28 Weeks

 

Baby really wanted to say "Hi!" today!

How far along? 28 weeks

Maternity clothes: Still rockin the tanks/tees with sweaters/jackets/etc... Craving some new post-baby clothes these days too... Until I try them on and then I'm like, "Nah, I'll wait."

Stretch marks? No

Sleep: Sleep has been okay... uncomfortable at times and I'll wake up to readjust, but then fall back asleep. That could also be due to the little girl arms and legs lodged under my back from a certain little monster that sneaks into our bed. :)

Best moment this week: 1. Jose getting a piece of glass removed from his foot after having it stuck in there for almost two days! I still cringe at the thought of what that had to have felt like. 2. Dinner with family on Saturday, including my cousin that I hadn't seen in almost two years!

Miss anything? Now that I'm starting to eat a little healthier, I'm actually missing working out too. Not like, the actual workouts themselves, but the feeling I get after doing them. Trying to ease my way back into them, but also not trying to go crazy at this point. Especially since my energy has been varying from day to day.

Movement: Lots and lots of little ninja kicks! Love this little guy so much already!

Food cravings? Still nothing particular. And still trying to fight off the sweets. I swear I'm reminded daily that it's still Girl Scout season. 

Anything make you queasy or sick? Nope!

Gender: Boy ...who may or may not have a name!

Labor signs: No

Belly button in or out? Pretty sure it's all the way out there now!

Wedding rings on or off? On

Mood most of the time: Not gonna lie... I was a cranky little witch last week. I still believe my having to miss the sunshine last weekend was a major contributor. [Yes, it effects me that much! And why I don't live somewhere farther south is beyond me!]

Looking forward to: This little boy's arrival and spending the whole summer with my babies. :)

Total weight gain: ~25 lbs.

In the memetime (haha, see what I did there?), here's a selfie I took while waiting for Jose to start painting the nursery...

I guess he had a good excuse with the whole glass in the foot thing, and he probably thinks I'm annoying, but we have so much stuff for the nursery and I can't wait to see it all come together!

That's all for now friends!

Weekend Whine Down

So if you're the envious type, you may just want to stop right here. Because I'm about to make everyone super jelly of how awesome my weekend was. You ready?! :D

The weekend started out with a bang on Friday evening, when we got ice cream with my parents. Jose had to work [of course], but ice cream is always a good time, I don't care who you are or who's missing from the equation [sorry Jose]. This was the highlight of my weekend, as things took a turn for the worse early Saturday morning when Aurora woke up at ~6 am saying her tummy hurt. If you know me personally, you know about the issues we've had with this little girl's tummy. We've pretty much stopped giving her dairy almost all-together because girlfriend gets a belly ache just from looking at a cow. I figured it was her normal tummy issues - after all, she'd had a little bit of ice cream the night before - and told her to go back to bed. We woke up around 8:30 and she was still lying pitifully in bed moaning because her stomach hurt so bad. It was at this point that my stellar mom-of-the-year qualities began shining through, as I started feeling really sorry for myself that my daughter chose a fabulous, 60-degree, sunshiney February day to pull the "my everything hurts" stunt. I work Monday-Friday, 8-5. That means I get a total of 2 days to do absolutely nothing. Or whatever I want. Like most people here in northern Indiana, I'd been hearing about this 60-degree Saturday all week long. It's basically how I made it through the week. So I certainly wasn't going to have it ruined because Aurora wanted a little sympathy. [You can go ahead and hand me my MOTY trophy now.]

However, around 9-ish, Jose got home from work and we really started to find it odd that she was still claiming to not feel well. After all, she gets her 2 days of fun just like me. Why waste them pretending not to feel well? We save that shit for Mondays. The more I thought about it, she really had not appeared to be in so much pain since she had the flu on Christmas Eve. For the love of all things holy, not the flu again! Please! I was able to get her to eat a bite of toast and drink a few sips of water, but no medicine. [Turns out, if you mention medicine to my sweet, darling daughter, she morphs into a real life ninja. Not even kidding!] We ended up taking her to the emergency room around 10 am, where we would spend the following 6 hours confined to a cold, windowless, dungeon, where I was also subjected to Facebook post after Facebook post about how everyone else was outside, soaking up the sun. All this for us to be told, for the most part, that she was just backed up again and to continue giving her the medicine that we've been giving her, but to play around with the dosage. They did, however, inform us that dairy was not the issue we'd been told it was before, so she can have dairy now [which will be a lifesaver, since she loves milk and mac & cheese]!

Needless to say, we spent the rest of our evening inside [windows open, of course, but inside]. Yesterday morning, she woke up saying that she felt like a normal person and I was so ecstatic, but by around 10 am-ish, she was down again. Poor kid. She was out for pretty much the rest of the day and finally started to feel better around 6-ish last night. As sad as I was that we didn't get to go out and do all the things that you do when it's 60-degrees in February, I'm so glad that my sweet girl finally seems to be feeling better today. Aurora Marie, I hope you know that I would undoubtedly skip every day of nice weather to be by your side in a hospital dungeon. 

The silver linings of this weekend were that we got to spend some bonus time with Jose, had a great breakfast together Sunday morning, I kicked butt with my meal prep [and have stayed on-track so far today!], and we finally got things started in the nursery! I'm so excited for that room to come together and I'll definitely be posting pix once it's complete!

Also, what kind of fangirl would I really be if I didn't post this photo I took in vain last year, wearing a shirt I don't currently fit in, in honor of KC's 50th birthday!??

Here's to workin' for the weekend, my friends!

Heart Shaped Everything!

Since Valentine's Day falls on a Tuesday this year and I work and Aurora has school, we celebrated yesterday. The best way to celebrate any special occasion?? Food. Obviously. 

We started off with brunch. Pancakes, bacon, and donut + fruit skewers. Before I go any further, I have to confess that our whole situation surrounding said brunch went something like this. Friday afternoon convo:

Me: I wanna do a Valentine's Day brunch on Sunday, since we'll all be home.

Jose: That sounds cool.

Me: (Sends Jose links to all the recipes I want to make, many of which looked fantastic to me, but Jose and Aurora are a bit pickier. Jose was willing to be flexible, but Aurora - not so much. Basically, it came down to I would have pancakes and bacon to work with. I threw the donut skewers in there for me. Aurora saw me pick up donut holes at the store and made sure I knew that she'd be having nothing to do with them. I believe her response was something like, Literally, Mom. I'm not eating those. Had she not lived inside of me for 9 months, I would seriously question whether or not she was really my child.) So, I can do those donut skewers, no problem. But there really is no one that can flip a pancake quite like you. So... I may need your help with that.

Basically, the griddle we use is Jose's domain. Anything that's made on the griddle, he makes. Which means, he was responsible for 2/3 of our brunch menu. So. You can imagine his utter disappoint when he saw my Facebook post about our brunch and there was no mention of him as the main chef. Jose, my love. My life. My everything. From the bottom of my heart, I am truly sorry. Will you ever forgive me? :) He hates me right now.

Anyways, here's some photos of our brunch, once again proving that we have the absolute worst natural lighting in our house. And yes, by the time I was done with my culinary photography, the pancakes were cold and we had to reheat them. #reallife What's even more #reallife is that Jose and Aurora wanted nothing to do with my raspberry lemonade, so two of those went back in the container. I'm really blowing my domestic goddess cover here, aren't I?

We spent the rest of the day relaxing and then ran some quick errands as well. Dinner was a bit more low-key, but I thought I would further legitimize my domestic goddess status with my heart-shaped pepperonis on this less-than-mediocre homemade pizza. No seriously, the pizza tasted like crap. So much so that I made two and one of them got tossed. Hey, ya win some ya lose some, right?

Anyway, here's lookin at you Monday! ...Wishing you were Friday.

26 Weeks

How far along? 26 weeks

Maternity clothes: I'm happy to announce that after much trial and error, I think I've finally found the secret to maternity clothes! So far, plain, fitted tees and tanks with sweaters have been my best bet. And the best part is that any of the sweaters I've purchased will fit after the baby comes, so I don't even feel guilty. The only maternity-specific purchases I've made, even with a significantly bigger bump than I ever had with Aurora, have been a pair of dress pants, two pairs of jeans, and a few basic tops. Woohoo!

Stretch marks? No

Sleep: Sleep has been pretty amazing lately! So much so, in fact, that Jose told me when he came to bed the other night (long after I'd passed out), the baby was kicking so much that he couldn't believe I was able to sleep through it. 

Best moment this week: Getting to see our little man again last Monday! He grew so much from our last ultrasound and we got to see some glimpses of his cute little face! I say he's going to look just like his big sis!

Miss anything? Hot dogs! We passed the Weiner Shack today (local gourmet hot dog stand/food truck for all you dirty-minded people!), and it got me really excited for when they open in Spring, but then I remembered I'll still have a bit longer to wait before I can get one. :( :( :(

Movement: See the answer to how my sleep has been lately. ;)

Food cravings? Nothing particular. Just anything and everything, but still trying to at least minimize the sweets. Which is super hard to do!

Anything make you queasy or sick? Nope!

Gender: Boy

Labor signs: No

Belly button in or out? Still at that halfway mark. It's really not in or out at this point.

Wedding rings on or off? On

Mood most of the time: Mostly happy!

Looking forward to: See the answer to what I'm missing lately! :)

Total weight gain: ~25 lbs.

Fridays are my favorite!

Since I know you all have been sitting on the edge of your seats awaiting this week's edition of all things Friday [I'm pretending that is actually the case], I'll jump right in. :)

Let's talk about filing for a minute. SO exciting, right? So my boss was on vacation last week and I color-coded all 28,375,287 of her files. And I might go into her office a few times a day, open her drawers, and just stare at the rainbow of folders. Okay, slight exaggeration, but I'm obsessed. It's so much more visually appealing! Not to mention, it makes finding files so much easier because each category is a specific color. I've always been kind of an organization freak [Although you would never be able to tell by stepping foot inside my house, since I usually start by removing everything from it's messy place with the intention of organizing it neatly into it's new place, only to get interrupted/distracted from the project all together and leave crap sitting all over the room.], so I love stuff like this. I used these hanging file folders and these individual file folders to get the job done. I may have to do this with all our files at home...in our office... that we use for all of our important office things that go down. 

Moving right along...

Groupon has an extra $10 off today only! Code is Extra10. I just got $30 to Temper Grille for $5. Woohoo!!! Their steak bites and creamed corn are amazing! Jose and I never really enjoy the tapas experience there, since we're both greedy and get our own dishes, lol. But I haven't had anything on their menu that wasn't amazing!

I'm also scrambling to find ideas for a Valentine's brunch for Sunday for Jose and Aurora. I'm thinking any of the recipes below would be delish.

These doughnut + fruit skewers. I've actually made these before and they were just as amazing as they look. 

Again with the doughnuts. These baked strawberry glazed doughnuts look incredible and actually pretty easy!

These funfetti pancakes. I'm thinking this will be the likely choice, as Aurora is going through this weird, not-my-child-phase, where she claims she doesn't like doughnuts. Whose child are you!?

I also found some cute heart-shaped pizza ideas that look fun if I get real fancy. We'll see. 

It's supposed to be warm-ish (48!) this weekend, so there's also a good possibility that none of the brunch/lunch shenanigans will happen and I'll wind up sitting on my porch all day, drinking hot chocolate. I'm the adventurous type, so I like to keep myself guessing. [I'm not adventurous at all.]

Now, excuse me while I spend the next 10 mintues trying to get my socks on. 

Have a great weekend friends! XO

Cheers to the Weekend!

Happy Friday all!!! I'm cheersing with water of course.

In advance of a little day trip we're taking to Chicago tomorrow, I created a style board of all the things I'm currently trying to find a way to justify to Jose that I need. [Okay, let's be honest, I'm trying to justify them to myself because Jose would say, "Sure, why not!?" Yes, he really is #husbandgoals.] The majority of these pieces are "regular" clothes, not maternity specific, and would basically provide a lifetime of happiness. Did I just justify them all?!

1 |     Quilted Faux Leather Biker, $60 - I know I've mentioned this jacket several times before. I've literally had my eye on it for over a year. This, my friends, is how long it takes me to make a decision. However, it's now $30 less than usual. Decision made. 

2 |     Nordstrom Knit Cocoon Cardigan, $79 - Loving the gray! This is not maternity, so it could be worn after as well. With a plain tee/tank, some skinnies or leggings, and a cute pair of ankle booties, this would be adorbs. 

3 |     MAMA Jersey Tank Top, $9.99/each - These are maternity, but super basic and I'd probably wear them every day. Of course, I'm going off of how they look online and I'm pretty picky about my tanks, so we'll see if they make the cut. ;)

4 |     Lucky Brand Bashina Perforated Bootie, $96.90 - I've had my eye on these forever as well. They literally sell out and come back in stock, like, every day, so I'm afraid if I don't make the leap soon, I'll miss out. And, they're 30% off right now!

5 |     Kristin Cavallari Lash Split Shaft Bootie, $159.95 - Super cute peep-toe for Spring/Summer! 

6 & 7 |     Barefoot Dreams Circle Cardigan, $116/each - This cardigan looks so amazing and, according to reviews, is insanely soft. I kinda want it in several colors. 

8 |     ASOS Maternity Leather Look Paneled Legging, $34 - I love the paneled leggings! Pro: More exciting than plain leggings. Con: People may notice if I wear them for 10 days in a row.

9 |     MAMA Super Skinny Jeans, $34.99 - So I got an awesome pair of black maternity jeans from H&M a few weeks ago, but these look a bit more distressed, which I love. Also, for that price, I have a harder time not justifying them!

As for the rest of our trip, we're starting off at the Shedd Aquarium tomorrow morning. Super excited, as I haven't been there since I was little and I think Aurora will love it! Plus, we get to hang out with Jose's sis who lives there [in Chicago, not at the aquarium].  I'm thinking dinner at the Cheesecake Factory will happen. So cliche, I know, but they have these amazing sweet corn tamale cakes that I'm obsessed with and, do I really have to mention the bajillion types of cheesecake??? We always say we're going to eat somewhere else, but CF always wins. We'll probably do our shopping either before or after dinner. 

Also, apparently there's some type of football event going down Sunday evening. While I'm a little sad that Green Bay won't be playing, in all reality, I could care less. However, it sounds like a great excuse to try some fun [read: unhealthy] recipes! I'm thinking these pulled pork sandwiches look amazing! Some type of queso dip or buffalo chicken dip would be good, too. And now I'm hungry. I literally just ate lunch. 

Okay, that's all I got for today! Hope everyone has a great weekend! XO

Dressing the Bump

Okay. Maternity style is hard. But I promised a post this week, so here it is.

My biggest struggle with maternity clothes is I hate the thought of buying anything, knowing I will only be wearing it for a short amount of time. Especially when we're in the midst of a saving spree. [I know! WHO have I become!?] So far I've done my best to buy as few pieces as possible that were maternity specific, and am focusing on items [like this jacket, these shoes, etc.] that will complete the looks I'm going for. All so I can look cute for my weekly Target runs because, let's be honest, where else am I really going?

Here's some looks that I'm currently loving:

 Loving this look for when I go strolling through the airport. [Side note: I currently have no scheduled trips to the airport.]

My first pregnancy was easy, as I was able to wear most of my pre-pregnancy clothes for the duration of my pregnancy. [Don't mind me, just trying to see how many times I can fit the word "pregnancy" into one sentence.] This time around, that's not quite the case. There's also the possibility that we may have one more [2 more?!] after this one, so I'd get even more mileage out of any other maternity clothes I buy. But we'll see how that all pans out once this little guy is officially here. 

Until next time, Friends! XO