365 days in photo's

Yeah I am putting this here too. Like the trifecta, if you are my friend on facebook and/or follow me on twitter you have already seen this but I want to put it here too as this is my journal and this is about to be a part of my life.

About a year ago, I got my dream camera. A Canon Rebel! I was stoked. I took pictures of everything! Edited like crazy and posted them to facebook all the time.

Recently though, I have been slacking off. Just not taking pictures like I should. So I joined a 365 challenge with some friends on Facebook.

The goal for the 365 Photo Challenge is simple.Take 1 new picture every day for a year. With my group, we are doing a different theme each week to keep things fresh but you don't have to have themes. You can take pictures of whatever strikes you that day. It is something I would encourage any one to try. It is easy, fun and lets you explore photography. You don't even need a fancy camera to do it. Any camera or even a phone camera will work. The point is to take pictures of your life!

I will probably keep it to a weekly thing here. Posting a weeks worth of photo's once I have completed the week's theme.

For now, here are the 2 I have started on this week. The theme is "About Me"

Fantasy Football

My love of iced coffee

Me at 24 weeks

MAC Eye Make up

Insecurities- The Dream Sequence

Pregnancy has the innate ability to bring out the worst insecurities in even the most secure person. Usually these insecurities are unfounded but for the pregnant woman the are still very really.

Mine are currently manifesting themselves in a series of bad dreams.

You may or may not know, pregnant women tend to have very vivid dreams. The lucky ones get awesomely realistic dreams involving celebrity crushes. I am not one of the lucky ones. Very early on I started having dreams. Mostly they have just been bizarre and random but a few have been disturbing.

In the very beginning, I had 2 dreams about Sophie dying. I will not be detailing these out because they took quite a while for me to shake.

These (luckily) past fast and we were on to the weird and bizzare. I kept waiting for the sex dreams but those were a no go.

This week the disturbing dreams have started again. This time they are about my marriage ending.

The first: Jeff cheated on me. He apparently (as he told me in the dream) was drunk and it was an accident. Oddly, I wasn't upset about this but we had ended up moving this pregnant woman into our house, I guess to take care of her. The disturbing part of the dream was how frantic and scared I was that Jeff was going to choose her over me. That having her in the house would make him want her over me and he would leave me.

The second was last night: Jeff and I were having problems (I am assuming because I wasn't around for this part of the dream). I had asked him to move out. He was getting an apartment and I was moving in with my parents. The very first day we were apart I realized what a big mistake I had made. I didn't want to be separated and was over come with fear Jeff would move on and find someone new before we could patch things up. That being away from me would let him forget about me and start over with someone else and I would be left alone.

In both of these dreams I felt helpless to change the situation. I was hopeless, desperate and devastated. I woke up from both unable to fall back asleep.

I am definitely anxious for these dreams to stop but at least they reaffirm how much I love my husband. Thank god he puts up with me.

The Great Name Debate

Jeff and I are never going to decide on a name. Never. This baby is going to be born and we will be trying to leave the hospital and the nursing staff will be flagging us down.

"Wait Mrs. Miles! You didn't fill out a name on the birth certificate!"

I haven't really liked any name Jeff has suggested and he isn't to fond of names I liked. We have different tastes in names, I guess.

With Sophie, I had a short list I liked. Jeff wasn't wild but didn't hate any on that list. I picked Sophia and when he said "I don't know if I like it" I asked him what he did like. He said he didn't know. So I told him her name was Sophia until he came up with something better.

He never did.

The start of a new school year

I just can't believe it is that time of year again. August is half way over and school is starting. It's bittersweet because it means summer is also coming to an end.

Of course the start of the school year means backpacks, pencils, notebooks, lockers and the works to many parents- to me it means something slightly different. It means it is School Bus Season!
 

Sophie has some weird obsession with school buses. We don't know why or where it came from but every time she sees school bus, she shrieks with excitement.

"Mommy! SCHOOL BUS!!!!!"

"Mommy!! Another SCHOOL BUS!!!!"

Wonder how long I can keep up the excitement?

The Stages of Pregnancy

This post was inspired by my good friend, Amy Jones!

Much like grief, pregnancy has stages you will go through. They are pretty damn close to the stages of grief but with the pregnant woman twist on them. Here is my take on the Stages of Pregnancy:

1. Shock/Denial: When you first find out you are pregnant, or even when you first suspect you might be pregnant you will be in shock which likely may be accompanied by denial. It will probably go something like this “There is NO way I can be pregnant. None. Yes I know I am 2 weeks late and my boobs look like extra full water balloon and hurt to touch and I have cried over the laundry detergent commercial twice but there is NO way I am pregnant. I am SURE it is just stress”


2. Pain/Guilt: This is numerous for the pregnant woman. You will look back over the last X weeks before you knew you were pregnant and analyze every single thing you have done. Everything you have eaten, everything you have drank, every activity that is on the Do Not list for pregnant woman. You will think about that plane ride to visit family and wonder if the changing altitude could have harmed your baby. Hell you will even stress about the night you possibly conceived: “Shit I was wasted that night. Will my baby have fetal alcohol poisoning? Did I doom my baby from the moment he was conceived?”


3. Anger/Bargaining: This one is an interesting one. You wouldn’t think pregnancy and anger go together but they do. Oh they do. Your rage as a pregnant person will be like no rage you have ever experienced before. And it will come with out warning, over things your normal, sane self wouldn’t have cared about. Your husband ate the last pickle? Beat him with a spatula. Cars aren’t driving to your liking, lay on the horn and flip them the bird! The anger stage, unfortunately for those around you, can last through out your entire pregnancy. Along with Anger is Bargaining. As in “Hey 2 yr old daughter, I will trade you this yummy piece of broccoli for your chocolate” or “Dear Lord, I will do ANYTHING for you to speed up this pregnancy” Good luck with the bargaining.


4. Depression & Loneliness: You will go through a time where you feel alone and it will be depressing and it sucks. All your friends going out drinking? Well you can come and be the DD! Ummm, no thanks. You are fat, none of your cute clothes fit, you sweat more, you face look like an pepperoni pizza, you waddle when you walk, your emotions are running ramped, you are constipated, you get exhausted easy and no one else is going through what you are going through. No one EVER, ANYWHERE knows what you are going through at this very instant. You are the only one who has ever felt THIS bad and no one understands. Fuck em all……and cue Stage 3!

5. Insecurity: This is a stage I previously forgot and had to come back to amend. Insecurity is a funny thing. I consider myself a very secure and rational person.... most of the time. Pregnancy has the ability to rob you of that and turn you into a crying, hormonal, insecure mess. Things you used to be fine with will cause you panic and set up doubt in your mind. The worst part, there is no actual reason for you to be feeling this way- it is really all in your head. Sometimes it is dreams that shake you to your core. It could be her husband going for drinks with the guys and having this irrational fear he will cheat on her in the bar. It could be seeing a good looking woman and suddenly becoming very self conscious about your big old pregnant body. Anyway it manifests, it isn't fun. For you or your partner.


6. Upward Turn: All of a sudden, one day you will see the light at the end of the tunnell. It may be at the ultrasound to determine the sex of your baby, it might be at the beginning of the third trimester. Hell, it might even be when you decided to pack that hospital bag (BTW, what should I put in my hospital bag??) or when you doc says “Ok time to head to Labor and Delivery” but you will get there. You will feel optimistic. Yeah, fuck yeah, I can do this. Come one pregnancy- I GOT THIS!!!

7. Panic Stage: Once you have hit that upward turn, you will slightly veer off course and back on to the "What have I gotten myself into" course. This is the stage where you start panicking about whats to come. How will you handle the sleepless night? How will you tell you boss? How will you afford all the stuff that comes with a baby? I don't know if you realize this but babies are expensive! Diapers, formula, clothes, cribs, changing tables, toys, strollers, contraptions you can't even being to figure out how to work..... and they all cost money. Lot's of it. The Panic Stage can also rear it's ugly head when you go to register. There is so freaking much the stores will tell you you need for a baby. And since you can't figure out what most of it does or is for, you err on the side of caution and register for it all. Bring on the Financial Panic again! Showers and gifts from family and friends (if you are lucky enough to have any) will only go so far. How will you afford the rest of this stuff. And how will you know how to use it?? Don't forget about the baby crying inconsolably and you have NO clue why and you can't make it stop crying no matter what you try. During this stage, your mind will race with the how's and why's and where's of rearing a child and you. Will. PANIC!!!!


8. Reconstruction & Working Through: Basically, you will have an “Oh Shit” moment where you realize you are going to need help. Help during labor, help during delivery and help afterwards. So you frantically try to mend the bridges with all the people you pissed off during your pregnancy during your Anger Stage.


9. Acceptance & Hope: Somewhere at the end of your pregnancy, after you have tried all the “proven” at home labor inducers in your panicked attempt to “GET THIS KID OUT OF ME”, you will come to acceptance. You will finally make peace that your bundle of satanic joy will be residing in your uterus until it damn well feels like coming out. And nothing you can do will bring it out. Not until it is ready. You grit your teeth and grin and bare it and constantly repeat “I am feeling good” and “Nope no baby yet” when you get asked every single day for the rest of your pregnancy how you are feeling and my personal favorite “You haven’t had that baby yet?” Your hope will come with you start feeling those contractions. Light or strong, it is the beginning of the end and you hope will soar as you rush to Labor and Delivery to finally, after all this time, GET THIS BABY OUT!!!!

Twice!

The is the number of times I threatened to run into car on Nicholasville Rd on purpose. I am going to completely over look the fact I am hormonal and have a short fuse and bitch about why people can't be more courteous when they drive.

The first occurrence happened while I was driving to my chiropractor's appointment. Side note: I think he is a quack and is uber annoying. He thinks I actually care about all the workings in my back and spine. I would quit going completely but it feel so damn good to have your back cracked  Back to my story. I was stopped at a red light headed north and talking to Jeff on the phone. The turn light changed to green and the cars coming south bound who were turning started to go. Well guess what? There was a back up but the cars turning didn't seem to care. They just kept on coming. They blocked the whole intersection. My light then turns green and I can't go because these fuckers decided to run the red light. Well it pissed me off. So I did what any red blood person would do. I gunned it. Headed straight towards the car in front of me. Playing chicken with this lady if you will. It was move or get hit.

I won. She moved. After, Jeff and I were discussing who would have been at fault if I would have actually hit her. We decided it was probably going to be me, even though she DID run the light.

The second time was when I was leaving work. I was in my car with the car in reverse. There was a car stopped right behind my car in the drive path with 2 women standing there chatting and picking through a book of close. I give them a minute and then back our slowly, just a little bit- thinking maybe they didn't see my reverse lights. They both turned, looked at my car and then went back to picking through their clothes! Seriously? So again, I gunned it. In reverse. To let them know "Hey bitches, I am ready to leave!!!!"

I won. They moved.


Because of these incidents, I am going to end today's blog post with a clip of one of my all time favorite movies. If you have boobs, you probably already know whats coming!



http://youtu.be/57aoVRwRIjQ

I love Kathy Bates!

BakingFAIL

Do you ever just want something so bad, you willing to take the time to make it no matter what time it is and no matter how long it takes?

I get like that a lot when it comes to baked goods. I genuinely love baking. It relaxes me. I love creating the perfect cupcake and taking the time to frosting it with the right tip. I love creating caramel on the stove, evening out my cakes, layering them, icing them so no crumbs show through. I love when the things I bake not only turn out delicious but also are visually pleasing.

Baking is much, much different than cooking. I love cooking too. I love using fresh ingredients and making a meal from scratch my family will enjoy- but baking is something else entirely.

Last night (well really the last few days) I have had a craving for Tres Leches Cake. It is a Spanish 3 milk cake and is amazing. Dense cake which is soaked over night in a 3 milk sauce- I am getting hungry just thinking about it. The recipe I linked is my favorite because of the added recipe for Dulce de Leche (or sweet milk sauce). It is like the Spanish version of a caramel sauce.

Now, you can buy Dulce de Leche in the store and I am told by my Soul Sister it is decent but the recipe for it is so simple, I thought "why not just make it". After all, I had all the ingredients. It didn't even require anything more than a sauce pan, a wooden spoon and a blender.

I have tried to make this before, unsuccessfully. It would have been successful but I was impatient and didn't let it cook long enough so it remained very milky. Which was fine because I only had 2 of the 3 milks handy and I used the Dulce de Leche as the third milk.

This time I was determined to get it right. I measured out my ingrediants, put them in the pan and let it cook. Then I got distracted. Next thing I know I am running to the stove where my milk is boiling OVER the pan and Sophie is asking me "Whats wrong mommy?" as a let out muttered curses.

I cleaned up the mess and put the pot back on the burner to continue the cooking, stirring occasionally this time. After 50 minutes, it is still milk like. By this time it is time to get Sophie into bed. Given the state of Dulce de Leche I thought I had plenty of cook time ahead of me. I get Sophies PJ's on, we throw the bones for the dogs and before I read to her, I check on it once more. Still fine.

I finish bedtime and as I am walking out of Sophies door the smell hits me. I rush to the stove and there is my Dulce de Leche- completely burnt. I got to tell you, it hurt. All that time I spent cooking it and it was burnt bad- stinking up my whole house.

This is what it should have looked like. It didn't.

I sigh, scrap it into the garabe and resign myself to the fact I have to make and eat my Tres Leches Cake sans the warm caramel sauce. I go to get my ingrediants out and what do I find? I only have 1 eggs left. The recipe calls for 6.

Damn the cursed luck!

"I get my treat!!"

Conversations with my 2 year old are the best. The stuff that comes out of her mouth just has me rolling some times. I just laugh, shake my head and wonder where does she come up with these things.

Two happened this weekend I wanted to share.

First one:

Sophie: When my baby get here?

Me: She will be here for Christmas

Sophie: I sing Happy Birthday to her.

Me: I think she would love that.

Sophie: Then I eat cake.

This made me laugh because Sophie has no idea that will actually be the baby's birthday when she gets here. She just knows she likes to sing Happy Birthday and she usually gets cake afterwards.


The second:

Me: Sophie, do you know what Halloween is?

Sophie: What's that?

Me: It's were you get to dress up in a cool costume and you go knocking on peoples doors. You say "Trick-or-Treat" when they answer and they give you candy!

Sophie: I knock and say "I get my treat!!!!!"

She repeated this several times and even told Jeff, unprompted, that she knocks and says "I get my treat!" which I can only assume is her version of Trick-or-Treat.

For the record, I am trying to hype up Halloween in advance so I can hopefully get my way and pick out her costume myself. Thus saving myself from starting the "Princess Years" any earlier than I have to!

How does that thing go on?

Last night, as we were getting ready for bed, Sophie announced SHE was going to put on her own diaper. Interested to see how exactly she was going to accomplish this I told her to go ahead.

Funniest thing I had seen in a long time. I wish I had my camera! It was this greatly awkward waddle dance she was doing in a circle while holding the diaper between her legs (sideways, might I add) and looking down at it like "What's next". I let her do it for a few minutes before she handed it back to me and said "You do it, Mommy"



Speaking of dancing: the dress battle is continuing. Sophie now can not, like physically impossible, for her to do the Hot Dog Dance with out a dress on. The minute the music starts, if she is still in her PJ's, she will run at me all frantic and say "Dress! Mommy!".

Recipe Review: Pina Colada Cupcakes

I found this great new blog. Ok, actually my co-worker found it and told me about it and I am hooked. It is a recipe blog called "Gina's Skinny Recipes" and I love it. All the recipes are simple and healthy and most important: delicious!


I have several meal ideas I want to try from her blog and will over the next few weeks but I did a cupcake recipe last night which turned out amazing. They were called "Pina Colada Cupcakes" and amazingly they were only 150 calories per cupcake!

They were also very, very easy to make. The cupcake part was so moist and wonderful I could have eat the entire batch straight out of the oven. The icing compliments the cupcakes wonderfully as well. My co-workers thoroughly enjoyed them and they were gone well before lunch time.

I am not going to post the recipe here because I don't want to step on Gina's toes but I did like the blog and the specific recipe above. I highly recommend you check them out!

I am also adding it to the favorite links over to the left hand side of my blog!

Oh, the Phases You'll Go

Two blog posts in one week? Damn, you all are lucky!! Just kidding, I just have more to say. Surprising- I know.

I really just want to vent about the 2 stages Sophie seems to be going through right now. I will start with the more serious of the 2.

Sleeping: you know when you are expecting that you will be forced to battle several sleep issues, many-a sleepless nights and all that jazz. What you may not realize, you will be battling sleep wars for YEARS. Yes, I said years! Once you think you have it down, your little bugger will change it up on you.

Now for the most part Sophie has been sleeping through the night since she was 6 months old. Jeff and I buckled down and did sleep training with her, it worked and 90% of the nights since then have been nice, uninterrupted, full nights rest.

Right now is one of those exception times. Sophie seems to be going through an "Afraid" phase. Jeff and I aren't sure of the cause but she almost gets panicked when she realizes it is time for bed. A lot of times, as soon as I get her from daycare she will start with the "I no go bed, right?" questions. It breaks my heart because I have NO idea how to calm these fears. She can't even verbalize completely what it is that scares her.

At first, she said it was "doggy's getting her" so we thought she had a bad dream about dogs. So before bed every night now we get on our knees and we stand at her door and throw bones down the hallway for the dogs to chase and tell them "get out of Sophie's room. She's trying to sleep!". And it worked too- for like 3 days. (I know you all want to see me throwing these bones too!)

Then one night she told Jeff she was scared of the dark. He got her a nightlight but she still didn't want him to leave her.

I hate that she can't get a full nights rest (last night she was up at around 3:30 again after a battle to get her to stay in bed without panicking at 8) but mostly I hate that I feel helpless to help her. I don't remember having those moments when she was an infant and it sucks now.




Her second phase is more of an annoyance than anything else. It's dresses. All the freaking time. Dresses. As soon as she gets up in the morning, she asks to put on a dress. This morning, while trying to get her ready for daycare, she didn't want to put on her bathing suit until I explained she could put her dress on over it. She immediately told me she didn't want to do water play at school. "I no get in water". Why doesn't my water bug want to play in the water- she doesn't want to take off her dress. Seriously. PJ's? Nope- she wants to sleep in her dress. All she ever wants is a dress on.

And it is DRIVING. ME. CRAZY! She has so many cute clothes. Little skirts, shorts, tops, and capris that I fear will never even touch her body because it isn't a dress. I am half tempted to hide ALL the dresses so she has to choose something else, but my luck she will just have a mental breakdown and then I will have a hysterical kid on my hands.

All over dresses.

Next summer- I'm not buying ANY dresses. Take that Sophie!

Mother's Intutition?

I thought for sure this baby was a boy. Like, 100% for sure this was a boy baby. No chance it was a girl. I even said to Jeff in the waiting room "I would be really surprised if I hear the word girl."

I attribute most of it to the drastic difference in my pregnancies. With Sophie, I was always hungry, had terrible hair, acne all over my chin and the weight gain was EVERYWHERE! This time my skin is clear, I have energy, my hair looks good and I have only gained 6 pounds thus far. Hell, as I am typing this I am wearing a regular pair of pre-pregnancy pants- regular button fly and all.

I even had Jeff convinced (although he didn't admit it until after the ultrasound) it was a boy. I just KNEW!

Well, turns out my Mother's Intuition sucks because was indeed not a boy. It was very clearly a little girl on the screen! I was shocked and thrilled at the same time. Crazy- 2 little girls. I can see it though. I totally feel like I am the mom of girls. I already like saying "My girls....". I think a part of me was hoping for another pink bundle. Mostly because Sophie has some damn cute clothes I packed away.

I remember, every time I would pack up the clothes she no longer fit in or were out of season, I got sad knowing I might never get to see those clothes again. Now, I am thrilled to pull out that 0-3 month bin and go through all the cute onesies and sleepers Sophie wore!

I think Sophie is happy too. We showed her the picture and she told the picture "I love you" and kissed it. She also didn't want to give it up so I am going to get a cheap frame so she can keep them in her room for now.

So after the excitement of the day started to wind down, reality set in. We are having a girl.

Now we actually have to name her. Shit!