Maternity Leave

Figuring out when to begin my maternity leave has been quite an interesting adventure this time around. With Ella Rose it was much simpler, I was waiting for labor. :() Actually, I ended up waiting for a date to induce since my doctor was going out of the country. However, the induction didn't work and I ended up having her two days later...via c-section because my labor didn't progress properly and pre-eclampsia set in.

This time around though, there's no worries about labor. We won't be inducing and the only real determination has been when to start my maternity leave knowing that the c-section is scheduled for February 15th. Actually, it was originally scheduled for February 8th and that's why the maternity leave date began to move. I put in for my leave to begin on the 4th of February...but then my doctor announced he'd not be in town this week....SO...I moved the date until the 11th of February.

However, the situation has gotten more interesting. My little family has struggled through 4 deaths in 8 days right now. All of these deaths are people closely connected to my husband. Bless his heart...

So...things have been quite stressful at home. Needless to say my blood pressure has increased again during this pregnancy and so I've been worried about a repeat of the pre-eclampsia that didn't show up with Ella until I was in active labor. So tomorrow is it. I'll officially be on maternity leave until May 2nd, and I have to say that the prospect of being home for 9 weeks fills me with excitement, but anxiety.

I'm nervous about how things are going to go during the scheduled c-section. I'm very nervous about the two weeks at home confinement after the c-section. I am phenomenally nervous about how Ella Rose will react to having a sibling. I can't help but worrying that I'm somehow hurting her by bringing another baby into our lives. And yes, I worry that I won't be bonded with this child as much as I have with Ella Rose.

Ah, the worries of a soon to be second time Mommy.

I am however, looking forward to having time with my little ones...and I look forward to updating this site and having time to do things for my loved ones at home...

I guess we'll see how it goes.

Betty

The nesting begins

I am a month out from adding a new member to our little family. Ella Rose is quite excited about Evie's arrival and I have to admit I'm excited but nervous. There is soooooo much to do at school and soooooo much to do at home. Evie's border isn't up in her room yet. Her crib isn't put together. The guestroom has to be converted into a guestroom/office and the office has to be fully converted into Evie's room. I still have to buy a mattress and I need to retrieve Ella's cloth diapers from a friend who used them for their little one. But slowly, but surely all of this will get done...

In the meantime, I'm focusing on the little things. Ella and I sorted through her old clothes yesterday and organized them. We've cleaned all the cushions on the couch and yes, I mean CLEANED!! I took the covers all off of them, y'all and washed them. I don't think I've done that since I've had the couch. Yesterday, Ella and I mopped the floor and then got down on my hands and knees and cleaned under the cabinets. Ella and I also organized her cabinet in the kitchen and the tuperware drawer.

In the meantime, Ella and I played trains, tea party, and in her sandbox. We also went outside and played ball with our yellow lab, Daisy. It was fun and Ella just cackled with laughter as Daisy chased the ball.

We've also got to get Ella's new chest-of-drawers ready to go into her room and move the wicker one into Evie's. I feel like I have months of work to do to be ready for this precious little bundle of joy to be here...but I know it will all get done.

Then there's Ella's birthday party! Ella will turn TWO exactly 5 days after Evie arrives *if* Evie waits for her c-section date to arrive. So I'm trying to do all of the preparations and planning for her birthday now. I have decorations to order, a trackless train to schedule, and birthday presents to purchase. But I'm looking forward to it.

I may be totally out of my mind, but I can hardly wait to be home full time with my girls for a few months. And I know that things won't all go according to plan, but here's what I do have planned. Ella will keep going to Aunt 'Nise's on Tuesdays and Thursdays to play with her friends. Friday's Ella and I will go to Mommy and Me at the Arts Center and Evie will go to Aunt 'Nise's for an hour or so. Monday nights Ella will do gymnastics. Other than that we'll play outside...and do crafts at home and such. We can visit Wild Adventures on our season pass or go to Chehaw Park to the playground/zoo etc...on our season pass. I can hardly wait!

I have no idea what it will be like having two so close together in age, and I worry about how Ella Rose will react. Hopefully, it won't be so hard her. I am planning on tandem nursing and yes, Ella is still nursing now. I keep reminding her that Evie will bring more milk when she arrives. Ella really likes this.

But I am open for tips, suggestions and thoughts on what it's like to have two...two and under or just two in general. In the meantime, I'm going to return to my flurry of activities and nest away...after all Evie will be here soon...so there's a LOT to do before she comes.

Betty

Sunday, Sunday...

Well y'all, we didn't make to Kid-o-ween this weekend. Maybe we'll get there next weekend...instead we participated in a first Sunday brunch at our church. The family took naps this afternoon and we hung around the homefront and played. It was a nice Sunday overall. I did manage to find and purchase Ella's Thanksgiving dress. It's never too early to start working on that stuff...the house is still relatively clean and I've gotten my husband off for another business trip.

Tomorrow, will be another blissful morning of fall break. I don't yet know what the day holds, but I can hardly wait!

Until then,
Betty

Soothing Saturday

What a wonderful day to begin fall break.My dear husband returned from a business trip last night. Our dear daughter slept in this morning until 8:30. It was glorious!!! I thoroughly enjoyed the extra rest. The work that I'd put into cleaning the house yesterday before picking up my Ella Rose from the sitters has paid off. Amazingly the house is still relatively clean and we've had a grand family day so far.

Ella and I began our day by watching Thomas the Tank Engine. She is completely enthralled with him! She dances and sings every time she sees him and I am perfectly content with that being her main source of entertainment right now. In fact, we are taking her to see Thomas "Live" in a few weeks. I'm not sure which one of us is more excited...Josh, Ella Rose, or me! It will be so much fun! Ella will get to ride on Thomas, as will Josh and I. She'll get to meet Sir Topham Hat and  there will be so much there for her to do. I've even found pink Thomas the Tank Engine overalls for her to wear for this special occasion. :)

After our Thomas debut this morning, Ella and I fixed breakfast and then she announced it was time to go outside. So we let our kitchen dishes be  while we wandered out into the back yard! Have I mentioned lately how nice it is to have a fully sided house, y'all? It makes me smile, every time I look at it! :)  Ella played on her slide, in her sandbox and with her "bubbies" (bubbles). Then she began to entertain herself at her water table.

Josh decided he wanted to replace the side benches of the picnic table, so of course Ella Rose helped with that too. While they were busy, straightened up the morning dishes and headed off to the grocery store to pick up fresh fruits and veggies...I'm on a healthy eating kick, not that we've ever really eaten unhealthily, especially since we are vegetarian, but I know so many people in the U.S. don't get enough of their fruits and vegetables and I'm determined we will... Plus, we were out of most of our fruits and cheese. It was a nice relaxing trip.

I'm trying to get a bit more creative with Ella's lunches too. She is such a good eater, but I'd love to give her  better presentation of all of her foods. So I'm toying with the idea of doing bento. Hopefully, someone out there can  give me some advice. :)  I tried to make one for her for lunch today, and it turned out decently well...not picture worthy, but colorful nonetheless...

After lunch, there was more playing outside. Then Ella came in for a nap...and while I gathered up our recycling and loaded it into my car. Ella has now headed off to Lowes with her Daddy (this is her favorite store in the world) and I ran the recylcing to the recycling center. And now, I find myself back home, with a clean house and time to update my blog.

I just know this fall break is going to be great. I can hardly wait to share more about our adventures. Tomorrow, I think Ella and I may go to Wild Adventures for kid-o-ween...but that all depends on when Josh leaves for business. We wouldn't want to leave him out, ya know?

Until tomorrow! Have a blessed Saturday.
Betty

NaBloWriMo

Today begins the first day of NaBloWriMo and even though it's been a while since I've managed to blog, I'm looking forward to the opportunity. It also marks the first day of our fall vacation. I can hardly wait to share with all of you the wonderful experiences that my family has as we celebrate October and the fall.

-Betty

5 year plan

Growing up, my Momma regularly told me that I needed to have a five year plan. So I created one. After I finished college my 5 year planning process ended...I had vague goals, such as get married before 30...didn't manage that one...but came close. I wanted to have a baby...by the time I was 30. I missed that goal too, but not by much...just a couple of years. I knew I wanted to be working full time, and be able to support myself. Check! I managed that goal...but what I never imagined, not in a million years was that my next five year plan would be financial.

Yes folks, I'm the money lady around our house. Scary!!!! I have an English and Philosophy degree and to say that I'm not good at math is an understatement. I'm HORRIBLE when it comes to math...but oddly enough, decent when it comes to finances. Now, don't get me wrong. I don't care much for money. In fact, if I were to create a world, money wouldn't exist. It simply doesn't matter much to me, unless of course I don't have it.

Well, not having it has been a problem for a while. My husband and make a decent living...well...more than a decent living, but we're struggling to make ends meet and I finally had, had enough. So this month, I became the money lady. My husband handed the bills over to me and the passwords to accounts, etc...and told me to go to it. So I am.

And I've developed a five year plan! Ha! Who would have thought...I'd be back to five year plans? But they work. So here's the plan...and the steps to get there.

We are going to get out of debt, have another child, save for the future, pay off our mortgage early, go on a trip to Italy, and contribute to our retirement, save for our child's (or children's) college expenses, and I'm going to take a couple of years off from the outside the home workforce and be a Stay at home Mom for a couple of years. Then going further into the future. I'll go back to work, we'll continue saving for the future (retirement and children's college), we'll buy at least 5 acres and build a nice house in the country and my husband will be in business for himself. Then,we'll sell or rent our our current home.

Nice plan, huh? So how are we going to accomplish this? And why am I dreaming of leaving the workforce or going to Italy while our country is in the worst economic slump since the Great Depression? Well...it's simple. I've decided I'm sick of debt and I heard of Dave Ramsey and debt free living for the first time this year.

And we've begun to move through the steps to get there. There are 7 baby steps in the debt free living plan. We've been on this plan for 3 weeks now, I've been visualizing it for 6 weeks. We're half way through step one, and starting on step 2.

Let me break down the steps though and explain where I see them falling in our lives.
Step 1: Save a thousand dollars. As I said, we're half way now.
Step 2: Pay off all credit card, car loans, student loans, etc... (anything but the mortgage) as fast as possible. When one debt is paid off, apply the extra money to the next debt. We've been working on this step for 3 weeks. It will take us just over three years to finish this, although it may happen faster and I hope that it does.
Step 3: Save up the equivalent of 3-6 months of expenses. I want to do a few more months than 6 for us. I anticipate we will have this step finished in just under 4 years from now.

The following year, I will quit my teaching position for a few years. Don't get me wrong. I love teaching, but I've wanted to be a stay at home Momma for as long as I can remember and the reality is that I can be...soon. In four years that is...after we get out of debt.

Yesterday, I did the calculations, and realized once our debt is gone...our expenses for the month will be less than 1/2 of our income...way less. So it's possible...and so are our other dreams. Who would have thoughts. Not I. But we do have a five year plan...so where does Italy fit into this. That's our 5 year anniversary present...and I can hardly wait. This September, will be year three of marriage (not of the get out of debt plan). So we will have two and a half years to save for our trip and I just know that's possible too.

Debt free living...that's our plan...so what's your five year plan. Do you have one?

Finally Spring!

Hi all-

Happy Spring!! Okay, so it's been spring for several weeks now, but the weather has finally caught up. I'm in hog heaven loving the warmer weather. The winter was WAY too cold for my taste! Whew!!! And to think that I live down in SOUTH Georgia. I hate to think about what the winter was like for people north of here. But at least we did get snow down here in South Georgia for the first time in over tweny years! yay!

Anyway, this past week my little one and I have been living in Spring break to it's fullest potential. My parents, sister, and niece, and nephews came to visit for Easter and for Spring break. We had SO much fun. Last Sunday we had an egg hunt and brunch at the church. Then on Monday we all visited Wild Adventures. That was the second amusement park that my Daddy had ever visited and the first time that Ella Rose had ever been to one too. Ella and I got our season pass (she didn't need one, so she'll go on mine) and so did my Momma, niece, and nephews! We are all excited about going back this summer when the water park portion of the park is open. :)

After the Wild Adventure (adventure), Ella and I hurried home and packed up for our next adventure. We decided we'd travel out to Tennessee and Mississippi with Momma, Annie, Gabe, and Danny. :) It was SO much fun. We visited with Aunt Sara and Uncle Frog. We saw Dana's new house and the children got to play with their new cousin Hays. Yay!!! And they got to ride Jimmy the horse! Even Ella got to ride. I was so proud of my little one...she may be working on walking still, but that girl can ride!

We also let them go swimming...and took them to the Children's Museum of Memphis. I was IMPRESSED to say the least. Wow! We spent hours there and could have easily spent more time, but it was time to head back for Georgia. So after thoroughly enjoying the museum we loaded up for our trek back to the good old GA.

On the way we stopped at Casey Jones' village. Everyone ate a great meal, and so Gran decided they would all get to pick out toys. Three of the children picked out stuffed animals. Ella even got to choose her own and it's a big soft stuffed pig. She leaned over grabbed it and said, "I get." So she did!!! She has hugged and snuggled with that pig ever since.

No one can say my little girl lacks knowledge of what she wants. :)

The adventures didn't stop there though...we spent the night in Calhoun which was nice and then yesterday visited with Lisa, and Sophia. What fun! Ella and Sophia ate lunch together, talked together and played together. Thankfully, there were no tears and Ella didn't poke anyone with her finger. Sophia did poke Ella, but Ella didn't care.

Finally, Ella snoozed while we made the treck back home and spent a lovely evening with Josh. Josh and Ella both conked out early and are both still snoozing as I type this. I've thought about trying to take her over to the park in Albany today, but we'll see. I do believe she might revolt if I put her in the car again today, but then again...maybe she won't. It truly depends on how long those two snooze.

I still want to do some more work on my garden and I *need* to get my spring/summer clothes down from the attic. :) So we'll see what the rest of this weekend holds.

I do know that my summer count down has begun! We have 30 more school days with students. Can you tell I'm slightly excited about that. I can hardly wait to pretend to be a full time Mommy again. Perhaps, I should say that I can hardly wait to be a full time summertime stay at home Mommy again!

Come on Summer!!!