Baby Showers!

Last weekend I was treated to 2 baby showers, one with my girlfriends and the other with family and family friends and WOWEE was I showered with gifts! A hearty thanks to everyone that contributed to BBF's upcoming arrival - not only were they a lot of fun and it was great seeing everyone but the generosity was overwhelming. We brought home tons of clothes, essentials, handmade blankets and good advice along with some pretty interesting name suggestions (including "Mortimer" and "Aloicious!") My girlfriends also specfically themed the shower around books to help build BBF's library and it was great to receive so many books. I love that many of my friends chose their favorite books from when they were young.














The festive weekend was made even more fun as my mom and sister came up for the showers as well as our friends San Francisco, Atilla and Claire. I hadn't seen my family since September and at that point my baby bump was pretty small so it was great to have them rub the belly in it's full glory and feel Barry moving around in there.

Since Chinese New Year was Monday, on Saturday we enjoyed Dim Sum at King's Chinese Restaurant in Bellevue for lunch and as you can see the belly is big enough to balance a piping hot cup of tea.


The entire weekend was an eating schmorgaasboard. My favorite "Princess Torte Cake" was at the baby shower (marzipan covered cake with a layer of raspberry and the most delicious cream), we had the family over Saturday night for dinner which consisted of Ezell's Fried Chicken (Oprah will have it shipped to her in Chicago) and besides the delicious food at the showers, we brought leftovers home... grandma Peggy's delicious chicken cassarole, more cake etc. Hence, the BIG belly :)

Thank you Ashley, Brennan, Dreslaine, Peggy for planning and hosting the showers as well as anyone else that contributed with decorating and food (Melissa, Alexis, Rae Ann...). I will always have great memories of last weekend.

Crazy Birth Dream

Talking to mothers or reading pregnancy books there is mention about crazy birth dreams. The books say that this is normal because your body is of course preoccupied with the impending arrival and the psyche has all sorts of desires or fears which manifest in crazy dreams. For instance, I had a friend who dreamed she birthed a chocolate colored Labrador puppy and someone told me her friend dreamed she birthed a can of Hi-C.

Well, last night I had my first dream (at least that I recall) so I figure that I better blog about it before I forget it.

All I know is that I am having contractions and it is like a month before my due date and I have somehow gotten myself to the Hospital however Michael is not there yet. The doctor goes to check things out down there when I yell "It's coming, it's coming, I can't stop it!" and then I suddenly birth all my internal organs. Seriously... there is my liver, intestines etc on the bed but no baby. I am freaking out that I will die without my organs but the doctor just says calmly, "looks like we will have to do a Cesarean Section to take the baby out and put all your organs back in." At this point I know it is about 2 am and I don't know where my husband is despite calling him on his cell phone. I must have woken up because I don't remember anything else and I never saw the baby.

Not as funny as birthing a puppy but birthing all my internal organs doesn't make a whole lot of sense either! For all you amateur psychologists out there, feel free to analyze the dream and post it to the comments.

"Pregnant Woman Breaks Into Home"

Michael took a well deserved 24 hour trip to Vancouver, B.C. with a buddy to see the Vancouver Canuks Hockey game (Saturday morning to Sunday afternoon). With some quiet time on my hands Sunday, I decided to attend to some neglected chores around the house as I hadn't been feeling well the last several days. Since it was raining, I closed the door behind me as I took out the garbage only to return to a locked door (with a barking Winston behind it). Several of you may think, Good thing your neighbor boy has a key since he takes Winston out during the day. Well, sure however I stood outside my locked door swearing becuase I had just watched the family drive off for church 20 minutes prior.

So What's A Pregnant Girl To Do? Husband in Canada and not due home for 4 hours. I could have found another neighbor, called Micahel to call his parents since I don't have their number memorized and hope that they have their spare key and can let me in. However, I am way to stubborn to go that route (I had chores to conquer!). Instead I recalled that there is a certain window that doesn't latch properly. I managed to pry it open 6 inches only to be stopped by the wooden dowel that I protectively had jammed into the window ceil to prevent theives, hoodlums and robbers from breaking in. I tried slamming the window back and forth to see if the dowel would jump the track... no such luck.

Finally, I managed to get the window to pop up and over the dowel and open the window just wide enough to squeeze this big girl through it, but not without me climbing onto a flower barrel and nearly falling off! (don't worry mom, I am safe and sound). Winston looked thoroughly perplexed watching the whole thing.

I can't help but picture the whole situatuion as an onlooker from the street... like a cat burgler slipping through a window at midnight peering out to see if he is being watched... just change it to a fat girl trying to hoist herself onto the window ledge at 10am in broad day light. Better keep my day job, eh?!

Lunch with the Boss

On Tuesday, my boss comes over and asks "can I take you to lunch tomorrow?" This caught me off guard because (a) we never have lunch 1-on-1 (b) she had already marked in her schedule "very important lunch" that day and (c) I had made lunch plans with another friend (which I seldom do). Of course I said yes and then spent the next 24 hours worrying what it could be about. Is it the part time job I had requested? Would it not work out? Or maybe it's just a "Thank you and please come back to work and don't quit" conversation she wanted to have with me? The possibilities rolled through my mind all day and night. To top it all off, my jaw had been swollen and was particularly bad that day so I had to dope up on Tylenol so that I could chew and not just slurp soup (side note... it's been a really long time since I've had pain killers and boy are drugs great!).


Evidently, I am very self centered because I totally missed the warning signs that this was all a ruse for a surprise baby shower! The hostess showed us to a table in back with my entire team sitting there with smiles and gifts and well wishes. It was actually quite a feat for them to pull off because they all work in different locations and had to arrange everything without email or marking their calendars because I have access to all of that stuff and they couldn't risk that I would figure it out. My co-worker I sit right next to had to leave her desk without my noticing and then she had to send two other people over - one to distract me while the other pulled a gift out of a drawer that she had left behind. So sneaky!

Love that gift... there is a new kids movie coming out called "Hotel For Dogs" and FAO Schwartz sells plush dog figures. My friend had found the English Bull Dog "Cooper" and gave it to me as a gift. While the face isn't as bully'ish as you'd expect, the rest is great. There are back wrinkles (!) and a funny screwy tail AND you can put your fingers up under his lips and there are jowls - like pockets under the checks and skin. SUPER COOL! BBF will love it!

Bump 33 & Half Weeks

I so want my body back... I think we need to start taking these pictures head on.

Grand Dad Photos

A BIG Thank You to Auntie Barbara and Aunt Sharon for recently giving us pictures of each of our fathers when they were toddlers. We plan to frame them along side a toddler picture of Michael and put it in BBF's room. Although Dale (Raina's dad) recently decided to try a buzz cut, he has otherwise had the same hair cut most of his whole life so when Michael saw the picture he proclaimed, "He still has the same hair!"

Dale Mapel

Earl Fein