On the Verge...

I'm not yet. Ready, that is. But I am almost there. And I am only mostly there because I can't even imagine how much bigger I am going to get by the end, if I'm already out of room at 27 weeks! I hope this baby doesn't make me explode. I am NOT ready for actually having a baby in the house. The "nursery" is still a prayer room with a bunch of toys and clothes and bedding piled up in a chair. The other rooms of the house are pretty unorganized and not ready for all of the shifting that is going to have to happen. And I haven't yet done all of the "business" things that I wanted to start before he gets here. I wanted to get my etsy shop up and running, but this sounds so much easier than it actually is. We'll see how far that gets before November... On an optimistic note, I have started a better food/cooking routine for Quinn and I. Up until this point in our marriage, I have been a skillet dinner, frozen pizza, boxed meals kinda w...

I don't know if I am a completely rare case (which I have a hard time believing), or there is just a very sad lack of petite maternity clothing out there.  I am now 21 weeks pregnant and I have purchased two pairs of maternity pants - both online - and been sadly disappointed that, unless I gain an absurd amount of weight in places other than my tummy,  I will never fit into them.   Luckily, some of my pants / shorts are still able to receive the "hair tie - buttonhole" treatment, but I am quickly running out of options.  So now I have resorted to elastic pants, which are horribly unfashionable (and big) and making my own elastic pants, which are even more horribly unfashionable (but less big).    To look more fashionable, I would have to spend approximately $150 and sweat my butt off in designer jeans - like Sevens or Citizens of humanity.  These are seemingly the only jeans that can be bought in an apparently unheard of combination of "25/maternity".  No, my w...

I've had a few people ask me for pictures. "Pictures of what?" I ask. "Of your belly!" They respond, excitedly. Why would anyone want to see my big 'ol stomach? I don't even want to see it. I like the idea of the baby, but I'd take him right now, instead of going through all of the big belly-ness of a 40 week pregnancy. I've also had so many issues with not being able to go to the bathroom for sometimes days on end, that I haven't been sure that my belly is full with the baby or with... something else... But, recently, I've started to realize that I am going to go through this, and that I don't want Abram right now, because I want him to be as healthy as possible. So, if I'm going to have this belly, then I might as well embrace it. So here is one. I guess... enjoy... :P 17 weeks 20 weeks Abram's 20 week Ultrasound. Apparently, his face was pushed up against the placenta and he wouldn't move. So the technici...

There are so many things about being pregnant that people don't generally talk a lot about.  So now that I am experiencing it for the first time in my life, I am continually surprised at things that I am feeling or doing.  Bloody noses, constipation, expanding rib cage, other  strange bodily happenings.  Oh... and: dropping stuff, hitting myself with doors, running into things, spilling... a lot , making food for 10 people when only my husband and I will be eating.... those kind of things. I did the latter yesterday.  I don't know if I just wanted taco soup and I didn't think about the fact that my recipe serves 10, or if I subconsciously wanted to eat a very large pot of it.  But, whatever the case, the pot is made, 2 serving are gone, and the rest is chilling in the fridge. Luckily, it reheats on the stove and microwave quite nicely, is a very good small snack, and my community group will be forced to eat it tonight whether they like it or not! (they say they do, but o...

I have planned for this moment for the last year. I knew that I was going to quit teaching at the end of this school year. I knew that I was going to pack everything in my room and exit the building on June 4th, never to return in the same capacity again. I knew that I was going to be sad. I knew things were going to change. I didn't know things were going to change so very much. Now that the theatre season is officially over, it's like I have nothing to be here for anymore. That's just a testament to the fact that the teaching part of the school day is the torturous part and the after school rehearsal part of the school day is the redeeming part. So when you take the redeeming part out, all you have left is torture. I literally can't stand being in this building anymore. Without seeing my favorite kids at rehearsal every day, I just want to get the day over with and go home and watch TV. "Why CAN'T you see your favorite kids every day anyway?" Y...

You know when someone shows up at a party at your house... and they never take off their jacket? Not like a cute, little,this-is-really-a-part-of-my-outfit jacket, but like a ski jacket. Of course you are going to think that they don't want to be there. And, odds are, they will only stay for 5-10 minutes and then explain that they have another party to attend, or didn't get much sleep the night before, or left the oven on at home. I think it says even more when someone does not take off their jacket throughout the course of an 8-9 hour work day. Now, it's one thing if it is cold inside. Sometimes it is cold here in our classrooms at Hendrickson High School. But we all have individually controlled thermostats that work fairy well 85-90% of the time. And still my co-workers and I will have one of those days where we are too lazy to mess with the temperature and we just never take off our jackets. We are supposed to be skillful educators who welcome students into our ro...

The longer I teach, the more that I find I get involved and (sadly) interested in the high school drama that is constantly unfolding around me. I have a student who is more like a little sister than a student. I actually have never had her in a class. She has been a part of the extracurricular theatre program, so there's a little less of a boundary there than there is with my normal students. She supplies me with all of my information. She is wonderfully (and yet horribly) uninhibited and she will tell me anything. So tonight I not only found out about the relationships that I suspected, but also found out that the children are drinking. And now I have a little inkling of what it's like to be a parent of a teenager. I mean, I did that stuff when I was 18. And I knew that it was wrong. I was a bit more restrained than most of these kids are, though, so I am a bit worried. And how do you say: "Don't do what I did." Especially when you are NOT a parent th...