Eviction Notice

To: "Pistachio" Hall (Tenant)
Address: 1 My Belly Blvd, Greer SC 29650

"Pistachio" Hall (hereinafter referred to as "Tenant"), pursuant to the provisions of this pregnancy, you are hereby given an eviction notice and notice to vacate on or before November 19, 2010, the premises and appurtenances owned by Karen S. Hall (hereinafter referred to as "Landlord") of the City of Greer, in the County of Greenville, SC, which premises are now occupied by you.

The reasons for said eviction are set forth below:

The current tenant has a maximum of 23 days to gather his or her belongings and vacate the premises. After which he/she will be physically removed from the property. Expansions only to the front of the house, within reasonable limits, were discussed. Not only have these limits been exceeded, but additions to the back of the house were also made. Remodeling and gutting of the home was never approved, nor was changing the initial layout and base structure. Due to property damage caused by these unapproved renovations, there are now leaks in both the upper and lower levels of the home.

Any further violations of the terms of the lease will result in immediate and forceful removal.

Dated: October 27, 2010

By: Karen S. Hall (Landlord/Agent)

The Clock is Ticking...

We have less than one month until Pistachio's due date. I paid a visit to an online friend's blog the other day (she's also due in the next few weeks) and she had posted a video that could not describe the last few weeks of pregnancy any better. The song has been in my head ever since, so I now share it with you. You're welcome. ;)

I'm doing pretty well on my list of things I "need" to do before the baby's arrival:

1. Family vacation - CHECK
2. Trip with Chris to the Inn at Merridun - CHECK
3. Pack hospital bags - Kinda CHECK (I've started packing them)
4. Clean my house
5. Cadence's birthday party
6. Take the kids trick-or-treating
7. Spa trip

Our family trip to Gatlinburg two weekends ago was amazing. The kids had a blast at the Dixie Stampede and Wonderworks. I was really impressed by the natural beauty of Cades Cove.

This past weekend, Chris and I visited the Inn at Merridun. As usual, Peggy exceeded our expectations. She cooked us an amazing dinner consisting of carrot tomato curry soup, a salad, an amazing pork tenderloin roast with a maple glaze and deserts to die for. The inn was quiet this trip though with no questionable dog noises, drains mysteriously closing or other strange happenings. The inn is rumored to be haunted by ten or so different spirits, but they decided to stay quiet this weekend. Evidently, a pregnant woman that is kept up all night by strange sounds is a scary thought, even for a ghost. ;)

Nivens' Apple Orchard and Other Goings On

After church on Sunday, we took the kids and went to Nivens' Apple Orchard with Jon, Christy, Emily and Mitchell. It was pretty slim pickings in some parts of the orchard, but we were able to score an apple-picker-pole-thingy (yes, that's the technical term) and life became much easier. We went on a hayride, watched the kids play on the playground and picked up a few treats from the store. It was a great day!!

In other news, we had an appointment with our "baby doctor" yesterday. The baby is measuring about a week and a half ahead of schedule. This doesn't necessarily mean that the baby will be early though. It just most likely means that the baby will be big (yay).

This weekend is going to be super busy and fun! We are cramming the following into this weekend: Fall for Greenville, Fall Festival at Cadence's school, Trunk Treasure's, Low Country Boil with our church family, birthday crab boil at Jon & Christy's and preparation for Thanksgiving on Monday. I love our crazy life! :)

We Have a Messy House

We have a messy house. The floors need to be swept and mopped. The carpets need to be steamed. Dusting hasn't been done in months and there is a lot of clutter. Sometimes I think about how nice it would be to have a clean, organized house. But then I think of all of the things I would need to give up.

I could clean in the evenings, but then when would I do posters for my daughter's Fall Festival? I could clean in the mornings, but I'm already up at 6:30 a.m. How could I ensure that I was resting enough for the baby in my tummy. I could clean all weekend, but then how would I take the kids camping, or help Cadence set up a lemonade stand to raise money in memory of little Rachael? Is a clean house worth missing out on Saturday mornings curled up in bed with the kids watching cartoons? Is it worth missing homemade waffles, church and afternoon family outings?

Maybe I could get a maid? But where would the money for the maid come from? Should it come from our monthly Chuck E Cheese trips? Perhaps I could cut out a few of our family long-weekend vacations?

Some day, when my children are grown, I want them to remember their mommy participating in their Fall Festival. I want them to recall how careful mommy was when she was carrying their brother or sister. I want them to have fond memories of camping, lemonade stands, Saturday morning cartoons in mommy & daddy's bed, homemade waffles before church, family outings, Chuck E. Cheese nights and family vacations. Maybe, with all that, they'll forget that their mommy was slack in the housekeeping department. :)

The current status of the bar in my kitchen.

A Shout Out to My Amazing Husband

I am 31 weeks preggers today and am bordering the uncomfortably big portion of my pregnancy - and I still have anywhere from 7-9 weeks left! Some of my maternity shirts are even getting too short in the front. Nothing makes you feel more like a fat cow than outgrowing maternity clothes!

This is how I see myself right now:

Now I need to give a quick shout out to my amazing husband Chris because every morning he wakes me up by telling me I'm beautiful. He reminds me again when he gets home from work and tells me again before I go to sleep... and probably a few times throughout the day as well. This is how he makes me feel:

Thanks babe! Even if you are lying, you are amazing. I love you VERY much!!!

Star Wars Breakfast

A few weeks ago we finally tried out one of Chris's Father's Day presents... Star Wars pancake molds from Williams Sonoma.

We made the Fluffy Canadian Pancake recipe from http://allrecipes.com/Default.aspx.

Our first attempt with the Storm Trooper.

Unfortunately, we over-poured it and when the pancake rose the batter got stuck. He turned into a pile of pancake scraps. :(

Next up was Yoda.

Although bubbly from the "fluffy" pancake recipe, he turned out much better.

We also made a few Darth Vaders.

All in all, everyone enjoyed their Star Wars breakfasts. It was a lot of work, and a lot of Death Star pancakes were made (i.e. plain old circular ones), but we'll definitely try it again sometime.

We still have the Star Wars cookie cutter set to try out. Perhaps our Christmas cookies will be Star Wars inspired this year.... :)

Gabriel's wardrobe malfunction and our (somewhat) updated slideshow

We had Christy, Emily and Mitchell over for our weekly Monday dinner get-together. On the menu tonight was baked Tilapia, fried grit cakes with garlic alfredo sauce and a spinach salad. For dessert we had brownie ice cream sundaes. It was very tasty!

After dinner we let the kids play. Gabriel had to go potty and had already wet his Pull-up. I told him to just put his jeans back on and go commando for a few minutes since it was almost time to get ready for bed. Christy and I are watching Emily and Cadence play Wii bowling when Gabriel comes into the living room with one of each of Cadence's shoes on his feet and his jeans on Kriss Kross stlye with the zipper undone. I ran into the office to grab my camera and was able to get this shot as he bent over to pick something up.

In other news, I'm pretty aggravated with my What to Expect app on my iPhone. Chris and I have been taking a picture of my growing tummy every week and all of a sudden I cannot export the pictures to my library to upload to my slide show on Photobucket. Fortunately, we saved some of the pictures to my library when we originally took them so we aren't missing all of them. Here is the updated slide show: