My First "Wedding"

I use the word "wedding" loosely, but if that is what you call getting legally married, then that is what we had four years ago today.

A little background for those that don't know: Patrick is my highschool sweetheart. We started dating in January 2004 when I was a Junior, and he had already graduated in 2003 {thus, I am not HIS high school sweetheart}. Things were great for a couple months, and I was smitten. Then we hit some rough patches and were off and on for several years. Sometimes we were together, and I attended a couple graduations of various Army schools. For some others, we weren't on speaking terms. We danced at his mom's wedding in 2006, and I remember him asking me if I would still marry him one day even if he reenlisted, because he was about to re-up for six more years.

Anyway, after all this back and forth, we finally decided to put a stop to it in April 2008. I was still in school at OSU, and Patrick was in Washington. We rekindled our relationship over the phone, and he deployed just three days after I had reached out to him after over a year of not speaking. We made plans for me to come visit him during his leave that July, and booked our wedding venue for June 13, 2009. I counted down the days til I could see him again, and July finally arrived. I flew to Washington, and we had planned for me to stay until early August, then I would go back for my fall semester at OSU. Patrick had talked about maybe buying a house, but he would be deploying again in just six months and didn't want to have a house sitting unoccupied while he was gone. I suggested having a courthouse wedding just to get the extra BAH so we could buy a house, then even suggested that I could just stay here and live in it.

We looked into the courthouse thing, I even got a cute little white dress, but someone told me it wasn't as romantic as it is in the movies. They said you are just in line at the courthouse with the criminals waiting to hear there charges or go before the judge or whatever. That didn't sound very appealing to me...We talked it over, and Patrick didn't want to do anything ceremonious since we were having our wedding in the Church the next summer. I looked up people who could perform marriages near us, and found a pastor who actually lived in an apartment complex down the street. Awesome! So we make arrangements, and had the most un-ceremonious wedding in the history of weddings.

On a Thursday night, we  knock on the door and no one answers for a little while. We almost chicken out because it was a pretty sketchy apartment complex and we were thinking "wow, THIS is where we are about to get married..." And just as we are going to turn and walk away, a man with spiky hair, horn rimmed glasses, and huge holes in his ears answers the door. Obviously we are pretty surprised by his appearance, given the fact that he was a pastor. After making sure he was indeed able to marry us, and have it count, we go inside. We signed our lives away on a little piece of paper on his small, round bar table with his wife and our roommate at the time as witnesses. His wife was equally "colorful" with retro glasses, pink hair and tattoos. If you would've asked me at any point in my life before this night if I would ever get married by a punk preacher and his punk wife, I would have laughed. But that is what happened!


We did go on to have a beautiful "real" ceremony at St. Patrick's Church in New Orleans the next year to make our marriage official before God. I will write another post about that later, maybe on our next 4th anniversary (June 13, 2013).

I feel so blessed that he is still my best friend, with whom I am very much in love four years later. That's like 20 years in nowadays terms with people divorcing left and right. And I consider our marriage to be in great shape, as our only arguments seem to center around taste in decor, and sometimes my (lack of) housekeeping. I'd say after having two kids in two years, if those are our only problems we are doing pretty ok! Patrick is a great husband, and a great father, and I am so lucky to share my life with such a wonderful man.


And now I will leave you with some photos taken roughly around our anniversary each year, except for the ones, which were taken a couple months after we got married the first time.

This was in November 2008. This is a candid shot that I think is hilarious, I was complaining about being cold, and Patrick was talking to my dad.

This one is better. Oh to be young and thin again. Maybe one day. (Just thin though, obviously I can't go back in time and be young again.)

This was right after our ceremony, we took a horse carriage ride around New Orleans on the way to our reception site. June 13, 2009.

This was taken as we left the hospital with our daughter, on June 27th 2010, a month before our 2nd anniversary, or two weeks after our first, depending on which one you use. Confused yet?

Here is our little family in July 2011. Abigail had just turned one, we had our 2nd and 3rd anniversaries, and I was about 14 weeks into cooking little Patrick, Jr.

And here is our little family's most recent picture, from June 2012.

Pumpkin Pie

Something really exciting happened in my house today. My Bubba ate solids!! This might not sound like a big deal, since he is going to be 6 months old in a couple days, and that's the recommended time to start your baby on solids. Well, Abigail didn't eat solids until she was 10 months old. I waited until 6 months with her like I was supposed to, then spent four more anxious months worrying about her development as she continued to push every.single.thing. out of her mouth. I even took her to an occupational therapist to see if we could pinpoint the problem. Bam. She ate like a champ at the appointment, like she had been eating solid food her whole life. Of course. So I feel ridiculous even being there, but the OT was very nice about it and gave me lots of helpful information about what, and how much I should expect her to be eating. Anyway, on with the story.

I wanted something sweet today with lunch, and also needed some fiber (TMI? it happens.) so I made myself some pumpkin pie in a bowl. {A can of plain pumpkin, generous amounts of pumpkin pie spice(nutmeg, allspice, ginger), cinnamon, a little butter, and a little brown sugar, in the microwave for a minute and a half to melt the butter and sugar, relatively delicious.} I gave some to Abigail first, because she always wants to eat the same thing I am eating. Then Patrick ate like half of it, and finally I get around to eating some myself, and I think "hmm I wonder if Bubba would eat this."

There was probably 1/2 a cup left at this point, and I gave him a bite to taste. I noticed that he closed his mouth around the spoon, and REALLY thought about it. (Let me first say that I have tried solids only a handful of times, we've tried apples and sweet potatoes from the jar, both with not much luck). After he tasted it, I gave him another bite. He actually closed his mouth around the spoon on purpose! With the other foods, I've just kind of wiped the food on the roof of his mouth, pretty much forcing him to eat it. Or spit it out. He did a little of both. But today!! He loved it! He would get so excited when I brought the spoon to his mouth. After a while he had probably eaten a good 1/3 of a cup! That is a lot for a baby who's never eaten anything but milk before!

I am so very excited about this development. I guess he just needed to eat something yummy instead of nasty baby food jars. I guess it's time to bust out the Baby Bullet and make my boy some food! Now I just have to figure out how to keep Abigail from getting upset when she can't have what he is having. Oh well, we'll see. 

And now, here is an adorable sequence of photos I like to call "the story of a bite." Enjoy :-)

Table Transformation

Let's see if I can get this post written up in the next 20 minutes before Abigail gets up from her nap. Bubba is already crying from the other room, but if you read anything I say on facebook you know that's a sore subject for me right now. The boy is just boycotting sleep. Anyway. I have a table. It's from Ikea, and it's great. Very simple. It's this one, the Stornas table:

 Buuut...it's dark brown. I am obsessed with painting anything and everything white these days, so a few weeks ago I decided on a whim to paint the bottom part of our table white. Just the legs, and those boards running under the table top. I used the same paint that I am using on our cabinets, which claims to be a paint & primer in one. Don't believe the hype. It's not true. I don't know how they can even put that on their label and not get sued for false advertising. But I digress. I put on two, maybe three coats, and after a couple weeks there were already chips and peeling places. I decided it needed some REAL primer to really hold the paint on there.

Earlier this week, I got down and dirty and sanded off all the paint. What a pain. {but I learned my lesson! I will always prime first!} I painted on some kilz from the can. I would have loved to just used the spray paint but I couldn't get the table outside, and even if I could, there was nowhere to actually do it. So I just used a craft sponge brush and painted it on.

Then I taped up everything, used some aluminum foil, and some sheets, and whipped out my awesome paint sprayer to make the paint nice and even all over and avoid brush strokes.

Here was my little setup:

Don't mind Abigail's weird face, I guess I caught her mid-chew. This is what my house looked like for a couple hours, but luckily I did get it all cleaned up before Patrick got home from work. 

I didn't have anything else I could think of to use, and didn't want to run to Lowes just for drop cloths and stuff, so I taped foil around the edge. I felt pretty resourceful. 

I really like the white. I have big plans to sand the top and re-stain it a cherry color. Patrick says we can't do that right now though because the other furniture in our dining/living area is espresso colored and it would look weird. I agree, so I guess I'll just have to do something about that, huh? ;-)

Here is a random photo of my new owl from Goodwill. He was $1.99, and had some dirty spots on him. I gave him a couple coats of white gloss spraypaint, and a coat of spray polycrylic and now there he is on our mantle. 

Just want to take a moment to announce that Abigail can draw circles! Kind of. If you look in this picture, she is actually drawing spirals instead of just the zig-zag scribbles she usually does. And the best part is that she does it when I ask her to draw circles. I'm glad she's learning. I know she is very observant, and smart, but I just get so worried because she was so slow to talk, and still am a little worried now that she doesn't ask questions. But I'm sure I am just being paranoid. 

Pinteresting Day

I want to keep up with posting, but I am so tired I haven't been doing much projecting. The good news is, yesterday Abigail and I had a great day. I finally got to spend some real, quality time with her. We played outside for a while, read lots of stories, and had a great bedtime that wasn't rushed. It was definitely a much needed day with my baby girl! I can't wait to get that print from my last post up in a frame next to my bed to remind me every day to enjoy my sweet babies.

T Patrick is going to be crawling any day now. He is up on all fours like a champ, has been for like a month now, and now he is really rocking and ready to go. He just has to figure out how to do it :-) We brought out the pack n play last night to try getting him used to sleeping on a flat surface again. He slept pretty well last night really. I think he only woke up once at 3, but I could be wrong. I had to let Stewie outside at 12:30, and everything in the middle of the night just kind of runs together for me. So we'll just be optimistic and say he only woke up once. I brought a dining room chair in our room for now to nurse him in until we can get the Tullsta chair from Ikea. Which I've discovered is really a necessity, because I almost fell off the dining chair multiple times during our nursing session last night. I am pretty wobbly when I'm half asleep, so arms to keep my contained are a must!

Abigail had daycare this morning, so I was able to get a bit of work done on my friend's curtains. I am inching my way towards being done, but it is taken much longer than I hoped it would. So I think a BIG HUGE THANK YOU to Lindsey is necessary for having patience with me!

Once Abigail got home, I got to work on painting the bottom of our kitchen table. I will be writing a full post on that sometime when I can get the photos together.

And now, for the meat of this post, I am leaving you with some stuff I am LOVING on Pinterest right now. Because who doesn't love some house eye candy??

Source: younghouselove.com via Amy on Pinterest

Isn't that kitchen amazing? Click on the source to see the before and be even more amazed. Best thing is that it only cost a little over $1000! It looks pretty easy to turn your kitchen into something light and bright like this! (Although there is nothing easy about painting cabinets when you have two kids under two!)

Source: kerrisdaledesign.com via Amy on Pinterest

This night stand is awesome. And also kind of simple. I think maybe I will make it one day...? I emailed the designer about it, and apparently it's SUPER SPECIAL because it cost over $1000. Yep. I REALLY think I could make this though...stay tuned! I also love that pillow fabric.

Source: etsy.com via Amy on Pinterest

I want these so bad for Abigail's room! They totally go with her new curtains I made her recently and that pin board. Love.

Source: justagirlblog.com via Amy on Pinterest

I have been drooling over board and batten lately. It's everywhere, everyone's doing it, and consider me on board. I love it! I really think I want to do it in our entry. We'll see if that happens this winter. If not, I will definitely be doing some in our next abode!

That's all for now folks, little bubba is calling me.

From a Tired Mommy

This is a poem I found that was just what I needed to read right now:

This sentiment is something that I am really struggling with right now in my life. I feel like this time with my kids is slipping by so fast, and I am so tired that I find myself just "existing" and trying to stay alive long enough to make it to bed time. And bed time isn't even that much of a reprieve because I have not slept all night in two years. There was one month when Abigail was 10 months old where she slept all night, but then I got pregnant, and even though she was sleeping, I began having lots of insomnia and night waking very early in my pregnancy that lasted til the very end. And then obviously I have a baby who wakes up several times a night now. I. am. tired. I feel like even saying it with periods after each word is still an understatement. Like, understatement of the century.

Not only am I tired, but for 6 months I have been co-sleeping with T Patrick and if you have ever breastfed in the "side-lying" position, you know how your neck feels when you wake up after falling asleep that way. If you have never fallen asleep breastfeeding like that, just imagine sleeping on your side with your bottom arm all the way up under your head ALL NIGHT. So my neck and my trap muscles hurt always. And I am always having stingers in my neck. So much painful nerve things going on, and soreness, and it is just interfering with my ability to participate in life.

On one hand, I have a husband who gets frustrated with piles of laundry and things around our house. See our house tour to see just why he is always frustrated with me. On the other hand, I have a beautiful two year old who, when I open the door to let her occupy herself in the backyard while I get things done around the house, or just rest, comes to me and says "hand? hand? hand? hand? hand?" because she wants to walk around our back yard holding my hand. It breaks my heart that most of the time, resting or cleaning takes priority over playing with my little girl, who will only be two years old for 340 more days. And don't get me started on my sweet little boy. I could just bite his little cheeks all day long. He is the cutest thing ever. So squishy! And growing so fast. I love my babies. But I'm not enjoying them as much as I want to. 

If anyone reading this didn't already know, I live in Washington state. My parents are in Oklahoma and Patrick's parents are still in Louisiana, where we are both originally from. I don't have a lot of time to make friends up here, and the good ones I have made have all moved away in the last year. One of my closest friends from up here hasn't left yet, but lives about 45 minutes away from me. I don't know any of my neighbors, because I don't have the energy to try to meet them and maintain a friendship with them. So this means that I have NO help. I am with two small children day in, day out, without a break once in a while to take a nap, paint a cabinet door, or get a pedicure. Or just have a couple hours with no responsibility. No constantly being on guard for a toddler about to get into something she shouldn't be, or a puppy thinking about peeing on the floor, or a baby that may or may not be crying waking up from a nap. It can get exhausting to always be "on duty." And yes, I have my husband here, but he is tired too. He gets up for work at 4:50am and is out the door by 5:15 every week day, and often works weird overnight schedules and weekends. And he does help out and give me breaks every now and then, but it's not the same as having my mom live down the road and being able to come help me out when I'm having a rough day. I am completely on my own. 

I am not trying to complain really, just putting it out there. I know lots of people make it through life every day with two kids 19ish months apart. I just feel like it is SO HARD. I don't know how other people do it and make it look so easy. I'm writing this so when my kids are older, and I am sad that I didn't enjoy them as much as a should have when they were little babies, I can read this and remember how difficult it was and not be too hard on myself. 

Oh, and back to not having time or energy to appreciate my babies...we are currently trying to get Bubba to sleep through the night. I feel so guilty about letting him cry so much. I am of the opinion that sleeping through the night is a developmental milestone just like rolling, crawling, sitting, etc. And I don't think you can make a baby sleep all night if they're not ready any more than you can make a baby crawl before he is ready. Despite that belief, I am going to give "cry it out" the old college try, because I am just at a loss with the sleep deprivation and neck pain. 

To make a long story short, does anyone want to come spend a few hours at my house, a couple days a week, so I can take some breaks, do some chores and have the rest of my time to spend enjoying my beautiful, smart, sweet, adorable babies?? 

Blogger 411

I saw this on a friend's blog and thought it would fun to share some relevant and some random information with y'all!

1. How long have you been blogging? And what got you started on blogging? Has your blog changed?
I have been blogging officially since Mother's day this year, so only two months! My blog hasn't had much time to change yet!

2. Did you go to college? If so where, and what did you study?
I did, I spent three years at Oklahoma State University, moved to Washington and got married before my 4th year, so I've been working on finishing up online at Columbia Southern University ever since. Yes, still not done...whomp whomp. If you're counting, that's 7 years of college under my belt folks, and still no BA. I studied nutrition and exercise for two semesters at OSU, and the rest of my years have been spent studying marketing and finance.

3. Where have you traveled?
I have been to most of the U.S., Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and Belize.

4. If you won the lottery, what would be the first thing you would buy?
A different house and all new furniture, of course! (well, new to me...lots would be antiques!)

5. What are your 3 biggest pet peeves?
1. Grammar
2. Driving like an idiot (that includes fast idiocy, and slow idiocy, and all other types of driving idiocies)
3. Pets (har har...get it? But for real...not a fan.)

6. What is your favorite movie?
I like so many now that I don't think I can pick a favorite. But for the longest time, in like, middle school, My Best Friend's Wedding was my favorite movie! I could watch it over and over!!

7. What is your drink of choice; wine, beer, or liquor. Or Water, Soda, Tea?
I quit drinking alcohol for the most part after gaining 26lbs my freshman year of college! So I don't really have much of a taste for it. However, back in the day my only drink of choice was diet coke with either vodka (vanilla smirnoff in particular) or whiskey. Nowadays my only drink is water! I prefer to eat my calories rather than drink them, so water it is! 


8. What is something you enjoy to do when you have me time?
Projects around the house! Or sleeping!! Sleep is a big one. My kids don't think I need much, but they are mistaken. I also like to read and look at house eye candy on the internetzz. 

9. If you could have a $10,000 shopping spree to one store, which store would it be?
Oh my. One store...I would have to say Whole Foods so I could get grassfed meat for my family instead of the CAFO crap in the grocery stores. We {try to} eat Paleo in our house, so eat A LOT of meat, but the quality is not great and that concerns me. I would love to be able to afford $6/lb ground beef and pork chops from grassfed animals! 
If that answer is too boring, I would also LOVE to spend $10000 at a good flea market and get some awesome antique furniture, fix it up and start a shop selling it.


10. Share with us an embarrassing moment of your past? Or present. 
I am lucky enough to have gotten by so far without any catastrophically embarrassing moments in my life, but recently I have had the top button on my button up shirt come undone a few times in public. This happens to be a very crucial button that keeps my boobs inside my shirt, so it's not cool when it pops open.

I also farted on my husband's lap once. Which may not be embarrassing for a lot of people, but I am not a "fart and poop in front of my husband" kinda gal. So as far as he knows that is the only time I've ever farted in the last 4 years. Is this TMI? I think it might be...

11. What day would you love to relive again?
This is a hard one. I've never had any really particularly awesome days. My wedding was just kind of whatever, my childbirths were cool but awfully painful so I don't think I'd relive that again for the same kid...I guess I don't really have an answer to this question. Although it would be nice to relive any day when I weighed 125lbs. I would appreciate it more this time around!


12. If your life was turned into a movie... what actor would play you?
I was told once that I looked like Sandra Bullock in my driver's license photo. But I do not at all look like her. So it wouldn't be Sandy. It would probably be Kristen Wiig from SNL/Bridesmaids, etc. I am way not as funny as she is, but I am a big spaz and pretty awkward. So if she could be more awkward, in a less funny way, she would do a great job playing me. 


13. What are the jobs you had in high school/college/the early years?
In high school I worked at the Hot Spot tanning salon in Mandeville. Then I worked at three more tanning salons in Stillwater, OK while I was in school at OSU. Then when I moved to Washington, I worked for a psychotic chiropractor for 3 weeks, then spent a year working for American General Finance (now Springleaf Finance). And that right there is my whole resume, folks. I have been a stay at home mom since I was 21 weeks pregnant with Abigail. 


14. Show us a picture from high school or college.
I love looking at old photos of people, so I am going to post a bunch of these! 

This is me and my dad at the Sweet 16 for the sophomore girls at my school. I was 15 here though.

This is me and my baby boy Pepsi. He was my first horse that I got when I was 11 and he was 3. 

I love him!

This is me and my husband in 2004. I was just starting my senior year, and this was in Mississippi after one of his fights. {he won, hence the medal :-) } There is a better version of this floating around somewhere where Patrick's eyes are open, but I don't know where it is. :-(

This is one of my favorite pictures from college, I think it was the beginning of my sophomore year. These girls were my best friends at OSU! 

15. If you could travel anywhere in the world, all expenses paid, where would you go?
I would go to Greece! Hands down, I think it is so beautiful, I would LOVE to go there for FREEEE. I am hoping to eventually pay to go there anyway, but if anyone out there wants to foot the bill, you are more than welcome to!


16. Show us the most current picture of you or you, or your family, or anything of meaning to you. 

This is my family at our photo shoot in early June. I <3 my family! 

17. Where do you see your life 5 years from now?
Hopefully somewhere WARM! We should be living in the south somewhere, maybe with one more kid. But mostly I hope that we are all happy and healthy! And that my house is pretty and my husband and I don't get divorced over decor disagreements...ahem...

Some Bubba Eye Candy

This is just a picture dump of my boy and his dog. Enjoy!

"Hmm this looks yummyyyy...."

Nom nom nom...

Oooooohhhh...what's this???

Mom I think he is trying to get me....

That's all folks. Haven't been getting much sleep around here so I haven't had much energy to do work on the house. Here's hoping for a restful night tonight!

Let's Talk About Vacuums

This 1980's hideous awesomeness will soon be coming to live at my house! And I am actually SUPER excited about it!! My current vacuum just bit the dust a few days ago, and my parents were nice enough to foot the bill for the majority of this bad boy from their dealer in Tulsa. It will be shipped to my house for FREE and have a TEN year warranty! I cannot begin to tell you how excited I am to have a vacuum cleaner that is guaranteed for TEN YEARS! Can you tell how excited I am?????!!!!!

I can't believe I am so excited about a vacuum cleaner. I think that's how you know you are an old lady. Excited for a vacuum cleaner at age 25. But guess what. My mom has had her vacuum like this for 25 years. WHICH MEANS....I could still be using this vacuum cleaner when I have grand children. Sah-weet! Looking at my record so far with vacuums (two for about $200 in the last 4 years) this vacuum cleaner will have paid for itself in like 8 years, and anything after that is just awesome free vacuuming!!

Since I burned everyone's eyeballs with that hideous vacuum photo above, here is a picture of my little fruit thief at the grocery store:

I turn my head for 5 seconds to grab some peaches, and I must have had the cart too close to the produce, because when I turned back around she had taken a nectarine and already eaten two bites. At least my girl loves good food! It could definitely be worse!

Freebies! and a Miracle

Sorry for the tease in the title, but this post is not about freebies for any readers...I'm not famous enough for that yet! (However, if anyone reading this would like for me to review something, or use my blog to promote something feel free to contact me!)

What I'm talking about is all the free stuff I scored at Lowes yesterday! I went in just to price out having two more pieces of glass cut to match the piece I stole out of an old 11x14 frame and used in my new homemade frame. I asked the salesman about acrylic too, because I thought maybe it would be cheaper.  Well it turned out to be a LOT cheaper, because he had a bunch of scraps already there, and cut me two pieces for free! :-) Abigail was with me, and also got a free wooden toy to put together at home. It was their kid project for the day, and the lady who was taking the toys to set up walked past us and showed it to Abigail. It was a "Kung Fu Panda" on a stick that swiveled. Not the coolest toy ever, but Abigail was excited about the "PADA" so the lady gave us one to take home. Patrick put it together, and now this guy lives on our kitchen table, until it winds up on the ground and Stewie eats it.

And now for the miracle...

Abigail held her bubba all by herself on the couch yesterday for a few whole minutes AND SMILED while I took her picture!!! I am so excited! This NEVER happens!

Our photo shoot started like this:

Looking at the TV like usual, trying to figure out why the picture and sound goes away every time mommy gets out the camera.

Then she miraculously looked at me and did THIS:

And THIS:

(No, they are not the same picture...I promise. But I do have about 5 more that look just like these two. Just call me Patti Perkins. (That's my mom, and for those of you who don't know her, she is camera-crazy. For real. (How many parenthetical notations can I make inside eachother?? Should I stop?)))

Then when I thought we could call it done and had turned off my camera, she started giving Bubba the cutest sugars ever! So I pull my camera back up and by then I kind of missed the moment. I asked her to give him some more sugars, but all the pictures I got just look like she is torturing him. But here they are anyway for your viewing pleasure.

Disclaimer: No babies were harmed during the making of these photos.

Patrick Junior's Grand Entrance

I know a lot of people like to read other people's birth stories. Or maybe I'm the only one. If you don't like birth stories, then go ahead and skip this post! Ok, on with the story.

I had been getting weekly membrane sweeps since 38 weeks. We all thought I'd be having a big baby, so I was hoping for sooner rather than later. Fast forward to February 2. I was 40 weeks and 5 days pregnant. I had been sick for a week, and also had been in prodromal (or false) labor for a week. Slightly uncomfortable contractions every 7-10 minutes. For a WEEK. With no progress. I was GBS+ this time, so the goal was to get to the hospital with enough time to get some antibiotics. This made it tough to know when to go in, and we had 2 false alarms where we decided to go ahead and drop Abigail off with our friends and go to the hospital. But each time I was only 4cm dilated, which meant that I wasn't progressing even though my contractions would get to be 1-3 minutes apart.

Ok so I backed up a little after I fast forwarded. So February 2nd rolls around, and my contractions are starting to get closer and stronger again. I am really feeling like this is it, so around 5ish we leave for the hospital. We brought Abigail with us this time, so we didn't bother our friends for a third time in case it was another false alarm! Sure enough, I am still 4cm dilated. We ask if we can just go ahead and break my water since they had already offered that to us the second time we went in, and it seemed like that was the only thing keeping him from dilating my cervix all the way. They said they couldn't do it at that time because they were not staffed enough for an "elective induction." So we decided to go home. Again. My midwife offered me some morphine to help with the contraction pain so I could get some sleep since the pain appeared to be futile (as in, not doing any work to open my cervix.) While pretty uncomfortable, the contractions weren't unbearable at the time, so I turned down the morphine. I also didn't like the idea of taking something like that when I didn't really need it since, you know, I'm growing a person in my belly and sharing my blood with him.

On the way home, my contractions started getting a little stronger, and I was so annoyed that I was having all these contractions and no progress! I got home and bounced around a while on my exercise ball while watching Grey's Anatomy, but decided I was tired and needed these contractions to stop so I could get some sleep. I took a warm bath in hopes that relaxing would get them to stop, or at least be less strong. I always think baths are a good idea, until I get in my tub and remember how stupid it is because the water turns luke warm after like 5 minutes. Not cool. Anyway, I start not loving my bath, and I feel like my contractions might have let up a bit, so I get out and get in bed.

As soon as I laid down I got the longest, most intense contraction ever (for this labor, anyway...). Then another one. I would classify these as "fairly excruciating" because I actually had to "breathe" through them, or make noise or anything else to cope. I get out of bed and call the L&D to see if they can call in the prescription for Morphine for me. No dice, turns out Morphine is a shot, not pills. Duh, Amy. I am in so much pain I can barely talk so while the girl on the phone was talking to me, I just blurted out "I'm just going to come in" and hung up. I was a little hesitant to go out of our room and tell Patrick we needed to go BACK to the hospital after just coming from there, but I was really hurting so I figured something had to be going on. My contractions were coming one on top of the other, so I just barely managed to load myself into the car while Patrick got Abigail out of bed and buckled in her carseat. Patrick asked me to call our friends who were watching Abigail and let them know we were coming. I said no way, Jose...So he had to call them as we were leaving.

We pulled up at their house after like 15 or 20 minutes. I am just writhing in the front seat of the car. (Ever tried going through transition in the front seat of a car? Not fun) Patrick ran Abigail, still buckled in her carseat (!) to our friend's front porch. Lindsey met him out there and grabbed her overnight bag and we were back on the road.

After another 15 or 20 minutes, we pull up at the Emergency Room. Now, let me take a minute to explain the procedure for when you're in labor with my hospital. You are supposed to enter through the ER. You fill out some paperwork at the first window, then someone takes you back into a hallway and you fill out some more paperwork in a little room, then wait for someone from L&D to come down and get you. L&D is on the 14th floor. (It's really the 13th, but there is no "13" on the elevator buttons) So this is why I came in through the ER. Back to the story...

We park illegally right in front of the entrance. I couldn't even move and had to wait for my contraction to end before I could get out of the car. I finally managed to climb out of my seemingly enormous, gargantuan, Mt. Everest-sized vehicle (really just an Expedition) and waddle my way into the first window at the ER. I tell the girl I am about to have a baby. I am very clearly in extreme pain. She says OK let me just ask you a few questions, and I say no that's ok I need to go up to L&D, we can do the paperwork later. Then she says "hehe, I'm afraid that's not how it works :-)" (smiley face added to indicate her silly, cheery tone while saying this to a laboring woman who is in so much pain that she has dropped to her hands and knees in a nasty inner city ER) My poor husband answered all her questions for me while someone else came out with a wheelchair to wheel me into the next paperwork prison. The wheelchair felt terrible so I walked/crawled/hitched a ride on Patrick to make my way down the hall to fill out more papers.

Once we get to that room, I hit the floor again. This time I feel some stuff going on down there, and I yell out "I'M PUSHING!" Someone runs at me with a wheelchair, and I try to sit down, but I could feel the baby's HEAD so I jumped right back up and freaked out. Patrick was right in front of me and when I jumped up, I flung my arms around his neck and pretty much started climbing him like a tree. I felt like I was trying to climb away from the baby's head. I'm not sure what I thought that would accomplish, but it just happened.

Next, they brought me a gurney since the wheelchair was a no-go. Someone asked me if I wanted to go up to L&D, or if I had time to make it up there, or something like that. I said NO! So they wheeled my gurney into some room and pulled the curtain shut after like a hundred people came in the room. I was group B strep positive this time around, which means you need to have antibiotics during labor, preferably for four hours prior to giving birth. I told the nurses this so they would know that I hadn't been able to get the medicine, and they put the heplock in my hand anyway to start administering it. Turns out having a baby is a great way to distract from the pain of getting a needle stuck in your hand, because I didn't feel a thing. I was too busy using every ounce of strength I could muster to fight through the pain of a contraction and lift my butt off the gurney so they could remove my sweatpants.

Two pushes later, Patrick Jr's head was out. (That's right, I was about 2 minutes from having a baby in my pants.) His head was out and my water STILL had not broken! My midwife later told me that my "bag of waters" was one of the strongest she's ever seen. It finally broke when I pushed again to get the rest of his body out. It exploded everywhere, and was really gross. And he pooped right as the water exploded, so there was just this huge mess of baby funk everywhere. But anyway, he was out and it was such a relief to not be pregnant! They handed him to me, and I hiked up my {Patrick's} sweatshirt to feed him a little while all the people were running around cleaning and doing whatever else they needed to do.

Everyone was like "He's SO big!" and "Oh he has red hair!" They did his apgars and he got a 9 and a 10! It is really rare to get a 10, even for full term healthy babies, my little man is such a champ at life! After all that, they wheeled us up to the maternity floor where you stay after you've had your baby. I got all stitched up, and they weighed Little Patrick and confirmed that he was indeed a huge baby. 9lb 11.5oz and 21inches long. Then they got all concerned about him being "macrosomic" (which just means "big" or larger than 4000grams to be exact. I don't know how many pounds that is, feel free to do the math if you're curious) and started throwing around words like "diabetes." I was not diabetic during my pregnancy, so I wasn't very worried about it. They did a blood test to make sure he didn't have high blood sugar, and it turned out his blood sugar was actually too low. So then they are like, "we will have to test his sugar every 4 hours for a while to make sure it stabilizes, and if it doesn't, he will have to have some formula." I just continued to feed him whenever he wanted to eat, and his blood sugar continued to be completely normal for every test after that first one.

We ended up having to stay in the hospital until Saturday afternoon (I gave birth Thursday night) due to his blood sugar and GBS+ issues. But he was perfectly healthy. My giant perfectly healthy baby boy! Patrick had gone to pick up Abigail from our friends' house on Friday and hung out with her at home for a while before bringing her to meet her Bubba. It was love at first sight for her, and she has loved her Bubba ever since! We think he's pretty cool, too.

Voilà!

Yesterday I left y'all with an almost finished picture frame. I had spray painted it white with just one coat. After applying the second coat,  I liked how it looked kind of white washed and I could still see the wood grain through the paint, BUT the look I was going for was a pretty solid white. I got out my handy dandy Kilz spray primer and did a quick coat to get more coverage. Two more coats of white satin spray paint and I was high as a kite and my frame was good to go! (Just kidding about the high part, but I spray paint in my garage so I could definitely smell it a bit in our living area...woops.)

After all my paint was dry, I set the glass in the frame, then laid the matte and photo down on top of it. Then I used some trusty duct tape to secure the glass. It might not sound very safe, but with the notch in the wood, the glass was flush with outside of the frame (if that makes sense?) So the duct tape has a pretty easy job.

With everything secured, I slapped three 3M picture hanging strips on the back (two on top, one of bottom...this sucker is a little heavy!). Then I took down the mess of a gallery wall above my sofa, and popped this guy up using a small level and my best guess as to the center of our sofa!

Here is a close up of the finished product:

And here is a somewhat zoomed out view. Please ignore my shelf disaster in the corner!

Soon the other two will go up on either side. I am waiting for my photos from MPIX to arrive. Snapfish threw a bog ol' wrench in my plans for an 8x10 close up of each kid on either side when they sent the close-up of Bubba with like an inch of his head cut off. I was able to adjust the cropping on MPIX though, so I am crossing my fingers for frame-worthy prints this time!

Speaking of my adorable babies, here they are out running errands yesterday: 

Abigail has really been loving her Bubba lately.She has always liked asking to hold him, but usually would try to push him off saying "all done!" as soon as he hit her lap. Well the last couple days she has actually held him for minutes  at a time! And she loves giving him kisses! Whenever  I pick her up from daycare (she goes twice a week to get some little kid play-time) she looks for him in his carseat and says BUBBA!!! If Patrick happens to be home and able to keep him, she gets very concerned and asks where he is, it's so cute! 

A Quickie Frame

I love quick projects that I can actually get done after the kids go to sleep, but don't require me to stay up way too late! So tonight I made myself a frame for our family photos from the slats that were originally supposed to support my bed. Might as well use them for something, right? So I now have three free photo frames. Well, technically I paid for these materials at some point, but today they were all free!

I really want some big white frames from Ikea, but I don't feel like driving an hour and spending like $20x3, plus all 10 (I think?) 5x7 frames I need. {I am hoping those will be a late birthday present from my parents when they visit in a couple weeks.} Anyway, in another timely blog post, I saw younghouselove post about some easy frames they made for a recent pinterest project. I didn't really need to see how to make frames, but the timing was great to spark the idea and head to the garage.

I started with an old black 11x14 (I think?) frame and stole the glass and the paper matte. Using the glass, I measured how long each side needed to be. I didn't take any pictures of this step, but hopefully I can explain it clearly...I planned to use the table saw to make notches on the inside of the frame for the glass to set in, like in "real" frames, so when I measured the length, I slid the glass about 1/4 inch onto the board. Maybe it will make better sense when you see what I did to make the notches. Here is a close up of the board pretending to go through the saw: 

See the notch cut out? That's how far in I had the glass setting when I measured how long the inside length needed to be. Here's another shot just for fun:

When I measured the inside length, I marked a small line where the corner of my 45 degree angle cut needed to be. I marked it 1/4inch shorter than the glass on both the top and the bottom, to account for the 1/4inch notch that would also be on the top and bottom boards. Then I clamped the two side boards together to ensure that they would be exactly the same size and got to work on my miter saw. 

Clamp:

I did the same steps with the two top and bottom boards. Then I busted out the Kreg Jig and drilled a hole in each end of the two side boards. It doesn't matter where you drill the pocket hole, as long as you have one hole in each corner. I just found it to be easiest to only drill on two pieces instead of four. 

Got a picture of the hole for you this time! It looks exactly like the photo from the bed post, only it's mine.

Next I put some wood glue along each corner and assembled the frame. After I applied the glue, I screwed in all four pocket screws to hold it extra tight. This wood is super soft pine, so I could have also used my staple gun just as easily. I am just excited about my Kreg right now and want to use it for everything! Even just wood glue alone would probably be enough to hold it together if you were able to clamp it tight while it was drying. 

Here she is after the first coat of white spray paint:

Check back tomorrow (hopefully) for an update on the finished product hanging on my wall!