One of my new favorite things to do is to read my friend’s blogs. It used to be such a chore. I used to click on each person’s blog just to find out they didn’t update recently and it was a pain. Now I use bloglines (see side bar). You add everyone’s blog url and it will tell you when it’s updated. I used to use another service but it didn’t work every time someone updated I found out. Bloglines works really great, but it doesn’t tell you updated through your blog, you need to log in to see your list of blogs and who updated but that works fine for me! I love this! So if you noticed I’ve been hitting your blog a lot, that’s why!

This week I found out that our Howell high school class of 96 has a space on myspace.com and I added it to see who was signed up. I think out of the 36 people listed, I maybe knew 8? Not a lot. We did have 360 people in our graduating class! I couldn’t figure out who some of them were and was happy to see some of them have good lives and are doing well for themselves. I don’t know if I will go to a reunion. It’s our 10 year HS reunion this year for Joe and I but so far, no one has planned either. With the baby on the way, it wasn’t exactly the best timing for everything but it’s nice to connect to old friends though the internet.

On that note, anyone else using myspace.com? I must have a public profile because people I don’t know keep asking for my permission to add them as a friend. It’s kinda annoying, yet I want people I know who are searching for me to be able to find me.

Thursday afternoon after work I took Joey to the fruit market. He loves going there because of the trains that run on tracks suspended from the ceiling. I decided I was buying a bunch of fruit to cut into a huge fruit salad. The best fruit I had from this batch was the honeydew melon. It was sooooo good. I also added strawberries, blackberries, blueberries, cantaloupe and honeydew. Here’s a photo after I cut it on Thursday night. Doesn't this look AWESOME? Do you know how much I like fruit salad (Yummy yummy for all of you Wiggles fans out there!)? I put it in a strainer in a big bowl (the strainer is made for the bowl) and it keeps the fruit fresh longer because the juice comes out the bottom into another bowl and the fruit doesn’t sit in it.

Joey has been eating a LOT this week. I think he’s going through a major growth spurt. He seems taller. I told Joe we needed to measure him today. He was 36.5 inches in January and he’s 37 inches now. He’s getting so tall. He’s in 3T – 4T already! Amazing! This photo of him is of today. The only way I could get him to look at the camera is me asking him to see his eyes. He was squinting at me - it was quite cute but that would contribute to the look on his face!

Joe's favorite thing lately is to watch the Saprano's TV show. His buddy at work loaned him the tv series on tape and that's all he's been doing lately. He's hooked!

Anyone watch 'The OC'? One more episode left! And American Idol is finishing up too! I think Chris will win! I love the show! Chris rocks!

This week I feel like I’m really big. I can’t believe I have more than 15 weeks to go!! I’m going to be soooo big. Why can’t I be one of those cute ladies that only have that cute little ball tummy? Oh how I wish that were me! I’m certainly showing sooner, faster this time! Here was a photo from when I did a scrapbook album for Joey and I was 23 weeks (the small photo). I feel like I was a lot thinner then, but I am carrying a lot higher this time!

Justin has been kicking a LOT lately. Usually it’s right after I eat something he’ll kick me. It’s so neat. I love that feeling. I still haven’t been consistently able to feel him kick externally, so hopefully in another week he’ll be doing this more so Caroline will be able to feel it when we go to Seattle to see her!

This week the baby seems like every now and then he’s getting his legs and pushing out on my stomach and my stomach feels really really hard in just that one spot. It’s such a weird feeling!

Seriously, not much going on this week except I’m getting rounder! I’m also hungry a lot of the time and have been trying to eat better. I crave eggs and have been eating them daily. I have a book called ‘What to eat when you are expecting’ and it says if you do not have a cholesterol problem, it suggests you do eat an egg every day because it’s high in protein, which the baby needs. I think I crave eggs because I’m not a huge meat eater and it’s my body’s way of telling me I need more protein! I honestly do not like being preggo because I get so BIG and after being at goal with Weight Watchers, it’s hard to see myself gain all this weight. Anyone who was at WW goal and gets pregnant – it’s so hard to see the numbers go UP on the scale. It’s almost depressing some days!! I guess I’ll just have to work again at getting the weight off when the baby comes!

Also, notice the difference in these new photos. The one in pink was taken on Friday 4/5/06 and the one of me in black was taken 4/6/06 (the next day). The one of me in black I don’t look so big. If you can’t tell, I’m showing very very high, not low like I did with Joey.

23 weeks:

This week your baby is over 8½ inches in length (crown-to-rump) and weighs a little over a pound. Your baby's pancreas is developing well and is even beginning to produce insulin, which is necessary for the body to break down and use sugar. The bones in your baby’s middle ear are hardening now. Your little one is also beginning to exercise his or her fingers and toes, developing a strong grasp reflex. Your baby is now almost in complete proportion, although the head is still a bit bigger than the rest of the body.

Changes in your abdomen are progressing gradually, but you definitely are getting larger and many of your pre-pregnancy clothes are probably impossible to get on. You may have gained between 12-15 pounds at this point in your pregnancy. Your pelvic floor muscles will be stretched as a result of your pregnancy. Kegel exercises are simple techniques you can do to tone the muscles in your vagina and perineal area. They will help prepare your muscles for delivery and ensure a speedy recovery postpartum. You may find yourself having trouble with hemorrhoids. Increase your fiber intake and drink lots of water if they become bothersome. They will most likely vanish after delivery.

Ok, lesson number one as a parent - never ever buy a bean bag that is NOT put together already. What a fricking mess!!

Now it says to cut the bag in one spot, but as soon as you do, the little balls go flying everywhere all over the floor and there is no way you can get the bag corner in the 5 inch little zipped section they provide you so all over the floor they went.

I asked Joey to help me hold OPEN the bean bag, but he did as well as he could for a 2 year old but he wanted to play with it.

So after probably 10 minutes I managed to get the rest of the beans in the bag (with the exception of the 4000 that hit the floor - augh).

Challenge #1 - Try to keep Joey from kicking them all over the room.
Result - didn't work.

Challenge #2 - Try to keep Joey from running his cars through them and dragging them all over the upstairs.
Result - didn't work. Though he did think it was great to stick those styrofoam peanuts in the headlights of his car. I have to give him credit for being creative.


See a pattern?

So how do you clean up these dang things? Not an easy task.

Challenge #3 - how do we get these beans off the floor and into the bag?
Result: Didn't work (see the pattern! LOL). Joey and I tried to pick them up with our hands and put them beans in the bag, but they have static electricity so they stuck to our hands. AND my poor 2 year old wanted to play with them in the bag and pull them back out. 5000 beans on the floor.



Challenge #4 - How to clean up these off the floor. The heck with putting them in the bag.
Result - Didn't work well. The best idea was to vacuum them off the floor.

Challenge #5 - Getting them ALL off the floor.
Result - well it worked - hardly. The styrofoam beans stuck with static to the vacuum, in the container and all over. Every time I had to empty the container, I had to scoop them out of the container, and then I had to sweep them out of the vacuum so I could put the container back IN the vacuum! I meant to empty the container before today but this was not what I had in mind!

Result - all of them were finally picked up off the floor. I hope you found more humor in this than I did.

Moral - never do this without another adult, or in the supervision of your 2 yr old, unless you want to chase styrofoam balls all over your house. I'm sure we will keep finding them all over our house for the next year!

At least Joey enjoyed jumping on it when I was done! That made it worth all the hassle!





So today I had a dentist appt so I ran Joey out the door at 9:30 for daycare.

I went to the Salvation Army again. Do you remember my story from Saturday where there were 150 cars and it was nutty because it was a grand opening? Yeah, it wasn't a whole lot better today. The parking lot was full. They had people hired to show you parking spots. I kept thinking - "everyone - this is the SALVATION ARMY - not a super fancy awesome place to be." Then I thought, 'Yeah, so why are YOU here?'

So I got inside and OMG it was nice. They had a huge section for everything. I found a bunch of carters sleepers for this baby and I found a maternity shirt and dress (for Lori's wedding shower this month!). I spent $19. The line to checkout went half way though the store. I couldn't believe. The lady behind me was telling me that on Saturday people were fighting over stuff. As soon as you were interested in something, someone else wanted it! She said the police were ticketing people for parking across the street and j-walking across to come over so no one could park across the street. I'm glad we decided not to come on Saturday! Crazy I tell you!

Well because I had to wait in that forever line, I was a bit late to my dentist appt. Thankfully she did not beat the heck out of my teeth for being mad at me for being late! :)

Then I went to the consignment store that I love to frequent and spent $50. That's not too bad I suppose. I got a few books 'What to expect - the Toddler years' and another book like it 'What to eat while pregnant', a backpack diaper bag that is really nice, a few outfits for Justin, a UofM outfit for Joey, and a bed rail for the bed for Grandma's house up north for when Joey moves to the twin bed. I also got a few maternity shirts and a pant/shirt suit for work. I didn't do so bad.

I'll update more later. Joey's napping. Today was my day off. We may go to the pool later!

First of all, can you girls let me know if you are having problems with your browser crashing after you leave comments? I'm trying to debug my blog. Thanks! :)

Today was nice. We all woke up at 7:30 and just lazied around the house. We ate a big breakfast, I won't tell you what because you will say OMG. It wasn't the best stuff either! opps! ;)

Ok here's a funny story. Joey and I were sitting and playing around when I gave him a bunch of kisses on his neck and he giggled. He kept saying 'More kisses'. Then after awhile of doing that, he wanted me to kiss body parts, ears, neck, nose, leg, and then he stands up, bends over and says BUTT. Ok, now my son just asked me to kiss his butt. Joe heard everything and busted up laughing. I busted up laughing and Joey didn't really understand but he cracked up laughing. My silly little boy - asking me to kiss his butt! hahaha.

We later got ready and went shopping at Meijers. I got a new toilet bowl cleaner and love it. Only I would get excited about something like that. They are called Scotch-Brite Toilet Bowl Scrubbers. When you put them in the water the chemicals come out and they scrub the toilet really nicely. Then you toss the pad when you are done! I'm throwing out the old toilet brush - yuck!

I got some bird food while I was there, I needed compressed air because my pc keeps shutting off because the fans are gunked with dust, and we got Joey a new James car from Thomas the train. He played with it all day long.

Home we went. We ate lunch and then put Joey down for a nap. Caroline helped me try to debug my blog. I think it could be something on my sidebar causing the problems. Hmmm. We'll have to play with it more later.

Then I took a nap - it's so nice to nap!

When we got up around 4pm, we got ready to go to my parent's. We had pizza at their house and relaxed the rest of the night. Joe had 6 good humour ice cream bars tonight - well Joey helped eat maybe one or one and a half. Joe ate the rest! OINK :) Guess he likes those ice cream bars!