Large, round, taut...better.

[ty]

In response to the large volume of requests for pictures of Henry's belly, we give you, without further ado...the belly that ate Tucson.










And as an added bonus a picture of our good-for-nothing freeloading cats waiting to get in so they can eat some food and then take a nap.

The New (for us) Volvo

[ty]

So we finally sold the Kraken, our huge Ford F-250 truck that moved us down to AZ and transported the great majority of our house from IKEA/Home Depot in its cavernous bed. The end of an era. We replaced it with the heaviest car you can buy. A 1991 Volvo 240.

We named it Jayne after a character in Firefly.


The fuel pump replacement work Ty had to perform
on it almost immediately.

So far it has been a very good and sturdy vehicle. Gotta love those Swedes.

Wow

[jordanna]

I was not actually wasting time on the internet when I found this, I was looking for a part I need for my rig. This was just a bonus: cow magnets. That's right, cow magnets.

Still Gestating After All These Weeks

[jordanna]

The kid is still in utero. I probably shouldn't get impatient yet because I am still two weeks from our due date. But still. The good news is, the changing table/ dresser should be finished tonight! And, if I can bully my husband into it, the baby's room will be emptied of all tools. I may even go hog wild and ask him to build the crib (say it isn't so!). Of course, I haven't finished recovering the mattress, but that is Sunday's project. (He has a basinnette to sleep in when he arrives, we aren't completely unprepared). I would like to point out that I am preparing for motherhood by saying "hog wild" instead of "ass-crazy". I have been working lackadaisically to ammend my cursing ways.

Dog fight revision

[jordanna]

We went back to Sunday Funday yesterday. Turns out the other dog wasn't *exactly* unmarked. He had a couple of toothmarks, similarly to Roland. But Lucky (the other dog), like Roland, healed up fine. They seemed to make friends yesterday, with no growling and lots of tail wagging. Roland did keep following Lucky around as if to say, "Remember when we fought and I won? Cause I'm dominant, right? Remember? I won? Cause I'm big? Hey, remeber when we fought and I won?". I think this was his first real dog fight and he is somewhat baffled about how to proceed now. Either that or he is a sore winner.

Yeah Right

[jordanna]

Yesterday while we were on yet another Ikea run, we saw this lamp under a sign that said "NOT A TOY". Not a toy? Not only does it have wheels, it has a handle who's sole purpose is to drive the damn thing at mock 1 around your desk!

When You're A Jet, You're A Wicked Cool Jet

[ty]

Living right next to an air force base has its perks. The past two weekends there have been airshows and I got to see some very very cool planes. All these pictures were taken from my front yard.

F-117 Stealth Fighter


F-15 Strike Eagle


One of the F/A-18 Blue Angles landing


A blurry F-4 Phantom


The "Piece of Resistance", another F-15 (top right), 2 P-51 Mustangs?, and an F-22 Raptor. The Raptor is our newest and coolest fighter. The program cost an estimated $70 billion with each plane coming out to around $360 million. Madness.

Roland Got In A Dogfight!

[ty]

For those of you who may not have met our dog Roland, he is very large, very hairy, very sweet rescue dog. He's half Alaskan Malamute and half Great Pyrenees which results in a 110 lbs. of sweet disposition with a very strong stubborn streak.

Every Sunday morning we wake up at the ass-crack of dawn and haul ourselves over to the local Humane Society for "Sunday Funday." This is an opportunity for neutered dogs with all their shots and no history of aggression to race around in circles and sniff each others anus at top speed. Roland is not the most socially ept dog but he's not aggressive, he just doesn't know how to play and he loves running around with all the other idiot dogs.

So apparently what happened was this: A random pound mutt (~80 lbs) there for the first time loped up to Roland and took position right next to him and behind him, even with his shoulder. If done aggressively (hackles up, no wagging tail) its the doggy equivalent of a stranger standing right behind you with his hands up close to your neck. So Roland did what he does when another dog tries to hump him or growls at him, he growled and snapped at the air to show his displeasure. This was apparently enough for the other dog who promptly big Roland hard enough to draw blood on both sides of his muzzle.

Now I wasn't actually there when it happened but I've seen how my dog handles this sort of thing and the eyewitnesses all agreed. Roland let loose with a ferocious growling/snarl, picked the other dog up by his neck, slammed him down on the ground, stood over him, and held him pinned by his neck till my wife pulled him off the other dog. The other dog was crying, whining and wanted nothing to do with any other dogs after that, but he was unmarked.

Roland had a puncture on one side of his muzzle and a nasty scrape on the other. Interestingly, Walshy-man had a good point about why Roland probably didn't hurt the dog. As pack hunters, Malamutes have a very strict heirarchy determined sometimes by fighting. But when all is said and done and pecking order has been established if you've injured a pack member you're less likely to hunt effectively. Hence the "I owned you, but I didn't hurt you" tendency.

Or maybe he's just getting grumpy in his old age.

162.5 and holding

[jordanna]

We went to the doctor today and discovered that I haven't gained weight for 3 weeks! This is an unheard of event for this pregnancy, as I am usually gaining double what all those silly websites say. Interestingly, I have only met one woman who had a totaly pregnancy weight gain that jived with those websites. Everyone else I have talked to gained in the range of 40-50 pounds. (I am up 37.5). In light of this new information, I feel absolutely no guilt over that twix bar I ate on Sunday. Tyson, the truely supportive husband, ate it with me in solidarity. The doc we saw today is our backup lady, who is really nice. She is not as cool as our primary doc, who could be our long lost twin in terms of attitude towards child birth, but we are comfortable with her filling in if there is a problem. She surprised me today by saying she didn't think we would make it to 40 weeks. I am not sure what she is basing this on, but she thinks twitchy will make an entrance in the next 3 weeks. I have been fairly convinced he would be late. Any bets?

The end of a smelly era

[jordanna]

The Kraken, our beloved 1986 diesel truck, is gone! We sold it last night, and he is off to a new home. We didn't get the best price in the world, but decided that it was worth taking a small hit to have it taken care of before the kid came. Friends of ours listed two much more desirable vehicles in July. They finally sold one of them in December and still have the second sitting in their parking lot. Now we just need to get Cricket out of the shop... Turns out 100% biodiesel blows up injector pumps. Or, ours just wear out faster than other peoples. We have officially replaced the Kraken with a much more kid-friendly vehicle: Jayne, the 1991 Volvo 240 sedan. You can't find a safer cheap car on the planet. He has been a great addition to the family, and we are happy to have this all wrapped up. Tyson is happy I am in a safe vehicle, and I am happy that it doesn't take a fork lift to get me into the car anymore.

Illegal abuse of the english language, 5 yard penalty

MSN's headline: "8 great spots for a 'mancation' "

My favorite quotes from NPR this morning

[jordanna]

"Have you ever thought that the fashion accesory missing from your life was a pink pack of cigarettes? If so, Camel wants a shot at your lungs"

" Wait, it gets better... That's right, the pope's latin expert is advising you on how to properly pronounce the words to a drinking song"

The Home Stretch or Get Off My Intestines

[jordanna]

Well, Twitchy is due 4 weeks from today. We don't expect a timely arrival, but we have now transitioned to seeing the doctor once a week. They are very exciting appointments, where the doctor confirms that I am still pregnant and asks if I show any signs of being not-pregnant. Twitchy appears to have taken up a head down posture, which is good new for those of us hoping to avoid a cesarian. The bad news is he is much more constrained in his movements. This has led to a unique motor pattern where he alternately bends and straightens his legs, causing his knees to mash whatever organs they pass against my abdominal wall. We are almost finished with the baby's room and actually have a place for him to sleep when he arrives. We are so on the track to winning national parenting awards. We will post pics of the finished product after all the accessories are completed and moved in. Kendra will be here for a conference soon, and I have enlisted her aid in fixing up some nursery furniture. Good times will be had by all...

Turns out they're all dumb

[jordanna]

Without a doubt, Socket is the smartest cat we own. The other two were raised in comfort from the age of 6 weeks, and spoiled rotten by us. The side effect of this loving care appears to be a leaking of brain cells out their furry little ears. Socket came to us at the age of 5, having had a more adventurous youth. She can typically outwit the other two in her sleep with one paw tied behind her pack. Heck, make it two paws. However, I just watched her jump up onto the plant stand that holds the water bowl. Consequently, I just watched her jump into the water bowl, and then right back out again with a very shocked look on her face. Mind you, this is the water bowl she drinks out of EVERY DAY.

New Gear!

[jordanna]

Anyone who has watched us prepare to go snowshoeing, hiking or camping knows that we are addicted to gear (I don't know where Ty gets it from; as for me, I'm looking at you Dad!). The most entertaining aspects of having a new kid is all the new gear. Our decision to eschew disposable diapers has led to more conversations on diaper technology than I ever could have imagined. At one point I thought the options were: disposable or cloth. Then, I learned the options were: disposable, cloth, or flushables (g-diapers). Then I learned there are approximately a MILLION different ways to cloth diaper your baby. We don't think day care providers will go for flushables, and the flushables are fairly expensive (30-40% more than huggies) so we are going to do a trial run where we combine diapering technologies: flushables inside the g-diapers, cloth inserts inside g-diapers, and pocket diapers. What is a pocket diaper you ask? Check these out! We figure we should be able to use the same inserts inside the BumGenius and the g-diaper pants. The pocket diapers go on like a regular diaper, so we have hopes that child care providers will use them, and just stow the dirties inside our diaper bag (I am making a bunch of individual water proof bags). We bought two pocket diapers of a different brand (Swaddlebees) than the BumGenius just to try out the concept, since Twitchy won't be in daycare until August. I am having a hard time resisting buying the BumGenius now, because I think they are a little too adorable and they get better reviews than the swaddlebees. In the end, I don't know if it is my environmental morals that have led me away from disposables, or the fact that all the alternatives are so much cuter.

My not so secret addiction

[jordanna]

For those of you who don't know, I LOVE CRAIGSLIST! Even if I don't need to buy anything, I will peruse the ads on at least a weekly basis because you never know. Paula and Steve benefitted from this habit of mine, as they got to sleep on our new plush foldout sleeper chairs (30$ for two). One of the pleasant side effects of a free advertising community, is that you don't have to pay by the line. Which means you can be a verbose and creative as you want. There is a "best of craigslist" section which features some of the choicer gems that turn up across America. One of them featured my other favorite bastion of savings, Costco: http://www.craigslist.org/about/best/sea/273715530.html

It's the little things that make pregnancy charming...

[jordanna]

Like leaking just a *little* bit of urine everytime you sneeze.

Hoping I misheard her

[jordanna]

Ty and I went to his high school play last night, and I overheard a mother say, "How did her new nose come out? ____'s came out great!".