My Baby Shower at Work

My coworkers had been planning this for weeks now. I very carefully didn't pay attention as much as possible to all the whispering going on around me, and was pretty successful. I know they had a blast planning for it. I had no idea how much fun the entire floor had with it.

They did a fabulous job with the decorating and the cake.

From Michelles baby shower

Chocolate, my favorite.

Here are some of the party favors. So cute and inventive.

Yep, that's me, the guest of honor at 36 weeks and 5 days pregnant.

I got the first piece of cake. Of course I had to get a piece with a tiny little foot on it. So cute!

I love the hoopy, loopy camel.

My two best friends at work, Jo and Sandy, made this gorgeous baby quilt for me. They were so worried I'd notice all the bags going back and forth, but I guess I'm oblivious. I even missed it when another coworker came in and asked how the quilt was coming along. I think she got shushed pretty quickly. I probably had my iPod on anyway. :) I think it's cool that this actually got them both back into quilting, something neither of them had touched in a couple of years.

Okay, to explain the folks on my floor. First off, I work in Center Operations Directorate. That means our various offices are responsible for keeping the center running. We're not doing glamorous stuff like sitting in Mission Control, or training astronauts in the big pool. But if we weren't doing our job, there'd be no air conditioning, buildings wouldn't get built or refurbished, no moves would get planned, there'd be no water, sewer or electricity, trash wouldn't get picked up, the grounds wouldn't get mowed, and there'd be no environmental protection. So without us, there wouldn't even be a space program. How's that for important!

Each office went together to get me a gift. And they all themed their gifts around what their offices do. And they were all so incredibly thoughtful, meaningful and funny. These guys are great, and I'm so glad to work with them.

The planning office went first. I got a piggy bank, to plan for baby's financial future. . I also got a baby book and a growth chart, and the gift box was decorated with shuttles, rockets and astronauts. I can happily repurpose the box to hold baby stuff at home.

Of course, the construction management office had to get me a building toy. One of the project managers with a 1-year old said his little boy loved to pound that toy for hours. He quickly reassured me that soon, I wouldn't even hear it. I hope so!

From the office that manages the grounds maintenance contract, they got me a bubble mower. So cute. I may have to get out there and play with it to reduce my stress levels long before baby's able to play with it.

The procurement office got together and wrote up a purchase order to get me a new baby. Complete with all the government codes (made up, I hope) and correct forms and everything.

The office that manages the maintenance for the buildings in our "mall" area got me a bottle of baby powder, because everytime they do maintenance in the ceilings, they disturb the ceiling tiles, usually bringing down some white powder. And every time, the building occupants think it's asbestos. He wanted me to remember them at work while I'm maternity leave. And they also got me a gift certificate to the other kind of mall, the one with shops in it.

The utility office got me a bunch of little things, all related to the systems they manage. Gas system (gas relief drops), potable water system (a sippy cup), electrical system (outlet covers), chilled water system (a frozen teething ring), heating system (blankets), and more. Did I mention how creative these guys are?

The construction inspection group got me a cute baby book.

Here's my office. The environmental group has to live up to their word, of course. So I got some organic onesies with Peace and Cool 2 Be Green on them. Plus, they got me some primary spill containment (bibs, diapers) and some decontamination supplies (a bath support, flannel wipes). And they all chimed in to get me a car seat. Wow! Thanks guys!

Of course, you know there's a price for all this wonderfulness, right? There was only one shower game to be played after all the presents were given out. And the only participant was me! My challenge was to don level C personal protective equipment (PPE) and change a make-believe dirty diaper on a doll. It was a timed challenge, and I'd get penalized for various things, like sticking the baby with a diaper pin, dropping him, forgetting to wipe, etc. Did I mention that about 20-30 people were watching? No pressure.

So what does level C PPE include? A Tyvek suit (sometimes called a bunny suit). You have to stick your feet into the legs and booties. Um, hello, I'm 9 months pregnant. I can barely tie my shoes, let along stick my legs in the suit. But I managed.

Next comes the goggles, respirator mask and gloves. Woops, the Tyvek suit they got me was too small to zip over my belly.

Okay, I'm ready to go. I think.

By the way, they missed the shot of me holding the baby by its head. I just wanted to clarify that holding him by his head was not the correct way to hold a baby. It did get a lot of laughs, though.

And....Go! Thank goodness they let me take off the goggles, mask and gloves. I think I might have passed out from the heat, otherwise.

Okay, how does this outfit come off?

They put make-believe poo in the make-believe doll diaper! Ewwww! (just chocolate covered almonds, but still, very realistic when I first opened up the diaper)

Okay, diaper's off. Now what?

I won't say I got a good fit, but at least I didn't stick him with a diaper pin. Of course, as everyone pointed out, the doll wasn't squirming, either.

Success! As long as you don't count that I didn't wipe, forgot to cover his pee pee, and forgot to use a changing pad. According to the totally arbitrary time scale they set up, I fell between "Rookie Mom" and "Call Supernanny". Not bad for a first time.

Okay, you got me into this thing. Now someone help me get the Tyvek off because I can't reach my feet anymore.

I did have a blast. And all the gifts were so helpful. Thanks, everyone.

Pregnancy Photo Updates

I think my belly really grew a lot in the past couple of weeks.

34 weeks vs 36 weeks:



Look, I finally posed in some different clothes!

I also registered at the hospital today. I guess I have really good insurance. The guy booking me in looked up the codes online, and then he had to call customer service to confirm that I really was covered 100%. No deductible, no copay. No 80/20 split. Pretty nice. Of course, the doctors all charge separately, but at least that's one bill I won't have to pay.

Chewy Granola Muffins

I've been experimenting with a chewy granola bar for a long time now. Found a recipe and kept tinkering with it until I got it the way I like it. I hate crunchy granola, but I love chewy oatmeal, so with these, I think I've found the perfect sort of breakfast/snack bars.

CHEWY GRANOLA MUFFINS
Preheat oven to 375 degrees
Base:
8 Tbsp melted butter
1/4 cup brown sugar
3/4 cup white grape juice concentrate
2 eggs
1 tsp vanilla
2 1/2 cups rolled oats
1 cup whole wheat flour
2 heaping Tbsp ground flaxseed or oat bran
1/2 tsp baking soda

Mix butter, brown sugar, juice, eggs and vanilla. Stir in oats, flour, flaxseed, and soda. This is your base. Use this and add whatever you enjoy. Using non-stick large muffin pans, fill them up until they're almost full. You'll have to push the mix into the muffin cup to smush it down. These are very dense and crumbly. They won't stick together like a regular muffin will. Baking time depends on what you put into them, but generally 13-17 minutes. Let cool minimum of 5 minutes in pan, because these are very crumbly and prone to fall apart when you take them out, unless they're cool.


Here are my two current favorite variations.

Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Muffins (Daniel's favorite)
Add:
1-1.5 cups peanut butter
1-2 cups chocolate chips
Makes 18 full size muffins.
Bake 13-5 minutes.

CCC Muffins
1 tsp cinnamon
1 cup of unsweetened flaked coconut and chopped nuts combined, in whatever ratio you like. I use mostly coconut and about 1/4 cup toasted pecan pieces.
1 cup dried cranberries, blueberries, cherries, in whatever ratio you like or have in the pantry.
1 cup chocolate chips.
Makes 12-15 full size muffins.
Bake 15-17 minutes.

Other suggestions include chopped dried apricots with 1/2 cup apricot jam in the mix instead of sugar. Make a fall mix with dried apples, walnuts, cinnamon and nutmeg.

These freeze really well. I'll take one out in the morning and have it for an afternoon snack. They're very dense, chewy, and not too sweet, but full of fruit.

Work *sigh*

It's just been one of those weeks. Nothing horribly wrong, but there are so many little things to do that I feel like I'm being bitten by ants. 2 dozen small things that take up the entire day and then some, and don't leave you time to do the important things. I'm trying to wrap up all the contract stuff for the month of January, but I'm not looking forward to going through the financial statement.

By the way, since when did Technical Monitor come to mean Financial Monitor/Accountant? Can't I just tell my budget analyst that these numbers seem out of line and let him figure it out? Why do I have to spend hours and hours trying to decipher why the costs went up almost a million dollars?

Plus the whole not-sleeping-well thing doesn't help. It seems like more and more often, I'm waking up after 5 hours of sleep, then I need a nap right when I come home. Like today. It was a beautiful day out, and when I got home, I really needed and wanted to go for a walk. I'd been sitting on my butt all day and I know I need to move around. But I was laying on the bed, and I was very honest with myself. I wasn't about to get up and go for a walk, so an hour nap it was. Felt great, too. Even better than eating, which is impressive, because I was starving.

Pregnancy Update: Week 35

Doctor visit this morning. I haven't even stepped on the scale in two weeks, but at the doctor's office this morning, I think I may have only gained 1 pound, or maybe stayed the same. I don't pay a lot of attention to what the scale says there. I prefer to use the one in the gym at work. My blood pressure is still good at 116/62. My doctor made a weird comment this morning when she measured my uterus. She said I'm all baby this morning. I guess he had his butt sticking up against my stomach. When I laid down, my belly was rock hard and had that odd loaf-of-bread-under-the-skin look.

Next week I start going every week. I'm taking next Thursday off entirely since I've got a doctor's appointment in the morning, and a hair appointment in the afternoon. I also finally scheduled a dentist appointment for next Monday morning. Joy. I don't want one, but I need one, and I know I'm not going to be in any mood for one for several months.

I really, really, REALLY hate Paypal

I got so ticked at them last year that I closed my account. Then I needed to send someone some money, and I couldn't find a way of doing it without creating a new frakking account. I probably missed some tiny link somewhere. So instead of actually paying the amount with my credit card, they're charging my card $1.95, which they will kindly refund to my Paypal account in 2-3 days, providing I check with my credit card statement and get the Paypal code.

What a complicated, nonsensical pile of cr#p! Now I have to wait another 2-3 days before this woman gets her payment, I have extra steps to go through to do this damn verification process, and I have $2 sitting in an account I try never to use.

F**k Paypal.

Need more sleep

This waking up after 4 or 5 hours of sleep is getting old now. Fortunately, I can make it up by taking a 2-3 hour nap in the afternoon. This morning I was up at 5 and in at 6. I figured if I'm going to be awake, I might as well go to work and get stuff done, and at least get home early. So I can take my nap. :)

My first fluff mail

I got my first cloth diapers in the mail yesterday. Want to see?

From Misc Blog Pics

The top two are Bum Genius All In One (meaning you don't need a cover). Bottom two are Bum Genius Bamboo fitteds (and they need a cover, which I don't have yet), plus a dozen bamboo baby wipes. I prepped the diapers and the few baby clothes that I have today by running them through the wash. It takes forever to dry the diaper. Good thing I'm learning about this now. I still need lots and lots of cloth diapers though. They say you need around 36 for a newborn. I have 4. Yeah. Think I'll be looking for sales and such. Craigslist?

Photo updates

I happened to take a picture of myself at 34 weeks on Sunday. Sort of by happenstance, I had the same clothes I had when I took my 19 week and 24 week pictures, so I thought I'd put them up to compare. Tell me if you think I really look 34 weeks pregnant. I don't think so. I'm sort of glad I don't have a basketball belly, though. I feel like I can still move around pretty well, but I can tell every day it's getting a little bit harder to do stuff.

19 weeks:

24 weeks:

34 weeks:

Promised Update to Our Vegas Trip

I know, I'm a procrastinator. I was too busy sleeping or playing video games to get my pictures sorted.

So here's more of our trip to Vegas.

Me and Daniel at Caesar's, in the lobby. It was Chinese New Year, so all the hotels/casinos were decorated to celebrate. It's the Year of the Ox.

From Las Vegas 2009

In the Bellagio, they have a conservatory that always has different exhibits and themes. It's always absolutely gorgeous. This year it was a giant Chinese emperor figure, 3 amazing topiary pandas grazing on bamboo, a mountain shrouded in orchids, a koi poind and an ox made from over 10,000 living plants.

From Las Vegas 2009

I just had to take a picture of this to prove it exists. In New York, they have an ESPN Zone. We always like going there and playing the various games, like basketball, snowmobile racing, target shooting, air hockey and bocci bowling ball. In the bathrooms, they have a tv over every stall in the ladies room so you can keep watching the game.

From Las Vegas 2009

Our hotel was directly across from New York, and we just happened to catch this photo at dusk one evening. I think it turned out pretty cool.

From Las Vegas 2009

Another site more or less across from our hotel was the new City Center. We were in Vegas about 18 months ago, and it was a huge pit in the ground. Look how much they've built! It's going to be a 60 story hotel/casino (the biggest building in the back), plus a whole bunch of condos and shopping. I don't know how badly the economy is affecting their sales, but it certainly hasn't stopped the building.

From Las Vegas 2009

Here's the lobby display from our hotel, the MGM:

From Las Vegas 2009

And here are the MGM lions. They have several lions, and each 'set' works about a 5 hour day, so they have 2 groups per day. Each lion comes to 'work' 2-3 times a week. They even get a bath before each appearance, using baby shampoo. The display audio told us that the lions are always put in in packs of 2-3, or that if it's a single lion, there is always a trainer in there with him or her. We came by one day and they had a huge male in there with a trainer just scratching his mane. The male looked very content. The trainers use only voice and hand commands, and they have no tools to use. It's all a matter of trust between the lions and the people. The glass is thick and soundproofed, so the lions know that they can't hear or be bothered by the people. They ignore us completely. It was very neat to see all the different lions over the days we were there. Here's a group of 3 lionesses from the last day.

From Las Vegas 2009

From Las Vegas 2009

From Las Vegas 2009

Holy Return of the First Trimester, Batman!

Had a quiet weekend. They were doing something to the interstate that had it so backed up that I turned around on Saturday and didn't even try to go to the gem and mineral workshop. So I came back home and did some chores around the house. Never did get to the garage or moving the lava rocks out of the back yard. Someday, right?

Sunday, I did a few errands around town. Was out for about 2 hours, and when I got home, I was exhausted. It's not like I was hurrying around or walking for hours. I ended up taking a nap for at least 3, maybe 4 hours. I didn't count. I could have slept longer, too, but Daniel wanted dinner.

So I ended up staying up super late, since I wasn't tired, but I did get a lot of cooking done for the week ahead.

I'm also getting really sensitive to smells again, particularly cologne or perfume.

Pregnancy Updated: 33 weeks 5 days

Yep, counting days now. Had a good checkup. She didn't say anything about my weight, so I guess I'm doing okay. My BP was 106/64. I still can't believe it's so low. She said the baby is measuring right on target, so he doesn't seem big right now. Can't tell if he's still breech or transverse or not.

I was able to talk to my doctor about the actual labor and delivery process and how it's handled at the hospital I plan to use. It made me feel a little bit better about having control over how the whole thing will be handled.

We'll take a tour of the hospital next Sunday to see the place. Looking forward to it.

Back from Vegas - Quick Review

We got back from our last pre-baby vacation last night. We went to Vegas for 5 days. It was very much a spur-of-the-moment type vacation. We found a good package with air fare and a hotel, so we took it. We didn't plan anything for our trip besides the hotel room at the MGM Grand.

How did that work?

Well, it was strange. In some ways, it was relaxing. No schedule, no where to be, no plans to keep. On the other hand, we kept asking each other, "what do you want to do?" Then we'd shrug, talk about it for 10 minutes and do something random. We'd already been to most of the hotels, and some we didn't want to go back to (Tropicana is top of the list).

I think we've been to Vegas too much, too recently. But even given that, it broke us out of the awful ennui that had gripped us both the last few weeks. It was nice to get away and do something different, even if it was eating M&Ms on the hotel bed while watching CNN in the afternoon. (Don't get me wrong, that wasn't the only thing we did in our hotel room.)

The MGM Grand:
First impressions: Big.
Second: Disappointing Room. I paid for an upgraded room in the West Wing. The advertising on their website made it sound like it had this great decor, great furniture, lots of space and cool tech-y gadgets. They gush about the TV in the bathroom mirror, the extra large bathrooms and the showcase of modern design.

When I first saw our room, I went "This is it??" It's tiny. It had just enough room for 1 king size bed and a couple of uncomfortable, modern chairs. I only sat in it a couple of times to put on my shoes. There was no relaxing in it. No place to sit down and have a meal except on the bed, and then you worried about getting mustard on the super-white, fancy coverlet. The bed was comfy, I'll give them that. The shower was large, and the water was hot and had lots of water pressure. Would I stay in the West Wing again? Never. Even given the fact that I don't care for modern design, I felt like I got stuck in a tiny room and they tried to shoe-horn in a bunch of amenities that should really be standard. I mean, flat-screen TV? That's getting to be standard just about everywhere.

Oh well, it fulfills our requirement of staying somewhere different every time we go, but for my money, my favorite place was still the Mirage. Spacious rooms that didn't make you feel like you were sleeping in a shoebox and comfortable design with chairs and a table you could really use.

(Edit: I also have to say the entire place was spotless, from the rooms to the casino to the restaurants. They were very thorough and it was very nice.)

The food at the MGM Grand:

Good - The studio cafe. The french dip sandwich is the absolute best I have ever eaten in my life. If you're there, order it. You'll be thrilled. Their omelet was delicious, filling and satisfying, and the chicken strips were generous, tasty and not overly greasy.

Nice - Fiamma's. For once, we splurged on a fancy, ritzy, celebrity chef restaraunt. Our last night, we went to the Italian place in the MGM, and it was nice. The portions were not oversized, the pasta was light, even with a cream sauce, and I'm trying to figure out how to recreate that incredible insalata with pears, gorgonzola and pistachios.

Bad - The Buffet at the MGM. Save your money. The food was worse than boring. It was bland, unimaginative and limited. And they charged us $30 for this pitiful spread. They don't even have a bathroom in the restaurant and they don't provide you with little towlettes. I had crab legs, and it was awful trying to clean my hands off afterward. Even the desserts were boring. Two words - Stay Away.

One final comment on the weather. We are four for four now. Four trips, and every single time, it's rained on us. They should pay us to come to Vegas when they're having a water shortage.

More to come later, including pictures, lions and a pregnant woman's guide to Las Vegas Bathrooms.

3D/4D Ultrasound

Since my mom is visiting, I thought it would be cool to do a 3D/4D ultrasound. That's where you can actually see the baby in 3D in the womb. The 4th D is time, where they make a video of his movements. Unfortunately, he was sleeping and didn't want to wake up. He moved around some, but most of the time, he had a hand in front of his face, so it was hard to see. The tech did get some good pictures though. We saw him yawn at the very beginning, but they hadn't started recording yet. It was fun, even if it wasn't strictly necessary.

Here are some of the 3D pictures.

Here's his face.


Here he is all scrunched up with his hands and face.

He kept putting his hands over his eyes.

One chubby foot and one chubby hand.

Still sleeping. I should have had some coffee before I went in.

30 Week Pregnancy Update

Had my 30 week appointment on Tuesday morning. Everything is fine. My blood pressure continues to be super low compared to normal, so I guess that's a good thing. Only down side was that I gained 8 pounds in 2 weeks. I don't actually feel like I did anything too wrong. I mean, no matter how badly I ate, you just can't gain 8 pounds in 2 weeks, so it's mostly water weight. The bad thing is that gaining that much water that fast isn't good either, so I imagine the doctor will keep an eye on it.

At least it's reinforced my determination to up my vegetable and fruit intake. And cut down on the chips, not that I was eating that many anyway.

The little guy is active a lot, it seems. I know I don't have anything else to compare to, but he's usually active right after I wake up, right after lunch, and around 9-11 at night. He'll be moving for at least an hour, sometimes two. I rather like these little movements. It's fun and neat. Sometimes I play games with him. I'll feel part of him pushing against my belly, so I push back. Sometimes it's a foot or hand, and it'll move or roll across my belly to another location. Other times, it's a head or a butt, because it's much bigger and doesn't move very much.

Last night was very exasperating with his positioning though. For about 5 hours, I had to go to the bathroom every 15-30 minutes. I actually was worried I was getting a bladder infection. Then I guess he moved off my bladder, and things got much easier. Silly child.

Hooray for food

I was in a cooking mood last weekend. Daniel hates it when I get in a baking mood, because he says I'm making him fat. I try to put the extra goodies in the freezer, but he says he likes them just as well frozen. I won't touch them until they thaw out, and that means I have to think about getting them out in advance.

Anyway, last week, I made cinnamon rolls using the Pioneer Woman's recipe. They were fabulous! I made half a recipe, because her recipe makes 7 pans of rolls, and that was too much for us. When I made half a recipe of the maple frosting, it didn't look like enough for all the rolls, but it turned out to be the perfect amount. She recommends making them as Christmas presents, and I can see why. They were good. Yummm.

Then yesterday, I found a recipe for Dark Chocolate and Bacon Cupcakes, and I have to say, I'm sorely tempted to make them tomorrow to see how they turn out.

I also have to give kudos yet again to the Eating Well When You're Expecting book. I've made a roasted root vegetable soup that was good, although I got tired of it on the last serving, and a vegetable and edamame soup that was really, really good. This time I learned and put half the soup in the freezer so I wouldn't get tired of it before it was done.

And this morning I'm having an Elvis breakfast: oatmeal (fiber and calcium) with peanut butter (good fats), cocoa (it's chocolate), and half a banana (potassium because I'm getting leg cramps). Can't say I'm a fan of bananas, but I can tolerate a few bites a day. And of course, the chocolate and peanut butter help.

Date Night at Home

It's the simple things in life that are good. We had breakfast for dinner tonight: waffles and sausage patties, and they were delicious. Then we watched Tropic Thunder. I have to say, it was a lot better than I was expecting, and I loved Tom Cruise and Robert Downey Jr. in it. They both stole all their scenes. I'm not a Cruise fan at all, but he was fantastic.

Got one of the two things done tonight that I really needed to do. Hemmed up 3 pairs of pants so they don't drag on the ground. But I didn't manage to get the supports drilled into the closet for the new shelves I'm putting in. I really have to get those done by this weekend so I can get the room back in order. My mom's coming to visit next week, and it would be good if she could sleep on the guest bed instead of on the couch.

Found out that they're going to give me a baby shower at work. Yay! That's so nice of them. I picked a date: Feb 20. Now I need to finish up my registry and figure out what I really need. It's so confusing! Who knew there were so many choices for diapers, bottles, strollers and car seats?

Pregnancy Update: Week 29

I passed my one-hour glucose test last week. Yay! So how did I celebrate? Yep, by getting a donut yesterday. Sorry, but I'd been craving one for a couple of weeks. It was good, too!

I managed to come down with another cold. This really sucks, especially when you can't take anything really strong for it. I take benedryl at night, but only because it makes me fall asleep. During the day, I pretty much just suffer.

I think I'm starting to experience the dreaded pains of the third trimester. Yesterday, my lower back started hurting pretty badly, down in the sacrum. Supposedly, there's a hormone released that relaxes the ligaments to prepare the body for childbirth, and as it relaxes the ligaments, it causes lovely things like back pain. I also noticed I'm starting to retain water pretty badly. I'm not saying my ankles were ever all that shapely, but I noticed last night they're getting pretty thick. Bleah.

Finally some progress on my house repairs

Three and a half months have gone by since Hurricane Ike. I talked to the roofing company and they're going ot deliver the new shingles on Jan 6 and plan to roof our house on Jan 8-9. My fencing guy called last night and he's going to start on Friday. My mortgage company also called yesterday and said I didn't sign one form and so they won't send me my insurance check until I do. Grrr. Of everything I have to deal with, the freaking mortgage company is giving me the most grief. I hate the fact that they are holding my insurance check and insist on all this damn paperwork before they dole out the money.

It's 4 am and I'm awake

I guess that's what happens when you go to bed at 9. Actually, I've been up since 3, and I'm already had my morning eggs, an oatmeal muffin, an orange and a glass of almond milk. I have a feeling my whole day is going to be screwed up now. Oh well.

I'm proud that I got a few things accomplished yesterday. Put drawer pulls on the drawers in the garage and changed the tire on the wheel barrow. I'd love to put up pegboard on one wall of the garage for my tools, but I think I may ask my dad to do that when he visits in a couple months. My rationale is that he'll probably be bored and want something to do. :)

Had my glucose test this morning

Everyone was right. The drink they give you is disgusting. Mine tasted like limeade. The first 3rd wasn't all that bad, really. The second 3rd I had to work to get it down. The last 3rd only went down by sheer willpower. Blech. Then you sit around for an hour before they draw your blood. I won't find out the results until Friday. The nurse was nice, but they had not written on my paper work that I was supposed to get 2 vials of blood drawn. One for the glucose test, and the other for standard blood work, including anemia. I mentioned that to her, unfortunately AFTER she had taken the needle out of my vein. She apologized and proceeded to stick the other arm for the 2nd vial. Luckily she was very good and neither of the needle sticks hurt.

Asked my doctor about a couple of questions I had. The main one was my heart rate. It seems like it's been racing lately. I walked into Kroger's and just walking into the store, my heart was pounding. So I sat at the automatic blood pressure thing to see what my blood pressure was. It was 117/72 but my heart rate was 95! Today in the doctor's office, my bp was 106/62, so I obviously don't have a bp problem yet.

The doctor said it was very normal for a pregnant woman's heart rate to speed up because of the extra work it's doing. She said 95 wasn't bad at all, but if it went to 110-120 and wouldn't go back down, I should go to the ER. I also asked about my exercising heart rate. I'd been trying to keep it to 140 or less because that was what I had read. I asked her if that was right, and she said yes. Actually, for me, she said it should probably be lower because of my age. She wants it to be 220-my age * 60 to 70%, so somewhere around 120. Man, that's like barely doing any work at all. (Actually, I just calcualted it. It's 108-126. That feels like I'm not even exercising!)

My weight gain is about on track. Looks like I gained about 3-4 pounds last month. A pound a week. Not bad for Christmas with a sweet tooth. Speaking of which, it was really hard to resist the temptation to stop and get a donut on my way home from the doctor's office this morning. Silly, I know. But my sweet tooth has been going crazy lately, and I've had to abstain from sugar for the last 5 days including Christmas. But I was good. I came home and made a bowl of oatmeal with a bit of peanut butter and cocoa in it.

Now I'm off to contemplate improving the storage in the closet in the baby's room.

Merry Christmas!

Hope everyone had a wonderful day. I had a very nice day. Nice and quiet and fun.

Apparently I drove Daniel crazy and he just had to give me my present on Christmas eve. I don't mind. I got something really cool! I got a Kindle! Awesome! I'd wanted one ever since they came out, but I didn't figure I'd get one for at least another 2-3 years. Within about 10 minutes of opening it up, I had it connected, registered to me and had bought a book and was able to read it on my Kindle. It's pretty darn slick.

So far, I've downloaded a bunch of first chapters of a whole bunch of books, and I've got a free 2-week subscription to 3 different blogs, to see how much I like them. They've only got access to about 21 magazines and about 15-20 newspapers. I don't tend to read newspapers, but it would be nice to look at individual editions sometimes. The Houston Chronicle costs $0.50/issue. I can also get Newsweek for a really cheap price.

It's also connected to my Amazon wish list, so I can browse the store through the same wireless that cell phones use, all free of charge. If something strikes my fancy, I can see if the book is available, or I can check Wikipedia for a word or phrase that interests me. I can even check the weather whenever I want to.

It's not a multimedia device. It's strictly a reader, but I love to read. I have a feeling I'll be spending lots more money on e-books now.

I got Daniel 3 movies that he wanted, plus some Kona coffee from Hawaii and a couple of shirts. I think the only time he gets new shirts is when I buy them for him at Christmas. :)

It was nice out today. Overcast, but fairly warm. Went for a couple of walks and had a couple of snoozes. For dinner, we had our fried turkey. Eh, can't say it was as good as all that. Wasn't any better or juicier than roasting our own bird at home, but now we've tried one. Maybe it would be better fresh. We picked it up on Tuesday and kept it in the frig until tonight. I also made a great butternut squash and cranberry dish that was delicious. Took the place of desert. Which is good, since I need to stop eating sugar until after next Tuesday and my gestational diabetes test. Bleah. Oh well, I think I'm tired of sugar and junk food and chocolate for a while.

Christmas Eve Eve

This year we ordered a fried turkey from our favorite BBQ place in Alvin. Everyone has been telling us that a fried turkey is the best and so delicious. Not wanting to deal with 5 gallons of used oil or potentially burning the house down, when we noticed that Joe's BBQ was selling fried turkeys, we thought that sounded like the ideal solution.

So tonight we went to pick it up, and coincidentally had dinner at Joe's too. Yummy. They have fantastic ribs!

Came home and got Daniel to play the new Prince of Persia while I finished wrapping Christmas presents. I had a little help...

From Dora:

From Misc Blog Pics

And then from Nomia:

From Misc Blog Pics

And I took this one of Nomia the other night. It doesn't fit anywhere, but I think it just looks hilarious. Looks like she's going "FEED ME!!! NOW! OR I SHALL CONSUME YOU, PITIFUL HUMAN"

From Misc Blog Pics

Such wierd weather.

I know. Everyone in the US is saying that, or they're complaining about horrible winter storm that just came through.

We had snow last week, and last night, we slept with the windows open. Yesterday, I had the AC on in my car, and today, I'm lounging around in shorts.

Nope, can't complain about winter weather in Texas.

We're going on a babymoon!

We booked a vacation the other day, our last one as a couple. We're going back to Vegas. It's one of our favorite places to go, and we got really good deals. I guess Vegas is having the same recession problems as everyone else. We never go to gamble anyway. We go for the fun, the shows, the people watching. This time we're staying at the MGM Grand. We picked it because we got a package deal for an upgraded room from Expedia, and it's got a monorail stop inside. I know it's a huge hotel, but I'm hoping we don't have to walk too horribly far to get to stuff inside. To prepare, I bought a new pair of Birkenstocks so I could wear those in Las Vegas. My last pair was incredible. This new pair will require a bit of breaking in though, so I'll be wearing them for a couple of weeks at home.

Can't wait!

Forgetfulness

Ever commit to do something, and then forget all about it?

I promised to give a talk on recycling at work to one of our orgs. Made the promise early last week and the talk is today. Yesterday, one of the org guys called me to ask if there was anything he could do to help me get ready for my talk today. You should have seen my face. I'm glad I was on the phone, because my face said Oh CR#$! I forgot!

So I chatted with him a bit to get some details about the audience and what they wanted to hear. I didn't want to tell him he'd already done the most valuable thing he could, by reminding me about it.

Anyway, I put together a rough draft in about an hour, and spent another hour finding pictures and polishing it up. Sent it to him last night to see if it was what they were wanting. Whew. Hopefully not many changes to make to it this morning.

I'd been doing so well on all my work stuff, too. But it's just getting to be too much, especially with the contract stuff I manage. That office is going to be hurting bad when I go out on maternity leave.

Shuttle Flyover

The space shuttle was flying back from Edwards to Kennedy yesterday, and it's flight path took it over JSC. Someone got a call that it was near so we headed to the window.

From the 7th floor, we saw the plane with the shuttle on top fly low over Ellington Field, then curve around. Everyone ran outside next. I didn't even have time to grab my coat, and it was cold outside. But it was incredible.

The plane flew in a big circle over JSC and we could see the shuttle fixed to the back. It was very low and the weather was perfectly clear. I was regretting the fact that I didn't have my camera, but it also gave me a chance just to watch it, instead of trying to take a picture.

The plane circled around again, and this time, it fly right overhead! It was so close I could see the individual tiles on the belly of the shuttle. Everyone cheered, then we headed back inside to have dessert for our holiday lunch.

Afterward, some of my friends with cameras sent me some pictures. Here they are.

The shuttle on its first circle around JSC:

From Misc Blog Pics

Here it is on the second pass. From where I was standing, it actually flew directly overhead. These pictures are from a friend in a different building.

From Misc Blog Pics

Here is a picture of it taking off from Edward's Air Force Base Thursday morning.

From Misc Blog Pics

It Snowed!!

Yes, snow in Houston!! Give me a bit more time later today and I'll have the pictures up to prove it.

I took the day off work to go shopping north of Houston with some ladies from work. We knew it would be cold, windy and wet. However, we did not expect it would actually turn first to sleet, then to big fluffy flakes late in the afternoon. So we ended up going home a couple hours sooner than we usually do, in case the traffic was bad. I slept most of the way home, but it was still a long ride.

Daniel was sort of sad he didn't see snow. It was raining at home, south of Houston. Later that evening, I looked outside, and the ground looked odd. I thought maybe it was frost, since we occasionally get frost here. Then I looked out back, and we had over an inch of snow on all the plants and patio furniture!

You can tell we're from the north. We heard kids outside screaming and playing. The next day I heard everyone talking about going out and throwing snowballs and making (tiny) snowmen. Daniel and I looked at the snow, said, yep it's pretty, and went back inside. We've already done enough snow stuff. We're content to look at it from inside the cozy house.

UPDATE (12/20/08)
Yes, I'm lazy with posting my pictures. But here are my snow pictures from last week.

Our front yard:

From Misc Blog Pics

Snow on a couple of our palm trees. Wierd.

From Misc Blog Pics

From Misc Blog Pics

Just back from the doctor's office

Had my regular monthly appointment and everything is fine. Gained 4 pounds last month. Could be worse. I'm doing better with my diet and exercising more, so hopefully I'll keep the weight gain in check. And hey, this morning, I passed up the Starbucks peppermint mocha that was calling my name, along with the Shipley's donut place I drove by when I was starving. I came home and had a cranberry oatmeal muffin and a glass of water. Small steps.

This was the first time she measured my stomach/uterus. It was 24 inches on the tape measure, which she said was exactly where it was supposed to be. Doesn't mean anything to me, but if she's happy, I'm happy.

Tonight at work we have an interview with a guy coming in for the open water specialist position in my office. He's flying in from Florida and won't get here until 4:00, so we'll be doing the interview late. Poor guy gets a group interview with everyone in the office, which right now is 4 of us.

I am so looking forward to tomorrow. The women at work take a day off and go shopping in Spring, north of Houston. It's a cute, kitschy little town with lots of neat shops. Unfortunately, it looks like the bottom's going to drop out of the temperature tonight and it'll be cold and windy tomorrow. Oh well. If I run out of steam, I'll go sit in the coffee shop and drink hot chocolate for a bit while the others shop.

Good luck to my Mother-In Law

She's having knee surgery today. Wish her the best.

I'm fighting a losing battle

As far as my fitness goes. Of course, I'm sure it didn't help that I spent about a month eating junk food and not exercising at all. but I finally got my expanding butt to the gym this week, and I'm trying to eat more veggies, beans and lean protein and cut back on the sugar.

For the upper body workouts, I finally switched to machines for a lot of the chest exercises instead of free weights. I don't want to lie on my back anymore. Those aren't so bad. But it's the unexpected things that get you. Like doing assisted pullups or cable pushdowns and realize that you don't have the ab strength you used to. My core strength is still good, but it's definitely going down as I can't rely on my abs as much.

I did a pretty normal one- hour workout Wed at lunch, split between the elliptical and upper body lifting. I didn't think I'd worked out too hard, but after lunch, I turned into a zombie. I just sat and stared at my computer, and even writing an email was too much work. I stuck it out as long as I could, then finally went home and went to bed for an hour.

Guess I'll take advantage of all the naps I can get now.

Pregnancy Update

Well, since my mom is wanting to see pictures of me, I'll be brave and post a few.

Here's me at 17 weeks:

From Baby

Me at 19 weeks:

From Baby

And me at 24 weeks at the Ren Fair:

From Baby

I really don't feel like I have much of a bump yet. Just a very thick midsection. Oh well.

Yes, I'm wearing the same clothes. I don't have a whole lot of clothes I can wear right now. And I just ordered some new warmer clothes for the winter, such as we have here in Texas. Ordered them from Old Navy online. They have free returns, so if I don't like them, not a problem to send them back. I'm buying more and more stuff online these days. It's getting very easy. And ordering from Amazon is just way too freakin' easy.

Just for Carolyn, here's a picture of the baby quilt I made years ago:

From Baby

I'm working on my baby registry. I'll post the link to it soon, I promise. I'm trying to figure out what we really need. I know I don't want a lot of plastic, and no soft plastic toys he can put in his mouth. Mostly organic, when I can, but if it's too pricy, I'm not going to sweat it.

Happy Thanksgiving Weekend

Hope everyone had a good time. I did.

Took off early on Wednesday, just because. Thursday was quiet for us. It always is, since there's only the 2 of us, and we're not into football. Had a nice quiet dinner. It always seems strange to me, how you can spend hours preparing for dinner, and then eat it in 15 minutes.

Friday, we went to the Texas Renaissance Festival, north of Houston. Had a good time. Here's a link to the library with some of the pictures there.

Texas Ren Fair 2008

Mainly I got pictures of the parade at noon. I wanted to ride an elephant, but I wasn't thinking, and I work a skirt that day. Couldn't ride an elephant in that! We saw a bird show that showcased lots of different raptors, owls and vultures. The hawks were free flying around the stage, attacking a leather bag they used as a training prop. We also saw a carillion show. It's a 4.5 ton instrument made of cast bronze bells. The player would ring the bells using a sort of piano set up. He'd hit the keys and it would ring the bells. He played "Ring, Silver Bells" (Can't remember the name of the song, but it's one of my favorites), Carmina Burana, and one other I didn't recognize. It was very, very cool, but it was amazingly loud. It woke up the baby, and he started kicking.

I didn't find much I wanted to buy there, but it was fun looking at all the shops. At the end of the day, there was one shop I wanted to go back to, a candle shop in Polonia. He was selling hand-made beeswax candles. Next door was a rock and jewelry shop that I had missed the first time through. How did I miss that!? So we wandered through, and I found some amazing deals. I got a huge piece of mahogany obsidian for $24! I also found a nice large emerald crystal for $3. It's not clear, but I bet I could make a nice cab out of it.

On Saturday, I took the obsidian into the Houston gem workshop and showed it off. Everyone said I got a fantastic deal. Rusty said he'd have happily paid $100 for the piece, and we was salivating all day long asking if he could buy some of it from me. I told him he could when I was done slabbing what I wanted. I spent hours slabbing the thing and only got about a quarter of the way through it.

I had a very productive day at the shop. Ended up finishing 6 cabs, and Rusty gave me one he had done, but didn't like. I had taken a bunch of stuff to the shop with me, so I'd have a lot of options, and I ended up coming home with twice as much as I started with, because Rusty kept giving me extra slabs of stuff he had. Some very nice plume agate and west George (?) petrified wood.

Still not used to tropical winters

Such a nice morning that I'm wearing shorts and a t-shirt and have the windows open. There's lots of things I don't like about Texas, but winters ain't one of them.

I was so productive at the gem shop yesterday. Cut and polished 3 cabs completely: tear-drop sodalite, large oval moss agate, and a diamond blue tigers eye. They came out very nice, especially the moss agate. Then I spent about an hour and a half working on a Boulder opal. It's so soft, I was worried about chipping it. Actually, I was worried about ruining it. I've had this piece for probably 2 or 3 years, and never really did anything with it. Finally decided it wasn't worth anything just sitting in my closet, so started to play with it. Another guy was working on Boulder opal yesterday too, so we compared notes. Still not finished with it. I'll have to take it back next Saturday to see if I can get anything out of it.

I hope I'm doing peeling from my misadventure with the sun last weekend. Bleah. Bad enough to have a burn and peel, but for it to be on your face is the worst.

Today is a nice day to stay at home and do stuff around the house. And work some more on my baby registry. I did manage to convince Daniel to go with me to Babies-R-Us to look at car seats and strollers. I had to bribe him by taking him to dinner afterward, because he said it was too early to worry about that sort of stuff. I don't care. I'm trying to figure all this stuff out. I never knew strollers and car seats were so complicated. Sheesh.

We also had a nice get-together at work on Friday. Someone brought it a copy of Wall-E, and we had a potluck lunch. I volunteered to bring a salad because I knew everyone else would bring desserts. Yep, mine was the only green thing on the table. Everyone loved it though. I made that and a blueberry oatmeal cake, both from my Eating Well When You're Expecting book, and they were both great.

Quantum of Solace Rocks!

I believe that Daniel Craig is the best Bond ever. He's even better than Sean Connery. I loved QoS, although I thought the plot was a little shaky and difficult to follow. I like how Craig makes you feel every single hit and punch. He doesn't shrug them off, and it really feels like a spy movie for the 21st century.

Now, I still like the old Bond movies; they have their charm. But I'm definitely loving this new direction for the series.

Such a successful recycling event!

On Saturday, my work hosted an e-waste recycling event for the south Houston area. We were one of 5 locations around Houston, and we thought it would be a big turnout. Wow, we had no idea!

The morning got off to a hectic start. The forklifts were an hour late showing up, so we couldn't unload the supplies from the trucks. The guys finally resorted to pulling out pallets by hand.

The event didn't officially start until 9:00 am, and by 9, we already had 66 cars come through. By the time it ended at 4, we had to turn cars away, and we had about 1,500 cars come through to drop off stuff. The wait was about an hour long, so kudos to everyone who waited. We ended up filling 12 tractor trailers full of e-waste, with an estimated weight of 400,000 pounds. Absolutely amazing.

The weather was good, too. It was sunny, but chilly and very windy. Unfortunately, that meant I got a bad sunburn. I was up before dawn and forgot about sunscreen, then it was so cool that I didn't realize I was getting burned. Daniel called me raccoon girl all weekend because my face was red except around my eyes where my sunglasses had been.

Overall though, it was great. I hope we can do it again next year.

Link to Countdown To Victory

I was wandering through CNN's site and came across a link to Countdown To Victory. The first video is of Grant Park at 11:00 Eastern Time when the crowd was counting down the seconds until the polls on the west coast closed. They start cheering, and you can hear the second that the crowd realizes Obama won, and the cheering changes from normal to Hell, yeah, our guy just won!!

Watching it, that moment still makes me smile and even still bring a tear to my eye. How sappy is that? Maybe I can blame pregnancy hormones.

A collection of miscellaneous thoughts

On Barack Obama:
Yeah, I know I'm a week late on this, but I have to say something about Barack Obama's win. I got so tired of hearing about him being black. Yes, it's historic, but I didn't vote for him because he was black. I voted for him because I thought he was the best candidate for the job and because he stood for the things I believe in. If there are other reasons to be happy, so be it. But that's why I voted for Obama.

On other politics:
How the hell is Alaska's Ted Stevens even still close to being reelected as Senator after being convicted of multiple felonies? How???? What is wrong with the voters in Alaska?

PS: It sucks living in Texas and knowing your vote never counts. Not even at the local level.

On Fallout 3:
I knew I was resisting Daniel getting me to try his new video game. He kept raving about it, so I finally tried it Sunday. I was right. It ate my brain. I played it most of the day on Sunday, Monday and Tuesday. There went my 4 day weekend, but I don't care. I had fun. Besides, it rained all day on Monday and Tuesday. 5 inches total.

On Whole Foods:
That's such a fun store. Shame it's so very expensive to shop there. We went there Saturday and had fun wandering around. I picked up a bag of apples for a good price. Too good to be true. Turned out most of the apples were soft and couldn't wait for my to eat them over the week. So I ended up making cinnamon applesauce, and then I canned most of it. It wasn't as hard as I thought it would be. I got out my preserving cookbook, and I had all the equipment ready to go. Had all the jars and lids and had bought a nice big canning pot last year. So now I have 5 jars of homemade cinnamon (very yummy) applesauce in my pantry. That was fun. I may have to experiment with other recipes in that book.

On lapidary:
I learned to use the rock saw at the mineral shop on Saturday. Ended up cutting a whole bunch of slabs of tiger's eye and a couple of slabs of malachite. People can be so funny and nice there. Everyone just trades around extra raw stones. Guy gave me a piece of blue tiger's eye, and then someone else gave me a piece of Botswana agate. I traded them some of my tiger's eye, since I had so much.

On new vacuum cleaners:
We finally broke down and bought a new vacuum cleaner. Found a great deal on a bagless from amazon.com. $80 and free shipping. We used it today, and holy cow. We had to empty the container after every room because it was filled (FILLED!) with cat hair. I can't believe there was so much crap still in the carpet. Either this is really good, or our old one was really, really bad. Maybe both.

My great debate tonight: Fallout 3 or make a carrot cake. A healthy version from my Eating Well When You're Expecting book. Full of very yummy recipes.

Obama Wins!!!!!!!!

Hurray!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I'm so, so happy. Finally, I feel like anyone really can grow up to be President.

Halloween is awesome

I love Halloween. I love all the kids coming to the door and handing candy out to them. We live in a great neighborhood for that. Lots of kids, most of them still little and having lots of fun. We gave out at least 9 bags of candy, and we only gave each kid 2 pieces: a piece of chocolate and a sugary candy like Smarties or Twizzlers. My poor scaredy cat was hiding all night in the couch because the doorbell kept ringing. I think she finally reappeared around midnight.

I'm not much for costumes for myself. I wanted to get a t-shirt with a pumpkin painted on the belly and with a logo that says Pumpkin Smuggler, but ran out of time.

And it's a....

Boy!

We found out last week at our ultrasound. I tried to keep it a secret. Last about 2 days. :) Now we have to think of a name, but we're in no hurry to do that. Every time I think of a name, it's for a girl. Why is it so hard to think of boy names?

I still refuse to repaint the guest bedroom, aka soon-to-be-nursery. I'll wait until he grows up and asks "Why are the walls purple, mommy?" Then I'll let him figure out what color he wants it to be. Subject to parental veto.

Ultrasound Pictures

I totally forgot to put the pictures up from the ultrasound on Friday. Here's the best two:


Profile at 18 weeks:

From Baby

Picture of two tiny feet:

From Baby

Big Ultrasound on Friday; Rotten Clinic

I had originally been going to the hospital in Galveston for some of my labwork, but the hospital got hit really hard by Hurricane Ike. So I had to go to the Pearland clinic for my genetic counseling and ultrasound.

We got lost on the way there and had to rush lunch. I ended up not even eating because I didn't like my sandwich. My appointment was at 2 for the genetics counseling, followed by the ultrasound at 3. They kept us waiting in the main waiting room for over an hour. I went up to the reception twice to ask what was wrong and to make sure they had me on the waiting list.

Finally they move a whole group of us to a back waiting room, but that did nothing to improve the situation. Now there's just as many people in an even smaller room. And this is the only clinic I've been in that didn't have any magazines, and I forgot to bring in a book.

After 2.5 hours, I was wandering around stretching my legs. I stopped by the nurses' station to look at the schedule and saw my name on it. Finally talked to a nurse and told her I was still waiting for my genetics appointment, and what was going on? She got a worried look on her face and went down the hallway. When she came back, she told me all the genetics counselors had gone home.

That's when I lost it. I was tired, hungry, angry and frustrated. I started crying in the hallway about how I was supposed to figure out if we were going to get an amnio before the ultrasound and now we couldn't do that. The nurse asked if I wanted to reschedule and I blew up at her. Of course I'm not going to reschedule. I took off the afternoon from work and I've been sitting here doing nothing for 3 hours! Why would I want to subject myself to this AGAIN?

Maybe it was because I had a meltdown, but they took us back into the ultrasound room right after that. The tech spent the next hour looking at blobs on the screen and telling me everything looked okay.

The doctor came in, and Daniel yelled at her because of the whole genetics thing. She talked to us a little bit about it, but it's not the same. She said everything looked okay except they found one soft marker for Downs. The femur bone was a little shorter than they like to see. We couldn't be sure of the sex because the umbilical cord was in the way.

On the way out, we found an administrator, and Daniel let him have it too. I'm glad he was there, because I was in no mood to deal with anyone right then. What should have been an exciting visit turned into a hellish one because of their screwups.

Even worse, they never cleaned the bathrooms all afternoon, and the whole place just looked dingy. I wouldn't trust them to give me an amnio there now, anyway.

So that was a rotten end to a good week. On Friday morning, I gave a big presentation I'd been working on for a month, and everyone said it went really well. So I was in a good mood in the morning. Stupid clinic.

And the verdict on our roof is...

We need to get it replaced. That's what our insurance adjuster said. I'm actually happy. I wasn't happy with the idea of patching it, but he got up there and tromped around for a while. He also poked around our attic, the backyard with the blown-over fence and shattered pillars, and our water-stained ceilings.

After all that, he said that his report would show we needed carpet cleaning, repainting for a textured ceiling, a new roof, 80 feet of new fence and a new set of patio pillars. Awesome! I didn't even know some of that qualified. It's funny that I made this big list of food we threw out, and he said that was personal property, not building, so it had a separate deductible. Since food is the only thing on it, we won't meet that one. But we will on the building, and that's the most important one.

It'll be a week before he gets us the report, and in the meantime, I have to search Google for the cast stone pillars to find out replacement costs. He said there was a place in Austin that sold them, so I'll look for them tomorrow.

I love long weekends

Somehow, having that extra Monday off is just a fantastic feeling.

We were busy this weekend. Last week, I admitted a desire for Ikea's meatball lunch. Silly, yes, but Daniel said he'd had the same desire. We also needed some new bedside tables and thought we could probably find something decent at Ikea. It's on the north side of town, so it's not someplace we normally go on a whim.

So we had a pleasant morning of shopping around and having lunch. We did a lot of window shopping, and actually found a nice pair of nightstands we both liked. Wouldn't you know, they were out of stock! However, I did manage to find a nice rocking chair to use with the baby. Daniel put it together, and we took bets as to how long it would take one of the cats to claim it. We both lost. It took 3 days.

Sunday I was still restless, plus I needed some new clothes badly. I'd been looking at Kohl's and Target, but didn't like any of the clothes they had. So I decided to buck up and go to the mall. Sears was a bust so I tried the actual maternity store in the mall.

It was great! The lady there helped me find a new bra and I found lots of shirts that actually looked good on me, looked professional, and fit right. Daniel winced when I told him how much it was, but I said it was going to be my entire wardrobe through next spring, so that wasn't so bad.

Daniel had school on Monday, and for some reason, I woke up early. I hope this isn't a trend. So I made biscuits and gravy, with everything made from scratch. Then I decided that I shouldn't spend my free day playing video games, I should actually do something productive. So I cleaned the house. I did all the stuff that Daniel never sees. He does a pretty good job keeping the house clean, but he never thinks about cleaning the top of the washer and dryer, or getting the cat hair off the ceiling fans.

I also got serious about cleaning out the storage closet. I'd been using it for all my craft stuff over the years. I got rid of a bunch of stuff, but some of it's still too hard to part with. Like an autographed painting by a world-class fantasy artist, even though I don't have it framed and wouldn't know where to hang it. Still, it's a start, and I've still got many months to sort stuff out. I'm gonna have a heck of a lot of stuff to give to the charity thrift store.

I heard the heartbeat!

I had another checkup at the doctor's office yesterday. I guess I've entered the time frame of the short and sweet visit. Pee in a cup, get weighed, see the doctor for 5 minutes. The coolest thing was getting to hear the baby's heartbeat on a Doppler machine. Sounded very cool. Sort of a swishing thump-thump. Made me smile.

And just like I figured, she gave me a warning about gaining too much weight. I'm blaming my clothes. Because the scale at her office weighed me 7 pounds heavier than I do at home. Still, I know I need to watch it.

Oh, we got DirectTV last night. The installer came out, and it took him a good 3 hours to install the dish and all the receivers. Gonna take me a long time to get used to the new system. We had to put it on a pole in the side yard because we have too many trees in our yard to get a good signal anywhere except that one place. The only thing I'm disappointed about is the loss of Entertainment on Demand. I was hoping to be able to browse movies on Showtime On Demand

Doing good so far in the pregnancy and movie reviews

I have to give kudos again to the "Eating Well When You're Expecting" book. Every recipe in there that I've made is great. Last night I made beef and barley stew, and it was fantastic. Took a couple hours prep and stewing time, but that was no problem. It said to add half a cup of barley, and I thought that didn't look like enough and I was debating adding more. After the 30 minute cooking time, I'm very glad I didn't. It was just enough. Another thing I like about the recipes is that they make just 1, 2 or at most 4 servings. Very handy when there's only 2 of us.

For breakfast this morning, I had a broiled grapefruit and stuffed french toast, again from EWWYE. It had whole grain bread stuffed with peanut butter and apple slices, then soaked and fried as french toast. Sprinkled it with a touch of powdered sugar instead of syrup and it was delicious.

I am definitely keeping that book for a recipe book for years to come.

Another good note is that I was finally feeling well enough to do some light exercise last night. I pulled out the Wii Fit, which is so much fun. It even weighs you, and to my relief I had only gained 1 pound in 2 weeks. I was worried that with all my bad eating habits, I'd gained too much, but it looks like I'm not doing too badly.

The Wii keeps telling me I'm overweight and I should lose weight. It lets me put in a goal, so I keep doing a 1 pound gain for 2 weeks. Feels weird to put in a weight-gain goal.

Caught some movies on HBO over the weekend. Finally watched The Silver Surfer. Oh my god, that was a horrible movie. Every cliche you can imagine and enormous plot holes. Normally I'm very forgiving, but even I couldn't get over the problems in that movie.

Next I saw The Seeker. I was really excited when it came out initially, because I adore the books it's based on. But it got poor reviews, so I never bothered to watch it. After seeing it last night, I was sorely disappointed. It bore only the faintest resemblance to the book and was terribly scattered. Very bad movie.

Saw most of Interview With a Vampire. I can't say it holds up very well. Maybe it wasn't so good when I saw it the first time, years ago. But my goodness, what a whiny, emo movie. I wanted to kick Brad Pitt part way through just to give him some emotions instead of that flat monotone he kept talking in.

Tonight, hopefully I'll get to watch A Clockwork Orange. We downloaded it from the PS3 network as a movie rental. Started it yesterday at lunch. I think it finally finished downloading at midnight.

Healthy Pumpkin Muffins

I got the book "Eating Well When You're Expecting" and it has some great recipes in it. I plan to keep using it for many years to come. Since it's fall, I was in the mood for something pumpkin-ish, and these muffins did not disappoint.

The neat thing about her baked goods is that she substitutes frozen white grape juice concentrate for the sugar, to give you some extra nutrients. The recipe used a cup of whole wheat flour and a quarter cup of ground flaxseeds. The muffins are so moist and delicious, you can't tell it's whole wheat flour, and the flaxseeds aren't noticeable at all. The only thing I didn't like was the addition of chopped dried apricots. Normally I like them, but in this recipe, they seemed jarring everytime I got a bite of one in a muffin.

Since I had some light cream cheese and leftover pumpkin, I creamed the two together with a couple tablespoons of brown sugar. I would have added some maple extract, but I was out. A bit of vanilla and a sprinkle of cinnamon, and I had the best topping ever for my muffins.

I even had a bit of batter left over after I made the 12 muffin cups, and rather than throw it out, I thew it in a non-stick skillet and made a pumpkin pancake out of it. Turned out pretty good, although it wanted to burn on the bottom before it cooked all the way through.

I highly recommend this book just for the recipes alone.

Having a cold while pregnant is miserable

Having a cold is bad enough. But you can usually take enough drugs to alleviate your symptoms to get through the day. Not when you're pregnant. I can take plain Robitussin, cough drops, and tea with honey. I've been coughing now for a whole week, and I've taking 3 days of sick leave. I guess I'll have to actually go back into work tomorrow.

I talked to the nurse, and she said this cold going around is bad, and I can expect to keep coughing for another 4 or 5 days. Great. Hopefully, it won't turn into bronchitis, and hopefully I'm on the downhill side of this thing. I even broke down and bought a netti pot to use for my stuffed up sinuses. It's kinda gross, but it works great.

I've been so productive with my time at home too. I've caught up on Survivor, America's Toughest Jobs, and HBO's True Blood. It figures that as soon as HBO puts out another series I'm interested in, I'm about to switch to Showtime because we're changing to Verizon over Comcast. I also had the new Lego Batman game to play, and it's a lot of fun. So I kinda got a vacation, although it wasn't what I was planning. And I was still checking emails and doing a bit of work to keep up with stuff.

I must be feeling better, because I'm actually contemplating making some healthy muffins for breakfast tomorrow.