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My Turn

Wednesday, June 18th, 2008

I guess it is about time I write something. I just can’t let Pat have all the fun. This entry is dedicated to all those women out there who have told me how wonderful being pregnant is and how much they loved it. My question for you is what were you on because the whole pregnancy thing SUCKS! Ok, well, physically it sucks. Don’t get me wrong, I enjoy the fact that Ella and Jackson will be here soon, but why must women go through hell for it. Let me start at the top and work my way down.

Do you remember when you were about 13 and puberty started to kick in? I do. Wanna know what I remember most about it? The zits! Guess what, they’re back. It’s like I went to sleep one night and the hormones all kicked in and decided it would be funny to make me relive a miserable time in my life. Why don’t the books tell you about zits!!! I am not glowing, I am zitting.

If you work your way down what do you think comes next? Yup, boobs. My chest has always been on the larger side for as long as I can remember. They have never been too big, despite what my parents say. Now they are. They are heavy, in the way, and I can’t button my shirts anymore. I used to like going bra shopping and picking out all the cute ones, but apparently they don’t make cute ones in a size 38 OMG. I went to the maternity store for a bathing suit for an upcoming trip and I even had trouble fitting them into a maternity suit. The woman behind the counter informed me that they carry a “sleeping bra” for night time support. I didn’t understand the point of it until last night when I was laying in bed and I rolled over. You know what they did? They clapped. That’s right. I rolled over and my boobs clapped. I guess I could use a little night time support. For now they are just going to have to be happy resting on my stomach. There is one other thing that you are not informed of when you get pregnant. Your boobs change colors. I’m not going to go into detail here, but I will say two words: burnt pancakes.

Ok, here comes the fun part, my stomach. You know when a snake swallows a tennis ball and it gets stuck and it just looks ridiculous. Well I look like I swallowed a huge watermelon and it got stuck. I am only 23 weeks so I am supposed to have a cute little bump. I am not supposed to look like I’m about to explode yet. Damn twins. I do have to say I have been fortunate enough not to get any of the dreaded stretch marks yet. Not only is my stomach a boob holder, it is also a punching bag. Sure it’s cute when the babies kick every once in awhile, but when you are trying to sleep or get some work done, they decide it would be fun to start kicking each other and me. Actually I think only one is kicking because the other one is squeezing my bladder and I know they can’t multi task yet.

That brings us to the bladder. So when I used to sit on the couch in the evenings and I had the urge to go to the bathroom it was no big deal. I would wait till a break and then make my way to the throne. Now when I am sitting or laying down and I have to go, I better get my ass to the bathroom pronto! When I sit up, the weight of the babies all go to the bladder. Imagine having to pee really bad and then having someone put a watermelon right on top of your bladder. It can be a little uncomfortable.

Moving a little further south we encounter an area I can no longer see. When we go to the doctors office they always make me pee in a cup. Well today, I could no longer see the cup so I had to do it by sound. Do you understand how hard it is to blindly pee into a little tiny Dixie cup? HARD. Good thing they have a lot of soap there.

Now for my feet. Yes my feet. I have always had wide feet so I have to wear wide shoes. Most often these are shoes that lace up. Well, if I can’t pee into a cup, what makes you think I can bend over and tie my shoes? Not so much. I now have to wear my narrow slip on shoes with swollen feet, unless Pat wants to practice the shoe tying song.

Overall, all the changes your body goes through to get two beautiful babies, really sucks. I can no longer bend over. I need help getting off the couch, and rolling over has become a chore. So to all you women out there who loved being pregnant, I hope you at least went through hell during labor.

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Is This A Joke?

Wednesday, June 11th, 2008

Tonight Shae informed me that the babies have started producing their own hormones (that’s right, I still haven’t blocked her Internet access to the pregnancy websites). Super. If I made a list of things Shae needs right now, do you know what would be at the top? Me neither, but I know what would be at the bottom: more hormones. Thanks a lot kids. I have a feeling a lot more work is going to magically appear that will keep me at the office late. Weird how that works.

Posted in Pregnant | 2 Responses »

It’s A …

Friday, May 30th, 2008

Today Shae and I finally went in for our first “real” ultrasound. We’ve gotten a look at the babies on our trips to see the doc, but today we went to see a specialist and got to take a look using a much better ultrasound machine. That means we were able to tell the sex(es) of the babies today. If you want to find out too, you’ll have to put up with my recap first.

Thanks to awesome scheduling, our appointment was at 1:45, so I got to take half a day off of work (Shae does all the “work” and I get time off…go me). While Shae filled out the insurance paperwork, I looked for a magazine to read. All I had to choose from were pregnancy magazines and US Weekly (I guess there aren’t too many men visiting this office), so I got to learn that famous people are “Just Like Us!” (they drink coffee, jog, and buy food…who knew?).

Eventually we got into the exam room and Shae jumped up on the table. The technician spread some gel all over my wife’s stomach and we took a look at our babies. The quality of the ultrasound was way better than the little one our doc had used, and it was pretty cool to see the kids so much more clearly. We thought we were in for a quick look at the kids and then we’d find out the sex(es). Not so much. The technician took measurements and pictures of pretty much every body part you can imagine: arms, legs, heart (one of each side), head, brain, skeleton, kidneys, bloodflow (with pretty colors…oohh…ahhh), genitalia, and probably some I can’t remember right now. After seeing pretty much every view of Baby A we could imagine, we finally got the one we wanted. If you can’t tell from the pic, Baby A is a girl.

After we were done looking at Baby A, we went through the whole thing again with Baby B. Everything was pretty much the same, except for a pretty substantial difference (I’ll give you a hint: it rhymes with “schmenis”):

So, to recap, Shae got ultrasound gel in every crack and crevice imaginable, I got half a day off work, and we found out we’re having a boy and a girl. We were (not so) secretly hoping for one of each so we’re really excited. Lunchbox gets a brother to play with him and a sister to dress him up; he’s really excited (or it could have just been excitement over dinner, it’s hard to tell). We didn’t get sent home with all of the pics (they got sent to our doctor), but we got quite a few. You can take a look at them here.

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Poops & Pickles

Saturday, May 17th, 2008

I guess my last post was a day too early. Today’s words of wisdom from the prego:

(Jabbing her stomach) “Our babies can hear us now if we talk directly to them. Babies! Wake up! I’m going to keep them awake so when they’re born they’ll sleep a lot.”
(At dinner) “Did you know if you drink a bunch of carrot juice in the morning your babies will like carrots? Our babies are going to like chicken noodle soup and mac & cheese. And chai tea frappuccinos. Ooohh…that mac and cheese looks good!” (The kid at the table across from us had a plate of macaroni and cheese.)
(Still at dinner) “Our babies can hear my bowel movements now. And they can recognize mine.” (At this point I tried to figure out what other bowel movements they could hear, but decided not to go there.) “Oh, and they can smell things too.” (I don’t know if those statements are related or not, but they came out back-to-back so I’m assuming they are.)
“They need to make chocolate covered pickles. Ooh! With peanut butter! Yeah…chocolate covered pickles filled with peanut butter. They have to be Bubbies pickles though.”

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Odds & Ends

Friday, May 16th, 2008

Well, it’s been another quiet week so there’s not a lot to update. That being said, if I don’t write something I have to hear about it from my mother so here are a few tidbits from the last few days.

My mom came into town last weekend for Mother’s Day. That’s right, while some children travel to see their mom on Mother’s Day I make my mom fly down to San Diego. We had a good time, and it was a nice relaxing weekend. Happy Mother’s day mom!
Lunchbox was a superstar at CGC class on Sunday. If the test had been last week he would have passed it no problem. Of course he probably wasted his good day three weeks early, but at least he was back to his top dog ways at least for one class.
Shae is starting to show. A lot. In the last week or so the twins have definitely started to grow a lot faster (or at least Shae’s stomach has started to grow a lot faster). I think she’s finally passed the awkward “pregnant or fat” stage. Congratulations Shae. Hopefully I’ll get a good prego-Shae pic to post one of these days.
If you’ve been to our house you’ve probably noticed the unmaintained median, complete with palm trees that look like they haven’t been trimmed in 20 years or so. So today Shae called at work me all excited because there were city workers out trimming the palm trees. Apparently they got bored pretty quick because they trimmed one tree and called it a day.

That’s about it for now. Sorry there’s nothing more exciting to share. Blame Shae for not giving me more deep thoughts to share.

Posted in Lunchbox | 1 Response »

Pillow Talk

Wednesday, May 7th, 2008

As I was drifting off to sleep last night around 11, the little voice in my bed decided it was time to share more fun facts and thoughts:

“Did you know that our babies can’t open their eyes? They can see through their eyelids because their skin is really thin. Does that mean that their skin is growing in and that before this they didn’t have any skin at all? Gross.”

“I have my seat really far forward in my car (to reach the pedals) and I’m really close to the steering wheel. My stomach is already almost touching the wheel. What am I going to do when I get really pregnant? If I move the seat back I can’t reach the pedals. Am I going to need blocks on the pedals so I can reach them? Maybe I’ll just recline my seat and drive gansta’ style. What should my gansta’ name be? Baby Momma? Shizzle?”

Stay tuned for more deep thoughts from Shizzle.

Posted in Pregnant | 1 Response »

Flashing

Monday, May 5th, 2008

I think it really might be time to take away Shae’s access to the Internet; this is getting ridiculous. I was doing my standard pacing while talking on the phone and Shae asked me to get her a flashlight. I didn’t think anything of it at that moment, but why in the hell does someone sitting on the couch watching TV need a flashlight? So I grabbed the flashlight, gave it to Shae, and went back to my pacing. When I finished up my phone call and got back to the couch, there was my wife shining the flashlight on her belly. Apparently she read that the babies can sense light now and if you shine a flashlight you can make them swim around. It’s not enough for Shae to wake me up when I’m trying to sleep, now she feels the need to annoy the babies to. I guess she actually did feel them move around a little. She said she could feel them “kind of flutter”, whatever that means.

Posted in Pregnant | 2 Responses »

Fuzzy Babies

Saturday, May 3rd, 2008

I think it’s pretty obvious that the Internet has a lot of uses. I personally waste more time that I would like to admit surfing the web, and it’s hard to imagine life before you could answer almost any question that came up with a 30 second search. So yeah, the Internet is super.

That being said, I don’t think Shae should be allowed to go online anymore. It seems like all she ever does anymore is search the web for baby info. This wouldn’t be a problem, except she seems to feel the need to share the grossest tidbits with me when I’m trying to go to sleep. Here’s some of the “highlights” from last night’s sharing session:

Apparently, the babies are covered in fur (aka “downy hair”). Between Shae and I these kids are destined to be hairy, but I guess right now they’re like tiny hairy monkeys.
You know what they do with that hair? They shed it into the amniotic fluid they’re swimming in. Then they drink the fur-fluid and poop/pee it back out into their sac.
So, to clarify that, the kids poop/pee into their own sac and then swim around in it (and also drink it I guess).

Who knows, maybe without the Internet Shae would be buying all the books with this info and waking me up with her gross facts anyway. I do know that the web makes it a lot easier for her to load up on info while watching TV on the couch. There are actually a lot more fun facts Shae has shared over the last few months, but I can’t remember them right now.

On a Lunchbox related note, I don’t think he knows about the Internet yet. On Thursday he found a roll of stamps and ate about 15. To follow that up, he ate one of our checkbooks on Friday. I think he’s trying to place an order from a mail-order magazine. I’m just waiting for him to crap out a filled out order form in an addressed envelope (with full postage of course).

And finally, this weekend is our neighborhood’s big yard sale. Apparently they do this every year, and there are tons of people selling stuff all over the neighborhood. We took the LB out for a nice walk and browsed most of the yard sales, but most of the good stuff was gone (if there was any good stuff to start with). Shae found some stuff for The Learning Garden, but that was about it. We were hoping to find some good baby stuff, but we hit up about 30 yard sales and found nothing. Oh well.

Other than that, there isn’t much going on. Work is fine (for both of us), Lunchbox is fine (and retaking his Canine Good Citizenship class), the babies seem to be doing great, and Shae is starting her nesting (she’s currently making some picture frames for their bedroom).

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One Year

Tuesday, April 29th, 2008

Yup. It’s been one whole year since Shae and I got hitched. To say it’s been a busy year would be an understatement. In the last 12 months we got married, bought a house, got a dog, bought a business, and somehow found the time to knock Shae up (times two). I need a break. (Call it a hunch, but I don’t think that’s gonna happen.)

For our anniversary, Shae got me Mario Kart and a shirt. I got her some maternity clothes. I’m pretty sure I read somewhere that the first anniversary is the maternity clothes anniversary; the matern-iversary. Of course, I also let Shae win at Mario Kart as an extra anniversary present. I’m way too nice sometimes.

I should also point out that in addition to being our anniversary it’s also Lunchbox’s first birthday. He got a $2 toy. I hope my kids are that cheap. (Another hunch, I don’t think they will be. I really don’t like my hunches sometimes.)

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Goofing Off In The Doc’s Office

Thursday, April 24th, 2008

Shae and I had our third visit to the doc today and everything is still good. There are still two and apparently they’re doing fine. Now that we got that out of the way, here’s a recap of our visit.

Just for the hell of it, we actually got to the doctor’s office early for our appointment this time. The first thing we noticed when we got to the office was that our nemesis couple was there. Not only has this couple had the appointment before us every time we’ve seen the doc, but they’re having twins too. Since they finish their appointment right before us, they always seem to get the slot right before us for the next visit. It’s a vicious cycle. We hate them. Maybe one of these visits we’ll actually talk to them and become best friends, but I doubt it.

Thanks to our favorite couple getting in to see the doctor before us, Shae and I had about a 45 minute wait in our little exam room. All I can say about our wait is that there is no way Shae and I are anywhere near mature enough for this whole kid thing. Our wait included laughing hysterically at my farts, analyzing posters of the female reproductive system, and whispering like we were in a library. We aren’t even mature enough to handle a poster with the term “hypogonadism” on it. Every time it sounded like our door was opening we both jumped and got really guilty looks on our faces like we just got caught with our hands in the cookie jar. It was like we were in detention or something and we were scared the teacher was going to walk back into the room and catch us talking. Also, we discovered that apparently they make a chewable birth control pill now. That information might have been useful several months ago. I’m thinking they might want to move that advertisement out to the lobby. Basically, now you can go straight from Flintstones vitamins to the pill (“We’re the Flintstones kids. Ten million strong…And growing!”).

Eventually the doc got to us and it was time to take a look at the kids, but first we got to listen to the heartbeat(s). When I tell this story to my children I’m sure hearing their heartbeats will be a huge life-changing event, but for now it just sounded like a fast heartbeat. After we were done listening we got to see the twins again. If you look at the pics, you can actually see Baby A pretty well (head at the left, knees up). Our doctor drew her own diagram below the pic to help you guys out. Baby B wasn’t quite as cooperative (no surprise there, according to Shae “B” is the one who’s always flipping me off) and is supposedly sitting cross-legged. I’ll take the docs word on that, but she drew another picture to help out.

Finally, Lunchbox made his first sacrifice for the babies this weekend. We were at Petco picking up a few things on Saturday and the Humane Society was there with their “Adopt Me” pets. You know what they had? A baby yellow lab puppy. If not for the two little weights sitting on Shae’s bladder I think there’s about a 99% chance that LB would have gotten a new playmate. Oh well, I think he’ll live.

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