Sorry, Sorry, Sorry!

First things first... this is not a post with beach pictures. I KNOW they are overdue, and I SWEAR I will get at least some of them up this week, but I have just had one heck of a time catching up with things around here!

For those of you that want to know, I am feeling MUCH better these days. Yes, the last few months have resembled hell on earth for me, but the "all day sickness" seems to be tapering off. I haven't thrown up in a week! When you compare that to throwing up every day, several times a day... its enough to make a person downright giddy! And because of that I am feeling more "normal". I am able to cook dinner again, play with my son, run a few errands. Its great. Now, I still have to pace myself. I find that when I try to do to much in one day (run multiple errands in a two hour time period for example) I get very lightheaded and sick feeling, therefore making me stay on the couch the rest of the day. So I just have to take it slow-ish. I am so, so, so thankful that I am getting back to normal!

You may be thinking, "Well since you are feeling better and getting back into a normal-ish routine why cant you blog on a more regular basis?"

Well, good readers, that is a good question. And I have a good answer.

My son is the devil.

Haha. Just kidding. But over the past week he has definitely hit a certain stage that reminds me a little bit of the devil. I may choose to go into more detail later, but lets just say that he has developed quite the attitude lately and he is not afraid to show it.

So between me growing a baby and the new toddler phase that has taken over this house, when I get a moment to blog I just plop on the couch and stay there as long as I possibly can. I feel like a major bum, but its the only way for me to do anything remotely close to re-energizing myself. And re-energizing myself keeps me from stabbing myself in the eye with a fork, so as you can see it is pretty important.

Anyway! Thats about it for today. I swear, I WILL post pictures soon.

Don't hate me.

:)

Z-isms

Hey everyone!

I just wanted to stop by and tell you that we are back. We have actually been back for four days now, but I just haven't graced the blog with my presence until now.

My bad.

Anyway! I have pictures and cute stories to share, but for now you will just have to settle with a few funny things Zachariah has been saying here recently (aka: I am trying to stall until I can get my rear in gear and go through my pictures).

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Here is a conversation we have EVERY time we eat Taco Bell:

Z: Is that poop?

Dad: No, its beef

Z: Beef? I dont like beef. Its yuk.

I walked into the playroom where Z & D are playing...

Z: Moooom. Go in da kitchen and make us some food!

Me: Are you kidding me?

Z: No. Pwease!

Z: I need to change my diaper!

Me: You will have to wait just a bit. Mommy needs to throw up.

Z: But I have POOP!

Me: Well I have VOMIT!

The other day Zachariah informed me that "mushrooms yook yike marshmallows in the grass!"

After hearing some ruckus in Zachariah's bedroom during what was supposed to be nap time, I go in there and ask, "Why aren't you taking a nap?" He responds with "I JUST readin my Bible!". Sure enough, he had his toddler Bible in the bed with him. :)

Me: Zachariah, you need to get dressed so we can leave! Z: Where we going? We going Mimi and Poppie's? Me: Nope. Z: RiverQuarium? Me: Nope. Z: Chick fil a? Me: Nope. We are going to Toys R Us! Z: *GASP* Toys R Us?!?! Maybe they have some toys? Me: Yeah baby, I think they might have some toys.

And last but not least, my favorite...

Due to some recent outbursts of Zachariah's, I was explaining to him how we need to be gentle and sweet to mommy's tummy. He said, "Like this?" And rubbed my belly very gently. I praised him for being so sweet and he got a very proud look on his face. He asked me why I had a baby in my tummy and I told him that God gave me the baby in my tummy. Then he lifted up my shirt a little so he could see my stomach, put his eyeball on my belly button and said, "I need to see it." I explained to him that we would not be able to see the baby for a while because it has to stay in my tummy and grow big and strong. He sat there with a thoughtful look on his face then leaned in close to my stomach and yelled, "BOO!" After giving him a questioning look he said, "I trying to scare it."

Ok! Now that I have successfully documented my sons cute little conversations I am going to go play with him. Stay tuned for beach vacation pictures! :)

Vacation Time!

We are going to the beach, baby!!!!

Each year we take a family vacation to the beach with Daniel's family and we always have lots and lots of fun. Everyone enjoys the heck out of themselves so much that we pretty much start counting down the days till the next beach vacation the day we get home!

Zachariah has been especially excited this year. He is old enough to anticipate fun things, and this is no exception. Every day for the past week he has been inviting me to go to the beach with him. It is so funny! This week we have had a nice countdown going and announce throughout the house "TWO DAYS UNTIL THE BEACH!" (that was yesterday's in case you were wondering)

Anyway! I just wanted to drop in to tell you that we are going to be on vacation and you should be super jealous. :) If you are having blog post withdrawals, feel free to click here to see last years beach pictures and click here to look at pictures from the year before last!

Now, I am off to pack.

Wish me luck.

:)

Say It Aint So

In a little less than a month my son will be turning three.

THREE!

He is obviously moving out of the toddler stage and into the "boyhood" stage real quick like. And that makes me sad. But I have a few more weeks until I have to deal with this age change issue, so I am going to just ignore it now, ok?

I took this picture the other day. He had just woken up from his nap. He has adorable bed head, his paci in his mouth and his blue blanket under his nose, (along with gung-gung, this is something he does not sleep without). Ever since he was a baby (not infant, baby. like, 6 months old or something) he HAS to put his blanket or gung-gung under his nose in order to fall asleep. He also does this when he is tired/wishing he was going to sleep. I have no idea why, but it is just something he does. And I LOVE it. It is one of the cutest things ever.

Anyway. I am very glad I took this picture. This is something I want to always remember. It is part of who he was as a baby and part of who he is as a toddler, and no matter how old he gets I want to be able to look back and remember this exact face. This groggy, yet obviously happy face of my baby. I just can't get enough.

My Beautiful Child

First things first. Thanks for those who let me know their opinion on the crib situation in the post below! Whether it was by comment on my blog, email or facebook, I really appreciate the feedback! I am personally leaning towards crib number two... but we will see how it goes! I will keep you posted! :)

Ok. Now, for the blog post...

Since I have been puking for the past 2.5 months I have not taken very many pictures. In fact, I have not so much as thought about picking up my camera! I enjoy taking pictures and so I have been kinda missing the whole taking-pictures-for-fun-thing that I had going on. And once I can get my act together I hope to trot on over to my friend Shelley's house and take some pictures of her ADORABLE baby girl. :)

Anyway. All that to say that the other day I was laying on the couch, per my usual, when I looked over to see Zachariah playing at the window. He was being SO incredibly cute and so I decided to heave myself off the comfy piece of furniture and grab my camera. It took me a while to remember where I keep the thing, but once I found it I got all up in Zachariah's play space so I could show you some pictures of his adorableness.

You can thank me later. :)

See his cute little dinosaur? That dinosaur lives in the blinds (no joke. that is his home now.) and Zachariah loves to periodically come over and make him "ride the elevator" or "walk up some steps".

I love seeing his imagination at work. I could seriously watch him play for hours. It is the cutest and most entertaining thing to hear him come up with voices for his toys and to see what "trials" he will have them conquer. Today this dino is just getting a lot of exercise going from one level to another. :)

And I am now getting roared at. That was Z's not so subtle way of telling me I was cramping his style with my camera. :)

I just love this kid. His hair rocks my socks, his eyes melt me and I could just kiss that face all day long. God has truly blessed me, and I am so incredibly thankful. I cant imagine life without this awesome kid. :)

Cribs

So, I have been crib shopping.

Yes, I know that might seem a little silly considering this is our second kid and we still have Zachariah's crib... but here is the thing. We bought Z's crib and changing table for REALLY cheap from a former co-workers sister. She had used it for two kids already and it wasn't in "like new" condition. Which was fine. We aren't snobs and we don't need things to be bran spankin new. But after Z put some wear and tear on it, it is just not that safe to use for another kid. The pull down rail is very wobbly, which is a bit dangerous. (I just learned that cribs with the rails that can go up and down have actually been recalled. They don't make them like that anymore due to safety issues.) The changing table that came with the crib was pretty much a few pieces of particle board with nails in it. Again, after Z put some wear and tear on it, just not the best idea to use it any longer. Anyway, all that to say, we have decided to purchase a new crib and changing table for baby number two. Hence, my crib shopping!

And let me tell you, this is just the kind of shopping therapy that I have been needing. Since I have been so sick I don't really get out of the house much, so that cuts down on my impulse/nonsense buying. (Our budget has been a very happy camper) I cant buy bedding or clothing yet because we wont know the gender of our sweet baby for another two months. So this crib shopping is seriously so much fun for me right now!

So, Daniel and I have pretty much narrowed down our favorite cribs to two different ones. Obviously we have PLENTY of time before baby number two gets here, but we are just trying to plan a few things out in advance. Mainly to appease me and my boredom/need to shop. :)

Here is crib number one:

Crib number one generally runs for about 400-500 bucks, but walmart sells it for $250. How great is that? This crib has PHENOMENAL reviews and it is exactly what I had in mind when I set out on this online crib shopping journey of mine.

And here is crib number two:

This crib is NOTHING like what I had imagined wanting or buying, but I really like it! It is simple yet very unique. It is a little shorter than a "regular" crib, and I find that very appealing since crib rails no longer slide down. This crib is about a hundred dollars cheaper than crib number one, which I think is a VERY reasonable price for such a cute looking crib. The only negative is that it is a fairly new crib on the market, so it has ZERO reviews. I make every online decisions based on reviews, so it throws me off my game when I don't have reviews to help me out.

Anyway, those are the two cribs we are debating between. I would LOVE your opinion on which one you like better/think we should get! Both are a cherry wood and would look great with pink OR blue bedding, so its kinda a win-win if you ask me!

Once we find out the gender I will be back with bedding options. Haha! :)

Have a great Monday!

3 Little Things

Good evening everyone! Because my son is watching Blues Clues, I happen to have a few minutes of peace and quiet. Well, not technically peace and quiet. Zachariah is constantly giving me the play by play on what Steve and Blue are doing, and I am hearing the "Mail Time!" song... but its about as quiet as its going to get right now! :) So since I have these few moments, I have decided to grace the blog world with my presence.

You are welcome.

Today I thought I would start something new over here on That's What She Said. Over the past couple years Daniel and I have made an effort to eat healthier. Most of the stuff we have done seems like pretty common sense stuff, but before we started making a conscious effort to be a little healthier, they weren't really common sense to us at all! So, just in case you all are interested, once a week I am going to post three to five simple things you can do to extend your life expectancy!

Haha. That was a little joke there. Doing one of the random three things I post wont make you life 10 years longer or anything, but it WILL make you just a little healthier. And heck, if it DOES make you live longer, let me know. I will write a book.

Oh, and just as a disclaimer, I am not a nutritionist. I am not an expert in anything health related. I am a research freak and I am just sharing a few things that our family has found helpful in being a little more healthy!

1) Drink 100% juice. When purchasing juices, stay away from anything that is made from less than 100% juice. Those juices have unnecessary sugar and not enough nutrients. I just don't understand the point of buying a juice that is only 30% juice and the rest water, sugar and "natural flavoring". Why not just buy the real thing? It is better for you and it taste a lot better too! So next time you are at the grocery store try to stay away from the "fake" juices and look for the ones that advertise 100% juice! (I know that Great Value, the walmart brand, carries quite a few 100% juices and they are VERY tasty.)

* Honestly, it is best if you don't drink juices at all and get your daily servings of fruit from actual fruits, but we have not cut out juices in our diet, so I am not about to preach to you about avoiding juice. I did think I should mention the fact that eating an apple is actually better for you than drinking a glass of juice. :)

2) Cut out the junk food. You know what I am talking about. The Pringles, Doritos, Fritos, Chex Mix... all of the pre-packaged snack foods. As wonderful as they taste (mostly due to all the MSG), there is just no good that can come from keeping those items in your pantry. When we decided to stop buying the junk snack food we honestly thought it was going to be ridiculously difficult. But you know what? After a week or two we didn't even miss those things! Instead of bringing out a bag of chips to munch on, try a handful of blueberries, or a cup yogurt, some peanuts, or string cheese. They are healthier AND tastier. Chips (and other bagged snack foods) will fill you up and then leave you hungry again in a short amount of time (again, its the MSG), but the more natural foods will leave you more satisfied. Try it! I swear, if my husband can go from eating Doritos several times a day to eating yogurt and rice cakes (and loving it), you can too!

3) Eat fresh fruit. Canned fruit is probably the worst type of fruit you could eat. Well, chocolate covered fruit is probably a little less healthy than canned, but not by much. The syrup is very sugary and the fruit contains less vitamins and minerals. And quite frankly, it just doesn't taste as good as fresh fruit. Don't believe me? My husband swore up and down that he did NOT like peaches, until I gave him a fresh peach. And then he thought he died and went to heaven! Pretty much all he had eaten was canned peaches and he had no clue how wonderful the real things were! So when at all possible, go for the fresh stuff. But if you aren't always able to do fresh, frozen is the next best thing. (Zachariah eats frozen mango chunks for lunch almost daily!) It doesn't take long to thaw and the fruit still keeps most of its nutrients!

Ok folks! That about does it for today. Again, these are very simple things to do, and I feel a bit silly even posting about them, but if one person realizes that there is a difference between 100% juice and the juice they are purchasing, then I consider it a successful post! :)

Happy healthy eating (or drinking)!