I have an ultrasound tomorrow where we can find out the baby's gender if it cooperates.

John's money is on a boy.  We'll see.
Love,
Trina

Because Teagan, our scaredy dog, is TERRIFIED of strollers, I decided our first major baby purchase ought to be a stroller so she has lots of time to get used to it without the baby and hopefully not be troubled by it once it contains a baby.

Stroller shopping was very discouraging.  We went to Babies R Us, and I was extremely underwhelmed by everything they had.  I was so underwhelmed, I declared I wasn't going to buy anything and just lug the baby around.  Since that wasn't realistic, John rallied for us to press on.

Like a super yuppy Goldilocks, I did find the one that was just right at Nordstrom at a price of $530.  That outrageous price completely offended my sensibilities (especially when the Consumer Reports best buy stroller was a mere $230), but I couldn't imagine myself with another stroller.  Thus I started looking for used ones.

On craigslist, I found the more deluxe version of my dream stroller for 1/2 off its retail price, which made it only marginally more than the CR recommended stroller.  And it was ORANGE!  A few e-mail exchanges and a test drive later, we brought it home.  Now it just needs a big blue I patch, and it's ready to go.  Yay!

Teagan has been treating it like the vacuum cleaner.  She bolts when it's in motion, but she sniffs it when it's parked.  She's ridiculous, but she's awfully cute!  See:


Love,
Trina

In between my second and third OB appointments, I stopped wanting to eat every 2 hours to assuage my queasiness and lost interest in food in general.  It was hard to eat when I didn't want anything.  Since I figured I had to eat something on a regular basis to keep little baby happy, I had been choking down healthy things like spinach and bananas, but what I really wanted was cherry Pop Tarts with milk or a V-8. 

At my third appointment, I asked the doctor, if I am going to force myself to eat something, what should I eat?  She said that I didn't have to force myself to eat at all and explained that the baby is a parasite that is getting what it needs, so I should only eat when I feel like it and be grateful that I'm not hungrier because it will decrease the likelihood that I will gain 50 pounds.  What a relief!  John thought it was hilarious that she called the baby a parasite.

What John also thought was hilarious about this appointment was I thoughtlessly wore my Pooh Bear undies (a b-day present from Chris and Jayme, who went to Disney World for spring break that year), which cracked up my doctor and led to a whole conversation about whether or not we were going to have a Pooh Bear themed nursery.  That's right, I'm going to be a mom in 5 months, and I still have cartoon underwear and not enough sense to wear them on a day that no one will see them. 

And, no, we're not going to have a Pooh Bear nursery.  John has vetoed all themed nurseries in general.  Party pooper.

Jayme, thank you for the package of baby things.  Everything was totally adorable (I especially loved the teeny hats), and the dogs keep trying an adventure quest to reach the hippo that I have put up on a table and play with it. 
Love, Trina (and John) and Little Baby

The second OB appt is not as exciting as the first because you don't get to see the baby, but it was nice to meet with my doctor and ask her my list of questions.  In addition to a slew of questions about feeling crappy, I double-checked some things about cord blood donation because I had the option to donate publicly, donate to research, or freeze to save for baby.  After working in the Unrelated Donor Program for as long as I did, donating cord blood is very important to me.  We're going to donate it publicly.  I hope it does some good.

We got to listen to the baby's heartbeat, which John admitted afterwards he couldn't hear.    The doctor and I did, though, and she said it sounded good and that the baby was still quite tucked away.

Kinda like the Bat Mobile except with fewer toys attached.

We traded in the Jetta for a Prius.  The Prius was a compromise between my not wanting to part with my small car and acknowledging that a baby and 2 dogs in the backseat of the Jetta was ludicrous.  We bought it on New Year's Eve.

I think my favorite feature on the car is the Bluetooth that comes through the speakers.  It's like Night Rider.  John named the car Penny.  My second favorite feature is the fact that the gas mileage is higher and thus I don't have to go to the gas station as often.  Awesome!

The doggys in the cargo area are darling.  I've caught Ronan looking out the roof at the crows, and both Teagan and Ronan like to rest their chins between the headrests and watch me drive.  There is lots more room in the backseat in comparison to the Jetta and John's Acura for that matter, which is quite nice.  Word on the street is it could be possible to put a car seat back there and squish two people in, so we'll see how that goes.

Our neighbors were teasing us for buying such a Seattle car.  John's brother, James, is excited because he can get an H2 and the Wright family would be carbon neutral, if you believe in that sort of thing. 

I eventually had to get a new bra.  After researching a little bit online and asking a friend for advice (thanks, Mimi), I set my sites on a underwireless bra with lots of support.  I went to the store in search of an18-hour bra.

We made our first venture to Target.  They didn't have anything.  In general, they were quite picked over on the underwireless bras, like I missed a sale or something.  I almost bought a sports bra, but they were extravagantly uni-booby.

Next place we went to was Sears, which is my top-secret destination for most of my specialty underwear items.  I found the rack of 18-hour bras in the display case and headed into the changing room.

Now, I'm not overly vain about my appearance or the clothes I wear, and the 18-hour bra almost made me cry.  It was beyond being a "granny" bra, which was John'a greatest concern.  It had FOUR ROWS of hooks and eyes, all sorts of seams, and made my boobs look rather misshapen.  Ugh.  It was terrible!  So much so, I couldn't even handle it and put it back on its hanger and back on the rack.

After a bit more time searching, I did eventually find two that were nice looking.  They're soft cotton.  They're smooth.  They make my breasts look roundy instead of oblongy.  I was sold.  They've been working out pretty well so far. 

Definitely no pictures for this post.

I told my parents right away.  They were really surprised, perhaps because it was a Thursday evening, and I started the conversation the same way I normally would.  I made sure John uploaded ultrasound photos right away so they could take a look.  I think within moments of sending them, my mom had them posted on the fridge.  :)

We waited until Christmas to tell John's parents.  They were planning on visiting because it had been a while since they had been to Seattle, and John and I couldn't really go back to Chicago for Christmas since we had just taken a 3-week vacation the month before.  We sat them on the couch and surprised them first with dog #2, Ronan, and then with baby.  Yay!  They were also excited.

Sorry, no pictures to go with this one.  Well, perhaps you want to see Ronan.


Love,
Trina