Valentines Day 2014

Slowly catching up on a few posts here and there. The nausea and fatigue with this pregnancy was so severe..I sort of went a-wall for a while :)


HAPPY VALENTINES DAY!!


Valentines day was great this year. It was Morgans first year of being able to pick out a card for daddy and telling him Happy Valentines Day {even though she doesn't know what it means yet}


We celebrated by making mini hamburger sliders for dinner and valentine brownies for desert.

I frosted the brownies with pink cream cheese and the kiddos decorated the entire pan. Then I used heart shaped cookie cutters to cut out hearts. It was cute. They were very good. Rich but good.

Tyler helping me with the "clean up". This is usually daddy's duty, but he wasn't home so he missed out.

Our cute little valentine brownie hearts :)

Morgan showing daddy his card. The cute thing about this was...I think Morgan thought it was hers. It was adorable to see her give this to her daddy.

I also received a valentine...from kale. WITH my favorite candy. Twizzlers. I was actually very surprised because we promised each other this year.. no surprises! But he did it anyways. 

I'm laughing really hard because he bought me one of those comical cards...ya know the kind that you read... in the middle of target...trying not to pee yourself as you laugh hysterically as if your the only person in the store but in reality everyone is staring at you and thinks your nuts...YEP.. It was that kind of card. 

Surely enough...I died laughing and almost peed myself. THANKS babe!!

It's always the small things in life!

~ The Shank Family

My Kidney Bean - 8 weeks

8 Weeks with Baby Shank

Here is one of our sonogram pics from March 28th! Our precious little one...so small and tiny.

This photo was taken at 7 weeks and 6 days

Baby Update:

Heart rate was fast and strong at 165 bpm. Everything checked out normal during our sonogram.  I took a bunch of baby tests and that was it. We were so excited to meet our baby!!

Mommy Update:

Starting Weight: 130lbs

I hit the gym nearly 5 days a week in preparation for this pregnancy! I weighed around 148 after the Holidays and seriously needed to lose a ton of weight before we got pregnant. My pre-pregnancy weight with Morgan was 128. I feel great losing the weight and almost made it!! But 130 is better than nothing!

Weight Gain: 3 lbs 

Maternity Clothes: Not yet, thankfully, but I know it will be much sooner than with any of my other pregnancies. Jeans and capris are getting tight! The "bump" you see obviously is not baby yet. It's bloating and 3 lbs of weight gain :)

My favorite moment: Meeting our baby and spending the whole day with Kale.

I really miss: running and working out. Almost the entire pregnancy so far has been nausea and fatigue. I have been unable to do a lot around the house let alone work out.

I also miss: Being tan!! I think I mentioned this with Morgan as well. I stopped tanning the about a week after having the inkling I was pregnant. We confirmed at home and now I am as pale as a ghost. But I'm o.k. with that :) I am looking forward to warmer weather so I can get somewhat of a tan!!

Cravings: Not anything out of the norm. The only weird thing I have craved was around 3 weeks of pregnancy before we confirmed with home test and dr. test. I had decided one day (right in front of Kale) that I needed to eat sour cream right out of the container. Yep. WEIRD! I opened the fridge, started humming a little, grabbed a spoon and stuck a huge glop of sour cream in my mouth! IT WAS SO GOOD. I totally knew that I was pregnant. The look on Kale's face was priceless!

Sleep is good. When I hit the sack...its over. There is no waking me up. period!

Fatigue and Nausea are at the extreme. For two entire weeks (8th and 9th week of pregnancy) I did nothing. Absolutely nothing. I was totally incapacitated with sickness. I felt like a truck hit me and I needed to get out my sickness but couldn't. It was absolutely terrible. I can't even explain how terrible I felt. I had to literally eat all day long to keep something in my stomach. It was terrible. My diet consisted of toast, crackers, water and soup.

Daddy Update:

He's excited :)

again!!!

Kale is happy and excited. He is acknowledging faster when I'm tired and don't feel good with this pregnancy. With Morgan, I had to tell him how I felt (after he hinted around a little unsure. I think after going through our pregnancy with Morgan, he has learned the signs. This makes me happy because I don't have to talk. I can just look at him and he already knows.

He's been extremely helpful. Over this past two weeks he has worked his 12 hour days, cleaned the kitchen, washed all the laundry and sort of kind of cleaned the house. Man standard. lol.

He is preparing for baby already. He has made a few purchases and has encouraged me to make purchases each week for baby shank. It's a lot of fun. We did this with Morgan and even though in the end it all costs the same, it helped us to not have to come up with a ton of baby money after we had her.

Plus...I really like to shop so this pacifies me until baby does arrive :)

I promised myself that we would only buy necessities until after we have a baby shower!! IF we have a baby shower!!

Kale's favorite buy this month...probably for the whole pregnancy...was this BOON thing. He wanted one of these after we had made our purchases for Morgan. He despised the little bottle holder I purchased for her stuff. He decided 2 years ago that the next time we had a baby...it was going to be this BOON thingy all the way!!

Kale's Baby Buy

We are looking forward to another appointment on the 24th of April. More importantly, we are just happy that baby is healthy, great heart beat and that we are so blessed with another pregnancy.


Oh...and for the record...we are VERY confident that this will be our last pregnancy! I have known for a very long time that I wanted to have 4 children and am blessed beyond measure that the Lord has blessed me with 4 kiddos!!! I couldn't be more excited to fill up 4 bedrooms with beautiful children! I know life will get tough...but we are overjoyed!


~ The Shank Family