No Horror Stories Here

Any friends or people I'd talked to in the past who had had a baby, always felt the need to share their 'horror' stories, but particularly when I was pregnant, it's like people felt the need to share any and all details of how horrible and painful and terrible their deliveries were. Well, as you can imagine, that only added to my already anxiety-level fears of having a baby.

I spent the first 4 1/2 months truly dreading the labor process. I wanted the baby, but not the delivery. And then as my pregnancy became trying and high-risk, I wasn't sure I wanted anything except the baby to come out by the snap of my fingers! Well lo and behold, I happened to be visiting a friends website on Myspace that I'd come across and I hadn't seen her in several years (though we go to the same church and sing in the same choir!). I happened to read about her new business that she was doing and checked out the website that she posted for everyone to read. Turns out, she had been working as a Doula and she also did private, in-home birth education. I'd never heard of a Doula before, so I sent her a quick message asking some questions about birth and delivery and agreed to meet up with her to talk more in-depth about birth education. I knew Greg would not be comfortable in a group setting at the hospital practicing 'breathing' techniques and we both wanted to learn more than just breathing, but learn about the pros & cons of different birth choices, birthing positions, and pain management that wasn't drug induced. At any rate, we ended up working with her for the full services of education and Doula.

Her goal was for us to have the best possible birth experience that we could have and leave the hospital feeling like we had no regrets about ANY decision that was made. I honestly cannot say that I had a terrible or dreadful experience during any time of my labor and delivery - and I did it all naturally with no drugs of any kind. And I honestly don't even think it hurt that bad, It was more hard work than anything, but that's normal! And had I not had the abnormal uterus & brith canal, there wouldn't have been any surgery afterwards - that's how smooth it all truly went!

Our Doula worked with us as our advocate, coach, and friend. She spent the months leading up to delivery educating us on all the pros and cons of drugs and of not using drugs, continually reminding and reassuring of all the symptoms during labor were normal and that I could do it, she educated us on laboring positions, techniques, and relaxation, she encouraged me throughout the entire labor either by phone or at our house and then at the hospital, she was able to help Greg coach and encourage me and free him up to be what he needed to be - my husband, she stayed through for my surgery afterwards, and met with me postpartum.

Now don't get me wrong. I don't condone or think it's wrong to use drugs for pain management, but we didn't want to have to use it if we didn't need to. And she would've been just as supportive and done all the same things if we had chosen to use all the pain killers there were. Point is - she was there to encourage and advocate on our behalf and to make sure that we walked out of their happy about our birthing experience.

If we ever decide to have a 2nd child, you better believe we will use a Doula again. I can't imagine any woman not having one.

It was a great birth experience and I truly have no horror stories to share or compare!

Date Night!

Here I am sitting at Starbucks -- with my husband. Now, I do believe that I got the better end of the deal: I don't have to do work! I am purely entertaining myself while I drink my Chai Tea Egg Nog Latte. He on the other hand, is sitting here grading papers that he must have in before he leaves town again for more basketball games.

We did have quite the little "adventure", if you will, on our way over here this eve. For our business in the summer time, Greg has his pick-ups and trailer and all the mowers, landscaping machines, etc. and usually they sit in our front on the 3rd garage space. Well, in the winter with our Nazi of homeowners association, we have to move EVERYTHING. It technically isn't "Country Club appearance". lol. I have no idea why! :)~~ And we've been cited 3 times now. So last weekend Greg went and secured a rental unit for everything until March. Now for the story: Naturally, the trailer is un-licensed for starters :), the ramp doesn't have the latches on it to hold it up, so there's a bungy cord sort of thing holding it upright, and the wires aren't hooked up, so nothing flashes when he's driving/turning, etc. So I have to follow him to the storage unit. Well, we barely get out of our neighborhood and the ramp falls down scraping with flying sparkes, so I flash my lights at him, we pull over and then there's only 1 more bungy to hold it in place for 2mi. In the midst of all this, it's dark and we're seriously rushing because we want to get it fixed before Johnny Sherrif Law comes driving by and stops to check on us (with an un-licensed trailer) We did eventually make it to the storage unit, but once we were there, they'd plowed snow in front of all the parking lots, so the trailer got stuck in the snow, and well you get the point by now.... :) FINALLY, we finish and head to Starbucks. Now, this was just funny to me because here I am in my car switching from left to right, left to right to shine my lights to help him back into the spot without hitting anyone else and I'm seriously looking like a clueless blonde (which partially I was clueless!), the pickup is getting stuck, and I can't lift worth a darn right now, so he's doing everything. He's laughing about it now...anyhow, my funny story for the evening. [especially posted for you Ceccy, who needs a laugh...]

12% in Five Years!

Yep. I am sitting here drinking Egg Nog and posting maps of places I've been. I stopped at Safeway tonight on my way back and picked up a signature soup, french bread, & egg nog -- comfort food for a VERY long day that I'm glad is done! I will be back tomorrow and I have a date to look forward to!! I love you Greg :)

So, if you think about it, it's pretty amazing that in a 5 year time period, I visited 12% of the world! And..it's been 3 years since my last overseas trip. To note, I didn't include anyplace that was just a "fly through" or "layover". Any country highlighted has been lived in for at a minimum of 2days or more. :)

And here is where I've been in our good ole US of A:

To make your very own Countries & States visited, click here.

Well, now that this highlight is over and I've thoroughly amused myself, I do believe I will call my husband, go to bed and listen to Christmas music.

White Elephant!

Yea!! My present arrived today! I participated in an online white elephant exchange organized by my friend at HalfPintHouse. Here's what Jennifer sent me:

Here's the goods before I opened them..

Lo and behold it's a cookbook to romance my husband & a cute Christmas pad and decoration!

A close-up of the book:

The notepad and snowman were so cute! And thank you, thank you, thank you, for the cookbook!! It absolutely made me laugh out loud when I saw it. And here's why it's so funny that you should send it -- Greg is always teasing me saying "Gosh I wish you'd cook more around this house." Totally in jest because, really, he prefers to do the cooking and though I love it, I'm always up for his cooking. So, he saw that and we both just cracked up!! Guess, I need to get in the kitchen and start cooking!! :) Ha! It was great! Thank you!!!

I mailed my White Elephant on Friday, so mine should be getting hers any day!

Keeping Above Water

Well, I've survived the week after being gone from my office for 12 days! Between traveling and having the flu, I've just been swimming this week with stuff. Am very glad for the weekend. I've finalized my travel schedule for January and made my deadlines for Christmas gifting for our Agency. I've got 6 clients currently that I will be getting baskets done for and delivering over the next week and a half. Am very excited for this!

This weekend my husband and I will be FINALLY getting the Christmas lights on the house. Between the weather and his travel for bball, it has been delayed a few times. :) Will also be getting the house cleaned and ready for our Holiday Party next weekend. I think we've got just about all 50 or so people RSVP'd, so this will be quite the event! Will be sure to post pics afterwards.

I've ordered one of Greg's Christmas presents, and am getting the menu ready for Christmas, as we're hosting this year for my family and any friends who're around.

Oh yes...one more thing.. I AM MAILING MY WHITE ELEPHANT GIFT THIS WEEK(tomorrow, actually)!! Apologies for the delay. I, however, had to find the right kind of packaging. :) Will post pics, so keep looking.

Grown-Up Baby

Well, I was supposed to leave for a business trip on Monday for the entire week in San Diego. However, I cancelled that trip and attended my Grandfather's funeral on Tuesday. I am very glad that I ended up going. He was my first grandparent to pass away and it was much harder on me than I thought it would be. My cousin did a great job on the eulogy and my other cousin put together the slide show. We then left on Tuesday evening and drove back in the snow.

Which brings me to yesterday--we were snowed in--again. This time it really was more ice than lots of snow with some wind by the evening. My husband had the day off and we watched movies, baked, and got our Holiday party invitations printed.

Which brings me to today--I'm sick. 6am it hit, and well, I am finally now able to sit up and drink water (will be considering saltines). Now really if I had to pick a week to be sick, this was the week. I've had the privilege to work from home this week and just keep up on my emails and phone messages. But seriously, I was hoping to do some Christmas shopping, decorating, and visit with my friends -- so much for that (at least today!) . I just don't handle pain at all anymore. Really, I could consider myself a grown baby :)~~.

So today I will be laying here on the couch, watching movies, and enjoying the fact that my beagle is snuggled up to me keeping me warm! And now its time to lay down and rest...

Weddings, Adoption, & Other Random Thoughts

Here is my handsome husband at his brother's wedding! I love weddings now. I mean, I've always enjoyed weddings, but since I've been married, I've loved the ceremony so much more. I love listening to the vows, sermon, & the rituals. Maybe it's because they all have so much more meaning to me. I just have to say this evening that I love my husband so very much. He is my completer and protector. He makes me laugh and he comforts me. I love you babe!

Augh...it has been a VERY LONG WEEK. I will not discuss or process at this time on the blog, but I am so very thankful for 24hrs off before I go 100% again.

I am finally on my weekend now as of this afternoon! I have tomorrow off before I head back into a busy week -- I'll only be in the office on Tuesday this week, while I'll be out the remainder of the week travelling for classes and also attending activities for the National Adoption Initiative. Just a few stats to throw out for those in Colorado: 777 children are free to adopt(parental rights have been terminated) currently in the State. There are 37 of those kids in my home county. At any rate, the link above is worth checking out. I have a wonderful opportunity to go to a fundraiser for a local Adoption Agency next week and am excited to see how Faith Partners will get involved even more at the local level.

Now, since I'm home & have had some dinner, I get to watch my favorite (and yes, somewhat cheesy) tv show, 7th Heaven.

Contest

Ok. So why not sign up for this contest?! You never know..you may win...I may win..someone will win. :) I'm always up for a new design and look!

Skype--International Communication At It's Best

My best friend Ceccy is returning to the States on September 27th -- that's 11 days. (not that I'm counting!) She'll either be living in New York or Minnestoa. Either way, I figure she's closer than Portugal. Somehow I will be making a trip in the next month to see her!

We have however, been using the wonderful world of Skype to talk back and forth. Seriously, this is the way to go. Even the paid services are WAY CHEAP. I wish it would've been around when I was travelling internationally. You can do domestic talking as well(for a small fee). All you need is a microphone on your computer. At the very minimum, only one person really needs the mic on the computer and they can call your cell or land line! It's a sweet gig.

Here's to being "regular"

So I love the idea and concept of blogging, but when it comes down to acutally sitting down on a regular basis to write whatever, I don't want to take the time to do it. So much has gone on this summer that I could've posted pictures about and/or written about. I've been journaling for all of my trainings and classes for work, as well as my whole experience working with our government in DC, but when it comes to having to put it down on the computer, I really struggle.

My new "resolution" if you will, for the fall is to blog at least once a week. This will be amazing if I'm able to do it!

Here's to seeing if I can be a 'regular' bloggie...

More Reading...More Landscaping

So we have been spending the entire summer getting our yard put in -- front and back. Today we FINALLY got the sod started. We will finish tomorrow (with the wonderful help of my family) and have green stuff in our front and back yard! Plus, we will be able to put the fence back up which means that we can FINALLY get Milo off his chain and let him run freely about the backyard.

Inbetween all this landscaping I've been putting off all my reading for my MSW requirements. Yea, no big deal until yesterday when I realized, "I have tests and seminars coming up in less than a month with no breaks till December and I have 3 books to read!" This is now a problem, as I am not too keen on doing homework at 9pm at night, and well, quite frankly I am just tired of school. So, I will be reading Bridges out of Poverty by Ruby Payne(along with the workbooks), finishing up Framework: Understanding Poverty by the same author; along with The Working Poor by Shipler and The Tragedy of American Compassion (and at this point I cant remember anymore authors names! lol) Oh yea, and I will be posting my thoughts from Fridays seminar "Fatherhood in Child Welfare." I honestly thought that was the best simulation and seminar I;ve been to yet with the county for traning. I am learning so much about the American system and enjoying it,. When I went to school to study international cultures, I thought they would be more interesting and challenging. However, I am learning that America is just as challenging to assess with families and class as any other culture. And what a blessing for me to actually be in an occupation that I went to school for! For this I consider myself very blessed. Its been almost 3yrs since I've done Culture Assessment, but it has been like riding a bike -- you never forget!

So the next few months will be lots of thoughts as I complete these books. And hopefully I will have pics to post of our completed yard by the end of this weekend! (and if we're lucky with weather, we'll have trees and shrubs by next weekend!)

New Look -- New Posts -- New Thoughts!

So I have re-vamped this site and it is now mine. :) I want to hear your thoughts and thank "Pannasmontata Templates" for helping me get a nice, personalized look! I will also be using this as a true "blog", if you will, as I've decided that with my job these days I've been doing lots more journaling to express -- aside from music! There is lots of work to be done yet, but at least it is "postable" now.


My best friend left yesterday for Portugal. She and I worked together for a few years while I was still in college and then she moved to New York and then to Omaha and now to Portugal. However we have not missed a day together and have spent equal times in flying to visit one another! She was my Maid of Honor and is continually a source of encouragement to me. She and I have very rarely gone more than 24hrs without phone calls, so as you can imagine, it seems as if it's been forever. And though I know she was so busy getting ready to leave, I really thought we'd get to talk one more time on Saturday before she left. Ah well...I'm sure that our email inboxes will just have to be flooded now to replace our phone bills! :)

So here's to you Ceccy!! I hope that things are going well and that you are blessed during this time as you transition back into missions. I hope that you are able to quickly learn the things you need before you head back over here to finish fundraising. I miss you already!!