Snow day=car wreck

I can't believe I'm even writing this, but Brandon and I got in a car wreck as he was taking me to work this morning. We were on the interstate headed west toward Mt. Juliet and were, oddly enough, talking about how Brandon thought the interstate was the safest place to be in snow or ice. I disagreed because I feel more comfortable on back roads that I can be all granny-like and creep on when I'm afraid of sliding. I would rather slide into a ditch than into another car going a fast speed.

Anyhow, we were going along just fine until we slowed on the ramp. And then the Honda had a mind of its own. We went zig-zagging through three lanes, slowly at first, building momentum until Brandon's side of the car rammed into a silver Kia. We're okay. Let me repeat that. We're okay! The other guys bumper was damaged and the driver's side back door was dented in enough that we can't open it. I hit the console pretty hard at the impact and have a bit of bruising on the side of my belly, but baby's moving fine. We called the doctor and she told me not to come in unless I was bleeding or the baby didn't move for several hours. Hours later, I'm beginning to feel like I had some pretty substanstial jarring. My hips hurt and so does my chest. It could be that I burst into tears as we started sliding. I thought we were going to die, and I had visions of our car tearing through the guardrail and tumbling down the hill into traffic.

I called out of work and spent the day on my grandma's couch with a massive headache, no doubt brought on by the panic attack. Brandon was okay and went on to work despite my pleadings. Haha, I was worked up and thought the interstate was evil.

I'm okay now. Baby's fine. Thank God we weren't killed. I hate the snow and ice.

microwave pizza... awful!

I hate that commercial and it was on, hence the blog title. I'm not terribly creative when it comes to giving things a title. Sorry.
At the risk of sounding totally vain and self-absorbed ( I would have to be a little bit anyways to preface a blog entry with such an introduction, right?), can I just say that I have a bit of a complex when it comes to the way I see myself? Like, when I look in the mirror, I usually see an incredibly obese person with no semblance of beauty? Okay, now that we've gotten that out of the way. . . WHAT THE JUNK? (That's probably as close as I'll ever come to cussing on this blog, so take advantage of that.) I was scrolling through some of my old facebook albums tonight and some of my mother-in-law's pictures. These are pictures I had outlawed being tagged in because I was so concerned about double chins or zits or fat rolls or something else unseemly.

Okay, I don't know if it's pregnancy that does it or what, but I realized that those pictures, the ones that I abhored, are the ones I wish I still looked like. And I wonder why the heck I was even concerned to begin with. Maybe it's because I'm older and wiser and find beauty in different things. Maybe it's because I have a daughter on the way and don't want her to adopt the sick mindset I've had over the years.

That being said, I cannot wait to get healthy when the baby comes. I know I shouldn't be phrasing that in future tense because I need to be healthy now that she's growing inside of me. . . blahblahblah. What I mean is, I cannot wait to shed the 20+ lbs that I've gained when she's delivered safely into my arms. I was so naive when I got pregnant. I thought, "Why should I lose weight before the fact if I'm just going to gain weight?" Well, here's why. You won't want to lug 20 extra pounds on top of the thirty pounds you're already overweight. It hurts. It sucks. Your feet will be swollen and look like mattresses by the end of the day. You'll flop around like a beached whale at night trying to fall into a comfortable sleeping position. It's not pretty, and it's not fun. Also, you won't have to go through the humiliation of your doctor telling you that in your eight months of pregnancy, you've gained the amount of weight that she usually likes to see in a full term pregnancy. Meaning? Those 23 lbs I gained were supposed to last until my due date, and those 10 lbs I kept on from the miscarriage didn't help matters. I still have 10 weeks to go, and I think it's childlike to imagine that I won't gain weight when Natalie's growing so quickly.

So, folks, as a measure of accountability and complete humility, I annouce to the world that I am a mere 3 lbs shy of the 200 lb mark. Yes, this is awful. Yes, I feel remorse. And I hope and pray that breastfeeding delivers me from this fate. That, and walking. I guess I could exercise. I hate it so and cannot imagine what it would feel like postpartum, but I digress. Someone said something about doing a sit-up today, and Natalie kicked. It's like she was telling me, "Don't you dare."

And while this blog entry isn't really going anywhere, can I just share another weakness? I am terrible about following through on things. That ranges anywhere from returning a phone call to finishing a craft project or writing things down in a planner. I like to think of myself as a crafty sort of creative person who is completely unorganized. Like, I need to finish the nursery, but I am forever getting distracted by bigger, better projects on the various craft blogs I follow. It's like my mind isn't satisfied until I have a huge pile of scrapbook paper, mod-podge, and ribbon occupying our kitchen table. Oh, and let's not get started on how distracted I become when I'm in the midst of cleaning the house. I am terrified that I'll be on the hoarders show when Natalie comes. Maybe this mind dump is the beginning of the "nesting period" for me. I have to cleanse! Purge! Purge!

I'm waiting for the exhaustion to subside and the urge to clean to show up. With only ten weeks to go, now 9 (EEK!), I am wondering when every surface of my house will shine. It's not like it's dirty now, not even cluttered-- but having it completely spotless for a few days would be amazing. Especially if people are going to be dropping by to see the newest addition.

One thing simply HAS to be done. Cat doors. Installed. I'm tired of our upstairs smelling like poop. I know that it's going to be smelling like poop from a different source for a while, but cat poop is the nastiest thing to ever fall upon the nostril. Baby diarrhea is nothing to cat poop.

Okay, so wanna see those pictures I was so loathe to share with the world?

Okay, I like this one! And Chloe was sooo tiny! I remember focusing on each roll of back chub and getting mad, though. Madness.
Ocean City, NJ with Brandon
Making coleslaw. . . eww at my hands.


I promise a pregnancy post will be on its way soon. I took some belly pictures after my doctor's appointment on Wednesday, and it's really evident that I'm pregnant now! Just a quick blurb because I'm excited-- Natalie is measuring large, so I am being seen back for an ultrasound the week after next to see if my dates were off. Sometimes, when you get pregnant in the cycle immediately after a miscarriage, your dates are thrown off. So I could be further along than I think! I know that sounds bizarre, considering I've had earlier ultrasounds and the dates I provided and the dates of the ultrasound were only off by a few days. That, or she could just be an exceptionally large baby. Haha. Or it could be that I'm simply short-waisted, and she's taking up a lot of room in there. In any event, I'm beyond excited to see her again, this time much more developed than the last time. Between you and me, I don't think my stomach can stretch much further, so an earlier due date would be heavenly.

Anyway, going to log off and get some shut eye. It's snowing in Middle TN again, and that means a perilous journey to work in the morning. :/

random picture of three faves-- just floating around the interwebz. ;)

Ain't no thang, just three of my favorite actors ever in the same room! Kim Cattrall (Samantha from Sex and the City), Colin Firth (Mr. Darcy, among other impressive roles) , and Jennifer Ehle (Elizabeth Bennett).

I follow way too many obscure celebrity blogs. Anyhow, there they are. Happy, happy! Wish I could have been there to meet them! Some sort of luncheon in NYC...Colin Firth looks like a blade of grass next to these ladies ( who are very beautiful and slender) , so he'd probably evaporate if I hugged him. ( Seriously, Colin, if you ever become one of those celebs who google your name, I'd love to meet you and subsequently hug you and ask you all sorts of questions about your career and listen to your awesome accent. Hopefully the baby weight would be dropped, so I promise I wouldn't make you evaporate.) Celebrity males-- coerced into being very skinny. Just an observation.


Why the excess of blog entries, you ask? Well, my foot is a lovely shade of blurple right now and has to stay elevated for the rest of the morning. This translates to "I'm bored out of my mind and Brandon is snoring beside me!"

Who was your unlikely teenybopper crush?

Any of my readers recall his or her first teenybopper crush? Like, who were you totally gaga over when you were at that impressionable age of twelve or thirteen?

You know who I was infatuated with? (And this is mildly embarrassing, but not AS embarrassing as N'Synce or Backstreet Boys or any of those other boy bands. Okay, so who am I kidding? This is probably worse, but I think this individual has more talent in his pinky finger than the entirety of both boy bands combined. I like to think my crush was of the intellectual variety, but-- who am I kidding? I totally had a thing for his sideburns.)

THIS GUY.

His name is Philip Quast, and he's an Australian musical theatre icon. How do I know this, you ask? Well, he played Javert in my overplayed VHS recording of the Les Miserables 10th Anniversary concert circa 1995. I am such a dork. I was reminded of this infatuation when I was perusing through our dvds. Sadly (okay, not sadly. I love musical theatre, and I am not ashamed), I coerced Brandon into buying the 10th Anniversary concert on dvd when I spied it at Costco. Now there's a 25th anniversary concert. And there will probably be a 50th, 75th, and so on. Great things like that just never die. ::end dork ramble::

Anyhow, I know that this guy was probably in his early 40s when I got all googly-eyed over him. Haha.

He's still a handsome man, but wow. . . perspective changes!

Anyhow, needless to say. . . I have moved on to another tall, reasonably sideburned man with pretty eyes.

Who was your embarrassing crush? The more unlikely, the better. I love to laugh. I think mine's stinking hilarious because no one outside of musical theatre dorkdom knows of this guy.

Oh, little Jami. You were and still are so very random.

And this guy is, like, sixty.

Maybe he'll google his name one day and see this and smile.

I still love you, Philip!

mamma mia...

I can't imagine ever wanting to harm a baby. I just can't fathom it, but I've been reading a lot about postpartum depression and anxiety disorders and seriously freaking out that I could develop one. I probably already have a little bit of an anxious personality, so it would not surprise me if I had anxious, paranoid tendencies after the baby comes. The big picture things don't scare me. It's the little things (okay, so they're big to me). Like, what if I put the baby down into her crib at night and she stops breathing? I never thought I would be the kind of mom who lost sleep by constantly checking in on her child, but I can see how that happens. I can also understand why some new moms don't shower for days; they're terrified to leave the side of an infant.

Or, what if I pinch off her little fingers when I'm clipping those tiny fingernails? As the end of the pregnancy draws nearer, my fears loom larger. It's not that I'm afraid of making mistakes; I know those will happen. I know I will only grow through them. I'm afraid of falling into a deep psychosis and not being able to emerge. I'm terrified of a suffocating fear and that I won't be able to enjoy my baby because I'm obsessed with not hurting her! I know this sounds incredibly dire and not anything like the normal ramblings of someone who's happily pregnant. I apologize for that, but it's what's going on in the old brain of mine. I think this is what the What to Expect book refers to as normal fears and misgivings. What if your greatest fear about motherhood is that you'll be sucked into a black hole and won't have anything left for your child?

These thoughts have only popped up recently. I am beginning to realize that it won't be easy, that it won't be painless. There will be death with the new life, and I realize that some hopes and dreams and selfish plans will be laid to rest with the arrival of this sweet child. I do not dread meeting my daughter. I am so excited to finally hold her (ie get her out of me). I'm just hoping I'm knocked upside the head with passionate love because, at this very moment, ambivalence comes to mind and it scares me. I don't want to just casually acknowledge this miracle. I want to embrace it, but the fear of losing her and losing myself is so overwhelming right now. ( I can already see it. I'll be driving people nuts because I won't know what I'm doing. And I'll be crying all the time, walking around in a leaky nursing bra, unshowered and smelling like dried milk. The cats will be following me around because of the smell. There will be seven days worth of mascara crust under my eyes, and Brandon will avoid me like the plague as I desperately shove a screaming baby into his arms so I can, God forbid, put on some deodorant. When the time comes to go back to work, I won't know how to function, and I will lose my job to a seventeen year old...)

I know that this is probably just your run-of-the-mill hormonal rant and a mixture of reading too many online articles on PPD and having swollen feet and going into work on what should have been a snow day. For what it's worth,I would like to look back on this post in a couple of months and laugh at my silly fears. I will be taken care of, but why am I afraid?

This is all coming from the girl who had a breakdown in her in-laws' bathroom because she put all of her weight down on a swollen ankle, so take it with a grain of salt. In my defense, though, I've been up since 5:30am ( a mixture of insomnia and snow day excitement) and have not had the traditional pregnancy benefit of "getting off my feet" or "taking it easy". When I hurt, people, I hurt. And tonight, I just wanted to be crabby, sit around and wallow in preggie-pity, and have Brandon listen to me whine about my ankles and my stretch marks and the fact that there's a PERSON wiggling around inside of me and sticking her little limbs into my ribs. We had dinner at his parents', and I didn't know it was supposed to be followed by a movie. I literally could not stay another two hours to finish a movie, Inception, of all things. My chair was uncomfortable. I was moody and swollen, and ... just. . . I just wanted to break away from the crowd and cry in the bathroom and throw a little fit until he felt compelled to come downstairs looking for me.

And that's exactly what happened (minus the fit because I'm a little more mature than that). So, I'm sitting here in my blue terry cloth moomoo, counting the baby's kicks and clawing at my belly (ok, just scratching), and rejoicing that I don't have to go to work tomorrow. Maternity leave can't get here soon enough. I'm tired. I know it's a little early in the game to feel this way, but there's only ten more weeks of this. Ten more weeks of swollen, unrecognizeable feet. I didn't think I'd be a waddler, but I am. And a limper. And sometimes I pee on myself when I bend over or sneeze. ::uncomfortable silence::

Dear Jesus, please save me from the trap of post-partum depression and mood killers. Let me rejoice in the miracle of this sweet baby and not be so obsessed with rituals and routines and rules. Let me just enjoy her and love her and crave what's best for her.

( I am all over the place tonight. Sorry, guys.)

Okay, going now. Because, for sure, you've had enough.

Pregnancy Update- 29 weeks

So, only 11 or so more weeks to go!!



When you put it that way, it's not long at all.



I decided I would go back to doing my weekly pregnancy updates since I've fallen into a bit of a blogging rut. I still want to have something to refer back to if Natalie ever, you know, wants to know about what life was like before she came along. . .



Without further adieu, I launch into my list of pregnancy complaints and joys.

Total Weight Gained: 20 lbs

Maternity clothes: Yes, though today I wore a pre-pregnancy dress that's empire waisted.

Sleep: Not getting very much "good" sleep! Between waking up in the middle of the night to pee and constantly correcting myself to sleep on my side, it's pretty difficult to feel rested. Last night, for example, we went to bed around 8:45 (I know, party animals, right?). I woke up at 10:00 pm having to pee, again at midnight, and again at 3ish. This was between the periods of erratic tossing and turning. Finally, at 4, I came downstairs for a glass of water and decided that I should try out the couch. I laid down and watched an episode of "What Not to Wear" before falling asleep for, like, thirty minutes before waking up and going upstairs again. I then fell asleep and woke up around 8:30. Obviously, this doesn't work on a day when I have to actually go to work, so I feel like my hands are tied.

Best Moment of the week: A toss up between the progress I made on the nursery and the adorable hat that Andy's grandmother knitted for Natalie!

Food cravings: Although I don't see it as a craving as much as it's me becoming undisciplined in my habits, cookies and milk! Side note: I am so ready to have a basic turkey sandwich that I can't stand it. I also want to go back to guzzling diet coke nonstop. Oh, and caffeine is very much missed! I think I may even have a coffee habit once she comes!

Food aversions: Can't think of anything that turns my stomach.

Symptoms: Charlie horses, trouble sleeping, frequent trips to the bathroom, and more stretch marks. :/

Movement: I am feeling her more in the early morning and at night. I think she's mostly a day sleeper. I've felt her have hiccups once or twice, and it's so cute.

Gender: Still a girl. :)

What I miss: Caffeine, lunch meat, feeling "normal", being able to diet if I want to (though I haven't really WANTED to) , regular clothes, better movement. I am like a slow cow.

What I'm looking forward to: My water breaking and going into labor. :D

Weekly wisdom: I have none. I'm still navigating the rocky waters of "beginning parenthood".

Milestones: I'm in the third trimester, y'all. Heck yes!