Pregnancy rantings....

I've noticed a few things since becoming pregnant that I never noticed before.
1. People, mostly men, stare at my belly. Like I'm harboring an alien child. Sometimes, when dealing with customers, men's eyes will flit from my face to my stomach no less than 15 times in a 2 minute conversation with a nervous look on their face like I have a highly contagious disease that they're in danger of catching. Am I delusional in thinking that these men HAD to encounter pregnant women in the past? Some of these men have to be married with children...were you absent for the 9 months your wife was pregnant? You can't tell me that I'm the first expectant mom they've come across in all their years on this Earth. The bigger I've gotten, the more I've noticed this behavior. Like they're waiting for my water to break all over the place and they want to run away in the other direction as fast as they can. As if I didn't feel unattractive enough.....so to you, man in the Wal-Mart line or customer in the bank that I'm walking past to go to the bathroom for the 25th time that day, I'm fine. I will not be going into labor any time soon (and if I do, feel free to go about your business. I have a cell phone and can call the hospital/my husband/my mother) and I am not going to pop out an alien child. Please stop staring at my belly. It's weird.
2. On the opposite end of the spectrum, I've noticed that everyone and their brother wants to give me advice now. They ask lots of personal questions like if I'm quitting work, getting an epidural, having a home birth or if I'm breastfeeding my child. If I decide to answer those questions, they immediately ramble on about how I should quit work, shouldn't get an epidural, how home births are the best and how I should breastfeed until my child is 5. Thank you, kind stranger, for your unsolicited advice, but I think I'll be doing my own thing, which includes working, getting an epidural in the comfort of a hospital room and my breastfeeding plan is none of your beeswax. I totally understand that every mother thinks their way is best and they want to bring every person they possibly can to see things from their point of view. However, just because it was good for you, doesn't mean it's going to work for me. Note to self: when I become a mommy, keep the advice to myself unless otherwise asked for such advice. [disclaimer: this does not apply to family. I totally realize that, as my family, you are allowed to give advice whenever and wherever you'd like. I just don't have to listen to you. :)]
3. Suddenly, everyone I see is a doctor. When I stand up or walk by someone, they feel the need to exclaim "You're huge!!" or "Gosh! You look like you're about to pop any day now!" Actually, no. I have two more months left and will get a lot bigger than this. Thank you for your outburst because I didn't really feel like a sweaty beached whale that waddles. You've made me feel so much better about myself.
I hope when this is all over and I have the baby in my arms instead of my belly, people can go back to ignoring me. I'm sure I'll still receive the unwelcome advice once Avery comes and I'll have to learn to take that in stride. As long as they're not still telling me I look like I'm about to pop.

Silly little baby quiz :)

How far along? 26 weeks, 6 days. :)))


Total weight gain: 17 pounds


Maternity clothes? Can't live without them. I still mix in non-maternity pieces like cardigans, but it's mostly stretchy pants and empire waisted tops :)


Sleep: Terrible. Avery is most active at nighttime....figures. lol


Best moment this week: Sitting with Marty and actually watching my stomach move as she kicked me.

Movement: She is VERY active. Thebump.com says that babies in the 2nd trimester should be sleeping/resting up to 14 hours a day....I think my little one sleeps maybe 5. She is her father's child.

Gender: Girl (although I keep having a reoccuring nightmare that we go to the next ultrasound and they tell me they've made a mistake...)

Labor Signs: I would sure hope not! I'd be panicking if they were coming this early.


Belly Button in or out? In. The day I wake up with an outie belly button will be the day I go into complete hibernation.


What I miss: My non-maternity clothes and high heels.


Weekly Wisdom: Just trying to enjoy every little milestone in my pregnancy. It's such an amazing experience!

Baby's Size: An eggplant. She weighs almost 2 pounds :)

Milestones: Her eyes are developing this week and will be blinking soon. She's getting stronger every day....and kicking me HARD to prove it!

Decorating a baby's room....my idea of fun?

Does it make me a bad person to admit that the first reaction I had after we found out we were pregnant (behind shock and excitement, of course) was obsessive thoughts about how I was going to decorate the nursery?? I was beyond excited that I had a new room to decorate...a blank canvas almost. And a nursery is a room where you can get away with doing a lot of cutesy, crafty things without it looking totally overboard. I laid in bed at night and dreamt of all the possibilities. I knew, of course, that we were going with a black and white theme. It's classy, it's gender neutral and could be used again if we have a second child that's a boy. Plus, it's totally me. :) So my nursery hunt began with the search for black and white nursery bedding. It took several months before I found anything I even halfway liked. Finally, I came across a major deal on toysrus.com. Mix and match black and white print bedding....almost EXACTLY what I had pictured in my mind. I was beyond thrilled. The baby mattress came yesterday from Wal-Mart and I immediately rushed to put the bedding in the room to see what it looked like against the purple walls. Love!

I really don't think I could love the result any more than I do. I adore the polka dot, damask, and black and white stripe combination. It's beautiful. And again, exactly what I had pictured in my head. I love it when a plan unfolds just like you envisioned :)

After I had the bedding, my thoughts quickly turned to craft ideas. Things that I could make for Avery's room that would make it uniquely hers. Don't get offended or anything, but I'm just not a fan of the cookie cutter, let's buy a "12 piece set and everything in the room will match perfectly" matchy-matchy type of baby room. Yes, I realize it's more convenient, but I love the idea of mixing and matching things. Finding bedding online, a lamp from Kirklands, a chair from Target, painting her a canvas for the wall. Then the room suddenly turns from just another baby room to completely, 100% Avery's room. But anyway, back to my crafting ideas. The first vision I had was of a bow holder. Yes, I've seen the cute bow holders with the block of wood and the ribbons hanging down where you can attach the bows, but I wanted something a little bit different. Inspiration came in the form of a giant picture frame I found at Hobby Lobby last year for $6...

I wasn't sure how it was going to work, but I just knew this would be the perfect solution for my unique bow holder plans. After throwing around a couple of ideas, my boss informed me that she had roll upon roll of this plastic netting that she used in her garden and no longer needed. Easy to cut, but durable, I knew I had found the solution. Adding a metal flower from a garden ornament on clearance at Kirkland's and a massive burn from my hot glue gun, Avery now has a bigger bow holder than even I think she'll need:

It's not the finished product I had in mind, but it's pretty close. Project #1 of baby's room....done!

My next project I had pictured was a mobile to hang over her crib. Gone are the days of little stuffed bears playing lullabies for baby's crib's. Extensive searching on google provided the most gorgeous results. Butterflies and printed patterns that fluttered with the slightest breeze, long pieces of tulle decorated with gorgeous flowers, pinwheels....you name it, they have made it into a crib mobile. After searching through page after page of mobiles, I decided that I was going to save a considerable amount of money if I just made it myself. The end result isn't exactly what I had planned, but I'm still happy with it. That's all I have done so far. She'll be here in another 3 1/2 months (ahhh!) and I have the following projects:

One VERY large canvas to be made into a personalized subway art painting. A wine rack...this one's a secret :) And attempting to find a super cute black and white printed glider. You have no idea how much I'm enjoying this process. Yes, because it's decorating for my own baby's arrival, but I'm loving the process of finding things that match or go with the room. I wonder if there's a career out there as a nursery interior designer?

Cloth diapering=crazy mommy?

Why is it that everyone looks at me like I have three heads when I mention that I'm thinking about using cloth diapers? No, I'm not a "hippie mom" that's against disposables, I just like the idea of not spending as much on disposables when I can just wash and reuse the cloth diapers. Call me old fashioned, but I love the idea of cloth diapering. And it's not like they're the plain, jane white burp cloth-like diapers from days of old. Have you seen the new cloth diapers? They are super freaking cute! You can get them in all kinds of prints to match babies' outfits or let them be super stylish when they're crawling around in nothing but a diaper!

Yes, there are a few issues when looking at cloth diapers. 1. When purchasing them for the first time, they can be expensive. Some brands charge $18 for just one little diaper cover! That doesn't include any inserts or multiple diapers. Just one diaper. I think that's crazy. But the more I research, the more options I'm finding (and boy are there a BUNCH of options out there!!). The best deal I've found so far has been SunBaby diapers. (http://sunbabydiapers.com/) 12 diapers with 24 diaper inserts for $78. Before you throw a fit, that's just $4 a diaper. I'll spend more than that on disposables. Especially since I can reuse these until they fall apart! I'm also looking into the old fashioned cloth diapers and then keeping them closed with a Snappi (oh, the things people think of now!) http://www.snappibaby.com/products/snappidiaperfastener.html Issue number 2. The mess. When using cloth diapers, you have the diaper itself and then cloth liners that you slide in and out of a pocket in the diaper. I'm not so fond of the idea of having to reach into a dirty diaper and pull out the liner to clean it off. I also get a little grossed out about the idea of actually cleaning off the diaper. But I need to be a tougher mommy. Just the idea of blood and throw up and guts is enough to send me running to the bathroom. Not really an option when Avery will come running up to me with a snotty nose. Or when I change her first not-so-neat diaper. Or when she spits up on me for the first time. Like it or not, I'm going to have to start dealing with the really yucky things. #3. More laundry. Everyone has said that the biggest part of using cloth is the increased laundry you'll be doing. Well, correct me if I'm wrong, but won't you be doing more laundry anyway when a baby comes? I've heard I'll be doing laundry all the time because the second you get a clean outfit on the baby, they spit up on it. Why not add a few little diaper inserts to the pile? Baby clothes are little and don't take up that much room in the wash, I can't imagine that it will increase my washing time and water use enough for me to notice a difference.

At first, cloth diapering was just an idea I was throwing around to save a little money. Now, it's become more of a "I AM going to use cloth diapers" kind of thought. I guess I'll just have to get used to the skeptical, "oh, you're a hippy" look and the "you're wasting your time" kind of speeches. Yes, I'm doing it more for the money saving aspect than the save the enviroment one, but it might be nice to become a little more green in the process......I'll let you know how my venture into the unknown world of cloth diapering goes!

iTunes alternative - CopyTrans Manager - iOS 4.3.1 compatibility

For nearly two years now I'm a regular user of the free iTunes alternative - CopyTrans Manager. I even decided not to upgrade to iOS 4.3.1 unless this tool is compatible.

Finally! The newest version 0.936 brought full iOS 4.3.1 compatibility, allowing you to add music, videos, films, TV-shows, podcasts, audio books to iPhone, iTouch or iPad using the newest firmware.

Manage iPod and iPhone without iTunes

Another more visible thing is that they removed the skin, which turns out to be nice on a PC with Windows 7, but less attractive if you're running it on XP. That's why I decided to reactivate the old CopyTrans Manager skin.

How?
Just go to the Settings tab and click on "Advanced Settings". Search for skin and change "main.skin.file" from "no" to "yes".

Coming soon ... - New roundup of existing iTunes alternatives, stay tuned!

Manage iPhone without iTunes and without duplicates

After a long break there are good news about the free iTunes Alternative CopyTrans Manager. TuneSwift now supports the management of duplicate files on iPod, iPhone and iPad. E.g. If you're going to add music to your iPhone, CopyTrans Manager recognizes already existing tracks and won't add them once again.

If you've already got duplicate files on your iDevice, you can easily display and remove them. Therefore just push the right mouse button in the main track-list and choose "Show duplicates". This way you can delete all duplicate files from your iPhone, iPod or iPad.

Here's how the program looks like

You can download this free iTunes Alternative from the following page:

Download the free iTunes Alternative for iPhone, iPad and iPod


You've got the choice between the Installer for the Control Center (containing all CopyTrans apps) and the standalone version, which doesn't require installation.

CopyTrans Manager supports the following devices:

• iPhone, 3G, 3GS and 4 up to iOS4
• iPod Touch, 2G, 3G and 4G up to iOS4
• iPad 1 up to iOS 4
• iPod Nano up to iPod Nano 5G
• iPod Classic, iPod Video and iPod Photo
• iPod Shuffle up to iPod Shuffle 2G
• iPod Mini
• Mac formatted iPods (HFS+)
• Palm Pre

P-I-N-K

I think I have a medical condition. I feel a little funny. Things around me don't seem the same as they used to. It's almost like they've taken on a different coloring, a lighter colored hue almost. I think I'm seeing.......pink. Lots and lots of pink. :)

Last week, Marty and I went to our ultrasound appointment to find out if little baby Gaddie was going to be a boy or a girl. But we weren't going to be finding out in the traditional way. Instead of having the ultrasound tech move her little paddle around and tell us what we were looking at, we told her we wanted the results put into a sealed envelope to be opened later...at our gender reveal party. If you've never heard of one, you're not alone. When my brilliant sister first approached me with this idea, I was a little skeptical. I'd never heard of a party like this, so what would other people think about it? And then I realized that it was a fun, untraditional way to get my family together and find out all at once what we were having, so we made plans. Invitations were sent:

The idea behind a gender party is that the entire family finds out together what you're having via cake (or cupcakes, whatever floats your boat). Marty and I went to our ultrasound appointment, had the tech seal the envelope and the envelope was quickly whisked off to a bakery for the bakery people to open. They would then proceed to make us a cake filled with either pink or blue icing.

All along, I just KNEW I was having a boy. I saw visions of baseball practices, dirty uniforms and all kinds of creepy crawling insects that a boy would just find fascinating. I imagined tractor rides and fishing lessons and days on the farm with '"Granddaddy." I had absolutely convinced myself that it was a boy and didn't even consider another option. Not that I didn't want a girl. I would LOVE a girl. I'm not big into pink, but I could see myself getting a little girl ready for school and bringing her a bouquet of flowers for her first ballet recital. I just didn't think that was going to happen. So I was preparing myself for a boy. Getting ready for our party, I slipped on my blue shirt, put out the decorations and waited until cake cutting time. When I picked up the cake from the bakery, it's all I could do not to dig my finger into the icing and find out for myself if we were having a Dalton or an Avery. But I was a good little girl and waited the entire 8 hours for our party so I could find out with my husband and our families. When the time actually arrived, I was so incredibly nervous! No more calling the baby "it!" No more calling it just "the baby" when I felt like "it" was too harsh. No more looking at baby things, but unable to buy them because I didn't know if I needed pink or blue! It almost seemed surreal that we were about to find out. My heart was pounding when we cut into the cake...and then I saw the pink. I was absolutely in shock!

So, Avery Leigh Gaddie will be here sometime in July (I hope, I hope I hope...) and I am in the process of going broke. Two days after our gender party, I went with my mom to the Kentucky Kid's Consignment Sale at Pritchard. Bad news bears. Mom and I are not the "hunter-gatherer" type of shoppers. The only place I will dig to find something good is TJMaxx--and that's only because it's required at that store. If it's not immediately accessible or within reach, I'm just going to move along. I'd rather pay $10 more for the convenience (and sanity!) of Target than having to dig for deal. However, I had heard all of these wonderful things about the consignment sale and I knew it would be my first chance to go baby shopping, so I purchased two tickets. When mom and I walked in the door, we were tempted to turn right back around and walk out. There were pregnant women, grandmothers and baby strollers EVERYWHERE. I just knew it was going to be a madhouse the second those doors were opened. Surprisingly, it was calm. Surprisingly, I found a $45 carseat and several adorable outfits without massive digging. Since the consignment sale, I may have bought her a few things from GAP and Old Navy :) and have been checking websites daily for possible nursery decor options. I absolutely cannot wait to start planning now that we know for sure this baby is a "she." And she seems just as excited as I am...hiccups, moving and squirming CONSTANTLY since the day of the gender party. Looks like we have a diva on our hands already!