ABC Meme

I so should be using my precious time off while Stella sleeps doing something responsible like cleaning the kitchen or washing diapers, but I can’t resist that I was tagged!

ACCENT: I like to think I don’t have one, but having lived in Texas my entire life, I know I do.  When I speak to my relatives in East Texas, it is hilarious how it just gets worse and worse.  I think it also gets thicker when I am drunk or tired, it seems like Tim’s told me that before.

BIBLE BOOK THAT I LIKE: Unfortunately, I’m not familiar enough with the Bible to have one.  I plan to fix that by getting one of those Bibles that set it so you can read them in a year.

CHORE I DON’T CARE FOR: Cleaning the bathtub, followed by mopping are my most hated and luckily Tim will do both of those!  I also hate cleaning the bathroom counters, but I’m usually stuck with that one.  Which is why it’s filthy in my bathroom right now!

DOG OR CAT: I grew up being a cat person, but then I got Lucy, one of my dogs, and fell in love.  I love dogs, they make me happy.  Although my dog Roxie, who is very old but we’ve only had for less than 2 years, scared us by sending us to the vet last night where the vet revealed that she has a heart murmur AND her teeth are all rotting out of her head.  I am really sad and torn because if we do the tooth cleaning/removal, she could die under anesthetic b/c of the murmur,  and if we wait, she could have bacteria from the advanced tooth disease enter her blood stream.  I know she’s old, but I’m not ready to let her go yetL

**ESSENTIAL ELECTRONICS:**  My brand-new laptop which I have had for less than a week.  I love being able to use it wherever I want and Tim and I can have side-by-side play now while we both doodle around on our laptops.  Also, my Ipod and Tivo-rip off from time warner.

FAVORITE COLOGNE: Tim has worn Grass, which the Gap used to make, scents (get it?)  we met.  Unfortunately, he is getting to the last bottle of it and they don’t make it anymore.  It is the best smelling stuff on earth.  I cannot stand cologne on myself, but I wear Vanilla Essential perfume oil from the body shop.

GOLD OR SILVER: Silver. Can’t stand gold. 

HANDBAG I CARRY MOST OFTEN: Stella’s diaper bag, which is a unisex black.  But Tim and Stella just got me a pretty red with purple piping oriental brocade diaper bag for Mother’s Day that I will start using.  When I go out I have a purse that I got in LA’s Chinatown that is shaped like a chinese take-out box and has black brocade with flowers fabric.  I love that.

INSOMNIA: Yes, my entire life, although once I stopped drinking caffeine late in the day it improved tremendously to the point where I’d only have a night where I didn’t sleep a wink 3 times a year (before it’d been once a month).  Now I wake up at night to feed Stella, so there isn’t time for it to be an issue.

JOB TITLE: I told my job I wasn’t coming back from maternity leave last week, so now I’m officially a Stay At Home Mom.  Best job I’ve ever had.  Soon I’ll return to acting, which is more a passion than a job.

KIDS: Stella, 7 weeks, 4 days.

LIVING ARRANGEMENTS: House with Tim, my husband of 7 years (as of yesterday!), daughter Stella, dogs Lucy and Roxie, and cat Punky

MOST ADMIRABLE TRAIT: I’ve been told I am a very good listener, and I have to believe it’s true because near-strangers tell me things that I wouldn’t tell my best friend.

NAUGHTIEST CHILDHOOD BEHAVIOR: When I wanted to get out of something or was nervous about it, I would get a stomachache.  Not fake a stomachache, I could literally make myself sick.  I missed out on a lot of fun stuff because of that, I’m not proud of it.

OVERNIGHT HOSPITAL STAYS: Childbirth March 24-26, 2006.

PHOBIAS: Claustrophobia.  I discovered how badly I had this when we were in Cambridge, England summer before last and I started freaking out when we were going up a narrow turret in St. Mary’s Church.  I had to come down. 

QUOTE: Hmm, there are so many, but my classic that I feel sums me up is “Bigmouth strikes again and I’ve got no right to take my place in the human race.”  Morrissey, (The Smiths)

RELIGION: I’ve always been United Methodist, although I did not go regularly for about 15  years there until just a few months ago.  We found a wonderful church in Hyde Park United Methodist and I actually look forward to going to church and enjoy it, rather than dreading it like when I was a kid.  Tip:  The Methodists have the best hymns.

SIBLINGS: 1 brother, 3 sister-in-laws and 3 brother-in-laws.

TIME I WAKE UP: I usually wake up at 3am, 7am, and 10am to feed Stella.   I usually get out of bed after the 10am feeding.

UNUSUAL TALENT OR SKILL: Incredible memory for useless facts about pop-culture, know all the words to “The Goonies” plus all songs I listened to as a teenager.  Can usually identify any video that was played on MTV’s 120 Minutes or PostModern from the years of 1989-1995 within 2 seconds.

VEGETABLE I REFUSE TO EAT: I hate cauliflower, carrots, peas and celery.  But I only refuse to eat peas.

WORST HABIT: Hmm…  Well, I quit smoking over a year and a half ago, so I figure no habit is as bad as that.  I am mostly cured of biting my nails, but still do it occasionally.

X-RAYS: The dental ones you have every year, plus any I had to get at checkups.  The only odd ones were when I was little, every summer my left wrist would start to hurt terribly.  I had a lot of xrays and tests for that, they never figured out what it was.  Also, I badly sprained my ankle April 15, 2004, so I had to have an xray then.

YUMMY STUFF I COOK: Uh, next!

ZOO ANIMAL I LIKE MOST: The sea otters they had at The Aquarium in New Orleans were fascinating.  We couldn’t stop watching them!  I hope they were okay after KatrinaL

 

So you’re supposed to tag people you hope will do this.   I tag:  Travis, Anna, Ian, Bill and Erin.Â

So I think I’m going to buy a laptop with our tax refund!  My computer is on its last legs, is slower than molasses, and is a desktop, so I can’t use it everywhere.  Once I had Stella, I realized how great a laptop would be.  I could check my email while feeding her, make lists, always have what I needed at my fingertips.  But it seemed horribly irresponsible to purchase a laptop when we just added a new mouth to feed and I’m no longer getting paid, right?  But I have crunched some numbers and I think it’s beyond safe to go ahead and do it!  I managed to save boo-koos of money before Stella was born, and we spend a lot less now that I’m at home and we can’t go out all the time, plus Tim has gotten a new job so the spectre of lay-offs is gone, so I figure, I can do it.  I never buy anything big for myself, I feel flush with the excitement and guilt of consumerism.  Yuck, I know.  I felt this way when I allowed myself to buy a new stereo/home theatre system with my profit sharing from Blue Fish at the beginning of last year.  But the laptop will so useful, so I can kind of justify it. 

Yay!  Hopefully this will result in lots more updates, I’ll finally get my blog together, and I’ll update my ipod regularly.  Plus, I’ll make tim show me how to use the new photo software he’s using and I’ll get pictures of stella out on the web in a more timely fashion.  Yippee!  I’m so excited!

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Comments

Drek (http://www.loadedguntheory.com/blog/index.php/listblog/.html)

2011-09-18T03:29:22.000Z

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Sometimes it just hits me that I’m a Mom.  And that that is pretty darn cool.  Being a mom is much harder than I thought it would be, but I think I’m doing a good job just like I thought I would.  It comes pretty naturally and is pretty fantastic.  And I read the blogs from Kelli and Katie talking about their own moms, and it made me realize that it’s a pretty big honor and responsibility to have that kind of influence on shaping a young life.  Luckily, really I don’t have anything big to worry about right now, basically just love Stella and take care of her basic needs, but it’s exciting to think about what I can do with her once she forms memories.  I was really close to my Mom growing up (both my parents really, except when my Dad and I fought about Math, grades, politics, etc.), I even considered her my best friend, so I hope that Stella and I will have a similiar close relationship.

Stella had a big weekend this weekend.  We had Anna and Sean’s baby shower Saturday afternoon at our house, and then Saturday evening we went over to Tara and Jeff for Tara’s birthday party.  Little Stella behaved beautifully at both places, mostly just sleeping. But that’s great!  She also went nearly 6 hours between feedings Saturday night!  When I woke up, I was like “something must be wrong with her!”  I figured she was just tuckered out from all the excitement.  But then last night she went 6 and a half hours!  I’ve consulted the books, and it seems like this is perfectly normal, although not sleeping that long is just as normal.  I cannot express how wonderful it is to get 5 hours of sleep in a row!  It is actually good quality sleep.  I don’t feel like a zombie anymore!  I just hope she keeps this up. Of course, I just nursed her for an hour and 15 minutes, only an 2.5 hours after she’d eaten the last time, but I’m willing to do a little more daytime nursing to get that high quality sleep at night.  It’s fantastic!  She’s such a wonderful little baby, we’re really lucky.  Although everyone tells Tim that the first one is the good one to trick you into having more, then they turn into hellions!  But luckily we have a few years before we have to worry about that:)

So the baby’s asleep, not in my arms for once, thankfully, and I feel like I must update my blog with something, although I have no clue what.  I do not really have as much time as I used to for navel-gazing and selfish introspection that is necessary to complete a blog.  I think of great things I could use while on a walk or nursing Stella in the dead of night, but then I never get around to typing them up.  Crap, there she goes, with her crying that sounds  a lot like Frankenstein (at least over the monitor).  Her binky probably fell out. 

Yep, her binky fell out, the vibration on her bassinet stopped, as well as the womb sounds.  Sometimes you just got to do anything you can to soothe the baby, folks.  Thank God for electronics.  Anyway, I still have not set up my Stella-blog, filled out her baby book, or cleaned the bathroom and baseboards, like I said I would today for Anna’s shower Saturday.  Sometimes I just can’t get motivated.  Also, I feel like she is going to start wailing any moment, and so I just don’t get started on a project.  Bad, I know;)  But, I did get a load of diapers washed today (they are currently drying), so all is not lost!

I did have a belly-gazing thought on a walk the other day; my boobs have ceased to be sexual objects, or things to be modest about, or connected to me in any way really.  They are simply “Bottles” that feed Stella.  I mean, I whip them out in front of more and more people and don’t really care if they look.  What kind of freak looks at the boobs of a nursing mother, that’s just wrong?!  But I used to be so modest about it.  Now I couldn’t care less.  In just a month and 3 days, that transformation has taken place.  Kind of amazing.

Oh, I got intoxicated Saturday night for the first time in God knows how long.  Actually, I do know how long, I think the last time was my birthday, June 2, or the night I went out with the AWD folks which would have been like the next week after that.  It was fun, but I felt really gross and dry mouthed and icky throughout the night and the next morning.  And because I had to dump my milk, I wound up not being able to see The Beard of Avon.  So I don’t know that it was worth it.  Of course, there is another temptation this weekend at Tara’s birthday, but I think I’ll try to be responsible and stick to my one drink.  If I don’t have any milk stored, I guess I don’t have any choice!Â

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Comments

Marsha

2006-04-28T21:55:52.000Z

I just stopped nursing after 9 months.  I have all but forgotten when my cleavage made me feel sexy.  And I lost my understanding that other women didn’t expose their boobs unflinchingly in public.  I got so used to it.  Just not a big deal to me.  Interesting phenomenon, isn’t it?

Are you using cloth diapers?  I use prefolds and bummis.  Would love to know what you use and how they work for you.

Drek (http://www.loadedguntheory.com/blog/index.php/listblog/.html)

2011-09-18T03:30:38.000Z

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apparently faster than i thought.  i’m back among the living.  sort of.  i could put stella in her sling, but peaceful sleep is such a fragile thing these days, i’m afraid to try a change of position.  apparently the rest of lgt is putting 2gether a play, but i currently am knee-deep in pooh and feeding.  really more feeding.  you have no idea how much time feeding a baby takes.  really, probably the most difficult thing about being a mom is the fact that u have no control over how ur time is spent.  i’m a very productive person, and now i feel like i can’t get anything done!  this is really hard for super-industrious me.  and the mood swings.  oh lord, the mood swings!  i cry for absolutely no reason. and i cry when she cries.  honestly, it breaks my heart.  i’d do anything to take away whatever is causing my little angel pain.  i really didn’t believe i could love her as much as i do, it’s totally amazing.  and i REALLY like her at times like this when she is sleeping peacefully:)

so, i promise not to totally soil the lgt blog w/ baby musings, i’m going to set up  a separate blog totally for babbling about stella.  we’ll see when i get around to that!

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Comments

ashmita

2006-04-04T22:23:46.000Z

Amen to what Marsha said, it does go by fast.  Henry will be 6 months old in a few weeks!  6 months!  Where has the time gone?  I think the dust on my dark furniture is about 1/8 of an inch deep.  Thats about 6 months worth.  And there is about 6 months worth of pollen on my car which gives the red a lovely irridescent green hue.  I know the dog hasn’t been washed in about 5 months.

What I have done is basked in the smiles of our boy and kissed his soft furry head many times over for 6 months.  So instead of worrying about my dust build up I concentrate on the kiss build up on his cheeks.  And his giggles.  And his tiny toes.  And his old man fringe on the back of his head.

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Ugh, last night sucked.  Well, really, this morning sucks more.  I had contractions all night long.  I kept waking up and going back to sleep, but at about 6, I woke  up and couldn’t go back to sleep and they’d gotten pretty strong.  I actually let myself think “maybe this is it!”.  When Tim woke up at 7:45, I told him that perhaps he should work from home.  Then I had one pretty strong one about 8:10, thought, maybe I’ll take a warm bath to relieve the pain, and then nothing.  They abruptly stopped.  So I told Tim to go to work.  Now I’m just totally depressed, I even cried this morning because I was just so sure that it was going to happen today.  There are signs, but I just think Eunice Tallulah is going to ignore them.

And it gets so much harder everytime someone calls or emails to ask “how are you?  Have you had the baby yet?”  I know it is totally out of my control, but I feel like I am letting down everyone because this baby has not been born yet.  Like somehow my first failure as a mother is not producing the child quickly enough.  The grandmothers, as you would expect, are the worst.  My mother somehow misunderstood that my doctor’s office mandates induction after two weeks, she thought it was only one, so she thought that the latest the baby could be born was next Sunday.  So I think she was really disappointed to find out that we might have to wait another week.  Tim and I are anti-induction because of the extra danger of a c-section it introduces, but I did want to discuss it with my dr yesterday. Unfortunately she was out at the hospital and we saw her PA and I just thought it would be weird to discuss it with her.  Then, the icing on the cake is that I couldn’t get an appointment for next week until Thursday.  So I assume the induction thing is not going to happen. We have an ultrasound this Thursday to make sure everything is okay and there is a sick part of me that hopes they find she’s a little large and decide they should induce.  I know, bad, induction scary!  But I really want her to be born, and if someone else made the decision to induce, I would not have failed in my resolve;)

So please, if you read this blog, do not email or call us to ask if the baby is here yet.  The rational part of my brain knows that everyone is being concerned and caring and loving, but the irrational part of my brain flares up every time I read or hear “is there a baby yet?” or “how are you?”  We have everyone on a list and if you are family you’ll get a call when I go into labor, if you are one of our bestest friends, you will get a personal call telling you when the blessed event happens.  For all our other dear friends, we have a super-duper email list assembled and we will let you know by that ASAP after the birth.  With pictures.  And the name.  I promise!

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Comments

Tara

2006-03-22T19:49:44.000Z

What a crappy night/morning. Has your cold gotten better at least? Hope your throat doesn’t still hurt. You know, if you’re sitting at home bored and stuff, I don’t leave for work until about 2pm. You can call anytime if you just want some company for a little while. Just so you know I’m here for ya’. Well, any day except today, since I have to leave for work in 10 minutes. =)

Marsha

2006-03-23T00:05:24.000Z

I know how miserable this is for you.  Jackson was 8 days late (with 2 preceeding weeks of “pre-labor”) and I truly began to feel like I was going to be pregnant forever.  like, “Ha ha, it was all a big joke, there’s no baby…”  It got to the point that David and I were not allowed to call anyone because they would automatically answer and be all excited thinking he was here or I was at least in labor.  To top it all off, David’s father had to deploy to Iraq for 4 months on  July 10th.  Jackson’s due date was July 6th.  And he wasn’t born till the 14th.  Talk about failing miserably to produce on time. I cried a lot.  But it all turned out ok. 

Hang in there.  It will happen.

Kate

2006-03-23T01:41:00.000Z

I’m so sorry you’ve had such a crappy night and morning.  I don’t have any advice other than to say you’re fabulous and I am sending big hugs.  And I promise not to call.  :)

So for all of you who are anxiously awaiting news of Eunice Tallulah’s arrival, she is still living in her little protected world.  She decided to ignore the “due date” that has been assigned to her and to hibernate for a longer time.  I knew she’d be late, so I am not surprised, but I was a bit disappointed to see March 19th pass without incident.  And it looks like March 20th will pass the same way.  I told my Dad tonight that I tried to get her to be born today to be a birthday present for him, but nope, she wasn’t having it.  And the Siberian Death March, (aka 3 mile, 1 hour 40 minute walk around Town Lake), Tim put me and the dogs on yesterday obviously did not have the desired effect either.  And now I have a cold.  Not from the death march, but from the La Leche meeting Anna, Ashley and Henry and I attended Friday.  Where there were lots of unleashed children, I’m sure one of whom got me sick.  I just hope it’s the same thing Ashley and Henry have already had so they don’t get sick again too:(  I have been fortunate enough to not get sick the entire time I’ve been pregnant and my luck runs out now?  Sorry, I’m feeling just a little sorry for myself.  Hopefully my body will kick this thing fast.  I’m already feeling better than this afternoon when I was sweating like a pig, then freezing.  No fever, thankfully, but a sore throat which is making me whiny.  I always get sore throats and I hate them worse than any other cold symptom because I love to talk so much! 

Speaking of the La Leche meeting, it was wild!  There were about 30 children of varying ages playing in the middle of the circle, and none of the moms would speak up, so you couldn’t hear anything that was being said.  I wanted to do an impromptu class in public speaking.  The children were not badly behaved, they were just behaving like children do, and it was totally overwhelming!  Plus there was lots of boobage, and lots of breastfeeding of children that were old enough to ask for it, not to mention lots of “we’re not going to answer your question because it involves limiting your child and we do not believe in that”.  I think all of us were a bit shell-shocked afterwards.  Charlotte and Owen were there too, I couldn’t tell what she thought of it, but I assume she had a similiar reaction.

Sarah and Philip stopped by this weekend and she got us the cutest goth onesies, I about died!  One is The Cure with the Japanese Whispers album cover, and the other says “Siouxsie and the Banshees Peekaboo” and has a little frilly skirt built in.  They are SOOO cute!  Eunice has gotten lots of adorable clothes, but nothing that she can wear to her first concert.  Now she’s ready!  Katie and Ryan also came and visited and we had a great time with them, mostly eating, but also enjoying the SOCO SXSW craziness.  I was worried I’d go into labor or be a real louse Saturday, but luckily I was in a good mood and just had a wonderful time with them, I’m so glad they visited!

Dude, work has been so nice to me today, I am horrible for thinking they weren’t going to be!  Cory got me a bottle of really nice champagne so that my first drink would be a good one, everyone took me out to lunch, and my boss got me a beautiful flower arrangement.  Aw, I am going to be missed!  (And I’m going to miss them too) :(

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Comments

Kate

2006-03-16T15:14:18.000Z

Yeah for having people fuss over you and for being done with work!  Does this mean you’ll have more time for blogging?  ;)

So tomorrow is my last day of work.  There will be no fanfare, probably not even a free lunch.  This makes me sad because this is the longest I’ve ever had a job:  two years and 2 months.  But I’m not really surprised.  The office manager doesn’t usually get a party unless she throws it for herself.  Hell, the day I started I at least got lunch.  Not so tomorrow, unless someone really surprises me.  Oh, well, onward and upward I suppose!

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Comments

Kate

2006-03-15T04:56:11.000Z

That sucks.  But being done with them doesn’t.  :) Congrats!

So I am being completely irrational and giving into Old Wives’ Tales because tomorrow is the full moon.  Apparently, according to anectodal stories, more women give birth on or around the full moon.  I know this does not mean I will give birth on the full moon, but I cannot help but hope.  Really, I have a ton of stuff going on this week, some fun, some not, some a little stressful, so I wouldn’t mind not having to attend to this stuff and just go early.  Everything’s pretty much ready, and the stuff that isn’t ready is stuff I really don’t feel like doing anyway!  Plus, this week is my Mom’s spring break, and she already has planned to take next week off from work, so she’d be really happy if it was this week too. 

I have even gone to a website where you can see when the full moon occurred historically and checked out the birthdays of everyone I can think of to see if they occured on the full moon.  For those of you who are curious:
Tim and I were born on a full moon, Tim’s sisters Caroline and Christine were born on a full moon, Tim’s sister Katie was not, Erin was born on a full moon, Anna, Travis, Ashley, and Ian were not, Henry was born on a full moon, another friend’s baby was born on a full moon, Owen, my boss’ baby was not born on a full moon, my brother was not born on a full moon, and my friends Sarah and Diane were not born on a full moon.  I have run out of people now, but if you want to send me your birthday, I’ll look it up, as long as it is after 1951. 

I haven’t been able to blog much lately because I am training my replacement.  That sucks and I am so ready to have it over with!  I really don’t feel like doing anything but surfing the web for the next 2 days.

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Comments

Tara

2006-03-14T18:06:13.000Z

What about Jeff and me? I feel so left out… =)

Me - 4/25/1977    Jeff - 3/29/1976

I’m really curious.

Julie

2006-03-14T18:44:23.000Z

I couldn’t remember your birthdays, sorry!  Neither of you were born on a full moon.

Kate

2006-03-15T04:58:51.000Z

I’m hoping for the monkey to be born sooner rather than later.  It would be great for your mom to be able to spend more time with you.

Looking forward to seeing you Saturday if you’re not busy.  And if you’re feeling like doing anything other than visiting, we will totally understand.