time for a project

I love projects. I love sewing and re creating things. I'll post some of my pillows sometime.
Today I decided it was time to finally paint and reupholster this little stool I have had for some time. Now that I did it I can't believe it didn't do it sooner.....

BEFORE.....

AFTER.....

I feel kind of addicted to the whole project thing...I want to go out and look for more furniture to redo....I feel like this obsession will come in handy when its time to do the nursery....speaking of nursery's....I CAN'T WAIT FOR MY BABY TO ARRIVE!! :)
Oooh I should look for an old(ish) rocking chair!!!! Now I'm officially on a mission.....

bahamas

blog location: back porch

It was so wonderful being in the bahamas with my mom, sisters and sister in law. It was also nice coming back to such warm and wonderful charlotte weather :) My mom told me something on the cruise that I thought was so great! She was in the bahamas pregnant with me and in her 1st trimester! So random that I would be pregnant and in the bahamas too? How special! I can't wait to tell my kid that someday! SO CUTE! maybe I should go to the bahamas every time I'm pregnant to continue the story? :)
I wore a bikini on the trip because I figured I obviously look pregnant? Needless to say, I got a couple curious looks....I figured they could have been for 1 or 2 reasons: 1. is she pregnant or does she have a beer gut? 2. is she pregnant? she looks 17 or 18? --- I wanted to wear a sign that said I'm 23 and happily married..... it wasnt all negative looks though :) I got some smiles and some friendly questions which I enjoyed. It was my first obvious pregnant outing (or so I thought).

here I am at 13 weeks

my favorite thing: fresh coconut water!

 all of us girls :) I love my family!

There really is nothing better than family: Whether it is blood relatives, friends that have become family or family by marriage. I am so thankful for my family. I love my family, my in laws and I love my friends.

a little update

I feel like there's a lot of little things to give an update on so that is what Ill do. It has been such a beautiful week! Im sitting out on our deck soaking in a little afternoon sun :)


My parents came to town this past week and it was really good to see them (as usual). Sunday night my parents and Josh and I went uptown to Blue Restaurant Bar and Lounge. I had never been there before, it was really good! My parents celebrated 36 valentines together- awwww :)! Someday Josh and I will do the same :) On monday night (valentines) Josh and I exchanged gifts and then went to 15 North for dinner. Josh did amazing in the gift department!! I was impressed! He got me a beautiful free people dress tank (my fav brand of clothing) a light sweater with owls on it (my fav creature) a notebook for journaling with an owl on it,  and he wrote me "thank you" cards to give me every morning this whole week. They all say wonderful sweet things inside :) this last one this morning had a coupon for a free trip to autobell!! my car needs it big time :)  oh and I bought Josh charcoal jeans and a button up from Jcrew.

one of my thank you cards

Josh at 15 North in the shirt I got him

On monday I leave for a cruise with my mom, sisters, and sister in law!!  I CANNOT WAIT! I have been DYING to go somewhere and get some sun and relaxation! It was part of our christmas gift from mom and it couldn't have come at a better time. We are taking the Norwegian Sky and we are going from Miami to Grand Bahama Island; Nassau; Great Stirrup Cay! I fly out to Miami monday morning. I have never been on a cruise before. I am so so very excited!! On a side note: I feel like I look kind of funny in my bikini...oh well! the baby needs some sun too, right? Needless to say, I might not blog much next week.....

As far as the pregnancy goes, Ill be 13 weeks pregnant on wednesday while we are on the cruise! yay! so exciting. The baby started clasping its hands this week :) how precious! Last night I was half asleep and I said to Josh "I feel like I can feel the baby flutter" haha who knows? Like I said, I was half asleep but I remember feeling something whether it was in my sleepy mind or not. Also, I have been craving sushi non stop...not raw sushi but cooked sushi. I have had it at least 5 times this week and I was having it some last week too. It has just been so delicious.

Next week starts my 2nd trimester. I cannot believe it....Thank God my 1st trimester went SO WELL!! Today I have been looking up videos of ultrasounds at 12 and 13 weeks. I can't believe how much the baby moves! Im so excited for our ultrasound! We won't have one for another 6 weeks or so...but when we do we will finally know what we are having! :) Have a good week everyone!

continuity

I have been having this thought lately....well, more like a discovery of something that is true but I might not have realized it before or seen it in this particular way. I was sharing it with Josh in the car tonight and the more I talked about it the more it unraveled and made perfect sense. I mean this is basic knowledge here. Sometimes I visualize the Lord picking up a strand of wisdom and placing it into my brain and then seeing a light bulb light up :)

Basically, if I want to see and walk in a daily flow of results in my life I have to start with the one thing that creates everything....the Lord. He is what gives me everything, I have nothing without him. He literally created me! Every part of who I am....He gives me creativity, peace, life, strength, joy all of my ideas and a million other things. He is the reason I wake up in the morning. If I need opportunities, He opens them up. It's almost so simple I forget to think about it? The thing is, I don't want to go to Him just when I need something, I want to go to Him simply because I want to worship him, hear from Him, spend time with Him, just hang out with Him. Sometimes I forget these things. I don't want to forget these things. I want him to be the start of my day so the holy spirt can just flow through me at all times. I want to be so wrapped up in Him that everything great I have in my life is a obvious connection to my relationship with Him. A kind of abundance that cannot be created or made up of or from anything but Him. If I want all these things  in my life it only makes sense to start with the one thing that created everything...its a circle, a kind of flow that is continuous. A direct connection.  He is FOR me. He wants me to have everything and He wants me to Himself. He loves me more than I could ever even imagine. 

His grace, love, and wisdom is ever ending. Who wouldn't wanna be a part of that? :) 

There are so many verses that pertain to this, but one that always makes my heart full is Psalm 139.

I love learning and being reminded of things that have to do with Him. Don't you? :)

a litte heartbeat

On wednesday Josh and I went to hear our baby's heartbeat and he made a video of the whole thing. It was so crazy/amazing. I couldn't believe there was an actual heartbeat inside of ME?! Pregnancy is definitely an amazing thing and I feel so blessed to experience it! After we heard the heartbeat I couldn't stop listening to it on the video and crying, I just felt so overwhelmed with a love that I couldn't describe. It almost felt perfect, like I felt like the baby could do no wrong in my eyes no matter what. Now, I know this is not true because I'm sure when I have a child I will feel many types of human emotions through out its life and in my own, but I felt like for a little bit I got just a little glimpse of what the Lord feels about me...about every single person. What an intense overwhelming love? and He feels that all the time no matter what? Needless to say, I'm in love with the Lord, my husband, and my child in such a major way and it feels awesome. I already cant wait to see and meet her or him. I got 6 months left, I think I can handle it.

here's the video, you can tell in the beginning I was nervous

because I thought she couldn't find the heartbeat :) haha

On a side note: This whole pregnancy I have been thinking I am having a girl. I am not quite sure why? I want boys and girls! In fact, I honestly want 2 girls and 2 boys if I could pick it exactly how I think I want it. I have just had a feeling that it is a girl since the beginning and so has everyone else. There have been 5 people that have said they thought it was a boy but every other single person says girl...is this true or not? I don't know and honestly I do not care what I have first. I am just SO curious! 

About 4 weeks ago I had a dream about my daughter, whether she comes first, second, third, or fourth it doesn't matter but I do believe it was her :) she had really blue eyes, freckles (which I secretly prayed for:) and brown STRAIGHT hair!? when I woke up I was like what? I always thought she'd have curly hair like me and Josh? About 15 minutes ago my mom called me and said "I had a dream about my grand daughter! she had blue eyes and brown straight hair!" haha :) this all made me laugh. We can't plan things the way we think they should be or assume things and believe them so much that we are shocked when OUR ideas don't look the way we think they would. The Lord is going to do things how he wants and sees them to be best. I trust in Him and I want my baby to be exactly how He wants it to be :) everything is going to work out the way it is supposed to be and I am just along for the journey. 

11 weeks

Thanks for all the blog support everyone! who knew blogging could be so enjoyable?
SO yesterday marked 11 weeks pregnant for me...I have had so many feelings happen all in the last 7-8 weeks since knowing I was pregnant. First Ill tell you how I found out. Its a long story but Ill try to make it short for the sake of the length of this entry :) I never knew I could be so long winded? haha
It was Christmas weekend....we went to Josh's dad's house for Christmas eve and Christmas morning. I didn't know this at the time but Josh's step mom later told me that as soon as she saw me she thought "oh my gosh she's pregnant."
All that weekend I knew I was supposed to get my period and I kept feeling the cramping but nothing else was happening. I decided I would just let it go and take a test when we got to my family's house in PA. Christmas afternoon we headed to PA, the next morning still nothing...I was thinking "hmm?" that afternoon we all opened gifts, at one point my dad handed josh a book and said, "here - you and your daughter need to read this...oops, I mean wife, I don't know why I said daughter?" as soon as that sentence was finished I jumped up and ran to the car to get the 1 and only pregnancy test I had stored in my dashboard (random, I know). I took the test and got a faint line...I started sweating, I was afraid to get excited because that had happened before...I also felt nervous. I yelled downstairs for Laura (my sister and law) and her and my sister Selena came upstairs. They both looked at the test and concluded I should get another one. I told everyone we were going to the drug store to get ice cream (hahah). Laura, Josh, and my sisters knew the real deal (josh was excited but waiting for confirmation).
By the time I came back pretty much everyone (except for my dad) knew I was a "pending pregnant lady" I was in the bathroom and I took the digital test. While I was waiting for the hourglass to give me my true results Sherah (my sister) had opened the door. Pretty much everyone was crammed in the bathroom...my niece and nephew, Sherah and her husband, Josh, Laura, and my brother. Laura was holding the test for me...when the results came up she handed it to me with a blank face....I quickly grabbed it and it read:
PREGNANT! Immediately started bawling - it was a crazy surge of emotions...Sherah of course started bawling as well! The kids were like woah, what? you're having a baby?! Wes was out of the loop and Sherah handed him the test crying and he thought it was Laura who was pregnant (HAHAH!) Laura quickly corrected him...she has a 9 month old so she's ok with waiting some more :)
I was crying and searching for my mom and dad, dad was downstairs and looked up the balcony and said, "what's going on up there?" I yelled "I'm pregnant!" he was excited! Finally I found mom and told her and she started crying as well! Basically, it was one of the best days of my life and my family was there to share it with me.
So there's my story! The best way I could have ever imagined finding out I was pregnant :)

this picture was taken a couple hours after we found out :)

Also, here's a little video of my best friends husband finding out I was pregnant. I would show the video of her but there was a lot of tears and blubbering involved.

newness

Everyone has been blogging these days...apparantly, I've decided to as well. Let me just start by saying, I may not have anything "life changing" to share or have any "deep provoking" thoughts. On top of that, I am mostly terrible at grammar. Almost every sentence will be grammatically incorrect...I do not care though. I type how I talk. yay! 

Anyways, I have decided to blog because my dear friend Courtney Clark said to me, "you should start blogging to share all your thoughts and experiences." I thought to myself - what a great idea?? I have been loving reading other peoples blogs and birth stories. Also,  I have so many new thoughts and feelings happening in my life. I got engaged, married, and pregnant all in under one year. This march it will be one year since I have been engaged, sept marks 1 year of marriage, and the baby will be born in August or September right before our anniversary. WOW! what a year full of blessings and all my hearts desires.  

Getting Pregnant:

Im sure all of you know how this happens :) .....some of you may say/think  - wow she got pregnant right away! was it on purpose? (I've heard this question a lot) The answer is kinda :) LOONNGGG story short - When I was 16 I was told I had "endometriosis" and was put on birth control, I was on it for 5 years. One morning I woke up and thought - I have to get off birth control. Weird huh? Well, to me it was the Lord. When I got off of it within 2 months and 2 nightmare cycles I knew something felt wrong. I got my hormones tested and I was pre-menopausal.....what a nightmare...I had been told before and was told again that I would have a hard time getting pregnant or would not be able to. This was all completely devastating to me, my whole life I could not wait to be a mom. Anyways, I was put on natural hormone therapy for a little over a year (bio identical hormone replacement) 6 weeks before our wedding I took a chance, got off of them, and tested my hormones. 1 week before the wedding I got the results back that I was back on track without the hormones (PTL!) my body finally kicked in began producing things on its own! However, during those 6 weeks before the wedding I developed a hemorrhagic cyst on my right ovary and a bunch of regular cysts on my left ovary.....needless to say, I became very discouraged. my hemorrhagic cyst burst and I wasnt able to do anything. It was the most painful thing I had ever experienced. All the fluid was in my abdominal cavity and had to absorb into my body...OUCH! One nurse said to me that hers was "as bad as giving birth" hmmm...we shall see. Anyway, through all of this the Lord was so close to me, he heard all my prayers and gathered my tears in a jar (cheesy but true). I knew he would heal me and I knew he knew my heart, I wanted to be a mom.
When Josh and I got together one of the many things we had in common was our excitement and desire about being parents. He knew my whole situation from day one and he prayed over my hormones and my womb almost every single night. He blessed my body and prayed life over my endocrine system. All of this brought hope to my every single day. SO - when we got married we weren't really all about preventing something that could be a miracle and blessing to have happen to us. The first month we used protection and then after than we just didnt worry about it. When I got my period in october and november I was ok with it but deep down inside I was worried thinking - why am I not pregnant?! - Finally, December came and brought a big surprise! We found out we were pregnant!! This blog entry is getting long so Ill tell that story another time :)
Not sure why I went into all that? It just felt right :) I dont mind being candid. Basically, Josh is the man of my dreams and the love of my heart, starting a family with him  is the #1 thing I want to do with my life.  I hope you enjoy my blog and my stories....ignore my grammar....or lack thereof.