Wednesday's Walk- Welcome Home, Elwood!

This past Friday my mom and I were walking through the mall and I saw this cat in a store window.  I usually don't park on this one particular side of the mall, but on Friday I happened to.  I had no clue that our mall had an animal rescue mission in it, and that's the storefront I saw the cat laying in.  This particular cat was big, and that's what attracted me to him.  I have always told Eric that I want a fat baby and a fat cat.  I got my fat baby, she has now grown into a slender version of a little girl, but for the fat cat, my poor Billy was only 8 pounds.  I was attracted to this cat, who wouldn't even turn around and look at the crazy lady pounding on the window-me :)  Typical cat!  I told my mom I wanted that cat.

On Saturday, my mom and I went back to the mall for something and I stopped in at the rescue mission.  They are only open like 2-3 days a week to the public, and they happened to be open when we were there.  I went straight to his little "home" cage, and started talking to him, I know, blame it on the hormones!  The director was there and came over and we started talking.  I told her we were interested in another cat or cats, maybe siblings, maybe kittens, or something younger, yet I still had my eye on this one cat.  She took my name and email and was going to email me some pictures of some foster kittens she had placed in a home.  She said they would be good with kids, and they have grown up together.  I took a flyer and said good bye to all the cats there.

I showed Eric the flyer and we got on the website and I immediately showed him my fat cat that I wanted.  He kept asking why I wanted him, especially since this particular cat is 6.  Now, never in a million years would I have ever thought about getting an older cat, but there was something about this cat, something about Elwood.

I instantly fell in love with him.  I have no clue why I love this cat so much and like I said I thought I wanted a younger cat, but sometimes your heart knows best!

We went back on Sunday and took Molly with us and we got to go in the "playroom" with him and interact with him.  It took all of 30 seconds for him to come over and get to know us, and roll over to show us how pretty he is.  He is pretty and he is a pretty big boy...over 20 pounds!  I finally got my fat cat!  He is so sweet and super mellow.  They call him the "peacekeeper" in kittyland, and the director said he has never gotten upset about anything there.  He was surrender by a family in November for unknown reasons, probably they couldn't take care of him or something.  And no one has ever asked to play with him since.  How sad!

So today at 2pm we are officially adopting Elwood, and welcoming him into our home!  I am so excited!

I am sure he will miss his kitty home at the rescue mission, that's where all of these pictures were taken, but I am sure we can show him a good time at our house!  I am a little nervous because he does have his claws still, so I am praying he doesn't get an itch to tear my couch up.  The director said he has never used his claws towards another cat, volunteer, or tore anything up there before.  I am pretty sure he is a little lazy to use his claws, that might be too much effort for him.

I will let you know how adjusting Elwood to the Ferguson home goes.  Plus, we might start potty training tomorrow with Molly.  I am looking at it as a potty training 101 class with her.  We are introducing the idea, despite what my wonderful husband thinks...he thinks it will happen the first time.  We shall see!  So call us crazy with adopting a cat and potty training all in one week!

18 Weeks and Tid-bits of Radomness

So today I thought I would do a pregnancy update and throw some other little random tid-bits in there too...

**Taken at 18 weeks 2 Days**

I honestly can't remember all of the questions so bare with me here...

How Far Along: 18 weeks and 3 Days

Maternity Clothes: Yes, however I am not quite filling them out yet, but it won't be long!

Gender: We find out next Thursday, July 8th

Movement: Yes, and yes!  I think maybe I felt the hiccups last night, or it was some random punches and kicks all together in a synchronized motion

What I Miss: Not a whole lot yet...

Emotions: Excited to find out boy or girl!

So remember when I said I was going to have you all vote on something, well...majority ruled- my husband, and what I wasn't sure I wanted painted got painted.  But they turned out great and he actually had a better idea than I did about them.

I got the spoon/fork art piece at a White Elephant Gift exchange a couple years ago.  They are metal, and they were lime green.  Our dining room is a dark brown, chocolate like, and I wanted to leave them lime green.  But Eric's mom bought us some curtains to go in there and they have tan and black in them, and Eric thought painting the spoon and fork red would look good.  I agreed, so he spray painted them this weekend, and brought them in from the garage last night, and here is the almost-finished product.  We just have to hang them up, but I think they will look great!

Last night after I got Molly around for bed, she wanted to read...I leave the room for 5 seconds and come back to find this...

Does that child think she was born in a barn?!  I was there, and I am 

pretty sure she was born in a fancy hospital in downtown Cincinnati!

Earlier in the night she was like this...

All dolled up, pushing her stroller around with her bunny slippers on! 

And I will leave you with this...I am really starting to fill out with this pregnancy, and when I was reading about this week and what fruit/veggie the baby would be related to I totally thought something big. 

On the left is how I feel, on the right is actual reality...a little bit of a difference!

She's In Love...

This weekend Miss Molly got a playhouse!  She loves it so much!  It's in our garage right now due to all of the the storms we have been having, so we decided to not move it out to the muddy grass known as our backyard just yet.  This week is supposed to be nice and cool down.  So once it's not so gross back there, she will be under the shade playing away.  For now she plays in the garage while I sit in a lawn chair and enjoy watching her. 

Here she is helping put it together...

 

The view from looking down with the camera!

**Notice my feet are no where in sight!**

Molly loves to play in our car, supervised of course, so I thought I would take a picture of her, not realizing I would see my reflection in the window!  Pregnancy moment- maybe, hopefully :)

This weekend my mom and step-dad came in to visit.  It was a good weekend, quick visit, but Molly had a great time.  We celebrated Phil's birthday on Saturday night.  My mom and Molly made him a cake and homemade ice-cream, yum!  

Yesterday at church we had a baptism celebration, with 20 people getting baptized!  We brought in all of the kids for the first time, and they did wonderful!  I love how they were able to be apart of this pivotal moment in someones journey.  Plus, all of the volunteers were able to watch also.  We did a live video feed from the school pool into the auditorium which worked out perfectly!  Everyone did an awesome job pulling everything off!  

This week we are gearing up for the 4th of July.  Up here parades are huge, I mean like HUGE.  We are participating in 2 parades this Sunday.  Something we have never done before.  We are moving church in to the community and serving the people of Milwaukee.  We are praying really big for these 2 parades!  We have had so many people over the years attend The Ridge because they saw us at the parade singing U2 or Kansas and they liked that.  We baptized people yesterday that saw us at the parade last year.  So it's a very effective outreach for us. 

That's about it for now...happy Monday!

17 weeks Update

A Little Pregnancy Update...

*17 weeks 2 days*

How far along: I will be 18 weeks on Sunday, June 27

Total Weight Gain:  Trust me, this one is not a weight loss issue...I have gained 9 pounds.  I actually thought it would be A LOT more, but I went to the doctor this week for sinus stuff, and according to their scale, I have gained 9 pounds so far.  I think moving and walking with Molly on a daily basis has really helped me in this area, plus I am not as hungry anymore.  

Maternity Clothes: Yes, please!  Actually half and half...I have skirts and dresses that I wear, like the one in the picture that are not maternity, but are stretchy or have elastic waistbands in the them.  And then I have some shirts that are longer/stretchier that I can wear.  Some of my maternity clothes from when I was pregnant with Molly are still way too big since I was 8/9 months pregnant in the summer and was a lot bigger than I am now.  It's a toss up each day on what I wear.  

Stretchmarks:  Are you kidding me?!  Yes, I am sure, but I really try not to look!

Movement:  All of the time!  This child is way more active than Molly was at this stage.  Which is funny since Molly is super active now!  Actually I am getting kicked now!

Food Cravings:  I don't have to be pregnant to have a food craving!  But nothing really, at first I wanted a cheeseburger everyday.  Now it's probably sugar, I love sugar candy.

Gender:  We find out on July 8th if we are having a Blake Andrew or a Lucy May

Belly Button In or Out:  In for the most part, but it's expanding and starting to protrude a little.

What I Miss:  A clear complexion...these hormones are awful this time around, plus the stress of moving and losing my kitty doesn't help.  Sometimes I look like a 12 year old boy going through puberty!

Emotions:  I feel pretty good.  I get emotional when I see little kids get on a school bus, or say good-bye to their mom, but overall, pretty excited!

Well, there you have it folks!  Have a great Thursday!

 

Wednesday's Walk- Mother/Daughter Date

One thing I love to do with Molly is go out on dates.  Last week I took Molly out to the Gingerbread House, one of our favorite date spots because of the chickens and yummy cookies!

This is the cookie Molly picked out, with home made cream on the side!

Yumm!!

They have flowers like this all over the place, beautiful!

I have often heard it said that fathers should date their daughters, so one day a daughter knows how she should be treated by a boy who takes her out.  But I think the same goes for moms and daughters.  I want to date Molly so she knows how to have relationships and friendships with other girls, and with her own daughter some day.  I cherish our special time together, and I love just laughing with her while she dips her cookie in her cream and gets it all over her face.  I know there aren't too many more times she will let me take pictures of it, so I will enjoy the ones I get now, and look forward to our many dates to come.   

Signal Lost

We don't have Internet at our house right now and we aren't going to for a couple more weeks.  I guess we are getting new phones in July, and they are WI-Fi hot spots or something, so we can just get the signal from the phone and use our laptops.  Way too technical for me.  But I have been struggling with not having Internet at my fingertips lately.  Like sometimes I feel like I could die.  That may be a little dramatic, but you get the point. 

However, not having Internet is good because I have gotten a lot done around the house.  We are 97% unpacked, just waiting on some bookshelves to put the boxes of books away.  And that's about the only pro of no connection.  The cons- I have to do all of my interneting at work, during my lunch hour, which is fine, but I don't get it all done!  I would love to go to the library and use their computers, but with an almost 3 year old (gasp, what?!) it's too hard to keep saying "sit still, Mommy is almost done, I promise."  Same goes for taking her to Panera or Starbucks to use their signal. 

So bear with me friends!  My Mom and Phil are coming this weekend and I think I can con them into hanging out with Molly while I go to the library and get caught up on everything. 

So needless to say, I am learning patience!

We had a great weekend.  Eric's parents rolled into town on Thursday night, tools in hand.  Eric and his Dad worked on the house all weekend, and his Mom worked too.  We also went on a curtain, drapes, blinds, any window coverings will do hunt!  Our windows are the most random windows out there.  So it looks like we are going to have to special order our window coverings.  So we will be doing one room at a time at this rate!  We have really long windows and wide ones.  So nothing fits.  And the bathroom and Molly's room are the only rooms with doors on them.  All the other rooms have doors, but we want to paint them first, which could be a while.  So I am praying my wonderful husband will just put the doors up this week and worry about painting them later.  My brother-in-law and niece came in for a quick visit on Friday, they left Saturday.  It was nice seeing them!

Don't worry we didn't work Eric's parents to the bone, well at least not every bone :) 

Last night my MIL and I walked Molly downtown to the cute little malt shop to get some ice-cream, and they had the village band playing in the town square, under the gazebo.  Could this town get any freaking cuter or like Gilmore Girls?!  Seriously!!  The band was good.  They had teenagers all the way through great grandparents playing in it.  Molly loved the music.  She danced and sang to all of it.  Some people thought she was cute, however some people seemed annoyed.  Oh well, she had fun! 

Then today my in-laws left and now it's back to the daily grind.  This Sunday we have as of now over 20 people getting baptized at church!  Now that we meet in the school, we can use their pool to do the baptisms.  So we are going to live feed the baptisms into the main service up on the big screen so everyone can see what is going on.  All of the kids are going to be in service during that time too.  This is a first for us.  But we think it's so important to have everyone, including the babies, be apart of this celebration.  So hopefully we can pull it off!! 

Okay, my lunch break is coming to an end!!  Have a great Monday!!

Making Good-Somewhat

Okay, so I am making good on part of my promise...I have a new belly shot.  It's not from my new house, it's from my office.  But at least it's a new one!

This was after my wonderful lunch of cheese ravioli, followed up with 2 big helpings of nacho cheese Doritos.  Yumm!  Lets just say it is hard to do a self timer photo in a cubicle! 

I didn't get a chance to take a picture of our gift that is up for painting discussion at our house.  I promise, I will!  But I did want to show you want an awesome mom I am...here is what we ate for dinner last night...

Hello Kitty waffles!  My mom bought me a Hello Kitty waffle maker for our wedding, and Eric clearly has no interest in it, so God blessed me with a daughter who loves Hello Kitty just as much as I do!  So we had us some kitty waffles. 

Also, for those of you who do not believe me, mainly family, this is a picture of Molly's hair- wet, straight out of the tub, just combed...

Then once it dries is when you see the big, afro curls!  Even when you comb it, it still curls up.  Needless to say, I was not lieing when I told you all her hair is actually longer than it appears.  PS- Like our new wood burning fireplace in the background...I can't wait to use it this winter! 

The Official Call

Thank you all for your kind, sweet words about Billy.  Last night I got a call from the vet on duty when I took him to the animal ER.  She wanted to let me know what they found out during the post-mortem exam.  I know I mentioned before on here that Billy was diagnosed with a blood disease back in 2006, which resulted in a stay in the hospital, a blood transfusion, an anti-biotic, and steroids.  We joked he was the "million dollar cat."

This disease is not common, okay, it's rare, like one in a million have it.  So no big deal, ha!  Our vet in Cincinnati had no clue what was wrong with him, so he called another vet in to look at him and thankfully that vet knew what it was.  So needless to say, not too many people know about this disease, or how to treat it.  So long story short...the disease is what killed him.  When Billy died he literally had no red blood cells left in his body, and he his liver had shut down a couple weeks ago.  All of this unbeknown to us.  His little body was not producing enough blood and oxygen to get to his organs, heart, and brain.  His heart was working over time to try and get something flowing, and finally it all just gave out.  The vet said when he passed away he was more than likely brain dead and had no clue what was happening.  No sure this is comforting to me, or just super sad.

There was absolutely nothing we could have done to prevent this, and honestly the vet said that there is no textbook or medical explanation as to why he lived as long as he did.  He should have died 4 years ago, and even after the blood transfusion, she said most cats make it maybe a week.  Since he did survive he should have been on medicine for the rest of his little kitty life, but there is no way to tell if he would have responded to the medicine, or if his body would have eventually been immune to it.  If we did take him to the vet last week or the week before, we would have found out that his liver had failed and had to put him to sleep.

So on one hand I feel super proud of my little cat, which I laugh yesterday when April commented that he looked big in that picture...he was all of 8 pounds!  Billy was the runt of the liter and we always joked that he would be a tiny cat, and a wimp.  But now we know just how much of  a fighter he truly was, and it makes me love him all the more!

**The Champ**

Okay, so I am finished for now with the cat stories...I know a lot of family members read this, so I wanted to update everyone.  

Tonight my plan is to unpack, unpack, and unpack some more, and take a new belly shot!  I have not taken one in 2 weeks!  So I will share that with you all tomorrow!  I will have to find a good place in our new house to take one.  Also, I want to show you all this gift we got that Eric wants to paint, but I want to leave the same color.  So you all can vote and tell me what you think!

 

My heart is aching...

Today my heart is aching for my poor little Billy cat.  He passed away on Saturday.  We are guessing it was a heart attack, since it all happened very suddenly.  He didn't make it on the drive to the Animal ER, I don't think he even made it out of the driveway.  So I drove the whole way sobbing and apologizing to him for all of the events that had taken place in the last couple minutes of his life.  I just feel terrible, but I honestly don't know what else we could do to help him.

I opted not to keep his ashes, instead we got a clay paw print.  Which the only funny side, well sort of funny thing is, it looks nothing like a cat paw print, it looks like a dog.  The paw print looks like there are nails on it, and our cat did not have claws or long nails.  So that made me smile a little, because this would happen to us.

Eric was gone at a golf outing and was not reachable the whole day, so thank the Lord, for real, I am thanking Him, my best friend, Carrie was able to come over and watch Molly for me and help me through this.  I am also thanking God that Molly was asleep the whole time this happened.  Which it all seriously happened within 15-20 minutes, then he was gone.

Eric and I have talked a lot about Billy and the ifs, should haves, maybes...and we both keep coming to same conclusion.  Deep down in my gut I honestly believed Billy would bounce back once we moved.  His past record has shown this would happen.  If I ever thought for one second that anything was wrong with him, we would have had him at the vet in a minute.  He actually got a little bit better last week, thank you all for your prayers and kind words.  But then it just went downhill on Saturday morning.

I think if we would have taken to him to the vet, they probably would have found something wrong with him, and we probably would have had to put him to sleep, which would just be awful too.  So, not that I am glad he went the way he did, but at least I didn't have to make the decision to put him down.  Both ways are awful, not going to lie.

I never wanted him to suffer, and I am not sure he did.  By the end he was so out of it and not responsive to me.  Poor baby.  I loved him so much, anyone that knows me knows how much Billy meant to me.  He was like my first baby, and I miss him so much.

Molly is taking it pretty well.  She has only asked about him a couple of times, and seems to get it, but then who knows.  I know she will wonder someday who that cat was she remembers.  But until then we will look at pictures and share memories of her Bubby.

On a totally different note, we are all moved in to our house, and we are unpacking everything.  The move went wonderful!  We had over 20 people help us move, and everyone did a great job!  So thank you all!!

Right now we don't have internet, we are getting it this week, but who knows when.  So I know I am way behind on everyone's life.  I will get around to you all, no worries.  Thank you all again so much for the prayers and encouraging words.  They mean the world to me, and I am so thankful for all of you!!

Billy

See this sweet little thing...he is not doing very well.  This is out cat, Billy.  I love my cat, like love my cat.  Yes, I am one of those.  Our cat gets very, very stressed out when he sees a suitcase or boxes, like what we have going on right now.  Our cat also has a bleeding disorder, not a good combo with his stress factor.  When he gets stressed he bleeds internally, he already has had a blood transfusion.  

If you don't feel too silly, could you please pray for him.  I feel like that person at Bible Study saying, "our friend's neighbor's cat..."  But really, our cat could use your prayers.  Even Eric is worried about him, which never happens, never.  So we are deciding on taking him to the vet which literally could kill him with his high maintenance stress issues, or to see if he can make it to the big move on Friday.  He needs so kitty Prozac, or a tranquilizer.  So do I right now. 
 

Blog Party- Filled With Praise!

I am linking up today with Amy, from Filled With Praise.  She is celebrating her one year anniversary for her blog.  Hop over to say hey to Amy, and to join in the fun!!

1. If you could have dinner with any person (past or present) who would it be? I would say my brother.  He died 12 years ago, and I was only 14.  I would love to sit down with him and just talk and look at his face.

2. What is your most embarrassing moment that you are willing to share with the blogging world?  I do embarrassing things all of the time, I guess I always embarrass myself by putting my foot in my mouth, or just blurting out things without thinking first. 

3. If you could only use one word to describe yourself, what would it be? Naive

4. You found a machine that allows you to fast forward your life to a moment or to rewind your life to a certain moment, but it can only be used for one moment.  Would you fast forward or rewind and to which moment would you choose?  My first reaction to this was a HUGE YES!  But the more I thought about it, the more fitting my answer to number 3 is.  So, no, I would not fast forward or rewind.  As much as I LOVE planning everything, that kind of takes the fun out of life a little bit, and I try not to dwell on past mistakes, so I probably wouldn't want to do anything over, and relive the embarrassment! 

5. What is your favorite simple blessing in life?  Seeing my husband play, read, or sit with our daughter.

 

I am getting carried away now...

So I have been dying to tell you all that I read a book in less than 24 hours!  This once in a lifetime occurrence happened a month ago, but it still counts, right?  When my mom came to visit she brought me this...

It's funny, because even though we all know the story and know how it ended, I still could not put the book down!  Luckily my mom was here to watch Molly.  Not that I neglected either one of them in those 24 hours, but I would pick the book up real quick while my mom would change Molly's diaper!  So if you have not read it, you need to!  I will send you my copy once my friend, Donna is finished with it. 

Now I am working on this...

It's about being a pastor's wife, well more like how to be a better one.  I have really enjoyed it so far.  I am not going through it as quickly as Angie's book, but the topics are so different.  I found myself talking out loud while reading this book, saying things like "amen, wouldn't you know it, and how true is that."  Maybe it's a good thing I read when I am alone!

Sometimes I feel conflicted on the whole pastor's wife thing.  I don't want to get caught up in that mentality, but I guess it's reality for my family.  I love being in the ministry, check that, most days I love being in the ministry, and most days I love the people we minister to.  Maybe they should read this book, just to get a glimpse of what we go through, and the pressures we deal with.  But I am thankful for every opportunity God gives us in our ministry and wouldn't change a thing.

Now on to this...

 
I took these pictures after work on Tuesday.  I am sure my bump is a little larger than normal because we ate all day, seriously, ALL day at work on Tuesday celebrating a birthday.  We had brownies at 9am!  Then ate a huge lunch, and then we all ate ice-cream cake.  I am trying to get more creative with belly shots, but that's about the extent of it folks.  I can't believe I will be 15 weeks on Sunday and then on Thursday go for my 16 week check-up.  I keep thinking once Molly turns 3 in August, it is literally a matter of a couple of months before this baby shows up at out house.  Wow! 
,
Well, I am off to consume my daily dairy intake-more ice-cream!!  What, the baby needs it :) 

One Prayer-Unstoppable

One Prayer starts on Sunday!  I am so excited!  This is one of my favorite series that The Ridge does, and I know this year will be no exception.  I hope your churches participate in One Prayer.  That's what the whole thing is about, believers from all over the world coming together in love and unity.  If your church does not do One Prayer, tell them you want to next year!

The theme this year is Unstoppbale.  As Christians this should be our theme every day, not for 4 weeks a year.  Kristin posted a couple days about "Unstoppbale Idiots."  Go check it out! 

The Ridge has so many events, projects, and fun things planned for One Prayer.  I would tell you, but I don't want to give anything away just quite yet.  Stay tuned!