21 Weeks

This week I hit the 21 week mark.  Just past the half way mark!  We had an ultrasound last week, which was really neat.  I had a check up today and the doctor said the baby's head was perfect sized, smaller than the belly and the legs, which will be a good thing for me further down the road....I assume she meant at the Big D (that's Delivery to you).  Everything looks healthy and it's growing great. 

Some of you have been begging for a picture of me.  I made aaron take one tonight, but please note, it just started raining and my hair is suffering the consequences...not to mention it's the end of the day and I look like crap and bad lighting doesn't help.  Anyway, take it in, because clearly I am bad at this picture taking thing right now.

Love

Kristin

What Did I Miss?

I am well on my way to getting around the Baby Registry.  I am sure this will be fun, but like I said in my last post, I have some research to do.  In order to prepare for that research I figured I needed a check list, which again I told you I could barely find.  I took the Berkeley ladies' list and made it into a spread sheet- much easier for a Type A like myself.  You moms out there- did I miss anything on this list?  Let's just call this the Official, Unofficial Baby Registry Check List.  Add on in the comments section and I will update the list.  Maybe someone out in cyber land will find it useful!

Click the link below to go to the spread sheet:

The Official, Unofficial Baby Registry Check List

Ok Too Funny!

Hello Friends and Family!

This week we found out the Gender of our forthcoming baby!  If you have not heard the news yet, text or call me.  I can't publish it here, because I promised my Gram that I would do everything in my power to make sure she did not know what it was....at her request of course!   I think this might be a difficult next four months, on the blog, but I will do my best to not reveal the gender on here.  And you do the same in the comments section!  - Thank you!

Ok so since we found out the gender of the baby, the next step is to complete a registry.  Gram, don't look at my registries because I think I will definitely give the gender of the baby away on there.  Ahem, back on track- so I started researching for the registry.  I HATE research, but ok, this is probably one of the top 5 research projects I will need to do...and hopefully only once.

Being a First-Time-Mom, I have little idea what it is that I am going to need, and how much of the stuff I need to register for.  When we registered for the wedding 4.5 years ago all the stores supplied you with a check list, you could find a checklist on almost any wedding website, and it was a breeze....not so in baby land!  Do you know I have not found one stinking checklist online?  I am floored.  So today I googled "what do I need to register for for a baby shower".  Amazingly I got a half decent run down on a "mommy blog" based out of Berkeley, CA....not as earthy as I thought, and covered pretty close to everything.  Here's the kicker....one link said "Hands-Free Pumping Bra", I thought "novel, I wonder what that looks like?"  So I clicked.....

....AND ENDED IN A FIT OF LAUGHTER!!!!!!!!


Hope you got a good laugh out of that too!

Love
Kristin


"Hello John?  Yes, how are you doing to day?"
"Great, Thanks Gretta"
"John, I am going to need those TPS reports on my desk by tomorrow"
"Sure Gretta, but can you tell me what that swishing noise is in the back ground?  Where are you?"
"Uhhh......"

OOO Pretty!

Just some pictures I snapped on the road... is that illegal?

Poppin Out

Alrighty, most have you have seen this picture already, but I thought I would do a little post to log my progression.

I really wanted to continue where my mom had left off in her pregnancy/post pregnancy journal that she started for me and made about 4 months in to my life with.  Admirable effort, especially since I haven't written one word in it...  My poor children.  Anyway,  I thought since we are now in the digital era that I would scribble here on the blog instead...and a little differently.  Where my mom wrote to me, I will write to you, but it should be fun for them to page through someday, right?  I guess if we have boys they won't care, girls on the other hand might take a little interest.

Ok enough with that.  The picture posted is at 4.5 months along with, of course, our first. 
Today is the 16th of November and in just 8 days we will find out the 50-50 question that has been plaguing us all these past 4.75 months- BOY or GIRL  (Gram I will try to spare you the knowledg of this event)...or as Mom, Colleen and my co-worker Brenda think- Twins! 
DISCLAIMER: In the initial sonogram there was only one. At the 16 week check up we only heard one heart beat, so my guess is that we will not be surprised by a #2 in there, that there will only be one.  BUT Aaron is still holding out for a second.

...more to come

A Very Late Halloween!

Yes, yes, yes, this is very delayed.  My laptop went down, which is where I have been contucting these blog postings from.  Tonight, with a wish and a prayer, I turned it on and lo and behold it started it up without a glitch.  It is running a little slow, but I will take slow over not working at all.

My dad called the day of Halloween and asked me to pick up some pumpkins for the house....have you ever gone pumpkin hunting on the day of Halloween?  My advice, DON'T!  I went to five grocery stores and found two Cinderella pumpkins and three miniture organic pumpkins, and that was it!  I felt lucky at that!

Also, a note on Cinderella pumpkins, they don't smell like a regular pumpkin inside.  It's more like a typical gord or squash smell. Not unpleasant, but not the nostalgic pumpkin smell. They are also really soft, so on the upside, easier to clean out. Lastly, they are so squatty that you really don't have too many choice on design.  Hence why mine look like this!

After it was all said and done, it was super fun to carve 5 pumpkins.  They looked so neat all lit up...once it got dark.  We had about 30 trick-or-treaters, not too many, but enough to feel satisfied.  All in all a great Halloween....I just miss getting to be the trick-or-treater...maybe next year we will take the baby out- hahaha just kidding!

Having a Little Fun Figuring Things Out.

This morning I got up and decided there were some things that needed cleaned, organized and put together around the house.  I have only been up for an hour and a half and I have- cleaned the shower, taken a shower, done two loads of laundry, picked up the office, organized (well half organized) the finance book, cleaned up the coffee table, and my favorite....put the clean padding on the carseat! 

I was having a little trouble with the harnesses on the carseat, one was a bit looser than the other.  So I decided "I need a body in this thing".  I have my three favorite dolls from growing up, stuffed away in the guest closet: Baby, Kathryn That Can Walk (don't ask), and Rainbow Brite.  Since baby is about the size of a 3lb preemie I immediately knocked her out, Rainbow Brite is about the size of a 3 month old, so I thought she was too big.  It turns out that Kathryn That Can Walk is pretty close to a newborn size (probably about a 6 or 7 lb size (at least that is what I guessed).

I took K.T.C.W. and put her in the car seat.  With some menuevering and a lot of yanking and pulling I finally got the dang thing even and taught on both sides.  K.T.C.W looks so cute in the seat now!  I think I might just have to keep her in there for a while! hahaha!  Aaron will probably think this is creepy when he wakes up. oh well! hahaha

I'm BAAAACCCCKK!!!!

Wow...after a VERY long hiatus (sorry vicki), I am finally back, and hope to be (fingers crossed) a good blogger, staying consistant in my posts! 

The last time I posted was in July and little did Aaron and I know, but we had a big surprise waiting for us that month.  On August fifth we found I was/am PREGNANT!  What an exciting event!  This, ladies and gentlemen, is one main reason why I have been so bad!  No I don't have an excuse like "I was vomiting left and right and good barely drag my butt out of bed" becuase I had a great first trimester, with no sickness (enter all the women  of the world who struggled with this, letting out a loud "DANG THAT WOMAN!!!").  Honestly though, there is a reason why I wasn't sick and I am sure it's because God knew that I would have been the most miserable person to deal with.  I don't throw up...well at least not in recent history and so to think about that being a daily occurance frightens me, and then I let out a big sigh of relief and thank God that I did not have to deal with that.  Whew!

Onward- we are approaching week 16 here (yes I know time is flying...yeah right I wish!) which means another check up on Tuesday morning and hopefully the scheduling of the sonogram that will (fingers crossed again) determine the sex of the baby!  !!!!!   !!!!   !!!!!  AHH!  I am so excited!  I have been a lot more pacient about this coming event than I thought I would be however, it still sits in the back of my mind...or the front, as everyone is starting to ask "what are you having?"  - 'I don't know yet'  - "Do you have a prefernce as to what you want?" - 'Nope, neither of us do, we see great characteristics in either gender, so we are equally excited for both!'  Is my typical answer.... then of course the very next question is "When are you going to find out?"  Well people, we are hoping that we will know right around Thanksgiving!  Isn't that perfect?!!!   I am thinking that we are going to be hush on it until our traditional "what are your thankful for this year", table rounding on that Thursday.  I think I will make everyone else say something first and demand that we are last!   MOOHAHHAHA MOOHAHAHAH! (enter Dr. Evil) hahah! 

Ok that is way too much for you to read, so I will sign off for now.

Peace Out!

Inception

Courtesy of Gstatic.com

Last night Aaron and my dad and I went to see Inception, the new Leo DiCaprio flick.  Can I just say it was AMAZING!  Definitely a movie that you need to see, and in the theatre for that matter. Christopher Nolan directed the film and did a fantastic job of keeping us on the edge of our seat through out the movie.  This is definitly a "thinking" movie, something that keeps your mind active throoughout. Aaron said the ending was the best ending that he has seen in a long time as well.  After we left the theatre I kept thinking about the movie, that is when you know you saw a great film, when you are still thinking about it after you have left, and on in to the next day. I give 5 flaming redheads!  woo hoo!!!

Hiatus

My storage space on this blogging platform has been maximized, which means I can blog but I can't include pictures (unless I link them)....how boring!  So the 10 other blogs that I have all written up, but with no pictures won't be posted until i can figure out a way to get more space or link my pictures from a picture server.  Anyway, that is a lot of technical stuff, but just wanted to let you know why you aren't seeing more posts.

To Space hold for today I have put in a little offer from Travel Zoo that is really tugging at me... I WANT TO GO TO GREECE TOO!!!! (My sister just got back from a week's holiday in Greece, so I am a bit jealous...not to mention on top of that she gets to live in Europe- ugh!).

$1249 -- Greek Islands & Athens Vacation incl. Cruise & Air* 

She's Back!!!!

About four months ago our dear friend Davina left to go home for an undisclosed amount of time. Most of you think "home? so that's like down the street, or across the state right?" WRONG! D is from Germany! SHE LEFT US HERE 5K (errr...whatever) MILES AWAY!

Davina called me about a month ago and planned surprise return! Here was the best reaction to her surprise return: my future sister in law (wedding number three this summer...)- awesome!

Sailing...

The other day I was running behind, trying to get our weekly ultimate frisbee pick up match. I took the standard marina drive to the field and on the way I saw a million sailboats going by! So I had to take th opportunity to capture them on film. I sailed right past the freeway on ramp and took the high road up to the look out where I could take a few more pics (oh yeah I stopped and took a few pictures at the marina too...) needless to say i was a tad...ok 20 minutes late to our frisbee pick up game...however I got these great pics!!!!

And So It Begins....

...This was the first of the Pre-Wedding celebrations- Kristin G.'s Bachelorette Party!

We had a blast at the A's baseball game which was definitely Kris's cup-of-tea! She loved being able to root on her team and celebrate her pre-nuptuals with us girls. And to boot, the A's won! woot woot...Now if only we had been at the game the next day, we would have got to witness the 19th ever no hitter ever. Oh well we made our own memories that are lasting a la the obnoxious guys you can hear in the background of the "baseball anthem".

vick- ;) thanks for spurring me on to keep writing these! - Love you

Coming Soon...

A new Post coming tonight, and hopefully a whole lot more to follow. Check back tonight or tomorrow morning... woo hoo!

I know Vicki is jumping up and down!

Erin's Shower

So I am the MOH of Erin S. wedding (I told her I don't want to be called the Matron of Honour because it sounds too old! So we are just going with MOH). Sunday was my dutiful day to throw her a shower. Let me tell you, leading up to Sunday was a whirlwind...especially EVERYDAY last week. Today I woke up and thought, I need the weekend back!
Never the less, we had a TON of F-U-N! What a shower it was! The color scheme was Purple Green and Pink (see invitation). Jos put together AMAZING floral arrangements (no I don't have a picture) and we had a fantastic spread of food and drink! Let me mention the most important part (no not Erin) THE DRINKS! This was a "Cocktails in the Garden" kind of shower and so our list included (from weakest to strongest) Water infused with cucumber and strawberries (no, not alcoholic vodka infused ones), Lavender Lemonade (straight lemonade, no alcohol again you alchies!), Coppola Family Rosso and Bianco wines (YES! THERE IT IS, THE A-A-A-Alcohol....look it up it's a song- probably not a good one, so forget about looking it up!), and The Signiture drink Erin's Signiture Chambord-Grey Lemon Drop. Here's the recipe cuz I know you are dying to know it!
3 parts Lemonade (we used country time)
1 part Vodka (Grey Goose- nothing but the best- YEAH MAMA C!)
1 splash Chambord (MMMMMM!)
Anyway the party was a hit. Here some pics of Mama C, Erin and I. Nate's video is coming maybe later this week if I get to it! This is the first night I have had nothing to do...it's kind of nice. BUT tomorrow is the continuation of the Shoe Saga for the Brides Maid Dresses...hey I am not complaining, any shopping is good shopping!

For Vicki....

....So this is not about me, however, my coworker sent me this video today and I thought "Oh my gosh I have to share this with everyone I know!" Ladies and Gentlemen you are looking at a star in the making. This boy sings the song better than the performing artist Lady Gaga. Hands down I would much rather listen to him than her! (Make sure to watch the related videos too!)

Introducing Greyson Chance:

Tennis Anyone?

I played my first two tennis matches since high schoool on Sunday and Monday. Like my doubles partner said "there is only one direction you can go when you start, and thats up". So I took her adage and went with it. We won our first match on Sunday morning 6-4, 6-1....only to be overcome last night at Vacaville in a match that we lost 6-4, 6-2, 6-3. Ugh! As my tennis coach in high school said to me, when i played for him "Play your game. Don't let them get in you head." Those words i repeated over and over to myself as i dug myself deeper and deeper into our opponents head game....WHAT WAS I THINKING!!! I just couldn't manage to brush them off as well as the mistakes I was making. So now we are back to my partners wise words "the only place to go is up, from here!"

Give up your toaster, coffee maker and pants- the ipad is here.

Anothe Fabulous Article (or blurp as last posted) by the Satirical Simon Dumenco (taken from AdAge.com). Thought I don't agree with him, I do think this is one of the funniest pieces of I have read in a while. Eat it up you Mac lovers!

Why the IPad Has Inspired Me to Give Up My Toaster, My Coffeemaker, My Pants

Want to Be a Pathetic, Passive, Compliant Consumer? There's an App for That

By Simon Dumenco

Published: April 12, 2010

I feel like such an idiot. Here I thought I understood consumer satisfaction -- especially my own consumer satisfaction -- but I was wrong.

It all started with the iPad. On April 3, I bought one and fell in love with it. Or thought I fell in love with it.

Among the iPad's cruel seductions: It's incredibly easy to use. The 10-plus-hour battery life and the fact that there's no boot-up lag from its idle mode make a huge difference. And though it's primarily a media-consumption device (as advertised), I've had no trouble sending the same sort of basic content out of my iPad (e.g., e-mails, tweets and documents) that I pump out of my lumpen laptop.

But it turns out I was duped. Last week, iPad in hand, I got around to reading an essay by Boing Boing's Cory Doctorow titled "Why I Won't Buy An iPad (and Think You Shouldn't, Either)," which was actually published the day before the iPad's release. Doctorow, in slamming the iPad's "infantilizing hardware" and tightly controlled apps ecosystem, wrote that "The model of interaction with the iPad is to be a 'consumer,' what William Gibson memorably described as 'something the size of a baby hippo, the color of a week-old boiled potato, that lives by itself, in the dark, in a double-wide. ... It's covered with eyes and it sweats constantly. The sweat runs into those eyes and makes them sting. It has no mouth ... no genitals, and can only express its mute extremes of murderous rage and infantile desire by changing the channels on a universal remote.'"

Doctorow's anti-iPad manifesto was a throwing down of the gauntlet -- which plenty of other media types have since picked up. Like Jeff "BuzzMachine" Jarvis, who, in a Business Insider post titled "I'm Really Worried About What Apple Is Trying To Do With The iPad," wrote, "I see danger in moving from the web to apps. The iPad is retrograde. It tries to turn us back into an audience again." And he hates that the iPad has no USB ports. (To get stuff in or out of an iPad, you have to do it wirelessly or via cable.)

Reading more and more criticism of the iPad, tears began to drip out of my eyes. I looked around my double-wide (OK, actually my fifth-floor walk-up in Manhattan's East Village) with disgust -- mostly directed at myself. What a pathetic, passive, compliant consumer I've become! Like, over there, in the kitchen: my incredibly easy-to-use Senseo coffeemaker, which I thought I loved. But it only accepts certain kinds of coffee pods. How devious! And my sleek Braun toaster: Sure, it can accommodate sliced bread and bagels, but could I cook a pot roast with it? No! Does it have a camera? No!

I knew I would have to continue inventorying all the other sad little self-defeating choices I've made as a consumer, but I was so filled with rage that I resolved to first get my toaster and coffeemaker out of my life immediately. So, with the intent of bringing them, along with my iPad, down to the trash, I reached to pull some clothes onto my dickless, boiled-potato body. But then, jeans in hand, it struck me: only two ports for limbs! How ridiculously limiting!

Death to Levi's! Death to Senseo! Death to Braun! Death to Apple!

And don't get me started on the whole indoor-plumbing racket, what with those fixed pipe sizes and condescendingly simple handles and faucets and such.

Death to Kohler, too!

~ ~ ~
Simon Dumenco is the "Media Guy" media columnist for Advertising Age. You can follow him on Twitter @simondumenco. The latest Ad Age Insights white paper -- "Dumenco's State of the Media Report: From Social Media to Search, Print, Broadcast and Beyond, Where Ad-Supported Media Stands Now and Where It's Going" -- is available right here.

I hate Twitter

An excerpt from Simon Dumenco's latest Trender Chart on AdAge.... I just love this!

"But I'm most entertained by Twitter itself trending once again, largely because of a brief service outage April 5, which caused Twitter addicts to go nuts -- and then tweet about how they coped with Twitter withdrawal, using the hashtag #whentwitterwasdown, once Twitter was back up. Sample tweets:

* I don't know what to do. One word: bored
* I was hoping they were busy clearing out the Beliebers. Sadly I was wrong.
* I cried
* I almost had a stroke
* I realized my phone did this other shit they call "Texting" a strange more primitive form of tweeting!
* I complained about it on facebook
* Wait...hold on... twitter was down?? Damn didn't notice... guess cuz I have a life"

And IIIIII,.....IIIIII....IIIIII....Will Always Love YOUUUUUU!!

Ok this YOU HAVE TO SEE! Talk about a Male Susan Boyle:

Home School

Ok so I know a lot of random stuff has been appearing on here lately, but you gotta take what you can get!

Today's feature home school for your little fishies!

April Fool's Week Post 3

Ok you Tech Geeks, here is a good fool for the new iPad.
See the Website HERE

April Fool's Week Post 2

Starbizzle- ERRR Starbucks, got a little creative with thier new cup sizes:
Yes, I will have a Plenta Soy Latte no whip.

April Fool's WEEK!!!!

A Week fool of April Full's!!! ERRR A Week FULL of April FOOL'S!

Being from California all I can do is sit back and laugh at those poor, gullible people in New York:
Check out the article HERE

Rediculous....

ok, this is a little too stupid. It's right up there with UGG boots and mini skirts in the middle of a snowy winter:

DUMB!

Need I say Anything At All?
This stupid idea brought to you by Thrillist.com & by Thingstobuy

Parking Coo

Dont' you feel this way sometimes?
Click on the linke below and print this out for all those people who piss you off.

http://www.youparklikeanasshole.com/give.html

Happy Friday!

March Madness

Ok, so in lieu of posting things about my life that have been happening for the past month, I keep finding these cool things that EVERYONE would be interested in, and not just those of you who are interested in the monotony of my every day life. In an Ode to March Madness starting this week, I have linked below to a different kind of madness, namely that of the muppets! Can you guess who I picked to take it all home?

Is it possible?

OK SOMEONE TRY THIS AND LET ME KNOW IF IT WORKS AND HOW LONG IT TAKES YOU:

HA-LARIOUS!

Ok You gotta Watch this!

Valentines Note Cards

Just found this on another Daily Candy email! I LOVE this! What a great idea. I love that they are in a basic typewriter font and their sayings are so cute!

Erin T. want to make some for me ;) Even better- this would be a great give-a-way for your site!!

The Toilet

I was just reading Daily Candy this morning and saw this come across in one of their emails.

This is a Toilet Noise Maker, that Makes the sound of a toilet flushing for 25 seconds. Basically they say that if you are making some unmentionable noises you can block them out by pressing the button so the simulated sound of a flushing toilet is heard by those outside the bathroom door.

On the other hand what would people think if they heard two flushes instead of one?

Just shy of thirty

Erin T is 29 next year so she's got one more year before we get throw her an over the hill bash and the last year that she gets a normal birthday party. This year we took to the city for some kick'n food at beetlenut. If you know me you know I hate greens but I will scarf a whole plate of string beans from beetlenut ther ain't nothin greater! We ate so much and even tried (the over rated) punch bowl - next time we'll stick with our own drinks... Never the less we had a blast.
That weekend Aaron and his brothers and dad headed up to Reno to celebrate James' 21st birthday though they ALL lost their money, forfeited their hotel room, and came home the same say they left. I wouldn't exactly say they had fun, but a good time bonding on the 3 hour ride up and back.
Super fun... But I can't wait until next year when we get to celebrate the big 3-0... Rumor is we may be celebrating in the big apple!!!!

Click Here to see More Pictures from our Night Out!
Muah Muah - kristin

A Christmas tradition Kip. style

Every Christmas season mike and jos throw a homemade gift white elephant party. Since they started this 8 years ago the gifts have gotten more and more creative. Last year Aaron and I decided what we would do for this years gift and for once we rembered what we were going to do when the time came around. Aaron and I love watching 30 rock on NBC, there's this guy in there that wears a hat that has an ever changing phrase on it so Aaron made his own version of that hat, it ended up being one of the most sought after gifts. Mine didn't do too bad either. I made a version of my late grandmother's half aprons, one I even sewed panties in to ha ha ha ha!
Jos made a movie poster from the Halloween Broke Back Mountain picture that Aaron and Paul took , to say the least it was hilarious!!!
Here's a look at some of the gifts - I ended up with the beer bong made by erin .

Click Here To View The Pictures!

Benefit Beauty Bash!

Back in the fall, I entered my first facebook contest. It was for Benefit cosmetics. Well believe it or not, I won! The prize was a private party for me and 8 of my friends at the Benefit store in Berkeley. So I rounded up the troops from Nor Cal and So Cal and we all marched in for a fabulous time this weekend!

We were each given a service of our choice- eyelash tinting, eyebrow tinting or eye brow waxing/threading. I was a bit overzealous and went for both the eye lash tinting (I now have eye lashed that you can see!!!! I don't really have to wear mascara! woo hoo!) and eyebrow tinting (yay! no more eyebrow pencils!!!). We then got a full makeover along with enjoying wine (haha heather!!) and hors d' ouerves (spelling?). We had such a blast! (see pictures by clicking here)

Afterwards we headed out to dinner at a cute little american bistro called Venus and then on to a Dance Club in Walnut Creek called Vice.

Heather and Shauna took off after dinner to get home as heather was a little under the weather ;), but didn't end up getting home so quickly because they ran out of gas about a mile from my house!!! After numerous calls to only a handful of people they knew in the area, they finally tracked down Aaron, who came out and "saved them". Quite a night and one that we all remember for a very long time!

Muah Muah, Kristin

Here we come a caroling among the boys so tone def?

The boys performed their annual caroling, mostly intoxicated, but I need not say anymore as this video will do it more than justice....

Merry Christmas ... A little late

Here are some pictures from our Christmas!

Muah Muah -kristin

And a little video of some family singing....