bundle of joy

Weekend Breakfast Perfection…

After about 100 weekends when D surprised my very pregnant self with breakfast, I thought it was about time I returned the favour, so here we are… I baked him the best breakfast muffins I could come up with (being in the kitchen involves a lot of improvising for me). Just to get you in the mood, they contain prosciutto (because I forgot to buy bacon and prosciutto was the only thing I had in the fridge), red cheddar and a touch of garlic. Since it is the weekend, we tend to not count calories, fat or any other nasty stuff that could get our morale down, but I am telling you, these muffins are not for those that are on a diet, no, they are a cheat meal!

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Thankfully, if you have them for breakfast, they are not as bad as they seem on paper because you have an entire day to consume all that savoury goodness. That being said, I tried to keep them on the healthy side by not using white flour and by switching from sour cream to a much lighter yoghurt and low fat milk. I did not keep that in mind where the red full fat cheddar was involved, but you could easily switch to low fat mozzarella and skip the butter if you want them to actually be diet-friendly. I did not really want that because, hey, I am pregnant, and I need a day or two to indulge in my cravings fatty or not!

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So, getting down to the nitty gritty, here’s what you need for these dreamy breakfast muffins:

200 gr wholemeal flour
300 gr red cheddar
125 gr plain yoghurt
300 ml milk
80 gr butter
one garlic head
3 tsp baking powder
1 egg
A bit of oil for your tray (I used avocado spray oil)
12 slices of prosciutto

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Following the steps is quite easy and it takes you about 7-10 minutes:

Grate 200 gr of cheddar, cut the remaining cheddar into small slices, lightly beat the egg and mince the garlic.
In the flour bowl mix together the baking powder,milk,yoghurt and egg.
Incorporate the grated cheddar into the mix.
Put the butter in a pot and slowly heat it up. When the butter is all melted add the garlic and stir well for about 1 minute. Take the pot away from the stove.
Spray the muffin tray with a bit of oil.
Now you are going to make muffin sandwiches with quite a few layers: first, put the prosciutto in each muffin shape, add about one tablespoon of batter, add a teaspoon of the garlic infused oil, the cheddar slices and finally another tablespoon of batter.
Put in the over (pre-heated at 180 degrees) for about 20 minutes, until they are brown on top. Yes they are not the best looking muffins once you get them out of the oven.
That’s it! After they have cooled a bit, carefully take them out of the tray and serve them.

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The combo of aromas is just too amazing and we both ended up finishing the entire tray of muffins in one sitting, but, to be honest, since it is the weekend I do not want to ruin my mood by thinking of how the scale is going to tip at my next doctor’s appointment. I can tell you that the little bundle of joy (which is very energetic these days) enjoyed them very much and I hope you will too!

October 9, 2016

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It’s time for a bit of blue!

Just a bit of a blue moment happening here…no gender announcement yet, but I suspect that by the time we will have to make an announcement we both would have run out of pink and blue clothes. These shades seem to be our preferred ones recently, alongside the neutral grey that will probably turn into a more brownish hue for autumn. Unfortunately you can not see exactly how blue we were as we shot these photos right at sunset and let me tell you, the light is terrible especially if the desired effect is a more cold, icy one… None the less, these pics are part of my pregnancy album and I am very happy every time we manage to do a photoshoot especially since time is sparse lately.

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I’ve been wanting to wear this top/dress ever since I bought it from the Fashion corner at Untold festival – yeah, it’s been that long and it just stayed in my closed with the tags on, I guess that’s how I got to find clothes that I bought years ago still with their tags on when I rearranged my dressing room. Obviously this lovely piece is made by the very talented Romanian designer Iulia Sasu and it is just perfect for me during this period where I mostly feel comfortable with the way I look if I wear loose clothes that cover up as much as possible – I am sure it is just a phase. I love everything about this top: the length, the shape and the materials, not to mention the lovely shades of blue!

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On me:

Top – Iulia Sasu; Shorts – Mango; Shoes – Paez; Bag – Michael Kors; Bling – Tomorrowland, Pandora and Swarovski; Watch – Longines

I decided to wear this top with a pair of denim short shorts from Mango, and, I must admit to myself and to all of you that I miss my slender, athletic thighs, I seriously can not wait to get back in the gym – again this is a phase as I have days when I simply love not having to go (actually being forbidden to go) and work out. There are days and days… I also wore my Untold acquired Paez denim shoes – did you think that only D bought Paez espadrilles? Seriously, it’s shoes we are talking about after all! To complete my blue look I wore my Michael Kors mini Hamilton navy bag.

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On D:

T-shirt – Replay; Shorts – Mango; Shoes – Paez; Bling – Fossil and Constantin Nautics (bracelet and necklace); Watch – Longines

D is always excited when we have a blue photoshoot as he loves the colour as much as I do. I am well aware you can not see it in the photos, but his shorts from Mango are light blue as opposed to the greyish shade that appears in the photos because of the very warm light. His t-shirt is from Replay and obviously you can’t currently find it online, but I did manage to link a pretty solid alternative. His espadrilles are also from Paez and I have to say that for the first time, he bought more pairs of shoes than I have. This is making history!

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We both wore our Longines watches simply because when you have a blue outfit you can not go wrong with the ever classic Hydroconquest. D wore both a Constantin Nautics and Fossil bracelet, while I opted for my Tomorrowland and Pandora rings, but at the last minute decided to throw in a big blue ring from Swarovski in the mix. D also wore a Constantin Nautics necklace just to accentuate even more the blue theme.

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Despite the photos turning out too orange for my taste, I am very glad we got to do a new blue photoshoot to document the way I am expanding with each passing day. Even though we are posting every other day, please know that we do our best under the circumstances and as soon as our house is back on track we will start doing it more often.

September 9, 2016

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Popping out…

19 weeks, going into the 20th and my belly just popped out. I mean not really all of a sudden popped out, but it is starting to look more like a pregnant belly rather than a fat belly. No, the baby did not kick yet – everybody keeps asking me that, but my energy levels are higher than ever. Because of the lovely round belly that I am sporting there days, I worked-up the courage to wear something skin tight yesterday and I felt great. I have to admit that the fact that D keeps telling me how lovely my new curves (fat) are, does help a lot, so there you have it, all you future dads, that’s the best free advice ever.

Obviously two days ago we did not manage to find the dry time to take some photos but we did manage to do it yesterday and we made a few gifs as well. I confess that it started to rain a bit when we got to the park, but I really wanted to take these shots in this dress as I felt lovely in it. I really hope that we will have the time and energy to take as many photos of this period as it is said that this is the best time of the pregnancy. With this being the best time of the pregnancy, all we do is take advantage of the high mobility and energy levels to look for baby stuff.

On me:

Dress – Bershka; Shoes – Converse; Bag – Michael Kors; Bling – Tomorrowland and Pandora; Watch – Tissot

Back to yesterday’s outfits… I wore this lovely skin tight dress from Bershka and I am honestly considering buying a few similar models for autumn/winter as well as I have a feeling that this is going to be my uniform until the last trimester. It just feels very, very comfortable and I love that fact that there is nothing pressing my belly. I do not even want to think about pants during this period, and as I said, I want to postpone the maternity clothes as much as possible, or at least until I really have to go a size up. I feel that all the clothes that I bought this summer will still be perfect for me for many years to come after the pregnancy as they are my normal size and have the cut that I love most. I paired the dress with my ZARA vest and, as a matter of fact, the vest was the one that gave me the confidence to leave the house in this skin tight outfit. I have a feeling that the next few months are going to be all about layering for me.

On D:

T-shirt – H&M; Shorts – Mango; Shoes – Converse x John Varvatos; Bling – Fossil; Watch – Casio Red Bull Edifice

As you’ve noticed, the colour of choice was grey because a)we haven’t done a grey photoshoot in a while and b)I already had the grey dress from last year (yes, it does look better on a flat tummy, but I was surprised I could still get into it). We both chose to wear Converse shoes, even though they were different – I wore the new grey knit with a very comfortable sole, while D wore his very trendy Converse x John Varvatos sneaks. I also accessorised the outfit with my white bag from Michael Kors and the fact that it’s still the same white bag is a clear indication that I haven’t found a better one.

D wore his Mango man light blue shorts, because, surprisingly he doesn’t have a grey or black pair – we need to address that issue right away – and paired it with a print grey t-shirt form H&M that he bought last year. Accessories-wise we both kept it to a minimum, he only wore his Fossil bracelet, while I proudly wore my watch-ring that I got from the diamond museum in Amsterdam 4 or 5 years ago, naturally alongside my Tomorrowland and Pandora rings. We decided to not match out watches so I went for my white Tissot T-Race while D wore his Casio Edifice Red Bull Racing Edition. That is about it for the outfits.

I really do hope we will have time today to have another good photoshoot and to be honest I hope the weather will cooperate as it has been rather hectic these days, going from 20 degrees to 30 degrees in a matter of hours.

August 31, 2016

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Right before the storm!

I mean right before the storm! The storm last night…literally, the last photo we took coincided with the first drop of rain, that was not actually a drop but rather a puddle of water on our heads. Hence the lack of gifs in this post. Maybe we’ll get luckier today, as I plan to get back on track with the photos mainly because it has dawned on me that I need as many photos of this period because quite honestly, this is the best time I’ve had so far in my life. I mean, despite the adding kilos and the occasional discomforts (more on that in a later post), this has got to be the best I have ever felt about myself and the happiest I have ever been in my life mainly because I have the greatest human being beside me that makes me feel like the most beautiful woman in the world.

On top of all that sentimentalism, right now we are in full remodelling mode, not completely remodelling our apartment, rather on the redecorating side, but none-the-less, this is something that I love. I loved it when we did our seaside apartment (maybe we’ll do a post on that) and right now it feels even better as we are preparing for the little human being that will be joining us for a big chunk of our lives. That’s not to say that: a) the house is going to be either pink or blue, or b) every corner will be baby-proofed. Not by far, most of the redecorating will be about us trying to give our apartment a new feel, one that marks the next episode of our lives, by only tweaking a few things here and there.

On me:

Dress – Mango; Shoes – DOGO; Clutch – DOGO; Bling – Pandora and Tomorrowland; Watch – Daniel Wellington

Back to yesterday’s photoshoot. I just love the way pics look with a very cloudy sky and I really did not want to miss yesterday’s pre-storm clouds. Do not get me wrong, I just hate cloudy days, those grey cloudy autumn days are just the worst, but the clouds right before a summer storm are amazing. We decided to test our luck and we managed to do a full shoot before the storm started. We even had some strong wind which made it a bit difficult, but the result is lovely. Besides all the turquoise accents, or rather, theme, I really want to point your attention to my DOGO fun shoes and clutch. Did I mention that we are redecorating? Actually we started and managed to finish the dressing room… I know, priorities… But in the process I rediscovered a lot of long-lost but very loved items, true, many of them got binned, but not these two pieces from DOGO that I got a few years ago, but then totally forgot about them. You can find lots of similar fun items online. The dress is from Mango, this is not from the bundle of long-lost items, I got it this year for 7 E and naturally, you can not find the exact colour online anymore but I’ve linked an alternative. I barely worn any accessories because we were in a big hurry to manage to snap some photos before all hell broke loose, so I only wore my Tomorrowland and Pandora rings.

On D:

Shorts – H&M; T-shirt – Mango; Shoes – Paez; Bling – Fossil; Watch – Daniel Wellington

D was nice as always and followed my lead when it came to choosing the colour theme. He decided on his shorts from H&M (did you miss them????) and paired them with his beige t-shirt from Mango. He was most excited about yesterday’s outfit because he got to wear his second pair of Paez shoes and apparently the shoe-craze is starting to rub off on him as well, so our kid has to be a shoe lover. For sure!!!! Because we were in a hurry, he ended up wearing his Fossil bracelet and in some of the photos he ended up accessorising with my clutch as well. We both decided to wear our Daniel Wellington watches, but unfortunately, we totally forgot about changing the nato straps to match our outfits.

I seriously do hope that we will be able to have a full photoshoot today as well, but looking out the window, that might not be possible as the sky is steel grey since this morning and a few afternoon showers are announced. We’ll see… And you will see tomorrow if we managed to snap some shots or not!

August 29, 2016

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The first three months in pictures…

As promised, we have put together a post with some photos we took from our first trimester of pregnancy. Also, the beautiful personalised mason jar in the featured photo is from a gift from our lovely friends at Atelier Funky Fresh. Check them out! They can do basically anything you like in terms of decorative personalised pieces!

First Month

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Second Month

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Third Month

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L. & D.

August 25, 2016

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The first three months…

As you’ve probably noticed our posts tend to be in sets of threes lately and that is purely coincidental with the fact that soon there will be three of us posting here. No, in fact it has nothing to do with that and everything to do with the fact that we have been gone a lot lately, our house is a mess as we are doing a bit of redecorating/ baby-proofing and my constant tiredness. Taking each of these into consideration you’ll have to excuse my lack of daily posts and I promise that as soon as I can I will be back on track.

Back on the topic of today’s post subject: the first trimester of pregnancy. This is solely my experience and so far I have come to the conclusion that everyone experiments this time totally different, but here it goes… For the first five weeks we were’t even been aware of the miracle that started to form inside me, no sickness, not much actually, except for a feeling of constant lack of energy which, beside a few painful episodes and my period being late, have convinced us that it was time for a medical check -up. You’ve read all about the very emotional news we got at the doctors’ in this post here, so I will just skip the first five weeks altogether as I feel that most women do not really acknowledge the pregnancy until later on.

For me, the first three months have been bliss, especially if I compare my experience with some other women’s first trimester. I did not get any sickness at all, morning or otherwise so that helped me function a bit better throughout the whole period. I did however experience episodes of extreme sleepiness to the point that I wasn’t able to drive anywhere. As a matter of fact, this has only changed well into my forth month, but it did get better in time. Nor did I experience any weird cravings, but I did feel the need to eat a bit more (bout 300-400 kcals extra), but luckily, I mostly craved vegetables and fruits. I’ve noticed that meat, in any form makes me sick, and I do not mean sick as in throw up, but sick as in it did not feel right for my digestive system (but I suffer from this for a few years now – so no surprise there). Therefore, if you ask me, my weight gain has been constant and I have gained 1 kg per month and it still goes at that rate right now.

I was very aware of the fact that the first trimester is full of risks so I did try and not overdo it, but despite that, sometime in my 9th week I experienced a bit of bleeding and this is where I think that all future moms should be very careful! When I looked it up online, dr. Google kept telling me that it was normal, but when I called my doctor he immediately gave me hormones and it’s good that he did as a week later, at the ultrasound we discovered a small hematoma near the baby that healed nicely thanks to the hormones, but if not treated properly, it could’ve cause us to loose the pregnancy! So there you have it: my relationship with dr. Google is finished forever! All future moms should stay clear of looking for medical stuff online! I took the nasty hormones for almost two weeks and I have to say that that was the period when I actually felt the worst, not physically, but emotionally. Those hormones made me feel horrible, either having a rage attack (luckily most of the times I was by myself) or being emotional af (which really sucked BIG!). Once I was done with them, my old self started to resurface and I was yet again being the happiest person alive!

Another annoying first trimester symptom was the constant bloating and feeling full. This is super uncomfortable because you feel and look like you are in your fifth month when in fact you barely past your second, and you have this constant feeling that it is because of all the food you are eating, when, in fact, there is not much extra food you are actually eating during this time. Also, because of the horrible bloat, not many clothes fit or look right and that tends to be a big blow to the morale of a pregnant woman that already is hormonal and emotional most of the time. I was very lucky because of my entire work arrangement. I have no idea if I’ve told you by now, but I work with and for my parents which left room to a big advantage right when I needed it most: I got to stay at home from the second month because of the fact that I was longer able to drive to work thanks to the constant sleepiness. This was a great gift especially during the bloated days, and no, I did not get bored at home, I loved every minute of sleeping during the day! Hey, I’m an only child, I never get bored of myself!

Despite me feeling amazing on the inside, my exterior looks had take an beating! I mean, maybe there is such a thing as a pregnancy glow, but all I got were greasy patches on my face, quite a few pimples that made me change my beauty routine and my thighs have become the paradise of cellulite. These are all symptoms of the hormonal changes happening in my body and can be reversed for the most part once I am ok after giving birth. I call all these changes the living proof that something amazing is happening inside my belly and I try as much as I can to either ignore them (I have become rather good at it) or embrace them. My beauty routine has switched from SEPHORA to the Pharmacy (more details in a Pregnancy Beauty post) and as for my cellulite, I try as good as I can to hide it either with clothes, a big SMILE (it takes everyone’s attention off it) or with the perfect non-toxic self tan from Vita Liberata (review here). To be honest, the best recipe is the self tanner!

The thing that most definitely contributed to my cellulite reserves, besides the hormones, is the fact that my doctor forbade me to go to the gym for the entire period of the pregnancy. He did allow me to go swimming, but since I am afraid of the water, all I am really doing, exercise wise, is to take a few long walks per week and right now to go through all my clothes and shoes in order to re-arrange the dressing room – the first steps to overhauling our house. This was a blow at the beginning, but since it is for my own good, I embraced it and I will use this as motivation for my post-baby body. All in all, I do understand where my doctor is coming from and I will never take any chances where my pregnancy is concerned. Aside from that, there is nothing that he forbade me to do, so I guess I am very lucky so far.

I did have a lot of medical investigations to make in the first trimester, most of them were blood investigations, and I did manage to pass them nicely. The first morphologic ultrasound was very good, and as a matter of fact the baby is a few days ahead than what we thought, possibly due to the fact that I have been relaxing and taking good care of my diet. We did travel a lot during the first trimester (Madrid – even though we were not aware at the time, Milan, Paris, Cluj, to the seaside a couple of times), and no, there were no problems because of that, as a matter of fact it feels nice to know that our bundle of joy was with us everywhere and that there were no incidents during or after the time. In fact, I think that the baby actually enjoyed all these short trips!

All in all, I can honestly say that this is the best period of my life! Do not get me wrong, 90% of the blame is on D as he has been the most amazing and perfect father-to-be! I seriously couldn’t have asked for a better husband and partner during this time. I am convinced that the fact that I have been feeling so great during this time is thanks to him and all his efforts! He understands me like no other, he doesn’t let me do anything in the house, all he lets me lift is a small bottle of water, he is there no matter what I need. This is really important during this period as thanks to him my spirits have been sky high!

We decided not to have one of those growing belly photoshoots that tracks how huge I am getting every month, but we do try and take as many pictures of ourselves throughout this period as I think that both of us will suffer some physical changes for the better. I will soon post a slideshow of photos from the first trimester to let you see how we have evolved during the time.