I'm never going out with the baby again. [or until tomorrow, at least.]

On those days when you're about to leave the house with the baby [alone, I might add] and you only grab a onesie as you're walking out the door--no pants because you're just sort of planning for the "worst case poop scenario," you're basically asking for it. You're asking for that not-well-planned-for worst case poop scenario to happen while you're at Old Navy. And you know what? It did. Literally as soon as we got there, I had to go straight back to the bathroom to change my precious little boy. But what did he do as soon as I placed him on the changing table? He screamed. And not like, "I hate having my diaper change" crying... it was "I'm dying/in pain/being tortured" screaming. And of course, as soon as I take his pants off, poop is everywhere. Everywhere. [OK, not everywhere. But in the moment it felt like it.] I have to strip him down [more screaming] and somehow get all the poop cleaned up. And guess what? I'm down to about seven wipes. Why? Because this exact same thing happened yesterday at the bank. And I was, as previously stated, ill-prepared for another similar situation. I was miraculously able to conserve my wipe usage and had just enough to clean everything. I put the thank-goodness-I-grabbed-it onesie on him, and put him back in his carseat which resulted in--you guessed it!--more screaming. I quickly and not efficiently at all rinsed his clothes, washed my hands, and picked him back up. Then I proceeded to push a stroller with one hand and hold a very sad baby with the other while trying to find inexpensive short sleeved t-shirts as quickly as humanly possible. I found three t-shirts and two pairs of pants for Logan [because clearly we're lacking those], and hightailed it out of there. We're home. Logan nursed himself to sleep and I'm praying [truly genuinely praying with all my heart] that he will sleep for at least an hour and a half. It was a rough day... and this particular part of it was less than an hour long.

Just for the record, I've rinsed out three poop-covered onesies and pairs of pants since yesterday. My husband, just yesterday morning, said, "He really doesn't have poop explosions that often..." And I officially beg. to. differ. But you guys. We leave for Indonesia on Saturday. We will be traveling for over twenty-four hours straight. It's bad enough imagining that Logan will scream for a good part of our rather long flights. It's something else all together to imagine endless poop explosions on an airplane. Please pray that my sanity will still be in tact by the end of this week. I've imagined so many horrible scenarios for this trip, I don't know that it's good for my health to travel too much with this child. Sigh.

On a side note, I really love being a mom. And I love my son. I just don't like poop. Rather, I don't like cleaning poop off of clothing.

I've packed one bag. It can still hold about fourteen more pounds, but I don't know that we can fit that  much more in the bag. Nor do we have that much more stuff to pack... and still two and a half more suitcases we can fill. This week is kind of dragging on. It's only Tuesday. I really need to not be anticipating this trip anymore. Don't get me wrong, I'm beyond excited about visiting my family and my childhood "home" [by "home" I mean country]! And I can't wait to get some amazing Indonesian KFC and roti canai and kue putu. And possibly go to a movie for less than in a movie theater that puts American theaters to shame. [Most Indonesian movie theaters are so incredibly nice. Only a select few American theaters are nice. True story.]

So much for an hour and a half nap. He's awake. But at least he's happy and awake. :) And he's pretty cute. Hah.

You know what sounds incredibly wonderful right now? A big glass of cold water. Ah. Merry Christmas to all!

Learning to Crawl: Not as fun as you may think

Time is absolutely moving at a faster pace than it ever has before. My baby is already six months old. We've been living in this house for almost that same length of time. Thanksgiving is over. We're going to Indonesia in less than a month. [Less than three weeks, actually.] And 2014 is coming to a rapid end. What happened? On January 1st of this year, I felt Logan's little kicks for the very first time. How can that have already been nearly a year ago? It was a big moment for me because after a horrible first trimester, I needed to be reminded that I was carrying a brand new, precious life. I needed to feel the little flutters to help me realize that it was all going to be worth it in the end. And it was worth it. I mean, I saw a picture of Travis and me a year ago, and I'm pretty sure we look a lot older now, but it's been fun. Exhausting. Crazy. Wonderful. I was anticipating so many things this year... it's hard to believe they've [almost] already happened.

On a less serious/contemplative note, we went to our first family football game last Saturday. I was really excited about it up until we hit the game day traffic. And the stairs. And more stairs. Really steep stairs. And the absolutely repulsive smell of beer. (I would apologize to those of you that like beer, but it really truly smells horrible.) People were in our seats, so we had to ask them to move. Logan lasted about an hour before he was exhausted. I took him to the family restroom to nurse him (less for modesty's sake, more because he's so easily distracted and will, therefore, refuse to nurse) and he fell asleep in my arms. The toilet didn't have a seat cover, so I was standing up, holding a rather heavy sleeping child. (Nursing standing up is not as wonderful as you may think either...) And since he fell asleep nursing, I was still completely exposed, with no extra hand to cover up. Plus, I knew it would be infinitely louder outside the bathroom. But once my arms felt like jello, I carefully texted Travis to come help me. Logan woke up as soon as I handed him off. He took a twenty minute nap during halftime. We opted not to park at the stadium for $50, so our cars were two miles away at my sisters' apartment. (They dropped us off before the game...) Long story short, we didn't get home till almost 9:00, and Logan screamed for the last ten minutes of the drive. Sigh. Needless to say, next time we'll pay for parking, we won't climb to the nosebleed section but will, instead, sit at the lovely couches on one of the main floors, and never ever again will we take a six month old baby to a college football game. Of course, I'm not sure there's much of a chance I'll be going to a game again period. Watching football on TV at home is better in nearly every way. Some might disagree, but you're wrong. Hah! ;)

Other than the game (which was still a good experience to have under my belt), our Thanksgiving was lovely. Logan is a hit with the extended family--and he loves to be around lots of people. We're thinking he might be an extroverted baby. Does that change? Could he be an extroverted baby and then an introverted kid/teenager? Who knows. Oh yeah, and I'm just going to put this out there: if your baby doesn't poop for three days while you're on vacation, be prepared for a lot of diaper changes when you finally get home. And stain treatments. Hah.

I no longer babysit. Logan wasn't a big fan of missing his afternoon nap and made sure we all knew it by screaming for the entire 2+ hours I worked each day. I tried leaving really early and just driving around town for thirty minutes so he could fall asleep... but he never would. No nap for Logan made for a stressful afternoon for everyone involved, and an even more stressful evening for me. As much as I wanted to make it work, it was definitely for the best that I stop. He naps every afternoon right around when I would need to leave for work. OR he's still sleeping and I'd have to wake him up. Tatum woke him up today with her way too loud squeals of excitement about playing outside and it was a long hour and a half before he'd go back to sleep. Oh yeah, and this whole "learning to crawl" thing is one cruel joke. Logan falls on his face so many times, I'm thinking of having pillows installed over our floor. Not really. But the face-plants really are hurting my heart. His poor painful cries are a bit more than I can handle. Why didn't anyone tell me that crawling was so heartbreaking at first? Here I thought it was going to be cute and fun and we'd laugh and take videos. All lies. He loves to try to get to Sabre. (Tatum used to be his favorite, but then Sabre let him grab his fur and nose and paw. His love is rather conditional.) He desperately tries to crawl to Sabre... it's precious. I genuinely believe he'll start crawling just to get to that dog.

I have an affinity for passive voice. My apologies to those of you who don't like it. ;)

This Includes My Top Five Baby Items (I know you're dying to know what they are!)

I had a big, elaborate plan to write a lovely blog post while my sweet child slept the morning away. His nap, however, got cut from the hoped-for [at least] one hour into sixteen minutes. Sixteen minutes!! It's because I put him to sleep in the guest bed nursing him... and he nursed for at least thirty minutes before I unlatched him myself. And apparently sleeping without mommy is no fun. On the upside, he woke up calmly, making sweet little noises instead of screaming non-stop. (He only seems to scream if he wakes up in his crib. If he's in a bed, it's all good. Sigh.) Instead, I'm writing this in two minute spurts, moving Logan from one place to another and making sure the dogs don't get anymore dirt on him.

Logan turned five months old over the weekend. It's amazing how many changes occur in just five months! He's still toothless and [mostly] immobile, but for now, that's a good thing. I fear for my sanity (and my desire to continue breastfeeding) once those things change. Anyway, I thought I'd take this time to let you know which baby products have saved me from endless meltdowns. Because... well, why not!
   1. Nose Frida -- I never thought I'd actually use an actual, literal snot-sucker, let alone recommend one. But this thing is awesome! It really gets snot out of poor baby's nose (you can see it! Gross, but encouraging when you need to get snot out...) and you can clean the snot out! It's really great!
   2. Jumperoo -- Apparently there's all sorts of controversy about these things... but I decided not to read about it. Because, quite frankly, there's controversy about EVERYTHING related to babies. We were able to use the Jumperoos at a friend's house and at the church nursery first--so we knew Logan liked it. And we bought one at a consignment shop for $35 instead of a brand new one for nearly $100. It's been great! (He's in it right now, in fact. Jumping away! Though, I will admit, much like anything else, ten minutes is the longest he'll stay in there happily.)
   3. Ergobaby carrier -- It's expensive. It seems ridiculous. But once you try it, and you see how pain-free your back is and how comfortable baby is, suddenly it doesn't seem so crazy. And it's the only way to grocery shop with a baby in tow. Strap him on, and you've opened up both arms to push the cart and grab items. It's wonderful!
   4. Play Mat -- This has been our longest lasting item. (In that Logan hasn't lost interest in it yet...the swing and bumbo are old news.) He grabs the toys hanging down and tries to eat them. When he was smaller he just whacked at them, but it was good for his hand-eye coordination. And it's great to have a place to put him while I make lunch/dinner, go to the bathroom, sit without holding a baby... This is another thing we got at a consignment shop. They run like $50 brand new. Ours was only $18. :)
   5. Primo Eurobath -- It's big. But it has a nice "lounging" side for infants and a "sit up" side for older babies. Logan loves it! It has more support than most other baths (we used a different one for the first couple of months... then he outgrew it and got really irritated when we still tried to use it) and is better for transitioning. In other words, when he's too little for the bathtub but too big for the baby bathtub.

And there you have it. My first five "essential" baby items. Items that, I'm sure, will vary for each and every baby. But oh well.
 
Lately my time is spent putting Logan down for naps, feeding Logan, playing with Logan, putting Logan down for naps, and did I mention putting Logan down for naps? He fights them until he's basically cried himself to sleep. And then he sleeps for the shortest amount of time (see above) and we have to do it all over again in an hour or so. Since becoming a mom, my time has been a bit consumed by my baby boy. I knew I'd take on this new role, but I've found that in the process, I forgot about the other roles I hold. Becoming a mother didn't relieve me of my "wife" role or "homemaker" role (I don't know that I thought of myself as a homemaker, but a lot less cleaning gets done now, so apparently, I was), but I put those on the back burner. I talked to Travis about this the other day, letting him know that despite appearances, I'm working on balancing all my roles instead of focusing on just one. Despite always being a daughter and sister, I never felt those roles took specific effort. They were just always a part of me. Becoming a wife wasn't all that difficult, because it was the only "in the moment" role I had. Sure, I still talked to my parents and sisters and worked full-time, but day in and day out, I was a wife. Now day in and day out, I'm a wife AND a mother. And it's been hard to balance the two. Spending completely focused time with my husband is rare, but it's something I need to try to do more often. I really have to rely on God as I figure this out--because I really have no idea how to balance the two. But He gave me both these jobs, and He's going to help me master them. (And if not master, at least get better.)

I'm losing so much hair, I'm surprised I have any left. My sisters came for this past weekend and babysat Logan so Travis and I could go out on a date. It was sweet and wonderful! Brittany also cleaned the floor, which was almost as wonderful as watching my son. And she made us some banana chocolate chip muffins. I've eaten at least three every day. When she gets married, I hope the man she marries either works out a lot or has a really fast metabolism. ;) [Breastfeeding is my best friend when I want to eat a lot of food.] Travis put new baseboards in our living room/dining room this past weekend. My contribution to the whole project was as "painting assistant" (my official title) a couple weeks ago. [I only helped for an hour. Oops.] Travis did everything else. Measuring, cutting, installing, caulking... he's basically awesome. And the house looks so much better with baseboards! Oh! And transitions! Next project? Hm... fix our really wonky shower head? Not a top priority. I still leak when I nurse Logan. Is that normal? I'm getting really tired of buying nursing pads. And wearing them. I get to put "wife" and "mom" on temporary hold on Thursday morning to go get a manicure! I got a coupon for a free manicure at this local spa and I've only ever gotten a manicure in the states twice--and once was when I was thirteen and the other was for my wedding. So I'm excited. And grateful that the hubs is going to watch the baby. :) I long to make really delicious cake. One of these days I will. And frosting. Someday, guys, someday.

Tomorrow it's going to be cold. We're getting closer and closer to winter. And you know what that means? I need to get Logan some socks.

If I'd written this a few days ago, I would have had a cool title about shaving my legs.

The thirty minutes I had to write this just got cut down to twelve because my precious baby boy decided to wake up. After only an hour of sleep. I love being a mom, I really do. But the constant waking up multiple times every night is wearing me out. I know it's a normal part of motherhood with an infant, but I don't think I ever realized how much I relied on getting a decent number of continuous hours of sleep. You see, I probably get eight hours of sleep at night. But as it turns out, I don't just need eight hours of sleep. I need eight continuous hours of sleep. Or six for that matter! I got six continuous hours of sleep one night a couple weeks ago and it was magical. I felt so rested! But getting three hours, then two, then an hour and a half, then two...it's not the best. I did this way back (hah!) when Logan was first born, but I kind of looked at it like bootcamp. Just power through the first couple of months and then things will improve. And the depressing part is that they did! For about a month, he was sleeping eight+ continuous hours each night! I was on cloud nine. I felt like the most blessed new mom in the world. But then Logan decided it wasn't any fun to sleep so much. And here we are. He still wants to eat every two hours during the day, and will not go back to sleep at night without nursing. In fact, the last couple of days he's hardly been willing to go to sleep for his naps without nursing. And since his "awake period" is only about an hour to an hour and a half, he eats when he wakes up and then wants to eat again to go to sleep. No wonder the silly four-and-a-half month old baby is already moving up to 9-month clothes! (Not all clothes are created equal. He still fits in Carter's six month quite well. [Side note: I love Carter's. Soft, durable, cute. I. Love. Carter's.] But there are a number of other brands that he's even outgrowing the 6-9 month size... My breast milk must be akin to heavy cream.)

[If you thought a new paragraph meant a topic other than my baby, you will be very disappointed.] Logan is over 17.5 lbs., so I'm not sure how much longer I can carry his carseat with him in it. My arm muscles can't grow as fast as he is. (But my arms are getting much stronger! I'm like an awesome arms-only body builder. Except not really.) You know what though? I really really love my baby boy. I may cringe and my heart may stop when I hear him maybe possibly waking up on the monitor, but I still wouldn't trade my days (and nights) with him for anything. [OK, I might trade the nights for some sleep...but that's beside the point.] I'm talking in circles. It's the sleep deprivation. (aka, my official excuse for everything!) Oh yeah, and Logan's new favorite thing to do is grab my face. He especially likes to grab my lips with a death grip that rivals all death grips. It's so painful and he just keeps squeezing tighter until I'm convinced my whole mouth is bleeding. There's never actually been any blood, but boy does it seem like there should have been. He also loves to roll to his tummy. Though sometimes he rolls to his tummy even though he doesn't want to. Then he gets upset and I flip him back over... but we end up in a vicious cycle. Then it's usually nap time.

I really love chicken. I don't know that I need any other meats in my life. Except breakfast sausage. I've been making pancakes and sausage at least once a week because...well, because I love pancakes and sausage. I also love chocolate chip cookies, and we're out of cookie dough. My hair keeps getting more and more straight as the weeks go by. I'm losing hope that my curls will ever come back. It might be time to simply mourn their loss, and move on. It only took me about eighteen years to like my curly hair. Hopefully I'll embrace straight hair a little bit quicker. Sabre pulled a box through his doggy door. He couldn't push it though, so he went out the door, then stuck his head back in and pulled the box through. He's too smart for his own good. Logan loves to watch the dogs walk around. But if they get close to his face to lick him, he starts swatting at them. And he's pulled on Sabre's fur a couple times. Luckily, Sabre doesn't seem to notice. Tatum, on the other hand, runs away if he even reaches for her. And from what I can tell, Logan seems to be more interested in Tatum than Sabre. He must know she's a little more skittish and wants to break her of it.

My eyes are getting itchy, which means it's time to rest them. Maybe next time I won't only write about Logan... but don't hold me to that. I'm not sure I have it in me.

My Husband Always Tries to Read My Posts Before I'm Finished.

A few weeks ago, I told Travis that my birthday gift this year would be the trip we're taking to Hattiesburg. I figured, it costs money to board the dogs, drive to Mississippi, and I plan on eating at all my favorite restaurants from my good ol' college days... so why spend money on a gift? Besides, I couldn't think of anything I wanted. But then, as the days went by, my trusty macbook started acting up. And by "acting up" I really mean "dying." It froze all. the. time. For the last year or so, I haven't been able to do a whole lot of multitasking because it was just too much for the old guy to handle. (old guy: macbook) I was able to deal with limiting my multitasking, but restarting my computer multiple times a day (restarting took a good 30 to 45 minutes each time) was pushing me over the edge. I frantically searched for my external hard drive to back up my computer (something I hadn't done in over a year!) and barely got everything backed up. I started backtracking my "I don't need a birthday gift" stance yesterday and asked Travis if there was any chance I could get a new laptop. I made every case I could... and he didn't say a whole lot (which really isn't all that unusual). About the third time my computer froze up in a thirty minute period, Travis left the room and returned a few minutes later with a beautiful new Macbook Pro. I cried. He wanted to wait till my birthday, but the old guy gave out a week too soon. And in the end, it was an even bigger surprise. So I'm now writing my first blogpost on my brand new laptop. It's just so wonderful. And you know what else? My old laptop won't come back on. I got one last backup last night... and then he died. Travis has tried to revive him, but I think it's a lost cause. He held on till he knew I was taken care of. ;) He was a good laptop. So thoughtful.

Also, yesterday marked the one year anniversary of my positive pregnancy test. Apparently September 27th is a big day for me.

Logan no longer sleeps through the night. (I can't remember if he'd given that up when I last wrote...) However, we officially moved him to his own room, because I found that he was spending more time in my bed than his pack n' play. (And technically he's only supposed to use the bassinet portion of the pack n' play till he's 15 pounds... he's almost 17 pounds. Oops.) I was just too tired in the night to stay awake, so I kept falling asleep while he nursed back to sleep... and neither of us was getting the good, restful sleep we really need. I'm slowly figuring out this whole "baby sleep" thing. He naps a lot. He takes a nap somewhere between forty-five minutes and an hour and a half after he wakes up. After every nap. So by the end of the day he's taken about five naps. Or six. But he's a happier baby and he sleeps better at night. (One or two wake-ups instead of four or five.) I learned last night that Travis isn't allowed to help with nighttime wake-ups. He tried last night, but caved in when the little guy smiled at him. He smiled back! So of course, Logan thought it would be fun to stay up for a little while. It may be mean of me, but when Logan wakes up in the night, he gets fed and then goes back to sleep. I can barely open my eyes in the middle of the night, so smiling at him is less of a concern for me. Hah. Sometime during his nice long sleep last night, he figured out how to put his butt in the air and kind of get onto his knees to scoot forward. He can't move much at all, but it's a pretty impressive attempt. He's really trying to figure out how to become mobile. He doesn't like staying in one place. However, he's only [almost] four months old, so he's got some time. Though I do think our aspirations of an immobile baby on our international flights is far-fetched now. I think we'll be up and down the aisles a lot.

We have a new area rug in our living room. The dogs love it even more than I do. Hah. We've used our TV a few times...it's pretty small and hard to see. Maybe someday we'll upgrade. We ran out of rice. We went through ten kilos of rice really fast. It's the Asian in us. Travis doubled the chocolate chip cookie recipe (it's the absolute best ever!), so now we have a ton of frozen cookie dough balls in the freezer. And Magnums. They were on sale. And I need to get some sleep before my little one wakes up for his first (and hopefully only) middle of the night feeding.

Slow Motion vs. Fast Motion (...and Logan, of course)

In the last week or so, I've been paying more attention to which scenarios cause Travis and me to disagree or argue more often. You see, I felt problems were arising more often and I couldn't figure out why. As it turns out, there's one common factor to nearly every argument we've had in the last... probably since we got married. It only took me three years to figure it out. You see, I move in fast-motion a lot of the time. When I get hungry, I want food. right. now. And if I'm say, nursing or otherwise busy with my dear child, I might ask Travis to get me some food. If I ask him to get me some food and he says yes, it's as if I have an internal timer that, quite honestly, is not very long. So half an hour later, when my stomach sounds beyond angry, I express that anger towards Travis. After all, he did say that he'd get me some food. Travis's perspective, I've come to find out, is very different. When he agrees to get me some food, he never thinks it's an immediate agreement. He said he'd do it... he didn't say he'd do it now. Our new compromise is that if I ask for food, I have a very short wait period before the hunger takes over my mind... so if he can't or doesn't want to help right then, he needs to say "when I finish ___" or "I will in ___ minutes"... then I have a better idea when my food is coming. OR I can decide that he's going to take too long and I need to master the art of nursing standing up with one hand while making a sandwich with the other. ;) Or just learn to be more patient. It's all about compromise. My second example of "fast motion" is while shopping. I'm not a "let's go shopping for a few hours 'cause it's so much fun" kind of person. I know what I'm going to buy when I go out, and I want to buy it and go home. (I literally feel exhausted as soon as we've found the item I sought out to buy.) I'm a bit more flexible on this when we're at Target and I wander into the baby section... but grocery shopping. Blah. Travis, on the other hand, wants to compare prices for every item we need or just stroll along at a leisurely (ahem, slow) pace, while I feel as though we're tiptoeing through our mundane grocery shopping. Travis is basically the most laid-back person in the world. I mean, I was in full blown labor and he decided to take a shower. If a man isn't going to get into gear and move at a high speed when his wife is screaming in pain, I don't know that there's anything that will. So we're working on compromising our "fast motion" and "slow motion" personalities into a... medium motion. We'll see how it goes.

Logan giggles now. Not often. But when he does, it's the best thing ever. I'm sure in a few years, we'll go back through all our videos of Logan and wonder why we thought him lying on his back "cooing" for ten minutes was so exciting... but today, right now, it's wonderful. If his noisiness at 3.5 months is any indication of talkativeness later in life, he's going to talk our ears off. He's rarely quiet. It's pretty cute though. (Except when he's beyond exhausted and has decided that the best way to stay awake is to yell. Not cry or scream. Yell.) My poor little guy has a cold and isn't a big fan of the snot-sucker. It works really well... if he'll let us use it! He loves his door jumper and is determined to sit up all. the. time. Or pull himself to his feet (while holding our hands, of course). And the only things that work in getting him to nap now are the car seat (both in the car and out... though out of the car takes longer) and the ergo carrier (magic!). He used to fall asleep on his own in his cozy little swing. But then one day he decided swings aren't cool and pacifiers are gross, so we were back at square one. I'm pretty sure his preferences change daily.

I'm back to babysitting now. I watch a three year old boy, a seven month old girl, and my little guy. It's quite a party! A week ago Logan would fall asleep when the seven month old cried... now he stares around the room in utter confusion.... or joins in himself. The three year old says things so practically. He went to the Baylor football game a couple weeks ago. I asked him, "Did they run really far?" He answered, "No, they runned close together." He has a point. And while he was playing with his legos the other day, I asked him what he was building. He said, "A mistake." "What's a mistake?" I asked. He said, "I don't know, but Daddy knows." :) I'm guessing his dad was building something with the legos and said, "I made a mistake!" and now it's an official thing to build. It's fun! It's better on the days that the babies are calm and easy. Once Logan can sit up without help, that will be one less thing I have to do--support him while he insists on sitting.

In other news... we're going to Hattiesburg, MS (where I went to college) next month. I'm very excited. We have our tickets to Indonesia for December, the dog boarding is already paid for, and we have a used car seat to take along just in case it gets damaged. And our passport applications (Logan's and mine) have been sent off. Exciting things are happening. Life is good. God's blessings are the best.

Quite the Smitten Kitten

It might seem crazy, but today is my official first day of being at home with the baby and the dogs all by myself for (essentially) the rest of the day. I had two and a half months of guests helping me with cooking and cleaning and diaper changes and grocery shopping... but now it's all come to an end. It's just me and the little guy (and the dogs, of course). And, as luck would have it, it rained yesterday. Hard. And as much as we needed the rain, somewhere between having a baby, moving into our newly purchased home, fixing a myriad of things in said newly purchased home, and all sorts of other distractions, the grass in our backyard died. We bought sprinklers in hopes that it wasn't completely dead... but it is. Not all of it. Just most of it. And do you know what that means? It means that when it rains, our backyard becomes quite muddy. Very muddy. So muddy, in fact, that even after an entire day of 95+ degree heat, it's still a bit squishy out there. At our old house we just let the dogs out in the front yard when it was muddy in the back. But see, our old neighborhood didn't mind that we let our dogs off leash in the yard (they have e-collars on if they're off-leash...), but we did it one day here and some very welcoming neighbor called the cops on us. It's apparently not the way of this neighborhood to talk to you personally, they just call the cops. So we had a nice visit with a police officer about a week after moving in about our dogs not being allowed off leash (and that my sister's car was parked on the street facing the wrong direction...a law that everyone but us was aware of), so taking them to the front is no longer an option. (I can't hold a baby AND two dog leashes. I can't even put the baby in a carrier and hold two dog leashes. OK, let's be honest. I can't hold two dog leashes. The dogs are ridiculously strong.) So when they need to relieve themselves, I have to let them out back where their paws get muddy and then the floors (the freshly cleaned floors, I might add) also get muddy. And when I try to wipe off Sabre's paws, he's totally fine with me wiping his back paws, but he's apparently injured his front paw(s) and won't let me touch them. Pretty sure he cracked/broke another nail. Anyway, my point is, I get to go through my first solo day with Logan while also cleaning the floors every time the dogs need to go out AND the dogs can't go outside to play. It can only get better from here, right?

I never realized how exciting a baby could be. I remember seeing other moms post "baby achievements" on Facebook, and I never really understood them. I didn't know when babies were supposed to reach certain milestones, so I didn't understand the excitement if they got there early or even if they got there late. But now I get it. I got way too excited about Logan going from his tummy to his side--even though it only lasted for a second! Travis and I both spent way too long watching Logan "play" with the toys hanging over this bouncy seat. He whacks them and smiles at them and even "talks" to them. It's just so adorable. Hah! I love buying baby clothes (and thankfully I've been able to find some great deals at consignment shops, otherwise we'd be in trouble!). I also find myself looking at all the baby toys and trying to convince Travis we need to buy them, even though we have plenty of hand-me-down toys that he's yet to show interest in. Sigh.

I desperately want to buy an area rug for our living room. Who knew area rugs (soft, semi-nice ones) could be so expensive? Even the cheap, scratchy rugs are still $50 or so. I finally convinced Travis to buy a new vacuum and a doggie door, so I'm trying to be patient about the area rug. "Trying" being the operative word there.

And now for the "I-tried-not-to-do-it-but-I-can't-resist" list of Logan-quirks:
-He loves baths so much that he screams when we take him out. We thought he might be cold, but that doesn't seem to be the case.
-He doesn't seem to notice the difference between being in a swimming pool and being out of one. It's strange.
-He now wakes up from his naps crying. A very sad, pitiful cry.
-He sleeps somewhere between six and eight hours straight every night. I feel very blessed... however, I've heard it stops when they start teething. Kind of dreading that.
-His arms still flail about and keep him from sleeping well at night unless he's all swaddled up. He is, however, out-growing the swaddler, so hopefully he'll outgrow the flailing too.
-He's in the 90th percentile for his weight (or he was at his two month appointment) and 75th percentile for his height. I was worried that I was overfeeding him, but apparently you can't overfeed breast milk. And it's apparently nothing to worry about. The height percentile was more surprising than anything. Neither of us (Travis and I) are very tall, so I was expecting a pretty short little baby. However, he's only two and a half months old, so nothing's set in stone yet. ;)

I don't know if you can tell, but I'm pretty much smitten.

Marriage and Babies and Nursing, Oh My!

The day before our wedding three years ago, we were asked when we were going to have kids. I felt the question was a bit hasty considering we were still 24 hours away from being married, but we said we'd wait three years. And after our wedding, on our "getaway" car were the words "three years till kids!" Today marks our three year anniversary, and we did, in fact, stick with our three year plan. A year ago, I never would have thought that we'd have a beautiful baby boy by our next anniversary, but God's plans are always best. And while being stuck in the "postpartum" phase of child-bearing on our anniversary isn't exactly the greatest, I feel safe in saying that I'll spend more anniversaries NOT recovering from childbirth. (Although the truth is, I recovered from my childbirth ailments weeks ago--at least in terms of pain--so all that's left now is convincing my body to handle breastfeeding a bit better than it seems capable of...)

In keeping with the tradition I started last year, here are a few more things I've learned about marriage since last year:

1. Buying a house and having a baby at the same time is stressful.
    I don't think this needs explanation. Just don't do it. (Especially if you're buying a house that needs some fixing-up.)

2. Pregnancy is hard for husband and wife.
    While my dear husband never complained about my inability to do anything early in pregnancy (thanks to morning/all day sickness) or late in pregnancy (thanks to my giant belly), I know it gave him a lot more work to do. And, of course, I would really like to skip the first trimester of all future pregnancies I may or may not have.

3. If you want something done in a certain time frame (or at all), do it yourself.
    Our electricity went off on Tuesday at 12:30. I asked Travis to call our electric company and find out why. He didn't. Two hours later, I was at the point of total meltdown (literally melting), so I got the information from Travis and called them myself. For some reason, the company thought we had requested that our service be cancelled on July 8th, but couldn't figure out why they thought that. Moral of the story? Listen to your wife. Hah. Or in my case, make the call yourself. Otherwise, you won't have electricity again and you'll never know why.

4. A newborn can bring out the best and worst in you.
    I find myself feeling completely unsympathetic (in the sense that I want to physically hurt him) anytime my dear husband says he's tired... after getting 7+ hours of uninterrupted sleep. But then I also refrain from waking him up in the middle of the night to help me when I know he has work the next day. It's a vicious cycle. :)

But I sure do love being married. God gave me a good one. ;)

Now for the "I have a new baby and it's all I can think/talk about" update:
I am a mere three days away from being six weeks postpartum. I'm hoping that the miracle "week six" will literally hold some kind of miracle. I've had two bouts of mastitis and am rather susceptible to thrush now. Breastfeeding is slowly becoming less painful, but it's not as easy as I was told it would be once the first couple of weeks passed. However, I have noticed less engorgement, so that's one positive thing.

Logan will sleep at night for longer stretches as long as he's tightly swaddled. His arms startle him. The few times I've let him sleep on his tummy during the day, he sleeps so well and for quite a while. It's really a pain that tummy sleeping is so widely discouraged. He also loves looking at the ceiling--especially if there are lights on. And he's going through a phase (his phases change quite frequently) where he doesn't want to sleep during the day unless he's being held. Silly baby. I'm hoping the phase will have passed by the time my sisters leave, because I don't know how I'll get anything done if he needs to be held all day long. Although I'm looking forward to using my baby carrier, as soon as my chest isn't hurting all the time. Ah, the joys of breastfeeding.

Other than all of that, I can now sleep anytime, day or night. The dog fur is getting to me again. My mom left a week ago and it was the hardest goodbye I've ever said to her. When my sisters move back to Dallas for school, we're not going to know what to do with ourselves. And it's time to feed my sweet baby boy again. :)

A Bunch of Baby

It has been nearly a month since I last posted. The entire month of June has gone by and I haven't written about how incredibly life has changed in the last few weeks. On May 30th, we closed on our own home! It was exciting for so many reasons, one of the main ones being that I made it to closing still pregnant! But then I went into labor at 1:15 in the morning on June 1st. We spent a few hours at the hospital in the middle of the night, but I was only dilated to a 1+ the entire time, so they gave me a shot of morphine and sent me home. I napped on and off (it's hard to nap with those pesky contractions happening every few minutes) for a couple hours at home, took a hot bath to ease the contractions, and then eventually succumbed to the intense pain of active labor, fully aware that the morphine had completely worn off. I screamed through the contractions while my dear husband took a shower (it was very important to him that he shave before we went to the hospital--he didn't want to scratch the baby's face...) and my sister tried to reassure my mom (on the phone) that we were about to go back to the hospital. She was rather concerned when Brittany said my contractions were a minute and a half apart. I got the distinct impression that she didn't think Travis's shower was all that important right then. Hah. We made our way back to the hospital hoping that I had made some progress. I was beyond nervous that I had made no progress, and knew for certain that if the pain I was feeling wasn't active labor, I would never make it through the day. Thankfully though, they checked me immediately and found that I was now dilated to a four. As I was getting my stuff together, the nurse popped her head in and asked if I wanted an epidural. My response? YES, PLEASE RIGHT NOW THANKS.

:) I had to wait another hour or so before they gave me the epidural (I was very impatient--it felt like a lot longer than an hour!), but once it kicked in, everything was wonderful. I know there are some women that love natural labor and find it empowering and that's wonderful--for them. ;) But for me, that epidural was bliss. I dozed for an hour or so and relaxed for the afternoon. I was admitted at 12:45 and when the doctor came to check me at 3:45 or so, I was already dilated to a nine plus. I had read that an epidural could slow labor down, but it made me feel so relaxed and wonderful that it caused no problems in that department. I started pushing (completely painlessly, I might add) at 4:20 or so, and my beautiful baby boy was born at 5:08. Logan Stephen. And my life hasn't been the same since.

My wonderful husband spent the next week and a half getting our new home ready for move-in (with a ton of help from my sisters!), and my mom arrived on the 6th and helped us pack up our old house, clean, and helped me survive my first weeks of motherhood. It's been crazy and exhausting and wonderful all at the same time.

And, of course, I've learned some very valuable lessons in the last three weeks. :)

• Baby boys have a knack for peeing out of their diapers. I'm not sure how it happens, but we've had multiple wet onesies, wet mommy, wet aunts, yet somehow dry diapers...
• Travis (and supposedly most men) can somehow sleep through baby cries. Wailing even. Thankfully, ever since Logan figured out how to breastfeed better, he hasn't wailed a whole lot. But those first few nights? Lots of wailing.
• I would not have survived thus far if my mom and sisters weren't here. I honestly don't know what we would have done. I've already told them that they're going to have to move back in for every subsequent child I might have.
• Breastfeeding is not just mildly painful. It can be excruciatingly painful. Definitely the worst/hardest/most painful part of my postpartum life. 
• You can never have too many burp cloths.
• I often use two clean diapers at diaper changes because Logan decides to poop in his freshly clean diaper before I even close it all the way. But so far he waits till the new diaper is at least under him, so I'll just be grateful for that. 
• The Ergobaby carrier is truly wonderful--I only just used it yesterday, but it was lovely. 
• Poop explosions happen. They're unpleasant. 
• Logan wants to be held all the time. Literally all. the. time.
• Pretzel rolls are amazing. 
• I really truly wholeheartedly love my sweet baby boy. :)

one word: mangoes.

Big things (as in, huge things) seem to happen in my life every three years. (...for the past six years, anyway...) And so far, they seem to come in groups of two. Back in the summer of 2008 (six years ago, for those that don't like doing math), I graduated from high school and moved to the states for college. Then I spent the next three years in college while dating my [now] husband. In 2011, I graduated from college with a degree in English I still haven't put to much use (but it was free, guys! And fun!) and got married to the previously mentioned [now] husband. ;) For the next two years we enjoyed being poor "one-of-us-is-still-in-college" married people and then one year being not-quite-as-poor-about-to-be-parents married people. And now, in 2014, we're having a baby (any day now, I might add) and tomorrow we are buying a house. Hah! But seriously, we close on our house tomorrow!! It's all very exciting. And crazy.

[I should probably add that we had a pretty big summer last year as well, what with Travis graduating from college and getting an awesome job that actually puts his hard-earned engineering degree to good use... but I'm being self-focused and trying to find cool patterns in my life, and this particular big event messes that up. So we're going to call that "one of Travis's big life events" and enjoy the awesomeness of my three year pattern.]

My maternity shirts don't cover my belly. I have maybe three or so that still fit. When you buy maternity clothes, they tell you that the clothes will fit the whole way through because they're designed to stretch with your belly. Well they lied. The shirts still fit everywhere--except that they're not long enough to cover my belly! So now I get to try on shirt after shirt each morning until I find one that's long enough. Barely. I might be digging through Travis's shirts soon.

It's hot. And the sad part is that it's really not. We've had nice low-80s weather lately. But I'm always sweating. (Except in the car when I blast the AC and turn it down as cold as possible.) I tried wearing my jeans yesterday and nearly melted. Shorts only from now on. I would love nothing more than to turn our thermostat down into the 60s. I could go for 68. But I worry that Travis would find that excessive... and expensive. Though I will say this: if I had to be pregnant through a 100+ degree summer, we would be moving some money around in our budget for "pregnancy cooling." No joke.

My sisters have moved in for the summer. The dogs are beyond thrilled. Though they don't like it one bit when the girls go to their room to watch a movie with the door closed. We all just need to stay in the living room together like one big happy family. :) But I must say, I'm rather enjoying having the additional help with the cooking and washing dishes.

I'm sorry this post has very little substance to it. I think there's actually too much going on in my brain to make coherent sense in a blog post. Hah. I just hope everything will organize itself so I can get some sleep tonight. It's the house. And the baby. And the packing. And the painting/cleaning/moving/we've-completely-lost-our-minds stuff. Nothing a little help (moving/packing/painting) and a lot of prayer (everything!) can't fix.

Oh! And mangoes were on sale, so I bought around ten. At least.

Dog Miracles! (Need I say more?)

There's this moment of absolute terror when you let your dogs out into the rain (temporarily not pouring as much as it was earlier) to relieve themselves and instead of simply doing their business and coming back to you, they both hop into "play bows" and start sprinting through the muddy, watery, "not-really-grassy-at-all" yard. You can see the mud flinging off the ground and you get this image of two very large dogs soaked with mud and water, and you, poor pregnant "I-can-barely-bend-over" you, trying to figure out how to rinse and dry these two crazy dogs without the help of the ever-capable, not-pregnant husband. But then, God looks upon you with love and mercy and sends a miracle! The crazy dogs chasing each other through the mud suddenly return to the dry garage, only slightly wet and oddly (miraculously!!) not muddy at all. You give them a quick drying with the towel you brought and they willingly go back inside the house, knowing that they will probably be stuck inside for the remainder of the night. God is good, my friends. He is very good indeed. :) (And I'm super proud of my dogs for coming back to me, even though I ruined their fun.)

Despite how it looks if you walk into this house right now, we are officially moving (unless something absolutely crazy happens) in a matter of weeks. God has a ridiculous sense of humor when it comes to my need to plan and be over-the-top prepared for big life changes (like moving and babies and the like), so He decided to test the limits of my faith by prolonging the home-buying process to the point where our estimated closing date is May 30th instead of the "hoped-and-planned-for" beginning to middle of April date we really liked. So now we have about eleven days after closing (unless God sends another miracle and we close early!) to fix up the few things in our new home that desperately need fixing and move out of our current house. All the while staying prepared for the arrival of Baby Boy at any time in the next five weeks or so. Since I am only capable of packing and cleaning (for the most part...ceiling fans and baseboards don't seem very feasible at this point...or any later point that involves me still being pregnant), poor Travis is going to be doing a lot of stuff on his own. It was actually a year ago, almost to the day, that we moved out of our cozy little apartment into my grandparents' house to house-sit for two weeks, all the while wondering when Travis would hear back about a job and how long we'd be, essentially, homeless. But as I've shared before (or at least, I think I have), God provided a great job and a house with landlords that didn't balk at the idea of us bringing our two GSDs. And I must say, even though buying a house, moving, cleaning, and having a baby all at the same time sounds daunting at times, it's nowhere near as terrifying as our situation a year ago, and God brought us through that in a way only He could do. So when it seems like we've lost our minds, I just remind myself that God's got it. Always.

Baby is getting bigger and bigger. My bladder is getting smaller and smaller. My pain-free practice contractions are becoming more and more frequent. Sleeping isn't as easy as it once was, though I still do pretty well for myself considering. On the positive side of things, I have no feet/hands/face swelling or (ahem) colostrum leakage. My leg cramps have subsided and, over all, I haven't had too many aches and pains. (Though my husband may disagree with that last statement based on my endless complaining... OK, on second thought, the aches and pains may be more of an issue than I like to admit. But mostly when it involves standing up. And I mean the actual "getting up off the couch/bed/floor/etc. part. Once I'm up, I'm good. Mostly.) I've discovered that it's rather uncomfortable to drive with a baby jabbing into your side. It's hard to explain. But it's a tad distracting and makes me feel like I probably shouldn't be driving. Baby has the hiccups at the moment. Those are fun. ;)

We have two nests of newly hatched baby birds outside our front door. They're noisy little guys.

I no longer care (this month) about my weight gain. I just love chocolate.

Outgrowing Cuteness (in a good way)

My cute baby bump phase has passed. It was nice while it lasted. But now... now I just feel like a big big really big pregnant lady. Hah. And I still have six weeks to continue getting bigger. I'm trying to make myself feel better by looking back at my old bump pictures when I thought I was just huge and realizing that I was...not. So perhaps in a few weeks, I'll look back at my "34 weeks" bump and laugh at myself for thinking I was just so massive. We'll see. When I went in for my ultrasound at 19 weeks (when we found out we were having a boy), I was convinced that I looked mega pregnant. Here's my 19 week picture:

So huge, right? Haha. 

Here's 34 weeks (as in, now): 

I think I can see why no one knew I was pregnant at 19 weeks. Everybody knows now. 

In other news: 

• Tatum has an injured paw and isn't allowed to run and play. Poor, baby girl. :(
• Sabre is still Sabre. We're trying to schedule his neutering for... right away, in hopes that he'll be a bit more groggy and lethargic (surgery does that, right?), so he'll stop trying to play with Tatum by tackling her to the ground, probably injuring her paw even more. (It's also something we need to do...not just something we decided on a whim. hah.) 
• My dear husband smashed one of his fingers in a machine at work and now he's waiting for the nail to "pop off." I'm hoping I won't be present when said nail chooses to do so. 
• I have my first stretch marks and they itch. I'm not so fond of the itching. 
• We found a sweet puppy (about 6 months old or so) in our neighborhood on Saturday with no tags. She stayed with us for a couple hours and played with our crazy dogs before we found her owners. I discovered that three dogs is absolutely crazy. Hah. They sure had fun though!
• I'm out of cereal. It's been rough. ;)

Growing Up: It Just Happens.

I had a dental cleaning this morning. I typically enjoy getting my teeth cleaned. It's painless and the end result is clean teeth, so what could there possibly be to complain about? That's why, five minutes into my cleaning, when I started to feel clammy and nauseous and lost the ability to support my head, it came as a bit of a shock. I got my teeth cleaned back at the beginning of my first trimester when I was sick all day long and managed to survive the cleaning just fine! My poor hygienist had to call for some help to make sure I didn't completely pass out. The dentist came in, had someone give me some oxygen, and made me switch positions, hoping that it would get my blood circulating properly again. After a couple minutes, I could feel myself going back to normal. The dentist said he could tell I was doing better since there was some color back in my face. When I caught a glimpse of my face in the mirror, it was still pretty pale... which means I must have looked about as white as a sheet during my "episode." I felt just terrible that I put them through such an ordeal. Especially since I had no idea what caused it! I called my OB's office and spoke with my nurse who informed me that during pregnancy, dizziness/nausea/etc. (essentially a drop in blood pressure) is a fairly common occurrence if there's too much weight on my vena cava. Guess I should avoid such things. This whole "third trimester" thing is bringing on some lovely new symptoms. Hah.

I couldn't finish my whole breakfast this morning (leftover biscuits with sausage gravy) so I threw away what was left of it (which wasn't a lot), when Sabre stuck his face in the trash can and ate the gravy covered biscuit. Little brat. Now he's going to be even more convinced that the trash can is where all delicious things end up. On the other end of the scale, when we do the "leave it" command with Tatum (usually putting a treat in front of her or on her paw), she won't touch it. Even once we've told her she can eat the treat! She waits for us to pick it back up and give it to her. If we try to have both Sabre and Tatum "leave it" at the same time, Sabre usually eats the treat in front of him and the one in front of Tatum since she waits patiently for REAL permission. Such different personalities. Tatum also loves the baby smell that clings to me everyday after babysitting. She spends a good three minutes or so incessantly sniffing my left shoulder where I typically hold the two month old baby girl I now watch. It's going to be interesting to see what these doggies do when Baby gets here. :)

I couldn't focus my nesting into cooking and cleaning anymore--I had to get the nursery set up. The room we're going to be using (unless, of course, we move) was filled to the max with all sorts of random stuff (more like a storage room) and lots of empty boxes. And, of course, all the baby stuff in random bags/boxes/piles scattered throughout the room. It was time to rearrange and make everything look pretty. :) While we still have a few more things to do eventually, it's pretty ready for Baby. And then, if we do move, we'll just have to start all over again. Hah. Except now we have a basic idea of how we want to set things up. We got a rocker glider finally! Instead of spending over $500 on a nice one, we persistently checked craigslist and found a nice used one for $65. Yay! The cushions are pink, so we bought some material and are having it recovered. Thankfully my grandmother has a friend that does upholstery for a very reasonable price--the price we were quoted locally was over $350! We could order brand new cushions from the retailer for that price! Crazy! I was also told to check out a local consignment shop filled with all sorts of kid clothes, baby gear, and even some maternity stuff. I got a $50 diaper bag for $12! Travis helped pick it out, which means it looks absolutely nothing like a diaper bag (but it really is) and, therefore, he won't feel silly carrying it. :) We also got a play mat for $16--those things are ridiculously overpriced brand new! I'm a big fan of consignment shopping!

After a full day of insatiable hunger yesterday, today I've hardly felt the slightest pang of hunger. Strange. But my heartburn is in full gear and my back is nice and achy. I've started getting calf cramps in the middle of the night (thankfully not every night), and my overwhelming exhaustion seems to have returned. I'm also building up nice thigh muscles from standing up and sitting down while holding a baby. It's like doing squats on and off for a couple hours a day. As much as I can't wait to meet my little boy, I'm not sure I want these last seven weeks to fly by. I think it's a combination of wanting to move before he arrives (if it ever works out) and an underlying (and by underlying I mean very much at the forefront) fear of labor. Hah! Plus, even though I feel all sorts of kicks and jabs and flips and turns inside of me all day long, I'm not sure it's going to be real until he's born. It's like I was playing "house" just a few days ago and now I'm grown up and not playing anymore, and I don't know where the time went. That's not to say I'm not excited! I really truly am. I just don't know when all this "growing up" happened.

And look at that, I'm finally hungry.

Saturdays are nice.

My last three posts all included the word "sometimes" in the title. I think that's indicative that I'm overusing that word.

I can't say this with utter certainty, but I think there really is some kind of "mom gene" that kicks into gear when you're about to become a mom. You see, until a couple months ago, I didn't really cook. I tried. Every now and then I'd feel inspired to make some lovely sounding meal, only to taste it and feel utterly disappointed at my cooking skills. Most of the time I'd just throw the leftovers out--that's how much I didn't like it! But lately, my mom gene has kicked in and I can now cook quite yummy meals. It's strange, really. I made Chicken Pot Pie (with my own homemade crust, I might add) that turned out very yummy. I made some Homestyle Potatoes to go on the side of our grilled chicken that were awesome! I also made Chicken and Wild Rice Soup AND Chicken and Wild Rice Casserole (they tasted completely different, but both wonderful!). And I've made a vanilla pound cake, a vanilla yogurt cake, and have the ingredients for some no-bake chocolate bars. :) I'm not gonna lie, I'm pretty proud of myself. Hah! :)

The dogs have improved immensely in their training. We still have a bit of work to do, but overall, I'm glad we didn't spend the ridiculous amount of money to have them trained. We're doing quite well on our own--for free! Last night my sisters arrived for the weekend. Now Sabre loves Brittany something fierce and keeping him from jumping on her seemed like it might be the ultimate test of our training abilities. However, it's exactly the situation we need so we can get him to stop jumping on his favorite people. And wonderfully enough for us, he jumped towards her but not on her--a vast improvement from times past! Both Sabre and Tatum are doing much better at waiting for my command to go outside when we open the door. It's still not foolproof when someone knocks on the door, but we're just taking it one step at a time. Sabre does seem to understand that when he brings bricks into the house from the backyard (the best toys in the world, apparently) and I say, "Sabre, that's an outside toy," that he needs to take it back outside. Hah! He, of course, brings it back in a few minutes later, and then we go on repeat, but the fact that he takes it out at all amuses me to no end. :)

My chiropractor taught Travis how to do a basic back adjustment (similar to cracking someone's back but much more beneficial), so now I can get a basic adjustment for free! And I think Travis rather enjoys that he can actually do something that helps long(er) term. :) A back massage helps in the moment, but doesn't last. He's asked me to do it to him, but between my ever protruding belly and complete and total lack of upper body strength, I'm not sure there's much chance it's gonna happen.

I apparently decided that as soon as I entered into my third trimester of pregnancy, I would start working more. It's a bit backwards, perhaps, but it'll probably be good for me. Better than sitting home all day long, trying to find things to do to fill up my time. Instead, I now tutor Monday through Thursday in the mornings, and starting next week, I will resume babysitting in the afternoons throughout the week. On the upside though, I will be contributing a bit more to our monthly income than I was (hah!) and that's always helpful. Oh yes!! Now that it's April, I can officially say that in the month of March, we cut $100 off our grocery bill AND, compared to February, we knocked off $120 from our "eating out" spending! That's $220 saved just by planning meals, eating leftovers, and resisting the temptation to eat out all the time! I think I've found a new way of life. ;) Plus this whole meal planning allows me to embrace my pregnancy nesting by cooking and cleaning. Because after you cook, you then have to clean. (Which is probably one of the top reasons I avoided cooking in the first place. But the nesting, guys! It's real!)

Last night I went to my last movie before having a baby. And that's my final decision. We watched The Winter Soldier (Is it sad that I only seem to go to movies based on comic books? Comic books, I might add, that I've never read...) and while it was a good movie, I have never been so uncomfortable in a movie theater in my life. It's as if my back has changed shape or something, so I can't lean back and get support in the right places so I end up slouching more, which then hurts my butt and shoulders. I could kind of lean back and be semi-comfortable but to do that, my feet couldn't be completely on the floor, so in the end, that wasn't very comfortable either. It's a good thing I enjoyed the movie, because otherwise, I would have been out the door halfway through.

Everyone is sleeping still, except the dogs who are being dangerously quiet in the backyard. A quiet dog (unless sleeping) is never a good sign. Sabre always hides behind the couch and is suddenly as quiet as possible. When we go check to see what he's doing, 9 times out of 10, he's found something he's not supposed to have and is in the process of chewing/tearing it up. Luckily it's usually a clean paper napkin we were going to use (he loves ripping up paper products)... or at Christmas it was frequently a favorite ornament from the tree (though he rarely fully destroyed those). In other dog news, both Sabre and Tatum are now microchipped (Tatum took it like a champ, Sabre cried like a baby) and Sabre's days as an intact male are coming to an end soon, now that he's pretty much done growing (give or take a couple months, perhaps). (That last sentence probably needs to be restructured, but I'm not going to do it.)

Oh and if you haven't tried Blue Bell's new ice cream flavor "I Heart Chocolate," you are seriously depriving yourself of true deliciousness in this world. Go buy some. Now.

Sometimes You Just Need to Write in Bullet Points (or dashes, in this case)

My life right now:

- I bought a new body pillow yesterday. It's huge! And it's wonderful. I was using a smaller body pillow I got in high school. But all the fluff was falling out, so it was time for an upgrade. Since I've been sleeping with a body pillow for a few months now, I can no longer remember how or why I used to sleep without one. I think I've made a new permanent life change. :) Plus, another shopper at Target told me that the body pillow (only $10!) was a wonderful investment both for pregnancy, and for blocking your child into their bed later on. I love meeting friendly shoppers!

- We met with a trainer today about dog training classes/sessions. Poor Sabre has been identified as our "problem" dog. Hah. Our conversation went something like this:
Trainer: Do they have any problems with jumping?
Me/Travis: Yeah, Sabre does.
Trainer: Do they have any separation anxiety?
Me/Travis: Yeah, Sabre does.
Trainer: Do they have a tendency to bark a lot?
Me/Travis: If there are kids playing outside and he wants to join in, Sabre does.
This particular company we met with today charges a bit too much for our liking. In fact, it's kind of crazy. I'm a bit sad because I really want to have really well-behaved dogs. We need them to be better on leash (I hate taking them on leash because they pull so much!), to sit and stay where I tell them when someone comes to the door (in other words, not try to greet said person and run out into the yard for playtime), stop barking when told to stop, and always always always "come" when told to do so. With such specific needs, we really need more specified lessons (not just sit, down, stay, etc.) so it's a challenge. Plus, so many group lessons are either early in the morning (when Travis is sleeping) or in the evening (when Travis is working), and I have no interest in going by myself. Sigh. I'm sure we could train these things ourselves if we just set our minds to it... but they're hard. ;)

- I've been going to a new chiropractor for the last month or so. It has been absolutely amazing!! I go in for an adjustment and can immediately feel a difference--and it lasts! I've had neck/shoulder pain for years and years and years. Pregnancy wasn't helping a whole lot. And my husband has been super wonderful and doesn't mind my going for an adjustment when I need it. Plus, it makes me super happy and he really likes it when I'm happy. ;) hah!

- I've developed a new love for peanut M&Ms. So good.

- We made it till today without going to the grocery store. I made a detailed list of foods to buy and managed to buy all the ingredients for at least eight meals (most of which will include lots of leftovers) plus some basics (milk, bread, ham, cereal, fruit, etc.) for $100.04. I was very proud of myself! I don't know the exact breakdown for each meal, but I think we should be able to make it till nearly the end of the month without any major shopping. We'll probably have to stock up on some more basics, but that's not a big deal. Ah, to be responsible and careful with money. Feels pretty good, actually.

- I took my glucose tolerance test and had more blood work done at my last OB appointment. I do not have gestational diabetes (yay!), but I am anemic. I have to take an iron supplement now. I'm concerned it's because I've been taking the gummy prenatals instead of the pill version, but the prescription kind were insanely expensive and the over-the-counter pills made me vomit each time I took them (three times! I gave them three chances and they completely failed me!), so I switched to gummies. But the gummies have no iron in them. I guess I'm getting enough iron now though... (On a side note, I'm getting much better at handling needles. Only took 24 years to get there, but better late than never!)

- I'm growing exponentially, it seems. After no weight gain in the first three months, to have gained so much in the second three months, it feels like it's never going to stop! And at this point (27 weeks along), Baby only weighs about two pounds. I know I have to account for the amniotic fluid and placenta and extra blood and other such things, but still. It's pretty crazy. On the upside though, my skin is either very elastic or my weight gain has been surprisingly gradual enough that I don't have any stretch marks on my belly. (Yet!) It's a small thing really. I'm not the bikini-wearing type, so no one would ever see my belly anyways. I figure if I never showed off my belly before having a baby, I'm not going to start afterwards. :)

I'm sleepy. It is, after all, almost 9:30. The dogs are already sleeping. Sabre is even in his crate. (His way of letting me know it's past time for bed.) And Baby is kicking and moving around lots (a sure sign it's time for me to try to fall asleep, hah!). Therefore, I bid you farewell as I make my way to a nice hot shower and cozy pajamas.

Sometimes Titles Are Too Hard.

This month is going to be a month of very intentional frugality. You see, last month was not. Back in November, I took the never-to-be-had-again opportunity to convince Travis that we should go on a "babymoon" since all the articles and books about pregnancy recommend it. Essentially, it's your "final" honeymoon before the baby arrives. (That's not to say that you'll never get a weekend away again, but it's far more complicated to make happen once you have babies.) I also happened to know that Wicked on Tour was going to be in Austin in February. So I asked my dear husband if he would be willing to go to Austin for a weekend in February so we could watch Wicked and enjoy a nice, clean hotel room, and the joys of not having to cook, and all such things. He was very sweet and agreed. :) Then some family stuff came up and we ended up needing to go to New Jersey the weekend before our "babymoon" which involved driving to Dallas, flying (not my favorite thing to do pregnant, I found) to New Jersey, staying in another hotel room, and, essentially, spending a tad bit more money than we'd originally planned. It was a wonderful time with Travis's family, and I have no regrets that we went. However, two weekends of traveling and hotels coupled with extra eating out (because what else are you going to do while you're traveling?) made for a very expensive month. And ironically, it was the shortest month of the year so Travis's paycheck was slightly less than usual. Go figure.

So this month we need to play catch-up! I don't know when or if we've ever played catch-up before, but I'm almost looking forward to the challenge. I had originally planned to go grocery shopping yesterday, but didn't. Then I was going to go today... but here's the thing: we're playing catch up! And in so doing, I think it would be an excellent time to eat the food we have. In terms of meat, we don't have much. But I think we'll be able to manage. I've been craving pancakes and we have some frozen sausage and bacon in the freezer and plenty of ingredients for pancakes! We have leftover spaghetti sauce in the fridge, spaghetti in the pantry, and frozen bread in the freezer! We have two boxes of macaroni and cheese in the pantry and two loaves (because we prefer different kinds) of bread for sandwiches! We have ham and cheese and lettuce... and we have LOTS of indomie! I'm almost tempted to see how long we can make it before we absolutely need to go to the store. I'm interested to see how resourceful we become with what we have when we don't have the option of just "running to the store" whenever we so please. (But then I do have a man to feed... so meat might be more of a necessity than I think it is.)

I've also been reading up on home-buying and saving money in small ways and all that incredibly exciting stuff. Unfortunately we don't have a whole lot we can cut out (which I guess is also a good thing, depending on how you look at it). I would cut out my data plan on my phone, but I'm stuck in a contract for another year or so. Too bad. We don't have a TV, so we don't have cable. (Travis broke our TV... I'm sure I've told you THAT story!) We try to keep our electricity bill down by never running the heat (and by "we" I mean Travis in this particular example). The dogs make things expensive at times (like when Sabre keeps breaking his nails), but they're not going anywhere. :) And you know what's incredibly amazing? We already have so much "baby stuff" that my aunt and uncle gave us! We have a crib, changing table/dresser, pack n' play, a heavy-duty and a lightweight stroller (for poor weak me when Travis isn't out with us!), a swing, two bouncers, two baby bathtubs, and about fifteen trunks of boy clothes from newborn size to at least 5T! We even have bibs and hooded towels and washcloths and adorable little baby shoes! God has provided us with wonderful family that help us manage something that, at one point in time, seemed utterly impossible! I'm dying to start setting up (I think they call it "nesting") the nursery, but since we might be moving, I'm holding off till we figure that out.

This was, perhaps, not the most exciting post in the world. But talking about managing money and preparing for baby makes me feel responsible and grown up. :) My belly is growing quite fast it seems. Yesterday I noticed that my bellybutton is starting to pop out. Travis is thoroughly fascinated by my stomach. It's cute. :) Baby kicks a lot! The dogs don't seem to have noticed anything different going on. Some people say their dog(s) acted completely different (more protective/clingy/etc.) while they were pregnant... my dogs haven't done that. This morning, Baby was kicking pretty hard while Tatum had her head on my belly and she didn't even notice. It's going to be very interesting how they handle our new addition in just about three months! Wow, time sure is flying by now!

My newest and most persistent craving is for ice cream with dark chocolate fudge sauce and strawberries. And we're almost out. It's going to be an interesting month. ;)

Sometimes A Bunch of Random Nothing Becomes A Blog Post

I'm starting to wonder if I blog when I have a big basket of laundry to fold/hang up. Interesting.

My lovely husband bought some new RAM for my laptop a few days ago. I won't bore you with the really boring details, but my laptop now runs like a true champion. There are still cracks in the laptop itself and it still shocks me on occasion (because of said cracks), but I can now do two things at once on my computer (eg: skype with my sister AND read said article she mentioned) without the entire thing rebelling and freezing up and causing me over-dramatic frustration. We're going on five and a half years together, you see. There have certainly been some ups and downs, but overall, I love this little guy. Of course, the day after upgrading my RAM, my power cord bit the dust. I'm sharing power with the husband for now, though I'm pretty sure he bought me a new cord. Someday I will upgrade to a new computer, but that day no longer has to be now. Yay for the durability of Macbooks!

I had a doctor's appointment a couple days ago. Despite my initial "all-food-is-awful-I-hate-eating" for the first couple of months of pregnancy, those days have passed (praise the Lord!!) and I am officially gaining weight. I'm trying really hard to be upbeat about it. :) But honestly though, I'll take a gradual weight gain over feeling sick 24/7. My dear little boy only weighs a bit over a pound at this point. Though I gotta say, he's got some strong little limbs in there. I can now see my belly poke out when he kicks me, and I'm far too fascinated by it. We're flying up to New Jersey next weekend, and my main concern is that they're going to deny me adequate water supply on the flight. I really love water. Lots and lots of water. I'm also worried about the possible swelling I keep hearing about, because it sounds rather unpleasant and my vanity doesn't want me to be swollen. True confessions here, folks. But overall, things are going well. Prenatal gummies are the way to go. I have not had a single person ask me if I'm pregnant, randomly touch my belly, ask me what I'm having, etc. I don't know if I just live around people that mind their own business, or if I don't look pregnant to the outside world. My little boy likes to kick me the most when I'm trying to sleep. I've eaten way too many flamin' hot cheetos over the last few weeks. Body pillows really are a pregnant woman's best friend.

We left the dogs out of their crates while we went grocery shopping yesterday. We were gone for about an hour and a half or so. Travis set up his laptop to record them while we were gone, just to see what they would do. Sabre freaked out for the first ten minutes or so while Tatum watched him, remaining completely calm. Sabre moved around restlessly for the next twenty minutes, but then they both slept. At one point, they both moved onto the couch and cuddled with each other. Cutie pies. So we basically discovered that whether they're out of their crates or in their crates while we're gone, they just sleep.

I napped for two and a half hours today. Already sleepy again.

Goodbye, Curls; Hello, Sleeplessness (Sorta)

For those of you that are already sick of hearing me rattle on about pregnancy, I apologize in advance because this post is not going to excite you much.

I've found that each week I learn something new about pregnancy. And you know what makes it all so great and wonderful (sarcastically speaking) is that no one warned me about so many of these things. Or maybe they did, but I had it in my naive little head that I was going to be one of those women that had a problem-free, vacation-like pregnancy. Oh little child. Here are some of my more recent discoveries:

1. You will read something somewhere that tells you something "wonderful" you can look forward to about pregnancy...and you will experience the complete opposite.

Today!

     Exhibit A: "During pregnancy, less of your hair will fall out. In exchange, you'll be blessed with thick, luscious locks!" LIES. Since getting pregnant, my hair has gradually gotten thinner (not to the point that I'm worried about balding or anything, but still) and, the biggest surprise of all, I'm losing my curls! I spent the better part of my teenage years despising my curls. I frequently considered chemically straightening my hair and just being done with it. However, thanks to the pleadings of my mother, I kept the curls and eventually grew to like them. (Most days...) Once I mastered the art of styling curly hair, I no longer had a hate-hate relationship with my hair. Now I'm the first to admit that my hair was never ringlet, springy curly. It had a more wavy-curly combo thing going on. But either way, I knew how it worked. Now? Now my hair is oddly straight (with a slight little wave to it) and always seems to be full of static... though I don't know if the two are related. To help you understand my plight a bit more, I posted pictures for you.

Back when things used to be normal. ;)

Perhaps I'm making too big a deal of this. But now that I'm faced with the possibility of losing my curly hair forever, I feel a true sense of loss. Sigh. I suppose I just need to learn how to handle straight hair now. I still secretly have a plan to sneak out the curls by putting mousse in my damp hair in the morning, and then diffusing it. If that doesn't work.... I may shed a tear or two, but then it will be time to be a grown up and move on.





2. Women that choose to wear regular bras during pregnancy have my utmost confusion. (I apologize to any male readers out there for my candidness, but I'm just beyond some things now.) Regular bras are not comfortable. They're hardly comfortable when you're not pregnant, much less when you are. Sports bras are either too tight or offer no support. I have found that the only option that has kept me from bawling my eyes out on a daily basis is the "grow-with-you" nursing bras. I ordered them online (because the nursing bras in the store aren't big enough AND make the assumption that you will stay the same size--LIES!) and the day they arrived was a joyous day indeed.

3. The inability to stay full is a real thing. I cannot recall a time in my life where I needed to eat quite so frequently. Now, I am not of the group that feels hungry all day, every day. However, I have had a couple days where every hour and a half, my stomach started growling again and again and again. Back in my former life, I wasn't much of a snacker. I learned a while back that my downfall in terms of weight management is snacking. More often than not, whenever I snacked, it had far less to do with hunger and a lot to do with, "Mmm.. that sounds delicious!" Thus, I refrained from snacking. Or if I did snack, it was only when I knew for certain I was actually hungry. Now, however, I pretty much have to snack in between all my meals. If my stomach starts growling and I don't get ahold of some food pretty quickly, my gag reflex gets a bit out of hand and I instantly regret my hesitation to acquire some food. So far my snacks of choice are oranges, chips and salsa, or colby jack cheese.

4. I am completely incapable of sleeping through the night. I have to take a potty break at least once each night, but that's fairly minor at this point. I just wake up sporadically throughout the night, typically to adjust my sleeping position. If I don't sleep with a body pillow between my legs, I wake up because my back and hips hurt. If I do sleep with the body pillow, I have to move it back and forth as I switch sides during the night. It turns out I'm much more of a back-sleeper than I realized, so I often end up on my back and then I wake up because it's not all that comfortable for long periods of time. I've been able to go back to sleep pretty quickly so far, so here's to hoping that continues. And what worries me the most is that, from what I've heard, this isn't going to get any better.

5. Second trimester does not always mean ample energy. I waited for this supposed wave of energy to hit me. It never did. I occasionally get a sudden urge to clean the kitchen or living room, but I think that's fairly normal once the house gets a bit messy. I haven't been setting up the nursery or constantly moving or incessantly cleaning the house. I've still been tired every afternoon and I don't move as quickly (...which is something my husband pointed out to me. I used to be a pretty fast walker... not anymore!). However, I'm grateful the nausea/vomiting went away this trimester, so the burst of energy is completely second fiddle.

And that's that. It's past my bedtime. My puppies are on my sleeping schedule and they fell asleep a while ago, if that tells you anything. Hah. :) Tomorrow morning I have some laundry to fold (it seems like that's always the case, doesn't it?) and some homemade biscuits to eat.

Baby Kicks and A Lot of Girls

January has already been quite an eventful month. On the first day of the year, I was finally able to feel little baby kicks. It was a very exciting and somewhat emotional experience for me. My overall pregnancy experience has been filled with a lot more "downs" than "ups," so it was a big moment for me to come to terms with the little human life I'm nourishing and protecting inside my body, and how much of a gift and blessing and miracle it really is. There's definitely something about feeling movement that makes everything seem more real and amazing. Travis was able to feel a kick a few days later. He has to be patient, because not all the kicks are strong enough to feel from the outside. But I think he was pretty awed once he felt an actual kick. And even though I was told that the kicking can come and go at first, I have consistently felt kicks all throughout the day (whenever I'm sitting or lying down) everyday since January 1st. We have an active little one! Quite a way to welcome in the new year, huh?

Then on January 10th we had our big ultrasound to make sure baby is healthy and growing properly and, if we so pleased, to find out our baby's gender. Here's what you need to know about me. I have two little sisters. (I use the term "little" despite the fact that they're both in college and are both taller than me...) On one side of my extended family, my grandparents have ten granddaughters and one grandson. On the other side of my family, my grandparents have seven granddaughters and three grandsons. My husband has two sisters. Needless to say, I've been around far more girls than boys. I've really hardly been around any boys. And I feel that with my rather girly girl tendencies (I'm not a tomboy by any stretch of the imagination), having a baby girl would fit quite well. But see, I also know how much God loves to push me out of my comfort zone. He pushed me to go to college in a state where I didn't know anybody at all. He pushed me to explore theatre from behind the scenes instead of having to be onstage. And then, when I got really comfortable being backstage, He pushed me to take on the most time-consuming, enjoyable, challenging role I've ever done. He pushed me to move to another new city after I got married and start all over again. He pushed me to find a job to support my husband through his last two years of college. He pushed me to trust Him when we went for a month without a home or jobs over the summer. He pushed me to my limits when I battled morning sickness for my entire first trimester, as I wondered what I had gotten myself into and whether I could survive this phase of life. And as our ultrasound tech began looking at the little baby growing inside of me, she said, "I think I see a little boy part." And somehow, I wasn't surprised. God's asking me (though I really have no say in the matter) to once again step out of my comfort zone and learn how to raise a little boy. Nearly everything I know about the male species I've learned in the last two and a half years of marriage--and now it's time for me to learn a whole lot more! And even though it still scares me sometimes, I'm also so excited that God has entrusted me with a precious baby boy. It's going to be a crazy ride!

Despite the fact that I got a two hour nap today, I think it's very nearly time for bed. The dogs have already fallen asleep. My eyes are starting to hurt. And I have to pee (which isn't all that unusual).