Archive for December 2014
Growing up…
Posted on: December 28, 2014
We moved into this house in August.
Since then, I feel like M has grown so much. She moved into this apartment a toddler, she’s now a full-fledged kid. No joke.
Everything “baby” or “toddler” about her has been practically outgrown. No more bottles, sippy cups, baby spoons, thumb sucking…
Where did my baby go?
She’s also so much taller than she was when we first moved in. Talk about a serious growth spurt!
She’s a whole head and more taller than the bathroom counter. She no longer has to tip toe to reach the top section of the shutters on the sliding door, she used to struggle to reach them when we first moved in.
Her movements are so much more controlled and just seem more “kid-like” than anything else..
Seriously, where did my baby go?
Her vocabulary and communication skills have grown so much also. I could have a conversation with her now and we no longer have to constantly guess what she wants or needs anymore.
We’ve been able to tell her what to do more and she follows directions better and better each day. I know she’ll be a great helper when her baby sister finally makes her arrival. All this growth and development makes me confident that she will make a great big sister…
But I still miss my baby M.
It makes me so sentimental for the days that she would just sit on my lap, or just lie on the floor and rolling over was her only mode of transportation… It makes me miss the days when she depended on me so much more than she does now..
I know she has to grow up. I just wish it didn’t have to happen so fast.
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Pregnancy reminder of the day…
Posted on: December 27, 2014
Note to self:
No baby has ever kicked the side of a mother’s belly/uterus hard enough that they actually broke through that way… even if it feels like it could happen.
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36 weeks!
Posted on: December 26, 2014
I’m writing this way ahead of time, hoping that I will actually make it to this day… if anything changes, you’ll see it in a subsequent blog post…
If all goes well, I’m 36 weeks today! It’s a big deal. It means that I don’t have to be off my feet all the time. I’m allowed to walk around more. In fact, I’m encouraged to walk around more to start regaining some of the strength I’ve lost due to being off my feet for so long..
It also means I no longer have to do nightly progesterone dosages. I’m so glad to finally be done with those!
But being on my feet again AND no more progesterone also means that this baby can literally come at any time…
My next doctor’s appointment is on Monday.. I hope I make it to then to see if I’m finally dialated…
Any moment now… I’m hoping that she can stay in until I hit 37 weeks, since at that point she won’t be considered a late preterm birth.. 38 weeks would be best.. who knows?
It’s getting super real and I’m getting super excited to finally see this little girl…
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Christmas Eve 2014
Posted on: December 24, 2014
Today is Christmas Eve. This is the first year since Hubby and I have been married that we will be staying home for Christmas. That means that we will be able to do the whole “Christmas Eve” experience with M.
We will be spending time with Hubby’s family tonight to exchange gifts and open presents, then it’s back home. Usually, we spend Christmas Eve night driving an hour and a half north to my parent’s house to spend Christmas Day there. However, because of this pregnancy, we’ve decided to stay in the area just in case this little girl wants to make a Christmas debut.
I have to admit that I’m pretty excited. We have the stockings up on the fireplace mantle (click here to see our heavily toddler-influenced Christmas decor), and M is super excited for the whole Santa thing.
Her “Santa gift” is all wrapped up and hidden upstairs, ready to be brought down after she goes to sleep. Before she goes to bed, we will set out milk and cookies (or brownies). I can’t wait! I’ve been waiting to be able to do this for her since she was born. This is the year I know she will totally understand and I can’t wait to see her face when she sees the treats all eaten and a gift waiting for her!
Tomorrow is Christmas and I’m planning on taking that day off on the blog!
Have a great Christmas Day! May it be full of happiness and blessings!
When I come back on Friday, I will be 36 weeks pregnant… yay!
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The weight…
Posted on: December 23, 2014
During my last appointment about a week ago, my OB-GYN determined that the current weight of this little baby is about 5lbs, 10oz.
I would imagine that at this point, the baby is probably pushing 6lbs now.
When M was born, she weighed only 5lbs, 3oz.
That means that this baby is currently heavier than M ever was in my tummy. Believe me, I’m feeling every bit of that weight.
At this point, I’m quickly approaching the 36 week mark and feeling heavier and sorer (is that word?) than I’ve ever felt before.
This part of pregnancy is all new to me. Feeling very heavy, and feeling that this baby is quickly running out of room. I thought it was uncomfortable when I was pregnant with M, but this is vastly different.
There are days when I’m sluggish. I’m on bedrest and hardly getting up to do anything, yet I’m still sluggish! I can barely move, even to just roll over! Everything hurts from my back to my front and everything in between. I don’t remember being this way with M.
I’m so thankful that God has blessed this child to stay in me for as long as she is staying, but I just never realized how uncomfortable it truly is!
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False alarm…
Posted on: December 22, 2014
False labor.
When I was pregnant with M, I had my share of Braxton Hicks, but I never had false labor. When I was pregnant with M, my water broke at 36 weeks to our shock and surprise and before we knew it, we were parents.
But false labor? Nope. Never.
Until last week.
We were all in bed. Then, it started.
It started out as Braxton Hicks, nothing out of the ordinary, just the normal tightening and discomfort.
But then, it kept coming. One after another.
I did what was suggested of me to determine if it was truly preterm labor. I went to the bathroom to empty my bladder, I drank a lot of water, and I lied on my left side. Nothing was slowing it down, it felt like it was increasing everything.
I recently downloaded an app called “Full Term.” It’s an app that helps keep track of contractions. All you have to do is hit “start” when a contraction starts and “end” when it ends. The app times it and calculates the frequency.
Because the tightening started coming in intervals, I decided to use the app to keep track.
The contractions were lasting for 50 seconds to a minute long and coming in ever 2 1/2 to 3 minutes.
As the tightening continued to come and go, the intensity started increasing. It started getting harder to talk through. I started using breathing techniques that we learned three years ago during our Lamaze classes we took when pregnant with M.
I decided that I needed to that the anti-contraction medicine I was given back in October when my cervix first shrunk. I had been hesitant to take it because I hate taking any sort of medicine while pregnant. However, the app was showing that I had at least 10 contractions within the past hour, so I had to take it. I figured that if I didn’t take it and I went to the hospital, the doctors might give me something stronger to stop the contractions and I didn’t want that at all.
So I took the medicine and called Labor and Delivery to ask how long it would take the medicine to kick in and slow the contractions down.
By then, the contractions were hurting. Not only were they hard to talk through, they were hard to breathe through because they were hurting. I kept concentrating on the breathing exercises to try to calm myself down, but I was obviously very nervous. Was this it? Were we going in? Were we going to have this baby at 34 weeks?
Labor and Delivery told me that it would take about half an hour for the medicine to kick in and to wait about an hour to determine if we needed to really come to the hospital or not. So I got off the phone with them and continued to try to relax and concentrate on breathing, hoping the medicine could kick in soon.
Within half an hour, I noticed the intensity of the contractions were decreasing. Then as the hour progressed, the contractions also started to space themselves farther apart and decreased into just a mere uncomfortable tightening. By the time the hour passed, everything was done.
If I didn’t have that medicine, who knows what could have happened.
I’m hoping that the episode didn’t cause my cervix to dialate. I’m hoping that I can still last the week and have this baby AFTER Christmas…
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As promised here, this is the blog post about the hands/feet wreath in the middle of our Christmas mantle.
I found this on Pinterest and I knew I had to try it!
Click here to take you to the website the pin is linked to.
I had supplies. I had green cardstock in two different shades. I had red cardstock scraps and a circle hole punch. I also had a paper plate to make the process of wreath-creating much easier.
I took two full 12in x 12in sheets of green cardstock in a light shade and a dark shade.
I took M’s hand and traced it out.
Sorry so blurry. It was hard enough keeping her still to trace her hand, so you could imagine how hard it was for me to try to trace her hand AND take a picture at the same time!
After I did her hands, she wanted her feet traced too. The pinterest project doesn’t feature feet, but I figure we could take some creative license and add some feet. So I took the other shade of green cardstock and used that for her feet.
In the end, we had a stack of hands and feet.
I cut a hole in the middle of a paper plate, covered it with glue and we just started sticking the hands and feet down. It took a bit of guidance from me to make sure we made it circular. She had fun sticking things down in the “goopy glue.”
I used my 1in circle hole punch to punch out several red circles out of a piece of red scrap cardstock. I put down blobs of glue and allowed M to stick them down where the blobs of glue were.
I’m sure we could have covered the paper plate better buy adding more hands and feet, but the amount of hands and feet we had were just the right amount to keep her attention.
Have I told you how much I love having a three-year old during Christmas time?!
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Drawing
Posted on: December 20, 2014
M likes to draw. M likes to paint.
The other night, she was playing on Hubby’s pad of scratch paper when I told her to draw Mickey Mouse.
Here’s what she came up with:
Do you see it?
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Hot cocoa…
Posted on: December 19, 2014
- In: Baby food | Food | Parenthood
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M has been pretty obsessed with hot cocoa lately. She saw it on one of the TV shows she likes to watch and has been asking for it for awhile.
Last year, we tried to buy her a hot chocolate from Starbucks to try, but she just wasn’t into it. So this year, I was a little hesitant to let her try it. However, it’s been a year. A lot can (and has) change in a year.
Hubby came home one weekend morning from running errands and treated M and I to some Starbucks in bed. I got a Salted Caramel Hot Chocolate and M had a kids hot chocolate.
She LOVED it.
Those kid’s hot chocolates are so small and the temperature was just barely warm enough that she ended up guzzling the whole thing within minutes!
I knew she was hooked.
I’m all about making things at home now without having to rely too much on mixes or overly processed items, mainly because of her peanut allergy. It was relieving to see that the can of baking cocoa that I had in my pantry had a hot cocoa recipe.
Hot Cocoa
1 tablespoon of sugar
1 tablespoon of baking cocoaA tiny splash of milk to mix it into a paste.
1 cup of warmed milk to mix into the paste.
Super simple, right?
Everyone’s microwave is different, but I warm up M’s milk for about a minute and half, while I warm up my milk for 2 minutes.
She loves this. It’s not too sweet at all. The sugar can be adjusted to taste also. You don’t have to rely on those packet mixes that can be too sweet. This one is just right amount of chocoately sweetness.
I bought my baking cocoa at Sprouts, but I’m sure you can use any brand of preference.
It’s the perfect drink for these cold winter days and nights!
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Rag Quilt – Sewing
Posted on: December 18, 2014
Rag Quilt – Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4
With all the sandwiches done, all that’s left to do is put the quilt together. I have to admit, it was scary.
I was worried that things wouldn’t line up properly. I was worried the squares won’t look like squares once everything was said and done. I was worried that putting it all together was going to much harder than I anticipated. Everything else seemed to go fairly smoothly, I was sure that these final steps were going to be a disaster…
But then again, this was my first time making any sort of quilt. I was going to allow myself imperfections. I was going to consider these all lessons to be learned.
First, the squares have to be arranged in the order they will be sewn together. I had to do this on the floor because I have no table space big enough. Hubby took M out to play in the neighborhood, so I took advantage of the free floor to do it.
You can see I did 5 squares across and 6 squares down. There was no systematic way of arranging them. I just made sure none of the same patterns were directly next to each other, and it was just pleasing to my eye.
Then, I sewed them together, row by row, with a 1in seam allowance to allow for a seam big enough for ragging. I numbered the rows with the left square on the top..
Once the rows were done, it was time to piece them all together. It took a lot of pins and a lot of patience. I definitely feel like a walking foot would help putting this together because there were times that I felt things were shifting because of the way they were feeding through the machine. Still, I made it work with what I had..
I flattened the seams when I was sewing the rows together. I’ve seen other videos where they nest the seams. I’m assuming it’s just whatever your preference is. The edges are going to get cut up in the ragging process anyway, the way the seams were sewn together probably doesn’t matter all that much in the end.
After all the rows had been sewn together, I took the quilt and topstitched a 1in seam aorund the entire quilt’s edge. That was the end of all the sewing!
Here’s a view of the back and the front of the quilt before I started cutting up the edges.
It was a lot easier than I thought it would be…
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Living life in the carpool lane.. 