Saturday, December 21, 2013

Husband Bonus Points

Last month, for our fifth anniversary, my husband did a wonderful thing and bought me the dining room table that I have been coveting for years. Years, and years and years. That post is here.

This past weekend, he gave me my Christmas present a little early because, well, who actually knows if we'll be at the house for Christmas, and it was a 'why wait' sort of gift.

So, on Saturday he comes home with four of the beautiful, red leather chairs that I have wanted to go with the beautiful table and have been drooling over for years. Years, and years and years.

On Tuesday, two large boxes showed up at the house, also from Crate and Barrel. He had no idea.

Inside, were two more beautiful, red leather chairs.

Our parents had gone in together to get the last two chairs we needed to complete the set.

Now I have this in my dining room.

I could not be more excited about my table and chairs. I love them. Love, love, love them. They're perfect. Exactly what I wanted.


Thursday, December 19, 2013

I would give you the moon

This morning on our way in to Mama T's, Baby A saw the moon in the sky.

She is fascinated by the moon and frequently asks where it is. During the day I tell her it's gone to bed. The moon sleeps all day while the sun is out, and the sun sleeps all night while the moon is out.

This morning while watching it on our drive, she asked me to bring down the moon.

It was a moment that just warmed my heart and made me smile.

If I could, I would give you the moon.


Monday, December 16, 2013

12 Days of Chr...I mean...Pregnancy

12 trips to the bathroom

11 Oreo's eaten

10 kicks an hour

9 bottles washed

8 packs of diapers

7 footsie sleepers

6 pack of formula (just in case)

5 hours of sleep (not consecutive)

4 pacifiers

3 swaddle blankets (found them!)

2 bouncy chairs

and a completely ready mama!!!

Well, ready as in, everything is clean, washed, in place, organized and just waiting for a baby. That doesn't mean this little one needs to arrive today though.

My sister flies in from Germany this coming Sunday and she didn't get to see me pregnant at all the last time. She'd really, really love to be able to be at the hospital. We planned her visit for several weeks after Baby A's due date just in case. We didn't want her to fly in from Germany ahead of time to see me pregnant and then also have me be two weeks overdue.  This time around, she booked her flight for Christmas and, as it happened, my due date fell in just after her arrival. The trick now will be to stay pregnant until at least Monday morning.

I have a check up tomorrow so we'll see if anything has progressed. At last week's appointment I was 1 cm dilated but not started to efface. Tomorrow is also the full moon, so if old wives tales can be believed, we'll see what happens. In all honesty, I'd be ok with it. I don't have much to do at work and am basically here so that I'll sit more. If I'm home, I'm running around the house getting things done. Normal things, laundry, dusting, vacuuming, etc. I rarely sit. If I'm at work, I'm at my desk. I actually rest better here.

I haven't been sleeping well, mostly just discomfort. Having to wake up to roll over every time. I've had to start eating a late evening snack so I don't wake up at 2 am hungry. That's happened pretty regularly the last week or so. I've been super hungry and trying to pace myself but it's so much harder these days. The worst part is the battery on my bathroom scale died about four weeks ago so I haven't really been able to keep up with my weight gain except at my appointments, and I never believe the scales at the doctors office. At least in relation to actual weight gained. Yes, ok their scale is probably more accurate, but if my scale has given me my starting point, and I weight myself at the same time each day in the same clothes, that to me is more believable than the office scale which records my breakfast and liter of water drunk as well as my 'in public' clothes.

All that aside. I am trying to really enjoy my time with Baby A since I know things are going to change. I know that some day she will love and treasure her little sister just like I do and I hope and pray that she will have the kind of relationship that I have with my sister. But for now, I know it's going to be hard on her. It will be hard on all of us to make these adjustments, but it will all work out.

Thursday, December 12, 2013

Morning Miracles

There are a lot of mornings where, by the time Baby A and I sit down in the car to head to Mama T's, I can't for the life of me remember the sequence of events that lead up to actually pulling out of the garage.

There are mornings where I would swear we were on time. I could have sworn that I was out of the shower early, hair done, and had Baby A up, fed, dressed and ready to go with time to spare, but then we sit down in the car, and when the clock comes on it's 7:32.

I aim to be out the door between 7:20 and 7:25. That is on time, anywhere in those 5 minutes is on time. Anything before 7:20 is early and anything after 7:25 is late.

Yesterday morning, Baby A woke up happy, ate her breakfast just fine, brushed her teeth, everything should have been smooth, but, turned the car on, 7:28. Late.

This morning was a mess. I ran out of energy last night to give Baby A a bath, and she needed one, desperately. My husband had a work thing last night so he wasn't there to help so I just decided to give her a fast one in the morning. Now I knew I was asking for trouble going that route. Baby A loves to take baths. LOVES them. She loves the water, loves to play, loves to be in there and I knew that trying to get her in and out quickly without the playtime normally involved was going to create a scene. My goal was just to power through but the whole morning turned into one big tantrum. I finally got her out of the tub, hair dried, only half dressed and downstairs for breakfast and I already felt like I needed a nap.

Once I got her some breakfast and got some pants on her, things settled down and I was able to get myself dressed and ready to go. At that point I looked at the clock. Baby A was just about done with breakfast, I was ready to go, she just had to put on her jacket, and it was 7:15.

We were in the car and pulling out of the garage at 7:24.

On time.

How the hell does this work?

I have calm, happy, smooth mornings and am 10-15 minutes late getting out.

I have manic, screaming, snot filled mornings, and am out on time or early.

There is something very unfair about that whole set up.


Wednesday, December 11, 2013

16 Days - I want a donut.

Good lord, that's just scary to type!

16 Days.

And that's assuming I make it until the 27th, which no one is betting on.

I have a short list of things to do for Christmas. I haven't finished wrapping yet and need to get stocking stuffers for Baby A.

I have a short list of things that need to happen in preparation for the new baby, but they're all pretty minor. Things that should they not happen before the baby comes, won't be a huge deal, but things that I would like to get done ahead of time if I can.

I have friends calling wanting to schedule visits and play dates before we have the new baby.

I have family calling wanting to schedule visits for after we have the new baby.

I have a few things left to finish up at work, but not many.

I am also losing my sweet tooth battle. I have been so good all the way through. I just keep telling myself I only have two weeks left. Two weeks and then this horrendous hormonal based craving will go away. I just have to make it though.

But I want a donut. I want a Dunkin Donut. A chocolate cake, glazed donut. Only, I don't want one. I want about six. And if I get one, and only one, I'll just be mad.

Add to that the crazy amount of desserts that were around for Thanksgiving. And that my SIL visited this past weekend and made caramel popcorn. And left it all with us!!

Yikes!

27 lbs gained. Really, I'm doing so well that I can just let go the last two weeks right? I mean, I may go into labor tomorrow, so I should go ahead and eat the donuts, right?

:(

Monday, December 9, 2013

Santa 2013

When Baby A was just over three months old, we took her to see Santa for the first time. It's at a local tree farm that he and I have been going to for years and they have a great Santa. We really thought that at 3 months old we could get at least one year in of a nice photo with Santa before it became a big deal.

She screamed!

Of course I don't have those photos on my computer here but it was pretty impressive.

Last year she was just over a year, about 15 months or so.


Yeah, totally let him have it, wouldn't even get near him.

This year we spent a little while watching the other kids visit with Santa first and have their picture taken and then get a candy cane. Well, Baby A really wanted a candy cane. Really REALLY wanted a candy cane. We told her that if she cried at him, Santa might not give her one.

She tried so hard. Very, very hard and my husband pretty much captured the whole thing scene by scene from grudging acceptance to tears.

 






As far as I'm concerned that is the most hysterical set of photos ever. 



Thursday, December 5, 2013

22 Days left

Thankfully my husband and I spent a good portion of our Thanksgiving weekend getting things ready for the new arrival. So now, should I wake some random morning at 4 am with contractions, we at least have a clean and ready to install car seat and a cradle set up and ready to go for when we bring her home.

That at least has me feeling a little better about the whole thing.

In general our friends and family do not expect me to make it until the 27th. The full moon is the 17th although I have a few people making bets as early as this coming weekend.

Most of me wants to let this little one cook as long as possible and this coming weekend is definitely too early. Add to that, my sister flies in from Germany on Dec 22nd and is really excited about being able to go to the hospital with us for the birth. But, a part of me is just about ready. Not quite ready, but mostly. I think if something happened next week, say Thursday or so, that would be ok. I've started handing things off at work and my days at my desk are getting quieter.

There are a few things left to be done. All of Baby A's clothes from when she was first born are still in bins. They're all clean and sorted, but nothing is hung up in the closet or put away in drawers. There are still a few boxes of odd items on the floor in her room. I have finished the bumpers and bed skirt for the crib, but have to make and put the ties on the bumper so that they can be attached to the crib. They look so good too. I'm super excited about them. Which is dumb, because they're bumpers, for a baby crib, that will then be donated once she's too old for them. But still, I made them and they're pretty.

I have a few small Christmas things left to do. I need to get the group present for Mama T, like literally just go pick it up. I need to do Baby A's stocking and I need to wrap my husbands presents which are currently hidden at work in my office, because if they are anywhere in the house, he will find them. Every. Single. Time. Seriously.

The house is decorated, although minimally, I didn't want to have massive amounts of un-decorating to do with a newborn in tow. We are getting a tree this weekend and my sister in law is coming down for a visit to hang out with Baby A and to help me finish up the things that need to happen before #2 comes along. I'm happy to have her here. It's nice to have someone around to help entertain Baby A these days. It's so much harder for me to do much of anything. I can get down on the floor to play and color with her, but getting back up is tricky, and kind of painful. With SIL here, we'll be able to get the closet organized, do a little shopping and have a babysitter on hand for my husbands company Christmas party Saturday night. I'm having a hard time looking forward to that outing. I am 37 weeks pregnant and pretty much tired all the time. It sounds like a cocktail party type of setting, not a sit down dinner, which makes me a little nervous that I won't have a chair. Which starts off sounding a little stupid, but if you saw me right now, you'd be telling me to sit also.

I have started to gain a little more weight, which was kind of expected as I have had to stop walking due to the varicose veins. I did reach a point during my pregnancy with Baby A where I had to stop also because it was making me dizzy. This time around I actually made it further along before having to stop, but I really think being able to walk, even just one short walk a day, makes such a big difference. So, I think I'm at 26 lbs gained, which is still not bad. I gained 45 with Baby A so overall I'm very happy and I'm hoping not to put too much more on over the next few weeks.

Wednesday, December 4, 2013

I knew this day was coming...

I said ‘shit’ this morning while driving to Mama T's. And don’t you know, from the backseat comes a little voice saying ‘shit’ right back to me. *sigh* I tried to change it to shoot and kept saying, ‘mama said shoot, can you say shoot?’ and she kept saying ‘no, shit!’ She knew I hadn't said shoot. So then I just yelled, ‘look, a yellow bus!’

L


I really wanted to be able to blame my husband for it when it happened. 

Monday, December 2, 2013

Fun 'Firsts' with Baby A

I am very, very thankful that we chose to stay home for the Thanksgiving Holiday this year.

Yes, it would have been nice to see family and have a massive dinner and lots of desserts and do the whole big event. But, at the end of the day, it was really special to be home with my family. My core family. Me, my husband and Baby A. That's my family. It's great to have our parents and siblings involved, but what's really important and what we sometimes lose track of, is that we, the three (almost four) of us are our core family unit and we need to start creating our own memories.

So in that line of thought.

Baby A and I made blueberry muffins for breakfast Thanksgiving morning. She helped mix, she helped pour, she helped fill the tins and everything. She thought it was great and I had so much fun sharing that with her.

I spent each evening leading up to Thanksgiving putting one piece of the dinner together so that come Thursday, all I had to do was put everything in the oven. We were having a late afternoon meal and I bought a tiny turkey so nothing really had to be done before 1 in the afternoon.

I was able to spend the whole morning with Baby A watching the Macy's Day Parade. There were sections of it that I cried through to see her enjoying it so thoroughly. They had musical numbers from some Broadway shows that she just loved, like the Cinderella one. Completely mesmerized. She loved all the balloons and floats and of course when the Sesame Street float appeared she thought that was great. It was amazing to watch the parade through a 2 year old's eyes.

We put up Christmas decorations and her reaction to all that was great. We don't have a tree yet but will do that this weekend.

It was a wonderful and quiet long weekend at home that I think we enjoyed even more because we knew that our 'quiet' weekends are very quickly coming to an end and that life with a newborn is approaching. Even more than that, life with a newborn and a toddler. I don't expect that quiet will be part of our vocabulary until sometime next Spring, hopefully.

Last night when we put Baby A down for the night I told her that today she was going to go see Mama T. I wasn't sure if I expected drama after four days home, but she was thrilled. She immediately lit up and said 'And Max and Hunter??' who are her two little buddies. She even woke up this morning saying 'go see mama t, see Max and Hunter.' I love that she is so happy there and that she has her friends.

All in all, it was exactly what we needed as a family, for ourselves and for each other as we wind down toward the next stage in our adventure together.

Tuesday, November 26, 2013

Dehydration: A pregnant woman's worst enemy

So, yesterday morning at 4:15 I woke with what I was fairly sure were contractions. Like, real ones, not the braxton hicks variety.

Sent my husband and I into a panic.

We are SO not ready for this baby to come yet.

Rest assured, I am fine, the baby is fine and I am still pregnant. After a couple hours of erratic contractions, everything slowed down and once I was able to talk to the nurse she was very sure that it had been triggered by being dehydrated. So, the plan was to spend yesterday pushing fluids, and eating a high calorie diet to keep my blood sugar up, and then see how I felt today before we ran to the office for a check up. I drank almost four liters of water yesterday. And I didn't start really going to the bathroom until late afternoon. Apparently I didn't do a very good job of staying hydrated over the weekend and Monday morning it bit me in the pregnant butt.

However, it really made us look around and reevaluate where we are in the planning stage of bringing baby #2 home and what actually needs to be done.

For instance. I have no clean bottles. Well, amendment. I have no clean nipples. I have bottles, but come to find out, everything I had pulled out of the basement to be washed was the medium and fast flow, not the slow ones I'll need to start with.

Also, we have no where to put the baby down. Literally. All chairs, seats, bassinets, cribs and play mats are out of the basement, where they've been for anywhere from 12-18 months. But nothing is clean. There would be no where to put the baby.

The car seat hadn't made it out of the basement and we knew where one base was, but not both and the covers and infant inserts weren't clean.

Neither of us had bags packed for the hospital and we had no plan for Baby A should I go into labor during the day while she's at Mama T's.

Add to all the panic...my parents left Monday morning to drive to NH for Thanksgiving and we had no idea what some of our friends plans were for the holiday's and if anyone was going to be around if something happened.

Thankfully, everything is fine and I'm glad I didn't go running to the doctor's office. I am glad that I called, and that it was a minor issue, easily fixed.

So, moral of the story. Drink. Drink. And drink some more! And, be prepared. More prepared anyway. We're going to work on a lot of that this weekend. The list of things we thought we were doing over Thanksgiving has been adjusted slightly.


Monday, November 25, 2013

Sneak Cleaning my own house.

With the varicose veins issues going on I've managed to end up with a multitude of 'mothers' who scold me for all kinds of things. I am supposed to be staying off my feet as much as possible, and resting. Ok fine, but really, I still have a house to run and a toddler to chase. Those things don't go away.

So, on the phone with my mother last week I complained about my dirty floors and how badly I needed to wash them. I had decided I would do one thing a day and that Friday afternoon my one thing would be to wash the floors. Well, my mother went crazy and said I couldn't do that and my husband needed to be doing these things and that if I needed them washed so badly she'd come over on Friday and take care of that.

So, she came over on Friday and didn't wash my floors. She did several loads of laundry, emptied the dish washer, washed a load of bottles that I had brought up from the basement but hadn't touched yet. So, she did a lot, but she didn't wash my floors.

So, I did.

After she left, I washed the floors. To be fair, I have a super fabulous steam mop and can do the entire downstairs in under 15 minutes when I'm doing a very thorough job. This time around, I just did a 'hit the highlights' version and it took me 6 minutes.

I haven't told her. What she doesn't know won't hurt her.

I do feel more than a little goofy that I have to sneak clean my house.

Thursday, November 21, 2013

20 Things I love about two year old's.

1. Everything is new and amazing.

2. The leaves changing colors and falling has been a source of fascination that can't be experienced by anyone other than a two year old.

3. Counting school buses that go by is a great game.

4. The joy that every single bus is 'lellow!!'

5. The best part of the day is sitting in Daddy's lap to read the Cat in the Hat (again).

6. The use of  'cute' as a weapon.

7. The sheer joy of dancing with abandon.

8. Listening to them 'read' their favorite book.

9. Kisses cure boo boos.

10. Coloring outside the lines.

11. Geese are awesome.

12. Swings are awesome.

13. Running around in the grass is high entertainment for hours at a time.

14. Holiday decorations.

15. Holiday outfits.

16. The squeals of happiness to see Grandma.

17. Pink cowgirl boots.

18. Still young enough for an afternoon nap (i.e. mama's break time).

19. Spinning Circles & Somersaults (spelled that right on the first try, thank you very much!)

20. She's mine.


Tuesday, November 19, 2013

Stupid things you do because of your toddler.

Those things you say that you then have to follow through on no matter how stupid you realize they are...

That is how the letter Z ended up in time out, in my cabinets.


Monday, November 18, 2013

39 Days Left

Yes, I am counting down days now.

I am technically 34 weeks and three days along.

It's a tough day today. I had a mostly good weekend but yesterday morning I pushed it too far. I woke up feeling really good. Baby A was having a great morning and we dusted and cleaned, and did laundry and made cookies together.  The whole weekend was rainy and cold and it's hard to be stuck inside with a toddler for that long. Especially Baby A who LOVES to be outside. She is an outdoor kinda girl, which is great, unless it's 50 degrees and raining.

But apparently I just pushed a little too hard and by 11:30 I hit a wall. Hard.

I still haven't managed to get the prescription brand support hose for the varicose veins but have three pairs of OTC ones. They're ok. They help, probably not as much as the prescription ones would but it's just not convenient for me to get over to the only place I found that sells them and get them ordered. This is some seriously not fun stuff though. I really don't think I have the words for the level of discomfort that I'm in due to them. My entire left leg looks like it's been in a car wreck. The veins are so stressed, all of them, that they're all blue and purple and raised, from the very top of my thigh all down to my ankle.

We had an appointment for Big M in the afternoon and I did need to go to that with my husband but once we got home, I sat. Pretty much the rest of the day and I'm still really not feeling well today.

I have a checkup tomorrow and will mention it but I don't know how much they can do for me, other than bug me to go get the prescription hose. Honestly I'm afraid to show them my leg. I'm afraid they'll either freak out about it, or tell me it's not that bad. I don't know which would be worse. At least if they freak out it will justify how badly I feel. If they say 'yeah, that's what it looks like', that means this is normal and could potentially be worse, which is by itself scary.

Apparently my parents and in laws are taking bets on how early I go into labor. No one thinks I'll make it to the 27th.  My FIL mentioned Dec 10th, which is just not funny. While I'm definitely tired of being pregnant, I'm not ready for the alternative quite yet. I did a lot of baby organizing yesterday and have done a lot of work on the new bedding, but I maintain that this little girl needs to wait until at least Dec 23rd. I may be working from home those last few weeks and doing what I can on 15 minutes of allowed walking during the day, but this baby will cook as long as possible.

Scream free - Second Review

I don't think I'm going to make it through this one. The basis seems to be centered around controlling your responses to situations. Which is great. Necessary. True. One of the lines that stuck with me from the Love & Respect book was 'you are responsible for your own response'. I 100% agree, I just really think it was approached better in the first book and I'm very concerned that the entire 8 hours of Scream Free is going to be hashing and rehashing this one and only topic. I'm an hour in and he's just really getting started on it and there's been no breakdown of what's to come. With a physical, hard copy book, you can check out the table of contents and know what the general layout is. Not so much with an audio book, you just have to listen. 

Friday, November 15, 2013

Christmas Shopping - Stage 2

Last month I started my Christmas shopping and in the post mentioned that I wanted to be done by the end of October.

I have to say I am quite proud of myself.

I'm not 100% done, but I'm really, really close. My husband has even jumped on board the early shopping train and he's got his dad done already.

I don't think he's started shopping for me yet, and we have his siblings to do too, but we pick names at Thanksgiving, so we really haven't been able to work on that one yet anyway. Plus those are both on his plate, not mine.

Other than that, there's my dad.

And that's it.

IT.

Really.

Baby A and two of her little friends, my niece, both of our mothers, my sister, my husband, the dogs, the daycare kids presents and Mama T's present.

Done.

In addition, I've done three baby presents since that last post. One still needs to go in the mail, but the other two are out and done. Sadly, the one that still needs to be mailed is the only one where the baby is actually here already and I didn't think to do anything a couple months ago.

I have to admit I'm stumped about what to do for my dad, but I know between me, mom and my sister we'll come up with something.

But yeah, I'm pretty proud of myself in general.

I'm hoping this weekend to start wrapping some of it so that's out of the way too.

Thursday, November 14, 2013

Thanksgiving Stress

I posted already about not really wanting to travel for Thanksgiving this year. At that point I will be 36 weeks pregnant and I didn't then, and still don't think it's going to be all that comfortable and it's a 4 or 5 hour drive to my in laws.

Since that post my husband and I have had a couple conversations but haven't made any final decisions. At the last one I said that I didn't want to be stressed about Thanksgiving. I can't be. I can't do it.

Argghh. Apparently that's a WHOLE lot easier said than done.

Here are my stresses:

1- My poor father in law got the shaft this year and has to work Thanksgiving evening and I think the day after. (Not at K-mart!) So, my in laws can't travel this year, they're staying in Nashville.

In of itself that's not a huge deal.

2- My sister in law with her boyfriend have already talked about going to Nashville and spending Christmas with the boyfriend's family.

Again, not a huge deal.

3 - This year is also the year for my brother in law with his family to spend Thanksgiving with the parents. Last year they hosted at their house for his wife's family.

This starts to be come a deal.

When we get together with my husbands family, we typically go to their 'cabin' in North Tennessee. They have a small house on the side of a mountain and built a second one on the property also. The houses are not on top of each other, far enough away that they feel separate, but you can yell back and forth between them. At the 'cabin' we have four bedrooms, four and a half baths, two kitchens, two separate living rooms with two separate tv's and screened in porches. If we need to escape from each other, there are places to go. We can all cook easily and have lots of space between the two kitchens to not be completely on top of each other.

In Nashville, there are three bedrooms, the master and two very small guest rooms. Very small meaning, no pack n play will fit in there, no room for kids. It's a room with a bed and that's it. There is one small kitchen, and two bathrooms, one master, decently sized, and one very small guest.

Should all of us descend on my in laws. That means there are eight adults and two children. And, should our dogs go to, which they normally do, three dogs and two cats.

And nowhere to hide. And nowhere to sleep actually.

There is going to have to be a hotel situation, but who gets that short stick? Us with the dogs makes is really hard. Big M has never been in a hotel and I know he would not settle down in that type of environment. My Old Lady has been in hotels before and she usually stands at the door growling at the noises in the hallway.

To be honest, just my crew will fill the house. We're the truckload that puts the whole circus over the top. Without us, there would theoretically be enough room for my husbands brother and sister with their respective 'others'. There would only be one dog, the one who lives there, and my niece can be set up in the den.

So, there's that.

And, then, adding to my pot of stress.

My parents are not staying in GA for Thanksgiving. They're driving to New Hampshire to spend the holiday with my grandmother and a couple of my aunts.

So now if we stay in GA, we're having Thanksgiving with just the three of us. And if we go to TN, we're the catalyst for making it an overcrowded, over stressed house.

Part of me would like to put the responsibility on my husband for this because I am very worried that if we stayed home, and didn't see any family on Thanksgiving, that he would be sad and disappointed. But really, that's how I'm afraid I'll feel. I know how hormonal and emotional I am these days. I'm afraid I'm going to be upset about it. But then I flip it around and actually consider going to TN and that just stresses me out again.

I don't know what we're going to do. I just have to believe that it will work out and it will be fine.


Scream Free - Initial Response

We're not starting off on a good foot with this one.

First off, I am a very firm believer that no one should ever read their own writing to others. You think you're a lot funnier than the rest of us do and you think what you've written is clearly brilliant. The rest of us may not agree. But in either case, whether or not we appreciate the writing can very quickly be overshadowed by how poorly it is read.

The Love and Respect author did read his own book too, and there were definitely sections where he clearly thought he was hysterical, but overall it wasn't too bad and he did a decent job.

Then there are those people who may be good writers, but not necessarily good readers. You can't read an audio book the same way that you would give a live presentation and you can't read it like you're reading a teleprompter with hiccups. That would be this guy.

Secondly, I am also a very firm believer that if you want to write a self help book, you should not start off by telling your readers that everything they read previously is wrong and is probably part of whatever problem they're having. That is one of the highest form of arrogance I can think of and once my brain has put you in the "you're kinda full of yourself, huh" category, you're there for the duration and it flavors everything else you say.

Thirdly, never, ever, ever, ever put The Forty Year Old Virgin in the category of Romantic Comedy (he actually says RomCom, repeatedly, it hurt every time) and most assuredly, more than anything else that may ever come out of your mouth for the rest of your life, don't ever, ever, put that movie as categorically relevant to When Harry Met Sally and Sleepless in Seattle in terms of movie's people watch to feel good about the character's relationships and happy endings.

I about went off the road when he put those three movies together.

I am only 20 minutes into this and am not sure how far I'm going to make it. I'll give him some more time to get past his painful intro and will keep my fingers crossed that the actual book information will be better. This however, is an 8 hour recording. Love and Respect was 3 hours. Which is about right. I don't know what this guy has to say that is going to take 8 hours to get through.

We will see.

Or not.

Wednesday, November 13, 2013

Sew Important!

I've posted a couple times about my desire to learn how to sew. Of course the last three months or so has been the latest season of Project Runway and now it's All Stars which I really love because it's fun to see the bigger personalities come back and have at each other for 10 weeks. That show always makes me want to be more creative.

Well, I was floating around online and found a super cute Fall/Thanksgiving themed holiday skirt. They were only in Little Girl sizes though, not toddler but it was a fairly basic skirt. I decided I could do that. My mother had made Baby A her Halloween outfit, which was a cowgirl skirt and vest. The shape of that skirt was basically the same as what I saw online, just without the fringe.

So, I went and bought the fabric and called my mom for the pattern.

She came over last Friday and during Baby A's nap, we made this:

(yes, that is my awesome new table too)

I am so stupidly proud of that skirt, and Baby A hates skirts and dresses. :-(

My little tom boy, but she's going to wear it anyway. Probably with sneakers, but I'm ok with that.

So, inspired, I decided that I wanted new bedding for the nursery. There's nothing wrong with the bumpers and bedding that we had in there from when Baby A was first born, but those are her colors. I want this little girl to have her own.

We're not repainting the room, so that gives me some limits. But, I went back to the fabric store and got some super cute patterns and I am going to recover the bumpers and put a new ruffle on the bedskirt. I spent $30 in fabric. If you look at just crib bumpers, or crib sets in general, they start around $60 or higher. So, I figure I'm already ahead.

I spent about an hour on Sunday afternoon working on it and have made some progress.

Lesson #1 that I learned is: Chevron patterns are incredibly hard to work with. 

It's going to be really cute, but the majority of the time I spent on Sunday was attempting to get my pieces square with the pattern. The actual sewing part was probably 15 minutes. I only put together the front of one bumper, but the pieces are cut for the other long bumper so that one should go together quickly.


Again, my beautiful table, and yes, the antique sewing machine.

The chevron pattern is going to make up the majority of the bedskirt and I am a little disappointed in how much actual pattern shows on the bumper, but I thought doing the side panels in it also would be overkill so I just used it to accent.

I need to find the old bedskirt so I can get the measurements and take a close look at how it's put together. I hope to finish the bumpers this weekend and then next weekend start on the skirt.

All in all, I'm pretty excited about it!

Tuesday, November 12, 2013

A Scream Free Marriage

We don't actually do a lot of screaming, which is good...and bad. We don't fight much, or well, or ever really accomplish anything in terms of some of our most major disagreements. This bothers me. I feel like somethings are never resolved and just left to fester. I know my husband feels that if it's not being talked about, it must not be that big a deal.

Great communication, huh?

Every so often I like to read (listen to) a marriage and relationship book just to have some reminders on how effective relationships work and how to move yours towards that goal.

Last time, I listened to Love and Respect, which I enjoyed and would highly recommend. This time around I am listening to one called A Scream Free Marriage.

The reviews are decent. A few people saying that there was nothing shocking or mind blowing about it, but I do still find that hearing someone else say 'play nice, don't throw sand in the sandbox' is sometimes necessary to reinforce things you already know.

My own reviews will be forthcoming.


Monday, November 11, 2013

More than you wanted to know about Varicose Veins.

I really feel like I"m complaining my way through this pregnancy. And I feel really guilty about that. I should be happy and thankful for a healthy pregnancy and that I was able to have this second child relatively easily.

However.

I am so over this shit.

Varicose veins. I always thought about that term like you do hemorrhoids or gestational diabetes. One of those nasty pregnancy/labor issues that you just cross your fingers you never have to deal with. Only this one I got. Big time. Not just, aww, crap, varicose veins. I got the HOLY MOTHER EFFER version of them.

It feels like my leg is on fire.

Now, if you look up ways to relieve the pain and discomfort associated with varicose veins you get the following:

Anti-inflammatory like Ibuprofen: Nope, not on the prego approved list.

Lose Weight: yeah right.

Exercise Regularly: Umm, hello, 33 weeks pregnant, almost 34. I HAVE been exercising regularly. Throughout this whole thing I have walked the dogs every morning. Not a far distance, and for the past month or so I've cut the distance down and it's gotten slower. Today I walked the dogs and wanted to cry, it hurt, so bad. I've spent the whole day limping. So, yeah, that whole "exercise regularly" thing can bite my pregnant butt.

At my last checkup I got a prescription for support hose. Maternity support hose and was told that regular pharmacies couldn't order them and I had to go to a specialty shop. She gave the name of a few and I haven't done anything about it until today. Just for the sake of argument I went to the CVS down the street. Nope.

Ok, fine. Specialty item.

So I called two locations that were supposed to have them. One didn't have any on hand and their supplier was out. Another didn't carry it at all. Both gave me recommendations on other pharmacies to try.

Of those, one was in an assisted living community. Yeah, sending me to an old lady pharmacy for my old lady stockings. They actually didn't have any either. I guess none of the biddies had gotten knocked up recently...

I finally did find one that had some in stock, not my size, but they could order it. Retail is $60.

?!?!?!?

I said that I had been told that insurance would cover these, they said it would have to be paid for and reimbursed.

$60 for support stockings.

I don't even know what to do.

The comments about my size come pretty much every other day or so and adding a limp to the mix doesn't help. People really do think I'm about to pop. I've gained 22 lbs. That's it. It's just all up front.

Six and a half weeks left.

Only six and a half weeks left.

Tuesday, November 5, 2013

5 Year Anniversary

A couple months back I had been talking with my husband about our pending anniversary and that I didn't know what to do for it. We can't really go anywhere or do anything 'fun' because, hey, pregnant. But it's 5 years, so that's kind of a milestone, right? So he said he had some ideas and that he would take care of it.

I did get him a small gift. He started a new job recently (he likes to do that while I'm pregnant, second time, second pregnancy) and it's a higher class office. Shirts and ties and suits, etc. All his former companies were polo and khaki's style offices. So I got him a really sharp tie bar from Neiman Marcus. Probably the only thing I could afford at Neiman Marcus, but it looks really nice and definitely steps up his game a bit. :)

Our anniversary was last Friday, Nov 1st. My in laws were in town to watch Baby A since my daycare lady had taken a few days off. Since we got up that morning, I felt like there was something going on. Something that everyone was in on and knew except me. Well, I was right.

I only worked half a day and then I went to get a mani/pedi, which was awesome. I got home and walked in the door to see my fall decorations that had been on my dining room table, were now on the kitchen counter.

Strange. But I figured maybe my father in law needed table space for something.

I came in further to see that the table itself had been pushed aside.

Also strange, but maybe his computer cord didn't reach the nearest outlet.

All the chairs were lined up against the walls, and there was no project on the table. In fact, the leaves had been taken out and it had been closed down to it's smallest size.

I just kept looking around oddly. My mother in law had run out to the store so it was just my father in law and Baby A at the house. I looked at him and said 'I feel like something's going on.' He says 'I don't know' in a very unconvincing tone.

A few minutes later, I look out to see this stop outside the house:

The delivery guy comes in and asks 'where do you want it'. I said 'no idea, I don't know what you have'. He thought that was pretty funny, that I had no idea what was coming. My father in law instructed on the where and how and next thing I know. I have this:

Not the chairs. Just the table. The chairs are from the old table. But this, this is the table I have wanted for years. Years and years and drooled over in catalogs for so long.

The chairs will eventually look like this:

They're just a little expensive and we'll have to buy them in two's or three's for a couple months to get them all. But this will be the finished look when I have the dining room of my dreams (without the rug, but with the light).

Really, I have the best husband ever.

Monday, November 4, 2013

Update: Stages of Pregnancy

I missed the stage where you develop varicose veins. So now, not only do you feel fat because everyone and their brother comments on your size while you're out in public places, but you also feel old, because your legs now look like a 90 year old's...

It just gets better and better.

32 weeks and Halloween

Just chugging along in terms of this pregnancy. I am getting really, really tired of strangers commenting to me about my size though.

I've gained 20 lbs.

20.

Not 200.

Not even the 30-35 or so that I had gained already at this point with Baby A.

However people just can't seem to help but comment on my size, or my due date, or the completely random 'should you be in a hospital'.

Yeah. Someone said that to me. Although I was in Walmart at the time, so maybe there's a different level of 'socially acceptable' in that particular store.

Halloween was so much fun. Baby A was a little cowgirl. My mom made the outfit and we got some KILLER pink cowgirl boots. Baby A was a little hesitant about walking up to a house and knocking on the door, but when she realized candy was involved, it got a whole lot more fun after that. By the third house she was marching up all by herself and knocking on the door. It was really funny. My husband kept trying to get her to say Trick or Treat and we explained that when the person opens the door, if you say Trick or Treat, they'll give you candy. So, he says 'say Trick or Treat' and she says 'Candy'. Ok. Short cut the process I guess. She's very efficient. We only went to about four houses and then headed home but she really had a blast.
My cowgirl.

Wednesday, October 30, 2013

Embarrassing Pregnant Moments

I woke up hungry this morning.

Like at 3:30 this morning.

And not just, hmm, I could use a snack. It was a, hmm, I'm going to chew my arm off if I don't get up and get something to eat.

And it hasn't stopped all day. I pried myself out of bed at 4:30, after trying for an hour to go back to sleep despite my rumbling stomach, and had a small snack.

I had a bowl of Cheerios and a granola bar before leaving the house. (7:00)

I had my Fage yogurt and granola when I got to work. (9:00)

By 10, I was hungry, but was in a meeting.

By 11, I was in another meeting with my boss and finally had to stop and look at him and say, I have to go get something to eat, I'm sorry.

So I went to the kitchen and got my sliced up apple from the fridge and went back to his office to eat my apple and finish the conversation we were having.

When I got there he was talking with our CFO and I just sat down to eat my snack.

In addition to being so hungry I could cry, I was also contracting pretty seriously and it was very, very uncomfortable.

Well, apparently I was actually moaning through the contractions, while stuffing my face with the apple. I looked up to see both men staring at me and I just started laughing because I realized what I had been doing. It sounded like I was really enjoying that apple. I also blushed terribly and had to explain the contractions.

Really, I am very, very lucky to work for a small family company. We can make jokes about things like that and not worry too much about crossing a line.

I gave up on sticking to the lunch I brought with me, my PB&J on a 100 calorie Arnold's thin bread roll, and went to Wendy's. I had to silence the beast in my belly. She was such a hungry girl. Hopefully that nice, fat, heavy calorie lunch will do me for the day and I can have a normal dinner.


Destroyed it...

Happy Mama


The snob in me is now happy. 

Tuesday, October 29, 2013

For the love of Fage (Fa-yeh)

Apparently I am now officially a Greek Yogurt snob.

I used to eat plain, non fat Chobani and add my own fruit and granola. If I didn't have the fruit or granola it was a little hard to eat, the flavor is rather strong and I didn't care all that much for the ones with the fruit included.

Then there was a run on the plain non fat Chobani and every grocery store I went to was out, completely out. By the third week I gave up on the Chobani and tried Fage.

It was much thicker than the Chobani, and had a much milder taste. I ended up liking it much better than the Chobani.

It's not as popular though and not as many stores carry it.

I usually do my grocery shopping at the Walmart Market near Baby A's daycare because I can save a significant amount of money shopping there over the mainstream Grocery Store for the staple items. For fresh produce and bakery items, I love Publix. But when it comes down to it, the same list at Publix is around $150 and at the Walmart Market it's under $100. That's a big difference.

Walmart finally started carrying the Fage brand of Greek Yogurt but prior to that I would make two trips. One to walmart for the bulk of my list and a second to publix for the specialty items and my yogurt.

Well, this weekend I was short on time, I had a lot to do and couldn't justify the drive to Walmart much less the two stops, so I went to the closest and most convenient store.

The bad part is that the closest and most convenient store to my house is Kroger. They're in the middle price wise, but they don't carry the Fage.

I figured it was ok and I'd just go back to the Chobani and, hey, there are other brands too, why not try some of those?

It is not ok.

I suffered through the Chobani yesterday but really didn't enjoy it and today I tried a different brand, Oikos, and that was terrible. I had to throw it out. Maybe I had a bad cup. It was thin and watery and just tasted terrible. I threw it out and got a Pop Tart from the office snack supply.

I'm going to have to stop at Walmart on the way home tonight and get my Fage. I can't substitute. I'm a Greek Yogurt Snob.

Thursday, October 17, 2013

Stages of pregnancy


Just my two cents.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Whoohoo! We're pregnant!

whoo (pause to vomit) hoo, we're pregnant!

whoo (pause to vomit, take a nap, vomit again) who's idea was this?

 Pregnant schmegnant, I got this.

Hey, my pants don't button, cool.

No! don't touch the boobies!

WTF - I'm already in maternity clothes?

Hey, maternity pants are awesome.

Why the hell won't maternity pants stay put?

Wow, what's that little tickle in my belly?

Hey, there's a heel poking me! Cool!

Holy shit kid, stop kicking me.

WTF - I just sneezed and peed my pants.

So, these braxton hicks things just keep coming, don't they?

Go ahead, say something about my size, I dare you.

How many weeks left??

Ugghh, we have 10 weeks to go??

Ahh!! we only have 10 weeks left??

I'm so excited to hold my new baby!

Holy shit. What were we thinking?
---------------------------------------------------------

Then you can just keep alternative those last four, counting down the weeks until you get to:

I. Am. SO. Over. This.

And then you have a beautiful baby after 12 or so hours of pain and torture.

Again, just my two cents.

Wednesday, October 16, 2013

If this guy can do it, why aren't we all???

I left work early last Friday to do a few things before having to go get Baby A from daycare. Driving home I saw an old man walking down the side of the busy street outside my subdivision. Traffic was pretty much at a stand still due to construction and so I had some time to observe him before I actually made it up to him.

For quite a while I sat in my car, creeping up on this old man, thinking I should offer him a ride when I finally get up there. My subdivision was the likeliest place this guy was going and even if it wasn't near my house (huge subdivision) it wouldn't be that far out of my way. 

He was moving slowly, we all were, he was hunched a bit, with a slight limp.

As I got closer and closer I started to notice other things.

His new and solid walking shoes.

His hat and light backpack, not fully loaded by any means.

And once I was closer, the bottle of water with ice in it in his hand.

I also noticed his left hand curled in and that the limp was on his left side. Clearly he had suffered a stroke at some point. I realized that this man was right where he wanted to be and that he didn't want or need a ride from me. So, I passed him and drove home.

An hour later. I was getting ready to head out the door to pick up Baby A from daycare.

And guess who I saw. 

The same old man, climbing up the very steep hill outside my house. I couldn't believe it. From where I saw him, it was a mile and a half to my house. I've mapped it and I've walked it before, in a non pregnant state, but really, right now, it's probably not something I could do. Especially when you take into account that in order for him to have gotten where he was on his route when I first saw him, there was likely another mile or two added to the total. 

I was in awe and had to call out to him. I said 'Hello!! You've walked quite a long ways. I saw you out on Holcomb Bridge!'

He stopped, smiled and waved, 'Yes! I have. It's a long route I do and I try to do it as much as possible.'

We chatted a bit more and then he kept going and I got in the car to go, but couldn't resist snapping a quick photo of him as he climbed our hill.

How awesome is he??  :)

Tuesday, October 15, 2013

The fine line between healthy and happy

In the effort to find a breakfast menu for Baby A that fills her, is healthy and is something she likes to eat,  I have experimented with a few healthy muffin recipes.

The first one was a banana and oatmeal one that I thought was only ok. Baby A was a big fan though.

The second one was basically a veggie muffin. I know you've seen these, shredded veggies baked in muffins, posing as desserts. This one was actually pretty good. 


I didn't add the coconut because I don't like coconut and I used raisins instead of cherries. I also skipped the pecans because these are for Baby A and I'm not actually sure if she's had baked goods with nuts, I don't typically use them, so I left them out just for good measure. I really enjoyed these but Baby A wasn't as enthusiastic about them. They're lower in fat and calories than the banana oatmeal ones but I thought they were tastier. 

I also did a zucchini bread that I am really enjoying. I substituted applesauce for the oil and cut the sugar in half. It still came out really good. I was worried it wouldn't have any sweetness to it, but I managed to eat half a loaf by myself with no trouble. I haven't had Baby A try that one yet. My husband made his 'special' oatmeal for her this morning so tomorrow we'll try the bread.

In addition I've been going for greater variety to help add to the overall quantity, ending in something I know she loves, i.e. strawberry yogurt. Normally, I give her plain greek yogurt with granola added in and some fresh fruit if it's in season. I try to keep the processed sugars to a minimum and while Yopliat can advertise all they want about how healthy they are and how many people lose weight eating a low fat yogurt for breakfast or a snack, if you actually look at the sugar content on those, it's pretty high.

However, back to the title of this post healthy vs happy. The discussion I had with my husband about her eating was mainly centered around the fact that she does eat very well, not huge quantities, but if we can get her to eat the healthy stuff first (the bowl of cheerios with a banana) and then top it off with some yummy yogurt that I know she'll stuff in there no matter what, maybe that's worth the sugar.

She is a funny girl though. She just doesn't overeat, and I hate to try and break that habit, it's a good one to have. She's so set about it that she has given back a half eaten oreo because she was full and didn't want to finish it. My husband just about disowned her at that point.

Mostly I"m just trying to figure out what she needs versus what she wants and how to put something in front of her that I don't have to stand over her and say 'take another bite, take another bite, take another bite, take another bite.' Yes, if I gave her waffles smothered in syrup every day, she'd scarf it down without a word from me. Yes, I will occasionally resort to that when I have to get her out the f-ing door and I don't have time to play around. But really, I need to be teaching her to eat the healthy things too and not to take half an hour to eat one muffin. I'm just not always sure how to do that. 

Monday, October 14, 2013

How to quietly starve your children

Apparently I haven't been giving Baby A enough to eat in the mornings.

In my own defense, I think this is a recent phenomenon. She is a little girl. As in, petite, she's tiny. She's two and still wears 12 and 12-18 month sized clothes. She's just little.

She's a very good eater in terms of the variety of things that she eats happily and that we feed her regularly. She gets lots of vegetables, lots of fruit, lots of good healthy snacks, and yes, she gets a cookie if she eats all her dinner. However, she is also not an over eater. She stops when she's full and every once in a while I over do it in terms of what I sit her down with for a meal. So, I get into a routine of quantity and apparently forget that she is actually still growing and as she grows, will need more food to sustain that.

Baby A has been rather cranky lately at Mama T's. Everything has been a battle and all this week she's just been unhappy.

The other morning my husband made her breakfast, which he does occasionally. He eats oatmeal many mornings and adds peanut butter, honey and sliced bananas to it. Baby A loves this. So that morning he made her usual amount and she scarfed it down before I managed to finish my own bowl of cereal. That evening my husband and I laughed about it and thought, well, maybe we need to give her a larger portion.

So the next morning my husband increased the quantity. She ate it all. Not as fast as the smaller portion and there was definitely a little slow down at the end, but she ate it all.

I got a text and a picture from Mama T:

Having a Happy Day!

Wow, do I feel like such a crappy mother. 

To be fair, it's not like I'm not feeding her. She's getting a bowl of cheerios with banana sliced into it, or an english muffin, or about 1/2 a cup of plain greek yogurt with another 1/2 a cup of granola mixed in. Plus a full glass of milk. 

So, I raided allrecipes.com for some more healthy, mildly sweet, breakfast options that I can start adding to her diet since she clearly is needing something more filling.

This whole parenting 'learn as you go' thing can really suck sometimes.

Friday, October 11, 2013

Be the spouse you want your children to be

There are so many things to think about as parents. Making sure everyone is healthy, cared for, fed, cleaned, educated, polite, happy, loved, etc, etc. We as parents work so hard to make sure we provide these things for our children and there are so many things that we do subconsciously that really do create models for them as they grow. How and what we eat. Parents who snack have kids who snack. Parents who eat salads and steamed vegetables have kids who eat salads and steamed vegetables. Parents who are active have kids who are active. Everything we do is a lesson to our kids and one of the things that I try to be very aware of is how my husband and I treat each other. Not just in front of our child (soon to be children) but in all instances.

Don't fool yourself. Even if you argue in private, even if you never say a negative word in front of your children, kids know if their parents are getting along. Respect and love are shown in so much more than just words and if you're in a relationship without those things they will know.

Not only will they know, but they will consider it normal.

Modeling a healthy marriage is the best way to help your children grow into adults who have healthy marriages.

Well, 'duh'. Right?

It sounds so easy, but is it?? What is a healthy marriage? How do you know if you have one?

I don’t think that I have the answers to those questions. Really, I’ve been married for 5 years. What do I know?? I took a basic Psychology course in college, but never pursued it further. I have no background or formal education in this area.

I don’t know what the definition is of a healthy marriage or how to identify the characteristics of one.

But I do know what I want for my children.

I want my daughter(s) to find a person who loves and respects her. That easy though. Isn't that what all mothers want for their daughters?

But more than that, I want my daughter to know how to be a good wife.

I want her to be able to communicate without screaming. 

I want her to be able to define and articulate what her needs are to her spouse without being mean, or demeaning, or demanding.

To know how to choose her battles. 

To know when to put her foot down and when to find a middle ground. 

How to reach that middle ground fairly.

How to demonstrate her love and respect for her spouse in appropriate ways that also show love and respect for herself.

Those are all things that I can do, that I can model for her. It is up to me to be the wife who communicates without screaming. It is up to me, to be the wife who can comprise a situation without compromising herself.

In every interaction with my husband, I am modeling a behavior. In how we treat each other and respond to each other's needs, we are modeling a behavior. 

We need to be aware of those behaviors. We need to be sure we know what we’re modeling.

For the mother’s, next time you argue with your husband, think about your son being the person on the other side of that argument. Are you treating your husband the way you want your son’s future wife to treat him? Are you being respectful? Honest? Fair? Are you raising a daughter who is going to treat her husband (someone else’s son) the way you would want your son treated by his wife?

For the father’s with daughters, same question. Put your daughter on the receiving end of that conversation. Are you treating your wife the way you want your daughter treated in her future relationship. Are you calm and respectful? Do you automatically blame or do you share responsibility? Are you raising a son who is going to treat his future wife the way you want your daughter treated in a marriage?


Be the spouse you want your child to be.  

Christmas shopping stage 1

I feel like I am on my way to being fully prepared for Christmas.

I have purchased presents for my sister, Baby A, my Niece J and our good friend's daughter Chubs. I actually got the same thing for all three girls and am so excited!

Are they just the cutest little things!! They're currently on sale at The Children's Place, online. I love that site. The purple leopard is for my niece and my daughter. The flower one is for Chubs.

I've already got some other things too, of course, but I just think these vests are adorable. This is definitely the bad part of shopping so early. Now I have to wait THREE months to give everyone their presents!

I plan on going out this weekend, probably Sunday afternoon to a great antiques and consignment shop that I love, A Classy Flea to see if I can find some things for my mother and my mother in law. They have similar tastes in decorating and I've been with them both to that store several times and never come away empty handed. If you happen to be in the Big Chicken area of Marietta, you HAVE to go and check it out.

I have a spreadsheet with everyone who needs a present and an estimated budget for each person and by the end of October hope to have Baby A, my niece, Chubs, my sister, my parents and my mother in law done. And the dogs too, of course.

I've already told my husband that he is in charge of gifts for his father (the hardest man in the world to shop for) and his siblings.

That sounds fair right?

Thursday, October 10, 2013

Mama needs a new pair of shoes

My last pregnancy was in the  middle of the summer. In Georgia. It was hot. Very, very hot. Towards the end I lived in flip flops.

This time around, I'm due in December. Flip flops aren't going to work this time around, even in GA. In addition I am still having some back pain and haven't been able to wear all of my heels. My normal winter footwear typically is closed toed pumps or tall boots. The tall boots I expect to be problematic because of looming weight gain. Last pregnancy I wasn't able to wear any of my boots because my calves were too fat. It was very sad.  :(

I do have some ankle high booties, but, the heels are pretty significant on those so I don't think they're going to work either.

So, I need to go shoe shopping!

I want a pair of low heeled black booties to wear with my leggings and then I also want a pair of shoes to wear with my (maternity) dress pants. This is a dilemma since, they're kind of long. I also don't want to get them hemmed because I plan on selling all this maternity stuff after I make it back into 'real' clothes. I have a pair of shoes now that I can wear with them, platform style that doesn't put a bad angle on my back and keeps the pants from dragging on the floor, but their open toed, cork heel, summer shoes. Cork heels are not as common in winter heels and finding a comfortable platform style shoe to wear while pregnant in the winter, may be a little challenging.

Oh, such problems that I have. :)

Tuesday, October 8, 2013

How to prepare a two year old for a new baby?

I just googled this. I feel like we're doing all the right things but change is so hard for toddlers. I feel like Baby A is an especially routine child and she reacts so strongly to anything that is out of the ordinary. Last week my husband was home Friday morning during our normal 'get up and out' dance. He wasn't leaving the house until 7:30, was dressed and ready so offered to help with Baby A. I thought that was great. She, did not. I think it would probably have been different if I hadn't been in the house too. But, I was. I was upstairs doing my hair and getting dressed while my husband was downstairs trying to get Baby A to eat her breakfast. Everything he did, she screamed 'No! Mama! No! Mama!' I felt so bad, but I knew intervening wasn't an option. She has to deal with Daddy doing things even if I'm around. Soon I'll be taking care of the new baby and will need him to help with things like getting Baby A up, changed, dressed, fed and out the door. It's easier to let them figure it out now while we're all working on a full nights sleep and not completely stressed out.

Bringing a new baby into the house is probably the biggest thing we could possibly do to disrupt her little world. It kind of breaks my heart for her.

When I googled this I found all kinds of articles about explaining things to your two year old. Telling them what's going on and what changes are coming. I don't know about everyone else's two year olds, but there is no way that Baby A understands what I'm saying when I tell her we're having a baby. She knows what a baby is. And we've told her for months now that there's a baby in Mama's belly. But as far as her making the connection that this baby is coming home with us forever and ever and she's going to have to share attention, there is no way to explain that to a two year old. This is just going to be completely traumatic for her and it kills me.

At the same time, I know she'll get over it and I am so excited that she's going to get to have a little sister. I have a little sister and she is my best friend. I can't imagine my life without her and the fact that Baby A will get to have that relationship too makes me so happy.

We just all have to survive the next two to three years.

Which is probably a little questionable...

Monday, October 7, 2013

Can we start the countdown yet?

I alternate between being ready for having a little baby in the house again and being terrified.

I have eleven weeks to go.

Eleven.

11

That's it.

Some might say, "that's almost three months away, it's so far!"

I say:

1. Halloween
2. Anniversary
3. Thanksgiving
4. Christmas

And all the preparations that all three of those things require.

First of all, it is completely unfair that the stores are currently loaded with candy. Exactly how does anyone expect me to buy Halloween candy now and actually have any of it on hand when trick-or-treaters come around?? Not that we get any, we live in the middle of a massive, steep hill that no rational child or even adventurous teen is willing to climb just for candy.

Secondly, we have to come up with Baby A's Halloween costume and figure out what we're going to do that night. At 2, she's not really old enough to actually go trick or treating, so, I don't know, maybe we go to a few homes we know and call that quits. My in laws are actually going to be down that week, so maybe we'll find something fun to do.

Oh that's right. My in laws are coming down that week because Halloween is also Mama T's birthday and she takes it off every year. So my MIL is coming down to watch Baby A for those few days. Overall, very cool. I'm happy they're coming and they will be on hand for our five year anniversary. Built in babysitters! Too bad I'll be even more hugely pregnant by then and not able to really enjoy it all that much.

Thankfully my husband has taken over the anniversary plans. I was starting to stress about it, because it is a 'number'. It's our fifth and I wanted to try and do something, but, what am I going to do that I can actually enjoy?? He cut short the stress avalanche that was looming and said he had some ideas and that he would take care of it. Fortunately I can actually take that off my plate for worries. I know some women would probably stress even more if their husbands said that they were handling plans for their anniversary, but he does a good job when it comes to these things, so other than show up, I'm hoping I don't have a whole lot more for expectations.

Then there's Thanksgiving which I've pretty much decided we're not traveling for. At that point I will only be about 4 weeks away from my due date and given my current size, I can't imagine I will be at all comfortable driving four or five hours to TN to spend the holiday with my husband's family. Plus there's so much involved, dogs, Baby A, shared food responsibilities and the prep/time/effort that goes into it. I'd rather stay home and have a turkey sandwich. Not that we will be that sad. I'm sure my parents are planning on staying in GA also and we'll probably do something small and then expect to see a few of the In-law crowd in the days afterwards.

Then we hit December and it's an all out sprint to the finish. To start with, the nursery is currently closed. Shut. Does not exist. We moved Baby A into her 'big girl room' and shut the door on the nursery. It will stay that way until after Thanksgiving. So, come December, I need to get back in there and get shit together. I have started buying diapers, but I need to get the clothes out and organized. The drawers stocked and the room decorated. I moved a lot of the decorations to Baby A's new room and so want to get a few things that are just for this new little girl, as opposed to all hand me down leftovers.

I also need to pull all the boxes out of the basement and all that 'little' baby stuff out, cleaned and organized. Bottles, pacifiers, bumpers, bouncy seats, swings, baby blankets, bassinets, all of it. It needs to be washed and put back together and then, the fun part, finding a spot to put all that in the midst of Baby A's toys and the dog's toys and beds, etc, etc. My Sister in Law is coming down to help with that some weekend after Thanksgiving. She's been offering to do something to help and I said here's what I need to do, come on down!

Add to that the required Christmas parties. Hopefully my company isn't doing anything, partly because if we were, I'd need to know about it around two months ago to actually start planning something. I know my husband is going to want to attend whatever function his company has, which will be awesome, because I will be huge. And we have the party with Mama T and all the kids which is easy and fun and hopefully not on the same night as my husbands party.

Plus Christmas shopping. And decorating. And cards. I'm actually starting the shopping now. I'm not waiting until December to do this. I hope to have the majority of it done this month and then only have my husband left to shop for later. He's a stinker and if I get him something this far ahead of time he will either A) find it, B) guess what it is or C) end up buying one for himself in the meantime.

So really, with everything else that's going on, 11 weeks is not a lot of time.


Tuesday, September 24, 2013

Swaddle Problems

Baby A has her blankies. They are the swaddle blankets that I bought for her and they've been in her crib and now in her big girl bed basically since she was born. She has a funny habit of sleeping with a blanket over her face. Yes, it's completely disconcerting as a parent to have your child's face covered, but I learned pretty quickly that it was done by choice and unless I wanted a screaming infant, to let her do her own thing.

Now that I think about it, that seems to be a pretty standard mantra with her.

Buy anyway, this was when she was old enough to be fairly mobile in her crib, not a newborn, so the risk of suffocation was pretty low, but, to ease my own anxiety I would give her the light, linen swaddle blankets that were easy to breath through.

These have turned into her blankies and overall I'm very happy with the fact that we have four of them. I know parents who've dealt with horror situations where the one and only 'thing' has disappeared, whether it's a blanket, toy, pacifier, doll, animal, etc, etc. When there's only one, and it's gone, there can be no good outcome 99% of the time.

Baby A has four and they're completely interchangeable. She has no preferences. All in all, not that bad.

They're a perfect size too. Somewhere around 36x36 or 40x40. I found that size to be really perfect when you're swaddling a 5 lb infant. They're kind of little and the more standard size of 46x46 was really a lot of extra material. We had one of those too, but rarely used it because we'd have to wrap it around her ten times.

Well, now that we have baby #2 on the way, we always knew we were going to have to buy new swaddle blankets. There's just no way Baby A is going to give up hers, which I wouldn't expect anyway, but overall my thought process was to get the same type but in new colors/patterns so they looked completely different.

And there's the problem.

I can't find them.

Anywhere.

Ok, anywhere means they're not on Amazon and not on Target.com. That to me is pretty much the entire universe of online shopping.

I suppose I could go into a Target and actually look for them (argh) but I think I'd rather just complain about it. Plus if I go into Target, I never leave with just what I need. I always have to pick up a few things that jump off the shelves and into my cart and I'm just not ready to do that yet. Especially since I did it last weekend. I went in to buy pajama's for Baby A and left $90 later...yeah, *sigh* that's just how it goes and actually 'only' $90 is a pretty light day for Target.

I will probably have to cave and go in search of them because I really do love that size and while they're not the 'popular' brand right now (hello aden!) that's really what I want.

Wednesday, September 18, 2013

Sleep is for the weak

I've been fighting a cold again this week. Has been the same sore throat and cough that started my last two week long head cold. Hopefully this one will be a shorter version but even so with the coughing I've had trouble sleeping. Even with medication, I'm still up most of the night. It's not just the coughing that's keeping me up though. Add to that an amazingly active baby who is large enough now to really make an impact on my comfort at night, multiple trips to the bathroom, leg cramps and of course the Braxton Hicks contractions are making another appearance. They had settled down for several weeks and while I had them occasionally, they were pretty minor and short lived. These are waking me up at night and making my entire day pretty uncomfortable.

Yesterday apparently I hit such a wall in the sleep deprivation category that I ended up with a severe migraine with blurred vision for about two hours in the afternoon. I gave up after food, water and Tylenol didn't help and waited until I could see well enough to drive home. I then slept for an hour and a half and felt better. Not great, but better.

When I was pregnant with Baby A I didn't really have any trouble sleeping at night. She never kept me awake and after she was born, she settled into a nighttime sleep routine pretty quickly. By 8 weeks she was sleeping 6 hour stretch at night and by 12 weeks she was at 8 hours.

I have a feeling that this baby's nightly route will be significantly different.

Tuesday, September 17, 2013

How to piss off a pregnant woman

In one step:

Stupid Man #1:  "Are you due next month?"
Me: "No, I have three more to go, thanks."

In two steps:

Stupid Man #2: "How far along are you?"
Me: "Six Months"
Stupid Man #2: "Wow, you got big early!"
Me: ...

Yeah, two comments in one week.

Feeling fabulous.

Monday, September 9, 2013

Monkey See, Monkey Do, Monkey...Teach???

There are some days where I just have to hang my head and sigh.

My husband is a very intelligent man. He really is. Whenever we come to a subject that he doesn't know something about, it's always very surprising to me.

Apparently, raising children falls into that category.

Not to say that I'm an expert, but I think some things should be fairly obvious.

For instance...

For Baby A's birthday we bought her a toddler slide. It's about 3 feet tall and fits in the coat closet when not in use. She loves it and frequently in the evenings we'll pull that out for her to play on.

Last week, one evening after dinner, we were watching baseball and Baby A was sliding down her slide having a great time.

My husband jumps up and says "Baby A watch this!!"

(let me just insert, anything your husband, brother, son, nephew, etc, etc, says that starts with 'watch this' should be considered very, very suspect.)

He then proceeds to put her on the top of the slide, facing backwards, and slide her down to the floor. At this the following conversation takes place.

Me: 'Don't teach her that. She's going to try it on her own, topple down the slide and hurt herself.'

Husband: 'She's not going to hurt herself, besides she's not on this unsupervised.'

Me: 'She's on it unsupervised enough, if I'm cooking dinner and the slide is out, my eyes aren't on her every minute. Besides, if you teach this to her here, she is going to think she can slide down every slide backwards.'

He harrumphed and kind of got the point. Or so I thought.

Last night, I was cooking dinner and my husband was playing with Baby A in the living room when I hear...

"Here, try this, go down face first..."

So, now I've had to warn our daycare lady that my very intelligent husband has been teaching our daughter to go down slides backwards and face first without any thought to the fact that she is highly likely to try this on a slide that is not 3 feet tall with a carpeted floor at the bottom...

Really???


Thursday, September 5, 2013

Kickboxing strategies and how they relate to pregnancy

Back in my single days I loved kickboxing. Loved it.

This was not the aerobics class at the local YMCA or LA Fitness or Lifetime Fitness.

This was a boxing gym.

They trained fighters.

They participated in local boxing matches.

They had bruises and black eyes.

I was one of those people. With the bruises and black eyes. I loved it.

I actually did train to fight in the ring for a while. Not with the intention of actually getting in the ring, but one of the other girls in the gym did want to and needed a partner to spar with that was her height/size/class etc.

It was awesome.

I also used to go to the boxing matches in Atlanta and one of those fights will probably stay in my head for as long as I live, but probably not for the reason you would expect.

When the two fighters came out, one was a tall, broad shouldered, hulk of a guy. Thick arms, thick legs, looked like he could break a tree trunk in half by blinking at it.

The other guy was tall too, but thin, wiry, clearly muscled as well, but looked like a shadow of a person next to his opponent.

When the fight started it seemed like an obvious win.

The bell rang and the two opponents started circling. They threw out test punches and the little guy swatted a kick on the Hulk's left thigh.

The hulk barely noticed it. Never bothered to block or counter it.

They kept circling and the little guy kept deftly avoiding getting hit with anything solid and kept up these swat kicks at the Hulk's left thigh. In the same spot every time. They were solid kicks but not anything that was going to sweep the legs out from under the Hulk, he just kept ignoring them and trying to land a solid punch.

By the third round, these kicks were a little more noticeable. The little guy would swat kick that same spot and the leg would shake a bit. Then it started to buckle a bit at each kick.

The fight eventually ended with the Hulk having to withdraw because he couldn't stand anymore.

The crowd didn't know what to do. It was amazing and kind of anticlimactic. You go to a boxing match to see two guys beat the hell out of each other, right? This was done so deftly, so quietly that by the time the Hulk realized there was a problem, the fight was almost over. By repeated kicking just one spot, in a non threatening way, over and over and over the little guy slowly worked the leg right out from under his much larger opponent and won the match without ever having to land a punch or come down to a test of sheer muscle strength.

I thought it was brilliant, later, at the time I was just as amazed and kind of let down as the rest of the crowd.

Now, reference this back to pregnancy.

I have a little opponent.

Much smaller than me.

Not very strong.

But she's a kicker.

And she kicks me in the same spot.

Over.

And Over.

And Over.

And every time I make a face about it, someone has to say 'she's only a pound, she can't be kicking you that hard.'

No. She's not.

The strength behind the kick is not the issue here.

It's the fact that she only kicks me in one spot.

The same spot.

Repeatedly.

For hours every day and night.

So, yeah, she's only a pound but my little lightweight is winning this particular match.