i'm feelin' 22....

...weeks that is!  This is just a progress report.  I've started the downhill slide, over the 20 week hump.  Teddy is super active lately.  Yesterday I thought he'd invited friends over, because how else could he kick my lower left side, my upper right side and then my lower right side in a span of thirty seconds?  He also had what I'm terming his first temper tantrum the other day when I was lying on my stomach during a nap.  I guess he was feeling kind of squished because he kicked me repeatedly until I turned over on my side.  I'm at the point that I can't lie completely on my stomach anymore.  I have to lean to one side or the other or just stay on my side, which I try to do.  It's hard.  I'm not a great sleeper and it's not going to get easier from here on out.

I also can't eat anything, ever.  Everything makes me sick and I'm losing a bit of weight, which I like, and my doctor says is fine because Ted's growing like he should.  Something sounds delish, like a jalapeno cheddar hot dog (on a wheat bun, of course, because that makes it better) and it makes me nauseous.  So the next meal I go for something bland, like a turkey sandwich, hold the mustard - and that makes me sick.  So whatever.  I'll eat what sounds good and is relatively healthy (most of the time) and if it makes me sick, I'll deal with it.  As long as I'm getting what the baby needs to grow, then I'm fine.

I have an ultrasound on Tuesday because Ted's still shy about showing us all the chambers of his heart.  We'll see if he cooperates this time!

it's not hard to confuse a stomach bug with pregnancy

On Wednesday I felt just plain awful.  I thought it was the normal pregnancy nausea and that was that.  When I got home from work, however, I threw up and thought, "Oh well.  It happens."  I didn't feel better after that.  In fact, I was quite miserable.  I tried eating some crackers and ginger ale.  Threw that up.  Tried eating something else.  Threw that up.  I called the after hours nurse at my clinic and got a prescription for Zofran, picked it up, took it.  Then I got confident and ate some chicken noodle soup and grapes.  For those who are unaware, grapes are not fun coming back up and the noodles are disconcerting little worms.  Three more times I threw up.  The after hours nurse said to call back if the vomiting did not stop, so I did and was told to come in.  Apparently babies do not handle changes in blood sugar very well and since I could not eat, there was a chance my blood sugar was too low.  I checked it before we left and it was 76, which while low, is about what my fasting glucose is normally.  I don't know if the baby got the message about me being sick, though, because he thought it was party time.  Middle of the night and we're up and about and he's dancing like "Saturday Night Fever" in there.  Not cool for a nauseous tummy.  We went to maternity admissions at Women's Hospital in Greensboro.  They checked my urine for ketones and such which would indicate a super low blood sugar.  Then we waited about three hours.  I was charged with eating some crackers and having a drink to see if I kept it down.  I did.  We went home.  I felt pretty queasy the rest of Thursday and ate mostly rice or soup.  Friday I didn't eat much until dinner time.  The Zofran helped the nausea, but we won't talk about it's major side effect.  Just trust me on this and if you have to take it for any period of time, up your fiber intake if at all possible!

i don't want to give my kids everything

Let me clarify this by saying that I think most of us out there want to give their kids everything they can.  I just don't think it's necessary.  I haven't been a parent yet, so I don't have a lot of experience with this, but I have met some spoiled kids.  I know some parents who buy their kids expensive shoes and clothes but don't pay their own rent.  I know some kids who've never been denied a thing in their lives.  Trust me.  Your kid doesn't need the unicorn rides at their birthday party, especially when the unicorn rides are an additional $300 more than the regular pony rides because they have to glue the sparkly horn to the pony's head to make it a magical unicorn.  They probably don't even need the regular pony rides.  In these situations, sure you're providing the kiddos with magical unicorn rides, but really you're just showing off for the other parents who then have to turn around and have something bigger than magical unicorns for their kids' parties, something like spaceship rides or something.  I'm not sure how the spaceship rides would work, except I know they'd be tiny and only fit one kid at a time and they'd probably only go to the moon or maybe Mars.  I mean, really what more do kids need at a party than cake, ice cream, friends, presents and maybe a pinata?  Pinatas are about as magical as it gets for kids.  Blind folds and sticks and candy wrapped in a colorful shape or animal made out of paper?  Could it get any better than that?

I may have digressed slightly from the point of my post.  I was inspired by a post that circulated Facebook about things kids need to hear - one of which was, "We can't afford it."  If more people said that to their kids instead of buying them totally pointless costumes for over a hundred dollars then maybe there would be more fiscally responsible adults in the world.

I want to be able to provide my kids with a nice life without spoiling them.  I want them to appreciate what they do have and not be envious of the things someone else has.  I may not succeed every time, but this is one of the things I want to strive for as a parent.


*Aside*  How about that spoiled eighteen year old girl who is suing her parents for financial support even though she moved out because they wouldn't let her see her inappropriate boyfriend?  Insane.

it's a...

BOY!

these pics are better quality than my ob

It's a boy!  I was extremely excited that Teddy wasn't shy this time!  Since Ed didn't get to come with me this time I decided to make a little surprise for him.  I went to Babies 'R Us and got a boy toy to wrap in a box and give to him.  (Not wrapped in blue paper!) (Actually I wrapped it in Christmas paper.)

I could venture to say that Ed's pretty excited about the fact that it's a boy!

This is a pretty lame post, but I'm tired and can't be clever right now.

Ice-pocalypse 2014

Well.  We survived Ice-pocalypse 2014.  The funny thing about it was that, while it sleeted and freezing rained about 3 inches Thursday night and into Friday morning, almost every single bit was melted by Saturday afternoon when it was 65 degrees.  And yet... we lost power for four days.  It flickered about five times at 4 am on Friday morning and each time it came back on the doorbell rang and Bailey barked.  That was fun to deal with in the middle of the night.  Ed disconnected the doorbell, but the power soon gave up the ghost and was out for good for the next four days.

 Two of the pines that we lost

Ed's work was canceled on Friday, but I braved the conditions and made it in.  In all honesty, had I known how bad the roads were in Greensboro, I probably wouldn't have left the house.  I passed five fallen trees before I'd gone a mile, one of which I had to drive slightly off the road in the slushy, sleety mess, terrified I was going to go in the ditch like the numerous other people I passed.  I thought once I got to the interstate it would be better and that since I survived Alamance Church Road, the worst was behind me.  I was partially right.  The worst was behind me, but the interstate was not much better.  It was still sleeting and the lanes were covered in an inch or so of slippery slush.  Conditions were fairly treacherous, only allowing me to drive 40mph at the fastest, and it took me an hour and fifteen minutes to get the 35 miles to Winston.

Trees were completely uprooted

We lost several trees and even more branches in our yard.  Luckily, nothing landed on the house or cars.  We were very fortunate in that way.  In other yards, I saw branches and trees on houses and cars, and most frighteningly on power lines and telephone poles.  We drove under a tree on Nelson Farm Road that was leaning on a power line.  Trees simply exploded with all the ice.  I saw more than one tree that had split in the center, with all the branches touching the ground like an inverted umbrella.  It looked like a giant had come through, smashing all things taller than a house.

Without power we were limited to the things we could do and the showers we could take.  Thankfully our friends, Caroline and Tyson, opened up their home to people who were without power and let us shower there.  We stayed overnight in Charlotte (where the storm had only been rain) with Tim and Dorian and were able to watch Carolina get crushed by Duke (most disappointing).  It was a long four days, but I'm thankful that it didn't go any longer!

my little ponies

There's probably no one who reads this that isn't my friend on Facebook but this was an interesting conversation that we had about dolls versus other toys and action figures.

Ed: Plus you can't fight Barbies. 
Jen: We didn't really fight Barbies.
Ed: You can fight My Little Ponies.
Jen: My Little Ponies are peaceful, Quaker-type animals. They don't fight.
Ed: The ponies lived in a castle. Castles require wealth. Where ever there is a differential of wealth, there's fighting.

Apparently My Little Ponies had a much more complicated dynamic than I was aware.  My ponies just played in the bathtub!  I didn't really like Barbies that much.  I was more into Pound Puppies, MLP and my stuffed animals.  Stef had a cool Barbie condo though, which made Barbie a little more interesting to me!

I wonder what my kid will play with...

baby has a head!

Ok.  So we couldn't find out the sex of the baby.  No big.  Just kidding.  I'm the single most impatient person I know and I couldn't be more frustrated about this!  I blame Ed because he was born breech and there is no data that suggests breech born fathers do not beget breech babies.  (Of course there's no data supporting that they do, but I digress).   Baby had its silly little hand covering the crucial bits needed to be viewed in order to know if it's a male or female.  Silly baby...

baby has a head!

In two weeks I'll go back to my doctor and have another scan.  Not just because we didn't get to see the sex but also because she couldn't get good enough pictures of the heart.  BUT.  Evidently I can get a free scan at Wake Forest next week if there are appointments available, because there is an ultrasound program at the school.  It would be a student performing the scan, but how much damage could a kid with an ultrasound wand do?

now that's a face only a mother could love!

little hand much like the one covering the crucial bits

don't lose your head

With the big anatomy scan ultrasound looming tomorrow, I've suddenly developed a whole set of worries that weren't there yesterday.  I've listened to the baby's heartbeat every. single. day.  I've felt the flips.  I've even felt a few kicks.  I saw a picture of him or her six short weeks ago and all appendages were accounted for.  And yet, tomorrow, I have this fear that the doctor or ultrasound tech will turn to me and say something like, "I'm sorry ma'am, your baby seems to have lost his head."  And I'll be like, "What, you mean figuratively or literally?" and she'll be like, "Literally.  He doesn't have a head."  And I'll be like, "What do you mean he doesn't have a head?"  and she'll be like, "It's just not there."   And I'll be like... well you get the picture.

I am beyond excited about finding out the sex and you guys will be like the 10th to know after we tell all our family.  Which should happen within about six minutes of the ultrasound.  I can't wait to start thinking about the baby with the correct pronouns and possibly even a name.  I can't be sure of the girl name; it's quite possible I won't finalize that until the birth day.  If it's a boy, however, Ed seems quite stuck on Edward Franklin Mearns, Jr. called  Ted or Teddy.  I'm alright with this but not-so-secretly wish that we would be able to choose the boy name as well as the girl name.  But this also gives me exclusive naming rights should we have a girl, so...  potato potahhto.  I'm not naming her potahhto.