EvY at HomE

Well, much like my high school chemistry class, I took the three hour glucose tolerance test and failed. Which means I probably have gestational diabeetus. I have no answers in regards to officially having diabeetus or what my levels were but I've been instructed to make an appointment with the specialist who will inform me of what course of action I'm to take now to keep this under control. All I know is if I have it, it usually goes away after the baby is born but I'll have to watch myself for all subsequent pregnancies and make sure I watch her nutrition as she grows to make sure she doesn't get it when she's older. Poor kid has diabeetus on both sides of the family. Her great grandmother and future namesake has it and her grandmother aka my mom it. I also know it's gonna change my diet significantly and our office PA has it so she's been really helpful in telling me what food is good and what food is bad. It's definitely good to knock out al...

Matt sent me these pictures when he finished the ground cover. He even moved some of the old furniture into place just to show us that it was done. Well, you know the big, heavy part of it. Exciting isn't it??! Maybe we can buy furniture soon! I have a 3 hour glucose test tomorrow morning SUPER early and after I eat and maybe take a nap, Matt and I are gonna hit up a Victorian Festival with my family for a few hours and then chill out. I work Sunday unfortunately but hey, could use that extra money for all the backyard costs we're piling on!

Ta-da! Behold, the glorious concrete paver path that defines the outdoor "zones". It's even better than I imagined in my dreams... I'll attempt to explain what my men have done since I've been at work making money to pay for the things they're doing back there. After they installed the piping, they laid out border to define the plant areas and to keep the ground cover at bay, and placed weed block over most everything (that's the black stuff you see on the ground). You can dig through that weed block when you plant things and it helps keep the weed problem down and then you put some bark on top of that business to make it look finished and also help with weed problems. The boys did it in the front yard and it worked out great. This is the "lounge area". Along the wall we hope to plant boxwood hedges. So, originally I had drafted up the backyard floor plan with the floor covering for the different zones as what I learned later was called ...

The backyard is coming along nicely! I came home to find the path had been laid out and the zones were defined. I don't have photos quite yet but soon there will be a fun blank slate for you all. In the meantime, let's empty out some brain clouds. Other than the furniture purchase the next big decisions to be made will be the landscaping and the "water feature." I know I want something modern looking but I'm not quite sure what that means.  Oh and we decided to go with a portable fire pit and I'd like for it to be propane tank powered. That's another thing I gotta find. Can't wait to show you guys what we decide on!

If I'm up before my alarm and make myself breakfast, I am able to enjoy a kind of peace and quiet I very much wanted to capture before I become a mother of five.  The dining room curtain is open about 90% of the time since the sheers give us plenty of privacy and the morning light is just so darn perfect. Our morning ritual with the pups is whoever is awake first lets them out of the laundry room and makes sure they have water. The boys book it for the fence area where they do their business and then start patrolling the yard. On this particular morning Matt was still asleep and they were being barky so I let them back in and they hung out on the couch.  Usually the cats will be seated on the living room couch in the same position the dogs are and once I walk into the kitchen they are on me meowing for their breakfast. They're not polite Japanese cats . After I've filled their bowls and topped off their water, I make my breakfast. Lately it's cereal or egg...

Well we're all back to work. I started last week on Thursday and the gents got to work on the backyard. Digging trenches for the new sprinklers, leveling out the ground, and adding electricity. Supervisor Woz approves. Here's the nice clean slate ready for some more action. Where the shady are is where we'll put the dining table/outdoor desk for Mrs. Alexa. Dining area again. Those posts will eventually have a modern looking fence. We're installing outlets for laptops and such on the fence, see that little pole sticking up? Electricity my friends. To the left of this shed is where we'll put the play area for Miss Alice. You can see the sprinkler system up and ready. Around there is where I'd like to put a doggy pee area.  Here's an outlet by the lounge area. For laptops or outdoor lamps and such. Here's a sample paver that will become our path around the whole place. It's so refreshing to see the beginning of something. ...

A few weeks ago Matt had a great idea for our girl's room: a ceiling fan. I was thinking about a pretty light fixture but a quick google of "ceiling fans in nurseries" and the result of "are very good for baby" moved me in the yeah lets do it! Now I gotta find one that's not hideous.

I noticed something funny that happened over the weekend recently, well two weekends I guess. We were around a lot of women due to a family wedding so it was a lot of meeting new people, catching up, and general chatter. Obviously the majority of chit chat directed at me was about the bun in my oven. Understandably so, it's a big life event.  But I did notice that during the course of the weekend, not a single person asked me what I did for a living. Ain't that funny?

I woke up this morning to an alert from my pregnancy App telling me that I am now in my third trimester and to "get ready for the big finish and a new beginning". This is the current state of me: I can tell this girl is gettin' bigger because her movements, while in the beginning were adorable and like little flutters are now big ole alien movements and at times, uncomfortable; like someone poking you very slowly from the inside. How am I feeling? Overall pretty good, I love the kindness of strangers and smiles I get from friends and co-workers when they see me. I was a big hit at the wedding with Matt's family. It's been four years since we've had a baby in the family and I think everyone was ready for another one (luckily they were all polite enough to never pressure or ask about the state of the uterus but now I know they were all praying for it). The extra weight has put a little strain on my lower back, as I expected, since I suffered from lower bac...

I didn't really care too much about ancestry before, especially since I'm 100% Mexican (with some of your usual Spanish/Aztec situation) but it hit me on St. Patrick's Day this year as my child was dancing to The Chieftains, that I was having an Irish baby. Well, part of her anyway. Now instead of glazing over stories of Matt's ancestry, now I'm very interested in learning that he has family that was born in Cork, Rochester, NY, and Germany. I wanna know more about all these cultures and people my daughter will be born into. All of these long gone people are a little part of my daughter now. Ain't that something? And this weekend I get to hang with a bunch of them. Have a great weekend everybody!

Well… still no work. We did however get a few things of importance done. I went in for my monthly baby check up (all is well), I went to take that gestational diabeetuhs pre-test  (the sugary drink tastes like flat sprite but the blood draw was extra painful for some reason), we checked out cars at CarMax, we emptied all the spare boxes in the kid's room out, we saw Captain America: Winter Soldier, and we just lazy'd about. Like Gadget. YAWN! STRETCH! I feel like I should be more productive during this unexpected time off and I'm trying very hard to be. So I guess that I should get out of my PJs, get my nails did, and head to Target and the grocery store for supplies. Know what I badly need? Shorts. I have one pair that fits because they're stretchy waist but with the weather warming up, and HURRAH for that, I am in need of some chorts. Oh! We got the mattress! I had a crib sheet hanging around just waiting for this moment. We kinda got it for free since we...

As you know, we have a zoo at our home with two cats and two dogs. Over the many years our nieces have visited, the pets have been generally tolerant and stay away. All except one. To put it bluntly, when it comes to kids, LJ is a little jerk. He's scratched at the girls on more than one occasion and he's extra deceptive when he does it too. We're always around when the girls are in the room with him but if we look away for a second, he reaches out and scratches them if they're near him. It's a total dick move and that has been cause for concern around the farm. If he's like that with these girls, what hope is there for his behavior with our girl? My mom's solution is to simply get rid of him (she's not much of an animal lover) but he's my first baby. How can I get rid of a member of the family? That's not an option. Matt and I have said before and I'll say again that once these cats pass, we're done with cats. It's not that I d...

It was a good weekend full of a lot of food and a lot of family. Saturday we just hung out but for dinner we went to El Cholo in La Habra, a family favorite. During the family prayer Poppa Dan mentioned the four generations around one table and that got grandma all teary eyed.  When Matt's mom was a girl she would eat here and get a toy from the treasure chest, her kids did too, and her kid's kids. Isn't that something? Decades of cheap $1 toys that bring so much joy. The nieces really wanted to feel the baby kick and of course she wouldn't perform once prompted. On Sunday after church we made a pit stop to the newly opened 85º Bakery Cafe in Buena Park. We lucked out and there were no lines so I piled on the pastries and had a big ole cup of sea salt iced coffee. It's the end of my second trimester this week gang. Next week begins the ole home stretch. Believe it or not after the pile of pastries we had lunch at Gondola Pizza , another family favori...