Let's go back to my crib

Yesterday Jon and I made our first non-onesie-or-t-shirt baby purchase: a crib mattress! Saturday Jon's mom told us she found a good crib at a garage sale of a friend of hers and asked if we were interested. Of course! Used baby furniture is the greatest thing ever. So I drove up to Greeley and helped her disassemble the thing and put it in my car. On Sunday Jon had to go to a street festival to work a booth for his shop, so I stayed home and washed and reassembled the crib in the baby's room-to-be. The room is coming together nicely. We even got rid of the extra coffee table we were using to stack junk on. Now the only things in the nursery (haha, that word is so silly) are a guest bed, which is staying, the CRIB (how awesome is that), a bookcase with Jon's albums that we haven't figured out how to store, and miscellaneous knitting and other stuff. It's fabulous. We won't be able to decorate it like a really baby's room since we are renters so I'm trying to figure out ways to make it look nice. I have no good ideas yet. Perhaps I will pull out my trusty sewing machine and make some curtains or a valence or something.

After the festival (the 4-20 festival...sheesh) we went to Baby Depot, bought a seemingly fine crib mattress and all-natural, hypo-allergenic mattress pad. Jon's mom had bought a crib sheet already, because she's cool like that. Now the crib is all set up, with a mattress and sheets and everything. We put Sophie in it as a test run and the thing didn't fall apart, so that is a good sign. The ends of the crib are solid pieces of wood laminate that Jon is going to paint something on once we find out the gender. I have requested no skulls, but he has made no promises. The man loves to paint skulls...

So I feel like a mom, getting ready for the baby. It's very fun and a little scary. There are approximately 5 million things that we need to buy between now and September, but yesterday was the very first purchase.

Meant to Be

Jon and I have a lot in common, as you would suspect from two people who chose to marry each other. We also have a lot of differences, also not unusual. But we recently discovered that we both have one identical, very odd pet peeve.

We both hate cartoon cows that have both horns and utters.


Not something the average person probably notices or cares about. But it annoys us both. Very funny.

I also like that after being together three years we can still learn new little thing about each other. I hope that continues throughout our lives.

Pregnancy and Food

There were so many things about pregnancy I didn't know about before I became pregnant myself. Maybe these are things nobody talks about, or maybe I have some unusual symptoms and side-effects. One of the more peculiar is my relationship with food.

Everyone knows about the first trimester nausea and food aversion. Nothing unusual there. But now that I've mostly gotten over that particular phase, I still have a weird relationship with food. I'm hungry all the time (not surprising) and I have to eat small amounts of food quite frequently (also not surprising). But if I'm sitting at home and I'm trying to decide what to eat for lunch, I can't eat something I'm not in the "mood" for. Today, I didn't want anything in particular, and we have some leftover pizza so I figured I'd warm it up, even though I wasn't overjoyed at the idea. I ate most of one piece, and now I feel sick. Same thing last night. I wanted sopapillas for dinner (not healthy) but instead we had Chinese. (We were locked out of the house and had to eat something within walking disatance, but that's a different story.) I couldn't eat much of it at all and then felt ill. So very strange. Pre-pregnancy I could eat whatever I needed to, regardless if I wanted it or not. Now, it's much harder. Fruit smoothies and dairy products seem to be the exception. I can eat them whenever and feel fine.

So pizza is out today, I guess I'll have to forage for something else. Bowl of cereal? It's the go-to meal.

So smooth

I have become obsessed with fruit smoothies. I've been craving fresh fruit for the past while, but since it isn't really peak fruit season yet, and un-ripe, trucked-in fruit isn't cutting it, I've turned to the frozen stuff. Raspberries, blueberries, blackberries, bananas, orange juice and vanilla yogurt all mixed together into a yummy yummy smoothie. It's like the greatest thing ever. I hit Jamba Juice four times last week. I went to Costco with my aunt this weekend and bought a huge bag of frozen fruit. I can't get enough of the smoothies!!

Nothing else of note going on. I'm starting to show a little bit, but not enough that other people could tell. I need to find maternity clothes soon. I have two shirts and one pair of pants, but it's really not enough.

Three weeks until we find out if it's a boy or girl!

Weekend fun

I'm so tired this morning, recovering from a fun-filled weekend. Alisa was in town this weekend for a surprise birthday trip for her brother's birthday. All four of her brothers came to town, but she stayed with me instead of at their stinky boy-filled hotel. :) We did pregnant lady stuff, looking at car seats and strollers, and eating lots of food, frequent trips to the bathroom. It was great. I did miss a few naps, though, and my bed time most nights, so I am quite tired today. I tried to get up for work....but that didn't happen. So I'm at home, working away. I'll take a nice afternoon nap and go to bed early and be ready for the office tomorrow.

Death and taxes

Hooray! Our taxes are done! Our accountant is e-filing them today and I don't have to think about it for another year.

This year was quite different than my pre-marriage tax filing. First, Jon is technically self-employed and has a million write-offs accumulating through the year. Therefore, he uses an accountant to make sure he's getting all appropriate deductions, and that all his write-offs are on the up-and-up. I previously used the 1040-EZ and it took me all of 10 minutes to do my taxes. His are much more complicated. He's been using the same accountant for the last 3 or 4 years and she is very trusted. We got all our tax information to her over a month ago, but then realized we didn't have the right tax information from Jon's work. His boss thought he didn't have to provide any official information for some reason. Anyway, it got figured out and we had to wait for the appropriate filing information. But then Jon's boss had a situation with his accountant and didn't get Jon's tax information to us until YESTERDAY. Not by February, which I'm pretty sure is required by law. Sheesh.

Water under the bridge, though, as all is well and we're filing in time and nothing bad happened. Turns out marriage agrees with our tax filing situation and we're getting a refund. Nothing enormous, but a nice little addition to the Maternity Leave Savings Fund I've got going on. It might even buy me an extra week of leave. Maybe. I'd really prefer 10 weeks off after having the baby, but for now we can only afford about 8. Stupid American system of no mandatory paid maternity leave. I should live in Sweden or something.

Marriage Life Dogs Knitting

I have been neglecting the title themes of this blog. Let's catch up.

Marriage: My marriage is good, nothing too exciting to report there. Unlike some people, I didn't get any huge surprises with marriage. Nothing the just shook me to the core or questioned my decision to marry Jon. The first eight months of marriage have been good. Ups and downs, of course, but good. I have yet to figure out why Jon seems unable to turn off the light when he leaves the bathroom, but that just seems like one of those fun mysteries that will continue to unfold.

Life: Um, I'm pregnant, so that's my life right now. Well, work is part of my life, too, and work is good. Everyone seems happy with my work and I'm trying to expand my position a little. I've got an idea brewing that will probably mean a lot of work for me, but a lot of benefit for the company, so I'm working on that.

Dogs: Oh, the dogs. They are great and terrible all at the same time. Sofie is signed up for an obedience class in a few weeks. I need to learn how to train her properly before the baby comes. Mainly, I need to get my dogs to stop barking incessantly every time someone approaches the front gate or door. It is bad at night when Jon comes home at 9pm. Presumably my sweet future child will be asleep at 9pm, and Tucker barking his little head off, with Sofie egging him on, will not help. Gotta nip that in the bud.

Oh, also Sofie got the WORST HAIRCUT EARTH last weekend. She has never been groomed so poorly. This groomer is our go-to groomer and usually does a good job. Maybe she had too much coffee that morning, or maybe she was really rushed, or maybe she had an assistant cut the hair--something, because Sofie looks insane. Her face is all lopsided, the top of her head is uneven, and she has racing stripes down her back. Seriously, racing stripes. The groomer cut her back shorter than her sides, so where the two meet there is a distinct stripe. WORST HAIRCUT. She doesn't even look like our little Sofie, she looks like some crazy mutt you find wandering the streets. Poor little girl.

Knitting: I have not knit anything since getting pregnant. I don't know what it is. I started knitting a stuffed bunny to give to Alisa's baby, and then stopped. I've printed out patterns I like, but then nothing. I just don't have the desire. It is very strange. I should be knitting my fingers to the bone, making booties and baby cardigans and whatnot. But no, I just can't seem to pick up the needles. I hope it comes back soon.

So there you go. A relatively non-pregnancy related post. Enjoy.