Yeah, that's right

This baby is a BOY! We are so happy and so excited!! I was so excited to tell Jenna because she was really hoping for a boy. I waited til Eric got home from work and then I showed her the ultrasound pictures. She was so thrilled to be seeing the baby, even though it looked funny. So I'm showing her these pictures





She gets to this one and I ask her to read what it says:


She reads out loud "Looks like a *huge gasp* BOY!!" then she looks at me with big ol' eyes so excited! I wish I had thought to film that, it was so cute! And we'll never get another moment like that... but what can you do? Oh well. Anyway, it was a fun moment and after that we asked Jenna for some name help because we are feeling lost in this area. The first name she suggests is Crick. LOL She was so serious too! So after a few more ridiculous names I had to pull out some paper and make a list so I could post them to the blog. Here is what Jenna came up with. Remember, she is telling me these names with complete seriousness in her voice and face.

Crick
Jacker
Jackie
Pine
Jack-Jack
Sell
Alvin
Simon
Chuck
Max
Cranny
Kathy

I was trying so hard not to laugh, and of course not doing a good job. Marah suggested Kiki for the baby, better be sure to mention that too.

As for us, we're still thinking about it. I really want to figure it out soon because I feel like having the name just helps you to bond with the baby before it's born. Since with Jenna we didn't know if we had a boy or girl we weren't able to call her by name until she was born and then the name just felt so foreign. It was a very weird experience for me and with Marah it was so much easier because we knew she was a girl.

Anyway, we were throwing names around yesterday and not agreeing on much as usual. Eric did say he thinks he's okay with Clayton, which is what we had chosen when I was pregnant with Jenna if she had been a boy. However, even though I still love the name and it does have personal meaning attached to it, I have a hard time picturing calling my son that now. So we went back to the drawing board. We both liked Joaquin with the nickname Jack. I thought it sounded like a good name that a kid could grow into. I still don't think it feels perfect though. I used to really not care for one syllable first names however lately I have been liking names like Jack, Mark, Sam, etc. We are both kinda thinking of Alexander too. I like the nickname Alex and I like the full name too, I could go either way. So I think the two main contenders at this point are Joaquin and Alexander. I'm hoping Eric will feel comfortable with one of those two by the end of the week so it can be settled.

I picked this up yesterday at Target to give Eric the news:



I thought it was cute and when I showed Jenna she went to work drawing this picture:



This is her and her baby brother. See what he's wearing? :) She also drew a little family portrait:




So that's about it for news. I have to get to cleaning now as my morning free hour is about up. I'll just throw in these cute pics of Eric and Marah I took last night and be done :)









Have a lovely day!

ah the weekend

It was a nice weekend... well, weather wise it sucked but otherwise it was nice. Yeah, Friday night it was fuh-reeeezing and the wind was blowing so hard. Then Saturday morning we wake up to blizzarding conditions... um, it's less than a week til May. We were lucky though, I think we got about 2 inches of snow where in thief river falls, where we used to live and only about 50 miles east of us they got closer to 8 inches! My friend said the snow was up to her knees!!! I really want to get out of here.

Anyway, on Friday night we went to the circus. This was the worst circus I've seen since I've lived here. It was a real disappointment. However the kids loved it and had a really great time! Marah was so cute dancing to the music and they both liked the farting clown quite a bit, of course. Uncle Fred and Aunt Tera and Grandma and Grandpa came too which made the night extra special for the girls. Fred is too sweet to those girls, he is a really great uncle. Of course, they are all so good to my kids and it always fills me with warm fuzzies to see them loving on my babies. The girls got popcorn and cotton candy and some really fun neon light up toys that I'm sure cost way too much money, but Grandpa insisted.

Here are some pictures of us that night.













See, I did really good! i can't believe I took so many photos! I'm really proud of myself.

So on Saturday we brought the girls out to Fred and Tera's who kept them overnight so that Eric and I could get out on our own which we haven't done in quite awhile. That was nice. The day did not start out so great but we pushed through it and ended up having a nice time together. On Sunday Mike and Abby came out from Thief River and we saw Forgetting Sarah Marshall and Harold and Kumar Escape from Guantanamo Bay. We ate far too much junk at the theater and Eric was sick afterward. The girls were so sad to leave Fred and Tera's as usual and cried and were depressed all evening, but once they were in bed I was able to relax and enjoy the last bit of the weekend with Eric.

Today I have a lot of housework to do so I really need to get to it. I swore to myself I would only spend an hour on the computer this morning and it has been an hour so I'm gonna go. Have a lovely day!

nada

Don't even know why I'm blogging today really, except maybe to push that picture of myself down a little bit LOL Even though I'm not like, impressed with my body and I don't have the cute pregnant body that I would like to have, I still am going to make myself take pictures. I have like, 2 pictures of my pregnant self with Jenna and that's at the very end and none that I know of with Marah. This is because I don't like the way I look and my tummy area is usually the very last place on earth I would want a camera aimed. But I already regret not getting those pictures with the last two and since this is my last baby I really need to do it.

I'm at this weird stage body wise. The baby is taking up my lower abdominal area and is pushing all the fat upward so I look like I'm pregnant up top but not at the bottom. I have to hold myself a certain way to try to look pregnant instead of just oddly shaped. I'm just anxious for the baby to fill out some more so I look pregnant. It would help to have maternity pants too. My jeans are too tight now and I feel like I'm crushing the little sprout when I wear them. I hate this stage of pregnancy.

With Jenna I didn't really even look pregnant at the end unless I made myself look pregnant. I could still wear regular tops and my tummy was bigger but not pregnant big, just looked fatter than usual. I didn't like that at all. I love looking pregnant. It's the only thing I like about pregnancy.

I started moving furniture around today. I was tired of the living room arrangement and I am my mother's daughter so I just started moving. Of course I got tired in the middle of it and now there is junk all over the floor where the couch used to be covering it and I haven't had the energy to clean it up and vacuum, but I will later today. I did get the kitchen cleaned up and did 3 loads of laundry today so far so I'm happy about that. Afterwards I was exhausted and could barely keep my eyes open plus my back was starting to hurt so I laid on a heating pad for an hour. I feel better now but Marah's napping so I think I'm gonna rest a bit more.

We are going to the Shrine Circus tonight! I'm very excited! I never went to the circus as a kid so I still feel like I kid when I go now and we try to go every year. Jenna loves it and Marah should really be into it this year too so that will be fun! I need to remember to take pictures. I used to be so good about this in high school and even when Eric and I were dating, now it just is something I forget about often or I feel silly about it for whatever reason. I'm weird like that.

Alrighty, love to you all!

20 weeks

Well, technically not until Sunday, but it's close enough.

productive scrap morning

So I have been reading one of my favorite blogs and just feeling inspired. She is a template creator and I love using her templates to get my layouts done. Anyway, she has four kids, her fourth one is just a month old and I am always so inspired when I see what all she is able to accomplish with so much going on in her family life. She is an amazing person. Anyway, so this morning I'm reading and see that she is getting her 5 year old involved with digital scrapbooking by using templates! These pages this little girl is creating are so cute! And I was just thinking, I should definitely get Jenna involved in that. She would really love doing it and she's so good with the computer that I'm sure she could get it in no time. So I'm gonna try to get her started on that.

So I pulled out some templates and started scrapping. I really should do this more often. I get so overwhelmed sometimes, and feel like I need to make these little artsy creations every time I scrap, but that is not at all true! I am really trying to get away from that mindset and just get this stuff done! I am behind and I really need to start getting these pages done. I haven't even done one layout about this pregnancy yet! I plan to do a couple this week though. That will be my goal for tomorrow.

I decided to go with the "less is more" approach this time around and not spend hours trying to embelish my pages. This way I was able to get two layouts done in an hour.





These pictures of Marah and Eric have been sitting on my computer for years as you can see, and I really did not like them at first. It's funny how that happens. When I first saw them I was like, okay... Eric why can't you take some nice pictures. :) But then today I was looking at them and just loved them! I realized, you know, pictures don't need to be perfect. We don't always look perfect... in fact, we rarely do! haha! So I just went for it and I thought, you know these are really cute. It's cute that Eric just got out the camera and went to town taking all thes pictures of him and Marah being silly. It's one of the things I love about him and sometimes I forget that.

So now I've documented it. I really need to get these layouts printed and in an album! I'm really bad about that. I will work on that this summer. I like to print at 8x8 so that I can get them done at walmart.

Okay, anyway, I had a major lazy day yesterday. My back was killing me all day and I just laid in bed almost all day. Marah had a lazy day too, just watching tv :) It allowed me to get the rest I needed and today I feel alot better, though I did have two cups of coffee so that helped!

I have to get some housework done today. It's really frightening how bad the place can get with just one day of doing nothing when you have a 3 year old who likes to pull out everything and drop things wherever she is standing. My kids think the floor is a garbage can. It's really frustrating. And the dishes are all dirty now. Yes, we use all our dishes in one day! I purposely only have that many dishes so that I have to do them everyday. It's a good strategy until I have a lazy day and then I have to wash dishes out of the sink as we need them.

Okay, well I better go start doing those things that need to get done! My goal today is no nap. I really should get some stuff done while Marah is napping. But it is a rainy, cloudy day so it's tough to not want to lay down! Well, I'll try anyway.

Love to all!

The Rain, Rain, Rain Came Pouring Down

She told me to Shut up

Friday

Jenna had the day off today so I made the decision yesterday that I would really try to not be lazy today and do something with the girls rather than have them cooped up all day. The weather has been beautiful so I need to be better about taking advantage of it.

Anyway, I didn't take pictures... sorry :) but we went to the library this morning and picked up some new books for the girls. I found The English Roses by chance and grabbed it for Jenna. The illustrations totally remind me of her artwork:





She was pretty excited when I showed her. So hopefully she'll draw some more cute little girls... though I wish she would draw them without having to add cleavage to everyone lol!

Thank you to everyone who commented on her artwork. I read them to her and she was very proud. That meant alot to her :)

So after the library we went to the mall to return some shoes that were hurting Marah's feet. Yay for $16! Which I turned right around and spent at McDonalds getting lunch to take to the park! I honestly don't like going to the park. I just don't like the sand. I wish we had one of those cool parks with the squishy floor and no sand. I think there might be one around here, though I'm not sure... with all the snow and ice it's probably not good for it. I can't wait til it warms up enough to take the girls to the splash park again! They sure do love it there.

We went home, Marah took a nap and Jenna watched Tarzan while I got some work done. Got our cable hooked back up! no more missing The Office!!! That was rough. I can't wait til HBO starts up Season 4 of Big Love, that's when we'll turn HBO on for a bit :) I absolutely love that show!

After the cable guy came I took a nap. I slept too long. Then I woke up and our chicken was still not defrosted so I ordered Papa John's and I'm just waiting for the delivery guy cause I'm hungry!

okay, like I said, no pics of the day, but Marah did pose for me:




bwahaha!



Have a lovely weekend!

oh, hello there

apparently Uncle Pat made the rounds last night and made up for his sore lack of commenting lately in one fell swoop. So that was nice of him. ;)

I did it!

Here you go, several of Jenna's latest drawings. I had to pick my faves from a huge pile and it was hard but I tried to choose a variety of poses, themes, facial expressions etc.

This nurse did not appreciate her patient pigging out on junk food



Love the girl laughing her butt off there!


She got this image from The Princess Bride but instead of the grandpa reading to his grandson, the mom is reading to her daughter. This is actually part of a story she wrote. I would have posted the whole story but it's huge. Maybe one day.


Apparently, the angel bunny brought these two together!



So, Jenna went thru a period where she could not find her library books and apparently the school library was giving her a hard time. She really got stressed out about it and didn't even like library day anymore. I finally found them but she made this drawing and it cracked me up. Check out the crazy lady on the far right there. lol



This was the cover to the story she wrote. I love all the little details in this one.



Ouch!


I think these boy dogs have a thing for the girl on the left. I love the dog wagging it's tail.



I think this sorceress looks so cool! I think she got this from Enchanted.




Cats in love. The girl on the right is the ugly girl apparently. Jenna's been into drawing ugly girls since she saw The Producers.



She's a very brave girl.




An adorable fairy. Jenna's been into these "Rainbow Fairy" books lately.




I just love all the poses here.



Just another one I think is so cute.



Ratatouille. Check out all the detail in the foods!







Animal high school



Poor guy, he didn't stand a chance!



She drew this one last night. I just cracked up over it. She's so adorable!



Okay, there's 20 drawings. Now rave about how awesome she is LOL

Well, here's a video :)

Oh and I do know that Marah's hair is ridiculous. I cut it last night. Those bangs were annoying the heck out of me. I tried to let them grow out but I couldn't do it.

careful

Me: I'll be right back, I'm going to the bathroom.

Marah: Okay mommy. Be careful on the toilet okay?

:)

slacker

I know, I'm sorry.

I do have pics, just need to upload them and that takes time and again, I'm lazy. It'll happen though, just bear with me.

this should tell you something...

I'm sooooo tired. My back has been getting so bad that it's really tough to sleep. Add some acid reflux to that and last night was miserable. I think I finally fell asleep at around 5 this morning and was up at 7. I can barely focus on typing right now, it's gonna be a long day. Eric started his job today so I'm here with Marah alone and she's pretty demanding of attention though she's being pretty good right now, just sitting next to me patiently playing with some cupcake decorative picks and waiting for me to put her movie on. It's either ET or The Princess Bride this morning so two nice long movies I may be able to get a little sleep on the couch before she starts making me actually play with her LOL!

Okay I am gonna do that and then maybe this afternoon if I don't nap during her naptime... which is unlikely but you never know, then I'll post a few pictures that I took this weekend. Otherwise I will try really hard to do it tonight after they go to bed.

Have a lovely day :)

lazy

yeah, I've pretty much been lazy lately. I'm just so drained of energy all the time. i need to figure something out cause this isn't working.

I haven't taken a single picture with my camera in so long! Again, total laziness. I just don't want to take the time to get it out and put the memory card in. It's not that I don't remember to do it... I just don't want to. It's that bad.

I've been sitting at the computer since I woke up (which was a 1 pm) and doing absolutely nothing. Just wasting time. Marah is in bed.

I don't think it's a depressed thing. Usually I kind of recognize that. I could be wrong though. I'll probably talk to my doctor about it at my next appointment. I really just think it's being pregnant. I was not this tired with the other two, but then again I didn't have two kids to care for all day at that time either.

I would lay in bed all day if it didn't hurt my back so much. That's the only thing that really gets me out of bed when Eric lets me sleep. I won't be able to do this anymore once he starts working though.

I have been feeling the baby moving. I'm almost in my 17th week and wow, last night I couldn't believe how much I could feel that little one moving. It was so weird, almost like how it feels toward the end when they're really big! It was like, rolling or something. Such a strangely unsettling and yet amazingly exciting feeling!

Eric's sister and her husband are coming over for dinner tonight so we have to get this place cleaned up. It's not too bad thankfully, so it shouldn't take too long.

I really need to document Jenna's drawing progress on here. I should try to take a picture every day (lol, yeah right) because the girl draws like at least 10 pictures EVERY day. It's insane! I seriously adore her drawings. Not only are they amazing for her age but they are so creative! I really don't know how she comes up with some of this stuff. I know that most of her inspiration is from cartoons and movies though. Even when she isn't drawing direct scenes from something, she is drawing some element from it. She cracks me up!

But I'm too lazy to go get the camera! Okay, but I promise I'll try to make myself take a lot of pictures of her drawings tomorrow and post them on monday.

Love,
me

Oh man, I gotta get used to this

Today Eric went to orientation for his job. I haven't been a stay at home mom without Eric here (since he's been out of work for so long) since August. I have been lazy lately, admittedly and I wanted to put an end to that today and make a fresh start. So I planned out the day to make sure that I wouldn't revert to my lazy ways and actually stay productive and have fun with Marah too.

So I'm exhausted. LOL It will take some getting used to I discovered. Marah was pretty good today thankfully, but yeah, I didn't take a nap which I've grown quite fond of, I went grocery shopping with her and since Eric wasn't home I had to make two trips up to the third floor of our building with arms loaded with groceries. Since I've been pregnant this is really a very difficult task and takes my breath away. I have been making Eric do this chore because I always feel like I'm going to have an asthma attack when I've done it lately.

Anyway, I made it through that and then Marah and I crafted a bit and sang songs and danced. I did the dishes and then made Marah's lunch and she went down for a nap. I managed to get the laundry folded that has been neglected the last week and then Marah and I went to get Jenna. When we got home the girls got their bikes out and played/rode for a while. It was so nice to be able to let them do that! Marah has had cabin fever this winter. It's such a depressing time. It finally is spring though (a cold one, but that's normal and it's actually warm for us at 40 degrees). Almost all the snow has melted though I know we are in for probably one more good snow fall before it's over.

Now I'm just beat and I have to make supper and I don't want to. I'm all crabby and I hate that. It probably doesn't sound like a very tiring day :) but for me it was. I hope that doesn't make me a major wimp.

I got a layout done yesterday. It took forever! I'm still so out of my scrapping zone and it feels almost foreign to me. It's sad. I think about how much things have changed for me since a year ago. Scrapping was my life! Now I have to force myself to do it. I still enjoy it and I'm always thrilled when I finish a page, but I don't want to do it all the time like before. And forget about designing anything! I have no creativity for that still. I hope it will come back sometime soon cause I could really use the extra money, but so far no luck.



Is anyone besides my mom still out there reading? :)