Friday, August 31, 2007

Little Miss Impatient Pants

*sigh* I had another check up this morning. Little to no change/improvement from last week. I realize it doesn't mean anything. Heck, they could check me at 3 cm and I could stay that way for a couple weeks , just as I could be at 1 cm and go into labor tomorrow. Its just so frustrating, because I WANT to see some progression here!!! I want to know when to expect this little person to arrive! I'm SOOO impatient! I guess I just don't like the anticipation, nor do I like the not knowing. It all goes back to all my control issues I have, I suppose.

UGH

Dr. guestimates baby at around 6 - 6 1/2 pounds right now. He said today "if you go to full term, this baby won't be a shrimp, that's for sure". Great. I've been trying to mentally prepare myself for a 12 pound baby, but wouldn't it be so much easier/quicker if it were just an itty bitty 6 pounder? I'm really not thinking that's gonna happen though. But, I suppose since God gave me this big ol' child bearing hips, I might as well put them to good use and pop out giant babies!

Side note, an old wives tale states that if you have heartburn, you're going to have a hairy baby. I recently read that there have been studies to confirm this tale. Something about the same hormone that relaxes the esophagus and contributes to heartburn (in addition to the fact that your stomach is all squished to high heaven sharing prime real estate with the baby) has been noted to be the same hormone that is responsible for fetal hair growth. Hmm.....interesting.

Given that A) I've had wicked aweful heartburn over this last trimester and B) Baby Daddy is a rather big fuzz ball himself - I'm sure I'll have a baby that more resembles a monchhichi than the bald baby I was (I don't think I had hair until I was 3.....). What do you think? There's still lots of potential for cuteness through the fuzz, eh?


And dammit - now I can't get the Monchhichi song out of my head.

oh, Happy Labor Day weekend to everyone!!! Summer is officially over.....almost! We're headed to Michael & Kristen's tomorrow morning for the weekend. It will be nice to visit some family again.....especially since they don't live far away :) Its still within my one hour radius of the hospital my Dr. says I'm allowed to roam freely in.

::::::::::: AND NOW, YOUR MOMENT OF SCRAPPING ZEN :::::::::::

Chicago Botanic Gardens: The End of Summer [Credits]


Journaling Reads:

The end of August. The end of Summer.

But all is not ending. This means that September is almost here, and September brings the beginning of a new life for us! This day, we took advantage of one of our last days alone as a couple, and took a walk around the Chicago Botanic Gardens...enjoying each others company, the scenery and the warm late summer sunshine. Don't get me wrong, we love each other so much, but we can't wait until our new addition arrives! Bring on the Fall!

Wednesday, August 29, 2007

Dammitallanyway

I was getting antsy and tired of working at home today, so Pat and I decided to head to Staples to purchase some office supplies - and then head to Target. It was supposed to be a quick afternoon jaunt, but no such luck.

Upon our exit of our parking spot, Pat noticed another person who started backing up after he was already mostly out in the isle......he stopped. Honked. For a good couple seconds. The other people kept on backing up. Right into the drivers side back door. *sigh* at least it was a low impact collision, and the door just crumpled. Turns out it was a college age girl and her high school age sister......they had insurance and everything, but were obviously relatively upset about backing into someone.

But its still a giant pain in the ass. No police report since it was in a parking lot (Chicago Police have bigger fish to fry). Exchange of information - blah blah blah. We already were able to report the accident with GE, take the car to a body shop to get an estimate already, so we'll just wait to hear from them to see what to do next. Or at least Pat will, since it was his company car. We definitely have that to be thankful for too - fleet vehicle companies are awesome. I had a couple accidents with our other company, PHH, which went pretty well, but this will be our first with GE.

We were able to make it to Target afterward, but at the end of the day our 1 hour trip a total of about 2.5 hours. Oh, and note to self (and a good rule to follow in general). When going to Target, don't show up in khaki pants and a red polo shirt. Luckily, Pat had a very visibly pregnant wife in tow and we weren't bothered at all, but I'm sure if he went alone he would have been bombarded with many questions about where the milk was, or if the swiffer wet jet was on sale.

Christian Humor :)

Jesus and Satan were having an on-going argument about who was better on the computer.

They had been going at it for days, and frankly God was tired of hearing all the bickering.

Finally fed up, God said, "THAT'S IT! I have had enough. I am going to set up a test that will run for two hours, and from those results, I will judge who does the better job."

So Satan and Jesus sat down at the keyboards and typed away.

They moused.
They faxed.
They e-mailed.
They e-mailed with attachments.
They downloaded.
They did spreadsheets!
They wrote reports.
They created labels and cards.
They created charts and graphs.
They did some genealogy reports
They did every job known to man.

Jesus worked with heavenly efficiency and Satan was faster than hell.

Then, ten minutes before their time was up, lightning suddenly flashed across the sky, thunder rolled, rain poured, and, of course, the power went off.

Satan stared at his blank screen and screamed every curse word known in the underworld.

Jesus just sighed.

Finally the electricity came back on, and each of them restarted their computers. Satan started searching frantically, screaming: "It's gone! It's all GONE! "I lost everything when the power went out!"

Meanwhile, Jesus quietly started printing out all of his files from the past two hours of work.

Satan observed this and became irate.

"Wait!" he screamed. "That's not fair! He cheated! How come he has all his work and I don't have any?"

God just shrugged and said,

JESUS SAVES

Sunday, August 26, 2007

We're Ready!


The classes have been had, the nursery has been set up, car seats are installed, and we are officially READY to go for baby!

Or rather, as ready as we're ever going to be!

The classes were really helpful - the breastfeeding, infant CPR, and the Great Expectations classes. The CPR and breastfeeding classes were informative, and gave out lots of useful information. The Great Expectations class can't actually teach how to be a parent or anything, but it was more so just to expose us to various issues that may arise during labor and when the baby gets here, so we'll be a little more calm, and less likely to freak out. And Pat proved that he could put on a diaper and shirt and give a sponge bath - on a motionless doll anyway :) He's so cute, and going to be such a great dad!

The last thing we really needed was to get our car seat and stroller set, which arrived via UPS on Wednesday. I put the stroller together myself :) Pat installed the car seat base, in my car anyway, and we practiced taking it in and out, just like we played with the stroller too. We ended up purchasing a travel system from Costco - I'm glad we did! We got a great deal on it, and ended up with a less bulky stroller to boot! The stroller is much more city friendly - it folds quite nice and small for trains and buses and such, and the infant car seat still fits and snaps in nice and snug too. I'm very happy with it.

We didn't have a doll handy to practice using the car seat buckles and such, but we did have a Teddy bear handy........so Ted was our practice victim. Ah Ted. He's seen better days, but he's still my go to man in a pinch.




I had a check up appointment on Friday - and things are still going well. I have a touch of an Urinary Tract Infection, but I've got antibiotics for that now. Aside from that, Dr. Kelsey took a Group B Strep swap test (I'll get test results back in a week), and an internal exam to see how I was doing. Baby is down nice and low with its head locked and loaded :) And I'm about 1 cm dilated (not that it means anything at all) and on my way! He also restricted me to working only in the Chicago Metro area, so no more trips to Cheeseland :( But I suppose the less time I spend in the car, the more comfortable I am.

And I also found out that Dr. Kelsey is going to be on vacation from September 7th - 24th. I wasn't really all that heartbroken about it - I've spent lots of time with the other practitioners, and I like all of them - it doesn't matter much to me who catches the baby...that was one of the reasons why I wanted a multi-doctor practice.

We're almost a month out - and getting more and more excited as time chugs along!

Saturday, August 25, 2007

Lonely Saturday

I shouldn't say lonely.......I've got my cats to keep me company :) Pat has been gone most of the day today galavanting about in Chi-town. His buddy is getting married soon - so they are having a Bachelor party boys day for him. I'm sure he'll be home late, but the weather was fantastic today (which is a nice break from all the stinkin' rain and storms we've been having!) so I'm hoping he had a great time!!

Truth be told, I enjoy a day to myself now and again, and I SUPER am enjoying this day because I know in another month these days will be few and far in between! Its been very relaxing - I did yoga, cleaned a bit, sorted photos, cuddled cats, talked on the phone with some friends / family, ate lots of snacks, watched a shit pile of HGTV - overall, yeah, I guess I'd say its been a fun day! Solitary, yes, but definitely nice!

I think in the next week or two (or maybe sooner) I may integrate my two blogs into one - its just a pain in the butt to have two, know what I mean? In the beginning I thought it would be a good idea, and it was (especially before we had shared the news with everyone), but now so much of our life is consumed (and will continue to be) by this little person growing inside me, it seems silly to keep them separate. So, look for changes soon....very soon.

Thursday, August 16, 2007

Family Photo :)

It was great visiting the fam last weekend - in addition to the baby shower we also went to go see a movie. Karli, Nikki & Janelle and I went to see Hairspray, while Pat opted to go see The Bourne Ultimatum in the theater across the hall......I was pleasantly surprised about Hairspray - I mean, it was a cheesy musical, but it was well done and entertaining. Other than that we spent our time hanging out and lounging in the pool and just visiting over all.

OH - Pat and I slept on my sister's waterbed. That was fun - NOT! I slept pretty well the second night, but the first night Pat was being rather over exaggerated in his motions and flopping us all over god's green earth. And the bed may have been a tad overfilled for the two of us (compared to one teeny tiny Karli girl!)....so it was kind of like we were sleeping on a hill. But it worked out great for my hips and back - no pain at all!

HOLY COW! Did you know my sister has her permit!?? And turns 16 in about two weeks!? When did that happen!??! I had her drive me to the store this weekend, and it was so strange having her in the seat next to me! She's just growing up so quickly!

Even though everyone wasn't there for all of the time, I was able to wrangle the entire family together for a photo session before we left on Sunday - everyone was less than enthused! Hey - I HAD to try out my new tri-pod! But, they eventually cooperated (even Chino was patient!) and I managed to get a good shot or two (or ten! LOL). Here's my fav......

Here's another one we took the night before, including our cousin's Janelle & Nikki, and excluding Keith.

I really like these shots because they were rather spontaneous - meaning I didn't give anyone any time to primp or prepare.....so its us, just as us. Real. I {heart} my family!

No big plans for this weekend - we've got a few baby classes to attend, but after the crazy travel weekend last weekend I would like to just hang out and do a whole lot of nothing, know what I mean?

Wednesday, August 01, 2007

Oh! Other Weekly activities!

Last week, I went to TWO (count 'em - TWO ) Tiger games - unfortunately they lost both :( Tuesday I went by myself (cuz Pat was in Buffalo) and the weather was kind of drizzley and crappy, but on Thursday I did get to spend a little bit of time with two of my cousins! Pat and Will's friend Rudy also went with us, too! Rudy was rockin' some serious Magglio Ordonez hair - but he ended up putting it in a pony tail because it was H-O-T! We had FABULOUS seats - and I got a gazillion pics! You can see them all on the baseball set on Flickr - but here are a few of my favorites here:

Lil' Dan
Willis
Me & Pat
Rudy, Will, Dennis & Pat
Tiger Pics

Culinary disaters and other dissappointments

*whew* its been so long since I posted, I guess I need to do somewhat of a weekly recap. Last Friday was Pat's 31st birthday - so I decided I needed to make him a cake. From scratch. Which was a bad idea from the get go seeing as how I sometimes have a negative attitude towards stuff made from scratch. Its deep seeded and would take more explaining than I care to go into right now - but suffice to say it was a bad idea before I started.

So I made the cake (and a huge mess, as almost always one accompanies the other). And it was tasty. But, since I can't do anything half assed I was trying to be all professional and stuff cutting and trimming. Hey, I figured I've seen enough episodes of Ace Of Cakes - I'm almost professional myself. WRONG! I mutilated the cake, but I figured I'd be able to save it the next day when I assembled it and put frosting on it.

I go out and buy a mini-starter cake decorating kit from the store, and proceed to try to make the frosting that Pat says is the easiest and yummiest to make. Well - once again, no such luck. The frosting turned out to be more of an icing (think: cinnamon rolls)....so I poured it over each layer, and basically just threw in the towel. I didn't even get a picture of it - it was so embarrassing. We did sing Happy Birthday and did eat the entire thing because although it was horrifying and mutilated, it still was cake and icing, and quite delectable. But the whole experience was rather traumatizing for me.

On Saturday, I had made plans to go to this benefit event at Shedd Aquarium called BLU. A great big "Save the World" kind of thing, where you get all dressed up and eat food and drink. Because it was in conjunction with fireworks and the Venetian Fest Boat Parade, I thought it would be a good birthday present for Pat. You know, a nice night out on the town before Baby gets here.

Let me back up. I despise buying presents. I hate the pressure and emotional turmoil that goes with it. Because really, even though its the thought that counts, why give something that someone either doesn't really love, or doesn't need? Then you've wasted all this energy and time trying to think of a good and/or fun surprise, only to be let down if the recipient doesn't think its the greatest well thought out gift in the world. Life would be much simpler if presents were agreed upon before hand - or chosen from a list. Kind of like a registry. It might not knock their socks off, but it certainly is guaranteed to be something needed / appreciated.

Last year, I surprised Pat with a new, nice Gary Fischer bike - that he totally wanted, and liked and uses often. I spent good money on it, because I knew it was exactly what he wanted - and I knew he wasn't expecting it. I was told this year to not spend that much money....which pretty much nixed the Blu Ray Disc player or 80G iPod off the list. So that in itself creates all this pressure - I could get him something that he needs (Socks and underwear, anyone?) and be totally lame, or try to come up with something fun and romantic. Which is what this BLU event was supposed to be. Back in February, we went to what we thought was a similar event at Shedd, and it was actually kind of fun - so it seemed like a good choice.

Apparently this evening was as doomed as my ill fated cake.

Let me back up again: Earlier on Saturday we had the opportunity to go out shopping, and also stopped for a yummy dive lunch at the Bunny Hutch, and then played 18 holes of super retro mini-golf. The place was awesome. And I got a hole in one on the WINDMILL people - the WINDMILL!! I also kicked Pat's butt by like, 5 strokes. It was awesome.

OK - back to Saturday night. We get there, and there is a big line - 20 minutes after the event was supposed to start. I don't know about you, but if I'm paying big cash to go to an event, I don't want to stand in line. At all. After we get in, there are only, like, 4 teeny tiny food stations - two of which are laden with onions and make you throw up a little bit in your mouth after eating them. Then, there are a million people standing in line to get one little cream puff at each area. Again, if I'm paying a lot of money for light, tiny dishes - there had better be sufficient areas so no one has to wait. Ditto with the booze lines - even if I am only getting a Sierra Mist. Top that off with a zillion Chaz & Trixie's - and its just not a good vibe. I know - what did I expect right? Its a benefit to save the world. Of course Chaz & Trixie and their yachting friends will be there.

I was hoping to have a perfect view of the boat parade and fireworks from the North Terrace (as advertised in the BLU promotion), but there weren't very many seats around, so Trixie & Buffy took all of the seats, and Chaz & Thurston were blocking the areas around the girls, so basically I didn't get any good shots at all. We were packed like sardines. Save for this semi-blurry view of the Chicago sunset, that I had to beg some ol' biddy to let me stand in front of her for three seconds.
While standing in line for strawberries & chocolate, I saw them open up an area, which allowed Pat to go and scope us a spot to actually sit down and maybe even eat. We scored a mini-steak burger from Gibson's (OHHHH SOOOO YUMMY!) and were able to enjoy our chocolate covered strawberries in peace. But we were completely out of view of the fireworks at that point, so all we saw were a few glows, booms and smoke coming back out of the harbor. I did snap this city shot (again, blurry) through the glass squeezed between a couple people:


The good things: Kettle One sponsored the event, and they had this really cool ice bar they were making cosmo's and dirty martini's for everyone (except me). I made it Pat's mission to drink as much as possible, so we could at least get some money's worth out of this gig.



They also had a nice selection of decadent desserts at the end...some almost too rich - but yummy! And, we got a nice Save The World bag with fun goodies (including a nice Porche Pen - because Porche was a sponsor and they weren't sending us all home with cars).

So, with our tired feet and aching backs from standing all night, we left at 10:30 and made our way home with the rest of the Venetian night traffic. Hopefully we'll look back at this birthday and laugh - but for now, ugh, what a disaster.