Prego update!

I am about 4wks out from Jelly Beans arrival. Looking forward to holding the little one in my arms for the first time! He seems to be a pretty active little guy. I can only imagine what it will be like once he figures out how to crawl and walk.

Up to this point I haven't taking any of the normal pregnancy belly pics until this week. My grandma wanted a pic of me standing from the side. Only because it was grandma's request did I allow my mom to get a side pic and of course she didn't wait long enough for me to pose and smile. So this is the picture.

Being 4wks out, my energy level gets exhausted quickly. I have so much to do to get ready for Jelly Bean. Most important is the little guy needs a room. So last weekend Aunt Cindy came over and helped me paint the room. I finally settled on a theme for his room. I decided to keep it simple and focus on one things.

Mitch helped me pick out the color. I wanted something that was some what bright but not florescent and I didn't want anything that had a grey tone. That seems to be the trend right now for baby rooms. My whole house has that grey ton, spa like feeling to it and I didn't want it for the baby's room. I wanted something fun, bright and happy.

Still needs a second coat and the baseboards need to be painted...then it's complete! Aunt Cindy is coming over agian the help me finish it.

For the furniture I decided to stay away from the white furniture for a couple of reasons.
1) White gets dirty really quickly and we are having a boy....enough said...LOL
2) Wanted the furniture to grow with him and I just couldn't see a white bed for a boy in his teen years

So here is what we came up with:

The crib can be transformed and grow with baby. I think the largest it goes is a twin bed. We'll figure that one out later. 

 The theme of the bedroom will be airplanes! Mitch and I do so many different things that it was hard to nail down just one theme. But because Flying was a big part of our life in the beginning of our relationship it only seemed fitting for it to be a big part of Jelly Bean's life in the beginning too.

So here are the pieces of the theme:

I am a big big advocate of reading to Jelly Bean throughout his life. Something that was missing from my childhood. I didn't find the love for reading until much later and I want Jelly Bean to see the joy of reading from the very beginning. We have a great start with his little library. So may people have given us books to start his collection....I can't wait!

This is a huge decal that I found on amazon....you customize it to you child's name. No, Dylan is not his name. Jelly Bean's name will be announced once he arrives. This will go over his crib.

There are just fun to look at. A little piece of history, at least it feels like a little piece of history. The propeller is 4' long and I plan on putting the pictures over the propeller over the dresser.

I didn't want to make the room to complicated. I know Jelly Bean will find his own hobby's and interest's as he grows so I didn't want to invest a lot of money into a nursery that will change just as quickly as he will grow.

Jelly Bean will be very much loved. Not only by Mom and Dad but by all our family and friends.

Baby Room

The baby room....I'm having a hard time finding the right inspiration to create the Nursery. I've looked a pinterest and google images to try to spark some ideas. But nothing, my creative juices seem to have left my mind. Frustrating!

All the baby rooms I'm finding are neutral colored walls with a splash of color from other items. Kinda boring....IMO. Don't get me wrong they all look really nice. A baby and toddler should have lots of color and exciting things that surround them. There is plenty of time for the our kid to grow up and decide on some nice adult looking theme. I so desperately want color for my child's room.

 So I dropped the "lets see what other people are doing" to, what do I want for our baby. I've never been the "normal" person so why should I do the "normal" baby room.

Here is what I've gotten so far.

First, the furniture will be dark wood, not white. It seems that most of the furniture in nurseries are white.

Second, I want color on the walls. Lots of color! Bright and cheerful colors.

Here is my sad rendering of the colors of the walls. Blue on the wall that will hold the baby crib, Yellow on the opposite wall and green on the other two walls. Still working on the curtains but was thinking of some type of blue and yellow curtain to starting bringing the colors together. Plus the underlining theme of Blue and Yellow make Green. 

The actual theme is even more difficult because I want Baby Jelly Bean to be exposed to so many things that one theme see restrictive to his exposure. The initial theme was airplanes but I want to include a world map, dogs, camping, natures, computer coding....just knowledge across the board. 

Found these decals on Amazon that I'm thinking about purchasing. 

I want to incorporate subtle education into the room. Kids naturally have a curious mind and will ask lots of questions if they are exposed to things. If I can add something that is interesting to look at but educational at the same time that is a bonus. 

I've come to accept that the nursery will have a very eclectic look and feel. I need to walk Hobby Lobby to start sparking more design idea's. These are just my initial idea's that will morph into something else in the end. 

Welcomed Surprise!!

2019 started off with some excitement!

First, I started Jan off with a scare. I had pain in my chest which led me to the ER. Luckily it was not a heart attack but some other stress induced symptom. Stress is the vain of my existence. Has been since I was a teen....it's just who I am.

After a follow up visit at the Dr's I was good to go with a new stress relief program to start. AKA, change my life!

Then the end of Jan came with a welcomed Surprise! I discovered I was pregnant!!

The amount of emotions I went through when I discovered I was pregnant was exhausting. And if you were wondering, yes this was planned. M and I had a lot of discussion leading up to this moment.

The interesting thing was I gave up hope in Dec. After almost 16 months of trying, I was sure it wasn't meant for us to have children. Then Jan came and there you go!

I'm 6 months and Baby Jellybean and I are doing well.

2019 is definitely the year for major change:)

South Dakota

Its been a long time since I've played with my camera and this trip to South Dakota gave me an opportunity to get it out and practice with it. I also bought a new lens and was eager to try it. I am still very rusty with the camera but hope to improve over time. Even though its been a while I still think these pictures turned out great!

Poets Table - South Dakota

M and I went to South Dakota recently and had the great opportunity to discover Poets Table.

For those that don't know what poets table is here is the short description I on Rapid City Journal:  "Poet’s Table is a well-kept local secret, one of those places that intentionally doesn’t get a lot of publicity to protect the pristine spot in the southern Black Hills from overuse or desecration. It’s well worth the effort to find this unsung gem, where one can drink in a breathtaking view of the Needles formation, hear and feel the wind wafting through the fragrant pines, and then leave your feelings of the moment in an informal “guest register” of spiral notebooks." 

They were not joking when they said it was a well kept secret. M and I searched the internet for GPS coordinates or better directions than the vague ones that can be found out there. We came up empty handed and had to use the ones we had.

We entered the path and started our journey to Poets Tables. We climbed up and down the mountain and hiking paths for about 3 hours before we exhausted all options. Then we found something that gave us a directional perspective and headed in a completely different direction.  A short time later M found it from where we were standing and with some effort made our way over to the table.

 When you go to poets table you can leave a piece of who you are there as well. The cabinet is filled with note books with poems, diary entries and personal confessions. It really was an amazing experience and something that can not be accurately described. 

 I'm sure we will take this same adventure in the future and visit poet's table again.

I'm Back!!!

Wow, it's been a long time since I've been on my blog. I've missed it greatly. The only reason I took an almost two year break from here is because I decided to completed my MBA. I discovered rather quickly that I didn't have time to post. I have since completed my MBA and life is moving forward faster than I expected.

I'm excited to be back and sharing all the wonderful adventures I experience!

Blink and Life will change!

Wow…how different I feel from my last post. It’s crazy how fast life changes. I was in a very bad spot when I wrote my last post back in March but now, just 6 months later, my life has done a 180. It’s just crazy how I blinked and my life changed.  Lots of great things are happening to me at this moment. So I wanted to take the time to write down a few things.

So what has changed from March until now?

1)      Got into a job that is so much more enjoyable! I can not explain how important no only is the person a good match for the job but the job is a good match for the person. Yep, I had experienced where the job was not a good fit for me.  I survived it and had some really low moments but in the end I learned so much. I got the opportunity to get to experience a different business unit and  I also learned so much about myself that I didn’t realize. Sometime the hardest moments are the ones you learn the most from.

2)      I started my MBA Program in Sept! I’ve only been in the program for a month and what an amazing month it has been. I forgot how much I enjoy learning. About two years ago I started another MBA program and realized the program was not a good one and after the first class I dropped out. Even though I was the one that made the decision to drop out I still felt like a failure. It’s hard to describe why I felt that way but I did even though I knew the program was not the right fit for me. I wanted more out of the program than what they were offering. Standing where I am at today and looking back, I am counting my lucky stars that I made that tough decision to drop out and took some time to regroup.  This program is challenging and pushing my mind to its limits….I LOVE IT! I feel like I fit right in with the class members and I feel like I fall right about in the middle of the class experience. This is not a bad thing! I have a good mix of being able to help those that don’t have as much experience and the opportunity to learn from those that have been in an industry for years. This is right where I want to be.

3)      The most surprising thing that has happened….I’m ENGAGED!!! Yep, he finally proposed to me in South Dakota on top of Harny Peak (tallest point East of the Rockies). It was amazing and surprising and all I could say at first was “REALLY, YOU’RE REALLY PROPOSING!”. I couldn’t believe it, it was actually happening. Of course, after I got over the initial shock I did say yes and he placed the ring on my finger. There is a whole story behind the proposal that I will save for a later date.

4)      Oh and how could I forget about my first Tri Athlon! Sprint tri Athlon to be exact. I’ll keep this one short. But the story goes, I was going to a tri this year regardless. But at the beginning of Jan I was talking to Jen (sister in law) and asked her if she wanted to do a tri with me this year. I was truly expecting her to say no because everyone I had asked said no for one reason or another. But I was pleasantly surprised when she said yes! So we trained and in Aug we both completed our first Tri Athlon. I have to say she kicked my butt and is now the one calling me up and asking me to sign up for tri’s. And yes, I have the bug too…I now have by sights set on doing an Olympic distance which is 1500m swim, 20mile bike and 6 miles run. But I am going to save that one for a couple of years down the road. I need to improve on the sprint distance before I move up in distanceJ  My goal to move on to the Olympic distance is to complete the sprint in 1 hr and 25mins. My current time is 1hr 45min. It will be a challenge to shave 20 mins off my time but that is my goal. I can do it!

The last three months have been mind blowing. I didn’t realize how unhappy I really was at the beginning of the year and how insanely happy I am now. It’s like the Ying and yang of life and some how I crossed the bridge from darkness to light in a matter of seconds.