Chatagua Festival 2007 and other things

Well, first and foremost, I posted my first blog to the Atlanta Parent blog that they set up for me. The URL is http://www.atlantaparent6.blogspot.com/ in case you are interested. I'm trying to figure out exactly what type of tone to use, and trying to keep things personal, but interesting to strangers. It's definitely a learning experience... I also have to remember to ask them to change the spelling of the title. They put in an unecessary apostrophe, and the English major in me didn't even want to post to the blog until that was corrected, but I realized that I'm being a little silly.

We had a fun day yesterday at the Chatagua Festival in Winder. We got to see Ella and Chloe dance, spend time with my mom and Leah and even saw my grandparents for a little while. It was a nice day. My sister and I trekked to Mall of Georgia, and I almost bought Hosey some stuff at Gymboree, but talked myself out of everything. It was on clearance, but it was all bigger sizes that would fit next fall/winter. What if Hosey is extremely chubby or extremely skinny? I had visions of this cute winter coat, sized 12-18 months, fitting right at the end of February, or even worse, sometime in September! And Justin pointed out later that it will be fun to pick things out as we go. I just have this bargain shopper streak that makes me want to buy things off season and on clearance.

The pictures are from the festival, but of course, the rest are on Flickr. It occured to me the other day that a lot of you don't have Flickr accounts. This is absolutely fine, but I put the settings for photos of my nieces on private, so only people with Flickr accounts who are listed as friends or family of mine can actually view them. All of the other photos are public though. Just thought I'd mention that.

Justin and I worked in the nursery for a while today, arranging things how we think we'll keep them. It's much nicer in there with the new orientation. We also installed the new blinds on one side, which ended up being a ridiculously huge problem, as the window was a weird size, etc. Let me just tell you that there was a lot of cutting, breaking things, stripping screws, and swearing. It was definitely harder than putting the crib together... We also compiled the initial baby load of laundry with blankets and the crib mattress cover. Once that's all washed I can make the crib, which of course won't be used for months, but it will look cute!

We got the bassinet from my Mom's house last weekend, and again, thanks to her and her family for sharing! Especially Leah! We're trying to decide if we should go ahead and set it up in our bedroom, or leave it in the nursery for a while... The next few weeks will be getting busy with Thanksgiving and other family events, so we're trying to at least get a handle on what needs to be done. Is anyone ever ready for baby?

Oh, and don't worry, we are still working on the name game. We just haven't found that perfect one yet. Everything seems just a little short of perfect.

All over the place

This has been something of a difficult week. It's been long! I don't have much new to report, just a few points. You can see that I am very scatter-brained these last few days, and probably mildly incoherent.

*My grandmother is not improving. Please keep her in your thoughts and hearts and send love to her in New Jersey. I'm sad for her, and very sad that I cannot go to visit her, but I know that she is well taken care of and has a lot of family with her right now.

*Selfishly, I'm still anxiously worrying about my ultrasound. I called the doctor's office today to follow up, and the nice woman I spoke with told me that radiology has yet to send the ultrasound results back up. So no news there. The pain is still present, although today has been a little better. Let's hope that continues!

*I have a little piece of happy news. I sent an e-mail to the editor of Atlanta Parent magazine and told her that I thought she needed a younger and less experienced parent to join her current team of bloggers. To my shock, she responded the next day and told me she thought I'd be a good edition. So at some point in the next week or so, I'll be starting a blog on their website. I'm sure it's not paid, and it's not exactly the New York Times, but I'm excited. I'm trying to build a resume with my writing and eventually be able to try and land some more freelance work that is actually paid. But we'll see. If anything, you all just have to click on the blog at Atlanta Parent a million times a day to make it look like the whole world wants to read my blog.

Anyways, this weekend Justin and I are off to Winder to see Ella and Chloe perform at the Chatagua Festival on Saturday morning. I love watching them dance. I need some uplifting time, and I think this will be perfect. The Chatagua Festival is fun, too. We enjoyed it last year. There are cows and bulls and ponies, and crafts, and the Native American dancers were really neat to watch. Chloe was mesmerized by them.

33 Weeks and Sad News

Today marks 33 weeks. It turns out that it is bad timing, as I just found out that my Grandmother on Dad's side is not doing very well healthwise, and I would have liked to go up to see her. After calling my doctor yesterday, the nurse told me that it is strongly advised that women past 32 weeks not travel. I asked if I could drive, but since it's about 14 hours in the car, she said that would be even worse than flying. My sister is going to go to New Jersey to visit her on Saturday, so I'm going to write a letter for my sister to read to her for me. It's not optimal, but it's the best I can do. I feel very badly about it, but again, I don't have very much of a choice. I'm hopeful that she overcomes the odds and maybe we can go see her with Hosey in the next few months.

I still haven't heard from the doctor, and I still have the pain in my side, but I'm continuing to hope that it's something normal, like maybe the rib pain that my doctor was talking about. I read about some women who have their babies stick their feet in between ribs of their moms, and this can be very painful. But it shouldn't be permanent. Maybe Hosey just is a little stinker and is constantly wedging his/her feet in there. Hopefully I'll know by the end of the week. When I spoke with the nurse yesterday, she said they still hadn't had the results sent up from radiology. Again, I'm assuming if it was something really bad, the technician would have helped get the results pushed through faster. So for now, I'm trying to convince myself that it is normal.

No news is good news?

I haven't heard anything back from the doctor yet. I did call yesterday at lunch time to make sure that the ultrasounds made it back up to my doctor's office, and the woman I talked to sort of laughed at me. She told me "we don't work that fast." Oops. When I pushed a little to find out when I should expect a phone call, the best I got was "later in the week." Apparently the results have to be reviewed by a radiologist, and then it will get sent to my doctor, etc. etc. The wheels move so blindingly quickly at hospitals. I was just hopeful because last time, the doctor called me the same day as the ultrasound to let me know I didn't have a blood clot. But I guess that was more of an emergency situation.

In other news, my mom and I are going to a class at Babies R Us in Alpharetta tonight. It's all about newborn care, stuff like baths and skincare, etc. I'm sure it will be lots of shameless plugs for the sponsoring companies, but I'm also thinking there will be coupons. And samples. :)

Part One

I just got to work a little while ago, and my ultrasound went very quickly. The technician wouldn't tell me anything. He was nice, but very quiet. For now I'm just in limbo waiting for the doctor to call me after looking the results over and let me know if everything looks OK. I'm really hoping that it is all fine. I'm still having the pain in my side, but I would like to be told that it is nothing but gas or heartburn or something. After doing some research, gall bladder problems do not look fun, and while they are definitely better than some things, I would rather just be dealing with regular old pregnancy pains. It's just that the pain has been very severe, and lately makes it difficult to do a whole lot. Over the weekends, I'm OK to stay out and about for most of the day, but usually by late afternoon I'm in enough pain that I have to go home and lay down for a while. Usually it takes about half an hour of laying down, and the pain goes away. But it's very frustrating.

Our weekend was nice, with things fairly laid back and easy. We went shopping for a little while on Saturday at the thrift store to get costumes for a Halloween party on Saturday night. However, we ended up missing the party because even after laying down for a couple of hours, the pain in my side was excruciating, and the party was out in Kennesaw, which would require lots of car time. I was disappointed, as I was looking forward to going to the party and acting normal for a little while... but oh well.

Sunday was my family birthday party at my Mom's house. It was very fun. My mom cooked some delicious Paula Deen vegetable soup, and we had a delicious cherry stuff dessert that she made. I got to see my little sister, and my sister Kendree, her husband Jon and Ella and Chloe were there. It was a nice afternoon. We arrived thinking we were 15 minutes late, and then realized we were 45 minutes early, as we both thought the time change was supposed to happen overnight on Sunday night.

Anyways, I'll put up another post once I hear back from my doctor. Hopefully it will be today.

Tee Hee; Warning, objectionable content

So halfway through a spirited Cranium tournament last night, everyone ran out of beer/wine. Since I am officially a DD for the next few months, I offered to drive to Greene's Liquor Store on Ponce, which is very close to where we were at my friend's apartment in the VA Highlands. There were six of us, three girls and three boys, and we ended up just going with the girls and leaving the boys at home. So I was in charge of getting Justin his beer.

Here's me, 8 months pregnant, buying beer. Don't I look thrilled? I was oddly embarassed walking through there carrying a 12 pack of Negro Modelo and having to heave it around my big belly. But I think it was a golden moment. As you can see from the guy behind me, I don't think anyone in the store really thought anything of it, or maybe they just assumed that my belly was brought on my too many Negro Modelos and not a Hosey. Either way, I just thought I'd share this picture. I think it shows my true class.

Please Excuse my pregnant lady emotional moment

The last couple of weeks marked both me and Justin hitting our one year mark (mine was Tuesday) at our jobs. It's hard to believe it's been a year already that we've been living in Atlanta, but at the same time, we've been through lots of changes (ahem, HOSEY).

It made me look back and sort of take stock of how much our families have helped us through some tough times, from moving back from Taiwan, to finding jobs and a new place to live, to adjusting, my minor surgery saga, and then baby, and then moving. And I know that the biggest change is yet to come.

I know everybody knows how they've pitched in to help us get through everything, and I hope you all know how much Justin and I appreciate it. It's overwhelming for me to think about how much people have offered up to us to make things easier and better for us. It definitely makes me less scared to have the baby and worry about how we'll manage the changes that come along with it. Thank you again for everything.