iPhone Photo Dump - March

Well, I've made the technology jump and bought an iPhone.  Hopefully having a good camera on my phone will let me take lots of pics of the baby.  

Here are my first iphone photos...

A poppy on a walk to Blackberry Farm

The scenery on our babymoon in Pacific Grove.

The Transformation

This post has been a long time coming, but well worth the wait!

Wes and I, well mostly Wes, undertook the transformation of our second bedroom from a guest room/office into a guest room/nursery. Yes...still a guest room, so people can still visit. You may wonder how that would work...no you don't have to sleep with and wake up to change/feed the baby. Baby will be in our room :).

But note...my little step by step picture series makes this look easy...but Wes did some SERIOUS work here. I am very grateful. And we are both relieved that after many evenings/weekends of Wes being a weekend warrior, now we can relax a bit more.

Anyway, here are the chronicles of the transformation!

Before pic! Only one angle...this is just leaving out the desk opposing the bed.

Step 1 - Rip up the gray carpet.


Step 2 - Paint!


Step 3 - Put in new laminate floors. The people who lived here before us did these throughout the duplex, but not in the two bedrooms. So Wes basically finished the job. But this only shows his work in the second bedroom.


Step 4 - This was actually many steps...new ceiling fan, new plugs, baseboards, etc....And finally moving back in and decorating. Here is Wes and his finished product!


Now....here's the virtual tour. Imagine you are standing in the doorway, turning clockwise...here we go!


And now we wait!

Watch for Wes' next adventure of crib assembly and sidecar-ing it to our bed :)

Work Shower

My colleagues surprised me with a little shower at work the other day. I was quite surprised. I still have 3 weeks left, so I certainly wasn't expecting any festivities soon. But they caught me!

They had a cute little cake, which apparently the baker had to specify to my boss...those are booties...in case it wasn't obvious :)

Normally there are very few people in the office, but it seemed like the whole place had crowded into our little VUI cubelet. It was cool. We enjoyed the cake together.

And everyone pitched in for some very cool gifts! I got a great diaper bag, ergo carrier, bath toy holder, some cute little clothes, and even a book on sleep that one of my coworkers swears by. Very thoughtful. Here are the behinds of some of the cute little newborn clothes.

I'm glad to have some time off in a few weeks, but it's days like these that make me think it will be harder than I imagine to be off work for a while. There are some great people there.

Shower Time

This weekend I was blessed to attend my baby shower, hosted by Wendy, Heather, Sarah, Andrea, and Jessie! Here are some pics from our fun time!

My beautiful hostesses...

My aunt and cousins...

My grandma and great aunt...soon to be GREAT grandma and GREAT great aunt...

The winners of the guess the size of my belly contest...Jessie did have an advantage, as you can see, but Meg is a pro!

The amazing cakes...Debbie's delicious rendition of my favorite cake, chocolate with mint icing, and the diaper cake made by Heather.

And last but not least, as you requested Laura :), here's a sampling of some of the cuteness I received!

I can't wait to see the little person who will be wearing all of these! :)

A teaser

So a while ago, I was complaining to a friend of mine about all the obnoxious things people will say to you when you are pregnant. It is seriously like a free pass to be socially inappropriate. Anyway...she reminded me that she kept a list of these weird things people would say, and it turned out to be seriously hilarious.

I decided to start my own list, more as a coping mechanism...you know, instead of being offended, I'll just say to myself, "Great! one more comment to add to my list!". Anyway...I am keeping the list, but just when I thought it was going to start growing exponentially, it stopped. So it's not very big right now. I need to try to sift through my memories to get more.

But today at work, I had more of a conversation to add to the list, rather than just a comment. So I thought I'd post that for you as a teaser of things to come. Here it goes...

Scene: Heating up lunch in the break room. The conversationalist walks in...

him: hi Elaine, how are you

me: fine thanks, you?

him: good....so how many days left now?

me: well, 11 weeks

him: oh...weeks!

me (in my head): geeze am i that huge?

him: (ok too much info to give you word for word...must paraphrase)- He then proceeds to tell me about his friend who is having a baby in 3 weeks. She happens to be a model who has just appeared on some morning talk show to show someones new maternity clothing line. As a model, she of course is obsessed with working out and had problems gaining weight. So much so, that when she auditioned for maternity clothes modeling, the clothes were too big for her... Then some chuckling...

me: oh that's interesting...(in my head: and why do you tell this story to someone you have just insinuated to that she is HUGE? while I am heating up my lunch no less...)

him: well, have a great day

me: thanks, you too. (in my head: well lunch is heated, guess I'll go bulk up then...)

And for more pregnancy faux pas, here is my friend's list that she compiled during her first pregnancy. Enjoy and stay tuned for my larger list as it grows!

P.S. Do you think this post belongs on Nisamina or Team Zuber?
P.P.S. Do you think I should keep Nisamina? If so, what for?

Heading into the Home Stretch

Well, I've hit the 3rd trimester. People keep telling me that now I'm in the "home stretch". I'm not sure it feels quite like the home stretch, but I'm sure it will go by faster than I expect. Only 8 more weeks at work, then 4 more at home before my due date. I definitely identify with the "stretch" part of that phrase though. I feel like my belly is huge and stretched to the max. Not sure how it could possibly get bigger, but then again, that's where most people reply with things like"oh...just you wait...". So I guess that's what I'll do...wait. :)

The little one is still super active. Kicking me strongly whenever he/she remembers to do so. Even as I type! He/she also must be growing a lot, cause I'm super tired again. Last week, the 3rd trimester welcomed me with a great big suck of energy. It was fun to feel like myself again after the first few months of sickness...but now I'm a slower version of myself. But that's okay too. The waiting continues! As each day goes by we can't wait to find out more about this little person growing inside.

Here are some pics of the last few weeks, wrapping up the 2nd trimester. Enjoy!

Traveling Bellies

Well, it's gonna be some time before I make it through all the Malaysia/Hong Kong pictures. But in the mean time, we're also behind on belly pics! So here you go. I seem to be in a stage where I feel bigger every week. Kinda scary, but the baby is also getting stronger, I can feel bigger kicks every day. It's nice to feel it's presence on this journey.