Furniture Acquisition

When Trinity got home from work on Friday we loaded up and drove south to my sister's house to get Genevieve's nursery furniture.  Dragging a UHaul trailer behind T's truck in 108 degree temperatures was so fun!  I wasn't cranky at all!  

On Saturday morning we tackled the attic and lugged down all sorts of baby accoutrements.  Caroline was in the thick of all of it, until she wasn't.

She soon grew tired of the hot attic and decided that she would take advantage of some new "toys."  Eloise tested out the Jeep jogging stroller.

You all know how I love to jog.

I think this will be better suited for the husband.  I can't stop laughing when I think of him running around the neighborhood with our child in that thing.  

CeCe was intrigued by the Bumbo seat.

It was perfectly sized for her. 

Yeah, right.

You could fit a whole litter of Ceces in that seat.

That dog is tiny, cute and enjoys making out with my feet.

Seriously, she gets right under your feet as you are walking and licks your toes.

I'm amazed she hasn't been smooshed to pieces by my equally gigantic sister or her child.  

Katie, Caroline and I all tend to walk with a heavy foot.

Brunhildas, unite!

This doll chillaxed in a car seat.

While this one was placed in some sort of vibrating chair.  

I want a vibrating chair, but a gentle one.

The one at the nail salon beats the tar out of me.

I had to have the man turn it off when I got a pedicure a month ago.

I told him it was going to send me into premature labor at 6 months.

He moved quickly to shut that thing off.  

We loaded up.

By "we" I mean husband, brother in law, and sister.  

Caroline rode her bike.

I watched BET.

I do enjoy me a little Black Entertainment Television.

Chip drove us down to the lake to visit the Cajun Snowball stand.

When I was growing up, we called this a Hawaiian Ice stand.  It seems the ethnicity has changed behind the concept.

It's still a bunch of shaved ice with Kool-aid mix poured over the top that loses its flavor before the ice is all consumed. 

It was refreshing.  

We got tatted up, courtesy of Kat Von D, aka Caroline.

Trinity opted for a forearm tattoo.

I chose the ever classy inner ankle locale for my cupcake tat.

I thought about a butt hat tattoo, you know, the kind that sits at a girl's lower waist, on her back?

Here I am thinking about that and giggling.

I quite loathe tattoos, not to be mean.

If you want one, great, I'm just not a fan.

I'm not really sure how I found and married a man who is almost 36 years old and survived Spring Breaks 1994-1999 without getting inked.

I'm just lucky, I guess.  

We dudded up and attended church with Aunt Shirley at the Presbyterian church.

It was my first Presbyterian experience.

I like to say "Presbyterian."

I also like that those Protestants don't kneel.

Can a pregnant woman get an amen?

Amen.

I have started to abstain from the kneeling at mass.

I'm getting larger, as you can see, so I'm sure no one is looking askance at my resistance to knee resting. 

Shirley is a multi-tasking church attendee.

She is an active member, but also the pianist, and the treasurer.

We loved seeing her. 

T's family on his mother's side are long time members of this sweet church in McKenzie.  

We are home now and will soon start to put together the nursery.  I will post pictures when we are done!

Moving Right Along

The summer heat wave in Indiana continues.  I have been trying to make better choices in attire, so as to avoid sweating in unfortunate locales.  My mother went with me on Wednesday for my 28 week appointment.

She takes a better picture.

I wore a zebra print dress that is quite drafty, so it was perfect.

It is not maternity, so I just stretched that pattern to an entirely new level.

We were pleased to find out that our girl seems to be of average size, as we had an additional growth ultrasound.  My OB thought she might be quite tiny after the 20 week one.  Fortunately, she measured in the 49th percentile at 28 weeks, and is estimated to weigh 2 lbs, 8oz.

The words "average" and "normal" were music to my ears.

I really can't imagine that I won't birth a behemoth of a child, as my poor mother pushed out a toddler when I was born at over 9lbs.

I don't think she will be a big baby, but we still have 10-12 weeks to see.

Trinity was a peanut, though, as he continues to be.

I'm currently suffering from an affliction where my already trim husband decides to beef up his workout routine and clean up his eating a tad as I grow larger daily.  

Just love him for that!

In fact he told me that he forgot something the other day because he was too busy with GCP.

He explained that this is his lingo for "gym, cafe, parfait."

He calls black coffee "cafe."  Like he's fancy or something.  He enjoys this routine on the weekend, where he goes to the gym and then gets a black coffee and a fruit and yogurt parfait from McDonald's.  

Lord.

In other developments, I saw two of my college friends last weekend.  

Tiny Kate came in from Chicago.

I always love to see her sweet face and little 5'1" self.

She stayed at Meg's house and we went to dinner on Saturday.

Meg's life has changed a bit.

Check out those precious littles.  

The heat wave has me and kitty laying low.

She always lays low, I suppose.

She was being ever so supportive the other day while I watched the morning news. 

T left for work this morning after telling us, "Now my 3 best girls better take it easy today.  It's too hot to do a lot."

Silly man!  We need no reminders foster our lethargy!  Now go to work so we can watch Wimbledon.

These prints arrived for G's nursery.

I'm enjoying all of this fluff, as I have almost exactly 4 weeks until I'm back waddling the hallways in my new job.

Summer Putzing

I so wish I had exciting pictures and stories to share.  I am in the middle of my typical summer putzing, when I do so little it is a bit embarrassing.  

We took my 27 week picture in front of the fireplace.  

We're mixing it up.

I'm not sure why I'm standing like a linebacker doing a pelvic tilt dance.

The belly is getting bigger, and so are those glorious Polish thighs.

I had a typical summer putzing day on Friday, when I drove up to Zionsville to eat cookies.

Everyone does that, right?

I do love Main Street in Zionsville since it is so cute and quaint.

I discovered a bakery up there that makes macarons.  They have officially replaced the cupcake in my sweets lovin'.

I simply had to get them.

I quickly snarfed down vanilla and framboise, which is French for raspberry.

I think.

I zippidy-do-dahed down to Nordstrom, with birthday gift cards from sister, Chipper and Caroline burning a hole in my purse.

I didn't find anything that I was dying to have, so I decided to save them for the Anniversary Sale, which is right up there with Jesus' birthday, my anniversary and birthday as my favorite time of the year.  

I love to call ahead and go behind the curtain to "preview" when they're still setting up and pretend I'm all fancy and not just a teacher with a spending problem.  

I did buy these handy dandy neon hair ties.

Source: google.com via Betsy on Pinterest

I like them a lot.

I also went to see Moonrise Kingdom by myself that afternoon.

I love to see movies alone.  I'm not really sure if that's totally true or if I just learned to love it when I was single and then when I married a man who basically refuses to go to a movie theater.  

Wes Anderson maintains his brilliant, artsy-fartsy creative director status in my book.

I stuffed another macaron in my gullet as I enjoyed that cinematic masterpiece, since I had to purchased one to go too.  

I arrived home to find that Genevieve's pillow covers arrived.  

I loved the packaging.  

I ordered five to line the back of her crib, which I will then remove every night so she doesn't spit all over them. 

That would be tragic.

Her furniture should arrive later this week, along with some Etsy prints I ordered.  

I have been calling daycares this morning and feeling like  a total mother imposter.

I still can't believe this child is mine, even though she kicks me every 30 seconds.

It's a surreal feeling!

Childbirth Class and Sweaty Boobs=Bully

Trinity and I started our 7 week childbirth class last evening.  The class meets each week for 2 1/2 hours and focuses on Lamaze breathing, information on the 3rd trimester, childbirth, medical intervention, breastfeeding and infant care.  

Last night's class lasted almost 3 hours and I think my husband nearly died.

My first clue when he leaned over to me after one hour and said "this is just an hour class, right?"

Um, no.

I was excited to head to a class that required me to bring a pillow.

T and the other dads participated in a "demonstration" of the weight that a pregnant woman carries.

T is in yellow, clearly looking upwards for some sweet salvation from this torture.

They held a blanket taut to represent the pelvic floor and she dropped in weighted bags of rice to represent the placenta, extra blood volume,etc.

T noted that it was "heavy."

Yes, heavy, Trinity.

Only that rice didn't kick the tar out of your insides.

So you don't get it.

Our class ran over due to our breathing and relaxation exercises.  

I got to sit on that giant green birthing ball as it was the biggest size and I was taller than all of the other mothers by at least 6 inches.

High five for Giantess status.

T rubbed my back as I did breathing very similar to what I do in yoga.

I learned my husband gives a great back rub.

He would not have initiated this, but the other menfolk were doing it, and the teacher encouraged him to do so.

I think I will be enjoying this class more than him, since it was so cold in there and I got to relax.

This brings me to the other part of my post title, the sweaty boobs=bully part.

It's really hot in Indiana.

I'm not liking it.  I am gaining weight, my limbs are swelling slightly, and I am hot.  I'm sweating in places that I didn't know existed.

It's all making me rather cranky, really.

My family let me know this past weekend that my discomfort is causing me to be mean.

I am picking on everyone, making little digs and overall making my immediate family feel like worthless dirtbags.

My brother engaged me in a  little Come to Jesus talk last night about my attitude.  I claimed I wasn't unkind in the least.  He said that I had reverted back to Junior High Betsy.

Ouch.

No one, and I mean, no one, needs to be subjected to that era again.

I am vowing to be kinder to my family.

I must remind myself that although I am sweating profusely when I leave the house, I am currently not working, thus my days are filled with naps, yoga and watching episodes of The Closer.

I have little to be irritated about.  

For anyone who was concerned, my husband has not been subjected to my ire.

I am still nice to him.

No divorce in sight.  

Garage Sales and Father's Day

My mother and I decided to participate in my neighborhood's annual summer garage sale.  It was our first attempt at such an event.  

It was hilarious.  

Thursday evening we prepped the garage for serious selling.  We didn't have any tables, so right away we knew we would be pegged as amateurs.  We soldiered on.  

I helped very little, because, well... I'm pregnant.

That fact is totally irrelevant, as we all know.

I really just don't like helping.  

Trinity and Robby lugged out furniture that we needed to sell to prepare Genevieve's nursery.  

Mom unloaded trinkets from the last 30 years, at least those that didn't drown in the flood.  

Prices on her items ranged from $.25-$1.50, so she was set to make a killing.  

My husband tried to sneak out wedding gifts that he felt were unnecessary.  I stopped him at every turn.  

* Mother is deciding how to price Ralph Wigham from The Simpsons.  He sold for $1.  

Robby reclaimed old Sega games and various items from his childhood and put them in his trunk.  Robby is a bit of a memory keeper in the form of stuff.  He is reluctant to let things go.  I didn't make fun of him at all for this. 

Jane left Friday afternoon with $46 in her pocket, about enough to cover the gas and Starbucks she consumed driving to my house.  

T and I made a profit of $250, selling our old grill, a few pieces of furniture and some of my old pajamas.  That old lady is going to love those pjs. 

We had lots of no-sells.  

like these dolls I had as a young lass.  Her clothes were seasonal.  

On Saturday morning we departed early for a fun filled Father's Day weekend extravaganza.  When we arrived at my parents' house, Robeghan gave me a birthday gift. 

They have a much better understanding of the gift packaging presentation.  

The six of us loaded into a red Dodge Caravan that Robby rented from the airport and headed to St. Louis.  The Thrifty rental car guys gave him a bit of trouble at the rental counter at Indianapolis International Airport because he was a "local" and picking up his rental at 9:00 p.m. on a Friday night.  Local yokels renting mini vans from their city of residence and picking up prostitutes and doing 8 balls of cocaine is somewhat of an issue, and I guess Robby looked suspicious.

I just made that up, but just the part about coke binging and such.  They really were not pleased because I guess local  people might rent cars for parties or something less imaginative than the aforementioned visual I created.  Robby explained he was picking up his Baby Boomer parents, fiancé, pregnant sister and brother-in-law and driving to St. Louis to see a Cardinals game and go to Grant's Farm.  

They gave him the van.   

We arrived safely and I became increasingly concerned about the heat.  93 degrees was the forecast, and sunny.  

Here's a before picture of part of the crew headed into Busch stadium.

Look at me, I'm like all happy that I'm going to eat a hot dog. 

Fast forward one hour.

Holy Mother of God, it was hot.

I was glistening.

T was straight up sweating his a** off.

This is when I was feeling very grateful to my father, and his habit of buyng high priced tickets.  Since we were practically sitting in the 1st baseman's hip pocket, we were allowed access to this underground lair of luxury.

It was a small air-conditioned lounge under the bleachers and it was heaven.  I may have spent the entire game sitting down there, eating Ben and Jerry's mango sorbet. 

I had a trusty companion in Caroline.

She got sassy ra-ras.  

Katie and Chip stayed out in their seats almost the entire game.  That's why I don't have pictures of them.  I lasted about 25 minutes out there, in 3 minute increments.  

Mom and Dad survived.  Mother was wearing her "I'm having tea and crumpets in an English garden" straw hat to protect her face.  

and here comes Betsy beast.

My ankles and feet had swollen to the size of sausages due to heat and baby, I guess.

My precious brother in law was sure to comment on them, and those sandals had to practically be cut off my tootsies.  I fear I may continuously battle with what I will henceforth refer to as 

Big Trouble in Little China feet.  

If you don't know this movie, you haven't lived.  Watch it.  It stars Kurt Russell and Kim Cattrall in all of their campy 80s glory fighting an evil Chinese man named Lo Pan.  We loved it as kids, particularly the part where the guy swells and then bursts into a pile of lettuce and various other vegetables.  I couldn't find a google image of his feet, but you get the idea here...

this is what my feet looked like.

Not good.

We wrapped up our family weekend at Grant's Farm, where we visited lots of animals, including Clydesdales.  

We had a great time visiting with my family and celebrating T's first Father's Day.  It's hard to believe that next year we'll have a 9 month old daughter!

My Birthday

My birthday started a bit early when Trinity came home from work with this box-

those would be the chocolate macarons that I fell in love with last summer in Seattle. 

T had his pal Andy pick them up when he went to Seattle this week for work.

That's some planning!

I was thrilled. 

I opened it after my intermediate/advanced yoga class on Monday evening, which is becoming increasingly more slow flow/Betsy modifies everything and spends a lot of time in child's pose.  

T bought me this Lulu top in California as an early gift to better accommodate my growing girth.  

Last night we bought Trinity a new natural gas grill.

This was an hour and a half endeavor as he had to bargain with the Lowe's peeps to get the same deal he found at Home Depot.

I was forced to sit on a lawn mower and wait.  

This morning I was presented with my final gift.  Trinity knows I love gift packaging, so he went into my closet, snagged this gift bag full of maternity clothes I borrowed from Nicole, dumped them all over the floor and then dropped a teeny box inside this giant bag, sans tissue.  

He really gets what I mean when I say swanky presentation.  

I do love my new necklace.

I wore it today for my 33rd birthday/week 26 picture.

I am definitely growing.  This top accentuates that.  My innie belly button is rapidly becoming an outie and I am not handling it well.  No one can control what kind of former link they had to their mothers, but outies gross me out.

They make me think of Cabbage Patch Dolls (terrifying) and tied ends of balloons (even more terrifying.)

I shall soon have an outie, which I will be unable to touch or gaze upon.

I am excited to see my entire family this weekend, and collect more gifts.

I got a Bonefish gift card from Aunt Shirley because she knows I can down some serious Bang Bang.

Eddie and Pat sent me a gift card to A Pea in the Pod for a fun shower dress.

Yay!

Lastly, BFF Marinda nailed it!

Petunia the goose is my favorite book character.  Most of these are out of print, but she has a way, that little sneak.

These will go in Vivi's library and I am thrilled!