Starches, sugars and carbs, oh my

I failed my glucose test, that lovely test where you have to drink a bottle of super sweet, flat Fanta-esque orange drink and then get your blood drawn to look out for gestational diabetes. Apparently I was borderline, coming in at 134 when the cut-off is 130. My sister was right, apparently until a year ago it was 140, but they recently dropped it back to 130. Great. That meant I got to back for the three hour fasting glucose test where I have to not eat anything after midnight the day before, get my blood drawn, then drink the Kool-Aid and have my blood taken again at one hour, two hours and three hours. It was pretty grim.

My sister advise me to really hunker down and have a good diet this week in preparation. I think that's slightly cheating, but as she said, if I don't do it now they'll make me do it later. I was even holding back from the Tootsie-Rolls that my office mates have around the office, which is hard for me. While I don't much care for dessert, I do love candy. Drinking the glucose wasn't that bad, I got fruit punch flavor this time, not the orange that I've had before.

It was sort of interesting hanging around a doctor's office. I brought plenty of work to keep me busy, but I love to people watch and wow, is that fertile ground. Things were packed again, apparently Fridays are their busiest day with all the doctors in the office (normally someone is at the hospital). Plus, apparently Fridays are the chosen day for folks to schedule OB appointments since a lot of government workers have compressed schedules. There were several men there to support and a few kids with dads, probably to see the ultrasound. At the peak, there was a problem with enough seats, but this time men and other women were fighting to give them up to a pregnant lady. I must have just gotten there on a good day.

It was also interesting to see all the drug reps stopping by to hand out free samples of vitamins and other things. I counted two in an hour at one point. They all look the same - women in their mid-30s and 40s wearing tight fitting work suits, carrying a PDA and rolling a suitcase.

I got my OB visit in while I was there. BGB is now head down, but again she was refusing to look at us so I haven't gotten a good look at her face. It's pretty cool seeing the ultrasound now. In the beginning, it's just a speck on the screen and now she's so big her body won't fit on the screen. She's definitely looking more and more like a baby which is pretty amazing. I didn't get a lot of ultrasounds with Andy (my old OB was pretty old school and didn't have a machine in her office) so it's fun to see her develop as all I can see day to day is my belly growing and moving. The other bonus of the visit was I had gained less than a pound in the last three weeks. Score! Some earlier appointments were quite disheartening in the weight gain department making me fearful I'd end up with a 20 pound baby so it's nice to know the tide might be ebbing a bit. I wonder if that means I'll get to stay in the clothes I'm in for the duration.

Speaking of duration, I'm at exactly the two month mark until my due date. Not that I'm counting for anything.

Pictures galore

Now that I have a new camera, I've been taking a lot more pictures to try to get used to how it works. No sense practicing on BGB when she comes, I need to get my practice now so I can make sure to document every 15 minutes of her life, much like we did with Andy. I swear with the ease of digital photography we could almost put all the pictures of Andy in a row and watch him age before our eyes. That would be kind of cool actually.

Andy and I walked down to the park last week to check out the playground and feed the ducks (and play with my new camera). Those specks in the distance are the birds. Andy is waving the bag at them telling them we have food. As you can see, the response was not immediate.

We had two stale hot dog buns to feed the ducks. I gave Andy one and instructed him on tearing off bits to throw into the water. He them promptly threw the whole thing in. At least he hit the water.

The ducks, er, mostly geese once they finally came around. The buggers were pretty aggressive so after a bit, I had to shoo them off with my feet to keep them from chasing Andy. By the end, he was karate kicking at them to keep them away. Rather amusing.

This one is out of place with the others, but I liked it anyway. Here Andy is after a bath where he declared it was "too cold" and promptly curled up in the hallway. I'm not sure why exactly either, but he wasn't so cold that he didn't want to smile for the camera. This kid sure loves to mug for the camera.

Nursery 2.0

We (actually, Mark and Bjorn) spent a good part of the weekend clearing out the computer room to make room upstairs for a nursery again. We now have both computers in the basement and the room is empty except for my non-maternity clothes and a massive filing cabinet. Both will have to move before too long, but the bulk of the work is done.

They also got the crib out of the attic. It all looks so small seeing it again. I need to get out and find a rug for the room though. With Andy, the room still had wall-to-wall carpeting, but it was old to start with and pretty nasty by the end of it all. So when when we switched Andy's into a bigger room, we exposed the hardwood floors. They're in good shape, but I think something warmer on my feet would be good for all the late nights and early mornings in winter.

As you can see, we still have to put the crib et al together, but at least we have the space to do it. Plus, unlike last time, the crib is in six big pieces and not 30 little ones so it should be easier to put back together.

We went to a birthday party at a place today in Manassas called Pump It Up that is a huge indoor moon bounce with slides. The kids liked it, even Andy who is afraid of moonbounces got it and jumped around a little bit. The odd thing was that they made us sign a waiver saying we wouldn't sue if we got hurt. Then as you approach the room, there are signs saying by entering, I understand they are not liable if I or my dependents get hurt. They even have a training video to watch so you understand what you're getting yourself into. I know America is litigious, but wow, this was pretty over the top, it seems.

We've been on a birthday party circuit the last few weeks. So much so that Andy is now asking about his birthday party (he has asked both me and Bjorn if we can come). This is posing a bit of a dilemma for me. We haven't really done a party for him in the past, but he'll be three and this year he knows not only how old he is, but how birthday parties work. So I feel like I really have to throw him some kind of a party, but on January 11, I'm going to be 9 months pregnant and most likely uninterested in a huge party. I've been thinking about just inviting 4-5 friends with kids Andy knows over for a small party so he can do cake and celebrate, but where do I draw the line? In January, it will be winter so inviting five families means at least one adult and one kid, possibly more. Then adding in some family it will easily get to be 20 people. So much for a small party. Thoughts? Tips? Drug suggestions?

Christmas card

Here's the top (and so far, only) contender for the Christmas card this year. The sun is a little too bright in the background, but I think everyone looks pretty good. It's too bad Andy is looking the other direction, but he's smiling at least. What do you think?

Happy Thanksgiving

It's been a nice day and we have lots to be thankful for, like good health, family, friends, jobs and a seemingly healthy baby girl wiggling inside my belly. Then the extras, like the Cowboys going 10-1. Granted, it was the New York Jets, but I'll take it.

We went to the house of old family friends of Bjorn's for omelettes and Bloody Mary's before coming back to get ready for dinner here. We had a thin crowd, just the three kids, my brother-in-law and us, but it was nice, friendly and low key with some amazing food.

Andy picked today to be too hyped up to nap. He's so exhausted now he can't sleep. He wore his blue blazer today as did his father and they looked quite darling. I also got all three kids to pose for some Christmas card possibilities. I like the idea of getting the whole family in the picture, not just the kids, but with my ever-expanding waistline that causes bitchy women to ask if I'm having twins, I opted out of that this year. Next year...

I'm still getting used to the new camera. I only took 70 pictures today and blew through two more batteries (at least they're AA). It's so much more powerful it requires me to actually think. What's up with that?

Things NOT to say to a pregnant lady

I'm not a delicate flower. I like to joke and have a good time. But being an enormously pregnant with the knowledge I have many more weeks to go, I am a tad cranky (Bjorn would disagree over the "tad" part). It doesn't help that people can be total morons when it comes to talking to pregnant ladies. Here's a list of things people have said to me recently that I would safely put in the "avoid" column.

• Don't ask if I'm having twins. Hahaha. That's so NOT funny.
• Don't tell me how big I'm getting. I know that. While I'm excited about the reason, the actual getting big part actually doesn't feel that great and comes with a host of side effects.
• Don't tell me stillbirth stories. Bad things happen, I get it. Really. I'm also worried about it so, please, don't give me more things to worry about that I might not have thought about already.
• Don't tell me how terrible labor and delivery is. I have done it once already and wouldn't recommend it in a Zagat guide or anything, but it's sort of unavoidable. If you've got good advice, like how it was helpful to take a class or bring a book to the delivery room, great. But don't just tell me how terrible it is. At this point, the kid is eventually going to have to come out one way or the other so why give me more to worry about?
• Don't tell me how hard it's going to be to have two kids. I'm terrified enough of the prospect. Again, tips are useful; blanket statements that scare me are not.

There is a lot of fun stuff to talk about when having a baby. Like clothes and gear. Like stupid baby names (Apple or Pilot Inspektor anyone?) Like what crazy thing my celebrity pregnant BFF, Nicole Richie, has done recently.

New toy!

As an awesome anniversary gift, Bjorn got me a new digital camera. To be exact, it's a Canon PowerShot SX100 IS which is tons more powerful than my Kodak EasyShare DX7630. It's so much more powerful and fancy that I still haven't figured out how to use it properly. But when I do, stand back (even Andy looks scared here of what can happen) because it's going to rock the house. I'm pretty excited about it.

I've even been reading the manual for this one because it's so much fancier than just pointing and clicking (and I know once I figure it out, I'll be able to do all sorts of neat stuff). What's funny is it uses terms I used to (almost) have a handle on, like ISO, shutter speed and aperture, but with the last few cameras I've had, they have been so simple I didn't have to bother. Now I'm finding I need to look up what they mean so I can use it right (sure, the manual has 12 blank pages for "notes" but they couldn't include a basic glossary of terms?)

The cool and not so cool

We got the word at the pediatrician's office today - Andy's long-running ear infection is refusing to clear up after three rounds of antibiotics. Based on his ears' performance refusing to clear up last spring when colds were less common and now that we're going into cold and flu season, she says it's time to get the surgery to put in ear tubes. Everyone I've talked to whose child has them raves that it has made all the difference in both their kids' temperament improving because their ears don't hurt and then the kids avoiding being sick going forward, but it's still something I was hoping to avoid. Rats.

I called the surgeon and we're booked for December 10. It sounds like a quick procedure. They said he's put under a general anesthetic delivered through a mask. Then we leave the room and about 10 minutes later, we're brought back into the recovery room where he wakes up minutes later. Our pediatrician said some kids are able to take a nap and go to daycare in the afternoon, but I don't think we'll test that. Now I've got to figure out some of the follow up stuff, like do I have to plug his ears for bath time and swimming? He refuses to put his head under water in the bath or pool at the moment (as you can see, he prefers "cooking" instead), but I imagine that won't last forever.

Meanwhile, my earlier post on men refusing to give up a seat to a pregnant lady at the OB's office got me a shout out over on DC Blogs. I feel so famous. Thanks to Chris for telling me about it.

Just ignore the pregnant lady

I went to the OB's last week. It was a regular 28 week check-up, complete with glucose test (to my surprise, the orange drink didn't taste so bad.) It was a Friday so I had Andy with me. The doctor's office was unusually full. There are probably eight chairs in the waiting room and all eight chairs were occupied -- two by men. I checked in, noticed there was no seat and had to stand there with Andy for about five minutes before one of the guys had his cell phone ring and he got up and left. Apparently being great with child and with a toddler doesn't get you a seat any more.

Seriously, guys, it's an obstetrician's office! I know you're not there because you're the patient. Plus, both of you were probably 30-years-old or so. I appreciate that you're nice enough to go to the doctor with your wife/girlfriend, but being a little less self absorbed would be a good thing. I was also surprised one of the wives/girlfriends didn't nudge a guy out of his seat.

When I went back to the exam room, I mentioned to one of the nurses that they ought to get more chairs. Her reply, "Or one of the men could GET UP." That made me think about how awesome it would be for one of the big black nurses to burst through the door and make a skinny white guy get out of his seat.

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Andy has been a darling this week. I don't know if his ears feel better or if he's just in a better place, but I haven't felt like smacking him once in the past few days. Well, I take that back. Monday night he decided to wake up every 15 minutes and scream for one of us. That wasn't so great. I don't think he's having night terrors since he seems more or less awake when one of us goes in, but they might be scary dreams. I think he's really starting to dream and sometimes he wakes up and in confused about what's going on. I have tried to talk to him about what dreams are and seeing things in his head/eyes when he's asleep, but I'm not sure it registers.

Despite his (and our) lack of sleep, his language continues to pick up. His new word is dangerous. Bjorn and I are both impressed since it's three syllables and he seems to use it properly. He can also spell a few words, like stop signs, "S-T-O-P means STOP!" Bjorn even taught him that T-A-R-G-E-T spells Target. I took Andy over the weekend and he spelled and then read it to me. I was most impressed that he was really reading until Bjorn said they'd practiced it. Still, he's making progress. It's pretty exciting.

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Today is our nine-year wedding anniversary. How crazy is that? We looked at pictures from the wedding over the weekend. My, how young we looked.

The one where "throw-up" enters the lexicon

Andy threw up last night. It was an impressive move really, he was sitting in my lap in the dining room as I tried to get him to eat some apple sauce while he complained that his tummy hurt. Then he let loose. All over my leg, all over himself and the floor (thankfully, we'd taken the rug up in the dining room last year). Andy hasn't thrown up in a long time, probably a year, so he didn't really know what was happening.

"It came out my face!" he said, somewhat proudly after we all calmed down and cleaned up. The one shot seemed to improve him quite a bit. He was cheerful and playful almost immediately afterwards, which was good since we had reservations to go out for our anniversary (nine years!) and Mark was already lined up to babysit. Fortunately, Bjorn talked me out of immediately calling to cancel our reservation because within minutes Andy was seemingly back to normal. The cause, we decided, was that Bjorn only fed him gummi bears earlier in the day at Mark's football game and by the time they got home, Andy was tired and cranky so he just put him down for a nap without anything better to eat so when he did eat something, it didn't sit well. Lovely. The good part was he was fine the rest of the evening for Mark and we did end up getting out for our anniversary dinner.

The funny thing, though, is he keeps talking about how he threw up "yesterday last night." He also has discovered that we jump through hoops when he tells us his tummy hurts so he's been saying that a lot today whenever he wants anything. The kid's not stupid, that's for sure.

Tomorrow is Veteran's Day. I've never worked for a company that has the day off, but Andy's school is closed so I'm taking it off anyway. If I were smart, I might get a jump on Christmas shopping. Or better yet, a jump on cleaning up the computer room in preparation for the big computer move in 10 days. I have a feeling neither is going to happen.

Who says dancing in a circle while singing isn't cool?

This video cracks me up every time I watch it, partly because of how ridiculous it is and partly because being 2 3/4 means that running in a circle chanting nonsense is fun. I should point out that his hair is particularly awful though. He had picture day at school and in getting his cowlick to stay in place, they put a little product in it that apparently had a chemical reaction with the Santa hat, causing it to stand straight up.

Merry Christmas

In cleaning out Andy's closet, I came across a Santa hat that I believe was Bjorn's growing up. My mother-in-law found a box a couple of years ago when she was moving full of 40-year-old baby stuff and, being the pack rat that I am, I have been trying to salvage whatever of it I can, including this hat. Andy put it on a few nights ago and proceeded to dance around the room. I have some hi-larious video to upload later when Blogger speeds up a bit of him dancing to his own song as he prances around the room. More blackmail material it's so cute.

What I like about this picture is he's naked except for his diaper, his Santa hat and all the spaghetti sauce all over his face (it was right after dinner and just before bath time). Well, that and he's just got a great smile that makes me smile looking at it.

BGB seems to be cooking along nicely. I swear she can kick me in the hip and in the boob at the same time, making me think she's 20 inches and 10 pounds already. The movement is cool and always reassuring, but there are some times (like when I'm trying to get comfortable in bed) that I want her to pipe down in there. I'm also really started to feel like a whale, having trouble getting in and out of bed, and dropping stuff constantly. It scares me to think that I have 10-12 more weeks of this when I'll just get bigger and more uncomfortable.

At this point, it's sort of a toss up. I know having a newborn is going to be tough, especially with an active (and often cranky) three-year-old in tow. But the backaches, muscle aches, leg cramps, weird dreams, water retention, clumsiness and enormous belly are all making me anxious to get to the next phase.

Mom?

In the last two days, Andy has gone from calling me "Mommy" to calling me "Mom." It's fine; I really preferred "Mama" over "Mommy" anyway. But now that he's doing it, it seems so grown up somehow. "Mom" is what teenagers call their mothers, not nearly three year olds, right?

My darling angel child has been back today. Sure, he's still clearly 2 3/4, but his mood has been lighter, the fits less frequent and generally he's a joy to be around. We spent the evening moving an old dresser from Mark's room into Andy's. The dresser Mark had needed repairs, plus the drawers are annoyingly small for a grown up. For a kid, they're great. I managed to have enough drawers to segregate the pajama tops and bottoms by sleeve and leg length and still have tons more drawers so it's actually somewhat practical with a kid this age. And for Mark, Bjorn got him a taller dresser with four really big drawers that not only works better, but is a lot more useful. There is one short dresser that we moved from Andy's room into into BGB's (Baby Girl Bennett) room. We're getting close (well, 2 1/2 months) to needing to have the room set up. Yikes!

Persistence

Andy is getting more an more persistent about things, which is surprising, charming and annoying all at once. Here's a recent dialogue:

Andy: I want to watch Thomas.
Me: After breakfast, you can watch one Thomas. Then you can help me in the yard.
Andy: NO! I want to watch Thomas NOW!
Me: Holding back a laugh. Why don't we have breakfast first?
Andy: NO! I want Thomas first!

This goes on and on until we come to some agreement or one of us wears down. Charming, eh?

To the right is a not very good picture of Andy wearing his new blue blazer. My friend Laura works for Macy's and scored us a great discount on a blazer so now he can look just like his father and brother. Plus, now I have something dressy for holiday stuff. The kicker though is just how darn cute he looks in it! It's a 4T so a bit too big still and I need to find the right shirt to wear underneath (a Child's Place sells plain white Oxfords, but I want to find one that's permanent press as ironing a shirt for a kid seems senseless).

Last year I had good luck at Wal-Mart of all places that sold a permanent press shirt complete with a tie that Velcros (Velcroes?) at the back of the neck. I looked a few weeks ago, but at the moment I think it's too early in the season for the holiday wear to be out. Then again, all the stores here have taken down their Halloween decorations and gone straight to Christmas so maybe now is the time to shop after all.

What's scary is I'm having this much fun dressing a boy. Imagine with a girl all the fun I'll have with Mary Jane's (apostrophe or not? I struggled...), tights and velvet dresses. So long as it's not pink.

Antibiotics here we come

It's official - the never-ending ear infection is back. We went to the doctor's today who confirmed that he still has an ear infection and that's probably building up infection in his sinuses, causing the eye goop. Way better than pink eye, but it does mean we're back on this treadmill again. When asked about tubes, she said that the infection may be starting in the nose and sinuses, but it can't drain through the ears properly which is why he's still sick. The plan is to try another round of antibiotics (this time amoxicillan/Augmentin) and see if we can't clear it up without surgery. But she did say that this kind of perpetual infection this early in the cold and flu season doesn't look good. Sigh. One more thing to worry about between now and the end of January.

The only good news is that apparently his ears are so red, she said they most certainly hurt. And that's good because it means my kid is not the demon he has been portraying lately, he's just uncomfortable and I can help alleviate that.

Meanwhile, check the porn shot I posted. He really wanted to wear his boots the other day as I had him undressed for his bath. He looked so funny clomping around that I took a couple of pictures. I found I actually had to delete one that showed his boy parts because it just looked so, so wrong somehow -- naked except for yellow rain boots and posing. So I made him put Jeff on his lap to at least cover the money shot. I still think this will be properly humiliating when he gets older. I see rehearsal dinner slide show written all over this one.

Happy Halloween

I rushed home from Los Angeles to celebrate Halloween to find that Andy's sinus infection (or goopy eye, running nose and cough) appear to be back, putting him somewhat in a cranky mood. We didn't tour the neighborhood, but Bjorn was able to get him into his costume and the boys sat on the porch and handed out candy. I already had a follow-up doctor's appointment scheduled for the afternoon so we'll just go to that to have his symptoms looked at again. Of course, I'm already worried that this means we'll be going through another series of ear infections that will ultimately lead to getting tubes in his ears. I know, I know, there is nothing wrong with tubes, it's just if we can avoid a surgery - however minor - I'd prefer to do that.