29 Weeks

29 Weeks

December 30, 2014

This week was eventful with Christmas and a babymoon! 

However at this size I've had to finally buy a support belt. 

Pregnancy Highlights:

How Far Along: 29 weeks

Size of baby: Baby H is the size of a pineapple

Maternity Clothes: All maternity pants and bras, and Piko tops. Plus whatever of Jeremy's that fits. - added a support belt to the mix this week

Gender: Boy

Movement: All day, every day. He keeps sitting somewhere weird and causing me to have this strange numbness/pain sensation at the top of my stomach.

Sleep: Really good the two nights we were in a hotel bed that was a lot like my old antique bed I had covered in down everything!

Cravings: Crushed ice, eating it really helps with heartburn.
Highlight this week: We bought all of our baby furniture at IKEA yesterday and have our 1st 3rd trimester appointment tomorrow.

Here are a few highlights from our Houston Babymoon >>>

It literally rained the entire time, but we ate at a lot of great places (Lankford Grocery and Tacos A Go Go are must). Crepes and coffee weren't a bad hangout while we were waiting to check into the hotel. 

As far as things to do, we went to the Galleria (could have lived without it), played Top Golf, went to the Improve Comedy Club, watched a movie, baby furniture shopped, and slept an entire afternoon. 

It was glorious. 

I even scored 113 and beat Jeremy at a game of Top Golf, which I don't think is too shabby for being 29 weeks pregnant. 

After our long nap I realized I was having some serious pregnancy women lip injections. I feel like all the fluid either pools in my face or my feet. 

Now for a little comparison >>> 29, 19, and 7 weeks. 

I couldn't locate the 9 weeks pregnant pic. 

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28 Weeks

28 Weeks

December 23, 2014

We've finally hit the 3rd trimester!

This are about to get real around here, ready or not.

Pregnancy Highlights:

How Far Along: 28 weeks

Size of baby: Baby H is the size of a coconut

Maternity Clothes: All maternity pants and bras, and Piko tops. Plus whatever of Jeremy's that fits.

Gender: Boy

Movement: All day, he moves a lot in the morning or at night when I've gotten up. We've finally hit the point were he will stick out a fist or his head and I have a knot sticking out of my stomach ha!

Sleep: Not too bad, the heating pad helps.

Cravings: Nothing really sticks out this week, it's just been so hot that Sonic ice is really appealing. Which I'll have to live without since we are out of school for two weeks. (we have a glorious ice machine at work)
Highlight this week: At the end of the week we are headed to Houston for our babymoon/furniture buying Ikea extravaganza! 

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Meal Pinning Monday

Meal Pinning Monday

This isn't my normal cooking week, but I'll share what we are making! 

[What is Meal Pinning Monday?]

MPM is how I meal plan for our little family. I once spent a lot of time searching the web and my recipe books hunting for new recipes and ideas for what to cook every week. Then, Pinterest came along and made meal planning much easier for me. Every weekend I look over what I have pinned the prior week and decide what I would like to cook and make my grocery list from these recipes. MPM came about as a way to share what I am cooking, and to also see what others are cooking every week to hopefully get even more dinner ideas from other bloggers. If you don't pin your recipes feel free to just share what you are cooking.

Tuesday - Fried Shrimp & Catfish

No real recipe here, but Mom uses the Zatarans Lemon Pepper Fish Fry and it's heavenly on fish. 

Wednesday - Christmas Eve App Party & Christmas Lights

We also make meatballs, sliders, several other dips, and hot chocolate for when we go look at lights! 

Thursday - Christmas Day

There will also be a brined turkey, rolls, and several other recipes I haven't shared just yet:)

Friday - Grilled Chicken with Fried Cabbage

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27 Weeks

27 Weeks

December 17, 2014

There seem to be some pros and cons of Pikos as maternity wear. 

1. They are comfortable.

2. You look like you're wearing a tent. 

Pregnancy Highlights:

How Far Along: 27 weeks

Size of baby: Baby H is the size of a bunch of bananas

Maternity Clothes: All maternity pants and bras, and Piko tops. Plus whatever of Jeremy's that fits.

Gender: Boy

Movement: All the time. What's really weird is to watch my stomach stick out all funny when he kicks while I'm in the bath tub. 

Sleep: Not any worse than not pregnant sleep. I just suck at sleep. Sleeping with a heating pad on my hips has helped a lot. 

Cravings: Crackers with Pickapeppa sauce.
Highlight this week: Jeremy finally agreed to ordering the big giraffe for the nursery!

Here are my nursery inspiration pics -

(source)

That's actually the bedding we have:) and the wall color is very similar. The next pic has a better view of the giraffe I fell in love with.

(source)

I didn't get the exact chair, but I did get a gray glider/rocker. We are going after Christmas to get everything else. Hopefully I can land some lamps and black out curtains I love while we are in Houston. Those seem to be the only big decorative pieces I'm lacking. Oh and a pouf, I can't find one that makes me happy.

There isn't an ounce of baby gear in place, no clothing, absolutely nada. 

Well except for the monitor we got on Black Friday.

But he has books for days as of right now! 

Can you tell I'm a teacher? Ha! 

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Uncommon Goods Gift Ideas & Giveaway

Uncommon Goods Gift Ideas & Giveaway

December 15, 2014

Christmas is right around the corner and it's high time to finish up the gift buying for this year.

I'm not one to spend tons on presents, I really think the season is more about being together. I also think that if you're going to give something, make it something that person could use or might want.

Goodness knows I've gotten my hands on a few things throughout past Christmas's that were less than stellar. (See also... things I found out I was allergic to. Those are the most joyful gifts of all.)

The other type of best gift is the kind I would never find myself but I would love to have found. My mother is great at those gifts, I on the other hand didn't inherit her gift giving ability.

Which makes it all the better than I found a great site that has a variety of products. If y'all are anything like me, it's a little annoying to have to order from 10 different places.

I really prefer to get everything done at one time.

So without further rambling from me, here are a few of my favorite gift ideas for this season... all from Uncommon Goods.

To make it more interesting, I'll share my favorite's from Uncommon Good's Christmas Gift sections and then you can share your favorites with me... and there may be a little surprise in it for you at the end. 

continue reading...

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26 Weeks

26 Weeks

December 9, 2014

Another week. 

A little larger. 

Pregnancy Highlights:

How Far Along: 26 weeks

Size of baby: Baby H is the size of a butternut squash

Maternity Clothes: All maternity pants and bras, and Piko tops. Plus whatever of Jeremy's that fits.

Gender: Boy

Movement: Constant. This weekend he stuck his head so far out you could see it on the outside (and not like the kicking), it made my stomach turn and that mixed with the heart burn caused the pregnancy puking to resume. Living with this big baby is like being strapped to a roller coaster ride at Six Flags all day every day. 

Sleep: It's gotten better. I think the massage helped with a lot of the pain I was having. 

Cravings: Cold foods. Celery with vinegar is a good one, plus celery is supposed to help heartburn.
Highlight this week: I survived the glucose test and even finished cleaning up my old rocking horse Rocky Joe. And yes, at 18 months old my mother said I insisted they buy the blue wooden rocking horse and I named him Rocky Joe myself. 

Here's a more accurate - how big Emily is - photo. The Piko tunics skew reality a bit and make me look larger. It's definitely a bunch of baby in there. My always tiny rear-end is now even tinier looking in comparison to my ever growing front-end. 

Apparently they've stepped up their glucose test game in recent years. I managed to not puke, it tasted just like Hawaiian Punch, and I didn't get shaky from all the sugar like I thought I would. Here's to hoping I passed, all of our lab work gets sent off so we never know anything fast. 

 Ole Rocky Joe in the baby room. Don't let the editing fool you, the walls are a bit more blue than they appear. Also, the 28 year old tail was looking a little rough after having lived through 3 kids touching it, I soaked it in White Brite and it made it look a lot closer to a 2 year old tail instead of the nearly 30 year old tail it is. 

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Meal Pinning Monday

Meal Pinning Monday

December 7, 2014

Freezer meal prep is in full swing around here. The goal is to take one of our weekly meals and double it every week until the baby shows up, just to make life easier for the first few weeks.

Later in the week I'll share what my meals are for the months of cooking ahead, plus there will be a linky to link up your own great freezer meals.

[What is Meal Pinning Monday?]

MPM is how I meal plan for our little family. I once spent a lot of time searching the web and my recipe books hunting for new recipes and ideas for what to cook every week. Then, Pinterest came along and made meal planning much easier for me. Every weekend I look over what I have pinned the prior week and decide what I would like to cook and make my grocery list from these recipes. MPM came about as a way to share what I am cooking, and to also see what others are cooking every week to hopefully get even more dinner ideas from other bloggers. If you don't pin your recipes feel free to just share what you are cooking.

Monday - Baked Parmesan Spaghetti (doube to freeze)

Tuesday - leftovers

Wednesday - Grilled Chicken with Sweet Potato Fries

Thursday - Leftover Grilled Chicken with Parmesan Gremolata Smashed Potatoes

Friday - Date Night

Saturday - Irish Nachos

There is a women's event at church Saturday night so I'm taking these::

Sunday - Eating Out

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A Simple Christmas

A Simple Christmas

December 5, 2014

This year, being a relatively chaotic year, has made the two of us think seriously about downsizing our Christmas.

In all honesty I've been thinking for months about how to decorate, especially since I knew we would have our own house by the holidays.

Salt dough ornaments, cinnamon ornaments, tons of buffalo print ribbon.

I wanted it to be simple, inexpensive, and a "country charming" feel.

However, the closer either of us got to the season, it felt forced. As in, why spend money on a tree when we haven't even finished unpacking?

It started with Jeremy suggesting that we not get a tree this year. The first year in 3 years we had room for a live tree again. I agreed with him on it, then disagreed, and now that we are a few days past Thanksgiving, I don't have the energy to even do it this year. 

I'm still going to drag out our tiny table top tree, sans decorations. Just the little fiber optic lights to make it pretty at night in the living room. 

Between the tree discussion and where I am now the thought of Christmas cards came into play. 

I had Jeremy pack what we would be wearing and lug it to my parents house for Thanksgiving with the thought that we would do our annual trek to the Natchez Trace and take pictures. 

Then the night before I told Jeremy to let my sister know she could sleep in, I wasn't dragging her out to take the photo. 

We weren't taking a photo at all. 

No Christmas picture. 

I might buy some cute cards and send them to our family, but the effort and money I put into our Christmas cards every year just wasn't appealing. 

Heck, I've said multiple times that the part of Christmas I enjoy the most is Christmas Eve. We all sit around eating appetizers and then grab some hot chocolate and look at lights. 

Last year was hands down one of the best. On top of our usual Christmas Eve shindigs with our tiny family of 7 we dug out Nanny's recipe for tamales and had Pop teach us all how to roll tamales. 

Times like that are what I love about Christmas. Being with my family who I rarely see, doing things we haven't done in ages, and hearing stories of the silly things Pop did when he was younger. 

Not the presents. 

The conversations and memories. 

I can't tell you what I got for Christmas many years, but I can tell you what I did with my parents and grandparents. I can tell you the feeling of sitting around the table snacking, or sitting on the couch eating the newest Blue Bell flavor of ice cream with Pop. 

I don't recall a single thing Granny Aida ever got me, but I do have a good laugh every time there is a good frost outside. The little Puerto Rican woman called us super early one morning, extremely excited and wanting Mom to send Laura and I out side to see the snow. Granted it wasn't snow, but she thought to call us to tell us to run outside and see what she thought was snow. 

That's what Christmas is about. 

Memories. 

After this past year with everything Dad has been through, it's just nice to all be together. 

10 years from now I won't even remember the lack of decorations, or what Jeremy bought me. I'll just remember the feeling of being together and some silly story that someone told. 

So here's to a simple Christmas at our house, with lots of extra time for memories. 

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Old Fashion Better than Sex Cake

Old Fashion Better than Sex Cake

December 4, 2014

I really expected this to be a chocolate version of the Better than Sex Cake, but considering Nanny hated chocolate it's no wonder there isn't an ounce of chocolate to be found in this recipe. 

She always said that Reese's ruined perfectly good peanut butter, if that is any indication of her disdain for chocolate. 

I know a lot of people are coconut picky, just leave it off if that's your crowd. Or even use walnuts in place of pecans. 

This is a Southern woman's recipe, everything in their recipe books seems to contain some coconut and pecans somewhere. 

As a side note, almond milk does not work with instant pudding. Don't even try it. 

The beauty of the recipes that come from our grandmother's between the 50's and 60's is that they weren't from scratch. They grew up with everything from scratch, hence the cake mix and cool whip. These women were ready to leave the from scratch cooking behind. 

For the most part. 

Old Fashioned Better than Sex Cake

Ingredients::

1 box yellow cake mix

15.5 oz can crushed pineapple 

1 cup sugar

4 bananas

large instant vanilla pudding mix 

large cool whip

1 1/2 cups coconut 

1 cup chopped pecans

+ingredients needed for pudding and cake mix (according to instructions)

Directions::

Bake one box of yellow cake mix according to directions. 

Mix 15.5 oz can of crusted pineapple and 1 cup sugar in a sauce pan over medium heat until sugar dissolves. Pour over cake while hot. Slice 4 bananas over cake. Mix large instant vanilla pudding mix according to directions, pour over cake. Top with large cool whip. Mix 1 1/2 cups coconut and 1 cup pecans and sprinkle over top. Keep refrigerated. 

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25 Weeks

25 Weeks

December 2, 2014

Not my favorite look thus far, hair just wasn't working for me this Sunday. In all honesty though, I'm a cold weather gal for the ease of hair management 100%. 

But let's talk baby. 

Pregnancy Highlights:

How Far Along: 25 weeks

Size of baby: Baby H is the size of a head of cauliflower (my uterus is the size of a soccer ball)

Maternity Clothes: All maternity pants and bras, and Piko tops. Plus whatever of Jeremy's that fits.

Gender: Boy

Movement: We need to have a discussion this week. Every night since I hit 25 weeks he has started moving at 3:30am every 20 minutes for about 5 minutes at a time. Once I fall asleep again he starts up again. So that leads into the next topic...

Sleep: Haven't had any. Thank you child for wanting to party all night. I literally have a maternity body pillow, a pillow behind my head on top of the maternity pillow, one between my knees, a pillow in between my calves/feet, and last night I added one just to prop up my stomach up extra. None of it has helped and I've been a grouchy old woman every day at work. I need sleep just to be able to have patience. 

Cravings: Super cold water, pretzels with mustard, and the blue cheese coleslaw I made with dinner Monday night.
Highlight this week: Baby's movement has finally gotten to the point where Jeremy can see it and definitely feel it. I was thinking for a good while that this child kicked only when no one was around. However after Laura shook my stomach half to death he as been on a rampage. I also have my glucose test tomorrow and a prenatal massage Thursday.

Here's to hoping the massage works miracles and I can get some sleep.

What did y'all do for the back pain?
I teach and have to be on my feet all day and not in the most comfortable shoes, but nothing is really that comfortable these days. 

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