Third Time is the Charm

Sorry! I have been slacking on updating the blog . . . but promise that this post will contain pretty exciting stuff that will be worth the wait! :)

Well, I havn't really been doing a lot of baking, I have been feeling quite uncomfortable (moving around wise!) making it a little hard to feel motivated to bake! Since my sweethreat loves muffins, I did make up a batch of cimonon spice muffins for his first week of classes, and this Sunday I used up our very brown bannanas to make two loaves of bananna bread . . . besides that, I haven't really exersized my oven!

The Wedensday before Roland started back up with school, January 18th . . . Roland and I made a trip up to the birthing center because I was having contractions about 5 minute apart!  They hooked me up to the machine to check on my contractions and our little girl's heart beat and everything looked good. When they checked my cirvix I was already dialated to about 2 1/2 centimeters! Unfortantly, that is where it stayed, so after about a couple hours of seeing if I was going into "real" labor, they sent me home saying that I was having non-progressive labor! Sad day!

Then two days later, on January 20th, I thought that my water had broke . . . not the big gush like you see on tv, but rather springing a leak. I wasn't having any contractions that I could feel, but I felt like something was different, so we make another trip up the the birthing center. They did a special test to see if my water had broke, and sadly it was a no go!  I can't begin to tell you how embarressing it is to thing walk into a birthing center thinking your water has broke and walking out with basically being told that you probably just peed your pants! Okay, so no one said that, but that was kind of how it felt! :)

Roland started back up with classes on January 23rd and that whole week goes by very uneventfully! That is something that Roland was happy about, he was able to go to all of his classes and tell all of his teachers that his wife was very pregnant and could be having the baby any day now. For me, I just continued going about my buisness as best as I could, kind of hopeing that I would go into labor so I could finanlly meet our little girl!

It was starting to look like she was going to be a Feburary baby, until about 12:00 in the morning on January 31st, I started having contratctions. They were harder than the ones I had when we went in on the 18th, but I wanted to wait to see if they were getting closer together than 15 minutes apart, so I told Roland to try to get some sleep.  Two hours later, I woke him up saying that they were getting closer together and we probably should go in.  By the time we got to the birthing center they were about every four minutes! They checked my cervix, and sure enough, I was dialated to a 4! So, at about 3 o'clock in the morning, we were told that we weren't going to be leaving until our baby was born!  :) They kept monitoring my  contractions and making sure that our little girl was still doing okay for the next couple hours while I would try to rest as much as I could.  About 6:30 I decided that I wanted to get an epidural, but I could wait until the anitiologist got in at 7:00.  They gave me some sort of pain medicine that could take the edge off that lasted about two hours.  I am not above using the benifits of living in a time when modren medicine is avanced enough that I don't have to be in extruiating pain while giving birth and I can enjoy the experiance. I am sure that if given the option the woman in the Bible would have too! Around 9:00, when they gave me the epidural, I was only dialated to a 6, so the OB decided to brake my water for me, to help my labor speed up. It was then around noon, when I really wasn't getting anywhere too fast, I was given some patocine which did the trick! Somewhere around 1:30 or 2:00, I was ready to push! At 3:31pm on January 31st, our little girl was born! :)

Abigail Reina Fuller

January 31, 2012 at 3:31 PM

7 pounds 2 ounces

20 inches long

Roland with his baby girl, Abby!

Our first family picture!

Check out how much hair she has! :)

Baby Abby with her momma!

Isn't she a beautiful baby girl? She was so worth the wait!

Baking Bread with Roland

Oh, just in case anyone was wondering . . . I did end up baking some super delicous homemade bread on Wednesday! Roland was helping me get it done in time for us to go to our Lamaze class this week . . . so he was the one who split the dough into two loaves and put them into the pans. Well, all I am going to say is that I am glad that it doesn't matter how "pretty" the loaf of bread is, it still tastes super yummy! haha Instead of shaping the dough to have a smooth top, he just punched it down, so they came out kind of lumpy topped! Even if the bread didn't come out as pretty as it would have if I had taken the time to do it myself, I am grateful for the help! Roland is getting to be a very good assistant in the kitchen (usually being the assistant is my job, because he is the better cook of the two of us)!☺

One Month and Counting

Baby update . . . earlier this week I made a paper chain count down until our little girl’s due date! I can’t believe that it is actually less than thirty days! It is getting so close . . . I am already at 36 weeks!

 

Earlier this week I posted on facebook about how proud of myself I was when I realized I could still put on my socks by myself! Roland laughed at me while I was attempting it . . . and I have to admit, it had to have been a pretty funny sight to see! Can you just imagine what it looked like? I would first pull one leg up, while trying to push my belly out of the way, so I could reach my toes. Then after some inventive stretching and wiggling I would somehow pull the sock on! I think it took me a little longer just because I was so busy laughing at myself as I was trying not to fall over! ☺ Roland has been such a sweetheart and helping me put my socks on for the last little while, so it made me smile to find out I could still do it myself!

 

I miss my feet! I know it sounds a little funny . . . but the other day I looked down and all I could see was my belly and my first thought was, “where did my feet go?” haha I guess that is one of the reasons why I have gotten into the habit of wearing slip on shoes all the time!

I know that someday I will be able to see my feet again . . . in about a month, give or take a couple weeks! Until then, I am going to enjoy laughing at myself, because if you can’t laugh at yourself, you’re missing out on some of the best jokes! ☺I think that while being pregnant, one of the best things I have learned is to not take everything so seriously and be willing to laugh at myself! I think that Roland and I have laughed more in the last eight months than we probably have in our entire lives! Laughing until you cry has new meaning to me! This reminds me a of really cool quote that my sister-in-law, Nicole, shared with me . . . “The only way to get through life is to laugh your way through it. You either have to laugh or cry. I prefer to laugh. Crying gives me a headache.” -Marjorie Pay Hinckley

More Than Words

I don’t remember exactly when it was, but I know it was after we had gotten married. At the end of a particularly bad day, I was waiting for Roland to come home from work. I don’t remember what I was upset about, and I don’t think Roland even knew that I was upset (I do remember that I wasn’t upset at him, I think it was just one of those “life is hard today” days). Anyways, Roland came home, and told me that he had just heard a great song on the radio that he wanted to listen to again with me. He pulled up the song, took me in his arms, and started dancing with me around our teeny tiny little apartment, while we listened to the song! He softly sang along while dancing with me! I don’t remember anything else about that day, except thinking how lucky I was to be married to such a great guy! He might not be every girl’s vision of her prince charming, but I wouldn’t take anyone else to live my happily ever after with . . . he is my Prince Charming, weird quirks and all!

I found a version of the song that he played for me and I thought that you might enjoy hearing it! Enjoy!

Another Month of Baking!

So, apparently it is my destiny to write only once a month . . . hopefully, this doesn’t become a habit! I promise, I really am trying to do better! It is the thought that counts, right? ☺ In my defense, the last couple weeks have been super busy with the holidays . . . lame excuse, but it is pretty much the best one I have, so take it or leave it!

I will give you the quick update on my cooking adventures! Last time I talked about possibly making no bake cookies and/or spritz cookies for my sweetheart. Well, in the past month I have done both (I think that I made spritz cookies about three times . . . they are super yummy!) and I have made some puppy chow! I love this time of year when all sorts of yummy treats are being made all the time!

For Christmas, my mom and I made some Pull-Apart Garlic Bread and Christmas Rolls . . . both turned out wonderfully! Christmas Rolls is a sweetbread with cinnamon yummy-ness and other delicious ingredients and it has been a tradition in my husband’s family ever since my mother-in-law was a little girl . . . and it was a HUGE hit at our family’s Christmas get together! I have been told that I NEED to bring it again next year or I might just get kick out of the family! ☺

The week after Christmas I used up some of that delicious Christmas ham by making some simple crock pot ham hock and beans soup (okay, so it was just normal ham not ham hock that I used, but it still tasted uber yummy!) and I baked a loaf of homemade bread to go along with it! I FINALLY figured out how to bake a loaf of bread and to have it still have soft crust (like the kind you get from the store) even days later! I happen to be super proud of myself for figuring this out . . . I am thinking of baking another loaf again this week just to see if I really did figure it out or if I just got lucky this time!

My last baking fun adventures have been with normal chocolate chip cookies and some more homemade pizza! It is amazing how much better just simple things like cookies and pizza tastes when you make them from scratch rather than from a store bought package!  I did run into some trouble when making my cookies though this time . . . I didn’t have enough butter (oops!) so I ended up having to substitute some oil and add a little more flour in to have them turn out right! Oh well, the cookies still tasted yummy!

Well, I haven’t decided what I am going to bake tomorrow . . . possible I will try to recreate my soft crust bread again! I will let you know how it goes! Until next time! ☺

Kitchen Fun

Sorry that I haven’t wrote lately . . . sometimes life just gets too busy for you to just stop and write, so here I am again, feeling the need to play catch up! ☺ I said that I would try to write every week saying what I have been baking; well, I have been baking, just not writing about it! Opps! Here is some of the things that I have been cooking up for the past month!

My “Wednesday Baking Adventure” for November 16th: We have a bunch of left over Peanut M&Ms from Halloween, and since Roland and I aren’t too big of fans of the peanut ones, I thought that I would try putting it in something and seeing if that would help us get rid of them. So, I made up some Peanut M&M Brownies. They actually tasted better than I thought they were going to, but after a brownie or two, I just ended up picking out the M&Ms and eating the brownie by itself! Oh, well! I guess it is the thought that counts, right? ☺ So, my lesson that I learned is: don’t try put something you don’t like in something you like when you can pick it out . . . you will end up picking it out and throwing it away anyways, so save yourself the trouble and don’t do it!

My “Wednesday Baking Adventure” for November 23rd: Well, since it was the day before Thanksgiving, I didn’t actually do any baking on the Wednesday itself, but I did help my mom out with making the Thanksgiving lunch/dinner the next day, so I am counting that! (After all, I am the one who is making the rules, so I can!)  On Thanksgiving Day, my mom and I baked up some super yummy dinner rolls! She put me in charge of it, but we didn’t have enough space for me to hand knead the dough (do to other yummy things being made) so we ended up putting the ingredients in my mom’s bread machine and just set it on Dough, that way it wouldn’t back it! We thought it was a brilliant plan, until the machine beeped saying it was done and I went to look at it . . . let me just say, if you are using a bread machine, make sure you don’t put in more ingredients than the directions on the machine says, it WILL over flow and make a mess if you don’t! haha Don’t worry, I cleaned it up and saved the dough, before anyone noticed, and the rolls turned out great! My lesson that I learned from this is: don’t skip steps just to make things go faster, you usually end up making a big mess and having to spend more time cleaning it up than it would have taken to do it the right way in the first place!

My “Wednesday Baking Adventure” for November 30th: I don’t remember if I baked anything this week . . . besides a baked potato that I usually have every week or so! Ever since I got into my second trimester (and now that I am in my third) I get the craving for a baked potato every now and again. Since Roland isn’t a huge fan of then, I usually just make myself one for lunch if I am in the mood. I know that everyone has a different way of making baked potatoes, so I shall share my favorite way! I always start my preheating my oven that way it is all ready for my potato to pop in when I am done getting it ready! After I scrub the potato, I stab my potato for ventilation. I always use aluminum foil, but I do something a little different before wrapping my potato up . . . a rub it with olive oil and then sprinkle some salt on it (sometimes other spices too). I do this so then after the potato is all done, the skins a soft and uber yummy too! I don’t know where I found this idea, but I have loved it ever since . . . even Roland says it isn’t too bad! Then of course you bake it in the oven for about an hour! That’s it, super easy! Lesson learned: umm . . . write more in my blog so I actually remember what I really made that day! haha

My “Wednesday Baking Adventure” for December 7th: Last week, because Roland was gone ALL day (I mean it, he left before 7:30 in the morning to go to school and came home from work a little before 11:30 at night) I made for Roland his favorite kind of cookie, Spritz! Turns out, they are super easy to make and taste pretty good too! I might have to spoil the boy more often and make them for him more! I had to borrow my mom’s cookie press, because ours didn’t come until this week! My only problem came in to play when baking the cookies themselves. For the life of me I couldn’t seem to get them not to come out looking more done than they should be, there might have been some extra well done bottoms on a few of them too! I don’t know if I had my temperature up too high or that I had them in too long for our oven, or if our oven what just hating me that day, but it felt like a epic fail! Then Roland came home and his face lit up like a little kid when he saw them, and he immediately started eating them . . . so not so much a fail! ☺ Lesson of the week: Be more patient when baking cookies, and always remember, no matter if they even come out a little burnt, Roland will still eat them!

My “Wednesday Baking Adventure” for December 14th: Hey, that’s today! How about that! Well, yesterday I baked some yummy banana bread! I have this no fail recipe that I go to for banana bread . . . here is a link to the website that I found it at and I highly recommend it! http://www.banana-bread-recipe.com/ I usually spice it up a little bit by adding a little cinnamon and nutmeg, but it tastes good just straight by the book too! If banana bread is something that kind of scares you or never seems to turn out right for you and you have those extra bananas that are over rip, the is the recipe to turn to! I promise, it will turn out! ☺ I also made for Roland some homemade pizza last night for dinner.  I used a new to me recipe. I was pretty sure it would turn out good, because I was using Roland’s sister’s recipe, but it is always nice to have something come out of the oven done “perfectly” knowing that you did that! It always makes me smile! I haven’t decided weather I am going to bake something later today or not yet. Roland wants me to bake him some more Spritz cookies and some No-Bake cookies . . . I might do that this evening or tomorrow, I probably should do my laundry first! My learning moment for this week so far: follow the directions, they were put there for a reason, and usually they are right!

Well, that’s all my baking for the last month or so . . . I really love to bake! I love the process of making a new creation, the way it makes my home smell super yummy, and the eating part when it is all done! Sometimes it is important to just step back and enjoy the simple things in life . . . like FOOD! ☺

A Thankful Post

Since it was Thanksgiving a little while ago, I figured that I would share ten of the many things that I am thankful for this year!

1.    I am grateful for the Gospel of Jesus Christ, it is truly a huge blessing in my life!
2.    I am grateful that I have a family that can be and will be together forever, until death is not long enough!
3.    I am grateful for education . . . even if I am not the one going to school right now, I am grateful that Roland has this opportunity!
4.    I am grateful to have been born in and be living in a free country, when so many don’t.
5.    I am grateful for all of the men and woman (past, current, and future) who have chosen to put their lives on the line for my freedom.
6.    I am grateful to have a safe roof over my head and enough food in the cupboards.
7.    I am grateful for technology . . . simply being able to pick up the phone and talk to someone who is over one thousand miles away!
8.    I am grateful for a wonderful husband who loves me and is always more than willing to help me and support me through anything!
9.    I am grateful for the ability to create and rise my children . . . I am already seeing the blessings and joy it brings, and my first one isn’t even born yet!
10.    I am grateful to have so many loving friends and other loved ones, who truly care about me and really do go that extra mile for me!