Oh No, Not Again!

I shouldn't be at the computer typing; I should by lying on the couch resting. Maybe trying to get in some fluid.

Several weeks ago I had a couple days where I couldn't keep down anything, not crackers or water or anything. I even had to go to the ER because I was dehydrated from not being able to keep down any liquids.

Sigh, it's happening again. It started this morning when I lost my oatmeal. I tried again with apple juice and a bread roll. No dice. My lunch of leftover rice pilaf didn't last more than ten minutes. Water has been coming back up all afternoon and evening. I just ate about six green beans for dinner. We'll see how long I'm able to keep that down.

I wish the morning sickness would just go away and stay away! I'll be just fine for days at a time, but every time I think it's finally gone it comes back. This is the worst it's been since my ER episode, and I'm hoping that I won't have to go to the ER again.

Dinner tonight was especially interesting. I knew that I had to come up with something to feed the kids, but couldn't think of anything! I couldn't even do leftovers - we had done that for lunch. We didn't even have bread for sandwiches, just one lone bread roll. No way was I going to cook something, even something as simple as pasta and tomato sauce. Finally I remembered that there were two hot dogs in the fridge and tossed them in the microwave. I also microwaved some green beans and split the roll between the two kids. They're totally satisfied. I threw up from handling that much food.

There is a silver lining to this dark and dense cloud of nausea. All the unrest and excitement in my body is apparently stimulating for the baby - after one bout of throwing up I laid back down on the couch and was immediately greeted by encouraging little bumps and squirms in my belly. It was as if the baby were trying to tell me, "It's okay, Mom. I'm still fine, and you're going to get through this." That brought a smile to my face, in spite of all the throwing up.

Sorry for the rambling nature of this post, I guess that's just what happens when you've had a day like I have. :-/

Super Quick...

I know I need to post more regularly here, and I will get around to doing an update sometime.

I just wanted to post really quick that I just felt the baby move! Little swishy flutterings right in my lower abdomen! It actually made my eyes tear up a bit, I'm so excited. :-)

Funny how these little things can get us so excited and emotional. I think I'll be in a better mood this evening than I've been for days.

Such an Awesome Deal!

We did our grocery shopping on Tuesday, and I had noticed in the Smith's sales flyer that the Kroger salad dressings were on sale for 88 cents each. That was such an incredible price that we couldn't resist! I planned on getting some ranch, some Italian, just the basics. That was until we got to the salad dressing aisle and saw the varieties that were available. We might have gotten a little over-excited...

We came home with seven bottles of fancy-schmancy dressing, for only $6.16! Check out this lineup:


Our awesome dressing varieties are: Avocado Ranch, California Honey French, Balsamic Vinaigrette, Russian, Chunky Bleu Cheese, Roasted Red Pepper Vinaigrette with Parmesan, and Greek. We love fancy dressings, but don't often get them because they tend to be pricier. So this was such an awesome buy for us!

Prenatal Appointment

I had my second prenatal appointment today. It wasn't super eventful - the nurse took my weight (I've only gained a pound) and blood pressure (it was excellent). Then I waited for a very long time to see the midwife. Seriously, I made it through an entire Family Fun magazine before she came in! She was with another patient - maybe they double booked and we both showed up? Anyway, I guess it was cool, because I never actually make it through an entire magazine while waiting, usually I get interrupted mid-article.

We talked briefly about symptoms, then came the fun part - listening for the baby's heart beat on the doppler. Apparently the baby was curled up right behind my aorta - it took forever for the midwife to find the heartbeat. She kept moving the doppler wand around in various positions, trying higher and then lower, the left and the right, for several minutes but all we heard was the large, slow swooshing of my own heart beat. Finally the silly little baby cooperated and moved a little away from the aorta and we heard the tiny, fast swoosh, swoosh, swoosh of its heart beat. Welcome sound! Heart rate was about 160, perfectly normal range for how far along I am.

I'm really glad that I'm not one of those women who get scared and panic at every little thing (okay, so I was scared when I was spotting earlier in the pregnancy, but that's different). Going that long with the doppler without getting the heartbeat could have been nervewracking, but I was very calm and confident through the whole thing. I knew my baby was in there and doing fine, it was just hiding.

Anyway, got to hear the heart beat and even got to feel my uterus - the midwife pointed out where it was and showed me where to press so I could feel it too. Despite the long wait (both to be seen by the midwife and to hear the heartbeat) it was a nice appointment, and everything is going well. Next one in four weeks!

Bad News For Jeff?

After a very difficult night, we took Jeff to the health clinic this morning. We have noticed that he gets a very bad reaction every time he eats things like bacon and sausage. It started last year, when he got diarrhea and a stomachache eating turkey sausage. It's gotten progressively worse, until last night. He had bacon yesterday, and was up vomiting and diarrhea-ing all night long. This time he even got a rash on his neck and arms. So they're going to do some allergy testing on him to find out why. We'll go back in about a week to see what they found.

This really is bad news for Jeff - sausage and bacon are two of his favorite foods in the whole world! We have half a package of bacon in the fridge right now, and he can't have any of it (though, this might not be bad news for me, because that just means more for me...). It's just kind of a sad situation - I imagine it would be something like me finding out I was allergic to chocolate or something!

Anyway, I'll update when we find out more. Keep poor Jeff in your thoughts. Can't eat bacon, what a terrible thing!

Kissy Kissy!

This is Thomas' fun new thing - he loves to give kisses! It started with he and I exchanging kissing noises back and forth, and now he has discovered how fun it is to plant a smacker right on Mommy or Daddy's lips. It's so cute! Well, except for when his face is coated in ketchup... :-)


Zaylee's new and exciting news is her new shoes. When she was less than a year old, I found a pair of shoes at a yard sale that were only a dollar, so I bought them. But they were so big! I thought she'd never actually grow into them. Well now, two years later, she's finally growing out of those shoes I bought so long ago (why do children have to grow so fast), so we took her on a special trip down the shoe aisle the other day. As I let her try on various pairs of shoes, she was so excited that she kept saying, "This is so magical! So magical!" It was just darling. Anyway, we found a pair that she just loved, and it was on clearance for $6 (I love clearance!). So here are her new, sparkly, bright purple shoes.


She's super excited about the sparklies on the front, and also about the fact that she can put them on all by herself. Her other shoes were getting so small that she always needed help to squeeze her feet into them. But these are still a bit on the big size (growing room), and are meant to slip on easily. Works out great for all of us - Jeff and I don't have to stop what we're doing to help her put her shoes on, and Zaylee gets to feel like a big girl!

Missed Church and a Frustrating Craving

After several days of not throwing up (that Zofran has been a life-saver!) I got sick yesterday, enough to have to stay home from church. It was kind of a bummer - it wasn't morning sickness related, the nausea was different and it came with stomach cramps and diarrhea. But it's over now, as quickly as it started. The real bummer was having to miss church and choir. We were out of town at my parents' house last week, so this makes two weeks of me missing our home ward. The choir just started working on the Mother's Day song, and are singing it next Sunday, and I haven't even heard it yet! I don't think I'll be able to participate with the choir next week, which makes me kind of sad. But I'll get over it.

Last night after Jeff got home from work, we lay in bed talking for a while. This doesn't happen very often, or at all actually, because he gets home around 2 in the morning and we both just sleep. But I had just gotten up to use the bathroom, and was partially awake already, and we just ended up talking. It was cool, we haven't really talked like that for a while. One of our conversation topics was the difference between Top Ramen packets and the real ramen you buy in ramen shops in Japan. Top Ramen is rubbery noodles in a sodium-laden broth-like substance. I really like it, but it pales in comparison to real ramen. There was this ramen shop in Tokyo that I went to once. The bowls were enormous - several inches deep and twice as wide. The fresh noodles are all pooled at the bottom, topped with real broth. Floating in the broth above the noodles are all the delicious extras that the Japanese serve with their ramen - several kinds of mushrooms, a variety of tender-crisp vegetable strips, tenderly cooked greens, sometimes some small pieces of meat, sliced boiled egg, and a little pink fish paste cut in the shape of a flower. That's real ramen, and eating it is an incredible experience.

And ever since that conversation, I have had the most annoying craving - for real ramen prepared in a ramen shop in Tokyo. How frustrating is that! It's not like we can just jump on a plane and head to Tokyo so I can get my ramen fix! Grrr. I just need to tell myself to stop talking or thinking about food, because every time I do I either find that I can't stand the thought of that particular food, or I suddenly want it so bad I feel like crying because I can't have it.

Sigh. Ramen. Real ramen.