We spent a good part of this weekend shopping for carseats at BRU. We ended up buying a glider for the nursery. The other part of the weekend was painting the nursery. Painting is lame. The only fun part of this process is the results and we’re not even there yet. I spent most of Saturday taping up the room and painting the lower half while Brian watched the UT game.

Then on Sunday we both tackled the room and we’re still not done. I would say we’re about 75% there. I think we need to put on an extra coating. Textured walls are so difficult to paint on. Unfortunately we’ can’t put the nursery together until we get the furniture in, which is sometime next month. But at least the hard part will be done with.

I think I finished our registry. Thank goodness.

Despite all the manual labor I put in this week, I’m feeling slightly better this morning. Even though I got in 7 hours of sleep, I woke up several times because either my shoulder was aching from laying on it, my knees where aching because it was bent weird, or my wrists were hurting from pregnancy carpel tunnel. I feel like an old lady. I hope this isn’t an omen of what’s to come when I age. It better go away

I finally just woke up at 5am and worked out. But after that I felt like laying down again. I guess I woke up too early.

Baby’s kicks are getting stronger. I get this feeling every now and then like she’s sneezing. It’s cute. Our next appt is this Friday and we start seeing the doctor every 2 weeks until the final month.

There’s still quite a bit to do, not just with the baby, but everything else. I have to clean out my parent’s place. All that’s left is clothes that I need to send off to Goodwill and some of the large furniture pieces along with scrubbing the place clean. Ack.

We also have our maternity/family photo shoot this Saturday. I hope it stays cool through the weekend. The last thing I want is to feel all sweaty. We’ll be shooting with our dogs at some park somewhere. It’s our first professional photo shoot since our wedding 5 years ago. Can’t wait to see how it turns out.

I’m hoping to get in a solid 2-3 chapters of this giant baby book I’m reading before the day is over.

Week 29 is about to start. A few days ago, I woke up with this really annoying pain in the groin area. It hurts to move around in bed or walk. I’m now at the stage where I’m having to waddle around. I thought walking may relieve the pain, but after spending a good 3 hours at the fair yesterday, all I wanted to do was lay down, and the pain had worsen. I mentioned it to my doctor during Friday’s appointment, unfortunately her response was that it’s just my body stretching and there’s not much to do. Hmph. I refuse to take painkillers. I’m hoping stretching it out a little each day will help. As long as it doesn’t worsen as this baby grows I’m fine living with it. I guess we’ll see in a couple weeks if I need to start seeing a chiropractor.

I should also check my insurance to see if chiros are covered. Speaking of, I maxed out this year’s flex spending. I only put in $1000 thinking I may or may not use it all this year, but between the doctor’s fees, very expensive prenatal vitamins, and a couple of trips of the dentist I guess it wasn’t that hard to use up. I think I’m down to one more payment to the OB before I’m done with her fees.

Hopefully the hospital bill won’t be too outrageous. We’ve got to pre-register and look into the remaining out of pocket costs. Luckily I have a great service at work that handles all of that stuff for me (particularly if I think my bill is wrong). All I need to do is send them an email and fax in any paperwork…

Well now that I’ve collected stuff for the nursery, we’ve got to paint and wait for the furniture to come in.

Next up is finishing the registry…again another daunting task. Thank goodness for Amazon. Our trip to Target was pretty disappointing. Not only did I have to fight with the registry kiosk, but they didn’t seem to have much of anything. I’m tempted to just buy everything now though…

Back to reading and laundry.

I should probably go read but it’s hard to concentrate with the game blaring on tv. I’m currently reading two books. The Host by Stephenie Meyer and The Gargoyle by Andrew Davidson. They’re both good books, but I’m struggling with The Host only because it’s a bit slow in the beginning. Other than that, nothing much going on this weekend.

Anyway, the reason for this post is pictures. I haven’t featured much pictures since I’m too lazy to sort through. There’s always the link to flickr on the right side of the screen.

Here’s some from last weekend, at Linda’s wedding.

Anyway, other than the movie, we spent the majority of the weekend chilling. I baked Brian his birthday cake today, and tonight we’ll probably grill or something for his early birthday dinner. I need to pack up for my trip to Richmond tomorrow. I feel completely unprepared, although I’m not sure what else I can do. Most of it is going to be talking anyway.

Since Matt and Josie are coming into town next weekend, I’ve been getting the laundry done and washing all the sheets in the guest room. I hate laundry. It’s NEVER ending. Anyway, there’s more tidying up to do, but I guess I can work on it when I get back.

At least her spirit is the same, for the most part that is. I want her to be 100% healthy, but it’s so hard to keep her that way when she likes playing rough. She hurt herself by hitting the corner of the wall as she turned around to catch her squeaky.

Anyway, this weekend was very uneventful since Brian is sick. I’m not sure where it came from, but he was sick with something similar about a month ago. I hope I don’t catch it again because it took me about 2 weeks to recover from it.

Then on Saturday, we spent a couple hours at my parents place before heading out to the ballpark in Arlington to watch the Astros and Rangers. The Rangers won. We haven’t been to a ballgame in a two years, but it was fun and we’ll have to do it again. The only reason why we went this year was because I got the tickets from work. Too bad the hotdogs and nachos we had sucked, but Brian did enjoy his cotton candy which he reluctantly shared it with me. And…shame on me for having processed meat! I suck at trying to be vegetarian.

Anyway, we left the game after the 8th inning and went to a friend’s house for some drinks. After getting tipsy some more and eating more junk food we finally headed home at 3am and crashed until lunchtime the next day. By the way, these people’s house makes me want to redecorate. It had a lofty feel to it, which is the total opposite of our decor.

On Sunday, I had to finish up my cupcakes for the cake decorating class. Before the class, we went to Chili’s for lunch and I for some reason craved their fried stuff, possibly because I was eating lousy all weekend long. My body definitely paid for it last night and this morning because I didn’t sleep well at all and woke up with a stomach ache.

So this week, I need to get back on the healthy routine. I had a veggie sandwich for lunch, and need to plan what to have for dinner since we have nothing to cook with at home.

I also need to do a better job of meal planning. I haven’t been cooking as much which isn’t a good thing. On top of that, I need to start going back to the gym and doing some of those free classes. I enjoy those much more than the boring cardio workout. I think I’ll go to yoga tomorrow morning at Sunstone. That is if I can wake up at 5:30 am….

The other to-do is finish planning our trip. We’re undecided between a fancy hotel or the standard economy hotels. I know we won’t be spending too much time in the room, but it is a vacation afterall. I looked at the rates for the Solamar Hotel that Terri recommended, but I think it’s too much of a splurge. I did see some good rates at Temecula Creek Inn, but it seems out of the way. The Hyatt Regency in La Jolla had some good rates. If I had it my way, I’d go with the Hyatt, but Brian had some sticker shock only because he doesn’t do any of the planning and didn’t realize how expensive stuff was. I guess we’ll figure it all out tonight.

Anyway, we spent the day today cleaning and reorganizing. It’s been almost a year since we’ve moved in and the place is a clutter. I cleared the kitchen counters so it looks less cluttered. I even moved some of the canned goods and spices into the cabinet next to the fridge to make room in the pantry.

Brian spent the morning hanging some floating shelves that we got for Christmas and then spent the afternoon clearing out the tubs in the back bedroom. It looks less like a storage room. Even the office downstairs is clean.

We even went and looked at some new model homes to get ideas for decoration, but I was more inspired by all the modern touches of the houses than I was with the decor. Too bad we didn’t take any pictures. I would love to someday have dark wood floors downstairs. Although it might clash with our cabinets.

I am so glad the studying is over. It’s so nice not having to spend all your free time studying or thinking about studying. I can now enjoy reading the book for my work bookclub and watching tv. Next week, we’re having a rock band party and I’m going to spend Sunday planting flowers in our yard.

Oh and since I’m rambling, Reesey had an animal’s head in her mouth yesterday. I could tell she had something in her mouth as soon as she ran inside. I was too afraid to try to take it from her, so I threw a snausage across the room. She dropped whatever she was trying to eat to grab the snausage and I shrieked the entire time I was trying to pick up the nastiness that she brought into the house. Brian was still in bed as it was only 7am, but he came running down to see what was going on. I had him look in the trash and I think we both agreed it was a head of some sort. I could totally see guts sticking out from the head. Yuck. What a gross doggy!! No kissies for her!

Anyway, I haven’t started meditating yet, but I will start this week. I need to find articles or books to see how I can do this effectively. So if anyone has any recommendations, let me know. I know a girl at work that is interested in doing it with me if I happen to find a class. But I think I’ll try mastering it by myself first.

So with that said, starting this week, I’m going to try to eat a semi vegetarian diet (limiting my meat intake to once or twice a week, gotta start slowly). I packed myself a bowl of whole wheat couscous with some feta mixed in. So what is sparking all of this?? My visit to the doctor yesterday was ok. My blood pressure is on the borderline of the prehypertension stage (130/90) and I need to get it down. It’s not a horrible thing, but I should start watching my body. That’s probably why I get headaches all the time. So with these small changes, I am hoping that things will get better in 2 weeks when I return to the doctor. I am sure the fact that my dad was in the hospital earlier this month and the looming PMP exam which is in TWO days isn’t helping with my stress. But once the test is over, things will we back in order. In fact, I plan on spending the weekend shopping and gardening. I’ve been waiting all season to be able to replant our flowers.

I’ve even started counting my calories today. Hopefully that will deter me from eating bad stuff. This morning I had a bagel. Then for lunch I had a frozen entree – Chicken Tikka Masala. I’m not sure what to do for dinner. My plan is to limit the amount of carbs at night. I bought some salmon yesterday, so we be having fish.

This weekend was quite uneventful. Brian hung the speakers I bought him for Christmas. They’re now nicely hung in the downstairs family room. If only he can do the same upstairs or maybe hang some of my other stuff. We also did laundry. I studied some. THANK GOD my PMP exam isn’t tomorrow. I would’ve died from test anxiety. Oh and we also went to Home Depot and got a bunch of grass fertilizer and weed killer. I had a dream the other night that our front lawn was full of weeds. Needless to say, there were a bunch of weeds. UGH. I blame our neighbors.

Anyway, that’s all I got.

Commercials were boring, although I did like the Corolla one. I didn’t pay much attention to the game other than the end which apparently was the best part. Of course I missed half time. I was actually asleep. After spending much of the day with my parents, I was exhausted.

The day prior, Brian and I went over to World Market and got some furniture. I was only interested in an accent table they had on sale that would fit perfectly in the foyer area. I took pictures, but of course they’re at home. Here’s one from the website.

But while looking at this particular table, we also found an end table that was the perfect size for our game room. So we bought two of those. Brian spent most of Saturday putting the tables together. What a pain in the butt they were.

We also got a pretty iron piece from Pier 1 for our bedroom. The bedroom is almost complete, other than the end table for my side of the bed. I really want one that match, perhaps when we go down to NB next weekend, we can stop by the furniture store and get one, if they still have it in stock.

So much furniture. We still need to fill the other two rooms downstairs. I think we have to wait another year before we can do that.

Anyway, on Friday night, we went on a “double-date” with Linda and Jason. We didn’t have a plan on what to do until the last minute. Originally Linda mentioned Trader Vic’s, but after looking at the menu online, we all agreed it was a no-go. The menu started at around 30 bucks a person. No thanks.

So I sat around looking at the Guidelive website and saw that Coal Vines served up good pizza. Who doesn’t like pizza right. Well, first thing was we didn’t see how far it was from where we lived. Not that it mattered, but considering it was already 8pm, it was getting late. We headed out there anyway, and OMG…I would never go back there again. Way too overrated in my opinion. Picture this, tiny restaurant with a bar, swarms of people just hanging out at the bar. No hostess to be found to put our name on the list. We literally had to push our way to the back in hopes of finding the host, but of course after about 10 minutes of squeezing our way through, the little old man was no where to be found. I guess it was more of a bar hangout, although it was even too crowded for that. People were literally hovering over the tables where others were eating. So somehow, we ended up ordering the pizza to go and getting a bottle of wine. Now where do we eat this?? They said we could take it upstairs. Upstairs?? Where?? Apparently there’s a club/lounge next door. We got our pizzas, and our wine in our styrofoam to go cups and headed up the stairs. BUT the bouncer turned us away. He told us no food or drinks allowed. So we went around the front door and the guy there said it was a not a problem, we just couldn’t bring the cups with us. So we stood around trying to finish the cup of wine as quickly as possible. Not a good way to enjoy wine.

We finally made our way up there with our box of pizza. The music was loud, people were on the dance floor, some folks walked by gawking at us an our pizza. We ordered some drinks. After 2 cocktails I was done. But apparently the girl didn’t understand because she kept coming back with me. So instead I ended up consuming 4 apple martinis. Brian on the other hand had some pretty strong Jack and Coke. Let’s just say he woke up with a pretty bad hangover the next morning.

Speaking of the next day, it was actually the day of our end of year party at work. So more booze and fun. But after the night before, we decided to go light. It’s interesting to see folks outside the work environment along with their spouses/partners/dates. The theme of the party was diamonds and denims, so some people showed up all decked out and some came in jeans. I had on a sweater dress and Brian was in jeans and a sweater. we played it safe.

Anyway, we didn’t bring cameras either nights so no pictures to share. I’m hoping the photographers will post theirs up soon so I can borrow some.

Brian’s car died on the way home Friday. Apparently this was a clue for us to replace the car. He knew what kind of car he wanted, it was just a matter a timing. So…on Saturday morning after we dropped off Brian’s old Explorer at the shop (it died on the way of course), we stopped by Toyota of Richardson and got him a new 2008 4Runner Sport Edition. It’s so black and shiny. We were kinda hoping that Toyota would come out with a hybrid version, but unfortunately it doesn’t seem to be any time soon. We’ll post a real picture when we take them.

Anyway, I’m glad the weekend is here. I’ve been enjoying doing absolutely nothing. Although, Brian and I did head out to the gym to do the kickboxing class this morning. This wasn’t my first time doing kickboxing, but it was Brian’s. He left after 15 minutes, I blame his pinky toe that he broke trying to get out of bed this morning. I was asleep on the couch so I didn’t know what happen exactly. So now his toe is swollen and purple. Speaking of sleeping on the couch, I think I like that more than sleeping in bed. I can actually sleep through the entire night. Perhaps it’s because I can roll around without kicking my husband or dog. Maybe next time we’ll try a different class together.

On a different note, I decided to wear one of my new boots. My foot is burning hot. I want to take them off, but I bet it’s been sweaty and now smelly. AHHHH, wish I had a spare pair of shoes.