Reminiscing

Now that summer has come to Alabama , there is only a very fine window of time when it is bearable to be outside. The heat and the humidity are overbearing all day long, and the bugs come out with a vengeance once the sun goes down. These days, I mostly stay inside where the air conditioning makes me want to snuggle up with a blanket.

But I still like to take a daily walk, which means I watch the clock after dinner. The only semi-comfortable time is from 7:30-8:00 at night. It's cooled off enough to be bearable, and it's not quite dark yet, so the bugs are still tolerable.

Tonight I headed out at 7:36. It was muggy, but the wind was blowing and there were clouds headed our way for a rainstorm, which always cools things off AND keeps the bugs away. Bonus!

At 7:41 I felt a small raindrop on my arm. I kept going.

At 7:44 four more raindrops hit me, two on the arm, one on the leg, and one on the face. I thought about turning around, but decided I was close to halfway through the route so I might as well continue on and get a couple hills in.

7:45: The rain started to pour. Pour. And you know what, I smiled. I kept walking, got more and more wet, and got nostalgic. It made me think about how often I went out in rainstorms when I was a teenager. I would dance in the rain, jump in the puddles, walk through the rivers in the gutter. I loved being outside in the rain. I decided to love it today.

Only one problem: going downhill, my feet were sliding out of the front of my flip-flops. I was afraid I would scrape my toes on the road, so ... I just took my shoes off. I walked a little slower after that, but felt it was worth it.

Cars passed, and I waved and smiled. Who knows what they were thinking. It reminded me of a time in junior high that my friend Lacy and I were walking home from school and her mom came to pick us up because it was raining. We declined the car ride, and walked the mile in the rain instead, mostly in the gutter rivers. Just because it was fun.

Why don't I do things like this more often? It felt so good to let go and be young!

8:03: Walked in the house, took my sopping picture and hung my wet clothes on the banister to dry.

Pink or Blue?

Todd and I have been anxiously counting down the months, weeks, and now days until Friday, July 18th, the day we find out if The Bean is a boy or a girl. We are dying with anticipation, and really hoping we get a clear view on the ultrasound so the suspense can be laid to rest and we can stop calling The Bean an "it."
Basically every day, I ask Todd what kind he thinks the baby is, and then I tell him what I'm thinking. Our answers vary from day to day, depending on gut instincts. We also have to rate it. For instance, Todd will say, "I'm feeling boy, 55%," or "Girl today, 62." In general, Todd thinks it's a boy the majority of the time, but rarely goes above 58%. I swing all over the board, and have even thought boy AND girl as strongly as 85% on different days. We were both in a girl kick right after my dream I posted about a couple weeks ago, but for the most part, it's been a tight race.

As the countdown begins (only nine days left!), we enlist the gut instincts of all our faithful readers. Please vote for what you think we're having on the poll on the sidebar. One vote per person, and please, everyone let us know what you think. It's all fun and games. And the poll is open!

The Big Easy

With only seven or eight weeks left until we move out of the South (yay!), Todd and I decided to take advantage of the time he had off for the holiday and drive out to New Orleans, Louisiana for the Fourth of July.

We left Thursday morning and arrived in N.O. in the afternoon. We planned to visit the Contemporary Arts Center, a large museum with a sizable collection of contemporary art, local and otherwise, that just happened to be free on Thursdays. Unfortunately, when we got there, a sign on the door announced that it was closed for renovations until the following week. Small frown.
Instead, we hopped on the streetcar (half trolley, half bus) and rode it uptown and back, getting a great view of the Garden District and plenty of true Southern-style homes. We also noticed that there were Mardi Gras beads stuck in tons of the trees, as though they had been thrown up there and never cleaned off. Interesting.
For dinner we had roast beef and ham Po Boys at Mother's Restaurant, complete with debris. Debris? you might ask. Sounded gross, until we found a list of terms and their definitions on the back of the menu. It's the roast beef that falls into the gravy when it's being cooked. Super soft and way too delicious. We were impressed with the spicy Cajun mustard, as well.
Then we took a stroll through the French Quarter, including Bourbon Street. It was after 7:00 at that point, and the parties were just getting started. Todd received a "Party Pooper" ticket because we didn't look like we were drunk yet. The whole street was scandalous. I kept covering Todd's eyes, and eventually, we just cut over to the next block. I asked Todd if that was what Vegas was like, and he said no, that made Vegas look tame. I'll spare you the rest of the details.
At 8:00, we went to Preservation Hall for a traditional jazz concert. It was a big band night and took me back to college, when I used to go to jazz class improv jam sessions. Ah, yeah! We've got some of the music on the video below, if you want to check it out yourself.
Friday we went on a swamp tour through the Louisiana bayou. We saw lots of little alligators (maybe four feet) and plenty of egrets and mullet fish, along with lots of true bayou trees. For lunch we had to try crawfish kickers at the local diner. The locals were speaking another language - Creole French, I believe. It was cool to hear.
Later Todd and I went on a hike through a bayou in a natural preserve. It was cool. There were banana spiders everywhere, and tons of frogs with lots of different calls. One of them sounded like a sheep "baa-ing." Craziness.
We had Cajun pasta for dinner, and then watched the Fourth of July fireworks lit off a barge on the Mississippi River.
Saturday we drove to the Baton Rouge Temple and did a session, and then we drove home. It was a fun little trip.
Here's the video Todd made. I really dig that music!

Hamburdogs

What do you do when you invite friends over for Sunday night hamburgers, but when you get home from church you discover that you don't have any hamburger buns?

Serve hamburdogs!

Baby Dreams

Earlier this week, I dreamed about The Bean, the child within me. It was a girl, and she wasn't born yet. In fact, she was quite accurately aged - just under 4 months developed (a fetus.)

We were underwater, because she couldn't survive out of it, and now that I think about it, I think we were swimming in amniotic fluid. She was shimmery, kind of a silvery-blue all over. She laughed a lot.

We were playing catch with a little ball that was the perfect size for her hand. She was very good at catching the ball. A genius! I actually think now that the ball must have been the nucleus, the part that gives support the first trimester until the placenta takes over the job. Now that she's old enough not to need it, we were playing with it.

Anyway, we were just swimming around, throwing the nucleus to each other, and I was praising her for doing such a good job throwing and catching, and she was giggling up a storm. Shimmery silver fetus. A girl. So sweet.

Knock it off, Napoleon. Just make yourself a dang quesadilla!

Last night I made chicken quesadillas and rice-a-roni for dinner. There were leftovers, so I took out the plastic wrap, intending to wrap each quesadilla separately to make them easy for Todd to take as lunches. Suddenly, an undeniable urge to go to the bathroom hit, so I left it all on the counter and did my business. When I came back a minute later, everything was off the counter and Todd was just closing the fridge. Impressed, I thanked him for cleaning up dinner. Sure, he was too fast to have wrapped them all individually, but such is life. He could wrap them later when he packed his lunches.

Well, I wanted one of the quesadillas for lunch today, so I took the tupperware out of the fridge. I couldn't help but laugh out loud when I saw how Todd had packed last night's dinner away.
Such a guy! I would have thought he'd at least put the rice in a separate container! Too funny. No wonder he was done so fast.

Help! I'm only 16 weeks and I've already developed Pregnant Brain. How am I supposed to survive for the next six months?

I went grocery shopping yesterday. I walked in, grabbed a cart, went to the produce section. Checked my list:

fruit (no apples)
lettuce
green pepper

Grabbed some nectarines, pears, bananas, a green pepper, a head of romaine. Looked at the list to see what I needed next. But wait! My list was NOT in my hand! I didn't remember setting it down. I looked in my cart. Nope. Checked my purse. Uh-uh. Went back to each section where I had picked up produce, to see if I had set it down while filling my bags. Nada. I looked on the floor. Nothing. No list. And I couldn't remember much of what was on it.

I then had to push my cart up and down every single isle, so I could see if my memory would be jogged by certain items. Oh, yeah! We need jam. Got it. I still have no idea if I got everything that was on my list.

When I got home, I noticed I'm almost out of vanilla. Should have bought some. But I don't remember putting it on the list before. (Smile.)

Which Chair Should I Choose?

So I'm currently debating nursery seating. I want something comfy to rock the baby to sleep on in the middle of the night, and a place to sit while I feed the kid as well. The question is, what kind of a chair is best? I'd like some input, please.

I'm almost positive I don't want one of these:

I mean, where's the comfort? There's nothing to snuggle my head against when it's 3:00 in the morning. Personally, I think these belong on a porch.

The real debate is, do I get one of these:
Or one of these:
The rocking armchair is really peaking my fancy. It's similar to what my mom had at home, and they seem so luxurious. The real problem is I can only find expensive ones. I like that they can have slipcovers that can be washed, and that they will still look good when you move them to your living room later in life. But am I being indulgent? Shouldn't a glider be good enough? Plus, maybe a glider is actually BETTER, and I just don't know it, because I haven't had a lot of Glider Exposure in my life. So readers, share your thoughts with me.

Quiz of Threes

3 Joys:

1. Todd, especially when he pays a ton of attention to me instead of his homework

2. Knowing there's a baby growing inside of me

3. Family


3 Fears:

1. Taking care of a newborn

2. Cockroaches

3. Being alone outside in the dark


3 Goals:

1. Find the perfect rocking armchair

2. Stay sane for the next year and a half

3. Appreciate every single day I get to spend with Todd


3 Current Obsessions/Collections:

1. Obsessed with watching LOST online. Thanks, Amy Naseath. Your post made me curious. I had never watched it before. Now I'm squeezing in two episodes a day and falling asleep each night thinking about the plot twists.

2. Slowly collecting maternity clothes. I think I'm going to have to start moving faster if I don't want to wear the same shirt and shorts every day next month.

3. Collecting a large pile of pictures I want to scrapbook, and yet, haven't made a page in months. I'm thinking about forcing myself to do 45 minutes of scrapbooking for every LOST episode I watch.


3 Random Surprising Facts About Myself:

1. I love to pluck face hair. I prune my eyebrows thrice weekly, and am always looking for random hairs Todd missed when he shaved so I can pull them out with my tweezers. He also grows prickly hair on the ridges of his ears, and I get to pull those out, too.

2. From 8th-12th grade, I led a group in a week-long celebration titled, "National Spy Association Appreciation Week." I initiated new members each year. We dressed up in wacky clothes and went by spy names, carried around little notebooks and wrote secret observations in them, and had a spy breakfast Friday morning outside the school. I was the Queen Mother Spy. I wish I had pictures of it all, but at the time, I felt it was "confidential," so - nada.

3. I used to HATE to exercise. Now I do it almost every day. Some days I really don't feel like it, but most of the time I crave the energy I get from it. The key is finding activities you like. I prefer pilates, aerobics, and biking.

What Todd and I did for fun last night...

Is it just me, or are extra large t-shirts ridiculously huge?