Two Weeks into the Wide Blue Yonder

Introducing Ryann Serena Hiscock!

Birthday Bash

Since Jared and I both have birthdays early in October, we decided that we would combine our birthday celebrations as well as our last big date night out before Ryann joins our little family. We talked about what we wanted to do and finally settled on going out for dinner at Creektown Cafe, followed by the opening concert at the symphony, finished up by dessert out at Saffron. We also decided that we would take this spit up free, poopiless opportunity to get dressed to the nines. I wore my latest recital dress while Jared wore his tux jacket with jeans and a sweater, under approval of the JCrew consultant.

The dinner was delicious, the concert was surprisingly good (considering most of the music programmed), and dessert was a blast. Yay for good food, good times, and most of all, good friends!

Pictures Commemorating Five weeks from D-Day

Below is a collection of photos from week 35 of Ryann's occupation. We are currently closing in on week 36 and are in disbelief at how soon she is coming. We really can't wait to meet this little corker. And my innards wants their space back.

Delinquent Belly Pictures

I just noticed that the last belly shot that I posted was from 24 weeks! Yikes! It's unrecognizable now. As an apology I will post the last THREE shots that we've taken. And as soon as we have week 35, I'll get that up here as well.

29.5 weeks

31 weeks

32.5 weeks

Brown Paper Packages Tied up with Packing Tape

Today is our 34 week checkup, though technically it's closer to 35 weeks. I ended up having to reschedule our appointment because when I originally scheduled it I completely spaced on a work meeting that was at that exact time. As a result, these next two appointments will be quite close together. The better to satisfy the Ryann craving! Always so much fun to hear her little heartbeat. Also nice to know that there's still something on earth that has a higher pulse than me. She outstrips my horrifying 95 by racing along at about 145. We had better have good models that can deal with a lot of milage, because they're getting a workout.

This week is an exciting mail week, as it brings not one, not two, but THREE deliveries. There's really nothing more fun than getting a package in the mail. The first one arrived yesterday and bore our long awaited diaper bag. Jared originally found it online a few months ago, but at the time it was an exorbitant amount and we just couldn't bring ourselves to actually fork over the cash. However, when returning to ogle again this past week, we saw that it was on sale. Not only on sale, on a $50 off sale! So, while it's still a bit pricey, we indulged and bought the bag. Noreen is now enjoying the packing box.

The second package should arrive today and will come filled with crib bedding. Sheets and a bumper and a crib skirt. And while we originally didn't plan on going all girly-girl on her, the crib will be flowing in pink. But it's a cute pink! Really! I swear! You'll just have to see.

The third package will be the salvation of my winter wardrobe. It will come bearing a full-length pair of pants (capris were never meant for winter), a skirt to be paired with my lovely boots and tights, and a gorgeous sweater dress that should cover Ryann quite comfortably. Also a new pair of comfy pants to live out my maternity leave in, as my current pair has now been cropped, is oddly stretched in the knees, and sports holes across my backside. They are way past due for a replacement.

In addition to the package excitement for the week, we have also been basking in birthday glory. Jared's birthday was just this past Friday while mine is this coming Sunday. Hip hip hooray! I dread the day I start dreading birthdays, they're so much fun! Let's hope Ryann waits an appropriate amount of time to celebrate hers. As long as she remembers she's supposed to be a NOVEMBER baby, then we'll be fine. And no Halloween birthdays. Creepy. Although that would make for some awesome birthday photo shoots in the future with Molly, the perfect Halloween cat. But I think I'll pass.

Vampires Vegetarian Salvation

I love beets. Really really love beets. I was going to eat my two huge beets for lunch, but partway through Jared suggested that I save the rest for supper, as I already looked like a vampire - post feeding. So I grudgingly agreed to finish up lunch with the leftover beans and save the remainder of my beets for another time.

As I'm sure most of you have experienced, eating beets leads to . . . interesting looking, to say the least, restroom leavings. Purple and pink. A little girl's dream. And I suppose a little boy's too, in the gross-out department. Hehe. I always look forward to it. Can you imagine if you got sick and threw up after you ate a bunch of beets? Ew, now that would be gross.

I threatened to throw a beet into my morning smoothie. That's when I got the idea for the vampires. They should really all become beet farmers. Much more sustainable and less gruesome. Unless you run into them right after a feeding. Then it all looks the same.

Family Passing Through

Last night my sister and brother-in-law were passing through town. Now, I'm pretty sure that everyone reading this blog knows me and Kristin, but just in case, let me explain this. We are twins. Separated by two years. But bound by strange mind vibes and many years of sharing close quarters. We are two Charles Wallaces, kything. And we have not seen eachother in over a year. However, David's brother is getting married this weekend (Congratulations!) and they stayed with us last night on their way up to Lethbridge. They ended up getting into town about 7 last night and we all went over to the Dettwiler's (cousins) for a huge haystack supper. After that we trekked back to the apartment and showed the Dettwilers our little nest and then holed up for an evening of talking and baby poking and some sleep.

Though Kristin and David are already gone, I feel better having had a bit of a sister fix and knowing that I get her for a whole month when Ryann gets here. Yay! And Mom too. So much family goodness. And then Dad and David to add to the pile for Thanksgiving. Can't wait.

Today it finally hit me that while I've been functioning under the time table of Ryann arriving in 8 more weeks, it may very well be sooner than that. Lately I've had a gut feeling that she's coming early, and since babies are considered full- term-ish from 37 weeks on, this means that she could be here in as little as 5 weeks. Crazy! However, as much as we can't wait to meet her, we are perfectly willing to wait for her to come fully baked. No raw babies here.

FuzziBunz

Jared and I have been going back and forth over whether to use disposable diapers or cotton. There's lots of talk on both sides on which is better for the environment and for Ryann's little bottom. We had finally settled on using disposables, but the unbleached, biodegradable kind. However, yesterday, while perusing one of my favorite blogs, www.pacingthepanicroom.blogspot.com, I found that they are hosting a FuzziBunz giveaway! So, if we happen to win the drawing, Hooray for Ryann's bum! And if not, on with our plan of friendly disposables. If you're curious as to what cotton diapers are like nowadays, go check them out at www.fuzzibunz.com. And cross your fingers.

Tardy Update

Why hello, all of you patient peoples. I have discovered that I am as faithful at writing a blog as I was at keeping a diary, back in the day. Sad for all of you, not a surprise for me. So, even though I have no pictures on hand to post, I thought that I could at least give you an update on how we're all doing. Let us commence.

I am now undeniably huge and pregnant. I find myself walking around sometimes and noticing that people are giving me cute little smiles and I start to wonder, 'What is up with them? Kinda creepy.' And then I remember that I'm pregnant. It's the pregnant cutesy smile. Very cute. When I remember what it is.

My Mom was just in town for about two weeks, which was really fun. Usually I only get to see Mom and Dad about once a year, but this year I get to see Mom three times! And Dad twice! Though the first time I saw Dad this year was only for a few hours. Lame. But much better than the average. While Mom was in town, she so kindly agreed to help Jared and me finish up painting our apartment. A project that we began a year ago and simply ran out of steam on. I'm afraid I was actually very little help on the actual painting, though I did get to several other odd jobs that had been waiting in the wings, much to the detriment of my baby bearing back. Mom was shocked and horrified by one of our kitchen corners, rightly so. You know when you see something every day, you don't really realize how bad it's getting? That was this corner. So, to all of you who have visited us and come over for meals and games, I apologize for that corner. If you can bear to come again, you will happily find that the apartment is now entirely bright and clean and cheery. No scary corners.

We're just about to begin the third trimester and I'm afraid that the fatigue is already setting in. This last week I seem to have been ridiculously tired and slow for no apparent reason, apart from this little stowaway, that is. It's hard to believe that in just a few months we'll actually have another little person in the apartment. Crazy. Two of our friends have just had babies within the last week or two and visiting them and holding the babies made the whole idea much more real. Also very exciting. I think it really kick-started Jared's impatience. Though we do want Ryann to stay in there until she's ready to come out, he can't wait until she is ready to come out and meet us. I think I'm going to have a hard time getting her out of his arms for a while.

Now, I will make no promises and vow no vows, but I will try to post some pictures soon. Really and truly.

New Living Room and Bigger Belly

The Big Reveal

Yesterday was the big mid-pregnancy ultrasound. It was really fun to lay there and watch the ultrasound tech find all the little parts of baby. Pointing out the kidneys and stomach. Watching the heart pump away. The baby measured right on track, 19 weeks and 6 days. We were kinda scared that they wouldn't be able to tell us if it's Ryann or Israel in there because they were squashed back into a corner upside down and facing backwards, not a very cooperative baby. However, right at the end the tech found a lucky angle. So we now know that we're carting around little Ryann Serena. I do have some more ultrasound pictures to put up, and promise to do that by the end of the week.

When the doctor was listening to the heartbeat it kept being interrupted by these big bangs. The doctor told us that was Ryann kicking. Oh boy. Right now I can't feel much of anything, but I have a feeling I'm going to be kicked to a pulp by this little one. Every time we've gone in to the doctor they laugh about how active she is. She never holds still for her measurements, just jumps and kicks and waves. I wonder if this is a sign of things to come.

This last weekend was Jared's sister's wedding. It was pretty fun to see her get married. She was a gorgeous bride and was very happy. They're now toasting themselves down in St. Lucia, lucky ducks.

On the way back we hit quite a bit of rain going over Snoqualmie pass. This wouldn't have been a problem, except for the fact that our windshield wipers are a bit gimpy. The right one is just fine, but the left one keeps working its way farther and farther to the edge of the car until it flies off the side and rests itself on the mirror. However, being the master jimmy rigger I am, we now have them ties together with a pair of iPod headphones that had already surrendered to the fuzz. So now our wipers work like a charm and our headphones weren't all a waste. Though we do get a lot of odd looks.

Some pictures to satisfy the masses

The other day while I was taking a bath I kept hearing the most intriguing crinkling sound. I figured it must be one of the cats, so I called them. But of course, being cats, they did not come. After I got out I snooped around to see if the crinkler was still about their business, and this is what I found.

She had actually knocked the lid off and taken over the box all on her own. Noreen tried this the other day as well, but being twice the size of Molly, he wasn't quite so successful. Though I think he would disagree. He looked a bit like an overstuffed, overrisen loaf of bread. But he was happy.

Last weekend, Jared happened to be in Portland on the WWU choir tour. He took along his brand new daddy cam and shot me a bunch of (dog looking for a place to pee) lovely videos. However, I do think he's going to try to tame his use of the words 'awesome' and 'wow' now. While he was in Portland he stopped by Moonstruck Chocolatier's and bought me a wonderful little 6 piece truffle box. Of course my favorite truffle is the one below.

And now for the long awaited belly shots. I apologize for the long wait and the random timings of the photos. We had great intentions of taking many many photos all in the same clothes in the same place and in the same pose, because that's always so awesome and creepy. Alas, I take after my Mother in my photo-taking habits. Toting my camera everywhere with me and taking not a single picture. Don't worry, we are working on curbing this habit.

7 weeks

9 weeks

15 weeks

15 weeks

Enjoy!

For all those followers out there...

this is for you. Not really a whole lot going on here on the baby front. He seems to be resting up from his big triple pow on Monday. It takes a lot of energy to flutter like that. We have our next appointment this coming Wednesday, so we should have a bunch of news and pictures from that, so don't change the channel.

So, I know that a lot of people like to keep the names a secret until the big reveal, but we're not very secretive people. Jared and I have settled on a boy's name and a girl's name, so we should be set either way. So, with the roll of the drum...

Israel Emil

or

Ryann Serena

And no, there really aren't any backgrounds on the names, except Serena. I'm named after my great-grandma, and her daughter is my grandma, Serena. So, there you go. The circle of life. On a side note - did you know that when I was a kid I always wanted to be named after someone? It seemed so cool. It didn't hit me until I was about 12 that I am named after someone. Wow. Blonde moment. Or childhood.

Our fridge died again. Luckily I think we were able to save most everything. However, today for lunch, Jared discovered that our jams were not very good anymore. We had four delicious jars of local jam; peach, raspberry, blackberry, and blueberry. But they smelled a bit like wine jelly. A bit too sharp for their own good. How very sad. Guess we'll have to toss those. I think Jared is in mourning. He is a jammy boy.

Last night we had a friend from Eugene, OR stay over. It was really great to see her, but I hope she was very asleep last night. First of all you must know that Jared and I let the cats out onto the roof most of the time. When it's nice out, which it was last night, we just leave the window open all night. In the middle of the night, I woke up to cats yowling outside our window, cat fight. I woke up and in my bleary state decided that one of our cats must have fallen off the roof and was now terrorizing the neighborhood. Actually, it's more likely that they would be the terrorizee than the terrorizer. So I jumped out of bed, smashed on my glasses and ran out into the living room. Our guest, meanwhile is sleeping in the middle of the living room on our little crib mattress. So I whisper/yell in her direction, 'I don't have any pants on!' and proceed in search of the cats. Molly jumps right in the window, but her tail is enormous, which only strengthens my fear that it was Noreen getting bullied outside. So I run and get a sweater, and yes, I put on pants, and run down the stairs to get Noreen. Outside, there is no sign of a cat, though there is an abundance of orange hair scattered around our steps. After I've been wandering around for a while calling Noreen and worrying the neighbors, I go back in to see if I missed him there. Of course, when I shake the food, he jumps in the window. I think the scaredy-cat hid under the eaves when the fight broke out and wouldn't budge except for food. I closed the window and went to bed. But the cats aren't used to Jared and I having our door pulled shut, and it apparently disturbed them greatly. I next awoke to desperate clawing at the door. I think Noreen wanted in, but then realized that our guest was right behind him. Instead of giving up on the door and finding sanctuary elsewhere, it simply instilled in him a sense of urgency and desperation that required me to once again leap out of bed and appease him. None of this did Jared hear. I hope the baby takes after his daddy.

General Back-Info on 'It's' Progress

Mom, that title was just for you. We actually rarely call him an 'it'. We usually call the baby 'him', so we're in for some weird changes if we find out it's a girl. Maybe we'll call him Heshe, in honor of old grumpy-pants.

Jared and I found out that we were going to add to our little family on March 7. And on March 8 I promptly crashed in bed with a wicked week-long fever. As a result, we waited for a while before telling anyone about the little hitchhiker, just to make sure he was still along for the ride. We have a total of four pee sticks and a very active ultrasound video to prove that he's not to be budged.

When we were ready to announce the news, we wanted to do it in a fun and, for some, confusing way. We found that women generally saw it coming, while men had to have women tell them what it meant. The announcement is below:

Those were a lot of fun to make and send out. We knew people would get a kick out of them. After that, it was pretty quiet for a while. People around campus were slowly finding out, which was fun. Recently, people around campus have been noticing, which is even more fun.

The latest greatest news on the baby front is that I felt the first little kicks yesterday. They felt like three little popcorns popping in my belly. And no, it was not gas.