Pregnancy Photoshoot, or Why I Hate Modeling

I've always been hyper-critical of myself in pictures... and I've always hated taking pictures. These are my favorites that Joshua captured. I wish the ones in the black dress had turned out a bit better though... I look much more at home in the jeans and t-shirt.

But that's pretty indicative of my personality anyway. This is me at 30 weeks.

So much to update...

It's official. I am The Suck at blogging.

Then again a lot has happened.

In no particular order:

I don't have The Beetus. Joshua started school again. Squirrel's room is painted. Squirrel has a crib. Some of my favorite people are throwing parties for Squirrel. Everyone is still trying to figure out Squirrel's name. I keep growing. Squirrel keeps growing. Squirrel has no more room to move. Squirrel is still of average size.

I will share more on these things in their own posts, backdated, to follow immediately.

The crib has landed!

Much like painting, furniture assembly at the Heerssen household is never a good thing. Inevitably, the man of the house will misread directions or forget a critical step and end up having to backtrack, leaving the woman of the house harping out of frustration and reading the instructions to him for the remainder of the project. We were reminded of this unhappy ritual when we recently purchased an IKEA entertainment center. If you've ever purchased anything from IKEA, well I don't have to explain the measure of desperation those cryptic assembly guides and small wooden pegs will create in the pit of your soul. For the rest of you, use your imagination.

Thankfully, our crib is not from IKEA. Joshua's parents were sweet enough to purchase our crib for us and have it delivered to our house for our assembly enjoyment. I use that word loosely.

Step 1 - Unwrap the pieces. Scatter the pieces. Decipher the instructions.

Step 2 - Begin. Let the cats help if they want.

Step 3 - Give the female the instructions for deciphering for the remainder of the project. Continue.

Step 4 - 90% completion. Assemble the Drawer Of Awesome.

It is important that I mention here that this drawer was 50% the reason I decided on this particular crib. I am a sucker for practical storage.

Step 5 - Completion!

Step 6 - Move into temporary position. Apply temporary ornamentation.

Step 7 - Insert baby here.

At the end of the day it wasn't all that bad really. It could have been worse... we didn't need to glue any critical pieces together so it was a win in my book. Also a win: the now undeniable fact that the queen bed will not fit in Squirrel's room along with the rest of her goodies. Which I knew from the beginning. Not that I'm bragging or anything.

Adding to the stash

Maggie, Joshua's teaching partner, has already given us a ton of toys and a Pack n' Play for Squirrel... and she continues to find things that her two children have outgrown and pass them along to us. Thanks to her we have a few more toys, a tension rod baby gate and an umbrella stroller.

Also, on the first day of school, one of Joshua's former students, Kylemock (all one word) came up to say hello/goodbye before leaving for college in New York. He was sent with this from his mom to give to Mr. Heerssen.

Mrs. Mock is apparently a crazy-mad knitting/crocheting machine. She produced these in one weekend!

This child is loved and spoiled beyond words... and so are we. I really don't know how to express my thanks enough. Truly.

I'm going to be a big crying soppy mess at the shower!

Wasabi on the walls

The last time Joshua and I painted and I was actively involved in the process, we were living together in a 3 bedroom townhouse. We almost got a divorce before we were married.

Since then, we have avoided painting. However, Squirrel's impending arrival brought on the drive to put some color on our untouched walls. The living room accent wall Joshua did in June was our litmus test for how painting in the Heerssen household would go. I was mostly uninvolved. I think then we both decided, to ourselves, that it would be best if I remain uninvolved when painting our daughter's room too. Of course I had every intention of being involved... when we said "we're painting tomorrow" I was expecting to jump right in when I got home from work. Joshua had other plans... because he's amazing.

He not only painted Squirrel's room, he painted our electric blue accent wall in the gameroom. And cleaned up before I got home.

The color is perfect... not an exact match to her bedding, but given the amount of color I've got planned for her little space, exactness was not a concern. The window wall was left the original tan-ish builder color. Vinyl art and shelving will eventually live on that wall.

Here's the gameroom wall. I have a slew of movie posters to frame and decorate that wall with.

More painting is planned for Labor Day weekend... dresser, end tables and shelves.

29 Weeks

I don't know why, but I've always avoided odd numbers. Odd dates, odd months, they're all weird to me. 1 and 5 are the only exception, because they have an order about them. Multiples of 5 are orderly and simple. And 1? It's a straight line. Nothing threatening about that.

So, given my weirdness, I am not really a fan of the fact that this picture was taken at 29 weeks. I am getting more comfortable with the fact that I continue to grow, though.

It's fun to watch that white shirt continue to stretch.

Houston, we have colostrum!

FINALLY!

Oh, right, TMI Disclaimer - this post is 90% about my boobs. Skip if you're offended.

Anyway, FINALLY! Finally the first signs that my breasts are good for something other than free drinks, getting my way with the opposite sex and making me easily recognizable from a distance. I was beginning to become quite dismayed at the lack of progress the girls were making as it related to my pregnancy body. They didn't swell to amazing size, they were never particularly sore or tender and aside from some odd sensations of interior tickling they didn't do much of anything. They've just been sitting, waiting, getting dwarfed by my expanding belly, much to my chagrin.

This morning I'm showering and checking out my chest meat, as I do every morning. I'd been noticing stretching, cracking and expanding of the holes in my nipples, so I knew they were doing something. But today when I squeezed ever so slightly, again as I do every morning, I almost yelped for joy at seeing liquid emerge from not one, but BOTH of my nipples. My boobs are working!!!! They're doing exactly what they are supposed to do and I really couldn't be happier.

So there we have it. Way much more information than you ever wanted to know about my breasts. If you ignored the disclaimer and read to the end and are offended, don't act like I peed in your Cheerios. You were warned.

I HAD to get this out. I was going to tell Joshua, but as he's sleeping, with one of my eye masks over his face no less, (which I should take a picture of because it's really quite hilarious) and since the cats respond with a meow no matter what I tell them, I figured I'd just let my joy out on the blog.

JOY!!