sick and tired...

literally. i started getting a scratchy throat on monday and now i'm in a full-blown cold of some kind on thursday, this stinks! i've been running a fever off and on for a couple days, my nose is stuffed up on the right side, my right eye has been running like a faucet all day, and my right ear is stopped up so it sounds like i have my finger stuck in my ear. i made it to the chiropractor yesterday, so i feel much better where my back and neck are concerned, it helped so so much to get an adjustment!

so i missed both of my days of doing my practicum work this week and will have to convince my sitter to stay over a few times to make up for it. if i can pull it off without missing any more days, i can have my hours done by the end of march. it would be great to be finished early to give myself the extra time to focus on the other six classes i'm taking.

i've decided that i need to be more organized and utilize better time management skills (that's kind of obvious when you consider a 5 month-old baby, 21 credit hours of college classes, marriage, an elementary school-aged daughter, and a teen-aged son...and then look at my house). so once i get past this week's worth of schoolwork, i am going to sit down and make a schedule for myself to stick to. i know with kids things will come up to change the schedule, but if i have a basic schedule for the the days i'm home and stick to it, i could probably actually have time to do things i "want" to do like sewing and knitting, among other things. so i'll check in next week and let you know how i'm doing. if you have any tips or suggestions, feel free to share! my "priority" is to finish the knitted diaper covers for my photographer friend laura at toddlerazzi. then i will focus on finishing the nursery (yes, he's 5 months old) and the next "project" is re-doing nick's room. somewhere in there i need to finish sewing the burp cloths for mister slobbers, and his set of cloth diapers too. i guess those are kind of at the top of the list also.

okay, off to take some medicine and work on school stuff...

things i want to do...

seem to always get pushed aside for things i "need" to do. especially now that a new semester has begun, my time is yet again spoken for in ways that i don't "want" it to be.

i want to sew some things, i need to sew some others. i need to knit some things, i want to knit some others. i want to paint some stuff, i need to paint the walls. ...you get the jist.

so how does one figure out how to juggle it all? i'm not sure yet, but if you have any suggestions, i'm all ears! time management and organization are not my strongest skills. help! lol

i think that the first focus needs to be the nursery...paint the walls, paint the armoire, sew the dust ruffle, rocker cushions, curtains, etc. and hang (and buy) pictures for the walls.

so my goal is to do something every day to work on the nursery. i washed the fabric ready to be sewn yesterday. today i think i will cut the fabric for the dust ruffle. i want to make it tailored looking, so i think i'm going to do box pleats at the corners and not gather it. tomorrow's goal will be to sew it together (if i don't do it today)...after i get back from doing some of my practicum hours for most of the day...

i did it...

i made my first official knitted diaper cover!

go over to my "katee did it" blog and check it out!

big boy....

my little cuddle bug is snuggling up in his sling while i'm doing stuff on the computer this evening because he can't seem to stay asleep and he's fussy when he's awake thanks to the cold he acquired from somewhere....isn't he too cute?!?

i didn't end up getting much of my "to do" list accomplished today because i had to take thad to the pediatrician. his eyes started looking "funny" (that expression mom's use when they "know" their child isn't feeling well before they have any other symptoms!) yesterday afternoon. last night he started sneezing a lot (he does a few times a day anyway it seems, but this was a lot more). then i noticed him giving out little coughs, he did just one and i laughed because i thought it was so cute and then he had more...i figured he's probably too little to do stuff "again" because it got attention (especially coughs, smiles maybe...) so it must be "real". then, i noticed that when he was nursing he was having a hard time feeding and breathing at the same time and he seemed a bit congested. he had a bath and we went to bed. he seemed a bit congested when nursing in the middle of the night, but i was too groggy to think much of it at the time. this morning he seemed miserable, he had that little pathetic whimpery, whiney cry and i knew he must be feeling badly, so i called the pediatrician. we went in, they took a "snot swab" for rsv, and said to saline and suction his nose. poor little booger!!! (pun intended...ha)

anyway, the "little" guy now weighs 13 pounds 4 ounces!!! he started at 9:6, went to 8:7 while at the hospital, was up to 9:4 at one week, and was was 10:2 at two weeks...now he's 5 weeks and 13:4...that's 3 pounds in 3 weeks! at this rate he'll be over 50 pounds at a year old...hope he slows down!!! (i guess mama's diner is serving it up right...but i won't mention what my friend said on here....haha)

so yeah, we're just snuggling and trying to get through this cold without incident...

about time i came back to post something...

the very next day after my "so over it" post i ended up going to the hospital (after calling the OB's office) to get checked again for the lovely pain i was enduring. they gave me 2 percocet and after an hour i wasn't feeling any better so they offered to induce (with the warning that the baby's lungs might not be ready and he might end up in NICU if that was the case). i decided that since he was measuring big anyway, and i was already past 38 weeks, that it would be fine. i had driven myself to the hospital, so i called jerry to let him know i was going to stay. he was in brandon, the kids were at school, and he did very well in keeping from being in a big panic. he finished up his work, got the kids out of school early and settled at the house with money for pizza and instructions to watch movies all evening, then he headed to the hospital. by the time he got there they had broke my water and had started pitocin, i was at 3 cm, then quickly moved to 4 and on to 5. at 5 cm i asked for an epidural because i knew from experience that the pitocin is a pain after awhile and i'd be screaming for an epidural eventually anyway. i got the epidural and my blood pressure plummeted, it took them 4-5 doses of ephedrine to get it back to a stable number to be able to start the pitocin back up (during this time they had discussed a possible c-section, but tried to avoid it if at all possible). after about 30 minutes of pitocin, they came in and said the baby's heart rate wasn't great and they were going to stop the pit to see if it went back to normal (it was running too high for too long and then would drop too low before and after contractions). after 30 more minutes of monitoring, his heart rate was fine and they decided to try to start the pitocin again. the first 30 minutes were good, so they decided to up the dose a little bit, but 10 minutes into the higher dose his heart rate went up high again and would spike low. i was still on 5 cm, so there was no way to get this to go faster without putting the baby at risk, so they decided that a c-section was needed, to which we agreed because we wanted a healthy baby more than we wanted a surgery-free delivery.

at this point, i wasn't scared or nervous, but part of me was second guessing myself about agreeing to the induction...maybe i should've endured the pain longer, maybe if we'd waited a c-section wouldn' t be necessary, maybe if we waited he wouldn't have been in any distress...

they got us ready for surgery, jerry came in and they began. within 5 minutes baby was delivered. he had the cord wrapped around his neck twice, and it was pretty tight...a regular delivery wouldn't have been an option if we had waited, and he would've been bigger and maybe had more distress... thaddeus aaron was delivered at 8:51 p.m. on 9/2, weighed 9 pounds 6 ounces, was 21 3/4 inches long, and was 2 weeks early! they did a little work on him to get all of the fluid out of his lungs, but both of his apgar scores were good and he was just perfect!

i was given morphine (which made me itch like crazy) and benadryl, so i was pretty much out of it for the first night, though i didn't think i was at the time. now it's all kind of a blur. i was discharged friday evening, but thad had to go under the bili lights friday morning through saturday afternoon because his bilirubin count was too high. his weight had also dropped to 8 pounds 7 ounces, so that was a bit of a concern also. it was stressful for me to go home without him that night, but due to the c-section there was no way i could have slept in a chair all night long either.

we took him back to the hospital for a blood test on sunday, which was up a little but still okay, and then we went to our pediatrician on monday for another follow-up blood test. he weighed 9 pounds 2 ounces that day, and his bilirubin numbers were okay too. i just kept him near windows with the blinds open for the rest of the week and it seemed to work well.

at his 2 week appointment at the pediatrician, thad weighed 10 pounds 2 ounces! he's been doing great, feeding well, latching on like a pro, and pooping and sleeping the rest of the time! he sleeps for 3-4 hours at a time, and is wide awake and alert more every day. he's such a sweetie pie and such a joy to have in my life. i was so apprehensive about having another little one come into our lives because it's been so long, but from the instant i saw him...all of that went away!

until i get a chance to get some more pictures, you can check out what we've got so far on our family blog. he's a little cutie pie, and he's my little cuddle bug, loves to be held and stays curled up in a little baby ball!!! i promise to get some good pictures posted here soon!!!

soooo over it...

being pregnant that is!!! baby boy needs to make an appearance already!!! yesterday i woke up in more excruciating pain than i've had the whole time, which has been pretty bad anyway. i ended up calling the doctor to see if there was something i could do about it and she wanted me to go to l&d to get checked out to make sure nothing major was going on. we got there a couple of hours later (decided that since i wasn't on the verge of delivering in my home that we'd pack bags and get the kids situated watching movies, etc. while we went to the hospital). i got all registered, had to leave a cup "donation" for them to check out, and get dressed in one of those lovely hospital gowns that opens in the back so you're at risk of mooning the world if you walk anywhere in it...that was great!

they put me on a monitor, the baby got hiccups and kept kicking the monitor. his heart rate was good. i on the other hand, had been having regular contractions all most all week long 10-20 minutes apart and they were 7-10 minutes apart the whole night before this...the whole time i was on the monitor, i had TWO contractions, that's all!!! one of my OB's arrived, checked everything out, nothing "major" is wrong, i'm not dilated enough to stay, so she offers some extra pain meds and clears me to be sent home.

i lost it, i just started crying because the pain has been so bad (i couldn't move my right leg even one inch by sliding it over without serious pain!!!). on top of that, i soooo was hoping that he would be born in august and miss the school cut-off, but that's not such a big deal because there are worse things in the world to deal with than an extra year of day care tuition! lol so i got the shot of morphine to take the pain away for the rest of the day, got dressed and headed home.

jerry and i stopped for lunch at applebee's (at about 3:00 p.m.) and picked up a pizza on the way home for the kids. the morphine....it's a good thing! i was tired for the rest of the evening, but i was also pain free!!!

so here i am, on labor day and NOT in labor!!! i laid around all morning because i was in so much pain again, and the contractions i've been having are pretty much gone (i'm wondering if morphine is a muscle relaxer and helped to cause them to stop?!?). i've been working on some school work this afternoon, then went to the grocery store (attempting to walk around to get things going again) and besides being in pain again, nothing else is happening...

grrr!!! lol

insomniac...

yep, that's me! i can barely sleep through the night, and when i get woke up i can't get back to sleep. they told me to take benadryl, but i don't want to take it too far into the night and have a hard time getting up to get the kids to school!

the kids started back to school this week, and it seems weird not to be going with them. i know this leave is a good thing (for baby and college classes) but it's hard not going to work every day and wondering what i'm missing out on too! i miss hanging out with my coworkers...guess i'll be meandering down there to volunteer so i can still feel like i'm connected a little!

second day of school was canceled for tropical storm fay...and nothing happened, we barely even got a sprinkle of rain! now "she" is still hanging around and it's kind of windy out and we've gotten some rain tonight from her. my friends over in cocoa haven't gotten flooded in their house, i hope it stays that way since they just bought it and moved in this month!!!

my fall semester started this week, so i need to get on top of my assignments and not let them get out of hand at all. i have 2 extensions that i need to complete too, so we'll see if i can get them done soon! i should take my insomniac time to work on them. i've been trying to get myself tired so i can go back to sleep, but i guess i'd better roll with it and use the time from now on to work on school stuff...since i like to sleep a lot during the day!

i had some stuff i wanted to blog about a week or so ago, after reading a book for one of my summer classes, but i never got around to it. there was some pretty good stuff in there. i'm sure i'll have some interesting insightful stuff to blog this semester...i'm taking 4 psych classes and i'm sure i'll be psychoanalyzing myself! one of the classes is "preventive stress maintenance"...the guy at the book store said i'll need that one with all of my psych classes and a statistics class on top of it! greeeeeaaaaat!!! the other classes are "biblical counseling" which should be pretty good, "contemporary issues" which covers some interesting topics like divorce/remarriage, homosexuality, and a few others. then i have "social psych" too.

okay, i think i'm rambling now, but wanted to post a little update here.

still waiting for baby to decide to come...little stinker isn't cooperating with what mommy wants! (hopefully that's not a sign of things to come! haha) i just need to quit being pregnant already. the pain and dizziness and fatigue is all i can handle and i'm over it. now my ganglion cyst is back in my right hand, and i'm mentally fuzzy...i want my body back to myself!!! (well, except for the breastfeeding part...i won't have it "all" back for awhile...)

hopefully i'll have something more interesting to say next time...

baby pic!!!

here he is, isn't he sooooo cute?!? i love how his hand is smooshing his little nose!

i went for my ultrasound this morning and everything looks good. the placenta has moved up, so no worries there. the little guy is measuring 2 weeks bigger than his gestational age, so yeehaw...we're going to have another big 'un! i almost blacked out yesterday when i was outside (just leaning against the car, not even exerting myself at all) so i mentioned that to the doctor i saw today and he said i'm not hydrated enough and to drink so much water that i feel like i'm turning into a fish...fun! (that means tons of bathroom runs too...yay.) he also suggested being in a pool as much as possible...just like the other doc did a few weeks ago, guess i need to work on that one! so baby boy is head down, so it's his butt that keeps poking out around my belly button and his feet that are going up under my ribcage. sometimes he pushes on my hip bone with his hands and his butt pops out on top, it's really funny to watch my belly move like an alien is in there!

so there you go, baby update...i'm still having pain, but dealing with it. now i'm just trying to drink as much as possible (and shuffle to the john every little bit)... just a few more weeks, am i ready for this?!?!? (i really don't know!)

lazy weekend...

we've just been hanging out around the house this weekend and doing pretty much nothing, it's been really nice! (especially since i'm so tired all of the time and jerry's not felt well for a few days)

we drove to dade city to see the fireworks and got there just in time to get a really good spot just before they started. we were closer sitting in the car than if we'd gone inside the fairgrounds to watch them. afterward we got fireworks and let them off at the house until midnight...i got a lot, so we can let them off tonight too. i love letting off fireworks, i have so many cool memories of it throughout my life...from blowing up cans, my step-dad having to run out into the meadow to stomp out a fire, to shooting off roman candles down the street (holding it on the ground with your foot and balls of fire literally shooting down the street!), watching my kids enjoy sparklers, Nick trying to blow up an orange last year, me about blowing us all up last night...fun times and good memories! i think that i, thanks to growing up in the country and burning our trash, have a little bit of pyromaniac in me, just enough to be silly, but not enough to really be dangerous. it has also been a bit of a good thing too, because i'm not scared to just go up to a small flame or cinders in the grass and stomp them out so no one steps on them barefoot.

on another note, for those who may be wondering...i don't have gestational diabetes. the 3 hour test on monday was brutal because i was so thirsty and having back pain while sitting there for so long, but after having blood drawn 5 times, the tests came back negative, so that's a good thing. my iron was a little low, but i guess we'll discuss that this week when i go for my ultrasound to check the location of the placenta (and hopefully get some measurements of the baby too...). little bubba is really starting to get cramped i think, he tries to stretch out and one big bump will be up under my ribcage and the other bump will be poking the opposite hip bone, and he doesn't like being pushed back in place because he'll just stay there and refuse to move to make mommy feel more comfortable. little booger! i just can't believe it's getting so close to his arrival, only a few more weeks (and sooooo much to do to get ready still)!!!

it's excruciating...

the preggo pain that is...

i have less than 3 months left until the little man is due, but the pain i've been having is getting increasingly worse by the week. if it continues worsening and doesn't let up, i can't honestly see how i'm going to function for the next several weeks. as it is i'm not really doing much, i'm staying home with my kids, doing school work and accomplishing minimal chore-age around the abode...and by the end of the day (and actually from the time i get up now) i can barely move. i find i'm shuffling when i walk, taking forever to get from one position to another (even if it's just rolling over in bed), and having almost no relief even when taking the lovely tylenol with codeine. everyone is sympathetic with the fact that i'm pregnant during the "heat of the summer" but that's not an issue that bothers me...it's called "air conditioning" and it's pretty much everywhere in florida...it's just the constant pain, of not being able to move my legs, pick up my feet or bend... i know this little guy is going to be such a sweetie, but i am really over the whole "being preggers" thing.

two-thirds there...

so i guess i'm officially in the third trimester now, i've gotten a ton of email stating that anyway. (i signed up for a bunch of information email early on and now they're getting annoying. lol)

so for the next 13 weeks or so it's probably going to drag out, especially since it's summer break and i'm in a lot of pain. we went to busch gardens on saturday and it was excruciating afterward to walk or move. but i've been having that for weeks now. i can't just sit on the couch all summer and make my family sit at home with me. we're planning to go to orlando and hit universal studios and wanted to do sea world too, but i told jerry tonight that there's no way i can do both parks in one weekend if this is going to be the norm! (maybe we could look into renting one of those electric scooters and then i could do it, we'll see.)

today, all i did was work on some of my humanities assignments, watched tv and did laundry with help of the kids. this evening, i couldn't even lift my own leg/foot up onto to the sofa to lie down. i actually asked nick to help me...how pathetic is that?

so, 13 more weeks? i'm praying he'll be big and "need" to come early (or want to come 2 weeks early like his big sister did)...that, or request an epidural for the next couple of months at least!

on the positive side...he's an active little booger! he kicks and bumps and pushes and hits pretty much all day long! i hope that doesn't mean he's not going to sleep much or be hyper though! haha

...and we still have to agree on a name...that needs to be remedied soon, so i don't continue having dreams of having a toddler walking around and us calling him "little man" or "big guy"...gotta work on that one!

just want to lay down and die....

not really, but there were moments today that i was in enough pain that it sounded like a good idea...or at least take some strong medicine and go to bed. neither of which i could do...i was at work, and i'm preggers...no bed at work and no strong meds for my mommy machine! i had a major ligament cramp last night and it's been sore all day today, i think i had a definite preggers walk going on, but it felt more like an old lady walk than anything! and this is supposed to go on for another 4ish more months?!? yikes! little dude is moving around a lot, and i don't feel like there's anything "wrong", just pain thanks to the monster baby (as my o.b. referred to it) from the last pregnancy...love ya elisabeth! ;)

speaking of elisabeth, she's growing up so fast! she missed part of her reading time yesterday morning because i had to take nick's c.t. films to the doctor and i took her to school late. silly girl decided to try to read fast and cram a.r. tests in and bombed one so it made her total fall below 80% and she didn't get to go to the a.r. celebration today. her teacher said she took it like a trooper and didn't get upset at all.... well, that didn't totally last though because she was upset when she saw me after school. but she also told me that because she was trying to get her total up (it's over 80% now), she took some a.r. tests today and not only raised her score, but broke 50 points for the year! since she worked hard and rectified her score AND surpassed 50 a.r. points, told her i'd reward her by buying her some books of her choice so she can get a good start on her summer reading. she thought that sounded great and has asked that i get her the "spyderwick chronicles"...so we'll be heading to a bookstore in the next week or two and picking them up. growing up, acting mature....my baby girl isn't so much anymore!

and nick update...since that's what this is turning out to be...for those of you who have been following the "saga" the doctor called me personally yesterday (wow...usually it's a nurse) and he gave me specifics on what kind of hypertonic saline to get nick for him to flush out (ewwwww) his sinuses. he said he's pretty sure the staph infection isn't the current issue, it's mostly post-surgical swelling, worse than usual because of the prior chronic sinus infections he's endured. he did say that it will be at least 2-3 weeks before he'll be feeling better, so to continue pain meds as necessary and do the hypertonic saline wash 4-5 times a day....well, stuff is moving and it's gross...i'll stop there and spare you the details, but keep praying for him to recover. this school year's basically a wash, but i really hope he can get back to himself and have a good summer and feel up to having some fun. (it's pretty bad when he's not even feeling well enough to ride in the car to wendy's to eat supper...)

so there ya go....i'm not really suicidal, just in pain...but some good stuff too. :)

so much going on...

nick's follow-up was yesterday and it went really well. they had to suck out some gunk that was stuck in his sinuses, but the doctor said it should all be good now. he did have a headache early today, but when we got home he seemed much better. i love that the dark circles are finally going away from under his eyes. i'm just praying that he'll continue to get better and that the neurologist will take him off the meds she prescribed...we'll see her on tuesday.

i'm super behind in schoolwork. i have 2 tests this weekend, and about 10 papers to do. once we get past tomorrow i'll be able to focus on it all. we have a youth fundraiser at our house...parents' night out...how things like this happen sometimes is beyond me. they just seem to appear out of thin air sometimes, and end up at my house. lol

pregnancy issues...pelvic bones are shifting too early, so i'm in a lot of pain...along with lovely round ligament pain... went to the doctor wednesday afternoon, got checked out and everything is fine. so i'm told to stay off of my feet as much as possible...i work at a school, are you kidding me? also, i'm having people at my house tonight...not staying off the feet today...gotta clean the house and then help watch at least a dozen kids! on the plus side, my ultra-sound is tuesday. i can't wait to find out what kind of little bun is in the oven! i've got so many sewing and crafting projects in mind, but need to know what's coming first! then we'll find out if we need to actually agree on a boy name (which we haven't been able to do), or if we'll get to use our chosen girl name... stay tuned!

half-way there...

since elisabeth was born 2 weeks early, and i'm now 19 weeks pregnant...i'm counting it as being half-way there! as far as i'm concerned, this baby can be born in august...it'll save us an extra year of preschool, etc. lol (i'd hate to miss the school cut-off!)

baby's definitely growing! i can feel it moving and kicking quite a bit, but not with my hand on my tummy yet, so i can't let anyone else feel it yet. i think elisabeth is the most excited about the baby, she wants to feel it move so badly, and constantly talks about it coming. she just can't wait.

so i have some great friends. i've already been given a bassinet. i have a crib, matress, toddler bed, stroller, convertible car seat, and exersaucer all promised to me too! it's amazing! there's definitely a jogging stroller/carrier car seat combo we want to purchase, but compared to being given everything else, it's no big deal to buy one big thing for ourselves.

still debating on the cloth diaper issue, but i've been sent a boxful of prefolds, so i can at least give them a try. i'm leaning towards it for the most part and have found a great alternative to disposables when we're out and about and don't want to mess with cloth either...gdiapers...they have a waterproof outer cover that's washable, and disposable liners that you can flush, compost or throw away...and they are 100% biodegradable, good for baby and the environment. we'll see...

so next week is my ultrasound, and this baby had better cooperate! i want to know if it's a boy or a girl so we can decide on the name and start buying stuff. i'm so excited to start sewing the nursery stuff and other items i have planned...but i have to know pink or blue first! it's like waiting for christmas...only worse!

it went too fast...

spring break is basically over, we have today and tomorrow and then it's back to school. jerry's preaching tomorrow, so today will be focused on that for him, and then of course church is tomorrow so there's the weekend.

nick's surgery went well. he seems to be recovering rather well too, but last night he was getting a headache from the inflammation. he's been running a lowgrade temp and his poor little face was looking kind of puffy and swollen, but he's a trooper and in a good mood for the most part. i just pray that this will be the "cure" for his headaches. the poor guy has missed over 40 days of school this year and has a few he has to miss coming up for his follow-up and other appointments too. it's been quite a year for him.

i've done almost nothing for my classes this week, i've done some but not as much as i'd hoped. i've also done almost nothing around the house this week either. so i decided to get motivated yesterday and was spray painting furniture that needed refurbished, moving big bins and boxes around in the garage, moving furniture, doing laundry...and i barely put a dent in what needs done and killed my back in the meantime. jerry was aggravated at me for not having him move the heavy stuff...as well he should've been, it was dumb. i'm feeling fine today though, so i'm going to continue to finish the laundry and do the regular cleaning that needs done (vacuuming, mopping, bathrooms, kids' rooms, etc.) but i'm going to put the kids to work on some of it too, at least elisabeth...maybe nick depending on how he's feeling. my nesting instincts have started in, i just haven't had a lot of motivation and energy to do anything about it.

i can feel "sparky" moving quite a bit now, it's kinda cool. i'm still in shock at having another kid, but starting to get excited about meeting this new little one too. i have an ob appointment on monday, hopefully my weight gain hasn't been too bad, but i'm not going to hold my breath. i actually haven't been eating a lot, but we'll see. (i was supposed to be on my way to my skinny, in-shape self right now...not gaining weight! ahhh!) i have an ultrasound in a couple of weeks, so hopefully we'll see the "goods" and know what we're having...

much to do, and the weekend's getting away...

starting to get excited...

i've been watching all of the baby shows on discovery lately...my favorite one is "deliver me", but i've been watching "baby story" and several others too since i'm on spring break and can have the tv on in the mornings while i'm doing stuff around the house (or working on my coursework). now that sparky/sparkle is moving, it's becoming more and more real that we have another little one on the way, and i am starting to say "awwwwww" instead of "oh my"!

i went to target today and just "had" to walk through the baby section...i love love love the contemporary bedding they have there, and the clothes are just so cute too. i'm getting excited about nursing again, and the possibility of cloth diapering (yes, i'm still thinking about it and the more i think about it...the more i'm sure i want to do it). i'm ready to find out what we're having so i can begin planning the nursery. the fact that we have a free crib, mattress, bassinet, and toddler bed coming...that's awesome! i was looking at an email from better homes and gardens about repurposing bookshelves and entertainment centers, and i fell in love with the thing they did with an entertainment center unit. they used it for a laundry station, but it could easily be modified to be used like a little armoire type piece of furniture for a baby's room. here's a pic...

if painted the right color, couldn't that look awesome in a nursery?!?

i'm so excited...and ready for summer break!

(i need to get the sewing machine out and work on some maternity clothes first though...belly's getting big and there's nothing to wear most days!)

i've been thinking...and that can be a dangerous thing sometimes...

there are many things i want to accomplish in the next few months, but one recurring theme seems to be trying to become more frugal and more "green".

one thing i'm looking into is how we can buy a home instead of continuing to rent... there are many homes in our area for sale, and several in our subdivision are super low in price...so there has to be one out there somewhere! a place with a pool would be a bonus, but not totally unlikely, right? this fits into my "frugality" because of the fact that we'd be owning a home and not throwing away money to fund someone else's investment.

another thing...we need a new vehicle for our growing family, but we don't want a minivan. we'd love to have an suv that has seating for 7, but we'd also like to have a hybrid. not sure if we can swing payments for a hybrid, but it's what we'd like...it's not easy being green...

with another baby on the way, it's tempting to go all out and get matching furniture and have an awesome nursery. i'm determined not to spend a ton and reuse previously baby-fied items. we've been given a bassinet (i may make a new cover/skirt or whatever for it to match our decor), have a crib we can get from a friend, a toddler bed and mattress, and a stroller. we have found a carseat/stroller combo we really like, but i think that will be the only major purchase we're going to need to make. once we know if the baby's a boy or girl, i'll be buying fabric to make the crib set and accessories for the nursery.

along with my frugal mentality, i've been looking at patterns and fabric i already have and trying to figure out what i can make for myself for maternity clothing...stuff that's cute but cheap because it's so expensive to buy that stuff and it's only for a little while. i think i can sufficiently make several pairs of shorts/capris and maybe a couple of skirts, and i've looked at a few patterns for tops that i plan to modify so i have some fashionable stuff without having to pay the maternity clothing industry's full prices for them.

another green/frugal thing i've been contemplating...and this is where it gets dangerous and i'm feeling a little crazy for even considering it...cloth diapers. yes, you read that right, i am actually considering using cloth diapers for this baby. i mentioned it at supper tonight and my whole family flipped out. but after looking at sites for info and reading up on it, i really think it will be a good thing. i can even make a lot of them myself if i want, but even if i don't it'd be cheaper than disposables and would save a lot of landfill space too. we'll see. jerry said it's stupid because we can't seem to keep up with the laundry we already have, but if i'm not working full-time, that won't be as much of an issue. guess i'll be catching up on laundry and getting the closets/dressers in better order this summer (while i'm not working) to show him it can actually be done! lol i took it as a challenge to prove him wrong. rofl

i sooo need to update more!

nick's headaches have actually gotten worse recently. he missed all of last week from school and we're on spring break now. he's having sinus surgery to remove a huge polyp from his left maxillary sinus, along with scraping everything out and removing a few other smaller polyps/cysts. i sure hope this is the answer to all of his medical issues, at least the headaches if nothing else!

elisabeth went camping this past weekend with her brownie troop and had a good time. she can't remember everything she did, but she said it was fun. lol she sure missed us though, she was really clingy all day yesterday after she got home. it was kind of nice being missed. saturday evening, when jerry and i were watching tv and nick was playing xbox, it was so quiet around here...i told jerry i'm sure glad we have more than one kid, it would be too quiet and life would be boring. he agreed...now we have another one coming...definitely won't be boring in a few months!

on that note, everything is going well pregnancy-wise. i'm now 17 weeks along, almost halfway there...that blows my mind that it's going so fast! after spring break, there are only 8 weeks left of school and i'll be on leave for the next year and then some...except for a possibility of needing to go back in august for a bit, but i'm not sure about that yet. it's just flying by though.

i go in for another appointment next monday, hopefully my weight gain will be along the lines it's been so far, i really don't want to gain too much. after that, i go in 2 weeks later for my 20 week u/s and hopefully we'll know what we're having so we can focus on baby names and cute little baby things. i've started feeling the baby move lately, so it's helping me to get more excited...it's still overwhelming too though!

pics of sparky...

such a cutie...




can you see the little face in the last picture? it's a side profile and so sweet!

elisabeth begged to come with me, so i gave in and let her. she was absolutely mesmerized! she had such a great time seeing the baby. at one point the tech held the wand completely still and you could see sparky moving around all over the place, even though i can't feel a thing yet! elisabeth said "the baby must need to use the restroom, it's doing the same wiggle dance i do when i need to go!" too funny!