Lately...

It seems I haven't been doing a very good job of keeping you people in the loop of what's going on in my life lately.

Maybe it's because it's been a whole lot of BORING around here. I'm still on bed rest (for just a couple more weeks!) and I've been doing nothing except laying around, trying to stay cool, and stuffing my face.

Baby Stella is growing- and growing- and my belly is stretching out like crazy to accommodate her. I've now got at least 10 stretch marks to prove she's definitely had a growth spurt. However, I will embrace them. And then use them to make her feel guilty when she's older.

Here she is at 29 weeks along...

that was a couple of weeks ago, but I'm not doing my hair until at least Sunday so this picture will have to suffice.

We're now at 31 weeks and I'm going back to the doctor this afternoon. I'm hoping my doctor doesn't get on to me for all the cake I've been consuming the past week and a half.

Here's the deal: for about 5 weeks straight I was craving chocolate cake. And not just any chocolate cake. Texas sheet cake. We have a restaurant near our house that serves it as dessert, but every time we went in, they didn't have any. It had either just gone in the oven or they were already sold out. I was making Heath miserable with this craving. So, I called Nana. She's a super hero and saved the day (and our wallets) by giving me the yummy recipe for her chocolate sheet cake. I loved it so much....I ate 6 pieces in one afternoon. And then I made Heath take the rest to Bible study because really, no ONE person should eat an entire sheet cake by themselves.

So, without further ado, I would like to share this wonderful recipe with you!

Texas Sheet Cake

Ingredients for the cake:

2 cups sugar
2 cups flour
1/2 cup crisco
1/2 cup butter
4 tbsp cocoa
1 cup water
2 eggs
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp vanilla
1/4 salt
1/2 cup buttermilk (I always used the powdered stuff and mix it up fresh. It keeps forever in the fridge)

For the icing:

1/2 cup butter
4 tbsp cocoa
6 tbsp EVAPORATED milk (comes in a small can)
1 lb powdered sugar
1 cup chopped pecans (optional, but very tasty)

Procedure:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease a sheet cake pan.

Mix flour and sugar together in a bowl (or a stand mixer). In a saucepan, combine crisco, butter, cocoa, and water. Let it come just to a slight boil. Remove from the heat for a few seconds and then add to your dry ingredients. Then, add the buttermilk. This will help cool down the mixture. Add also eggs, baking soda, vanilla, and salt. Mix well. The batter will be thin. Pour into the sheet cake pan and bake at 350 degrees for 20-25 minutes (this took a little longer in my oven- possibly an altitude adjustment).

When you have just a few minutes left on the timer, it's time to make the icing. You can rinse out the same saucepan you used for the cake and use that. In a saucepan, add butter, cocoa, and evaporated milk. Once melted, slowly add in the powdered sugar. Use a whisk to get out the lumps that will form. Finally, add in your pecans (if desired). You can keep the icing on low heat until your cake comes out of the oven, but you really don't want it to boil much or else you'll have candy instead of icing.

When you remove the cake from the oven, I let it sit for maybe....2 minutes...and then pour the warm icing over the top of the warm cake. You'll probably need a spatula to spread the icing out to the edges. This is great because it gives you one more thing to lick once you're done :-). Let the cake cool for 1-2 hours before cutting into it. You want the icing to set up and harden a bit. If you cut it too soon, you'll have a huge mess. It'll still taste good, but it won't look very pretty.

Make sure if you're going to eat a good portion of it yourself before serving it to friends and family that you go ahead and cut up the rest of the pieces and arrange them on a plate. That way there's no evidence of how much you actually ate :-).

Things are looking a little brighter...plus a tutorial!

I went back to the doctor on Wednesday and she checked out baby and me and decided that there had been NO CHANGE from Monday to Wednesday so I was safe to be at home on bed rest. So, here I am, safe at home and baby is safe inside my irritable uterus. For now.

I have appointments scheduled with the perinatologist and with my OB once a week from now until the end of June. My next appointment is on Tuesday, and then again on Thursday. I am grateful that my doctor is so on top of things and I am hopeful that I will not have to be admitted to the hospital and that this is something that can be managed at home by taking it easy.

That being said, yesterday was a day of laying around doing homework and crafting- The craft did not take me long at all- about an hour start to finish. It was also very inexpensive to complete.

I have been lusting after these letters to use in the nursery for a while, but could not justify buying them.

anthropologie

At $14 a piece, I would only be able to buy our baby's first initial, when what I really wanted was her whole name. Plus, these are super heavy and I worry about them falling down. And the colors are a little off...

Anyway, I decided, with the encouragement of my super frugal husband, that I could replicate these fabric covered letters for a lot less $$.

I went to Hobby Lobby and rifled through our basement and found everything I needed to complete this project. However, it is not quite finished as I only found 3 fabrics I was happy with the colors in and I thought coordinated with each other and with the nursery. I will be making the other 3 letters once my grandma gets fabric for the quilt she's making. I want the letters to all be pieces from the quilt. 

Here's a picture of the finished project and then I'll tell you all about how I did it.

So cute, right? I'm in love with them.

No, we're not naming our baby Sla, Als, or Las. Her name is Stella :-) I chose the letters I did based on the sizes of fabric pieces I had instead of going in order of the letters in her name. 

If you want to make some super cute letters too, here's what you'll need:

-Paper mache letters (purchased at Hobby Lobby with a 40% off coupon- $1.48 each)

-Modge Podge

-1" sponge paint brush

-Batting- you want the kind made for quilts, not pillows, so that it lays flat like fabric and will be easy to cut. They have some on sale at Hobby Lobby this week for $2.79 and it would be more than enough to do as many letters as you would like

-Fabric of your choice- I used some fat quarters I had hiding in the basement. For the letter A, I used about half of the fat quarter. The L, I used a lot less and was able to use up a weirdly cut scrap piece. The letters are covered both front and back, so that will give you a good idea of how much you need. 

-Ribbon- I used 7/8" grossgrain ribbon that was on sale for $.39/yard. For these 3 letters, I used 3 yards. I used the most ribbon on the S. 

So first things first. Lay your letter, front side up, on top of the batting and trace around it- I used a sharpie marker to trace on the batting. Be careful not to pull and stretch it too much or you'll have to do a lot of trimming. You'll need two thicknesses of batting so you can either fold it in half to trace and cut or you can cut two separate pieces. I recommend the folding in half method as it makes sure that at least the 2 pieces are the same size. 

After you trace your letter onto the batting, you want to trace it onto your fabric as well. I folded my fabric, right sides together, and used a pencil to trace the letters. I left about 1/2" around the edge to be able to glue down. You don't have to leave quite that much, but I was being extra cautious. 

Once you have everything traced and cut out, it's time to start gluing. First, you want to glue down the batting on the front side of the letter. With some letters, this won't matter (like the A) but with others, it certainly does so please pay attention to what side you're working on! If you're using two layers of batting like suggested, you'll have to glue down one layer and then dab on the modge podge to glue down the second layer. When you finish this step, your letter will look like this:

You can see the where I glued the two layers together through the batting. 

The next step in this project is to glue on your fabric. This was a little tricky with such a curvy letter, but it can be done. As you go around curves, you just need to cut out a bunch of little notches so that the fabric will lay flat. Around corners, the trick is to miter the corners. Basically, cut it in half at an angle up towards the corner. Then it will be easier to glue down. 

I started by laying the batting side down onto the fabric and snipping all of the curves. Then I began gluing down the fabric with the straight parts first and then finishing with the curves. 

Once you finish the front side with the batting, you can turn it over and repeat the same procedure on the back side. This side was much easier. All I did was spread the modge podge, stick on the fabric, and then repeat the procedure for gluing down the edge. Because there is no batting on this side, it was easier to glue down. It will also allow it lay flat against a wall if you choose to hang these. 

Here's what it looked like when I finished covering it with fabric:

Not too shabby, eh?

But it was still unfinished. So, I used the ribbon to glue all around the edges. It's not quite the same width as the letter- it was slightly smaller- but I think it looks even better that way. I just started on the inside of one of the curves (an inconspicuous place) and used the modge podge to stick it down all the way around the letter. 

*Tip- the ribbon will stay glued down better if you apply the glue directly to the ribbon rather than the letter. I discovered this after my ribbon falling off and moving multiple times. 

And here's the final product:

This entire project, including the 3 letters I have yet to finish, cost me around $12- that's less than ONE letter from anthro!

If you decide to try this project, I'd love to see a picture of your finished letters! 

100th post- kind of a downer

I noticed when I logged in this morning that this is my 100th post on this blog! My, how things have changed since I started it. I mostly try to keep everything light-hearted, but sometimes, life comes up and I just need to put some things out there.

Today I am 24 weeks pregnant with our sweet baby girl. I went for my routine appointment yesterday with my OB and mentioned that I had been having some pretty intense contractions on and off since Thursday. She thought it would be good just to check me over and make sure they were just harmless Braxton Hicks contractions and that I wasn't actually progressing into labor. She did a manual exam (talk about uncomfortable) and was somewhat concerned. She said to me "Well, your cervix is pretty high up there but it feels pretty soft. I'm going to grab the ultrasound and just take a measurement to be on the safe side." Ok- no problem. I've had like, 50 ultrasounds over the past year. Bring on the wand.

She began the ultrasound and started measuring and then immediately turned the screen away from me. Now, in my experience, the only time a doctor turns the screen away from you is when they don't want you to see something, which translated to me as something was wrong. She spent about 30 more seconds taking measurements and then looked me square in the face and said "Your cervix is quite short. I'm very concerned that you're experiencing preterm labor. We are sending you to St. Joseph's because they have the good NICU. We need this baby to stay in for at least 6 more weeks, but I also need you to be monitored and get a steroid shot just to be safe."

Wait, what?!?! I'm only 24 weeks along! You're telling me that you're concerned that I might be in LABOR!!!??? This is not supposed to happen for at least 13 more weeks...if not more.

I calmly nodded my head and asked a few questions like "What are the steroid shots for? You don't think that she'll be born soon, right?" and "What does this mean?"

She just hooked me up to a contraction monitor.

I was monitored there in the office for about 20 minutes and then they said to me "Yes, you're still having contractions. We need you to be monitored long-term. We'll call the hospital and tell them you're on your way."

This whole time, I did not freak out. I calmly sent Heath a text message and told him I was going to pick him up from work so we could go to the hospital. I calmly called my grandma and told her we were headed to the hospital for some observation. And then I called my friend Abbie. And I COMPLETELY LOST IT.

My mom is out of town- in a foreign country- and I'm looking at the possibility of having a very small baby to take care of very soon. This baby is NOT ready to come out. Yes, she has all of her vital organs. But what about her lack of body fat? What about her underdeveloped lungs? What about her very thin skin? What about her fused eyelids? Not to mention the fact that she probably only weighs a little more than a pound right now and is not much longer than a foot. I cannot handle this.

I cried the whole way to my husband's office.

I cried once we got his bike in the car.

I cried when we got home to pack a bag.

I cried as we drove to the hospital.

And somewhere, in between the tears and hiccups, I was praying, pleading with God to let our baby girl stay put just a while longer.


When I got to the hospital, they hooked me up to a heart monitor to watch her heartbeat and a contraction monitor. Honestly, this was probably the coolest thing ever. It took them a while to find her heartbeat because she was basically running away from the monitor. Her heart rate was perfect. And I was still having contractions. I was having some small contractions every minute or two and then every once in a while I would have a big, painful contraction. They decided to hook me up to an IV because they thought a little hydration could do some good to help my irritable uterus. As the nurse was digging in both of my arms to find a vein, I had another, very painful contraction. I was scared to death.

The doctor ran some labs from a blood and urine sample. Everything on my lab work came back normal. No infection. No signs of anything super dangerous. And my contractions started to slow down a bit. They measured my cervix again with the ultrasound and got the same measurement my doctor had gotten in the office, so I was not progressing into full-blown labor. This was very good. While they were measuring, the sweet doctor decided to peek at the baby and take some measurements of her just to have some updated stats in case she needed to come meet us sooner rather than later. We got to see her sticking out her tongue at us and showing off her thigh- I hope this is not indicative of what is to come in later years with her :-). Still, she measured perfectly and her head was not too big, which has been a fear of ours since before Heath and I got married. We're both from gene pools with incredibly large melons. Good for holding tons of brains- not so fun to give birth to.

They finally let me eat some food around 9:30pm- I hadn't eaten anything since about noon. At 10:30 my IV was done and they had taken me off the fetal monitors. The doctor decided since I hadn't made any progress towards labor that I was safe to go home and sleep in my own bed. What a blessing!!

Today was scheduled to be my first day back at work after being off on medical leave for 4 weeks. However, I am now on bed rest at home for at least the rest of the week until I get an "all clear" from my OB. We shall see what she says when I go back in. I suspect they will do more measuring and watch for any changes.

This is still a scary time for us as we are not quite out of the woods yet, but we have hope and faith that God is in control and is working in this situation to bless us. We also have a lot of confidence in the doctors I've seen and are thankful that they have been so vigilant. Please also keep us in your prayers that baby and I can stay healthy and make it much much longer before we meet her!

baby projects!

We found out 2 weeks ago that baby March is a GIRL!  We are so excited to meet her. Heath has already decided that she will definitely be a daddy's girl. We constantly have discussions on who she will be more like- nerdy and musically talented like Heath, or girly and moody like me. It's a fun way for us to get excited about figuring out who this baby girl will be. I'm rooting for a nice mix of both of us. Either way, I decided she's going to have some girly decor in her bedroom.

We ordered our crib shortly after we found out she was a girl. I insisted We decided together that a Jenny Lind style crib would look awesome. It was also a lot cheaper than some of the cribs we had seen out shopping. So, we bought this awesome white spindle crib off amazon.com and set it up this weekend.

We put one of my quilts in it to cover up the ugly mattress pad since we don't have any bedding yet.

We also picked out some new paint. As you can see from the picture above, the "nursery" was already a light periwinkle color. I liked the color ok, but I just wanted something a little bit brighter for the room. I picked out this color:

It's just bright enough without being overwhelming. It's called Ocean Whisper from Valspar.

We also started searching craigslist for a dresser. We have limited space in our room so we have to utilize it wisely. That means that instead of a changing table and a dresser, we needed to combine the two. We started searching for a lower dresser that we could put a changing pad on. I also wanted something that looked girly and that had some ornate details- nothing plain for our little lady :-). We found this lady on craigslist who had tons of furniture that was "shabby chic" style so we went over to her house to look around. She had so many cool things! If I had unlimited monetary resources, I would have probably bought her entire living room. She had one piece, however, that she hadn't really done anything with yet and was in pretty good shape except for being a little bit dirty and having a burn mark on the top. It was the perfect size for what we wanted so we loaded it up and took it home.

This is the before picture. It was two different shades of cream with gold accents and hardware that was half brass and half cream-colored paint. 

Since our crib is bright white, I decided that this needed a little paint. We went with spray paint- so easy by the way! We didn't even sand the dresser first. We used some liquid sand paper just to de-gloss the surface, then some odorless Kilz spray primer, and then white spray paint. It still needs another coat (or two) and a top coat, so I won't post the pictures yet, but I'm very excited about how it's looking! Originally I thought we might distress it a bit, but once we got the first coat of spray paint on there, we thought it looked so great and went better with the smooth look of the crib to leave it un-distressed. I'll post pictures once we finish the project.

My nana has also started working on some quilts and blankets. I'm really excited to see some of the fabrics she's picked out so that we can work together to find something for the bumpers, crib skirt, and curtains. I wasn't having much luck finding anything I liked at the stores. It all seemed too matchy for me, so we'll see what we can come up with! 

17 weeks!

We are anxiously awaiting finding out whether this little baby is going to be a girl or boy! We've had many people weigh in on Heath's facebook page and the guesses were overwhelmingly girl! Here's the stats:

How far along? 17 weeks
Total weight gain: 4 lbs- this is after losing some due to the extreme sickness, but overall I think I have gained a full 4 lbs since the week before Thanksgiving.
Maternity clothes? yes- when I'm lucky. I'm waiting on some clothes to come in the mail that I ordered. My mom and nana did buy me a couple of things a few weeks ago that I can wear to work and I've been wearing them out! When I'm at home, I stick to stretchy pants or yoga pants as I can't handle any sort of pressure on my stomach.
Stretch marks? I found 2 new ones when I was shopping for maternity clothes. I knew it was inevitable, but I didn't think it would happen before I was even really showing.
Sleep: not going so well. I wake up several times a night either to go to the bathroom or to be sick.
Best moment this week: calling my dear friend Susan (our wedding cake baker) to order a cake for our gender reveal dinner party- I designed it and she's going to wait for a call from the nurse telling her what color to make the inside :-) We'll find out together with our families on March 17th.
Miss anything? my old clothes and getting to eat without being sick
Movement: I have felt a few flutters but nothing big or consistent
Food cravings: I guess I would say savory foods- anything salty, sour, or anything with cheese. I always think I want sweets, but when I indulge I get really sick. The savory and sour things seem to not upset my stomach as bad.
Anything make you queasy or sick? You name it- I've been extremely sick this entire pregnancy. I can't seem to find what the trigger is.
Gender: we'll find out in 2 weeks!!
Labor signs: ha!
Symptoms: click here to find out all about hyperemesis- my least favorite symptom of pregnancy but a constant reminder that I am in fact pregnant!
Belly button in or out? in
Wedding rings on or off? on- but I woke up in the middle of the night a few nights ago and my hands were so swollen I had to take my ring off.
Happy or moody most of the time? Hmm...that's tough. I feel like I'm on an emotional roller coaster. I'm exhausted from work and home life and not feeling well physically is starting to really take a toll on my mood.
Looking forward to: ordering our crib and starting to get the baby's room ready!

we're expanding by 2 feet!

And no, we're not adding on to the house just yet. We've been busy cooking this little cutie:

That's right! We're going to have a little baby in the March family :-)

Baby is expected to arrive around August 8, 2012.

Baby stats:

How many weeks- 12 weeks 3 days

Size- baby is the size of a peach- a cute, sweet little fuzzy peach :-)

Bump- no, but I've been bloated because I started eating bread again...

Sickness/aversions- YES! I've been sick since the day we found out. I can't keep much down without taking Zofran. I also have some major aversions to sweets which is so unlike me. 

Emotions- nervous and super excited! We waited a long time for this and experienced some complications at the beginning but the doctor checked everything out and the baby looks PERFECT so we're trusting that and choosing to just ride on the feelings of joy :-) 

We are so incredibly blessed and are thankful for our many friends and family who have been praying for us during this trying time. We love you all so much! 

I'm in the home stretch

Today is day 25 of 35- I only have 10 days left on my detox diet. I'm actually starting to notice some changes. Here are the stats as of this past Monday.
Weight- 135
Body fat- 23.2%

I've lost a total of 7.8 lbs and .6% body fat. My body fat percentage has fluctuated the most...last week I was down to 22%. My nutritionist said these things change from day to day, but we're looking at overall results, so I'm still doing well. Also, it's important to note that anything between 20-25% for women is quite good. Women need more body fat than men so that we can have babies and feed them. I say all of that to say I'm not really concerned with that number.

Here's the biggest change- I HAVE ENERGY! I am able to actually get out of bed in the morning (usually around 7) and get moving! It's amazing. I get so much more accomplished during the day. And get this- I've even been to the gym- TWICE! Granted, I only stayed for 25 minutes each time, but that's 25 minutes more than I had been! I've found that I really don't mind the elliptical and I can do that for about 15 minutes before I need to change it up. However, I like going around mid-morning because there's no one else there to judge me. See, I went earlier this week around 4:30 and there were TONS of people there working out. I did my thing, got on the elliptical for 15 minutes, took a short break, then got on the bike for 10. AndI could see all these people giving me these looks like "really? only 15 minutes? I've been on this treadmill for 45." It makes me feel worse about myself. But mid-morning is just fine. There's a cute little pregnant lady who likes to read while she rides the bike and an old grandma who walks the track. This is where I fit in. And I like it.

Another thing that has changed is I'm cooking so much more. The food I'm cooking is also much healthier (obviously). I've come up with some pretty tasty recipes. My favorite from last week is homemade egg drop soup. Now, you could add some chicken or tofu to this and I'm sure it would be great but it didn't fit into my daily nutrition plan for that day, so I just had veggies and egg in mine. Here's the recipe- bear with me because I made it up.

2 cups of vegetables- I used lima beans, okra, green beans, and carrots- they were all frozen
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 can of chicken broth
1 tsp corn starch
2-3 eggs
salt to taste

First I sauteed the vegetables in the olive oil. Since mine were frozen and I needed the extra calories, this worked out well. I should have added salt at this point, but I didn't and I regretted it.
After the veggies were cooked and had soaked up all of the yummy fat, I added in the chicken broth. Let the broth heat up and almost boil. Add the corn starch next to thicken the broth. Bring the soup to a boil. Once it is boiling, scramble 2-3 eggs and drizzle them in the pot. The egg will cook almost instantly. Serve with salt or soy sauce. I can't have soy on my diet, so I used salt. The okra and lima beans in it were so yummy, but I could've done without the green beans and carrots. Maybe if the carrots were cut up more they would have been better.

I had this for lunch one day and then again with dinner that night. Even Heath liked it.

Another recipe that I have liked that was new for me was mashed cauliflower. I don't really care one thing about cauliflower. I'll eat it when it's in a vegetable mix, but I don't like it raw or alone. However, I kept seeing recipes for mashed cauliflower that supposedly tastes like mashed potatoes. I LOVE mashed potatoes and gravy, so I felt like I needed to give this a try.

1 bag frozen cauliflower (I used the King Soopers brand, small-ish bag)
3 tbsp butter
salt and pepper to taste

Boil 4-6 cups of water (salted).Throw the bag of cauliflower in the microwave for about 2 minutes to thaw it out. Add cauliflower to boiling water. Cook for about 7 minutes of until really tender. Drain and reserve the water. Add butter, salt, and pepper and mash. Add water back into the cauliflower as needed for smooth texture (this is instead of milk, but you could certainly use milk I suppose).

I'm definitely more creative with food than I was before. And we're not eating out as much since it's so hard to find food at a restaurant that doesn't have milk, soy, sugar, wheat, some other grain....but it's definitely been a blessing because I'm feeling better and so is our checking account!