Waiting and Day-Dreaming

Waiting. It's the hardest thing for me to do. I find myself always getting frustrated with life because I don't want to wait anymore! So in the midst of this frustration, I day-dream...

What is it I day-dream about? 

It's funny because my dreams haven't changed much since I was a little girl. I used to come home from school and sit on our front porch swing (when we lived in Utah) and spend hours swinging back and forth, while day-dreaming about my future and what it might hold for me. Of course there was always the handsome man with the great career and the beautiful house full of beautiful children. And in my dreams I was always happy. 

Today, I'm dreaming about our house. 

-I want so badly to have our own home again! 

-I want to cook and bake whenever the mood strikes me without having to ask permission, or ask where things are. 

-I want to "nest" and put together our little boys room so that it will feel more real that he is actually going to be here soon. 

-I want to have access to the internet again without having to go to the library, or use my cell phone. 

-I want to have privacy and not have to tell people where I am going all the time and when I will be home.

-I want to have control over the TV so I can watch what interests me, and not have to worry about it being interesting to other people. 

-I want to be able to practice yoga in my living room without someone watching me and laughing at how ridiculous some of the poses are.

-Basically, I just want a place I can call my own, so I can be myself. 

***The projected completion date of our house is July 31st, and then we will probably be able to move in a week after that. So I have a little over a month of day-dreaming before this dream becomes a reality. Time can't move any faster!!!  

This is what our house looked like a week ago when I met up with the building supervisor to go over the building plans and layout that we wanted. Since then, we were told that they put in all the insulation and will be doing the dry wall next!

  

I'm also dreaming about our baby.

-I can't wait to hold him, cuddle with him, and breathe in that sweet scent of a newborn. 

-I am excited to put our awesome new stroller to good use and go on lots of walks/runs with him! 

-I am soooooo excited for the holidays so we can experience those with him for the first time!

-In my dreams our baby has hair, and lots of it! So of course I will be styling his hair and dressing him in all sorts of adorable little man outfits all day long!

The only damper I've been feeling about this dream is that I will be a full time working mom.... That was never a part of the dream, and it bothers me a lot. Why did the economy have to crash? Why can't it be like the 1950's when Dads went to work and Moms stayed home with the kids and got together with the neighborhood ladies every Wednesday afternoon for the weekly card game? I envy our Grandparents and the simple lives they led. 

But then again, would I be willing to give up all of our vacations? Or how about all of our fun date nights, Sonic runs for their amazing Vanilla-CokeZero's, dinners out, pedicures, and shopping sprees (once I can actually fit into normal clothes again)? Or what about the house we are currently building? When I think about it that way, I remember why I work. Basically it's because I want it all and that kind of lifestyle takes $$$.  

 So basically I just need to be more patient. Come mid-July, our angel will be here and about two weeks after that our house will be finished. Then we can move in, set up the nursery, and I will finally have my kitchen back along with all the privacy, yoga, and stroller walks/runs I could ever ask for!

Not a bad dream :).

 

  

 

Baby News ~ 37 Weeks (THE FINAL MONTH!!!!)

It's the last leg of the race and the end is in sight!

Remember how I mentioned that I am scared to death of labor/delivery? Well, I'm at the point now where even that doesn't sound too bad if it means I can get this pregnancy over with! It is an extremely uncomfortable feeling being 3X your normal size. I can't eat very much because there is no room for the food to go anywhere so I end up waking up in the middle of the night to throw up. The heat has been a KILLER and that too makes me nauseous, swollen, and lightheaded. It hurts to walk, it hurts to sit....and when I try to lie down I can't breathe! So yes, I am at that point where I will go through the pain if I can just feel normal again!!

At 37 Weeks I Am:

Craving- fruits and chocolate. The fridge is packed with strawberries, apples, grapes, nectarines, peaches, lemons, grapefruit, and plums at the moment and every Friday I go back to the farmer's market for more! I'm trying to eat more of the healthy stuff than the chocolate but I won't lie and say that I am trying very hard ;).

Feeling- Exhausted, hot (in the non-sexy sense of the word), and excited to meet our baby boy very soon! We can't wait to hold him and love him, and hopefully he will be a good baby and feel the same way about us. With how hard working has become, I'm really hoping the baby comes early. I have been getting really swollen in my hands, legs, and feet. The other day when I took off the compression socks I wear while I work, my knees were literally the size of grapefruits! I have also been having trouble with low blood pressure. My normal blood pressure and heart rate are always low, but now that I am pregnant it has gotten to the extremely low category which puts the baby at risk for not getting enough oxygen. I know, normally pregnant women have the opposite problem. So the bright side of this situation is that my doctor wrote a note to my boss saying I'm not allowed to work overtime, on call, or graveyard shifts until the baby comes! Yay!!!

Loving: Not a whole lot right now (sorry this is such a negative post). However, I HAVE loved getting the final baby shopping done! I took inventory of everything we got at the baby showers and everything we are missing, and then went on a shopping spree with all the gift cards/cash we were given. Josh has been wanting a Colin Kaepernick jersey for the baby to wear so that the two of them can cheer on the 49'ERS together this year all decked out in their gear. So of course I decided to take it a step further and for Father's Day bought Josh all sorts of 49'ERS stuff (including the baby jersey and a shirt of his own) to decorate the baby's bedroom with! We had decided on making the nursery into a little baby man-cave with all of our favorite teams and their souvenirs. This means we need to make a trip to the University of Utah bookstore this summer because of course he is going to be a huge UTAH fan! Josh was soooooo excited (which made my day) and he can't wait for our house to be finished so we can decorate! Basically this kid is going to like sports whether he wants to or not hahaha.

   

PS. I just had my weekly OB checkup and the doctor said the baby is still pretty high, so it doesn't look like he will be coming any time soon, but better luck next time :(. I am going to die if I am like my Mom and end up going 2 weeks overdue without even dilating!!

Baby News - 35 Weeks

I am now 35 weeks along and am definitely feeling ready to be done with this pregnancy business. The baby weighs approximately 5 1/4 pounds and is over 18 inches long! I am feeling the extra weight and it doesn't feel like it is possible for him to get any bigger or I might explode! But besides the aches and pains, we are really really excited!!! Just 5 more weeks until we get to meet our little man! I have been craving tuna fish again.... not sure what's up with that. Maybe I'm not eating enough protein? The new craving though has been chocolate. I always want chocolate and sadly for my waist line, I have been eating a lot of it. Work has become very difficult now that I am getting bigger and it is putting a huge strain on my back and poor swollen legs.

This was the baby bump at 32 weeks on our Anniversary Getaway.

It's hard to see the bump since I am wearing black, but this is the best most recent picture I have (34 weeks at my baby shower with my best friend Jura).

We have been working hard and saving up money for our house and new baby that should both be coming around the exact same time this summer! It will be so nice to have our own place again and we can't wait to finally have the ability to set up the baby's bedroom!

The baby moves around like crazy now-a-days and I have loved it....except when he decides to reach up into my ribs and start hitting things.... I think I liked it better when he was lower because the expansion of my ribcage has not been a fun feeling.

Sometimes the baby moves around so much at night that it has even woke Josh up! Josh has been such a sweet heart through everything and I love him so much. At night he curls up to me and puts his face by my belly and that's how we've been falling asleep. I love my boys so much already and I haven't even officially met one of them! 

Isn't Life Grand!

Recently in the life of Josh and Ashly: 

The Latest On Our House

This is what our new house is looking like so far! We will meet with the Building Supervisor to go over details of what's next with the process on Monday. We were so excited to get to walk through it and daydream about our lives once it is finished. It is being built in West Henderson in a master planned community called INSPIRADA. We fell in love with the community the minute we saw it. There are parks, a community center, and pools everywhere (or there will be once all the building is finished) and right across from our house will be the water park where our kids can play! We weren't sure why we were supposed to move to Nevada in the beginning but things have been going pretty great since we got here so we must be doing something right!

WE CELEBRATED OUR 3RD ANNIVERSARY!!!

 Time flies when you're having fun, right? I actually had to work on our anniversary so we celebrated early by staying at the Aliante Hotel/Casino. Our weekend consisted of lounging by the pool, eating at different restaurants, attending the "Best Dam BBQ cook off" in Boulder City, talking and laughing, and catching up on long lost sleep in our nice hotel room that came with dark-out curtains. It was pure bliss!!

I can't even tell you how nice it was to lounge around all day reading and eating kettle-corn we had bought from the BBQ cook-off!

Our Anniversary Oasis

I can't believe this crazy guy has been all mine for 3 years now! Words can't describe how much I love him!

Happy 3 year Anniversary!! I think I could handle 3 more.... ;)

Jewel Concert With My Mom

I have wanted to see Jewel in concert since I was 12 years old and a couple of weeks ago, my dream came true! My Mom and I got to see her at the Smith Center and she was just as amazing and beautiful as I had imagined! She sang all of my favorite songs and even took requests from the crowd. Needless to say, I was in heaven. The opening artists were pretty great/hilarious too! Thanks Mom for the fun night out!

Nevada Baby Shower 

 

Let's just say, this kid is going to be one spoiled little boy! My Mom and her friend threw me a beautiful baby shower and so many people I have loved throughout my life came! It was a blast, and thank you to everyone who came! I felt so so loved! This is basically a photo dump because the pictures explain it all.

Old high school friends! I loved getting to catch up on everyone's lives and little babies!

Opening up all my gifts!

As you can see, there were a lot of them!

The food was delicious! You can't go wrong with fruit and a chocolate fountain!

I"m so sad we didn't take before-pics of the tables before everyone got into the food because they were set up really cute!

Concerts in Laughlin

We also took a little trip to Laughlin about a month ago and saw Joan Jett and the Steve Miller Band with my parents. This trip was more for Josh and Nathan than it was for my Mom and I, but we had a lot of fun none-the-less. We stayed in a hotel by the Colorado River and had fun eating, enjoying the pool, and playing on the penny slots a little bit ;). It was a very nice weekend getaway and Laughlin is actually a pretty cool little town (contrary to my previous belief)!  

The Steve Miller Band

Josh and I by the Colorado River

We got to take a water taxi across the Colorado River because two stubborn personages (who will remain nameless) wouldn't ask for directions and our feet were killing us from walking around so much! That boat ride was actually one of my favorite parts of the whole trip so I ended up not being quite so annoyed :).

***Just a side note for any 70's music lovers: Smoke tends to settle, so unless you enjoy getting high off of 2nd hand marijuana smoke, buy the bleacher seats as high up as you can get them! It saves you money AND is a little less disgusting! Plus you won't have crazy pot-heads dancing up on you all night. My parents learned that lesson the hard way. Josh and I just happen to be cheapsters so our experience wasn't quite as bad/hilarious depending on how you look at it hahaha ;).