MIA.... yet again. Oops!

I've been a terrible, no-good blogger lately... sorry! Things have been hectic these past few weeks. Not much been happening but Boogie has just been weird lately. She's extra clingy, doesn't want to play... but she's not sick and as far as I can tell she's not teething. Totally weird. She's eating fine... sleeping like "normal", at least normal for HER. I honestly don't have any hopes that she will be sleeping through the night any time soon. Oh joy! She doesn't even nurse at night anymore, at least not most nights. Occasionally if I'm having a really hard time getting her back to sleep then I let her nurse, but typically she only nurses before her nap and before bedtime.


We totally missed out on any kind of Easter celebrations with Boogie. We did some finger painting the week before and ATTEMPTED to make sugar cookies, and that was an epic fail. Then Boogie was sick the weekend of Easter so we missed church and had to cancel our family get together (we invited both sets of grandparents to my mom's to celebrate Boogie's 2nd Easter). So we didn't do an egg hunt, we didn't dye eggs.... nothing. Hopefully all will be well NEXT year!


The week before Easter we did manage to get some great pics of Boogie in her Easter dress though! Woo! So.... here you go!

New Look

Thanks to my Aunt Tracee, I found a great new layout for my blog! So, I'm updating here and there, including some stuff in my pages... so bare with me while I'm "under construction"... and please pray for my Boogie, she's caught a bug and we're hoping she'll start feeling better soon!

Five Question Friday

1. Would you prefer having people over for dinner or going to their house?
It honestly depends on who it is... for instance, if we're having dinner with the Flint Monsters, it's just easier going to their house. We have far less kids, lmbo, to load into a car than they do. If it's our parents, sometimes it's better for them to come here so that we don't have to load Boogie into the car and have her pitch a fit when we load her back in to come home. She HATES her car seat.

2. Favorite bible verse and why?
Jeremiah 29:11... because it gives me hope that no matter what happens in my life that God has a plan for me. I may not understand His plan, but I know that He knows exactly where my life is heading, even if I don't always make the right choices or choose the right road to take.

3. What was the first concert you ever attended, and the most recent one? 
My first concert was when I was 10 years old and my mom took me to see Michael W. Smith in concert... AND I got to go backstage and meet him! I was thrilled! The last concert I went too.... oh man. I don't think I've been to one since Justin and I started dating actually... so it was probably a Christian concert and Xtreme Winter my senior year in high school. I want to say Barlow Girl was there... but other than that I can't remember.

4. The year is 2025. What are you doing, and what have you done?
In the year 2025 I will be 37 years old, I will have had 4 kids and Boogie will be 15 (yikes!). I hope to still be a stay at home mom, home-schooling my kids and taking them on grand adventures :) Maybe by then I will be a doula and a lactation consultant!

5. What's your favorite Easter treat?
Honestly? Ham. I love ham... too bad we're not having a ham this year... darn it! 

What's On Your Nightstand? - April

It's that time of month again! I think these are my favorite blog posts to write (at least most days... since bragging about Boogie is pretty fun too! LOL!) I've found a great deal of time to read this month, the bigger Boogie gets the more time I'm finding to bury my nose in fantastic adventures and stories!
What I've read this past month...

This is the 3rd book in the Hunger Game series... I don't like giving summaries on series if you haven't read the first books, but I will say that this was NOT my favorite of the trio. However, it was still a great read. I still, and will continue to recommend this series!

I'm so sad that this is the last book in Bailey's series... she has been one of my favorite characters in several series of Karen Kingsbury's books. We followed her childhood in the Firstborn series, then we go with her to college in the Above the Line series, and then finally we watch her follow her dreams and become an adult in the Bailey Flanigan series. I can't even explain to you the joy that ALL of Karen Kingsbury's books bring to me. Her novels are inspirational, uplifting.... and each and every book is a wonderful read. 

Like I said about Mockingjay, I will not summarize books in series because you don't need to know details unless you read the first ones! Hehe! This series has been pretty interesting so far, not at all what I expected... now I just have to wait for my name to be "called" on the waiting list for our library's digital book site!

Since it typically takes some mommy milk, cuddling, and reading to get our little one to sleep, J and I have started reading the Chronicles of Narnia out loud once Boogie is nursing and starting to fade. It seems to help soothe her and relax her AND we get to read this awesome series together! The first book wasn't at all what I expected, if you enjoyed the movies then these books should catch your interest as well. You do have to remember that the language is a bit old, and some words are words that I laughed at when reading them out loud... they just sound silly in this day and age I guess! I don't want to give many details about this one either, but to give you a sneak peak... in this first book of Narnia you discover how Narnia came to be, where the White Witch came from, who the professor that the children stay with during the war is, and much much more! 

What I'm reading now and hope to read later this month: 

We actually started this second book a few weeks ago, we'll probably finish the last few chapters this week. I loved this one... it's so much different from the movie, but so so so so SO much better! I love the details that C.S. Lewis gives you about everything. He describes the smells, the tastes, the textures, the colors.... everything about Narnia and the beings that live there. We're almost to the war, I'm excited to see how the book is different from the movie here as well!

Book 3 will be next of course... I'm excited to see what this one is about since they skipped this one in the move business as well as Book 1!

This is the Forever Faithful Trilogy which includes Waiting for Morning, A Moment of Weakness, and Halfway to Forever. I JUST finished Waiting for Morning this evening and am getting ready to start A Moment of Weakness. The first novel was heartbreaking AND eye opening. The basic lesson of the entire book is forgiveness. A family of 4 is broken because a drunk driver hit their family car and killed the father and the oldest child... the mother fights to have the drunk driver given the harshest punishment she can get... but yet she still finds herself battling anger and resentment. Her youngest daughter fights depression and eventually makes an attempt at suicide.... it's heartbreaking, but the end is beautiful. Forgiveness is a hard thing to deal with, whether it be with a simple act or an enormous gesture as this woman did for the man who killed half of her family. I'm looking forward to reading the next novel in the series.

I was hoping to read this one last month but I didn't get that far... so hopefully I'll get a chance to read this one soon!

I've actually already read this one, but it's been a while.... and I'd like to reread it before seeing the movie. I don't even remember much about it... oops!

After reading Marta's legacy books I wanted to find another series of Francine River's to read.... this set looks promising! I'm excited to find a copy and start reading!

Crazy Busy with a Crazy Toddler

Whew! These past few weeks have been a whirlwind of crazy, to say the least. J was promoted, Boogie cut a couple thousand new teeth (obviously I'm exaggerating, but it was NOT fun), we welcomed a sweet sweet little 3 month old boy into our home to play 2 days a week.... we're settling into our apartment.... getting into confrontations with our neighbors about parking spaces (yea, really. it's insane) and fighting to get the deposit back from our old apartment. Yikes! Anyways, so yes. It's been a crazy few weeks. But enough of that! Let's talk about my girl!

Boogie turned 15 months old on the 28th and we went to her 15 month check up on the 29th. She weighs 21 lbs and is 30.5 inches tall, she is coming along swimmingly :-D Her vocabulary is exploding, she astounds me on a daily basis... today she tried to say octopus but it came out more like "pictopus" lol. We are slowly transitioning into our summer clothes, although most of hers are VERY big on her. She still fits pretty well into her 18 month sizes, but the majority of her summer clothes are 24 months or 2T, however, I'm sure they will fit better in the next few months when she'll need them more! We have started working on the alphabet and naming animals, she's pretty good at naming a few animals and she can identify a few of the letters thanks to this awesome Leapfrong Fridge Magnet Phonics thing we bought. Speaking of which.... thanks to pinterest we decided to buy an oil drip pan to use as a magnet board. I also spray painted it with chalkboard paint, so it doubles as a chalk board! It's awesome! Anyways, yea, so she is working on that. She can point out a large amount of body parts (eyes, nose, ears, head, hair, etc.) and has started putting words with her signs. So in the middle of the night she knows if she says "milk, pwease.... pwetty pwetty pwease" that I can't say no. Geez. What else? She's becoming very very VERY independent. She does NOT like to hold hands, does NOT like to be held, does NOT like to be worn (although she settles down once she's comfortable), does NOT like any kind of help.... unless she says, "help?" Ay yi yi! My girl is growing up!

Alright... enough talk. Here are some pics of our life the past few weeks.... please excuse the ginormous mess of dishes in the kitchen, I promise I washed them RIGHT after taking pictures. Really.... I did. And there are some photos of the day we spent some time with our favorite Flint Monsters!

And mobile photos... so the quality isn't as great but...

A Whirlwind of Blessings

This past week has been incredible. As I mentioned before we spent last week moving into a new apartment with a much better landlord... this apartment is beyond amazing. Now of course we have neighbors above us so we have to get used to the creaking of floors and such, but beyond that it is SO much better than our previous home. Boogie's room is much much bigger, we have a normal sized kitchen, a back patio with a fence... and we are finally moved in and everything is unpacked (with the exception of some decor). We love it! I'm sure you could tell from pictures of Boogie in our old apartment that her toys had overrun the living room... well in our new apartment her room is big enough to fit almost ALL of her toys, including her new kitchen! We have one shelf of toys and a few of her bigger toys in the living room, but other than that everything is in her room. It's amazing having a living room not cluttered with a multitude of toys!


If you have read my posts then you know that in December a new company took over the food services department that J works in and he got promoted to a cook's position at that time. You also know then that J has been working towards getting his certification as a CDM (certified Dietary Manager) and completed the class in December. Now we are just waiting for him to complete the exam in October. Well, this past week a position opened up for the Assistant Manager in the same department he was working in (I think the technical job name is Production Manager or something like that) so he decided to apply for it. We were hesitant to get excited because we didn't know if they would be willing to hire him without having his certification complete. We were hopeful though because it would mean significant pay increase and better benefits..... well J got the job! I'm so proud of him! He's worked so hard to get here and he has a lot more work ahead of him, but this is a step in the right direction. He's gone a lot now because of his new schedule, but like I told him last night, it won't be like this forever. Currently he works from about 8:30am-6pm Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday, and then he works 5:30am-6pm on Fridays and Saturdays. He's off Sundays and Mondays thankfully. Another exciting thing about this new job is that once his certification is complete he will have the opportunity within the company to get a CDM position, this company is spread across the East coast, so we could go anywhere!


Boogie is doing so well with all these changes we've made. She's really grown a lot in the past week and has learned more and more new words. She completely blows my mind most days with how much she learns so quickly. My favorite words she says right now is "milk, please?" and she signs it at the same time. It comes out more as "milk, pwease", but it's SO cute. Love her!


I will take some pics of our new apartment as soon as I can, and hopefully I'll get some pics of my girl as well. Until then.... God bless!

Five Question Friday

1. Will you run to the store or to pick up a kid looking a mess?
Kind of! I do pull my hair up and put on more suitable clothing... I usually wear nursing tanks and pajama shorts that would NOT be appropriate for the public. Not that they're revealing or anything, just too short and revealing for me!

2. Do you finish a book if it's boring or you don't like it?
Yes, I always finish my books!

3. Beach or mountain vacations?
Both! Even though we live in the mountains it's always nice to take last minute or short weekend trips to Gatlinburg. Longer vacations I prefer going to the beach!

4. What thing/event says "winter will end and spring is around the corner" to you?
  Daffodils, tulips, and violets!

5. Would you prefer couples or family vacation?
Family. FAMILY. Family! I much prefer spending time with J AND Boogie, vacations just aren't as fun with my girl!

Five Question Friday

**FYI - we are moving this coming week so I will be totally MIA for about 2 weeks. I'm going to try to at least do FQF, but we'll see. Might not have internet hooked up next Friday.**




1. Are you looking forward to the time change this weekend?
Actually, yes! It really won't affect me or Boogie that much, especially since lately she's been going to bed later than usual and waking up later than usual. It might just put her back on her normal schedule lol! It also means more sunshine to enjoy in the evenings and SPRING!

2. Are you getting a new iPad/do you want an iPad?
I wish! I want to save up for one to use for homeschooling, there are some amazing apps to use for school and development :-D

3. If money was not a problem, what is the one thing you would splurge on?
My dream house.

4. How did you and Mr. meet?
We actually went to school together and then re-connected via Myspace!

5. Summer is right around the corner. Bikini or one piece?
LMBO! Right... I'll be sporting a one piece and STILL would even if I had abs of steel. Thank you, VERY much! ;-)

What's On Your Nightstand?

Yay! It's that time again! I love to read... I just wish I had more time to do so! Lately, even though she sleeps great in her crib for naps, I've been cuddling up with Boogie in the recliner and letting her nap on me. One, I get sweet cuddles that she isn't always inclined to share, and two, I'm forced to sit there and then I have time to read :-D Anyways... I just finished several books, let's see if I can remember them all!

 

Ok, I admit it. I saw the movie BEFORE reading the book. Shame on me! Oh well... the book was fantastic, and I'm glad that I'm not the type of person who busts into tears during a sad read (unless I'm pregnant) because this was also an incredibly sad story. Basically, this book is about a family who started out with 2 kids (Jesse and Kate) and they find out that their daughter Kate has leukemia. Jesse and his parents are not a match to help with blood transfusions or organ donation so the doctor suggests for them to have another child. So here enters Anna... her entire life she's been giving and giving to Kate to help Kate live, which is GREAT... but nobody ever ASKS her if she wants too. So Anna hires a lawyer and sues her parents. It's truly a great read, and I highly recommend it!

 

Oh this book... I though My Sister's Keeper was sad, but this one was heartbreaking. This book is about a family (Charlotte and Sean get married and start trying to have a baby, Charlotte already had one child named Amelia) who finally gets pregnant with their first child together, and after an ultrasound at 20(I think) weeks, it's discovered that the baby girl, Willow, has a bone disease called osteogenesis  imperfecta. This bone disease causes Willow's bones to be incredibly brittle and easily broken, her case is so severe that just a slight touch of her newborn body and her bones could break. You follow this family on a vacation where Willow falls at Disney World and is sent to the hospital... a lot of miscommunication happens at the hospital and her parents are arrested for child abuse and her sister Amelia is taken to stay with a foster family. Once everything is worked out and they return home Sean decides to sue the hospital and police station who handled the entire ordeal but finds that he has no case. During this meeting with the lawyers, the lawyers explain that although they don't have a case based on this incident they may be able to sue for wrongful birth (speaking of Willow). It's a hard read, especially if you're a mother... but it's a good book, it's inspiring, heart wrenching, and another good read by Jodi Picoult. 

 

I am not going to summarize this book because you HAVE to read the first one first! But these books are phenomenal, only took me a few days to read (and if I could have I would have had the first 2 read in a few hours....). Seriously, go find a copy. READ THEM NOW!

Ok, moving on to what I'm reading now and later this month....

Before I share these first two let me explain that I'm really into supernatural teen fiction lately. Yes, that includes Twilight, House of Night series, Vampire Academy... etc. I'm a book nerd. 

 

This is the book I'm reading now, it's the 3rd book in this particular series (Fallen). It's a little hard to explain, so I'll point you to Lauren Kate's page so you can read up on the series. Go HERE.

And here are the books I'm hoping to read later:

 

 

 

 

 

 

Five Question Friday

1. Where is your favorite vacation spot and why?
I really want to say the beach... but I haven't been there with Boogie yet so I may NOT like it with a small child, who knows? So, I think right now my favorite spot would be Gatlinburg, TN. It's close enough that it's not absolute torture to ride in the car with a kid who hates her carseat, and there's lots to do to stay busy!

2. What is your biggest guilty pleasure?
Pinterest, oh Pinterest.... how I love thee!

3. What is your favorite fashion trend right now? Or in the past?
I really love sweater dresses with leggings and boots... not sure if that's "in"... I don't really keep up with fashion. I wear what I like ;-) For Boogie, I love putting her in tights, dresses or skirts and her cowboy boots. :-D

4. What are your spring break plans?
Spring Break for me is any other week really... although my mom is a teacher and will be off so hopefully we will get to spend some time with "Mamaw!" AND, hopefully make a trip to Ohio to see her side of the family.... I'm excited and dreading taking Boogie. 6 hours in her carseat... ugh. 

5. What baby names do you hate?
Stupid names.... you know names like Snow, Bear, Dude... why would you name your kid something like that? or Neaveh... yea, Heaven backwards. That one just annoys me.