Four Months

Alan turned four months last Friday. Yesterday we took him to the pediatrician (our last Kaiser appointment - Yay!) for his four month appointment.


Alan and Mommy at the doctor's office, waiting for the nurse to call his name

He weighs 12lbs 14oz and is 26.5" long, which puts him in the 90th percentile for height and 10th percentile for weight. He is a tall, skinny boy and getting skinnier each month!

We got the official go-ahead to start solids. They prefer we start with the rice cereal mixed with tap water. They also said to start with green vegetables, move on to orange vegetables, and then do fruits last. We bought some green beans at Kroger, so Friday morning when we're both home, we'll probably start him off with that. I'll be sure to video record the exciting milestone.

Alan also got to visit Santa for the second time this season.


Alan with Santa at Bass Pro Shop

He did a great job sitting on Santa's lap for the picture. Santa said he was too easy. I told him to wait for next year, when I'm sure he won't be too keen on sitting on a strange man's lap.

We got a lot of smiles yesterday before the appointment.


After the appointment, though, he was rather fussy due to his shots. This morning he had his first fever (101.6 degrees). His little legs are rather sore, and he was burning up. Poor little guy.

Exhausted

I am completely exhausted. It seems that no matter how much sleep I get, I am still tired. We actually went to bed at a decent time both days this weekend and didn't wake up too early, yet I'm still half falling asleep at the stoplights this morning on the way to work.

Rob mentioned that maybe it is because I'm not as active as I used to be. That might be part of it, but last week I got up and worked out three days - which is three days more than I had been doing since Thanksgiving. It didn't seem to help.

Perhaps nursing has something to do with it. I still am getting up in the middle of the night to pump, even though Alan is sleeping through the night. That along with the fact that my body is producing the milk might make me tired.

Perhaps it is postpartum depression? I really think this Reglan that I'm taking to increase my milk supply is making my PPD worse. I had a mild case of it before the Reglan, but I wonder if it has gotten worse - causing my boredom and exhaustion.

Perhaps my vacation will help and I'll be able to get some sleep and come back to work in the new year rested and ready to go. I hope so.

Santa Came Early

Everyone at my job gets two weeks of vacation. Coming from public accounting where you get four weeks after about two years of service, I was able to negotiate an extra week when I started my current job. I then purchase an extra week of vacation each year, because I value time off way more than I value salary. And in 2010 we get three personal holidays since there were only seven company holidays.

That gives me a total of 184 hours of paid time off.

I thought that with my two weeks that I took off after maternity leave, the few random days here and there, and my one week that I took for our last childless vacation, I would have no more vacation time left.

Well, think again. I sat down and figured out my vacation/personal days today, and I still have 40 hours that I hadn't accounted for!! That means that I only have to work two more days this year!

You don't understand how absolutely giddy I am right now! I feel like dancing around the office.

Whoo-hoo! Vacation!!

Bored with Life

It seems like lately I can't take anything to completion. I get started on a project and get bored with it long before it's over. I don't feel like doing anything. Nothing is interesting to me anymore.

For example, I started a project before leaving for maternity leave. We're supposed to work on our individual development plans at work, and my career goal is to be a Chief Ethics Officer for a company. In order to see what I needed to do to reach that goal, I interviewed nine different people who were in the role of Chief Ethics or Chief Compliance Officers at various different Fortune 500 companies. I asked them about their educational background. I asked about their career progression. I asked about what skills they valued most for their job. I asked them what they would look for if they were retiring and interviewing their replacement. It was fascinating work.

Then I went on maternity leave. I had a baby. I came back to work and became bored with life.

I started working on the project again today by consolidating answers. I got not even a fourth of the way finished before I decided I didn't want to do it anymore.

I still would like to be a Chief Ethics Officer, but I don't feel like figuring out how to get there.

I thought I had gotten out of this funk, but apparently I'm so deep in it, I can't get out. I've lost the way. I can't see the light at the opening of the hole anymore. It's become a tiny dot.

I'm sitting at my desk, bored with my job, and I just want to cry.

Moonlighting as a Mom

I work in Security for a paper manufacturing company, and I moonlight as a mom. Why do I say that? Because it seems like the only time I ever get to see my precious little boy is at night when he's sleeping or on the weekends.

Sometimes I feel like having a son is a chore. He always has to be watched and entertained and fed and changed. He can't move much on his own, but doesn't like to sit still. Other times having a son is the best thing in the world.

Yesterday I worked from home, and got to enjoy him all day long. Rob had a meeting to go to in the evening, so I got to spend the whole day and evening alone with my little boy. We read stories. We chatted. We sang along to the Lulluby Radio on Pandora. We sat by the fireplace. It was a lot of fun! I miss being able to spend all day with Alan, especially now that he's reacting to the world so much more. Maternity leave was way too short, and then duty calls.

Here is a video of Alan chatting away yesterday. He was a very chatty boy.


He will be four months on Friday. He will go for his 4 month pictures on Saturday and will go for his four month appointment next Tuesday.

Taking a Break

I have officially decided to take a break from marathoning.

It's been unofficial since Thanksgiving. But today, I make it official.

After my DNF with the Atlanta Half Marathon, I have not had the desire to run. Part of the reason is fear that I am going to have the same feeling I had during the Half with not being able to control my legs. Another part of the reason is because it's just so darn cold outside that I haven't wanted to bundle up to go run. Now that I'm so far behind in my training, I am not going to have time to make it up before the Myrtle Beach marathon.

I really would like to use Myrtle Beach as a Boston qualifier. It is flat, fast, and close to home. Because my training isn't going well and the race was pretty cheap anyway, I am going to forgo this year and try again next year.

I may try the Outer Banks marathon next fall as my first marathon after having Alan.

I'll still probably run some here and there. But my mileage will probably be pretty low - maybe in the 5k range for awhile.

Perpetual State of Cold

I thought I lived in the state of Georgia. But alas, I live in a perpetual state of coldness.

I love summer. I love fires in the fireplace. I love feeling the sun on my skin (although I hide cake on the sunscreen for fear of skin cancer). I love snuggling in a warm bed with my hubby. Heat relaxes me. If it could be 80 degrees all the time, inside and out, year-round, I would be in heaven. My hell wouldn't be a lake of fire...it would be a polar ice cap.

In contrast, I hate being cold. I am very cold-natured, and it seems like I am always cold. It causes tension. It makes my muscles hurt and makes me feel like I need a massage every night.

It's a good thing Alan was born in the summer, because there is no way I would have been able to relax when I was shivering to stay warm.

Being cold causes me to eat more. I guess my body feels like it needs more energy to warm me up. Winter is the real reason that people gain weight. It's not because of the apple and pumpkin pies during Thanksgiving or the Christmas cookies. It's not because the average Thanksgiving meal is 3,000 calories. It's because it's frikkin cold this time of year!!

Winter is the epitome of misery. The world looks dead with all the leaves gone, which is depressing. My hands and lips are dry and cracked. I look like Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer. Static electricity rears its ugly head. My neck and shoulders hurt because of tension. I have to wear a bulky coat and drag it around with me all the time. My hands shrink, so my rings almost fall off. At work I have to wear a sweater and wrap a blanket around my legs to keep me warm enough for my hands to not shiver. Ice on the roads makes it dangerous to drive. Bundling up to run is no fun.

Why do we need this miserable season?

And I live in Atlanta, GA. I couldn't imagine living anywhere north of here. Every winter I remember why I want to live in Florida.

Summer, come back soon!

It's Beginning to Look a Lot Like Christmas

Other than the cold weather, this is the most wonderful time of the year. I love Christmas and the Christmas season.

We had our family portraits taken on November 21st. They turned out beautifully, if I do say so myself.



We ordered our Christmas cards. Actually, I am a sucker for pictures, so I ordered three different Christmas cards. One is a postcard (to save on postage costs), which will be sent to a majority of our list. Two are actual Christmas photo cards to be sent to family. They all have the above two pictures in them. I'm so excited to get them out in the mail!

On Monday the 29th, I went to Target after work and got all the trimmings for our Christmas tree - the first Christmas tree in our new house. I decided the tree would have purple and silver decorations. We put the tree up that night, but didn't get all the lights, ornaments, and garland on until the 2nd.


On the 2nd I also put up our nativity scene and the stockings on the fireplace.



K-C had a Holiday Family Night on the evening of the 2nd. We took Alan to meet some of my co-workers and have his first encounter with Santa. I think it turned out pretty well.

Alan with Santa at the K-C Family night

I'm looking forward to having my family back over for Christmas at my house on December 27th. Bring on the carols and long mall lines!

Weights and Measures

It has definitely been a struggle to get back to my old size and shape. I don't know if it will ever happen. I'm going to give myself nine months, since it took nine months to get to the place I was. After that, I will no longer be able to blame my size and shape on the baby.

Before I got pregnant here were my measurements:
Waist - 24.5"
Bust - 30.5"
Hips - 36"
Thighs - 36"
Weight 115

This was on October 29, 2009 - a month before getting pregnant.

Now my measurements are:
Waist - 27.5" (I have three inches to lose)
Bust - 33.5 (I think I'll take that, although I'm sure I'll lose it when finished breastfeeding)
Hips - 35.5" (Wha??? My hips are smaller??)
Thighs - 35.5" (Again, Huh?)
Weight 122.6 (So 7.6 lbs to lose still)

I'm pretty happy with the fact that my hips and thighs are smaller, but I have got to get my waist and weight back in order.

I didn't measure my belly before getting pregnant, so I don't know what it was initially, but it is now 30.5". I think that is a huge part of my problem with trying to get into my old clothes. My belly sticks out over top of them like a muffin top. *sigh*

I have five more months to go to get back to my original shape. Wish me luck!

Thanksgiving

I blogged most of this month about things I was thankful for. Thanksgiving weekend really brought a lot of those things together. It has been an eventful last couple of days.

Family
I hosted Thanksgiving for my family this year. We had 13 adults and 4 children over at my house. On Wednesday night, we had 11 overnight guests. The house was packed, and I enjoyed every minute of it.

My mother and stepmother met for the first time this weekend. It seemed to go very well. They were civil to each other, even friendly.

Alan with cousin Anastasia over Thanksgiving holiday

My first DNF
Thanksgiving morning, I attempted to run my first half marathon since Alan was born. It was a big FAIL. I had my first DNF, which in the running world means "did not finish." I was doing well for the first three miles. Then, sometime between mile three and four, my legs started feeling weird. It was as if I couldn't control them. I've never felt that way before. It felt like I was running like one of those people who have to walk with the crutches attached to their arms. I don't think I looked that way, but that's how it felt. I stopped to stretch and started again. I was fine for a little while, but then it started happening again. After the fourth time of this happening, I was approaching Colony Square and knew that it would be the easiest place for Rob to pick me up. So I dropped out of the race. According to my Garmin, I had run 5.40 miles when I dropped out - not even halfway! It was very disappointing to say the least.

I know I can run at least 9 miles, or at least I could two weeks ago. So why did I all of a sudden have this weird thing happen to me? I think it may be a hip injury that affected my legs, so I am going to schedule an appointment with my sports massage therapist and see if he can work it out. If that doesn't work, I might schedule an appointment with a neurologist or something to see if it's a nerve issue.

Alan's first cold
Alan started coughing this weekend. He has been congested sounding in the past, but it has escalated to a much more raspy and consistent cough. Sometimes he will cough three or so times and then draw a huge breath, almost sounding like he can't breathe very well. We've put a humidifier in his room, but it hasn't seemed to help. I will be calling the doctor for an appointment today.

Decreasing milk supply
My milk supply has been decreasing recently. It is actually quite sudden how much it has gone down. It went down when I went back to work, but I never had a problem getting enough to send with Alan to daycare. Normally the pattern is that I have a decent supply toward the beginning of the week. It gradually decreases throughout the week. Then it will go up again on the weekend when I am around Alan more.

Two weekends ago, I had a huge supply. An overabundance. In fact, it was enough that I took a night off from night pumping and was still okay. Then last weekend, things started changing. Over the weekend, I wasn't getting as much as I had before. My supply should have gone up a lot over Thanksgiving weekend, because I was around Alan and nursing him most of the weekend. I started getting the bottles ready for today, and I only had enough for two and a half bottles.

Not only is my supply dwindling, but he's eating a lot more. We decided to try a formula bottle to see how he would take it. He ate 6oz of an 8oz bottle. Then he proceeded to projectile vomit an ounce out, and then spit up another couple of ounces in his crib while sleeping. Hmm...formula didn't go over too well.

So what am I going to do? He doesn't like the formula, and I'm not making enough to satisfy him. I even got a prescription for some medicine that is supposed to increase my supply. It hasn't seemed to help so far, but we will see now that I'm back at work and pumping more rather than nursing. Talk about frustrating!

Alan's dedication
On Sunday, we went to Dunwoody Baptist Church for Alan's dedication. Norcross First UMC, where we are members, refused to do a baby dedication instead of a baptism. I firmly believe that you shouldn't get baptized until you believe in Jesus Christ and accept him as your Lord and savior. Since Alan is too young to do that, I wanted to have him dedicated to the Lord and dedicate us to raising him in a Christian family environment, to teach him the way of the Lord in hopes that he will someday accept Jesus for himself. I used to go to DBC before getting married, and they were willing to do our dedication even though we aren't members.

Us dedicating ourselves to raising Alan in a Christian home

We were supposed to have 18 people come to the dedication and lunch at our house afterwards. We ended up having only 10. Everyone cancelled at the last minute. So now I have a TON of leftovers. I suppose we will be eating spaghetti for a long time.

Family present at the dedication

Final thoughts
It was an exciting, event-packed weekend. I didn't get much sleep, which I would have liked to get when having an extra couple days off work. But I did have a lot of fun. I enjoyed being the hostess for the two big events. Now it's time to get back to the real world and a normal, routine life.

Go Pirates! Arrrggghhhh!

Today I am thankful for my education.



I started college at Mars Hill College, a small baptist college near Asheville, NC, on a full-tuition scholarship. The college was too small for my taste, so I decided to look at other options.

I had been living in North Carolina over the summer after my freshman year, and decided to stay there and gain residency. During the process of gaining residency, I went to Asheville-Buncombe Technical Community College for my sophomore year.

Once I gained residency, I applied to four different schools: Western Carolina University, Appalachian State, University of North Carolina at Asheville, and East Carolina University. I was accepted into all four, but decided to travel away from the western North Carolina area and enrolled at East Carolina University.

ECU has a five year program where you can get a Bachelors and Masters degree in Accounting together. Although some of my credits didn't transfer, and I had to take classes over the summer, I still managed to graduate in five total college years with my Master's degree.

My education prepared me for taking the CPA exam. Because of the way ECU set up their program and because of my great professors, I was able to pass the exam in one sitting.

My education has also allowed me to gain great experience with big companies. I have worked for two of the Big Four accounting firms. I have had my pick of jobs anytime I wanted a change.

While often times I wish I had gone to a school with bigger sports programs and that were closer to where I currently live, I am thankful that I had the opportunity to get a good education and that I chose a field that has a lot of possible career choices.

To see what others are thankful for today, visit:

The Holiday Season Is Upon Us

In the past month, I have blogged about some of my favorite things: Pictures and Holidays. With Christmas coming up and a new baby in the family, Rob and I are planning on sending our first ever photo Christmas card. We had a great photo shoot with the whole family last Sunday and look forward to using some of those pictures for our card.

The concept of photo holiday cards immediately makes me think of the Friends episode – The One with the Creepy Holiday Card. In the show, Ross starts to panic when Mona gets an idea to send out a holiday card for the two of them, thinking that their relationship is starting to move too fast.

Perhaps the Christmas card is overdue in our case. We’ve been married now for almost three years and have never done a photo holiday card. Last year we received several of them from family and friends, and they are still decorating our refrigerator. Holiday cards are a great way to share your updated family picture with your friends and family, which is especially important with a growing, changing boy in our family now.

Shutterfly has always been our “go-to” printer for photo books and birth announcements.
• When Rob and I had our first dating anniversary before we got married, I made him a photo book that showed all the things we did during our first year together.
• For our wedding, we used Shutterfly to create our guest book. I put together a book showing each of us separately from birth to when we started dating, added the story of how we met, and included pictures of us while we were together. At the end, I had lines where guests could sign and add comments for us. It is such a great keepsake now, and I will probably pull it out to use again as a guest book for parties on our significant anniversaries (like 20th, 30th, etc).
• When Alan was born, I created our birth announcements using Shutterfly.

With a history like that, we will probably use Shutterfly again for our holiday cards. They have a wonderful selection of designs, and I know their products are great quality products. I particularly like this card because it is a 5x7, which is a normal photo size that we could put in a frame. It also allows for two pictures and has the year in the top corner.

If you didn’t get a birth announcement from us, it is probably because we don’t have your most current address. If you’re interested in getting a Christmas card from us, please send me your address!

Hole in the Ground??

Today I am thankful for pumbing and running water.



One of the great things about living in America is that we have modern plumbing.

I went to China in March of 2009, and was completely shocked at the bathrooms there.

Me at the Great Wall of China. No toilets there!

The hotel was nice and modern, but outside of that, the bathrooms consisted of a hole in the ground. I suppose it wouldn't be too bad if you only had to pee and if you were a guy. But as a girl, I was not about to try to figure out how to squat over a hole and attempt not to pee all over my pants. I held it all day until we were back in the hotel. I'm surprised I didn't get a UTI because of holding it so long.

I've also been on a mission trip with the youth choir where a hot shower was nowhere to be found. That has absolutely no appeal to me. I seriously feel sorry for people who have to live in those conditions on a regular basis.

I will go camping and sleep in a tent or on the ground if there are facilities that I can shower and use the bathroom in. Otherwise, you will not find me at a campsite.

Everyday during the winter, I love standing under the hot water of a good shower, and dread getting out into the cold air.

I am thankful for toilets. I am thankful for hot showers. I am thankful that I live in America.

To see what others are thankful for today, visit:

What Smells?

Today I am thankful for my sense of smell.



It rained last week, and as I was running shortly after the rain, I caught a whiff of some freshly cut wood. With the smell of the rain lingering in the air and the fresh wood smell, my run was so pleasant.

I was once told that how we tasted food was determine mostly (like 80%) by our sense of smell. So if you were blindfolded and given something to eat, but someone put an orange right under your nose for you to smell, whatever it was you were eating would taste like the orange. So between smell and taste, smell is the dominant sense.

My dad has lost his sense of smell completely. My husband's sense of smell is not the best. I think my sense of smell is one of my stronger senses, and most of the time, I'm thankful for it.

During my pregnancy, my sense of smell increased. I could smell things before they were close enough to see.

My favorite smells are probably strange to most people. I like the smell of a musty basement. I like the smell of skin. I like the smell of the dryer. I like the smell of leaves burning in the fall. Then there are the normal smells that almost everyone likes: baking cookies, flowers, etc.

It's so nice to be able to experience life to the fullest through our senses.

To see what others are thankful for today, visit:

Say Cheese!

Today I am thankful for pictures.



I don't have the best camera, and I'm not the best photographer, but I love pictures. I love taking them. I love getting them taken. I love hanging them around my house. I love posting them on facebook.

Today, we are taking Simon family pictures, so it seemed appropriate that I blog about pictures. We are going to Portrait Innovations to get a picture of everyone in Rob's family (parents, sister and her family, and our family). We are also going to take our family picture that I hope to use in our Christmas card this year.

Pictures capture some of life's most precious moments. They are the only thing (other than the marriage itself, of course) that is really left over after the big wedding day event. They show how much a baby grows and changes over the first year of life. They allow others to participate in your life when they are far away.

If there is one thing that I could save if my house went down in flames (other than people and dogs, of course), it would be a box of CDs with all my digital pictures on them.

Unfortunately, my husband doesn't feel the same way, and is often reluctant to have his picture taken. I have to fight sometimes to get some good pictures of us and the things we do together. He's always saying that the camera steals your soul. But when he does manage to cooperate, we get some great shots! I'm hoping today's session will have some great results.

Here are some of my favorite memories:


Steak n Shake (my favorite restaurant) after dancing during ATLX 2007


We're engaged! 2007


Wedding on Sand Key Beach in Clearwater, FL, June 2008


Hiking in Alaska during our Simon family cruise 2008


Graceland with my best friend, Lisa, during Liberty Bowl weekend 2009


One of our many Braves vs Mets games


Oregon vacation 2009


My dad and me after the Richmond marathon, where I finally ran a sub-4 hr marathon!


Maternity picture while pregnant with Alan


Rob and Alan during Alan's first college game day


First picture capturing a reactive smile from Alan


To see what others are thankful for today, visit:

Happy Trails to You

Today I am thankful for trails.

Running is made much easier when there are good trails to run.

My favorite is the Cochran Shoals river trail along the Chattahoochee River. The trail is a 5k loop, but it also has some roads at either end that can extend the run to a 10 miler. Columns Drive is a straight, flat road at one end of the river trail that goes 2.5 miles out to a light. On the other end, if you turn left out of the river trail parking lot, the road goes up a big hill a mile to a light. This is my favorite place to do my 20 mile runs. If I put a water bottle somewhere along the course, it gives you plenty of opportunities to hydrate as you pass it. It is partially on packed gravel, so your joints don't wear out too badly. It has nice houses and scenery to look at as you go, and it is marked off by the quarter mile, so you know how long you've run.


Cochran Shoals river trail

During the week, I've started running on the Big Creek Greenway after work. It is a half mile to the greenway from the office, and the greenway spans eight miles from Roswell up to Alpharetta. I run to the greenway, run half the distance I want to get, and turn around and come back. It is very well maintained and is a beautiful, peacefull trail.


Big Creek Greenway

Aside from running, I love to hike. I try to get at least three hikes in each summer. The three that I typically do are: Stone Mountain, Anna Ruby Falls, and one up in Clayton, GA. I've also gone hiking in Big Canoe with my in-laws the past two years.


Hiking in Blairsville, GA 2005


Clayton hike 2006


Clayton hike 2007


Anna Ruby Falls hike 2008


Big Canoe 2009


To see what others are thankful for today, visit:

Holidays

Today I am thankful for holidays.



Today is my Name Day. A Name Day is similar to a birthday (with cake and presents), but everyone with the same name celebrates on the same day. It is a Czech tradition. I'm 3/8 Czech, so I claim it as one of my traditions. My name in Czech is Alžběta, and everyone with that name celebrates today.

Generally your parents will name you something that has a name day about six months after your birthday so you can have a celebration twice a year. I just found out that if we had done that with Alan, his name would probably be Peter Simon because Petr's name day is February 22nd, which is six months after my due date. I find that funny because most people were calling our little unborn baby "Simon Peter" before he was born.

They also say that if your parents named you something that made your name day be close to your birthday, they didn't like you. It just so happens that Alan's name day is August 14th, just a mere three days before his birthday. Rob's name day is April 29th, which is six days after his birthday. Of course the saying doesn't hold true in our family, because both Alan and Rob are well loved by their parents.

Most people think of Thanksgiving and Christmas when they think of "the holidays." That time of year is the most wonderful time of the year when it comes to seeing family and giving thanks for what you have. I love my family, and we are not able to get together as often as before, so the holiday season is very special to me now. I will have 19 people at my house this year for Thanksgiving, and I can't wait!

Christmas has become a little too commercialized for me. It has really taken away from the true meaning of the holiday - the birth of my Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. But as long as the family keeps the primary reason front and center (we always read the Christmas story from Luke at breakfast on Christmas day), I do love buying and giving gifts, decorating, and eating all the delicious Christmas cookies.

I also love Halloween. This holiday is the opposite of Christmas; the commercialization is a good thing. As a Christian, I don't like the origin of the holiday, but I love seeing the kids dressed up in their costumes, carving pumpkins, and handing out candy.

With the spring comes birthday season. Between mine and my husband's family, we have at least one person with a birthday in every month from January to August. Getting together to celebrate is the highlight of each month.

To see what others are thankful for today, visit:

Home is Where the Heart Is

Today I am thankful for work-from-home days.


This is obviously not me, but I thought it was a good picture of a home office

In the past I blogged about how I was thankful for my job and thankful for my boss and thankful for technology. Well, all those things come together to allow for today's topic. I have a job where I sit in front of a computer all day long. Because my boss is so awesome and technology is available, one day a week I work from home.

I get a lot done, both personally and professionally, when I work from home. I love that I can throw a load of laundry in and then go back to working. I love that I have very few distractions when I'm trying to get something done for work. But most of all, I love that I can be with my son all day long when I work from home.

I also get way more milk when I'm at home and around him than I do when I'm at the office. On weekends and on my work-from-home days, I can easily get 5+ ounces in a pumping session. When I'm at work, I'm lucky if I get 4 ounces.

I still have conference calls to get to and work to get done, but when I'm at home, I can cuddle with Alan in front of the computer while I'm doing those things. The only time I really can't do any work is when I'm feeding him. The rest of the time, he is content to hang out in his vibrating chair or under the activity gym or on my lap while I work.


To see what others are thankful for today, visit:

What Do You Expect?

Today I am thankful for my new found friends on the August mommy What to Expect message board.



Today my son turns 3 months old. The journey to becoming a new mom has been an interesting one. With hormones out of whack and routines changing, it's important to have an outlet. I found that outlet in several places, but one of them was a group of ladies who were in the same boat that I was.

I have to admit that I stole the idea for today's blog from one of those ladies. But her blog was so accurate, that on this 3-month milestone of my son's life, I felt it appropriate to be thankful for those who helped me through my journey.

I had always heard of the book What to Expect When You're Expecting. It is probably the most popular book for pregnant women. Now they have a What to Expect (WTE) iPhone application that tells you almost everything you need to know about pregnancy. I'll be honest, I never bought the book, and if the author read this, she would probably start charging for the app. But through this application and the website that goes along with it, I found a message board with ladies from all over the world who were expecting a baby in August just like me.

During my pregnancy, I was almost always on my iPhone. Rob would come home and ask if I was on facebook or WTE. It was always one or the other.

It's so exciting to share your experiences with people who are going through the same thing that you are. It was especially important before I told my family that I was pregnant (we waited until after the first trimester to tell), because it gave me a way to get the excitement out without giving away the secret.

Over the past year, I have established great friendships with these ladies. We have gone through a lot together. One of the posters lost her house and all she owned in a fire a mere week before her due date. To make things more complicated, she had been planning a home birth. During that trial, the WTE ladies banded together to provide care packages and money to help her get back on her feet before the baby arrived. Luckily the baby was a few weeks late, so she had more time to get things ready.

That's just one example of the things we have gone through as a group. We shared our stresses (PPD, significant others, work, etc), our joys (ultrasounds, birth stories, pictures of our little ones when they were born), and our losses (one lady lost her baby at 33 weeks gestation and another lost her 11-week-old to SIDS). We have a sounding board for questions about milestones. We have something to keep us occupied during those middle of the night feeding/pumping sessions.

I am so thankful for these ladies and how they have helped me stay sane throughout this life-changing experience.


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Electricity

Today I am thankful for electricity and central heat.



Yesterday, I blogged about technology. While electricity and plumbing are probably also considered technology, I wanted to discuss them separately.

I honestly cannot imagine living in a time where we can't turn on the lights at night, especially now that it gets dark at 5pm. I can't imagine working by candlelight. I can't imagine how dark the world is without streetlights and storefront signs at night. A world like that is so depressing to me.

I can't imagine living in a world where there is no heat, or you have to burn wood in order to heat your house. I lived without heat for one winter in Asheville, NC, and if I have anything to say in the matter, I will never do that again! They story goes like this:

My sophomore year in college, I was married and living in a double-wide trailer on a tobacco farm in Weaverville, NC. (That sentence just reeks of redneck, doesn't it?) There were about 20 farm cats that lived near us. The trailer had no underpinning, so when it started getting cold outside, the cats went under the house and dug into the heating ducts for warmth. One of them got sick, crawled up into the heating duct, and died. So, when we turned on the heat, it smelled of dead cat. Because of where the cat was and how the ducts turned, it was very difficult to get it out of the duct. You would need a flexible stick of some sort. If we were able to get a stick or something long and flexible enough to get to the cat and drag it out, it would fall down right onto whoever was trying to get it out. So, we went without heat that winter.

We had a kerosene heater that we used during the day, but it's not safe to use one of those things at night. We turned it off during the night and slept under a pile of blankets a foot thick. It was miserable.

If you thought that story was bad, it gets worse. Apparently maggots were eating away at the dead cat carcass inside the heating duct. Spring comes, and the maggots turn into flies. The flies don't want to be in the heating duct anymore, so they fly through the vent into the bathroom. Our bathroom was FULL of flies. I took the vacuum cleaner attachment and sucked flies out of the air into the vacuum cleaner.

True story.

So, today, I am thankful that: 1) I no longer live in a double-wide trailer on a tobacco farm in North Carolina, 2) I do not own any cats, and 3) I have electricity and central heat.

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Technology

Today I am thankful for technology.


The picture I took the first day Alan was in daycare, showing how much I missed him

This past weekend I went up to Epworth, GA to visit Rob's grandparents. It made me think of all the benefits of modern technology. Epworth is in the north Georgia mountains, very close to the Georgia-Tennessee boarder. And it is in the middle of nowhere; a place where your closest neighbor may not be within walking distance. Needless to say, I had no cell service while at his grandfather's house.

But even in Epworth, GA I could see modern technology everywhere. They have TVs and computers, microwaves, refrigerators, ovens, dishwashers. I could not imagine life without these conveniences.

This world is becoming so global. The company I work for has plants and/or offices in over 150 countries. In order to communicate with people across the seas, we have teleconferences, video conferences, instant messaging, email, an intranet site that we can use for collaboration on projects, webinars, etc. Without modern technology, none of this could happen. Can you imagine how long it would take to get a message to China using only the post office? And even then, the post office today uses so much technology to get there faster. What if they didn't have airplanes to fly letters across the oceans? How long would it take to get a message from the United States to China using absolutely no technology. How would you even do it? Horses and sailboats? My mind can't even grasp that.

We live in an instant gratification world. If we call or text someone and they don't answer right away, we get frustrated. If we need to know something, we pull out our smart phones and Google it and know the answer in an instant. Everything is at our fingertips. Sometimes that can be to our detriment, like constantly being connected to work and feeling like you are "on call" 24/7. But for the most part, I wouldn't change it for anything.


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