Lessons on life

Things I've learned recently:

1. Underwire bras are not comfortable when your belly protrudes farther than your breasts...maybe I should be more specific and say your pregnant belly. I have always been a fan of underwire, mostly for the push-up effect. In the past, I found that non-underwire bras had less padding, and therefore did not hide the fact that where peaches should be, I had apricots. My girlfriends in college called it "false advertising." They joked that I couldn't feel it if they poked me in my boob. (And because of all the padding, most of the time I couldn't.) After realizing that underwire would not cut it for me anymore, I went in search of a new, more comfortable bra. Looking through the racks, I found that there are more bras nowadays that are wirefree and have some padding. I, however, need less than I did before. But it is nice to know that it's out there. Wire-free bras have come a long way.

2. The pregnant belly gets a lot of attention, mostly people ask: "how are you feeling?" I wouldn't mind so much, if I wasn't asked by every single person I work with, my patients and their families. Most of the time people expect a complaint or negative feeling. The only one I can offer is that I have some terrible heartburn. Most of the time they seem disappointed.

3. In a few months I am going to miss getting poked and prodded off and on during the day (and night). I've come to realize that I enjoy the moments when I can feel him kicking and moving around. It is going to be strange having my body to myself again. Well, I'll kind of have my body to myself.

4. Do not leave butter on the counter and then leave your dogs locked in the kitchen. Especially with a dog like Bacardi, who can apparently reach the counter top to get the butter down.

5. The Bissell SpotBot Carpet cleaner, which I received from my mom for Christmas last year, was one of the best gifts I could have ever received. Did you know that if a dog eats about a half a stick of butter they then will have diarrhea all over your carpet? Don't worry if you have a SpotBot. It sucked a lot to pre-clean, because the smell about made me puke, but you can't tell at all that there used to be diarrhea on my carpet. (Side note: After I complained about the smell, Jamaal said "You know what's in diapers right?" Of course I do. But my sense of smell is heightened, and newborns don't eat what Bella ate.

TMI to follow.

The Good.
I still am pretty much free of nausea. Ever so often I get a touch queasy, so I eat something and feel better. I work with several mamas, and pretty much all of them have had awful nausea. One girl would stare at her pantry looking for something to eat, because she was starving, but eventually she would lose her cookies just thinking about the food. Another girl would come to work, try to eat, and would always have a garbage can next to her, for the eventual regurgitation. Yet another would guzzle chocolate milk, then run to the toilet. She always wanted more chocolate milk, but could never keep it down.

I feel pretty guilty for having so little nausea. It actually makes me nervous as well, as if something is wrong with the baby. Whenever I feel like complaining, I remember that it could always be worse.

I am 10 weeks and 2 days along now. I have less than 5 weeks until my next appointment, which is super exciting. I didn't ask if there would be another ultrasound or not at this appointment, but if there is, we might get to find out the gender of this little gummy bear. There are mixed feelings out there, my family is rooting for healthy pink. I think Jamaal's mom would like a granddaughter since she has only sons, but Jamaal's brother wants a nephew.

Obviously we'll take what we get, and everyone is hoping for a healthy little bundle. But I keep thinking "Please let there be no penis." ;)

Today is Jamaal and my Anniversary. 1 year of marriage. 5 years together. 1 baby cooking. And I couldn't be happier. We laugh together daily (when we get to see each other). And still enjoy being around one another. :D

I bought Trophy cupcakes to celebrate. We will also try our wedding cake top, but since I wasn't sure how well it will taste, I wanted to have a back up. Jamaal loves the cupcakes. Yesterday he asked me what it was that they put in them, because they tasted so good. :D This is a dangerous thing, I do better when he doesn't like something, because I won't get it if he doesn't care for it. He loves them...so do I...cupcakes will be visiting our house again in the future.

Last night I made some banana bread, and it is pretty darn good. It tastes like Christmas. So when I taste it I think about how shortly after Christmas I'll get to meet the little gummy bear for the first time. :D It cannot come soon enough.

The Bad.

I am not without any symptoms. One of the worst ones is pretty bad constipation. I've been taking stool softeners, which helps a little, but I find that I have some diarrhea at times too. So I go between pretty bad constipation, followed by diarrhea. It's like I cannot win. I'm thinking of trying Senna (a laxative) to see if I can get things moving instead of softening. It's pretty gross. And unfortunate. But it's the price I pay for not being nauseated I guess.

I also have some lower back pain. It does not radiate down my legs or butt, so as of yet it isn't sciatica pain. But it is pretty bad. It twinges when I get up out of chairs sometimes. I find it is worse when I'm at work, which makes me think it is related to my stress level. I must be tensing up in a way that aggravates it. I really want to see a chiropractor to get it better controlled.

My girls have been causing mischief as well. Yesterday Jamaal mowed the lawn. On one side of our house, we have double fences. There is one at the front of the house and one at the back of the house. Jamaal left the one at the back of the house open, but the front one was shut. I went to let the girls in, and Bella was the only dog that came. I looked everywhere for Bacardi. I didn't know how she got out, since the front gate was shut. Jamaal came home while I was searching the backyard. I asked if he had seen Bacardi, and he said "no." I went out front and couldn't find her there either. I was beginning to panic.

Well, the husband had lied. He put her in the front seat of his car. He said "I can't believe you didn't see her there." I didn't see her because I didn't look there. I was a little upset with him for lying to me. I was really worried about her. She's cute. People might like to keep her for themselves. She also is pretty loving to most strangers eventually, so she might even not fight them. Or worse, she could get hit by a car, and get hurt, or killed.

The gate at the front of the house is a little bit short, so Bacardi just crawled out from under it. So, we shut the gate in the back of the house. Then this morning after I let the girls out, they didn't come when I called them to come in. I was smarter this time. I threw on a bathrobe (I had just gotten out of the shower) and went to the front yard and called for Bella and Bacardi. Bella was munching on something she found right next to the front of the house. My guess is cat poop. Blech. But again, Bacardi was nowhere to be found. I went inside to double check the backyard, and to wake Jamaal if she wasn't there. We were going to have to do a sweep of the neighborhood. Thankfully she's a smart cookie. When she heard me go to the front yard, she pretended like she never left the back yard. I'm no fool though. Both girls were in trouble. But I was thankful to have found them.

The Ugly.

Could I be pregnant with a girl? They say that girls steal their mother's beauty...and I'm breaking out a lot more than usual. It's not terribly bad but I sure don't feel very pretty.

My hair is also pretty dry and frizzy. It's frustrating. I'm sure it has something to do with the chlorine from water aerobics. It could also be that I haven't had my hair cut since March. I don't know when I'll be able to get in to get my haircut now, because I have plans most days this week.

Raining cats...

And dogs can't go outside.

When the weather is wet, the girls become prissy pups. They love going outside. They would go out every hour if offered. They usually only spend about 10-20 minutes at a time outside, sometimes only 5.

But the moment it begins to rain, they will have none of it. Bacardi will actually go out the door, then stand under the cover and stare out. Bella hears the rain from inside, looks at me, and walks away. "You've got to be kidding me mom," she says.

They certainly are spoiled.

My Cone head

Today I thought I would share a post about my darling girls. Mostly, about my poor Bella girl. She has a slight problem: she chews and scratches herself uncontrollably. So, Jamaal and I decided to put a cone on her to make her stop. Bella has had this problem for a while. She has a spot on her right hip, one on the middle of her back, and also likes to lick her armpits in the front. When we were still in Tukwila, we tried medications and I put the cone on her then, but at the time I was on night shift, and Jamaal felt guilty putting the cone on her. But now, we are on a united front. She actually wakes us up in the middle of the night with her chewing and scratching, and we think "enough is enough." 

So I thought I would show you all my little girl with her cone, but needed to take a few pictures to do so. What I found was not good.  This might be one of the last times I use our old camera. I picked it up and noticed blue painter's tape was on it, I didn't know why the painter's tape was on it, so I took it off and the front case of the camera popped off. So the painters tape is holding our camera together. We knew the end of the camera's days was coming soon, since there is a black hole on the view screen. It is very small, but once the screen starts to go, that's it for this camera, since there is no other way to see what we're taking a picture of once that screen goes. But I digress...

It seems mean to have a cone on a dog, but really she doesn't seem to notice it much. She can eat her food with it on, she can drink water with it on, and as you can see in the videos I took, she can play with it on. I think I notice it more than she does, as she hits me with it all the time. She gets my shins and face the most with it. :D I have 3 videos that I'm going to share today, I hope you enjoy them. :D



This is a video I took of Bacardi a while back. Every time we put an ice cube in her water dish, she will not rest until she gets the ice cube out. This particular day she was really quick at getting it out, usually there is a lot more spillage...



This is proof that my little girl is not suffering...she acts exactly the same as she did before the cone was on. She is very adaptable.



This video focuses more on Bacardi, but also features my Cone head as well. :D

From shag

To chic

The bows didn't last very long. I had my dad take a couple pictures of her right after her haircut, my mom and I went to Costco, and by the time we came back she had one bow and the other was hanging off her head. She looks like a completely different dog. And sometimes she acts differently too. She is colder now so she needs to be snuggled a lot more.

If my girls could talk...

I'm sure they would have some pretty funny things to say.

I honestly believe they would have some pretty vulgar vocabulary. Because sometimes they do things that really must have some sort of cuss word in front of it.

Example Number 1:

Bacardi must have fresh water at all times. They have a plastic double dish that we keep filled with water, and they go through it pretty quick. It has metal insets for the water to go in. If Bacardi finds it empty she will flick the metal dishes out of the base in protest.

Other times she will simply go into the main bathroom, find the toilet cover up, and drink from the toilet. When I see her go into that bathroom, I know why, and I'll call her out.

Her speech bubble reads: "B*&#$ I told you to keep fresh water in that bowl!"

Example Number 2:

Some times Jamaal or I will wake up the girls in the middle of the night by turning on the lights. Their eyes open, and Bella won't even lift up her head. Her eyes glare at us as if to say "WTF man, I'm sleeping here!"

Other times they might not have such vulgar speech, like the times when Bella runs into a wall and looks around to see if anyone saw. (Or she's looking around to see what hit her...) Either way I imagine her thoughts would be hilarious to hear.

Jamaal and I watched Up! the other day, and in that movie the dogs talk. In other words you hear their thoughts. It is hilarious, because sometimes they will randomly shout out "Squirrel!" which is exactly something Bacardi would do. I loved the dogs in that movie, because so much of what they said is what I imagine my girls saying. I kept looking to see if Jamaal agreed with me, and for the most part he did.

By the way, if you haven't seen Up! you should, but just make sure to wash your face first, and have cucumbers ready for after...I bawled. But I cry at commercials...

My little Bells

Just a video of my Bella girl, playing with her food. Unless she is really hungry, she will do this every meal time...Sometimes she does the "nosing" part of it for much longer. She used to have a bowl that would tip over, and so she would nose it enough that it would tip. We got tired of stepping on bits of food. We still step on random pieces that she spits out...wish I could get into that head of hers and find out what the heck she's doing!!