Maternity Clothes

In a word, shopping for maternity clothes sucks. Especially when you are 20 weeks pregnant and 9lbs heavier than you were before you were pregnant.

I continue to gain weight at a pretty normal rate. I will admit to trying to be reasonably healthy and not using pregnancy and as excuse to eat whatever the hell I want.  I have yet to sit and eat an entire bag of cheetos or a container of Hagen Daz (though Husband and I shared a marble slab concoction of oreos, cake batter, cookie dough and hot fudge on Saturday and I was sad I had gotten a small because I could have totally downed three larges all by myself).  My own clothes however, save for a few empire waist items, fit like a fat sausage trying to fit into a teeny tiny casing (what are those casings made out of anyway? Sausage and hot dog type items are so mysterious).  So I went looking for some maternity clothes and those are like gigantic mumus that hang off my body making it look like I ought to gain another 100lbs just so I fit.

Where are the designers with the in between clothes? I don’t think I will be in “real” maternity clothes for at least another two months  so what do I do in the meantime? Someone needs to come up with the in between clothes. The bella band is my new best friend (except I use the cheap Target version), I have a pair of maternity jeans that sag like nobody’s business and several maternity wifebeaters to wear under my regular tops but other than that I’m at a loss.

There is already enough suffering during pregnancy the least someone could do make it so I can dress and not feel frumpy. Rotating outfits and wearing the same thing every three days is not working for me.

Also, I was wearing my “good” outfit the one that makes me look like I’m not pregnant or just fat yesterday because I had a meeting with the mortgage loan lady (and I said I had no dependents and I don’t want her thinking about how I have a negative 5 months dependent) and she cancelled on me and rescheduled for today…so I had to come home and wash my meet the loan officer outfit. No good.

Now He Wants a Boy

You seem a little sad about the girl news.

No, but maybe now I think I wanted a boy.

Why?

I mean what are we going to talk about? She’ll want to get manicures with you and I’ll be home twiddling my thumbs watching the game by myself. She probably won’t even like stocks.

She might like stocks. But I don’t like stocks and we still have stuff to talk about.

I guess.

She might not like manicures. She might like trains and football.

I guess. Do you think she’ll want to go to business school? [Insert Husband's actual alma mater in here]

I don’t know, maybe. Do you want her to go to your school?

Yes.

And the conversation continued (including what are we going to do when she brings home some random guy she wants to marry and we hate — I told Husband we have 25 years to think of a solution so we will probably be fine) and I thought everything was fine until Husband said well if we don’t have a boy next time we will have to try for a third. And then I laughed uproariously, asked him about his malthusian population control issues and told him, no way buddy.

I may not feel maternal yet but I think Husband became a Dad at that ultrasound.

And It’s A…

We had our anatomy scan yesterday and we are having a girl! Everyone here at the Parsing family is happy. Though both Husband and I could have done without the ultrasound tech pointing out our negative 5 month old baby’s anatomy in such clinical terms. Saying it’s a girl would have been preferable.  It totally made me think of her as a 13 year old with hormones, yelling at me for never letting her do anything fun and everyone else has hot pink bras why can’t she (I’m not sure why since neither my sister or I were like that).

Husband and I also separately had the same thought which was, “oh crap now we have to budget for her wedding.”

Honestly, the whole thing has become a lot more real for me. She was moving around and looked to generally be having a good time in there. The Beast is a girl.  So crazy. We need a new nickname for her I think, any suggestions?  I tried to scan our ultrasound photo but the black and white didn’t come out that well.

For some reason I expect her to look like this in five months, but I suppose she could just as easily look like Husband (I don’t have any baby photos of him though).

(Hello Parsingtime as a wrinkly monkey baby — my mom’s description)

I can’t believe someone is going to let me take something this small home without instructions. I mean a flat screen TV comes with more instructional material than a baby.

Holy crap people, we are having a baby.

Happy Birthday To Me

I’m not going to jail and I get to keep my driver’s license. Yay.

The bad news is that the court thinks I’m a menace to society and are punishing me with defensive driving (and not online, people), a hefty fine and a “donation” to their slush fund.  The donation is in an amount that is supposed to discourage my reckless behavior in the future.

Oh, sure I don’t have to take the deal but then North Carolina will revoke my license.

So happy 30th birthday to me.  I just spent any gift I might have wanted for the next ten years donating to Crappy County in Georgia (Crappy is not the real name but I don’t trust that the DA doesn’t google his own county and then he’ll find me and throw me in jail and double my “donation”).

And don’t think I don’t feel guilty when I think about how my ticket costs equate to a house payment. But I get to keep my license.

Please consider me sufficiently discouraged.

Driver Decision Day

Well today is D day. As in driver’s license day. Will I become a felon of the state of Georgia and have my license revoked in North Carolina? Who knows.  I wonder if there is internet in prison? I could become famous as the pregnant blogging felon. Then I’ll write a book about my experiences in prison and then I’ll have a Lifetime movie made of my story. The only question is, who will play me in the movie?

Seriously though, my attorney better step up and make something happen.

Also today may be the day we decide on the house we are going to bid on. After much back and forth over two particular houses, including a visit from my in-laws last weekend to check them out we may just go for a third house that wasn’t on our radar until Sunday afternoon.   I know a lot of my real life friends out in cyberspace haven’t bought homes yet and I just want to say — it is hard and less fun than you would expect.  But that could be because I like to see high numbers in my bank account verses looking at a brick building.

Boy or Girl

I hope we have a girl.

Really? I would have thought a boy.

No, a girl. They are cuter and more fun. More importantly they love their dad more than their moms.  And at the end of the day that’s all that matters…that they love me more than you. Plus if you do something crazy a girl is more likely to throw you under the bus and tell me what’s been going on.

We also recently had a discussion about discipline and I asked Husband if he was going to back me up on the whole discipline and his response? I will, unless the kid is going to get upset with me. It needs to love me unconditionally. If you don’t love me unconditionally I’ll be okay.

People, this is the man I chose to marry of my own free will. We find out soon…almost to the halfway point!

I’m Not Cool

Husband’s awesome quote from the weekend, “that guy seems cool, except he’s an attorney.”

We’ve Eaten Enough

Despite eating an enormous bowl of cereal, half a bagel, 2lbs of grapes (I’m not even joking), a peach, a pear, a vat of minestrone soup, two Digestive biscuits, left over Indian food, almonds, yogurt and edamame The Beast still seems to be hungry.

And it wants chocolate mini eggs, a Costco sized bag of salt and vinegar potato chips, a spicy tuna roll, a banh mi sandwich with extra jalapenos and an entire veggie pizza with siracha.

Dear Baby,

Did you know that the books say you and I only need an extra 300 calories per day? You get those extra calories at breakfast and yet you are not appeased. Do you have an over-eating disorder we need to discuss?

Please get full. There is NO MORE ROOM IN MY STOMACH.  In fact, if you do want me to eat more then you are going to have to give up some amniotic fluid room. That means less swimming space.

Also, while we are having this talk, why is it you don’t have to pee that much during the day but at night you need to go all the time –I do believe this is an example of you messing with me and I don’t appreciate it, remember I get to be in charge in a few months, sort of. Alright, fine,  I get to be in charge in like two years, but still at some point I do get to be in charge and I won’t forget these in utero months — I prefer not to have to pee three times a night, it disturbs my sleep. So if you could find a way to sort that out I would be thrilled.

Thrilled enough that I might let you eat potato chips. Think about it. I’m open to bargaining and bribery. Let’s make a deal.

Love,

Your Mom? Mommy? Mama? Let’s go with Host for now. I don’t feel like  a Mom yet.*

* For those of you who send hate mail about what a terrible parent I’m going to be…it’s a joke. I recognize that the person growing in my body is not purposely,with malicious intent, causing the hunger or multiple potty breaks. Also, I can’t believe I have to spell that out…humorless people.

Oh, Steve

I realize that this is not important in any way shape or form but I really wish someone would buy Steve Jobs a new shirt and a belt.

Every damn announcement he makes, whether it is to talk about his liver or the iPod, he wears the same black semi-turtle neck t-shirt and no belt. Doesn’t he know that men are required to wear a belt when they tuck in their shirts?

I wanted to talk about the State of the Union this morning but I was so distracted by Nancy Pelosi’s rapidly blinking eyes and smug looks every time Obama mentioned things the House had passed, that I can’t write anything.

More House

We found a great house this week. It fits our criteria in all but one area and is on a street we like in the neighborhood we like…the only problem is it isn’t move in ready. It needs new carpet in the bedrooms, new appliances, new counter tops and new paint everywhere (I mean from doors to ceilings — my real estate agent thinks I can live with the mocha walls, a red accent wall and lemon bedrooms but I can’t). So I would guess about $15-$20,000 worth of work.

We would price it as the fair value on a square foot basis for that area and then knock off the amount of work needed to be done and offer that much but it makes me nervous. I’m not able to pick decorative accents without feeling buyers remorse let alone picking a house,  paint and carpet.  HGTV has not improved my decorating sense.

And of course the real estate agent wants to make an offer on the house like, NOW NOW NOW. And I need time to think about it.  Of course someone else may make an offer on it but would I be heart-broken? So many people tell me they walked into a house and just knew that it was the perfect house for them. I have yet to feel that way.

So do you wait for that feeling or do you acknowledge that this is your first home and unlikely to be your last and go with what works for now?

I have such first world problems. I’m going to go self-flagellate.