Take a Guess // Gender Predictions {Baby #3}

First off, I have to say a big thank you for the sweet words of encouragement and support when I shared that we are expecting. It is a wonderful feeling knowing that people I have never met in real life but feel such a close connection to are just as excited for this baby as we are. 

I was fortunate to be able to get the 10 week blood draw done for this pregnancy and let me tell you, it is AWESOME knowing before the halfway mark! The planner in me is loving all the extra time.

I'm not the best at memorializing my pregnancies (because weekly bump dates just do not happen) but when Courtney and Sarah did gender predictions last year that was something I knew I wanted to do!

I would love to know your guesses too! Please share in the comments. I promise to let you know next week :)

Linking up here.

   

   

Styled by Becky // Whitney Wears {a fashion blog hop}

Joining my favorite fashionable friends for another blog hop! Becky, Beth, Meghan and I thought it would be fun if we styled each other so I took a page right out of Becky's book and interpreted one of her outfits.

This is not the first time I've been inspired by Becky's style. In fact she is one of my absolute favorite fashion bloggers! Her outfits are always fun and playful and exactly how I like them, without fuss.

I adore everything about this flat lay that Becky shared on IG several weeks ago. The colors are beautiful (helloo, mustard!) I have a plum peplum top already (and I want to buy it in all the colors because it is cut beautifully!) and there's a scarf; this outfit was screaming my name.

The first time I wore this outfit, the weather was on the chilly side so I switched the plaid scarf for another print (leopard) cardigan and swapped the flats for my boots. 

A couple of weeks later, I tried the original combo of peplum+scarf+skinny jeans+flats. I don't have a plaid scarf that incorporates this outfits colors like Becky, but this scarf has the perfect shade of plums and purples!

I think the best part of being inspired by someone else's style is that it challenges you to think about how to wear your clothes in new and different ways. I knew I had all the pieces to recreate this look but didn't think to put those pieces together in this exact combination before Becky's flat lay.

After all, imitation is the sincerest form of flattery :) 

Check out who's style these ladies are borrowing!

Beth

Meghan

Becky

Linking up here.

   

   

Sharing Our Sweet News!

If you follow me on Instagram then you already saw our big announcement last Thursday. And if not, 

We're having a baby!!

I figured I'd give you more information here because that's the point of a blog, right? And now that I'm getting back my energy (praise the Lord) I feel like I can give this space a little bit more attention. So on to the details!

This blessed baby was a surprise. Er, as far as that can go. In December we had a loss in the family and between mourning and trying to keep the festiveness of the holidays for the girls, I was not focused on much else. I will also add I wasn't even sure we would ever have another. This is just all around such a awesome experience!

And then New Years arrived and I just felt... different. And that's when I knew in my soul I was pregnant and which was confirmed two days later. No cutesy way in telling Brian either, he walked into the bathroom mere minutes after I took the test and got a pee stick shoved into his face at 6-something in the morning. I'm not the smoothest.

Thus began the waiting game. After my miscarriage in 2014, I will silently endure 24/7 nausea and fatigue and fervently pray for the health and well-being of my baby. Luckily my symptoms don't include throwing up though I do get a few gnarly migraines that cause me to throw up; but overall nothing too extreme. 

My first doctor's appointment was on February 1st. I'm not going to lie, I was nervous sitting in the ultrasound room in my little gown, just praying that there would, indeed, be a baby in there. Seeing that fluttering heartbeat is the sweetest sight.

Sharing the news with Kinsey and Brielana was so fun! Kinsey was super excited and depending on the day, Brielana can go either way lol. But hearing them talk about "mommy with a baby in her tummy" just melts my heart.

We will be welcoming baby the first week of September. I'm seriously hoping for another 4th-of-the-month baby but won't do anything drastic to ensure that, haha. And I already did the early blood draw (something we missed out on with Brielana by a mere 6 months, boo) so we will know gender any day now!

Thank you for sharing this wonderful journey with us! 

Linking up here.

   

   

What We're Reading #3

Well folks, I spoke too soon last month as I've only gotten halfway through one book this month. Whomp, whomp. Thank goodness it's a good one! Affiliate links used. A small commission may be received if you purchase an item through my links. Thank you for supporting my blog!

Fiction Reads for February

GoodReads Synopsis:

Ruth Thomas grows up on Fort Niles Island, off the coast of Maine, among lobstermen, lobster boats, and, well, lobsters. There's just not much out there besides ocean. Abandoned by her mother, she lives sometimes with her dad and sometimes with her beautiful neighbor, Mrs. Pommeroy, and the seven idiot Pommeroy boys. Eventually she is plucked from obscurity by the wealthy Ellises—vacationers on Fort Niles for some hundred years—and sent, against her will, to a fancy boarding school in Delaware. (Sorting out her relationship with this highly manipulative family is one of the novel's crooked joys.) Now she has returned, and is casting about for something to do.

What Ruth does (hang around with her eccentric island friends, fall in love, organize the lobstermen) makes for an engaging book that's all the more charming for its rather lumpy, slow-paced plotting. Gilbert delivers a kind of delicious ethnography of lobster-fishing culture, if such a thing is possible, as well as a love story and a bildungsroman. But best of all, she possesses an ear for the ridiculous ways people communicate. One of Mrs. Pommeroy's young sons, "in addition to having the local habit of not pronouncing r at the end of a word—could not say any word that started with r.... What's more, for a long time everyone on Fort Niles Island imitated him. Over the whole spread of the island, you could hear the great strong fishermen complaining that they had to mend their wopes or fix their wigging or buy a new short-wave wadio."

My thoughts:

Full of rich detail of scenery and imagery, Gilbert's first novel is very entertaining. Life on an island centered around lobster fishing doesn't seem appealing in general but Gilbert's writing is widely entertaining. There is a short bit about finding an elephant tusk in muddy 

shallows that made me feel like I had read it before so that little bit of deja vu really piqued my interest (where had I read that before?!)

Characters:

The wide range of characters are eccentric and crude and mostly likeable. The main character Ruth is my kind of girl and I appreciate and trust her point of view. This is most certainly a coming of age story and one that I would recommend. 

Stars:

Is it too soon to rate? I would say at this point in time I would give this a 3.5 out of 5.

Now it's your turn! Add your book-related link below. Thanks for joining Stephanie, Keri, Whitney, Justine, Crystal, Johannah, Heather and me for What We're Reading Wednesday on the first Wednesday of every month!

An InLinkz Link-up

Linking up here.

   

   

The Grass // Our favorite spot {California Moms blog hop}

When Justine first brought up the idea for a California Moms blog hop I instantly fell in love with the idea; I am a born and raised native Californian and even though there are some issues in this beautiful state, I still lovingly call it home. Plus any chance to connect with other bloggers is always a good thing (especially when that already includes some of your favorite blog buddies!) For this blog hop we are each sharing a secret spot in our hometown and mine is The Grass.

A lil Kinsey, be still my heart

Now, that isn't it's official name. Actually, I don't know if it even has an official name. The patch of grass I'm referring to is located in Pacific Grove about a mile or two down the Coast from Lover's Point Beach and overlooks the Recreation Trail right into the Pacific Ocean. It can't be but a 1/4 the size of a football field but the grass is always green and there is a tall, ancient Cypress giving shade on hot days.

That view

Family of 3

I have been going to The Grass since I was a little girl with my mom and extended family. And when Brian and I first started dating we would come here to picnic (with a turkey and salami, pepperjack cheese, lettuce, tomatoes, pickles and mayo and mustard on a french roll, two bags of chips and two tall cans of Arizona tea from either Troia's or Bi-rite Market in tow.) And now our girls have both played and picnicked here too!

And an even lil'er Brielana! She was less than a month old when we went for a picnic (not that you can see where we are!) And I get giddy just thinking about bringing our third little nugget here!

It is a spot very near and dear to my heart and I'm not the only one who adores it. It has been the site of many local weddings too! I wish I had more recent pictures but the rain has been ridiculous rendering a fun picnic impossible. 

And check out these other California Mom Bloggers to see their favorite CA spot! 

Bethany at House of Mitchells

Elizabeth at Chasin' Mason

Jenny at Princess Turned Mom

Justine at Little Dove

Sarah at Foxy's Domestic Side

Tiffany at  Tiffany Ching Bean

Linking up here.