Life As I Know It...: May 2016

Since I've been on maternity leave I have had plenty of time through out the day to sit around on Pinterest and ask myself "What in the world am I going to cook for dinner?" I've pinned some super delicious recipes lately on my Food-Main Dishes board!

Here are my three favorite recipes that I've made the past few weeks, with links to their recipes!

One Dish Queso Chicken Bake from the Pinning Mama
Mexican food is my favorite food of all time, and this dish was delish! Very easy to make and it hit the spot for my Mexican craving. You literally throw everything in the pyrex dish and then cook it! I highly suggest it for a busy weeknight dinner!

Chicken Parmesan Baked Pasta from the Budget Savvy Diva

Chicken Parmesan is my very most favorite Italian meal so I just had to try this out! It was an excellent recipe, but next time I will definitely add some more sauce. It was a little dry when I made it, but deliciously tasty nonetheless!

Cheesy Spinach Dip Chicken Pasta from Crunchy Creamy Sweet

This was an instant family favorite! I couldn't believe how creamy and delicious this dish was. It is a definite must try! I almost wanted to bust out some tortilla chips and eat it with chips! Lol!

Follow me on Pinterest for more awesome dishes to try out! I wish I was creative enough to create my own recipes, but why recreate the wheel when delicious recipes like these exist?!

With good reason, I have been out of the blogging world for quite a while. I found out the day before school started last year that I was pregnant!

Crazy timing, I know! With school starting and having just had an ectopic pregnancy, I couldn't let myself immediately get excited about this pregnancy. I spent virtually my entire first trimester living in fear- fear that I would lose another baby, either to miscarriage or ectopic pregnancy, both of which I have experienced.

There is nothing worse to me than the first trimester of pregnancy. It is supposed to be a joyous time in a mother's life - filled with excitement and growing love. But for me, almost every moment was filled with fear and anxiety. I tried to be excited, but more often than not my mind would wander off to dark places. Eventually my first trimester successfully ended and I was able to have peace about my pregnancy. I spent the next 6 months falling in love with the child growing in my womb.

A photo of me at my baby shower!

I had a very healthy pregnancy. My blood pressure stayed under control this time, no gestational diabetes, and I didn't even gain much weight! I found out at 16 weeks through a 3d ultrasound that we were having another girl!

When we burst the balloon at our gender reveal party!

It's a girl!

Now on to the hard part - the labor. With my first daughter I was induced and I loved it, so I planned on being induced again with this baby, but my body had other plans! I went into labor on April 21st around 4am. I stayed home from school with contractions about 10 minutes apart all morning. At 11:30am I had my husband take me to the hospital to be checked out. I was dilated to a 4, but after staying for 2 hours I was no further along so they sent me home. (Horrible idea)

From there I continued to have contractions all day long, which got worse and closer together. I had the dreaded BACK LABOR, and it is something I wouldn't wish upon my worst enemy. There is no way to describe the immense pain I experienced during labor. I looked like one of those crazy women who go into labor on TV shows- screaming, sweating, shaking, etc.

I finally had my husband take me back to the hospital at 11:30pm. I was dilated to a 7 and knew I would be meeting my beautiful baby girl very soon! At 1am I got my epidural, and it was much different than the one I got with my first daughter. This epidural didn't relax me and make me feel wonderful and warm all over. It made me feel like my legs were asleep. Like, pins and needles asleep. It was very uncomfortable, but at least I wasn't having back labor anymore.

I was able to get some rest on and off through out the early morning hours, and at 4:45am my nurse woke me up saying it was time to push! "It's time to push" are the most simple, horrifying and exciting words of all time!

Once the doctor got to my room I pushed for 12 minutes and my beautiful baby girl, Penelope Iris Taylor, entered the world. My husband and I were instantly in love with the incredible blessing that we prayed over for 9 months.