Archive for April, 2006

Saturday, April 29th, 2006

Health Group- Year 2, week 46

Good morning! I’m feeling pretty good. I haven’t bled in a couple of days, and last night I did some stretches and physical therapy exercises.

I’m weak.

The exercises were difficult, so I know I have some SERIOUS “catch-up” to do. But we expected that. However, I will say that it felt SO GOOD to get moving again. As I was stretching, I could feel the oxygen getting into my muscles, and my mind felt brighter. It sounds weird, although I’m sure some of you know exactly what I’m talking about.

I’m doing better with water consumption, and I’m trying to decide what to do about breakfasts in the mornings. Most mornings, if I’m even hungry, food sounds nauseating. Sometimes I make myself eat anyway. Sometimes I don’t eat at all, which I know is very unhealthy. And sometimes, I just snack on junk, a bite here and there, instead of eating something nutritious.

All of those scenarios suck.

Sooooooo, I’ve been thinking about trying to do breakfast shakes. I know my brother-in-law does them a lot. I think he does fruit, yogurt, and dry oatmeal. I’m not sure what else. I don’t like the idea of commercially processed “meal replacement” shakes. Mainly because I don’t trust them and can’t imagine they’re healthier than something I could make with real food. But I’m not opposed to supplementing a homemade shake with a vitamin or a protein powder to make it more balanced.

Anyone have any thoughts or experience with this? What do I put in a breakfast shake? How valid is the salmonella hype as it pertains to adding a raw egg?

I know that when I start my day out right nutritionally, I’m much more likely to exercise, drink my water, and continue eating well. When I start it out with junk and empty calories, or none at all, I spend the rest of the day trying to climb out of a pit.

Tell me about your week? How’d it go?

Thursday, April 27th, 2006

House talk

Ok, so you want to hear about the house?

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It’s 2950 square feet. Twice the size of our last house. There are 4 bedrooms, and the large one downstairs is currently Nate’s office and the workout room. So we’re still in 3 bedrooms, and everyone is sharing, but the bedrooms are significantly bigger than they were in the last house. At some point in the future (as we intend to be here forever), we may build an office for Nate onto the back of the house so we can reclaim the 4th bedroom.

The new house is 2 miles away from the old one, so we don’t feel uprooted. We’re going to the same school, our church congregation is the same, and we still have the neighbors over for dinner and family celebrations.

That was very important to us, staying very close. We’ve put roots down here the past 6 years, and had no intention or desire to start all that over again. We LOVE the new house. Everyone that comes over says that it is very “us.” We agree.

The orange wall you see in the photo is the wall that had the diamonds. Remember those? The funky plants in the foreground came from Molbaks, along with the gorgeous glass pots they’re sitting in. I love them.

We seem to be going with a very green & orange theme in the living room. It’s cheery. And it must be trendy right now, because there is green and/or orange stuff EVERYWHERE in the stores. I’m not worried about changing trends though. Nate has loved orange forever, and aside from the fact that I REALLY like green, it plays very well off of the leafing maple trees right outside of the large windows, bringing the outdoors indoors in a way.

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Not the best picture, but this is the carpet that went into the girls’ room. It is “Playground” carpet in the Kathy Ireland collection. I don’t remember the name of the color, but it’s the less bright of the two available greens. As it turns out, it’s the right color for the living room, and the remnant they left is the perfect size. The carpet company said it’d be $120 to bind the remnant edges into a rug, which seems very pricey to me. I might shop around for a better deal.

Monday, April 24th, 2006

Gorgeous day

It was amazing. Absolutely beautiful.

New carpet was installed in the girls’ bedrooms today, so we can unpack “for reals” now and establish proper places for things, removing any legitimate excuse for the girls when they leave their stuff all over the place, or can’t find things like socks. And pajamas.

Also, the really nasty smell that showed up each time the sun came through V’s window and hit the mysteriously discolored spot on the floor… is gone.

We’re very excited.

I feel like it’s getting to the point where I can take a deep breath, let it out slow, and get back to life. The move is done. The baby is born. I can eat again. The taxes are paid. The girls’ birthdays are over. Spring Break is over. Abigail’s baptism and the accompanying festivities are over. Nate is going back to a more regular work schedule, and work is picking up rapidly for him right now, so he’s going to be busy. Which is a return to normal.

I’m having knitting thoughts. Like, bibs for Clark, who is developing quite the little spit-up habit.

By the way, he’s 3 weeks old now-

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and cute as a bug.

I make no promises that this will turn back into a legitimate knitting blog anytime soon, but I can at least visualize knitting without hearing a “yeah right” in the back of my mind.

But it might be delusion.

Saturday, April 22nd, 2006

Health Group- Year 2, week 45

Hello all! I’m doing very well. This week has been busy. Abigail was baptized this morning, my mom is in town and staying with us, and we had a very large family luncheon at our house this afternoon following the baptism. About half of Nate’s family hadn’t seen the new house yet, so it was fun to have them all here.

Whew! Now that that’s over, I might actually get some rest!

Clark is doing very well. I’m feeling great, aside from the waves of fatigue and sleepiness. I’m being as sensible as I can, doing what needs to be done slowly, and sitting/resting as much as I can.

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I’ve been cutting down my sugar/candy consumption this week, and have decided to avoid fast food. I’m not much of a fast food consumer as it is, but I’m going to make efforts to do it even less. It feels good. I’m still having difficulty drinking a lot of water. I used to love it, but I’m fighting with it right now.

My original goal was to start exercising next week, but after all the excitement of this last week, I’m not going to push myself. I’m really tired. But I might start some of the easier toning exercises I learned at my physical therapy sessions.

The flabby abs are starting to bug me.

Tell me your news!

Wednesday, April 19th, 2006

Stupid bandwidth

As I’m sure many of you know, my site was down most of yesterday because I had exceeded my bandwidth allotment. This happens on a semi-regular basis, and although we keep upping my bandwidth and checking our usage, it happens still. Then when we DO up it again, it takes several hours to come back online.

Argh!

So here I am, back again.

Yesterday was Olivia’s 7th birthday. Everyone in the house was happy to see the big day finally arrive. Liv was happy because she’s been looking forward to it since Christmas, and the rest of us are thrilled it’s over, because we’ve been hearing about it since Christmas.

That girl is persistent. More so than anyone I know.

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We all made the trek to the school cafeteria to help her celebrate.

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Nate brought the flowers, I brought the baby for his first public school appearance… and cookies.

I’ll just say that a nice, big kitchen with ample counter space is every bit as wonderful, if not more so, than I thought it would be. Liv wanted to make gingerbread cookies to take to school on her birthday. The girls and I made up the dough. I rolled it into balls which were then passed down the counter to one of the girls who each had their own bowl of sugar to coat the cookie in before putting it on a baking sheet.

It worked out so well, and went much faster than it used to, when there was room for only ME in the kitchen.

Veronica helped me make pretzel dogs for dinner one night, Olivia helped with dinner rolls on Easter, and all three of them helped with Liv’s birthday cookies.

It’s great. I love it.

For her birthday, Liv wanted piano lessons. My mother-in-law gave/lent us her electronic keyboard, and yesterday, Veronica and I went to Guitar Center to buy her a stand and seat to go with it.

What a cool store that is! If I were a musician, I think I would live there.

I’ve cleaned up my sidebar a little bit. All of the knit-alongs are inactive, so I’ve changed their status and left links to completed items.

Monday, April 17th, 2006

Aaah! Just let me POST already!

What keeps me from posting? Well, Nate is working from home most days now, which severely limits my computer access. Because of the new working situation, Nate bought a laptop to take back and forth with him when he goes into the office, and I will get the computer he used to have at the office, which is a nice Mac Mini.

We are waiting for our carpenter friend to build what will be a gorgeous, wooden breakfast bar in the eating nook off of the kitchen and living room before we set my computer up, because that is where it will be.

So I am practically computer-less for the time being.

And then there’s the other reason I have difficulty posting.

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(He’s 2 weeks old now. I can’t believe it).

I SWEAR he slept almost all day. But whenever Nate left the computer, giving me an opportunity to post…

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He’d wake up positively STARVING.

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But we love him anyway.

Sunday, April 16th, 2006

Health Group- Year 2, week 44

Every time I sat down to do Health Group yesterday, Clark decided he needed to eat immediately. So the post is late.

I weigh about 219 right now. And I can cross my legs relatively comfortably! So I guess I lost some weight during the months I couldn’t eat. This surprises me somewhat, since what I did eat when I could eat was junk, but it looks like I lost some weight just the same.

I still think it’s mostly muscle.

But, to help take advantage of the situation, I went grocery shopping and bought some food to make healthy meals. Like fantastic salads for lunches. I had one today. Mmmmmm. And some good crockpot meals, since my energy is ok during the day, but fades real quick as the sun starts to go down.

It’s SO nice to be able to eat again!

How’s it going for you?

Friday, April 14th, 2006

Fantastic Easter suggestions!

Thank you all so much!

Also, I’ve been meaning to show you the cutest diaper bag that my mom had made for Clark.

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She asked Keri to make a Superman bag, and that’s what we got! I love it.

To answer Mia’s question from yesterday…

All of my babies so far have slept in our bed with no problems. I was worried about Clark, mainly because Nate has been really tired and sleeping heavier and I didn’t want him to roll over onto the baby. (He’s older now than he was the last time we did this). That’s why I’ve been sleeping semi-propped on the couch downstairs until recently. I moved to the bed a few nights ago because my neck and back are killing me, and I find that if I keep Clark right close to me, he’s fine.

Usually, my babies are only in our bed for a little while, although I can’t remember exactly how long, and then they spend the next several months sleeping in the battery powered swing.

The swing is TOTALLY where it’s at! And has saved me from sleep deprivation each new baby!

Thursday, April 13th, 2006

Nothing but babies and rest around here

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This is what I woke up to this morning.

Things are going well. Nights are getting better. I’m still tired, and my neck and back are in sad shape. I hurt more each morning, so I went back to the chiropractor and got cracked today. My neck is sore, so I’m going to put hot packs on it this afternoon. If that doesn’t help, I’ll take a bath.

Nate and I are trying to arrange a date for ourselves so we can go and get stocked for Easter. I’m looking forward to hiding a bazillion plastic eggs in our new, very large house. The problem with this is that the kids will end up getting a bazillion plastic eggs worth of candy, which isn’t a good thing. So we’re thinking about stickers, cheap toys, and other such egg-fillers.