The Nursery

Shhhhhhh. Can you hear that? It is the sound of silence, meaning I've quit tearing the nursery to shreds as I organize and reorganize the baby's room. Yep, it is true, I've finally (FINALLY) gotten the baby's nursery together. And, because patting my own back is difficult because I have limited mobility and get tired easily, I'm sharing with all of you so you can heap your praises on me. Go ahead. Heap.

So, in truth, it isn't a huge feat to have gotten this far, but I truly felt like it would never happen. I'm pretty positive that my poor husband was equally positive it wouldn't happen, and was planning which of his dresser drawers would have to be emptied so that our poor child would have a place to sleep when she was born. Every time he neared a wall with so much as a thumb tack to hang something, I would completely loose my mind, unable to fathom doing something so permanent as HANGING something on the WALL. Dear LORD what if we changed our minds about where it should HANG!?!

However, we finally made progress, and except for the space above the crib where we will put Baby E's name (when we figure it out... give us time people, the world wasn't made in day here) everything is put just exactly where it should be.

I'm at peace with the room. Which is good because my crazy has moved its laser focus back to the baby's clothes which are ALL WRONG. But that is for a different post.

Enjoy below, the beauty that is Baby E's nursery.

Bragging on Ben

I'm a little behind on blogging, but I have to back up for a few days to brag on Ben. One, because I love him and am proud of him and want everyone to know how amazing my husband is. But two, because I have a sneaky suspicion he may also LOVE for everyone to know how amazing he is, so if I keep bragging on him, I keep getting special treatment and grand gestures. Its a win, win for everyone involved.

The day before Valentine's Day, Ben had flowers delivered to my office. When the receptionist brought them to my office, a few of the other girls followed her in to help deliver them. Not because there was one bouquet of flowers, but because there were TWO bouquets, and everyone wanted to know who they were from (duh, like any other man would send me flowers) and what the cards read.

The first arrangement was a large, beautiful piece with lilies, roses, daisies and more. The card was from Ben and was a nice, sweet love note to me (no way nosey, the card was between us, thank you very much!)

The second vase was smaller, filled with two red roses and some baby's breath. The card, which I DID read aloud to the room made a few co-workers sigh and a few others swoon. This arrangement was for Baby E, and the card simply read "I can't wait to meet you."Yes, my sweet and nearly perfect husband bought flowers for our UNBORN CHILD. On the romance scale of 1 to 10, this little act had my heart tripping in at a good 15. I mean, come ON people, does your heart not just melt a little hearing about it?

So that is my good husband story of the day. He doesn't always get a lot of credit for the things he does for me day-in and day-out, but he is my rock, my cheerleader, my partner in crime and my best friend, so in honor of Valentine's Day and good husbands everywhere, I want to say thanks to my Ben. Love you honey.

Week 35: The weight debate

Having a debilitating cold has its pros and cons. I believe I may have beaten you over the head with the cons last week, so how about today we start with the pros.

I had my week 35 appointment today, and (drum roll please) I LOST four pounds since my last visit!! I nearly wept with joy when I heard that, and once the nurse left the exam room, Ben and I high-fived and did a little victory dance that I'm pretty sure looked more like the African Anteater dance from "Can't Buy Me Love" (awkward and unattractive) but it still felt pretty darn good.

When my doctor came in to chat, I again mentioned how excited I was that I lost weight. She looked at my chart, made a few notations and looked at me and smiled, and then said "Yes, that is good. Now you are at a perfect weight. Try not to loose any more weight, but don't gain any either. Try to stay just about where you are."

I think my eyeballs may have popped out of my head while she was looking back down at the chart. I wanted to say "Sorry sister, but this isn't exactly a precise science, what with the baby gaining about half a pound a week, and me facing down cravings like a fighter pilot facing enemy crafts and my body retaining water like a camel before a long trek. I mean, sheesh lady." But instead, I shook my head in eager agreement and looked innocent. I then went for lunch and had two biscuits slathered with honey for my reward, followed by an enormous dinner with ice cream for dessert. Yep, I'm going to get back to watching what I eat, but damn if that little day of indulgence didn't make me happy, and the four or five Tums I had to take down to atone for it didn't even taste all that chalky.

Out of my way: I'm pregnant and nesting

Several months ago, I mentioned in a post that I thought I was nesting. Haha, silly six-month ago me -- I was just in a mood to clean that day, and had no IDEA what nesting really was. NOW I'm nesting. For the last few days, I've been following an insane urge to shop every day for MORE BABY STUFF which I then drag home and ORGANIZE. And then, I look at the nursery and have this need to REORGANIZE because, surely, the baby blankets can't go on THAT shelf, they make much more sense to go in this DRAWER and OH MY GOSH what was I thinking putting her lovies and dolls in BASKET on the FLOOR when there is clearly more space on the SHELF??

Each day ends with me, spent and slumped in a chair looking at the room that I am certain I made MORE disorganized, with piles of stuff just waiting for their crazy master (me) to decide where they should go.

Saturday, I sorted the clothes we have for Baby E into ages. I thought it would help me get an idea of where we stand and what we still need. Instead, it caused a HUGE amount of panic, because LORD HELP ME if I have any idea what size this baby will be when she comes out, so how do I know if we need a bunch of newborn onesies, or if we should go with the 0-3 month ones, that seem to make sense but completely dwarf the newborn onesies and we don't want her swallowed alive by her clothes so we should definitely have some newborn onesies, but DO WE HAVE ENOUGH!?! DO WE HAVE TOO MANY?!? The uncertainty is absolutely killing me, I'm a planner and a waste-not, want-not so the idea of taking tags off clothes WE MAY NEVER USE makes me want to cry, or at least wash everything with the tags still on.

And don't get me started there. Ben came home from class on Saturday and looked at all the baby's clothes on the floor and I babbled on for awhile about how we need to wash all her clothes before she gets here, which is why I've emptied her drawers onto the floor. He just waited me out, then smiled gently and said "Okay, great, I'll just go throw these in the washer and we can head out." I nearly lost my mind as I lunged for all the tiny onesies and pulled them out of his hand. I WAS NOT READY FOR THOSE TO GO IN THE WASH. I said they NEEDED to be washed. But not yet. And CERTAINLY not by you, Mr. cutting tags off and being all rationale guy. OH NO SIR.

Does it make sense? Nope. Was it nice he wanted to help me do the baby's laundry. Yep. Am I a COMPLETE LUNATIC who has a need for CONTROL over little, insignificant things? HELL YES.

Today I'm tackling the baby's bathroom. I'm cleaning out all the junk under the sink and organizing her towels, washcloths, soaps and medicines. Don't be surprised if you talk to Ben later and he mentions how he will likely find me tonight. Sitting on the cold, hard tile of the bathroom floor, surrounded by baby products and agonizing over whether the Frog Pod should go on the front, back or side wall of the shower and whether or not four hooded bath towels and six washcloths are enough, or if I need more, and if so, what color should they be?

Blogging from my closet

So tonight in Dallas there are severe thunderstorms and tornado watches/warnings all over the place. Which is fine, except I grew up in Oklahoma where tornado watches/warnings nearly ALWAYS lead to actual tornadoes, so I'm a bit twitchy whenever I see the little alerts show up on the bottom of my evening programming. Throw in my pregnancy, a little leftover illness and the fact that the tornado sirens actually WENT OFF in our neighborhood and you get my current situation... blogging from the closet while my annoyed but defeated spouse and two dogs sleep in awkward and uncomfortable positions.

I would write something pithy here about my over reacting to the situation and how it could JUST NOT GET WORSE, but last time I complained about something semi-uncomfortable, God leaned over with the ungrateful stick and smacked me with more illness and misery than I had thought possible.

Last week when I blogged about being sick, I thought I was really pretty sick. The joke was on me, when just HOURS later I got "oh THIS is sick" sick, which means a fever, and what I thought was near and certain death. Panic-y calls to my OB-GYN, a handful of tylenol, two gatorades, several gargles with salt water and a torture device where you spray OCEAN water in one nostril and let it come out the other later, and it was clear I wasn't dying, but I should never EVER back-talk modern medicine again.

So, I've learned my lesson and I'm just throwing out there to the Internet that I'm blogging from my closet... and LOVING it.

My poor husband who has a flight out of Dallas tomorrow morning at SIX a.m. trying to get some sleep because his crazy, panic stricken and pregnant wife insisted he hunker down in the closet. Lucky he can sleep anywhere, so I think he's good until morning.

Jack and Dex are just excited that they have someone sleeping with them on the floor. Well, Dex is. Jack keeps just slightly opening his lids to give me the stink-eye before going back to sleep.

Its a cold, cold world

Despite all my whining these past eight months or so, pregnancy hasn't been all that bad. As far as growing a human goes, my experience has been pretty misery-free compared to some people I've talked to. But today, I feel differently. Today I have a cold and I am pretty sure my entire world is ending.

Yes, I AM a big baby, thank you for asking.

I'm usually one of those "I'll tough it out" types. Besides the occassional Tylenol, I haven't taken a single drug since I've been pregnant. I'm kind of that way when I'm not pregnant too, following dosage labels to the letter and begging my husband to stop swigging cough medicine from the bottle and use the LITTLE CUP IT CAME WITH, damnit!

But today, today I would throw all of my caution to the wind and mix every single cold medicine I could legally get my hands on, if I didn't have to worry about one little thing (er, person).

To be responsible, I called my doctor and asked what medications I could take, being in my third trimester and all. The woman on the phone recommended Tylenol (duh), Robatussin, Claratin or Benadryl. DONE! I raced to the pharmacy and bought all of them and dragged my loot home, coughing, wheezing and chortling like some demented drug pirate. I drank some Robatussin, took a Benadryl and immediately conked out -- that great kind of drug-induced sleep where you wake up not knowing where you are and wiping a good amount of drool off your cheek.

I wandered into the kitchen to decide what lovely drug cocktail I could cook up next, when my Mom (who is visiting) and Ben showed up. We got to talking about what my doctor (or rather, her receptionist) recommended and a little voice started nagging at me to be VERY careful about what I'm taking. I told the voice to shut up or I would take it out back and beat it, but it got the best of me and I sat down to do a little Web research before I took anything else.

Googled Claratin first and got to reading the drug information. Well, what do you know but they suggest that people be ESPECIALLY wary of taking the drug in their THIRD trimester. Apparently my doctor's office let Mrs. Potato Head answer the phone today and she just spouted out some random drugs when I talked to her. I'm suprised I actually got medicine names and not just random words like "Jungle! Toothbrush! Hickey!! San Salvador!!!"

I found a good article on WebMD that listed safe medications to take, and the two I had actually taken already were fine, Whew. At this point, I decided that I was done branching out and Benadryl and Robatussin were the only drugs I'd dare take. And, as I sit here with a Kleenex stuffed up my nose, I'm cursing both of them for their great ineffectiveness.

I'm also fairly certain I'm going to be the parent that reminds their children of everything they went through to bring them into the world. Because as I focus on how miserable I am, I'm already practicing the speech in my head that my (likely teenage) daughter will hear someday.

"Not ONLY did I get way fat and find out my real hair color is BROWN, but I carried you for NINE WHOLE MONTHS and then went through pain and agony to get you out into the world. But you know the WORST part? One day, I used an entire BOX of Kleenex because I felt like my brains were melting and draining out of my skull, and my throat hurt and I kept coughing up stuff that should never see the light of day and you kept KICKING me, like you had no CLUE how miserable I was and I HAD TO DEAL WITH IT practically drug-free. Like no hard core stuff, just so you could be all perfect and non-birth defect-y. But do you APPRECIATE my sacrifice?!!? DO YOU?????"

(In my head, this is the point my voice gets all screechy and hard to understand and my daughter will roll her eyes, call me weird and slam the door behind her on her way out. It's only fair -- ask my Mom about our relationship during my teen years.)

Now you'll have to excuse me. I need a nap and a new box of Kleenex.

33 weeks and growing

As promised (a week or so ago) here is the latest belly photo. As you can see, I'm the size of a small air ship and no surprise but my doctor just about fell out of her chair when she saw how much weight I had gained over the last three weeks. Apparently, I'm some kind of super-human eating machine. Neat.

When I tried to explain that I normally have my appointments first thing in the morning before breakfast, and today my appointment fell just after lunch so that might add to the total weight gain, she just looked at me and asked if my lunch salad had possibly weighed 10 pounds.

Touche.

I acted so baffled by the weight gain, she took pity on me and shared with me how I might THINK I'm eating healthy, but really not. As in, I might eat a WHOLE banana, but really, because of the sugar content, I should limit myself to HALF a banana each time I sit down to eat one. I should drink skim milk, and cut juice out of my diet.

At this point, I realize that if those are her suggestions, I probably AM responsible for my weight gain and should just own up to it. Nope, sorry doc, its not those late night apple juice cravings or sneaking one whole banana at a time that is doing this to me. Its more the cookies, brownies, cakes and doughnuts that are turning me into a female Jabba the Hut.

I mean, last week when Ben was in class, I had a Cinnabon for dinner for God's sake. A CINNABON.

As punishment, I'm forcing myself to go to yoga tonight, and then I'm going to eat something miserable, like a Lean Cuisine. And then I'm going to cry myself to sleep.