Mmmm...Stretchy

Oy. Here's the important lesson I learned Saturday: when you're pregnant, you can only go so long pretending that you still fit into your old clothes without eventually paying serious consequences for a waistband digging into your abdomen. My penance came in the form of some serious, take-no-prisoners indegestion that left me whimpering in a supine position for hours yesterday. No vomiting, but all kinds of other nastiness ensued. If I hadn't known that I'd eaten nothing that could have possibly caused it, I would have suspected food poisoning. As it is, the only plausible precipitating event I can come up with is too many hours in too small pants with a baby obstructing my digestive organs.

So. Lesson #1: elastic is my new best friend (actually, lesson #1 was probably that Cheerios are my best friends when I was having all the nausea, so make this lesson #2), because I am still too early for maternity clothes. I'm hoping another week or two will allow me to fit into some. In the meantime, thank heavens I wear scrubs to work. But howcome there's no industry for in-between clothes? In the message boards in which I lurk, there's no end to women complaining of their old clothes being too tight and their maternity clothes being too big, so I know I'm not alone here. I know they sell those Bella Bands for this purpose, but I'm torn, not knowing anyone personally who's successfully used one.

15 weeks tomorrow! And 3 weeks til we can try to find out the sex!

Excuses, Excuses...

We're back from our trip to Buffalo last weekend, where we were blessed with warm weather. The husband and I still froze at night, but that's due to the Tucson-thinned blood, not to any shortcomings by the Buffalo weather gods. We visited Niagara Falls, caught up with old and very dear friends, saw die Frau married off, ate some wedding cake, did some dancing, and the husband even got to eat some wings from the restaurant that claims to have invented them. The wedding was beautiful. Die Frau looked gorgeous. It was all that a wedding should be. I expect die Frau will post some of her own pics soon, but here are a few of ours (find more from Ouiser).

This pic is stolen from a friend

Ouiser and family

Ouiser's baby S

Ouiser, hubby, yours truly, and my husband

In other news...big news...news that I've been dying to blog about for weeks and weeks...news that explains why I've been such an absentee blogger for the past couple of months...well, the pictures will speak for themselves:

I will be 14 weeks pregnant this Thursday. The pics were taken at 12 weeks. For those not well-versed in the art of reading these things, the baby has his/her head off to the right, kind of tilted to his/her left. The other big, round part is the torso, and those four little blobs around the torso are the arms and legs. He/she was waving them everywhere during the ultrasound. And no, you can't tell the sex yet. What you see is the umbilical cord.

I feel lucky to have gotten an ultrasound so early. It wasn't planned, but the doctor wasn't satisfied with the read she was getting off the heartbeat doohickey; she could only get it for a second at a time. So I got to have these pics to take home. You can even see the four heart chambers in the second pic, if you know what you're looking for. Unfortunately, the husband couldn't be there, but hopefully he'll catch the next baby show, I think at 18 weeks. And yes, we'll be finding out the sex then, if all goes well.

The nausea's 99% gone now. But it was a doozy. I kept everything down, but "morning" sickness is a big, fat lie. Progesterone poisoning, as it was called in one of the books I looked at, is much more apt. It lasted all day, every day. And that little baby would only be appeased by my eating the crappiest crap I could get my paws on: white bread, potatoes, bagels, scones, cookies. Ugh. Makes me a little ill just thinking about it. Who eats white bread?!? The husband, that's who. I couldn't look at a vegetable. Thank goodness I'm back on track now.

I'm starting to show a wee bit, but only to those who know me. Not obviously pregnant yet. And I'm starting to have some clothing struggles, but am nowhere even near being ready for maternity clothes, so not quite sure what to do there.

At any rate, it's an adventure so look for this to transition yet again from a craft blog to a puppy blog to a baby blog.

Outward Hound

Yesterday was the husband's actual 30th birthday and we had a pretty low key celebration. Chewy had his first hike. We hit a trail on Mt. Lemmon and the pup-pup broke in his doggy backpack. He carried two bottles of water and his travel bowl.
He did great; didn't seem to mind the pack at all. He was well-mannered on his leash. We hiked for an hour and 40 minutes and got back just as he was starting to look pretty pooped. I think that dog found muscles he didn't know he had. He acted a bit nervous about jumping up and down the terrain at first, but I think those working dog genes kicked in and he seemed to realize he could do more than he thought he could.
He was a bit jumpy though. Twice something must have poked him somewhere, surprising him, and I swear all four feet were in the air as he did an aerial 360 and landed about 8 feet away. The husband and I had each seen him do this once or twice on walks before, but it's always hilarious. He looks like he's made of springs.

Later that night we went to the roller derby. Our second time ever. One of our dear friends is in the try-out process and was working the penalty box. I don't see myself becoming a rabid roller derby fan, but there is something unmistakably fun about the costumes, the themes, the fights. It's the kind of thing I could have seen myself doing in my early 20s had I been exposed to it. And had I been able to skate. And had functioning knees.

Bizarre overheard conversation during roller derby intermission:

• Girl 1: This 15 minutes is going to seem like an hour.
• Girl 2: I know. I wish I smoked.

So you could approach death that much faster? Really? Lung cancer seems better than a few idle moments?

On a brighter side, gratuitous picture of Bob, "helping" with the cleanup of birthday decorations. She got into that outfit all on her own, my friends.

Next on the List: Conquering the World (or at Least the Vacuuming)

Okay, now I know I'm on the mend. I ended up with a "snow day" today (yay!) and haven't felt so much like myself in weeks. My impressive list of accomplishments today include:

• laundry (including folding! That never happens around here)
• unloading the dishwasher
• walking the dog
• grocery shopping
• cooking dinner
• purchasing tickets to see my parents in June
• beginning travel plans for our anniversary

Okay, so "impressive" may be an overstatement, at least for you normal folks. I'm impressed with myself. It's been so long since I've been a contributing member of this household. And now I've blogged twice in two days! Though no pictures today. I'll share a recipe instead:

Fettucine with Bacon, Peas, and Parmesan

• 9 oz fresh fettucine pasta
• 2 slices bacon
• 1/2 cup chopped onion
• 2 tsps minced garlic
• 1 Tbsp chopped fresh thyme
• 1/2 c frozen peas
• 1/2 c chopped green onions
• 1/3 c half and half
• 2 tsps butter
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1/8 tsp black pepper
• 1/4 c shredded parmesan cheese

1. Cook pasta according to package instructions. Drain, reserving 1/4 c cooking liquid.
2. Cook bacon over medium heat until crisp. Remove bacon from pan, reserving drippings in pan; crumble. Add onion, garlic, and thyme to drippings in pan; saute 2 min. Stire in peas; saute 1 min. Add green onions; saute 1 1/2 min. Add pasta, reserved cooking liquid, and half and half to pan; cook 1 min or until thoroughly heated, tossing to combine. Remove from heat. Add butter, salt, pepper to pan; toss until butter melts. Sprinkle with crumbled bacon and parmesan cheese.

4 servings.

It's from the March 2007 Cooking Light. I skipped the green onions because we boycott those in this household. I also used skim milk instead of half and half because that's what I had. I also forgot to reserve the pasta liquid to add in later. For us it only served 2, but I had intended to serve a salad or veggie with it, which I didn't because the husband was too starving to wait by the time it was ready. With sides, it would have served 4, if none of the 4 were my husband. I imagine it would be a lot better with the half and half than the skim milk, though it was pretty good as is. If anyone tries it before I do again, let me know!

Better Late than Never?

Yeah, I'm still alive. Sorry. Returning to my blog last weekend obviously didn't happen. I have plenty of excuses though.


We celebrated the husband's 30th birthday last weekend and his brother and best friend (Ouiser's hubby!) flew in to celebrate. Both were surprises. We had a party that Saturday night, which was not a surprise, and they left Sunday and Monday. Then I immediately got sick and have been out for the count all week. I'm on the upswing now, but still nowhere near 100%. Hence my absence. I've missed you, blogland! But I've just been utterly useless and unable to put this many words together coherently since last week.

Chewy had his own guest at the party, Josie, who is way cute, but who stole his bed and his dinner! He was a gentleman about it.

Ouiser's hubby and Chewy wishing the husband a happy birthday

Bob "enjoying" the party. Not sure she enjoyed the manhandling.

Some evidence of my recent uselessness is the Easter gifts I have still sitting in my sewing room that were intended for four various babies I happen to know. Completely did not realize Easter was this weekend until yesterday. You can tell how religious we are. But I had purchased these gifts back in early March. The good thing about babies is that they don't care if you're late with gifts, so hopefully I'll get them sent out soon.

I swear there were only two bunnies when I put them in the closet...

How can you resist bunnies from Target's $1 rack?

Gratuitous picture of Bob. She likes fabric bins, too.