{24 weeks in photos} cont - "week 25"??

I still haven't quite figured out how to say how many weeks along I am - when I hit another Monday it's another week...however, on that Monday it will say you are "24 weeks gestation" so then every day after that seems to be in the "25th" week...but I really don't know...here are some pictures from the past week - March 23 - March 25) (they're out of order because I can't figure out how to get blogger to put them in the order I upload them in...still learning about this thing they call blogging!):

Skyping with Crystal & Caleb is so fun - Caleb loves to see "Richard, Sally & Friend" on the computer!

Ale is a friend from Mexico City - I took her to Cheddar's  because she was staying in Burlington with a co-worker!

Abigail came to the firehouse when Richard was working so this is the "girl shot" :) 

We watched Bogey for a few days (Ryann & Keith's dog) - they love looking out the front door, playing together and sleeping!

Ethan had 4 pins put in his arm on Friday...so I went to the hospital to see him and sit with Amanda & Chris.

Before/After surgery - the first picture we sent to JoJo so he smiled...the bottom one he just wasn't feeling it and only wanted a picture of his arm! He asked the nurses to let his aunt come back which was really sweet. We went to the counter and they said "Who's the aunt?" and I thought they weren't going to let me back - but they said he's been asking for you and asking for you...made my day!

Caleb seeing himself and the bear in the phone and saying "Awww" to both!

This is what 6 months looks like on me - I'm getting bigger & feeling him more & more! He loves to move around, that's for sure!

Caleb enjoying his jello at Ponderosa - we always have a great meal there and he loves it! He's so much fun!

To see Caleb saying "Richard" and "Friend' (what Crystal calls me) click here:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pXeMyva4aT4&list=UUhGf0T_eShCfsaCsp0fMGIQ&index=4&feature=plcp

87 degrees in March!

Donna (from work) went shopping with her 2 granddaughters (Grace & Faith) over the weekend and picked out baby McFarland's first pair of baby shoes! How cute are they?! She waited until I went to the bathroom and then left them on my desk - it was SO sweet of them to think of the baby!

I love the way these trees bloom out so pretty, but their smell sends my allergies into crazy mode!

I took a walk to Panera to meet Kathy, Marla & Julie for lunch today and on my way back I took a picture of the College of Business where I work - it was a beautiful day and the kid's are on spring break so it was nice & quiet!

Today it got up to the high 80's (87 is what my car clocked it in at on the way home) - Sally enjoys hanging out with me on the deck and the picture on the right was her response to me saying "I'm going to stay out here." HA!

{24 weeks / 6 months} - Happy St. Patrick's Day!

Michelle & I had lunch at Pomodori's - love catching up with her and asking her all sorts of mom-to-be questions! 

Traffic was crazy on Friday because some person ran into the wall coming onto the bridge, so I stopped to see Richard and his crew while they were working on the truck / water...so fun to see Richard in action! 

Michelle gave me these really cute trucks for the baby - one firetruck & one mail truck (her husband is a mailman and the baby already has a mail ducky to play with too!) - she also gave us her boy's favorite book - which was so thoughtful!

"Happy St. Patrick's Day from the McFarland's" is what I sent to Corey & Crystal & Marthe to be silly - we actually both had on green for lunch - woo hoo! I love weekend days when we get to be home together - Richard has breakfast club that morning (so I walked with Sally and then Amy) but once he got home, we have a ball together!

Skyline has green spaghetti on St. Patrick's Day - how fun!

I made it to 6 months / 24 weeks...WOO HOO! :)  Technically the date is Monday but I knew Richard wouldn't be home, so I had him take a picture to show my new shorts from Gap outlet, my pride in being Irish and just how nice of a day it was!

We celebrated Amy & Caroline's birthday at 3 on Saturday - Tommy made Amy a slideshow of her life and Caroline kept saying "That's me" :) Really cute!

Family dinner to celebrate dad's birthday at Flemming's in Dayton - we stopped to see Nancy, Junior, Amanda, Chris, Kalysta & Ethan on the way home which was fun...we popped in for about an hour to visit and then headed home. All in all, great weekend!

This week has Richard working a lot (24 hours Monday, 24 hour coverage for a friend on Tuesday, off Wednesday, 24 hours at Covington on Thursday and 10-6 at Edgewood on Friday) - needless to say, I enjoyed this weekend with him knowing how much he'll be working this week.

This Wednesday we're getting a few quotes on having the ceilings of the upstairs painted...hopefully we can get that taken care of soon! I'm looking forward to dinner with Amy tomorrow night - we don't get a lot of time just the two of us to catch up, so that should be wonderful!

We also started to clean the garage out today and getting things organized so we can move the stuff for sale on Craig's list (http://cincinnati.craigslist.org/fuo/2909423266.html) into the garage and then out of our house and make more room for all the baby's stuff that I'm sure will be coming (if the pile in the basement is any indication - we're going to be packed full of baby stuff!) :)

I'm feeling pretty good at 24 weeks - much more like myself and I feel the baby a lot! I'll answer those same questions every month so we can see if any of them change:

How far along?  24 weeks

Maternity clothes? Yep - all the time with pants but with shirts, I can still wear normal ones every now and then but I don't love that...I have been wearing my tank tops but I know I'll have to be in maternity ones before long because they need to be longer! :) I think it's going to be a hot summer! 

Movement: Oh yes! I feel flutters pretty regularly and pains from everything changing inside...I can tell if I do too much, my stomach starts to feel weird. Coolest moment the other day was I was at the chiro and sat on the massage chair - when I got up it's like I could feel him flip flopping around in there or something...I could definitely tell it was him moving and doing something inside me - very cool! 

Food cravings: Cereal is still a staple - and I like Skyline a lot lately - still not terribly hungry but eating more and more and gaining a bit of weight now!

Anything making you queasy or sick: Mexican still but I did eat Chipotle the other day but it certainly wasn't my favorite!

Have you started to show yet: Yes, the woman at the bank a couple of weeks ago was the first complete stranger that didn't know me to ask "When are you due?" and I was shocked because I had my fleece on so I wasn't sure it was THAT obvious but apparently it was! That was a fun moment though!

Gender: BOY!!

Belly Button in or out? In.

Wedding rings on or off? On.

Happy or Moody most of the time: SAME - Somewhere in between - I'm truly excited that I'm getting to experience all of this but I'm not as crazy excited as I thought I'd be...as I told Marthe the other day, I do see this as a means to the end...I want to meet my sweet baby boy and kiss him and hold him and just get to see him grown up...feeling kind of blah and stuff is for the birds :) but it has all been worth it and I'm glad I'm able to go through it - I am forever thankful for that.

Most scared about: Still how this little guy is going to come out and breast feeding probably

Any other news on the pregnancy front? Not really - just enjoying as much as possible since I'm feeling so much better - love this phase of the process!
What's Richard been up to? Richard painted the closet doors today for the baby's room and he's been cleaning up the garage/getting things organized and we got everything up on Craig's list for now...just getting painters to come give estimates, we got our taxes done last week - so following up with quotes on the bathroom, scheduling the carpet guys to come...all the fun stuff. He's also in charge of finding and contacting pediatricians...I don't want to do it, so I'm going to let him work on that! 

{a week in pictures: March 10-15, 2012}

I love taking pictures more than the average person - I enjoy taking them, editing them, looking back at them - and just enjoying them! I started using Instagram and it's fun...allows you to quickly edit pics before posting or saving....here are a few of the highlights from the week:

When Richard works - we walk...Sally loves to walk!

Caleb LOVES the iPhone because he can see himself while the picture's being taken!

Kalysta celebrated her 12th birthday on Saturday!

We celebrated dad's birthday a day early on Sunday - we also played some kinect sports season 2 which was fun to watch!

We watched Scamp overnight from Tuesday to Wednesday. 

Sally got a bath on Wednesday while we got our taxes done!

Thursday - a strong hail storm happened in the morning...Richard saved some of the hail balls in the freezer for me to check out!

Junior, Richard & Nancy went shopping at Carter's and came up with these outfits (as well as an outfit we already got from Marcie & Craig but Richard forgot what it looked like) :) 

We ended tonight with more rain and it came down like crazy - lots of thunder & lightening...we went downstairs and watched the UK basketball game as the NCAA March Madness has started! Richard & I are competing with brackets this year - may the best person win!

{22 weeks}

22 weeks pregnant now - and the bump is starting to show more! 

22 week OB appointment went well - baby's heartbeat sounds great - I've actually gained weight for the first time (a whopping 8 or so pounds - yikes!) but they didn't mention it - I just read it on the scale.

I saw Dr. Horn today & she wanted to make sure I didn't have any questions, said we could do the 4D ultrasound later in the pregnancy but she had to tell us that it isn't a medical ultrasound, but they don't think there would be any harm to the baby, made sure my paper's were turned into the hospital, we knew about the classes and that it was ok if we found a pediatrician that doesn't come to Good Sam - he would be seen by the doctor at Good Sam and then we would take him as outpatient to the actual pediatricians office (if we went with one in NKY that didn't come to Good Sam to see the baby). 

That's about all for this visit - not too exciting and we were in & out quickly which was nice. Next time we see Dr. Rinala on April 2nd (who is our favorite doctor so far!) so I'm excited about that. Mid-April I'll do my glucose test (around 28 weeks is normal).

Here I am being silly in front of the mirror the other day - 

AND I finally figured out how to login correctly to Instagram so I took a few pictures of Sally on the Reds blanket...I told Richard it would be better if he's going to let her lay on the couch downstairs (even though she has a really nice bed we bought her on the FLOOR) that we should have her lay on a blanket so I can wash it and get it really clean etc. and the hair isn't everywhere on the couch...she seems to do pretty well just laying in the one spot (I think deep down she knows I don't want her on the couch so she gets up and lays pretty still so I don't say anything). Sigh...

All in all, I'm feeling pretty good these days - still get tired at the end of the day and my body definitely lets me know if I've pushed it to far (and I can't push it as far as I used to be able to!) so that's an adjustment but that's ok - all worth it!

I'm off work today, so I'm going to spend some time with mom and just get things together to do our taxes next week with a new tax guy - woo hoo, right?? Well, hopefully the tax return will help with our bathroom/carpet remodel so I'm hopeful!!

home improvements - carpet, lights & more!

Richard has been wanting to get new carpet for YEARS now...he mentions it here & there and usually I just brush it off and think our carpet is fine. We've had professional cleaners come out a couple of times & Richard has rented the machine from Home Depot and done it himself several times...and there are still some areas that the stains won't come out from the previous owners. With a new baby on the way, Richard really wanted to start fresh and have fresh carpet in the house (especially the upstairs)! The downstairs will need it eventually but for right now - we're focusing on the main level. We went to Buddy's carpet in Florence (to see Wilson) who helped us tremendously! First - we didn't really know what we were looking for - we told him what we had, told him we didn't want to spend our life savings on carpet so he pointed us straight to what they had on sale because it's the majority of their business so they stock certain carpet. I think this stuff is called California berber carpet and it's got flecks of color in it...I asked if we could take the sample home with us and he said that sounded good to him. I'm glad we did because the color we had originally picked was a bit too dark for our rooms. We ended up going with the "Sand Drift" which is on the bottom row - third from the left. It looks the best with our furniture/walls/kitchen tile/is a bit darker than what we have in the house right now. 

 I was a bit hesitant to put the same carpet through the entire house but he explained that it's cheaper to usually do that because they can use bits & pieces in closets if they need to / you usually need less carpet. It should also make the house feel more open with the same carpet being throughout. Did you know there's different ways to do the stairs with carpet? A traditional "waterfall" effect (which is what we have now) costs no extra $$ but if you want it to "lip" or have some kind of effect, it's more $$ - who knew? I'm glad they explained all this to us because I have no clue (nor do I care to understand the details of carpet!) 

Richard replaced the lights in the kitchen because one fell completely out of the hole and they were starting to discolor and these brushed nickel lights look SO much better in the room than the cream/yellowish ones before. Now the only thing in the kitchen that doesn't match is the light above the table....it's still a stylish gold color but who knows what we want there so I'll ignore it (for now...) :)

Here's a view looking from our hallway and I have to say - the red wall is still one of my favorite things about the home! I just love it every time I see it!

Here's the baby's room (not quite finished - or barely started!) - and Sally still enjoying her bed. Richard did the trim around the middle - we still need to finish painting the trim on the bottom and the closet doors when the weather is nicer and we can set them up in the garage. The baby's crib has been ordered and should be in around 8-12 weeks...and the rest of the furniture we haven't ordered just yet!

The next project will be the bathroom - and here's why....

Do you see the mauve in the counter? The mauve is all that has survived (that and a lot of other stuff I don't like!) - it's my least favorite room in the house & we are waiting for our estimate to have it completely gutted and re-done! I can't wait to have a really nice master bath - we can't really make it much bigger than it is - but if the stuff was just nice/new and looked better than it does now - I'd be happy!! So would Richard - it finally annoyed him enough that he was like "We have to get this done" :) Can't wait to show you the before/after of this room - it's going to be awesome!!

Also, if anyone has any ideas for getting the rest of this off of this fan in our bedroom - I would love your suggestions - we thought maybe the lights were too bright in the lamp, but that wasn't it - it just started peeling and looks like this now...it would look ok probably if we could just get the rest of that stuff OFF...time will tell - but ideas are welcome!

21 weeks: fun ramblings from Ashley

With feeling quite a bit better than I have in recent months - I have started taking more random pictures & getting caught up on that to-do list that was growing by the day! Just wanted to share what's been going on with the McFarland's lately...

 I FINALLY got caught up on Project Life - it's one of those things that's easy to let slip away from you because I don't print my pictures at home - I print them when I feel like it / when I have enough to get a walgreens or snapfish or shutterfly deal - so it's pretty random in my brain! Here are a couple of layouts from the past few months that I did - it felt great to be caught up and spend some time getting creative with all my different page layout designs. One of the most time-consuming parts of the project is that I want to round all the corners of the pictures - it makes it look a lot nicer and then they match the journaling cards but I hand do it - so it takes a bit of time!

 Here is a layout from our Florida trip - using the Design A pages as well as the 12x6 which I absolutely love - it allows me to scrapbook just half a page but keep a lot of those "little things" I collect along the way (post cards, match books etc.) - I'm not taking a picture a day this year and I am SO glad I made that decision - some days I take 5 pictures, some days I take 0 - I like that - I don't need to be so crazy about getting a picture a day - the funny thing is, I LOVE looking back on both of my 365 projects but actually getting to the end results wears on me after awhile...so I enjoy just being able to scrapbook and tell my story along the way - I'm sure when the baby gets here I'll have hundreds of pictures on some days - and that's ok, I just don't want to feel like I missed out if I missed a day!

I print a lot of pictures but sometimes I don't want to use them all for something and I'd just like a nice place to store them and keep them neat/organized - I went to Hobby Lobby on my way home last week and found a white box for $2.99 on 40% off...then I realized, I couldn't see what the pictures were on the inside and I really didn't have a good way of organizing them...THEN I came across this awesome box that is plastic and has plastic boxes on the inside (I think it holds 6 boxes that hold 100 pictures each) - and I can see through them! Granted, it was a bit more - $16.99 I believe but now I can organize the baby pictures and know where they all are!) - you can just get the boxes on the inside for $2.49 I think or something like that...but I liked that I had TONS of space to store pictures as we do showers/the baby makes his appearance!

This week I finally got to meet Lynn for dinner on Monday evening after work - and she gave us the cutest little newborn set of clothes - I think we will take these to the hospital because they're so cute! I couldn't believe how small the clothes were - it makes me even more excited to meet baby McFarland and dress him up in cute clothes! It was great to catch up with Lynn and she was so sweet to think of the baby before he's even here!

Here are the 2 dressers that we want to do for the room - one is a 5 drawer dresser that's a bit taller -and the other is a 6 drawer dresser that we'll put his changing pad on. I love the little feet at the bottom of this set and we both love the color.

Here is the bedding we registered for - "Jungle Tales" it's called from buy buy Baby - it is ADORABLE - and it's very cute for the room. We're going to leave the room the green that it is and maybe put a few extra things on the wall to spice it up!

Here's the bed we agreed on (but it will match the color of the dressers in the pictures above) - Nancy, my mother-in-law and Junior, my father-in-law wanted to buy the crib for the baby so they are taking care of that...so nice of them!

When we went to buy buy Baby again on Wednesday (my normal day off) - we stopped by my friend Courtney's house and she gave us so much stuff too that we took to mom & dad's - she was so generous with it - and mom & dad were thrilled to have some stuff to keep at their place! On the way home Richard asked what I wanted for lunch and for some reason - I wanted a Richard's steak sandwich - it was more delicious than I even remember and it was just what I needed! My stomach felt ok, so the baby must've been ok with it too! HA!

And they always say when you have a baby it's going to take over your house - WELL...I think it already is - everyone has been so generous with gifts/stuff to give the baby...it's unreal - this is our "baby stash" that we have so far that's just sitting in the basement waiting for his room to be cleaned out so we can move some stuff in! The Gap outlet has really cute hangers (wooden for 10 cents) - that Richard really wants to get to hang the clothes in the closet - so we might have to go back and get a few of those! All in all, we're just preparing for the best day of our lives when he decides to make an appearance.

So that's just a bit of what's been going on around our place / what we've been up to - I am loving my new job, it makes me so happy that they are so flexible, that I only work 30 hours per week and I can focus on relaxing/feeling ok during this pregnancy. 31 is going well too - I haven't had as many parties as normal just because I wasn't feeling well but hopefully things will pick back up now that I'm feeling better!

Hope everyone is having a great week!