Today I decided to paint the changing table that mom and dad found me at a yard sale. It doesn't match the rest of the furniture, so I thought painting it one of the colors in the bedding would be cool. Since it's a Jenny Lind design it has these little ridges and I wanted to paint them different colors, but I found that to be a little harder than I had the patience for today...especially with all the help my dogs wanted to give me.

As you can see I chose a reddish color and I had started the little bits of color around the top. Roscoe is oblivious to the paint and all my hard work and poor Woodrow just wants me to throw the frisbee.

Here's a close up of the places I painted different colors. Since I didn't stay in the lines too well, I decided to lightly spray the red to where it just splattered over the colors to take away from the stark contrast...it looked much better.

And here it is the room...the extra little colors are barely noticable which is how I like it. I was very happy with the way it turned out and glad I got it done before going back to work tomorrow! Be ready for more picture next weekend because I think the walls will be done next!!

Merry Christmas 2008

Hope everyone had a Merry Christmas! Josh and I celebrated with my parents on Christmas Eve, his parents Christmas morning, and then I drove to Pocahontas to see everyone for a couple of nights! We had lots of fun! Here's some pictures!

Here's our Christmas lunch at our house...deer, duck, mac n cheese, green bean casserole, sweet potato pie, peas, deviled eggs and PRESENTS...hehehehe!!

Here's Ana, Rachel, and my Aunt Cissy decorating cupcakes with a nifty little gift!

Here's my mom practicing her grandma role with my newest baby cousin, Noah.

This is a picture I took with my new camera I bought myself for christmas...the day after christmas on sale! I like this picture because you can see Ozzy watching the hunting channel...he really watches it and gets very excited when deer get killed.

I took this picture from Leah's new camera's screen...I didn't get my camera out quick enough to get this picture.

Here's some of us girls around the table...thats just one bottle of several that "they" all went through...except for me...Diet Caffeine Free Coke for me!

Here's Luke and Ashley eating popcorn balls that my Grandmother brought over from Halloween. They seemed to really like these, as well as Luke's dog, Oscar. At the end of the night he licked up all the crumbs in the dining room!

This last little video was Ely telling his "story" that he shared on Christmas day with the family...in case you can't understand him, he is saying that "once upon a time...." grandmother was out in her yard planting flower and lightening came down and STRUCK her and killed her....the end...somehow a little boy telling that story is cute!

Dancing Elves

My Aunt Lisa sent me the famous "elf yourself" videos of her and her kids....very cute!! Well I got addicted and made 3 different ones of Josh, me and Roscoe, then Leah, Tiff, and me, and then finally my parents...here they are:



http://elfyourself.jibjab.com/view/AvVDdzxmogiIqT5z

http://elfyourself.jibjab.com/view/yzgBAZqOu0cgx6hNI1Fy

http://elfyourself.jibjab.com/view/H92ZIFLLoQWHZiPCv7Me

Hope these work...they expire Jan 15th I think!

Mason is moving!

Today I decided to take a bath instead of shower before I ran out to Walmart and then to work. So I grabbed my cell phone, laid back to relax, and started texting my cousins Tiffany and Leah. All of sudden I felt the HUGE movement in my belly at the same time that in my peripheral vision I SAW my belly move. It was crazy...it last for about 30 secs. and I started laughing it tickled me so much and then he stopped. It was so neat and strange at the same time!

Another fun thing that happened this week was yesterday I got to see one of my best friends, Jennifer! I don't see her much so it was cool to talk to her! I sure hope her flight goes better back to Arizona than it did coming here!!

Merry Christmas Everyone...My supervisor gave me a great gift a couple of days ago by telling me I could have Christmas day off...so now I have a 4 day weekend and I can go to Pocahontas to see my family! Josh is hunting over the Christmas break so I hope he has fun, of course!

Enjoy the Holidays and Be Safe!!

Shopping Day

Mom and I went to go register for baby things Saturday. I found this slightly difficult because I would look things up online and read other peoples reviews and get worried that I would not like anything...I finally had to tell myself that things can be returned if they don't work.

I registered at BabyDepot online because the store is very unorganized...but it's mainly my bedding and nursery decor. We went to BabiesRUs and actually did some scanning and registered for most of the big stuff...stroller, car seat, monitors, etc.

Tomorrow I am going to go do the rest of my registering at Target...I get a $20 gift card if I register there so I will probably register for smaller necessities there!

Today I took a day off from everything. I've laid on the couch all day except to go get dinner for Josh and myself. I've been feeling the baby move more, I think...it's still that strange feeling like trying to tell the difference between the baby and gas...hahaha! We are also still pondering names...leaning toward "Mason" Josh likes the middle name Cache, pronounced Cash, but spelled like the river that he likes to hunt.

By the way...I have felt better since my stomach virus over Thanksgiving. I mean better than I've felt in a long time!! Yeah!!

Mom, dad and I went to Pocahontas Friday and Saturday for my grandmother's family reunion. I was very excited to show off my ultrasound photos and tell everyone we were having a boy! It didn't turn out that well. Friday night I stayed at Tiffany and Eric's house and everything was fine...the next day I had what I thought was my normal morning sickness. After throwing up 3 times at Tiff's I started wondering if something was wrong.

We got to the church where the reunion was and I couldn't keep anything down...not water, tea, sprite or even gatorade. I didn't try to eat anything...I was miserable. My parents and I ended up leaving a little early and I even got sick 3 times in a cup on the way home...reminded me of "Wayne's World" when Garth says " if you gotta spew, spew in this" and hands Wayne and small dixie cup.

After I got home, Josh went to Walmart and got me some pedialyte, soup and crackers. I got sick a total of 4 more times before I finally got to sleep. I woke up around 3:30 this morning feeling much better and I haven't been sick today at all!

I have no idea what happened, but after puking 14 times total I was thinking I may have to go the ER.

Sorry to everyone that I didn't get to talk to this weekend...I wasn't trying to be rude or anything...just sick! OH, and thanks Tiff for the socks...they are cute and Josh loved them!

It's a BOY!!!

This last Wednesday, Josh and I and mom and Josh's mom went to find out what was growing inside of me...and it's a BOY! We got a lot of great pictures of him wiggling and being very shy...not wanting to show his face but for a split second! After the big morning, my very sweet supervisor, Tammy, overstaffed me for the day and Josh and I went shopping...and needless to say after weeks of narrowing down baby bedding we ended up going with something completely different. Josh actually found it at Baby Depot as we were about to pick up the baby deer bedding. It was a little more expensive, but very very sweet...it's called Enchanted Hollow by Eddie Bauer.

Above is a profile of his right side...you can see his head to the right and his spinal column. Below was a snapshot of him wiggling right when we caught the first glimpse of his "you know what"

Above is the split second that we got to see him face to face...kindof scary huh? He's turned sideways!

When we got home we set up the crib and put our bedding on it to see how it looked. Roscoe seemed very confused of what was going on...he thought that the big bear my mom sent with us to decorate the forest theme was all for him...I think he becoming jealous!

He's hiding in the diaper changer here because he got yelled at for trying to steal baby toys.

Here's a shot of the crib with the bedding on it...Josh first noticed the owls in the top left corner when we saw it in the store. It also has a deer and bunny, a porcupine, bear, and what I think is a red fox...but Josh says it's a squirrell. We loved the idea of all the forest animals.

Above is the big bear my mom had at her house in her guest room which also had a forest theme. This is what Roscoe thought we brought home for him. He stood next to the crib and cried for a long time.

Deer hunting and baby nursery...what a combo.

Josh killed another 8 pt. deer this weekend. His last one was the biggest the processor said he had seen this year...and had one of the thickest necks he had ever seen. We have tons of deer meat and thats not counting this one he killed today.

The closer we get to finding out what we are having, the more I am looking at nursery stuff. I think I've narrowed my bedding down to a few different things. One is very girly, one is very boyish, and the other is neutral.

Here's the neutral...it's a small picture, but it's bright green and blue with bubbles and fish...I LOVE these colors. If I pick this and it's a girl, I would add some pink accents around the room!

The one below is the girly one...I LOVE the paisly and think that it would grow with "her" as she got older. I would probably add some light blue accents since I love the color blue.

And lastly, this is the boyish one...I can't help but love this because it makes me think of Josh and it would be a way to apply something Josh loves to the baby's room without doing camo or anything like that. The colors are what my eye typically goes to like the bright blues and greens, but it is adorable!

As indecisive as I am, this can all change in a blink of an eye, but I've been looking for weeks now and always come back to these designs and colors. The prices are in my budget and hopefully they will all look good with cherry wood which is what my crib is...

I have an option of using a white or oak color crib, but I really love the cherry. We may even use a piece of our bedroom furniture in the nursery and it is also cherry. Hopefully in a few weekend I will be posting finished nursery pictures!

A couple of more weeks...and counting...

Went to the doctor today and everything is good so far...baby's HR is 150. Mom came with me and was very excited to hear the heart beat, it's always a nice sound when your not feeling much going on. Our next appointment is our ultrasound...November 26th, the day before Thanksgiving. I sure hope that the baby is cooperative so that will have exciting news to tell everyone at Thanksgiving. (start making bets now...boy or girl?)

Now that I'm feeling better...really better, with fewer morning sickness spells and more energy, I can see myself possibly going through this again in a couple of years...hahaha. It's amazing how miserable you can be at one point and then when you feel better you kindof forget the bad times! I haven't completely forgotten how sick I was but I'm thankful that I feel better! I guess that is how most women get through L&D...after the "bad" times, your so thankful it's over and you have a sweet little baby that you kindof "forget" the pain...maybe "forget" isn't the right word, but it's all worth it!

Now it's time to get down to the fun stuff...registering for baby stuff, getting the nursery ready, taking the classes! I didn't know how overwhelming it would be to go through and research baby items...there is a lot of stuff out there! I've already talked to a few friends that have recently had babies and got some really helpful hints and good ideas...so please feel free to email me some things that you couldn't live without with your newborns...or ideas that worked well for you! I'm open to any advice!!

Weekend Activities!

Mom and I went shopping all weekend. Mainly trying to find me some tops I can wear to work since I'm slowly outgrowing my regular t-shirts. I did search through my closet and found some tops that I had before I lost weight and they are fitting me for now!

We did find some cute stuff, along with some clearance halloween baby things that were gender neutral!

Even better news...Josh killed a deer this morning. He called me and said it was a pretty big bodied deer and it took 31/2 hours to drag him out of the woods. We didn't get any pictures of him and the deer with the camera, so I just took a few of it in the back of the truck.

Lastly, I have decided I need a new pillow...I'm hating the one I have now. Mom and I went to Linens N Things, which by the way is going out of buisness so check it out, and I got some big, firm pillows. Well "someone" thought that they were for him and decided to check them out for himself...

I'VE FELT "IT" MOVE!!!

Well today at around 1:30 p.m. I felt the baby move!! I must say that I have had plenty of "gas" and I now know that feeling well, and this was NOT gas. It was a little to the left and the only way I can really describe it is a "cat purrrrrr" It was a small, light flutter feeling that seemed like it was just a few centimeters from the surface of my belly.

Of course, I had to call my mom and then my friend Angel to confirm if this was what they felt and they both said YES!

Ahhhh finally, the barfing, the expanding waist, the food aversions...all worth it...I can now feel this little guy, or gal moving!!!

Rearranging Rooms!

I had Friday off and so Josh and I took advantage of the extra time and did some rearranging.
Previously we had a room fixed for guests and then a "junk" room. The guest room is a little smaller than the other and has a smaller closet. The junk room has a pretty big walk in closet that Josh uses for ALL his hunting stuff. We decided to switch the two rooms so the baby would have it's own closet and not be in the room with all the hunting stuff. Here's the guest room before we switched.

Here's the junk room with some accessories from the guest room as we were moving.So here's our switch and our two days of hard work...

So another funny little story and picture to share with everyone...Roscoe, being the only "child" for a long time, can't tell the difference in baby's toys and dog toys. He thinks ALL toys should be his toys. So he was sneaking in the room and stealing toys while I wasn't paying attention...but I caught him!

What a bad boy!!

15 weeks - Halloween!

Ok here's my first pair of maternity jeans...hehehe. I grabbed them in Wal-mart today and they are really comfortable.

Tonight is the first Halloween in years that I've been off work and been able to pass out candy...it's a blast! I've had sooo much fun! Roscoe has a chicken hat but he refuses to wear it very long, or stay still long enough to get a picture.

Happy Halloween!!!

New words for a pregnant woman's dictionary!

I forgot :to add this little story to my last post


So I'm looking on several different pregnancy websites, reading what other expectant mothers are experiencing, and I come across a forum titled "snissing" and the question is.."when was everyone's first sniss?" I start reading answers trying to figure out what a "sniss" is and it's impossible to tell...most answers are "all the time", "never done it", etc.



So I decide to google it and at first I'm thinking it is some computer tech. term until I get down a few hits and see that it is a SNEEZE and a PISS at the same time...HAHAHA!



Well fortunately or unfortunately I have not experienced a sniss yet, but I have had another little problem that I have decided to make up my own term to describe...a "spiss"



What that consists of is spewing, another term I like to use for puking, and pissing. That seems to be my problem at times. HAHA. Good thing I can laugh at myself!

My belly at 11 weeks

This is the last picture I have taken of my belly which was right before the race. It is at 11 weeks...not quite showing through any clothes but definetely thickening up...haha!

I will take some current pictures as soon as my battery charges up on my camera...I'm much bigger now. It's amazing how you can puke so much and still steadly gain weight...hehehe!

October 11th - Race for the Cure!

Ok...as I promised I am downloading and putting pictures on the blog. These are from a few weekends ago during Race for the Cure. Lindsay and I went with a friend from my work, Sonia, and some of the gals from the community center where she teaches aerobics. There were over 45,000 people at the race...which unless you were at the front of the race, it was impossible to run it...which believe me, I did not want to run it!

Here's a flag that hung over the starting point held up by the firetruck ladders!

This was the view that Lindsay and I had as we started the race...you can see how many people are in front of us, even up at the bridge! A taller woman next to me took this pictures!
And below is a few of the firefighters on top of their truck doing a little pseudo strip dance for us girls!!

Above is my wonderful friend, Cara, doing her favorite hobby of belly dancing. There were several groups of people cheering us on such as...motorcycle groups, firefighters, radio and t.v. stations, etc. And then of course the belly dancers!!!
These are all the survivors lining up to walk the 5K. They had their own parade, which of course they deserved!

The last time I did this race was over 5 years ago and there were not nearly as many people as there were on this day. It was truely amazing to see everyone out there. At one point, as we crossed one the bridges over the river, we could look across to the first bridge we had crossed and still see people starting the race. It was awesome!

I'm a horrible pregnant person!

Ok, so pregnancy isn't really something I'm cut out to do. I started feeling better about 2 weeks ago, but sadly I am now sick again almost everyday. I promise I will get some pictures online soon...maybe tomorrow since I have the day off!!

I don't know how my aunts did this 3 or 4 times....I don't even think I'm interested in having another baby after this one. Well, of course, according to everyone I will feel a lot different when the baby is finally here...and I hope I do! I guess since I'm not feeling it move yet, I don't know what it is yet, and "it" just makes me sick all the time I'm just not overly excited at this point. I hope this doesn't make me a bad parent already. We will find out very close to Thanksgiving and I can't wait. I tell Josh that I feel like it's a girl, but he says it's a boy...we'll see!

I can say that I started feeling a little more excited than normal the other day when I saw some of the neat toys my parents have found at yard sales. They are pretty expensive toys and with a little cleaning look brand new! I try to get online when I'm not busy at work and research things about car seats, strollers, cribs, and breast feeding...which I hope I can do! I always saw my aunts do it with my cousins and never thought twice about it. I have read that a lot of women have problems breast feeding and end up not doing it long.

Well my goal tomorrow is to get the house clean, the nursery room cleaned out, and put pictures on the blog...wish me luck because I may just end up sleeping or watching scary movies all day!

Happy Halloween Everyone!

day in the life of audra right now!

Oh my what can I say...I have slacked off on the blogging! I think my energy is finally coming back. I don't think I have ever been so sluggish and tired in my whole life. For all of you that heard my concerns of not being sick with my pregnancy...rest assured I have been. It hit about 8 weeks but got really bad after that first doctors visit. It started to hit me in the evenings before I went home from work. But THANK GOD I think I'm getting over that! I don't think my supervisors could keep letting me leave early every night...hehehe!

Before I got pregnant I had this magnificent plan of continuing to eat healthy and only gaining 3-4 lbs and really "doing by the book" HA! That didn't happen. I've gained 10lbs and in my eyes I feel like I'm already showing. I have crazy, mad craving for subway sandwiches with mayonnaise!! My friend, Kristin, even brought me one to work...it was GREAT. I have been reading that deli meat isn't good to eat unless you heat it up and that mayo has raw eggs which is a no no for pregnant women. I have learned that I can't read and worry about EVERYTHING! I never knew that hormones could really control your mind like they do...I have become a bum! I haven't worked out like I said would, I eat lots of fast foods though I try to make it as healthy as I can...but I have no desire to cook or eat things at home. The ribs that I used to love Josh to grill don't appeal to me anymore. Ahhhh! It's crazy!

For all of you that have been through this you are probably laughing and saying "told you so"

I'll try to put some more belly picture online, but I warn you it's not pretty!

Happy Birthday!

Happy Birthday Tucker!!

6lbs 6.7ozs

19 inches

Born 2:35pm

Our Girl's Weekend!!!

We had a great weekend in Hot Springs! It started with me forgetting my wallet and Josh having to bring it to me in North Little Rock while we ate breakfast. Oops! It was Lindsey G. , Lindsay S. , Courtney, and Cara met us in Hot Springs for the day.

We started at Mid-America Museum to go through the "Our Bodies" exhibit! It was pretty cool! I would have loved to see that when I was in high school...to see what your body really looks like inside, instead of the "animated" pictures in all your biology and anatomy books. We could not take pictures in the exhibit.

Next we went through the museum and played with all the "things". It brought back a lot of memories and we all commented on how much bigger we remembered the museum being when we were little.

So we checked into our room and then headed out to shop and then grab dinner at the Olive Garden where I had straight vodka on the rocks...also known as water! We STUFFED ourselves until we were sick and said goodbye to Cara and went to bed.

The next day was Magic Springs! We all agreed that our backs hurt because the beds were hard and we were pretty sluggish from the huge dinner the night before. I think we sat at a bench and talked more than we did anything else in Magic Springs...but thanks to Lindsay S. we didn't have to pay much for those tickets! They have free drinks at the park...fountain drink stations set up which sounded like a really cool idea until we realize that you have to fight through swarms of bees...I almost swallowed one that decided to take a dip in my drink.

This is us dodging the bees...hahaha. We have all decided to do this as often as we can...we had so much fun!

Art Projects

Today mom and I went out to look at baby furniture and just get out since I'm feeling so much better! After we were done, Lindsay and I decided to do some art projects. My two projects were for the baby's room...possibly. I know they look like boys colors, but I LOVE these colors and want to use them whether it's a girl or boy...I'll just add some pink if it's a girl. I guess the question is...can I keep up with these little things for the next 7 or so months.
I took 8X10 canvas and used small styrofoam balls that I cut in half and some stencils of the alphabet and numbers and created these little wall hangings. Mom and I noticed that a lot canvas art for nurseries are pretty expensive so I'm hoping that I can make some larger ones sometime that will match our theme when we find out what we are having. Lindsay made an 8X10 painting of a wine glass and bottle with grapes. She is giving it to John to put in his kitchen.

ultrasound at 9 weeks!

Ok here it is...the proof there's a little jellybean in my tummy (besides the now VOMITTING that I have started). It's heartbeat was 173 bpm and it's 2.01 cm long from head to rump!

Thankfully my doctor prescribed me some Zofran that I am going to go fill RIGHT NOW, otherwise I refuse to go to work...hehehe...NOT! I gotta go work, but this vomitting thing needs to go AWAY! I've gained 7 lbs, but I can still fit in my clothes snuggly! Of course, I've kept several sizes of pants from the past year so maybe I won't have to get maternity clothes any time soon!

I looked at some chinese calenders for the fun of it and 4 out of 6 said we were having a boy...this is based on my birthday and conception month.