Tights & a Wedge

We did a little shopping tonight. A little. I had ordered D a new pair of black dress shoes from DSW.com and they were too pointy for his taste. A couple of days after I ordered the shoes, we got a coupon from DSW for $20 off a purchase of $50 or more. We decided to run by DSW tonight and exchange the black shoes and, while we were there, purchase him a new pair of brown shoes, too. He's pretty hard on his shoes. I think it's the way he walks, but he tends to wear holes in the soles of his shoes after about a year. It was time to replace both pairs of shoes so that's what we did tonight. I really like the styles we chose and it was nice to have such a great coupon!

After that we stopped by Old Navy's meager maternity section (didn't find a thing) then meandered into Osh Kosh (I forgot it was there!). We didn't have time to browse for long since we were meeting some friends for dinner, but we went back after dinner and I picked up 8 pairs of tights for $8.68. Two pair of tights were only $1.99 for the set!
Dinner was really fun. One of our friends just moved to London for work so we wanted to meet up with him before he had to leave again. Another friend and his wife who were at dinner are due with their first baby (a boy) on Wednesday. I really admire that she is still getting out and about - I know she's not very comfortable!

I got my prenatal cradle and Pregnancy Wedge in the mail today. I plan to try the wedge tonight when I go to bed and my prenatal cradle tomorrow. I'll let you know what I think!

You're going to make fun of me, but I'm almost 100% positive that my nose is getting bigger. I just want to know if it goes back down after the baby is born...? Here's a picture of D & me at the wedding we attended on Saturday. Thanks, Mom, for the use of your necklace and earrings! I can't believe you had those on you when you visited! Perfect! My mom also bought me a "cherry blossom pashmina" when she and Dad were in D.C. last week. I plan to devote some time to that (with pictures!) tomorrow. It's beautiful - I love it a lot. I wore it to breakfast on Saturday and the hostess complimented me on it!

D just booked our September Chicago trip! I'm so excited! We're using our Alaska Airlines miles which is saving us over $700! I'm a little nervous about traveling with Amelia when she's so young, but thankfully we'll be staying with D's aunt and uncle who are so sweet and accomodating so hopefully it won't be such a big deal. Direct flights both ways which is also a relief!

Well, bedtime is calling my name and D looks like he's fading so until tomorrow night!

Tess's Favorite Spot

I'm sitting here. On the couch. I've been sitting here all night, trying not to move much. I think Amelia is head down because today when she had the hiccups I felt them pretty far down. For this reason, I also think she's got her head pressing on my sciatica nerve. It's not a fun feeling. But, usually by the end of the week I feel pretty beat up. A good night of doing absolutely nothing seems to help!

I don't have much to say.

Our 7lb long-haired chihuahua, Tess, has found a new favorite spot on the couch while we're at work. She perches herself on the top of a couch cushion by the window, thereby leaving a Tess-shaped dent in the cushion and Tess hair clumped on the cushion. When we are home, I don't let her on the couch at all which I think she's having a hard time grasping. She was allowed to be on our old couch all she wanted, so the new rules are probably confusing. Although, she never lets us see her perched on top of the couch cushion. Smart dog. Anyway, I'm trying to figure out a way to keep her off the top of the couch when we aren't at home. Any ideas?

Happy weekend!!

Recipe Success: Chicken Tetrazzini

D gave this meal a very enthusiastic thumbs up so I figured I'd share it with you guys. I adapted it from a recipe online so I don't take credit for it. (This is also known as chicken spaghetti...I'd feel silly calling it chicken tetrazzini without mentioning its real name)

Easy Chicken Tetrazzini

1 pound spaghetti

3 cubes chicken bouillon
5 chicken breasts, cooked and cubed
3 cups frozen broccoli (or peas, or whatever frozen veggie you want)

2 (10.75 ounce) cans condensed cream of mushroom soup
2 1/4 cups water
1/4 cup butter
2 cubes chicken bouillon
1 t garlic powder

1 t onion powder

1/2 cup butter
1 sleeve Ritz crackers
Cheddar cheese, shredded (to taste)

Prepare spaghetti by boiling in water with 3 bouillon cubes and frozen broccoli. Drain, add chicken and set aside.
In medium saucepan heat together soup, water, butter, garlic powder, onion powder and bouillon. Bring to a boil and then pour over the pasta and chicken. Mix together then pour into 13x9 pan. Press down mixture a bit.
In a separate bowl, melt 1/2 cup butter. Crush 1 sleeve of Ritz crackers and mix in with the butter. Spread across the top of the dish.

Bake at 350 degrees for 25 minutes. Add cheese to taste.

The original recipe is here.
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This made a TON of food and D was a huge fan so I'll be making it again. I actually used linguine noodles instead of spaghetti noodles. My sister made this dish tonight, too, but I haven't talk to her to ask how it turned out. She was going to use angel hair pasta and not add veggies. I think she was also going to use cream of chicken instead of cream of mushroom.

By the way, I passed my GD test and also did fine on my iron levels which was amazing considering I've been anemic or borderline anemic all of my life.

I called Babies R Us and ordered the furniture. Yay! They had 41 cribs left at their warehouse...now they're down to 40. I learned that handy trick of subtraction in 1st grade.

Also, as an aside, David talked with a coworker yesterday about a class she took through the hospital where she delivered (same hospital I'll deliver at). It was a class for new moms and their babies (when the babies are 4-6 weeks old) and this coworker said she loved it. She said it was just nice to get out of the house and meet with other moms who were going through the same thing as you. After the class series ended, the moms still got together and this woman is still friends with some of the moms and it's been years since her daughter was born. This turned out to be the same class that my carpool's wife took after their baby was born, too. My carpool partner is always telling me about a picnic they went to and the weekly Mommy group that his wife is a part of...and their son was born 2 years ago.

Anyway, I signed up for the class. One of the classes was already completely booked so I assume it's a pretty popular class. I'm excited.

Well, I think D is getting ready for bed without me so I better go.

Waddle, waddle

We just got back from a trip to Motherhood Maternity and IKEA. I had to return a shirt to Motherhood Maternity - my sweet mom picked it up for me while she was visiting relatives in Texas. The only problem was that she had already bought it for me 3 months prior along with a bunch of other maternity clothes when I first found out I was pregnant. It's a very cute shirt - and it definitely looks like something I'd wear so I'd say she did a great job picking it out - twice!

D & I are going to a wedding this Saturday and I needed something more formal to wear. I have a spring dress that my mom picked up for me (also while she was in Texas) but I think it's a little too springy & bright for an evening wedding. I can't wait to wear it to my baby shower, though! Anyway, I tried on a couple of dresses but I'm not feelin' the dress thing right now. I'm fat, white as a ghost, and can't reach my toenails to paint them. Why do all maternity dresses only hit right at the knee or higher? What about actually covering the chunky trunk legs & swollen ankles of a pregnant mama with a long dress? A novel concept!

I went with some black stretchy dress pants, a red stretchy formal tank and a couple of camis. I'll wear a black cardigan over the formal tank, hopefully...if my pre-pregnancy black cardigan still fits without looking ghetto fabulous.

Then we went to IKEA to check out a dresser that would also be a changing table. I really loved it but it's french white, not pure white, so it wouldn't go with one of my crib choices. Speaking of crib choices, here are the two we're deciding between. I can't decide if the off-white would really bug me or if I'd love it.

Just kidding - D & I just looked at both options and decided on one. Really, just now as I was sitting here writing this post we looked at both and made our informed decision. I'm actually excited to have a decision made. The crib is out of stock online but I'm going to call the store tomorrow to see if it's in. This is the off-white set that might just bug me. I guess if the lack of pure white drives me crazy I can always spray paint it! That was a joke.

In case you'd like a refresher on the bedding, here it is (but it's cuter in person)...
Hard to imagine it all together, isn't it? I promise to post pictures when the nursery is done. I guess to get it done we need to actually get started. We're hoping to get the ball rolling in the next couple of weeks.

My mattress is calling my name.

At least I got Tuesday's post in under the wire. Goodnight!

Spring...?

Amelia has the hiccups. She's been on a steady hiccuping beat for the last half hour or so - this is the first time I've felt her having the hiccups that I was sure that's what it was. Definitely a weird feeling but it's funny because I can now tell that she's head down. Good girl! Stay that way for the next 14 weeks!

Today is my gestational diabetes test. I have to fast after 10:45am and then drink the glucola drink at 2:45pm. This fasting thing is for the birds - I don't know how I'm going to not eat for 5 hours. I should send out a memo to people at work: "Pregnant lady not allowed to eat. Steer clear after 11am". I have heard of some women being told that it's okay to eat certain foods but my doctor instructed me to fast so I better do it that way. I suppose if I get desperately hungry I could call my doctor's office and ask if I can have a piece of bread (I heard carbs are okay) ::something with PROTEIN:: - it's protein that's okay, not carbs!

My parents and their friends met us at Maggiano's on Friday evening around 5:45pm and we had a wonderful dinner! The food was really great and the company was so fun! They flew out to D.C. the next morning. My sweet husband took them to the airport at 4:30am and on his way home grabbed DONUTS! When he was getting back in bed around 5am, he told me "No need to wake me up - I got donuts on my way home". Of course I slept fitfully for the next few hours just knowing that there were rounds of doughy, chocolaty goodness in my kitchen.

We watched UW lose to Purdue. I was not a fan of the refs of that game. For the record. If anyone is recording this.

We had to run to Lowe's because our list was getting longer and longer. While we were there, we decided to pick up some flowers for the spot in our front yard that has been vacant for at least the last 6 months. I've never learned how to garden and never really had too much of an interest since everything I plant seems to wither and die or not sprout up in the first place. But, I really wanted that front area filled so we picked up some flowers that we thought were pretty and planted them that night since the evening was mild (around 55°) and it was still light out. I have to say it looks much better! Don't worry - we made sure that the flowers we chose would do well in that area with the lighting and drainage. We're not complete amateurs! We still have to get a few more flowers to fill in some empty spots, but it's an improvement! D even dug up some of our tulips from the backyard and planted them in with our new flowers. They haven't bloomed yet - I wonder if they even will this season.

D prepped the upstairs guest bath for painting last night and he'll paint it tonight. It's nice to finally get some rooms painted that we've been waiting to paint for a while. Tomorrow we'll go look for baby furniture.

Amelia's hiccups are gone. I better go eat. I plan to stuff myself silly until 10:45. Probably not the best choices of food before a glucose test, but I brought a banana, an apple, a pear, and the fixings for toast with honey. Ha! I can't help it if my child already has a fanatical sweet tooth.

Obligatory Post after a Missed Day

I told you how bad I am at following through. I didn't post yesterday...oops.

In my defense, it was a busy day. But, today is a new day and my hair is curled which makes me feel a lot better than when it's board straight and straggly.

Last night after work I stopped by the store for milk. We've been going through it at a pretty rapid pace due to my Raising Bran Crunch addiction. Speaking of which, I picked up 2 more boxes last night - the nerve of Safeway to keep it on sale for so long! I guess I could have worse cravings! I also picked up some grapes, bananas (product of Chile - I happened to notice), and Gala apples (99 cents/pound!).

Cereal for dinner then off to Costco before Bible class. D always eats at their little food court. Every once in a while I do, too, especially now that I'm pregnant and don't have to watch my calories quite as closely. While he was downing his piece of pepperoni pizza and polish dog, I sucked down a Mocha Freeze so quickly that it started a watery-eyed coughing fit. That's really the only interesting part of that story. I picked up some pears at Costco along with the usual restocking items. I found Amelia a really cute Carter's dress for next summer for $5.37. I wanted to look some more but we were in a hurry and a lady had pulled her cart right in front of the clothes, blocking 3/4 of the items. She was oblivious that I was hovering around her so I grabbed the dress closest to me which I happened to love, anyway.

Couldn't sleep last night. Amelia kept me awake and then woke me up this morning. She must know that today is the first day of March Madness! My bracket is filled out and I'm all set to go. No, I don't bet on my bracket but it's always fun to see between family whose bracket comes out on top. I don't have the UW Huskies going very far but I hope they prove me wrong!

I tried to find some pictures for you to make this post more interesting but nothing seemed to apply. I would take a picture of the Sound but it's foggy and nasty outside so there wouldn't be much to see. Although... here it is on a clear day back in July 2007! It's the view from my office window. Cruise ships dock in front of that teal colored building. That's Alki Beach across the water there...and a ferry, of course.

Happy Thursday! I can't believe it's Thursday already. Not that I'm complaining!

Green potatoes

Happy St. Patrick's Day (even though we're not Catholic and barely Irish)

Me: I'm craving mashed potatoes
D (sitting on the couch wearing his green button-up shirt): You should dye them green
Me: You really want green potatoes? Really?
D: You're right - green potatoes are too fun. We shouldn't try to have fun.

So, the potatoes were green. It messed with my mind. I plated the blob and poked at them with my fork a couple of times before timidly taking the first bite. Hm, they taste like mashed potatoes. I'm an intelligent person, but I really expected that they would have a more - I don't know - green taste. My craving had already disappeared by the time I took my first bite, so I don't think I'll be making green mashed potatoes again - until next year. Or, maybe I should dye all of my food irregular colors if it keeps me from over-stuffing my face.

My belly has felt really heavy the last couple of days. At night it feels almost sore. I know that it's ligament pain from my belly actually getting heavier, but it just makes me want to sit on the couch and do nothing. I really need to get some things done, though, especially since my plan is to get to bed at a reasonable hour. My parents and another couple who are good friends of theirs are coming to stay with us just for one night before they fly to D.C. for vacation. Bible class is tomorrow night, Ladies Bible class is Thursday night and then company comes on Friday. You'd think that would motivate me to get off the couch but I'm here to tell you that the 5:30am wake-up calls sciatica woes and heavy belly about do me in. I know, I know - it gets worse.

Ok, I'm going to get off here and get things done.

Bathroom/Living Room - Redone

I can't be on long because my sweet husband is waiting for his computer - I stole it. He's patiently waiting by playing Xbox in the meantime :)

This counts as my Monday post - just FYI.

D has worked very, very hard to update our house project by project from replacing almond-colored light switches to tackling remodeling an entire bathroom. He really amazes me with everything he takes on (& completes!). He keeps a running list of every improvement he's made to this house - someday I'll share the list.

So, here's the bathroom before (*shudder*):

And this is our remodeled guest bathroom! We painted it a light brown and chose the darker tile.

I should point out that the toilet paper is no longer sitting on the sink. D installed the toilet paper holder this evening - I just took the picture before he did that!

We drove a 16' Enterprise rental truck down to Oregon last weekend because my parents gave us a killer deal on their living room furniture. The ride was pretty interesting and at some points pretty bouncy but it was kind of nice to be riding up that high. I was able to knit the entire way down to Oregon which I'm definitely not capable of doing in a regular car.

My mom had a surprise baby "sprinkle" for my sister on Saturday. Since it's my sister's 2nd baby my mom just invited a few of her closest friends. She was pretty surprised! I'll talk about that more later.

Here are the living room pictures. I'm not sold on keeping all the decorations how they are, so if you have suggestions send them my way. I haven't decided whether or not to keep the sheers on the windows. I may replace them since they might be a little too busy for the room. I used to have an oriental rug on the floor but with the chair pattern I was feeling a little overwhelmed with different patterns. It will go in another room.

Hope you enjoyed the little virtual tour. Amelia has been kicking me all day long. She's usually only active at certain times of the day but today it's been almost constant. I do not mind one bit! Today we got the CUTEST Mariner's outfit for Amelia from David's Aunt Patty. I'll be posting pictures of it tomorrow!

On to bed...

A Lot of Nothing

Ok, I forgot to post yesterday. Sorry!

I'm at work right now - it's 6:30am. My carpool partner wanted to come in early and then leave early which is fine with me since we're going to need to pack and get things ready to head to Oregon. This morning was a little dicey - I was thankful that I showered last night because I did not want to get out of bed. D has a Flex Day today which means he has the day off. Everyone at the City gets a Flex Day if they want it. Basically he works 9 1/2 hours every day then he gets every other Friday off. Once we have the baby and he's able to be home for long weekends every other week I'm sure I'll love it. For now it just ticks me off that he gets to sleep in and I have to drag my rotund self out of bed to go to work :)

It's so weird to be in the office this early. I can't even see the water because it's so dark outside. The moon is clearly visible hanging high in the sky. I think it's a quarter moon today.

The headband I'm working on knitting is coming together pretty nicely. I realized yesterday after I got home from work that I was doing it wrong so I had to undo about 2 hours worth of work and start over. I'm glad I did, though, because it looks a lot better now. I was supposed to go to a Ladies class at church last night but since I've been sick I haven't had the energy to do laundry or pack for the trip so I had to get that stuff done last night. I was sad to miss the class but it's going on for the next month or so, so I'll be able to attend the next one!

Every day I commute to work makes me stand by my "Washington drivers are the worst" assessment. Just saying.

I'd like to get our trip to Chicago booked pretty soon. I like having things lined up and planned out in advance so that I can start looking forward to them. We're hoping to take the baby out to Chicago sometime in September. If you didn't know, I used to live in the Chicago area and have friends back there that I miss terribly. D also has an aunt out there that I dearly love whom we would love to visit as well. We went back last May for a visit and really enjoyed ourselves. I would imagine that we'd have a wonderful time with the baby, too. So, we'll see. I could really use some Girodano's pizza and a Portillo's salad or hot dog. Oh, and a buffalo burger from Tim Turner's Montana Grill. YUM!

This post is totally boring...sorry about that.

Amelia hasn't been as active the last day or so. Of course that means I'm worried about her. Hopefully it's normal for the baby to not be as active on some days as they adjust their sleeping/awake times.

Last night I made pasta with spinach, tomatoes and white beans. It hit the spot - I've been craving pasta. Then I had 2 bowls of Raisin Bran Crunch. Yes, 2 bowls. I think I hit my daily iron requirement because for lunch I had a spinach salad. Did you know that Raisin Bran Crunch cereal has more iron per serving than spinach and red meat combined? That must be why I've polished off 2 1/2 boxes in one week. Several times this week I've taken a few bites of my dinner, pushed it aside, and had a bowl of cereal instead.

I could also eat cinnamon sugar toast at any time. It's been my breakfast for at least the last couple of weeks.

So...
- Pasta
- Raisin Bran Crunch
- Spinach
- Pineapple (I forgot to mention that I downed an entire can of pineapple chunks the other day at lunch)

And, as always, I love chocolate. I even added chocolate chips to the banana bread I made late last week.

Boring post over. Have a happy Friday and a wonderful weekend!

Knitting

I'm a knitter - a very, very beginner knitter. But, I do knit the old-fashioned way with needles. It's pretty therapeutic sometimes, although often I'm just in a hurry to get my project finished so I can see how it turned out.

I got a little ambitious last night. I've seen knitted baby headbands online that have knitted flowers on them and I had to have one. But, I didn't want to spend the money for someone else to make something that I thought I could maybe do myself. So, I searched online for an easy flower pattern and a headband pattern. Then I searched online for a way to read the patterns. This, I felt, warranted a trip to JoAnn's Fabrics at 8:30 last night for more yarn and some circular needles (thanks, Mom, for the coupons - I used one last night). Our JoAnn's is slightly ghetto and usually a ghost town, but I found what I was looking for. My sweet husband asked an employee where he might find "one of those things that winds your yarn for you" but they didn't have it. He rarely asks employees of any stores for help - he tries to find an item himself until I finally ask someone and get us pointed in the right direction. But, he must have seen how frustrated I was during my last knitting project when I grabbed the wrong end of the the yarn and spent hours untangling yarn before I could proeceed. Sweet guy!

So last night I made my first flower and my first french knot. The french knot took me a while to figure out even with David trying to help with the instructions. I was looking at my knitting book (thanks, Mom B - I use it all the time!) trying to figure it out when finally I realized it might be easier to see how a knot is done if I look online. Sure enough, there was a video on how to do a french knot and I popped one out in a few seconds.

So, here is my first attempt at a knitted flower...hopefully this will go on a baby headband soon.
For those who asked, I think I'm in love with "Millie" as Amelia's nickname. That might change once we meet her, but for now I find myself calling her that every now and then.

I'm still feeling kind of puny and I'm really, really tired. I want to be well by this weekend when we head down to Oregon.

Just as an aside - I've lived in 7 states and have visited even more. Washington state has the worst drivers. By "worst", I mean they drive 45mph in the fast lane (where there's a 60mph speed limit) and don't care/realize that they're holding up the entire morning/afternoon commute. I'm not exaggerating when I say this happens all of the time. That's all I'll say about that. I'm overjoyed about not commuting anymore in 3 short months.

Now to work...

Have a great Wednesday!

Millie's Closet

My daughter already has half as many clothes as I have and she's not even on the outside yet. I bought my first couple of girly outfits about a year or more ago. Kohl's is my weakness. They have the best sales on baby clothes. I told myself that I would use the baby girl outfits that I bought as baby shower gifts but of course they were too cute and I wanted to keep them for the little girl that wasn't even a blip on the radar yet.

When I was a little over 12 weeks pregnant, the ultrasound tech told me that she thought we were having a girl but "not to go buying pink yet". I confessed to her at my last ultrasound that I bought at least 8 girly items at the Kohl's "After Christmas Sale". She laughed, but I'm sure that kind of behavior is unacceptable. I have no self control when it comes to baby girl clothes - especially smocking. And holiday dresses. I tried to show you a picture of the smocked one-piece I have but Blogger keeps rotating my picture sideways. Sorry about the picture quality - I never claimed to be a photographer. I'll hone my skills when Amelia is born and I have a helpless subject to photograph mercilessly.

I can't wait until there's a chubby little girl to squeeze into these outfits. Lately, Ameila has been karate chopping my insides so that it's visible on the outside. It's my entertainment lately. I'll sit on the couch and just stare at my belly at night and watch her go. She's particularly active between 6 and 11pm. Must be the after-dinner ice cream.

I'm back at work today though not without struggle. It would have been wonderful to be able to stay home another day, but I'm getting over a cold not the plague so I think I can drag myself in here. Although I carpool today which means I have no option of leaving a little early if I start feeling bad again. Guess I'll just have to plan to feel good!

Happy Tuesday!

Sick Day

I probably should have qualified my "blog every day in March" statement with "unless sick" and "usually not on weekends". I started getting a sore throat last Tuesday and by Friday I had a stuffy nose and cough and earache. On Saturday I woke up with the voice of a 40 year smoker. I know I'm getting better, but I'm still not even close to 100% so I stayed home from work today.

This is what we woke up to this morning:

It's March, right? As in, almost Spring? "Global Warming" my foot!

My super sweet mother-in-law is bringing us soup and Jello and other sickie food. She's so thoughtful - she takes such good care of us!

By the way, we sold our queen-sized futon and our living room furniture on Craigslist this weekend. Pretty great! So D and I blew up the queen-sized Aerobed in the living room and are using that to sit on until we get my parents' furniture this weekend. :)

My brain is not functioning at full capacity so I'm going to take my leave. Have a great Monday!

Bargains & Belly

For some reason I can't find the pictures of me as a kid that I uploaded to my home computer. I also uploaded them to Snapfish but the pictures are grayed out...I'm not sure what that's about. Anyway, hopefully pictures from my childhood to come relatively soon.

Before I forget, I wanted to show you the front of our house comparison with and without the contorted filbert.

With...

Without...


The bare spot where it used to be is that huge rock. I know I'm partial, but I like that area without Fil. We're planning to plant some flowers there soon...or something. If you have any ideas I'd love to hear them!

We put our living room couch and chair up for sale on Craigslist. We are buying my parents' couch and chair from them so we need to make room. I'll post pictures when the new furniture is in place - probably in about 2 weeks since we aren't picking it up until possibly next weekend. I love it - I can't wait. Anyway, back to Craigslist. If you ever want to post an item for sale on Craigslist, post it on a Wednesday night, Thursday, or Friday morning. That's when I've had the most number of responses to what I'm trying to sell. I posted our furniture last night around 9:30pm and as of 6am this morning I had 5 responses. If we sell it this weekend D is going to inflate our queen sized Aerobed for use as living room furniture until we get the couch from my parents. I think that should be pretty funny - maybe I'll post pictures of that, too, for posterity.

So the last time I showed you belly pictures was 18 weeks. I promised myself that I'd take belly photos in 5 week intervals, and since my timing got messed up I will show you one today. I "popped" somewhere around 16-17 weeks and didn't want to wait 20 weeks to take a picture of the progress so I broke my 5 week rule and took a picture 3 weeks after I had taken the last.

So, here I am at 18 weeks with my ragamuffin hair (on left) and 23 weeks (on right).


I feel huge. Just sayin'.

Today I'm supposed to meet a girl off Craigslist at the Market and pay her $25 for her "excellent condition" Baby Bjorn. It's identical to the $80 one we registered for! The Bjorn will be for David, mostly. When I need to wear the baby I'm hoping to use a sling. I don't think I'm going to get David to wear a flower printed sling.

It's a beautiful, sunny, albeit COLD day here in Seattle. I don't mind the cold as long as we can have the sun!

Happy Friday, everyone!

Pike Place in the morning & 23 weeks

There are definite benefits to taking the bus to work - the above picture is just a portion of them. I don't take the bus anymore because my respiratory system and my back aren't what they used to be and the Seattle hills can be killers even when you're not pregnant. I took the above picture back in October on my walk from the bus stop to work. It was probably around 7am as I was making my way through Pike Place Market. There was a ferry on the Sound and the streets were quiet (which, if you've been to Pike Place Market in the afternoon you know that "quiet" is not typical). A coworker brought in a bag of Piroshkies this morning and offered one to me. He walks through the Market on the way to work every day and today he gave in to the smells wafting through the streets of freshly baked pastries. We talked for a bit about how peaceful and mood-lifting walking through the market on a weekday morning can be. Fresh fish being unloaded from delivery trucks, florists setting up their booths with loads of the most beautiful fresh flowers that will later be sold for the unbelievable price of $10/bouquet, the smell of freshly roasted coffee and newly baked pastries...really it doesn't get much better than that. To top it off, if you walk up the hill from the market just a bit or walk across the street to the park you get a beautiful view of the Sound and Mt. Rainier.

I didn't take my coworker up on his offer of a Piroshky because I already had my cinnamon toast bagel, but I do want to try one someday. His ham & cheese piroshky smelled really good and I got a whiff of the apple one as I passed by another coworker's desk.

Right now I'm drinking my tea and watching the rain fall as I try to get some work done. I've been feeling pretty run down lately and yesterday brought the onset of a sore throat, ear pain and a stopped up nose. I'm officially sick. I'm thankful for a cold rather than the flu - I'm still semi-functional.

I'm 23 weeks pregnant today! According to BabyCenter.com, Amelia is 11 inches long and weighs just over a pound (to the right is an illustration of what a baby at 23 weeks looks like). With her newly developed sense of movement she can feel when I'm swaying to music or rocking in my seat. The rocking thing is fairly common for me now, especially at church. I start without realizing that I'm doing it and it usually ends when D makes fun of me by moving the song book back and forth or side to side (depending on which way I'm rocking). Amelia has been using my bladder as her personal punching bag which means I can't get away with long intervals between bathroom trips...she doesn't like being crowded, apparently. She also has found a spot inside of me to kick that feels somewhere between a tickle and a really unpleasant sensation. I love to feel her moving but when she kicks that spot I do everything I can to get her to stop!

It's off to get some work done on this Thursday morning. Have a great day!

Memories (& lack thereof)

My March resolution is to write something on this blog site every day. So those of you who subscribe to my blog via email may want to reconsider! I'm not promising anything substantial or even interesting, but just getting something down.

I have a horrible memory. I know my parents used to think it was just a lame excuse as to why I didn't do something when I was younger. "I forgot" was one of my signature phrases, unfortunately. Mom, Dad, you'll be unpleasantly surprised to know that my memory has not improved with time.

I have friends who can remember when they were 6 and who they played with on the playground and what their favorite outfit was and their favorite game to play with their friends. I have scattered memories based on mostly smell and they rarely make much sense as to why I would remember those things and nothing else.

For example, here are some of my scattered memories:

- When I was 5, a kid named Aaron Hines chased me around the classroom.

- My elementary school teachers names: Mrs. McBroom, Mrs. Thompson, Mrs. Dull, Mrs. Pitts

- I told Mrs. Pitts that she smelled like my aunt. I later learned that Mrs. Pitts was a smoker. My aunt is not.

- I remember a girl in my kindergarten class named Buffy. She was crude, crass, and all-around embarassing to have as a classmate. I was mortified to learn at the end of the school year that her real name was Jamie.

- There was a kid in my 3rd grade class named Brian. We square-danced together. When he found out I was moving to Michigan, he put his hands on my shoulders and said he'd come visit.

- I was in a "special" math class in 4th grade. I still don't know if it was for kids who had a hard time with math or kids who excelled at math. I tend to think the former.

- When I was probably 6 or so the babysitter locked my sisters and me outside. I don't remember how long we were out there, but I remember she ate a chocolate chip cookie at the sliding glass door to tease us. Mean, mean girl. I don't think she ever babysat for us again.

- I remember the smell of everything. A few months ago I got a whiff of my kindergarten classroom and it made me miss it.

There are other things I remember but the funny thing is that none of my early childhood memories really have to do with the friends I had or the fun I had with my friends. Is that sad, or maybe a little messed up? Maybe if I thought long and hard I would be able to think of good times I had with friends when we lived in Oklahoma, because I know they existed!

Mrs. S was my 5th grade teacher. She had a boyfriend fighting in the Gulf War, she loved pickles, she wanted to "save the earth", and her boyfriend sent Saudi Arabian coins and dollar bills for each of the kids in the class to have one. We were the envy of the playground. I had a crush on a kid named Brandon Cornell. One time Mrs. S told a kid named Jacob that he had a guilty conscience. There was a cute boy in my class named Corey Kugle and Mrs. S called him Corey Kugleshiver...I don't know why.

Check back later - I'm going to post photos of me as a kid when I get home tonight.

Okay, now I'm on memory sharing overload. I need to turn off my brain now.

As a side note, I'm fairly certain that I'm getting sick. My throat hurts a lot and I can't make it stop! I've been downing orange juice so I'm not sure what the problem is.

Until tomorrow!

The Weekend - Goodbye Fil.

First, I'll answer the 3 questions I received from my "Slow News Day" post :)

Leah asked: Besides being a mom and all that, what would your dream job be?

My dream job (besides being a mom) would probably have something to do with illustrating or painting. I would love to illustrate childrens books and/or travel the world and paint the scenery. Anything creative that allows me to work at my own pace and set my own schedule. Even without kids that would be important to me! And I say all this with the assumption that were I to land my "dream job" (before I had kids) that my husband would be able to travel the world with me!

Melissa asked: As for a question..... when are we going to get together again??????????????????????

That's a lot of question marks! Hopefully soon! We owe you guys - I'll talk to David. We need to have you over for dinner soon! We drove right by your house on our way to Leavenworth and if I would have had your number I would have called and asked if we could stop by. Carrie & Lori were with me :)

Diane asked: My question is, So far, what has been the most surprising thing about your pregnancy?

That's tough, because some of the more surprising things are things no one ever told me would happen when you get pregnant but things I shouldn't share publicly :) I think the most surprising thing that I can say about this pregnancy is that I never get tired of feeling her kick & move. It surprises me and comforts me every time I feel her. I wish I could somehow transfer this feeling to my husband just for a few minutes so he can experience how amazing this feels. I'm also surprised that I'm not scared about the labor/delivery part. Maybe I'm naive, but I just try to tell myself that everything will work out fine...because what will worry do?

Thanks for the questions!

By the way, Diane is having a great giveaway on her blog today! Go check it out!

Well, our (not so) beloved Contorted Filbert is gone. We gave it to a family from church who wanted it. I admit the thing had personality, but the front of our home was a very strange place for it to be planted. We would have just transplanted it elsewhere, but our back yard is already crowded with other plant life and there would be nowhere for us to move the filbert without uprooting another tree or plants which we weren't willing to do. So, the filbert had to go. David's dad came over along with members of the family who were taking the tree to dig it out.

Here's the tree. Looks like a mess, doesn't it?

Here's the front of our house with the tree. Just seems like a strange place for the tree to be. D's been doing a really great job of keeping our yard trimmed up even during the winter. I commented to him the other day that winter is my least favorite season simply because everything is dead and ugly. Our yard is so pretty in the spring!

Here are the guys (minus D who is taking the picture) working on the tree.

Here you can see the big root ball. We have no idea how it was growing where it was planted. In the next picture you'll see why.

There was a HUGE rock under there! You can barely see it in this picture, but there's a giant rock in the ground right where the tree was planted. That is one resilient tree if it was still able to grow in those conditions!

We went and registered for Amelia this weekend at Babies R Us. We were sufficiently overwhelmed. It took us over 2 hours to walk through the store and one large bottle of water. I'm not sure if the things I have on my registry are good or if I need to add things or take things away. It would have been helpful to have someone with me who knew what they were doing - D & I are definitely amateurs! Whoever entered our registry info online misspelled my last name which is funny because Baldwin is a pretty easy name to spell...maybe they just fat-fingered it. I called and supposedly it will be changed by tomorrow at the latest. No sweat!

Have a great Monday!