Picnic Frock GIVEAWAY!!!!

Picnic Frock GIVEAWAY!!!!

This dress is darling. And I can wear it next summer after all the baby weight magically melts off. Ironically, it looks like my bathroom curtain...

WORDS

These words should be omitted from a pregnant woman's wardrobe:

• Romper
• jumper
• gingham
• skirted swimsuit
• lacey collar
• skort

Shiver. Run away from these words. RUN AWAY!

P.S. I mean no offense.

Ultrasound & Check-Ups

Crooked though they be, there they are! Pictures from our first ultrasound with Brooks 2. Not much to say really, I've gained 3lbs, which is normal in my first trimester since I don't throw up. I tend to snack and eat two dinners :D. Last time I didn't gain much in the 2nd, but the third I did. We had a fire our last month and had to eat out every meal, so I gained 7lbs in 2 weeks. I'm hoping that doesn't happen this time around :)

Baby is in perfect health as far as we can tell at this point and there is just ONE. Twins run on both sides of our family so we got a lot of questions, but nope, just ONE BABY. D is relieved. Unless they were twin girls.

This baby didn't move around too much but that heart sure was flapping! The big circle next to the baby's head is the yolk sac, which I don't remember seeing before. The yolk sac is what the baby lives off of until the placenta is fully formed. Interesting. I didn't know that before.

Last time we went to BV Women's Center and they were okay. It felt a lot like a business transaction so this time we decided to try Cascades. Their building isn't as nice, but the people have so far been fantastic. They were so nice! So we're glad that we switched, except that one of the delivery doctors is an elderly gent and D isn't too keen on the idea of a man being around me, haha.

P also had his doctor's appointment yesterday. He had to get two shots which broke my heart. I think they hurt his feelings more than anything b/c he always gets this shocked look on his face, and doesn't cry, then sees the nurse doing it and that little face just crumbles. Dr. Beck never tells me what percentile P is in, just that his head, weight and height are all perfectly matched and that's what counts. He also said that he's impressed by P's maturity b/c most 18 month checks ups are the worse because the babies are screaming the whole time due to stranger anxiety. Dr. Beck has cool toys in his pockets, so he and P got along just fine! Anyway, D is healthy too! We're all in the clear health-wise!

#2 Coming in December!

Woohoo! So it's baby time for us again. We were originally planning for next year (my sister-in-law planned hers so she was pregnant in August and baby was born in March and I personally thought it was brilliant). BUT, I love it when things you want come earlier than expected.

We've known for over a month but just let the cat out of the bag since I'm showing already.

We're due the first week of December right around my birthday. Somewhere between the 5th and the 7th depending on who you ask. It's great timing b/c we should already be in our house for a couple of months and I can have the room all ready.

I haven't had any morning sickness but have been way more nauseous than I was with Piercen. I also have to pee everytime I stand up and I had my first weird craving ever (pb icecream with chocolate syrup and strawberries). It was divine by the way.

So some things are weird when you happily find out you're pregnant and you weren't trying. While we were waiting for the test I had these thoughts:

1. Holy crap, what if it's a negative. I'll be so disappointed.

2. Holy crap, I'll be disappointed!?

3. Dang, I just lost my baby weight!

4. I wonder if it will be a girl so I can finally buy frilly dresses.

5. Three minutes isn't very long. Or is it?

Tomorrow is our first ultrasound so we're excited to already get a move on with things. It seemed like it all took much longer with P.

Why my husband said I don't love our son...

I think it has something to do with the white short overalls or maybe it's the blazer. But he has a Sandman action figure so I'm not totally ruining him right?

Insider: Home Appraisals

So the bank you get your loan through will want to do an appraisal on the home you're tryin to buy. INSIDER TIP* Learn who your bank uses and have the seller of the home have that appraiser appraise the house BEFORE you tell the bank which one you've chosen.
It turns out that home appraisers tend to be, uh... biased when appraising a home for the bank they work for. Often times, they'll give a low appraisal. BUT, if they don't know who you're getting your loan from they'll be more honest.
I know, isn't that a shame? Thankfully, we've learned from other people's bad experiences and the person who we want to buy our house from has agreed to use a certain person from 1st National to appraise his home. That way it will be honest and when we go to get our loan, they'll have already appraised it and they won't be able to go back and say it's worth less.
# of times I used th word appraise in some variation: 9 (including this sentence)

Lazy Picture Uploader

That's me. I'm really awful at uploading my pictures once I've taken them. But here's what's been up:

Easter:

Then we had the most perfect weekend. Thursday we looked at 6 more houses and didn't find anything except confirm we liked the first house we saw. Then my Grandma came up from TN so we all went to Hong Kong Buffet, the only buffet we'll go to, to celebrate D's birthday that was on Saturday.

Friday we went with Jen and Nick to the Mud Hen's game (also for D's birthday, in case he asks) and it was awesome. D never went before and loved it. We got pretty much every type of food they had available. Between us we had nachos, pretzels (the cup is the cheese they gave Jen, wow) peanuts, hotdogs and french fries. It was a lot of fun. Great tickets Jen!

Finally, Saturday was D's actual birthday, so he went out and a round of golf for the most perfect weather in the world. He went with his dad and my dad and had a good time. Meanwhile I ran and got him a cake. P got impatient with waiting for cake...

Today we finished out our weekend by having my family come over for dinner. It wasn't as near as nice as yesterday, but we still grilled out and D played soccer with my niece and nephew. It was such a relief to have a clean house! Even if it only lasted for a couple of minutes!

HOUSE

So I've had a few people ask me how we liked the house we went to look at Friday. Well, we really loved it. It's not in the best location however. I don't mean that our town has slums or anything, haha, but there is a trailer on each side of the property and down the road a bit there's the backside of a trailer park. Now the plus side to that is that they're old people trailers and not white trash trailers so everything is well kept and quiet. Plus there's a lot of land on each side and your neighbors aren't on top of you.
The PROS of the house is that in 1997 the house had been vacated for 6 years when they bought it. And the electricity and sub-pump had been turned off and there were crazy mold issues from the standing water. So they gutted the entire house, inside and out, with brand new beautifulness. There are lots of personal touches that I like too like the black board paint surrounding the pantry door and the textured walls in the bathroom. The bedrooms upstairs are enourmous and there's space to add a bathroom with the plumbing all done. We'd just have to buy a tub and toilet basically. There's also a really nice basement where, if we stayed a while, we could put in two more bedroom and a bathroom should our family increase that much.
So it's all new, cheap and there's plenty of easy ways to grow into it. And we're behind the park. We have to wait to put in our offer because that's when his contract with the realtors is over with. So we're going to look at all the houses we can until May 3, but that's most likely the one we'll go with. Not including any unforeseen circumstances of course!

New Developments - Very Exciting

So my husband has taken this househunting thing in full gear. We have found a house (via on-line) that we seem to love with our whole hearts.

We're going to see it Friday at 4pm! I don't know if the link will still work later because the house is supposed to go off the market. The owner still wants to sell it, but he wants to cut out the middle man which means we can get the house for another $8000 cheaper. Hopefully. I can't wait to see it in person.

LOANS- Now I have no idea what's going on with our pre-approval status. One guy told us we'd only get approved for about $70,000 and that would go up to $90,000 in June. The houses I've seen in town at that price range are ridiculous and wouldn't make my baby live there.

Then another guy told us that we'd be approved for $160,000 conservatively. Of course, I wouldn't spend that much on a house. Just because we're approved for it doesn't mean we can really afford it. If we want to eat.

The house D found would be as much as our rent IF we have a high percentage rate 6.5% AND if we use the $8,000 the government gives us as a downpayment. We'd save money on gas, but we'd also have homeowners insurance and taxes, etc, so it would all even out.

Anyway, if anyone out there has pointers on buying a house. I NEED TO HEAR IT.

Pre Loan Applications 101

So D talked to another mortgage lender today and he basically said that people who have commission based jobs are "screwed" as far as getting loans unless they've been in the job for awhile. If we were to qualify we'd have an unfixed rate starting at around 6.5%. Which means of course they could change our rate on us randomly.
BUT, the lender said that he would really plead our case since we have such great credit scores and something about our payment history (?) and that we've never made a late or had a missed payment which is excellent.
So, even if we don't qualify for the loan we want, we'll still go ahead and take it BECAUSE until November 29, 2009 all first time homebuyers get an $8,000 check from the government. I know, CASH! So I figure we can always refinance in a couple of years for a fixed rate and it will still save us money.
Anyway, good FYI for all you first time home buyers out there. Oh, and by the way, a first time home buyer is defined as one who has not owned a home in 3 years so it may quailify more of you than you think!