Week 20: Ooohhhh We're Halfway There....

I still have this song in my head. All week long. Bon Jovi... over and over.



The good news is: WE ARE HALFWAY THROUGH THIS PREGNANCY!!!!

WHOO HOO!!!!!

Week 20:

Pregnancy Stats:

How Far Along: 20 weeks (and a couple of days)

Size of baby: Baby Page is the size of a banana!

Total Weight Gain: 8 lbs? I think? I'll find out exact weight gain at my dr. appointment tomorrow.

Gender: Still a mystery - I've felt like it was a boy all along, but now I'm starting to get a girl vibe.

Movement: All the time and it's more defined now. I can feel the baby moving around my abdomen. Baby is currently hanging out on the right side but hangs out low most of the time.

Sleep: Dreams have been a little better, but still very odd. I usually only have one nightmare a night (as opposed to 3-4) so that's been better.

What I miss: Raw sushi.

Cravings: Chocolate milk is still #1, but popsicles and mexican food are a close 2nd. I was on an Asian kick for a while, but that has subsided.

Symptoms: I've actually been feeling really great lately! Hiccups are still constant, but they usually don't last long.

Maternity Clothes: Bought a new pair of khakis yesterday and my sweet hubby told me I can go to Kohl's today and pick up a cute dress and pair of trouser jeans that I found yesterday!


Best Moment this week: Laying on the couch and Riley crawled up next to me, laid down, and put his paw up on my belly. I immediately started crying... it was the sweetest thing ever. He definitely knows something. He is usually a mama's boy, but has been especially clingy since the pregnancy. Sometimes he lays his head on my belly and I swear he can hear something. Love that puppy.

Mommy's Sweet Little Baby

Am I talking about this beautiful life that I'm carrying inside my body right now?

Not this time...

This time I'm talking about my "sweet little baby Riley". Casey's and my first pup and first love. Right now I am sitting on the couch waiting for my mom to wake up so we can go run errands and get lunch and Mr. Riley is curled up on me sleeping and making the sweetest little sounds.



If a dog is making my heart smile this much, how on Earth am I going to deal with the incredible amount of love we will surely have for our new baby? So far in life I've said, "Nothing feels better than a warm puppy snuggling on you". I hope after the baby comes there will still be time for some of this sweet snuggling. I love this puppy so much!

Pool Puppies

This afternoon I took sweet Riley and Zac to my friend's house to go swimming. Riley absolutely loves to swim and hardly gets to go swimming now because we don't live near the big dog park with the bone shaped pool he so dearly loved anymore. I was hoping Zac would be interested in swimming too since he's never been, but alas... he just sat in the shade behind the bushes the entire time.
My friend Krystal and I spent about an hour straight throwing the ball in the pool for Riley so he could run and jump in and bring the ball back. I swear this dog could do this for hours. Unfortunately, Riley was having so much fun that he really hurt his paws and didn't even seem to notice. Krystal finally noticed that his back foot was bleeding a little and upon further inspection I saw that he had worn ALL of his back nails down to the quick (a couple were bleeding) and he had rubbed his toe pads raw on a few of his toes as well. Poor puppy!! I made him sit out the rest of the time and rest but he was not happy. He kept pacing the fence and barking for me to let him back in the pool. When we finally left he limped to the car and I had to lift him so he could get in. He has been passed out in the same spot since we got home. Zac on the other hand is of course fine and seems to be worried about his big brother. He keeps nuzzling Riley and laying near him. Our dogs are so flipping adorable. Here are some pictures from Dog's Day Out.

Krystal and I

4th of July & Pancakes

Happy Independence Day!!

Yesterday was Independence Day and I woke up with one thing and one thing only on my mind. Not America, not my freedom... no.... that one thing was.....Pancakes. I had to have them. I never want pancakes, but yesterday morning I could not stop thinking about them. I got up and looked in the pantry and *GASP* there was no Bisquik. This is probably because I make pancakes about once a year. Luckily the internet is my BFF and I quickly found an easy recipe and my first time pancakes from scratch turned out wonderfully! The batter made way to much so I made the dogs some extras and made one "MEGA pancake" for Casey to use as a frisbee for the dogs.

Behold MEGA PANCAKE!!!!

BOW to MEGA PANCAKE!!

After "Pancake Mania" we rearranged the guest rooms to consolidate into one room so we will have room in the nursery.

Yesterday afternoon we headed to Chris & Jessica's for their 4th of July block party. Normally we have a 4th of July party at our house, but this year it was nice to have a break. Here is a pic of Casey, myself, and the bump. :)

Rollin' with the Homies

NERD ALERT!

For those of you who were not aware until I was about 16 I had an intense passion for roller skating. Yes I was one of those "Rink Rats" that was at the skating rink 3-4 times a week. It started out with birthday parties and maybe going occasionally on Saturday afternoons with my dad, but it turned into a true passion. I started going Friday -Sunday to every session and when I was 11 decided I would try my hand at inline speed skating (the equivalent of speed skating in the olympics, but with inline skates instead of ice). I joined the East Texas Sprinters and for several years practiced 4-5 times a week and competed at meets all around Texas. It made me so happy, unfortunately it did not make my dad (or his wallet) as happy. I ended up getting burnt out and quit skating and took up golf (that's a WHOOOLE other story). Since quitting I have missed it constantly, but it's hard to find people who love skating as much as you and you never want to be the 25 year old creepy woman skating by herself at the skating rink on Saturday.

A month or two ago my mom gave me this pair of roller blades that her friend gave her but were too big for her (they were a 7-8 which is PERFECT for me!) and I decided I would start skating around my neighborhood for exercise. I thought it would take me a while to get back into the swing of things, but it was like I had never taken a pair of skates off my feet. For the past week or so I've been skating a lot and I have even included Riley a few times. He loves it because he gets to full out sprint while I skate behind him (and I can keep up) instead of him walking quickly when we got jogging. We just got done skating a mile and he is WORN OUT. Riley is currently laying on the hard wood floor panting and trying to cool off and I am about to do the same. Just thought I would share a forgotten passion that is being revived. :)

Summer time and the living is easy...

Update time!

I have been a lazy, lazy blogger, and while I seriously doubt that anyone reads my blog enough to notice, I still feel like I should be updating more often. So here's what's been going on in the life of Sarah, Casey, Riley, & Zac (our new official spelling of his name):


1. Instead of going to New Braunfels for the weekend after the flooding that happened, we opted to make it a day trip and ride up to New Braunfels with Casey's parents to show them around that area (neither of them had ever been) and then to drive up to Austin for our wedding food tasting. On Saturday we took the Pages to New Braunfels and showed them around. We made our first stop at Naegelin's, the oldest bakery in Texas. This is always a must when we go to New Braunfels for 2 reasons. 1. We love supporting family owned small businesses. 2. Everything they make is incredibly delicious and very affordable. We ended up buying them out of kolaches so that we could take some back to the Chagla's who weren't able to take their family trip this year due to the flooding. After Naegelin's we went over to check on Heidelberg and were very sad to see that they were hit pretty hard with the flooding. All of their downstairs lodge rooms were flooded so all of the rooms were being gutted and repaired. Hopefully they will be back up and running by the time Casey's bachelor party rolls around in a few weeks.

2. I have been subbing at TWYLA and am loving it.

3. The weekend of June 18-20 I went to Nacogdoches and was lucky enough to be asked to help plan my best friend's proposal! James proposed to my beautiful best friend Leigh Anne on June 18th and it was perfect. I also got to hang out with my other best friend Sara Baker! Here are some pics from the weekend:






4. Upon getting home from Nacogdoches we celebrated Father's Day with Casey's family at Shannon's house. We got Casey's dad a bunch of miscellaneous gifts and among them was this book. I HIGHLY recommend it as it has made me laugh harder than I've laughed in a LONG time- WARNING: it obviously uses very explicit language- use discretion if you are offended by curse words. After getting home from Father's Day festivities we had Casey's (dog) Father's Day from the boys:




4. We went to Longview this past weekend to help my dad with some stuff and go to my cousin Lily's 5th birthday. Later that night my mom helped Casey and I give the pups a hair cut. Here are some pics from the party and also our hairless hounds:

Our God daughter Abby crawling all over me

My cousin Jen & I

Ms. Lily opening her gifts!

BEFORE

DURING

AFTER

5. I've been missing some things lately... I really miss cooking, fashion, and photography. I used to be so passionate about all three of these things and I've really let my passion for these things go by the way side. So in addition to planning a wedding, trying to stay fit, helping my best friend plan a wedding, keeping the house in order, and working part time, I am going to try to also put some effort into bringing more artistic and creative endeavors into my life again. What this means for you blog readers is that from time to time I might post an outfit, photograph, or meal that I have cooked and that I am proud of. Whether these things will truly hold any artistic value will remain to be seen, but they will be things I am proud of and this blog is about self expression and finding myself so yeah... lol. Here are some meals that I have made that I am proud of:

I may have blogged about this dish before, but it's my signature dish and something I make all the time so I thought I would share. I call it Italian Flag Pasta (because of the red green and white)

Italian Flag Pasta:
-Any pasta - I usually use angel hair or penne and I mix 1/2 whole wheat pasta and 1/2 regular for texture
-Cherry or Grape tomatoes - quartered
-Chopped fresh basil (does not work with dried basil)
-Kosher salt (my secret ingredient in everything)
-Fresh cracked black pepper
-Olive oil
-Lemon juice

I usually add shrimp that I have sauteed in olive oil and fresh minced garlic, but you can have this as a side dish (I'm planning to have it as a side for our 4th of July party) or you can add grilled chicken or shrimp and have it as a main course. It's SO easy and so yummy! It's a perfect summer dish.

This is a pasta recipe that I got from HEB Cooking Connection. It's pasta with this amazing imported tomato sauce with chicken sausage, fresh basil, and parmesan cheese. You can really do this with any pasta, tomato sauce, and chicken sausage. I have been adding basil to everything because my basil plant is thriving - yay!

Okay so I think I have successfully overloaded this post and it just might be the LOOOOOOONGEST post ever. More later!

More blessings and back on the wagon

This week I decided that I absolutely had to be back on the wagon and focused on this weight loss. I luckily did not gain anything back and have lost an additional pound recently but I still have a ways to go. I want to lose an additional 5 lbs by Halloween and then the other 3-5 lbs by Christmas. I will post some more "after" pictures soon and my measurements.

Yesterday I worked at Loft (Ann Taylor Loft) from 8:30-12:00 and I just have to say that I really love working there so far. The clothes are fabulous, my bosses are wonderful, and my coworkers are very nice. Having never shopped at Loft before now I am so impressed by the quality of the material and the quality of the fit of all of the clothing. I bought three pairs of jeans yesterday as well as a dress, a cardigan, and an ADORABLE slouchy "grandpa" sweater that looks soooo cute with skinny jeans. Speaking of which I finally can fit into skinny jeans and not look like a sausage - haha- YAY! I am very excited about being back in retail and honing my love of fashion again. I will definitely have to watch my spending though- I want everything in the store!

After getting off of work I had a text from Katie (Casey's sister) and she was back from her fabulous Mexican cruise. She was downtown so I went and picked her up and we had a nice time hanging out and catching up. Last night the whole Page family went to dinner and silly me - I didn't get any pictures! What is wrong with me? I used to be a complusive picture taker and now I forget! We went to Guadalajara's and it was wonderful as usual.

This morning I have been hanging out around the house and getting some "to-do"s done. I took Riley out for a run/extended walk and we ended up being out for an hour walking and running around the neighborhood. When we got back I felt bad that Zach didn't get to go so he and I went for a leash training session around the pond and back. He did really well and I'm excited that he's finally getting better on the leash.

Now I'm off to have lunch with Andi at Chick-Fil-A and then tanning. More later!

A new look for the blog and "off the wagon"....

So if you haven't noticed- the blog got a new look! I finally went to thecutestblogontheblock.com and sifted through hundreds of backgrounds before finding this one- which is perfect! It's supposedly a Christmas-y background, but I think it's cute for everyday. I was getting kind of bored with the 10 background offered by blogger so on to better and prettier things!

As you might have noticed, I haven't blogged about my weight loss in over a week and that's because I have kind of fallen off the wagon a bit. I still haven't had much bread per say, but I have been cheating with tortillas and tortilla chips a little. This weekend when Dad came in we were eating out so much that the temptation was just too much for me to handle and I gave in - boo! So yesterday morning I was back on the wagon and eating right again. The working out thing hasn't been what it should be and I haven't really ran or worked out since last Thursday -EEK! I am planning on going to the gym sometime today and getting my butt back in gear. I think I have worked really hard to lose the first five pounds, but it hasn't been enough and I need to work even harder to lose the 5-8 more lbs I want to lose. I keep telling myself with all of the time I am going to have that I should be doing 2-a-days (working out in the morning and again in the afternoon), but saying something and doing it are two very different things. Maybe I will work out today and then try two-a-days tomorrow? We'll see...

Today I have a lot of stuff on my agenda, but nothing really of consequence. I need to give Riley a B-A-T-H and clean around the house some more, but there's a ton of little things in between that I need to do as well. For some reason I am really missing my family right now and I'm not sure if it's that I have all of this time on my hands now or if I am not seeing them enough, but it sucks. All I want to do right now is hang out with my family, especially Jen, Chris, and Abby. I miss you guys SO much - you have no idea. I am very excited that Chris got promoted to Sergeant though and they will FINALLY be able to move in the next year or two. YAY!! Here's the little girl that I miss so much:


Okay well I'm off to do housework and run more errands!

Springtime is finally here!!

YAY! It's the first day of Spring and what a beautiful day it is. It's currently 79 degrees here in Houston (Spring) and the sun is shining. I have decided to try and start blogging because I've always wanted to keep a journal but just could never keep up with it. Hope you enjoy it!

Just got home from work and I am SO relieved that the weekend is here. This week seemed to drag on forever. Tonight I am going to Adriane Russell's Premier Jewelry Party and I am super excited because I get to hang out with two of my favorite girlfriends, Adriane and Megan. We used to work at Elliott Electric together and I really miss those two- they were the only way I stayed sane at that job!

Casey is feeling a little under the weather right now so it's probaby good that I will be out of the house tonight - every time I try to be quiet I end up being clumsier than usual and realllllly loud.

Just went outside and played with the dogs for a bit. For those of you who don't know - we've been fostering a one year old Collie/Australian Shepherd mix named Zach and although he's really sweet and we really like him, we just don't think that this is the right time in our life to get another dog. So if anyone is looking for a really sweet and affectionate and 99% housebroken dog- let me know! We are taking him to an adoption event tomorrow at Market Street in The Woodlands so hopefully he will get adopted by a great family that will have plenty of time, patience, and love for him.

Here are some pics of me and the pups playing outside:

Me and Riley :)

Zach and Riley playing




Also - here is a picture from last weekend that I meant to post on Facebook or Myspace but forgot.



This is Mrs. Yerby, Suzanne, myself, and Jessica at couple's poker night. We had so much fun and it was really great finally getting to meet Austin Berlin's girlfriend Suzi.

Anyway -that's all for now!