A Peek at the Little Being 3.0

So yesterday was our third doctor's appointment and third ultrasound of the Little Being. It's always great to see and hear the life that I know is inside of me, but that I am not directly feeling quite yet. The doctor got a peek at the Little Being's bottom to determine the gender and she thinks we're having a girl. Because it wasn't a great angle, she had to make an educated guess.

We're hoping to have a better look next month when I have a Level II Ultrasound. We hope to know for sure if we're having a boy or girl after that. For now, we're just thrilled that BabyW is growing big and strong and all looks well. And we'll hold off on shopping for pink or blue until we know more.

The Well Traveled Fetus

I found out today I will be headed to Scotland and England next month for work. I will be over there for a week. This got me to thinking about our Little Being. What a well-traveled fetus! Auckland, Washington D.C., Detroit all before week 13 of gestation and now Glasgow, Birmingham, Reigate, Brighton and London plus Nashville in the Fall. All before he or she makes it to the big wide world. WOW! Here's hoping I do okay with this overseas trip now that I am into my second trimester. At least the international flight will be business class. Thank goodness!

First August Post

Well...since I only had two in July, I am already half way there for August, right? But seriously, I mean to be blogging more, but quite honestly, our life is very predictable right now. Sleep is my top priority and it seems I can never have enough! And then there's work...which right now means Saturdays a couple times of month for the next few months.

Last Saturday I worked and all was going well until late in the day when one of the committee members, who came in from out of town, started to feel ill. She got hot and her heart started racing. Long story short, we called 911 and the paramedics took her to the hospital to check her out. We finished our meeting a couple of hours later and I took the other two members to go see her at the hospital. She was still in the emergency room and hadn't much information for us at that point. The doc did say she'd have to stay the night for observation. So we flew into action, canceling her flight for the next morning and checking her out of her hotel room. I took the two others to get a bite to eat and pick up a sandwich for their comrade in the Emergency Room since she hadn't eaten for hours.

The next day (Sunday) the other two members flew back home to their respective cities and states and the one left in the hospital called me to say that she was being discharged, but that her friend was already en route to Tulsa. So I rebooked her a room at the hotel where our company has a contract, picked her up at the hospital and checked her into the hotel. Then we went to the Tulsa Airport to pick up her friend. They asked if we could swing by my office (which is National Headquarters for their organization) and I gave them a quick tour of the building. Finally, I dropped them at the hotel. Whew! Not the way I had planned to spend my weekend, but I was glad to have been there for her in her time of need. Turns out her episode was most likely stress coupled with lack of sleep, and too much caffeine! I am glad it wasn't worse. And I feel like it's good karma for when I am traveling in the coming months...God forbid anything should happen to me or the baby, but I would want someone local to be there to help me in my time of need too.

So I basically worked both Saturday and Sunday last week. So I took this past Friday off. Which was great. I caught up on sleep for sure! Thankfully, last Sunday morning, J and I were able to attend church for the first time in nearly a year. We're going to All Souls here in Tulsa and are really enjoying it. We plan to go again this Sunday. Since he's no longer working double shifts on the weekend, it is something that we can do together, consistently, which is great.

Speaking of J, he arrived home late Thursday evening (I picked him up around midnight Friday morning, actually) after being in Las Vegas with his folks since Tuesday. Unfortunately, his father was readmitted to the hospital just after his arrival and is still there. We think the docs have figure out what is going on, but it's still scary. He is now receiving dialysis five hours each day! J plans to go back in early October, after he completes his five week CNA course at TCC. Please keep J and his parents in your thoughts. It's been rough to have both his mother and father with failing health. If anything, it has motivated both of us to become as healthy as possible so that we aren't in the same situation 20-30 years from now.

What else is going on? We have an appointment with our OB/GYN on Thursday and will get another peek at the Little Being. Hopefully we'll get a good, clear pic to post! And I think I am starting to "pop." At least my pre-pregnancy chub is getting firmer and starting to look more like a baby bump. I am still in my pre-pregnancy clothes, but feel it's only a matter of time before I will be in my maternity wear. I've scored some great pieces for work of eBay!

I am also in the process of contacting a doula to help us when our Little Being decides to come. I hope that I can find someone we like. I am sure that we will...luckily Tulsa has some great options. Now, if they'd only start a diaper service!?!? We want to cloth diaper and since there's no diaper service here it will be DIY for us. Women have done it for years, so I know that I can too, but a diaper service would just make it so much easier. Ah well. We're committed to making cloth diapering work. So I've just started my research on it all. Wish me luck!

Checking-in

In my last post I promised to get back to blogging more. Unfortunately a week-long seminar out of town for work followed by recovering from 16 hour work days has delayed my post until now. If only there were more hours in the day?! In fact, it was J that said, "are you gonna update our blog?" Oddly enough, he's had co-authoring rights since day one and yet, he's never posted a single thing. So technically, "our" blog is really "my" blog, right?

To-may-to...to-mah-to...

Life in our house has been good. J finished his summer semester (accelerated courses) with a 4.0 and is on break for another week. The weather here has cooled and the puggies have been getting daily walks in the morning, except for today, since it was raining. The rain has kept the grass nice and green and the temperatures under 90 degrees. I am busy with work, this is the time of year that we have a lot of committee meetings with our volunteers on Saturdays. The good news is that when I work a Saturday I get to take a weekday off later in the week. So next week, I think I'll take Friday off since J will be in Las Vegas visiting his dad and step-mom in the earlier part of the week and Friday will be a nice day for us to reconnect and will give me a three day weekend! YAY!

Today is also officially the first day of my second trimester...13 weeks and 3 days pregnant. With that comes a sense of some relief as the tenuous first tri has officially passed. Our next appointment is August 13 and they'll do some routine screening tests and of course another ultrasound, so you can expect another portrait of our Little Being. Other than that, we're just plowing headlong into August. We did manage to find a new (to us) breakfast spot that we like. It's in Brookside (of course!) and is called Jimmy's Egg. The food is good and the prices are great! I really loved their sweet potato pancakes...delish!

Big News

Okay, I confess. The main reason I haven't been blogging much these past couple of months is well...I have been a little preoccupied. With....THIS!

Yes! J and I are expecting our first child! The baby is due on February 2, 2010. We actually found out on his birthday, but were waiting until the second trimester before announcing it to the world. It's hard to tell what you're seeing in that photo above, so I have mapped it out:

It's been a crazy 8 weeks! First returning from Auckland to find out that we were pregnant, then confirming it at the doctor's 6 days later. They also found an asymptomatic UTI which I had to take antibiotics to get rid of which led to...um...other..."female problems" that took another week to clear up! ARG! I swear got that UTI from being seated in the middle seat on an overnight flight home from Auckland!

Then I had that trip to D.C. and broke out in a rash from having poison ivy in our backyard that the dogs had tracked in!!! So...here I am...poison ivy clearing up (finally!) and telling the world I am pregnant. It feels good to tell. I am horrible at keeping a secret.

J is super excited and we've just been homebodies for the past two months. Mainly because he's wrapping up his accelerated summer courses in algebra and biology (final exams are next week) and well, I've been extremely tired and nauseated, especially in the late afternoons. J did drop his early morning job and just has the one steakhouse gig in the evenings about 4-5 nights a week. That has been WAY better since he's also in school fulltime now.

We did manage to get to see Kathy Griffin Live at the SpiritBank Center in Bixby. It was a HOT night! 100 degrees even at 10:30 p.m. But her show was a blast (and extremely air conditioned)! She's hilarious and even had jokes about Tulsa. She said, "Thanks for coming here to see me. I know you had a tough choice to make between this, Rocklahoma and The Art of Barbeque." She had some other Tulsa jokes too. I am glad we got tickets and had a "date night," since it's been some time. I am off to Detroit next week for a conference for work...so it will be some more time before our next date night. Where should we go? What should we do?

So that, my friends, is why this blog has been neglected. Now that we've told everyone we're expecting, I hope to get back to blogging more regularly. And yes, it will have tons of baby-related stuff since, well, that's what's going on in our lives. But it will also have more insight into our life here in OK. We've only been here a year and there's still tons to discover. And now that a baby is coming into the picture, I am sure there will be more to discuss, like will our child grow up with a CA "accent" because he/she lives with parents that have a bit of it or will our child sound more like an Okie? Dude, only time will tell. Right y'all (sounds like "rite-ch-all").

Recovering from D.C.

Still lagging on posting to this blog! I am so sorry. I promise to step it up. Life has been busy and full. I got home from my business trip to D.C. on Wednesday. Six hours later than originally planned. It took six hours to take the normally 45 minute flight from DFW to TUL! UGH!

First it was a mechanical issue that delayed our plane. Then they decided we couldn't fly on that one at all and tried to find us a new one. More delays. And a gate change (in a completely new terminal). We finally boarded that plane 3 hours after our original departure time and they announced that it had a mechanical issue too! They resolved it and we began to taxi for departure when the pilot announces that there are 35 planes AHEAD of us on the runway! We waited and waited. Then he tells us we're heading to the gate to refuel. WHAT?

So we do and the passengers get very restless, some demanding to get off. The pilot, who was about 6'5" and 350 lbs. came back and convinced them otherwise (thank goodness...getting their baggage off the flight would have been a nightmare and more delays for the rest of us)! Finally, refueled, the pilot pulled some strings and we cut in line behind about 10 planes to depart. The passengers applauded when the plane took off the ground.

Forty-five minutes later we landed in Tulsa, just intime for a thick downpour. I was soaked getting into the car! But we needed it. We have had record temps for the past two weeks. All in the high '90's/low 100's. It's been nuts. Today we have a respite with 92 degree weather. It seems to have rained overnight and lowered the heat index a bit. WHEW! Our a/c is working overtime and the poor puggies can only go outside for five minutes at a time.

Speaking of which, Ms. Regina broke her toenail off on Friday so we had a nice unplanned trip to the vet because of it. This is the second time in 3 months she's done this and I have no idea how it's happening. I am guessing that when she's chasing birds and squirrels in the backyard she runs across some exposed tree roots that are grabbing her nails. I hope this doesn't happen again. She bleeds A LOT and it's not cheap to run off to the vet with that sort of minor emergency.

Anyway, D.C. was good, I did manage to get out of the hotel/convention for one great meal out at a Spanish Tapas place called Jaleo. It was delish. We also tried the new bagel place here in Tulsa, Old School Bagel Cafe, in Brookside. They have a good menu and lots of fresh items, although J thought they were all a bit overpriced. Of course, we're used to having more bagel options, in general, in CA and of course, NYC. So this place sort of has the market cornered and can charge $6.00 for a bagel with cream cheese and lox. Oh well, it was yummy! So was their fresh-squeeze OJ, but at $4.00 I won't be ordering that again. I will, however, be back for their Everything Bagel with cream cheese and lox. Now, if we could only get them to start making Asiago Cheese Bagels!

A Post...Finally!

I have been a slacker blogger these past few weeks. So much has been going on and I just haven't had the chance to blog. J is in school fulltime now and also still working two jobs (60+ hours a week). Mom is back after a month in CA and I have finally recovered from my whirlwind trip overseas last month.

This weekend I head to Washington D.C. for a music educators' conference. I'll be there through Wednesday. I hope to have dinner with some of the gals I've been chatting with online for the past few years. We met while planning our destination weddings in Hawaii on a message board for brides. Hopefully that will work out. My next trip is to Detroit in late July. After that, no travels until October, when I head to Nashville for ten days. Oh how I'd love a leisure travel trip too, but with my work schedule and J's crazy work/school schedule I don't really see how's that possible anytime soon. We'll have to find a little getaway, closer to home.

Other than that, we've just been trying to beat the heat. It's been really humid and near 100 degrees for the past few days and should continue for a few more. I am seriously considering getting a kiddie pool for the backyard. We never go outside because it's too hot. The poor pugs, even at night, get overheated because it's still in the high 70's/low 80's after the sun goes down around 9 p.m. I did see fireflies for the first time last night, so that was fun. I don't remember it being this hot in June last year. We mostly had rain and thunderstorms. Guess it's different this year.