Oh Well

Annie received adorable little Puma gym shoes for Christmas. They don't fit her very well one of them is always falling off. I realized this morning when I tried them on her again that it is the same one that keeps falling off. So I decided to look in the toe of the shoe and realized that there was still packing stuffed in the top half inch of the shoe!!! Poor kid has been trying to wear shoes three different times that have paper in the toe!! Oh well...

Annie received a Christmas sing along video that is all of the wonderful songs from the classics like Frosty, Rudolph etc... She loves it so much she pulls on the basket that it is in and says "wa HoHO?" to watch the Ho Ho video, so here it is the end of January and we are still watching a Christmas video daily!! Oh well...

I have yet to take down the outside christmas decorations because it has been so stinking cold and rainy (yes, that is my excuse) so we are officially "that house" on our street! Oh well...

Pregnancy, Free Food, & House for Sale

Goodness, I think this is quickly going to turn into a bullet point blog post. I was going to just blog about some pregnancy details. Then I found a link I couldn't pass up sharing. As I thought about how to begin I thought it would turn into a stream of consciousness post when I quickly realized that I have big news so this is an official bullet point post! I love bullet points, they make it look fancy :o)

• I am 16+ weeks and though I feel like I started showing a month ago, I don't think the bump has grown much since then. I finally got motivated enough to take a picture of the bump. I vividly remember taking my first bump pictures last time however I couldn't remember how many weeks I was, looking back I was 11 weeks and I realize now that I didn't really have a real bump and that this time I looked like that before I was pregnant!! ;o) I am eagerly awaiting feeling the first flutters. It should be happening here soon!

• Here is a link to a money saving blog that I follow that has the most complete list of kids eat free nights at restaurants that I have EVER seen. I have never been able to find more than skyline and goldstar around here! http://thedomesticchick.blogspot.com/ check out the list on the sidebar!
  

• Joe and I went to look at another house this week. We really liked it although it was a repossessed house that needed a lot of TLC. We had big plans for not only finishing the amazingly huge basement but also doing some major renovations on the first floor as well (it was a ranch!!) It was in THE PERFECT location and in spite of sitting on the side of a hill it had a nice yard. I found it Monday, drove by it Tuesday, called John Wednesday, went to see it Thursday, put in an offer that afternoon and found out we didn't get it by Saturday!!
  We were really praying that everything would happen according to the Lords plan for our family. Because it was a rehab it was inexpensive and therefore we humans could have made it push through without being considerate of what God had in store for us. After our offer was turned down our wonderful realtor suggested that we go ahead and list our house. We have put in offers on two houses now and in both of them we were standoffish and a little reserved with our offers. It was suggested to us that if we were serious about moving and since we have been looking for a while now we should go ahead and list our house so that we can get a feel for how ours will sell. To my amazement in the Lord I was/am completely at peace about listing our house! I have never been ready to list our house. I love our house I just hate living in the city and I am ready for Annie and I to have a yard to play in.
  So we are in the process of listing our little love nest :o)
  

• I am a minimalist, I dont keep anything, I will throw you away if you stand still too long. However that doesn't mean that I don't live with someone who keeps things just because. Mostly clothes and things that I cant tell what they are like electronic gadgets. So I get points for not having to put much away off the counters and such in order to show the house. However there is SOOO much that I need to put into storage. Our closets are RIDICULOUS because we don't put away our out of season clothes and I haven't really packed up much of the stuff that Annie no longer uses because we are blessed with space in this house and I know that I will be getting it all out again soon. However it can't be teetering on the edge of the closet shelf when a stranger opens the door to have it fall on their head! So tomorrow I start the purging, organizing, storing process. Luckily I am in a nesting sort of mode and I LOVE organizing things. Plus there is a lot of crap in this house that I have been wanting to get rid of for a long time so I am excited about the opportunity to have a reason to make me do it! As a bonus I found storage containers at Home Depot for $3.50!!! I have never seen them that cheap! They are ugly colors but its just a container right?

So that is a little update on our family. If I don't blog for a while do me a favor and come looking for me under a pile in one of our closets!

Painting

The tongue comes out farther and farther as she paints longer and concentrates harder :o)

Am I Crazy?

I would like to take a little poll here to find out if I am the only one who finds this so concerning that she would loose sleep over it.
How would you feel about a male labor and delivery nurse?


I'll give you time to think about it


Time is up! Did that take you more than .5 seconds to answer?

I have heard rumor that there was a hiring of a male nurse on our floor. I don't have a problem with male nurses because they generally work in an area that is fitting. The OR = a pt under anesthesia, blood, guts etc... ER = trauma, blood, guts, craziness etc...

Here are my thoughts about a male L&D nurse that kept me from sleeping last night, Ill give you a typical scenario and then you insert a male in the position instead of me.

-Pt comes into hospital room contracting and as her husband brings in her things she starts a contraction and throws both arms around my neck and lays her head on my shoulder as I help her breathe through the contraction.
-I gently tuck her into bed making sure she is nice and snuggy (you know as your mom would)
-Pt wants to be checked before getting her epidural Dr checks her and its very painful for her, I hold her hand and stroke her hair talking to her in a low voice about her children at home or the name of the baby to be, trying to distract her and help her relax. (Problem: Male MD's must have the nurse present when he checks his patients, will we ladies be expected to be in the room every time this mans patients are checked by male doctors?)
-Pt gets epidural and sitting on the side of the bed she holds both my hands and lays her head on my shoulder which is the most comfortable way to get an epi.
-Its time to push and first time mom would benefit from massage to help her not tear, are this male nurses patients just screwed? Sorry but there was no female in the room while you were pushing to allow your RN to touch you down there!
-Mom has delivered, she wants help breastfeeding... no problem we are all trained in this area, I will help you. Here is how you hold your baby, here is how you hold your breast, and now we are practically forehead to forehead while I watch to see if baby is latching or sucking properly, no problem right?!?
-Mom is ready to get cleaned up and go to postpartum floor. I help her put on pad and panties, to the bathroom, assist her in cleaning up and stay with her if she feels lightheaded from being up for the first time. No woman likes this part but all see it as a necessity and both apologize and thank you a million times.

I mean honestly! Can you see a male even wanting to do any of those things let alone one who possesses the nurturing characteristics for him to enjoy the process! This will be interesting to say the least. Someone said that our managers opinion is "why not try it?". What are we going to do if it doesn't work out? You can't fire someone for being male!

Just Like Da Da

This child loves her Daddy! When he comes home she runs immediately to the door yelling DaDa!! however when he gets in the house she turns and runs away from him so that he will have to chase her down for a kiss and sometimes not getting one out of her until she sees him kiss me (ill not complain about that). Or if she doesn't hear him come in he whistles for her and then she goes running.

She doesn't nap well when Joe is home because she wants to spend time with him. The other day when I put her down for her nap she did her usual routine. Play, throw all her blankets paci and bear out of her bed poo, cry, I come in to change her, give her her things back and she falls asleep. Only this time I had the monitor in my pocket and when I got her out of bed it squealed because I got too close to the receiving end. Annie immediately looked up and said "Dada" I said no its not Dada and she said "Uh Hu Dada" tried to whistle at me to tell me she heard him whistle :o) It was ADORABLE!
He left his dirty gross work hat on the bench in the entry way and yesterday she picked it up and put it on.

"I love a girl in a hat"

She Blogs

I love being a blogger. I love belonging to the blog community, I love saying "well in my blog..." I love reading others blogs as well. I get a thrill out of finding out what others find important enough to share. I love the uniqueness of each blog and finding out what the authors blogging purpose is. Some blogs are obvious kiddie/family updates for out of town family. Some blogs have a theme like money saving or biblical inspiration. Others blogs are for their own journalism purposes a sort of diary about life. I appreciate the latter and hope that one day my blog as well will not get lost in the Internet world so that I can go back and enjoy reading about my past blessings or frustrations. All blogs are an outlet for the blogger of some sort. A place to write down your thoughts and feelings about certain subjects or events. The very best blogs of all are a true form of art. The author is gifted in composition that is entertaining or interesting despite her topic.
I am thrilled with these blogs and find myself wishing I were a better blogger. They give me blogging shame and artistic covetousness :o) In spite of being a blogger simply because I have a blogging website. Sitting down to write an entry is not a natural act for me. I have a natural desire to blog, I go through the motions, however when I actually begin to type the words that I would like to share I have a mental block that frustrates the living daylights out of me. I can see what I want to say in this beautifully crafted way of putting things that makes the readers laugh and cry and want to come running back to see what I will have to say another time. In all actuality I think that my blog is a lot like me. Mildly entertaining, even funny at times (although difficult for me regarding the challenge of typing out sarcasm) but mostly just there and fun to keep up with just in case there will be a truly good OB nurse story or interesting life update.

My blogging style is often what MckMomma titles "Stream of Consciousness" when she just sits down and writes down everything that she is thinking and feeling and doing at that moment or in that day. Darn her for making it seem so lovely to be experiencing morning sickness with her 5th child while packing for a 2 week mission trip to Africa with the husband where she will be paid to hang out in the slums with little children and blog about it!!! No Lie! Her blog is so powerful that she was contacted by a ministry to travel and blog about it!

So in my stream of consciousness would you be interested in knowing that I denied my daughter breakfast this morning until after we were showered and dressed so that I could put on makeup while she had her bottle at 9:30? What kind of mother does that? The one who didn't plan her morning out properly and finds herself in a pinch of desperation.
I had an OB appointment this morning with my FAVE female in the group. I am in love with Dr Carol Choi and highly recommend her!
Annie was very good in the office but I want to figure out a way to not have to bring her with me, its just stressful and would be better if I could figure something else out. She was very protective of me and didn't want them to weigh me (who does?) take my BP or listen to the heartbeat. Mostly she didn't want them to touch me or she yelled at them :o)

I also had to go to Motherhood Maternity who has decent clothes at decent prices but I HATE dealing with the people who work there. They think they know everything, force you to try on things you dont want and I SWEAR they work on commission. PLEASE LEAVE ME ALONE AND DONT PUT ANOTHER FULL PANELED PAIR OF PANTS IN A DRESSING ROOM AFTER I TOLD YOU NOT TO AND THEN PROCEED TO CALL THE ROOM "MINE". I DONT WANT TO TRY ON ANY OF THE CLOTHES YOU JUST PUT IN THERE THANK YOU VERY MUCH! They just want you to buy something you dont like so that you will have to return it under the worlds crappiest return policy! I ended up liking the pair of jeans that I picked out for myself (thank you very much) and was the only thing I went in for!

Now my day consists of laundry and making chicken enchiladas. Which my husband loves but I really dont care for. Do you have a chicken enchilada recipe that you like? Would you mind sharing it with me?

Garlic Chicken

By popular demand the recipe for Garlic Chicken.

WARNING: You had better like the smell of garlic in your house for a few days when you make this meal!

Garlic Chicken serves 6

6 Boneless Skinless Ck Breast
1/2 tsp salt
1/4 tsp pepper
4 1/2 Tbsp Dijon Mustard
3 Tbsp butter
8 Cloves of Garlic minced (cut this down to 5-6 if they are large)
1/2 C Chicken Stock
1 16oz pkg Bow tie Pasta
1 1/2 Tbsp butter
2 Tbsp parsley
1/ 1/2 Tsp basil
1 C heavy Cream'
1/4 tsp pepper
1/3 C Parmesan cheese

Put ck breast between plastic wrap (I use heavy duty freezer bags for less mess) pound to 3/8 inch thickness (I just pound on it for a while till it looks smaller)
Salt & pepper and coat with mustard set aside for 10min. ( I dont measure, I just squirt mustard on to lightly coat the ck)

Preheat Oven 350*. In large skillet over med heat melt 2 Tbsp butter and cook ck until brown not cooked through. Transfer to ovenproof pan and bake 10 min until cooked through.

Melt remaining Tbsp butter saute garlic about 2 min, do not allow to brown. Add ck stock simmer until liquid reduces to half.

Cook pasta, drain, add 1 1/2 Tbsp butter, parsley & basil ( dont measure these either, I just sprinkle with spices) Cover to keep warm.

Add cream salt and pepper to stock simmer over low heat until sauce reduces until it coats the back of a spoon. (halfway through this process I put my chicken into the sauce and let it soak up the creamy garlicy goodness) Serve over pasta, sprinkle with parm cheese.

Notes from the chef:
I like a lot of sauce with this dish so I usually add a little extra broth and cream. I make the same amount of sauce for this recipe but use only 4 ck breast. I don't measure the mustard or spices either. I like to serve this with a non garlic bread since it is so very very garlicy.

Good Old Things

Wonderful possessions that I acquired over the Holidays that I will treasure deeply.

A Hummel given to me by my Grandpa Neal from his very own collection!

The rolling pin my grandmother used to make "Grandma Noodles"

The washboard my Great Granny Jewel used to wash her familys clothes

The bouquet of "Passion Roses" that my husband presented to me on our 4th Anniversary

A Better Blogger

I read only one blog that belongs to a woman that I don't know. I figure I while away enough hours on here keeping up with the thoughts and activities of those I do know to go wasting time reading about someones life I don't know. However this woman who I linked to from Jennys blog captured my interest because she had a little baby boy with SVT. I am familiar with babies with SVT in utero because we house the mothers in L&D and pump their bodies full of heart meds that are potentially harmful to them in an effort to get baby's heart to convert to a normal sinus rhythm instead of the 260 bpm that they are in. I have never seen this effort successful however they tell me it works sometimes. I have never taken care of these women myself and so I don't know the outcome of them or their babies. However when I found out that this woman had a one year old with the dangerously rapid heart beat I wanted to see what his story was.
It turned out to be one that brought me to tears many times as I caught onto her blog just as she (to make a VERY long heart wrenching story short) traveled to Boston by herself leaving her other 3 small children at home to do a procedure that would either save his life or end it. During her short stay and before the surgery was actually scheduled to happen her baby stopped breathing and went lifeless in an emergent ambulance ride where she watched screen after screen of her sons heart with asystole = no heart beat at all. Then just as suddenly as it stopped his heart started again and he regained his color! This was all happening while her husband was in flight to join them in Boston and unreachable and the child went into the emergency procedure while this woman that I only know as "MckMomma" sat alone waiting for her husband to land and the news of whether or not her child was alive!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
God blessed their family that day and the procedure never done on a child so small worked and he is now SVT free and healthy!!! I love to read this woman's blog because she is real, she posts about her feelings when her marriage is rocky and praises God for his hand in it. She posts lovely things about her children with messy faces and all.
This week she made a comment about the desire to make yourself look & sound better than you are on your blog and facebook statuses. Instead of "I just spent the day baking and making cookies with my children" try posting "I just spent three hellish hours in the kitchen trying to bake cookies with my kids and now I have a messy kitchen and children that I was so sick of I sent them all off for naps an hour early just to regain my sanity!" I have to admit I am guilty of doing that often. But I tend to have these fairy tail pictures in my head of making an art project and coloring with my little girl only to have her throw a fit because I can't figure out what she wants and she can't talk and she ends up throwing all the crayons on the floor just as her father comes home and rescues her from a serious beat down :o) Instead I have a picture that she managed to color during the process and my facebook status says "coloring with my baby on this snowy day" Oh PUHLLLEASE!
Anyway MckMomma is also a photographer and I LOVE her for it! She makes me crazy wanting to be a better photographer and its so frustrating not having the knowledge about my camera or the time to learn. She has a few VERY helpful tutorials on her blog and I have learned a lot from them.
She is fun, very eclectic, lives in the country, home schools, cloth diapers (not a desire of mine) and is a fantastic blogger, very captivating. So I invite you, my known blogging friends, to join me in admiring MckMommas blog art.

http://www.mycharmingkids.net/

Today

I Just thought I would keep it real and update that I must have overdone it yesterday because since going to the Gym this morning I have not left the couch for longer than the time it takes to tend my baby or make a cup of soup. :o( Turns out I should pace myself!! I think I will order a Pizza for dinner so that I dont tax myself before small group. :o)

Yesterday

*****"All my troubles seemed so far away"**** No no wait that's not what I am writing about!
I wanted to share my day with you! Guess what..... nothing significant happened and it was wonderful! I was looking forward to yesterday soo much and I was not let down! I think I am writing to the right crowd here and you are not saddened by my overwhelming desire to stay home and clean, organise, restock and just be a stay at home mom!
I decided to start my day out slow. Let things happen as they would. I have been trying to keep the TV off in the morning. I used to get up and turn on the news and then it would lead into the stupid morning show where they only talk about Tiger Woods and John & Kate. Why do I care!!?? All I want to know is the weather and if anything truly important happened so that I keep up a little on current events. However Obama sucking and Health Care bills are no longer current events but old boring monotony that I have decided to ignore :o) The TV seems to slow my morning down greatly. It makes me sit instead of move and start things that need to be started like laundry and dishes.
So after feeding Annie her bottle I... Loaded The Dishwasher! What is it about unloading the Dishwasher that is so horrible to me? Its not like putting away other things where you have to find a home for them. All of the dishes have a home and they reside not 5 steps away from each other. Yet I procrastinate emptying the dishwasher for so long that the dirty ones fill up the sink and I have a gross mess on my hands that only makes me put it off longer. So one of my goals is to keep the dishwasher cycle up to date. Empty it when its clean and fill it back up even run it before its jam packed and will make life more convenient.

After showering we went to the Grocery store (sans makeup and if you know me you are truly amazed at the laid back state I was in) which I hadn't been to in 3 weeks and with snow coming I keep worrying that I didn't buy nearly enough food even though I bought the same amount I buy every week.

Upon returning home I put Annie down for a nap and did a few loads of laundry and took the lights off the tree so that Joe could take it out when he got home. I also managed to clean my bathroom which I dont even want to think about how long that has been!

Then I sat down to rest because my stinkin ribs were hurting and mostly just make my body tired of holding itself up.

For dinner I made yummy Garlic Chicken. We love garlic chicken. Everyone I know loves Garlic Chicken. I found it amusing that even though I hadn't been to the store in so long with all the staples I keep stocked all I needed to make a meal was cream :o)

When Joe got home he rescued me and took out the three bags of garbage that I had piled next to the back door because I didn't want to go back out in the cold all day long. Then he even took the tree out and played with Annie while Kelly and I cleaned up piles and piles of pine needles. I decided that even though it is depressing to take down the christmas tree at least it still smells wonderful while you are doing it.

So now today I have only managed to go to the gym and empty the dishwasher however that is what you get to do when you have such a productive day, a lazy day!

Catching Up : End Of The Year

I can't believe how these past few weeks have FLOWN by! I kept reminding myself that I was making the decision to do all the running around that we were doing. However I couldn't help but wish I could just be at home where it was quiet and enjoy the season. I have been seriously busy every day doing things that I decided I couldn't give up. Annie's whiny attitude is an unfortunate result of all the running here and there that we have been doing. We spent Christmas day at my moms and headed to Owensboro to visit Joe's grandma that night. We returned the very next night and I had come down with a serious cough that I caught from Annie. We spent Sunday at my parents house because Mom and I were starting on The Best Christmas Surprise Ever!
My Grandma Edna (who passed away in may) was an amazing cook. She didn't believe in recipes and therefore had a very small recipe box. However mom and I copied 20 recipes that she had written down and scrapbooked a recipe book/photo album with pictures of her growing up. We finished 4 books (20 pages each) in 3 days! I spent all day Monday and Wednesday at her house and we finished them in time to take them to my Aunts and Uncle in Indiana.
I worked all day Tuesday and sometime during the course of the day managed to dislocate a rib from the pesky cough that I am still fighting! I found there was nothing anyone could do about the now extremely painful to cough/sneeze/lift rib damage however demanded a z-pack in desperation.
Wednesday night was spent celebrating Christmas with the Glenn family which is always an enjoyable time where Kelly got our 85 year old Grandma to admit that she would get a tattoo of our cousin Kevin's name with a heart around it because he is her favorite!
Oh yeah and I managed to remember sometime Wednesday morning that it was our 4th Anniversary and my husband surprised me with beautiful passion roses when he got home :o)

I spent Thursday at home making some sense of order out of the chaos that it was and doing a bazillion loads of laundry so that we had something to pack for our trip to Indiana for New Years weekend. Thursday night I took Annie to Joes moms so that we could go to Dinner to celebrate our Anniversary. I made 5:30 reservations at Walts Hitching Post which is a favorite of mine, with plenty of time to eat before I was on call to work from 7-1am! After finding out that it was unlikely that I would get called in we decided to head to Krissy and Johns house for a 4+ hour long game of Settlers! It was a super fun way to ring in the new year!
Arriving home at 2am we quickly went to bed so that we could get up the next morning and head to Indiana!

Friday we had our annual new years day party in the shed at Uncle Joes where we had 2 Turkeys, Ham and Chili along with tons of other food. We also received the best Christmas gift of all. The little girls all got new baby dolls along with doll clothes that my Grandma Viola made for them! Then my sweet grandpa decided to give all his granddaughters one of the Hummel figurines from his collection that my Great Grandma Nellie gave him. He was going to will them to us but decided that he would rather see our reaction to having them and he wasn't disappointed! He also gave his 3 guns to his 3 grandsons who were also extremely thrilled!

Saturday we cooked a dinner tribute to Grandma Edna of all her most famous dishes. She was soooo good at making Fried Chicken, Mashed Potatoes, Chicken and Noodles, Chicken Broccoli Casserole and Coconut Cream Pies! So we all pitched in and made an amazing dinner!

With all that said you can imagine my extreme excitement that the only thing on my calendar for this week after work tomorrow is an OB appointment on friday :o)

Annie and Joe's Nephew Brady had matching Christmas Jammies

Annie after her nap I took her outfit off because she was hot but she wanted to wear her new Pumas from Aunt Charlotte :o) Look at those chicken legs!

She was so cute with her stocking Christmas morning she was very excited

Mom, Aunt Reg, Aunt Lan Kara and I Making Grandma food :o) (oh yeah p.s. my baby belly has officially made itself known)

Never too old to snug with the Grandpa!