Last Sunday I started a new tradition in our household – Soup-er Sundays. We were off to a great start. This Sunday’s plan was to make homemade tomato soup and grilled cheese plus a new bread recipe to feed us breakfast for the week. Christian mentioned earlier in the week that he was craving Tomato Soup and Grilled Cheese. Easy enough. I headed to pinterest. I found a yummy picture that lead me to a yummy recipe. I bought the ingredients.
Crockpot Tomato Soup
My big sunday plan was to get the soup and the bread cooking before I head to my mom’s house at 11am for Chet’s BABY SHOWER!
What actually happened: I made bread. I really really enjoyed myself at my shower. I desperately need a nap but never got one. We ordered Tijuana Flat’s to-go for dinner. I was in bed by 9:30pm.
I also headed to pinterest for another bread recipe. This weeks desire: Pumpkin.
Cinnamon Pumpkin Bread
The Results: A yummy bread with way too much Cream Cheese. The center of the bread is filled with cream cheese spread. It’s a good combination, it is just too much. Next time I will leave it out and use it as a spread on top of the bread when serving.
Since I didn’t make soup on Sunday, I now have a refrigerator FULL of tomatoes (3 lbs to be exact). My new revised plan was to make the soup for dinner tonight until I discovered….
….Cole really doesn’t like tomato soup
….Christian doesn’t really like grilled cheese sandwiches (unless it’s submersed in tomato soup)
and I already know I’m not a huge fan of tomatoes.
WHY did I think homemade tomato soup was a good idea?
Any one have any great ideas for the 3 lbs of tomatoes in my refrigerator?
Minus the soup, my Sunday was still Soup-er! My baby shower was more than wonderful! Chet is one loved baby. I got to see so many great friends. Chet’s bedroom is now overflowing with goodies. (More on the baby shower tomorrow!)
This weekend is one of my favorite weekends of the entire year! It’s Neptune Festival in Virginia Beach. Since we moved to Virginia when I was 8, we have always attended. The entire boardwalk turns into a celebration. It marks the end of tourist season. It welcomes in the fall. There is a surf competition, volleyball competition, boardwalk art show, sand sculpting competition, parade, lots of food, and a 5k and 8k race. My sister was in the high school band. She always marched in the parade. I played in the volleyball tournaments. As an adult, I’ve always enjoyed the art show. As a mom, I love the parade. One of these years I’m going to run the 8k.
Sand Castles are my Favorite!
Not only is this weekend a fun beach celebration, but a cold front is also on its way. This non-heat lover is very excited. I welcome the lows of mid 40s and highs of mid 60s with open arms.
Neptune Festival! Cooler Weather! and if that isn’t enough to make me excited………
My baby shower is on SUNDAY!
It’s a little sooner than baby showers are traditionally held, but my family knows me well. My sister and my mom have been working away to get things ready for Sunday! Since October is jam-packed with events with the exception of this weekend, the date was easy to decide. I’ve dedicated November as my month to get ready for the holidays. I hope to have all my santa duties done by Thanksgiving so I can relax and enjoy the holiday season with my family. This weekend is the only free, not already assigned responsibilities, weekend on my calendar until December. CRAZY!
It is hard to wrap my brain around the idea that our baby is due in 88 days! It is even harder to wrap my brain around the idea that our baby is due 2 days after Christmas. Chet and I have had some serious talks about his due date. It would be very kind of him to allow me to be home Christmas Eve and Christmas Morning so I can enjoy the holiday with his brother. Chet is more than welcome to join us before the holiday or right after, but I’d like to be home to put out cookies for Santa! Let’s hope it works!
This picture never gets old
Although my pregnancy is flying by, I’m sure this weekend will be a fun reminder that my due date is right around the corner!
This weekend is all about enjoying family, friends, fall weather, and Neptune Festival.
Before I start this story, let me start by telling you that I normally really enjoying painting. My mom and I have painted dozens of rooms together in our life time. It’s always enjoyable. I love the instant gratification I receive when I put the new paint color on the wall. It’s an instant pick-me-up for a room, and it doesn’t cost a ton of money.
This story is not like those other dozen paint stories.
My mom wasn’t my painting partner this time. With my dad being so sick lately and her long list of things to complete in her house before my baby shower, Christian stepped up to be my painting buddy. Although I’m glad my mom is taking great care of my dad and is having the baby shower at her house, she was missed. Christian was a great painting buddy too!
Christian and I started painting Chet’s bedroom two weekends ago. We bought the paint on Saturday, and we got busy painting on Sunday. Before we could even get paint up on the walls, we had to move the last of the non-baby items out of the room. Christian’s dresser is now in our bedroom. The rest is piled up in our front room (I’ll work on that room on a rainy day in the future!).
Ready for Paint
Before my 2nd trimester even started, I knew the “theme” we wanted for our baby room. I prefer things to be gender neutral so it was easy to day dream without knowing the sex of the baby. You can read about my motivation here. I also knew I wanted to incorporate the feeling of the ocean in the baby’s room. While watching Design Star one night, I saw painted walls I had to have in our baby’s room. It looked easy enough. I was sold.
Wall Inspiration
Step 1: Paint tan on the bottom half of the walls
Our first Sunday painting, we started with the bottom sand color. There was no instant gratification with this paint color. As I edged and Christian rolled, I started to have my doubts. Should it be darker? Did I really like it? Did we waste money on a gallon of paint that was hardly any different then what was already on the walls?
Look closely...the bottom half is a new color
Although the color change isn’t dramatic, the quality of paint is drastically different. Our entire house was painted with the neutral paint tone before it was put up for sale. It has to be the cheapest quality paint ever. It’s honestly nothing more than a primer that covered up some really horrible paint choices before. The baby’s room was Bright Grass Green before according to the paint under the light switch.
I wasn’t sold on my great paint plan at this point, but I was committed to the process. There was no going back. We had bought the paint. I needed to see the final product before I made up my mind.
Next step: Blue Paint on the top half of the walls
I swear I'm going to "lose" that tank top one day in the laundry
I still wasn’t sold on paint colors at this point. Was the blue too baby blue? I wanted crisp not pastel. There was no turning back. The entire room was now painted. All that was left was the two stripes around the center of the walls.
Too blue? Not tan enough? (ignore my finger over the lens!)
We called it a night after finishing up the blue paint. I was tired, and I was sick of painting with colors I wasn’t sure I liked.
I had big hopes of painting a little bit each night of the week, but life got busy. I didn’t get back into the room to paint until Thursday.
Step 3: Paint the white strip
I bought a new small roller for this task. I thought a roller would provide more even coverage than a paint brush. I was able to get two coats of paint up on the walls Thursday night. Once the white got up on the walls, I started to like the blue and the tan a lot more. The white seemed to balance out the other two colors. Maybe this wasn’t going to be a disaster after all?
Slowly coming together
Saturday morning came around. I was anxious to get the painting done. I was ready to peel back the tape, admire my straight white lines and add the final touch. I was ready for the navy blue stripe.
True to my typical anxious self, I head into the Chet’s room before Christian was ready to start his morning. I started to peel back the tape. DISASTER! The crisp white lines I was envisioning were nowhere to be seen. It looked like I had hand painted the lines. In fact, I probably could have hand painted them more successfully.
Christian tried to come to my rescue. He had tons of solutions. I wasn’t hearing any of them. I was done. If the light blue paint had already been out, I would have instantly started painting the whole room baby blue.
Needless to say, I didnt’ take any pictures. I was to busy having a melt-down that looked something like this:
By Saturday evening, I had myself back under control.
Step 4: Paint a new crisp light blue border to the white strip
Christian re-taped of the white line. I repainted blue paint on top of the white line. This time I used a brush. I think the roller put too much paint on the walls, and it seeped under the painter’s tape.
Step 5: Paint the navy blue strip
Christian also taped off the borders for the blue strip. This color had me more nervous than any of the other colors. If we messed up on this one, it would be hard to cover up with another color. I painted a VERY light first coat of the navy blue paint. Since it needed to dry for 8 hours (according to the paint employees), we retired our paint brushes for the night.
Sunday morning I woke up anxious. I painted the second coat of paint, and we waited……….
By Sunday afternoon, we were ready to take off the tape. Fingers were crossed. I didn’t want to look.
First corner to get peeled back
While the first peel wasn’t perfect, it was doable. It was also a 100% improvement from the paint the day before. As we pulled back more and more tape, it actually became okay. If you stand right next to the walls and scrutinize the paint, it is far from perfect. If you take a step back and look at the whole room, I think it turned out pretty good.
Final Product
I was more than happy to put away the paint cans, rinse out our brushes, and get our house back to normal. Even though I was unsure of the entire process, I really do love the final product. Chet’s bedroom is one step closer to feeling like home to me.
Not only did the paint turn out better than I had anticipated, but I was also surprised to discover that I now like the curtains in the room. I had it on my to-do list to sew new ones. I can scratch that one off the list. The current curtains work great!
Lessons Learned:
Not Perfect is actually great.
Overly ambitious paint projects might not be something I should tackle while pregnant.
How a projects start doesn’t necessarily reflect the final product. It’s important to have all the pieces of the puzzle in place before determining “like” or “dislike”.
Never use a roller when attempting to paint a straight line on a textured wall with painter’s tape.
Some how my 3rd trimester is creeping up on me. Where did my 2nd trimester go? I can’t believe our due date is 91 days away. I have noticed a huge difference in my pregnancy this week. I’m still feeling good. My energy levels are still high (relatively speaking). But…
I’m Starving!: My hunger is through the roof! I’m hungry all day long. I wake up starving which isn’t a good thing for me. It usually results in me throwing up. I try to go to bed full, but I can’t get enough food this week. Today alone, I have already ate:
Breakfast: Banana Zucchini Bread and Orange Juice
Morning Snack: Apple
Lunch: Turkey Sandwich, Cheese stick, and Carrots
Afternoon After lunch Snack: Yogurt
All of this was consumed before 1pm. I’ll have another snack before I leave work at 4. It’s Tuesday which means we will be heading to Tijuana Flats for Taco Tuesdays! And before bed, I’ll have some ice cream (Ben and Jerry’s Phish food is a must have!) and a kiwi or a peach. I’m also pretty sure I’ll eat a handful or two of Swedish fish at some point today.
Even after all that food, I can guarantee I’ll be hungry 1 hour after eating.
Yesterday at the beach: 80 Degrees and Still Humid
I’m HOT! – Hot flashes are here. I’m hot all the time. I’m normally a cold person, but not anymore. The heat and humidity we have going on (STILL!) isn’t helping one bit. Bring on the fall weather.
My Belly is Growing! – Mister Moo has to be growing. My stomach is definitely expanding. I’ve had pain/stretching in my upper stomach below my rib cage. I think things are shifting around to make room for baby. My skin is itchy. Round ligament pains are back. It’s also becoming more difficult to bend over, shave my legs, put on pants, tie my shoes, etc….pregnancy is definitely humbling for an independent girl who normally doesn’t ask for help.
I have one active baby! – Mister Moo is a very active baby. I can now feel movement in multiple areas at the same time. He’s pretty quiet in the mornings, but after noon he wakes up and parties all day. He is his most active when I finally sit down at the end of the day up until bedtime. I think he keeps the party going into the late night hours. He is moving around every time I wake up to pee or roll over. Let’s hope this isn’t the case when he makes his entrance into the word. Not only am I feeling his movements, but they are also visible outside of my stomach. We can see kicks. You can also tell what side of my stomach he is hanging out in. He still favors my right side!
Hip & Pelvic Pain? – It has definitely got better since the Rock n Roll Half. It still bothers me on days that I sit for too long. If I’m sitting or laying for more than 2 hours, the pain comes back. If I stay on my feet moving all day, I don’t feel anything at all. Most days this works for me since I like to be on the go, but on days I’m craving down time or a nap, it can be rather frustrating. Apparently my body agrees that I’m my happiest when I’m active. I’m not meant to be a “put my feet up” pregnant lady, but it would be nice if I could do it comfortably once a week.
I’m Preparing for Baby – I feel so much better now that his room is painted. I feel like if our due date was today, the only thing we would really need is a car seat. Of course there is a lot more that I want, but we have time to fill in those gaps.
Finally feeling good after 3 miles
I’m Still Running – I’m officially pregnant waddling. I ran a 5k yesterday after admitting to the fact that I need a training plan. I ran the first mile in about 12 minutes (no walking), but I had horrible cramps in my right lower calf and shin. This problem showed some signs of surfacing during other runs. I normally can run through it, but yesterday’s cramps stopped me in my tracks. I couldn’t even walk comfortably. I stopped running and stretched out my legs. I drank some water. After about 10 minutes of stretching, they were gone. I finished the last 2.1 miles run/walking. I ran a song. I walked a song. And true to my every day running, by the time mile 3 showed up, I felt great. Why can’t the first 3 miles be as easy? Minus the irritating leg cramps (that also woke me up last night in my sleep), my body felt great.
Any tips for dealing with leg cramps? Will compress socks help? (Nicole, chime in!) I think they are being caused by the awful circulation in my legs. Pre-pregnancy I have horrible circulation in my lower body due to my broken legs. During pregnancy the circulation has got even worse. Believe it or not, running actually helps keep the blood flowing.
Minus the few aches and pains, I feel so fortunate to have an easy pregnancy. This baby has been good to me and my body. I’m also very lucky to have a supportive husband, son, and family.
3 more months to go until I have another boy monster to add to the mix!
Kristy Maute 