Something White

In the midst of my late-pregnancy blues from this morning, I decided to kill some time and finally finish a project that I began back in October.

The project began with this...

...my beautiful Alfred Angelo wedding gown that I wore on May 22, 2011 when I married my best friend.  I bought it in 2010, when I made a trip down to Tucson to check out a sale at the designer's store with my brother and sister-in-law.  It was the first dress that I put on, and we all loved it.  

Doesn't Nathan look thrilled??

And, just for one more look, here is a picture that I *love* of Pete looking my dress over for the first time.

I decided long ago that I did not want my dress to sit in a closet for 50 years, and that instead, I would make it into a Blessing Quilt for my future daughter to be wrapped in when she receives her Newborn Priesthood Blessing in church.  I wanted to create something that could be handed down from generation to generation, that my future grandchildren and great-grandchildren could also be blessed in.  So once we found out that we were having a baby girl, it was time to whip out the gown and...*gasp*...cut it up.

I will admit that it sat in my dining room for about
two weeks before I mustered up the guts to cut it apart.

***

Three months later, the quilt is finally finished.

This is what it looks like now...

When it is in storage it will be tied in the corset ribbon from the back of the dress.

It is not perfect, as I am not an expert quilter or seamstress...but I think it turned out pretty well. It is very obvious that it is handmade and full of mistakes...but isn't that how heirlooms are supposed to be?  I hope it is something that my future children, grandchildren, and more can look at and maybe feel a little bit of the love that Pete and I felt on our wedding day.  I know that sounds ridiculously cheesy...but its true (and I'm full of pregnancy hormones, so I'm allowed to be a little cheesy - don't hate me).

Now we just need to take a trip to the dry cleaners and it will be all ready for Baby K.  Maybe now she will feel it's time to make her arrival? (In case you couldn't tell, I'm a bit desperate.)  Everything is done now, Baby Bean!  It's time to get out!

And in the meantime, here's one more look at what used to be my dress, because, really, I will use any excuse to post wedding pictures. <3

38 Weeks: Hitting the Wall

I woke up this morning in tears.  I have now had so many dreams where I'm holding my baby girl that I actually woke up and cried when I realized she was not in my arms (but still punching my bladder).  It doesn't even matter that the dream I awoke from this morning was completely ridiculous (I gave birth at a water park, Pete was nowhere to be found, I got in a fight with my brother because he wanted to watch the dolphin show before coming to meet his niece, and I decided to learn how to surf when the baby was one day old...WOW).  All that mattered was that I woke up feeling so intensely fed up, impatient and upset that all I could do was cry.

Like most pregnant women, I hit the point of being done with this pregnancy physically quite a few weeks ago.  But today I think I finally hit the point of being emotionally done with it.  I have felt depressed all morning.  After spending weeks cleaning, organizing  shopping, getting ready, making lists and crossing things off them, and taking care of my sick six-year-old, today I just feel incredibly bored.  Everything is crossed off of my lists, everything is packed, the nursery is ready, Ryan is pretty much well, we have enough leftovers in the frig for dinner for the next four days, and the house is clean (except for dishes, which I hate, so they will probably sit for a while since Pete is too sick to wash them).  I feel like I have nothing to do...yet at the same time, I have absolutely no energy to do anything that I should do, like taking a shower or getting out of my pajamas.  I haven't seen any of my friends in weeks thanks to everyone's kids being endlessly ill with the plagues of winter, and with Pete being sick now too, I haven't had much quality time with him either.  So I feel alone.  I'm tired, because I toss and turn for hours trying to get comfortable enough to sleep, and when I do sleep, I dream about being in labor or meeting our baby and then I wake up thinking it's finally time...but it never is...and then I get nauseous and have to take medicine so I don't throw up, and then I start the whole process of trying to fall asleep all over again.  Ever since getting out of bed this morning, I just feel sad, even though I have no real reason to be sad.  And that's exhausting.  All I want to do is hold her. And kiss her tiny nose. And smell that awesome baby smell. And hold her.  I feel like it is just never going to happen, even though I know the truth is that it will happen very soon.  How does that make any sense?!?

I hit this wall when I was pregnant with Ryan too...but not until after I passed my due date (and unfortunately  because I was already battling depression during that pregnancy, it got pretty bad by the time I was finally induced at 42 weeks). This time around, I'm hitting the wall two weeks before my due date...and I'm not quite sure how I feel about that.  All I can do is hope and pray that it won't last much longer, and try to find some way to deal with it in the meantime.  New projects?  More cleaning?  More naps?  A massage and pedicure (*hint hint to my husband*)?

I know I won't be pregnant forever. In fact I probably won't be pregnant for longer than two more weeks.  But somehow that feels like such a long time right now.  But this little girl and I have made it through 38 weeks, and most of it was pretty rough, so I guess we can hold out for a couple more.

P.S. I need Chipotle. And I will never agree to be pregnant again until I live close enough to one. The end.

Happiness in foil, oh how I miss you.

37 Weeks: Nesting, the Flu and My Cervix

You know that rare moment when you're in the middle of a vaginal exam and you're so happy you almost cry?
Okay maybe not.  But it happened to me yesterday!

I was very apprehensive about asking for any cervical checks with this pregnancy, as I am well aware that they are really not any indication of when labor will begin, and I remember how I would literally cry each time I was checked when I was pregnant with Ryan and the doctors would continue to say "not dilated at all," "no progress,"  "it's time to talk about induction"...etc.  This time around, however, I have actually had many BH contractions and some other signs of dilation, so I figured I might as well bite the bullet and get checked at least once.  Once the exam began, and I felt the pain, I began to regret that decision - until my midwife exclaimed, "four and a half!...and 90 percent effaced!"  Then I seriously almost cried - out of happiness. Yes, I know it is very possible to remain dilated that far for a while and that labor may still be a few weeks away.  But for a woman who's previous pregnancy made it all the way to 42 weeks without even one centimeter of dilation, it does make a world of difference to know that I am already 50% of the way there three weeks before my due date.   It makes me feel like my body is actually doing something right this time.  It makes me feel like I can actually do this on my own, without being induced.  It makes me feel pretty confident that I will not have to suffer past my due date like I did six years ago.  And that is music to my ears.  I feel like I should congratulate my cervix for actually helping me out this time...but if I did I'm sure I would get some strange looks...so I won't.

My midwife said that at this point I could go into labor at any time, and that walking or sex could likely get me there pretty quickly, so of course Pete and I are very ready to spend some time making laps at the mall and getting busy at night...except for the wonderful fact that our little Ryan came down with the flu on Sunday night. I spent last week trying to keep him from getting whooping cough (which is now officially an epidemic at our county schools), then I spent the weekend thinking he was coming down with pink eye (luckily it went away), so I was a little thrown off when the flu hit at 12:30 in the morning.  As of this morning he is still running a fever, has no appetite, and it's like fighting a war to get fluids down him.  So unfortunately the home labor-induction plans are being put on hold until we get the little guy over the plague.  Hopefully the baby will wait just a little while longer, as it would make me feel awful to have to send him to someone else's house when he is sick and just wants his mommy.  It has already been hard enough because I wish I could just hold him and snuggle with him like he wants me to, but neither Pete nor I can take any chances with getting the flu ourselves considering the baby could come at any time, so we have had to keep our distance as much as possible.

In the meantime, I have been nesting like a mad-woman, and now with the flu in the house, it has gotten even worse.  I cannot even count the number of times I disinfected the counters, facets, stair rails, remotes, phones or door handles yesterday.  In the past week I have scrubbed the kitchen floor with bleach, scrubbed and disinfected walls and doors, wiped floor boards, reorganized cabinets and closets, rearranged furniture, redecorated the kitchen, washed all of Ryan's bedding twice (that was before the flu...so a third wash will be coming up), reorganized and cleaned the pantry, cooked three freezer meals for post-baby, reorganized Ryan's toy bins, and scheduled a carpet cleaning for the living room, dining room and staircase.  Additionally, my awesome husband has indulged my madness by helping scrub floors and kitchen cabinet doors, cleaning the freezer, frig and microwave (the oven is on his list for today), and he even spent three hours last week repainting random areas throughout the house that needed to be touched up. Yeah, he rocks.  The carpet cleaning guys are coming today, so hopefully after that gets done and Pete finishes the oven, I might actually feel like the house is clean enough for little Bean to make her arrival...let's just hope she comes soon enough that it doesn't all get dirty again and I have to start all over.  Ugh.

I will wrap up with a 37-Week photo...even though I look awful and exhausted and am wearing pajamas (I'm telling myself that all moms look this way at 37 weeks pregnant while taking care of a sick child...they do, right??).  It might be the last picture I get in before labor, so I figured it was worth the yuckiness.  I just hope the next photo I post on here is of my sweet baby girl and her *healthy* big brother. :)

Looking back and forward at the same time

One year ago, Pete and Ryan and I were living in a tiny apartment that we hated in the ghetto of Mesa.  I was unable to work due to full-time, unpaid student teaching, so we were living off of Pete's salary and my financial aid, which together amounted to less than $30k a year.  Pete's car was broken down with repairs needed beyond what the car was even worth.  We had absolutely no social life, Ryan had no friends to play with outside of his grandparents, his babysitter and her children.  He had no real place to ride his bike or play outside unless we drove to a park on the weekends, and as a five year old boy, he was getting cabin fever.  Pete and I desperately wanted to have a baby, but knew that given our financial situation we would not be able to do so for a very long time.  I was beginning my final semester at ASU, after four and a half years of full time (plus summer school) work, and I was completely exhausted.  I was so stressed out that migraines, nose-bleeds and panic attacks were routine aspects of everyday life.  Pete hated his job and despite how amazing he was at it, his employers completely ignored him and his efforts.  He was passed over for every promotion,  pay-raise and opportunity that he applied for.  He spent months (well, years, really) searching and applying for other jobs, but never got farther than the interviews.  Between the two of us, we had gained about 50 lbs in the six months since our wedding, we felt like crap, and we fought...a lot.

When the ball dropped at midnight one year ago and it was officially 2012, I cried.  I was overwhelmed with emotion when I realized that this would be the year when things could finally change.  I would be graduating, which meant we could finally move out of Phoenix, I could finally get a job and make real money, and we could finally try to move forward.  We were desperate for change.

So Pete and I sat down and made a list of goals for the new year.  We didn't like the idea of resolutions, we just wanted realistic goals to work toward, because we needed some kind of visual way to hope that things really could get better.  I had found a quote on Pinterest that really spoke to me, it said "If you don't like where you are, change it. You are not a tree."  We put that quote on the very top of the page, and we hung the list on our bathroom mirror where we would see it every day.

Of the 23 bullet points, the most significant goals on the list were:

* Graduate!
* Pete pay increase with better benefits
* Apply for jobs in CO, UT, IL and AZ
* 3 bedroom/2 bath house with a yard
* Pay off Gina's debt
* Make a baby!

I would love to claim that we achieved all of those goals out of sheer determination on our part.  But the truth is that it all just happened.  It happened through challenges, roadblocks, struggles, triumphs and prayer.  And a lot of it was really hard to get through.  But in the end, when we look back on the past year, it is crystal clear that every challenge had a purpose, and every step of it was worth it.

Looking back...

Pete's car was a piece of crap.  But, if it had not broken down, we would not have been able to buy his first Harley, which ended up being our only way to afford the move to Utah (we had to sell the bike for moving money).

The engine block in my car cracked on March 1st, leaving us with no car at all.  But, if my car had not broken down on March 1st, I would have been driving it two weeks later instead of Nathan's car, and I probably would not have survived.

Pete was strung along for months, being promised a job with a huge raise by a different division within his company, before learning that the guy who promised it to him was eventually laid off.  If he had gotten the job, he would have had to travel around the country 60% of the time and Ryan and I would have had to stay in AZ, alone and miserable.

I came very close to being killed in the car crash on March 13th.  My brother's car was destroyed.  I broke several bones, sustained several other injuries as well as head trauma and emotional trauma, I racked up 50 grand in medical bills, and missed so much of my student teaching that I almost failed to graduate. I suffered physically and emotionally for many weeks. But, if the accident had not have happened, I would not be getting an incredible amount of money from the insurance settlement that has already bought us a brand new car and will soon be paying off all of my debt.  And if the accident had not completely shaken up my view of miracles and life and death, I would not have started going back to church, which would have prevented all the wonderful and much-needed spiritual growth that Pete, Ryan and myself have experienced this year.

The injuries from the accident prevented me from taking my AZ teaching certifications exams in March and getting my teaching license in enough time to apply for 2012-13 teaching jobs.  But, if I had taken the exams and gotten certified in the spring, I would have applied for the job that I desperately wanted at the school I was student teaching at, and the chances are high that I would have gotten it.  But, if I had, Pete and I would have had to stay in AZ despite how much we hated it, we would have put off the baby plan for at least another year or two, and Pete would have been stuck with the job he hated.

Ryan's sitter had to stop watching him in March because she was about to have a baby, and we were faced with the incredible stress of finding full time childcare we could actually afford.  But, if he had not been at his very first day at his new preschool on March 13th, I would not have been on the highway at the spot where I was hit in the accident on my way to pick him up.  And, as already established, if the accident had not have happened, many other great things would not have happened either.

Pete could not find a better job in AZ.  But, if he had, it would not have been such an easy decision for us to pick up and move (on almost instant notice) to a new state and a city we had never even seen in person.

And after making that decision to move to Utah...
I got pregnant the very first night we were here.
Pete has more than doubled his salary, gotten two promotions in seven months, and loves where he works.
We have medical benefits for the first time in our relationship, and they are pretty darn good.
We live in a 3 bedroom/2 bath townhouse with a yard and a playground behind our back fence in an awesome neighborhood full of kids for Ryan to play with.
I crossed off one of my life-long dreams from my to-do list by seeing Garth Brooks live in Vegas.
I have been able to take an entire year off (amazing!) and stay home with my son for the first time since he was an infant.
The migraines, nose-bleeds and panic attacks have stopped and my stress level is lower than it has been since I was about 15.
I have made close female friends for the first time since high school.
We are the owners of a car that currently has less than 400 miles on it.
Pete has been able to bring one of his defaulted student loans into good standing and we are working on getting several others consolidated and current.
I will be taking my Utah teaching exams in a couple months and will finally be certified to start my career.
I have survived this pregnancy and we will be welcoming our daughter in less than five weeks.


There were 23 bullet points on our list of goals that we made a year ago. As of yesterday, 12 of the goals have been reached, and a 13th will be reached by the end of this month.  I'm guessing that a 56% success rate would not be called "great" by most people.  But for us, that 56% has completely changed our life.

The fact of the matter is that 2012 was pretty damn good for us, even when it was awful. And the lesson we have learned from that fact is one of the most valuable lessons I have ever been taught.

And now it is a new year yet again.  Will 2013 bring just as many challenges, blessings and lessons?  Do I have any idea where we could be a year from now?

Everything is still rapidly changing.  I will be the mother of two very soon.  The relationship I have with Ryan will change.  The relationship I have with Pete will change.  I will have a whole new person to love undeniably.  Pete and I will have to battle losing weight again.  My year-long vacation will be ending.  I will finally be starting my teaching career, which is both stressful and exciting.  I will have to get over my fear of driving.  Soon I will not be pregnant, I will be able to eat and drink normally again, and I won't have to take 14 pills a day anymore.  Maybe my brother and sister-in-law will finally be able to have a baby.  Maybe Pete will get a better promotion.  Maybe we will move into a bigger house.  Maybe a Chipotle will be opened in Provo.  Baby Bean might be an incredibly challenging infant and we might not get sleep or silence for the rest of the year.  Financial struggles will probably hit, because they always do, and things will probably get hard.  But no matter what, I have faith.  I have faith that it will all work out in the end.  It will all lead us wherever it is that we need to be. It might be an incredible year, it might not be.  But we will move forward regardless. And I'm looking forward to it.

Goodbye, 2012. Thanks for everything.

34 Weeks Down

Christmas has passed and December is almost finished.  And I am now 34 weeks pregnant with less than six weeks to go until I get to meet my daughter.

I haven't written much this month due to stress, sickness and being busier than usual.  The first week of the month was unusually difficult, as I wrote about in this post.  The rest of the month was full of wonderful ups and downs and very little down time (unless we count hours spent on the couch fighting back vomit).

In the past few weeks...

- we celebrated Pete's birthday and Ryan's birthday and Ryan was a guest at two other birthday parties

- we drove to SLC twice, once for the Christmas Devotional and once for the Forgotten Carols

- I made it through two more prenatal appointments and was diagnosed with SPD

- HG has found a way to rear its ugly head again, I have thrown up more frequently than I did even in the first trimester, my weight gain slowed down, and my Zofran/Diclectin dosage has increased.

- we finally reached a settlement with the insurance company for the car accident and signed all the paperwork that will bless us with an amazing amount of money next month

- I spent hours and hours researching and shopping vehicles and we spent several hours at car dealerships

- we debated buying a used version of my "dream car" versus buying something else brand new, and once we finally decided it was the wisest financial investment to get the new car, we discovered that we would not be able to spend any of the settlement money until the very end of January (banks suck), and seeing as how the baby could very well be born by then or due any day at that time, we set out to figure out a way to buy the car before then.  

- after several more hours at the dealership, we finally financed and walked away with a brand new Hyundai Santa Fe and have been in love with it ever since.  I am still kind of in shock and disbelief about it and stressing about when the settlement money will actually be here so we can pay it off, mostly because I just don't really know how to accept such an awesome blessing without worrying something will go wrong.

- I spent many hours at my sewing machine, sewing three pillows and one quilt for Baby K's nursery, a Star Wars/Avengers quilt for Brittany's Christmas gift, and two pot holders for Ryan's new play kitchen

- Pete and I put the finishing touches on Bean's room, washed and organized all of her clothes, and marveled at all the work we have put in over the past four months to create our perfect nursery.

- despite fighting fatigue and vomiting, I have spent a ton of time in the kitchen baking Pete's birthday brownies, Ryan's birthday cake, shortbread cookies for friends, brownies for Nathan's graduation, chocolate chip cookies for my pregnancy cravings, and sugar cookies for Santa

- we made it through Christmas shopping, wrapping and shipping

- Pete and I had a great little Christmas with Ryan and Nathan and Angela and ate lots of yummy food

- I got to eat tacos at Chipotle :)

So this month has been pretty full, and I am very ready to slow down.  I am trying to finish all of my pre-baby projects so that I can relax for a little while before little K gets here, but I don't know if that is actually going to happen.  I have been carrying her extremely low for a long time, so many others are convinced that I will go into labor before my due date, and I am trying to be as prepared as I can for that possibility.  Unfortunately, however, with the constant bouts of nausea and vomiting that have come back over the past four weeks and the coma-like intensity of fatigue that has set in over the past few days, getting things crossed off my to-do list is getting harder and harder.

I will be slowing down this weekend, though, and I cannot wait.  Pete and I made plans for our "final adult getaway before baby" last month and luckily had already paid for it before the financial crisis hit us at the beginning of this month.  Thanks to it being non-refundable, we get to spend two nights - including New Years Eve - alone at a fancy bed-and-breakfast in SLC.  It will be the first NYE that we have ever spent alone without Ryan, and the idea of going out to a fancy dinner and celebrating as adults is pretty exciting.  I am hoping and praying that all my pregnancy issues will just take a little break for a few days so that we can really enjoy our time together and celebrate the changes that are about to come in our marriage and family.

It will most likely be 2013 when I write again. I don't know how 2013 could really ever top this year, as it has been one of the greatest years of my life, but I'm sure the birth of our little girl will find a way to make the new year even better.  I cannot wait to experience all that the next year has to offer. I am blown away by just the thought of the possibilities.

Cake or Death?

"Um, cake please."
(If you are not familiar with Eddie Izzard that quote will make no sense to you, and that is unfortunate.)

So I have this compulsive need to make huge birthday cakes for my son.  It began with his second birthday, mostly out of guilt, because his first birthday was such a disaster in my memory.  His first birthday was right in the middle of my divorce, when I was complete wreck, and I did not feel like I had time to make a good enough cake, so I made a deal with my ex husband that I would buy cute decorations if he would buy him a cute cake. For whatever reason, he didn't end up getting the cake, and his Aunt Wendy ended up making one last minute, and I felt incredibly guilty for not just making him one myself.  Ryan was also pretty sick on his birthday, and with that plus the palpable tension in the room, it wasn't exactly what I imagined for my baby's very first birthday. So when his second birthday rolled around a year later, I spent several hours making him a "Cars" themed cake and pulled off a very happy, fun birthday party for him.

 When his third birthday came, he asked for a Handy Manny cake.  By this point I had gotten over the guilt and decided I just wanted the over-the-top cakes to become a tradition that he could look back on fondly as an adult someday.  So Pete and I stayed up all night and into the wee hours of the morning trying to make a Handy Manny Toolbox cake.  We encountered several problems along the way, but making the tools out of sugar cookie dough was pretty fun.  In the end the cookies ended up being way too heavy for the cake, so the whole thing turned out pretty wonky and lopsided, but at least the tools were cute.

 For Birthday #4, the theme was Toy Story, and I found some awesome pictures online that inspired me to try to make fondant for the first time.  It was incredibly time-consuming to make the fondant and learn how to work with it, and I'm pretty sure we ran out of frosting or marshmallows at some point requiring a late night trip to Wal Mart, so of course it took all night yet again.  Then when we realized we didn't have enough fondant to cover the bottom tier, Pete had to run to the store again to find something to put around the bottom. Chocolate covered wafers to the rescue!   In the end, this cake was my absolute favorite and still is to this day.  It turned out almost exactly as I imagined, and Ryan LOVED it. We only got a couple of hours of sleep that night, but it was worth it.

Ryan's 5th birthday was a special one.  He had started asking to go to Disneyland sometime when he was 4, and as we knew we couldn't afford it nor did we have time while I was in school, Pete and I decided we would try to make a trip to California for my graduation "present" in 2012.  So for many months we kept pacifying Ryan by telling him he couldn't go to Disneyland until he was 5.  As more time went on we realized that making the trip after my graduation was a bad idea (we knew we were going to be moving out of state), so we found a way to plan the Disneyland trip for December 2011.  The trip became Ryan's birthday present once we found a way to plan it so that we would actually get on the plane to CA right after his birthday party.  We kept it a secret, so I "suggested" to Ryan that he have a Mickey Mouse Clubhouse themed birthday party.  Luckily he went for it, and we went all-out to have a Mickey themed party that would tie in perfectly to his big gift.  I found ideas online for Mickey Mouse Clubhouse shaped cakes, and decided to try it.  It turned out much more difficult than we imagined.  We had to deal with fondant problems, structural issues and food-coloring nightmares, plus we had to make a ton of cake and rice crispie treats for Mickey's head, neck and foot.  So once again, we stayed up all night (I think we got about three hours of sleep), we destroyed our kitchen and cursed about how we would never do fondant again, and this was the result.

I really was serious about giving up on fondant, and I also wanted to give up on the tiered cakes for a while.  And for this year, birthday #6, I had to factor in the reality of being eight months pregnant when planning his birthday.  We decided to spring for a party at Chuck-E-Cheese so that I wouldn't have to stress about planning or set-up and clean-up, but I still had the cake to deal with.  Yes, I did consider just buying one, but that would be breaking tradition, and I couldn't sit well with the idea of him looking back and knowing the year I broke tradition was the year I was pregnant with his sister, especially considering he has had to sacrifice a LOT of time, activities and special things with me due to how sick I have been with this baby. I also couldn't live with myself knowing I copped out on the year Ryan chose Star Wars, since I love Star Wars so very much. So sick and tired or not, I was going to make a fabulous cake, but I tried to find a way to downscale the design a bit from what I might normally attempt.

I borrowed a cake mold from a friend in the shape of Darth Vader's head, so I decided I would just make a big square cake to put the head on and only cover the square in fondant (because it would look so much better than frosting.)  How hard could covering one square really be?  Plus we decided to use food coloring spray-paint instead of coloring the fondant itself, in a effort to make it as simple as possible.  Pete took on the responsibility of making the fondant one day ahead and baking all the cakes early on Friday so that all I would really have to worry about was icing Vader's head and decorating the two "climate corners" of Degobah and Tatooine.  But of course it did not turn out as simple as we had planned.  The cake baking took much longer than expected because one of the cakes did not pop out of the pan and needed to be remade, and we ran out of frosting when assembling the big square.  By the time Pete had to leave for work at 7:30 pm on Friday night, we had finally taken six cakes and made them into one fondant covered base.

All I had to do was spray paint it black, put little white fondant balls all over it to look like stars in space, and then I could move on to decorating and maybe get to bed before midnight.  That plan all went out the window when the stupid spray paint food coloring turned out purple instead of black.  I used two cans, hoping it would get darker if I put more on, but it ended up looking awful. I had a can of black spinkles, so I thought maybe it would look more black if I covered the cake with them. Worst idea ever.  It looked even worse after the sprinkles, and they would only stick to the top and not the sides.  After trying not to cry, I decided to try and take the fondant off the cake and just frost it.  But the cake started falling apart when I took off the first corner, so I put it back and was left with an ugly purple cake and a cracked, ruined corner.

After an hour of brainstorming with Pete online, the only solution we could come up with was to cover the whole thing in black frosting.  But I did not have enough food coloring or powdered sugar to do that plus Vader's head.  And I had no car.  So I called my friend Cherie and she offered to take me to the store with her.  Poor Ryan had to go with us even though it was past his bedtime and he was super tired, but he was a trooper and  we made it back home by 11:30 pm. Cherie scraped all the sprinkles off (which fell to the floor and stained the bottom of our feet) while I ate a burrito, then we made a giant batch of frosting and tinted it black.  She went home and I finally started covering the cake at 12:30 am.  I finished a little after 5:00 am and Pete came home at 5:30 to find his kitchen destroyed, his pregnant wife scrubbing the bottom of her feet, and the finished product (minus the stars because they would not stick to the icing):

People ask me every year why I don't do this for other people and make money for it.  I think this post sums up the reason why I always answer "I would have to charge $500 to make it worth it."  I do this ridiculous up-all-night song and dance once a year for only two reasons:  1) it is incredibly time consuming, frustrating, and messy; and 2) my little Bug's smile when he sees his cake always makes it worth it.  So no, I don't do it as a business, and no, I am not ready to have to do it twice a year after Baby K gets here.  But there is a part of me that still does it for Ryan every year and loves to do it, because I know he will someday cherish the memories of his cakes and the effort put into them.  And that makes my heart smile.  

This face is what it's all about. <3

Beware The Ides of December

Merriam-Webster defines ides as "this day and the seven days preceding it."

Thursday.  I was finally getting over the head cold that plagued me all the way through Thanksgiving and my 27th birthday. I was excited for December...which is saying a lot. I had actually already decorated for Christmas, and even decided that we need more decorations (this is unheard of for me, as I am usually not the biggest fan of the Christmas season).  I had a well-organized, balanced budget set out for the rest of the year and a plan to have all of the remaining stuff on our baby list purchased and the nursery finished within a week or two.

Friday.  Pete and Ryan and I were shopping at Coscto (which really means we were there for the pregnant woman to eat all the free samples for lunch and actually only buy one thing), when we checked our bank account online and discovered Pete's paycheck was waaaay less than it was supposed to be. He couldn't access his paystubs without being logged in from his computer at work, so we could only speculate the reasons until he went to work at 8 pm that night.  By 8:30 I was sobbing after we figured out what the cause was, and that it would essentially cause a long-term deficit in our monthly income.  I cried on and off for a couple hours, talked to Nathan about what to do, listened to a good friend while she assured me everything would be fine, puked a few times, and held tight to Pete on his lunch break as we tried to convince each other that it would all get worked out on Monday morning when he would try his best to fix the situation. Before I went to bed I prayed. For a very long time.

Saturday.  We tried to ignore everything as best we could since we couldn't do anything about it until Monday.  We returned a duplicate baby gift to Babies R Us and used the store credit to buy some more things on the baby list. Babies need a lot of crap. And it's expensive. But it does help ease the pain when everything's all pink and soft and cuddly.  I spent some time sitting in my rocking chair in little K's almost-finished room, just taking in the silence, and tried to clear my head.  And I prayed some more.

Sunday.  We went to church, came home, and then headed up to Salt Lake for the First Presidency Christmas Devotional. My pregnant hobbit body walked three blocks in heels and then trekked up and down hundreds of stairs in the Conference Center and was in a tremendous amount of pain before the devotional even started, but it was a great night regardless.  It was overwhelming to be in the same room as President Monson, and a great experience to share with my husband and brother and sister-in-law.  We risked our lives driving home in an awful storm, but we made it back and enjoyed some nice alone time in front of the Christmas tree playing games with Baby Bean's kicks and laughing at her crazy uterine antics.

Monday.  Pete did what he could but was unable to fix the financial issue right away.  We were instead led to a solution that should take place within a couple months. In the meantime (30-60 days), we have to find a way to deal with the significant deficit.  We were blessed with help from my brother and some unexpected money on Pete's next paycheck, so after a couple hours of extreme budgeting and cutting corners wherever possible, I found a way to make things (kind of ) work until then.  We decided to stop worrying about it (as much as possible) by going out to eat to celebrate Pete's birthday using a gift card sent from his sister.  We ate delicious Italian food and tried to remember how much better life is now than it was seven months ago, even if it feels like things are falling apart.

Tuesday.  I woke up puking.  I spent the majority of the day trying desperately to not continue the puking.  I took a much needed nap while my sweet boy played Legos next to me.  I felt awful.  But we had dinner with a good friend and I actually had an appetite, then I came home and managed to clean the kitchen.  Progress is progress, right?

Yesterday.  My amazing husband's birthday!  I was too sick to get out of bed until noon, but I made it out and baked his birthday cake before he had to leave for work.  Ryan spent his day doing chores (as punishment for bad behavior the night before) so between the two of us we got quite a bit of cleaning done.  I was sick again by the end of the night, but I managed to eat several chocolate chip cookies before then, so it wasn't too bad.  I even did three loads of laundry.

Today.  I woke up early to go shopping for Ryan's birthday cake supplies, but was derailed by throwing up in not one, but both, of our bathroom sinks.  We eventually made it to the store while Ryan was at school and I fought back vomiting in the parking lot.  Seven cake mixes, three tubs of icing, four pounds of powdered sugar, two bags of marshmallows and 12 icing bags later, I made it back to the couch for a tiny rest before it was time to make fondant and send Pete off to work.  A sweet friend fed Ryan and I dinner since I felt too awful to do much on my own, and I was able to keep the food down. Hooray for small victories.  All day I have been fighting some kind of horrible pain in my groin/pubic bone, and by dinnertime I was almost in tears from the pain I felt while climbing up the stairs.  I'm guessing it is either a severe UTI or Symphysis Pubis Dysfunction...I'm waiting to see if it gets worse tomorrow before debating a trip to the hospital.  So in the meantime I sit here, trying to ignore the pain, the nausea, the heartburn and the laundry while I stare at the clock and countdown the remaining hours before my baby boy turns six years old.  I am emotional about him getting older, and about everything else, and it is hard not to cry.  The nursery is still not finished, the budget is scary, and I can only hope I make it through my Bug's birthday festivities without throwing up.  But the clock ticks on, and I need to sleep, so that is all for now.

Tomorrow is another day.