Too bad

Well kids, I almost made it. For 39 weeks no stretch marks on my belly, but sadly they showed up today. :( Oh well. Anyway, here's pictures: 38 weeks and 39 weeks. Do I look this big in real life?

Whoa.

Those of you paying attention to my pregnancy counter thing may have noticed that I am 38 weeks 5 days pregnant today. (Incidentally, I have a picture of me at 38 weeks, but I keep forgetting to take it off the camera and put it on the computer. I'm sure I'll post it sometime.) This means there are only 9 days left until my due date. That's in the single digits people! And that's a little startling. Not that I didn't know it was coming, obviously, just startling in the same way that waking up the morning of a big test is startling. Like-- oh man that's today? I should have studied more! Oh well.

I'm not really sure where I'm at with all this. Part of me is totally ready, all set to go; the other part of me is saying-- we're having a baby? When did this happen?! But you know, nothing I can do about it now. Anyway, still not dilated, only having a very few contractions, but I'm 80% effaced so I'm sure my body will get in gear sooner or later. Crazy.

Here it is

After the numerous beatings, constant nagging, and now the public humiliation I have decided to make a post. It’s not like I have been remodeling the house or anything. So anyways, now that I have decided to stop being lazy I figured I would start off slow. You know, keep the expectations low. Don’t want Elsha thinking she can bend me to her will, because that would be bad. So anyways I thought for a first post I would list 10 things that you won’t hear me say (unless I am being sarcastic).  So here it is:

 

1. You know, I think my T.V. is just too big.

 

2. I think I just have too much free time.

 

3. You know what I love? Airplane bathrooms.

 

4. You know what else I love? New on time departures.

 

5. I am done buying movies.

 

6. This iPhone just has too many features for me.

 

7. You know what I need? A slower computer.

 

8. Hey Elsha, I love it when you don’t scrape your food into the trash before putting your plate in the sink.

 

9. You know what makes me happy and warm inside? Waking up to dog vomit on the carpet.

 

10. I am jealous that I can’t experience the joys of child birth.

 

 

I don't have a good title for this

Once upon a time when I started this blog...alright, that was only like 2 months ago. Anyway, when I started this blog I invited Brian to also be an author. That way, I figured we could have this family blog where we could both post and people wouldn't always have to hear things from my perspective. He accepted my invitation, made his blogger account and then didn't post anything. When I asked him why, he informed me that he'd forgotten his password and also didn't remember the e-mail address he'd used to set up an account. Makes it hard to sign in no? So I said, alright, I'll just delete you as an author and invite you again and this time, write your password down or something. Well, I deleted him and invited him, and he says he has the e-mail marked as new so he'll remember to sign up, but so far NOTHING. And I'm sure if I asked why he hasn't done it yet he'd give me some lame excuse about needing to finish remodeling the house or something, like that takes all his time... ;)

Either way, I told him I was going to write a blog and harass him about it because I know he has some good stuff to write about. Like how he is in love with his iPhone, or how anticlimactic his acceptance to Texas Tech was, or how his crazy pregnant wife is making him her personal slave in addition to forcing him to remodel and paint the whole house...or something. Anyway, maybe he'll listen to you guys. So anyone who wants to see Brian write some stuff here, comment and say so! And if you don't want him to write anything because you're just so in love with my writing that having anyone else write here would be a huge letdown, comment and say so! Then maybe he'll start writing just to be mean :)

In other news, I'm still pregnant. 38 weeks today, and everything is still the same, blah, blah, blah. Here's a picture of me at 37 weeks. Because I never got around to posting it.

Tagged!

The 5's Tag

10 Years Ago:
10 years ago I was 15 and in my second semester of my freshman year of high school.

5 Years Ago:
5 years ago I was a sophomore in college, living at my sorority house and probably not getting very good grades.

5 Months Ago:
Brian's family was visiting for Thanksgiving and we were probably watching a LOT of football.

5 Things on my To Do list today:
1. Update some presentations for work. (Check that off the list, I finished before lunch!)
2. Organize some stuff for the baby's room.
3. Buy stamps.
4. Mail some stuff.
5. Ummm, watch TV? I'm pretty lazy on weekdays.

5 Snacks I enjoy:
1. Microwave popcorn
2. Cheetos
3. Cheese and crackers
4. Tortilla chips with guacamole or queso or salsa
5. Toast

5 Things I would do if I were suddenly a billionaire:
1. Pay off all our debt.
2. Quit my job!
3. Get a really good financial planner and invest so Brian and I wouldn't have to work ever again.
4. Build a house.
5. Probably spend about $100,000 at Best Buy.

5 of my Bad Habits:
1. Procrastination
2. General laziness
3. Gossiping- I don't think I'm as bad as I used to be, but that might just be because I don't have as many people out here to gossip with...
4. Eating out all the time. Although I'm pretty sure that will change here in the next few weeks.
5. Leaving laundry in the dryer instead of folding it and putting it away.

5 Places I have lived:
1. Coucil Bluffs, Iowa
2. Grand Junction, Colorado
3. Golden, Colorado
4. Lakewood, Colorado
5. Midland, Texas

5 Things people don't know about me:
1. I graduated 2nd in my class in high school but nobody told me, so I didn't find out until I picked up my transcripts after graduation was over.
2. I am a certified yoga instructor. (Certified through NESTA in case you're wondering)
3. Brian and I have been together for 2 years and 7 months, married for 1 year and 10 months of that, but it isn't the longest relationship either of us has been in.
4. My favorite comfort food is a bowl of plain Cheerios.
5. I didn't learn how to do laundry until after I graduated from high school. How sad is that?

5 People I Tag:
1. Jule
2. April
3. Brittney
4. Ashleigh
5. Mardi

Just for fun

Here is a quick post just for fun. This is a list of 10 things you will never hear me say! (Or, at least if I say them I'm being sarcastic)

1. I think I'll dye my hair black.
2. Microwave popcorn? Yuck.
3. I wish I could work longer hours!
4. I'm just glad my skin stays this pasty white color all the time.
5. You know what sounds like fun? Going running!
6. I'm thinking about giving up meat.
7. It's a good thing our last name is so easy to pronounce.
8. Reading is overrated.
9. I just feel so naked without makeup on.
10. Having kidney stones, that was fun; I'd like to do that again.

So what about you? (Anyone who's reading this) What are 10 things I'll never hear you say?

Mr. Fixit

On Monday evening, we were on our way out the door to go to dinner when we discovered that one of the pipes to the water heater had sprung a leak. Brian shut off the hot water valve, looked everything over while I got a towel, and then said we'd stop by Lowe's after dinner to get what he needed to fix it.

That is pretty typical of how things go when something breaks around the house. And after I started thinking about it, I realized just how helpless I would be if Brian weren't around. For example, here are some things that Brian has fixed that I wouldn't have known how to deal with.

• Lighting the pilot light for our water heater when we first moved into the house. I've never used gas appliances, so I probably would have let the water run for like an hour wondering why it wouldn't get hot.
• Changing the filter on the heater/air conditioner. I didn't even know it had one.
• Reattaching hoses inside our washing machine when it started leaking all over the floor.
• Putting new shingles on the roof after a windstorm. I probably wouldn't have even noticed any were missing.
• And of course, most recently, the water heater. Now, I'm sure I could have figured out the shutting off the hot water part since the valve was right above the leak, but the rest of it not so much. When we got home from dinner he shut off the water to the house, drained the water heater, replaced the leaking piece of pipe, and soldered the new one in place.

This list doesn't even include projects he's taken on voluntarily that I would also have no idea how to do. Such as:

• Putting in a dog door
• Installing an RO system in the kitchen
• Installing a new dishwasher
• Setting up surround sound
• Setting up a network so we could share files between our 3 computers
• Scraping the ceilings
• Reparing drywall and texturing the ceilings
• Taking down a mirrored wall

So here's what I'm wondering-- is it just a guy thing to know how to do all this stuff? Or should I know it too and you all think less of me now because I don't? Or does it come with owning a house and figuring out how to fix stuff? Or does Brian just know all this because he worked in construction and picked it up there? He pointed out to me that after almost 4 years in construction if he didn't know some of this stuff that would be pretty sad. Whatever it is, I'm just glad the only handyman I ever have to call is Brian:)

36 weeks

Well, less than a month now before I am due. Everything is right on target. The baby is head down and she is measuring almost exactly average for how far along I am. The doctor estimates her birth weight will be between 7 and 8 pounds.

People have started saying "Oh, any day now!" to me on a regular basis, but I always just say that she's not coming early. No wonder women get so antsy to be done being pregnant if they start thinking "any day now" at 36 weeks. I imagine it makes for a long 4 weeks walking around thinking that. I still think she'll come sometime from the 12th through the 16th; Brian thinks it will happen sometime from the 9th through the 12th. We'll see soon enough I suppose. I probably should just listen to Brian, he's the one who said he really felt like I was pregnant before we found out that I was, and he's also the one who said he really felt like it would be a girl before we found out it is, so maybe he's right about this too? He's pretty intuitive that kid.

I am still pretty comfortable considering. Although, it has gotten hard for me to get up off the floor which is too bad since that's my favorite place to sit. That hasn't stopped me from sitting on the floor, but I do try to avoid getting up, so that means I ask Brian to get me stuff a lot more than I used to. I'm sure he appreciates that:) Also, I've had to resort to sleeping on two pillows instead of just one to keep my heartburn from being too bad at night. (Even though I generally drink a glass of milk and have a couple of Tums right before bed.) Nothing too bad though. I'm definitely not uncomfortable enough to want to have the baby early. Maybe it will still get worse?

Anyway, here's a picture of me at 36 weeks looking ridiculously pregnant. Onyx thinks there is something good for her to lick off my fingers.

On with the remodel!

So, all that stuff I said that Brian wanted to do to the house before the baby comes? It's happening- scraping and texturing of ceilings, painting of walls and ceilings, the whole bit. He is already finished with the first area which consisted of one of the upstairs bedrooms, the upstairs hallway and the upstairs bathroom.

He's prepped the next section (second upstairs bedroom, stairway, and downstairs front room- not the living room) and is starting on that today. In the front room he also took down an entire wall of mirrors and repaired the drywall behind them. For the record, if you think putting a mirrored wall in a room is a good idea, you're wrong. I like mirrors. I like big framed mirrors; I like mirrored closet doors; I like full length mirrors, but floor to ceiling wall to wall mirrors = BAD. You can't put anything against a mirrored wall, and it makes the room look cluttered because you see two of EVERYTHING! Anyway, yahoo for a regular wall!

Here's what I've learned about remodeling so far:
1) Scraping popcorn ceilings makes lots of dust. Don't worry, we had the popcorn texture tested and it is asbestos free so it's not mesothelioma-causing dust, just regular dust.

2) Paint is expensive. Maybe it's because I've never bought paint in large quantities before, but I was not expecting to spend as much as we did.

3) It's good to have a friend who buys lots of tools all the time for no reason so that when you remodel you can borrow his: ladder, air compressor, drywall texture thing, scaffolding (for the vaulted ceilings in the living room) and other miscellaneous tools.

4) It's good to have a husband who knows what he's doing. Otherwise a project like this could get out of hand in a heartbeat.

5) The best time to have your husband remodel is when you are pregnant and he isn't working. This is because: a) you can't even offer to help, b) he can get lots of work done during the day, and c) he has a VERY REAL deadline, so no procrastinating.

Anyway, so far so good! I'll post some before and after pictures when it's all done. Although the before pictures were taken when we were looking at the house before we bought it so none of the stuff in them is ours. Oh well, you'll still be able to see the difference.

Busy and Boring

Life has been busy. Although apparently nothing that has been keeping us busy has been interesting enough to blog about. Hence the lack of blogging.

Here's a quick recap of what's been going on. I had Friday March 21st off work because I live in the South and down here Good Friday is a holiday. So yea for living somewhere where blatantly religious holidays are still acceptable! Then I spent March 26th through the 28th out of town; well, two days driving and one day in Corpus Christi. For work unfortunately, not the beach. On Saturday the 29th we spent the day in Lubbock with cousins. We mostly just hung out and talked, everyone wanted to spend a little time with Brad before he leaves for Iraq again. You would think we'd see them more often since they're the only family we have within day trip range. (And especially Lisa and her family since they live all of 20 minutes from here.) But no.

Anyway, April 1st was my first baby shower, given by the lovely ladies from church. I got ridiculous amounts of cute stuff and realized that sometime next month* I'm actually going to bring home a tiny little person to wear all this cute stuff. Crazy!

In the midst of all this, we have also been picking out paint colors because Brian is set on getting the house painted (interior not exterior) before the baby gets here. He is also planning on getting rid of our popcorn ceilings. This all sounds like quite the undertaking, but fortunately Brian's schedule consists of class for about 7 hours a week and, well, now this. :) Still, if he didn't have the background in construction that he has there's no way I'd willingly start all this 5 weeks before the baby is due.

So, this whole post is pretty random, maybe I'll be able to put together something more coherent later this week. Maybe not. No promises.

Last but not least, here is a picture of me at 34 weeks. For those of you paying attention, yes, I'm actually at 35 weeks now. I'm a little behind on the picture posting.

*I'm due May 10th for those of you who don't already have that written on your calender, which, you should because doesn't your life revolve around an exact date on which I may or may not give birth?! I personally am predicting it will happen sometime the following week if anyone is taking bets.