We took the dogs to the vet last weekend and mentioned in passing that Gouda has been having intermittent bowel issues again. The vet asked us to bring in a sample next time he did and so I scooped up a really good one for them to bring in on Wednesday.

Today we had a voicemail from the vet talking about “spore forming rods” in his poo and about how that means that his body is overproducing some bacteria which is causing the problems. She prescribed metronidazole and said we’ll see how it goes and said the next step would be a blood panel.

This all sounds oh-so-very-familiar.

We saw a different vet this time, at the same clinic we’ve been going to. I talked about possibly switching vet offices so we could follow the vet we liked so much from the practice we go to, but in the end this office is closer and on the way home from work which makes it super easy to pick up medication. Anyways! Tomorrow I’m going to call to talk to this new vet that we saw to make sure she has completely looked over his chart to see that last  year what we did was a little something like this:

Metronidazole + Probiotics (several courses of it)
ZD Low Allergen Chow
Blood Work
B12 Shots
Pancreatic Enzymes
Prednisone

With, as far as I know, no actual final diagnosis except that the enzymes were crazy expensive and did not work, and the prednisone did. Then he was on the ZD chow for a long time with no meds and I think he did OK, and then we slowly moved him back to regular chow and he was fine on that for a long time, but recently he’s been getting worse again and I really wish we could figure out why!

At least this time he doesn’t seem sick. He’s still playful and acting completely normal (for him) so I guess we’ll see how it goes! If we’re lucky I’m hoping we can just get him on the metronidazole, keep his regular chow, and never let him eat anything out of the ordinary again (although I honestly can’t figure out what could have caused this semi-regular problem this time).

Seriously! I need another weekend to help me recover from my weekend!

Nate and I took the Labor and Delivery weekend cram session. It was from 9-4 on Saturday (which included lunch at the hospital… yum….) and then from 9-1 on Sunday! It was very informative, and the instructor was awesome! She’s also the mom of a girl that Meg is friends with, so small world! Anyways, like I said. Very informative in an “are you sure there isn’t a drug that makes you sleep through your entire labor and delivery and doesn’t wake you up until the baby is born?” kind of way. Yikes!

Also Saturday night was a couple’s baby shower. It was pretty fun. The men had to drink 4oz. of beer out of baby bottles. It looked really hard! My husband won though, so it was a proud moment for me.

Anyways, on account of the fact that the weekend was SO BUSY (we went baby-stuff-shopping on Sunday after class) and also because it’s a day that ends in “Y”  it’s 9:05 and I’m going to bed!

Oh, and I have all day training all week at work this week, which I didn’t learn about til late afternoon last Friday so I think it’s going to be a long week to boot!

It’s a Payphone!

Originally uploaded by Geeky-Girl

Pretty much since they started taking them down and selling them, Nate has wanted a pay phone. This year he got lucky and he got one for Christmas!

So he installed it in our bonus room. He ran a phone line to it and everything so it rings and you can call out from it and everything! And it’s static-y just like a real-live payphone should be.

Oddly enough we think it may have been interfering with the answering machine for a couple of days. Both of my parents reported calling the house and instead of the answering machine picking up, the fax machine did. Or they thought it was the fax machine. So we unplugged the fax machine and called the house to make sure the answering machine picked up, but it didn’t. So…. weird! Nate changed the machine to pick up after 4 rings instead of 6 rings and that stopped the problem, so we’re OK now, but I still can’t figure out why the payphone would be trying to answer like that!

So anyways, we now have a payphone hanging upstairs in our house. Now if I could just figure out how to make it charge for calls we’d be all set!

Yes, the Car is on Fire.

Originally uploaded by Geeky-Girl

Since we live near a fire station hearing the sirens go by is normal.

Over the weekend it sounded like it was winding down and really close and that was definitely not normal. So Nate got up to check it out and here is what we saw. From the kitchen window. (I didn’t want to be totally obvious so we just watched it from the house).

There was a guy standing off by the main road so we’re guessing the car caught fire and the guy just pulled over here and called 911.

It looked like it actually gave them some trouble trying to put the fire out. They had to saw the hood off before the fire would go out. Fortunately no one was hurt, but that is definitely something you don’t see every day!

35w6d

Originally uploaded by Geeky-Girl

Today at work I filled out paperwork associated with taking my maternity leave, once again firmly driving home the fact that my due date is in 30 days. As much as he moves around, and as much as we’re prepping for a baby it’s still really hard to believe that there is going to be an actual live baby in the house with us in around a month.

In this picture is the pack and play we set up in our bedroom and in the pack and play are a few stuffed animals plus a “fake baby” that we tried to use to get the dogs used to the idea of us using the pack and play. It would be more effective if Layne didn’t care WAY more about the cats than she does about the fake baby.

So baby update! My last appointment was last Wednesday and I am going every week now. This means that once a week I get to pee in a cup, get weighed, have my blood pressure taken, listen to his heart beat and have my uterus measured. Super fun. On the bright side, it does get me out of the office a little early most of the time!

As of my last appointment he’s estimated to be at 5.5lbs with a chance to reach 6.5-7lbs by birth and he is currently head down! This would be more surprising if I didn’t feel his feet poking me in the ribs on a semi-regular basis. Sometimes I feel like he’s trying to stretch his legs out, which he totally can’t do because there is NO MORE ROOM and there is just nothing I can do about that! I keep thinking we’re about to re-enact that scene from Alien, but so far so good!

I’m going to go ahead and spare you the whining about back aches, stair climbing and cankles. You’re welcome.

Caulk til You Drop

Originally uploaded by Geeky-Girl

Nate has been off work all week this week. I am supremely jealous, but he has way more vacation days than I do and actually had to take the days or else he would have been over his roll-over-able amount and would have lost them. So whatever, I was at work and he hasn’t.

Instead of working he has been wildly productive at home building custom shelves for the upstairs closets with my dad. I seriously feel so very lucky to be related to two such incredibly handy people! In two days they did three closets, removed the giant over the counter mirror from the master bath and moved the outlet that was not centered so that they could hang the two framed mirrors that we bought at Home Goods like 4 months ago. That’s in addition to the phone/cable hookup they moved upstairs to allow us to move our cable/phone modem and router to the bonus room and out of our bedroom with also enables us to hook an Ethernet cable from the router directly to the bluray player that does not have wireless capabilities so I can finally watch Netflix streaming movies on the TV upstairs. It is awesome. For good measure I’ll throw in the bit about how they replaced a light switch in the kitchen (for the light over the table) and in the dining room with a dimmer switch which may not be the hardest thing in the world to do (although I’ve never done it myself). I don’t want to leave anything out of the incredible list of things that have been accomplished in just a few short days.

Anyways, three new closet systems and a moved outlet means there is a lot of patching up to be done and that part of the projects normally fall to me. It’s funny because I’m kind of in a mix of rushing, wanting to have everything done NOW NOW NOW, and between wanting to go loaf around on the sofa and hope that it will caulk and paint itself. I’m pretty sure it won’t, but man that’s a nice thought.

So far I have caulked and spackled all three closets, and we’ve got the trim paint done, just have the wall paint to go. And then there is the master bathroom which doesn’t really require caulk, but does require a shit-ton of spackle since they moved an outlet to the other side of two studs and had to run wires through the studs which makes the piece I have to fill in VERY LARGE. It’s a good thing the dog has put her butt through the living room wall twice now, or else I may not have had the experience necessary to feel comfortable patching such a large area.

So they’re pretty much exactly what they sound like. If they sound like ground up Oreos mixed with cream cheese and dipped in melted white chocolate.

Nate and I were invited to a holiday gathering a couple of weeks ago and someone had made these delicious Oreo balls at work so I thought “how hard can that be?!” and decided to make some to bring with us.

It was actually much harder than I thought it would be. Everything started out great! I used my food processor (for the first time in.. umm.. years maybe?) to ground up the Oreos, then I mixed in a block of cream cheese letting my stand mixer do all of the heavy lifting, and then I rolled the mix into little balls to refrigerate for a few hours. See how easy that was? So easy!

Then came the hard part.

The next part of the directions I had advised me to melt almond bark to use for dipping. Since I did not see anything “bark” related at the grocery I decided to use white chocolate chips instead.

Did you know that chocolate chips don’t lose their shape as they melt? At least, not until you start mixing them up. So after microwaving them for 1 minute, if they look like they haven’t melted even in the slightest, they’re lying. Start stirring! Do NOT put them back around for another minute, it will not end well. Your kitchen will smell like burnt chocolate for hours and you’ll have to send your husband to the grocery store for an emergency “buy more white chocolate chips” trip.

So anyways, once I (thought I) figured out the chocolate melting part I stuck each ball with a tooth pick and started using the tooth picks to dip the balls into the chocolate to coat them evenly and turn them into pretty little desserts. Not surprisingly, this too went poorly. The chocolate was heavy and the Oreo balls kept falling off their tooth picks which was not in any way completely frustrating. So I started dropping the balls in and pulling them out with a spoon while quietly (or loudly) cursing myself for ever thinking there was any such thing as “quick and easy” in the kitchen. As a bonus I also learned that the longer you microwave chocolate chips, the less melty they actually become. They hit their maximum meltiness and then start turning back into a powdery solid. Who knew?!

In the end I wound up assuring our party hosts that they tasted much better than they looked (and they did) and Nate was sure to add that while he’d love to say they were made with love, in reality they were made with hate and loathing with some swearing thrown in for good measure.

I wish I had taken a picture of them but I did not. I was just so relieved to have them done with I never wanted to look at them again! (Until the next day when it was time to eat them, by then I was over it.)

I have a cold. I haven’t been able to breathe through my nose in like 3 days which is extra fun.

It’s kind of a blessing and a curse to be sick like this over the Christmas holiday. On the one hand I have 4 automatic days in a row of taking it easy so I don’t have to worry about taking any time off work because I’m hoping by Monday that I’ll be on the upswing of this thing. On the other hand, I have to spend my four glorious days off sniffling, coughing, and breathing through my mouth.

So it’s a toss up.

Good Enough!

Originally uploaded by Geeky-Girl

We both have off work today which is AWESOME because I’m hoarding all of my vacation days for when The Baby arrives. Nate actually has so many days saved up that he has to take off all of next week or else he’d be over the limit you can carry over and he’d lose days. Having that many vacation days completely blows my mind!

The dogs have been enjoying their day off today too! We’ve made three trips outside to play and all three of them actually involved playing! (Sometimes trips outside to play only actually end up involving grass-eating).

This morning I made a derby pie to bring to my parents’ house for dinner tonight, and also we (finally) iced the Christmas cookies I made the other day, so finally my holiday baking is done! I really enjoy the baking, but I’m sure Nate is glad that dish-washing portion is over!

So I hope everyone has a great holiday season!

But there is this little calico cat that I’ve seen before prowling around the trees behind my house…

Mostly I figured it must live somewhere near by and just be let out sometimes to go have fun. I also had the thought that maybe it’s a barn cat that lives across the street from my neighborhood at a house that has horses (don’t let the horses fool you, while I love where we do live, it is not anywhere out in the country or picturesque in the type of way that “trees and horses” may imply).

This morning though, while I was taking the dogs out one last time before loading them into the car and heading to day camp, I saw the cat laying down in the empty lot next to my house, about 20 feet from the fence. It was not in the area I usually see it stalking in, and I’ve never seen it just lying down out there. So either its people got up extra early to let it out this morning, or what if it’s really just a stray cat that lives outside near my house and doesn’t have any heat?!

I know that’s maybe the least likely of the possible options, but I just hate that it may be spending nights outside, especially with as cold as it’s gotten lately. I also refuse to call the pound on it, and I cannot bring it into my house for so very many reasons. But still…  What if it lives outside in the cold?! How can I stand it!?

I wish I could put a heated cat-house outside or something equally ridiculous, but I’m pretty sure I’m just going to have to let this one go and I really REALLY hate that! I guess on the bright side, I haven’t seen her in a few days, so maybe her people brought her inside finally?

This morning Layne got the mouth sweats, which is usually followed by us cleaning up dog puke. Fortunately we were already in the bathroom getting ready for work so at lease clean up would be easy. To make it even easier, Layne hopped into the bath tub, all by herself with almost no prodding from me or Nate. I’m not even kidding. Smartest dog ever! (Nate tries to run her to the bathtub if she’s on the carpet, and that’s 100% how she learned to get in on her own).

Luckily she didn’t puke, and when she felt better she hopped out. We were so proud.

Then Nate left for work and I hung around with the dogs because today actually looks like it might be halfway decent (unlike the rest of the week) so I’ve decided to take them to daycamp. Things were going great until about 5 minutes ago I decided to go ahead and put on my shoes and suddenly my two “normal” dogs turn into whining wiggly wrecks of excitement.

Because they know.

They have learned to read the signs and all signs point to day camp and holy cow I should take a video sometime of what pathetic messes they become once they realize. They used to not know until I put the leashes on them but they’re catching on earlier and earlier now.

Family Picture

Originally uploaded by Geeky-Girl

Holy crap, people, I’m having a baby!

Seriously!

It all seemed so far away, but now it’s breathing down my neck. I’ve started going to the doctor every 2 weeks which goes a little something like this:

1. Pee in a cup
2. Get weighed
3. Have blood pressure taken
4. Hear The Baby’s heartbeat
5. Have uterus measured
6. Go home

I’m also starting to get to the super fun part of the pregnancy where stairs exhaust me, bending over is awkward, my back is killing me and I haven’t worn shoes with laces for weeks now because my belly gets in the way while I’m trying to tie them and it’s just not worth it!

I’ll admit I was feeling a little pleased with myself over the fact that people kept asking if I noticed the foot swelling etc and I was all “no not at all!” and then yesterday I went to put on a pair of shoes I wear all the time and they’re getting kind of tight, as are my rings. So let’s go ahead and scratch that one off the list of things to look forward to, because YAY it’s here!

I know this is incredibly whiny but I wanted to get it all down somewhere because I’ve heard that after giving birth your hormones will make you completely forget any pregnancy discomfort you may have felt in order to encourage you to go through it again. I just want to make sure that afterward when someone asks me what it was like to be pregnant that I don’t lie to them and tell them it’s rainbows and puppies and full of awesome.

Not that it doesn’t have it’s good points. I mean the fact that it will result in an actual baby is cool. And sometimes it’s fun to sit and watch him move around and feel him move around (and sometimes I want for him to go back to sleep because it’s also really distracting while I’m trying to read or something).

So I think that about sums it up! I’ve been hoping I could come up with something more interesting to wring about…. but I couldn’t!

Dead?

Originally uploaded by Geeky-Girl

And when I say “new” I mean “new to me” because obviously these plants are anything but new. As a matter of fact I’m pretty sure that both of these plants are easily closer to the “dead” side of things than they are to the “live” side of things. Much closer.

So I’m going to attempt to bring them back from the brink. I think the one on the left stands a good chance of pulling through, and the one on the right stands a good chance of dying. We’ll see how it goes.

I actually wound up sort of adopting these plants today. My group moved to this area of the building a couple of months ago. Ever since the move these two plants have been sitting next to the window on the other side of the cube wall from me. I’ve noticed them in passing, and always wondered who they belong to, but never paid them that much attention. Until today.

Today I realized that probably they were not actually being watered and were actually not looking so good. So I adopted them. I mean surely no one will miss them, right? I’ve trimmed all of the dead leaves off of them (so the one on the right has like 2 leaves left) and will bring in new pots for them, new soil and some fertilizer.

Wish me luck!

So this weekend Nate and I are having a few friends and family over for dinner and we’re going to play Dirty Santa and the gifts are supposed to be around $10 each and I don’t have one yet.

Not only do I not have one yet, I don’t even have one picked out yet. I don’t even have the start of an idea of what to get that would be good.

So can anyone think of a $10 anything that they would not be hugely disappointed to be stuck with at the end of such a game? Or better yet, can anyone think of a $10 something that they would actually be happy to end up with after such a game?

I’m seriously stuck.

This is our first live Christmas tree. Before this we had a very small fake tree because we were a little worried about how the pets would treat a real tree in their home. Especially considering Colby is a big time plant-eater.

Turns out the pets don’t care at all. Layne is a little confused about where her beds have gone since they used to be on that wall and obviously they can’t be any more, but beyond that they haven’t paid it any any attention!

In addition to putting up the tree we put some lights up outside, and put out the rest of our Christmas decorations. We even bought those LED lights to see how that went. They look pretty good except for some reason the stupid ice cycle lights and the net lights are more of a bright white than the yellow of the strand lights that are outside. I mean they’re both LED lights, they’re the same brand, is it too much to ask for them to be the same color?! Really?!

Plus I need about two more strands because they didn’t go quite as far as I thought they would. Go figure. This was after we made two trips to Target yesterday because I also underestimated the number of strands to go on the tree. Too bad we hadn’t put up the outside lights yet because that could have saved me a trip!