Party Time

Dr. T. told us that Tot would be considered full term at 37 weeks. That's today. She's starting to make an impact:

We celebrated the beginning of the end of this stage yesterday at our 3rd Tot Wash at my parents' house. I had a great time, and was so very glad to spend some time with my cousins who came from out of town to host the event:

Lynn and Bonnie are awesome, and I was so thankful for all the work they did! I always wish we all had more time to hang out when they're in town, but they have so much family to see and things to do that it's usually hard to pin down more than a couple of hours. This time I monopolized them for an entire day!

I can't describe all the great gifts we got yesterday, but I thought I'd share two. Greg's convinced that Tot will arrive on Halloween and thought she needed to be a little pumpkin. Now she can!

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The award for "Most Popular Gift," as voted on by 4-8 year old boys in attendance after the shower, was by far the jungle play mat:

I'll probably post more pics on my Flickr, but since I have 212 so far (I haven't gotten the ones off Mom's camera yet) I'm being a little selective here. But I'll share one more. My dear sweet brother is a little scared of pregnant women. If he makes one more comment about me being fat he will have good reason, but as it is he's afraid I'm either contagious or that I'll go into labor in his presence. That'd be a little too much for him. This was the only time he let me get this close the entire weekend.

I'm totally determined to have this baby November 7 just to hijack his birthday. I'd have the upper hand the rest of my life...

Things I Never Thought I'd Blog About

I don't think I ever mentioned that we bought a new vacuum last week. Our old one wasn't really dead, it did a decent job, but it didn't have attachments. At all. And I really wanted some attachments. I did my research and then almost talked myself out of buying one. That's when Greg stepped in and informed me that I was going to buy one.

In truth, I think Greg understands this nesting thing better than I do. He gets many bonus points for that. Or else he was tired of listening to me whine about it. Either way, we went and bought a new vac.

No, I didn't buy a Dyson. I couldn't do it. I spent less than half the price of the Dyson I wanted and can sleep at night knowing I didn't deprive my child of her college education. I'm not that hard to please. Most importantly, it has attachments. I knew I wanted them, I just didn't realize how much I wanted them!

There are parts of my house that are cleaner right now than they have been since the day I moved in. I vacuumed baseboards and corners and crevices and vent covers of every imaginable variety. I broke out the motorized pet hair tool and went to town on the pup couch. And it works on bare floors, too. I've never had one that I could use in the kitchen/dining room. Best of all...

I have this serious phobia about mice in my house. I never had a mouse in the house until they started construction on the new library in my back yard. We've had several mouse issues since then. I hate cleaning up mouse poop more than just about anything in the world. I would rather just not use certain drawers in the kitchen than face it. But guess what vacuum attachments will do? Suck up the mouse poop without me having to get anywhere near it. Maybe I can use two of my kitchen drawers again! (After using copious amounts of bleach to finish the job...)

Over all, I probably vacuumed up three or four dogs worth of hair today. And I'm not done. I just wore myself out and started getting overheated. Every time I ran the vac and the AC cut on it blew the breaker. After the second time in different rooms I just turned off the AC. At least it's not the middle of summer!

I've worn myself out every day this week. Tomorrow I have to take it easy, it's a travel day. And I need to be rested for Saturday's Tot Wash and much quality time with the extended family!

Apples

I have never before in my life had a doctor roll her eyes and tell me to quit snacking on apples. Apparently they have, "practically no calories at all..." Sigh. Tot likes apples. And pineapple. And I thought fruit was healthy? And what about that apple a day thing. Guess that's not really working, as I'm seeing her once a week now!

I don't know what she was complaining about. I gained two pounds this week. And when they pricked my finger my sugar was 113, well below the 140 limit. Not dilated any, but Dr. T thinks her head has moved down. In other words, right on schedule for 36 weeks.

This weekend is Tot Wash #3 at my mom's house. I'm looking forward to it, I get to see some family (including BFF Lynn) who I haven't seen in well over a year. And my brother's girlfriend is coming, which should take some of the attention off of me, thank goodness. This should be our last trip out of town until post-Tot. Since our next (and last) shower is a diaper shower, I should have an idea of what we have and what we need to get after this weekend. Maybe.

I Dunno...

The #1 most frequently asked question I'm getting these days is, "So, what do you still need..."

In all honesty, I dunno. I've never actually done this before. Other than the basics, which we have, I don't have a clue what we'll need!

I've made a list of things I think we need to have before Tot arrives, but it's mostly things other people aren't going to buy for us. Like an extra car seat base. Or a garbage can. And I'm absolutely NOT requesting people buy me breastfeeding supplies! I'll take care of that myself, thanks!

We've gotten so much stuff already, and there really isn't that much that we need in the first place. There are some things we haven't gotten at either of the two showers so far that I've found strange. Like no diapers. At all. This doesn't concern me, as Greg's office is having a diaper shower for us on the 16th. We'll be set. Just weird that nobody's given us any after two showers. And only one set of bottles. Which also doesn't concern me, as I have no clue what type of bottles Tot will be willing to take or how long it will be before I actually need them if I'm able to breastfeed. But between the stuff Lauren gave me, the "extra" stuff Jen gave me, and the first two showers, I can bring a baby home right now and be fine for a while!

On a slightly different note, I realized that while we've taken a lot of pictures of me since I got pregnant, we hadn't really taken any of me and Greg. So I had my MIL take this one at the Tot Wash this past Saturday:

Looks like I need to lay off the beer.

Perspective

I bought a half gallon of milk this week.

While making my bowl of cereal this morning I noticed that my milk expires on 11/15.

Tot will be here before my milk expires.

Oh my.