Thursday, April 30, 2009

SO.....

We've had exactly one baby shower. AND already we're in need of a bigger house, and another car.

Awesome.

I can't even write any more on this subject right now. I have to go put several of my favorite belongings on the front porch for the Vietnam Vets to pick up so there will be room for baby furniture.

Monday, April 20, 2009

Gifts!

I love getting gifts for the baby. Courtney posted a few good ones.

My favorite gifts so far are:

Baby Crib and Changing Table - I was going to find this one on Craigslist, so I feel very lucky to have such a nice bed and changing table for little Para. I was a bit astonished at what Cribs cost. One at Rolly's, a baby store near our house, cost $2000. I hope it guarantees full nights of sleep for everyone in the house. Ours did NOT cost $2000. We could have bought 4 cribs and 4 changing tables for $2000. But still, having new ones, and having them match, is really nice.

Elvis Onesie - This requires no explanation if you have a brain. Elvis is the King. Whether we have a boy or girl, I will have them in this thing all the time. Rocking it, of course. It's a hand me down from Angela at work, and I will have a hard time returning it when Para outgrows this little piece of Heaven.

Sunday, April 12, 2009

Everybody's Growing

I've noticed that quite a lot of couples who are going to have a baby use "we" do describe the pregnancy.

"We're pregnant."
"We're going to have a drug-free birthing process."
"We're going to breast feed."

Well, I don't use "we." I'm well aware that Courtney is going to be the only one pushing, getting up to breast feed (if she chooses to do so) and if she wants drugs during birth, I'm all for it. I wouldn't try and pass a kidney stone without some drogas, so I certainly don't expect her to pass a child the size of a cantaloupe without Dr. Feelgood.

BUT, I have also noticed there is some "we" in pregnancy. We were sleeping a ton, and not we're not. We have to up twice a night to pee. Well, I didn't know I had to pee, but since she's getting up and I wake up, I find out I have to pee. We also are very hungry, even 30 minutes after a meal.

This hungry thing is all new. What, do I have a tapeworm? She's the one with the parasite inside of her. I have nothing aiding me in the consumption of this extra meal (or two) per day. And so for the longest time I did the part of a good husband and just ate along with her, happily telling her how cute she was as her belly began to grow. Then, last Monday I went to the Y to work out. That morning I had noticed I was having a *really* hard time getting into my pants. I was just shy of 200 lbs. 200 lbs! That's 50lbs over the weight at which I graduated college 10 years ago. Holy crap! It's 25 lbs over the weight I was, oh say... 6 months ago.

So, although it may not be the more popular decision at this point in "our" pregnancy, I'm cutting out the extra meals, and losing back down to my normal weight. I mean, 200lbs is just ridiculous, and I can't afford all new pants AND a bupivacaine injection on delivery day.

Wednesday, April 8, 2009

Courtney Has The BEST Students

We've been talking about daycare, Courtney staying home from school with the baby, and all that jazz. Someone had given me some info that daycare is like 800 million dollars per week. So, I decided that was plainly ridiculous and made a few calls around the Dash. Daycare is about $150 per week. Now that's doable. So, I emailed Courtney to let her know the good news that she could keep working if she so chose (because a teacher makes approximately $3 more dollars than that per week after taxes, buying pencils for everyone in class, and buying uniforms), and I got a response that basically said "I'm applying for a job bagging groceries."

Courtney came home looking like she had participated in the Tet Offensive.

I lost our digital camera, so I'm going to have to give you an approximate visual:



I asked "What happened at the work place today?" Were the kids just bad?

She replied "No, they were just normal."

To which I replied "Normal means bad?"

To which she replied "They just get up and walk in and out of the room, talk outloud all the time. Take each other's stuff and play keep away, wrestle in the middle of the floor, and then sometimes, it gets worse."

WHAT? In school? During class? I had some classes with the common folk in seventh grade, and none of this happened. Kids were crazy, sure. But they weren't this level of disrespectful. We would have been smacked around like a ping pong ball.

So we talked about it some more and the problem is in the rules. You can't beat these kids anymore! You can just send them home. Boy, if I was the principal around there we wouldn't have a discipline problem. There wouldn't be but about 6 kids left in class: the ones who want to learn.

My take away from all of this was two things:
1) The parent has to teach the discipline, so I guess I'll be teaching little Para to sit up and act right.
2) It's time to let the school administrators start beating kids in school again. If you don't spank the kids, this will happen:
http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=5c9_1235188814