Simplifying for God

My hiatus is on hiatus

2012-02-02T12:52:00.001-08:00

So, it's been quite a while since I posted anything. Babies are demanding, kiddo started school, holidays came and went. Wow... typed out, it doesn't seem like that much, but in the scheme of things, we stayed pretty busy! Now, here we are, on the cusp of Spring and it's time for another busy season to start.

Last year I tried my hand at gardening. Thinking, "Oh, my newborn baby will just hang out in the front pack/bouncy seat as I weed the rows and harvest my crops" kind of flew out the window as the realization of a needy, always wanting to be held, screaming if I EVER put her down, baby came to light. It also didn't help that there was really no warm up period to the summer. It stayed about 70 degrees and then one day shot up to 90+ degrees, where it stayed for about 3-4 months. I couldn't justify even trying to put the baby in the bouncy seat when the sun was streaming down in our yard and we have no areas of shade. I shouldn't put the blame only on the baby. The area that I was trying to garden didn't play so nice either. I would dig down and up would come clumps of roots and HUGE stones. Naively, I still tried to plant my garden, only to see it wither away in a mere matter of weeks.

I've been doing my research, and I'm getting a head start on the growing season, so here's hoping I can do a lot better this year. I have decided to make some raised beds. I plan to attach some weed blocker on the bottom of them and fill them with rich potting soil, so there will be plenty of nutrients for the plants to thrive. I've also decided to try and grow my plants from seed instead of using starts. Maybe this will get me more in touch with them and really care about what happens.

Yesterday I started buying seeds with the kids and collecting empty bottles to store up in the garage. I was pretty amazed by how ambitious I'm planning to be, considering my experience last year. I've noticed that is a running theme with me though. When I do something, I just go for it. None of this "let's just take it a step at a time and wade into the deep end" for me. I'm an all-or-nothing kind of gal. I kinda think it makes it more fun :-P Besides, I think it would be better not only to have a wide variety of plants to harvest, but to also see what will/will not be successful in our growing conditions.

So, now for some photos (these were taken at night, so please forgive the atrocious exposure):

I have already made 2 raised beds and put them out in this area. I think I should be able to fit 2-3 more up there and plan to put 2 more down on our patio. This will give me a lot of area to work with and thus increasing our yield :-)

When I get all the boxes built and in place I'll show how I built them and take photos of them in their new home. Stay tuned :-)

Quinoa salad = YUM!

2011-08-29T23:06:00.000-07:00

We went to a BBQ at a friend's house not too long ago. One of the sides was a quinoa salad. For those who don't know, quinoa is a grain, but it is also a whole protein. If any of you are non-meat eaters, this is a great way to intake the protein you miss out on by cutting out delicious animals :-P

2 parta cooked/cooled quinoa
1 part cooked/cooled beans (black, garbanzo, white)
1 part diced cucumber
Dress with lemon juice, extra virgin olive oil, salt, pepper, fresh parsley
Add to taste: feta, diced red bell pepper, halved cherry tomatoes, etc.

When I cooked my quinoa, I didn't use water. I used chicken stock (vegetable stock would work as well). I also ended up making a couple of changes to this. One I made by accident was putting cilantro in the salad instead of parsley. It was surprisingly good. I think if I were going to make it again with the cilantro, I would probably use lime juice instead of lemon juice. We also used some Parmesan along with the feta. What can I say? We LOVE cheese!

116. Sydney sleeping in her bed on her own for the first time!
117. Having God answer my want right after it came out of my mouth. God is amazing like that :-)
118. Having access to sermons online to feed my desire to learn more about Him
119. Sitting down and having a family dinner. I love learning about what my kid's highs and lows were for the day
120. An amazing trip to the beach! It was Sydney's first time and it was such a blast! Next time I think we'll take extra clothes though ;-)
121. My kids have such a zest for life! I hope this continues as they get older and are able to do more
122. Dan is such a trooper with maintenance for the car. He is always the one to take it in for an oil change, get it washed, fill it with gas and vacuum it out
123. My eyes were opened to how humorous the Bible can be. I can't wait to read more and find out where God has used his subtle sense of humor
124. Quiet time to myself to reflect and veg after everyone has gone to bed
125. Getting more involved in activities in our town. I hope to soon join a MOPS group that meets down the street.

More to be thankful for

2011-08-27T19:26:00.001-07:00

101. Dan getting large amounts of overtime at work.
102. Beautiful weather to give us an actual summer
103. AC to cool down our house on said beautiful days
104. Sydney is to the smiling/cooing phase
105. Family members willing to watch all the kids, even with Sydney screaming when mom isn't nearby
106. Slowly getting back to my old self. I've had energy to cook, clean, organize, bake and sew.
107. Being married for 6 years to my best friend :-)
108. Dan's schedule working out with us only having 1 car
109. Receiving a check from Dan's work that helped us pay a huge amount of our car note
110. Having an area that the kids are able to ride their bikes without too much worry of cars hitting them
111. The Ghia is now back at our house!
112. Getting tools to work on the Ghia. Interior is mostly stripped and the rust on the floorpans only looks like surface rust :-D
113. Having family members who will continually put us up at their house. Thanks, mom and dad!
114. Finding great deals on CL and at garage sales for things we decided to get
115. Going blueberry picking with the kids for the first time. They were very well behaved, which gives me hope for future trips

6 years!

2011-08-23T23:27:00.000-07:00

Today was mine and my husband's 6th anniversary! In that short amount of time we have:

- Had 3 kids
- Moved 4 times
- Owned 7 cars (only 1 of which we've had the whole time we've been married)
- Earned 3 degrees
- Had 4 beta fish
- Had 13 people added to the family (through marriages and births)
- Made some great, very close friends
- Started rebuilding a car
- Began homebrewing beer
- Found 558 geocaches!

There is no one else I'd love to be on this ride with. My husband is my best friend, confidant, sounding board, lover and playmate. I had no idea that married people could have so much fun hanging out together and doing nothing or even pursuing hobbies together. I am so thankful that God designed my husband for me and am looking forward to as many more years together as He will bless us with :-)

Our first anniversary

Our 3rd anniversary

Our 4th anniversary

Our 5th anniversary

Our 6th anniversary

August is among us

2011-08-01T14:29:00.000-07:00

I can't believe that it's already August! Time has really been flying since Sydney was born. Things started out slowly adjusting to life with 3 kids. I think we are starting to get the hang of it though. I have even ventured out with all 3 for some couponing trips! Most times I will wait for Dan because with all 3 kids being in the cart, there's never enough room for food :-P

We have been taking advantage of Dan's time off on weekends, including trying to find fun things to do in our new area. We have gone out geocaching a few times and have done a couple of hikes. Dan was such a sweet husband and insisted on going out to Gresham to bring our 4th "child" home. This child is my 1965 Volkswagen Karmann Ghia. This will start keeping us busy more often, especially as it gets darker earlier in the evening. The first weekend she was home, I went to it and started ripping out the interior. We decided to check out the floor pans and makes sure they weren't rusting through. To our surprise, they looked VERY solid. There was some surface rust, but that should be easy enough to get rid of an put down some sealant to make them rust-proof.

Sydney is such a fun addition to our family! Gabe and Izzy absolutely LOVE her. They are constantly trying to give her hugs and kisses and we have dubbed Gabe as the "baby whisperer" because he is usually the one that can calm her down in the car :-) I think they will be even more excited when she is able to move around with them, but for now, we are all trying to take advantage of her being so little and immobile. Gabe is still so excited for kindergarten. This month we are supposed to meet his teacher and he will get to see his classroom. He's also becoming a lot more helpful around the house. He will help us sort laundry, put dishes away, help prepare lunch and other various things around the house. Izzy is becoming a fun little kiddo, too. She is becoming more and more interested in being a little comedian. She loves to make us laugh. She enjoys playing dress-up and doing puzzles. Today was a very exciting day because she used the toilet successfully for the first time! To celebrate, we are taking her to buy a Rapunzel barbie doll that she always is drawn to when we go to Fred Meyer. I'm hoping this will help her stay excited about using the potty and she will wear underwear full-time now. Sydney is starting to hold her head up and can even look around occasionally. We took her to the VW show in Portland the other day and she had her first definite smile! The last few nights she has slept quite a bit. I've been able to get a solid 5 hours in a row! All in all she's been a pretty good baby, but you definitely know when she's not happy.

Things I'm thankful for:
86. Air conditioning on hot summer days
87. Constant beautiful weather so we can get out and enjoy family time
88. The last few months our electric bill has been really low!
89. Dan's unexpected bonus from work
90. We've all made new friends who live only a few blocks away from us
91. We had the opportunity to buy the exact couch we wanted for a very discounted price! Now there's seating for the whole family!
92. Healthy checkups for all the kids
93. Feeling like my "normal" self again after having Sydney. I actually have energy to do things now!
94. My regular jeans fit me only 5 weeks after having Sydney
95. A full freezer of groceries!
96. Our Volvo is almost paid off!
97. My husband is such a helper around the house. God has truly blessed me with someone who knows what it means to be a man!
98. Family members who will babysit, so Dan an I can go on a date
99. Having kids that are friends and care about each other
100. Napping girls so that I can spend alone time with Gabe :-)

Sydney's birth story

2011-06-20T14:49:00.000-07:00

We welcomed our newest baby girl, Sydney Renee, on June 17, 2011 at 4:13 am. Here is her story :-)

With my other 2 kids, I was early. My son was 6 days early and my other daughter was 2 weeks early. I had a feeling that this was the precise amount of time that they would be born ahead of schedule. Everyone told me I was crazy, but something inside of me just knew. With Sydney, I had a feeling that I was going to be right up to my due date.

After our son was born, my husband and I have decided that we would leave finding out the sex of our babies until the end, as it made for an extra special part of the delivery. Everyone would give me a hard time because they knew the thought of having daughters scares me. I'd get asked what I thought the sex of this baby would be. For a while I would avoid the questions, but one night I told my husband that I secretly thought it was a girl. With this looming in the back of my mind, I started really ramping up to meet the little bun in the oven :-)

On the 16th, against my better judgement, I decided to stay up late and watch some TV. I don't really think I could have helped it. I was pretty wired. 12:30am of the 17th came around and I finally decided that I should probably head to bed as I hadn't had any signs of impending labor for the last few days and I knew the kids would be up bright and early. As I laid my head down on my pillow, I started to feel a little nervous about going too far over my due date and what implications that could have on my desire to do a natural childbirth. I started freaking out that my baby would be an 11 lb monster and would probably be able to crawl out of the womb. I quietly prayed for some peace from God and started to drift off to sleep.

When the contractions started, I was at that place no one likes to be woken up from. You are just starting to fall into a deep sleep and it feels like a few hours have elapsed, but it's really only been 20 minutes or so. I looked over at the clock and it said 1:19am. I didn't wake up Dan right away as I'd had a "false alarm" earlier in the week and thought this could be another one. As I waited for it to calm down, I started thinking about if I'd actually remember what labor pains felt like (a silly thought, I know, considering I already have 2 kids :-P) The pain did stop, so I shut my eyes again and tried to drift off to sleep, only to have another pain start shortly. I looked over at the clock and it said 1:22am. Again, trying not to be deceived, I waited for it to stop. Again, it stopped and a few minutes later, there was another one at 1:28am. At this time, I decided to get up and move around a bit to see if that would change anything. It didn't. I decided it was time to wake up Dan and start timing them to see if they had a pattern and started lasting longer.

From the get-go, my contractions were anywhere from 4.5 to 5.5 minutes apart and lasted about a minute and a half. And they were STRONG! Let me tell you, trying to get everything ready to go to the hospital when you're in labor is not a fun task. By the time I'd called my dad, I'd already been contracting for about 40 minutes. My folks live out in Gresham, so I knew it would take about an hour and a half for him to get out here to stay with the kids. I tried to stay as relaxed as I could, but the fact that with every contractions I had horrific back pain that shot numbing/tingling down my legs didn't help any. Dan was a trooper, staying by my side the whole time applying as much counter pressure as he could. It finally got to the point where I couldn't stand it anymore. I told Dan that I really needed to get to the hospital. We packed up the kids and he drove me the 5 blocks to the emergency room door and told me he'd be back as soon as he could (my dad was about 20 minutes away at this point). I checked myself in and waddled down to my room where they were getting the last bed ready for me.

For the last week that I'd been pregnant, I was barely dilated to 2cm, only 50% effaced and my cervix was still posterior. When I got into the hospital and the nurse checked me, I was to 7cm! I'd only been in labor for 2 hours and I'd jumped from 2-7cm in that short of a time. Within the next 20 minutes, the pressure was becoming too much. I told them I was in a large amount of pain and wondered if they could give me something in my IV to take the edge off. They told me that anything administered ran the risk of the baby not breathing when it was born, so I knew I would have to suck it up (besides, that's what I wanted all along). I finally complained about the pressure enough that they checked me again and I was to 9.5cm. This was great news, except for the fact that Dan wasn't there yet! They gave the DR a call and he came in, thankfully with Dan right on his heels.

I started pushing around 3:40am. I was already so tired, but knew I was going to have to muster it up from somewhere if I didn't want to run the risk of C-section. The DR told me they were going to break the bag because it was impeding the birth canal for the baby to fully come down. After they did that is when the action really started. I have to say, natural childbirth, not an unpainful experience. However, the fact that I know I worked hard for my baby makes me feel so empowered! There were a few times I whimpered, "I don't think I can do this!" and Dan looked at me and said, "Yes, Tristan, you CAN do this!" (he's an amazing, supportive husband :-D) When it came down to the end, I glanced at the mirror and noticed our little bundle of joy had her hand up next to her face. Let's just say this made for a painful time ;-)

At 4:13am, she was born and up on my chest, crying in my face. I asked Dan what the sex of the baby was and he told me she was a girl! All I could muster was, "I knew it!" and we both smiled at each other. She came in at 8lbs 5oz and was 21 inches long.

I look back at the experience now and think about how I wanted medicine for the pain. However, this has been my fastest recovery I've had after giving birth. I was able to be up and about within an hour. Able to use the bathroom on my own, move around the room and take care of the baby, go and sit next to my husband and not on that uncomfortable hospital bed. It has also been a lot easier since I've been home. There hasn't been too much pain and Dan and I were even able to get out for a lunch and dinner date since we got back yesterday. As crazy as it seems, I think I would try and do natural childbirth again, if we have any more kids. Besides, if we have anymore, I don't think I'd be able to get anywhere in time to get any ;-)

Summer's a comin'

2011-06-09T08:57:00.000-07:00

We took the kiddos down to the "faster slide park" yesterday. Next to it is a community swimming pool. Apparently summer is in the air because they were filling that thing up! Gabe got very excited at the prospect of going swimming all summer long, and I don't really blame him. We've had pretty nice days here lately, but with the wind, it's hard to think about swimming. I'm sure that when it's almost 100 degrees outside, the wind will be such a blessing.

Our garden is starting to grow, too! For some reason, the first vegetables I put in the ground didn't take too well. The rest of the stuff I've put in has been doing pretty good. We have in our strawberries, blueberries, raspberries, a cantaloupe plant and some garlic. I also moved our lettuce from under the pine tree into a container on our patio (salad on demand is what someone else called it ;-P). We had a reddening strawberry one day and then I think the birds got to it. GRRRR! I guess that's what happens when you move where there is wildlife around you. At least there's still some fruit getting ready to ripen on the blueberry and raspberry bushes :-)

Baby "X" has shown no signs of really wanting to be born anytime soon. I'm exactly a week away from my due date. Since the beginning of this pregnancy I had a feeling this one would push through all 40 weeks. I'm at the point where I'm ready. I've been having "contractions" for a few weeks now. Let's clarify: I'm having "contractions" not contractions (the " " is very important in this). These suck because they are pretty painful. In fact, I got woken up yesterday morning because of them, and they lasted for over an hour. They also suck because they aren't doing anything! Last week when I was at my midwife appointment, I was still on 1 cm and not effacing at all. I have another appointment tomorrow, so hopefully there will be some sort of change.

Things I'm thankful for:
81. Making friends in our new town
82. A blossoming garden that will provide delicious food this summer
83. Dan has found a co-worker to carpool with, which cuts down on our gas budget significantly
84. Our new furniture which allows us to have good amounts of family time (family dinner where everyone can actually sit down at the table; family movie nights to cuddle with kiddos on the couch)
85. Gabe is registered for kindergarten and SO excited about going :-)

What I'm doing today:
- Running to Rite Aid to do some couponing
- Buying "staple" groceries (eggs, milk, etc). I have a hankering to bake something
- Finishing up thank you notes with Izzy from her birthday

Just a few photos

2011-06-05T15:34:00.000-07:00

Looks like a "d'oh" moment ;-)

Learning how to put on her shoes like a big girl!

Playing outside

2011-05-23T09:15:00.001-07:00

This last week I have been focusing on trying to plant a garden. I went to the store and bought a bunch of starts, so now I'm just hoping they'll take in the ground. I also tried something new with hanging a tomato plant upside down. I cut a hole in the bottom of a 5 gallon bucket and put the plant through. I decided not to waste the space in the top so I'm trying to grow some basil out of it, so we'll see if that lasts. It's been so warm here during the days that I'm afraid the plants aren't getting enough water for the majority of the day.

Gabe was very excited to help me choose out which fruits and vegetables we were going to plant. We don't have all of them in the ground (it's pretty hard to stay bent over the garden with a huge belly poking out at me :-P). So far we have in blueberries, strawberries, lettuce and one tomato plant. We are still planning on putting in cantaloupe, watermelon, peppers (red, green, orange and jalapeno), more tomatoes, raspberries, sunflowers, cucumbers (both regular and pickling), onions, garlic, carrots, broccoli, kohlrabi, potatoes, green beans, peas, and plenty of herbs. We should be busy little gardeners this season :-)

I have never fully appreciated gardening before. Maybe that's because I've not felt comfortable in an area to do it. Maybe it's because the kids weren't independent enough to wander around on their own and play while I worked the garden. Whatever it was, I'm finding a different appeal to it this year. We are in such a quiet neighborhood that when I am outside, there is nothing else going on! It has become such a great time to internalize and reflect on what's been going on in our lives. I can also have some quiet time and pray and talk to God. I have found that it is a great stress reliever, even when the kids want to "help" me by tossing dirt around.

I'll be finishing up planting the garden hopefully this next week. Probably should do it soon since my due date is only 3 weeks away, don't you think? ;-)

Things I'm thankful for:
76. Not being diagnosed with preeclampsia
77. We are getting our couch and dining table delivered today!
78. A visit from the in-laws and getting out to show them around town
79. Not having to pay for repairs that happen to our car
80. Being able to pay cash for items that our house desperately needs

What I'm doing today:
-Getting furniture delieverd
-Going in to have the midwife double check my BP
-Planting more stuff in the garden
-Folding/putting away laundry

Home again

2011-05-17T19:23:00.001-07:00

My midwife let me go after 3 hours of being monitored. She said my BP was looking good and staying down and there were only very slight traces of protein in my urine (both great things). So, no preeclampsia. However, she did say that they are going to test for a bladder infection. If it comes back positive, I'll have to be on antibiotics. The other thing she wants me to be wary of is the fact that I'm having contractions. They aren't horrible, just uncomfortable. They aren't consistent and they aren't dilating me. She just wants me to pay more attention than usual to them. I am due to go into the office to meet one of the other DRs next Thursday, but she also wants me to head back next Monday in order to get my BP taken again and do another urine test. Now that I'm on weekly checkups, I'm sure this last part of my pregnancy will go pretty quick.

Thanks for the encouraging words from everyone. It was great to feel everyone's support and know that there were people praying and sending positive thoughts my way. I am a truly blessed woman :-)

Every 15 minutes...

2011-05-17T13:50:00.000-07:00

that's how often they are currently monitoring my blood pressure. I have gone in to see my midwife a few times since moving here and each time I've gone in, my BP was high when the nurse took it, so the midwife took it again. Yesterday, the same thing happened. She asked that I come back in to the office today in order to have them check me again. She told me that if it came back high or if they found protein in my urine, they were going to send me over to the hospital to be monitored. Well, lo and behold, here I am sitting in a hospital bed :-( I guess the upside to it is I have a really nice view.

They are checking to see if I have preeclampsia. I'm not sure as of right now how severe it might be. I've not really been suffering from any of the symptoms. The only one that sticks out to me is the nausea/faintness and now the elevated BP. I'm hoping that I won't have to stay for a week or so as they have to continue monitoring me. I'm really hoping they won't have to jack me up on steroids so they can quickly develop the baby's lungs. I'm hoping that the worse thing I'll have to deal with is being on bedrest for the next few weeks. I think I can manage that. The worst part about it is I don't have much help out here, so I know I'll be dealing with cranky kiddos. A small price to pay for a healthy baby.

Please keep us in your prayers and I'll keep you updated on what is happening. Thanks :-)

sigh

2011-05-14T21:39:00.000-07:00

Today my little baby girl turned 3 years old. Where has the time gone?! She has grown into quite an awesome young lady since she was born. I remember my husband telling me she was a girl after she was born and me thinking, "what in the world do I do with a girl?!" I have learned a lot over these last three years and am sure that God has plenty more to teach me, not only in being a mother, but also about how to be a female as well.

Isabella has definitely taught me to embrace my more feminine side. She has started loving to dress up, put on shows, play with dolls and is getting into Disney princess stuff. I was never really into any of that growing up. I was more of a tomboy, so this is one of the learning experiences I was talking about. I did promise myself that I would try my best to hold myself back from trying to tell my kids what is/isn't appropriate in that aspect. Don't get me wrong. I definitely plan to work as hard as I can to shape them into respectable, productive members of society, but I can't force sports on Gabe and I can't force non-girlness on Izzy. I just need to go with the flow and allow them to experience life and enjoy the things they enjoy.

Today was a much quieter party than we had last weekend. Granted that was 3 birthdays AND mother's day all rolled into one. But, that side of the family just keeps growing and as such, the noise just keeps growing with it :-P It's a fun experience when you're not 4 weeks away from delivering a baby and you have energy. Suffice to say, I was pretty drained after that weekend. This was a nice change of pace. This was my folks, my SIL and a few friends with their kids. We all even got out and took a walk around the neighborhood after cake and presents. All in all, it was a great birthday celebration. Happy birthday, my beautiful little girl! Your daddy and I wish you SO many blessings through this next year. We will be praying for you and love you so much :-)

Things I'm thankful for:
66. Watching how 3 years of my life have cultivated into a neat little person
67. Learning how to embrace girliness! I am looking forward to spending more time doing things with Izzy as she grows up
68. Hearing, "I love you, mommy and daddy." as our little girl is falling asleep in the next room
69. Singing songs while Izzy makes her dolls dance around
70. My daughter's love language (from what I can tell) is physical touch. She loves to climb in your lap and have you tickle her back. She also loves to give hugs and kisses!
71. Izzy really looks up to her big brother. I hope this relationship can continue long into their life
72. She is now able to clean up after herself and take her own dishes to the sink
73. Izzy has beautiful, LONG, golden hair. She's not a huge fan of me combing it, but it's still pretty nonetheless
74. She is a very polite little girl. When she wants something she'll say, "May I please have _________?"
75. She loves her "apple blankie" and loves to take it everywhere with her. I love that my kids have lovies :-)

Summer is in the air!

2011-05-13T18:26:00.000-07:00

The weather here has been B-E-A-Utiful! Today it was blue skies and over 70 degrees. We started out our morning with our jackets, but an hour after we had left the house, we needed to discard them as they weren't necessary anymore. We are now to the point where we REALLY need a lawn mower. Our backyard has grown up so much in such a short time (I guess since the ground is warming up, things are sprouting quickly?). Not only that, but our landlord had a landscaping company out here today and they dug up the seeded grass that another company had put down (that didn't grow, BTW) and they put down sod instead. It looks really good! Dan said he wasn't sure it was our house when he came home today :-P

Another way I know summer is on its way is Izzy's birthday is tomorrow. She's going to be 3! I cannot believe it. How does time seem to slip away so quickly? We are planning on having some family and friends out for a smaller celebration and to allow people to see our house. I'm sure they'll be so impressed since we don't really have any furniture, but what are you gonna do? Dan and I are PICKY! LOL :-)

Things I'm thankful for:
61. Having a great thirst for knowledge and finding sources to fill that thirst
62. Friends and family who are willing to drive out to see us (even if they think we live in Timbuktu) ;-)
63. An empty laundry room... even if it only lasts for a few moments
64. Having one room in the house completely DONE!
65. Bargain shopping! No, I'm not talking coupons. It's garage sale season, folks!!!

What I did today:
-Took Gabe to the pediatrician to "establish care"
-Got down to the bank to switch out accounts. Bye-bye BofA!
-Bought some arts and craft supplies for the kids. Gabe is going to be working on cutting with scissors :-)
-Baking goodies for tomorrow's party
-Going to the store to get food for the party

Melted my heart

2011-05-06T10:09:00.000-07:00

Last night, my husband gave me a great compliment. We currently do not have a couch, so we spend our evenings together laying in bed, doing stuff on our laptops and talking. I have recently started listening online to various shows from Focus on the Family. They are a Christian talk radio show that deals with various topics. The ones I've been listening to have been regarding marriage and parenting. As I'm listening to the broadcast, Dan stops what he's doing, looks over at me and says, "I think it's awesome that this is how you want to spend your free time." I'm sure people might not get it, but to me that spoke so much to my heart! I'm not sure if he meant it this in depth, but it made me feel like he was admiring my character for pursuing more knowledge about how to make our life work more smoothly. Not only that, but using biblical principles to do so and trying to make sure that we stay God focused. There have been a few that he's listened to with me and he agrees that it's "good stuff" :-)

There is a book called The Five Love Languages by Dr. Gary Chapman. It talks about how each person has a main way that speaks love to them and if their spouse doesn't realize what that it, the other feels unloved. Usually what happens is you try to show someone else love by using your language. If you are lucky, it will work. Usually, it doesn't. I have read the book, but could never fully understand how someone could speak love to me. After last night, I'm pretty sure it is Word of Affirmation.

Things I'm thankful for:
56. A husband who reaches for me to hold me in the middle of the night
57. Independent kids who allow mom to rest when she's not feeling well
58. A growing boy who is getting closer and closer to starting school
59. Having such an amazing view of Mount Hood. I love how lately it is stark white against a blue sky!
60. Continuing to learn about my husband and see how his mind works

What I'm doing today:
-Packing for Gresham. Got a HUGE family celebration for all the birthdays and Mother's Day
-Vacuuming the house
-Getting any couponing deals ready for the stores we don't have out here (Albertsons, Target, Wal-Mart)
-Working on shapes/colors with Izzy
-Working on letter sounds with Gabe
-Researching how to get Gabe's birth certificate

Busy, busy, busy

2011-05-05T18:24:00.000-07:00

Today has been very productive! I managed to get the majority of my stockpile put away (all except the stuff I need Rubbermaid boxes for), I have done 3 loads of laundry, got out for a special treat with the kids (we had an apple turnover at Petite Provence), I got to the grocery store to get stuff for lunches for Dan and I even managed to get some time to pamper myself and do a small pedicure :-)

Thank you to everyone who has been praying for my FIL. He was hospitalized in Seattle a couple of weeks ago and found out he was suffering from atrial fibrillation. This is where the top portion of the heart doesn't actually beat, it kinda flutters. He came home and met with a cardiologist. They were saying it would possibly take years to get him to a point where they might be able to shock his heart. During Easter, he didn't seem like himself. He is a VERY social person, but he had been laying down and when he did visit, he got winded very easily. It was hard for Dan and I to see him like this. A few days later, we got an email late in the evening saying that he had been hospitalized again, due to tightness/pain in his chest and that it was hard for him to breathe. The doctors started messing with his medication and at one point his heart rate plummeted. This caused him to be sent to the CICU (Cardiac Intensive Care Unit). While he was there, he got A LOT better! The doctors had run test after test and found that what he was suffering from was probably just a virus, since every result they had coming in to them came back 100% healthy. He was put back into a regular hospital room on Friday (April 29th) and that following Monday his heart was working at a high enough rate to go through the shock procedure! He is currently under strict DR orders to take it easy and build his stamina back up. Praise God for protecting him! We are so thankful to have him back at home and be able to visit. This weekend we are doing one big celebration for Mother's Day, Zoe and Izzy's birthday and Eileen's birthday. It should be a blast to be able to get the whole family together again :-)

Things I'm thankful for:
51. Spending relaxing afternoons with Gabe while Izzy naps
52. Sitting on the bed and reading book after book with the kids and having them point out new things each time (we read Where's Waldo, so we looked for all the crazy things the people in Waldo's world are doing)
53. Leftovers for when I've had a productive day, but am then too tired to cook ;-)
54. Taking time to do things to take care of myself (I'm sure my husband is thankful for this as well :-P)
55. My kiddos randomly saying, "I love you, mommy" :-D

What I'm doing today:
-Folding the last load of laundry I washed
-Vacuuming the house
-Sitting down, putting my feet up, and eating a bowl of ice cream!

My sister (blog)

2011-05-04T21:30:00.000-07:00

I started up a new blog today. At first I wanted it to be all about couponing, but then I felt a tug at my heart that it should be a place where I can share how God has been working in our lives and how we are trying to steward those blessings. The URL for the blog is:

www.stewarding456.blogspot.com

Things I'm thankful for:
46. A working washer and dryer!
47. Gabe and Izzy being such diligent workers with me today. The baby's room is almost done!
48. My father in law is home from the hospital and doing great :-D
49. Being able to see how God works in our lives and has kept us afloat through these 6 years
50. Snuggling with my kiddos in bed when I'm not quite ready to wake up. They come in and nestle in close and scratch my back or just look into my eyes. I love it!

What I did today:
-Washed an abundance of clothing/towels
-Vacuumed the house. This last visit from the exterminator seems to be working so far (hooray!)
-Unpacked some boxes in the baby's room. Things are starting to come together in there. Now all I need is a rug and a crib and we are set
-Got dinner prepared at a decent hour! Chicken chili and blueberry bread... YUM!

Habit 2 of a happy mother

2011-05-02T19:52:00.001-07:00

It's no secret that women need friends. Some women think they only need a select few. Maybe you are able to function like that. I know that as I have progressed into different stages in life, the need for friendship has become more apparent. There is only so much you can rely on your husband or boyfriend for. It has been said on many occasions that if you try to put everything into your relationship with your spouse, not only will it strain that relationship, but women will find discontentment as well. Let's face it, while our husbands can be a vital confidante in our life, they really cannot replace a close girlfriend that understands what you are going through as a wife/mother/woman.

Dr. Meeker states that the second habit we need in our lives is to maintain key friendships. When we are younger, friendship can be an easy thing to maintain because our lives are so simple. As we grow older and add more to our plate, it is VERY easy to let any friendships slip away. Then, when we look around and realize we are alone, we often wonder, "What happened?" Another issue we can have as women is, as I stated before, we can try to fulfill our relationships through our marriage or children (a very dangerous path to start walking down). Meeker also states that even if we are able to double up and have a friendship with our coworkers, it can become a strain because of the competition of trying to get ahead, which can damage the relationship.

Many times, especially as a SAHM, it is very easy to become lonely due to the fact that we "don't have time for friends". Usually, when this loneliness sets in, we begin to question ourselves and start believing that we are unlikable or even unlovable. When women feel this way, we begin to coil back and close ourselves off even more, which then makes us feel more lonely (can you see how dangerous this cycle could be?). The voices in our head (and I'm sure this message is Satan trying to plant a seed within our minds) say, "Avoid book clubs because you don't have anything to add. Avoid playgroup because those mothers stay at home with their kids and are better mothers." It is essential to fight these thoughts and feelings and realize that we are worthwhile and have something to give! Friends are a necessity, not a luxury.

Dr. Meeker talks about how we need to find our tribe. In a tribe, the women stick together to help run households and take care of children. In this day and age this would be the equivalent of driving each other kid's where they need to go, watching each other's kids so we can go to doctor appointments or quickly run to the grocery store, coming over to help with housework or bring food when we have a new baby, being there to knock some sense into us when our marriages get hard and we want to give up, allowing us to call them late at night when tragedy hits home, being there when our parents fall ill, and so on.

How to make the habits stick:
1.Have an inner and outer circle of friends
The inner circle of friends are usually few in numbers (2-4). They could come from family or friends who have been around long enough to have seen us at our worst, know our worst secrets, love us despite that last 10 pounds that sticks around after our last baby and best of all... THEY DON'T CARE! They have an insane amount of patience for us and can help bring us back to reality/knock some sense into us when we think our life is tough. Inner circle friendships are based on trust, maturity and faithfulness, much like a marriage. However, you must be sure that these friendships are not one-sided. Both friends must fulfill each other. It might seem like these friendships are some we just happen upon, but they really take work! You must make that phone call, even if you're too tired. You must make the effort to learn what the other person needs in a time of happiness, sadness, anger, etc.

Outer circle friends are no less valuable, but the are different. They might be the ones you can count on to drive your kids to various activities or might bring food when we are sick, they also bring laughter and comfort in the ups and downs of life. Usually a woman will have 10 or so of these types of friends. They help us have a sense of belonging in a woman's world, and they don't necessarily have to be mothers themselves. Like inner circle friends, these friendships require work. They will grow weary quickly if they are ignored for too long because they realize they need companionship.

2. Balance the types of friends you choose
You need to make sure that the people you choose as friends can give as well as take (i.e. need what you have to give). It is very easy to get into a friendship in which you can be taken advantage of, especially if you have suffered from chronic loneliness. We must be weary of these type of relationships because they can suck us dry. If you find that you are feeling drained, even when being around friends, it's probably because you are not finding balance within these friendships.

3. Love a friend better than you know how to
Break-ups are not specifically designated for boyfriends. Girlfriends can go through devastating break-ups as well. This can happen for a variety of reasons. There could be unresolved anger or a lack of forgiveness. There are other times when we fail to love our friends because we are selfish or too consumed by our own needs and desires and push others to the back burner. Sometimes women fail to see beyond their own lives and alienate people by not considering another person's needs. It CAN be very hard to love our friends. We need to be willing to make that call, even if it's just for 5 minutes, to catch-up. We need to graciously eat that dinner they brought over and tell them how thankful we were for it. We need to be willing to rearrange our schedules when our friends have a crisis that comes up. We need to speak in our friend's behalf, even if we are in a disagreement with them. We need to be ready to step into her shoes if something happens and she is unable to function at full capacity. We need to be there for her and her children no matter what, because that is what friends do.

Things I'm thankful for:
41. A husband who helps out with the housework
42. Freshly made beds with the pillows fluffed, inviting me to dive into them
43. A beautiful day in Portland (77 degrees, sun shining, snow covered mountain against a bright blue sky)
44. A relaxing day playing with the kids in the backyard
45. Teaching my kids new things (ABCs, simple math, how to add ingredients together to make something delicious)

What I'm doing tonight/tomorrow:
-Making lunch for Dan (special request from him for delicious sandwiches... LOL)
-Paying bills
-Putting away my stockpile in my cupboards
-Finding a place that sells dry ice... anyone have any ideas?

Habit 1 of a happy mother

2011-04-29T12:32:00.000-07:00

I've been reading a book called "The 10 Habits of Happy Mothers" by Dr. Meg Meeker. I first heard of said book on the Dave Ramsey show. I haphazardly listened as she began and Dave began their back and forth repertoire until I heard the title of the book. I listened as she began to go through the list that promised to make me happier in my motherly life. I decided to give it a look and put it on hold a the library. I picked it up a few weeks ago and yesterday I started reading it. I made it through the first and second habits and am looking forward to what else she talks about.

Habit 1 is "Understanding Your Value as a Mother". She talks about how in our society, all women compare themselves to each other. We obsess about not being thin/pretty/rich/organized enough. She talks about how this has become the "American way". If you have a sense in who you are, you are considered a snob. Apparently it's better to think you aren't worth anything in our society, which is a crying shame! We need to recognize that we, as mothers, serve a huge role within the family. True, doing laundry all day, changing dirty diapers, sweeping up cracker crumbs and constantly cleaning up toys is not a glamorous job, but it is necessary to keep a household running. There is also SO MUCH MORE to being a mom! Kids need theirs moms to be listeners, to discipline and to comfort them. Dr. Meeker even goes so far as to say, "They even need us to do the menial, boring chores for them because, while these feel trite to us, they communicate to our kids that when it comes to caring for them, no task is unimportant." They need us for the big things and even the little things.

Dr. Meeker also believes that no matter how you run your life (SAHM or workaholic), each woman is called to a higher purpose. We all have special gifts that can be used inside or outside of the house. Many women use their gifts only in the house, and that's fine, but plenty of women are able to go outside the home and affect the world in some small way, whether this is working an outside job or even doing some hobby that makes you happy. We all have unique gifts and abilities, but using them outside of parenting is never more important that being a mother; it's just different.

Dr. Meeker is a pediatrician and she says that in her 25 years of working in this field, she notices that many mothers easily overlook how their kids look at them. She feels she has an unbiased sneak peek into the view kids have towards the moms. They get excited when we praise them, they want to make up after we have scolded them, they will cry with us over our hurt, laugh with us at a joke and we can even make them want to pull out their hair when we are stubborn with them! She notices that our children's body language can change when we walk into the room. They relax and feel safe once again. She knows that each of us strive to be an excellent mother, but that we don't give ourselves enough credit. Our kids don't care if we are tall/skinny/organized/a great chef/etc. They just want US!

If you happen to be one of the moms who completely get this, there is a warning that Dr. Meeker also puts out. We need to make sure that in our understanding of our value, we need to have humility. Being humble doesn't mean discounting yourself, but it does mean that we understand that one person's worth is relative to another person's. Everyone has equal value. Even if you disagree with someone who works outside the home, they are still an equal asset in their family as you are to yours. When we are humble, we have extraordinary freedom. If we limit ourselves by lowering our abilities, are unable to admit to our personal strengths and gifts and live with false modesty, we lower all mothers. Just because we are humble, doesn't mean we can't have good self-esteem. Having a healthy self-esteem can buffer us from the hard things in life.

She then has a way for us to "Make the Habit Stick":
1. Make a list
Many women don't know what they are good at, what we can accomplish or what brings us pleasure. It's very easy to focus on the negative (what we'd change about our husbands/children), but she wants you to think of the good and write them down. She then challenges us to ACT on them. By doing this, we can begin to retrain our brain to not allow us to get dragged down. Our feelings can soften and we become emotionally lighter.

2. Live to Impress No One:
It's a fairly simple concept. If you are insecure, you will scour the territory to make sure that you won't look foolish or they will try to do things that they think will impress others. A mother who is comfortable with who she is will then be able to help elevate others. A woman who embraces that deep sense that she is valuable can speak volumes of her self esteem through simple gestures.

3.Write Down What Goes in the Box (and what doesn't)
What will people be thinking as you are put into your final resting place? What is going to be in that box with you? She concludes that the only thing in there with you will be God. He doesn't die, but he's there with you. There is life before our life on earth and life after. At the beginning and end of our life, God is there to accompany us. Because He is always there, we will never be alone or unloved. That is definitely something to celebrate as you ponder your worth.

Things I'm thankful for:
36. A huge pile of clean clothes (even though we have to put them away!) God has provided so much for us :-)
37. I was able to have an hour long conversation with my older brother yesterday. This is a huge deal for me.
38. Beautiful flowers blooming around the neighborhood
39. Having so many resources at my fingertips when I need questions answered
40. Having a son who will ask a million questions until he understands what's in front of him. I love his sense of curiosity :-D

What I'm doing today:
-Packing to head into Gresham
-Made muddy buddies for the first time (didn't really come out like the photo on the box, but they were still good!)
-Clearing out the master bedroom and getting things put away where they go
-Preparing coupons for shopping at Target while in town
-Listening to people yell out, "I'm debt free!" with Gabe (he LOVES listening to the Dave Ramsey show!)

The feeling of finishing a project

2011-04-27T18:39:00.000-07:00

Today has been a fairly productive day. I managed to get myself down to the grocery stores and do a couple of couponing deals. Today I saved 75-80% off my grocery bill. That has become one of my new favorite things! The best part is I saved all that money on stuff we will actually use pretty soon :-P

Over the last week I have been accumulating plenty of groceries to feed the family, but they've not managed to find their way to their home in my cupboards. I guess the other groceries weren't being too friendly? Well, today I decided to surprise Dan and get the majority of stuff put away. The only thing I haven't put away yet is my HUGE bag of mangoes and all the apples I bought. I know myself though... if I put them away somewhere, I'll forget about them or lose the motivation for the project I have put in front of myself. I am planning on using my food dehydrator for the first time and making cinnamon apple chips and dried mango slices. YUM! Now I just have to figure out what a good recipe/time is to leave them in there so they come out and the family wants to eat them :-)

Things I'm thankful for:
31. Having a good support system with family and friends while there are health issues going on.
32. Having Gabe tell me he's too old to take a nap, but then he falls asleep on my shoulder while I listen to the Dave Ramsey show and play a computer game.
33. Having Gabe want to listen to the Dave Ramsey show with me. He's getting so excited about when we can finally yell out, "We're debt free!" (he'll probably be the loudest out of all of us)
34. I married a wonderful man that LOVES me and LOVES our children! He's is such a good companion to me and them :-D
35. Getting to go out on a date with said wonderful husband!

What I've been up to today:
-Putting away groceries/cleaning off counters
-Making coconut chicken curry for dinner. YUM!
-Listening to some great podcasts from Focus on the Family about parenting and marriage
-Getting pumped up for my interview tomorrow!!!

Back into the groove

2011-04-26T09:07:00.000-07:00

Well, in my last post, I put that I was thankful Dan had 9 days left until he came home. He came home 2 days after I last posted! He had known for a week that he would be coming home early. He sure pulled a number on me. When the day came that he would come home, I was far from surprised. By the time he got home, I was a nervous wreck! All day I had been trying to get a hold of him for HOURS and eventually his phone went straight to voicemail. He hadn't told me he wasn't going to be turning his phone off, so this was uncharacteristic of him. Eventually, I allowed my mind to wander to the "what ifs". What if he's just out with the guys and doesn't want his wife harassing him? What if they all decided to go out and then got in a horrific car accident? What if they did something stupid and he's in jail and he's too nervous to call me (yes, I really did think this)?

Another thing that made me so crazy was thinking, "God, I really hope you weren't trying to get me ready for a life without my husband." During the last few weeks, I had to do everything I wasn't used to. I got the oil in the car changed, had to get my brakes checked out, washed dishes (usually Dan does this and I do the cooking), took the garbage out to the street for morning pickup, bathed the kids (again, Dan usually does this since it's hard for me to lean over the bathtub), did all the laundry and actually made sure it got put away and many other things. It gave me a glimpse into how much Dan does for our family and made me appreciate him that much more!

By the time he finally told me what was going on, I was out with some friends watching a movie. A Facebook text came in that he posted that said "0 days. ;-)" (he'd been doing a countdown since the first day. I immediately called him and asked what he was talking about. He said, "Um, I'm at your parent's house right now. Where are you?" When we finally met up at the theater, I fell apart! It was SO good to hold him in my arms and to know that he was safe! I also had to tell him, "This is not a joke you want to play on a woman who is 7 months pregnant!" HAHA :-)

So, now we are a family of 4.5 again! Things are great! Dan has jumped back into his role as dad, husband and provider with such ease, it's almost like he was never gone. The kids have been having a great time playing board games with him and telling him about all the adventures we had while he was gone. Gabe is excited to take him up to the "park on the hill" (the one that is too big for me to take the kiddos by myself), to take him up to the museum and show him all the fun things we did and even go out geocaching again. Izzy is thankful to have another person to have cuddles with. It's hard with mom's tummy pushing her out of the way a bit, so having daddy home is a huge blessing to her and fills her love tank so it's overflowing. It's also nice for mom to have the second half of the parental unit back. It's a lot easier for me to not lose my cool having someone back me up with the kids and they know we mean business!

Things I'm thankful for:
26. Having my husband back home!
27. An upcoming interview that may allow me time out of the house each week, but also allows for on-site childcare (so the kiddos won't be too far away!)
28. A stockpile of cereal for late night cravings
29. 2 working cars that can get Dan and I from point A to point B
30. A loving, generous family that will put us up for the night when we come to visit

What I'm doing today:
-HUGE amounts of laundry to get Dan stocked up for this next week at work
-Taking the kiddos to play with their new friend Faithlynn
-Heading to the grocery store for lunch stuff
-Preparing for my couponing excursion later this week

Speaking of couponing, I was debating on whether or not I should start posting deals I've taken advantage of on here. Or maybe I should start a sister blog and post deals over there. What do you guys think?

Catch-up

2011-04-21T09:49:00.000-07:00

Today is now a day of catch-up. Last night I went to bed not feeling so well. Still not feeling great, but doing a lot better. Last night is one of the nights I'm glad Dan can't see what I'm up to while he's gone. I left a sink full of dishes, haven't run any laundry and kid's toys laying all over the place. On the bright side, I did the majority of stuff from my list yesterday. I filled out the second application for that job, I watched some Scrubs and played some Solitaire and I even read a chapter in my book that's going back to the library. Even though I didn't do much, I feel accomplished ;-)

Things I'm thankful for:
21. Waking up to the laughter of my kids playing together
22. Overhearing Gabe try and teach Izzy about different things
23. 9 days until Dan is home!!!
24. Finally realizing how much budgeting makes your life easier!
25. A well running vehicle that gets me where I need to go

What I'm doing today:
-Washing/folding/putting away laundry
-Vacuuming the house
-Taking the kids out to the "slide park" to enjoy the sun
-Finishing up dishes!

Also, for anyone keeping track, I'm coming home this weekend. If you want to get together, let me know :-)

At a stand still

2011-04-20T19:22:00.001-07:00

Today started off as a productive day. We got up and I filled out my application for the massage therapist job. We then went to our friend's house and the kiddos played well into the afternoon while she and I talked couponing, husbands, small town life, etc. When we got home, however, my body shut down :-( I have not been feeling very well for quite a few hours now. I am a little achy and my stomach is feeling nauseous. To make matters worse, I haven't done anything on my to-do list. I guess everyone needs a break every now and then, right? I'm hoping that with some rest tonight, I will start feeling better.

Things I'm thankful for:
16. Kids who are able to entertain themselves for a while so that mommy can lay down
17. Easy dinners that make everyone in the family happy (breakfast for dinner again!)
18. Blooming friendships with a really great gal who understands what I'm going through
19. Talking to my husband after a long day and getting out all of the information I've been accumulating
20. Hot showers!

What I'm doing today:
-Filled out an application for the massage therapist job (already being reviewed. That was fast!)
-Going to fill out an application for the lead massage therapist job
-Taking it easy as soon as kiddos are in bed (Scrubs, here I come!)
-Possibly finishing a book that needs to get back to the library

Met the midwife (and other happenings)

2011-04-19T18:31:00.000-07:00

I had my first baby doctor appointment out here. I decided with this birth I wanted to go with a midwife. My midwife was really nice! She was very friendly and informative and had answers to all the questions I threw at her. From the sounds of it, I think I'm going to like giving birth in a smaller town. She said that each of the doctors really make an effort to deliver their own patients. However, there is the chance (obviously) that could not happen, so they make it a point to have you at least meet each of the other doctors in the office so you aren't faced with a stranger come labor day. She also informed me that because they do not have a huge central monitoring system running in each of the rooms, they are constantly having face to face time with their patients as they check their progression. It sounds like it will be a very positive experience :-)

Today has also been a hard, but interesting day. I'm starting to feel very worn on my nerves with Dan being gone for so long. We are halfway through and I'm starting to see a glimmer of the light at the end of the tunnel. However, I am going CRAZY being here! I have started becoming friends with a gal whose husband works with Dan, so that definitely helps. She also has a little girl who is 2, so the kids have fun playing together. However, there is only so much child interaction I can have before my mind is going to explode! I miss being able to go out with my friends. I miss being able to go to a DR appt without the kiddos because my babysitters are right down the street. I miss being able to take a minute to breathe without hearing, "AHHHH! MOOOOOOOOOOOMMMMMMMMYYYYYYYY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!" I'm very much looking forward to heading back to my folk's house to spend Easter with them.

On a brighter note, I got some interesting news from one of my old teachers. He was telling me he knew of a job opportunity out here. The hospital here has opened a wellness spa (I had no idea they were affiliated). My teacher told me they are looking for a part-time massage therapist. I am really thinking of applying for this position! I went and looked at the job postings to read about it and found that they are also looking for a LEAD massage therapist! This person would be in charge of training new therapists who come in on techniques, services, etc. I think this would be a great position! I was really wanting to go back to my school to teach a class or two, but couldn't because we knew we were going to be moving. I have known that in some way or another, I really wanted to teach something about massage to someone else. I'm going to be praying hard about this and I hope that whoever is reading this will, too. Dan is all for me finding anything to do while we are here, so he is being very supportive. Now it's just a matter of everything falling into place :-)

Things I'm thankful for:
11. A sweet little boy that yearns to spend time with his mama (even when it's not the most convenient for me)
12. Beautiful blue skies, even when it's still only 50 degrees outside
13. Quails running through our yard every morning and every evening
14. A healthy pregnancy!
15. My house is FINALLY starting to come together

My to-do list has been helpful with keeping me on track. Giving myself only a few things to do makes it SO much more manageable. I did 4 more loads of laundry, did some more dishes, vacuumed, and got some stuff up on the walls/boxes unpacked!

What I'm doing today:
-Went to my first DR appt
-Do a few more loads of laundry
-Get the kid's clothes put away in their dresser

Mmmm... Sunshine!

2011-04-18T09:14:00.000-07:00

At 7 am, the sun was glaring into my room! Not particularly my favorite time of the day, so that's why I promptly went back to sleep after cuddling Izzy next to me :-)
Now, it's 9 am and I'm ready to greet the day. Things around here are going good. I'm slowly starting to restore order to the house, the weather has been great for getting outside and playing with the kids, and there are less than 2 weeks before Dan comes home! On the downside, the fleas are still lingering! However, with Easter coming up, I'm going to be visiting family for a few days, so I can easily be gone so the exterminator can come back in :-)

Things I'm thankful for:
6. A roof over my head
7. Being able to cook a delicious meal for my family and enjoying doing it
8. Awesome friends that are there for me
9. Still living in the pacific NW
10. Having my kiddos love to play together

I was looking at my "to-do" list from the last post and I'm pretty proud of myself. I didn't finish the laundry like I wanted to, but I did get through 4 loads with at least that many more to do. It's hard to get it all done when there's really no place to put it to be a part of the family. We still don't have a couch, which I'm glad for since we have the flea issue, so it all goes on my bed when it's dry. I don't like separating myself from the kids for too long to do chores, so I really can only fold it after they go to bed. Plus, with the plumbing in the house, I can't run the washer and the dishwasher at the same time or nothing will get clean (there's absolutely NO water pressure in the kitchen), so that eats up more time, too. Wow, really nice justification here, huh? Maybe I should've been a lawyer :-P Either way, I still did the dishes, organized my coupons, took the kids to the Discovery Center and did 4 loads of laundry. I'm pretty proud of the progress I made :-)

What I'm doing today:
-Getting the kids outside. Either to play at the park or just out in the backyard (then I can do some gardening!)
-Doing more laundry
-Unpacking some more boxes
-Continuing the daily vacuuming (that has become my life) in order to pick up any more dead flea carcasses

1000 gifts

2011-04-16T09:43:00.000-07:00

One of my friends has a blog and her post from today challenged others to start creating a list of 1000 things they are thankful for. You can find her blog here (http://murphfamilyadventure.blogspot.com/)

In today's culture, it is far to easy to let pessimism creep its way into our lives and lose sight of the little things that make life so awesome. I know that it's easy for me to do this, which I now find strange since everyone used to groan at me for being the eternal optimist in high school. I'm hoping that if I turn my heart towards thankfulness, I can start to recover some of that annoying quality ;-)

1. Having a generous husband that works his butt off so I can stay home with our kids
2. Adding another blessing to our family (due to appear in June!)
3. Having the flea infestation at our new house under control
4. Starting to understand this couponing thing... and I'm LOVING the savings that go along with it!!!
5. Sharing things with my kids from my childhood, and having them love it, too

I will be trying to post 4-5 things each time I get on to add a new post. I also really liked my friend's idea of writing down a few things you are going to do that day. She has done this to help keep her motivated to just get it done instead of putting it off until later. I think this will help me begin to get back into a routine. It has been very hectic the last few months. We have moved out of our old place, in with my folks while Dan was gone during the week for work, moved into our new place, been gone a few days at least every week due to the flea infestation and the bombings that go along with it and now Dan is gone in NY for 3 weeks doing training for is new job. I really need to get back in a routine, especially with the baby being due in the next few months...

What I'm doing today:
-Taking the kids to the Discovery Center
-Washing/folding/putting away laundry that has been accumulating from all the flea bombings and our move
-Organizing my coupons to get ready for any sales next week
-Washing the HUGE pile of dishes that are currently glaring at me from the sink (I miss Dan)

Dinner plan 1/16/11 to 1/22/11

2011-01-16T18:23:00.000-08:00

Sunday January 16:
*Lasagna
*Salad
*Garlic bread

Monday January 17:
*Chicken cordon bleu
*Sauteed broccoli
*Dinner rolls

Tuesday January 18:
*Meatloaf
*Mashed potatoes and gravy
*Sauteed zucchini
*Birthday cake!!! (For Dan)

Wednesday January 19:
*No dinner to cook tonight. Our bible study at church has family dinner each night before class!

Thursday January 20:
*Pita pocket sandwiches

Friday January 21:
*Stir-fry veggies and chicken
*Whole grain rice

Saturday January 22:
*Leftovers (Another really easy night of the week!)

"Keeper recipes" from last week:
Chicken Parmesan
Ingredients
1 cup flour
2 eggs, lightly beaten
1/2 cup breadcrumbs
1 cup grated Parmigiano-Reggiano, divided
1/4 cup chopped parsley (about a handful)
2 tablespoons chopped oregano (about half a palmful)
Salt and freshly ground black pepper
8 chicken breast cutlets, about 1 1/2 to 2 pounds
5 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil (EVOO), divided, plus additional
3 to 4 cloves garlic, chopped
1 teaspoon crushed red pepper flakes
1 small, yellow-skinned onion, finely chopped
1 28-ounce can fire-roasted diced tomatoes, such as Muir Glen brand
1 cup chopped fresh basil (about 2 handfuls), plus additional for garnish
1 cup shredded mozzarella
Yields: 4 servings

Preparation
Preheat broiler.

Set up three dishes on your countertop: Fill one with the flour, one with the eggs, and the other with a mixture of the breadcrumbs, half the grated cheese, herbs, salt and pepper.

Place a large skillet over medium-high heat with 3 turns of the pan of EVOO, about 3 tablespoons. While the pan is heating up, season the chicken cutlets with salt and freshly ground black pepper, and coat each one in the flour, then in the egg, and lastly in the cheesy breadcrumbs.

Once the oil is hot, cook the chicken cutlets until golden brown and cooked through, 3-5 minutes per side depending on how thick they are. Cook them in two batches, transferring the cooked cutlets to a paper towel-lined plate while the others, adding more oil to the pan between batches if need be.

While the chicken is cooking, place a medium-size pot on the stove over medium heat. Add 2 tablespoons EVOO, 2 turns of the pan. Add garlic, crushed red pepper flakes and chopped onion. Cook 5-6 minutes, stirring often, until the veggies have softened. Add the tomatoes and heat them through, about 2 minutes. Remove the pot from the heat and stir in the basil, then season the sauce with salt and freshly ground black pepper.

Layer the chicken with the sauce in a casserole dish. Top the casserole with the remaining grated Parmigiano and mozzarella. Brown the chicken parm casserole under the broiler until the cheese has melted and is lightly golden brown, about 3 minutes. Garnish with some chopped basil before serving.

Changes

2011-01-16T17:58:00.000-08:00

I've been on a kick for the last few weeks. The sudden change in behavior could be construed as a "New Year's resolution", but I know if I call it that, I'll probably give up on it. I'm really hoping this can continue, as it has been making life just that much easier!

The change I'm talking about is I've put a meal plan in place. The first few weeks I tried to do all three meals, but found that I never stuck too rigorously to it, especially because if Dan got up with the kids before me he'd just give them whatever he saw first.

So, now I'm mainly focusing on dinner. Let's be honest... Dinner is one of those meals that, at the end of a long day, no one wants to think about making, but it's supposed to be the most sustainable. Having an idea at the beginning of the day of what you're going to cook and being able to pull it out without having to frantically defrost something has made it a much less stressful endeavor.

The other upside to having a dinner plan for the week is, with the pregnancy, I'm still not 100% and it seems to be rearing its ugly head later on in the day. With stuff pulled out, I can then ask Dan to get it started (especially the stinky parts that kill my nose like chopping onions... Thanks, honey!)

We are now also able to take stock of our groceries and see what all we need for the next week. This does include any food I think we might need for breakfast and lunch, but at least I know I'll have everything necessary for my meals at dinner :-) This has been making for much smaller shopping trips and I'm pretty sure we're spending less money since we are now only getting things on our list.

My goal now is to try and keep a running post of what meals we have done and will do. I want to try at least one new recipe per week (if money will allow for possibly more "exotic" groceries) and I'd like to share all the keepers we find :-)

Baking spree!

2010-10-01T13:08:00.001-07:00

Gonna work on some stuff to get through all the zucchini, apples and pears that I have around the house.

1. Canned apple pie filling and apple slices
2. Canned applesauce
3. Pear butter
4. Autumn apple chocolate cake
5. Free form apple tart
6. Chocolate zucchini bread
7. Chocolate chip zucchini bread
8. (Just for fun) Pumpkin spice muffins

Gonna be a lot of work, but we'll have some good baked treats to last a while :-)

Wyoming or bust!

2010-09-23T08:48:00.001-07:00

Essential oils

2010-09-19T20:08:00.000-07:00

During my time in massage school, I also took a complimentary course of spa therapies. The first couple of classes offered were about essential oils. Throughout my training, I learned the bare minimum, not really caring as I wasn't too sure about how oil from flowers/grasses/roots/etc could help the human body.

After graduation, I began to become a little more in touch with natural remedies. I began to think that for centuries, people would be healed from various illnesses, often through the wildlife that surrounded them. I started using different oils from my kit to add to cleaners because of their disinfecting qualities.

A few months ago, I began sorting through baby clothes. I kept quite a few with the hopes of making a memory quilt for each of my kids. I got out my cutting mat and rotary cutter and began going at all of the clothes. I got about halfway through my project when I began to get a little tired. I took a short break and was trying to sort through everything I'd just worked on. Right when I picked up a piece of clothing, my finger barely bumped the rotary cutter. I looked down and could see that it got cut pretty deep. I sum it up to cutting the tip of your finger with a knife. It's in that really bad spot that every time you use it, it splits open *shudder*.

It didn't start bleeding right away, so I thought that maybe I'd try some essential oils on it. I knew there were some that were supposed to help eliminate scar tissue, so I started looking through my journal of oils. I came across an oil called Helichrysum and remembered talking about it a lot in class.

You can read more about it here
http://www.naturesgift.com/essential/helichrysum-essential-oil.htm

I put on a few drops neat (straight from the bottle, not diluted with a carrier oil) on the cut and covered it with a bandage. I was amazed that I wasn't experiencing pain! Helichrysum is an analgesic, which means it is a pain reliever. I also used Roman Chamomile later on that evening as a pain reliever (because Helichrysum is a more expensive oil to get), and it worked amazing, too!

The next morning I decided to check out my cut. I took off the bandage and was blown away by what I saw. My wound was completely closed up and there were no traces of blood! I wasn't experiencing any pain and even when I bent my finger it was like I hadn't even cut it open. At this point I was interested to see if it would work again. Weeeeell....

Tonight I was cutting some stuff up in the kitchen. The tip of my pinky got grazed by the tip of the knife and I got a small cut. I decided to try out some helichrysum again. I put a couple of drops on the cut, covered it with a bandage and all I could do was wait. Well, I'm not so patient with waiting, so I started surfing the internet. However, my bandaged pinky was hitting multiple keys, so I decided to air out my wound and see how it was doing. I swear up and down and across, 2 hour later, my cut is completely closed up and there is very little evidence that anything happened!

I am now a firm believer in the power of essential oils! I even want to start a healing garden when we get settled again so that I can maybe begin to distill my own oils. That's probably a while down the road, but I look forward to it! I'm very interested in pursuing natural healing classes and possibly even becoming a naturopath or aromatherapist. Who knows where this could lead me!!

Psalm 34:18

2010-07-29T14:17:00.001-07:00

"The Lord is close to the brokenhearted and saves those who are crushed in spirit."

Today has been a very hard day. It started out like any other... Trying to get errands done while Dan is home and before the kid's nap. Plus, the sun is shining. Not much better than that. I got a wild hair the other day to create a memory blanket out of some of the kid's baby clothes. It has been kinda hard to cut up the clothes that my children had worn when they were completely dependent and tiny. Today, it was really difficult.

Gabe didn't have that many newborn sized outfits, but Izzy did. I think that's the part that has been hurting so much. For those who do not know, I have now had 3 miscarriages. My last one was in April. Yes, I have 2 very healthy and happy kids, but Dan and I had always talked about having 3-4 total. I am going through many emotions: Confusion, anger, sadness, etc. I am so confused as to why God has decided to allow me to get pregnant, but not carry. I am also struggling with anger towards Him. I am beginning to feel a little hopeless. I also feel a little guilty. Guilty because my body has not been able to bless my husband with any more children. Dan continues to encourage me to not give up on trying to have more children. I have to remind myself that all of this is in God's hands. If we have more children, I will be ecstatic. If we are only blessed with the 2, I can become resolved in the happiness that they give me.

The other thing that hit me today is, although I may not have met those 3 other children in a worldly sense, I will be able to see them up in Heaven. Those unnamed, unmet babies will be waiting for me up in Heaven with God looking out for them. I will be able to hug them and tell them how much I have loved them. All of us will be reunited someday, and that is a very encouraging thought.

I just came across another verse, thanks to my BIL and SIL, that really resonated in my heart:

"'For I know the plans I have for you,' declares the Lord. 'Plans to prosper you, and not harm you. Plans to give you hope and a future.'" Jeremiah 29:11

If anyone is reading this, please pray that I will not be angry and that I can trust in God's plan for my life. Please pray that I will not be impatient and that I will enjoy my children as fully as possible.

waiting... and praying!

2010-05-13T17:14:00.001-07:00

Yesterday I took my practical for my license. Pretty excited to be done with it, but also nervous. I'm trying not to think too much about it. I was told I would hear from them anywhere from within a week to a month. Kinda a big gap, but my days are full no matter when it is, the time should fly by.

I've also started being a TA for a kinesiology class at my school. I'm very excited about this! Kinesiology (the study of movement in the muscles) was the subject I thought I would dread, but it turns out that I absolutely LOVED it. It's very hard, though, because we have over 30 people in the class and it doesn't seem like there is enough time to cover everything and answer all the questions. I've volunteered to help people get caught up and I hope they will take advantage of this. My end game is that I would love to eventually get into a class and be a teacher in this subject.

I do have to say, life has been pretty crazy these last few weeks. I have definitely felt a growth in my relationship with the Lord since starting school. I think it has a lot to do with the fact that I am doing what He has planned for my life and I am trusting in Him to show me which direction I need to go. It's not only been regarding my schooling that I have felt him, however. Dan has recently been laid off and we were told that he wasn't going to be able to collect unemployment. The other day it got really hard and it was really weighing on my heart. I was driving out to my friend's house to study for my state test and I felt the urge to pray. I began to cry out to God that I really needed to feel Him and needed to know He was watching out for us. I also prayed that I would have the strength to trust that He knew what He was doing with our lives right now. When I got home, Dan told me they still have his claim open and we may be able to get some unemployment after all. This was great news! We are still waiting to hear what comes of all of this, but it's moments like that where I know God is watching out for our family and has His hand upon our lives and our family :-)

I remain faithful that He will continue to guide us as some HUGE decisions come up in the near future. Should we all relocate? Would it be better for Dan to travel? Which area should Dan focus on in his new career? Will I end up being able to teach? Which classes should I take to help shape my career?

If anyone is reading this, prayer would definitely be appreciated. Not only for the current situation we are in, but wisdom that we will remember to listen to God as we head into the future :-)

Goals

2010-03-25T09:28:00.001-07:00

I'm so ready to be done with the chaos that I feel is all around me! Having been in school over the last year, I was always busy trying to do homework, make time for friends, meet my quota of massages needed during the week, taking care of the kids and studying for tests that I completely ignored the house and everything that was piling up around me... I wouldn't say that I never did anything around the house, but other things took priority so I did the BARE minimum of what I needed to do (and even then sometimes that didn't get met).

Now that I'm out of school, I'm starting to feel like I'm at square one and need to begin a routine to regain control. There is always so much laundry that I never feel caught up, our closets are full of things that have been shoved to the side that I now need to go back through and reorganize them all, I have to get back into a routine of trying to make dinner for the whole family and, in general, I think I need to build up my stamina and motivation to get things done.

A few days ago I printed out a "household notebook". The original idea came off of a blog I follow (http://www.passionatehomemaking.com). She writes her blog about trying to live naturally and simply to glorify God and do what He has set out for our lives. It seems like a great idea! You have pages for grocery lists, inventory of things you already have (to save money not buying multiple of things), a central place for addresses/phone numbers, routines for your day, to-do lists, menu plan for the week, schedule of when to do certain chores, etc.

Here's the thing... I have all of the pages printed out, organized in the journal and looking at me with hopeful blank lines, but I'm not motivated to fill it out. The bit of advice that was given with doing this journal was to do it a little at a time, so you're not overwhelmed. Me, I'm not one to really do that. If there is a task that needs to be done, I don't like to do part of it and revisit it later. I'd rather just finish it all in one shot. This is now my challenge for myself. Not only do I want to get this journal in rotation in my life, but I'd like to use this as a stepping stone to get control over the other areas that need me. I'm hoping that I can start to do it before I begin working (especially with Dan going to school, too!)

Anyways, the actual point of this post was to come up with a list of goals for myself:
1. Get chores around the house on a schedule. That way I will only have a few things that need to get done at any given time instead of a house overhaul.
2. Find a balance between my time with the kids, work and household duties. I want to make sure that I'm still able to make dinner so we can continue with our journey to healthy eating.
3. Begin to sort out the chaos that has infiltrated our house. I become very anxious with so much STUFF around the house. I need to find a place for everything and have everything in its place!
4. Start to read the Word on a daily basis. I think part of my anxiety has to do with the fact that I'm out of touch with God. I need to have some sort of daily reading that will help me begin to find peace in my relationship with Him again.
5. Start reading anything else. It has been so long since I've read any books. It's a little ridiculous that Twilight is what got me back into reading (what can I say, they are GOOD books!) I feel like I probably need to start reading something with some sustenance to it.

Well, I'm going to let that be all for now. The nice thing is in my household journal, there is a master goals list, so any time I think of something, I can just write it down :-)

How to sustain our family

2010-03-22T12:44:00.000-07:00

This has been weighing on my mind for a while. I guess it all started when I was watching Oprah of all programs. Dr. Oz was on and he was talking about the top 5 things you should cut out of your diet: High fructose corn syrup, Sugar, Enriched flour, Trans fat and Saturated fat. I'm not saying that I'm perfect and have cut all of these out completely, but we are slowly trying to figure out ways to make the family's diet more healthy.

http://www.dietsinreview.com/diet_column/02/5-things-to-remove-from-your-diet-today/

One of the major changes we've made is not buying pre-packaged chicken nuggets for the kid's lunches. We have been stocking up on chicken and making huge batches and freezing them for when we need them. It's nice to know that the chicken is real (although still probably the cage grown, hormone injected chickens... hoping to buy some chicken shares eventually). I also use store bought bread crumbs, but am hoping to find a good recipe to make my own.

Gabe has really gotten me motivated this year to plant a large vegetable garden. He's always talking about how he wants to help me in the garden and I told him about getting stuff for dinner from outside and he's pumped about it! We went to the store and picked up some seeds. Now I just need to get some wood to build planter boxes to plant everything.

I'm hoping to grow a lot of stuff, but I also am thinking that I'd like to buy huge bushels of tomatoes and apples and begin jarring them. I'm especially wanting to try the tomatoes. I've read a lot of stuff about how the cans aren't good because they can break down and the metal can leach into the food. This can especially happen with tomatoes because of all of the acid. I'd also like to jar peaches, pears, applesauce and maybe learn to pickle a few things.

Another reason I'm hoping to grown our own veggies/fruits is because I'd like to plan on making baby food for any other children Dan and I are blessed with. I tried it once with Izzy, and did a little, but never got too far into it. I'm hoping that if I can find some good recipes, I'll be more motivated. I think I also need to get a food processor. I have one currently, but it only holds 1 1/2 cups, which isn't enough when doing bulk batches.

Not only am I trying to sustain us with our groceries, but I'm also working towards making cleaning products. I cannot believe how much I used to love the smell of a bleach cleaner (because it made me feel like the house was clean). Ever since I was in school, they always made it a point to have us be conscientious about what we are using/what it could be doing to our bodies/what it could be doing for the environment. After not having used that kind of stuff for a while, I went back to try and clean the bathroom and it made me lightheaded and sick! It's amazing in how short of a time your body can reject things like that. I've also been looking at making some natural products for daily cleaning around the house. I have a mild disinfectant and a harsher disinfectant (which I used while everyone was suffering from the flu... and it worked great!) The great thing about it is I can use essential oils to make it smell nice and I feel comfortable using it around the kids.

I'm trying to be realistic about how much I can accomplish at one time, especially since I plan to start working soon. I'm trying to make a list for myself and slowly work down it, one thing at a time instead of overwhelming myself. If anyone has any suggestions, I'd love to hear them :-)

Almost Christmas (and school update)

2009-12-16T08:48:00.000-08:00

I can't believe how fast this month has been flying by. I knew it would, just because of all the hustle and bustle of preparing for the holidays, but I didn't realize it would be even more quick because I'm in school. I just recently started a new mod (another set of classes), and so far it's been pretty great! I was accepted into the cancer clinic which means I get to go and work with patients while they are receiving chemo treatments and we also work with people who have family members at an "end of days" house. I'm also in a business and professional development class, spa and an energy/Eastern theories class. With the dynamic of certain classmates being back together, I have a feeling this set of classes is going to fly by in a whirl and I might not remember too much of it. This is my last mod with some of my classmates and it's a little bittersweet :-(

On a brighter side, I'm doing an ok job getting my gifts made for Christmas. I have 4 people done, but I still need to finish for 6 others! This might be interesting. Thankfully I have next week off, so I can work diligently while the kids are napping. The hard part about making everything is the fact that you have to do the finishing touches like putting a cuff on things to wear, tacking down liners so they aren't moving all over the place, putting on buttons or Velcro, etc... I bet I could employ my husband to help me tie off ends and all of that, just to take a little pressure off myself. Sometimes I feel like I need to remember not to feel like I have to do everything!

Stole this from Beth

2009-12-05T10:19:00.001-08:00

15 things to know about coffee

blogs and photos

2009-10-26T20:54:00.001-07:00

Fellow bloggers/photographers... Here are a couple of websites to help you spruce up your blog or even just some photographs. I'm hoping to get the chance to try them out within the next few weeks. Let me know if you try them out and how you like it :-)

www.scrapblog.com
www.picnik.com

Pumpkins and big kid beds :-)

2009-10-25T20:13:00.000-07:00

Yesterday we went to the pumpkin patch with my mom to get some pumpkins for pie! We went out to Sauvie Island, but I don't remember the name of the one that we went to. It was small, but nice. I found 3 pumpkins for pies for Thanksgiving and the kids had a great time checking out everything and climbing all over a hay stack. Dan also had a great time, as he got paid in an organic locally brewed beer for being our muscle ;-) Also, after getting pumpkins we drove around and checked out the scenery and found a geocache.

Today we decided to take the next step and switch our kids up to their next appropriate bed. That means, Izzy went into Gabe's old toddler bed and Gabe has moved up to a twin bed. I looked at their room after the transition was done and it didn't feel like a little kid room anymore. It felt like there are 2 big kids living in there now... Uh-oh, hope this doesn't mean the baby clock is ticking. I don't think I am quite ready for #3 yet!

On a good note, I am enjoying my time off from school thus far. We've spent the last few days going out as a family. Not to mention that we are actually eating meals together, too! Tonight we ate chicken noodle soup (Izzy is fighting a cold and I think it's great for helping with that). After dinner we watched Finding Nemo and drank hot cocoa! I miss hanging out with my family. All in due time I suppose. I am almost 3/4 of the way done with my program and then I'll have a little down time waiting for the state to license me, so I'll get to spend a bit more time with everyone. I'm hoping that when Dan goes back to school, his classes aren't going to be held as late as mine were. It would be nice to feel like we are on a "normal" schedule while we get re-route our lives this next year.

Peek a boo!

2009-10-25T20:03:00.000-07:00

A huge milestone!

2009-10-23T17:01:00.000-07:00

Gabe pooped IN THE POTTY! Thank goodness! I'm hoping this will be the first of many poops and that the rest of this training is downhill.

As a reward we bought him a fish from the pet store. It's an albino beta that Gabe named.... Fish (go figure!). He is so enthusiastic about feeding it and watching it swim around the pickle jar (um... yeah, we don't have a bowl readily available, so we improvised!) Now we just need to find other bits to keep Gabe motivated with his potty BMs. Any ideas would be welcome :-)

Funny

2009-10-07T10:01:00.001-07:00

Go to Google.com

Type in "Find Chuck Norris"

Hit the "I'm Feeling Lucky" button

Enjoy!

Great video series!

2009-10-04T19:42:00.000-07:00

I saw on another friend's blog a link for a video sermon called The Peasant Princess. This is a series done on the book of Song of Songs. I'd heard of it before, but didn't really know anything about it, so I never gave it another thought. When I came across it again, I thought I might as well check it out since I had nothing else going on. I started out watching the first little bit by myself, but it caught Dan's attention so we have been watching it together!

This is such a good series! It is done by a pastor up in Seattle at Mars Hill Church. Basically he goes through the book and relates it to marriage and how we as Christians shouldn't be afraid of our sexuality. I will say that anyone younger doesn't need to watch this until they are in a place to get engaged or are getting married. I highly believe this series will help benefit married couples!

I'm kinda sad that we are almost done with the series, but I'm also excited. This church has gone through many other books of the bible including: Luke, Proverbs, Titus, Ruth, Nehemiah, 1st Corinthians, Genesis, John, 1st Timothy, 2nd Timothy, Revelation, Ecclesiastes, Habakkuk, Ephesians, and Galatians as whole books. They also have a few other series that dip into multiple books. I'm hoping that the rest of these series will be as good as The Peasant Princess. He poses great questions for couples to ask each other and he breaks down the book to the equivalent of what we would say today so that it is easy to understand.

If any one else is interested in checking it out, you can go to http://peasantprincess.com/ or you can visit the church's website and check out the rest of their online sermons at http://www.marshillchurch.org/

Advent conspiracy

2009-09-30T15:57:00.000-07:00

I've come to the resolve that I'm definitely thinking I'm going to try and make as many of our Christmas gifts this year as I possibly can. I'm hoping that I won't get too overwhelmed by trying to do all of it while also being in school full-time, but, thankfully, I'm down to 5 weeks mods, with a week break after. Hopefully I can get a lot of sewing/knitting/crocheting done in those times. I'm also hoping Dan will be willing to give me time on the weekends to work towards this goal.

Other ways I'm hoping to put forth more time by volunteering to help out at the church with Christmas stuff. They have a dessert thing, so I'm hoping I'll be able to either make some food or volunteer for set-up or something. I also know that there will be our annual giving tree at the church and I'd like to take some of the money we use to buy gifts for our family and bless another family this year.

Something else that I think would be kinda great to give to is Living Water. As it said in the video, it would only take $10 billion to give the ENTIRE WORLD clean drinking water. A far fraction from the $460 billion American's spend on Christmas EVERY YEAR! (um, can you say consumerism?) On their website it stated that it only takes $1 to give clean water to one person every year. Do you think you could sacrifice that much? I know I could! I'm hoping Dan and I can start up a fund within our home to raise at least $50 (probably even more) to give to them this year. If you'd like to contribute, let me know. This would be a great thing to get rolling :-)

86 days until Christmas

2009-09-28T12:44:00.000-07:00

I'm not trying to freak anybody out by putting a ticking timeline on how quickly the holidays will be approaching. I just wanted to get out the message to everyone of something that I am interested in partaking in again this year.

For the past few years, my heart has hurt as I saw how horribly commercial Christmas was. I've been wanting to make sure that I raise my kids to understand that Christmas is not about how much/how expensive their gifts are. I want to make sure they understand that Christmas is a time to recognize that Jesus came to the Earth to begin his journey to the cross for us.

Last year, my church showed a video for something called the Advent Conspiracy. I don't know if many of you have heard about this, but basically it is a challenge to everyone to make Christmas less about presents and make it more about PRESENCE. Buy less, give more, volunteer, etc. I tried to do as much as I could with the skills I had. I had a great time making as many of the gifts that I gave people as I could. This year, I'm hoping to do it again and even focus more on spending time with the kids and volunteering with the needs at the church.

I put this before you, not that you have to stop buying presents all together, but try to buy even ONE less gift than you normally would. Volunteer your time/energy to help those around you. If you are going to give gifts, put your time/energy into making them for another person!

Thanks for taking the time to read this and maybe even watch the video. I'd love to hear if anyone else decides to participate in this. Let me know what you will be doing :-D

Almost half done...

2009-08-31T21:03:00.000-07:00

*sigh* I'm almost half done with school! I cannot believe how this time has flown by. Suffice to say, I am ready for my week break that will be coming up very soon. Thankfully the house is pretty clean because we had company over the other night, so that means I won't have a complete overhaul to do. School is going good. Still staying on top of my classes and being the "overachiever", but I'm ok with people harassing me about it. I'm working my butt off to make sure I am understanding everything. It feels kinda good to have my classmates come to me needing help with homework or understanding certain things we are studying.

The kids are doing really good, too. Izzy is all over the place and is definitely her mother's daughter. She's starting to get an attitude on her which my mom says is reminiscent of when I was a baby. Hm... I honestly don't see the correlation :-P She is getting into that phase where
she pretends she doesn't hear you telling her "No" and just keeps doing whatever it was she's doing. Kinda frustrating, but still cute at the same time. She's babbling a lot more like she wants to talk full sentences to us. She says "Hi" "Bye-bye" and she'll sometimes say "Gabe". She loves her big brother and tries to keep up with him, doing the things he does. Whenever he is sitting on the couch, she crawls up there and sits down right next to him and just grins :-) Thankfully it doesn't bother Gabe too much right now. My hope is that they will be friends and look out for each other.

Gabe is becoming such a smart cookie. He's starting to learn the sounds the letters make, which I hope will soon turn to reading. He's getting better with his numbers, too. Dan will use one hand and randomly stick up fingers and have Gabe say how many he is holding up. Gabe, too, is starting to talk a lot more. He starts to ask questions about why things are the way they are andif that situation comes up again he'll explain things to me. He follows suit in trying to boss Izzy around. If she starts doing something he knows she's not supposed to he'll say, "No, no, no, no Izzy" just like I do. Also, when I tell Gabe we are going to do something he'll say, "We'll see, mommy. We'll see." Can't believe that kid is almost the right age to attend preschool. Yikes! Where in the world has the time gone?

So, here are some photos of what we've been up to a little this month. Some are from playing at the park and some are from mine and Dan's 4 year anniversary :-)

We also added a new member to our family. For now I like to call her Ruby Tuesday. No specific reason why. Probably because I told Dan one day we would own a car and name them all for each day of the week. He has the Bronco, named Friday, and now my car is named for Tuesday. There's no specific logic in why they are named for the days they are named, but it's still a fun goal to shoot for :-) The car we bought is a 1965 VW Karmann Ghia. I've always liked those cars and have wanted to own one. The timing was never right before, but since I've been doing so great in school and kicking butt at staying on top of everything, Dan said we could look around for an early graduation present. We found this car randomly and things fell into place, so we made her ours! I'm very much looking forward to fixing her up with Dan and taking her out when we have our date nights (it's only a 2 seater, so the kids aren't allowed).

Things have been very fast paced, but thoroughly enjoyable. I'm hoping that these next few mods at school will go as smoothly as my first half and that I'm still able to stay on top of things. I'm also hoping that I'll get to spend a little more time with the family now that I'm going down to 5 week sessions instead of 6. I vie for the days of being able to work the same hours with Dan and be able to be home with the family in the evenings. All in due time...

Catch-up

2009-06-26T10:43:00.000-07:00

I'm now 1/4 of the way through my program! I ended up my first 12 weeks with a 4.0!!! I'm very excited. I'm hoping that I'll still be able to keep up with my school work and end my year with a 4.0. Things in my classes have been going well. I thoroughly enjoyed my Swedish Massage class and learned a lot in my A&P (anatomy and physiology) and Kinesiology (study of muscles and their movements) classes. It's amazing to learn how complex and amazing the human body is.

Right now I'm in Deep Tissue of the Upper Body, A&P of the Upper Body and Kinesiology of the Upper Body. I had my first taste of deep tissue last night and let me tell you, it was enjoyable, painful and VERY interesting. I've had a spot on my back that has been hurting my since my weight lifting days in high school (what was that, oh, about 9 or so years ago!!!) that I've never really had worked on. When my teacher and my partner (Nickie) were going over the spot last night, I could feel trigger points referring pain up my back and I could feel how tight and sore it really was. The reason I thought my massage was interesting was because as Nickie was going over my back, there were many spots I had no idea needed to be worked so badly. An example would be over my sacral area (the low spot in your back right before your butt). As Nickie and my teacher were rubbing over that, I felt nerve pain shoot down my leg. When I asked my teacher about this he told me it was because the muscles around my sacral nerves needed to be loosened because they were constricting them. It's crazy how when you think there is only one little thing that needs to be taken care of, there are probably 5 more that need to be taken care of as well!

The kids are doing well, too! Gabe has been getting a little 3 year old attitude on him, but he is still such a sweetheart and says the most random things sometimes. Izzy is walking like crazy now. She's not doing it all the time, but she is getting a lot further on each attempt. She is also starting to talk!!! Along with the obvious "Mama" and "Dada" she is also saying "Hi" and has attempted "Bye-bye". Also, when she and Gabe watch Calliou she makes the sounds along with the theme song. My crazy kiddos are growing up :-)

I would post photos here, but Dan has decided to change out our computer and wasn't able to fit our old hard drive in this one, but he's working on it. So, photos to come soon :-)

My big girl :-)

2009-05-27T08:36:00.000-07:00

Yesterday Izzy was all over the place. During a few of the times she was actually staying still she decided to stand up (without holding onto anything) and just hang out. Well, I usually try to get her to move from standing position and she just allows herself to fall over.

When I held my hands out to her, she took 3 steps towards me!!! They weren't the Frankenstein steps followed by a face fall. She actually tried to balance herself after taking each step so she could go further! I'm so proud of my baby, but also kinda sad. It's very bittersweet to have your child depend completely on you and then begin to grow and change so they can do things for themselves. Hurray for Izzy, though. She's becoming such a nice little lady :-)

I'm not dead!!!

2009-05-16T00:08:00.001-07:00

I have been accused of being lazy about keeping up with my blog. Yes, I do admit that it has been a little while since I've last written. Oooookay..... it's been 2 months, but A LOT has happened in that time!

The majority of my free time is spent going to school. I am currently attending 5 days a week from 6 until 10. However, I have to head up to Vancouver with the rush hour traffic, so I actually leave here at 5 at the latest. AND, I'm trying to get some extra credit for my kinesiology class so I head in even earlier, like around 4:30 (try to be there between 5:15 and 5:30) for study group. Right now I'm in my second set of classes which are Anatomy & Physiology and Kinesiology. I've been in these classes for 2 weeks now. My first class was Swedish Massage and I LOVED it! I definitely feel like this is where God has lead me to be. I didn't think I'd enjoy it as much as I am. It felt pretty good to get back into schooling again. It felt even better to finish up my first classes with A's! I ended my first class with a 99%, which I haven't done in any class since high school!

On another note, Izzy turned 1 yesterday!!! Her new tricks include making the sound to give kisses (Mmmmuah!), starting to walk between Dan and I (although it looks more like a trust fall than anything else), putting hats on/taking them off of her head and trying to mimic what we say. We are celebrating her birthday tomorrow with the family. I'll try and get some photos posted soon.

I'll also have to post some of the hike we all went to do last weekend. We went up to Bridal Veil and walked through the whole park and down to the falls. The hike was awesome. It felt so great to get outside and breathe the fresh air. Gabe and Izzy really liked it, too. I think their favorite part was when we stopped in Cascade Lockes at the drive-in burger stand for some ice cream cones. They have the most monstrous cones for such a cheap price. Gabe, Izzy and myself shared one and it was almost too much. Dan and I have been looking forward to the day when we'd be able to take Izzy out for her first ice cream cone. We remembered taking Gabe there when he had his and had thought it would be a nice tradition to take Izzy also. We had started talking about it after she was only a few months old. What can I say? We hold the silly stuff so near and dear :-)

Potty training with Gabe has been progressing slowly. I think the majority of it has to do with me not being consistent all the time. I think Dan forgets to take him potty, too, while I'm gone at school. Anywho, he's at least using the potty when I do remember to take him. He gets so excited and wants to call daddy and tell him, which I think is so cute! As of right now, he's only peeing, but that's better than nothing at all. We've even had a few days when he has told me he needed to go before he wet his pull-up, so that's saying something!

Well, time for bed. I'm going to try and make blogging a priority as it seems to be very therapeutic for my sanity when the kids are asleep. Good night :-)

Updates

2009-03-10T23:58:00.000-07:00

I am REALLY sucking at blogging lately. I guess it doesn't help that our computer won't stay connected to the internet for more than 15-20 minutes at a time. I think Dan has remedied that however.

Life has been going pretty great lately. Izzy is still crawling and standing up all over the place. She is starting to get more gutsy about trying to move between two objects. She'll turn off of the couch and reach out towards my hands and try to walk to me. She is gonna be one happy girl when she is able to get around all by herself. She's almost 10 months and I cannot believe how much she has changed even in this last month. She went from being a lump on a log to being a VERY active little girl. She thoroughly enjoys playing with Gabe and he makes her crack up! She is still a very clingy little monkey to me, especially around bedtime, but since Gabe never liked to cuddle, it's very nice :-)

Gabe is definitely becoming more 3 every day. He still has no desire to use the potty... too many other things that are WAY too important. However, he has started to change his own pull-up when he pees, so I have some hope that he will be ready soon. He's talking even more than usual and is using real sentences. Some of the stuff that comes out of that kid's mouth makes Dan and I look at each other and start laughing. It's amazing to see his mind work as he is trying to figure sentences out. He will say something 3 or 4 times, saying different parts of the sentence until he finally is able to put it together. "I want tacos... I want dinner... I want tacos, dinner... I want to eat tacos for dinner". (That's what we had tonight)

In about 2 weeks, I am going to be heading back to school. I decided to study massage therapy. This was something that I have always wanted to study, but I've put it on the back burner thinking that photography and graphic design were what I was supposed to do. While doing my programs at MHCC, massage therapy had come back across my radar a couple of times, but I didn't pay it any mind because I was already doing another program and I felt like it would have been such a waste of money/time/energy not to finish.

About a month ago, massage therapy got brought back into my attention again and I asked Dan what he thought about me going back to school to study it. He told me it would be fine as long as I really wanted to do it/could picture myself making a career out of it and I would actually follow through with using this degree. I'm very excited about this endeavor! I am hoping that when I am done with school (which will be in a year) I will be able to work 20 hours a week (I found out that 25 is full-time) and still be able to spend a good chunk of time with the kids. It would be great if I could find an afternoon/evening shift so I could be with the kids during the day and Dan could be with them at night. We'll see what happens when I'm done. I'm trying to focus more on the present than looking too far ahead.

Dan and I took a trip out to Baker City for his brother's very last basketball game. He attends Portland Lutheran and they made it to state. I guess this was one of the only times the school has ever made it within the top 10. They placed 6th, which was great! While we were driving through the gorge, Dan and I were looking at how many of the wind turbines are placed out there, especially when we got near The Dalles. I was joking with Dan that when I am done with school I should get a job as a masseuse at Google and he should work on the turbines. To my surprise he told me he has been doing some research and is thinking he'd really like to do that :-o We're going to wait until I am done with school to see if we'd be able to get Dan in the RET program. The only one that is in state is in The Dalles, so we're gonna have some decisions to make!

Anywho, that's what's going on with us these days. I will try and post some photos soon of the kids. I really need to try and keep up more!

Izzy is becomig a big girl!

2009-02-18T18:45:00.000-08:00

Today after Izzy was up from her nap, we went in to get her and found this:

Later tonight, we found out this wasn't just a fluke:

I should probably also mention that she is now officially crawling on hands and knees and has mostly given up the army crawl. I swear, she starts to learn one thing one day, goes to bed and the next day she is able to do whatever she had been trying as if she'd always been doing it!

(sorry the video is so dark... my husband has a thing against artificial light.)

Gabe turns 3!

2009-02-13T09:01:00.000-08:00

Holy cow! Where has the time gone? I cannot believe that on Tuesday we celebrated Gabe's 3rd birthday. I have to say, his birthday was A LOT different than when I had him. I remember the weather being somewhat cold and sunny, not snowing and close to freezing!

Gabe had told me the week before that all he wanted for his birthday was to have his family members here for cake and presents. We had over only a handful of the Stein clan, which was ok, because if they had all shown up, I don't think I would have had enough cake. Here are the pictures of how the day went:

The night before, Dan and I decorated to surprise Gabe

Gabe was really cheesing for the camera. I guess today was all about birthdays because when we were watching Elmo's World, Elmo was talking all about birthdays. Then we went to the library for storytime and all of the books were about birthdays. It was nice that we could celebrate everywhere all day long :-)

I couldn't believe it was snowing... and the flakes got pretty big!

My dad showed up early and dropped off Gabe's present. He got a cool bug collection puzzle and some great clothes. He has a shirt with a bear holding a sign that says "Will hug for food". This is a joke with Gabe because when we go to my parent's house, he will give them a big hug and then ask for a cookie!

I let Gabe choose what he wanted for dinner and he chose chicken enchiladas. Yum!

After dinner we sat down and started watching Wall-E. We still have yet to get through it. Every time we start it up again, Gabe wants to watch it from the beginning!

I really don't think cake decorating is in my future... my frosting writing looks like Gabe could have done it himself. The cake was angel food with strawberries and bananas inside with dark chocolate icing. The cupcakes were made from the leftover ingredients. Gabe chose the car theme. He REALLY loves that movie.

Gabe got some very nice presents from the family. He got some bigger clothes from Grandma Stein; a vest and Hot Wheels from Auntie V, Uncle Jay, Monique and Leilani, and a great floor puzzle from Auntie Michelle, Uncle Paul, James and Zoe. We got Gabe Chutes and Ladders, Candy Land and Cars Bingo. I'm SO looking forward to many hours of fun playing those over and over again!

Auntie V decided to double fist the big girls :-)

*sigh* Here I am with my growing boy right before bedtime. I love this little guy!

8 months

2009-01-16T00:03:00.000-08:00

Well, I'm about a day and half late posting this, but there's no time like the present. On the 14th, Izzy turned 8 months! Holy cow. I thought time flew fast when it was just Gabe, but with 2 of them, it's even more of a whirlwind!

She is turning into such a big girl :-) She still loves to "dance" in her jumperoo and will even do said dance when someone is holding her in a standing position. She loves to also walk around holding onto our hands. She gets a big grin like she knows she is accomplishing something great. As far as crawling goes, she is starting to push herself onto hands and knees, but she's pretty content to just roll around on the floor to get where she needs to go. She's not quite doing the army crawl like Gabe did, but she does scooch herself forward with all her might to reach a toy. I'm actually quite glad she's not completely mobile yet. I have Gabe running around like crazy so I'm not really in a hurry to have 2 all over the place, and I also am still cherishing her as a baby still. I don't need her growing up on me too quickly!

Here are a couple of pictures that I took of her. As you can see, she is sitting up VERY well and loves the doll that we got her for Christmas:

Things all in all have been pretty good. The only thing that's been a kink in our daily routine is being sick. The kids both got the same thing: high fever, ear infections, wheezing/coughing and now they're both upgraded to pink eye! And, they decided to pass it along to me! (I think it's from Gabe coughing in my face when he crawled into bed with me a couple of nights in a row) Thankfully Dan has stayed healthy up to this point and I'm hoping he will continue. The 3 of us are on medication now, so hopefully we'll nip this thing in the bud and I can get everything sanitized. Funny... I never thought I would vie for the day that I could do some heavy duty laundry/cleaning.

Also, I think I've mentioned in previous posts, I've started sewing within the time we moved into the duplex. Our previous neighbor, Elyse, started teaching me the basics of it and I've slowly tried to expand on it. I'm not sure if I'll just keep posting on this blog or if I may start another one, but I wanted to share all the things I've been making. I've been working on a bedding set for Izzy and really only have the bed skirt left to do. I made a crib quilt and a bumper :-)

Holidays and the end of 2008

2009-01-02T10:44:00.000-08:00

Christmas Eve went really well. Dan's dad came and picked us up and dropped us off. Thankfully, more people had become determined to make it up their hill, so the snow/ice had broken up a bit. The tradition at the Stein house is we have to sing a bunch of Christmas carols before we can open gifts, which I don't mind... until we start trying to sing one song for each person in the family. Let me tell you, 22 songs is A LOT. I don't even think we made it through that many before mutiny started and everyone gave up from hoarse voices. After we sang we started handing out our presents to our individual people whose name we drew at Thanksgiving.

To Uncle Bobby, Gabe helped us put together his first Bag of Crap! We kept an old WOOT! box and when he saw it he was pretty excited. We also threw a family tradition in the mix that I hope Bobby and Kathleen will keep. When Dan and I had our first Christmas, Jay and Veronica gave us a fruit cake that someone had given them on their first Christmas. I think they had it for about 5 years or so before giving it to us and then we had it for over 3 years. I wonder how long Bobby and Kathleen are going to need to hang on to it before yet another Stein gets married :-)

For Tricia I had made a scarf and matching hat. I was very proud of myself. I knitted the scarf (which I really do not like knitting... probably because I'm not that great at it) and I crocheted the hat. I felt good yesterday because she was wearing the hat when the girls went out for coffee :-)

Izzy gave Uncle Aaron the hat that I knitted on a loom to match a scarf that he already had and Dan got James a train whistle. All in all it was a good Christmas with the Steins.

Christmas at my parent's house was a little more low key. It probably had a lot to do with the fact that there were only 10 people there. Caleb really liked the ear flap hat I crocheted for him and then we surprised him with a bass guitar we got for a steal! He had gotten a mandolin from my mom earlier that day, so the fact that he also got a bass blew his mind!

Brandi really liked the diaper bag and receiving blankets I made. She was surprised that I had sewn a bag together for her. I hate it when people toot their own horn, but I was also really surprised at the way it came out. It looked like a real diaper bag! I kinda thought it was gonna be really difficult and come out kinda whompy, but I thought it looked pretty good.

Jean seemed to like the purse that I made for her. It was made out of green felt and I had done some beading on the front to make some flowers and a butterfly. I kept joking that if nothing else she could "accidentally" leave it behind when they went back to California because I would have totally used it! I also made an outfit for Jordan (my niece). I tried to find some good southern Cali material to use and I hope it works out. I made a skirt and some pants that went with a shirt with cute pink, yellow and orangish diagonal stripes.

As for our New Years, we first went and had dinner with my parents because it was my dad's birthday. We had prime rib, baked potatoes and green beans! MMMMMM! It was freaking delicious :-)

That evening we were supposed to go out with Bobby and Kathleen, but lack of funds kept us home. We had Paul, Michelle, Aaron, our neighbors Joel and Kendra, and a couple of their friends who were visiting over to the house. We started off the night playing Bunco, which was really fun. We've never really had enough people over to have a big match. It was Paul's first time playing and he won. Nice work! After that we busted out "TV Scene It". The girls annihilated on the first round and the guys took the second. We didn't have time for a third because it was close to midnight. After the ball dropped, everyone headed outside for some fireworks... or should I say firecrackers (that's what we call the illegal kind here in Oregon). I don't know which one was lit, but it sounded like part of our sidewalk got blown up when one of them went off.

Shortly after the firecrackers, everyone went their respective ways except for Aaron. We introduced him to Guitar Hero (which was one of our presents to ourselves). I think he had a pretty good time playing it. We went to bed that night ready to get up the next morning for the Stein family tradition.

The guys (or at least the ones who were around) decided to go try and hike up Multnomah Falls for some guy time and some reflection. Dan told me that the trail was closed due to it icing over, so they just went to the lodge and ate some food instead.

The girls (along with a bunch of little kiddos) went down to Carlino's Coffee Shop in Fairview. Suffice to say, a bunch of kids while trying to have girl time didn't work so well. We did get the chance to talk about our resolutions though. Mine are to potty train Gabe soon (short term) and to really try and save up money this year (long term) either to get us through rough patches of non-paid holidays off or to start saving up to get into a house.

After we got back from coffee, we put the boys down for their nap and some of the girls went to rent a movie. We rented "Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day". By the time we were done renting, the guys were back home, so the older girls came over to my house to watch it. It was a pretty cute movie. It had Amy Adams in it and I really like the majority of stuff she's been in so far.

Happy 2009 to everyone. I hope you are all able to stick to whatever resolutions you've made for yourself. I wish you all a happy and healthy new year! :-D

Christmas Eve

2008-12-24T09:12:00.000-08:00

Merry Christmas Eve to all! I hope everyone has a nice time going out and visiting friends and family members. Tonight we are going over to the Stein house. I'm really nervous about getting there because they live up a big hill off of Towle and it hasn't been plowed. I'm hoping someone will be able to come get us, because if not, Dan wants us to park somewhere and walk up the hill with 2 kids, all of our gifts, dessert for after dinner and a partridge in a pear tree :-P If anyone reads this before tonight, please pray that the conditions don't get too much worse and that we'll be able to make it up the hill alright. Thanks!

7 months... and a few days

2008-12-20T12:14:00.000-08:00

I wanted to post a blog when Izzy turned 7 months, but our computer was down, so here it is a few days later. As of right now, Izzy is doing really good. She is smiling like crazy, laughing at her brot her, babbling "ma ma ma" when she gets good and mad and is moving around like nobody's business. Also, on Thanksgiving, I was feeding her some turkey and ham and noticed that she had her first tooth coming in! The next day (black friday) I noticed she had her second tooth coming in, too! It's very happy and sad all at the same time. I love watching her grow and change, but it's a reminder that she is not going to be little forever :-(

As far as the movement goes, she's not crawling, yet, but she is rolling all over the place. Last night Dan and I were in the living room and Izzy was on the floor next to us. A few minutes later I looked over to check on her and she wasn't in sight. I asked Dan if he had her and he told me she had moved across the floor! She reminds me of Gabe when he was younger. We nicknamed him The Rolling Log. Shortly after he mastered rolling to wherever he wanted to go, he started to do an army crawl, so I'm wondering if Izzy will do the same thing. I'm excited to see where she is going to go with her moving next.

This is probably the shortest blog I've posted in a while, but there's not really too much else to tell except that we are enjoying the snow thoroughly and have had some fun rallying the car around in empty parking lots! Gabe and Dan have had some fun throwing snowballs at each other and Izzy has only been able to go out a few times without her poor little hands freezing. I guess that's the bad thing about living in an area that rarely sees snow... We don't really have an huge supply of winter gear, but we make do. Hope everyone else is enjoying the snow as well. Stay safe out there :-)

Photos

2008-12-11T11:23:00.000-08:00

Sleeping like a lamb :-)

1st steps in snow

Horsing around with mom

Gotcha, dad!

Gotta keep our hands warm

We messed this up good!

Throwing snowballs at grandpa

Helping build the "snow penguin"

The finished work of art

This photo makes me laugh. The keg wasn't really this big, the proportion just makes it seem that way :-)

Our Thanksgiving spread!

Izzy's 1st Thanksgiving... Doesn't she look thrilled?

Leilani and James munching some applesauce

SO many people!

Continuation of Thanksgiving #1

2008-12-11T10:51:00.000-08:00

On the 8th, everyone decided to go up to Timberline for some snow play and hanging out. We managed to be able to take both Gabe and Izzy with us despite the fact that it was naptime. Izzy, of course, slept in her carseat, while Gabe was way too pumped to settle down, so he wasn't even going to take a nap had he been given the chance.

When up at the lodge, Dan's brother, Nathan, and I found a set of cougar tracks, which was pretty cool. All the people back home told me they were probably a dog's tracks, but we also saw a set for a dog and they were very small comapred to these tracks. Everyone had a great time having a snowball fight and Gabe even helped Auntie Nique, Rina and Yoon build a snow penguin! After chilling out for a while, we headed inside to have some hot cocoa and relax. Unfortunately, we didn't get to relax for long. We realized that we needed to have parking passes to be in the parking lot, so we had to finish our cocoa and head back to the cars. All in all it was a pretty good trip and a lot of fun.

Then we headed back to the house. Thanksgiving dinner was ready to get underway. The kids were in the living room area having Tetris Party tournaments with each other and the adults were preparing dinner. We had great food, good conversation and a lot of laughs. Thank you, Tom and Eileen, for taking everyone out for a family vacation to celebrate the good things that have happened through this last year. We thoroughly enjoyed ourselves and were glad to spend that weekend with you guys.

After dinner, we made the kids clean up and Tom, Eileen, Dan and I walked down to the bar in the resort, which was really nice. We had some decent (not great) drinks and talked with Tom about what is going on with the Haitian project and catch up on life in general. It was nice to get out and see them outside of the borders of "mom" and "dad". We left after an hour or so and headed back to the cabin (which I forgot to mention was named Bear Hut). Nique was reading through the log book and noticed someone had gone through and counted all of the bears that were in this cabin. Nathan and Dan both thought they probably counted some of the bears more than once, since they wrote there were 400-something (back in 2004). They made it their mission to go through and see how many bears they could find. They kept at it for a while, but gave up after they got to 700-something. That'll teach them to not trust someone who was there 4 years ago!

Sunday morning was pretty crazy. Not only did we have to do 10+ loads of laundry, but we were trying to keep everyone focused so we could have one more Tetris Party tournament before we had to leave. I had asked Dan if he could run out and grab me a cup of coffee, which he did. He took a few of his sisters with him because they needed to grab some stuff at the local store. I kept cleaning and taking my turn at Tetris and began to get a little impatient because they were gone for well over an hour! When he got back he had around 10 cups of coffee with him. I looked at him in amazement and asked him what the deal with all the coffee was. Veronica proceeded to tell the heroic story of Dan and the Search for the Perfect Cup of Coffee. Apparently Dan went to a bunch of different places ranging from right down the street to halfway up to Government Camp. Each time he'd go somewhere he'd turn right around because either the barista didn't know what they were doing (she asked Dan's younger sister if there was coffee in a steamer) or the place was REALLY creepy/dirty. Honestly, how much does your husband love you if he goes to multiple places to find you the best white chocolate mocha possible because he knows how picky you are about your coffee? I'm married to such a great guy! I love you, Dan :-)

We finally got all laundry done and packed all our stuff in the car and headed out. When we got home we were SO relieved. I love Dan's family very much, but being in such tight quarters can make you want to take a vacation from your vacation.

In my next installment, I'll start talking about the transition towards Christmas and Thanksgiving with my parents. Pictures will shortly follow as I am organizing them. Bye!

It's been a while...

2008-12-11T07:25:00.000-08:00

I realized that it's been a *cough* while since the last time I posted a blog. Um... it's been at least a month. Well, if you're ready, this may end up being a loooong blog because a lot of things have been happening.

First off, my younger brother turned 21! Holy cow! When did this happen? The last time I checked, he was still 14 and still needed me around to do things. Where in the world did all the time go?!? Now he's off and legal, in a relationship, working in a career (he's a pile driver, like my dad!) and doing pretty darned well for himself.

Our family went up to Welches with the Steins to have our Thanksgiving together. They rented a (approx.) 1000 sq. ft 3-bedroom cabin at a resort for 22 people to stay in. Now, I love Dan's family, but for this kind of tight quarters, you kinda have to have a LOT of love. It was a great experience though. We were up there from the 6th to the 9th of November. The reason we were there so early is because Dan's parents were going to be gone in Haiti for the real Thanksgiving. Dan's dad is president of a school down there and had a business trip to go on, plus it was also their anniversary, so Dan's mom went down there with him. Thanksgiving was really good. We had turkey, goose, stuffing, potatoes and gravy, salad and some other fixings :-)

So, besides me going out of order with the dinner, let me give you a rundown of how our trip looked:

Dan and I took the kids up to the cabin on Thursday evening after Dan got off of work. Normally we would wait until Friday evening, but I had done some at home work recently and we found ourselves with a little extra cash, so Dan gave himself a paid day off... Being a contractor he doesn't get sick days/paid holidays/vacation time, so this was a rare treat in and of itself! We headed up to Welches, got ourselves settled in for the night and took it easy. The next day, we were still waiting for the rest of the clan to get there, so Dan and I took the kids up the mountain a little ways to find some snow. Every time I am out in natures I am in complete awe. I look around and see how beautiful the northwest is and am so thankful that God created all of it for us to enjoy! I enjoy it so much I keep telling Dan that I will never be able to leave the northwest longer than a visit. Our first adventure driving up to find some snow took us to Government Camp. I can't believe how built up that area is now. It's actually a really cute little town. We stopped very briefly at a parking area near a hotel where we found a patch of ground that was untouched by people walking through it...

Oh, let me tell you some back story about Gabe and snow. This time that we took Gabe into the snow, was basically the first time he has ever played in it, even though he is almost 3 years old. The first time we had snow, we lived in our apartment and plus we didn't have any winter clothes to put him in, so I never really let him experience it. The next time I tried to take him out in it because we actually had stuff to keep him warm and as soon as I set him down in it, he screamed bloody murder. He completely despised snow. So, suffice to say, I was not looking forward to another screaming match. To get him ready to want to play in the snow I would get really excited about it a week or so ahead of time and tell him we were going to go up to the mountain to play in the snow. I'd describe it for him and show him when we saw snow on books or TV. He also has a pair of pajamas that has some penguins in some snow flurries, so I told him, "Look, the penguins are playing in the snow. Don't you want to go up to the mountain to play in the snow like the penguins?" Apparently, to Gabe, what I had just told him was, "Whenever there is snow, there will be penguins" because the whole time we were on our trip to Welches, he kept saying, "I want snow penguins". Eventually I had to tell him, "Our area for snow is too warm for them, but we can still try and look if you really want to. And, if we don't find any penguins, we can act like penguins and slide around on our bellys and waddle in the snow!" He thought this was a great idea.

So, we get up to the patch of snow in Gvt. Camp, and put Gabe down. He looked at it and I thought he was not going to like it, so I ran up ahead of him and told him to come get me. He got a huge grin on his face and ran towards me. It was great! Dan and I taught him to make snowballs and snow angels and Gabe had the best time kicking snow at daddy and throwing clumps of snow in the air and having it rain down like it was snowing!

After we were done we headed a little further up. I saw the pulloff for Trillium Lake and thought it would be beautiful to try and get a photo of snowy Mt. Hood with the lake since it was nice and sunny out. We found it to be a little difficult, however. We were driving my Nissan Altima, which sits pretty low to the ground. When we drove down the road, we thought it might be ok since there were tire marks down to actual ground, but we didn't anticipate the snow that was between the track marks to be so high! We drove in for probably not even a quarter mile when we decided we better turn back :-( I knew we should've gotten some kind of SUV for our second car... Oh well, the mountain will be there another day.

We headed a little further up the mountain and went to another spot to find some snow to play in, but with Izzy sleeping in the car our options were a little limited. We turned around in parking lot for snow bunny (I think that's where it was) and Dan decided he was really tempted to bust through a little mound of snow that had been piled up. We backed up and Dan floored it and next thing we know there was snow spraying up all around the car. He probably would have gone back and done it a few more times, but I had to remind him that this was our good car and we didn't need to bust it up worse than necessary... If only we had gotten that SUV for our second car :-P

Well, unfortunately babies are getting fussy, so I have to head off... I'll continue with the next part and get some pictures up soon. Thanks to those who sat through and read all of this. There will be plenty more to come :-)

Laughing and Halloween

2008-11-04T07:33:00.000-08:00

The other day, Dan and I got to our breaking point of how much laundry we'd let pile up before we got desperate enough to put it ALL away. The majority of our clothes is hang up stuff, so it really shouldn't be hard. Anyways, we took it in our room and had a pile of hangers on the bed. Gabe thought this would be a great toy, and I'm all for anything that will entertain the kid that we didn't have to shell out tons of money for. Izzy heard the commotion after a nap and we brought her in and the following video is what became of it all:

I also wanted to post photos of the kid's halloween costumes. Izzy resused the duck costume from Gabe's first Halloween, which was fun. Gabe went in a costume that I made for him. He was Oscar the Grouch! I wasn't sure if anyone was going to get that he was the Grouch, but a few stores saw him and even gave double candy to him because they (thankfully) liked it so much. I'm glad it turned out relatively well :-)

This is of Gabe's 1st Halloween, then Izzy's

He's so grouchy!

CRAP

2008-10-23T22:01:00.000-07:00

For the past 2 days there was a wootoff. The coveted prize for wooters is the Bag of Crap. When it comes up, the server completely gets bogged down and you're extremely lucky if you can get in there to purchase some.

Dan called me today to let me know that he was in the running for a BOC. Later, as he was heading out of the office, he told me to check my e-mail. I looked and he sent a message with a receipt for our BOC!!! I'm so excited. I'm hoping it won't be anything too crappy, but for $8 who's gonna complain too hard?

Good job, Dan! I'm proud of you and excited you experienced your first crap!

Sleeping

2008-10-21T23:47:00.000-07:00

The transition from our room to sharing a room with Gabe has been going really well for Izzy. We've been putting her down around 7-ish and she'll sleep until 10:30 or 11 when she wakes briefly to eat and then slumber off again. Thankfully, she sleeps until 2 or 3 am to eat again and then will go back to sleep... so, that means she's doing 5 or so straight hours so far. Not too bad. I think Gabe did around 6 hours at this age. Gabe is still being a good big brother when he knows she is sleeping. I'm still being a little lazy and just getting her in the early morning and laying down to feed her so I can sleep, but I came to the realization tonight that I think I really don't want to wake Gabe up. Part of me would feel so bad to disturb his sleep, but another part is afraid that he might think it's time to get up and play in the early hours. However, I think back to when my brother & sister-in-law (Jay and Veronica) told me about getting Mo and Leilani to sleep in the same room...

Leilani would wake up crying in the middle of the night and at first Mo would sleep through it. Eventually she would get woken up and complain to her mom that Leilani was being too loud and she was keeping her awake. Veronica just said, "Getting woken up builds character!" I know, it doesn't really make that much sense, but if you can convince a kid of something like that, apparently it will work. Mo stopped complaining about it so much and would try to fall back asleep.

So, maybe I should try to tell Gabe that him getting woken up will build character in him. Then again, I don't know if he'll even notice. I've gone in when Izzy is screaming at the top of her lungs (apparently so loud that our neighbors heard her through the wall the other night) and it didn't even phase him. Thank God he is such a good sleeper! Hm... now if only we can get Izzy to follow suit...

Rolling baby

2008-10-16T20:45:00.000-07:00

As far as I know, the first time Izzy rolled over was on my birthday (back in September). The other day I gave her some tummy time and put some toys around her. Next thing I know, she started rolling again! I kept flipping her back over to see if maybe it was just a fluke... She hadn't rolled since my birthday. Not only did she roll over to her left, she also started rolling to her right! Next step, from back to tummy. So, to prove to myself that I'm not just imagining things, I got a few short videos with my camera. The one that I'm posting though is of Gabe trying to be a good big brother... either that or he was getting bored with me constantly saying, "Izzy, are you going to roll over? Roll over again, Iz!"

Gabe has been doing pretty good lately. Thankfully the colds that have been getting passed between Gabe and Izzy are gone. Gabe is thoroughly enjoying having sissy in his room and is very respectful of the fact that she is sleeping and will whisper at me when he needs something. He's been doing very good with his ABCs. For the longest while he has been adding in letters when we I stop singing, but he has now started taking the initiative to start the song himself and he has at least half of the letters down!

Of course, what would a blog be without some adorable pictures of the kiddos?

She loves this chair. Thanks Julie!

Some people might think it's mean to post this, but look at that punum!

Mm... tastes good!

I should really tell him cooking without pants isn't a good idea

He's growing up WAY too fast :-(

Anyone see any simliarities?

New bed

2008-10-14T08:15:00.000-07:00

Last night we tried to have Izzy sleep in her room with Gabe. I say tried because she somehow migrated back to our bedroom. We put her down at bedtime and let her cry herself to sleep and then an hour later we put Gabe down. They both stayed asleep for a little while, but around 10:30 or so, Izzy started crying. We let her cry for a little while to see if she'd soothe herself, which she didn't, so I fed her and she zonked right out again. I was very surprised because Gabe didn't even flinch while she was crying... At least that's a promising sign!

Later in the early morning Izzy started crying again and I went to get her and feed her again. I think this is where I need to be a little more motivated. Whenever I lay down with her, I fall asleep right off the bat. I need to kick my butt into gear and actually get up to feed her instead of bringing her back into our room. Please keep me in your prayers as we continue this transition that I'll be able to keep her in her own bed and that I won't be lazy trying to get her used to sleeping in the crib.

I do need to note how empty our room felt last night. I was so used to walking on egg shells when Izzy was in there because I didn't want to wake her up. It was strange to actually be able to go into our room and turn on the light to get ready for bed and to actually have a conversation. It was strange to look over into Izzy's bassinet and see an empty area where she usually was. It almost felt like the waiting for Izzy to join our family again (except I wasn't pregnant). This transition has made me a little sad, but I know it will be good for everyone invovled :-)

Baby photos

2008-09-22T22:56:00.001-07:00

Here are some recent photos of Gabe and Izzy

24... almost a quarter of a century

2008-09-22T22:00:00.001-07:00

My birthday was today. I was thinking this birthday wasn't going to be anything too special. (Mom, if you're reading this, this has nothing to do with the family birthdays I had...)

I don't know what it has been about my birthdays. I've always been a little disappointed with the way they've turned out. Even if they started out pretty good, there seemed to be something looming over that had soured up the day. There have also been very many where nothing too special has happened and it seemed like an ordinary day.

However, this birthday has been different. At first I was thinking this was going to be another ho-hum birthday because we didn't have funds available to go out and do anything. On Friday we FINALLY received our "kicker check" so we were able to go out to dinner and dessert. We decided to try some new places. We went to dinner out to Tommy O's and dessert at Pix Patisserie. Both places were great and definitely worth the money. Tommy O's was Hawaiian style food and we went on a night where they had live music. We went to Pix Patisserie with Dan's brother, Aaron, and his girlfriend, Sarah. We each ordered something different and traded them around our table to get a great variety of rich, decadent desserts.

Yesterday my friend, Elyse, and I went down to the waterfront and participated in the Race for the Cure. I've never been one to enjoy running, so to participate in this race felt like a HUGE accomplishment to me. We were doing really good until I hurt my hip and started slowing us down. However, even though I got hurt, we still did better than we were expecting to.

Today, my actual birthday, started out with me babysitting my niece and nephew. I have nothing against watching them, but starting my day like that was not exactly what I had in mind for a celebration. My older brother, Nate, did call me early in the morning to wish me a happy birthday, so that made me feel pretty good that he remembered and cared enough to call :-) Later this afternoon, I piled Gabe and Izzy in the car to head downtown to pick up Dan from work. Our game plan was to head down to the Ben & Jerry's on Hawthorne and get a free ice cream cone. I can't remember the exact flavor, but it was chocolaty and very delicious! We came home and put Gabe down for a nap, Dan made some dinner for everyone and we all piled in the car, again, to head over to Cold Stone Creamery to get some more free ice cream. Dan's brother Nathan was working so he let me get a huge container of ice cream! That one was All Lovin', No Oven (cake batter, cookie dough, fudge, almonds and whipped cream!) We came home and settled into the couch to have some dessert, then put Gabe and Izzy down for bed and started surfing the net. I decided to see what was on woot.com and they were having a WOOT-OFF!!!

Oh, and I forgot to mention, today, before James and Zoe were dropped off, I was playing with Izzy down on the floor and she ROLLED OVER! I was so excited! She's getting to be such a big girl. Tonight, she also had her first taste of baby cereal and did pretty well with it. All in all this birthday has been the best one I've had thus far. Thanks to my hubby for helping me have such a good time and thanks to everyone who helped me celebrate! I love all of you guys!

mawage...

2008-09-15T11:25:00.000-07:00

Gabe has gotten to the point where he loves to watch the same movie over and over and OVER for days on end. Before this phase really started I thought I'd have to watch a Disney movie and would get sick of it beyond belief after the 3rd time. However, Gabe really took to watching Jumanji. He loves all animals and would name them and get really excited when they'd come on the screen. Surprisingly I didn't mind so much because it is an extremely action packed movie and he would still watch it even if I'd turn it all the way down. After 2 months of watching nothing but Jumanji, Gabe finally stopped (partly because I'd returned it to my parent's house, so he really had no choice).

For the past month or so Gabe has started watching a new movie. The Princess Bride! It's so funny... every time Inigo is fencing Wesley, Gabe will jump up and cheer them on, " Go, Go, GO!" He also loves the fire swamp with the fire spurts and the ROUS's. Suffice to say, Dan and I both don't mind him watching this movie because it is such a classic and it's kinda hard to get sick of it.

Today while we were watching it, the part where the wedding is going on. Izzy was sitting in her little rocking chair looking at me and I started quoting, "Mawage. Mawage is what bwings us togevah today..." She was staring at me intently and then she started to laugh a little bit! Yay! Her first laugh! I LOVE IT!!! It was also really cute because her laugh was getting interrupted by a few hiccups, so it was even cuter!

Extraordinary

2008-08-26T22:02:00.000-07:00

This word really bothers me! How can something be very special if it is extra ordinary? Something that is ordinary isn't special, so if it is EXTRA ordinary, wouldn't that make it even less special? Hm...

Anniversary #3

2008-08-25T21:45:00.000-07:00

Our 3 year anniversary was on the 23rd. Dan and I started the festivities back on the 9th when we went to watch roller derby. It was freaking awesome! There was nothing better than watching a bunch of strong ladies knocking each other down in an attempt to gain the most amount of points. During the first half we sat up in the bleachers, which was VERY uncomfortable, but during the second half we moved down to floor level to really get into the action. It too was not all that comfortable, but I kinda forgot about it since I got to sit that close.

On our actual anniversary, Dan and I went up to Hood River to take a ride on the Mount Hood Railroad. During the ride up to Dee, we passed through rivers, creeks, hillsides, various pear orchards and saw great views of the mountain! On the ride back down, there was a murder mystery dinner show. It was very entertaining. I've been wanting to do this for a long time, so I'm glad it was something Dan and I could do together. It was really fun to watch the show and cavort with our fellow diners about whodunit during act breaks. Dan and I talked after we were heading home and we might want to go do another dinner theater thing where we go to a house or restaurant and have to actually interview the actors and we have a chance of getting "killed", too. All in all it was a great anniversary. We were very thankful to my parents for being willing to watch our kiddos while we went out and had some "big kid" time.

Getting dirty

2008-08-08T00:16:00.000-07:00

When we were first married, one of our "daily drivers" was Dan's 1971 Ford Bronco. Dan received his inheritance early from his grandpa and was given that truck. It's a perfect fit for him and I thought he was really hot when I first met him because he worked in a garage (so he would always smell like a strange combination of gasoline/oil and man sweat) and he had an awesome lifted truck.

We drove the Bronco (named Friday) as far as he would let us go. There have been a few times when he's given up on Dan as he'd been coming home from work, and there was even a point where Friday had to leave us for almost a year to go to the farm and get some help from Dan's uncles. When we finally got him back we were so excited. We wanted to take Gabe out for rides in it on hot summer days and eventually start fixing it up so we could show it off. However, on one fateful joyriding night, Friday broke down and he wasn't getting back up :-(

Dan was driving around with Gabe and Friday died. The cause of "death" was a bad alternator. So, Dan got a tow truck and took Friday to his parent's house where he had been sitting for a long time. Because it wasn't my truck, I would constantly forget that it wasn't working. Every time it was nice out I'd ask Dan to take me out for a ride in the truck like the "good old days", but he'd have to remind me that Friday was in a funk and wanted to rest. I finally sat Dan down and asked him what he needed to at least get the truck running again. "An alternator," he said. With that, I went to work trying to find one that was relatively inexpensive and would fit Dan's truck.

As of yesterday, we had an alternator in our hot little hands and we were determined to get the truck working again. It had always been my dream to fix up a car (and the main component of my dream was to do it with my dad), but it never came true. The fact that Dan has this classic truck that he likes to work on himself is great because it gives us something to do together that feeds into his needing shoulder to shoulder time and my needing to be able to talk time.

We were both nervous that the alternator wasn't going to be enough. We were hoping the regulator was still good because that would have been even harder to replace (not that we wouldn't want the challenge). We worked our way through and were successful except for the stupid BATTERY not working anymore!!! As you can see by the following photos, the last one shows us having to jump start the Bronco. The battery didn't hold a charge after being turned off, but we at least got to go for a short ride together before Friday went to sleep again.
1.Beginning the process
2.The old alternator
3,"Let's check all the angles"
4.Loosening up the battery tray
5.Our array of tools
6.The empty battery cavity
7.Looks so confusing
8.Look, I'm a grease monkey!
9.Working on the parts
10.Let's reinstall
11.Doesn't this look SO COOL!?!
12.Teamwork :-D
13.Gotta love small girly hands
14.They can reach where the boys can't
15.Poor, Friday. Needs a kick in the pants.

2 months

2008-07-24T09:44:00.000-07:00

I took Izzy in for her 2 month checkup about a week ago. Things went well and she is growing like a weed. She weighed 12 lb. 3 oz. and was 22 1/2" tall. Her percentiles were 75-90% for weight and 50-75% for height. I compared that to Gabe's numbers at 2 months and for him the percentiles were opposite. He was longer than heavier. I wonder if she'll switch around or if she'll stay on this track. Maybe she'll have a booty like her mom, who knows.

She also had to get 4 immunizations. One of them they have started doing orally which I thought was a little strange. The other 3 were done in her thigh, which she did not like at all (but that seems kinda obvious). She lightly was crying for the first 2, but then they did the one that goes deep and she screamed! I could barely calm her down even after I got her home. I would give her a little tylenol and she'd be ok but then she'd try to kick her leg and she'd start screaming again. Poor kid!

So, suffice to say, I was really worried about if she was going to sleep at all that night. When I put her down to sleep it was about midnight. I went to bed and when she did wake up I felt surprisingly refreshed. When I looked at the clock it was 6:30! I couldn't believe she had slept so long. I did the side lay with her while I fed her and we both ended up falling asleep until Gabe got us up at 9:00. It was amazing to me that I got so much sleep. Since that day she's been doing a bit better about sleeping longer at night, too. She will go about 5-6 hours from when she goes down for the night to when she wakes me up in the morning.

All in all things are going good. It's good to know Izzy is thriving and she's at such a fun age because she is smiling at us all the time! I can't wait to see what this next month is going to hold in store for us :-)

Progress?

2008-07-14T22:27:00.000-07:00

This evening Elyse and I went out to do our Monday run. We're still kinda doing the same thing: Running 3/4 of a lap and walking the other 1/4, and doing this for a mile. When we started it last Monday she and I were completely winded by the time our first lap was done, which made us feel kinda pathetic. Tonight, however, we were both able to keep up conversation and weren't hurting too badly by the time we were done with the first lap. By the time we were done with our full workout, we were both quite surprised to find that we were able to quickly catch our breath and recover. It was nice to be able to notice that we had made some progress from where we were even a week ago!

We've decided that we are going to start slowly working our way up so we can quickly get to the 3 miles by the time September comes around. We decided the next time we are going to jog a full lap and continue with the walking/jogging routine we've worked out. And next week we are planning on jogging a full lap and adding on another walk/jog lap for a total of 5 times around the track. Oh, and we're going to start doing running along the roads instead of the track on Monday nights because we get out too late and the big, concealing bushes are kinda scary for 2 girls who are alone and not in that great of shape. At least we will start to get some "terrain" training to get us ready for the real race. I will be following up also with our "before" measurements and maybe posting some photos. I'm hoping to start trimming up a little bit and getting more lean. Here's to hoping!

2008-07-12T17:48:00.000-07:00

update

2008-07-12T17:30:00.000-07:00

I haven't been able to keep an update of everything going on because Comcast couldn't come until a week after we had moved out of the apartment.

Elyse and I started doing our training at the beginning of the week. We've started out kinda slow because neither of us are in all that great of shape. Neither of us were able to jog a full lap without getting really winded. Sad, I know :-( So, we're just taking it a little at a time. Today we also went out in the morning. It was pretty warm, but it made it more enjoyable to get to our destination a bit faster. We jogged down to the farmer's market and had a cool coffee drink at the end. We didn't go as far today, but we were going on small hills (and I do mean small) that really started to work our legs. We compared our results as of the first day we went out and both of us had sore quads. I also had sore shins. At least we know that it is working out our muscles as well as our lungs.

Moving in went relatively well. We were out of the apartment and into the duplex within 3 hours. All in all, a pretty quick move. Probably one of the smoothest and fastest I've dealt with. We have the majority of our stuff put away, but there are still a few boxes we need to deal with and find a place for. We have started sorting the stuff that we want verses the stuff we can live without. It's kinda hard to part with my stuff, but I usually feel accomplished and streamlined when all is said and done.

Izzy is doing really well. She is almost 2 months old. She has been smiling a lot and holding her head up a lot more. I'm excited to go to her appointment and see how much she has grown. She has chunked out evenly all over and is getting cute baby rolls. She also seems like she has stretched out a bit. Even though I'm looking forward to seeing how much she has grown, I'm very much NOT looking forward to starting immunizations. I hate having to be the one that holds her down while someone comes at her with a needle! Thankfully kids don't really remember this kind of thing at this age or she'd start resenting me way before she's a teenager.

Gabe is doing really well, too. He has started talking A LOT more. He even says words that I didn't know he recognized. He is thoroughly enjoying the new yard and loves splashing around in the kiddie pool Grandma Stein got for him as a housewarming present. He has also started counting everything. He can count, suprisingly, to eleven. Well, let's just say he was doing all the numbers and slowly he has started getting lazy and skipping a few. He goes: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 8, 9, 10, 11! He's so proud of himself. It's cute too because he doesn't pronounce the numbers all the way yet. One, two, free, foe, fie, eh, nie, ten, eneneh. Kid might be able to pronounce everything better if he'd put away his tongue while he's speaking. Oh well, it's still cute to see a trail of drool running down his face as he cries out his various words.

All in all things are going pretty good. I'm still not used to this new place being our new home, but I'm sure as soon as the bills start pouring in it will change my opinion. Pictures to follow.

Get ready, get set...

2008-06-26T21:00:00.000-07:00

I'm hoping it will be a go. I've been thinking about something for few years, but have never gotten motivated enough to do anything about it. I'm thinking that the time for me to start will be right after we move into the duplex. I may be especially motivated because I've asked Elyse to do it with me and she seemed really psyched about it. I've decided to try and do the Race for the Cure this year. It is going to be on September 21, the day before my birthday. The thing I'm worried about is the fact that I do not run/jog/saunter/gallop/etc. Heck, I hardly get out and go for a walk unless we get motivated enough to go to my parent's house. I will be starting completely from scratch!

I really want to do this. It is my goal to do at least one marathon before I die. The Race for the Cure is a little over 3 miles, so that's a nice place to start. A full fledged marathon consists of 26 miles. If I am able to get myself in shape and finish this thing, I'm hoping it will motivate me to continue to train myself to get to a full marathon. If nothing else, I'm hoping that training will help me lose the last little bit of baby weight I have and then some.

This race is also something that has started to be held dear to my heart. My grandma had breast cancer and had to get a mastectomy. It scares me that it could be a possibility that I could get it when I'm older, too. I want to help raise money for the Susan G. Komen foundation and for many women who cannot afford to get a mammogram. If anyone is interested in sponsoring me, let me know and I'll give you the info when I get registered. I'll keep everyone updated as I begin working on my training. Please keep me in your prayers.

So you think you can dance....

2008-06-25T20:14:00.000-07:00

is what I'm watching right now. This was one of the shows Dan and I got hooked on a couple of years ago right after we had Gabe and we've been watching it ever since. This season I'm rooting for Joshua. Right now he's dancing with a girl named Katee. I don't know how I really feel about her. I kinda think she's not one of the best dancers. I guess we'll see what America thinks by the end of the show, eh?

Playing in the dirt

2008-06-24T14:21:00.001-07:00

My parents have been gracious enough to allow me to take over a small chunk of their yard in order to grow some vegetables. We started this project before we knew we were going to be moving into a place that had its own yard, but that's ok. If nothing else, we could always have 2 veggie gardens and give some of the extra away or sell it when our economy recedes even further.

I've been going over there with Dan and we've been working the dirt, cleaning out weeds and planting various types of veggies. Today I pretty much finished it up. The plants in the ground are peppers (green, red and cayenne), lots of types of beans/peas, many different types of lettuce, a few different types/sizes of tomatoes, tomatillos, bok choy, broccoli, kohlrabi, broccoli rab, lemon cucumbers, pie pumpkins, summer squash, green onions and sweet white onions. We also decided to get a couple of fruit bushes growing. We have kiwi fruit, blueberries and raspberries. One of these days we are going to get a couple of garbage bins and plant some seed potatoes, too.

One of the best parts about doing this garden, besides getting to work side by side with Dan, is allowing Gabe to come outside with us and work in the garden too. He has his little shovel and he moves dirt around. I explain to him what the different plants are and when we will get to eat them. He also LOVES to help with the watering. It's good for him to learn this stuff and grow up with it. It gives me hope that he will learn to be responsible for things and learn how to take care of a living organism. I'll post some photos of Gabe in the garden one of these days. I gotta show everyone how into it he gets... Today he go so dirty he looked like an army man with camo paint on his face :-)

2008-06-19T23:58:00.000-07:00

Here are some photos from our trip over father's day weekend up to Yakima and one of Dan and Izzy snoozing tonight whilst I am blogging :-D

Moving

2008-06-19T23:32:00.000-07:00

Well, since cutting Gabe's hair, the only real thing that has happened to Dan and I is that we are going to be moving. Our friends from church rent a duplex in Gresham and the back unit became available. They knew that we wanted to move out of our apartment so they informed us about it. Dan and I went to look at it and it seems like the logical next step for us. It is still a 2 bedroom and it might be slightly smaller square footage, but there is a fenced yard and tons of storage (including an attic, extra closets, a shed in the yard and a storage area under our carport). The nice thing about it is it's kind of the next step to getting a house. We will be in a place where we don't have people living above or below us, we will have to take care of doing yard work and we will have to worry about fixing our washer and dryer (we have to buy one because it only has hookups). It will be like seeing what kind of responsibilities we will have with a house without yet having to worry about a huge house payment of multiple other huge responsibilities.

I cannot really believe that this is going to happen. We've been starting to pack up the things that we have that we don't use on a daily basis and every time I see parts of the apartment getting more and more empty, I begin to get REALLY emotional. This has been our home for the last 3 years. This is where Dan and I started our married life together. This is the home we created to begin our family. This was the first place that both Gabe and Izzy have lived and now we are packing up everything and moving away from it. I knew this day was going to come, but I wasn't really prepared for how I was going to feel about it. I'm just hoping that this next chapter in our lives will transition smoothly and we get off to a great start in our new home.

WHAT DID I DO???

2008-06-05T18:46:00.000-07:00

So, I don't know if I was just bored or if it is because I still have all these pregnancy hormones leaving my body and rendering me temporarily insane, but I cannot believe what I did. For a while now Dan and I have been talking about using the clippers to get rid of Gabe's hair, simply because it's cheaper for us to do it than to pay someone to do it. So, tonight I decided I'd try and see if Gabe would let me go after him with the clippers. I sat him down in the bathroom and told him he could have a bath when we were done and he was ready for anything after that.

It is SO amazing how 2 years of hair growth can disappear in a matter of minutes. I was so scared doing it because he started to have a mullet as I was working my way back and I didn't want him to think he'd had enough at that point. That's what every mother wants... their kid to unintentionally have a mullet. Thankfully he sat still through it all and let me finish. However, there is kinda a balder spot up in the front because Dan mentioned a number we might be able to shave him at and it was WAAAAAY to low! Thankfully it was only a small spot.

The scary thing about it is the fact that he looks like a completely different kid. He makes me feel like I have a third, previously unmentioned child running around my house. I just DO NOT recognize him. He kind of looks like my nephew Doryen though. Anywho, just thought I needed to share. I need opinions about what I did and if you all think I'm as crazy as I think I am. The real test will come tonight. I think I'm going to let Gabe stay up late to greet dad. Dan doesn't know I was going to do this to him, so I'm kinda scared to see what his reaction will be.

Ah, the familiar pain

2008-06-04T23:54:00.000-07:00

So, I don't know what it was about tonight, but I decided to get up off my butt after we put Gabe to bed (and Izzy was sleeping in her bouncy seat) and do some exercises. I worked my abs, arms and legs. I cannot believe how bad of shape I am in right now. I'm really disappointed that carrying around a 2 year old and 30 extra pounds of baby over the past while hadn't done more for me. I did what people suggest and worked through the pain, so by the time I was done I WAS DONE! I flopped down on the couch after working my legs and took it easy for a little bit. Dan helped me to my feet after 15 minutes or so and as soon as I stood up I almost fell over. Thankfully I regained my balance and composure and was able to start walking around again.

So, I'm going to attempt to keep myself motivated in doing some exercises. I know I'm going to need to start putting in some cardio to really round out my workout, but for now, I'm just working on toning and tightening things back up again. I gained about 30 pounds being pregnant this last time and I've lost all but about 10 pounds of it or so in the last 3 weeks. I feel really good about that fact, but I'm hoping to get down to my pre-pregnant weight again. I'm also hoping that I can lose about 10 more pounds on top of that, but we'll see what happens after I start getting myself back into shape. I'm going to start keeping an online diary to try and keep myself accountable. For those who read this, please help me stay accountable as well by asking how the workouts are going. Dan and I also decided we need to start changing the way we are eating because he got some bloodwork done and his cholesterol is slightly elevated. I told him I'd try and eat better with him so we are getting healthy together, so I need accountability for that as well. Wish us luck as we begin this journey and please keep us in your prayers.

Me= awake; Dan= sleeping

2008-06-03T23:10:00.000-07:00

Ah, yes. The good old days of not sleeping at all during the night because your baby has their schedule all backwards and wants to eat and stay awake from 11-3. Right now I've got Izzy sitting in a bouncy chair next to me and her eyes are WIDE open! Now, if I actually was able to catch up on my sleep at all, I might be up for staying awake into the wee morning. It's kinda strange because all I did when I was pregnant was stay up until the early hours watching a movie or TV and now, my night owl ways are on hiatus. Probably for the best though because as soon as she decides to pass out, I'm more than willing to go get some shut eye for as long as I can. The other thing about not being able to go to sleep is it's been a while since Dan and I have been able to really sleep next to each other. I've been trying to be a nice wife and let him get some quality sleep during the night so as soon as Izzy starts crying, I whisk her away so Dan doesn't wake up. We end up in the living room and tend to fall asleep on the couch. So, suffice to say, Dan says the bed has been a little lonely lately because every time he wakes up I'm not there.

On the plus side, Izzy is doing really well. She is getting better at holding her head up for longer periods of time and is still able to turn it to the side. You can definitely tell she is thriving, too. Her face is starting to fill out (and not resemble an alien) and she is starting to get little leg rolls, which are too cute! Gabe never really filled out during his first few months. He always stayed long and lean, so it's really fun to see a little bit of a roley poley baby. I've been trying to give her a bit of tummy time, especially when Gabe can hang out with her. He loves being able to interact with her. Today he laid down on his tummy next to her and they were just staring at each other. He would also reach out his hand and pet her hair or pat her back. It's so great to see him being so loving on her. I just hope he remembers how much he loves sissy when she starts to follow him EVERYWHERE and copies everything he does. BTW, I don't remember if I posted this or not, but Gabe put together his first sentence, by himself, and it was "I love sissy!" Too freaking cute!

Well, now for reality. Dan got word today that they may have to put him back down to his original hours that he started at, working from 8-2. Basically this means he will be losing 5 hours each weeks, so over $200 per paycheck. This really hurts us because we were going to try and get out of our apartment and try to find something affordable with 3 bedrooms. Dan has been debating on whether or not he is going to stick it out with the company or if he should try to get a job somewhere else. I feel really bad because he loves where he is working now. They have great opportunities to move up within the company (but you have to be hired on as a full-time worker first) and not only that, they are #4 (up from #17 last year) out of the top 50 large companies to work for in Oregon. He really feels like this would be a place he could stay for a while, but he has to get an actual position within the company first. We just really need prayer about what should done and for a full-time position to open up either in this company or in another great company.

BOC updated

2008-05-29T11:03:00.001-07:00

Dan and I finally got out bags of crap! We were so anxious to get it Dan went down to the post office in Troutdale and picked it up. I guess the postal worker might have gotten a little annoyed because Dan told me she said, "What, you can't wait until tomorrow to get it?" Oh well... We'd already been waiting almost an extra week past what the original delivery date was.

So, inside our package was:
1- Woot bucket #374
3- InstaJacks (turn an outlet in your house into an automatic phone line)
1- Delta Travel Kit
1- Pack of USB extension cables
1- Random AC adaptor
1- Bluetooth earpiece
1- Portable weather station
9!- SanDisk Sansa MP3 players (6- 4 gig and 3- 2 gig)

All in all, it was a good haul for $8 :-)

Tummy time

2008-05-23T12:44:00.000-07:00

Today I made Izzy do some tummy time. She was not down with that... at first. When I first flipped her over, she started howling and getting really mad at mommy for making her do something she didn't want to do (foreshadowing for adolescence perhaps?) She started settling down a little bit, especially when Gabe came over and was playing near her. I was, of course, being a paparazzi to her and kept taking lots of photos, but I actually got a couple where her eyes are open! I'm really surprised, though, because she is still awake and we started tummy time over an hour and a half ago. Hopefully she'll sleep really well tonight.

First doctor visit

2008-05-21T09:00:00.000-07:00

Yesterday I took Izzy in for her first meeting with the pediatrician. It was a typical visit with height, weight, head circumference and overall checkout. I couldn't believe when the nurse took us over to the scale and the number read over what her birth weight was! She had also grown 1/2" since being home from the hospital. I wonder if she really dropped very much below her birth weight at all. The doctor also told me that she had really good coloring and there was no jaundice in sight. I'm glad she is doing so well, but I'm scared that I'm gonna have a little cherub on my hands and have to haul around 2 heavy kids.

Welcome newest Stein!

2008-05-19T13:43:00.000-07:00

On May 14th at 7:24 am, Isabella Grace Stein came into the world. She weighed 7 lb. 7.5 oz. and measured in at 19.5" long. Labor lasted approximately 6 hours and, thankfully, pushing only lasted 5 minutes!

Dan and I didn't know what we were having, so the doctors let him tell me after she came out. When he first said, "It's a girl" I thought he was playing a joke on me. We were both really thinking that we were going to have another boy. Even up until I had to get ready to push we were still thinking of a name for a boy. I had a thought in the back of my head that told me we might be wasting our time looking for a boy name because there still was a chance it was a girl. Well, lo and behold, out pops Izzy.

Life has not changed too much as of this moment. Yes, we do have 2 kids, but only one of them is active right now so I don't really have too much to deal with. The only thing that has really changed is that I have been able to function on only 4-5 hours of sleep as opposed to 7-8. Last night was a little rough. I was ready to go to sleep and of course, when I wanted to sleep, Izzy decided to stay up for another 3 hours. I had to move us into the living room and I ended up sleeping on the floor with her so we could be spread out. Even after moving in there she still wasn't falling asleep so I decided to swaddle her up and, BAM, there it happened. I'm thinking I'll try that right off the bat tonight and see what happens.

I attempted my first outing today with both of them by myself and it went relatively well. We went to go visit my mom at her work so she can show off her new grand baby. Things went well except Gabe kept wanting me to hold him. It really wouldn't be a problem, but I'm still a little sore, so it hurts to hold a 30+ lb. kid instead of an 8 lb. kid. I fell bad though because I don't want Gabe to think I don't want to hold him or cuddle with him anymore.

All in all, the transition has been a pretty smooth one. Thankfully Dan is willing to fully participate in our family when he gets home from work. If I need to feed Izzy, he's willing to play with Gabe (or do anything else that needs to be done). Or if I want to spend some time with Gabe he is more than willing to hold Izzy for a while. From the first moment Dan saw his little girl he was completely enchanted with her and it is so cute. I can't help but fall more in love with him when I see him being a devoted father and a loving husband :-D

Blushing Over Compliments (AKA: Bags of Crap)

2008-05-10T09:32:00.000-07:00

Starting Wednesday evening, before bed, I went to woot.com to see their new shirt that had won their contest. I looked at the main page to see what they had been selling throughout the day and I guess I had checked it at just the right time because directly under the item were a couple of flashing lights. I called Dan into the bedroom and exclaimed, "Dan! They're having a woot-off!"

A woot-off is what woot.com does when they need to get rid of a bunch of items from different days that hadn't sold out. Some of the stuff is kinda cool, some of it is kinda lame, some of it is refurbished, some of it is new. Sometimes they have a bunch of an item and it takes FOREVER to sell it and sometimes they only have 1 of something and it sells out way too fast for you to realize/rationalize if it is something that you want or need.

I didn't realize how long a woot-off lasts until Dan got me hooked on checking the progress of a sale. I knew it was bad when the next morning (Thursday) I woke up to go use the bathroom around 7:30 and didn't go back to sleep. Those who know me know I DO NOT like to acknowledge the fact that a 7:30 in the morning even exists. I usually sleep until at least 8:30 or 9 depending on how long Gabe will sleep or entertain himself in the mornings. After I used the bathroom I sat down at the computer and just stayed there. I looked over the list of things that had sold throughout the night and thankfully the coveted BOCs had not yet come up.

Dan has been a member of woot.com for a little over 2 years now and he's never gotten one. He rarely even gets past hitting the button the get to an order page because the servers at woot get so bogged down that the whole website shuts down for a few minutes. I was determined to help him out with his goal of getting his 3 BOCs. Now, to explain what a BOC is: The correct terminology of it is Bag Of Crap. Basically, the way Dan has told it to me, you can order up to 3 items and you have absolutely no idea what they will be. Pretty much it is a guarantee that it will be crappy items, but there have also been accounts where people have said one of their items they received was a new LCD TV or and XBox 360. This doesn't happen very often, but there are 4500 items that get shipped out which gives you kinda good odds that at least one of your items is going to be something relatively good.

We'd been wooting for over a day and it finally hit! I was IMing with Dan and we were talking about the different items that had been selling when I switched over and refreshed the page. The whole page hadn't even loaded, just the item name and the button to say "I Want One". Explaining it here doesn't really justify what you are going through. You have adrenaline rushing as you are hitting F5 to refresh your page, knowing that you really only have 1 chance to get in there and reserve your 3 BOCs before they sell out. I had my cursor over where the button was going to be and as soon as I saw "Random Crap" pop up, I clicked my mouse. I got to the order page and put in my security code and started to place an order. I noticed that I had only picked to order one, so, on an adrenaline filled whim, I decided to hit back and change the amount ordered to 3 (the max amount). I hit Order again, but it wouldn't let me get to the next page. I was having a little trouble figuring out what was going on and then I realized that it didn't save my security code, so I had to enter it again. I finally got everything filled out correctly and crossed my fingers as I hit the order button. I was sure that they were going to be sold out and we would have missed our chance to get our BOCs again. However, the next page that came up told me that they had 3 items reserved for me as they processed my card. The page was supposed to automatically refresh, so I just left it alone for a while to let it do its thing. When I checked it next the server had crapped out and my "waiting in line" page had disappeared. I called Dan and told him the story about what happened and we both were a little glum for a while because that was the closest he had ever gotten and then it was ripped from our grasps.

An hour or so later I decided to check out our account information page. This is where they post what you have ever ordered from their website. I noticed that the very first thing on the list was "Random Crap- quantity:3". I could not believe my eyes. I called Dan on the phone and told him he needed to check it out in case I was hallucinating. He looked at it and saw the same thing. We were both SO excited. Now, we have to wait a couple of weeks to see what kind of "crap" we are going to get.

Now a personal message to my friends and family:
In looking back over how I have spent the past 2 days, especially when writing about it, I've realized that the old saying is true. Married people do begin to act the same. I kinda sound like a nerd getting so excited over some BOCs and spending multiple hours stalking our computer screen to continuously refresh a page. Please, remember me the way I was... before woot-offs, before I began to care about how many gigs or ram is in our computer, before I encouraged my husband to explain, in plain English, all the intricacies about his job and all the technical problems he has to fix. I can only imagine I'll continue to transform from this point on. Adieu!

Sick at the beach

2008-05-04T08:11:00.000-07:00

Well, we are finishing up our weekend down in Lincoln City with my parents. The trip went really well except for the fact that I am still sick and my throat doesn't want to cooperate. I tried 2 different types of throat lozenges and I even gargled with salt water! }:-P
Gabe was really good this weekend. Dan and I even got to leave him behind with my parents last night and go out for some pizza. We started talking about it and we've never had a "pizza date". Sure, we've ordered pizza and had it delivered to the house, but I'm talking about going out for a date to a pizza restaurant where they have either a pool table or an arcade and just being able to relax in each other's company without having to worry about doing any cleaning up later.
The most surprising part of the weekend came when Dan and I busted out the Wii. We were playing a game and my mom started to ask some questions about it and the next thing I know she is playing some bowling. Then, when my dad saw her bowling, he decided he wanted to join in. They must have had some fun playing because my mom asked my dad if he would actually play with her if she got one and he said, "Yes". I just asked her if she was sore from playing and she said she is feeling it a little in her arm. I remember those days. I still get that way when I do the baseball stuff on the Wii.
Well, anywho, better get going. Gotta help my mom make some breakfast. We're gonna trade womanly stories and today, we're making waffles! YUM!!

Hooray!... NOT

2008-05-01T09:58:00.000-07:00

Last night Dan and I took his 2 youngest sisters with us on a tour of our local Safeways because they had chicken for 99 cents/lb. Dan and I are completely stocked up on chicken right now (which is nice because it's the one thing I didn't get when we went grocery shopping the other day) and I feel like we don't have to be vegetarians for the next little while! All in all it was a pretty good trip and Dan's sisters thoroughly enjoyed it... Ah, the naivety of being young. Just wait until they have to go shopping for a family of their own ;-)

Anywho, while we were driving around, my throat started getting a little sore. I didn't really think too much of it, especially while we were at Safeway and I passed right by the orange juice. I didn't think it was going to be too bad... until we got home and I settled down. What is it about the human body that, as soon as you settle down and begin to relax, it turns on you and lets the germs infiltrate completely? My throat is on fire and I cannot swallow for the life of me. I woke up at least half a dozen times throughout the night/early morning partly from needing to pee so much and because my throat was killing me. Right now I'm contemplating running over to my parent's house and chugging their O.J. Of course it would be that I get over there and it just got finished today or something.

At any rate, I'm sick of being sick. I just want to be well for our trip to the beach this weekend and just be well in general. Everyone, please, pray for me!

4 weeks left...

2008-04-28T22:16:00.001-07:00

I went to the doctor today and it was my first "examination" for her to check on the baby. Granted I am not at all excited to have her all up in my business, but I was anxious to find out if I had progressed at all and what the baby placement was. My doctor told me that I am 1 cm dilated (which means I'm 1/10th of the way there!!!) and the baby's head is down in my pelvis. I can definitely feel that the baby has dropped. I can breathe a little easier when I'm trying to do things and I can definitely feel the pressure of the baby being lower... not such a pleasant feeling. So, now I'm scheduled to start going in every week for her to "examine" me and make sure things are still progressing nicely. So far it seems like I am right on track for my due date (which is the very end of May), but my intuition is still telling me that I will probably be a little early. I was a week early with Gabe and had a feeling about it for at least 4 months ahead of time and I've been thinking I'd be 1-2 weeks early with this one since about my 4th month. At least I'm not too dilated that I've been put under house arrest. I'm looking forward to our family trip to the beach with my parents and brother :-)

Marriage... HELP!

2008-04-27T16:58:00.000-07:00

My small group at church is a young marrieds group. It consists of about 5 or 6 couples that have been married 5 years or less. We had worked through a book called "Love and Respect". It talked about how a man needs to feel like he is respected in the relationship and the woman needs to feel like she is loved. If each person doesn't feel like that, then begins the "crazy cycle". I won't go into all the details here, but check out the book if you get the chance. It was really good and the video series that went with it was awesome, too!

Anywho, it has been a few months since our group has really started doing anything marriage related. We meet every other week and have a game night or do some devotions with worship. In talking with one of the girls in the group, we have both decided it might be time to start up another marriage related topic. The only problem with that is our group doesn't seem like they are too big on doing books, so the alternative would be a video series that has a workbook with it. I don't know if anyone out there knows of any good Christian books/video series or of another route we could take with this whole thing. Please, HELP!

One more for today

2008-04-23T14:32:00.000-07:00

For my snack today I decided to eat some yogurt. I don't know what it is about it, but there is something about the fruit chunks sitting in the bottom of the container that give me the heebie jeebies. Don't get me wrong, I love fruit. But there's just something about eating some really nice, smooth yogurt and then getting this random chunk in your mouth. It might also be the fact that you can't ever really tell when it is coming up because the yogurt is covering it. Man, I am just one weird person!

Random photo

2008-04-23T10:23:00.001-07:00

Dan took this last night and I thought I should post it. This is proof to those who don't believe that Gabe ever cuddles.

Beached whale...

2008-04-23T09:42:00.000-07:00

At least, that's how I've been feeling lately. My back has been hurting so much and it is so hard to get comfortable while laying down. Last night I felt really pathetic. I was laying on the couch and I needed to get up to use the bathroom (what else is new when you have virtually no bladder) and I could not get up. I had to ask Dan for some assistance and at first he gave me a hand. I tried to pull myself up to no avail and he finally had to use his other hand to pull me all the way up onto my feet. Regardless to say I felt pretty embarrassed. I really hope that it doesn't take the entire 5 more weeks until I'm due. I think I could hold out for at least 2 more, but 5 seems like a lifetime.

Today as I was preparing to write this Gabe was sitting next to me in my room playing when I heard that familiar song... "Lala la la, lala la la, Elmo's World"... I told Gabe that Elmo was on TV and he ran out into the hall to see if it was true. When he saw that Elmo's TV show was on he dashed into the living room and I haven't seen or heard from him since (that was about 20 minutes ago). It's crazy to think that he can recognize the things that he likes. He doesn't only do it with Elmo, but he is also crazy about Bob the Builder, too. I think he likes it for the trucks... to tell the truth, I can stand watching it because there is a certain amount of sexual tension between Bob and Wendy that I think (and very much hope) only adults can see. It's like watching the Shrek movies... They are entertaining for kids, but there is the aspect that only adults can see that can make them enjoyable for us as well.

So, back to what this post was really about... It might sound a little bit crazy, but I am freaked out by having to go through the birthing process again. The pain, not so much, because last time my labor was only 8 hours and I had the epidural (hurrah!). I am a little freaked out because I've heard so many people say that each birth after the first goes even faster. What if I can't make it in time for an epidural... What if Dan doesn't get home in time from work... What if this next kid is way more enormous than Gabe... What if I have to get a c-section. I have all of these thoughts pounding in my head day after day at B-day (baby day) approaches. I can only hope that everything goes as smoothly as when I had Gabe. I remember laboring at home for about half the time and then, in the hospital, visiting with family and playing cards until the time came to push. I just really hope that I can learn to relax up until then... I'm sure adding extra stress onto everything won't help me get to labor any faster.

Who knows... Maybe Dan and I need to go out hiking to the top of Multnomah Falls again when the weather turns nice. It seemed to work pretty well when we had Gabe...

The Spider Song

2008-04-18T23:34:00.001-07:00

Each night Dan brushes Gabe's teeth, we tuck him into bed, and I sing to him. Since starting this tradition Gabe has gotten a lot better at sitting still and just letting me stroke his hair and face as a way to let me help him calm down for sleep. He's also gotten better about telling me which song he prefers I sing that night.

Like all 2 year olds, Gabe is in the phase where if he really likes something he wants it done over, and over, and OVER! Right now he's stuck on the song "Itsy Bitsy Spider". Although he doesn't know how to say the name of it, he knows how to do the hand motions to show the spider "going up the spout". Even before I finish singing the song through one time he's already started doing the motion again to show me he wants me to sing it again.

Lately he's been doing a lot more than just requesting the song. He's started doing the hand motions with me through the whole thing. It's so great to see his face light up when we're singing through and he and mom are on the same page. Overall, it's just great to see him enthusiastic about stuff and take so much joy in the little things. It's a great constant reminder that sometimes we need to slow down and focus on the world around us instead of getting caught up in the day to day routine. We need to take time to enjoy learning something new, not worry about playing outside and getting dirty, and just enjoy being in someone else's company.

Are kids like dogs?

2008-04-17T10:02:00.001-07:00

Dan always says I do a good job of "training" Gabe... He's learned to say "please" and "thank you", he knows how to say he's sorry when he does something that hurts someone else, he knows how to answer questions that are asked of him, and he does a relatively good job of listening (although, he is 2 after all and still has his stubborn-headed moments... I wonder where he gets that from ;-P ).

Yesterday was no exception for awesome new things to be learned. I know I've said it before, but it's the most amazing thing to see your kids grow and change right in front of your eyes. It's also amazing to see them learn something new right in front of you. Gabe learned 2 new words yesterday! He now knows how to say "Out" (we'll work on finishing up with "side" later) and he also learned to cut down "Bye-Bye" to just "Bye". This may not seem like the greatest accomplishment in the world, but I've been a little worried about Gabe not saying too many actual words. Yeah, sure, he can make the animal noises and he knows "mommy" and "dad", but there's something completely remarkable about your kid learning new words that will let them communicate in a way that adults can understand.

On another note, the family went out for our first fishing trip of the season the other day! The 3 of us went out with my mom, dad and brother, Caleb. It's been a REALLY long time since we've all been able to not have anything going at the same time and be able to go hang out and do something we all enjoy. We went to Trojan Lake which is outside of St. Helens. The weather was beautiful and sunny. I think the temperature got up to at least 75 degrees or so. Granted, we hardly caught any fish, but it was still great to just get outside and relax. Gabe thoroughly enjoyed it too. This year he was way too big to try and put him in the playpen, so we just let him run around and enjoy being free. He got dirty and sweaty, got to feed the geese (yuck!) and he also caught his first fish! My dad did the typical thing he always did when we were younger and hooked a fish on his pole, but let one of the kiddos reel it in. Gabe thought it was great getting the fish in out of the water.

Oh yeah, just for the record, I was the person who caught the other fish of the day. So, like I said, not too many were caught, but Dan and I took them home, Dan cleaned them out and we grilled them outside. All in all it was a great day and an awesome way to kick off the first nice weekend of Spring!

Playing catch-up

2008-04-09T09:47:00.000-07:00

Wow... I really suck at this blogging thing. I can't believe over a month has passed by since I last made a post.

Gabe is still growing and changing. He's getting a lot more secure in starting to try and say new words. For the most part he is learning animal noises, but there have been a few things he will actually say. The animal noises he makes are for an elephant, turkey, lion, puppy, snake, monkey and horse. It's really funny hearing him try to be an animal. He thinks it's the greatest thing when he sees that particular animal in a book or in real life and starts to make the sound. He gets the biggest smile on his face and laughs like there is no tomorrow. There's no way you can't not laugh when he's cracking himself up so hard.

Dan and I have made a very late New Year's resolution (or maybe you can just call it post-baby resolution). We have decided that when I've popped this next kid out he and I are going to sit down and figure out a diet/exercise plan that will work for both of us and having 2 bambinos. We've both decided that we need to get in slightly better shape. It's kind of depressing when we've looked at height-weight ratio charts and they tell us we're both "overweight". Apparently we both need to lose 30 lbs. or so (mine is based on my pre-baby weight). I don't think I'm quite that desperate to be "fit", but getting my self back down 10 lbs. or so would be nice. And that still wouldn't be the weight I was when I got my driver's license back during sophomore year of high school. So, to all who are reading this, keep us in your prayers that we maintain will-power and the drive to start and continue with our plan.

Well, that's all I have for now. I've got to try and remember to write more often in this thing. Oh well... I doubt anyone actually reads it anyways. We'll just say it's for mental release from the crazy world!

Babies

2008-03-02T22:08:00.001-08:00

Gabe has been getting SO big! I'm constantly telling people what he's been up to, so if anyone actually reads this it will probably be no surprise. For the last little while, Gabe has been able to answer yes or no questions to let us know what he wants (example: Do you want a cookie? Yeah!; Do you want to take a nap? No!) It's been really funny because sometimes you can see his little brain working at figuring out what it is that we are asking or whether he should say yes or no. The most recent thing that he's been doing is trying to formulate words and actually try his hand at talking. We've gotten down (in toddler speak) "Please" and "Thank you" and a few others. There have been times when I've gotten down next to him to show him how my mouth moves to say something and you can see his lips attempting to move the same way (silently) and his brain is trying to figure out what sounds to make. It's amazing to see this change in him. The fact that he is 2 years old blows me away! I mean, here I was 2 years ago without any kids at all and then in a matter of a few hours I become a mom! Looking forward, 2 years seems like a lot, but looking back on it all, 2 years flew by without me realizing.

We are trying to get Gabe excited about being a big brother. We are trying to get him to understand that he isn't going to be the baby anymore, but instead he gets to be a big boy! We are constantly telling him he doesn't have to sit in his high chair, but he can sit at the table at a normal chair like a big boy; he doesn't need to sleep in a crib like a baby, but instead he gets a big boy bed; and we've even tried to get him to understand that only a baby uses a diaper and a big boy uses a toilet. This is going to be probably one of the most challenging things we will attempt with him. Getting him to sleep in a crib was a piece of cake. He has been sleeping through the night up to 12 hours for as long as I can remember. Transferring from a bottle to a sippy cup was easy. Getting him to be a good eater was effortless (the kid LOVES food!) The first night we put him in his toddler bed he slept in it and we haven't had a problem with him getting out of it yet.
HOWEVER... We have tried to get Gabe to use the potty a few times. The first time we sat him on it he screamed bloody murder! The next few times he thought it was great because he got to sit there and look at books and talk to mom while we waited to see if he would use it. I've asked Gabe randomly throughout our day if he wants to use the potty like a big boy and he say "No". I then will ask him if he wants to keep going potty in his diaper and he say "Yeah". All in all, I know I'm not supposed to push the issue, but I really wonder how much longer he will want to hold out before he wants to start really being a "big boy" and use the grown up potty. Don't get me wrong, I do not want him to grow up super fast, but the thought of two babies in diapers scares me... for economic reasons (diapers are freaking expensive) and for personal reasons (I REALLY don't want to take care of more poopy diapers than I really need to).

As far as our bun in the oven goes, people keep telling me they have a feeling that I'm having a boy. I've been saying that for as long as I can remember. I had the same feeling with this one that I did with Gabe that I was going to have a little boy. There is a small part of me that does wonder if I might be having a little girl though. I've been having a few dreams about us having Gabe and a little girl. The most recent one I had was Dan and my 5th wedding anniversary. We were out where we got married and I was looking out over our friends and family and I saw Gabe running around with his super blond hair and then I looked over and there was our little girl with brown hair cut in a bob and she was wearing a little pink dress. My gut reaction is that we are still having a boy and that would be great, but overall I really don't have a preference. I'm just thankful this pregnancy has been going well and that we have been blessed to be pregnant this time.

It's only money, right?

2008-02-19T14:21:00.001-08:00

Dan and I have been starting to think about moving out of our apartment within the next few months. How ridiculous is it that every time our lease is up, our rent goes up? I understand the cost of living is also on the rise, but the fact that we get nothing extra as incentive to stay here is kinda crappy. Also, the fact that the real estate market is on the decline has helped us put things a little more into perspective. Why would we want to pay to stay in a place where we get no equity, tax deduction and don't own when the gap between what we pay in rent and could possibly pay in a mortgage payment is starting to close?

Dan works hard to provide for the family and I admire him greatly for that. He wants us to have the best life possible and has no problem providing it and allowing me to stay home with our 2 year old son, Gabe. With another rugrat on the way I'm becoming a little nervous that our money situation might take a turn the opposite way and we might eat through whatever we bring in even faster than we do now. I really don't want Dan to start thinking I respect him less because he's not able to bring home enough bacon, because it's not that at all! I'm perfectly fine staying in an apartment for another couple of years just so we don't screw ourselves over and "lose the shirt off our back" just because we rushed trying to buy a house. I would hate it if he thought I needed to step up and take charge of earning the families income by leaving my post as stay-at-home mom and dip my tootsies into the world of working. We have talked about it and we know we definitely cannot afford daycare for 2 kids, but Dan has actually joked about going down to part-part time (he only has to work 35 hours/week right now) and staying home with the kiddos. I wonder if that would really work.

Now, don't take this the wrong way. I have tried to explain to people before that I love staying at home with Gabe and another baby would be even more of a blessing to stay with. It's not that we need the money! We are living SO comfortably right now. We stay relatively within our means... granted we like to go out as adults (sans kid) and have a kind of expensive dinner every once in a while, but we don't go out and buy the newest TV or electronic on the market. Heck, we don't even have cable TV or text messaging because we don't need it! So again I say: We do NOT need the money! I kind of feel it would be nice to have something that is just for me when the kids are down for a nap and I can keep my skills up to date from what I have learned at school. The fact that there would be a paycheck involved is only a bonus. Plus, it would be great to have some kind of fall back if we ever did hit a financial wall. Ultimately I would just like to have something that I could do from home, but if I did find the absolutely most perfect job for me, I think I would pursue it.

So, back to the title of my blog, it's only money, right? I shouldn't worry too much about it. Like they say, "money doesn't buy happiness", "money doesn't grow on trees", and "money is the biggest conflict creator in a marriage". I guess I should just take everything in stride, scrimp and save with Dan to provide stability for our family (house or not) and just create happy memories with my family that will last us the rest of our lives... There is always geocaching or fishing to fall back on :-D