her strict orders to stay off the trampoline until she healed, and to stay away from flips on the trampoline forever! She was pretty sore for a few days in her chest area from the way she scrunched up when she landed, but she’s all better now.

I’m 10 weeks pregnant now, and the baby is the size of a prune. Sadly I look like I’m about 4 months pregnant instead of 2 and 1/2, although I’ve not gained any weight. I’ve heard that you show earlier with each child, and I know that was certainly true with Daisy. I didn’t even know I was pregnant with her until I was 13 weeks along, but I remember getting really frustrated because I was losing weight but seemed to have developed this unexplainable extra (extra) padding – above my belly button! My ab muscles never really regained their former strength after Morgan, and when my uterus started expanding, it started pushing everything up and out.

For now I’m still in regular jeans, but maternity jeans are starting to look awfully appealing. Funny story – my friend Elizabeth is about 8 weeks ahead of me, and about, oh ONE DAY before I found out I was pregnant I took her all my maternity jeans. I had a ton of them because jeans were all we ever wore at my job, and I gave her every single pair. She’s been kind enough to offer to give them all back, but I told her it would be great if I could just get back a couple of pair.

Oh yeah – I got spanked Monday night! I was just kind of feeling down and stressed about everything from money to the housework to a crazy day with the kids to the fact that Nick and I never seem to get date nights anymore (I know, we had one just last month, but it was the first in AGES). Nick took me upstairs, pulled out the Spencer paddle, made me bend over the side of the bed, and told me that I needed some motivation and some stress relief. He let me keep my jeans on, but he spanked hard, and I didn’t do a great job of staying put. I think I got somewhere around a hundred swats, and by the time he was done I was crying. He put the paddle down and picked up a bottle of lotion and began to massage first my back, then my arms, and he eventually took off my pants and massaged my legs and my poor throbbing bottom. When he was done with the lotion he moved on to an even more effective form of stress relief, and it ended up being a very good night after all.

Today Nick brought home a used Toyota Sequoia from the dealership where he works. He wanted to see what I thought about it, and honestly I’m a little bit in love. I have a built in bias against buying a (new to us) car, just because I never think we can afford it, but this one just may be different. We would be trading in my Camry, and our car payments might actually go down. Insurance should stay about the same. The only downside that I can see is that we would be losing just a little on gas mileage, but this would be my daily driver, not Nick’s, and I don’t do all that much driving unless I’m picking Morgan up from school 20 minutes away. The thing is, we really do need a bigger vehicle. It’s just not very doable to squeeze Morgan into the back of the Camry between two car seats. Honestly, it would be a tight fit back there even if there were three kids not in car seats/booster seats (which there won’t be for another 8 years or so).

Anyway, this just came in yesterday, and we’re really praying about it. For it to work for us, we would really not be able to go up at all on our car payments.

Let’s see, what else? We’ve had a trip to Texas to see Nick’s sister K and her family planned for the end of July/beginning of August for months now. We’ve made this trip for the last two years with Nick’s other sister R, and this will be the first year that R’s husband C is also able to go, something we’ve all been looking forward to since last year. A few weeks ago it became apparent that we (Nick, I, and the girls) just couldn’t afford to go. Last year K flew us all down, but this year we were driving. True, we were planning on splitting the cost of gas with R and C, but with there being 6 of us total, we were going to have to rent a van or something else capable of hauling all of us, and that was just more expense to split. Plus, it’s a long, long way to K’s house, and the first year we drove Nick and I had to get a motel room and make the drive over two days.

SO, I decided that Daisy and I would stay home and just let Nick and Morgan go. That way they could rent a cheaper vehicle (or maybe just take Nick’s Xterra) since there would only be four people, get a single motel room instead of two if they had to stop, and it would just be cheaper to feed two less people on the road and in Texas.

Last year we had like $40 to go on the whole week – not that we didn’t try to save, just the way it turned out. K kept suggesting all these cool things to go and do, and finally I had to sit down with her and explain that we just didn’t have the money to really do anything. THAT was an awkward conversation, and one I really didn’t want to have. K and her husband are extremely well off (thus them flying us down last year), so the conversation had the unfortunate result of making her feel like they should just pay for everything for us while we were there (very generous, but NOT my intention, and it really embarrassed us and made us feel like we were imposing, especially since we were staying in their home and they had flown us down).

Anyway, I felt like Daisy and I staying home would automatically take two people out of the equation if K and her husband did decide to treat everyone to lunch/dinner/entertainment. Nick was not happy with the plan, and honestly I was pretty heartbroken myself, but I just didn’t see another way, and I felt like it was important that he and Morgan get to go and visit. Now that this Sequoia has come up as a possibility, and if God does allow us to get it, it kind of changes the game. First of all, we can take all 6 of us without renting a car, and with 4 adults, we can probably just drive straight through instead of stopping at a motel. Nick has assured me that he’s totally fine with just hanging out with me and Daisy by the pool while everybody else goes and does fun stuff (Morgan automatically goes along because K’s daughter wants her to), and he’s sworn to live off McD’s $1 cheeseburgers on the road (yuck, but affordable). I’m still trying not to get my hopes up, but it would be sooooo awesome if I got to go too. We would really appreciate your prayers – both for the trip and for God’s guidance on the car!

I’ve got another Eden Fantasys product review coming up in a few days, but I’ve got to get a chance to actually try the item first.

Oh, more randomness, I’ve sold a few things from my etsy shop now. Actually I got a request for a custom order yesterday, although that lady has not yet actually pulled the trigger on buying. And I booked two weddings for this fall for my photography – one in October and one in November! Nick’s going to second shoot for me, and I’m sooooo excited!

Anyway, that’s all – I’m off to bed. Have a great weekend!

Grabbing a minute…

2011-06-28T03:32:00.001-04:00

Ok, I’m making myself sit down and post. I’ve been meaning to get an update out here for a couple of weeks, but life has been CA-RAZY!

Everything seems to be going well with the baby. I did have a scare a couple of weeks ago. Thursday before last (the 16th) my mom was at our house helping Morgan go through her room and pare down on some clothes and toys (my job, I know, but I’m working on Daisy’s room so we can hopefully squeeze a toddler bed in there too by the time the baby comes). Anyway, I went to the bathroom and had just a huge gush of bright red blood (sorry if that’s TMI, but for the time being this is more of a pregnancy blog, so don’t be surprised to see more of such down the road).

I hadn’t yet had an ultrasound, so I didn’t know how far along I was, but I knew I was less than 2 months, and bright red heavy bleeding in early pregnancy is always alarming. I called my doctor’s office and let them know what was happening, and they told me to go ahead and come in for an ultrasound. I told them that my insurance was still in the process of being approved, but they said not to worry about it and to just get there ASAP.

Fortunately everything turned out to be just fine. I got to see the heartbeat, and they gave me a due date of February 9, 2012. Yay!

My insurance got approved about a week and a half ago, and I got to have my official first visit today (er, yesterday). Everything still seems to be fine, but I’ll find out for sure tomorrow (today?) how my progesterone level is doing.

The day after the bleeding scare Nick and I got to have a date night of sorts (better do it now while there’s still just two to find sitters for lol). My brother and his wife had gotten us a Red Lobster gift card for Christmas, and Nick’s sister K had given him a movie gift card for his birthday in April 2010 (shows you how often we get a chance to go out!). Anyway, we had a lovely dinner at Red Lobster, but unfortunately the movie we had planned to see was sold out when we got there, and there wasn’t another one we could fit into our allotted baby-sitting time. It was still a lovely night, and this way we can enjoy the movie as a separate date. My in-laws kept the kids for this one, so my mom said she’d be happy to keep them while we go to the movie one night.

Speaking of keeping the kids – I’m a little concerned about Daisy having to be away from me overnight a couple of nights when I go to the hospital to have the baby. I’m probably being overprotective – after all, Morgan will most likely be with her, and she/they will be with either my parents or my in-laws. But Morgan didn’t spend the night away from us until she was four, and even then she got really homesick for us. Daisy will just be 2 (gaaahhhh – is she really almost 2!?!?!?), and she’s used to sleeping in a crib, although we hope to change that before the new arrival.

I’m actually thinking about letting Morgan be in the delivery room this time. The hospital is pretty open about who you have in there, so I think it would be okay with them. She wanted to be in there when Daisy was born, but I felt she was too young then. I guess I’ll wait to see how the pregnancy goes. Daisy was an amazingly easy delivery, and they tend to get easier with each one, but we’ll definitely have to do some praying about it.

What else? Father’s Day was a week ago Sunday. I got my dad a book about the history of our town, which he LOVED. That made me really happy, because he’s really hard to buy for. I got Nick a pair of shoes he wanted. For Nick’s dad we got a book about roadside attractions across America – really cheesy stuff, but exactly the sort of thing he and his wife are into, so it was a big hit too. And for Nick’s papaw we got a book like my dad’s only it was about the town where their lake cabin is, also a winner.

And speaking of the lake cabin, Sunday was mine and Nick’s 13th anniversary, so we spent the weekend there with the kids. It was a short trip, but a lot of fun, and both girls had a blast in the lake.

Geez this is a long post! Well, I’m off to bed – night all!

Glee Review

2011-06-16T02:37:00.001-04:00

No, not that Glee, although I do confess that Fox’s hit show is one of our guilty pleasures.

This Glee is by Doc Johnson, and it’s part of their Reflections line. When Eden Fantasys contacted me to see if I’d like to do another sex toys review for them (um, yes please!), I asked if I could try something from their wide selection of g-spot vibrators, and this sweet number was among those they offered for me to choose from.

The Reflections Glee combines two of my favorite features in a sex toy – a velvety surface texture and a glass body. I have to say, I was looking forward to trying it out, but I found myself even more pleased with it than I expected.

It stays in place really well, and it’s very easy to operate. It has three speeds, which are controlled by a simple button on the end. One small complaint is that the vibrations aren’t super strong unless you have a very fresh battery, and it does tend to go through battery power pretty quickly, but the good news is that it only takes a single double A for operation. I do have to say that the batteries we have right now were super cheap (as in 48 for like eight bucks at the flea market), so I imagine it would do better with a better quality of battery.

As always, the specs straight from the site:

Color:: Pink
Length:: 6 1/2"
Insertable length:: 5"
Circumference:: 4 1/8"
Diameter:: 1 1/4"
Weight:: 6.5 oz

I found it to be a terrific addition to a clit vibe (specifically my beloved Lelo Lily). I love how easy to clean it is – because it’s made of tempered glass, you don’t have to worry about special cleaners or lubes. It’s also waterproof, a feature I’d probably enjoy greatly if I ever got to take a bath without kids knocking on the door every two minutes, lol. All in all, I was very pleased with the Glee, and it will be a welcome addition to my toy box.

Eden Fantasys provided me with this product to review at no charge, but I was in no was compensated for this review, and all opinions are my own.

So what’s new with you guys?

2011-06-09T04:07:00.001-04:00

So I look up and it’s been three weeks since I posted. Surely I’ve had a few interesting things happen since then!

Let’s see – I had a photo shoot. It turned out great, and the client (a repeat client!) wants to buy a CD just as soon as she gets the money together.

Daisy turned 20 months old (gaaaaahhhh!).

My brother moved to L.A. He’s really close to Venice Beach, and he seems to be enjoying it there. He’s planning on (hopefully) being back home by the time Christmas gets here. Last year he was gone for Thanksgiving and Christmas, not to mention New Year’s and Easter, so it will be nice if he can wraps things up there by then.

We’re supposed to be going back to Texas to visit Nick’s sister and her family in August. I’m not sure if we’ll be driving or flying (depends entirely on whether or not they book us plane tickets like they did last year lol), but either way it’s going to be an, um, active trip with a 22 month old!

Tonight I made this pie. It’s called Danger Pie, for two very good reasons. First of all because there really is an element of danger in the prep work if you do it wrong – but only if you’re careless with it. It calls for the magic of boiling an unopened can of sweetened condensed milk for 2 1/2 hours, then opening it (after cooling!) to find it astonishingly full of ooey-gooey caramel. This really, really does work, but you have to keep a close eye on the water level and add more as needed to keep the can submersed – otherwise it will explode (thus the danger). The second reason it’s called Danger Pie is of course that you may very well face the danger of locking yourself in the bathroom and eating the whole thing yourself. It is THAT GOOD.

Morgan is away at church camp this week. It’s her very first time going, and her first time being away from home this long. (Well, she stayed with my parents while we were in Hawaii a couple of years ago, but that doesn’t really count since she was with her grandparents and even got to take Pancho with her.) Anyway, she was super nervous about going, but being the ~~pushy~~ awesome parents we are, we insisted, and of course she’s having a blast!

Nick finally got his Fairlane running! Yay for him not being in a bad mood about it anymore!

Anything else? Oh yeah – I’m pregnant. What?

Yep, I was about a week late, so Monday after taking Morgan to camp, I went to Wal-mart and picked up a couple of tests. Honestly though, I was a little stunned when they came back positive. And the teensiest bit panicked. Uh, we don’t have health insurance. The health insurance through Nick’s job is – get ready for this – $1500.00 a month! That $18,000.00 a year! There’s just no way on earth we can afford that, so we’ve just gone without since mine ran out after Daisy was born. I’ve been taking Daisy to the Health Department for immunizations, and we found a health department referral clinic willing to take payments so I could take her in for a check-up about a month ago. Fortunately Morgan hasn’t been sick.

BUT, God has already begun providing for us with this baby. Me getting pregnant makes us a family of five and qualifies me for maternity benefits through a program in our state. When it was just four of us, Nick made too much money for us to be eligible. I had checked into it before because I was trying to get coverage for the kids as part of the same program, but no dice. Now, not only do I qualify, but Morgan and Daisy do as well, so they’ll have insurance again – yay! And actually it’s much better insurance than we would have had through Nick’s job anyway. This program pays 100% with no premiums, I’ll have one $15 co-pay on my first doctor’s visit, one $100 co-pay for the hospital stay (can I just say that we still owe almost $1000 on Daisy?), it will cover the baby for a year, and me for 60 days after delivery. Another awesome thing God has done: I called my OB-GYN to tell them I had a positive test and explained that I needed a statement from them saying I was pregnant so I could apply for the insurance. They let me come in and do the bare minimum (a simple blood test to confirm the pregnancy and check my levels), and the lab is going to let me make payments. Unfortunately my progesterone came back very low, so they needed to put me on medication immediately to raise it. Now this happened with Morgan (and very well may have happened with Daisy, but since I was 3 months along before I knew I was pregnant I have no way of knowing), so I’ve dealt with it before, but still, it’s pretty critical to not delay treatment. Unfortunately, this is a pretty expensive medication. Even with a discounted cash-pay (no insurance) price, every pharmacy I called was charging $5 a pill, and I need two a day. $70 a week is just not within our means right now. BUT, my friend Elizabeth is also pregnant right now. AND she’s been on the same medication for low progesterone. AND they’re taking her off of it today, but she has two refills left! She called in the refill and let me pick it up, and for $40 I was able to get 30 pills, enough to do me for 15 days, by which time the insurance should kick in!

Anyway, please be in prayer that a) the baby will be okay and my progesterone will come up and b) that there won’t be any snags with getting approval for the insurance. Oh, and if you’re my friend on FB, my in-laws are out of town and don’t know yet, so please don’t say anything about it on there. Thanks!

So anyway, what’s up with you?

Mother’s Day, etc.

2011-05-18T10:51:00.001-04:00

Hello, everyone! I had a moment free to sit down and post, so I thought I’d take advantage! Life has been good. God provided some unexpected side work for Nick to help meet our needs, and I’ve also sold some photography packages. I also made my first etsy sale – yippee!

Did everyone have a nice Mother’s Day? It was a busy weekend for us – Nick’s sister K and her husband went to the Derby, and my in-laws babysat for them, so we got to see the kids over the weekend and K and her husband on Sunday when they came back. We went to church that morning, then the whole family spent the day at Nick’s other sister’s house until it was time for K and family to fly back to Texas.

I made anniversary pillow covers for Nick’s stepmom and grandmother, a pillow cover for K with the address of her lake house translated to French, and a pillow cover with a favorite hymn lyric for my mom. For my gift, I bought myself a couple of watches on sale a few weeks ago.

Coincidentally, my brother also came home from Texas that weekend. I think I’ve mentioned that he’s a surgical tech and was doing a travelling job there for a few months. That job has ended, and in a few days he’ll be packing back up to do a stint in Los Angeles. I miss him like crazy, but this is a good time in life for him to travel. He’s single, childless, and still in his twenties, so I’m glad for him to get the opportunity to see some new places. He makes good money being willing to travel, and that’s allowing him to save up for a house.

There’s not been a whole lot happening on the DD front, but neither has it felt like it’s absent. There’s just been no reason for punishment, which is a good thing!

Well, I’m off to edit pictures and work on the laundry – have a great day!

Rombee Review

2011-05-10T19:11:00.001-04:00

Eden Fantasys contacted me toward the end of last month with an opportunity to do another review for them. I really enjoyed the last review, so I was glad to get to do it again! Eden Fantasys has a huge selection of adult toys, and this time they sent me a product from their extensive offering of anal toys. I had expressed an interest in trying something of a different material than the glass products I’m such a fan of, so they sent me The Rombee.

The Rombee is made of pure silicone, and I found it to be a very versatile toy. It was a bit outside my comfort zone as an anal toy, but it was just perfect as a dildo. The bulged design and velvety texture gave a great sensation and I really liked the ring on the end for getting a firm grip on it. The little “tail” just below the ring is an added bonus for clitoral stimulation.

The product specs, again straight from the website are as follows:

Color:: Hot pink
Length:: 7"
Insertable length:: 5 1/2"
Circumference:: 4 r1/2"
Diameter:: 1 3/8"
Weight:: 0.3 lb

It’s very flexible, yet still stiff enough for easy insertion, and very easy to clean with antibacterial soap and water. It should be noted that it should only be used with water based lubricants. Just like the last item I tried from Eden Fantasys, it’s durable, battery free, and packed full of sensation. And with kids in the house, I certainly appreciate the fact that it’s noise free. All in all, I think it’s a great addition to the toy box.

Eden Fantasys provided me with this product to review at no charge, but I was in no was compensated for this review, and all opinions are my own.

Happy (okay very late) Easter!

2011-05-01T01:45:00.001-04:00

I hope that everyone had a wonderful Easter! Ours was lovely. It was also both Nick’s and Morgan’s birthday, and while I’m quite alright with being married to a 32 year old, I’m having a bit of trouble with being mother to a 10 year old! How on earth did my little baby get to be such a big girl? I swear it seems like 6 months since she was Daisy’s size! Of course Daisy’s pulling this growing up trick on me too – she’s still supposed to be brand new, and she’s almost 19 months old already!

Anyway, we went to church that morning, then went to Nick’s grandmother’s house for Easter/Birthday brunch and hunting eggs. Right now I’ve got the only two children in the family except for Nick’s sister’s two, and they live in Texas. Speaking of them, they’ll be coming in next weekend. K and her husband will be going to see the Kentucky Derby, and they’re leaving the kids with Nick’s dad and stepmom for the weekend. It will be great to see them all, even if it’s only briefly.

Backing up just a bit, Nick made Morgan the most awesome birthday gift. (Well, I helped with reading off the plans, and my dad provided the scrap wood and the saw, and my mom made the linens and bedding. Oh, and I painted it.) I think I’ve mentioned how much she loves her American Girl doll her aunt bought her for Christmas. Shortly after she got it, I found her an Our Generation doll at Tuesday Morning for a great price. Anyway, great big ten year old that she may be, she still has enough little girl in her to really, really love them and want tons of accessories for them. Well I found a plan for an American Girl farmhouse doll bed on Ana White’s website, and Nick and I spent a couple of hours at my parent’s house building it. We modified it just a bit to make it wide enough to accommodate both dolls, and Morgan was THRILLED with it! Nick doesn’t do a lot of wood working, but he did such a great job on this, and I couldn’t be happier with how it came out!

What’s really neat is that she has the plans for this bed all the way up to a California King size – I’d love to have one for us!

Morgan and I did some really neat egg dying this year. I found a really cool tutorial for dyeing eggs using silk ties, so I headed to the thrift store, and we ended up with these!

Let’s see, what else has been happening? Nick had to go away for school (for work) the Monday through Thursday prior to his birthday. Morgan’s spring break started that Wednesday, so I was home alone with two kids there for a couple of days. But he brought me back a Godiva cheesecake from The Cheesecake Factory so I forgave him.

I was also supposed to do a photo shoot that Wednesday, but it got rained out, so we postponed it to this past Wednesday. Of course that was the day all the storms hit, so hopefully we’ll actually be able to make it happen this coming Wednesday. Speaking of the storms, we were very fortunate to get only heavy rains at our house. A lot of people in our city got tons of hail and hail damage. One friend on the opposite side of town lost every window in her house, her brand new roof had holes torn through it, and her vinyl siding looked like it had been through a drive-by shooting. And of course Alabama was hit terribly hard. We had several cities in our state take some heavy damage as well, but nothing like Tuscaloosa suffered. Please keep them all in your prayers.

Today my mom kept the girls for me so I could spend some time at a car show with Nick. That’s something I’ve not gotten to do kid-free in a very long time, and I really enjoyed it. I got to take some cool pictures, and I got to spend some time with my favorite guy.

Anyway, I think that’s about everything that’s happened since I last posted. Happy Spring!

It’s Spriiiiiing!!!

2011-04-14T00:09:00.002-04:00

Hello, everyone! How are you all? I’m doing great! Our beautiful pink azaleas have bloomed, and the peonies are hot on their heels! (No pictures – what was I thinking?)

I finally (on the third rescheduling) got to take Morgan’s team pictures on Monday, and I think they turned out great. Hopefully the parents will think so too and will buy lots!

My awesome chair and 1/2 came in last Wednesday, and I LOVE it! I’ve been doing some more crafting, and I’ve come up with some more pillow covers that I’m really pleased with. I plan on eventually stocking them in my etsy shop. (June 26 is our anniversary).

Oh, and I got spanked last night. Here’s the thing – weekend before last, I told Nick I would really appreciate some attention in that area, and he said he would try to get to it that weekend. It never happened, and I think that may have factored into last night’s spanking just a bit. I’ve been working really hard on getting the laundry done, and I’m most of the way there. Nick was out in the garage working on his Fairlane, and I went out to put in another load. I teasingly said something about how I had the pile just about gone “despite the lack of promised motivation.” He said that I had been doing really well, but that he wasn’t afraid to step up if I started screwing up, and without really thinking about it, I said that I’d rather not have to do that. It was an offhand remark, not one that I really meant to make, but I think he heard it.

Sunday night after church I fell asleep on the couch and didn’t wake up till about 11:30. Nick went to bed shortly after I got up, but I was wide awake. I knew I had the soccer photo shoot the next day, so I started working up an order form (the coach’s fiance had made me one, but it was crooked, misspelled, and just generally not very professional looking, so I wanted to make my own). While I was waiting on our excruciatingly slow printer to churn out 10 copies of the 5 page order form (1 page of package details, 3 pages of team photo template choices, and 1 page for the actual order form), I started working on the Mr. and Mrs. pillows pictured above. By the time I got in bed, it was after 5:00 in the morning, and Nick woke up and caught me, although he didn’t say much about it at the time other than to let me know that he noticed.

Now a few weeks ago we had made an agreement (at my request) that I would be up by 9:00 every day and text him by 9:15 to let him know. I’d been trying to keep to it, but I’d missed a few times without him saying anything, and I’d kind of fallen off doing it just because I felt like he didn’t really care either way. Monday I slept (way) in until 11:00, and obviously didn’t text him. When he got to Morgan’s soccer game he said something about it and let me know that we’d be discussing it later.

Monday night he fell asleep on the couch, and I kind of didn’t wake him up until I was pretty sure he would just go straight to bed. Not very mature I admit, but I was feeling pretty nervous. Nervous enough, in fact, that I couldn’t fall asleep until late. Despite my alarm and my best intentions, I didn’t wake up until 10:15. I immediately texted him and told him that I’d overslept. The text I got back? “Wow, sucks for you.” Yikes!

By the time he got home my stomach was doing pretty much constant flips.

I had rented Due Date for us to watch, a movie he’d been wanting to see. Soon after he got home I quietly apologized for staying up late and oversleeping. He told me that he was going to take care of it, and I asked if we could do it before we watched the movie. I really didn’t want to sit through it while trying not to think about what was coming.

I put the kids to bed at nine, and we watched TV for a little while to give them time to fall asleep. Before I knew it though, he was ushering me upstairs. I immediately ran to the bathroom to pee, and when I came out he had the AngelBrat Paddle in hand. He made me bend over the side of the bed, then he took down my jeans and panties. He honestly probably only gave me 25 or 30 swats, but I had an awful time staying still for it. My bottom was on fire by the time it was over, and I don’t think I could have handled much more. Fortunately he had a good handle on what I needed, and he ended it much, much sooner than most spankings he’s ever given me.

After he spanked me, he held me and rubbed my bottom for a bit, then left me to compose myself and come down when I was ready. I put away the paddle, pulled my jeans and panties back up, and joined him downstairs. The movie was very funny, and I enjoyed it so much more than I would have if I’d had the paddling hanging over my head.

Anyway, that’s been what’s going on in our house. How have your lives been?

Catching up

2011-04-04T15:16:00.001-04:00

Hello, everyone! It’s been a busy few weeks for me, but I’m finally getting the chance to pop in for a minute. We got our new furniture last Tuesday! Yay! Well, except for my awesome chair and a half. That’s coming in on another truck. Boo! But seriously, we love, love, love the furniture we do have. We also sold our old couch on Craigslist along with a couple of other items, so that was a nice to have a little money to help out.

We painted our living room, which has made a huge difference, since we went from this:

to this:

Also, I made a pillow for the new couch using my Silhouette SD to cut a stencil for it, and I’m soooo in love with the way it turned out. Pancho, it seems, is too:

Let’s see, what else?

Oh! I can’t believe I forgot to mention this earlier, but on Feb 27, a little girl Morgan’s age at our church asked Morgan if she could help her get saved. Morgan asked me if I would talk to her, so I grabbed my brother (the pastor), and together we led her to the Lord! But the evening got even better – Morgan made a profession of faith and was baptized several years ago, but we’d always had our doubts that she really understood it at the time, and we just weren’t seeing the attitude and actions of a Christian in her. I talked to her about the little girl who’d just gotten saved, and she told me that she didn’t feel like she was really saved herself. So this time I grabbed my brother’s wife and my mom, and we went and talked to Morgan about it some more, and she prayed and asked Jesus into her heart! Then a couple of weeks later the first little girl’s twin sister asked to talk to me, and she also became a Christian! Nick called me the kid whisperer, but I can assure you it was all God and had nothing at all to do with me. Yesterday all three girls were baptized!

Let’s see, in other news, Morgan is playing soccer this year, so that’s an adventure. She’s still learning, but we think she really has the potential to be a great player.

My photography is really picking up with the warmer weather. I had a shoot with a great family a couple of weeks ago, and I have a few more on the books for this month. I’m actually supposed to do the team pictures for Morgan’s soccer team this evening (if we don’t get rained out again grrr!). I’ll be offering several packages, so hopefully that will bring in a little money.

I love that spring is starting to bloom around here. Nick brought me some gorgeous flowers out of the blue a few days ago , and the trees in our yard are starting to blossom. I’ll leave you with a few local shots from the last few weeks.

Eden Fantasys Review

2011-04-04T14:08:00.001-04:00

A couple of weeks ago Eden Fantasys contacted me to see if I would be interested in reviewing a product for them. Eden Fantasys is a well known online retailer offering tons of adult toys. It had been a while since I’d done a toy review, so I welcomed the opportunity. They have a huge selection of products, and I spent some time browsing through their dildos. I offered a few suggestions of items I would be interested in, and I was excited when they emailed me back letting me know they were shipping me the Blue Swirl.

I have a couple of other glass dildos, and I love everything about them, so I was glad to get to try a different one. Both of my other two have textured shafts, but nothing as intense as the tight spirals on the Blue Swirl. At first I wasn’t just 100% in love with the sensation of so many closely spaced ridges, but I think it was just a matter of getting used to it. Further um, research into it, I’ve grown to love the feel of it, as well as the way it stays put if I want it to.

The product specs straight from the website are as follow:

Color:
Blue / Clear
Length:
6 3/4"
Insertable length:
6 1/4"
Circumference:
4 1/2"
Diameter:
1 3/8"
Weight:
10.5 oz

It’s also made of food-grade Pyrex, which makes it not only very durable, but also very safe and easy to clean. It came with a velvet pouch, a detail I appreciate since I prefer to have something to put it in inside the suitcase when I travel.

Shipping was both very fast and very discreet. I got it 4 days after they let me know what I would be getting, and the plain brown package was so nondescript that I wasn’t sure who it was from until I opened it. At just under $30, this is an item that I would recommend if you’re looking for something durable, easy-to-clean, battery free, and packed full of sensation. It should last you a lifetime, and it’s small and light enough to take with you wherever you’d like.

Eden Fantasys provided me with this product to review at no charge, but I was in no was compensated for this review, and all opinions are my own.

Just what I needed

2011-03-13T22:45:00.001-04:00

Last night I had reached my breaking point stress-wise. I hadn’t had a break from the kids for what seemed like days, and they were both just dancing on my last nerve. Morgan’s first soccer game was yesterday, the teams were not well-matched, and she was turning out to be a very sore loser. Daisy was into absolutely everything (as 17 month old babies tend to be), and Nick had been working for 6 days and spending some of his evenings on side work at his friend’s house.

Basically all of this had left me with a pretty horrible attitude myself, and I found myself snapping at everyone. When Nick asked me if I had done any laundry like he asked, I retorted that I hadn’t done a thing all day except take care of the kids, but that I’d be happy to get to it when I was done with what I was doing.

A few minutes later I went out to the garage to pull the clean clothes out of the dryer.Within a few seconds the door opened behind me, and I found myself being pushed forward over the washing machine. Nick had grabbed a paddle on the way out and proceeded to spank me hard enough to break it across my bottom. Once it broke he continued to use the half he had left until he felt like he had my attention. Granted, it wasn’t a very heavy duty paddle, but it was sturdy enough to leave my bottom throbbing, even used over my jeans.

After he finished spanking me he turned me around and told me in no uncertain terms that he was absolutely done with my attitude. At that point all I could do was just hug him and thank him for bringing me back from the edge. He held me for a few minutes, and it was just exactly what I needed. It’s almost crazy how quickly and consistently a spanking will solve an attitude problem for me, and it was such a perfect thing for him to do right then.

Gosh, it’s been a while, hasn’t it?

2011-03-02T20:20:00.001-05:00

I looked at the blog and realized it has been almost a month since I’ve posted! It seems like I just never have any time!

I did actually get a spanking Saturday night – the first one in nearly four months. I’d finally broken down and told him I needed it a while before it happened. It wasn’t the longest or hardest I’ve had by any means, but four months really gives a girl’s butt time to get tender! He told me to pick an implement, and I managed to convince him to use his hand since it had been so long. That lasted until his hand started hurting. After that he switched to the snake paddle I reviewed a few months back.

Yesterday we had a short conversation about the length of time it had been since there had been any sort of discipline. I have to admit that I had gotten to the point where I was feeling both neglected and very angry about it. He told me that he felt like I should be happy that he was ever doing it at all since it’s not something he enjoys and that part of it was letting it happen when he decided it needed to happen. I kind of call BS on that though. If he doesn’t want to do it at all, then the whole reason he’s doing it is for me. And if he’s doing it for me, but he’s not doing it at anywhere near a level where it will be beneficial to me then what’s the point of doing it at all?

I tried to explain it this way: Imagine there are two people, one of whom is madly in love with the other one. Person A wants a committed relationship, but Person B says that he doesn’t want to commit, but is willing to have a few romantic weekends here and there, just so long as he doesn’t have to go too much out of his way and they don’t have to ever talk about their “relationship”. In that situation, it would be kinder for Person B to just end the romantic relationship completely so that Person A can come to terms with the loss and move on.

It’s not that I want him to just pull the plug on DD completely, but it’s incredibly hard to have the need and believe there’s some small chance it will be met, but spend the vast majority of my time with it unmet. I just need to have some attention paid to it more than a few times a year. Sometimes I think it would be better to just cut ties with DD completely so that I can mourn it properly.

BUT, with my undying optimism apparently firmly in place, I’ve ordered something that I hope will help. A few days ago I got a $10 coupon from Zazzle.com. LOVE that company! It’s where I ordered these. Anyway, it’s super easy to create your own designs, so I ordered these magnets, to put up on the fridge when the need gets especially strong. All of them are subtle enough that I can explain them away if Morgan asks about them, yet specific enough to tell him just what I need.

Hopefully he’ll be on board with it, but I guess we’ll see.

In other news – we got our income tax return back!! Aaaaand…it was awesome! We got back enough to catch up on all of our bills, pay a few of them ahead, and buy some stuff we really wanted! The big ticket item we got was a new living room set! Squeeee! We’ve never in our whole marriage had a brand-new-never-been-owned-by-anyone-but-us piece of furniture. Well, we did buy a new crib and rocker when Morgan was born, but nothing for us. Anyway, it looks almost exactly like this:

Unfortunately we won’t get it all for about another 3 weeks, but that will give us time to paint first. We also got to finally pay off Nick’s Fairlane (this was actually from him selling his bike a few weeks ago), and he’s going to be able to get a transmission for it (which is the main thing it needs). I got to get one of these:

It’s a Sizzix BigKick Die Cutter, and it has made making hair bows super fast and easy. Oh yeah – I’ve been making and selling hair bows and glass magnets along with a few other crafty things, and I will eventually move all of it into an etsy shop. And along the lines of crafty things, I got to finally order:

I am SO excited about it! Anyway, that’s been our lovely last month. How has yours been?

Randomness

2011-02-06T01:08:00.001-05:00

Hello, everyone. Just popping in. Nothing much happening here. I’m nicely recovered from my tumble down the stairs – thank you all for your sweet comments.

This past Tuesday Nick’s grandparents took us out to dinner at The Chop House, which is my favorite restaurant in the whole wide world. Nick loves it too, so we very much enjoyed it. They have apparently decided to take each of the grandchildren (and their spouses if they’re married) out for dinner, so this was our turn.

Nick’s sister K and her kids are coming in to visit in a couple of weeks, which will be nice. They didn’t get to come in for Christmas, so we haven’t seen them since we visited them in Texas last August.

Speaking of Texas, my brother decided to take on another 3 month assignment in Houston, so he won’t be back till spring. Daisy will have gone from 13 to 19 months by the time he sees her again, so he’ll hardly recognize her!

I’ve started selling some of my craft items among my friends, and I’ve had quite a bit of interest as well as a few purchases so far, so hopefully that will help fill the gap until the weather warms up and I can start booking photography clients again.

We should be getting our income tax return in about 3 weeks, and I can’t wait. We’re going to pay off a few big bills, catch up a few small ones, and buy a few things we’ve been wanting, one of which is a Silhouette machine. This will allow me to do tons of new crafts, as well as open up a few new business opportunities for me.

Anyway, that’s what’s going on around here. I hope you guys are all doing well!

Um–ouch!

2011-01-25T23:14:00.000-05:00

Hey, guys. How have you all been? A few nights ago Nick and I had a brief DD related conversation, and he assured me that he’s not done with it. There’s been no real change, but I’ve not given him any reason to punish either, and it made me feel better just to hear him say he’s still on board. He did say that he’s aware of the need but that there just hasn’t been any time to take care of it.

On another subject, yesterday was exciting, but not in a good way. I was carrying Daisy down the stairs along with a cup of tea and a bowl of banana bread I had been feeding her. About halfway down my foot slipped, and I (we) went flying headlong into the wall at the bottom. Fortunately I threw everything but her and had her wrapped up like a football by the time I hit, so she wasn’t hurt, and the extent of her involvement was a very glancing bump against the wall after I hit and was rolling down to the floor. She was certainly frightened by it all, but her tears lasted less than 15 seconds, and she was happily playing in the spilled tea and bread crumbs while I lay there and tried to make sure I wasn’t going to pass out. That was purely God, because I certainly wasn’t capable of any sort of planning in the 7 or 8 steps distance to the landing. Also purely God was the fact that I came through it with just some scrapes and bruises.

I did have a bad moment where I thought I was going to lose consciousness, so I called my dad to come over since it was just me and the baby, but the spell passed pretty quickly.

Today I’m very, very sore, and I’m finding that I’m banged up more than I initially realized. I have some bad bruises on both knees, my left calf, left shoulder, and left elbow, as well as scrapes on both knees, the back of my left thigh, and my left shoulder. I also have a bruise coming up on my chin, not surprising since that’s what made first contact with the wall, and hard enough to have left a pretty sizeable dent in the sheetrock. I also busted my lower lip against my teeth when I hit. The worst of it though is probably my left ring finger. It’s not broken, but it was jammed hard enough that I knew to switch my wedding ring to my right hand before I even made it out of the floor. Tonight it’s purple and swollen, although I can still move it without it being excruciating.

Anyway, my dad came over and went to pick Morgan up from school (at that point we were thinking driving might not be the wisest decision), and Nick came home to take care of me. Fortunately his workday was almost over anyway, so he won’t lose any pay over it. So that was my Monday. How’s your week going?

Still blessed

2011-01-16T03:30:00.001-05:00

Ok, ok, I know it looks like I gave up on DD and fell off the face of the earth, but I promise that’s not what happened! I’ve just been crazy busy lately. As far as DD, well, there’s been some small mention of it on my part with some small not-completely-oppositional response on Nick’s part, so here’s hoping, anyway.

Something VERY cool happened yesterday. Well, to back up just a bit – on Christmas Eve we went to celebrate with Nick’s extended family, and Nick’s cousin B was there. Now B used to weigh somewhere in the neighborhood of 400 pounds, but a couple of years ago he had gastric bypass and lost a ton of weight. He’s even had the surgery to remove his excess skin, and he looks just great.

Anyway, we started talking about my photography business, and he said that he’d be interested in booking a portrait session, because the only formal pictures anyone has of him are pre-weight loss. Now I would have been happy to do this for free, just because he’s family, and it would make me happy to do something to help him celebrate his transformation to a healthy weight. But what he offered instead was to bring me his copy of Photoshop CS5, the very newest version and way up high on my wish list of things we really can’t afford but that would make my life so much easier! Yesterday he brought it by and installed it for me, and I’ve had so much fun playing with it!

In other news, I’ve been playing around a lot with different craft projects, and I’ve decided to open an Etsy shop just as soon as I can get some inventory built up. There are so many easy, inexpensive things I can make, from hair bows to magnets to coasters, and maybe I can bring in a little money that way. My friend R loved the coasters I made for some of my family for Christmas, and today she met me with some supplies to make a set for her to give as a birthday gift. I’m not charging her to make them, but the supplies she brought me will make many more than just hers, so I’m still coming out ahead.

This week is pretty tight money-wise, so I’ve not been able to go out and load up on supplies like I’d like, but I’ve got enough to make a few things anyway. Nick didn’t get to go to school last week because of the snow, which also caused his work to be closed for one day and open late another day. It also kept most of the customer’s away, and the New Year’s holiday hurt us too, so his check was a lot smaller than we needed. BUT, that just gives God a chance to really shine in taking care of us. In fact, we were in this same position this time last year, and this happened.

Anyway, I’m off to bed – church in the morning!

Yuck!

2011-01-05T23:10:00.001-05:00

We’re all sick here. I HATE being sick! It’s nothing serious, just colds all around, but I wish it would be done with already. We had an unexpected snowstorm today, and the ground is covered, so school will probably be out tomorrow. Morgan is in better shape than the rest of us, so she’s been going to school this week, although Nick missed work yesterday. Anyway, not much point to this post, just complaining a bit. Hope you’re all feeling well and having a great week!

A wise man once said…

2011-01-04T10:56:00.001-05:00

I was cleaning out my inbox this morning, and I found this quote in an email from The Generous Wife:

He is a wise man who does not grieve for the things which he has not, but rejoices for those which he has. Epictetus

And I realized that it didn’t take me too long at all to quit zeroing in on my blessings once November passed, and I need to try to regain some of that focus. So for today, here’s a Gratitude Post.

Today I’m thankful for:

Morgan’s new glasses. The eye doctor we use was running a special before Christmas for $1 eye exams. My in-laws had told me that they wanted to take her after the holidays to get new glasses, and I was able to take advantage of the $1 exam so that her prescription would be up to date. It had just run out in November and hadn’t, as it turned out, changed at all, but it had to be renewed for them to make her new glasses. She had picked out her old glasses herself, but she pretty quickly grew to hate the way she looked in them. They also ended up eventually getting pretty scuffed up, as glasses worn by an 8/9 year old will tend to do. Unfortunately we hadn’t had the money to buy her new ones, so it was a blessing that my in-laws offered. The doctor’s office was running a special for 2 pairs for $99, so they ended up getting her 2 pairs, plus a year’s worth of insurance on her favorite pair.

These cookies. Oh. My. Goodness.

A few months ago I ordered a set of postcards for my photography business from www.overnightprints.com along with a calendar for my brother and his wife for Christmas. When the order came the postcards were missing, so I called them and they reprinted them and sent them out. Last week they randomly sent me another set. Yay free stuff!

Nick gets to go back to Atlanta for another round of classes for work next week, and while I’m not looking forward to him being gone again, it is another step closer to him achieving his ASE certification, which will mean a raise at work along with some other benefits.

Windows Live Writer. I just discovered it, and I love the way it functions with Blogger.

Have a great day!

Brightening it up a bit

2011-01-02T00:34:00.001-05:00

So as you can see, I have a new template. Well, actually it’s the same old template, but I played with the colors a bit. It may get old for me, but I’ve got the old version saved if it does. But I figured, hey, Valentine’s Day is just around the corner – why not?

Resolutions

2011-01-01T15:51:00.000-05:00

Well, it’s that time again – time to make resolutions to keep or at least strive for. This year I hope to:

Grow my photography business to the point that I at least double my investment.

Get my laundry completely done and keep on top of it.

Do more crafting! This year I made almost all of the Christmas gifts that left our house, and not only did it save us a ton of money, but everyone seemed to love them!

Along those same lines – get a Silhouette machine. This is actually something that Nick and I will both use (rather, I will use it for him). I think I’ve mentioned that he and a couple of his friends are trying to get a custom car business off the ground in their free time, and we would use the machine to cut stickers to sell and to make heat transfers for t-shirts.

I want to learn how to sew on a machine. I got a nice sewing machine for Christmas about three years ago, and it’s never been out of the box. It’s not that I don’t want to use it – it’s that I have no place to set it up. I’m not sure how to go about remedying that, but I really would love to find some room to do not just sewing, but the rest of my crafting as well, and I'd love to be able to get back into origami as well.

I want to try to keep my house within about 15-30 minutes of being ready for company at all times.

I want to be better at couponing.

I want to get Daisy’s room completely organized. I hate to admit it, but right now it’s still half full of stuff that got dumped in there while we were putting down the new flooring in the rest of the downstairs. Her bed and the area around it and through the middle of the room are clear, but her pack-n-play is full of toys that belong to both her and Morgan, and they need to be seriously paired down.

I want to have more company over this year.

I want Morgan to be able to have more friends sleep over.

I’d like to have more date nights.

I want to get to know Jesus better.

How about you guys – any resolutions for you?

A New Year, a new era?

2011-01-01T04:00:00.001-05:00

Thirteen years ago Nick spanked me for the first time. Six years after that we introduced the concept of domestic discipline into our marriage, and it changed our marriage entirely. Seven years later, DD seems to have died a quiet death. The day just past was the 7 year anniversary of DD for us, and as I expected, it passed without mention.

It’s been a couple of months since there was any form of discipline happening, and it’s been nearly as long since there’s been so much as a mention of it. A few days after this spanking there was another one promised for the same thing. I had ended up staying up all night the next Tuesday night, albeit with good intentions. Nick had an early meeting the next morning, and I was trying to make sure he got up on time. When I woke him up and he realized I hadn’t been to bed, he let me know that it would be dealt with. I asked him if we could try to take care of it soon, and he promised to try to do it the next day. Obviously that never happened. Nor was it ever even referenced again.

Honestly, I didn’t want the spanking, and I certainly hadn’t been trying to earn it, but I have to admit that the broken promise felt an awful lot like not caring. Much the same way that the birthday spanking he promised never happened. Sort of like how the birthday spankings for 2008 and 2009 never happened either. It’s not like this is the longest we’ve ever gone without any kind of spanking for punishment or play. There was, after all, the seven month hiatus of 2009, although that was during my pregnancy. But this feels different. All the other times we went through dry spells as far as actual activity, Nick still made verbal references to his authority. This time around it’s as if he’d never taken on the responsibility in the first place.

I’ve purposely refrained from bringing it up because I just haven’t had the spare strength to deal with the inevitable feelings of insecurity and burdensomeness. And I always told myself that I’d let it go if it ever got to the point that it was no longer doing our marriage any good. It seems clear that we’ve reached that point.

There’s a tiny voice in the back of my mind saying “See! I told you he doesn’t love you enough to do this without you pestering him!” And while I can mostly dismiss that as my insecurities bubbling up, I have to admit that there is some small truth in it too. And so it has come down to this: Does he love me enough to ever really wholeheartedly make a commitment to having a DD marriage? Or do I love him enough to not try to make him? The fact is, I can’t answer for him, although I suspect what the true answer might be. But I can answer for me. The question really boils down to this: “Do I love him more than I love me?” and the answer is yes, of course I do. And so I have to let it go. It may be that I’m wrong (as I have been before), and if so, I’ll be glad to be so. But this time I have to be the one to make a real commitment to being the wife he needs me to be, the wife that lives under his authority by never making him exercise it. After all these years, I think I may be getting the hang of it.

Whew! A minute to breathe again!

2010-12-29T00:31:00.002-05:00

Hey, guys! I hope everyone had an AWESOME Christmas! Ours was lovely, going back to the day after my last post.

On the day of the 22nd Morgan, Daisy, and I got to spend some unexpected time with mine and Nick's niece K. Her mom is the sister who lives in Texas, but K was in the state to spend Christmas with her dad, so we were thrilled to get to see her. On the 23rd we did Christmas at my parents' house. Everybody really loved the homemade gifts I got them. Nick and I both got some clothes, and I got a pair of boots. We also got a gift card to Red Lobster from my brother and his wife. The girls got both clothes and toys, and it was just a sweet time together as a family. The 24th we went to have Christmas with Nick's extended family and there was a neat video montage of pictures from Christmases past. I got a set of stuff from Bath and Body Works, and Nick got a gift card to Olive Garden. That night when we were wrapping gifts I was trying to remove the glass from a picture frame to clean it and the glass cracked. Unfortunately the frame was the biggest gift we had for Nick's dad and stepmom, so he ended up giving them the Olive Garden gift card to replace it.

Christmas morning we opened gifts at home first, and the girls had a blast. Afterwards we went to Nick's dad and stepmom's house for breakfast and gifts. My favorite gift there was a beautiful Stella & Dot necklace from Nick's sister in Texas. It has 3 charms, a silver circle with "mom" stamped in it and two gold circles with the girls' initials. I totally didn't expect to have something over there to open from them because they had already sent us the biggest gift we got from anyone - a nice big check that allowed us to pay the house payment and buy a few things. This was such a blessing, and truly an answer to prayer, because I didn't know how we were going to pay the house payment.

Saturday we went running around for a bit and did a little after Christmas shopping. We bought this coffee maker as a gift to each other, and it is FABULOUS! It was a little pricey for a coffee maker (okay a lot pricey, but we got it 20% off), but we love, love, LOVE it!

But the best, best, BEST thing I got for Christmas wasn't a physical gift. Okay, first of all some sad news. On my meme the other day I said that I hadn't been to any funerals in 2010. Thursday I got word that yet another former co-worker had unexpectedly passed away, but this one was a man I very much liked and respected. In fact, he was my direct supervisor for a number of years, and I always had a soft spot for him. His funeral service was tonight, and I made arrangements to attend with my friend D. Now I've mentioned D on here before. She's been coming to church with us quite a bit lately, and she's really been under conviction, but she had never broken down and become a Christian. The deaths at work lately have really hit her hard, and the funeral tonight even harder. Jim, the man who passed away, was a very strong Christian, and one of my former coworkers shared this story about him: Last week she and Jim were talking about the woman who had passed away earlier that week. They had just come from her funeral, and the coworker sharing the story said that it was weird to think that you just never knew how much time you have left. "That's why you have to be ready," Jim replied. Within just a few days he was gone himself.

After the funeral tonight I asked D if she wanted to grab a bite to eat. She agreed and we went and had dinner. I had been in prayer for her all evening (well for days really, but especially in light of the funeral tonight). Dinner was lighthearted for the most part, but toward the end it turned toward spiritual matters, and I could tell that she had been trying to work her way around to this conversation. We spent a long time talking, eventually moving out to my car where we talked some more. She broke down in tears and asked me to please show her what she needed to do to become a Christian, and I had the amazing privilege of leading her to the Lord! I have to say that this was none of my doing whatsoever - I rambled and cried and went off on rabbit trails and was generally just a terrible evangelist, but God used me in spite of my shortcomings, and I'm absolutely thrilled! This has been such an amazing answer to prayer, and I know that Jim is in heaven rejoicing that such a blessing came from his passing!

So that's been my crazy wonderful week - how has yours been?

Another Meme

2010-12-22T01:48:00.003-05:00

So I was looking back through my archives to see if I had ever done the meme I just posted before. I came across one I did in January 2009, and I was struck by all the changes that have taken place since then. I thought I'd repost it with my updated answers (in red). Feel free to steal it. :)

1. What did you do in 2008 that you’d never done before? Went to Houston, won a trip to Hawaii (although we've not gone yet).
In 2010 I became a stay at home mom for the first time and also launched a photography business.

2. Did you keep your new year’s resolutions, and will you make more for next year? I honestly can't remember last year's resolutions, but we've decided to make some financial changes this year.
This year's resolution was just to trust God more, and we've definitely had to do that. Next year I'd like to expand my photography business.

3. Did anyone close to you give birth? Yes. Unfortunately she also got divorced. We also found out that Nick's sister is pregnant. Sadly, still not me, although at this point that would be something of a financial disaster.
Two girls I graduated high school with gave birth. But considering my 2009 answer, I want to point out that I got pregnant about three weeks after I posted that answer and I entered 2010 with a 13 week old baby of my own!

4. Did anyone close to you die? My grandfather
No. I'm blessed to have attended no funerals in 2010, although I did learn that a former co-worker passed away a week ago.

5. What countries did you visit? Just this one.
Same answer.

6. What would you like to have in 2009 that you lacked in 2008? A SLR digital camera
This coming year I'd like to have the full Photoshop Suite/Lightroom and a better lighting equipment package. And since I've been reading all these craft blogs, I've fallen in love with the idea of having a Cricut machine.

7. What dates from 2008 will remain etched upon your memory, and why? March 3, the day my papaw passed away, and June 26, our 10th anniversary.
January 7, 2010 was the day I went in and quit my job.

8. What was your biggest achievement of the year? I don't know how much of an achievement you'd consider it, but I did win that trip to Hawaii.
Actually getting a few photography clients. Also, moderate overall success as a coupon ninja, and serious coupon ninja success when it came to Christmas this year.

9. What was your biggest failure? Probably that we could have handled our money better.
Not keeping more on top of the laundry.

10. Did you suffer illness or injury? Not unless you count strep throat
Nope! Unless you count the time I slipped in our backyard and ended up with a very sore spine and tailbone for a few days.

11. What was the best thing you bought? Probably my car - it's been a great investment so far.
My camera!

12. Whose behavior merited celebration? Morgan has really gotten it together with school. She had some issues in October with not really wanting to get her work done, but she's improved 110%.
Morgan has been an ah-may-zing big sister!

13. Whose behavior made you appalled and depressed? A couple we've known for years and years and actually introduced. They both just gave up on their marriage and decided to get divorced rather than putting any effort into fixing things.
Barack Obama

14. Where did most of your money go? Bills, food.
Bills, diapers, formula

15. What did you get really, really, really excited about? Our trip to Houston.
My camera and our trip back to Texas.

16. What song will always remind you of 2008? Anything Hannah Montana. If I never hear Hannah Montana again it will be too soon, but since Morgan sings the stuff in her sleep, I'm probably not that lucky.
Anything by the Avett Brothers. Nick has been playing the crap out of them!

17. Compared to this time last year, are you: a) happier or sadder? Probably happier, Probably about the same b) thinner or fatter? About the same, maybe a little heavier, but not much c) richer or poorer? Probably about the same, although we really should be richer, Poorer

18. What do you wish you’d done more of? Photography
Day to day photography just for myself.

19. What do you wish you’d done less of? Eating out.
Staying up way too late.

20. How did you spend Christmas? With family, eating, opening gifts.
This year will be the same.

21. Did you fall in love in 2008? Yes, with my husband and daughter, every day.
Yes, with my husband and both of my daughters, every day.

22. What was your favorite TV program? Lost
Lost, until it went off, then Sons of Anarchy and Terriers.

23. Do you hate anyone now that you didn’t hate this time last year? Nah
Nope.

24. What was the best book you read? I couldn't even begin to narrow that down.
Same answer, although there have been some great ones!

25. What was your greatest musical discovery? That Itunes will let you redownload your purchases if your hard drive crashes!
The Avett Brothers

26. What did you want and get? A better car.
A Nikon D90

27. What did you want and not get? A Nikon D90
Photoshop/Lightroom

28. What was your favorite film of this year? Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, Fireproof
Sherlock Holmes

29. What did you do on your birthday, and how old were you? I turned 31, and I hung out with Nick, went shopping, went to see the movie Fireproof, and stopped to visit with some friends.
I turned 33, and to celebrate we had a cookout with family and friends the day before, then I had a photo shoot. The day of we went to church then went and had lunch with Nick's sister and her husband.

30. What one thing would have made your year immeasurably more satisfying?More money? Definitely more money, and a baby, or at least having one on the way.
Having made enough off my photography to have paid for my camera in full. Right now I'm a little over 50% of the way there.

31. How would you describe your personal fashion concept in 2008? Same old jeans and cute shirts I'm afraid.
Not much has changed here.

32. What kept you sane? Nick beating my butt when I got too stressed, although I probably could have used more of that.
Concentrating on letting God take care of us and our finances.

33. Which celebrity/public figure did you fancy the most? Mmmmm....Josh Holloway, although Harrison Ford wasn't bad either.
Still Josh Holloway - Oh, Sawyer, I miss you!

34. What political issue stirred you the most? No politics here, please.
The health care fiasco!

35. Who did you miss? My friend L
Still my friend L, although I got to see her a bit more this year.

36. Who was the best new person you met? I can't really think of anyone new I met in real life that made a big impression, but I met lots of great people on here!
Same answer

37. Tell us a valuable life lesson you learned in 2008. Life is not fair - sometimes the people who make the worst decisions can still end up swimming in money.
God is always there for us - His mercies are new every morning!

38. Quote a song lyric that sums up your year. I can't really think of a good answer for this one.
Still can't come up with one!

Fried Brain

2010-12-22T00:52:00.003-05:00

I feel like my brain is fried right now. I've been rushing around trying to get everything finished for Christmas while still juggling the house and kids and it's wearing me out! I'm done with almost everything but the wrapping. Oh, and that other batch of lotion I have to make. And the rest of the lip balm. And the sugar scrub. And those other two Question Jars. Oh, and the other two sets of crayons. Oh yeah, and I still have to apply the sealer to the other 7 sets of coasters I made. But that's it. Except for whipping up those sets of glass stone magnets. So really - I'm practically done. Look, I've got 71 hours left till Christmas - don't judge me!

Anyway, I need a minute to be not-creative, so I'm totally going to steal Grace's Christmas meme:

1.Egg Nog or Hot Chocolate?
Definitely hot chocolate, although I do like to have about a half a glass of eggnog once a year.

2.Does Santa wrap presents or just sit them under the tree?
I don't technically wrap. I bag. If anything actually gets wrapped it's generally by Nick. But either way, they're packaged.

3.Colored lights on tree/house or white?
White inside, colored outside.

4.Do you hang mistletoe?
We used to, but I haven't found anywhere to buy it in a couple of years.

5.When do you put your decorations up?
Okay, I'm going to tell you the worst thing in the world: It's three days till Christmas and my tree still isn't up. Normally I put it up just after Thanksgiving, but this year I wanted to wait because I figured Daisy would be tearing it apart. Then after a few days I realized it's up in the attic and we don't have a ladder. So I decided to just decorate a small fake pine we have out year round. And I'm totally going to do that. Right after I finish those glass stone magnets...

6.What is your favorite holiday dish?
Ummmm, I'd have to say sausage balls. But only if they're really moist and cheesy.

7.Favorite Holiday memory as a child?
Christmas Eve. We opened gifts at home and at both grandparents' houses on Christmas Eve, and I loved coming home after the final celebration and discovering all over again all the
gifts I'd gotten earlier in the evening.

8.When and how did you learn the truth about Santa?
My parents never did the Santa Claus thing with us, although someone always dressed as Santa to hand out gifts on my dad's side of the family. In fact, when my brother was about 4, he nearly started a riot among a room full of kindergarten-age cousins when he declared that the man in the red suit was really Uncle Claude.

9.Do you open a gift on Christmas Eve?
Now that we're grown with families of our own, the celebration gets stretched out some. This past Friday we did my dad's side of the family, Thursday we'll do my parent's house, Friday we'll do Nick's extended family, Christmas morning we'll open at home then at Nick's parents' house, and sometime next week we'll do my mom's side of the family.

10.How do you decorate your Christmas tree?
Well, normally it's a very rustic, woodsy, fishing cabin type theme. This year it's going to be a bit more Charlie Brown since I'll be scavenging stuff from around the house to decorate with.

11.Snow! Love it or Dread it?
Love it, although I hate driving in it.

12.Can you ice skate?
Nope!

13.Do you remember your favorite gift?
The year I was 10 I got a 100 piece accessory set for my Barbies. Morgan still has some of the pieces to it around here somewhere.

14.What’s the most important thing about the Holidays for you?
Family.

15.What is your favorite Holiday Dessert?
My sister-in-law's amazing boiled custard.

16.What tops your tree?
Hehe, usually a miniature fishing hat.

17.Which do you prefer giving or receiving?
Definitely giving.

18.What is your favorite Christmas Song?
O Holy Night

19.Candy Canes: Yuck or Yum?
They're okay.

20. Favorite Christmas Show?
Lampoon's Christmas Vacation

21.Saddest Christmas Song?
I’ll be Home for Christmas

Christmas Crafting

2010-12-16T23:45:00.001-05:00

Okay, so I know - I've totally not been posting like I should. But I've been a busy bee, I promise! Nick had to go to Atlanta for some training classes for work on Monday and got back tonight. Morgan was home sick from school last Wednesday and Thursday (thus lots of make-up work), then school was out because of the weather Monday, Tuesday, and today. So it's been a busy week as a solo parent.

But I've also been doing lots of crafting for Christmas! God has been really good in providing some wonderful options for gifts. Because Nick's sister and her husband (the ones in Texas) are so far out of our league financially and they always get us such nice gifts, it completely stresses me out every year trying to come up with something nice for them that we can afford. Not that they would make a big deal out if it, but they've always been so generous to us that we really want to get them something they'll love. All that I had to start with was a panoramic picture of the lake I had taken off the upper deck of their lake house when we were there in August. I found a 9x24 frame at the Goodwill for $5, and I'm going to try to refinish it, and I ordered a print of the picture to fit into it. Then I came across some great craft blogs, and I've been busy making some really neat things to supplement not only their gift, but also gifts of some others in the family that we didn't have much for.

I got the ideas for the dressed-up post-its (hello, teacher gift!) and the coasters here. I actually did the coasters with rub-ons instead of napkins or paper, and I'm in L-O-V-E with how they turned out. Plus the tiles were only 16 cents each at Lowes! I've got enough tiles left to make two more sets, and I think I'm going to see if my artist husband will paint them for me. The post-its were 12 pads for $3.94 at Wal-mart, and the scrap-book paper I used for the craft I already had.

The snowman crayons are TERRIFIC! I found the idea for them here. Daisy is right at the age where she has discovered coloring and scribbling, but standard crayons and pencils are sometimes hard for her to keep steady. I'm going to make another set for Nick's sister's little boy (4 months older than Daisy), and my cousin's little boy (8 weeks older than Daisy). I will say that I ended up having to use 11 full size crayons for each snowman , but fortunately I had stocked up on crayons when they were twenty cents a box back when school started, so I had all I needed. I will, however, have to go with non-primary colors for the other two sets. The most labor-intensive part of the whole thing was unwrapping all the unmelted crayons. The mold was a silicone muffin pan I got at Target from the dollar bin (well, the $2.50 bin). I just filled the cups and stuck the whole thing in the oven on a cookie sheet at 150 degrees. It took about 45 minutes for them to fully melt, but I think they turned out great!

The little tin pots are homemade lip balm. I found the recipe for that here. My mom and dad actually came by yesterday and surprised me with almost all of the supplies I needed for that. My mom used to make candles and knew of a great wholesale place to buy that sort of thing, so they got me the lip balm pots along with some beeswax, fragrance, glycerin soap, lotion bases, soap dyes, and lotion bottles, along with some baskets and bath poufs so that I can put together some gifts sets. I also got some epsom salt and made bath salts (which I still have to package), and I'm going to make some sugar scrub as well.

But my very, very favorite gift is the Question Jar. This is such a neat idea, and it cost me almost nothing. Hobby Lobby had the jars for half off, the raffia I had, and the flower I made out of a twenty cent piece of felt. This is a jar filled with some really neat get-to-know-you-better questions on strips of card stock, and best of all, Pamela Donnis, the lady who created the idea, even has a PDF you can download for free with the questions already on it! She also has the tutorial for the flower. I found the list of questions to be interesting and thought-provoking. While there were some pretty standard ones in there (like "What would you do with a million dollars?"), there were also some that I had never thought about before (like "What was the most interesting class you ever took?"). I bought three jars, and I'm making one to give to each of Nick's two sisters and brothers-in-law, and one to my brother and sister-in-law. Eventually though I'm going to make one for me and Nick too.

In other news - well, there is no other news. TTWD seems to be TTWdon'tD these days, and I've pretty much let it drop. Life is chugging along, and for the moment it's just less complicated without it. If there's ever a lesson I've learned it's that stirring that particular pot never fails to send some doubts and insecurities to the surface too, and I can always do with fewer of those.

Hope everyone has a wonderful Christmas!

Good deals and oddly specific spanko gear

2010-12-10T12:42:00.004-05:00

Hello, everyone. How's everybody's Christmas season going? I got a few more great deals the other day. Hasbro has some great toy coupon s right now and I got four of each of these completely free at Target and Walmart.

I also got a coupon for $10 off $10 at Zazzle.com. I had previously ordered some business cards from them using a similar deal, so I was excited to get another offer. Right now they have free shipping on everything, so that made it even better. I ended up ordering a button, a magnet, and a keychain. My total after the coupon was only $1.05, and when I got the package yesterday they had (accidentally?) included an extra keychain. I probably should have ordered something for someone else for Christmas instead, but how could I pass up a Naughty Photographer keychain? Actually, they had a huge number of oddly specific products like that, so if you'll got look, chances are you'll find something in your line of work. :) Might make for some cute stocking stuffers for the spanko you love.

Date Night

2010-12-06T12:06:00.003-05:00

Nick and I had a lot of fun at his company Christmas party night before last. The company he works for sells high-end cars, and they like to try to give their employees a night experiencing life on the high side, so they always try to pick an exclusive venue for the party. One year it was held at a local historic theater. One year they completely rented out a very expensive restaurant. One year it was held in a very exclusive dining club. This year they rented out the dining club attached to the sky boxes of our city's college football stadium.

College football is big business in our town, so this was everyone's favorite place yet. There are always all kinds of games, and Nick won a $50 gift card. I got some neat pictures of the stadium (rare to have a chance to get pictures of it empty as generally we wouldn't be allowed inside other than for a game). We really wanted to get down on the field and take pictures, but were told it was off limits. About halfway through the night Nick disappeared with three of his coworkers. A few minutes later he called my phone and told me to get on the elevator and bring my camera. Turns out they had found the open door to the roof of the stadium! I got some really neat pictures up there, and what a rare opportunity!

As we were leaving for the night a guy Nick works with and his wife came spilling out of the building into the parking lot, giggling up a storm. They had found a way onto the field and were just giddy with the experience. Nick and I immediately headed back into the stadium, and they showed us how to get there. We got about 20 pictures from on the field, and it was the highlight of the night. It's a good thing we hurried though, because when we got to the door to get back outside one of the stadium employees had her hand on it to close it and lock it. She was very nice about it - she didn't scold us for being somewhere we shouldn't have been, just remarked that we were lucky we hadn't been locked in. I was elated to be able to get such rare photos, and Nick was on top of the world to have gotten to walk around where so many football legends have played. All in all it was a great night.

Yesterday was low key - church for all of us followed by some last minute Christmas shopping for me while the kids stayed at home with Nick. I can't believe we're only 19 days from Christmas!

It's beginning...

2010-12-03T23:24:00.000-05:00

...to look a lot like Christmas! This evening Nick and I took the girls to see a locally famous Christmas light display. Unfortunately Daisy slept through the whole thing, but we'll go again before the season is up. :) This family goes all out every year, over 70,000 lights between the father's house and the son's house. Both homes have light displays synchronized to the music on a local radio station (a different one for each house), and the show is free. We've been for several years in a row now, and it's always a treat.

The $60 I got to put in the bank yesterday was definitely needed - without it we would have gone about $11 overdrawn plus the fees! God is so very good to us! Another blessing I forgot to mention:

If you've ever bought baby formula, you know how ridiculously expensive it is. A 24 ounce can of Enfamil powder will run you about $23, and even the Wal-Mart brand is about $14 for the same size can. While I breastfeed (and obviously she's on solids too now), Daisy still takes formula on a regular basis just because I've found it's the most consistent and effective way to make sure she gets all her needed nutrients when she's not a big fan of the solid food I put in front of her. What we've been blessed enough to have access to buy for most of her life has been a large can of formula at Sam's. It's a 3 lb (48 oz) can for $19.97. Compared to other options, this is a great deal! However, this formula is really only meant for babies up to a year.

Enfamil and Wal-Mart both make formula intended for toddlers, but we're back to the $20+ dollar range for a 24 oz can. Wednesday I was in the discount grocery outlet they just put in near our house and I found that they have shelves upon shelves of Nestle Nido Kinder, which is basically a "next step" for formula fed babies. It's marketed to Hispanic communities, but the store I was at pulls overstock from all kinds of businesses. Rather than a formula, it's a milk product fortified with vitamins, minerals, and prebiotics, and is better for toddlers her age. What's so fantastic about this for us? It's $9.99 for a 3 1/2 pound can! I've been wanting to wean her off formula for a couple of months now, but I just don't produce enough breast milk any more to completely satisfy her urge to nurse, and I was afraid that she would miss the nutrients in formula since she can be a somewhat picky eater. This solves that problem while cutting our formula expense by over half!

Anyway, I'm headed to bed, Good night!

Still plenty to be thankful for

2010-12-03T01:39:00.004-05:00

Well, we're into December now, and God continues to provide. Yesterday I found a really cute plaid shirt in the bag of stuff Elizabeth had sent home with me the day before. It was just Morgan's size, and she loved it. In fact, she put it on to wear to church that night. While we were at church, Elizabeth texted me and asked if she had accidentally put a plaid shirt in the bag. Oops...turns out it belonged to her mother-in-law (who lives out of state), and Elizabeth needed to send it back to her. Morgan was pretty sad about it, but we dropped it off on the way home from church. When I got home, Money Saving Mom had a coupon posted for JC Penney for $10 off a $10 purchase. I went online and after fighting the extremely slow site for a while, I managed to snag a very similar plaid shirt for her for all of 44 cents out of pocket!

I knew yesterday that we needed about an extra $20-$30 to put in the bank to cover our outstanding charges (the JC Penney charge won't be billed till next week when they ship). I didn't have any way to come up with the money, and I had gone through all my pockets and purses and only been able to come up with $7. Then one of my clients decided to buy a CD from her session. It was only a small CD, but it gave us $60. I met her to give her the CD and get the money, then got the check in the bank 15 minutes before closing time.

We are facing some serious bills this week, and I know that Nick's paycheck won't be enough to cover it. An average check would be a stretch, but this week will be short because of Thanksgiving. All of that said, it's wonderful to know that God is going to provide, even if I don't know how He 's going to do it.

Saturday night is Nick's company Christmas party, and we're really excited about having a date night! I can't believe we're just over 3 weeks from Christmas! I've decided to try to do something Christmasy with Morgan every day until the 25th. Yesterday we sang Christmas songs on the way home from church. Today we got milk shakes and listened to Christmas music while we waited on my client to meet us. Perhaps a bit of a slow start, but it's getting us in the spirit. :) Normally we have our tree up by now, but I'm a little terrified to put it up right now with Daisy so extremely curious and mobile, lol! We'll probably put it up next week, but I can't help remembering my brother at her age. He was forever pulling ornaments off and being scolded away from the tree. One day my mom and I were in the kitchen when suddenly we heard a crash, and ornaments flew through the dining room - we rushed into the living room to find the tree overturned and my brother waving his arms wildly from underneath it. Hehe - he was fine, and we didn't have any problems with him touching the tree after that. :)

Oh, speaking of Christmas, Wal-mart has a couple of cute (and inexpensive!) shirts that I thought were really cute. Sorry if the picture quality is poor - I was using my phone to take them. The first one says "Naught or Nice, You may need to check the list twice." The second one says "Naughty but Sweet".

Anyway, I'm off to bed. Have a great night!

Last Day

2010-11-30T23:57:00.001-05:00

I can't believe November's already over! I have to say, I'm glad to see it done, although I can't really say why. Maybe I'm just anxious to get to Christmas. Today's thank yous:

Today I got the $0.95 coasters I ordered from One Kings Lane a few weeks ago, and they included a pretty little silver picture frame in the box at no charge. Sweet!

I got our free Christmas cards from Shutterfly today and I luuuurve them!

I also got our niece K's photo book today, and I think she'll really like it.

I got to have another visit with my friend Elizabeth. When I ordered my sample prints, I got 11 sheets of wallets in different poses. Each sheet comes with 8 wallets. I got 6 of the sheets of images from a shoot I did of her and her family in October. It was a shoot I did pro bono, just because she's been my friend literally my whole life (we were in the church nursery together), and they're having a really hard time financially right now. When I went to see her tonight I gave her 4 wallets of each pose that I had, and she was thrilled with them!

Elizabeth sent me home with a bunch of Christmas decorations that I can use this year.

It's only 25 days till Christmas!

Goodnight, everybody!

Sweet Cyber Monday

2010-11-29T23:14:00.000-05:00

I'm sure most of you are aware that this was Cyber Monday, the online equivalent to Black Friday. Today's thank-you are in part due to that:

I got 154 photo prints for $0.28.

I won a $15 gift card to an online retailer on Facebook. (I never win anything - who would have thought I'd win 2 things off Facebook in one month!)

Nick fixed dinner tonight.

It was his special breakfast burritos - sausage, eggs, hash browns, onions, peppers, bacon, cheese, and sour cream, all wrapped up in tortillas and love. Yum!

I'm especially thankful today to have left my old job. I ran into a former coworker today at Wal-Mart, and she was telling me that the department has gotten pretty unbearable. They've taken away most of the privileges from the agents and begun firing people right and left. They recently fired a supervisor who had been there 23 years, and I got the impression it wasn't a very fair situation, one of those where they look for a reason to let you go.

Yesterday I stopped at Wal-Mart with Morgan to pick up some things for lunch and they were doing free Santa pictures. No purchase necessary, just sit down and pose, and they would have a free 5x7 ready for you in a couple of hours. Morgan has never believed in Santa, but I thought it would be a cute picture, so I asked her if she would do it if I was in it with her and she agreed. When we went to pick the picture up (that's why we went back today), the lady at the counter had three different poses of us. I was going to buy the other two because I absolutely LOVED the way they turned out, but she said to just go ahead and take all three. Apparently Wal-Mart's plan was to print the extras in hopes of selling them, but no one was buying, so they just decided to give them away rather than trashing them.

God continues to take care of us, and I praise Him for it!

Good night, everybody!

More Sunday Sweetness

2010-11-28T23:14:00.001-05:00

Today I am thankful for:

The soreness in my neck being mostly gone.

God's provisions.

The great church services we had today.

The Pioneer Woman's Bacon-Wrapped Jalapeno Thingies (yes, I made more - I may need some sort of 12 step program to stop eating them!).

I delivered the last of my print orders today and the clients were thrilled with the pictures. Now if only I can get some more booked!

A clean living room.

A washer and dryer that work so that I can get some laundry done.

My dishwasher.

Potstickers.

Mozy - they are my off-site file back-up, and they came in very handy tonight in recovering a folder of pictures I accidentally deleted!

My parents.

My children.

My husband.

That my brother is enjoying Texas and his assignment there.

That I was able to get my shutterfly order for 151 free prints submitted about 2 minutes before the coupon code expired.

Happy Holidays!

Another Day of Thanks

2010-11-27T23:23:00.003-05:00

Hello again. Today's list of thank-yous:

My neck feels a bit better today. Yesterday I woke up with a terrible crick in it, and it took me a ridiculous amount of time to even maneuver myself out of bed. It was pretty excruciating all day if I tried to turn to my right, and I'm thankful that it has eased off quite a bit today, although it's still a little stiff.

Nick's sister and her husband came over today so that Nick could change her oil. They bought us some McDonald's for dinner and stayed to watch The Blind Side with us, and we really enjoyed the time together.

God has continued to extend His hand of mercy on our bank account.

We have some pressing financial needs right now, and I'm thankful that God is going to provide for those in the proper time.

Nick's normal day off through the week is Thursday (every other week). Since this week it fell on Thanksgiving and everybody got the day off, he got to take Friday off. It's been ages since he had a 4 day weekend, and I'm so thankful he was able to work it out.

My first print order came in the mail yesterday and the prints are beautiful! We took the package to the guy who ordered it, and he was thrilled with it!

Both of my baby girls are snuggled up asleep in bed, and it warms my heart.

Good night!

Happy Thanksgiving!!!

2010-11-25T23:39:00.004-05:00

What a lovely day! So very much to be grateful for today. Everything we brought to the dinner was a HUGE hit, especially the Bacon-Wrapped Jalapeno Thingies. Nick helped all morning with the cooking and did the deviled eggs and jalapenos himself. The sweet potato casserole was a recipe we got from a guy Nick works with and it turned out fabulous! It was just wonderful to be able to spend time with both of our families together.

See, Nick's sister's husband C is my parents' godson. Both of C's parents passed away when he was young. His mother was actually murdered, so there's a lot of trauma in his past. Before she was killed his mother asked my parents to be godparents to C and his younger twin sisters. After she died, her parents got custody and raised the kids for several years, but within about 10 years both grandparents were gone too. C was about 19 by this time, and he moved from his home about 3 hours away to our town to be close to my parents and go to school. His younger sisters were still minors, so they went to live with their aunt and uncle until they were adults. Anyway, C really began to become like a part of the family, to the point that my brothers and I consider him a brother, my parents consider him a son, and he calls them Mom and Dad.

So Thanksgiving dinner this year was made up of both my (and C's) family and Nick's (and his sister's) family. We are blessed to have families that get along well, and it was just a sweet time for us all. My friend D was able to join us too, and I think she really enjoyed it.

I hope you all had many, many blessing today. Happy Thanksgiving!

Countdown to Casserole Time!

2010-11-24T23:25:00.001-05:00

Hello, everyone! Less than 24 hours till the big dinner! I'm really excited, but dreading the morning a bit. LOTS of cooking to do. Tomorrow I'm making sweet potato casserole, corn casserole, cheese biscuits, and The Pioneer Woman's Bacon-Wrapped Jalapeno Thingies. Nick is making deviled eggs, and we're bringing a few 2 liter drinks. Now about the jalapenos - I am NOT a spicy food type person. AT ALL. Nick's not much for them either. But Mija blogged that she will be making them, and well, they sounded really good. So tonight I did a test run of about 15 of them, just to see if they would be worth bringing tomorrow. Oh. My. Goodness. They are FABULOUS! I made sure to hull them really well, and we got all the flavor with very little of the heat, although they can definitely be made hotter. But I give them an A+. Just make sure to wear gloves while seeding the peppers.

Anyway, today I'm thankful for:

Kay, who left me a comment with a new discount code for restaurant.com. I ended up not being able to get the gift certificates for my brother the last go around, so I was quick to take advantage of it today and his Christmas gift is purchased.

Getting three packages in the mail today - always fun! I got my Thanksgiving cards (LOVE them, although I wish I'd gotten them sooner. Still I can pass them out to family tomorrow). I also got 151 prints from Shutterfly, filler for the photo albums I bought Morgan and her cousin K. And I got The Blind Side.

Which leads me to the fact that we get to keep The Blind Side for ourselves. It was supposed to be for Nick's sister and her husband, but I found out today that they already have it (also grateful to find that out NOW rather than when they opened it). So I do have to come up with something else for them, but Nick and I have both been wanting to see it, so now we can!

Two of my facebook friends have had babies this week, and I'm very glad for both. One girl especially was having a hard pregnancy, and it's good to see her done with it.

I got to pick up my free photo collage from Walgreens tonight.

I got to spend a few hours with my friend Elizabeth. It's not often that I get that opportunity, so when my parents offered to keep Morgan overnight and Elizabeth invited me over, I jumped on the chance.

Elizabeth has a little girl about 15 months older than Daisy, and she gave me some clothes and very cute toys for her tonight. We've gotten a lot of great toys from her over the last year, and I'm always grateful.

Anyway, lots to do tomorrow, so I'm off to bed!

Terrific Tuesday

2010-11-23T23:45:00.003-05:00

Happy Almost Thanksgiving!

Today's thankfuls:

Yep, more online deals! A free 8x10 photo collage from Walgreens (use BFCOLLAGE at checkout and choose pickup at store to get it completely free with no shipping).

I completely finished Morgan's Christmas shopping today! One thing I was hoping to get her was a cheap used digital camera. Nick's sister is getting her daughter one, and anything K gets, Morgan wants too. Of course their budget is waaaaay out of our league, so I knew we couldn't get her a new one of any quality. Plus I didn't want to put too much money into it until we know she will take care of it. I found a used 7 MP HP today at a pawn shop for $25, so I snatched it up. I'd love it if she took a real interest in photography - maybe someday we can shoot together!

I also finished her cousin K's shopping as well. I ended up getting her a photo album (since she's getting a camera too) and a small camera case, and I paid less than $10 for both of them together. I also got Morgan a photo album at the same place.

I also found this cool toy for my friend R's little girl. Honestly I had forgotten I needed to buy for her, but she always gets Morgan something, and I just couldn't pass up the deal! It was supposed to be $19.98, but it was marked $4.98. The cashier started to argue with me about it, and a manager walked by. Apparently there was a known issue with the price, because the manager said that yes, I was right and that she'd had to fix the price on one yesterday. So I got the last one on the shelf for basically 75% off!

I got a facebook message today that I had won a contest I entered (and frankly forgot about). I'm getting a super cute pair of earrings that are probably a little young for me, but Morgan will love them in her stocking!

I finally got my 50 free Christmas cards ordered from Shutterfly tonight - hooray for not waiting too late this year!

A while back I had an offer for $15 off a $15 order from overnightprints.com. This is the second time I've gotten that offer. The first time I ordered some extra business cards and some magnets made just like the cards. This time I ordered the photo calendar for my brother and his wife and some postcards for my business. The calendar came a couple of weeks ago, but they somehow left out the postcards. I called and let them know, and I finally got them today and I love them!

My photo shoot client for today called me last night and cancelled (again) because her little boy is sick. This might seem like a bad thing, but it rained all day anyway, and this way I got to spend the day taking care of some errands and getting some great deals!

God has just been so very good to me, and doing this (almost) post-a-day has really brought that out for me and let me focus on it. I can't promise that I'll be able to keep it up after November, but I'm going to try to make gratitude posts a regular thing on this blog again.

Have a great night!

Almost Turkey Day!

2010-11-22T23:54:00.002-05:00

Hello, hello! Today I'm thankful for:

Getting a lot done on the house today. It was nice and clean by the time Nick got home.

Getting The Blind Side for $3.99 with free 2 day shipping from Amazon! (Feel free to email me if you want to know how to get the free shipping).

I also got 140 free return address labels in the mail today from Vistaprint.com. We got to customize them to use as Christmas tags, and they are soooo cute! Vistaprint is who I order my business cards from, and they are constantly running specials to get stuff free if you pay the shipping. I recommend them to anyone needing business products!

I was cleaning out my hotmail account tonight. It's the account I use any time I enter a contest or sign up for something free, so it's always full of spam. But I happened to spot an email from Pampers, and they had a special offer from Shutterfly for another free photo book! So tonight I was able to knock out another Christmas gift, this one for our niece. So far the photo offers I've come across have gotten me: a free photo book for my parents, a free photo flip book for Nick's grandparents, a free photo book for our niece, a free photo calendar for my brother and his wife using their engagement pictures, 151 free prints to put in albums for our niece (her birthday is just after Christmas, so we need 2 gifts for her) and for Morgan, and a free photo mug for my dad for his birthday!

We're going to be doing Christmas on a pretty small scale this year, but I know everyone understands, and I'm just thrilled to be able to get something for everyone we need to. All that I have left to get: 2 small gifts for Morgan, something small for Nick's sister and her husband, and a couple of very small toys for my cousins' kids. I also need to print out a panorama shot I did of the view from Nick's other sister's lake house and get it framed for her and her husband. Oh, yeah, and a picture album to put the prints I just ordered in for our niece.

I'm really excited about Thanksgiving. It's going to be at Nick's youngest sister's house, and she and I are doing most of the cooking. Anyhoo, I'm off to bed - good night all!

A New Week

2010-11-21T23:52:00.002-05:00

Hello guys - can you believe it's already Thanksgiving week? Today I'm thankful for:

A God whose mercies are new every morning! Lamentations 3:22-23

The photo shoot that has been rescheduled twice but which is (finally) supposed to be Tuesday afternoon.

Nick's dad offering to make the shoe moulding we need to go around the trim in our house around the edges of our new floors. If we buy the actual shoe moulding it's about $1 a foot. Nick's dad is going to cut and route it out of shelving board, which will cost us about $18 instead of $108.

The new furniture arrangement in our living room. It was just moving pieces around, but it was free and it gave the room a fresh feel.

A couple of clients who I had just about written off as far as ordering prints from their sessions contacted me to let me know they want to order soon.

The nice cashier at the grocery store tonight voluntarily went through her personal stash of coupons and gave me a handful that I'll be able to use in the coming weeks.

Have a great week, everyone!

AngelBrat's Blog

New Year’s Meme (Part Three)

Life these days…

A blessed New Year

Happy New Year!

Quick Update

So here’s what’s up…

Crazy, busy, blessed life

Blessed nonetheless…

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Your baby's packing on the pounds, which look so cute on her. If only you could say the same for your varicose veins….

Week 29 Pregnancy Tip: Counting Baby's Kicks

New toys!

Eden Fantasys Review: Tenga Egg

Shape / Design / Size / Fit

Laptop, sweet laptop

November already!

Your baby's eyes — which have been closed for the past few months — are now beginning to open. Your baby's brain-wave activity is also kicking in at this stage in fetal development, which means your little one can not only hear noises but can now also respond to them.

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Week 25 of Pregnancy: Baby's Lung Development

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Your baby weighs more than a pound and a half right now and sports a crown-to-rump length of about eight and a half inches (standard letter size!). At this point in fetal development, that beautiful face (though still tiny) is almost fully formed.

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Week 23 of Pregnancy: Fetal Weight Gain

At eight inches and slightly over a pound, your baby is the size and shape of a small doll. You've probably heard your developing baby's heartbeat through a Doppler a number of times, but by now you can also hear it through a standard stethoscope. What a heart throb!

Thankful Thursday

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At about seven inches in length and almost 11 ounces in weight, your baby is about the size of a large banana. There's still a great deal of room in your womb — though your tenant will soon begin to feel cramped, so be prepared!

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Week 20 of Pregnancy: Boy or Girl?

So I had my ultrasound today, and…

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Week 18 of Pregnancy: Fetal Nervous System

This week your baby is about five and a half inches long, crown to rump, and weighs about five ounces. And fetal development has reached the stage for you to start feeling those movements some time in the next few weeks — so get ready!

Thankful Thursday

Week 17 of Pregnancy

Your baby is practicing sucking and swallowing as she gets ready for the real thing: a breast or bottle! As for Mom, you may be warding off some unwanted belly touching.

Your Body in Week 17 of Pregnancy

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Thankful Thursday

Reflections Candy Cane Vibe Review

Material / Texture

Functions / Performance / Controls

A bit late, but so much to be thankful for!

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Bunch of randomness :)

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Rombee Review

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Eden Fantasys Review

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Gosh, it’s been a while, hasn’t it?

Randomness

Um–ouch!

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