Day 1

Today (January 25) is the first day of my career as a Stay at Home (work from home?) mom. Even though my little girl is 2 weeks old M has been home with us for the past 2 weeks so they don't tecnically count. As of today I start to figure out how to do everything all over again and do it while the baby (hopefully) sleeps. I also need to figure out how to take my photography to the next level...I need to figure out how to use my brand new Nikon D5000, set up my recently purchased backdrops and lights and figure out how to market myself...while I am doing that I need to get my jewelry making in order and figure out how to market that as well and figure out how to get my products in to some local stores...anything and everything I can do to not have to go back to work fulltime so that I can figure out how to be a mom and grow the best little girl that I can...

So it's been a while...

I know it's been quite a while since my last post, but I have a REALLY good reason!

Since December 21 I have been out of work on bed rest due to Pregnancy Induced Hypertension so I was a bit busy trying to keep my bun in the oven...but as of January 8 the PIH officially turned into Preeclampsia and my doctor signed the little Smudge's eviction notice. I was checked into L&D at 1:30 pm at 4:00 the Dr. broke my water and at 10:47 pm weighing in at 6 lbs 15 oz Cassie was officially a part of our life!!

The birth was absolutely nothing like what I expected or was planning on having, due to the PIH/PE I was confined to bed and hooked up to an IV pumping me full of Magnesium (absolutely terrible), Pitocin (not as bad as any of the stories I heard probably because of the Mag) and I am assuming regular fluids. I wasn't allowed to try out any of the alternative pain relieve methods I had planned on in order to avoid the epidural, like walking, showering and/or using the birthing ball...so I ended up getting one, which was also no where near as bad as I had expected and whoa baby did it really work!! less than 2 hours after I got the epi I was told I was ready to start pushing, my doctor got there and after 10 minutes of pushing Cassie was in my arms. It was just plain amazing!

And for your viewing pleasure...

New Things on the Way!!!

Just a quicky update!

I have been working on some new items to share with the world :) soon we will be offering not only square pendants, but rectangle and circle shaped pendants as well!! Also coming soon? Bracelets! Check back soon for more info!

New Items Up!

I put some new items up on the Etsy site, go check them out, I am sure they would make great holiday gifts!

Custom Photo Pendant



Fiddle Love



I Don't Want to Play Grown Up Anymore

Hello world!

Wow, I post some pictures on Facebook and my little world explodes in a wonderful kind of way! I just finished up my first ever custom order for a friend and hopefully have a few more on the way! Which reminds me I also listed my first item on KatieVDesigns.Etsy.Com today!

Kayaking Original Photo Pendant








I probably will not be able to get any more of my original photo pendants up on etsy for a little while owing to the fact that my poor Sony Alpha 300 had to be sent out for repair...I am already in withdrawal, hopefully it will be back safe and sound soon! Till then I will be working on custom orders and building up my stock of Original Pendants so keep checking for new listings!

New Adventures

So we haven't done much geocaching lately, mainly because of the house stuff and the weather, but also because we still have to get Sirius down to the vet to get him his flea, tick and worm meds, don't want to risk getting anything out in the woods!

One thing we did get to try out is Kayaking!! It is so much fun! The previous owners of the house left a kayak here when they left so Matt decided to take it out and liked it so he got me to try it out (something I never ever thought I would try) and surprise surprise, I had a blast :)

Some Pics I took with my cell phone (I was WAY too scared I would flip and loose my good one :) )

The great rack Matt built for the truck, he insisted he could do it cheaper than we could buy it for, I think he just likes building things

This is literally out back of Matt's work, must be nice...

Updates and Such

Sorry, It has been such a long time since the last post and so much has happened that I am not even going to try to get everything in to one blog post so here goes...



We have an addition to the VanDerlofske family coming in February!!



Our little smudge is due on (around) February 3, 2010!



We also got some more home improvements done!! We took off some time for our (2 year) anniversary and got some work done!! I won't bog down the blog with tons of pictures, but we fenced in the back yard so that Sirius could run free and we got our bed room finished!


Beginning

Middle










Final!

Here is the link to the full picture set if you would like to see all the work. The we still aren't 100% finished with the room yet, but finished enough for the time being! Next project is the soon to be baby's room!

Next post will be about our latest adventures in Kayaking!!