Monthly Archives: October 2006

17 months and 18 weeks

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Happy 17 month birthday to my big guy. He
celebrated by spending 2 hours at the hospital going with me
from one doctor appointment to another. Fun. I treated him to a
blueberry muffin at the end :)

We had
our 2nd ultrasound today. It was highly annoying. The
technician was professional and polite, but that’s about it.
She told us Lex could stay in the room, but couldn’t walk
around, so Alan had to hold him. That lasted all of about 5
minutes. Lex likes his freedom. So Alan and Lex left to wander
the hospital hallways. I stayed to get abused. Apparently baby
wasn’t in a position the tech could work with, so she kept
poking my lower abdomen with the ultrasound wand in an effort
to get baby in a different position. Baby is apparently camera
shy. She was trying to see the face and baby kept putting its
arm up to block her – probably wasn’t appreciating the pokings
either :) After 1/2 hour (my others all took about 10 minutes),
she told me to stay put (flat on my back, gel all over my
belly), while she ran the report… just in case. Then she
comes in 10 minutes later and says, “Are you seeing the
high-risk doctors?” I say, “No, should I be?” She says, “Just
curious.” and leaves! What the hell! Then she comes back 10
minutes later with the report.

Soo….
I meet up with Alan and Lex and we head to the follow up
appointment with the midwife. Alan has to go to work, so it’s
just Lex and I now. The nurse asked how the ultrasound went, so
I told her it was long, painful, annoying, and apparently they
think I need to see the high-risk doctor. She was concerned and
opened my report right away. Then she gave me the report and
showed me that everything was normal. She left it with me to
read while I waited for the midwife, but I didn’t get to it as
I was feeding Lex. So the midwife comes in a few minutes later
(I love these ladies), scans the report, and also comments on
how everything is great and she has no idea what the tech was
talking about. The she says, “So, she told you you’re having a
little girl?” I must have had a pretty blank look on my face
because I had told the tech we didn’t want to know and I was
pretty sure the tech never even went down there. I said,
“Nooo… she didn’t tell me and I told her we didn’t want to
know.” But there it was, right on the report. Which was ok, but
just a surprise. My midwife was none too pleased because the
tech is supposed to write “parent doesn’t want to know” and not
even check. She left to call the tech and see what was going
on. The midwife thought maybe I had the wrong report or
something! She comes back a few minutes later, happy but
annoyed, and said the tech hit the wrong button and never even
looked down there (like I thought). The tech wasn’t apologetic
or anything, just all matter-of-fact. My midwife apparently
gave her a good talking to about how “hitting the wrong button”
isn’t an acceptable thing to do when dealing with the sex of a
child, neither is asking about high-risk without an
explanation. I guess all reports have a doctor and midwife name
on them (since some insurance companies won’t pay for midwife
services) so the tech was confused by that – hence the
high-risk question.

I’ve officially had
enough ultrasounds for this pregnancy. They are progressively
getting more and more annoying. And I guess we now know that we
may (or may not) be having a girl :)

Tiny baby kicks

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I felt baby kick today! Lex and I were
wrestling on the floor and he was climbing on my and basically
gently kicking my belly. Then he jumped up to look out the
window (a big truck drove by) and I started feeling tiny baby
kicks from inside. I think baby wanted to play with Lex :) I
felt them a few other times later in the day, so I’m certain
they are kicks.

I’m at 18 weeks now and
we have our regular 18wk ultrasound tomorrow morning. I’ll try
and post another picture, but I’m guessing it’s going to look a
lot like the last one :)

The house is
coming along well. Just a few more days until we move. I’m a
big mess of excitement, nervousness, and pure exhaustion. I’ll
be happy when the whole thing is done and we’re in the new
house. Just a few more days….

It’s the small things…

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Like when you are facing a sink full of
dirty dishes and dreading the fact that you have to unload the
dishwasher first. Rough life, I know. So you procrastinate
until the very end, then open the dishwasher and… it’s empty!
Yay! Of course I unloaded it earlier in the day, but I forgot,
so it was a nice little surprise :)

But
what I really wanted to mention (again) is how amazing it is to
watch Lex learn. He’s getting really good at categorization.
For example, whenever he sees something resembling a frog,
he’ll do the frog sign and look at me questioningly. This is
impressive to me. It’s not always a frog, but most often it is.
He recognizes real frogs, drawings, puppets, abstract things,
toys, etc. All very different looking, but all frogs. He also
is very good at finding clocks. Anything that’s round with
numbers and hands. But the other day he started pointing out
the square and/or numberless clocks. It’s just amazing how
rapidly his brain is working and processing all of this
seemingly mundane information.

Anyway,
Alan is home now so I gotta go. PS – the carpet and paint is
done upstairs. The house is really looking great!!

Apple picking

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Lex and I went apple picking
this morning. It was beautiful out, sunny and cold. We picked
two whole bags of apples. I picked from the tree, but Lex
preferred to pick from the ground :) He wore his big boots and
the grass was tall, so he had a little trouble moving. But he
had a great time. We saw dogs and tractors and lots and lots of
apples. Then we went to the house to give the guys a bag of
apples (to balance out the giant bag of Halloween candy I gave
them the other day!)
The pics ended up big
instead of small, but I’m too lazy to change them
now.

The house is coming
along well. They have the lower cabinets in place and are now
painting and working on the bathrooms. Everyone is tired and
stressed because we couldn’t reschedule the flooring guy, so
it’s crunch time trying to prepare for that. I think next week
will be better though. Once the flooring guy is there are they
are able to figure out how best to work together. I’m
frustrated on my end because there is so much to do and I can’t
do anything. I try to stop by every day to say hi, but can’t
stay long because Lex is into everything (not good on a
construction site) and very distracting to everyone. So I’ve
resigned myself to the fact that it’s out of my hands now and I
just have to hope Alan, Barney and Dad can handle it all. I
have trouble letting go. It’s a weakness. So I’ll keep packing
and maybe whip up an apple pie. You know, do all the homemakery
things I’ve gotten so good at.

Some thoughts

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It’s been a few days, so here are a few
unrelated thoughts for you.

My smart boy
Lex
grows smarter by the minute and his communication skills have
really taken off. He can now use two word phrases, which is
sometimes helpful (“more milk”) and sometimes just silly (“big
clock”). He’s fascinated with clocks and points them out
everywhere we go. He still confuses clocks and gauges, like the
speedometer or a pressure gauge, but that’s an understandable
mistake. He also tries very hard to repeat everything I say and
seems to be picking up new words rapidly. I love it. The other
day I was zoning into my computer and he came running in (with
his silly, silly run) saying “help, help” and doing the sign as
he ran. When he got to me he pointed to his sippy cup which was
stuck in his overall buckles :) He pointed to the cup, said and
signed “help” and pointed to the cup again. So smart!
(excluding the fact that he got his sippy cup stuck in his
overalls, of course :) ). So I unhooked the cup and handed it
to him. He immediately handed it back and said and signed “more
milk.” The cup was empty. He ran to the fridge and said/signed
“more milk” again. Soooo smart!! He also has been peeing on the
potty once or twice a day lately, and on his own accord. He’ll
sit right down on the potty (clothes and all) or come get me
and bring me to his potty. Then, once the diaper is off, he
sits right down and pees.

My fears
Like I
said, some unrelated thoughts here. The house is moving along
nicely. The flooring guy comes on Monday for the week so dad
and crew are putting in some overtime to be sure we’re ready
for him. I wish so much I could go over and help too. As much
as I love the little man, he’s definitely not good to have
around at a construction site. So my visits are just that –
short and social. Then I leave and the work continues. Anyway,
my biggest fear right now is that they will get done and I’ll
look around and think “Oh my god, I can’t believe I chose
that color!” We have been making so many
decisions and I’m just hoping that when we put it all together
it actually looks good :) I can’t even imagine the scary
decisions you have to make when you build a house from scratch.
Oh well. I guess if I have to have fears, those are ok ones to
have.

My little
one
The little one inside seems to be
coming along nicely. My belly is definitely sticking out these
days. We have an appointment in 2 weeks for another ultrasound
and the morning sickness, for the most part, has passed. Not
much else to report. I was looking at my baby blog for Lex and
saw that I felt the first kicks around 19 weeks. I’m looking
forward to that again. It’s a pretty cool feeling having
someone growing inside you. We saw a great shirt awhile back
that said “I grow people.” Made me laugh.

What about MySpace?

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I just pulled myself out of a
half hour MySpace daze. I discovered that not one, but
both of my sisters now have MySpace lives
and I thought, “Hmm… maybe I need MySpace…” After reading
their pages though, I decided that I’m just not cool enough. Oh
well. Not sure I have enough time to answer all those survey’s
anyway! I guess I’ll just stick to Lex’s space instead.

We went to a really nice
outdoor playgroup today. They have a giant sandbox and lots of
toys. Lex usually makes a bee-line for the sandbox and doesn’t
leave for an hour and a half, but today he actually played with
the other toys too. It was exciting (the sandbox is boring!).

Here are a few other random pics. From
top to bottom:

1) Lex showing off his
new kicks from Grandpa Tom and Uncle B. They are two sizes too
big, but he loves them anyway.

2) He
then tried to hide under the highchair :) He’s hiding skills
are actually improving, but this wasn’t one of his best
efforts.

3) Helping me pack.

4) Breakfast time. Lex recently figured out
how to sit on these chairs by himself. These days we frequently
find him sitting at the table.

5)
Playing with a toy car at playgroup.

Waiting on the cable guy…

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What a day. I spent 2 1/2 hours
entertaining a 1yr old at a construction site. Talk about
draining! I was also torn because there is so much to do at the
house and I really wanted to get a few quick things done, but
alas, that rarely happens with Lex around. I was able to get
one thing done and then we spent a lot of time outside, playing
in the leaves, chasing the neighbor’s cat and detouring Lex
back into our yard. We met a new neighbor in the last 1/2 hour.
Her and her 10-ish yr old son came over and played. He asked if
he could rake our leaves and play in them. We have a ton of
leaves. Lex loved it! The boy made a big pile and then took
turns with Lex hiding in it. It was cute. I was kicking myself
for not having the camera. I even thought about bringing it on
my way out, but was already so loaded down I decided not to
bother. I could have taken some really nice autumn photos today
:/

And, after all of that, the cable
guy never even showed up! I ended up leaving 45 minutes past
the time-frame I was given and he hadn’t called or showed up :(
Things are always complicated.

My house

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Geez… leave the men in this family alone
in the kitchen for a few hours and look at what happens!! Yes, that is the stove and
fridge in the dining room. :) I was actually amazed at how
quickly they got the whole place torn out. Poor Lex, the
littlest man, was stuck at the fabric store with the women. He
was none too pleased :)

We had an
electrician come out today to see what we need done. He’s going
to come over a few more times this week to actually do the
work. Not surprisingly, the project grows every day. We keep
reminding ourselves that it’s better to do it right now (while
the whole place is torn apart anyway) than to try and do it
right later after we’ve already moved in.

I’m so excited though. The closing went smoothly, the work
started promptly, and they are making great progress. Yay, we
have a house!

PS. When we left
the house this afternoon, Lex said “bye house.” It was so clear
and well spoken :)