Silly hormones

Am I the only one who loves the lullaby in the movie Dumbo?

Tonight my pregnancy hormones surfaced blubberingly while we watched the "Baby Mine" scene in Dumbo. The music started and I felt my face explode in tears. I looked over at Matt whilst simultaneously laughing and weeping. A moment he'll likely remind me of in years to come. :)

What funny moments (funny now that is) do you have from your exuberant baby hormones?

p.s. For those of you who enjoy the pregnancy details (it's probably obvious that I'm one of those women, eh?) I lost the mucus plug tonight and am having menstrual-type cramps ever 12-15 minutes or so. Those are contractions, right?

Still pregnant

I'm hacking and sniffling and I don't feel like blogging but I feel obliged to update you all on the pregnancy. I acquired a head cold a few days ago and it really hit me hard last night. It's the hurts-to-cough-sniffling-chills type of cold (isn't that a nyquil commercial?). Yucky! Boy am I thankful to have a college prof. for a hubby that has long winter breaks. He watched Chloe so I could take a few catnaps today. And tonight I'm very excited about taking some codein to be knocked into dreamworld. Any one else suffering from winter colds?

Finally had my membranes stripped today - YAY! I'm dilated to 2.75 cm, 25-50% effaced, and the baby's head is engaged and down. Let's hope things start happening soon!

I was enraptured to hear that I was dilated last week at my appointment. But now I'm seeing that ladies can be dilated for awhile before labor starts. How long were you dilated before labor began?

Joy to the World!

Tonight we drank hot cocoa and sang Christmas carols. Enjoy Chloe's stirring rendition of "Joy to the World". Sorry the video's so dark; we were singing by the light of the tree for some Christmas ambiance. Merry Christmas from our family to yours!


Photo Sharing - Video Sharing - Photo Printing - Photo Books

Appointment update

Well, unfortunately I wasn't able to experience the whole membrane-stripping ordeal at my midwife appointment this afternoon. Even though she assured me at my last appointment that she would, today she was hesitant. She'd like to see what my body will naturally during this next week and then use the membrane-stripping technique if things aren't moving and grooving by then. Wah!

I was disappointed because I had really built up today in my mind and was getting mentally psyched for baby #2 to arrive very soon.

BUT the great news is that my body is indeed starting to progress towards labor. Unbeknowedst (is that a word?) to me, I'm dilated to 2 cm already! I know that many women can be dilated for weeks so I probably shouldn't get excited. But after being induced with Chloe and needing drugs just to get me to 1.5 cm dilation, I was pleasantly surprised to hear that my cervix was dilating on its own. And I'm 25% effaced and the baby has dropped and his noggin' is engaged firmly in my pelvis AND I'm measuring smaller than I was two weeks ago. Yeehaw! My midwife is fairly certain this baby isn't as monstrous as previously predicted. Double yeehaw!

Many thanks to all of you who posted your membrane-stripping anecdotes. My prayer is that baby #2 will still arrive this week while my family is in town. It would be sooooooo very convenient and less complicated regarding Chloe-care if that happened. We'll keep you posted!

Oh yeah, and Merry Christmas. :)

Free 8 x 10 from Walgreens TODAY ONLY

Here's a Merry Christmas gift from me to you. :) Hope you all can take advantage of this great freebie!

The element of surprise

Last night as Matt and I attempted to watch The Fountain (turned it off because we couldn't get into it) I wrapped up most of our remaining Christmas gifts. As I sat there wrapping gifts for myself from Matt I realized that we've totally lost the element of surprise in giving each other gifts.

Matt could care less about the surprise factor when opening or giving a gift. I, on the other hand, enjoy that surprise-wow-aha moment very much in gift giving and receiving. I find it a fun and unique challenge to search out the perfect gift for each person. Of course, we're limited by budget so that presents boundaries to my gifting. It's kind of like a complex math problem with several variables involved (that analogy was for you Kelly) and I get to solve the problem for each loved one. Doesn't that sound like fun?

I've succeeded in keeping most of my gifts a secret from Matt though he "accidentally" found a few cds I got him (by the way, any of you use a cd swapping/exchange store? I got rid of 9 of our cds yesterday that we no longer listen to and in exchange got 3-4 new or used cds for our collection! What a financially frugal way to switch up our music!). Matt however straight-up asked me for a list of specific gift ideas. I guess after 6 Christmases together he's tired of trying to guess what I'd like. Not that I'm complaining; it will be awesome to actually get what I want and need this year. (I'm pumped because I'm finally getting a new nut chopper - talk about romance!)

How about your family? Is surprise a big deal to your clan during Christmas time?

Tomorrow is a big day

Tomorrow is a big day for several reasons.

1) Tomorrow morning my mom and grandma fly in for our Christmas visit. Yay!
2) Tomorrow afternoon at my 37 week appointment my midwife will attempt to strip my membranes to get labor started early. Let's hope it works!

I've also been taking my evening primrose oil capsules (3-4 a day - thanks to tip from Rachel I got a bottle online for under $5!) and drinking my red raspberry leaf tea. I've done a tiny bit of research online about this stripping the membranes thing and I'm getting a bit nervous now. Sounds like it could be painful. Have any of you had this done at the end of your pregnancy?

Toddler animal classification

Chloe has a nature book she enjoys looking at with me and it's been interesting lately to see her limited view of animal classification. To Chloe every animal falls into two categories: animals that will bite you and animals that won't bite you. Not sure where she got that from; my only inkling is from a line in The Cat in the Hat ("these things will not bite, they have come here to play").

Most animals are in the won't-bite-you category according to Chloe. I have taught her though that jellyfish and sharks shouldn't be trifled with. Good thing too, we run across those animals all the time.

Ah, the wonderful workings of the toddler mind. Chloe likes most animals so I can't say she has a favorite. What animals do your kiddos enjoy?

You guys are NOT going to believe this!!!!

Here's a good reason to enter freebie blog contests - you just might win!

I subscribe to goodyblog. It's a fun blog created by the editors of parents magazine with posts on a wide variety of topics. Anything from parenting headlines and trends to unique products and craft ideas can be found on goodyblog.

For the month of December, goodyblog held several free giveaway contests. And due to my love for all-things-free you better believe I took the time to sign up for each one. :) It was easy, just read the giveaway post and then post a comment to enter.

And guess what?!?! I won the gigantic holiday gift guide prize! I did, seriously!!! I just about cried when I received the email today confirming my winnings. I won 32 unique gifts featured in the parents magazine holiday gift guide in their December issue. It's worth over $750 all together. Can you believe this?!?! Here's a link to the blog so you can all see the neato things I won. You'll have to scroll down a bit (it's the 8th one down with the Christmas tree photo) and then click the link to see my winnings.

I'm overwhelmed and dizzied with God's lavishness to me. All these things I won were grown-up non-Chloe type things so it's obvious that God is giving this prize specifically to me (though I hope to share several of the prizes with loved ones as gifts). Wow. I'm speechless and stunned and agog.

Anyone know who I can give the hanukkah activity menorrah to?

Napping battles

For months as I've made mommy friends we dish about our toddlers and their toddler-issues, and inevitably the topic of naptime has come up. I usually politely nod my head as the other mommy complains about how early her toddler "gave up" naps. On the inside I'm thinking, "Right, your toddler gave up naps. Who's in control here? That will NEVER happen to us. Chloe's such a good sleeper and I'm strong enough as a mom to put my foot down and make her take a nap."

Yet another case of my huge and inexperienced mommy-pride. You'd think I'd have learned by now that I do not have all the mommy answers and that just because we're not in a particular developmental/behavioral stage yet doesn't mean we won't be soon. In fact, usually each dreaded stage is right around the corner.

As I type this blog post, Chloe has been crying for 30 minutes in naptime protest. She's gotten a spanking and a talking-to and now I'm letting her cry it out. Now that she's so verbal she tries everything she can think of to get me up to her room. For example, this afternoon she screamed at various times "I poopy, mommy", "I hit my head", "My nose has boogies", "I wake up", "I need help". The poopy one got me up there today but she was bluffing.

I seem to have won the battle today. Chloe cried for almost 40 minutes but she did finally give up and fall asleep (albeit vvvvvvvery late).

Got any tips for a mom who needs naptime advice? What do you do with your naptime protesters? I'm extremely curious and anxious to hear your responses on this one. My mommy pride walls have broken down in the last few weeks and I'm more than ready to admit I need help!

Preparing for baby and freebies from God

Nope, we did not birth the extremely tiny-headed baby pictured at left. That's Chloe's baby Pinocchio that she's singing a lullaby to in our bassinet. Boy was Chloe pumped to see all the baby equipment come out! She promptly put all her animals and baby dolls into the various places and went to work at playing mommy. :) I taught her how to cradle a baby too so now when she walks around with an animal she holds him gently in the crook of her arm. Let's hope she's as sweet and motherly with our real baby!

Things are slowly coming into place to welcome baby #2. The crib, swing, bassinet, dresser, and changing table are all moved and ready. Now that we've moved so much baby furniture from Chloe's room, it's looking mighty bare! I'm hoping to make Chloe's room more of a play room for her but we don't have many big toys to take up the space.

UNTIL Sunday that is. Driving home from church we passed a pile of big plastic toys on the curb waiting for trash pickup. Now, I'm not usually a dumpster diver but I try to keep my eyes peeled for re-usable things if they sit curbside. One man's trash is another man's treasure as the saying goes! We snagged this awesome desk for Chloe (it was quite funny to watch Matt squish it into our pint-sized Jetta). Matt cleaned it all up and it looks as good as new. God is so good!

God also provided some free stuff for baby #2 last night. A good pal of mine is done having kiddos and she had FIVE bins of baby boy clothes for me to go through! Not all of it will work with the seasons and such but we came away with lots of stuff that will take us through to at least 18 mos. Looking through all the baby sleepers and cozy velour outfits last night is making me excited to have a new baby to cuddle. A huge THANK YOU to the Macks for being so generous to us!

Though I certainly didn't need a new maternity top, God provided one for me for FREE while shopping with a friend. She was purchasing a dress and I noticed a coupon for $10 off in the circular lying on the counter. I snatched it up and got a free shirt out of the deal! It's super cute and trendy. I'd post a photo but I'm afraid it might scare you to gaze upon the hugeness of my 36 week belly. :)

It's encouraging for me to reflect on all that God's done in getting us ready for baby #2's arrival. Now that I'm nearing the end of the pregnancy, my energy level dips lower and lower each day so I don't feel like I'm getting much done. I call it "reverse nesting".

I've done absolutely NO pregnancy/baby reading this time around. Any good books you recommend I skim before the time comes? Also, any last-minute preparation tips for a tired preggo?

Favorite Christmas Carol poll

During the day I play Christmas music to keep Chloe and I singing and bouncing around (not that I'm doing much bouncing these days). It's so fun to teach her the Christmas carols and to watch her playing with her nativity set. Today she lost the lamb and she was going around the first floor calling out, "Lamby?! Lamby where are you?" Then she took Mary and proceeded to speak for the virgin by saying, "Lamby! Where are you? I miss you!" I didn't know the lamb was that important to Mary . . . .

I digress. I'm wondering what your favorite Christmas carol, hymn, or song is. And why is it your favorite during this wondrous season?

My fave would have to be "O Holy Night". I especially like the version sung by the lovable crooner, Harry Connick Jr. It's such a gorgeous musical arrangement and the words are so powerful and truth-packed. The song's dramatic musicality emphasizes the immense importance of God's incarnation in His saving-Son Jesus on Christmas Day.

Now it's your turn to answer . . .

A pregnancy first

You know your internal organs are getting squished and twisted when you have to go to the bathroom twice in one visit.

Last night I rushed upstairs (yes, our only bathroom is upstairs - ugh) to relieve my cramped bladder. As I finished washing my hands and prepared to leave the bathroom the urge struck me again!

My poor organs.

p.s. THANK YOU for all the wise labor-inducing advice! Not sure if I'll try all of the suggested methods (I about fainted when I saw the price of evening primrose oil capsules) but I'll keep you posted. Discreetly posted that is, wink-wink.

Pregnancy update: 35 weeks

My overwhelming feeling at 35 weeks is anticipation and longing for this baby to arrive early. I'm sure every mother feels that way during the last weeks of pregnancy, but I more so since I'm still measuring bigger than Santa's huge pack of toys (like the Christmas metaphor?). I'm measuring as though I'm 39 weeks now so it's no wonder I feel like I want to be done with all things pregnancy!

During my most recent appointment, my midwife gave me all the possibilities for labor. As it's looking definite that I won't be able to deliver baby #2 if I carry him to term, these are the scenarios:
1. I go into labor naturally 1-3 weeks before my due date and the baby will be small enough for me to deliver vaginally.
2. If my body is showing signs of readiness, they can try to induce me but not until 39 weeks. At which point the baby would probably be too big (if their estimates are correct) and I'd most likely end up with another c-section.
3. We can schedule an elective c-section at 39 weeks. (We'll also have another ultrasound at 38 weeks for a weight estimate.)

So at least I'm guaranteed that something will happen during week 39! :)

We're praying for scenario number 1 but we know that God is in control. All that matters is that we get a healthy bouncing baby boy out of this experience!

As for me, I'm pretty uncomfortable. Feeling a lot of pressure and forceful movement from our little guy. I get up often during the night and I've developed a 4 pillow system to keep me as cushy as possible. I'm convinced God will use these restless nights to prepare me for the newborn weeks to come!

My midwife gave me some herbal suggestions for getting the hormones moving and grooving. Do any of you have any tips or stories of what works to get labor going?

It DOES really exist (and other news)

Kudos to Jen S. for validating my claim on St. Nick's Eve as a real holiday. (No, Carissa, I didn't make it up!) One of my blog subscriptions even mentioned St. Nick's today. Chloe really liked her Christmas puffy stickers and I'm pumped about her Elmo preschool activity book. Thanks for the goodies, mom! (I mean St. Nick, of course.)

In other news, Chloe is doing great passy-free. She only cries a wee little bit before bedtime now and it's almost like she's totally forgotten about it. Yeehaw!

Potty-training seems to be progressing upwards slowly. Turns out the stickers aren't truly motivating her. In fact, she really likes sitting on the potty because I read to her and she gets my undivided attention. So lately when she sits she prolongs the process and doesn't do her business. I'm on to her now though! Yesterday I realized her bladder could NOT possibly hold it any longer and so I tried a new tactic. Our conversation went like this . . .

Me: Chloe, I'd like to go downstairs and make some Christmas cookies. Would you like to help me?
Chloe: (immediately jumping off the potty) I go downstairs please!
Me: Well, you can't come downstairs with me to make cookies until you go pee-pee in the potty. I don't want you to have an accident while we're downstairs.
Chloe: (hopping back up on the potty and tinkling in a matter of seconds) I go pee-pees, mommy.

What a stinker! She certainly knows what's going on and can't fool me anymore. Tonight she did something similar and went almost immediately when I motivated her the right way. Pray for me to be consistent and to separate reading books from potty time. When baby #2 comes along I certainly won't have the time (or the energy) to sit and read to Chloe on the potty.

St. Nick's?

Tonight I'll be sneaky and put little stocking stuffers into all our stockings to celebrate St. Nick's Eve. My hubby's never heard of it but I grew up always excited about waking up to goodies in my stocking on the morning of December 6th. Since I'm from Milwaukee, I'm assuming this holiday tradition has German roots.

How many of you celebrate St. Nick's Eve?

Binky break-up

Tonight we were forced to start the binky break-up process. After a long, disappointing and messy day of potty-training and then a naptime strike with Chloe (Chloe won), I was more than ready for something positive in my mommy world. Matt took Chloe away for some errands to give me some quiet recuperation time. He insisted we have fishsticks and mac-and-cheese for dinner so I'd have no supper prep stress. Then he gave her a bath and she was exhausted by about 7:40 this evening.

I was reading her a bedtime story when she dropped her beloved passy behind the bedrail. It must have been humorous to watch me in my huge pregnant state contorting myself to fish said passy out from behind the bed! I came up empty though and the passy fell irretrievably into a nook that is beyond both Matt and my reaches. So, the passy has been lost for good.

Thankfully we've started talking to Chloe about giving up her passy so she wasn't completely taken aback. But she wasn't happy either. Here was our conversation tonight . . . .

Chloe: Mommy, I want my passy please.
Me: It's lost Chloe, there's no more passy. You don't need it anymore because you're a big girl, remember?
Chloe: Mommy, I want another one passy please.
Me: But sweetheart, it's lost and we don't have any more passies.
Chloe: (after a pause) I not a big girl anymore.
Me: But you ARE a big girl, sweetie. You're so big that you don't need to use a passy to go night-night. Only babies need passies.
Chloe: (rubbing her eyes from exhaustion and having difficulty expressing herself) I . . . I want a birthday cake.
Me: Ok, I think it's time to pray together and go night-night. We'll pray that God helps you fall asleep without your passy.

After only 10 minutes of crying she's sleeping passy-free tonight! Yay! God is His providence kept her from napping so she'd be tired enough not to put up a big fight. Let's hope she deals well with this new transition. Matt was ready to run out to the drug store to buy another passy but I'm fine getting rid of it now. I've heard going cold-turkey and enduring the crying is the way to go. What do you all think?

Snowpants!

Today we woke up to a couple meager inches of snow. It wasn't much but definitely enough to do some romping and playing in.

I happily got out Chloe's winter snowpants and decked her out for the cold. She's such a big girl; this year she's graduated to the overall type of snowpants! She LOVED them. The feel, the noise, everything. Check out her happy smiles below! Who needs snow when you've got rockin' snowpants?!?

Outside we made a teensy-weensy snowman, romped through the backyard making footprints, and formed some snowballs. Chloe doesn't get the whole throw-the-snowball idea yet. She just wanted to hold hers and carry it around. :)

After only 20 minutes I got cold and forced Chloe inside. She kept saying, "I not cold. I not cold, mommy!" Oh well, there will be other snowy play days where her and daddy can brave the weather for longer periods of time.



What are your favorite snow-playing activities?

December already?!?

Am I the only one in shock that today is December 1st?!? I'm still wondering where October went, much less November.

Our Christmas decor is up, most of our cards are mailed and I'm plodding forward on some homemade Christmas gifts. I'm a slow worker on sewing gifts and my project-time has been diminished as of late as my energy and Chloe's seem to be inversely proportional. It doesn't help that I'm constantly making mistakes like sewing snaps on wrong or mis-measuring fabric.

This year Chloe is extremely cognizant of what's going on and so we're hoping to institute some family Christmas traditions. We've already started moving the Mendez-family traditional teddy bear on the Christmas calendar but that's it so far. I'd like to do an advent devotional every night after supper instead of our regular Bible reading/prayer time. Any suggestions?

Tonight I also plan to give Chloe her own little nativity set to play with. She actually found it herself at a dollar store last month. I was looking down the aisle at gift wrap and Chloe discovered an open nativity set which she proceeded to set up and play with there on dollar store floor.

I naively thought I'd have time to make our own advent calendar to use during our devotional time but that never happened. Oh well! Is it just me or is it difficult to even find advent calendars to buy in stores these days? I've only looked two places but was disappointed not to see any advent calendars displayed. Now that I'm starting to look online, I'm astonished at how many advent calendars have nothing to do with Jesus' birth.

What family Christmas traditions do you practice?

Some silly analogies

I know this is more of an email forward type thing than a blog post, but I thought you all might like a giggle on this cold afternoon. I'm in a silly and overtired mood so these made me laugh riotously! Enjoy; post and let me know which one struck your funny bone. Or if you think they're all lame, let me know that too. Remember, I warned you I was in a weird mood. :)

Every year, English teachers from across the USA can submit their collections of actual analogies and metaphors found in high school essays. These excerpts are published each year to the amusement of teachers across the country. Here are last year's winners. . .

1. Her face was a perfect oval, like a circle that had its two sides gently compressed by a Thigh Master.
2. His thoughts tumbled in his head, making and breaking alliances like underpants in a dryer without Cling Free.
3. He spoke with the wisdom that can only come from experience, like a guy who went blind because he looked at a solar eclipse without one of those boxes with a pinhole in it and now goes around the country speaking at high schools about the dangers of looking at a solar eclipse without one of those boxes with a pinhole in it.
4. She grew on him like she was a colony of E. coli, and he was room-temperature Canadian beef.
5. She had a deep, throaty, genuine laugh, like that sound a dog makes just before it throws up.
6. Her vocabulary was as bad as, like, whatever.
7. He was as tall as a six-foot, three-inch tree.
8. The revelation that his marriage of 30 years had disintegrated because of his wife's infidelity came as a rude shock, like a surcharge at a formerly surcharge-free ATM machine.
9. The little boat gently drifted across the pond exactly the way a bowling ball wouldn't.
10. McBride fell 12 stories, hitting the pavement like a Hefty bag filled with vegetable soup.
11. From the attic came an unearthly howl. The whole scene had an eerie, surreal quality, like when you're on vacation in another city and Jeopardy comes on at 7:00 p.m .... instead of 7:30.
12. Her hair glistened in the rain like a nose hair after a sneeze.
13. The hailstones leaped from the pavement, just like maggots when you fry them in hot grease.
14. Long separated by cruel fate, the star-crossed lovers raced across the grassy field toward each other like two freight trains, one having left Cleveland at 6:36 p.m. traveling at 55 mph, the other from Topeka at 4:19 p.m. at a speed of 35 mph.
15. They lived in a typical suburban neighborhood with picket fences that resembled Nancy Kerrigan's teeth.
16. John and Mary had never met. They were like two hummingbirds who had also never met.
17. He fell for her like his heart was a mob informant, and she was the East River.
18. Even in his last years, Granddad had a mind like a steel trap, only one that had been left out so long, it had rusted shut.
19. Shots rang out, as shots will do.
20. The plan was simple, like my brother-in-law Phil. But unlike Phil, this plan just might work.
21. The young fighter had a hungry look, the kind you get from not eating for a while.
22. He was as lame as a duck. Not the metaphorical lame duck, either, but a real duck that was actually lame, maybe from stepping on a landmine or something.
23. The ballerina rose gracefully en Pointe and extended one slender leg behind her, like a dog at a fire hydrant.
24. It was an American tradition, like fathers chasing kids around with power tools.
25. He was deeply in love. When she spoke, he thought he heard bells, as if she were a garbage truck backing up.

It sure feels good to wake up early!

Last night I got my exhausted body to bed by 9:30 p.m. Seems like during these big old third trimester days I run on adrenaline until about 3 and then I do some serious crashing. I usually take a nap while Chloe sleeps and that's enough to get me through the evening.

Yesterday though I had a ridiculous amount of computer work to do for my online job so I knew it was no napping for me. Wahh! By the time Matt arrived home in the afternoon, I looked like a zombie and was on the verge of tears; all signs of imminent mommy break-down. He stepped up to the daddy plate and took care of Chloe so I could make a quick supper, take a bubble bath, and hit the hay early. What a dear hubby!

My early bedtime caused me to rise with the sun this morning and it sure feels good! I could get used to this! Thus far this morning I've boiled some eggs for egg salad, mixed up dough for 2 batches of Rachel's phenomenal cinnamon rolls, made the coffee and I'm currently doing yet more online work. Of course I haven't showered yet for fear of waking up Chloe but I can do that quickly when Matt wakes up.

All this early waking jazz leads me to ask you all a question. I'm slightly afraid to ask it because I'm sure your responses will make me feel rather guilty for my usual leisurely waking-up time of 8 o'clock (or later some days!). But I am a giant pregnant woman who needs my rest and I know that baby #2 will drastically change our morning routines.

What time do you regularly wake up? What's your morning routine like?

Bitten by the Christmas bug

When we woke up Friday morning to a light dusting of snow (boy, was Chloe excited!) the Christmas bug bit me! We put up our wee artificial tree (someday I'll insist on a real one but for now this is saving us lots of money) and Chloe helped me decorate it. It's always a treat to see our memories come out of the ornament box. Last year Chloe learned what most of the ornaments were and she was able to point them out to me. Now that she's nearly 2 1/3 she's having a ball finding the ornaments on the tree and forever asking me, "What dat?" (don't you love her home-girl slang?)

Saturday I dragged my hubby along with Chloe and I (he's a scrooge about most things Christmas) to Akron's holiday tree festival. The festival consists of 200 trees all decorated differently to benefit the children's hospital. Businesses or families donate the decorated artificial trees and then people shell out money to buy them. Chloe's fave was the pinocchio tree; I liked the children's book tree and Matt favored the white-lighted palm trees. :) A brass band was playing Christmas music as we strolled through the tree wonderland and we even spotted Santa and Mrs. Claus.

Though it was a chilly windy day we took our lunch sacks outside and walked two blocks to see Akron's Christmas parade. It was incredibly cold but we braved it for an hour and saw bands, big floaty balloons, lots of doggies, and Chloe even garnered a few pieces of candy. After it was all done and we were back in our snuggly warm car I asked Chloe what she saw at the parade. Her immediate response was, "Candy!" What a sweet monger.

I've got about 1/2 of my Christmas cards done though all are addressed (picked up some cheap printer labels last year that's saved me tons of time). I've inventoried my Christmas gift stash and made a list of what's left to buy. I think my nesting instinct is being swallowed up by my Christmas instinct. :) More likely is that I'm getting nervous that baby #2 will arrive any minute and God forbid that my Christmas cards wouldn't get mailed on time. That's the weird rationale of a pregnant mind for you . . .

What Christmas preparations have you made thus far? What special Christmas activities are you planning?

A fabulous and memorable Thanksgiving

This year we were blessed to have my family here for Thanksgiving. In the past my mom and grandma always come in November but the timing never worked out to celebrate the actual turkey day together. This year it did. And we had an added bonus to our eating and visiting festivities - my sister came! Yay! She and Chloe got along great (thanks to lots of airplane rides and silliness).

Mostly we visited, shopped, and ate delectable foods. My mom, grandma, and sis did a great job helping out around the house and kitchen so I didn't have to do much work. We also played loads of games including scrabble (of course!), apples to apples, scattergories, and cribbage. And of course we sat around and enjoyed Chloe in all her glory. And Chloe loved being the center of attention. What a silly head.

Other highlights of the visit included a date night for me and Matt, hanging out with my sister and chatting, getting some adorable hand-made gifts from my sis and grandma, having my sis trim my hair, watching and singing to newsies, raking in some amazing deals at 50 cent Monday, eating some special treats that we don't normally get (thanks, ma!), laughing over scattergories, making homemade ice cream with our ice cream ball, and watching Chloe love on her grandma and nana.

What special family memories did you create this turkey day?

The promised pumpkin recipes

More than a week ago I posted on my love of pumpkins and implored you, my fellow bloggers, to email me your fave pumpkin recipes.

I finally posted them today! I used googlepages so the format is a bit different than blogger. Click here to see the varied assortment of tasty recipes that came in. My sister even contributed some New Zealand-esque pumpkin recipes including the delectable Thai Pumpkin Soup.

Just because we're enjoying Thanksgiving leftoevers doesn't mean it's too late to cook up some yummy pumpkin! (If you have a favorite pumpkin recipe that you'd still like to contribute, email it to me at aliciamhorn@gmail.com)

Back to life as usual

I've been a rather delinquent blogger as of late because we've been blessed by lots of family coming to visit us! It's such a joy to have extended family members in our home. Since we don't have any family in the immediate vicinity, these special visits are precious times to me.

Last Monday through Wednesday, Matt's brother Ben and family drove out for a quick visit. It had been several months since we'd seen each other and we had a ball playing games, shopping, and chatting. Chloe and her cousin Grace are only 5 months apart in age and they interact more and more now. They actually played together instead of parallel this time! And Grace is finally catching up to Chloe in height. Who knows if she'll ever catch up to her in the weight and head size category . . . .

As always, I'm stunned by how much my nieces and nephew have grown through the year. Ahna is 9 and Zach 12. Ahna is sweetness personified. I can't help hugging on her and smiling as I watch her bound around with joyful energy. And though Zach is on the brink of teen-dom, he still has that mischievous boyish Horn twinkle in his eye. He's a hard-working kid and very fun to be around.

The days flew by too quickly for my liking but I certainly think we enjoyed each moment together to its fullest.

Thanks again for making the trip out to see us, Ben & Diane! You're welcome again any time (except for December - January when I'll be birthing a baby).

The strange workings of a 2 year old mind

Most of the time I'm fairly good at interpreting what Chloe says and means. We hang out so much together that I understand what experience or memory she's referring to when others don't.

Lately though, she's been stumping me with her strange and creative retorts. Here are a few memorable exchanges we've had recently . . .

(Setting: Potty time and I've been patiently reading books to Chloe and waiting for something magical to happen.)
Me: Chloe, are you making pee-pees or poo-poos?
Chloe: I making blue ton-tons!
Me: Blue ton-tons?!? (holding back laughter and frustration) What are blue ton-tons?
Chloe: I making red ton-tons! (She proceeds to tell me all the other color ton-tons she'll be making. Don't worry, no ton-tons were actually created.)

(Setting: Playing with her kitchen and her brand new plastic veggies.)
Me: Chloe, what are you doing?
Chloe: (while dipping a cucumber in a cup) Painting! I paint walls.

(Setting: During a family visit this week we read and prayed together after supper. Silence ensues as Matt leads in prayer.)
Matt: Dear Lord, thank you for our family and . . .
Chloe: (Loudly) Mommy, I making poo-poos in my undies!

(Setting: Living room. Chloe is playing with her dress-up hats and her library story-time nametag. She takes the nametag and sets it on the stairs.)
Me: Chloe, what are you doing?
Chloe: My nametag is dirty.
Me: So why are you putting it on the stairs?
Chloe: So it no get dirty.
Me: (Knowingly) Oh, I see.

(Setting: Chloe's room while she tinkers in her kitchen.)
Me: Chloe what are you making?
Chloe: Soup.
Me: What kind of soup?
Chloe: Soup with (long and drawn out) honey in it.

Those don't sound as comical now that I've typed them out. But she got me laughing and wondering about her brain functions. What random weird funny things do your kiddos surprise you with?

Pumpkin love

I know at least one of you out there is a pumpkin-loving fanatic just like I am. Should we start a club? :) There's something soothing and homey about cooking pumpkins that resonates with me come fall. And it helps that are bazillions of yummy baking recipes to pull out in pumpkin season. The aromas of freshly baked pumpkin bread just can not be duplicated by a fall yankee candle. And did I mention that pumpkin is rich in vitamin A and fiber?

Thus far I've roasted 3 pumpkins and have a good sized container of pumpkin mash in my freezer. I picked up 2 more little guys cheap to roast up in the coming weeks. Good thing too, we're going through our pumpkin mash fast! In the last few weeks I made two pumpkin bread loaves, a large batch of pumpkin pancakes, and pumpkin oatmeal.

A fun bonus about cooking up pumpkins is that I can get Chloe involved. We both don our aprons and she stands on a chair to help me scrape out the pumpkin guts. Pumpkin roasting is so incredibly easy that the preparation is short enough to keep even my busy toddler's attention for a few minutes time. Plus Chloe's in that loves-to-help-mommy-with-everything phase (let's hope this lasts into adulthood) so she gets overly excited about anything she's allowed to assist with. I caught her stealing my pumpkins so she could pretend to cook and eat them - what a character.

Anyways, that brings me to my question for you. What are your favorite pumpkin recipes? Email them to me at aliciamhorn@gmail.com and I'll post them all here by next week.

If you're curious about pumpkin roasting but never tried it, here's an illustrated how-to link to get you started. It's so incredibly easy you'll wonder why most Americans don't roast pumpkins instead of tossing them come November 1. (Aarrrgh - that is a huge pet peeve of mine! Can you imagine how many delicious pumpkins get thrown away because people only use them as decor instead of food?!? We are a decadent society. Think I'll start a pumpkin-snatching group to rescue pumpkins from trash cans. Anyone with me?)

Pregnancy update: 31 weeks

Nine weeks left and counting until we meet our baby boy! We had a friend take our family photo together at church this morning since we all looked so dapper . . . wow, guess I needed a prego camisole to cover up my belly in this dress next time. Hopefully that belly-button exposure was only seen by the flash of the camera and not the congregation. :)

Can you tell I suffer from distracted pregnancy brain?

Literally, the big news is that I'm BIG. My appointment this past Friday showed that I'm no longer measuring 3 weeks ahead; now I'm measuring 4 weeks ahead! The doc wants to see what's going on with this baby so I get to have two more ultrasounds in the next 4 weeks. My weight has actually gone done since my last appointment so it's not as though I'm just packing on extra prego pounds. I either have a huge boy growing inside me or he's positioned weirdly. In any event, I'm super excited about getting to have some more ultrasounds done! The bonus is that my mom, grandma, and sister are coming to visit during Thanksgiving week and they'll be able to come along for the ultrasound too!

I've stopped swimming laps now since my muscles below are feeling much pressure and easily strained. I am striving to do 20 minutes on our stationary bike 1-2 times a week but that's about all I can handle. I read while I bike (Pilgrim's Regress is what I'm poring over lately - awesome read!) and it gets distracting to keep on hitting my tummy with my knees.

Boy, I'm ready for this second pregnancy to be over and done with. I've had some sweet bonding moments with Chloe lately and I know I'll miss those precious one-on-one times with my little buddy. But I'll be glad when this physical discomfort is gone and I can get up from the floor like a normal person.

We'll keep you posted as the weeks go by!

I've been tagged!

Kelly Glupker recently posted about her favorite dinner recipes and the benefits of using a weekly menu to plan and stay on budget. She tagged me to also post my fave recipes for the supper table. I'd post my menu for this week too but it's a bit wacky since we'll have family in town visiting. Here are a few of our easy family favorites.

Tortilla Sausage Rolls
1 lb pork sausage
16 oz cottage cheese
1/4 cup chopped onions
2 Tbsp flour
1/4 cup chopped black olives
16 oz jar tomato or spaghetti sauce
12 flour tortillas
1 cup shredded mozarella cheese

Saute sausage slowly until brown, drain off fat. Place sausage in a large bowl. Add cottage cheese, onions, olives, flour and 1/2 cup sauce; stir until blended. Preheat oven to 375.
Spoon meat mixture onto tortillas, using 1/3 cup for each. Roll up each tortilla (jelly-roll style) and place seam-side down in a greased 13 x 9 baking dish. Spoon remaining sauce over tortillas. Bake 15 minutes. Sprinkle with cheese. Bake 10 more minutes.


Cheesy Ham Casserole
1/2 cup salad dressing or mayo
2 cups fresh broccoli flowerets
1 1/2 cup shredded cheddar cheese
1 1/2 cup chopped ham (or spam!)
1/4 cup milk
1 1/2 cup corkscrew noodles, cooked and drained
1/2 cup chopped red or green pepper (optional)
1/3 cup seasoned croutons

Mix all ingredients except 1/2 cup cheese and croutons. Spoon into 1 1/2 or 2 qt. casserole dish. Sprinkle with remaining cheese and croutons. Bake at 350 for 30 minutes.

This is a great cheap favorite of mine. It also works well to be made ahead of time and refrigerated until supper time. It's very kid-friendly though we usually leave out the peppers since Chloe picks them out.


And now I tag the following five gals to post their favorite meal recipes: Rachel, Carrie, Karen, Abby and Tracy. Tag, you're it!

Peppermint white chocolate mocha decaf bliss

This feels very strange but I'm sitting here in panera blogging on my laptop. What a high tech-mommy I am. :)

After a vvvvvvvvvvvery difficult morning of potty training with Chloe, Matt made me take a nap and then kicked me out for the evening to enjoy some much-needed alone time. What a great guy I snagged. So I headed out wondering what to nosh on for dinner. After various stops, I splurged at starbucks on a peppermint white chocolate mocha (don't worry - I decafed it). We seriously NEVER go to starbucks. Just not a toddler-friendly place and truthfully, I think they're way overpriced and I much prefer panera's coffee to the strong as oil starbucks brand java. Though I do very much appreciate the fact that starbucks is a fair and well-paying employer (or so I've heard).

But Matt told me to splurge on something special so I did. Yowza, what delight hit my tastebuds when I sipped the perfectly pepperminty chocolatey drink! Yum! Definitely worth $3.50 (even though that same money would buy a gallon of milk).

What special treat do you enjoy during a splurging moment?

Chloe the ragamuffin

I'm officially renaming the 2-3 year old age as the ragamuffin phase. Seems like every morning after I get her dressed she quickly regresses to messy scraggly mode.

That's why this morning I seized the photo opportunity before we left for our library story-time outing. I knew afterwards her nicely done up pony-tail and perfectly clean sweater shirt would be in disarray by lunch time.

We're definitely making baths an every other day thing instead of every 2-3 day thing because all manners of mysterious globs get tangled in her hair. It doesn't help that Matt let her take her lollipop into the bath with her last night. What a pushover!

Any help for this phase, moms? Or do we just grin and bear it and wash her grubby self with wipes continually?

Freezing questions

(I can hear you cheering out there; finally a post that is NOT about potty-training! I just have to tell you this though - Chloe went a record 3 times on the potty yesterday and had no accidents. Hopefully she's made a breakthrough.)

We have two sets of family coming to visit us starting in a week and a half. I'm so overwhelmingly excited! But I also know how much planning and cleaning I have to do in preparation for said visits. Plus we have some reorganizing of rooms and winter house preparations to do before then. Needless to say, my mind is constantly racing and creating to-do lists.

To make the visits less hectic but still special meal-wise, I'd love to cook up loads of food and freeze it ahead of time. And next month I hope to freeze some additional meals for when the baby arrives. I've done a wee bit of freezing in the past (mostly veggies, fruits, and a lasagna or two) but I need your advice. Help me out you experienced chefs you by answering the following freezing questions:

1. What's your most successful or stand-by frozen meal for company?
   
2. Have any good cookie recipes that freeze well?
3. Have you ever frozen any breakfast items? Or do you have a good breakfast recipe that you can prepare the night before?

Thanks in advance for your input!

Four little words

I feel like lately my life and mind have been consumed with potty-training thoughts. I'm potty-trained out! Thankfully the Lord gives us Thursdays and Sundays as weekly reprieves from the process.

The fabulous news is that Chloe now enjoys sitting on the potty and will willingly do so throughout the day. She has had some recent successes and she gets so cute and excited when she actually goes pee-pee on the potty. (Forgive me if that's TMI for you! Pee-pee and poo-poo have become ingrained in our family's vocabulary lately. I even made up some songs to help Chloe with making pee-pees and poo-poos. Ok, that was definitely TMI. The funniest moment was when I overheard my scholarly husband using such potty lingo and trying to sing my homemade songs. I wish I would have gotten that on tape!)


The frustrating news is that her strong-as-steel bladder only relieves itself 2-3 times a day so we do a lot more potty-sitting than potty-going. Yesterday I gave her more playing freedom and she'd sit on the potty every 40 minutes or so. When it got close to nap time I shortened the intervals because I knew her bladder was ready. By the time she succeeded in going potty (around 2:30), she had sat on the potty TEN TIMES already. I was thoroughly pooped! (pun not intended)

When I reached my patience limit and was near tears, Chloe leaned over, put her head on mine and said sweetly, "I love you mommy!" That was just what I needed to hear at that moment. Thank you, God for sweet moments of refreshment!

Today at Bible study I was reminded of God's purpose in all things - even in something as silly as potty-training.

Therefore, since we have been justified through faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have gained access by faith into this grace in which we now stand. And we rejoice in the hope of the glory of God. Not only so, but we also rejoice in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope. And hope does not disappoint us, because God has poured out his love into our hearts by the Holy Spirit, whom he has given us. [Romans 5:1-5]

Trick-or-treating outing #2

Trick-or-treating in our city was Saturday evening. And it was a wet drizzly cold evening! Lots of Halloween ambiance. :)

Chloe didn't seem to mind the weather since she was purely motivated by her love of candy.

Not many kiddos braved the weather so our neighbors were incredibly generous with their candy-doling-out. So now we have oodles of candy to share! Anyone want a dum-dum?

Chloe's costume this year cost us all of $2. I snagged the outfit for a buck at a summer yard sale and then we spent another dollar on devil horns headband. I then sewed white and black felt over the evil red horns, removed them and put them on one of Chloe's fabric headbands. Her "milk" bucket was leftover from last Easter and I printed out the letters from the computer and taped them on.

What did your kids dress up as this year?

Life updates

Seems like my blog posts lately have been open-ended. Thanks to all of you for all your comments on portrait studios, potty-training, and Halloween candy excess. Here are some updates on those life issues:

• The best update must come first; Chloe went pee-pee on the potty twice yesterday!!!!! She definitely has some inhibitions about going on the potty because late in the morning (after much juice and two accidents) a few drops came out while she was sitting on the potty. She cried and screamed and tried to get off. I just hugged her and sang to her and a whole 5 drops went in the potty! After that, she was excited to be able to wipe herself, flush, and wash her hands. She raced downstairs to tell daddy (thankfully he came home early yesterday so he was around for the big event) and then he treated us all to ice cream at Dairy Queen. We went sans diaper for her nap which made for a short nap, but I'm thinking this is the way to go for her so she doesn't train herself to go when she gets a nap-diaper. The second potty success came last night. Chloe and Matt went off to run some errands after dinner and she kept her undies dry despite having a diaper on over top! So, I knew she needed potty-time when they got home. I was bound and determined to have her go before bedtime. It took almost an hour of me reading and playing with her while she sat on the potty but she did her tinkling! And this time she didn't cry or try to escape. YES! Thank you Lord for a small step forward!
• Stupid Sears won't give me any money back on my portrait purchase. I'm never going back.
  
• We've kept Chloe's candy stash out of sight and it's like she's totally forgotten about it! We'll recycle some tonight for our neighborhood trick-or-treat time. My mom already has dibs on any chocolate we have left over. :) She, grandma, and my sister are coming for Thanksgiving so I'm supposed to save the "good candy" until then.
  
• Had a midwife appointment yesterday and I'm still measuring 3 weeks ahead/big. The crazy news is I gained 7 pounds in the last two weeks!?! How can that be right? I've not eaten too much differently these past weeks though I know I've had a few uncharacteristic fast-food meals. She suggested lower carbs, higher proteins, and lower sugar. My glucose level is low so I'm not at risk for GD. Just carrying a big ole baby boy!
  

Trick-or-treat outing #1

Tonight we braved the costumed-crowd for Chloe's first trick-or-treat outing of the season.

I know I'm biased, but she was seriously the cutest kid out there with the most adorable costume (a green bay packer player and cute little girl bumblebee tied for second in my mind). Out of hundreds of dressed-up kids she was the only cow we saw! There was an abundance of witches, pirates, grim reapers, star wars soldiers and hippies though.

Chloe caught on to the whole put-candy-in-my-bucket scene. After each store she'd say, "Another one store, please" in her mixed up toddler grammar way. We've decided we'll let her have 1-2 pieces of her candy a day. How do you handle the abundance of candy your kids rake in for Halloween?

Enjoy the moo-ving photos. Sorry, cow puns are utterly irresistible to me.

Phone survey

Since I'm tired of posting about all-things-potty-training, thought I'd probe your brains for some information about phone usage.

For several years we've tried to save money by not paying for long-distance access on our home phone. Instead we purchase the long-distance calling cards from Sam's Club and then keep recharging them when we run out of minutes. We currently use SBC as both our phone and internet provider.

That system seems to have saved us money in years past but now that phone and internet providers have literally exploded on the market, I think it's time to change up our system. Even without long-distance on our phone we still pay 15-20 bucks a month for the phone. Plus we recharge our phone card ($26 a pop) about every two months. My mom is a vonage user and her $15 a month goes a long way - including lots of free long-distance minutes. Any of you use vonage?

I should also add that we do not own cell phones (I know, we're rare birds in this day and age). We have a cheap trac phone that we use for emergencies but that's it.

What do you do for phone usage and about how much do you pay monthly (if you don't mind sharing)?