spring things

spring is FINALLY here, which means so is spring fashion!

here are a few things i have my eye on...

1. Wildbloom ruffle underwire tank bathing suit

2. French terry skirt

3. Maritime-stripe hoodie

4. Suede laser cut flats

5. Soft washed wool scarf

6. Flutter sleeve crewneck T

7. Mystique 1644

8. Cutler and Gross® sunglasses #0862

9. Gingham vintage schoolboy shirt

the wife will play when the husband's away

austin got back last night from a 5 day trip to park city. i would have mentioned it in my previous posts, but i didn't want everyone in cyberspace to know that i was here alone for 5 days... creepy! so while he was gone, i kept myself busy with some more fun projects.

recently, i saw my super cute sister-in-law becca rockin these gold glitter toms. they are awesome!!!

first of all, i am obsessed with toms. they are so comfy and so cute. not to mention the fact that for every pair you buy, they donate a pair to a child. i don't think i could ever pull off these shoes quite like becca can, but i thought maybe the girls could. so here's how they turned out. they are definitely not an exact replica, but they are still fun none the less!!

so when we were little, my mom would make matching outfits for her and us kids for easter (shout out to my super crafty and talented mom who i learned all of my sewing skills from). i love looking at those pictures and having memories of this fun tradition, so i thought i'd do the same thing this year.

so far i've made the girls' skirts and here they are. i'm going to make a matching skirt for me, but in pink, and a tie for austin in blue. hopefully it will end up being fun and cute and not tacky and tragic (like matching easter eggs).

i also made: a camera strap for my camera, a memory board for the girls' room, and i painted this white ikea lamp shade that had been bugging me because it was so plain.

so i was a busy little girl, but it was good because it kept my mind off the fact that austin was gone. i don't know what it is, but i've definitely been bitten by craft bug lately. hope i can keep it up, because i'm having a lot of fun!!

warm weather... finally!

its was a warm 40 degrees here this past wednesday.

you laugh, but that is a big deal for us minnesotans!

so in order to celebrate, the girls and i went on our first jog of the season. i was worried the girls wouldn't be game, but they loved it. in fact, they didn't make a peep the whole time.

looking forward to lots more "warm" days like this one to come!!!!

{you can still see some snow in the background}

love this stuff

my latest food obsession is Fage greek yogurt. its SO good! it comes in 3 different fat contents: total, 2%, and 0%. but of course the one i like is the one with the full fat, total. i wouldn't expect anything less from myself! my favorite flavor is definitely strawberry, but the honey one is awesome too.

i love that the yogurt and the fruit are in two separate compartments. that way i can get the perfect amount of each in every bite (i'm anal about my food that way).

basically what i'm trying to say is... this stuff rocks!!!

all about ella

this little girl sure does know how to put a smile on your face. if reese is the spice in our family then miss ella is definitely the sugar!

she's our talkative one and is extremely social. she especially loves other babies and still gets the hiccups when we make her laugh (which is often, because we just can't help ourselves).

she's not crawling yet, but she definitely manages to get from place to place with her roly-poly maneuvers. she loves to give kisses and has even started trying to wave.

happy doesn't even begin to describe this girl's personality!

she's OBSESSED with her green blanket that her grandma teri made for her. she likes to sleep with it covering her face. it looks like we're trying to smother her when we put her to bed, but she loves it!

here's a video of her and reese playing. now, ella's a little on the cranky side because its right before i put them down for a nap, but its the most recent video i have.

i just want to squeeze those chubby cheeks every chance i get. i heart her!!!

success!

i've been wanting to make shoes for the girls for a really long time, but felt like i wouldn't get much use out of them at their age. but now that the crawling has begun and even some pulling to a standing position, i figured it was time to test my sewing skills.

so... last night i made the girls some shoes.

it actually wasn't too hard, just time consuming. i think the whole project took me 4 1/2 hours. but you have to remember that the time would have been cut in half if i was only making one pair.

i bought a super cute pattern off of etsy and crossed my fingers that the directions would be easy enough to follow. actually i did one of those 3 patterns for $15 type of things. so there might be more shoe posts to come!

i had a lot of fun making them and i think they turned out pretty darn cute (mostly because i LOVE polka dots). success!!

all about reese

its hard to believe that my sweet babies are 8 months old! so i thought it would be fun to devote a whole post to each of the girls. today is reese's turn! or as we affectionately call her reesey piecey...

we love this girl SO much. she adds the spice to our little family and always keeps us on our toes. she loves to dance and has the most hilarious facial expressions. lately she's had some big milestones happening in her life.

she got her first tooth. if you squint REALLY hard you can kind of see it!

she's started to crawl

now that she can get around she's become extremely mischievous

and she just gets cuter and cuter everyday!

love you reesey piecey!

strike!

we went bowling for the first time in a REALLY long time this past weekend, with our friends brett and andrea livingston. it was a much needed night out for us. we had SO much fun. it felt like we were back in college!

one of the best things about the bowling alley was that it was smoke free! always a nice bonus to not come home stinking of smoke!!! yuck...

double trouble... again!

there's going to be double trouble AGAIN in the archibald family!! no, i'm not pregnant again with twins but my sister-in-law brittany IS! how crazy is that!?! for those of you who don't know, when we moved to minnesota austin's brother, jordan, and his wife, brittany, had already been living here for a year. we actually live only .8 miles from each other.

i think we all got the shock of our life when we found out!

they have 3 kids so the twins will be numbers 4 and 5. and oh ya, they are going to be identical boys. we are SO excited and can hardly wait to meet them.

its been so fun to answer all of brittany's questions and share such a unique experience with her. its definitely reminded me of my own pregnancy and "inspired" me to record a little about it. like i've said in the past, the main purpose of this blog is to try and keep a record of our lives, because i basically stink at journaling. trust me, once you see the pictures of me you'll realize i'm not doing this for my own vain reasons, but really just so that i can have this experience written down somewhere.

so here goes:

i've always been really open about our struggle with infertility. i know for some it is a very private matter, and i can COMPLETELY understand why. its not always an easy thing to talk about, because its a very sensitive subject. but throughout our infertility journey, i've always been willing/able to share what we went through with others. i think a lot of it has to do with my personality. i don't usually hold back. those of you who really know me, know what i'm talking about.

so that's really where the story about my pregnancy begins. after a year of trying to get pregnant, we discovered that we would have to do in vitro in order to conceive. and another year later, on our second in vitro attempt, i was pregnant.

i'll never forget that day.

i was so anxious for our results that i tried to sleep all day so i could make the time pass as quickly as possible. i told austin that i didn't want to take the call from the nurse, who would tell us if my blood test was positive or negative, because i didn't want a repeat of what happened when i took the call from our first in vitro attempt (as you can imagine, i didn't handle it very well).

so when austin walked into our room, he had a total blank stare on his face. i thought i would be able to tell right away if the results were good or bad, but i couldn't. what seemed like an eternity later (which was really only like 2 seconds) he said that i was pregnant. so cliche, but words cannot describe the joy/relief/peace i felt.

the nurse told austin that my hormone levels looked great and that they were in fact a little high. she said that in some cases that could be an indicator of twins, but not to get our hopes up or anything. about a week later i went in for an ultrasound and sure enough, twins.

as far as twins go, my pregnancy wasn't too bad. i went to the hospital for preterm labor at 27 weeks and was back again a week later for some bleeding but everything turned out ok. they put me on medicine to stop my contractions for the rest of my pregnancy. after that i was on a moderate bedrest, which just means taking it easy. at 34 weeks i went on full bedrest and at 37 weeks i was induced because one of the girls had too much fluid in their sack, i was looking a little pre-eclamptic and i pretty much begged them to. and off to the hospital we went, but that's another story for another day!

and to make a long post, even longer here are those pictures i promised. oh the memories!

13 weeks

16 weeks

18 weeks

24 weeks

32 weeks

(take note of this outfit, because it appears a couple more times. its basically the only think i could fit into at the end)

34 weeks

(the moo moo)

35 weeks

37 weeks

(literally right before we left for the hospital. i had been crying and didn't really want to take a picture, but now so glad that i did)