Friday, May 30, 2008

Nice Try, Sucker.

I made the silly, silly mistake of thinking that I might be able to go a day without Zofran last week. Zofran, for those who don't know, is a little white miracle pill straight from Jesus himself that controlls nausea. As it turns out, I am Zofran's bitch. My little experiment lasted exactly as long as it took me to pull myself off the bathroom floor and drive to CVS to beg the pharmacist for mercy.
My mom told me a few months ago that she was sick all 9 months with her babies. And now she just told me that my grandma was sick all 9 months with her babies as well. I guess I'm resigned to the fact that this probably isn't going to end for me this time around. But the big question on my mind is, why in the world did these crazy ladies keep having babies (4 for each of them), if it meant puking for 9 months? NO THANKS!

Friday, May 23, 2008

It's A Boy!

Pete and I went for my 20 week ultrasound and found out that we're having another little boy. I've been surprised at how excited I am by the news, although I think I would be typing the same thing right now if we had found out it was a girl. But right now I'm really loving the thought of brothers.

Early on, I was absolutely convinced that this was a girl, but I think maybe it's just because I couldn't picture having a son who wasn't Caden. But I eventually got over that, so the feeling wasn't so strong. Most women say that their pregnancies for boys and girls were like night and day. But this pregnancy compared to the one with Caden has been like night and... later that night. Same fatigue. Same never ending nausea. And then 2 weeks ago I had a dream that we were looking at the sonogram screen and we saw a boy. That sealed it. I was pretty sure I knew the score before the tech confirmed it for us.

I sure hope boy #2 likes cars and trucks, because Caden is already excited to teach him everything he knows.

Friday, May 9, 2008

A Good Farewell

My grandpa Tommy passed away last month, and it was my privilege to take part in his final send off. Let me say one thing: My family knows how to throw an awesome funeral. It fit him to a T, and he would have loved every second of it.

As you can tell from the photo, he was a total bad ass Marine. At his funeral service there was a full Marine Corps honor guard and a 21 gun salute. And these weren't your old, pretty wooden ceremony rifles either. Those Marines were carrying the same semi-automatic weapons you'd see on the streets of Baghdad because this is wartime, son. (Did you catch that grandpa? The beauty is in the details, isn't it?)

The other thing we did was tell stories. All 7 of his grandchildren stood up together and just told stories about our favorite memories of him. And we didn't just eulogize him. We were talking and laughing with each other and with the people out in the pews. What a wonderful thing to inspire at your own memorial service.


I hope with all my heart that when I die (after a very long and happy life with my husband and children, Inshallah), that people have so many stories about me that it takes 3 days to tell them. I hope that there's at least one story that's so crazy and so juicy that my grandchildren fight over who gets to be the one to tell it. So I'm going to remind myself to take my kids on adventures, and tell them jokes, and teach them the real value of being ridiculous as well as forthright and upstanding. There's room for everything.

And I really hope, when my time is up, that they remember to put up that photo of me looking all hot and sassy in my bikini on the beach in Portugal.

Grandpa giving me a bottle.

Grandpa meets Caden for the first time.