16 weeks

How far along? 16 weeks 5 days

Total weight gain/loss: +4 pounds

Maternity clothes? i was graciously given a TON of maternity clothes last week from some sweet ladies in my community group! so far i've just worn a top! 

Stretch marks? No
Sleep: still sleeping great

Best moment this week: picking up our crib & glider -- thanks CH!!  

Have you told family and friends: yep  

Movement: still having the "fluttering" feeling, but nothing definite 

Food cravings: watermelon 
Anything making you queasy or sick: still avoiding anything dairy [except cheese...] 

Have you started to show yet: oh yes, the bump is there 
Gender prediction: no idea (: 

Labor Signs: No [way too early for this!] 
Belly Button in or out? In
Wedding rings on or off? On
Happy or Moody most of the time: Happy

Looking forward to: turning the guest room into the nursery! 

weekend in new york: part I

amber & i ventured to new york over memorial day weekend to visit our sweet friend alexa. we "toured" the city through alexa's eyes - seeing the things she sees every day. it was such a treat to be part of her world for a few days!

 we had donuts on saturday morning and then proceeded to walk every calorie [and then some] off as we meandered about the city. don't worry though, baby M was fed well while we were in new york! i loved every.single.thing about this weekend!

15 weeks

How far along? 15 weeks 5 days

Total weight gain/loss: +4 pounds [probably more by now, but my next appointment isn't for another couple of weeks]

Maternity clothes? Still not yet, but I immediately resort to sweats or workout clothes after work

Stretch marks? No
Sleep: still sleeping great

Best moment this week: using my mother's day massage that mikey gave me! 

Have you told family and friends: yep 
Miss Anything? being able to breathe in my work clothes! 

Movement: Have had a few instances where it definitely felt like something is swimming around in my belly!

Food cravings: nothing new 
Anything making you queasy or sick: nope, but I'm still having some nasty headaches 

Have you started to show yet: there's a little bump - I've been told by 2 people recently [one being Mike] that I definitely look pregnant now
Gender prediction: no idea (: 

Labor Signs: No
Belly Button in or out? In
Wedding rings on or off? On
Happy or Moody most of the time: Happy

Looking forward to: takin' this baby [bump] to NY for a long weekend with my cousin, Amber to see Alexa! 

mother's day & peach pie

This past Sunday was my very first Mother's Day! I know, technically I don't have any kiddos runnin' around yet, but there is one growin' inside of me & that has to count for something! I got sweet cards from friends and family and my precious Mikey gave me a massage at Urban Nirvana! He was super excited to give it to me [so much so that he asked all weekend if I wanted my gift early] and told me once I opened it that I'd better go ahead and schedule it right away. Sweet boy!

We celebrated mother's day at the Martins with a big ole Southern lunch. With Mike's help, I decided to bake a peach pie for dessert. I'd seen a man selling local peaches at a road-side stand within walking distance from our house so I scooped up a bag in all of my running around Saturday AM. I found a simple recipe online and tweaked it jus' a little (: I think once the peaches are a little bigger and a little riper we'll be eatin' this pie again! Enjoy!

Ingredients:

• Pastry for double crust pie (9")
• 5 cups sliced & peeled fresh peaches (we had to use 7 small peaches)
• 2 teaspoons lemon juice
• 1/8 teaspoon almond extract
• 1 cup Splenda 
• 1/4 cup cornstarch
• 1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg
• pinch of salt
• 2 tablespoons butter [i didn't use this much]
• milk [for brushing]

Directions:

• Preheat oven to 400F. 
• Line a 9" pie plate with bottom pastry; trim even with edge of plate. Set aside. 
• In a large bowl combine the peaches, lemon juice & extract. Combine the sugar, cornstarch, nutmeg & salt. Add to peach mixture; toss gently to coat. Pour into crust; dot with butter. 
• Roll out remaining pastry to fill top of pie; make decorative cutouts in pastry. Set cutouts aside. Place over top of pie. Brush with milk. Cover edges loosely with foil.
• Bake @ 400F for 40 minutes. Remove foil; bake 10-15 minutes longer or until crust is golden brown & filling bubbly. Cool on a wire rack. Store in the refrigerator. 

*Yield 8 servings

Recipe adapted from: http://www.tasteofhome.com/Recipes/Golden-Peach-Pie

 

                

14 weeks

How far along? 14 weeks 4 days 

Total weight gain/loss: +4 pounds [@ last appt] 
Maternity clothes? Not yet, but my pants are definitely getting tighter ...
Stretch marks? No
Sleep: Sleeping great [praise the Lord] 
Best moment this week: Getting my very first Mother's Day cards! 
Have you told family and friends: Yes!
Miss Anything? running [and a margarita would be nice!] 
Movement: Not yet
Food cravings: nothing new 
Anything making you queasy or sick: still dairy products and i have insane heartburn / reflux after i eat anything 
Have you started to show yet: there's a little bump 
Gender prediction: Mike's still confident it's a boy, so I'm still confident it's a girl
Labor Signs: No
Belly Button in or out? In
Wedding rings on or off? On
Happy or Moody most of the time: Happy (: 
Weekly Wisdom: keep track of what makes you feel bad eating-wise. i have a running "can't-eat-that-for-another-six-months" list of things that don't make me feel great. and trust me, i won't eat them for another six months...it's not worth it! 
Looking forward to: still waiting to feel the baby move 

In other news, our sweet friends Ally & Landon from our community group just found out that their twins are both GIRLS! This means that in the year we'll have been together as a group we'll have added 6 little girls + whatever baby Martin is! If it's the only boy in the group he'll have lots of cuties to pick from and if it's a girl she's going to have one sweet group of girl friends! It's a little crazy to me that we could potentially have added 100% girls to our group this year [although, Mike says "Statistically speaking, it won't happen." We'll see!] 

Announcement!!!!

Mikey & I have some exciting news! We'll be welcoming Baby Martin in November of this year! We've hit the 13 week mark and are sailin' right along. We found out 2 days before Mike's 25th birthday [on March 8th] and have slowly been spilling the secret to our family and friends. We've had our first 2 appointments and so far the little bambino is growing nicely. At the first appointment we had an ultrasound and it looked like a blob, but hey - it's our little blob (: We've decided NOT to find out the gender of the baby...since we've started talking / dreaming about kids we agreed that we wanted baby #1 to be a surprise. Just know, if Mike calls it a boy he really doesn't know - and if you hear me call it a girl in response to his calling it a boy, I don't know either. Everything will be gender neutral and green...my favorite color, of course. 

We are super stoked and feel extremely blessed to begin this journey [well, continue it since we've been on it for 13 weeks] and hope that you'll journey with us from being married to being first time parents. 

How far along? 13 Weeks 2 days
Total weight gain/loss: +4 pounds 
Maternity clothes? Not yet! 
Stretch marks? No
Sleep: I'm zonked in the afternoon, but still sleeping great at night
Best moment this week: feeling "normal" again for most of the week 
Have you told family and friends: Yes!
Miss Anything? 
Movement: Not yet
Food cravings: Fried pickles [seriously], non-spicy Thai, and french fries [from anywhere] 
Anything making you queasy or sick: sometimes dairy products, sometimes not...which makes eating dairy difficult 
Have you started to show yet: A little bump so far - basically looks like I ate too much, which is typically the case
Gender prediction: Mikey says boy 100% of the time - in turn I say girl 100% of the time 
Labor Signs: No
Belly Button in or out? In
Wedding rings on or off? On
Happy or Moody most of the time: Happy!
Weekly Wisdom: exercise! our trainer has scaled back my workouts, but getting in the gym really does help with energy 
Looking forward to: Feeling the baby move ( : 

  

Banana Oatmeal Cups with Chocolate Chips & Cowboy Cookies

We've had a lazy, but productive Saturday. We slept in, ate breakfast at Wa-Ho, got some more supplies for the house, and have been working on various projects since then. Mike's projects have included caulking everything inside that still needs to be caulked [bless him!], finishing the trim on the doors in the kitchen [hallelujah!], and helping me raise the guest bed / rearrange the furniture in there. While he was hard at work I added some dirt to the plants in the window boxes, rearranged the furniture in the guest room, took a short nap, and baked a lot of stuff. (: I've missed these kind of Saturdays - no running around, just hangin' out getting stuff done!

I baked the Banana Oatmeal Cups with Chocolate Chips because I had some bananas in the fridge that were going bad...like they were already pretty black. AND, I actually had everything in the pantry / fridge that the recipe called for (: 

Banana Oatmeal Cups with Chocolate Chips

Ingredients:

• 2 mashed bananas (the riper, the better!)
• 4 oz natural, unsweetened applesauce
• 1 cup milk
• 2 eggs
• 1 tbsp Baking Powder
• 3 cups Old Fashioned or Rolled Oats
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 3 tbsp mini chocolate chips
• *I didn't have mini chocolate chips, so I used a little more than 1/4 cup of regular chocolate chips

Directions:

1. In a medium mixing bowl, mash the bananas and add applesauce. Mix the rest of the ingredients into this bowl except for the chocolate chips. Let sit while you prepare the muffin pans.
2. Spray a muffin pan or add liners to muffin tin.
3. Stir the chocolate chips into the oatmeal batter.
4. Divide batter into 15 muffin cups. They should be just about filled.
5. Bake 20-30 minutes, you'll see the edges just starting to brown and they'll be firm to the touch.

*The muffins may stick when hot, but are easily removed when cooled for a bit.

While I had out the ingredients I just mentioned the famous Cowboy Cookies and Mike immediately got googlie-eyed and asked for some. So, I also made Cowboy cookies, just for him. I tweaked the recipe a little though and skipped the nuts [because we were out] and added shredded, unsweetened coconut. YUM! At some point I want to try them with peanut butter! (: 

*I also have never made them in a sheet. It only added a few minutes to the bake time and will be just as easy to serve and enjoy! 

homemade pimento cheese

I don't know why it's so hard for me to post about food. By now you know how much I love food - cooking and eating it. So, over the rest of the spring and summer I am really going to try to be better at posting recipes that I've tried and liked [or not] and some of my favorite tried & true recipes.

Not only have I recently joined a food co-op, The Noisy Rabbit, but our garden should be planted this weekend [better late than never] and I am pumped about the plethora of fresh fruits and veggies that are soon to abound! Between the local fruits and veggies, growing our own and our farm fresh eggs from our friends Mike & Kayla we're on our way to true hippie-dom (: [as if my family didn't think we were already there...haha]!

One of my very favorite things to make is homemade pimento cheese. Mike and I started playing with making our own when we were living with his 'rents last spring before we hit the trail and have created something that is absolutely delicious. One day when I own my own bakery / deli / cafe I'll serve you some on some homemade bread. (:

Ingredients:
1 pound block sharp cheddar cheese
1 medium sized jar of diced pimentos
1 small scoop of light mayonnaise
3 squirts spicy mustard with horseradish
pepper to taste

Directions:
Pour pimentos into bowl. Shred cheese over bowl. Add mayo, mustard and pepper. Stir. Taste (:

Serve chilled with celery, crackers or just eat by itself!

*If you're interested in the Noisy Rabbit I'll be happy to share what I know about it with you! (: