A Very Pregnant New Year's Eve.

Seven days of family time makes your house feel really quiet after everyone leaves. This Christmas we were lucky enough to spend the holidays with all of G's family, right here in Savannah (and Florida too!) You always hear people's horror stories about their in-laws, but I can easily say that I have none. I am so fortunate to have such a wonderful group of people now so close to me.

This New Year's Eve is definitely like none we've experienced before. Years prior we've been out until late, rushing around trying to see as many friends as we could. Debating where to go first and last. How late the trains ran or which taxis to call. I looked forward to surrounding myself with the chaos and excitement that counting in the new year brings. Just one year ago my priorities were so different.

This New Year's Eve I am looking forward to curling up in our warm bed, right next to the boy and cat that I love the most. I'm trading the late nights and craziness for the butterflies, nervousness, and happiness that feeling our little (upside down now!!) baby kicking my belly, safely sandwiched between us brings. Toasting 2010 with a big glass of sparkling grape juice while the fireworks and yelps from people outside filters through the walls of our new cozy house.

I love this New Year's Eve the best. There is nothing that feels better or more right than this here right now.

Wishing you all a happy 2010!!


38 Weeks

Sweet Dreams, Henry.

My wonderful (and very talented!) friend Melissa made this beautiful mobile for Baby H's room. I know he's going to love it just as much as we already do...



Tomorrow is our external cephalic version....wish me luck!! Turn baby! Turn!

A Picture Is Worth a Thousand Words...

I haven't written lately because a) we've been so busy moving into our new house and b) I am suffering from blog envy. I love reading other people's blogs but have come to the conclusion that I need to stop reading so much and instead work on improving my writing skills. I love how most have such a way with words and the more I read the more I realize I am far from filling their shoes. I think I'll just post some pictures tonight, brush up on my creative writing skills, and save trying to type something half interesting for another rainy day. Pictures are easy. They speak for themselves. And that, I can totally do.

35 Weeks!


36 1/2 Weeks!

We're going to be parents soon!

I had one of four remaining baby doctor appointments on Wednesday and a super quick ultrasound peak showed Henry sitting up in my uterus the wrong way. He's what doctors like to refer to as "breech" but I'm calling it, "really confused". The breech position is not normal and doctors would like to see him laying head down or else it's c-section time. A breech baby looks like this:

* picture from: http://www.mensxp.com/UltimateEditorInclude/UserFiles/01%20A/normalvbreech.jpg

He should have turned on his own by now and most likely will not without a special procedure called an External Cephalic Version. If this guy doesn't flip on his own, this will be me Wednesday, December 23rd at 12:30 pm. Don't even ask me how much this freaks me out.

Note to family and family friends: this video is totally clean. Just creepy and kind of gross/weird. Maybe compare to Ripley's Believe it or Not...

I'll Light the Fire...

Our house is a very, very fine house
With two cats in the yard
Life used to be so hard
Now everything is easy
'Cause of you.
-Crosby, Stills, Nash, and Young

Best Dad Ever!

Last night G told me to post these pictures of him painting Henry's room and to title this entry "Best Dad Ever!". And while Baby Henry isn't even here yet, I totally already agree with him. And the Best Dad EVER award goes to....G.

Also, look at that color! SO fun!

Bright As Yellow/The Innocence Mission.

For many wonderful reasons I just love The Innocence Mission. The memories I associate with their music are some of the most beautiful thoughts inside my head.

Can You Find the Cat?

B had to come to work with me when I just about killed her with an Advil. She loved hiding out in the laundry room!

We're painting Henry's room today, a bright turquoise!

I just love painted walls :-)

Go, Go, Go.

My mind is on overload. We have too, too much going on right now and while it is all very exciting I am ready to just be settled so I can begin quieting my thoughts and easing my restlessness. I am ready to be all moved in to our new place and pretty stressed that I haven't been able to tackle any part of Henry's room. We're tripping over boxes of useless crap, organizing a garage sale, and computing from the bathroom floor next to a recovering kitty. Unpacking boxes of clothes and towels and blankets, trying to decide what stays and what goes. Creating new ways to hide our things that we don't use too much in closets and under sofas.... behind the things we do use. We're looking at getting a dog, transferring all of our mail to our new address, and eating horribly because of our busy schedules. And although we don't talk about it too much (we probably should), I can tell that G and I are equally stressed out...which makes spending actual time together much different than before. I'm not too worried though, I know everything will get back to its previous state. Eventually. Maybe we'll get one stress free week together before this baby pops out. Maybe.

This whole nesting things got me list-making like crazy but the things on my to-do list can't be done until the house is finished. Things like painting walls and sewing more Baby H outfits and hanging cool plants from the ceiling and building spice racks and hanging pictures and oh-my-goodness-we-haven't-even-put-up-Christmas-things! These things are all really important to me right now, which is funny because before I think I could have really cared less.

Today my absent mindedness almost killed no-claws-B. I picked her up from surgery yesterday and she was doing pretty alright for just going through what was probably the most confusing and stressful two days of her entire life. Instead of sending me home with pain meds like the vet had mentioned before, they told me that she was doing so well she could just take Advil. Advil? Really? Okay! I was happy that it was much, much cheaper than the meds they were originally
sending her home with. Last night I mashed up the pieces of pill inside some of her favorite treats and she ate them right up.

Since those worked sooo well, I called the vet today to ask when I could give her another. They said, "Wait. You gave her ADVIL?!?! You were supposed to give her ASPIRIN!!!" They told me to monitor her closely and watch for signs of excessive bleeding and/or vomiting. I felt so bad. What had I done! Here she makes it through this painful procedure and I trick her into eating medicine that could actually kill her?

She's at work with me today, locked up in the family's laundry room and seems to be doing just fine. Knock on wood and cross your fingers (but not both you're fingers OR your toes) and pray and oh-shoot, oh-shoot hope that she's going to be okay. It's almost been 24 hours since she ate the pill and like my mom said once before, "That cat could make it through anything with her satanic powers."

I need to start listening better from now on.

We have internet at our house now and we're getting a new (used) futon for the baby room! We had a huge storm last night and lost power for two hours which was a nice excuse to stop packing and sit around candles for a bit.

Oh, am I excited for the weekend....

Week 33

Week 33 was definitely a memorable one. Sleeping in a hotel with cat, eating free cafeteria food that made me want to puke every time I smelled it, waking up every two hours to Lady Gaga music videos, and searching for a mold free home. G said that if Baby H was living in the hotel with us it'd be a lot like Suite Life of Zack and Cody...which would make Baby H awesome (although we already think he's pretty alright).



* suite life photo from allmoviephoto.com

Salt Water.

One of my favorite things about Savannah is that when the tide is high, the flatlands surrounding the islands overflow with water from the Atlantic. I love driving back with my windows open and smelling the ocean all the way home.

The Atlantic Ocean can't compete with the Pacific...but on days like these it's hard to complain.

Long Weekend.

We are officially completely moved in to our new house! G and I spent the entire weekend moving our things over to the new house and cleaning the old one...a project that I am more than happy to leave behind. We are really lucky to know some wonderful people here who helped us load and unload the truck and we couldn't have done it without them. Moving when you're pregnant is hard because you feel so lazy and guilty while everyone moves large boxes and furniture. I felt like a wimp carrying down stacks of books and odds and ends, pots and pans. I had to keep reminding myself that I'm not as agile as I used to be and that I should take it easy.

It feels good to have everything we own together in the same place, rather than spread out between car, hotel, old house, and new. It's also overwhelming just seeing how much junk we've managed to accumulate over the past six months. We're planning on garage sale-ing a ton of things this Saturday which will be great because we'll actually be able to walk through our rooms without tripping over chairs and boxes and clothes.

I took Bunz to the vet today to have her claws removed. I hate that we have to put her through such an awful thing, especially with the new move and upcoming dog and baby appearances. For those of you who know nothing about me, please do not bother lecturing me on the cruelty of de-clawing. I do not think it's a fair or pleasant experience to put any animal through and have dreaded this day since the first time we talked about having to do it. We just simply do not have a choice. B isn't the kind of cat who would love to be pet by our baby and I'm just not willing to take the risk of her scratching baby H all up and down. And those of you who have met B know that if we were to give her to the shelter, no one would adopt her because she is so scary and unfriendly to strangers.

I just got a call from the vet letting us know that everything went smoothly and that she'll be able to come home with us on Wednesday. Poor little B.


Hope you all had a great Thanksgiving...I'll write much more and post pictures when we get internet in our teeny-tiny new home!

White Winter Hymnal/Fleet Foxes.

This song really makes me miss having real Falls and cold Winters. I never thought I'd be saying this, but I really want to be in Chicago right now putting on two sweaters, a huge coat, boots, and mittens...just to walk in the snow to go to the grocery store and back.

Warm and humid Thanksgivings? Mild temperature, no snow Christmases? No thanks.

Guuurl, You Lookin' Good In Them Jeans......

Today I bought my first maternity clothes. I was originally thinking that perhaps I could make it this entire pregnancy without having to wear one item with "MATERNITY" on the tag. At the rate this baby's growing now...it was only a matter of time.

I also thought that I would never (EVER) own a pair of those god-awful jeans with the elastic band running up past the stomach. And so, I have been cramming my newly popped big ol' belly into my pre-preggo jeans (with the help of a hair tie looped through the button hole. It's beginning to get a little uncomfortable.

Just for kicks and out of extreme curiosity I tried on a pair of those "horrible" jeans and there was the "Oh-my-gosh-these-are-SOOOO-comfortable-why-didn't-I-buy-these-three-months-ago-I'm-totally-going-to-sleep-in-these-I-think-I-can-get-away-with-wearing-them-every-day-does-this-band-actually-make-my-baby-bump-look-smaller!!-now-I-can-wear-all-of-my-old-shirts-these-are-amazing" feeling. [Meg G- this one's for you!]

Shopping for maternity clothes was really hard for me to do without my mom. It really felt like one of those rare and special times that you should be experiencing with your mom and it was weird doing it without her. I almost felt guilty, like I should have gone shopping with her months ago when they were visiting for my birthday.

I really wish she could have been there to laugh at all of the stretchy waist lines and over sized sweaters with me. I wish she could have been there to tell me which jeans fit me the best and which shirts to keep....

D.A.N.C.E/Justice.

We at the Hotel, Motel, Holiday Inn....

We just found out that this hotel will be our home until November 28th. We stopped by the house to pick up our mail and our neighbors said that our landlord told them they can terminate their lease as well...so it must be a pretty moldy situation up there. G couldn't resist a peak inside our (used to be) home and he said that the whole area smells like harsh chemicals and they are running air filters in every room.

On Wednesday I spent the whole day trying to find a new home for us to move into (with no luck). I viewed over seven apartments and must have called about thirty as well. At 5:00 G came home from work, jumped on Craigslist, and within minutes found us a cute little house in a safe neighborhood. This is how it always happens, so I'm figuring either I'm really bad at house hunting or he's just really lucky when it comes to that kind of stuff.

Two days later and we've signed the lease on a CUTE two bedroom house. A HOUSE. Our own house! Rent is about two hundred dollars cheaper than what we were paying for our (much larger) mold garden. The thing I love the most is that the walls are painted fun colors. I've always wanted to live in a house with colored walls, but have always been too lazy to even think about painting and then re-painting everything white before our lease ends. The house is so small it actually feels like a home, somewhere you actually look forward to coming back too after work. We get the keys on Wednesday and move in by Saturday (after Thanksgiving)!!!


Because of the smaller size of this house, we have to downsize big time. I can't wait to start throwing out a lot of our household items that never get used. It's like we're starting over, which feels really good. New baby, new house, new adventure. Go us. Yay!

Goodbyes and Big Stomachs.

Today I said goodbye to all my little kiddos. I thought I'd be real excited but it was actually really hard. At least I'm not moving and will be able to visit them whenever I want. BIG plus of leaving? Not being so sick all the time!



Speaking of BIG...holy crap look at my stomach now! AND it gets bigger? This is getting really funny.



My family sent us a bunch baby clothes AND a machine for listening to baby's heartbeat! I can't wait to listen in on him and also for G to hear it as well (his first time!)

Roll The Dice...

Our friend Katie took this picture over the weekend. I just love it so much, especially because it captures our relationship pretty perfectly. We're staying in a hotel until Tuesday to avoid the mold garden that has since taken over our house. It's like Jumanji over there, black and blue mold quickly creeping and crawling over the walls and floors, tables, and beds. All of our things are covered in fuzz and every day the mold spreads to more and more of our belongings (including Little Baby's things! :-/ ) Maybe this whole thing would be more bearable if we had an unshaven Robin Williams running around, cutting through the mold with a machete and making tons of PG jokes while doing it.

While I'm missing my bed already, I can't say I'll miss coughing and sneezing all of the time and hardly sleeping because I'm paranoid about the spores I'm breathing in. It's also pretty freakin nice to have a high powered shower and clean sheets, cable TV, and continental breakfasts too. Cat is having a great time as well and loves the big new bed and all of the crawling spaces she's discovering inside our (two bedroom!) room.

I Can't wait until this whole thing gets figured out. To tell you the truth, I wouldn't mind getting out of the whole place and into somewhere actually livable.

An Update and a Rant.

This weekend we got to play around Savannah with two of our wonderful Chicago friends. I don't think I really realized how badly we need more friends here before I picked them up at the airport. This whole weekend flew by, obviously time does when you're so busy having a blast almost 24/7.

This weekend, I learned that although I am over seven months pregnant, I can still walk into a bar without stares or giggles. I can still ride bikes all over the beach and take pictures while doing so (I'll post some of those later...) I learned that blasting Miley Cyrus', "Party in the USA" is way more fun when you are driving a car full of friends home at one o'clock in the morning. I also learned that I miss Chicago like crazy...or maybe I just miss all the people we left behind.

The baby room is getting more complete and I have been having so much fun framing artwork and painting shelves. The rest of our house will always be scattered, incomplete, and somewhat bare, but that baby room? EEEEE-Gawds! (as my Grandma would say) it's gonna blow your mind. Matching furniture? What?! Carpet? What?! Organization? Whoa.

Guess you know where to find me....


I think I've been putting so much time and effort into decorating that room because I am getting so sick of our apartment. Maybe it's the whole "nesting" thing...whatever that is, but I am so tired of our house looking and feeling so disorganized. I never realized how expensive it is to actually decorate a house and make it feel like a home.

Also, lately it seems like no matter how much I clean the house is always messy. And not in a "lived in" sort of way. I'm talking about a "moldy, damp, and smelly" sort of way. We have black mold covering the walls of our back room and our pillow cases, blankets, and clothes are always damp at night. I get home from work and spend the rest of the night sneezing and coughing up who-knows-what because of it all. Makes me real excited to get home.

I don't think there's anything we can really do about the mold and dampness, which makes the whole thing that much worse. And then I think about bringing a baby into that environment and I just about loose it. Now that Savannah is cooling off a bit, the mold and condensation in our place has really become a pain. Any one have sugguestions? I'm sick of being sick and I'm sick of scrubbing mold and dust all the time. I want to look forward to coming home, instead of dreading it all day.

Gross.

30 Weeks!

Only ten more weeks (at the most!) left in this pregnancy? Yikes! We are getting so excited, I get butterflies every time I think about meeting the tiny guy.


29 1/2 Weeks!

30 Weeks!

30 Weeks!

We're working on it!

A Typical Day At Work:

F: What are you eating?
A: A mint.
F: Oh...............What are you eating?
A: A mint.
F: Oh................What are you eating?
A: I already told you what I'm eating, so you tell me what I'm eating.
F: Huh?
A: What am I eating?
F: Huh?
A: WHAT am I EATING?
F: Huh?
A: A MINT!
F: Oh..........A mint?
A: Yep!
F: Oh.........I have some for me too?
A: No, none for F...they are too spicy.
F: Too spicy?
A: Yep.....
F: Oh........Too spicy mint?
A: Yep.
F: Oh. I have some spicy mint too?
A: Nope, sorry.
F: What are you eating?
A: It's a mint!
F: Oh, I have a jelly bean too?
A: I don't have jelly beans.
F: Oh. What you have?
A: A MINT.

SO glad it's my Friday....

Got To Admit It's Getting Better.

I've had some serious bronchitis for the past three weeks now and am getting rather sick of it. This last week was a rollercoaster of emotions for me as I went from thinking I was getting better to finding out that I had made it all worse by overdoing it. I mean, God I hadn't had a day off for the last 25 days! Doctors were telling me that I might have to be put on steroids (which aren't good for the baby AT ALL) and have chest x-rays (also bad news for baby). And I've been taking so many antibiotics that poor Baby Henry was probably seeing bright colors and thinking "What the crap is going on in here?!"

Good news today though! I went to a pulmonologist and he says that I should be getting better if I just take it easy for the next few days. That means absolutely no working, exercising, or being around large groups of people until Monday (fingers crossed it's that early!)

This week has been really hard for me...not necessarily the whole sick part of it but the making myself stop and slow down part. I've gotten in the habit lately of running myself into the ground, working long hours and giving every ounce of energy to my jobs. It's a struggle for me to make myself wind down but I've made myself so sick that the doctor actually told me to just take a break for a while and let my body heal itself. I think I've over scheduled myself with job after job and tons of after-hour lesson plans/project planning so that my mind would stay active and less focused on my growing belly and the stresses that brings.

But if this scary week has taught me anything, it's that making yourself rest and even being a little selfish is really an okay thing sometimes.

27 Weeks...

and growing!

The Veggie System.

CONGRATULATIONS! Your baby is now as tall as an English hothouse cucumber and weighs about the same as a large head of cauliflower!

Apparently the easiest way to visualize the size/weight of your baby is by really knowing your veggies. Measuring a baby by common, well known objects is a great idea...my doctor even uses the "veggie system". But seriously, could they have chosen any more bizarre vegetables to give parents an idea of their baby's size?

At ten weeks little baby was the size of a kumquat. I've never even seen a kumquat before. At 17 weeks he was the size of a turnip and just a few weeks ago marked the day his weight was equal to the weight of a rutabaga.

Now that I am 27 weeks along, I get to start comparing my baby to vegetables by weight only. No more, "Your baby is as tall as a sesame seed". Congratulations to me because from now on it's, "Your baby weighs as much as a large jicama".


* picture from babycenter.com

Picture Update!

26 Weeks

Visiting Joe and Maile at Disney World.

Joe and Maile.

G Makes Black Bean Burgers!

Washington State's Not So Bad After All...

Fall is here, although it hasn't even felt like it until today. I'm getting tired of hot and muggy days, one right after the other. October is supposed to be sweater weather...this just doesn't feel right. Today, however, has been perfect. It's been raining and dark all day and even a little "chilly" (Savannah's "chilly" is like Washington's "warm"). And this morning G made pot roast with vegetables in the crock pot and it's making the whole house smell like a home. I haven't had pot roast in forever, growing up my mom used to make it all the time. It has got to be one of my favorite dishes, especially on colder days.

Last night I realized that I've gotten really bad at social situations. In Chicago I was capable of being around a group of people I barely knew. I was more outgoing, less stressed, and not awkward. I actually found going out enjoyable and looked forward to doing it. Apparently since we've moved here I've managed to loose all of that. Maybe it's the fact that we have no real friends here. It is hard going from hanging out with the same one person (thanks G) every night of the week, to being around a bunch of people your age that you hardly know. Or maybe it's the fact that I'm pregnant so I already feel like I stick out in a group of socializing peers. It's like, "Hey guys. I really have nothing in common with you...unless you've had a baby before." And it's not like you can tell people, "I really used to be good at this social stuff a few months ago. I swear I used to fun. You should have known me last year...Blah, blah, blah".

Lately I've been thinking about how much this baby is going to change our lives. There's the obvious- less sleep, fewer nights out, baby toys scattered across the house. But it's the not so obvious that's been creeping up on me lately. The baby stuff you never think about until you are actually having a kid (oh crap). Like the fact that from here on out, we are responsible for a life other than our own. Like the fact that our priorities are changing and we're really having to grow up. Fast. Like the fact that the old things will never be the same again. Like, oh crap I wish I had done more carefree, stupid things while I was only responsible for my own life.

Because starting in three months we're going to be watching our old lives quickly change into something new. We'll be saying goodbye to our old lives and accepting change. Nothing will be the same as it used to.

And while it's hard and scary to realize this, it is the most exciting and wonderful thing that we have ever experienced.

So while I might be awkward and boring, I'll raise an O'douls to our new life as a family of three and watch our priorities evolve into ones that actually matter for once.

Dance Babies.

I smile so much every time these guys dance together. Seriously too cute, it's the best part about my job!

This thing gets even BIGGER?!

The internet at our house is down, so I'm trying to catch up on everything while the kids I watch are asleep. Everything is going really well, been super busy with work and baby making (not that kind...already did that!) The other day at Target a girl asked me if I was pregnant and I just about flipped out. I seriously could have hugged her right then and there, if it wasn't for the counter separating us. Holy crap this belly is really popping! 25 weeks- in baby months thats about six already! Grow baby, grow!

I really like this picture because it shows how my belly is un-rounding. That's a made up pregnancy term for a lop-sided, almost triangular belly shape. It's not rounded fat anymore. Just a few weeks ago it was just a little bit of pudge and now...Oh my goodness! There's really a baby in there!

By this time, the baby's brain and nerve endings are developed enough for it to be able to feel things and it's arms are already the size they will be at birth! He weighs about one and a half pounds and is thirteen and a half inches long. And this thing gets even bigger? Yikes!

I took my camera into work yesterday and snapped some photos of the ridiculously cute (and wild) children in my class. They really aren't supposed to be climbing in their cubbies like they are but seriously, come on. Would you be able to remove them?


I finally completed the first baby outfit I have officially ever sewed. Unfortunately it wasn't the little green jumper I was hoping to make, I got in waaay over my head with that one. This onezie was pretty easy and a lot of fun to make. One of my new favorite things is Heat N' Bond. I think I'll make a giraffe one next but there are a million possiblities it's so hard to choose.

23 1/2 Weeks.

The other day I was at the grocery store and I couldn't find what I was looking for. I walked up to someone stocking the shelves and said, "Excuse me, do you know where I could find cornstarch?" And instead of looking at my face, he stared at my stomach for a bit. I was so excited and have decided that it's much more fun being a bit more pregnant than just walking around with what could be nothing more than just a beer and pizza belly.

Every night around 11:00 this baby starts to dance. I can feel him wiggling all around and even kicking off of my stomach. Sometimes I grab G's hand, waking him from his sleep and say, "QUICK! FEEL THIS!" Of course, once I place his hand on my stomach the baby holds completely still. He thinks he's been able to feel him move at least once.

I want to be having bizarre food cravings but so far there's been nothing. I guess I eat more lemons and cheese than I'm used to and there's hardly ever a time when Mexican food doesn't sound good. I guess the whole pickles and ice cream story is just a myth.

Right now we both really like the name Henry. And Elliot. Henry Elliot Marr? Hmmmm.

Oh, and did I mention G's back from Montreal? It was a loooong and super quiet week here without him and both me and cat are very excited to have him back. It's fun to have someone to laugh, talk, and bicker with again. And at the end of the work day, it's especially nice to have someone to curl up next to in our big comfy bed.

He's Back!

And it feels so good.

The Window Lizard.

One of our favorite things lately has been our window lizard. Every night around 8:00, a tiny lizard appears and clings to the same window screen for about forty five minutes. He's been here a whole week in a row. We were really surprised to see it at first, but now just expect it to be there. Even Cat, who was really into chasing it at first, has gotten so used to its company that when it comes she just kind of stares at it and then falls back asleep.

I feel like I'm getting HUGE, although I still seem to be much smaller than most girls at week 21.
WEEK 21?!

Holy crap.

First Baby Outfits!

Today we each picked out an outfit for Baby (Henry? Elliot?). We had so much fun looking through the size: tiny clothes and ooo-ing and aww-ing over them all. Okay, mostly it was me making the rediculous noises...although G was pretty into his outfit choice.



And yes, mom. Those are weiner dogs on the sleeper. ;-)