Today..

Luke and I went to the Farmer's market today, and totally should have thought better of going 2 days before Thanksgiving. It was a mad house! Then Luke DESPERATELY needed new shoes, so we stopped at Rackroom and he picked up a pair(on sale!), then ate CiCi's pizza. Its so freakishly cheap here it almost makes me nervous to eat it..haha..then Luke graciously allowed me to stop in at Target and pick up 2 more long sleeved shirts. Its getting cold here and I only had 2 that fit, so it was time. :) We came home and played some Rock Band 2...didn't realize we still had tons of progress to make on the game. I meanwhile have been doing laundry all day so we'd have clothes to pack for our 5 day trip to T'ville. Tonight we watched Biggest Loser after eating scrumpcious stir-fry and tofu over rice, I made Muddy Buddy mix and Luke and I settled in to fold the 5 loads of laundry that needed to be folded. Luke brought down all the suitcases, so I put everything in them while folding..only thing left now is last minute stuff like toiletries. This trip will be interesting cause its the first time we've ever stayed with Luke's family...not interesting in a bad way by any means, but just different.

Erin and I had a blast at the movies. It was so funny to sit in with the more Twihards...I mean I like the books and the movies, but I'm not drooling/screaming/wearing t-shirts in support type of a fan...and I can't even count the times we heard screams during the movie. It was seriously comical and pretty annoying all at the same time. But I had fun none the less...I don't get out alone often especially with Erin, so I counted it a real treat to have some time to ourselves. I'm also getting a NIECE! I am soo beyond excited about getting a niece...with 3 nephews its about time. I can't be the only girl supplier around here..haha...She will be loved soo much and it will be nice to see all of Kate's clothes getting some use again.

I also really really enjoyed having my mom up here this past week. We don't get nearly enough time with her and so it means everything when we get to be together. I'm so glad you came Mom. I'm glad we'll see you some this week and that Christmas isn't far away! :)

We won't be able to do our normal home church meeting this week, and that makes me sad. We have really come to love our get togethers....Kelly, know we'll be missing you and Ty!

Off to put the last load in the dryer and get ready to watch a little Conan...he's my fave!

Exciting week..

My Dad came up yesterday for some more work, my mom is coming tomorrow, which is also when we do our homechurch, Erin's ultrasound to find out what she's having is Thursday, Erin and I go to see New Moon on Friday, its Erin's birthday on Sat, and Luke and I were thinking dinner out on Sunday at where my Aunt is the chef...So much is going on and I'm so excited about all of it.

I've been trying to focus on not just walking on the treadmill recently, but also upper body stuff too..I didn't realize how weak and pathetic my upper body was..haha..but I can visibily see a difference in my arms now..I've got noticable muscle now..yay! The mile around the park seems soo soo much easier now that I've been walking more then that daily...However I'm thinking I need some new shoes or something cause I noticed when I walk/run that my feet feel like I have bruises on them for days..and that doesn't make me want to do it again..ugh. So we'll see..I may just have to go with it for right now, shoes are on the low end of the need spectrum. :)

I just realized the other day that Pandora had a ipod App and I have been really enjoying it. Since we have wireless here in the house its been nice to just use that and get some new music to listen to then what I've heard lots of times.

Olivia..

I entered Olivia into one of those silly little child model contests..haha..this is what happens when I get bored. :)

So if you want to vote for her, click here!

http://modelsearch.parenting.com/contests/showentry/95018

Well..

Thats as good as it gets right now. I gotta figure out how to get rid of the middle template and just have the layout...ugh. I don't remember it being this hard. haha..

Sorry I haven't blogged in a while. I've been quite busy and just haven't had the alone time and brain capacity to do it. All spare time has been spent reading, working out, watching movies with the fam, and going places...What's spare time again?? :)

If your popping in right now

I'm sorry..I'm trying to figure out how to change my layout...it wasn't this hard, but I somehow clicked something that made it where I couldn't get back to a editing page and now only the layout is showing up, and none of my actual postings...weird.

Hang in there..:)

Fun weekend..

We had a fun weekend..We just had mostly a chill day on Sat...and went grocery shopping. We needed so much...I'm still trying to get a feel for how to use WIC, but I'm thinking I'm getting it..Publix also had some great BOGO's this week...I always make use of the weeks they have pasta or pasta sauces BOGO cause I KNOW I'll use those and it helps to stock up on them for times when I don't have as much money to use on groceries.

Yesterday we got up and got ready and decided to go to IKEA. Ended up getting lots of children eating ware for Luke's mom's house...and a train set for Noah for Christmas(Luke's going to hopefully build him a little table for his room to put them on), and some stacking cups for Kate. We ran an errand to a friends house to drop some stuff off and then on to Tyler and Kelly's house to go to the park right by them, we had a lot of fun. The kids were pooped, so we ate dinner and put the kids down for bed a little earlier then normal...which allowed us to watch a movie without it being too late when it was over! Yay..I love when it works out that way.

Luke has taken on a salesmen type role with a company here that does exterior finishing type stuff(you know, siding, window, roofing). He's only making commission so we haven't seen really any fruits, but its of no loss to us right now cause he's not doing it 8 hrs a day or anything. This allows him to work and do the side construction stuff he's been doing but with the option of finding sales through the company. It could be a good thing, but since its not an official "job", it hasn't felt like he's gotten a job or anything. We'll just have to wait and see where God leads this...Pray for favor though either way..:)

Today is..

Cleaning and purging day. I'm so tired of all the extra things we have around the house. So I'm trying my best to go through all of the clothes right now, mostly the kids. Noah's got a ton of things he's outgrown that I need to find homes for, bigger clothes that we've been given need to be organized and put somewhere, and all the things Kate's outgrown need to be put up to save for Erin in case she happens to have a girl. I'm also going to go through and organize pots, pans, glass wear, and tupperwear stuff and get rid of some of them. I have way way too much glass wear and I'm sure someone else could benefit from them more then I can just having them there to look at. :)

Planning on going to IKEA this week. Going to pick up some eating ware to take with us to the Fletcher's for Thanksgiving, and possibly a couple Christmas gifts for the kids. I love how wonderfully cheap their stuff is, but its so well made! I'm also thankful that Kate's young enough this year, she won't require really anything at all, so she'll only get a couple gifts..and most will be practical ones. haha

We were able to find Noah a new carseat on Craigslist a couple weeks ago, he still fits into his Britax Roundabout, but Kate's only a couple pounds away from needing it, so we bought the size up and got him the Marathon which is what Olivia has too...he's excited to have a new "big boy" seat(even though it really only has a taller back, it looks almost the same.)..and it will be nice to have the Roundabout for Kate now.

100th!

This is officially my 100th post...feels good. :) I occasionally go back and look at my prior posts and its amazing how far I've come over the time I've been blogging here..My 100th post is going to be about breastfeeding..just a warning in case no one wants to be surprised by it as they read. Its also long...just warning.

Right after I had Olivia I was of the mindset that I would nurse her..my milk took forever to come in..like over 5 days..it was frustrating to hold a crying baby and feel like I wasn't feeding her enough. I'm thankful my mom was around to help and encourage..finally it came in and things were fine. I'd say like less then a week later I noticed I had a lump in my breast..called my midwife and she had a look at it...we concluded it was a clogged duct and helped me figure out how to get it out..2days later I could barely sleep cause I was running fever and in a lot of pain. She refered me to a surgeon who diagnosed me with whats called a Galactocele. A cyst that kept getting filled up with milk and had no outlet, creating a breeding ground for infection. After going in every 3-4 days to have it aspirated by needle and being on countless rounds of antibiotics(this was several weeks) they decided to put a drain in and surgically attach it to my chest. It was soo annoying. I wasn't allowed to get it wet, so I was sponge bathing and I had this for over a month. Not to mention, its hard to hide that sort of thing under a shirt...:) They finally took it out and said that outside of surgery to remove it there wasn't much more they could do because I was still trying to nurse and even though I was unable to nurse out of that side and I was trying to keep it dry, it still kept filling up. When Olivia was 3 1/2 months old I made the decision to stop breastfeeding. It was a choice made out of frustration and also relief. I was tired of trying, was tired of the pain, wanted something easier, and because of my experience I really really didn't like nursing. I was also sad, because I knew it meant letting go of ME providing nutrition and feeling like I'd failed something very important. While it was a sad choice to make, I know it was the right one. I was a much happier, healthier and better mommy after that.

When I got pregnant with Noah I immediately decided I would try my hardest again. My Dr's were telling me the cyst would come back and would most likely cause problems again. Luke and I decided right then and there we were NOT claiming that. We rebuked the words spoken and cursed the cyst and commanded life over my future nursing relationship. My milk came in the day after I gave birth and came in STRONG! I was overwhelming the poor little guy and he just couldn't keep up..which led me to pumping a lot...which for me started a vicious cycle. I loved Luke being able to feed Noah with all that extra milk, but it also made it where Noah prefered the bottle..and I was left very FULL a lot of the time even with pumping. He was a funny eater and while I was so happy to finally be breastfeeding I still didn't enjoy it very much those first couple of months while we worked out the kinks. We praised God that He was faithful and healed me allowing me to nurse on BOTH sides and not having any more cysts. I am a testimate to the fact that Dr's do not have the final say in healing. :) As the months went by I was so thankful that things got soo easy and I felt too lazy to pump and feed my child and gave up on that unless I had to go somewhere. We made it all the way to 12 months...We probably could have gone longer, but I wasn't as willing to nurse an "older" baby at the time.

My experience with breastfeeding has only got better and better. Kate is a GREAT nurser and has never given me any problems. She acted like she knew what she was doing. When she was 3 weeks old we went to stay with my Dad for 7 weeks while they worked on a project. I didn't bring my pump with me so when she was hungry there were no other choices but for me to feed her. I think it really helped our nursing relationship...she does NOT like bottles or pacifiers which is a new one for me as my other two loved both. But she's a super efficiant nurser who's almost always done in under 10 minutes total. She's plump and sweet and I relish the idea of nursing her for a while. She loves reaching up and playing with my face while she's nursing, or seeing how far she can place her foot up on my arm..and I love when she's so happy she can't even stay latched on due to smiling. Now, don't get me wrong..I know there are moments when it'd be nice to pass off a feeding or not having to worry about who I'm leaving her with cause I know there will be a bottle battle, but its all worth it.

My point is, if at first you don't succeed, try again! It IS worth it, and I don't mean any of this to put down anyone who formula feeds. Since we did it with Olivia I have a lot more mercy about it then I know a lot of breastfeeding moms. I'm just saying if it doesn't work one time, it doesn't mean it won't work again..

Alright..now you now a lot about my nursing life. :) It kind of consumes you while your doing it..haha..

Off to get dinner out of the oven!