Winner Winner Turkey Dinner!

Congrats Keiko for winning the uber-cute giveaway here!! Although since I know how amazingly you're decorating Cash's room, I wish I'd gone with the owl items that the site offers...it's just rare that I find someone else who loves owls as I do!

Thanks to everyone who entered to win :)

Gobble Gobble 2009

Happy Thanksgiving 2009!

turkey on the bbq grill - the best way to do it!

connor and grammy van hook looking at photos

nom nom nom

here's the spread from this year...totally forgot to get a pic of the food before the turkey was carved. oops.

Happy Thanksgiving

Can't believe it's already almost thanksgiving...which means that it's almost Christmas which is just crazy. That also means that 2009 is almost over. My head is spinning.

Speaking of crazy, here are pics of Connor's two Thanksgivings so far. He's such a tiny little baby, I just can't believe it. I'll be sure to post some next week of our holiday this year. Still strange to think that next year, we'll have two kiddos at thanksgiving...I just can't wrap my head around that!

This year we're not getting all the families together which is kinda a bummer, but it may be nice to have a quieter turkey day. It's going to be Jeffrey, Connor and myself, plus my mom and dad. We'll have my dad's yummy bbq turkey and stuffing. I'm making a crock pot sweet potato casserole and some yummy creamed spinach. Jeff's favorite part of thanksgiving is the green bean casserole so he'll be making a couple of those--one with onions and one without. Mom's bringing a yummy relish plate, bread and mashed potatoes. Connor, as usual, is contributing nothing. This may be the year we teach him about pulling his own weight.

Happy Thanksgiving Everyone!

Week 13 Update

I love Tuesdays. Not really for it's placement in the Monday-Friday countdown, but more for the fact that it's the day my week turns in my pregnancy. As of today I'm 13 weeks along. This is my last week of the first trimester which is a real big landmark. After week 13 the liklihood of bad stuff happening is reduced significantly so that's obviously great news. By no means am I out of the woods, but it's a good thing. My next landmark week I want to get to is 18-20 which is where I'll be able to know the gender. Also, week 24 since then we'll be considered viable! Hooray for viability!

Back to my love of Tuesday...I get an email every Tuesday telling me what's going on with Baby Barnes 2 (BB2) and today I was creeped out by a couple things in the email. First, it said that if BB2 is a girl, she already has 2 million eggs. Kinda creepy right? Second, BB2 is the size of a jumbo shrimp. Hearing that news made me immediatly want to eat some shrimp which seems a bit canabalistic. Not great. The rest of the news in the email was good though...BB2 now has fingerprints which makes it seem pretty real. Also, he/she is about 3" long and about an ounce in weight.

Still feeling pretty lousy, but the rule of thumb is that once you reach that 13 week point, the morning sickness typically subsides. I'm really hoping that happens for me-none of my work pants fit anymore and I'm not talking about them being too tight. Too big pants makes me look kinda sloppy in addition to looking exhausted and maybe smelling like vommit. Ok, I don't really smell like vomit but I feel like I do.

Baby names...our girl name will always be Caitlin Grace and so it's the boy names we're struggling with again. Noah and Logan are the top contenders right now, with Grant and Garrett in the running as well. We'll see. We're not really in love with any of them right now so we're still working on it.

Super Duper Friday Giveaway!

The Promotional Team at CSN Baby contacted me and asked if I'd do a giveaway on my blog. What?!? I was shocked but really excited to help them giveaway a few quality items. After thinking it over for about 3.2 seconds I decided Hell yeah, i'd love to play! These great pieces would make amazing shower gifts so even if you don't have kids, enter anyway!

I've been doing lots of online window shopping since we found out we are expecting barnes baby #2. There are so many really, really cute things out there-especially for babies and kiddos-love the nursery decor items. Even more cool stuff than when Connor was born.

I'm really not a fan of the characters and other kitchy stuff so many shops are peddling, so I really loved that CSN Baby had fun, interesting items that don't have Thomas the Train on them...no offense to anyone with an affinity for trains. hooray, trains. Here are the items that are up for grabs - and remember the winner of the giveaway will win all items:

Super cute set of 4 Giggles burp cloths. Moms out there know that burp cloths are used for everything and you can truly never have too many. If I owned these great looking cloths, they'd be the ones I took with me when I left the house. I'd leave the boring ones at home and grab these on my way out the door.

Set of two lovely hanging picture frames. Aren't the colors just perfect? These frames each hold a 4x6 photo and I'm really loving the design and colors. These would make amazing gifts...unless you wanted to keep them for yourself!

Now the fine print :)
*due to shipping charges, the giveaway is only open to US Residents.
*The drawing is open as of the time/date of this posting and will close at noon (az time) on Friday, November 27th
*All you have to do to enter is leave a comment on this post. I'll do a random drawing and the winner will be mailed the items.

That's it, pretty simple! Please spread the word so friends/family can also enter to win. Everyone loves free stuff--especially free stuff that's cute and makes great gifts.

Week 12 Update

Because of my overall crappy feelings, the doctor had me come back in three weeks rather than a month for a checkup. Last night we had the appointment and Jeffrey brought Connor along. I think he was pretty freaked out seeing me in the doctor's office-not sure but he didn't love the idea. We'll probably avoid that with future appointments, except an ultrasound maybe. I think he may like that part.

The appointment started with the nurse telling me that I've lost 10lbs so far. While this would typically be a victory...it's not when you're trying to sustain a pregnancy. The next part always freaks me out...trying to find the heartbeat with the doppler. Now, since the baby is too small (size of a lime!) right now for me to feel him/her moving and know that he/she is ok, the doppler waiting game is scary. The nurse tried and tried for a few minutes (felt like hours) and couldn't find it. She had another woman come in who found it pretty quick so that was a relief. You can just feel your own heart pounding with every second that passes and they can't find the baby's heart. Such a horrible feeling. But, they found it and that's all that matters.

My doctor was genuinely shocked that his super duper recommendation didn't change my life in regards to my nausea and vommiting. He said to keep trying it and so I will. Today I tried to force down one piece of PB toast. I only got through half before it made it's exit. Fail.

He said that he was concerned with my weight loss and that I need to do whatever I can to gain the weight. I'm kinda at a loss. I know I'm not eating nearly enough, but it's truly difficult when you feel as if you are on the edge of throwing up 24 hours a day. Feeling like that does not make you want to have a sandwich. I am eating, just not enough. He went on to explain that the baby is growing--for now--but that we'll reach an impass where the baby stops growing if I don't start gaining weight myself. Well, I can't let that happen so it's game on. I don't really know what I mean by game on, but I'm just going to have to try harder I suppose. He told me that if I like burritos, eat burritos. If I like chicken nuggets, eat chicken nuggets. It's the caloric intake I need now, so whatever sounds good should be eaten.

At this point, I've stopped taking both of the Rx. They don't work and that's ok, I've just got to wait it out. I'm hoping that this baby adheres to the typical 13 week point where all morning sickness subsides. We shall see. As of yesterday, I'm officially 12 weeks along.

He told me that he wants to see me back in 2 weeks to make sure my levels are good. I had more blood drawn and was outta there until next time.

According to my weekly emails, the baby is doing some pretty great stuff in week 12. Reflexes are developing so the baby can open and close fingers, curl toes, and start making the sucking movements with his/her mouth. The baby weighs about an ounce right now and is about 2 inches long from head to bottom. Kidneys are starting to produce urine so things are moving along.

I think that's all the update for now. I'm happy to be nearing the end of the first trimester. I felt like being pregnant with Connor just flew by but this one seems to be taking it's time :)

Excuses, excuses

Dear loyal readers (all 4 of you),

I have really blown it with blogging over the past couple of weeks. I'm really going to have to play the pregnancy card here. Not only am I exhausted (pity me) but I am still really sick (really, really pity me). Everything is going just fine, but I have such a lack of focus that I just couldn't psych myself up enough to get on here and do my thing!! I promise to be better--or to try to be better at the very least!

I do have a fun surprise coming up to thank anyone who has stuck it out though...details and more to follow in a few days!! Are you excited? Good!

Love,
me

Video - Halloween Dancing

Nearly Wordless Wednesday

This year we kinda blew it with the halloween costume. Last year was amazing, and we just couldn't top it so we let Connor pick. Shockingly, he wanted to be a baseball player. Fortunately, we had everything but pants so we were a go! I searched all over for itty bitty baseball pants-size 2t. no luck. we ended up just putting some black sweat pants on him and calling it good.

Friday at school they were having a party with snacks and stuff so we dressed him in his costume. Surprisingly, no one else in his class had their costume on, but maybe one kid. Who knows. That evening, his school, Kyrene de las Brisas had the pumpkin walk where all the kids displayed their pumpkins they'd carved earlier that week. I guess they gave the little kids shapes to place on their pumpkin and the teachers carved them where they landed. Here are some pics from school and the Pumpkin Walk.

connor's class at school

connor and aidan at the Pumpkin Walk

connor and dada checking out all the pumpkins

sitting by his pumpkin. his is on the left with the smooshed in face. Aidan's still has the shapes on it.

Every year on Halloween we go over to Steve and Jean's house. Steve & Jean are my BIL Ryan's parents. We're a big family so we all get toghether with the kids to trick or treat so they can all go with their cousins. It's a great time. They live in this amazing neighborhood where everyone actually knows each other. Shocking. The day or two before Halloween a flyer goes out to everyone who lives there with a code word...I guess there are issues of neighboring communities dropping their kids off in this area and hunting down "the good candy". Hilarity. So, the code word is used to get the really good stuff. Everyone else gets candy, but not the full size stuff I guess.

Jacob was Spiderman again this year. Here he's doing his best Spidey pose

Jacob, Isabelle, and Connor getting ready to Trick or Treat

My sister in law Megan, about 4 days past due. She had her baby girl yesterday btw.

This was Connor's third year trick or treating so he's an old pro by now. Zero patience though and he pushed to the front of the line each time. We'll need to work on his Trick or Treat etiquette before next year!

After every house he'd dig around in his bucket to see what he got

The Blum Family - Ryan, Jake and Megan...Kaden was with his dad this year

not the best family pic. i look largely preg and my kid is picking his nose or something. super.

After Trick or Treating, he dumped out all of his candy to see what he got

he got to pick one piece to have that night and so the blue tootsie pop won

Bella trying to make off with Connor's haul

and Connor subsequently freaking out

nom nom nom - candy

josh surprised the kids with his skelleton puppet that danced to Monster Mash. Hilarious. The kids were kinda freaked out at first, but then loved it and danced for a while.

Hope everyone had a great Halloween!