May is Doula Appreciation Month!

In my quest to avoid all of the interventions that I received during my labor and deliver with Gemma I have begun interviewing doulas.  I believe I have found my doula and I will be officially hiring her May 2!

To show our appreciation for doulas and the service they provide a fellow mommy has started a giveaway.  Please follow the link to her blog and show your appreciation for doulas!

Giveaway!

Life is crazy

I haven't updated in forever.  Really pregnancy has made me feel like a giant blimp and my family's opinions aren't helping!  My wonderful husband (we got married March 22!) is apparently nesting as he ripped out our entire kitchen and rendered the whole house pretty much useless for the last couple weeks.  That's finally starting to come back together but now he is planning further renovations throughout the house!  *sigh*

Work picked up for awhile as well.  I went from getting 1 day a week if I was lucky to getting 3 or 4 full days.  Between my main job and my real estate I got very behind on school.  On top of that Gemma's attitude has gotten out of control.  I think she is finally starting to understand that she really is getting a little sister and she really is going to have to share her room, her toys and her mother.  She is one VERY unhappy camper a lot of the time now. 

Exercise of course took a backseat during all of this.  At my 21 week appointment I was up somewhere around 15 pounds already.  I said enough is enough and started doing Wii Fit.  Anything's better than nothing right?  Now the running bug is really biting and telling me that my treadmill is lonely and the weather has been so nice most of these spring days that I am REALLY missing out.  So I broke down and ordered a Gabrialla support band and I plan to start run/walking again as soon as it comes in.  I'm also eyeing up the BOB jogging strollers for post-partum.  I only hope I can stick with all these big plans!

Between planning a natural birth, breast feeding, cloth diapering and staying fit (along with staying in school and working) I am feeling like I am doomed to fail at ONE of them.  Hopefully I won't but in the end a happy and healthy baby is all I really want.  Of course, a couple of the maternity running skirts, a bigger sports bra, and a half-size bigger pair of shoes wouldn't hurt!

Anyway, I will add some wedding photos and belly shots soon, I promise!  I should be able to add videos soon too, as we just bought the new Flip Ultra HD.  Let's hope I can figure it out and get some decent videos to put up here!

For now I will leave you with these:

My daughter and I planned to venture into the realm of dyeing our prefold and fitted diapers today.  We started with 9 colors of Dylon dye, a pair of rubber gloves, a stainless steel bowl, and paper towels.  I then planned out how many diapers, onesies and burp cloths I wanted to be each color.  I had more cloth than dye so some of it will be left for another time.  I first prepped the diapers as per the manufacturer's instructions and laid them out on the table.

These are the ones left for later:

I mixed the dye in 4 cups hot water in the stainless steel bowl and then filled the sink with bath-warm water.  I mixed in 4 TBSP of Mortons Salt and then mixed in the dye with a whisk.  I then added the wet cloth.  I added the cloth wet because it absorbs dye more evenly that way.  Below is Bahama Blue and Tulip Red.

I stirred each dye with the whisks continuously for 15 minutes.  After that I stirred them well once every 15 minutes for another 45 minutes.  Below is Flamingo Pink and Tropical Green.

For fun here is a picture of my daughter stirring the cloth.

After they were done soaking, I rinsed the cloth with cool water until the water ran almost clear.  Then I took them to the basement in the stainless steel bowl to avoid drips and began washing with Tide Free.

I washed each color in hot with several extra rinse cycles until no trace of dye remained in the rinse water.  Then I dried them completely in a hot drier.

Here is the completely dyed stash.  Newborn prefolds are on the left, small prefolds are in the middle and fitteds are on the right.

We added embellishments to a few of the prefolds and fitteds.  A few examples are below.

I also had some plain white covers that I decided to test in the dye.  The results ae below and I plan to try some more with the next batch of dyes.

These are the onesies that we dyed and embellished.

I hope you enjoyed!  It was a very time consuming process but not really hard or messy.  I am looking forward to finishing up the rest of our cloth soon!

Running Baby

I haven't posted in awhile because things have been so hectic.  I had my first ultrasound December 29th and we saw a beautiful heartbeat.  Everything looked perfect and I feel so much better knowing that everything seems okay for now.  I had my first real prenatal appointment January 11th and we tried to hear the heartbeat with a doppler but couldn't find it.  I really hope that baby is okay and was just moving around alot.  I go for another ultrasound on Friday so I'm praying everything is perfect again!  Here is my baby at 7 weeks, 3 days!

So far this baby, nicknamed Sunny, has run 38 miles with me this month.  We are about to head to the basement and up that number!  It's amazing that I have made it to the tail end of the first trimester feeling mostly normal.  I've had very minimal sickness, only thrown up once.  I feel tired alot but being active and eating right really helps.  It almost feels too good to be true!

My wonderful daughter decided to eat a hair barette over the weekend.  It was shaped like a butterfly and lodged in her throat.  After a very scary ambulance ride and then another ambulance ride to Children's Hospital a surgeon was finally able to remove it.  They knocked out one of her baby teeth in the process and loosened another.  We are praying she won't loose the second one.  It was a very scary weekend and only now are things starting to feel normal.  Can you find the buttefly in her X-Ray below?

Well now that you know why I'm MIA I hope that you'll forgive me.  It's time for my run.  Have a wonderful night and don't forget to hug your little ones!  I've never been more grateful for my daughter than the last few days!  I am so glad that I have such a wonderful family and I can't wait to meet our new addition! 

The Downers Are Really Getting to Me....

I haven't posted in a few days because I found out we are expecting baby #2.  Don't get me wrong, I am THRILLED!  DBF is thrilled and so is my daughter.  Even my mom seemed genuinely happy for us.  However, my sister and my grandma were both not supportive.  My grandmother seems to have come around (I understand her worries about finances and my job, etc.) but my sister has cut herself from our lives completely and taken my nephew with her.  It makes me really sad and angry that she can be so petty just because she doesn't like my boyfriend and now I can't drink with her on her 21st birthday.  I think it's just jealousy and I hope she'll get over it but I can't help but be hurt that she'd be jealous.  I'm the older sister!  I had Gemma and she had Damien two years later.  Now two years after that I'm pregnant.  She could very well be ready to have another in two years and I wouldn't judge or be angry.  Even when it looked like she would have another before me (diagnosed with secondary infertility) I felt happy for her.  I just wish she could respect me enough to be happy for my miracle baby!

Then there is a whole nother group of people that are downers.  I belong to a discussion board for women who are waiting to try to conceive.  They are all very supportive and lovely women.  Some of us have been together on that board for over 3 years!  I had my moments of pain and jealousy when women graduated to trying to conceive and then pregnancy.  All in all though, I never let it show.  I always posted a nice comment and supported them when they worried about their pregnancy.  I waited almost 2.5 years to get my baby!  I had an IUD after my daughter and I got it removed in September of 2007.  I never went back on birthcontrol after that and I didn't get pregnant until Nov./Dec. 2009!  Now one of these women has expressed her disappointment with my miracle because she has been trying over a year and has had a loss while waiting.  I understand the pain of a loss.  I had one myself before my daughter.  However, I don't understand how she can be upset with me when I was praying to get pregnant for most of the last four years!  It's just so hurtful and it sucks.  I know she might actually need medicine to get pregnant but I thought I would too!  I just hope she comes around and sees that her miracle may just be waiting in the wings too!

On a good note my doctor sent me for bloodwork and the results came back great!  The amount of hCG in your blood in early pregnancy should double every 48-72 hours.  My numbers came back as 2,231 and 5,319!!!  So my numbers are doubling every 34 hours!  This is either one REALLY sticky bean or TWO sticky beans!!!  I can't wait until my ultrasound on December 29!!

I also went for my first run since finding out we are expecting!  It was only 2 miles but I'm glad to say I think I will be able to continue running, at least for now!  If we find out it is twins I most likely will not be allowed to continue.  So until then I'll be making happy trails (as long as I keep escaping the morning sickness!)!!!

Christmas came early in my house!

I guess DBF will just have to get over my recent weight gain.  It looks like it can be attritubted to Santa dropping off a brand new baby!  Baby B. is due 8/14/2010!  Merry Christmas to us!

I'm in shape! Round is a shape!

My ever-blundering boyfriend pointed out to me that I'm definitely gaining some weight.  I wasn't so sure but a quick trip to the scale showed that I now weigh more than he does (although that's not hard!).  To avoid any more ribbing and to gain back a little smidgen of my self-esteem, I put our entire household on a healthy eating plan.  I'm taking my notes from the Body for Life program and low-carb diets.  As a runner I know I can't really do low-carb but I can eat healthier carbs!  A quick trip to the grocery store produced a bill that was actually cheaper than normal!  Well, well... Healthy for the body and for the wallet! 

My first adventure into healthy cooking is simmering as I type... Turkey Chili.  After Thanksgiving most people have had enough turkey to last until the next one comes around but not my family!  Oh no!  We raise 50lb mammoth turkeys that fill our freezers for months!  So I've been searching for ways to use up some of the massive supply of ground turkey I have frozen and this seemed like the answer!

First I put 2 cups of water, 1 can of crushed tomatoes, 1 can of kidney beans, 2 cloves of minced garlic, diced green bell pepper and seasonings in the pot.  Meanwhile, I browned 1 lb of ground turkey in a skillet.  Once the turkey was totally brown I added diced onion and kept it over low-medium heat for another 3-4 minutes.

Before adding the turkey and onions:

After adding the turkey and onions:

While that was simmering, I prepped food for meals and snacks for the remainder of the week.  Below is the rest of the diced green bell pepper, diced onion, tuna salad (made with fat free Miracle Whip), and hard boiled eggs (I am only going to put the whites in the tuna salad).  I also cleaned and cut-up celery stalks and sorted them into ziplock baggies for healthy snacks (great with low fat cream cheese or peanut butter).

Finally, all the cooking and prepping made me hungry so I made a quick and healthy lunch!  A Flatout Whole Grain Flatbread tortilla with leftover turkey.  Topped with a slice of fat free American cheese and 2 Tbsp of medium salsa! Yum!

I can't wait to try out tomorrow's recipe, hamburger soup!  But I'm substituting ground turkey (of, course!) for the ground meat.  Plus I will be adding whole wheat pasta instead of the refined white kind.  Check back tomorrow for a follow up to the turkey chili and the entire recipe for the turkey burger soup!