Half way there!!

I am 20 weeks today and I have to be honest and say......I absolutely love being pregnant!! It has its moments, don't get me wrong and there was a time in the beginning when I was nauseous and barley had energy to get out of bed that I sobbed to my husband that I wasn't sure if I wanted to be pregnant anymore.....I can't believe I ever said that now. I am head over heels in love with my little one already and can't imagine not getting to experience EVERYTHING that pregnancy brings. Overall I feel great! I am having some slight discomfort at night trying to get comfortable and I think I may have some mild Braxton Hicks contractions but nothing that I can't handle and I actually feel pretty lucky to be feeling so good.

~20 week belly~

We had out 18 week ultrasound on 8-18-11 and we are so proud to say we are having a little.....girl!! 
We are 99% set on the name, Olivia Lin.
When the tech was performing the ultrasound and said she knew what the sex was......followed by a long pause........I started tearing up instantly and knew that boy or girl it didn't make a difference in the world as long as the baby was healthy.....and she is very healthy and perfect in every way. I even got to count all five fingers on her tiny hand via the ultrasound!

In true "Holly" style I instantly started the shopping frenzy and bought her a outfit the night of the ultrasound, when I got home from work that day to let my husband know we were operation shopping I was surprised to find out he had bought her a little outfit already that said "daddy's cutie"......I held back the tears but it made me want to cry seeing how excited he was too. The shopping has continued since that day and I am currently putting myself in shopping timeout for a little while....at least until I see a deal that couldn't possibly be ignored.....hehe.

This little one is quite the mover and in the last 2 weeks I have REALLY been feeling her move around. Kicks on the right side and seconds later more kicks on the left. Most days she is active from almost the time I wake up until a few hours before I go to bed……already on mommy’s schedule, what a good girl. Most recently today I started to be able really feel some movement from the outside also and I cannot wait until Frankie gets to feel her moving around in there!

Frankie is officially back on a carrier in Bremerton and  the ship doesn't pull into its homeport, Everett, until December. After some research we found that it would be practically impossible for him to commute back and forth daily and I'm sad to say that he is staying in Bremerton Mon-Fri and is only able to come home on the weekends. I didn't think it would be so bad, I mean we both work all week anyway so we really only see each other for awhile before it's off to bed.......I really took for granted those couple hours and unconscious moments he was around me.  I miss him soooooo much. This will be week 3 and I have spent a good majority of that time crying. I depend on my husband more than I thought.....and not depend on him in a way that I can't get things done without him, but emotionally I count on him to come home to at the end of a hard day and to sleep next to at night.....yes even with the TV light's blaring & causing me insomnia and him stealing the covers and the fact that he lets the dog on the bed, I miss it all. His schedule is still up in the air and even though there is a "schedule" things rarely stay the same when planned for months down the road. Regardless, the fact that he is gone all week was nothing compared to the blow that the schedule that is currently out says he has to deploy for a month the day before my due date. I can’t and won't imagine giving birth to our child without my husband by my side....I know women have to do it all the time and I know that we choose this lifestyle but I'm not most women, and I would never "choose" this.  We choose to give ourselves and our children the best future we could and nothing comes without some cons but this is one I cannot live with. I am praying and hoping that we end up not having to worry about any of this and that the schedule changes. In the instance it does not, Frankie is requesting to stay behind, (sometimes that works, sometimes not) and if that fails I will ask to be induced a little early (even though I really wanted to avoid being induced at all costs) as long as it wouldn’t put the baby at risk of course.

I am not going to spend the next 20 weeks dwelling on what “could happen” so I am going to continue to enjoy ever little moment of this pregnancy and my time with my handsome husband.  

Belly touchers......

It amazes me how many people have walked up to me over the last few weeks and touched my belly!
To be honest it hasn't really bothered me, although I thought it would. I haven't had a complete stranger do the belly touch yet and I'm pretty sure when that day comes I will be a little uneasy......I am not a big fan at all of the stranger hug or shoulder squeeze (both of which you get a lot from patient's working at a medical office), so I can't imagine I will be fond of the complete stranger belly touch. I don't mind at all when good friends or family touch my belly but it has really surprised me how many people who work at the clinic I do, whom I don't know that well at all (I work for a large company), walk up to me smile and then just reach out and touch my belly. I can't imagine in a million years doing that without permission to anyone other than my very close friends, and even with my best friend, that I have known since we were in elementary school, I was hesitant to over step my boundaries and constantly touch her belly without the green light. Again though, I honestly have not minded....it just surprises me. 

I figure I must be starting to show a little more over the past couple weeks since I have had 2 people (one a complete stranger) ask how far along I am. Hahaha, that being said....... I am still pretty confident that I am going to be the world's largest pregnant women and they will have to lift my newborn out with a crane after having me brought to the hospital on a large semi-truck bed.  But really on a serious note I have already gained 14 pounds and I am currently only 17 weeks! Hopefully the weight gain will even out a little at some point since my plan was to not gain more than 30 pounds. I vaguely remember a blog on here prior to getting pregnant about losing weight and getting in shape prior to becoming pregnant.....unfortunately that never did go as planned and I started this pregnancy off a little heavier than I would have liked. I guess that's just life though and now I will just have to embrace every pound gained (within reason!!) as a sign my little be-be is healthy. I don't want to be a overweight momma and I want to set a good example of health to my kids so I am going to work really hard on getting in shape after this pregnancy.

I am feeling really good lately. It continues to amaze me how much my body changes even on a daily basis and there are some minor aches and pains and strange happenings along the way but all and all I have to say I am feeling really good, I fell healthy and my energy level seems to be really good lately. I am having a lot of fun buying some baby things and just being in the moment and enjoying this pregnancy. In 9 days we find out if we will welcome a little baby boy or a little baby girl.......then the fun really starts!!

Garage sale madness!

This past weekend we put on our first ever garage sale.

In getting ready for the baby, it has become quite apparent that we just have too much stuff! So I figured instead of packing it all up and taking it to the Goodwill we might as well try to make some money off it that we could put toward the nursery. Most of what we had wasn't worth much and we didn't have a whole lot of furniture or other big ticket items so I was expecting to make only a minimal amount but though that it would be fun regardless. We are both new to putting on garage sales but Frankie is pretty new to the concept of garage sales and at one point suggested we hand out free water and soda to people when they came....ahhhh my husband, so polite but obviously missing the point that our objective was to make money not spend it!

We opened up around 9:30am and immediately the crowds starting coming. The clothes became a instant hit, much to my surprise, that was the one thing I was sure wasn't going to make us any money.  We even got visits from my mom and our friend Meghan, both of who helped contribute towards our profit by buying a few things. By 3:30 the traffic had started to really slow down and we were quickly running out of things so we decided to call it a day.  Our grand total $220! That is in addition to the $90 cash I had made the week prior selling some things on our work classifieds. We decided to not have the garage sale on Sunday since there wasn't much left and went to IKEA to spend our earnings on a changing table and bookshelf for the nursery, and also some new pillows for the couch and a coat rack for the entry way.....and we still have leftover $ to go to the next baby necessity.

Quite the productive weekend.

2 years ago......

2 years ago.......two years ago Frankie and me said our vows to each other on July 18th 2009, it was also when we started our journey in trying to start our family. Life was perfect. 


I came home from our honeymoon with a tan, madly in love, with a mild handover and recovering from paradise and thought we might have a surprise honeymoon baby.....when we found out otherwise it confirmed all our doubts about waiting or not waiting to start our family. We both wanted a baby.


Looking back now, I am glad we had the opportunity to enjoy those two years as newly weds before getting pregnant. We enjoyed each other, we bought our first home, brand new, and got to pick out everything for it and watch it be built from the ground up. We joined a wine club after Frankie discovered he really liked wine on our honeymoon, we took vacations, we laughed together, cried, and learned a lot. It wasn't always perfect and the disappointment of trying to get pregnant was sometimes unbearable but we got through it....together. I think those two years made us stronger. I think it will make us better parents and has made us better spouses. It has, without a doubt, made us so very grateful for the little be-be in my belly today.

Two years ago was one of the best times of my life....and now we are getting to experience another wonderful chapter in our lives.



On our two year anniversary this year we took what might be our last trip together for awhile. We went to the Washington Coast and stayed in Pacific Beach, about 20 minutes North of Ocean Shores. Frankie had never been to the Washington Coast and I had not been in years so it was kind of new to both of us. We were lucky enough to have some very nice weather on our Anniversary day and spent all day at the beach and in Ocean Shores and also took a little drive to Quinault Lake and a short hike in the rain forest. It was a wonderful trip.

Can you see that belly peaking out?