Girls weekend

It’d been a long time coming, this trip. It had been talked about for literally years until Linda finally did something about it. And it was awesome. We were minus one due to last minute changes, but we still managed to have fun without her. We pretty much just shopped and ate. More eating than shopping, despite going to the Mall of America! We did our research and made sure we went to only the best spots in MSP, and our efforts paid off. I’m pretty sure we all came home a good 5 pounds heavier.

Just a warning to my lady friends: if you are planning on doing some serious shopping, and you go with 2 pregnant friends, expect to do most of your shopping alone. Unless the shopping consists of sitting in director’s chairs getting makeovers. They are not likely to try on a stitch of clothing, and are instead intent on finding a place to sit while you wait in lines for fitting rooms. Or just try it on over your clothes in the middle of the store. Whatever works. They were good sports though, following me around through all 3 levels of shopping bliss, and never complaining even though I know they were super sore and tired.

Here are the spoils from the day. Not too bad, right? Buried underneath is all of our stuff from IKEA, too. I felt super trendy, buying things that are trendy now, instead of buying them on clearance on their way out: neons, colored denim, feathers, etc. Hey, at least once in my life I can be in style and wear something cute, right?

Food highlights:

Chino Latino. Serving foods from around the Equator. We got carne asada, bulgogi lettuce cups, chicken skewers, and friend bananas. So. Much. Food. And so delicious. It did not disappoint. If you go, make reservations. Huge wait. But not for us, we made reservations!

Izzy’s for ice cream. You get a scoop and a little “Izzy” scoop of a different flavor for you to try. Apparently their waffle cones are to die for…a fact my friends failed to tell me until I had already ordered my dinky sugar cone. :(

Hell’s Kitchen for breakfast. Totally crazy place….almost like a Halloween-ish vibe. But crazy delicious food. We got a huge caramel cinnamon roll, giant huevos rancheros, and lemon ricotta pancakes. Oh, and this bison sausage toast stuff. All very unique and so good. Again, make reservations!

Matt’s Bar for a Minneapolis staple, the Jucy Lucy, a cheese-stuffed burger. A teeny bar, no reservations taken. We sat at the bar because it opened up first. We had to wait awhile, but it was so worth it. The cheese is like molten hot lava at first bite but oh so good. Look at it pouring out!! Almost my favorite meal of the whole trip. And good fries, too. Yum.

We hit up Jamba Juice and happened upon Free Pretzel Day at Auntie Anne’s! Score!

Met another mascot,

and a Lego Woody,

and learned that bike lanes are huuuuuge in Minneapolis. I thought that was a lane, and was totally confused that there was an empty car parked in the middle of the road and totally drove right past it on the right. Oops.

It was a super fabulous trip. Derrick was a little, ok a lot, nervous to stay with the girls all weekend, but they loved it, and he did great, even with a power outage one night! It was so fun to get away and spend some quality time with 2 of my best friends. Next time we gotta have more of our friends join us and really have a party!!

Perfect Day

We have had some crazy amazing weather lately, and we are loving it. It’s so bizarre that it’s been so nice here lately. Usually we’re buried in mountains of snow with no real sign of spring for weeks. But my crocuses and hyacinths are blooming, and you can hear and see signs of life everywhere.

Saturday we were outside the entire day. The girls were in heaven. So much, in fact, that this morning when Hannah woke up the first thing she said was “outside? swing?” and when I told her we had to go to church she just crumpled on the ground and started crying. Poor girl!

While we were grocery shopping in the morning we had a visit from the secret leprechaun! He left two scandalous looking bouncing balls and some snacks for the girls. They loved it.

  

Then we packed a lunch and headed to a big park up in Cedarburg. We all played and ate and had a great time. Then we checked out the last covered bridge left in Wisconsin, just a few minutes away from the park. It’s in a pretty charming little park with a little stream and a meadowy lawn and a big blue porta potty that Summer insisted on using twice in the 15 minutes we were there. After a quick trip to Costco we headed home for naps and then built a fire in the firepit. We roasted wieners for dinner and had s’mores for dessert.

A little more playtime and it was time for baths and bed. But I was so sad…I wanted to stay outside with my family and keep playing. It really was as close to as perfect day as we could get. The girls were so well behaved, the weather was beyond amazing, it was just a lot of fun.

sometimes we like to play “India” and see how many people we can fit in one car.       

Let’s hope for many many more days like this one!

Valentine’s Day Part 2

Warning: TMI following! Lots of talk of womanly issues. Male readers beware! :)

Towards the end of our Valentine’s party I started to feel really crampy. (I had felt crampy the day before at church as well, and took some Ibuprofen…so I thought. In my pained stupor I took a prenatal vitamin out of habit. Those don’t work for pain, FYI. Someone gave me an Aleve, which didn’t do anything either.) So after I put the kids to bed I laid down to try and take a nap but couldn’t really sleep because I was in so much pain. I dozed on and off for maybe 20 minutes and then felt fine. I made dinner and we put the kids to bed and I settled down to watch some Bachelor. Derrick went to bed at 9 and around 10 I started to feel a little achy again. I made my way to bed around 11 after taking some Ibuprofen hoping it would die down and I could sleep. Well, that never happened. It started to get worse and I laid writhed around in pain for an hour and half or so with what felt like contractions. They were every couple of minutes or so and felt just like contractions in intensity and pain. I was on my period at the time so I thought maybe I was just having those crazy cramps I sometimes hear about from other girls. In between contractions I googled my symptoms but couldn’t find anything conclusive. I finally had to wake Derrick up and tell him I thought we should go to the ER. At this point it’s 1:30 am. I don’t think I can drive myself, so we call our good friend Ann to come stay with the kids while we go to the hospital.

After being stopped by the Menomonee Falls police for a burned out headlight, we make it to the ER, which was thankfully dead, and I was taken right back. I got an IV and some morphine and the doctor came all within like 10 minutes. It was amazing. The doctor does a pelvic exam and says he sees something protruding out of my cervix and that he’s never seen anything like it. Comforting, right? He says he’s going to call my doctor and see what she says. Thankfully, my doctor was on call that night and she came to see what was going on. She confirmed that there was indeed stuff stuck in my cervix. “Products of conception” she called it, leftover from my miscarriage back in NOVEMBER. She used forceps and ridiculously large Q-Tip looking things and pulled out half a specimen jar full of stuff. Leftover placental tissue, likely.

Even though she was pretty sure she got everything, we decided to go ahead and do the D&C just to make sure. By this time it’s Tuesday, her day set aside for surgery. Another blessing. I was admitted to my own room and my surgery was scheduled for 9:30 am. Since I was in a bed this whole time I slept on and off while poor Derrick was stuck in a stiff chair, trying to sleep in any position he can. I felt horrible for him.

I had to leave my glasses in my room while they wheeled my bed to pre-op, which I hated. I’m practically blind. But everyone was so nice and comforting. In the OR the anesthesiologist told me I might feel a little bit dizzy, and I told them I still had on my underwear, which I guess I was worried about, and then the next thing I know I’m waking up in my room. Craaaazy.

Meanwhile Ann got Summer ready for Joy School and sent her on her way and was totally taking care of everything back home. I was going to send Valentine’s for her friends but that didn’t happen obviously and my friend noticed Summer didn’t have any to give while everyone else did and helped her make some really quickly. I don’t know why, but that little act of kindness STILL makes me cry thinking about it!!

After recovering for a bit I was discharged, and back home by 2 pm. I felt fine, no pain, just really tired. I took a nap and Derrick took the kids and let me rest. My amazing friends set me up with dinners for the week and just took good care of me. I had beautiful flowers delivered from sweet girls at Derrick’s work. I was feeling very loved, for sure.

Since November I’d been having my blood levels drawn to make sure my pregnancy hormones were dropping like they should. And they were, just soooo slowly. But they were still falling so my doctor wasn’t concerned. Who knew my uterus was a hoarder????

This whole thing is just a big frustrating mess. I feel like I am wasting so much time by not being pregnant! If I were going to have another baby spaced the same as Summer and Hannah I would be having a baby in 9 days. CRAZY!! So it’s so weird to me to not even be close to pregnant. And while I thought I would be able to start trying now, now I have to wait ANOTHER 2 cycles, so that I can have a better chance at getting and staying pregnant next time. I know in the grand scheme of things it’s really nothing, but I really just wanted to crank out all my kids and get it all over with, as horrible as that sounds. I’ve come to terms with it though, and am really enjoying my two girls and where they’re at now. They are both a great, predictable age, and both are starting to do and say some fun things. So I’m just trying to focus on the NOW, instead of on the what could have been.

And that’s all I have to say about that.