Haby Baby ~ Part Two

 Today I bring you Haby Baby ~ Part 2 aka...

After

Of course I got pretty excited and didn't really believe what I was seeing so I pulled out the digital test I had been saving for exactly this moment.  btw those digital tests are way expensive!  It too, gave me the good news and I did the happy dance in the bathroom with Sako and literally jumped up and down for joy.  Brett wasn't home yet so I had to contain myself for at least an hour before I could tell him in person.  

When he did come home, he sat on the couch and turned on the T.V., common practice after a hard day's work. This is the look he gave me when I told him I had to show him something someone made me and could he pause the T.V.  As you can tell by his lovely expression, he wasn't too pleased with pausing. ;)

He was pretty excited, for a man who is still a little in shock that it finally happened, and proudly displayed the longhorn booties.  They now reside on our bedroom dresser as a daily reminder of God's blessing.  He also told me today that he wanted to be called "poppa", in an Italian accent of course, rather than "Daddy".  If you have never met my husband, he is quite the kidder and has some sort of response to everything that is bound to get a laugh out of someone. 

He poured us drinks to celebrate.  I got orange juice in my favorite wine glass :) 

Then we went shopping for things to tell the family in a fun way.   

My mom got a onesie that had her company's logo on the front and a laugh on the back (Brett's idea of course)

My brothers got Cowboys pacifiers. 

My Dad got a Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers onsesie (he established my love for that band when I was a toddler myself). 

                                                                          Brett's Dad got a kiddie fishing pole and his Mom a Pandora charm for her bracelet.  

Brett's littlest brother is a lifeguard so he got a baby float and sunscreen and his brother who lives in St. Louis with his wife got an Arch onesie in the mail. 

The most fun we had though was with Brett's grandma who has been wanting a great grandchild forever and had recently told me that she thinks we sleep in separate twin beds. :) We got her some honey buns from Haby's bakery in Castroville and took her some brunch.  She freaked out and easily won the award for best reaction!  I love Ma. :)

We had to wait until I was about 7 weeks to see the Dr. for the first time, but the little bity grain of rice sized baby we saw was worth the wait.  Brett was in awe and I was happy crying on the table.  Sorry for the graininess of the sonogram pics, they aren't exactly taken in high def and trying to take a pic of the pic without an awful glare is way harder than one might think.

Then we let parents and grandparents tell immediate family, told our bosses, and a few really close friends.  And the morning, rather all. day. long. morning sickness really kicked in... boo to that btw....thank goodness I got to deal with all that in the summer rather than during the school year...  But, chocolate milk seemed to be majorly delicious when I did have an appetite. Yummmmm!

We got to see the little one again at almost 10 weeks, now about the size of a still shelled peanut (think baseball games or elephants), hence why we loving referred to it as "the peanut" for several weeks. My mom went with me to this sonogram and loved watching the peanut move.  Apparently we have a wiggler on our hands. :)

We got to see the baby one more time at 13 weeks when I had a first trimester screening.  It was bopping up and down, touching it's face, kicking its feet, and waving hello.  At this point the kiddo measured 7.7cm but that is only from crown to rump, it doesn't include legs, so that's about the size of a rather large shrimp. I told one of my friends this and she lovingly named the baby "Nemo".  Brett's 6 year old cousin heard us calling the baby Nemo and said that if it comes out a baby she wants to hug it but if it is a fish she wants to keep it and put it in a fish tank. :) I love little kids!  I know these sonograms are hard to figure out, but the head is on the left, with a hand up by the face, the shoulders/belly in the middle and the little legs/feet in the top right.  Most precious thing I have ever seen, but I think I might be just a tad bit biased. ;)

Once we got all the results from that screening back telling us everything was normal and our little HabyBaby was healthy, we decided it was finally time to share the good news!  That brings us to this week, 14 weeks in. :) 

And here is a baby bump timeline for you lucky readers. 

 

4 weeks, still a flat tummy. :)                                      8 weeks (2 months)

 12 weeks (3 months)                                                      14 weeks 

We get to find out the gender the first week of September and I can't wait.  Brett and my mom are convinced it is a girl, but I don't have any feeling either way yet, so we shall see.

Haby Baby ~ Part One

Rather than to have a ridiculously long post about all the events that go along with pregnancy, but that I couldn't share until the news was out, I decided to break this announcement post up into two parts.  So let's begin today with the very beginning, part 1 ~ cleverly titled...

Before

     

     Brett and I were married June 21, 2008 after dating for over 6 years.  We were high school and college sweethearts, which I think is pretty cool.  If your relationship can make it through the wildness of college, especially at  a university as big and "out there" as UT,  you can make it through a lot.  Brett and I both love kids, I'm a teacher and he is pretty darn good with my nieces and nephew, so when we got married our original plan, I'm a planner, kind of OCD about things following a predetermined plan, but I'm working on that and have actually chilled out a lot in the past year, was to start thinking about having kids about 2 years in.   Then someone decided to start grad school right about the time someone else decided to make a career move, so the baby idea got put on hold. 

What I got used to seeing for awhile.

     Fast forward to the fall of last year (2010) and we come to the chat where Brett and I realized that if we started trying for kids fairly soon that even if I got pregnant on the first try, the baby would not be due until I was done with grad school, which sounded like a good plan.  However, I did not get pregnant on the first, second, third, etc. try and instead began to learn to live by God's plan not mine.  I do not suffer from infertility, and I pray for those who do because I only had a glimpse of that kind of pain and can not imagine enduring it every day.

Matthew 6:34

      The whole experience is something I am glad I went through though becaues it deepened my faith in the Lord and brought me closer to my husband.  Matthew 6:34 has become my favorite verse and I have also grown as a person by finally learning to "Let Go & Let God".  At the end of the day I am glad it all worked out the way it did and realize that God's plan is 25 times more awesome than my plan and his includes a lot of wonderful blessings along the way that I might not have recognized without the hurt I felt.

 I  threw myself into teaching and grad school and even though I think I tend to overdo it with one and complain a lot about the other, I am so proud of how far I have come in both.

I worked on my eating habits and general health and discovered some tasty new foods and recipes.  And, according to my most recent blood work, kicked my anemia's butt!

I also read a lot of books about fertility/ pregnancy and learned all about the huge difference in "not preventing" vs. "trying", charting, basal body temps,  opks, etc. 

    

I found the joy in loving on other people's babies and how amazing it is to watch a baby chick hatch.  

I got crafty on a regular basis, simply enjoying the process of making a gift for someone I loved by hand.  

I rediscovered some awesome songs on my ipod.

 

I enjoyed time with my husband whether at the beach, watering the yard, or watching Dexter.  It totally creeped me out at first but now I like it.  Plus we have to watch that kind of stuff before we have kids. ;)  He is a downright amazing guy and I am so lucky to call him mine. Plus, he puts up with me and I put up with him, so we work. :)

Most importantly, I learned to just enjoy the 

God created glory and beauty in sunrises and sunsets.

Then finally, on May 16, 2011, we got this little gift. 

Lake Weekend

This past weekend was spent playing in the sun and water at lake LBJ with the hubby's extended family.  We are talking aunts, uncles, cousins, grandparents…24 people to be exact ranging from the ages of 6 - 70ish. It was the second year we went and had just as much fun.  Tubing, wake-boarding, jet-skiing, poolside lounging which I did almost the entire time, volleyball, pool playing, and eating all day long were the main things on the agenda.  I was awful about taking pictures, I have been really bad about that recently and don't know why :(.  I used to be obsessive about pictures and scrapbooking and now I am just kinda nonchalant about it all, maybe blame it on the grad school summer funk I'm in…  but I do have a few to share with you.   

 Brad, my brother-in-law, wake-boarding.  If I wasn't in the pool I was in the boat watching tubers, wake-boarders, or the like.   I wake-boarded last year and hurt for a week straight so this year this old lady laid low.

My other brother-in-law, Brandon, entertaining us on the knee board.  He is quite the little dare devil, last year we got him to attempt barefoot skiing. :) 

The hubs on the jet-ski. 

Even Brett's Grandma and Grandpa took the jet-ski for a spin.  

Like I said, we ate delicious food all weekend and naturally I had to bake some cookies to take along.  The other dish I made was a bigger hit but naturally I forgot to take a picture of them.  

The hubs and me lounging in the pool.  Thank goodness my mother in law took pictures or I wouldn't have a single one of us. 

The whole Haby family, posing for the Christmas card.  My father in law has his toes flexed like that because his nieces painted his toenails hot pink while he was sleeping. ;) 

Overall, lovely but exhausting weekend.  Being in the sun for extended periods of time always wear me out.   I went to bed at 8:00 last night to get my rest for the last exhausting full week of grad school.  Less than 10 days until I am done forever!

Simple Sunday

Long time, no post, yes I know.  This week was simply ridiculous and overall not so great.  A few big stress-out sessions here and there and lots of tears made up the majority of my days. Thanks grad school... Today at church, the pastor was talking to the kids during children's sermon about how the doughnut he was holding, (usually a fluffy, sweet, and wonderful thing) had been squished and shaken up all morning since too many people unknowingly mishandled it and now was not quite itself.  He talked about how sometimes we as people go through the same thing and I thought "I hear ya buddy, big-time."  Lately I feel pressure/ major stress pushing in on all sorts of areas from all sorts of people (even people who do so unintentionally) and I was turning into that squished up doughnut.  I don't like what stress does to me, not one bit, and am constantly praying for strength and guidance with that.

But, I'm back, with a realization that I can do small things to make things these last few weeks a little more manageable and actually enjoyable at times (I hate not wanting to get up in the morning because all I get to look forward to is being overwhelmed by grad school and what not.  I'm burning out quick and I feel like my brain may have reached capacity and that sometimes a few hours of work and I don't even make sense to myself...).  I made a commitment to this degree and goal and there's no backing down now, especially when the finish line is less 3 weeks away.  However, I've come to the realization that going day by day, dealing with what is important to ME at that time is what matters at this point.  Sure it sounds selfish, but honestly, I'm at the survival point for the next 15 or so days.  So again, be patient with me, you'll get your darling Dana back soon enough.  :)  

So now that that's out, let me share with you some recent simple joys that help me pull myself up by the bootstraps and keep on trucking....

1.  The game you probably watched on T.V. today too.  Fifa Women's World Cup Final.  These chicks are LEGIT athletes.  I have pretty much no athletic skill, and just watching them leaves me in awe. Abby Wambach and her headers are pretty much the most awesome thing ever.  My parents put me in softball, soccer, volleyball, all that when I was little but when I was doing cartwheels in left field or told my dad that "soccer was silly because you just chased the same ball back and forth" they decided to stop pushing the issue. Yes I cheered in high school, but seriously, that's not really a sport.  And I played intramurals in college, but mainly just to meet the numbers and give Brett a good laugh.   These chicks show some serious dedication and ability and plain out rock!  Go USA! 

 

2. Sonic Happy Hour.  It takes place at the time of day when I seem most in a grad school funk/ brain block and allows me just the right amount of break time with a little "reward" built right in. :)  

  

3.  3 new Essie nail polishes.  I discovered these bad boys through another blog I follow and have since been loving giving myself manicures.  As often as I chip my polish or change my mind on the color I can't afford to have them professionally done. ;)  One of my 25@25 is to stop biting/ peeling my nails.  Nasty habit, trust me I know, but one that was hard to break since I've been doing it since I was a little bitty.  However, I think I have finally 9 months later accomplished this goal.  I only peel my nail if it is breaking now, and can probably nix that with just having a file on hand.   My new vitamins have made my nails 10 times stronger and having a great polish color on them makes me 10 times less likely to mess with them.  Plus, I can do my nails and work on my laptop at the same time. The left one is "pop art pink", the middle is "neo whimsical" and the right is "tart deco".   (p.s. I know I promised a post on the 25@25 deal but there are a few things on there I'm not quite ready to justify just yet.  Let me make it through grad school first.)

4. Chicken Express.  I bet those super awesome soccer girls never eat this stuff.  I don't do fast food very often, and am super picky about it when I do, but Chicken Express rocks my socks off when I'm needing a good fried chicken tender and corn nuggets fix.  Their tea and biscuits are awesome too and who doesn't love some tasty comfort food.  When the lady in the Oreo commercial says "Shut the front door!"  pretty much describes how I felt today eating this deliciousness. :)

5. Getting to spend quality time with my Daddy yesterday while he and the hubs did some carpentry work on a piece of furniture.   He's a bit of a work-a-holic overachiever like myself so we both get pretty busy and miss out on time with each other.  He's a pretty smart guy who gives some pretty good advice. :)

6. Taking a grad school break to clean out the guest rooms with the hubs.  Sure we argued a bit about what to keep/ toss, my finger got smashed, and his idea of decor might not match mine, but I love spending time with him.  He was amazed how much scrapbooking stuff I still have that I have not used in years or plan to get to in years, but didn't push the issue on going through it right this minute, just made room for them in his hunting closet.  I didn't make him narrow down his basketballs or hunting stuff though either so we are getting better at compromising.  However, he couldn't refrain from commenting on the 3, yes 3 plastic storage tubs full of stuff I want to do for my classroom.  He even let me keep the trash bag full of empty plastic bottles after I thoroughly explained how this particular kind was the best choice for a sweet word work or number search center.  What a sweetie. :)   He was amazed I have all these good ideas in my brain, all the materials bought and in boxes, and hadn't touched a lick of it.  Again, thanks grad school.  Once I get back into the swing of things, classroom ideas are easily on the top of the list.

7. Looking forward to a few things.  

- A weekend at lake LBJ with the extented in-law family.   I'm bringing stuff for smores and Skipbo. :)

- The upcoming birth of a dear friend's baby boy.

- Twinks coming to visit and helping me go through my closet like we did yearly at UT.   Naturally some of our old school faves like Fergie, Brittney, Cory, Pat, and the likewise will be joining us via Pandora Radio. We'll probably bake too and hopefully nothing ends up on the floor. ;)

- Convincing my mom to take me shopping for some back to school clothes.  Yes, I'm 25.  Yes my mom still spoils me occasionally.  Yes, I love it. :)

- Getting into my classroom and getting it all set up.  It doesn't stress me out, I love doing it, I just don't have the time yet. :(   I wish I could do it this week, but I have GOT to do grad school instead.  No choice there. 

- Deciding if I want to cut all my hair off in the coming weeks.  I'm thinking I want something like this but my hair is thin and I have a way bigger forehead than she does so I'm not quite convinced I can pull it off yet.  Naturally I'm considering highlights too but thats another financial commitment this cheapo might not want to make. 

And that my friends, is the random post as I watch the last few minutes of the World Cup and dread the paper I have to write when it is over.  It's coming down to penalty kicks again and not looking so good...

"Crossing" # 20 off the 25@25 list

When I started coming up with the 25@25 list last fall (I'll do a post next week with details on that whole literally life changing idea), my crafty self knew I had to put a new project of sorts on there, something I had never done before.  I don't even remember now where I first saw the "unique crosses" that jumpstarted the whole thing, but it has evolved into something I now love doing.  It took awhile to figure out the specifics, (saw blade, wood type and thickness, bonding glue, brushes, decoupage material, paper thickness, etc.) but over the past few months it has greatly evolved.

The first cross was a gift for Brett's grandma and I was super proud of it at the time, but  now I realize it was really just the start of the learning process.  The picture is of the church in Castroville that she is very involved in and that Brett and I got married in.

The second one I did was for a friend's daughter's nursery.  I matched it to her crib bedding and added initials and some ribbon details.

The third one was for my sister-in-law.  It is done in her wedding colors and patterns and has their wedding picture, date and Mr. & Mrs. Haby details.

 


The fourth was for another friend's son's nursery.  This one has a ribbon wrapped cross detail and complements the crib bedding.  (It is attached to the diaper cake since it was part of a shower gift)

The fifth and most recent one I did was by far the hardest, probably because someone wanted to pay me for it so every little imperfection bugged my OCD self, and took forever since I was doing summer grad school at the time, but also ended up being one of my favorites.   It is for a coworker's niece's nursery and has ribbon detail around the middle cross and pink pearl details. 

So now I get to cross off
 #20: Learn to make unique crosses.     Done :) 


This is by far one of my favorite things I have accomplished on my list but also one of the hardest.  I love making them since I get to design the whole thing and try something new every time, but they sure do take forever since it is all done by hand from scratch.  I think the next one needs to be for a room in my own house though....