Weekend Snaps

 A present for my dad, tied up simply with brown paper and yarn.

 Embroidery threads finally finding usefulness again.

The fireplace mantle, finally decorated again after Christmas. I'd broken a frame and a mirror that went on it before and finally changed it up. That's some driftwood from Irondequoit, New York (seen here) and sand from Deception Pass State Park in Washington state (seen here). 

The family traditional birthday cake; cherry nut cake that I studded with vanilla bean flecks and sprinkled with edible glitter.

Seventy candles, all aglow. 

Evan deciding who looks funnier; mama with her thirty-three week twin belly or Uncle Crash with his balloon belly.



So bad I broke down and ate a brownie

I had a day.

One of those days that is so bad that at the end of it you can't even tell if you're laughing or crying anymore. (I'm pretty sure I was crying.)

This was possibly the only smile of the day:

Yeah, we bribed him at the mall, but dude, the day was that bad, even at that point. I had already had a crying jag in Target, where the pharmacist had to pet my arm and tell me he understood it was rough and stressful.

So yeah, bad day. And to try and make me smile, Robert took us out for dinner.

And when we got back in the car, there was this:

Yeah.

On the car so new it doesn't even have license plates. (But hey, at least they left a note?)

I can't drink myself into oblivion at the moment (doctors tend to frown upon that sort of thing), so I did the only other cure I knew that people say makes them feel better: I ate chocolate.

And it was good.

Not good enough to make the day good, but enough to keep me from having a final laugh-cry before I go to bed.

Tomorrow has to be better.

It just has to.

Coulrophobia Fun

If you suffer from coulrophobia, I'd go ahead and close out of this post about now...

A few weeks ago, Kelly and Bryon closed on a new house when they moved to town. And not even a month into home ownership did disaster strike. It was one of those freaky things that can happen without warning; the pipe leading to their hot water heater busted. The hot water heater is in the attic. They were gone when it happened, and the water flooded the attic. This caused part of the upstairs ceiling to collapse (specifically the room where their toddler sleeps), soaked through the carpet and dripped down into their first-floor kitchen.

Luckily, when they stopped at home for a moment before heading out, Kelly heard a drip-drip-drip and asked what it was. They were lucky that the damage that happened was all. It could have been much worse, but dude, suckage. Robert and I brought them dinner that night, and Robert helped Bryon a bit. It's been a headache.

This past weekend, Bryon went to check things out in the attic and found something creepy. He found...well, Creepy. They suppose the original owner of the house accidentally left it behind. However, I think it's safe to say the culprit of the accident has been found.

He's been quite helpful creepy and fun more creepy.

Need a mechanic?

Help with the grill?

Don't you want to take your 32-week twin pregnancy photos with a scary clown?

Kelly is sadly passing on Creepy the Clown. People have asked for him. So, she's asking that people who get Creepy send in pics of him being...well, creepy.

You can follow his adventures at CreepyTheClown.blogspot.com

Thirty-Two Weeks : Guessing Games

Dr O came into my exam room cheering this week; I had managed to gain a whole two-and-a-half pounds. I really thought it would have been more seeing as how I accidentally ate Robert's breakfast that morning. Well, it was sort of an accident; we picked up something on the way and I unwrapped his to hand to him and it suddenly smelled so delicious that I couldn't help but eat it.

Dr O wanted to talk about birth plans and such, and same as last time, I maintain "healthy baby, healthy mama". However, this time I'm more inclined to consider the possibility of a c-section. IUGR babies don't tend to tolerate labor as well as their chubby counterparts. Whichever way they arrive is fine and dandy with me; I just want them healthy.

As far as the when, though, Dr O said she was doubting my full-term goal date was probable. What with the IUGR and the frequency of which I have contractions (contractions, might I add that do NOTHING other than annoy me)(okay, and I've had a few that made me tear up)(and say bad words), she was guessing three weeks out.

She said March 3.

I told her that was kind of the one day I was hoping not to go into labor. See? It's Evan's birthday that day and I'd like him to have his own day. Dr O breathed in through clenched teeth. "Oh, alright then, I'll guess March 6. Is that okay?"

I nodded.





Evan has refused to put his arrival date guess in. I think he knows when they're coming, but is keeping it a secret.

Not that guesses mean all that much, but there shall be no guessing of March 3 on the Arrival Date Pool that we have going. I have two people betting on the end of February, Robert is guessing the first of March and I'm the last one on the list at March 12.

Although, I did have a fetal fibronectin test the other day when I mentioned, and Robert mentioned as well, that my contractions sometimes come in regular five-minute intervals and last for well over a minute. They'll stay that way for a four-to-six hour window and then slip back into their more regular 12-minute holding pattern. The test was negative, which doesn't mean a whole lot (positive doesn't mean a whole lot, either), but being negative gives you a 95% guess that you won't be popping out babies in the next two weeks.

Even though I've explained such to Robert, he's had a few panicky moments of "are you alright?" when I've had a few eye-watering contractions that came eerily close together. Or when I took a four-hour nap. Or when he noticed that my speed has gone from annoyingly slow to painfully slow, thanks to babies that sit so low I often feel like I have to walk with my thighs squeezed together to keep them inside.

View from above.

I've felt particularly nesty this week; suddenly I thought the tile by the back door needed to be scrubbed by hand. And I needed to make freezer meals. And by gosh, I wasn't going to let another night pass with my canning jars in my kitchen and not in the laundry room storage. It's your basic insanity. I think I have everything else prepped, as well as can be expected, so now I'm nitpicking on things that wouldn't matter to anyone. But they matter to me. I mean, truly, doesn't it keep anyone else awake at night knowing that storage bins of outgrown toddler clothes aren't sorted by sleeve length?

I have no pants that fit, yet I still wear three pair. They all either sag at the underbelly part, or the panel has given up and slides down. I have point-blank refused to buy any more maternity clothes. I also have given up all shame in how I eat; from my cravings of pickles and cold grapefruit (although not together), to ice cream studded with marshmallows to steak.

Kelly and Bryon brought Robert and I over a king cake today, and Robert told them we'd enjoy it after dinner. I huffed. Please. Their tires had barely left our driveway when I assaulted the cake with a knife and didn't even bother with a plate. Or napkin. Or fork. By the time we left for the grocery store not ten minutes later, a good 1/4 of the cake was gone as I snuck back in to shovel one last piece. Robert coughed from the doorway. I had been caught. Yet the guilt? Was not there. This cake was good.

Clockwise:

1. Someone gaining better access to play with their early birthday present.

2. Using my big belly as a Snoogle.

3. Cuddling in bed together, and me loving those tufts of white-blond cotton candy hair.

4. Evan using my belly as a mere pillow.

However long I have left, whether it be three days or three weeks or even longer, I'm okay with it. Yes, I'm tired and feel limited in what I can do, but I'm not anxious. I'm not scared, either. I'm being content in the now. I know the now. Things are pretty darn good.

Besides, there's still cake.

Thirty-One Weeks : A Peri Update

I didn't see Dr Amem today. Or either of the Pretty Peris. I saw the lady that shall forever be the Awkward Peri. She was nice, just in a strange way. I think she thought patting my ankle was comforting, but all it really did was make me question how well I'd shaved my legs.

The babies are doing well; they're breathing and moving and still showing no signs of stress. That's a relief.

But, what I really wanted was to address last week...the thing that has kept me up at night: their size. The babies are small. And not in a "awww, babies are small" kind of way, but in a "uh, holy crap, those babies are tiny kind of way." Like, IUGR classified. (Dr Amem had told me he doesn't like saying IUGR, but he apologized because he had to put it in my chart.)

So, that still stands over my head. Or in my belly. I'm glad they look good, but they need to grow. They are scary tiny.

I'd like to know more numbers to see if there has been any progress. Or lack of progress. Or regression (as it was). Three weeks can change a lot, and it seems forever to wait, holding my breath and hoping all the calorie-stuffing I'm doing is maybe doing the babies some good.

Shirt seen last pregnancy here. Big awkward bath flower from here.

The nutritionist they had me meet with last week was much more helpful and suggested a calorie supplement, instead of whey protein. It's flavorless, and I've been pouring it into my smoothies and milkshakes each day. I'll know by Thursday when I see Dr O if it's done any good.

Until then, I'm doing what I can to pack on the pounds, seeing as I'm supposed to be up a good 47 pounds by now, and I haven't broken the 20 pound mark. I know that it sounds weird to complain about being too small in pregnancy, but it is a legitimate, scary, medical concern. For whatever reason that I can't pack on the pounds, the babies can't either.

I have no reason to believe that this will affect them once they are here. Evan was a tiny guy at birth, and within a month on my milk he no longer had a neck and was full of delicious wrist, belly and thigh chub.

For now, though, it's just a waiting game; we wait and see. Wait to determine if they're better out than in. Make sure they're not stressed and they're hitting their milestones. Wait. Hold your breath and wait.

Thirty-One Weeks : Unfocus

I feel as though I am holding my breath; waiting. Waiting on something, but not sure what. Maybe the other shoe to drop? To be able to breathe comfortably? To do something other than sit contemplative and quiet and bored and scared and anxious?

My last appointment with the Peri didn't go so well. I didn't see the Pretty Peri or the Other Pretty Peri, but a loud man who when I asked his name guffawed into laughter and said people call him the Angry Middle Eastern Man. Kelly was with me at that appointment, and we've taken to calling him Dr. Amem.

Robert's work schedule has been bogging him down, both physically and mentally, so I was prepped to go by myself to the appointment. I don't mind going alone at all; it gives me strange freedoms of blaring the radio and driving with the sun-roof open. Kelly said she'd been wanting to see a high-tech ultrasound (and later admitted to having a nagging gut feeling she needed to go with me), so she tagged along. I didn't mind; I can't figure out the XM radio stations on the new van and it was raining anyways.

The appointment was not good, and not good in a way that half-way through a much longer than normal ultrasound, when I started noticing something wasn't right, and the ultrasound tech couldn't tell me a thing, I stopped being in that room and went to my happy place. My eyes blinked a few times and I was whisked away to Viareggio, Italy where I remember laying on the warm beaches, salty air flirting with my unmanageable hair and finishing Alessandro Baricco's Ocean Sea. I can be there or hiking to Mariposa Grove in Yosemite with Robert in the snow, or on a cabana bed overlooking the Pacific in Brisas de Mita. I have the luxury of vivid memories that I store in my pocket to pull out when life gets uncomfortable.

This was just such a time.

I don't close my eyes or hum, I just...I don't know. I let my eyes unfocus and pull myself away to somewhere happier where I don't have to think or feel or worry.

When Dr Amem came in and insisted on doing some of his own looking with the ultrasound wand, I tried to unfocus again, but it was too loud and bright and there were questions to be answered and asked.

There was a follow-up with him in his office, seeing as all the chatter was taking too much time in the ultrasound room. I left with a single picture, a great 3D image of Baby Girl looking just like Evan (we discovered last appointment that Baby Boy looks just like Evan too. I make Evan clones. Hooray!), and an itinerary of my upcoming visits. Every week from here on, I'll be up there with Dr Amem or one of the Pretty Peris, peering inside my uterus keeping a close eye on things. 

Kelly and I left, and it was quiet, but we went out for Mexican food at lunch. "I need a Margarita" she said. I agreed that a fistful of tequila sounded magical. "Drinks, ladies?" asked our waiter. "Pina Colada" I ordered pointing at my belly, "I need a virgin, because clearly I'm not one". I gasped. 

I said that out loud. Kelly erupted into laughter, and our waiter grinned nervously at me. I apologized for my lack of tact and told him it was one of those days. He nodded in vague understanding.

Evan's assessment of the day.

At home, I had to rehash all the details to Robert who hadn't been there to hear it all the first go 'round. We decided that a dinner out would be nice. We decided on a Greek hole-in-the-wall that is on the cusp of downtown, but has Robert's favorite lamb.

Almost there, I turned to Evan, "Are you hungry?" He shook his head no. "Really?" I pressed, "You don't want to eat?"

And then it happened; the car was suddenly christened with a fountain of foulness that just.wouldn't.stop. We had no napkins, or even a baby wipe in the car. We pulled to a swanky grocery store, the closest pit stop we could find. I ran in for supplies, while Robert cleaned up Evan. So much for all that new car smell.

We had the windows down while Robert gave Evan a once-over bath with diaper wipes and I did the best job I could with the car seat. Evan was upset at not feeling well, so we took to singing campfire songs for the enjoyment of our toddler and all those upscale urbanites dodging into the store.

We scrapped our idea for dinner and just wanted to head home. But then it happened again. This time, we at least had wipes, but were still far away from home, so we made another emergency stop at a Target to re-clean out the car seat and the baby, and my God, it happened all over me in the store as I went to find Evan a new outfit.

We drove home quietly, and by the time we pulled in the driveway, Evan's mysteriousness vanished as quickly as it appeared and he began asking for food and a bath and play time.



It would have been good if I could have cried that night. But I couldn't. I either didn't want to or didn't know how, so I stayed harboring all that inside.



It was Thursday before I cried, and it wasn't good. Well, it was good to get it out, but not the way I did. I did it at Robert. I finally popped off at the most random comment and then tried my best not to dissolve in a fit of tears. I put myself in time out, and after Evan went to bed I sobbed and inanely chattered while Robert listened. And then he offered to rub my feet.



After that boiler explosion, things are okay. Not great, but okay. I feel like we're both still tiptoeing, waiting for the next appointment to check on things and hopefully hear something good. It's been our pattern this pregnancy of alternating good and bad appointments.

We go tomorrow morning to see how things are doing. I need some good news so I don't frenzy myself into more contractions and morning sickness. I've got too many other things to focus on.

Details will come later when I know more about what they mean.

A note of gratitude and love.

Although this blog has been quite belly-focused for the past twenty-seven weeks, there is life other than my bump.

Evan has changed so much these past few months; from a baby into a little boy. He talks in sentences, and clearly expresses himself. He's learned how to jump, to skip, to tell a joke to make himself laugh. He transitioned himself to a toddler bed and then into a regular bed, urging us to take his crib away. We worried about how he'd transition, but he seems steps ahead of us.

He has these idiosyncrasies I never want to forget about his toddlerdom; how he calls Star Wars "bots" and Mickey Mouse is "hot dog" and anything Sesame Street is "cookie".  He calls any meat on his plate "chicken" and insists on feeding himself any and all food. He asks for a bib if he's wanting yogurt, and will try most anything if he watches you eat it first.

He loves to feed the dogs their treats. He also insists on telling most everyone "hi" from cashiers to cars to birds. He'll repeat his greeting over and over until someone acknowledges it. He loves to play with trains, and his kitchen, and in our kitchen. He thinks books are the best and insists on the same bed time book each night. He likes legos and cars and puzzles. And judging from his outfits sent home from preschool: painting. He enjoys singing in the car, making requests as to who should sing next. He'll even request which car he wants to ride in.

The grocery store is a place where he gets cookies, and lest you forget, he'll remind you each time you drive by any one of the few we frequent. He likes to help whenever and wherever he can; from throwing away trash to loading laundry in the machines to putting dishes in the dishwasher. He squeals with happiness to brush his teeth and isn't satisfied until he scrubs his tongue. He'll brush his hair and then demand you do the same to yours. His favorite person is Pop-Pop (my dad). He likes to dress himself, and most of all run around until he falls down and yells "CRASH!" and dissolves in a fit of giggles.

He is possibly the most fun person I've ever been around.

Even though I'm not as limber, or fast, or energized as I used to be, he still loves to play with me. He'll pat me when I'm not feeling well, and loves to sit next to me on the bed or sofa and simply cuddle. He insists on checking on me when I'm laying down and always wants to kiss me, and the babies good-night.

And then there's Robert: the guy who has had to take on the brunt of the household work. He somehow manages to wake up before me and go to sleep after me. He's become handy at making a few breakfast staples, and manages to get Evan up and ready every single day.

Robert insists on going with me to every doctor's appointment, starting my showers and keeping me comfortable. He offers belly-rubs, foot-rubs and brings me jars of pickles when I'm in the tub.

He's indulged in my every craving, and has never once told me to shut up when I play the incessant tape of "I don't feel good" or "I'm so tired." He takes care of me, takes care of Evan, works his tail off at work, and still manages to take care of the house, too.

Robert never ceases to praise me, or tell me how attractive I am to him. He prays each night for me and Evan and the babies, and then always offers to turn off my lamp and turn on my fan, and huddles behind me in the sub-zero climate I request to sleep in.



However I ended up here, so lucky in circumstance, I don't know. I have two of the best guys in the world looking out for me and loving me. Although there are days when the time-out corner is frequented and snappy words abound in the air, I know that I've got two of the best people in my corner. This little family of mine, right on the cusp of changing, is so wonderful...and I know in my heart, from these past few years of learning how to live together, that the next chapter will be even better.

Thirty Weeks : Weddings, Weight and Walls

I hit one of the major milestones in a multiple pregnancy: thirty weeks. I also managed to somehow lose weight. Now, between the cookie eating, ice cream scarfing, cheese-sandwich eating and hummus snacking, I'm a tad confused. Even my doctor was a bit perplexed as to what to advise. I see the Pretty Peri on Tuesday to check on the babies, and make a plan from there.

I think I fully hit that wall of exhaustion. I'm not helpless, but I am certainly a lot more choosy about what tasks I'm going to do. I sleep very well at night and mostly mosey around during the day. Showers feel luxuriously amazing. I told Robert I'd be the world's worst water waster if I could figure out a way to put a pillow on the shower floor and also cart in a jar of ice-cold pickled jalapenos.

I had gone out to run some errands this week; mostly nesting and finishing off our check lists of what we needed to call ourselves ready for the babies.

"Ready to pop?" said the first cashier. I smiled politely and told her I had two months to go. And then it was a shopper, "Any day now?" Smile, nod. "That baby will be here any time" exclaimed another shopper. And on and on it went. There was this steady stream of commentary about my belly, and I honestly felt perplexed.

I asked Robert if I was looking bigger than I thought, and he bought me a pretzel and an icee. My husband is one smart guy.

I then texted Kelly about all the comments and stated "I guess I think I still look kinda petite sometimes." In the legs, arms/shoulders and face? Yes.  But in the belly? Not so much, she replied.

We texted back and forth a bit, mostly about had I actually seen my belly? I laughed and kept stating that I didn't think I was that big. And then there was this moment of side-by-side comparison to a friend who is due any day now. And then a comparison to other twin moms (that I thought were oh-so-bellyriffic and MUCH bigger)...and suddenly, I got really quiet.

"So, how about that perspective, huh?" Kelly asked.

"It's not good for me to back peddle seeing as I'm supposed to be taking it easy..." I replied.

Tonight, after changing out of the one pair of non-legging pants that still sort-of fit, I noticed my belly button had given way. It had previously been only about 50% popped out, but I was amused to note what happened without me noticing. I looked at a picture Robert had taken and said, "Well, that's why...look how big my belly is!"

I told Kelly about how I'd come to terms with my size. "I'm glad you and your belly have had a come-to-Jesus moment" she told me.

In other wardrobe adventures, one of Robert's cousins got married this weekend. I had fretted about what to wear, but ultimately settled on this:

Dress: Shabby Apple, Tights: Hue, Shoes: Fitzwell (oh so ugly, but fairly comfortable)

I'm pretty sure that's the last time that dress saw the light of day.

Twenty-Nine Weeks : Heavy Light-as-air Hearted

I've been having one of those days.

For weeks.

I don't want to say it's depression, but calling it the blues seems a little childish. Whatever the classification or vocabulary, it was there and all around me and I barely recognized that I had another thing brewing in my body. It started out small; bed rest way back in early December. I'm not the most social person on the planet, but I do like to get out and see friends and family and travel. I like wandering around Target. I'll admit that I find my inner peace on long walks, whether it is somewhere in nature or simply on the pavement around the neighborhood.

Suddenly, I felt like I was staring at four walls; the same four walls over and over. Robert brought down a TV to put in our bedroom. I watched Netflix and flipped through endless pages of books. I would open the blinds every day and get dressed to try to ward off the negativity.

But it slipped in anyways.

It's been bad recently. I've been sour and felt down, and although I felt so lonely, I didn't want to be held close. I was a (big) ball of contradiction.

I went to a girl's dinner Monday night with some friends I hadn't seen in forever. And Wednesday, Kelly came over and treated me to a day of "Operation Beautify Elizabeth" wherein she not only colored my locks, but trimmed them, cleaned up my brows and even painted my toenails. I was feeling so much better.

Dress: Michael Kors (non-maternity)

And yet, so lonely.

Saturday of this week, Robert had planned to do yard work and clean the house, and we talked about having a friend over who is watching his three kids solo while his wife is out of town. I offered to make a simple dinner for all of us. Robert had a weird reaction to it, but let me charge forward with planning. I kept reassuring him it was going to be easy to fix, and I wouldn't exhaust myself with work.

Robert told me that he didn't want me doing all the work on Saturday, so he insisted I do part of the prep work on Friday. Saturday morning came and there was nothing much to do. We made pancakes and played with Evan, and talked about plans. Robert could sense I was still struggling a bit with it, whatever it was, and offered to take me out to lunch. We went out and it was nice, but I was tired.

When we returned home, I laid down for a nap. I was in a deep sleep; two fans whirling air around me and tucked in with my Snoogle. Robert came and patted me awake, "Come with me for a second." I sat up. Shit, I thought, I slept late and his friend is here and dinner isn't ready. I sprang up (as fast as a twenty-nine-week pregnant-with-twins lady springs) and Robert said, "take your time, put on pants." I apologized for being so sleepy and lazy and popped open the bedroom door. It was still really bright out. I turned back to look at the clock. It blinked 2:15.

I froze. What was going on?

I poked my head out and saw some flowers on the living room table. "Are people here?" I asked Robert. He smiled and kissed my forehead. I rounded the column on the stairs and saw it. Saw them. All of them. A lot of them. My friends. My family. All there, waiting for me in the entry way.

And I cried.

Me, the girl who makes it impossible to do surprises and has declined offers of baby showers had the best damn baby shower, ever.

I was speechless. There were friends from online. And church. And the neighborhood. And family from here. And family from far. And friends of family.

The thing is; I've had this skeleton in my closet since February of 2010. I can tell you today, but I couldn't have told you yesterday.

When I was pregnant with Evan, Kelly wanted to throw me a baby shower. Robert and I had struggled to get pregnant, and my pregnancy was hard. Kelly was living out of town at the time, but her parents lived close by to me, and she had set the party for there. She invited my friends and had this elaborately beautiful buffet of food and cute decor.

And two people came. Three if you count Kelly. And five if you count my mother and my mother-in-law. I was humiliated.

I enjoyed the time with my three friends and ate cake, but I hurt. It wasn't about gifts. It wasn't anything physical; it was feeling alone. I felt that I didn't have support and love. That no one cared enough about me to show up and eat cake. I felt so unsupported and lonely and friendless. I felt like a loser. A failure. I felt as though no one cared I was having a baby. Whether those were accurate feelings or not is not the point; that is how I felt.

There was this raw undercurrent of emotion that stayed with me for a long time. I cried about that day on rare, unrelated occasions. I never said anything to anyone other than Robert how I felt so friendless and sad. I let a bunch of circumstances and bad timing affect how I felt. I carried that with me since then.

When I got pregnant this time, people who knew I had such a small turn-out at a previous shower offered to throw me one. I declined. I didn't want to feel that way ever again, and the best route I knew to take was avoid a party at all costs.

Not satisfied with that answer, my friends approached Robert. He thought it was a wonderful idea, but stated, "if, and only if, there is a good turn out." Again, not about the gifts. It's about the support. The people. The village of love you need and surround yourself with when you're vulnerable and need help and have lots of figuring out to do.

And yesterday was exactly that. I hugged so many friends and smiled and was patted by dozens of hands. I ate and drank and laughed. And these babies? These two wonderful little miracles still growing inside were celebrated and loved on and spoiled. People brought gifts for Evan, too.

My house was this loud, bright, chaotic frenzy of friendship and celebration yesterday. It was definitely one of the best days of my life.

After everyone left, way after the sun set, Robert pulled me close. I cried. I had this deep, emotional release of everything I'd held in for two years and in that instant, that moment when I peered into my front entry way and saw dozens of smiling faces just waiting to celebrate my family, all that hurt and sorrow and self-consciousness was replaced. It was disintegrated into thin air and disappeared over conversations and smiles and hugs.

"You deserved all that," Robert said. I shook my head. I don't like the word deserve. It's tricky and finicky.

"You needed that," Robert said. "I did," I replied. I stayed there in his arms, feeling so calm. "I feel so loved" I said after a long pause.

And I am. And I know it. And I don't know adequate words to thank people for what they did for me. Because love? It can be hard to come by sometimes. But knowing that I'm not alone, that I'm not forgotten, and that there are so many people out there wanting and wishing the best for me was the best gift I could have ever received.

You don't want to know how far I had to bend over to see my feet and what was caught on them.

Twenty-Eight Weeks : Words Are Delicious

A long time ago, back when I was still wearing pants with zippers and drank martinis, I said something dumb. Shocking, I know.

When Robert and I went to Yosemite to get married, it was a rough trip. In between the flights there, we learned one of our dogs had a seizure at the kennel and they weren't sure they could save her. I remember sitting on the next leg of the flight, crying and upset that one of my dogs had died. I was already stressed out enough about traveling and making sure we had everything for the wedding (newsflash: we didn't. Robert didn't have suit pants). (Minor spoiler: the dog was fine. It seems she either faked the whole thing or it really wasn't a big deal. What was a big deal? The vet bill we paid upon our return two weeks later.)

When we landed in Fresno, we went to pick up our car; a nice little sporty convertible we'd confirmed the day before. We went to the rental counter and checked in, and the associate made a tsk-tsk noise. She was sorry to inform us, but they didn't have a convertible after all.

Or any fun cars.

Or any regular cars.

They had one car: a mini-van.

My stress level was already through the roof and I asked, "Do I look like the type of person who would drive a mini-van?"

[Cough]

We named him T-Sizzle for no other reason than to combat the grown-up feeling of owning a mini-van.

For story-telling purposes, I feel compelled to tell you our poor associate at the rental counter that day felt bad, especially after Robert apologized for my seeming lack of brain-to-mouth filter and told her about our day and how we were flying up there to get married and blahblahblah, and she told us if we waited for an hour or so, it seemed someone was supposed to be turning in a Jeep. We got the Jeep. She got my apology. And years later, I got to eat my words. Karma!

We tried not to get a mini-van. Okay, I tried. On the day we found out it was twins way back in August, the first thing Robert said was "We're going to need a bigger car!" I was resistant. I liked my vehicle. I saw no purpose in giving it up. Surely three car seats would fit.

[Sad trombone]

I had Robert try to fit them on about six different occasions to no avail. There was no logistical way to fit three car seats in my vehicle. Or Robert's vehicle. Ugh.

So, we looked at mini-vans. And I drug my heels and felt justified when the first one I drove had about as much get up and go as my grandmother's Oldsmobile. But then? We drove a Sienna. It was nice. And fast. And it ranked fairly low on the dork factor. I told Robert we could get one by my birthday, that mid-October would be plenty of time!

I then changed the date to Thanksgiving.

Thanksgiving came and went because I kept saying "December 15!" And then December 15 turned to "the end of the year!" And then I started saying "January 15!" and then "How do you feel about March?" And Robert finally said, "January 15. No later. No excuses."

We bought it on January 14th. How's that for some negotiation? [I sometimes feel sorry for all Robert has to put up with.]

In non-vehicular news, I made it to twenty-eight weeks. Hooray! It's nothing significant, but kind of sounds that way. I'm mostly happy I had two really good doctor's appointments this past week. It seems Baby Girl is now out of the danger zone (8th percentile to the 11th percentile), and Baby Boy went and impressed us with a jump from the 17th percentile to the 42nd percentile. I also have a steel-trap cervix that not only isn't affected by contractions, it's actually grown longer. The other Pretty Peri gave me a high-five.

Perhaps the growing babies are why this dress fits a bit different now?

I've grown a few inches, but only managed to put on one measly pound this past week. The babies put on almost a pound each. Math like that hurts my head.

I'm feeling okay; a bit tired here and there, a bit queasy occasionally and random bits of heartburn, but nothing really to note. I don't feel that big, to be honest. I had a feeling that by the time I was in my third trimester I'd be a gravitational anomaly; leaving everyone wondering how I wasn't tipping over simply by being upright. But? I think I still look compact. Sure, I look pregnant, but not in the "Oh my gosh, are you having twins? Or due any day now?" type of commentary.

This is more what I really look like day to day. I tried on the dress in the above picture to see if I would feel comfortable wearing it to a wedding in a few weeks. I wouldn't dare wear heels to the event, but wanted to feel fancy, if only for a second. I think I'll wear a much prettier dress my friend Papar has lent me....paired with some flip-flops.

It's becoming more and more real to me that things are changing. The nursery wasn't that big of a deal; it's a room upstairs that I decorated and then shut the door to. But now, with the new car, the list of things we need to be ready is dwindling; finish sewing curtains, buy another infant car seat, find a bouncer, borrow an extra swing. We have tons of clothes, swaddling blankets and toys. I've even stashed a bottle or two in case we need to supplement. A twin breast-feeding pillow is on order.

Now, we wait. Grow babies, grow.