Mostly-Mommy

No new posts recently because of the Christmas festivities and travel. I’ll be doing a bit better soon when we get back home and I get some pictures downloaded.

Right now we are enjoying ourselves in (mostly) sunny Phoenix, Arizona visiting some family. I greatly enjoy walking outside every morning and picking some fresh grapefruit or tangerines to eat for breakfast, they are soooooooo delicious!

Travel to here on Sunday was a bit on the hellish side considering that we had a connection (which we missed) in Denver. The flight out of Kansas City was very late so when we got to Denver we were extremely grateful to catch a later flight to Phoenix. Nick was great for the first leg of the trip but had really started to lose his patience by the time we left Denver. So after a pretty long and stressful day we got to Phoenix and this woman WOULD NOT GIVE ME OUR LUGGAGE. I could see it, I could touch it, she WOULD NOT LET ME TAKE IT. For any of you out there in the service industry who may be considering screwing with a tired and stressed out pregnant woman, I must strongly advise against it. Let me just say I was having none of her crap and let her know that in a none-too-nice manor. Actually I think I was very nice considering that she was the biggest pain in the ass stickler for rules bitch that I have encountered in quite a while. Thanks for the memories Sky Harbor!

I calmed myself down and we headed over to Mike’s Aunt Robin’s house for a lovely Christmas Eve party. Good food, lots of family, overstimulated baby. The sleeping did not go so well (holy crap was I crabby the next day — Merry Christmas!) that night. Nights have been much better since then but Nick has become extremely resistant to sleep in general since we’ve been here, ornery little thing.

Things here have been very laid back, perfect for a vacation. Yesterday afternoon Mike and I actually snuck away by ourselves to see “Casino Royale” which really was the best Bond movie I’ve ever seen. I think I even like the new guy better than Connery! I don’t think that would be the case if Connery’s movies had been written like this one though — this was less “Bond-ish” which I think is a big improvement.

Yesterday we also all trucked out to the Chandler Fashion Center for a little post-holiday insanity. I am less than pleased to report that we had our first tantrum toy buy at Barnes & Noble (I am so ashamed). Nick has developed an unhealthy obsession with Thomas the Tank Engine lately — how do they figure these things out? He loves all things Thomas and he barely is old enough to know what a train is yet. Anyhoo, he got his hands on a Thomas book that had buttons to push with train noises on them and by Grapthar’s Hammer we were NOT leaving the store without it. When we tried to pay for it he had a complete meltdown like .03 seconds after it left his hands. We are so in for it.

Today we had Alex all to ourselves so we treated her to In ‘n Out Burger and a hellishly long trip to IKEA! I had a wonderful time though! Oh IKEA, wonderful, magical IKEA, how I love thee. I really could live there. Seriously. They have beds and bathrooms and a cafe and everything. I could live in a different “apartment” every night for like a month. I’ve thought this through. Do you think they’d notice? The only bad thing is that I want EVERYTHING there and can neither afford to buy it or have the means to transport it back to my house. I’m going to start a campaign to get one built in Kansas City. Seriously. And then I’ll sell a kidney and maybe some plasma so that we can remodel our kitchen with mediocre Danish furniture. Seriously.

I’ll write more soon. Seriously.

Our little hippy baby.

You can’t tell in this picture but Nick was NOT HAPPY. He looked down and saw that hair all over his shirt and he TOTALLY FREAKED OUT.

Lookin’ good!

(I wrote this entry quite a while ago, sorry to take so long to post it!)

This baby has GOT to be a girl. My hormones are just all over the place and all I can think is that this little baby has got to be feeding me the crazy pills.

For the past few nights I have been having sooooo much trouble around dinnertime. I spend quite a bit of my time thinking about, preparing and feeding food to Nick and myself that it always seems to be an issue for me. Then add to the mix a moody and hormonal pregnant Katie and things go south pretty quickly.

Take, for example, tonight. By the time Mike got home I was already being pulled into the Pit of Despair — I picked a fight with him over something ridiculous, apologized a minute later, and was in tears not long after that. Of course it had nothing do do with him, I was crying because I didn’t want to eat a grilled cheese sandwich that Mike suggested I make for dinner. Actually it was because I didn’t want to eat any food at all. More accurately it was because I felt guilty for not eating well during this pregnancy because I don’t want to eat anything at all. And also because I was embarrassed that I was crying (rather hysterically) over something so silly.

We ended up eating at the Jerusalem Bakery and a little delicious falaffel helped me to put things in perspective.

It is so weird to me how different this pregnancy is than when I was cooking the first one. With Nick I was pretty well grounded most of the time and starving in a get-out-of-my-way-or-I-will-eat-you kind of way. This time I am a total emotional wreck and completely apathetic in the food department. I guess I’m happy I haven’t gained any weight yet, but I think my loved ones would appreciate the other scenario a bit more.

Gaaaaggghhhhh… more licorice…

A few days ago I was having a pretty bad day. I was hormonal and lonely and developing a severe case of The Hunger of pregnancy, which didn’t help things at all. It was a beautiful day so Nick and I walked down to the Jerusalem Bakery to pick up some lunch (which was delightful by the way… mmm, falaffel).

On the way to the restaurant we passed the Emmanuel Lutheran Church and for the first time I really appreciated how beautiful it is. It reminded me of the old Catholic church that I used to attend during the summers with my Grandma Rose. It has elaborate stone work, stained glass windows and nice decorations up for Christmas. I had a strong desire to go inside and ask them for help.

I am not a religious person (at all) and have never been drawn to organized religion of any kind. I have truly prayed only once in my entire life. It was the night that my sister died. I sat on the floor of that tiny bathroom, purposely not watching as they shocked her again and again, and I prayed to her. I asked her please. Please come back, just come back.

When I looked at that church for the first time it meant something to me, on a completely random day in December. It meant community, spirituality, love, something to believe in. I don’t believe in anything and it makes me sad. For all that I have experienced in my life I can never shake my skepticism, I can never just believe in something. I want to be able to trust that everything will be okay, to know that things are how they are supposed to be, to feel like someone cares and is watching over us.

It is such a nice idea in theory. I wish I could believe.