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Tuesday, August 28, 2007Just So You All Know......that there is still no baby OUTSIDE my womb, I am taking this opportunity to indulge in a little tag from my loving doula Nicole, who tagged me, no doubt, in order to give me something useful to do with my hands instead of wringing them over the fact that I've still not gone into labor. Wise woman, she is. So here goes. You know I'm not going to follow the "tag this many people" rule to the letter, so I'm asking you to post your name in my comment box if you decide to participate. Though I do have a few "must be taggeds" in mind... The rules: Post the rules before giving the facts. P layers start with eight random facts/habits about themselves - People who are tagged need to write on their own blog about their eight things and post these rules - At the end of the your blog you need to tag (hopefully) six people and list their names - Leave them a comment on their blog, telling them they have been tagged and not to forget to read your blog. The random facts/habits about me: 1. I have a small birthmark in the middle of my right forearm. When I was little, I sincerely thought that everybody had a small birthmark in the middle of their right forearms, just like everybody has a bellybutton. 2. As a child, I once got sick to my stomach after eating a disgustingly fluffy food product called "ambrosia," which consisted of cottage cheese, mandarin orange slices, crushed pineapple, jello, and pastel-colored miniature marshmallows. To this day, I will not eat raw marshmallows. They have to be toasted over an open fire or melted into a mug of hot cocoa. If they're raw, I gag on them. 3. My first grade music teacher was so impressed that I could sing the entire first verse of O, Come, All Ye Faithful in Latin that she brought me over to her fourth grade class and had me sing it in front of them. I'm sure they were all thrilled beyond belief. 4. In 1994, I had out-patient surgery to remove a cyst from my left breast. Though I had been given "happy forgetful drugs" for the surgery (instead of going under), I clearly remember the surgeon taking my face in both of his hands after the surgery was complete and saying, "You probably won't remember this, but it was benign." 5. During the first trimester of my fourth pregnancy, I had continual, 24-hour-a-day nausea -- the kind that feels like heavy-duty motion sickness. One night it was so bad that I was literally moaning in bed. Eric woke up, heard my moans, and rolled toward me, laying his hands on me and praying that the sick feeling would lift. I fell asleep, and when I woke up in the morning, the nausea was completely gone. It never came back. 6. My sister and I used to fill the upstairs bathtub with water, dump in a good quantity of our mom's blue-colored bath salts, and go "swimming" in our bathing suits. (Overflowing with creativity, we were.) Once, in the midst of our swim, one of the wooden shutters on the window by the tub came crashing down into the water. That one was a little hard to explain to Mom... 7. In college, I sang for two years in a twelve-voice chamber group that was hand-picked by our choir director. After having sung at a local church one Sunday afternoon, we were enjoying a pot-luck lunch with the members of the audience. An elderly woman sitting across from me smiled and said, "You look like Rosemary Clooney." Having never seen White Christmas, the only reference point I had was the gray-haired, beefy, smoker-voiced woman on the Coronet paper towels commercials ("Extra value is what you get...when you buy Co-ro-NET!"). I was highly offended. 8. While peeing in the high school girl's lavatory one day, I discovered some scrawling graffiti on the side of the stall that read, "Jill Schafer sucks cow balls." Highly upset, I ran to a friend and told her what I'd just read. My friend rolled her eyes and replied, "Well, that's really stupid. Cows don't have balls." And I'm tagging: Jamie, Wendy, Dave, Thomas, Ken, and any of the ladies from Hearts at Home who feel like playing! (Just leave a comment here letting me know that you're playing, and leave your eight facts over on the boards.) There. I've done something. Now it's back to waiting for contractions to begin... Friday, August 24, 2007Writer On HiatusIt's official. I am completely unable to pursue a single writing project, whether it be novel or children's book or following up on an agent's request. Honestly, I don't know how pregnant women in corporate America are able to work up to the last minute of their pregnancies. Nothing -- NOTHING -- matters to me more right now than birthing this baby. Fortunately, my timing is perfect. The publishing industry is notoriously slow in August. My end-of-pregnancy stagnation fits well with the you-won't-hear-much-this-month coming from New York. Not that I'm enjoying this. I thrive on being creative; I get a "writer's high" when I've had a productive day (you writers know exactly what I'm talking about). As it stands (or sits, really), the right side of my brain is at serious risk for atrophy. The left side, naturally, is thriving -- planning, calculating, administrating. Boring stuff in comparison, but vital to my current state of being. So. Rather than drive myself insane by continually lamenting my non-productive state (while reveling in my reproductive state), I am making an official declaration of "I'm On Maternity Leave." There -- I've said it. I'm on maternity leave! I don't have to finish the next chapter or re-work my rhyming children's book or touch base with anyone about anything. I feel better already. And as soon as Baby is here and we've had some time to rest and adjust and get the breastfeeding thing down to a fine art, I'll be back at my keyboard. Because I have, after all, a houseful of built-in babysitters. I have no intention of losing myself in a postpartum bog. Having said all that, I'm off to pray for labor to JUST START ALREADY! May your weekend be joyful. Hopefully the next thing you'll read here is a birth announcement. If not -- well, I'll try not to be too grumpy about that. Cheers! Tuesday, August 21, 2007On Clueless Men In StoresI know my belly is huge. It goes without saying that, these days, my belly is the focus of my complete physical person -- the sum total of Who I Am right now. I can't get around it, can't slide into tight spaces, can't hug my husband front-on, can't see my feet, can't even keep my maternity shorts from scootching down, like the pants of a beer-bellied fisherman as he emerges from the driver's seat of his Ford F-150. And I know that I'm pretty much ALL belly. All baby. There's me, and then there's the Belly. I understand that it might come off a bit...alarming. But I'm never quite prepared each time I see a Clueless Man reacting to the Belly as I walk by. It's not my imagination. It happens in two distinct ways: First, there's the direct approach. Man sees Belly, has a quick thought process of, "Holy cow, this woman looks like she's going to give birth right in front of me." Then come the comments: "You're not going to have this baby right now, are you?" "Now you just take it easy, take your time, ma'am..." "So. Urgh. How soon is that baby due?" Secondly, there's the indirect approach, which amuses me beyond description. These are the men who see me in the store, and their eyes go immediately to the Belly. Within a nanosecond, they've sized up the situation, and the expression on their faces morphs into unmitigated horror. I get no verbal response, no friendly greeting, no offer to hold a door or push my shopping cart. No. I get the most indescribable deer-in-the-headlights responses I've ever seen. You'd think they've never, ever seen a pregnant woman before. And then they walk past me as quickly as ever they can, eyes still glued in terror to the Belly, as though it were going to leap out and knock them upside the head. Or maybe explode. Even my husband -- my life partner, my birth coach deluxe -- is beginning to have moments of "Oh. My. Gosh." It's just that...big. Like there's no possible way for human skin to stretch any farther than mine has. Of course, the women I encounter have no such reaction. They blithely ask me when the baby's due, sympathize with my end-of-the-last-trimester discomfort, and tell me that I look adorable. (Hey, I don't care whether they mean it or not. I just love hearing it.) I haven't had a single female over the age of four stare at me with terrified eyes. No, indeed. It's just the men. I do have to give one of these men some extra credit, though, for approaching the situation with humor. He looked at me and said, "I'm guessing you're about two months pregnant." I smiled. "You're good! How did you know?" "Oh, I'm really good at guessing how far along women are, and I can tell you have at least six months left." Good man. He was the father of four girls, living in a completely Female Household. He knew his stuff. He didn't freak out or turn the other way. In his own, male-like manner, he sympathized with me. So this one gets a gold star. The rest? Forget it. Climb back into your caves and try to remember what it was like when your own wives were great with child. Don't come back out until you've trained yourselves not to gape at pregnant bellies as though it's the final sign before the onslaught of Armageddon. It's cliched and I don't say it often, but I've got to say it now: MEN! Labels: pregnancy Thursday, August 16, 2007Announcing: The Big Guess-The-Birth-Day Contest!It wouldn't be half as fun if we didn't make a little game of it, right? So here's the skinny: If you want to play, please leave your guess in the comment box of this post. Don't post anonymously; use a screen name that will make you easily identifiable. Your guess must consist of two parts: The DATE of birth and the WEIGHT of the baby. We already know it's a girl. Judging criteria are as follow: Contest entries will be based FIRST on the date. If two or more entrees have the correct date, the winner will be the one with the closest WEIGHT. Getting the weight correct but the date wrong does not a winner make! You can add any other "guesses" you'd like, just for some fun conversation. However, the actual contest will be based solely on the above criteria. What's the PRIZE, you ask? It's a cool one! Jenn at The Virgin Bean will graciously supply the winner with a free Coffee Sampler, consisting of three, four-ounce samples of some of the most scrumptious, organic coffee beans you'll ever experience. (See the little red "X" to the right? That's supposed to be a logo for The Virgin Bean. We're still working on it. In the meantime, it's clickable, so head on over and check out their web site!) As far as making educated guesses? Anything goes. My "due date" is September 5. I'm not known for going late. My earliest baby came at 38 weeks. That's all I've got for you. Sweet Baby Girl will make her appearance when she's ready. Want to play? The contest begins now! Wednesday, August 15, 2007And Now For Some Photos...
    ...and one must certainly find oneself asking, exactly how wide does this woman's mouth open, and does she ever shut it?
Monday, August 13, 2007ShoweredYesterday was my Big Baby Shower Day. No signs of impending labor, no last-minute disasters. Unless you include the fact that my right foot decided to swell to inhuman proportions, rendering me completely ankle-less. Even my toes were swollen, like a row of mutant grapes. I couldn't wear the sandals I'd picked out to go with my Baby Shower Outfit. I slipped them on an hour or so before the scheduled arrival of my hostesses and was chagrined to see my right foot slopping through the strips of leather like some sort of biological silly putty. It was disgusting. So I stayed quintessentially Barefoot and Pregnant during the shower. Which was apropos, since one of my sweet hostesses is Korean and never wears shoes in her home. Disfigured foot aside, the shower was most certainly the most beautiful, most meaningful, most delightful baby shower I've ever had in my long history of Having Babies. My hostesses worked like a well-greased machine -- I felt as though I'd hired professional caterers for the affair. The spread was wonderful, complete with a beautiful fruit pizza and cashews in an antique, pedestaled bowl. Fresh flowers were placed on my coffee table, a balloon tied to my mailbox. I didn't even have to answer the doorbell when it began to ring; I simply sat there with my swollen foot and greeted my guests like a queen in her royal lying-in chamber. I felt amazingly pampered and blessed. My Oldest Friend since my move to Tennessee was there -- Fran, whom I've known for over nineteen years now. My Newest Friend since my move to Tennessee was also there -- Nicole, my beloved doula, whom I met in March. And all the friends in between. Some I hadn't seen in years. Some I'd seen recently, even had coffee with. All arriving with shining faces and bearing thoughtful, generous gifts for my new baby. Each one receiving a deeply sincere hug. And nobody seemed to notice my edema-ridden foot. (Well, except Nicole, in whose face I stuck the offensive extremity with a "Look at this!" As if she had a choice. Poor girl. She didn't realize when she took me on that I'd expect her to make everything right.) Yes, there are pictures. They are cozily tucked inside the digital camera, where they will unfortunately stay until Somebody is kind enough to dump them for me. Once they've been freed, I'll share a few. And now I must go take a wee nap. As if one big celebration wasn't enough for this sorta-slowed-down pregnant mama (and I haven't even mentioned the shower-after-the-shower that my husband and children surprised me with!), today is Eric's and my nineteenth wedding anniversary, and he wants to take me out tonight. I hope he doesn't mind if I wear flip flops; my foot is morphing again. So I continue to limp along toward the Big Day. Coming soon: a Guess the Birth Date and Size of Baby Contest, complete with a modest but delightful prize! Wednesday, August 08, 2007Fed Up With Gummed-Up Ice CreamAside from the obscure, all natural, highly localized ice cream that one might find by the pint here or there, Breyer's was the only ice cream manufacturer that offered truly natural, real ice cream. That is to say, the ingredients made perfect sense: cream, whole milk, sugar. Add vanilla beans for the vanilla, real peaches for the peach, and you've got ice cream the way it's meant to be. Smooth and creamy -- not unnaturally fluffy or easy to scoop. That is, until just recently. We bought some Breyer's ice cream while we were on vacation. It was a fabulous new flavor -- triple chocolate! It still said "all natural" on the front of the package, so I knew it wasn't included in their new-fangled, "we call it extra-creamy but it's really just an effort to imitate those other brands by adding junk to it" line. It was delicious and chocolaty, to be sure. But something wasn't right. It scooped too easily. It melted too quickly. It felt too..fluffy. I checked the label. Lo and behold, one of the ingredients listed was "natural tara gum." Tara gum?? I've never heard of it, and I don't care whether it's "natural" or not. It doesn't belong in my Breyer's ice cream. Slightly panicked, I started checking the ingredients in other classic Breyer's flavors on my next trip to the grocery store. French Vanilla. Neapolitan. And my favorite of all favorites: Cherry Vanilla. All of them now have "natural tara gum" added. I feel betrayed. Not only is the texture all wrong, but the taste is affected as well. It just isn't Breyer's anymore. They've sold out to the image of "extra fluffy creamy crap-filled ice cream" that has been dominating the market for years now. (Yes, yes, yes, Ben and Jerry's has stupid gums in it, too. I may love the occasional Phish Food, but I don't wave the banner of "all natural" over it. At least they use hormone-free dairy.) Breyer's was, in fact, the only ice cream I could buy with confidence. Now they've gone and ruined it all. I know, because they just had a buy-one-get-one-free sale on Breyer's at Publix, and I, with hopeful heart, picked up a carton of Cherry Vanilla. Alas, they've ruined it. How could they ruin my Cherry Vanilla? I guess we're going to have to resort to churning our own ice cream at home. Ice cream is such a simple pleasure, and we don't buy it every week. It was so nice to be able to buy a carton of Breyer's and know that I wasn't feeding my children gums and chemicals and artificial flavors. But an era seems to have ended, and I'm going to have to deal with it. Any classic Breyer's fans out there? Feel free to join me in a good sulk. Labels: life Monday, August 06, 2007Labor Black-out DatesAirlines do it all the time. Grab the super-low, round-trip tickets while you can, just in time for the holidays. But don't even think about flying on December 23, 24, 26, or 30. Or January 1. The timing of your arrival and/or departure for this trip will in no way be convenient to you or to your family members. Right. Well, I'd like to order a few black-out dates for the arrival of my baby: August 12 (Baby Shower) August 13 (19th wedding anniversary, but who's counting?) August 14 (Jonathan's first Biology class) I'm not sure with whom I should clear these dates, though. My midwife? The baby? God? And suddenly I'm at it again -- full steam ahead in Control Freak mode. As if I have any say in the matter. When the time comes, it comes. It would just be really nice to, you know, enjoy the baby shower that my friends are so graciously, so generously throwing for me. And to have a romantic dinner with the love of my life on our anniversary (not to mention avoiding the sharing of this date with one of our children for the rest of our lives). At any rate, my stress level today is much lower, having just installed our new infant seat in the van. One baby transport system, ready to go! As I was preparing to clean out the van seat in order to muddle through the installation, my beautiful doula pulled up in my driveway bearing gifts. Unexpected gifts on a humid Monday -- what could be better? And among the gifts was her just-read copy of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. Who knew that someone would pay that much attention to my blog whines? Thank you, Nicole. You're a gem. So my productive morning and the kindness of a friend have helped dispel the gloom from a way-too-hormonal weekend. I think I'll go put up my swollen feet and enjoy the somersaulting child within me, reveling in the ease of caring for her in this pre-born, pre-nursing, pre-diaper, pre-crying state. May your Monday be as delightful as mine has turned out! Friday, August 03, 2007Tax Free Shopping Spree'Tis the weekend of tax-free shopping in Tennessee -- so long as you're buying school supplies or clothing. At 9.25 percent, the Tennessee retail tax is something I'm more than happy to say bye-bye to once a year. Really, I don't mind paying tax only on what I purchase. We've got no state income tax, and I like it that way. It's just that our tax rate is ridiculously high (with, frankly, not much to show for it), and the almost-ten-percent mark-up on everything tends to add up. So. Spencer has had signs hanging up around the house for over a week now: "AUGUST 3 TAX HOLIDAY AT WALMART!" He's been just a wee bit excited to buy his stash of ten-cent notebooks and twenty-cent crayons -- tax free. So a little after ten o'clock, my offspring and I piled into the van and headed to Walmart. And it was a veritable zoo. A madhouse, even. Why, no one even moved out of the way when they saw my gargantuan belly. They were too busy burying their noses in the "lists of things for XYZ Elementary School" to notice anything else. Funny. Quite of bit of the Tennessee sales tax is supposedly apportioned for schools. Yet all the school moms have to buy every last bit of "stuff" for each child, down to the last pencil. But I digress. We navigated our way through the mess of people and got what we wanted. The children spent their allowances and I spent Eric's paycheck. At any rate, you really can't beat packages of lined notebook paper for thirty cents a pop, or a box of ten Crayola markers for a mere eighty-eight cents. We left the store well-stocked and happy. Why, I even purchased a desk calendar. This was a good thing, considering the fact that December, 2006 was still proudly displayed on my kitchen desk up until a couple of hours ago. It's amazing how a simple thing like a current calendar on my desk has lowered my stress level. I'm happy. The kids are happy. It's Friday. And one more thing has been crossed off my list. Wish the crib we're paying off tomorrow were eligible for a tax exemption this weekend. Ah, well. At least I've got a closet full of cheap school supplies. Have a glorious weekend! Labels: homeschooling, life Thursday, August 02, 2007Jury Duty: The Final PerkI received a check in the mail for $31.50 for three days of jury duty. Which means, of course, that we were all paid $10.50 each day, whether or not we ended up actually sitting on a trial. It's not salary material. And I didn't commit to serving just to get a few bucks back. But let me tell you, that $31.50 felt like a pot o'gold in my hands. Know what I bought? A cute little "Coming Home From the Hospital" shirt. For me, not for the baby. It's a good thing these ridiculous, high-waisted babydoll styles are all the rage right now. They're perfect for hiding a post-pregnancy belly. Mind you, if I weren't going to be post-pregnant for the rest of the summer, I never would have purchased the shirt. But it's going to serve its purpose well. I've still got $20 left. That's enough to finally purchase a copy of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, but I'm still holding out for some kind soul to hand me his copy out of sheer altruism. (Do you know how hard it is to avoid all the buzz and banter so as not to spoil the story for myself?) Instead, I think I may buy a little "Coming Home" outfit for the baby. Or maybe a stick of my favorite Clinique lipstick. Something that I won't have to share, you know? Because I've already promised Jonathan that he may read Harry Potter first. Then, of course, I'll have to be a good mom and allow Maggie to read it next. Which means I'd have to wait good and long to get my hands on it. Why spend my hard-earned jury duty money on such a venture? No, I need to spend the remainder on something non-communal. Maybe a T-shirt that reads, "I served on the jury in Williamson County." (For that matter, they might've had the decency to hand those out as we left the building. But that would have precluded the $31.50 payment, surely.) Anyway, you know I'm into simple pleasures, and that check from the county powers-that-be certainly qualifies. And imagine this -- Eric was ready to confiscate the check and add it to our strained bank account. Honestly! I'm glad he saw the light of day before whisking my hard-earned check into oblivion. At any rate, I've promised to hand over next month's royalty check. (What was I thinking?) So tomorrow I'm going shopping. I love the way people hold doors for me and offer to carry things when they see the startling protrusion of baby attached at the front. So even if I don't find what I'm looking for, I'm sure to enjoy the attention. Till then! Wednesday, August 01, 2007Casual BarfingJust an ordinary day in the life of an eight-year-old boy -- playing, eating, barfing. I spent yesterday morning running errands and arrived home after the children had already eaten lunch (okay, so maybe I planned it that way). I hadn't been home long when Spencer started complaining about a "gas pain." His description and the location of the pain, however, led me to believe that it was some sort of tummy distress. He didn't seem overly put out by it, so I let him be. "If the pain comes again, try to poop," I said. Ancient Motherly Wisdom, that. Later, the come-and-go pain had become enough of a bother that I found him lounging on his bed. Not a good sign. Still, he wasn't acting particularly ill. I invited him to come snuggle with me for a while in the living room (for we all know that tired, pregnant mamas are always up for a good snuggle). He was bright-eyed and chatty, and after a while said he'd like to watch Milo and Otis. He happily set about getting the DVD, and I slipped into the laundry room to play catch-up on my ironing. Moments later, Spencer called out, rather casually, "Oh. I feel like I have to barf." "Well, hurry up," I said. "Run to the bathroom." He did. Upon his return, he announced, "Yep. I barfed! It came out three times." Then he ran into the family room and popped in his DVD as though he had simply gone pee. And that was that. I didn't allow him to eat supper, which didn't seem to bother him. Before bed, I offered him a banana to keep his blood sugar from plummeting overnight. He wasn't hungry. Not a good sign, but again, he was completely nonchalant about the whole thing, and claimed he felt okay. Around 10:30, Eric checked on him. Not being the kind of daddy who can resist smooching on a sleeping boy, Eric ended up waking Spencer. Spencer, Eric informed me, was pleasant, chipper, and took some sips of water from his cup upon Daddy's recommendation. A few minutes later, Eric heard him coughing in the bathroom. "I barfed again!" Spencer told him when it was all over. He crawled into bed, fell asleep, and that was the end of it. I'm not quite sure what happened yesterday. Was my son actually sick? Or did something aggravate his belly for a little while and work itself out quickly? All I know is, that was one of the easiest barfing bouts I've ever dealt with. I guess I've never placed throwing up on the list of things-I-announce-casually-to-my-parents. "I rode my bike around Carphilly Circle." "I found a female cricket." "I finished cleaning my room." "I barfed." Whatever! I'll take it. Spencer has always been decidedly the most unusual child I've ever known. I love him this way. If he wants to barf casually, that's fine with me. Isn't motherhood the grandest of callings? |
About Me
I am: Mother to five stunningly individualistic children... Writer of young adult fantasy... Passionate advocate for Women At Home... Madly in love with my husband... In need of Organic Gourmet Chocolate on a regular basis. I've got a Paypal account if you'd like to contribute to the cause....
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