A Very Baby Culver kind of Christmas

Baby Culver had a very good Christmas this year. His/her grandparents loaded Baby Culver up with all kinds of goodies!

Grandma and Grandpa Culver gave us a Glider/Ottoman combo for the nursery that Ben put together on Christmas day (with minimal cussing I might add!). Pa Lar and Ma Pat gave us the Graco Travel System that is also in this photo - that one took me a while - lots of wheels and things!

Pa Lar and Ma Pat also gave us our pack 'n play for Baby Culver which I put together in the living room before spending twice as much time trying to figure out how to UN-pack'n'play it!

Baby Culver also received his/her first stocking from Santa - which Santa sent through the Bosworth house - Santa included: A Benny the Beaver book, a book about Belly Buttons, a Funny Feet book, a pacifier clip with pacifier that said "Pull to Sound Alarm", some clip together letter toys, and a OSU Beaver onesie and socks! Baby Culver really cleaned up!

Finally, Baby Culver also recieved a swing from Pa Lar and Ma Pat that the dogs are modeling here. They are not sure what to think about all of this new stuff and are pretty sure it is supposed to be for them!

Thanks to BBC's grandparents and Santa for wonderful stuff for Baby Culver!

Shower in a Box...Day 7

My very good friend Kim VanderZanden (also known as Radar's 'Mama Kim') - sent us some Avent bottles on Day 6. These are very exciting because as ridiculous as shopping is in Lawton -we can't even buy good baby bottles! Ben and I had this discussion with some friends who are scheduled to have twins two days before our due date and the dad of those babies talked about doing bottle research and how excited he was to discover some bottles are shown to help alleviate colic! You can imagine how happy a future father of twin boys would be about that! So, we are very happy that Kim sent along some bottles to help us with colic and fussiness!

Shower in a Box...Day 6

Day 6 of Shower in a Box Baby Culver was given an adorable Carter's outfit from our friend Colleen Holbert. Colleen also sent a small stuffed mouse that our dog Radar thinks is his toy - I have a feeling there will be some disagreements about what is a baby toy and what is a dog toy - Radar thinks it is all for him.
Colleen included this note to Baby Culver: "Precious One, So Small, So Sweet. Dancing in on Angel Feet. Straigt from Heaven's Brightest Star. What a Miracle You Are".

Shower in a Box...Day 5

Grandma and Grandpa Bosworth gave Baby Culver a gift on day 5. They included this note in the numbered box: "Pretty soon you will have a bundle of joy to hold and love. A baby is so very precious and grows up too soon. You'll have lots of sleepless nights but many, many good times to make up for them. We are very happy for you and send a prayer everything goes real easy. Wish we could be there. Be sure and send us pictures. Gram and Grump"

Grandma and Grandpa gave Baby Culver a very cute Pooh blanket as well as a green onesie and a rattle/noise maker (this kid is going to have a lot of ways to make noise!). Grandma and Grandpa also included a gift for Ben and I - some cash "for diapers"!

Shower in a Box...Day 4

Day 4 of Shower in a Box was a gift from mom - or Ma Pat as we now call her! Mom included a message for Ben and I in the numbered box: "I know I've shared this quote with you before, but Mandy, I will always think of you when I read it...I hope you have the chance to sneak in and witness your baby smiling as he or she sees the sun rising on his or her crib. I love you. Mom 'If one feels the need of something grand, something infinite, something that makes one feel aware of God, one need not go far to find it. I think that I see something deeper, more infinite, more eternal than the ocean in the expression of the eyes of a little baby when it wakes in the morning and coos or laughs because it sees the sun shining on its cradle.' - Vincent van Gogh
Mom gave us some really cute Classic Pooh stuff! There was a Classic Pooh bath set that has some washcloths and a hooded towel, a Classic Pooh layette set with a onesie and some socks and a bib and a hat, and also some Classic Pooh baskets. I am very excited about all of it - but especially the baskets because Baby Culver's stuff already seems unorganized to me, so I have something to help me get it under control!

Shower in a Box...Day 3

Mom wanted to make sure that we opened as many of the gifts from Culver family and friends as we could while Dave and Gayle were with us for Christmas. So, on day 3 we opened a gift from Culver family friends Jon and Joleyne Lea. The Leas included a note for us in the numbered box: "Hi! The time is near for you to celebrate your new bundle of Joy! May God Bless you and your new little one, and for all the work you do and sacrifices you make for our country. Best wishes!" The Leas gift to Baby Culver was a mattress pad for the crib, some adorable recieving blankets, some chimes for the car seat, and some really cute bath squirt toys (I told Ben that I registered for these to allow him some fun when he gave the baby a bath).

Shower in a Box...Day 2

Day 2 of Shower in a box we opened some more gifts from family friends of the Culver's. The first gifts we opened were from Doug and Cheryl Baxter. The Baxter's gave us some adorable Pooh washcloths, a blanket, some Pooh socks, a Pooh hat with booties (which I am so excited about because I have a few other hats with ears on them - our kid has a high probability of holding this against me when he/she is older), and also some car seat chimes (Ben says the Baxters know that he likes to make noise so his kid will be the same).


The second gift we opened was from Culver family friends Carl and Jenny Solomon. They enclosed a note in the box for us: "Congratulations to 2 wonderful people. You will be wonderful parents." They gave us one of my favorite books from my childhood Pat the Bunny as well as a Target gift card (Ben and I will defiantly be making a run up to the OKC Target around the end of January!).

Shower in a Box...Day 1

I am going to try to stay on top of "Shower in a Box" and post what has come out of each day's box. The video of the first day shows Ben and I opening the first day's boxes, but I wanted to also post photos here.

The first gift we opened was from Ben's mom Gayle. She enclosed a note in the box which read: "Thank you for the special gift of a grandchild". In the package were these adorable "Life Lessons" books and also the "Shop and Play" cover for shopping carts and restaurant high chairs.














The second gift on day one was from Ben's brother KC's family. They gave us this adorable Teddy bear for the baby as well as some wipes and diaper cream (you can never have enough of those I hear)!















The third gift of the day was from some special Culver family friends - Joe and Sherry Simpson. Sherry is an amazing scrapbooker and she made for us two Winnie the Pooh scrapbooks (one large and one small) as well as a handmade supply of Winnie the Pooh Thank-You cards. When someone makes it this easy they might even make a scrapbooker out of me!

Shower in a Box...The Beginning

Around December 18th the UPS man was about to declare a mutiny when 6 large crates were delivered to our house in Lawton, OK. Every box was marked with "Do not open until further instructions". (For any who are curious, the photo of the boxes here is from Mom and Dad's house - not mine - apparently Mom needed some wine after packing it all up!) Of course my mother is an expert at "projects" and great ideas, so I could only guess at what was before us. Mom had given strict instructions, and told us that we would receive more information "when it was time". With this in mind we had NO IDEA how long these boxes would be in the house and Ben's response was "Tell your Mom she needs to quit shipping us so much stuff or find us a bigger house." As a good daughter I quietly stacked the boxes in the baby room and didn't nag her about them again until a few days before Christmas - when I was told I would get more instructions "soon".



Fast forward to Christmas Day. Ben was out checking on our boat because of the big Oklahoma snow storm and I was cooking up some appetizers for the afternoon - Mom called to ask if I "had a few minutes to talk". I said sure but when she discovered Ben and his Dad were gone, she said I had to call back when they were home. We did that and she told Ben to find box #1 and to have Gayle get the video camera ready. Below I have uploaded the video of what happened next...I have clipped it a bit - the original was almost 17 minutes and had some "where is this" and "what are my instructions" stuff that I cut out for time...



As you can tell - and imagine - I was VERY surprised. Never in my wildest dreams was this what these packages held. Who would have come up with this? My mother of course.

Here is an excerptt of the instructions that were with the numbered box: "Dear Mandy and Ben, Well, now the secret is out...if we couldn't bring you and your friends and family HERE for a shower, we decided to bring the shower to YOU! So, now that you've read the invitation it's time for the fun to begin! Each little box has a numbered tag in it which corresponds to a gift tagged with the same number. Your friends were so generous! More than 25 people responded and so, in some cases I had to "double up" in the boxes!...I had originally planned on having you start this on January 1, but since Gayle has been in on it with me from the start, I wanted you to start this while they are with you. So, each day, after Day 1 you get to open the next day's packages..but ONLY that day's! No cheating!...We love you so much, and from the response to this little 'project', it's obvious that you have many loving friends and family members. We wish we could be with yo, but with every minute spend putting this together, we both added our love, I hope the shower of gifts feels like a shower of everyone's love. May God bless all three of you. Love, Mom and Dad."

Well, if you want to make a pregnant lady cry, just write her something like that. I am sure you can tell from the video that Ben and I were both absolutely overwhelmed by this amazing gift. We have been able to open 4 days worth of gifts so far and each day we are overwhelmed again by the love and generosity of our friends and family.
I was of course disappointed when we realized that going home for a "family" shower would not be in the cards for us - but chalked it up to another thing about Army life. To see now how supportive all of our family and friends are and to have them so generous as to give us a "shower" long distance makes both Ben and I realize how truly lucky we are to have all of them in our lives. And of course how could you ever thank a Mom like mine who comes up with this amazing idea to welcome her first grandchild into the world and prove yet again that she would do anything to make her own little girl smile.

The Tradition Continues...

Many moons ago there was a woman named Lani Davidson who had a husband named Bruce...Bruce worked with a man named Larry Bosworth who had a wife named Patti. As luck would have it Patti and Lani happened to become pregnant around the same time and in 1981 each delivered a baby boy. The Davidsons already had a daughter named Heather and the Bosworths later had a daughter named Mandy. Thus began the Bosworth-Davidson clan...

Throughout the years the Bosworth and Davidson families became very close friends - with their children occassionaly becoming confused on who was actually their sibling and who was not...Fast forward to 2009...
In the early summer of 2009 the respecitve parents of Mandy and Heather were on the phone with one another - each believing they had exceptionally surprising news to tell: they were going to be grandparents! - little did they know that the people on the other end of the line had the same news! So, it was discovered - Mandy and Heather were both pregnant - and due within about 10 weeks of one another!

Ah yes, a crazy tradition for Heather and I to keep - when we both realized what had happened we began fervently e-mailing to catch up and find out how each other's pregnancies were going. We also decided that it was vital that we get together during this crazy time and see each other in pregnant glory.

It worked out that on Halloween weekend Heather flew in to Oklahoma to spend the a few days. We had a great time talkin' it up, sharing pregnancy stories, walking the dogs, baking cookies, and carving pumpkins! We even took some time for some belly shots for the parents! All in all it was an amazing weekend (that flew by too fast!) with an old friend...now we have another generation of Bosworth-Davidsons (or Culver-Wadehras) to add to the family - I couldn't be happier to continue on this tradition that our parents began over 28 years ago!

Scary machine fitting to Halloween

When I made my initial list of things I needed for the baby, of course the infamous breast pump was one of them. When I told Ben we would have to buy one of these delightful contraptions his response was something along the lines of "Why? Won't you have the kid with you all the time?" Ha ha...ummm no.

So I researched all the brands and read the pregnancy magazines and narrowed in on the Medela pump that comes in a handy bag...fabulous. I ordered it from Amazon and it came the other day. Now, some people have asked me why I didn't just register for a breast pump, but my whole thought process on that is that I think my friends/family would have a lot more fun buying something a little less "intimate" than this particular machine!

To be fair, I have seen enough TV and pictures to know about what the breast pump was going to look like, but reality is a whole different ball game. Once the box came I opened it up to unload all the pieces and see how complicated this was going to be...let me just say this - looking at the pieces of this thing almost made me want to sit down - someone is going to have to explain to me where all this crap goes! And I didn't even see an instruction book! (There probably is one in there - I was just too flustered to see it). So, I now have every intention of taking this innocent looking "messenger bag" with me to the hospital when the baby comes so a nurse or SOMEONE can show me how to operate this thing! I swear, it looks more complicated than a Rubix Cube!

Ice Cream and The Biggest Loser

Ah...my own little pregnancy tradition. Now, this didn't really start as a "tradition" but one night (I believe it was premier night of the latest season) I decided it would be fun to "fight the man" (Jillian) and eat some ice cream while I watched The Biggest Loser. Of course, when I first became a Biggest Loser fan, I would fix the healthiest dinner I could think of on Tuesday nights so that I wouldn't feel bad to watch all those people suffer for 2 hours. Well, apparently that is all over! Now, every Tuesday night I say a little thank you to Baby Culver while I whip out the Slow Churned Ice Cream and prepare my Biggest Loser treat.

Now, I didn't feel the slightest bit guilty about my little tradition until about 4 days ago when Ben and I had our latest pregnancy check-up and I asked how I was doing on my weight-gain. Now, due to the early pregnancy sickies I had lost some weight in the first trimester, so I wanted to make sure I wasn't behind...little did I know! When Dr. Carson took a look at my chart she had a little smile on her face and said "Well, we want you to gain about a pound a week - about 4 between each appointment. Between your 1st appointment with me and your last appointment with Dr. Old Man (I don't remember his name) you hadn't gained any, but between your last appointment and this one you have gained 7." I don't think it is possible for Ben to have snorted louder! And ever so quietly he leaned in and said "that's almost double" - thanks Mr. Mathematician, I got it! Of course the doctor said it is nothing to worry about unless I keep up this trend for the next 3 or so appointments. But, of course as the conversation wrapped up Ben was (somewhat gleefully) letting me know that I might not need ice cream quite so often...whatever.

So, after all of this adventure I have decided that no, I am not in fact going to give up my Biggest Loser treat, but maybe I will try to have berries or something the other nights of the week instead of letting myself eat ice cream 3 or so nights...But don't you worry, tomorrow night at 7:00 (yes, Central time zone can be fantastic) I will be found on the couch with my bowl of ice cream - take that Jillian!

Beer with my ladies and BBC...

So, one of the few unfortunate things about pregnancy is the inability to enjoy a good drink when you want to! Well, this unfortunate problem presented itself in-force when I was in St. Louis hanging out with my good friends Kim and Celeste. Kim was kind enough to take us to the Budweiser brewery for a tour (which was pretty freaking amazing) and then afterward the brewery gives everyone 2 complimentary "tastes". Now, I have been on similar brewery tours before, and like most people, the complimentary tastes are my favorite part! So, I was a little disappointed going along the tour and thinking I would be unable to partake in this little piece of St. Louis. Now yes, there are many who have told me "oh, a little bit here and there can't hurt you" and while I appreciate their well-meant advice, I also know that *knock on wood* if my child came out with 6 fingers on one hand it would be tough not to blame that "little bit here and there"...so, alas I am not one who partakes in alcohol right now.

Little did I know that Budweiser also produces America's well-known non-alcoholic beer O'Doul's and O'Doul's comes in both pale and amber flavors! Who would have thought! So, When it was all said and done Baby Culver and I were able to sit and have a pint (or close to it by Budweiser tasting standards) with our friends Kim and Celeste...good times!

Why are you kicking me?

So yes, the baby kicks. I actually felt him/her move for the first time a few months ago, but it has become much more regular recently. Mostly I can just feel when the baby completely turns around or moves from one side of my stomach to the other. As we saw on the ultrasound the other day, the baby still has a lot of room to swim around, so I don't fell everything. It was pretty funny to see him/her scissor kicking on the screen the other day and I was just feeling little pokes - so much work for so little effect on his/her part!

However, don't go thinking that the kid can't pack a punch when it wants to. There have been quite a few instances so far when I can feel that the baby is TOTALLY stretched out and stiff-legging me to my side. I jusually try to rub his/her foot back into place inside my belly, but that usually only results in me getting kicked on the other side. I tend to blame this behavior on Ben and tell him that his child must have the same kind of temper that he has.

All in all, the kicking hasn't been too crazy yet, and noone else can feel it from the outside - I figure it is only a matter of a couple more weeks before that happens - although I haven't tried my friend McKenna's trick of laying on my back to see if someone else can feel! I am sure you all will hear about it as soon as kicking can be seen/felt from the outside!

Baby Culver's Second Viewing...

Yesterday we had the second official viewing of little Baby Culver. Once again I had to drink an insane amount of water and then lay still while the lady moved the probe around on my belly - she swore she wasn't focusing on my bladder, but I don't believe her! This appointment was mainly to take all the pictures of the baby's parts (organs and limbs mostly) to make sure everything is where it is supposed to be and working properly. It takes about an hour and I can tell you that the baby and I were both a little over it by the time it was done!

Although this is the appointment where you "traditionally" find out the baby's sex, we don't want to know, so we told the technician that up front to be sure she didn't show us. She was really careful about it and while she measured the legs she made Ben stand in the corner. She said you could definately tell what it was if you looked, but we didn't find out. She did say "The baby sure is showing us everything it's got" - so read into that what you will!

The only real bummer about the appointment was that by the time she was going to take some profile pictures for us the baby was so irritated it was kicking like crazy and then curled into a little ball. So, when you look at the picture if it looks like the baby has something growing out of his/her face it is actually a hand...

Because sometimes you can only get nagged SO much...

Yes, a blog...I have become a blogger...not that there is anything wrong with bloggers, I know some very nice bloggers, what is funny about my becoming a blogger is I do it somewhat under protest. Many moons ago (or at the beginning of this journey into motherhood) I thought it would be amusing to blog once in a while when I thought of something humorous; I began that blog on TheBump.com and shared it with a few people. Some of those people decided that I wasn't coming up with humorous things to write about quite often enough (and you know who you are) so I was getting constantly "reminded" to update my blog...sounds good, except I didn't have anything funny/interesting to say. So, now I am one of "those" bloggers - the "I will write it even if you don't give a darn and hopefully once in a while it is interesting!" kind of blogger. Ha! But, I will begin it here because TheBump blog is hard to use and personalize, so I figured more people will have access to this one. I will also re-post the blogs that I wrote on TheBump, and in the next week or so update what has happened since those blogs... To see the older blogs be sure to look under previous months on the right of the blog page because I will post them with their original date...



I officially dedicate this blog to not only Baby Culver, but also his/her grandparents (even the "adopted ones"), our awesome family spread far and wide, and our terrific friends ("adopted aunts and uncles".

Winnie the Pooh

For as long as I have been a loyal Target shopper I have loved the Winnie the Pooh Classic baby line. Of course, when I found out we were pregnant the first decision I made was to decorate the baby nursery in Classic Pooh. I also have Mom's old "House at Pooh Corner" book which I am going to find a way to display in the nursery. So far I have purchased a some stuffed animals to add to my existing Eeyore collection and also have purchased almost anything Classic Pooh I can find. Mom bought the baby a Classic Pooh crib set, blanket, and diaper bag when she was here - which has been added to the collection.

Now, although I don't want to go crazy overboard with this Pooh theme, I do love some classic Pooh quotes from the book as well as the older cartoon. I am going to try to find some way to incorporate these into the nursery once I start really working on it....below are some of my favorites so far...

· “It is more fun to talk with someone who doesn't use long, difficult words but rather short, easy words like "What about lunch?"”
· “You can't stay in your corner of the Forest waiting for others to come to you. You have to go to them sometimes.”
· “If the person you are talking to doesn't appear to be listening, be patient. It may simply be that he has a small piece of fluff in his ear.”
· “When late morning rolls around and you're feeling a bit out of sorts, don't worry; you're probably just a little eleven o'clockish.”
· “Nobody can be uncheered with a balloon”
· Did you ever stop to think, and forget to start again?
· It's so much more friendly with two.
· They're funny things, Accidents. You never have them till you're having them.
· You can't help respecting anybody who can spell TUESDAY, even if he doesn't spell it right; but spelling isn't everything. There are days when spelling Tuesday simply doesn't count.
· Christopher Robin: Pooh Bear, there's only one thing we can do, wait for you to get thin again. Winnie the Pooh: Oh bother. How long will that take?
Eeyore: Days, weeks, months, who knows?
Eeyore: Bounced again.

Furniture...

I was hesitant to start looking for furniture for our nursery because I am still holding out hope that we will be able to move into a house on-post before the baby comes...however, I ended up getting really lucky and a friend of mine called one day to say she was getting rid of her daughter's baby furniture and wanted to know if we would like to have it. Of course I was beyond excited and took Ben over there that afternoon to pick up the crib and dresser Tara wanted to give us.

The two pieces were just perfect for the Pooh crib set that Mom had bought for me at Target and I was so excited to get it. Unfortunately we weren't ready to set it all up right away, because we still had to get rid of Ben's awful bachelor loveseat!

Well, as of now I have set up the Pooh crib and even put a bunch of the baby clothes I have purchased in the dresser. It looks just awesome and even if we do end up moving it will all be worth it!

Registering with Mom...

Of course, very soon after I found out I was pregnant I began combing pregnancy magazines and the internet to research what we are going to need for the new baby and what the best products were. I was thinking I was pretty organized...boy, was I wrong!

Mom decided to come and visit Oklahoma in September to see Ben and I and to spend some time with Baby Bump Culver (BBC). (I think she was a little jealous of one of her friends in particular who is also having a grandchild soon and spending a lot of time with her daughter) Ben and I were really excited for her to come - mostly because I knew that registering was looming over me and that getting Ben to drive to Oklahoma City for the event would have taken some serious teeth pulling. So, on the last full day Mom was here we went up to OKC to visit BabiesRUs and Target (yes, it is sad, Lawton does not even have a Target).

We arrived in OKC around 11:00 ready to shop and with my list in hand. As someone who had never been inside BabiesRUs I was very excited, but confident I would have no problem busting out what I needed to do...And then we walked in the door...

I will say this much, BabiesRUs sure knows their audience. They start us new moms off with small decisions like what kind of baby bath to buy, and what kind of bottles we want; then they bring out the big guns like two entire carseat and stroller sections as well as Pack 'n' Plays and swings...goodness gracious! I will say my saving grace for most of this was not only my mom talking me through "Do you really need that?" but a nice lady who was pushing around the stroller I was looking at and told us all about it and how you can also get the high chair, swing, and Pack 'n' Play to match...SOLD!

So, after a little over 2 hours at this monstrosity of a store we walked out with our respective purchases, a mile-long list of items, and what some would call the post-registry glow but what I would call the "I'm starving and tired and don't want to look at any more baby crap" attitude...

After it was all said and done we did register at BabiesRUs, Target, and Amazon.com.

Our Registries:

Amazon.com

http://www.amazon.com/gp/registry/baby/PV4E7UZZ7V6Y

Target

http://www.target.com/registry/baby/014139700001122

BabiesRUs

http://www.toysrus.com/registry/link/index.jsp?overrideStore=TRUS&registryNumber=43013848

First Pictures of BBC

As any new mom-to-be I was super excited to get an opportunity to see our new little addition and find out how he/she was doing...Unfortunately I had heard that depending on what doctor we were assigned at the Army Hospital we may or may not get an ultrasound so early in the pregnancy. Luckily we saw a nice young doctor named Dr. Carson who said she wanted us to go down and get some pictures to get an accurate date and see how things were going. YEA!

So, one afternoon we were scheduled to go in and see the baby. When we initially scheduled the appointment they gave me an information sheet that gave instructions for the appointment - such as drinking 32 ounces of water in the hour before your appointment. At the time I thought drinking that much water would be no problem because I drink a bunch of water throughout the day...of course, you never realize how much you take the ability to pee for granted until someone takes it away...So, there we were, sitting in the waiting room waiting for our appointment...and waiting...and waiting...until I was about to BURST and then the nice lady came to call us back. I was on the exam table just long enough for the lady to find the baby and say he/she was easy to see and then she sent me to go to the restroom - thank goodness!

We ended up with the technician for almost an hour and she felt so bad for keeping us waiting that she gave us a few extra pictures. It was really cool to see the baby hanging out and moving around, even though I couldn't feel it yet, and the doctor said everything looked great.

We have another ultrasound on October 14th, so we will see the baby again then!

Pregnancy Emotions and Zen...

So, I keep reading up in my "What to Expect When You're Expecting" book and it seems every month so far has started with explaining the emotional ups and downs that pregnancy can bring. As far as I could tell this was no big deal, just normal emotions for me - no big blowouts with Ben about what dinner would be - no crying fits because I couldn't find socks - just not much to report...and THEN...I was watching a seemingly benign show on E! called Kendra...if you are not familiar, this is a ridiculous show about one of Hugh Hefner's former girlfriends who moved into her own house now with a boatload of money gained from the pure act of being Hef's girlfriend and doing The Girls Next Door on E! for a few seasons....anyway, long story short she is now engaged to a football player and much of the show led up to her wedding. I mostly enjoy this show because of her ridiculous antics and being generally retarded about everything - like not knowing how to grocery shop...However, low and behold the season finale arrives a week or so ago and all the sudden I am literally BAWLING MY EYES OUT about this girl's wedding! I was crying when she put on her dress, and crying when Hugh came in to check on her, and crying when she made her friends say "fart" so she wouldn't cry...seriously? What the heck is wrong with me? So, I was hoping for my sake (and Ben's) that this was a one-time occurance and I wouldn't have to worry about this kind of behavior again...and then came Whale Wars the show about people trying to stop whaling in the south pacific...and the Japanese shot a whale, and then another one, and then by whale number 3 I am crying like a baby and telling Ben we aren't eating living things anymore (that only lasted until dinner - my grandparents would never allow such a thing), but never-the-less I have lost my mind apparently. Just waiting for Grey's Anatomy to start...that show NEVER makes me cry...yeah right.
I will say the positive thing that has come is that though I may be sentimental about whales (and apparently former girlfriends of Hugh Hefner's), I seem to be generally more Zen in other areas of my life. I find myself driving without getting angry when people cut in front of me, and generally liking where Ben and I live (which is rough in the middle of Nowhere, Oklahoma). So, apparently I am a perfect contradiction - bawling over reality TV while calmly maneuvering the Wal-Mart parking lot.
Pregnancy is weird.

Symptoms and the crazy stuff people tell you!

So yes, about 10+ weeks along and "enjoying" the full spectrum of pregnancy symptoms. First, it is a cruel joke that everyone acts like the peeing thing doesn't start until your baby is big enough to rest on your bladder - not so much - my baby is the size of a prune apparently and I still pee about 18 times a night - I feel like an old man! And the "glowing"? I think not. I haven't had a complexion this bad...well...ever...I guess that means high school couldn't have been too bad, and THANK GOD I know how to apply makeup! I have also become a slave to the evening sickness that the Girlfriends' Guide to Pregnancy told me to call "progesterone poisoning" - it really sucks - especially when you have a husband like mine who can actually grill really well and it sounds great until about an hour before I am supposed to eat it - at which time I feel like I should crawl into a ball.
Also - I have a hard time believing that women who are beyond their desire to have anymore children are honestly trying to be helpful when they fill you in about all of their own horrible symptoms. It seems to be that the first thing out of someone's mouth when they realize you are pregnant is: "Soooo, has THIS happened to you yet?" And if they have not actually had a child of their own yet they settle for telling you THE WORST childbirth story they ever heard about a friend-of-a-friend (I choose to believe they are Urban Myths). I even was in for a bikini wax the other day when the woman decided to inform me about her FULL BEARD that she grew when pregnant. Seriously? I don't even know you! I think it is all a conspiracy against emotional fragile pregnant women - ridiculous!

The Beginning

Ok, so as of today we are one day short of 8 weeks pregnant and I have been meaning to write about the experience. Ben had been home from Iraq for about 3 months when we decided to go "all barriers down" for lack of a better phrase! I knew we were going to Oklahoma at the end of June, but figured even if we got pregnant right away it would be the early stages and I wouldn't be too stressed. As luck would have it the first month was a no-go and we were planning to move about a week before I was considered "testable" again. The day the movers came to pack up our house I was going through the bathroom supplies to pack and came across one lonely pregnancy test. I thought to myself "why would I pack this?" so I just decided what the heck and I took it. I had actually completely forgotten about it until after my shower and whatnot about 15 minutes later when I looked on the counter and the little digital readout said "pregnant". I just stared at it for a good minute and a half and tried to make sure that the "not" before the "pregnant" hadn't just faded away or something. This was the point when I started to say "Holy Sh*t" about 3 times. Ben was outside the bathroom door and the way he tells it is "I don't know why I would go IN the bathroom when she is saying that, but..." and so he walked in and I just handed him the test and he stared at it - and in true Ben form said "guess you shouldn't've had that margarita last night" - thanks, awesome. So yes, that is the whole story. From that moment on we were officially "expecting". Apparently when those commericals say "test 5 days before your missed period" they aren't joking!