Week 24

How Far Along: 24 weeks (actually I'm 25 weeks tomorrow but I like to recap the week before)

Total Weight Gain/Loss: Well last week at the doctors office it appeared that I had gained 18 pounds, then I have weighed myself a couple of times after that and I have come up with only 15 pounds. Including weighing myself on the Wii Fit and we all know the Wii fit don't lie. So who really knows? I did have a sweater and boots on the day I weighed myself at the doctor's office so it might have been off a bit. I need a scale at home so I can weigh myself in the nude.

Maternity Clothes: All maternity pants. Shirts are a combination of regular and maternity. But getting to be mainly maternity.

Gender: BOY!! Eli Tree

Movement: I've been feeling him more and more lately. It doesn't feel like swift "kicks" it mainly just feels like he's rolling around all in there.

Sleep: I've been sleeping pretty well.

What I miss: I have started to miss diet coke a lot. I was drinking regular coke but cut that out once I hit 18(ish?) lbs so now I just miss coke in general.

Cravings: Nothing in particular. I honestly feel like my eating habits have been the same minus a few cravings here and there.

Symptoms: I thought my heartburn was bad last week but this week it has been AWFUL. Like so bad my eyes will start watering from the pain. Also, insecruity....does that count as a pregnancy symptom? Comments from other people sure don't help.

Best Moment this week: Purchasing the nursery furniture! It's so exciting to start getting things ready for our sweet little Eli!

And my favorite husband quote of the week:

I don't have an exact quote from Luke this week, but it was fun to talk about what Eli would be doing this time next year at Thanksgiving. How he will be 8 months old and probably moving and scooting all around. So fun!

Thanksgiving 2010

Thanksgiving 2010 was wonderful!

We split every holiday time between my family and Luke's family. They only live about 45 minutes away from each other so it makes this pretty easy.

Wednesday afternoon we headed to my parent's house. We spent the rest of the night hanging with the family and watching some TV.

Thursday we woke up and I turned on the Macy's Thanksgiving Day parade. Nobody else seemed to be too interested in it, but I LOVE watching the parade. It's just so magical, even though most of it is bad lip-synchers and people walking with a string in hand I still love it.

My mom was busy preparing our Thanksgiving feast and I decided to help her and made some green bean bundles. This must be documented. Since I'm going to be joining the world of mothers this coming year I decided I should start helping with the Thanksgiving festivities. Even though it was one meal and took about 5 minutes of preparation. Then we ate lunch and it was yummy. My 2 favorite dishes on Thanksgiving are cheese potato's, and dressing. Yum yum.

Also, I'm a mixer, I mix all my food up together. It's just better that way.

Then we took some pics

My two sometimes-sweet, sometimes-not sisters:
Me and the momma-sita
Me and my baby (who is not really a baby anymore, she is 18) sister. I'm the sweet one all the time.


And the 3 sisters together:
Before we headed to Luke's parent's house we burned some calories on the Wii. By the way I'm horrible when it comes to games on the Wii Fit that require you to balance, which is basically all of them. Here I am trying to hit soccer balls with my head. NOT as easy as it sounds.

Thursday and Friday night we spent the night at Luke's parent's house. It was a good time. Friday we did not wake up early and go shopping but that evening Luke's mom and I ventured out to go shopping and got some great deals. Gap maternity was having some good sales so I stocked up on some maternity clothes, PLUS we finally purchased our nursery furniture. YAY!!

Saturday I went to see Wicked with Luke's aunt and cousin. I had never seen it and was so excited when Luke's parent's got me a ticket for an early Christmas present. I LOVED it and want to see it again with Luke. I think he would like it.Saturday night we headed back home and we have spent Sunday relaxing and watching TV (football games and Christmas movies).

We are thankful for our families and that we are able to spend so much time with them during the holiday season. It was a great one!

Week 23

How Far Along: 23 weeks (actually I'm 24 weeks tomorrow but I like to recap the week before)

Total Weight Gain/Loss: 18 pounds. Whoa. Mama.

Maternity Clothes: All maternity pants. Shirts are a combination of regular and maternity. I think maternity makes me look bigger, but they are more comfortable.

Gender: BOY!! Eli Tree

Movement: About the same.I feel him every now and then, and feel him quite a bit at night when I'm very still in bed.

Sleep: Sleep is ok. I usually get pretty bad heartburn shortly after lying down and have to pop a couple of tums. Once that passes I sleep through the night pretty well.

What I miss: Deli meat. I went to the dr again this week and asked her about this and she told me to still avoid it. I just wanted to double check. She is also pregnant and says she doesn't eat it either.

Cravings: Nothing in particular.

Symptoms: Heartburn and indigestion have hit an all time high and don't seem to be going anywhere anytime soon. I honestly get heartburn from drinking water. Tum's smoothies have become my new BFF.

Best Moment this week: Hearing the heartbeat again. I always love to hear his sweet little heartbeat. It was 149 this week. I wish that I could get an ultrasound done every dr visit.

And my favorite husband quote of the week:

On Saturday we were cleaning the house like crazy, getting it somewhat "baby ready" when Luke randomly looked at me and said:

"Wow, I cannot believe you are pregnant"

Not sure if he knows, but I've been pregnant for several months now. Boys are a little slow when it comes to this sort of thing I guess. :-)

Weekly Weekend Update

Friday night Luke and I had plans to go see Harry Potter with some of our friends. Before I get to the movie review I have to say that I currently work with one of the world's biggest Harry Potter fans. Like for real. I text her 294805 times with all my questions while reading the books. So of course, being one of the world's biggest HP fans, she saw the movie on Thursday night at midnight and wore her Harry Potter get-up, and so then the next day she kindly let me borrow the outfit for the movie.

Megan as Harry:I do have to say Luke who never gets embarrassed was incredibly embarrassed of me and told me that it wasn't even funny embarrassing it was just plain embarrassing. Whatever.

I intended on wearing my Harry Potter get-up but my friend didn't have any Harry Potter accessories, so me being the very giving person I am let her wear my tie. But I kept the glasses.

Here we are in line:The movie was very good. I have many thoughts but I won't get into them here. Also during the movie I realized that when the final installment comes out in July we will need to get a babysitter to go see the movie.

Weirdness.

Saturday I cleaned all day. Nothing exciting there. Our house was disgusting so I spent pretty much the whole day cleaning.

Then that night some friends came over and we watched the OU game and ate dinner. It was fun and relaxing after cleaning all day long.

Sunday was church like normal and then Thanksgiving with my mom's side of the family. The food was super yummy and it was good to hang out with family.

Here I am with my sisters:

My sweet nephew holding a rabbit. (random)
It was a great weekend.

Tomorrow is Monday and is my only day of work this week. I am excited for some time off and spending time with our families.

Happy Thanksgiving Week!

Weird Dreams

I have failed. I am not going to finish the Harry Potter books before the movie. Which is fine cause I enjoy the movies, so I will still enjoy the first part of the final movie. I just really wish I would have finished the books first.And I plan to finish them all before the final installment of the final movie. And with two holiday breaks in my future this is very doable.

Lately it has been ALL Harry Potter ALL the time at our house.

Well not really all the time, but some of the time.

I read the book when I have free time, I usually fall asleep reading it and Luke and I have spent a great deal of time watching the movies together.

My brain has been infiltrated with Harry.

So this morning when we woke up Luke informed me that last night while we were sleeping I hit him and started yelling for him to pull that thing down, the thing that the TV sits on.

He of course being of right mind had no idea what I was talking about, but he said I was really serious about it and kept asking him to get it down and then I got mad at him cause he didn't know what I as talking about and went back to sleep.

Well as he was telling me this story the memories of last night all came flooding back to me.

I do remember hitting him and telling him to get that floating thing.

You see I thought I saw a floating TV tray, and I wanted Luke to get it down cause a floating anything is just freaky.

And I can remember in my mind trying to figure out if I should be scared or not of this floating tray and then ultimately deciding that in the past I would have been scared, but that was before I went to wizard school, and now I know that anything floating is normal.

Um... I FLIPPING THINK I'M A WIZARD.

Reading Harry Potter, while pregnant and having crazy preggo dreams is not a good combination.

Plus I usually get mildly obsessed with anything that I put an ounce of effort into, so its not a surprise that I'm dreaming about it.

Oh I also dreamed I worked with Robert Pattinson but his name was Cedric Diggory and he disappeared and we assumed he got murdered.

I mean some FREAKY STUFF people.

I explained this all to Luke this morning and I'm pretty sure he thinks I'm crazy. Especially when I referenced that I "went" to wizarding school.

Coo. Coo.

Although I do blame this all on Luke because last night as we were getting into bed, he choose that moment to show me a SCAR ON HIS FOREHEAD.

Um.. he has had a scar on his forehead his whole life and I never knew that??

It was just a weird revelation that apparently started a night of weird dreams in my head.

And if you've never read or watched Harry Potter this will all be completely pointless and boring to you.

Don't worry it will go away soon, I was very into Twilight this time last year and that ship has sailed.

Although if I had to choose I would pick Harry over Twilight any day.

Mommy Help

Becoming a new mommy can be very very overwhelming.

And I haven't even popped out the kid yet! I can't imagine what it will be like when the little guy is sitting here in front of me crying and I'm trying to decipher what that certain cry means!!!

I get anxiety just thinking about it.

But before he arrives there are lots of things to buy. Bottles to choose, blankets to pick for swaddling, and plenty of other items to buy. Some that I have probably never even heard of.

I have several friends who are also pregnant with their first little one and we have talked about how we aren't really sure what we need this first go around.

Considering we have NOTHING baby related in our homes now.

So....I thought I would enlist you, my friends to help us first-time moms.

Perhaps you have written a previous blog post (or several) about baby products that you couldn't live without that first year. Or products that you thought you wouldn't be able to live without, and turns out it was a big ole waste of money for you.

Maybe you haven't written a blog post about that certain topic but you want to share your wise knowledge with me.

Either way link your post (or posts) below. I don't care if you have 10 of them, all of us new mommies will appreciate it!!!

Or if you don't have a post, or don't want to write a whole post about this topic you can leave your words of wisdom in the comments section.

Believe me, we need help!

So if you care to share, link a post about your favorite baby products, or your best new mommy advice that you have, or you can share your wisdom in the comments!

Randomocities

1. I never use those "toilet seat covers" that are found in women's restroom stalls. I mean IT'S TISSUE PAPER. What will it really protect you from? I think it's a conspiracy.

2. I so completely wish that I had Tammy Taylor's hair. If you do not know who Tammy Taylor is I feel sorry for you.

3. I am starting to get FREAKED OUT thinking about this baby weight I am putting on. I went through a phase in my life were I was worried about my body image, but other than that short time in my life I have never worked to lose or keep weight off. I think that is all about to change. I am BEYOND thankful for this time and amazed at how a body can grow and stretch. But HOLY MAN ALIVE how will the body go back into it's regular place? Is there a button I can push to make it do it?

4. I love how one night my husband can totally get on my nerves and we will fight about something stupid, and then the next day he will make me laugh nonstop and I will want to spend every minute with him. Marriage is fun.

5. I am thankful for authentic friendships. Transparency is a beautiful thing.

6. After my post about our current situation several people commented that my attitude is inspiring. Please know that any peace I am feeling is nothing short of the Holy Spirit working in me. Also, it is a choice. I daily have to make a choice to count my blessings and block out the lies that come from the enemy. Some days I choose not to do it and then I pay the consequences.

7. I've been having Braxton Hicks contractions for awhile, it is such a weird feeling. I also had horrible HORRIBLE gas pains this past week. I've never felt anything like that in my life. I assured my mom that the gas pains I was feeling was way worse than any measly labor pains. She had no comment.

8. I absolutely cannot handle the commercials of parent's surprising their kids with a trip to Disney World. I won't be going on a Disney trip anytime soon but I definitely plan on surprising my kids one day. I just think it will be so fun!!

9. Shopping for nursery furniture is stressful. I know what color I want, but I want to get something that is good quality and will stand the test of time. I think I have read every review on every nursery furniture on the internet.

10. I love the middle name suggestions. Some of them were names that Luke had suggested and now we are taking them seriously. TBA

Week 21

First off, I can't begin this post without saying thank you for all of your kind words of encouragement and promises of prayer during this time. I have said it before and I will say it again. I love keeping a blog as a "journal" of our life, and the friendships that I have made in the process are just an added bonus. Writing is sort of a "therapy" for me, even before I had a blog I would write out my thoughts, so I'm thankful I have this avenue.

Now onto fun baby stuff.........

I feel like most girls have these sweet rounded bellies. Mine always looks like a torpedo for some reason.

How Far Along: 21 weeks

Total Weight Gain/Loss: 10 pounds. I feel like I'm not as big in real life as I appear in pictures but maybe I am. Maybe the pictures are just a swift REALITY CHECK.

Maternity Clothes: Combination of both maternity and regular. I feel comfortable in all maternity clothes, but a lot of the maternity shirts are too big, but I still want to wear them. I'm weird about clothes. I need to feel comfortable. When I was younger I went through a phase where I would only wear leggings cause I thought jeans were so uncomfortable. Then I went through that phase again last year.

Gender: BOY!!

Movement: I feel him every so often. Still not as often as I would like. And when I feel him it is crazy low, so sometimes that worries me. When I imagined feeling a baby I always thought it would be high up, but most of the time its below my belly button. Not sure what is normal.

Sleep: Sleep has been fine. I wake up with some weird pains but I'm sure it's all apart of the process. My mom told me my hip pains were probably just my hips stretching and in her words "they will never go back". Thanks for the pep talk mom, love ya.

What I miss: Hm.. nothing really this week.

Cravings: This week I wanted a cookie cake. Which isn't too out of the ordinary I always crave that in my everyday non-preggo life. So no weird cravings this week. Oh well I just remembered I've been eating a lot of Velveeta shells and cheese. I've always loved it but now I want it for every meal.

Symptoms: Weird side pain, CRAZY cramps in my leg and feet.

Best Moment this week: Buying the baby bedding fabric. I am NOT good at decisions at all so it is good that I found something this early and we can start working on more things for the nursery.

The Name:

We still haven't decided on a middle name but I have had several people ask if I'm going to share the name we picked and I realized it looked like I was keeping it a secret or something. I'm really not I'm just trying to come up with a middle name. We are open to suggestions. :-)

The name that we decided to go with despite the fact that you or your second cousin may know a demon-child with this name is:

Eli

We have both always loved the name. And even though Luke is a die-hard New York Giants fan, our son will not be named after Eli Manning. He is merely inspiration.

I'm so glad the last name is already picked out because I have had a hard enough time with the other two names!

Our Life Right Now

This weekend I spent some time going through some old posts of mine on the blog. I absolutely LOVE having this blog and using it to keep a journal of our lives and what is going on. I went through old posts and got a little sad thinking about our sweet apartment that I hated so much, and how thankful I am that I have pictures of us from that season of our life. We made that apartment our home, regardless of the fact that we wanted to be in a house so badly at that time.

Having an online journal is similar to a prayer journal. I go back through different seasons of our life and I can see where we were, how far we have come, what God has done. Ways in which we surrendered to him, or sometimes held on to something stubbornly, only to later surrender and watch him provide.

And now we find ourselves in another season of life, our current chapter.

Sometimes it's weird how life can change drastically, something will take you by complete surprise, yet looking back you see how maybe, just maybe, God was preparing you for this time. Unfortunately, last week we found out that Luke no longer has an income at his current job.

It is a long and VERY confusing story, and to be honest, 10 years down the road I'm not sure if I will care about all the details. In fact some of them may cause bitterness, or hurt, or just anger and there is no need to keep record of those things to later dwell on.

The black and white of it is that our church where we have served and ministered for 6 years is unfortunately no longer able to pay it's staff. It is a sad situation and one that has caused us to ask questions after questions after questions.

But as I stated in a previous post, answers are not what we need right now. This is a time that we can learn to trust and rely on God.

It is easy to say you live a life of faith, and trust, and thanks. But do you really live those things when the ground below you is shaking and everything that you knew as "stable" is now a big fat question mark?

I can honestly say that throughout this whole experience we have felt nothing but peace. A peace that can only come from our God.

You see, our Hope is not in money, or stability. We live a life where we strive to be content no matter what the circumstances are, and that applies in ALL situations.

Now I am not naive. I know that it takes money to live, but lately we have gotten used to a whole lot of "wants" and a very few "needs".

Strangely, I have begun to see this time as a blessing. So many times in life I spend money on frivolous things.

Do I really need the fanciest nursery furniture? No.

Do I really need to stop at Starbucks every single day just because its red cup season and I can get my beloved peppermint mocha? No.

Do I really need to buy an ENTIRE new wardrobe of maternity clothes, because I don't want to wear the same clothes over and over while pregnant? No.

I could go on and on but I think the moral of my story is that God is teaching me to be dependent on Him and not money.

And even though we have peace about it all, it's still a bit of a nerve-wracking time. So many things are up in the air, but we also know that it will be ok.

And we will use this time to learn.

Honestly we are thankful. We have SO much to be thankful for, we have amazing families, amazing friends who have committed to praying for us through this season, a sweet Baby Tree on the way, a beautiful home, and even neighbors who mow our yard! :-) We are thankful.

And really, there are so many people going through so much worse. Losing an income is not even close to horrible in our opinion. It's just the "unknown" that is stressful, but we know we will see the other side soon.

So that is our life right now. It's all apart of our journey and I wanted to be sure and record it.

Weekly Weekend Update

We had another fun and busy weekend.

Friday right when I got home from work we immediately got in the car and drove about an hour away to enjoy a hay ride and bonfire with several families from our church. I haven't been on a hayride in forever but I loved it. We had such a good time.

Headed out. I now always like to get pictures of me with Baby Tree. I won't always have him in my belly with me so I like to capture the moments. Probably a little weird.

Oh and please take note of the bag and magazines in the back on the floor. Those have been there since we got back from Chicago LAST WEEK. Here's the thing, somebody left those magazines in the chair pocket in front of me, so I was like OH YES FREE MAGAZINES and immediately put them in my bad. THen I got home and started thinking "who was touching this magazine?" "did they wash their hands after using the restroom?" '"did they pick their nose" "what if they put poison on the magazines and left them there for some unsuspecting fool to pick them up".

So they have sat right there not to be touched every since.

It's a complicated life in my mind but it's something I have learned to live with.

ANYWAYS...back to a bit of normalcy, here is Luke headed to the hay ride.

After I took this picture he informed me that he doesn't like pictures of himself driving.

Um...ok, that's not weird.

Us enjoying the hay ride:

and Luke roasting some hot dogs and smores for me. Yes I won't eat turkey but I eat hot dogs. It's complicated and I don't understand my mind either. Please don't try!!!

Saturday morning we headed to Tulsa. Luke went to the TU game and I spent the day fabric shopping with my mom. I am lucky enough to have a wonderful seamstress of a mother and she is going to make my baby bedding, so I have been researching fabric online and getting ideas for what I like.

We set out to some fabric stores in search of fabric similar but cheaper then what I have found online.

And I picked fabric that is NOTHING like what I picked online. That's usually how my life works. But I love fabric and can't wait for my mom to make the bedding.

Sunday we did our normal church thing and then I had an open house for my Scentsy.

Now I'm back home enjoying a few too many baked cheetos and watching football. Well I'm not really watching the football, but ya know, the hubs it so it's on.

Oh and I'm also about to start Harry Potter. I'm now on the 5th book, trucking away!!

Whatcha up to?

Do you ever have times where you want to say hey Lord, whatcha up to up there?? I guess you decided to do a little "remix" with my life did ya??

Right now, the Tree's are definitely in the middle of a season of remix. Our families are fine and healthy, baby Tree is snuggled in my tummy doing well, but there are other small issues going on that are mixing things up a bit.

I am a planner by nature. I have always wanted every detail of my life planned. I will lay around at night and try to plan certain scenarios of my life.

Scenarios that may never happen, yet by golly I have a plan.

Before I got married, before I was even engaged I had my wedding planned to a T. What song I would walk down the aisle to, what colors I would use, how my groom would look when I walked down the aisle (I didn't want tears but I wanted a look of pure elation), what song would play during the sideshow. It was a wedding in a box waiting to be put into action.

Then the planning day came....and I did not use one aspect from my already planned wedding.

Time changed thing, circumstances were different. The plan that once seemed perfect no longer fit my situation or where I was in life.

Life cannot be planned.

Last night around 4am I was laying awake in my bed, just staring at the ceiling. In my mind I asked God, "what do you what me to learn right now" and a response came clear as day.

Trust.

It wasn't a huge long answer, it wasn't something that solved every problem or even answered all of my other questions, but it was an answer.

I need to learn to trust.

I have never been a person to say that I hear God's voice audibly. In fact many times I am jealous of people who say that they can hear him audibly. I don't get it. I often question what is from God. How do you tell the difference between your own thoughts and what is from God? Can God use our own thoughts to speak to us or does it have to be his own voice?? I spend so much time questioning.

It all gets so confusing to me. In fact, in a bit of frustration the other day I told Luke I wish there was just some kind of instruction manual from God to help us figure all of this out.

He just stared at me.

Oh yeah, the bible.I had truly forgot in that moment.

You see I get so caught up in the questioning and planning of everything that I forget the simplicity of God.

His answers don't have to be these big complex answers, it doesn't have to be this voice that splits the sky and echos through my house and knocks me from my feet. I don't have to sit for hours questioning every thought thinking "is this God"? "is this what we are supposed to do?"

He is simple.

He loves us.

He wants to teach us.

He wants us to trust Him.

Simple.

I don't need to flip through His "instruction manual" looking for life's answers. Trying to put together X, Y, and Z to see if it equals the answer I'm looking for.

Instead I can spend time in that instruction manual learning more about Him, growing closer to Him, and through that, life's answers will come.

Life is not simple. Hard times come, confusion comes, we go through peaks and valley's, but our God is simple.

So when I want to spend time trying to find an answer to every question and make a plan for the next step I will remember to trust.

And really I am typing all of this out to serve as a reminder for myself. Because my human nature and stubborn mind will take over and I will begin to make my own plans. And maybe even say "hey God, I've got it planned this way and it looks pretty good, pretty please put this into action, thanks love ya"

But peace does not come from me making my own plans for life, or by telling God what I think he should do.

There is nowhere I would rather be then right in the middle of God's peace.

Peace comes from trust. Simple.

Week 20

I realize that I make a disclaimer about every picture, maybe I'm insecure. Whatev. But I have to tell you this is a weird picture, I look like I'm trying to be sexy with my hair in my eyes or something. I can assure you I'm not. Truth is Luke was in a hurry and we basically had one shot. This was it. Fun times.

How Far Along: 20 weeks (actually I'm 21 weeks today but I like to recap the week before)

Total Weight Gain/Loss: I'm up to 10 pounds! I gained 6 pounds in one month. My dr said since I didn't gain any during the 1st trimester this was ok, but if I did it again she would have to "get on to me." Snap. She also reminded me that I have Thanksgiving at the end of the month and I need to "take it easy". Um... clearly this woman doesn't know me. I never "take it easy" when it comes to food. Especially at holidays.

Maternity Clothes: Combination of both maternity and regular. This week I wore one of my favorite shirts from the Limited. I've had it since college and it is an XS. However, after I wrote it yesterday I'm guessing it is no longer an XS, but also, after my 6 pound month, I think I will never been that size again so we're ok. Plus we all know an extra small about 5 years ago is now equivalent to a large.

Gender: BOY!!

Movement: I feel him every so often. Still not as often as I would like. I need him to start doing some aerobics in there or something so I really can feel him.

Sleep: Sleep has not been fun. I have been waking up with this AWFUL pain in my side. I sought the advice of my trusty friend El Interneto, which told me that its because I sleep with a pillow between my legs, but not between my feet which is causing some sort of weird alignment and messing up my hips. I'm not sure how accurate the El Interneto is because he has also told me I have various diseases and that my according to the quiz I took, I'm among the few people in the world who can truly consider themselves a genius.

What I miss: I still miss my precious deli meat. I also miss not worrying all the time. I know that sounds weird, BUT now that I'm pregnant I worry about everything. The other day at the Notre Dame game I hit myself in the stomach with the bathroom stall door and then I spent about an hour worrying if it had hit Baby Tree in the head. I begged God to let me feel him move so that I would know the bathroom stall didn't hurt him. Then I went to the bathroom AND HIT MYSELF IN THE STOMACH AGAIN. I mean really.....Did I learn nothing the first time?!?! My friend told me something about how our the baby is safe in the womb and we could be carrying fragile china in there and it wouldn't break - but it still doesn't stop me from not worrying. I have always worried enough about my own sanity/health. It's hard to worry about another human being. And for some reason I have a feeling that won't go away once he is here......


Cravings: Nothing in particular this week. Just food.

Symptoms: Just the insane pain in my hip. Ouch.

Best Moment this week: Going to Chicago with Luke's family. We had a really good time. Baby Tree has now been on a trip in September and a trip in October. I told Luke we need to take him somewhere really good in November!

And my favorite husband quote of the week:

"I don't know why everybody thinks the baby will have a lot of hair just because of me, YOU have a lot of hair also you know"

Geez....somebody is getting a little sensitive about their hair.

I'm on a Deadline

I've never been one to deny the fact that I am what you might call a "band-wagoner"

If something is popular I either love it, or will love it soon.

Maybe I'm a follower - or maybe I just don't want to miss out on something good!!

So naturally I've been meaning to read Harry Potter for quite sometime now.

My curiousty was first peaked when the last book was released. Luke and I had been on a trip with his family when it was released. On our way home as we walked through the airport it seemed like every single person was reading the book. Every where we turned people were sitting, standing, or even walking while reading the book. So I made it my goal to read it.

I started the first book shortly before Luke and I got engaged. And then I got busy planning a wedding and crying everyday so that didn't leave a lot of time for reading.

Fast forward a couple of years. Previews for the last movie began appearing online and I then made it my absolute GOAL to read all the books and watch all the movies before the final movie came out. That way I could watch the final movie for the first time with everybody else and I wouldn't be behind.

Easier said than done.

First of all I'm not a big "fantasy" reader. I will read a romance fiction book (think Nicholas Sparks, etc) in about a day or so. Very easy reads.

Harry Potter, for me, is a whole other story. It takes a while for me to wrap my mind around everything. There are SO many characters, and so much stuff that is out of the ordinary I have to read it extra slow and go back through and make sure I caught every detail.

Even the first book that was originally geared towards children took me forever. There is just so much going on that isn't "normal" it's hard for me to comprehend.

I know, so lame, and I kind of can't believe I am admitting this. Don't think less of me.

So anyways, getting through the Harry Potter books has not happened as quickly as I once thought or hoped.

Plus life hasn't left a lot of time for reading lately. Boo.

But now the time has come. I have to get down and dirty.

I have less than a month to finish 3 books and 2 movies. Three LONG books. Three books with LOTS of information, and I am a very thorough reader! I go back through to make sure I haven't missed a single detail.

But our tickets are purchased and the date is set. I have no choice but to finish the books. And I want to finish the books soon.

I love the books and I do love the movies even though they change some things, which seems natural, so I can't wait to read the rest of the series!

Are there any other HP fans out there??

Any other fellow bandwagoners who aren't ashamed??

I also jumped on the Twilight bandwagon after everybody had read them all. It's just what I do! :-)