Things I've noticed

It's now been 2 weeks since I've been off work and I've noticed a couple of things about myself. Some good, some bad.
1. When I have no solid time to get up in the morning, I have a much harder time winding down at night and getting into bed at a reasonable hour. Which means I'm generally not in bed before midnight. It's actually quite liberating. LOL.
2. It's infinately more pleasant to wake up to my son's smiling face beside my bed telling me it's time to get up than a blaring alarm clock-no matter what time that happens to be.
3. I'm more of a perfectionist than I thought I was. The longer I'm at home the more I realize that there are definately things I like done a certain way when it comes to the housework.
4. The more I'm home, the more I nag my husband. Poor guy.
5. I'm slightly laundry obsessed. Ok more than slightly.It's that instant gratification thing-what once was dirty is now clean and back where it belongs. If only life were so simple.
6. The amount of time it takes me to lose my temper with Josh is DIRECTLY related to the amount of sleep I have had. Period. For some reason I have not realized this concept til now.
7. More time home does not (unfortunately for my family) equal more home cooked meals. I just don't like to do it. If any of you want to swap home cooked meals for housework-let me know.
8. It's really nice not to deal with other people's crap all day and only have to worry about what goes on here. Quite selfish of me isn't it?
9. The more I'm around Josh the more I want to be around him and miss him when we're apart.
10. The same cannot be said for my husband.
11. The more time I have to do things, the less gets done. If you want something done, ask a busy person (and probably not one who is 8 months pregnant)
12. More available time doesn't mean I spend more time on my spiritual self-see #11
13. More available time also doesn't mean I'm any more on time for things than before (I know Mandy-I have NO excuses!!)
14. I spend more time blog hopping now than I ever did before~not sure why I care about some random stranger's pictures of their 2 year olds birthday. I think I need to buy a timer to go beside the computer and set some sort of limit to this
All in all, I realized I really do enjoy not working outside the home but sometimes miss the feeling of importance I got from being "SO" busy. I do like not having to hand Josh off to so many different people and just be able to take care of him myself. It's nice to focus on quality time with Josh before this baby makes an appearance. Only 2 things about pregancy are bothering my lately. 1.Trying to find a comfortable position to sleep in at night. I have never used this many pillows for sleeping in my life! 2. Acid reflux. Yuck. 1 month to go...

Last Day of Work

Friday, June 6th was my official last day of work. On Thursday, the girls booked fake patients for an hour so we could close down and celebrate with Thai food (thanks Boss!) and homemade strawberry cheesecake (Thanks Joi!!). The office also got me a $100 gift certificate for Riverside spa which I will make very good use of! I've been so lucky to work there for 11 1/2 years and I'll really miss some of our patients and the social interaction aspect of it. I definately WON'T miss getting up at 5 :45 am 3 days a week to get myself and Josh out the door, him at day home, and me at work by 7:30 am. In fact it was quite blissful to look at my alarm clock this morning at 7:15, smile, and proceed to go back to sleep til 9. Plus I'm still getting paid for this month as I had holidays saved up.
I took Josh to Prairie Winds park for 1 1/2 hrs this afternoon and it was so nice not to feel like we were rushed or have my mind racing about what we needed to get done. We just stayed til we were all played out. I took him to the bottle depot and he kept scrunching up his face and saying "It smells in here". Yeah-can you imagine working in that smell for 8 hours? As we got in the car I said-that's why you need to get an education so you have the option of NOT working in that smell. So I'm officially a stay at home Mom and now only have one job to contend with. We'll see how long it takes for the novelty to wear off-if it ever does.

Turning Point

Today is officially the most pregnant I have ever been. I'm not sure what to expect from here on out but people keep telling me that I'm just going to be getting bigger. Yeah-thanks for reminding me. Not sure how that is going to happen as the skin on my belly feels as stretched as it can be but there's no turning back now. Funny how when you're pregnant everyone is allowed to comment on your weight but how would someone feel if I walked up to them and said-Woah-you're so much bigger than the last time I saw you. LOL. At least I'm fat with purpose. It's slightly odd to that I don't really even care about the weight-it just means baby is growing like they're supposed to.

I'm SO excited to meet this new little person. I don't care if it's a boy or a girl-just the fact that we get to add another little one to our family. There was a time that I wasn't sure it would happen between all the drama of the past few years. It's feels sort of cavalier to say God has a plan but when that plan and my plan aren't meshing, it's hard to try to figure out exactly which curveball to dodge sometimes. And then my plan and his do mesh the very same month that I think-if I'm not pregnant this just isn't meant to be and we're going to stop trying. All signs point to this NOT being a great idea from every logical perspective. Luckily He anticipated this line of thinking and voila-positive sign on the test. Plus is there REALLY anything logical about having kids. Oh yes-please sign me up for gaining at least 30 pounds while being violently ill every other day, then going through the valley of death to take home a crying, pooping, demanding bundle to whom I am a slave to their every need. And that's just the beginning. And once you do it you'd never go back. In fact you volunteer to do it again-thank heaven for selective memory-labour wasn't really THAT bad, right?

Josh came early because I was leaking amniotic fluid for a few weeks. No leakage yet this time other than from these growths that used to be my petite B cup lovelies. Not so lovely now. TMI I know but it's my blog. Evidently I was a cow in a former life. (No comments please) I saw my MD Friday and she mentioned sending me for an ultrasound to check my fluid....until she felt my belly. Definately LOTS of fluid this time. And so we venture into the unknown. Wish we luck.

Despite the joking I've been thinking a lot lately about people I know who for one reason or another haven't been able to have kids. Though I can't say I understand how that would feel, my heart goes out to them. However, I do know what it feels like to want one thing so badly you'd give up almost anything to get it. We are all blessed in different aspects of our lives at different times of our lives and it's easy to look at others and think they have everything they want exactly when they want it. If only we could see their reality I'm sure we would think differently.

4 Year Old

Joshua turned 4 today! We went and had his picture taken at Superstore-I sort of wish the girl had been more creative but it still turned out great. Not even close to some of the photographers I know but you do get what you pay for. It seems crazy that it's only been 4 years since Josh has been with us as I can't really remember what I did before he was here. Then Joe, Josh and I went to Montana's for lunch and they sang to him and tried to put the moose ears on his head (which he would NOT allow) We got him a bike for his birthday-I figure when this baby shows up then we can go for walks and he can ride his bike while I push the baby in the stroller. At least it will encourage us to get out of the house and give me more exercise than just moving from room to room. 8 weeks to go-if this were the same timeline as Josh I'd be having this baby in 1 1/2 weeks. YIKES-no wonder we weren't ready.








I've noticed that since having Josh I'm slightly obsessed with him. I don't know if mothers with only one child are like that or if you just get obsessed with each one as they come along. Most of the pictures I take are of him and I'm rarely in pictures anymore. I love to be with him and we keep counting down the days til Mom doesn't have to get up and go to work in the morning (10!!!!) He cried on Fri morning when I left for work and it doesn't happen often but when he's upset and the longer I stay the later I am-it just sucks. I'm SO excited to go on mat leave-I hope this baby will cook at least til early July to give me time with Josh and to get this house organized.




These are my 10 favorite things about my son:




1. His hugs and kisses-he's very affectionate and has always been a cuddler

2. When he tells me he loves me

3. Watching him enjoy things-he's SO expressive and I love to watch the expressions on his face

4. His big brown eyes

5. The way he says his prayers-doesn't matter if it's to bless the food or before bed-it's the same prayer word for word and don't think you can try to tell him how to change it.

6. The way his little legs look in shorts

7. The twinkle in his eyes when he's teasing me (must get it from his Great Grandpa Bohne)

8. That he's obsessed with all things Halloween-ESPECIALLY witches

9. When he gets shy

10. His imagination

The Rescuer and more randomness

I tend to rescue. You have a problem-let me help you fix it. Let me listen to everything that's wrong with your life and we'll come up with a game plan. The problem with rescuing is it does nothing really to help the other person grow and figure their problems out on their own. They get to play out the victim role. This is one important lesson I have learned this past year-so now I say things like " How do you plan to deal with that?" and "I know you'll figure out what to do". When I'd SO rather give my two cents. Or ten cents. I'm really good at giving my ten cents-a little too good sometimes. I need to learn how to sugar coat things a bit better. I know this will help me in raising my kids and heaven knows I'll need all the help I can get. I always say to Joe that I'm an optimist but I'm a realist.
And sometimes when you're always the rescuer...it would be nice to be rescued once in a while. Sometimes it would be nice to be taken care of once in a while instead of being the one who takes care of everything. I'm sure no other woman can relate to that ;> Lately I feel like I'm the one keeping all the balls in the air- at work, at home etc. Work is CRAZY lately. I can do things really well if I only have a few things to focus on. Like if I was at home 8 hours of the day instead of at work-my house would be more organized (or so I'd like to believe). But I am and it's not and some days it's enough to drive me batty. I'm into organizing lately. STRUCTURE. I think it's from watching Jon and Kate plus 8-now that lady is organized. And slightly crazy in her type A organization. I'm sort of jealous. I just don't have time to focus on that right now-rather I choose not to. And somehow Grey's Anatomy still gets watched every week so I obviously have my priorities....
The closer I get to my maternity leave ( 1 month!!!!) the more I'm looking forward to it. At least I can stop juggling one of those balls-only to pick up about 3 more when I have a new baby in the house. I do enjoy my job but after 11 years it's time for a career change. I'd like the chance to try being a stay at home mom and all that comes with it. I feel like I'll do anything to be able to stay at home after this 2nd baby comes. Especially when they're little because when they're older they won't care as much-at least they won't admit they care. I miss Josh so much some days and I go in his room at night and just watch him sleep-wondering if we've even spent any time together that day that he'll remember. He's been getting really upset lately when he wakes up and I'm already off at work. I keep telling him that soon mommy will be able to be home every morning and he gets all excited and hugs me tight. That's one thing I love-he's such an affectionate kid. Sometimes I'll be getting ready and he'll say " You look so beautiful!" The other night as I was tucking him into bed he said " I missed you-you're my best friend. I love you sweetheart". Something about your almost 4 year old son calling you sweetheart. Sigh. It makes up for the past hellish Sunday with 2 time outs.
Speaking of Sundays. When I sit there wrestling with my son and counting the minutes until sacrament meeting is done and he's off to Primary I wonder if the women whose husbands are there really appreciate that they're THERE. Even if they're almost as annoying as the kids are, at least they're present and accounted for. One day I would like my husband to be THERE. But it's kind of the same way I wonder if really wealthy people truly appreciate their big houses. I would appreciate a big house. Actually any house that I knew I was paying into and not having to move from in the next year.
Blah blah blah. Next time I won't post at 1 am because I can't sleep. :>

20 Ways to Tell you're Grown Up

My cousin posted this on our family website and I thought it was SO TRUE. Unfortunately. Sigh.
1. Your houseplants are alive.
2. 6:00 AM is when you get up, not when you go to bed
3. You hear your favorite song in an elevator
4. You watch The Weather Channel
5. You don't sleep in a twin bed
6. Instead of sneaking back in the house, you're the one waiting with worry & anger
7. Your friends marry and divorce instead of 'going steady' and 'breaking up'.
8. You go from 130 days of vacation time to 14
9. Jeans and a sweater no longer qualify as "dressed up."
10. You're the one calling the police because those %&@# kids next door won't turn down the stereo
11. Older relatives feel comfortable telling sex jokes around you
12. You don't know what time Taco Bell closes anymore.
13. Your car insurance goes down and your car payments go up.
14. You feed your dog Science Diet instead of McDonald's leftovers.
15. Sleeping on the couch makes your back hurt.
16. You take naps.
17. Dinner and a movie is the whole date instead of the beginning of one.
18. Eating a basket of chicken wings at 3AM would severely upset, rather than settle, your stomach
19. You actually eat breakfast food at breakfast time.
20. 90% of the time you spend in front of a computer is for real work.

Favorites

5 things you cannot live without under $10
1. Really cute bookmarks
2. 7-11 5 cent candies
3. Ben & Jerry's Half Baked Ice Cream
4. Aveeno Lotion
5. Lip Smackers Vanilla Chapstick


5 favourite movies
1. Dirty Dancing
2. Simon Birch
3. Sommersby
4. The Notebook
5. How to Lose A Guy in 10 Days

Baby names you love(but won't use) As Joe has vetoed most of them...
Girls:
1. Reagan
2. Alexis
3. Emily
4. Ashley
5. Mikaela
Boys:
1. Matthew
2. Jacob
3. Jackson
4. Ethan
5.Tarek

5 songs you could listen to over and over:
1. No Ordinary Love-Sade
2. Crash - Dave Matthews Band
3. Godspeed-Dixie Chicks
4. You Are Loved(Don't Give Up)-Josh Groban
5. Where Would You Be-Martina McBride

5 people who influenced your life in a positive way:
1. My mother
2. My father
3. One of my best friends-Kim
4. My mother in law
5. My piano teacher-Gail

5 things that stay in your purse all the time:
1. Chapstick
2. Kleenex
3. Mac Lipglass
4. My Wallet
5. A pen

5 moments you knew changed you forever:
1. When I decided to come back to church-for good (August 1999)
2. When I went throught the temple for the first time (October 2002)
3. My wedding day (Feb 24, 2001)
4. The day Josh was born (May 24, 2004)
5. The day Joe moved back in after we'd been separated for 5 months (July 2006)

5 obsessions you have right now:
1. This Blog
2. Most of the reality shows on TV-LOL
3. Reading (this is a lifetime obsession)
4. My son (another lifetime obsession-I just LOVE him)
5.Facebook

5 places you would really love to go:
1. To Disneyland with my little family once the kids are old enough to appreciate it
2. HAWAII for like a month
3. Mexico
4. Italy
5. On a Carribean cruise