Videos

Lily likes to sing, this is her singing "Somebody's Watchin' Me" that she learned from the Geico commercial

This next video is her helping me cook

And this one was taken this afternoon of her riding her bike through the sprinklers. She has gotten really good at riding it.

Little over 4 months and the symptoms begin

Things have much improved since my last post. That one day, last Thursday, everything seemed to just all go wrong and it was hard to deal with being prego-hormonal and Ross being out of town. The news that day actually got worse after the post. Ross was in NY for a big meeting about changes in at Carlsberg. We thought they would be good changes for us (ie; raise & company car) but it was bad news instead. The lucky thing is that he still has a job and still has all of his benefits so that is good. This would NOT be a good time to be out of health insurance! Basically, the company was bought out but it was the former CEO that is now the owner. New name, but no raise. Potential for the future though, so we are optimistic.

After fretting over the fridge and price shopping for new ones I decided to give the repairman one last shot. He actually came out on Saturday and didn't charge us. So far, so good. It has been working almost a week now.

Then, things got even better on Saturday. We finally found a dryer on freecycle! Yay, I love freecycle. It makes a weird noise, but it works. It drys clothes. It is so nice to have my outdoor furniture back to being furniture instead of a giant drying rack.

Computers are still broken, but two things fixed in one day way awesome.

Pregnancy update:

I'm about 4.5 months along and I've got a belly, but just like last time, my boobs stick out further than my belly so it still isn't as obvious as it would be on most women.

I've only gained 10 pounds but look and feel much bigger.

This pic was taken on Sunday before I went to the beach, as you can see, I just look fat.



Now that the perpetual sickness has subsided, the other annoying symptoms of pregnancy have come out in full force. I'm taking a Zantac150 everyday and still chewing tums all evening. The bad veins came back but this time with a vengeance. Again, they are only on my left leg. Strange. The other annoying and gross part of being pregnant is that I have broken out with acne all over my shoulders, neck, chest and back. Last time it was just my shoulders, this time it has spread. Gross.

I'm ready for the baby to be born and get back to normal and I'm not even half-way through this. ugh.

There are several moms in my SAHM group that say that they loved being pregnant. One even wants to be a surrogate! I am NOT one of those moms. I do NOT enjoy pregnancy.

This is what I enjoy!

I didn't see this, Ross took this picture on a morning that he let me sleep in. I'm not exactly sure why Lily is wearing a stocking cap but no clothes and is outside. The bandaid was because she scratched her face falling off of a skateboard at the baby sitter's house. It was very minor but she kept scratching the scab off and the bandaid is to prevent that.

Ross was getting excited about his trip to Dubai so he pulled out his suitcase and both Lily and Zelda wanted to go too.

Not me, I have no desire to leave the country while pregnant.

I need today to be over

Today sucks. It has just been one of those days where things have built up and built up and I need to vent. I had a doctors appointment today at 8 am. I scheduled it so early because Ross never knows what his schedule is going to look like in advance and doctors visits have to be scheduled in advance. So, I figured that if I planned it really early (beer reps don't have to visit bars REALLY early, so Ross does computer work in the mornings) I wouldn't have to take Lily. Well, that backfired because Ross had to fly off to New York with only one day's notice.
So, I woke Lily up at 7AM when she has been sleeping in until 8:30 or 9 everyday!
And, of course, this doctors appointment wasn't at my regular docs office that is less than a mile from the house, but at another office that is a 30 minute drive away on the turnpike, 45 in early morning traffic.
The bright side of this appointment was that I thought I was going to get a sonogram so I would find out the sex. Nope. Apparently I was mistaken and all I had to do was get two vials of blood drawn. 45 minutes of driving, two tolls, 20 minutes in a waiting room for all of 2 minutes with a nurse tech. Didn't even see a doctor or NP!

So, the rest of the morning I'm dealing with an over-tired cranky toddler and I'm tired too and because I'm pregnant, can't pump myself up full of caffeine. Needless to say, I'm cranky too.

I thought treating myself & Lily to some junk food for lunch would be fun. Lily and I went to Burger King so we could eat fat food and play in the playplace. This turned out really bad. The food made me feel like I was going to puke and didn't even taste good and Lily got bullied. She was up in the tunnel thingy, there were lots of other kids and I hear Lily crying out "I want my mommy". This is not something I've ever heard come out of her mouth before. I look to see her and she is all the way at the top just bawling her eyes out. I called up to her and told her it was ok and to just come back down and I'd give her a hug. Then, I see this little boy, probably about 1.5 or 2 come over and push her into the wall!!! I screamed "hey" but really, what can I do? Then, I see this other boy about the same age go over and push her too! Then the original boy does it again. I turned and tried to find the moms of the boys and found one but just couldn't take it anymore and scrambled up into this maze of tubes to rescue my baby. Not an easy task when you are an adult and 4 months pregnant.
We left and I got into the car and just cried and cried. I can't describe how awful it was to see Lily getting pushed and being so upset and not being able to get to her. What do I do? Teach her to push back? Teach her to run? I didn't think I was going to have to deal with this so young.
I felt bad about cutting her playtime short so I took her to another park.
Then, I come home and guess what...... THE FRIDGE IS NOT WORKING!!!
Last week the repairman told me that if what he did then didn't work than the next repair would be $200.00. I've already invested $300 into this repair and just can't bring myself to invest another 2 when it isn't even going to guarantee that it is fixed. But I have no clue how we are going to be able to afford to buy a new one right now.
AND, as if that isn't enough, I have had more returns this week than I have had sales so my business account is negative!

I just need to go to bed and start over.
Sorry for the rant.

Last week's apron making

This weekend there is a benefit for a couple of my friends who were in a terrible car accident. They will both be out of work for awhile and without their knowing, Mitzie put together a benefit BBQ. She got a bunch of sponsors and products to raffle and auction off to raise money. Of course, I donated an apron. And, finally got the bug to get back into sewing full steam again. Last week I made 6 aprons and hope to keep up a pace of at least 4 a week so that way when it comes craft show season again next winter, I'll have enough inventory to do a show without having to stress out.
Just gonna show off my work:

working again

Ok, so, since I've been doing so much complaining about everything breaking around here, I'm gonna give a quick update because some things are actually starting to come back together.
We used our creativity (and a suggestion from one of Ross's co-workers) to combine the two broken computers. And guess what... it worked. We now have a laptop whose screen doesn't work, hooked up to the monitor of the computer that the hard-drive is fried. Voila, two broken computers equals one that works.
It looks a little silly on the desk, but it is so much better now that Ross and I don't have to stand over one another asking if we are finished with the computer yet. Also nice to have a computer that performs at an acceptable speed.
On a side note, this is how slow the "working" laptop is.
Hit the button to wake it up, go unload the dishwasher, sit back down, and clean off the desk. Now the computer is awake. Type in the web address, go make some tea, type in my password, read Lily a book. And on like that, click.... wait ...... wait..... wait; So you see how unproductive it was for Ross and I to BOTH be sharing that computer!

The fridge is now working again too! It only took 4 visits from the repairman, and a full week. The nice thing is, even though it wasn't cheap, he never charged me after the first repair. On Thursday when it had been a full week since the initial repair he had some other guy come with him for a second opinion. In the end it turns out that the part that he replaced on the first visit was bad and all it took was replacing it again.

Now if only we could find a way to get the dryer working again, we'd be in business!

Sleeplessness and Mornings

This pregnancy has been so different from the last. I have been sick and tired so much and even when I think it is over, or ending, I get sick again. Yesterday was great at the beginning, I had energy and got stuff done for the first half of the day but by 3pm I was pooped. I do remember that quick exhaustion from last time, but don't remember it being this early. Then, of course, there is the insomnia.
I had trouble sleeping last time too but it was toward the end when I was just uncomfortable with my body being huge. This time, there is no explanation. I can go to bed early and I'm up from 4-6AM, I can go to bed late, and I'm up from 4-6AM. Doesn't seem to matter.

Lily is still being awesome though. She crawls into bed with us in the mornings and it so sweet. She is funny too because she demands that I get up and get her breakfast. This morning I was told "Mommy, get up and get me some brown milk" (aka chocolate milk)

oh, and by the way, getting that "brown milk" is more of a mission that you might think. I have to get up and get dressed and walk to the store to buy a small container of milk because our fridge is STILL BROKEN! After 3 visits so far from the repairman and a full 7 days, no working fridge. The silver lining today being that last night the temp droped to in the 30s so I didn't have to throw out last night's leftovers and was able to keep them on the back porch.
(next to my clothes that are drying out there from the broken dryer)
errrrrr

Update on the broken stuff around my house

It is pretty sad that there are enough broken things around here to have written that post, but to top it all off, our REFRIGERATOR broke this week! It wasn't even on the "about to break" list!
Wednesday night I poured myself some milk and thought it just wasn't cold enough. Thinking it was a pregnancy thing, I got a second opinion from Ross. He confirmed, it wasn't cold.
The next morning, the fridge was almost room temperature and everything in it was starting to stink.
yuck.
Money is EXTREMELY tight right now so having to repair the fridge was painful.
The repair guy came out quickly and quickly replaced some stuff and after spending my whole day throwing out food and cleaning the fridge and writing a check for $287.00, I was at least happy that the fridge was up and running again.
WRONG.
The next morning, my juice is warm.
I call the repair guy and he said he will be back between 1 and 3.
By 1, the fridge was working again so I cancelled the appointment.
I shouldn't have done that because at some point Friday night it quit on me again. Now I have a room temperature fridge again but at least this time I don't have any rotting food in it.
When you are on a super strict budget like we are, eating out isn't an option so I'm practicing my hurricane survival skills by putting together meals of strictly canned foods.
It is annoying.
But this little girl keeps smiles on our faces: