The Mindful project days #162-166

The Mindful project day # 162

Nesting!

Yes, its a bit too early in the pregnancy, I am a bit of a control-freak and I have so many things in my head that I want to do/prepare before the baby arrives that at times I feel overwhelmed. I have learned that the best thing to do is to start with something hence:

The baby already has 2 empty drawers in our dresser!!!

I have been organizing my kitchen cabinets so that when we are very busy with the baby we can have a simplified access to stuff.

Under the sink cabinet (and truly the only cabinet we have in the house for these stuff!!!!!) before:

what a mess!!

in progress...

 

Organizing tool nr. 1 

Organizing tool nr. 2

Organizing tool nr. 3

 The after:

 I know it looks stuffed but as I mentioned its the only cabinet we have in the house for these stuff.

Kitchen cabinet before:

Organization tool nr.4

 The after:

Its just simple things that I think will make our lives easier when we are to busy and tired... 

I am also declutering the unnecessary but this is something I do on a regular basis (I have a donation bag prepared to deliver to one of my local charity shops).

The Mindful project day # 163

Hearty, healthy bites!

I've always liked fruit however my intake varies a bit, some days I eat a lot others just a piece. Since I am pregnant I try to eat better (though I crave a lot of sugary stuff and I don't always resist the temptation...) and I have been eating a lot of fruit. In the first trimester it was basically my all-day snack as it didn't upset my stomach as much.

 

I am grateful that we are able to get a great variety of good fruit (and veggies)!

 

Now I should try to exercise more....

The Mindful project day # 164

Support!

 

I found out that here in the Netherlands you can get free babyboxs or zwangerboxs (pregnantbox) if you are expecting or already have a newborn. We are not in a bad economic situation but its not good either so every help is most welcomed.

 

Tus, if you live in the Netherlands, are pregnant/or already have a newborn and were unaware of this here are the places where you can sign-up for great free babykits:

 

-Etos;

-Kruidvat;

-Wij jongouders website;

-Hoogvliet (here you collect after you baby is born);

-Baby Dump;

-Plus (also after the baby is born);

-Jumbo;

-Nutricia;

 

I have registered but I am still waiting on more information to collected them (goes through your email) but once I have something I will post about it so you can see what comes with these free boxes.

 

The Mindful project day # 165

 

Celebrating our special dates!

 

We don't do Valentines day on the 14th of February but we do celebrate our Love on the 11th of February as we officially started dating on the 11th of July (and got married on the 11th of March). Doesn't really matter if it makes sense to others as it makes sense to us and that's what is important.

 

This year and as we don't want to splurge to much, I gave my husband a chocolate heart:

It says " I love you" in Dutch!

 

and he surprised me with this beautiful flower bouquet:

Love the flower combination!

What makes it special, at least to me, is that its not a gift that comes attached to a "regular" festivity, its our special celebration.

 

So, don't forget to celebrate you special moments may they be with your other-half, with your kids or with yourself!!

The Mindful project day # 166

 

The new found joy of hand making stuff for my baby! I am grateful that I have time and the economic possibility to do this.

I will show you later how and what it turns into!

 

Have a lovely day!

The Mindful project days # 86- until now

Hello,

Wow,  I haven't written in a long, long time!!! ~ 2 months to be more exact... I have been thinking about it often but I have been a bit busy and tired (but we'll came back to that!).

I have thought about how/what I would write in this "comeback" post and I've decided that it will be just about the most important things that happen and/or that I am grateful, during this silent period otherwise it will be huge!

 

Since the last post and until the end of 2015 I worked on this work-related project that I mentioned in the Mindful project day # 80 and for which I still don't know the outcome!! Meanwhile, I have applied for other job openings but haven't gotten any positive answers back which is very frustrating and takes my spirits down quite often as you can imagine.

 

On the 5th of December we celebrated Sinterklaas with my Dutch family with the whole family including my husbands opa (grandpa in Dutch) who I love. I have never met any of my grandfathers and I think opa embodies my view of a grandpa, he's adorable!! In our family, we gather around the sitting room after dinner and go about distributing gifts. You will never know who bought it and it usually comes with a poem that mocks all the silly things you did during the year..it can be very funny or not depending how you take it!!

 

Also in the beginning of December we found out WE ARE HAVING A BABY!!!!!!!!

 

We are, obviously, very happy about it specially as we have been trying almost a year. A great help was reading and applying the knowledge from this book (I learned a lot and charting really helped):

I've heard about it in a vlog post from "Pretty Neat Living" and I highly recommend it!!

I am very grateful for these news as I was afraid that my age together with family infertility cases would mean that we would have a harder time.

Our Christmas was very quiet as it was just the 4 of us (me, hubby, peanut and our cat) but I liked it very much. We saw same episodes of one of my favourite TV-series "Castle"!!!!

Nathan Fillion is definitely ruggedly handsome!!!!

I think this series is amazing, its about crime-solving which I love but its really funny and at times, romantic. Nothing like Criminal Minds or CSI which I find very disturbing.

 

Here are a few of our Christmas decorations:

I used the Christmas stock I knitted!!

 That gnome-like creature is our Swedish Tomte!!

 

 I made this in the garden I volunteer at and I love it!

 

 Our unusual Christmas tree!!

 

Our Christmas-stall, a gift from my parents-in-law, both the stall and the figurines are handmade, amazing!!

 

 

We spent the 26th of December with my Dutch family and it was amazing. We had a dinner where each person brought something. We made Ale-pie, a British recipe that we picked up when we lived there, delicious.

 

The New Year's eve was at our friends M&A together with another couple S&G. It was really nice, great food, good boardgaming and an amazing firework at midnight. One thing about Dutch they love firework, so during the Christmas and New Year's time you hear it a lot even thought its only allowed on New Year's eve after 18h....it can get really scary when you are cycling and there is firework exploding from all sides of the street!!!!!

 

I am very grateful for being able to have a good Christmas and New Year's time, in such good company.

 

This past January has passed so fast that I didn't even notice that we were already in February.... we had our 12 week scan:

 

It looks like he is waving!!!!

Did same test and everything seems OK.  I feel very blessed and I am grateful for this.

The first trimester I was hungry very often and feeling nausea (normal) and very tired but these symptoms have subdue a bit. 

 

Our little Flor has grown a lot, she was sterilized in the middle of January and thankfully everything went fine.

 Loves to take a nap in mommy's lap!!

 

Pulls out these incredible positions when sleeping!!

 

 Look at this cutie!

 

This is it for updates, more soon.

 

Have a lovely day!!