Yep, she's that important

It's my big sister Chaney's 36th birthday today! (seriously, if anyone has issues with me divulging ages on here, speak now or forever hold your peace) Because she is very popular in the greater St. Louis area, people all over the city are flocking to the grocery store today to pick up birthday cards and cakes for her birthday celebration. I also heard mumblings about some devastating ice storm that is headed this way, but surely that was just in reference to how any weather developments might hinder this evening's celebrations. I am sure everything will be fine.

We went out on Saturday night to celebrate Chaney's birthday a few days early, "grown-up style". We visited Amigo Joe's, where the queso and margaritas were provided en abundancia (I'm sure that's accurate). Chaney was even serenaded by the lovely restaurant workers, which was awesome.

She even took a suspiciously green shot of tequila! Ole!

There are plans for a family pizza get-together this evening. Hopefully mother nature will grant us a reprieve and allow for this to happen. It should be mandatory that pizza places and hospitals remain open during violent winter weather. I will add that to my list of mandates for when I rule the world.

Parker's Barbie: A Cautionary Tale

At one point Barbie was fully-limbed with blonde flowing hair. She was Parker's first doll and thanks to some sort of repetitive fidgety motion Parker did when she slept, she was soon known belovedly as "Dreadlock Barbie". But Dreadlock Barbie was hip and edgy! No one would mess with a super skinny chick with dreads. Especially one that was rarely wearing pants.

Dreadlock Barbie, wearing pants and a tasteful midriff-revealing top for the photo

Beware the effects of alcohol, kids.

Then the rubbing continued, and ultimately all hair was lost. But Barbie rocked that look too! She was a hot bald chick and no one batted an eye. Especially sweet Parker, who loved that Barbie. Slowly, over time, limbs started to fall off. Then the head. Not even Barbie and her shiny white smile could hide the shame of that her homemade neck brace and pointy where-her-limbs-used-to-be nubs. I think she started to even scare Parker. Barbie mysteriously disappeared about five years ago, never to be heard from again.

Guess who showed up in a box in the Hagemann basement today??? You guessed it!!! I was so excited when I got the text. But the Elizabeth Smart of barbie dolls does not look good. She appears to have stayed too long at spring break and has the scars to prove it.

SVU Barbie

So while I am a bit nostalgic over prodigal Barbie and am thankful that they mystery of her whereabouts has been resolved, I now see why she went away. She served her time and made a little girl very happy for a long time. Thanks for the years of service, Barbie! I expect you to surface in another 10 years during the next Hagemann basement cleanup effort.

Who's up for a game of soccer?

Because, according to my phone, at 24 weeks my uterus is the size of a SOCCER BALL! Impressive! Super is now around 13 inches long and 1.25 pounds. She's continuing to develop taste buds, branches of her respiratory system, and is starting to hear completely. In a scary little piece of info, I just learned that a baby would likely survive a premature birth at 24 weeks with very special care. Though I know Super is very excited to meet us, I hope she enjoys that cozy womb enough to stay in there another 16 weeks. I have zero interest in learning the miraculous capabilities of a NICU right now.

I learned in my appointment on Monday that I will be going in for my glucose tolerance test before my next appointment, so that will be interesting. Apparently I have to drink some super sweet tang-like substance and then wait an hour to see how my body handles all the sugar. Can't they just give me a jar of nutella?

Advantage: Me

I will freely admit that I blatantly ripped this off of a college friend's blog.

I read it last week and it has stuck with me since then. I think of all the times I hear people talking about how much they do for their husbands, bosses, children, etc, with little to no reciprocity. It's easy to fall into a "well I did it last time" or "that's not my job" (which is an ongoing joke at Casa de Erwin) mentality, which just breeds bitterness and resentment. I am going to make an effort to appreciate everything that others do for me and doing all I can to enrich their lives as much as they have mine. Life is so much more pleasant when you try to focus on and match the good others do, rather than focus on how much you are doing for others.

I am also going to pray my husband is not keeping score, because I am getting trounced right now.

Pregnancy Math

Here's a little riddle to start off your Tuesday:

What do you get when you combine a pregnant woman, a family trip to Miami, a Sam's size jar of nutella, and a crippling illness which prohibited any sort of working out for 3 weeks? If you guessed a NINE POUND WEIGHT GAIN IN ONE MONTH, you would be correct! The grand prize is a lifetime of Spanks and a Thighmaster. You can claim your prizes at your next over-eater's anonymous meeting.

Oh well. Sure, I gained the same amount of weight in the month of January that I had gained in my previous 5 months of pregnancy. Can't unring that bell. Dr. J insisted that my weight gain was still "perfect". I really wish he would sort of lay into me at this point, because all this positive reinforcement is seemingly backfiring. He did add the "just do your best" line, which was cute.

Truth be told, I think I was just in a funk yesterday, because I feel fine about it all today. It's just part of the process/experience, I think it is more funny to talk about than to get upset over. It's like your body is on a mission and doesn't plan to include you on the agenda, so you "just do your best" to not explode out of your pregnancy jeans and hit the gym a few times a week. Oh, and try to ignore that cake that your contractor brought you. That's proving to be a little difficult.

Does this baby make my butt look big?

It's starting. The feeling that your body is not your own. That you are skidding off the rails. The wheels are falling off. I have heard about it from all my friends and hoped it would not happen to me. Well, it's happening.

Official 23 week picture. Super, meet the blog. Blog, meet Super.

I have naively wondered in the past how people could gain 80 pounds during a pregnancy. That just seemed like quite an accomplishment for a 9 month period. I now completely understand. It's quite a frustrating situation. I liken it to a "less than attractive" person going on a diet. You can lose all the weight you want, but you are still going to have that face. Same concept applies to pregnancy: you can try all you want to eat right and limit the damage, but in the end, there will be damage, and you will never feel skinny.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, there's the whole "but it's so much better for you and the baby" business. I realize that, and frankly that is the only thing keeping me away from riding out the rest of my pregnancy at an all you can eat pizza buffet. I guess I also still hold out hope that I can be a cute pregnant person, but that dream is slowly slipping through my hands as I stare down the barrel of the third trimester. Who knew I was so vain? Ok, put your hands down.

My goal for the next 16 weeks is to focus on enjoying the pregnancy experience and trying to focus on the positive and the miracle of everything that is going on with my body. And when that fails miserably, you can find me at the all you can eat pizza buffet.

Fast Track

Today has been a big day in Casa de Erwin. We started off the morning with Parker's soccer game, then went to meet some nanny options, which was eye-opening and scary all at the same time. We then came home and moved the large furniture out of the nursery and moved in the chest of drawers that we purchased off craigslist. As if all of that was not enough, Joe Naert came over to go over last minute plans for the big basement remodel, which will start next week.

We are headed to Parker's indoor soccer game later today and then hopefully can lay low this evening.

Here are some before pics of the basement so you can see how awesome this thing looks when Joe is finished!

Pretty creepy, no? Needless to say, I can't wait to see the finished product. And because Joe's a true professional and knows his clients, he brought this pregnant lady a cake! What other general contractor do you know that would do that?

The year of the Ox

Ahh, the winds of change, they are a'blowin here amongst the Harkins siblings. Not only are we expecting our first child, but big brother Patrick is making a big move to Austin as I type this. He has been living in Nashville for the past 7 (is that right?) or so years and, though a great city, he is on to bigger and better things. I spoke to him this morning as I was headed to work and as he was making his final trip out of the front door of his very first home.

For someone who has moved one zillion times in my life, I get strangely attached to things like houses, apartments, cars, etc. Maybe it's precisely because of all the moves that I get this way. I will be sending my parents my therapy bills some time in the near future. But I got a bit nostalgic even at the thought of my brother leaving his house. Patrick's first house was absolutely perfect for him and was a perfect reflection of his personality. There were bikes strewn around all over the place, (tasteful) concert posters on the walls, beautiful custom kitchen cabinets filled to the brim with books (no food), a basically unused Viking range (we tried to use it once but the fire alarm went off), and super comfy furniture hand-picked by his doting sisters, mother, and several charming female saleswomen that convinced him that he HAD to have some item for his home. We always loved to go visit Happy in Nashville and usually dreaded the hungover drive home on Sundays after long weekends filled with good food and good company.

He also threw some great parties in his house, most notably the great New Year's Eve party of 2007. This was when I first experienced what I have learned is basically the Harkins Family Mantra of "it is better to have too much than not enough". When coming up with the shopping list for the party of approximately 40 people, I was instructed to pick up a keg of beer, a bottle of wine for each person, and about 10 bottles of various liquors. I also picked up about two dozen chipwich ice cream sandwiches, which are Patrick's favorite. Patrick wanted to make sure his guests had the opportunity to drink equal amounts of each adult beverage option over the course of the evening, should they so choose. Far be it from him to deny them that indulgence on New Year's Eve. Not on his watch. I thought this was silly at the time, but given the fact that I recall very little of that evening, I seem to have taken advantage of this bevy of beverages along with many of the other guests that evening.

Patrick and his first chipwich of the evening. Have you ever seen someone stare so lovingly at a sandwich cookie?

Chipwich #2, later that evening
I can't quit you Chipwich!!! (photo taking ability becomes compromised as the evening progressed, apparently)

Word of warning: don't come hungry to a Patrick Harkins party. In addition to the chipwich, vienna sausages and potted meat product were the mainstays of the menu.

As always, a great time was had by all.

We will miss you, Nashville house. Thanks for the memories!

23 Weeks

Are there brakes on this pregnancy? It feels like we are skidding head-first through the second trimester here. Supity is now a little over a pound and over a foot long! She is now the size of a large papaya. Given that papaya are currently not in stock in the local Schnucks, I cannot gauge how large that really is. You really have to be on top of your fruit/veggie game to get these references. Maybe it's a subtle attempt to get pregnant women to eat healthy foods. I am not falling for it.

Super is on the move fairly regularly now and is bumpin' and thumpin' around a few times a day. I even captured some of the movements on video yesterday, but have had technical issues getting the video uploaded. Maybe tomorrow. Either way, I love it when she gets moving and conversely get paranoid when she doesn't for a while. This pregnancy thing can really mess with your mind.

Super also got to attend her first "concert" on Tuesday. Concert is in quotes because it was Girl Talk, which is essentially this DJ guy that does mash-ups of all sorts of music. Rick and I went last year and danced our booties off. This year we were joined by Liza, Amy, and Jen/Joe Naert. I guess I failed to remember just how loud that show really was last year, so when I started feeling bass vibrations in my stomach, I bailed and spent a large portion of the show hanging out with The Pageant's bouncers/security guards. This happened to be a show in itself between all the drunk adults, drunk teenagers, and fake IDs. It was quite entertaining and I could still hear the show, though at a safer volume.

After watching all the stumbling 16 year old girls I had a minor panic attack about how Rick and I are going to handle a teenager. I keep telling myself that our kid will be different...

Tooth Removal Tuesday

The Harkins clan is no stranger to dental woes. We either have too many or too few teeth. Or they are in the wrong spot. The latest dilemma is sweet Chloe and her tiny little mouth and not enough room for her grown up teeth. The first phase of addressing this issue took place this morning when two teeth were to be extracted.

Now we have known for a while that Chloe seems to have some sort of super-human tolerance for pain and in general, never shows fear in any situation. Much like her Aunt Kaly. This was demonstrated several times in the past when she would break bones, never to complain about the pain, and only to be taken to the doctor eventually because she had mysteriously stopped using one of her limbs. The girl is a tank in a Skipper Barbie body.

The above is a picture of Chloe pre-extraction. Clearly I was joking above when I said I show no fear, because if this was a picture of me pre-extraction, I would have a bottle of tequila in one hand, a bottle of pain killers in the other, tears streaming down my face, and a gas mask on delivering a steady stream of "make it better air". Not Chloe, who is mugging it up for the camera and likely already contemplating tomorrow's tights selection.

According to Chaney, both teeth did not go willingly. One came out fairly readily, but the other broke and they had to dig around for the root. I might faint. Chaney said it was pretty gruesome and Chloe took it all in stride. I don't know how Chaney stayed in the room. I guess it doesn't instill confidence or peace in your child when you run screaming from the room when they are having a procedure. Or vomit. Or pass out and vomit as you are running screaming from the room. All are scenarios I can imagine. I presume these are things I need to get a grip on in the next months/years. Or send Rick.

Check out the roots on these bad boys!

Chloe and Chaney are currently headed to Maggie Moo's for a well-deserved milk shake. I think the tooth fairy should be coming up with some extra funding for these two whoppers.

Probably for the best

Wow. To say today has already been a challenging day at work would be a gross understatement. Needless to say, Super is keeping her host from going on a (to further the Simpson's theme) "Take the kids to the neighbors...I'm coming home loaded!" type bender this evening. Then, of course, I would be worthless tomorrow and not able to assist with the house cleanup, I would miss Parker and Chloe's soccer and basketball games, and I would end up sad about it all. So thank you, Super, for keeping me in line. A glass of wine won't hurt though...

22 weeks!

Holy moses. Is it just me or are these Thursdays coming faster and faster? We have a lot of work to do over at Casa de Erwin to prepare for Super. We had a lot riding on a productive weekend, which was wiped out by the Great Erwin Plague of 2011. Here's hoping Rick and I are fully recovered so we can really make some progress this weekend.

As for Super's progress, she is now almost a foot long and still hovering around three quarters of a pound. One of my aps has given up the veggie comparison, while the other picked up the torch just in time to compare her size to a spaghetti squash. Getting a bit obscure, no? She is getting more acive and tooth buds have formed under the gums. Dear Lord, please give this child a full set of chompers. Mommy and Daddy have tight annual vacation budgets that do not account for orthodontia. And in your daily dose of too much information, her ovaries are starting to produce eggs.

In somewhat related news, I had my first stranger approach me and ask when the baby was due. Of course, there was an 80-something old man in Miami that pointed at my stomach when we walked into his pizza place and exclaimed "Pizza for TWO!", but for some reason that doesn't count. Old people say crazy things. This was someone around my age that was sitting next to me at an "Excelling as a Manager or Supervisor" training class I was sent to yesterday. I think my boss is trying to tell me something, though I am not sure what. I was thrilled that I finally looked pregnant enough for people to finally comment and was content with the knowledge that this pregnancy was finally legit....Until I got home and looked at myself in the mirror. I had thrown on a grey sweater over a shirt and pants on my way out the door that morning without really assessing my appearance. When I did finally see what I looked like, the expression of shock on the girl's face when I told her I was 5.5 months pregnant made a bit more sense. While cozy and comfy, this sweater was doing me no favors and I appeared to be 250 weeks pregnant. Oh well. I say it still counts.

I will leave you with this photo I snapped in the ladies' bathroom at the Holiday Inn in Arnold. If you are ever feeling blue about having to attend a boss-mandated Supervisor Training, be thankful you are not the person eating butterfingers in the public bathroom stall. It can always be worse. It could have been an almond joy wrapper.

Apologies to Mrs. D

I remember when I was in my early 20s and I met my dear friend Emma for the first time. It was St. Patrick's day and she had just started dating a guy named Kevin D (last name withheld to protect his privacy and to keep his lawyer-self from suing me). Kevin and Emma would later marry and have two beautiful children. But before there was marriage and babies, there was plenty of time spent discussing this new relationship with Emma. Tales of dates, "disagreements", and delight. As it goes with any relationship, once it started getting serious Emma went to meet Kevin's parents. I can only recall two bits of information regarding Kevin's parents:

1. They are from Boston (or the greater Boston area)
2. Kevin's mother washes her walls. As in the walls of her house.

Because we knew everything when we were 25 and clearly had our lives sparkly clean and organized, we scoffed at what was clearly some sort of obsessive compulsive disorder. We taunted Emma with warnings that she better get her walls clean every time there was news of Kevin's family coming to visit.

Imagine my dismay when I was just sitting here on my couch, working from home on this wintery day, and looked up and saw this:

Not the greatest picture, but in real life you can clearly see a hand print in the dust that has somehow accumulated on our walls, once again proving that with age comes wisdom. Looks like my only option is to follow the ways of Mrs. D and clean these walls. Or turn off that lamp.

Blabbermouth

This is Cottage 13's 100th post! Who knew I had so much to say? Of course, I don't have anything earth-shattering to report in this particular post, other than Rick and I are still sick. I finally broke down and called the doctor today to see if there is anything else they can give me for this nonsense. I guess they are calling in a Z-Pack. Ricker is the sickest I have ever seen him. He was actually NAPPING all weekend, which is unheard of in this house. He was suspiciously quiet last night though, which usually means he got a little liberal with the nyquil. More power to him.

Meanwhile, I was up most of the night worshipping at the altar of the neti pot. For those of you not familiar, the premise is that you pour a saline solution into one nostril and it (along with whatever is up there) comes out the other nostril. Now, this is all fine and dandy assuming there is a somewhat clear pathway for said saline solution. I guess at 3:00 this morning, that wasn't the case. Stop reading now if you are easily grossed out (I know most of my family has no issues with the gross stuff, so this is for you guys). Instead of the saline flowing out my other nostril due to blockage, it re-routed out my mouth. Excellent. I guess that was a partial blessing in disguise because the stuff that came out was no joke. I kept thanking of the Mr. Mucus Mucinex guy the whole time and vacillated between being both disgusted and fascinated. Needless to say, that didn't help much with the nose, but I guess it made the throat feel better.

So I am home again today and currently plan on trying to actually take a sick day (this plan will change later in the day as the emails amass) and catch up on my Lifetime Craigslist Killer TV movie. Lifetime makes everything better.

Culinary Genius

You know you are pregnant when you look at a perfectly lovely jar of nutella and think, I bet that stuff would be awesome with some marshmallow fluff.

You know you are sick when you can't muster up the energy to go to the store for marshmallow fluff.

Marketer's Dream

We are party animals. We spent our Friday night in the cold and flu aisle of Walgreens trying to figure out what cold meds Rick could take to help him sleep through the night. Because I am living vicariously through him now (and am considering that I might have a small-ish infatuation with over the counter meds) I spent about 5 minutes comparing the active ingredients in various Nyquil, Tylenol, and Robitussin products for him. I had narrowed it down to two. One was cheaper than the other by a whopping two dollars, so that's the way I was leaning when Rick ripped the other out of my hands and declared that was the one he wanted. When I questioned his decision, he pronounced "It's cherry vanilla swirl Nyquil! It's all about the flavors baby!" So much for my scientific review.

On the drive home he stated that he wanted to try the China Inn, because it has a "real deal Chinese roof". If any market researchers need a subject to test a potential commercial campaign, Rick's your guy. Here's hoping that the cherry vanilla swirl does the trick.

She's 21!!!

Weeks, that is. It will be quite some time before ol' Soup's allowed to legally enjoy adult beverages. She is now hulking around at 3/4 of a pound and some of that weight gain is thanks to muscles that are now beginning to get stronger. The eyebrows and eyelashes are now almost fully formed. The brain has developed to a point where Super now has wake and sleep cycles. This has been something I have noticed regularly in the past week or so. She tends to wake up about 20 minutes after I eat something (or at least gets to movin') and typically rumbles around when it's time to leave work. I think there have also been a few bouts of hiccups in the past two days, which is actually pretty cool to feel.

The baby is now around 10 1/4 inches and the veggie comparison is suspiciously absent from my weekly update on one of my aps. The other references a banana. I am assuming that's just the length because I don't think a banana-shape on a child (or adult) would be very flattering.

Phone Doc mentions that my belly button will likely start to pop out in the coming weeks. As Rick can attest, I am more than a little grossed out by belly buttons, particularly my own. Mine seems to be infinite and from the way it looks, it should probably emerge out of my back. I have never seen the end of it. Mom made a bet with me ($100) that we will see the end of the belly button my the end of this, and I don't think that is possible. Time will tell. I don't know if I hope that happens or not. It will be equal parts disgusting and fascinating to see a part of my body that hasn't seen the light of day in 34 years. I'll stop there.

The phone also keeps telling me that this is the most comfortable stage of my pregnancy, which would probably be true if I wasn't sick. When not pregnant, I like to test the boundaries of my body's tolerance for medication when I am not feeling well. I think both my doctor and Super would frown on that type of behavior right now, so I am suffering through. No afrin-advil-nyquil-ambien cocktails for me (it was just once and was taken over the course of a few hours, don't judge, and I slept like a maniac once it all kicked in and felt much better the next day thankyouverymuch). I also read this little tidbit in my pregnancy packet last night, which did not make me feel very optimistic about the coming days/weeks, "If you develop a common cold your symptoms will be more severe and last longer than in a non-pregnant state....A common cold may linger for 10 days to 2 weeks as compared to 3-4 days in a non-pregnant state." It then goes on to list the measly 3 things that are safe to take (none of which are part of my aforementioned cold-remedy cocktail). Awesome. God certainly has a fun sense of humor about these things. Let's make it 2-3 times worse for those ladies and make sure they can't take anything to feel better. Hardy-har, Heavenly Father. If anyone needs proof that God is not a woman, I think this is it.

Slugs and Snails...

...and puppy dog tails. That's what little boys are made of! But we are preparing ourselves for sugar and spice and everything nice because Super is a GIRL!!!! Yes, dear POMBs, our suspicions were confimed on 12/27/10 that we are having a girl. All signs were pointing to a girl based on countless old wives tales, chinese gender predictors, and the always reliable "needle over the belly" test, which repeatedly pointed to girl, no matter how many times we tested. We stopped just short of Mom's recommended "pee in drano" test after reading warnings of noxious fumes generated during the process. I am sure that would have also told us that Super is a girl.

We found this shirt while shopping in Miami this weekend. Every girl needs a super-dog and a super-horse as a sidekick.

The ultrasound showed that everything checked out as normal. Super has long legs, which we are not sure where that came from. Perhaps I am hogging all the torso genes, which left more leg for the baby. I am no genetics expert, but I am sure that's how that works. Super continues to be on the move and I can feel her more and more these days. Parker got to feel a good THUMP while we were on vacation, but we are still waiting for Rick to have that experience.

In other non-baby related news, today is the 40th birthday of the king of slugs and snails and puppy dog tails, our dear brother Patrick! He was the first and last boy to be birthed on our branch of the family tree and he is definitely holding his own. His birthday was the reason we were down in Miami and we had a fabulous time. Patrick makes 40 look a lot like 30 and has taken all of the fun out of calling him old, because he could soundly out-run, out-bike, or just about out-anything any one of his younger (or older) family members. Plus, I am guessing he probably still hits pretty hard, so I will just continue to praise him for his youthful spirit and appearance and pray some of those genes were shared amongst the rest of the siblings.

So happy birthday to our dear Happy. I hope you have a great day. More tales from the "Sober Adventures in Miami" to follow in the coming days....