Fall Fun

The weather here has been so nice the past few weeks! They say it's "unseasonably" warm, but the last several years it's stayed warm into October. The polar bears love it.

We've been trying to take advantage of the warm weather and smaller crowds now that everyone's kids are in school, so our schedule has been jam packed.

I'm trying to just accept the fact that I have an uber cranky baby and just move forward with my life, but each day poses as an opportunity for Lena to spaz for no reason. I've found that taking her out and getting into the nice weather is usually the solution to this problem. I've also learned that if things are going well, I just need to let sleeping dogs lie and not call attention to myself by taking pictures of her or letting her know that I still exist.

There's a little farm down the street from us that has some fun fall activities and animals that you can feed. They have a little shop in their barn that is mostly creepy but I got a bunch of honey crisp apples for way less than the grocery store, so I guess I can handle this watching me as I shop around:

She has reverse vitiligo on her face. 

We also visited the zoo, had lunch while we watched airplanes take off and land at the airport, checked out Art Prize, and had the time of our lives at the Grand Rapids Oktoberfest.

Lena surprisingly loved the loud music and dancing!

Lottie made friends on the dance floor and they copied whatever the other was doing.

Charotte was so excited about "going dancing" and she danced for close to 2 hours. When it was time to eat, she would boogie with tears streaming down her face saying "just wanna dance!" It was awesome.

In unrelated fall fun stories, this morning Lena was wailing about nothing in particular when I realized she had called a neighbor (and friend - so it's not completely absurd) on my phone. I grabbed the phone from her and promptly disconnected without checking to see if my friend was on the other end. Well of course, she immediately calls me back. Since it was morning and I hadn't yet had my coffee or whatever other excuse I can find, I was having a hard time putting words together as I tried to explain that my shrieking 1 year old didn't dial her because of an emergency. But it probably wasn't that convincing  because I couldn't form a coherent phrase. I believe the first thing I uttered was "sorry she called me."

I hadn't gotten much sleep because of the unknown metamorphosis my baby is undergoing so I sounded like an idiot. Imagine getting a phone call at 7:30 am and hearing a baby shouting at you on the other end. That's no way to start the day. So for that, Kim, I apologize. And also welcome to my life.

Okay really. Will the crabbiness ever stop? We've had a couple good weeks here and there, but she is persistent in letting me know that this will be her personality for the rest of her life. 

Did you have a cranky baby that morphed into a gentle butterfly of a toddler? Make up a story if you have to.

Like Sand Through an Hourglass...

You know those little moments that just happen and you tell yourself  "I never want to forget this"?
Sometimes they happen and it's just a nice moment and that's all. Other times, you wish there was something you could do that would guarantee that you'll never forget. We recently watched some home videos of my husband and his family at Christmas from more than 25 years ago. There was nothing momentous about the footage, and there was little to no narration, but there's something about it that makes you feel warm and I imagine his parents would remember things that were long gone when they see the old recording.

In the last couple of weeks, Charlotte will occasionally snuggle in my bed before she goes to sleep. We moved the rocking chair into Lena's room, and Charlotte is still in a crib, so there isn't much place to have some downtime with her. Besides that, she's never been big on cuddling. A few nights ago, she climbed up onto our big bed and was the little spoon to my big and I read a couple of books and we talked. Well, I talked and she listened.
Tonight she wanted to recreate that and once she was on our bed, she flopped around like a fish because she couldn't figure out how we got into that perfect snuggle just a couple of nights ago. While she couldn't make herself become the little spoon again, she found another cozy position, laying with her head on my chest while looking at my face.

This was one of those moments.

Charlotte's second birthday is tomorrow. I haven't spent much time reflecting on this lately, just with the busyness of Christmas and the New Year, and of course just not prioritizing a birthday party like I did last year.
As she lay with her ear on my heart and her hand cupping my cheek, I couldn't help but want to stay in that moment for as long as possible. There's a part of me that thinks she wanted the same thing, but then again, maybe she was just avoiding bedtime. She's growing up and becoming a little girl, and some day she won't climb into my bed and snuggle. She won't study my mouth as I speak because she wants so badly to repeat the words I'm saying, she won't pat my back like I do to hers, and she won't ask that I sing her songs before bed.

No matter what I do, and how hard I try, there is no guarantee that I'll remember that moment forever. The best I can do is write it down and take a picture. And since my phone is almost always handy, that's exactly what I did. The memory might slip through the cracks some day, but just like those home videos of Christmases 25 years ago, when you come across them again, it all comes back.

So here's to hoping that in 25 years I might just be able to come across this post, and these photos, and have those warm feelings wash over me once again.

and to celebrate 2 years, a little reminder of our first moments too.

While I can't wait to see what the future holds for this sweet little child, I wish I could just keep her this way forever. xoxo my gentle, goofy, sweet, little Charlotte.

A Weekend Away

Over the weekend we spent some time at my in law's condo in Suttons Bay. We haven't been up there as a family since Memorial Day, and I spent that time pretty miserable. I ended up in the ER for a mystery ailment that I'm pretty sure was gallbladder/pregnancy related.
But that's beside the point.

My husband has a building project about 20 minutes from there and he travels up every Thursday for work. So  I loaded up the girls, Darby, and about 20 bags and boxes to come up and meet him. Let me tell you, the packing and planning is so.much.crazier when you have an infant along. I remember we brought Charlotte up when She was about the same age as Lena but I wasn't on my own for packing.
My plan was to leave around 8 am, but we didn't get on the road until after 10:00. There's just so much to think about! But we managed, and we had a perfect trip.

We really haven't spent much time doing "nothing" as a family. There's always something to be done around the house, mounds of laundry, basement crap, general non-relaxation. Going away was exactly what we needed.

We checked out the completed project my husband managed for his job and after that went to the local children's museum.

This place used to house mental patients. Now they just pose on the porch.

Escaping Shawshank

"helping"

My parents joined us for a couple of nights and even watched the girls so Marcus and I could go on a date!

I had two cocktails which was one too many because suddenly my husband got funny again. Okay, that's not nice, but we had a great time out and need to try to get out on a more frequent basis. Those kids are draining!

We played some life sized Jenga. My mom was very frazzled by it. Every piece was "stuck" and she didn't grasp the idea for several rounds. :)

Marcus lost

I think the trip was a good practice for our upcoming vacation to Disney! We won't have help from my parents when we go, but it gave us an idea how the girls would do on a long car ride and sleeping in a new place. It went really well, and we had a lot of fun, so there's hope. 

It's been a busy November so far, and it's going to stay that way until December, and then it's Christmastime! I bought the Elf on a Shelf book this year. I know Charlotte is young, and I wasn't planning on doing the whole "Santa" thing but I gave in. I love the idea of starting little traditions now.

Do you have any traditions you do with your family, or remember fun ones from growing up?

My First Week as a SAHM

I loved it. I love it so much. I love it more than I thought I would. I know I'm only one week in, and there will be times where I want to tear my hair out and just take a vacation from home. But right now, I feel so happy.

The first few days Charlotte woke up super early (for her) and even though I didn't love that, I did love snuggling in my bed while she watched Disney Jr.
I didn't get as much done as I thought I would in the first week, but I tackled at least one small project every day. But even better than that, I spent quality time with the sweetest little girl.

I filled up the splash and scoop bay and after we started playing, I realized my husband had fertilized the lawn the day before. I asked him if he thought it was okay, or if we should wait. He recommended waiting...but it was too late.

The feet! They burn! 

Mommy makes me play too much.

We went to lunch with a friend of mine and a former coworker so I still get all the juicy work gossip, which usually goes something like this "And then this old guy? He needed a cane, but he got one in 2011 and I forgot to get him to sign ABN! Whaaat?!"

Today we even made it to the zoo with another friend and her little girl and enjoyed the most perfect weather that May has to offer. Charlotte slept until 8:40 after I put some blackout fabric over her windows. I knew it'd be the perfect day to have a morning activity with just one nap in the afternoon, but the little stinker fell asleep in the car 3 minutes after we left the zoo! But then a couple hours later she took a killer nap.

zonked. she had drool EVERYWHERE.

Why does Darby have buttons??

This weekend my dear husband celebrates his 30th birthday, and we are having a bash at our place, and since my initial plans to throw him a themed party were thrown out the window (by him!), tomorrow I will finish up the last minute details and get the house ready to have everyone over. Last year I blogged about how I didn't know what to get him for his birthday, and I could basically say the same thing this year, but we agreed that since we're finishing the basement and we just got a sweet TV, that can be his happy birthday.

OH, except I found this gem...that he WILL be opening as his gift at his party.

This is a framed 2'x3' poster that I found at my  neighbor's garage sale. Why would anyone ever sell this?
Happy Birthday, Marcus!!

It won't be a complete surprise, since I showed him this picture before I bought it, but I'm hoping he forgot about it.

All in all, it was the perfect week!

Thankful

Today I am more thankful than I've ever been. I am blessed beyond my wildest dreams.
It's so easy to take what we have for granted, and just rattle off what we're thankful for without really reflecting on it. But today, I truly have thought this out.
My husband and I both have jobs that enable us to stay on top of our bills and then some.
We have a stocked fridge and pantry with nutritious food.
We have a warm home, even if we choose to keep it at arctic temperatures.
We have a beautiful daughter who is healthy, smart, strong, funny and the stinking light of my life.
We have "we". A wonderful marriage (that of course is not wonderful every moment) - my husband is easily the greatest man I know. He is reasonable and level headed which is the perfect balance to my crazy and impulsive nature.
We have wonderful and loving families.
We are so healthy it's sickening.

I'm not sure what we did to deserve this crazy outpouring of blessings but I am so grateful. SO grateful.
Have a wonderful Thanksgiving, friends.

Happy Blogoversary!

Yesterday was my one year blogoversary!!
I've been oversharing for over 365 days!
To celebrate, I am sharing photos of the last year highlighting some events of each month.



With the help of my niece and nephews, we shared the news of our sweet baby girl joining the family!

They each unwrapped a gift bag and pulled out the cards. So fun!




In September, we babymooned in Miami! It was an amazing trip, I was totally spoiled. WTF am I doing, you ask? I had a lot of discomfort due to the kiddo (who was like a pound and a half, mind you) putting pressure down under. I convinced myself this would help.





One of the few photos I have from October. About 29 weeks pregnant.







My sweet friends threw a baby shower for me in November! It was beautiful and so much fun!



I was surprised with this beauty on Christmas morning! Just living the minivan dream....



WELCOME CHARLOTTE JANE! January 4, 2011. Pretty Big Deal.



Oh Darbs. I wouldn't exactly call this a highlight of February, but I just had to feature the hound for once. :)
And yes, that's a boppy wrapped around her. She did this to herself, I had nothing to do with it.



Wine tasting in March. Our first little getaway with the kid was a success!



Ready for vacation! We traveled to Florida and Charlotte took her first airplane ride. She made lots of friends. What I really mean, is she made no friends because her diaper failed and she stunk up the plane and was crying.

In May, we went to see NKOTBSB and my face hurt from smiling so much. It was my first *fun* night in a  l o n g time!



Our first time leaving Charlotte over night! As you can see, I was very tormented by this and had a miserable time.



Enjoying the beautiful weather we had for the entire month of July. Charlotte loves spending time outside.



It sure is nice having a dog around when she starts feeding herself! She stinkin loves graham crackers.
One year ago, little girl, we found out that that's exactly what you were!

Thank you blogosphere, for letting me share the exciting, the mundane, and the just plan weird happenings of my life. I appreciate you, my readers, for your comments and ideas and advice that's been shared. Your words of encouragement are invaluable.

Here's to another year of oversharing!!
:)

A Success Story

Hey y'all.
We. Have. A. SLEEPER!

I hope that if there are any of you out there that have had sleep issues with your little ones, you'll read ahead. We have a well rested family.

I have hesitated to write about it in fear of jinxing it. I'm sure there are plenty of you that know what I'm talking about. The moment you "brag" about your great sleeper, they change on you. And maybe she will after this post.
You may remember this entry or this one. And now that I look back, it's been over two months in the making.
I asked for lots of advice and suggestions. I think I read every book, blog, and magazine about it. I followed my instincts, and I ignored my instincts. I somehow managed to be consistently inconsistent. But we got it figured out.
When Charlotte was 4 months old, her pediatrician told me that "she can nutritionally go 12 hours without eating." I wouldn't believe it. She could barely go 5 hours without waking up and I assumed it was because of hunger. But starting then, I chose to not feed her at night. And breast-feeding moms? You know how that feels. Hello boobies!! There were times that I would get up to pump at night just so I could fall back asleep. Yes, Charlotte was still waking constantly, and I felt horrible about pumping when I could just feed her.
After several weeks of attempting to phase out a night feeding, we were sort of making progress. About once a week, we'd get a little bit more sleep.
But she was still a stinker.
Cry Cry Crying. She'd sleep great from 7:30-11, then she'd be up multiple times. For weeks, the most I got was maybe 3 consecutive hours of sleep.
This is when I started the book reading. And I am so thankful for the suggestions to read Healthy Sleep Habits, Happy Child.
::side note : my friend Betsy recommended this book. And her daughter sleeps like a CHAMP.::
This book saved my sanity. It was tough. I downloaded it on my eReader and found the parts that applied to me and started putting them into practice.
What it came down to was that she was going to have to cry. I mean, she was crying anyway, even when I was trying everything to get her to stop. So now I was just going to have to not try.
We turned down/off the monitor, and cracked the door so I could just barely hear her. I think it took roughly a week of doing this seriously. There were many nights where I had no idea how well she did because I couldn't hear if she was crying.
Okay, I'll cut to the chase.
She now sleeps 7:30pm-7:30am with 1-3 wake ups but goes RIGHT BACK to sleep many times without my help. The 5:30 wake up is harder to break, but we're getting there. She takes killer naps, but we are still enjoying a flexible schedule. It's not the end of the world anymore if her naps get screwy.

The downside to all of this? The lack of a night time feeding has greatly reduced my milk supply. The combo of that and going back to work and having less than comfortable pumping accommodations has meant that Charlotte is now on formula 99.9 % of the time as of last week. I miss the good ol' days, but life is getting so much easier and for that I am thankful.

Thank you to all of you who offered your help, and for any of you who are struggling with night time sleep, shoot me an email/comment/message on facebook. You can do it!

Oh, and we also broke the swaddle cold-turkey! Without a single problem, incidentally. I think I was so afraid to try it in fear that our nights would be filled with the screams of an enraged child, but she's getting too big for it. And it worked!

Moving ahead towards our next hurdle...whatever that might be.
Crap. Now we'll be dealing with teething.
But at least I know she is capable of being an incredibly awesome baby.
sigh.

Project Marriage

Oh. Hey there, blog!
I've been struggling to come up with a topic for my newest blog entry. But after visiting mommyfriend, I was reminded of the Project Marriage challenge for June; sharing your love story. I think overall, our love story is less than thrilling. I mean...don't tell Marcus I said so. However, we've had plenty of memorable moments.
Here's one of my favorites.

Marcus and I had been dating for nearly 3 years when Spring of 2006 came around. Marcus was basically obsessed with me and wouldn't stop telling me how much he wanted to get married.
Read that last sentence and replace "obsessed" with "putting up" and "married" with "buffalo wings."

It was I who was constantly bugging him about making a life long commitment to me, and I'm sure I made it super appealing by being as annoying as possible. I just didn't want to be wasting my time having fun with a guy I totally adored, ya know?

I kept on waiting for clues. But there were no special dates planned, no bridal magazines hidden under his bed, nothing! Finally, I told myself to relax and just enjoy the time that we are actually having! I was creating unnecessary tension by looking for a way to bring it up all the time. (Ugh, what was I thinking?)

One Friday night, we decided to go out kind of last minute. I had to work the next morning, so I didn't want to be out too late. He asked me where I'd like to have dinner and I decided on one of my favorite tapas restaurants. It's usually quite busy, and we didn't realize that there would be a long wait to be seated. We decided to just sit along the grill and enjoy our dinner there. It was hot, it was loud, but we had sangria and lots of laughter. And since things were going so swimmingly, we decided to grab an after dinner drink.

There's kind of a swanky spot nearby that we tried to get into, but they were at capacity, so we wandered down the street to a popular bar where you know you'll always see a familiar face. Once we got there, we thought it would be funny to sneak into one of the VIP events they had going on. It happened to be Cinco De Mayo and it was quite the fiesta in the club. We snagged a seat on a big leather couch and I ordered a glass of chardonnay, and Marcus ordered a beer. We felt so sneaky...trying to look around to see if anyone noticed that we were crashing their party. As far as I could tell, we were under the radar.

There was some hot chick strutting around with a tray full of complimentary tequila shots, and with Marcus being Dutch (read: frugal) he couldn't pass up that offer. Besides, tequila is was his liquor of choice. (He has since moved on to Scotch.) He picked up a shooter for me as well, even though I can't stand the stuff. But hey! It's Cinco De Mayo! A holiday I've always cherished because I love guacamole.

Being the ever annoying girl that I was...I just had to bring it up. Tease him a little bit about his habit of dodging "the subject". So I say to him, "What will you give me if I take this shot of tequila?" So coy, I was.
He response was somewhat uncharacteristic and he said, "I will take you for a romantic stroll downtown..."
Continuing to be delightful as ever, I replied with "That's lame. You know what I want to hear." (oy.)
All I had really expected was "Okay. Fine. I'll marry you if drink that tequila." And I would have been a happy senorita.
Then, wouldn't you know it, he was in front of me on one knee, holding a sparkly ring.
And I'm holding a mini glass of tequila.
"Emily, will you marry me?" he asked.
My eyes hurt from being open so wide and my hands were covering my mouth.
As far as I know, I said yes.
People all around were noticing.
It was the biggest surprise EVER.
I downed the tequila.
We continued celebrating when we saw nearly everyone we knew downstairs in the main portion of the bar.
I recognize it's sort of tacky to say we got engaged in a bar, but it was one of the most fun nights I've ever had.
Had he actually taken me on that romantic stroll, I think I would have realized what was going on. I loved the spontaneity and the surprise. I'm glad there wasn't a trail of rose petals and a fancy dinner...my man knows how to make memories.
And now I ponder what other surprises await me over say, a dram of Scotch...

Are You A Blogger? And Quick Update on C!

Hi Friends!
Any of you have a blog you'd like to share with me? I'm always up for a good read!
Leave a comment and share your link!
Or...if you have favorites, I'd love to see what's out there.

While I'm here, I'll do a very quick Charlotte update.
At her 2 month appointment last week, she weighed in at 10 lbs 14 oz (50th percentile)
She is....shoot I can't remember how "tall", but she's in the 55th percentile and her head is in the 50th too.
Nice little average size baby.
She is sort of getting better with sleeping, still working at it. When she sleeps on her back in her crib, she'll only go 2.5-3.5 hours between feedings, when she sleeps in her carseat in her room, she goes 4-6 hours. So I've been opting to put her in there where she gets good sleep and lets me get good sleep too!
She's getting SUPER crabby at night between 7-10, but I'm also figuring out what works and what doesn't. She used to want to be held close, but now have discovered that she wants to lie flat on the couch or floor, but wants to be in close reach.
She had her first public spaz out yesterday at wendy's.
I've nursed her in the van more times than I can count...anyone else feed their baby in the car a lot? (obviously parked, for any people who think I'm an idiot.)
She's reallly starting to look like daddy.
Strangely I think she also looks like a turtle, even though Marcus doesn't resemble one.
She loves her panda on the play gym.
She is really starting to smile and make lots and lots of sounds.
She discovered her hands which is hilarious. She sticks them in front of her face during diaper changes and goes cross eyed when she holds them too close.
This is no longer a "quick" update.

But seriously! Share your blog with me, I'd love to read it. Even if you know I already rread it, share it so others can read it too
Happy Saturday!

to sum up a saturday...

Last night, we went out with friends for dinner and had Grandpa and Grandma R watch Charlotte for the evening. I'm still getting used the whole babysitter thing, but it went swimmingly and she even slept alright...until about 3:30. Then it was wide, wide, wide awake time. Smiley and awake. So cute. And tiring.

Marcus was a dear and kept C asleep for a while so I could sleep in until about 9. But we just chilled all day. Love it.

Came upstairs and Darby got comfortable with the boppy. No joke. She did this herself.

The "Family Bed" :)

My little sweetie. Before she got crabby for the day.

Life is good. But now I spend my evening folding laundry. Something that several months ago would have been the biggest drag ever. But this is what we asked for, right?

Ikea tomorrow. Thinking it's time to actually decorate and make my bedroom a room to enjoy.

My Dog is a Houdini...

Among many other things.

I am surprised I haven't posted more about my dog.
I'm going to tell a little story about her.

My dog is Darby. She is almost 3 years old. She is a Rhodesian Ridgeback. She is a very special member of our little family.

We've had our fair share of adventures with her. When we first got her, she barfed every time she was in the car. We even had a system. A very disgusting system of watching the signs: she stands up, starts licking her chops, gets a creepy smile thing going, and her stomach starts heaving. I enter the scene with trash bag, or other "catching" device. She pukes in bag. Success!

Then there was the time where she grabbed a near empty container of hummus off an end table. I saw her do it, didn't think it was a big deal, after all, It's just hummus. Apparently, our dog should not have hummus, as she had an extreme allergic reaction to it, and I thought she was going to die. She didn't. She's very sturdy.



Our biggest scare was last February when after several vet visits, we discovered she had a blockage in her intestines and stomach. This did not come as a major surprise to us, as she's always been a big time chewer. Although we keep a good eye on her, she is stealthy. After a pretty major surgery, the dr. found shreds of a rope toy all tangled up in her innards.

Once again, she was very resilient, and recovered beautifully from her surgery.



Fast forward to today. Darbs has had a couple of bumps removed in the last few months. The first two were removed in October, said to be harmless, but if she gets more, let them know. She had a couple more pop up and we decided to have them removed and sent in for analysis. So now we wait. But while we wait, we deal with a very tricky dog. We've tried just about everything to keep her away from her stitches (on her back leg). She removed them all together on Sunday. We had to call the on-call vet to have her stitched back up. It was ugly! So we took her home, put the giant cone of shame on her head, kept her bandaged, and put a pair of boxer shorts on her.

On Monday, we discovered that she squirmed out of her cone of shame and chewed out more stitches. We brought her back in, where the stapled, stitched and wrapped her up as best as they could.

Today, I got her a new cone (e-collar), that fit her much better, no way could she get out! I bandaged her up again, replaced the boxer briefs so they were nice and snug, kept her in her e-collar, and put her in her crate, where there isn't enough room to move with the cone on.

Seriously. Short of locking her head and front paws in stocks, she was secure!

I got home just after 5pm. Her e-collar was still on! Success! Although...somehow....it had teeth marks. And somehow, her boxers and bandaid were off. And somehow, her boxers and bandaid were completely missing. As in, she ate them. The stitches look okay.



W.T.F.



She hasn't been this happy in days.



I can't believe that her stomach feels so good, and she has some pretty nasty gas.



Dr. won't prescribe a sedative, but reccommends that we board her there for the day, where she can be watched.



NAUGHTY!!!!



I love her so much. I would do anything for her. Some people say this will change after the baby arrives. I can see why they'd say this. Baby is close to arriving, and I admit that I don't worry about her like I used to. Some of that is perspective, and some of it is distraction.



I just hope she is getting this out of her system, because in a matter of days, I won't be able to cater to her every strange demand.

Poor, pathetic hound. I love you!! :)

...

plugging along

Not too much has changed in the last few weeks. I suppose that's why I haven't posted anything in a litle while.

I've discovered that I've been having lots of braxton hicks contractions, or "practice contractions" as my dr. called them. For the most part, they don't bother me, but if I have a particularly busy day, they can cause a lot of discomfort. Yesterday was a pretty rough day, but after 10 hours (yes 10!) of sleep, I'm feeling quite a bit better today.

I've had big plans to get the baby room painted, but it is sometimes hard to find the time to get it prepped. I keep telling myself it's better to do it now, because I'm not gaining energy at this point. Had I really understood that, I would have gotten this started 6 weeks ago. We do have the paint and supplies, so now we just need to do it already!! I am SO excited to have it start coming together.

I am loving the fall weather! I was getting sick of grill-food. I do love me some comfort food! For whatever reason, I get the itch to start baking (which is not necessarily a talent) and making soup, chili, and big pasta meals! No wonder I always pack on a few extra lbs in the fall. At least now I'm supposed to be gaining weight....ha, no problem!
Oh, and I also started my sewing class! Oh my stars. We've had two classes. My neighbor and I go together, and the first class started at 6:30. We got there at 6:30. Everyone was running their machine already. We looked at eachother like, "huh??" Our teacher does not
teach anything! She basically tells us to do something, is sort of surprised when we don't know how to do it, so then she does it for us. This is an adult beginner class. I am not sure what she was expecting. I did successfully complete a pin cushion in the first class, and a very cute tote bag in the second class. However, I am not sure I could repeat it, considering I had a lot of help along the way.
It was during my second class where I realized I do have a hobby! I love to cook! The one problem with this is that while I enjoy doing it, I have all kinds of food as a result. That presents a problem because no household of two should have that much food. I'm going to have to start a little store. :)
I'm not going to give up on sewing. Maybe once I get the hang of it, I'll feel a little better about it.

This is all that's new for now. Not all that interesting. I think I'll take a nap. :)
Happy Sunday!

Babymoon Recap

It appears I took an accidental break from my bloggie! Sorry about that!

Life is good in Emilyworld.

I have been feeling little baby girl move around a TON! There have been a few times where it's been a little obnoxious, even. Is there any connection between an active fetus and an active baby? I'm curious to see if she'll be a squirmy kid. What was your experience?

The hubs and I also just took a babymoon last week, and it was such a wonderful getaway. Very different from the trips we've taken in the past. A babymoon is something I've been told we really need to do, and I'm glad we were able to take the time to travel.

Our first stop was Ft. Lauderdale. We stayed at the Hard Rock Hotel & Casino. Marcus enjoys a good game of blackjack (well who doesn't enjoy a good game?) and I'm a big fan of the fancy new slot machines that have speakers in the seats and shake when good things happen. My personal favorites are the Sex & The City slots, Indiana Jones, and the Amazing Race<--- which might be my all time favorite. We stayed at the Hard Rock for just one evening, and while we were there, we lounged by their resort style pool, won some $$, and mistakenly spent $18 on chips and guacamole. Our server was apparently very good at upselling without our knowing.

Our next destination was Miami! I had been looking forward to this for a long time. We opted to stay downtown Miami vs. South Beach/Miami Beach because, frankly, we were there to be spoiled and to relax, and not party. And boy were we ever spoiled!
We lounged by the pool (when it wasn't raining), ate some amazing food, received massages, took naps & finished books. Just what I needed. The only issue was my baby is sitting pretty low so I have been getting more uncomfortable and it wasn't a rare sight to see me trying to "move" her. There may be no proof, but I think that lying on the floor with my hips and legs up made her "float" up a little bit. Haha...kind of ridiculous.
Unfortunately, our flight was delayed on the way home, causing us to miss our connection, so we stayed another night and kind of a creepy hotel. I quickly realized how spoiled we were!
And now, a couple of pictures!

Crazy storm coming in while we were visiting Miami Beach. 2 minutes after this picture was taken, it started POURING, and not the typical Florida 10-minute rain, it was a 45 minute downpour. Kind of fun, and we got gelato while we waited it out.

This was SUCH a fun night! We told the concierge that we kind of just wanted pizza for dinner that night. He mentioned that the best place only had take out/delivery, which was fine with us. But they wanted us to have an experience, so they set up a private table with candles and flowers on the lounge balcony, just for us!! There was a man named "B" who was kind of like a little butler who set everything up, and called us Mr. Marcus and Ms. Emily and on this particular night he was playing "his" music and it was all Lady Gaga and dance music and we kept catching him bust out 2 second moves. We told him we'd have a dance party with him later, but we couldn't find him once we were ready. :)






Couldn't resist this one. :)


someone is getting large and in charge...

Well, if you made it through this entry, give yourself a pat on the back!

Time for me to get a move on...it's (finally) baby registering day!!
This is not something I'm looking forward to, blog post to come. :)

Have a good weekend, friends!

Tomorrow, Tomorrow, I Love ya, Tomorrow!

So...I'm pretty excited for tomorrow. Not only is it Friday, my most favorite day of the week, but we find out what kind of baby I'm growing! Now, I do not question why some people choose to not find out the sex of their baby, but knowing for me is one of the greatest surprises ever. Yes, it's still a surprise, even if you find out before hand, sillies.

I honestly do not have a strong feeling one way or another. It's changed too many times, so I will be pleased no matter what we find out tomorrow.

In an upcoming post I will have to tell you more about me and my goals and aspirations.
But for now, I leave you with a link to one of the most absurd and time consuming websites I've ever discovered. www.theoatmeal.com. This dude is twisted. Enjoy, my little peanut heads!