Tagged

I got tagged by Natalie, and am kind of interested in thinking about/reminiscing over this one, so here goes...

10 Years Ago
- I was just starting my junior year of HS at Moon Valley in Phoenix
- I was 16 years and one day old
- I was allowed to 'legally' date my boyfriend Eric
- I hadn't entered the work force yet! Ahhh good times!

5 Years Ago
- Ryan and I had been married almost 2 years and had no kiddies
- I was living in Prescott
- I was just promoted to a Service Manager at Wells Fargo
- I believe I was still driving my little red Mazda Miata convertible
- We were starting the processing of getting qualified to buy our first place- a condo (which we still miss although it would be way too small for our family now!)

5 Months Ago
- I had 2 kids with none on the way
- I was 2nd Counselor in YW
- I was still trying to get rid of my tummy after having Katelyn
- Hailey was starting piano & gymnastics
- We replaced the TV in the family room with a piano (I can't believe it's been that long!)

5 Things to do Today
- Watch the Young and the Restless
- Harass my eye Dr. to see if my contacts came in (they were supposed to be in Tues!)
- Organize my office to get ready to paint next weekend
- Bake the cookie dough in my fridge
- Hopefully do something fun with my honey!

5 Bad Habits
- Watching the Young and the Restless whenever I can (I blame this on my grandpa!)
- Over thinking EVERYTHING
- Being too practical and not spontaneous enough
- Procrastinating
- Not unplugging or turning off the iron (I blame this the auto shut off feature! But it drives Ryan nuts- apparently I'm going to burn our house down or something)

5 Places I've Lived
- Glendale/ Phoenix
- Prescott (at 3 different addresses)
- Yuma
- Chino Valley
- Surprise

I now tag...Dawn, Mindy, Nicole and Zach

I'm crazy, I know!

So for those of you who have been in my house, you know that it's colorful. Too colorful. Every room is painted a different color, or multiple different colors (except for mine which is STILL white and undecorated). Not only do I pick lots of colors, I pick the wrong colors or at least the wrong shades of that color! So I never end up being satisfied with what I've done.

Well good news, for those of you who have been overwhelmed by my kiwi green guest bathroom- the green is gone! Monday Ryan was lazy and didn't want to get up and go to work at 3:30am (I can't say I blame him, but I still give him crap for it) so he used a vacation day, slept in, we dropped off the kids at the babysitter, went to home depot, got our supplies and came home and HE went to work redoing the bathroom. I did help him tape off a lot of the bathroom but that was about the extent that I could help due to the fumes.

The green changed to a very light yellow- much more neutral. Again, I don't feel like I picked quite the right color, but it's a very big improvement. The only problem now is that the bathroom feels very BLAH to me- remember I like color! Everything is either light yellow or white and then there's the maple cabinets. So I've got to go shopping for some new decor to spice things up a bit.

We also bought crown molding for the bathroom and got that up- thanks to the help of a friend in our ward that does carpentry who did the whole bathroom in like 5 minutes! The great news is that he's willing to help with the rest of the house if and when we have the money to do it. We'll probablly just do bedrooms first one by one, then tackle the big expense of the main family area.

I'll get a picture of the bathroom posted once we caulk and paint the crown molding and I get some other color in there.

So now for the rest of the house...

I've extended an invite to my family and a couple of friends to come over Labor Day weekend and just help me repaint or paint several rooms and just get 'er done! I'm going to buy the eco-friendly, low fume paint so that I can be in the house and we can just knock it out! I want to get rid of the yellow in my family room, paint the baby's room (we'll know tomorrow a definite of which color scheme to do!)and I can finally get rid of the 'golden wheat' color my sister had put in here (right now it's the office). Then I want to paint my hallway which has never been painted and maybe, just maybe finally paint my bedroom!!

I realize it's A LOT of work and if it can't all happen, it's all good and we'll just get done what we can. But I thought I would throw the invitation out to anyone else who just loves painting and would like to come help! I am offering free food (BBQ, baked goods etc) to any of my helpers! Also, if you live in the Prescott area and don't want to paint but wouldn't mind watching my kids for part of a day- that would be awesome too! I have some people I may ask, but if anyone wants to volunteer- that would be even better!

I'll make sure to take before and afters of anything that we do!

Some things worth mentioning...

So you all know that I've been really bad at blogging lately, but that doesn't mean that we haven't had anything worth while happen over the last couple of months! So here some things that stand out and are worth making note of...

- Katelyn had her 1st birthday Aug. 3rd. She's walking around the edges of everything now and she'll venture one step away before she dramatically goes down to a crawl with a little squeal. As of this weekend she is also bringing herself up to a standing position without holding on to anything. She finally has two bottom teeth and the top two are coming in along with a side molar (according to her Dr.)and she's been pretty cranky about it so I'm sure the doc is right!

- My brother David's farewell was last Sunday and he reported to the MTC on Weds (the 13th). When he was leaving their house to be set apart and we were leaving to drive back to Prescott- Katelyn said bye and waved to him. This was the first time I'd ever seen/heard her do this and it was priceless timing!

- I've been feeling much better since my week at the hospital. I still haven't lost my cookies a single time! I'm still having issues with insane fatigue (which I do know is just part of being pregnant (and having two kids) but I'm also not really gaining much weight still- despite eating big meals and snacking constantly. I have to write down every single thing I eat and I've been counting calories to make sure that I am eating enough and then turn those into the Dr. until I make some good progress that she's comfortable with. (I'm still not up to my pre-pregnancy weight and at this point in my pregnancy I should have already gained at least 5 pounds minumum.)

-The calorie counting has been very eye opening, I've always been vaguely aware of how many calories are in some prepackaged foods (I like to read lables out of boredom while I'm eating), but writing it all down as shown me just how bad a lot of what we eat is- and not just for me but for Ryan. So once I'm not supposed to be getting all of the calories I can, our eating habits will definitely be changing!

-Having been sick, I've gotten to have a nice break from work. Before I went to the hospital, I had been put on a 4hr/day work schedule by my Dr. but then I went to the hosital 3 days later. Then I was off work the week I was in the hospital and got the next two weeks off as well (last week and this upcoming week). I go into the Dr. again Thursday to check things out (and weigh in) and we'll go from there. Luckily, I have great benefits at my job and all this time off is being paid 100% in addition to really low co-pays for the hospital visits. This has also allowed me to still take the kids to their babysitter so that I can rest without it being a financial strain. We're definitely blessed.

- I also get my ultrasound Thursday to determine our baby's sex. We're pretty sure we know what it is based on the ultrasounds I had while in the hospital, but they wouldn't tell us officially since I was only 16 weeks and they don't normally like that determination until later. I'm sure if it were my Dr. she would have just told me...but it was just the ultrasound techs and they were silly about it.

- I chopped my hair off to chin length in the middle of July and love it. I have been sick of my long hair for a good year now, but like most guys- Ryan liked it long, so I kept it long until I just couldnt take it anymore. No regrets about chopping it at all. P.S. My husband still loves me.

- Ryan got his new work schedule- which goes into effect toward the beginning of Sept. Just as we were dreading, he's working Sundays. He'll have Friday and Saturday off though and be off by 2:30 everyday. If it weren't for the Sundays, it would be a pretty good schedule. Luckily, the shifts will be shuffled in January and we'll pray for Sundays off then.

-We've had a great monsoon season this year. In fact, it's probablly going to rain within the hour. I love rainy Sundays! As wonderful as this has been, it has been one more thing keeping Ryan from being able to work on the backyard since it's always a big muddy mess. The sloping of our yard is off and we end up with a big lake in the yard instead of it draining out. It stays muddy for days after a good rain. This in turn means that the dogs are always a mess and I don't really like them coming into the house.

-The dogs are huge and really good looking labs. But, they drive me nuts. I have too many other concerns with life right now than to have to deal with them as well. Not to mention the barking at 6:30 every morning until I go feed them and refill the water (which no matter what kind of container we put it in, they dump it over within a very short while!) Ryan loves his dogs and him and Hailey take them to the dog park or Watson Lake in Prescott as often as possible- which isn't near as often as Ryan or Hailey would like!

That's all I've got for now. Sorry about the lack of pictures again! We're having massive issues with our desktop PC (which I prefer to use) and Ryan is researching food storage and emergency preparedness on his laptop- so I can't upload the hundreds of pictures on my camera from the last few months. So maybe this week I'll get some uploaded and posted.

My Week

So I had a super boring yet fairly eventful week. I have been at Yavapai Regional Medical Center since Monday around 1pm and just came home at 6:30 tonight. I have/had hyperemisis- which short and sweet means extreme nausea and vomiting, basically resulting in malnutrition and weight loss. Obviously not a good thing for anyone- let alone someone of my size. So after several visits to my doctor and her threatening to hospitalize me multiple times, I took a visit to my OB/GYN Monday morning, I got sent to the hospital.

I had a very small breakfast (which didn't stay down) that morning and no lunch before I went. Then I got put on NPO- which is a legal form of torture where you can't eat or drink and you're surviving off of IVs only. Due to the fact that I was still vomiting despite not eating or drinking, I wasn't allowed to go on liquids until Weds morning. But once again, I got sick and went back NPO until Thursday morning. I then got to have liquids again. It's really sad how excited you can get about drinking broth! Then because I held it down, around 2:30 Thursday I got to have a turkey sandwich. It was amazing! (Actually I don't recommend YRMCs food at all, but when you haven't eaten in days, you think anything tastes amazing!) I've held down food since and was able to come home tonight.

Thank goodness for my AMAZING husband who took care of everything at home without a complaint. He even had the house clean for me when I got home. A thank you to my family and friends (who knew where I was) that called with their well wishes, words of encouragement, empathy, and prayers. And thank you to Ryan's parents who have the girls today and overnight so that I could rest up a little more at home.

I could obviously go into a ton more detail about it all, but I won't. I'm tired. It was a horrible week and I just want to go sleep in my own bed.

Wish me luck that my pregnancy goes better from here out! I could very easily end up going back to the hospital if I get sick again or my weight doesn't pick up at a good rate of speed. Sigh.