Memorial Weekend at Upper Lake Mary

My catchin's

Sedona enjoying the freezing water

Maddison and her Ladybug friend

Marc getting his pole ready

P-Paw Larry and Maddison




Ahhh...what a peaceful weekend it was! Marc, Maddison, my dad, Sedona and I all made the drive up to Lake Mary on Friday afternoon for a camping and fishing trip. I hadn't been there since I was 4 years old and my dad caught a fish that was literally as big as I was. I'll have to find that picture and post it on here. The weather was beautiful during the day, around 72 degrees both days. the nights were a little more chilly. 36 degrees Friday night and 32 degress Saturday night! WOW that's cold! It was a great trip, so relaxing and refreshing, it was just what I needed! Not to mention Saturday I was the only one to catch anything and I caught three 7lb Pikes!!!! We haven't eaten any of them yet. Dad filleted one of them but his knife wasn't sharp enough to do a decent job of it so we canned that one and brought the rest home for him to do with some decent utensils. I'm excited to try it! I have never had Pike, neither has my dad. In fact in all the times he's been to Lake Mary he said he has never caught a single Pike! So I am pretty proud I was able to catch 3 in one day! Not to mention, decent sized fish at that! Anyway, we all had a great time, but it's soooo good to be home and showered and have a real bed to sleep in. Our air mattress apparently has a hole in it so within an hour or so we were all on the rock hard ground. Ah well, that's what "roughin' it" is all about!

Belly Pics

19 Weeks 1 Day.

16 Weeks I don't have my 8 week photo because it is stored on a phone that no longer has service. But considering there's not much to see at 16 weeks, there was even less at 8 weeks!

3D Ultrasound

Beautiful Baby Cylie

It's a................

GIRL!!!!


We had our 3D ultrasound today and got some good pictures and some very good looks at many different angles to double/triple/quadruple check that she really IS a girl. Maddison played a trick on me at one point (well, actually the ultrasound tech just wasn't the best...), so she is definitely a girl. The whole last week Ive been saying its a girl, so has Marc, and even Maddison decided she wanted a sister after she found out boys can't wear dresses with her! =) So I am very excited to start a new search for girl stuff. At first I was very set on it being a boy, I had bedding picked out and I knew exactly what I would do with his room. Now, I get to start fresh! I am a little relieved, I must say! Boys are just...not my thing! I know nothing about them, and they are just too roudy and loud for me. Plus, I am so used ot my little cautious queen, I think a dare-devil boy might give me a heart attack! Maybe next time...if there is a next time!!

As far as names for a girl, we are thinking (so far...like I said, we were set on a boy until a week ago I just had a feeling it was a girl so we havent put as much thought into girl names as we had boy names):

Top Contenders:

Cylie (Kylie)

Rylee

Makena

At one point Mackenzie was on this list also...not so sure anymore.

Names I LOVE but are afraid to get negative feedback about:

Aspen

Blake

Blair

Denver (Yes, even for a girl...I don't know whats up with the Colorado cities...don't ask.)

Kennedy

Rylee is sort of on this list too!

Prescott (Strange, maybe! But I think it's cute!)

...as of now that is all I can remember.

If she had been a boy our names were:

Mason Montgomery

Easton Montgomery

and TODAY on the way I came up with the greatest of them all which we just might use for the next (if it's a boy)....

COHEN! Yes, I did watch 2 episodes of The O.C this morning when I was up at 4am, and I'm glad I did, my special love for Seth (it's a special kind of special....like a "I wish he was my best friend/brother" kind of special) brought me to this name because as you ALL know, Summer always referred to Seth as simply, "Cohen". "He's Cohen" was her explaination for his many quirks. So Cohen Michael Strick would have been our boy, but we always have next time...maybe! =)

Very long week for Maddison =(

Well this post isn't the most pleasant, but the next one will be. Maddison has been sick since Monday night (it is now Saturday night) when she developed Pink Eye in her left eye. Tuesday we took her in, she had a low-grade fever, got some drops for the eye, also diagnosed with a URI By the end of the day it crossed over into her right eye as well. Fever got out of control (over 104) all through the night horrible hacking cough, so bad she was hacking up huge masses of mucous (enough that it was like throwing up). Wednesday her condition worsened, fever stayed very high and Mortin was only keeping it down 3-4 hours at a time. As soon as it wore off, it would spike back up to over 104. I took her back in for a throat culture because she said it hurt her mouth to swallow. Strep test came back negative so no antibiotics were given. Thursday and Friday no signs of any real improvement. She would have ups and downs throughout the day. Saturday we went and had our ultrasound (that will be the next post). She seemed to be doing much better and I even felt silly for calling the doctors office the day before and leaving a message with the nurse. They did call back, just waited until they were closed to when I missed their call and tried ot call back they were closed of course. Anyway, after the scan we went to Target where she seemed very tired. She fell asleep on the way there, and on the way to PPP for Justus' birthday. Unfortunately we couldnt stay longer than 10 minutes or so because of her condition, but she was so ill she just wanted to go home and sleep anyway. She fell asleep on the car ride home and was extremely cranky when we got home and laid her down. She was crying over nothing, and then said she wanted ot watch a movie. We put one on, and she fell asleep shortly after. I'm not sure exactly how long she was sleeping, but she woke up SCREAMING as though the dog had bitten her arm off or something. Marc ran to get her, and as he passed her to me, he noticed her eye. Her eye had swelled up to about 3x the normal size, just her left eye. She was fire hot, and when I sat her down to take her temperature I noticed she was covered in a rash. After looking for some sort of bite or scratch to cause it we took her into Urgent Care. She had intercostal retraction and her O2 sats were a little low due to her excessive congestion so they gave her a breathing treatment, which brought her skin color from bright red to normal, and oddly enough, her eye swelling went down about half the size during this as well. They still don't know what caused her eye to swell but she was diagnosed with Scarlet Fever due to undiagnosed and untreated strep. The strep also went into her lungs causing the horrible congestion and hacking. and the lack of her ability to breathe. So they sent her home with antibiotics and steroids. She should show some improvement within 24 hours with the steroids and if not - straight ot the ER we go. Poor girl =( She's doing fine right this minute, she doesnt look anything like her normal self, her eyes are very swollen and dark and she has a very raspy voice, but right this moment she is her happy self. Hopefully she will do okay tonight so we can both get some much needed sleep (I've been up since 4am!), and hopefully she improves tomorrow!

Dilemma Resolved!

Marc LOVED the idea of having the loft/pool room be his sports room, and he was even excited about having the team be red. Coyotes or Cardinals?!?! We are leaning more to the right on this one!

As far as the craft room, I picked out a table and bought 2 samples of blue paint (MORE?! Yes!! That makes 10 colors on my wall!) And AGAIN I didnt like either of them! I first came across 3 different shades of blue, one more of a true blue, another a dark Tiffany blue, and the last was somewhere in the middle. Then I got scared they might be too bright and vibrant for a downstairs room with only one small window so I went with 2 shades that are so light they may as well be white! So I think I am DONE with samples, I am just going to nip it in the butt and buy a gallon and just og with whatever my heart feels! I have the full vision of the room now, I am just hoping I can get it all done before I quit my job so that all the projects can be finished and purchased with my pay checks so we can practice living off of just Marc's income - because believe me, after a Monday like I had today I dont know how many more I can handle! (Headache, billing due, scanner broke for 4.5 hours so I was stuck in limbo doing nothing, by the time it was fixed I had to leave, got stuck in accident traffic, came home dropped the open paint sample and splattered it all the way across the room, up the door, over my favorite pair of scrubs, all over Marc's favorite shoes...aye yi yi!)

So now that I have my vision, its time ot just DO it and stop my nonsense of being afraid of paint color! I have 7 bright cheery colors in Maddison's room and never thought twice about it. WHY does this room scare me so much?!?! Anyway, I am thinking:
A cheery bluish/turquoise paint color
The laminate wood flooring
My white craft table from Target
I'd LOVE a frumpy funky white chair with ottoman in there for a reading nook with a bright blue chenille blankie to snuggle with and blue and green accent pillows (Im thinking Ikea might have something along those lines)
A tall white 5 shelf book case - nicely organized with blue and bright/lime photo storage boxes
2 white shelves on both sides of the window with 3 holes drilled in them to drop cool cups in to store all my crazy scissors/markers/colored pencils...etc.
2 flat white...boards on both sides with silver clips to hang stuff (if that makes sense...I have a vision okay!)
And I am currently browsing table lamps...I have a couple in mind...but will buy that last as things come together. I am so excited!!! I can actually have a space to myself to do something I love!

P.S. Baby appt tomorrow. I am going to BEG for a quick U/S to check gender...I highly doubt Ill get my way but we will see!

Demo Room Dilemma

I'm very delicately teetering the rope of sanity right now trying to decide what to do with our downstairs bedroom. It's driving me absolutely insane! This room has been stripped for the last 13 months due to flood/sewage damage that happened just a month after we moved in. Long story short, the ceiling in the closet caved in and sewage spilled everywhere onto the carpet and seeped into the walls. After a VERY expensive clean-up, we had to rip out the carpet and re-do the ceiling and door casings for the closet. Everything is done, except the flooring. We have decided to go with a hard surface, and got a quote for Brazilian Hickory laminate from Home Depot, but Marc's brother sells hard surface flooring through Shaw and could get us a good deal on real hardwood. Even with the deal I am thinking thats a little more than I am wanting to spend on flooring for a guest room, so we will probably go with laminate wood. I currently have 5 horrific paint samples painted on the wall - all of which I LOVED in the store - none of which I could ever fathom staring at in my own home once the paint dried. UGH!



So the main dilemma is what the room should be.



I want it to be a fully functional and comfortable guest bedroom since my mom and step-dad visit so often, also for people to just crash since some of our friends live pretty far away and usually our nights of entertainment (few and far between as they may be) usually go into the wee hours of the morning.



I also have a DREAM to have a craft room. A nice big table to scrapbook on and just let my creativity wander into making whatever it is I feel like in that moment and having everything right there at my fingertips and the space to spread out and get it all done.



We also thought about having an office, but we really don't have a strong need to have anything more than a computer sitting on a table. He is finished with school, and I am...well...in remission (school can very much feel like a disease!) so other than a place to blog and pay bills we really don't need much space. Plus, we have a built in corner desk upstairs that I already have a vision for. Now whether this becomes the office space or the scrapbook space is still up in the air. DECISIONS!



Lastly, it would be nice if Marc and I could compromise somehow on where exactly all of his sports shenanigans should go. Since we finally decided to keep the pool table I am thinking floor length red drapes and he can pick a red team to go with. Picky Nikki just cant have green as much as I LOVE my Green Bay Packers, their colors are aweful. But not near as aweful as the Bears!

SO! I will present my ideas to hubby and get back to you!