I'm dreaming of junk...

Have you noticed that people have been doing some spring purging lately? Seems like everyday I notice new stuff on the side of the road, just waiting to be picked up by someone. I have been trying really hard not to pick up every single thing that I find on the side of the road. Our house doesn't have the extra space to store stuff that isn't needed, so most of the time I just pass right by a good find. That is especially hard to do when it comes to toys for Coral. There have been so many opportunities to pick up toys that are in great condition for Coral, but again, I pass by because of the lack of space.

This weekend though, I might go a little nuts. I will be with my mom, who encourages me to pick up free stuff, and my sister, who also encourages me to pick up free stuff. We will be driving all over, from door to door, looking through peoples junk.

Junk days are officially on in Norfolk County! What are junk days? That's not the official name, just what my family calls it, but basically it's where each town in the county gets a specific time to put out all of their junk at the side of the road, and the garbage men will come and take whatever it is you don't want. It's a gold mine for treasure hunters like myself. Were talking free stuff everywhere. Piles and piles of it. All for the taking.

I'm so excited to see what I'm going to find this weekend. It is always a blast going with my mom and sister, and usually works out pretty good since we all have slightly different tastes when it comes to decorating our houses.

Oh and if you happen to be in the area, don't forget it's the village yard sales in Port Rowan this weekend. My family will be having one. Come and find us, were the loudest house in the villages.

This weekend is going to be a blast!

Big ugly dresser complete!

Yes, the big ugly dresser is finally done. With a fresh coat of paint and some new hardware, this dresser went from ugly to beautiful. I painted it a while ago, but it took a long time for us to put the new hardware on it. I couldn't find hardware that matched the holes of the old hardware, so new holes had to be made. That was probably the hardest part of the whole project.

So here it is. But just to refresh your memory, here is the before picture.



Big brown and ugly. Here is the after.















She's kinda pretty isn't she. I love all the details, and I LOVE the extra nine drawers of space it gave me.

Disaster house!

For those of you who think my house is always clean, don't be fooled. I have a child, so it's impossible for my house to stay clean always. But lately it's been a whole lot more then just Coral messes around here. I have mentioned a time or two that I'm not a fan of renos right? I don't think I would mind so much if the mess stayed downstairs.

Here's what I'm talking about.






Andrew has been stockin up on some basement goodies (such as a tv, and speakers for the surround sound, wallpaper for the guest room, bathroom supplies) as they come on sale (smart right? We're not fans of buying things full price). So, he buys them, and they end up in this small little room because we have no place else to store them. Our garage has a mini ramp in it, so there is no storage space there, and our storage room currently looks like this:




Umm. Ya. That room WAS organized when the basement renos first started, but then it slowly got messier and messier as we added things, and took away things as we needed them. See all that stuff in the back right corner? That's all our baby stuff that I can't get at until the renos are complete.

Our guest room (Corals soon to be big girl room) has a mattress permanently on the floor until the renos are done (so our guests still have a place to crash in the mean time). Coral thinks its a dress up mattress, so it always looks like this:



And our master bedroom (that I'm suppose to be re-decorating because of the big ugly dresser remember) can't have anything else done to it because it is currently hosting a shelf that will go downstairs.




Junk junk everywhere. I'm ready for the basement renos to end. Andrew is ready for that too. We are SO close yet SO far from being done. Right now Andrew is working on taping and mudding the dry wall during all his free time. He's not a fan, and it's a slow process, but it's saving us almost $2500 by him doing it himself. Go Andrew go!

I'm guessing if I wasn't pregnant, the clutter around the house wouldn't bother me so much. But this pregnancy I'm going nesting crazy (I think it's because I actually know this time how little can be accomplished once you bring a new born home). I want to get this house, every corner and closet organized in good time before the baby comes.

So probs stay away from the Hodgson house for a while. If you happen to be so brave to venture over here, I might just hand you some sand paper and a mask and put you to work :) kidding.....maybe.

Thoughts on Epidurals

Ok for all you non-pregnant people out there, this post will mean nothing to you, but I'm writing it because I have had a number of moms-to-be (first time, and not first time) ask me about my thoughts on Epidurals. I'm not sure if it's my parenting style (trying to go all natural when I can, using cloth diapers, homeopathic medicine, no harsh chemicals in the house) that made these women ask me about this topic, but I'm going to try to answer your questions as best as possible.

First of all, yes I had an epidural with Coral. I knew LONG before going into the hospital that I would take any pain meds that would be offered to me. In fact the first thing I said to the nurses upon arriving at the hospital was "I'm getting an epidural....not now...but just so your aware I want my pain meds."

When I first got pregnant with Coral I did a ton of research on Epidurals. If you have researched this topic at all, you probably found that people are either really against them, or really for them. People against them claim that labour is longer with them, baby comes out drowsy and is more likely to have latch on problems, and you can't feel when you need to push (to that I say a big HA. Your pushing out a child, I'm sorry but there is absolutely no way, no matter how many meds you are on, you are not feeling it).

For me, it really came down to how I wanted my labour experience to go. Not only did I want a good experience for myself, but I wanted it to be a good experience for my hubby as well. I knew that I wanted more children after this, and I figured if I traumatized Andrew, he might just call it quits after our first one. I wanted it to be an experience that I could actually enjoy (and it sounds crazy, but I actually did enjoy my labour). So I decided to go for the epidural. My drs response was a big "oh thank goodness! I don't understand why anyone would reject pain relief in a moment like giving birth." hmm..so true.

Ok, so let me banish a couple of those nasty epidural myths. Because I had chosen to get the epidural, I knew that I had an out for the pain. So for each contraction, I was able to relax and breathe right through it, knowing that if it became to much, I had a way out. And that's exactly what happened. The pain was getting to much, so I got the needle. Myth: Epidurals hurt like crazy. Ok maybe perhaps, if you don't do well with needles, I can see why it would be scary. It's a giant needle going right into your spine. But let me tell you, the contractions hurt WAY more then the needle. In fact I didn't even feel the needle go in (bless my poor hubby's heart. The guy does not do well with needles and he held my hand through the whole thing. He turned white as a ghost and I thought he was going to pass out).

Myth: contractions slow down your labour. First of all, this wasn't a concern of mine. If you happen to be one of those people that it does slow your labour down, who cares! Your not in pain anymore! Enjoy the extra hours you have of just you and your hubby, your baby will come soon enough. For me, it actually sped labour up. When I got the epidural, I had been in labour for 12 hours already. I was only 2 cm dilated, the same as when I first got into the hospital. I was put on an IV drip to make me go into active labour, so the contractions were REALLY bad, but my labour wasn't progressing. I got the epidural, and I could no longer feel the contractions. So I slept. Because I was sleeping, and so relaxed through my contractions, it helped me dilate.

Myth: you won't know when it's time to push. Like I said, after the epidural, I fell asleep, and allowed by body to do its thing. I woke up, the nurse checked me and said "still only 2.5 cm...your baby isn't coming any time soon. Just keep sleeping." I called the nurse back in half hour later and said its time to push. She kind of laughed at me, but I was insistent. Sure enough I went from 2.5 to 10 cm in half hour. Andrew was out doing errands, so I had to call him back. It's a weird feeling, you don't actually feel the contractions, but you DO feel when you need to push. Oh my, I don't thing anything could take away that pain.

Myth: baby will be born drowsy and won't latch on. Well, hard for me to say on this one. Coral was only born 2 weeks early, but the drs considered her a premie because of her size. She was drowsy, but not overly drowsy. She still did skin to skin, and she latched on like a pro. No problems there. AND, again, going into my labour, I really didn't care if I had a drowsy baby for the first few hours. Good grief soon enough they will be fully alert and require your full attention. Take the drowsy baby and maybe get some extra sleep while your at it.

My over all experience with the epidural was great. However, I did have a slight problem with it. After I had given birth and the epidural was wearing off, I had an allergic reaction to it. Like severe. It wasnt effecting my breathing, but I was breaking out in hives, and I was so itchy. So itchy that I was drawing blood on my arms and legs from scratching so much. Apparently it's very uncommon, but it can happen. So I was to given a shot of Benadryl in my IV. The Benadryl made me extremely sleepy. The nurse warned it might put me to sleep. That was my only beef with it. I was so tired I remember the room was filled With family members, and I had no clue what was going on. In fact I was so out of it, I only recently found out that my brother-in-law was actually at the hospital. I had thought this whole time he met her a while after she was born. Oops.

That being said, despite the allergic reaction, I'm still going for the epidural for this baby. After all, they don't give out medals to people who have an all natural birth do they. I actually enjoyed my birth experience, and I have to applaud the epidural for that.

Ladies I hope this answered all of your questions.

Dress up

A couple of weekends ago, Coral and I went to visit my sister and fam in their new house. Coral and her big cousin Emma always take off and play together by themselves, and Kaden usually sicks with Crystal and I. It was time for supper so I went up to Emma's room to get the girls. When I entered the room, I saw my little girl all dressed up from head to toe. Emma put a fairy skirt on her, fancy shoes, a sparkling stop, bracelets, necklaces, and a crown. Ever since then, Coral has been addicted to playing dress up.

She didn't really have dress up stuff at our house. I thought she was to little yet to want to play that. But she made do with what she had. Every day she would go through her clothes and pick out different outfits to wear. She would then put on some of Mommas make up, and then find a pair of my shoes to wear.

I slowly want to collect dress up clothes for Coral and future siblings. When I was little our local thrift store had garbage bag days, and us kids would shove as much dress up clothes as we could in a bag, and would only have to pay a dollar for it. Our dress up truck was always full, and we made good use out of all of it. It allowed us to get creative. We would dress up, make up plays, and present them to our parents, and aunt and uncle and cousins that lived by.

So, let the dress up games begin! I can't wait to hunt in thrift stores for the perfect dress up clothes. In the mean time, I got her a couple of things from Superstore the other day to get her started. Every little girl needs a crown, a wand, and fancy shoes.













She wants to wear her fake little heels everywhere. Look out, this little girl has quite the imagination when she puts her dress up clothes on. If you come over, expect to play king and queen with her, and catch scary lions with your magic wand.

A case of the nerves.

The other day Andrew and I were tidying up after Coral went to bed when he said to me "Do you remember infancy and how hard it is?" I looked at him and said with a scared look on my face "yes...."

You may have noticed that there is going to be quite the gap between our first born and our second. Part of that decision was made by God when we lost a baby back in October, but a huge part of that decision was also ours. Andrew and I didn't get the typical baby blues a few months after Coral was born, in fact, we were down right scared to try for another for a long long time. Don't worry all you preggo first time mamas out there, We didn't have a typical infancy experience.

Coral was born exactly two weeks before her due date. She weighed a whole 5 lbs 14 oz, and was only 17 inches long. She was so tiny, and so perfect. We experienced the typical lack of sleep, I myself waking up to feed her almost every hour in the night because she was so tiny and needed to gain weight (note: she woke up every hour all on her own. I was so tired there is no way you could have convinced me to wake a sleeping baby at night at that point). So yes, I was tired, but she was a good baby.

Let's fast forward to when she hits the three week mark. I can remember when the crying started so clearly. We were at my friend Britts house watching the bachelor. Coral started crying, and no matter what I did, she wouldn't stop. Little did I know that she would continue to cry for the next three and a half months. I had had her for three weeks already. I knew her so well. I knew what every whimper, cry and face meant. This cry, was totally different.

Your baby is described as having colic if they cry at least three times a week for more then three hours at a time, typically in the evening. HA! That's jokes. That's a easy baby compared to what we had.

Let me paint you a picture. Coral gets up around 7 in the morning, and starts to cry. She continues to cry all. Day. Long. She doesn't nap, because she is to busy crying. She continues to cry throughout the evening, and then finally settles down around 1:00 am (if I am lucky) and goes to sleep, but wakes up every hour on the hour to be fed. And a colic cry, is not a typical try. It's loud, and there is no way to stop it. Let me say that again, there is NO way to stop it.

For me, that was the hardest part about being a new mom. A first time mom already feels like all eyes are on her, and everyone is judging what kind of mom will she be. Will she be a natural? Or will she struggle and have no clue what she is doing? I'm confident in saying I was born to be a mama, I'm a natural, but what Coral was doing was not natural.

I constantly felt like people were judging me. Everywhere I went people made comments. Comments like these: "oh do you think she could be hungry?" my response was "no she's colic" but in my head I'm thinking "wow thanks for the genius advice, if only I had thought to feed her then I wouldn't have dealt with constant crying for the last three months".

Or "maybe she's tired"....well of course she is, she doesn't sleep and she cries all day and night. If you can get her to sleep be my guest.

Or "maybe she's wet and uncomfortable." Good one, the thought of changing her diaper never crossed my mind.

Or "maybe she has gas?".....ya, she does. She's colic.

Let me tell you, it took everything in my sleepless mental state not to actually say those things out loud. I mean, sure, they were all well meaning, and just trying to help, but still, I felt like a new mom being looked down on, like I had no clue what I was doing.

I have had some moms with fussier babies ask me what I did do that helped. Each day was a new day, and what worked for Coral one day, wouldn't work the next. She spent a lot of time being held on her tummy, sometimes that helped. Sometimes it helped to swaddle her REALLY tightly, other times she needed her legs free. I ate a bland diet, which sometimes helped, and no diary. Gripe water did nothing, but some other homeopathic stuff did help sometimes....I tried them all. Rocking sometimes helped, bouncing on an exercise ball sometimes helped. Holding both her little feet and pressing her legs up into her tummy sometimes helped. All of these things sometimes helped, sometimes made it worse. Each day was different.

So that's the crying part of it. Now, did you know that if your baby has/had colic you can't sleep train them until they are over 8 months old? That means every single time your baby wakes up, you have to go to him or her and comfort or feed them. Coral was still, up until 8 months when she got sleep trained, getting up every single hour. I was beyond exhausted.

Between the crying and the lack of sleep, I hardly knew what was going on around me. Friends would come over to visit for the evening and I remember just sitting there in a fog, trying to keep my eyes open.

We had a pretty rough go for the first eight months of Corals life. Let me tell you, sleep makes all the difference, and baby Hodgson (ooooh you better not be colic) will be sleep trained as soon as he or she hits the required weight to be sleep trained (remember, I give birth to really small infants). I did however make myself write in Corals baby book and journal through out her colic, and even during the most difficult times I only had the best things to say about being a mommy. I still adored her. I still stared at that little crying face with love. I was still smitten through it all.

And so, as you can see, we did not have the typical first born, first parenting experience. It was hard, it took us a long time for us to want to do it again. But here we are, almost 18 weeks pregnant, and ready. Nervous, but ready. I feel like if we have a good baby, we won't know what hit us. It will be a breeze for us. Even if we have a fussier then normal baby it still will be a breeze for us. And if we do happen to have a colic baby, well, we're pros by now anyway right (but please someone come over and play with my toddler and hold my crying baby so I can shower).

And for those mamas out there who do have a fussy or colic baby, hold on, it does get easier. Umm, I'll be honest, not for a few months, but eventually it will get easier. And don't be afraid to just put your baby down in a safe spot like its crib, shut the door and let it cry (heck, it's crying anyway right) while you go have a coffee with some ear plugs in.

Front Entrance

What do you look for in a front entrance?

I have never really given that question much thought when it comes to my own house, after all, its not like its a spot in our house where people hang out. But, it's the first thing people see when they walk into your house. It's their first impression. Wouldn't you want it to be just as warm and welcoming as the rest of your house.

Here is the current state of our front entry.









It's not terrible. But it's DARK. I really dont mind darker wall colors, if you have the natural lighting for it. This space, does not. It feels like a cave. The wall color is from the previous owners still, and I'm not quite sure how to describe it. In some lighting it looks brown, in some it takes on more purple tones. Either way, it has to go.

Heres the plan. It all started with a rug. A beautiful rug that Coral (Andrew) ordered me for mothers day. I don't have it yet, it's being shipped here, so you will have to wait to see it when the entrance is done. But trust me, it's going to look awesome. The walls are going to be painted a light cream, and the front door a beige. I got a new bench (actually a really narrow coffee table, that I will turn into a bench), and some funky fabric and pillows to go on top and some bright colored art. Ah I can just imagine now much better it will be.

It's going to be a big project, especially because I'm pregnant. I painted Corals whole nursery when I was pregnant, so I already know what paint is safe to use, and whats not. And I can keep the door and bathroom window open so it will be well ventilated. But still, with me being pregnant, I am not going to be able to be my speedy self with this project. The color continues all the way upstairs (which will have to be left as an accent wall because there is no way I could convince anyone to hang off a tall ladder and paint it ) and all the way to the basement. The basement is about to be tapped and mudded which I hear is the messiest part of renos, so I think I will wait until that is done to give the walls a fresh coat of paint.

What have you done with your entry to make it inviting for guests? Is yours narrow like mine, not giving you much option on how to decorate it?

Puddle jumping.

I wish I had some photos to show you for this post, I really do, because Corals puddle jumping this morning was epic.

Waking up this morning, I discovered we were out of two very important things, wipes and coffee. So, Coral and I took a walk to the Metro, picked up our goodies, and then continued on to the park. When we got there, we were the only ones there. Probably because A: there was a huge storm last night and the park was completely soaked, and there were puddles everywhere. And B: there were huge rain clouds everywhere you looked.

I'm proud to say Corals first instinct was to run directly towards the huge puddles and jump in them. And I didn't attempt to stop her, even though she was wearing her freshly washed white Capri jeans. She jumped, and jumped and jumped. She even plopped her little butt down and sat in the puddles. Of course then she ran to the muddy sand to build big sand castles. Coral, you would have made your uncle Jer proud today.

My mom was never afraid to let us kids get dirty. When I was little, you could usually find my brother and I (rain or shine) out in the mud, digging around, making mud stew, even forts in the mud. A lot of my childhood memories are of us in the puddles and mud. And I'm glad Coral isn't afraid to get dirty.

It's time to get that little girl some rubber boots so we can make puddle jumping a more regular activity. Let your kids get dirty today...it's fun!

Are we finding out the gender?

Coral was a surprise. We waited that whole looooong nine months to find out if we would diving into the world of dress-up and tea parties, or if we would be putting on capes and kicking balls around. It was hard, and there were so many times throughout my pregnancy that I just wanted to find out what we were having. But, there is nothing like giving birth and at that very moment finding out it's a boy or girl; and then you have that "ah ha, of course it's a....." moment.

Before we got pregnant with this lil nugget, we bounced back and forth on whether to find out the gender this time or not. The surprise is SO good, but the wait is so hard. And then there's that weird feeling of not knowing what your having, so you try not to think about it to much and get attached to one gender over the other. This happened to Andrew last time.

You see, he was CONVINCED, not a doubt in his mind that he would only reproduce males (he is after all from Viking decent, no lie). Sure, we had a girls named picked out just in case, but really, he knew it would be a boy. I myself (secretly hoping I would have a little girl, but knew I would love a boy as well) didn't get attached to the thought of having any gender.

As you can imagine, Andrew got quite the shock when Coral was born, and he now had a daughter instead of a son. In fact, when she was born, no one told me the gender, I had to look and say to Andrew "it's a girl Hodg!" to which he responded "a girl???" and he sat in shock for the next couple of hours as visitors came and left, not really saying anything.

Now I have got to say, he was in shock, but that doesn't mean he was disappointed. He held her, fell in love, and now can only imagine himself having more girls. How could he not? Coral is adorable if I do say so myself.

So after this, we thought that maybe it would be best if we found out the gender for our future little viking children. BUT, that thrill of the surprise was just to good. Not only did it help me get through labour and delivery, but I LOVE how anxious it made everyone else while we were in the hospital. Because no body knew what we were having, and they didn't know the names we chose, we had everyone on their toes for the whole 16.5 hours I was in labour.

So, the answer is, no we are not finding out the gender for this baby as well. It will be a surprise, and I'm excited to keep all you readers on your toes while I'm in labour. We already have a gender neutral nursery, gender neutral clothes and blankets from Coral, and a boys name and girls named picked out. We are set.

And we both know this time not to get attached to the idea of having a certain gender (although this time I think if we have a boy Andrew will be in shock again...what can I say, he loves his girls).

I get asked a lot if I have a feeling what the gender might be. No, I don't, but I didn't with Coral either. If we have another baby after this one, I could probably be persuaded to find out the gender, because I am curious if I would have more of a bond with my baby throughout my pregnancy knowing if it's a boy or girl. But we will see.

We also get asked a lot whether we have a preference for the gender this time. Actually, more often we get "so I guess your hoping for a boy this time eh." and truthfully, I don't know how to answer that question. I have always pictured myself in a house full of girls. I'm good at the girl thing. The dress up, nail polish, dolls and barbies. I love having a little girl, and I think it would be amazing if Coral had a little sister to bond with. Andrew feels the same way. He loves Coral so much that he would love to have another little girl. But we wouldn't be disappointed if we have a boy either. We would bust out the train sets and little basketballs and mini skateboards. For us, getting to this pregnancy was hard, and we feel so blessed to be having another child, that really, honestly, we just want our child to be healthy, no matter what the gender.

And now y'all only have five more months to wait until we find out if it's a son or daughter were having :)