I've hopped aboard the consumer train these past couple of days, trying to piece together the beginnings of a baby registry for the folks chomping at the bit to help out. It is mind boggling how many different changing pads, strollers, cloth diapers, and random baby things there are to wade through. I have some strong preferences on some of the basic gear after so many years of baby care, most of them leaning away from our income bracket, but even with only the bare minimum in mind I came away from the laptop cringing with ickyness...how could one little person need so much stuff? And we don't even have a nursery!
I turned from on-line to real world retail today in a mission to find some maternity jeans. After complaining at the beginning of last week that I'll never show or look anything like any of the pictures in my pregnancy books I had a ton of abdominal pain on Thursday and suddenly was sporting a belly on Friday. It is nice to finally have some physical evidence of this crazy process, but I'm getting to the point with my jeans where the elastic trick isn't cutting it. (The elastic trick is very useful for pregnancy or weight gain - you thread an elastic - rubber band for those of you not raised on the East Coast - through the button hole of your pants and loop it 'round the button, so you gain a couple of inches of stretch without the flap hanging out. You do have to make sure you have a long enough shirt to cover your dropping zipper, though, and it is disarming to feel like your pants are undone all day long.) Maternity jeans are wacky, but way more comfortable.
And thus ends my weekend in mommy shopping hell. Luckily we also caught "The Departed", a nice Thai dinner, and a couple of marathon walks around the neighborhood. All in all all too normal and a bit boring. I'll have to start refreshing my alternative lifestyle practice to be a real role model to this kid.
It is that time of year again - the time when I get a little tired of looking at pink roses and purple lavender blooming in the garden and long for some yellow mums or an orangey-red maple tree, for just a whisper of that smokey, musky, cold scent of fall. Instead of the annual New Englander's trip to the apple orchard, here in Northern California we journey to the vineyards. The golden (dried up) hillsides and the autumn hued (dying) grape leaves can trick me into thinking there's a fall here, too. Nat and I headed up to Sonoma yesterday to catch a bit of the harvest and the upscale equivalent of Drumlin Farm's mule driven hayride through the fields - a biodiesel tractor tram ride through the Benziger vineyard. Even thought the day was overcast and much cooler than it has been lately, it was still a rockin' good time. Benziger's tour is by far the best in our estimation - not only do we love that the vineyard is certified Biodynamic, they really try to give you a sense of the whole process. We got to go through the fields and see the grapes plump on the vines, check out the smashing, go into the caves they've carved out of Sonoma Mountain, and end it all with a special tasting of some private and reserve wines. That part was pretty funny. I took the equivalent of one sip between all the wines and Nat drank the rest of mine on top of his.
Tonight I'm trying to retain a sense of the fall-ness by cooking a bunch of comfort veggies that remiond me of the farm and the cold weather - squash, spinach and asparagus casserole, herby rice pilaf...yum.
"Up to 70 percent of expectant mothers have nausea, sometimes with vomiting, early in pregnancy. Queasiness may be most noticeable in the morning, but it can occur at any time. It generally improves by the 13th or 14th week of pregnancy."
A SCENE FROM THIS MORNING (17 weeks, 1 day preggers):
Erin finishes up a breakfast of english muffins, oj, and a mostly-steamed-milk latte. She packs her lunch, does the breakfast dishes, and goes to brush her teeth. After brushing a few times, she suddenly vomits. Twice. Yuck. She cleans the sink of the regurgitaed breakfast, reapplies toothpaste to the brush, and starts all over again. And then vomits three more times. Out the nose, too. Way yuck. So, she cleans out the sink, rinses her mouth, and tries the old toothbrushing one last time. And vomits. And thinks, "Will I ever get to work WITHOUT puke breath today?" And brushes her teeth successfully. Ah, the simple things.
Oh, what a musical weekend. Kicked it all off with a Paul SImon concert at the Greek Theater here in Berkeley (thank you, craigslist for always providing cheap last minute seats.) and wrapped it all up with 2 fuller-than-full days at the annual Hardly Strictly Bluegrass festival across the Bay in Golden Gate Park. It was AWESOME, and FREE! The weather was summery and perfect, and the bands were spectacular. I've been really into banjos since I first heard Bela Fleck at 17 and my enthusiasm and knowledge definitely grew with exposure to all the great southern alt/country/bluegrass bands during my years in Mississippi. I worry sometimes that I'm stuck in an old-timey, tears-in-the-bottle-folksy, janglin' and ramblin' rut in terms of my musical preferences, but then an event like this happens and I feel like a kid in a candy store stocked with her favorite flavors. Some of the tastiest were at the show - Gillian Welch, and David Rawlings, Jerry Douglas, Emmylou Harris, Danny Barnes, Elvis Costello, the North Mississippi Allstars, and Steve Earle. Plus I finally got to hear Richard Thompson in all his uber-guitarist glory. Oh, AND T--Bone Burnett, AND Billy Bragg, AND....(I could go on, you see, it was that big.) No Bela or Tony Furtado or Be Good Tanyas, but they would have just made the decisions of which stage to be at any given time that much more difficult.
Free concerts are such an inspiring experience. There were so many different types of people, and so much variability to the music. Even though I'd heard of and heard many of the bands, I still got to be exposed to new folks and new permutations of old songs. And I got to hang with some good buddies. There was no worrying that we were "getting our money's worth" or that our seats were good enough. No stressing over the $6 vendor baked potato or the $15 cd. Heck, I WANTED to by the merchandise just to give some sort of economic support to the performers. And the diversity of audience...we certainly didn't get that at the Paul Simon concert. There just aren't that many people willing to shell out upwards of $50 a ticket to sit on a cold, steep hill a stadium's length away from the performer on a foggy night. And those that are look pretty similar to one another. Cold. And white. And way too into singing along to "You can call me Al." I'm totally into singing along, don't get me wrong, I was belting out Amazing Grace with one of the performers this morning, but there was a sort of twilight zone thing going on when Paul Simon launched into that song.
The best news is that the baby seems to dig low basses and twanging as much as his/her momma. I started to feel it wriggling around this week, and it was totally getting down whenever a real raucous tune came on this weekend. I have a feeling Nat and I are going to need to practice our amped-up lullaby performance routine to keep this one happy. He's already working on "Vincent Black Lightening." Not the most upbeat song for a fetus, but gorgeous nonetheless. Let me know if you have any favorite lullabies/"kid"songs, or simply favorites that might be good for in-utero exposure. I'm open to suggestions, with or without banjos...
I wish, wish, wish we had a video camera for this one... After breakfast out on Saturday we took the opportunity to toy store shop and bought the little pea its first stuffy, a softer than soft little black bear. When we got home, I figured it'd be fun to see who was softer - Oliver or the bear. The introduction was like an episode of Wild Kingdom. Nat pulled the bear out of the bag and Oliver instantly arched his back and put up all his fur. He then slunk down to the floor and slowly, so slowly, approached the intruder, flinching every time we laughed or touched the intruder. He never blinked. When he realized the bear couldn't move of its own accord, he sniffed it all over, tentatively. Apparently it was finally to his liking, because he started to groom the thing! Nat put the bear back in the bag and took it to the closet, and Oliver followed, watching like a hawk. He kept an eye on the closet for the entire night. II can just imagine having to do introductions for every stuffed animal to come...
This is rapidly becoming a pregnancy blog, but heck, that's where I'm at lately. This morning, lying in bed with aching legs from a long day on my feet yesterday and a queasy stomach, I was contemplating how sucky early pregnancy has been for me. Beyond the lack of energy, constant nausea and upchucking, and general "who's body is this??" grapplings, I've also had to give up a lot. Brie, for one thing., which is a BIG thing in our household. Tuna, for another...the one and only sandwich I like. The Banned From Pregnancy list is comprehensive: no soft cheeses, no lunch meats or deli foods, no alcohol, no swordfish, mackerel, or tuna. No sushi, no undercooked meat, no handling meat. No raw root vegetables (that toxoplasmosis thing again), cut the coffee, stop the chocolate, no gardening without gloves, no lifting heavy things, no cleaning up after your cats. No paint fumes, no hair dye, no fingernail polish, and no even walking into a nail salon (my poor, scratchy, pedicure-less heels.) No hot tubs, no long showers, no long bike rides. Nevermind the other stuff I feel guilty about exposing myself to...the times I've had to use rubber cement to affix signs and finish art projects at work during the first trimester. The copier toner I inhale running off letters and teaching packets and lessons. The formaldehyde infused sharks I dissected with the older kids this summer when I didn't want anyone to know I was pregnant. The artificial colors and flavors the poor fetus gets exposed to almost daily as a result of my ceaseless sugar and carbonation cravings. I never drink soda, and now I want it all the time. Sparkling water and juice seems to hot the same spot, but the cravings have me dreaming of Coke. I've also given up my semi-veg status and gone whole hog on the meat eating to boost my protein intake and curb the sickness - I always thought pregnancy would be when I would be the best vegetarian I could be - no processed anything, no sugar, 8 servings of beans a day, a soymilk resurgence. Instead, I find that I can't possibly stomach the amount of legumes and even dairy it would take to reach the mythic 75 grams of protein I'm supposed to be getting, and I've turned towards animals. Luckily I'm in California and have access to the hormone/antibiotic-free, less impact variety, but still, it seems a bit of a letdown. I wanted to be a study in pregnancy perfection, I suppose - the glowing, robust, energetic, healthy model of a balanced, holistic baby bakery. Yet, the minutiae and the complexity of what can impact this baby is overwhelming and permeates absolutely everything I do. There is no way to avoid all of it, or to even be aware of most of it. And yet, even with the occasional coke icee, I've got to trust that I am doing the best that I can, and that the kid will be fine.. And if it isn't, well, it may not be the bacon's fault. Time to roll with the changes and accept (with heavy resistance) the limitations, good lessons for every parent.
