Brandon's First Haircut

Wow! This draft is over a year old! He has grown so much!

Despite Mom's pushing to wait till he was a year old, I couldn't take my little mans wild hair any longer. So Saturday we took him for his first haircut.

Baby Updates

Wow, it has been awhile. I am going to try to venture back in to this thing and get everything caught up.

We had another baby appointment! :) They moved little Brandon's due date up again, he is now scheduled to arrive 9/18. It seems like so far away until I count the weeks, only 12 more to go! I'd like to state for the record that this "9 months of pregnancy" notion is BS. Anyone who has been pregnant understands that the total gestation period is 40 weeks, TEN months, 280 days. So where the heck did this "9 months" come from? Was this some cruel plan to trick us into getting pregnant?

Anyways, Brandon is perfect. We saw all of his organs, all four chambers of his little heart, and the best part of all, the cutest profile I have ever seen. I am so in love with my little man, I can't believe how I could love him any more, but know that I will when he finally gets here.

This past weekend we went on a hospital tour. I swear the room is bigger than my master bedroom, and the nurses seem so sweet. I just hope I can maintain this appreciative frame of mind while I am trying to push this thing out......

We are working on Brandon's nursery. It is a Red Sox theme, which is pretty fitting since we will be winning the World Series in his birth year.

The second trimester was great. I felt good, Brandon was moving like crazy, making me fall in love with his little pitter patters. The third trimester so far has been a little more difficult, Brandon is taking up quite a bit of space in my ever growing belly, he is pushing on all of my organs at once, which means that breathing, eating, and peeing are all "different" now. One of the worst side effects so far has been heartburn. Mike is calling Brandon his little "fire-breather". I eat, and Brandon breathes fire back up my throat.

Only 12 more weeks, I keep telling myself that. In the meantime I have been having the greatest dreams, about finally holding Brandon, seeing him, playing with him. Amazing. Of course there was that one nightmare about him weighing 13 pounds....let's all pray that doesn't come true!!!

Pregnancy Update

21 weeks down!! 19 more to go!!! I've been feeling amazing - this second trimester stuff is great!

Brandon is moving like crazy lately. He feels like he is doing flips in there, kicking me low, then high, to the right, to the left - maybe he is practicing for his future professional sports career? Perhaps practicing his baseball slides and home run swings? I should call my Red Sox and let them know he will be ready in a few years.

I feel him most when I am sitting or laying down. He also seems to get very active when I am hungry and just after I eat. It is like he is screaming for me to give him food and then thanking me for obliging. For anyone who has not felt a baby move, it is the weirdest, and most wonderful feeling in the world. It is like he is letting me know that he is still there and doing well. It reminds me that I really AM growing a little person in there.

I was brought to tears yesterday by socks. Yes, SOCKS. Our neighbors brought over a huge tub of baby clothes that their little boy has outgrown. We couldn't be MORE appreciative of that. They are almost new since he grew out of them so fast and Brandon already has a full closet. While going through the tub of clothes I came across an unopened package of what I thought was toddler socks - it seemed like it would fit their two year old.

So yesterday, (after getting picked on for destroying the courthouse), I brought the socks back to the neighbor. She explained that these were not toddler socks and opened the package to show me. They were the cutest, smallest, little gym socks that I have ever seen. I was overcome with visions of my little man running around in them, (and of me and Mike running around trying to get them back from the dogs on laundry day).

I can't wait till he is here - so he can wear these socks. I swear, Brandon truly is a blessing.

Random Story of the Day

Disclaimer - I don't fully understand what happened - maybe some of you techie people can elaborate!

So, on Tuesday I received a call from my local cable company while at work. My cell signal here is spotty at best so I only heard a few words. What I was able to surmise is that they were doing work in our neighborhood and noticed a problem with our signal. They wanted to schedule maintenance to clear up my problems. I'd seen cable trucks out and about in force lately in our area, and since we have been having random problems with our Internet going down and with our HD channels "pixilating" I was excited and scheduled the maintenance for the next day. The technician who called told me to ONLY call her back if I wanted to cancel, that she knew all about my "situation" and needed to be informed if I had to reschedule. (should have been a warning sign)

I was so excited that the cable company actually called ME and was so willing to proactively help me. I was thinking about ways that I could recognize them for such great customer service, bragging to the bestie that the technicians up here in the county are sooooo much better than her city technicians, etc.

So, being a responsible person, I got off work early to meet the cable guy. I put each dog in one of the bedrooms, cleared away anything that would get in his way, trying to be helpful. He comes in the house and tells me that he is there to "fix all of your problems". Great! I didn't even know until you called that I had such big problems!

My nice county cable guy runs lots of tests, checks each cable connection, checked the connection at the street, the connection at the house, at each TV (which involved him leaving the house so I could play musical bedrooms with the dogs without them seeing him), VERY thorough tech. Again, I was sooooo proud of our wonderful county cable guy.

An hour later he comes in the house to tell me they need to run new cable. At this point my curiosity was peaked so I asked him what was going on here, we never called in a problem, the random loss of pixels didn't bother us that bad, what's up?

Story of our life - it isn't as simple as a problem with our signal. Apparently, unbeknownst to us, the network has been bombarded with "radio interference", which has been destroying the network up the street at the courthouse area (court, jail, police, fire, hospital - nothing big). They have been spreading out from the courthouse and scanning to find the source of this interference. Eventually they narrowed it down between our house and the next door neighbor. And after running tests, WE are the culprits. Our cable lines are so bad that we are sending interference all the way back through the network and destroying the courthouse. :(

I feel so guilty. And I didn't even know we were doing it! I went outside after the cable guy left and the neighbor came over to ask how things went. HE knew all about this problem, I guess they got better cell phone signal and heard the whole story when the cable company called. I told him that they were laying new cables and he jokingly screamed "You are the ones!" and not two seconds later his wife came over screaming "so it was YOU!!!". I feel like we need to wear Scarlet "C"'s for our violations.

And so, out of guilt for the poor courthouse people, the police, clerks, judges, doctors, nurses, patients, and prisoners who didn't get your cable and Internet:

(To the Tune of Sorry by BuckCherry)

I'm sorry I'm bad, I'm sorry You're blue
I'm sorry about all things I did to you
And I know, I can't take it back
You must have been bored, without all your sounds
'Cause cable makes the world go round
And I just wanted to say - I'm sorry

This time I know, I'm to blame
It's hard for you to get through your days
You get bored and no cable is to blame
'Cause everything you want, it never comes through right
And when your network dies, it makes you want to cry

I'm sorry, I'm bad, I'm sorry You're blue
I'm sorry about all things I did to you
And I know, I can't take it back
You must have been bored, without all your sounds
'Cause cable makes the world go round
And I just wanted to say - I'm sorry
I'm sorry

Random Story of the Day

I am supposed to keep myself hydrated. Number 1 - it is healthy. Number 2 - Mom keeps telling me my ankles will swell if I don't. Number 3 - I've heard it can prevent stretch marks. Soooo, keeping this in mind, I set out this past Sunday to ensure I was well stocked in the hydration department. Since I am not supposed to lift heavy things I brought the hubby along. $150 worth of groceries later (can you EVER get out of Wal-Mart for less) we were stocking the car. We went about this very strategically. Our new, family friendly car has a pretty neat rear hatch with an adjustable "shelf".



(NOT our surfboard!) As I was saying, we strategically placed the bags under the shelf, with frozen items on bottom, bread and veggies on top of that. And then, on top of the shelf we placed three boxes of mini Gatorade and a case of water (trying to stay hydrated). Thereby protecting the groceries from getting squashed. Smart, huh?

We didn't make it out of the parking lot before we heard a crash and looked back to see that the shelf can't hold that much weight, thereby collapsing onto our "protected" veggies and bread. Lesson learned. Anyone got a recipe for squashed tomatoes, zucchini, and bread?

Great Yard Sign

Got this in email today. Of course we don't need this in Gloucester, unless we put a bunch at the bridge pointing south to the city. :)

(Soon to be) Mother's Day

I celebrated my "soon-to-be" Mother's Day this past weekend. To begin the weekend Mike and I became adventurous and decided to try a new restaurant in Gloucester. In case you don't know anything about Gloucester (most people don't), there aren't many restaurants to choose from. We have two chains - Ruby Tuesday and Applebees, both of which I am tired of. With my crazy pregnancy cravings it is a bit difficult for Mike to find some place for me. So we drove up and down Route 17, hoping that one would jump out at me. We ended up at a local place called GoodFellas, a Pasta, Steak, Seafood restaurant. Here is where being a vegetarian, pregnant women who recently came down with a shellfish allergy becomes a problem. But my stubborn self was determined that this was THE restaurant. After reviewing the menu I narrowed down my choices to Fettuccine Alfredo or Stir Fried Teriyaki vegetables. I was overcome with pregnancy guilt over the lack of vegetables I had eaten that day, so I went with the stir fry. (Note to self - don't order Japanese food at a steakhouse - there is a reason they aren't a Japanese restaurant.) Everything else was great, and the lack of food I ate left room for the best cheesecake ever. Problem Solved, and Brandon got extra calcium, vitamin D, etc!! :)

Saturday was a spa day with Mom, a gift from Dad for his two favorite "mothers". Spending the day with Mom, learning about her pregnancies, and just relaxing was great. After the spa, we were starving, and my abnormal pregnancy food problems kicked in again. This time we only drove around for about 10 minutes until I found a place. Unfortunately when we went inside and the lady came to help us I was overcome by the smell of fresh cooking cow (known to you meat eaters as steak). Mom of course thought this smelled amazing and was ready to order exactly what was cooking. But since she loves me she walked out with me and we kept driving. We ended up at Moes, which smelled like fresh cut vegetables. Yummm.

For my "soon-to-be" Mother's Day I got cards form all four of my boys - Riggins, Gibbs, Mike, and Brandon. Brandon also gave me a prenatal massage since he is getting so heavy! Mass on Sunday was run completely by the youth of the church - choir, readings, everything. They also presented a special tribute to all their moms and then passed out flowers to all of us. So sweet.

Couldn't have asked for a better "soon-to-be" Mother's Day weekend. Can't wait to join the ranks of motherhood, which Mom has been a card-carrying member of for - hmmm hmmm 32 years! :) Love you Mom!