Nursery Update

We have been working on the nursery the past few weeks and although it is nowhere near finished, we are getting things accomplished slowly but surely. I thought I would post a few pictures to show the things we have completed.

This is a picture of the crib. It is probably my favorite part of the nursery! When Justin and I first started trying to have a baby he decided he wanted to build the crib. I was happy with his decision since he has built several pieces of furniture in our house and each one has exceeded my expectations. He did such a great job and it is beautiful!


The letters in the crib will eventually be covered in fabric matching baby girl’s bedding and framed over her crib.


This picture is of the changing table (minus the drawer pulls). The changing table was originally a desk that came from my great aunt’s house. When I was in high school, I refinished it to match my bedroom at mom and dad’s. I recently, sanded down and painted it once again to give it new life as a changing table. I am happy with the way it turned out and happy to have a piece of family heritage in the room as well.



I will post more about the nursery as we get things accomplished!

Week 23 & 24

How Far Along: 23 Weeks


Size of Baby: Baby Wilkins is the size of a large mango.
Total Weight Gain/Loss: gained about 14 lbs
Maternity Clothes: mostly maternity; some regular shirts and dresses still fit
Gender: It's a girl!!! Emmalyn Caroline Wilkins
Movement: This week she is starting to move all the time! She has found my bladder and is using it as a trampoline.
Sleep: Depends on the night. Sometimes I wake up multiple times and some nights I do not wake up until I feel like my bladder will burst.
What I Miss: Shrimp! That will probably be my answer until this pregnancy is over!
Cravings: Honestly, it was two weeks ago and I can’t remember. :-)
Symptoms: Tiredness and a catch in my hip and butt. I think baby girl may be hanging out on a nerve.
Best Moment this week: Going to the doctor and hearing that everything with my sweet girl and me are going well!

How Far Along: 24 Weeks


For fun this is a picture of me in the same dress at 18 weeks!


Size of Baby: Baby Wilkins is just over a pound and probably just over the length of an ear of corn.
Total Weight Gain/Loss: gained about 14 lbs
Maternity Clothes: mostly maternity; some regular shirts and dresses still fit
Gender: It's a girl!!! Emmalyn Caroline Wilkins
Movement: She is still moving a lot. I felt her do a karate kick and flip for the first time. At least that is what it felt like she did!
Sleep: Depends on the night. Sometimes I wake up multiple times and some nights I do not wake up until I feel like my bladder will burst.
What I Miss: Shrimp and tuna! That will probably be my answer until this pregnancy is over!
Cravings: It depended on the day! This week it seemed like if it was food, I wanted it!
Symptoms: Tiredness but that was due to the crazy week I had.
Best Moment this week: I can’t pick just one; since it is my blog I can put as many as I like! This week Grandbee and I went to register and spend a girls day shopping. Justin, Michael, and I went to the braves’ game. We spent time with family and went out with friends on the lake for Memorial Day!

Weeks 20, 21, & 22!

This is a post for weeks 20, 21, and 22!
I am so far behind. My hope was to update everyone each week so that family and friends who do not see me every day would be able to share in my pregnancy experience.

Pregnancy Highlights:

How Far Along: 20 Weeks
Size of baby: Baby Wilkins is the size of a banana.
Total Weight Gain/Loss: gained a little over 10 lbs
Maternity Clothes: mostly maternity; some regular shirts and dresses still fit
Gender: It's a girl!!! Emmalyn Caroline Wilkins
Movement: Feeling her move more and more. Justin felt her move for the first time this week.
Sleep: Sleeping has been pretty normal this week.
What I miss: Shrimp! That will probably be my answer until this pregnancy is over!
Cravings: Ice Cream; I was unable to eat it for so many weeks I guess I felt like I had to catch up on all I missed.
Symptoms: Tiredness is the main one this week.
Best Moment this week: Seeing Justin’s face after feeling her the first time. We had been to his Granny Wilkins’s Funeral and it had been a rough week. It was wonderful to see him have something to brighten his sad day.

How Far Along: 21 Weeks
Size of baby: Baby Wilkins is the length of a carrot.
Total Weight Gain/Loss: gained about 12 lbs
Maternity Clothes: mostly maternity; some regular shirts and dresses still fit
Gender: It's a girl!!! Emmalyn Caroline Wilkins
Movement: Feeling her move more and more.
Sleep: Sleeping has been pretty normal this week.
What I miss: Shrimp and spicy tuna rolls! That will probably be my answer until this pregnancy is over!
Cravings: Ice Cream; I was unable to eat it for so many weeks I guess I felt like I had to catch up on all I missed.
Symptoms: Tiredness is the main one this week.
Best Moment this week: Grandbee feeling Emmalyn move for the first time and Papa deciding to nickname her M&M after his favorite candy.

How Far Along: 22 Weeks
Size of Baby: Baby Wilkins is the size of a naval orange.
Total Weight Gain/Loss: gained about 12 lbs
Maternity Clothes: mostly maternity; some regular shirts and dresses still fit
Gender: It's a girl!!! Emmalyn Caroline Wilkins
Movement: This week she is starting to move all the time! She has found my bladder and is using it as a trampoline.
Sleep: Terrible; the dreams that I am having have been vivid and horror movie like. I will wake up sweating and not be able to get back to sleep.
What I Miss: Shrimp! That will probably be my answer until this pregnancy is over!
Cravings: Homemade trail mix: craisins, banana chips, cheerios, and chocolate covered raisins.
Symptoms: Tiredness and a catch in my hip and butt. I think baby girl may be hanging out on a nerve.
Best Moment this week: Enjoying a much needed date night with my hubby! We saw What to Expect When You are Expecting; it was a great movie that really hit home in my current situation!

Positively Expecting

This is a very detailed account of the events of January 16th, 2012. I will warn you that it will probably be boring to most but I am putting it here so that I can treasure the memory for my self and my family.

January 16th, 2012. I had been felling weird for a couple of days and noticed that when I would eat my daily serving of ice cream I would get very nauseas to the point of throwing up. This seemed peculiar to me since I love ice cream and have eaten it almost everyday of my life. I had an appointment set the next morning to finish a root canal so I ultimately made the decision that I might want to take a pregnancy test just to be sure. I waited for Justin to leave for work and then headed in the bathroom to take care of business. I waited the 3 minutes and then looked. I was a bit disappointed because only seeing the one line; I decided the test was negative. As I finished getting ready to leave the house, I suddenly thought… that line was different this time. Sure enough I looked back at the test and the line that I saw was the bright pink positive line with a much lighter line beside it. I was excited but still was not sure so I made the decision to go buy another test. Of course it ended up being a crazy day at my internship; by the time I got to buy a test I was on my way home. Justin had beaten me home so I had to sneak in the guest bathroom and take the test before he could figure out what I was doing. It had been hard not to say anything to him all day but I didn’t want to get his hopes up unless I was sure. I bought the type of test that reads out “Pregnant” or “Not Pregnant”, that way I would not be confused by the lines again. Haha… For the second time, I waited the 3 minutes, even though the test started to beep before then to tell me it had the results. It said “Pregnant”. I had already known that when I got a positive test I would want to tell Justin in a creative way, so during my lunch hour I had put together a power point just in case. While he was in the shower, I added a picture of both tests at the end of the presentation and then told him I had an early anniversary gift. We sat down and started the power point and I thought my heart was going to leap out of my chest! I knew this was something we both had wanted for some time but now that the reality was hitting I sat there in a panic. When it got to the last slide I was so over whelmed I started to cry; he looked at me and asked if I was serious. It was such a sweet moment. We had discussed before we were married that we wanted to wait and have children until I finished school or, if school took longer than expected, when we had been married 3 years. I got to tell the love of my life that we were expecting on the eve of our third anniversary! What a way to be reminded that God has our every step ordered and if we follow in the path he has set before us then we are always a part of his perfect timing.

"Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, before you were born I set you apart; I appointed you as a prophet to the nations." Jeremiah 1:15

Has it been a year already???

Each year I make out a list of goals for the coming year. I have always believed that if you do not know where you are headed, it is very hard to get anywhere; hence my need to make a list of goals I want to accomplish each year. One of the goals I made for myself is to blog more. I know I have said it time and time again but I really feel like this time I am going to stick to it. I need an outlet for my rants... LOL! Just kidding, however I do need to get things off my chest from time to time and a blog seems to be a reasonable form of getting things out in the open. So for now I am setting my goal to simply blog more than I did last year. I believe this is obtainable, since this post will ensure that the goal is met because last year’s blog total was a big whopping ZERO! Stay tuned to see if I can do better than my original goal and post more than this once during 2012.

You will appreciate it when you are older

Over the course of my life I have heard the phrase “you will appreciate it when you are older” over a hundred times or more. Of course when you hear this as a child you roll your eyes and wonder how simply getting older will make one appreciate things more? Now that I am starting to get a little older I can see how age makes a difference in the way we see many things. For instance last night I was at the drug store buying some cough medicine and the cashier asked me to see my license. This sort of thing does not bother me since I understand this is a precaution to keep individuals who are under age from being able to purchase things that they may be tempted to abuse, however, it was what came next that was the kicker. I was digging in my purse to find my ID to give to the cashier, anyone who knows me personally would know finding something in my purse is often a difficult task so it took a few seconds. Meanwhile, watching me dig the cashier says, “sorry to have to card you but you look young”. So I say, “Oh that’s ok I get that a lot… “. She then says, “but, you are over eighteen right?”. Haha I about lost it… I am seven years nearly eight years past being eighteen! And before I know it I say to the cashier, “I guess that is something I will appreciate when I am older”. I then completed my purchase and headed out of the store laughing inside that after all these years I get it… I get how some things take time to appreciate them. I realized that the same thing that bothered me when I was eighteen and trying to get into dance clubs, (i.e. my few months of wild life… haha I really did just dance) now at twenty-five made me smile and appreciate that I do not look my age. Considering I found a white hair in the midst of all the dark ones on my head the other day; I am happy to look younger than my actual age. Someday, when I have children of my own I am sure at some point, I will tell them “you will appreciate it when you are older” and they will look at me and roll their eyes. Then sooner or later they will have to make the same call I did and say hey mom, I get it!

Here We Go Again...

So, to say I am behind at this point would be an understatement... It seems school took over my life and I have been unable to update my blog in ages. I would promise to do better but I have made that promise before and failed miserably. It is now December and I am wondering where has this year gone? I hope in time, I will look back on my years in school and not regret taking the time to get my education. Sometimes I feel so overwhelmed with the course work and the house work and working full time that I feel like I want to just give something up but know deep down that is not possible. I am looking forward for the day when I will be finished with school so I will have more time… haha that is what I say now but I know when I finish school I will just find another way to fill my time and will end up at some point overwhelmed again… it seems to be a reoccurring cycle in my life, if I am not busy then I find a way to become busy. Anyway enough of that soap box; I am excited for the Christmas season! I love the lights, the songs and getting to spend time with family and friends. Hopefully this will not be my last post for 2010 but I am not making any promises. haha