Half Way There

So I'm now around my 20th week of pregnancy, so celebrate with me because I'm half way done! During my first pregnancy with Hayden, I dove right into any and all cravings, from Taco Bell to Dairy Queen shakes to cheesecake. It was a big love fest of food, and I gained 80 pounds! So maybe the whole losing of a lot of weight wasn't fun, but the pregnancy sure was. With Roman, I had gestational diabetes, so my cravings were reserved to taco salads and chocolate milk made from sugar-free syrup. But even without the excess sugar, I had a great pregnancy. I wasn't too sick, and even when I was, I gloried in the fact that it was all just a part of having another baby. And, I only gained 25 pounds, which was a lot easier to lose post-partum.

This pregnancy, so far, seems a bit different. Maybe because it wasn't expected, so it's been a little harder for me to get in the whole pregnancy groove. Or maybe because I have two energetic children who keep me busy enough that I have to pause and think if I even showered that day. Or maybe it's these blasted headaches I keep getting!!! Many of you know that I've had horrible tension headaches the last few months, absolutely nothing seems to help them, and believe me, I've tried everything. So I finally got into physical therapy, and basically the physical therapist told me that since I'm pregnant most of my options were out the window. Part of me thinks he is giving me 6 weeks of pressure point massages and exercises to do at home because he feels sorry for me, not because he actually thinks they will do anything. But maybe (hopefully!) I'm wrong and I come out after 6 weeks headache free.

Other than that, my nausea is pretty much gone except if I skip a meal or eat late. Chocolate milk seems to chase away the nausea, and I drink so much that Jeremiah asked me the other day if there was such thing as drinking too much milk. Of course, my chocolate milk, as well as all other beverages I consume, water included, are drank through a straw, a habit I picked up in my second pregnancy. Don't ask me the significance, but it's a demand I have. I know. High-maintanence. Other cravings include Applebees Oriental Chicken Salad, Taco Bell, Diet DP, watermelon (or other juicy fruits), and Chik-Fil-A, which actually right now really sounds good.

Haven't really felt the baby move much. On the ultrasound she was all over the place, but so far just tiny flutters. I felt Hayden at 20 weeks on the dot, Roman at 21. Maybe she's just not my little soccer player. I feel her mostly first thing in the morning, when I wake up...oh wait, I mean when my kids wake me up.

I started yoga this week. I only go once a week, on Tuesday nights. We got a YMCA membership and I'm trying it out. The yoga instructor kept giving us words of encouragement about how we were finding our balance...except I'm pregnant and I have no balance. Take for example the tree pose. Everyone looked all graceful and still, and here I am like a tree swaying in the breeze. There is a water aerobics class that I hear is great for pregnancy, but my fear is that I will be the youngest person in the class by 50 years. We'll see about that one.

Lastly, the kids seem to be pretty excited for the baby. Every morning they climb on my bed and say "Hi baby!" to my belly. Hayden will sometimes give the "baby" a kiss. Roman usually points to my boobs and says "Baby!" and I understand they are big, but come on! So obviously he doesn't quite get it. Roman's first two-word sentence, though, was "Hi bee-bee!" and it's really cute. Hayden thinks we should name the baby "Olivia." What do you think? Good idea? Speaking of names, we are at a standstill. I love what he hates, he loves what I hate. Luckily we have time to figure that all out.

In need of more vacation

So this blog isn't exactly going in chronilogical order...I should have posted my Utah vacation first, followed by this particular post, and then my Mother's Day post, but I didn't and well, it's my blog so I'll do what I want. Just stay with me here.

After my Utah vacation, I flew into Cleveland. I stayed the night at Carissa and Adam's house, made my traditional trip to Trader Joe's (we don't have one in Toledo), and slept on the couch - which, to take Carissa off the hook, I totally offered to do since I thought their couch was comfortable. Word of advice: couches are comfortable to lounge on, maybe watch a long movie, but definately not when you are on them all night! And especially not when you are pregnant.

Anyway they followed me back to Toledo to spend some quality time with the Lafrancas. After my ultrasound, we went to Applebees for dinner with all the kids. Jeremiah and I don't usually go out to dinner with the kids, but they did okay. We went right at 5pm so it wasn't really crowded, and besides Jack's super high-pitch screams, they were relatively good. Of course I got the Oriental Chicken Salad, which never sounded good to me until I got pregnant. After dinner the guys went and saw "Iron Man" while Carissa and I went grocery shopping with the kids and put them to bed. The next day we went to the Toledo Zoo, our first opportunity to use our zoo pass here. It's a huge zoo! We saw maybe 3/4 of the zoo and we were there like 3 hours. It was a little cold but the kids had a great time.

The kids at the polar bear exhibit. This was my favorite because the bears were awake and active. One kept wrestling with a bucket, and you could watch them on the ground or underwater.Our attempt to get all four kids to take a picture together. If you remember from our Hogle Zoo experience, Hayden wants his picture taken with each statue. The rest of the kids just wanted to play.This is what happens when Jeremiah takes over the camera. The kids being a little restless, this was our last stop at the zoo. The gorilla (or ape?) kept hitting the window, the kids thought it was great (and I thought it was great that the glass was so strong!).

That night Carissa and I saw Made of Honor with Patrick Dempsey, meaning we went to see Patrick Dempsey, and then made a pit stop at Children's Place before heading home. My intention was to buy an outfit for our baby to celebrate her girl status, but I didn't see anything super impressive so I got the boys some flip flops. We played Mexican Train that night, where the Poyfairs kicked our butts. I think they cheated.

Our last day with them was spent at Old Navy and the Shops at Fallen Timbers, a new outdoor mall in Maumee. In an embarrassing moment, Roman grabbed a shirt inside Buckle and threw it at his feet in the stroller...unknown to me until the shop's alarms went off as I went to leave. Who taught him to steal?! We promised the kids popsicles if they were good, and so we kept our promise...

While Olivia just eats her popsicle, Hayden has contracted Pearson fever, making strange faces whenever a camera comes near him. A cure please?

Roman, although world's slowest popsicle eater, didn't make quite the mess I anticipated. He was still eating his popsicle while the rest of the kids were getting ready for naps.

We had a great time with the Poyfairs here, although it did make me realize how small my family room is. The kids got along relatively well, maybe because we tried to keep them busy. Thanks for coming and visiting! I needed a second vacation =)

Finally...a vacation!

I know we just went to Washington for three weeks in December, but by the time April rolled around, I was feeling quite homebound and lonely, and our Utah vacation couldn't come fast enough.

We spent the first few days pre-Utah at Carissa's house. I forgot my camera and Jeremiah had to send it on to Utah, so I don't have any photos from Carissa's house, but needless to say it was fun. It's always fun at her house because the kids can play (and fight) and it's nice to have another adult to hang out with.

We flew out on April 23, and I must have been having a crazy day when I booked the flight, because we didn't leave until 6pm and arrived in Utah at 11pm (which, for those not so good at math, is 1am Ohio time!). My kids were terrors the first leg, terrors at our layover, but luckily slept during our last leg of the flight. Unfortunately, being sandwiched between two sleeping kids didn't work so well with my intentions to sleep.

We spent the first week or so at my mother-in law's house. The kids had a blast being with her, and I think she was probably grateful to have company, even if that company was up at 7am every day. I had a whole list of things I wanted to accomplish while I was there, and although I didn't get to do everything (ahem...temple square?!) in the end I realized just how much fun I had because I got to see just about everyone I intended to see (except Maria, but you're totally on my list for December!). Here's a condensed list of what I did, followed by way cool pictures :)

• Saw my brother, Kory, for a little bit and met his kind-of girlfriend. I didn't get to see him nearly as much as I thought, but I won't complain.
• Had lunch with my friends from my old social work job. I had to take the kids, so it was a litte chaotic, and Hayden kept telling strange stories to everyone about a moth, but it was great to see everyone. Can't wait to see them all in December...I'm thinking CPK? Guess what I'll be ordering?!
• Destiny cut my hair. I didn't do anything dramatic, just a trim, but of course I look way cuter now. And we went to Arctic Circle for lunch. It's delicious. I love spending time with Destiny, it's like I never left.
• Checked Deseret Book and the Distribution Center off my list. My mother-in-law went with us.
• McDonalds playdate with Stina and her kids. Had to do it for old times' sake. I loved these too much that the first time I took the kids to McD's here I cried and cried because I missed having Stina and her kids with me.
• Speaking of Stina, we went to the Hogle Zoo, even switched our date from Wednesday to Thursday because the weatherpeople said so. Of course, it was nice on Wednesday and it snowed on Thursday. So we were cold and wet, but we are troopers. I even picked up a lion lovey similar to Roman's giraffe lovey.
• GIRLS NIGHT OUT! Stina and Destiny and I went to Macaroni Grill for dessert. We stayed two hours. It was a huge highlight of my trip. Celeste, we're totally doing that at Christmas if you guys make it out to Utah.
• I spent a few days at Steve and Mel's house too. Melanie and I took Josette to dinner without any of the kids except Roman, who dismissed his sippy of juice in favor of my soda. We watched "27 Dresses" which I thought was really cute. We also went to the Utah County Scout Expo at Thanksgiving Point which turned out to be quite fun. They had a lot of blow-up slides and activities for the kids. Hayden even pitched 2 of 3 balls into a target and won a free ticket to an Orem Owlz game, which we gave to Mel of course. Pictures to follow.
• Josette made couscous. Another highlight. Yum!
• I spent the last few days at my aunt and uncle's house in Sandy. Wendy is only a few years older than me, and we get along really well. Her girls also got along with my kids really well, it was like having free daycare because they were so good with my kids. She took me to a scrapbook store (check that off my list!) and we ate at Pei Wei (sorry, Carissa, had to do it). I was nervous to have Roman on the trampoline, since his breath-holding incident happened here back in November, but he did really well on the trampoline and the older kids were really careful with him. No ER this time!
• The plane ride home was horrible. The kids were okay, and when we landed in Minneapolis for our layover, we ended up right by a huge playarea. The ride from there to Cleveland was really hard on me. Let's just say I couldn't hold anything down and I was feeling really faint, but the flight attendants were really generous and kept checking on me, even bringing me snacks to eat that I would normally have to pay for.

That's the condensed version of our trip...I know, you're thinking "condensed"?! But we were a bit busy and had so much fun seeing everyone. It's nice to be home, back with Jeremiah, and in my own bed (sorry to those who housed us, but nothing compares to my own bed!). Here's some pictures:

Hayden and Roman loved spending time outside at my mother-in-law's house. They especially enjoyed digging around in her dirt. Hayden made mounds of dirt called "bad guys"...don't ask me. Roman's job was to destroy these "bad guys" which, much to Roman's delight, caused Hayden to freak out every time.

Here we are entering the zoo. Do you see the snow?! The kids were such troopers, I hadn't exactly packed for snow, so I prayed that layers upon layers would do the trick. Despite the snow, we had a blast!!

Luckily it stopped snowing about halfway into our trip. Hayden realized that these bronze (metal?) statues were photo ops and had to pose for each. During this particular picture, a stupid kid on a school field trip was rummaging through my bag from the gift shop while I had my back turned. Where was her chaperone?!?!

Girl's night out at Macaroni Grill...or as Adam would call it, the "Grill". Aren't my friends gorgeous?!

Steve with the kids at an Apache helicopter on display at the Scout Expo. They also had a real tank that the kids could climb on and inside, but Hayden wasn't too interested.

Taylor's scout group was in charge of the ice cream making display. They put the ingredients in this can and roll it around for like 20 minutes. Hayden loved doing this so much that we're considering one of those balls that make ice cream.

The birthday boys (we decided to celebrate them all together) Hayden, Roman, Steve, and Taylor. Melanie even got a pralines and cream ice cream cake. Roman loved it so much he started eating everyone else's when they weren't looking.

Nana Lafranca with some of her grandkids. Luckily it was a nice day outside! I love her yard!

At Wendy's house, they put the sprinkler on while the kids jumped on the trampoline. Roman wanted nothing to do with the sprinkler. Hayden lasted about 5 minutes. Afterwards, unknown to me, Hayden took off his shorts and underwear ("because they were wet, Mom!") and continued to jump on the trampoline NAKED! Only my kids...

Hayden wanted Roman to see out the window. They thought it was hilarious that Hayden was holding Roman, but they were also amazed that they could see a million cars down below. Obviously we were close to landing which was good news for me. I'm quite glad to not be flying for awhile!

From the confines of my own home (mostly bed)

So today is Mother's Day and I should be blogging about how great I am in every possible way. Instead, it's turned into a great day to showcase my husband...I know, weird, so let me explain.

Jeremiah let me sleep in today, which I desperately needed after my long vacation. I woke up to breakfast in bed, with strawberries, blueberries, crossaints, and scrambled eggs. It was delicious, and while eating Jeremiah gave me my Mother's Day gift, a cookbook from Everyday Italian's Giada De Laurentiis (!!!) and a bookmark. However, things sort of went downhill from there, and either I have the stomach flu or some serious morning sickness, and I'll leave it at that...unless someone wants details? Anyway, Jeremiah took the kids while I slept, he played with them, fed them lunch, and put them down for naps. I finally held down mashed potatoes (oddly enough, the only thing that sounded good) around 4pm and have been weak since, but at least I'm eating. I even held down a slice of Papa Murphys pizza, my own personal choice for Mother's Day dinner...no dishes! I would post my traditional photo of me and my kids, but seriously does anyone want to see how I look right now?!

Anyway, my Mother's Day wasn't as planned, but it turned out okay in the end, and Jeremiah did a great job with the kids while I recovered. A shout out to my own mother...Happy Mother's Day mom! I called her this morning at 8:30am her time hoping to be the first to wish her a happy day, but of course my brother beat me by 5 minutes. And to all my friends and my sisters, happy day to you too.

Lacking Something

I know most of you are expecting a blog about our Utah vacation, but that will have to wait for a day when I get more than 6 hours of uninterrupted sleep (pray with me that it is soon!).

We had our ultrasound today. It was initally scheduled to determine a due date since my midwife said I was measuring a little small, but the ultrasound tech was able to see everything she needed to see so we will not need to go back for a second ultrasound, which actually turned out well since Jeremiah starts school next week and this was his only opportunity to actually go with me. Everything looked really healthy, the baby is measuring on time and the expected due date is October 10. The baby is a huge mover, I was surprised that I hadn't felt it move considering how much it was all over the place.

So you're wondering the gender? Can't figure it out by the title?