Let the Holidays begin!

Thursday was Thanksgiving. John's parents had Thanksgiving at his sister's house, which I'm sure they enjoyed. John and I had a very low key dinner at our house, I made all the side dishes the day before and John put the ham on the morning of. After we ate ourselves into a food coma (not really, eating too much makes me sick) we went to my parent's house to do pretty much nothing. I did bring tupperware w/ me so I could take home leftovers (re: turkey) and not have to worry about returning anything. I was disappointed at the lack of choc pie, but they had plenty of others to satisfy us.

We stayed long enough to listen to my cousin Larry come over and lay out the plan to conquer Black Friday. I'm really glad I had my Christmas shopping done and wrapped. Unfortunetly, John decided he had to go out on Black Friday and he needed company. Nothing I could say would talk him out of it. The morning of I was feeling crappy, heartburn was killing me. We got up, went to Wal-mart, got what he wanted (drill, socket kit, shop vac) paid and left. While walking to the truck, I started to feel worse. The heartburn was killing me, despite all the Tums I had taken. Naturally, of course, I threw up 2xs in the Wal-mart parking lot. John was very good, he rubbed my back and resisted the temptation to walk on ahead of me while pretending not to know me. Even throwing up couldn't stop Black Friday shopping. We kept shopping. I did manage to go back to bed after we were done and slept for 4 hrs. Hopefully, this is the last time I go shopping on Black Friday.

Despite all of the holiday foods, I'm still losing weight. According to the scales I have at home, I've lost 3 more pounds. I think it's mostly b/c I've got heartburn like no other. We had to elevate the head of the bed today to hopefully help me get a better night sleep. I guess it's a good thing I can no longer tolerate really spicy foods (or really, any foods that have flavor) or else I might be in trouble.

On the upside, John thinks I'm starting to show just a smidge. I can't tell, but then again, I'm looking everyday to see if I am. You can't see changes everyday. All I know is my pants don't fit anymore.

Meh

So, I finally overcame one hurdle of pregnancy: I threw up. In all fairness, I'm not sure if it was b/c of the monster migraine I had (from about 5pm Sat. till the next day) or morning sickness, but puke it was. It did worry John a little bit, mostly b/c I had just taken a bite of fruit cocktail w/ cherries and he thought it was blood, but it was cherries. This was Sunday. I spent most of Sunday in bed (under the influence of Tylenol, which does nothing for migraines) or stretched out on the recliner.



As a result of my throwing up, I informed my friend Susan, that I was sticking the pins back in her voodoo doll. She (and others) keep telling me that morning sickness doesn't necessarily stop magically at 3 months. I don't know why people insist on telling women this. Telling me about someone they know who threw up everyday for 8 of the 9 months she was pregnant does not make me feel better. Then again, knowing someone who didn't throw up or generally feel miserable during some point of pregnancy doesn't help either.



I spent some time earlier looking at family photos I have on my computer. I have long said that we were cute kids, but puberty was very hard on the Hurt kids. This is my favorite picture of my youngest brother when he was a baby. It looks like Dad is strangling him. He was a cute baby, too bad he had to grow up (hehe love you Winky!).

I was esp cute when I was a kid, but then again, when compared to my brothers, of course I was. A girl vs 4 boys will always win in the cuteness department.

Work on our bathroom is going. It's going slowly, but that's probably b/c I still can't do any heavy lifting. I'm still on the dr restriction, but thankfully we had our friend Chris over during the weekend and he pitched in (while I did less strenuous stuff downstairs). We now have drywall up on 2 walls. Eventually I'll get my shower.

Winter is closing in. This morning when I woke up, we had a light dusting of snow on the grass. It didn't stick to the roads, but it was 28 degrees F when I woke up this morning. Now, if that were Celsius, I would be happy, but not in Fahrenheit. The outside even smells crisp and cold, like winter. My toes are already freezing. I really don't like cold weather.

And the world continues to go 'round and 'round

I'm not sure if my baby hates me or not. All I know, baby doesn't like the food mommy likes. I thought I was over morning sickness, but I've moved onto something completely different. Anytime I look at food, I feel sick. Worse, if I eat said food, I get the dry heaves. Today just walking to my kitchen I almost threw up. Almost as in, I felt the vomit all the way up my throat. I really tried to get to the sink (b/c the trash can was full, trash day) so I wouldn't have to clean the floor, but luckily, nothing happened. John still finds this funny (but worries that I'm not able to eat anything other than fruit cocktail, pizza and occasionally things like Wheat Thins), but I surprisingly do not.

This morning I had a bad dry heave attack. My sister in law, Kim, told me when she was preggers, peppermint helped her. I was feeling nausea's and thought, "I have some peppermint candy a friend left, so I'll try some of that". Oh how wrong I was. Less than 10 minutes later, I had thrown the candy away and was loudly (b/c that's how I throw up/dry heave, loudly) dry heaving over a trash can. I am so not trying that trick again.

One thing that is amazing are all the old wife's tales that abound. I still have 4 weeks before we can find out the gender, but that doesn't stop people from speculating. Kim told me today that because of my heaving, I'm having a boy. My cousin Marsha told me recently I'm having a girl b/c the girl wants to make me as ugly as possible in Dad's eye. Not sure if I believe either of them, but they have a 50/50 chance of being right ;)

Since I'm now 4 months along, we felt it safe to start telling people about my pregnancy, esp since I'm going to start showing within the month. It was unusual to have all these people coming up and congratulating me. One comment that I really don't like and for some reason have gotten at least 3xs is, "was it planned". What does it matter if the baby was planned or not (which, it totally was)? I guess some people just can't stop asking rude questions.

Another rude question that I got a lot that really bugs me (pre-baby), "when are you going to have a baby?" or even better, "Are you pregnant?" Of course, it's better than a friend of mine who had gotten a lecture from someone she went to church with on how it's against God's plan to wait to have babies. She just looked at the lady and lied to her. Told her she couldn't have kids, just to make her feel bad. She knew it was wrong of her to do, but it is so rude!

On to a different subject. John is encouraging me to make a baby quilt. It's actually not a bad suggestion considering I'm still really tired (as in, I sit down and wake up 3 hours later) and can't do as much as I used to pre baby. I found a really cute, but easy pattern online called Funky Monkey. I probably won't use monkey material (I plan on going thru all the fabric my mother in law and mom have and pick out animal prints), but I think it will look cute once I'm done w/ it. I have 5 months to complete it and it should be fun.

Hopefully, all will keep going good. Life is good, I have a baby in the belly and a loving husband in my home. I don't know how life can get better.

Little Bit of This an' that

So Tuesday was election day and John and I walked down to vote. I felt all self important, doing my civic duty to elect the president. We'd done our research and looked at all the candidates to see who believed in the same things that we do and made sure we could remember their names. We get to the polling place and only waited a little while before we voted. They explained, again, how to use the machine before allowing me to vote. After we voted, we walked home (on the way home I realized it took longer to walk to the polling place and back then it did to vote) discussing the election. I was just ready to not have to watch the commercials again b/c they made me cry (stupid hormones!). My pride in myself lasted until I woke up in the morning and realized that only 1 person that I voted for got elected. I apologize to all of the candidates I voted for.

I've also been thinking about Thanksgiving. A tradition we've started since being married is having it at our house, no matter what. When we moved into John's old house (the one he grew up in) we started inviting his parents b/c they are close by (we also invite my parents, but it seems like except for one year they always have an excuse). This year I'm probably not going to be allowed heavy lifting (turkey? HEAVY) or staying on my feet too long so maybe we'll go to my parent's house or just eat pizza. I'm pretty sure at this point neither of us care.

Here's something embarrassing that happened today. I went to the bank this morning and since I'm not supposed to be walking a lot, John dropped me off on his way to work. I get everything done super fast b/c it's 8am and hardly anyone's there. I walk home listening to my mp3 player and generally feeling good. I walk in the door and the first thing I do (and have done for a while) is change back into my pj bottoms. As I do this, I realize something: my pants were not zipped up. All I can hope for is that my shirt was low enough to hide this. I guess this is one of the joys of being pregnant.

It is a blog, not a website!

Kelli got mad and made me write something here. I don't understand what is going on with her. She is acting really wierd, really really wierd.

Anyway, I've built http://www.diversified-medical-alliance.com/ from scratch for my boss. Hopefully it will look good on my resume. One of my jobs for R.T.B. Summer Camp is updating this website http://rtbcamp.org. I'll also be taking pictures again for the camp and probally teaching a few merit badges.

Well, that is about all I have to say. Take a look at http://www.diversified-medical-alliance.com/ and let me know what you think.

later
jh

My First Blog

I have been after John for a while to create a Harmon Family Website, but between work, callings, and owning an old home he was never able to find (or wanted to find)the time to do so until a few days ago. By that time I had seen several family members who had started blogs (to be fair, the most consistent are my female cousins) and thought that might be an easier option for someone not as technosavy as John.



One of the reasons I put off starting a blog was because I have a secret. I knew I would spill if I started a blog so I decided to wait until I considered it safe to tell my secret. My secret is, I'm 13 weeks pregnant with our first child! I wanted to wait until it was "safe" to tell and my Dr assures me now is a safe time. Here is an ultrasound I had at 12 weeks. John, being the proud father that he is, told me our baby looks like an alien. I got mad at him so he showed it to my brother Jason who said the same thing. I blame it on them being boys.


Being pregnant is a scary and amazing thing. I constantly worry if I'm eating right, sleeping enough, or exercising enough. John is concerned with that as well, but he's worried more about physical things he can change, like finishing up the bathroom remodel (as my brother Jason delicately said, "pretty soon she'll be so big she won't be able to get out of that tub by herself") or figuring out which room would be the best room for a nursery. He was there when the Dr told me I had to take it easy and not to do heavy lifting, get on ladders (he won't even let me stand on a chair), or vacuum, sweep, and mop.


I've also discovered that I have hormones. Not very happy about that and I'm pretty sure John isn't either. Yesterday I started crying on the phone while talking to him about a decision I made a couple of weeks ago (we are giving away our dog because he's too big, bouncy and jealous to have around a baby. Plus, he likes to smack things on the head to get them to play with him and that's not a funny image to have of a big husky smacking your baby on the head and then running away to get chased). Like most men, John hates hearing or watching me cry because most of the time he can't fix it. I assured him it was hormones and apologized. I called a good friend of mine (who is due in January with her 3rd) and she told me what her husband does when she starts crying. He asks if it's something he did, something he could get her or if he needs to leave her alone. Then he stand in the corner as far away from the crazy pregnant lady as possible.


I'm sure I'll have many more adventures as my pregnancy progresses, but for now, I'm enjoying the ride.