The baby list

A lot of things have happened since I started my baby to-do list waaaaayyyy back around 20 weeks.  Lots of things to check off the list...

• Have 20-week ultrasound and find out gender - Done!
• Read books about baby care, labor, child development, etc. - In progress
• Create a will - Still need to think about this...
• Call in-home daycare providers and interview - Done!
• Update address with daycare centers once we move
• Call daycare centers/providers back in Nov. to see where we stand on wait lists
• Add baby to insurance
• Send in OB intake form
• Call diaper service and decide if that's something we want to do - Pretty sure
• Otherwise research cloth diaper options
• Attend labor and delivery, breastfeeding, and postpartum care classes at the hospital
• Choose a pediatrician - Eeek.  I keep putting this off, too.
• Buy car seat from UW health
• Take car seat to the fire station to have it properly installed
• Wash baby clothes/bedding
• Decorate nursery
• Pack a hospital bag
• Choose a name
• Get flu shot 
• Get whooping cough (yes, it's going around in WI and babies don't have immunity for the entire first year) shot
• Have Daniel get flu and whooping cough shots

And the things we either need to or think we might want to buy:

• Car seat
• Crib (mattress, bedding??)
• Bassinet/ something for the baby to sleep in when he is very little - Will probably just use a swing if he needs it
• Dresser to use as changing table, changing pad
• Futon or other sleeping surface for baby's room
• Rocking chair?
• Diapers and changing supplies
• Nursing pillow
• Breast pump (bought from Craigslist), bottles, equipment
• Pack N Play for downstairs
• Swing
• Swaddling blankets/ sleep sacks
• Baby sling
• Stroller 
• Baby book/ photo album

We're making our epic voyage to Ikea (but that deserves its own post) next weekend so many of the furnishings and bedding-type items will be checked off the list.  Almost all our baby classes happen in October, and my baby shower and the last baby class are the first weekend in November, which will take care of another chunk of the to-do list.  It's amazing how much there is to think about, though.  And how easy it is to forget things.  Like I really really really need to research pediatricians.  And that will thing... we need to think about that.  Time is going to fly by.    

Parenthood changes your life...

We made our first gigantic space-eating educational toy purchase today!  A Baby Einstein Musical Motion Activity Jumper.  

I have a friend whose daughter loved hers, and she passed along an ad on Craigslist when she saw one for sale.  I have to say - it's pretty impressive.  It was maybe a little dirtier than I would have liked (I couldn't really tell until I got it outside - the seller's house was dirty, too), but I bought it for half the retail value, all the parts and electronics work, and there wasn't anything about it that couldn't be fixed with a good scrub and Lysol-ing.  It's not like our baby isn't going to get it messy anyway.  We plan to keep it downstairs once he gets big enough to use it, I think it will be great to put him in when I need my hands free to cook dinner or fold clothes.    

I've been checking Craigslist every once in awhile, but I need to get on it more regularly.  There was an ad for a swing I'm interested in, too, but by the time I e-mailed about it, it was already spoken for.  I can see how buying baby stuff can be addictive.  Next weekend we're going to Ikea for furniture!

28 weeks

Welcome to the 3rd trimester!  

This week the baby is the size of an eggplant.

He can blink his eyes and is adding more neurons and body fat week by week.  He's supposed to have flipped over so that his head is aimed down now, but I still feel like his kicks are coming in the same place, so maybe he hasn't made the move quite yet.  What's truly amazing is that if - in the worst case scenario - he was born even this early, his chances of survival (with lots and lots of help) are already very good.  Three cheers for modern medicine!

I've been sleeping slightly better this week.  The heart burn is still bad at night, but I've been taking antacids before I go to sleep and then immediately after I wake up in the middle of the night rather than just hoping that it will go away if I drink some water.  I've also started getting heartburn mid-morning and mid-afternoon, but the antacids do the trick, and I figure a little extra calcium can't hurt.  I'm also starting to have some swelling in my lower legs.  I don't think they look bigger, but my socks feel really uncomfortably tight if I pull them up onto my calves where they belong, so I have to fold them down to my ankles.

I'm curious about the next 3 months will bring physically.  The official weigh in this morning showed that I'm up 12.2lbs from pre-pregnancy, right on track to gain the recommended 25ish lbs.  I know I'll get heavier because the baby will spend the next 3 months getting heavier, but he won't actually grow that much longer, so it's hard to guess how much bigger my belly will get.  I have two more weeks until my next OB appointment and then I'll start going every two weeks after that.  It's starting to feel no so far away!  

Are You Faster Than A Politician?

Runners line up on my right for high-5s
[source]

See how you stack up against the real and imaginary marathon PR times of famous politicians.

If I had a million dollars...

I would spend it on trendy luxury baby furniture.

Like this Joya Rocker:

So sleek and modern, and I love the white.  At $900, I'm sure that material is washable, right?

Or a neon-green designer high chair.  Smashed peas will blend right in.

Maybe a sweet orange baby seat that you can buy with a clear base so it looks like the seat is hovering in the air:

And why get a Bumbo when you can buy a Kapsule Chair?  I can only guess what horrors I would find stuffed in that capsule hole.  "So... where is your bug collection?"

Forget boring lights, I'd go all out with a dachshund light:

And one of these cool bendy armed lamps:

Finally, for the late nights, I'd buy a classy futon for between-feeding snoozes.

Anyone want to be my generous anonymous benefactor?

Diaper Dilemmas

Sooooooo... I need advice.

I want to use cloth diapers* for the baby after he's born, but I'm torn on whether it makes more sense for us to buy diapers and do the dirty work ourselves or to use a diaper service.

Here's what I see as the pros and cons are for each type:

Buy cloth and wash ourselves

Pros:

• You have more options.  Seriously, there are so many cute baby diapers out there.

[Source]

• It's the cheapest option in the long run - especially if we do the super environmentally friendly/ frugal thing and buy used ones.
• You can sell the diapers later and recoup some of the costs.

Cons:

• It's expensive upfront, and we may have to buy some extras as the baby grows (although most have 7 zillion snaps that allow them to grow, too).
• We'd have to wash them.  One the one hand, we're going to be washing a lot of stuff anyway.  On the other hand, most diapers require a pre-soak cycle, and as much as I love my washing machine, it only has two cycles "On" and "Off", there's no pre-soak option as far as I know.
• Even though I know parents get totally immune to this kind of thing, you have to wash the poop off before the diaper goes in the washing machine (for good and obvious reasons) by swirling the diaper in the toilet.  I cannot envision a world where I would not happily pay someone else to do any and all poop swirling for me.  

Diaper service

Pros:

• No poop swirling (and I'm led to believe that babies make a lot of poop... though breast milk poop doesn't smell too bad???).
• No washing (so less stuff to wash overall).  The service can wash everything in super hot water with hypoallergenic detergent. 
• The upfront investment is no more than doing disposable diapers.  
• Supports a local business.

Cons:

• It's more expensive in the long term than doing the work yourself, but it's comparable to buying disposable diapers.
• The service only picks up once a week so even with the special trash can and bags and deodorizers they provide, it might get smelly.
• The service only provides prefold diapers (the old fashioned kind) paired with diaper covers (but this actually doesn't seem that much different from the more modern pad/cover combos I've seen).

Unsure:

• You can "rent" a package of 4 diaper covers for $19 and trade them for a larger size at any time.  There's also an option to buy extra covers from the service at $8 a piece (they are normally about $16 a piece at our local diaper shop).  BUT 1.I'm guessing 4 covers is FAR from enough.  and 2.You have to wash the covers yourself.  If I'm already washing covers, might I just as well be washing diapers, too???  I probably need to call and talk to the service people more about this.

Right now I'm leaning toward using the service.  It's definitely easier/less expensive to switch from service to washing my own diapers than it is to decide I'm not going to use a bunch of cloth diapers I've already bought and use a service instead.  Plus, even though I'm sure my wonderful child will make wonderful poop, I'm also sure that I'm not going to want to have to deal with washing said wonderful poop out in the toilet after being at work all day.  As I said before,  I cannot envision a world where I would not happily pay someone else to do any and all poop swirling for me.    

What do you think?  Does this seem like a good decision?  Other factors...Our daycare is happy to do cloth diapers, and I can register at both the cloth diaper store and with the service so people can contribute (if they choose) for my baby shower.  Is there anything else I should consider?  Am I totally crazy to do cloth in the first place?  

*There are perks to disposables, too, and I plan to have some to use when were out/traveling away from home, but I want to save the whales, and using cloth diapers saves the whales ;).

Because realistically I'm not going to come up with anything better

I slept in until thelastpossiblesecond this morning and it's been busy...  This song should be stuck in everyone's head at least once today.


You're welcome.  See you tomorrow.

Getting there

We made some major progress getting things unpacked and organized this weekend.  Daniel was actually the super hero who made all of this possible:

He got our TV* mounted above the fire place, did some surgery to the back of a bookcase so it could hold all of our electronic gadgetry, and lugged allllll the books (but ask him who 95% of those books belong to) back downstairs so I could put them in the bookshelves.  Both of us were amazed at how well this turned out.  It's not Southern Living, but it doesn't look like "my first college apartment" either.    

Having the TV hooked back up again allowed us to catch up on some Netflix watching last night - we have a bunch of Hitchcock movies in our queue - with Dial M for Murder and have Strangers on a Train on tap for tonight.

*Yes, we finally bought a flat screen TV when we found out that it would cost almost half as much to get an antenna and converter box for our massive square one.  I'm still not sure what we're going to do with it.  Anyone want a really heavy TV that was manufactured the year I learned to drive?

Let's Waste Time

So I've just spent far far far too much time playing around with this Baby Morpher gizmo that will allow you to mash up two photos to determine what the resulting baby would look like.

I quickly realized that Daniel has no good photos of him alone so I decided to go with bad ones of both of us, just to keep it even and interesting.  Here's what I was working with:

and

The website will let you select whether you're having a boy, girl or surprise, and whether the program should decide the baby's skin tone on its own or it should be light, medium, or dark.  And then the fun begins.

This is what we get when we just let the program run wild.  A hobbit.  That was a surprise.

Here was our light-skinned baby boy.  Looking fairly normal.

But if I put in medium skin tone, we get Siddhartha!!!!

And just for fun, what if I had the fastest baby in the world?

Or the most interesting baby in the world?

Or the best smelling baby in the world?

All of these pictures are entirely too creepy, but I admit, it was fun to play around with.  I take it as a sign that I should get off the computer and re-join society.  Have a good Saturday, all.

27 weeks

27 weeks down, 13 (or so) to go.  Pregnancy math is total voodoo, but I'm three months out from my due date (12/21) so I can say I'm now officially 6 months along with one week left to go in the second trimester.  I like the way my belly has gotten large enough that it makes my behind look really small...  I'm rocking the "I should join the circus because I can swallow an entire watermelon" look.

This week the baby is the size of a rutabaga (You have one of those lying around so you know what size they are, right?) - somewhere around 14 inches long and 2lbs.

[source]

He is continuing to grow and develop in there.  His lungs are getting closer to being able to work on their own, and he's starting to be able to hear and taste things and his little brain is showing activity.  All's quiet as I type this, but he's been moving around A LOT lately.  The pregnancy sites say to expect to feel hiccoughs any time now, but I'm not sure I could distinguish that from all the other "cat in a washing machine" feelings I get when he becomes active.  

I've noticed a few changes in how I feel as well.  For one, I think it's time to say goodbye to the idea of getting a good night's sleep for the next 18-20 years.  Reliably, I have excruciating heartburn and excellent kidney function from 1-3am each night, and I know it's only going to get worse over the next few months.  And then the baby will be born.  The other change is that I think I've started having Braxton-Hicks contractions.  It actually took me forever to figure out what was going on, but they seem to fit the descriptions I've read online - they tend to happen when I get up from sitting or laying down, everything gets reallytight for a minute or so, and, while they are kind of uncomfortable (especially because they are infrequent enough to catch me by surprise) they aren't painful either.

We're planning to do some organizing/decorating work in the living room this weekend so hopefully I'll be able to get the non-baby items out so I can think about setting up the nursery.  I'm also going to start registering for baby things so if you have any suggestions about different types of wraps/baby carriers/diaper bags/car seats/whatever that worked well for you, leave me a note in the comments.         

Houston, we have daycare!

Not that the city as a whole or any particular individual named Houston would care that we have a daycare provider lined up for next March, but after considerable searching and stressing, the stars aligned this morning and we contracted for daycare for the baby!  I'm so happy and relieved to have this whole thing settled, and I'm amazed at how "meant to be" it feels.

I ended up going with the center* I visited this morning for several reasons:

• It's very close to our home and is basically on the way to work.
• I got a good vibe from watching the teacher/staff/child interactions.  Kids were coming in happy to be there, hugging teachers, etc.  I was there during the morning drop-off rush, and while things were BUSY, they didn't seem stressful or hectic.
• The building was sunny, warm, and colorful and there was good outdoor and indoor (very important in WI) play space.  
• I got along well with the center director and the lead infant classroom teacher (who is due a day before me and will return to work with her little one about the time mine starts).
• It was the only center I called where a human being actually answered the phone.
• It was the only center I visited that has an "open door" policy where parents who are looking for care can come in and observe without an appointment.  That said, there was still good security, and it seemed like the staff and parents knew each other well enough that they recognized that I was an "outsider" (not in a bad way) and made sure to keep an eye on me and ask me if I needed help with anything, etc.
• They are happy to do pumped milk and cloth diapers.  They make their own baby food from CSA vegetables and produce from their own garden and use organic cleaning products (Be still, my upper-middle-class aspiring heart!).
• This is going to make me sound like I'd sell my baby's soul for 20 silver coins, but it was MUCH less expensive than other centers we'd toured near campus.  MUCH.  And I really think it's just because it's not near campus.  
• They had one last infant spot open for March.  No wait lists.  No extra fees.  No paying for months of childcare I didn't need because I needed to secure a place.  No more daycare worries! 

I called Daniel and we talked about the decision for a little bit, but we both felt like I've been to enough centers (7) and called enough other centers (Including the one where you have to be on the wait list for care at least a year before you need it... not sure how that's supposed to work) and individuals to know what we want.  I know I'll cry a bucket of tears the first week  day, but I truly feel like I will be able to drop my child off there for care during the day and feel good about that decision.  

*Not that a million people read this blog, but I think I should leave the name of the center off the internet... for their privacy and mine.

File this under "Cool, but ultimately a bad idea".

Can you tell the difference between this

[source]

and this?

[source]

One of them looks like this after two days when mixed with water

[source]

and one of them looks like this!

The toy (which admittedly is pretty cool) is called Water Ballz, and I heard about it - not surprisingly- on the news this morning because small children like to eat them, and, unlike gum or marbles that just pass through, these bad boys cause BIG problems.  Evidently the package comes with a warming not to give them to children under 3-years-old, but let's be honest, they look a whole lot like gum.  (In fact, they looked a lot like jelly beans on the news).

It reminds me of old the SNL skit for Petchow brand rat poison.

Yes, we should all read the packages of things we buy, but seriously...

Thoughts on daycare

Cloth diapers vs. disposable, breast milk vs. formula, attachment parenting vs. scheduling... If it wasn't enough to make big decisions for your own life, parenthood means being responsible for making big decisions for another very little person as well.  And one of the biggest for most mothers (although this applies to dads as well, just not on the same scale) is whether to stay home or to return to work.  And if you do decide to go back to work, you have to think about daycare.

For better or for worse, staying home was not a realistic option for me.  Daniel is in grad school and in order for us to maintain a certain standard of living (ie. not having to live in the EasyMac box our dinner just came out of), I need to go back to work.  Plus I like my job and my coworkers, and I would feel like I was leaving them in the lurch if I quit.  Also, we live in an economic climate when anyone can be laid off at any point for any reason through no fault of their own and finding another job can take months or years, and I feel like it's irresponsible to try to raise a family without having two separate incomes.  Reasonable can people disagree, but having a "backup salary" is a bit of financial security I don't think I'd be willing to live without.

So that solved one parenthood dilemma but raised a second - what to do about daycare.

Neither Daniel or I went to daycare as children so neither of us has any personal knowledge of what is good and/or bad about being a kid in daycare.  It seems like in the '90s there were all these studies showing that sending your kid to daycare was a sure fire way to turn him or her into a serial killer, but the pendulum has now swung back the other way and daycare is just fine as long as you don't pick the one run by the iPhone factory in China.

But it's still hard.  It's really really really hard to think about leaving my tiny 8-week-old baby with a stranger. It's hard to think about returning to work after not sleeping for 2 straight months and trying to figure out how our lives will change to meet the baby's needs.  While I don't think being a stay at home mom is easy, I do think that there are a lot of aspects of it that are easier than being a working mom.  And I don't want my baby to become a serial killer.  Part of the reason I stopped going to visit daycare centers after July (in addition to spending my time organizing the move) is that, no matter now nice and wonderful each center seemed, I always left feeling sad and overwhelmed about the decision to "give my baby away" for part of the day.

Anyway... from the very beginning, I've felt more comfortable with the idea of the baby going to a daycare center rather than an in-home daycare.  I have coworkers and friends who LOVE LOVE LOVE their in-home daycare providers and advocate that as 100% the way to go, but I still like the idea of a center better both because there would be more oversight for teachers and because you don't have to worry about a back-up plan if the teacher gets sick/has a family emergency/etc.  On the other side, in-home care tends to be cheaper and more flexible than a center.

So far I've visited 6 centers and applied for 4 waiting lists (one center was unacceptable and one only takes applications in March).  Infant care is competitive so it's recommended you be on something like 10 (!!!) waiting lists, so I'm still looking.  I'm planning to go to one more center on Thursday, but I do want to step out of my comfort zone and explore what's out there for in-home care, too.  The problem that I've run into so far on cites like Care.com and Craigslist is that the only people who are advertising are people looking for kids to watch NOW, and people who won't be looking for kids to watch until March (when I want care) aren't advertising so I can't find them.

So... my plan is to visit this final center and then just peruse Care.com and Craigslist regularly and keep my ears open for recommendations for in-home providers to try to round out my 10.  I'm going to call the centers I've already applied to in November to see where we are on the waiting list, and if NOTHING looks like it will pan out, then I'll make my in-home care search more active again.  I feel like this plan balances my need to feel like I have some control over the future without dragging myself through emotional hell by visiting a million more day care providers.  

Whew.

I'm not sure I accomplished anything by typing all that out, but it's been on my mind a lot lately, and I needed a blog topic for day, so there you have it.

Because this post was so un-funny, I give you My Dog: The Paradox.  If you haven't seen it yet, it's totally hilarious (but crude and contains bad language, FYI).

 



 

Instead

I was planning on writing a thoughtful post about daycare - trying to find the right one, the wait-list hoopla, the fact that I want to cry when I think about leaving my 8-week-old with a stranger to return to work, the fact that I fear I will go absolutely batty spending 8 weeks at home alone in the winter with a tiny baby - but instead I wanted to show you that this exists:

[source]

Someone in Madison was selling one on Craigslist, and I thought for about 0.0002 seconds about buying it "for the baby" as a gag gift for Daniel.  If someone asked me to summarize American culture in 2012 in a single image, I think that would be it.  A fat toddler overhead pressing a foam barbell with all the plates on both sides.  What more can be said?

On a more age-appropriate fitness side note, I ran with the belly supporter this morning and it was MUCH more comfortable.    

    

Channeling My Inner Martha

While I have figured out that blogging about food - especially taking pictures of said food - should be left to the experts, I was abnormally prolific in the kitchen today, and because that taxed all the creative energy I might have otherwise used to come up with an interesting blog topic, this afternoon you are getting pictures of food*.

First, I put together a take-home meal for friends who just had a baby.  There's broccoli and dip, chili ingredients in the crock-pot that just needs to be plugged in, cheese and sour cream for toppings, and corn bread.  I'm hoping it will provide a good meal plus a lot of leftovers (at least if it tastes good).

Plus I got baby Ben 'n' Jerry's pints for desert.  My hand is in this picture both to show you the scale and to show my approval.

I also attempted to make up for all of the times I brought a 2-liter of Diet Coke to our office potluck lunches by making a quiche to take to a gathering this week.  Multiply this guy x2 because I had two pie crusts and two quiches worth of spicy greens I wanted to get rid of.  

And last but not least, I made coconut bars for our church small group meeting tomorrow.  Coconut is one of those foods that people feel strongly about, but *I* really like it and I'm hoping that someone else will as well.  I've never made this recipe before, so I may have to test one out tonight for quality control purposes.

And there you have it.  Now I feel completely justified in eating Campbell's for dinner for the rest of the week.

*And one very long run-on sentence.

Running at 26 weeks

So you know how I said I was going to stop running for the rest of pregnancy?  Well, that lasted almost two whole weeks.  The spot that had been bothering me before felt like it was 100% better, and I just couldn't stand the idea of "giving up" on running so early into pregnancy.  I guess two weeks away from the third trimester isn't super early, but I still (probably) have 3.5 months of pregnancy left + recovery time after delivery, and a 4.5 month break is a really long break, even if I'm doing other exercise*.

Anyway, yesterday I got on the treadmill at the gym and decided to test things out to see if I could still make the magic happen.  And it did, sort of.  I jogged for 10 minutes and then did 4 minutes of jogging followed by 1 minute of walking until I finished 3 miles.  3 miles in 33 minutes has to be an all-time record for slowness for me, but this run also earned a place in the annals of most uncomfortable runs.  If I could dedicate a song to this run it would be:

I don't know why this surprises me, but it really felt like I was running with a cantaloupe in a bag suspended from the front of me except that bag was my skin and every time the cantaloupe would bounce it would land on my bladder.  So yeah... there was a lot of pressure pushing down on things.  BUT, I didn't feel any actual "I think something might be wrong" pain, so I'm hoping to be able to stick with jog/walking for at least a few more weeks.

One thing that *should* help is some new maternity wear additions.  A very sweet friend who just had a beautiful baby girl loaned me some of her maternity wear including two belly support bands.  Please please please ignore the giant mess in the back of the photos.  We are still in the process of figuring out where things should go in our new apartment.

This one is an interesting Santa suspenders get up.  It's a little too big right now, but I can see it working in the future (yes, you wear it under your clothes).

The other one was more like a weightlifting belt.

I think this is the one I'm going to try running with first.  It's fully adjustable so it fits now and it (along with the other one) can go in the washing machine so I don't to worry about getting them sweaty.

The shirt is also a new purchase from Road Runner Sports.  I'd been wearing medium tank tops to work out in since the first trimester, but they were quickly becoming waaaayyyy too short.  This is a large, and it's so much more comfortable.  And I figure it won't hurt to have one or two baggy workout shirts after I'm done giving birth.  

So yeah, while I'm certainly not going to be running the Chicago Marathon this fall, I am glad that it looks like my running life is going to be extended a little longer into pregnancy.


*Which I'm not really... some elliptical, some walking, some yoga, some monkeying around with weight machines... but I get winded just walking up stairs so the intensity level is very low.

26 weeks

Still looking/feeling the same on the outside, although I will tell you (but not show you, thank me later) that my belly button has started to look really weird.

The baby is the size of a head of lettuce this week:

[source]

His eyes are forming and will open soon, and he's practicing breathing and developing his immune system.  And moving around.  Like woah.  He's a feisty one, too.  Yesterday at my doctor's appointment he kept kicking the Doppler while she was checking his heartbeat.  Not just kicking while she was using the Doppler... kicking the exact spot where she was pushing down.  Already overachieving :) ...at what I'm not sure, but it's never too early to start thinking that anything the baby does proves that he's the most wonderful human being to have ever existed.  Just wait until I tell you about the first time he poops....

The rest of the doctor's appointment was good.  I do not have gestational diabetes - yay!  I celebrated with a big bag of Pixy Stix for lunch (not really).  All my other labs are fine, and the doc. said I was a model pregnant woman.  Just keep on keepin' on for the next four months.

Drink up

It's glucose tolerance test day.  Mmmmmmmm.

50-Sun Dex is part balanced breakfast... when you balance it with eggs with a little salsa for flavor, which I did because I really do not want to fail this test.  Do that and you have to take the three hour glucose tolerance test with the gallon jug of Sun Dex...  No thanks.

I just took my first couple sips of the stuff, and it's not too bad.  It tastes like Hi-C.  No better, no worse.  I think the last time I drank anything this sweet, it was mixed with an equal part of everclear and served in a trash can at a UF marching band party circa 2001.

The back of the bottle has all kinds of scary medical warnings.  The most common reactions are nausea, vomiting, abdominal bloating and/or headache (which also reminds me of that party...).  The instructions are for the patient to remain quiet (because you'll scare it?), refrain from smoking or drinking beverages containing caffeine, and to protect the beverage from light (because it sunburns easily?) and to chill it before serving to "enhance palatability".

Well, wish me luck.  I have to head over to the doctor's office in about a 1/2 hour so I can get ready to have my blood drawn and then I have my (almost) 26 week OB appointment.    .

I love my labor-saving devices

You know how I was feeling a little bit nostalgic about leaving Eagle Heights yesterday?  Yeah, I'm over that now.  Deciding at the very last minute to scrub all the windows helped.  And besides, I'm in love with all the appliances at our new place.  I have put together a short tribute to each one.  

Oh washing machine, I already don't know how I lived without you all to myself for four whole years.  I know you will never dump leftover bleach on my sheets and towels like other washing machines from my past.  

Dryer, lovely dryer.  I look ahead with delight to the wonderful hours we'll spend together after the baby is born.  I can rest assured that if I ever leave clothes in the washing machine after the cycle is over, no one will take a pair of jeans that justbarelyfits and throw them in you for 3 hours on the irradiate setting.

I forgot how much easier it is not to have to share laundry equipment with who knows how many people living 11 other apartments - plus the ones who sneak in.  I making it a personal goal to never ever ever ever have to go outside to do the laundry again EVER... especially not in the snow.

Dishwasher, sweet dishwasher.  This picture is lopsided because I can't help but incline my head to the right as I gaze lovingly at you.  Now the answer to the persistent question of has to clean the nasty pan left to soak in the sink is, "No one".  No one human at least.  Thank you, dishwasher.  You have improved our evenings at least as much as a half a bottle of wine and a trashy nightgown from Victoria's Secret good book.  

And last but not least, my dear friend Central Heat and Air.

Thanks to you, I slept under something heavier than a sheet for the first time in 4 months.  No more rattling window unit spewing mold spores on us.  No more waking up in a puddle of sweat at 2am, wondering how I possibly have been asleep in the oven for the last 4 hours.  Now we run the fan at night because we like how the white noise gives us trippy dreams and not because we'd melt otherwise.

You're the best.  Peace out.

Goodbye, Eagle Heights

One last look... Dear Apartment, I can only hope you are clean enough to get us at least some of our security deposit back. 

(Those smudges are from the camera lens, not big paint/dirt spots on the closet door and kitchen cabinet.)

We are going over to our old apartment for one last mission tonight... to check the cabinets and closets one final time, lock the windows, sweep out the storage unit, turn in our keys and parking decal and take one more crack at a spot on the wall with a Mr. Clean Magic Eraser.  

It's hard to believe we walked into the same (albeit cleaner) empty apartment four whole years ago.  We lived there for longer than either of us have lived in any single place since we were teenagers.  And as much as I love love love our new place and think it was absolutely the right decision to move before the baby is born, I will miss a few things about EH:

• The sounds (kids playing and window ACs rattling during the summer, the radiator playing the xylophone and the building life-force during the winter, the marching band during the fall)
• Being so close to campus
• Runs and walks in Shorewood Hills and along the Lakeshore Path
• Cheap rent

There are also plenty of things I won't miss, but I won't get into those now...  

Goodbye, Eagle Heights Apartment.  Thanks for the memories.

And speaking of memories, insert 9/11 memorial here.  Not much to say about that... it's a day we'll all never forget.

The never-ending, always-growing apartment to-do list

I suppose it could be worse...

[source]

but the truth is, I think I've added more to the list than I've checked off...

• Sign lease and e-mail back to landlords
• Receive copy of signed lease back
• Send in security deposit and post-dated rent checks (I was afraid I'd forget when baby brain really started to set in)
• Get keys to new apartment (done 8/18)
• Put in 90-days notice at current apartment
• Pay final rent to current apartment
• Schedule movers
• Get coupon for movers from friend or buy a Bucky Book
• Transfer utilities
• Turn on water
• Turn on internet
• Buy TV antenna/ digital converter box/ thing that will play Netflix movies
• Update address with services/ put in change of address with post office
• Set up treadmill
• Pack and move small stuff
• Have movers take over big stuff
• Clean current apartment
• Unpack at new apartment
• Wash and put away dishes
• Transfer renter's insurance to new place
• Finish taking out trash at new apartment (long story...)
• E-mail new address to friends and family
• Update address for...
• Magazine subscriptions
• Bank
• Doctor
• Dentist
• Donation to St. Vinny's
• Figure out how to watch something/ listen to music while using treadmill in garage
• Vacuum treadmill motor + lubricate belt
• Voyage to Ikea for:
• Futon??
• Crib
• Desk
• Dresser/changing table
• Baby room decorations/bedding
• TV stand/ mount TV on wall
• Modify bookshelf to hold electronics for TV
• Put away books and CDs
• Put away other randomness in the nursery

IMoo Sunday

Like Hippie Christmas, IronMan Sunday is a local end of the summer/beginning of fall tradition around here.  It's something you either love - tons of people, even ones who have no relationship to anyone in the race, come out to see the start or the transitions - or something you hate - it really does mess up traffic downtown and all over campus for a better part of the day.  We were scheduled for our last(!!!) Sunday to set up at church downtown so we were able to watch the end of the swim and the transition to the bike.

IronMan is always impressive, and this year, when I'm more out of shape than I've been since high school, it's even more so.  For me a good three event day would involve walking up and down the stairs a few times, vacuuming, and making dinner.  Heck, there have only been a few isolated points in time in my life that I've been in shape enough to do even 1/3 of an IronMan.  That said, hanging around at the end of one of the segments shows that, even though most of the athletes out there are in top shape, the only real qualification to do IronMan is to have your check clear.  Again, I'm not saying that I'm in any better shape than those people, I just have enough sense to know it.

As for us, we need to leave in 2 minutes to go to singing and a post-signing potluck dinner.  I know I will be a champ in the lifting fork to mouth event.      

Saturday Randomness

It's hard to believe it's already afternoon on Saturday!  It takes about 4 times as long for 1pm to get here on a week day (unless I have to give a talk the next day, then it takes about 5 minutes).

I've been fairly productive so far.  I got in a 4mi walk around the neighborhood and saw 16!!!!! turkeys in a flock grazing (do birds do that?) in someone's yard.  It was actually kind of intimidating.  If they were a turkey gang and wanted to, they could have taken me down.

Daniel is working today, and I've been busy running errands.  I went back to Eagle Heights with some Resolve to finish up the cleaning job we started last night.  I know in my heart of hearts that we won't get our security deposit back (What incentive does a landlord have to give you back 300 of your dollars that he/she could keep instead?) , but I did want to leave the place looking fairly nice.  We (plus S and K) really scrubbed everything last weekend, and Daniel and I got up most of the dust that was left under our furniture, but there are still some spots... okay a lot of spots... that won't be fixed without a carpet cleaner (which the complex says it will take care of) and a coat of paint.  To console myself, I bought 2 24-month old outfits for baby Moonpie - one with dinosaurs, one with a gator- from the Eagle Heights yard sale for $0.50.

There's still a ton to be done at the new place, too.  Books need to be put away.  The furniture layout needs to be tweaked.  We need to vacuum and mop to pick up all the detritus that's been tracked in.  I need to put in a change of address and figure out where the nearest mail box is (The post office delivers but doesn't pick up here... crazy, huh?) and change things on our renters insurance and order new return address stamps, and give out our address to friends and family, etc. etc. etc.

But instead I'm going to a friends' 1-year-old's birthday party this afternoon at his fancy tea room-type place, which sounds infinitely more fun.    I can't believe she's already 1.  Like I had to go and dig out her birth announcement because I could have sworn she was born at the END of September, but no... it's this weekend.  We bought her this sweet toy flip phone.  It plays sounds when you open it.

[source]

Gotta start 'em young.

Have a good Saturday!

25 weeks

And not much new to report.  I don't feel any bigger/different than I was last week.

The baby isn't doing a whole lot new or different, either.  This week he's about the size of a cauliflower:

[source]

He's growing taller, gaining weight, growing hair, and his internal organs (especially his lungs) are continuing to develop for life on the outside.  According to The Bump, he can even tell which way is up and which was down.  Sometimes it feels like he's doing somersaults in there, so hopefully he'll end up aimed in the right direction 15 weeks from now. 

I have my (almost) 26-week OB appointment this Thursday, which means I get to drink the special orange drink for my glucose tolerance test.  What fun!

Three Things Thursday

1. Thanks to the Paul Ryan Marathon Calculator, I've finally achieved my goal of running a sub-3-hour marathon without having to do any actual work:

2. I take back what I said about Groupon going downhill.  Just yesterday, I got an offer for $10 worth of fried stuff at Fried and Fabulous for just $5.  A fried food cart open from 10pm to 3am in the student ghetto?  That's a business plan that couldn't possibly fail.  Plus, check out the menu:

[source]

I'll take the deep fried cheesecake and a Diet Coke, please.

3. Yesterday a water main broke outside my office, leaving an entire 14-floor building without water.  The repair guys were called in, and, when it became obvious that major work (ie, digging a hole with a backhoe) was needed, our plumbing system was hooked up to a fire hydrant using a fire hose.  The official word was that everything was fine and there might be a *little* water discoloration but we should just go about peeing and drinking as normal.  The unofficial word was DON'T DRINK THE WATER.  Despite the saying about drinking from a fire hose, you should not actually drink anything from a fire hose because the inside of a fire hose is nasty.

Your pipes are fixed [source]

Seriously, the water in the toilets looked like it had been pumped in from the black lagoon.  It was so dark it was almost purple.  No thanks.  Fortunately today things seem to be better.