All you need is LOVE

To re-ignite my month of daily blogging from November...every day this month I will blog about, at least, one thing that I love. And really, it's the shortest month of the year. I can do this!

I love that a trip to the sporting goods store and then to the pet store made a morning of fun for the Bug and I. He hopped on a bike and rode around the sporting goods store while we looked at stuff...and didn't spend a dime. Then we headed to the pet store where Bug got to push a tiny buggy around while we checked out fish, turtles, lizards, snakes, birds, hamsters, rats, ferrets and a few other little critters. Two stores and no money spent but a wonderful way to enjoy a cold morning indoors and out of the house.

Join the fun if you want to LOVE life for a month.

Faker the Baker presents her Mighty Spidey cupcakes

I have zero qualms admitting that I was not put on this earth to bake. I do have an affinity for cheesecakes and have made some delightful ones from elbow grease, cookie crumbs, sugar and cream cheese.  And I've got a sweet tooth that is unrivaled in my family and my current group of friends.

I've never met a problem I didn't feel comfortable throwing money at. And at a time like this...looking 13 months pregnant and planning Bug's 3 year birthday party...I was almost willing to resort to picking up a grocery store cake or Sams's Club cupcakes. Instead, I decided to be the mom I want to be rather than the mom I am...I wanted to bake Bug's spider.man cupcakes. Now, I have baked his cupcakes for his party each year. I just figured that this year I might have earned a pass. No dice...I didn't let myself off the hook and I got as creative as a girl like me possibly can.

Allow me to present the Mighty Spidey cupcakes brought to you by Dun.can Hines red velvet box mix, a package of Spider.man candies and me!

I am proud of myself.

Another round of updates and the chance that I will become a better blogger in the coming days

SO...again it has been a bit since I posted. As I mentioned, Big's travel has begun and it will take us a couple trips before we have the routine down to a science. Of course, my ever-expanding belly has added an element of challenge to this travel schedule. We are in the midst of trip number two in the new job and it is going well. We had a wildly busy week last week and several things fell during Big's travel so it made it a little more hectic than I will usually get to handle. This week, we have some extra stuff but Bug has been hit with a fever since his 3 year well check this morning...so things may get booted until he is well. That is the kick off to...

My updates (which will be in bullet form for simplicity sake):

• Bug turned 3 this past Friday. Huh?! 3?! It is kinda crazy to me that he has turned into a big kid in such a hurry.

• As for dr. appointments since my last post, all has gone well. Homocysteine levels came back normal so we will continue to monitor it weekly starting next week since I have hit the third trimester. My glucose test came back normal as well as anemia, and whatever litany of additional tests Super OB ran last week.

• I baked like a bat-shit-crazed-Martha-Stewart-fanatic...albeit from a box of mix each time. Still, I am no baker and I made cupcakes for Bug's birthday party and frosted them to look like spider webs with Spidey candies in the center of each (oh, I'll post pics in a future post b/c this is soo out of character for me), then made orange supreme cupcakes with white frosting for his preschool class on Thursday and made a marbled jello cake...white cake with berry blue jello for his actual birthday dessert.

• Have been trying some new recipes while Big has been gone since he doesn't eat red meat. We had a great and super simple Beef Stroganoff last week and are having tomato with cheese ravioli soup tonight.

• Bug was hit with fever today after his well visit at the doctor. Sucks to see him so hobbled by the vaccines and just limping around...got one in each leg and he just keeps telling me how sore it feels. Bless his dear sweet, feverish little heart. I wish I knew if it was just vaccine-related fever b/c then he could go to school tomorrow if the fever has cleared.

• Of course, he may be sick as we attended a birthday party on Saturday where the birthday boy coughed on the cake and then after everyone had eaten it...his uncle felt him and said, "He feels warm." Oh, shit!

• My baby.center update this week said that many babies at this stage of pregnancy live if they are born premature. That is a relief in many ways but I still have a terrible fear of cord accidents regardless and that can happen up until the last second of pregnancy and result in death. How morbid, yes! But it's thoughts like those that keep me monitoring movement like some sort of crazy trainer on that Big.gest Loser show.

• Much as I would like to be a better blogger and offer more than just the occasional update...I simply have to get used to this travel stuff before I can manage to pull it off more frequently.

• Today Stirrup Queen, Melissa, blogged about treating herself and ourselves to special things on no particular occasion...I got right in the mood with that and hunted on Tiffany's website. Big loves to buy me jewelry so I am starting a little wish list. And one day, I may just follow Melissa's lead and buy a jewelry treat rather than always trying to be so damn practical.

• I am feeling a little forgotten by some of my girlfriends with regard to this pregnancy...and I realize it may just be the irrational hormones coursing through my body but I wanted to 'voice' it. Then, if it isn't all in my imagination, I can bitch about it later and know I'm not a nut-job.

Well, there is probably more but I have a little man hiccupping inside and a little man with fever beside me. I better move along. More to come in the future...who knows when but it will be in the future.

Thinking doesn't equal doing

I have been thinking about posting and letting it haunt me b/c it has been such a while since I did it. I was worried that I needed to update or something but I figured I better just get back in the groove and put whatever the hell I wanted out here...

Christmas and New Year's were great!

I did catch a little stomach something or other this past weekend and was out of commission for a good few days but all is well now. I focused on staying hydrated since food wasn't my friend and that pulled me through in time.

Had some blood work today to check my homocysteine levels...part of the MTHFR crap but not sure when those results will be in. Thankfully perinatalogist isn't a knee-jerk Heparin shot guy and he's monitoring my homocysteine levels rather than going with the daily belly injections. God bless him! I will have a blood draw every week to keep the daily needles at bay. If we find that I need the Heparin though, I will be on board...we've come this far and I know Big wants to keep me alive and the tiny one, too.

All is going according to plan with the pregnancy at this point. We hope it maintains until our scheduled c-section but life happens. So, we will see where we are when that date rolls around.

I am going to make a concerted effort to be a bit more blog-a-licious but with Big's travel about to kick in and Bug's 3rd birthday party this coming Sunday...it may be a little more time before that becomes a realistic goal.

May 2010 bring us all good things and a year that outshines 2009...no matter how good or bad a year it was!

Snappy Holidays!

TIme has flown in a snap since my last post nearly 2 weeks ago. I have been wildly busy which has kept me from blogging but it's hard to narrow down exactly what to write about. So I am going to break down a few things that have filled our last 2 weeks.

• Decorated my first ever gingerbread house. And it already came assembled in the box...all we had to do was decorate. It was still a bit of a challenge with a 2 year old as my primary assistant. Bug decorated half and I decorated half. Then he decided to spice up my boring side and he did a damn fine job of it. Overall, I was happy with our resulting house!
• I made Christmas sugar cookies and decorated them for the first time ever. I am not a girly girl and we never did this stuff in my childhood. We had some great traditions for Christmas growing up but they didn't include baking sugar cookies to decorate or gingerbread houses. We did make chocolate chip cookies for Santa and I plan to continue that with Bug. Mainly because Big and I LOVE chocolate chip cookies.
• We got a beautiful nativity scene and Bug has been earning a piece each morning for the last several mornings from his advent calendar. He so loves picking out which piece he gets to put out and it is fun to see how he wants to line them all up. And I know he is going to lose his marbles when he gets to put out Baby Jesus...he's got a mad crush on Baby Jesus right now. They learn all about him at preschool.
• We went to Bug's first Christmas program held during lunchtime last Tuesday at his preschool...it was beyond adorable. He went up in front of all the parents in the sanctuary and they sang 'Jingle Bells' and 'Happy Birthday' to Baby Jesus...of course. They all stayed up at the altar singing and smiling and it just made my life to watch.
• Our small town holds a Christmas festival and we went in dreary weather to see the sights and have Bug photographed with Santa. He is not Santa's hugest fan when up close and personal but he took one for the team and smiled for his shot. Then he mentioned to Santa that he wants a motorcycle for Christmas. Huh?! This is the very first we have heard about a motorcycle.
• We had a visit with Super OB and all sounds good. We head back to the perinatalogist next week on the 30th for another ultrasound to check things out. This will be the first we get to see him in 8 weeks so I am anxious for that visit. I am hoping he is still developing well and looking like a healthy little baby-to-be.
• There are more and more moments when Bug talks about baby brother and he hugs and kisses my belly. Then he sings to him, talks to him and rubs my belly. He loves him so much already. I am hopeful that we all get to meet him. I realize that siblings are not all roses and cupcakes but there is love right now and there will always be love. Please let us be blessed with loving brothers who are a team and remain close for all their time together on earth and beyond.

I hope to put something out here before or on Christmas but if I happen to miss the chance...

Merry Christmas to all and to all a good time!!

Tiny Tikes Polar TEXpress-Wordless Wednesday

Thankful Feather

Although we are already into a new month and my month of grace has passed...I had to fall back into it for one more day. Only this time, it isn't what I am thankful for but what Bug is thankful for that earned a post.

Each Tuesday and Thursday when I pick up Bug from pre-school, his folder is filled with projects that he made and various other info for the parents. Today I found a wonderful nugget of Bug wisdom in his folder. There was a big thankful turkey on the wall of his classroom and each child got to add a feather with their thanks to the turkey. Today, I got Bo's feather as they had disassembled the turkey.

At first I couldn't figure out what this brown, baseball bat-shaped piece of paper was. Then I saw it...

"I am thankful for my tool box."

That's my boy!