7 Things That Have Made This Pregnancy Better

I'm over at my other blog discussing fun topics like vitamins and bladder control!

It's A Girl!! According to Some Old Wives, Anyway

I had to get an extra ultrasound because there was concern that baby wasn't growing properly. According to the ultrasound, baby's measurements are just fine. I did ALMOST cave and ask about the gender...ALMOST. I was very excited to have a picture of Baby so close to our due date, but alas, Baby wasn't having it and had his/her arm up over the face. So here is a terrible, blobby picture. 

I love to hear peoples' predictions about whether Baby is a boy or girl. So I decided to put a list together of "Old Wives' Tests" and see what was predicted. I narrowed it down to 21, because some of the tests were...um...subjects I would only discuss with my husband or doctor...and some were gross (ok, ok, I may have considered peeing on some cabbage just because it made me laugh, but that would have required me to go to the store and get cabbage).

The first option is girl (red), the second is boy (blue), and the answer is turned to that color.

1. Chinese Gender Calendar     GIRL or BOY

2. Cravings                              SWEET or SALTY

Baby really likes pop tarts and ice-cream. Or at least, that's my excuse and I'm sticking to it.

3. Baby's Heartbeat                   HIGH or LOW

Baby's heartbeat has been in the middle of the range every single time. Baby is just going to keep us guessing.

4. Daddy's Weight              GAINING or MAINTAINING

Although he has been "sympathy eating", since I've had all kinds of extra food around.

5. Morning Sickness                    YES or NO

Yep, but for the record, I had morning sickness with Little Man too.

6. Skin                                         SOFT or DRY

My skin is pretty much the best when I'm pregnant. Incentive to have more kids, right?

7. Headaches                                  NO or YES

This one was new to me. I had a period of horrible pregnancy migraines - didn't know that was a thing til this pregnancy - but luckily they subsided in the usual amount of time, but yikes was that not fun. The only thing that touched them was tylenol + caffeine, so The Hubs learned to make white chocolate mochas for me.

8. Nose getting wider or bigger    NO or YES

9.  Sleep with your pillow to the North NO or YES 

I had to think way to hard about this.

10. Sleeping side                      RIGHT or LEFT

I have slept equally on both sides. So maybe I'm having a puppy.

11. Feet colder than usual STAYS THE SAME or YES

Actually, I feel like my feet have been hotter, so make of that what you will.

12. Dry hands                                 NO or YES

13. Acne                                         YES or NO

14. Mayan Tale: Mothers age at conception + year of conception  

                                                     EVEN or ODD

15. If your legs stay in shape        YES or NO

I mean, my legs are still the shape of legs...just a bit larger and not toned. I just call the extra "chunk" "baby food"

16. If you eat the ends of bread     NO or YES

17. Dreaming of gender?            GIRL or BOY

The only dreams I've had where Baby had a gender, it was a boy.

18. Cravings                              FRUIT or PROTEIN

I almost deemed this question inconclusive because I could eat fruit and protein my whole pregnancy, but since I could put down two flats of strawberries a week early in my pregnancy, I went with fruit. However, I did the same with Little Man.

19. Belly                    WATERMELON  or BASKETBALL

The Hubs says watermelon.

20.                                      GRACEFUL or CLUMSY

Um, I don't know that I'm ever graceful. And is there a pregnant woman who isn't a bit clumsy? Never mind, if so, don't tell me.

21. If you can only think of girl names then you're having a girl or vice versa. 

                                                      GIRL  or BOY

We have name choices for both boy and girl, and some days I like them, and some days I'm like "I don't like any of our name choices". We're still discussing names, and open to suggestions.

BONUS: It should be noted, that two weeks prior to finding out I was pregnant, Little Man came up to me and said "I want a little brother", to which I stared open-mouthed because we had never discussed that with him. And throughout the pregnancy, if you asked him if he wanted a little brother or little sister, 95% of the time he replied "little brother". I'm very interested to see if he is correct. Also, The Hubs and I are both think it's a boy. Also, I was correct with Little Man's gender.  But, enough talking...

AND THE RESULTS ARE???

GIRL = 11      BOY = 7   Inconclusive = 3

Old Wives Predict = GIRL

Leave your predictions in the comments!

Painting With Kids

We've been busy! At least that is my excuse for the silence here and I'm sticking to it. Our days are pretty much pool time, lunch, naps, etc, rinse and repeat. But the thunderstorms this week have limited our pool days. I've been messing around with art stuff as of late and decided to brave an activity with Little Man.

My first idea was to do "blow art" with food colors. Somebody did this with me as a child, and I thought it'd be fun.

Unfortunately, Little Man couldn't quite get the technique of blowing the food coloring down and it started seeping through the paper. So, plan number one was kind of a failure. 

Luckily, plan B was a great success. I pulled out some old cheapo water colors I've had laying around since high school, put an old youth group shirt to use, and voila! Child contained and entertained for roughly an hour, with the occasional paper and water change.

And it went great, until a precariously placed water cup (that contained a lot of paint) spilled...and well...

...my very pregnant self was bending over and sitting on the floor trying to clean up the mess. That put an end to painting time (it was past lunch time and creeping into nap time anyway) and initiated sobbing from the previously happy two-year-old. Who cried because painting time was over. And then cried because he couldn't find his puppy. And then cried because he found his puppy. Which made me really want a nap. God bless Netflix, which ceased the crying long enough for me to get lunch ready, the kid fed, and down for a nap.

Oh well...all's well that ends with the two-year-old crying and paint on the walls, right?

Happy Easter!

I'm linking up with Like Mother, Like Daughter for {Pretty, Happy, Funny, Real}. And since there is a wholelotta {pretty, happy, funny, real} going on around here, I'll let you choose what is which.

So, remember this gem?

a.k.a. my issues with committing to a paint color

After much weeping and gnashing of teeth, I finally committed to a color. Easter was our goal (which we thought we'd meet easily...ha...haha) because we were hosting family from both sides for the weekend and Easter lunch. We managed to get the trim and two walls painted. At least, the walls that did get painted were the ones that had the paint samples on them. They were starting to make us twitch. Of course, now that they're gone, I'm starting to lose motivation to finish the other two walls.

Ah :) no more paint swatches :)

I think that I've mentioned that we've started milling our own wheat? Well, I tried using our wheat for my Easter cake, which calls for AP flour and I didn't do any research, yadayadayada and....

almost completely hollow but tasted good

I was pretty determined to make the cake since it's a family recipe, and I don't have many of those, and I knew my family would love it (which they did), so I hacked around some forums for about 10 minutes (which I should have done anyway), and after braving a three-and-a-half-our-priest-skimps-on-nothing (including using full-sized drink pitchers for baptisms)-vigil-mass with our two year old and getting to bed around 1 am, I got up early and made cake #2.

Ah, much better. 

We had a blast with all the family, ate our traditional lamb, risotto, homemade bread, salad, etc meal (my husband is a beast in the kitchen; I did the cake), and then enjoyed watching the kiddos hunt for eggs.

hunting for eggs

My niece and her Easter stash

Grandma hid them well in the bushes

Mommy getting in on the action

My nephew and his eggs

hustling to find more eggs

adorable

Cousins 6yrs, 3 1/2 yrs, and 2 1/2 yrs.

Cousins with babies at 37, 22, and 17 weeks gestation

Grandparent and Great Grandparent love

After all of the egg hunting and the food eating we just enjoyed hanging out together. So what do you get when you cross one entertaining cousin with a deliriously silly cousin?

We got to enjoy some low key time with my sister's family after everyone else left. The kids had a blast playing in the yard (watched by us through the window). Before we realized what they were doing, the cousins had discovered a fun way to go down a small hill in our yard.

We hope your Easter was as wonderful and joyful as ours! Happy Easter from my family to yours!

Family Day of Hiking and Sushi

Linking up with Like Mother, Like Daughter for their {Pretty, Happy, Funny, Real} link-up today. Stop by and tell them hello :)

The Hubs surprised us by taking a day off from work last week just to have fun! And fun for us usually involves a hiking trail. We have a North Georgia trail guide book that we sometimes use and we never quite know what we're getting ourselves into. This trail was at the end of a long drive (approx 1.5 hrs), a very short hike (0.2 miles), and had a beautiful waterfall. It's called Minihaha Falls. The entrance to the trail is on the side of the road after driving through several miles of a community of lake houses (a windy road that almost did me in), and if you blinked you might have missed it. See Exhibit A.

{real}

Exhibit A - this was it for trail markings

The stairs are across the road from a "parking area", or a spot to pull off the road. The path was narrow with a pretty steep drop off, but Little Man handled it well. If you have a child who has no sense of boundaries/edges and does not stay with you well, this is not the trail for you. There were several tree roots sticking out of the ground which Little Man was timid about stepping over so he pretty much held my hand the whole time, which made me less nervous. The hike was pretty steep but of course short, and I was kind of bummed when it was over, until I saw the waterfall.

Mommy and Matthan at Minihaha Falls

I could have stayed there all day long. We stayed there for a long while. Little Man sat on the rock with me for a bit, ate some snacks, and then explored the area while Daddy stayed glued to his side (you know, rushing water and all that). He had been timid about walking around but as soon as I gave him my walking sticks he had no problem exploring the small area around the falls. See the video below for Little Man in action.

{funny}

Little Man with hiking sticks

{happy}

Family selfie in front of the falls

We have been to a couple waterfalls where Little Man could play in the water, but not only was this water very cold, it was moving really fast. He so desperately wanted to go in, so Daddy kept a good grip on him. It was a colder day than Tim had anticipated, so you'll have to excuse what he called the "unabomber look".

Splashing Daddy

{pretty}

Minihaha Falls

After eating lunch in Clayton, we stopped at a farm that I had seen advertised on billboards during our drive. It's still clearly the off season for them because there was only a couple people around. It ended up being a total tourist trap, but we enjoyed seeing the animals nonetheless. 

After a quick nap, we ended the day with sushi and ice-cream. It was a wonderful family day, hopefully to be repeated sooner rather than later.