Home Stretch

I'm 10 days out from my due date. Will he come on time? Early? Late? It seems most first time pregnancies are late so I'm not counting on anything until after the 15th (just please not too late Logan!). I have finally started feeling the uncomfortable-ness that a lot of women talk about. For the most part I'm pretty good, but I'm definitely not sleeping as well as I used to and I'm having all sorts of little pains and pressure throughout the day. I have gained around 27lbs so far, and feel like a moose. People tell me I'm not but who is really going to say anything too horrible to someone 9 months pregnant? But I'm ready to be done and not have to lease space to another human in my body anymore :) I know we are in for a ride when he gets here but it will be nice to not be pregnant.

So here I am in all my glory. We've been taking weekly pictures (just a missed a few) with me in the same outfit. I thought that maybe I painted myself into a corner and wouldn't be able to fit into it at the end but it surprisingly does still fit. Even the shirt - I think right now just a bit of my belly peaks out on the bottom if I were to put it all the way down.


And here I am from the front. I think it's weird that you can still sort of see my waist, with what looks like a basketball placed on top.

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Cheering for Florida State

Marty said, "I forgot what you looked like!"

37+ weeks

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November 22

I got to cheer on one of my very best friends from afar while she did her first IM in Arizona. She did awesome finishing in 11:00:03 (her goal was 11 hours so I'd say she nailed it pretty good). Kari and I made her a video and lots of posters since we couldn't be there to cheer her on in person. Kari and I wrote the script and acted in it, Marty filmed, directed and edited, and Jimmy and Bobby also made appearances. I'll just say it - we are hilarious.

Tassie says, "Happy Turkey Day!"


She has lots of toys that she pretty much equally plays with (so that makes them spread all over our house). You may notice 2 other toys in this picture, all ingeniously named. Of course, there's 'turkey', then 'ducky' not too far behind her, and finally a bit of 'santa' in the far back.

Here's a Tassie story from this morning. Marty got up early (story of his life) to go coach Master's and Tassie was up with him. When I get up on days like this, she is usually right outside the door waiting for me. Not today. She was laid up in Logan's room and when I walked in there she didn't even lift her head. She did open her eyes and then very lazily lifted her leg so I could come over and scratch her belly. Spoiled dog.

Things I'm going to miss about being pregnant:

• Feeling him move around and kick. I thought this was going to be super weird and it was at the beginning but now it's just so neat and I know I'm going to miss it. At this point he doesn't have as much room so when he moves you can see his foot (or heel, or whatever) poking out of my stomach.
• Having thick hair. Okay, it's technically not thicker, but when you're pregnant your hair doesn't shed as much (or really at all). I have very fine hair and not a whole lot of it so this has been awesome. What's not going to be awesome is when it does shed after his birth (which it will). Then I'll be bald and overweight...not going to be a good look, that's for sure.
  

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Soooo excited! This weekend we're going to go see the latest Twilight movie - Breaking Dawn Part 1. All of these movies are totally cringe-worthy with the terrible acting but I can't NOT go see it. I absolutely loved the books.

Quote from a review in the NY Times, too funny:

"...as is the unavoidable truth that Mr. Lautner, whose pumped physique and flat affect bring to mind one of those friendly pizza delivery boys in a pornographic movie, remains a dish best served with as few words and clothes as possible."

How can you not want to see a movie as well done as that?

The other movie I can't wait to see (but I'll have to wait until March) is The Hunger Games.

Here's the trailer.

This book was awesome - and it's short for those of you anti-readers (I don't get you, by the way). It's a trilogy and I definitely feel that each book got worse, but it didn't stop me from blowing through all 3.

Pregnancy is still humming along. I'm 36 weeks now and don't feel any signs of early labor. I've heard that on average first pregnancies go 10 days late. Let's hope not as that would put him being born on Christmas. No one wants that, especially the little guy because you know he'll get screwed in the gift department for his entire life.

Total aside, but why does blogger insist on putting all sorts of spaces into my posts? How do I get rid of them? You add one picture and it wants all this blank area between every paragraph, no matter how many times I go in and delete them.

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Marty's 40th Birthday

What better way to spend a birthday then at a Foo Fighters concert? At least, that's what I thought. I imagine if you're not a fan you might think of other things you'd rather do, but for the Gaal's this was an awesome one.

So I'm bringing it WAY back - to the very beginning of me and Marty. When I first met him he had just been to a concert in Orlando with some of his friends; Foo Fighters/Red Hot Chili Peppers (what a concert!). I was super jealous and told him I LOVED Foo. If they were ever touring close we would definitely get tickets.

And they never toured close to where we were until now. The second I heard they would be in Charlotte I knew we had to get tickets. Oh yeah, I would be 8 months pregnant - is that safe? Google and several nurse friends assured me it was no problem. And I did see other pregnant girls at the concert, too.

We had a nice dinner before the shows and made it to the venue for the 2nd opening act (Social Distortion). They played for around 45min before the Foo Fighters came on.

It. Was. Awesome.

Best concert I've ever been to. Dave Grohl is awesome and funny and runs all over the place interacting with fans. They played for almost 3 hours but it went by so quick because it was just that good.

And they ended with Everlong - the song that turned me onto the band back in the late 90's. My phone of course, would never do them justice, but here's a little snippet.

A few pics:

Bobby, Marty, Me, Kelly, Heather, Alex and Kari (hiding my belly on request)

I beat Marty in pool before dinner

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Getting Close!

This week I'll be 35 weeks pregnant! At 37 weeks, you are considered 'full term' although really you want that bun to cook for the full 40 weeks. And that is fine by me. I hear a lot of women start saying, "I'm over it" or "I can't wait until this baby is out" but I'm over here saying "I'm not ready yet!" I almost feel guilty at how good I feel - I've admitted to a few people that there are a few times where I still forget I'm pregnant! A quick glance down at my belly or an internal kick to the ribs quickly gets me out of that mindset.

I haven't run in over a week and a half now, and may be done with that at this point. It's just sort of uncomfortable - lots of pressure and not really all that enjoyable. But I'm still swimming (and yes, still flipturning) and the elliptical feels great. I'm also taking walks which is so low on the exercise level but it sure is nice right now with our cool weather and beautiful fall leaves.



Marty and I both do feel a bit more confident in our overall knowledge at least. I drug him to a 5 week labor and birth course that just finished up this past week. We also went to a breastfeeding class and a newborn basics class. The latter at which I proceeded to rip the first diaper I changed. That cannot bode well for the future.

In other news, Marty's birthday celebration/end of the year triathlon party was a smashing success. LOTS of people came to the Flying Saucer - so many that you could hardly move in the back room that we rented (total fire hazard!). Everyone was dressed up and looking all spiffy - including the man of the hour. After an hour or so we all went out to the main bar where we literally overtook the place (apologies to the regular patrons) so we could see Marty's plate unveiling. There were lots of cheers and and a chant of "Marty! Marty!" throughout and then we finally got to see his personalized plate: It had his name and quote - "One Beer Beyond" Clever, eh?

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Fun with pictures

This past weekend I spectated the Beach 2 Battleship half and full iron distance races. Marty wrote a detailed race report you should check out (you don't get these very often from him). I spent most of my day running around Wrightsville and Wilmington with my good friend Alysia - it's always a good time when we're together. After Marty finished, he grumbled and stumbled around for a short time before we hopped on a boat to get back to downtown Wilmington. We quickly found a lunch spot and I have to estimate that the time from him finishing hunched over with a locked up back and to when this picture was taken couldn't have been more than hour.

We had big plans of dressing up for Halloween and cheering on the rest of the full distance racers but situations beyond our control foiled them. First, the awards ceremony was way later than advertised and by the time we were able to get back into downtown where the car was parked was several hours behind where we thought we would be. Now we really didn't have time to drive back to Wrightsville, shower, change, and get back into downtown. Plus, we were both exhausted. And the kicker - it was FREEZING! So we dressed up last night and took some fun pictures.

We have 22 years of Catholic school between the 2 of us, just FYI :)

Next Tuesday is Marty's 40th birthday, but this Saturday we'll be celebrating at the Flying Saucer with lots of people. Here's a picture of Marty with me and Anna (his sister) at his surprise 30th birthday. We were all babies!

And finally, I frequent several different blogs, some of people I do actually know and have met, and others that I haven't ever met, but feel like I know. Imagine my surprise when I went to Kim Schwabenbauer's blog yesterday only to see quite possibly the most unflattering running picture of myself.

That's Kim on the left looking all relaxed and that's me on the right looking like I'm about ready to crap my pants. Please notice how much of my midriff is showing -- this was not allowed by the NCAA at the time (I have no idea if that's still a rule) but my torso is freakishly long and none of my uniforms ever came down to my bunhuggers. I would have to slouch/hunch at the starting line so the officials wouldn't notice. It's also why people tell me I look relatively small for how many weeks pregnant I am - baby's got a lot of room in there. I guarantee he won't actually be small and am fully expecting at least a 9lb-er.

But I digress - this picture was shot at the Spiked Shoe Invitational my senior year. I have vague recollections of the actual race; I didn't run great but I also didn't run horribly (sort of like my entire collegiate career). What I remember the most is that for some reason we stayed overnight after the race which was not something we typically did (the night before, yes, but we were usually on a flight back home the same day as the race). So me and my friend who was also 21 called a cab from our hotel and went to a bar that night. We ended up at the Rathskeller and had a great time. We didn't exactly sneak out since we just walked out the front door, but we certainly didn't ask anyone if we could go out. I'm sure if we had we would've been met with an emphatic 'NO' Ahhh, college :)

The most frightening thing about the above photo is that it looks like it was a poster or media guide, meaning that picture was on walls or still in storage bins...of course I'm not helping matters by posting it. I promise never to make that face (while running).

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