New digs

Well, I've had two weeks of spring break - but neither of us has been relaxing. The family helped us rip up all the carpeting upstairs and for days now, I've been going up and down two flights of stairs at least 900 times a day to cut flooring or trim or fetch the pencil I left in the basement next to the saw. We're both exausted, but check it out - now the alcove of our bedroom looks like a baby could move in without getting misplaced in a heap of laundry, dog hair or dirt. It was the last of the carpet in the house and I'm really glad now that it's gone.



So tonight, after a big IKEA furniture assembly session, we identified our favorite nursery item:
this excellent LED bird mobile thingy Jason found at the marvelous IKEA. As we stood next to the crib in blue illuminated quiet, he said "I wish I was small again. I want to climb right in there and go to sleep."

Hopefully the bean feels the same way.

Once Upon A Time-ah

Okay, I think this is pretty funny and it's baby related. Sort of.

Way back in the day, when Jason still lived in Burlington, VT, his band knew other bands and one of those bands was Bag Of Panties. We have a few of their CDs. They're quite clever. Anyways on their CD, Tomorrow Shall Be My Dancing Day, is fabulous track 6, titled Catastrophe. I'd like to think it's about the conception of George W. but, alas, the song predates awareness of that catastrophe.

Here's the first line, repeatedly sung throughout our house over the past few months:

And here's the entire song if you have the time and bandwidth:

If you're using Firefox, you need to do this to hear the Panties:
1. Open Quicktime Player
2. Go to "Edit -> Preferences -> Quicktime Preferences"
3. Go to the Browser tab and click the MIME Settings button.
4. Enable MP3 files.
5. Click OK and refresh We & The Bean

Every Baby Needs A Rat

So the thing about babies, they take a while to get here. In the meantime, we're entertaining ourselves in some pretty infantile ways. We drove to the Pittsburg IKEA yesterday to buy a crib setup. We ended up getting way more than just the crib, all for someone who's still breathing in their own pee. Jason's #1 favorite purchase was a rat. Apparently every baby needs a rat. Or at least ours does. I've named it Templeton so as not to get too creeped out. Memories/visions of my college pal's pet rat Ava, dragging anything and everything to her treasure pile under the bed pop into my head whenever I look at it. I stop myself before Ava adds our baby to the pile.

Whatever... Jason loves it and I love Jason, so our baby, has a rat.

Expansion

Today I buttoned my pants...and by the time I got to work I wanted to rip them into a sad, sad pile. Thus, I have immediately converted to using a rubber band to fasten my pants together. By the end of the day I decided that that's really what rubber bands are made for. As the day passes, the bean makes more gas, the belly gets bigger and the band... just expands. It's one of those modern miracles. So stretchy.

WAPAM!

I woke up yesterday morning for work and - wapam! - the Bean grew like crazy overnight. In this 14th week I can still wear my normal pants but Jason's belt rather than mine is now a necessary though somewhat sad fashion adjustment.

Jason really wanted monthly belly shots for the blog during the second and third trimesters. He must have sensed that I'm a little sensitive about my new alien protrusion (my body has suddenly become over-stuffed sausage casing) as he eagerly volunteered his own belly for all to see. It's so furry! You know you want to pet it - but no, no, you can't. It's mine all mine.