Baby Update

33 Weeks :)

  - Baby boy E is doing great! He is still moving around a lot and I love it. He is growing more and more everyday and I will feel like I'm becoming more and more torpedo like but I love the feeling of life growing inside my body :)

- I'm still exercising but I'm having to take it slower now since I get worn out a lot faster. I'm also tired during the day a lot more but its not too bad.

- I'm getting to that point that I can't bend over without something to hold onto or lean on because I'll fall over if I do :) My balance is way off.

- I'm craving cantaloupe these days :)

- I learned this week what a braxton hick contraction feels like and I realized I've been experiencing them for about 2 weeks now off and on! They aren't painful....just a little uncomfortable but not bad :)

This Saturday is my baby shower in Charleston! I'm so excited to see everyone and to celebrate our little boy :)

Easter 2014

We had a wonderful Easter this year! It was just Mike and I which was perfect. It was so nice to stay home and relax and just picture how different next year will be :) We do things a little differently for Easter. In our family the Easter bunny comes on Saturday. This is something Mike and I started doing after we got married but I got the idea from a friend of mine who does it with her kids and I thought it made perfect sense.

After teaching Primary for a long time I was always sad that kids would come to church and have a really hard time focusing because all they wanted to talk about was the Easter bunny and the egg hunt after church and half of them were already hyper from eating candy that morning. I just felt like that took away from the true meaning and focus of Easter which should be the Savior. However, I love Easter! I love all of the traditions that come with it including dying eggs and egg hunts and Easter baskets full of goodies and little presents and I have no desire to deprive my children of that joy or those experiences. I just want to separate the 2 and make sure they understand and can focus on the Savior on that Easter Sunday.

So on Saturday night our Easter bunny came. A tradition in Mike's family was to get books for Easter and I love it so we have continued it. Here are our Easter "baskets". We were lame this year and didn't actually get baskets but you get the idea :)

If you can't see: he got The Velveteen Rabbit and The Little Mouse, the Red Ripe Strawberry and the Big Hungry Bear. 

Then we also celebrated by watching the movie Hop and munching on some of our Easter treats :)

Sunday was a beautiful day. Church was wonderful and uplifting and the talks were exactly what I needed to hear. The speakers did a wonderful job speaking about the Atonement and Resurrection of the Savior. Then we came home and we talked with our families which is so nice to be able to do especially when we're so far away. We also went outside and enjoyed the beautiful day by going to for a walk. It was so much fun to imagine how different next Easter will be when we have our little boy here to celebrate with us too :) We ended our Easter by watching the Because of Him video again which was just the perfect reminder of the reason we celebrate Easter. I know Christ lives and that because he lives, I will live again. I'm grateful that because of Him I will get to be with my family forever.

31 Weeks

31 weeks and 1 day

AHHHH!!! I can't believe I'm 31 weeks already! Is anyone besides me freaking out that little baby E will be here in 9 weeks (hopefully)! If no one else is then I guarantee I am freaking out enough for everyone :) Sometimes its just excited freaking out and other times not so much.

I'm sure everyone can tell that I'm tiny. I've taken my sweet time getting a belly during this pregnancy and at my 30 week appointment they finally said that I was measuring small or below "normal". The bright side was that we would get to have an ultrasound a week later and actually see our little man. So we had an ultrasound on Friday because our doctor thought that baby E was probably way smaller than he should be and was telling us that they would probably have to take him early if he wasn't growing. I just kept thinking...I'm a small person...he is probably just small so he can fit in the space he has. Well good news....baby E is just fine. He is measuring in the 41st percentile in weight (anything above 10% is out of danger) so he is a little below average but not too bad. I laughed when the technician told me his length was about a week or so shorter than "normal". I told her well look at his parents....we aren't exactly giants either :) So he is growing but it is just a little slower than average but he is growing and has no problems right now :) YAY!

- I'm starting to feel more exhausted lately so naps are becoming more common :)

- Little man has the hiccups a lot which are a lot of fun to feel. He has also started rolling around more.

- I'm still exercising almost everyday but just not quite as long anymore. I'm loving that I still can though cause I don't know what I would do if I couldn't.

- I'm still able to wear all of my pre-pregnancy pants like normal (no rubber band trick yet) :) I have had to get rid of a few shirts though til after June cause they just aren't long enough anymore.

- I'm still craving fruit all the time it seems like! My most recent has been watermelon...I would eat it all day if I could :)

- I'm starting to get slightly more uncomfortable at night but its not too bad yet and if I wake up I'm usually able to get back to sleep pretty quickly.

We are getting more and more excited for our little man to arrive! I love imagining who he is going to look more like or act more like. I love feeling him move around and I totally don't care when he kicks me repeatedly. I'm sure the emotional wreck I am most of the time is really not fun for Mike but I know it will all be worth it when we have our little guy :)

*Thank you for putting up with me sweetie. I love you!

A Day in Atlanta

Mike has this week off from school. Its nice for him to relax around the apartment of course but its also nice to get out and go do fun stuff that we don't get to do when he's in school. So we planned a day trip to Atlanta. We planned to try out Fernbank museum and to have a picnic too. Just a nice simple relaxing day.

The view when you walk into the museum

 The museum is a decent size and it focuses on Georgia so it was interesting to see how things how changed and evolved in this region. We got lucky too that it wasn't crowded while we were there so we could actually enjoy things.

So even though the dinosaur bones weren't real, they were built to scale which was still pretty impressive. Also, if you know me then you know I love dinosaurs so I thought the dinosaurs were pretty cool.

The main reason we went to this museum was to see the whale exhibit. Mike has been talking about seeing this since we went to the aquarium last year and saw whale sharks. Unfortunately you couldn't take any pictures in that part of the museum (which is sad because it was seriously the best part of the whole thing). We got to see the skeleton of a 59 ft. male sperm whale and a 40 ft female sperm whale which was amazing and the skeletons of some much smaller whales as well. It was really cool to see.

Just some pictures of the other things we got to see in the museum (I didn't realize how few pictures I took):

We got to pretend to be a weather man and a weather women...Mike blended into the rain

So here is my review of the museum. I would give it 3.5 out of 5 stars. It's not too bad for a state natural history museum and they have a lot of exhibits for kids. The reason I give it a lower ranking is because a lot of the rooms are pretty sparse as far as artifacts and those types of things. Also, some of the signs were missing writing that had been torn or rubbed off. For the price you pay to get in, you expect to be able to read all of the plaques at the very least. The special exhibit was what made it all worth it for me but without that it would have been much more disappointing. It also would probably have been more interesting if I didn't already know a lot of the information.

After the museum, we were going to head downtown and eat at a park. However, we knew the park was free but we figured we would have to pay for parking so we decided to go see the Atlanta temple since we were so close and just have a nice lunch at the temple.

We also couldn't leave the beautiful temple grounds without taking a picture of my belly.

Picture taken at 29 weeks and 3 days

 Even though the museum was a bit disappointing, we still had a great time just being out and going to see new things. We love to explore new places and go see new things so this was a fun trip :)

Four Years!!!

 Happy Anniversary Mike! I can't believe its already been 4 years but it has definitely been the best 4 years ever!!

 Someday Mike and I may be able to celebrate our anniversary on the actual day but at least one of us has been in school each year since we got married or it was on a Sunday so we usually have to push it to another day. This year the month of March was crazy since Mike was in school and had board exams and finals right around March 25th. This meant we were both extremely stressed right around our anniversary. So we decided to wait until the 29th to do our celebrating because Mike would be completely done with the quarter and so we would both be much more relaxed.

We planned a full day in Greenville and I was so excited about it. The day was going to be full of shopping, registering, movies and yummy food. We were so excited to kind of get out of town and just spend the day relaxing and having fun that a forecast of rain couldn't even ruin our day.

We have been needing to do our baby registries so we decided to start at Target and do that one first. I forgot how much fun it is to create one! We loved just wandering the store and picking out fun stuff for our little guy :)

The other part of our plan to celebrate our 4 years was to go see a movie. We haven't been to a movie in a while and our first plan was to go see the new movie Noah. Then we heard such terrible things about it that we decided to go see Divergent instead. I had read the book so I was really excited to see it and for Mike to see it!

We LOVED the movie!! Honestly, I thought it was excellent and really kept me engaged. I love the story and the message it gives. I thought the acting was great too. I would strongly recommend this movie.

Such good food! Happy Anniversary sweetie!

Dinner was an interesting experience. Our original plan was to go to Ruby Tuesday because we had such a good experience there on Valentine's Day. When we got there it was about 6:55 and they weren't too busy. Lots of people were inside but we didn't have to wait to be seated. So we went and sat down and the hostess got us our water and then said our waiter would be right with us. So we sat and looked at our menu's and decided on our food. Then we waited and we waited and we waited. Before we knew it, it was 7:20 and still no one had come to our table. So it had now been 25 minutes or so and I looked at Mike and said "let's go". So we stood up and walked out of the restaurant. Honestly, I was so annoyed about it. I mean it would be one thing if we had been waiting for food but no one even came to introduce themselves or take our order.

So instead we went to Red Robin. It was super busy when we got there. We had to wait about 15 minutes to be seated but once we were the waitress came right to our table and began to serve us-shocking I know. Then we proceeded to have a lovely dinner of great food and great company :) It ended up being a great dinner. Our waitress even took a picture of us.

No anniversary celebration would be complete though without something sweet and terrible for you but oh so delicious, so we headed to Coldstone! I seriously love the ice cream here so much that we only come here on special occasions because if I not then I would go way too much :) I had my traditional cheesecake ice cream that I always look forwards to getting but I added a brownie and nuts and whip cream this time and oh boy I was in heaven :) It was the perfect ending to a wonderful day!

I can't believe Mike and I have already been married 4 years. I know that may not seem like a lot to most people but I think its amazing. Sometimes it seems like we got married yesterday and sometimes I feel like we've always been together. We've had our ups and downs and its not always easy but its so worth it! I think this past year with all our fertility struggles and my anxiety during pregnancy has really strengthened our marriage. I'm grateful our family is growing but I'm also grateful to have had the past 4 years to learn and grow as husband and wife and enjoy that time together :) I love him so much! He is seriously the best husband (I know everyone says that but its true) and is so patient with me. He treats me better than I deserve and is honestly willing to do anything for me. I've been especially difficult lately (I'm not a very nice pregnant woman and I'm super emotional and anxious) and he has handled it so well and I'm so grateful for that. (I think if the roles were reversed I would've run away by now haha) I know that neither of us is perfect but I feel like we are perfect for each other and help to bring out the best in each other. I can't wait to see him with our little boy! I know he is going to be a wonderful dad :) I love you Mike!

Mike Update 3/14

Mike here again. I just wanted to write a little update on my progress so far, although most people following this blog want pregnancy/baby updates, I will interject a little about what has been going on in my life, (selfish mike moment). Today marked the last day of my seventh quarter of school. Since it is a fourteen quarter program, you guessed it I am half way there. It has gone fast but not quite fast enough for my liking, you know the old phrase days feel like years but weeks feel like minutes or something like that. Seventh quarter was one of the toughest for me so far. This was the quarter where at the end I took my first of the four part national licensing board examinations. While studying for those, I also had eight other classes to worry about, which ended up giving me by far the most quizzes and tests I have ever taken in a 11 week period. But here I am writing this to you today as a survivor. So in retrospect I experienced a lot in the last year and three quarters. During this time I have been able to perform well on the first of my board examinations, (which marks a completion of basic sciences, thank goodness) I have been able to discover the way that I will deliver my services as a chiropractor i.e. the technique I will use (which I am taking the elective on it this next quarter which I am very excited about), I have learned a ton of material (from different types of bacterium to the angle of the joints on your spine to energy metabolism and even the stages of syphilis plus much much more), and I have made some great friends in the process as well (suffering together helps to build relationships and you cannot hide when everyone that started with you has the same classes throughout the three and a half year program).

So today also marks a large transition in my education. The first half has been nearly all sitting in classes getting lectured at, but starting next quarter we transition to my time in the clinic as an intern. We start with review classes next quarter and then student clinic in the summer, where we get a student reciprocal as a patient as well as new students of Sherman as patients and then this fall they will set us loose on outpatients from the outside world, (under the supervision of a licensed case doctor of course). I will need to bring in my some of my own new patients so if anyone is wanting to try out the empowering effects of chiropractic care let me know. So on new experiences and more success as I journey to becoming a chiropractor.

I have included details of how boards went from my blog, Musings of a Future Chiropractor, the post was written last Monday. If you want to learn more about chiropractic and other health topics go check that blog out. Here is that Board post:

Well that was one of the fastest weekends I have ever experienced. Nine hours of testing over a day and half makes time pass rapidly. It turns out that I have been able to retain information for a year and a half of classes. I was able to keep track of how many of the questions I knew for sure the answer to, and to my joy it was more than half on all six sections, (you need 375 out of 800 or 46% to pass each section of part 1). Biochemistry was by far my strongest section, no surprise there. Although this is no guarantee that I have passed them, as with all standardized tests, they will now take all the tests from around the country and statistically adjust them; like if everyone got a question right, or if everyone got it wrong they throw it out and readjust and they will do all other types of statistical wizardry to get the final scores. Based on past results they tend to curve the tests in such a way that ~75% pass and ~25% fail each time they administer the exams. I feel confident that I am in the top 75% and I will get the official scores on May 5th.

With everything said and done, I am happy to have that experience done and over with. One less hoop to jump through before I can become a licensed chiropractor. I would like to thank all those that gave my support and sent happy thoughts my way way. Now on to pre-clinic next quarter and the next phase in my education.

                                    

-Mike E

A food post

I thoroughly enjoyed the second trimester of pregnancy as far as my high energy level. I took full advantage of it since I know it won't last forever. Since I'm home now during the day I've been trying to find things to keep me busy. One thing I have been doing is cooking more. I really enjoy cooking (but not baking) and so we bought a new cookbook for me to use to try some new things out. I was getting really bored with our menu lately.

I love cooking and I love to try new things but I always get frustrated when I see this long list of ingredients and half of them I don't have and would only use when I made that meal. I don't want to pay for that especially if we may end up not liking the meal. Then we went to Barnes and Noble to look around and found this: Taste of Home: 5-Ingredient Cookbook

I love this book so far! My favorite part is that I have and use just about everything a recipe calls for in my apartment. Everything we've tried has been a winner so far. So I thought I would share a couple of our favorites:

1. Garlic potatoes and ham (This is so good!)

8 small red potatoes, cut into wedges
1 tablespoon vegetable oil
1 package (16oz) frozen broccoli cuts, partially thawed (we used green beans...delicious)
1 cup cubed fully cooked ham
1 envelope herb with garlic soup mix (we used half the package for the 2 of us and it was perfect)

In a large skillet, cook potatoes in oil over medium-high heat for 10 minutes or until lightly browned. Stir in broccoli, ham and soup mix. Reduce heat; cover and cook for 25 minutes or until potatoes are tender. (4 servings)

2. Noodle and rice pilaf

*We usually have this with chicken and corn on the cob

1/4c butter
1 cup long grain rice (uncooked)
1/2 cup uncooked fine egg noodles
2-3/4 cups chicken broth
Minced parsley

In a saucepan, melt butter. Add the rice and noodles; cook and stir until lightly browned, about 3 minutes. Stir in broth; bring to a boil. Reduce heat; cover and simmer for 20-25 minutes or until broth is absorbed and rice is tender. Stir in parsley. (4 servings)

3. Ham and rice bake

1 can (10-3/4oz) condensed cream of chicken soup, undiluted
1 cup shredded cheddar cheese, divided
1 package frozen vegetables, thawed (we don't mix the veggies in with the bake-we just have them on the side so I don't know how that would turn out)
1 cup cooked rice
1 cup cubed fully cooked ham

In a large saucepan, combine the soup and a 1/2 cup cheese; cook and stir until cheese is melted. Stir in vegetables, rice and ham.
Transfer to a greased 1-1/2 qt. baking dish. Sprinkle remaining cheese on top. Bake, uncovered, at 350 for 25-30 minutes. Enjoy :)

4. Seafood stuffing

1 package instant chicken flavored stuffing mix
1 cup imitation crabmeat
1 cup small frozen cooked shrimp
1 teaspoon lemon juice

Cook the stuffing according to package directions. Mix with seafood and sprinkle with lemon juice. This is so tasty, easy and filling. 

5. Graham Cracker Brownies (I made these for a bake sale at Sherman and they were gone in the first hour. Several people came back and bought a second or third)

2 cups graham cracker crumbs (about 30 squares of crushed graham cracker)
1 cup semisweet chocolate chips
1 tsp. baking powder
pinch of salt
1 14-oz can sweetened condensed milk

Combine all ingredients in a bowl. Spread into greased 8-in. square baking pan. Bake at 350 for 30-35 minutes. Let cool and then enjoy :)

I had such a hard time just choosing 5 to share but these are some of the easiest and most cooked in our home. They are so good and so easy to manipulate according to the size of your family. 

*All recipes above came from the Taste of Home: 5-Ingredient Cookbook