Falltime Fun

Well, here's a bunch of random stuff for ya. I wrote a nice post, pictures all in order and captioned, and then it got brutally torn apart and eaten for lunch by the monster inside the computer. I don't know how it happens. If I were wearing shoes, I would've thrown one.

We had a Jamba Reunion in our back yard! First of all, it was a celebration of having a back yard for the first time. It was really fun to see some old Jamba coworkers, potluck it for a delicious dinner, and whip up some delicious blender whirls. This picture doesn't look like much, but considering that it was dark and James had our little camera and tripod balanced precariously in a tree, I'd say he was very successful.

Here's a little tribute to James's inner engineer. Sure, he's got a linguistics degree, but I think that was divine intervention to get us married.

In this picture we've got some of his finest work rigged up. The projector on the table was a 3 month long soldering job. He managed to take apart his own and his brother's broken projectors, not break anything vital, and put them back together into one that works. Very nice. My job was to hold wires and buy a white sheet so we could have a screen. The rest of the stuff on the table was for our Jamba guests' enjoyment. James's friend lent us his Wii to play games on the big screen. Then we've got a whole system of cords and speakers to make sure it sounded just right. The sheet blocked the AC from the kitchen...hence the fan. So, it doesn't look great, but it worked great! We got to have a living room date afterwards of Labyrinth on the big screen.

Here's the artist at work again, this time turning a rain gutter into a cord organizer. Why no one has figured out how to run a computer on less than 57 cords is anybody's guess. Anyway, it was a mess. Now, several hours, some sawdust and lots of twisty ties later, it looks great! Probably saved our kid from electrocution too.

Ok, enough about him. I want some sympathy for my cankles now. Sick, huh? I don't know why it happens. All I know is that I can no longer fit into any shoes. Also, if you push on my ankle, you can make a dent that stays for 5 minutes. James thinks it's disgusting but I'm pretty sure it's a valuable skill somewhere.

We tried our hand at the stand-by line for a session of General Conference. We failed, but it was still fun to be up in Salt Lake and watch conference in the Joseph Smith building. We ended up parking at the capitol building because there was seriously no other parking anywhere. It was actually a nice place to park and isn't as far as it looks. (Uphill on the way back though.)
Here's more proof that we went. Next time we'll get in line a little earlier.

The Bump continued...

Still growing...

The doctor told me 2 weeks ago that he thinks the baby will be early. I was really excited for a couple of days until I realized how mean that is. You can't do that to a pregnant lady! What if he's late? That doctor takes his life into his hands.

What they don't tell you...

I have to say, I'm pretty proud of myself for not ranting in print about the joys of pregnancy. I figure no one really wants to hear about it. Today I'm giving in though. There are just so many things that no one told me going into this whole baby business. I'm just doing my duty to the world by exposing the facts. I hope it doesn't make anyone feel awkward.

1. "Morning" sickness
Seriously? Who came up with that name? Certainly not someone who spent morning, noon and night hunched grossly over a toilet. To its defense, I started having real morning sickness at about 32 weeks when, after giving in to Unisom and Vitamin B6, the queasies were finally quelled after about 11am. Which brings me to my second beef with issue number 1. Someone told all the books (and doctors, for that matter) that you should start feeling better at about 14 weeks. That's some nice light at the end of the tunnel for those who actually DO start feeling better, but it makes the rest of us question whether life really is worth living for the second two trimesters.

2. Hairiness

Ok, I've heard that pregnant women have nice hair. Anyone want to know why? Because none of your hair falls out when you're pregnant. That's right, not just the stuff on your head. Blondies don't notice quite so much (so I hear) but the rest of us get pretty fuzzy all over. So as if shaving blindly over a huge belly wasn't hard enough, it is now a daily necessity.

3. Hyperpigmentation

I think I just made up a word. What I mean is, everything that was light gets darker, and what was dark can now be seen from a mile away on a galloping horse. One day it's a freckle, the next, you think you have cancer. Same goes for scars and that lovely line running all the way down your belly (betcha didn't even know what was there).

4. Braindeadness

I've never been so dumb in my life. I promise, I graduated from college and got good grades and stuff, it's just that now I can't seem to make it through a day without some kind of disaster.
Example: Locked my keys in the house while on my way to get James from work. So I can't get in the house; can't get in the car; everybody's stranded. This was after I put the keys on the table thinking 'I'd better not forget these when I go out the door'.

5. Peeing in a cup

I seriously was going to take a picture of the cup you have to pee in every time you go to the doctor, but...see number 4. The thing holds one ounce. Like half a dixie cup. I'm convinced that even a man would have trouble stemming the stream to fill that puppy without spilling. Add to that the following limitations:
You're a woman:

You can't see a thing

You have no idea when how full the cup is until it's already overflowed

You're squatting uncomfortably

Missing the cup altogether is entirely possible

You're pregnant:

Everything's a bit swollen which makes you pee crooked

Not only are you squatting weirdly on the toilet, but you've got a huge belly to reach around

You've been holding it for what seems like an eternity (which is probably just 30 minutes)

That being said, I'm proud to announce that at my last doctor's visit I didn't spill a drop.

6. Sleeping is really hard

You're not allowed to lay on your back or stomach or your baby will die (or something bad like that). For some reason your joints are super loose and will actually fall out of socket if you're not careful. So you've got a pillow under your knee (protect that hip joint) and one under your arm (ditto shoulder), one behind your back and however many under your head. Now where's your husband supposed to sleep? Add to that the 12 nightly bathroom runs and the time it takes to get resituated after each trip and you've got yourself a humdinger of a night!

7. Eating for two

Right. Assuming you can keep your food down in the first place, try fitting a whole meal in your stomach with a baby. On the other hand, you're hungry for two, so join the toddlers in church with your fruit snacks and crackers.

8. The snail trail

I've heard that your body produces more mucus in preparation for shooting that baby on out when the time comes. Ok, great but why does it last the whole 9 months and why on earth do you need that mucus in your nose?

9. Contractions do not mean labor

So, it turns out that you can have contractions every 10 minutes for weeks and no baby. I'll admit to liking them at first because they made me look tough (your stomach gets so hard you could bounce a quarter off it), but after a few nights of waking up to every single one of them I've started to wonder what the point is.

10. No one can tell you what labor feels like

Seriously. I've asked around. Since contractions do not equal labor, what does? Some people say their back hurts. Ok, so I've been in labor for 5 months now. Some say their contractions get closer together and more regular. Some people have their babies with contractions 20 minutes apart. Pretty much I'm going to either spend days in the hospital with false hope, or have this baby in the car when I finally realize what's going on.

I think that's enough complaining. I feel better now. I think I'll top off the afternoon with some chocolate milk and yet another deep cleaning of the bathroom.

The Bump

This is the moment you've all been waiting for...well, some of you anyway. I've gotten more than one email and threatening phone call saying that you want to see just how much of a heifer I've become during the last 8 months. I'll admit, I was one of you, begging for pregnancy profile shots, until I became the bulbous profile; now I'm all about hiding out in my over-sized maternity clothes and willing myself to go into labor.

Long about week 18 of pregnancy, James and I got the great idea that we should take a mug shot every week in the same shirt to track my hugeness. By 18 weeks I was already pretty huge. That's one of the perks of having a torso so short that my ribs and hips are normally about an inch apart. I had outgrown my pants by 6 weeks and, even though I didn't really keep a meal down for the first few months, I've done a masterful job of packing on the pounds (and inches). My doctor is so proud of my weight gaining skills.

And so, here we are at 34 weeks. I haven't seen my feet in quite some time and I'm quite sure that I now weigh more than James. The baby now weighs about 5 lbs. Explain the other 30!

***WARNING***

Most of these pictures were taken in an un-airconditioned apartment in the middle of summer. No make-up. Definitely no hair stying. Just look at the belly and ignore the head s'il vous plait.

It's a boy!

We were in Italy this week. No sticky notes for week 22. Also the last time my feet were small enough to fit into anything but flip flops.

This is the week we started moving. No pictures on the wall, yes piles on the floor.

New apartment!

And here is my condition as of last Monday. Man, that thing protrudes! No wonder I'm always burning it on the stove and getting stuck between the shopping cart and the check-out counter.

Mentos and Diet Coke

Ever since he saw a video about making rockets out of Mentos and Diet Coke, James has pretty much been obsessed. We found some Coke on sale, he borrowed some Mentos from work, and we even made a special trip to Home Depot for PVC pipes in preparation for the big day.

The next step was finding partners in crime. We chose our friends Jarom and Stephanie Brown because a) we like them. b) they're not afraid to get sticky. And c) every time we see them a new invention seems to hatch (i.e. giant hamster ball that propels itself across the water).

Jarom and James got busy making a PVC pipe launcher.
Trying to speed the hot glue cooling process in the freezer...
...and with a fan
We had to drink 2 liters of root beer during dinner to get another bottle top of the right size...just to make sure the aerodynamics were just right. Stephanie made some nice cardboard fins to help this puppy fly.
We drove around for quite a while trying to find a place to make our mess where we wouldn't get arrested. We settled on a field by a high school. There were sprinklers going all around us, so we hoped that the coke smell would be gone by morning. The first attempt proved to be the most successful, flying up about 15 feet.
The boys were completely soaked in artificially sweetened stickiness.

We tried smaller bottles to see if they'd fly higher. No luck. Our parking lot got its share of sticky puddles though.

So Coke and Mentos rockets = big mess and not a lot of flying. I'm sure this is only our maiden voyage though. Watch out Utah!

Forgot the Camera

Happy first anniversary to us! We got married last year on Thursday, August 13 because really, really wanted to celebrate our first anniversary on Friday the 13th...that's not why we got married; that's why we picked that day. Anyway, it turned out to be quite the fun adventure.

I packed the car with everything we might need (including a hideous stuffed cat to remind us of the creepy kitty in the B&B where we spent our wedding night that scared us to death every time we walked by it) except the camera. So sad.
James got off work a couple of hours early and we hit the road for St. George. It turns out that it's pretty far away. We misjudged the distance and had to floor it the whole way there. No speeding tickets though. We got a room at the first decently priced hotel we found, and only got mildly lost on the way to the Tuacahn theater for our Tarzan show! It turns out that we completely missed the dinner that we paid for, but oh well. The show was awesome. The actors were really talented singers and dancers. They had erected quite the labyrinth of zip lines and there we monkeys flying all over the place during the whole show. So fun!

I think the Comfort Inn had pregnant women in mind when they designed their beds. I was in heaven with the soft sheets, supportive mattress, and about 10 squishy pillows wedged all around me. Delicious. They even made the pillows small enough that James didn't get shoved into the crack between the bed and the wall. Genius. It was so nice that we didn't set an alarm, slept through breakfast (second meal we paid for and didn't taste), and didn't even touch the pool.

When we finally did heave ourselves out of bed and back into the world (when we could hear vacuums all around, we figured they'd break down the door soon), we put on our Sunday best, (i.e. I shoved my swollen feet into something prettier than filthy flip flops) and went to the St. George Temple. I thought ahead enough to find a couple of family files to do there. It's a beautiful temple and we highly recommend it.
We had lunch at Cafe Rio for the first time since our first date. Aaawwww.

We did a little more sightseeing at the St. George tabernacle and Brigham Young's winter home before hitting the highway back home. This time we weren't in a rush, but we did manage to get a speeding ticket. The little stinker cop pulled us over for going 80 seriously 300 feet before the speed limit changed to 80mph. Whatever. We had such a fun weekend that we didn't even care.

Italy!

Yay DigiCert for flying us half way around the world! We had a whirlwind week-long trip to Italy as our summer vacation/last hurrah without a baby (or at least one that cries and requires a stroller).

In order to maximize our days in Italy, James worked a double shift, meaning that he was up all night long, then flew for 14 hours. I don't think it was his favorite day ever. When we arrived in Rome we found out that our 2 hour layover was extended to 3 and then 4 hours. By the end of that, he had firmly decided that he didn't like Italy and it would take some seriously good food to convince him otherwise.

We did finally make it to Palermo. We had to take a web of buses to get to our hotel, and when we finally got there, James crashed. I would have too, but my stomach won the battle and I went in search of a fruit guy and some bread. That day we polished off our first kilo of tomatoes.

Later in the evening, we managed to rip ourselves out of bed (beds, actually. The whole trip we slept on 2 single beds shoved together), and get enough food to keep ourselves from being sabbath breakers the next day. We walked along the waterfront and found this great little outdoor pizzeria.

One bite into his delicious pizza and James informed me that all the hate he had for Italy was gone. It was good stuff.

The next morning was the reason we came to Italy to begin with. Sicily finally pulled it together and became a stake! It was an excellent conference and everybody was so excited. I think there were around 850 people in attendance, including some previous mission presidents. (One of them from 32 years ago came all the way from Argentina!)I had a blast seeing everyone again and James was a trouper. He perfected his Italian skills for introducing himself and saying "E' maschio". They were all thrilled as he is that it's a boy.
Here we are with my mission president and his wife (they got home before we did!) and the Harris's. Bro. Harris is James's old scoutmaster and their families go way back. It was pretty neat to see them on a mission.

And here we are with Lea and Andrea, my favorite people in the world. They got our baby a Catania soccer bib, just to put him in his place. The greatest thing for me was to see people we had taught on the mission still progressing and active in church. These guys are rocks. So awesome.

The Harris's gave us a ride from Palermo to Catania which was SO nice! We went to Monreale on the way back and saw this amazing cathedral. It was built in 1172, I believe and the entire ceiling and all the walls were covered in mosaics. So all that stuff that looks like gold leaf and paintings is actually a bunch of little tiny pieces. It was incredible.
We spent the next day in Catania. (This is a picture of us being elephants.) I could've spent the whole week there, but then we would've missed the rest of the amazing trip. We went to Catania for 3 reasons, Savia (best arancini in the world), Ciocolato e Gelato (ditto ice cream), and to see people. Well, the first two were closed, which was a real dream wrecker, but we did get to see a lot of neat sights and spend the evening with Lea, Andrea and Francesca.

During the morning we made a run to the market for some more tomatoes and ties. I think we bought 8 ties. Later, we went on a little tour train around the city and I left the bag of ties on the train. Sad day! Just as I was feeling really awful about it, we saw the train go by again with another load of tourists. We went screaming down the street and Andrea stopped traffic so that the train would have to stop. We made a really big scene. Anyway, may wonders never cease, the bag was still on the train with all the ties in it! Best day of my life. Thanks, Andrea!
The next day we took a train to Siracusa and spent the day walking our feet off. We went to the Greek Theatre and all the old stuff that goes with it. Here's James taking a lovely zombie picture in an ancient sarcophagus. About 2 seconds later he got kicked out by the sarcophagus guard guy. (The resident sarcophicer, if you will.)I think that was his only job. I mean, they could put up a sign or ropes, but paying a guy to pace around is good too.

In the market we met this cheese guy. He was awesome and cut us a sweet deal on some ricotta for lunch. We put up a couple of pictures of him on Facebook and it turns out that he's pretty much a Siracusa legend.

We spent the evening with Gianni and Patrizia, a really awesome couple that was in my English class. They went all out for us. The drove us around to all kinds of awesome sights (my favorite was a to-scale model of the Madonna delle Lacrime church made entirely of match sticks. So stinking cool). They took us to their house to meet their dog and parrot, took us out to eat an amazing meal, and drove us all the way back to Catania. I'm not really sure how to make it up to them because I'm not ok with giving them our baby. We'll have to think of something else.
The next day we spent mostly on the train to Naples. We got kicked out of our seats twice before we realized that we had been assigned a seat. OOooohhhh. I didn't think transportation in Italy was that organized. Naples was awesome. Very narrow and dirty, but we loved it. We walked our feet off, once again, and vowed to buy walking shoes for our next vacation.
A friend told us where to go for real pizza napoletana, and of course we did. It was delicious, naturally.

We managed to hit a few museums and cathedrals in our short visit there. There's so much to see that we'll just have to go back again. We're pretty proud that we didn't get robbed or even seriously ripped off while we were there.
We spent our last day in Rome. The Patane's from Ravenna drove 4 hours down to spend the day with us. It was so fun to have some traveling buddies that kind of knew what was going on. We destroyed that city and saw everything that was free.
Rome was a very clean city, at least compared to what we'd see earlier. Here's proof that it's still Italy though. It looked like the car on the right was rammed from behind by someone who drove away. That caused a 3 car crash, no body can get out, and who gets the ticket? The car that got mashed from both ends. Nice.
The only thing we had time to see in the Vatican was St. Peter's Basilica. It was seriously impressive though. Here's Michaelangelo's Pieta'. I think you could spend a whole day just seeing art in the Vatican, but we were hungry and so we left. Besides, you have to pay to get into the Sistine Chapel.
Here we are in front of the Trevi Fountain. You can't see it because of the mobs of people, but it's really nice. According to the travel book (Provo Library has a billion, if you're interested), when Bernini was building it there was a barber that came out and gave him a hard time sometimes. The barber didn't think the fountain would work out for him. Bernini showed him by not only building an incredible fountain, but he also sculpted this random pot on one side that completely blocks the public's view of the barber's sign. It's still there, the barber is not.

Another, more recent, story is that, since people toss money into the fountain, a local bum collected it every day with a magnet. He made over $1,000 a day, but gave it all away to other homeless people. They tried to arrest him, but couldn't because it's not illegal to pick money up off the street. When they came out with the Euro, his magnet didn't work on it anymore so I guess he had to find a new job.

And there you have it. We ended the week so tired that we didn't even mind the eternal plane ride home. We're ready to do it all again though (with walking shoes this time).