Nursery

So we're in our 37th week here and anxiously anticipating the birth of this little guy. I'm totally loving watching him moving around my belly though, I will miss having him inside of me. Things are definitely getting real; we have the nursery together, bags packed and carseat installed. When we left church on Sunday I realized that there are only a couple more times that we'll be leaving church and its just me and the hubs. The nursery is done, clothes are washed and put away, diapers are washed and put away. There are a few things left to do; like scrub the house and bake an insane amount of dinners and snacks.
Without further ado, here is a look at the nursery.
This is a look at the corner of the room; I love the crate that holds the books you can't see it but it the fabric has awesome numbers and letters in different fonts. The books were the wishing well at the shower, we really got some amazing books that I've been enjoying reading to Baby B already. I have some handmade things from when I was little the Strawberry Shortcake figures were made for me by my sister and there is a little duck finger puppet that my cousin made me. We've been calling this baby our lobster because thats how he looked in the ultrasound and there is a cute lobster hat from his Auntie and Uncle. I also love his Piggy Bank gifted from Eminstiches. Our quilt is also hung here, the theme of the nursery is birds and trees but its really just a loose theme.
I love this crazy mobile. Last Christmas I used some money I received to purchase some things for our nursery. This was before we found out we were pregnant and I was so happy to find out a few weeks later that we were expecting. The birdies are Christmas ornaments from Anthropologie, and I just really liked all the colors, a few of them have little shiny bits as well. Baby B will have a good amount to look at there!!
This is a pic of the shelf above the crib. The garland was decoration from my shower made by Mama K, the cute birdie print is from Mama K as well (you can't tell here but the birds totally match the ribbon from the mobile!). The cross is St. Brigids cross, if Baby B was a girl his name was going to be Brigid after this saint. The cross is made by weaving reeds from the River Shannon, to me its just a beautiful way of using God's creation to tell the story of redemption. The angel is hope, because we hoped and prayed for this little boy.
We received some really beautiful homemade goodies for Baby B; the Froggie was made for me by Eminstitches, this blanket was made by Granny Dirkey for Baby B. When he's born I'm going to be posting some more of the handmade goodies we received, I really do treasure the hard work that goes into those types of gifts.
I love this present that we received; its Baby B's name, meaning and a scripture (2nd Chronicles 16:9 "The eyes of the LORD search the whole earth in order to strengthen those whose hearts are fully committed to him. "). My friend did the calligraphy herself and I love that its the first thing that we see when coming into the nursery.
here's a look into the room with the little toy basket and hamper at the base of the bed. I really like how the room turned out. We purposefully wanted it to be pretty gender neutral (in hopes of future little ones) and think we accomplished this. Every time I look around I see all the love that surrounds our family and Baby Ben; he is so blessed to have so many wonderful people in his life.

Cloth Diapering Amazingness!

So this little lobster is getting cloth diapers, way more for frugal reasons than for any other but the environmental issues did weigh in in our decision making. The hubs is totally on board with it, I think it made it easier that he learned how to do cloth with the twins and realized its not that difficult. Thankfully I have some IRL friends that use cloth on their tots that have totally helped me decide what I do and don't need. When we had the twins we purchased about 2 dozen prefolds and about 6 covers in medium size; which is awesome now cause that money was long ago spent and doesn't impact our current budget. In the past week or so I've gotten awesome gifts and loans of more cloth diapers. One of my former doula clients and friends gave us on loan 32 Swaddlebees with a bunch of newborn covers, woolies and fleece. Another friend who is on her last babe passed along a bunch of prefolds. My dear friend, Mama K, has said she would help me organize my stash and see if there are any holes (as well as pass along on loan some of her small ones). I also won the most adorable medium cover from Deb at Made By Mama by being her fan on Facebook.

As it looks now we pretty much are set for diapering our babe in October. I'm just so incredibly thankful that this is working out so early in my pregnancy and I don't need to worry about it later on. I'm also so thankful that I have friends and family that already do alot of the things that the hubs and I would like to do with our child. What a wonderful support network already in place.

I am blessed.

Dream

So this morning I woke up at 3:30 am after having a dream. It wasn't a bad dream it was one of those ones you kind of wish you could fall back asleep and revisit. I had a very vivid dream about my best friend Amanda. I was at a spending time at her house with her and it was obvious that I was in her world. She was doing great with a whole host of friends and a lovely house. The house was one of those ones that you would love to explore with nooks and cranys and odd spaces. I was able to tell her my news and see her reaction. It was one of those dreams thats like a gift to you. I've gotten several gifts like this since Amanda had passed but this one was special because its been so long and my news is something we both dreamed about all growing up; to be moms. I got to tell her all about Jason and then tell her my news, it was so nice. Its still amazing to me that you can miss someone so much after so long, but I'm so glad I got to share with my first bff if only in a dream.

I wasn't going to share my news on my blog just yet but I couldn't keep that dream to myself. I don't want to forget it.

We are due 10/10/10 and are so incredibly excited. We saw our little lobsters (what the baby looks like on the ultrasound) heartbeat last Tuesday and it was so incredibly amazing to watch that little heart going.

Camping Trip

So we left off last week on our way to the campground in the pouring rain. The family that was going with us had a little girl so they weren't so sure they wanted to brave the elements. Well we turned into the state forest and it stopped raining. Wondering if it was just a beneficial fluke we quickly set up camp, worried that it would start raining again. We got the camp set up in record time and the weather held for us. Our friends ended up meeting us a few hours later with their little girl. It was so nice being out in the woods again hearing all the bugs and frogs. I really miss how loud nature can be :)

one of the gorgeous wooded paths

We were pretty much alone at the campsite that night, there were a couple of other campsites filled up but not really anyone that we even saw or heard. It was great spending a quiet night by the fire playing Phase 10, talking and making some smores. We woke up pretty late on Saturday and just spent the day walking around and playing on the playground.

The hubs and his good friend were "super" excited to play on the playground

The hubs caught the fishing bug while we were there and is so ridiculously excited to get back out with his pole.

My hottie

That night was another campfire, more games, more smores and more talking. This was probably one of the most relaxing camping weekends I've had in my life.

There's fish in that there water

A great bonus was how cheap it was, we stayed at the state park so it was $20 a night split by the two couples it was just $20 for the weekend. The campground allows 6 people on a site so it could be even cheaper if we split it three ways. We did pretty frugal meals; Hot dogs and pasta for dinners; eggs, bacon and pancakes for breakfasts and sandwiches for lunch.

Oh boy I love him :)

Heart Breaking

Today I'm heading to a funeral.  I haven't seen this man for about 11 years but still my heart breaks a little thinking about it.  The last time I saw him he was a few days out of a coma and shortly after he had to be admitted to a rehabilitation center as his injuries didn't allow him to be  cared for at home.  He was my best friends dad and was in a coma due to the car accident that took my best friends life.  A few weeks ago it was the 11th anniversary of that accident and every year I can't help but think how that accident changed their family's life and also my own. 

 They had a small family just a mom, dad, son and daughter.  I used to go over often to play when I was little and to hang out as we got older, I'll never forget the love that they had for each other and for myself as well and I will always treasure those memories.  

That day, my friend Amanda, was driving from the mall to a Bible study with her dad in the car.  She didn't gauge the turn correctly and ended up being hit by a car.  She died a few hours later.  

I got my own license a few months later and I know her accident caused me to be a more cautious driver.  Personally it is what showed me there was a God and that He loved me.   Yes, it was a horrible horrible time in my life but through it I felt God's love for me in a real and tangible way. Since that day I have been able to rest in that knowledge knowing that love has carried me through some of my toughest days.  

As for Amanda's family, her mother died a couple years after she did while I was on a missions trip to Haiti.  I wasn't able to go to that funeral but I did visit her shortly before her passing.  Now her father has also passed.  My heart and prayers go out to her brother, and I ask you to also keep him in your prayers today.  That he would feel that same love strengthen him to get through these tough days ahead.

Funny for today

So I was down at Mama K's yesterday and brought her some prints that I got from Walgreens (they had a 20 free print thing going on the other day). Anyway Mama K's little boy W and my little niece Meggie are about two weeks apart in age and both little blonds with brown eyes. So I showed W a pic of Meggie and said "here's a picture of your future wife, w".
Well W looks intently at the picture for about 2 minutes then says kind of nonchalantly "I like that."
Let the wedding planning begin :)

Raw Smoothie Week

So I've been catching up on some books that I've wanted to read lately.  I just finished Green for Life and I'm about midway through Gorgeously Green. Between those two books and some conversations with Mama K I'm inspired to try going Raw for up until dinner this week.  Being the ridiculously supportive husband that he is the hubs is jumping on the bandwagon to help me.  I just spent about an hour blending all the smoothies for us for tomorrow.  We have a Chia Seed, Apple, Lemon, Kale blend; a Blueberry, Banana, Celery Blend and a simple Banana, Spinach blend.  I tasted them all and they are pretty good.  We'll see how filling they are as the week goes on but I'm excited to try it at least.  

Its been pretty interesting reading in depth in Green for Life on some of the points brought up in the book about PH levels in your stomach and stomach acid in regards to how you absorb nutrients.  Also the comparison to a typical American diet to that of the closest animal to us in genetic composition the Chimpanzee, was pretty intriguing.  Gorgeously Green has some great tips on finding health and beauty items that are good for you, some great tips on getting my body moving and I'm sure alot more but I'm only halfway through that one.  Being a part of a local coop has really helped me switch most of our bath and body products over to healthy choices but there are some holdouts (deodorant is the big one) that we just haven't found a good alternative for.  Its been inspiring me to examine that a bit more. 

As far as getting moving I got my butt kicked by Leslie Sansone's Walk and Fit which tells me that I need to do it some more. I threw in some pilates beforehand but only got ten minutes in before I had to call it quits on that.  The hubs and I have made a promise to each other to do some type of workout three times a week together as I realize I'm less likely to quit doing it if he's doing it with me and he feels the same. 

I literally feel like a page is turning in my life and there is a gorgeously blank slate set before me.  Everything in my life has changed recently but for the first time in weeks I'm kind of seeing some good come out of it.  

The Big 3-0

Sunrise in Hawaii on my birthday
So you all might remember that my 30th birthday was a couple of weeks ago, it happened to fall while I was in Hawaii (yes I planned it like that). It was a wonderful day spent relaxing on the beach in Hawaii, then frantically packing our condo (we got the check out time wrong), walking around Waikiki and topping it off by taking a 14 hour plane trip. Interspersed in there were some great phone calls from friends and family wishing me a happy birthday. I felt (and feel) incredibly loved and blessed to have the friends and family that I have. My mom met me at work the next day with cake for the office, a gift and a balloon (yes, she's that sweet). The hubs got me an awesome present in an old lady bike with a bell (he gave me a choice and I was like OLD LADY BIKE HERE I COME!!!). Just have to pick up some velour track suits and I'm ready for the grandkids.... errrr... kids.. whatever :)
Pics of my birthday party friends top row right to left: Mama K, Eminstitches, Dirkey, Kitten Mom, bottom row: Anne, Tamara, Gelsey and Becky

Well last Saturday the hubs had to work so I had exciting plans to clean my house the whole day then have Mama K, Eminstitches and my very unbloggy friend Tamara over for some leftover chicken soup. Well Mama K showed up first and we're talking then the doorbell rings and its a bunch of my good friends with balloons, a feather boa and a princess hat (compliments of Kitten Mom). They brought a whole fondue party over to my house!! We had some incredible cheese and chocolate fondue, crazy drinks and then a choice of a bunch of movies (I picked Love Guru). It was so incredibly sweet of everyone. I was amazed at the amount of planning that went into it too, to bring all those ingredients over, to have everyone show up at the right time, to really think of something that I would like. I'm still overwhelmed with gratitude to the really great friends that I have! I am a very blessed girl!
Also next party at my house cause jeez louis they all left a bunch of booze!

Happy Birthday Daddy

So my dad is coming over tonight for a birthday dinner, so as is customary I made him a birthday cake last night. As you know my birthday cakes aren't usually the normal run of the mill type jobs, I like to have fun with them, and if you know my father you know that this one is especially appropriate.

The hubs and I were happy to have two really good friends over last night helping us with this tremendous undertaking. My friend Lisa kept singing "I think your tractors sexy" song and lets just say that after about 2 hours of cream cheese icing intake we were having a good time. There may have been another cake decorated with a plastic Captain Kirk and something about a sexy starship written on it but I'll just leave that to your imagination.

Getting it done

I have unrealistic expectations of myself. There, I said it. I expect to be able to work full time, keep my house amazingly clean, make a home-cooked nutritious dinner every night, eat right, exercise, maintain a healthy marriage, keep in touch with my friends, read, spend time praying, studying my bible and find time for my many projects.

Shocker: I can't.

I'm coming to terms with this and realizing that I need to find ways to be able to do what I can. This week I started making "easy meals" for dinner. Instead of thinking I can come home and make a meatloaf, mashed potatoes and asparagus; I come home just saying hey I can make scrambled eggs. Just by giving myself that break I'm usually able to go a bit higher than I expected. I'll add some sauteed spinach and onions in the scrambled eggs and grate some cheese and put it in a pita.

I've noticed this in my weight loss, if I look at the big picture and the whole amount I want to lose I get frustrated and lose my way. If I take it a day at a time and try to make good choices within that day it works better and I feel better about myself in the meantime.

In my house, my goal is to make my bed every morning and put away more than I take out. Everything doesn't need to be spotless all the time I just need to try to do what I can. If I keep on track with it the house can look pretty decent.

So I'm trying to take life a bite at a time. I want to start working at whats at hand, trying to throw away the ridiculous expectations that I place on myself and on others.

Wordless Wednesday-Weekend of Cakes

Above cake was made for my friend Mary's wedding this weekend by my best friend T who is AMAZING!


This cake was made by Dirkey for a friends retirement party. Its a yellow cake with buttercream and a raspberry filling; it was decorated with buttercream, fresh raspberries and fresh flowers.

After much prodding-Soggy Mama has been launched

My good friend Melody has been gently persuaded by me for the past 2 months to start a blog, and if you know anything about me and how I gently persuade people it usually is similar to a 2 year old trying to convince you to do something. I start out all nice like "mama drink?" then in about 5 seconds it moves straight to "MAMA DRINK MAMA DRINK MAMA DRIIIIIIIIIIIIINNNNKK!!!". In this case it was "Melody you should start a blog" all nonchalant like, then quickly moved to "MELODY BLOG, MELODY BLOG, MEEEEEEELLOOOODYYYY BLOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOG!!!!!!!"
So like any tired mama she just gave in and started one for little old me. Now I can waste away hours reading about her fabulous toilet swishing life and just dreaming of when we move out to our big duplex in Lancaster to be neighbors.
Without further ado I bring you Confessions of a Soggy Mama

Fun in New Castle DE

Pic of Hannah taken by Dirkey on 8/23/08

Did you guys know that if you google "fun in new castle de" is comes up as no results... well it did on Saturday when I googled it from my phone.

Pic of Park taken by Dirky on 8/23

My SIL, we'll call her R-sis, and I were planning an adventure down to a big antique show down there on Saturday. It ended up that the hubs and his brother were able to go as well, so we all jumped in their minivan and headed on down.

Hannah and Pongo Boy, who is coincidentally a girl, taken by Dirkey 8/23

We got within about a mile away and they had one of those banners up that goes across the road. I started reading it and realized that the Antique Show was SUNDAY, yeah we drove that far away (over an hour) for something that was the next day.. grrrrr... We were determined to make Lemonaid out of the sour lemon situation and had ourselves a picnic and hung out at the cute park the Antique show would have been in had it been the right day. We had Homemade Hummus and Pitas, Cheese and Crackers, PB and J, Fruit Salad, Homemade Sugar Cookies.

Picture of some mini pb and j sandwhiches that were assembled by your favorite Dirkey 8/23/08

After we had lunch we had to burn off all those calories so we did some exploring.

Pic where Hannah reminds me of a pirate 8/23/08

And some Shoulder Riding... Ok only Hannah did this because if anyone else did it would cause some serious injuries

Pic of Hannah and Her Daddy 8/23/08

The hubs and I took the opportunity to take our famous self-portrait or as his brother likes to say our "myspace shot"

Dirkey and her hubs 8/23/08

After the park we went to the Christiana Mall for some tax free shopping, and ended up just window shopping.

It was a great day, made even better by some awesome company.

R-sis, Hannah and J-bro taken by Dirkey 8/23/08

So now when someone googles Fun in New Castle De they'll see us and our
Fabulous, relaxing Frugal Fun Day

Prayers Please

A good friend of mine, Frank, is going for a biopsy of his brain today. He is my friend Becky's father and I'm asking any and all prayers I can get for him. From what I hear he lost vision in his one eye yesterday and they ended up scanning his brain and finding a mass there. Frank and his wife Leslie started a ministry called Hope Alive to provide for the medical and spiritual needs of the people of Haiti. I have been down to their clinic twice, once to visit(while on a missions trip to another mission) and another time I spent about 5 weeks working there with their daughter Becky. I am amazed at how much they do; and at the level of accountability they have. Frank and Leslie cover all administrative costs themselves so that every penny donated meets a direct need in Haiti. I have tremendous respect and love for the two of them. If you could say some prayers today, I would appreciate them more than you know.
I'll update as soon as I know anything.

Weekend Update Pt 2- The Wedding in Pictures A very wordy wordless Wednesday

So I mentioned before I went to my cousins wedding this weekend. It was a pretty classy wedding but you never know what will happen when you invite the family Dirkey to something classy, its very possible you might get this
more than likely you will get this.. yes its my mother swearing that she's only had two drinks... yeah.. as my cousin Kate said "were those two drinks, two bottles of vodka?!"
As is the case most times, the hubs and I took the oportunity to look ridiculously cute and in love (you can just call me squinty!)
My nephew Mason and his idol, Jason a.k.a. the hubs taking adorableness to a whole new level
It was great to see family that I don't normally see; my uncle, aunt and cuz from Colorado. I absolutely adore my cuz, and want to invent some type of tube that would connect Jerzy and Colorado so I could see her more or have her to dinner.
Yes, yes I lost track so we were at a wedding. The bridesmaid dresses were adorable, the church was awesome. Here is a pic of the girls walking down with an extra bonus of my moms camera
I've mentioned before that the hubs is a twin, but I'm surrounded by them here is my aunt the Mother of the Bride (looking absolutely stunning) being escorted by her twin brother.
Ahh the most important people in attendance my cousin, the gorgeous bride and the very very lucky groom. May they always look at each other like this.
Then on to the party it was held at the Larchmont Yacht Club which was just beautiful and very fitting to a cousin who has always had a love of water and sailing.

We were all treated to a full moon over the water. It really was a gorgeous day all around.

My hair, my crown of glory

So yeah, Dirkey's got her some thick old hair. Hair that hairdressers constantly comment on (oh when I say constant I'm talking about the two times a year that I go to a salon to get it cut). When Mama K told me that she washed her hair with a bar of soap I was skeptical. My brain was kind of exploding thinking that a bar of soap could never replace the ever changing amount of products that I put in my hair to make my ponytail look that much better. For one, I had never in my life, gone without conditioner. How does one do that, can you comb your hair afterwards? I've never even gotten it wet without putting conditioner in it before I attempted to comb it afterwards. So despite of my skepticism at how well this Shampoo Bar does, I decided to try it out. Now I stepped in gradually and used the bar in conjunction with a good natural conditioner but the more I read about it the more I saw that the websites said you don't need conditioner if you do this. I took the scary step last week and stopped using conditioner and you know what, I don't miss it. My hair looks and feels great (even though its still not out of its elastic jail of a ponytail).
I normally get mine at Chagrin Valley.

Shout out to Mama K

So Mama K's birthday was yesterday, so I wanted to show her a little bloggy love. If you don't know Mama K and I have been friends since high school, and she has grown to be one of the most amazing friends I've ever had. We met when we were younger maybe 13-14 at the Creation Festival (where I currently work) and then reconnected at a Bible study we both attended. We've stood up for each other our weddings, had lots of fun making memories with various different Karaoke moments, been to our fair share of Tom Jones concerts and just generally been there for each other. So in honor of when we first became friends I'm going to post this little ditty, and Mama K I hope you had and amazing Rappy Birthday!

Frugal Friday-My guide to online shopping

Today's frugal friday involves online shopping. Being the stereotypical American, I'm a busy person. By the time I get home from work, make dinner, throw a load of laundry in the washer; I don't want or have time to run out to the mall. Online shopping has wrapped me in its warm blanket of simplicity and ease. I love the fact that I can shop for gifts in the comfort of my own home, bargain shopping easily between sites. I also love being able to find gifts that I can feel good about giving; as I'm becoming more environmentally aware I'm able to find organic cotton, sustainable and fair trade products with great ease right on the internet. When I first started online shopping I wasn't quite the bargain hunter that I am today; I made a few blunders and paid for things that weren't quite what they seemed. So this is a little guide to tell you my tricks to online shopping.

1.)Find the item you want-If I'm completely blank on what to get someone I check out some of the standard gift giving websites (Mighty Goods, Red Envelope, Non Toxic Tots). If I really don't have any idea I just start googling away, when shopping for my wedding invitations I google "cheap wedding invitations" my husbands wedding band was purchased on eweddingbands.com. There are so many online retailers that it really is simple to find ANYTHING YOU NEED. Be careful once you find the item; read the small print, check the measurements, read the reviews of the product.

2.)Figure out what site you will use to purchase-Once I find the item I will google the item and look at the different sites that sell it. Its here that I try to put my money where my mouth is. I try not to purchase on big mega giants like Walmart, Target, Macy's; but put my money to something I feel good about supporting (WAHM shops, Environmentally Sound Companies, Companies supporting Fair Trade). Within these sites I do a bit of bargain shopping to see where the cheapest place to purchase is.

3.)Google for Coupon Codes-I then google to see if I can find a coupon code for free shipping or a percentage off of my order. Its like the old saying goes-You never know until you ask.

I know its not rocket science but these are the things that I've learned from online shopping, hope it helps you!

<a href="http://www.dirkey.blogspot.com" target="_blank"><img alt="Dirkey" src="http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2306/2422433079_00cdb91b63_m.jpg" border="0" /></a>

I found out that Frugal Friday didn't start here-the original is at Biblical Womanhood, go check out the original!

Oh No!!!

So my best friend called me today and told me that her puppy Anubis has bone cancer. Anubis is like her little baby as her and her husband do not have kids. The vet said that they give him about 6 months to live. Please keep Tamara in your prayers that she would have peace and be comforted.

Princess for the day

Or so I have been crowned by Julie Laipply at our festival.