I suppose I’d best start about 2 weeks before the wedding. Although there were plenty (and I mean plenty) of problems before then, this was when things really started to go pear shaped! I cringe thinking about the run up to our wedding day, and although I can laugh about it all now rather than having a full-on meltdown it was certainly something to try the patience of a saint, let alone a nervous and already stressed out bride to be!

So. After finally arranging to use the stake centre for our venue (no mean feat when it’s not your usual Sunday meetinghouse and no-one seems to understand why on God’s green earth you would want to use somewhere other than that) and booking a registrar through the local council (the one from the stake centre would be on holiday), we get a call from the registry office saying our registrar was actually double booked, and could not make it.

Oh, dear. After all the messing about we went through just to get this far, this was most definitely not what we needed to hear. I remember getting the call about half an hour before I started work and being somewhat hysterical. After managing to reach tones only dogs could hear and sobbing to the poor girl on the other end of the line about my wedding being ruined, she promised me another call with whatever resolution they were able to offer before 9am.

At two minutes to nine she called back, saying they could not offer any registrar for 11:30 on 12th September; it would have to be 12:30 or nothing at all, and they had to be away within around half an hour as they had another wedding to go to.

Of course by this point invitations had been sent to all 120 of our guests and of course they had all RSVP’ed expecting to see a wedding at 11:30.

The car was booked to pick me up from my parents at 10:45 (a little early even for 11:30, due to us booking late and him already having prior commitments afterwards) and we had the caterers arriving at 11 to set out the food in the cultural hall.

Needless to say 12:30 was definitely NOT ideal. But we had no choice; it was either move the ceremony back by one hour or not have a wedding at all that day. So we set about letting 120 of our nearest and dearest know any way that we could – e-mail, text, phone calls, word of mouth – that the time had changed, and to please start arriving one hour later than originally planned.

We tried in vain to move the caterers and the car to one hour later also, however because they both had other bookings they would have to work to the schedule we had already set.

So of course I ended up arriving at the church over an hour early and being ushered into an upstairs room to hide from my hubby to be, but I’ll cover that more later.

Surely, I thought, there could absolutely not be anything left to go wrong. I had had my fair share of wedding nightmares, and besides, how much more could an already frazzled bride-to-be handle before her big day?! Oh, you poor naive little thing. Just you wait…

The last couple of days I’ve been feeling particularly down. The pain in my pelvis, legs and back isn’t getting any better, and it’s making things increasingly difficult. Having always been fiercely independent, it’s hard to learn to rely more on others for things I could usually do for myself. I know this won’t be forever, but rather than allow myself to be pulled into self-pity, I’ve decided to focus on the things that I am thankful for.

First and foremost, my faith. I am a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, and my testimony has brought about such a monumental change in my life. It will be three years in October that I was baptised and although it has been a somewhat difficult road at times (a story for another day), it has been more than worth it. I wouldn’t be who – or where – I am today if it wasn’t for my faith.

My parents. My goodness, we’ve been through so much together. A lot of which I’m sorry to say has been completely my fault. I had some incredibly difficult teenage years and must have driven them to despair time and time again, but they have always been there for me. They have always stood by me, and always believed in me. Especially when I didn’t have the strength or even the inclination to fight for myself, they stood in and fought for me.
My Mother has been to hell and back on my behalf and she is such an unbelievably strong, passionate, independent woman with an unyielding supply of love for her family. She inspires me. The bond between her and my Father has only grown stronger over the years and despite their differences and the struggles they’ve had as a couple, I know she would do anything for him, and vice versa.
My Dad has always been the strong, silent type. He is a “man’s man”, ever the joker and always looking to lighten any situation with a laugh and a smile. Although he doesn’t often give voice to his emotions, he leaves no doubt of his feelings for those close to him. He loves my Mother more than I think even she realises, and I know he would be lost without her, although he would be hard pressed to say it out loud. He is a wonderfully generous, kind man and although I joke about it, I’m happy to have found a man just like him in nature.

Which brings me to…

My husband, Shaun. I cannot begin to describe just how much of a better person I have become for knowing and loving him. I am more selfless, more caring, more loving, patient and just simply better. He has made me realise what is really important in life, and inspired me to reach for those things. He has taught me what love really is, and how it works. He is my best friend, my sparring partner, my confidant, and always knows how to handle my somewhat scatty personality unlike anyone I’ve met. He’s seen me at my worst and still tells me I’m the most beautiful woman he knows. He spurs me on spiritually, and helps me to grow in the gospel by being a wonderful example of steadfastness and strength. He has blessed me in so many ways…

One of which is our son, who will be with us in November.
Although this pregnancy isn’t as straightforward as it could be, I am still so grateful and feel very privileged to have the opportunity to bring our little one into this world. I am so looking forward to meeting him, and I can’t help wondering what he will be like – his personality, his spirit, his looks, his mind… I am looking forward to my new role as “Mother”, as scary as it might be at first, and am in constant awe at this little miracle happening inside me. I spend hours reading about his development, and marvel at how so much can happen in so little time. He makes me grateful for all the changes that have had to happen to me, mentally, to prepare for this. If he had come along any sooner, I wouldn’t have been ready, no matter how much I may have tried to convince myself otherwise. It reminds me that although I might like to think so a lot of the time, when it comes down to it it’s not me that’s in the driving seat, and there’s a strange sort of comfort in that.

Anyway. Reeces Peanut Butter Cups are one of my favourite sweets. You can get hold of them in England, but they’re quite expensive. When I came across this recipe on Tasty Kitchen, I knew I had to try it. And it didn’t disappoint!

(side note: Tasty Kitchen is an AMAZING recipe site and if you haven’t seen it yet I suggest you go take a look!)

Ingredients

6 tbsp smooth peanut butter
3 tbsp butter
1 cup powdered sugar
1/2 cup digestive biscuit crumbs (or graham cracker crumbs if you’re in the US!)
2 cups dark chocolate chips
2 cups milk chocolate chips

Method

Mix half of the semi-sweet and half of the milk chocolate chips in a microwavable bowl and melt in the microwave using 30-second intervals.

Take around 30 petit four cases for mini PB cups, or around 24 regular cupcake cases for larger PB cups. Arrange on a large baking tray.

Fill cavities up 1/3 of the way with the melted chocolate and place in the freezer to chill for about 5 minutes.

Prepare PB filling – mix all remaining ingredients with mixer/fork. (The original recipe said to do this in stages, but it tastes the same and this is much easier!)

Remove the pan from the freezer and roll out balls of PB mixture to fit your size cup. Flatten slightly, making sure not to fill it up to the edges so that your top layer of chocolate can drip down and form the sides, and making sure there is still room on top to cover with chocolate without overflowing.

Mix and melt remaining chocolate chips and pour over the peanut butter so that it fills in the gaps on the sides and is even on top.

Refrigerate for between 30 minutes to an hour before serving.

Thankfully, this was one experiment that turned out pretty well. The stock mix took away slightly from what would have been a very sweet sauce and the flavours worked very well together.

I served this with my Garlic Mashed Potatoes & Fluffy Southern Biscuits, and it was delicious!

This recipe makes enough for 2, but can be doubled to serve 4, or more if needed.

Ingredients

2 chicken quarters
1 can peaches
1 cube chicken stock
1/4 cup boiling water
2 tbsp olive oil
2 tbsp soy sauce
1 tbsp honey
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp pepper

Method

Preheat oven to 375, Gas Mark 5.

Place chicken quarters into a medium/large casserole dish.

Mix chicken stock with boiling water, oil, soy sauce, honey, salt and pepper. Pour over chicken.

Season chicken with a little extra salt & pepper.

Bake, covered, for 45 minutes, basting with the sauce again halfway through.

Take chicken out of the oven and pour the peaches over. Place back in the oven and cook uncovered for a further 20 minutes.

This next step isn’t necessary but to make my chicken a little more crispy on the top I fired up the grill and put the dish under for a couple minutes before serving.

And you’re all done! Enjoy!

I absolutely love them, but mine always turn out too lumpy, too watery, too heavy… I just can’t get them right! In my frustration this past Sunday, I googled “world’s best mashed potatoes” and after a few pages, came across a simple recipe with no complicated steps. It seemed that even I, with my somewhat shady track record for mashed potato making, couldn’t get it wrong. So I thought I’d give it a shot.

I modified the recipe to be fit for 2 people – there was only hubby and I eating at the time – but it would be simple enough to alter to however many people you’re feeding.

Ingredients

3 large white potatoes, peeled & chopped
5 tbsp milk
1/2 tsp garlic puree (the original recipe called for roasted garlic cloves, but I don’t tend to use them)
1/4 tsp salt
1/4 tsp pepper

And that’s it!

Method

Boil potatoes until fork tender, around 10-15 minutes.

Drain and allow to cool slightly and dry completely before mashing. (apparently this drying stage is one of the “secrets” to good mash – maybe that’s what I’ve been doing wrong!)

Once dried, mash potatoes to desired consistency with salt, pepper, milk and garlic.

You’re all done! To mix it up a bit, try leaving the skins on for a more “rustic” feel, or bake your potatoes, uncovered, at 350 for around 15 minutes (as pictured below).

I’d been a little apprehensive to try any recipes like this, simply because I didn’t think they’d match up to my expectations, but these were pretty darn good – hubby gave his seal of approval, too! These biscuits are light, fluffy and buttery – perfect!

Ingredients

2 cups all-purpose Flour
4 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
1 tbsp sugar
1 egg
7 1/2 tbsp margarine/butter
3/4 cup milk

Method

Preheat oven to 450, gas mark 8.

Stir together dry ingredients.

Beat egg with milk and add a bit at a time to the dry mix, and keep stirring until fully combined.

Turn dough onto floured surface and knead a few times.

Pat & press to desired thickness (around 1/2 inch is good), then cut out biscuits (makes around 1 dozen).

Bake for 9-12 minutes until golden.

And just as a side note – these babies are best served warm from the oven!

I remembered having something similar to this at a Relief Society gathering a couple years ago. I couldn’t remember exactly what went in it but we had spinach and strawberries that needed using, so I thought I’d have a go at recreating it! I know there were pine nuts in the original, but seeing as I didn’t have any I substituted flaked almonds. It worked really well. We served this simply with some bread and butter.

Ingredients

Dressing
2 tbsp sesame seeds
1 tbsp poppy seeds
1/4 cup white sugar
1/2 cup olive oil
1/4 cup balsamic vinegar
1/4 tsp paprika
1/4 tsp Worcestershire sauce

Salad
1 bag baby spinach
1 quart strawberries – sliced
1/4 cup flaked almonds – blanched

Method

To make the dressing, mix sesame seeds, poppy seeds, sugar, oil, vinegar, paprika and Worcestershire sauce in a good sized bowl/jug until well combined. Chill for 1 hour to allow flavours to combine (you may need to quickly re-mix after it has been standing for a while).

To make the salad, wash the spinach and strawberries and then slice the strawberries. Quickly blanch the almonds in the microwave for 30 seconds, then drain. Combine spinach, strawberries and almonds and toss.

Serve in bowls and add dressing to taste.

Enjoy!

I was really dubious of this recipe, just because – well – I’m not a huge fan of microwave cooking, and I’ve certainly never thought of making a cake this way, but I’m glad I tried it! It’s very chocolatey, and nice and easy to make – takes about 5 minutes including prep time.

The only difference I would make next time is to add about another 1/2 tbsp of oil – the cake was a tiny bit on the dry side, but with ice cream you can’t tell!

Ingredients

4 tbsp all-purpose flour
4 tbsp sugar
2 tbsp cocoa
1/2 tsp baking powder
1 egg
3 1/2 tbsp milk
1/2 tsp vanilla
1/2 tsp cinnamon
3tbsp vegetable oil

Method

Combine dry ingredients in a medium sized bowl

Add egg & mix well

Add vanilla, milk and oil

Spray oversized mug with baking spray and pour in the batter. It should reach just below halfway. If it’s any more, you will need to split the batter as it will overflow during cooking!

Microwave for 2 minutes 50 seconds (I use an 850W microwave, if yours is different you may need to adjust cooking times accordingly). Make sure you keep an eye on the cake throughout cooking.

When finished, let the cake cool in the cup for another couple of minutes before turning out, or if you like eat straight from the mug!

This recipe was enough for 2, so I turned the cake out of the mug and then sliced in half to make two portions. I also added some powdered sugar on top to make it look pretty

These calzones are tuna, tomato & baby spinach, so I’ll write the recipe for that, but feel free to alter it to have whatever the heck you like… One tin of tuna makes around 3 calzones, so this recipe covers that. But again, it’s incredibly easy to adapt to however many hungry mouths you need to feed!

Ingredients

3 tortilla wraps
1 tin tuna, drained
1/4-1/2 tsp black pepper (or to taste)
1 1/2 tsp lemon juice (bottled is fine)
1 medium tomato, diced small
Small handful of baby spinach per calzone
Small handful of grated cheese per calzone (we use whatever is in the fridge – was Wensleydale this time and was super yummy!)
3/4 tbsp tomato puree per calzone
2 tbsp olive oil per calzone
Mixed herbs, to taste

Method

Put drained tuna, diced tomatoes, black pepper and lemon juice into a jug/mixing bowl and mix well.

Run tortilla wraps under water so they are slightly moist – this helps them stick together.

Spread tomato puree all over one side of your wraps and then sprinkle on some mixed herbs.

Put half of your cheese down on one side of each wrap, then some of the tuna mixture, then baby spinach and finally the rest of your cheese.

Fold half of your wrap over the filling and press down on the edges. If it is not sticking well, wet your fingers and run them along the edges to get the wrap to stick together. Make sure you don’t overfill – you don’t want it to be too full otherwise it will burst open during cooking.

When your wraps are assembled, heat up your oil in a large frying pan and then fry your calzones one at a time, about 1 minute on each side or until golden brown.

And that’s all there is to it!
Super easy, super yummy and super quick! Enjoy

Which, I guess, is why after weeks of me saying “oh, I don’t need to take any pictures of myself just yet, I’ve hardly changed, I’ll wait until there’s something there to see“, I’ve suddenly woken up this morning and realised that all of a sudden I look very, very pregnant…

Yep. That’s me. The one with the supersize belly and only just made it past halfway.
Man alive – what am I gonna look like full term?!

And don’t be fooled – if you think you can see any semblance of that so-called “second trimester glow”, let me tell you – I got lucky with the lighting. I’m pretty much going through the mill right now.

I had morning sickness up to around 17 weeks, then all seemed to go well up until last week. Early in the week I started to get some pretty bad aches and pains in my lower back. Perfectly normal, says I, and I just carried on. Last weekend I was at work and noticed a really strange feeling in my feet… I look down and – whoa. My feet had very literally doubled in size.
I’d had my shoes off cause it was a hot day, but when I tried to put them back on (more out of curiosity than anything, and wondering if my eyes were playing tricks on me) I couldn’t. They would even fit a teeny bit. Later on in the afternoon they got even bigger. By now they had probably tripled in size, and the weird tingly feeling I had in my feet was working its way up my ankles and calves, which obviously didn’t want to be left out of the fun and started to swell, too.

I know swelling in pregnancy is normal, but this just felt weird. Like something wasn’t quite right. By now it was about 2pm.
I called the emergency doctors and was advised to come in to check blood pressure and let them “have a look” at what was going on.

So, Shaun and I got there around 6pm. We then spent about another hour waiting to be seen (typical doctors, right!). Once in the office I explained what had happened, took off my slippers (the only things I could find that would fit!) and let the doctor examine me. He took my blood pressure, which he said was “right on the top side of normal, but still OK for now”, and then he did the strangest thing…

He put his thumb onto my leg and pushed really hard for about 10 seconds. It hurt a little, but was more uncomfortable than anything. When he took his thumb away, the dent he had made stayed there. Oh my goodness, it was so surreal. Skin isn’t supposed to do that!! After I finished being completely freaked out, he said that this is what he was expecting, and it tells us that it is only fluid that is in my legs as opposed to something like a blood clot. He said it was called pitting edema, and along with high blood pressure and protein in urine, was one of the symptoms for preeclampsia. But, because my blood pressure was for now still in the normal range, he advised to just rest and visit my doctor a couple of weeks later with a urine sample and to have my blood pressure re-tested. This was all last Saturday 3rd July.

Oish. Well. It never rains but it pours…

By Monday morning my feet and legs had pretty much returned to normal. Unfortunately for me, the little aches and pains I’d been getting in my back turned into much more and pretty much pushed me to breaking point. I called in sick from work because it was that bad – I could hardly move. And the pains seemed to have moved from my back and more towards my front, where I would expect the bottom of my pelvis to be.

I spent Monday resting as much as I could, then when Tuesday rolled around and I was only getting worse, I called my midwife and then on her recommendation, headed to the doctors.

I explained my symptoms to him – trouble climbing stairs, getting in and out of bed, rolling over in bed and pretty much anything that forces my legs any other way than together. I explained how every time I had to have my legs apart for whatever reason (even walking), it felt as though they were being ripped apart at my pelvis. Deep joy.

Anyway, he knew straight away what it was, and told me I was experiencing “Symphysis Pubis Dysfunction (SPD)”. I’ve since done some research and found out that the technical term for this is now “Pelvic Girdle Pain (PGP)”.
What this delightful condition means is that during pregnancy, a hormone called “relaxin” is released into the body to soften ligaments in the pelvis and allow baby an easier passage out into the world. Fair enough.
Unfortunately, for some lucky ladies, too much relaxin can be released (and much too soon), resulting in anything from mild discomfort to complete agony as the ligaments soften too much and the pelvic bones misalign. I guess I’m extra lucky, considering this has started happening to me just over halfway through my pregnancy, and if I’m in agony now I dread to think how much worse it’s going to get – in the words of my doctor, “it’ll only get worse from here until your baby is born”. Oh, joy! Elation!

At least something is being done. I’ve been given a prescription for safe painkillers, and have been referred to a physiotherapist. But the latter can take up to 6 weeks. In the mean time it’s just a case of having to “grin and bear it”.

So now, I’m trying to make the decision between taking further time away from work (I’ve already been off for a week) and being able to rest and make myself comfortable at home however I can (although nothing seems to help), or go back to work and be in pain there, but not be able to do anything to help it if I need to. Tough decision – I’m bored out of my brains at home, but at least I can listen to my body. At work I’d be kept busy, and I do only sit at a desk all day, but would that be at the detriment of my health? I don’t know…