It's what FUN is!

A couple weeks back we headed up to Lagoon for my company's end of summer party. I hadn't been there since my Jr. High days and had no idea what to expect--especially with a toddler in tow. Well, to my surprise it really hadn't changed much and Hattie absolutely L.O.V.E.D it! She went on all of the kiddie rides without a fuss and had a smile on her face the entire time. We didn't stay for more than a few hours but it was well worth the trip! We all had such a great time!

21 Weeks

Pregnancy Highlights:
How far Along: 21 weeks
Size of baby: Length of a carrot.
Total Weight Gain/Loss: + 6 lbs
Maternity clothes: Not yet!
Gender: It's a GIRL! Holden Claire Pack
Movement: She moves a lot at night just like her big sis :)
Sleep: I've been sleeping pretty good!
What I miss: Not having heartburn
Cravings: Lots and lots of Halloween candy--namely candy corns and candy corn taffy--YUM!
Symptoms: Pretty much just heartburn
Best Moment this Week: Mr. Pack feeling baby girl move

It's all in a Name

As a follow up to this post...

We have finally decided on a name for this little girl growing in my belly! Can you believe it?! We have gone back and forth for weeks now between 2 (sometimes 3) names. I seriously feel like the two of us have never had so many discussions over something before! With Manhattan it was easy--we had a name we liked and never looked back--but for some reason this little girl being named Holland didn't sit quite right with me (mother's intuition perhaps? who knows?) So we took some time, reevaluated and have made our decision. We changed our minds on the name Holland and have decided to name her...drum roll please...

Holden Claire Pack

So that's that. We now have a name that the Mr. and I both love! We can't wait to meet this little girl in 19 weeks! Yippee! :)

20 Weeks - Half way there!

So I've been kinda cranky this week and haven't wanted to take a pic...so you get this cute little profile instead.
P.S. her profile looks just like Hattie's did!

Pregnancy Highlights:
How far Along: 20 weeks
Size of baby: Length of a banana. She is in the 56th percentile, weighs almost a pound and measuring a few days early :)
Total Weight Gain/Loss: + 6 lbs
Maternity clothes: Busted out the leggings and lovin' it!
Gender: It's a GIRL!
Movement: She moves a lot at night just like her big sis :)
Sleep: I've been sleeping pretty good!
What I miss: Not having heartburn
Cravings: This week I HAD.TO.HAVE. chocolate pudding. I made some from scratch and it was absolutely terrible so angrily I threw it out. The Mr. asked what he could do to help and I responded in my demon pregnant lady voice "Go find me pudding!" (I know...not nice...I have since apologized to the Mr. for being a demon pregnant lady) Thank you to my sis-in-law Shara for having a box of instant pudding and saving this crazy pregnant gal :)
Symptoms: NO MORE ZOFRAN! (this week anyway, yay!) and megga, MAJOR heartburn (boo!)
Best Moment this Week: Going to our 20 week appointment and seeing the little cutie bug

Going CrAzY

So lately I feel like life has just been just a little bit crazy. I feel like there is not enough time in the day to clean, make meals, pay bills, play with Hattie, spend time with the Mr., etc, etc, etc! So a few weeks back when I totally spaced paying Sean's car payment (yeah...i know...not good...) I realized that I needed to get organized. I talked it over with Mr. Pack and felt that it would be good for me to get a day planner. I love technology and all the conveniences that it at times provides, but for me, writing something down makes all the difference.

Mine looks like this but says, "the Pack Family"

I had seen a few blogs where people raved about their LIFE planners from Erin Condren (see them here) and I decided to get one for myself. Let me tell you--I feel like it has SAVED me! Everyday I sit down and plan and review the day and coming week. It has been wonderful. It's a little big but it fits perfectly in my "massive purse" as Mr. Pack refers to it :) and it has a place for everything--even a little notebook fits in the back! I L.O.V.E. it! It has enabled me to remember just about everything (unless I forget to write it down, ha!) and I've even started a cleaning schedule to help me keep the house in order:

• Monday: Bedrooms
• Tuesday: Bathrooms
• Wednesday: Kitchen / Living room
• Thursday: Trash Day
• Friday: Dust / sheets
• Saturday: Vacuum / mop / Prada's bath
• Daily: Bed's made /1 load of laundry / dishes

This may seem silly to some but being a working mom it has helped me out immensely! Now I don't feel like I have to come home every day and clean the entire house, top to bottom, and not have time for anything else. Anyway, if you are looking for a planner to help get you more organized check out the LIFE planner from Erin Condren. It's simply wonderful.

19 Weeks

Pregnancy Highlights:
How far Along: 19 weeks
Size of baby: Size of an heirloom tomato
Total Weight Gain/Loss: + 6 lbs
Maternity clothes: Busted out the leggings and lovin' it!
Gender: It's a GIRL!
Movement: She moves a lot at night just like her big sis :)
Sleep: I've been sleeping pretty good!
What I miss: Sleeping on my stomach and having a waistline (am I allowed to say that? ha!)
Cravings: I haven't had Mexican food in about a week and I'm definitely NEEDING it about now. Taco Amigo anyone? :)
Symptoms: I'm still taking Zofran for nausea but not every day. Also, the heartburn has definitely kicked in--NOT fun!
Best Moment this Week: Feeling her move more and more

The Key to His Heart

I don't know about your Mister, but the key to Mr. Pack's heart is making his absolute favorite foods. I made these two recipes this weekend and I think we had a pretty happy Mr. around the house!

Chicken Crescent Squares
This recipe is super yummy and really easy to make. I received this recipe at one of my bridal showers along with the ingredients to make it. Every time I make it I think of our first apartment and it's teeny tiny little kitchen and it makes me smile.

Mix together:
3 oz Cream Cheese (I use 1/3rd less fat)
2 tbsp. Milk
1/2 tsp. onion powder
3 tbsp. melted butter (I use margarine)
a pinch of salt & pepper

Add:
1 12 oz. can Chicken Breast (drained)

Divide:
2 rolls of Pillsbury Crescent Rolls (I use the low fat ones). Press each roll slightly and put 2 tbsp. of chicken filling. Fold over and press corners and sides of crescent to hold in mixture.

Bake:
At 350 for 15 minutes.

Okay, so I know mine don't look very pretty put I promise they are YUM!

Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Cookies
When fall rolls around I can't help but make these. Normally I use the tried and true
(not to mention EASY) 3 ingredient recipe, but I didn't have a spice cake on hand. I found this recipe online and I think it's a definite keeper--considering they became my dinner replacement last night! HAHA!

Ingredients:
1 cup canned pumpkin
1 cup white sugar
1/2 cup vegetable oil
1 egg
2 cups all-purpose flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon milk
1 tablespoon vanilla extract
2 cups semisweet chocolate chips
1/2 cup chopped walnuts (optional)

Combine:
Pumpkin, sugar, vegetable oil, and egg. In a separate bowl, stir together flour, baking powder, ground cinnamon, and salt. Dissolve the baking soda with the milk and stir in. Add flour mixture to pumpkin mixture and mix well.

Add:
Vanilla, chocolate chips and nuts.

Bake:
Drop by spoonful on greased cookie sheet and bake at 350 degrees F for approximately 10 minutes or until lightly brown and firm. I make mine pretty big and baked them for 15 minutes.

They don't come out very orange in color. I'm sure that you could probably add food coloring to the batter to make them more orangey--is that a word? HA!

Wall Grouping

So I kind of, sort of, REALLY like photographs. That's probably the reason that we are "that family" that gets family pictures twice a year. I like it though because that is how I decorate a lot of the walls in our home, plus with kids they change SO MUCH! With that being said, I've been meaning to post this for almost a year! This is a project that I did when we had our family pictures done last fall. When I hang groupings around our home, I first lay everything out on the floor to get an idea of how I want it to look and where I want things to go.

I almost cropped Hattie's little hand out but thought it was cute. I love my little helper :)

I then trace out each picture frame onto a large piece of paper (usually newspaper) so that I have a template to put onto the wall. This may not work for everyone but, I'm not the good, patient measuring type and would rather just eyeball it with my templates and the negative space. So I just tape my templates where I want them, hammer my nails in the wall and presto! Picture perfect every time...well most of the time...HA! :)
You may not be able to tell but this is a pretty large grouping--each picture is an 11X14. I really like what a statement large pictures make. This particular one hangs in the hallway outside Hattie's bedroom and I get to walk by it every day. I absolutely love the way it turned out!

Metal Scroll: Hobby Lobby
11x14 Wood Frames: Hobby Lobby
Photography: Brody Dezember Photography

18 Weeks

Pregnancy Highlights:
How far Along: 18 weeks
Size of baby: Size of a bell pepper
Total Weight Gain/Loss: + 6 lbs
Maternity clothes: I'm on the look out for tunics and leggings for fall!
Gender: It's a GIRL!
Movement: This little girl is a MOVER. I feel her all the time lately and I love it :)
Sleep: I've been sleeping pretty good!
What I miss: Sleeping on my stomach
Cravings: Mexican food and this week I HAD to have cookie pie.
Symptoms: I'm still taking Zofran for nausea but not every day. Also, the heartburn has definitely kicked in--not fun!
Best Moment this Week: Hearing the heartbeat and scheduling our 20 week ultrasound

St. George Marathon 2011

So I live with a pretty crazy Mister. Crazy AWESOME that is. This past weekend we packed up that car and traveled down to St. George so that Mr. Pack could run the St. George Marathon with 7,500 other crazy people. I honestly don't know how anybody can physically, mentally or emotionally run 26.2 miles and the Mr. did it without ANY training--well, unless you consider running the Red Rock Relay a few weeks prior to the marathon your "training" which soooo doesn't count. This is the second marathon that he has ran and the second marathon he hasn't trained for and the last marathon he will run WITHOUT training. It simply takes too much out of him. So, he finished at 4:14 which is SO AMAZING but not quite what he wanted--he was hoping for a sub 4. Regardless of his time, we are so SUPER proud of Mr. Pack and his athleticism. What's next on the horizon for Mr. Pack? Training for an Iron Man. Umm...see...I told you he was crazy, HA!

Sorry these are all proofs! We are still waiting for them to upload
all of the pictures before purchasing the rights to them.
Not to mention I took some pretty crappy one handed pictures due to the
holding of a sleeping toddler as he crossed the finish line.
Hopefully my cheering made up for the lack of pictures :)