Haaaay

Hey followers!

I'm still using this profile, but at a different blog. It was created for my family to keep up with the baby and such, and most of my updates are going on down there. So, if you'd like to see what's up, skip over there! It's mostly baby, house, family-friendly related stuff...so if you'd like to see the rest, check me out at http://mrslicky.tumblr.com - you'll find the links to all of my other stuff over there, including the blog mentioned above.

iiit's a scrotum.

last night, little man woke up for a 1am feeding. husband had taken a nap earlier in the day, so feeling fairly well rested he volunteered to take care of the diapering & swaddling for me before i had to feed him. so as he was doing his daddy duty, i sat up in bed waiting for luke. i had my shirt up & was inspecting my poor, ravaged belly once again. i'd started a skin-firming lotion ritual earlier that day, and my skin was already feeling smoother. as i sat there, staring at the wreckage, i saw something move in there. my belly button & surrounding area - was seriously, moving. on it's own! it looked like....something was crawling around just under my skin!

i told husband to stop what he was doing and watch, just to make sure it wasn't sleep-deprivation that was causing me to see this. he thought i was crazy at first, and he said something smart-assy like, "did we leave a baby in there?". i assured him, something was moving. so he sat down on the edge of the bed and stared. a few seconds later he exclaimed, "EW! It IS moving! It's moving like my balls!".

and really, with the wrinkly texture of my skin now, that's not so far off base. so there you have it. i now have a giant scrotum for a stomach.





seriously though. what the hell is moving in there?

hey, i had a baby!

yeah, so i'm the world's worst blogspot blogger in history, so what. life got....well, a little busy! since i last wrote, my body ballooned to epic proportions. (see picture) my co-workers began calling me spaulding. ya know, like the sports ball manufacturer. they asked me constantly if i'd shoplifted a sporting goods store. ha-ha.

though i was enormous, my body escaped the dreaded stretch mark demon. until the last couple weeks. it was like my skin cooperated as long as it possibly could, and when the end was near it got a skin-version of senioritis and in "aw, the hell with it" fashion, made up for lost time. my belly & hips look.......well, i don't even want to think about it. nor the fact that the stretch marks on my hips got deeper & more plentiful AFTER my sasquatch of a baby was delivered. what gives, hip skin? and then there's my belly button, who decided it was no longer a part of a caucasion body but an african american body and promptly turned the darkest shades of brown and black i've ever seen. mix it's new coloring along with my over-used, elephant-like in texture skin, and i now have a belly burnt marshmallow instead of a button.

oh how late pregnancy loathed me.

the birth was an experience, that's for sure. i know i'm being lame by not detailing it at all here, but the truth is i've already done it elsewhere and i don't have the time (ya know, infant and all) to re-tell it. it was scary, and thrilling, and emotional - and well, let's just say i hope i don't have to do it more than 1 or 2 more times. if i didn't love the crap out of babies, i'd probably say...i'm all set. don't get me wrong - the thrill of meeting my little guy and seeing his pudgy little face for the first time is probably THE BEST moment of my life. but the anxiety, and the pain that settles in that first night.......gah. not enjoyable. birth = pretty gay. and i didn't even have to do the whole labor bit, so i can only imagine how much that blows.

so, my little man made his appearance on january 15, 2009 at 8:49am. he weighed 9lbs 50z (yes, he was huuuge), and was 20.5" long. he is, the best looking infant in history (maybe i'm a little biased). he looks a lot like his daddy. his mouth looks like his dad's, but i see my sister in it, too. his nose is allll daddy's, as well as his forehead. the shape of his eyes are mine, but the color isn't. he still has those, white baby, grey-blue eyes so the color is really yet to be determined. but, mine are about as dark brown as they come, and were since birth, so i know that's not what he'll have.

here he is, shortly after birth. my little lukas james!

and because i'm just way too lazy, fast forward four weeks and here's one of him from the other day. his eyes look weird, but he's slowly starting to for-real smile this week (as in, socially smile, rather than "i'm going to fart on you, and my mouth does something that sort of resembles a smile", smile) - and this picture is one of the first examples i have of this.

and my last visual aid, might cause you to erupt from the cuteness so prepare yourselves. this is, the loves of my life from yesterday morning. they were all snuggled up in bed together, looking ridiculously alike and adorable.



so far, mommyhood is fantastic. i love my lukey to absolute pieces. breastfeeding is...well, it's going, but i can't say i love it. i do love giving my baby the best nutrition i possibly can. i love seeing his bright anxious eyes and little nose peeking over my boob as he fills his belly. i do love the anti-in-law feature it provides. a simple, "okay, he needs to eat now!" is the simple sanity-saving phrase needed to get my baby back in my arms and out of theirs. they can't argue that, and i don't have to share feeding time. but, that's also a problem. while i can give husband the luxury of sleeping through his night-time wakings, he cannot do the same for me. i have the boobs, thus i have to get up every time. but mostly, it's the nipple soreness from his non-stop eating, and the stress of my supply dropping off once in a while. it's frustrating, and takes a lot more will power to keep at than i imagined it would take.

but, overall, i'm loving being his mommy. i think my banner needs an update.

it's basically the only reason i married him.

last night husband was reading from his expectant fathers book, and i told him to read to me & the baby too so we could learn. he actually really enjoys doing this, but last night he hit a couple snags in the content. he is, shall we say - extremely squeamish, about the simplest things. and i found complete hilarity in his reactions.

husband (reading about things to pack for the hospital): "don't forget a box of extra absorbent maxi p...ooooookay".
me: laughing hysterically.
husband (leans over to my belly): "dude, be glad you're not a chick".

later on in the pages, i was reading ahead as he was going along and i noticed he was about to stumble on a bit about the umbilical cord stump. since he has little to zero experience with newborns i had a feeling he'd be clueless about this...and i knew he'd react to it when he got there. as expected...

husband: "....the umbilical cord stump....WHAT! WHAT THE HELL IS THAT?! A STUMP?!!?!"

cue me laughing hysterically again. i used this opportunity to ask him if he planned on cutting the cord (knowing full well what his answer would be) and without a second's hesitation he shouted NO!!!!!!!

as he read along, if he stumbled over something he didn't want to know he'd kind of la-la-la for a second, as if doing so would make him un-read what he just saw? oh that husband of mine. he sure is good for a laugh, though. one of the suggested things to pack was a birthday cake & a bottle of champagne to celebrate after the birth. he thought this was hilarious. through laughs he was reciting situations like, "hang on hunny! just keep breathing i gotta bake this cake before we leave for the hospital!". he also imagined packing up all the ingredients as an alternative & asking the hospital if he could use one of their ovens while i "finished up".

if nothing else, he will keep me laughing through all of this :)

2/3rds there.

i was just thinking...how nice it is, that i can get up in the morning and cruise through the internet, perfectly content with a few hunger pangs...and not fear TEHBARF. for a while there, i thought i'd never be able to enjoy a quiet morning of educating myself on everything pointless with a hot cup of whatever-i-chose-that-morning. i'd be okay for a second, and then every passing moment would bring me closer to puke-land. until eventually, i'd be rocking back and forth in front of the toilet wishing it would just happen already so i could get on with my day. it made me sad, because i love mornings. i love being up before the sunrise, experiencing the chill in the air, and watching the world wake up. i love seeing the sun slowly filter itself over everything and into my window. but pregnancy was having none of that. for the first 17 weeks*, anyway. i was no longer a morning person.

*to be completely accurate, nausea didn't start until i was 6 weeks, and ended at 17 weeks...so it was really about 11 weeks of hell.

the worst part, was knowing if i didn't eat something bland and dry i would surely start on my journey towards puking. but eating anything, let alone something that tasted like cardboard and stuck to my already dry mouth, was just....not appealing. eventually i learned which cereals were easiest to get down, and how fast i needed to take my anti-nausea meds, and i'd function. but even so, i was never "quite right". i don't know why i even expected to feel "normal" - my body was, after all, gearing up to grow a human. not an easy feat.

but then the 2nd trimester hit, and it was a whole other ball game! this is when i learned to enjoy pregnancy. don't get me wrong. it still....sucks, in general - just, the ever-growing list of things that don't work the way they used to, and they're all in the less favorable sense. but, i could spend my mornings normally - without traveling with a baggie of dry cereal, without looking pale & green (not saying i look(ed) good, but certainly better than near-death), and without plotting where the nearest toilet was. i started to feel my baby move, and i saw his face on a sonogram. i found out that he was a boy. my belly started looking cute, and comments started rolling in. and the realization that, holy crap, there really is something in there, MY baby, and he's ALIVE! INSIDE ME!! My excitement finally came bursting through (and i say it like that, because i felt so utterly miserable during trimester #1 that it was hard to show anything other than, "don't get too close i could barf on you").

and so....here we are. 3 days left of this glorious trimester, about to embark on the scary 3rd. the one where aches & pains hit their peak, doctors visits increase, and the pressure to prepare kicks in. i am a little scared for this phase - excited, but a little scared. i'm hoping, that i still have a little while of sleeping well - because until now (knock on wood) that hasn't been a problem for me. and the discomfort has been slowly setting in for the past couple weeks, so i think i've been slowly preparing for that. aaand my nursery hasn't even been started, but i can't feel badly about that since it's kind of out of my control. but ya know, this means i'm getting closer and closer to meeting my little man...and after this point, his chances of thriving should he be born early for whatever reason, just continue to increase. so that, is reassuring.

all of this is worth it. every stage, every moment. every time i feel him kick and flip i remember why i'm having to go through all of these less than favorable things. because the reward, is worth so much more.

ARE you kidding me.

here's a little diddy about the constant outpouring of cash from my home.

i told you all about the mold room, correct? that's going to be about $1,000 out of pocket when they finish their stupid work. the same time the mold construction started, we had to get our gutters cleaned. charlotte suddenly decided rain was cool and started pouring it over our over-stuffed gutters & rolling off the side of our house. not cool. within a few days, the windshield on my car grew a massive crack. too big to be filled. north carolina, in their total awesomeness, does not cover glass in their insurance policies. sweet. i also i had to buy a crib for the fetus i'm growing.

let's recap.

mold room - $1,000
gutters - $125
windshield - $255
crib - $200

total wallet raping - $1580

sweet right? well guess what. yesterday within 10 seconds of my commute on the thruway, a massive rock shot out of.....i don't know, someone throwing massive rocks from a bridge? flying out from a dump truck? all plausible - but it looked to me like it came straight down from heaven like a mini meteor with my car's name on it. SMACK in the middle of my windshield. where there is now, a lovely crater, in my 4 week old windshield.

what, the, hell, murphy's law. i'm about sick of you.

weekend love.

as usual, i have work to do and i'm slacking like a super star. instead of being productive, i'm sipping some pepsi (making goop get a little work out in the depths of my belly), jamming to peppy ghetto songs, aaand contemplating updating you on my fantastic weekend.

ps, i'm pretty close to choosing a prettylicious purple purse, but humor me anyway and tell me which one you think is worth your hard earned monies. there was this gorgeous, so-purple-i-could-eat-it dooney at macy's, but for $345 - uh, no.

friday night husband & i went out with some friends from work. i was all excited that i had an actual experience to write about, and now that i'm thinking of it...i have nothing to say. it was really a simple night. we went to a wine bar...which, was pretty cool actually. its a very free-for-all place, where tables and couches & loungey areas are set up in random order, and you just kinda come in and claim an area. all through the whole place there are endless shelves of wine, an enormous beer cooler (all individual bottles), and other random coolers with safe-for-preggo's drinks, like...uh, water. you just kinda walk around til something jumps out at you (i went for the water), bring it up to the counter to pay for it, and return to your little corner. husband was making trips to the beer cooler and sampling bottles of random brews. the other guys joined him later in the night, but for the most part they'd just pick up a glass and share bottles of wine.

it was a pretty cool night. there wasn't much room for potential friendship building with G. for one, because she left within 30 minutes of us getting there...i'm not really sure why. that, and i wasn't seated anywhere near her. but, it was still a lot of fun. it was great to get out of the house for once, and cool seeing my co-workers in a different setting. conversation was never-ending, usually touching on hot topics (and thank goodness the guys all seemed to agree on things) and usually coming back to my pregnancy in some way shape or form.

the only "sticky" part, was when my co-worker's wife asked me who i was voting for. i'm pretty sure it was a total side convo, because the boys were talking (pretty intensely) about alternative energy and didn't really hear her ask me. i would have opened up had it really just been me speaking to her & no one else...however, i know her husband is very hardcore one-sided. i was afraid that if i didn't answer "correctly", he'd either suddenly hear & protest my answer, or she'd tell him later and...well, no thanks. i just don't like getting involved in politics. instead i said i was still unsure, and it seemed like a good response. she even agreed that it was a tough decision this year. however, her next sentence included something about how in 2 years she will be able to vote (both she & her husband, my co-worker, are natives of venezuela and i'm pretty sure she's only been here as long as they've been married, which is about 2 years). she said something about being proud to do her civic duty, and then i felt a little guilty that i wasn't tripping over myself with opinions.

overall though? a really great night. we even discussed future plans - including a baby shower/ football party combo, dinner out, and a day trip to the mountains (pregnant me probably having to skip the latter). but, baby certainly made me pay for being awake after 11pm.

saturday morning was the true start of chilly fall. it was glorious! we decided to celebrate the start of the chilly weather with our favorite cold morning breakfast tradition. warm drinks, asiago cheese bagels, and snuggly conversation by the fire at panera's. we did just that, with hot chocolate being the warm drink of choice. once our bellies were sufficiently full, i did a bit of maternity clothes shopping at target before heading home. most of the day was filled with naps and relaxing, but we had a date night planned. none of the actual date had been chosen, just simply that...we needed a weekend full of relaxation after our tough week. we settled on going somewhere close to target, since the D cup bra i bought earlier that day was STILL not enough to hold my preggo tatas (yes, they have ballooned THAT much) and i needed to return it.

dinner ended up being olive garden, and OH yum. i don't know why, but with a very round belly touching the table our waitress looked directly at me & tried to upsell us on "yummy fruity wine!", as she put it. i, once again, went with water. we shared 2 rounds of salad (because mmm this baby LOVES salad and you don't get much better than the OG), and decided to order something "different" than our usual. i went with the chicken carbonara - it was delish!

after dinner, we returned my bra and husband offered to buy me a new pair of fuzzy pj pants. it was completely random of him, but he said he wanted me to be comfortable. i wasn't protesting! i got a really cute grey pair with black polka dots. they are SO comfy, mmm i can't wait to get this day over with and put them on. we finished off our date with a trip to starbucks. hellooo decaf caramel macchiato. i have always been obsessed with the regular caffeinated version, but stupid me thought they were off limits until bff informed me that decaf espresso was, in fact, a real thing. oooh, heaven. husband just went with straight up coffee, and we split a slice of pumpkin loaf for dessert. we sat chatting for a while, and i noticed that every other patron was 50+. it was just strange...usually starbucks attracts such a different crowd. is that changing? and if so, purposely or not? interesting.

sunday was really...a lazy day. we did nothing. no, lies. we went to kohl's...where i found a fitting bra, and 2 more maternity shirts. husband found a really nice dress shirt & tie. then we attempted to get a new phone for moi, and had a run-in with the most SUCK salesperson i've ever met. so that was a no-go. the rest of the day, i went through all of our paperwork & filed absolutely everything. it took so long, all i had time for was dinner & dh before it was bedtime. but, at least it will be a lot easier to keep the paperwork organized from here on out.

so, speaking of organization...i should really...do work now. i have to figure out if i'm training G some more, or if she's a lost cause (in the work sense). that's, a whole other issue for another day. basically she's not really excelling here, and i'm getting stuck in the middle considering my job is one she's supposed to be learning...at the same time i'm semi-jump starting a could-be friendship. it's sticky. and too much thought for a monday.