5 Favorites: Resort Style

Due to my lack of motivation to write but still feeling the urge to write, I am going to cop out with a 5 Favorites post about the resort we stayed at. 

1. This was the view from my balcony. 

First off, every room HAD a balcony. But when we got there, it was Husband's 30th birthday and we got upgraded to a 10th level pool/Disney view room. We were fans. This gave us fireworks to look at every night without any crowds and well... those pools are gorgeous. You could paddle boat or kyak on that lake. There were also mini-golf, regular golf and trails all around to walk or bike on. Pretty nice. 

2. Relaxing Pool Side

 

I was able to spend quite a bit of time by the pool. Reading and snoozing. In this chair I lasted about 40 minutes because I didn't want to burn. 

3. Socializing by the pool.

On Friday, when all sorts of people had shown up from the company, we all spent HOURS by the pool. And the company paid for food and beverages galore so that was pretty great. I was able to swim but not until Friday night when I had the pool basically to myself. 

4. Proximity

We are a Disney people and Mickey is our guy. In this picture, also from my balcony, see that white blob at the top of the picture near the skyline? That is the La Nouba Tent at Downtown Disney. It's not a good picture. But like I said, we could also see Cinderella's Castle, Spaceship Earth and Downtown Disney clearly. I'm a fan! Next best thing to staying on Disney property which is my preference. (But we weren't there for us so... it worked out.)

5. Spending Time in Downtown Disney

I actually was able to get to Downtown Disney twice, once on Wednesday night to celebrate Husband's birthday. We ate at Raglan Road, an Irish pub. We ate there on our honeymoon and it was a wonderful evening of chatting and reminiscing. One of my college roommates actually lives in the Orlando area so on Thursday she and her husband picked me up and we went back to Downtown Disney. We ate at Earl of Sandwich (A new to me experience and one that I will be repeating for sure.) and then we were able to walk around I bought the tee shirts I regretted not buying the night before. 

So there you have it. 

Home Again!

We are home! I haven't been in my house since April 16 and boy is it good to be home!!!! C is playing with his stuff like it's brand new. I am just sitting and not thinking. The. Best. The best I tell you!

I have so much to write about. Easter. Vacation. Disney. Traveling.

But for now, I will just leave you with this, I am very happy to be home. My trip was delightful but I am excited for normalcy again!

If You Need Me

So... Because of general life business and Holy Week and Easter and recouping from Easter the bloggy world has been dead.

Yes. And sure enough now that it is apparently NOT dead you won't be hearing from me much. Or maybe you will. I don't know yet.

Because I am on vacation!!

That's right. Real and true vacation. Husband has a work conference and my parents are holding down the fort with C.

Now of course this is the longest I'll have ever been away from him. And yes my super hormonal self was a wreck leaving this morning while he was still sleeping like a bug. But I think it will be good. I just keep telling myself that. I'm sure he's barely noticed I'm gone yet.

We haven't had a vacation since our honeymoon (And since Husband is working it's probably not exactly a vacation but shhhh don't tell me that.)

Oh yeah, it is ALSO Husband's 30th birthday today so we are having a great day. Since it is the travel day he conference doesn't start until tomorrow. Which equals almost maybe a real vacation day?

So if you need me I'll be the pale 15 week pregnant lady hanging out by the pool with her mocktail. Life is pretty good!

Happy Easter!

I didn't mean to drop big news and disappear but Holy Week was busy and time got away from me!

Wishing all a Happy Happy Easter!

My Best 7 Quick Takes Ever

Woah. Lot's to live up to here. But I'm feeling pretty confident! Let's take a look at my week in review okay?

1. Our Chest Freezer Died. 

I'm sad. I am glad that I noticed when stuff was still partially frozen. We managed to save a lot. It's still a bummer. But we have a coupon actually for appliance repair and it's only about 2 years old so hopefully it will be an easy and cheap fix! 

2. C has been sick. 

Totally awful. And gross. Let's just say that I have Lysol-ed a lot this week. And I mopped the kitchen floor. Not because of his sickness, but because it was dirty and I needed something to be clean and healthy. So the kitchen floor won. We have a doctor's appointment today. I hope he's on the mend!

3. Husband was on a work retreat Tuesday-Thursday. 

God Bless all the single parents out there. Nothing makes me happier than Husband walking through the door. Apparently it was pretty okay and we are happy to have him home!! 

4. Keep Praying for Beth and Family

As I write this, there's no update on Rebecca's surgery yet but let's assume Beth's family needs continued prayers throughout the weekend. We want Beth to be released from her hospital so she can go be with Rebecca at hers! 

5. My New Found Love

Of cheesy Hallmark/ABC Family original movies. I keep Netflixing them. They're so brainless and enjoyable. You can watch, or not watch and you still get that warm and gooey feeling inside!

6. Palm Sunday is THIS Sunday.

Hello Holy Week! We've been waiting for you! 

(And not just because I am anxious to get back to my paper plates.)

7. This. 

We're thrilled. 

And thankful. 

And with that I am linking up with Jen for Quick Takes and Jamie for Thankfuls. 

Have a wonderful weekend! 

Prayer Warriors! Updated!

Prayer Warriors!

If you read this, you probably already read Beth's blog.

If not, Beth's daughter Rebecca has Trisomy 18 and will be born TODAY Thursday, April 10. At 9:00 AM Eastern Time the C-section is scheduled to begin. was born today at 9:40 Eastern Time. She will need surgery of her esophagus tonight hopefully!

Beth has these specific intentions below but regardless of what you're doing today please lift her family in prayer!!

• Pray that the c-section goes smoothly and that there are no complications for me.
• Pray for a miracle for Rebecca - that she be born free from any signs of Trisomy 18 or any other birth defects.
• If that's not the Lord's plan for her pray that Dan and I have wisdom and discernment when making decisions about her medical care. 
•  Pray that all the doctors and medical personnel that see Rebecca understand that even though she has a condition that deems her "incompatible with life", we see her as God sees her - beautiful and precious and worth doing everything we can to save.  Give these doctors wisdom on the best way to proceed.
• Pray that if she needs surgery to repair her esophagus tomorrow or Friday that the doctors are guided by the hand of God during the surgery.
• Pray for Peter and Sarah.  Pray that they feel God's love and peace. They are both dealing with this possible diagnosis in completely different ways and neither way is what I would deem healthy.

We are also adding that we are praying for a strong recovery for Beth so she may be discharged from her hospital to go be with Rebecca at hers! (She had to be transported for her surgery.) 

Pray Pray Pray!

Wedding Dance Along

So Grace is hosting this delightful wedding dance along. And, well, I took the music at our wedding very seriously.

How seriously you may ask?

Here have a look at my Do Not Play List:

Do Not Play:

Artists:

Any song by The Beatles or a former Beatle, especially Imagine. I cannot stress this point enough. No covers. No originals. No post Beatles. No Beatles. None.

Jamie Foxx

The Fray (Not that they are particularly dance worthy but even still.)

Rod Stewart

Specific Songs We Don’t Want to Hear (in any rendition):

Over the Rainbow

Unchained Melody

Picture (Kid Rock)

Smooth (Rob Thomas)

Maggie May

Loving You

So Happy Together

I love You More Today than Yesterday

Chicken Dance

Shout

At Last

Brown Eyed Girl

Celebration

Are You Going to be my Girl (Jets)

Proud Mary

Have I Told You Lately that I Love You

I Will Survive

Wonderful World

Every Breath You Take

You Light Up My Life

Close to You

We've Only Just Begun

My Heart Will Go On ,

Open Arms

Can't Smile Without You

The Wind Beneath My Wings

Hopelessly Devoted to You

Endless Love

Everything I do, I do it for you

Truly Madly Deeply

Redneck Woman

Save a Horse, Ride a Cowboy

Say Hey (I Love You)

I Like to Move It

All Summer Long (Kid Rock)

Yep.

I had three requirements for our first dance:

1. It couldn't be a song I dislike (duh) 
2. It couldn't be cheesy
3. It couldn't be too popular

Only thing is... did you see my do not play list? I dislike a lot.

I don't like The Beatles. I do not judge you for your music tastes but they give me a headache and I choose to not listen to them. You absolutely can. I just try to avoid them. And it was my wedding. Not time for a headache. In fairness, I do like "Got My Mind Set On You" by George Harrison but that seemed more complicated than stating "The Beatles or anything by a former Beatle" 

And I do not have brown eyes, making "Brown Eyed Girl" inappropriate for my wedding. Also a few songs/artists (Jamie Foxx) were added by Husband so I am not all crazy I swear. 

And also in fairness my "Must Play List" involved only 6 songs

1. Our First Dance Song
2. Father/Daughter Dance "My Girl" by The Temptations
3. First Group Dance "Gonna Make You Sweat (Everybody Dance Now)" by C+C Music Factory
4. My favorite song: "Crazy Beautiful" by Hanson (Judge Away)
5. Our song "Chasing Cars" by Snow Patrol
6. Our favorite cheesy love song "The Inspiration" by Chicago

As you can see from that list, we have an "our song" and we did dance to it, we just wanted it to be for us and not with 200 people staring at us while we danced to it. So for Chasing Cars AND The Inspiration we still danced with each other, happily and in love they just weren't our first dance song. 

Which led me to years of looking for the right song. Yes years. We had a 2 year, 3 month engagement and right after picking the date and the place of our wedding I got to work on the first dance. 

I finally landed on "You Got Me" by Colbie Caillat.

This is a long weird story, but right after we got engaged "Bubbly" was super popular and I remember this crystal clear. I was driving home from work for lunch (normal occurance at my summer job) and I was driving down my street and about to turn into the cul-de-sac and I thought, "I love her voice and this song. Maybe it could be our song? Nah... too slow."

And I picked all kinds of songs. And then they weren't right. But then I picked. Finally. It was approved. It was glorious. I am all about the lyrics, and certain parts of songs that I love didn't work for me because of one lyric. But "You Got Me" worked. It even starts out saying "I like you." Which is something we say a lot!

Then as a little break from grad school life, Husband who was Fiance back then, took me to see Letters to Juliet. And I was excited. Until the opening note of the movie hit. It was "You Got Me" by Colbie Caillat. Of course it was. I believe I stammered something along the lines of "If this song suddenly becomes popular I will seriously flip out." 

It didn't. Or maybe it did. But I never heard it on the radio so I was fairly content with life at that point. So we went and got ourselves married. Pretended to eat some food and danced.  

Then we tore up the dance floor because the songs of the summer were "In My Head" by Jason Derulo and "Dynamite" by Taio Cruz. And I LOVE me some Top 40! 

And our DJ did end up playing the beginning 3 seconds of Proud Mary before my dad shut that down. (Actually it was my parent's only request for the Do Not Play List... I funny enough have no problem with that song.) And now in 2014 I also see he played "I Like to Move It" which I think is a dumb song but I also remember nobody danced to it anyway so... who cares? 

My mother of course thought all my music was ghetto but I swear it wasn't. I swear. 

And thus ends the saga of Madeline's Wedding First Dance Song. 

Liebster Award

Laura over at String of Pearls nominated my little blog for a Liebster Award. Which is very thoughtful and she asked 11 incredibly challenging questions. But I think I did them justice so we'll see! Here are the rules: 

Liebster Award Rules:

Acknowledge the blog that nominated you.

Answer the 11 questions the nominating blogger created.

List 11 bloggers with less than 200 followers that deserve some recognition.

Write 11 questions for them to answer.

Notify them they've been nominated.

My answers to her thought provoking questions: 

1. Do you have a favorite saint with whom you feel a special kinship? (Who is it, and why?)
I have always been very fond of St. Anthony. He has very rarely let me down on those pesky lost things! I would use his name to honor a baby but I don't love Anthony as a first name and because of the last initial we can't use any vowels for middle names. On the feminine side, I did my confirmation report on St. Barbara and while I am not likely to die a quick and violent death at work I do love her dearly.

2. Do you have a "bucket list"?  (And if so, what's the first item on the list?)
For the past few years I've had a list of "25 Things to Do When I'm 25" or whatever the age may be. Funny enough I didn't make one for 27 which would be this year's list. So now I am writing a "30 Things to Do Before I'm 30" list. That will give me about 2 years and 4 months... I can do that right?! 

3. Where is your favorite place to swim: a heated pool, a freshwater lake, or the ocean?
Heated pool. Yes. I like to look at the ocean. And I like boat in lakes. But swimming no question is the very best in a pool. 

4. What are three words that describe you?  (Sorry--I hate it when people ask me questions like that.) Passionate, Sensitive and Realistic. 

5. Are you fluent in a second language? Not even close. I took French 7-10 grade but I was HORRIBLE at it. Just terrible. My brothers for sure got that gene. They're really good at it. I took ASL in 11th grade and can finger spell quite fast. Otherwise I can basically ask people how they're doing, what their name is etc. Not super skilled at all. Then I also went to Danish immersion summer camp for 6 years the last of which was for high school credit (senior year) so I am about equal to my sign language skills in Danish. Which is a really useful language. (Not really)

6. Do you like to travel, or are you more of a homebody? Well I truthfully am a homebody. But I do like a good vacation--we just don't take them! I wish we would! We do travel to see family quite a bit but I mean like a no obligation to anyone kind of vacation is my ideal. The last one we took was our honeymoon. Hopefully we'll take one soon but it's not likely. 

7. What's your all-time favorite book (if you can name just one; if not, how about your three favorites)?

The Last of the Really Great Whangdoodles by Julie Andrews Edwards.  

Yes. That Julie Andrews. It was one of the read aloud books my fourth grade class read after lunch and it was magical. We had a scrappy cap party. I wanted to read it on my own and my mom took me to the library. The librarian couldn't find it for a while then we she did she asked me "Why didn't you just say it was by Julie Andrews?" I didn't know. I was 9. And Mrs. Hovland certainly didn't explain to us that the book was written by Mary Poppins and Maria. 

I still read it annually. I still think it's magical. One of my life's ambitions is to meet Julie Andrews and thank her for this book. She spoke at my high school (after I graduated obviously) and her children's book tours haven't come to my area and they also specifically say she only signs her new book that day. But I have faith I will meet her at some point. I really do. 

8. Do you love to cook (or would you rather eat out and have someone else do it)? I can cook. I don't love it. I love to bake sweet things, cookies, cakes and brownies. Husband does love to cook and he bakes bread so we split time in the kitchen. I do love going out to eat but with C we just don't often . I was able to go out to eat last weekend which was very fun and exciting for me! 

9. If you could only have one dessert for the rest of your life (a horrible prospect, I know!), what would you choose? I really really love dessert. But if I have to pick, I would pick a fresh warm brownie right out the oven. You can dress a brownie up with ice cream, or frosting or just by itself with a glass of milk. I think I could be content with brownies fresh from the oven. 

10. Is there a particular work of Catholic art that is your favorite?  (Share the image with us, if you can.) I am a little ashamed that I don't have a favorite. Especially since I took AP Art History and enjoyed it. Certain images speak to me more than others. Pretty much any photograph of Blessed Pope John-Paul II warms my heart with good feelings. I just wish I had been able to hug him. He looks as though he would have given great hugs. What a kind and gentle spirit he had, with kindness in his eyes. There are also certain statues and icons that I love but I have no favorite. I am on a new quest to have one though!

11. What inspired you to begin your blog? We had just gotten married and I moved out-of-state and I didn't have a job yet. So I started a blog as something to do. The original blog is archived and gone now when I made my move over to A Dash of Snark. I moved because I wanted a different blog address! 

Okay now the rules state I am supposed to nominate 11 people... but I am a rule breaker. So what I am going to do is ask 11 questions and if you want to answer my questions and blog about it, consider yourself nominated. I know I felt all warm and fuzzy when Laura nominated me so this is a total cop out for you, but I just don't have that many people who read and comment regularly. 

Here are my 11 questions in case you are interested: 

1. What is your favorite color and why? 
2. What is your top baby name that you wouldn't ever use? (Either done having kids, rhymes with your last name or vetoed by your spouse.)
3. Why do you love your home? 
4. What modern convenience could you not live without?
5. Quick! You just won $100 to the store of your choice. Which store and what would you buy?
6. Would you rather travel by train, plane or automobile? Or boat? Let's throw boat in as an option. 
7. If you could pick a new hobby and be immediately skilled at it what would you pick? 
8. What's the best gift you've ever received? 
9. If someone asked you for a random piece of advice what would you say? 
10. What is the first thing you notice about people? 
11. Why do you like your church over others you've attended? What makes your faith home so special to you? 

So there we have it. My totally rule breaking Liebster Award. Ah well, I am going to own my rule breaking! 

The Past 4 Days

It's Monday. On Friday I had a headache creep in on me and it didn't fully go away until yesterday morning. So I spent the majority of the weekend hydrating and sleeping because that is pretty much what was enjoyable to me.

Thankfully I was able to just rest. I slept for a LONG time Friday into Saturday and that really helped. I went out to lunch with a friend then to Hobby Lobby. I was getting this jolly good idea to join in the stitch-a-long with Jenna so I went to buy a transfer pen and they had none. So... we'll see if this happens or not. But then Saturday night that headache came creeping back. So I slept hard until Sunday when I felt much better finally.

I did wind up helping with yard work yesterday. Spring yard clean up is not really all that fun but there's only 2 weeks of free yard waste pick up. It was sunny and nice out yesterday and there's this saying about farmer's making hay when the sun shines. Basically... do it while you know you can.

I would have been grumpy having to pay $5 a bag for the yard waste we could have had picked up for free so we did almost everything in the yard except one flower bed. (We still have next week for pick up.) I even managed to get the Turf Builder down so hopefully my grass looks less like weeds this year! Time will tell.

Monday came in quietly but the action sure picked up this afternoon! Of course it was garbage day today. So obviously it would be a good day for the chest freezer to go kaput. We're lucky to have friends with Tuesday garbage pick up so we're not stuck with rotting food for a week! It's a good thing I wanted to get some applesauce out or I wouldn't have noticed until tomorrow probably! At least I was able to salvage some things to the upstairs freezer and changed my entire menu plan for the week to include the now-thawing meat in my fridge. Is Thursday an actual Feast day? Because it is now at our house!

I did have to make some choices over what would stay and what would go and Husband was of course not shocked when I determined the pepperoni was a goner. Luckily the steaks and other expensive cuts of meat and giant 5lb blocks of cheese were still frozen and I could make room for them. As it happens we just used the last of our ground beef so I can safely say no beef went to waste at all!

The only real bummer was the push-ups were toast. Just orange liquid. And C and I had only split one so there was a lot of waste. The consolation is that we used our bonus reward points to buy them so while we lost the points we didn't lose cash on wasted treats. Small victories right?

That's what we've been up to the past few days. I hope your Monday has been less running around with not-quite-frozen food than mine!

7 Takes of Quick

It's a Quick Takes Day. And I haven't written a whole lot this week so, lucky you! Quick Takes!

1. Toddler Antics

The letter C. Yes it is the first letter in his name. Yes Cookie Monster sings about it. And we might watch that a lot. But my son is obsessed with finding all the Cs in the world and pointing to them. And saying "C." And singing the C is for Cookie song. It's endearing but I am hoping to add another letter soon. P or O show promise. 

It doesn't help that now all he asks for are cookies. Like when he woke himself up at 2:00 AM the other night. Which is weird anyway but when asked what he wanted the answer was cookie. Repeatedly. He didn't get one if you were wondering. He got to go back to sleep. 

2. Obsession with Pigeon

We got the latest and greatest new Pigeon book on Tuesday. And I swear we've read it 200 times since then. It's like Ted and Marshall's road trip with the Proclaimer's song "I'm Gonna Be (500 Miles)" 

I get sick of it. The it comes back around again as the best book ever. There are lots of gems in the book. And if you know that Mo started writing children's books because of the Go Dog. Go conversations about hats, one part is especially funny. 

If you want to check out the book and have a Barnes and Noble near you, at 11:00 tomorrow (in everyone's time zone's respective 11:00s.) The Pigeon Needs A Bath will be read for story time. 

3. In More C News

In the world of talking I believe it's a lot like a roller coaster. You slowly build upon what they know and at a certain point you reach the point of no return and you're off. We have gone over the hump and now he is adding words all the time and sayings. Granted, not everyone in the world would understand him all the time, but Husband and I understand him more than we don't. So that's a win! 

4. Why Not Talk About the Weather? 

It's supposed to be nice this weekend. Which I am happy about. In the spring we get 2 free yard waste collection weeks and Monday is our first one. So I am glad the rain will stop and we can do a clean up without having to pay for it. (Yet.) Still waiting for more nice days. Lot's of fine days. Thankfully no snow. But now that I've typed that I am sure I've jinxed myself. 

5. I saw Divergent

Yes it was all the way last Friday and a full week after it came out. My movie buddy is a doula and she had a busy birth week. It was good. I feel like they did the best job they could have. Obviously they twisted the ending a little bit to make it more dramatic (and to give Kate Winslet more to do I'm sure) but overall it was fairly true to the book in the way that no movie can ever be the book. 

The next one doesn't come out for a long long while. And while Divergent has the concept that is the most intriguing to me it is not my favorite Dystopic trilogy. I know some people had problems with the violence in the first book. And since the violence was 90% training it's probably better if you don't read the second and third books! :) 

Any day they'll announce the Matched movies and the Legend movies. I saw the preview for The Maze Runner so certainly these other two trilogies aren't far behind. 

6. I Still Haven't Seen Frozen

Or heard this "Let it Go" everyone keeps posting to the Facebook. I love Disney and I have no doubt I'll enjoy it when I see it, but it just hasn't been my biggest priority. I'll get there sometime I'm sure. Until then, which conspiracy theory/hidden agenda is most accurate? 

7. April is A Busy Month

We're in the calm before the storm. Husband has a "work retreat" which sounds just awful by the way, next week. Then it's Easter and then vacation... It's hard not to be getting ahead of myself. All in all I think it will be a good month though. Busy can be good sometimes. And it's my last full month to enjoy a 1 year old!! May 26 is coming up FAST! 

Have a terrific weekend!! Linking up over at the Conversion Diary because Jen is the host of the Quick Takes. 

WWRW: The Pigeon Needs A Bath

If you've been here before you already know about our love of Mo Willems.

If not I'll quickly explain: we love Mo Willems.

So way back when we pre-ordered the newest book in the Pigeon line: The Pigeon Needs A Bath. With an April Fool's Day release date I was sure we were in for a treat. Little in life is as satisfying as waking up from nap to a delivery from the UPS man. But it's an even more satisfying when it's a book! And even more satisfying YET when it's by Mo Willems. Needless to say, it was an exciting afternoon yesterday.

The Pigeon Needs A Bath has everything you'd expect from the Pigeon. 

It starts out with the Bus Driver letting us know that the Pigeon is filthy and needs a bath. 

After much arguing and stalling the Pigeon decides that fine, he will take a bath, and then my favorite part. If you've read some of the Pigeon books where Mo Willems divides each page into 4 mini-pages with a separate argument on each then you'll love this spread too. 29 squares with the bathtub and Pigeon figuring out his perfect bath. (Is it too hot? Cold? Reflective? Do you have some toys?) 

Then, predictably, he finally gets in and loves his bath time. 

On the toddler scale The Pigeon Needs A Bath got C's stamp of approval. 

On a parent scale I would say that The Pigeon Needs A Bath is a fun read. There are lots of bonus Mo characters in the book. Knuffle Bunny makes 2 separate appearances and Piggie is snuck in as well. Also a fun new twist to the Pigeon books, the endpaper/flypaper art has a hidden twist like Mo uses for the Elephant and Piggie Books. 

If you're looking for a fun new read or a gift for someone (small or tall) it's a fairly safe guess they don't have The Pigeon Needs A Bath yet as it's only been available for 24 hours.  

Linking up with Jessica and her WWRW Link-Up.