Best leftovers ever!

So I have always been a foodie and loved cooking homemade meals for my family, but it has gotten much worse since I've been pregnant, as you can imagine.  If I love a meal, I LOVE that meal.  And I loved our dinner last night, but I LOVED it as lunch today.  It is a healthy lasagna soup.  I think soups make the best leftovers because the flavors just mix together more and it becomes more flavorful overnight.  Last night I served it with a big ol' leafy green salad and garlic bread I made out of leftover hamburger buns I froze a few weeks ago with butter and garlic powder heated in the oven for about 10 minutes (sounds weird but it's delish.  my mom used to do this all the time when I was a kid.) and today I just had it with a piece of my homemade wheat bread with butter on it.  I tried to upload some pictures, but it keeps messing up my Internet Explorer, so no pictures for you!  But here is the link to the recipe Healthy Lasagna Soup.  I used chicken Italian sausage because I couldn't find turkey, dried basil because I hate buying fresh herbs for some reason, and I topped ours with more fresh parmesan cheese because...well, do I really need to explain that.  :)  I have a list of food to make and freeze for my family to have on hand after the birth of my daughter and Jason and I unanimously decided this would go to the top of the list.  I'm not sure how the noodles will be after defrosting, but we'll see!  I clearly loved this recipe, my husband loved it, and my toddler loved it.  Mommy for the win!  Bon apetite!

With love, Doni



The Pregnancy of Miss Isabelle Mae

Since I just started updating my blog again, I wanted to document what my pregnancy has been like this far.

 It has been much different than my pregnancy with Jonathan, and I feel kind of guilty about that.  With JC everything was so new and every little thing just seemed like such a miracle!  Now don't get me wrong, I believe that all babies are miracles, but I kind of feel like I have a case of the "been there, done that".  And being pregnant with a toddler is.....less than ideal.  I can't nap when I want to, I can't sleep in on the weekends, I can't just sit down when I get home from work and not move until bed time. 

But, there are a lot of "I can's".  I can feel my little girl moving all day long, I can feel my love for her grow more and more every second, I can see my son kiss my belly and say "sissy", I can imagine what her little face will look like, I can believe in myself and in my body.  The "I can's" definitely outweigh the "I cant's".

11 weeks

 

13 weeks

 

18 weeks.  The day we found out blue or pink!

20 weeks

23 weeks

25 weeks

26 weeks  (hubby and I got bored and this is what he came up with)

 

I still can't believe I am putting the last two pictures on here and that I posted them on Facebook!  I have always been overweight and never been comfortable with my body.  Then, with my lovely son's pregnancy I got stretch marks, like most women I think.  I have had a really hard time accepting them as part of me.  I lost almost 25 pounds after I had my son (in addition to all the pregnancy weight) and that helped my confidence for sure, but I still hated my stretch marks.  This pregnancy however I have become much more....zen....and hippie I guess.  My husband says hippie.  lol  But, I see all these women with beautiful bodies and their stretch marks don't bother me.  So, why do mine???  I'm learning to accept them I guess.  And I think my bump looks pretty cute right now.  Hope ya'll are having a good weekend!!!

 

With love, Doni

Hi, I'm Doni, and you are......?

     Hello!  Boy have I been gone a while!  I started this blog to document my pregnancy with my son back in 2010.  And I successfully posted two whole blog posts!  And then I quit.  I have a history of doing things like this (I also have a mommy journal I started when my son was a few months old and I only have one entry in there.).  HOPEFULLY this one will last longer.  I have much more to say this time around.

     So let me just fill you all in on who I am and what I'm about...

     I am a mother of a two year old son, I am in my late 20's (wahhhhh!), and I have been married to the love of my life since May of 2009.  They are my everything.  As I have had the difficult realization over the last year or so that my relationships with my friends are different now that we are all grown up and that some people in my life are users and not really there for me like I thought, they have been my constants.  They are always there and I know they always will be. 

     When I was pregnant with my son, my eyes were opened to the fact that my lifestyle was not the healthiest.  I thought I was eating pretty good, but boy was I wrong!  So, he changed that completely.  Then his arrival sent me into overdrive.  I became more aware of toxins that are everywhere and I just wanted to hide him from them, which in turn meant hiding myself and my husband from them.  The health of my boys is my complete inspiration for everything I do and every change I have made to our lifestyle over the last two years. 

     So now I am 5 and a half months pregnant with the little girl I have dreamed about forever, planning a homebirth this summer, and trying to be the perfect stay at home mom and wife.   It's hard.  I find navigating this new life is much more difficult than my old life.  It was so much easier to be totally unaware.  At least I think so.  Some people make it look like second nature.  Hopefully I'll get there some day.  The sooner the better. 

    I hope you all enjoy my new, revamped blog!  Be prepared to see a lot about breastfeeding, natural childbirth, homemade goodies, my love for my husband, my love for my son, cloth diapers, and essential oils.    

With love, Doni