Beauty From Chaos

Tomorrow makes 20 weeks in the pregnancy, that’s half way to full term for most people. If this pregnancy’s length is like my other two, then it’s over half way since I delivered Lexi at 34.5 weeks and Caylee at just under 37 weeks. if there is a pattern of adding 2.5 weeks then I should have this one at 39.5 weeks.

However, this one is a boy and who knows what will happen. He’s already given me more trouble than the girls.  The morning sickness was comparable, but at least with the girls I found something that helped make it go away. The acne is about the same, but he’s been giving me cramps, and there was the whole bleeding thing last month. And the low placenta they will be checking on in 10 more weeks.  Oh and don’t forget the fact that I already feel like my stomach is out as far as it should go… and yes, I’m only at 20 weeks, I have a feeling I better start bathing in lotion or something.

For the longest time I didn’t feel anxious for this pregnancy to be over, I wasn’t spending all day looking at baby stuff, or getting really excited. I figured it was because I had two other kids of my own, plus two of my sister in law’s kids here keeping me busy. But once we found out this was a boy I went crazy. I have been spending so much time on oldnavy.com and childrensplace.com and anywhere else.com that sells baby clothes. I cannot wait to dress this boy.

Monday I go in for my glucose screening, we shall see if losing 35lbs was enough to keep me away from having to check my blood sugar and watch my diet. I was off of soda and junk for so long, then shortly after I found out I was pregnant I got hooked again, even on caffeine!  The past week I’ve been trying to detox myself from the soda and caffeine, maybe next week I’ll work on the junk food.  I really don’t want to gain a million pounds, or even 40, so I know I need to start controlling my sweet tooth!!

It’s getting kinda late for this pregnant woman, especially since we have to get up early tomorrow and we have a busy day… so to bed I go!

We’ve lived here for 5 months now and still haven’t found a church, in fact, most Sunday’s we’ve been driving over an hour one way to get to a church that’s actually preaching the truth.  Every once and awhile we decide to try out a local church instead of making the long drive. Today was one of those days.

We did something I’ve never done before in my life. We got up, got the kids out of their children’s church/nursery and left before the pastor even got on the stage.

Why? Because they were tickling the ears of everyone in there and we couldn’t stand it. The man on stage was talking about a series the pastor is doing on Wednesday nights about being blessed and how God wants to bless you. Ok, Yes, God does want His children blessed. But he went on about how God wants His children to have things in this world and have money and have this and have that.

Right about there is where my husband and I looked at each other with that look. You know, the one that says “if this goes on, we’ll have to leave…” unfortunately it went on and on and on.  He even went as far as to say that if you rejoice when someone around you is blessed you put yourself one step closer to being blessed yourself. He was talking all about financial blessings mind you, not just the blessings of being alive, or having joy or having Christ as your savior.

We left somewhere in there. And this is why….

Jesus himself had no place to call home, no pillow to lay His head on. All of his disciples were told to leave their families and posessions and follow him. Jesus said it is easier for a camel to be put through the eye of a needle than a rich man to enter the Kingdom of Heaven.  When people asked Jesus what they must do to enter He told them sell all you own and follow me.

So tell me, If Jesus and his disciples lived like that, why would He want us to just have stuff we don’t deserve?

There are very few things on our list of stuff for this baby. The majority of the things we need are boy stuff- clothes, blankets, burp clothes. stuff like that.

The only two big things we needed/wanted was a certain swing and a certain bathing seat. I planned on looking used, the seat I couldn’t find used anywhere, but it is only $15 new so that didn’t bother me. The swing was about $75 used.

I mentioned this to my friend as we were talking about consignment sale shopping. She mentioned that the people who sold her their new house left a swing in the basement that she’d be happy to give us. Imagine my surprise when I go down there and it’s the EXACT one I wanted!!

Then today while looking at craigslist, I found the bath seat for $5!! God is so awesome. We’ve also been given some boy clothes from a few different people.  I’m hoping to find the last few non diaper things I need at a consignment sale coming up in a few weeks. I wouldn’t be surprised if God just happens to put the cloth diaper stuff I need there too!!

It didn’t really take me all day to do these few small areas. I was done by 1, and included in the time between posting the before pictures and being done was lunch for me and 4 kids, 3 diaper changes, 3 loads of laundry being handled (some put in the dryer, some folded some put in the washer) and the usual stuff. I also managed to sweep, mop and vacuum all floors and clear off clutter from two other areas that I didn’t post pictures of (the top of the microwave and part of the counter.)

Anyway, here’s my proof that i did the work…. The only thing I didn’t get done was my husband’s desk, he was working the whole time and told me not to touch his stuff. lol. I cleared off the clutter that was on the very top, it was mostly stuff that didn’t belong in the office anyway.  I still have a small stack of papers on my desk,  they are the ultra sound pictures from yesterday and a list of stuff we need to get next time we go to the store.  Also, i had to put the time out stool on the top of the fridge because the kids keep dragging it places and getting into stuff they’re not allowed to.

So Kacie suggested I take pictures of areas in my house I wanted to clean/organize so that I’d be more motivated to actually take care of those problem spots instead of ignoring them day after day.

So here ya go world. The messiest spots in my house (right now)

• the top of the fridge- it has become the catch all for anything we don’t want the kids to get into or things that have been taken away from them.
• My desk- another catch all. For any bills, coupons, and just about anything else.
• The top of our rolling cart- Here’s where anything that is supposed to be IN the cart gets piled for some reason it’s just too hard to open a drawer and put the stuff away.
• My husband’s desk- again, another place for just about EVERYTHING.  Pretty much the entire office in general is a problem area. It will be fixed.

Time to get busy.

We had the Ultra sound today to tell us the gender of the baby. I wont keep you guessing because most of you already saw my post on facebook and know that well, it’s a boy!  He would no cooperate with the ultra sound tech though, every time they tried to see his face he’d turn or stretch way out and look way back. We saw him very clearly jumping just like in the last ultra sound. We got three clear pictures of his boy parts, so we are certain he’s a boy. His hands were up by his face the whole time and he kept opening and closing his mouth,  they were calling him a chatter box.  The only other good shot we got was this:

They did have a little concern that the placenta is lower than it should be, so I go back around 30 weeks for another ultrasound to make sure it goes up.

I am very excited to have a boy to shop for! I’m sick of girl clothes and sick of the same girl clothes. There is a consignment sale at the beginning of next month where I am putting 95% of my girl clothes. I’m keeping a few sentimental outfits and their blankets of course. Other than that- bye bye pink!!!

You may think that’s unwise of us since more than likely we’ll have more kids, but our issue is with storage. We have no storage space here. The girls room and the office have very small closets, their closet is full of a dresser and their clothes as well as some other baby items, the office closet is where we’ve kept the clothes not in use. We have 6 totes of them. 2 of them we can get rid of now that we are having a boy which allows for enough space above the other 4 totes to actually hang baby clothes. 1 tote has the few girl items I’m keeping as well as some gender neutral clothes and burp cloths and blankets, 1 tote is 3T clothes waiting for Caylee to grow into, 1 tote is 4T fall stuff, and the other tote is 2T fall stuff. As Caylee outgrows her clothes we will more than likely get ride of all of them, maybe keeping one or two outfit here or there.

The storage issue is the main reason we are choosing to get rid of all the girl stuff. Yes, being sick of looking at them helps. When we made a list of the pros and cons of keeping them vs getting rid of them, getting rid of them won. After all, it would be about 3 more years before we’d need them again, and by then I’m sure we can save up $50 to get some new clothes.

Now comes the hard part- choosing a name!

I read a great post this morning about striving to be a perfect mom and it really hit home. Not too long ago that was me losing control, screaming, longing to just be alone for a few days. no kids. I couldn’t handle them, they were too much. They didn’t listen, in fact they did the opposite of what I said. Lexi screamed at me, threw temper tantrums if she didn’t get her way. My life was miserable because I couldn’t make my kids obey. we went on vacation and I was embarrassed at my children’s behavior, so embarrassed I cried when I left my friend’s house because I felt like I had completely failed as a mom.

It wasn’t until two weeks ago that it honestly hit me… I CAN’T DO IT. That’s what God wanted me to realize. Just like my friend Beth says in her post, we can’t be a perfect mother by our own power, even if we somehow could achieve this, how would it glorify Him?

Although I didn’t stop reading my Bible I wasn’t applying anything. Like someone wanting to lose weight can read all the success stories they want but until they diet and exercise nothing is going to change! As Christians we do the same thing, we read a chapter of our Bible a day and walk away thinking that we’re going to become great Christians, perfect parents, spouses and friends all because we read a verse. It’s not going to happen that way. You have to actually choose to starve the flesh and feed the spirit, you have to choose to put on the armor of Christ, you have to choose to show the fruit of the spirit not the vices of the world. I was choosing the opposite of what I was reading.

What will you choose today? Today is a lot to think about, so maybe we should break it down a bit. What will you choose when your child disobeys?  What will you choose when the kids are fighting? What will it be, the fruit of the spirit or the fruit of the flesh?

Lately I’ve been feeling motivated to get rid of stuff. It started a few months ago, we had a yard sale, and although not much sold I was determined not to bring the junk back in my house so we donated it to a place that GIVES away stuff to those in need. I would much rather donate my stuff to people who will give it away than to a place like Salvation Army or Goodwill that sells it. Anyway…

That was a car full of stuff and it made me content for a little while. Then Kacie started talking about decluttering, and even linked to someone who has a challenge going on right now to get rid of an average of 2 items per day for the whole year of 2010.  It really made me think,  because 730 things seems like a lot to get rid of and I wasn’t sure if I had that much stuff! Then I thought about how much I got rid of at the yard sale, If you count each item of clothing plus the toys it was at least 200 things.  That’s when I decided to just see what I could find.  being that we have two kids and another due in December, we will be getting a lot of stuff for birthdays and Christmas, stuff gets brought in this house every month so it only makes sense for stuff to go out every month too.  After all, there’s only so much space in this house.

Last night I started with a little spot in the girls closet that I had noticed stuff piling up, I found 5 things there, and organized the rest. Then I moved to the linen closet. Which is also our medicine/extra stuff closet. Yah, I found a ton there. Probably 50 things, most of which I threw away.  After we find out if this little baby inside of me is a boy or a girl it will help a ton. If it’s a boy, there will be totes of baby girl clothes and blankets headed out the door!

I’m sure after we go through our dressers, closets and under our beds we’ll find a bunch more.  I’m so excited for even more organization. Organization gets me so pumped. I don’t think I’ll ever feel like there’s no more room for improvement, clutter is everywhere!

I’m a little over 16 weeks, I’ve taken two belly shots so far, one at 14 weeks and one at 16 weeks. I will share them with you… The first one (outside) is 14 weeks, the second is the 16 weeks. Yes, I know I’m huge already.  When compared to my pregnancy with Lexi my 16 week shot is about the same as my 19 week shot. With Caylee the 16 compares to the 17 week shot- sort of. I was SO big with Caylee that I look way different.

In two weeks (July 12th) we have an ultra sound to find out the gender! I’m so excited. We’re hoping for a boy, I’m getting sick of pink and drama, but if it’s another girl that’s fine with us, We really just want a HEALTHY baby!!  I’ve felt movement off and on for a few weeks now, nothing consistent yet, but I’m sure it’s coming soon.

Father’s day we spent 4 hours in the Emergency room because I was bleeding, after tests and an ultra sound they had no reason for it, and told me to follow up with my dr but that the baby and everything looked fine. I went to my dr the next day and they told me the same thing, that it must just be “old blood” coming out. So who knows what is going on, all I know is the Ultra Sound they did in the ER showed a healthy moving baby with a strong heart beat. Praise the Lord. I’m still having some of the blood come out over a week later, but I’m trying not to get concerned about it since everything was fine!

Anyway, here are the pictures you’re waiting for!

I just went ballistic and spazzed out over soda cans. My husband is a bit of a Mt. Dew fan, and now his cousin (who is also a Mt Dew fan, is staying with us. They go through quite a few cans a day, which means a lot of empty cans sitting around.

Thankfully they don’t leave them spread out through the whole house, just in one or two spots. However, I HATE seeing them pile up. Even one can on the counter drives me insane. It is a rule that they must be rinsed before being left on the counter, and I love my husband because he at least does that much.

However this morning I went crazy. there were maybe 8 cans on the counter, but there were ants all over the floor. I HATE ANTS. They will not go away. About a week ago I went ballistic and put the garbage can for the soda cans right outside the back door (right next to the counter they get stacked on). I thought it would help keep them off the counter. It didn’t. Well, it did because I kept throwing them in the can.

Anyway, I started grabbing the cans, rinsing them and brought them out back. Then realized the garbage can was full, so I dumped it all over the porch and started crushing them. They take up a lot less space that way. Then I came in the office where my husband was in search of cans, found about 5 more and i *might* have freaked out a bit and said I was about to ban all soda from my house. Then I went out and crushed them, and came in and apologized.

Why is it that things like empty soda cans can set me over the edge?