Hello Monday!

We are off to an early start around these parts since a certain little man has decided 6:30 is the new 8 AM for the last few days! And of course it's the last few days that I have actually had to get up too. Our weekend was pretty low key!

I am actually struggling to remember what we did Friday night, one thing I'm sure is that I was in bed early haha. Real exciting times over here.

Saturday morning Noah went with M to run errands and to visit my Dad in the hospital. While I stayed home and folded baskets of laundry (we were about 2 months behind - soo embarrassing) while getting caught up on Kendra On Top on the box and hanging out with our fur babies who were all demanding extra attention! 

Check out Gracie's new look:

Reminds me of when she was a puppy!! Soo fluffy and cute! She had a great spa morning on Friday! 

And these two boys were up to no good as usual:

Once the boys got home and Noah settled for his nap, I headed into the hospital to hang out with Dad
for the afternoon! M ended up making plans to go for dinner with his friend and thier family to help
give into my Wonton Nacho craving! We ordered just appetizers which of course were not healthy at all, but soo yummy! I should be good for a while now! Noah had pizza and ice cream for dessert- which he was a big fan of:

After dinner I ran my left overs up to the hospital and ended up visiting for a bit longer - missing bedtime for Noah, which of course I hate, but luckily it doesn't happen very often. I went to bed before 10! That was a smart move because this little monkey woke up at 6:30 again! Such a stinker and M was gone early to help set up for the fireman's breakfast so you bet I was up just as early. He insisted on having his morning bottle with Gracie:

We headed for breakfast around 9 AM, which Noah sure enjoyed, but really he enjoyed sitting in ALL of the fire trucks instead of just one! 

Our little fire fighter:

Noah went down for a morning nap because he was up early, so I tackled putting away some of that dreaded laundry! M came home at noon, so I could take lunch up to Dad. I got home just after 2, had a quick nap and then back to putting away laundry. I'm happy to announce it is all put away and the mudroom floor was visible for a bit before I had M start bringing down boxes of baby clothes from the spare room that I plan to sort through this week. 

M and Noah headed outside to cut the grass while ribs were cooking in the oven! Noah did a nasty 

face plant hitting his head on M's running board on the truck, giving himself a giant goose egg! Poor guy! We watched Heartland while eating dinner, which is something we have always done when it's on!

Bedtime wasn't far behind for this little guy: 

After he went to bed, I ran into town to grab some groceries with J and got home just in time to finally order bedding for Noah's big boy room!! I of course had to order from the U.S., which sucks with the dollar, but I got a great deal and my Dad is willing to pick it up for me from the PO box, so it was meant to be! I think the colors will be perfect! It's just what I think I am looking for! 

Today a morning nap will be on the agenda today, as well as a nice walk, as it's supposed to be half decent today and not freezing cold like all weekend! I will also be awaiting my call from my sister or Dad once the doctor comes into see him to conference me in and hear the plan. 

And to start off a new thing here on the blog, as I love reading what others are doing as far as weekly menus go, here is our menu plan for the week!

Meal Plan Monday:

Sunday: Ribs and Italian Garden Salad

Monday: Easy Mac and Cheese - we tried this recipe two weeks ago and loved it and it really was easy

Tuesday: Chicken quesadillas 

Wednesday: Sloppy Joe Casserole, but instead of putting it on potatoes, I will be trying it with pasta

Thursday: Homemade Pizzas 

Friday: Chicken Fingers and French fries

Weekend Rewind

This weekend was super busy, but super productive in the packing department!! We officially move out Tuesday night, over to the farm we go! We are looking at being there for about 3 weeks! Luckily M's parents have given us a room to use and we will be taking our bed, along with Noah's parafenalia! We were planning on staying in a trailer, but M's Dad wasn't keen on that idea, so we came up with the alternate plan!

Friday night we came up with our game plan and took it easy! M got home late from work and we just enjoyed some family time! 

Saturday we began packing! M got the garage all cleaned out and we started moving the extra furniture out there that we didn't need! We made up those nectarines we bought at the market into baby food for Noah, took down the art work and then decided to run into town, grab dinner and some groceries! 

Noah was a sport! Apparently I need to make a trip to Costco and Old Navy or the mall and find the little man some warm fall outdoor wear or a snow suit! Because we have officially hit cooler weather than we are able to dress for! 

Infact come Sunday morning the heat was turned on in our house! Yes I try to hold out until the end of the month, but clearly having a baby in the house doesn't allow me to be stubborn in that department anymore! 

Sunday morning we bundled up and headed to help Daddy at the fireman's breakfast! My sister and her little fam jam came and we had a quick visit at home afterwards in our chaotic mess!! After they left, M and I got right back to work packing up the kitchen cupboards, the bathroom, etc. 

Then between naps for Noah we took turns working outside! I cut the lawn and M put away all the lawn furniture! Two big jobs we won't have to worry about, we will just have the gardens to cut back, which we do on an upcoming weekend! 

Luckily my back seems to be okay now, still not sure what I did to create the pain last week! 

Noah did wake up from one of his naps on the wrong side... Or something was off because he was soo very angry! We assume his mouth was sore, although we still don't see any teeth! But it took a good 40 minutes to calm him down and it took a football game to help our cause too!!

M's parents stopped over on their way home from the lake to see how we made out this weekend and to go over the plan for the next few days for moving over there and ended up staying for a ribs dinner! After they left we got settled into our evening routine and relaxed after another busy busy weekend! 

The next few days will be a little tricky for getting everyone situated and us settled in at the farm. The pets are all moving tomorrow and Tuesday we will make the move! 

Weekend Rewind

We finally had a nice low key, slow weekend.

Friday night was baseball... It was a pathetic loss. These games are getting harder and harder to watch  because by the last two innings they lose focus it seems, make mistakes and hand it over to the other team, even when they were up by 10... I told M I am going to stop keeping score and keep track of errors instead. This is totally a fun team, in a beer drinking league, but these pathetic losses I am sure are taking a toll! 

Saturday we lazed around the house, since I managed to get the house cleaned from top to mostly bottom on Friday! M got done work early on Friday so we did groceries together, I fought with the Wal-Mart pharmacy - yup I was that lady in Wal-Mart, who refused to fill Noah's prescription and then left me standing there waiting for nothing for 15 minutes. This will be the last script they get. End rant. While we were gone Lily and Gracie decided they should eat Kleenex... We later discovered it was Lily who did it, but we dog shamed them both! Little brats: 

Back to Saturday, I vacuumed the pool, we are still dealing with a very green pool, despite the copious amounts of shock we have put in it. It is very frustrating! So today I'm going to try an algeacide. Binx got her bath, Noah researched cereal:

I had a nice long nap in the afternoon, M worked on some yard work and had downtime with Noah. It was great! 

Sunday was an exciting day, Noah tried cereal for the first time and he loved it! 

I worked on the pool again, did some laundry, watched a lot of The Good Wife, M bathed the other two cats! Lux was really impressed:

We had ribs for dinner, went for a full walk around the village and then put the little man to bed! It was a nice weekend to get caught up on rest and what not after travelling for 2 weeks that's for sure!

What I Am Loving!!

Let me start off by saying that I am loving the weather!! Finally I think spring might actually be here!!

I am loving this flirty little boy: 

I am loving and hating that my cats caught a mouse in the house... Love that they caught it, but hate that there was a mouse in my house! We haven't had any for a long time! I'm happy M was home to deal with it! 

I love that yesterday both Noah and I stayed in our jammies all day long! Today I will get dressed!! Noah will most likely stay in his sleeper because he is in between newborn clothes and 0-3 months! Therefore he has no pants that fit... Unless they don't have feet and I don't feel like 50 million sock/slipper changes at diaper change time. The sleepers win right now, even if only 5 fit good right now. The one above is too big still, but we are over it! Old navy fits best right now! 

I am loving the smiles this little man is coming up with these days! I need to video tape these because the noises he makes are just as good as the faces!! Think big giggles and squeals! 

I love that my new perfume has come in today and I can't wait to go grab it from the post office!! 

I am loving playing around with my new blog design as some of you may have noticed!! Just working on the about me section next, which is taking a bit more time than I care to admit to! 

I am loving my little mans new wardrobe, however I am still not enjoying attempting to organize it!! He will be one trendy little man after seeing all the gifts he has received!! Which means I have a second and probably third batch of thank yous to get done! 

Hope everyone is enjoying their Wednesday!! Tomorrow I will be back to talk about my story with infertility to support Infertility Awareness Week!! 

Noah's First Easter Weekend [weekend rewind]

Noah had another super busy weekend filled with 4 days of fun! I will start off by saying how nice the 20 degree weather was all weekend long! It makes today's rain not so bad!

Friday S&K came over in the morning with W for a visit. The guys looked at our roof and sure enough it is going to need some work this summer! We had a great visit and W enjoyed some fun baby snuggles with Noah!

Once they left, I enjoyed my first bath in the new tub, as well as my first bath in this house!! It was great!! 

Friday we had dinner at the farm! Mike's parents invited my sisters family and my parents over for dinner. It was soo nice having our family all together, especially for Noah's First Easter! I might have mentioned we should do this once a year!! 

Noah was spoiled by Grandpa and had his first taste of ice cream - black cherry, Grandpa's favorite! Fun was had by all!! My Mom stayed over both Friday night and Saturday night. 

Friday night was the first night Noah slept ALL night long!! Celebrations were had!! So proud of our little man!! 

Saturday we worked on the garage, it flooded when all the snow melted for some reason and we had a lot of card board on the ground. Needless to say we had a mess! We got a lot of it cleaned up, but the garage is far from clean yet. We did get a good start before we had to goto Easter celebration #2 with my Mom's extended family. I did find myself a new bottle of wine to enjoy: 

Noah slept great again, not quite all night, but soo close!! 

Sunday morning we took pictures of Noah and his Easter loot! We went with clothes this year, since we all know I won't be able to do that again!! Grandma gave him the basket, the bunny that us actually the same size as him haha, and the books! 

This picture sums up Easter for Noah: 

Noah had some playtime with Lux: 

We were at the farm for lunch. M's Mom helped me out with making his car seat cover. I just have the straps to finish, maybe this week! M helped his Dad with some yard work and the dogs had a blast running around after the quad and playing in the fields! We went to my Aunts for yet another Easter dinner, which was fun! 

M worked Monday morning, but got off around 11, so we could head to London for the final Easter celebration with my Dad's extended family! It was great because my cousin from out west was home visiting!! We had a great visit and were home by 6 after picking up the dogs up from the farm! 

Noah did great after having such a busy weekend!! We are soo proud of him! He slept great at night, waking each morning at 4:30 after filling his pants! If he didn't fill his pants at 4:30, he would most likely sleep through the night like he did on Friday night! 

So last night we tried moving his last feed up to 9:45pm and having him in bed at 10 - but he still woke at 4:30 on the dot with needing a diaper change!! 

Over all we had a great weekend and finished it up with a family photo! I'm not sure how we got Noah looking at the camera and actually smiling, but we did at just 9 weeks old!! 

Hope everyone had a great weekend as well!! 

Weekend Rewind

I had full intentions of posting on Friday, but clearly it didn't happen!

Friday I had my 6 week follow up with my OB! Everything is all good, blood pressure is back to normal and I can resume regular activity as far as my c-section goes. Now we just need to get my ankle back into shape, so I can start getting back into shape! 

Excuse my wild hair - it was a long day! 

After my appointment we went up to visit my Grandma. She unfortunately isn't doing well at all, to the point where she was blessed by the priest on Sunday. She hasn't been well for 2 years, but as much as she is fighting a hard fight, her body is now failing in all aspects. Luckily they are able to keep her comfortable, but unfortunately her days are very limited. Noah was able to "meet" his great-grandma, but sadly he was only able to say hello and a final goodbye in his first visit. Grandma has lived a good life, and as much as we will all miss her, it's soo hard to see her like this and suffering. My Grandma is our last living grandparent for both M and I. 

We did a quick trip to Costco, stopped at Chapters, where M insisted on buying Noah the biggest stuffed dog - it's bigger than Noah! We picked up spare jets for the hot tub and then ended up at the farm for pizza! It was a looong day, but Noah was a champ, up until bedtime that is! He had a rough night! We find if we haven't held him a lot in the day then he either misses us and needs that time, if he was just over stimulated in the day. He also had an upset tummy, which didn't help matters! M ended up sleeping on the lazy boy with him until 5 AM... 

Saturday we managed to get some more spring cleaning done, as well as the nursery, so you will all be happy to hear it will be posted TOMORROW!! Can't wait to share it!! We also enjoyed our first Dairy Queen of the season!! Saturday evening Noah's tummy was upset again, but we figured out the problem! Both days he had a bottle - we used the medela calma nipple that we have always used, but Noah can drink too fast with it. He drank 3 ounces in like 5 minutes, with a burping session at the half way point! The bottle is designed to help ease nipple confusion between breast and bottle, but Noah can suck away to fast and much that he gets it too quick, where as before he had to work hard to get what he could. So we won't be using that one again and will switch over to our Dr. Brown bottles now. 

He ended up sleeping in bed with us, as long as one of us had our hand of him while he was in his Bummzie, then he was content. Little bum. He woke up at 3 for a feed and then 8,we were going to get up, but decided to sleep in. I got up at 10:45am to find M back on the chair with Noah:

Apparently M didn't feel like coming back to bed, but decided the chair wasn't soo bad after all. Because he then did this again at bed time.

We ended up with some visitors that popped in to see Noah in the afternoon. 

We enjoyed a nice family walk, which of course included a family selfie!! We did the whole village again for the first time since fracturing my ankle. I was a little stiff after, but it felt great! I think we still work our way up to it, but throw in the full walk every now and then until I can do it with more ease. 

When we got back we learned that when the dogs are away, the cats don't play, they steal their beds... We couldn't help but to laugh! 

Noah was back to himself, content and happy, got some more housework done and enjoyed chicken on the BBQ before relaxing for the evening!

I forgot the CMA's were on last night until an hour was passed, so hopefully we will watch that today at some point! 

Today Noah is all smiles. I love that he is really figuring out who M and I are and gives us smiles while locking eyes with us. I caught the end of one this morning:

It brings tears to my eyes feeling his love right back at us with his smiles!

 I also think maybe I'm a bit sappy with all that's going on with my Grandma. It feels soo wrong to be soo happy while she is suffering. They say new life brings the end of another, I just wish it wasn't the case. I can remember how happy she was when I told her we were expecting and I'm trying my best to preserve that memory, amongst many others. I was going through pictures last night of my Grandma and found myself teary eyed while collecting them. I just pray for her suffering to end and that she will pass with ease. It is soo hard to see her go through this stage of life. 

High Five Yo!!

Wow Friday has finally come!! I've been saying how fast time has been going, but this week dragged on!!

My week has been pretty boring to say the least, but we made the best of it. 

1) sprung house arrest today. Although it was only for a doctors appointment. 

That aircast weighs 5 pounds! 

2) my doctors appointment went well this morning. Blood pressure is stable and meds are remaining the same! The doctor said this was one way to control it, as I'm essentially on bed rest because of my foot. Huge thanks to my Dad for taking me, even if he used my wheelchair to stop the elevator doors from shutting lol. 

3) the nursery curtains came in the mail yesterday, which meant I got to go up to see the nursery!! We didn't have the proper light bulb, so the lighting was very poor, but I will go up again on the weekend to see how it matches, but I am just loving the way it looks!! Felt great to be up there again! I'm hoping to be able to start working in there next week (foot dependant).

4) loving snuggles with this little guy all week:

He takes bed rest pretty seriously, and reading up on pregnancy not so much. His little paws actually opened my what to expect app. 

He also lives feeling the baby kick:

 M caught him up laying on the nursery rug looking at the crib. He is patiently waiting too. 

5) the weekend is here and although I had to cancel my dinner plans with N & M, we don't have much on the go! Hopefully M will catch some downtime! 

Hope everyone has a great and safe weekend!! 

A Real Post, I'd Rather Not post

This is the view I work up to:

 

There are two things wrong with this picture! 1. That is snow you see, luckily not a lot, but enough to be on the ground and trees. Yuck! 2. There are no window covers on my windows, not just this one either, in fact all do our window coverings are down! Why you ask? 

FLEAS! 

Yup, luckily not a lot, but you don't need a lot to freak out! I'm sure I've gone overboard, but better safe than sorry. How did I find out? Insert back story:

My Dad moved back down home, got his own place and all, which meant that all of his stuff in my shop can go to his new place. He brings his dog over all the time, this was no different. Then he went moose hunting and sure enough my sister volunteered to watch the dog. About 3 days later she found a ton of fleas on her. So she went all crazy in her house, bathed Gypsy 3 times, and sure enough all was to be fine. 

Yesterday I was at my sisters house photographing her jewelry and her dog kept itching, so I told her to check him and sure enough, she found a flea. Her dogs are treated with flea stuff regularly, but still managed to have fleas. She called my Dad over to bath her dogs and cat with flea treatment. Sure enough he went. I packed up, headed home and then checked my pets and sure enough, I found one on Gracie, and one on Lux. None on Jazz, Lily or Binx. But if one has them, they all have them in my eyes, as they are always cuddling, sharing beds, etc. So I called my Dad, told him how not impressed. I was and then got straight to work. 

M came home from work to a frantic pregnant clean freak, coming up with a master plan of how we were going to deal with this. We used the bathrooms as holding areas for the pets. Dogs in my bathroom, cats in M's. Then started a contamination room - aka laundry room to hold all of the potentially contaminated linens. We had a quick dinner, and then cleaned our house top to bottom, took all bedding, curtains, pillows, washable rugs, clothes and put them into the contamination room to be washed. Sure enough I have a heck of a lot of laundry to do, which was also started last night. My house is spotless for the most part. Everything was vacuumed, floors washed, I'm sure you get the picture. 

We bathed Lily first and sure enough we still didn't find any fleas. Poor M was stuck bashing everyone because I couldn't come into contact with the shampoo being pregnant. So I dried the dogs with these handy dandy gloves on! Better safe than sorry! 

Gracie was up next, still rather simple to bath, the dogs usually are. While I was drying Gracie, Binx was up next. She is soo easy to bath thank goodness! She's just laid back and purring. But I found a few more fleas on Gracie while drying her off! luckily they were dead but I couldn't get them off with my gloves on, so M came over to help and sure enough Binx is just wandering around the bathroom. We finished drying Gracie, finished bathing Binx and moved on to Jazz. You would have thought we were skinning her alive, she was soo upset with having a bath. I dried her while Lux was up next, he was a brat. Let's just say the baby won't be the first one to go to the bathroom in the tub! Poor M! And poor Lux!
 

We put all the towels in the wash, then shut both bathrooms at 11:30pm, made the bed, cleaned ourselves, emptied the vacuums and garbages and sure enough it was past midnight by the time we came to bed. 

Needless to say we were beat! 

So I have 3 rooms left to be cleaned, 2 of which will be done today - both bathrooms and the laundry room once everything is washed! 

The good news is my house is spotless. My animals are clean, but man that was a whole ton of work! I'm sure those without animals - if they made it this far in the post are not only disgusted, but wondering why someone would have an animal. But those who do have animals know this is a possibility and yes it does in deed suck. 

But my answer to those without pets would be, these animals are my fur-children, my babies, and they are part of our family. And although this evening really sucked, I would do it all over again, even with a baby on the way or even here. There is a bond between pets and humans, one that only pet owners understand. 

Weekend REwind

So clearly this week has got away on me! So instead of just recapping my weekend, I will recap my week as well!

Saturday - M and I ran some errands in town, including picking up ceiling paint for the nursery!! We also ended up getting a new cabinet for the kitchen, so we have extra storage once the baby comes. Crazy how much stuff a baby needs for being soo small!

We headed down to the lake for thanksgiving at the boat, where we had a full delicious turkey dinner - coming from someone who doesn't care for turkey. We stayed the night on the boat, I was in bed by 10:30 - party animal! The boat comes out of the water next week, so this was our last time staying down!

Sunday - We had breakfast with the family, then M's parents had a wedding to get to and we had a family dinner to attend, so M's Mom and I did each others hair, snapped a few pics and headed our separate ways!

We dropped the dogs off at home, through an appetizer together, grabbed our buns and headed to my Aunts to celebrate with my Mom's side of the family. Once again, we had a full turkey dinner, played games and enjoyed each other's company!

Monday - we did some yard work, laundry, housework, vacuumed the pool and M put the first coat of paint on the ceiling in the nursery and what a change it makes!! Its already soo much brighter in the room!

Tuesday - at around 2:30 in the morning I awoke to come crazy painful stomach cramps. My sister had been telling me Monday night that Hannah, Brandon and Eric were all sick, as well as Eric's immediate family, who they had celebrated thanksgiving with earlier on Sunday. I was ever hopeful it was something they ate, not the flu. Turns out I ended up with the flu as well! It was horrible! After 6 hours of being violently ill, I survived the worst part and was able to keep liquids down at least. I haven't been THAT sick since I was a kid! Poor baby was probably wondering what the heck was going on! I am now super thankful for never having morning sickness!

Worst part was I had a photo shoot scheduled for that morning that I had to reschedule! I still feel bad about it, but it was out of my control!

I spent my entire day in either the bed or the bathroom! I don't recommend getting the flu while prego! Luckily I was under the watchful eye of Lux, he didn't leave me alone once!

Wednesday - I still wasn't feeling 100%, and I ended up with a bad headache all day and my body was just plain old sore! Nothing was taking it away, including forcing myself to eat, which I didn't have an appetite at all yet! Turns out my cousins ended up with the flu as well!

Thursday - still not 100%, but much better, just really tired, but I forced myself to get dressed and out of the house to run some errands. We also ended up having wings with friends last night too. It was great to actually feel and look human again!

Friday - still catching up on housework, as I feel the need to clean the house like crazy after having the flu, but still lacking in energy! But a little bit at a time!

Needless to say my week did not go as planned! But we survived it! I am still hoping and praying that M doesn't end up with it! He just has to survive today and he should be in the clear!

I am soo thankful for everyone who sent well wishes for my recovery, luckily it went through quick, its just the recovery stage that sucks! I would have been lost without Mike, who full on admits I make the worst sick person ever, especially while pregnant, as I ended up crying about it, my Dad and MIL - who both stopped in to check on my and bring me Gatorade and popsicles!

This weekend I have a photo shoot booked for each day, weather pending of course and we plan to close the pool, assuming we can get the water to clear up! I'm also hoping the final coat will go on the nursery ceiling and we can tackle some more items on our to-do list!

Hope everyone has a great weekend!!

Cleanse/Binx

We are 4 days into our Yeast Free Cleanse and we are still alive! This cleanse is super challenging!!

Day 1 was really rough, we were hungry and I think going through a bit of a sugar withdrawal. For dinner we had ham/pineapple/bacon kabobs! No glaze, but in all honesty we didn't need one, the pineapple flavored them both. We will make this recipe again.

 

Day 2 I found some snack we could have! These have made a huge difference!! I think the best thing with all of this is not only the weight we are losing already, but it really makes you think about the food we are eating! I'm not exactly committing to this cleanse for life because let's be honest I miss cheese, ice cream and sweets!

Day 3 we tried Brown Rice - wasn't a big fan, but M says he could tolerate it! I am willing to try it again. I missed my juice in the morning so M squeezed me 2 oranges and I got a shot worth of juice lol. We also tried juicing an apple - it was pretty awesome!

<<<- -="" and="" apple="" orange="">>>

 

We also made our very first spaghetti sauce from scratch - absolutely no preservatives!! We will be having that tonight with brown rice pasta.

 

 

On another note, poor Binxy spent the night at the vet last night. We found blood in her urine on Tuesday night, called the vet and had an appointment to bring her in yesterday. We locked her up in the bathroom Tuesday night and Lux spent the whole night on the other side trying to break her out! M took her to the appointment, as I was working, and they couldn't get her to pee and her bladder wasn't full enough to draw out a sample so they decided to keep her over night. He thinks it is just a UTI (urinary tract infection) but doesn't want to treat it blindly.

 

I got an update on her this morning, she did pee, however she kicked her litter box empty so they couldn't gather it. So she got an IV and they were going to draw out the fluid. She is still eating and drinking and her temperament is good. I hope to pick her up this afternoon with some answers. Hoping she is okay and that it is just a UTI.

Lux is miserable without her, but in all honesty we are all missing her, including Gracie who has been looking for her! They are best buddies!