17 (or so) weeks

Hello 17ish weeks! I say "ish" for a reason. I had a dr appt yesterday and the doctor was feeling where my uterus is, and it is closer to my belly button than it should be at 17 weeks, so there is a possibility that I am ahead of what they originally measured. I will know when I have my ultrasound at 22 weeks. We've been wondering all along if I was ahead because I seem to hit pregnancy "milestones" earlier than I should, for example: my belly showing, and feeling the baby moving (more on that later), etc. The appointment went really well! The doctor was happy with my weight gain so far (so weird to say that! I never feel weight gain is good, so it is nice that a doctor thinks it is good!). The nurse was trying to get the heartbeat on the monitor, but Charlie was moving around like crazy! Just when the nurse would get it, Charlie would move to a new spot and the nurse would have to hunt it down. She eventually gave up, but said the heartbeat sounded great.  We got the Quad Screen results back and all is normal! YAY! I was nervous about this one, but I wanted the test so that I knew how to prepare for my little one to enter the world. I was very glad the results came back A-OK!

How far along: 17 (ish) weeks

Total weight gain: 6 lbs total, although I had to pee pretty badly when they weighed me, so I am going to say 5 lbs, haha. 

Maternity clothes: Oh yes, and I finally found a comfortable pair of maternity jeans. :)

Stretch marks: Same as before... Nothing really, except old ones from when I weighed more before I lost weight.

Sleep: No longer on my stomach, but it is getting better for now. I don't have to get up all the time to pee right now, which is a blessing. :) I was sick this week, though, so I could barely breath and woke up because of that. I ended up sleeping on 3 pillows. 

Best moment of this week: Getting kicked. :) It isn't all of the time. The movement has changed from a flutter so I don't feel it as much anymore, but now is when I will start to feel the kicks. I was bending over to pick something up and was kicked. I stood straight up, so surprised, and then spent the rest of the night bending over trying to get it to happen again. No such luck... but it did happen again a few days later at school, again when I was bending over to pick something up, and it just happened a few minutes ago! What a neat feeling!

Miss anything: The same: Wine... sigh... and running (I try to do it, but it is so difficult). Jeff has been brewing his own beer and I want to try it so badly, especially this latest batch, which is chocolate peanut butter porter, and chocolate oatmeal stout. Oh well... they are saving it for me for when I can drink again. :)

Movement: See "best moment of this week". :)

Food cravings: Still FRUIT FRUIT FRUIT, all of the time. Yum! Nothing else really, but I am hungry all of the time!

Anything making you queasy or sick: Still meat and random smells, but overall the queasiness has gone. The sneezing is back, though that may be related to my cold too, and I get queasy just before I sneeze, and then I sneeze and the queasiness disappears. 

Have you started to show yet: Yes!

Gender: Still not finding out! :) 

Labor signs: Too early! I better not feel them for a while!

Belly button in or out: In, but it is harder underneath it now. :)

Wedding rings on or off: On 

Happy or moody most of the time: Happy, but with mood swings. I can totally feel when I am moody too!

Looking forward to: Registering, which I guess I should consider doing soon, and picking out a daycare place, because that is starting to make me panic! 

16 weeks

It was so nice to see comments from readers from when I wrote this blog before! I love the encouragement of writing! :)

How far along: 16 weeks

Total weight gain: 2 lbs as of the last appointment... my next appointment isn't until Thursday and I don't want to weigh myself between now and then!

Maternity clothes: Pretty much everything I wear, though I really want to go buy more because I don't have much and feel like I'm repeating all my outfits already! It is too early to feel this way!

Stretch marks: Same as before... Nothing really, except old ones from when I weighed more before I lost weight.

Sleep: A bit better because I'm not getting up EVERY night to pee, but I still have some crazy dreams. Oh and no more belly sleeping. I feel like I am laying on a bubble if I am on my belly. Darn! I am a stomach sleeper too! I can sleep on my side, so I will be OK for now. 

Best moment of this week: Having people comment on how much I've popped. :) I finally look pregnant and not like I ate too many donuts, so I am loving it and the comments I'm getting! :)

Miss anything: Wine... sigh... and running (I try to do it, but it is so difficult),  lunchmeat... I am craving a turkey wrap, which will be on my list for after the baby is born!

Movement: My guess is the baby's movement has changed from the jerky fluttering I felt before, so I'm not feeling as much as I was. I am paying attention for the kicking movement that I should start feeling in the next couple of weeks!

Food cravings: Still FRUIT FRUIT FRUIT! I also had an intense craving for a pickle, which I was able to satisfy right away and it was good. :) I walked around yesterday DYING for something, but I just couldn't tell what it was. Everything I tried did not match my craving. I was so bummed out. 

Anything making you queasy or sick: Still chunks of meat and random smells, but overall my morning sickness is gone. YAY! :) One of my weirdest symptoms is/was sneezing all the time, but I think that went along with my nausea. I am not as nauseous anymore so I don't sneeze as much! YAY! It was seriously 5-10 times a day! 

Have you started to show yet: Yes!

Gender: Still not finding out! :) 

Labor signs: Too early! I better not feel them for a while!

Belly button in or out: In, but it is harder underneath it now. :)

Wedding rings on or off: On 

Happy or moody most of the time: Happy, but with mood swings. I can totally feel when I am moody too!

Looking forward to: Hitting 24 weeks... I just want to know that there is something they can do to save the baby if something goes wrong. Also feeling those kicks! And getting the nursery together. We started! :)

A lot of life changes!

I haven't been on this blog in a long time. I haven't posted in a long time. But I've had a lot of life changes, and one in particular I'd really like to document. To start, I am finally in a permanent teaching position, teaching 2nd grade in an awesome district. I am very thrilled about this job! I spent the last year working my butt off to lose weight and lost 62lbs! I've also run 4 half marathons in the last 2 years, but 2 of them were this year and I set personal records for both! I was 14 lbs away from my goal weight when... I found out I was PREGNANT! :) If you read my blog before, I was diagnosed with infertility, so imagine our surprise when we found out we were pregnant naturally! We are SO THRILLED!

So to document my pregnancy for me, and share with family/friends that live further away, I have decided to try to get this blog going.

How far along: 15 weeks

Total weight gain: 2 lbs

Maternity clothes: Since I lost so much weight before pregnancy, I really didn't have many clothes to wear to begin with and was trying to buy by season to build my wardrobe, so I actually am all in maternity clothes now because I don't have too much to wear otherwise. 

Stretch marks: Nothing really, except old ones from when I weighed more before I lost weight.

Sleep: Crappy... I pee at LEAST once a night, but sometimes more. I also dream like crazy. Last night I was dreaming that Jurassic Park was real and we were living in TRex world. 

Best moment of this week: TMI, but eating more fiber, which made me feel better overall. :)

Miss anything: Running (I try to do it, but it is so difficult), wine, lunchmeat

Movement: A bit, but not really kicks, just overall fluttering from baby moving around 

Food cravings: FRUIT... I can eat fruit 100% of my day. The fresher, the better. Weirdest craving so far has been dill pickle chips with an apple (eaten one bite each, alternating) or a cookie whoopie pie.

Anything making you queasy or sick: Chunks of meat and random smells. I used to get queasy with rice too, but not so much anymore. I don't really want greasy food either. 

Have you started to show yet: Yes

Gender: Not finding out! :) 

Labor signs: Too early!

Belly button in or out: In, but it is harder underneath it now. :)

Wedding rings on or off: On 

Happy or moody most of the time: Happy, but with mood swings. I can totally feel when I am moody too!

Looking forward to: Hitting 24 weeks... I just want to know that there is something they can do to save the baby if something goes wrong. 

Memories

It's been a while. I know. I'm not even going to ask for forgiveness, because I've been trying to enjoy life. It is summer now. Maybe I will get in more updates. Maybe not.

I've been walking down memory lane lately. I've decided to sell my piano (and have sold it, just waiting for it to be moved to the buyer's house. It is going to a teenage girl who will play it instead of use it as furniture like I do, since I didn't learn enough during my piano lessons to play it well). The only reason why I was holding onto it was because of the sentimental memories attached to it. But I can write down some memories and hold onto them, and still let the piano go to someone who will give it life and use it the way it was meant to be used.

When I was a kid, my parents let me take piano lessons. They bought a piano and my piano teacher came over to the house and gave me a lesson. I hated to play the piano. Well, most of the time. There was one song I played over and over and over. "The Little Birch Canoe". Today I called my mom and said "listen!" and put down my phone and played the song for her. I haven't played the piano in years but I remembered that song and played it for her. She laughed.

There is a mark on the piano bench. It looks like a bunch of scratches in one concentrated area. When I was young I used to do everything I could do to avoid practicing. Where the piano was located, I could see down the stairs to the family room, straight to the TV if I bent down enough. I would sit on the bench and plink around a bit to give the illusion that I was actually practicing, and then I would get on my knees on the bench and bend down and lay my head on the bench (kind of like in a yoga child's pose) so that I could see the TV. I would watch and every commercial break I would plink around. I don't think I was fooling anyone. :) But I still tried. Well I had a pair of boots that I loved to wear. It was the kind where you had to twist the laces around hooks in order to pull it tight and tie it. I wore those shoes one day while practicing, and the shoes, while in my child's pose position on the bench, scratched the piano bench. I was afraid of losing that memory after passing on the piano. I wanted to write it down.

I hope that the girl getting the piano will have her own memories attached to it. In the meantime, I will be learning the art of photography with my new camera (well when I buy it... sometime between tomorrow and Wednesday!).

Creamy Cheesy Chicken Lasagna Rolls

I have a bunch of requests for this recipe, and I've been meaning to blog about it... so here it is! They are SUPER yummy and VERY easy to make! We doubled our recipe this time and it made 14 rolls, so that is the recipe I will put on there. It came from the Clean Eating magazine March 2011 issue, but it had tilapia in it instead of chicken. Since we do not eat seafood, we substituted chicken breast and it was very good! So without further ado...


Ingredients
*2 boneless, skinless chicken breasts, boiled and shredded
*1 carrot peeled and either shredded or chopped into small pieces (we chopped with our Pampered Chef hand chopper... best kitchen tool EVER)
*1 package of whole grain lasagna noodles
*1 cup of skim milk
*8 oz of low fat cream cheese
*7 oz of all natural mozzarella cheese
*1 tsp of dill weed
*1 tsp of sea salt
*spring onions (optional)

Directions
1. Preheat oven to 350*. In a large pot, boil the lasagna noodles. For the last 90 seconds, throw in the layered shoots of the spring onions to get them limp so that you can tip them around the spring rolls if you would like. We have done it with and without. They don't add much flavor, but they do give it a neat look.
2. While noodles are cooking, boil and shred the two chicken breasts.
3. While both the noodles and the chicken are boiling, peel and chop the carrots.
4. After the chicken is finished, in a medium saucepan combine milk, cream cheese, dill weed and salt into a saucepan and cook on medium to low until the cream cheese is broken up into the milk, whisking continuously. When the cream cheese is broken up, add half of the mozzarella cheese into the mixture and continue to whisk until the cheese is melted and it is a thick sauce (about 1 minute). When it is finished, remove from heat, pour about 1 cup into a liquid measuring cup and set aside.
5. Remove noodles from heat when they are finished and drain.
6. Combine the chicken and carrots with the sauce and mix until evenly distributed.
7. On a non-stick pan, lay out a lasagna noodle. Spoon about 2 tbsps (I just eyeball it) of the mixture onto the lasagna noodle and then roll it up. If you are using spring onion shoots, take a shoot and tie it around to hold the roll closed. If not, then just place the roll on top of the loose end so that it stays shut. Continue until you run out of the chicken mixture.
8. Pour the sauce that was set aside evenly over the lasagna rolls. Sprinkle the remaining mozzarella cheese evenly over the rolls and sauce.
9. Place in oven and bake until the cheese starts to brown. Remove from the oven and ENJOY!

I have even had this leftover and it is wonderful left over as well!

I love giveaways!

I'd like to do one someday on my blog! But for now, I can enter them and share them. Here is a giveaway that Katie from When Hello Means Good-Bye is doing. The giveaway is something from Etsy seller, the r house, who makes beautiful, encouraging jewelry and is a major supporter of adoption.

Check it out and check out Katie's blog! She is one of the most positive bloggers I have ever read, especially after her heartwrenching but amazing life story!

Baked Ziti

So I haven't made a whole lot of brand new recipes to blog about lately... more of the same stuff that we've already made. We did make one or two things that we didn't like (like Tandoori Chicken... EW! Definitely not good!), but tonight I made Baked Ziti from the Clean Eating for Family and Kids book (which I highly recommend! As long as any of the other Clean Eating books) and it ROCKED. I don't have a picture because facebook changed their photo settings and now for some reason I can't get the image address from my own picture. So now I need to figure out another option.

Ok... so enough babbling and on with the recipe:

Baked Ziti (with my changes... there are some changes in the recipe itself, but I am not going to note those because I think the way I made it was wonderful)

Ingredients
*1 lb ground beef or ground turkey (I used beef)
*2 cups of shredded carrots (I did not put this in)
*1 small onion, peeled and diced
*2 cloves of garlic peeled and pressed (or 1/4 tsp of dried minced garlic)
*26 oz can of crushed tomatoes (I used 28 oz)
*1 cup of chicken or vegetable stock (I didn't have this so I used low sodium natural chicken broth)
*8 oz of whole grain penne, ziti, rigatoni (I used 12 oz of rigatoni)
*2 tbsp of fresh basil leaves finely chopped (I used 2 tsp of dried basil leaves)
*1/2 cup of fresh mozzarella (I used an 8oz bag of natural, shredded mozzarella)

Directions:
1. In a large skillet, combine meat, onions, and garlic and cook until meat is brown. Drain the fat. At the same time, in a separate pot, boil water and then put the noodles in to cook.
2. Add to the meat the tomatoes, chicken/veggie stock/broth, basil and let simmer.
3. When the noodles are al dente, drain and then combine with the sauce.
4. Put the noodle/sauce mixture into a lightly greased baking pan (I used a 9x13) and the coat with the mozzarella cheese.
5. Bake at 350* until cheese is brown.

ENJOY!