Friend Makin Monday

So I noticed a bunch of these kind of posts in my reader today and decided to check out what it's about. Visit Amber if you'd like to play along.

1. Do you cook every night?
I cook pretty much every night, just about every weekend we have one meal either at my parent's or the in-laws. But I love to cook and enjoy coming up with menus and new recipes to try.

2. What kind of laundry detergent do you use & why?
I switch it up, currently using All and Downy Simple Pleasures (Vanilla & Lavender), and if I can find it the Tide Simple Pleasures same scent. So good smelling!


3. Do you do laundry every day or loads at a time?
Since our house is on the market I try and do a load every day/every other day depending on what I have.


4. How often do you eat out per week?
Hardly ever, esp. since the hubs has been laid off since May.


5. Where do you usually eat out?
If we do, we hit up the dollar menu at a fast food place, but we also love Chili's, Texas Roadhouse, Friendly's.


6. What is your favorite retail store?
Tar-Jay

7. What's your favorite thing to drink?
Turkey Hill Iced Tea


8. Do you take vitamins? What kind?
No - I'm horrible at remembering.


9. What percentage of the household chores to you do?
75%


10. Do your children do chores? {Or will they, did they, etc}
Emma cleans up after herself and as she gets older she'll be given more. But she loves helping us with chores.


11. Do you go to church?
Just occasionally.

12. Do you have a housework schedule?
I used to follow the Fly Lady's schedule, but have gotten off of it, the house never gets horrible so that I can have it looking great for a showing in about 30 minutes.

13. Do you keep a working budget?
No. And honestly right now only money going out is bills/groceries/gas.

14. What do you do at night as a family?
Eat dinner, play time, bath, and then we head up to our big bed and all snuggle and watch America's Funniest Home Videos.


15. How do you prepare yourself for a new week?
Now that I'm a full-time stay at home mom, days and weeks don't really start or end, just see what's in store and needs to be done.

16. What do your mornings look like?
Emma comes to wake me up b/w 6-6:30 am, we lay in bed until a little after 7. Get up eat breakfast watch morning tv. Play or do some preschool lessons.

17. What time do you get up in the mornings?
See Above.

18. What time do you go to bed at night?
Normally between 11-1, but now that I'm preggo, I need a good 2+ hour nap during the day to even make it to 11, so whatever time I zonk out.

19. How do you manage all of the paperwork that floods into your household? {bills, school work, magazines, ads, etc}
I def. need a better system for this. I have piles all over and drive the hubs nuts.

20. How do you keep your household organized? {calendars, charts, etc}
In the past months I keep a calendar on the fridge and fill in everything we are doing and also have my personal pocket calendar for my purse. The fridge one is so that the hubs knows what's coming up and he doesn't ask me a gazillion times because he forgets and will ask me that many times, saves both of us some frustration.

S.W.S

Thirteen days until the ultrasound, ahhhhhh!

I really hope today goes better!

Farkle, you've sucked me into addiction.

Friday Fill-In

1. He was a knigh in shining armor when I need one.

2. Fall coming is what I look forward to most this time of year.

3. My best friend knows me better than I know myself sometimes.

4. This is supposed to be the energetic part of my pregnancy but I can't seem to get enough sleep to be honest with you.

5. Appearances can be the most deceiving.

6. The last person I gave a hug to was my baby girl.

7. And as for the weekend, tonight I'm looking forward to homemade corn chowder, tomorrow my plans include a playdate and Sunday, I want to work on my organization and relax!

Wordless Wednesday

She gives the baby kisses and talks to him/her a couple times a day - one of my favorite things. 17 weeks 1 day here.

I never...

want to go through selling a house again in my life! It's so stressful. Why does no one really share this tid bit? I mean really - perhaps it's me but I'm getting annoyed at some of the buyers and our realtor.

Examples:

• Our agents office calls yesterday morning @ 10:20 to see if someone can look at our house @ 10:30. Um - that gives me exactly 10 minutes, I have a toddler and hubs (who is still laid off) and me are both home, the house is not "show" ready. Not only that but it specifically says in our file for 24 hrs notice. I had them push it to 11, because honestly I just needed time to straighten up the house, and then the people decided to re-schedule for later in the week.
• Buyers who give a 2 hour frame for the showing, and then don't even show up until the end of those 2 hours and are still there afterwards, I only know this b/c we stopped by the house after an hour hoping they would have come already. It's hard trying to find things that can be entertaining for a toddler and cost no money for that length of time, especially over dinnertime, again have I mentioned the hubs is laid off = no money.
• Perhaps it's just pregnancy hormones but I just feel like people do not think about the seller at all. When we looked we showed up promptly at the time we asked/scheduled for. And I just really don't feel like continuing to bend over backwards.
  
• Our realtor is a total dunce! I can't wait until the beginning of October when our contract runs out and we can find someone new if the house isn't sold by then. She's so forgetful, and has forgotten to tell us about showings. Last time it happened I had company over and everything!

I also know that you want the house to look as big as possible, show off it's better aspects - we were supposed to move in July,which has unfortunately been post-poned until I have no clue! So majority of our house is in boxes stacked against the walls, under the dining room table, our basement only has a small pathway. Perhaps, if we could just get out of this house then I wouldn't be feeling like this. I just hate having disarray in my life, and miss my "home", we are only living in a house at this moment. And to top it off - I freak out more as the pregnacy progresses - this fall is going to fly by and then it will be baby time!

Sorry to be a debbie downer but I do feel a little better now.

Good Cop / Bad Cop

Our little one is leaving terrible 2's & entering the treacherous 3's. The past month has been very trying on all 3 of us. Where did my sweet little girl go?

Now I get to hear backtalking, defiance, and major attitude. I feel like the hubs and me are constantly having to bring out the "Bad Cop" & I hate being that person. For nap today I dragged the hubs inside from what he was doing to be the "Bad Cop". We have transitioned her crib into the toddler bed, but nap times seem to be horrible. We tell her she needs to stay in bed. If she gets out then we will be forced to put the front back on. Some might say she's getting too old for naps, but she definitely still needs them. Otherwise we are dealing with an even bigger bear the rest of the day. The worse part is when he does go to put the crib front back on she pleads for him not to, b/c she hates it so much. He says that he feels bad.

I feel that follow through is one of the best things we can do. We have to go through with whatever we say we are going to do, b/c she needs to realize we are boss, not her. I'm feeling at a loss for the right course of action to take with her. I'm finding that staying calm and just talking to her is working the best so far, but I still can't seem to get through to her!

Any suggestions?

Six Word Saturday

I want to eat those meatballs!

Prenatal Appt & Other such non-sense

Had my scheduled 16 week appt this morning. All is well and the baby sounds great. Next appt and the BIG u/s is scheduled for 9.11.09, we can't wait! While there I rummaged through the magazine racks on the wall to see if I wanted any of the freebies offered. Picked up two. When I got home I was flipping through and two ad's caught my attention and alls I could think was WTF? Are these items for real?

The 1st one I'd like to bring up is the Tummy Tub USA. (See picture below) Now I don't know about you but the first thing that came to my mind was those 5 gallon buckets that have the warnings to not let your kids in them with water b/c of risk of drowning. Seems very similar. But this site says it's stressfree for the baby, they adopt the fetal position, and this is good up until 18 months. I just don't really see the ease of actually washing the baby in this or feeling really safe using it.

This next one literally had me laughing out loud, just trying to envision the comfortableness of it. It's called the Kush Support, (See picture below). This product offers comfort for C-cup breasts or larger, proper spine alignment, side sleeprs, breast impants, pregnancy, nursing mothers, menstrual cycles. Perhaps it's me but when I think of my gi-normous breasts - I just don't see this staying in place - yet according to the testimonials this little thing is amazing.

I think a lot of this is in how the ads are done - what are your thoughts? Would you consider using either of these?

*I have not seen or tested either of these products - these ramblings are just from seeing the ads in a magazine and the humor I found in them. *

Friday Fill-In

1. I remember, I remember that kiss & that night.

2. Dear Emma I want you to know that I understand you're growing up, but want my sweet little girl back, instead of my almost 3 yr old going on 15 yr old I seem to have stumbled upon.

3. Is that my belly bump I see when I look down towards my feet !!???

4. I'm trying to resist the temptation of re-reading the Twilight series, yet again .

5. I'm saving a popsicle just for you!

6. If I made a birthday list house sold and all settled in the new one would definitely be on it!!!

7. And as for the weekend, tonight I'm looking forward to relaxing with the family, tomorrow my plans include girls' day with Emma and Sunday, I will be at a family gathering!

Wordless Wednesday - Lake Tobias

Weekend Wrap-UP

What a nice weekend it's been. I swear even though I don't "technically" go to work during the week anymore, there's just something about those weekend's that makes the time even more enjoyable.

Little one has pretty much completely made the transfer to a toddler bed. This is a good transition b/c once in the new house she'll be in a twin bed. Only down side - is she keeps waking me up earlier and earlier - today it was 6:02, the sun wasn't even up yet! - although I think another part of today's was she really wanted to see Landyn b/c the first words out of her mouth were Can I play with him now? I told her tonight that if it's dark she needs to stay in bed, lols, we'll see how tomorrow morning goes.

Want to wish my sister-in-law a Happy 20th Birthday today!

We celebrated today with my cousin and his family on his son's baptism. It's always nice to visit the family - especially since we don't get to see each other very often.

Now for the pictures:

Little one on her first night in the new converted toddler bed.

Gramma with her two Great-Granbabies, she looks so happy!

He is just so adorable!!!

Emma holding him - this just proves to me more that she is going to be a rockin' BIG Sister!

Mom, Sister & the 2 little ones. Something was very funny!

Landyn & me.

Friday Fill-Ins

1. When will someone buy my house?2. Bones was the last good book I read or movie I saw or tv show I watched.3. Everything has its beauty but many people don't take the time to actually see it.4. Whole wheat lasagna with ground turkey is what I had for dinner.5. I'd like your every wish to come true.6. At the beach is where I want to be right now. 7. And as for the weekend, tonight I'm looking forward to relaxing, tomorrow my plans include birthday for SIL and Sunday, I get to see my 2nd cousin get baptised!

Locks of Love - Cancer is a bitch!

So - my hair has been growing out for a year or so. It was getting to the point where it was just too long to really do anything with except throw it up in ponytail or bun, and overall just a big ole' pain in the ass when it was down. We found out that my Gramma's cancer was back with a vengeance this spring. So - I thought why not do something to honor her & help someone else out. And can I just say I feel like a new woman! It's amazing the miracles a good haircut can do!

This is the morning of the haircut - before shots. Oh so long and pretty!

And here it is later that day all chopped off with some very puuuurty layers and a flip thing going on.

And I needed a front shot, but unfortunately little 2 year old girls make funky wonky faces so cropped her out of this one.

1. Being at the pool is my favorite summertime activity.

2. My favorite John Hughes movies is Sixteen Candles. (he directed this film)

3. Soft blankets are something I love to touch.

4. The full moon makes people CARRAAAZYYY.

5. I'm ready for a snack right now.

6. When daylight fades the little one is in bed and it's adult time.

7. And as for the weekend, tonight I'm looking forward to the carnival, tomorrow my plans include nothing and Sunday, I want to visit my family!