The cure for what ails...

is this:


I am operating on few hours of sleep, and I have so much to do today (and tomorrow and next week) that I am beginning to feel overwhelmed with it all. I will be rewarding myself at the end of the day with one or seven of these cupcakes before tumbling into bed for some much needed cupcake-induced rest.

But first, I have to make them. Oh dear.

In his own words...

I am not teaching my class this evening, so as to give my body a break and Joe some extra time to do his Joe Work. I went in, brought Joe some lunch, worked on office-y things like my Vega Newsletter and emails, and then headed home with the boy.

I decided to drop by the store for some dinner items and ice cream cone fixin's. Since I was going to be home with Oliver during dinner time, which is rare, I wanted to make it special. So I was consulting my friend Allison on what to have for dinner, and she suggested breakfast for dinner, like eggs and waffles. Brilliant!

"Oliver, do you want eggs for dinner?"

"Nooooo."

So then Allison suggested French toast. Another brilliant idea. I love French toast. But then I said, "Oh wait. He hasn't pooped in a couple days, he can't have bread for dinner."

To which Oliver piped up. "Mom, I better talk to Allison for a minute."

So I put Allison on speaker phone, and Oliver told her, "Allison? Hi. I can't have any bread because I have to poop..."

I mean, just in case she didn't understand it the first time. It's always good to make sure people know exactly what's going on.

Top Heavy

So I have been blatantly operating on the assumption that this baby is going to be small because she is a girl. Girls are small. I'm a girl, and I'm small. This also means that I have been living in the peaceful ignorant bliss of assuming that she is going to just magically appear after a few unpleasant contractions and an epidural cocktail.

Considering my first run at childbirth, this is a FANTASTIC theory.

But over the past few days, I have had the sinking realization that perhaps I am wrong. Now that her movements are much more than mere flutters, it is apparent that she is already filling up my entire torso. When I feel her move right under my ribs, I also feel something kick me alllll the way down toward my pubic bone. At the same time. Great. Another long baby.

Right about now in the pregnancy, all that is left is the growing. As in, starting now is when the belly will begin to get larger and larger until I am that lady walking (barely) from the car to the front door of the grocery store who people get puppy dog eyes (if you have ever been pregnant before) and say to their friend or husband, "That poor poor girl. She looks like she could go any minute..."

Only, I am already sporting the Great Pumpkin belly. I wear loose clothes a lot, since I only go from home to the studio where I teach dance, and so I am in sweats and a sweatshirt most of the time. So people don't really pay attention and notice unless I point it out. But naked? Thar she blows, people!

And it's only going to get bigger and bigger and more ungainly. And I am fine with that. What is ungainly for me to carry around on my five-foot frame is entertaining for friends who think pregnancy is cute to look at. And it is. I totally get it. There's a baby in there and babies are cute.

However, mentally and emotionally, there is a wee feeling of dread. I know that if she is already filling up my torso now, and starting this week is when she is supposed to just grow and grow and grow until she's ready to come out, I am in for a big baby. And big babies don't seem to like coming out of me very easily. And that, folks, freaks me out. Fuh-reeks. Me out.

Is it too late to find a strapping young Nordic surrogate? I can pay her in homemade soup.

EauMyGod

But I get to dress her in things like this:


And this:

Please and Thank You Goes a Long Way.

This is by far one of my favorite conversations I have ever had with Oliver:

As I was driving in the rain (I keep mentioning the rain, but it's just so extra soggy outside, that it contributes to making mundane things seem a wee bit miserable) in the Fred Meyer parking lot, I was about to pull into a parking spot when someone else came whipping in from the opposite direction and took the spot...

Me, muttering under my breath: Well, thank you A-Hole.
Oliver: Mom, did you just say "thank you, A-Hole?"
Me: Yes, Oliver, I did.
Oliver, after a pause: Mommy, you were really NICE to that A-Hole!

Today's Food Adventure, or otherwise known as boring stuff about my eating habits.

Well, I overcame my paralysis of earlier, gathered my chi, and hit the grocery in the rain on a Sunday.

Oliver was the best helper, as was my iPhone grocery list. I just made a note in my phone, and as I put an item in the cart, I delete it off my list. Nothing fancy, but it was cool to see the list get smaller and smaller until there was nothing on it.

I have decided that tonight's fun dinner will be mini-tostada cups filled with langostino tails (you can buy them at Trader Joe's and they taste like lobster), freshly chopped onion, lettuce, tomato, avocado. On top will be a flavored sour cream I make by combining some avocado, sour cream, minced cilantro and lime juice. Other options are grated cheddar cheese, dice jalepeno and a bit of black beans on the bottom of the cup, which I hope I have, because I forgot to buy some black beans at the store today...

This is a meal I made over the summer with some helpful hints from my pal Annie in regards to tortillas. And because she gave me the brilliant idea, I had to have her and her cute husband who looks like my cute husband over to enjoy it. It was a success.

I bought corn tortillas and Annie's cool suggestion was to warm up the tortillas in some heated oil in a frying pan to get them soft and pliable, and then press them into cupcake tins and bake them in the oven to make actual mini cups. UM, okay!

Anyway, it's delicious and fresh and an all-around feel good meal to enjoy with a cold beer. I have to be sans the beer for now, but you don't. Chef some up for yourself*.

Tomorrow I plan to be more weather appropriate with my eating, as I purchased all the ingredients for homemade clam chowder. I made this for Christmas Eve dinner and it was delicious then as well as reheated a few days later. You will need to do some working out before this meal to compensate for the wee bit of half and half involved, though.

*If you do, bake the tortilla cups on low heat, like 200-250 for about an hour-ish.

23 Weeks.

And counting.

This week, Baby G-let is coming out of her shell and making a permanent appearance. There is really no more hiding the belly these days, so I have stopped trying. And for those of you who are new to Pregnant Evie, I am NOT shy about rocking my pregnant body to the world. But until it actually LOOKS like a baby belly, it mostly just looks like you have developed a penchant for Doritos and cake and not working out.

Due to my three months straight of morning sickness, I did not develop that habit. No, I actually ate less. But your body goes into motherhood mode and slows down metabolism and stores almost everything you give it. I am only five feet tall, so there is no room to spread it around, and it does not seem to be relative to size. I still have a normal sized baby, and therefore, I will retain the same amount of fat as a woman who is 5'7". How neat for me!!!

Anyway, now that the belly sticks out, I don't look as plump anymore. Which is nice, because my clothing options have expanded from baggy everything to more fitted clothing.

I am starting to feel tired again, as I approach my third trimester. Today, I have the day off from work, but that means I have time to go to the grocery store, cook dinner, and do the massive quantities of laundry that is starting to take over my house. However, after folding one load and starting another, I had to sit down. So I made my grocery list. I am pretty sure that sent me over the edge because now I am just curled up in my chair with my pregnancy body pillow and I can't seem to move much more than these typing fingers.

I decided that amongst all this busy work we have had in our lives, and all the anxiety, that I would take my "I Need a Bigger Bra Money" reserved for Victoria's Secret and spend only $4.99 of it on a bigger bra at Ross (it's totally cute, too!) and use the rest for some adorable baby clothes for my lil nugget. Clue: Ross and Marshall's have super cute baby clothes.

The Little Lady has a nautical themed outfit, which I will accessorize with a headband and an anchor with flowers. Also procured is a pair of teeny footie pajamas that are blue, with red cherries all over it. Sigh...

Live in a drawer for all I care, just hurry up and get here so I can see you in that cherries onesie and squeeze your cheeks.

Nuggets

Well, I was just about to post something, but Oliver is popping up from behind the computer screen, from around the back side of the chair, from the kitchen entryway, saying "Chicken Nuggets!" every chance he gets. Now he is huddled next to me in my leopard print thinking chair and putting his feet in front of the screen.

So I think I better prepare the kid some lunch. Too bad, because today's entry was going to be spectacular.

21 and a half weeks!

I had my monthly baby checkup today. Thankfully. It almost didn't happen because I never put the appointment in my iPhone calendar. I decided at around 11am today to call in and see when my appointment was, because I knew it would be coming up soon. I have been consumed with work and doing our taxes, and I am surprised I have not forgotten about more things.

Sure enough, the appointment was for today at 11:45. I laughed, hung up the phone, looked at Oliver, looked down at myself, snuggled in a blanket on my chair and ottoman, looked at the clock... took a big breath, and then got my shit together.

I made it with time to spare, and if you are childless, just know that this was a miracle.

Anyway, she (the baby) is progressing nicely, I weigh about a ton (for me), Dr. Murray (a.k.a. Dr. Awesome Badass) let Oliver put the "goo" on the sonogram wand and we listened to her heart beat away.

The main thing I took away from the appointment was panic and anxiety, however, as Dr. Murray told me it was time to schedule the rest of my appointments from now until Baby G-let is born. Nothing will make time whiz past me like being able to scratch off appointments from my calendar as they occur. I have one monthly left, then 2 3-weekers, then a couple 2-weekers, and the rest is once a week until she gets here.

Once again, I wonder if we can get the studio done, and even START on our basement before she gets here. I know we can, Joe says so. But it's hard to bank on it because I want it now, for my own peace of mind. I want to set up the crib in her room and find a cute picture of a deer and some other woodland creatures for her wall. I don't want to feel like a band of gypsies, living in one room with a Murphy bed and nothing but canned food on the shelves with all the labels peeled off so you never know what you will be eating for dinner until it slides out of the can.

Okay, so our current living situation is nothing like that at all, and our house is quite cozy and cute. The only thing missing is a room for the tiny one. And for the first month or so she will be sleeping in my room anyway, nursery or no nursery. But the above scenario is easy to conjure up when you are panic-stricken and feel like time is hurtling you through space, toward the inevitable. There are no push backs. There are no re-schedules.

But you know? Through all the anxiety, I am aware that it's all temporary. And soon I will have another baby, and Oliver will have a sister, and Joe will have a daughter, and we will be a happy family who loves each other very much. And these funky times of not having enough room in our house will be a memory that makes us smile. Because the more squished together we are, the more we are forced to snuggle. And years from now, I can look at G-let's face and say with fondness, "Remember when you slept in a drawer?"