My Day

Check this out. I don't post for a month and then you get 3 posts within the last 10 days.


It is 4:38 pm and I have 22 minutes remaining at work. At least I hope it is only 12 more minutes. Jared went over to a client building and has yet to return. The thought came to me that I could use the remaining time to do some more actual work. But I'm exhausted. Let me tell you why.


As you may or may not have known, work decided to have a team building activity. It was initial scheduled to be in the middle of September. That didn't happen. So we set it for today with a Halloween theme. As is usual with these types of things, I was largely in charge. When I told the managers that I was seeing people decline the meeting invite to come, I got the task of telling people that it was mandatory and they must come or have a most excellent reason for missing out. As it turned out, we only had a handful of people not able to come. We had about 60 of the 80 people present.


I had all my prep work done yesterday and the only thing I had left to take from my apartment was my jello (which was absolutely yummy and I was excited to see a little bit leftover afterwards). I wasn't feeling anxious or stressed about everything being prepared. Despite that, I had a horrible time sleeping last night. I just couldn't. I was exhausted by the time I was supposed to be up that I burst out in tears when my cat found one tiny bit of my leg showing through my blanket on my couch recliner. Not what I would call a good start to my day.

Jared was beyond amazing today. He helped me out instead of doing the tons of work he had to do. He and a co-worker (Tyler) set up the tables and chairs for me. Then they kept going and put up the bats and table cloths. And they just kept helping. It was awesome. I wish I hadn't forgotten my camera so Rod (the picture taker) had better have taken good pictures of my decorations.

Table cloths: black trash bags cut open. Two to a table. Taped together to imitate stitches like Frankenstein. Jared initially thought up the idea of trash bags, but I don't think he was being serious because as soon as I decided it was a good idea he said "but it's tacky!" Hey, it's Halloween. Tyler thought it was cool.

Center pieces: trees made from paper bags. Took about 15-20 minutes per bag. I used paper clip holders as weights so the trees would stand up. I also made little ghosts from salt dough. I will not do that again. At least not with the dough recipe I chose. A few people liked them enough to keep some though. I also put Halloween rubber duckies and Jack-O-Lantern stress balls that were "party favors" on the tables. The stress balls were really cute.

Bats: I made 150 origami bats. Really easy, just a little time consuming because of the amount. Oh, and then I ended up having to paint eyes on them (pens weren't working for me) with white out. Jared and Tyler put them up on the walls and did a great job with it. It looked really good -- better than I had envisioned!

Halloween Trivia: team activity #1 that was done during the potluck portion of the activity.

Build the Perfect Team Member: This turned out really well. We split everyone into teams (randomly) and gave them a small box of random parts. They had to list 6 characteristics of the perfect team member and then build a team member using the parts they were given. Afterwards, they showed them off and told them why they chose what they did. We now have them on display in our office. Kind of in a remote area of the office but... we don't exactly have a central display case.

All in all today, I started at 8:45 am and clean up ended at 2:15 pm. I got lots of compliments on the decor. Everyone seemed to have an enjoyable time. And best of all, I don't have to take home tons of food.

Oh, and I have Friday and Monday off. I need sleep.

Picture Post

Amidst the creation of bats, spooky trees, and ghosts, I decided to post some pictures - quite on a whim. These were all taken with my new camera (except for this first picture).

This first picture is me at 26 weeks. Just so you can see the difference between then and now.



These next two pictures are me at 33 weeks. Technically, 32 weeks and 6 days. Tomorrow I am 34 weeks.



I chose my top favorite pictures that I took at Colleen's book launch last weekend. I took a little over 100 (and still could have taken more). As a little bit of a background to Colleen's books: she began writing a few years ago. Her first two books are now self-published and she is writing her third. It is a series of 4 books telling the story of a girl from Oregon who has to help two ancient Indian princes break a curse that has turned them into tigers. The first book, Tiger's Curse, takes us to India and the mythical kingdom of Kishkindha. Tiger's Quest, the second book, takes us to Tibet and the magical Shangri-la.

Jared and I, along with other family members and friends, were part of her "early readers group". Jared also built (and is still building...) and maintains her website - www.colleenhouck.com. You can purchase her book through her website. You can also request your library if they will carry it (and get other people to request it too because the more people who request such a newly-published book, the more likely your library system will pick it up).

This is just some of the food of Shangri-la that was at the party. Brad, Colleen's husband, decided I took far too many food pictures.




I just thought this turned out to be a cool picture. The focal point of this picture are a number of bookmarks that were made for Colleen's book. There were also earrings, bracelets, and necklaces. I got an earring/bracelet/bookmark set as a gift from Colleen. Very pretty and well made. There is a link to the maker's Etsy site from Colleen's website. There aren't many pictures up yet, but you can get a feel for what she makes.


Colleen Houck, the author.


Alan, a nephew in attendance.


Sarah, a niece: it took me a loooong time to get a picture of her face. She gets to be quite shy and usually has her chin glued to her chest.


A lotus flower. Colleen has a tier of them in different colors.


Matthew, a nephew. His brother, Alan, won one of the raffle drawings and chose the first book as a prize. Matthew immediately sat down to read it. It took me a while to get a picture. People kept getting in the way.


It was a beautiful day. Actually, not really. It was raining all morning and the early part of the afternoon.


Honey nectar from Shangri-la. Colleen really liked this picture. Jared says the sorbet on the lime mars the perfectness of this picture. I still like it. And it tasted really good. It was served in tall, skinny flute glasses. There were two servers who came and would take my cup away and give me a new one.

It's About Time

It is 6:30 pm on my day off. I've had a great day. Played with makeup, went to a dr appointment, had lunch at Chipotle, and went to a movie. Almost all with Jared. It's been a great day for both of us. It's a good thing we have more days off coming up. I'm really excited about our week long NO WORK week in November. We're going to spend a few days at the coast in Newport. It'll be cold, but whateves. Alaska would have been cold too if we had been able to do that.

My baby's room is looking more and more like what it is intended for and less like a storage holding facility. My crib and changing table is a beautiful dark wood. Funny story that I wish I had pictures of: one day we didn't shut the door after being in there because one of the cats was still in there. A little bit later, Jared went to shut the door. We found Kara laying inside the crib and Jaeden lounging on top of the changing table. Cute, but not a good sign. My wall border is in my possession. In fact, I am staring at it now as it is on the desk in front of me. I haven't quite had the time to put it up yet. I have 4 day weekend next week. We'll likely do it then.

It took me a while, but I finally found a rocker/glider that I liked. Best of all, it was on sale. And out of stock. So now I have a rain check. They said they would call when it was in stock... they didn't know how long that would take.

The first two books that my sister-in-law wrote can now be purchased. We had a launch party for her last week. I'm glad that's over. Quite a bit of prep work involved. My job during the party was to take pictures. We bought a new digital camera that day and so I had some fun with it. Best feature: there isn't a 30 second wait in between pictures. I read a lot of reviews on different cameras and was shocked to be reading that 3 seconds between pictures was slow. I'm not sure what that makes my old camera. What's beyond slow?

Today at my appointment, they couldn't figure out if baby's head was down or up. Previously, she was head up. This time, they're not certain. Even finding the heartbeat didn't help much because it was pretty much close to my belly button which really means any way goes. No worries on that yet. But hopefully she is head down at my next appointment with Patricia. (Which is after my next two appointments which are with Susie, my other midwife.)

I also got the results of my gestational diabetes test. The only reason I took it was because my carb and sugar intake has been pretty high all throughout pregnancy. As I expected, I was in the high range. High enough to where I need to be more careful and diligent, but low enough that I don't have to take the 3 hour GD test. Sigh. I guess I shouldn't make cinnamon rolls too often unless I really use those as an incentive to NOT eat other things.

I still don't have my baby's 3D ultrasound scanned in due to not having a scanner that works with Vista or Windows 7. She's cute, of course. She kept her foot by her face most of the time. She wouldn't roll over so we couldn't get a full face picture, just her profile. It was pretty cool because the tech could cut away part of the picture to make her face the focal point. This was especially good because my placenta was over part of her face and they could just cut that away. She has a Laulusa nose.

Dinner is calling to me now so I bid thee farewell.

Week 28 - but no pictures. Yet.

That's right. I wanted to write something but I don't have computerized pictures yet. We'll be taking one when we get home from work. Last week we also got a 3D ultrasound done. More on that when I get the pictures scanned in.

I'm staring at the final stretch before the real work begins. A lot of people have started to ask me if I'm ready yet, if the baby's room is ready, etc. A huge big fat no. I have 2 packs of diapers, a gift certificate to Amazon, and a bassinet that I haven't moved to my apartment yet. I'm thinking that not being ready yet will help time not slow down during these last few months. Shout out to Valerie: You know what I want! I'm largely on hold waiting for that one little package from you.

On the up side, I'm going crib shopping this Saturday. Any favorites out there?

----Next Topic----

Last month, I got pears. Half a box of whatever size it was -- I forget. They weren't ripe. And then when they did ripen, they all ripened at once and immediately went overripe. Soooo not much opportunity to eat a raw pear unless you like them mushy. Which I don't. Overall, I ended up making 4 loaves of pear bread and 4 pear pies. I was so pleased with how they turned out. Very yummy and good looking. 1 pie and bread went to a co-worker. I had brought in a pie to work and he loved it and had seconds. Today he said his family also loved the pie and bread. I am quite pleased! I can't fully take credit because I did follow a recipe (which I gave to him upon request). Well, I mostly followed the recipes.

----Next Topic----

When we moved into our new apartment, we said we needed to get curtains. Well, I said I wanted them, then we discovered we did actually need them with a bright light that shines into our bedroom window from across the parking lot. When we came back from Florida last month, we said we really did need to get curtains because we suspected they were the reason I slept much better in FL than I had been. Two weeks ago, we finally went to get curtains. But, no drill. Long story short: we finally borrowed a drill, ended up not having the right kind of drill bits, used the drill anyway but in a different way. And now my curtains are up!

AND I LOVE IT.

I have only woken up once or twice each night in the last two nights. I love it for my cats too. They don't wake me up and are still really sleepy when I get up.

Week 26 Appt and the Bread Machine

Today I had an appointment. I'm 26 weeks along and have so far gained 23 pounds. Yup, another 10 pounds in 4 weeks.

Picture taken 20 minutes ago.

The conversation went something like this:
Me: *talking about what I've been eating and how it's been hard to curb the carb cravings*
Midwife: Well, you look really healthy so I'm not worried. Now if we starting seeing something odd, we may have this conversation again only different.
10 minutes later I weigh myself.
Midwife: Remember when I said we may talk again....
She wasn't really worried (yet anyway) but did suggest that I could try substituting more protein for carbs. If I continue this trend, I'm facing about 60 total pounds of weight gain.

Baby was doing good with her heartbeat in the 140s. Her head is down. And they say I'm pretty much all baby. (And Jared agrees with me that my thighs and butt doesn't look any bigger, so where is all that weight going? The boob growth can't equate THAT much particularly since they haven't grown any more in the last few months.)

They both said they love my appointments because I'm so easy. They assure me I'll be awesome when I go past my due date and also when I'm actually in labor. I'm not so sure about that. Just because I'm laid back now doesn't mean that I'm always like that.

Next topic: Making bread with my bread machine.

Some time ago, my sister-in-law got a new bread machine which means I got her old one. (This is also how I received my sewing machine.) I've never used it. I've intended to use it, but just never had. Well, one thing this carb craving did was to get me to use it. We had a bread machine box mix thingy. I made a 1lb bread because I didn't know if my pan would fit the 1 1/2 - 2 lb. Turns out that it will.

Anyway, I searched online for a manual. None. Great. So I looked at the manuals I could find and found one that had a similar display and interface. All other instructions seemed to be the same for this brand of machine (Oster).



It was delicious to the taste and very desirable. It was also gone in 24 hours. And no, I did not eat all of it. Jared had half of it.

Next time I will try "light crust" because "medium" was too dark for me. (ou should know that I am the person who eats what my husband and my family calls "warm bread" instead of "toast".)