I shouldn’t put things together

A few months ago, I went to a friends garage sale and bought a change table for $10.  Yeah, you’d think I would already have one, since I have a 21 month old, but I don’t.  When we had Hannah, we lived in a tiny little apartment that didn’t have room for a change table.  Then we never bothered to buy one.  Well I’ll be darned if I’m going to change nappies on a change mat on the floor for another 2+ years.  No thank you.  But, I’m cheap (as I’m sure you’re all aware), so I didn’t want to buy one for 100-200 bucks from a baby store.  Hence the garage sale attendance.

Anyway, my friend had a really nice white change table with removable shelves for all of the creams and nappies, and it even has a baby bath under the actual change mat.  Yay, a two for one!  So I paid my measly 10 bucks for the change table (GREAT deal!) and wheeled it to the car.  It didn’t fit.  Humph.  My friend and I sat on the side of the road unscrewing it all so I could fit it in the boot.

Guess I should have paid attention to how it went together.  It didn’t look very complicated, so I didn’t really take much notice.  There were some bars, 2 end pieces, and some trays.  No big deal.

Maybe I should have put it together as soon as I got home.  But I didn’t.  Instead, it sat in what will be Boy Baby’s room, amongst all the clutter that has since been thrown in there until we do the room up.  So, there it was in pieces on the mattress YaYa left here. Next to the few bags of baby boy clothes we have. Adjacent to the pile of board games that we are going to sell on ebay, but haven’t gotten around to yet. Parallel to my bike, that came inside when we were fixing up the garage. Near Aaron’s bike, which lives inside because it’s expensive and he’s afraid someone will steal it if it’s in the garage. And of course, amongst Grandma’s many shopping trolleys  that she won’t throw out.

Yesterday, I decided to put said change table together.  I’m cleaning out the room so it can be painted and prepared for Boy Baby’s arrival.  With the change table put together, I can stack all of Boy Baby’s clothes on it, and all the other things we have for him so far, and then just wheel it out of the room at painting time.

the first bar went around the top horizontally

It started out fine.  I screwed the top bar  (that holds the bath and change mat up) on to one of the sides, and then tried to put the next bar on.  It wasn’t wide enough.  How could it not be wide enough?  I’d seen the thing all put together when I bought it, I knew it fit.  I got the other bar and tried to put that on next.  Nope, that one wasn’t wide enough either.

I pondered it for quite some time, wondered how on earth this thing possibly fit together.  I couldn’t for the life of me figure it out.  Seriously, I’m not that dumb am I?

Eventually, I had to give up and put it in the lounge room (in pieces) for Aaron to put together later.

A while later, I was playing with Hannah when it hit me.  What if

The second and third bars fit on vertically. Humph.

the 2nd and 3rd bars didn’t make a big rectangle around the second row of screw holes horizontally, but instead made a big rectangle only on one side of the table vertically, same with the other bar on the other side??  I went to check.  Yep, turning the bar made it fit.  Humph, why didn’t I think of that earlier?  I’m going to blame baby brain….  At least it’s together now.

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Belly’s getting bigger, pants are getting tighter

Lately, I’ve been finding myself unbuttoning my shorts whenever I sit down.  I seem to have ‘popped out’ recently, and when buttoned, my daks tend to strangle my belly upon sitting.  Sure I could buy some maternity clothes, but it’s February.  It’s still too hot to wear pants, but soon it won’t be (I hope anyway).  So I don’t want to buy summer maternity clothes, just to wear them for a couple of weeks. And, I’d surely die of heat exhaustion if I were to wear them right now anyway.  Shorts unbottoned when sitting it is.  Makes sense to me.  I could, of course, wear the belly belt (a pants extender of sorts.  It has a slit on one end to go over the button, the other is a button for the slit end of the pants to go on), except I can’t seem to find it.  Plus, you have to have shirts long enough to cover it and if your shirt happens to come up a bit, say, when you sit down or something, it’s “hello, here’s my undies,” and then everyone knows you are too fat to button your pants.

Anyway, I went to Kmart the other day to get some hair dye as I was feeling kind of ugly with my scraggly long hair (baby seems to be leeching all of my nutrients), and glasses (have to wear them in this pregnancy as I can’t seem to tolerate my contacts for some reason.  Plus my eyesight keeps changing with all the hormones), so I decided to do something different.  A chop and and dye.  Awesome.

I went into Kmart with Hannah, found some dye and started off on my merry way.  On my way out, I saw someone I used to work with nearly 5 years ago.  We’ve run into eachother at Kmart before.  Kmart is a great place to go when you have a toddler and need to get out of the house.

“Is it congratulations?”  She asked me as she walked over, looking at my belly.

“Yeah, I’m glad it’s finally looking like a baby bump, rather than just a fat belly.”  Really, I was elated.  I mean, to me it looks like a baby bump, but to other people, who knows, they may just think I’ve had a few too many beers down the pub.  Not that I drink beers, they taste disgusting, but you get what I’m saying.

We chatted for a bit, and then Hannah and I went to the car.  I went to unbutton my pants in preparation for sitting to drive.  Oh. Snap.  I’d been walking around Kmart that whole time with my shorts undone.  Darn you baby brain!  No wonder she felt ok asking me if I was pregnant.  Only a pregnant woman would walk around with her pants undone.

 

36 weeks

Pregnancy: 36 weeks 2 days
Total weight gain: 15.5kgs (34.17lbs)
Baby size (head to toe): 47cm (18.5in)
Baby weight (approx): 2.6kg (5.7lbs)

It seems I’m getting bigger and more awkward by the day. My involuntary grunting noises when getting up are getting louder, my feet swell more, I get more reflux, I have to pee more often, my internal organs are getting more squished, and feet in my ribs are becoming more frequent. But, it’s all part of the experience, and I know that soon we will have a little bundle of joy. I am to the point where I just want to get it out of me though. I think you know you’re ready when the “get it out of me” feeling becomes stronger then the fear of labour itself. I’m certainly getting to that point, and fast.

Last week was my first week off work. I feel so much less tired now that I don’t have to wake up at 5:15 every morning. Now the alarm goes off at 6:30 (for Aaron), but I don’t get up until 7 which is awesome!

The other night Aaron showed me a website called broken telephone picture (http://www.brokenpicturetelephone.com/). It’s like telephone (chinese whispers for the aussies), but the first person writes something down (can be anything, like half human, half bear, half pig (I know that doesn’t equate, but it’s funny), eating a pie), then the next person has to draw it. The person after that gets the drawing and has to write it, then the next person draws it and so on. I don’t think I’ve laughed so much since the hypnotist show in Vegas. I was laughing so hard, I was honestly scared that I might A) wet myself or B) prematurely break my waters. Luckily neither happened, but if it had, I would have been unsure if I had wet myself, or my waters had broken. I can just see that, going to hospital saying my waters broke, docs have a look, give me a puzzled expression, then tell me I must have wet myself because my waters are indeed intact. Note to self: do more pelvic floor exercises, just in case….

Speaking of that region, my shiny new epi-no came in the mail last week. What is an epi-no exactly, you ask? The epi-no is a contraption made of some sort of squishy, maybe soft plastic material that is attached to a little hand pump ball. You put the blue squishy oval thing in your nether region, then pump the ball so that the blue squishy thing expands, therefore stretching your perineum. It is supposed to make you less likely to tear or need an episiotomy during childbirth. As I’ve said before, anything to lower that risk, I’m going to try. You can also use it to strengthen your pelvic floor muscles before and after birth (so you don’t wet yourself…).

My second baby shower (put on by my church) was on Saturday, and I had a lot of fun. There was a game where everyone had to bring a baby picture of themselves, then we had to guess which one was who. I only got 2 correct. Newborns don’t look anything like what the older person will look like! I know I certainly didn’t (I’ll put a photo of myself on here just to prove my point…). There was so much food there! Cupcakes, cake, some sort of chocolate slice, peanut butter cookies, muffins, quiche (which was really really yummy!), it was all so tasty!!!!!!!! I got lots more good baby stuff too, which means we don’t have to buy too much stuff.

Yesterday we went to the supermarket and fruit shop to get some groceries. I have been craving pudding for a week now (yes I’m strange, but we all know this), so we wandered around Coles looking for the pudding aisle, and couldn’t find it anywhere! How dare Coles hide the pudding from me. They should have a giant flashing sign with arrows that points me in the right direction. Or at the very least put pudding (or even jello/jelly, since they’d be on the same aisle) on the sign that tells you what is in each aisle. I still don’t have my pudding. I’m going to try a different coles on Wednesday.

We decided to go to Kmart while we were at the chase (the shopping centre where we went to coles and the fruit shop) to get a cute little dresser for Mushi that we had seen there a while back. The Chase is doing lots of renovating and remodelling, and adding of sections, and even though Kmart is staying exactly where it has been for years, Kmart is remodelling. Every time we go there, things are in a different spot. We wandered around the store for quite some time looking for said cute dresser with no luck. We finally asked someone who worked there (when we could find one that wasn’t already trying to show someone else where to find something) who pointed us towards one end of the store. No dresser there. We asked someone else. They pointed us in a different direction. On our way over, we saw someone else and asked again (we had already been where we are going and didn’t see any furniture). Person number 3 pointed us in an entirely different direction. We decided to follow 3rd person’s directions via 2nd persons, just in case. Good decision, we found the dresser hiding on the back wall with a couple of other dressers just where person 2 told us they would be. They used to keep all of the furniture together, but it seems now everything is everywhere. At least we got the dresser. Now we actually have somewhere to put Mushi’s clothes. Bonus, the dresser has a giraffe on it, is very cute, and was only $50.

I haven’t said anything about the “baby brain” for a while now, but I’ve certainly still got it. We went to church on Sunday after eating dinner (we go to the evening service) only to discover when we got home that I had left the oven on the entire time. I’m glad I didn’t burn the house down!

As of next week, I will be considered full term, so not long now!!!!!!!!!!!

30 weeks

Pregnancy: 30 weeks 1 day
Total weight gain: scale ran out of batteries…. check next week
Baby size (head to butt): 27cm (10.62in)
Baby weight: 1.3kgs (2.86lbs)

It’s crazy to think that in 7-10 weeks (considered “full term at 37 weeks, but due date is calculated at 40 weeks), we will have a little baby. That is really not that long. I’m kind of freaking out, we haven’t picked up the crib, bassinet, or pretty much anything else yet!! We need to get on that ASAP so I can nest in Mushi’s room and get it all ready. Yesterday Aaron and I walked up the road to a baby shop (pre-loved, new, and hire) and had a look around. We bought a really cute little Noah’s Ark puzzle toy. It even has some hebrew (I think that is what it is, Trish told me, but I can’t remember if it was hebrew or greek or whatever other ancient language the Noah’s Ark part of the bible is written in) on written on it. The artist musn’t have done his research too carefully though as in the background of the magnetic portion of the toy is another smaller fishing type boat. I’m pretty sure the bible says there was only the Ark floating around during the flood, and not random little fishing boats as well, but we’ll overlook that… the toy is cute anyway.

A month of so ago, Aaron shared a photo from his RSS feed (um… Internet reader thingy, no idea what it stands for) that showed photos of funny mobile phone towers see them here http://waynesword.palomar.edu/faketree.htm). It seems these days they are trying to make them inconspicuous by fashioning them to look like trees. They still look pretty fake though. When we moved, I was waiting for the bus to work when I spotted a funny looking tree behind the petrol station. After studying it for a few minutes, I determined that said tree was indeed a mobile phone tower. There is no way that plasticy looking tree was real. I kept telling Aaron to look out for it because it was so funny, but he came back saying he couldn’t see a cell phone tower tree. Hmmm…. Finally, when we were driving back from Penrith this weekend, I noticed some other trees that looked just like the cell phone tower tree, which did make me feel a little bit silly. Turns out, it’s not a cell phone tower tree at all, but a real tree. In my defense, it doesn’t look like all the gum trees surrounding it, and it does look very plasticy. Note to brain: after baby is born, please work properly again. At least I was amused for a week.

Oh, FYI, the bowls were in the cupboard of our old place, I did forget to pack them. They are nicely in the cupboards of our new place now.

The other day, I was making a roast dinner (roast chicken, potatoes, sweet potato and corn). The chicken had been in the oven for an hour, so it was time to put in the potatoes. I grabbed the oven mitts off the fridge (they have magnets at the top to hold them on the fridge), and took the pan out of the oven. I took off the oven mitts and put them on the counter. I would need them to put the chicken back in the oven. After putting the potatoes in the pan with the chicken (they taste so darn good when cooked in the chicken juice!), I put the mitts back on and was about a millimetre from touching the pan. To my horror, I realised that I wasn’t wearing the oven mitts at all, but instead, I donned the bright pink, melt to your skin if you touch a hot pan, dish gloves that were sitting on the edge of the sink next to the oven mitts. Oh that was close. The absentminded baby brain at work again!

Thursday we had our third antenatal class. We got to go on a tour of the delivery suites. Luckily, the birthing rooms are all single occupant. I don’t have to push a human being out of me while listening to someone cursing loudly while also pushing a human being out right next to me. You can adjust the lighting to make it darker in there, play CDs, have some snacks, use the shower or bath. There’s even a sofa to sit on. The bed itself goes into wacky positions so you can squat on it, make it look like a giant throne. There is an exercise ball and mats if I want to kneel on the floor over the ball or something. I can pretty much give birth in whatever position I darn well feel like. That’s good, I’d rather not lay on my back with my feet in the stirrups (it makes labour more difficult and makes you tear easier). The rooms are also very noise proof so if I scream bloody murder, no one on the outside will hear me. I’m hoping it won’t come to that…. If the baby needs oxygen or extra warmth or something, there is a special crib in the room. There is no nursery, the baby stays with you. Unless of course, it needs intensive care, there is a special ward for that. I was quite annoyed about what they said about water births though. I was told during all of my check ups at the hospital that a water birth is fine at RNS as long as I was in one of the rooms with a bath (2 of them do not have baths, the rest do). They never told me that it also depends on which midwives are on duty. You can only have a proper water birth if there is a midwife on duty who is accredited with such things, and not all of them are. I much would have preferred it if they told me that to begin with instead of just saying no problem and writing water birth on my yellow card. It’s not so bad though, even if no accredited midwives are on duty, I can still be in the bath right up until it’s time for the baby to come out. That’s ok I guess, just not as good as actually having Mushi in the water and then pulling him/her out (of the water) myself. This of course also depends on if I can have a natural birth anyway. I still have to have an ultrasound (at 32, 34, or 36 weeks, I can’t remember which) to determine if my placenta has moved up. If not, I will have to have a C-section. I’d much rather push a human being out of me then have a c-section any day.

The door to the delivery suite used to be on street level so cars could drive straight up to it and the labouring women could go straight in. They no longer do that though. Over zealous husbands used to accidentally run the car through the doors in their frantic “oh no, my wife is in labour, must get her to hospital” panic. Now the new maternity ward is not on ground level and you need to take an elevator to it. Probably for the best. I hear they had to replace the doors way too many times.

The Jess and I are having an audition to be on Ready Steady Cook on Wednesday, so wish us luck!

24 weeks

24 weeks Pregnant:
Aaron and I went away this weekend, a lovely present that Aaron got me for my birthday. We were both lucky enough to have Friday off work, so were able to leave at about 1pm which was quite good. I also got my very first Australian drivers licence that morning. About time, it’s only been 8 years! We were both very hungry for lunch by the time we got going, so we thought we’d find some fast food or something on the motorway, but as time went on, nothing was found. We decided to stop in a little whoop whoop town called Mooney Mooney, which seemed to consist of a boat ramp, and one gas station/shop/burger joint. This was all the one store mind you. The things they had on their shelves were actually quite comical. They only had one of each item, and the items were quite random. If you wanted some rice, or plain pasta, you were just plain out of luck. If you wanted a blue odd shaped wooden thingy that kind of resembled a step stool (but didn’t look like it would be very safe or level), then you were in the right place. They did however, have one thing of baby powder (but nothing else for baby). I should have taken a photo of what was on their shelves, but I did not. Anyway, we had fish and chips for lunch there. You would think the man who worked there (and probably owned it) would be happy for any customers, but instead he seemed a bit grumpy at the prospect of having to serve us.

The cabin Aaron booked for us was really good. It was so relaxed, had a bath tub (with jets), kitchen, bedroom, and a tv, dvd player, and cable. Not that the DVD player worked. It was a very good, relaxing weekend. There were some giant ducks hanging about as well that I fed out of my hand (after some coaxing). I was quite alarmed the first night when I got up after playing lots of board games with Aaron and my feet were very swollen and sore. That is the first time I’ve had that in my pregnancy so far. It felt so weird walking on them. Luckily we had the bathtub, I had a nice (lukewarm so as not to cook Mushi) bath and put my feet on the jets which worked a treat.

Mushi seems to really like church. Everytime we go, he/she is very excitable, moving all around and kicking up a storm. This week at church, I saw a lady in the bathroom who told me that a member of the morning congregation (we go to the evening service) just had a baby naturally that weighed 4.5 Kilos (9.9 pounds). I can’t even begin to imagine having a baby that giant, and really really hope that ours does not weigh that much at birth. After all, I’m not that big. We had to leave fairly early from the supper/yakking after church due to my crazy pregnancy reflux. I forgot to bring my Rennie (prego woman safe antacids), and really needed to go home and have some so my throat didn’t feel like it was being slowly burned into nothing.

This morning I took some fish oil tablets (to aid in the growth of Mushi’s brain), and an hour or so later, I burped. It tasted like fish and I couldn’t figure out why. I thought back, I haven’t eaten fish in the last 2 days, what is going on??? Oh yeah, I had a fish oil tablet. Bad idea I tell you! I’ve been burping fish taste all day. It’s not the most pleasant thing in the world. Note to self: next time, spend the little bit more and get “odourless” fish oil tablets. Only about 400 more left in the jar before that can happen….

Oh yeah, (see, the baby brain… it’s making me forget stuff), on Thursday, Aaron and I looked at a granny flat in Chatswood (as we are looking to move out of our tiny 1 bedroom, preferably before the baby is born), but it turned out to be horrid. The picture that was posted on the website clearly showed a dining table, china hutch and couch. When we got there though, all we saw was a kitchen, 2 small bedrooms, and a little bathroom. I have no idea where they supposedly took the photo on the web from as there is absolutely NO WAY a couch and dining table would fit in that little place. One or the other would barely fit, but not both. The web also said it had a yard, which turned out to be a block of cement otherwise known as the carport that goes with the main house. Awesome. Needless to say, we did not apply for said granny flat, nor were we impressed. The agent didn’t even say hi, which I thought was very rude. As if anyone is going to pay $370 per week for something that is smaller then our current tiny one bedroom apartment. Tell him he’s dreaming. And so, the search continues. The problem of course, is that we have guinea pigs, and despite the fact they they are in a cage, and can’t do any sort of damage to a house/apartment/whatever, they are not allowed in most places (and we don’t want to lie and then sneak them in because that is not the right thing to do).

So to sum up being 24 weeks pregnant: I’m so awkward in my movements that it’s comical (especially when trying to get out of bed over my long pregnancy pillow. It seems like I’m trying to get over a mountain, and probably looks that way), my feet have started to whinge at me by swelling if I don’t elevate them some during the day, my stomach acid wants to eat my esophagus (can’t be bothered looking up the spelling on that one, and I’m sorry, but it’s just not a word that I need to spell on a regualr basis), Bending over to pick something up is somewhat of a production which includes involuntary grunts, I’m horrified by the thought of having a giant 4.5 kilo baby, and I don’t great a great nights sleep because I have to wake up to pee at least once during the night. But you know what? This is all part of the beautiful gift of life that is growing inside me, it’s just funny to write about. Oh, and one more thing, my belly button is threatening me more and more each day with thoughts of popping out. I wonder if it will suddenly just pop one day, or slowly become an outy. I shall soon (very by the looks of it) find out!

23 weeks

HHello again! Right now we are 23 weeks and 2 days pregnant. My belly seems to be getting bigger with my belly button threatening to pop out. Despite my protests, my ass also seems to be getting bigger, but I could be imagining that…. Aaron and I got a toddler bible which we started to read to Mushi the other day. I’m starting to get fairly bad reflux, which apparently only gets worse as time goes on and Mushi gets bigger, pressing against my stomach and pushing the acid up.ello again! Right now we are 23 weeks and 2 days pregnant. My belly seems to be getting bigger with my belly button threatening to pop out. Despite my protests, my ass also seems to be getting bigger, but I could be imagining that…. Aaron and I got a toddler bible which we started to read to Mushi the other day. I’m starting to get fairly bad reflux, which apparently only gets worse as time goes on and Mushi gets bigger, pressing against my stomach and pushing the acid up.

For some reason, I want lots of foods which I sometimes used to eat, but now since I can’t have them, really want them. I seem to be compiling a list of things I’m going to eat as soon as the baby pops out (although someone asked me if I could still eat them when breastfeeding. I’m not quite sure, but am really hoping yes!). I really want a kebab (not like meat on a stick, like a lebanese type kebab, with the dodgy chicken, tabouli, sun dried tomatoes etc.), even though one usually only eats a kebab when drunk/half drunk and nothing else is open, a chicken hotdog (although I do wonder if I could eat that now if properly cooked), Feta, brie, and camembert cheese, soft serve ice cream, runny yolk eggs, etc. It seems I may put on more weight after the baby is born, with all the things I want to eat!

I don’t think I have weird cravings, but I do have cravings. Unfortunately, at the moment I’m craving things I can’t get in this country. I could really go some peanut butter cup ice cream (why oh why didn’t I get some on my visit??!!), and wheat thins (but not together, as I said, I don’t crave weird things or odd combinations). If only I had enough room in my bag to bring back some wheat thins…. Ok, I need to stop now because it’s just making me hungry.

I also have a serious case of the baby brain. The other day I was changing clothes after work, and got my dress and purple crop top out (so my boobs don’t pop out of my dress), but then spent 10 minutes looking for the purple crop top only to find that I had already gotten it out of the closet. I also locked the work keys in the storeroom one day. They were locked in there all night until someone who was on after me could find a spare. I went to get a lightbulb out of the store room, but when I was confronted with all the different wattages and types, I put down the keys to search for the right one. Proud of myself for finally finding it, I left the storeroom and closed the door, only to realise that I had locked the keys inside.

Up until now, I didn’t really get extra hungy, I just pretty much ate the quantities I usually ate. Now though, I’m ravenous! Maybe that is contributing to the expanding ass….

Thanks for listening (and it’s so great that I’m doing this whilst at work, getting paid).