I would apologize for my lack of check in yesterday but I hate to sound like a broken record, which is what it feels like lately when my blog is concerned. I forgot to get on the scale Tuesday but Monday morning I snuck a peak and weighed in at 111 which is slightly up from my last weigh in but not even by a full pound. I am on the brink of gaining more than my 2 pounds that I’ve allotted myself for each month though so I’m going to be as careful as possible and take some extra long walks in the forest with Scooter this weekend.

My ever expanding waistline tells me that I have gained though, or at least expanded in the belly region. Maybe I’m not really gaining in pounds but my stomach is just shifting, ya know what I mean? I have finally bitten the bullet and ordered some maternity pants from good old Lane Bryant and they should be arriving at my mom’s house for her to ship over here any day now. I got a really good deal, buy one get one half off, plus a $25 off coupon if you spend $75, which I did manage to spend after I threw in a new pair of cute undies! I cannot wait to get the pants because walking around with my pants totally undone is not really comfortable and you can see the little sticky outtie things from them being undone through my shirts. Not attractive in the least.

I’m still feeling really great. I really can’t complain at all. I sleep enormous amounts but hey, I’m building a human here, that’ll suck the energy out of anybody! I’m not having any strange cravings to speak of. I do want ice cream quite often but that was pre-pregnancy as well. In fact I’ve never had one of those pregnant woman moments where I just HAVE to have something right now or I’ll go crazy. Marco’s never had to put his pants on at 3 am and go down to the night shop to buy me pickles and chips. Actually if I didn’t have the scale going in the opposite direction I wouldn’t even know I am pregnant. Well, that and the sonograms showing me the baby and all. It’s a bit surreal for me still even after 19 weeks. I keep thinking that once the little pumpkin starts moving around so that I can feel it everything will magically become real for me but that moment has yet to arrive. I’m looking forward to it.

I hope you all are doing well and having successful and healthy weeks!

Fun filled baby inspired weekend!

What a fun weekend we managed to have! Marco was off, which only happens every third weekend so we got to spend the entire weekend together. We managed to do some baby stuff shopping and actually made some decisions on some things, which thrills me to death. I'm a planner and it kills me when I can't have everything done immediately.

As of Friday we hadn't bought one single thing for the baby yet. Well I'm only 19 weeks to that's normal you say... please go back and re-read the first paragraph... I'm a planner and I like things done immediately. At first we didn't buy anything because I wanted to make sure we were going to make it past the first trimester without any problem. You know, the whole jinx thing. Then we just never bought anything because we couldn't find anything we really loved or thought we "needed" right at the moment. Even now we're still way ahead of the baby game but it feels good to have a few things known, if not bought.

First we picked out a travel playpen type thingy for Marco's parents house. They'll be providing our daycare needs, at least in the beginning, so this seemed to be an important item. Plus we hit a great sale in a nearby town. We also couldn't pass up this super soft plush square thingy with a little rattle in it just for kicks really.

Saturday we also continued fruitlessly to shop for cribs. Well I did have some strawberries but you know what I mean. The thing is that I found some beautiful cribs on a few US websites and fell in love. There is nothing remotely similar to any of them here. Every time we shop we go home frustrated because we don't see anything that even makes us stop and take a closer look. That's never a good thing. After shopping Saturday Marco wisely told me, we better get over the fact that we aren't going to find cribs like we wanted from the US so we may as well open our minds a little bit and find something here that we can live with. Today we did exactly that. We took ourselves to the nearest Prénatal (a baby store here) and voila! We've ordered our crib to be delivered in just 6 to 8 weeks. WOOHOO!

We also popped into IKEA and found the closet/wardrobe and chest of drawer/changing table we will use in the baby's room. Funny thing, if you buy a closet and chest of drawers at IKEA in the normal section you pay a few hundred euros. If you go to a baby store and buy a very similar closet and chest of drawers you pay about 7 to 8 hundred euros. Now I know IKEA is supposed to be cheaper (and a lesser quality I suppose) but really there is no difference in quality that I can see between the baby store's items and what we've found at IKEA so why the enormous jack-up in price other than one is labeled and marketed for babies and expecting parents? Do they use magic nails that sound an alarm when the toddler decided that climbing the chest of drawers is a great way to spend the afternoon? Do fairies come and alert the parents when the child opens the closet and flings every newly laundered and folded article of clothing onto the floor? I somehow doubt it (but feel free to correct me if I'm wrong!).

We've also decided on a stroller, the Quinny Speedy, but are still doing some shopping around for the best bargain. What's sad is that the stroller, of all things, seems to be the most expensive item! It will get a lot of use for many years though so I think it's money well spent. Plus Marco's totally in love with it.

I've also decided to order some maternity clothing from JC Penny online because they carry quite a range of plus size maternity clothing. I honestly cannot find one plus size maternity shop in the entire effin country and I have searched like Holmes. Saturday morning we exhausted our last two options for stores here and came out of both places empty handed. I give up! If any of you are regular Penny's shoppers can you please tell me how their sizes run in comparison to Lane Bryant? I am probably going to err on the safe size and order larger than I think I need because I really really don't want to have to have them shipped over to not fit and have to ship them back. Pre-pregnancy I was 18-20 on top and 20-22 on bottoms. Just in the past two weeks I've been unable to comfortably zip/button my 22's due to pg belly. According to JC's website I could probably order a 1x in shirts and 2x in pants but I'm thinking of doing a 2x and 3x. Any advice is appreciated!

So I'm not quite halfway through this pregnancy and already I feel like we have a big jump on things, finally. Once we have the ultra sound on the 5th of March (clearly marked on all your calendar's, no?) we'll pick a definite theme for the room and get the whole she-bang-a-lang started! WOOHOO!

Hope you all had a wonderful, successful and healthy weekend!

Let's Deskersize!

I know I sit all together too many hours at a desk at work. Recently I was sent this handy helpful article on how to get in a little stretching and/or exercise at work. I personally love the Funky Chicken regardless of who's watching me!

Hold the butter, wait, scratch that.

"Fatty Mcfatterson?"

"Present!" I scream as I wave my arm in the air.

Slight exaggeration but that's how I felt when I stepped on the scale this morning and tipped it at 110.2 kilos (multiply by 2.2 if you want pounds). Ugh. My pants are so tight on my belly that I feel I should be buttering myself up to get them closed. I can't zip them all the way up anymore and have been walking around the office with them totally undone with just my sweater pulled down over them to hold them up. Granted I have enough junk in my trunk to keep them from falling down but still, it's not a nice feeling to walk around with nothing between your privates and your coworkers but a sweater (well undies, but you catch my drift)! I'm going to try to go shopping this weekend and get something that's going to work a little bit better.

Okay so I haven't gained quite 5 full kilos yet. I'm on the verge of being at 10 pounds above my pre pregnancy weight. I'm in my 5th month (4.5 months actually) so that's about 2 pounds a month. As long as I can keep this pace I think I'll be okay but there's just a lot of growing to still do and I can't help but think "OMG I'm going to be enormous".

In the same breath I also want to yell "BRING IT ON BITCH!" because after struggling so long to even be pregnant I don't care if I gain one zillions kilos, I'll do it. This baby will be worth every single extra pound I have to take off once it's born... every single one.

We're totally excited for the March 5th appointment and are counting down the days! I hope you're all having a sucessful and healthy weeks!

Update: English Breakfast

The normal podcast from the show isn't working for some reason so they're created a temporary file for this mornings show. You can (hopefully) get there by clicking:

http://theenglishbreakfast.podbean.com/2008/02/18/the-english-breakfast-feb-18/

If you click where it says "English Breakfast from 7-8" you can hear my intro around 15:18 (so you can ff) and that's about all I say in the first hour. I'm the Sarah without the New Zealand accent. LOL Mick and Sarah1 are New Zealanders and I believe Mike and Angus are Brits.

If you click English Breakfast from 8-9 you can hear me at 6:25 to 6:44 and also from 39:14 until about 44:15. I'll have to say this last little part was the best/longest although the cow story we're talking about in the 6:25 story was pretty funny.

Of course you're more than welcome to listen to the whole show!

English Breakfast was yummy!

I did it! I went into the radio station this morning and participated in my first English Breakfast morning radio show! It started off a little rocky as I stood in front of the building freezing my ta-tas off with two of the other Monday morning personalities, Angus and Mark, waiting for somebody to show up with a key. After a while of shivering and a few mobile phone calls (one was a wrong number, oops! That' s never fun at 6:45 in the morning) trying to get us actually INTO the building, Angus decided to call the show since Sarah (the New Zealand version, not me obviously) was supposed to already be there. Within a few short seconds we were in the elevator and on our way up to the show.

I met Mick, the main Monday man and the show was off to a rolling start. The show is 2 hours long from 7-9 every Monday thru Friday. The first hour I didn't say much as there were 4 microphones and I made person #5. As I was there only to really observe that was okay with me. I did get a brief intro in the first hour though. Mick caught me a bit off gaurd when he asked me "what brought me to the show this morning" but I came back with a somewhat witty response of "Well I've always been told I have a face for radio" and laughter ensued. Whew.

After 8 a.m. Mike had to leave and I took my spot on the stool right in front of the microphone. He left me some news bits to read with the rest of the bunch and I was ready to go. I read my bits, gave my input, chimed in as to what the others were reading/talking about and overall just had a really good time. I only got nervous once and it was in the middle of reading one of my news stories. It lasted about 3 seconds and the rest of the time it just felt "right". The two hours seriously flew by. It was so much fun and I really cannot wait to do it again.

Sarah, the New Zealand version, is going on vacation for the next 5 weeks so I'm hoping to get to fill in for her. That would be awesome! I don't want to sound over enthusiastic or anything so I'm going to wait a good hour or so before I email the crew and invite myself back.

You're supposed to be able to listen to the show again if you missed it in the first place. You go to www.englishbreakfast.nl and click the "how to listen again" link at the top. After that, you guys are on your own. I'm not sure how often they update it or upload it or whatever happens. If ya can't tell I'm not exactly "techy". If I can manage to find out where you can listen to it I will come back and post it here.

So yeah, my first real true English Breakfast was yummy!

Negenmaandenbeurs was lackluster to say the least

After all the excitement I had built up on my head for the nine-month fair on Friday I was quite surprised at the lack of anything with "wow" factor. We managed to have a good time just because we hardly seem to spend much time together wandering around places aimlessly but we were both less than impressed with what the fair had to offer.

It was more of the same to be honest. More of the same stores we've already been too. More of the same maternity clothing that I cannot fit into. More of the same uninspiring cribs and fabrics for the baby's room. I did see some wall art that I really loved and we may end up using in the baby's room. Here is the link to the website http://www.mibakunst.nl/ It's in Dutch but if you click on the left hand side where it says "Galerie" you'll see the individual paintings. It's something that can go for a girl or a boy and they're just so darned cute.

But yeah, we wandered around the event for over 2 hours and I found one booth that made me think "wow now that's some cute stuff". Blah.

I did managed to snag a shot of a bicycle that you non-Dutch readers may find interesting but of course Blogger is having a "known" problem uploading images so I can't post it here. I'll try to remeber to do it another time. Marco also got his picture taken with Bert and Ernie, lucky bastard. I was too "shy" to go up there and sit with them myself. I think it was more me being start struck than anything as I've always been an enormous Ernie fan. I even contemplated getting an Ernie tatoo at one time. Yes folks, it's true.

I'm sorry I missed my weigh in this Tuesday as my loyal reader and dear friend Keith pointed out to me. I swear time is flying by so quick some weeks but at the same time it feels like I'm standing still. I'm in this vacuum where everything is happening around me at warp speed but I'm going in slow motion. Hard to explain. I did hop on the scale this morning and saw some ugly numbers. I'll wait to share them on Tuesday in hopes that I'm either retaining 4 pounds of water or my bowels are backed up holding onto 4 pounds of intestinal fun. Both are a possibility and neither are fun.

I'm going to the radio station on Monday morning to see what it's all about. If you want to can catch the show by going to http://www.englishbreakfast.nl/ and click on "how to listen again". My Holland readers can of course catch the show in the morning on 99.4 from 7 to 9 a.m. Maybe I should be holding onto this information in my little pocket until I see what kind of jerk I make of myself but then again, what the hell, I've shared some of my most embarrassing and silliest moments with you all, why not this too?

I hope you're having a successful and healthy week.

February is just flying by isn't it? I really thought this month would c-r-e-e-p like a three toed sloth since we're so excited about our March 5th appointment but it's just flying by steadily.

So far this month my sister has had her 34th birthday (Happy Birthday old lady! (which I can totally say because I'm a cool spry 31 (but was told by my new colleague that she thought I was 25 or 26 (I almost got fired for kissing her (I think this is a record for parenthesis within parenthesis))))). The work weeks have flown by as I am swamped and I have a new trainee which takes up my entire day most days.

I have my appointment with the midwife on Monday which I'm not necessarily looking forward to but it'll make me late for work which is always a good way to start the week. Friday is the big baby shopping spree at the negenmaandenbeurs (yes, that's really a word, not a typo) that I told you about in the last post so that's going to be fun. Then I'm off the weekend and took Monday off to as Marco is off and I thought it'd just be nice to have the day together.

Inbetween that time is Valentines day. Yes, go ahead, roll your little eyes at the Hallmark holiday but it marks the 4 year anniversary of the lucky day that Marco and I met so I do look forward to it (and I hope you snapped some ligaments in your eyes when you were rolling them, shame on you!).

Also on the 13th my cousin Melissa will be giving birth (via scheuled c-section, which is how we know it's the 13th) to her new little daughter Hallie Rhea. Hallie will be joining her adorable big sister Brenna in this big crazy world and we're all excited to meet her. Congrats Melissa and Steve!

On the 18th I am going to a local radio station that I may possibly be guest djaying/host on someday for their morning show "English Breakfast". I'm just checking it out to see if I'm interested but radio is something I've always wanted to do (but never thought I'd get a chance to) and it's just right up my alley. It's the first English speaking radio show in the Netherlands and is only on for two hours (7-9am) Monday thru Friday so it wouldn't necessarily screw up my work day since I'd only be on probably once a week. All the spots are filled right now but I could fill in when somebody is away and who knows when something will open up. I believe all the hosts are volunteers at this point, working other jobs, so it's not like they're tied to the show permanently. Plus I can also do little side reports, reviews, possibly some writing on the side just to have something to do besides go to work and come home every day. I'm TOTALLY looking forward to this so fingers crossed for me please!

Then comes two of my nieces birthday's Ryleigh and Paige. They're sisters and born on the same day! My (abovementioned) older sister, Jill, can plan it can't she (she also has two other kids that aren't twins but born on the same day, seeeeeee I told you she was a planner! She has 6 kids altogether so not only is she a planner, she's also nuts)? The day after their birthdays is my parent's anniversary. Then before you know it the month is over and it's time to find out what this little pumpkin is! I'll be so glad to finally be able to quit refering to the baby as either "it" or "the baby".

This week, according to most internet sites, the baby can start hearing sounds from outside the womb. I'll tell ya, we've been yaking up a storm too. I sang every childrens song and nursey rhyme I could think of to "it" the other night while laying in bed and Marco did his renditions in Dutch. I have to admit that I'm going to be needing some English books to bring over here as my nursery rhymes were a bit rusty. Often I'd get the first couple lines done and then forget what comes next. It went a little something like this...

"Little boy blue come blow your horn, the sheeps in the meadows the cows in the corn..."

Ummm... okay I don't know the rest.

"Jack Sprat could eat not fat, his wife cold eat no lean..."

Ummm... something about licking a bowl clean but I can't remember the rest.

Finally I just started making up the rest. That went a little something like this...

"There was an old woman who lived in shoe. She had so many children she didn't know what to do...ummmm... and her name was Aunt Jill! THE END

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

(sorry had to get in one more cheap shot about my sister's oldness while the gettin is good.)

So okay... that's just another buffet of what's happening in my head these days. Busy busy little bee!

(spellcheck for Blogger is STILL not working. I'll re-read but I can't make any promises! Auto-spell in Word has created a poor speller in me! Plus I'm just a bad typer. Pardon the mishaps)

I beg your pardon!

Sorry I've been MIA for a while. This week has been a bit of a whirlwind. Tuesday I missed my weigh in due to headache and slip of the old pregnant mind. I've been training a new colleague at work so getting in some blog time on my lunch hour has even been difficult. Thursday I did finally remember to weigh in and came in at 108.8 which is up a smidgeon from last week but nothing too unsettling.

I have had some changes in the past 4 days that I wasn't expecting quite yet. I can no longer comfortably button my blue jeans, especially when sitting. I do realize I'm in my 5th month of pregnancy but I really was not expecting this to happen until the 6th month or even later. As I haven't found a bella band or similar here yet I'm just walking around with them unbuttoned but still zipped, crossing my fingers that they don't slip down and give the whole office something to see. (get our your dollar bills folks, here comes Sarah!) To look at me I still look the same but underneath my clothes my belly is definately taking on a new life. It's obviously bigger but it's also harder, not that "mushy belly" feeling that is used to have. It's nice to finally have a little something that makes me "feel" pregnant.

I still haven't felt any movement from the baby but it's still very early for that. I have been sleeping quite a bit more than usual once again, hitting the hay at a whopping 7:30 pm Wednesday night and sleeping until 7 the next morning. I was thinking the fatigued had passed when I began the second trimester but apparenlty it was just taking a short break.

We went shopping to try to find me any sort of clothing last Saturday and I'm going to have to claim "crazy pregnant lady" for that trip. I left almost every store in tears or near tears. It is so frustrating to try to shop in the Netherlands when you're plus sized. Not one single store had any plus size maternity, which I already knew but even in the plus sized stores I was disappointed (once again) in the craptastic selection of flowery bold patterns, oversized long shirts and old lady fashion. What in the world is a 31 year old semi-cute semi-fashionable person supposed to do? It makes me feel like such a leper, like I don’t count, like I don’t even exist! I’ve not only cried about it though, I’ve decided enough is enough and took some action. I wrote nice, well written, friendly emails to every plus size and maternity store that I could find online asking them why they don’t carry plus size maternity. I pointed out that not once single store in the COUNTRY carried this type of clothing and there is a large market of people that they seem to be missing out on (no pun intended). Will my little letter campaign do any good? Probably not, but at least I can said I did something about it and have a bit of a peace of mind. I have gotten a few responses from stores apologizing and saying they will send my letter to the “upper management” but that doesn’t do me much good right now. I’m going to probably be ordering from JC Penny online and having my good sweet Mommy ship them over.

They’re having the “Negenmaandenbeurs 2008” (nine-month fair) at the RAI, which is a huge venue here, next week. We’re going to go in hopes to find a crib that we like and just have a little look around to see what else is there. I hope to get some inspiration for some nursery ideas, find some cute bedding sets and see all the new gadgets and toys they have for babies to play with and for baby safety. Mostly I’m just glad to have the day off with Marco and to be able to shop baby all day long!

So that's that for this week. I hope you're all having a successful healthy week no matter what your goals are!

Mark it on your calendar folks...

Since day one of my BFP (big fat positive, meaning pregnancy test) I have been obsessed with if this baby is a girl or a boy. Naturally we are thrilled beyond belief that we're even pg so we don't care what the gender is but I am just so curious. My Mom says that waiting until the baby is born to find out is half the fun but she also said "you're a planner Sarah, you just can't wait." Oh how wise my mother is. So I made my appointment for March 5th and you better believe I am joyously ticking off the days on the calendar. It's a shame to wish the month away but really if I could skip over February this year I wouldn't be too upset.

I've gone back and forth on my "feelings" of which it is. At first I had no clue but had the waving baby dream that I told you about and in that dream it was a girl. Then at one of the emergency ultra sounds (with the polyp) I just 'felt' that it was a boy. At my 12 week ultra sound I was swayed again and thought "girl". Now I am just clueless! Marco has felt it is a girl all along with the exception of a few days after the same ultrasound that made me think boy. He's back on the girl feeling though.

My niece, Tyler, has requested a girl. According to her boys are "goobers" and yes, that's a direct quote. My nephew, Milan, says he'll only play with a boy, again another direct quote. Another niece, Kamryn, has requested a boy for unspecified reasons. Marco's parents are hopeing for a girl (but of course only wish for a healthy baby most importantly) as they only have boys in their family. My family hasn't really been vocal about their thoughts or intuitions on the baby. Of course there are so many kids in my family (our baby will be grandchild #12, making it an even dozen) already of either gender that the gender isn't really a big deal I think. They'll be thrilled with whatever we have.

It's so nice to have something to really look forward to and be excited about. It makes all the mundane days seem to go by just a little bit quicker and makes the things that irritate the hell out me seem a little less irritating.

I hope the baby cooperates and shows the goods. I'm dying to know if we're going to bring home a Ty John Robert or a Sadie Marie!

(the spell check wouldn't work for some reason so please pardon the typos, I'll try to run it later when blogger is behaving better).