Adios 2008!

I do realize that it is now the end of the 2nd week in January, and I should have done this post - oh, you know - 2 weeks ago... but life slips by you, what can I say?!

1.) What did you do in 2008 that you'd never done before?
Got braces. Lead a small group. Hit my lowest weight I had been and lost a total of 74 pounds. Got a job as a supervisor over 5 people. Got bit by a "creativity" bug and spent a lot of time making cards. Bought a house. Got (and stayed) pregnant.

2.) Did you keep your new year's resolutions and will you make more for the next year?
I honestly didn't make any last year - so they were easy to keep. ;) The only thing I wanted to do was to continue to lose weight, and I did.

3.) Did anyone close to you give birth?
One of my best friends, Danelle and her husband Ryan had a baby girl.  My cousin Hollie and her husband had a little boy in March.  I think that's it!

4.) Did anyone close to you die?
Nope, neither of our families had any deaths.  Thank God!

5.) What countries did you visit?
No countries were visited this year - sadly! 

6.) What would you like to have in '09 that you lacked in '08?
More self-confidence, realize my self-worth, more patience, more generosity, among many other things.

7.) What dates in '08 will remain etched in your memory and why?
May 16 - closed on our home
July 4 - found out we were pregnant
July 9 - celebrated 3 years of being married to my best friend!
September 24 - found out we're having a boy!

8.) What was your biggest personal achievement?
Hmm.. well, I'd have to say I definitely got to know myself better this year and figured out what I like and don't like, instead of what I liked/disliked because of other people.  My husband and I bought a beautiful house at a young age.  Grew closer in my walk with Christ.  And of course I was proud of all the weight I lost.

9.) What was your biggest failure?
Letting other people and things they did to me affect me too much.

10.) Did you suffer illness or injury?
Nope!  Weird, huh?  ;)

11.) What was the best thing you bought?
Our house!

12.) Who's behavior merited celebration?
My incredible husband's - who is literally the best support system I could ever ask for.  He is encouraging, thoughtful, loving, kind, giving, and self-less.  Most importantly - he's mine!  How in the world did I get blessed with him?!

13.) Who's behavior made you appalled or depressed?
I wouldn't be a very nice person if I actually put someone's name here... so I wont!

14.) Where did most of your money go?
Buying a house.  Gas (traveling a lot!).  Decor, paint, etc for the house. And then baby things.

15.) What did you get really, really, really excited about?
Vacations. Family Reunions. Trips to visit family. Becoming a homeowner. Finding out we're going to be parents.  (first..very scared.. eventually excited.)

16.) What song will always remind you of 2008?
Hmmmm... can't think of any.  Maybe the song my friend Laura wrote for me when we found out we were pregnant - titled "Megan's Baby".

17.) Compared to this time last year are you: a) happier or sadder? b) thinner or fatter? c) richer or poorer?
a. happier.
b. i'm 8 months pregnant - what do you think?
c. maybe a tad more ahead of the game.

18.) What do you wish you'd done more of?
Journaled/Blogged my thoughts more.  Spent more time playing my guitar/piano - expressing myself musically.  Spent more time with new friends and family.

19.) What do you wish you'd done less of?
Obsessing over lost relationships.  I also wish I wouldn't have worked so much!

20.) Did you fall in love in 2008?
I fell "more" in love with my husband and family... amazing people, can't say it enough.

21.) What was your favorite TV program?
Grey's Anatomy, The Bachelor, Biggest Loser, CSI.

22.) Do you hate anyone now that you didn't hate this time last year?
Hate? No.

23.) What was the best book you read?
Hmmm... I read a lot of good ones!  Butterfly in Brazil.  The Shack.  Velvet Elvis.  Sex God.  The Barbarian Way.  And probably a few more that I'm forgetting...

24.) What were your greatest musical discoveries?
Eh... no one new!  I did become a big country music lover, and fell in love with New Life's new music.

25.) What did you want and get?
A house ;)

26.) What did you want and not get?
A new coach purse - my husband will not budge on that one either!

27.) What was your favorite film of this year?
Hmmm... really liked the Batman movie.  Can't think of any others off the top of my head.

28.) What did you do on your birthday and how old were you?
Had a yummy dinner with my husband and siblings & niece/nephew.

29.) What one thing that would have made your year immeasurably more satisfying?
Can't really think of much... we had a good year overall.  Maybe if we would have had more friends/couple friends to hang out with.

30.) How would you describe your personal fashion concept in 2008?
Ha - non existant?  lol... never been "up" in the fashion world!

31.) What kept you sane?
My relationship with God.  Tyler.  Our family.  Hope.

Cheers to 2009!  I can't wait to see all the amazing things that are going to happen!

Words I hate.

• Moist


• Rash


• Crusty


• Blouse


• Chafed


• Slacks


• Ointment

What about you?  Are there any words that give you the heebie geebies?

32/33 weeks.

Well - here we are.  33 weeks and baby Keith could be here "safely" in 4-8 weeks.  (4 weeks means I'll be 37 weeks which is considered full-term... 8 weeks means I'll be 41 weeks and not a happy camper since I'll be overdue!)  I can't believe how fast this pregnancy has gone... it literally feels like it was last month when I was announcing we were having a baby, and February seemed soooo far away at the time!  Then January came around and Tyler and I had a conversation that went like this:

T: Holy Crap!  It's January!
M: Yeah...?
T: That means we're having a baby next month.
::: deep, long, scared-to-death stare-down takes place and a small dose of hyperventilating occurs :::

Anyway, baby is doing good and measuring just a little ahead of our original due date.  They are now saying he could be born as early as February 14 due to his size.  At my last appt we had an ultrasound to follow-up on my "thin placenta" issue, but thank God, we're in the clear.  They think I was most likely having a contraction at the time they thought my placenta was measuring thin.  But we're fine... which is a good thing. Our ultrasound was amazing... baby is getting so big that it was hard to get a good picture of him because he took up most of the screen.  They did a complete ultrasound (like they did at 20 weeks) and he looked great!  And got a definite confirmation that baby is all BOY!)  2 weeks ago he was already measuring in at almost 4 1/2 pounds.  4 1/2 pounds people!!  That is a huge baby... and still have 4-8 weeks to go.  I thought it was unusual since Tyler and I were both average size babies, but that night when I told my Mom that, she said "Average size??!!  You were 9 lbs 9 oz!!!"  My jaw dropped and I am officially scared.  I would really prefer to have a normal birth and avoid a c-section at all costs, but whatever it takes to get baby here safe & sound is fine with me. 

At 33 weeks, here's what the baby is up to...although its off because my baby weighed over 4 pounds 2 weeks ago!: (from babycenter.com)
This week your baby weighs a little over 4 pounds (heft a pineapple) and has passed the 17-inch mark. He's rapidly losing that wrinkled, alien look and his skeleton is hardening. The bones in his skull aren't fused together, which allows them to move and slightly overlap, thus making it easier for him to fit through the birth canal. (The pressure on the head during birth is so intense that many babies are born with a conehead-like appearance.) These bones don't entirely fuse until early adulthood, so they can grow as his brain and other tissue expands during infancy and childhood.

And here's a couple belly pics! 


I can't believe I'm doing this... but here's my belly in all it's glory!


Have a great rest of the week!!!

One reason I love being married...

You can sit at home on New Years Eve night sick as a dog, exhausted from only getting 2 hrs of sleep the night before, and feeling crappy all together... but still feel so happy and content because you're still able to spend the night with your best friend.

Christmas recap.

Tyler and I had a great Christmas this year, and trust you did too!  Here's some of the highlights...

Tuesday we left for Columbia and arrived right around dinner time.  The night was spent practicing our nursing home music, playing a game, and watching a christmas movie.  Mom loved watching my belly move and loved seeing her grandson kicking... we had lots to catch up on regarding the baby since earlier in the day I had an appt.  Here's proof of the belly obsession... my sister snapped a picture of my mom checking it out. 
{don't mind the chihuahua... she makes her way into every picture!}


Wednesday (Christmas Eve) both my Mom and Dad had to work so Tyler and I took full advantage of that and slept in.  Once we woke up, we had a really lazy morning, consisting of sipping on coffee, wrapping a few leftover gifts, and ran to Best Buy to check out a video camera we're looking at buying. (gotta catch all those cute baby keith things on video!)  Once my Mom got home we spent the afternoon baking... sorry, no pics.  We made lots of Christmas goodies, including a delicious pistacio dessert... one good enough that I'll be making it again soon! 

That night we went to my parents church for our usual Christmas Eve service... it was good.  A little long for my taste, but still beautiful none the less.





After the service my Dad took us to drive by what was named "the prettiest Christmas tree in Columbia".  It definitely lived up to its named.  This baby is called "The Magic Tree" - it has 75,000 lights on it... no joke!  A guy has this set up in his front yard... you should have seen the traffic!  Lots of people driving by just to see it.  $20 bucks says the neighbors can't stand the guy... haha.



Christmas morning we woke up and did the usual... opened our stockings to see what "Santa" brought us.  One thing I wanted for Christmas was for it to be a "white Christmas"... but no such luck.  It was more like a "upper 40's-50's kind-of Christmas".



One tradition we have as a family is every Christmas we go to a local Nursing home and bless the residents there with some music.  We play our instruments, and sing lots of fun vocal arrangements.  This year we went to the same place that we did last year... it was fun recognizing some of the faces we saw last year.  It is always such a blessing to me when we do this... such an easy way to bless so many people.  So many of these people spend Christmas day cooped up in their rooms, and it's spent just like any other day of the week.  No family comes to visit them, no one stops in to give them a gift... nothing.  It is so sad and makes me cry every year when you see their faces light up.  I love that my family does this every year.  It is one of the quickest ways for me to snap right into the holiday spirit... by giving to others.  And check out this sign they had posted all over the nursing home!!  They were super excited to have us back again!  (but seriously, who wouldn't be?!  juuuust kidding!!!!)


Chad and Kaela and the kids arrived Christmas night so after we had a delicious dinner, we recited our Christmas verses (everyone in the family has a section of the Christmas story from the Bible that we have to MEMORIZE and recite before we can open gifts) and then opened our gifts.  Christmas night was spent laughing endlessly and playing the new games we received. 


My parents beautiful tree!


The whole fam!

Friday we shopped till we dropped... never again will I step foot in a mall the day after Christmas!!  It was by far worse than Black Friday.  And the evening was spent ... you guessed it!  Playing games.  (My family is sorta obsessed with this, as you can probably tell!)

Saturday morning we made Perogies.  If you know what perogies are, you win a gold star for the day.  This is one of my Dad's family's old recipes that my family never makes because it is soooo time consuming.  However, when you make a "train" and have a different person doing each step of the "train", it goes by a lot faster.  In fact, we whipped these perogies together within about 30 minutes, when it would normally take hours to do with 2 people.  Saturday afternoon we went bowling which was a blast!  Here's a couple pics of the all-star bowler... my 3  yr old nephew!  He was actually pretty good.


Isn't he cute?!


He held this pose the entire time the ball was going down the lane each time!  It was hilarious.

We left Columbia to head back home on Saturday after dinner (after enjoying those delicious perogies!!!)  We got home late Saturday night and spent Sunday relaxing and catching up on housework.... gotta love being an adult ;)

 Hope you had a Merry Christmas and was able to celebrate the birth of our Savior... the real reason for Christmas!!!

Happy New Year!

{Stay tuned for a 32/33 week baby update... I have lots to share!}