Pour some sugar on me

My sweet tooth has apparently caught up with me. I failed my 1 hr glucose screening test. :( It doesn't really mean anything yet, except that I have to do a 3 hr test on friday. I have to fast for 12 hrs, then go sit at the lab for 3 hours while they draw my blood a bunch of times before and after drinking the sugar stuff. Fun! I suppose pass or fail the next part, I need to cut back on my sugar intake. All this the day after we got our girl scout cookies! They're in the freezer now, taunting me. :)

Baby stuff

I guess there isn't too much to update with the baby. Tomorrow marks 27 weeks. He's getting bigger, meaning I'm getting bigger too. The last couple of days I've noticed that if I slouch a little, he can reach the inside of my ribs. I can't say I'm too excited about this, not the most pleasant feeling.
What I am excited about is the beginning of garage sale season! I've already hit a bunch, and found a few good deals. I had to force myself to stop looking at the clothes though! Tomorrow is the Bailey's Grove sale, which I've heard is good. If anyone is bored and wants to join me, let me know.
His room is coming together, too. I'll put pictures at the bottom. I finished sewing the crib skirt and valances, along with a bunch of other things. His name, on the other hand, is not coming together yet. We keep trying, but every time we try to narrow down our list (currently down to 9), we end up adding another name or two. The middle name still is definitely Scott.
Also, I've been having tons of braxton hicks contractions, for several weeks. Sara said this means my uterus will be well practiced for labor, and therefore it should go quickly and easily (or something like that). Sounds good to me! :)



Here's the crib skirt


A close up of the fabric, I think its so cute!
One of the valences


Some views of the room - excuse all the bins and clutter. I'm glad I have 3 months to clean and organize!


We found this at Baker and thought it fit our theme quite well!
Here's a big stack of burp cloths that I made this week (again with the flannel on one side and soft terry cloth on the other side)


Sewing has been so much fun! I've also made a pouch sling and a wrap (like a Moby wrap) - although that pretty much only involved hemming 5 yards of fabric. Still working on the pail liners and wet bag. And in all the Joann's grand opening sale fun, I got a book with a bunch of patterns for fun things to make for the baby (like hats, shoes, toys, etc). I'm excited to get started on some of those. However, that will be testing my skills as I haven't actually branched out past variations on rectangles yet. Scott is so nice and patiently listens to me and smiles when I excitedly tell him all the new things I want to make, the fun store I visited for cloth diapers, the latest article I read about this or that. Not that he doesn't care, but I'm sure it doesn't top his list of exciting topics right now. :)

Things around the house have been a little frustrating. It seems like everything is breaking lately. So much for trying to get ahead with all of Scott's overtime! It started with the fridge dying. We lost some food (although thankfully we salvaged a lot of it - and thankfully it died right before our vacation instead of during) and had to buy a new one. At least Scott gets a discount on GE appliances. We had to get Scott's car fixed this week, and on the day he picked up his car, mine decided not to start. We should have seen that coming since its been starting sort of funny for several weeks, but always would start. Thankfully when it happened I wasn't too far from Scott's work, so I just called and he came to rescue me. I happily shopped at Joann's while waiting. Of course when he got there, it started right up! So I got it home, and Scott is deciding what to do with it now - it won't start at all anymore. Most likely going to have to have it towed to the dealership or something. All this about 2 months before we were going to start our new car search! Oh well. We know these are just minor things and we have so much to thank God for!

Vacation

I have like 8 posts lined up in my head, but I'll start with our vacation. Scott and I went over to the East Coast earlier this month. We took 2 days to drive to New Jersey first to visit Becky. Monday, she took us into Manhattan, but the weather was cold and rainy so we didn't do very much. We ate a great lunch and dinner and waited in a long, cold line to get discount broadway tickets. Then we saw the Marvelous Wonderettes later that night. We didn't even know what it was about, but it was pretty fun! It was also really great to spend some time with Becky, we miss her!
Tuesday we left for Boston (actually, it was just outside of Boston) and met up with Jeremy and Marilee and twins for dinner. Wednesday we went with them to Salem, and then drove up the coast, and just for the fun of it (and to say we had been there) we drove through New Hampshire into Maine. Thursday all of us went into Boston and visited the Aquarium and some other historic landmarks. Then Scott and I had dinner with Esther. It was so good to see her and catch up a little!!
Friday we left for home, stopping for the night in Utica, New York. So my 30th birthday was spent mostly in the car - we did splurge on dessert that night though, which really is all it takes to make me happy anyway! We planned on visiting Niagara Falls on Saturday on the way home, which we did, but it was crazy busy! We just parked for a few minutes, fought our way through the crowd to the falls and took some pictures, then left. We made it home I think around 11 that night. All in all, it was a fun vacation! I was disappointed that I couldn't do more, I would get so tired after walking for a while. But we made the best of it and rested a lot.

An interesting fact: Scott's 30th birthday was on Good Friday, 2008, and mine was on Good Friday, 2009. We figured that out during our many, many hours spent in the car.

And some pictures:

Bailey was a great traveling companion for the first part of our trip! He kept burying treats in the back seat, our dogs are going crazy now trying to find them under the seat cover!


Stopping at a rest stop in Pennsylvania (or New Jersey?) for peanut butter and jelly sandwiches.
The view of Manhattan from Becky's apartment

At the Salem Witch Museum
I was being a wimp about the cold - in Salem

I don't remember the name of this boat

A beach in Maine


At the same beach

North Church in Boston, where Paul Revere hung the lanterns (actually we learned that he had someone else do it)

A good belly shot

Sleeping turtle at the Aquarium

Me and Esther!


Niagara Falls, unfortunately we didn't get a good shot of the thousands of people around us.
If you're bored, there are better and more pictures up at flickr.

Ultrasound

We went in for the big ultrasound this morning! Scott and I have both been "feeling" boy the last couple weeks so we decided last night that we would be surprised if we found out the baby is a girl. We weren't surprised - its a boy! It was very obvious, too. How fun to watch him move around and see his little heart and brain and bones! Scott says he was a little distracted trying to figure out how the software works, but he was excited too.

Here's some pictures (I know, they look like every other ultrasound picture, but they're ours!)

Profile, you can see the spine and legs

Same thing again pretty much
A little harder to see, but its his face w/ his arm and hand above it

Fun Stuff

Scott and I celebrated our first anniversary on the 14th! We had a fabulous day. Scott didn't go in to work (yeah, it was a Saturday, but he usually has to work), so we slept in, took the dogs for a walk at the nature area, went to Babies R Us, and had a huge dinner at Ming Ten.
I figured out one of the great things about our marriage: Scott is romantic and sentimental and sweet; I'm none of those, but I love cake! He ordered a cake from the Cake Connection (who made our wedding cake) to celebrate. We didn't even eat it on Saturday b/c we were so full from dinner, but we enjoyed it the rest of the week.

The gifts (a lot of paper):

The Cake:This past Saturday was Scott's birthday. We had another fun day, except he didn't get to sleep in because he went to work. We went to the Ultimate Sports Show, where Scott drooled over some fishing boats. Then out to dinner at Outback. We got to celebrate Scott and Andrew's birthdays - as well as say goodbye and wish Andrew luck in Louisiana - with the family on Sunday.

We owe a huge thanks to Mom and Dad M. for the crib and mattress, and for helping to assemble it. The baby's room is starting to come together.
I'm almost finished with sewing the crib skirt. I have enough fabric left over to sew valences for the windows too! Looking through Babies R Us and Target at bedding sets, we decided not to even register for one b/c they are so expensive! I found fabric that I like better than anything else we've seen anyway. Here was the inspiration for the room/theme:
I bought this like 5 years ago for $3 because I thought it was cute. Scott likes it too, so we hung it up in there, and a theme was born. :)


And just a plug - if you ever need a cake for anything (wedding, shower, just because), please call Marla at Cake Connection (you can google it for the info)! She operates out of her house, her cakes are so yummy and beautiful and affordable, and she's really nice!

Still Good

Today was the 18.5 week appointment with the Dr. It was just as exciting as the last one, I guess. The heartbeat sounded good, it was at 144. Not so "girl" sounding today. I like that my weight right now in the chart only looks like 3 pounds up. When they first weighed me, I was wearing boots and a winter coat. The last time and today, just normal clothes and shoes, no coat. It makes a surprising difference b/c I know from the scale at home that I have gained way more than 3 pounds! I'm trying so hard to fatten up Scott so I don't outweigh him soon, but so far its not working! Also, we scheduled our ultrasound for March 26. Hopefully we will have some good news to share that day!
In other exciting pregnancy news, I have been able to feel the baby move for at least a week now. Last week, I was suspicious, but not entirely sure that's what I was feeling. But this week has been pretty unmistakable. Scott hasn't been able to feel anything yet, but he's looking forward to it.

We owe a belated congratulations to Jen and Jon, Chris and Katie, and Chet and Angie! They had their babies within a few days of each other a couple weeks ago, all are healthy and beautiful!

And a big thanks to Cara who spent some time to teach me to sew! I instantly fell in love. Which meant that Scott and I bought a sewing machine soon after. I was so excited to save some money and sew things for the baby, but actually buying the machine sort of defeated that purpose. But Scott is a great sport about it, and it gives me something to do. So far, I've made large amounts of flannel/terry cloth baby wipes to be used with cloth diapers (can also double as extra inserts for nighttime) for me and Jen. Next on the list is a couple of water proof/washable diaper pail liners for the cloth diapers, burp cloths, and a sling. And if I'm feeling particularly creative, I might try a wet bag for on the go. Thank goodness for the internet and many free sewing patterns/instructions.


Scott has been busy, busy, busy too! He installed a bunch of outlets in the basement (one by my sewing machine!) and in the garage with the help of his dad. I'd post pictures, but ummm, they're outlets. He did help me install shelves in our closet (and by help me, I mean he did it all himself while I watched from bed) for my clothes. And we both cleaned out our closet and the spare room (now baby's room). He also built a gate for our deck. Since fencing our yard was out of the budget, Scott picked up a 12x12 kennel from Menards and we are going to attach that to the side of the deck and remove some slats so the dogs can easily get off the deck into the kennel. This way, we can just throw them out and keep them contained. I was not amused watching Spot dance around in the street, ignoring me completely as traffic approached a couple weeks ago.
Up next on the list is drywall in the basement and maybe putting together the crib this weekend!

So far so good

We had our 14 week appointment today. It went a little better than the 10 week (ie it lasted longer than 30 seconds) but wasn't really any more exciting. We did get to hear the heartbeat though, so that was fun. And a relief. Not that I was worried, but any verification that he or she is still kicking in there takes a small load of my shoulders. Dr. R didn't give us a number but said it was high and that it sounds like a girl. But then he gave a lengthy disclaimer about how there is no truth to that and he likes to joke about it - and if we decide not to find out the sex of the baby and he comments at a later appointment that it sounds like a girl/boy he will be again just joking and not sharing the sex with us. Apparently he has gotten some angry phone calls. 6 or so more weeks until the big ultrasound!
I was feeling fabulous for a couple weeks, then for the past week I've had a migraine. But it seems to be getting better and I was told today that for the 2nd trimester I can add in ibuprofin if I need to. And I broke down and bought a pair of maternity jeans last weekend. I haven't worn them yet, but the rubber band can only stretch so much to hold up my normal jeans, so it will be soon! Scott and I went to Howell for Colby's 2nd birthday party on Saturday, and Sara so conveniently lives very close to the Tanger outlets, so we stopped on the way home. Scott got his first taste of outlet shopping and I think he liked it! Unfortunately, I had a headache and wanted to get the jeans and get home, but as we drove around looking for the Motherhood Maternity store, he kept pointing out all the other great stores there. He's not quite as excited about Gap, Banana Republic, and J. Crew as I am, but Bose and a couple others I can't remember caught his attention. Maybe he'll be willing to go back on a better day? Scott and I rarely shop together, but he was a very good sport while I tried on like 20 pairs. I couldn't bring myself to try on the little foam belly they have to see what you'll look like in 4 months - I don't want to see it yet! I also couldn't bring myself to buy the "full panel" pants. So hopefully these still fit in a few months.

Well, I'll have more interesting pictures in 6 months or so, but until then - who can resist this??