Post?

So I had a big post written about how the dishwashing detergent wasn't working as well as I had hoped. I'm going to try a few alterations and then I'll post the recipe.

I'm disappointed. I have read from many people about how the dishwashing soap is the hardest to make.

Oh well.

In other news, I have decided to give myself a break. I'm not stopping blogging because this is a great way to have an account of our lives as a growing family but . . . if I just don't have time to blog, I won't. I'm soon to be a mom of 3 kids under 3.4 years old and I've given myself a break on many things in preparation of this busy season at time (volunteering, work, etc) so I'm doing the same with my blog.

Perhaps I will find more time once I'm done with work but if not . . . oh well.

Walk on the Wild Side

Okay, for many of you, this may not be a big deal but it feels like it for me! I'm trying something new at our house . . .

Homemade Dishwasher Soap &

Homemade Laundry Soap

Needless to say our budget is tight (more about this in another post) with one income and my very small one to be going away soon and that is my main reason for trying these recipes. I have all the ingredients except for two and so I just ordered the two I was missing from Amazon for about $15. Close to what I spent on dishwasher soap alone in a month.

I hope it works. I'll let you all know what happens! Wooo! I hope that I can share the recipes with you and rave over them! We'll see.

Christmas Time Part 1

I cannot remember how much I have written about Christmas but probably not much, considering all my unplanned blogging breaks!

We had a wonderful Christmas! This year it was time to make the long trek to Kansas to visit my family for the holiday. It was an interesting experience with a 2 yr old, 1 yr old, and a pregnant lady.

Here is some of what happened:

Abigail loved taking pictures of people while we were there, so I have included some of those.

We left at 6 am on Wednesday before Christmas and our plan was to have the girls finish their nights sleep in the car. Well, didn't happen. I'm not sure if it was the empty stomach or the laying back in the car where she couldn't see out but our oldest, Abigail, ended up throwing up twice even before we were out of Ohio. I was sure we were in for a long day of this but once we had breakfast she was fine (praise the Lord!). Seriously!

We managed to drive out to Kansas . . . all 15 hours . . . in one single day. It felt like a week but it was nice not to have to pay for the hotel room and to just get it over with.

Abigail did really great with potty breaks on the trip. She never had an accident and her daddy even made her wait once after she said she had to go. She isn't afraid of strange or loud flushing toilets, etc.

My Dad. A picture by Abigail . . . isn't it cute?!

Tired Elsie in the car.

Abigail borrowing Mommy's sunglasses for part of the trip!

The way home was a bit more eventful, however. The night before we left Abigail started coming down with a cold. Just a croaky throat, sniffles, etc but she was up a lot!! She coughed a lot too. At 1:30 am her coughing woke up her sister. Elsie, finally figuring out we were in the room with her, would not go back to sleep.

I tried everything. In bed with us, letting her cry (which kept us all awake), rocking her to sleep and then laying her down (then she'd wake up). We were at the end of our breastfeeding journey at this point (more in another post) but I gave it one last shot. I just fed her and laid her down even though she was awake. Not another peep. Of course, it was almost 5 am by this time.

Tired!!

So, we leave the next day after lunch and drive until almost to St. Louis. This is a pretty good distance considering we have had little sleep and now have a kiddo with a fever and cold symptoms. She'd really either be sleeping or crying. It was sad!

Well we settled down for another night's sleep in our hotel room. Elsie in a crib, Daddy sleeping with Abigail to help her, and me in my own bed where I could tend to Elsie if needed. Elsie cried for a bit at first but then ended up sleeping all night.

Abigail was up a lot . . . again. This is so unlike her normally. She would tell her daddy that she had to use the bathroom, or she was coughing, or she was shivering from the fever. Terrible night. Finally at about 3:30 am, she tells her daddy that she feels sick. Before he can react there is vomit in the hotel bed (yes, Elsie slept through this!).

Let me tell you, being sick is no fun but being sick away from home is worse. Perhaps we're bad parents, I don't know, but we didn't have much choice. We simply cleaned up the bed with towels as best as we could, pulled up the clean sheet, and put her back to bed. Andrew moved in with me! :)

We finally got a little more sleep and the rest of the trip went fine.

Wow, it was so good to be home in our own beds.

Also, Elsie has slept through the night since we got home. Unbelieveable!

Okay, now that I have recorded that adventure, I'll leave you with a beautiful picture I took of my two loving girls before our trip to Kansas.

Alone!

Elsie (for the first time) and Abigail had a sleep-over at their Nana's house last night. Andrew and I calculated last night that this was the first night we'd spent alone in our own house since before Abigail was born - is that right? We had a little getaway to a Bed and Breakfast before Elsie was born so we weren't actually in our own home.

It was nice . . . and weird. I actually had a dream that I was waiting for my family at a concert (Andrew and the girls) and they never showed up. It was also weird and scary.

This morning I'm actually blogging for the first time in a while, am going to go relax in the bathtub, and leisurely head into work. I'll try not to get used to this!

Lately my mind has been way more ambitious than my body. My body is calling for rest, rest, rest, and my mind knows the entire to-do list and wants it done. It's a constant battle. :) My body is just more tired this time, having these two babies close together, so I have to be a little more cautious and careful with how long I'm on my feet. I still have 15 some weeks to go. Crazy! I have to be honest and say that it's hard to rest when kids are around. Especially Abigail always needs me to get up and do something (drink, snack, potty, change the TV settings, Elsie's doing something, etc). It's all about balance.

Well, that's all for now. I have more posts (and lots more recipes) rattling around in my head but they'll have to wait until later. I want to make sure I can relax a bit before going to work today.

Tests

For the first time I have found out a few tests I failed from the midwives. I'm in shock, seriously!

I failed my glucose test this weekend. I snuck in a piece of bread along with my hard boiled eggs so that's what probably pushed it over the top. Lovely, right? My sugar wasn't very high but it was slightly beyond the normal range, so that means I get to sit in a blood lab for 3 hours. Thankfully they're open on a weekend so my husband can keep the kids and I don't have to worry about fasting, getting to the lab, having four (yes four!) blood draws in that amount of time, and also schleping the kids out in the winter.

It's so hard to get everyone bundled up and out the door!

I'm also anemic. Lovely. Might explain some of my thethargy.

I failed a few other tests that I won't be sharing publically on my blog. Thankfully they are minor and can be easily treated.

Please pray that I pass the 3-hour glucose test. I don't think I will be allowed to go to the birth center if I have diabetes - makes a pregnancy high risk!

Randomness

• Yesterday was a big day in our family. It's my dad's birthday (Happy Birthday, Dad!!), my dog's birthday, my in-law's anniversary, and the rememberance of my grandparents in-law's anniversary . . . if that makes sense. We celebrated by having a lovely dinner at a very nice place up here. Delicous! Anyway . . .
• I'm so thankful for my husband. He has really stepped up to take care of things when I wasn't feeling well lately. He came home early a few days last week and went in late on Wednesday (so I could go to the midwives) and Thursday (so I could go to the dentist).
• He's also doing childcare alone this morning so I can go have my glucose test done - just the 1 hour. I'm also thankful that the lab is open on a Saturday morning. That is so convenient for working mom's and for stay-at-home mom's - so the daddy can just stay home with the kids.

Speaking of that, I'd better get to it.

Weirdness!

Well, this blogging break was brought to you by my friend . . . my stomach.

I have been having very weird stomach pain since last Saturday. My appetite is finally back today and the pain after eating seems to have lessened somewhat. Yeah! I haven't actually eaten a whole meal yet today, so we'll see, but I'm less miserable than a few days ago.

I have no idea what it was. Neither does anyone else. The only thing weird was some tests from the midwives office yesterday. Those led them to believe I had a Kidney Infection or UTI but my symptoms didn't fit that.

Oh well, it doesn't matter as long as I'm feeling better. The baby is fine as well. He was checked all along the way!

Santa Clause

So Christmas is over but thoughts of Santa are still around. We are not a family who "does" Santa. I have no problems with good ole' St. Nick (the real guy) but I do have a problem when a fictional guy is the main focus of the season - over the miraculous birth of our Savior - when the fictional guy takes claim for all the expensive gifts my child gets - instead of using it as an opportunity for my child to express appreciation to the appropriate real-life people - and several other issues.

I don't want to be a stick-in-the-mud, I really don't. I don't want to ruin it for anyone and I will tell my children about St. Nick and his story. However, we won't do the traditional "Santa" deal.

So far we've just been able to ignore it. Abigail didn't know about it, we didn't talk about, we don't have Santa figures in our house so . . . no problem.

Then . . . today . . . out-of-the-blue my daughter was "reading" her Bible (which is her new obsession - yeah!) and she said to me, "Mama, this book is about Santa".

Whoa! Wait just a second. I tried, I think successfully, not to act shocked.

I said, "Oh really? I think it is mainly about Jesus. Remember baby Jesus who just had a birthday?"

My daughter answered, "Oh yeah."

Me: "Where did you hear about Santa?"

She said: "Mama, we saw Santa at the horse parade."

That was at the beginning of December. My girl is growing up and starting to really pay attention!

The matter was dropped and she went on to "read" her Bible and talk all about God, etc.

We might be talking about Santa sooner than I thought!

Little Tornados

Calling all stay-at-home moms. Do your days feel like mine?

I spent 45 minutes before my child's nap "cleaning" her room. I was putting away clothes, sorting and trying to organize toys, cleaning out clothes that were too small, etc (not really "cleaning"). When I went to lay her down for her nap I looked around and what did I see? A room that was just as messy or messier than before.

As I was working on cleaning Abigail's room I suddenly hear "splash, splash". Not good. I investigate, only to find the baby playing in the toilet water. Thankfully it had been flushed but still, ewwwwww! I washed her hands and set her down so she could play. As she was crawling after me she slipped with her wet hands on the floor and banged her face on the floor. She's fine but really. . . I'm in for a new adventure because my oldest would never in a million years play in the toilet water. I guess we're keeping the bathroom doors closed.

I am about to emark on another adventure, picking up my books, again, from my bookshelf (beside my bed). My kids (or kid - the almost 14 month old) has pulled them off for the 2nd time today.

It's no wonder that when I fall into bed at night, I feel like I have worked my tail off (and I have) but have gotten absolutely no where. I know this will pass and I will miss these days with sweet little ones, but honestly, I don't think I will miss cleaning the same mess over and over again.

Hey, maybe I just need to look on the bright side. I did get all the Christmas decorations put away today - finally, I thought it was never going to happen - with the help of a toddler and nothing was broken.

2011 Goals

Being that I'm using my body to grow a baby this year, I'm trying to make my goals easily attainable. Here they are:

Goals for 2011:
Read the one verse a day calendar - everyday.
Spend 30 minutes of uninterrupted time each day with children.
Accomplish monthly goal.
Have healthy baby.
Lose 15 pounds after baby is born (more if possible).
Go through entire character traits and manners with children.

Let me explain the monthly goal thing. . . Our house is no where near complete. There are many things, however, that I can do on my own without bothering Andrew. I'm the kind of person who likes to dive in head first and work hard at something. I have realized since becoming a mother, however, that if I start a house project and get interrupted by the demands of a little one, it makes me frustrated. My main job is to be a mother (and cook, maid, launderer, etc) so I can't let these little projects get in the way of that.

So . . .

I'm starting small.

I'm just picking one very small project for each month (except I will possibly skip May, June, July, etc - you get the picture) and have Andrew and I work together on a few things. That way I will have 30 days, give or take, to get something done and I will hopefully, not be bothered in the least bit by interruptions.

I may wait until the start of each month to decide on a project. We'll see.

January's project is to finish sanding, touch-up painting, and putting pulls on our drawers in our room. It's a project that should only really take an hour or two at best. I can do the sanding and painting part. :)

Welcome 2011!!

2010 Goal Review

Here is what I wrote for my goals last year. Let's see how I did.

Goals for 2010:

Read the 1 verse a day calendar. - I did this quite well until my kid got super sick in March. For some reason I just couldn't bring myself to catch up again.

Exercise 2x a week. - Nope - some weeks I did good but overall - nope.

Spend more quality time during my quantity time with my kids. - Schooling them. - I actually think I accomplished this. Abigail learned a lot this last year and I was pretty focused on it. She knows her alphabet, can write many letters, knows many numbers and is still very interested in more.

Work through Character qualities with myself and my kids. - nope - did not do this.

Lose 20 pounds. - this is the only one I totally accomplished. I actually lost about 35 pounds. . . then I got pregnant. I'm still down about 10 from last January so I'm happy with that.

Blessed Season!

Wow. Again . . . didn't meant to take a break in blogging. It just happened. The reason . . . it's been a whirlwind two weeks at our house.

On the 20th we found out were are having a boy! Then laundry, cleaning, packing, and early at 6 am on the 22nd we headed to my family Christmas in Kansas.

The trip didn't start out so well, with Abigail vomiting twice before we got to the Ohio border, but she felt better after that and the rest of the trip was decently uneventful.

We had a lovely time in Kansas and it was made even more special because all of the little babies got to be together. Abigail and Elsie had fun playing with cousins Alex and Isaac. Just wish we could all get together more often.

We headed home on December 27th but decided to break this trip up into two days so we arrived home on the 28th. The last two nights of our journey were especially hard. I think we got 3 to 4 hours of sleep each night. Abigail was getting a cold and Elsie just had realized we were all in the same room. Never has our home and own beds felt so good to me, despite missing our loving family. Both girls slept like well, I guess "babies" in in their own beds!

Then the next two days I took advantage of Andrew being off work and fit in two doctor's appointment, grocery shopping, running errands, etc. I felt like I didn't sit down for a minute. Repacking was also a priority because. . .

On Friday morning we got up and left for Columbus to attend Andrew's cousin's wedding. Abigail was chosen to be a flower girl for the wedding. I was a nervous Nelly with all the "special" stuff I had to remember to bring for her but we got it all done.

She only made it down 1/2 of the aisle before realizing that I wasn't coming with her and there were lots of people watching her. :) She stalled and started to get a little emotional before her daddy came to the rescue. Oh well, she's only 2!!

The wedding was beautiful. Andrew and I both really appreciated the choir they had and their beautiful church. Made me think that I might shrivel up and die if I don't find somewhere to sing soon but I'll just be content to sing "Mary had a little lamb" for the time being. Andrew said he felt the same way . . . some day.

The reception was also fun. We checked out about 6 pm to get our tired girls home. When I say tired, I mean I have never seen Abigail so moody or out-of-sorts before. Lots of excitement and not a very good nap makes one cranky girl. She's much better today.

So . . . there are pictures and video from all these happenings. After laundry, bills, and some cleaning I'll get around to uploading them and putting them on here.

Happy New Year!!!