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    Getting to know ME!

    January 27th, 2008

    I have nothing new baby related just yet. S has been sick all week with a cold and a sprained back (makes for a great combo), and I’m trying hard to avoid his germies. He is the most diligent patient of anything. It’s a little annoying in how perfect he is at following instructions. I’m more of a “listen to your body” kinda gal.

    The worst part of S being sick, for me – because of course I’m selfish about it, has been sleeping. I love cuddling with him – it’s the best part of night time, but with him being stuffed up, cuddling means a big fat snore in my ear. Now, I’m very proud to be able to say that I can sleep through anything. My proudest story is falling asleep in a dance club while waiting for my friends to leave. Snoring on the other hand, when it’s not consistent, and comes in varying decibels drives me simply bonkers. And of course I want my darling man to be comforted at night and stay close, but snoring in my ear is not good and makes for a cranky me in the AM.
    This morning I put a pillow over my head. It didn’t work. I should have taken him up on his ear-plugs offer 🙁

    I hope he gets well soon!

    So while you wait for some intriguing kid news, I’m getting on the bandwagon and doing the “Getting to Know You” poll.

    1. WERE YOU NAMED AFTER ANYONE? Sorta – I was the first grandkid in the family, and it’s often tradition to have children named after grandparents. In order to appease both of my grandmothers, my father took the first letter of each of their names, and created a super long name that is unconventional and rare even in my culture. A is my nick-name. My full name contains 9 letters, that even I couldn’t pronounce growing up. The story is that I actually gave myself my own nick-name. Apparently it’s all that I could pronounce. My full name is great though. Although I don’t use it publicly or professionally, I’d never change it. Plus it’s great, because when phone solicitors call butchering it up, I know what I’m in for:)
    2. WHEN WAS THE LAST TIME YOU CRIED? A few days ago listening to a radio story. Pregnancy really does make you weepy!
    3. DO YOU LIKE YOUR HANDWRITING? Yep, although I don’t get to hand-write much these days. It’s small, straight, and most people can’t read it!
    4. WHAT IS YOUR FAVORITE LUNCH MEAT? Mortadella finely sliced salami… but the kind without the pistachios.
    5. DO YOU HAVE PET? Yes – an awesome Red Mackerel Main Coon named Neko. He’s not friendly to outsiders. No clue why and it’s a little sad really, because when it’s just S and me, he is the sweetest kitty ever. I think he has multiple personality disorder. On a bonus side though, I rarely worry about our house being broken into. Neko is more of a guard dog than houses with dogs!
    6. IF YOU WERE ANOTHER PERSON WOULD YOU BE FRIENDS WITH YOU? I’d like to think so.
    7. DO YOU USE SARCASM? Me? Sarcasm? Never! ;p
    8. DO YOU STILL HAVE YOUR TONSILS? Nope, I’ve had all 3 removed…. At different times. NOT fun!
    9. WOULD YOU BUNGEE JUMP? Hellz yez!
    10. WHAT IS YOUR FAVORITE CEREAL? Great Grains. Yummy!
    11. DO YOU UNTIE YOUR SHOES WHEN YOU TAKE THEM OFF? Depends on which shoes.
    12. DO YOU THINK YOU ARE STRONG? Most of the time, yes. Emotionally speaking I deal through difficult situations and then in private freak out about them. There have been two exceptions: learning my mom had cancer, and the first time I got news of my dad’s heart condition. It’s hard to think of loosing your parents!
    13. WHAT IS YOUR FAVORITE ICE CREAM? Safeway used to sell this ice-cream called Portofino. I liked the Vanilla and hazelnut. Alas, it no more. I like hazelnut gellato in general though.
    14. WHAT IS THE FIRST THING YOU NOTICE ABOUT PEOPLE? Their height.
    15. RED OR PINK? Red!
    16. WHAT IS THE LEAST FAVORITE THING ABOUT YOURSELF? Right now, and pregnancy aside, the fact that I’m out of shape and have no will-power to eat healthily.
    17. WHO DO YOU MISS THE MOST? My family! I wish they lived closer.
    18. WHAT COLOR ARE YOUR EYES? Dark, dark brown.
    19. WHAT COLOR PANTS AND SHOES ARE YOU WEARING? Right now I’m in my PJ’s so, green.
    20. WHAT WAS THE LAST THING YOU ATE? Wheat Thin crackers late at night. Small snacks when tummy is upset apparently keeps away the nausea.
    21. WHAT ARE YOU LISTENING TO RIGHT NOW? Birds chirping in my back-yard. Oh, and the heater kicking off.
    22. IF YOU WERE A CRAYON, WHAT COLOR WOULD YOU BE? Blue. It’s my favorite!
    23. FAVORITE SMELLS? The smell of wet cement right after it’s been washed. Yep, I’m a freak – don’t judge! In the building I grew up they’d wash the stairway, and the smell of wet cement just bring up memories of my childhood. It’s just a good smell.
    24. WHO WAS THE LAST PERSON YOU TALKED TO ON THE PHONE? My sister.
    25. DO YOU LIKE THUNDERSTORMS? Nope.
    26. FAVORITE SPORTS TO WATCH? I don’t watch sports on TV, but if you made me pick, I’d choose rhythmic gymnastics.
    27. HAIR COLOR? I’m a Brunette. I like myself with a reddish brown color most though.
    28. DO YOU WEAR CONTACTS? Nope, although I see that changing in a few years.
    29. FAVORITE FOOD? Italian.
    30. SCARY MOVIES OR HAPPY ENDINGS? Happy endings: I really avoid scary movies – I’m a scaredy-cat. Seriously. I don’t like being in the dark by myself. I’m XX years old, and I think my kid will be able to sleep in the dark and be braver than me.
    31. LAST MOVIE YOU WATCHED? Waitress: It was OK. If anyone else chose to watch it, I’d recommend turning on the captions and going to the first fast-forward speed of your DVD player. It was definitely on the slow side.
    32. WHAT COLOR SHIRT ARE YOU WEARING? Gray. Don’t judge – PJ’s don’t have to color coordinate and the sleep fairy doesn’t care what you’re wearing – it’s dark and she can’t see you anyway.
    33. SUMMER OR WINTER? Winter. Especially if it snows.
    34. Hugs or kisses? Hugs, most definitely.
    35. FAVORITE DESSERT? Tiramisu baby! Best part of our wedding cake was our tiramisu layer. So glad we found our baker!
    36. WHAT BOOK ARE YOU READING NOW? I have a couple floating around: Religion for Dummies, Your Pregnancy Week by Week and The New Well Pregnancy Book. Your Pregnancy Week by Week gets the most play though.
    37. WHAT IS ON YOUR MOUSE PAD? I’m a Windows person, but I have a Mac Safari promotional mouse-pad at work. At home, it’s my laptop.
    38. ROLLING STONES OR BEATLES? Pink Floyd!
    39. WHAT IS THE FARTHEST YOU HAVE BEEN FROM HOME? Australia, and I’d go back in a heart-beat.
    40. WHERE WERE YOU BORN? Eastern Europe. Bulgaria to be exact.

    Play along if you’d like 🙂


    We graduated from our RE clinic!

    January 22nd, 2008

    Today has been a good day. We had our second ultrasound and it went well. There’s still a kid in there hanging strong. No miracle twin surprises.

    But you wanna see it?

    8w3d u/s - front view

    8w3d u/s - side view

    In the first picture at the top it’s looking right at you, so you see its little hunched head and limb nubbins. At the bottom photo you can get a better side view. And yeah, that’s probably not a nose quite yet, but it’s where a future nose is forming.

    The little peanut is measuring 18mm crown to rump – that’s roughly the size of an edamame bean. It has a strong little heart beat of 169bpm, which may be high to you and I, but it’s a good measurement for an embryo.

    Because we’re doing so well, our RE clinic has “graduated” us from their care. I will now be transferred to the care of my regular OBGYN. I have an appointment with them next Tuesday, so a week away. S is coming with me. I’m hoping that he can give me his opinion afterwards if we should stay with that practice or look for a new OB.
    Meanwhile, I’m having a copy of all my records sent to me. Apparently if your doctor has records from another physician, if you ever transfer care they can only copy and transfer their own records and won’t transfer anything done by another provider. All this means is that my RE records will be missing if I switch OB’s down the line. FYI to all you other folk out there.

    I’ll also be reducing my Progesterone daily dosage. I’ll go down to taking it 2 times a day vs. 3, and in two weeks I’ll go down to only once daily. S has come up with all-so-pretty names for these pills. I wanna share so badly, but it would turn this post from the remotely PG-13 content to a very clear X-rated category.


    I saw where babies come from today

    January 19th, 2008

    S and I are thinking about switching OBGYN’s. Since OBGYN’s and delivery hospitals come in pairs, we figured we’ll visit a few of the local hospitals around, until we found one we liked and work backwards.

    … so today was the visit to our first hospital. It was a nice place – gave us some good things to think about.

    As we showed up to the hospital there were at least a dozen other couples already there. Most everyone was towards the tail end of their second trimester because there were baby bumps supported by just about every woman on that tour. I felt a little out of place lacking a bump of my own.

    The tour started with a visit to the Special Nursery. Sadly it’s where babies that need some help are there. It was nice to see the nurses be so attentive, but a little sad too.

    Then we were issued to a private delivery room.

    S was asked to do some role playing with the nurse for the benefit of the tour. So there he was squatting towards the end of the bed, pretending to be The Doctor.

    Then IT happened. Apparently with a few minor changes the most innocent looking hospital bed, in full-on Transformers fashion, can turn into a Delivering device with crazy stirrups, handles and a collection container. I think I know what this is for 🙁

    I think it was at the stage that the bottom of the bed went away, and the grab bars came out that I realized what S and I are about to embark on. I, no joke, had a panic attack. It was just like ring shopping before S and I got engaged – too many options…it was just overwhelming.

    Now… to understand said panic attack – let me tell you a little about me. As interested as I am about kids, parenting (and of course the process of getting pregnant), I have always asked to NOT hear birthing stories – it was just something I wanted to leave for myself for after I was already pregnant. Some parents want to be surprised about the gender of their child… I’ve wanted to be surprised about the labor. “Ignorant until the end!” It’s been my policy and request. Well… now I am pregnant and my ignorance got a kick in its rear.

    The bed – the bed is where babies come from!

    In the classroom at the end of the tour we saw some other goodies that you take home after the birth. I gotta tell you – on TV when you see the mom walk her baby home looking all happy, perky and skinny – it don’t work like that!

    When the tour was over, I asked S to let me sit there for a bit. I was feeling faint. I think there’s a reason you’re not supposed to do the tour in the “nauseous” trimester. It just makes you imagine things that your stomach just doesn’t think are pretty 🙂

    Interestingly enough though, now that we’re home and I’ve had a few hours to process I’m actually getting excited about it. I want our little one to be healthy and happy through the next months.

    There are things that I saw though that I’d never thought would be important to me: things like having your own private room the whole time and not having your baby ever leave the room without your request. Wireless access is also a nice bonus ;p

    It’s also made me think about who I want to be there for the labor. For our loved ones that read this blog, please be OK when I say that for the labor part, in the room, I just want to share a private experience with my husband. I love you all, but after what I saw today, you’re welcome to join us in the hospital and greet our new addition as soon as we’re all cleaned up. For your benefit S is already planning on asking our Doc to wear a helmet cam, but unfortunately for you, I’m can’t squash that idea soon enough.
    I think a possible exception to this might be my mom. She might be the only person other than S I’d like to have in there… provided she wants to and doesn’t freak her out… after all, she did faint watching me get my ears pierced ;p I LOVE YOU MOM!

    So… with our big adventure today, S and I will have many questions.

    Here’s the first: what’s the shower for? They told us to have S bring a bathing suit so he can be in the shower with me. It’s funny that there is a private shower in the delivery room, but not a shower in the post-partum room. What gives?


    Cravings, Queasiness, Food aversions, oh my!

    January 13th, 2008

    Lookie — two posts in two days. You must be lucky!

    I think I’m finally starting to feel pregnant. As always it’s the ever-so-popular phrase “Be careful what you wish for!”

    I’m giddy I’m finally here…. of course mixed in with a small dose of regret for complaining about it a few weeks ago.

    Let’s start with last night:
    S and I went out to see Cirque with some friends. We caught the early show so afterwards we went to grab some dinner. Our place of choice? Amici’s Pizza. As we’re done with our meal, right before we leave the restaurant, I attend to my now standard “go potty” routine. As I’m on my way back to the table I pass by a birthday cake: a tall cake with white frosting with a chocolate sauce on the top with intentional drippings on the sides. I walk by it and think “Yum!”.
    Then the cake began to stalk me. It magically developed candles and someone carried it right behind me and plopped it on the table right next to ours. The kids were giddy. I was salivating. I whimpered “Birthday Cake!”….
    We go get our parking ticket validated after making a little shopping spree at Safeway. Of course you walk in through the door, and what is the first department 10 feet from the door? Pastries — with juicy, tasty looking cakes lined up to the window.
    S is trying to calm me down and lead me away from the path of temptation.

    BIG MISTAKE!!!

    “Why?” you might ask. Well, come 5am this little filly wakes up mad, and hungry. For what? CAKE!!!!

    I have never had a craving so bad that it wouldn’t go away!

    Finally this afternoon after non-stop cake thoughts I caved in — I went to our local market and bought myself the tiniest, tiniest cake I could find. It was in a tiny container the size of an orange. I ate half of it and now I’m finally happy!

    I kinda thought pregnancy cravings were kind of a joke. I’m formally eating my words. Pregnancy cravings are dangerous, dangerous things!

    Now I feel bad for threatening S that I’m purposefully going to give him a craving of cheese that has to come from Paris, France. What if I really do?

    Now… onto Queasiness.

    After waking up mad that I got no cake, nor had any cake, I went back to bed and begrudgingly back to sleep. I slept poorly — bad dreams, crampy tummy, it was awful. I had to reach over and grab my “emergency” crackers. I ate three while half asleep trying to convince myself I was just hungry and with a few crackers “Life would be better”.

    I was wrong! I spent my day today curled up in bed feeling “not so right”. No official Toilet God contributions, but enough to put me feel poopie until noon. At least it happened on a day where I was planning on hanging out in bed anyway.

    The weird part — right now I am thrilled to be able to say this! After waiting so long to get pregnant, I couldn’t be happier!

    … but the thought of being sick daily for another 7 weeks isn’t so thrilling 🙂


    Aaaah! Baby Names

    January 12th, 2008

    Yeah, yeah, I know it’s early, but over the last few weeks S and I have been around some other pregnant couples (in person and online) and names have come up. Three times this week, interestingly enough!

    I don’t know if this is typical, but S and I have become kinda greedy and protective of our names… esp. with people due before us — almost for fear that they’ll name their child the same and we’ll feel like the “us too” family.

    I know that you can’t call “dibbs” on a name… or at least it’s poor form to… so S and I have decided to share with everyone (that reads this post at least) the top picks on our lists of baby names.

    Boys:

    • Griffin
    • Storm
    • Zane

    Girls:

    • Quinn
    • Zoe
    • Alexa

    If you like any of these, already plan to use any of these, or decide that you like them for you own — we will not object or complain… just don’t be surprised if come Labor Day week-end there’s another kid in your ‘hood with the same 🙂

    We’re being honest and up-front now, and not knowing your choices please don’t feel like we’re copying you.

    Down the line, once we know the gender of our kiddo, we’ll compile the final name list, first/middle/last name and will send it to our friends. Why you ask? We need a sanity check — and hence will be inviting our friends to regress to their playground days of making fun of our names to the worst extreme.

    If you’d like to play the “Make fun of our child’s name” game, let me know and I’ll put you on our list.


    I’m pregnant with a blurry dot!

    January 8th, 2008

    Today was our first ultrasound.

    It’s strange to describe the sense of excitement and nervousness that coincided together. For the last two weeks I’ve kept rubbing my belly saying “One or two I just want it to be healthy!”.

    And there was one!

    Doctor B was so excited as she was pointing it out on the screen, and I was both so very, very happy that our baby is healthy and a little sad that our second embryo didn’t make it. I kept being hopeful that both would make it, but I guess it wasn’t meant to be. Whenever I’ve told people in the past that I would love to have twins some would look at me as though I’m crazy. I think it comes down to the fact that S and I love to be challenged: we thrive under pressure and get off on resolving hard situations. Don’t get me wrong, I know that raising even a single child is difficult, and quite frankly if we are “blessed” with the kind of devilish youngster that I was we’ll have our hands plenty full, but still… twins… it was a nice hope while it lasted.

    So my consolation thoughts are:

    • One baby is lower risk, since the chances of carrying to term are higher
    • I won’t get super huge
    • I don’t have to drink twice the amount of water I do now. (Have I told you how often I have to pee?)
    • I “might” be able to get more sleep once the baby is born 
    • Chasing one toddler around the house is easier than chasing two
    • Buying two cars when they turn 16 is more costly than only buying one

    Our little munchkin is measuring right on track. Right now it is the size of a grain of rice. Dr. B even showed us its little fluttering heart beat! I’d be lying if I said I saw it, but S did and that makes me happy.

    Wanna see it?

    6w0d ultrasound

    Confused? That’s why I highlighted the gestational sac in green. The space in between the “x”’s is our little one. It is measuring proudly at 3.3mm.

    We get to go back in another two weeks. After that I should hopefully graduate from our RE clinic and move onto my regular OBGYN.

    Meanwhile, I finally get to setup one of these cute little tickers I see people on Nest proudly sport around their profiles.

    Lilypie Expecting a baby Ticker

    Tee Hee!


    Am I missing out on something?

    January 6th, 2008

    The last two weeks of waiting have felt very long. The only info or feedback to go on is from A – I wake up each morning and ask how she’s doing. Not the normal Good Morning question, I want to know what’s she’s feeling or not feeling. Is she tired? nauseous? in pain? hungry? sleepy? She’s my only link to what’s happening.

    I’ve kept a reserved mindset – I call it Cautiously Optimistic. I think it’s somewhat of a protective approach in case something goes wrong – which is a very real possibility given we are in the very early stages. I’m worried that if I give in to the thrill of the excitement it could make things harder later.

    But I just can’t stop thinking that this is a once in a lifetime opportunity — our first kid. You don’t get to recreate these moments. Am I missing out on a something? Am I going to regret my cautious mindset?


    Is Now the time to Tell?

    January 6th, 2008

    The last week has been filled with mixed emotions. We are at such the early stages that it feels like we shouldn’t tell many people about our state, but that’s seems strange given how open we’ve been with our process (well it’s mostly been A doing the sharing). It didn’t feel right to suddenly go Radio Silent, especially with those that have been following this blog.

    We’ve decided to keep posting on this blog — so we’ll keep posting updates, information on the process, and our general feelings as we continue down this journey. There may be times when you get info from the blog instead of from a direct call or email. Please don’t feel like you’ve been left out — if you are reading this then you are already part of the Inner Circle. Precisely the people that we want and need to provide us with the love and support, regardless of any twists and turns this journey make take.

    The balance we’ve struck is that we have two groups – those that know our Secret and those that don’t. If you were following the blog before we received our BFP (big fat positive) then you know all the details. But until we progress through the first trimester, we’re not broadcasting our news. So help us keep the Secret for a while longer.

    We love the support we’ve received thus far and truly appreciate it. Stayed tuned for more posts.