My Little Man Is Here :)

I know that I haven’t got to write in a while but I have a great excuse! On November 4th Steveo and I welcomed our third little man into the world. And this little man was very stubborn about making his entrance. We tried everything we could possibly do to induce labor naturally. I got a labor inducing massage, took evening primrose oil, did every pressure point I could find on YouTube, and even took Castor oil. Nothing worked besides giving me contractions for about an hour, only for them to stop. Finally my doctor recommended induction (ugh pitocin!) when it looked like I was approaching 42 weeks. 

I was so depressed a few days before I had to go in. On one hand I was getting my doctor who knew what my wishes were for this labor, but on the other hand I really wanted to labor at home as long as I could and I felt like everything that I had planned for this labor was just gone out the window. My only excitment was that I had a great doula who I felt like I was really connecting with. So friday morning came and we checked in and got the process started. Around 930 my doula showed up and we spent the next hour just hanging out. Finally contrations were starting but nothing was really happening so we decided to try different positions to see what worked for me. Steve and my doula were great, but my nurse was negative nancy and giving me every horror situation that she could. 

Finally at 12 my labor got serious yay! One minute I was lauging through a contration and the next one almost took my breath away and I realized that things were finally happening. The pain was pretty intense but Steve and Melanie (my doula) were really great about trying to get me comfortable and helping with the pain. Then all of the sudden my body has this tremendous urge to push and holy cow this is really happening. My legs are shaking and I am starting to doubt myself at this point. The stupid tigger sticker that someone has put on the ceiling that was annoying me greatly is now my focal point and helping me get through this. After being told not to push even though my body is the doctor is finally there and things are being all set up. I really wanted a quiet labor because I tend to freak out when too much is going on at once all of the sudden my mom is there along with a respiratory team (there was meconium in my water) and madness is about to break loose. Did I mention that at this point I also have an upper respiratory infection and breathing is hard to do in general? Yes so when it comes time to push I am only making it to the count of 5, everything is completely painful, I am crying and trying to not freak out on everyone because they are all talking!!!! 

After about 40 minutes of on and off pushing, me getting almost hysterical because the pain is so bad I start screaming to cut the child out of me, give me an epidural, do something because I am not pushing this child out. My poor doctor tried to make a few jokes to which I was a complete brat to and snapping at everyone. Finally the doctor told me the way he could help is try and vaccum this baby out to which I agree. THE MOST PAINFUL THING EVER!!!! After about 3 attempts a head finally comes out followed by a fat body. I hear a sweet first cry and this large child is put on my chest. 

At this point I am crying even more because I felt like such a punk for the way I acted, some words I said (sorry Mom), and because I doubted myself. I keep appologizing to mister Chaim Nole and kissing his sweet little head. I was very happy that he was fine and hadn't swallowed any meconium and my mouth hit the floor when we all saw how much he weighed. My fat little man was 10 pounds 10 ounces and 22 inches long. Geez no wonder it hurt so much between his size and the fact that he was face up (which makes labor harder apparently) I no longer felt bad for crying like a little girl ha! So here are some pictures of my sweet little man. He definitely has his own little attitude and the boys love him to pieces.But we are slowly learning to deal with the ups and downs and enjoying every minute of it (ok the non-screaming minutes) with him in our family. And even though at the time I thought my labor was so painful it was a great experience and I wouldn't change any of it. And even though I told Steveo no more kids I would totally go natural again, I just felt so great after and the recovery and pain wasn't that bad and I didn't feel all drugged up. I know that you don't get to hear that very much after a hard labor :)

He already has fat rolls :)

Such a sweet face

Such Long Legs!

Big brother checking him out

Brothers are so proud

Classic flipping the bird because he hates his carseat

Sweet NEW face :)

Attempting to smile

Serious face

  

Baby W's Room

Its finally here!!!! Not the baby but a mostly complete baby's room :) I'm very excited because this was my first project to decorate a room all by myself.  Our room first looked like this when we moved in:

And we totally could not decide on a color which was making me a little crazy. I wanted to use a color called robin's egg blue because I had seen it in so many cute boys little rooms (how many times have I mentioned I think its a boy ha!) but then Steve asked if by chance it was a girl would I really want a blue room. My answer was still yes but just in case I let him talk me into a nice soft green which I believe is called Lunar Moon (I'll double check).  

Next came the curtains which took forever because I had no clue on how to use my sewing machine but my sweet neighbor came over and off we went. Curtains were made out of cloth I found at Ikea as well as some of the wall decorations. So here are the pictures!!!! I can't wait to bring this new baby home and putting him(ok maybe her) in their room.

I couldn't get the color to come out right, I hope you can tell how cute they look. I also got the frames below from a thrift store and my mom sanded them down for me so I could paint them different colors and hang up. Once I know what I am having I will paint the burlap I set inside them with the name. Steve had gotten a shipment for his work stuff and so we made creative use out of the pallets.

This was a panel from the pallet that we used to hang the frames on the wall. The frames are held up by twine (excuse the one in the middle it needs to be repainted and I can't find the paint), and I took the glass out just in case one fell down. Instead I put in burlap (which ps when cutting is very scratchy I thought I was going to go crazy) and the knobs are just fun cabinet knobs I found at Lowes.

This is one of my favorite parts of the room. I got these free printouts here and just used different color stock paper to print them out on. I just cut them down and tied them up with twine and hung with baby clothes pins. Even when I am done with this in the baby's room it will be up somewhere in my house its way to cute!

I had extra fabric from the curtains so I just found some sewing hoops at AC Moore pretty cheap and cut the different characters out that I loved and put them up on the wall. The hubs made a W (for Witherup in case you are curious) out of plywood for me and here is another wall.

I already had the crib sheets and the comforter came from Ikea as well and I found a great tutorial on how to just add ribbon to a crib skirt so I think it all came together nicely.

The bed skirt!

Little/big brother helping me take pictures :)

I still have a few more things to do, I need a shelf built (I'm so glad my husband is handy with tools) and there are two pictures that need to be hung but I can't do the pictures until the little one gets here :) I hope you guys like the room, I don't think the pictures do it justice but it will be so sweet for my little one. I can't wait to use it, hopefully in just another week I will be able too!!!! 8 DAYS AND COUNTING!!!!

Wreath DIY

Ok I know that I am more than behind on my blog but I have a pretty good reason. Only 1 week and 2 days til my due date and while I know that this baby will come out when its good and ready the countdown is fun for me. Anyway while I am not nesting by cleaning up my need to decorate and create things has gone into overdrive!!!! So last week and part of this week I decided to decorate my front door with one of the wreaths that I keep seeing online everywhere. And while it was hard for me to decide on one thing I just combined all that I loved into this one wreath. So it started with just a round foam wreath and a fun easy yarn color that was a bit neutral. I used a hot glue gun with this and just started wrapping the yarn around the wreath holding it tight and glueing about every 6 or 7 wraps like so...

I couldn't decide what type of flowers that I wanted on the wreath so I decided to mix it up and do a few. The first one that I started with was felt flowers and after googling quite a few I found the one that I liked. I got $.29 fabric pieces from AC Moore and cut them up into 1 in strips.

Depending on how large I wanted my flower I was doing some with 2 strips and some with 3 strips. Then I cut small niches in each strip.

After cutting all of the strips I started to roll them and glue them every few rolls.

Here was my end result :)



I also made some rosettes (I got the tutorial here) like this:

And did a few frayed flowers like this: (tutorial here)



After all of that I got a fun "W" to be in the middle and painted it (ok my husband did so I wasnt smelling fumes) midnight blue. I'm not too excited about how I have it held in the wreath but until I find something better I think its ok. I also wanted to be able to change the color of the flowers out depending on the season so I used large pins with different color heads to add a little bit of flare like this:

Ok and now the moment you have all been waiting for my end results. I was pretty excited about it all!!!

I hope you guys like it. Up next will be the babies room, its even more fun than this!

My life as I know it

My countdown is on, like literally I only have 4 weeks left and if this little person is anything like one of he/she’s older brothers it means an early arrival.  Asher came a little over 3 weeks early and Soren showed up 2 days early, so guessing when this baby will come is going to be fun. The next full moon is supposed to be October 12th so I am hoping for around then ha!

I have so many emotions going on right now and yes I can blame some on the hormones but most of them are just about the unexpected. I am more than excited and nervous about this labor. Both my previous labors were completely done in the hospital but this time I am going to stay at home as long as I can.  I am nervous about the pain and that I won't be strong enough to do this drug-free. I'm nervous about how the hospital will react to a natural birth, as well as the doctor who will be on rotation that day. 

I am more than excited to meet this little person inside of me. I'm ready to know if I really am having another boy (I'm 99% sure that is the case, and I am completely ok with that), or if a little girl is in my future, which I think scares me more than having another boy. I'm ready to see who this child looks like and how the older two will react. I'm more than ready to hold this child and snuggle with it as much as I can.  I'm ready to start our life as a family of 5.

I am totally not ready to see what this pregnancy has done to my body. I know that there is going to be a lot of hard work I am going to have to do to get my body back in shape. And this might sound superficial but I worked hard to be in shape and did nothing about it to keep it up while pregnant. I can only blame myself for this and trust me I do, but I am also trying to be realistic about what I can and cannot do. 

And so this is my life as I know it, full of nervousness, fear, excitment, anxious waiting, and so much joy.  Everyday I look at my boys in such awe loving them more and more and I can't wait to share that love with one more little person.  

My New Fav Dish!!!

This baby has been really funny about what he/she wants me to eat J Once I find a meal I like this child loves for me to eat it until my whole family is sick of the same meal ha! So recently I have been craving Olive Garden's Steak Gorgonzola-Alfredo but my husband will not pay $15.50 a plate every time I am craving it so I decided to try and make it myself. So here is how I make it, you will have to do the portions for your family.

I start out with thin steaks (but whatever size you choose will works this is just a very filling meal) so that I can cut them into thin strips and soak them in balsamic vinegar for about 30 minutes (this replaces their glaze since I don't know how to make it). While cooking the steaks I also saute some spinach with it and set it aside. I also cook my angel hair pasta according to how much my family will eat, then I heat up the alfredo sauce (I use Bertolli's its the best I have found for this) throw in a bunch of gorgonzola cheese (the more the better for me), as well as a few finely chopped up sun-dried tomatoes. I then mix this with the pasta and top it with the steak and spinach last. Sorry I don't have a picture of what it looks like, it normally gets all eaten up before I can get one, my family loves it! Try it out let me know what you think :)

Bon appetit friends!

I'm Sorry....

For the past few weeks I have been meaning to write about how peaceful my house has been lately. We had a relatively painless move, the boys were learning to play so great together, and they were listening when I asked them to do things pretty much the first time, my life felt almost perfect. Then last week hit and something just happened with my whole family. Now my days are filled with "stop fighting", "give that back to him", "go to bed! quit playing!", you get the picture. Some days I don't know how I am going to make it being a momma to boys. There are so many things I don't get about them like the constant wrestling, having to always win (OK I get that one a little), and I especially do not understand sibling rivalry.

I feel like my days are filled with constant frustration on my part and even more repeating what I have said more times than I care. When I ask the boys why they don't listen the first time all I get are shrugs of the shoulders or I don't know. I have tried to be as patient as I can be, showing grace as much as I can, and taking a step back with my attitude. Then today happened, and it seems like all my hard work got shot to hell.

I know that I should not feel guilty when my kids make the wrong choice and I have to discipline them. But when those doe eyes are looking up at you filled with tears and I take a step back to see if the punishment is fitting to the crime and then to realize I have been more harsh than I should be guilt floods me. I end up having a worse day than my kids who have already forgotten what they did and being yelled at or spanked.

I know that I am not a perfect mom, wife, or person and that no one expects me to be. But I want to be the best mom my kids can have. I want them to know that I love them more than I love my own life and I have nothing but their best interest at heart. I want them to feel so secure when they are with me knowing that no matter what I will stick up for them through thick and thin and love them regardless of what they do wrong or right. And so because I want all of these things I am not afraid to tell my kids I'm sorry. I can sit them down and tell them that mommy shouldn't have been as upset as I was and to ask for them to forgive me. I make sure we all hug as much as possible each day even when we fight with each other and that we always tell each other how much we love each other. I'm not perfect and neither are my kids but we all love each other so much, and letting my kids know that I am not the perfect person will help them grow up to be more forgiving of others when bad things come their way.

32 weeks....

I have absolutely hit a wall in this pregnancy this week. Most of the time I don't feel like I know how I am going to make it til my husband gets home and can help out with the boys. There are so many things I feel like I need to do, so much guilt I feel because of the things I am unable to do with my boys. Being outside is pretty much off limits because it is way too hot and I am already swollen enough. Asher and Soren have probably watched too much spiderman, superman, and Popeye to fill a lifetime.

My to do list for this child inside me includes:

• getting the hubs to paint all the trim in the nursery
• decorating the walls
• sewing curtains, a bed skirt, and bumper
• washing the clothes (holy cow I just remembered that one)
• finishing the blanket I am knitting
• cleaning the glider
• packing my bags for the hospital
• aahh geez what am I forgetting

At least tonight I got to meet my doula. That's right friends, I am trying to go all natural! I have felt pretty strongly about having a natural labor since I had Soren. But meeting her was great, she seemed so caring and open to what was important to me which is what I need. This is a new adventure for me, I am so nervous and excited, and scared, and overwhelmed about a new child, labor, and life with three kids.

I can't wait to meet this little person inside of me. This baby has been the busiest one so far, always moving. I don't think he/she ever sleeps, not something that is helping my exhaustion at this point :) And so on that note I am going to go to bed, I am about to fall asleep typing.

Until next week friends!

Shower Time!

I got to help plan a bridal shower this past week for a dear friend whose wedding I am in.  I was so excited to get to do the decorations and my mind was so full of ideas.  My first stop was to a thrift store called Value Village for some random pieces of china, old candlestick holders, old candy dishes, and some fun glasses to start with my projects.

I love these plates!

I started out piecing the plates together finding fun combinations before gluing them, here is what I came up with.

The bride is from New York but loves everything southern, so my inspiration for this party went from there. After scouring the Internet for days I found enough ideas to have a great party. I wanted to keep it as simple as I could so that the little details made a big difference. I used an old pitcher and a bath salts jar to take the place of vases for the flowers. Old lace curtains with bright color sheets under them became our tablecloths, and old mason jars were our choice for drinking cups.

I wanted to make the jars look cute and personal and I found great printouts on Martha Stewart's wedding website to add a special touch. I glued them on to a doily and used twine around the back to add a little southern flare. I also used Martha's website to get the letter printouts for their banner. I then glued the letters to scrapbook paper and hung it all up on twine with mini clothes pins.

We set up all the food on their bar, and instead of using a tablecloth and trying to fold it up to fit the bar I used my old women's handkercheifs (they are for a quilt I want to make) and placed a different color under each plate. We had lots of great southern food which included fried macaroni and pimento cheese bites, chicken salad sandwiches, mini ham and cheese sandwiches, a cheese platter, veggies, fruits, enchilda dip, buffalo dip, and all the desserts you can imagine. For our drinks we offered sweet tea and a fun party punch.



The groom to be.



We had a great time planning, decorating, eating, and celebrating with the bride-to-be. This is going to be one wedding I won't forget, even if I am as big as a house in a bride's maid dress.

The bride to be and all of her presents!