the big ultrasound

Tuesday was the big, long awaited ultrasound when we got to find out BabyTwo's gender.
BabyTwo is probably our last child, and there was no denying which direction my hopes were in. Here's a hint: we had a lovely girl name picked out, and not even a list of boy names under consideration. I may or may not have already picked out a variety of pink and purple nursery items I wanted.

Fast forward to the appointment. The technician puts the sensor to my belly and within literally seconds of the image popping up I had an excellent full frontal view and my answer. What are the odds? I mean, what a coincidence that the technician just happened to set the sensor in just the right place, with the baby moving just the right way, that it was plain to see immediately. I waited a few seconds to see if the technician would say anything before I said, "I see boy parts there don't I?" She hadn't even been looking there yet, but indeed it was a baby boy! I then got to enjoy an extensive viewing of my littlest -- ultrasounds are so cool!

So I started my life in all female household and now it will be me and my boys! I can continue saying, "How are my boys?" when I get home. And I get to pull out all Little Guy's old blue stuff and imagine another darling little baby boy filling it.

I have made Little Guy take an oath to give me granddaughters and plan to make BabyTwo do the same. So the awesome girl name and the dreams of shopping for pink and purple are not entirely gone ;)

Here is my handsome littlest guy...

damn you cookie monster!

my son now thinks the way to eat almost everything, not just cookies, is to crumble it up with his hands in front of his mouth while he's taking a bite. a great way to send pieces of food flying everywhere. not a great way to actually consume food.

snow snow SNOW!

our first snow...yep, it's exciting!

personal safety: paranoia or prudence

Today we stopped at a liquor store to buy some alcohol for a Christmas party. I elected to wait in the car with Little Guy while hubby ran in.

Coming out of the store directly in front of where we were parked I couldn't help but notice a man that looked rather like Santa. But if Santa were a truck driver. He stared at me as he walked and then came up to my door and knocked on my window.

"Can I ask you a question?" he said.

Shit. Fuck. Damn. What am I supposed to do? It would be so incredibly rude to ignore this man, but the whole situation was setting off alarm bells. In the end I guess the fear of being rude won, because I cracked open the door (couldn't roll down the window) and spoke to the man.

Despite my clearly uncomfortable demeanor the man proceeded to ask me various questions at great length about our GPS unit, situated visibly on our dash. Finally, with the guy still talking to me, I got myself and Little Guy out of the car. Now standing a comfortable distance away from the man I tried to wrap up our conversation. I told him we were going to go inside to join my husband, but he stopped me with more questions. He kept on talking, at one point kind of grabbing my arm supposedly in play with my son. That did it. I made it clear that we were going inside and he got in his van and left.

This encounter is so unsettling to me. I hate to be cynical and suspicous. This man could very well just be a super talkative friendly guy with GPS questions. But he also could have been a very dangerous man. And I'm kind of sick with myself that I allowed it to play out the way that it did for as long as it did. I guess next time I'd rather be rude.

being a child of divorce never gets fun

it's always been hard dividing up the holidays without hurting someone's feelings. now that i'm married and there's more beloved and wonderful family it's even harder. thankfully despite my enormous levels of stress about it all parties involved have acted magnanimous and flexible. i've made every effort i can to be fair (if you could see my spreadsheet you'd know). i just hope everyone really is ok with our division of time. sigh.

oh for the love of all thats holy...

is it December 16th yet? The waiting is killing me!

Is it a boy? Is it a girl? Is it California time yet? Christmas-time yet?

What the hell do you mean there are still weeks to go?

a light at the end of the tunnel

In this past week, the 17th of my pregnancy, I found myself feeling a lot better. Much less nauseous, much more hungry...my pregnancy weight loss program may finally be coming to an end! I felt so good in fact that Monday night I decided to not take my nausea medicine at bedtime. The next 24 hours were some of the worst yet. So lesson learned: I take my nausea medicine at bedtime...I feel pretty good the next day. I guess it really has been helping! In any case it is truly wonderful to have a degree of normalcy back.