Winter Rocks

Hey, my kids are enjoying Winter. This is the Igloo they built with their Dad. This is where I may be sending them to live if they can't stop trashing our house.

And check out this kid's face as he reads all the very sweet comments on his blog.

Thanks everyone!

Pumped

One thing Steve suggested I do to stay positive was to start thinking of goals and things I want to do after the baby is born. And you know what, it really does help! If you know anything about me, you know I love setting goals. And you know that I get excited about what I'm working on and find great satisfaction in the process and accomplishment of them.

So one of those is to train for a marathon and run one by the time my baby turns 1. I cannot wait to hit that pavement again! No, I am not a great runner. But I think I love it as much as the great runners out there do. And that's the beauty of the sport. All people of all shapes, sizes and levels are welcomed with open arms. I've only done one marathon and one half marathon. But I only started running a couple of years ago. But my times were not good. Not good at all.

I joined Netflix over the weekend and quickly ordered some documentaries. I love documentaries. I ordered two about marathons.
The first one was called Marathon Challenge.

Nova took 13 couch potatoes and trained them for a marathon in 40 weeks. Pretty cool! Do I tell you the results? I'll just recommend you check it out if you are interested.

The 2nd one I watched was The Spirit of the Marathon

This followed several people ranging in talent and abilities as they trained for the Chicago Marathon. Also very good.

I cried like a baby during both of these movies. It was so inspiring! But if I'm honest, I think it was just my hormones bringing me to tears.

So I am totally going to run another marathon. And even more than that, I want to one day qualify for the Boston. Yeah, you heard me say the most audacious thing. I want to qualify for the Boston! If you know anything about marathons, you know the Boston is the mother of marathons. To qualify into this race is to not just be a runner, but a good runner. Women of my age need to run a qualifying marathon in 3 hours and 40 minutes to get in. That averages out to be below an 8 and a half minute mile for all 26.2 miles. Do I think I could do that? Within the next year, no way. But within a few years? I think if I wanted it bad enough I could.
Mark my words people...it might take me years, but I want to do it.

Another goal: The ridiculous triathlon.

Blog Casserole

I'm titling this post "Blog Casserole" because I'm gonna write about a few things that are all random and unrelated yet all mixed together into one post.

First off, I want to thank everyone for your great advice and comments on my last post. I've got some really nice friends and family and that is a huge blessing. I am actually doing pretty good now. Things could be so much worse and I am ever so grateful to be expecting another child! My spirits have been lifted quite a bit and that has helped me tremendously. And miraculously I was able to sit through all 3 hours of church today. NO vomiting! Of course right afterwards my body kind of let loose, but that's totally cool. The meetings were all very good too. Very uplifting.

I also decided not to post my plan here about staying positive. It's personal and much of it spiritual. So I'll refrain. But all of your advice was a great way to get me moving in the right direction.

Secondly: Jonah. If you happen to have seen yesterday, he did a few posts on his blog. If you saw those posts, you may have wondered...they were a bit odd. He's not doing too well lately. Mentally that is. This cute little guy here

has grown up to be quite complicated. He was doing great for several months. But this month he's had some serious problems again. He's getting really depressed. Inconsolably sad for no good reason. And when he's not depressed, he's kind of just crazy wild. The wild part of him can get me a bit frustrated. But the sad part of him breaks my heart. I wish he could just feel somewhere in-between the two extremes like most everyone else.

Anyhow, he said to me "Maybe if I post a lot on my blog people will love me and make comments." That made me sad to hear! 8 years old and already suffering from lackofblogcomments=lackoflovesyndrome. I think many of you bloggers have felt that at one time or another. Not fun. Don't worry, I will do my best to straighten that little problem out and let him know he is plenty loved. But it still couldn't hurt if you'd stop by his blog and express to him your love. Church was really rough for him today. Lots of tears and sadness.

Finally, with that really poor picture of horses, I want to tell a story. I got a comment on my last post from Leann Fidler Williams. I was shocked! I hadn't seen or heard from her in years. We were super good friends back in Junior High. I thought in honor of meeting up with her again, I would tell a Leann story.

In junior high school I hung out with a great group of girls. Kristen Lawson, Leann Fidler, Leanna Harris, Shazelle Safely, Brenda (forgot her last name) and others. Some of these friends had horses. So occasionally we would go horseback riding together. It was always a blast. I miss doing that!
So one day I think it was 4 of us that went. Me, Kristen, Leann and I can't remember who else. We only had 2 horses. So we paired up. Me and Leann were together. She was nice enough to let me ride up front with the reigns. She sat behind me. I think we were just riding with a bareback pad this time because we were paired up.

So we rode for a while. We were riding down this one vacant country road when we decided we wanted to get the horse flying. The horse with it's orders clipped a good speed and Leann behind me wasn't satisfied. She was trying to get him to go faster. If I remember right she was swatting his butt and yelling for him to pick it up. Then it got quiet. Finally I realized Leann wasn't there anymore. I turn around and way back there on that road she was lying on the ground. No injuries fortunately. That image has never left me. It was pretty funny. She was a great sport about it and I think she thought it was as funny as the rest of us.
Leann was always a good time.

Happy happy happy

Ok, so if you couldn't tell from my last post, and maybe even the post before, I've been struggling. This week has been SOOO hard for me. I got really depressed. Probably too depressed. Probably too irrational and so forth. But try to be patient with me. Some of you were kind and encouraging and that was great. Thanks.
I went from being an obsessively active person to being nothing at all. It was a complete joy for me to spend an hour or two at least each day working out. I liked to stay on top of everything I could in my household. I liked to fix myself up each day for my hubby. I liked to do a bunch of things. And now, I feel like a total loser because as badly as I love to do those things, I cannot right now.
Maybe for you to understand a little bit how I felt, you could do a little exercise? Imagine you've got the stomach flu. All you have done for the last 2 days is lay in bed and either puke or feel like you are going to puke. Your body feels incredibly worn out and you have almost no strength in you. Your house gets destroyed by all living in it. Dinner doesn't get made. Your long "to-do" list remains untouched. Those days get to be feeling pretty depressing don't they? Well imagine you are like that for 3 weeks straight. Every waking moment your body feels like crap. You have the ability to force yourself up occasionally, but the majority of the time, you just can't. Everything feels like it's falling through the cracks. The laundry piles up, the mail has been delivered for days to your mailbox and you've never made it out there to get it, your house is trashed, the kids are way behind on all their school assignments, and nothing is getting done.
It seems like there is no outside world almost. I have a serious case of cabin fever and all I've done is lay in bed and play on Facebook or stalk blogs on the laptop. It's like this weird time warp I'm in. Like the clocks aren't moving, time is standing still and I'm completely out of touch with reality. I suspect there are people out there that don't totally buy that I feel as sick as I say. Maybe because I don't lose enough weight or something? I don't know. I guess it would be hard for them to understand if they haven't really felt it themselves. Or maybe they think I'm just a baby who is over-dramatizing it. (Whatever to that!) Trust me, I have a decent pain tolerance. I did run a 5k on a broken foot afterall. And win it too. But to those people, I can't make them understand so I doubt trying to would help.
So I hope this doesn't come off as complaining. I really don't want to do that! It's just stating what's really happening here. Just keepin it real.
I realized today that something has got to change. I need to do something to snap out of this before I completely lose it. I think I did for a little bit there. And tonight I finally kind of snapped out of my horrible state of mind and decided I am ready to change. I mustered the will to at least.
First order of business: Be grateful and change my attitude NOW. (done)
My 2nd order of business: blog about it so you aren't all watching my bad attitude proudly displayed by my "Winter Sucks" post. (done)
Final order of business: start brainstorming for ideas on how I can keep my mind in a happy place at all times. (doing)
I may post my plan later. Not that any of you will likely care. But somehow doing it publicly will help me I think to stick with it.
You know I'm not trying to please anyone with this post. It's obvious to me that it will be boring and I doubt many will even read it all. No pictures, no fun content, nothing interesting. I'm doing this strictly for survival purposes.
So that's that.
Happy happy happy is going to be my tune. :::Crossing my fingers I can stick to it:::

Winter Sucks

I was getting tired of my "Ziplocs" post, but can't think of anything else to post about. I've been laying around in bed way too much and my creativity is zapped. I think I'm going crazy. The only thing I can think of is how sick of Winter I am. And that 3" layer of ice on our road that seems to have been there forever and will never go away.
Summer come back!!!!
Quick people, pull me out of this funk.

Ziplocs

Today I am feeling a little discouraged. I felt like talking to someone about it. Or blogging about it. Then I decided to stay more positive. I decided to do something good. I got onto Ziploc's website and submitted my story to them. I thought I'd share with you what I just sent them. Hope my story inspires someone out there.
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Dear Ziploc Company,
I want to share my "amazing story" with you as well. To start I have to express my deep gratitude for your products. They have made the quality of my life infinitely better. I thank God to live in this day and age when I can be here with Ziploc bags. :::singing my praises::: Let me explain.
I am currently 7 weeks pregnant with my 6th child. With each of my pregnancies I have had a condition called Hyperemesis Gravidarum. I'll explain it by just copying from Wikipedia. Wikipedia is yet another thing I thank God for. :::singing praises again::: Anyhow, Wikipedia says: "(from Greek hyper and emesis and Latin gravida; meaning 'excessive vomiting of pregnant women') is a severe form of morning sickness, with unrelenting, excessive pregnancy-related nausea and/or vomiting that prevents adequate intake of food and fluids.[1] [That is without some kind of medical intervention.] Hyperemesis is considered a rare complication of pregnancy... Estimates of the percentage of pregnant women afflicted range from 0.3% to 2%." End of quote.
So basically I puke a lot. Not only that, I puke the entire pregnancy. Although my 2nd and 3rd trimesters are usually significantly better than my 1st trimester! Thankfully.

I learned early on in my first pregnancy that I did not have the strength to go to the bathroom and do my puking in a toilet. At times I couldn't stand much less walk to the bathroom. At times the toilet made me feel all the more sick and I puked even more.
So then I tried to puke in bowls. Soon I learned that was a lot of dishes to worry about and sometimes those bowls accidentally spilled their goods. Not fun.

So in a stroke of inspiration I tried Ziploc bags. And my life improved immensely.

I remember how nice it was when I first started using them! I would just grab a bag and puke in it and zip it up and set it down. I would do this bag after bag until my sweet husband would come home from work and gather up all of the bags to easily toss them all away.
As my condition improved, I was able to move around a bit more. Even go places. I still puked, but I was able to live my life because I had your Ziploc bags always in the pockets of my clothes, in the car, in my purse and handy anywhere I may be. They are most convenient. And they really hold that puke like nothing else could. I know I can trust your Ziploc bags to keep the puke from oozing out anywhere. They are wonderful! Seriously the best thing ever.

I have thought many many times how I have wanted to tell you my story, but haven't done it until now. I would offer my great acting abilities to even do a commercial for you if you like. Actually with me being pregnant and sick now, you could just record me throwing up. No acting needed. And I would even offer my services for free. I owe you that much. Your decision.
My only suggestion to you, would be that you would make bags that aren't clear. I think this would be a great option for people with my condition.
Either way, I love your products and company and thank you for what you have done for me. You are truly a force for good in a very troubled world.

Sincerely,
Amanda Bishop

Family Fun Day- Ice Skating Edition

I was totally kicking myself when we were well on our way to the ice skating arena and I realized we left the camera at home. I had big plans of making another cool video for everyone. But it was a no go. Sorry.
But I decided to blog about it anyhow. Imagine my delight when I found pictures on Google Image Search that were a great interpretation of what our little FFD looked like.

So Steve looked like this most of the time with Becca. It was pretty sweet and cute. But when he was able to get a little break from carrying her around on the ice, he was pulling out all the stops. He basically looked like this:

Honest.

As for the kids, they started out looking like this:

It was their first time ice skating after all. But by the end, they were doing tricks like this:

And as for me. Well, I was a wallflower on a bench observing with my two constant companions. 1- A gallon size Zip-Lock baggie and 2- Nausea.

We had a great time!

Panel Discussion #2

Remember my last "Panel Discussion"? Well, this one is totally on a different topic.
Here's what I want to chat about:

What kind of blog posts are the most interesting to you?

What are your favorite kind of posts? Your least favorite kind? Etc...

This is where I am going to ask all of you to put on here what you like to read about on blogs the most. What qualities make a post good or bad? Not just my blog. This way we can all get input and if it interests you, improve the reading pleasure of your loyal followers. So it's a lot to ask, but I want as much input as possible and lets keep it real. Be anonymous if you must.

Top 10 Reasons Why I love this place

Chuck E. Cheese's that is:
10- Their pizza isn't terrible and they have a salad bar.
9- Their bathrooms are usually kid friendly enough to send your kids in there and not have to help your youngest ones. ie: short toilets and a step stool for the sink.
8- It only costs 1 token to play any game.
7- Watching the kids freak out when Chuck E. himself comes out.
6- The creepy stage with the character's live show. You can't help but be captivated and watch. CAN'T help it I say.
5- CEC TV. The videos are kind of funny. I was thinking I wouldn't mind being one of their dancers on their little videos they have.
4- You can pay cash for the prizes instead of tickets. Or use your tickets and pay cash for what you don't have enough tickets for. 1 cent = 1 ticket. This is a no-brainer what is the better deal. Take advantage people.
3- The kids love going there and get almost as excited about it as they did about Disneyland.
2- I don't have to cook dinner.
1- You can totally not pay attention to where your kids may be roaming because of their very nice anal neon hand stamping system. I love it.

I feel like I won the lottery!

Carrie is pretty much my new best friend for the super nice things she said about my blog on her blog when she awarded me, and only me this award! I have never met this girl, but I know she's amazing, because she likes me. She really knows how to flatter me, and she scored big time. Totally check out her blog, because it's great too. Obviously, as she got this award too!

So here's what I am supposed to do with this award (I just copied her blog for this part):
1. Put the logo on your blog. check
2. Add a link to the person who awarded the blog to you. check
3. Award up to ten other blogs. check
4. Add links to the blogs you award onto your blog. check
5. Leave a message for your awardees on their blogs. check

Ok, so this hopefully wont hurt any feelings cuz I am just gonna award one person too. I would totally give it to all of the blogs I follow because I really do love them all!!! But I am little too lazy for that, and it wouldn't mean that much to you if I gave it to you all would it? Typically, I enjoy the blogs that post the most the best. But I am going to give this award to someone who doesn't post very much at all. But when he does post, he always is super funny and I always love a good laugh. It is :::::drum roll please::::::::: Morgan Strasser. This guy is my cousin Sara's hubby and he is heeelarious. I hope he sees this and I hope he starts posting more, because I can always use a little dose of Morgan.

Hobbies Past Present and Future

First off before I get to the hobby talk, I have to tell you all that I have the most wonderful sisters! I've been very sick lately. Today I'm doing a bit better. But Anna came over yesterday and cleaned my house for me. Even brought dinner. I LOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOVE her!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
_____________________
Now that I am starting a new hobby, I started thinking about all the things in my past that I was totally gung-ho about doing. I thought, "This is it! I totally want to be a _______!" So I went for it. Some things I worked at for years. Some things just months. Some things I was pathetic at, others I got pretty good at. I just am interested in a lot of things and have dabbled in quite a bit. I was wondering if this guitar thing was going to make the cut.
I thought I'd share with all of you some of those things I dabbled in. I started out trying to put these in order of when I stopped doing them first to last. But I am not sure if I got it all right. There was a period in my life when I was doing a bunch of them at once, and I'm not sure when exactly I gave some of them up.

First: Swimming

Started: As a toddler. Swim team as a kid. Loved it as a teenager.

Gave up: Years ago

Will I pick it up again: Maybe

Do I want to: Mildly

Woodworking.

Started: Junior High. Loved it.

Gave up: After JH but picked it up for a short stint when I was first married.

Will I pick it up again: Not likely

Do I want to: Not really

Chess

Started: Teenager

Gave up: As a teenager

Will I pick it up again: Not likely

Do I want to: No

Tin Whistle

Started: As a teenager when my parents randomly brought one home for me.

Gave up: Months later

Will I pick it up again: No

Do I want to: No

Balloon Animal Making

Started: As a teenager when I decided having a side job as a clown would be awesome.

Gave up: Months later

Will I pick it up again: If needed to for the offspring

Do I want to: If it would really please

Dream Interpretation

Started: In HS when I won the school, then County and went on to the California State Science Fair with a dream interpretation project.

Gave up: Years later

Will I pick it up again: Maybe

Do I want to: It's kind of fun, so maybe.

Cheerleading

Started: High School

Gave up: High School

Will I pick it up again: No way

Do I want to: Not at all

Singing

Started: As a kid in a Magnet Arts School

Gave up: When mom was giving me voice lessons in High School and I got made fun of by a sibling.

Will I pick it up again: Maybe

Do I want to: Yes

Drama

Started: As a kid in plays with my Magnet Arts School

Gave up: My last play was I think "Phantom of the Opera" with the Bakersfield Civic Light Opera at age 16/17

Will I pick it up again: Probably not

Would I like to: Yeah

Tap

Started: In Elementary School

Gave up: My last stint with tap was teaching it as an adult

Will I pick it up again: Not likely

Would I like to: Yeah

Jazz Dancing

Started: Elementary School

Gave up: When I quit teaching as an adult

Will I pick it up again: No

Would I like to: No

Contemporary Dance

Started: High School

Gave up: After I quit college and was a dance major

Will I pick it up again: Maybe

Would I like to: Kind of

Juggling

Started: High School when I was determined an act on Venice Beach would be life's ultimate fulfillment.

Gave up: Never really did. Just don't really practice and have lost my touch

Will I pick it up again: Probably

Would I like to: Yes

Pottery

Started: High School

Gave up: High School

Will I pick it up again: Probably not

Would I like to: Not sure

Astronomy

Started: High School

Gave up: Not sure

Will I pick it up again: Yeah in the next life

Would I like to: Yeah

Rollerblading (Slightly aggressively)

Started: High School

Gave up: When I started having babies

Will I pick it up again: Not likely

Would I like to: Mildly

Piano

Started: I think I was 13 when I started teaching myself

Gave up: When I was probably 13, but took a few lessons here and there

Will I pick it up again: Thought about it

Would I like to: Yes and No. Piano players sometimes turn into music slaves at church.

Sewing

Started: High School with a few dresses and having to sew some things for dance

Gave up: For fun when Jonah was a baby, but still do it when I have to.

Will I pick it up again: If our country gets thrown back into the 19th century because of some economic catastrophe

Would I like to: No

Yoga

Started: Maybe 9 years ago

Gave up: Recently

Will I pick it up again: Probably

Would I like to: Yes

Watercolor

Started: About 5 years ago

Gave up: Probably only about 6 months after my beautiful watercolor kit was given to me for Christmas

Will I pick it up again: Maybe

Do I want to: Maybe

Ballet

Started: Age 10 I think

Gave up: My last class was I think August of 2007

Will I pick it up again: Not sure

Do I want to: Yes

Scrapbooking

Started: Just before I got married

Gave up: About a year ago

Will I pick up again: Probably not

Do I want to: No

Baking and Cooking for fun

Started: When I got married

Gave up: Only do it out of necessity now, not for fun usually

Will I pick it up again: Hope so

Do I want to: Yeah

Reading

Started: When I first got pregnant over 9 years ago

Gave up: Still doing it

Dieting

Started: Obsessing about it years ago

Gave up: About 3 weeks ago

Will I pick it up again: Definitely

Do I want to: I guess

Weight Training

Started: In 2001

Gave up: Still attempting to do it a little

Will I pick it up again: Yes

Do I want to: Yes

Running
Started: In 2006

Gave up: A few weeks ago

Will I pick it up again: Definitely (I think running has been the most fulfilling hobby I have ever had.)

Do I want to: Absolutely

Guitar

Started: Tried for a few weeks as a teenager. Trying again now.

Only time will tell how I'll do with this one. Want to take a guess?

Your Much Anticipated Details

So you should be grateful I finally dragged my tooshie out of bed to do this. Today was a really rough day for me. I didn't even make it to church. I felt like I was hit by a truck overnight. Turns out, it was really just a super tiny little creature in my uterus... But after Steve cooked me up 4 eggs over hard with plenty of salt and pepper, it seemed to hit the spot and I am back at the blog. I've been eating all kinds of crazy things lately but I'll spare you the details. Instead I'll give you details on our house! So here is an image of what our house looks like. We didn't get photos yesterday. We will get some later. There is only a 2 car garage on ours though. It's a rambler with a totally finished basement. Here's the main floor plan if you can see it ok.

The basement floor plan they had online wasn't like ours so I didn't bother posting it. But it's got 3 bedrooms, a bathroom and a family room down there.

Stats: Square footage 2626 (half of that on main floor, half of it in basement)

Bedrooms: 5

Bathrooms: 2.5

The lot is pretty small, but we're ok with it.
There are 2 parks very close. One really nice one. The school we've heard is great and is also a very quick little walk. I'd say the walk to the parks and school are all probably less than 2 minutes?

The house just got done being built. Actually, they aren't totally done, but it's ready to live in. It's not super fancy and doesn't really have any bells and whistles, but it's nice enough. It comes with a complete 1 year warranty on everything and 10 year warranty on some of the features. The builder is rated #1 in customer satisfaction in our state (actually, I think nationwide even,) and we were impressed with a lot of what they told us. It's an Energy Star rated home and seems like it was efficiently built.

It's also really close to a **llmart going in this Spring, 3 dance studios, some restaurants, two pharmacies, another grocery store, and much of what I need. The running here I think will be great too when I get those shoes back on in the Fall. It's about 7 miles to Anna's and 25 miles to Steve's work. Steve decided he wanted to live in this neighborhood a while back and I am happy with that. It was somewhat of a compromise because I didn't want to move far from Anna and he wanted to be closer to work. It's still gonna be a commute, but it will shave off about 20 minutes a day, which was enough for us.

The price was right too. I started doing some hunting about a month ago. I looked at every single house I think there was available in our price range and that fit our criteria. I even joined some online foreclosure and short sale sites to look in that market. I searched for property by owners too. On Friday I scheduled for us to have a showing Saturday at the top 9 houses I found. It was a marathon house shopping day yesterday! This house was Steve's favorite of all of them. He got pretty excited about it. I liked it a lot too. It wasn't my favorite, but my favorite was not in the location he wanted. But now that I've had more time to think about it, I am beginning to like this house better than what had previously been my top pick. This house seemed popular among home shoppers yesterday too. We saw a few couples going through it or interested in it just while we were there. I guess that is what got us to move a little quicker.

The space is a little bit of a concern for me. This is our 4th house we'll have purchased. Our first was 2000sf, our 2nd was 3600 sf, our 3rd 1600 sf, and now this one will be 2600 sf. (All approximates of course.) I didn't want a super big house. It certainly didn't need to be above 3000 sf, but maybe a little more than 2600 would have been nice. But we managed to live in 1600 sf just fine and I think this will work for us as well. We are certainly very blessed to have a home at all and I do remember that.

We feel like we got a great deal on this house. It was cheaper than almost everything we saw and with it being totally new, it was quite appealing. Even most of the old trashed existing homes were priced higher! I could tell you what we paid, but I guess that's getting a little too personal. So if you really want to know, just ask. We're not really private about stuff like that, but I guess I shouldn't be telling the whole world what our house cost and how much we are putting down and all that.

We aren't sure when we'll close and move in. It could be pretty quick if we wanted (like a couple of weeks.) But we think we'll try to take it slow as our lease here in our current rental isn't up until May. We're thinking March. But we don't know yet. We'll probably set a date this week.

Anyhow, that's about it. Hope that satisfies all your questions.

Guess what!?

First off I want to tell all my blogging frousins and SIL that I totally toyed with the idea of trying on my wedding gown again and blogging about it along with you, but decided against it.
Reason #1- I feel fat and ugly and I don't need to make myself feel worse by proving that I am indeed - - - well, fat and ugly.
Reason #2- I'm lazy

Ok. So here's the news.
We actually bought a house today! Yeah, we are both surprised we did it because we had no intention of doing it today, but we just really liked the house and the deal. So we went for it. I'll give you more details on that tomorrow. Go ahead and get all excited while I go catch myself some shut eye.

It's a slow blogging day

**Edit** Below

So last night I had my first guitar lesson. My teacher is a 16 year old pimpled guy, but I thought he was fantastic! I think we bonded. I left there pretty excited and pumped to get at it.
I told him this song is my goal. I don't know why, but I have loved this song since I was like 13 years old and I never get sick of it. I just love it!
When I am working towards a goal I like to envision myself reaching it. For example: when I run a half marathon, I picture myself looking all muscular and skinny and strong finishing up my 13th mile.
Now that I am beginning to learn the guitar, I am picturing myself with long dyed black hair, black nails, tight dark jeans that are folded at the bottom, 15 pair of earrings, and a Gothic looking spiked bracelet around my wrist as I sing this little diddy, "More Than Words." I see myself sitting on a stool singing it to my straight-laced sweetheart.
Perfect inspiration.
**So Steve looks at this post and shouts out "15 pair of earrings!? What?!" Y'all know I was totally kidding right?

Baby Jesse

This picture was posted on my SIL Memzy's blog, but I wanted my friends and other side of the family to see it. (By the way, my friends and Steve's family out there who don't know Memzy, you totally should start following her. She's awesome.) Many of you know of the admiration I hold for my big bro Tim. And now he's got this little miracle! I love the name by the way Tim. I think it's perfect. Baby Jesse, we love you and can't wait to see you in person!

For those of you who don't know what a miracle this is, you'll have to check out my sister Emily's blog. She gave an explanation.

So this is wonderful news! Baby Jesse is here safe and sound.
I am however really worried about Brenda. My mom just called me to tell me that Brenda is still in ICU. She hasn't been able to breath on her own and mom said Brenda isn't alert yet and hasn't even seen the baby. The situation sounded scary to me. Will you all please keep her in your prayers? Please.

***I hear she's breathing on her own now. But please keep her in your prayers still. We are so grateful about how's she has improved already!

My very first debut film!

Stick around for everyone's carefully choreographed solos.

Ok Ok Ok Katie!

If all our recent posts with our PDA's (public displays of affection) weren't enough for you...
If you hadn't guessed yet that my husband and I were totally into each other already...
If you haven't puked in your mouth already....
Here's one more doosie for you....
This post is gonna really, really show you what a total nerd I am too... Go ahead, count them. Yep, there are 8 positive pregnancy tests that were saturated in my urine. (Amanda.) The first one is a pretty faint positive and was taken on December 22nd - two weeks ago. The other successive tests got a progressively brighter pink little positive line.
Do I need to explain why I took all these tests? Do I need to explain why I saved them? Or why I wrote the dates on them? Or why I lined them all up in perfect order and took a photo of them? I hope you don't need me to because it is just a totally lame thing I did and I don't deny it. Two words will explain it quite adequately: 1- I'm 2- Crazy.
So you ask, "Are you and Steve happy about it?"

Heck yeah we are!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Y'all know that I am sooo not a private person. But I got pretty nervous this time around about announcing this. In the past we have always announced our happy news pretty quickly. Then we had 3 miscarriages, consecutively. You better believe I am nervous about another one. But I have always been of the mentality that I could use a little support in a loss that way - cause it does break my little heart pretty bad. However, I'm already beginning to feel a little more at peace and settled about this pregnancy. I will even go as far to say that I am feeling quite optimistic. I'm not saying that I know for sure nothing bad will happen, but I've decided to let myself get happy and excited about it regardless.

So now I am starting to feel nauseated. Not terribly. Just enough to feel like I may puke, but I don't. I am still able to eat pretty much anything I want and have let myself. As evidenced by my size 4 jeans deciding today they did not want to be squeezed onto my quickly enlarging body. I've managed to put on a nice little bit of weight over the last two weeks.

But we are thrilled and I have never been more excited to be sick in my life! I vowed long ago I would never complain about being sick again with pregnancy if I could have the blessing of another child. I may mention it, but I will certainly try to never sound like I am complaining.

So there you go. That's allz I'm gonna say about that for now.

In other news, my gorgeous sister Molly is here in town with her lovely husband and friend. I love it! Here she is today with her awesome dog.

And I got an email from a lady today who took a picture of my kids in an arch at Arches National Park. My camera batteries had died and she offered to take a photo and email it to me. The kids were pretty blurry in this, but I still liked it.

I'll end by saying that I have decided that the time has come for me to learn to do a video on blogger. I know I am way behind the times here and I've been way too lazy to learn. So no more sappy posts for you to deal with- at least until possibly Steve's birthday or Valentines Day or something. I am going to do a video! Just give me a little time to get to it.

See ya.