Happy Holidays!

Menu Plan Monday

Nick is working super late 3 nights this week so I am not sure how well this menu plan will stick. When he isn't home, the kids pick a lot of the meals. So we often have mac and cheese and breakfast foods since the kids love those! :0) Also I have TONS of homework so I have a super easy menu plan for the week. So enjoy!

Monday: Slow cooker spaghetti with corn (new recipe so it should be interesting)

Tuesday: Corn dogs and mac and cheese

Wednesday: leftover spaghetti made into a casserole with lots of cheese :0) if there is not a lot of leftovers then i will make french toast and bacon

Thursday: Sloppy joes and baked beans

Friday: Green bean and beef pasta supper (betty crocker recipe...new recipe again)

Everyone have a great week! I hope to have some time this week to post again since I have been slacking majorly. What can I say, 3 kids, 1 newborn, lots of college homework and a husband...I don't have much time left for blogging.

Wordless Wednesday

Happy Birthday!

(little man coming home from the hospital)


Today my little boy turns 2!
You are my happy, giggly, silly boy!
You are a complete boy...rough and tough.
You love teasing your sisters.
You are obsessed with trucks and balls.
You have become a great big brother!
I love hearing you call me, Momma.

Mr. Christian,
Mommy loves you very much.
You have brought so much joy into our lives.
I love hearing your giggle, and your smile makes me smile.
Feel free to slow down and stop getting so big.
Love, Momma

Evelyn Rita

We had a baby!!

Evelyn Rita
August 25, 2011
7 lbs 11 oz
19 3/4 inches

Happy Anniversary!

6 years ago today, I married my best friend, Nick.
For better or worse, through thick and thin,
You've been there by my side
Sharing the laughter and the tears
Through life's uncertain ride.
We don't know what the future
Has in store for you and me
But this I know, without a doubt,
I'll find you by my side.



As we enter our 6 year anniversary today, we will be super busy. Your brother gets married today. You and the girls are in the wedding and we will be crazy busy. We have tons of stuff to do and lots of running around today. Let's pray our 4th little bundle of joy decides to stay in for at least today. Love you tons and praying for a smooth day today. ( and a tiny little prayer that we at least get a little 'us' time today on our anniversary despite the wedding today) Love you Always!!

38 Weeks Pregnant!!!

Pregnancy survey!
How far along? 38 Weeks

Total weight gain/loss: still down 3 pounds from my pre-pregnancy weight. i just can't believe i haven't really gained anything and i am almost done!!!

Maternity clothes? yeppers! and i feel like i am maxing those out!!

Sleep: not sleeping so much these days....i am up way tooo much making potty trips.

Best moment this week: had an ultrasound Wednesday again and got to see our little baby :0) and i even got good news...she is finally head down...lets pray she stays this way!! also we got some maternity and family pictures this week. I have never got real maternity pictures done before so this was really cool!

Movement: yes-tons!!! lots and lots of hiccups!!

Food cravings: i love peanut butter! crave sweets but can't have them :(

Gender: girl :0)

Labor Signs: just braxton hicks

Belly Button in or out? in...but it wants to pop out so we will see :0)

What I am looking forward to: just about everything :0) a sweet little baby in my arms and no more gestational diabetes

38 Weeks and Huge :0)

37 Weeks Pregnant!!!

**updated with a picture**

Pregnancy survey!
How far along? 37 Weeks
Total weight gain/loss: still down 3 pounds from my pre-pregnancy weight.
Maternity clothes? yeppers!
Sleep: i feel doesn't exist....i am up way tooo much making potty trips.
Best moment this week: had an ultrasound yesterday and got to see our little baby :0)
Movement: yes-tons!!! lots and lots of hiccups!!
Food cravings: i love peanut butter! crave sweets but can't have them :(
Gender: girl :0)
Labor Signs: just braxton hicks
Belly Button in or out? in...it wants to pop so we will see :0)
What I am looking forward to: just about everything :0) a sweet little baby in my arms and no more gestational diabetes

37 Weeks and Huge :0)



I had an ultrasound yesterday....baby is doing well other than being transverse...she is about 6 lbs 13 oz and doing really well for being a gestational diabetes baby....but there is a lot of fluid around her....so next week i have to go in for another ultrasound. praying she has flipped and the fluid amount has went down. Then my next appointment is august 22 and then he will schedule my induction or c-section for that week. so that means in less than a week and half i will be holding my precious little one. and boy i can't wait!!!!

Till next time...have a wonderful weekend!!

Wordless Wednesday--Reading is Hard Work :0)

30 Weeks!

Pregnancy survey!
How far along? 30 Weeks
Total weight gain/loss: still down 6 pounds--definitely don't feel that way though!
Maternity clothes? yeppers!
Sleep: just getting up usually once or twice a night
Best moment this week: had an ultrasound yesterday and got to see our little baby :0)
Movement: yes-tons!!!
Food cravings: i love peanut butter!
Gender: girl :0)
Labor Signs: No
Belly Button in or out? in
What I am looking forward to: just about everything :0) mostly in 7 weeks i will have another ultrasound and i can't wait...its the next best thing to actually having her in my arms :0)

I can't believe its been 3 weeks since my last post and I still haven't taken one single belly pic :/ I always think of it once Nick has left for work. Hopefully I can remember once he gets home tonight.

Till next time...have a wonderful weekend!!

27 weeks!!

Pregnancy survey!
How far along? 27 Weeks
Total weight gain/loss: still down 10 pounds
Maternity clothes? yeppers!
Sleep: just getting up usually once or twice a night
Best moment this week: sleeping a bit better :0)
Movement: yes-tons!!!
Food cravings: i just want about everything i can't have-I have gestational diabetes :(
Gender: girl :0)
Labor Signs: No
Belly Button in or out? in
What I am looking forward to: 3rd trimester one more week!


I have been feeling a bit better this week since my my diabetes doctor switched my dosages of insulin. SO yeah for that!! also have been getting better sleep this week. I have even been able to sleep a few nights through without having to get up to go 'potty'. lol Hopefully by next week I can post my first pregnancy picture. Not sure why I haven't taken any belly pictures this pregnancy but I better get my butt in gear. I have to treasure this pregnancy, its a true blessing and our last one. :)

well i am off until next time :) have a good weekend!

Wordless Wednesday

catch up...Mother's Day

Since Blogger seems to be working good again. I will try blogging again this week. Mother's Day, we have started a tradition since having kids, taking them to the big zoo of the state - Milwaukee Zoo. Mothers/Grandmas get in free, which was our first reason we started going, but now we have a zoo pass and love it. Its about a hour and half drive...but the kids do well since they know that as soon as we get there we get to see animals and go on the train. The ride home there's no whining either, since they are zonked by the time we even leave Milwaukee. :0)

This year, we invited Nick's mom and step-dad to go along with us. They haven't been to this zoo in about 15-20 years. So this was a fun trip for all of us. It was a great day, no whining, no crying, and wonderful weather. God sure blessed us! Here are some pictures from our fun time at the zoo!

Catch up....Maddie's 5th Birthday

Ms. Maddie, my oldest child turned the big 5 on this past Saturday. Since I have been soooo busy, I didn't get a chance to a dedication birthday post for her. booo :( I do love her very much, she makes my life very interesting everyday! She definitely challenges me everyday single day, but I would never change a day of it! God has blessed us so much to have her and can't appreciate it enough!!

We had her birthday party on her birthday. So Saturday was super busy, but fun! Plus the beautiful sun graced us that day, so we got to have an outside party. Yah!! Here are some pictures from her party.











Happy Birthday, my precious Maddie! Can't wait to see what this next year will bring. Love you!!!

Wordless Wednesday--My little Monkeys

It's a.....

GIRL!!!!!


i figured i would do a blog update. we found out two weeks ago we are going to be having another little girl. We are so thrilled and excited!! Everything looks great with her!! I was hoping to be able to scan some of the ultrasound pictures but life has got crazy busy and I haven't had a chance. I will try very soon though!!

Now the big task of trying to finding a cute name! All our kiddos names end in 'N' so that limits are options ;0) Once we get a few narrowed down I will have to post a blog and see what responses we get.

Well, that's it for now! :0) talk to you soon!!!

Wordless Wednesday

a quick thing...

i went to my ob last week and he felt around my liver area and was concerned that it might be getting bigger. so tomorrow i have yet another liver ultrasound. so if you feel led to say a quick prayer for my appointment tomorrow, please do. :) i would completely appreciate it! and thank you in advance. i pray that its not growing and the baby is still doing well.

i love my hubby!

i have been feeling a little under the weather the last two days. the one of the things that have gotten me through is zofran!! so thankful for that medicine. i am one that hates medicine but i couldn't take it anymore and finally gave in and took it yesterday. the other thing that has gotten me through the last two days is my hubby. he took care of the kids so i could sleep. he cleaned the house so i could rest. and every time i needed something he got it for me!! i am so thankful for him!!!

not only being sick and feeling awful i felt horrible that i wasn't up to feeling better and making my hubby's birthday better. yes, yesterday was his birthday and i couldn't barely handle standing up even. i was super dizzy and nauseated. i did manage making one of his favorite meals and thankfully its a 20 minute meal! orange glazed pork chops with rice and green beans. he ate with the kids, i laid on the couch. i wanted to make sure he didn't have to have peanut butter and jelly sandwich for his birthday supper. i am sure he would have been happy with pb & j but you only get one birthday a year so i wanted to try to make it a bit special.

i love this man. he does so much for me and our family. he has taken great care of me during this pregnancy and health problems i have had this year. he works hard and long hours away from home. i am so proud to call him my husband, best friend, and father of my children! I love you, Nick!

Happy 3rd Birthday my sweet Allie!

The day, I was blessed with a new daughter.



Allie's 1st birthday.



Allie's 2nd birthday. love that smile!!





Its been 3 precious years with my middle child!! I am so proud to be your mommy! You make me smile everyday!! I love you very much, Allie!

menu plan monday

I haven't done menu planning for a few weeks now. Mainly because I have been too ill lately to even think of food. This past week my appetite has come back a tad. A tad like as in eating like toddler size meals. Better than nothing right? I am hoping in the next couple weeks the morning sickness will hit the road and I will only feel better. I know some of it will stick around due to whatever digestive issues I have. So anyways, I figured I will attempt a menu plan this week and see what happens. Since we are getting lots of snow this week, I figured it would be a good week for soups :0)

Monday: Pepper Steak with rice and watermelon (the watermelon was delish!)

Tuesday: stuffed pepper soup with dinner rolls

Wednesday: Baked Greek Chicken with orzo

Thursday: Leftovers with maybe grilled cheeses

Friday: clam chowder

This weekend I am not sure yet. I know we will have snacky foods sunday for the big football game though ;0)

I hope everyone has a great week!

P.S. Thank you everyone for the kind words and prayers for all my health problems and all the congratulations for the new baby :0) :0) :0)

a major update...

I have sat here, at least a dozen times, attempting to type something, anything. I just don’t know how much I want to share, how much I should share, or if I should just share the good news and not the bad. So needless to say, I haven’t written anything at all for weeks. I think I analyze my posts too much. Then I just don’t hit publish. So therefore I don’t blog. I need to stop analyzing and just hit publish!! So here’s my attempt. Its gonna be a long post, fyi.

I don’t even know where to start. Early December my family and I went to my mother in laws for the weekend. I woke up in the middle of the night with the worse side pain I have ever had in my life. nothing helped. Breathing even hurt. But if you know me I try telling myself, nothing is wrong, it will go away, I am not running a fever, so I am fine. I always talk myself out of going to the doctor or the hospital. Why? No idea. I am not afraid of hospitals or doctors, so I am not sure why I do it. I even told my mother in law about it, and she thought it was strange. The pain eventually went away. Other symptoms came shortly after, bloating, constipation, fullness, weight loss, nauseous, and basically anything and everything with my digestive system. Then over the weeks the side pain came and went. I thought it was weird. I goggled it, I called nurse direct, and I goggled it more. Everything I heard and read it seemed like my gallbladder was acting up. But me being me, I just said well if it was my gallbladder and it got bad, the pain would get worse and I would get a fever if it got really bad. I know I am horrible! Lol

Then I woke up December 22, and felt sooo sick. I felt like puking! A new symptom, just great I thought!! I hate puke more than anything. It’s my worst fear…like seriously I would rather jump off a cliff then ever puke myself, hear or see it. It’s horrible!! Since I was in so much denial that it was not my gall bladder I tried finding other reasons why I would feel so ill. Maybe I had the stomach flu, maybe it was a new medication, maybe I am going to get my period, or maybe I am pregnant? Since I wanted to make sure it wasn’t the flu, I took a pregnancy test. I know, weird? So I sat in the bathroom waiting to see not pregnant and to move on with the symptoms. Well, this is what I saw!!


Yes, that’s right I am pregnant! I was (and still am) beyond thrilled, what a wonderful surprise! But as soon as I settled down, I started freaking out since I still had the pain and symptoms, which I know are not pregnancy related other than obviously the puking sensation. (I have thought 4 times now that I was getting the flu the day I find out I am pregnant) I then promised myself the next time I have the severe pain I will call my ob/gyn and get this figured out. Yes, the only time I go to the doctor is when I am pregnant. Its all for the baby :)

So fast forward a bit. My sweet hubby, set up a date night first time in years. He got us an overnight sitter and the whole works. We went out to dinner. And since eating has been a chore with the symptoms and now pregnancy, I figured I would just eat a little and play it safe with bland foods. Dinner went okay. As soon as dinner was done, I was instantly sick and asked to go home. The pain hit hard. I was so much pain I just went to bed. What a wonderful date night :( I was bummed. The pain didn’t go away this time. All day Sunday it was there too, this was the worst I have had it.
So Monday morning I called my ob, and he scheduled me a gallbladder ultrasound that day. I went to the doctor, had my ultrasound then saw my ob afterwards. He came in the room and acted a bit odd. He said well since you are here do you mind if I do a normal check up (pap and all). So he examined me. He then said my uterus was larger than my date said so he asked if I could do uterus ultrasound to check dates. I then started to freak out, maybe I was pregnant with twins. Lol the ultrasound showed just one baby. Big relief! I even got to hear the precious baby’s heartbeat. I love that sound!!! :) then I went back in to talk to my ob. He said everything seems fine with the baby. It was actually a little smaller than the date said, heartbeat was right on track and looks good. He then said my gallbladder looked good, no stones, no inflammation, nothing. (I sat there and was think huh, this pain is not imaginary what is going on then!!) He then proceeds to tell me that I have a couple masses on my liver. (what my liver?! Huh) he said one is as large as 8 cm! he said normally when things like these are found, a cat scan is the next step, but since I am pregnant that is not really a good option. Then a mri would be the next option, but the radiologist was not willing to since I am pregnant and in first trimester. Apparently the risk of miscarriage is there and the radiologist didn’t want that risk. My ob then had expressed that if I was his wife, he would suggest that she did a mri, and not wait until second trimester. I just sat there I just said okay. He said a surgeon would be calling to set up an appt tomorrow. I just said okay and left. As soon as I got to my car, I bawled, and bawled. He couldn’t tell me what it was and I hated hearing the chances of miscarriage. This is not what I was expecting! I was expecting having my gallbladder removed.

Thursday, I had my doctor appt with a surgeon. The appt was kinda pointless. He said he couldn’t tell me it wasn’t cancer and that it was. He said he was going to refer me to a liver surgeon two hours away. And that I would be getting a call to set it up. So much was happening and happening so fast, it scared me even more. I just kept to myself and prayed A LOT!! I don’t think I even talked that week!

Friday morning, I got the call. They wanted to seem asap. (great, that didn’t help the nerves) they scheduled me that afternoon. I hurried got a sitter and drove down two hours to the appt. they do a special mri without contrast so the impact is less on the baby. It’s still freaky to sign a waiver for the risk of pregnancy still. God was holding my hand this whole time, if he wasn’t I wouldn’t have been able to do this, any of this!! The radiologist told me the mri should last 20 minutes and 40 at the most. Well it lasted 65 minutes. It freaked me out that it took so long. As soon as I got out of the mri, the tech said the radiologist wants to talk to me after I get dressed. (This can’t be good, I was about to cry) the radiologist walked in and said…well, its not cancer!! I immediately was beyond thrilled; I had ‘good’ tears in my eyes. It was the best news in the world. He did say I have a benign tumor the size of baseball on my liver, but I shouldn’t need any more testing until after the birth of my baby. God is soooo good!!

Tuesday, I met with the liver surgeon. She restated everything I heard on Friday. It was still so good to hear again! Then she said she doesn’t think the pain and symptoms are not caused by the tumor and she would like to continue to do some testing to cross every possible thing off the list before having possible life threatening surgery on my liver. so that was a bit disappointing that I don’t have answers really. But I do understand why go in and have possible life threaten surgery when I could be something else. So I am back at square one. I meet with my ob on Thursday and I am hoping he will refer me to a gi doctor and see where that takes me. its so hard right now to get good answers since I am pregnant. So right now I am on prescription for the nausea, which is causing headaches. :(

This whole experience has shown me how god has his hand in everything. I am so glad I have faith, if I didn’t I am not sure I could be where I am now. Also I would like to thank everyone who has said a prayer or many for me. I completely appreciate it! I am still trying to hold my head up high, and focus on the good.