Melarky

Wellington is becoming a big boy so fast and with a little brother on the way I’m sure he’ll seem even bigger, but I just wanted him to know that even though we’ll have a new baby soon, he’ll always be my baby.

We’re ON for having a baby next Friday. I’m super excited. I can’t wait to meet him, see who he looks like, how big he is…ect. I’m also really excited that I don’t have to stay in the hospital for two days. If there aren’t any complications we should be able to go home the next day. Which is great news because its gets awfully boring in the hospital.

I feel ready-ish for the baby to come. I was feeling more ready when it came to the house being clean and organized, but since I’ve been sick (we’ve all got nasty colds at our house) I’ve let the house go, and so now I don’t feel so ready.

The baby seems pretty content, and is still very, VERY active. I had an appointment yesterday and Dr. H and he said that I was “Almost dilated to a three!”. Mark said that was just a fancy way of saying I’m still a two. Either way we’re going in early Friday morning to have a baby.

Curious what we’re thinking of naming him? Top three names; Hilyard, Callum, and Bentley. Which name do you like the best?

His brother was 9 lbs. 13 oz. and 19 inches long, but he was also a week late. This baby will be a week early. Any bets on how big this baby will be?

We’ve been having great weather in Cache Valley this past week. My Mom was kind enough to take Wellsy to the park yesterday and play/chase him around for me. She bought him a toy shovel and a rake and they had tons of fun in the sand with it.

They built a sand castle together. Grandma showed him how to put sticks in the castle and build a fence out of chestnuts. I’m sure whoever comes to play Volleyball in the sand next will hate them.

Grandma chased him around the park. Helping him up ladders and down slides.

Wellington wants to be so big, and do exactly as the other kids are doing. He loves going down the biggest slides (Dear Red slide at Adam’s park, I hate you. Why do you have to be so tall, and why do the railings leading up to the top have to be so easy to go over, through and under? No body even likes your steep metal stairs. Why don’t they just tear you down already?).

He ran from one thing to the next and when it was time to go I was so glad my Mom was there. You practically have to drag him away from the park. But she somehow got him to come peacefully. Grandma’s always have a way.

Unfortunately, we’re due from some more depressing weather. Rain and snow are coming soon to Logan. You know, I used to not care so much, but when you have a kid and your stuck inside all day with no sunny, fresh air breaks in sight, its gets a little depressing.

I’m glad spring is here though. And I’m definitely looking forward to spending more time outside. I want to have lots of outings this summer, picnics at the park, family get togethers, bbq’s, and road trips. Oh, and I’m also really looking forward to having this baby. Only 13 more days to go. I’m feeling fine. Well, very pregnant, but fine. I’m sleeping less (I hate being up at 6 a.m. on a Saturday), waddling more, and maybe the worst of all….my shopping stamina has frightfully decreased. I can only walk around a store for maybe 10 minutes before I feel like my stomach weighs a million pounds and my bladder might explode.

I think I’m ready for this baby. We have clothes, diapers, all the necessities, but the house isn’t ready. The bathrooms are scary, more laundry needs laundered (yeah, like I’ll ever see an end to that?). But overall I feel ready. I can’t wait for him to come. I can’t wait to see who he looks like, how big he will be, how his older brother will react. I can wait however for no sleep.

I’ve got a ton of pictures on my cell phone and a ton of things I was going to blog about, but there’s been a real lack of blogging enthusiasm lately. You know some people have to try and get ready for the arrival of a new baby! About 16 days to go!

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I will never let Wellington take one of those kid sized grocery carts. One experience at Smith’s Market Place was all I needed to cure me of that. But Grandma, she’ll give in, just like a good Grandma should.

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Our poor kid gets croup at least once or twice a year. I think we were in the emergency room this time last year as well. Two weekends ago, we put him to bed, with a slight cough, nothing to worry about, and he awoke in the middle of the night gasping for air. At two in the morning, his Dad wrapped him up and took him outside. Taking him outside in the cool night air usually takes care of it. But after that trick didn’t work, we hurried, got dressed and took him to the ER. We drove to the hospital and when we got there he seemed fine. We drove back home, thinking that the cool air had finally did its trick, put when we pulled up the driveway, he wasn’t fine. We went back to the ER and went in.

They said it was good we brought him in. He was pretty bad and took the usual oral steroid treatment, but this time he had a nebulizer treatment as well. This treatment required him to wear a mask over his nose and mouth. He hated it, absolutely hated it with all of his heart. He cried and cried, but kept the mask on. He was actually fine wearing it up until they turned it on and the smoke/gas, whatever it was, started to come out. I think it scared him.

He looked so sad there laying on the hospital bed with his blanky. We were at the hospital for about two hours while they monitored him, gave him treatments, with most of the time being spent coaxing him to take his medicine. Not even a popsicle or juice bribed him. He’s getting too smart for bribes.

The next morning after a rough night was spent on the couch, next to an open window so he could breath better. It was a little on the cold side, so he was bundled up while he was sleeping. Even though it was sad he was sick, he was very cute all cuddled in a mess of blankets and with his hat on.

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My sister, Barbara, “tried” the Screamer. She kinda “sissed out”. Missed our post on the Screamer? Check it out!

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After a few days of being sick and stuck in the house, Welly was anxious to go outside. His Dad got him all ready to go out. When I realized what he was wearing, I said, “He can’t go out like that!”. If you can’t tell by the pictures he had one of my scarfs on, a fluffy hat, space invaders jacket, and Batman jammies. Awesome combination! Even though he looked like a big nerd, he also looked very cute, so I allowed him to go out of the house.

“Don’t throw your toys”
“Get your hand out of your diaper”
“No Fussing”
“Keep the water in the tub”
“Get in your car seat”
“No! Don’t eat that off the floor!”
“Clean up your mess”
“Don’t hit”

Yes, that list could go on and on. I guess sounding like a broken record kinda comes with the job title “Mom”, doesn’t it?

As I was thinking of things I tell my son multiple times a day, I realized some of them seemed negative and kinda bossy. “No” “Don’t” and “Stop” are heard over and over again. Even though they seem negative, they also seem necessary for my two year old to learn. I do include nice, positive things as well. I remember to use please and thank you myself but most of what I say seems more on the negative side. I hate saying “No” all the time, but I find these days are filled with them.

I’d like to improve how I teach and mold my son into a polite, well rounded and hopefully hygienic (“get your hands out of your diaper!”) boy. I’m not sure how to do it. Any tips on how you do or did it?

Saturday morning we woke to a heavy box on our door step. After seeing it was from woot.com, my husband and I were both puzzled because we hadn’t ordered anything from woot that warranted a box that big. We had ordered three random shirts from shirt.woot.com a while back, but that wouldn’t take a big box. Mark even commented, “It’s too heavy to be shirts”.

We brought it in and opened it and it was our three random shirts, a note and more shirts! Lots more shirts! The note said; “Important customers, “Congratulations” you get a mess of misprints. Regards, Woot!”.

One after another Mark pulled out over 30 shirts in all different sizes from toddler sizes to ladies small to xl, and Mens small to xxl. The bulk of the sizes fell into my size category, so it looks like you’ll be seeing me in a lot more woot shirts. Some of them did have printing mess ups, but most of them looked fine. There were even a few “blank” ones, perfect for our hobby of screen printing.

It was so fun and so crazy! How did we get to be so lucky? Thanks Woot.com!

P.S. Not sure what woot.com, shirt.woot.com, and random shirts are? Woot offers one product per day until its stock of that item is sold out or the product is replaced at midnight. Shirt.woot is an extension of that site. Similar to woot.com, shirt.woot changes it’s silk-screened shirt design each day. Designs are submitted by established artists and its forum community. Unlike Woot, if a shirt on shirt.woot sells out, you can still purchase it for a higher price. Woot occasionally offers a Random Shirt day. Shoppers can purchase up to three randomly-selected usually discontinued shirts for $6.66 each. Customers can only specify the size and quantity (up to 3) desired, not the design.

Why do we go out to eat? To celebrate, convenience, a craving or boredom (I very often eat when I’m bored)? There are many different reasons why we might pull into that fast food drive through, but after reading an article today I’m inspired to change my going out-to-eat ways. From an article on KSL.com today;

“The recession has people looking to save money, but apparently we’re not willing to say no to hamburgers just yet.” “…McDonald’s saw sales rise in February.” “Utah has also seen several new burger stores announced, including an In-and-Out in Draper and 13 more Five Guys Burgers and Fries restaurants.”

Just think how much money you could save if you ate out less?

I find myself very often saying, “There’s nothing to eat (at home)”, “I don’t feel like cooking tonight”, “I’m totally craving cheese curds from A&W (they’re the most delicious bits of deep fried cheese in the world).

But why when things are so economically tough right now can I still justify going out-to-eat so much? I took a quick look at our “out-to-eat” expenses for the last few months and I’m kinda embarrassed to find that we spend an average of $100 a month on going out-to-eat. I blame our new love for Pizza Plus’s pizza and bread sticks but really there needs to be a serious change, one that hopefully still includes those fried pieces of heaven.

I don’t think cutting out going out-to-eat all together is the answer. I think it’s unrealistic to say I’ll never go out-to-eat ever, but a goal of how often and a budget of how much is more reasonable.

My goal. Cut our going out-to-eat expenses in half. This is hard for me, especially right now when my pregnancy cravings are out of control. But I think it’s totally do-able.

The Plan.
-Shopping at the grocery store. A little obvious. Instead of spending $20 on dinner, use that money at the grocery store and make it last through two or three meals. Taking advantage of grocery store sales, case lot sales and actually reading the grocery store ads to compare prices.

-Cook at home. Again, pretty obvious. Cooking at home is healthier and more economical. It means more family time and more left overs to use for lunches, helping cut down on the money spent on lunches.

-Stocking up. When hamburger meat was on sale the other week, I bought 10 or 11 lbs, cooked it up and it’s now ready in 1 Lb. bags in the freezer, ready to go into spaghetti, tacos, stroganoff, hamburger helpers….whatever. Having it already cooked saves a ton of time. I did the same thing when cheese was on sale. Huge bags of shredded cheese were split up into smaller bags and put in the freezer.

-Resist the urge. Probably my biggest problem. So often will I make a last minute decision to swerve, make a u-turn, cut across traffic, run a stop sign just to pull into a drive through to satisfy a craving. Okay, I’m a lot less dangerous about it but my lack of self control results in a lot of unnecessary eating out. I’d like to say it’s just because I’m pregnant, but those moments of weakness and secret eating happens when I’m not pregnant too.

-Getting excited. Even if there are things in the house to cook, that always doesn’t get motivated to do it. Things that get me excited about cooking; watching a cooking show or reading a fun new cookbook. Discussing with my husband about new things we want to try.

-Plan ahead. When I was first married, I used to make a calendar with all the meals planned out for that month. It worked great. Mark always knew what was being fixed that night and I knew just what I needed to get at the store. With a plan, we ate out way less and I’m sure saved a lot more money.

PRINT A BLANK CALENDAR

I really know that I need to be more thrifty especially in these hard times and it’s up to me to do it. What are some of things you do to help your family save money when it comes to eating out and food budgeting?

Somehow a jacket that my husband used to wear as a child made it fairly safely through the years so that our son could wear it. It’s pretty fun to have him wear something that his Dad wore and that his Great Grandmother lovingly knit.

When we unpacked the bunny jacket from storage, there were a few holes and the zipper was broken. My sister-in-law Holly and master knitter, took it back home to Washington D.C. with her when she last visited. She did an incredible job fixing the holes and zipper (you really can’t tell where she repaired it). THANKS HOLLY!

The other picture is of Wellington’s new shirt. Another great shirt from shirt.woot.com called The Convenient Tiny Chair. This particular design I thought was really fun so both Wellington and his Dad got one. It was kinda cold today, probably bad day for a photo shoot, but I got a quick shot of his shirt without a jacket on before any complaining happened.

If you missed it, there is another post right below this one that has yet ANOTHER cute picture of my son not looking at the camera. What’s his deal?

P.S. I’m on the look out for fun photo op’s in Logan. I will probably do a post later of locations. Found these two today. Orange one-500 N. and Dee Ave.(about 100 West) and the Blue one- 600 W. between 200 and 300 S.

My 2 year old and I were riding in the car the last night. I had the radio on like I usually do. A good song was just on, which I had turned up (if you’re wondering I wasn’t blasting ACDC or anything, the good song I’m referring to is, In the Summertime by Mungo Jerry).

After the song was over I had this thought that I shouldn’t have the radio on all the time in the car. I should turn it off for a bit and talk to Wellington or sing The Wheels on the Bus with him, you know make a more productive use out of time spent in the car. But after I had turned it off, from the back seat I hear,
“Turn it up!”.

I love my boy and he IS the coolest even if we are rockin’ out to oldies.