I realized the other day that it's been a while since five question Friday.  And since I'm tired and want to pretend that I can't think straight, it seemed easier than coming up with my own post.

1. Have you ever testified in court? For what?

No.

2. Do you still have your wedding dress?

Yes.  Although it's in the storage building.

3. Is there a special place you like to go when you're happy, sad, stressed, etc.?

Those are all so different.  I'm not sure there's a place I go when happy.  When I'm sad or stressed I like to go under a blanket.  Preferably somewhere I can sleep too.

4. If you have kids, do they sleep with you? If you don't have kids...will you let your kids sleep with you when/if you have them?

Probably not.  Flurry takes up too much of the bed as is.

5. Do you watch late night TV?

No, mainly because we don't have cable.  When I'm in a bedroom that has a TV in it I'll often watch something before bed, but then when I get to engrossed in it I'm glad that I don't do it often.

Tuesday: baby update

Today I was in for another OB appointment. Im still measuring a week large and the baby still has a heartbeat (although I forgot what the number was). Baby's head is also pointed the correct direction too. I still have a hard time feeling how the baby is pointing...I might be able to guess from where I feel kicks, but it would still only be a guess. She can do it from the outside! I suppose that comes with practice.

I also got to briefly see Betsy and Bryan in the waiting room, so that was a fun surprise.

Sunday: tester

Flurry is about the same size as a baby.  So we've made her try out several of our new baby items in advance of the baby.

The monster-shark didn't fit her very well, although she did have good teeth for it.

We've also put her in the stroller.  It doesn't keep cats in very securely...she kept jumping out.

Saturday: Happy Birthday

Today we celebrated Ben's 30th birthday.  30 years.  We did quite a bit of relaxing during the day, including trying out the new StarWars game.  It was fun, although neither of us see ourselves playing it much past getting to the highest level.  This was a free testing weekend, so we're not even sure if we'll get the game in the end.  Then for dinner we went out to eat with the family.

Friday: Christmas tree

Today we put up the Christmas tree. It's in front of the window so that we can enjoy it and it can be our neighborly Christmas decoration




However, we're not putting any ornaments on it and we probably won't do any other decorations (although I do still have a string of white lights.)


Oh, I did end up putting one ornament on it. I got it at last Sunday's baby shower and so it got to the house instead of being with all the other ornaments. It looks a little lonely, but eventually it won't be.

Thursday: happy Thanksgiving

Today we spent a very nice day with the family.

It's wonderful to be blessed by a great family.

Wednesday: emergencies

Today Ben and I figured out the family plan for three different emergencies.

1) House fire.
Get out of the house.  Meet on the road (or the other side of the road) across from the house.  Flurry's plan is the same.

2) Lack of donuts
Call a family member to bring you some.

3) A goose egg breaks open on your head.
First: don't open your mouth.  Second: If you do get raw egg in your mouth, spit it out and rinse with water.  Note1: We didn't actually cover how to deal with the broken egg on the outside of your body, since that isn't an emergency.  It's just a mess.
Note2: Getting raw egg in your mouth is declared an emergency as pregnant people aren't supposed to have any type of raw egg.  It isn't really recommended for non-pregnant people either.

(image credit)

Tuesday: hi

Baby Hilldore says hi.


(Or "get me out of here! There's not enough room!". But don't worry...i'll be a good parent and tell him he has to stay in and doesn't have a choice.)

Monday: hot chocolate

Betsy and I had drinks after work today.  As always, it was great to see her.  And she had a camera, so we were able to get a picture of us being pregnant together!

Sunday: baby shower

I had a baby shower today.  It was a lot of fun to see the ladies and hear the various stories that came out about their children.  And Baby Hilldore has a lot of cool new stuff. :)

I don't have any pictures right now, so you'll just have to take my word that everything was very nice.

Saturday: birthing class

Today Ben and I went to the child birthing class at the hospital.  It was pretty good, although also a bit scary...everyone in the videos looked like they were in so much pain.  (A little later they talked about pain medications and such, so that eased the scariness a little bit).  There was also a tour and just general information about how the hospital works and what to expect.  There were a few hands on activities, but they were all pretty short...we all had a baby doll but all that we did was swaddle it once.

At the end we got a certificate of completion, although it kind of felt like a certificate of having no clue what we're getting into.

Friday: dining

We went out to eat this evening, as we normally do on Fridays. The wait to get seated was a little bit long, but oh well. When we finally got seated they took our drink and dinner order.

Two minutes later our food came out. Thirty seconds after that our drinks came out. Now, it sure is nice to get your food quickly, but that was a little bit too fast.

Thursday: hair cut

I got my hair chopped off today.  I know I've been talking about it for a while, but I finally set up the appointment.

Here I am in the morning:

Here I am after the cut.

I don't think I love the cut, but I usually don't love my hair quite this short.  I do like it though.  And I get to send five ponytails of hair off to a hair donation place.  I was told that usually people get to send two, maybe three.  Yay!  It makes me feel special.

Tuesday: baby

Today was another prenatal checkup.  :)  They're fast, but I enjoy them.

Baby is measuring at 34 weeks (1 week larger than expected).  The heart rate was 138 but going up because he started moving.  The head is facing my lower right.

Right before my appointment I went to the hospital to see an old childhood friend that just had a baby.  The baby was early (34 weeks) but is doing well.  Her baby is very small, but at the same time very large when I consider that I have something that size inside me.  I'm not really sure how he fits.

Monday: another first - honking

Today I did my first "watch what you're doing" honk.  I was driving down the highway (luckily not minding my own business).  You can see my car in the picture below as the brown car.  The Other Car (silver oval) was doing a Michigan turn.  (Side note: Michigan turns are weird left turns.  Basically you take a right onto the highway and the do a U-turn around the median.)  The other car was moving as I approached, but I wasn't thinking much about it.  I figured they would scoot into the turn lane or into the right lane; it happens all the time.

But no.  They slowly turn into the left lane.  Slowly.  By the time I realize that they're not being polite and that they aren't speeding up quickly I have to step on the brakes.  Not super hard, but hard enough to topple the bag-of-stuff that I have in the back seat.  Then I honked.  It was a polite honk, but seriously...they really cut me off and there was no good reason.  Then I had enough time to see no one was in the right lane (where slow cars are supposed to be), switched lanes, and continued on my merry way.

Sunday: solid foods

I got to watch Autumn eat her first piece of solid food today.  She as not thrilled and the looks on her face clearly conveyed that.  It was fun to watch.

Saturday: early Thanksgiving

Today we part of the day with family and celebrated an early Thanksgiving.  It was wonderful to have everyone together for a bit.

Pat made a delicious meal.

Nathan and Liz gave us some baby presents.  Here is the monkey modeling the awesome shark-monster towel.

And Nathan and Liz took a trip down memory lane with a well loved book.

Friday: 11/11/11

happy 1 day! I missed 11:11 both times, but don't feel too bad about it.

Nathan and Liz came by for dinner, so that was a lot of fun.

It gets dark too early.

Thursday: laundry

Well, I am about to put a load of laundry into the dryer, so I did manage to get that done tonight.  I didn't even touch the quilt, so I guess that won't get pinned together this weekend.  I'll have to find a different time/place to do it.

Today was the first snow of the season!  Yay snow.

Wednesday: sleepy...again

Oh, I'm going to say the same thing I say every few days...I'm tired.  I make it through the day ok, but then once I get home I crash. The last two days haven't been too bad, but I'm not getting my second wind tonight so I'm going to bed.

I need to finish the backing for my quilt so that I can use Dad and Pat's table to pin it this weekend.  I also need to do a few loads of laundry...we're all out of towels.  Chances of these happening tonight: 0%.  Chances of these happening tomorrow night? A strong 30% for each.

Monday: ?

What to say tonight?

We have a smart cat.
And a squirmy baby.
Ben found an awesome deal on a cool looking baby monitor.  It has video and will play music and we can talk to the baby and tell him to go back to sleep.  He'll listen to us, right?

Oh!  Flurry has a love of the penguin blankets.  She usually won't come cuddle with me, but if I'm under these blankets she will. So I make it a point to use them a lot.  She likes the outside, I like the super soft inside.  It's a win-win situation.

Sunday: Pininterest

Well, a few weeks ago I joined the pininterest craze.  It's because there are so many cool quilt ideas out there and this way seems like the easiest way to keep track of them.  I had been using a power point file, but it was getting large and bulky.

So if you happen to be interested, you can see the ones I like at http://pinterest.com/ahilldore/quilts/

Saturday: a wedding

Once upon a time there was a large group of friends (many friends missing from the photo though)

Seven years later, one of them got married (a few people still missing)

                                     

Only to find that the group had grown rather large.

After the wedding we went to someone's house and hung out, which was a lot of fun.  We played games, laughed at each other, met each other, and got caught up with life.

Friday: yay for the weekend

It's the weekend! Ben and I were both thinking of the same thing for dinner...ordering in pizza. It was nice - both that we were thinking the same thing and that I didn't have to leave the house after I got home.

Thursday: dinner

We hadn't seen Dad and Pat for a while, so we had dinner with them tonight...it was nice. However, I didn't take my nap after work so now I'm tired. And Flurry won't cuddle with me.

Wednesday: raking

Today I got home and since it hadn't rained I thought I'd get the leaves off the driveway.  They had nicely piled up, so all I had to do was move them down the driveway.  There were a few more than I expected, and so half the time I ended up using my legs to help push them instead of a rake.  It was fun.  Well, as fun as raking can be.