In which I am sick...

I have The Black Plague, I think. At least, I'm pretty sure that's what's wrong with me. Gabe continues to be remarkable and funny and probably a genius, and Version 2.0 kicks and kicks and kicks (and she is STILL a girl, according to the ultrasound I had last Friday, woo hoo!), so that is all good news even if I am suffering from The Black Plague.

Please distract yourselves with this recent concert video while I go moan and cough and generally feel sorry for myself. (I would post some of the ultrasound photos as an additional distraction and also to give equal love to both children, but the only shots we got last Friday are of the baby's terrifying skull face, and I will spare you those scary images.)

Halfway There!

20 weeks! 20 weeks! Oh my goodness, the time is flying by!

But before I get to that, I must tell you that Gabe is so awesome. This evening he was splashing around happily in his bathtub with a toy fish when he suddenly stood up and looked me straight in the eyes. (And that kid knows the rule that we only sit down on our bottom in the bathtub because it is dangerous to stand! Dangerous!) "You need to sit down, baby," I said.

"Hug!" he replied. "Hug!" And then he held out his arms and gave me a big, giant, wet bathtub hug. And then he cheerfully sat down and resumed playing with the toy fish. My heart practically cracked open with mushy toddler love.

About a half hour later it was bedtime, and as I laid him down in the corner of his crib where he likes it the best, he looked up at me and said, "Eye-of you," which of course means "I love you."

"I love you too, baby," I said, heart bursting all over again. "Good night."

"Night night," he replied, already half asleep.

Does it get any better than a toddler at sixteen months old? Don't even try to tell me that it does, because I don't believe you.

But back to our original subject...20 weeks! 20 weeks! I read that second pregnancies tend to go much more quickly, perhaps because most second-time mommies are too preoccupied with chasing around their already-born children to spend a whole lot of time stroking their pregnant bellies and contemplating the miracle of life within, etc.

But 20 weeks! Halfway! (And actually, I'm more than halfway if Dr. M wins our ongoing argument and convinces me to schedule the c-section for 39 weeks.) How did this happen? It seems like I just got that positive pregnancy test about five minutes ago, and yet somehow I am at the point where I feel the baby move every day. Plus they're starting to feel like real kicks rather than just tiny little taps and flutters. It's so great. (Although you know what's not great? Puking. Time to go away, morning sickness. No one wants you here, and you have seriously overstayed your welcome.)

I have my structural ultrasound with the perinatologist next Friday, and I am really looking forward to getting a peek at the little lamb chop. Although I still suspect she's really a boy. I'm actually glad we're getting a second opinion from this doctor, because as much as I love Susan, I still cannot bring myself to believe that we're having a girl. It's just too much, too exciting. Too much joy.

An Ode to Three (Four) Day Weekends

Oh, what a great weekend we had. It was the kind of delicious, leisurely weekend that makes it almost physically painful to return to routine on Tuesday morning.

Last week I had to go away on a business trip, which, frankly, was horrible. I mean, the trip itself was fine, but three whole days without this?? Torture! Deprivation!

So to celebrate my return home, I worked from home on Friday and after getting some contracts done I just played and played and played with my fantastic son. We went to the park, we read dozens of books, we played tickle torture until we laughed so hard we could barely breathe. And then the real fun began!

On Saturday we took him to the first home football game of the season! He loved tailgating with GrandBob, Uncle Ross and Auntie Katie, loved eating junk food, LOVED the marching band. Every time the band played - even for just ten seconds in between plays - he would turn his face up to me and cry, "More! More!" He made it through the entire first half without complaint, and we would have stayed even longer had it not been so hot. I think Gabe was actually a little sad to leave the stadium, he enjoyed the experience so much. The whole day made me happy.

And on Sunday things got even better still. My parents belong to a charitable organization that puts on a very elaborate equestrian competition each year, with all of the money benefiting Childrens Hospital. If Gabe loved the marching band on Saturday, then he had fits of ecstasy over the horses at the competition on Sunday. "Neigh! Neigh!" he shouted over and over again, his finger pointing, his head whipping right and left as quickly as possible to make sure he got a glimpse of every single horse. He even got to pet two beautiful horses (including one who was the great-grandson of Secretariat!) and he and GrandBob got to ride on a tractor. When you are sixteen months old, I am not sure life gets any better than this. He finally fell asleep in my arms in a heap of absolute exhaustion around 2:30 p.m., and we managed to get him into the car and all the way back home before he woke up from his nap. And when he did wake up, he was MAD. "Neigh! Gammy! Bob!" he demanded, angry to be at home and away from the horse show. "Neigh! Gammy! Bob!"

On Monday, we celebrated Labor Day with a barbecue at Matt's parents' house, and Gabe got to go swimming in the pool with Cousin Parker. He was also allowed to eat vast quantities of Earth's Best Vanilla Cookies (affectionately known in our house as "ELMO COOKIES YAY!") and Pirate's Booty, and I am sad to report that's pretty much all he ate all weekend. Apparently when we deviate from his routine with too many fun activities, he refuses to eat any food containing any semblance of nutritional value. This stresses me out to no end but so far does not seem to have an adverse affect on the child. Although I am debating taking him back to the baby store near us where they have a weigh station so that I can weigh him and make sure he hasn't actually dropped any pounds in the past couple of weeks. Wow, I have gotten paranoid in my old age.

So in sum, GREAT WEEKEND. I think this is best captured by Gabe's reaction when it was time to take him to daycare this morning (and he is loving the Toddler room, by the way). As we reached his classroom I opened the door and began waiving to all of his friends, saying good morning. I looked back and he was still standing in the doorway. He caught my eye, raised his eyebrows, and shook his head no. He was not interested in going to school. It took a blueberry muffin and two turns on the slide to warm him up to the idea.

So for all of you who had a rough day back at work, rest assured that even toddlers get the end-of-long-weekend blues.

XX

The new baby is a girl.

A girl!

A GIRL!

I could not have been more surprised if the ultrasound technician had told me I was having a unicorn.

As Matt and I headed into my appointment on Friday morning I was overcome with a sudden feeling of doubt and worry. "I don't want to go," I said to him.

"We don't have to," he replied.

I shrugged my shoulders, and in we went.

Our favorite technician, whose name is Susan, smiled to welcome us and tell us she was going to do the ultrasound, which immediately made me feel better. "How far along are you?" she asked as we walked into the exam room.

"A little over sixteen weeks," I replied.

"Big day! Are you ready to find out what you're having?"

A boy, I thought to myself. As if there's any doubt. For months now I have dreamed of myself as a mother to three boys. But I simply said, "Yes, we're ready," and hopped up onto the table.

She laughed and joked with us a bit during the beginning, as she rolled the transducer over my belly. She showed us the brains, the kidneys, the stomach with fluid in it (which she said was a good thing), and the four chambers of the heart. She turned on the volume and let us listen to the heartbeat, which I love so so much.

Then she laughed and said, "The baby's sleeping, and the legs are crossed. But don't worry, I don't give up easy." And she didn't. She spent the next several minutes poking the baby (and me) with the transducer and coaxing the baby to roll over and examining the little butt and legs from every angle she could manage. After a few minutes of silence she said, "I know what it is, but I want to look around a little more to be sure."

During this entire time I craned my neck and examined the swooshing images on the screen to look for the (I thought inevitable) penis. I kept thinking I could see glimpses of it, but Susan never managed a perfectly clear shot. Finally at one point I was sure I saw it. With a jolt of combined elation and the most minute bit of disappointment (I know, I know, I am a terrible person and should be thanking the Heavens for my good fortune at being pregnant with a second child, not selfishly wishing for a girl), I exhaled and said, "Oh, there it is! I know! It's a boy, right? I see the penis!"

Susan, flicked her eyes away from the screen for a brief second and said to me, "No, you don't." Matt started to laugh. "It's a girl," she declared. "You're having a girl."

That is when I started to cry, tears of happiness and utter disbelief streaming down my cheeks.

A girl. A little girl!!! I laughed and cried, Matt hugged and kissed me, Susan congratulated us both and continued to smile and joke while she took measurements of our gorgeous little baby girl. Who looks perfectly healthy, which is of course the most important thing of all. She is growing right on schedule and appears to have long legs and eventually she woke up long enough to move around a bit and show us her breathtakingly beautiful profile. (Well, beautiful for an ultrasound image, that is.) She weighs approximately six ounces and is the size of an avocado.

At the end of the exam I asked Susan, "Are you sure?"

"I'm sure," she replied. "I know my girls," and then she typed "FETUS IS FEMALE" on the report for my doctor. "There," she said, "it's official."

I am shocked and thrilled and almost overcome with joy and gratitude. Gabe will be a big brother to his little sister. I cannot think of any way to say this that doesn't sound trite: we are so lucky and blessed.

Sometimes it's hard to love the cat.

This evening as Gabe and I were going through our cozy bedtime ritual, I walked him over to his crib to take out the decorative stuffed animals (as placed there by the decorators who staged our home which STILL HAS NOT SOLD ahhhhh am losing my mind from the noise of the vacuum and the fumes from the kitchen cleaners which I use EVERY DAMN DAY), I noticed something highly unpleasant.

Our cat, who has been acting up a bit ever since Gabe started walking in earnest, had peed in the crib.

CAT PEE IN THE CRIB.

The bad, bad, bad cat also managed to pee all over Gabe's lovey lion blanket (a very soft, sweet, small blanket with a lion's head sewn on one corner). I was horrified. I am still horrified, several hours later.

So rather than rock Gabe in the glider chair and lay him down gently to sleep as had been my plan thirty seconds earlier, I was forced to strip the crib and and put on a clean mattress pad and sheets. Thank goodness for the waterproof mattress pads that I bought in bulk when Gabe was a newborn. That purchase represents a rare moment of lucidity in the midst of several highly sleep-deprived weeks.

Also, thank goodness we have a backup lovey blanket.

OR SO I THOUGHT.

Gabe has slept with his lovey lion blanket since he was a very little guy. It's organic and made from breathable fabric and it's quite small, so even though I was absolutely terrified of SIDS (and undoubtedly will be again for Version 2.0), the lovey lion blanket never worried me much. Shortly after Gabe began sleeping with the lovey lion, we received a nearly identical blanket as a gift. It's exactly the same, except it has (you guessed it smart readers!) a bear's head on the corner.

I've offered Gabe the bear blanket on a few occasions in the past, usually when the lion was in the wash, and he accepted it without protest.

Not tonight.

Tonight I got him all snuggled down in his crib and handed him the lovey bear. He took it happily, then frowned and sat up to get a better look at it. He examined the blanket, looked at me with raised eyebrows, looked back at the blanket, then smelled the blanket. He turned to me with a very serious expression on his face, extended his arm to show me the blanket, and said, "Uh oh!"

Clearly, not fooled. Not for a minute.

After some serious negotiations he accepted his Elmo doll and DaDoh the gingham stuffed lion as substitutes, and seriously, I don't know what I would have done if he hadn't taken them. I had a few moments of something close to panic as I tried to imagine how I would get him to sleep without the cat-pee-soaked lovey lion. We have an allegedly high efficiency washing machine and dryer, and those damn things take an hour each to run a full cycle, so tossing the lovey lion in for a quick wash was not a good option.

Lucky for me, I have the greatest baby in the whole entire world, and he cheerfully settled down with Elmo tucked under one arm and DaDoh tucked under the other, and was out cold in mere minutes.

Lovey lion is in the wash now, and should be good as new in a couple of hours.

But what am I going to do about the cat?

Self-Aware

Yesterday afternoon I was speaking with a co-worker in the hallway outside my office. At one point during our conversation I leaned against the wall and oh-so-casually put my hands in the back pockets of my pants. Then I grimaced a little bit. It turns out that at some point yesterday morning Gabe handed me his graham cracker, which I absentmindedly put in one of the back pockets. I then proceeded to, you know, sit down in my car and in my desk chair for most of the day, reducing the graham cracker remnants to graham cracker dust. Let me just tell you, it is hard to carry on a serious hallway conversation about patent indemnity with graham cracker crumbs under your fingernails. But I must say, finding that cracker in my pocket made me feel like a real mom. Only real moms take partially-chewed food and put it in their pockets like it's no big deal.

Just as I am now aware of my status as a real mom, Gabe is now aware that he is "Gabe." Or as he pronounces it, "GEEB!" I find this to be a truly thrilling development. Matt and I spent a gleeful ten minutes this morning having him say his name over and over.

I have a beautiful silver charm bracelet from Planet Jill that I received as a Christmas gift from my parents last year. On it are two circular charms that contain tiny photographs of Gabe: one taken when he was a newborn, still in the hospital, and one taken when he was six months old. (This reminds me that I really should get another charm with a current photograph.) Anyhow, tonight while he was eating dinner, Gabe noticed the charm bracelet for the first time ever, and suddenly sat straight up in his booster chair to declare, "GEEB! GEEB! GEEB!" while pointing at the six-month photo of himself. He even got his grubbly little hands on the charm, which again, made me feel like a real mom. Only real moms have macaroni and cheese residue on their jewelry.

Now, unrealted to any of the above, please enjoy some pictures of GEEB! eating many, many strawberries at the farmers' market last weekend. He tried to eat them husks and all, in case you were curious. (More proof that I am a real mom. Real moms very coolly and calmly pry strawberry husks out of their toddlers' mouths in public.)

Mmmmm, delicious strawberry husks.

They are so delicious that I will do a little dance!

I know what you're thinking, and yes, I agree that I do look quite handsome in this hat.

Night Night

We have the nicest little bedtime routine, Gabe and I. When it's getting late enough, Gabe gets a clean diaper and a clean pair of PJs, and we lower the blinds in his bedroom to make the room feel nice and cozy. Then we settle into the big soft glider chair in his room with a bottle (the only bottle he gets nowadays, which he drinks with unbridled enthusiasm) and a stack of picture books. Then we read and read and read until he begins to rub his eyes. Next is the best part: we turn the lights down very low and cuddle in the glider and rock and rock and rock until he is nice and sleepy. Then it's kisses and hugs and time to go to sleep in the crib.

Tonight while we were rocking, when I suspected Gabe was beginning to drift off to sleep, he nuzzled his head a little deeper into the crook of my arm and said, "Mommy." Then he looked up at me, straight into my eyes, and said, "Happy." Then he nuzzled back down and let out the most contented sigh I have ever heard.

This ranks in the top ten moments of my life, for sure.

I love our routine so much, and I really, truly hope I can figure out some way to continue it after baby #2 is born early next year.

That's right, I'm pregnant again. Like, really pregnant. Fourteen weeks. That's officially second trimester and everything.

I've been trying to muster up the enthusiasm to write a "Hooray I'm Knocked Up Again Hooray Hooray!" post for literally weeks now, because Matt and I are over-the-moon excited, but quite obviously this post has not happened. I blame: (1) my full-time job, which seems to be more full-time than ever, if such a thing is possible; (2) my toddler, who only walks now (no crawling!) and is trying to figure out how to run; (3) the killer fatigue of early pregnancy, which I somehow managed to block out from last time around (although I really should have remembered the multiple times I flat-out fell asleep at my desk at work during my pregnancy with Gabe, including once with a little drool on the desk); and, most critically (4) the evil, evil "morning" sickness.

I experienced very little morning sickness during my pregnancy with Gabe, and really, I should have thanked my lucky stars for that fact. I did not appreciate it enough at the time. Not nearly enough. Because this time I am sick. SICK. Since the six-week mark, I have been somewhere on the sliding scale of nausea - dry heaves - puking every single day. Usually towards the puking end of the scale, and not just once a day puking either. One of my pregnancy books refers to morning sickness as "progesterone poisoning," and really, that is such a better and more accurate description.

It's bad enough that I whined to my OB about it, hoping he would have some good advice or maybe some nice anti-nausea drugs or something. His respone? "Well, you got off easy last time. This should make you appreciate what an easy pregnancy you had last time around!" He said this with remarkable cheerfulness and a big smile. I kind of wanted to hit him.

So as I mentioned, I am now about fourteen weeks along. I am hoping (praying!) that the progesterone poisoning tapers off pretty soon so that I can attempt to enjoy this pregnancy. Because honestly, we are so damn lucky. Tonight as I sat in the glider chair in Gabe's quiet bedroom, I had a growing baby in my belly and a happy baby in my arms. That, my friends, is just about as good as life ever gets.