House Full of Sickies!

I’ve been MIA for the past 5 days due to our house being struck with “the sickies.”

It started with Grace who had a dreadful runny nose and cough that turned out to also be a double ear infection.  Poor thing was totally miserable and couldn’t even sleep it off very well because of the ear pain.  Fortunately after only a couple days I took her into the pediatrician who got her on “the pink stuff” (aka Amoxicillin).  Both Andy and I are slightly jealous that she gets the bubble gummy goodness twice a day :)

She’s on the mend now which is great, but I got sick a few days ago which is the pits.  The only thing more uncomfortable than being 9 months pregnant is being 9 months pregnant and sick.  I’m feeling significantly better today which I’m very grateful for, but now Andy is getting it.

Boo!

At least he’s on his 3 week Christmas break right now so he can lay low and rest up while he gets better.  Grace and I love having him around all day and hope that baby sister arrives early enough to get some full-time Daddy time before he’s back to his rigorous school schedule.

I had my weekly appointment with the midwife today and so far everything is still good.  Baby’s heartbeat sounds great and my blood pressure is holding steady which is fantastic since I was already having issues at this point when I was pregnant with Grace.

As much as I want this baby out of me, I really want her to come in her own time and au naturale :)  I somehow made it through my pitocin fueled labor with Grace but I’d like to see what a regular contraction feels like this time.

I’m probably one of the only pregnant women who is actually excited about the labor and delivery process.  It was by far the most painful thing I’d ever experienced when I brought Grace into the world, but it has become my “happy place” because it was such an amazing experience at the same time.  Plus, it’s just temporary and the reward is so very sweet! :)

We’ve finalized baby girl #2’s name after much debate about her middle name.  Just last night I had cold feet about our choice but talked it over with Andy at dinner tonight and I’m back to loving it.  Like last time we’re keeping it under wraps until she makes her grand entrance, but I’ll be sure to put up a post with her name and stats as soon as I can.

Christmas prep is just about done around here despite us all juggling being sick.  I figure if I’m cooped up and can’t go anywhere at least I can bake!

So far I’ve tackled thin mints (a Pinterest find), buckeyes, frosted butter cookies, chocolate crinkle cookies and gingerbread men.

After the gingerbread saga last week, I’ve been anticipating the outcome of these guys.  Honestly, I’m not in love with them :( They are not as chewy or sweet as I remember so I’m thinking one of two things needs to happen…1) I need to try grandma’s crazy 7 cups of flour recipe or 2) I need to find a new recipe all together.  If you have a great one, let me know!

I did have lots of fun making them with Grace and setting aside my perfectionistic tendencies to let her put the eyes and buttons wherever she wanted.  Then, in an attempt to sweeten them up, I added some leftover butter cookie icing to the edges but it didn’t go very well.  C’est la vie!  I guess you win some and lose some :)

Still on the pre-Christmas list are Russian Tea Cakes which I never got around to last week as well as cranberry poppy seed bread and cornflake marshmallow wreaths because I saw them on Pinterest and they reminded me of my grandma :)

I also want to try to get Christmas cards out before the weekend but photo opportunities have not been good with at least one of the 3 of us looking miserable since last week!  Maybe I’ll send belated Christmas cards.  Ha!

P.S. If you missed my last post, you didn’t see that I have an awesome new plugin that allows me to post printable recipes!  I’m working on getting all of my recipes into the new format so you can just click and print instead of lugging your laptop into the kitchen or copying and pasting the info into Word.  I’m pretty stinkin’ excited about the new format so be sure to check it out!