A Body In Motion

... In this house, tends to want to stay at rest after all the movement I've been doing.

Hello! And welcome to "What-the-feck-did-you-think-you-were-doing?-trying-to-move-around-everyone's-freakin'-birthdays-omg!"

We have the lease. We haven't signed it yet - we're waiting on the landlords' researching ways for us to pay electronically.

We've talked to our current landlord, who is fine with us pro-rating into May, until the 15th.

The new landlords said we can get into the new house by May 10th.

My birthday is in early April. Alli's birthday is just past the midway point of April, Aishlinn's birthday is in early May. We also have my best friend Kathleen's birthday, as well as her daughter's birthday, also after and before the midway point of April. Holy crap, Batman. Little does our oldest daughter know that Mommy has a surprise up her sleeve. I'm going to take the Hyrulian shield cake idea that she asked for, and do a mash-up cake. Because the girls' birthdays are within a few weeks of one another, I thought I'd combine My Little Pony with Link. It'll be Derpy dressed as Link, with a miniature shield of Hyrule. I really hope it turns out. The other option I gave Alli was for me to do a TARDIS cake. But, well, I haven't had spectacular results with that. Oh well.

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And really? Have you ever tried getting rid of furniture for free on Craigslist? Honestly, it's like the hardest thing. They send an email expressing interest. I send one back confirming the size, that you'll need a truck to move it, and asking when can they pick up. I hear nothing back for four hours. It's like chasing someone down to hand them FREE stuff. I went through five interested parties before someone actually responded back. BINGO. The Antique chair is YOURS, Ms.I-have-a-truck! Come and get it TONIGHT.

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We have boxes - some assembled, others not, still more filled with crap we're either taking with us or are intent on going through before we move. I have a feeling what's going to end up happening is this:
The week before we move, we start taping up boxes.

Me: "Whoops. Guess I never went through this shite. *tapes box up* I'll have time when we move to the new house. I'll do it for sure then."

This is exactly what happened the last time we moved - in 2010. And we still have those exact same emm-effing boxes IN THE GARAGE. (Sorry, I think I'm approaching Moving Rage, Stage 2 right now. It's been a long week already.) Then again, you're reading the ramblings of a woman who still has three dozen 35mm cameras from her wedding that have not been processed yet. We just keep moving the box that says "Wedding Cameras" from house to house.

We've been married seven years this year; I blame it on my husband.

I am known to be a pack mule.

Mommy's purse basically carries everything that you may ever need - from Barbie's lost pink shoe to graham crackers from three years ago that have been crushed into crumbs which are held inside plastic packaging that lies, saying it tastes delicious. No, they don't. They likely taste like stale toe jam.

Anyhow, I digress.

A few months ago, Dave and I were searching online at new products on www.Thinkgeek.com when I saw this little beauty.

I knew I HAD to have it. I proclaimed my intent to receive it on FaceBook. I called out the fact that I NEEDED it and it would be PERFECT to cart all the crap around for other people that I normally do in my purse.

Truth?

The sucker is just too big. It is the biggest messenger bag that I have EVER owned. I took it with me to church on Sunday to give it a test drive before committing to moving all the crap and crumbs over from my ChrisYulKwanzaCkah purse.

It was just too large.

And so now, I am determined to release my messenger bag back into the Wilds where --- oh feck that. I'll just wrap it up and give it to my oldest daughter who turns 14 this April, for her birthday! She was literally drooling over it when I took it out of the box anyway, so I know she'll just be jumping for absolute joy.

And for me? I bought myself at $13.00 black patent leather purse that still fits everything it did before. There's just no dancing gingerbread and holiday decor plastered all over the side of it. I even threw the graham cracker dust bag into the new purse to show I was committed to the change.

I'm such a good mom. Some days.

27 weeks to go

Now that the room has stopped spinning and I can eat peanut butter related items again, I'm just having to deal with the fatigue. Which is normal - and believe me, I'm not complaining! Just stating a fact.

I remember when I was prego with Alli that I used to fall to sleep and it would take a foghorn in the ear to wake me up. Exhaustion was my constant companion then.... but it's mild now compared to what I remembered. Still, I'm old. I turn 29 on Sunday. Alli turns 7 on the 18th of April. Which brings me to remember what it was like when she was born and how I'm preggers again. Oy.

When Alli was born, it was by emergency c-section and I was about 27 weeks with pre-eclampsia and HELLP. She emerged at just about 1 pound, 11 and 1/2 ounces. Talk about traumatic for us both!

And so now, nearly 7 years later, I look back on her birth and promise myself and my family that this time should not be nearly so traumatic or dramatic. According to my perinatologists, I have only a 25% chance to develope pre-eclampsia again, and that knowing about any predisposition means that we are armed to take better care this time. I think a large factor that is in my favor this time is that Dave isn't asking for a divorce when I'm 6 months pregnant (as my ex husband did). *L* Stress is never good, let alone when you're pregnant. Go figure.

But... so far all is well and normal. I have my Level II ultrasound in about 6 weeks to check for additional possible issues and do a really COOL 3D picture of the baby. We should also be able to see something as to the gender as well. I'm pretty darn excited this time - Alli was a surprise, but I am too old for surprises. *L* I want to know what gender it is so we can plan ahead. No fun you say? Oh well. I have enough surprises daily with my 7 year old.

My Birthday

I turned 28 today - this evening, if memory serves, at about 6:50pm.

I don't really feel any older at this moment than I did this morning. Over the years I've learned not to expect too much. I mean, it's not like I woke up this morning to streamers and balloons and a massive rheumatoid arthritis flare up. *L*

No. I woke up, greeted the morning with a smile as I listened to Dave snoring so loud he shook the bed. Then I got dressed as usual, knowing that I only had to work a half day. Sheer joy.

One of the gals at work made me a yummy-licious chocolate cake with rainbow sprinkles. I made sure that someone else cut it as I'm still recovering from a small cold/flu that hit me up last week and didn't want to contaminate the cake today. Other friends at work brought over helium balloons and put more goodies in my easter bucket, and even brought me a present or two. Sweet, sweet people! Thank you ladies! ;)

I came home around noon, grabbed Alli and we returned to work as 'visitors' so Alli could have her yearly visit with the people I work with and act all shy and retiring. Wouldn't you know I couldn't make her stop talking all the way home. lol

Dave of course told me that in addition to the Doc Martens shoes he bought for me, he had something else. The something else turned out to be a BEAUTIFUL Birthday Wreath from Calyx & Corolla
which happens to be affiliated with the Vermont Teddy Bear Co. While I didn't get a VT teddy bear for my birthday (which I'm good with), he did get another beautiful red box with gourmet chocolates. Yum. No, no, DOUBLE Yum.

Dinner tonight was a fabulous feast from a new local Chinese delivery place. Highly impressed with the packaging AND we got free doughnuts from them! Later came the chocolate cake... yummmmm... and the chocolate chunk frozen yogurt. *wistful sigh* Would that my belly could hold any more chocolatey goodness, for I am fit to burst!

After speaking with friends and some family, I am ready for bed. I have to say, I was quite surprised; my grandmother who lives in Hawaii and is pushing late 80's actually sent me her yearly birthday greetings... in EMAIL. Yes, my grandmother is extremely special. What can I say? *L*

So we open up another year... a year to be older. A year to become wiser. A year to build better friendships, and repair old relationships with previous friends and family members. A year for hope. :)