gotta give him credit

i promised to write today... as i start this post it's 11:56, so i'm gonna say it counts!

as far as writing about something -- i'm afraid i'm still having writer's block.

nono, wait. i do have something that is TOTALLY blog-worthy! plus, the hubby would beat me if i didn't write about this!

so in my previous post i whined about discussed how exhausted/swollen/beat i was from going back to work after having 5/6 days off. what i didn't mention (because i was so dadgum tired) was that i had a BIG treat waiting on me when i got home from work at 9 pm last night.

the HUBBY cleaned HOUSE!

and i don't mean he just put the dirty dishes in the sink and stuffed the dirty clothes under the bed and sprayed febreze around the place to make the smell coming from the trash can disappear... i mean he actually CLEANED!

vacuumed, folded a load of towels i had done, started another load of towels, cleaned up a mess i had made making crafts, MADE THE BED, put his dirty clothes in the dirty clothes basket, (this is a big one!) cleaned the bathroom countertops -- WITH scrubbing bubbles, and cleaned the toilet. AND he mowed the back yard. i nearly cried. i was so happy to be able to go to bed and not think about all the cleaning i was going to have to do this morning. what's so funny is he did all this between 5:30 and 9:00 because when i came home from lunch at 4:30 the house was a wreck and i made a comment about how messy it was. he told me he didn't want me to have to spend my weekend cleaning the house. awwwww. so sweet.

i may have mentioned to him at some point that i sometimes gripe write about things he does or does not do around the house, which might have led to him cleaning for me. either way, i assured him i would brag ALL about him on my blog and make sure he gets full kudos for a job well done.

i'll write more tomorrow. i promise!

i'm alive.

my vacation ended wednesday night. i was gonna cry about it to you, but something came up. i can't remember what now. my brain is fried.

i worked thursday/friday/saturday. i am WORN. OUT. six days off kind of spoiled me.

my poor feet are so swollen and hurting. and something about the way i'm sleeping (i think) is messing up my right, ahem, groin muscle. it hurts to... well, move my leg.

i have tomorrow and monday off. hallelujah!

i know i've been neglecting the blog world recently, but i'll catch back up with my posting and commenting once i recuperate from three whole days of working at walmart.

i'm such a weenie.

well, that didn't take long

Our PS3 quit working back in November, and we just replaced it a few days ago.

You know how little kids are when they get a new toy? They love it more than ANY of their other toys and play with it nonstop -- won't put it down, won't play with any other toys, sometimes even sleep with it...

Well, the PS3 isn't in our bed, but it might as well be. I'm hoping this infatuation doesn't last long -- the hubby wasn't playing this much before it quit working, so I'm hoping it's just the "newness" and that it'll wear off. Soon...

**hang mirror in laundry room
**load boxes of crap valuable personal possessions he won't throw away into the car to be taken to storage
**call lawyer in Texas (This one has to do with us qualifying for Medicaid. As in, saving us thousands of dollars in hospital bills.)
**set up surround sound (Should have been done when we moved in.... in September...)
**hide wires around entertainment center
**pay for his real estate classes he took in February and arrange to take state test (You know, so that he can get his license and go make some friggin money so that i can actually afford to go to quit work and go to nursing school.)
**mow BACK yard (because only the FRONT yard got mowed on Saturday.)

...because this is a list of stuff he could should be doing instead.

go go go!

I'm no longer upset with my hubby. My yard is mowed. =)

I'm sure I will find something else to gripe about in the (possibly near) future, and when I do, I might just write about it. I can do that, because this is my blog.

I do love him dearly and just needed to vent a little bit yesterday.

Two days vacation down, three days vacation left. It goes by way too quickly. Yesterday we went to Hot Springs with Tyler and Britney. Yesterday was Ty's birthday and Britney had given him a gift certificate to Best Buy so he could get a surround sound system, so the four of us loaded up in the car around 4 yesterday afternoon for a quick trip outta town. I have SO much fun with them. We went to Best Buy, Chili's, and Pirate's Cove for a round of mini-golf. Fun times with my family!

For tomorrow, I have a whole bunch of nothin' planned. It should be great!!

VACATION!!!!!!!!!!!!

I'm getting paid as I type this right now! WHOOHOO!!!!!!!!!!!!

Of course, my "vacation" will consist of staying at home and relaxing. This is okay with me, though, cause I'm getting PAID to do it!

After much talk, thought, and consideration, my mom and I decided to order the bedding for Christopher's nursery. We were my mom was originally going to make it, but I think it will be cheaper, easier, and faster this way. I wish we had thought about this a week ago, but we just decided last night -- so I am ordering the bedding off eBay this morning. We were hoping to have paint matched to the bedding and start painting sometime this week, but we probably won't have time. We'll just get the room cleaned out and ready to start working on it. That in itself will be a chore. I would take a picture of how it looks right now, but I'm not gonna subject y'all to that....

Also -- my mother and I went to a yard sale yesterday morning and hit the jackpot! We got some awesome stuff for a great deal. A stroller/carseat combo, a crib mattress, a jumparoo, a swing, a bassinet, some Tommy Hilfiger shoes, a few onesies, a baby monitor, and lots o' toys!

My husband slept from 10:30pm Thursday night to 10:45 Friday morning... he says he was awake for about an hour and a half in the middle of the night. THEN he fell back asleep on the couch around noon for 30 minutes or so. Then he slept from 1:45 to 2:45 - after promising me he would mow the yard after a "little nap." I left to go to town around 3:00 yesterday, and he was getting ready to mow the yard. When I got home at 3:30ish, he was asleep on the couch, and a few minutes later he moved to the bed, where he stayed until 5:30, when his mother called him asking him to move some furniture into her house for her.

And so he did....

...and my yard is still not mowed.

He finally stayed up after moving furniture, but went to bed at 11:30 last night and is still in bed right now -- at 9:30.

I'm getting way past irritated.

And I'm seriously, seriously thinking about going to mow the yard right now.

After I order the nursery bedding!

rambling =)

i have had SUCH a busy week. or at least it seems that way to me! i have worked 8am-5pm all week long, and Stephen has worked 8pm-7/8am all week long. we have just been seeing each other as he was walking in the door and i was on my way to work, and for a few hours between 530 and 730 --if he wasn't napping. i'm not a morning person and i had trouble sleeping without stephen (just going to bed, i would put it off because i'm a scaredy cat) so i've been EXHAUSTED all day long at work. my feet/legs/hands have been SO swollen, when i get off work i look like a balloon and i barely have enough energy to stand. i'm scared to see what August weather will do to me if May is kicking my butt this much!

i got off at 2 today because i had some overtime (long story, but it involves me working 9.5 hours yesterday) and tomorrow i work 12-9 (hallelujah for sleeping past 6:50!) and then i am ON VACATION! i'll have 5 days off and be paid for 4 of them. this is the first time in my working career that i get paid to not go to work so i'll be a happy camper next week!

i had a doctor's appointment this week and he thought my fundal height measurement is weirdly large, so i am having an ultrasound next tuesday to see what's going on with Mr. Christopher. i'm excited to get see him again - my last two ultrasounds have been kind of disappointing, we haven't really been able to see anything fun, like a face, hand, foot, etc. we are praying that everything is fine and that i'm just having a big, healthy baby boy!

i'm off to do more laundry and housework!

OH! and YAAAAAAY for Kris Allen winning AI last night -- so awesome!

boring blog - you've been warned!

Being poor really changes your attitude when it comes to shopping. In high school, I could have gone to Texarkana and spent a few hundred dollars without really blinking my eye. Not now! Of course, back then I didn't have any payments - the only thing I really needed money for was gas.

Stephen and I got our tax refund back a few weeks ago, and while the majority of it has gone to a savings account for EMERGENCY USE ONLY. (Like when WalMart decided to cut us back to 15 hours a week and we had NO. MONEY. AT. ALL.) We're using a small portion of it to fix up the house a little bit. New vent-a-hood, (see pictures of our current nasty one) new paint in the kitchen - cabinets & walls, possibly new counter tops - this one I'm super excited about - and some new siding in a few places on the exterior of the house. Then a portion of it is going towards credit cards, of course. I wil be glad when those are paid off!

So -- yesterday we head down to Texarkana to do some shopping. I had several things I wanted to buy, plus we were going to price countertops, cabinet handles, etc etc. We went to:

Home Depot
Best Buy (Gift Card)
Kirklands
Bed, Bath, and Beyond (Gift Card)
Lowes
Hobby Lobby
Victoria's Secret (I needed more underoos.)
Sears
TJ Maxx

ALL those places... and we still spent less than $65.00

It's just different shopping now, knowing that the money could be put somewhere more useful, other than home decor. =( It makes me sad.

BUT I had a great day anyway. We picked up my brother & his fiance when we got there and they spent the day being chauffeured all around Texarkana. They are probably our favorite couple to hang out with and we don't get to spend nearly enough time with them, so we really enjoyed hanging out! We went to Olive Garden for dinner and then back to Ty's apartment to watch Taken (the movie Stephen bought with his gift card at Best Buy.) It was really good.

We made it home about 2 am and crashed, and I just got up around 10. I have so much to be doing - pick up house, laundry, and deep clean my laundry room. I also want to start working on taking my cabinet doors off and start sanding them so that I don't have so much to do next week!

Sorry for this long, boring, pointless post. Maybe next time I post it'll be something fun!

some kind of big news.

i'm home alone (which is kind of nice) with nothing to do (because i had such a busy day yesterday) and extremely bored. i'm thinking i should have left something un-done yesterday so that i had something to do today.

not that there's not plenty of stuff i could be doing, but it's all big projects and stuff i didn't feel like starting without being able to finish. (deep clean laundry room, deep clean kitchen cabinets, deep clean nursery.)

(i may be nesting just a little. or turning into my mother.)

sooo. onto different, more exciting things. whoop whoop.

I GOT ACCEPTED TO NURSING SCHOOL!!!!

yes, it's just the practical nursing program here at RMCC, but it's a BIG step forward for stephen and me. (a BIG step AWAY from walmart. this in in itself is muy importante.)

it's a step towards making other things possible -- being able to have a good paying job while stephen finishes his teaching degree, firstly.

it's going to tough, i KNOW. classes are supposed to start, like, 5 days after my due date. yikes, right? but it's one of those gotta-do-it-now things that i just can't put off.

the plan: leave walmart at the end of july, be induced at 38 weeks, have 3 weeks before classes start to spend with my precious new baby, then be a full-time nursing student for 11 months (minus one Christmas break and one spring break.)

and even though i know this is going to be one of the hardest things i have ever done, i am SO, SO, SO excited. i have wanted to be a nurse since i was in high school -- i was a nursing major for my first three semesters at henderson state university, before i switched my major to teaching and QUICKLY learned i did not want to do that for the rest of my life. and i know i'm taking the L-O-N-G way there, i will be an RN one day... eventually. this is just the best place for me to start, so that my classes and clinicals are in the same town as my newborn baby, you know...

(something else i want to do eventually is finish my bachelors in general studies from hsu -- something i'm about 12 hours away from completing. we'll see.)

can't quit blogging...

3 posts in one day. What what! Crazy, I know. Especially since *sniff sniff* nobody loves me and I NEVER get comments anymore...

Just wanted to list some things I am happy about today...

**I GET TO QUIT MY JOB AT WALMART!!!!!! (not for several months - more on this tomorrow.)
**Tax Return Money
**My husband and his sweet Mother's Day card for me (and his gift - cupcakes! this has been a pregnancy craving of mine that I have REALLY tried to not give into!)
**My days off. (Sunday and Monday)
**Organization (although my mother wouldn't necessarily agree with this)
**Blogging/the blogging world. I love reading about other peoples lives!
**Baxter is HOME!
**My mom and dad for helping me hang hanging my new mirror on the wall today.
**My whole sweetie pie family - my husband, parents, brother, future sister-in-law, and my four puppy babies. And, of course, the baby doing jumping jacks in my belly right now!
**And lastly... getting to crawl into my bed in just a few minutes! I stayed at my parents last night because Stephen had bombed the house for yucky bugs and spiders and we decided I shouldn't sleep in the house directly afterwards. (He bombed it about 4 yesterday evening.) I didn't sleep very well even though I was sleeping in my old bed... you know, from less than a year ago. Weirdness, but whatever. Goodnight!

Mother's Day

Since I started blogging again last fall, I have come across many, many blogs about women who are infertile -- women who long to be mothers; women who have tried time and time again to become pregnant. I've read about people who have gone through numerous IVF procedures and are still without children. I've read about women who have adopted children, fostered childen, and been successful with IVF. I've read about women who -- after waiting so long for a child -- have spent weeks, even months, in the NICU with their new babies.

I don't understand why it's so hard for some women to conceive, and not hard at all for other women. I don't understand why there are teenagers and drug addicts having children, or why some women are aborting their babies, or why some people seem to get pregnant by using the same bar of soap -- when there are so many parents struggling to have a family of their own.

I almost feel guilty that I am pregnant -- without even trying -- when there are so many women whose blogs I read (some here in my own town) who are paying thousands upon thousands of dollars for infertility treatments so they can have a child of their own.

Today in church, our preacher had all the mothers in the congregation stand so that we could applaud them. I couldn't help thinking about the women who yearn so much to be a mother -- how tough it must be to sit in the pew, year after year, hoping that next year they will be able to stand, and call themselves a Mom.

I have not struggled with infertility myself, so I cannot even begin to imagine waiting and trying for years to get pregnant. The closest I can relate to this is the time between September and December, after I miscarried and before I realized I was pregnant again, when I was at such a low point in my life. Each day was a battle. I felt so empty, so hollow, so incomplete. It seemed like there was nothing I could do, nothing Stephen could do, to take the pain away. I want all the women out there struggling with infertility to know that I pray for you and hope that God will soon bless you with a baby of your own.

Happy Mother's Day to all the moms out there -- from grandmothers to mothers-to-be, to future mothers.

enter this giveaway!

So, everybody should go to this blog and enter for a chance to win some neat stuff on Jill's 100th post giveaway!

I can't wait until I have a 100th post giveaway!

I will post a Mother's Day blog later!

26 weeks!

The network of nerves in your baby's ears is better developed and more sensitive than before. He may now be able to hear both your voice and your partner's as you chat with each other. He's inhaling and exhaling small amounts of amniotic fluid, which is essential for the development of his lungs. These so-called breathing movements are also good practice for when he's born and takes that first gulp of air. And he's continuing to put on baby fat. He now weighs about a pound and two-thirds and measures 14 inches (an English hothouse cucumber) from head to heel. If you're having a boy, his testicles are beginning to descend into his scrotum — a trip that will take about two to three days.

insomnia.

I woke up at 3:30... it's 5:40... I've been on the computer reading blogs for about an hour now. I'm not sure whether I want to stay up and just get this day started, or if I should go back to bed for 2 hours. Sometimes going back to sleep for just a few hours is worse than not sleeping at all. Sigh.

One of the reasons I couldn't go back to sleep. All the things I *want* to do.

* Go on vacation
* Finish college (I'm so close...)
* Be out of debt
* Get a different job

* Paint my kitchen (and other home improvement projects)

* Paint the nursery (Yes I know I just posted a blog about my plans to do this, so it's at least in my near future.)

* Lose weight (after August, of course.)
* We have too many dogs, but I just love them all so much. I'm afraid we aren't going to have enough time to devote to all of them once Christopher gets here. What should I do?

And now I'm faced with having to make the decision to either go back to bed or stay up. I'm not sure what I would do if I stayed up... laundry? Work out? I'm not even sure what time Curves opens now. Run to Daylight Donuts? Yum... I have been so hungry recently. If I did that, I would have to go work out too. What would my mother do if I called her at 7 am wanting to work out? Probably check to see if she was dreaming, because no way THIS girl is up at the crack of dawn unless it's (a) Black Friday or (b) getting ready to leave for a vacation!!!

Baxter has been at my parents house the last few days and I am missing him terribly. He's spending time with them until Zoe's out of heat -- he's neutered, so he wouldn't have done any harm, but he was just all over her and it was grossing me out. I guess I could go spend some time with him! He's my sweetheart. =)

In other news, my front yard is starting to look like a small lake, and from what I can tell it's only going to get worse. I'm ready for a week of sunshine! Can you tell I'm just babbling now? I'm not sure if it's just drowsiness, or if it's because I'm putting off going back to bed because it's now straight up 6 am, and in the back of my mind, I think I should just get in the shower and start the day.

weekend wrap-up

I had a wonderful weekend! (And by weekend I mean Sunday/Monday.) Sunday I sat at home and relaxed, went to a baby shower, and had dinner with my bestie Jessica. Monday I went to Texarkana with my mom and dad to do some shopping! I got some used maternity clothes from a friend of my cousin, ate some good food at Ironwood Grill (lunch) and Ruby Tuesday (dinner) and spent good quality time with my mom, dad, and brother! My mom is very generous with my dad's money (haha) and bought me lots of good stuff! Much-needed maternity clothing, some ADORABLE newborn onesies, a Cozy Rider, and some wall decor from Kirklands. The wall decor is the inspiration for the nursery, so I am super duper excited about it. I LOVE Kirklands -- if you've never been to a Kirklands, check it out sometime. I love their stuff! (I am SO turning into my mother...)

A big part of me wants to post the adorable wall stuff I got, but I think I am going to wait until the nursery is finished to post pictures of it all together. =) It's gonna be so cute! I am taking some vacation time the last week of May, so those are the days I am planning on painting and putting together the nursery. I'll take some before pictures sometime soon so that you can see the transformation!

my kitchen

Ok, Kelly is doing a "Show Us Your Home Friday" over at her blog, and while I'm a few days late, my kitchen has been a mess and today is the first day I've had off to take pictures of it, let alone clean it up! I have a galley style kitchen, it's really long and really narrow. The eating area is also small, so we just have a little round table on that side of it and we have a bigger dining room table in our "dining room." (Another story in itself.) We're planning on making some changes to the kitchen sometime after the baby is born, so it'll be fun to compare the pictures from now after we've painted it!

My cabinets -- wine/magarita glasses that only used for 2 months of our marriage before getting pregnant!

Everyday glasses -- love these.

These are my dishes, which I love! They are red and black -- the colors I decided to decorate my kitchen in when we registered for wedding gifts. So far, the only red and black in my kitchen are these dishes a a few hand towels!

My gorgeous stainless steel refrigerator -- a wedding gift from Stephen's mom.

The view of my kitchen when you're walking in from the living room.
I don't really use this space much, hence the yucky decorations.
I'm not really happy with this section of the kitchen, I need to make it more useful.
I'm thinking it would make a really neat bar area, but with a baby on the way, we just wouldn't use it that much. Any ideas?

Wedding gift from my brother and sister-in law.

I love cookbooks. =) My mom gets me a new one each year for Christmas

Spice rack, another wedding gift from my mother-in-law.

Our kitchen table.
Yes, I'm aware that my candle holders have no candlesticks. I need some red ones.

A cute plaque my mom got me for Christmas one year.

Those are my Rachael Ray knives -- wedding gift from Stephen's brother and sister-in-law.

My stove. I hate it and want a new one, but that's not gonna happen for a LONG time.
I just love my spoon rest and the glass jar or whatever that thing is. It holds vegetable oil.

Left side of my galley kitchen.

I need a stainless steel breadbox!

This is the side of the kitchen that is opposite the sink... this was taken from next to the stove.

Same side as above, just taken from entrance from the living room.

We're getting a vent-a-hood microwave -- our current microwave is HUGE and takes up a lot of counterspace (see the picture above this one) and this current vent-a-hood is old and nasty. I'me excited about this!

So... that is my kitchen! Even though it is galley style and not laid out that well, I really do like my kitchen. We I am planning on painting the cabinets black and the walls red, but it will be a time-consuming project and I am wanting to paint my living room first, so the kitchen will probably not be updated for at least 6 or 8 months, but I think it will be so cute once it is painted! I would LOVE to replace the countertops and stove, but that will only happen if we somehow come across several thousand dollars. Ha!

25 weeks!

Head to heels, your baby now measures about 13 1/2 inches. His weight — a pound and a half — isn't much more than an average rutabega, but he's beginning to exchange his long, lean look for some baby fat. As he does, his wrinkled skin will begin to smooth out and he'll start to look more and more like a newborn. He's also growing more hair — and if you could see it, you'd now be able to discern its color and texture.