Category: Personal

This blogger says you are organized if you know exactly where to find the following 31 items in your house. This Wednesday: a quiz–are you organized or disorganized?.

•  stamps
•  your passport and if you’re married, your spouse’s passport
•  a corkscrew
•  Bandaids
•  a safety pin
•  a flashlight
•  a functioning alarm clock
•  paperclips or a stapler
•  your phone charger
•  a spare set of keys
•  your doctor’s phone number
•  cinnamon
•  your tax statements from 2003
•  fabric stain remover
•  a pair of mittens
•  spare AA batteries

  C

•  a tape measure
•  your high-school yearbook
•  a Swiss army knife
•  a pencil sharpener
•  a copy of Pride and Prejudice or The Da Vinci Code
•  the instruction manual for your camera
•  silver polish
•  a vase the proper size to hold a bunch of tulips
•  food coloring
•  a tube of lip balm
•  a cheese knife
•  an extension cord
•  a recipe for a favorite food your mother or father used to make
•  a pack of playing cards
•  a pad of sticky notes (Post-Its)

I’m happy to say that I can find all of them except the four things I don’t own (Pride and Prejudice of the Da Vinci Code, silver polish, food coloring and the recipe) and I don’t know exactly where the extension cord is.  (I think I know where an extension cord would be but I tend to avoid trying to be involved in organizing the garage as then I’d have to be involved in keeping it organized and that causes my stress level to go too high.  Better to ignore it as best I can.)

The real question is, is it good to be that organized?  Does it make that big of a deal in your life?  Do you save lots of time?  Or money (from not buying duplicates or making late payments?)  Do I suffer more stress from things that aren’t organized (because of others around me) than an unorganized person does from not being able to find things?

Or, maybe the real question is, can you truely change your nature?  I can’t imagine being comfortable with being unorganized.  And I can’t imagine forgetting where the spare set of keys are.  I was quite upset a few months ago when they were removed from their standard spot and got lost.

I have a lot of friends who insist that they loved being pregnant.  While I love the idea that we will soon have a new member of the family, I can’t say that I love being pregnant.  I’ve had the easiest
pregnancy I know about and I can’t sleep well, my back and hips hurt
occasionally, my legs cramp up and my face is swollen.  And let’s not
mention the things I can’t do that I enjoy like running, hockey,
drinking beer and staying up late.  (On the flip side, I haven’t gained any excessive weight, on an average day I don’t have any aches and pains, the baby is healthy, I’m healthy, my ankles aren’t swollen, I found lots of good cheap clothes on eBay … all is good.)  But still, what part of this is so
enjoyable???  Is it just the expectation of a baby?

For all of you that insist you love being pregnant … please comment!

Courtney and Jon, my friends expecting triplets, now have a blog to keep us all informed: Court and Jon and ….  Courtney, Jon, Matilda, Anna and Noah can use all your prayers, best wishes and finger crossings over the next couple of weeks.

Talk about coincidences … I had three roommates in college and all four of are expecting a baby now! 

And we’ll end up with 6 babies as one of us (not me!) is expecting triplets!  Send her lots of good vibes!

I have been debating whether or not to blog about this and I’ve finally decided that it’s been such a strange experience that I have to share. 

People say the strangest things when you are pregnant.  For example, just last week I was sitting on an airplane across the aisle from a man.  He seemed like a nice guy.  He was in his seventies, wearing a baseball cap and traveling with his wife and daughter and a big Christian group, and he genuinely just seemed to be looking for a conversation partner.  So he starts out by saying, "You’re pregnant, right?"  (I should point out that I’m 6 and half months pregnant right now, so it’s hard to miss the belly.)
I said, "Yes, I am."
He said, "Good. I brought a lot of food."  And he hoists up this bag that’s bigger than my briefcase that is chock full of food – everything from nuts to chocolate to crackers to who knows what else.  And he did offer to share everything with me during the whole seven hour flight!
Then he says, "You are planning on going through with it, right?"
I think I just stared at him for a minute.  I try to respond politely to all these strange questions, but that one caught me completely off guard.  (In retrospect, maybe I should just raise my eyebrows or let my jaw drop so people could see the effect that these questions have on the pregnant woman.)  I ended up saying, "Yes, of course."  I then added, because I thought my belly should have been answer enough, "I’m six months pregnant."  I mean who would go through with 30+ weeks of pregnancy if they weren’t planning on going through with it?  It’s not been the most comfortable time of my life!

My other "favorite" question that I’ve been asked by everyone from friends to co-workers to strangers on the street was "Was it planned?"  What kind of question is that?  Would they ask if I looked older?  If I was wearing a wedding ring on my hand?  Do they ask every pregnant woman that?  I’ve never asked anyone if their pregnancy was planned.

Frank’s "favorite" is "It’s going to change your life."  Any child is going to change our life!  It’s a whole new person.  But we do have a child already so it’s not like we (especially Frank) don’t know what we are getting into!

I sent my top 10 strange questions to a friend the last time I felt like venting and he sent me back the funniest email where he managed to use all top 10 strange questions in a way that was hilarious and he wrapped it up with some very nice compliments and a funny statement at the end:

"I’ve always thought you’d make a great mom […]  After all, Teddy [my dog] probably had better language skills at age 5 than I did and was more well behaved!  I doubt you’ll ever need anything, but if you do, you can always ask me."

Good friends are priceless.  And I just try to remember that a lot of the strange questions have come from very well meaning folks!

Santiago’s is our favorite Mexican take out restaurant. 

Frank ran over to Santiago’s for take out on Friday. 

Saturday in the car Jacob asked "Did you go to Santiago’s house yesterday?"  Turns out Santiago is also the name of a boy on Jacob’s baseball team.  He was feeling a bit left out!

Heard the day after my birthday, through the open window:

Stormy is older than you!  She’s 400!

I know I’m a year older but I don’t feel quite that old yet!

"I only had two brownies because I was saving room for dessert."
– Jacob at the dinner table

If you ever go to register for gifts, I have one piece of advice that I didn’t hear or find anywhere.  Discuss with your significant other (or whoever is registering with you) what is appropriate to register for and what isn’t.

We knew what we needed – I had read all the books and made a list and Frank had lots of good ideas and advice from first hand experience.  What we didn’t agree on was what was appropriate to register for.  It’s already uncomfortable enough to be making a list – it feels like you are asking for things – that you really should discuss these things before you get to the store.

Here’s some things you should think about:

• Is it appropriate to register for lots of "big ticket items"?  Will you feel like someone spent too much if they get one of them?
• Should you select exactly what you want (this pooh-bear hat) or are you just selecting things to give people an idea of what you need or like?
• Should you register for toys that you don’t "need" but would really like to have?
• Should you register for all those little items that you’ll need but aren’t typically considered gift items like diaper rash cream and baby soap?
• How many of each thing should you register for?  Are you going to feel greedy if you register for eight bibs instead of two?

Obviously, nobody has to buy you anything, much less anything you registered for, so it really shouldn’t be that big of a deal what you register for or don’t, but I really felt like we were asking people for something and it made me hyperconsious of everything we put on the list.  At one point Frank said, we shouldn’t register for that thing because we can afford it.  And my response was, we could afford everything on the list! So he said, that’s why I didn’t want to register.  To which I responded but people are going to buy us things anyway and most of them like knowing what we need!  We want to make sure we don’t get 30 bibs!  (Or do we want 30 bibs?)

What a useful but strange and awkward custom is all I can say in retrospect.

P.S.  Did you know you need a swing and a bouncy seat for a baby?  The book said so and I didn’t believe it so I made it a swing "or" a bouncy seat and Frank (who thinks I’m a bit silly for reading all the books) was very adament about the fact that we needed both of them.  Maybe we ought to give the baby our room and move into the smaller one ourselves. 🙂

I seem to have a theme lately of "what to do with your life" and this quote resonated.  According to research done by the authors of Freakonomics, practice is more important than talent; you are just more likely to practice what you like so you end up being good at what you like.  (Or vice versa.)  From A Star Is Made – New York Times.

when it comes to choosing a life path, you should do what you love — because if you don’t love it, you are unlikely to work hard enough to get very good. Most people naturally don’t like to do things they aren’t "good" at. So they often give up, telling themselves they simply don’t possess the talent for math or skiing or the violin. But what they really lack is the desire to be good and to undertake the deliberate practice that would make them better.

So the key is figuring out what you enjoy doing whether you are good at it or not yet.