Thursday, March 31, 2011

Introducing... Easton




Easton Mark Frank

Born: March 22, 2011 at 1:59 pm
Weight: 7 lb 10 ounces
Length: 19.5 inches
Labor duration: about 14 hours





Friday, March 18, 2011

One week left!


Wow, where has the time gone!?
Even though it says one week left, I wonder when baby Easton really plans to get here. I have a tentative induction date for April 1st, but am considering skipping it... what's one more week, right?!
I was not too thrilled about the April 1st birthday either, especially cause Ryan has already been joking about and pushing for an April Fools birthday. Great, our son isn't even born yet and the poor kid's father is already scheming his birthday. I am still hopeful for a March baby:)
Things have been going well though and I am very content with pregnancy right now. Aside from the growing few stretch marks I have acquired (tear) and this awful cold I caught this past week, I am feeling pretty great. False labor has been going on for weeks and it's kinda fun to feel the muscles contract. Bodies are pretty amazing to me.
So I will post one last pregnancy picture. I had another growth spurt the past two weeks. I still don't feel enormous, but the picture might say otherwise. Sometimes Ryan lifts my belly for me and it feels so liberating to get the weight off! It makes me gitty to get my body back and the weight off! Now, lack of sleep, I can stand to put off for another week or so!

Tuesday, March 15, 2011

Foooood!!!

Tonight we are having a couple LDS missionaries over for dinner. As Ryan is home and we are having two young guys over for dinner, I am making something hearty. I am making Pasta with Basil Cream Sauce, salad, rolls, and pie. The recipe that I found for the pasta sauce, is without fail, a hit every time I make it. The flavor is wonderful and of course there is all that cream which leaves your stomach begging for a second helping. Yes, it's one of those lean-back-in-your-chair-as-you kick-yourself-for-over-eating recipes.
As some of you might know, I almost never memorize recipes and never remember how I tweak them either. I try to write notes, but in the end I think half of what I make is forgotten and difficult to find or reinvent again. This is not one of those. Thankfully I found the recipe online and somehow I always manage to find the correct page again.
This basil cream sauce is made by Chef Vogel and after a little further investigation, discovered that he has his own website of recipes. Once I find a good recipe, I tend to experiment with others from the same webpage. I haven't ventured into the other recipes...yet, but I can assure you that if the only recipe you walk away with is the Basil Cream Sauce, you will be content.
Here is the site:
www.foodforthoughtonline.net
I hope all you aspiring chefs enjoy!

Ps, the cream sauce is very quick and easy to make! I usually add peas or roasted peppers for a little more color and variation.

Tuesday, March 1, 2011

Stress and joy

Holy crap, things have been crazy lately!
So just 25 days left till baby Frank's due date, but who knows what that really means!
Last Monday Ryan and I flew from Mexico to Madison. The trip was a success and I was really grateful that I didn't really have a swelling issue or any other discomforts. In fact I was feeling so confident about my state of being that when the flight attendant offered vouchers for a later flight, Ryan and I were the first ones to the counter. I love free miles!
Then I ran amock last week, spending time with my Mother, trying to get prenatal classes finshed and meeting my Dr. for the first time (weird saying that at 36 weeks!). He is... interesting. Great Dr., totally different than what I was expecting though.
Then Friday afternoon I was working out all the kinks to getting Doodle back to Mexico after he is born. Screeeeech, eeeeek, ahhhh! Apparently, you can't take an infant over the border with just a birth certificate (unless you are by land or sea), which is what I had been told. He needs a passport after all... yeah those take a little while. So does that social security card that the passport app requires... and so does that birth certificate that the social security card app requires!! and of course it was 3:30 on a Friday when I figured this all out, three days after I am no longer advised to fly internationally! Ahh, I was about to turn my little hiney right back around and sneak onto the next flight to Mexico City. I was so stressed and there was no way I was sitting in the US for the first two-three months of my baby's life without my hubby.
I called different agencies incessantly till the clock tocked five. Dang passport call center kept feeding Ryan and I different info about it all, you need a social security #, then you don't. It was 2 to 1, not in our favor at five. Ryan felt pretty confident that this was all going to be okay and that in some weird way it was supposed to happen. Hannah's thought: Yeah, maybe it was supposed to happen to prove what irresponsible parents we will be! (When I panic, optimism is not my strength!)
So after worrying for the next couple days Ryan left on a jet plane Sunday afternoon, back to Mexico for work. Then bright and early Monday morn, I called the different birth certificate people to see if I could get a rush on that. Ryan called the passport agency and good news!!! We don't need a social security card, we can get the passport processed in a day and no longer than two weeks, and I am going to be put on the list as a priority for the birth certificate to be processed, so no more than a two week wait, and prob much shorter! Woooopeeee!

So, if all our sources check out, we will be sitting pretty on the airplane sometime in April.
If not, we will resort to plan b: travel by land or sea (that would be.... interesting).

Moral of the story:

Don't wait to get these sorts of gov't documents for your wee one. It takes forever and you will be grateful you don't have to worry about this sort of thing when you decide to travel, if you just get it done in the beginning!