This is my current favorite pic of the babe... I keep wondering if his eyes will stay blue but only time will tell.
Major good news - he got into daycare. What a huge sigh of relief. I have never been so happy to hand over every cent of my disposable income. Ahhh, the life of parenthood!
Monday, March 21, 2011
2 months old!
Friday, March 04, 2011
Emmett gets dedicated
Here is a shot of Emmett getting dedicated. Our little man has the Stratton performing gene because he was actually awake for the entire thing. His Grandpa loved introducing him to the church!
He also looked super cute in his tiny white collar shirt and blue plaid pants.
Tuesday, March 01, 2011
Eating my way through Evansville
This weekend we headed home to Evansville, IN and my number one priority (other than spending time with family) was to eat my face off. I have been making up for lost calories and consuming mass quantities of food now that I am no longer pregnant and don't want to throw up every five minutes.
Without any further ado... here is my Evansville food diary!
Thursday
On the way down to Eville I suddenly get hungry. The next McDonald's is in half an hour, but this hunger is dire. We stop at a gas station to get Combos, cheetos, and some chocolate Donnettes. I snarf the donuts and some cheetos and combos. Half an hour later we stop for McDonald's and I take down a crispy classic chicken sandwich with fries.
We arrive at the parents' house at 4:30. Dinner is at my favorite mexican restaurant, Los Bravos, at 7:30. I am starving already and eat a granola bar, a bowl of grapes, and a big glass of milk. I warn my mom that I may eat her out of house and home.
Dinner at Los Bravos is everything I hope for and more. I immediately order the cheesy bean dip since I can't have too much salsa (don't want to eat too spicy and piss little man off!) and a virgin strawberry daiquiri. I work on the dip and tortilla chips until our meals show up approximately five minutes after we put in the order. I eat 3/4 of the two enchiladas on my plate and the better part of my rice. I take home the rest of the enchiladas and the chicken taco that came on the side of my plate. Before leaving I smear the rest of the bean dip onto the chicken taco. Hubs laughs at me and asks who I am right now.
On the way home we see that the "Hot and Fresh NOW" sign is on at Krispy Kreme. I insist we stop and get a half dozen donuts. To be fair, I only ate one. Also, Milly had a half of one. She loves Krispy Kreme!
Friday
My mom makes a pineapple coffee cake for breakfast and I have a big piece of that and a glass of milk. Then, before heading out I eat the taco from Los Bravos the night before. The shell got mushy but it still tastes amazing!
On the way to visit with some friends we stop by Pizza King for stromboli and chips that are only sold around Evansville - Grippos. The grippos are thick with barbeque seasoning and they are OH so good. I eat half of my stromboli and save the other half for later. After visiting with the friends, we stop back by Pizza King to get a stromboli for my brother. While waiting for Jay's stromboli we spin through the drive through of a local ice cream shop, Lic's. I get a one scoop cappuccino cone and eat it while we wait. Once we get back to the house (around 3) I take down the other half of my stromboli.
Dinner is at 6 at Rafferty's, which is a chain restaurant with classic Americana food. There is not a Rafferty's in Chicago, I think the chain is mostly in the south. There I order a cup of baked potato soup and the chicken finger salad. Lest you think that the salad is healthy, just know that it's topped with fried chicken fingers and the dressing is a combination of honey mustard and HOT BACON GREASE. And lo, it is good.
After dinner my brother and his fiance hit up Coldstone. I request a small berry ice cream.
Saturday
My dad hit up Cracker barrel at the break of dawn and brought back a massive blueberry muffin. I eat part of that before our family breakfast at 9AM. At breakfast I eat a biscuit and a large serving of breakfast casserole.
For lunch, we order Kipplee's. Hot ham and cheese, pizza, and dough dogs (tiny hot dogs with dough wrapped around them). I eat a little bit of all of that, and graze on some hot ham and cheese in the afternoon. My sister heads to Lic's with a friend and she asks if I want anything. I request another one scoop cappuccino cone.
Dinner is rolls, green beans, and my mom's lasagna. I eat two servings of lasagna before falling asleep on a chair in the living room with the baby on my chest. It's pretty much how I roll these days - eating and sleeping with the baby cuddled up on me!
Sunday
I grab a Cliff Bar on the way to church at 8:45. After church I wolf down more hot ham and cheese at home while we pack up. Then we stop at Sonic on the way out of town where I get a cheeseburger, tater tots, and a large cherry limeade.
Man, I love eating in Evansville! I think I am definitely making up for lost time with the eating!
Without any further ado... here is my Evansville food diary!
Thursday
On the way down to Eville I suddenly get hungry. The next McDonald's is in half an hour, but this hunger is dire. We stop at a gas station to get Combos, cheetos, and some chocolate Donnettes. I snarf the donuts and some cheetos and combos. Half an hour later we stop for McDonald's and I take down a crispy classic chicken sandwich with fries.
We arrive at the parents' house at 4:30. Dinner is at my favorite mexican restaurant, Los Bravos, at 7:30. I am starving already and eat a granola bar, a bowl of grapes, and a big glass of milk. I warn my mom that I may eat her out of house and home.
Dinner at Los Bravos is everything I hope for and more. I immediately order the cheesy bean dip since I can't have too much salsa (don't want to eat too spicy and piss little man off!) and a virgin strawberry daiquiri. I work on the dip and tortilla chips until our meals show up approximately five minutes after we put in the order. I eat 3/4 of the two enchiladas on my plate and the better part of my rice. I take home the rest of the enchiladas and the chicken taco that came on the side of my plate. Before leaving I smear the rest of the bean dip onto the chicken taco. Hubs laughs at me and asks who I am right now.
On the way home we see that the "Hot and Fresh NOW" sign is on at Krispy Kreme. I insist we stop and get a half dozen donuts. To be fair, I only ate one. Also, Milly had a half of one. She loves Krispy Kreme!
Friday
My mom makes a pineapple coffee cake for breakfast and I have a big piece of that and a glass of milk. Then, before heading out I eat the taco from Los Bravos the night before. The shell got mushy but it still tastes amazing!
On the way to visit with some friends we stop by Pizza King for stromboli and chips that are only sold around Evansville - Grippos. The grippos are thick with barbeque seasoning and they are OH so good. I eat half of my stromboli and save the other half for later. After visiting with the friends, we stop back by Pizza King to get a stromboli for my brother. While waiting for Jay's stromboli we spin through the drive through of a local ice cream shop, Lic's. I get a one scoop cappuccino cone and eat it while we wait. Once we get back to the house (around 3) I take down the other half of my stromboli.
Dinner is at 6 at Rafferty's, which is a chain restaurant with classic Americana food. There is not a Rafferty's in Chicago, I think the chain is mostly in the south. There I order a cup of baked potato soup and the chicken finger salad. Lest you think that the salad is healthy, just know that it's topped with fried chicken fingers and the dressing is a combination of honey mustard and HOT BACON GREASE. And lo, it is good.
After dinner my brother and his fiance hit up Coldstone. I request a small berry ice cream.
Saturday
My dad hit up Cracker barrel at the break of dawn and brought back a massive blueberry muffin. I eat part of that before our family breakfast at 9AM. At breakfast I eat a biscuit and a large serving of breakfast casserole.
For lunch, we order Kipplee's. Hot ham and cheese, pizza, and dough dogs (tiny hot dogs with dough wrapped around them). I eat a little bit of all of that, and graze on some hot ham and cheese in the afternoon. My sister heads to Lic's with a friend and she asks if I want anything. I request another one scoop cappuccino cone.
Dinner is rolls, green beans, and my mom's lasagna. I eat two servings of lasagna before falling asleep on a chair in the living room with the baby on my chest. It's pretty much how I roll these days - eating and sleeping with the baby cuddled up on me!
Sunday
I grab a Cliff Bar on the way to church at 8:45. After church I wolf down more hot ham and cheese at home while we pack up. Then we stop at Sonic on the way out of town where I get a cheeseburger, tater tots, and a large cherry limeade.
Man, I love eating in Evansville! I think I am definitely making up for lost time with the eating!
Monday, January 31, 2011
Groundhog Days
My days are like the movie "Groundhog Day" but in increments of 3 hours instead of 24. Feed kiddo, change him, hang out/sleep for a bit and then start it all over. But I love it! I'm loving being around our little man all day. And it's cold outside, so it's nice to not go out there!
Tuesday, January 18, 2011
Birth story
I was drying my hair when I felt a little bit like I'd wet myself. Weird... I thought... I didn't think I had to go. But whatevs... maybe baby kicked my bladder or something. I pottied again, put a pad in just in case I did it again, finished getting ready and headed off to work.
In the car on the way to work I called Mike. "Call your doctor," he told me. So of course I hung up and called my friend Tracy, who has a two year old. "Go home, change into fresh underclothes. Roll around in bed, stand up and if water comes out then your water probably broke." I headed back home to try this out, but once I got home and used the bathroom again I realized what was coming out was tinged pink. I knew at this point that something was happening - what, exactly, was the big question. I called the Doctor's office and left a message - the on-call doctor called me back almost immediately and told me to head to triage at the Women's Hospital. I called Mike, told him I was heading to the hospital (he then convinced me to bring my hospital bag, which was mostly already packed, with a listing of what else I needed on top of the bag, so I quickly tossed the other items in the bag and headed out).
On the way to the hospital I stopped and got a bagel with schmear from Einstein's, and then promptly got stuck in rush-hour traffic on the way to the hospital. I didn't have any contractions at this point, so I wasn't too worried about getting there fast. My dad called when I was in the car on the way down there, and I freaked out that he knew I was headed to the hospital (he'd happened to call Mike when Mike was heading out of the office). "Don't tell anyone!" I exlaimed to him. I was terrified that people would think I was in labor and then we would just find out I peed my pants. That would have been awesome.
At this point, I was 34 weeks and 4 days. After 34 weeks, the risk to the baby of staying inside after your water breaks is greater than the risks of being born a bit early. So when I got to the hospital and they confirmed my water had broken, they brought me up to a labor and delivery room. My doctor stopped by - she happened to be at the hospital - and told me that her colleague was on call and would deliver me. She jokingly said "I wasn't supposed to see you here yet!" when she walked into the room. We discussed starting some pitocin to start labor and I had been dead against the use of pitocin. I asked her to check my dilation to see if I'd started progressing at all first and she balked a bit - they don't like to check too often after your water has broken b.c they don't want to introduce germs to the baby's environment and I was just a bit crampy/didn't have real contractions yet. But she checked and at that point I was 3cm. We agreed to start just a bit of pitocin to get my labor going - the nurse mentioned that pitocin can be dialed up to 40 or so and I was on 2 or 4 most of the time. So I didn't need a whole lot to really get the contractions rolling.
And rolling they did. I didn't want the epidural until I really needed it, and so I did the full blown labor thing until I was about 5cm dilated. The contractions were coming pretty close together and were not pleasant at all.... I demanded that Mike stand by me and that my Dad (who had jumped on a plane only half an hour after talking to me - when I'd told everyone to wait and see if I was even IN labor or not before doing anything... hahah) not talk at all during contractions. I even yelled at him a little bit when he got chatty during a contraction. Hey, I was in labor! I get to yell right?
Around 5cm I finally called Uncle and got the darn epidural already. Dadnd Mike had to step out of the room while the anesthesiologist attending and resident did their thing. I really didn't feel anything at all (they do topical anesthetic before sticking you with the needle) and the nice nurse we had held my hand. I was a bit scared but it ended up being total cake. Relief washed over my midsection and my legs went numb. I went from writhing in pain to being on top of the world. I had to actually look at the monitor to see when I was having a contraction. Since it was around 2:30 and Mike hadn't had lunch yet, I sent him off for a cheeseburger and fries while I was on Cloud Epidural Nine. Thank goodness I did this too, because it was going to turn out to be a long day.
Getting in some reading after the epi
The nurses kept fiddling with my pitocin, dialing it up to a 4 or 6 and then back to a 2-3 after the contractions came too fast. I was feeling a short pain in my right side but it was nowhere near as painful as the early contractions. That was the only indication I had that I was having a contraction at the time. I will just say I expected to be in ALOT more pain during labor, epidural or not. By 5 or so I begged the resident to check how far I was dilated. I simply needed to know if I was going to be in for another hour of waiting around or another half day of waiting around before pushing. I was 8cm and fully effaced, so things were definitely in full swing. About an hour later the doc himself swung by, pronounced me 10 cm dilated and gave the nurse instructions to start the pushing. At this point I didn't really feel the urge to push (as the doctor said "You have a really good epidural") but that doctor said we could get things going anyway. My nurse, Autumn, who had been helping out in several rooms, notified someone else to take over her other rooms and prepared to start the pushing process. We loved this labor and delivery nurse - I have a new respect for the nursing profession after this whole experience!!
I'm told that usually people are allowed to push for about 3 hours. I pushed for 5. I was not tired and in a great mood to just meet our little one. I didn't want to have a csection after a whole bunch of pushing, so I just kept begging to keep going. We tried pushing in about every position in the book. We could see a bit of change but the whole effort wasn't really going very far. At one point I made a whole lot of progress, and we got to the point where the nurse said she thought I was far enough along to avoid a csection. This made me pretty happy.
At about 5 hours of pushing, the Doc came back in and talked to us. I had been pushing for two full hours longer than he usually lets people, he could tell we were pretty tired out. He indicated that he could use the forceps and get baby out. At this point I was pretty convinced he was right and that baby wouldn't be arriving without some sort of help - I'd been pushing with all my might for 5 hours, Mike was exhausted, I was only OK b.c of all the adrenaline, and our nice L&D nurse had had to go home and she was replaced with one who wasn't very helpful or encouraging. So we looked at each other and knew that it was going to have to happen this way... he was sunny side up, facing up and just not coming out.
The minute we acquiesed to the forceps, the room jumped to life. The doc's resident came in to help position the forceps, the anethesiologist came in to redose my epi, and a team of pediatricians came in to attend to the baby since he was almost 6 weeks early. There were literally 20 people in the room as they positioned my legs up on some platforms and got me all medicated and positioned. I felt really bummed that I hadn't been able to push baby out on my own, but happy that he was going to make his way into the world like NOW. I also needed some more encouragement what with the Doc not being my doc and being very matter-of-fact/quiet and the nurse who wasn't friendly. And Mike was looking pretty exhausted. So I asked him to go get my sister. I needed someone in Hyper Cheerleader on Crack Mode. He and Katie stood at my side as the docs got all done and positioned and we waited for the next contraction.
The next contraction came and I pushed 5 times...and the docs pulled him right out. Katie was perfect, going nuts and hollering encouragement "You're doing it! You're doing it! It's out! He's perfect! He's perfect! Oh my gosh! You did it!" I collapsed, so relieved that Dos had made his way into the world, and so happy to have labor all over with.
The team of pediatricians attended to Dos, now christened Emmett Jeffrey, while my doc and resident finished delivering the rest of the "junk" and sewed me up. The doc wouldn't say how many stiches I had, which clued me into the fact that there were kind of alot. At this point my epidural was so well-supplied that I didn't much care.
They laid him on my chest and we all met each other as a family.
I love the look on Mike's face here.... our first moments as a family
We had an hour with him before they whisked the little one off to the NICU to be monitored and watched. Any baby under 35 weeks goes straight to the NICU. We were just 4 days short, delivering him at 34 weeks and 4 days. Now that we are home I am so thankful he had such great NICU staff to watch him and make sure he was 100% healthy. But at the time being away from him was SO HARD.
After I'd been sewed up, my Dad came in and told me he didn't know we were thinking of using his name as a middle name. His lip was trembling and he looked really touched. Katie told him he should just cry it out, and he pulled it together. So cute.
I wish I could say that we all just headed to our postpartum room after that, but right before they took Emmett to the NICU I got a really bad case of the shakes and could not get warm. I shivered for about two hours before finally dropping off to sleep and shaking it. It was pretty much the most awful part about the whole experience; I wanted someone to pitch me out the window it was so awful. My sister tried to feed Emmett a bottle; I was afraid I would drop him b.c I was shaking so bad so I wouldn't hold him while I was shaking. The nurse brought me a turkey sandwich but I was so messed up I couldn't eat it.
About two hours later they wheeled me down to the postpartum room where a nurse helped me clean up and into bed. She was amazing, and was the night nurse most of the time I was there. She was great. Thanks, Nelly!
Only two hours later I woke up with the realizations that a) I was going to need pain medication for awhile and b) that I had a son. I suddenly couldn't wait to see him. I ordered room service breakfast and prepared to go meet him, updating my facebook status to say that he had been born in the middle of the night. And the rest isn't really birth story...
In the car on the way to work I called Mike. "Call your doctor," he told me. So of course I hung up and called my friend Tracy, who has a two year old. "Go home, change into fresh underclothes. Roll around in bed, stand up and if water comes out then your water probably broke." I headed back home to try this out, but once I got home and used the bathroom again I realized what was coming out was tinged pink. I knew at this point that something was happening - what, exactly, was the big question. I called the Doctor's office and left a message - the on-call doctor called me back almost immediately and told me to head to triage at the Women's Hospital. I called Mike, told him I was heading to the hospital (he then convinced me to bring my hospital bag, which was mostly already packed, with a listing of what else I needed on top of the bag, so I quickly tossed the other items in the bag and headed out).
On the way to the hospital I stopped and got a bagel with schmear from Einstein's, and then promptly got stuck in rush-hour traffic on the way to the hospital. I didn't have any contractions at this point, so I wasn't too worried about getting there fast. My dad called when I was in the car on the way down there, and I freaked out that he knew I was headed to the hospital (he'd happened to call Mike when Mike was heading out of the office). "Don't tell anyone!" I exlaimed to him. I was terrified that people would think I was in labor and then we would just find out I peed my pants. That would have been awesome.
At this point, I was 34 weeks and 4 days. After 34 weeks, the risk to the baby of staying inside after your water breaks is greater than the risks of being born a bit early. So when I got to the hospital and they confirmed my water had broken, they brought me up to a labor and delivery room. My doctor stopped by - she happened to be at the hospital - and told me that her colleague was on call and would deliver me. She jokingly said "I wasn't supposed to see you here yet!" when she walked into the room. We discussed starting some pitocin to start labor and I had been dead against the use of pitocin. I asked her to check my dilation to see if I'd started progressing at all first and she balked a bit - they don't like to check too often after your water has broken b.c they don't want to introduce germs to the baby's environment and I was just a bit crampy/didn't have real contractions yet. But she checked and at that point I was 3cm. We agreed to start just a bit of pitocin to get my labor going - the nurse mentioned that pitocin can be dialed up to 40 or so and I was on 2 or 4 most of the time. So I didn't need a whole lot to really get the contractions rolling.
And rolling they did. I didn't want the epidural until I really needed it, and so I did the full blown labor thing until I was about 5cm dilated. The contractions were coming pretty close together and were not pleasant at all.... I demanded that Mike stand by me and that my Dad (who had jumped on a plane only half an hour after talking to me - when I'd told everyone to wait and see if I was even IN labor or not before doing anything... hahah) not talk at all during contractions. I even yelled at him a little bit when he got chatty during a contraction. Hey, I was in labor! I get to yell right?
Around 5cm I finally called Uncle and got the darn epidural already. Dadnd Mike had to step out of the room while the anesthesiologist attending and resident did their thing. I really didn't feel anything at all (they do topical anesthetic before sticking you with the needle) and the nice nurse we had held my hand. I was a bit scared but it ended up being total cake. Relief washed over my midsection and my legs went numb. I went from writhing in pain to being on top of the world. I had to actually look at the monitor to see when I was having a contraction. Since it was around 2:30 and Mike hadn't had lunch yet, I sent him off for a cheeseburger and fries while I was on Cloud Epidural Nine. Thank goodness I did this too, because it was going to turn out to be a long day.
Three cheers for epidurals
Getting in some reading after the epi
The nurses kept fiddling with my pitocin, dialing it up to a 4 or 6 and then back to a 2-3 after the contractions came too fast. I was feeling a short pain in my right side but it was nowhere near as painful as the early contractions. That was the only indication I had that I was having a contraction at the time. I will just say I expected to be in ALOT more pain during labor, epidural or not. By 5 or so I begged the resident to check how far I was dilated. I simply needed to know if I was going to be in for another hour of waiting around or another half day of waiting around before pushing. I was 8cm and fully effaced, so things were definitely in full swing. About an hour later the doc himself swung by, pronounced me 10 cm dilated and gave the nurse instructions to start the pushing. At this point I didn't really feel the urge to push (as the doctor said "You have a really good epidural") but that doctor said we could get things going anyway. My nurse, Autumn, who had been helping out in several rooms, notified someone else to take over her other rooms and prepared to start the pushing process. We loved this labor and delivery nurse - I have a new respect for the nursing profession after this whole experience!!
This chart told me when I was having a contraction
I'm told that usually people are allowed to push for about 3 hours. I pushed for 5. I was not tired and in a great mood to just meet our little one. I didn't want to have a csection after a whole bunch of pushing, so I just kept begging to keep going. We tried pushing in about every position in the book. We could see a bit of change but the whole effort wasn't really going very far. At one point I made a whole lot of progress, and we got to the point where the nurse said she thought I was far enough along to avoid a csection. This made me pretty happy.
At about 5 hours of pushing, the Doc came back in and talked to us. I had been pushing for two full hours longer than he usually lets people, he could tell we were pretty tired out. He indicated that he could use the forceps and get baby out. At this point I was pretty convinced he was right and that baby wouldn't be arriving without some sort of help - I'd been pushing with all my might for 5 hours, Mike was exhausted, I was only OK b.c of all the adrenaline, and our nice L&D nurse had had to go home and she was replaced with one who wasn't very helpful or encouraging. So we looked at each other and knew that it was going to have to happen this way... he was sunny side up, facing up and just not coming out.
The minute we acquiesed to the forceps, the room jumped to life. The doc's resident came in to help position the forceps, the anethesiologist came in to redose my epi, and a team of pediatricians came in to attend to the baby since he was almost 6 weeks early. There were literally 20 people in the room as they positioned my legs up on some platforms and got me all medicated and positioned. I felt really bummed that I hadn't been able to push baby out on my own, but happy that he was going to make his way into the world like NOW. I also needed some more encouragement what with the Doc not being my doc and being very matter-of-fact/quiet and the nurse who wasn't friendly. And Mike was looking pretty exhausted. So I asked him to go get my sister. I needed someone in Hyper Cheerleader on Crack Mode. He and Katie stood at my side as the docs got all done and positioned and we waited for the next contraction.
The next contraction came and I pushed 5 times...and the docs pulled him right out. Katie was perfect, going nuts and hollering encouragement "You're doing it! You're doing it! It's out! He's perfect! He's perfect! Oh my gosh! You did it!" I collapsed, so relieved that Dos had made his way into the world, and so happy to have labor all over with.
The team of pediatricians attended to Dos, now christened Emmett Jeffrey, while my doc and resident finished delivering the rest of the "junk" and sewed me up. The doc wouldn't say how many stiches I had, which clued me into the fact that there were kind of alot. At this point my epidural was so well-supplied that I didn't much care.
They laid him on my chest and we all met each other as a family.
When he came out I immediately started crying.... more crying came when they put him on my chest
I love the look on Mike's face here.... our first moments as a family
We had an hour with him before they whisked the little one off to the NICU to be monitored and watched. Any baby under 35 weeks goes straight to the NICU. We were just 4 days short, delivering him at 34 weeks and 4 days. Now that we are home I am so thankful he had such great NICU staff to watch him and make sure he was 100% healthy. But at the time being away from him was SO HARD.
After I'd been sewed up, my Dad came in and told me he didn't know we were thinking of using his name as a middle name. His lip was trembling and he looked really touched. Katie told him he should just cry it out, and he pulled it together. So cute.
I wish I could say that we all just headed to our postpartum room after that, but right before they took Emmett to the NICU I got a really bad case of the shakes and could not get warm. I shivered for about two hours before finally dropping off to sleep and shaking it. It was pretty much the most awful part about the whole experience; I wanted someone to pitch me out the window it was so awful. My sister tried to feed Emmett a bottle; I was afraid I would drop him b.c I was shaking so bad so I wouldn't hold him while I was shaking. The nurse brought me a turkey sandwich but I was so messed up I couldn't eat it.
About two hours later they wheeled me down to the postpartum room where a nurse helped me clean up and into bed. She was amazing, and was the night nurse most of the time I was there. She was great. Thanks, Nelly!
Only two hours later I woke up with the realizations that a) I was going to need pain medication for awhile and b) that I had a son. I suddenly couldn't wait to see him. I ordered room service breakfast and prepared to go meet him, updating my facebook status to say that he had been born in the middle of the night. And the rest isn't really birth story...
Wednesday, January 12, 2011
Our first family photo
Our little Dos came a bit early... more later but right now I'm getting in my cuddle time in the NICU. He's doing well but any baby born under 35 weeks goes straight to the NICU. We hope to have him home by next week. Maybe then I can post about his birth!
Emmett Jeffrey, 1:45 AM on 1/8/2011. 5 lbs, 12 ounces, 19 inches long
Wednesday, January 05, 2011
A small recap
The holidays were great! I didn't take much time off, but I accomplished SO MUCH over the two week span around the holidays that I didn't really care. I mean, how productive are most people usually over those two weeks? This time I got a huge amount of work-work done and also got the baby's room in Major Order. I finished the quilt my Grandma Stratton started like 20 years ago and addressed a bunch of baby announcement envelopes. Mike also took a large chunk out of his honey-do list and only has a few things left on it - none of which stress me out at all (OK, yes I would like the keg out of the baby's closet before Dos shows up, but it would make for a funny story as well. "When we brought you home Dad still had a year-old keg of skunked Bud Light in your closet"). He would only have one thing left on the honey-do list if someone else in the condo building hadn't already had the ladder... so he couldn't get up on the roof to pull the cables for the satellite back up there. Woe, poor boy, such is life. Maybe this weekend.
Mike and I both got new Kindles for Christmas and are LOVING them. They are awesome. I also got a Flip HD to take videos of Dos and Mike got some media server add-on thingy that is supposed to be super cool and I should probably understand but don't fully. I let him handle these things. As long as I can watch my Bravo on the TV I don't much care what is going on with it.
I was convinced this past weekend that I was entering my "uncomfortable phase" and maybe I still am, but it turns out that Monday I just felt really EXTRA crappy. I was only slightly uncomfortable this weekend so hopefully that is more of the norm than what happened on Monday. On Monday I was in pain and crabby with Milly and then came home and slept on the couch for two hours after work. I only got up to drink more water and then go back to bed. I was worried that the next six weeks would be like that. Thank goodness, I got some of my chipper disposition back, even if I still am a bit uncomfortable. That is to be expected, I guess. The tiny human in me is getting to be not-so-tiny, even the doctor agrees that it is a bit larger than expected. They are measuring Dos again next week for size, so we shall see how that goes!
Also, the world is ending. Last night I went to Jewel and they weren't taking credit cards, then this morning McDonald's was cash-only. What. The. Heck. Luckily I've had Parent Christmas money on me, so no biggie. But still!
Mike and I both got new Kindles for Christmas and are LOVING them. They are awesome. I also got a Flip HD to take videos of Dos and Mike got some media server add-on thingy that is supposed to be super cool and I should probably understand but don't fully. I let him handle these things. As long as I can watch my Bravo on the TV I don't much care what is going on with it.
I was convinced this past weekend that I was entering my "uncomfortable phase" and maybe I still am, but it turns out that Monday I just felt really EXTRA crappy. I was only slightly uncomfortable this weekend so hopefully that is more of the norm than what happened on Monday. On Monday I was in pain and crabby with Milly and then came home and slept on the couch for two hours after work. I only got up to drink more water and then go back to bed. I was worried that the next six weeks would be like that. Thank goodness, I got some of my chipper disposition back, even if I still am a bit uncomfortable. That is to be expected, I guess. The tiny human in me is getting to be not-so-tiny, even the doctor agrees that it is a bit larger than expected. They are measuring Dos again next week for size, so we shall see how that goes!
Also, the world is ending. Last night I went to Jewel and they weren't taking credit cards, then this morning McDonald's was cash-only. What. The. Heck. Luckily I've had Parent Christmas money on me, so no biggie. But still!
Friday, December 31, 2010
2010 Recap
Here is the quiz that I've been doing for a few year's from Linda's website.
1. What did you do in 2010 that you’d never done before?
Put together a crib. Ordered/picked out a ton of baby things. Suffered through months of nausea and exhaustion. Basically lots of baby-related things.
2. Did you keep your new year’s resolutions, and will you make more for next year?
Here were my resolutions:
I think I've gotten a bit better at getting to work on time, even if I'm consistently getting there right at 9... at least I'm not rolling in around 9:30. I did go to the Digital Class, which was great. And we've done a good job of saving money as well. We hit the savings goal we wanted to, and then I took $500 out of that account to pay for the water damage to the floors we found when we redid the hardwoods. So we're basically there, I just need to transfer $500 back in!
As for resolutions for 2011, I have no idea. Maybe to not be a total control freak when Dos arrives and let Hubs be the involved, awesome Dad I know he will be. The only thing that would get in the way of that would be my own neurosis.
3. Did anyone close to you give birth?
Mike's friend John and his wife Fran had a baby in September, my friend Jiyon gave birth in June. My brother's fiance's sister had a little boy just a few weeks ago. Lots of babies are on the way for 2011 as well!
4. Did anyone close to you die?
Hmmm.... we've been pretty lucky overall. A close family friend died, which stunk. He was a really great person. And Mike's aunt died about a month ago.
5. What countries did you visit?
This was the year of domestic US trips, I don't think we went anywhere out of the country really unless you count the British Virgin Islands for a brief lunch stop over Thanksgiving! We went to Vegas in June, Boston in July, Napa in August, Baltimore in September and the Virgin Islands in November. I also took a trip to FL in April to attend a wedding with Emily, which was a crazy good time. Another trip to FL in September to visit my friend Dora, who is due the day before I am!
6. What would you like to have in 2011 that you lacked in 2010?
A real live human baby! On the outside of me! Also, I have been missing my waist for awhile now, that will be good to hopefully have back one day.
7. What dates from 2010 will remain etched upon your memory, and why?
June 10, when we found out about Dos. Sometime around September or so when I felt like Dos would definitely stick around.
8. What was your biggest achievement of the year?
Oh man, I feel like I didn't achieve that much this year. But I think I've realized how very blessed I am, which is probably a big achievement. I did work very hard to relax and try to let the baby thing happen when it happened, and I did enjoy a lot of the year because of that.
9. What was your biggest failure?
Getting hella frustrated with the babymaking process in early 2010. Not having faith that it would work out.
10. Did you suffer illness or injury?
Had a few colds, but nothing major.
11. What was the best thing you bought?
We got a new TV in January. New appliances this spring, which are pretty darn nice. I think the appliances probably win - the new convection oven and I are homies for sure. Redoing the hardwood floors was a pretty great thing to spend money on, and we took a ton of vacations. All good things!
12. Whose behavior merited celebration?
Hubs for always being willing to deal with preggo complaints, hormones, and drama around food, and for not constantly rolling his eyes at me when I'm being difficult.
13. Whose behavior made you appalled and depressed?
Politicians because they just seem to like to argue rather than actually do their jobs.. Other than that, not really anyone. This is totally the same answer as last year.
14. Where did most of your money go?
Mortgage. Bills. Savings. Vacations. Regarding allowance, I bought a ton of new clothes, including maternity clothes. I figure if I have to lose my waist I might as well feel somewhat cute in my clothes.
15. What did you get really excited about?
Baby Dos! Vacations... naps!
16. What song will always remind you of 2010?
Like a G6
17. Compared to this time last year, are you:
– happier or sadder? happier
– thinner or fatter? Um, fatter around my middle but thinner in my arms and legs. I lost a bit of weight at the beginning of pregnancy and it seems that the only place I've put it back on is around the baby-carrying area, thank goodness. I still have 6 weeks left so we'll see how that goes!
– richer or poorer? richer, just slightly
18. What do you wish you’d done more of?
Working out. Man, this is my answer every year. I really fell off the wagon though, I tried a few times a month or two ago but the belly just gets. in. the. way!!
19. What do you wish you’d done less of?
Worrying
20. How did you spend Christmas?
We went to see Mike's family. We started the day with Grandma K at 11, Grandma H's at 12:30, then hit up a third set of grandparents for dinner at 3. Holy Christmas, Batman! Then it was back to Mike's parents' house to hang out with the older two nephews and watch them open a few presents (and beg to open even more :)).
21. Did you fall in love in 2010?
Yeah, I think I've fallen in love with this baby. I'm so guarded that it's hard; I know that not everyone who gets pregnant ends up with a baby, even those as far into the process as we are. But as we get closer it's getting easier to feel like it might actually happen, and I feel like once I see him/her it will all come rushing to me.
22. What was your favorite TV program?
How I Met Your Mother. Top Chef (normal season and AllStars - hated Just Desserts). Glee (oh how I love Glee!!)
23. Do you hate anyone now that you didn’t hate this time last year?
No. This is the same answer as last year....I can't say I really hate anyone. More like I really pity some people, people who do my loved ones wrong. Because they don't get to have the awesomeness that is my loved ones in their lives.
24. What was the best book you read?
I really liked Three Cups of Tea, and I read a ton of baby books. My favorite was by Dr Oz, and was called YOU: Having a baby
25. What was your greatest musical discovery?
The Script - love the song Breakeven
26. What did you want and get?
Pregnancy. Husband not travelling so much!
27. What did you want and not get?
Baby Dos a bit earlier... I guess shim is on his/her own schedule. But the timing works out really really well for us - especially for me at work. So I guess shim knows what shim is doing!
28. What was your favorite film of this year?
Really liked Inception. I also liked going to see Sex and the City 2, even if the movie wasn't all that great. We went to the Icon theater on Roosevelt and I had some amazing dirty martinis and good times with the gals. The movie was a bit secondary to the event as a whole though!
29. What did you do on your birthday, and how old were you?
I turned 31. Went to lunch with the coworkers at Rivers, ate entirely too many chocolate cupcakes, hit up dinner with my future sister-in-law at CPK, then came home and fell asleep on the couch. It was awesome.
30. What one thing would have made your year immeasurably more satisfying?
Not quite sure... as I said I've felt incredibly blessed. Maybe less things breaking around the house? haha...
31. How would you describe your personal fashion concept in 2009?
Whatever fits and looks remotely cute. Lots of Target, Old Navy, and Gap maternity clothes.
32. What kept you sane?
Does HGTV count? I did try acupuncture early in the year and that was pretty awesome. I actually saw a therapist for a few sessions and really appreciated being able to talk to someone about some things I was going through. I think everyone would benefit from a few therapy sessions a year. My Mom also keeps me sane by listening to me complain or mock whatever is going on at the time.
33. Which celebrity/public figure did you fancy the most?
I don't know, they are all a bit crazy.
34. What political issue stirred you the most?
I have no idea. I get kind of fired up at people just wanting Obama to fail. I mean, why would people want our president to fail? Don't they get that that has an affect on them regardless of their party orientation?
35. Who did you miss?
My Grandma S. Still missing her, years after she passed. I guess the whole baby thing makes me really wish she were around. I know she would be so excited for us.
36. Who was the best new person you met?
Can I say Gracie? She's not a baby anymore, she's a little girl, and I feel like she's a whole new person!
37. Tell us a valuable life lesson you learned in 2010.
I still haven't learned this fully, but it's that sometimes I can't just fix things, as much as I want to.
38. Quote a song lyric that sums up your year.
Oh, I have no idea!!
1. What did you do in 2010 that you’d never done before?
Put together a crib. Ordered/picked out a ton of baby things. Suffered through months of nausea and exhaustion. Basically lots of baby-related things.
2. Did you keep your new year’s resolutions, and will you make more for next year?
Here were my resolutions:
- Get to work on time. This means prior to 9:00. I am constantly missing the 8:45 train and then have to take the 8:55 which not ONLY has a mean conductor but also puts me in at right after 9. I already messed this one up on Day 2, but am going to make a concerted effort to show up on time!
- Go to Digital 2 class. And by go, I mean actually sign up for the class and attend it this year
- Save money. Hit our savings goal for the year that Mike and I set.
I think I've gotten a bit better at getting to work on time, even if I'm consistently getting there right at 9... at least I'm not rolling in around 9:30. I did go to the Digital Class, which was great. And we've done a good job of saving money as well. We hit the savings goal we wanted to, and then I took $500 out of that account to pay for the water damage to the floors we found when we redid the hardwoods. So we're basically there, I just need to transfer $500 back in!
As for resolutions for 2011, I have no idea. Maybe to not be a total control freak when Dos arrives and let Hubs be the involved, awesome Dad I know he will be. The only thing that would get in the way of that would be my own neurosis.
3. Did anyone close to you give birth?
Mike's friend John and his wife Fran had a baby in September, my friend Jiyon gave birth in June. My brother's fiance's sister had a little boy just a few weeks ago. Lots of babies are on the way for 2011 as well!
4. Did anyone close to you die?
Hmmm.... we've been pretty lucky overall. A close family friend died, which stunk. He was a really great person. And Mike's aunt died about a month ago.
5. What countries did you visit?
This was the year of domestic US trips, I don't think we went anywhere out of the country really unless you count the British Virgin Islands for a brief lunch stop over Thanksgiving! We went to Vegas in June, Boston in July, Napa in August, Baltimore in September and the Virgin Islands in November. I also took a trip to FL in April to attend a wedding with Emily, which was a crazy good time. Another trip to FL in September to visit my friend Dora, who is due the day before I am!
6. What would you like to have in 2011 that you lacked in 2010?
A real live human baby! On the outside of me! Also, I have been missing my waist for awhile now, that will be good to hopefully have back one day.
7. What dates from 2010 will remain etched upon your memory, and why?
June 10, when we found out about Dos. Sometime around September or so when I felt like Dos would definitely stick around.
8. What was your biggest achievement of the year?
Oh man, I feel like I didn't achieve that much this year. But I think I've realized how very blessed I am, which is probably a big achievement. I did work very hard to relax and try to let the baby thing happen when it happened, and I did enjoy a lot of the year because of that.
9. What was your biggest failure?
Getting hella frustrated with the babymaking process in early 2010. Not having faith that it would work out.
10. Did you suffer illness or injury?
Had a few colds, but nothing major.
11. What was the best thing you bought?
We got a new TV in January. New appliances this spring, which are pretty darn nice. I think the appliances probably win - the new convection oven and I are homies for sure. Redoing the hardwood floors was a pretty great thing to spend money on, and we took a ton of vacations. All good things!
12. Whose behavior merited celebration?
Hubs for always being willing to deal with preggo complaints, hormones, and drama around food, and for not constantly rolling his eyes at me when I'm being difficult.
13. Whose behavior made you appalled and depressed?
Politicians because they just seem to like to argue rather than actually do their jobs.. Other than that, not really anyone. This is totally the same answer as last year.
14. Where did most of your money go?
Mortgage. Bills. Savings. Vacations. Regarding allowance, I bought a ton of new clothes, including maternity clothes. I figure if I have to lose my waist I might as well feel somewhat cute in my clothes.
15. What did you get really excited about?
Baby Dos! Vacations... naps!
16. What song will always remind you of 2010?
Like a G6
17. Compared to this time last year, are you:
– happier or sadder? happier
– thinner or fatter? Um, fatter around my middle but thinner in my arms and legs. I lost a bit of weight at the beginning of pregnancy and it seems that the only place I've put it back on is around the baby-carrying area, thank goodness. I still have 6 weeks left so we'll see how that goes!
– richer or poorer? richer, just slightly
18. What do you wish you’d done more of?
Working out. Man, this is my answer every year. I really fell off the wagon though, I tried a few times a month or two ago but the belly just gets. in. the. way!!
19. What do you wish you’d done less of?
Worrying
20. How did you spend Christmas?
We went to see Mike's family. We started the day with Grandma K at 11, Grandma H's at 12:30, then hit up a third set of grandparents for dinner at 3. Holy Christmas, Batman! Then it was back to Mike's parents' house to hang out with the older two nephews and watch them open a few presents (and beg to open even more :)).
21. Did you fall in love in 2010?
Yeah, I think I've fallen in love with this baby. I'm so guarded that it's hard; I know that not everyone who gets pregnant ends up with a baby, even those as far into the process as we are. But as we get closer it's getting easier to feel like it might actually happen, and I feel like once I see him/her it will all come rushing to me.
22. What was your favorite TV program?
How I Met Your Mother. Top Chef (normal season and AllStars - hated Just Desserts). Glee (oh how I love Glee!!)
23. Do you hate anyone now that you didn’t hate this time last year?
No. This is the same answer as last year....I can't say I really hate anyone. More like I really pity some people, people who do my loved ones wrong. Because they don't get to have the awesomeness that is my loved ones in their lives.
24. What was the best book you read?
I really liked Three Cups of Tea, and I read a ton of baby books. My favorite was by Dr Oz, and was called YOU: Having a baby
25. What was your greatest musical discovery?
The Script - love the song Breakeven
26. What did you want and get?
Pregnancy. Husband not travelling so much!
27. What did you want and not get?
Baby Dos a bit earlier... I guess shim is on his/her own schedule. But the timing works out really really well for us - especially for me at work. So I guess shim knows what shim is doing!
28. What was your favorite film of this year?
Really liked Inception. I also liked going to see Sex and the City 2, even if the movie wasn't all that great. We went to the Icon theater on Roosevelt and I had some amazing dirty martinis and good times with the gals. The movie was a bit secondary to the event as a whole though!
29. What did you do on your birthday, and how old were you?
I turned 31. Went to lunch with the coworkers at Rivers, ate entirely too many chocolate cupcakes, hit up dinner with my future sister-in-law at CPK, then came home and fell asleep on the couch. It was awesome.
30. What one thing would have made your year immeasurably more satisfying?
Not quite sure... as I said I've felt incredibly blessed. Maybe less things breaking around the house? haha...
31. How would you describe your personal fashion concept in 2009?
Whatever fits and looks remotely cute. Lots of Target, Old Navy, and Gap maternity clothes.
32. What kept you sane?
Does HGTV count? I did try acupuncture early in the year and that was pretty awesome. I actually saw a therapist for a few sessions and really appreciated being able to talk to someone about some things I was going through. I think everyone would benefit from a few therapy sessions a year. My Mom also keeps me sane by listening to me complain or mock whatever is going on at the time.
33. Which celebrity/public figure did you fancy the most?
I don't know, they are all a bit crazy.
34. What political issue stirred you the most?
I have no idea. I get kind of fired up at people just wanting Obama to fail. I mean, why would people want our president to fail? Don't they get that that has an affect on them regardless of their party orientation?
35. Who did you miss?
My Grandma S. Still missing her, years after she passed. I guess the whole baby thing makes me really wish she were around. I know she would be so excited for us.
36. Who was the best new person you met?
Can I say Gracie? She's not a baby anymore, she's a little girl, and I feel like she's a whole new person!
37. Tell us a valuable life lesson you learned in 2010.
I still haven't learned this fully, but it's that sometimes I can't just fix things, as much as I want to.
38. Quote a song lyric that sums up your year.
Oh, I have no idea!!
Thursday, December 23, 2010
Yay, holidays :)
Hubs and I are off to Indiana tomorrow with beagle in tow, but just wanted to send along some holiday greetings! Hope everyone has a very merry holiday!
By Less Ordinary DesignsMonday, December 20, 2010
Misc update
It doesn't really seem like Christmas. There, I said it. Maybe it's because we went to the tropical vacation route for Thanksgiving... maybe because Mike and I were too lazy to put up any Christmas decorations save for one little stocking with a question mark on it (which is a tradition in my family when a baby is due - my mom used it for Jay and Katie and my niece... and I asked to borrow it before thinking that THEY might want to hang it up for Dos, oops :)) and one knick-knacky plate thingy that my Grandpa gave me from one of Grandma S's many collections.
Regardless of "feeling like Christmas" or not, all our presents are purchased and wrapped, and I'm looking forward to seeing the wrapping paper fly when all four nephews tear into their stuff. That is always a fun time. We gave Grace her presents last week in Fort Wayne and we got her a pillow pet, a little puppy toy, and some clothes. "A pill pet! A pill pet!" she kept exclaiming.... so cute!
All along, I've said that Valentine's day will be here before we know it and Dos will be here. The impending holiday is making that all the more real. The doctor has said Dos is measuring a little larger than normal, so I started to get worried that shim might come a little sooner than expected. So I moved up my audit-finishing timeline to January 15th, to hopefully ensure that my work is done before baby makes his or her appearance.
Yesterday we had a pretty chill day and I washed all of Dos's linens and diapers (we're going to try to cloth diaper when we're at home... the daycares won't do it). I felt really accomplished and like I got alot done. Then I couldn't get to sleep to save my life last night. I kept drifting in and out of consciousness and having these crazy dreams that the hospital wouldn't let us bring Dos home because we didn't have the crib mattress yet. Nevermind that the kid won't use the mattress for the first couple weeks AT LEAST and will sleep in the bassinet attachment of the stroller. Nevermind that the only thing you HAVE to have is a car seat. Or nevermind that there are these things called STORES that will sell you things that you do not have pretty much whenever you want it. Or that I am not even worried about the things we still need to get for Dos - after our last shower I plan on just adding the last few things to an Amazon list and having them shipped to us. I think my obsession with the mattress is that it went up $20 in price on Amazon like THE DAY I was going to order it and it's been ticking me off mightily ever since. I keep waiting for it to drop again, but I fear I'm SOL and I'm stubborn enough to try and wait it out :)
So anyways, that's what is going on here. A trip to visit Mike's family for Christmas, then we settle in to wait for Dos. I am excited to meet the kidlet, but not overeager... I'm liking that the kid is contained right now and the punches I get all day long amuse me. Let's just hope that shim waits until at least January 15th!!
Regardless of "feeling like Christmas" or not, all our presents are purchased and wrapped, and I'm looking forward to seeing the wrapping paper fly when all four nephews tear into their stuff. That is always a fun time. We gave Grace her presents last week in Fort Wayne and we got her a pillow pet, a little puppy toy, and some clothes. "A pill pet! A pill pet!" she kept exclaiming.... so cute!
All along, I've said that Valentine's day will be here before we know it and Dos will be here. The impending holiday is making that all the more real. The doctor has said Dos is measuring a little larger than normal, so I started to get worried that shim might come a little sooner than expected. So I moved up my audit-finishing timeline to January 15th, to hopefully ensure that my work is done before baby makes his or her appearance.
Yesterday we had a pretty chill day and I washed all of Dos's linens and diapers (we're going to try to cloth diaper when we're at home... the daycares won't do it). I felt really accomplished and like I got alot done. Then I couldn't get to sleep to save my life last night. I kept drifting in and out of consciousness and having these crazy dreams that the hospital wouldn't let us bring Dos home because we didn't have the crib mattress yet. Nevermind that the kid won't use the mattress for the first couple weeks AT LEAST and will sleep in the bassinet attachment of the stroller. Nevermind that the only thing you HAVE to have is a car seat. Or nevermind that there are these things called STORES that will sell you things that you do not have pretty much whenever you want it. Or that I am not even worried about the things we still need to get for Dos - after our last shower I plan on just adding the last few things to an Amazon list and having them shipped to us. I think my obsession with the mattress is that it went up $20 in price on Amazon like THE DAY I was going to order it and it's been ticking me off mightily ever since. I keep waiting for it to drop again, but I fear I'm SOL and I'm stubborn enough to try and wait it out :)
So anyways, that's what is going on here. A trip to visit Mike's family for Christmas, then we settle in to wait for Dos. I am excited to meet the kidlet, but not overeager... I'm liking that the kid is contained right now and the punches I get all day long amuse me. Let's just hope that shim waits until at least January 15th!!
Friday, December 17, 2010
Tada!
Gracie has been taking gymnastics classes and when you say Tada! she will strike a gymnast-at-the-end-of-her-routine pose. It's kind of awesome to just yell TADA whenever.
Gracie and the candy
One of my baby showers was this past weekend and Gracie ate about a hundred of these little candy baby bottles. I was cracking up at her standing here next to the table, like "what? I am totally not interested in this candy. What are you talking about?" trying to be all nonchalant. Hilarious!
Friday, December 10, 2010
St John - Day 6
Since Mike and I flew out at the buttcrack of dawn on Friday after Thanksgiving, the actual holiday was our last day in St John. This worked out pretty well. Originally we planned on Mike and I making dinner that night, but then my Mom and I got the idea to try and put together an impromptu Thanksgiving meal. We left it largely up to the Fates - if the grocery had the things we needed we would go for it. If not, it was going to be a signature April meal of goat-cheese stuffed chicken :)
Well, the fates complied and everything we needed was available at the store! After breakfast was over that morning, my Dad and I got to work on two pumpkin pies and baked those asap. Then my mom prepped the turkey breast she'd bought at the store and put that into the oven to roast while Mike and I peeled/cut up potatoes for the mashed potatoes. A couple days earlier Mom had cut up bread and set it out to dry up a bit for the stuffing. I cut up the celery and onions for the stuffing and Dad made some broth to make it as well. We were pumped that the turkey breast came with some junk (technical term that is, junk) to make gravy. So we didn't have to try and backdoor it as much with broth as we'd originally planned. Mom had purchased peas and corn to have with dinner as well, so I put some peas on to boil for an hour or two since Mike likes them mushy (everyone else got fresher peas!).
Around 2:00 or so everything was ready and we sat down at the table on the deck to eat our grub.
Everyone agreed that for something we didn't get too stressed over, it was really good. It helped that everyone pitched in, but really we didn't spend too much time cooking the meal. Mostly it was checking on things and then laying out on the deck some more! Plus, having a Thanksgiving meal with a view like this one was a great experience.
After the big meal, there was copious amounts of laying about and relaxing/napping. We took a belly shot for the week.... love the background. This will be fun to put in the Belly Book I've been using to document the pregnancy :)
This was the location of some of the laying around. Deck time!!
Later that afternoon I decided to finally get around to taking pics of the sunset. I had to have taken close to 200 over the course of an hour, watching the sun go further and further down. Here are some of my favorites.
So beautiful, and such a nice relaxing vacation!!
Well, the fates complied and everything we needed was available at the store! After breakfast was over that morning, my Dad and I got to work on two pumpkin pies and baked those asap. Then my mom prepped the turkey breast she'd bought at the store and put that into the oven to roast while Mike and I peeled/cut up potatoes for the mashed potatoes. A couple days earlier Mom had cut up bread and set it out to dry up a bit for the stuffing. I cut up the celery and onions for the stuffing and Dad made some broth to make it as well. We were pumped that the turkey breast came with some junk (technical term that is, junk) to make gravy. So we didn't have to try and backdoor it as much with broth as we'd originally planned. Mom had purchased peas and corn to have with dinner as well, so I put some peas on to boil for an hour or two since Mike likes them mushy (everyone else got fresher peas!).
Around 2:00 or so everything was ready and we sat down at the table on the deck to eat our grub.
Everyone agreed that for something we didn't get too stressed over, it was really good. It helped that everyone pitched in, but really we didn't spend too much time cooking the meal. Mostly it was checking on things and then laying out on the deck some more! Plus, having a Thanksgiving meal with a view like this one was a great experience.After the big meal, there was copious amounts of laying about and relaxing/napping. We took a belly shot for the week.... love the background. This will be fun to put in the Belly Book I've been using to document the pregnancy :)
This was the location of some of the laying around. Deck time!!
Later that afternoon I decided to finally get around to taking pics of the sunset. I had to have taken close to 200 over the course of an hour, watching the sun go further and further down. Here are some of my favorites.
So beautiful, and such a nice relaxing vacation!!
Monday, December 06, 2010
St John - Days 4 & 5
This vacation is not going to have as many posts as my vacations normally do... mostly because we chilled out alot more than normal!
On Tuesday we decided that a day in the beach was in order, and headed to Trunk Bay. It's rated consistently in the top three beaches of the world, and once we got there we could see why:
Amazing! Luckily, Dad kidding around with some cab drivers in the parking lot netted us a parking space and we sauntered in. You paid like $4 each for everyone to get in, because they had some pretty decent bathroom and shower facilities. I'll pay $4 not to pee in the jungle, so that was fine by me.
We basically laid on the beach and chatted and caught some rays. Oh, except for Dad, who rolled in the sand. Hahaha!
Here is a pic of he and my mom getting some swim time in. The boys spent some time snorkeling about as well. I had no interest in snorkeling, and very little interest in getting in the water (for some reason I was worried it would hurt Dos). But after some prodding from Mike I ended up in the water for a little bit.
For lunch we hit up the snack bar at the beach. Once we got home we got all cleaned up and headed into town for dinner. We started at this SoGo's place that looked pretty shady, had appetizers and drinks and decided to bail. Then we went to this place called The Fish Trap which was much better. The hostess insisted that I am having a girl and asked me to "bring her back to see us sometime!" So funny - I crack up at people that are so insistent upon Dos's gender being one way or another... I suppose they have a 50/50 shot right? We'll find out who is right in February!
The next day we rented a boat that departed from the nearby Westin's docks. Our captain, Stan, stopped by a good place to snorkel while the girls filled out our customs paperwork.
Then we stopped in Jost van Dyke to clear customs. Here is the police station that processed our paperwork.
Here we are waiting to clear customs. You can tell it was pretty hectic.
After clearing customs, we headed down Main Street to Foxy's bar. Dad was enthralled with "Main Street". About 80 people total live on this island!
Getting a drink at Foxy's.... love this pic of Mike...
Then we all got back in the boat and headed around the island to Soggy Dollar Bar. It is dubbed this because there is no dock so you have to swim in and then pay for your food/drinks with soggy money. Good thing I got over my reservations about swimming the previous day! The food at Soggy Dollar was just bar food, but it was really good all the same. I had a jerk chicken sandwich that was super tasty, and the onion rings were massive and the batter they had been fried in was nice and doughy. Hard to explain, but I highly recommend for a good midday meal!
After getting back in the boat at Soggy Dollar, we set off to find the small beach where the Corona commercials are taped... then settled on Sandy Key and some pics. It was this super small little island with nothing on it, so we swam in to hang out a bit. We cracked up b.c as we swam in we noticed Jay up on the beach trying his darnedest to crack open this big coconut. Jay was obsessed with cracking open coconuts on vacation, it was pretty funny.
Wednesday was "Jay and Kim dinner night" where they grilled some grub and we ate out on the deck. Delish!
On Tuesday we decided that a day in the beach was in order, and headed to Trunk Bay. It's rated consistently in the top three beaches of the world, and once we got there we could see why:
Amazing! Luckily, Dad kidding around with some cab drivers in the parking lot netted us a parking space and we sauntered in. You paid like $4 each for everyone to get in, because they had some pretty decent bathroom and shower facilities. I'll pay $4 not to pee in the jungle, so that was fine by me.We basically laid on the beach and chatted and caught some rays. Oh, except for Dad, who rolled in the sand. Hahaha!
Here is a pic of he and my mom getting some swim time in. The boys spent some time snorkeling about as well. I had no interest in snorkeling, and very little interest in getting in the water (for some reason I was worried it would hurt Dos). But after some prodding from Mike I ended up in the water for a little bit.
For lunch we hit up the snack bar at the beach. Once we got home we got all cleaned up and headed into town for dinner. We started at this SoGo's place that looked pretty shady, had appetizers and drinks and decided to bail. Then we went to this place called The Fish Trap which was much better. The hostess insisted that I am having a girl and asked me to "bring her back to see us sometime!" So funny - I crack up at people that are so insistent upon Dos's gender being one way or another... I suppose they have a 50/50 shot right? We'll find out who is right in February!The next day we rented a boat that departed from the nearby Westin's docks. Our captain, Stan, stopped by a good place to snorkel while the girls filled out our customs paperwork.
Then we stopped in Jost van Dyke to clear customs. Here is the police station that processed our paperwork.
Here we are waiting to clear customs. You can tell it was pretty hectic.
After clearing customs, we headed down Main Street to Foxy's bar. Dad was enthralled with "Main Street". About 80 people total live on this island!
Getting a drink at Foxy's.... love this pic of Mike...
Then we all got back in the boat and headed around the island to Soggy Dollar Bar. It is dubbed this because there is no dock so you have to swim in and then pay for your food/drinks with soggy money. Good thing I got over my reservations about swimming the previous day! The food at Soggy Dollar was just bar food, but it was really good all the same. I had a jerk chicken sandwich that was super tasty, and the onion rings were massive and the batter they had been fried in was nice and doughy. Hard to explain, but I highly recommend for a good midday meal!
After getting back in the boat at Soggy Dollar, we set off to find the small beach where the Corona commercials are taped... then settled on Sandy Key and some pics. It was this super small little island with nothing on it, so we swam in to hang out a bit. We cracked up b.c as we swam in we noticed Jay up on the beach trying his darnedest to crack open this big coconut. Jay was obsessed with cracking open coconuts on vacation, it was pretty funny.
Wednesday was "Jay and Kim dinner night" where they grilled some grub and we ate out on the deck. Delish!
Wednesday, December 01, 2010
St John - Days 1-3
We started vacation on Saturday by getting up at the buttcrack of dawn and heading to the airport. Hearing horror stories about TSA groping patdowns and security lines of hours, we decided we should get to the airport arond 6:00-6:15 for our 8:20 flight. We had a cab pick us up at 5:30 and dropped by down the street to pick up Jay and Kim.
Of course, we were through security in about fifteen minutes. Figures.
Jay and Kim flew American and we were on United, so Mike and I headed to the Tuscany at one end of the B gates for breakfast. Why, you ask? Because there were pictures of divine-looking french toast hanging all over advertising the place. Count me in.
Once we were about done with our food, the parents and Grandpa Stratton showed up for breakfast, so we chilled out there until our flight.
The flight as a whole was pretty uneventful, and we got to St Thomas around 3 o'clock. We hit up a cab to the Red Hook ferry and took that to St John. We ended up getting the 4:30 ferry, which was then met by our rental car company and our villa company. The villa lady followed us to the rental car place, where we put my Dad and I on the driver list (me being the backup for sober-driving purposes). After that we headed to the villa, and were greeted with this place:
Pretty nice, if I do say so myself. The place was pretty cool and had four bedrooms and four baths. The downstairs bedrooms had their own baths, which was nice, but you couldn't reach them from inside the house. It wasn't too much of a pain to go outside down to our rooms, though.
Once getting our stuff in, we headed to dinner at the Lime Inn and then Mom/Dad picked up Jay and Kim from the ferry. They'd had a connecting flight, wheras ours was direct, so they were a bit later. It worked out well actually, since the car we had the first night only fit 5, and the parents picked up a larger car the next day that fit 7.
Sunday we pretty much just laid around the pool at the house and then headed into town to watch the Colts game ("game day baby!" says Jay). Monday we decided to take a drive around the island. It rained off and on throughout the day so we basically drove around the whole island, ate a lunch of cheeseburgers at Skinny Legs (the cheeseburger smell made me queasy, so I didn't get much down. But I did have a nice after-lunch snack of Goldfish and Berry Berry Skittles that helped), and settled on hiking to a small beach off the roadway called Salt Pond bay. It was so nice, and overall not very crowded at all. I didn't take my camera to this place since it was a bit of a hike and I didn't want it to get soaked. The boys snorkeled a bit and the girls and Gramps laid on the beach and caught some rays. Perfect start to vacation, esp since our bedtimes mysteriously migrated to around 8-9 PM (which was 6-7PM our time... not sure how we started that!). At least I was getting lots of sleep!!
Of course, we were through security in about fifteen minutes. Figures.
Jay and Kim flew American and we were on United, so Mike and I headed to the Tuscany at one end of the B gates for breakfast. Why, you ask? Because there were pictures of divine-looking french toast hanging all over advertising the place. Count me in.
Once we were about done with our food, the parents and Grandpa Stratton showed up for breakfast, so we chilled out there until our flight.
The flight as a whole was pretty uneventful, and we got to St Thomas around 3 o'clock. We hit up a cab to the Red Hook ferry and took that to St John. We ended up getting the 4:30 ferry, which was then met by our rental car company and our villa company. The villa lady followed us to the rental car place, where we put my Dad and I on the driver list (me being the backup for sober-driving purposes). After that we headed to the villa, and were greeted with this place:
Pretty nice, if I do say so myself. The place was pretty cool and had four bedrooms and four baths. The downstairs bedrooms had their own baths, which was nice, but you couldn't reach them from inside the house. It wasn't too much of a pain to go outside down to our rooms, though.Once getting our stuff in, we headed to dinner at the Lime Inn and then Mom/Dad picked up Jay and Kim from the ferry. They'd had a connecting flight, wheras ours was direct, so they were a bit later. It worked out well actually, since the car we had the first night only fit 5, and the parents picked up a larger car the next day that fit 7.
Sunday we pretty much just laid around the pool at the house and then headed into town to watch the Colts game ("game day baby!" says Jay). Monday we decided to take a drive around the island. It rained off and on throughout the day so we basically drove around the whole island, ate a lunch of cheeseburgers at Skinny Legs (the cheeseburger smell made me queasy, so I didn't get much down. But I did have a nice after-lunch snack of Goldfish and Berry Berry Skittles that helped), and settled on hiking to a small beach off the roadway called Salt Pond bay. It was so nice, and overall not very crowded at all. I didn't take my camera to this place since it was a bit of a hike and I didn't want it to get soaked. The boys snorkeled a bit and the girls and Gramps laid on the beach and caught some rays. Perfect start to vacation, esp since our bedtimes mysteriously migrated to around 8-9 PM (which was 6-7PM our time... not sure how we started that!). At least I was getting lots of sleep!!
Doughnut sadness, nicknames
With the end of Thanksgiving has come the day that I have dreaded... I am pretty sure that Dunkin' Donuts has discontinued their pumpkin doughnuts. So sad. It's become a Friday tradition for me to drop by and snag one on Friday (along with a Boston Creme for the Boss). They only had them about half the time though, so when I asked for it, sometimes I got greeted with "No." Not "We're out" or "Sorry, no more".... just NO. The Dunkin guys in the train station are such odd ducks. But so sad that I won't get my pumpkin doughnuts on some Fridays anymore. Ahhh, such is life.
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Mike refers to me as "Upper Management." It totally cracks me up - when people ask us if we can do dinner or hang out, he says "let me check with Upper Management." So funny. He's been telling me that the Sportsguy refers to his youngest kid as "The CEO." Want to guess what Dos's second nickname will probably be? It's good that I think that nickname is pretty funny as well.
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Mike refers to me as "Upper Management." It totally cracks me up - when people ask us if we can do dinner or hang out, he says "let me check with Upper Management." So funny. He's been telling me that the Sportsguy refers to his youngest kid as "The CEO." Want to guess what Dos's second nickname will probably be? It's good that I think that nickname is pretty funny as well.
Monday, November 29, 2010
Holy whirlwind, Batman. The last half of November has been crazy for us.
Can you spot the three preggos?
- Nov 10 was my birthday and we celebrated by bowling with some friends on the Friday following the bday. The actual birthday was fun - there were cupcakes that I brought to work but made Hubs make (although I frosted... artfully piped-on swirls of frosting are not exactly how Hubs rolls). And then my whole group at work went out to lunch and the Big Boss picked up the check. I had a lobster pasta dish that was super good! Then that evening my brother's fiance Kim and I went to dinner at CPK because Hubs was playing flag football. Good food, cupcakes and getting to bed by 9 - sounds like this preggo's idea of a good birthday time!
- Saturday after the bday, a couple college friends came in from out of town. One of the girls is in a surgery residency and is super busy so we hardly get to see her - but she was in town for a medical conference. So she brought her boyfriend and we all got to meet him! We headed to dinner on Saturday at Lucia's (VERY good, and very reasonable since it's a BYO. Here is a pic of all of the girls from that night! So cute.
Can you spot the three preggos?- Sunday my friend Amy M (from Michigan) had stayed with me and we are both pregnant so we woke up at the buttcrack of dawn. We snagged breakfast and then she headed out of town. All week we'd been moving the little stuff in the living room to either the guest room or the upstairs den, and once Amy took off my brother came over to help Mike move all the living room furniture into the guest room in preparation for the hardwood floors to be redone. After they finished I took Jay home and then headed to Logan Bar and Grill for lunch with our out-of-town surgeon friend and some other gals. I got down a good part of a bratwurst sandwich with sauerkraut, yummy! The rest of the day was finishing moving crap upstairs or stashing it in the kitchen cabinets, and then Mike and I went through our benefits information and decided which plan to be on. I did some major research and figured out how we could save some healthcare dough even after Dos is born. Now that is grownup stuff, dude, going on an HMO with your husband and baby. Crazy. For dinner we took the out-of-town friend and her boyfriend to Pequod's pizza, our fave pizza in the city. I think they enjoyed it, and I enjoyed eating pizza and spending some more time with them!
- Monday Hubs and I started working on putting plastic over the cabinets/windows and making all the edges airtight. I lobbied hardcore for putting the plastic over the windows since our blinds cost like a million dollars, are cloth, are impossible to take down without breaking, and cost major cash money to clean and/or fix after I break them trying to take them down. So putting plastic over them and taping everything securely seemed to work best.
- Tuesday was batten down the hatches night. Everything was moved up or to the guest room and the taping and plastic was finished. We sealed off the door to the upstairs and started using the upstairs entrance to get in and out of the condo.
- Wednesday was Hardwood Day. We had scheduled to have the floors refinished AND have some of the kitchen floor replaced. I realized earlier this year that if we didn't do this project before Dos, then we would NEVER get to it! The hardwood guys showed up at 7:30 AM. Oy. I wasn't even there when they got there since they'd said they would be there at 8. Milly and I were in the process of retrieving Milk Chugs and chocolate Donettes from the gas station. But Mike let them in. Thank goodness he stayed at home for his 7AM conference call b.c when the hardwood guys started taking up the little bit of hardwood they were supposed to replace in the kitchen (from an old dishwasher leak it was all warped and messed up) - they discovered some pretty decent water damage to the sublayers/subfloor. The guy who ran the crew kept looking at me and pointing at the floor and saying "This big problem" or "This bullsh*t". I got that he couldn't just put new hardwood over the water damage and expect that to fix it, but he wasn't giving me any options. At one point, I wanted to say, "Look, you fix floors. I write checks. Let me know how much the check needs to be and I will let you know if that is OK or not. Let's talk options." Instead I went up and got Mike who ran through some possible repair scenarios with the guys. Finally they agreed upon a plan and a price and they got to work. Yay! They were pretty good too... they started the lacquer around 3 so I scrammed and headed to my friend Amy C's house, since that is the smelly part. I came back around 5:30-6 to close up the condo and make sure everything was OK and they were done. It looked great! I grabbed a few more things and headed to spend the night at Amy's since the fumes were too much for Dos.
- Thursday was a normal day at work, and Mike worked from home at our place and left a bunch of windows open to air out all day. By the time I got home it was definitely OK for me to be there. So I helped Mike with a little cleanup and then we head to watch the Bears game with friends. I stayed with Amy again that night, just to be on the safe side with fumes and Dos, and Mike and Milly stayed at our place.
- Friday night Mike and I stayed at our own place and finished packing for vacation, cleaned up lots of hardwood dust, and worked on washing the walls. There was dust everywhere! But we got it pretty cleaned up, enough to make me stop twitching at least.
That bring us up to Saturday the 20th, where we got up at 5:00AM and left for the airport for the last pre-baby vacation. That is another post altogether, but let's just say that we had 6 days in St John and they were fabulous! Pics and vacation recaps coming soon!
Wednesday, November 10, 2010
Glucose test update
I passed, I passed! So excited!
It was not a fun test, let me just tell you. I thought I was going to barf a couple times and was so thankful that Mike could accompany me to keep my mind off things.
But yay, no special diet for Dos and I!
It was not a fun test, let me just tell you. I thought I was going to barf a couple times and was so thankful that Mike could accompany me to keep my mind off things.
But yay, no special diet for Dos and I!
Tuesday, November 09, 2010
Pic from the weekend's wedding
A pic of Hubs and I. I was worried that this dress was way too bright for a wedding but I ended up getting alot compliments and I loved it!
Tuesday, November 02, 2010
Pet Peeves.... these are my feet, dude.
When it comes to pet peeves, I have about a million of them. One of them that got triggered this morning is people stepping on the back of my feet.
Plain and simple: If you are stepping on the backs of my feet, you are WALKING TOO DARN CLOSE TO ME.
Geesh.
So I started thinking this morning... I don't know that I ever step on the backs of someone's feet when it's not intentional. I mean, I like to give a flat tire with the best of them (esp to the Boss as we walk to lunch). But to unintentionally step on someone's feet? Really? Do you have to be walking that close? This isn't Europe and this one foot of space on either side of me belongs to ME.
I don't know, what do you think? I just really don't think there is much of a reason for it.
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In other news:
Plain and simple: If you are stepping on the backs of my feet, you are WALKING TOO DARN CLOSE TO ME.
Geesh.
So I started thinking this morning... I don't know that I ever step on the backs of someone's feet when it's not intentional. I mean, I like to give a flat tire with the best of them (esp to the Boss as we walk to lunch). But to unintentionally step on someone's feet? Really? Do you have to be walking that close? This isn't Europe and this one foot of space on either side of me belongs to ME.
I don't know, what do you think? I just really don't think there is much of a reason for it.
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In other news:
- My dentist did not yell at me today like I had anticipated. I've been horrible about flossing, mostly because I usually fall asleep on the couch around 9 and am prodded up to bed by Hubs. So I figured I would get lectured thoroughly. I'm very glad that wasn't the case!
- I failed my one hour glucose screening last week (just *barely*) so now I'm carb-loading as instructed by the lady doctor today, tomorrow, and Thursday, and then fasting and going in on Friday for the full-on three hour screening. Wish me luck, if I fail I am majorly screwed, as carbs are about the only thing I get calories from these days. I find it laughable that someone who has gained ONE WHOLE POUND (woo!) during pregnancy may be put on a diet and exercise plan. I may get out of this pregnancy 10-20 lbs lighter than I went in. Wouldn't that be a hoot. It sure would save me time at the gym next spring.
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