I'm Pregnant!

I am happy to say that I am pregnant with baby #2! I am very excited since we had actually been trying for a while. With Kaitlyn we got pregnant the first month we tried so the disappointment each month of finding out I wasn't pregnant was new for me. Although I am sure mine is nothing in comparison to some. We only tried for about 5 months before having the positive test, but to me it felt like forever! I think I was just spoiled getting pregnant right away with Kaitlyn. Anyway, my due date is October 30th so we will have a Halloween baby! I am about 12 weeks along and for some reason have been soooo nervous this time around. With Kaitlyn we told everyone pretty much right away. This time, for some reason, I have just been so nervous about miscarrying that I have kept it quiet. I was talking about it to one of my friends and she gave me good advice as I told her that I just had a bad feeling this time around. She said that "those bad feelings are never put there by Heavenly Father, but by Satan. He is the one that wants us to have bad feelings about good things." Which is so true and did make me feel better at the time. But for some reason I can't shake the feelings of miscarriage out of my mind. I will just be happy to get far enough into my second trimester to feel better. Other than my "uncessary worries" I am starting to feel better. I have not physically thrown up, but have felt pretty nauseous. Mainly though I am just tired and weak feeling. I just want to sleep all the time but recently just lay in bed and can't fall asleep! Very annoying when all I want is sleep! My house has pretty much went into shambles :) Cleaning is just not at the top of my priority list. (not that it ever was very high!) But at least I have turned in my work notice! I felt much better after that knowing that there is a light at the end of the tunnel and it is not as bad working when there is an end in sight! I am looking forward to being able to enjoy my summer free with Kaitlyn and hopefully have a relaxing second trimester!

Freedom Park

This past Friday was a beautiful day so I decided to take Kaitlyn to Freedom Park to feed the ducks/geese. I wish it wasn't so far away b/c it has so much to keep kids entertained. We have a playground in our neighborhood, but I don't know of a closer location that ALWAYS has ducks around to feed. Anyone?? Anyways, Kaitlyn enjoyed swinging on the swings... Then we made our way over to where all the ducks were. I was nervous about her falling into the water, but she seemed to know not too get too close. She was loving it at first, but didn't get the hang of how to throw the bread to them. She kept just holding it out in her hand and I would have to take it from her to throw to the ducks. Well eventually one of the Canadian geese decided to take it from her hand anyway! It was so quick, I think she mainly just got scared by it, but needless to say she wanted nothing to do with them after one "bit" her finger! haha. So I finished feeding them our bread and then we headed back home.

Just holding the bread out for them...

Eating a little bit of the bread for herself

I think this may have been the goose that bit her :)

I Quit!

I really did it. I quit my job today. It has been a long time coming, and I am not finished officially, but the notice is in. I am giving my work a 2 months notice since I am currently the ONLY one that does my job, or really knows even how to work everything since they decided to lay off my other 5 co-workers over the past few years. But I feel like giant weight has been lifted off my shoulder already. I knew I wanted to quit, I have just been dreading giving the notice. I HATE confrontations like that. But I am happy to say it went well. My boss was very professional about it and only had nice things to say. Although my two month notice, vs. two weeks made it much easier on him. So now I just have to figure out how I am going to go into the office regularly to train my replacement once they have found someone. My decision to quit has been a long time coming. I knew I wanted to just be a stay at home mom ever since Kaitlyn was born, but we still had a lot of debt and since I had to opportunity to work from home, we decided to take advantage of it. But lately it has been getting harder and harder to manage while still tending to Kaitlyn as she gets older and more demanding. I find that as work gets busier (which it has picked up quite a bit lately) that I have been getting more and more stressed out. And I find myself taking it out on Kaitlyn which is not good. I just feel so guilty when I have all this work to do and I am sitting at my computer and Kaitlyn is hanging on my leg and I am having to try and tell her to go play somewhere else. Not good. I know this decision is the right thing, although finances will definitely be tight now. Luckily we have all of our debt (minus mortgage of course) paid off so we will just have to live very cheaply...even more so for those who already make fun! haha! So my two month notice should be up sometime probably mid-June and then I will be able to enjoy the remainder of my summer as a regular stay at home mom! So bring on the play dates everyone!

February 2011

Life has been crazy as usual, but I keep neglecting this poor blog! Nothing too exciting going on this past month. Valentines Day was pretty low key for us. My only request was for a card (that had to have more written in it than "Love, Justin" and my request was granted, along with the Sound of Music DVD I had been wanting. Justin received some of his favorite candies and a new grill brush and cover since our current ones were worn out. For dinner we went out to Cracker Barrel with a gift card. You may scoff, but that is actually one of my FAVORITE places to eat. Nothing beats a good ol' fashioned southern meal. MMM. Another highlight of the month was that Justin and I both had to give talks at church...acutally not a highlight, but glad it is over! We have been loving the weather lately and have been having fun with Kaitlyn outside. Check out her hair when she plays on her new playset we found on Craigslist! haha!



And my mom got her this awesome shopping cart for Christmas. She pushes it around with her baby in it, but Justin thought it would be funny to put her in it. She loved it!

This past weekend we went to my mom's house to help her build a square foot garden and Kaitlyn had a horrible accident. Justin had been driving the riding Lawn Mower to haul bags of soil, and while we were all busy Kaitlyn touch a hot part on the mower and her hand blistered up pretty bad. She was pitiful. We soaked it in chilled Aloe Vera Juice for about 20 minutes and then wrapped in up in a bandage and she passed out from crying so much. Definitely her worst injury so far :( I was so impressed by how she handled it though. The initial burn was horrible, but ever since she woke up from the following nap, she has not even been bothered by it! We kept it bandaged the first day and she just used her other hand for everything and kept the injured hand up at her side. After that we took off the bandage to let it breath and it hasn't even slowed her down! I am worried about infection though. She won't let us touch it, so every time she is asleep we go and coat it with neosporin and she doesn't mind it being washed in the bath tub. Here are some pictures of her bandaged hand :( But also some happier pictures prior to her injury over at Mom's house:

Catch Up

So I am very behing on my blog, but I had a lot of pictures I wanted to put up here. Nothing much is new with us, except that Justin started school this past week. He is obtaining his MBA through an online program with ECU (where I graduated.) It will take him 3 years since he is only going part time, so hopefully it will not be too time consuming for him. Hopefully it will lead to better career options. Things with my work haven't been too bad lately so I am holding in there for now. We'll see what happens once the housing market starts picking up again in the spring.

Here are some pictures from a couple months ago before it got so cold, but this used to be one of our daily activities was a wagon ride. I am looking forward to being able to get outside more again but it is just too cold right now. I am excited b/c I bought a really cool playset off craigslist for Kaitlyn too once it warms up.

About to depart on our wagon ride...

Love our wagon rides!

Christmas was good for us. This was our first year waking up and having our first family Christmas just the 3 of us. Then we went over to my mom's house where Kaitlyn hit the motherload of toys along with my extended family. We went down to see Justin's family over New Year's along with most of his siblings so Kaitlyn enjoyed that. Christmas was so busy I actually didn't really get many pictures which I regret...but here are a few from Justin's parents.

Modeling the cute hat and scarf that Justin's mom made.

We have had so much snow lately! We had our first white Christmas since I have been alive and then we had another huge snow storm this past week. here are a few pics of Kaitlyn in her snow gear. She is not too fond of it, but I think she mainly just hates her snow suit. The gloves are a little weird for her as well.

Leaving the house and wondering what all that white stuff is...

Sledding down our driveway

Trudging through the snow...

Car Crash

Today I just experienced the worst car crash of my life. With that said it could have definitely been worse and I feel lucky to have walked out of in unscathed along with Kaitlyn. Today started out to be a fairly good day. My dad came over this morning while I was working to play with Kaitlyn. Then my mom called and asked if I wanted to come meet her at Carolina Place mall. "Sure" I said since I needed to do a little shopping anyway for Christmas. I was in the right turning lane to get off I-485 when it happened. A pick-up truck came right into my lane right next to me forcing me to swerve off the road. Then my car completely lost control and I ended up spinning out of control ACROSS 3 LANES of oncoming interstate traffic, ACTUALLY spinning through the oncoming cars, miraculously not hitting them until the very far left lane a guy ended up hitting my front tire, giving us a little more spin to finally go crashing through the cable wires of the median. The cables sliced through the front of my car, but saved us from spinning all the way into the opposite side of oncoming traffic. I was in hysterics. I immediately flew out of the car and ran to get Kaitlyn who was completely unfazed by the whole thing. It really is a miracle that we didn't' get hurt and I know someone was looking out for us. To top it off though, the pick-up truck drove away, leaving me to be responsible for the whole thing. The cop was nice and didn't give me a ticket since I obviously didn't have time to get the guys licence tag no. but told me insurance would definitely file it as a fault. And they did. The car is pretty totaled since the cables sliced through the whole front hood. We had it towed to KIA and they were very nice and gave us a loaner car for free! I am too scared to drive it though. Here are some pics of the damage once it was pulled from the cables. I should have taken one while it was in the ditch but I was a little preoccupied and freaking out :)

Close up of where the cables sliced through the car.

here you can see how high up the cables went acros the hood through the car...and the radiator leaking into the parking lot

27 Things I am Grateful for...

I thought I would do a Gratitude post in honor of Thanksgiving which is around the corner. I couldn't think of a number for how many I should do, so I picked 27...the number of years I have lived on this Earth :)

1. My Faith in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints: I am so grateful to be fully active in our church. I was inactive for several years during late high school and college but always knew that some day I would return. Now that I have, I never want to leave again. There is not a doubt in my mind that this church is true.


2. My Husband: Whether I'm moody or stressed out he knows how to deal with me. He helps out around the house whether it is laundry or couponing with me.


3. My Daughter: Although she was quite horrid in the early months and is still pretty high maintenance, she has turned into a fun-loving, energetic, silly little girl.


4. My Family: They've made me who I am today and will always be there for me when I need them.


5. Friends: Whether I've had them since high school or only a couple years I am grateful to have them in my life.


6. This Country: I am very grateful to live in a country where we have the freedoms that we have...even if some people may be trying to diminish some of those freedoms...


7. The Internet: That may sound shallow, but I cannot imagine life without it now. I use it for everything!


8. Good Food: I LOVE to eat and will try most anything unless it has chocolate in it :)


9. We FINALLY finished reading the Old Testament: We are trying to make it through the entire quad (Old Testament, New Testament, BofM, D&C, Pearl of Great Price) from front to back. We started about 2 1/2 years ago and FINALLY finished the OT. Although we do use the Institute study manual as we go along, so that takes extra time.


10. Yard Sales: Yes I love them and about 90% of Kaitlyn's belongings come from them.


11. Good In-laws: From my sibling-in-laws to my in-laws they are all nothing but nice to me.


12. Our Home: Althought I do wish we didn't rush into buying it, I am happy we are stuck with a house that at least is large enough to grow into.


13. DVR: We hate watching live TV now. We love our favorite shows, but love to be able to watch them on our own time and fast forward through all the commercials.


14. The Temple: We have had the opportunity to start going a lot more often and are very grateful for that.


15. Dave Ramsey: We started his program in February of this year and I am now happy to say that we are completely out of debt as of today (besides our mortgage of course.)


16. Our Jobs: Even though I don't plan on keeping mine for too much longer, I am grateful for how things have worked out to allow me to still be at home with Kaitlyn.


17. Electricity


18. Sleep: Something I don't get enough of anymore.


19. Warm Weather


20. Cars


21. Cell Phones


22. Baby Monitors


23. Vacations: Mostly cruises. We LOVE them. We actually wish we were on that cruise that got stranded so that we would have received a full refund, plus a free cruise voucher!


24. Good Books


25. Coupons: We definitely couldn't live on our grocery budget of $140 without them!


26. Cats


27. 8:00: That is Kaitlyn's bedtime. Yes, yes we love spending time with her, but we don't get upset when 8:00 rolls around :)