Our New Life

Two weeks ago today my husband and I were blessed to have our 2nd baby girl. Although this life change hasn't been quite the shock as our first child, it is still quite an adjustment!

I am learning the art of balancing my sanity with a personal life, marriage, toddler, and newborn. I am pleased to say that today is my second day completely alone with the two girls and things are going swimmingly! I even have both of them sleeping as I type. I know days will not always be like this, but here's to hoping!

Mom's Vacation

My mom is in town. She meant to be in town when the new baby was born, but apparently that idea hasn't worked out. The good thing is that she will be available 24/7 to watch my daughter if we do have the baby soon.

I love it when my mom is here because we have supper cooked for us every night (including desert!). She folds the laundry and occupies my little girl when I need a rest. She is a great companion for a stay-at-home mom who usually never gets adult interaction during the day.

Tonight we are having lasagna because it also freezes well. She's going to freeze the rest of the food we don't eat for when she leaves. Ahh, don't you just love moms!

Happy Independence Day!

Yes, it's the 4th of July, but that is the last thing on my mind. I am due tomorrow and I feel no sign of baby what so ever. I really expected this day to be spent laboring, in the hospital, or nursing a newborn. Now, I have to rethink all of our family activities. We weren't going to go to the fireworks tonight, but now we are. We weren't going to do anything too active today, but we've already gone to the splash pad, park, and city pool. Wow, this day is not going as planned! Although I want to go into labor, I am thankful that I got to spend this last 4th of July alone with my daughter. I will always remember the 4th of July before baby brother/sister was born.

The Traveling Pregnant Woman

I am due to have a baby in 5 days. One of my dear friends is getting married today 2 hours away from my house and 2.5 hours away from my hospital. My husband and I were trying to decide if we were going to go. Some of my friends haven't seen my 2 year old in a year! Also, it may be the last time in a while that I am able to travel easily.

When I went to my doctor appointment yesterday, the doctor told me that he wouldn't be surprised if he saw me again next week. Although I now cervical checks don't mean much, it made my case to go to the wedding all that much more inviting.

Well, my husband and I came to our final decision. We are going to travel. The chances of having this baby in the next 6 hours are highly unlikely, so here goes nothin'!

Iowa Weddings

Iowa may have crazy weather. It gets extremely cold and windy in the Winter and devilishly cold during the summer. However, when you hit a nice day, the weather is priceless. It just doesn't get better than Iowa on a nice day!

My friend is getting married today and today is one of those beautiful days. It brings me back to the day I got married about 5 years ago. When we woke up it was storming and raining. Then, about 3 hours before I walked down the isle, the sun came out, the clouds parted, and the wind died. The weather was perfect for our special day.

I wanted to Congratulate Patrice and Bryant. I hope their life together is just as beautiful as the day they got married.

Online Bill Pay: hassle or convenience?

I have no switched about half of my bills over to my bank's electronic bill pay service. This is nice because save money on stamps. Instead of paying 39 cents to send a payment, I pay 25 cents for each e-check. It's nice. However, having dial-up Internet is a hassle with electronic bill-pay!

Instead of writing a check out in 40 seconds, it takes my computer about 5 minutes per bill to submit and confirm. Granted, once I get all my accounts in the system, payment will become much simpler. There will no longer be any addresses and phone numbers to input. I'll be able to put all my payments into one screen and hit submit.

You would think that it would be easier for me to just enter all my information on all of my billing accounts at once. Wrong! You try typing with a 2 year old running around trying to type with you. Combine that with about 10 million billing accounts and you've got trouble. I've been doing a couple a month. At this point there really isn't too much left to do. I cannot wait until this e-bill system is completely up and running!

Birth day is almost here

I am due to have my baby in 1.5 weeks. At my last doctor appointment I was 70% effaced and dilated to 1. However, he said my cervix was still in an unfavorable location because it's still towards the back. He said as labor approaches it will move forward. All in all, I thought this was good news. When I went into labor with my first baby, I was only 10% effaced an dilated to 1! At least I've got a head start on this labor.

I figure I'll try some nipple stimulation to get things going. hey, it can't hurt right?!