11/30/11

Fall Art and Decorations

Fall is coming to an end, and it is now time to decorate for Christmas!!!  Here are some of Finnley and Lawson's artwork we had on display around our house!

Turkey Place-mat #1 (By Finnley)
Turkey Place-mat #2 (By Finnley)

Cabinet Art (By Finnley)
Cabinet Art (By Lawson)


Pantry Door Art (By Finnley)

On Mommy and Daddy's Door (By Finnley)
Art on the Front Door (By Finnley and Lawson)


Finnley and Lawson's Halloween Pumpkins!

11/29/11

Baby X Update!

22 weeks!

Today I had the anatomy ultrasound!  Which, although I've decided not to find out the gender, was still just as exciting!  I love watching that lil' kiddo and getting new pictures to post!  

 Baby X is also measuring 1 lb and 4 ounces... and they are predicting another big kiddo because he/she already has a nice round belly and some chubby cheeks.


Our Family's First Thanksgiving at Home

This was our first year hosting Thanksgiving and my first year making all the food.  I'm very proud to say that it turned out great!  The only thing I messed up on were the dinner croissants, which was also probably the easiest thing to make...  but luckily they weren't missed too much since everything else was not only edible but yummy too!





11/24/11

Thankful Thursday #4

I am thankful for:

1) My kiddos!  Such sweet, fun, happy kids!  I love them so much  - they light up my days, make me smile, and make me realize how truley blessed we are!

2) My husband!  I know I've listed him before, but he truly is a blessing in my life.  He makes me laugh and not take things so seriously.  He is a great friend, husband, and a great Daddy to our babies.

3) Modern appliances.   How grateful I am to not have to wash every dish and cloth diaper by hand!

4) Coffee.  I shouldn't drink as much as I do - but it makes my days better!

5) Baby Name books - I can't come up with a name for "Baby X" if it is a girl.  And I finally caved and bought a naming book which I look through while I put the kiddos down for bed.

6) Our car brakes being fixed.  How stressful it is to not have a car in working condition!

7) My sister living in the same city.  It is always nice to spend time with her - and being able to have her close enough to see the kids fairly often is great!

I would really like to list more - but I have to start prepping our food for Thanksgiving!  Hope everyone has a wonderful Turkey Day!

Happy Turkey Day!!!

11/22/11

The Brake Situation

I brought our van in today to have the brakes re-re-done.  

Luckily, they were very quick to take it back and fix the problem.  

So the brakes are fixed (again) but the mechanic said he doesn't know why the brake spring keeps slipping out of place... which doesn't sound very promising.  

Now I'm paranoid that the problem will return.  When I asked what to do if it happens again he just said that it shouldn't.  Which again isn't a huge confidence builder for me considering it shouldn't have done it two times before.  

So I'm really praying that the brakes don't go bad again, and that the van can just hold on without any major problems until tax return time!

11/19/11

Uhg! Not My Week

So this week has been overwhelming to say the least.  I'm physically and mentally exhausted.  In fact, right now my kids should be in bed, but I am so tired that sitting in their room til they fall asleep was too much for me. 

So we are watching Barney while they fall asleep watching TV - so lame, but I need a break.  

My week started with having to make a lot of phone calls to doctor's and dentist offices.  This week alone I went to 5 different appointments - 4 of them for me.  One of my fillings had decided to fall out during the very beginning of pregnancy and since I felt so terrible at that point I didn't call to have it taken care of til now.  Lucky me, I find out on Tuesday that it has to be extracted.  So I feel like a total failure for my tooth.  But they don't do extractions at that office, so I had to schedule another appointment with an oral surgeon.  But I still got to pay $50 so they could tell me that.

On Wednesday I was in the process of switching OBGYNs.  The first one was charging us way too much, and I found another doctor whose cost is better covered under our insurance.  So I got to go talk to my former OBGYN and then meet the next one, all with the kiddos in tow.  They actually did as well as anyone could hope they would do.  But still after 2 hours at a doctors appt., no kid is going to be very patient.

Thursday I met with my new oral surgeon, which actually took a little stress off of the whole situation of getting my tooth extracted.  He said that it looked like the tooth might have been doomed from the beginning (since my wisdom teeth were never taken out) because the same tooth on the other side was really cramped and if there was a filling on that side it would have fallen out too.  So that made me feel slightly better that maybe I wasn't a complete failure, but rather my genes had played a small part it me having to say goodbye to this tooth.  So I set an appt. for that - which is again stressful, because our dental "insurance" turns out to be nothing more than a discount card.  So although not the full amount - its not pocket change either.

Immediatly after leaving that appt. I had to take Lawson to go get his shots - poor guy got four!  His legs were so sore that night that he had trouble walking.  That was the first time I questioned giving my babies their immunizations.

Luckily, on Friday we had nothing to do.  We had a movie day so Lawson could get over the little fevers that follow getting shots.  But in all honestly, I felt like I was failing Finnley for not getting her out to go play.

Then comes today.  It has just been a really stressful week - so this topped it off to the point where I am just on the verge of a minor depression.  Our car brakes are bad again.  We had our car brakes fixed right after getting the car in September.  Then we had to get them re-done at the end of October.  NOW - not even a month later, the same problem is back!  I hate going back to the mechanic and telling them that something is wrong, and I'm not sure if they are going to re-fix it for free again.  

I'm stressed over money.  I'm stressed over not being able to use our car until it is fixed, and not knowing when that will be and if/how much we will have to be paying for it.  I can't get my tooth fixed until the car is fixed, but if we have to pay to get the car fixed then I'm not sure if we'll have enough to fix my tooth.  (Which can only be done in the next 5 weeks b/c it can't be done in my 3rd trimester.)

So I could really use a good night sleep.  But I can't even do that because I am constantly uncomfortable with 'Baby X'.   Happily, not as bad as with Lawson - but still my body just can't get comfortable.  

Sorry for such a negative rant, but I really needed to just write and vent.  Hopefully this next week is better. 

11/11/11

Finnley's Christmas Wish List

Yesterday we went to the mall and saw Santa!   I actually didn't think he was already there, but when Finnley saw him she insisted on saying 'hi'.  So she sat on his lap and told him everything she wanted for Christmas.  Santa said we could also bring him a letter (there is a really big cute mail box for kids to put their letters in).  Finnley was so excited to mail a letter to Santa that we decided to make her Christmas Wish List now instead of after Thanksgiving.  She was very proud of her letter and I know she'll have fun sending it next week!

11/10/11

Thankful Thursday #3!

Today I am very thankful for learning how to coupon!  I can thank my friend, Jamie, for getting me into it.  If anyone is interested - this site: Share The 31 Secret, is the one that taught me what I know.   But I was able to buy all of our necessities for the week and our Thanksgiving: Turkey, Gravy, Pie Pumpkin, Stuffing and Mashed Potatoes for under $90!

Second, I'm also very thankful for Lawrence's job.  He has been getting a lot of overtime lately which has been very helpful.  But even better - when he works overtime he gets dinner for free so that also helps us save money!

I'm thankful that we moved to Austin!  We've been very blessed with a good church, Lawrence's job, a fun playgroup for the kiddos and myself... everything has worked out very well for us here so far!

 I'm thankful for being able to feel "Baby X" kick!  At 19 weeks these are the cute little innocent kicks that make you excited... not the ones at 29 weeks that actually hurt.

I'm thankful for bad moods passing quickly!  haha, I was in a bad mommy funk earlier this week, and I'm glad I got out of it quickly - never fun being a grouchy mommy.


 


11/9/11

Finnley's Applesauce

Finn and Lala both love the show, Sid the Science Kid.  Yesterday we watched an episode that had the characters make applesauce.  So Finnley insisted on doing that too!  So we made some for desert! 
 



(Mostly) Wordless Wednesday #1

11/7/11

Pregnancy Weight Gain...

So, this is my third time around being pregnant.  With Finn I gained 50 lbs... and with Lawson - another 50 lbs.  Only recently did I start losing the weight.  I swore that I wouldn't gain another 50 lbs this pregnancy ... heck, I didn't even want to go above 20.  

Well, apparently I suck at keeping goals - I'm almost 19 weeks and have already gained that 20 lbs.  

AHHH!!!

And it is 100% due to poor diet.  My cravings went through the roof for junk and more junk.  And I LOVE making excuses, and what better one to use than, "but I'm pregnant...".  So for the next 20 weeks I am going to really try and buckle down and not eat everything that is covered in sugar or baked in fat.  
 
Obviously a little leeway will be needed since it is the Holidays... but what better time to be pregnant right?!?  haha, but seriously, no more than 15 more lbs in the next 21 weeks.  I can do this.  I can go without the bag of Oreos in one day .... (so sad to admit that).

11/5/11

Finnley's Views of Austin

Me to Finnley:  "I'm trying to convince Papa to move to Austin."
Finnley: "Austin?"  But Austin is a Kangaroo."

(You will only understand this if you have seen Backyardigans.)


Blues Clues!!!

Last night I decided I wanted to have Finnley wake up to a fun game we could play.  She has been watching a little bit of Blues Clues so I figured having her guess what we were going to do today would be fun!

I put two clues up.  Not in the traditional way of putting them all together - I put one on the cereal to have her guess that we were going to eat breakfast, and then another on the play-shoes which she guessed right away meant we were going to play at the park!

But the very first thing she noticed was the "Handy Dandy Notebook".  She looked on the table after first waking up and said, "Mommy!  It's the thinking chair!"  I was so happy that she was already showing signs that she was excited to play the game with me!!!  I think I will keep this game going for a while.  So cute and fun!





Happy Anniversary!

Today Lawrence and I celebrated two years of marriage!

We're definitely a little strapped for cash (Holidays coming, Lawson's 2nd birthday, student loans, and one income will do that...)  But I wanted to do something a little special for today.

I looked online and found out that the 2nd year anniversary gift is Cotton and China.  So I imagine if you are rich you buy your significant other a nice robe or high thread count bed sheets?  And/or a really nice new set of china dishes?  

That was far from within our budget.  So I decided that I wanted to spend a grand total of $0.  But I wanted to do something together.  This is what I came up with:


 It's a board game made almost entirely out of frabric/cotton.  Of course I had to improvise a bit since I didn't want to spend money and only use what I already had laying about.

The point of the game: to get the other person naked first. You started out with five articles of clothing: undies, hat, shirt, pants, and shoes.  If you rolled a two you got to roll again, if you landed on a picture of us you picked up another clothing card, if you had more than one piece of the same clothing (ex: two hats) you could sacrifice one and make the other player also sacrifice a piece of clothing.

We played one game, and Lawrence kicked my butt.  But it was fun and totally served the purpose of giving us a laugh and something to do together in celebration of another year together!

So that covered the 'cotton' part of the anniversary gift.  But I also needed something for 'China'.  So I decided to get two fortune cookies - it covered the other part of the traditional anniversary gift and also desert!

I also had one left over iron transfer that I decided to have fun with.  I am a big fan of being festive for an occasion - so I made an anniversary shirt!

So overall, it was a fun anniversary!  

We did end up buying Church's chicken for dinner so it wasn't a completely $0 evening - but that was a good bonus since it means less clean up!