Confession

    I have a small confession to make; I’m addicted to the show Teen Mom.  I know, I know, it’s a ridiculous fake reality TV show and they are making money off of these poor teenagers who got themselves in this bad situation.  But, I can’t help but enjoy it.  You see, when we first found out S was pregnant, I went and put EVERYTHING even slightly baby related into our Netflix watch instantly queue and have watched all sorts of silly (and some great) movies.   So far I/we have watched (from what I can remember): Look Whose Talking, Babies, In The Womb, about 5 minutes worth of Baby Geniuses, Junior, Making Grace, For Keeps, Accidentally on Purpose, Nine Months, The Object of My Affection, The Business of Being Born, Science of Babies, and now Teen Mom.  And while I’m totally into Teen Mom, it is making me a bit nervous about being a stay at home mom.  I think that it’s given me at least a little bit more of an idea of what it will be like to be at home alone with a baby, and frankly, it looks hard.  It’s been a really long time since I was last around a baby for more than just an hour or two, so I’m starting to think that I’m not remembering all of the crying and diapers and stress a baby can bring quite a clearly as I think that I do.  Hopefully little Jude isn’t a colicky baby who cries all day and hates life, hopefully he will be the happy little joyful boy that I’ve imagined him to be.  And if not, well at least I’m not a broke, futureless18 year old with a looser boyfriend who I fight with all of the time and who doesn’t help with anything.   And at least I won’t be crying on TV if I am crying at all (it’s one of my goals in life to never be on TV crying).  So, anyone else a Teen Mom fan that will admit it?  Oh and by the way, S thinks I’m totally ridiculous and refuses to watch it at all

-Liz

Who’s belly button is that and the ninja inside

There are a lot of things that change when your pregnant.  The one I find the strangest so far is my belly button.  It used to be a huge cave and is almost flush right now.  I imagine I will have the “turkey’s done!”  belly button before the end of this pregnancy.  I always think those are so cute (and hilarious) on people, so I am not really worried about it.

Yesterday, I was a little worried about Jude.  He only gave me 2 tiny kicks, that could have been something else, before about 1pm.  He usually has 5 good kicking sessions by then.  I decided the best thing to do was get a massage and relax, so in the middle of my work day, I went and had a preggo massage.  What was funny about it was that the woman that massaged me was also pregnant, so we talked babies thru most of it.  Jude decided that it was the perfect time to high kick me, so I felt better.  That night, we were laying around watching Modern Family (brilliant show I might add) and Jude started really kicking.  I laid on my back with the belly towards Liz and let her feel the craziness going on inside me:)  I do love his little kicks, but the cool part was Liz felt each kick clearly.  She even said he moved her hand a few times.  He was kicking so hard that she is a little worried about what he is going to do once he weighs more than a pound and a half!  I have to admit, I am a little scared too as some of his kicks take my breath away already.  I love it so much though, that I am more excited then anything!

On a negative note, I got a message from my mom a night ago that really upset me.  She said she was probably going to skip the baby shower.  I felt so hurt that she would not be really excited about her first, and honestly  maybe her only, grandbaby’s shower.  With my mom, there are 2 ways to do things.  1. I can spare her feelings like I have for years and just say, “okay, it’s fine” or 2. my more recent approach of being honest with her.  She has not taken the 2nd one very well, but as Liz pointed out, I should probably be honest with her even if it is not always great.  So, I called her and told her I was very surprised she was not over the moon about going to the shower.  She broke down and explained that she does not do social gatherings very well and it would cost a lot of money.  We finally agreed on her coming to the shower in Austin instead of the one in Tulsa.  She feels like she knows my friends (??) and would feel more comfortable there than at the one with people she doesn’t know.  Okay, that’s fine.  I thought it was a good conversation and then she sent me an e-mail being her usual dramatic self. Sigh, and then she wonders why we don’t jump on the chance to come for a visit.

All in all the pregnancy is going well at this point.  I do keep staring at this big belly in the mirror.  It is so funny to me.  Liz is taking good care of me.  The other night, we were going to go to a movie, but I was too tired and then I was upset I was so tired.  She suggested we just rent a movie and make a cozy palate to cuddle up on.  We did that and then she rubbed my shoulders and feet and read me to sleep.  It was a nice, preggie chill, date night for us.

I did weigh myself this morning and have lost a pound and a half.  Not intentional, but I think between my stomach not feeling great most of the time and being busy, I am just not eating enough.  I even packed in some high calorie foods this week, but it did not seem to be enough.  I am not really all that worried about it since I was overweight to begin with.  I know that Jude is getting what he needs and I am the one missing out.  But still, at 6 months pregnant, weight should be going up, not down.

I am really enjoying little Jude being with me all the time.  I am at the point where I am feel pretty good, and he is active, so it is pretty amazing and fun right now.  I am really excited that Liz is starting to clearly feel him move around too.  I don’t think it will be very long until others can feel him also.  I have a whole bunch of people at work just dying to feel the little guy.  I think work is going to throw me a baby shower also.  That will be 3 showers!  Already little Jude has so much love around him!
-S

Nursery Progress

    As S said earlier this week, I’ve been making some progress on the nursery.  I’ve been working on a painting for the nursery for a while and I finally finished it.  I showed an “in progress” shot of it earlier this month, and here is the finished product!

    Sorry about the glare, I must have taken a million pictures of the painting but I just couldn’t get one without the glare.  If you couldn’t tell, the painting is of the lyrics of one of my favorite Beatles songs, Hey Jude, which is what Jude is being named for.  

    The second thing I finished for the nursery this week was a mobile to go over Jude’s crib.  I’ve been looking at mobiles online for what seems like forever and nothing I could find was just right.  I found a few on Etsy that I liked that were made of paper but I couldn’t justify spending $80 on something I could make myself.  Here is what I came up with!

   While it did take forever to make, it was pretty easy.  I used the outside of a wooden embroidery hoop for the top circle and two wooden dowel rods for support.  I epoxied the dowel rods together and then to the inside of the hoop.  For the circles, I used two different sized circle punches to cut out tons of circles and then used some of my other craft punches to make the umbrellas, whales, rabbits, etc.  Then I used a sewing needle to poke a tiny hole in the center of each circle and then used fishing line to string them together with knots between each circle to space them out.  Here is the view that Jude will see from his crib!

  I’m really happy with how it turned out and the bright colors look great against the gray nursery walls.  I also took a few longer shots of the nursery so you all could see how this is all coming together.

  And then one last picture because it makes me laugh, here is the little monster suit we got for Jude from Target the other day.  S put it in his crib and we have been joking that it looks like the rapture got him.

-Liz

Jude’s new trick

This little guy is very active.  He only moves around for short a amount of time, but he moves around often and he starting to pack a punch.   He surprises me sometimes with how intense he is being.  He has learned a new trick.  In line with the rebel he seems to be, he is pushing on the boundaries.  Considering I am his boundaries, this feels very strange!  He woke me up the other night because he pushed himself against on the front of my belly.  It felt intense and weird and in my sleepy state, I just tapped him a few times and he shifted.  That was the first time.  Now, he is not only giving me little kicks, but he is pushing against his current home.  It feels totally different then the little jabs he usually delivers.

I love it.  I will probably not like it as much when he starts waking me up on a regular basis (like him, I like my sleep!) but it is so cool to feel him moving around.  He was being so crazy last night.  I was laying on my left side, the side he likes to hang out on, and he was going nuts, so I had Liz come and feel.  He was not only kicking hard, but he was pushing the limits of his house and then kicking hard.  It felt amazing and strange to not only Liz, but to me too!  She could clearly feel him continually while he shifted around.

It is strange to be in the middle of a conversation and he starts moving around.  I am excited for other people to be able to feel him.  Liz is going to be glued to my stomach:)  She is so excited to be able to feel our little boy!  Even people I work with really want to feel the baby.  Right now, he is mostly my little secret without anyone really being able to feel him but Liz at this point.

Liz loves me pregnant.  She loves him moving around, she loves my belly, and she is taking good care of me.  I was exhausted after a hectic day at work last night and she made a meal plan for the week and made a list and then took my list of stuff and went shopping for us so I could go to bed at 8:30pm last night.  So sweet!  This was after she took care of the trash (a chore I normally do) and worked all day and then came home and made a roast with mashed potatoes and carrots.  She has been a powerhouse!  Hopefully she will post pictures soon of her finished projects.  She finished the mobile and the painting for the nursery and they both look amazing!  I barely have the energy to go to work and come home, but she has been nesting and getting all kinds of stuff done!

On a negative note, I threw up last night.  I have not actually thrown up in a while, but I have not felt great for a few days now on the stomach front.  I still gag in the mornings, but for about 3 days now, I have felt nausea thru the day too.  Last night, I felt great when I ate dinner, but afterwards, went downhill fast and threw it all up.  Yuck!  I think that is part of the reason that Jude went crazy last night.  It must feel like and earthquake in there when I throw up!

All in all, I am at the point where I am really enjoying this.  There is nothing like feeling him moving around daily and feeling his new feats as he gets bigger and explores more.  I start my 3rd trimester in a few weeks, so I am sure I will feel him more and more!
-S

Nursery Dresser DIY Project- Reveal!

I am so excited to finally have Jude’s dresser make-over completed!  Last night our friends Lauren and her husband Jason came by to help me move it out of my studio and into the nursery (I couldn’t move it alone and S couldn’t help me in her delicate state).  It looks so perfect in there with the gray nursery walls, it gives the room such a bold pop of color; I just love it so much.  It makes me really glad that we painted the nursery gray.  I emailed a picture of the finished product to S’s mom last night and found out from her that this dresser was not only S’s as a little girl, but it was her mom’s dresser as well, so this dresser will be used by three generations of kids!  I think that is pretty cool, I like that this dresser has some extra history to it. 

Here is a before shot of the dresser.  I forgot to get one right at the very start, so this picture actually shows it after I had started sanding it and prying off the little green flower embellishments. 

So the first thing that I did was remove all of the green flower embellishments.  I was worried when I first stated that they were attached to the dresser in some sort of weird way, like hidden screws or that they were actually a part of the wood on the dresser and that they wouldn’t come off.  So I was really nervous to mess with them and ding them up when I could just paint over them and hope that they sort of blended in better once the dresser was one solid color.  But I got lucky, and when I took a screw driver and butter knife to the edges of them, they all popped right off.  It looks like they were stapled in some way to the dresser.  Here is a detail shot of one of the dresser drawers with the flowers I’m talking about. 

     Once all of the flowers were off, I removed the original hardware on the drawers.  Quite a few of the pulls were missing, so I didn’t really have any option on keeping the old ones, which weren’t very cute anyway, so out they went.  The next step was sanding.  I wasn’t sure what sort of paint had been used originally on the dresser, so I wanted to make sure I at least got the clear coat off of it and I wanted to rough up the paint a bit so primer would stick better.  I borrowed a hand sander from a friend and went to town.  I did a rough sand first and then went back over it with a finer sand paper.  I wasn’t trying to get down to the raw wood so in all removing the flowers and hardware and then sanding probably took me about an hour. 

     Next it was time to paint.  Originally I had planned to use a separate primer and then paint, but somehow the guy a Home Depot talked me into using the Behr paint with added primer, and I went with it, despite my poor results from using it previously to paint the nursery gray.  The color I used is called Mermaid Treasure, which is actually just a little bit more of a turquoise color than the after photos below really show.  I got it in a flat, so that it would again stick a bit better and also to help the polyurethane to stick.  I used a 2 inch paint brush that I had bought when we painted the nursery gray, along with a mini foam roller.  I put the first coat on just as is, being sure to get as even and thin of a coat as possible. 

     For the second and third coats, I added a product called Floetrol to the paint.  Floetrol is really cool stuff, its only about $6 for a big container of it and what it does is keeps the paint from drying as quickly and helps keep the paint level, which means that you don’t have the same brush marks and roller edge marks that you normally will have with latex paint.  The stuff is genius and it totally worked.  The dresser had a bit of texture to it from how the wood is, so I don’t know that you would have seen a lot of brush marks on this wood anyway, but adding Floetrol guaranteed that there weren’t any.  If you are painting a particularly smooth piece of furniture, it is worth the money.  Now I didn’t use it with the first coat of paint because I was worried that it might affect the sticky “primer” part of the paint and keep me from getting the paint to really stick, but I’m not sure that it really would have made a difference.  Also, Floetrol doesn’t effect the color of the paint at all, in case you were wondering.  It does however, make the paint feel a bit more watery, which again helped to get thin even coats, which I think is key when painting.

     After about 24 hours of letting the paint get really dry, I added several coats of polyurethane to make it nice and shiny, and also to protect the paint from dings and scratches.  I used a product called Minwax for this, the water-based version.  I used the water-based version just for the sake of clean up, I didn’t want to have to pull out the paint thinner, soap and water is just a heck of a lot easier.  Now according to the directions, you need three coats to get the most even coverage and you are supposed to lightly sand it after the first coat.  I skipped the sanding part, mostly out of being lazy, and I put three coats on everything except for the top of the dresser.  I put four coats on that, because I figured that it would be the part getting the more wear and tear. 

     All that was left was putting on the new drawer pulls.  I got these from Target.  But annoyingly enough, the screws that they came with where too short and the old screws were too long (plus because I was missing some of the original pulls, I didn’t have enough even if they had fit).  So I was off again to Home Depot to get the screws that would fit just right.  I was like Goldilocks trying to find one that was just right. 

    So that is the whole story of how I DIY-ed our dresser.  And now the picture you’ve been waiting for, the finished product!

-Liz

Hosptial Tour

          Last night we went on the hospital tour to check out the maternity section.  It seems a little early to be doing stuff like that, but the tour at our hospital is only Wednesday nights and with our Bradley Birthing class starting in just two or three weeks which will also be on Wednesday nights, it was either do it now or wait until the first week of January.  And with S due January 23^rd ish, that seemed a bit late, so we decided to get it done.  I’m glad we went, we learned a lot of good information about where we are supposed to go, and how the whole big event is going to work. 

            We were on the tour with three other couples, all of whom where much further along than S, all of the women were between 28-36 weeks, and all of them were expecting girls.  In many ways, we were the odd couple.  For two of the moms, this will be their second child, so they both each had a little girl with them, both little girls were probably about 3 years old.  And before we started walking around and seeing the rooms and such we sat and talked and asked questions and the whole time the two little girls were running around like crazy giggling and chasing each other.  It was pretty cute, but it did make me nervous for my future as a parent because they whole time that they were running circles around us shrieking, I was thinking, “Dear God, someone shut these little monsters up or have them play some where else.”  They were loud and distracting and the nurse giving the tour wasn’t a super loud talker. 

            We learned during this talk a few surprising things.  I think that the thing that surprised me the most was that in the state of Texas your baby has to be given a Vitamin K shot to aid in blood clotting, and an antibiotic eye ointment to prevent eye infection.  If you refuse to let them do this, then they have to call CPS and CPS will at the very least start a file on you.  I think that it goes without saying that as a lesbian couple in a state like Texas, we just cannot risk having CPS get involved with our child in any way.  They also said that their C-section rate was about 30%, which I guess is ok, I don't have much to compare that to.

            Next we got to see the rooms.  The rooms weren’t that exciting, especially after our previous tour of the Birthing Center, where each room was nicer than even any hotel I’ve ever stayed at and nicer in some ways than my own house.  Each room did have it’s own bathroom and a cot for “Dad” to sleep in along with a glider, a TV (and I have my fingers crossed for room 12, which randomly gets HBO even though it isn’t supposed to) and all of the other stuff you would expect in a maternity hospital room.  They did say that S would have to been in the bed when it came time to start actually pushing, but that they can lower the bed almost all of the way to the floor and have a bar she can use for support if she wants to be squatting or on her knees or anything like that.  They also told us that we can video tape the birth if we want, but all of our video has to be waist up sort of stuff, no actual videos of the baby coming out.  Not that we want a video of that, yuck, but I thought it was weird that it is a state law that you couldn’t take video of it.  The nice thing about the room is that it is set up so that once the baby is born it doesn’t leave the room hardly at all.  I think she said that they have to do two basic tests on the baby before it leaves but other than that, it is in the room with you the whole time, which is nice.  They seem to really encourage skin to skin contact with the baby and breastfeeding and establishing a bond with your baby right away, all things I support.

            The other thing that the nurse really seemed to stress was that they will do whatever they can to let you have the experience you want for your birth.  So if you wanted to bring in fans, aroma therapy, music, or whatever, you can do it.  The pregnant ladies discussed playing music for a minute and one was wondering aloud what song she’d want to give birth to.  I suggested Salt-N-Pepa’s Push It, which no one thought was very funny, to my surprise.  I think that would be a hilarious song to give birth to.  But I guess they were all thinking that they wanted something soothing and soulful like Enya or something like that.  Well, that is just so not us.

            And lastly, the most exciting part was when S asked the nurse if I could be on the birth certificate, and she said yes!  She said that we would have to fill out some sort of form/paper work to make that happen, but that I could be on the birth certificate too!  I’m so excited, I didn’t think that it was even possible for that to happen, because again, we are in Texas, but I guess it isn’t a big issue.  Yay!  So excited to be one of baby Jude’s official parents!

**After some basic googling on this issue, I just don’t see how what the nurse told us about being able to put my name on the birth certificate is true.  It doesn’t appear to be legal in Texas to do this from what I can find, so I don’t know what she is talking about.  Erg.  We should have asked more questions.  In the end we need a lawyer anyway, so hopefully we can get the ball rolling on this and find out for sure one way or the other.

-Liz

In Progress (and Belly Shots!)

            Right now, everything seems to be in progress.  S is now more than half way through this pregnancy, so our baby is defiantly “in progress”.  Everyday our little boy gets bigger and stronger, I’ve felt him kick and move around probably 3-4 times now, but only one really big kick so far.  And everyday my beautiful wife’s belly gets rounder and rounder.  Here is her 22 weeks belly shot.  And guess what?  S is going to be showing her cute little face around here now!  Yay!

            The nursery is constantly in progress, though a lot of good progress has been made.  I’m working on a really cute “Hey Jude” painting to hang over his crib.  It’s getting close to done and hopefully I will finish it up this week.  Here it is so far, with the lovely S posing with it. 

            I’m also mostly done redoing the dresser that will go in the room.  I cannot wait to finish it, move it into the nursery, and mostly, show it off to you guys!  The dresser was an old one that I’ve always disliked that S had as a little girl.  It was cream/off white colored with green and blue accents and little blue and green 3D flowers on it.  All I have left to do on it is attach the new knobs and put at one last coat of polyurethane and it will be all done!  Again, I hope to have it done today or tomorrow, so you can expect a post later this week about the whole process, including before and after pictures!

-Liz

Ninja baby!

We had our regular Drs. appointment a few days ago.  My favorite part is hearing the heartbeat.  Turns out, this is not Jude’s favorite part.  The nurse took the little machine around my stomach, searching for him.  When she found him, he had a good solid heartbeat.  We were listening to it when he hi-ya kicked the machine.  He kicked it so hard, it interrupted the reading we were getting.  Much like his moms, Jude does not like his sleep interrupted!:)  The tech seemed shocked and Liz and I thought it was hilarious.

On another note, I got my first stranger smile.  You know, the “hey, you’re pregnant” smile.  I officially look preggie to the general public.  I have not had unsolicited tummy touches, but I am sure they will happen soon enough.

I also finally broke down and bought some new bras.  The ones I have are no longer fitting.  I hate bra shopping, so Liz had to coax me thru it.  I do officially have 2 new bras!  Neither of them are nursing bras, so I will still have to buy those, but I am have some time.

I also had a major preggie moment at work.  I feel at all times like my brain is in a cloud.  It is not very fun for this type A, but people at work think it is hilarious.  I was at the front desk(the only one up there) and some of the staff wanted their paychecks.  I popped in back to get them for them and then totally forgot about the desk!  About 10 minutes later, I am eating and jump up and run up front.  Fortunately, one of my employees was up there and I asked her if she was there when I went back and she said yes.  The good news: I did not actually leave the front desk unattended.  The bad news:  I totally thought I had and then could not remember if my employee was up there or not!  Aw jeez!!  I keep forgetting what I am supposed to do and getting distracted easily.  My concentration is not what it used to be!  It is frustrating for me, but my whole staff just thinks it is such a riot since it is so different from things I would normally do.  Oh well, not much I can do about it.

I also made one of my employees stop and get me a scone on the way to work yesterday.  I just needed it bad!

I feel Jude moving around all the time.  He is an active little guy.  It’s really neat!  He loves it when I eat.  He always wakes up for meal time.   I am starving all the time too!  I went from being sick all the time to wanting to eat the house down!  It seems like it is going fine though as I have gained a little under 9 pounds at this point.  I just have to be sure to swim and do my yoga or walk the dogs as I am so very hungry all the time!

We also signed up for a Bradley class!  I am very excited!!  It is 12 weeks, which is quite long, but I am one of those people who takes as much training as possible for anything, so I am happy to take it.  It is right around the corner from the house, which is nice and starts October 5th.

Well, off to work I go to forget things!;)
-S

Back from the Coast

We got back yesterday from our mini vacation to the coast.  It was really nice and we had a lot of fun.  We went with my BFF Brandon for his 30th birthday.  We went to Corpus Christi which is right on the gulf in Texas.  Corpus doesn’t have the prettiest beaches, but hey, a beach is still a good thing in my book.  Brandon has only been to the beach once when he was a kid, so I think it was a fun experience for him, despite the less than sparkling water.

We did run into a bit of danger while we were there though.  The first night I went outside our hotel to a little grassy area to sit with Brandon while he smoked (don’t worry, S was in bed) and I accidentally sat in a fire ant hill!  Holy Jesus the pain.  I ended up having to strip down and shower to get them all off of me.  I have about 20 bites on my right foot, 7 ish on my left foot, and 6 on my right hand, including one really annoying one in the center of my palm.  I’m feeling better now, but my poor feet arn’t looking so good.  The next day we were trying to find a particular beach and we were using my iphone to navigate and I ended up taking us to a military base.  It was very incognito and we didn’t realize right away what it was.  S couldn’t see the guy at the guard booth at first and there wasn’t an actual gate or bar, so she almost just zipped right in!  I can just picture the military police going crazy coming after us.  Luckily she stopped and the guards were just as confused as we were.  There was a sign asking for id, so S asked, “Do I need to show you my id?”  And the guard just looked at her, clearly waiting for her to state our business.  After an awkward silence, he said, “Ma’am, this is a military base.”  Oooooh.  “We are just looking for the beach!”  He gave us complicated directions on how to get to a beach, which none of us could really follow, and we high tailed it out of there.  Close one!

Once we did get to the beach, we got in the water and were having a great time until something bumped S’s hand, making her shriek.  She thought it was a fish at first, but then we saw that it was the top of a jelly fish.  And it wasn’t alone.  We took that as a sign that it was time to get out of the water.  Luckily, S did not get stung.  That would have been horrible.

In other news, I felt baby Jude kick last night!  For the past two or three days I’ve been feeling little flutters that I thought were him and then last night he kicked really hard and I could feel it!  It made me laugh with joy, it was such a cool feeling.  I haven’t been able to feel it since, but I’m hoping that I will again soon.

Today S and I both had off work and we went and registered for baby stuff at Babies R Us.  It was really fun, but a bit overwhelming.  I think that we did a good job of not being silly and just registering for everything we saw.  We also started looking into birthing classes at our hospital and are also considering taking a Bradley method class for natural child birth.  It looks interesting, but it’s 12 weeks long so we need to pretty much start this month or at the beginning of October, so we need to decide pretty soon here.  Anyone taken a Bradley Method class?  Any feedback would be appreciated.  Wow, it makes the next 19 weeks seem so short when you think about not being able to finish a 12 week class with enough time to be sure you will get through it all before the baby.  S is now more than half way to the finish line and has more time under her belt than she has left!  Crazy town!
-Liz

Jude is a Republican! The Horror!

I can’t believe that in 1-2 more days (depending on what tracker I’m looking at), S will be 20 weeks pregnant, which means, she is half way to the finish line.  I can’t believe my sweet wife is 5 months pregnant.  It still seems like such a dream and such a shock.  S told me the other day that she still wakes up half of the time wondering if this whole pregnancy has just been a dream and that in reality she is just getting fat.  But she isn’t getting fat, she is getting more and more wonderfully pregnant with our baby boy.  And I couldn’t be happier.  It feels like every day I fall more and more in love with my beautiful, strong, amazing wife and more and more in love with the little boy growing inside of her.  Truly, what a miracle all of this is. 

Yesterday, I think I might have felt Jude kick.  S has been feeling him moving and shaking (and lots of kicking) for the past three weeks or so, but every time I put a hand on her tummy, nothing.  But last night we were laying in bed reading and I think I might have felt it.  It was just the tiniest little flutter, and if I just had my hand on her and wasn’t actively hoping to feel him, I don’t know that I would have noticed it at all, but because I was looking for it, I felt it.  I hope that in the next two weeks our little Jude packs on some weight so there is a bit more heft to his tiny kicks so that I can feel them.  I can’t wait.

So now that we know that we are having a boy, we have been speculating on what he will be like.  My BFF Brandon said that he pictures Jude as being a really smart, liberal, jock type, where I have been picturing him as a witty, sarcastic surfer type of guy.  S and I have also been joking over the last few weeks about what he will be like.  You see, for the last month I’ve been working this weird schedule where I don’t go in until 11:15, so I have been able to watch morning daytime TV, including The View (not a big fan though I must say).  And S has a few mornings off too, so we have been watching it, joking that Jude is really conservative and how much he really loves Elizabeth (the conservative, right winger cast member) on The View and how he thinks she has some really great ideas/points.  It has been just cracking us up, but we are pretty weird.  We also decided (again, jokingly) that he is going to be a really annoying baby and not like the stuff that we like.  For example, one of the things that I am looking forward to (among lots of other things like mostly being around my baby all day) about being a stay at home mom is getting to hopefully watch The Ellen show (which I almost never see now because I’m at work).  And so we joke that he will really hate the Ellen show and make lots of grumbly sighs while I try to watch because he hates it so much.  Again, this cracks me up. 

In nursery news, I put up the mini blinds this week.  Man, what a pain in the neck (literally!  My neck is so sore!) putting those stupid things up were.  But they do block some light.  Though, even with the blinds and the curtains, it still isn’t terribly dark in there during the day.   I’m wondering if that will be a big deal as far as daytime naps will go and if so, should I add a layer of room darkening material to my curtains.  Any thoughts? 

Happy Friday!

-Liz