give the pregnant lady some food!

I thought I paid pretty good attention to the friends around me who have been pregnant over the years... thought I would have a pretty good handle on what it would be like to actually be pregnant... but I was wrong.

I was utterly unprepared for the total body makeover. I thought that meant I would just get bigger. But um, question: how does one get bigger? The obvious answer is food.

I have never in my life had a problem not eating enough. In fact, I've always struggled to not eat so much!

Things are a little different now though. In my first trimester I lost 11 pounds. With literally NO exercise and little movement at all. I was stationary on the couch or in my bed for approximately 6 weeks... and while there's been more time of feeling notsohot at least I've gained enough energy back to be able to accomplish some daily tasks. AKA eating.

It seems no matter what I eat, or how much of it, I'm always hungry! and the scale is not reflecting this!!! It's a dream come true... lol.

Don't worry, I'm sure I will be gaining some needed poundage over the next couple months... I have no doubts :P

But what's a girl to do when getting up and going to the grocery store seems like an insurmountable task? You send your husband... well at least that's what I did. We have not made a comprehensive grocery shopping trip since the first saturday in June! That's insane right?

Anyways, the point here is that I never thought food could be such an issue. Yesterday afternoon I was resting for a bit in between a house project we're working on and I realized just how dang hungry I was... and how there wasn't really anything in the house I wanted to eat.

I wanted pizza.

I feel like a different person. I don't even know who this person is! I don't feel comfortable with the new me and honestly, I hope I don't get comfortable, because I want the old me back! And I am told that will happen.

My superman husband heard my plight and dropped what he was doing, went to the store, bought the ingredients and made me a homemade pizza. True love.

I have no pretty picture to show you of the lovely pizza he made, but let me tell you what. I couldn't have asked for a better man. It's a good thing I'm the pregnant one and not him because I doubt my compassion level would compare to his. He's the best decision I've made so far ;)

The Christmas Present 2010

I love my husband for so many reasons. One of them is for his gift-giving abilities. He has a knack for picking out very thoughtful, yet useful gifts.

On my birthday, and the day we started dating, he brought me an 8 gig memory card. I ran the gamut of a few emotions and thoughts before settling on the fact that had not been lost on me.

The last thing I expected was a gift (since we actually didn't cross the "will you go out with me" phase til later that evening). I sincerely did not expect anything. But he knew better than me, and apparently knew I needed a new card... which I have been so thankful for on so many occasions. He sees things like that, that I just don't see.

Last year on Valentine's Day he bought me an air popper for popcorn. Again, I cocked my head to one side and said, "thank you???" In my head only of course! But don't you know I love that air popper! I use it all the time. To me, a thoughtful gift that will be used, and something I wouldn't think to buy myself is a good one.

I wish I had the same gift-giving ability he has! Thankfully, he hasn't bought me a toilet brush or something like that :P But you see, that isn't really thoughtful, so why would that even cross his mind? Exactly... :)

At any rate, we both had a hard time at Christmas this year. I felt like married Christmas was different than engaged Christmas... now all our money is the same... so we had to speak with each other on what we could afford/we felt was appropriate. And to justify what he wanted to get me, he ended up telling me ahead of time so that we could make sure it fit in our financial status.

And oh did it ;)



The one on the left there. Yep, that's what he got me! A lovely match to my other monitor, 3 inches smaller, but such an awesome addition!

I thought it was excessive at first, but I have come to just love having the two monitors side by side. Instead of tabbing all over the place I can keep so much more open (much the the chagrin of my hard drive) But I really like having internet on one side, photoshop on the other... etc. It's so convenient :)

Anyways, here's the a great Christmas present! And as an aside, because my office was so messy and full of boxes, it took me like 6 weeks to be able to set it up. The two of us set out to clean this office/guest room a couple weeks ago, and now I have pictures to show! But that will be tomorrow ;)

the honeymoon

This post along with a couple others I realized I've left in draft form the last couple months, so I'm revising and getting them up! Hence the weeks/months strike-off ;)

It should really be called the honeymoon vacation, because really, the honeymoon isn't over! Being married the last 3 weeks months has been amazing, and while we've already run into challenges, I am more convinced today than the day we took our vows that we were brought together by God.



This is the first view of our ship from the terminal, as we walked down the hallway to board we noticed they were touching up the paint. I thought it was just so cool that even though we were cruising in the Caribbean that our ship was decorated Hawaiian... I love Hawaii. I've been there twice when my brother was stationed in Pearl, it was so amazing. Steve and I most definitely want to go there and share that experience together! This ship was decorated Hawaiian because before it became the Norwegian Sky, it was actually the Pride of Aloha.



This was our stateroom. Totally tiny, but we didn't need a whole lot of room. There was plenty to do on the ship and lots of food to eat :)





This is the breakwater in the channel out of Miami... there were some kids out fishing on it.



The boat that made this wake in the channel was a 40-50 foot thrill ride that's goal was to get its passengers soaked ;) I think they were using the cruise ship's wake to do so.



Yes, the water really was that blue.



We chose to get a balcony room and it just so happened that every evening when the ship sailed, we were on the side with a sunset. That was just so cool! On our way out of the Miami port I took the most pictures... possibly because I felt like I was in an episode of CSI Miami?



Whenever I go on vacation, I like to get/do something that will mark the time and make a memory... This time I decided to get my hair braided. While my braids were complimented and totally "in" down there, when I got home I felt a little out of place ;) I was definitely praised by the locals though for being a blondie white girl with my whole head in braids... they called me Bahama Mama {ha!}





All braided up in Nassau, the whole ordeal only took about an hour. Plus the time it took to go find more money after my head was only half done ;) We then toured about on the island of Nassau and took pictures of ourselves with random pirates around. Steve in his classic Captain Morgan pose...



What's a trip to the bahamas (or anywhere tropical) without pictures of the beautiful hibiscus flower?



The first of these two was taken as we got off the ship (which is in the background there) and the second when we got back on



Gotta document the braids while they were still fresh! They got so frizzy after only a few days...



When we would come back to our room after dinner there would be little towel animal friends waiting for us. The ship gave lessons on how to make the lol, the only one we remember how to make really was the monkey ;)





It was a beautiful vacation! We had a lot of fun and when we got home we really got to having some fun! Somehow, I almost feel like real life is more fun than playing all the time :) Makes you appreciate the down time more maybe? I am loving married life, my husband and all the changes that this past year has brought :)

home once again

4 whole days in the car with my love, 4 whole days of Christmas with Beka. Can it get any better? Ok, maybe my idea of hours and hours in the car being fun is messed up to some of you but how could i not enjoy it when I got to hold hands with my very studly man {most} of the time :)

We left Sunday {but had originally planned to leave Sat morning, however my bridal shower was that day!} drove 16.5 hours. Got some sleep then finished the trip Monday around 4pm.

The weather in Denver was beautiful the entire time we were there. Rain had been predicted for Friday, but we never saw it! With Tuesday being the warmest day topping out around 86 and breaking a Denver record we decided to head to the mountains... where it was considerably cooler ;)



The mountains were absolutely stunning. It is just amazing to be driving on the highway and in front of you is this massive expanse of mountain range.



I took fewer pictures than I expected of myself but in all honesty I think it's easier to take less pictures of things that don't move around as much {aka mountains} I'll be interested to see how many Steve took though, certainly more than I have!



But when it came to this little stinker, I took a whole lot. Kinda like photographing kids, you take a bajillion pictures and get like {one} good one :)



This is Misa, Beka and Jared's pup. She's only 3 1/2 months old and just the cutest thing ever. What wasn't so cute was the throwing up in the back of the car... yep, she gets car sick. LOL.



We went to Rocky Mountain National Park 2 days in a row because the pass was closed. So Tuesday we went to the closer entrance, then Wednesday we drove all the way around the mountains to the other side... about 2-3 hours. I really lost track how long cuz we had such a good time driving and making so many random stops along the way... like for example Starbucks ;)





while they were making my drink I was taking a few pictures... and received a few looks. Really? I can't help my love for color, I realize that starbucks in NY has the same coffee as starbucks in Denver, but why waste an opportunity to drink in such a cool combo of color? I know I'm a weirdo.



Once on the other side of the park we decided to have a picnic.



The original picnic plan involved a picnic table and/or grass to lay a blanket down, but snow hindered our plans. So we set down in the parking lot.

Thursday we went to red rocks, which I'll post a few pics later about and Friday was our chill day. I forgot most of the day that it was Good Friday and then was pretty bummed that we drove all day Easter Sunday, but we still made it a good Easter :) More about all that later!

mile high city

If you guessed in the Rocky Mountains to my last post then you were right!



More specifically, I'm staying in Denver with my only remaining high-school friend Beka. She's also one of the girls in my wedding :)

And lest you think I drove out here alone, be ye not deceived. I have my man with me.



He has the best smile.

I'll be posting more about the things we did and the places we went soon :)