two year olds are SO hard

i can't believe what parker has been going through in the past month or so. she's got dual personalities: one so sweet, so gentle, so loving and adorible and then...the other one. i thought we were going to be arrested in target yesterday for attempted murder. parker was honesltly screaming so loudly that there were reverberations. i mean, i wanted to curl up and die.

20 weeks and less snarky!

half way! the baby is about 6.4 inches long and 9 ounces. there should be a large growth spurt in both of us sometime in the next few weeks! i have my appointment with rosanna on friday which should lend itself to some more interesting stuff. i'm feeling pretty good but have been really tired again lately. i've been napping with parker for 2.5-4 hours almost every day. yipes!

in case anyone was wondering:

1) this summer i am going to be giving birth to a small male child, not a professional athlete. he will not, at least initially, need jerseys. or shirts with teddy bears holding footballs. i am also not giving birth to a tiny sailor or a tiny business man. most likely the three piece suit can wait until he's at least a year old. so can the super patriotic garb. in other words, why don't they just make normal baby boy clothes!?

2) r and i have decided not to circumcise our son. while this is not up for discussion, here is the reason why we will be skipping this procedure: current research shows that there are no compelling reasons for circumcision, not medical, psychological, hygenic or social. please visit this website for more information!

3) we plan to continue to cloth diaper, cosleep, breastfeed and eat organic food. this isn't some hippy "phase" we're going through. these are things we are committed to because we believe they are the right things for our family! please feel free to decide what's right for your families.

ON A COMPLETELY DIFFERENT NOTE:

so, in the last six months or so we've donated bags and bags and bags of stuff to various different charities. a lot of the things we've given away have been baby clothes that are a little too ratty to store, stuffed animals and old toys that miss p has outgrown. when bagging stuff i tell parker that that her things are going to poor kids who are less fortunate than she is. she always very willingly parts with the bags. in fact, just now she brought me a deflated IHOP balloon and told me she wanted to give it to the "po kids."

womb with a view

guess what??? we're having a baby BOY! we can't believe it! two ultrasound techs and a doctor confirmed that the baby is healthy in all regards and has a penis! imagine that! he was a very calm little thing, held very still with his legs open the whole time (almost an hour).

here's what the little guy looks like. the last one is of parker inutero for comparison's sake!

here he is:

trying my scanner

so we've had this cool all-in-one printer/scanner/fax/copier thingie and i've never bothered to try out most of the features. i figured i'd get it set up so i can upload tomorrows ultrasound photos! here is my test run from our dinner out at la fondue for our 10 year anniversary.
and here is the ultrasound i had on 12.13.05

another "seen on mdc":

Guns don't shoot people, Vice Presidents shoot people.

19 weeks - holy crap!

i can't believe that we're almost halfway there. second pregnancies apparently go MUCH faster. the baby is about 6 inches long from crown to rump and about 7 ounces (the baby's weight will increase more than 15 times between now and delivery). i am about as big as i was at 6 months with parker, and i'm only 4 months pregnant. r pipes up: what if we're having twins? we will be ruling that out on thursday when we have our ultrasound! (fyi: r still hasn't decided if he wants to find out the gender...)



this week's photo



welcome to my world...

10 years!

so valentine's day was r's and my TEN year anniversary. on february 14, in 8th grade, r asked me out in front of my locker with two roses, one yellow and one red. somehow i can't even wrap my mind around the fact that we (at 24, married with a two year old and one on the way) are the same people who were holding hands during our 23 minute lunch break. unfortunately r had to work on tuesday so we couldn't celebrate but dad and maria are going to babysit on monday while we go out to la fondue. yay!

we had a picnic this afternoon despite the freeeeeeeezing weather.

18 weeks!

geesh, blogger has been down for the last 24ish hours! anyhow, here is this week's picture! we're getting big eh?

geesh

i guess it's been a slow week around here. i still don't have anything interesting to report. i'm finally feeling a little more energetic and the weather has been SO nice here. parker and my mom and i spent almost 2 hours at the playground yesterday. and...that's about it! i'll be posting my new picture and stuff tomorrow!

dad made me ribs for my birthday

and parker was NOT disappointed!

birthday card from r & four things

front:

(picture of a ferris wheel) "if i had a talking hamster, on his birthday, i'd take the little guy to the carnival to see the big wheel. upon seeing it, he'd be speechless, simply letting out little gasps of joy."

inside:

"may your birthday be filled with little gasps of joy."

four things

four jobs i've had in my life:
1. coffee shop bitch
2. summer camp counselor
3. editor in chief
4. jewelry director

four movies i can watch over and over:
1. willy wonka and the chocolate factory (1971 with gene wilder)
2. the princess bride
3. the jerk
4. the stand

four places i have lived:
1. port townsend, wa
2. santa cruz, ca
3. arlington, tx
4. los gatos, ca

four tv shows i love to watch:
1. criminal minds
2. er
3. american idol
4. the office

four places i have been on vacation:
1. maui
2. paris
3. amsterdam
4. sicily

four websites i visit daily:
1. mothering dot commune
2. my yahoo homepage
3. my blog
4. other blogs (dave's, karen's, etc.)

four of my favorite foods:
1. a really good turkey and avocado sandwhich
2. sushi
3. ribs
4. tacos from our local mexican dive

four places i would rather be right now:
1. at the movies, i haven't been in months...
2. on a beach in maui
3. on a beach in sicily
4. on a beach just about anywhere!

17 weeks & happy almost birthday to me!

sooo, getting close to the halfway mark already; i can't believe how fast it's going! the baby is about 5 inches from crown to rump or roughly as big as MY hand spread wide open. (before you ask dave, i would say that i have average woman size hands.) i am 3 pounds above my pre-pregnancy weight as compared to 15-20 at this point last time! i'm not eating any differently but i am still nursing and chasing after miss p.



we saw rosanna on friday and everything appears to be going swimmingly! the baby's heartbeat was strong and i am measuring right on target. as usual we had a nice leisurely appointment with plenty of time for questions. we discussed the many different types of practitioners that we can choose to see after the baby is born: a ped, a family practitioner, naturopath, chiropractor, oriental medicine... i'm still feeling a little hesitant about our current ped because of our decision to delay and selectively choose vaccines. we'll see, there's still time to decide.

oh, and in case anyone was wondering: my birthday is tomorrow!

the convict

here is parker doing her best nick nolte impression...you know, the mugshot picture!



okay, so i kept a food log for parker yesterday and here is what she ate:

~bowl of rice crispies with organic milk
~several animal crackers
~one half steamed shrimp/pork roll
~bowl of pho (noodles, beef, broth)
~several more animal crackers
~one half bananna
~one half avocado
~dry cheerios
~one tangerine
~one and one half slices cheese pizza
~one soft breadstick
~handful of yogurt covered rasins

no one can accuse us of starving the child!

la la la

anyone following american idol? we highly recommend renting arrested development, really funny series!

so, i wound up having to take my own pictures this week cause r has been really busy and working late nights. i assure you though, sunday's picture will be far superior to this one! in any case the baby has been very active the last two days and r was actually able to feel it moving this afternoon.