8 weeks left...

We are heading into the final stretch! With school... winter... and pregnancy. That means summer, 60's and a baby!

First I guess I'll give a school update. Things are starting to wrap up. I'm starting to get things ready for my long term sub and my kids are finally in the "I'm no longer a baby and can do things without being asked!" phase. I am enjoying it especially because there is a good chance I will not be teaching first grade next year! I've been given the opportunity to work 1/2 time and with little Baby A coming it sounds good! I will most likely be teaching 3rd grade or above and a part of me is excited to be in upper elementary again! It seems as though I will be taking off until November, and then starting November I will be working 12-4. We found a at home daycare that is 3 minutes from my school and both Mark and I feel extremely good about her :)

Additionally as school is coming to an end, I'm realizing how thankful I am for the parents at my school! At conferences, all my parents were so great  and I even got flowers to help brighten my cold conference week! My room mom is planning a little "present" for me, along with passing along tons of baby books, toys and blankets from her little one. It is much appreciated as for the most part our nursery is still empty!



But speak of the nursery, Mark and I were in "nesting" mode last weekend. We made a huge trip to home depot, and worked on a few projects around the house. First we put in blinds in the baby room (FINALLY!) and while Mark did that I put together our changing table/dresser! (Currently empty aside from a diaper cake Cathy gave me :) and changing pad inherited from a teacher at my school. Mark also worked on fixing a few small problems with our toilet, including putting in a handle that was not broken! *Hooray!

Current Nursery

Such a good carpenter :)

My work

Toilet handle :)

Practicing the baby carrier

Diaper Cake

Then pregnancy. GOOD, but definitely getting bigger and more tired again! I went to zumba this week and thought to myself, "this may be my last evening going to zumba". I was just so tired the next day and know that I am starting to get to the point where I should just start enjoying our "spring" weather and walk :) I know Cici will like that. And of course I can still do my daily yoga, which I think is why I still have 0 back or other body pains. I attribute it to that and using the foam roller every night.

29 weeks

32 weeks... yes I look morning tired :)

 As far as cravings go, I am loving good food, especially breakfast food. That and my baths/foot soaks are my way of pampering myself. I'm looking forward for more of that this coming week when I have Spring Break and my birthday! I plan on a lot of good alone time, craft time, a pre-natal
massage and cooking to prepare for the birth! 

Mexican Inspired Brunch

Breakfast cups

French toast with berry compote

Don't look good but chocolate oatmeal pancakes and eggs :) My fave!

The little stinker

I also hope to spend more time with family this week. We've loved spending time with sweet baby Henry, and I look forward to my family coming here this summer... In fact, my parents recently found out that an offer they put down on a little home about 30 min south of us was ACCEPTED! Which means they are now double homeowners and get to be close to baby more of the time! It is definitely a project, but it'll be so great knowing that they are so close and that they have their own little place in Minnesota.

Henry

And in two weeks i'm in my 3rd Trimester!

WOW! What a whirlwind it has been since my last post. I can't believe we are already to February (especially since it is less than 0 outside.... this arctic freeze winter is NOT my favorite).
This month has been very special because of a few different events. First my brother and Susan got married.... and then they had their sweet baby boy Henry! He gave us a little scare and had to be in ICU for a few days but after he learned how to live outside the womb, he has been a little angel :) And my mom has LOVED being here to take care of him! She leaves tomorrow, but she will soon be back for when my little guy decides to make his appearance.

Wedding

Trying to burp a sleeping baby

He makes great faces

In ICU

Burping a sleeping baby

My little guy was kicking like crazy here

Speak of my little guy I am 25 weeks! I can't believe it! I am definitely getting bigger and starting to feel some of the normal pregnancy pains-hips hurt when I sleep, getting sciatica on my right side, pelvic pain, feet hurting..... BUT I'm still loving being pregnant. Sounds so cliche, but it's neat to know that he's always there with me! I don't feel it too often yet, but he kicks throughout the day, and at night I definitely notice when I finally sit down for the evening. Mark even felt it a few days ago.... though he said it was "weird". :) I'm still able to work out ok, doing my Zumba classes and my daily yoga. Hopefully the yoga will keep my body from getting too many pregnancy pains, fingers crossed. Now, if you don't like pregnant belly pictures, do not look at the following, BUT for my own records :) Picture of me at 24 weeks. Yes, I look tired, just woke up on a Saturday, about to go to Zumba.

24 Weeks

With the other man in my life, it was Mark's 30th BIRTHDAY! Yes... I have been giving him a hard time about it for a while, saying he is an old man, but I still celebrated with him by getting tickets to the Timberwolves Game (which they dominated) and then we stayed in a hotel downtown so we were able to walk to dinner, and back to the hotel instead of having to drive ALL the way to Eagan that night :) Needless to say it was a nice little getaway.

Sunset view from our hotel

T-Wolves Scoreboard

A little selfie.... yes our seats were awful

In every day news, I am still enjoying being a homeowner. We are still slowly furnishing our house and getting things that make it seem more like a "home". In addition, thinking about projects we want to complete before baby comes (like get a freezer/fridge for the garage, and hardwood the main floor). Hopefully we get around to these things, I think we will :)

A funny thing about being almost in my 3rd trimester of pregnancy is that I eat a TON now. I'm always hungry! But I've been trying really hard to keep it healthy, and make sure that what I'm eating is good for me and the baby. Like this berry covered french toast :) I also made some DELICIOUS lentil/beef burritos the other day from a new cookbook I got the "Drop 10 CookBook". No I'm not trying to lose weight but I recommend it just for the quality of food and recipes that are in this book. They use all whole foods, and lots of healthy fats to make delicious filling meals! I also made a Quinoa crusted salmon from there that was delicious as well as a kale pasta dish!

Berry French Toast with banana and nutbutter

Delicious!

I'm also finding time to craft before baby comes. Made him his first stuffed animal this past week on a "cold" day we had no school for. A sock monkey! I'm pretty happy with how it turned out, just using directions from Pinterest! Not bad for one of my first times using the sewing machine! Thanks again Grandma :)

All the pieces sewed

She helped me stuff him

Reggie is all done!

It finally slows down (warning 3 weeks of craziness)

The past few weeks have been non-stop. Traveling every other weekend to weddings and to visit family have been so wonderful, but I'm glad for it to finally slow down!

It all started with Julie's wedding, in Pella, IA. Small dutch town, known for Pella Windows, tulips and windmills. It was a neat reunion with a few Kansas City friends and an excuse for my new husband and I :) to go to our first wedding together! Food was great, bride was beautiful, dancing was fun and 4 hr drive there not bad at all.

Weekend after that I got to my first Minnesota sporting event, we got a free ticket to see the MN Golden Gophers play football and went with a few friends. It was neat to be at a college football game (even it if wasn't the Deacs) and lucky for us they killed Purdue, so aside from being a tad chilly (a nice 40 degrees) it was a fun time! We grilled out with the friends afterwards at our place, so it was really nice to finally have a place bigger than a box so that we could host people for a second week in a row!


The next week flew by and I headed to NC to have the first visit with my family since I had been married! Of course, I left Mark at home :) I got to see my brother's new house, walk and play games with the family, we headed to the Blue Ridge to catch the last bits of fall colors (mainly brown) and visited with my Grandmother. Even though the weekend was short, it was wonderful to get to spend the time with my family. (My dad took some better pictures... I can't find them right now but they were good !)

The next week was one of the craziest weeks of my time here in MN! I got into the MN airport Monday afternoon, took public transportation (light rail + bus) into our little Minneapolis neighborhood and slept the day away because I had woken up at 3:30 to get to the airport! Then Tuesday night I had my first "grad' school class I'm taking with my district. Wednesday was Halloween and we went Trick-or-treating with Max and went to Pizza Nea for a last minute groupon date night! (about to expire of course). Thursday night and Friday morning were parent teacher conferences and Friday afternoon I left for Denver to go to CATHY's wedding!

Wow, it was such a neat time. I enjoyed my wedding of course, but there is something about being in wedding with some of your best friends, not having to worry if everything is going to go right, or about logistics, that is just fun and care-free! Cathy looked beautiful, we went for a hike in Boulder, had snuggle and giggle time on beds, and danced the night away. It was just perfect!

 Andrea and I like to be silly model poses :)


Luckily this week things finally slowed down (aside from the election-which went exactly how I wanted it in MN!). I was able to get back into normal routine, gym, clean house, cook, walk dog, watch silly reality tv, and we enjoyed a pretty relaxing weekend! Last night we went to celebrate a friend's end of being on campaign, but today another day of lazy do nothing but cook and watch football :) It's snowing which I still find exciting, but tomorrow's high is 29, so we'll see how much I like MN winter in a few months :)

neat view from our walk this week of skyline

Suffice it to say, I'm excited to do nothing the rest of the day, and may finish the leftovers from this morning's "Steve Aronson" breakfast for lunch with some homemade soup!

                            black bean and butternut squash soup

bacon, eggs and potatoes

Weekend of Cooking and Crafts :)

I will warn you.. the pictures aren't great because I took them on my ipod, but you get the gist :)

Like I said.. the Way I unwind after a long week is cook, and do crafts apparently :)

I started yesterday by attempting to make a good breakfast. Mark LOVES his dads hash browns, and after going to Whole Foods we had some delicious turkey bacon! So I was excited for a full course breakfast!



Now the hasbrowns turned to mush, because I got super distracted watching the Deacs play... and therefore they turned more into mashed potatoes, but that's ok. I also added that yum bacon and pumpkin french toast. And even mark liked it! (He doesn't like pumpkin)

Ingredients

* 3 eggs
* 1/4 cup pumpkin puree
* 1-3 tablespoon almond milk [or milk of choice]
* 1 teaspoon of ground cinnamon
* pinch of nutmeg
* 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
* 4 slices gluten-free bread
* optional – for sweetness, add 1-2 tbsp of brown sugar

Later in the afternoon I started crafting, while I continued watching the Deacs ALMOST beat Clemson . Made 2 wreaths :)





Later that day felt a sweet tooth so took another recipe from PINTEREST and made more pumpkin ( i love that stuff!) pumpkin chocolate chip brownies!

They were delicious and low cal!
http://pinterest.com/pin/145381894190672282/

Made chicken corn chili on the crock pot for dinner (wasn't too big a fan) So no picture or recipe included :)

This morning got up early again and got EXCITED for this new recipe i saw for "breakfast for dinner" I call it "Breakfast for breakfast"



That's a pancake topped with a fried egg, two slices of bacon, another pancake and carmelized apple maple syrup YUMMMM :)

http://www.rachaelraymag.com/Recipes/rachael-ray-magazine-recipe-search/rachael-ray-30-minute-meals/breakfast-for-dinner-pancakes

for recipe.

Today I have ambitions to walk my little pupppy the 60 degree weather IS WONDERFUL right now. And only 1 more week until there's an entire WEEK off from the school! :) SOOO excited.

I'm also going to make white sauce chicken pizza for dinner (made the dough yesterday) it is Pizza Sunday, and will maybe make some quinoa salad for lunches. Let's see how ambitious i get!!!!

I LOve the weekends.