{Oh Boy!}

So we had our big ultrasound yesterday and the verdict is in!

TWO BOYS!

We were both kind of expecting a girl and a boy, but we are so excited and thankful that they are healthy and everything looks like it is coming along the way it should be. They were so active during the ultrasound that the doctor had a hard time getting their measurements.

Now I'm so excited to start putting the nursery together. This is the bedding from Walmart that I really love. Its modern and fun and I love the nature theme-->



Being huge sports fans, Dan just a tad more than me (that was sarcasm :), we of course have to get them Cincinnati Reds outfits. Look at this cute baby hat!

And cute little outfits to match :)


And of course they are going to be born right at the beginning of baseball season...what could be more perfect? :)

On to exciting kitchen news...I have a few more progress pictures! the hardware and crown molding are installed on the cabinets, the tile behind the sink is done, and today he was starting to put the floor in! I can't wait until the walls are painted...that will really pull it all together. :)



We are supposed to get a nasty winter storm with up to 8 inches of snow starting tonight. I'm secretly praying for a snow day so I can stay home from work. :)

Hope everyone is having a good day!

{a million directions}

Today has been one crazy day and lately I feel like my mind has been pulled in a million different directions all at the same time. I woke up feeling really lightheaded and dizzy, so I had to have Dan go out and get me a big breakfast. By 10:00 I was feeling much better. I also had to call around and find someone to install a new water heater in the house...of course that goes right when we're paying for the kitchen too. Go figure.

Today we go for our 21 week ultrasound which I'm so anxious, excited, scared and nervous about. I just want to see them and know that they are doing OK in there. I'm also really hoping we can find out the sex today. We are both really anxious to know so we can pick out their names and start decorating the nursery. You can be sure I will post an update if we find out!

The kitchen is finally coming along. Yesterday I had a plumber come in to hook up the sink, dishwasher and disposal, and our contractor hung the rest of the cabinets. We are just so happy to finally have running water again! You don't realize how much you take something so simple for granted until you don't have it for 2 months! I am in love with our sink and faucet...they really make the room. When I left this morning our contractor was working on the tile behind the sink, so I'm looking forward to seeing how that turns out. Here are a few new pictures...we even put away most of our dishes last night-->



I *heart* my faucet :)


These are the tiles for behind the sink...kind of like Subway tiles. They'll be staggered for a "brick" effect.


Gotta love an organized cabinet!!


I discovered a few musical artists yesterday that I'm enjoying...

Nicole Atkins and A Fine Frenzy

I'm really into soothing music right now...not suprising. :)

{one step forward}

After so many weeks of no progress in the kitchen, I was finally greeted today on my lunch break with a sight for sore eyes. A counter and a sink where they are supposed to be!! I am disappointed that the backsplash doesn't continue behind the sink, but I don't think my contractor understood what I wanted. We can always fill that space in with some black tile to continue the line of the backsplash. Getting the walls painted will make a huge difference too...it is so stark right now with so much white. The walls will be a medium taupe. Our hardward has also arrived so that will really dress up the cabinets.





I'm so glad it is Friday. Dan and I are planning a trip to Muncie tomorrow so we can eat at Johnny Carinno's. It is one of our favorite places and since we don't have one in our town we know we won't make it there after the babies are born for awhile. We also want to do some shopping and stop at Panera for some baked goods. Mmmmmm. :)

Hope everyone has a fun, relaxing weekend planned!

{140 days!}

Or 20 weeks, however you want to say it, that's how long I've been pregnant. Hard to believe I'm probably over halfway there since hardly any twins make it to 40 weeks. Here is the latest pic of my bump. Hubby is getting pretty good at these shots! :)



Not much else going on in our world. Still doing a lot of eating out because our kitchen still isn't done. I'm not going to give an update for fear of jinxing it, so I'll just say that hopefully I'll have good news to report and some more pictures soon. Any prayers you want to say for our poor, pitiful kitchen would be much appreciated!

{my advice for the day}

Never tell a pregnant lady to "toughen up", especially one who is pregnant with twins.

We really don't take kindly to such advice.

That is all.

{retail therapy}

There's nothing like a good solo shopping trip to raise the spirits. I started my day looking for some more comfy work shoes and found some really cute black suede maryjane flats...on sale of course. I also got a maternity sweater and a new bra...the second being MUCH needed, especially since the girls have expanded some in the past few months. LOL :)

I took a much needed tour of Hobby Lobby...that place is like my second home. Didn't buy anything though. Crazy, huh? Once we know what the sex of the babies are I will go crazy in there with decor stuff for the nursery, especially if they are both girls. They have some really adorable shabby chic stuff.

I picked up the new issue of Better Homes and Gardens and also made a trip to Big Lots for some boring necessities. While there I found a Graco baby monitor though...and it has two receivers which will be great for times when the babies are in separate rooms.

A quick update on the kitchen...and for a change it is a good one! The countertop from Lowe's isn't going to work at all, so our contractor found a guy who makes them and he's going to custom make it for us this week. He said it will only take a few days, which would be amazing. With any luck, we'll have our counter, sink and dishwasher back by the middle of the week. Boy have we ever learned one massive lesson through this remodel!!

Hope everyone is having a great weekend! I'm looking forward to having Monday off...3 day weekends are the best!

{the biggest nightmare}

Sure, everyone tells you that home renovations are stressful. I didn't expect ours to be stress-free by any means. However, I also didn't expect it to be the nightmare that it has turned into. Almost 2 months without a functioning kitchen. Dealing with a Lowe's store that obviously hasn't trained their employees to know anything about kitchen renovations. Cabinets too big, counter too big. We're told it will be a week to get them back...that was on December 14th. We get a small piece of the counter and it isn't the style we ordered. So do we keep with that style or wait another month to get the one we wanted? Not worth it.

Now we have the replacement cabinets and counter and guess what? The counter doesn't work with our farmhouse sink. We might have to scrap it and buy a generic sink which breaks my heart. We've had that sink for 2 years just waiting to see it in that kitchen. It was going to be the centerpiece of the room. Granted, we are partly to blame for the counter not being compatible, but the moron on Lowe's didn't ask us any questions about the sink other than the size. We aren't experts...they are supposed to be. Now that moron isn't even working in the cabinets because of how royally he screwed up our kitchen.

Talk about squeezing the last ounce of excitement out of this project. Dan and I are so drained that we don't even care anymore. We just want a usable kitchen. My emotions are teetering on the verge of a mental breakdown...I've actually cried on the phone with the contractor now twice. He knows I'm pregnant but I still feel like a total idiot.

All I'm praying for is for something to go right at this point. Something. Anything. I don't know how much more I can take.

{the kitchen renovator's prayer}

Our contractor,
who art not in our kitchen,
I do not want to place the blame.

Our cabinets have come,
The counter is done.
At Lowe's, as it awaits your pick-up.

Give us I pray,
a place to be fed.
And relieve our regrets
As we forgive your tardiness.

And lead us not into more delayed plans,
but deliver us from fast food.

For our kitchen is the key to
Our sanity and our full stomachs,
Forever. Amen.

I'm really trying to have some humor about this kitchen renovation, can you tell? It is slowly dying...he better be back tomorrow!

{all sorts of random fun}

So my friend Janny posted this on her blog and I thought it was fun, so here's my list-->

On My Bedside Table:
prenatal vitamins
kleenex
B&BW tranquil mint foot cream
alarm clock of course
dust

Movies I want to See:
Juno
Atonement
27 Dresses
The new James Bond flick - comes out in May!

Latest Interests:
anything baby related of course
organizing our house

On My Mind:
our kitchen- hoping I'll have a counter installed when I get home today
my babies and everything related to them

Learning:
to be patient with life and take each day as it comes
to be thankful for the small things in life that make it so wonderful

Making:
scrapbook pages - glad to have my mojo back

Looking Forward To:
cooking a meal in my finished kitchen
finding out the sex of the babies
decorating their nursery

Enjoying:
my new comfy maternity pants
my hair-I love good hair days!
the return of my sweet tooth

Amused By:
Family Guy
my husband
my cats

And for other fun things...here is how my belly looks as of Saturday...getting big!! Tomorrow I'll be 19 weeks!


We were finally able to get out of town on Saturday and do some clothes shopping for me. Sadly my dress pants weren't fitting anymore, so I desperately needed new work clothes. I really hit the jackpot...found a bunch of cute stuff and it was all on sale. Score! :)

Yesterday I went through all of my clothes, took out a ton of stuff for Goodwill, and put away (sniff sniff) the stuff I won't be wearing for awhile. Although I'm very happy and excited to be pregnant, there is something very disheartening about looking at clothing that you're not sure you will ever fit into again. But, it does feel really good to have everything organized, and not have to look at the stuff I can't wear every time I go to get dressed.

I have also been doing quite a bit of scrapbooking the past few weeks. Christmas pictures, a 2007 review (got the idea from the latest Scrapbooks Etc.) and our 4 year wedding anniversary. Thanks for taking a peek!

{Friday, oh how I love you}

This has been a loooong week and I'm soooo glad its finally Friday!

Got some good news this morning. The replacement cabinets and counter are finally in for the kitchen! I'm hoping our contractor can get them installed today. He works super fast and is ready to get started so hopefully by the end of today we'll have a working sink again! *fingers crossed* You can be sure I'll be posting pics right away!

In baby news, we're hoping to go out of town to do some shopping this weekend. My work clothes are all getting too snug, so I desperately need some dressy pants and tops. I've tried ordering online, but being a taller girl has made that difficult. I definitely wish I had a job that let me wear jeans...that would make life so much easier.

I found this crib on Target.com and love it...especially if we have two girls.

I love the vintage/cottage style, and it is a convertible crib. Oh, and it is only $200! I'm counting the days until the 30th and hoping we find out the sex. I'm so anxious to get started on the nursery!

I got some much needed scrapbooking time in this past week and have some fun pages to share. But, I've been too lazy so far to scan them. That will be another goal of mine this weekend. :)

{overwhelmed}

Now that I'm about 4 1/2 months along, I'm really starting to get overwhelmed by the amount of things are are going to need for these two babies. One baby alone requires a lot of gear, but two?! Oy vey...I think that's how you say it. Two cribs, two car seats, double stroller, double the diapers, bottles, clothing. And the thought of breast feeding two babies...double oy vey. I'm finding myself in slight panic mode here. Plus, until I know the sex of the babies I don't really want to buy much...I don't want everything to be unisex if we have two girls or two boys.

And then there is getting our house ready. The nursery is currently my scrapbook room. I don't know where I'm going to move all of that stuff since we don't have another room for it. Right now the dining room is the front-runner, with the dining room table doing double duty when I want to scrapbook. That or any other scenario is going to require some major purging of supplies. We don't have a guest bed and Dan is worried that I'll have to go on bedrest, or just be too big and tired to sleep upstairs, so now we're looking at daybeds for our office downstairs. We still don't have a kitchen which just adds to the crazyness of it all. It is enough to drive a pregnant woman out of her mind! (not that I really need any help, the hormones are enough!)

So this has been a total downer vent session, but I really needed it. I know in the end, we will be just fine, the babies will have everything they need, and we'll learn what we're doing moment by moment, day by day. At least that's how I'm praying it will happen. :)

{happy '08!}

I'm so excited about what this year has to bring. Dan and I are going to become parents and that is just about the best gift that anyone could receive. We are so excited and can't wait to find out if we are having boys, girls or one of each. We go on the 30th for an ultrasound, so I'm keeping my fingers crossed that we will find out the sex then.

I'm seriously itching to start buying stuff, but it is so hard to find unisex clothing! I finally broke down today and bought a few girl and boy items...I'll just return some of them if I need to. I couldn't pass up these cute clothes! (they are from crazy8.com if you want to check it out)





I also came across the cutest nursery on HGTV's Rate My Space the other day...looooove the green, black and white! I'm thinking it would look really cute with brown tones instead of the black. Of course this was done by an interior designer, but darnit I can do it too! LOL :)



I also have a ton of scrapbooking that I want to do. I'm so tired in the evenings after work that I don't have the energy, so hopefully this weekend I'll get to it. I printed out a collage of pictures from 2007 that I'm really excited about scrapping...looking at all of the things we went through in the past year really makes me emotional and thankful. I also have pregnancy pictures of course, and I still haven't done a page from our 4 year wedding anniversary (that was back in October).

Dan put together my new IKEA bookshelf for my albums and supplies...its the expedit and I loooove it! It fits my albums perfectly and looks so cute!


In kitchen reno news, we are trying to patiently wait until next Friday, when the replacement cabinets and counter are "supposed" to be in at Lowes. Let me tell you, I will never work with our Lowes again on any project...worst customer service ever! We have become pros at eating out and finding inventive ways to eat without getting dishes dirty...ice cream in a plastic cup, anyone? I just keep trying to remind myself how great it will be when it is done.

TGIF everyone!!! :)

{a Merry Christmas to all}

It is hard to belive that Christmas is already over, and ours was full of so many emotions this year. We had such a great time with our family. First, mine on Christmas Eve, and Dan's on Christmas Day. The entire time I was reminding myself that this is our last Christmas as the two of us, and next year will be blessed with two children. It will be quite a different holiday! I was also feeling very sad this year now that both of my Dad's parents are gone. I thought about them so much this past week and still am, wishing they could be here to see their great-grandchildren when they are born.

Christmas Day with Dan's family was more chaotic than expected. It is always fun with tons of people and gifts, but this year was quite a bit more stressful. Dan's Grandma is in the late stages of alzheimer's, and lives in an assisted living facility. She fell yesterday afternoon and did quite a bit of damage to her head and face that required a trip to the emergency room and stitches. Dan's mom and her siblings spent about 6 hours of the afternoon at the hospital with her. We were all waiting at the house, hoping for good news and sad that Dan's grandma was going through such a rough time on Christmas. Luckily she is back at the nursing home and hopefully she is doing OK. I know this has been a rough time for Dan's mom and her siblings, as this is marking the end of holidays spent with their mother.

On a positive note, it was the first Christmas for our cousin's little boy, and it was so fun watching him open his presents (with a little help from Mom and Dad). He is such a happy baby. Here are a few pics from the past few days. We were blessed with so many fun gifts, including a couple adorable outfits and pacifiers for the babies. :)

{this makes me happy}

The one little piece of countertop that was made correctly is in!! Oh how excited I was this morning to have somewhere to put my cup when I poured my OJ. :) Just picture the walls a nice shade of tan and a new pretty parquet wood floor.

We also have pantry shelves which excites me sooo much. Please ignore the hideous walls...they obviously need a coat of paint. Until this pantry we never had good storage for our dry food/canned goods, so this is going to be such an improvement. Both of these things cheered me up a little after the bad cabinet news. I'm still holding on to a glimmer of hope that they will come in sooner than expected.

And just for Christmas...a pic of our house decked out in snow. I was so excited to have my new railing to decorate with greenery this year. I think it looks so pretty with the snow on it. :)

{standstill}

This week has been frustrating so far, as the kitchen is at a standstill. Found out today that it could be as late as January 7th before we get the reordered cabinets...quite a different story from the "few days" they told us last week. That definitely didn't make me happy. I'm really just sad because we are having my family over on Christmas Eve for appetizers and gifts and now I probably won't even have a sink to use. I'm trying to focus on how great it will be when it is done, but my pregnancy hormones are definitely trying to have their way. Patience, Mandy, patience.

I am really looking forward to a long holiday weekend though...five days off is sounding really good right now. Still have a few Christmas gifts to buy, but I think I know what to get as long as I can find it. Even with starting early, there are always those last few minute purchases.

{a real kitchen}

The kitchen is finally starting to resemble a kitchen again, which is so exciting! Our contractor hung all of the cabinets yesterday, aside from the ones that had to be reordered. Now we just have to wait until next week for the new cabinets and the counter (it was ordered too big...dumb Lowe's) I just can't wait to see my farmhouse sink and pretty new faucet in there! Between this and being pregnant, my patience is being tested more than ever!!

So happy that it is Friday. Not sure what the weekend holds...definitely need to sign and send our Christmas cards and maybe get some more Christmas shopping done. Hope everyone is having a great day!

{more progress}

The kitchen is slowly starting to take shape, and I'm so excited to see it come together over the next week. Thanks to some mistakes by Lowe's, things have been slowed down...a couple cabinets were wrong and our counter was made too long. Thankfully our contractor has handled everything which has been a Godsend. We also had to have the sink plumbing and electrical wiring to the dishwasher and disposal redone yesterday...can't wait to see that bill! The previous owner was the king of poor DIY jobs, and obviously worked his "magic" on every surface of that kitchen. Here are a few more progress pictures...the windows have been finished with new trim and the cabinets are out of their boxes! Our contractor is starting to put them in place today.




What do you think of these cute bin pulls for our drawers?? Not sure what I would label them with...numbers...kitchen words. I know I've seen them in a magazine article on kitchen drawers...wish I could remember where!


Onto baby news...I'm 14 weeks along now. Hard to believe. With all of the kitchen mess we haven't been putting too much time into baby stuff right now, but once that is all over we'll have more time to think about furniture and all of the other things we're going to have to purchase over the next few months. It still seems very surreal that I will have two children in a matter of months. Ready or not! :)

{progress!}

The kitchen cabinets arrived yesterday!! So this is what our dining room looks like currently since we don't have a garage to store them in--->



Although I'm excited about the new kitchen I'll be soooo glad to get my house back in order. It is a mess right now!! Our contractor also removed the built-in yesterday and drywalled--->



And the new windows are in!!



It is so exciting to see some progress finally!

In other fun house news I ordered a new desk and chair for our office from Target. We'll finally have all matching furniture in there for a change!



I want to get the house looking as best as possible before the babies arrive, because God only knows how long it will take for things to happen after that!

I feel like I've been shopping way too much lately...with Christmas gifts, furniture, and maternity clothes which is such an anxiety inducer. I've yet to find dress pants for work which is really stressing me out. I'm still fitting into my regular pants, but I have a feeling it won't be long before they'll have to be put out of commission.

Hope everyone is having a great Friday!