Confession Time

Okay, so the real reason I haven't blogged much is mostly to do with one thing. Sleep has become way more important to me. I have spent very little "creative time" at the computer lately. If I'm sitting at the computer it is usually while I'm nibbling on saltines trying to feel good enough to get going on the day while reading all y'alls blogs and mindlessly reading facebook statuses. But as soon as it feels like I might be ready to be creative Chico wakes up, and he does not like me to sit at the computer. :)
So in case the saltines and sleepiness didn't give it away... yes I'm pregnant!!!! And we're thrilled!  I'm 12 weeks along now and just saw my OB earlier this week for the second time. Everything is going really well!  He's pretty sure I don't have pregnancy onset Lupus or whatever which thrills us all!  The preeclampsia is still looming over our heads as a possibility but I'm trying to stay positive and think big thoughts. (big baby + big mommy = happy everybody) Speaking of big... I haven't really gained any weight yet but my uterus has sure expanded! I used to be able suck my tummy in flat but now I can't!  Then again, I rarely suck in and stand up straight and tall.... which could probably be why two people from my ward asked if I was pregnant... before I was even pregnant. :)
Sooo... this pregnancy so far has been probably a bit harder than chico's because I'm at home instead of sitting at school and at a desk all day like I did when pregnant with chico.  Chico has been awesome though, he loves Saltine crackers! So on the mornings that he would wake up before I was ready for him to be awake (which was often) I'd bring him in my bed and we would eat saltines together.  And we'd lay there reading books or turn on a movie for about 10 minutes.  It was something he never would have done before now, definitely a tender mercy.  He also has become SO cute about babies!!!  The day before we found out we were pregnant he started saying the word baby.  He points at any picture of himself or another baby and will say in the cutest little chico voice, "baby!".  I haven't quite convinced him that there is a baby in my belly.  My friend was 9 months pregnant and I tried to tell him she had a baby in her belly and he just kinda blew us off again.  Oh well. :)
He has a cute little cousin, "E". She is 4 months old.  He is quite cute with her.  Out of the blue the other day he went up and gave "E" a side hug (she was being held in a standing position by her mom).  Okay, he hardly ever just goes and gives people hugs. And he did it TWICE with "E" and then he went and squished in next to her so he could sit with his arm around her back.  I about died watching it because it was so adorable.  Whenever "E" cries he gets really concerned and looks like he wants to go comfort her. He's a man of few words so it's cute watching him try to comfort her with just hand motions. 
So yeah, he's just been really cute with little girls lately... makes me wonder if we're going to have a girl.  We go to a ward play group every week and the other lady who comes has two, wait no, now three little girls (she's my friend who was pregnant)  So anyway, one of the little girls, "H" is like 6 months older than Chico.  They're so funny together.  The other day we took them to the Church's Art and History Museum to the "I am a Child of God" room for kids.  We were kicking ourselves for not bringing our cameras because Chico and "H" were being so cute together.  They have a bunch of kid-sized plastic furniture some of which are love seats.  They kept sitting next to each other on the love seats.  "H" was adorable and would scoot in closer to Chico and want to sit by him, I think it actually made him a little uncomfortable one time. The look on his face was hilarious. Another time, Chico and "H" were just running around and we thought they had maybe escaped into the museum part but we found them standing there close to the entrance just standing next to each other LAUGHING and leaning their backs against the wall.  Oh man, it was cute! Sometimes I think he's able to communicate with the kids his age better than with me.
He's got a cousin, "N", who is 6 months older than him and they'll just run around together and play for the longest time together. My sister-in-law was watching chico the other day and said that he and "N" were just standing on the kitchen chairs throwing around the leftover ramen noodles from lunch and laughing really hard.
Anyway, I probably could go on and on, but it's just fun to see him growing up and interacting.
So, back to the pregnancy!  We went in at about 6 weeks and got to see our little baby.  He/She looked more like a little bean than a baby.  But it was still awesome to see! Then this week when I went in for my second appointment (just about 12 weeks) and got to have another ultrasound. I get to have an ultrasound at every appointment because I'm high risk!!! Woot!  (woot for the ultra sounds, not for the high riskedness, lol)  So anyway, I got to see our cute little baby again!!!  The doc didn't print any pictures which bummed out Brent greatly.  He didn't come with me to the appointment figuring he'd at least get to see pictures (that's what our last doc would do). I should have asked him to print some but was too thrilled looking at the baby and hearing the doc talk about how good everything looks that I didn't even think to ask.  The baby was kicking his/her legs a bunch and had it's cute little hand rested on it's knee.  It looks like just a cute little miniature baby!  He/She is only 2 1/2 inches long and looks so good and healthy!
The sickness is starting to go away slowly (knock on wood).  It's still random when I get sick though.  It's not always at the same time in the day.  That's how it was with chico too.  I remember with chico, Brent and I were riding the UTA bus home from school one night and I was way sick (yeah, the stinky bus didn't make it any better).  John Boom was sitting behind us (a guy from my high school) and he said I didn't look like I was feeling too well.  Brent put his arm around me and said to John, "Yeah, she's going through a sick time in her life."  I couldn't help but laugh at that statement.  John sat and thought for about 30 seconds and then he turns back around and says, "Is that a euphemism for being pregnant?"  Maybe you had to be there... or maybe you'd have to know John Boom to think it was funny. But Brent and I still laugh about it to this day.
Brent has been so awesome during all of my illness.  He is so patient with my fatigue and sickness.  He has really helped out a ton with the cleaning and shopping.  I don't cook a ton anymore, food just doesn't sound appealing.  Preparing it sounds even worse.  Brent is great about helping out with the gross stuff in cooking that I can't bear to do, mainly like cutting raw chicken.
Anyway, so I'm looking forward to my second trimester coming up here soon.  I have high hopes of having a lot of fun with my cute little fam before I get too uncomfortable.  I look forward to finding out the gender so I can know what to shop for and how to decorate.  And I'm going to try to get everything done before I reach 30 weeks just in case.  Because with chico, I had gotten approximately NOTHING done before he was born. 
I'm also looking forward to never getting a cold ever again.  I've had a cold almost the whole pregnancy long.  I had a mild cold when I was about 5 weeks.  Then at about 7 weeks I caught a terrible cold and it turned into a sinus infection.  Then right after I got better with that one just last week I caught yet ANOTHER cold.  This one isn't as bad, it's a sore throat/cough no stuffiness though (knock on wood).  Does knocking on wood help?  My doctor did it yesterday, so it probably does.;)
I'm mostly just looking forward to having another baby! The Lord has blessed us so much!  We're grateful he's giving us with another child and hope we can be the parents he would want us to be.
Well...I think that about sums it up. Hope you enjoyed my novel.

back from my slump

Man, it's been a while since I posted.  It's not because I've been busy... I really haven't been.  I could say it's because we've been pretty sick for a while too... but I don't think that's it either.  I think it's mostly because I just haven't felt like blogging.  So there ya go.

But I just took some CUTE pictures of Chico and wanted to share one of my favorites.  Oh he's so adorable.  This is a frame worthy picture for sure.  I'm pretty positive all the grandmas around are going to want a copy.
 

My mom's neighbor let me borrow these props (she's so nice!) and I did a baby photo shoot today.  So while all the equipment was out I seized the moment and took some of Chico. More to come once I've had a chance to edit them.  Hasta luego for now!

been reading

 

I started this last Friday and finished it today (Tuesday).  I have had a hard time putting down this 800 page book.  My Grandma got it for Christmas and when she finished it I asked her if I could read it.  She looked at where I was at today very surprised and said, "You are a fast reader!"  Well maybe, but neglectful mother/wife might be a better description.  Gerald Lund just knows how to wrap me in so that I can't put a book down.  I'll admit it, I have read the whole series of The Work and the Glory... three times. :)  Too bad I don't remember them better or else I'd be a whiz at church history! 

I just wanted to say a few things about these amazing people.  They had faith.  They were called on a mission to settle an area by the San Juan so that they could be a buffer for the Indians and White-Men Bandits I guess you could say.  How would you like that call?  Anyway, the hardest part though was GETTING to where they were going.  I won't go into detail but it was HARD and they stuck to it.  When they were at a point when they had to decide whether to go on or not one of the leaders said, "Even if there is no way to go through, we must go through." And they did it.  There was no way but with their faith in God, several miracles, and their "stick-to-ativness" they made the way through.  It took them 6 months when they thought it would take 6 weeks.

Lately I have been feeling inadequate in a lot of ways. Mostly with my role as a mother.  I've heard that most women feel or have felt this way at one point in their lives. I'm trying to work through it.  This book seemed to come at a good time.  I can make it through hard times, I can change, I can become a good mother even if I don't feel like I measure up right now. 

Yesterday I was making cookies for Brent's co-workers (the really good chocolate chip ones, "crack cookies" as they have deemed it) and I realized that it has been two years since I last ate cookie dough.  This seems like a super-dumb example but here it goes anyway.  When I first became pregnant with Chico I read that it's not good to eat cookie dough while pregnant because you could get salmonella from the raw eggs.  I told Brent about it and he said, "Well yeah, it's NEVER a good idea to eat cookie dough because of the raw eggs. That's disgusting."  I realized that he was RIGHT!  I would NEVER eat the contents of a raw egg plain, but there I would go shoving cookie dough down my throat like there was no tomorrow (Kimee can testify to that).  I decided from that moment to never eat cookie dough ever again.  So last night when I thought about that I realized that I am capable of change and it made me feel good.

Anyway, I just was wondering if any of you have ideas on how to make the long days more bearable at home?  To enjoy your time with your children?  I'd love some ideas, seriously.  Because I love my little chico, and as he's getting older I'm having a hard time adjusting to the greater demand to my time he requires.

a really nice weekend

Brent and I were together almost every minute of the nice long weekend.  He works 4, 10 hour shifts so he has Friday off.  So yes, we got Friday through Monday together.  It was awesome.  We got to go on a fun date to the Symphony on Saturday night because we happened to have tickets to it!  We stopped at Kmart on the way there to see if they still have a photobooth in the front of the store.  We were saddened to see that they do not.  So I ask you,

Does anyone know where there is a cheap photo booth in the Salt Lake Valley?

You know the kind where you squish your behinds together in on that little seat behind the curtain and you get 4 pictures on a strip?  I remember when Kimee and I went and did it at Kmart, they were only like a dollar each.  But that was like 8 years ago.

Anyway so while we were at Kmart we caved and bought a box of chocolates and Brent bought me a rose. We pretty much had half the box of chocolates downed by the end of the night.

The Symphony was BY FAR my favorite one we've been to.  Dvorak's New World Symphony.  Highly recommend it.  Honestly I don't know very much about symphonies and classical music, pretty much everything I know I've learned from Brent. So anyway I think this is a symphony that is accessible to everyone. Go ahead and look it up on You Tube and listen to it, I think you'll like it. :)

Church on Sunday was fun.  For Sharing Time this Sunday I was assigned to make a fool of myself to act out this fun roll play with the kids about a man falling into a hole.  I wore an extra long skirt to church knowing full well I would be flopping to the floor repeated times because we were doing this activity as one of three stations during Sharing Time.  So I had to do it 6 times total because Senior and Junior primary are separate. Most of the kids LOVED it, the only ones that rolled their eyes at me were the 10-11 year olds. But OH did the Junior primary LOVE LOVE LOVE it.  They were so excited to play make believe at church. It was cool.  And hopefully I got the message across about the Atonement that I was supposed to.

Tuesday was a GREAT day.  I finally caught up on photo editing!!!  What a good weird feeling.  I don't think I've been caught up since like May.  Seriously, it's been way too long.  Hopefully now that we finally feel caught up we can stay caught up and we are going to try REALLY hard not to bite off more than we can chew.  After I got the photo editing done and the CD delivered I got to go to our Relief Society Humanitarian Service night.  I started by tying quilts.  I know how to do it, I really do.  But for some reason I get distracted or SOMETHING and I still get the bunches of yarn at the bottom of the quilt like I did when I was a teenager.  I was also busy trying to watch Chico too so I finally abandoned the quilt and went and chatted with my friends in the ward.  Then they served dinner and then Brent came over when he got home from work and whisked Chico away so I could better serve for the rest of the evening.  So instead of tying quilts I colored alphabet books that go to help children learn English in other countries. It was SO nice to get out of the house and talk with other ladies.  I really enjoyed it.

Then I walked out to the car and found flowers on the seat.  My cute Sweetheart, I love that man.

screen saver

We have our screen saver mode on that one that randomly goes through your photos.  It makes me happy most of the time except for when I see those annoying crappy pictures that I should have erased ages ago!  It brings back so many fun memories of times Brent and I have shared.

Here are a few that just make me laugh every time I see them.

goofing around with a crappy camera back when we were engaged

Brent is so awesome. While we were engaged we were busy with finishing a basement apartment to live in, going to school, and working part time. With all the stress and strain on our time he wanted us to still go on fun dates while we were engaged. So we dressed up one night and went and walked through Walmart. Because it's not a full body shot you can't tell but I was a hippie and he was a cowboy.  Because everybody knows cowboys are attracted to hippies. His face is priceless.

These next two are way awesome.  Brent's dad has a nice camera and was doing candid shots at the temple on our wedding day.  Well of course the WHOLE family was following along watching as we were getting our pictures taken and apparently Brent's little brother stole the camera from his dad and started taking shots of us and was apparently being all annoying like a typical younger brother should.  Funny thing is I totally don't even remember him doing this but I'm glad he did. They're some of my favorites!

Tomorrow

If you are interested in taking Financial Peace University by Dave Ramsey my Stake is starting up the class on Thursday, February 11 (yeah I know that's tomorrow)  Anyway, even if you're not in my Stake you may still join (I asked).  Also if you don't live in the area I live in I know a guy who can help you find a class in your area.  How cool is that!?
SO, if you are interested shoot me an email and I can give the details.  (my email is sarahhatchphotography at gmail dot com)
It's a really really good class, I totally recommend it.  It's worth sacrificing your Thursday evening for 11 weeks I promise!

in our pajamas

Well, we've all been sick over this weekend so we've spent a lot of time in our pajamas.  In fact on Saturday I didn't get out of my pjs until about 7:00 when Brent said we had to get me out of the house and took me to Cafe Rio for a Pork Salad.  Oh man, there are few things better in the world than those salads. :)

Chico thinks it is fun when I climb in his crib with him. Brent was home and took some pictures of us in there together.

Well, then we climbed out and had some fun with the camera.  Though it's hard to take pictures of ourselves with our gigantic camera.  What do you think, our best family pictures yet? lol

Then chico wanted to start reading his books. :)

Later that day after church when Daddy was taking off his tie chico really wanted it.  So Daddy let him wear it. :)  Such a cutie.  But not quite as cute as his Daddy.