THUMPTHUMP-SWISH-THUMP

I don't remember ever being this aware with my first pregnancy, maybe because now I've done this before and now I know what to watch/feel for....

Or maybe it's just because I'm an anal psychopath this time around, and anything that seems a little 'off' tweaks my brains...yeah, I'm betting on that one.

It had been subtly simmering in the back of my brain that I hadn't felt any little 'flutters' in my baby maker for about a good week now. Not that I had been feeling major kicks or anything, I mean c'mon, this child is the size of a lima bean...BUT, I had been feeling some and it seemed to have stop the last week or so. And the absence of those butterfly kicks coupled with having some pretty uncomfortable cramping off and on had my brain doing uncoordinated jumping jacks.

I didn't say anything to anyone last night until I 'casually' mentioned that I was looking forward to hearing the babys heart beat at this mornings appointment because I was a 'little' worried that I felt like I hadn't noticed any kicking for a while.

Oh, and then I 'casually' mentioned the same thing to my momma.

Note to self: Don't get the gramma riled up if absolutely unnecessary. She didn't skip a beat when I mentioned it last night, didn't sound the LEAST bit worried about it-Until I talked to her today after the appointment and she made it clear that after our little conversation SHE had then been stewing over it as well.

*sigh*

ANYHOO, the three of us (Liv, John and myself), piled into the car at what felt like the buttcrack of dawn, made our way to our monthly appointment and nervously sat and waited for the Doctor to waltz into the room with the baby listener.

Liv crawled up and peeked her little face over the table so she could see the little doppler thingy on mommys tummy and the instant the Doctor put it on my tummy we hear 'THUMPTHUMPTHUMPTHUMPSWISHTHUMPTHUMPTHUMP'.

WAHOO! Nervous nelly over here got her already too-tight panties in a wad all for nothin-we heard a BEAUTIFUL heartbeat at a strong 150 bpm!!

In the midst of the incredibly strong heart beat we could hear baby swimming and rolling around. It's so funny to be able to visualize that kind of thing. So weird.

I WISH you all could have seen the priceless look on Livies face the second we heard the heart beat-like it was seriously the most unbelievable thing she has ever seen.

I will forever remember the look on her face at that exact moment. It majorly kissed my heart.

Ugh.

So it's about this perpetual funk I'm in.

I can't blog. *SOB*

I've got so much rolling around in my head. Stuff I think about while laying in bed AWAKE at night, stuff I can't stop thinking about while partaking in my every-day activities, no matter how mundane those said activities may be (sitting on the couch).

But I can't blog about them. I've got this malfunction lately somewhere between my brain and the tips of my fingers that prevents me from tapping these keys to put down exactly whats going on in this crazy noggin. It's like my brain farts the second I try and type it out, and let me tell ya, it doesn't smell so good, like it's something of the 'silent-but-deadly' variety. *sigh*

So, for now, I'll just share one of my favorite pictures of that child whom I birthed from my loins.

That was gross, I apologize.

This one never fails to make me smile, no matter how wickedly toddler-ish she has been lately:

Just a 'lil peeky into my day...

Notice the crazed look in my eye.

How about the unstyled hair and the smeared mascara that is slowly resembling the 'racoon look'? It's all the rage these days ladies, don't judge.

Oh, and I'm sure you didn't notice, but I will also direct you to the beautiful Easter stickers that Livie decided to wallpaper my face with.

Yes, my friends, it's just that kind of day.

Pop goes the question

What an incredibly exciting night we had last night...

Maybe I'll just show you the pictures and let you see for yourself.

The subjects in the photos are my Sister and her Boyfriend:

*sigh*











Carter, (their son) was pretty excited for mommy and daddy too!

Oh. And yeah, she said yes. :)

Hooray!! Congratulations sissy-poo. Love you.

Note to self:

Yeah, I should kept that in mind, say, 12 weeks ago??

You wanna have a 'special cuddle' honey??

Nah, I think I'll just get me some chocolate, but thanks anyways...

*sigh*

On a side note: I betcha didn't know that in my past life I was a super hot ad model huh?? Well, I now have proof, so eat your heart out ladies.

Reason #638,243 as to why we should not be allowed out in public...ever...

John came home last Friday with the brilliant idea of 'going out' to get something to eat. This made momma happy.

We (the 3.5 of us) ventured over to this little mom and pop hamburger shop in town in search of something to satisfy our grumbly tummys. We quickly ordered and found a table in the middle of the diner, where there would be no lack of things to look at to entertain Liv while eating. Miss waitress brings our sodas out.

John and I are chatting away and I here 'momma look!!'. I glance at Liv and in record time she has ripped off half of her straw wrapper, has the straw in position, and is ready to fire...

And she fires.

Right into the back of the ladies head behind me.

OMG.

I quickly turn around, realizing my face has never felt so beet red in my life and apologize profusely while groping for the launched wrapper which has now lodged itself in between the two ladies sitting directly behind me. Luckily, one of them had a great sense of humor and picked up her straw and told us 'oh, this is war!'

*whew* Law suit apparently avoided on that one...

Remember I mentioned that we chose a booth directly in the MIDDLE of the diner, where there were lots of fun things to look at? Yeah, GENIUS idea on my part...

No sooner had we avoided a straw shooting from the lady behind me, and Liv saw something across the diner on the wall that REALLY excited her.

She was SO excited about it that evidently the most efficient way to show us this said item was to swing her arm at rapid speed to point at it. Well, she swung it directly into Johns GIANT soda. Full soda. His GIANT full soda which then spilled it's ENTIRE contents all over the table and all over the main aisle of the floor.

Did I mention we were sitting in the very middle of the diner? In everyones view? Yeah, just thought I would remind you.

John and I could literally do nothing but die laughing and just stare at each other as if to silently say: 'really?! Could she possibly do anything else?!'

Oh dear.

Well, we managed to finish our meal without a hitch-Liv even ate her ENTIRE hot dog! Anyone who has a toddler KNOWS how virtually impossible it is to get your child to consume more than a few morsels before deciding that they aren't hungry/are bored/or having something really cool to talk about for the next 15 minutes.

After managing to avoiding certain death by embarrassment, we then decided to head over to our local Fred Meyer to exhaust any remaining energy that Liv may have had before bed time.
John and Liv held races up the back aisles, tried on headbands, and oohed and ahhed over the toy aisles.
We then ventured down the produce aisles to pick up a few things before paying for our purchases.
Again, in record time, we hear 'OOH! AN APPLE!!', and just as we look to see what she's talking about she seems to think the one on the VERY BOTTOM of the pile is the perfect one and she snatches out.

Now, boys and girls, what happens when you grab an apple from the BOTTOM of the produce pile? Yes, thats right, any that were sitting contently on top of said apple go rolling to the ground.

Oh, and they did.

I'm pretty sure John pulled a groin muscle with his acrobatic moves while attempting to wrangle all the fruit up off the ground before anyone could see our little fruit fiasco.

Oh golly. People, I couldn't make this stuff up if I tried.

I mean really. WHO on Gods green earth thought up the idea of placing the bottom of the fruit display just where little fingers could perfectly pluck one juicy item from the pile. WHO?? After our little apple adventure, I came up with many ideas of protecting their produce from grabby little paws:

How about an electric fence? Nothing to seriously hurt the child, just give them a little jolt. I'm sure it's a lot less painful than their parents aching egos after cleaning up the entire spilled display. I don't know, just a thought....

I guess you could say our lives certainly aren't boring....

Speechless

This picture that my sister took out at the beach this weekend left me, well, absolutely speechless.

Aside from the obvious crud that surrounds us, what a truly beautiful world we live in....

The recap

What better way to spend a weekend than with a bunch of seriously fun ladies??

I had such a great time this weekend-it wasn't necessarily restful in the fact that I got a lot of sleep (I didn't), but it WAS restful in the fact that I was just able to get away and enjoy being somewhere other than my couch.

It was so neat to enjoy each others company-sometimes you forget what it's like to carry on an extended conversation with someone over the age of 3!
I caught myself a few times saying words like 'tubby' (bathtub) and 'yucky'. *sigh* I'm sure they all understood. My brain, I've decided, is officially engraved with random toddler words, and I'm just going to have to live with that fact. If I start babbling like an infant randomly though, THEN you will need to start worrying.....

Though my retarded brain forgot my card for my camera in our computer at home, my sister and mom DID take some great pictures.
Here are a few images highlighting our weekend:


Here, we were split off into three big groups and instructed to create a team name and banner representing our team. We then had a sort of 'Survivor' competition, complete with a trek through the outdoors, and a blindfolded eating contest....
This was our banner for our team.


And yes, we won.


Throughout the weekend there were candle holders to make...


and nails to be painted. (yes, my sister is of a different breed. I often question my biological ties to this family.)



Over all it was such an awesome weekend. It was so much more than can be put into words. A lot was done on the inside.
I'm so thankful to have had such a special time with my mom and sister.
Yes, it was a good weekend!

All good things must come to an end

My little stint on the front page of 'TopMomma.com' has now ended. How much fun it was to be recognized as a top momma blogger and to have so many new readers enjoying my blog! I also in the mean time got to enjoy a few new blogs myself-and ya all know I just love a good read!

Thanks for all the 'clicks' to keep me up there! That was so nice, gee golly!

It's now time for someone else to enjoy one of the coveted TopMomma spots, so I encourage you to head back over there and see what new faces are on there! HI-LARIOUS I tell you!!

Have a great weekend everyone, and I'll fill you in on my little beachy adventure in a few days!

I'm straight up busting out of this joint....yo....

God is constantly astonishing me with his crazy-cool ways of orchestrating our lives....

I haven't attended the weekly womens bible study at our church for quite a while. For the last month and a half I've been feeling like a big bag of crap with all this morning sickness and just haven't had the energy to claw my way out the door in the morning, much less make myself look presentable. I've missed it. Oh how I've missed it.

I miss getting to just BE in the presence of other women. Any women. But these women in particular are just the coolest chicks on the planet. They have this absolutely INCREDIBLE desire to hold each other up and bless each other with encouraging words and prayer. Cool cool ladies I tell ya.

WELL, randomly I got up this morning and decided: THATS IT. I'm dragging my obnoxiously sick butt outta bed and Liv and I ARE GOING. They are women. They are going to understand why I look/feel/act like hell. And if not, at least I will pretend that they understand...

So I got there, slowly regretting every second that went by....I just felt so weak, so tired, so sick.

During announcements the yearly 'womens retreat' was mentioned. This was something I had been planning on going to-it's just an awesome weekend at the beach for a bunch of ladies from the church to be together, there may be 1 or 2 little talks/sharing times, but over all, it's a weekend to just be together, play games, do crafts, read, be by yourself, but to mostly just BE together in the presence of our awesome God. Last time I went I just happened to be pregnant with Liv, and here I knew this time I would be pregnant this round too. Oh joy. What I DIDN'T realize was that this little ladies get away snuck up on me and bit me in the butt about three weeks earlier than I thought it was going to be.

Yeah.

It's TOMORROW.

Aw frick.

I went into 'oh bummer, poor me I can't go now' mode thinking it was just too late to get childcare organized, things packed, snacks shopped for. Oh was I wrong...

WHY am I so darn good at doubting God??

My dear friend Aj just simply looked at me and my sulky face and said 'just go! I am, kinda last minute!' Oh. You mean I'm not the only goober that waited until the last minute possible to sign up?? I kid, Aj friend. Kinda. ;)

So, back to Gods little orchestration: John was THRILLED with the idea of me going and getting some wonderful time to myself, Livie's aunt and uncle were MORE than happy to have her come stay the night one night (she even gets a chuck e. cheese visit out of her stay!! Can you say SPOILED?!) AND, the most exciting part: I discovered that my mom and sister were also really wanting to go but had been debating whether or not to, but I convinced them and now we are all traveling down there together and staying in a cabin together all weekend!!

My mom made the comment that it was pretty obvious that God really wanted us to go! I think so too...

It's so funny to think that if I wouldn't have hauled my stubborn butt over to bible study this morning, then I wouldn't have heard the announcements, and my thick head wouldn't have realized until too late that it was this weekend!

And THAT my friends is how our awesome God works!

Boy meets Girl

This week Liv and I enjoyed the company of our friends Megan and Conner for part of the evening while 'our boys' were out of town for the night.

What a treat it was to have someone to visit with other than each other for once! :)

Megan and I B.S'd about dream scrapbooking rooms and Conner and Liv, well, they did what they do best....


Made gaga eyes at each other...



Whispered sweet nothings into each others ears...



Smooched a little....



And kicked back and enjoyed a nice flick together.

We are gonna have to watch that one, that Miss Olivia. We've got a tigress on our hands. No question who wears the pants in the relationship, we may have to resort to locking her in her room until she's 30 if she keeps this up...

Preparing my acceptance speech

Oh golly, who to thank first??

Of course there are those who have supported me all along, you, my bloggy readers. And then there is my daughter, who without her I would have never had as many great pooping stories as I have. Oh and my dear husband who makes sure to tell me how funny I am, even when I'm not. Thank you. THANK YOU EVERYONE!!

Ok, over dramatic much?

I was just informed via e-mail this morning that my blog made it onto TopMomma.com. Not really sure what that means, but oh-so-exciting at the same time?? Sure!

I guess the gist of it is, when you are a top-momma blogger, your blog picture makes it to the front page, and then readers can go and click on a referral link to keep your picture on the front page. I guess it's to see how long you can stay on the front page. Too much anxiety for me. One day is enough.

But alas, here is my referral link so that you know I'm not lying. :)

I'm the 'special' looking doggy with the glasses.

Looks like there are a ton of fabulous bloggers on there-so happy reading!

Sharing 101

I've got one thing to say.

All you co-sleepers out there? You are a crazy breed. CRAZY I tell you!!

I've never been really good at sharing. Until I got married/had kids, that is.

I grew up with just one sibling, so the rivalry wasn't HUGE being there were only two of us to divvy things up between. I was older, so if I got to it first, I would take it. I know, I'm just selfish like that.

Since starting a family of my own, I've noticed my selfish wall beginning to crumble. I'm so disappointed in myself. There is just one donut left in the box? I without a second thought will make sure John gets it. WHAT IS WRONG WITH ME?

Well, my selfish tendencies were brought back to life last night.

John was gone all night, visiting some friends some 2 1/2 hours away, so it was just me and the kid. All night. Just us.

Now, Liv has been sleeping in her own room, her own bed since she was about 3 months old. It was a decision that John and I made very early: 1, to make sure Liv had no issues sleeping on her own, and 2, for the sake of our marriage, we felt having a little one squished between us in bed for the next 3 years probably wouldn't do great things for what we like to refer to as 'marital relations'. :)
It is a VERY rare occasion that Liv will come and sleep with us in our bed. In fact I could probably count on 1 hand the amount of times she has in the last 2 1/2 years. She's never had problems sleeping in her own room/bed, in fact she rarely whines about it and goes right to sleep after we tuck her in and thats how we like to keep it.

Well, evidently, when Dads gone, all rules are flushed down the pooper.

The spawn of satan appeared in our home yesterday and continued to rear it's ugly head straight until morning.

I lay Liv down like usual and don't hear a peep for an hour....
Then, as I'm going to bed I hear 'MOOOOM'.
*sigh*
'What, Liv?'
'I caaan't sleeep'

So, this stupid momma in all her pregnant, pukey glory made the ridiculous mistake of asking her if she wanted to come sleep in mommys bed with mommy.

Of course she did.

So, we get all snuggled into bed: Livie, Mommy, the Giant body pillow, Blue, Elmo, blankie and Baloo. And the fun starts.

Little Miss Chatty talks my ear off until I finally turn the light off and resort to ignoring her. She falls asleep. Squished up against me. SO comfortable...not...

I'm a roller and flipper and mover in the middle of the night. Evidently so is my daughter. JUST GREAT.

Off and on through the night, I'm pretty sure it was hourly, she wakes up numerous times to inform me that she CANNOT lay on her pillow. There are snakes on her pillow.
Frickin' snakes.
I 'wipe the snakes off' and all is well again.

Suddenly, at approximately 3:45 in the AM, she sits up and decides it is time to get up and eat lunch. Hmm. Really? Because I swear it is still the MIDDLE OF THE FREAKING NIGHT!!! For the next two or so hours I convince her that it is still night night time and to NOT even think about talking to me until it is light outside.

4:15- 'Mom, can I talk yet?'

'NOOO!'

*sigh*

And so I am reminded again why I HATE sharing my bed. I just deal with John because he rubs my back and legs for me.

Hey, it's all about the sacrifice people, sacrifice....

okay okay OKAY!!! sheesh....

Since Jenny is SO eager to hear whether or not I attained a position in the entertainment industry pre-kids, and she WILL not leave me alone until I tell her, I figured I had better not delay on answering the rest of questions you fine ladies asked me as well.

Here goes nuthin' part deux:

Jenny asked: What job did you have before becoming a Domestic Engineer? And you HAVE to answer...even if you were a stripper! Were you? :)

So sorry to disappoint you my dear Jenny friend, but no. No exotic dancer past in this girls life. Unless you count dancing on the coyote ugly bar in las vegas during my 21st birthday. But that most certainly was for laughs, definitely NOT the exotic form. By the way, ask John why in heavens name he thought it would be great idea to call my mom and sister and tell them what I was doing at that very moment. Really, ask him because I have no freaking idea.
ANYWAY...I actually worked in clothing retail from about the year before we got married up until about 7 months ago. Whats better than being surrounded by cute clothes all day? LOVED it.
Other jobs I've had in my lifetime are: housekeeping for a camp and conference center, housekeeping for a hotel (ew), pizza maker, fundraising calling for my college, bridal store associate (lasted 2 days, another post for another day), bookkeeper for a tire store, stock room associate in a large chain store....I think that pretty much covers it.


Now, Kim-d said she would listen if I REALLY felt the need to talk about my bowels, but I'll go ahead a humor her and answer the question she's MORE interested in hearing the answer to:
"What I wanna know is this--name(s), specifically, for your new peanut. Girl? Name. Boy? Name. If Olivia would have been a boy instead of a girl? Name."

Well, If Olivia had been a boy, which I was SO sure she was going to be, we were going to name her Jackson and call her Jack. But alas, she very obviously is of the female persuasion, so we named her after our favorite character on our favorite show at the time: Olivia on Law and Order SVU. Cheesy, I know.
If our new little peanut is again a girl, we will most likely name her Samantha. Such a precious name. I have ALWAYS loved the name 'Ruby' for a girl, I just think that is the cutest little girl in pigtails kind of name. John isn't so fond of it. *sigh*
If it turns out that God blesses us with a boy, we REALLY like the name Sawyer. Jenny: one guess why, c'mon, I KNOW you can get this one :) We also still really like Jack, but it would have to just be Jack, Jackson has been used in our family since having Olivia. That would just get too confusing.

My Katie-girl jokingly asked me this (which led me to think she was trying to pick up on me?? Were you Katie, huh??):
What's your sign? LOL!
Well, I'm a Scorpio. Does that mean good things for us Katie? Do we mesh well as a future couple?

Melissa, who shares my addiction-I mean LOVE-of Diet Coke asked:
"Ok, how did you and your husband meet. If you've already told us this, forgive me."
No, Melissa, please forgive ME if I've already told you, I can't remember either....

I met John for the very first time in 7th grade. We had health class together and I thought he was oh so cute. You all know he has major boyish good looks, now put that on a 7th grader, and he was the cutest darn thing ever. I sat behind him and was 'flirting' by poking him in the back of the head with my pencil and he turned around to tell me to knock it off and I accidentally jabbed him in the tooth with my pencil and knocked his tooth out. In my defense, it was already loose, but there was blood. Lots of blood. He was totally hooked on me after that. What can I say? I've got moves....

Queeny asked me this one:
"OK, I've got one. What's the worst thing you've ever done behind your husband's back, since you've been married?"
QUEENY!! You saucy little thing you! What, are you trying to get me in trouble??
I'm having a hard time thinking of an answer for this one: honestly, the worse thing is probably lying to him about birthday presents or something like that. I know, I'm so scandalous. I've got too much anxiety to be keeping horrible secrets from him. Anything I've needed to come clean about in the past, we both have shared with each other and have left in the past. So for now, I'll just pretend that hiding presents from him is super bad.

My girl from Don Mills, THE Don Mills Diva herself asked:
"I'm wondering if you could give your children one attribute what would it be?"
Ooh, this is a good one. I think I would have to say patience. Not to be quick to anger. Patience with others. Patient in their faith.

And finally, Miss Amy asked me this:
"if you had a day to yourself, what would you do?"
Well, this one is a toughie. If you are asking the pregnant, miserable Abbie, I would without a doubt say my dream all-to-myself kind of day right now would be to find an awesome read and book a hotel room somewhere (I'm telling ya, even super8 would work right now) and lay in bed in my sweats ALL DAY and have uninterrupted sleep/tv/reading time. OH MY GOODNESS. I'm getting giddy just thinking about that.
Otherwise, normal Abbie would enjoy doing something like my sweet lady friend Kim did this last weekend. Hit up a Scrapbooking workshop and just sit for 2 days straight with good friends, good wine and scrapbook until my little heart is content.

Good questions ladies! I'm looking forward to finding out a little more about each of you as well! :) I promise not to ever ask you about your poop though. Though I love to talk about mine from time to time, I have no desire to know about yours.