My true self

I read lots of blogs, most of the women read about are very creative, I envy that... I am not creative... sure, I can decorate the heck out of a room and I accessorize well, but when it comes to a hobby, I dont have the typical one... some knit, some crochet, some bake and cook...

I well I....twilight... yes I made it a verb... I twilight.

What does one who "twilights" do might you ask? Simple... I read, watch, listen to anything having to do with twilight... sometimes I do all 3 of them... yes, I admit, at one point I was listening to the new moon soundtrack on my iPhone, watching twilight on my laptop and reading eclipse for the second time on my kindle (it was a long road trip, OK?) Tonight on the elliptical I watched twilight while reading new moon for the second time, oh did I mention I had on my "team Edward and team Jacob shirt" as I did all this...

Now what might be going through your head, is how did I not realize you were the biggest nerd on the planet? You may also be thinking to yourself, why am I reading a girl's blog who just made a movie a verb and is obsessed with a teeny bopper, vampire flick? But trust me, if you meet me you may not realize this about me, Im a private twilighter. Sure, I may have a poster of Edward at my desk at work (which I don't always keep up) but unless I told you that this is what I did in my spare time, (or that as I write this new moon is playing,) you may not think I am the total and complete geek that you think I am right now, but trust me, there are others who twilight out there... someone you are sitting next to may be one!!!!

But here I am and I am not ashamed to admit it, I am a twilightaholic. I understand if you stop reading, but admit it, you love that beautiful vampire too!

Dieting SUCKS!

I LOVE food, I mean really love it, I am often teased (lovingly of course) by my best friend Ilene about how I can describe how something tastes, perhaps now you can understand why a diet is no fun for me, especially when it comes to a diet to lose this baby weight... i remember when I first got pregnant I thought, yes finally time to let my inner fat girl run free... and then the nausea came, horrible, you cant eat anything nausea, I lost half a pound after thanksgiving at 4 months pregnant, I was the weight I had always wanted to be at 5 months pregnant, (the more I think about it maybe Owen was trying to tell me something from inside the womb???) After 23 weeks of not being to hold much of anything down my body decided it was time for me to eat again and eat I did. Chicken fingers and cheese fries... boxes of capri suns and tons of gatorade... I quickly gained the weight back that I needed to, but I wasnt in any ways huge, so I thought it was ok, I was determined that after Owen was born I would go back to working out and eat well, and hope that my young age may help those last extra pounds melt off... boy was I wrong!

Sure, the first 28 came off pretty quickly, but then that last 4 was still lingering there, it helped I wass till breastfeeding and was burning roughly 500 calories to be a milk machine, but what I didnt realize is that after you stop those french fries and chicken start to stick, and oh how they did... soon I had ballooned to a point where I almost felt like a different person, none of my clohes fit and I was miserable!

I decided to go on a diet, and I stuck to eat for a good 2 and a half weeks--only lean protein, veggies and fruit... but then the weekends happened and I realized I couldnt live like this for the rest of my life and the second my lips touch a peice of bread its all over! So here I am on weight watchers, 11 pounds lighter in a month, 16 pounds lighter since Christmas, and I feel much better, in fact I am almost lower than my pre pregnancy weight, now the goal is to lose another 15 and stay there, which is a challenge everyday, especially since again, my body wants to stuff itself with french fries, chocolate and ice cream, it doesnt want to wake up early to go to the gym, or stay on the elliptical, it wants to go home and eat a reeses peanut butter egg and relax!!! Thankfully I have my friend Lindsay to come with me to brave the crazy body pump and cycling teachers with, that helps keep me motivated! I will be in a bikini come Owen's first birthday, in fact I will be serving cake in said bikini, even if it is still 40 degrees outside.. I will be showing this body off! not really, but I would like to be to the point where if I wanted to people would not be speaking about me for weeks behind my back, "can you believe she did that at her sons birthday?" "no i cant, especially since her tummy was so flabby, it would be one thing if she was skinny" i want them to be thinking "if i looked like her id be doing the same thing" like I tell my skinny friends, if I had their bodies I would be walking around in a bikini, maybe not everyday, but a lot of the time and when someone told me I was so thin and looked great I would reply with I know:)

Before:

its not the best show of how big I was, but look at how wide I was and my face looks so fat!!!!!!

After (3 weeks ago)

(this is the only shot I have of me so far, but notice my face isnt AS huge anymore... when I lose more I will post more! I have lost 5 more pounds since this was last taken!!!

Owen 9 months

Dear sweet baby Owen,

You are 9 months old!!!! You are amazing and so smart! These days you're a wild man, crawling and pulling up on everything, you wear me out, but I am loving every second of it, I prayed for God to give me an energetic, fun loving baby and here you are, you are more than I could have ever asked for! I like to think of you as adventurous! I love to see the look of joy on your face when you see something you really like, there isnt anything quite like it, but it makes me want to vuy you everything because you look so amazed by it! You are saying mama, dada, baba and you can wave hi and bye!

You also are quite the dancer, I love to play music for you and watch you bend your little knees to the beat, if youre especially happy youll wave your chubby arms in the arm!!!! You are pulling up on everything in sight!

You weigh 19 pounds, 13 ounces and are 28 inches!!!!! Dr.B said he was very impressed by you and how you stand alone at your 9 months check up... yes you stand alone, only for about 15 seconds but you still do it... you have even tried to take steps, I think you are going to be a walking machine soon!!!!

You have one little corner of a tooth popping through, I am thinking that by this weekend we should see the appearance of it, I know your teeth were just waiting to be healthy and strong until they decided to pop through!!!!

Your favorite time is still bath time! You love the water, we put you in the pool with Heather and Riley and you loved it! I am going to be taking you back to go in again, I want you to be a water-baby so we can go to the beach lots this summer!

You are the most amazing little soul and I love you so much!!!

Mommy guilt

Hello my name is Shaz and I suffer from a ridiculous amount of mommy guilt. A truly ridiculous, stupid amount that sometimes I even get annoyed with myself! Am I the only one who suffers from this? I feel like if I have Owen in his swing that he is lonely, putting him in the bouncy seat is even worse, and don't get me started on when I see him from my rearview mirror in his car sear in the back seat. Laying him in the crib seems like the most cruel thing I could ever do, how dare I be selfish and lay him down when I could be holding him? These among other things are what goes through this crazy brain of mine each day... I work odd hours 3 days a week, and normal ones the other 2 so my time with Owen through out the week and weekends is so precious to me, but I feel as though I am harming him by doing this. I need to tell myself that its healthy for him to play on his own, its healthy for him to sleep in his crib, its healthy for him to learn to put the teething toy to his mouth, no Shaz he won't be sad because you are sitting next to him and did not keep it there so he could chew on it... crazy, crazy, crazy.... this weekend I really worked on it, I even went to my friends house for a couple of hours and hung out on my own, little by little I am trying, but still I feel guilty when I am away and could be with him... can someone out there please tell me I am not the only one who feels this way?????

4 months old!!!!!

Owen hamming it up at daycare in the middle of his friends
Dear sweet baby,

As I type this you are lying in your crib asleep for the first time and I am bawling across the room in your rocking chair, yes your mother is a freak. I am sad because I know this will be the end of our slumber parties, I know you need your sleep and so does Mommy, but it was so nice to have you next to me to cuddle. You are such a grown up boy at just 4 months old... you have discovered that your voice goes in many different ranges, my favorite to date is when you sort of squeal... you are blowing bubbles and mimicking sounds we do all the time, you truly are a genius! You love bath time even more these days, you kick and squeal when we lay you in there and smile and coo the entire time! You have become the most mellow baby, no matter where you go you are in a good mood unless you are hungry, you also love people and dont mind other people holding you, tonight Ilene and her mom came to visit and you smiled and talked to them, it warmed my heart. You had cereal for the first time tonight and LOVED it!!!! You ate a lot and did so well, you even got it off the spoon all by yourself, did I mention yet that you are a genius? You are so wonderful and sweet, you are a morning and a night person... when I wake you up so we can get ready for daycare, ( yes I have to wake you because you are that awesome of a baby!) you rub your face and then I say good morning my little lovebug and you smile at me and are happy and ready to go... you are sleeping from about 10 or 10:30 till about 5 or 6... sometimes you wake up and want to play around 12 on weekdays, which I love, in those cases you sleep till about 7, eat and then go back to sleep until I wake you up... Your favorite book is Your Personal Penguin by Sandra Boynton, you love to rock in the rocking chair in your room and read, last night you laughed and kicked as I read it to you, it brought such joy to my heart that you love when I read to you!!! You love the song my darling from the baby mine cd, as soon as I play that for you you start to nod off, you still love music... You love kisses, are now ticklish on your sides and love when we pat your hands and say "and one and two and three and four" are you going to be a drummer like daddy? You look like you are ready to roll over soon, which makes me nervous, can you hold out on that for a couple more weeks? Sweet baby O, you are so very loved, you make me the most happy I have ever been in my life, I miss you very second I am away from you and love every moment I have with you, you are such an absolute joy to be around, and I am so glad God chose me to be your mommy!!!!!!

gross

When checking on my order at amazon to see when my stroller would arrive, it said people also purchased this (it is a nasal aspirator)..... I am ashamed to be in the same category as these people!

It's back to work for me on Monday, I am not looking forward to it AT ALL!!!! I have had the most wonderful 3 months with my precious boy!!!! Along with going back to work comes quite a few decisions, the biggest one 0f course is who will be watching Owen... luckily I have a woman who is running day care out of her house and is kind and sweet and loooooves babies, I know he will be very well taken care of, but just the thought of dropping him off makes me want to throw up!!! the next is do I continue breast feeding? For selfish reasons I want to stop, but for Owen's I know its best to keep going, so Im going to try to keep going until he is 4 months and see how it goes. The second decision is diapering... I have not had to buy diapers since Owen was born, but since my chunkamonk is now in size 2's I had to go out and buy more diapers... 30 bucks later for wipes and diapers and upon feeling the Pampers baby dry, I decided that maybe I should consider something else, if u would not want something that rough on my skin, why would i want to put it on my baby? So I tried a cloth diaper and I loved it, my dad ordered me 6 more so I figure after he is out of his disposables we have left we will give it a whirl, plus theyre so cute!

!

One good thing I did receive is my "going back to work gift" !!!!! This Quinny buzz from my husband, we needed a second car seat so he also got me the maxi cosi car seat that goes with it... for any new moms I highly recomend this after watching the reviews... we have a chicco travel system, but its so bulky and takes up my whole trunk! This also opens itself up with just a press of a button!

Adam and I have a 2 year plan, we plan to pay off all our bills and buy a house in 2011, and maybe even make it so I can work less hours someday! For now I will cherish my last couple days as a stay at home mom this to this amazing baby boy!