One Month Down + Vandis Update + Craigslist Find = One FULL Blog Post

Today marks one month of Ryan being gone. It feels shorter than that and longer than that... which makes a ton of sense huh? Last month at this time I was...

washing a car seat that had been annihilated with diarrhea from an almost 16 month old

thinking about Ryan being on his way to Texas

wondering how this was all going to feel in a month...

Let me just tell you... It feels weird. It's not like I thought it would be at all. It's not fun, not romantic... but also not unbearable, and actually pretty O.K. most of the time. I would never choose this, but God has been showing me that He is SO ENOUGH... and I am so thankful for that!

Ryan is settled into his little room with his roommate. He has been sick the past few days. Hopefully he'll be feeling better soon! He has been working the 7pm to 7am shift at the air force base's airport in K-stan as baggage patrol for the past 2 weeks-ish, which actually works out well because he is pretty much on my regular time schedule. There is 11 hours (or possibly 13 hours... it used to be 12 hours but daylight savings time messed that up!) difference between us, and him working this schedule makes it a bit easier to Skype with each other. I get to talk with him usually every other day... sometimes every day which is a huge blessing. He is supposed to switch schedules every month, so we'll see how it works out with him working the other side of the day.

One month down with Ryan's deployment and one week 'till baby! Fun how that all works out huh? By this time next week I will be in labor with my second baby and first son, Vandis. My friend Emily will be here (all the way from Tulsa, OK) and will be helping me through everything. She is a nurse back in Tulsa, so she knows what to be expecting from me during this beautiful time :) Today I had an ultrasound because my stomach was measuring a month behind where it should be measuring. It most certainly does not look or feel that way to me... but that's what the tape measure says! I was bigger than this with Peyton, but I was just HUGE with her... like HUGE HUGE. Anyways, the ultrasound shows that...

we still have a boy

he is in the 45th to 55th percentile all around

my fluid levels are good

we have nothing to worry about!

I also had a regular appointment with my doctor today and he scheduled my induction for 9am... perfect! He said I'm looking ready and it's a good thing Emily will be here on Thursday... just in case... well thanks Doc! Now my mind is occupied with thoughts of my water breaking in Target... then I would have to find a new Target to shop at... and I really like my Target. It just became a "SUPER"! Ok enough about Target... Here is a picture of little Van...



Isn't he just the CUTEST?!?! I hope he and Peyton look alike... I really do. We'll see soon!

The last thing I wanted to share about today was my Craigslist find! Do you use Craigslist? I'm not lying when I say that everything in our house (minus the 2 nice "living room" couches from HOM Furniture)is from Craigslist, or Ikea, or Free from someone. So, I really love this Craig guy... and his list. For the past 4 months or so I have been looking for a dresser for my little guy's clothes. My phone has an app called "Craigslist Notification" where you put in what you are looking for (in my case "dresser") and the price range (if you want) (in my case "$2-$40") and then every time that a new post within those guidelines gets posted, you get notified! It's amazing. I love it. We are friends. Ryan... not as much in love. He'll get there... but probably not.

Moving on.

This morning upon my first check through my phone updates I saw it. 12 Drawer Red Dresser. It was like the sun shone on the post. I opened it and there it was... Ok... it didn't really go like that... more like "Oh nice! That would work... (call the number, leave a voicemail) we'll see!" I got a call back as I was sitting in the waiting room before my ultrasound and the guy on the other end told me a bit about it... there were some dings and dents and paint sploches missing... nothing a little elbow grease wouldn't fix. Normally I am all about the elbow grease. But this week, not so much. But I decided to go (it was only 20 min away) and check it out anyways. I just needed it to look decent enough to be in my room for a couple months before I get up the energy to work on it.

So I go and pick up my sister and brother and head down to Northeast Minneapolis. Saying prayers in my head around some corners... maybe not the safest place to be... We were fine.

We pull up to the garage and Isaac and I get out to meet this mystery man. He was clean and not dangerous looking. (Sigh of relif) He brought is into his garage which was actually like 3 garages put together FILLED with things he was selling on Craigslist! Tempting! But I just started my hard core Dave Ramsey Budget today. And you can't mess up on the first day! Sad.

Refocus.

Red Dresser. 12 Drawers. Not in bad shape... actually in pretty good shape. I LOVE IT! It's perfect! Small-ish size for my small-ish human and his small-ish clothes. I gave the man his $35 and he and my brother loaded it into the minivan! SCORE! After 4 months, I had pretty much given up hope of finding something. But praise Jesus... I found the one! For now it'll hang out in my room because Van will be in there with me anyways for 5-6 months. It fits great under my window and will probably stay there :)




So there you have it folks! 2 really quality pictures of Vandis' new dresser! Not bad for $35 right! And it came JUST IN TIME! I love it!

Good for you if you made it to the end of this novel of a post! I'm sure there is some blogger rules about spreading 3 topics into 3 posts... but I'm ignoring it. 'Cuz that's how I roll.