sweet tea and strollers

My friend Emily sent me an email recently asking if I would like to join her on a new blogging project along with 3 of her other pregnant friends. The idea is that the 5 of us will all contribute to one blog about anticipating, preparing for, and then experiencing first time motherhood. Of course I agreed, and I am excited to introduce you all to Sweet Tea and Strollers! All of us are due within the next few months, so the first entries are just introducing ourselves, our spouses, our relationship to Emily (since she is he founder and the one who knows all of us), and sharing how we are feeling as our due dates rapidly approach. Join us as we blog our way through pregnancy woes and joys, birth stories, baby pictures, and all of the anxieties and thrills of having a newborn!

nunya

(As in: "nunya" business.)

Today I am one month away from my due date. (Which means that I could technically go into labor at any point starting next week and still be considered "full term", fyi. Due dates are so over-rated.) There have been many things that have surprised me about pregnancy, especially in my last trimester. How I can press on the top of my foot and it leaves a little indentation (Mom says its called "pitting edema" or something like that. I think it's called "fat feet disease"). How time can fly by and drag all within one day. How I can still teach my classes and feel confident that my students are learning, even with less than stellar demonstration from me. How much I miss lying on my stomach. How much STUFF a baby needs. But I think the thing that I has surprised me the most is how entitled people feel to comment on my pregnancy. Strange people. In grocery stores and fast food restaurants and parking lots.

Now, people warned me about this. Or at least mentioned that strangers would come up and touch me without being invited to do so. But it's not the touching that bothers me (and really, not many people have tried to "pet the baby" without asking me first, so it hasn't been as much of an issue). It's the unsolicited commentary and the endless repeated questions. I think I'm going to start wearing a sandwich board (with a hole cut out in the front, of course) that says:

DUE: November (the date is not important, people, but it is the 14th since you all need to mark it on your personal calendars).
GENDER: Unknown (Yes, on purpose.)
TWINS: No. It is one baby. Just one. In my massive stomach, there is but one child. Hard to believe?

That should cover the questions. As for the comments about how huge I am and how there have GOT to be at least 8 babies in there that were actually due last week. When people widen their eyes and say "November? A whole MONTH to go?" or (one of my favorite phrases) "you are about to POP, aren't you?". Or exhale loudly through their mouths in a way that seems to say "good luck with that" in a very insincere and obnoxious way. For them I will turn around to show the back of my sandwich board with a giant middle finger on it.

boo!

So I don't know if any of you guys noticed this, but it is, in fact, October. No, you heard me right.

October. As in one month before November.

October. The month of candy corn pumpkins (there is no comma there on purpose... the pumpkin shaped candy corns are the BEST), apple cider, corn mazes, costume parties, and cooler weather- yes, even in Georgia!

There are only a handful of weeks left before the end of 2009 will be upon us, finding my little family, larger by one, sitting at the beach house and opening a time capsule full of memories from the New Year's that might have been the end of the world. (But wasn't... whew!). While part of me wants to race ahead- baby! holidays! time capsule!- part of me wants to stop time for a moment and take a deep breath. So much to look forward to often also means there is a lot to look back on. After October I will no longer be just a wife, daughter, sister... but a mother. My husband, my crazy friend from so many years back who asked the most ridiculous questions in history and ate all of the food out of my family's refrigerator and walked to my house in the mornings and threw rocks at the window to wake me up, is going to be a father. And of course once the baby comes time won't stop there... the baby will grow up and be an older sibling to more babies and many Octobers will come and go and more time capsules will be filled and opened and filled again for many more New Year's celebrations at the beach. So for now I am taking a moment to sit on my couch (forgetting for now that I am looking forward to the day when we replace it) in our new-ish apartment (forgetting for now that we will probably only be here for a few years before we move on again) and take a deep breath, looking back at not just 2009, but 2008 and 2007 and so on... (forgetting for now that eventually I will be taking a breath to look back to right now).

wanna go for a waaaaalk?

I couldn't resist sharing this. Definitely the cutest thing I've seen on youtube since the "All the Single Babies" video phenomenon last week. I tried to recreate it with my two pooches and it was pretty hysterical. Next time I'll try to have my Flip handy and capture all the fun. Until then, you'll have to settle for the pug brigade.

stomp stomp clap

Last night, Joe and I went to see Ingrid Michaelson at the Melting Point. We saw her last year at the 40 Watt opening for Matt Nathanson right after her single had been on the Old Navy commercial and she was starting to get a lot of radio play. At that point, she was only performing with one sidekick, Allie, and they did an incredible opening act. Actually, I think a lot of people came to see the show because she was the opener (maybe they did not yet know the wonder that is a live Matt Nathanson performance...). This time, she was headlining and SOLD OUT the Melting Point, which had to be a cool feeling. She also had a full band of 5 with her this time (including Allie) and her own terrific opening act that she discovered in a bar in NYC, Greg Holden (super cute, British accent, plays a mean guitar...). The entire show was fabulous and the Melting Point was a perfect intimate venue. Anyway, I didn't get many good pictures even though we did have an awesome view, but I did remember to take my handy-dandy Flip camera and got a few videos. This one is my favorite. Right beforehand, she had the whole band pose around her so that everyone could get the "perfect photo" ("Everytime I see pictures of myself on the internet I look like a big red mess... so hang on and we'll do this right..."). They posed like they were singing so that the photographer could take credit for capturing a special mid-concert moment. And then they played this fun little sing-a-long number. Doesn't it just make you want to be in her band? Look how much fun they have...

showers of all sorts

It has been raining in Athens for approximately a week. Now, we Athenians can't really complain too much about our dreary rain situation since our Atlanta neighbors to the west are flooding and sinkhole-ing and generally experiencing much worse side effects from the rain than we are, but still. Constant grey skies and intermittent deluges have a way of bringing a person down. Especially when you check weather.com and see that it is supposed to stay that way for another week. That just stinks.

But fortunately there are other kinds of showers that have a much brighter, happier connotation and I have also been inundated with those! This past weekend was my second baby shower, hosted by my aunt Jane and my middle sister Chelsea, both of whom are exceptional hostesses. The food was amazing, the house was sparkling (but then... Jane's house is ALWAYS clean), the drinks were festive and kept full, and the gifts were piled in pretty stacks on the dining room table. And let me tell you, you don't know gifts until you've had a baby shower. I guess maybe it's comparable to Christmas for a 5 year old, where you unwrap and unwrap and ooh and aah and exclaim, and then realize when you finish that you are trapped inside a semi-circle of bags, tissue paper, and loot. And while the gifts are fabulous in their own right, it really is an amazing experience to be the recipient of not only so much STUFF, but so much love and support and encouragement. All of the people circled around me, some of whom had traveled for hours just to be there, were beaming just as hugely as I was each time I pulled out a cute little outfit or a basket full of baby shampoos and soaps. And each card exclaimed just how happy the gift-giver was for Joe and me and our baby-to-be, and what good parents we are going to make. I hope they understand that part of our ability as parents will stem from having them all behind us instilling confidence, offering advice, extending help when we need it. And of course, for giving us so much before the baby is even here!

When Joe and I were both home together that night, I gave him a tour through the boxes and bags, telling stories of who gave what and why. He got to work assembling the bookshelf and the pack n' play (nesting, I tell you) while I sorted and folded tiny shirts and pants and socks and placed them into drawers.

"How much more do we really need?" he asked, surveying the pile at my feet.

And while I knew he was referring to things still left on my registries, or newborn diapers, or tiny socks, I couldn't help but think that, really, he's right to ask. Because when you get right down to it, we don't need anything else at all.

But it would be nice if it stopped raining.

an observation

Did you ever notice that chocolate desserts, especially at chain restaurants, are named frightful and terrible things? Chocolate Suicide... Death by Chocolate... Molten Meltdown of DOOM AND DESPAIR. Now, I don't know about you, but when I am considering a chocolatey, gooey, rich dessert, I do not want to be forced to order said dessert by asking for a meltdown. Or death. I'd rather ask for, say, a delight or a mountain of wonderment. But if they are trying to scare me away, then they must know that they will not succeed. I am female and pregnant and if I want my chocolate gooey goodness then I will ask for it by whatever named has been bestowed upon in it that little plastic booklet in the condiment rack. Chocolate Destruction of All That Is Good In the World? Yes, please. And just bring one spoon.