Holy Guacamole!!

How big is baby?

THIS big!!

As American as Apple Pie

I made this. From SCRATCH. I mean I mixed the dough, peeled the apples, sliced them into a million pieces and put the whole she-bang together like a real baker! A good friend of my family's gave me this recipe for "Your-Mother-In-Law-will-love-you Apple Pie" at my bridal shower 4 years ago - and I finally decided to attempt it yesterday. It took the better part of the afternoon to make, but it turned out great and I was incredibly proud of myself. (Perhaps more than one should be for an accomplishment involving pie.) The best part was, we had good friends that happened to be driving through Greenville last night and they made an impromptu visit. "Welcome to our home. Oh, that delicious smell wafting through the air? Just a freshly baked homemade pie warming in the oven. Care for a slice?"

Weird pictures

I was hunting through the Babycenter.com website and found exactly what I was looking for - pictures of other pregnant people that are at about as far along as I am. (So I could decide how self-conscious I should be on a daily basis.)

Helpful? Not so much.
Some of these women looked like they weighed 100 lbs. soaking wet and had the belly of a 15 year-old. And some looked like the baby was going to crown at any second. There was absolutely no comparative benefit.

And what's with the tattoos, ladies? Seriously, can you imagine what that dragon on your hip is going to look like in 20 more weeks? I shudder to think.

My one vomit story

(Mid-August) I'm in Atlanta visiting for the weekend, driving down Northside Drive (arguably one of the nicest residential areas of Atlanta) on my way to have breakfast with Mindy when I feel the nausea hit hard. But it was different than usual.
I could tell that this wasn't going to end well, and it wasn't going to end well in the next 3 minutes.
There was no where to go. Multi-million dollar homes lined the right side of the street, an exclusive golf course flanked the left. (Actually, I'm not sure how exclusive it actually is - but I'm fairly confident they don't appreciate people throwing up on the greens.)

About 20 seconds before I was forced to select which affluent Atlanta resident was going to end up with my insides on their front lawn, I spotted a side street. The corner of the side street had a little park-like area that didn't seem to belong to any individual in particular - and so I selected a nice tree to conceal myself from Saturday-morning golfers and did my thing. Three times.

Fortunately, by the time I arrived at breakfast - I had recovered enough to enjoy 2 eggs, some turkey bacon, and a flying biscuit.

The Sandlot

Last week, Husband came home from work one night - he found me on the couch - weeping. I had just watched the final scene of The Sandlot. (Some of you may have never seen this early 90's movie, which is totally geared towards an audience under the age of 14 - it's your basic rag-tag neighborhood kids form a sandlot baseball team with a side plot that involves the new kid losing his step-dad's prized baseball over the fence to a mean-old-dog who turns out in the end to be owned by James Earl Jones - if you haven't seen it - rent it - pretend it's for your kids.)

So - in the end, the narrator (who was formerly the "new kid") gives a synopsis of what all the players (who you have no-doubt grown emotionally attached to at this point) are doing as grown-ups. And it's just so darn moving. I'm weeping. Not just crying, but sobbing in the living room.

I pulled myself together and put dinner on the table. Husband asked when I had time to cook dinner if I had been watching the movie all night - and I had to admit that I had only turned it on 20 minutes ago.

Hormones. Very Entertaining.

Free Tip

If you are prone to sudden bouts of nausea, you should avoid watching the SPAM cook-off on the Food Network. For that matter, you should avoid SPAM entirely. Regardless of your nausea-propensity.

It's a bleeder

Ok - I know I owe about a thousand pieces of information and posts since my last one. They will all come in due time. For now - I'd like to discuss nosebleeds.

I've been getting them recently - a lot. Apparently one of the (many) side effects of pregnancy is that as your blood volume increases, you sometimes have nose bleeds.

I've been getting about 3-4 a week. Unless I have a particularly important day or meeting at work - in which case I get 3-4 a day.

As a result of the nosebleeds - I have developed a condition called (by me) "nosebleed paranoia." Basically, every time I feel my nose run in the least bit, I have to wipe it and then quickly look at the tissue (or sleeve, or finger) that I used to wipe to make sure there isn't blood. I'm sure it's a lovely sight for others. Nosebleed paranoia aside - everything else is going well. I'm finally through the exhaustion stage (where I couldn't make it past 3:00 pm without a nap) and the nausea - while still present - has definitely diminished. Exited to see family for the Jewish holidays this weekend. More to come soon.

Retro Snacking

There are fruit snacks in the faculty lounge (those gummy, fruit-flavored things). I haven't had fruit snacks since I was 8.

I ate too many and now my tummy hurts. This is exactly the way I remember it.

Little Stick. Big News.

Things I actually said today

Today is my half-birthday (a holiday that we actually celebrate in my family). I never thought that at the age of 29 (and a half) ANY of the following statements would have come out of my mouth . . . let alone in one day.

Please act like an adult
Don't sit on that railing, you'll fall to your death
Don't you think that skirt is a little short?
Eyes forward
Pay attention
I'm not punishing you, I'm caring about you
I think you know what you did
Turn that music down
Pick up that trash
Do NOT let me see you throw that again
I need to see you in my office
You're late
(The WORST) - Because I said so.
(and finally - the BEST) - Have a great LONG weekend!

Sometimes I think that if they took away all the kids, working at a high school would be really nice.