No more Baby Classes

Well aparently we have been taught everything we need to know about having a baby and keeping it - yeah right.

Last night was our 6th and final week of Pre-natal classes. This week was all about what your baby could look like when it comes out, ranging from Massive cone head, bruises from forceps, splotchy rashes, covered in goo. We watched a video of a lady who had just given birth and she was looking at her baby like it was an alien, it was pretty funny.

We were also introduced to a real baby, Chelsea, 4 days old, cute as a button and her mother looked fantastic, flat stomach about a size 8, huge milky boobs, not at all like she had just had a baby.

I successful managed to apply a nappy and wrap up a new "Stunt baby" this week I received a dark skinned (plastic) baby girl, perhaps to hide the bruises when I drop the baby, but successfully kept baby on my lap the entire time it was required. Louise then said we can put the babies back in the tub, Jamie motioned for me to see if I could sink a hoop by throwing baby from my seat into the tub, a distance of about 2 metres, challenge me, he dares, of course I thought I could do it but decided in the interest of "Stunt baby" that I would get up and place baby carefully back in the tub intstead.

Louise then asked if we had any questions, annoying girl of course, had some, she wanted to know the best feeding pillow to buy and the best baby bath etc etc. She is so annoying. Louise politely said pillow is a personal preference and the bath should be cheap because they are not in it for long, I piped up and said get 1 off ebay and the girl next to me suggested the Ikea baby bath. My mind wandered, aaaah Ikea I was thinking when could I road trip to Ikea to buy a baby bath I don't need and how much other stuff I could come home with at the same time, then I thought about how bad my Cankles would be if I sucessfully navigated all the arrows walking around Ikea for a day. I will have to give this more thought, if they provided a nana scooter with a trailer it could be done.

So final week of baby classes was pretty uneventful. I only have to keep my legs closed until Sunday and then I can birth at Figtree Hospital and I must say I am pretty ready to have this baby soon, don't know how much longer I can keep on waddling around.

Emotional Basketcase

Well Friday I hit a wall of emotions that I hadn't felt for a long time if ever. It all started with a day off work because I was going to be a domestic goddess and clean the house before we had visitors on Friday night and Sat.

I started on the Kitchen and had it spotless except for the mess that resides where we dump our stuff upon walking through the door. I kept trying to sort that mess but everytime I wanted to put something elsewhere I thought I am just going to have to move it again when I go to clean the next room.

Easily sidetracked I ended up in the scrap room with laptop open doing a combination of work and sorting out album pages. I was pulling apart a post bound travel album when all my spare bits fell off the table and onto the floor, this was the beginning of the meltdown. Jamie called right in the middle of it and I made light of the fact that I was too fat to bend over and pick them up. Not wanting to be outdone by my lack of wasteline, I swept all the bits into a pile and squatted and moaned and managed to pick them all up.

Dilema sorted, I put the pages in the album put it all back together only dropped 1 more bit which I again managed to pick up.

So I moved onto another space in the house that collects mess, the bottom of the stairs, Jamie's paintball stuff was sitting there as well as the "collectors" bottles of alcohol that he insists on buying but yet we have no space for, so I shoved things under the stairs. Then he rang right in the middle of my mess and he asked the dreaded question "what is wrong", bursting into tears, I started ranting - house, shitfight, mess, fat, dropping things, don't know where to start, can't bend over, hadn't yet had a shower, visitors coming, blah blah blah. After calming down a little I said don't worry I'll be fine, just being stupid, so I thought I would go and have a shower this might help. Well how wrong I was.

I caught a glimpse of my naked physique in the mirror, boobs sagging to an all time low, HUGE belly, it was hideous, I managed to blubber myself into the shower. Then I had to get dressed, I thought I would find a pair of lightweight trackies that I could roll up to 3/4 and a T-shirt that would fit to finish my housework, but no, absolutely nothing to wear, pants so tight I was embarrassed to wear them even around the house incase someone knocked on the door, t-shirt so tight it was like a lycra bodysuit, so I sat on the edge of the bed and cried some more, everything I wanted to wear was in the wash. I finally managed to locate a pair of gym shorts and a t-shirt that was semi respectable.

Housework can wait, I was in no state to do anything apart from hopefully see someone elses story who was worse off than me, cry about that and then my life would be all ok. So with a giant bowl of leftover chinese food in hand I plonked on the lounge to watch Oprah. Well it wasn't the story I was hoping for but it did keep my mind off the mess.

I had stopped crying when my friend Maryanne turned up from Maitland to stay the weekend and then she said the dreaded words "how are you", well that started me off all over again.

Long story short, I said fuck the messy house, I am not cleaning anymore, and as it turned out with Maryanne's whirlwind almost 3 year old in the house all weekend plus all the guests and their children on Sat and pizza making, not only did the rest of the house get messy but the kitchen was a disaster zone after making the dough, so I was probably lucky that I didn't keep going otherwise another meltdown could have been iminent.

Saturday was very relaxing apart from rolling out the Pizza dough I managed to get some quality time on the new deck chairs and we just chilled out and relaxed in the glorious weather, it was great to catch up with some of mine and Jamie's friends. I was a completely different person to Friday.

Moral to this story, don't do housework it messes with your head.

Baby Classes - the 2nd Installment

Dear Peanut

Daddy and I have just done week 5 of 6 weeks of classes all about how to care for a baby. This week was all about Breast feeding and Daddy has been looking forward to this all week, it's all about the Boobies he said.

First we had to each pull an item out of Louise's goodie bag and then say what relevance we think it has to breast feeding. I pulled out a Wine glass, yes you heard right a wine glass. I had 2 thoughts about what it could be for, 1 would be they were going to tell us that baby only drinks the equivalent of 1 standard glass of wine per feed the other and far more sensible was that they were going to tell us that any form of alcohol was "FORBIDDEN". Well it wasn't quite that bad, good ole Louise then explained how and when we can drink whilst breast feeding. I listened very intently, must get that right I don't want you all drunk and falling down at such a young age.

Daddy grabbed the Breast Pump, a hideous looking contraption that will cause RSI in the wrist and I am sure would be like milking a cow but worse, it would be like milking ME.

There were some other fun topics that came out of the items handed around, the colour and regularity of poos you will do in the first 4-6 weeks, the difference between formula fed babies and breast fed and the all important nutrients of breast fed babies.

Oh the pressure of breast feeding, it will make you smarter and have better teeth and have better eyesight and a great immune system. Daddy wasn't breast fed and he has perfect vision and is very smart and has great teeth and all the men on his side of the family all have a full head of hair at old age, if you are a boy lets hope you take after his side, my family has male baldness issues.

Another item to crop up was an ice cube tray, apparently this has 2 uses, 1 is for freezing water into ice to use for soothing engorged breasts or making bourbon and coke, the other is for storing breast milk for use at a later date. Lets hope the bourbon and milk drinkers don't get their ice mixed up.

Louise then whips a box out of the cupboard and hands us your stunt double, a rubber baby, naked with moulded boy bits and asks for us to assume the position of breast feeding, I whilst trying to juggle the extra piece of cake I got from the break we had just had was very confident that I could manage the eating of cake and juggling of "Stunt Baby" into the assumed feeding position. Mission accomplished, there were the 2 types of holds, the standard baby across the belly and then there was the Football hold where baby is tucked under your arm and attached to the nearest boob, whilst Jamie comments "should you put your arm out to defend off any attackers" as per rugby. There was a little snicker around the room from his comment.

Louise prattled on, I lost a little bit of concentration, because I had Stunt Baby to play with, so I was moving legs and arms, patting Stunt Baby on the back, which Louise must have seen because she said they don't teach the patting on the back technique for burping anymore because of an increase in "Shaken Baby" cases that have happened in recent years, it is a simple rubbing on the back, no back slaps, baby is not choking. My mind wandering yet again, thinking of wine drinking strategies and how funny it would be if Daddy mixed up the milk cubes with the ice cubes and then "Stunt Baby" leaps from my hands and falls to the ground with a thud, there was a few gasps of horror as naked rubber baby bounced around the floor and landed in the face down position, more than 2 dolly steps away from me. Loudly I stated "oh dear" and promptly waddled the 2 steps and groaned to bend over to pick up "Stunt Baby" off the ground and the entire room burst out laughing, including Daddy and I.

I was close to going into hysterical uncontrollable laughter and was soon silenced by my thoughts of what if that was my real baby. I am soooo not ready for this.

Itsy Bitsy Teeny Weeny........ socks

I must have broken into some sort of nesting phase this week as I pulled all baby items out of their packaging and recycled all packaging and prepared to wash everything. I even scrubbed the washing machine before I started to remove any trace of dirt and lint, read the instructions on how to operate the special baby detergent I bought and washed all items as per their instructions, must have been about 4 loads and all on delicate cycle. I could not resist taking a few pics of everything hanging on the line, soooo tiny and cute. Is it an omen that my row of socks all had pink pegs? I swear I didn't plan it that way.

Dear Peanut

Last night your Daddy and I went to a class to learn about how you are going to be born. It was very interesting and I learnt a lot about where you are living at the moment. Our Midwife/teacher Louise was very helpful.

Initially we had to go around the room and introduce ourselves, tell them all our name and 1 thing we like and 1 thing we dislike, of course I sat on an end and had to go first, "My name is Rachael and I like Pizza, and I don't like mushroom on my Pizza" and so it began the stupidity coming out of my mouth. Well we had just had Pizza for dinner and when put on the spot I couldn't think of anything else. Daddy he likes Paintball and dislikes bad drivers, this was probably top of his mind as well due to a traffic jam around the corner from the hospital and then followed my terrible parking in the dark and rainy carpark at the Hospital and my comment on thinking my driving is getting worse, I was way better when multi-tasking, like driving while smoking and eating a cheeseburger and talking on the phone, almost all at once. Of course I don't condone smoking and you will be in serious trouble if you ever start.

After our initial round of introductions Louise starts to ask us what we want to get out of these classes, I kept silent for fear of embarrassing Daddy, trying not to be the loud and annoying person in the group, and to my delight someone else took that role, she had a comment for everything, I think she was reading my mind and probably that of everyone in the room but she was the 1 who kept asking stupid yet relevant questions.


Louise went through the stages of labour, early contractions, timing, what happens to the cervix during dilation, she demonstrated the cervix with the little dolly that represented a baby and the knitted hippy type hat that represented the Cervix, she asked the question to the group "how do we measure the dilation of the cervix", I was ready to pipe up and say "der with a ruler or tape measure" and thankfully kept my mouth shut and was so wrong, she actually pokes up her pointer and middle finger spreads said 2 fingers apart and them whips them out for what I would say in engineering terms is a very inaccurate measure of how dilated the cervix actually is. Apparently they have been using this method for years and appears to be working for them so, I say lets run with it.

The next part of labour we were to learn was the transitioning, this is where the nice little mild contractions that I thought were going to break us in 2, actually get WORSE, and me your beautiful eloquent mother turns from nice mummy into Psycho Beast with turrets syndrome (you will probably meet her when you are naughty at some stage throughout your life). I fear this could be when daddy leaves the room and starts running screaming down the hallway, when in actual fact his job is to get up into my face and try to calm the BEAST. I hope he makes it, I believe he made attempts to warn that he may have to slap me across the face during this time, I don't condone domestic violence but will go so far as to say I may well need it at this point.

Next is the calm before the storm, apparently once the cervix is ready to go I get a 20 minute reprieve from the pain of the past 4-48 hours depending on individual circumstances, before pushing you out. Apparently once you pop out you are tossed onto my bare naked body for some quality skin to skin time, all gooey and slimy and you have to hang out there until you work out how to handle the sustenance of my engorged bosom. During all of this I have to also give birth to the Placenta which has been keeping you alive for the last 9 months, again the loud 1 in the group asks if this is painful, good ole' Louise says, no that is the easy part as it has no bones in it, charming I say. Whilst I get a whisper from Daddy who says "it will come out like a goon bag down a hallway", to which I almost lost my shit and tried to keep from laughing hysterically.

I won't be allowing you to read any of this until you are of the age when you won't have to ask me what a placenta or cervix or "goon bag" is, I might have to put a "goon bag" into your time capsule as I fear these may not be around for ever, they could get replaced by something less practical that will not turn into a party pillow or pool flotation device once finished.

Anyway we then got to sit through a video of about 4 different women giving birth to demonstrate all that we learnt tonight. Now this video must have been made somewhere Circa 1980, 1 of the caregivers or midwife had a hairdo that resembled the brunette out of ABBA, the harsh cut fringe and straight long hair and then the Pis ta resistance 1 lady was wearing nothing but leg warmers, WHAT THE. Well I need to go and get me some of those as that is standard birthing outfit.

Well only 5 more weeks of classes before your impending arrival in 9 weeks time, can't wait to meet you my little Peanut.

Peanut Update

After a quick visit to my Obstetrician Dr Walton yesterday for the results of my Glucose test it was all good news, it was on the low side which is remarkable, (I was going to ask if he got my results mixed up with someone else, but hey I will take his word for it), blood pressure still good, nice strong heartbeat, a couple more scans scheduled for 32 and 36 weeks to check on size.

I told him I was concerned that this pregnancy is going all too well, does that mean I am going to have a horrific labour or feral child. He reassured me that the good pregnancy should mean a good birth, he made no comment on the feral child comment. I guess that could be up to me, lol.

Baby Shower

What a great day I had on Sat catching up with my friends at Peanut's baby shower. Although it was difficult to spend quality time with everyone, I hope all who attended had fun.

Peanut got soooo many presents, some that Mum-2-be aka Me had a little difficulty working out what to do with it.

Some big thank you's for the day - Lisa for making the cutest little nesty birdy cake and cupcakes, mum for her always delicious sausage rolls and butterfly cakes, Colette for her famous Quiches, Checka for yet more cupcakes, Kim for her healthy platter (personally I never ate any of it but I heard it was good) and also for taking some photos for me and Kristy and Sonia for the help with set up and clean up and everyone else for coming along and especially from Peanut thanks for all the wonderful pressies.

A special mention to the Nanna's-2-be who weren't going to buy anything but wait til after the baby shower to see what we still needed and both ended up buying a truck loan of little bits and pieces, i can only imagine the horror (I mean delight) of how much stuff will come when Peanut finally arrives.

So with only 10.5 weeks to go is anyone game to bet on Boy or Girl?

Bring on the Weekend

Well this weekend saw me not doing a great deal of anything productive although I must say I had a very Asian inspired weekend.

This all started with Take-away chinese on Friday night for me and Jamie as we watched a bit of Masterchef (am totally loving that show). Then for lunch the next day was leftover Chinese.

Sat arvo I decided to bake the Scones I saw on masterchef, date and lemon scones. Kim and Cass came over for a spot of scrapping about 3ish in the afternoon and we proceeded to each a few too many scones with a cups of Tea (and I wonder why Jamie calls us nanna's). For dinner we ordered a reasonably health delivery of Thai food. There was (well for me anyway) a lot more chatting than scrapping, but who cares it was good to just chill out and relax. The scones were a hit and they will be making an appearance in the family or favourite recipe book I am making.

Sunday we headed up to Sydney to catch up with Adam and Checka some friends of ours and we went to Yum Cha at Blacktown, it was delicious as always and I rolled out of there feeling VERY full.

On the way home we had to pick up Jamie's sister Ria who had been at the Pink Concert the night before and had stayed in the city with friends. She got a lift back to Campbelltown so we picked her up from there and headed over to mum's for a quick visit and a spot of afternoon tea (more eating) before heading back down the coast to drop Ria off and then home. It was quite an exhausting day and I headed for bed about 9.30 and proceeded to snore the house down (aparently).

I must say though my throat was a little sore this morning so perhaps he was telling the truth.

Well all I can say for my fellow scrapbookers at Camp this coming weekend is SORRY. If you wonder why there are earplugs on your pillow, take my word for it you are going to need them.

Long time no Post

Well everyone it has been months since my last post on here and so much has happened. Well my pregnancy is progressing well I am 23.5 weeks. I could have sworn I was 24 or 25, but just counted it on the calendar and definitely 23.5 weeks. I have had a couple of scans and all is well. Peanut (as it is fondly known) is healthy and the right weight, length etc.

I have been sooo busy at work I didn't have time for morning sickness, and thankfully was only a little nauseaus and as long as I ate regularly I was pretty good. It was a weird feeling, not feeling 100% but not sick enough to stay home, doh.

I have also listed my business for Sale, I am feeling that I won't be able to give it 100% when I have a baby and that is not what I am about. I don't want to neglect clients and in my industry this is some people's biggest decision, so I don't want to let them down. I have had quite a bit of interest in the business and I am confident that I will sell it soon. I am happy to work for the new owner on a part time basis which I think I can fit around being a mother, I just don't want the sole responsiblity of being the owner.

Anyway back to the baby, we have painted the nursery, set up the furniture, got new blinds installed and I am currently working on my baby shower list. I don't really have a clue what I need however my ever helpful friends I am sure will guide me to add and cross things off the list to fine tune it.

Mum has offered to take me shopping to buy whatever I need and I suggested we wait until after the baby shower to see what I didn't get.

As for scrapbooking well I finished 110 pages filling 2 Honeymoon ablums so that is a massive achievement. Feel free to have a look if you are at my place but I won't be dragging it around to crops with me. lol.

Well that's about it from me for today. I promise I will update more regularly.

Peanut says Hi-5.

1st Wedding Anniversary

Today is our 1st Wedding Anniversary and I would have that day over and over again, it was the best. Marrying the love of my life in front of all our friends and family and having a great party to celebrate. Travelling like a Rockstar in the Hummer. Actually keeping a secret from Jamie about the Hummer (I am not a very good secret keeper). Feeling beautiful. Having my dear friends by my side. It was just amazing.

My husband has outdone himself today with a beautiful bunch of flowers arriving at work. Love is a wonderful thing and I don't know what I would do without him.