I have a pregnancy journal at BabyCenter which we are welcome to visit and read, as long as you want to hear allll about my symptoms

I’m not showing yet, that’s just my fat belly! lol. You know, the one I’d planned to get rid of before trying to conceive. Yeah, that’s hard to do when you’re surprised with a pregnancy. But that’s what I get for procrastinating

It is amazing, though, how I’m a little less self-conscious about my big ol’ belly because I can just say, “I’m pregnant!” Well, until they ask how far along am I and realize that is not my pregnant belly showing. *covers belly and walks away*

Make a pregnancy ticker

(Updated because I can never remember anything lol – whoops!)

I just started a journal over at BabyCenter. Here’s the link if you’re interested in knowing just how in the world this happened! (I’m not giving you those details, don’t worry ) I may or may not keep that link posted here, so bookmark it if you want to follow along, or add me on Twitter and or Facebook.

And yes, we are thrilled!

Dear Reader,

Every Halloween, I am disturbed by the number of children who jump out from the darkness and cry, “Boo!” If you have ever encountered such a person, you know that they are so upset that they are unable to finish the entire word, which is, of course, “Book.”

I am sorry to tell you that there are millions of children every year who can not afford a new book to read. Fortunately, there is a noble organization called First Book, which puts books in the hands of such children – more than 65 million books so far. Still, every Halloween, the ghastly cries of those growing up without new books rise into the night.

If you are as tired of hearing children cry “Boo!” as I am, you should probably do something about it. You might consider making a Halloween donation to First Book. For instance, $2.00 is an amount which here means “one new book.” And $20 is an amount which means “filling a backpack with enough books to make some lucky child a hunchback for Halloween.”

Wouldn’t you like to click here now to donate?

With all due respect,

Lemony Snicket

Lemony Snicket has written many alarming books for children including those in A Series of Unfortunate Events and he is one of 70 astonishing authors and artists, including Neil Gaiman, Margaret Atwood, and James Patterson, who contributed to Half-Minute Horrors, a collection of instant frights published in partnership with First Book. Half-Minute Horrors is available wherever books are sold.

Received from FirstBook.org.

Anyway, this time I used almond bark coating and a little bit of vanilla flavored wafers.

I used a box mix for Devil’s Food and tinted the batter red for a red velvet appearance (I’m pretty sure I’m going for red velvet dipped in white for the Halloween ones). Baked, let cool and then crumbled it up with a fork.

I pulled a Kalen and got a little brave/creative and mixed some raspberry flavored hot cocoa mix into the melted chocolate. Dipped, let set and the “drizzled” (it was more like wagging the fork over them lol) the vanilla flavored melted wafers over.

They’re kind of a mess but they taste so good! The hint of raspberry makes them seem .. gourmet almost. Yeah, as long as you don’t look at them! lol  (Ignore the white blob ones.  I had extra white chocolate lol)

Don’t you just love these vintage Good Housekeeping covers? Did you know that you can buy them as prints, posters or on canvas from Art.com, and save 20% off with coupon code “GHMAG”*. (I know I can’t be the only one that would love framed copies of these ) Check out Redbook, Esquire, Harper’s Bazaar and othermagazines there, as well as every other kind of art you can imagine. (I love Esquire’s women prints!) Art.com also offers custom framing and various sizes of prints. Check out all the website has to offer!

*Valid for new customers. Ends 2/28/10

Do you have any tips on getting rid of those ugly circles?

Here’s what I came up with:

Close-up of the sign (it would look better if I had fishing line, but white string will do.  And, um, yes, that’s an upside-down “M” lol.  Stupid pack of letters had only one “W”):

Here’s our door all webbed up and lighted:

Full view (with the ghosties flying in the wind):

And a creepy pumpkin peeking out from the window (another deal from after Halloween last year   We bought six of them!):

That’s SEVEN puppies! Four girls and three boys. (Yet again, the boys in our animal family are outnumbered.)

They are adorable, aren’t they? There’s no doubt that the daddy is a big black dog roaming around town. (Isn’t it amazing how male dogs seem to be running around loose when there is a female in heat?) Their fur looks so silky and soft.. and it’s just as soft as it looks. I can’t help petting and loving them

Black dogs seem pretty popular, so I don’t think we’ll have a hard time finding homes for them when they’re weened. We’ll start looking early this time! Oh, and once the puppies are re-homed, we will get momma spayed ourselves. There will be no doubt next time.