Choo! Merry Christmas

20 Weeks -- Already?!

Well, I am halfway through my pregnancy with our second blessing of a child. Actually, as of today I am 21 weeks, but who's counting?! A few days ago all three of us went to a radiologist for the 20w ultrasound and I wanted to share a few of the images that were given to us. 

sweet little face

see here for my post with a similar picture of William at 20w

The technician spent an hour taking measurements and looking at all of the bones and organs she could see. We saw the stomach since the baby is already swallowing and the kidneys. I was happy she pointed out things like that to us.

William was well behaved, but it is different having a toddler in the room. He was however excited to see "his baby." I was tempted to find out the gender, but, no, we are not finding out the gender again :)

Hi Momma, Daddy and big brother!

Running through my mind….

1. Is my sweet boy feeling sick? He fell asleep on my shoulder during bedtime songs and hasn't done that in at least 6 months. I hope it is just a sleep hangover from a night at Nana's…

2. When do I need to think about transitioning him to a bed?

3. When will our house sell? It has been on the market about 50 days and while we have had some twice-lookers, no offers (yet) but I am praying. Don't want to move William into a bed before we are in the new house (ideally).

4. How did I manage to get 52 hours "alone" from Saturday-Wednesday? Sweet boy gets overnights with both sets of grandparents thanks to black tie events Momma & Daddy are attending and today is MDO. So, in order to feel like I'm not wasting my time, I am going through boxes in the basement. Pulling out all the maternity clothes, sorting his baby clothes in case we have another springtime boy and making sell, trash, keep piles.

5. I am lucky because one of my closets friends is having a baby…any day…we hope…

6. I am also VERY lucky to have two of my closest local friends pregnant "with me," both due in June! I am very excited for both of them and cried when they told me :)

7. Proud to have some Christmas gifts done, but haven't started on others...

TWICE Blessed

This year I am most thankful for the two littlest people in my life:

Our second blessing of a baby, set to make his or her arrival at the end of April:

And for my dear first born son William with whom I spend my days. We spend our days playing, cooking, climbing, crafting, watching tractors and searching for animals and trucks outdoors. I couldn't imagine it any other way.

Sandy Stinks

We are at approximately hour 24 of rain from Hurricane Sandy. I am not writing from my own home because we have above ground power lines and we typically lose power pretty quickly. And the winds are supposed to be 65mph+ for more then twelve hours overnight. Doesn't sound fun does it?

So I hope if you are in the storm's path, you stay safe. We are inside, got some food at the grocery and I also picked up a pumpkin so William (I mean we) could carve it on the kitchen floor during the storm since we need something to do :)

We have some BIG NEWS so keep up!

Halloween Hat Cookies

Earlier this month I hosted a costume swap for our local MOMS Club. I decided to provide some Halloween treats, but did not go overboard since all of the attending children were toddlers or babies. Let's be serious, the cookies were for the Moms :)

All I had to buy for the cookies was a pack of fudge stripe cookies and a pack of Hershey's Kisses. You also need honey and "writing" frosting, but I had both of those.

As you can see, the stripe side of the cookie will be face down on your plate/tray. Put a small dollop (I like that word) of honey on the bottom of the Hershey Kiss and then push onto the cookie, covering the hole. I let them sit overnight to "stick" better.

The next morning I used a small tube of yellow writing frosting to make a ring around the edge, where the cookie joined the kiss.

Then I added little buckles to the witch's hats.

The cookies were yummy and people thought they were so cute! :)

Miss Me?

I decided after a full month away from writing my blog, but not reading my favorites, I'd come back (or try to). Alot has happened in the past month and alot is about to happen -- for that you'll just have to wait and see.

It is Autumn here and my pumpkin candle is glowing daily breathing the sweet scent I love into my home. To escape pre-Fall, we took a family vacation to Belize!

More on that later…if I achieve my goal of getting around to it.

Life is busy and I decided not to spend my evening blogging. There, that's the truth. Also, I think people see enough photos of my sweet William and our antics on Facebook so I don't need to post them here. After all, some of my most vigilant readers are family and close friends who know all too many details about what we are doing/have done that they really don't need my blog to tell them.

The craft bug hasn't bit me personally in a bit. I use my craft skills to make products for my Memorable Designs customers everyday and LOVE it, but as far as personal stuff…I'm hoping to get some Thanksgiving items and then Christmas things made (For me. For once.)

So I suppose this is a hello and a warning that I will probably only be back intermittently and I won't be taking pictures of recipes and all that so much because I am preoccupied with life and just trying to soak up every second.

Only in Maryland...

…do one year olds start learning how to eat crabs!

I think Grandma loved it as much as William!

September is Here and so am I

Whew - I'm back! I can say pretty confidently that I won't be blogging as frequently as I used to (before the summer) because it has become one more thing to keep up with. I never wanted to view it that way, but with posting pictures to Facebook, being a busy say-at-home/working mom and spending real time with William, I just can't find enough hours in the day. But I am going to make an effort!

August was a busy month with weekend trips to the beach, a suburb of Philadelphia, and down to Georgia for a friend's wedding (post in itself). I even went five weeks without seeing my good friend Holly and her girls because we were away, she was away, I was too busy, etc. Oh and we, well William, also had hand foot and mouth for a week.

If you are "only" a blogger friend, not a Facebook friend or friend in real life, here are a few pictures of our growing boy since you haven't seen him in awhile. He just turned 17 months last week!

To Buy or to Rent?

When I was a student at Clemson University (GO TIGERS!), i always tried to pinch pennies in terms of my textbooks. I recall buying used books for a few days until my order from Amazon or eBay or another seller arrived since it saved me a few dollars. Since I graduated, which was only five years ago, you can now RENT textbooks - fab idea!

One company, Campus Book Rentals, asked me to look through their service and site and give my opinion. All you do is is their search box to find your textbook. You can choose to keep the book for a semester, a quarter, or a summer session and the price is different based on the length of time. And for those students who attend a few classes and decide to drop the class after getting the book -- you can return them without charge within 30 days and take advantage of their FREE shipping!

I was the student who wrote in the margins and highlighted the heck out of my books. But when its a rental, I thought that would be a problem for others like me, but you can highlight in books from Capus Book Rentals. Pretty neat, although it means you will receive books already marked up too (help you get through the reading faster?? :) ).

This is an actual book I remember purchasing and although it is a less expensive buy, the rental is nearly half the price. Saving about $15 is alot and that is on the low end of savings (typical range is 40-90% savings)! As a side, note, the author of that book, Brian Solis, is a big social media guru now and I have seen him speak at a conference and have read other books he has authored.

To make you feel better about your purchase, feel good knowing that they donate to Operation Smile with every rented book. Some of you may be familiar with that philanthropy via Panhellenic/Greek Life or the PSA ads.

So for you college students, and siblings and parents of college students, forward this post and a link to Campus Book Rentals to save "your" students money. Hey, it will give them more money to spend on gas to drive home and visit YOU!

Time Off and Time with my Family

Life moves fast. I started to feel like I was missing things: moments with my son, moments with my husband and moments alone(!). For that reason, I have taken a step back from blogging. It makes me a little sad because I have all these recipes saved with coordinating photos I took to share and I will, just not so frequently.

But, when my son sees the laptop and comes running over to my lap, I know HE is most important. I am using my "spare time" if you can even call it that, to grow my successful business and for that I am grateful. Grateful for my creativity and the support of family, friends and strangers who keep me busy ordering my products!

I'm trying to step back from Facebook too, reminding myself that if anything "important" happens in the lives of those I am close with, they will call or text or even e-mail me to keep me in the loop. So, there you have it folks…I am on a little family hiatus.


I do have a post coming up soon that will be of interest to college students and their parents!

Sweet Balsamic Pork Loin {recipe}

Life is busy! So, I took advantage of a summertime recipe in the crockpot a few days ago and it was wonderful. Pork loins were buy one get one free at Harris Teeter so I picked up two and used one for this recipe. Everything else we had at home already.

I found the recipe on Mel's Kitchen blog, but as her post says, it isn't her original recipe. It's a keeper!

Feeling Grateful

I was talking to the mom of this cutie yesterday (as I do most days of the week)

 and she commented on how different they look from last July…when we first met.

And it got me thinking…was I really not friends with any of my local "mom friends" just one year ago?

I used to work full-time in DC and spent the rest of my time at home "in the country" as some say and my husband and I had friends with kids, but it just happened they were in our age range. What I mean is, we didn't purposefully seek out families with children. But I do now! Last fall I was part of our town's first MOMS Club and hold an Executive Board position which is alot of fun. I have met many more moms in town which is wonderful for those days when you go to a park and just shoot out an email to see if others want to join. Only a five minute drive for anyone in town, well except Jake and his mom ;)

But, the first friends I made as a new mom were some of these ladies:

This is what William looked like the day he met future friends Louisa, Samantha, Mason and Zoe:

These are some of the adventures they have had since then (plus another new friend or two):

    

I am so happy to have these friends (and their babies) in my life!