{Happy 4th of July!}

This 4th of July, William & i spent the day with some wonderful friends. Two of our friends, Travis & Taylor, are getting married in October {& we are totally psyched}. We spend quite a bit of time with them as it is, so of course it was natural to spend a holiday with them! We spent the 4th of July at Travis' parents' house. We are absolutely in LOVE with his parents, Mark & Loretta. They are the neatest people I have ever met & they really like us too :) Oh! & I cant forget about Luke, travis' younger brother, he celebrated with us as well! He is a total sweetheart :) Here are some pics from the day:

{Travis & Taylor}

{Mark & Loretta}

{William & Luke}

{William & myself}

{We played poker for hours...}

{& Taylor cleaned us all out!!!}

{The boys set off lots of fireworks..}

{Woohoo!}

{The girls had fun with sparklers}

{Here we are!}

{We ate Mark's Home smoked ribs. Delicious!}

{We enjoyed Tylor's homemade apple pie. This was the first one she made completely from scratch & it was absolutely wonderful!}

{We ate LOTS of watermelon too!!} 

What did you do for the 4th of July?? Happy Monday!

{Homemade (liquid) Laundry Detergent}

As some of you may already know, William & I try to be as frugal as possible in many areas. But not only frugal, we like it to be for a reason too. For example, I have made all of our household cleaners since the day we got married because, one, its cheap, & two, I think we feel better not having the harsh chemicals in our home. {& they work just as well, if not better, than store bought cleaners} I think i will begin sharing a few recipes every now & then on natural home care, if you are at all interested :) It is a part of our lives that we have just gotten used to & love! I will share today, the home care product i just finished making a new batch of yesterday: Laundry detergent. Sounds weird, but we love it! It cleans just as well as the stuff we used to use! Here is the recipe & instructions:

{You will need Washing soda, Borax & Fels.Naptha soap}

Walmart has all three ingredients. Make sure you get WASHING soda & not BAKING soda.

{Cut 1/3 of the felsnaptha soap off the bar}

{Now grate the 1/3 of bar soap. You can use a cheese grater, or be lazy like me, & use your cuisinart with the grater attatchment.}

{& voila! Grated soap that looks like shredded cheese, yum!  not}

{Now pour your grated soap into a pot with 6 Cups of water. Keep the mixture over the heat until the soap shreds melt completely}

{While the water & soap are heating, Portion out 1/2 C each washing soda & Borax}

{Once soap shreds are melted, pour in the portioned out washing soda & Borax}

{Stir all ingredients very well!! You want to make sure all ingredients are dissolved}

{Once the mixture is completely ready, Remove mixture from heat. Pour 4 C of hot water into a 5 gallon container. Then, pour your hot soapy mixture into the container as well. Mix. Then add 1 gallon & 6 cups of water to the mixture.}

** We also added about 30 drops of sweet orange essential oil at this point. You do not have to add any sort of smell if you dont want to though.

{Cover mixture & Let sit for 24 hours before using it. After 24 hours, open up the container. If the consistency of your laundry detergent looks like a bunch of mutilated jelly fish... you did it right! (that's what i think it looks like haha) }

{Store some of your detergent into easy to carry containers for every day use. I like to use these Lemonade bottles. Just because they're cute} 

{& there you go! Use about 1/4 C - 1/2 C per load, depending on soil level}

{Store the remainder of your detergent in a nice cool place. We store it under the laundry folding table in our laundry room.}

{Enjoy!}

{Happy Belated Fathers day!!}

I know i'm a day late, but our fathers day was a busy one! William & I both worked from 6am till 4pm {looong day} then came home & changed into Normal clothes. We then went to Buy Buy Baby to pick out something special for william for Fathers day :) Even though our little munchkin isn't in our arms yet, it still exists, right? So we are celebrating! This is what William chose as his fathers day gift:

Haha yes, I was surprised too. He walked right up to it at the store, picked it up & said, "This is what I want!" He loves it & is excited to use it! Which makes me very excited :) He will be so cute! 

After our trip to the store, we called Willy's dad, & grandpas, & my grandpa & wished them a happy fathers day. We then said a little prayer for my step dad.. {for those of you that don't know, my step dad passed away last month}  Later on in the day, my mom & sister came over, so we could all celebrate together. We went to dinner at one of Willy's favorite restaurants, Cornish Pasty Co.  Great conversations & great company, It was a great night! My sweet little sister Sarah {12 years old}, made willy the cutest card:

{Isn't that precious?} 

Today we went to my doctor for my 13 week checkup. We got to hear the heart beat again :) It is always so special when we get to hear it. It just gives us that constant reminder that, yes, there is something living & growing in my body, that I need to constantly be taking care of & that even though I cannot feel it moving around quite yet, everything I do can effect it. 

Today we also found out that I have a pretty rare blood type. I am AB-. We aren't sure yet how this will affect our little one. My Dr. was telling us that I may need to undergo a series of RhoGam shots once I am further along, in order to keep my blood from attacking our babies blood as it develops. {If you want to fully understand why, follow this link, it's kind of hard for me to explain} This is the only complication we have had so far & it's nothing to really worry about yet. Everything else seems pretty normal & in 5 weeks {July 28th} , we get to find out the sex of our baby, & we are sooo excited. I hope that day comes fast. 

Here I am, @ 13 weeks. Still look the same, for the most part! According to my Doctor, I have only gained 1 pound since my last visit a month ago, even though I feel & look like I have put on a lot more than that. He said It's probably due to the fact that my body is simply changing & moving around!  Crazy to think! 

Well, we hope you all had a great weekend! Happy Fathers day from the Johnstons! 

Did you do anything special for your dads, grandpas, or husbands? Tell us about it here! 

{Belly laugh: Pickles & Captain Crunch?}

Ok, I always thought that when people said "pregnant women crave pickles & Icecream during pregnancy" it was a myth... that is until 2 weeks ago. Yes, I finally broke down and bought a jar of pickles. {I still can't believe it} One of those big gallon ones ya know? That has like 50 pickles in it?  Yup! There it is! >>>

{Found image on google}

 I am so ashamed. & that's not even the worst part.. I bought this jar of pickles.. at walmart.. at 2am...when I was supposed to be getting something else that our little family actually NEEDED.{This just keeps sounding worse & worse! Promise I'm not crazy!} But good news, no ice cream yet, at least not WITH the pickles at the same time :)  I walked into our house after my shameful trip to walmart, jar of pickles in hand, my husband looked at me & laughed. "Here we go!" he said. "They just looked so good! I couldn't keep walking by!" I quickly rebuttled.

Anyways, I have gotten into a  habit. I eat a pickle at least once a day. Seriously, ask my husband.  Can that be considered a daily ritual? "My daily pickle enjoyment time?" {Ok, that just sounds weird, maybe I won't call it that.} But, whether it can be considered a ritual or not, I am going to call it one, even though it makes me feel funny to think that I have such a strange ritual instead of something cool.
All this pickle talk actually has a purpose, I promise:

Yesterday, after getting ready, I ran down our stairs to the kitchen, opened up the fridge & immediatly went for that big, beautiful jar of pickles, Picture this, this jar is so big {& it seems like the lid is always screwed on tighter & tighter every time} I have to use everything I have to open it! I have to like squat a little, & put the jar between my knees & twist the lid with both hands! {Awkward picture, I know} So, it takes me quite a bit of time to open this jar and I'm like out of breathe by the time I get it open. Anyways, I get the jar open, finally, gasping for air, grab a fork, fish for the pickle I want, & stab it, wrap it in a paper towel & lay it on the counter, close the jar and put it away. After I put the jar away, I grab the pickle off the counter, & by this time my mouth is watering, {seriously guys, I think pregnancy has made me like a crazy person! Salivating over a pickle? I mean, come on. I'm like Shmegal from Lord of the Rings "My precious"} I immediatly just take a big bite of it. I barely broke the skin , and out of the little fork holes I had just made getting it out of the jar, a load of pickle juice just shot out...INTO MY NOSE & EYES!! Gross! I dropped my pickle on the floor, & coughed & choked for quite a while. My husband, not knowing what was going on,  became very worried, & asked me what was going on & if I was ok. I told him what had happened, my eyes watering from the pickle juice & from choking. I could feel the smell of pickle juice coating every little nose hair. He tried to act serious, because he could tell I was quite distraught. But he couldn't help but laugh as he comforted me. He thought it was the funniest thing ever. I'm sure he was thinking "That's what you get." as he patted me on the back & held me close.  So needless to say, I don't know when or if I will re-start my daily Pickle eating ritual,  haven't eaten one yet today, & I don't plan on it. That was seriously traumatizing & totally gross. I  STIll smell pickle juice! I will just stick to eating my Captain Crunch berries a couple of times a day, as usual, but without the pickle snack time in between. haha
Good luck to all you Pregos out there & your crazy cravings. Be careful, because sometimes they come back to bite you in the butt.. or the nose in my case :)

{Coconut flour}

Have you ever heard of Coconut flour? I had never heard of it before, until I read the latest post on one of the blogs I follow {Heavenly Homemakers}. I am very interested in trying this white flour substitute. You can use it in place of flour in pretty much any recipe. It seems like it is pretty healthy for you too! & with a little one on the way, William & I are constantly looking for new ways to incorporate healthy eating in our home. I will be talking about some other ways we are planning to incorporate healthy eating soon :) But for now,  I would like to begin experimenting with Coconut flour immediately!

{Image found on Google}

{Image found on Google}

Has anyone used coconut flour before? If so, please feel free to comment & leave some advice or a yummy recipe to try out :)