My Michigan Boy

Sean was all boy this past weekend when we went Up North to Scott's parent's lake house.  From cars and boats to fishing and worms, he was all smiles all weekend.  While the weather wasn't the best, we couldn't complain since we were able to fit in some sun, sand, and water sports while enjoying great company and good food.

Saturday had a chilly start to the day, but that didn't stop us.  We put Sean in a fleece jacket and headed down to the beach for Pops to teach him how to fish.  Nana and Papa had bought him his own fishing pole with Cars, the movie, characters on it.  It even made sounds when you cast the line!  While Sean wasn't a huge fan of the worm or the fish itself, he seemed to really enjoy the process.  Here's a few action shots of Sean's fishing experiences this weekend:

Sunday rained all morning and early afternoon!  We were beginning to think the whole day was a lost cause, but I'm glad we held out and kept ourselves busy with Euchre games and a Walmart trip in town because when it cleared up it was beautiful!  Sean did a little swimming in his diaper since it was a last minute decision to let him go in the water and these were my absolute favorite shots of the whole weekend.  We BBQ'd ribs for dinner, which Sean ate with gusto while sharing with Dixie and we finished the evening by playing some ladder ball and having a bonfire and s'mores - all of which Sean stayed up for!

Monday was the best weather day of all, but we had to leave around Sean's nap time so we could get home while he was sleeping and still have time to get things ready for another work week.  So, we scarfed down breakfast and headed out to the sand bar to get some swimming in.  I sat on the boat, of course.  Someone has to take pictures!

Thank you to Nana and Pops for having us up for the weekend and for giving us such a great family weekend!  Sean is ready for some more fishing and tractor rides this summer!

24 Weeks BumpWatch!

How far along? 24 weeks, 2 days!  Since we were Up North for Memorial Weekend, I wasn't able to get my chalkboard/fruit comparison picture this week, but this is certainly a great background!

Weight gain/loss: I'm not going to weigh myself until my doctor's appointment on Wednesday.  Since there was ice cream, chocolate chip cookies, and apple fritters involved in this weekend's getaway, it's not going to be pretty.

Feeling: Umm...no swelling while we were Up North!!  Although, I had some during the work week from teaching. 

Maternity clothes? Loving my maternity bathing suit pictured above from Target.  I'm wearing an Old Navy cotton skirt with it since my legs aren't worthy of being shown.

Sleep: I had a rough weekend of sleep since I was sleeping in a different bed and forgot my body pillow at home.  Not to mention it's a difficult transition from a King to a Full with a big ol' belly, a 70 lb. pitbull, and a husband who hogs 80% of the space.

Food cravings: Watermelon.  We had some this weekend and it just hit the spot every time.  But, apparently Apple Fritters too, since I just had to buy some while we were out shopping over the weekend.

Movement? Starting to feel more on the sides and higher, although the low jabs are still there.  It's a miracle I haven't peed my pants yet since this little one seems to target my bladder.

What I miss? Beer.  Beer.  Beer.  Margarita's.  Wine.  All of it.  It sucked being sober this weekend.

Best moment this week: Great weekend with Sean Up North and a very special dinner where a Senior Honor's student chose to honor me and give a speech about how I've changed their life.  It's one of those rare moments in my career that make me appreciative of what I do.

What I'm looking forward to: Well, certainly not the glucose testing this week after a weekend of gorging.  So, I guess I'll just that I'm looking forward to school being out soon!!

Next Appointment: Wednesday, May 30th at 3:20pm with Dr. Weiermiller for my 1 hr. glucose screening.  Yay!

Milestones:  Compliments of babycenter.com, "Mr. Ear of Corn has gained about 4 ounces since last week. That puts him at just over a pound. Since he's almost a foot long, he cuts a pretty lean figure at this point, but his body is filling out proportionally and he'll soon start to plump up. His brain is also growing quickly now, and his taste buds are continuing to develop. His lungs are developing "branches" of the respiratory "tree" as well as cells that produce surfactant, a substance that will help his air sacs inflate once he hits the outside world. His skin is still thin and translucent, but that will start to change soon.

Meal Plan Monday!

Woo hoo!  Only two more weeks of school left and that sure makes meal planning a lot easier.  I cannot wait until I have some more free time to tackle the pile of recipes that I've been printing off the internet, not to mention my pins on Pinterest that look amazing!  As for this week, I have photography class tomorrow night and an OB appointment Wednesday after work that make two of the nights a challenge.  Plus, our parts are ordered to fix our oven, but won't be installed or working until Thursday.  So...here's yet another boring week of meals until I can come up with some better dinners:

Monday - MEMORIAL DAY!  Home from Up North, so a simple BBQ.  Hot dogs, buffalo style chicken sausages, salad, chips, and grapes.

Tuesday - Sloppy Joes, corn on the cob, and baked potatoes (in the toaster oven, thank God for that thing).

Wednesday - Scott's on his own with Sean, but if I'm feeling nice enough, I'm planning on making meatballs in the crockpot all day Wednesday.  So, all Scott has to do is make spaghetti noodles and a veggie and he's all set. (The recipe came from a Cooking Light Magazine from last year...can't remember the exact one).

Thursday - Grilled italian sausages with onions and peppers, Pierogies with potatoes and cheese, and broccoli.

Friday - Homemade BBQ chicken pizza (yum!) and salad.  Recipe from: BBQ Chicken Pizza.

Shutter speed, aperture, ISO, oh my!

While I won't get into much detail, I've been taking a photography class at a local community college so that I can finally learn the more advanced features of my DSLR camera that I got as a birthday gift in October.  With only 3 weeks under my belt, I'm proud to admit that I'm not afraid to take the camera off the auto settings and can now boldly shoot in Manual, Aperture Priority, and Shutter Priority!  And thanks to Adobe Lightroom, I can always fix what isn't perfect.  Here's some of my pictures I'm pretty proud of within the last 3 weeks:

Shot after my first class ever...I wanted to work on getting closer to my objects.  Side note:  Scott bought me these for Mother's Day - go Scott!

Taken in my classroom while working on blurring out the background and, once again, getting closer to my object!

Shot after my second class when I thought I would never want to pick up my camera again after being overwhelmed with all the technical aspects.  I focused on shooting in manual to adjust the shutter speed and aperture and shut off my flash and used natural lighting.

Taken tonight during class.  The difference between it being in the center and the rule of thirds.

Practicing depth of field in class tonight.  The first photo has the focus on the foreground (front of the picture) and the second one has a wider depth of field that focuses more on the middle part of the plant.

Depth of field practice again.  The first one has a shallow depth of field and second one has a wider depth of field.

I'm really looking forward to our first field trip in class next week to Maybury State Park to get some great landscaping shots and to attempt panning of mountain biking.  Here's hoping the weather is beautiful for a nice sunset on the pond!

23 Weeks BumpWatch!

How far along? 23 weeks, 3 days.  Almost to Viability day!

Weight gain/loss: As of this morning, 20 lbs.  Gulp....

Feeling: I had a pretty decent week overall.  The back pain was minimal and the swelling was surprisingly low even though we hit the 90's over the weekend.

Maternity clothes? I just bought 2 new awesome outfits.  One is the maxi dress I'm wearing in the picture above from Soma Intimates - you can't see the detail at the bottom of the dress unfortunately.  Another, is a long cotton skirt from Old Navy with shades of blues, greens, black, and white.

Sleep: The cool air in the evenings this week are going to be awesome for sleeping.  I make Scott leave one of our windows open and I sleep without sheets/blankets for the first time in my life.  This pregnancy I'm always HOT!

Food cravings: Greek salad.  I haven't had one yet this week, but it's going to have to happen for lunch one day.  I'm foreseeing a trip to Leo's in my future...

Movement? Very, very low all the time.  A few jabs on my left side, but I'm still surprised I'm not feeling anything higher.

What I miss? Having cute little toes and fingers.  The Vienna Sausage look is really hot....

Best moment this week: We had an awesome weekend!  I went shopping with my mom on Saturday Up North at an outlet mall and then we went to the Tigers game on Sunday with Sean and had a blast!

What I'm looking forward to: This long holiday weekend!  Hopefully heading Up North to my in-laws' cottage for some relaxation on the lake.

Next Appointment: Wednesday, May 30th at 3:20pm with Dr. Weiermiller for my 1 hr. glucose screening.  Yay!

Milestones: Mr. Grapefruit is a whopping 11 inches long and weighs over 1 lb. now!  Blood vessels in his lungs are developing to prepare for breathing, and the sounds that his increasingly keen ears pick up are preparing him for entry into the outside world.  Better stop bumping that hip hop music in the car now...

Meal Plan Monday!

Ugh...another challenging cooking week!  This is our last busy week of the school year with Scott finishing up the baseball coaching season, me having yoga on Monday, photography class on Tuesday, and a honors dinner for a student of mine on Thursday evening.  Plus, our oven took a crap on us late last week!  The gas stovetop works fine, but the electric panel that turns the oven on won't work at all.  We have a technician coming over tomorrow in the afternoon to hopefully fix it!  Thank God we got a home warranty on the house when we bought it last August!

That being said, here's what's for dinner this week:

Monday - Grilled cheese sandwiches, pasta salad, fruit salad.

Tuesday - Taco salad and queso dip with tortilla chips.

Wednesday -  Stuffed Green Peppers from a recipe I found on Pinterest that uses ground italian sausage instead of ground beef.  Plus, we got some huge fresh green peppers at the farmers market that will work great in this recipe.  Here's the details:  Green Peppers.

Thursday - Scott's on his own with Sean, so something simple like Spaghetti and broccoli.

Friday - My crockpot challenge of the week will be Crockpot Chicken Tacos.  Something simple and quick in the hopes that we'll be heading Up North for the long holiday weekend and will want to eat something fast before hitting the road.  Here's the details:  Chicken Tacos.

Next week I can't wait to dive into some more time consuming recipes since Scott will be home to help out with either dinner prep or watching the lil' guy!  I'm thinking the Sweedish Meatballs I never got around to making yet, Chicken Tortilla Soup in the crockpot, etc.  I'm drooling already...

Tigers Fever!

Talk about a scorcher!  Sitting out in the 90 degree heat was almost unbearable at Sunday's Tigers game against the Pittsburg Pirates, but Sean sure kept my mind off of it!  This little trooper never once whined, fussed, or cried the entire game.  I'm not lying.

Considering we woke him up from his nap, fed him lunch in the car, totted him around in an umbrella stroller to the game, made him sit in the seats for the first 3 innings, stood in line for 45 minutes to ride the carousel, and proceeded to sit in our seats for the rest of the game, lil' man enjoyed the whole experience!  We covered him head to toe in sunscreen and tried to push the hat on him, but he wasn't having that:

I need to give Sean a little more credit then I do because I'm usually pretty nervous to take him somewhere new when I don't know what to expect and I'm just assuming he'll have a meltdown of some sort.  I'm just amazed at how easy going this guy really is, considering I wanted to sit and whine the whole game that I was hot and sweaty.  I guess being pregnant in that heat really isn't a picnic, but if Sean can enjoy himself, then so can I.  And enjoy ourselves, we did!



Meal Plan Monday!

Last week's hits were definitely the Sausage and Peppers and the Gnocchi Mac n' Cheese by far!  I even took a picture of how delicious the Gnocchi was 2 seconds after it came out the oven and the cheese was bubbling:

This week is going to be a culinary challenge.  Since Scott's first baseball game of the season was cancelled because of inclement weather, they rescheduled it for tomorrow.  He also has a game on Wednesday night and potentially a play-off game Thursday night.  Which leaves me alone in the kitchen with Sean and no extra hands.  Additionally, I have photography class tomorrow night and have to leave and drop Sean off at 5:30pm!  So, this is the best I could come up with for quick and easy dinners this week:

Monday - Leftovers from Mother's Day....Maggiano's carry-out (thanks Mom and Dad!)  I also steamed broccoli for us to have some green in our diet.

Tuesday - English muffin pizzas.  Simple.  Somewhat healthy.   Quick.  Toppings range from pepperonis, pineapple, black olives, and/or anything Sean is normally picky about that I can sneak on pizza.

Wednesday - Grilled chicken salads.  We'll probably use an italian marinade for the chicken, throw on some hard boiled eggs, bacon, cucumbers, red onion, green pepper, croutons, and sunflower seeds.   I've got some Hawaiian Rolls to go with it too.

Thursday - Crockpot Mac and Cheese (yes, I know we just had Mac and Cheese last week, but it's easy and I have all the ingredients).  See the recipe here:  Crockpot Mac and Cheese.  I'll probably serve this with chicken sausages on the indoor grill and carrot coins.

Friday - Cheeseburgers, Alexa's waffle fries (the best!), and corn on the cob.  Yum!

Now...if we can make it through this week, the school year will feel like it's officially winding down.  20 more wake ups!

21 and 22 Weeks BumpWatch!

So, I'm a slacker this week and didn't take my 21 week picture until Friday evening.  Which means I was one day shy of 22 weeks.  Oh well...I'm trying, right?!  And please excuse the tank top I was wearing.  Ughh...it was comfortable.

21 Weeks:

How far along? 21 weeks, 6 days!  Getting huge...

Weight gain/loss: 16 lbs.  Still on par to hit right around 35 lbs.  Not horrible, but not great either.

Feeling: The oh so beautiful swelling has started with my feet, ankles, and hands.  And it's not even the summer yet!  I'm doomed this summer.

Sleep: It continues to get more and more difficult to turn over from side to side.  Scott made a point to tell me that I usually drill him in the face with my body pillow when I'm turning over.  Oops - sorry honey!

Food cravings: Birthday cake.  Reminds me so much of my pregnancy with Sean.  Not a cupcake, not a brownie, but birthday cake from Costco or Kroger.

Movement? Every day, every few hours.  I notice it when I'm eating and when I'm laying down at night.  I love every little kick.

What I miss? Well, Cinco de Mayo was this weekend and it sucked not getting to have a Corona with lime.  The boys enjoyed them though...

Best moment this week: I had a great Cinco de Mayo with my students and with my friends when we had people over.

What I'm looking forward to: Starting my photography class so I can take some awesome pictures of this little guy when he arrives.

Next Appointment: Thursday, May 17th at 3:50pm with Dr. Long.

Milestones: Little man is the size of a pomegranate (thebump used to say a banana, which I always thought was weird since last week was a cantaloupe).  His eyebrows and lids are present now and he's busy kicking away!

22 Weeks:

How far along? 22 weeks on the dot!

Weight gain/loss: 18 lbs.!  Yikes - all that Cinco de Mayo food and birthday cake caught up with me this week.

Feeling: My usual response of saying I'm feeling great is over.  Between the swelling and my back pain on the lower left side, I'm getting uncomfortable and fast!  It scares me to think of how much worse the back pain is going to get. 

Sleep: Thanks to Sean getting up twice this week in the middle of the night and it being my job to get him back to sleep, I'm feeling more sluggish than usual.  This must be getting me ready for another little one.

Food cravings: Watermelon!  And it's been delicious this week!

Movement? All the time!  I love it!

What I miss? Sleeping on my back.  Seriously.

Best moment this week: Probably today.  With Sean's swimming class this morning and fun filled day of the Farmer's Market and the Livonia fair, we had a great family day.

What I'm looking forward to: Going to Birch Run next weekend to hit the outlets with my mom and maybe even a Chicken dinner at Frankenmuth!

Next Appointment: Thursday, May 17th at 3:50pm with Dr. Long.

Milestones: Small fry is about 1 lb. and the length of spaghetti squash.  His lips, eyelids, and eyebrows are becoming more distinct, and he's even developing tiny tooth buds beneath his gums. His eyes have formed, but his irises (the colored part of the eye) still lack pigment.




Just because Sean wanted to sneak in one of these and then stick his tongue out at me...