Jacoby Joshua

Just like when I wrote about my experience of bring Ainsley Jo into the world, some of the details in this post may be TMI for some of y'all. If you think that may be you, here's the Spark Notes version:

Jacoby Joshua Massie was welcomed into the world via VBAC at 2:28pm on Thursday, March 7th, 2013. He weighed 9 pounds, 4 ounces and was 21 1/4 inches long.

After my doctor's appointment on Wednesday, I was excited about the news that while I was still 3 cm dialated, I had made progress in every other area: more effaced, cervix was no longer posterior but "mid", and my bag of waters was "bulging". This was exciting for me, but at the same time, since I had taken Ainsley to the doc that morning and ended up with 2 prescriptions and a breathing machine, and Mister went to Urgent Care to get a script for bronchitis, I just wanted my little family to get healthy so that we could prepare for the arrival of Baby Massie. I had no idea how soon we'd be welcoming him!

I woke at 4am on Thursday needing to go to the bathroom. This was nothing out of the ordinary for the past few weeks. After doing my business, I climbed back in bed with Mister and Ains. A few minutes later, back on the porcelain throne. From 4-5am, I was back and forth, back and forth. Chris woke during one of my returns, asking if I needed anything, but all I needed was to not have to have to constantly sit on the throne!!

At 5am, I found myself on the couch. I no longer felt the constant urge to go to the bathroom, but I did have period like cramps. From 5 to 6, I had about four of these period like cramps. They lasted for a few minutes at a time and weren't painful, but definitely uncomfortable. After the second one, I realized they were likely contractions, but still nothing that I was getting too excited about. I mean they were only uncomfortable, and perhaps it was just false labor.

At 6am, I figured it was time to start getting ready for school by straightening my hair. I figured if I continued about my day, I'd be able to differentiate between discomforts of perhaps false labor and if it was maybe the real deal. While straightening my hair I had to pause a couple times because of discomfort. After my hair was done, I decided I wasn't going to school that day. Even if this wasn't the real deal, I didn't feel like having to make "pauses" throughout the day in front of a class full of high schoolers. As I climbed back in bed and unsuccessfully tried to get comfortable [especially during the cramps contractions], I updated Chris on my morning and said that I wasn't going into work, but he might as well. To which he asked, "So what will it take for you to call me and say to come home?"

"I don't know, when things get real?!"

By this time, deep down I knew things were already getting real, but didn't want to get my hopes up as it was nearly 24 hours after my water broke with Ains before she was in my arms.

About 7am we were both out of bed, Chris had called his boss and said he wasn't coming in and my contractions were any where from 5 to 12 minutes apart. I was instructed to head to the hospital upon my water breaking or if I had regular contractions, 7 minutes apart. We decided we'd continue to wait it out at home, allowing Ainsley to sleep in before going out to Chris' parents'. No need to wake her up early if we were just going to be hanging out at home all morning.

Just before 8am, as I found myself stopping in my tracks with every contraction focusing on riding it out, I decided that whole "let Ainsley sleep in" idea was a bad idea! "Chris, let's wake Ainsley! I don't think I can wait for her to wake on her own." Chris sent a message to his parents saying we were going to be bringing Ainsley out. A few minutes later, Chris' dad was on his way to pick up Ains.

I was relieved.

Last pic as a family of three!

A quick pic [between contractions]
before heading to the hospital!

Just before 9am we headed to the hospital. A contraction as I tried to get into the car and another right as we were arriving. As we headed to the 5th floor, I buzzed into the Labor & Delivery wing, "Can we help you?"

"Uh, yes, I'm in labor..." As the door opens, I turn to Mister, "at least I better be!!"

We got all checked in, and then Nurse Judy checked me: 4 cm and bulging bag of waters. A bit of progress since the appointment the day before. Now at this time, I was having a bit of tension. I was afraid that this may not be it. I mean my water broke first with Ainsley, so why wouldn't it have broken already if it was time for true labor. But just like I had text my Momma-cita eariler, if this wasn't the real deal, I was doomed!

Over the next couple of hours, my contractions became more steady usually with an intense one quickly followed by one that wasn't quite as intense. They progressed from "Focus! Focus! Focus! Just breathe through it Rachel!" to "This hurts! Ahh, this hurts! Ahh, ahh, it's over!" By 11:30am, I had asked Nurse Judy a couple of times, "Now if I were to get an epidural, do you think it'd up my chances of a c-section?!" Each time I was told that it could but not necessarily. Judy said there were other options, like staydol but after my experience with Ainsley, I said HECK NO!!

So she suggested getting out of bed and try sitting in the rocking chair and rocking through each contraction. I knew that Dr. Bradley should be over about noon or so during his lunch to check on me and likely to break my water, so that was a goal--just make it until noon!!

I only made it one contraction in the rocking chair before I was back in bed and getting checked. I asked him what was so pressing on my mind--soooo, will that epidural up my chances of a c-section?! I didn't really get an answer but he grabbed the big ol' crochet hook and broke my water. "Ahh, just like peeing!!" and more pee and more pee! After he broke my water, he checked me, said I was at 8 cm [holy cow! 4 cm in just a couple of hours!!] and said he was headed to get a bite to eat but would be in the hospital.

I moaned, breathed, squeezed the bed rails during each contraction, shoving ice chips in my mouth like it was my job. I was uncomfortable. I was in pain. I was getting a bit more demanding of Mister--hold my hand, don't hold my hand, push on my back, don't push on my back, ICE NOW!! I was doing it, but I didn't know if I could do it.

Dr. Bradley returned with coffee in hand sitting in the rocking chair in my room. He informed my that once his coffee was gone, he'd check me again, attached an internal fetal monitor to the baby and returned to the rocking chair. I recall asking again, are you sure there's nothing I can get?!

"A margarita?!"

"If you've got strawberry, hook me up!!"

"Ah, sorry. All out of strawberry. Guess there's nothing for you!"

Because of the pain, I was really doubting if I could do this. Based on previous experience, I labored with true contractions for 6 hours. I just didn't know if I could last another 4 hours like this! [Dr. Bradley continued to hang out in my room through the arrival of our lil' one. While I appreciated this because last time I felt like my OB was absent, there were times I really wish he weren't there. Like when he was on his cell phone, and I was grimacing through contractions--I swear he was probably playing Words with Friends or something--or when he was checking me during contractions--I really wanted to just kick him in the head!!]

Shortly there after, I was told if I felt like I needed to push, it was time to start pushing. A few contractions later, I decided it was time to push. I didn't know if I felt like I needed to but I certainly wanted to because I wanted this baby to get here.

Over the course of the next hour or so, I pushed with nearly every contraction with Chris and Judy by my side counting to ten and encouraging me that I was doing well. There were a couple glimpses of labor humor as I "Welp! I jut crapped!" but overall, I was feeling a little discouraged. I didn't feel like I was doing well. I didn't know if I was make progress. I didn't know if the baby was any closer to its arrival. I didn't know if I could do it. During this time, I had a major meltdown. I can't do this! It hurts too much, this baby isn't coming! Dr. Bradley responded "too late" when I said I needed something. I could tell it was hard for Chris to encourage me as he knew I was in great pain. It hurt to keep my legs in the pushing position. I wanted to stop because my hips hurt. I wanted to push because I knew it'd be better. I can't do this, but I continued on.

Sometime in this time, Dr. Bradley gave me two shots in my who-ha of some sort of numbing agent--think the pinch, burning like when getting a cavity filled. He said he thought I was going to "need some extra room". [I'm not 100% sure what it was. Something in the 'caine' family of numbing agents I think, but later the nurses said it was something that Dr. Bradley is one of the very few that use it.]

About 2pm, things started to get a lot more busy in the room. I could tell prepping was happening, but I still didn't know how long I had until the arrival of our lil' one.

I think this was one of the hardest parts about the labor--well except the contractions of course!--I feel like I never really knew where I was at in the whole process. I assumed since more activity was going on, I had to be getting close, but I didn't know this. I was told I was doing great, but in the back of my mind, I thought I was afraid I wasn't and that this labor too would end in a c-section: my worst fear for the past 9 months!

Dr. Bradley then said he was trying to help me get the baby positioned correctly as it was posterior. [Later I found out the he wasn't just posterior, but was quite twisted up in there.] As he did this, he also said he was going to use a vacuum to help pull the baby down. I think this added to the uncertainty of my progress. Because of the added pressure of the vacuum, it was difficult for me to feel where the baby was and if I was getting close. [I guess I assume Mommas can feel the location by the added pressure as I don't know for sure.]

About a quarter after two came my second major meltdown! After a particularly painful pushing through a contraction, I began crying uncontrollably, shaking my head, "I can't do this! I can't! I can't! It's not going to happen!" Judy tried to calm me and grabbed the oxygen mask. Dr. Bradley encouraged  that I was indeed doing it. Chris held my hand and without saying anything, told me I had all his support and the choice was mine.

I wanted to give up. What the heck was I thinking? Why on earth did I dream of experiencing this since the day Ainsley was born? No wonder women say, just schedule a c-section. I can't do it. No, I have to do it. I want to do it!

I regrouped. Got myself together and continued to push with everything I had in me.

I'm not sure how many pushes/contractions later it was, but all of a sudden, Dr. Bradley declared, "The head is out."

"The baby's head is out?! We did it!! I did it!!"

I was reminded the job wasn't done yet, but I didn't care. "If the head's out, the rest of the baby has to come this way! I did it!"

And then, what seemed to be "just like that", Dr. Bradley laid our baby on my chest!

I spread the little legs, "It's a boy!" and looked into Chris' tear-filled eyes, "we have Jacoby!"

Kisses and snuggles and happiness and "I did its!" and "We did its!" and "Thank yous!" [to Dr. Bradley & Judy for believing in me] filled the next several minutes.

I seriously couldn't have done it without these 3 men!

Oh, and Jacoby showing us that his plumbing worked just fine as he laid on my chest! He was cleaned up. I was sown up. Vitals were taken "9 lbs. 4 oz. 21 1/4 inches"!

I looked at Dr. Bradley who had estimated a 7.5-8 lb. baby the day before, and with sweat on his brow, smirked saying, good thing we didn't know that or he wasn't sure we'd gone this [VBAC] route!

"But he fit! But we did it!!!" It is no exaggeration that I had dreamed of a VBAC since the very day of Ainsley's birth. I don't know the number of hours that I have spent dreaming, visualizing, thinking about, worrying about having a VBAC. Some may never understand. Some may think I am/was nuts for having such desire. [Shoot! I did about 15 minutes before successfully having a VBAC!]

But this was one of the most proudest moments of my life.

Everything seemed perfect! Jacoby Joshua was the most handsome, albeit hairy, little man I had ever seen! He nursed like a champ!

All was right in the world!

The rest of the story, as Paul Harvey would say, is to come in Jacoby's 1 week letter. 

Mister, the Papa

Six years ago I sat in the Teens For Christ office and across the room sat a guy I'd never seen before, but everyone seemed to know.

"That's Chris Massie."

"Oh as in Paul's brother and Wyatt's brother?!" [I had met them previously.]

"Yep."

"Gotcha. Okay."

End of conversation. End of thoughts-about-Chris. [For then. ;)]


Needless to say, I wasn't overwhelmingly smittened by him or immediately head over heels. Not that I can figure out why I wasn't as he is definitely worth butterflies in the stomach.

Now I won't give y'all the whole run down as to how "Paul & Wyatt's brother" became the love of my life over the past 6 years, but it happened.

Looking back over that time, it was quite evident that I was marrying a great man. He's a hardworker, compassionate, loyal, intelligent, and has a servant's heart. In many ways, we when said "I do." I was thinking about how I wanted to do life with him forever, and the kind of husband I was marrying. And then 9 months and 25 days ago, that changed.

No Chris didn't become a jerkish monster, yet rather instead of seeing him as a wonderful man and husband, I now saw him through the lense of Ainsley's amazing Papa! I've continued to be amazed by his compassion and love for her and  the way his heart comes alive when playing with her or even just talking about her.

Mister can make Ainsley laugh like no other.

Giggling as she blocked kisses

He loves to teach her all about life. I'm constantly asking, "what?!" only to get the response that he was explaining ______ to her. He wants to give of himself to Ainsley.

Sharing a peach

Chris wants to give her experiences. When I was still in school, it wasn't uncommon for me to get a run down of the new experiences she shared that day with him while I was gone.

Playing in the Slip 'n' Slide.

From touching grass for the first time to "learning" about gardening, Chris wants to "do life" all together.

Just this past week, we had a tiny--in hindsight--scare that Ainsley was seriously hurt. While I was preparing supper, Chris and Ainsley were playing and giggling in the kitchen as well. Chris decided to "fly" with Ainsley and so he bent down with a flat back and laid her on his back loosely gripping her spread arms. He soared and she giggled through the kitchen.

I'm not 100% sure what happened next as I was getting butter out of the fridge, but as I went to shut the fridge door, Ainsley was turning and Chris was quickly turning to catch her, I reach my arms in the tangled mess to catch her from falling just as we heard a loud "POP" and Ainsley began screaming! Cradling her close to my chest, I tried to calm her but couldn't dismiss the fact that her arm hung against her little chest, not moving. I continued to hold her arm near her chest, fearing that if I let go, it was going to dangle out-of-socket and focused on calming her. 

In the meantime, Chris paced in the kitchen confident he heard a pop and with a look on his face that I had never seen before nor desire to ever witness again.

The thought that he had caused such pain to Ainsley was more than he could bear. I attempted to mask my worry and reassure him it'd be alright as he repeatedly apologized to Ains.

Ainsley's tears soon dried up and I slowly let go of her little arm, preparing for the worst. It hung still for just a moment and then she was moving it around as if she didn't know what the fuss was all about!! It's amazing how durable lil' ones are and how they can bounce back so quickly! I locked eyes with Chris' fearful eyes and reassured, "Everything is okay! I was scared too."

I could tell his heart wasn't at ease, but then, Ainsley looked at her favorite person in the world and it was as if she knew exactly how to give him a bit of peace about it all. She looked at her Papa and with out hestiation, she reached both her little arms towards him snuggling around his neck.

Despite the worry/fear in the moments thinking Ainsley arm was dislocated or broken, I was reminded again of the compassionate, loving man that I walked down the aisle to 3 years ago.

I married a great man. I married a great papa.

My view

Chris' view

-Rachel

As a funny side note that makes me love this man so much, this is a text from Mister this morning: 

I can't make this stuff up!!

My response? "You're the sweetest man I know!"

Happy Methuselah Day!

Last Tuesday when I arrived home from school as I entered our house, I sighed a breath of relaxation as the house was tidy and had a fresh aroma. (Some of the things on my makes me happy list!) Anyways there was two oddities: Mister and Ains were in our bedroom--and I hadn't heard a "hey babe!"--and our journal was right inside the door.

After putting my bags in their designated spots, I scooped up the journal, wondering if the two afternoon oddities were connected. I read the most recent words from Chris. A sweet note that ended with, "So we dressed up to show you how much we appreciate you. P.S. Happy 'Methuselah' Day!"

Wondering what the heck Methuselah Day was, I made my way back to the bedroom to see these two cuties!

My coordinating cuties!

I asked Mister about the meaning of the day and he in turned asked how old was Methuselah when he died?

My response of "really" wasn't accurate enough and I soon learned that just as Methuselah was alive for 969 years, Chris and I had been married for 696 days! So to celebrate--after doing a run around to get a new phone--we headed to OG to celebrate with a shared appetizer, a shared entree, and of course a shared dessert with a drink!

I may have failed at Bible Trivia, but I certainly didn't fail at marrying a man who creative loves me even when I'm unloveable!

Goal #41 "Tuesday" Night Questions

41. Answer Tuesday Night Questions consistently for 12 weeks.

One of the things that we talked about when we celebrated our 2nd Anniversary was ways to stay connected and in love for a very long time. [Good goal, eh?] Well I mentioned in my anniversary post about a blog that had some wonderful ideas. This is where Tuesday Night Questions came into play. [Tuesdays is simply what worked for us initially. It's just a coincidence that the original source used Tuesday's too.] Since Ainsley's birth, Chris hasn't worked Wednesday morn

I liked the questions that the couple asked each other and felt like they pretty much covered everything--or at least were conversation starters to cover other topics that needed to be covered. So for the last 12 weeks, Chris and I have been intentional about setting aside time to ask each other the following 4 questions:

1. How did you feel loved this past week?
2. What does your upcoming week look like?
3. How would you feel most loved & encouraged in the days ahead? [Need motivation for anything?]
4. How would you feel best pursued in sex/intimacy this week?

They aren't super profound, but they help to make sure that we're on the same page and each other's needs/wants are being met. It's also a time to show appreciation for your needs/wants being met [particularly through question #1].

One thing that came up in a recent conversation was that Mister felt like his creative love was getting a bit dusty and needed to use it a bit more. Well that he did!

Yesterday morning after all three of us slowly woke, we headed out for a walk to the park. Mister had made a scroll [scrolls have become pretty significant in our relationship] and he wanted to go there to give it to me. It was an absolutely beautiful Fall day so I was all about the walk. [There's a park about 3ish blocks from our house.] We loaded Ains in the stroller and headed out the door.

Taking in the Fall beauty and chatting away, we were about 3/4 of the way there when Chris suddenly stopped. "Uh, I lost it." The scroll that he had put in his back pocket was no longer there. We looked where we were and then headed back towards our house to find it. There wasn't great significance in being at the park when I read it, so once we found it [5 houses from our house] we just headed back home and he gave it to me there.

As you can see, the scroll was dropped pretty close to our house. Not so close to the park. :)

Mister with his/my scroll.

Sitting on the front porch, I read the words written directly from his heart to mine:

And Then There Were Three...

When we began our journeY all I was thinking abOut was the two of Us, together, forever. Ah what bliss I pictured us togetheR! I may have imaginEd the journey with kids somewhere in the mix, but it wAs mostly just the two of us walking hand-in-hand through life.

Of course, as our journey proGressed I began to entertain the amazing thought of Raising a family with you, and the joy of that prospect drEw us onto that part of the journey.

No longer is it just you And me walking through life hand-in-hand, seeing whaT kind of adventures we can get ourselves into. Now it's you and me and Ainsley, wakling hand-in-hand-on-stroller. And I love it!

I wouldn't trade it for just the two of us. Getting to see your warM tenderness with our daughter is whAt I consider pure bliss now. Seeing how you care for her as you nurse her is really aMazing! Watching you selflessly chAnge diapers, pump extra milk, take time away from teaching, give up sleep to keep her fed and clean: what a great start Ainsley is getting Because of you.

I fall more in lovE with you as I see you do these things. I am so fortunAte to be on this journey with you.

Thank you my beautiful bride and perfect mama bear!

Love,

Papa Bear

9-13-11

Notice the bolded capital letters, just like in his "asking out" scroll, they had their own message. 

We continued in meaningful, intentional conversation before heading in to pack up to go to his parents' house. We were going to be learning some basics of canning by making grape jelly! And I think Grandma & Grandpa Massie wanted to see lil' Ainsley! :)

And Then There Were Three...

This is just an example of the good that has come out of our Tuesday Night Questions. I appreciate and feel cherished when Chris expresses himself in this way and he also feels like he's tapping into various aspects of his personality by showing love in this way. [I hope that part about him makes sense. He really does enjoy it. It's not all about me! :)]

So if you aren't taking time to connect with your spouse, I highly suggest that you start now, even if you've been married for decades! I hope to keep this habit a habit for many years to help me stay best connected to my best friend.

P.S. I've hit 5,007 blog views in the history of this blog! Thanks for checking it out and reading it! I hope you [whoever you are] enjoy the glimpse into our ordinary life that we try to live out extraordinarily. I always find it fascinating, and an honor, when I see people out and about and they tell me that they read my blog. I appreciate you taking time out of your busy lives to read about ours. :)

Weekend Review: Quality Time with Chris & 3 Goals Accomplished

After spending 6 hours learning all about having a baby, I sent Mister the following text message on our 5-minute ride home:

"Your adventure, should you choose to accept it, is to pack your bags and get ready to head back out on the road. You will need to pack a bag including the following: change of clothes [nothing fancy!], swimsuit, toothbrush, flip-flops, older tennis shoes, and your pillow. Hopefully that's everything! Will you join me?!"

*I later realized that I put nothing in there about needing shorts to sleep in. Oops. Good thing our tent was secluded!*

He turned to me, smiled, and said I'll join ya!

Had this statement not be made, this weekend would've went to the toilet real quick!

Chris and I packed our bags and we were off in my preloaded car. I told him our ETA was about 40 minutes, but I didn’t really know because I’d been there maybe once and he didn’t ask many questions. [He’s much easy—better—to surprise than me! I’d been playing 20 questions the whole way!

Ten minutes into the trip: “Oh crap!"

“What’s wrong?”

“I forgot to pack something!” What’s that important “something” that I forgot… butter of course! J

As I thought a little more, I realized that I may have needed to pack a rubber mallet to drive in the tent stakes but didn’t want to ask because it would’ve given it away. [We ended up not needed a mallet.]

A quick $2.61 for butter and a bag of ice and we were back on the road.

It wasn’t until we pulled into Van Buren’s KOA that Chris knew what we were doing for the weekend! I patted myself on the back for this secret planning accomplishment! After parking, registering, realizing that everyone there hated their jobs and their kids, we were off to set up our campsite.

Later we would have to return to said hatey workers to buy wood from their empty wood storage which reiterated their passion for the job!

Campsite

 A quick tent set-up and change into our bathing suits, we were off to the swimming area. This pond likely had more chemicals and we were surprised our suits didn’t turn teal so we decided not to go under, but wading chest deep was refreshing and relaxing! They also had a big inflatable slide as well as a "spinning log", but you had to rent their life jackets to use them and it was pretty kid-infested attraction anyways. After relaxing in the water and on the "beach" we journeyed back to our campsite.

Snackin' on a pretzel after wading in the teal water.

For supper we made pizza pudgy pies. All carbon aside they were good! I think I should have taken some PAM along to help out the sticking to the iron and burning factor, but I thought butter is all we'd need. That's a downfall of trying to replicate what you did when you were 12. You don't always remember the details!

I had packed apple pie filling to make dessert pudgy pies, but because of the trickiness of preventing burning that we couldn't quite master, we stuck we the good ol' camping standard, s'mores. Toasted to perfection, they were delish! As we sat around our lil fire, Chris enjoyed a pipe or two and I decided to working on crossing another thing off my list. Borrowing his knife I went to carve my initials in a tree. It was difficult to find a tree in our little area with smooth enough bark to do this, and it ended up not being the prettiest of carvings, but I'm am amateur when it comes to vandalism so it sufficed!

Lighting his pipe, which was much more
successful than the last time he attempted.

Not beautiful, but it counts. :)

 We decided to call it a night and retreated to our tent for the evening. Isn't it amazing how the sun dictates your sleeping and waking when you don't have electricity?! I had borrowed a friend's air mattress [ours took electricity to pump and they had a battery powered one] so sleeping was quite enjoyable. [One question that Chris did ask on the way up was if we'd be sleeping on a mattress that night. I told him I was, but I didn't know about him! This confused him a bit which was perfect! Later he realized why I answered that way.] We rested well and I dreamt about being on a WWF tag-team with Hulk Hogan against his evil twin and another guy. Quite a night. :)

The next morning we rose with the sun, trekked to the mosquito infested hole in the ground toilets, and then enjoyed delicious banana nut muffins cooked over the fire from Meijers. I still have a scar on my finger from the one time I remember making breakfast while camping, so I decided to go with a safer option! After devouring these muffins, we took a little walk around the campgrounds. We were drawn to a jumping pillow [never heard of it prior to this weekend] and saw a handful of kids jumping on it. We walked over intrigued, but I assumed it was a kids only kind of thing. As the kids got off and we got closer, a lady said that she had just turned it off, but asked if we wanted to jump because she could easily turn it back on. After some debating back and forth, the next thing we knew we were kangaroos hopping all over that thing!

I didn't have my camera and don't have Chris' near
to get the pic off his, but this is pretty much
the same thing!

After jumping to our hearts calves' content, we headed back to our site. [Sidenote: As we were leaving and she turned it off again, there was a 3-year old and a 13-year old that came over to jump. "Oh, I'm sorry you can't jump. I've already turned it off!" I felt bad that she turned it back on for us but denied the ones it was likely designed for!] We played several games of Crazy 8 Countdown and then decided weren't really hungry enough to build a fire to cook lunch and both of us were more than ready not to sit in a pool of our own sweat so we would go ahead and pack everything up.

Chris won all but one game of Crazy 8 Countdown.
I let him win since this was kind of like
his birthday celebration. ;)

 After a quick tear down of our campsite and packing of the car, we were homeward bound. In the air conditioning! It felt ah-mazing! Since we returned to Lima early enough in the afternoon [church was actually just getting out as we drove by] we decided to head to the mall to check a couple things out.

On Friday, my momma-cita had asked me to pick up her eyeglasses from JCPenney's and in doing so I saw a "gazebo" [canopy] discounted up on the second floor. Chris and I had talked about wanting to make our back yard a little more livable and have plans in the works for what we want to do to it next summer, but this gazebo seemed like a good option for now! So I looked at it a bit and did some online review research when I got home. Then when our mail came Friday we received a coupon for JCPenney's for 20% off if you used your JCP Credit Card and 15% anything else. Every have a feeling that a sale was made just for you! Yeah, I was feeling that way. So this is what we were going to check out and see if Chris thought it was as much of a good deal as I did!

He agreed.

At checkout they asked if I had a JCP Credit Card, which I did from when I purchased all our bridal parties' attire there over 2 years ago, but I was pretty confident that it had since been cancelled. I am glad that it had because my re-opening it, we were able to save another 10%. We left we our new gazebo canopy saving $398 overall! Cha-ching!

It only took about an hour to set it all up and now we have our own little backyard oasis. Okay not really but we have a back patio that we will actually use! It doesn't fit perfectly this year, but after our planned renovations next year, it'll fit much better!

Back Patio Before

Back Patio After
It has a mosquito netting that can be pulled around it.

Now I have a bit more motivation to pull all the weeds back there so we'll see how that goes!

So in additional to learning quite a bit about the birthing process, having a great getaway time with Mister, and bettering our home a bit I was also able to cross 3 things off my 101 in 1001 list.

40. Plan a surprise get-away with/for Chris.

57. Carve my name initials on a tree.

60. Go camping--somewhere other than our backyard. 

The bad news is I had to start over for Goal #21 even though I was on day 11 of 14. Drats!!

A New Experience

Yesterday I embarked on an adventure that I had never done before: to mow our lawn.

Now hear me out. I have mowed grass before while living at home with my parents, not too often, but I did do it on [slim] occasion. Then obviously while living on campus, lawn care wasn't a part of my duties so there was 5 years of not needing to think about that. We've been in our house for a year now [which seems crazy in and of itself] and when it has come to pretty much anything everything outdoors, that's been "Chris' Job"! You see, I've *thought* about mowing, but it has never been more than a thought. Especially after Chris' first mow job and his comment about how much of a workout it is!

But welcome yesterday. Chris started a new additional job this week, and so while we are getting used to his new work schedules, for the next couple of weeks while I am still in school, the time we are both home during the week is a bit slim. So I want to make sure that it's quality time! Well on Sunday/Monday, Chris commented that one day this week he wanted to trim the edging and another day he wanted to mow this week. Since I got home about 4:30 after getting a new tire for my annoying lovely car, I decided that if I mowed before he got home, then that would be an extra hour that we'd get to spend together once he got off at 6pm. [Secretly I was hoping it'd take me long enough that Chris would get home while I was still working on it, and then he could finish it up!]

And so I embarked on my latest adventure. Now we don't have a large yard, but we do have to make this more of an adventure is a reel mower. Notice I didn't say real but rather a reel mower.

Our real reel mower!

I began in the backyard because I figured that way, if I did an awful job, not too many people would see it. I also started in a little corner of the yard to "practice" a bit. I later learned after Chris got home that I started in what he refers to as the most difficult part of the yard thanks to unevenness due to tree removal before we moved in! Lovely!]

As I pushed this thing back and forth multiple times through the yard, I am just being honest when I admit that I thought about paying a neighbor to use their real non-reel mower so that I could finish in half the time! But I thought Chris may not like that idea since the whole reason we have the mower we do is to be more environmentally conscience. I also had a lot several other not so positive thoughts that went through my brain as I trudged along.

"Fake it 'til you feel it!"

Each time that I had those thoughts, and even became a bit bitter [which makes no sense since there was no one to be bitter against, since I was doing it on my own free will!] I reminded myself why I was mowing in the first place: more quality time with mister! That helped keep things in perspective. That's a lesson that I have to be taught many times--because I obviously haven't learned it yet--simply by doing an attitude check, I can make life, and that tasks in it, much more enjoyable!

I finished up the backyard, and the front yard, put everything away and then waited inside for Chris to get home. As I sat inside and drank even more water, sweat began to pour out of me. I even had a mental debate with myself--which is more of a work out: spin class, a 5k, or mowing?! A little after 6 when Chris returned, he was appreciative that I mowed simply because that meant he didn't have to, although my mow-manship wasn't quite to par.

Topped with cheese of course!

After relaxing just a few minutes, we headed back out to do some trimming. Thankfully about 3/4 of the way through trimming, it began to rain so we headed inside and decided it was supper time. Chris fired up the grill and we had some delicious, ginormous turkey burgers complete with the fixins and I tried my hand at steaming a whole head of cauliflower.

So big we even had to open up two hot dog buns per turkey burger!

Both were oh so yummy, and oh so fulfilling that it made it difficult to bend over and finish up the trimming when the rain let up. I could blame it on a real baby, while Chris' only excuse was the food baby he was growing!

Overall I got a little stinky, a lotta sweaty, a little grass-rashy/itchy, and a lotta time with Mister. So I guess I could say my first and likely last mowing job at our house was a success, and a workout!! :)

Happy [Belated] Anniversary to Us!

The first week of May, I had over half a post typed up but since I never finished it, it just got deleted and now to begin again!

So with that one scrapped, here's a fresh one! On Monday, Mister and I celebrated 2 years of marriage! In many ways, 2 years doesn’t sound like much at all, but in other ways it seems like such a long time! I even go back and forth in my mind if it “feels” like it has been 2 years. In one moment, it seems like just yesterday we said “I do!” and in others, that seems like an eternity ago!

Last year we decided that on our anniversary we would write each other letters and share a bottle of bubbly. Then after reading the letters and finishing off the bubbly, we would put the letters in the bottle. This was in part because of the creative way that Chris proposed so we want to carry on the tradition!

Monday nights I have spin class and Chris usually goes along and runs while I am working out and so despite our celebratory anniversary, we first went to spin and then Chris “had something planned” for after. Well thanks to the rain, and more rain, and more rain, that let loose while working out and continued thereafter, his plans had literally been dampered! So instead of enjoying the picnic he packed out in the sunshine, we enjoyed it in our living room.

Sorry it's sideways, I can't figure out how to rotate without reuploading which will until our 3rd Anniversary!

We enjoyed some cheese and crackers, veggie pizza [a personal favorite of mine], fruit, and bubbly [sans alcohol of course]! Delicious. We read each other’s letters and shared good conversation. After supper, we watched a movie together [thanks to our free Netflix trial which I signed up to earn more Swagbucks for our milker money fund J ] and enjoyed my favorite desserts from Olive Garden! Yum! Yum!

The movie was good, and made us appreciate our love and even brought tears to both of us a couple of times, but that is our lil’ secret right?!

Lastly, I figured I’d share about my not so original anniversary gifts: Love Books.

I’ve known for a while what I wanted to do because I was reading a friend’s blog and in her post she referenced another blog. I read the story about the SmallMetal Box which was originally an Ann Lander’s letter. As soon as I read it, I knew that would be his anniversary gift.

When I went to get the supplies to make the box, I made several rounds in Hobby Lobby searching for just the right supplies to make the perfect love box. I finally gathered everything I thought I would need and was quite excited about it! Then as any good shopper does, I decided to make my way through the clearance aisles. Well much to my surprise when I walked through one aisle, I found a fake book box that had love written all over it, literally! It was also half the price of all my supplies so I went with the premade gift instead! Here’s our love book:

I gave him the book/box with a dollar to start it off right of course! ;)

 

I also designed the cover to our own little love book. Thanks to a great deal I was able to find at papercoterie.com, I made a journal with some pictures. This journal will be used to share our love, our encouragement, and our life with one another. We will be taking turns writing letters to each other and then cleverly hiding the journal for the other to find it, and it will continue back and forth. I’m excited to affirm and love Chris well through words and create our own little book of love!

This was also inspired by www.todaysletters.com.

So all in all, Happy Belated Anniversary to my favorite couple! J

The "BIG Reveal"!

So as most of y’all know, yesterday we had our ultrasound to hopefully discover the gender of the lil’ one that has taken residency in my womb. Like I mentioned before, neither Chris nor I had a strong preference of the gender, but we just were really looking forward to knowing.

Wednesday night I baked cupcakes and hollowed out the middles. I had whipped cream ready in the fridge and blue and pink dye waiting on the counter. As soon as our appointment was over, we’d run home fill our cupcakes with pink or blue cool whip, ice them and then head to our ‘rents to reveal the gender of their third grandchild! First to Chris’ parents’, then drop Chris off at work, then to my parents’, I’d wait there until Zac got off give him a cupcake, and then hopefully stop by Grandma & Grandpa Cow’s for a few minutes before getting back to our house for Girls’ Night for the gender reveal and the Creamery. It was all planned out.

One little hiccup occurred: we had no idea whether to fill the cupcakes with pink or blue filling!

I didn’t even want to make the rounds, but as I mumbled “What do we do about all the cupcakes?!” Chris said, “We still do it.” *sigh* This wasn’t part of the plan. So instead our family and friends got to bite into green filled cupcakes.

Boy?! Wait that's green? Yep, we don't know what's in me!

Note that it was not by lack of effort that we were not able to tell the gender! Jodi poked, prodded, and shook my belly like it was her job! ;) Our child was not budging! I’ve heard of babies being cross legged hiding their business, but this child of ours had its knees locked together. Not of glimpse of light could’ve been seen between its thighs. As a result 45 minutes later, he may be a he or she may be a she.

Despite not really caring the result of yesterday’s appointment, I’d be a liar if I said I wasn’t bummed. Chris and I drove separately as we were both coming from work, so we obviously had to drive separately home. I got into my car, pulled my new zebra shades down over my eyes, and pulled out. Just as a single tear fell down my cheek, Thisis the Stuff by Francsesca Battstelli. Now this song’s beat is mildly annoying, but it’s so true for my life. It speaks about how there are small things that don’t really matter that test your patience and such and because of all of that, we forget our many blessings. So true. It definitely wasn’t the song I wanted to hear at that moment, but nevertheless it was a good reminder.

So I guess we'll move on, not knowing if our first child will be a boy or a girl, and having a gender nuetral shower, and getting a huge surprise come August! Honestly, yesterday I was extremely bummed about not knowing, simply because I had the expectation of knowing, but now I think I *may* be able to last another 19 weeks before finding out!

Here's a little glimpes of the stubborn and in control modest lil one! I'm sure [s]he be perfect! : )

Face shot, with it's nubby right arm.

Excuses & Lessons

It's the thought that counts right?! I sure hope so because based on that statement, I've had so many blogs posted since October that neither you or I would be able to count them! Sadly in this case, that statement doesn't matter!

Here is my primary excuse why I haven't put my fingers to the keyboard and typed up all these thoughts in my head over the course of the past 3 months:

I can't. 

Do you believe it? It's legit but I reckon it needs an explanation!

The reason that I can't is because the majority of what consumes my mind I have wanted to blog about aren't topics that I can share with the world. The internet causes a difficult balance of wanting to be transparent but remembering that being transparent on the internet means that you are transparent to EVERYONE in the ENTIRE WORLD! There are certain things that I wouldn't mind sharing with everyone but my students or everyone but co-workers or everyone but this particular group of people or another. It's not that I have awful thoughts swarming in my head or even a desire to vent, it's just that I wish I had the ability to keep what I write on here from being blabbed to the world a little more confidential than I can.

I digress.

Married life. Ever since Christmas [there's a topic I could chat about as well I guess], I have had about 0.0000000001 motivation to do any sort of house work! It's not that I enjoy living in a tornado scene, which I am not, but what's it really going to hurt if things are out of place and a few too many dishes are laying around? Nothing really, right? My excuse that I get to use for not too much longer is that Chris and his papa are working on building shelves to make a pantry like storage area. They tore out all the old, not so functional shelving in the room off the garage and put in a new door a couple weeks ago. Last night Wy joined them for putting up the majority of the shelving and now there is only one more wall to go! Wa-hoo!! Soon [hopefully] all of the canned and boxed food items that are in bags on the kitchen floor, miscellaneous small appliances, and all the junk lovely stuff that is filling the garage causing no room for a car will all have a lovely home in the new pantry!! THEN we'll finally be able to bring home our deep freeze Christmas present from my 'rents to fill up with delicious food! Maybe then I will be motivated to keep things a bit more organized... doubt it, but perhaps.

A second note on married life. I realized today that kind of "poisoned" Chris... completely unintentional of course! A week or so ago I made chili for the first time and I bought dry kidney beans to use in it. [Note to all: I have never made chili before and I have never used dried beans before!] Well I read the instructions on the beans bag and it said something about soaking them overnight to soften them, then rinsing them and THEN use them however you please. Well since I was going to be making the chili the night before in the Crockpot, I figured this would eliminate the need to soak them. I figured wrong. Despite the beans soaking in the Crockpot overnight and then cooking all day long, they were a bit "crunchy" when we ate supper Monday night. Me being the pickier eater and not afraid to not eat something if I don't like it, I got out a little plastic cup and with each spoonful of chili I would spit out all the crunchy beans! This was quite easy as when I was younger I didn't like the squishiness of kidney beans and didn't eat them then either. Well Chris will eat anything even if it's gross and he didn't really mind the crunchiness so after doctoring the soup up a bit with Hot Sauce he ate a couple bowls.

Fast-forward to the next morning. Chris was peeing out his butt had some stomach issues and clung to the toilet multiple times before leaving for work at 11am. We blamed it on the hot sauce because I only tried a bite of his [and didn't like it so didn't eat any more] and I didn't have any "issues".

Fast-forward again to last night/this morning. Chris ate some on the leftover chili before bed last night while I was satisfied with my Dora Fruit Snacks late night snack. Of course he didn't add any Hot Sauce this time and thought everything would be good. Well this morning, he woke and you guess it his urethra and rectum were once again confused! Since I suspected it was the beans that caused this issue, I did a little technical research and googled it! :) Sure enough eating undercooked kidney beans is actually quite bad! Whoops. There is actually such a thing as Kidney Bean Poisoning which is caused by Phytohaemagglutnin which is a toxin that can affect someone after consuming as few as 5 undercooked kidney beans. I'm just thankful that he didn't have the vomiting like the websites described!!

Lesson learned. I'll use canned beans, that is if he ever dares to let me venture to make chili again!