jenuinely inspired

it really is a wonderful life...

2009-12-24T09:33:00.001-08:00

I've been MIA...too busy enjoying my newborn daughter to blog! But I have to share this...

Merry Christmas, everyone!

Emma's Nursery

2009-12-03T21:10:00.001-08:00

We have finally put the finishing touches on the baby's nursery, and I was able to take a few pictures tonight. The pictures are not great - dark and a little blurry - but I wanted to share anyway since I don't know when else I will get a chance to get better pictures. There are actually two details that we are missing:

1. The tree decal - we bought not one, but two, of these: neu tree decal (in gold). It was supposed to go on the wall behind the glider. The first one we bought ripped when we were trying to put it up. I sobbed hysterically and ordered a new one, which we received a few weeks later. Ultimately, we decided not to put it up. As much as the website advertises the decals as "removable" and "reusable," we had such a hard time putting the first one up that we could not fathom being able to remove it and relocate it in one piece. Since we are hoping and praying to buy a house in 2010, we chose to just save the 2nd decal so that when and if we move in the near future, we can put it in Emma's next bedroom.

2. Our birdie knobs - found on eBay and spray painted white. They came out adorable, and we were supposed to put them on her changer/dresser. However, we have tried three different screw sizes and none of them have worked - meaning that we need to customize some of the standard sized screws by sawing them down so that they will be the proper size and hold the knobs in place correctly. We haven't gotten around to that yet. The knobs that the dresser came with seriously bug me - they stick out like a sore thumb in her otherwise white-furnished room. I'm hoping we get the knobs figured out soon...

So without further ado, here are the pictures!

The closet with her name spelled out on top (hard to make out, I know):

Her first Ralph Lauren sweater :)

Handmade wall art from one of my best friends:

Her stuffed animals and polka dot nightlight:

View of the wall with her crib:

Detail of her birdie curtain rods:

Her crib:

Details from the beautiful bedding sewn by my mom :)

Shelving:

Bin full of shoes:

Framed baby shower invitation and piggy bank (her dad already threw in her first $5!):

More handmade wall art by my friend, and a keepsake box:

Her books & DVDs with her birdie bookends:

Beautiful handmade birdhouses:

Samantha doll:

Dresser/changing table:

Closeup of artwork over dresser:

Birdie lamp with pink polka dot shade:

Music box #1 - early Christmas present to Emma from Gaby & I:

Music box #2 - birthday gift from my parents...a jewelry box dedicated to Emma and I; plays "Thank Heaven For Little Girls" when you open it :)

Her glider with a personalized pillow (which Stella is blocking):

Nightstand:

Emma's clothes (newborn and 0-3 month stuff):

Drawer full of bows, ribbons, socks, tights, and hats :)

Dresses!!!!

Credits:

Wall color: Sherwin Williams Captivating Cream (mixed to 75% intensity)
Name letters: PBK lower case in white
Polka dot nightlight: from PBK; no longer online but I've seen a bunch in the stores
Curtains: from PBK; discontinued (found on eBay)
Curtain rod and white ceramic bird finials: from PBK; no longer online, but can still be found in stores
Crib: Baby Mod Park Lane
Bedding: hand-sewn by my mom; she used a NuFoam bumper. I'm not sure what brand the rest of the fabrics are, but I know the polka dot pattern on the outside of the bumper is Laura Ashley.
Fitted sheet: Pink chambray from PBK
Bookcase: Ikea Expedit
Bookcase bins: Ikea Drona
Handmade birdhouses: from my fabulously talented friend, Lauren
Samantha doll: she's an American Girl doll that was mine when I was little; sadly she's been discontinued, but you can find her and most of her accessories on eBay
Dresser: Ikea Hemnes 8-drawer
Drawer organizers: Ikea Komplement
Artwork above dresser: Lucky Bluebird Art
Bird lamp & lamp shade: base was from PBK, but has been discontinued; lamp shade was found at Home Goods
Pink music box: from PBK...can't find it now, but it was on this page, where there are a few similar ones
Glider: Rock-a-Bye Upholstered Rocker in Ivory Chenille
Nightstand: Ikea Hemnes
Stuffed animal on nightstand: Hen & Chicks plush from PBK
Artwork on nightstand: Babybyrds

my dogs

2009-11-30T15:07:00.001-08:00

being all kinds of adorable:

For Once In My Life...

2009-11-30T13:07:00.000-08:00

Oprah is currently playing an episode of live musical performances by famous artists of Christmas music. It made me think of my favorite live Oprah performance ever...Tony Bennett, Josh Groban, Carrie Underwood, and Michael Buble doing "For Once In My Life." Not a Christmas song, but it still makes me feel all warm and fuzzy inside :)

Carrie sounds like an angel. I am not a country music fan, but if she were to do more jazzy stuff like this, I think I'd own every CD she ever put out. And Michael, despite looking bloated and somewhat sickly in this particular clip, still makes me swoon in all his Rat Pack-channeling glory.

2009-11-26T07:47:00.001-08:00

i can be a handful

2009-11-22T19:50:00.000-08:00

And I feel guilty about that sometimes. Gaby puts up with a lot. I saw this Marilyn Monroe quote for the first time today and it was very affirming:

From Sweet Nothings.

some recent favorites...

2009-11-22T18:35:00.000-08:00

Just a few things from around the blogosphere that have inspired me in the last few weeks:

My dream home office desk. From My tiCKLed PiNk.

That dress + me = New Year's Eve 2010. Give me 13 months. From Coco+Kelley.

I need to stock up on pretty little accessories like this for when I'm too much of a mom to anything more with my hair than throw it into a messy bun. From A CUP OF JO.

Floral embroidered Mexican dresses like these might just become my Spring/Summer 2010 uniform. From Brown Button.

Decor8 discusses Simplemente Blanco & Pottery Barn lust.

Caramel apple pie bars = deliciosity. From CakeSpy.

Ava's Rule

2009-11-22T14:49:00.000-08:00

Sheye Rosemeyer, one of my favorite bloggers and one of the most talented photographers I've ever seen, tragically lost her daughter, Ava, a few years ago. She recently shared this postcard explaining "Ava's Rule" on her blog and asked for everyone to pass it along. Living in South Florida, where temperatures linger in the 80s and 90s on a regular basis, I can definitely appreciate the importance of being aware of this danger...

Ava's Rule

"Health to the Princess,

2009-11-20T06:40:00.000-08:00

Wealth to the Princess
Long live the Princess Aurora!
Hail to the King,
Hail to the Queen,
Hail to the Princess Aurora!"

Disney's "The Sleeping Beauty" is one of my favorites, and when I was a little girl, I looooved the opening scene:

The song has been stuck in my head since yesterday. I still didn't have a coming-home outfit for Emma, and since we now know that she will be coming sooner rather than later (more on that in a second), my mother in law insisted on taking me yesterday to buy her outfit. The coming home outfit is a big tradition in our culture. I know a lot of people don't "get" it (including Gaby...when he saw the outfit, he couldn't get over how uncomfortable it looked), and think that it makes no sense to bring a baby home from the hospital in anything other than a comfy cotton sleeper. But I really like it...it's something nice and special to commemorate a huge life milestone. Not to mention the fact that the outfit itself becomes an instant heirloom. Check out Emma's:

Fit for a princess, no?! I am half expecting for a procession of horses and knights in shining armor to greet us at the hospital entrance and follow us home, trailing behind the Volvo ;)

So, Emma is big. I had an ultrasound on Wednesday and they are estimating her at 7 lbs., 6 oz. Now, I know that those estimates can be off by a pound in either direction. But when you see her face, you'll see how chunky she looks. Gaby and I both weighed 9 lbs., 3 oz. at birth, so the fact that she could potentially be huge comes as no surprise. The tech kept saying that if I were to go to 40 weeks, she could easily weigh 9 lbs. The ob is concerned about her size. With my frame, they are not very optimistic about my ability to vaginally deliver such a big baby. So we're talking early induction. I go in on Tuesday, at which point I'll be 38 weeks and a few days, and at that point, if I've started to dilate, they'll consider induction either on Wednesday, the day before Thanksgiving, or Monday the 30th. So exciting! I was never a fan of the idea of early induction unless it's medically necessary, but my rationale behind that was wanting to avoid a c-section. From what the doctors are telling me, the longer I wait and the bigger she gets, the higher my risk gets for needing a section. So I'm just going to defer to my doctors, and if they tell me that I'm ready to go, I'll accept the induction.

I am so ready. I thought I'd feel anxious or apprehensive about her actually being born, but surprisingly, I'm not. I can't wait to hold her. We got some AMAZING 3D images of her face at the ultrasound, and I am utterly blown away by how gorgeous she is. It has just made me that much more excited to finally meet her. Check her out:

I am soooooooooo ready to nibble on those little cheeks and see those beautiful lips up close and personal.

The real home stretch...

2009-11-16T16:35:00.000-08:00

Hi there! How ya been? I've been great, thanks for asking! Baby Emma is just three weeks away (!!!!!!!) and the months of September, October, and now almost November, seem to have whizzed by in a blur of work and nesting. I passed the bar (hell to the YES) and have since been busy keeping my wonderful employer happy by taking on as much work as I am physically able to before I give birth. He won't have the pleasure of my company again until after the 12 glorious weeks that I will spend with my baby girl, so I've really been trying hard to do everything I can for him considering my "condition."

Being this pregnant sucks. I really have had a wonderful Holy Grail of pregnancies compared to a lot of women I know, so I almost feel like I have no right to complain. The utter lack of morning sickness (except for the occasional nausea in the 1st trimester) alone should be enough to keep me from ever uttering a negative word about pregnancy being rough. But since complaining seems to be a right of passage amongst pregnant women, who am I to deny that to myself?! So here I go: I feel like a circus freak with how big my belly is. I KNOW I'M NOT THAT BIG compared to other people. I know I'm lucky enough to be almost "all belly." I know there are many, many women who grow much bigger and rounder and wider than I am today. But...I feel like a circus freak. Me. In my own skin...not comfy. There's so much belly. I don't waddle, and I don't have that "carrying a bowling ball with my Keigel muscles" feeling yet, but comfortable I am NOT. It's hard to get around and do simple things. Tying shoelace sneakers is a problem. I forgot what it was like to be able to put on pants while standing up. Bending over to pick something up off the ground, or standing up after I've been stupid enough to sit on the floor, is rough. And Gaby has to physically push me from behind so that I can get out of bed or out of a deep sofa.

I am tired...a lot. Physically tired and sleepy tired. The sleepy tired isn't quite as bad as it was in the 1st tri where I couldn't keep my eyes open if I hadn't had a nap in the last 4 or 5 hours, but I still feel exhausted all the time. And physically, my body just can't handle a lot of activity. Walking the mall for more than 45 minutes is enough to put me out of commission for the rest of the day.

Besides the physical discomfort and the tiredness, BACK PAIN and HEART BURN are my nemeses. My upper back seriously feels like it's going to snap in half (due in part, I'm sure, to the 34Gs I'm hauling around in my bra), and my lower back is just constantly sore. I'm a chiropractor's wet dream. The heart burn is ridiculous at this point, but honestly, nothing new. It's something I suffered from even pre-pregnancy...pregnancy just took me from the welterweight to the heavyweight division.

I am ready to have my body back. I realize that's kind of ironic considering how adamant I am about wanting to breastfeed, preferably for a year if I can. I know that doing so will make a huge physical demand on me, and that my body will never really be mine again until I wean her. But still...as demanding as I know breast feeding can be, the thought of being un-pregnant is thrilling right now. I can't wait to have my center of gravity back. I can't wait to be able to see my toes again...hell, I can't wait to see my freaking crotch again. I haven't been able to look down and see whether I'm due for a bikini wax in several months. Thank God for mirrors and Gaby to keep me in check, thus avoiding the "Georgina" of the Jungle effect.

I have SO much I want to share and I really hope I find the time and energy to do so in the next few weeks before her birth. We have all our fabulous baby gear ready to go, and her nursery, which has been a work in progress for several months, is finally almost done, down to the last little detail. She has an AMAZING wardrobe that I can't wait to put her in. I had a FABULOUS baby shower and FABULOUS maternity pictures taken, which I will be sharing as soon as my FABULOUS photographer gets me my proofs. Our family and friends have been beyond generous in helping us prepare for Emma's arrival, and I just feel so blessed...blessed to have this life and everyone in it, and blessed to be lucky enough to have this little girl on her way, ready to make me a mommy.

I went in for my 36 week appointment last week and although I haven't started dilating, my cervix is soft, low, and short, and Emma is in perfect position, with her head way down low pushing on said cervix. I go in this Wednesday for a growth ultrasound to check her size and my amniotic fluid levels, and then straight to the ob's office for another internal check (internals are done every week in the final month). I'm hoping for a little bit of dilation, even though I know it means nothing. Some women don't dilate at all until the last minute and then manage to go from 0 to 10 in 24 hours or less, whereas other women dilate centimeter by centimeter in the weeks leading up to birth only to stall out when real labor kicks in. But still...even knowing that, hearing that you are actually progressing is a good feeling :)

I'm not going to keep apologizing for my lack of posting or promise that I will be posting more often, because honestly, how many times have I done that and not followed through? So like I said...I have a lot to share and I really hope to do so in the next few weeks. I hope that those of you who follow will keep checking in with me from time to time and not write me off completely (if you haven't done so already!).

Some pictures to leave you with:

Emma Alexis at 27 weeks gestation - being shy and burying her face into me and covering it with her fist

Emmie-boo's closed right eye and her nose, with her fist covering her chin

Me at 21 weeks & 5 days pregnant

Me at 35 weeks & 5 days pregnant...on my 26th birthday!

my long-lost daughter...

2009-09-07T08:51:00.000-07:00

so much to say, so little time

oh, hi.

2009-09-05T17:38:00.001-07:00

Goodbye, Summer of 2009. It's now September. How the HELL did that happen?!

Remember me? The person who apparently forgot she had a blog? Well, I'm back! I fell out of blogging (both posting and following) in the few weeks leading up to the bar, and after the bar, I just mentally disconnected from the blogging world all together. It's been just in the last week or so that I've made a conscious effort to start catching up with some of my favorites on Google Reader, and I'm happy to say that I am fully in love with the blogosphere again. Instead of looking at my "unread" count (which has been "1000+" for as long as I can remember) and cringing, I'm actually looking forward to new posts again. So now that the inspiration is back, I figure it's a perfect time to get back in the habit of posting.

So what's been going on with me? The bar is over, praise the Lord, except it's not really over because it will be another sixteen days until the results come out, and until I know once and for all whether I passed or not, it's still something that's hanging over my head. I hate to possibly jinx myself, but I think I passed. The test was hard, very hard, but it's about what I expected, and I have yet to talk to a fellow test taker who thought it was easy - a good sign since it's graded on a curve. It's entirely possible that I failed, but I really think I did enough to squeeze by. We'll see...please keep your fingers crossed for me. The notion of possibly having to take it again (while MOTHERING AN INFANT) is a nightmare way too horrid to even contemplate.

This pregnancy is in full swing. I just have to LAUGH when I look at the last thing I posted here, that pathetic excuse for a belly pic. Oh how naive I was, thinking that I was "showing." I've got a big, round, full-blown belly now. And - how ironic is this? - I have NOT been keeping up with weekly belly pictures. That's right...after religiously photographing myself every Wednesday for the first trimester and a half or so, when I had nothing to show for it, I completely abandoned the practice when I actually had changes going on that would have been super cool to capture on film. I have pictures that have been taken at various family events and with friends, but no honest-to-goodness, pose in front of the mirror, belly pic self photography. It's just something that fell by the wayside in the last manic weeks preparing for the bar, and I haven't picked it back up again. I also haven't written in my pregnancy journal since week 17 (BEFORE WE KNEW SHE WAS A GIRL! holy crap...). I'm a bad mom.

Where I've slacked in pregnancy documentation, I've more than made up for in mentally nesting. Emma Alexis's nursery is an obsession of mine. The topic deserves an entire post of it's own (which will be of epic proportion in length). As it stands, at six and a half months into the pregnancy, we have yet to purchase a single piece of furniture or any kind of decor for the room. Right now it's just an empty room that we painted light yellow...not as pale a shade of yellow as I wanted, and not as bold of a yellow as Gaby wanted. So it's a compromise. But I am happy with the results. It's cheery yet subtle. Between that, and our brand new Elfa closets (thanks, Mom!) in both the nursery and our bedroom, it's been just enough to make me feel like we've gotten a start on things, but not enough to make me feel like we've even started to make a dent in all that we need to do.

I am in a major holding pattern right now, anxious to see some progress, but also terrified to commit to anything. I've been dreaming of my first child's nursery for as long as I can remember, and I can't believe how little time I have left to actually make these decisions and start putting it all together. I have these grand visions in my mind and I'm really scared that I won't be able to live up to my own expectations for what I want her room to look like. But the clock is ticking, decisions must be made, and things must be bought...so definitely expect several posts on the topic in the coming weeks.

What else? Baby shower is coming up, October 17th, and my feelings on it are very similar to my feelings on the nursery...I know I need to get on the ball and start planning it but I am in this weird place where I keep telling myself that I have plenty of time before I need to make any real decisions when in reality I have not a lot of time at all.

My little Emma seems to be perfectly healthy so far, thank God, and she's a real fireball. I can't believe that just 2 months ago, I couldn't even feel her and she wasn't even big enough to make my stomach stick out. Now I feel her rolling around and jabbing me CONSTANTLY, and she's making me look like I'm smuggling a basketball under my shirt. We have an ultrasound this coming Wednesday, our first since the big ultrasound we had on July 7th, and I can't wait to see my little girl again. Gaby is doing great, just as much in nesting mode as I am, and desperately impatient to meet his little girl. My puppies (who I just realized I have barely posted enough about on this blog considering what a huge part of my life they are), are gorgeous and adorable as always...I can't believe Shula will be 3 in October and Stella will be 2 in November. They're still very young, but getting older every day, and yet they somehow haven't stopped being my "pups." I don't think I'll EVER see them as adult dogs.

My work situation is going really well so far...knock on wood. I am currently working part time and from home (a fabulous combination, I must say) and my boss and I will reassess the situation on September 21st when I get my bar results. There's a slight chance that I will start to go into the office full time, but more likely than not I will remain on a modified schedule, working 20-30 hours a week, primarily from home, until Emma is born. Not only because of my pregnancy and the toll it would take both mentally and physically to start a demanding full time job in the 3rd trimester, but also because of issues we are currently having with office space. My boss is looking to relocate, and until he does, there isn't really room in our current office for me to be there full time. The new office will likely be up and running early in 2010, meaning that my boss will be more than ready to welcome me as a full time associate in March, approximately 12 weeks after Emma's birth, which is the length of time I've decided to take off to be with her. The thought both terrifies me and excites me. I've been looking into daycares in the last month and I have so much to say on the whole topic of what we'll do with her when I go back to work that it's definitely going to need it's own post.

So there you have it. That's what I've been up to and what's on my mind. I don't think I have any readers that I'm not already close to because either a) you are my friend or b) you are a fellow poster on a message board I frequent. So chances are that most people reading this didn't really need that long, drawn-out update :) But it still made me feel better to share, and I think it's a great way to get the ball rolling again. Please feel free to call me out if I slack on the blogging again...I really want to stay current.

18 weeks and a few days pregnant...

2009-07-10T12:58:00.001-07:00

Sorry about the weird expression on my face. Clearly I haven't mastered the art of self-photography and smiling like a normal person at the same time.

She's a GIRL! :)

2009-07-07T12:57:00.000-07:00

Emma was so well-behaved today...not shy at all! She gave us a great money shot, and the tech is absolutely positive that she is 100% girl. Gaby and I are over the moon :) We can't wait to tell her grandparents tonight.

Dear Baby,

2009-07-06T17:04:00.001-07:00

Today versus tomorrow...

Today, you're just "the baby" or "the little boo boo." Tomorrow, you will have a name. Today, you have three beige outfits. Tomorrow, you will have a lot more outfits that mom and dad will buy you, in either pink or blue. Today, the 2nd bedroom in our condo is still called "the office." Tomorrow, it will be "________'s room." Today, we ask Shula and Stella whether they are excited to have a little brother or sister. Tomorrow, we'll be able to be more specific. Tomorrow I'll finally be putting a long while of daydreaming and online browsing about what your nursery will look like, what clothes I will buy for you, and what sort of birth announcement we'll pick out into action (not all at once, of course), because tomorrow, we'll know whether you're a BOY or a GIRL!

This is, of course, contingent on the fact that you cooperate during the ultrasound and show us the goods. Tomorrow is not the day for modesty or shyness. I'm serious. Your dad is even more excited and anxious than I am, and I can't promise that you won't be grounded for life if you play coy. We will never tell you this again, but we actually WANT you to spread your legs and show it all off tomorrow ;)

I first started to really believe in you when I had my first ultrasound and saw the flicker of your heartbeat. Before then, the 4 or 5 positive pregnancy tests I took really didn't mean much. But then I actually saw the little blob that will become your body, and that flicker that meant you had your own beating heart, and I finally believed that you actually existed. Since then, I've continued to believe in you...but I still don't feel that I know you. You haven't really let me feel you move yet (although I think I may have felt a little kick today, though it may have been just a muscle twitch), and all I know so far is that you've been very, very quiet and have kept a very low profile. You haven't made me feel sick at all, and the few symptoms I have had have been very subtle.

I know I still have a long way to go before I really "know" you. I know that even when I give birth to you and lay eyes my eyes on you for the first time, I still won't really "know" you. Getting to know you, on different levels, will take anywhere from a few days, weeks, or months (to "get used" to you), to an entire lifetime (to really understand who you are). But, at least by tomorrow, I am hoping that the process of getting to know you can finally begin. I've been told by some fellow pregnant women who are several weeks ahead of me that the next few weeks should be very exciting, and I am SO happy about that. Calling you by your name, feeling you move inside of me, watching my belly continue to grow, getting started on your nursery, and buying you a few gender-specific outfits or toys are all things that will make you even more real to me and that will make me love you even more than I do right now.

Everyone, including your dad and I, think that you're a boy. A lot of people have asked me what I would prefer, and I've been honest, especially when they say "But what do you REALLY want?" Before getting pregnant, I always thought that the "I don't care as long as it's healthy" answer was such a cop out. Then I got pregnant, and I understood - in those first few weeks and months when everything is still so cautious and the risk of loss is so high, you just want your baby to stick around and be healthy with no regard as to what gender you want. But then as the pregnancy gets further along and you become more confident, you start to daydream about what it would be like to have a boy or a girl, and I think for a lot of people, including your dad and I, a slight preference emerges. I'm not going to tell you what our slight preference is, because honestly, it doesn't matter. We really, really, really, really, really want to have BOTH a boy and a girl at some point in our lives. We want the experience and the honor of raising kids of BOTH the genders. So whichever one you are, it's okay...you're lucky in being the firstborn in that sense. All the pressure is going to be on your younger siblings to fill in the gap of the missing gender. Believe me, I'll tell you this from personal experience - it's not easy being the firstborn (especially if you end up being the firstborn AND a girl). So you take the bonuses where they come, and one of those bonuses is that despite any slight preference your parents may have, they will be completely and utterly thrilled out of their minds to find out your gender, whether you are a boy or a girl.

Speaking of your parents, here we are, exactly two years ago tomorrow:
This was taken at around 2:30 am at the end of a very, very, very long day and night - the best day and night of our lives so far - at our wedding. I know there will only be a few incredibly special moments in our lifetimes where your dad will stop and look at me that way. One was that night, 2 years ago tomorrow, after he made me his wife, and I hope there will be another one when I make him your father.

If you had told me on July 7, 2007, that I would spend the majority of 2009 pregnant and that on July 7, 2009, in addition to celebrating our two year wedding anniversary, we would also be finding out the sex of our first child, I wouldn't have believed you. See, we really weren't expecting you to come around so quickly, and I'll be perfectly honest and tell you that this was the source of a lot of anxiety for me in the beginning of my pregnancy with you. I felt hugely unprepared because you really didn't fit into the seemingly perfect timeline that I had created for myself. Don't get me wrong - we wanted you VERY badly, and if nothing else was at issue but our emotions, we would have made you a honeymoon baby. But you'll learn in life that sometimes, you create expectations of what is ideal, and then you make plans based on those ideals and try to stick to those plans as much as possible, because you think that if you don't, things won't work out the way you want them to. There are about a million cliches that I could use to express my next thought, but it basically comes down to the idea that sometimes life doesn't care about your plans, and the things that you think are happening out of order or in the wrong place in time end up being the best things that could ever happen to you. Now, I truly believe and understand that your timing couldn't have been more perfect, and I see little things like this (finding out your sex on our anniversary) as signs that everything is just as it should be.

So, little stranger. I know this has been a mouthful (you'll have to get used to that...to call me "wordy" or "long-winded" would be the understatement of the century...I don't think I've ever said or written anything short in my life). But I hope that it sheds some light on where we are right at this moment. Our relationship will be something that changes and grows constantly from the second that you're born, so I want to do my best to capture the different stages of it the best I can, so that we can all remember. Time goes by way too quickly, so you can never be too careful in keeping your memories intact for the future.

I LOVE YOU! I can't wait to meet you.

Love,
Mama

ladies and gentlemen,

2009-07-01T15:56:00.000-07:00

I'm pregnant. And it's getting harder and harder to hide it (not that I want to hide it). I've had a major growth spurt in the last few days and it looks like I've finally "popped." Which makes sense, since the baby (now the size of an onion) is also having a major growth spurt - from last week (16 weeks) to a few weeks from now (20 weeks), he or she will have doubled in size. I didn't really look very pregnant this weekend, and then on Monday I thought I noticed that I looked a little bigger, and when I caught a glimpse of myself in the mirror at the gym today, I had to do a double take. There are less and less outfits that really hide it. Now almost anything I wear - even a somewhat loose t-shirt - reveals the belly. I'm also starting to get a few twinges of round ligament pain and the skin on my lower belly feels really tight and stretched out (I slather myself with an almond oil/lemon oil/vitamin E blend every night). My belly button is getting shallower and wider (gross), and I'm up 8 lbs. so far, which is right on track for the average weight gain of 25-30 lbs. for the whole pregnancy. I was one of the lucky few who didn't have any morning sickness during the 1st trimester, so unlike some of my family members and friends, I didn't start off my pregnancy losing weight. I'm hoping I'll end up gaining less than the average, but who knows. I'm not going to stress it. I'm going to trust that my body will do what it needs to do to give me a healthy baby and I don't want to question that. Hopefully it cooperates when I am ready to whip it back into shape ;)

please excuse my disgustingly streaky mirror - i tried to cleaned it with a Windex wipe right before taking the picture, but clearly pregnancy has made me blind to grime and i missed all the mess

17 weeks (about 4.5 months) pregnant

I still haven't felt any movement, which I'm dying to feel already, but that could happen anywhere from any day now to several more weeks. The big gender reveal is next week and words can't describe how excited Gaby and I are to find out what the little munchkin is :)

I've had a bit of a mini-meltdown the last few days regarding the bar. As of last week I was feeling really confident, but on Monday it hit me like a ton of bricks how close the exam is and how much I still have left to learn by then. I want to know who thought it was a good idea to force law school graduates to take a test that is basically the equivalent of squeezing 16 law school finals into a two day period, just so that we can have the right to use the degree that we've spent the last 3 years of our lives busting our asses for. It feels so unfair.

So needless to say, the next 27 days are going to be intense. Gaby just found out that he won't be able to accompany me to Tampa as planned (a big work audit was scheduled for those days), so today I asked my mom to go with me, and now it turns out both my parents might come. I feel kind of like a baby for needing someone to go with me, but I really didn't want to be with people who are also taking the test, because I feel like that will just freak me out, and I also didn't want to make that drive alone and then have to fend for myself once I'm there. I can count on my mom (or parents) to make the 4 hour drive for me while I relax in the backseat, drop me off and pick me up at the testing center (versus having to worry about parking), and take me out to dinner on Tuesday night to get my mind off things.

Keep your fingers crossed for me, guys! I'll be back next week with the results of the big ultrasound :)

The Blog, The Bar & The Belly

2009-06-14T14:34:00.000-07:00

So obviously, this blog has been abandoned for a while. It's the 2nd or 3rd time in Jenuinely Inspired's short lifespan that I have gone MIA for a week or more. I wish I had more time and mental energy to post regularly, but studying for the bar has hit me like a ton of bricks and between that and the baby, I barely have any brain cells left over to focus my attention on anything else. I lost track of the last time that my Google Reader had less than a thousand unread items on it, and today, after skimming a few of my favorites, I just clicked "mark all as read" and essentially deleted 1000+ new posts from my subscribed blogs. That's how busy I've been. I am beyond determined to take this bar exam ONCE and pass it the first time. I'm pretty confident that I can do it, but I will never forgive myself if I choke. So for the next 45 days, I'll be completely consumed with making myself as prepared as possible. This past week we were lucky enough to go on a cruise with my parents, brother, and brother's girlfriend. We had a great time, and it was amazing to spend 24/7 with Gaby with no distractions or responsibilities, but coming back home and facing how far behind I fell on my study schedule is beyond overwhelming and anxiety-inducing. It's going to be a scary week of playing catch-up.

Thinking and daydreaming about the baby is the most welcomed distraction from the bar, and it's enough to cheer me up when I'm feeling especially hopeless. I try to not let myself indulge too much, because I know myself, and I can get very easily caught up in planning. If I'm not careful, I could easily spend 2-3 hours a day browsing the Internet for baby-related things, and I just don't have time for that right now. So I just keep reminding myself that in 45 days, I'll be DONE, and I can spend all the time in the world thinking about and planning for the baby. It's going to be tough to stay focused, especially after July 7th, when we know whether it's a he or a she. But this baby deserves a mom who can focus on him or her 100% and not be worried about the next opportunity to retake and pass a stupid test. And now I'm having a major case of blogging deja vu (sp?)...I feel like I've talked about this before, and if I have, I apologize for being so boring and repetitive!

Anyway, I can't promise regular blogging until after the last week of July. I hope to find time once in a while to keep in touch, but I really don't know if I'll have the mental energy to post anything more than once every few weeks. Also - I really don't want this blog to become purely baby-related, but let's be real: that's the biggest thing going on in my life right now, and will especially be so after the exam. So while I'll try to keep posting about other fun topics, I also can't promise that 90% of the content won't be baby-related in some way.

As for the belly...it's growing! My uterus is about the size of a grapfruit now and the baby is about the size of a lemon, which is impossibly hard to believe because I really don't FEEL anything. There's a bump on my belly...but it's not the baby. The baby is still down by my underwear line. So I figure the bump I have is a combination of bloat, weight gain, and all my internal organs being slowly pushed upwards to make room for my grapefruit-sized uterus. I'm up 4 lbs. from pre-pregnancy weight the last time I checked, and I'm terrified to weigh myself after a week of eating like a mad woman on the cruise. Now that the 1st trimester nausea is gone and I can whatever I want and as much as I want, I have to be soooooo careful with my eating habits. I'm definitely back on Operation Eat Healthy starting tomorrow. I'm determined not to let my weight get out of control with this pregnancy, and unfortunately, knowing my appetite and my body structure, it's something I know could easily happen if I don't take care of myself properly.

Here are pictures from the last few weeks (note...all these pics are taken in the afternoon...in the mornings, my belly still looks relatively flat and un-pregnant, and then it grows throughout the day to look more or less like this):

11 weeks pregnant

12 weeks pregnant

13 weeks pregnant - this day, both my mom and my trainer exclaimed "Hey, you look pregnant!" when they saw me

14 weeks pregnant (in Labadee, Haitie - Royal Caribbean's private island)

I can't believe I'm already 3 1/2 months - 2nd trimester! What a great feeling. Every week that goes by is one week closer to the assurance of a healthy baby. It's a weird time because ALL of my 1st trimester symptoms are gone (except for the excessive peeing, which is ridiculously annoying), but I'm still not showing enough to really FEEL pregnant, and I'm still several weeks away from feeling any movement from the little lemon. So basically right now I feel exactly like I did before I got pregnant, which is a little unnerving. I have a doctor's appointment on Wednesday and I'm looking forward to hearing the baby's heartbeat on the doppler. That's seriously gotta be the best sound to a pregnant woman's ears!

good lord, they're gorgeous...

2009-05-20T19:36:00.001-07:00

i may need...

2009-05-18T16:58:00.000-07:00

...some of these adorable measuring cups from Anthropolgie:

Found on The Kitchn

want to steal her outfit!

2009-05-18T16:53:00.000-07:00

From The Sartorialist

genius

2009-05-17T07:46:00.000-07:00

Maegan of ...love Maegan wanted these Christian Louboutins:

But had these old Charles Davids:

So using these materials:

She made these:

it's friday...

2009-05-15T14:02:00.001-07:00

...and I've been a TERRIBLE blogger! Since I started this thing, I have never gone so long without a post. But as you all know, I was extremely busy last week with finals and paper-writing. I finished, and then this week was a combination of crazy and relaxing. Work was hectic, but I didn't have school stuff hanging over my head so it was a huge load off. I worked during the day, and then completely disconnected in the afternoons, barely logging in any online time.

I graduate on Sunday. Ever since I got married, I had a sneaking suspicion that I might be pregnant at my graduation. But as the months went on and May 2009 crept closer and closer, it seemed too crazy to be real. Being married made me feel more grown up...to an extent. It was still basically just Gaby and I taking care of ourselves. Yes, we have a condo with a mortgage, and we are solely responsible for keeping our two doggies alive and healthy, but that seems like small beans when weighed against the responsibility of being a parent. For all intents and purposes, responsibility-wise, we could have very well been just two college roommates living together. And at 25 and 28, we're still so young. We've wanted kids forever, and we always had the mentality that we would have them sooner rather than later, but if you had asked me in January or February or even March of this year that I would be pregnant right now, I would have laughed in your face. I figured maybe by 2010 I would be pregnant or a mommy, but not so soon. But lo and behold, here we, are soon to become a party of 5 (because you know I'll always count the dogs as part of our family unit). And I have my little buddy bean with me to walk at graduation and accept my diploma, and to sit for the Florida bar exam...my little lucky charm. He/she behaved soooo well during finals. I was exhausted the entire week, but my tummy didn't give me any trouble and I was able to concentrate and focus enough to do everything I had to do. I only hope he/she gives mommy a break and that I have as good of an experience while studying for the bar.

The wonderful Mrs. JL had the audacity to award me on her blog, despite my lack of posting for the past week. She is the sweetest and I love reading about all of her adventures with her husband, friends, and family. Thank you so much, Mrs. JL! :) That really brightened my day. The rules say that you are to accept the award and then award other bloggers. I would like to award two wonderful women: Steph of Confessions of a City Eater and Jackie of Jackie's Ever Exciting Life. Steph has been mentioned on this blog before...she is a wonderful friend, talented photographer and cook, and law student who just completed her first year. Jackie is a shopping diva and always has links to the best coupons and sales on everything under the sun.

So since I haven't posted in forever, this is going to be a long one (yeah, I know...it already IS long, but there's more...). I am just going to post a few things that have been on my mind or that have caught my eye over the past week. Here it goes!

My baby:

Hello, I love you, won't you tell me your name?

Or should I say, my little ghost-alien-tadpole looking thing?! They say it starts to look more and more like a "regular" baby every week, which I am looking forward to...the head becomes more proportioned to the body, the limbs begin to elongate, etc. But still, even at just 10 weeks, it's amazing how well formed the baby already is. You can clearly make out the profile, with the little eye sockets, nose, and mouth. And although you can't see them in this shot, you could clearly make out the little feet and hands, which were waving all over the place. The sonogram tech explained to us that at this stage, they are awake for a minute or two, then fall asleep for a few minutes, then awake for another minute or two, fall back asleep, etc. So when we started the sonogram, the baby was having a field day, doing flips and somersaults all around my uterus and waving his/her hands wildly. Then it settled into a little corner, curled up, and stayed still for the next several minutes. That's when this picture was taken. It truly is a miracle and the most amazing thing ever to see your tiny baby moving right before your eyes. The best part is that they sent me a week too early (because the damn doctor wouldn't listen to me when I told him when I conceived, so his timing was off) to conduct the NT scan, so I get to go back this coming week...yay! This last ultrasound was very exciting because it was the first one Gaby went to (and really the first one where the baby actually looked somewhat like a baby), and for the one next week, our moms will be joining me so that they can meet their grandchild. I'm so looking forward to it :)

Right now I am obsessed with knowing whether this baby is an Emma or a Nicolas. We all think boy, but it's entirely possible that there's a little girl in there waiting to surprise everyone. I would be lying if I didn't say a tiny part of me would prefer a girl - the dresses, the bows, the pink, the dolls, the ballet slippers and tutus - but I know how a little man would completely capture my heart and have me wrapped around his little finger. So really, it's a win-win situation. I just want to know!!! I want to decorate! I want to buy things! I want to paint the nursery! Here's to knowing in July.

I am still keeping up with my weekly belly pictures...actually, I forgot to do it last week, but I did it this week. I haven't uploaded it into my computer yet, though, and honestly it's kind of pointless to post it because it's identical to the last few. I think it'll be fun to post them once I start seeing some changes. I am up 2 lbs. from what I weighed the morning I found out I was pregnant, and so far it all feels like bloat and boobs. As the Imelda Marcos of bikinis, I am devestated to share that I am down to only three bathing suit tops that will contain the twins. So when we go on our cruise in June, I'll have to cycle around those three instead of having one for each day like I normally would. I know, I know...poor me.

2. Baby orangutan kiss

This series of photos from ZooBorns melted my heart.

3. Speaking of little girls...

Holy crap, these are cute.

4. Heidi fabulosity
If ever in the course of this pregnancy or any subsequent pregnancies, I find myself in need of a gown to wear to a gala, I think I'll phone up Mrs. Seal and ask her to lend me this from her closet.

5. Rocker obsession...
I saw this rocker on Ohdeedoh and now I'm in love. So simple and classic! I would refinish the frame in white and then reupholster it in a creamy neutral or the palest of gender-appropriate blue or pink. Ironically enough, it was posted by someone who wanted it but could not find it anywhere...there is no source to where you could buy anything like this. I will be scouring eBay and Craigslist, but in the meantime, if any of you spot anything similar, please give me a holler!

6. Great gift idea
My cousins bought my grandmother a Ceiva frame for Mother's Day. It's one of the most clever inventions I have ever heard of. It's basically a digital photo frame that is connected to the Internet via WiFi or a phone line. You register it, and then you send an invitation to all your friends and family, and they, in turn, can e-mail photographs directly to your frame. So basically, my grandmother, who is technologically challenged and would not be able to program or operate a digital photo frame on her own, has this frame displayed in her house, and any time one of us decides to e-mail pictures to her frame, they automatically appear in her little slide show. Ingenius, no? I think it's such a great gift for parents and grandparents. Gaby and I definitely want to get one for each set of our parents this Christmas so that we can constantly send them pics of the baby that will be displayed on their frames.

Whew...that's it. I hope I've made up for my lack of posting over this past week! I have a post on some t.v. shows that I hope to share over the weekend if I have time, and if not, early next week. Happy weekend, my friends!

FREEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEDOM!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

2009-05-07T15:14:00.001-07:00

Not quite yet, but so close I can taste it! I turn in a paper tomorrow (which I will be slaving over for the rest of the afternoon/night), and then that's IT. I am officially done with law school. I'll be graduating on May 17th, and then I'll have hell to pay studying for the bar, but at least I'll be done with school...no more finals, no more papers, no more classes! I've been a student for 20 years straight out of my 25 year-long life. I don't really know my life without school. And 7 of those years have been at UM, meaning that part of my daily routine for the past 7 years has involved going to the same campus for classes, studying, socializing, whatever. It's the end of an era! I'm sure years from now, looking back, I will miss being a student and I will miss "the U." But right now, I'm just excited to be done...FINALLY. Here's to moving on with my life!

There's a frat guy in my uterus...

2009-04-30T16:40:00.000-07:00

That, or the little lady in there doesn't have the daintiest of palletes. Gaby told me he had Zinger Melts (boneless chicken wings smothered in sour cream and melted cheese) for lunch today and I almost had a foodgasm. Then I started fantasizing about another one of the Alehouse's specialties, their smothered cheese fries, and that almost sent me over the edge with jealousy over the fact that he got to eat there for lunch and I didn't. And for weeks now I have been dying to go to Hooters so that I can have some of their curly fries dipped in the hot cheese sauce. YUM!

Too bad that, in reality, if I sat down at one of these restaurants and someone put one of those plates in front of me, I would probably only be able to eat a fraction of the portion I used to. But, oh man...I would savor every bite!

LOL

2009-04-29T17:57:00.000-07:00

8 weeks and a handful of days

2009-04-29T16:05:00.000-07:00

I am so swamped right now with school and a special project I'm on for work. I'm really behind on blogging - reading and posting. Next week will likely be worse since I have a final and a paper due. I don't want to fall behind on my pregnancy posts, but it will likely be another week and a half before I get back to regular, non-baby related posts.

I'm officially 2 months this week, which means in just about four weeks I'll be out of the first trimester...YAY! The first trimester is a scary place. There's so much that can go wrong in those first few months, and the risks decline dramatically once you enter the 2nd trimester. The 2nd trimester is my happy place. I know it will be an extremely hectic and stressful few months while trying to prepare for the bar, but I am really hoping that my body and my baby cooperate and that it turns out that what the majority of pregnant women say is the case rings true for me - that the 2nd trimester is the most comfortable. I can't really complain because the 1st trimester hasn't been too terrible. I am mainly hoping that my "pregnancy brain" subsides a little bit and allows me to study and actually retain information.

Here is my belly today...still no real progress:

I felt disgustingly bloated today. I've gained a pound, which I'm guessing is probably bloat and boobs. Speaking of boobs - they're getting big. And heavy. And when I say, "getting big," I should really say "getting bigger" or even "getting more gigantic." I was a 32DDD (equivalent to a 32F) before getting pregnant (a lovely gift from Mother Nature) and they seem to be getting bigger and heavier by the day. My bras still fit me, but they're getting quite snug. I am just praying that I fit into at least a few of my bikini tops come June when we're going on a week-long cruise with my parents.

This was the week of snacking. I still can't eat big portions, but my appetite for snacking is big. Watermelon is a big one...I was craving watermelon so much on Monday that I got in my car and drove to the store to buy some. I'm also eating a lot of saltines (spread with either cream cheese or peanut butter), cashews, cheddar & sour cream Ruffles, string cheese, cheddar Goldfish, Wheat Thins, and Bluebell Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough ice cream. That's right...the sweet tooth is back. Well, not totally back, but that ice cream is seriously the most delicious thing in the world. Freaking delicious.

Inspiration from Megan

2009-04-27T12:43:00.001-07:00

Megan of Lovely Happenings has had the cutest material the last few days...

This adorable little French girl who makes me want to send my future daughter to French boarding school as a toddler so that she can come back speaking like this:

An ingenious Macbook sticker:

And this, which will be funny to anyone who spent a decent chunk of their childhood playing Mario Bros. on the original Nintendo:

2009-04-27T12:38:00.000-07:00

I keep saying in my pregnancy-related posts that I'm not craving sweets, but it seems that all the recipes I post are for desserts. How freaking DEELICIOUS do these Doughnut Muffins look?

7 weeks and 2 days (or 3 or 4 or 5 days)

2009-04-27T12:10:00.001-07:00

This was taken last Wednesday, on April 22nd. I weighed half a pound more that morning than the morning of my positive pregnancy test. I think my weight is fluctuating back and forth a bit but it should be any day now when I start to see a steady increase. I've been eating soooooo unhealthily. The only thing keeping me in check is that if I eat too much, I get terribly nauseous. I'm so lucky because this is closest I've gotten to "morning" sickness (which as any pregnant woman knows can strike at ANY time of day). I am used to putting away pretty big portions. Now, I can barely eat half of what I used to eat without making myself sick. I have to stop before I'm even satisfied and then just wait a little while and have another bit of food then. And the kicker is that I feel great and really enjoy the food in the moment. It's about 15 minutes later when my stomach starts churning. So every day I'm learning more and more just what I can eat and how much of it I can eat. Sweets are still not really appealing to me...I can eat them if they're set in front of me, but after a few bites, I'm done. I'm still craving fried food (chicken fingers are my best friends), potatoes, pasta, cheese, bread, and crackers.

In much more exciting news...I finally got to see my baby last Tuesday. AND IT WAS AMAZING! I went in for what I thought was a routine doctor's visit and when my doctor walks in, he informs me that I am due for an ultrsound to confirm the pregnancy. I had NO idea that they were going to do it that day! Gaby was soooooooooo upset. He had been waiting so anxiously for the first ultrasound (which we thought was May 11). When I called him and told him that they were about to perform an ultrasound, he was devestated. It really sucked not having him there, and it was kind of weird not to share that moment with anyone except the OB. I would have become much more emotional if Gaby was with me, but since I was there alone, I didn't want to weird the doctor out by getting all weepy.

Anyway, it was truly one of the most amazing experiences of my life. Before that ultrasound, I really didn't feel very connected to this baby. I knew that I was pregnant, but the idea that there was a baby in there was still a very abstract one to me. But seeing that little blob on the monitor and seeing the flicker of his or her heartbeat was truly magical. I know it's cheesy, but I really can't explain the rush of love I felt for that little blueberry at that moment. Truly an incredible moment. Now I feel SO connected to the baby. I'm constantly rubbing my lower belly, talking to my baby, and becoming really excited for December to finally roll around! We still have a ways to go :) I'm also just counting down the days till May 11. I can't wait to see the baby again, and for Gaby to finally get to meet his baby.

Oh, and my ultrasound actually revealed that the baby is measuring a handful of days bigger than I had originally calculated. So it seems like I'm due in the first few days of December as opposed to the 6th or 7th like I originally thought.

Last Friday night, we babysat our friends' 7 month old baby, Ava. She is truly one of the happiest babies I have ever met in my entire life, and was so easy to take care of...it was the easiest babysitting gig ever! Gaby, of course, was beyond wonderful with her (no surprise there), but what REALLY made me excited was how good the puppies were. They were so loving and although not quite "gentle" (they were definitely all about wanting to lick her little face the same way they lick ours, and clearly that required a need for us to hold them back), they definitely exceeded my expectations. Stella, who is somewhat skittish at times, was actually terrified of Ava at first and would run any time Ava reached out for her. After a while, though, she was okay. Shula just wanted to be next to her the entire time, and was totally cool with Ava grabbing her face and pulling her hair. When Ava was napping on us, the girls just wanted to get close to her and sniff her head (and her diaper lol). Overall, the night was a great success. The pups still have some work to do before they're fully baby-proofed, but we're not as far from good behavior as I thought we might be.

You can't really tell from the angle of the picture, but Ava totally had her left leg draped over Stella's back and Stella didn't mind one bit :)

Cookies & Cream Rice Krispies Treats

2009-04-21T08:55:00.000-07:00

How scrumptious do these look?
I love Rice Krispies treats, and I am an Oreo cookie fiend, so these are right up my alley. This may be enough to get me out of my non-sweets-craving slump. Recipe can be found at Annie's Eats.

another funny

2009-04-20T18:48:00.000-07:00

i don't know what's wrong with me, but all these random internet videos keep cracking me up. i am laughing like a madwoman right now. wtf is this thing?!

See more funny videos and TBT Videos at Today's Big Thing.

l.m.a.o.

2009-04-20T18:32:00.001-07:00

this commercial gets me every time:

Pregnancy Guide

2009-04-20T09:22:00.000-07:00

A cute and helpful pregnancy guide by Abbey of Abbey goes Design Scouting.

amen.

2009-04-20T09:01:00.000-07:00

found on for the visionaries

Spinach'n'Peace

2009-04-19T12:52:00.000-07:00

My friend Lauren is a very talented artist. I've always been a fan of hers, so of course it makes me extremely proud everytime I see her getting public recognition. I actually commissioned Lauren to create a custom painting for me that I gave my husband as a gift on our 1 year wedding anniversary (1 year traditional gift = paper, and canvas = paper...yay!). It's one gift that I know will be hard to ever top. I will try to remember to take a picture of it and post it later, but basically it's an abstract-ish kind of silhouette done in browns and reds and yellows of Gaby and I during our first dance at the wedding. And then in Lauren's gorgeous handwriting, in gold ink, are the words to the chorus of our first dance song. It hangs in the hallway right outside our bedroom and it's seriously one of my most prized possessions.

Lauren's work was recently featured on Lilly Pea Designs. Be sure to check out her Etsy shop and her blog, too!

i've been tagged!

2009-04-19T09:25:00.000-07:00

tagged by the wonderful Mrs. J L from The JL Family. Her blog is so cute, and her son Johnny is adorable :) I really enjoyed reading 10 honest things about her. Here's my list:

The Rules are as Follows:
1. Choose a minimum of 7 blogs for brilliance in content/design.
2. Show the winners and let them know.
3. List at least 10 honest things about yourself.

I love to cook. My mom is a great cook, but growing up I never had any interest in it. Then I got engaged, something came over me, and all of a sudden I was interested. I guess even though I never tried to learn from my mom, certain things did rub off on me from watching her my whole life because I picked up on it pretty quickly. My favorite thing to cook is Italian food - pastas and risottos.
Gaby and I are obsessed with our dogs, to the point that I think people think we're weird. I know only other dog parents can understand. But to the average person, I'm sure we seem pretty wacky. People keep asking me what we are going to do about our dogs when the baby comes, because right now both of them sleep in our bed. Honestly, I don't see this changing. I don't get what the big deal is. There's plenty of room for the 4 of us plus a baby.
I think I reached my peak of religiousness in high school. At some point in college I started to lose some of my connectedness with God and with praying, and ever since it hasn't been the same. Now that I'm pregnant, I feel some of that slowly coming back to me. I still don't really consider myself that much of a religious person...I think I'm more spiritual than religious, if that makes sense. But I've definitely prayed more in the last few weeks than I have in a long while, and when I go to Mass now (I never stopped going), I feel much more into it and connected with the whole process.
I'm kind of sad that this pregnancy has turned me off from sweets. I'm dying to have something rich and chocolatey like brownies or an Oreo Blizzard from Dairy Queen. But none of those things appeal to me right now.
I want new clothes but I know that's not the wisest thing to spend money on right now. We're trying really hard to save for all the new things we'll be needing in the next 9 months, and I know I should just wait until I see how my body changes before buying anything.
My taste in home decor has been changing a little bit. It sucks because my husband and I were on the same page when we first bought and began to decorate our apartment, but now there's things about it that are starting to annoy me, while Gaby still loves it. I foresee big arguments when we buy a house and have to decorate it because I know he's not going to like some of the "looks" in home decor that I am leaning towards now.
I'm really over school. Like really. I finish on May 8th, which I know is right around the corner, but it seriously feels like an eternity. I have to write two papers and take a final. I know that's really nothing, but when you're tired and distracted and feeling lazy all the time, it's hard to find the motivation. I can't believe this is really it for me...after 13 years of elementary/middle/high school, 4 years of college, and 3 years of law school, I'm finally done!
I think that if I could change anything about myself, one of the first things I would consider doing would be to give myself a beautiful singing voice.
I never want to live anywhere else in the world than where I live now. I guess if i I were a millionaire, I'd have vacation homes in the Caribbean and possibly in Spain or Italy, where I would spend a few months out of the year with Gaby and the kids. But Miami will always be my home base.
I have a really unnatural fear of side zippers...those zippers on dresses or tops that zip up the side of your torso and finish near the armpit. Especially when the piece of clothing is tight. I always get scared that my armpit fat is going to get caught in the zipper when I'm zipping it up. I always hold those things as far away from my body as possible when trying to close them.

Hope you enjoyed those! And hope I didn't scare you off with my freakiness!
Now I tag...

From the Archives

2009-04-19T08:55:00.001-07:00

I fell in love with this shuttered bulletin board featured in Apartment Therapy and shared it with my friends back on December 12, 2008. I wish I was more crafty/handy!

Instructions here.

6 weeks, 2 days

2009-04-15T15:20:00.001-07:00

Please note my puppy Shula in the lower right-hand corner, looking at me as if to say "WTF? Has mom finally lost her mind?"

No weight gain reflecting on the scale yet, but there's puh-lenty of bloat. I think it's a combination of the pregnancy hormones, but also of being off the strict calorie-counting diet I was on up until I got my BFP ("big fat positive" - as in, big fat positive pregnancy test - in pregnant woman lingo). I had been so careful and so aware of everything I was eating and making sure to keep track of every little snack and nibble, and I was actually able to drop a handful of pounds which I am really grateful for. But now clearly calorie counting is out, and eat what you want, when you want it (all within reason, of course) is in. I'm sure I'm probably consuming at least 400-500 calories more daily now than I had been in the last few months. However, in the last few months I had been consuming a pretty low amount - enough to help me shed about a pound or two a week. So I figure the extra few hundred calories bring me to "maintenance level" (a.k.a., the number of calories I would need to maintain my current weight, versus what I would need to consume to lose weight), plus tacking on another 100-200 calories extra for the baby, which according to "What To Expect When You're Expecting" is all that the sesame seed needs right now. I'm indulging on copius amounts of carbs, so I'm sure that's affecting my little stomach pouch too.

Of course I am still super aware of what I'm eating, but for totally different reasons. Now everything is about what is safe or unsafe for the baby. My OB was pretty relaxed when I asked him about food restrictions - contrary to what I had read on some internet message boards, lunch meat is totally fine as long as it's of a reputable brand and from a reputable source. Which is great, because turkey sandwiches have replaced my daily Lean Cuisine for lunch habit. Obviously anything raw is out...which affects sushi, but I am a sushi little-leaguer anyway. I was never one to try some of the more adventurous raw options. I usually stick to cooked rolls. And fish no more than once a week...this is, again, fine by me. I am not a big fish person, though I LOOOOOVE shellfish, and from what I've read in my pregnancy books, cooked shrimp and lobster are just fine (Thank God!). My doctor didn't tell me anything about caffeine, but I have completely cut it out. I'm not a coffee drinker, but I've been known to slip into pretty bad Diet Coke and Excedrin addictions from time to time. I know caffeine in moderate amounts is considered safe, but for some reason I really haven't missed it, and as long as that's the case, I'd rather not chance anything. I'm sure later in the pregnancy when the seed has reassured me a little more about the fact that he/she is doing fine, I'll have my Diet Coke here and there. But for now I just feel better avoiding it.

My Florida Bar Application...

2009-04-15T15:18:00.000-07:00

...is in the mail! WOOHOO! :) I am way behind schedule. It's officially not due till May 1st, but most of my classmates sent theirs in months ago. What can I say, it's the procrastinator in me. I am hoping since that I don't have anything shady in my background to report, it won't take them too long to process everything. Now we just need baby sesame seed to cooperate and behave so that mommy can study for, take, and most importantly, PASS the bar exam without a hitch!

This made me cry...

2009-04-15T10:19:00.000-07:00

Susan Boyle on Britain's Got Talent
(you gotta click on the link because YouTube disabled embedding on this video for some reason)

Talk about inspiring...this gave me full-body goosebumps and brought tears to my eyes. One of my favorite songs of all time and she NAILED it! Go Susan!!!!!!!

Wise!

2009-04-15T08:17:00.000-07:00

Seen on La Mia Vita and Lovely Happenings

Sweet!

2009-04-15T08:15:00.001-07:00

Instructions on how to make your toast adorable using regular old cookie cutters found on Ohdeedoh. Perfect for bringing your sweetheart breakfast in bed, no?

Clever!

2009-04-15T08:09:00.001-07:00

Draw-in Digital Message Cards...Found on Unplggd and can be purchased at Urban Outfitters

Food Porn

2009-04-14T16:50:00.001-07:00

I've been craving hot, savory, salty, starchy, carb-y comfort food. Pasta and potatoes and warm buttered bread. I've always been an ice cream and chocolate fiend, and while I wouldn't go as far as to say that I've developed an aversion to these foods, they definitely do nothing for me anymore. I'll pass.

These roasted baby dutch yellow potatoes from Pam of For The Love of Cooking are calling my name right now. And they're so simple. The only ingredients are the potatoes, olive oil, sea salt, and garlic powder. I can't wait to make these!

floating on air

2009-04-14T10:39:00.000-07:00

I am loving this gorgeous, rosy image from JacqleenBleu (found on A Merry Mishap). Wouldn't it make a lovely print for a baby girl's nursery? ;)

Pregnancy brain...

2009-04-12T08:47:00.001-07:00

Apparently it strikes early. Just a few minutes ago in my last post I was complaining about how I couldn't find my camera's memory card transfer cable and it was preventing me from posting my pregnancy test pics, and I just now realized that I already did that (uploaded the pics, that is). OOPS. So here they are:

The bottom one, where the line is darker, is the first one I took. It was approx. 6 pm and I was on my way home from the hospital having just visited my aunt and my newborn goddaughter. I was a few days "late" and I just stopped at Walgreen's to buy the test on a complete whim. I was certain that I wasn't pregnant...I just decided to take a test for the heck of it so that I could definitively rule that out and then try to figure out why my period wasn't showing up. I took the test, set a timer for 3 minutes, and went about my business, fully positive that it was going to be negative. Sure enough, before the 3 minutes were up, I happened to pass by the bathroom and decided to glance at the test. I seriously thought I was hallucinating when I saw the two lines. Then I thought it was defective, because clearly since I was not pregnant, only one line should have been showing up. After several seconds of confusion it finally hit me that I was pregnant.

In the past, whenever I daydreamed about getting pregnant, I always thought of these romantic and exciting ways that I would break the news to Gaby and to our parents. Then reality struck and I was so stunned that I couldn't even think straight, much less go along with an elaborate plan to surprise Gaby in a cute way. Thank God he was on his way home already, because had it been in the middle of the day, I probably would have blabbed it over the phone. The minute he walked in the door, it was written all over my face that something was up. I asked him to sit down because I needed to tell him something, and immediately he knew. 10 minutes later, I was chugging glass after glass of water so that I could take another test. That's where the top one in the above picture came from. I'm figuring the 2nd line was so much lighter because I had diluted my pee from guzzling all that water minutes before taking it.

Then it was off to Walgreens again to purchase more tests, this time in a variety of different brands, including the digital ones. Can you tell we were in disbelief? This digital one is what sealed the deal. I think when Gaby read the word "YES," it finally hit him, and that's when he gave me a big hug and got choked up. We had always said that we would wait several weeks before telling ANYONE we were pregnant, including my parents, but as those positive tests began to add up, the dad-to-be could not contain his excitement and insisted on calling his parents. I would have paid a million bucks to have seen his mom's face when she heard her first grandchild was on its way, but unfortunately I had to settle to talking to her on the phone. Later that night, we went to my parents house to tell them the news (they live 2 minutes away from us). They were beyond shocked, since no one was really expecting this, and after a few minutes of staring at us in silence, they finally cracked some big smiles and got excited :)

As I said, the 12 days since have been a whirlwind, and already things have not gone how I imagined them, from how I told my husband, to how we told my parents, to how we ended up making the news "public" to the rest of our families and friends. I guess that just goes to show you that no matter how hard you try to plan things (and I am big on future-planning), you never know when the moment strikes what you are going to be feeling or how you are going to react. I think I still would have liked to have kept this our little secret for several more weeks, but now that it's out in the open, it feels good. I love being able to talk to my mom openly about it, and talking to my cousins and friends who are new moms or currently pregnant about what their experiences have been.

One of my cousins who is due in August also broke the news of her pregnancy when she was very early along, just a day or two after her missed period and her positive pregnancy test. She told me that she's very happy she told everyone and got to share the joy as soon as possible, but she warned me that this was going to make my pregnancy feel very long, since you pretty much have your whole world waiting with you for the next nine months (versus the next 7 or so months, should you choose to wait a little while before spreading the news). I think she's right. As crazy as the last week and a half has been, April 1st feels like it was forever ago. And May 11, my first opportunity to see my little seed, feels like it'll never come.

I've been a-slackin'...

2009-04-12T08:10:00.000-07:00

This has been somewhat of a slow week for me, blogwise. I've been trying to keep up on all my blog reading, but it's been a bit harder to keep up with my blog posting. First of all, I just wanted to say...

From Cake Wrecks

I hope you're all enjoying a wonderful Easter Sunday with friends and family :) Gaby and I are heading out to his parents' house for lunch in a bit, and then tonight we have dinner with my side of the family.

Second of all, although I think most people who read this blog are already aware of my news, I think it's time that I officially "come out" in the blogosphere...I'm pregnant!!! We just found out last week on April 1st (try telling your parents that you are pregnant on April Fool's Day and see if they take you seriously) and the last 12 days have been a roller coaster of every conceivable emotion under the sun, from shock to worry to joy to excitement. Once I got over being stunned, I allowed myself to actually start getting excited about this little sesame seed, our early December baby, although I feel like it's still so early and there is still so much room for worry. I won't have my first ultrasound until May 11 (the day after Mother's Day, at which point I'll be 11 weeks along), and I don't think I will be fully relaxed until that happens and I can see with my own eyes that there's actually a healthy little baby in there with a strong heartbeat. Until that happens, it's somewhat hard for me to believe that this is all real and that we're really going to be parents in approximately nine months. I spend every single day praying for a healthy baby, and ask anyone who will listen to please send lots of prayers and/or good vibes my way so that this little seed actually sticks around and makes me a proud momma.

So far, THANK GOD AND KNOCK ON WOOD, I've been feeling fine. I'm exhausted all the time, and I find myself going to sleep much earlier than usual. But luckily that has been the extent of my symptoms. My boobs are a little bit fuller and sore, but nothing out of this world uncomfortable. I know it's still really early and I have the potential to start feeling sick at any time. One of my cousins started to feel severe morning sickness at 6 weeks (which I hit tomorrow) and another one at 10 weeks. I know everyone is different, and I really have no way of knowing how my body in particular will react to this pregnancy (especially since it's my first), so right now I am just trying my best to stay positive. I keep telling myself that I will feel fine and I hope if I can convince my mind of that hard enough, maybe my body will follow. I am supposed to take the Florida bar exam in July and that was my first concern when I found out I was pregnant. Not being able to take the exam, or not being able to study properly for it and then fail it, would be one of my worst nightmares. The next opportunity to take it would be in February 2010, at which point I will most likely be the mother of a 2 month old infant. So needless to say it's very important to me that I am able to take this test and pass it now so that I never have to worry about it again. I have been getting a lot of positive reinforcement from everyone, from my mom to my friends, and I am so grateful for that. Now it's just a matter of waiting and seeing what will happen.

I really wanted to post some pictures of my positive pregnancy tests (I took 4, and got pictures of 3), but I can't find the stupid cable thingie that reads my camera's memory card. So instead I'll share my "belly" pictures...in which, of course, there is not yet a belly. I definitely have a little pouch that protrudes where my rock-hard, washboard abs should be, but that made its way onto my stomach way before the baby came along as a consequence of the blessed Newlywed 10 (8 lbs. of which I was able to lose in the last few months before getting pregnant - yay!).

So here's the day I found out I was pregnant (4 weeks, 2 days pregnant):

(sorry about the blurriness)

And here's the belly a week later, at 5 weeks, 2 days:

I really wish I could say that little protruding bump in my belly button area is all baby, but it's definitely not. The baby is currently the size of a sesame seed, and located several inches south of that little bump, lower in my pelvis.

Since I found out I was pregnant on a Wednesday, my goal is to take belly pics every Wednesday for the remainder of the pregnancy. I can't wait to see the whole timeline when I'm all done. I'm not super eager to start showing (I have lots of beautiful pre-pregnancy clothes that I love and would prefer to continue wearing for as long as possible, thank you very much), but at the same time, I think it's going to be so fun to actually have a real baby belly where people can tell just from looking at me that I'm pregnant. So far I feel kind of like a faker...I tell people I'm pregnant, but I really don't look any different :)

Anyway, I'm not planning for this blog to become purely baby-related. There are still a lot of other topics that I am super interested in and want to continue sharing with all of you. But this pregnancy will definitely give me a lot of material to blog about, so you can expect to hear regular updates on that front in addition to all my other musings. Thanks for letting me share! :)

Chic Trench

2009-04-09T14:33:00.000-07:00

Usually the fashions found on The Sartorialist are a little too out there for me. I'm a simple girl, and I tend to stick to the classics/basics. But this hot little number featured today made my heart sing:
I looooooove the classic black trench balanced out with the sleek leggings and then finished off with the sexy nude patent pumps. This is precisely the type of weekend outfit I'd wear if I lived in NYC.

Simply Irresistable

2009-04-08T08:31:00.001-07:00

from for the visionaries

Are ya kidding me? Fluffy little white bunnies with black ears? Wearing little pastel striped shirts? All piled up on a table a few days before Easter?! Gimme a break! :)

Where can I find...

2009-04-08T07:41:00.000-07:00

one of these babies?
I'm totally feeling these light and airy little rompers for summer. Don't know if I would go all out with the metallic strappy heels like in this picture, but with cute and casual flip flops, I think they're a go. This particular version, though beautiful, is from BCBG and a bit too pricey in my opinion for something that will probably go out of style very quickly and won't make it out of my closet past Labor Day. So I'm on the hunt for some cute, less expensive ones. Forever 21 has a couple but I need more places to look...any ideas?!

oooh la la

2009-04-08T07:02:00.001-07:00

A delicious Italian featured on The Sartorialist. Why can't American men (more specifically, my American man) dress like this?! So sexy...

Happy Birthday, Steph!

2009-04-05T15:42:00.000-07:00

My amazing friend Stephanie turns a fabulous 25 today. She and her husband recently found out that they will be moving back to Miami after a few years of living in Boston where her husband studied medicine. Alex, who is very gifted, was accepted into the University of Miami School of Medicine's ortho residency program, and Steph will be transferring to a local law school. They are in the process of house shopping in Miami. We couldn't be more thrilled to be welcoming them back home :)

Happy Birthday, Steph!

You're so pretty...

2009-04-05T15:40:00.000-07:00

From ZooBorns

What a gorgeous baby giraffe! These have to be some of the cutest animals on the planet...those eyelashes are a dream.

Pencil Cup Calendar

2009-04-04T12:40:00.000-07:00

Found on DesignSponge

What an adorable and clever little DIY project! So perfect for an office desk.

Ambitious Eggs...

2009-04-04T12:03:00.000-07:00

How beautiful are these gold Easter eggs? So pretty! The recipe involves sucking the insides out of the egg with a syringe, filling them with chocolate, and then painting them with gold powder and tequila. Way too advanced and ambitious for me, but they sure are great to look at. Found here.

988

2009-04-03T15:57:00.000-07:00

That's the number of unread new items in my Google Reader (a.k.a. Inspirationville, USA). It's been a long, crazy, and exhausting week. I haven't really sat down in front of the computer for a significant amount of time since Wednesday morning, which in "Jen-internet-time" is like 8 years. Anyway, I am looking forward to a relatively quiet, relaxing weekend, so hopefully I'll have a chance to catch up and return to my regular blogging :)

Sweet underground spiral wine cellar

2009-04-01T08:00:00.001-07:00

How cool is this baby?

Seen on Simply Stated, can be ordered (ha!) at Spiral Cellars US

I love the "trap door." My dream house would definitely feature one of these!

Been M.I.A. today...

2009-03-31T17:33:00.000-07:00

...and she's the reason why. My new little cousin and goddaughter...she is perfection and I am in L-O-V-E. I was so tempted to steal her and keep her for myself ;)

Lydie Marie Josephine
03-31-09
7 lbs., 11 oz.
20.5 inches

Yellow Doors

2009-03-30T08:11:00.000-07:00

I looooooooove the look of these bright and cheery pops of yellow in the form of painted yellow doors:

See more at Megan's blog, Lovely Happenings

I've always been a huge fan of yellow, and it seems like it's been everywhere lately since Pantone named Mimosa, an uber-cheerful orange-y yellow, it's color of the year. My ideal color scheme for my future home is a balance of cool (creamy whites) and warm (chocolate, cognac, tan) neutrals, with bright pops of yellow to liven things up. I love the idea of a yellow front door...so quintessentially summery. I just wonder how well it would jive later in the year with Christmas decor. Hmmm...

Coral Clutch

2009-03-30T08:09:00.000-07:00

Okay, so maybe it's more orange than coral, but either way, it's adorable! :) So perfect for spring/summer with a fresh white sundress and tan or metallic gold sandals. $65 at JenniferLadd's Etsy shop.

A lovely quote...

2009-03-28T09:37:00.000-07:00

"Love is like a friendship caught on fire. In the beginning, a flame, very pretty, often hot and fierce, but still only light and flickering. As love grows older, our hearts mature and our love becomes as coals, deep-burning and unquenchable." - Bruce Lee

Found on Brown Button

Kitchen Re-Do Magic

2009-03-28T09:32:00.001-07:00

A fabulous and inspiring kitchen transformation from Holly of Life in the Fun Lane. She and her husband took the kitchen in their first home from this...to this......with just $400 and a lot of elbow grease!

Pantry storage

2009-03-28T09:28:00.000-07:00

How cute are these etched jars for storage in the pantry? The best part is that they're totally DIY. Originally found on The Kitchn, with instructions from none other than Martha, of course. I daydream of a pantry full of these canisters for all of my dry goods :)

I feel like chicken tonight!

2009-03-28T09:10:00.000-07:00

Three great chicken-related posts from The Kitchn:

Garlic & thyme roasted chicken with crispy dripping croutons. Yummmmmm.

Jamie Oliver's recipe for chicken in milk and lemon. Sounds so freaking weird, right? But the blogger goes as far as to say that it's the best chicken he's ever had in his life. And the pictures are enough to make a believer out of me...the meat looks so moist and fall-off-the-bone juicy. I need to get brave and try this one day.

And after you've finished one of those amazing recipes, eight great ideas for using leftover chicken. Leftovers are not always the most appetizing meal options, but if you find a way to dress them up, as lettuce wraps or chicken pizza, for example, they take on a whole new delicious life of their own. Gaby and I are not great at using our leftovers and sadly we do end up throwing away a lot of food. This is something I want to change, and recipes like this inspire me to do so.

Heads up...

2009-03-27T22:23:00.000-07:00

Absolutely gorgeous spring-inspired computer desktop wallpapers available here.

This will be mine eventually, when I'm ready to move on from my current background:

Happy Weekend!

2009-03-27T14:43:00.001-07:00

Mixed Media Collage Print from DollFace Design

Hope everyone is ready to have a fabulous one! Gaby took the day off work today so we've spent the day so far being bums and lazying around the house...caught up on Season 2 of "The Wire" which we're currently watching on OnDemand. This is our first unstructured weekend in forever so we're enjoying not having plans and being able to do whatever we want. We'll likely take some time out to give our condo some much-needed TLC in the cleaning department, but besides that, the rest of the weekend is an open book waiting to be filled :)

Too cute for words

2009-03-27T13:35:00.000-07:00

thanks so much to JennyLo for posting this adorable video!

Come to the dark side...

2009-03-27T12:04:00.000-07:00

My friend Monica recently got me hooked on white kitchens. I have a huge file folder in my computer full of gorgeous images of white kitchens that I hope to use as inspiration for my future home. My husband, on the other hand, hates them. He thinks the only reason they look nice is because they're staged for the photos and thus perfectly clean. He's convinced that in a real house, they'd get dirty and dingy immediately. Not to mention the fact that he's a dark wood fanatic. I saw this beautiful kitchen today on Alkemie, and it's the kind of thing that could make me give in to my husband's ways and go dark in the kitchen...

The Pioneer Woman cracks me up...

2009-03-26T13:44:00.001-07:00

Any of you who are not already familiar with Ree, a.k.a. The Pioneer Woman, need to run, not walk, to her blog immediately and begin to catch up. She is a hilarious, red-headed, displaced city girl living in "the middle of nowhere" on a cattle ranch with her husband (Marlboro Man) and four adorable kids. She is an amazingly funny and inspiring writer, and a kick-ass cook. I would say at least 20% of my favorite bookmarked recipes come from her. Anyway, she never fails to crack me up, and today was no exception. She is blogging about a meatball recipe, and she shows this picture with this caption:

"Start with 1 1/2 pounds ground beef. This is home grown, baby. His name was Alfie."

OMG. LMFAO. So horribly offensive and irreverent to vegetarians everywhere, yet so deliciously hilarious at the same time. It reminds me of this t-shirt...

I apologize in advance, vegetarian readers. I hope I haven't offended you and driven you away from this blog for life.

Soooo me...

2009-03-26T08:50:00.001-07:00

You know when you come across an item that is "sooooo you"? That's how I feel about almost everything in the Etsy shop of rennes-le-château. Her gorgeous leather pieces are so me! I am NOT the kind of woman who has a million purses in her closet and is always switching around depending on the outfit. I buy one or two good bags every year or every other year, usually a big and a small, and I stick to those and switch around amongst them. For bigger bags, I gravitate towards simple, unfussy yet luxe leather in neutral colors. For small bags, I also stick to neutrals or metallics and go for small clutches. I believe I first came across this particular bag on Bryn's blog, and it was love at first sight:

I love, love, love it! It's just so me. Although this pinkish neutral is darling, the bag also comes in this gorgeous cognac-y brown:

Swoon! This version is not available in the shop right now, but I hope it will be again. Because the next time I'm due for a new bag, this is the first place I'm checking.

P.S. How freaking adorable are these iPod cases?

"Filimangos"

2009-03-25T15:36:00.000-07:00

That's what I used to call flamingos when I was little. We had a Little Golden Book about Mr. Zookeeper and his daily routine. He would go to all the different areas of the zoo and feed the animals. I wish I remember what it was called! My brother and I loved that book, and I think we asked my mom to read it to us every single night for years. If I close my eyes, I can still vividly picture some of the illustrations. My mom got a kick out of the fact that my 3 year old, bilingual self insisted on referring to the pink, long-legged birds kept at the zoo as filimangos instead of flamingos.

I love these dishes! If I'm ever lucky enough to own an apartment on the beach, I'd totally deck out my china cabinet with these...

Found through Thoughtful Day, available at Bailey Doesn't Bark

Nap time?

2009-03-25T12:35:00.000-07:00

I'd like to dive head-first into this comfy-looking bed in this soothing white room...

Guestroom at a gorgeous French Bed & Breakfast...From Alkemie

From the Archives

2009-03-25T10:01:00.000-07:00

My "archives" are the several months' worth of fun blog posts that I have been sharing with my dear friends and fellow Google Reader addicts, Steph and Monica (be sure to check out Steph's blog...you're in for a treat). Part of my inspiration for starting this blog was how much I enjoyed sharing all these fun links with these girls. Whether they were inspiring, practical, or just plain cute, I wanted Stephanie and Monica to get something out of these blog posts the same way I had. The idea of this blog is just that, but on a more widespread level.

Check this one out, from December 4, 2008:

from Cute Overload

This little guy knows exactly how I feel today, battling my cold and sore throat. Don't you just want to scoop him up and cuddle with him?!

My current computer desktop background:

2009-03-25T09:53:00.001-07:00

Found courtesy of the wonderful Mangonett
Originally from Blah, Blah, Blahg

Not just a bad Sex & The City episode...

2009-03-25T09:23:00.000-07:00

Last Thursday, one of my worst nightmares came true...my trusty, year and a half old MacBook completely crashed. No one was able to give me a good reason of why it happened. I really thought Macs were not supposed to crash. Apparently my hard drive got fried somehow...according to the tech at the place I took it to, my hard drive was almost full (which completely boggled my mind).

Anyway, I was given a 50% chance of losing all my data...close to 2 years worth of pictures, video clips, music, and Word documents (school and work related). NONE OF IT was backed up. Needless to say, I was an emotional wreck and was barely able to function until I knew what was going to happen. I dropped it off on Thursday afternoon. Like Carrie in that "My Motherboard, My Self" episode, I was a nervous wreck. But I gotta give her props for remaining semi-composed. I was a MESS by the time I reached the repair store. I had called my husband from the car on my way over, and when I started to tell him everything I stood to lose if the data could not be recovered, I burst into full-out sobs. The front desk guy at Computer Village got to see my splotchy face, Rudolph-red nose, and swollen eyes while I pleaded with him to PLEASE SAVE MY DATA, as if any form of begging would make a difference. On Saturday morning, I got the phone call saying that - THANK GOD - they were able to recover everything.

I feel like a huge moron for not having backed up any of that stuff and I can't believe I came so close to losing it. There was really no reason for me not to back up. It was just out of laziness and ignorance (I really thought Macs were immune to crashing). I think it's just one of those things that you know you "should" do, but you just never get around to it until you or someone close to you gets burned.

So now I am in the process of saving EVERYTHING. I ordered a 500 GB external hard drive from Amazon, and everything will go there. On top of that, I've uploaded ALL my photos onto Flikr - I paid the $24 yearly fee for pro membership, which is great. You get to load unlimited photos in their original size. Video clips are going to Flikr as well (the smaller ones) or to YouTube. All my documents are going on Google Documents. MP3s will be burned on CDs. I don't want to risk ever being in the position to lose my data again...consider me the BackUp Queen from here on out.

I just keep thinking about what would have happened if I had lost all this stuff...pretty much every recorded memory of my first year and a half of marriage. Most of my dogs' "baby pictures" and priceless videos of them playing for the first time together. The sad part is, if this hadn't happened now, I probably would have gone along my merry, un-backed-up way for years. Imagine if this would have happened to me several years down the line, with a few years worth of my future child's baby pictures on my hard drive! Horrible.

So yeah...the moral of the story is: don't be a moron like me. Back up your work!

Sick.

2009-03-24T08:21:00.001-07:00

I woke up this morning with my throat feeling like it was lined with sandpaper, runny eyes, and a runny nose. Ugh. I was just sick in January! I though I'd paid my dues for at least several more months.

Nice dog!

2009-03-23T19:35:00.000-07:00

From this Apartment Therapy post

Love the couch, love the dog! Gaby has always wanted a bulldog. Since I met him, whenever the topic of dogs came up, he'd reference his future bully, Rocco. Well we are maxed out right now in our condo with two dogs, and they are most definitely not bulldogs. I think bulldogs are cute (especially the puppies!), but the thought of owning one scares me. #1, that slobber...ick. And #2, they are infamous for suffering from a lot of different health problems. I know how emotionally and financially taxing that can be, and it's a big detractor. Still, it's always been Gaby's dream, so who knows. Maybe once we have a house with a yard we can look into a little boy bully rescue to join our girls.

The picture was prompted by a question sent into Apartment Therapy about where to find a "modern, but not too modern, leather couch." This describes my aesthetic perfectly..."modern, but not too modern." Our dark brown leather couch is the centerpiece of our living room (with its wear and tear of doggie destruction and all), and G loves it. As much as I love the look of elegant, cream-colored, slip-covered sofas, I think we'll always be "modern, but not too modern" brown leather couch people.

Obsession of the Week

2009-03-23T19:13:00.000-07:00

O...M...G. Best ice cream EVER!

Blue Bell is new to South Florida. For several weeks now, I've been hearing them run a ton of ads on local radio advertising it as available in Miami supermarkets for the first time ever. Just from listening to the commercials, I figured it would be good. Their ads conjure up images of a lazy summer afternoon in the countryside, with a big family gathered around a picnic table or on one of those huge, plantation-style wrap around porches, enjoying bowls of thick, creamy home-churned ice cream. When I had the opportunity to try the product, it did NOT disappoint.

At last Sunday's Family Dinner (more on those later), my uncle, who knows what a strawberry fan I am, insisted on walking to his house and coming back with a half-empty bucket of their Strawberries and Cream flavor. It was to die for. Then last Thursday, my good friend Lauren offered to bring dessert for a girl's night dinner. So glad she did, because she brought the yummiest brownies I've ever had, along with a delicious pint of Blue Bell's Homemade Vanilla. The combination of the warm, gooey, dark chocolate brownies, with the cool, pure flavor of the vanilla was orgasmic, to say the least. My husband Gaby had been away on business on the night of the girl's dinner. When he arrived on Saturday, I told him about the leftover brownies and the vanilla ice cream in the fridge. He took one spoonful of the ice cream and quickly declared it the BEST vanilla ice cream he had ever had in his life. It was so good, in fact, that he was hesitant to mix it in with the brownies and continued to eat the ice cream by itself...and this is a man who LOVES brownies. Ever since he tried the ice cream, he's been obsessed with it, repeating over and over again how he never thought plain vanilla ice cream could taste so good.

I made a quick run to the supermarket this afternoon and called G to see if there was anything he needed that I might forget. He begged me to bring home a small container of Blue Bell chocolate, "just to see if it's as good as the vanilla." Mind you, we're both supposed to be watching what we eat, especially on weekdays. But believe me, he didn't have to twist my arm very hard for me to give in. I went practically straight to the freezer aisle and was so disappointed when I saw that they didn't have any smaller pints of Blue Bell, nor any chocolate. Not so disappointed, though, that I didn't go with plan B - buying the big half gallon tub of a different flavor. I opted for Candy Jar...reminiscent of a Cold Stone concoction, this baby features their signature vanilla ice cream (cannot stress how delicious this is) chock full of mini peanut butter cups, chocolate chunks, peanut brittle, chocolate crisp pieces, and swirled all around with ribbons of caramel. To die for, I tell you!

The irony in this post is that later this week, I plan to blog about my favorite weight loss tool, "Lose It!". HA! A post about ice cream and weight loss in the same blog, much less in the same week. I'm a walking contradiction.

Testing the waters...

2009-03-23T16:14:00.000-07:00

I've been toying with the idea of starting a blog for a while now, and over a year ago, I did. After one post, I realized that no one wanted to read about my boring life and I quit. However, since that time, I have become much more "active" in the blogosphere - and by "active," I mean an actively passive reader. I am not one to comment a lot on blogs, but I savor them, reading every word and enjoying every picture. I'm a diehard Google Reader addict, and I currently subscribe to 146 blogs.

One of my biggest qualms about starting a blog was my worry that I wouldn't have enough original content. I'm not a talented photographer (though I'd love to learn), I love to cook and bake, but not enough to do anything fancy or blog-worthy on a regular basis (we keep things simple around here), and although I'd like to think I'm a pretty funny person, I don't know how well that would translate in this format. My life is beautiful and blessed, but fairly ordinary and unexciting. However, from time to time, things will happen to me and I think to myself, "This would make a good blog post."

The more I've gotten into reading and appreciating blogs, the more I've realized that original content doesn't really make or break it. Some of my favorite blogs are all about inspiration. It's about sharing great ideas or beautiful images. And if I'm anything, I'm a person who is very easily inspired. It's amazing how a simple but gorgeous image can make my mind race and inspire a million and one new ideas that I can find a way to apply to my everyday life. So that's what this blog will be about: INSPIRATION. I can't promise that it will always be funny, I can't promise that the material will always be original or exciting, but I promise that I will do my best to share with you some of the hundreds of inspirational ideas, links, articles, pictures, etc., that I come across weekly on the Internet. Whether it's decor, fashion, pop culture (movies, TV, music), food, or something more nerdy and boring, I'll share what inspires me in hopes that it might inspire you too.

Welcome!