ODE TO OCTOBER

Holy cow, I don't know if we could have crammed any more Halloween activities into October. It seems like the whole month, particularly the last three days, has been one big party. Here is a little recap of our Halloween festivities.

1. We visited a pumpkin patch with the BYU MBASA (MBA Spouse Association)



2. We went to Cornbelly's and had a blast





3. We met my sister and Aunt Robyn at Gardner's Village for witch days (we forgot the camera)

4. We went to the MBASA Halloween party where even I did a little dressing up



5. We went to the Omniture Halloween party, thanks to Autumn and Sean for the tickets.






6. We went to Tremonton to spend Halloween with my parents and trick or treat in their neighborhood.



7. We're still trying to recover

7 DOWN, 2 MORE TO GO

Months, that is. And I couldn't be more pleased about it. I am so excited to meet this little girl, I can barely stand it. Oh, and to have my body to call my own might be a little nice too :) For posterity's sake and anyone else who cares, here is a little update with my pregnancy thus far:

A little photo:


Another little photo ;)
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(A little glamor to embrace my hugeness or a little somethin' to fit the spooky holiday season. Your choice)

Eating habits and cravings:

I find the weird cravings to be something of the past. The only thing I do crave by the truckloads is MILK. Oh, this delicious, glorious, chilled, white beverage is utterly heavenly to my senses. I can and do drink it by the gallons.

My favorite (and probably only healthy) snack food is Jonagold Apples. They are like candy to me. Now if only, I ate them "instead" of candy as opposed to "in addition to", that would really be something. Lately, they've been very easy to find on sale too which is a plus in my book!

Oh, and my ability to eat portions the size of my house seems to be every increasing at this point of the game. I find if I stay super busy (or in other words heavily distracted)I manage to keep my food intake fairly reasonable.


Weight gain and appearance:

Yeah, right. I don't even like to know. Don't make me show you my glamor photo again.


Interesting symptoms:

She (so did Ryder) really likes to sit on nerve that goes through my lower back and right leg. It's kinda painful and doesn't help with my efforts to suppress any and all waddling inclinations.

My sleep is a getting more and more restless. This didn't happen to me with Ryder until the last month. Gooky dreams to.

I haven't had it too often yet, but the heart burn...oh it's fierce.


What to expect:
I find it continually fascinating how much I've forgotten about being pregnant since Ryder. It seems like everything that happens is an "oh yeah, I remember this". I just hope it all comes back to me really fast after she is actually born.

I can't promise any more photos of myself for awhile (like 4 months) because one thing I do remember is that the 7 month point marks the end of the "I'm feeling good, doin' fine/Oh look, she's pregnant, how sweet" phase and opens the door, in a rather quickly manner, to the "I can't move because I'm an inflating hot air balloon/She must be due tomorrow" phase. I tell ya, I don't know what crazy exponential growth goes on...but it's crazy...and exponential.

BLOG FREQUENCY

My goodness, it's like the more I try to blog, the less I actually do it! This gets on my nerves because I really like to blog. I find it rather therapeutic. But the second I tell myself I'm going to try and blog every other day or so, two weeks manage to fly by at the speed of lightening and I haven't blogged once. I know this probably doesn't matter to any of you, but alas, there it is. So I'm going to attempt to take a page out of any goal making 101 book and "make my goal realistic". Whatever. I've decided that my new realistic blogging goal is going to be once a week. Obviously, if I can allow myself to blog more than that, I will. (I am my own master). But I feel with the holiday season upon us and a brand-new baby after that, limiting myself to once a week is pretty realistic...eh? Or not? I guess we'll shall see.

HOLIDAY DECOR SHOPPING SPREE

I'm feeling so much holiday cozy goodness that I'm having a hard time channeling it. So far it's amounted to listening to Christmas music* in October and sniffing my pumpkin spice candle like it were cocaine. Anyhow, there has got to be a better way...

I think one of the reasons I love this time of year so much is that it gives you a reason to decorate you house...every month...for the next three months, if you so choose. My holiday decor has definitely room to grow I'd say, but I that's okay because that means I have room to build on it every year, right? Anyhow, the thing about the fall is that you have your Autumn/harvest decorations and that go with the entire Autumn season. Then, you mix in you Halloween-specific items for October and Thanksgiving-specific items for November. Christmas is its own event.

Unfortunately, I take out my Halloween-specific items and I've got nothing to replace it with. Where did I go wrong? I do think finding cool Thanksgiving decorations is a bit more difficult than finding Halloween decorations though. But I'm up for the challenge so come along on my pretend shopping spree for such items:)


First off, at Target I found this really cool Thanksgiving plate collection. I'd buy that in a heart beat. Simple, yet very festive.



I found these glass jars at Pottery Barn. I love that they put wheat stalks in there, PLUS you can switch them up for other holidays.



Instead of a cornucopia with plastic fruit, there is this really cool pumpkin and gourd collection (also at PB).



I still feel like I haven't found many "Thanksgiving-specific" items...however, if Phil and I were donning the below hostess set, no one would ever doubt our Thanksgiving spirit.




Why doesn't anyone make fun Halloween and Thanksgiving music?

IT'S THE MOST WONDERFUL TIME OF THE YEAR

Oh hello, October! Hello!
Besides this time of year being my most favorite time of year I was very excited to get September over with because I knew a lot of stressful items would be all taken care of and we would be all settled in. However, we couldn't go out with a bang. For the last week in September I had the typical glucose test for gestational diabetes and my rhogam shot (for those with RH negative blood) due at my 29 week mark. Well, I tested positive for gestational diabetes. I was like 2 points over. Grhhh. So I later that week I had to go in and do the ultra-glucose test. Talk about nasty. I had to fast for 12 hours (do you know what that's like for a pregnant lady?), take that delightful orange syrup beverage, and go in once every hour to get my finger pricked, 4 times. But, I didn't have it, to my pure and utter relief. Can you imagine Halloween, Thanksgiving and Christmas with no sweets? Torture. Pure torture. I mean, how hideous it would be to actually have to eat healthy. That's lame. But it's all over now.



And my beautiful October is here. We had General Conference to kick off the wonderful season with our annual "Family Fall Walk" (It's one of our first declared traditions, so it's kind of a big deal) We took a drive up beautiful Provo Canyon and even though it was a little rainy took a little walk, collected leaves and shot some photos.



And now I can just relax and have fun getting ready for the arrival of our little girl while soaking in the holidays.

BUT WHAT I REALLY WANT IS...

So. I'm totally excited about getting our new nursery ready. I get to combine two things I love: decorating and babies. However, with most aspects of design (decorating, not babies) I find trends change and my personal tastes even change. I end up doing one thing and wishing a few months down the line that I had done something completely different. That combined with a mad nesting instinct has made me very indecisive and picky about how I want to decorate our little gal's room. After looking through tons of bedding sets, I just can't seem to find what I'm looking for. Here is a list of the things I want:

• Color. I can't decorate a room in just two colors. Are you kidding me? The rest of the rainbow is feeling left out. Plus, I love yellow and blue with pink. So something with color.
• Not Too "Fru-fru". I as girly as the next girly-girl, but butterflies and flowers in pastel pink and purple isn't the look I'm going for.
• Patchwork Feel. Oh how I love the eclectic and cozy feel of patchwork quilts. I want to incorporate this look into her bedding and nic-nacs throughout the room.

So what I have come to realize is that I'm going to have to do this myself. Any custom-made crib bedding set I've seen has been a minimum of $200 but more commonly $300-$400. Have I scared you yet? Doing this would mean in the month of October (November & December I need to devote to Christmas and my large cumbersome self)I would have to:

• Clean out her room (right now it's being used for moving left-overs)
• Paint her room
• Re-paint the crib and changing table (most time-consuming project by far)
  
• Sew a crib bed skirt
• Sew a VERY simple baby quilt (I'm scratching the bumper because they don't help my fear of SIDS)
• Sew a pillow
• Put together/find a couple of nic-nacs to decorate

Can I do this!? Or have I lost my mind? Tell me I can. Here are some fabric swatches and photos of other ideas. Tell me what you think or if you just think I'm crazy.

So these are the fabrics I'd be using. All but that yellow-striped one are Heather Bailey. I'm hoping six is enough. Most examples I've seen use more.



I love a good yo-yo and I'm thinking I could make this $75 puppy out of my scraps.



Hello. How cute are these. I saw a pattern to buy on esty for a stuffed owl pretty similar to these ones...they just don't have the cute dangly legs.

WARNING:

It's probably important to mention at this time that I don't really know how to sew....hmmm...

AHEM...

Ryder here.

Shhhhh. Don't tell anyone, but I decided it was high time for an update about...me. And since my mom hasn't seemed to get around to it in quite awhile, I thought I'd take matters into my own hands. I mean, come on, I've got people who need to know these things!

Well, toward the end of the summer we got to live with Grandma and Grandpa Shorten for a few weeks where I...

Went camping and tubing and Crescent Bar

Got really good and helping my dad wash the car

Made the jump from my crib to a bed! Cool huh!? (This is during the transitional stage. I have an actual bed now, don't worry.)

Got to celebrate my birthday and open presents from Grandma and Grandpa!

It was a VERY HOT few weeks...

Then we moved to Utah! So my dad could go to school. (This is me in my new room and my new bed.)

And even though I miss my family and friends back in Seattle, I do get to see and play with my cousins a lot!

I also finally turned two and got to celebrate my birthday again and I got my very first bike! Woosh, I'm lucky.

I've also been busy watching BYU football games with my dad. Go Cougars!

So as you can see it's been an exciting few weeks! Not to mention my new found love for taking pictures. That silly flash just makes me so happy!
BYE!