Late Night and Early Wake Up Call

Last night Joe and I met a friend of his from college and his wife for a double date. We had a nice dinner at Outback catching up (we hadn't seen them since New Year's Eve a few years ago) and then went and saw the movie Avatar in 3D. Angie (the other wife) and I weren't terribly excited about seeing the movie but went along with the boys. Although it's really long (3 hours), I was pleasantly surprised. It was a better story line than I expected, and the imagery was really good. I'm sure I enjoyed it more because I wasn't expecting much, and honestly just hoped to stay awake through the whole thing (I have a tendency to fall asleep at movies that I'm not interested in). Joe, on the other hand, had higher expectations, and in his mind the movie didn't quite live up to them. To each his own!

Because of the length of the movie, we ended up getting home around midnight. After attending to the dogs and settling down, it was closer to 1am by the time we fell asleep. I haven't been sleeping too well lately - it's getting harder to get and stay comfortable. Early in the morning I woke up, unaware at first of why. Then I realized Lucy was standing at the end of the bed, moaning to go out. She's usually good about staying quiet until we're awake unless she really needs to go out, and since I was awake, I got up to let her and Molly out.

It's practice for what's to come in just a few weeks, right? Not exactly.

Turns out Lucy did need to go out, and did her business rather quickly. Molly, however, had other plans. I guess she hadn't met her quota for eating wild animals in 2009, and had to get one more in... It took Joe getting out of bed and going outside to bring her back in, as once she catches and starts eating the poor animal, she doesn't stop until forced to by one of us. As long as my early morning wake up calls with 7 don't involve wiping blood off his chin and checking for rabbit fur in his mouth, I'll take those over these mornings with the dogs any day!

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

We haven't made much progress on the nursery this week, due to being at my parents' house for Christmas. It was nice to be back in St. Louis and visit with my college friends, relax at home for a few days and not do much! We came back to Kansas City on Saturday to discover that while St. Louis received a dusting of snow on Christmas, KC received about 6 inches, with some snow drifts over a foot deep! Luckily, our neighbor's boyfriend decided to spread Christmas cheer and clear our driveway and sidewalk with his snowblower! It continued to snow on Saturday, so when we pulled in, we only had to shovel an inch or two.

Sunday we spent the day taking advantage of after Christmas sales and buying supplies for the baby's room. Since every place had their Christmas decorations at least 50% off, we stocked up on wrapping supplies and outdoor decorations. We probably spent too much, but it's all stuff Joe had been wanting to add to the display, so I'm happy to get it half off! Then Sunday afternoon we went to our favorite Mexican restaurant, Ponak's, to see Kyle and Kenny, who moved to North Carolina early in 2009. They were in town for Christmas as both of their families still live here, and so it was time to hang out and have some fun.

Yesterday was my 33-34 week appointment, where I discovered I'd only gained a pound over the Christmas holidays - not too bad when you consider how many cookies I'd baked and the lack of physical activity during Christmas week! The baby is measuring right on track, and it's really hard to believe I'll be full term in just 3 weeks!

As soon as we get the house cleaned up and the nursery finished (we're shooting for this week) I'll be sure to post more pictures.

Oooh, it's getting exciting!

Don't you want to know how great the nursery looks? You should! :) We are at the 90% finished spot, with just a little more outlining to do on the characters on the southwest corner of the room, a few touch-ups with paint, install window treatments, find a light fixture and figure out what we're going to do with pictures hanging on the wall above the crib. Here's a teaser picture that still needs a few spots touched up, but it'll give you an idea of how great the room is turning out....

Isn't Joe's artistic ability amazing? This is one part of our "one fish, two fish" and "green eggs and ham" scene on the south wall. I think it's both of our favorite parts so far.

Last night we stayed up late and put the crib together, after Joe finished the north wall and part of the west wall so we could move the dresser into its spot. Joe had asked me to bake "a million" cookies for him to take to hearings and give out as gifts today, so I spent the evening baking about 13 dozen pumpkin cookies and peanut butter kisses. He continued to work on the room, so we got to putting the crib together around 10:30. Luckily, it went together really fast, despite horrible directions.

And here's the finished product! The bedding is in the wash as I type, and I can't wait to get it all put together. We even brought the glider chair, ottoman, and the cute lamp that started this whole project into the room... it's really coming together! Our (ok, my) initial goal was to have the room finished by Christmas. Looks like that's not going to happen, but if little Joe shows up early he certainly has a room that is almost ready to go - just needs the finishing touches!

Dr. Seuss Murals in the Making

As promised, here's the nursery in progress. We started with tracing the images from photoshop onto the walls, using a data project. Joe did all of the tracing (Joe's done most of the work in the room, and is doing a fantastic job. He says he'd rather focus on the nursery while I continue to buy the necessary baby stuff, which works out well for the both of us!)

If you look closely, you'll see the north wall image as a pencil drawing in this picture...

And here's the first coat of paint - the sky color. We painted sky first, then water, then grass. Now we're onto the detailed colors, and we'll finish by outlining everything in black Sharpie to get it all to pop and look very Dr. Seuss.

It's starting to come to life! Although we've gotten further than this point, we've got to keep some secrets about how it looks, right? The flash makes the colors look a little lighter than they appear in the room, but it's still not crazy bright, which is what we were trying to avoid. So far, we're really happy with the way it's turning out!

T Minus Two Months!

It's crazy that we're at less than two months to the baby's due date now! This week has been a solid push to getting the nursery finished so that we can make our "done by Christmas" deadline. After re-examining the various mural images and starting to trace them on the walls on Wednesday, we (ok, I) decided I wasn't thrilled with the way one section was looking, and neither of us were happy with the north wall (the scene from The Lorax), so we (ok, Joe) spent another day redesigning the parts we weren't too happy about. I think in the end, we're both much happier with the newest designs, which seem to flow much better than the last set did.

Saturday, I did some work for the store while Joe finished tracing all of the images onto the walls. We had already bought the paint for the background sections of sky, grass and water, so Saturday night we stayed up getting all of that painted. It really didn't take as long as I thought it might, and the paint we bought must have been a really good quality paint (whatever Sherwin-Williams recommended for kids rooms) because we really only needed one coat.

Sunday was the beginning of the detail work, painting each of the characters. We're using craft acrylic paint for that, which is thinner than wall paint. It's taking longer than Joe though b/c of the trade off between more thin coats, or one-two heavy coats of paint. I got a little frustrated with the painting, and since this is Joe's project, left him to continue the detail work Sunday night while I made cookies for a cookie exchange at my friend's office and a couple more diapers. Turns out, I'm getting pretty decent at making diapers now! Maybe next week I'll venture into new sewing territory, like baby pants! :)

Pictures are coming.... I promise!

Adventures in Cloth Diaper Making, Part I

After deciding to cloth diaper and seeing just how expensive some of the newer styles of diapers are, I decided that making some diapers would be a good way for me to save some money and learn how to sew at the same time. Finding materials around the house (old stained towels, tshirts, flannel sheets, etc) has been quite easy, as is taking Joe to the fabric stores and picking out cute materials for the diapers. I decided to try making fitted diapers (100% cotton with the absorbancy sewn into the diaper) and pockets (an open pocket in the back allows for a variety of soakers to be stuffed into the diaper, adding more flexibility to how dry the baby will stay before needing a change). I started with a free pocket diaper pattern that many people have used with success online, and then grabbed my McCall's diaper cover pattern to adapt into a fitted. Although most people say these take about 30 minutes-1 hr to make per diaper, I'm still quite the newbie and it definitely takes me at least twice that long!

Here are the first two I've made so far - the fitted is on the left and the pocket is on the right...


The fitted is a flannel outside and inside, and I sewed an old kitchen towel folded over a few times into the inside layer. The pocket is also flannel outside and inside, and has space to stuff microfiber inserts that I made from car detailing towels from Walmart. They both could close with pins, but I'll probably try to use velcro on the fitted... This picture doesn't do the size difference justice, but the navy blue one is designed to be one sized, where you can fold the back down to fit smaller babies. I don't know that I totally believe that it'll fit before he's 12ish pounds, but we'll see!




I had to compare the fitted that I made in the newborn size pattern with the small sized BumGenius diaper we bought at the cloth diaper store in St. Louis. I've obviously got a lot of work to do before mine look that nice, but not too shabby, for my first time! I think I may try to shorten the wing length and width if I do decide to use velcro, as they appear to overlap quite a bit. My elastic sewing skills are quite rough, but this attempt was much better than the diaper cover I made this past summer!

Here's the picture we took of me with the fetus that was approximately baby Joe's developmental age at the "You! The Experience" exhibit in Chicago. It's crazy how much it looks just like a newborn, just smaller! Only a few more weeks before we meet the little guy, and I get to see who's been kicking me in the ribs all this time!

Thanksgiving Fun

Joe and I decided to spread out our Thanksgiving trip to his dad's house in Detroit over a full week this year. I wasn't certain how comfortable I'd be with the 13+ hour road trip, so on the way to Detroit, we stopped in St. Louis for a night, spend a day in Chicago, and then headed on to Michigan.

We had a fun day in Chicago, stopping by the Crate and Barrell and Land of Nod outlets, IKEA, visiting the Museum of Science and Industry, and eating lunch/dinner at Lou Malnati's for some great deep dish pizza before leaving. The Museum was fun and had a variety of interesting exhibits, including the "You! The Experience," which had about 3 dozen fetuses that had been donated, which show exactly how a fetus grows and develops while in utero. I'd see the display before, but being pregnant gave it a whole different feel, particularly the fetus that was within a day of two of my pregnancy - it was unbelievable to see how the baby just looked like a slightly smaller than average little baby!

Joe's dad had graciously offered to buy the dresser for the nursery, which we had decided to get at IKEA. On Wednesday, our first full day in Detroit, Joe, his dad and I went to the IKEA there on our way to pick up Mike, Linda and Ethan from the airport. We had scoped out what we wanted while in Chicago, which was a good thing because delays on the highway cut our shopping time down to about 20 minutes! (Of course, we still didn't get it done that fast, but it was the fastest trip to IKEA we've ever had!) We ended up with not only a dresser, but a nightstand for next to the glider, some picture frames for the nursery and a few other odds and ends. In Chicago we found this mobile that is goofy but looks like Dr. Suess with a "red fish, blue fish" theme, too.

Joe started putting the dresser together a few nights ago, but we haven't completed it yet. Now we pretty much have all of the components for the nursery, save for a diaper bin and window treatments. This room is starting to come together!

We had a great time with everyone, with delicious food, wonderful hospitality, a hopefully new turkey day tradition of competing in the Detroit Turkey Trot (Joe, Lisa and Linda ran the 10K race, Dan ran the 5K, and I walked the 5K - next year, we'll get everyone else out there!), bowling fun with babies and James, and even a baby shower! Lisa and Linda threw a great party (and saved us from having to watch Star Trek with the guys) complete with freezer paper stenciling baby clothes, which may be my new favorite, super easy craft project! (Definitely easier than making diapers, but more on that in the next post :) ).

Saturday we had to pack up and drive home after some morning golfing for the guys, as we decided we'd try to drive the whole 13 hours in one day. The trip wasn't really all that bad, as we got mobile updates on the MU/kU game (hooray for the good guys pulling out the last minute win!) and picked up a few redbox movies to watch/listen to once it got dark out and really boring. We arrived home a little after midnight, and were quite happy we decided to leave Saturday, as we needed Sunday to recooperate, sleep in and rest a bit, particularly after realizing that we both had picked up a cold while in Detroit. We finished the holiday weekend with Jill and Gary, who accompanied us to a boy scout Christmas tree lot where we picked our tree and had it decorated by Sunday evening.

Starting to measure ahead...

I had my last 4 week appointment today, during which I had the gestational diabetes test. I'll get the results in the next day or two, and hopefully everything's fine. The doctor also measured me and said I'm measuring at 29 weeks, while I'm actually at 27 1/2 weeks. Joe's convinced the baby is going to show up 10 days early (and has been saying this for a few months now), which may suggest he knows something I don't! Regardless, everthing looks good, and now I start doctor's visits every other week. I'm still growing and the weight continues to pile on, which I'm not thrilled about. But other than an increasing acid reflux problem and worsening sciatic nerve pain, which leads to quite a lower back ache, I'm still feeling good.

In other baby news, Joe did a fantastic job this weekend in the nursery - all of the wallpaper paste is gone! Tonight he's sanding and mudding the walls, and tomorrow will bring more sanding and prepping. Looks like the room will be primed and ready to paint this weekend! (No, we still haven't picked paint colors, but we're at least getting closer). I spent a good chunk of today sewing up a few dozen cloth wipes, so I could get them finished and practice more sewing before I tackle the actual diapers and diaper covers. They certainly aren't pretty (light blue flannel on one side, and either white or grey cotton jersey on the other), but hopefully will useful and hold up to the frequent washings!

We have a crib!

This morning we went to the local USA Baby store, as the last time we were there 3 weeks ago, the saleslady told us they were having a big one day sale. So we waited to buy the crib until we could see what the discount would be. This is the crib, although we bought it in white. Their regular price was already better than anything I'd seen online, and it was an additional 10% off, which was even better! The best part was that they had it in stock, and the box managed to fit in the RAV, so now the crib is sitting in the box in the dining room! So much for worrying about having to order and wait 8-12 weeks for it to show up. We also bought the crib mattress, as they were on sale. Jill and Gary, thanks so much for buying all of this for us!

We've decided to go with a large white dresser from IKEA (at least, that's the plan), and we'll put the changing pad on top of the dresser. We plan to pick out and buy the dresser while we make the trip to Detroit for Thanksgiving, so hopefully we'll have all of the furniture before the end of November. Now we just have to finish the walls so we can bring all of the furniture into the room and clean the dining room/garage out....

We also made a trip to Hancock Fabrics on our way home to look for materials to make cloth diapers. We probably went a little overboard, but almost everything in the store was on sale 30-50% off, so we stocked up on a bunch of different fabrics. When I got home, after watching Mizzou beat KU (hooray!) I decided it was time to clean out the linen closet, and found about a dozen old kitchen and hand towels that we can also use to stuff the diapers with, so at this point, all I need to get is thread, elastic, and some aplix (softer and stronger velcro) and maybe snaps, and we'll be set! Oh, yeah, I guess I have a lot of sewing ahead of me!

Super Active and Snickerdoodles

Little Joseph has gotten extremely active in the past few days. Yesterday, he was rolling around non-stop! Usually he'll be active for an hour or two, then calm for a few hours. Not yesterday. He was bumping and knocking around for most of the day, calmed down for a bit after dinner (I was up making cookies, so maybe he was trying to be good so I'd finish and eat them sooner!), and then was moving around constantly last night. I can say it's the first time I really haven't slept well because he was moving so much. I also woke up with a sharp pain in my ribs, which went away on its own after a bit, so I'm wondering if that was him or just another achey pregnancy symptom.

Gary took Joe and me out to dinner last night, and afterward I really wanted to bake. I didn't really care what I made, just had that desire to do the baking. So Joe decided he wanted Snickerdoodles. I found a new recipe (at least I think it's new) that went together really quickly, and let's just say that after making just under 5 dozen cookies at 8:30pm, only a dozen were left this morning! Joe and Gary gave it great reviews, so I thought I'd post it. I'd post a picture, but the remainder went to work with Joe, and if I had to guess, they're gone by now!

Snickerdoodles

Ingredients
1 cup shortening (I actually only had 1/2 c. shortening, so used that plus 1/2 c. unsalted softened butter)
1 1/2 cups white sugar
2 eggs
2 3/4 cups sifted all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
2 teaspoons cream of tartar
1/4 teaspoon salt
Cinnamon to taste

2 tablespoons white sugar
2 teaspoons ground cinnamon

Directions
Preheat oven to 375 degrees F.
In a large bowl, mix together the shortening and 1 1/2 cups of white sugar until smooth. Stir in the eggs one at a time, blending well after each. Combine the flour, baking soda, cream of tartar and salt; stir into the batter until blended. I also added cinnamon to the batter.
Roll the dough into balls the size of small walnuts. Roll in a mixture of 2 tablespoons sugar and 2 teaspoons cinnamon. Place 2 inches apart on an ungreased cookie sheet. The cookie balls didn't pick up much of the cinnamon/sugar mixture, so I sprinkled more on top after flattening the tops of the cookies slightly.
Bake in the preheated oven for 8 to 10 minutes or until lightly browned, but still soft.

These are the perfect texture - light crunch on the outside, but still super soft on the inside, and oh so good!

Baby Steps

We've been making slow progress to getting the nursery ready to paint. Gary, Joe's step-dad, has been staying with us this past week while Grandma is in the hospital recovering from surgery. In his free moments, he's helped us continue to scrap wallpaper paste from the walls. Last night I continued working, and realized we'd gotten to the point where it was more effective to use a wet rag to wipe the walls down, scraping the hard bits off when I got to those. After a few hours of scrubbing walls, my fingers and forearms were tired, so Joe's arrival home and suggestion that we go visit Grandma (now that she's out of the ICU) sounded great! I got about 1/4 of the walls done in about 3 hours yesterday, so I'm hoping that another night of scrubbing walls tonight will get us very close to being finished! Then we just have to mud and prime, and we'll be set.

In other baby news, we're continuing to gather items in preparation for little Joseph's arrival. I found a really cute diaper bag last week. It's rather unconventional looking, (Joe had already told me he wants one himself that's more manly), from the Gap, but is fun, has a bunch of pockets and changing pad, looks more like a big purse than a diaper bag (this picture doesn't reflect just how big the bag is), and best of all, had been marked down to $20 from $70! The bottom also opens up wider so that it could theoretically stand on its own when loaded up.

So if I find something I like better or seems more functional, I can always return it, but for now I'm kinda excited about my cute, pink diaper bag. At first I felt a little silly getting the pink one with a boy on the way, but I figured, hey, I'm a girl, I'm carrying the bag, I can do whatever I want. So there! :)

We have also made the decision to try cloth diapers on little Joe. I'm excited about the possibility of less blowouts and diaper rash, faster potty training, less trash/better for the environment and the cost savings over using only disposables. I know we may decide it's not for us down the road, and we still plan on using disposable diapers when we're traveling, out of convenience, but for now this is the goal. The other fun part is how much cuter cloth diapers have become than what our parents used on us, and they seem so much easier and convenient now!

While we could buy everything and it would still be relatively affordable, I've found some patterns to make my own fitted diapers (they resemble the shape of disposables) out of things around the house (old towels, sheets, etc) and cheap fabrics. They still need a waterproof cover, but those aren't too expensive. I went to a variety of places yesterday to start gathering supplies, and I think I may have enough fabric at this point to make a newborn/infant stash of fitted diapers that will in the end have cost us about $30-40. I still need to get elastic and aplix, a form of velcro that is softer and apparently holds up better through the millions of washings. I figure once I get the hang of the pattern, I'll be able to knock out a bunch of diapers at a time.

When he's big enough, we'll probably switch to using AIO's (all in ones), or AI2s (all in twos) which don't require a cover as they have the water-resistant material built in. The difference between the two is the AIOs have the absorbent pad sewn in, whereas the AI2s have snap-in "soaker" pads that can be swapped out and help the diaper dry faster after being washed. These diapers are pricey, but use an ingenious system of snaps and velcro so that they adjust to fit babies from about 8 lbs to 35 lbs, so they should last through potty training. Check out this website to see the variety of diapers that are on the market: http://www.pinstripesandpolkadots.com/ Aren't they adorable?? Many people can use these diapers through multiple children, which would be fantastic. The hard part will be not going overboard with all of the variety of options and cute patterns/colors!

Nursery updates

This is what the old guest room/new nursery looked like after we cleared the room of furniture. (And yes, mom, the mirror is now finally hanging above the dresser in our bedroom! :) ) At first glance, the room looks painted, and like it'd take no time at all to prep and repaint, right?

Wrong! Here's how the room looks now.... mid wallpaper paste removal. The white is the clear plaster, and the tan/beige is the remaining sections of paste. The bits of green are paint that was mixed in with drywall mud, that can't come off, so it'll all get covered when we prime. We have some light sanding to do after we get the last big spots of paste off, then repair the bad spots in the plaster (from removing two layers of wallpaper).

So far, all we have purchased for the room is our rocker/glider and ottoman, which is white wood with a beigy-tan cushion, a whimsical red lamp that'll sit on a nightstand next to the glider, and a few fun area rugs. We definitely have a lot of work ahead of us!

Fall fun

The leaves have officially turned and fallen, so this past weekend Joe was working in the front yard to clear the leaves. I started in the back yard, but quickly realized that raking is a task I just can't do for very long. The dogs were having a blast enjoying the nice weather and their toys, so while they're still our only "kids", here are a few new, cute pictures of them. The picture above is Lucy with a frisbee in her mouth, running it back to Joe.

Molly was having a blast jumping in the pile of leaves I was raking, so Joe started taking pictures of her. She was even totally fine with me dumping more leaves on top of her, as long as she had her ball!

Lucy's all healed at this point from her fight with Molly back in September, and now it's just a matter of letting all of her fur grow back out. (She had to be shaved down in a number of areas, and looked really goofy!) We're still working on finding her a new home, but haven't had any success yet.

Almost 100 days!

So tomorrow marks the 100 days left mark, and this week I'll be 26 weeks pregnant. I feel like I look so much more pregnant than the picture above shows, but I guess my growing chest doesn't help matters. The baby is doing well, he's getting really active and particularly enjoys kicking whichever side I'm trying to lay on when I go to sleep. Thus, I'm starting to get to the point of not being able to sleep soundly most nights. I know it's only going to get worse, so I'm trying to enjoy the few goods nights that I have when they happen!

I've started my work-from-home phase, but while I was in St. Louis, Joe started (much to my surprise) to work on the nursery. We had moved all of the furniture out a few weeks ago, and swapped our queen sized bed with my parents for a daybed/trundle that would fit up the stairs into our old office/new guest room upstairs. We haven't decided on how to paint the room, but Joe went ahead and tried to start priming the room. Unfortunately, the room has not one, but two layers of wallpaper, both of which were painted over, and made the prep a nightmare! By the time I got home, the wallpaper was all down, but the last layer of paste was still up and quite challenging to remove. We're still working on it, but hopefully will get it all off in the next few days so we can fix the cracks and bad spots in the plaster this weekend.

We think we've decided on a crib, and when we went to buy it, the salesperson let us know that the store was going to be having a big one day sale on the 14th. She advised us that they had plenty of the model and color we want in stock, and to wait to buy until then. Hopefully all of this will be worth it, as I'm starting to get nervous that we don't have any furniture at all!

Future dancer?

This past weekend was my sister's wedding. Things have been rather hectic in the couple of weeks leading up to the wedding, but it went off without a hitch and everyone had a great time. Now she and Mikael are off to Mexico to enjoy their honeymoon, and I'm back in KC, packing up the store. Friday was the last day open, and we're in the process of moving everything out of our current location and back to St. Louis, where we'll decide if it makes sense to re-open another version of the store in KC again in the spring.

Anyway, the baby has been growing and getting stronger. It's fun to feel him moving around each day, but Joe still hadn't been able to feel him. Last night, I'm pretty sure little Joseph decided to have a dance party, b/c he was going strong for a solid hour and a half! Joe kept his hand on my belly for a little bit and felt him once, and again a little bit later for what was probably the strongest kick I've felt yet. Now that I'm past the halfway mark, it's crazy to think how soon we'll be able to meet this little guy, but we're definitely excited about that. I'll try to remember to take a belly picture this week for a progress update, but have no fear - it's definitely growing!

It's a BOY!

After finding out at the ultrasound that we are the future parents of a very un-shy little boy (guess he is a Jeppson boy, after all!), Joe and I went over to a little mall near the doctor's office to start shopping. We had been wanting to get Mizzou specific clothing for our future tiger, and ended up with this outfit, so he's all set for a football game next fall!
Then it was off to baby gap to check their clearance rack, and found this really cute onesie on sale, along with a sun shade hat with monkeys on it. It's going to be really hard to not continue buying cute stuff for this little guy, and remember that we still have almost 5 months until we meet him!

18 weeks

It's here! The obvious beginnings of a baby bump. Actually, today I had customers in the store who have 5 little kids, between the ages of 3 and 11, and the wife asked if I was pregnant... true story! So hopefully that means I'm working my way past the "looking fat" stage.

I'm also sporting my newest maternity item, my under the belly Gap maternity jeans. These don't have any of the stretchy material at the belly, and instead sit low in front (but not so low you can see my underwear or anything). The elastic is hidden inside the jeans so there's no real evidence that they are maternity jeans. They have become my absolute favorite, although the little bit of stretch means they stretch out to the point of getting a little too loose. But that's ok, they still have the look and feel of my normal jeans, and best of all, weren't expensive and I was able to buy them in my normal pre-pregnancy size! What a pick-me-up!

Only 3 days left till the big ultrasound... and I'm definitely starting to notice the flutters getting stronger, so that's exciting. Any last bets on whether it's a boy or a girl?

Flutters

So within the last couple of days, I have started to feel what I imagine is the first fluttering of feeling the baby move. It's really hard to say if that's what it is, but it comes and goes, mainly at night and doesn't feel like anything I've really felt before. I'm sure in another week or two I'll know for sure, but it's fun now to think that's what I'm experiencing! Only a week and a half left of waiting for our big ultrasound, and since I've missed pictures the last couple of weeks, I'm sure we'll take one tomorrow and post it. The belly is definitely slowly growing, but I still feel like if you saw me, you'd just think I'm chubby, not pregnant. Soon enough I'll be wishing I could be back at this stage, I'm sure!

The ultrasound date is set!

We've scheduled our big ultrasound for Monday, September 14th. So in just a couple of weeks we'll get to see the baby again, hopefully find out everything's healthy and growing strong, and whether we're having Joe 7 or need to start coming up with girl names!

Just for fun, I found a list of old wives tales to tell whether you're having a boy or girl and highlighted which things I'm identifying with ...

It's a boy if:
You didn't experience morning sickness in early pregnancy
Your baby's heart rate is less than 140 beats per minute
You are carrying the extra weight out front
Your belly looks like a basketball
Your areolas have darkened considerably
You are carrying low
You are craving salty or sour foods
You are craving protein -- meats and cheese
Your feet are colder than they were before pregnancy
The hair on your legs has grown faster during pregnancy
Your hands are very dry
Your pillow faces north when you sleep
Dad-to-be is gaining weight, right along with you (he, he, sorry Joe!)
Pregnancy has you looking better than ever
Your urine is bright yellow in color
Your nose is spreading
You hang your wedding ring over your belly and it moves in circles
You are having headaches
You add your age at the time of conception and the number for the month you conceived and the sum is an even number

It's a girl if:
You had morning sickness early in pregnancy
Your baby's heart rate is at least 140 beats per minute
You are carrying the weight in your hips and rear
Your left breast is larger than your right breast
Your hair develops red highlights
You are carrying high
Your belly looks like a watermelon
You are craving sweets
You are craving fruit
You crave orange juice
You don't look quite as good as normal during pregnancy
You are moodier than usual during pregnancy
Your face breaks out more than usual
You refuse to eat the heel of a loaf of bread
Your breasts have really blossomed!
Your pillow faces south when you sleep
Your urine is a dull yellow color
You hang your wedding ring over your belly and it moves from side to side
You add your age at the time of conception and the number for the month you conceived and the sum is an odd number

We'll find out soon!

Another milestone

So I've been mainly wearing my normal pants, although shorts and some of my jeans just don't quite fit anymore. This morning, with my only pair of "fat" jeans in the wash, I pulled out two of my "normal" pre-pregnany jeans. The first pair was definitely a no go - I could hardly get them zipped! The second pair was better, and zipped about 2/3 of the way up before it was really uncomfortable. Remembering that I had my "belly band" (a stretchy band of material used to help hold waistbands up when you can't zip all the way) to use, I grabbed that and it seemed to do the trick. Until I'd been wearing it a few hours. I know understand why pregnant women seem to hate zippers! I hadn't felt this uncomfortable at all in the previous 15 weeks, but I guess I'm now to the point where I need the soft, stretchy maternity bottoms. Of course, I still don't have much of a belly, but just enough of one to take notice!

Anyway, I went to a local consignment maternity store at lunch and bought another pair of maternity jeans, since my first pair seem to need a much larger belly to stay up. Hopefully these will work out for the next few weeks, and at $15, I don't mind the "splurge"!

Monthly Doctor's Appointment

We had our monthly doctor's appointment today. Everything sounded and looked good, and we got to hear the baby's heart beat again, which is still good and strong. I've been feeling really good, except for occasionally being light headed. I asked the doctor about walking/jogging the KC half marathon, and she cleared me to do it, saying as long as I listen to my body and get plenty of fluids, it shouldn't be an issue or anything. Good thing, as this morning the dogs and I did our weekly long walk, 5 miles, and that was pretty easy.

Next up? Scheduling our big ultrasound! Sometime in the next few weeks we'll get a chance to see the baby again and find out if it's a boy or girl. We have to wait another 2-3 weeks, which I'm sure will be here before we know it, especially with how busy our schedules are. We can't wait!

Week 14 pictures

This is me exactly two weeks ago, at 12 weeks pregnant. It was my first time wearing a maternity shirt, and if you saw the front facing picture, you'd see just how baggy it is. I don't really look too different, although at 12 weeks I started losing my waist and my middle was getting thicker.

Here's today's 14 week picture. Not much has changed, except for my very happy girl in the picture with me - we had just gotten back from a morning walk, she had her breakfast and was having the best possible morning. :) I know I'm getting rounder, but it's subtle. Of course, if you saw me in the evenings, you'd see a totally different body!

Belly on the way

The week has been so nice - I am at that stage where I really don't feel pregnant, have much of my "normal" energy back, and have taken up jogging with the dogs again. I know I'm not supposed to be dieting or trying to lose weight right now, but I felt like I put on too much weight in the first trimester so I've been trying to watch more closely what I'm eating and up my activity levels to flatten out the growth. What I can't flatten out, though, is the slowly growing belly. This week I've noticed that I'm really starting to look more round (of course, ask me again in a few months and I'm sure I'll tell you I was crazy right now!).

Most of my jeans and shorts still fit, but are getting rather tight at the waist. Yesterday I was doing laundry and tried to get it all finished, but the jeans and shorts were the last load to be finished, and weren't dry this morning. Since I didn't have anything else to wear, and didn't want to wear a dress to work, I pulled the maternity jeans out of the bag that has been sitting on the floor for the last couple of weeks and decided I'd wear them today. Now, the elastic waist is quite comfortable, but I definitely put them on too soon - I can't hardly keep them up! Not that they're falling down, but they keep slowly creeping down to the point where I feel like the crotch is down around my knees. Sigh. I'm officially to the point of being a little too snug in my normal clothes to be comfortable (and not look like I'm really pudgy), but nowhere near big enough for true maternity clothes. Hopefully this period won't last too long, b/c I'm going to get really tired of the limited options I currently have!

Pictures

Joe has encouraged me to take weekly pictures to document the belly that will probably soon start growing. So far, the changes have been small enough that I don't think a camera will capture them, but we started taking a profile picture last Friday, which I'll post soon. I've decided to wear one of the maternity shirts I bought in each picture, so the clothing reference point will always be the same, provided it fits throughout the pregnancy. Right now, after wearing the shirt all day, it just looked very loose, almost baggy, around the waist, so I'm happy to report I'm nowhere near filling it out... with my belly, that is.

Anyway, I've seen some people post "stats" with their weekly pictures, including weight gain, cravings, how they're feeling, and other random things about that week. I'll try to do the same, but since my pregnancy so far has been quite symptom-free, it may not be too exciting! *Knocking on wood that it stays this way*

In other news, we started looking at baby items this weekend, since we figure we need to know what we're getting ourselves into and registering for baby goods, although a ways off, seems much more intimidating that registering for wedding presents! All of you with small children, we have decided that you are a much better resource for knowing what we "need" versus what Babies 'R' Us says, so don't be surprised when we start asking a million questions!

I think hell just froze over

When we moved in, our side yard was crazy overgrown, and other than keeping our side trimmed at the fence, there wasn't really anything we could do about it. Our neighbors, whose overgrown bushes were encroaching into our yard, always somewhat sheepishly said that they were trying their best to get everything fixed up, but it would take time. We bought the house with the yard looking the way it did in the picture above, so we knew it may never get any better, but had hope. Over the 6-9 months, the neighbors have started making improvements to their house, replacing windows, exterior doors, redoing their breezeway, kitchen and bathroom (so we have been told), and most recently, started to tackle the back yard. We don't talk to the neighbors that often, as their back yard got even worse this year - to the point we couldn't even really see into their yard!

A couple of weeks ago, Joe and I woke up to the sound of chainsaws humming. When we looked outside, we noticed these neighbors had a tree trimming service working in their front yard, taking a tree out. We crossed our fingers that they'd get to the back yard, and a few hours later, I discovered the workers starting to cut down a tree that was growing over the fence and brushing our roof, directly over the power lines to our house! I was so excited I was almost stunned, and sat watching as a few workers continued to take their heavy duty chainsaws to the bushes along the fence line. Although I would have really enjoyed watching this continue, I had to go to work. That night, we returned home to find that a good portion of the bushes along the fence had been cut way back, and a few trees that hung over our property were gone. While we were excited about the developments, we quickly came to the realization that now we could look into their yard, and the sight wasn't any better than the green, leafy 8' privacy fence we'd actually come to enjoy somewhat.

That was then. This morning, as Joe and I got up to go swimming before work, the tree trimmers pulled in the neighbors' driveway. Knowing that there wasn't anything left in the front yard to tackle, we could only assume that they were back to (hopefully!) finish the back yard. You saw the before picture above.... here's how their yard (and our view) changed and looks today....


We have never been able to see their entire fence, and it's amazing how large their yard really is, compared to what we've been used to seeing. Here's hoping that they continue to work on it, and maintain it so it doesn't get all overgrown in the coming years!

First attempt at sewing

Well, it finally happened. After my doctor's appointment this morning, confirming everything's going well with the baby, I decided I needed to pull out the sewing machine I got for Christmas and start practicing. I went to Hobby Lobby looking for patterns that looked easy for a serious beginner like me, and that wouldn't take too long. I opted for a selection of baby clothes; shirt, pants, gown, hat, onesie, and diaper cover. After selecting a fabric I thought was cute and forgiving for crooked seams and whatnot, I got home, ate lunch and started reading the manual for putting the sewing machine together. Turns out, it's quite user friendly!

Once I had the bobbin filled and needle threaded, I set out to try the diaper cover - it had the fewest steps of all of the patterns, so I figured I couldn't screw it up that much.
Figuring I'd need a lot of space, I set the fabric and pattern up on the dining room table, with the sewing maching in the living room. As you might notice from the above picture, the girls are totally bored with this sewing stuff! I got a lot of extra fabric so I can practice a few times, but the initial stitching went really well. After looking online for some terms I wasn't familiar with, I felt ready to stitch in the elastic around the legs and back. While looking online, I found a website to make an identical cover, with easier to follow steps. However, I had gotten too far involved with my pattern to make the changes, so I charged onward. The cover looked really good until the elastic, when I didn't leave enough space to tuck the elastic into the little pocket, so I had to sew it on the outside of the cover. It would work fine, except I couldn't master the zig zag stitch evenly around corners, and keep the tension on the elastic consistent. The bottom picture shows the (almost) finished cover - I didn't remember to pick up the velcro fasteners, but I'll probably try again to get the elastic down pat before calling this one done. Not too shabby for a first time project, and it only took me an hour or two once I'd put the machine together!

Another year older

Saturday was my 28th birthday, and unfortunately I had to work. On the other hand, we had a pretty good day at the store, selling a kayak, some lessons and general store merchandise, so at least I wasn't bored! Joe made the day great - I had breakfast in bed before work, he brought me lunch, and then after work we went to The Legends to do some shopping. Now that I'm at 11 1/2 weeks pregnant, my clothes aren't fitting as well as they used to! I have gotten through the first trimester really lucky - no morning sickness, only little bits of nausea, and no real food aversions. Unfortunately, that means that my appetite has been healthy, but the fatigue has lessened my ability to work out, which doesn't mean good things for my waistline! So it's time for the maternity t-shirts and my first attempt with maternity jeans. After shopping we ate dinner at Cheeseburger in Paradise, which was actually quite good.

I had asked Joe to bake my birthday cake himself, as opposed to buying one from the store. I actually prefer homemade cakes anyway, and I couldn't tell you the last time Joe made and decorated a cake, so I wanted to see what he could do. When we got home from dinner, he set about icing, assembling and decorating my cake, using the new cake plate I got from my parents for my bday. Joe's gift to me was a new camera, which I'm really excited about - it's so much faster than my old camera, with a digital screen that you can actually see pictures on! When Joe finally announced the cake was ready, I grabbed the camera to take a few pictures - he did a fantastic job! It not only looked great, but tasted delicious!

I'd love to report that we went out on the town later that night, but the dinner, cake and not enough sleep from traveling all week apparently took its toll, as I was falling asleep on the couch by 10pm! Oh well, it was still a great birthday!

Heat Wave

All this week we've had unbearable hot, humid weather. The temperature outside has been in the upper 90s, and with the humidity, it feels like it's 110! As frequently happens during super hot, humid weather, severe storms have been popping up around the midwest, usually in the evenings. Last night a big storm developed north of us, and within an hour had descended on the KC area. Tons of lightning, black skies, it looked ugly. I got home from work around 7pm, and Joe had gone to spin class and then an event promoting the KC Marathon this fall. Soon after I got home, it started pouring, and the winds picked up. Estimates I saw were 60-70 mph. In our neighborhood, all of the power lines are above ground, so wouldn't you know it, at 7:30 we lost power. I checked outside, and everyone on the opposite side of the road still had lights on, so I was hopeful that ours would come back on quickly.

Joe came home around 8:15, and the power was still off. Knowing that everything in the fridge and freezer was subject to going bad, (and having no way, other than the outdoor grill, to cook) we decided to go out for dinner. That took about an hour after trying to decide what we wanted, and discovering that our first choice had basically closed the kitchen already. When we returned home after 9:30 and still had no power, we realized that it may not be coming back for a while. Unfortunately for us, the brief rain showers and storm didn't drop the temperature very much, and the forecast was for the temp to creep back up as night went on. Joe decided to set up an air mattress in the basement. Sleeping in the dank basement on an air mattress sounded like a good idea because it was so much cooler down there, but after sore shoulders, necks, arms, etc, I headed back upstairs in the middle of the night to crawl into our much more comfortable bed. The worse part was not being able to turn on a fan and circulate any area, as there was no wind outside and the ambient air temperature just kept getting warmer and muggier.

Neither of us got much sleep, and as of 11 am the power was still off this morning. Our dogs got to stay at my sister's house, since we didn't want to leave them outside (today's high was forecast to be 96) and couldn't trust that the power would be restored soon enough to cool the inside of the house down. Luckily, when I got home tonight, the power was back on - I definitely wasn't ready to brave another night of no power and no air conditioning! Boy, do we have a greater appreciation for these modern conveniences!

The countdown begins!

Next week, Joe's family will descend on KC, which we are really excited about. Both sisters, their families, mom and step-dad, and I think even Grammy and Art are all coming for the 4th of July. What started as a long weekend visit with Lisa and family has turned into a mini family reunion! Thus, the rush to get the porch finished has started back up in earnest. Who knows - it may actually happen this time!

Sunday we put a second coat of paint on the ceiling panels, anticipating that Joe and a friend would start hanging them Sunday evening. Well, we didn't get started in time, so Joe pushed back the install job until Monday night after spinning class with said friend. On Monday, he managed to convince a couple other friends to come over and help as well, so we thought, no problem, we'll get them hung in a couple of hours! Well, that may have been the case, had Joe not forgotten to get all the necessary supplies ahead of time, and then left his wallet with one of the guys. So they didn't get started until around 7:30 or 8pm. Did I mention how horrifically hot it is right now, too? These poor 4 guys sweated more installing two ceiling panels than they did in their hour long spin class! By 9:30 they called it quits.

So now, we have 2 of 6 panels hung, and before the weekend Joe will re-install the ceiling fan and have that operational, as the next panel will cover that ceiling space above the fan. Saturday is the date to resume and finish hanging the ceiling, leaving us Sunday to touch up the paint, install the trim and hopefully finish the project (as much as we've decided we're going to do to call it done). Then Wednesday night, family starts to arrive and hopefully enjoy the finished porch!

Stay tuned!

Summer Fun

Over Memorial Day weekend, Joe's mom and step-dad were in town. We had a great time visiting with them, and upon realizing that our old grill was all rusted and needed the insides replaced, Jill bought Joe a new grill as an early birthday present. We had a great time grilling almost every lunch/dinner, and trying new foods on the grill. A week or so later, we went to this great store, called Smoke N' Fire, that specializes in all things BBQ (and fireplaces, but that's a different story). Joe was like a kid in a candy store, with all of the utensils, books, grills, and accessories. They also have an incredible selection of BBQ sauces, rubs, marinades and whatnot, so we went ahead and picked up a few different items to try.

Since the end of May, we've done a fair share of grilling, and really enjoy trying new things. It's nice having dinner cooked so quickly, and not heating up the kitchen in the process. When everyone comes to visit for the 4th of July, hopefully Joe will have perfected his techniques!

In other news, remember that "weekend project" of re-doing our screened porch? We started that last year, on the 4th of July weekend. Progress? Nope. We worked frantically to paint the ceiling panels before everyone came over on Memorial Day, but realized we need to brace a beam in the roof that is cracking. And since then, everything's sat in the same place. I don't think it's asking too much to have the project complete before its 1 year anniversary, do you? :)

Fun and Active Weekend

This weekend the forecast was for rain both days. Good thing those weather forecasters don't always get it right! Saturday was my store's first on-the-water kayak demo of the season. The sky was definitely overcast, but the rain stayed away all day and we had a decent turnout. Better yet, we sold a few kayaks! Joe decided to get a long bike ride in with some friends, and rode from the Plaza to Parkville, a small town north of downtown KC right on the river. The city was holding its annual Microbrew Fest, an event that brings 20-30 small breweries together and for $20, you get a sampling glass and can try all of the different beers that the breweries bring out. We went a couple of years ago and had a great day, so Joe and his friends thought it would be a fun way to spend the afternoon. I picked them all up, since they had ridden their bikes to the park, and Joe and I had a quick dinner out at Ponak's, the un-official place with the best margaritas in KC.

Sunday, Joe and a friend plotted to get me and the friend's girlfriend out to go golfing. I hadn't been for almost 2 years, and was a little reluctant, but agreed to go anyway. Joe and I split a bucket of golf balls at the driving range waiting for the others to show up. I figured, ehh, I'm probably a little rusty, but it can't be that ugly, right? WRONG! I missed the ball completely the first few times I swung, and the next dozen only moved a few feet. Getting more nervous, I insisted we split another bucket until I could tell I was settling down and my swing was coming back. We started the 9 hole course, and my game was definitely off. As we continued down the course, a miraculous thing happened - I got better! Unfortunately for Joe, it seemed that I may have been stealing his skills, because as my game improved, his worsened. We only had a little tantrum on the course, and no mom, it wasn't me! :)

Yesterday I opted to relax at home instead of doing work, and definitely paid for it today. Last night I made dinner, using Jill's meatloaf recipe that Joe and I both love. I decided to try something new as a side... instead of traditional mashed potatoes, and mashed cauliflower! I'd read that mashed cauliflower is a much better substitute for potatoes, and has a similar taste. I have always hated cauliflower and have been looking for ways to eat more vegetables. Turns out, with a little milk, garlic, salt and pepper, they really were pretty good! They definitely didn't taste exactly like mashed potatoes, and I need to perfect the recipe, but I plan on making them again. Once I figure out the recipe, I'll be sure to post it, as I think it's a great side dish that's tasty and really healthy!

More exciting news

Not to downplay the other exciting family visit, but we are also really looking forward to seeing Jill and Gary, and hopefully Grammy, as well, over Memorial Day. Our summer plans are really shaping up to be full of fun with family!

In other news, it turns out the sweat and blisters of last week's yard work will pay off! After a great rainfall this weekend, I went outside tonight to see if any grass was starting to grow. Finally, tons of tiny shoots are coming up! Now the challenge will be to keep the dogs off the large patch so that the grass actually has a chance to fully come in. That's definitely easier said than done!

Hooray!

We just found out Joe's sister, her husband Dan and their two kids, James and Ruth are coming to visit over the 4th of July! They'll be here for an extended weekend. Joe and I are very excited and can't wait to see them!

Sunday fun

Yesterday Joe and I accomplished quite a bit! Joe started the morning off running the annual Trolley Run, a 4 mile race along the old Trolley Trail in the Brookside/Plaza area. I had thought about running it as well, but haven't been as good with my training and knew the 4 miles would be over my head right now. I'm also trying my best to take Molly and Lucy on daily walks/runs, and I thought I'd rather jog 2-3 miles with them, than struggle at the race by myself. So after our respective runs, Joe and I set out sights on taking care of some things around the house that we hadn't finished since the kitchen project.

We started with the garage, which once again became the storage unit and kept both of our cars outside on the driveway. Most of the clutter came from bigger items, and things that just needed to be cleaned up and put away after collecting dust from the kitchen construction. It didn't take too long to get it emptied and cleaned out, (it is only a single car garage, mind you!) so we kept working and turned our attention to the cars. Both needed serious attention, more inside than out. A few hours later, my car was completely clean, and the inside of Joe's was looking much better!

After a quick lunch break, we ran to Lowe's to pick up a few basement subfloor tiles, designed for basements with moisture issues. I'm going to go out on a limb and say the small springs of water that flow from the natural stone walls in our basement during a heavy rain qualify us for "moisture issues!" The neat thing about this subfloor system is that it's pressed plywood attached to a layer of plastic grating, similar to the inside of an egg carton. The plastic part is on the bottom, so if there is moisture, it doesn't damage the wood above. The downside is that the subflooring is rather expensive, so we decided to try a few pieces on the cabinets we saved from the old kitchen that Joe's turning into a new workbench. We're planning on watching to see how well it works, and then may use it down the road if and when we finish the rest of the basement.

When we got home from Lowe's, we avoided any temptation to stop working, and headed straight downstairs. We had piles of dirty laundry that needed to be done, and yet another leftover workspace from the kitchen that was covered in sawdust and drywall dust. A few hours later, the basement was starting to look better, so we kept going. I think one of the things that kept us going was that while it was a warm 80 degrees upstairs, the basement was nice and cool. Not wanting to go hang out in the hot, humid living room above, we decided to arrange the old couches we've been storing in the basement and TV that we were planning on getting rid of into a second living/TV room. Joe even figure out how to re-run the cable lines in the house to add cable to the basement TV! We spent the rest of the afternoon doing laundry and watching a movie in our new space.

And the storm that pushed us to work quickly and finish ahead of it's forecast early afternoon arrival? It didn't roll into the area until much later, around 11pm. No hail, no damaging winds, but enough rain to start examining whether those subfloor tiles will be a good product for us or not!

One more first

I forgot another first for us. The other night, I decided to try a new recipe. It's one that I've looked at many times in the past and thought about making, but never had all of the ingredients. Thursday night I had all but one, and decided to go ahead and try it - Penne with Spinach Sauce. It called for goat cheese, which we don't ever have on hand and I didn't want to make a special trip to the stores, so I decided to substitute. The recipe is really easy - mix the ingredients for the sauce in a food processor while the pasta cooks, combine and voila! it's ready to go. Except our processor is a Magic Bullet, a very small, albeit great processor. It took much longer to mix the sauce, and as I tasted it, realized it had an overwhelming garlic flavor, despite all of the fresh spinach, cheese and spices that were also mixed in. I kept trying to dilute it, and then gave up. I tried a few bites and found it tolerable, but in the end threw mine out and ate a bowl of cereal for dinner. Joe, on the other hand, had seconds! I am fairly certain this was the first meal I've prepared that I disliked enough to not finish while Joe not only finished it but enjoyed it to eat it again. Oh well. We decided that the goat cheese must have been an important part of the recipe, but I'm not sure I'll ever give it a second chance!

A Week of Firsts

On my way into work this morning, I realized that a lot of things, albeit small, happened for the first time this week...

1. Joe and I had our first dinner, just the two of us, at our dining room table. Ever. It's only the 3rd or 4th time we've sat at it, usually for bigger family events. I decided that it's time for us to start eating healthier, and thus made a salad, salmon and asparagus for dinner. Joe decided that a dinner that nice deserved to be eaten at the real table!

2. Joe has started meeting with spanish speaking clients through an arrangement with another attorney who has staff that are fluent in spanish. He's been wanting to brush up and re-learn spanish for a while now, and this has given him a good reason to pursue it further. However, yesterday he came home and commented that he's finding that he's able to start filling in for the interpreter and even understanding/speaking more himself, without having taken any lessons since high school.

3. This morning, I fed the dogs and then got into the shower. I don't typically close the door to the bathroom b/c our fan doesn't work very well, so I try not to let the steam accumulate. Imagine my surprise when all of a sudden I felt something furry brush against my leg from behind... it was LUCY! For some completely unknown reason, the dog who almost tries to hide whenever it's bath time decided to hop into the shower with me, and proceeded to sit down in the tub! I have no idea what prompted it, but the thought of Lucy's first voluntary bath is enough to make me laugh.

4. This is apparently my first post in over a month. I apologize for not keeping up with it better! Now that spring is here, my business is crazy and I'm working many long hours. I'll try to do better, but make no guarantees!

Not much new going on

It's official. Joe gave his notice at work last week and his last day is April 3. Then it's off to the races with his new firm! There's lots to be done to get from here to opening a new business, but I'm confident that it'll all get done. Hopefully this new practice will provide him with much more satisfaction with his job and freedom to run a firm the way he wants.

In other news, I bought a boat! It's an older Hobie 16 catamaran, pictured below. We'll probably use it at the store for lessons and maybe rent it out, but it should provide Joe, me and our friends lots of enjoyment this summer. These boats can sail crazy fast, with one hull out of the water and the crew hanging on over the edge of the boat to keep it from flipping over. Lisa, Linda, Mike and Dan, if any or all of you come out this summer, be forewarned - you will be going sailing! :) I have yet to sail a Hobie 16, and I'm usually a little chicken when it comes to sailing small racing boats, but I have great hopes that this boat will help me become much more confident. If not, at least I tried!

Not much else is going on. The weather has been quite nice, so hopefully this weekend we'll get some of the remaining house projects finished - ceiling installed in the porch, rescreen the sections the dogs ran/fell through, clean up the yard and get ready for spring planting!

What's a lonely girl to do?

Joe took a week of vacation this week. Although I couldn't take off, we were able to spend a few lazy days together, since we never have 2 day weekends anymore. He decided to go visit his mom and sisters in Arizona for the second half of the week, once he realized that Lisa and the kiddos were going to be there too. Having a free Southwest roundtrip ticket definitely helped make that decision easier!

So since Thursday, after signing on the refi of our house, it's been the pups and me. I realized last night that it has been a really long time since I've been home alone without Joe - usually it's the other way around. Turns out, it's pretty boring! Joe got me a sewing machine for Christmas, which I haven't even gotten out of the box. With all of the house projects, it was pushed to the back of my mind. I guess sitting around with nothing to do got me to think about that sewing machine, just collecting dust in the basement. So after work last night, I headed to Jo-Ann's to look at patterns and fabrics and whatnot. I sewed for probably all of 4 hours about 15 years ago, so I'm a beginner's beginner, beside watching my mom sew when we were kids. I found a "sew easy!" dress pattern for $2.99 and decided it's never been a better time to get started.

Of course, by the time I finally got home, I realized the house needs to be cleaned before I start a new project. Sigh. My plans for the rest of today are to clean, try to take down the Christmas lights, that yes, are still up (but haven't been turned on in 2009!) and get ready to start cutting the pattern tomorrow. Eek! We'll see just how crafty this old girl is :)

Not beans, nor blowing raspberries, but

Books. Yup, while our favorite nephews and niece are learning all about the world around them and realizing that obedience can be quite rewarding (what a cute idea, Lisa!), Joe and I decided last night to expand on our knowledge of the history of Kansas City. After grabbing a late lunch/early dinner, we headed over to the local library where we stocked up on some reading materials. We each checked out a book on Kansas City's history, which I find to be quite interesting. Right now I've gotten through to the 1880s, and discovered that back then, the City Market, the area where Joe and I first lived when we moved here, was the spot where over 40 bordellos and 250 "working women" used to live and work. Interesting. Glad it's not that way anymore!

Anyway, I also found Obama's The Audacity of Hope which I figured would be a good thing to have read. So now there's no excuse for late night TV watching - we have a lot of reading to do over the next week or so.

Success!

The delay in posting this week has been due to one thing, and that's a successful boat show! My gut feeling was spot on - we met all of my sales goals for kayaks, and did sell a few sailboats, including one of the bigger boats! The stack of pending sales contracts on my desk is quite large, so trying to sort through that has taken a while. That, and the fact that while we were moving out of the show, we decided to completely remodel my store. Top to bottom, every fixture moved, along with everything on those shelves! Now, almost one week later, and things are almost entirely put back together.

In other news, the lawsuit is officially over. What a relief! Now we are able to close on the refinance of our home on Wednesday and check that off the list. As I know I've mentioned before, we're going to be able to use the new equity in the house to go from 2 loans, one being an ARM that resets in 3 1/2 years, to 1 fixed rate loan with a lower interest rate. We'll be saving a few hundred dollars each month, which is a welcome change.

Oh, and although today is the last day of February, we managed to have a snow storm come through and drop more snow than we've received all year on us! So far we've got about 4 inches, and it's still falling. It hasn't snowed enough this year (in my opinion, so I can't wait to go home after work and play with the pups, then relax on the couch watching movies or something. It's been almost 3 weeks since I've had a weekend off, and I'm definitely ready!

Last Round of Boat Shows

This is the height of boat show season for us. For us midwesterners, they typically start right after the New Year, and run until about the beginning of March, just in time to salivate for another month and change before it's warm enough to be on the water. Being in the boating industry means that for the last 8 weeks, our jobs are all about creating incentives to buy, laying out floor space, cleaning boats, moving in to shows, frantically setting up, long hours on our feet talking to potential customers for 12 hours or more a day, tearing everything down in one 8 hour time period, and getting ready for the next show. I've been to 4 shows so far this season, each lasting 3-5 days a piece. This weekend is the last of the shows - I can't wait for it all to be over for another year!

We decided to go big at this last Kansas City store, and practically emptied my store of its inventory to set up in our 5,000 square foot show space. It's a good thing store traffic is still slow, as I have had next to nothing to show customers this week! We started setting up for this particular show last Tuesday, and the show opened for last Friday-Sunday. I got to work at the store, catching up, this week, and tomorrow starts the last weekend. We had some really good traffic last weekend, with a few customers expressing very promising interest. I'm cautiously optimistic that we may sell a big boat or two at the show this weekend, or in the week immediately following the close of the show.

In other news, it looks like the lawsuit we have been involved in for the last year and a half is going to be settled in the next week.

Things are really starting to come together! I'd love to say we can relax and de-stress, but Joe's busier than ever for business this Spring, and I'll be the same in another couple of weeks. Hopefully things will continue to work out for us this year, despite all of the economic doom and gloom out there :)

Meet the newest member of our family...

While many of our friends and extended family continue to add babies to their families, our family has continued to stretch also. Only we seem to always add four-legged babies, in the form of puppies! Not to be left out, my sister, Ashley, and her fiance Mikael decided to take the plunge this weekend and brought home this sweet little girl...

Isn't she absolutely adorable??? They think her name will be Lily, and she's a 4 month old black lab mix. And when awake, she's a ball of fire! She's had fun getting to meet her cousins down the street this weekend. Molly's really taken to having a new friend to gnaw on, and the verdict's still out if Lucy will be friendly or old and grumpy. Oh, how this brings back memories of when Molly was a little 6 month old puppy! It's so funny to watch Molly and Lily play. Molly definitely likes to be in control, but so does Lily!



I've uploaded a video clip which is really funny, of the two of them playing. Molly likes to knock her down, but Lily will roll over and come back up with her jaws snapping and ready to pounce! What's really going to be funny is how their role will change once Lily grows into her skin - if her paws are any indication, she has the potential to be a big dog!