A Violet by any other name...

David and I debated over this little girl's name for months. Weirdly enough David and I have picked out all of our kids names way in advance (before we were married), but for some reason none of those names seemed right to me this time. We found out she was a she way back in December and I immediately started questioning the name we had previously picked out, which was PollyAnna. Polly was a family name on both sides 4 generations back and Anna was all over the chart everywhere haha. After looking over both of our family charts we both concluded that our families, for the most part, had very little creativity. Even to the point of naming several children the same name in the same family. This was usually because a child passed away, but still! The variety I was hoping to find was already found in the names we had previously agreed on.

There were lots of reasons we started to change our minds. Polly had the same ending sound as Davie and Macy (while its cute I'm not into having all my kids have similar sounding names or first letters etc), David didn't want Polly to be her nickname, which it most likely would have been, and the addition of a sister in law named Anna since we had originally picked it. David wanted to just use the next girl name on our list, but I hadn't been planning on using that name yet so it didn't feel right to me or seem to fit.

Shortly after we found out we were having a girl, I fell in love with the name Violet. It's a name I had always liked, but had never really considered. I had a tough time committing to the name Violet at first because it didn't fit our usual naming ritual. I have always loved older simpler names. Easy to say, no guess work easy to spell etc and as I got older I wanted our children's names to have lots of meaning, so I fell in love with using family names. Growing up I got called Car- E alllll the time. It wasn't my parents fault that the early 90's introduced this new way to say Kari and they were definitely thinking about me when they spelt it. My maiden name was Christiansen, that's 12 letters! They wanted to pick the easiest and shortest spelling for my name that they could. 

The only problem is Kari isn't that common and I don't know if I've ever had someone spell it right on the first try. Because of this I wanted my kids to have an easier time, so we've picked older names. I also didn't want the names to be too popular, David being the only exception. David will probably always be a little popular but when your kid is David 5th you can't really argue with that!

Anyways, David's first reaction to my liking Violet was to tease "is this because your favorite color is purple?". I laughed because I hadn't even thought of (which surprised me I usually think of those kinds of details) but once I had I loved Violet even more! Purple, lavender, and/or Violet have been my favorite colors for almost 20 years. Also cousin Violet on Downton Abbey is awesome ;) I absolutely love her character and how she is actually OLD school. I have a friend in the ward who was due a day before me who liked the name, and I didn't want to pick a name that was too popular (especially in the same Ward). 

Then David basically refused to truly weigh in at that time and didn't until about 4 or 5 weeks before Violet was born! Big stinker. In the meantime I poured over more baby name websites then I knew existed and our family history chart like I never had before. And while I found lots and LOTS of names I liked, however none of them stuck out or fit. There were also tons of family names I liked that are already currently in use on both sides of our families.

Maybe this sounds bad but her name is also the first and only baby name I have ever prayed about. With Davie and Macy, I just KNEW it was right, the family connections were just wonderful. Their names were perfectly planned no endless searching or arguing. None. David and I had a list of about 4 Boy names and 4 girl names (in a seniority order) completely planned way before their conception and I never questioned it.

About 2 or 3 weeks before she was born, we decided to do something we had never done before, wait until she arrived before we truly decided! That was more cautionary than anything, I had been consistently calling her Violet since mid March, haha and my sister in law and mom had been since December (they let me know their votes early). Needless to say I was both glad and relieved when she finally arrived. Violet is perfect for her. In the end I liked our little naming journey, even though it completely threw me off guard and was a little stressful. Violet may be baby #3 but she definitely has her own little story. 

Violet truly is our delicate little flower. She beat Davie's smallest baby record by almost a whole pound! Her tiny little fingers and toes are just adorable. 

Violet also seems easier to calm and soothe so far, she doesn't full on cry most of the time and usually if I pick her up she stops. Even if I'm only picking her up to change her. Davie and Macy were definitely never better once I started to change them. In fact for Davie diaper changes (especially the first of the day) were his daily crying sessions for probably over a year. I would also say that Violet is a little more snuggly, it's nice to feel like she needs me. When Macy would cry only food would help, when Violet cries Davie and Macy can just talk to her and sometimes she will stop. It's those short little moments as a parent that make a mom so happy! Violet has even stopped a full on cry to listen to Macy sing her version of "Twinkle twinkle little star". Which is Macy singing the words "uppa, uppa high" over and over again. 

All these little things make me think that maybe, just MAYBE, she will be our Vanilla baby. Also to clarify, by Vanilla I mainly mean temperament. She can be as sassy as she likes as long as she is more laid back than Davie or Macy :) 

Violet's Planned Entrance

Way before I scheduled to get induced with Violet I knew that I wanted to if it was possible. My family was coming the night before my official due date and they actually ended up arriving so late it was my due date. And while them being here meant that they could have helped with my kids while I was in the hospital I wanted to be out of the hospital by the time they got to Florida. So at 38 weeks my doctor let me set my induction day for the 8th. As long as I had made some progress my appointment would be good. When I went in the next week I had made progress, 1 to a 3, and the doctor told me he could even take me THAT day. It's funny because this baby I feel like I have been the least prepared with. On top of just getting tired and falling behind I've had my other two babies to take care of and I found myself randomly spoiling them with lots of my attention. No regrets. Especially with Macy. Anyways when my doctor offered to let me go in the day before my scheduled induction David and I both were just like "uhh, no". It was only a days difference but neither of us were ready. If that had been Davie or Macy we would have easily said yes. I think the whole "having other children (plural) and adding another one" has been slowly sinking in. We left knowing that we would be coming back at 6:00 am the next morning.

I'd like to say I went home and got a whole bunch of things done but I didn't. I caught up on a couple of chores, exchanged/bought a couple of last minute baby items, played with the kids but mostly hung around. I wanted to make myself busy but I just couldn't. I wasn't apprehensive or nervous or even super excited, I think it was sinking in pretty slowly. Since Violet was due to be induced the day before her Daddy's birthday I went out and picked up his favorite ice cream for him (he hates cake). David has been working 12-9pm so by the time he got home the kids were asleep. We watched a show ate some ice cream and went to bed. Later than we should have of course.

We were up at 5:00 am in order to get ourselves ready and the kiddies. We had a wonderful family in the ward who volunteered their help and I'm so glad they did. David doesn't accept help very well, he's great at giving it but not so great at receiving and this family made sure we let them help by calling and asking times and dates. We were late by the time we got on the road (of course). Davie went to bed late, wet his bed in the middle of the night AND woke up about the same time we did... for no reason at all. I was worried he was going to be awful but it sounds like he and the other kids had LOTS of fun which was a relief to me. When we got to the house to drop the kids off Davie practically ran in, he loves new people and places (you could say he loves nouns really haha). I was a little worried about Macy, she can randomly get sad when we drop her off places, sometimes it's genuine sometimes it's just for show. Surprisingly even with a great big doggy to greet her she went right in. As we drove away I actually started to cry a little. I don't usually do that. I just got started thinking about how big she was and how much I loved her and of course how happy I was that she didn't get upset when we left. Oh motherhood, there's always some tears from someone.

Macy watching Frozen at our friends house holding Anna and Elsa

When we got to the hospital I started with all my paperwork, there sure is a lot of paperwork to have a baby! By the time I signed my life away and my 3rd born and they finally got me all hooked up, water broken (this dr had GREAT technique btw it literally didn't hurt at all other times not so much, owie) and started pitocin it was probably about 9:00 am.

feeling ok at 9:16 am

 Two funny side notes there are 3 doctors in the OBGYN place I go to one did residency in Toledo AND worked with the guy who delivered Davie (small world) and I had never had an appointment with one of the ladies... haha and guess who was on call to deliver my baby :D the one I'd never met. She was great though very nice and like I said great water breaking technique. The nurse had to do my IV two time so that sucked, putting in the IV is the worst. 

It freaking HURTS and then it's itchy and hurty every second afterwards until they take it out. Hate, hate, hate it.

This is my arm 5 days after I delivered! And that doesn't do it justice. Painful :(

I'm going to admit right now that I didn't watch the clock as much this time around. But I did get to watch HGTV all day which was a great distraction and a family member blogged so I got to read that. I napped a little (like a tiny little bit) and around 11 or noon is when I started to feel uncomfortable. I don't understand how some women like to use birthing balls or walking around. I can barely breath through my really tough contractions not to mention bounce (ouch) on a ball or move around. I think the most annoying part was how much I had to got to the bathroom with the machine hooked up to me.

David relaxing while I do all the work! :P

I'll admit by noon I was hoping I would have made more progress I think I was at a 4cm. It was much slower than Colin or Macy who came naturally and more than Davie who I was only on a 2 drip of pitocin before he was born. One thing David and I noticed was that my nurse slowly turned up my pitocin, which is protocol, then after that she turned it down and up but never above 12 (20 is the max dose). I've never had a nurse do that before, but I was glad she didn't just keep cranking it up. So I kept telling myself I was going to wait to ask for the Nubain, right after I had another contraction and went pee one more time. I did that for at least an hour or two. I can't even remember what time it was when I finally got some pain killer but it was Stadol not Nubain. I'm going to be honest, I hated it this time. Maybe it was the higher pitocin drip, the fact that I'd already been in labor longer than the last time I'd had it with Davie, that I was already tired, or that it was just a slightly different drug, but it was awful. It made my eyes sooo heavy I literally could not keep them open and it did relax my body, but it made the contractions worse! It was amplifying how awful my contractions were compared to my little in between moments of non-contractions. This is also when my labor picked up a lot. I kept trying to breath my way through but I was groggy and felt completely out of control. Again I kept waiting in hopes that I would progress and be closer to finishing/pushing. Because I was groggy the time frame during all this is completely lost on me. It was just a blur of ridiculous pain followed by feeling heavier than a brick and completely asleep.

Not feeling so good at 4:18 pm

I have decided that each time I have a baby that I'll decide if I want an epidural or not during labor. It's never going to be an absolute either way. Every labor is different, every pregnancy and so far every time I've had a baby it's been at a different hospital in 3 different states. So there's enough variables I think that's a reasonable way to look at it. If you are still reading this, wow, sorry about being so wordy, but this is also where it gets interesting.

 Lady Violet's birth story is definitely one that I am going to tease is my most Hollywood birth story. My explanation of that is how going into labor is in the movies. I detest how birth is depicted in the movies a woman will just randomly have a contraction all the sudden it's time to go to the hospital and she's screaming and yelling OR her water breaks and that's totally not how it happens. Not to say that people's water doesn't break but not to very many people and you definitely don't have one contraction and all the sudden know you need to go to the hospital. Or the wife freaks out and yells at her husband and says she hates him. Those things didn't happen to me but as I tell my story I'll refer back to this and you'll know what I'm talking about.

I think it was after 4pm when I finally broke down and begged for an epidural. My contractions were making me feel like my midsection was going to explode. No pun intended. They say pitocin makes that worse BUT, when I was at an 8 with Macy it was pretty stinkin' bad so if it did actually make it worse it wasn't that much different. My eyes were finally a little less heavy and I was starting to get loud when I had contractions. That was embarrassing for me. I don't like losing my composure especially in public and I pretty much never do. The nurse had noticed how quickly things were going and set up for an epidural before I even asked. Again I don't remember this part that well but my contractions were close now and so the epidural had to be done between them. It never kicked it the way it has before because during the process of getting it I went from contractions to wow I need to push. And some where in all my moaning and basically screaming I swore! Haha, I said the "D" word. And then after the epidural was finished I had another huge need to push and I said I was in hell. Haha not dramatic at all right?! Sprinkle in some more very loud screams, as in louder than I have ever been before, and that's how transition went this time around. Easy peasy.

They were actually telling me not to push because the doctor hadn't come back! I had again gone from about 5 cm to practically complete in about 15 min or less. It was very similar to pushing with Davie even with the epidural and David said that the anesthesiologist gave me an extra dose before she left. By the time I got it I think I had maybe 10 minutes (or less) of labor left, but of course I didn't know that at the time. After waiting all day and feeling like it had gone so slow compared to how it had before that I didn't realize how close I was to Violet being born! It took about 4 huge pushes but that was it! It was the same shocked feeling I had after Davie. The pushing aways seems to just whiz right by when it's over (haha if that makes sense). Violet had the cord wrapped around her neck but shortly after they cut it off I could hear her soft muffled little cries.

Only 37 minutes after the last picture, Violet is here!! 4:54 pm

 It wasn't until we were sitting in the hospital that morning that I wondered if she was going to be smaller than my other babies. When they set her on me I couldn't believe how tiny she was! And how much hair she had. She was also my most waxy :) they had to wipe her down quite a bit. Then they weighed her- 6 pounds even! I had been right. Even though I gained more and my hands, fingers, feet and toes were puffier than ever before she was almost a pound smaller than Davie. And absolutely perfect.

So much hair!

Just a tiny little gal

Brand new!

tiny toes

So even with an epidural I pretty much did 95% (or more) of this delivery on my own. Part of me wishes I hadn't of asked for it because I was so far along that it really didn't help (at all!) and it costs so much. Thank goodness for insurance. The other part of me wishes I had just asked sooner and not even had the Stadol because it too was a waste of money. Oh drugs, it's so hard to decide on whether you want them and then they don't always work fast enough or the way you want. Of course none of that matters now because she is here and perfect and I would do it all over again. 

Daddy and daughter

PG 4

This is me today. 38 weeks and counting.
I feel like every time I'm pregnant it gets that much harder to wrap my mind around what pregnancy it is. This is my 4th pregnancy, but I only have 2 kids and when she gets here I'll only have 3. Sometimes I tease and say this is baby 3/4ths. I guess in a lot of ways I keep thinking that it will get easier to... understand... accept... I don't know but it's it's still a little weird and frustrating (if I'm being honest). I don't know if I'm saying that right because it's not a clear feeling or feelings and they come and go but hopefully that makes some sense.

I can't act like I have difficult pregnancies however this time and last time the last 10 weeks or so I've struggled with pelvic bone pain. Both my doctors have said it's because I carry low so there's a lot of pressure.  It's embarrassing because it literally makes me feel like an old lady. Even though I've gained more weight this time and last time when I need help getting up its because my bones hurt. It's weird to roll over at night and suddenly be in tons of pain and have to roll over extra slow like I'm a cripple. My waddle also has very little to do with my size and everything to do with bone pain. It's pretty cute to have a pregnancy/cripple waddle before age 30, trust me :) That's when I get most frustrated about having had more pregnancies than babies. My first two pregnancies were bone pain free, I just wish that the non-pain would have lasted more than two times. I'm hoping it will go away as soon as I have the baby like it did with Macy, fingers crossed! 

Other than that I'm all fluffy (like my fingers, toes and feet) and my fatigue has come back, but really just pregnancy life as normal. This picture is proof and it weirds me out. I normally have boney ankles and feet (thank you mom) so to not be able to see my ankles is just super weird to me. Did I mention that I kind of also hate feet? They are just kind of gross so to see my own feet look all bloated is extra yucky.

Along with extra weight gain I have come to the conclusion that since I live in Florida and we have a pool in our neighborhood I am spending time in the sun. Not a lot almost literally the daily recommended amount (15-20 minutes). I figure if I can't tone it ("it" meaning my ginormous pregnant self) I'll tan it. I feel like it's been really nice to dedicate time as often as possible to be in the sun. It does a body good. I figure if I have to spend the rest of the hot summer all fluffy post baby the least I could do is not be pasty white haha.

This week I'm 38 weeks along and it was only two days ago I actually pull out the little baby girl clothes and start washing them so they could be ready. And JUST today I finally ordered a bassinet. True story. With Davie we used our pack'n'play (which was just too big to have on the side of my bed) and with Macy we were able to borrow a bassinet so we've never actually owned one.

I've managed to take both kids to my doctors appointments the last 3 to 4 weeks. While taking the whole crew is not my favorite thing to do I can honestly say that it's not been too bad so far. No breakdowns or crying or anything else that made me feel like we needed to leave immediately so that's always good. No other major progress to report on that front but I'm still hopeful since all my babies have been born within a couple of days of D-day.

Right now I'm desperately trying to clean up the last couple of messes in our bedroom the fourth bedroom and the office. I'd say it's nesting but I've been trying to clean them up for months now and I think it's more like desperation at this point. The reasons why these areas have been neglected so long is because they could be closed off from small children but also because those spaces are really hard to clean with small children present... at all.

The 4th bedroom

We had visitors that spent the night last night and I BARELY managed to get the 4th bedroom under control by the time they got here. But not without absolute heck from Davie and Macy. Seriously yesterday my kids were THE worst. I hate saying that but yesterday it was true. They were all kinds of naughty to each other and all about making cleaning impossible as much as possible. As well as just literally following along behind me and destroying what I had done. ALL DAY LONG. Sometimes I think David worries about having more kids when I have days like that, but all I have to say is I really believe the part that frustrates me so much about days like yesterday is the fact that I know my kids can be SO well-behaved when they want to be. But aren't we all that way? And even more so as adults??

As far as this little gal goes she is a MOVER. Not the constant swishy/re-situaing type movements like my other babies have done but huge and often internally painful movements. There have been many evenings where her constant large movements have given my a tummy ache. Other nights I can watch what has to be one of her limbs move around as if she is trying to escape through my side! The plus side is I've never had to question if she is alive in there. I'm super curious to see what her personality will be like since both of my kids are so independent and busy. After I had Davie my mother-in-law said she didn't want any vanilla grand babies. I tease that Macy is my strawberry flavored baby and Davie is chocolate so I feel like I can have a vanilla baby now haha. A mom can hope!

This is me at 36 weeks and some change watching her try to escape from my stomach. Its extremely strange to watch and feel your entire belly move like that.

Other than that my family comes next Saturday and will be here for my birthday! Yay! And somewhere in all that hopefully we will have another baby girl. So at the end of the day there really isn't much to complain about. Life is good.

Sleep Training a 4 Year Old

We have always kind of known that Davie is a morning person. Which has always been bearable since he's always been a pretty darn good sleeper at night. Davie wakes up about 6:50 almost every day. It drives me kind of crazy but there is almost nothing that changes that. A couple of months ago we started doing our best to get him to sleep by 7pm as often as possible. That is a lot easier said than done because the girls I babysat often didn't leave until after 7:00 pm and to truly get your kid down or at least calmed down by 7 you really have to be on the ball by 6:30pm. That pushes up dinner and baths and everything else.  

The horrible bed and bedroom that Davie refused to sleep in.

Between about October until we came back from Idaho in March, Davie had decided that sleeping was best done in our bed. I can't say every night because there were a few exceptions (like once in a blue moon) but without fail about 99% of the time he was in our bed by about 1:00 am. It drove us nuts because he would go to bed really well and almost exactly 3-4 hours later he woke up and never wanted to go to his bed again. We originally tried just taking him back, laying down with him, locking our door, locking his door, punishment (which just lead to a LOT of screaming in the middle of the night) and many other things. Nothing worked, so instead of getting no sleep and waking up all the time we settled for only getting woken up once and letting him sleep with us.  

Now there were many times that I didn't mind because I know this won't last forever and thankfully our bed is big enough that it doesn't make a huge difference. However I did worry a LOT about this when the new baby comes. If I had two kids waking up at different times in the middle of the night, especially one who is VERY capable of sleeping through the night in his OWN bed, I might lose my mind. If we didn't let him in our bed there were many times that he would just wander around the house!  

Davie had gotten really good at sneaking up on us too, after we thought he was long asleep. We would be watching our shows together, hanging out and winding down in the evening and then he would just be standing there with NO warning. I have literally screamed in his face because he has startled me soooo bad! SOOO many times. David started getting mad at me because I would scream or yell and/or get frustrated, but seriously! Just picture the whole house is quiet and dark, you look over or go around the corner (in the dark) and a small boy is just suddenly standing there. Silent. It was creepy.  

Afterwards I would feel bad but in the moment I was just so scared and frustrated that he would NOT stay asleep that I just could not help it. That's why David usually dealt with him at that point. I just lose my patience. I mean he just lingers in the dark and stares at you! It's creepy!!! Obviously some nights were better or worse than others but I really REALLY missed him sleeping through the night. David kept blaming it on Davie being scared and while I thought that was a possible issue I didn't feel like it was THE issue. So about late January I just stopped resisting Davie's nightly invasions of our bed. After a couple of weeks of that David finally said "ok I can't handle him sleeping next to me anymore" haha David is a hotbox and so is Davie.  

Shortly after that we went to Idaho, but when we got home we promptly put a plan in motion. We bought some toys, grabbed a sticker chart and told Davie that every 5 nights he stayed in HIS bed ALL night, or at least until Daddy left for work, he could have one of those toys. 

And guess what? It worked almost IMMEDIATELY. 

I couldn't get Davie to smile so I told Macy to poke him. I was thinking in the tummy (i.e. tickle him) but she went straight for his face haha.
Now before you go thinking we were spoiling him they were twin packs of Star Wars action figures and one big dinosaur altogether I think it was like $35. The sticker chart was also 50 days worth of staying in bed, IF Davie were to have been absolutely perfect. Which was perfect. Experts say it takes about 50- 60 days to create a new habit or change a bad one. 

We split each character pack in two which broke down to be about $3. I figured you can barely get a milkshake for that plus he got to enjoy it longer. AND if he was bad I told him I would take back the toy and he would have to re-earn it. He earned those toys just about every 5-8 days with few exceptions.  

The BIG dinosaur finale prize!

 
Macy helping Davie point at his prizes.
Overall it's been great, I knew he wasn't really scared or having other problems and I felt like the experiment validated my mom hunch. He just needed the proper motivation to re-create his good habits. He has now earned all but the last big toy which takes 2 weeks to earn and he only has 2 more days to that prize. 

Gotta sneak one of the little sister in here, because hey she's been sleeping like a champ this whole time.
And that is how we have been sleep training our 4 year old. Or should I say sleep bribing? Either way we have ALL been sleeping better.

Adulting Win

I once watched a little video on Facebook that followed a young man while he posted updates on his Facebook. The gist of the video was that if he posted the truth no one liked it and if he posted something positive everyone payed attention. For example he posted that he was sad about his girlfriend breaking up with him and no one really said much and then he posted something like "Yay, I'm single" and everyone noticed. I REALLY liked this video and while I am in a totally different stage in life (marriage, house, kids) the point was clear. We share the positive and we edit the negative, in our posts, pictures and blogs. Even if we are going through a difficult time in our lives, which is unfortunate because that is when we should be sharing the most so we can receive support. 

So in order to NOT edit out the negative in my life and only share the positive, here is my rather long time coming adulting win I was finally able to experience mid February.

I feel like ever since I got pregnant I have been behind on house chores (and life but this post can't be that long). I didn't get sick per-say this time (more on that later.... maybe) but the fatigue was crippling. I was so tired! I have never been that tired before and it was not fun. I started babysitting at the beginning of September about a month after we moved in and then a month after that I got pregnant. In between all of that we had some visitors, holidays, game nights and just life. For the longest time we were just trying to clean up, organize/ unpack. I also was also not exercising, at all which of course made me feel even more crappy. Then December hit. We put up our tree, we got a TV, we set up our living room and cleaned for a game night. I was finally starting to feel like "yes! Our house is doing so great and we can do this!"

That was a Friday night. Macy got sick the next morning, thankfully it was only once, and all we had to do was clean all of her bedding and a small spot on the floor. Then on Sunday evening Davie got sick, for a full 24 hours. BUT Davie didn't just get sick. He got sick all over the carpet (as in we had to go out THAT night and buy a wet/dry shop vac to clean it up) and all over our NEW couch AND some of the couch pillows..... uuuuughhh. It was awful. We had to clean it immediately. Our couch was out of commission for several weeks until we got it cleaned professionally (totally worth the money we paid when we bought it) thank you upholstery protection plan! The carpet took forever to dry and basically we were up to our ears in laundry. To add to that later that night I got sick too. The kind of sick where you CANNOT eat anything for several hours or it just comes right up. Shakey, clammy awful. ALL NIGHT. I haven't been sick like that in YEARS. Probably about 15 years to be exact. AND The next day I had to babysit (sad face). 

So between getting sick, being fatigued, life and all our other projects I was feeling constantly behind. UNTIL the week of about February 15th. That's right. It was February and I was just barely feeling like we have hit the same level of cleanliness and organization that we had finally accomplished in December. Our computer/office room is still a disaster, but it's full of papers and things that are impossible to sort through with a small child even vaguely present (ESPECIALLY Macy), our bedroom because we don't have dressers means the clothing is out of control and our garage a LITTLE. Our garage isn't too bad though because we can park the Sequoia in there which is a HUGE car so I'm calling it an almost win. 

Anyways I guess where I am going with this is that sometimes in life I get feeling just soooo overwhelmed, like to the point of anxiety, and I feel like I will never get ahead, or even catch up, on my chores and life "things" in general. And way too often I don't think about times like the week of February before we visited Idaho. That last week at home before our trip was great. It's sooooo great to see and feel like we are making progress! I just hope we can all take a moment to enjoy our progress when it does FINALLY happen. I'm still working on getting my daily steps up (thank you Fitbit), but I'm feeling quite positive! There is a light at the end of the tunnel and to prove it I am finally posting some pictures of our house.

 Our Entrance area, to the left of our entrance is the office.

A small glimpse of the office

My super crafty office filing cabinet make over. What you can't see is how un-even the sprays turned out. Most are a matte finish (regardless of what the can said) and the top silver is nice and smooth. Oh well I still love it and the metallic sprays are useful for everything! 

 The downstairs bathroom/guest bathroom is to the right of the entrance area you can see the door. After the stairs is what they call the Drop Zone. It's basically an open coat closet that they built shelves in (not as an upgrade I might add!). It's a life saver. Of course ours only seems to looks this nice and clean about once or twice a week or when company comes :)

 The 4th bedroom is also down there, and even though it is actually pretty clean I didn't take pictures, it's really just an empty-ish room with storage items and my sewing machine.

First floor bathroom/guest bathroom.

This is my super cheap shower curtain from Kohl's, I think I ended up spending like $8 on it. I was excited haha. Mom life no? Trust me it was exciting. I had a very small budget for this room so it took me a while to get the towels and shower curtain. The flowers, mason jar and bird were nice because they were maybe $3.

Isn't that little birdie so cute? Davie found him for me at Habitat for Humanity for like .39 cents and then I painted him gold. I just love him!

 Living room if you go into the house from the entrance area.

Our amazing electronics cabinet that keeps little hands out of everything. I'm basically in love with it.

 Kitchen

Breakfast in the kitchen

Our cabinets

Looking at our front door from the kitchen area

Back to the entrance area and up the stairs.

I finally cut all the little plastic strings hanging out of our carpet and trimmed off the little paint spots left by the painters (don't even get me started).

TOYS! Of course they all leak downstairs and into the kids rooms, but I do try to round them up once a night and get kids to "clean up" completely once a week.

Kids rooms

Macy's pretty pink room

Lamp I re-did. I love gold spray paint

Craigslist dresser for $50. I wish it was a little more sturdy, but for $50 its great.

Davie's green room. I'm not in love with it. I actually kind of hate the green. I can't decide if I went to dark, or too yellow based or if I'm pregnant... etc. Either way I don't like it.

We had initially bought a red book shelf, but I exchanged it because it was just too much red and green with the red chair next to it. Again I can't decide what to do with his room now, it just seems so loud. I have always loved his decor before this and now I finally got to paint his room the color I always wanted to and I don't like it. I'm sure I'll figure something out eventually. I just don't want to/ can't afford to again paint for a while.