Surprise

Yep. I've tried to dance around it for a while now, but the plain fact is, I'm finding it hard to blog because the morning sickness and food and smell aversions have knocked me off my game. I was stunned to see a positive pregnancy test a few weeks ago, but it was in a "how could we possibly be that lucky?????" kind of way. Here we thought that the second go around could easily take another year or more, but nope. I'm apparently one of those wacky and lucky few who never get a period while breastfeeding and still manage to get pregnant again. I suppose I have some "survivor's guilt" about that. I lamented our previous experience for so long that I really felt those of us waiting for baby #2 were all in the same boat. Only I'm not; and that feels weird to me. I think I'm beginning to adjust to the fact that this is happening. Who knows what time will bring. I'm not due until June and I'm still several weeks away from the end of the 1st trimester, but for right now, this is real and it's an amazing gift.

Amidst all of our celebrating, we're still trying to get our house prepped for a rental. Did I mention we may have found renters? Some friends of friends need a place to stay for a few months during a renovation on their house and the timing coincides quite well with our excursion to the East Coast and then on to Japan. Doing all of the cleaning, prepping, packing, storing, etc. with the occasional bout of nausea has been a challenge. Right now, I'm just trying not to be overly ambitious.

For now, I'm hanging in there and have my eyes on the prize: I'm hoping that the nausea will have seriously subsided by the time Thanksgiving rolls around. This is my year for turkey, gravy and mashed potatoes!!

They say it's my birthday

Tomorrow is my birthday. Rather than dwelling on the crossing of the invisible line demarking "advanced maternal age" (that's right I turn 35 this year), I thought I'd focus on baking. I'm trying to do a lot more baking this year. In fact, I've sort of made it a pet project. I think the challenges presented by baking in Japan spurred me even further than I thought possible. Needless to say, I decided it was time to tackle one of my all-time favorites - a sweet treat I've never seen in Japan - the cannoli.

But that was before I finally succumbed to the germs or allergens. Peanut got sick last week, followed promptly by Gboy which put me back on full-time duty 24 hours a day for several days (Gboy wasn't just sick, he coughed the wrong way and seriously wrenched his back and was out of commission for several days). It's no surprise that I'm under the weather I suppose. But it sucks. I'm just too tired to do anything; and I couldn't taste the cannoli anyway.

And I'm a wee bit sad because no matter how many times I've told Gboy that he doesn't need to celebrate Valentine's Day or Mother's Day or Christmas (he's not a celebrater by nature and his family history either reinforces this or created it - not sure which) I've also told him that birthdays are a "my feelings will be hurt if you don't at least TRY to do something nice" kind of day. In the first few years we were together he really made an effort. Now, I might get dinner. *sigh* It just makes me a little sad.

So I know I need to make it special for myself if it's going to happen at all. Can you tell I've decided that this year's party theme is PITY?

Polka dots and spots

On Friday, Peanut seemed to nap surprisingly early in the morning, but since she'd been a tad on the cranky side, we figured she was tired and that's what caused her to zonk out so early. I was a bit concerned about going out for the better part of that afternoon and evening as I had originally planned - leaving Gboy home alone with a cranky Peanut for that long, but he assured me they'd be fine. I called that night before returning home and he told me she'd gone to sleep 30 minutes earlier than usual without a bit of fussing; she just fell asleep. He said she'd seemed a tad feverish but no big deal. We were amazed. She didn't need to nurse at all, didn't seem upset by my absence even though she's used to having both of us around for her bedtime routine. Congratulations to us on our fabulous parenting! Um or whatever. She slept soundly Friday night and on Saturday she seemed fine. That's when fate stepped in to prove to us how wrong we can be.

Saturday night...

We woke up in the middle of the night to lots of vigorous crying and as soon as I picked Peanut up I knew what was wrong - she was burning up. We took her temperature and it was over 39.6 C (that's somewhere over 103F if you're like me and don't operate metrically). Plenty high. Gboy being even more paranoid than I am decided we should make a trip to the hospital to have her checked out. We had called ahead and knew that there was no one in the urgent care/ER waiting area ("How is this possible?" I wondered as I recalled this story). The doctor took one look at her and said the symptoms of influenza weren't evident (we agreed with this as she HAD no symptoms other than a fever) and he diagnosed her as having Roseola. True to form, she had the high fever on and off for about 3 days and then promptly broke out in the tell-tale rash.

Ah ha! It all makes sense now! The unusually early and long nap on Friday morning. The early bedtime on Friday night. The easy bedtime routine.

I love being a parent. It's ALWAYS a surprise!