Oh Life!

My dear friend Bekah Adams reminded me I had this blog just yesterday. I had completely forgotten, as evidenced by the fact that I haven't posted anything in forever!

So much has happened, I don't even know where to start. Let's see, my last post was about wondering whether we were having a girl or boy. It was a girl! Krista Grace was born on February 23, 2012 at 5:49 p.m. She was 7 lbs 3 oz and 19 inches long and just perfect. Delivery was rough and definitely didn't go the way I hoped it would, but all 19 hours of labor that resulted in a pretty miserable c-section was still worth it for my sweet baby. So, we're now a family of three and loving it!

Krista is now 19 weeks old and has recently learned to roll over. She is also laughing pretty regularly now, though she laughs much more at daddy than she does at me. Guess he's just more goofy! ;) She's a pretty good sleeper at this point, though she's never made it through the night without at least one feeding. The last couple weeks she's been a bit more of a challenge on the sleeping front. She is getting too strong for her swaddle, but she can't seem to sleep without it, so she gets her hands out constantly and then just screams and screams. Poor thing. We are trying to figure out how to get her to sleep without the swaddle, but so far we haven't had much luck. She does really well though as far as the pacifier goes... She needs it to fall asleep, but once it falls out she's usually good for a while. If she wakes up in the night (which she has been a lot recently), she needs us to put it back in, but overall I can't complain too much. I'm glad she takes the pacifier honestly! It is pretty much a lifesaver in our house.

Our next big milestone will be solid food. Brandon and I have decided to hold off until August to introduce whole wheat rice cereal and then some fruits and veggies. She could probably do it now, but we've been going through a bunch of other transitions so we think it best to wait for a bit.

What transitions? Well the biggest one is this... I went back to my job a few weeks ago. But I just missed my little love too much to make it a permanent thing, so I only lasted two weeks. As of this week, I am officially a full time wife and stay-at-home mommy. BUT I am also doing consulting work for an ad agency my hospital contracts with - from home! It's truly the best of both worlds because I get to still help provide for my family (though my husband does a wonderful job at this) and I get to spend more time with my baby girl. Plus, it's a neat set up with work because I'm doing all the same things as before, but only part time and I do it from home in the afternoons when my daughter is napping and when my husband gets home from work. And since I'm technically consulting with the ad agency, I get to work for other clients as well. I can't believe how wonderfully this whole thing has worked out. My boss is fantastic and his flexibility and willingness to let me do this has been just amazing. So from here on out, this blog will address my adventures as a full-time wife and stay-at-home mommy, with a bit of marketing consulting on the side! Stay tuned!!! (I'm really going to try to use this blog more regularly, mainly just so I have a record of all the things going on in our lives!) 

The other big transition is that our church is no longer meeting together, so Brandon and I are now searching for a new church family. We were sad to no longer oversee the kids' ministry, but we know God has a plan and we are excited to see where He brings us and how He will use us wherever we end up. Brandon still desires to work in full-time ministry, so we're hoping that happens soon. For now though, we are so grateful for his job and his great boss. He really loves working there and it's such a great fit for us right now. I'm just hoping the company moves to Santa Clarita (they've been hoping to move for a while), because then we will move out there, too. Apartments (and houses!) are much cheaper out there, so we could get a comparable place to what we have here in Burbank, with a washer and dryer, for much less than we pay here. But it's still a great area! :) I want a washer and dryer sooooo bad! Especially now that we have Krista, who has decided to leak (explode!?) on three outfits, her carseat and the couch so far in the last two days!

Let's see what else... I'm completely obsessed with Pinterest, and I've decided to redecorate my daughter's nursery based on some things I've seen there. I initially went with neutral colors (I'm pretty sure I posted about that a long time ago), but now that she's here, I can't help but want to incorporate pink and more girly elements into her room!!! I know, that didn't last long, did it!?! So last night and this morning I've been working on making some fabric pom poms to hang from her ceiling. I'll post pictures later on. I'll also be making a new bedskirt and crib bumper to match the curtains I already made. I bought the fabric a few days ago, and it's just fantastic! I can't wait to wash it up this weekend so I can start my sewing! It's been hard not doing it the last couple days, but I've had to work, and I've spent the rest of my days with my lovely little girl! Speaking of which, we think she's turning into a dinosaur. Since Monday (it's now Friday), she's started making these crazy loud noises (she's not upset, just making noise) that seriously sound like velociraptor (no idea how to spell that) screeches. It is hysterical. Anyway, I've been lucky to have had time to start the pom poms, so sewing projects will definitely need to wait until my husband is home and available to help with Miss Dinosaur!

After I re-do her nursery, I'll start on the rest of the house! ;) I'm telling you, Pinterest might just ruin me, but it's sooooooo fantastic and there's the best ideas on there! I want to make a new duvet cover for our bed, some pillows, and possibly a shower curtain (ours are starting to look dingy anyway, so I'll either need to replace them soonish with store-bought things, or make them myself!)! Don't worry, I'm on a budget (go Dave Ramsey!) so I'll make sure I'm only spending within our means. Which means these projects will probably take place over the next few years, but I'm OK with that!

OK this post has suddenly gotten very long - mostly because Krista's nap has lasted longer than usual... So, I'm going to take care of a few more things around the house because she's bound to wake up soon!

Until next time!  

Is it a Girl or is it a Boy?

We've gotten lots of questions lately about baby. Most have been whether it's a boy or a girl. We still don't know yet, but we're supposed to find out in just a few weeks (as long as baby cooperates, of course).

Meanwhile, we haven't done much more to prepare for baby. We've cleaned a little more, and our living room is finally relatively normal, but that's about it. We have lots of projects we'll need to get to before baby comes, but fortunately, we still have a ways to go.

The other night, though, we did do one thing that was super fun... You see, I haven't started any sort of baby registry yet, but I have started researching various baby products and picking out colors and such. Brandon and I wanted to keep the bedroom a neutral color scheme, so I found a bedding set I loved online at Babies R Us. We stopped by the store after work the other night because I really wanted to see it in person and show it to Brandon.

We found the bedding set, and the good news was I absolutely LOVED it (and so did Brandon). Bad news was it was on clearance (ugh!) and there were only two sets left in the store and one was damaged. Better news? Because it was on clearance, it was marked half off. After thinking about it for a while (we lounged around in some gliders to discuss our options), Brandon convinced me we should just pick it up. It was such a great deal, and he could tell how much I loved it, so he didn't want to wait and risk us not getting it later on.

As such, we now have a theme and color scheme for the nursery!

It's just precious! It's green, yellow and white mostly, with chocolate brown trim. It features these cute little monkeys, elephant and toucan, as well as some giraffes, a lion, tiger, rhinocerous and crocodile! I just love it, and I'm glad we splurged!

I'm going to buy some fabric in a complimentary green color so I can (someday) make some curtain's for baby's room. And that's about as far as I've gotten so far, but hey, it's a start!

And so it Goes...

We've made a lot of progress on the redecorating front! We successfully moved the desk and computer equipment out to the living room. Surprisingly, it looks great - not too crowded and the computer is somewhat hidden from view. We bought a cool cabinet from IKEA, which we're going to mount on the wall and then fill up with some of our "collectibles" that no longer will stay in the baby's room.

Next step, sell our extra couch and chair so we can buy a smaller loveseat that will actually fit in our now smaller living room.

And good news, we traded in our extra twin bed for a crib and changing table! Now, my sister has a more comfy bed, and our baby to be also has a place to sleep... No mattresses yet, but we'll get there!

What else is going on in our lives? Work is going well for us both. Things are super busy, so we're tired a lot, but we're happy that God has provided us with these jobs at this transitional time in our lives.

We had our 12 week check-up earlier last week, and baby is doing well! We couldn't believe how much it was moving around in there. At first, it was squirming all around, but then it stopped. My doctor smiled and told us to watch, then she smushed the ultrasound camera thingy into my stomach and our baby flailed it's arms and legs! It was amazing. She got a picture right when that happened. You can even see fingers and toes. We're already so in love and can't wait for the baby to get bigger. Honestly, we can't wait to meet it - even though we still have six months left! :-)

That's all for now! Tonight, we're having date night. Since I usually want to go to bed super early, Brandon is bringing dinner home and we're going to watch movies. Just what I need today!

Redecorating for Baby Arrieta!

I've decided to get back into the blogging thing. I'm hoping this will be a way of posting updates about our life. I don't really figure many people will read it, but I'm fine with that. And for those of you who do read it, you likely already know what's included, but that's OK, too.

Today, Brandon and I have decided to redecorate the living room. We plan on making room for our desk in there, which will require that we completely change the layout of everything. We're going to switch everything entirely and I'm so excited! We're doing it as part of our first big attempt to make room for the little one that's currently on the way. I'm not due until February 29 (yes, that date is correct - leave it to me a Brandon!), but we realized that with us both working full time the entire pregnancy, we're actually going to have a hard time getting to all the things on our to-do list to prepare for baby. Which is why we're starting now! Once we move the desk out of the second bedroom (and it's many contents), we'll be able to start going through some of the stuff we've accumulated in that room so we're ready when the baby joins us next year.

I've actually wanted to redecorate the living room for quite some time, so I really can't wait. I'll post pictures another day!

Love, Kendra