We are Full of Scrap!

If you have ever been to Disneyland or Disneyworld with kids, you know that they love to get the signatures of the characters they see at the park. I had no idea about this when we first went a few years ago and we ended up buying an autograph book at the park. But this year, I bought personalized books for the girls from my friend, Maria, who runs her own business called We are Full of Scrap. She makes all kinds of crafty goodness . . . and she is good! Check out her site here! She makes invitations, announcements, photo books, autograph books, wedding card boxes, and so much more!

She worked with me to get exactly what I wanted. For example, Jenna's favorite princess is Belle, so she is on the cover. If you are like me and love the way scrapbooks, homemade cards, etc. look, but you detest making them, please contact her! She does excellent work:)

We Are Full of Scrap
Maria Egal: wearefullofscrap@gmail.com

Dirt

That's what my Honey Nut Cheerios tasted like today.

I remember the last two times I was pregnant, feeling like an alien took over my body. But this is nuts! The morning sickness/nausea deal went to a whole new level today. I really thought I was eating dirt. I was reading this article on weird things happening during pregnancy, and this was one of the things. Seriously! When I read that, I thought about how awful that was and how that could never happen to me. I mean, who eats Honey Nut Cheerios and tastes dirt instead of golden honey goodness? Dirt!

This pregnancy is a little bit different . . . so far I don't have the cravings that I did with the girls. I used to always want pizza, specifically Pizza Hut Cheese Pan Pizza. That was heaven to me. The thought of that makes me want to get sick right now. Before, I would eat anything with sugar in it. Anything. I drank way too much juice and loved cookies and cake. I really had to watch myself because I didn't want to have an issue with blood sugar.

I only had a few aversions--eggs and red meat. But this time, all food seems to fall into the aversion category. I mean really . . . there's a whole roll of uneaten Thin Mints in my freezer and I don't even want to think about eating them. If you know me, you know that I can eat a whole roll in minutes. There's even a huge box of Totino's pizza rolls in there. I bought them when we first got here, but can't go near them now.

So here I sit eating tiny bites of applesauce so that I can have something in my stomach. I guess I should be thankful that at least the applesauce doesn't taste like dirt . . . yet.

Oceanside and Legoland

After our two days in Disneyland, we drove down to the San Diego area. We were planning on going to Sea World or the zoo on our first day in San Diego, but we never made it there . . . Oceanside was too inviting! We stopped there for lunch and found ourselves in a beautiful seaside town that we ended up spending much of the afternoon in. First, we walked down a long beautiful pier and had lunch at a cute diner, overlooking the ocean. Then we headed to the beach, where the girls played and played and played and played!

Day two in San Diego was spent at Legoland. It's a little kid theme park where everything is made out of Legos. Very cool. We happened to be there on Halloween, so the girls wore their costumes all day and even did a little trick or treating at the park!

Mom with the girls on the pier.

I love playgrounds on the beach! I don't think we'll find these in Buffalo:)

Abby

Jenna

Ladybug Girl and Fancy Nancy!

Trick or Treating was a little different this year!

They loved the airplanes!

Disneyland

After our night in Morgan Hill, we traveled during the next day to Disneyland. We stopped in Huntington Beach to have dinner with the Gibsons and then spent two days at Disney--which is more than enough for me! Disney is awesome, but draining with two little kids:)

This is how we roll . . . a packed car, dvd player, and the ever important headphones!

First day at California Adventure . . . on our way to lunch with the princesses!

Lunch with the princesses was a huge hit again! The only problem was that Abby's favorite princess, Snow White, wasn't there. We spent the rest of our time hunting her down and finally got a picture with her at the end of our trip. Well worth the wait! Here's a picture with Belle, Jenna's favorite princess.

Cute sisters!

A pictures with Minnie all decked out in her Halloween dress!

(See the autograph book in Jenna's hand? My friend, Maria, makes them, and they are awesome and affordable. If you go to either Disneyland or Disneyworld, consider buying one from her! More details to come in the next post!)

Grandma and Abby

The Toy Story game in California Adventure was, by far, the favorite ride. We went on this ride a lot! Each player had to wear 3D glasses and got to shoot at video game type interactive screens throughout the game. Very fun! There's even a Wii game for this and I think we're going to ask Santa for it this year:)

And finally, Snow White! Abby was SO happy to finally get a picture with her!

Moving Day

The moving truck originally tried to back into our cul-de-sac, but it didn't work:) How huge is that truck?

boxes waiting to be packed on the truck!

Chuck and Jean, our vicar and his wife who moved into our house, kept the girls busy:)

Bye bye Hartke house! Can you believe it all fit in one third of that truck?

Leaving our house was very, very hard for Jenna.

Abby had an easier time, but wasn't so sure about all her stuff being put in that huge truck that was backing out of our street.

We were absolutely exhausted. Physically and emotionally. We ended up having dinner with our friends in Los Gatos and then got in the car to drive a little ways to get out of the city--on our way to Disneyland! We only made it to Morgan Hill:)

Last Sunday

I don't have many pictures of our last Sunday at Mount Olive, and the ones I do have include other people's kids. I generally don't post pictures of other people's kids, so I'll have to leave those out. But our last day at Mount Olive was hard . . . really hard.

Ironically, my friend, Julie moved one day before we did. She left that Sunday and in the craziness of all our packing, we didn't get a chance to say goodbye until the morning before church, so Julie and Lorraine (who was making the trip with her) stopped by before church to say goodbye. That's when I knew it would be a hard day . . .

We absolutely knew that accepting the call to New York was the right thing to do and we were excited about it, but that doesn't mean that we didn't grieve the loss of a great congregation and many people whom we loved. It was hard to watch our kids say goodbye to their friends and not fully understand what was going on. After church, there was a nice luncheon for us and people had a chance to tell funny stories or share some thoughts . . . it was awesome and we were overwhelmed by people of Mount Olive. Below is a picture of a formal "sending off" prayer. Our family was somewhere in the middle of all those people and everyone was connected in some way, praying for us as we finished our time at Mount Olive.

Overall, it was a very good day, but a difficult one. We are just thankful to have had such a great first congregation and know that God has wonderful things in store for the people of Mount Olive.

The Pumpkin Patch

I was done with work in the beginning of October and had the opportunity to go on the girls' fieldtrips to the Pumpkin Patch. I've realized one thing . . . I am a pumpkin patch snob. I hesitated to even tell you about my frustration with the pumpkin patches in California, as not to offend my CA friends who only know these kinds of patches, but I just have to tell you about it.

First, our trips were great. I love chaperoning fieldtrips, and we had a great time. Second, I know that not all pumpkin patches in CA are either A) set up in a parking lot with jumpy houses and hay to cover the lined parking spots or B) set up in a field where there are no pumpkins growing in sight. I know that REAL pumpkin patches exist in CA. I just found them hard to find and our preschool happened to not go to those in the past two years:)

My beef with the pumpkin patches we encountered in CA is that they are fake. I am a big fan of pumpkins that are actually still in the field. I want to get my shoes muddy when I go out to pick my pumpkin. I want to see all kinds of pumpkins: perfectly round ones, distorted ones, green ones, and really ugly bumpy ones. In CA, all the perfectly shaped, small pumpkins were laid out on the neatly lines haystacks for the kids to pick up. There was no mess and there wasn't even a hayride. The kids rode on tractor, but there was no hay and they just rode around an empty field which happened to go right next to the highway. How can pumpkin patches be next to the highway?

Okay, I'm done with my mini-rant about the awful pumpkin patches we encountered in the past two years. We really did have a good time . . . really!

Abby's not too sure about the peacock in the cage.

Jenna's not too sure either!

Apology

I am so sorry that I have been such a bad blogger lately. I fully realize that I have not posted many pictures since all the craziness of our transition began. Not to worry though . . . a flurry of new posts are coming in the next few days:)

Baby # 3 is on the way!

Two kids. That was it for so long. We were absolutely only having two kids--for two reasons. 1) Having more than two kids when we lived in California just wasn't a possiblity for us. We were committed to putting the girls in private school because we weren't comfortable with our area public schools, and we most definitely coudn't afford three kids at a private school in the Bay Area. 2) I nearly went nuts having two so close together. Abby was/is such an active kid and having two little ones close to the same age was very challenging. The thought of one more made me crazy:)

When Nate accepted the call to NY, we agreed that we'd CONSIDER having another baby. Note the emphasis on the word consider. Really only because we COULD consider it. Living in California, we knew there was absolutely no way we could have another baby. We agreed that once we got to New York, got settled in life, and felt comfortable with our finances, we'd think about a baby.

During our last weeks in California and especially while we were on vacation, I really felt like two kids was it for us. I was comfortable with our family, I was kind of excited to look for a full-time teaching job (or maybe part-time, who knows), and excited to get more involved in activities outside of our home. And this is all really hilarious to me because that was the exact time that I was pregnant and I didn't know it!

The first test was negative and I was relieved. But I was still late, so I took another test and the line that indicated a positive result was so, so faint. Really, I couldn't tell if my mind was playing tricks on me or if it was really there. So I waited a few more days and then we got the for sure positive result. And in all honesty, it took me a few days to be okay with it.

I feel bad for even saying that because it's a baby . . . a blessing . . . who wouldn't be ecstatic? With Jenna and Abby, we had planned them. I was waiting for them and so happy when I knew they were arriving. But this baby wasn't planned and I has mixed emotions about having three kids. It only took me a few days to get over it and be really excited. I think I was just scared.

I was scared of our comfortable family life changing (but really, what's one more change. we did just move to NY). I somehow felt like having three kids was a bit frivolous--for us (this isn't a reference to anyone else but us). Many couples have one kid. Two isn't abnormal because two is what a lot of people do these days. It makes sense to have another baby so that your first one can have a sibling. But three, if you have three, you must really want more kids or a "big family" as I've heard. (and please no comments about having 8 kids here . . . Nate is the oldest of 8, but we are not going for that many. surgery to prevent that is in one of our futures!) And there are people out there who actually think that having more than two kids is a really, really bad thing. I won't go into that . . . but I just wasn't sure about three. A family of five can't fit at a four chaired McDonald's table. One person will have to ride by themselves at amusement parks . . . all stupid thoughts, but that's what went through my head. I just had an idea of what our family was and it changed in an instant.

But I am very, very excited to hold a little baby in my arms in the beginning of July and think that after he or she arrives, I won't be able to imagine our lives without this new little one. Jenna and Abby are so very excited! When I first told Abby, I said, "I have a baby in my tummy!" Abby said, "Well, who is it?" So funny! Jenna has been carrying around heavy things just to show me that she can help carry the baby when he/she comes. They are both hoping for a baby brother so daddy won't be so lonely in our family! All so cute!

I would appreciate prayers for a healthy baby:) I haven't had any nausea yet, which is crazy because with the girls, I was so sick by now. But I have been feeling that pregnancy tiredness and hunger, but that's it. So far, so good!

How was your trip?

That's a question I've been answering a lot, so here's the answer . . .

I have so many pictures to post from our trip, but don't have them all downloaded yet, so this will kind of have to be out of order. I thought of so many blog posts on during our trip, but didn't have Internet access most nights we just got it here at the apartment yesterday!

Here is an update of what has happened in the past few weeks:

Our trip to Disneyland and San Diego was awesome! Tiring, but so wonderful. If my kids could have spent their entire time at the Toy Story 3D game in California Adventure, I think they would have. We attended the princess lunch again at Ariel's Grotto, and that was awesome . . . all except the fact that Snow White wasn't there that day and we had one very disappointed Abby. So we spent the rest of our time figuring out how we could see her. More on that later.

Most people would think that five days in the car with kids would be excrutiatingly difficult, but we actually enjoyed the trip a lot. Portable dvd players + headphones + new Barbie Three Musketeers movie = hours of quietness in the van. We had a ton of movies with us, but they watched that one the majority of the time. We made pit stops and let them pick out candy at the gas station once a day, so that was a nice bargaining tool for good behavior:) Overall, it was a nice, relaxing trip. Five days was certainly enough though!

We arrived in Orchard Park last Thursday, and Nate left for PLI on Saturday morning, so we didn't get a lot of unpacking done. He's home now and we are rocking and rolling on getting this place to feel more like home. The girls have both started school . . . both really loved it and seem to be jumping right into it. Jenna is a little sad and is missing her friends, but I expected that. Abby's way of dealing with the transition seems to be through bad behavior, but we're working on that and each day is getting better. She needs structure and a schedule, which is something we haven't had much of lately. We're taking this transition day by day and being positive about the good things here in NY, but remembering the good in CA. So far, so good.

The biggest surprise came during our vacation in Southern California:) I am pregnant. Yep . . . preggo, bun in the oven, new redhead on the way, three kids under six, not planned . . . we're having a baby! See the next post for details . . . .