13 Weeks

Let's just say that my first trimester hasn't exactly been a walk in the park.  I've puked in a plastic bag in the car, in the church bathroom, in the sink, well, you get the picture...  Fortunately, my job is extremely flexible.  On days when I couldn't manage to get out of the bathroom for awhile in the morning, I just didn't go to work until I could.

I'm not going to post a baby bump picture yet because, well, I don't have one.  I haven't gained any weight, and I can't really eat anything but lime Popsicles, cereal, and cornbread.  Fortunately, I haven't lost any weight either, so the doctor isn't worried at all.  Speaking of what I've been eating, let's talk a little bit about cravings.  Here are my thoughts:

Think about a time that you've had a really terrible stomach flu.  Got it?  Well, you know when you get to that point where you are STARVING, but even the thought of food makes you feel like throwing up again?  Well, that's kind of what I feel like.  Now imagine that you are able to come up with one item of food that you think you could maybe eat without throwing up yet again.  That is what I am calling "cravings."  Maybe other women have had other experiences, but this is my blog.

Now for the deets:

• My due date is November 26th, two days after Doug's birthday!  I'm hoping that the baby comes early so that my brother can meet the baby at Thanksgiving since he won't be able to come back home until Christmas.  
• There is only one baby.  Phew.  That may have been my worst fear.  Well, that's not entirely true.  Today, at our ultrasound appointment, when the image came up, the baby wasn't moving.  "Well, it's dead," I thought to myself.  Always the optimist.
• Boy or girl?  The doctor's "hunch" is girl based on our ultrasound today.  The little person decided to spread it's legs nice and wide.  Of course, it could just not be developed yet.  Which do we want?  Well... I love bows.  And Doug would LOVE to finally have a little girl in the family after his parent's 6 boys.  Buuuut... I would love to have a big brother in our little family.  And Doug would love to have a little surfer buddy.  I keep telling him that our daughter could surf with him too.  Sexist pig...
• Fun fact?  I am participating in a pregnancy study.  I get paid $250 each time I donate 3 vials of blood.  The purpose of the study is to try to develop a safe alternative to amnio by targeting fetal cells in the mother's blood.  Moral of the story: I'm rich!  And I get to spend all my hard earned (or bled) money on maternity clothes!  I probably won't because it sure will be nice when it comes time to buy strollers and such.

I promise to have some pictures up soon AND to be more regular about my blog posts!  Growing a baby is hard work!

Woah.

Man, oh man.  This picture makes me laugh.  Right after we found out that I was pregnant, my mind kicked into blogger mode.  "Ok Doug, we need to document this."  Welp, we didn't take a single picture with both of us smiling.  I think that we were both still in shock.  I mean, I know what happens when two people love each other very much, get married, and eventually stop "preventing," but I guess I just wasn't expecting it to happen so fast.  Like 12 days later...SURPRISE!

Here's how it happened:

1. Lizzie decides to get hair highlighted.  Realizes she should probably take a pregnancy test just incasers before putting chemicals on her head.
2. Takes dollar store pregnancy test in bathroom at work (I keep it classy.)
3. Pregnancy test is negative.
4. Lizzie gets her hair highlighted and celebrates her new bangs at a margarita happy hour with Doug (fortunately, the margarita was too sweet, and I only drank half of it.)
5. One week later, Lizzie takes another test.  There is a faint line.
6. Shows test to Doug.  He doesn't buy it.
7. Three days later, Doug insists that Lizzie buy a digital pregnancy test (those dollar store ones are crap.  Really, how can you tell if it's a line?)
8. Doug and Lizzie can't stand waiting for the test to develop, so they close the bathroom door and decide to clean the kitchen while the test develops.  Doug opens bathroom door and looks down at test.  He then shuts to door really fast and looks at Lizzie with eyes as wide as saucers.

Yep.  There's a baby in there.

Crazy Kids...

My mom and Cliff get married in less than a MONTH!!!  The wedding is going to be lovely, family only affair, and I am so excited to get to see all my cousins and aunts and uncles!

As you probably know, I grew up out in the country.  We have cows as neighbors.  Growing up, we had an outside farm dog named Sparky who was a Queensland Heeler.  Sparky hated to come in the house; she liked to be free.  The only time I remember her coming into the house was when my brother and cousins set off some fireworks, and we found her hiding in the closet.  When Sparky passed away, we got Harvey, our spunky little Boston Terrier who sleeps in bed with my sister and doesn't have a lot of interaction with other animals.  Enjoy.

Bin Laden

Yep.  I'm going there.

I found out that Bin Laden had been killed when I got off of the plane in Dallas.  When everyone turned on their phones, I could hear it murmured up and down the aisles of the plane.  My first reaction was a deep sadness followed by a lot of confusion about how I should be feeling.

My girlfriend, Mary Beth, posted this article, and I am really glad that someone addressed the issue so well.

Avoiding

So...I've been avoiding my blog lately.  I keep thinking that if I leave it alone long enough, posts will just write themselves.

I was in Dallas for work this week and had the terrible misfortune of sitting next to a sick man on the way home.  Let me tell you.  It was unpleasant.  He coughed.  Occasionally in my face since he fell asleep and his mouth was pointing toward me.  He spit up phlegm into his barf bag whenever I guess it got to be to much for his mouth to handle.  And no, in case you were wondering, he did not take the barf bag with him when he left.  He left it as a little gift for the next passenger of seat 36B.

Well, I got home and proceeded to get a terrible, terrible, all encompassing stomach flu.  I blame the sick man.  Darn you sick man and your wretched phlegm.