Waiting on Little Miss Labin

BABY UPDATE:
We're officially in countdown mode until the arrival of Baby Labin this September. She's due in 80 days!!! I know as well as anyone that she could be early or late, but at least it gives you a target. The third trimester has really ramped up to be pretty miserable. I feel like I am always either exhausted, hungry, have to pee or feel sick. Productivity is a thing of the past - and so is bending over. I started crying the other day because I just didn't feel like I could reach my feet in the shower - until Jon suggested I throw my washcloth on the ground and rub my feet with it.

I feel like we've accomplished the most important things in the getting ready for baby process, but there's still so much to do. We painted the nursery and pretty much got settled into the new house. We ordered the nursery furniture and I am busy making most of the decorations myself (with some sewing help from the grandmothers.) We registered for all of the baby gear at Babies R Us, Target, and Amazon. We've done allllll of the testing and passed everything with flying colors. We also have the list of names narrowed down to four. (But this will be a surprise.)

However, we still have to figure out daycare, the dedication ceremony for after her birth, and find a pediatrician. We registered for, but have not yet taken, all of the childbirth-nursing-infant care classes. We have to figure out the cord blood banking thing, and I have to start figuring out what I'm in for when it comes to labor. So far I've managed to push this off (no pun intended) but it feels like I can't do that anymore.

We're getting the carpet replaced tomorrow, and a vacation coming up, so next post will be about all that non-baby stuff.

Upswing

Yay! No more spinny-throw-uppy-headache-like-a-mofo episodes in two whole days! After a month of a yuck, it's been a welcome reprieve. That's enough about that - wouldn't want to seem ungrateful.

Also, seeing as how we started this blog to talk about the Home Maintenance Journey Fantastic it seems only fitting to throw in a few words about the topic here.

Jason got us back on track last weekend by volunteering his time and sanity to sit in a bathtub with me and throw some mud around . . . okay wait that's not what I meant. I mean that Jason and I worked really hard . . . uh, we tiled together. And Jon cut tile. And we made progress.

(You can all stop saying That's What She Said, now. We're past that.)

Hey Jason - thanks for backbuttering my tile.

(Hehe. Okay I'm really done now.) The man helps us get this neverending project done and what reward do I think appropriate? Inappropriateness. Commence finger-wagging.

Anyway, we are expecting friends this weekend...maybe we will even have a tiled bathroom to show!!!

A Confession

Ok, I admit it. I am a baby when it comes to not feeling well. I like attention, I like being taken care of, and I am really really cranky. (My husband is Soooo Lucky!)

This all-about-me regression has been my lifestyle for about three weeks. In addition to the physical symptoms, I am now scared, frustrated, and stressed out about not knowing what's going on. I am not my usual ray-of-sunshine-self.

So, the problem is that I am continuing to feel that way despite the fact that all of these people around me have much bigger issues going on. I really WANT to be selfless, and supportive to all of the people important to me, but I am so wrapped up in my own head, my own issues, that I catch myself being preoccupied with myself instead of helping others.

Let me give you a sampling of what is going on with folks around me, the things I should actually be focusing on:

• Friends finding out they are having a boy
• Other friends maybe having life changing stuff going on
• Yet others having their new baby girl
• Friend K. had her apartment flooded and had to move her pregnant self to a temp place
• Family in car accidents
• Other family leaving for a semester abroad

I just need to get my head on straight! Maybe if I focus on the right things, karma will make my own issues disappear.

Birthday Blues

So after a week of fairly consistent headaches, waves of dizziness, and a touch of nausea here and there - we still have no idea what's going on. It started out pretty bad, then started going better towards the end of the week - now I feel like it's getting worse again. Just more frequent. Ugh.

So now, I get to go stick my head in a giant magnet for my birthday. I've never had an MRI before, and it makes me just a little more stressed out. Ugh.

Many of you know that I spent my birthday last year trying not to think about it (I'll discuss this in another post) so I was really looking forward to this year. OH well.

10 Days and Counting

I am pretty sure that I have never, ever stuck to a diet for 10 straight days without "cheating" before. I never believed anyone when I was told this, but it gets easier.

For example, my friend at work and I go to Olive Garden for lunch pretty often - it's "our place" to go and complain about work and load up on carbs. So we were headed out yesterday and I actually changed our plans so that we could go somewhere more diet-friendly. I don't think I would have been able to do that before.

So here I am after 10 days of substituting green beans for french fries, picking the bun off my hamburger, and snacking only on cheese and nuts. 10 days, 4 workouts and 5 pounds. That's so definitely worth it!

Don't get me wrong - I REALLY want a slice of birthday cake. I have about a dozen opportunities during the celebrations over the next week to throw my diet out the window. So I respectfully asked everyone to leave the dessert at home. Yes, even the "healthy" desserts like fruit. Though some people seem to think it's more important to have a pastry to stick a stupid candle in then to respect my goals and ambitions - for my own birthday. Oh well.

So don't be offended friends, when you want to get together for my birthday and it ends up being a casual stay-at-home affair without sweets of any kind. Because for my birthday, it's all about me!

The Nature of My Obsessions

I must have a mild form of OCD. Not to be callous (I do have a friend with OCD) but my overwhelming drive to get things done around the house may be getting out of control. I woke up this morning and spent an hour and a half putting away Christmas before Jon got up.

Yeah, so? So the thing is, I could have waited for help, I could have left it up a few more days and not started the last day of my time off in a whirlwind of glitter and tissue paper. But no, I couldn't even sit down this morning I was too stressed about the tree, weeks after it had fulfilled its purpose still sitting in my living room. No, it had to come down!!!

And this is just one thing I'm worried about today. The unfortunate part is that for whatever reason, I work really hard all the time and I never get to check anything off my list. Remember all those things I listed a couple of posts ago? NONE of them are done! NONE!

Maybe Jon will surprise me today with a voluntary 10 hours of productivity and we will check a couple things off that ever-growing to-do list.

Recap

Some quick stories of the last few days:

• New Year's Eve: For a variety of reasons (including we're old and we get tired quickly) we had a great time at Sarah's place watching movies and chowing down on junk food (low-carb wings for us!) But then we were all done by about 11:30pm - so Jon and I left! We rung in the new year in our car exiting the highway. Strange, yes. Sad? I say no.
  
  
• New Year's Day: Jen and Jason have been alternating feeling badly for about a week. By Jan 1, Jen was ready for a "care package" so I whipped up some feel good food and entertainment and headed over. We play Uno and listened to U2. Very fun!
  
  
• Jan 2 - Well, it appears that someone did a bump and grab on Jason's phone. Luckily, the somewhat shady character who was given the phone (as a payment towards what the thief owed him) called Jason and offered to give it back. Without going into ALL of the details, let's just say my imagination kicked in, and by the time the four of caravan-ed over to pick it up I had an exit strategy, the police on speed dial, and I was doing my best bond impersonation.
  
  
• The plan for today is to finish up a couple of the items I mentioned before. I have to see how long Jon can hold out. The poor guy feels like when he gets home he just has to work the whole time. I'm trying my best to give him some relaxation time, but it's difficult when there are unfinished projects everywhere you turn. We are both desperate to be done with these home projects - and we're close, but it's so hard to find dedicated time. Oh well.

HAPPY NEW YEAR EVERYONE!